Knocking both of Swift's swords out of his hands to send them skidding across the chamber floor, William reduced the fighting to basic hand to hand combat. Punches and kicks were exchanged as the two of them fought on the brink of the dramatic plunge from the top of the apex.
"You think you know me Vampire?" Swift demanded; forcing William back to the point where his heal was over the edge. "Fine, I admit it. I really couldn't care less about the Order's campaign against your species.
But they promised me an eternal seat as the Guardian of the Pillar of Dimension." His grip tightened around the William's wrists, the metal of his gauntlets bruising the skin. "Do you know what kind of power the Third eye token that pillar grants its owner?" William glanced back over his shoulder briefly towards the long drop.
While he had wings, at the moment he hadn't enough muscle and nerve control over them to afford anything more than a short glide. A plummet like that he was not going to be able to take on. "With it enhancing my own summoning magic, I'll be able to conjure more than simple shades.
There's an entire dimension filled with demons just waiting for the opportunity to be unleashed."
"Are you insane?" William demanded. "Unleash the beasts of that hellish realm upon Nosgoth?"
"Imagine that blood and carnage they can inflict upon enemy cities, or how effective such beasts can be as foot soldiers." Swift replied with a sneer. "Imagine what kind of empire the Order could carve out of the ashes of this land with such armies, under my direct command!"
"Out of the ashes?" William repeated. "What do you mean?"
"Rebirth vampire!" With one final shove Swift pushed the fledgling over the edge, tossing him backwards over the abyss. "The Wheel of Fate's greatest turn!" As he fell, William lashed out and grabbed hold of Swift's ankle. Unable to stop himself in time, the Sarafan was pulled down with him. Grabbing hold of the edge with an outstretched hand Swift saved himself from a fall to certain death.
William refused to let go, grabbing the Sarafan's leg with both hands.
"You are mad!" He shouted up. "You'll unleash death and destruction of every living thing in Nosgoth!"
"And how is that any different from you goals here?" Swift asked down, bring his other leg up. "Or perhaps you're ignorant of exactly how the Hylden view all living beings outside their own race?" He foot came down on top of William's fingers, trying to break his hold.
William cried out and let go with one hand.
"Do you want to know how you can use magic, vampire?" Swift asked down. "No one taught it to you, did they?" William looked up in time to see a boot come crashing down. It smacked into his face repeatedly as Swift tried to force him to let go. "It's because of your ancestry. The blood of the very being who designed the Pillars themselves flows through your being. Perhaps the greatest Mage Nosgoth had ever seen.
The power he possessed is passed down to you, only to be fully realized once you became a vampire." A large sneer spread over Swift's face. "That was what those you call your allies were counting on. They want the Hylden freed and knew that only you, as the direct decedent of the Pillar's creator, would be able to do it." William looked up in surprise. "Understand now 'Sire?' You were brought back to complete that task and nothing more. You're a tool, to be used and then cast away."
The revelation struck home and William was left hanging there in comatose state. Was that really why Kain had raised him? To be the key in the lock binding the Hylden to the Demon realm? A simple tool to be used?
The explanation was so stunning simple and horrifying an answer that it left William unable to defend himself as Swift tore a knife from his belt and jabbed it down straight through his hand. The blade sank directly through to impale the bones of the fingers and William was forced to let go.
Time seemed to slow to a crawl at first as he slowly sank away from the top of the tower. Then it the tempo increased as the fledging tumbled down, crashing against side of the tower.
"William!" The seer cried out, dodging back from a swipe as Anubis came charging at her; the blades in her hands twirling through the air like meat cleavers.
"Time, time time." Anubis sang as she slicing through the air, her cleaves twirling around her as she dance. "Time to die!" The blade lanced forward to fast for the Hylden to dodge, piercing her left thigh. The seer screamed out and toppled back as Anubis wrenched her weapon clear trailing a river of blood.
The pain left her crippled, unable to get up; blood swelling from the stab wound, spurting in time to her heart beats.
Anubis smiled sadistically and lifted her blade to her mouth, tracing her tongue along it tasting the crimson stain.
"You are not human." The seer said from between clenched teeth and she struggled to push herself onto her arms.
"Now I thought that was obvious." Anubis replied, twirling the blade in his left hand around with her fingers like a fan. "Before all I did was hunt those that escaped the wheel, desperate to feed on what energy I could.
I was given a chance to come here, to be amongst his chosen nine, to never have to hunger again." With dawning realization, the seer gazed onto Anubis' face as if seeing it for the first time. The sharp jagged teeth and yellow eyes, features the Hylden had not paid much attention to. There was only one type of creature that had those.
"You… you are a Sluagh." She breathed as if she could hardly believe her own words. A spectral realm predator incarnate in flesh in the physical realm? Inconceivable.
Suddenly the name of Sally's own opponent who she was fighting at the far end of the chamber went through her head… Archon… "And him… is he…"
"Another of the master's servants given flesh in which to live." Anubis replied, spreading her arms out wide. "Oh it feels so warm, this body and its heat; its self propelling energy supply.
Finally I have a chance to live."
"You are an abomination." The seer hissed; struggling back as Anubis advanced with her blades held at the ready. "You are not meant to be here…"
"Who cares?" She asked and brought her weapons down preparing to strike at the Hylden's chest. The seer's hands clasped together on the blade, keeping it a mere inch above her skin. "I'm not going back to swirl in that endless twilight and when you lie dead on the ground and my place as Guardian of Time is secure I will never have to!" The Seer lashed out with her good leg, the kick striking Anubis along the thigh forcing her to drop slightly.
Using this momentum to her advance, the Hylden threw Anubis' weight to the side using her own blade as a lever. The incarnated Sluagh crashed down onto the stone floor. Wasting no time, the seer drew runes in the air with two fingers preparing a spell of compressed air.
Anubis countered by across her blades in front of herself as a shield. The blast bounced off the barrier and returned back to the seer; throwing the Hylden across the room before she rolled to a stop.
Archon studied the little vampire before him. She had the power; she was the one, the challenger…. The rightful candidate. But she still needed to earn her position.
Thus this vampire could manage was telepathy and self inflicted telekinesis. She was going to have to do better than that.
She crouched for him, ready to spring like a wild animal and every physical attack she tried he simply turned away with telekinesis.
"Enough playing, finish it Archon!" Anubis declared over the chamber to him. "Or perhaps you would enjoy returning to the Spectral Realm?" He looked back at her with a grim frown on his face.
Clearly, if he was going to provoke the reaction he wanted he was going to have to take some drastic measures.
He stared her down before reaching into his robes and withdrawing a silver knife, the blade gleaming brightly in the dim light.
Sally backed up, stopped by the wall as he approached.
Softly, his voice spoke into her head.
"This is the best you can do?" Archon asked her silently. "As a developing psychic I know you can use telekinesis." Archon ran his thumb along the blade testing its sharp edge. "You have one chance to survive Sally. Wrench the knife form my hand before I can kill you." Those last two words sank in heaviest of all and suddenly, faced the finality of death she was more terrified than she had ever been in her life. "Do it. I believe in you." Reacting instinctively she held out her palm towards him.
"Ewoden…" She cried out through the Whisper, trying desperately to reach him. "Please help me!" Before she never knew what was happening she felt a connection establish itself and strength flowed through the Whisper and into her.
The knife was wrenched out of Archon's hand. Telekinetically it was pulled into the air, before it swung about and slammed back into his shoulder; the blade embedding itself deep in the flesh.
Archon cried out and tipped backwards, slamming to the floor with the blade sticking out of him.
"Idiot!" Anubis declared, flicking one of her own blades up into her hand before she tossed it through the air like a spear towards the fledgling vampire. Sally' turned her head towards it and instantly the curved sword like blade stopped in mid air, floating there suspended by nothing.
Archon watched from the floor with a slowly spreading smile on his face as the sword swung around and soared back at Anubis. She incarnated Sluagh parried it away with her own blade before hissing angrily.
"This nonsense has gone on long enough." Swift sighted, drawing his sword. "If you're both incapable of dispatching your competitors then I suppose I'll just have to do it for you."
"And what makes you think you've done away with yours?" Anubis demanded.
"He fell to his death. What more do you want?"
"Fell to his death? Idiot, he has wings!" As if the fates had heard it, the faint sound of rustling feathers was brought to Swift's attention. He about faced just in time to received a punch across his face, the blow sending him toppling backwards onto the floor.
Archon's smile widened at the sight of William, standing there triumphant over the enraged Swift.
"Maybe your right and all I'm here for is to for fill a task to be cast aside afterwards." The fledgling said holding his injured hand close to his chest. "But regardless, it's still a role I need to and intend to fulfil." Turning his back on the Sarafan, William faced the gap in the wall; the ruins sight of the Pillars placed miles away but from the top of the tower was within his line of sight.
Holding out his good hand towards the sky, William focused himself inwards; trying to summon whatever strength he could as a strange connection was made between himself and some other force.
"No!" Swift declared as the air around them began to change, a steady shift that caused the world around them to morph as if it were an oil painting.
The sky above the Pillars started to darken, clouds gathering overhead. Clouds that were stained dark green.
I reformed myself from bat form and stood on the shore of the lake of tears, glancing up at the sky as the phenomenon took place.
"What is happening?" Raziel asked me. I had seen this effect before, at the Hylden gate where the Sarafan Lord had created his gate. It could only mean one thing.
"The Seer's collecting her fee." I replied with a small smile.
"The rift… I can't…It's too much…" William hissed from beneath clenched teeth. The strain of tearing the dimensional fabric and freeing the Hylden was taxing him to the extreme and the Pillars, even in their weakened state
"Yes you can." The seer urged him. "You said yourself, this is your task. A role you need to fill."
"Forget the roles!" Sally yelled to him. "If you open the gate, do it because it's what you want to do, not because it's what someone else requires of you." His muscles cramping, William dropped to one knee. The sky before him was churning bright green, the dimensional tear beginning.
Slowly, William pure white skin began to change. Renewed colour began to flow into the translucent surface, filling it with a pale aqua that began darker and darker until it was completely blue.
Sally watched William's hands in awe. He held them up towards the pillars, willing himself through them as he did; they changed. The five fingers melded together to form three, forming the cloven hands on an ancient. There it not for a different style of hair, he would now have looked almost identical to Janos.
"Kill him you idiots, kill him!" Anubis screamed, dragging her own blades through the air as she changed at William. Swift dragged his own sword forth and advanced on William from behind, preparing to drive the tip through his chest.
Archon reached out with one hand and tore their weapons from their hands with telekinesis. The blades flew across the chamber before their points sank into the far wall.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Swift demanded.
"What I came here to do." Archon replied, before sending two bolts of compressed telekinesis at them both. Anubis was thrown back to slam another wall, while Swift was tossed over the edge. Facing a fall to his death, he lashed out and grabbed William's ankle; refusing to let go.
"I…" Sally began.
"Say nothing little one." Archon replied, dragging the knife clear of his shoulder with one hand, blood staining his clothes. "You have done well."
"The master gave you a human body to enjoy and yet you betray him the moment you set foot in the physical plain?" Anubis demanded, struggling up to her feet.
"I've played devils advocate long enough. I came here to ensure the gate was opened and the Hylden were freed. Nothing more. I do not want the position as Guardian of the Mind." He replied. "Agreeing to that cancer's demands was the only way I could get here without being stopped." Despite the wound in his shoulder he adopted an unarmed fighting stance. "You mindless Sluagh. You relish in pain and torment of other souls. I am not surprised you were chosen to be one of his chosen nine."
"I don't understand…" Sally breathed with wide eyes.
"If I am alive in the next five minutes you may know more." Archon stated. "For now, help him open that gate!"