The room was…eerie. The chambers before it had hinted at what was to come, but Daniel still found himself taken aback by the strangeness, the otherworldliness, of the Inner Sanctum. There were three pillars, each with an orb on the top, illuminating the room with an eldritch glow. Daniel shuddered. It truly was a place of nightmares.
"So you finally found your way to me at last. Come to kill me? Am I the villain of the piece now? Tell me truly though, do you find no fault in yourself? No evil in Agrippa? No good at all in me?"
He hadn't expected the baron to be so…blue. Or to be floating. "Alexander I presume?" He sat the lantern down, almost having to pry his fingers from his sole companion on this arduous journey. He stepped away from it. No matter what was to come next, he would have no need for it again. He walked towards the man hovering in the air. Was it really a man? He seemed frailer than any mortal could have been and… were his ears slightly pointed? "I must confess you aren't how I pictured you."
The creature turned from the portal to glare at him. "The energies required to raise the gateway have diminished me." He disappeared. Daniel cast around for him, uneasy. The man appeared scarce a foot from him and Daniel gave a strangled sort of yelp, almost tripped over his own feet as he stepped back. "Is this better, does this prompt your memory?" He raised an eyebrow and gestured at himself.
Daniel really wished he would have conjured some clothing as well as a more sturdy appearance. "I thought you'd be a bit younger, actually. You don't seem to match your voice."
Alexander raised the other eyebrow and Daniel wondered if that was amusement in those strange eyes. The features of the man before him blurred for a moment and when they came back into focus it was a man in his fifties and not in his seventies before him.
"Yes, it was more like that."
Alexander shook his head. "You are the oddest creature I have ever encountered." He suddenly glowered and Daniel found himself flinching instinctively. "But you lied to me. You are hurt." He gestured at his side. Daniel looked down at the dried blood, his ripped shirt.
"Oh, yes. That. It was that…thingie. The lurker in the water."
"You have won your fair share of bruises and scrapes as well." Long, cool fingers under his chin tilted his head up. "I do wish you would not have thought the most expedient way to a place was to fall to it."
"I assure you, it was not on purpose." The hand lingered on him and Daniel began to flush. There was a struggle within him, memories trying to surface and something trying equally as hard to suppress them. "May I ask you something?"
"We hardly enough time for it, but ask." Alexander stepped away.
"Were we lovers?"
There was a long, long silence. "And what made you conclude that?"
Daniel unbuttoned the top button of his shirt and pulled his collar aside.
Alexander touched the small mark that was revealed, a slight smile on his lips. "Yes, that was my doing." He frowned. "Do you truly remember nothing of us?" That hurt again, that pain Daniel could feel radiating into his mind.
"I'm sorry, I do not. But don't you have a lover already? In your own world?" He trailed off at the confusion in Alexander's expression. "Ah." He smiled and it was a bitter thing. "There is no feeling like realizing you have been played the fool by no other than yourself."
"We will talk about this later. We will talk about it for decades, if you so desire, but we really must away and now."
"What?" Daniel looked down at the hand that grasped his, that was pulling him towards the shelf of stone before the vortex of energy.
"The gateway, we must be through it before that abomination of yours breaks through my last defenses."
"You mean to take me with you?"
Alexander stopped and Daniel crashed into his back. "Of course I mean to, you dolt."
"But I thought that was how this all got started. That I found out you had had no intention of…" His voice trailed off at the look the baron shot him.
"Quite the opposite, you'd find. We have no time for this. Come and hurry."
Daniel kept dragging his feet and the baron growled. The room lurched around him and Daniel soon found himself transported onto the shelf. His stomach heaved. "Please do not do that again. It seems to not agree with me."
"Brace yourself, it's opening."
It took a moment for the words to sink it. There was a high pitch whining in the air that was increasing in volume. Daniel pressed his hands to his ears, but the sound seemed to be like Alexander's and Agrippa's voices, a thing more of the mind than of the physical. The stones that had been levitating aimlessly in the air began to circle one another, spinning rapidly around and around. Daniel shrank against Alexander and was surprised at the comforting arm around his shoulders. He was tucked against the baron's side as they watched the spectacle before them. "Sweet Jesus." Daniel whispered as a rent in the very fabric of the world appeared.
"It worked." Alexander seemed just as amazed as he. "Behold, a gateway to another world. Isn't it…beautiful?" He turned to Daniel and kissed him on the temple. "At long last I can return home. We can go home."
That is no home of mine, if I am sure of anything else in this new life, Daniel thought. The energies were rising, pulling at him. His hair and clothing were being played with by the alien winds that were coming through that gate, as if they were enticing him to enter, to play with them. Alexander gently turned his face. "Are you ready? There might be some small pain, but it will be over quickly." The baron's hair was blowing wildly around him. His expression…Daniel swallowed. He understood now how his previous self could have been beguiled into those wretched deeds, if the baron had always looked at him thus.
"No." Daniel tried to pull away, but the baron held him tight. "I cannot go with you. I am sorry."
He expected anger, but a dim sort of puzzlement flitted across the baron's face. "I think you'll find you can, that you will."
"I cannot go with you." Daniel repeated it, more strongly this time.
"But why? You cannot still mean to kill me, to exact your petty little revenge? That was a plot hatched by Agrippa and you were… you were too ill to see it for the trap it was."
"That may very well be." Daniel reached out and brushed Alexander's hair back, kept his hand against his cheek so the lashing strands would not obscure his face. "Regardless if I wasn't told the whole truth, if I was merely a puppet, it still does not excuse what I have done. What we have done. Those horrible, terrible things. We have debts to pay, my lord."
Alexander opened his mouth, but Daniel quickly forestalled him. "You cannot argue against it, my-Alexander. You have committed atrocities that can have no excuse, and I…I was weak. Or insane. It does not matter which."
"And what would you propose we do? That we both die at each other's hand? I have always found the overly lauded plays of your countryman to be trite and overly sentimental; I have no wish to reenact them."
"I will not kill you. There has been enough death in Brennenberg. I must look to my own redemption and you...you will have to find your own way to atone. That is your burden to carry and not mine. But," Daniel thrust his knapsack into the baron's arms. Alexander took it, lip curling as he guessed its contents, "maybe that can be your first step towards it. Take him through the gate with you. Set him free at last. Whatever crimes he has done, let him answer for them in the hereafter."
"I will not leave without you." The baron's voice cracked.
"I think you'll find you will." He leaned forward, "Please forgive my presumptuousness." As kisses go, it probably was not the best, but it was his first and he thought it good. Something was jogged loose in the vault of his mind, a tiny bright flash in the darkness. He smiled. "I loved you. I am fairly certain that I did love you."
"And you will again, only give me the chance."
Daniel kissed him again. It was much sweeter than the last, lingering.
Alexander had shut his eyes. "Don't do this." He sounded broken, lost.
"I have to. They might not be my sins, but I am more than man enough to pay for them." He had to wrench himself from the baron's arms. The other man made to grab for him again, but Daniel was jumping off the ledge of stone. He landed hard on the floor below, his ankle turning underneath him. Away from the portal he could hear pounding on the door to the chamber now, pounding and a howling that chilled his blood.
"I will ask you a boon, Alexander, a small thing. Do not forget me. Not the man that came before, but the me that stands before you now. It has been a short life and maybe not a very good one, but to not be remembered…I can think of no fate lonelier." It was disconcerting to see a heart breaking, to see it so visibly written on the face of another. "Goodbye." He turned his back to the baron and strode forward to meet his fate. He did not look back, not once.
He thought that his name might have been shouted out, but if so the cry was lost in the whine of the gate. It grew even louder and the energies began to crackle.
He placed his hands on the door, feeling them shudder with the impact of the beast beyond them. He took a breath and another. He cursed his former self for being a fool, but could not summon any real enmity. This was why he had been created after all, this one purpose: to make amends. And he had chosen how he would do it. Him. Not his insane past self, not Agrippa with his supposed machinations, not even Alexander whom he had left weeping. A sense of peace flowed through him. He wished he could remember that girl's name, wished he had it to utter as a charm to stick his courage firmly in place. He took another breath and heard a whoosh of air behind him, followed by a crash as one of the pillars collapsed. He smiled. Alexander had gone through the portal with Agrippa then. All was right. He flung open the doors….
And recoiled. "Jesus Christ!" He reeled back, nothing had prepared him for it, the bulk of it, the horror of it. If he hadn't been changed by the potion, by his journey, the sight alone would have driven him instantly mad. The creature howled and there were teeth, so many many teeth. It drew back and Daniel wondered if he had surprised it by walking into its deadly embrace. But no, it was just gathering itself to spring-
A hand thrust over his shoulder and Daniel realized that there was now an arm around his waist, a strong body pressed into his back. "Take it, you gods' forsaken thing! This is what you came for! Take it and go, back to your den and back to your banal, lumbering dreams of bygone eons!"
A tendril snapped out and Alexander hissed in Daniel's ear. The orb was gone and so was a fair amount of skin on the baron's hand.
"Alexander?" Hadn't the man gone through the gate? Hadn't he heard him leave?
The creature seemed to have vanished, save for the blood red tendrils that covered the walls of the corridor like cobwebs from hell. A small vibration had started in the floor beneath their feet, a tremor that was quickly gathering force and intensity. There was a crash of stone somewhere beyond them, another soon following. The castle was starting to fall apart.
"Alexander?" He repeated placing a hand on the arms wrapped around him so tightly he could hardly breathe.
The baron only lowered his head to rest against Daniel's shoulder. He was shaking and Daniel wondered if the man was sobbing against him, mourning that he had given up the only way he had of ever returning to his home, had given it all up for a man who didn't even remember that they had been in love…
Daniel had no way of telling how long they had lain there in the dark. Alexander seemed to be in no hurry to stir himself from the pillow he had made of Daniel's leg. The moment the toils of the day had finally caught up to Daniel and his knees had buckled beneath him, the taller man had done his best to crawl into his lap. Daniel had let him, what else could he do? He stroked the long white hair, finding the gesture soothing and hoped that Alexander found it so too. The man was no longer shaking and Daniel wondered if he had fallen asleep. He could not tell for his face was turned so it was concealed against Daniel's thigh, the faint caress of breath the only sign he had that the man was still alive.
The walls had quit their trembling and the crashes of stone were coming less frequently. Everything now had a still and finished air about it. Daniel closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the pillar he rested upon. Maybe a few minutes of sleep would do him some good too… He opened one eye, a sudden thought striking him. Two of the orbs were still on their pillars and he wondered what had happened to their guardians. "Was that all I had to do? Just give the accursed thing back and I would have been free? All that bloodshed, that descent into madness, was it all unnecessary?" The man didn't stir and Daniel sighed. It had been necessary, but not for him. "You are a selfish, selfish creature." Was that a flinch? Or merely a trick of the fading light?
Fading light… His head jerked up as he peered at the orbs. Whatever force had animated them was almost depleted at last. The shadows in the room were growing longer, reaching for them… His breath began to speed, to clog his throat. "Alexander." He tried to roll the man off him, but he would not be budged. "Alexander, the light, it is fading. I need," He took a breath. "I need to find the lantern. The darkness…" He began to shove at the baron, clawing at his shoulders, trying to break free from his hold.
A muffled curse, a snap of fingers, and a glowing ball of blue flame burst into existence right in front of Daniel's nose. He cracked his head on the pillar when he reeled back in surprise. "Oh. Thank you. Can I…?" But Alexander's only response was to crawl off of him and curl in upon himself. Daniel bit his lip and reached for the flame. It didn't burn when he touched it and with a small exertion of thought he could move it about. He laughed, a bit delighted with it all. With a glance at the defeated form on the floor, he rose to his feet and took the flame with him to the entrance. If Alexander noticed he had left, he gave no sign.
Daniel peered into the gloom beyond. It seemed the veiny things that had always preceded the Shadow were gone as were bits of the ceiling, but the way still looked passable. He was worried about the long, spindly bridges though. If those were gone, he had no idea how they would be able to make it to the surface. "The way seems clear enough. I cannot tell what lies beyond though. Should I go check?" Nothing but silence. He looked over his shoulder, hesitating, tempted. He shuddered. He couldn't leave another creature alone in the darkness. He might have in some other life-a life that was getting more and more faint as time progressed-but whatever cruelty he had once possessed had died in him about half a day ago.
He retraced his steps-pausing to pick up a robe that had been thrown into a corner- and crouched down, pulling the fabric around Alexander. He then slung the baron's arm around his shoulders. "Come on you great thing you, let's get you to your feet." Alexander grimaced, but put up no resistance as Daniel made him stand up and began to lead him out of the chamber. Daniel had to support most of his weight and lead him around the obstacles that lay in their path. Alexander seemed miles away, lost in his thoughts, lost in his soul.