Wherever the Empty Angel walked, the land turned into bloody slough, the sky choked with endless rain and savage lightning that shattered the sky. The cities of Irdyvalas, Santurkev, Tohlet, and Uxalibei had all collapsed under the howling armies of the Blind God, and sunk into the mud as the God drank the life from the soil. Hope was a cold-hearted whore that abandoned men to damnation. Love was a myth, for all men knew was lust and hate. The dawn would never come.
The city of Anemos burned, but held. Howling Proxians had unleashed all of the fury of the Void upon the City of Winds, but the Temple did not fall. The armies of Emperor Attek did not pray for victory, for the Gods were dead. They knew in their hearts, cold and leaden with loss and rage, that no pack of inhuman djinn would break the people of the west. They would all be cast into the World Below before they surrendered to the monstrous touch of the Empty Angel. The streets of Anemos would flood with Proxian blood, and the winds that they once loved would charge with the essence of dead djinn. The Emperor willed it.
Scaly Northmen threw themselves upon Anemosic lances and hurled dark Void sorcery at the walls of the Temple District. General Dullahan cared not. His mother, his sister, his wife, his sons, his daughter… All had been taken by the Void's Legion. He would join them, but not without dragging countless thousands of the foe along. His violet eyes were wide with a far more visible madness than that of his soldiers. Since the Fall of Santurkev, his birthplace, not one night had he slept without screaming as he dreamed of blackened marble and the altar of the Divine Light coated with blood and excrement. Not one day had he spent without descending to the pits, so he could weep with joy as Northman captives were skinned alive, whipped to death, or forced to walk about with their bowels in a bucket. Rage, grief, and ecstasy danced across his face in wild spasms, and his skin was pale and stretched. He neglected food often.
Now Dullahan watched as Northmen shrieked, in zeal or agony, depending on where the arrows from the Temple fell. In the sky above Anemos, the Wind's Chosen closed with the djinn, and the force from their contact turned houses below to sand. The sky was clear and the stars shone like countless chips of some cosmic gem. The lands beyond the city walls were done burning, and now simply moldered, blackened and broken, without the growth of vegetation. The outer walls were now manned by Northmen soldiers, not Anemosic lancers. The streets were choked with corpses, northern and western. The sewers had not known shit for a long time, only blood.
"They war for themselves, our men," a familiar, hoarse voice said. Emperor Attek, his handsome face young but his eyes ancient with grief and pain, stood by Dullahan and watched his city bleed.
"They say they war for the morning," Dullahan grated. It angered him, that inane slogan of theirs. Our blood for our children's dawn!
"They say that because the truth is too real for them," Attek said in his irritatingly mysterious manner. "They battle so they can see the sun again."
"Then they're even more foolish!" Dullahan barked. "The sun is dead, the Empty Angel has extinguished it, and Weyard withers! After Anemos falls, the only great nation to stand against the Void's Legion will be Dirauv." He savored the filthiness of the name. The Dirauvi were not a people of war, but soft farmers from the south. He was astonished that their cities hadn't already been swallowed by the Blind God's wrath.
"If they have nothing to hold on to, they will not fight. If they do not war for the dawn, they will turn their blades upon themselves. Or they will turn to the Legion," Attek said, unperturbed. He was the maddest of them all, for he remained calm as ice during the death of Weyard. "Betrayal doomed Irdyvalas, because the men had no hope."
Dullahan scratched his beard. "Well, these men will soon have no lives. No matter. The Northmen will burn."
"I heard of your plan, General," the Emperor commented. "I must say… The barbarity of it surprises me."
"Void take it, these are barbaric times!" Dullahan roared, slamming his fist on the rail. Pain blossomed in his right arm, but he ignored it. "In Uxalibei, they ate the king alive. These fucking Northmen will stoop lower than beasts to exact their precious vengeance upon us. Their djinn beasts will suck the land dry of sorcery, and the Empty Angel will suck it dry of life. The Empire will tumble into the seas, and–"
Attek slapped him in the cold, hard way that a slaver strikes his goods. "I care not for your griping, General. The past is past. Now, in the present, you must defend Anemos one last time. Barbarity matters not. It was simply a comment."
Dullahan stared at his sovereign for one moment, then his face locked into a scowl, and he shrieked down to the soldiers below, "Burn the Northmen!"
Cauldrons resting on wheeled supports were dragged to the walls, and fires burned beneath them to keep the mixture from becoming viscous. The stinking mixture of naphtha, alcohol and sorcery bubbled and churned, and Anemosic soldiers stared at it with the single-minded devotion of men who had lost nearly everything but still clung to sanity. Below, the Northmen jeered and called in their guttural tongue, before some leader rallied them and began the chant.
"Virkez allich dirsapem ke koruj! Virkez allich mudalisk ke vateel! Balichdiquar eruysh Virkez akurlshup!" The Void is without beginning or end. The Void is without soul or mercy. The Blind God is the Void made flesh.
With insane grins plastered upon their faces, the men of Anemos threw torches into the boiling mixture. As one, they shrieked, "YOUR EYES WILL NEVER SEE THE DAWN!" The sound was deafening as it bounced off of the walls of the ancient Temple of the Divine Light. The light of the sun seemed to rage within the burning mix that brewed and boiled in the cauldrons.
And the liquid spilled forth.
"How beautiful," was all Dullahan could choke, tears tumbling down his cheeks, as the wrath of Anemos washed over the Proxians and their screams touched the uncaring stars.
For what seemed hours, the Northmen drowned and screamed and burned, and the Anemosic laughed and danced with murderous glee. High above, the djinn burst into oblivion as power thundered from the Wind's Chosen. Anemos had stood fast against the Void's Legion, and won. An army of the Empty Angel had fallen.
When the earth shook as though Weyard was shivering, however, the laughter stopped. The Proxians continued to burn and suffer, but those that survived smiled, even as their reptilian flesh blistered and burned. All they whispered was, "Balichdiquar eruysh Virkes akurlshup."
Thunder raced along the horizon. A vast, shapeless shadow blotted out the stars. The Empty Angel approached, and the city of Anemos was damned to ruin. The world shook more violently, and buildings collapsed in the lower city. The air became thick, unmoving, for the sheer presence of the Blind God had stifled the winds of Anemos. And the Void-That-Walked spoke.
WHAT IS THIS PLACE?Northmen twisted and jerked with rapture, men of Anemos stared blankly as blood trickled from their ears. The air became denser, the land darker. Now thunder could be heard, and rain fell.
WHY DO I LIVE? Those men of Anemos nearest the Empty Angel drew their knives and cut their own throats, their eyes empty. The Northmen sang hymns of revenge, and with the blood of their dead kinsmen, wrote unholy scripture on the walls of the City of Winds.
THERE IS ONLY DARKNESS. The darkness was nearly total. Only the fires of dead Northmen and the awesome echo of the Empty Angel existed. Dullahan saw Dyla, his son. He was laughing.
I AM EMPTY. WHAT AM I? Only the Void filled Dullahan's soul. Nothing else was real. Everything else, from love to blood to the earth he stood upon, was an illusion. Death sang.
WHY. WON'T. THIS. WORLD. DIE?!
And Dullahan raised his spear.