-0-
-0-
-0-
Raziel stood there, stock still with eyes wide in dawning horror for only a handful of moments. Then his face began to contort, twisting as powerful emotions burst free from the confusion the revelation had conjured, his eyes flaming with anger so intense his spindly blue body began to tremble. His hands curled into tightly balled fists on either side of himself.
"You…" His voice was like the crackling of ice after a long, hard winter. Heedless of the hole in his chest through which beams of bright light still lanced, he took a step towards their enemy. "You utter bastard!" His right arm flexed in a savage motion, his own blue wraith blade rushing forth with a screech of the most intense indignation. "Even now is there nothing in your soul but jealousy of me?!"
Above, Abaddon twisted his arm about as he studied his newly acquired wraith blade as though oblivious to their presence for the moment. Forged from the stolen soul of Ariel, the weapon was an almost exact match for Raziel's own save for being a deep golden colour. It hummed as its spectral flames danced and in that humming, Kain was certain he could hear faint cries, pleas for help as though from some terrible distance.
For centuries as he had sat upon the throne placed at the stump of the Pillar of Balance, Kain had listened to the whispered cries and moans of the spirit of his predecessor, sobbing away the years. He had always heard her quite clearly, weeping filled with lament and eternal sadness. Mourning which had always been beyond the ears of anyone else who ventured into the central chamber.
But now those cries were filled not with hopelessness but far more immediate reactions; panic, horror, desperation. Whatever refuge she had found while being bound to Raziel's soul must have been such a salve that being torn from him was causing her actual pain. Kain found that after all the years he had listened to her lament her fate, these cries were worse.
"You misunderstand." Abaddon said, holding her kidnapped form before him. "For you, Asmodeus had nothing but the most fiery of contempt and disdain. He truly hated you with a passion that was almost holy. His taking things from you was not jealousy, but rather a way of hurting you, punishing you."
He paused then in his admiration of his golden weapon, holding his arm perfectly still. That golden light reflecting off of those empty black eyes filled Kain with more dread than he had ever felt before at one time, even when they were not looking directly at any of them.
"And while I confess lingering desires of his remain in me, they are slowly fading. Asmodeus is gone and will not trouble you further." He said.
"If that is true, then give her back!" Raziel demanded in a voice that made Kain shoot him a look. It was a hoarse, raspy sound that he had only ever heard from the blue wraith once before, when he had been subjected to the horrors of being consumed by the Reaver. It was a gravelly voice of tightly wound pain.
"No." Abaddon replied flatly and dropped down to the floor of the chamber, folding his wings behind him. With a flourish he held his new weapon out at arm's length. "She is a useful tool that I will need to fulfil the edicts of the Master." Then he let a small smile part his translucent lips. "And I myself wish to see you suffer, not for Asmodeus' sake, but as punishment for your rejection of your rightful master. For your disobedience to the being which made you what you are and who rules over all life." His voice took on an edge of contempt and mockery. "For that crime, Raziel, you now truly stand alone."
Kain quickly reached for Raziel, grasping his shoulder tight.
"Raziel, don't be…" He began but too late. With a cry of blazing anger, the blue wraith tore himself out of Kain's grip and lunged at Abaddon, his own wraith blade echoing with a screech of outrage.
Abaddon responded in kind, racing forward to meet the oncoming charge and in a clash the two ghostly blades came together in an exchange of flaring light. The flash was so bright Kain had to raise his hand to shield his eyes. The two of them clashed over and over and each time those spectral swords met, the entire chamber was lit by an intense burst of brilliant radiance.
Raziel was attacking in a blind, vengeful, desperate fury. He was paying almost no attention to defense at all, pressing his assault so intently that for the moment Abaddon was forced to respond and parry to defend himself. But this balance of power would not last long, Kain knew for certain. In his enraged state, all Raziel had to do was make one mistake and Abaddon would finish him in an instant.
"Give her back!" The blue wraith snarled, thrusting himself into the air and spinning his entire body around with the Reaver screeching at the end of his outstretched arm. Kain recognised it as the Phantasmal Tempest technique, a unique move that only Raziel with his emaciated body could successfully perform. Abaddon raised his new weapon to block the attack but Raziel's fury seemed to lend it strength, forcing their enemy to take several steps back each time the two wraith blades met and flared together.
"Damn you, give me her back!" Raziel did not wait. The moment he hit the floor he attacked again, not with the Reaver this time but with a kick. His spindly blue body lashed out like an uncoiling whip and his foot caught Abaddon in the side. Abaddon grunted and staggered back from the blow. Kain tensed, a brief spark of hope flaring inside him.
Raziel leapt at their enemy with his talons outspread, pouncing like an enraged animal. The two collided and the blue wraith took Abaddon to the floor, one foot pinning down the arm upon which Ariel's captive spirit blazed. Abaddon simply gazed up from his position with no real sign of alarm. Indeed there was a half smile tugging at his lips, his teeth showing through their translucent flesh.
"You seem vexed, Raziel." Their enemy observed. "Are you truly so weak-minded without her whispering in your ear?" His tone was mockingly condescending. "After all those years entombed within the sword, was she really the only thing keeping you sane?"
Raziel flinched.
Kain was moving before Abaddon was, but even so he was still too late. In that one moment of hesitation, Abaddon reared back and struck Raziel full in the face with a headbutt that knocked the blue wraith backwards. Freed from his confines, their enemy swung his newly acquired sword around in an arc and sliced Raziel across the chest with it, the cut running diagonally up to the right-hand shoulder and carving open the hole even wider.
Raziel tumbled back, his torso looking like it had nearly been sliced in half, light pouring out of those wounds along with a neon blue ichor-like substance which seemed to stand for blood. Abaddon was rising, his weapon poised for a lunge which would impale Raziel and finish the wraith. But before he could, Abaddon turned quickly and beat his wings hard to push him out of the way as the serpentine form of the Reaver came down where he had been standing less than a moment ago.
"And do not think for a moment I have forgotten about you, Kain." Their enemy said as Kain stepped between him and Raziel. The blue wraith had collapsed down to his hands and knees, struggling with the gash opened in his chest, gasping in a hoarse moan as though unable to get his breath. His hands were grasping his body tight in a way that seemed to suggest he was literally trying to hold himself together.
"I would be insulted if you had." Kain replied, trying to sound jovial about it. But in truth he felt as though he were standing upon the edge of a towering cliff, ready to plunge over the precipice.
-0-
"If this reforged and galvanised version of our enemy was like Raziel, existing between the realms, then what could any of us possibly do to defeat him? No matter what we did to him in the physical world he would simply retreat to the spectral, recover, and then attack once more."
-0-
His mind raced, trying in a scramble of seeming madness to come up with some sort of strategy or plan which might serve. But it's efforts were in vain. Abaddon was simply too much for them, already depleted from the previous battle, to deal with on their own. They had to escape, regroup, and recover. This, of course, meant the risk of a translocation spell. Not ideal, for it would be tracked. But there seemed no alternative.
Presently, however, that avenue for escape was untenable. Ajatar was still lying unconscious some distance away and Raziel's body was on the verge of collapse. It was unlikely Abaddon was going to allow him to simply grasp them both and disappear. He needed to buy Raziel some time to recover.
"Asmodeus' one crucial error was saving you from the abyss of time." Abaddon was saying, lowering his new weapon down to his side and folding his wings behind him. "His ambition allowed you to escape when he ought have simply let you float out there where time means nothing. I will not repeat that mistake."
Kain's eyes flicked from Raziel to Ajatar, his lips pressed tight. Perhaps it was time to deploy one of his most rarely used weapons. Wit.
"Strange how you speak, like you are not Asmodeus but rather something supplanting his physical existence." He said, keeping the Reaver clasped firmly in both hands. He kept his tone neutral despite those black pits fixed upon him. Even now they ignited that primordial fear of death within him.
"I am Abaddon. I am as the Master made me." Their enemy replied, narrowing one eye almost challengingly. "Formed from refuse of a failed servant."
"So Asmodeus was but the clay on the potter's wheel?" Kain observed, keeping his eyes fixed on Abaddon as he began to pace to one side. Abaddon matched him, the two circling each other in a slow walk.
"In a manner of speaking." Abaddon conceded, tilting his head to one side.
"Fascinating." Kain muttered and then forced himself to adopt one of his wide, amused smiles. "And also tragic."
Abaddon's face creased, the action causing the muscle beneath the translucent skin to tighten and relax visibly.
"Explain yourself." He demanded with some irritation. Kain kept smiling, his eyes constantly moving, observing all that was going on in the chamber while he had successfully managed to get Abaddon's complete attention. All he had to do now was hold it until the time was exactly right.
"For all his many faults, there was one quality about Asmodeus worth admiring." Kain went on, slowing his pace and forcing Abaddon to match him. "A passion to drive him toward his own goals. Selfish goals to be certain, but he pursued them with vigor. I see none of that same fire in you." He shook his head. "You are empty. I wonder if this was a reward or a punishment for Asmodeus. Or if it really matters."
Those two empty holes regarded Kain for a prolonged, contemplative moment. Even then they seemed as bottomless as ever, an unending void where eternal silence waited.
"What use have I for such things?" Abaddon finally asked, his tone both dismissive and baffled at once. "I am but an instrument of the Master's will. His will is my will. His thoughts, my thoughts. This union and servitude has granted me peace the likes of which you could never understand."
Kain and Abaddon came to a stop, eyes still locked across the distance of blood-splattered chamber between them.
"Perhaps not." The Vampire admitted tensely, knowing they had arrived at the crucial moment. He was standing in exactly the right place now. And so was Abaddon. Everything came now down to timing. "But the irony is amusing. A soul of fire transformed into a soul of ice." His eyes glanced briefly past Abaddon and back again, then he smiled. "Speaking of ice…"
Abaddon frowned and parted his lips to say something but as he did, his breath came out as a visible white mist. Seeing this and then feeling the sudden cold all about him, the air turning crisp, he quickly turned. But not quite quickly enough. A screech spilled around the chamber as a massive icicle, blood red from the miasma coating the room, speared his body like a lance through his midsection. The jagged tip burst out his back between his wings at least a foot, leaving him pinned in place even while on his feet.
Gasping, Abaddon collapsed forward onto the impaling ice, his entire body shivering and twitching. His facial muscles contorted visibly under his skin to an expression of shock and startled pain. Still on the floor, but now with her eyes open was Ajatar-Cadre. She was laying on her side with one arm stretched out and a hand laid down upon the ground from whence she had used her Serioli talents to call forth the element of water to form an attack.
Kain had seen her recover from her unconscious state and had deliberately kept Abaddon talking so he would not notice, giving her time to attack him from behind. Now that she had, Kain had no intention of allowing their enemy's slip to go unexploited. Taking the Reaver firmly in both hands he charged forward with a roar, barreling down on Abaddon and ramming his sword with all the force he could muster into his chest.
The serpentine form of the Reaver blade bit deep, slamming through Abaddon's torso from behind and punching out his chest just below his collarbone. Their enemy coughed and swayed, pinned between the two impaling weapons stuck inside him. Snarling, Kain withdrew the Reaver blade before plunging it in again. Over and over he stabbed Abaddon with the weapon, each time leaving a gaping wound which, like Raziel's, poured intense beams of light.
Abaddon snarled, baring his teeth, grabbing Kain's arm as he swung the ancient weapon again, keeping it from punching through his body again.
"You'll find...that my soul is...harder to take than those of others!" He hissed before angrily raising a foot and kicking Kain back. The Vampire staggered several paces, trying to right himself but the interruption in the assault was all Abaddon needed. With one sweep of his right arm he brought his own variation of the wraith blade down upon the icicle pinioning his body, slicing it off and allowing him to tear the rest of it free with his left hand. Before Kain could attack again, Abaddon took that icicle tip and hurled it like a spear directly at him.
Kain batted it aside with the Reaver before advancing again, only this time Abaddon was waiting for him. The two of them came together with a powerful collision, shoulder slamming into shoulder before either of them could swing their weapons. They struggled against one another for a moment before backing off, weapons arching around. Both missed their mark but Kain grunted in annoyance as the golden blade formed by Ariel's stolen soul sliced down through the imperial banner which hung from his shoulder, leaving a large tear in it.
Lashing out with a foot he kicked Abaddon across the chin, knocking his enemy backwards several paces. As Abaddon staggered Kain threw forth a free hand and discharged a multitude of telekinetic bolts directly into his body, striking him across the head and shoulders. This did little damage, but they were enough to keep their enemy off balance, forcing him to raise his hands to protect himself.
"Ajatar, can you still fight?" He called to her, watching out the corner of his eye as the Grandmaster of the Serioli was struggling to get back to her feet. "And do not give me a stoic response of reassurance. I don't have time for useless bravado." He could see that her body was swaying quite ominously and the gaze she directed back at him was alarmingly unfocused.
"I feel like I am about to die, my Lord." She admitted quite openly and the waver in her voice showed that she was not speaking in jest.
"I would prefer it if you did not." Kain muttered, discharging more and more bolts of telekinetic force into Abaddon, forcing their enemy back step by step. The repetition of such blunt telekinesis was not something he could keep up indefinitely, however. Already he could feel his mind growing numb.
"I think I have one final surge in me." Ajatar huffed, leaning to one side, propping herself up with her good wing. "But it won't be enough to…" She was cut off when suddenly Raziel was there, his hand on her shoulder.
The blue wraith was still holding one hand around his chest, beams of light flickering about like embers from a fire. His entire physical body had grown hazey and indistinct. Its very outline seemed to be fading, as though whatever bound him together was on the verge of giving out. His eyes, however, were burning with a fierce, cold intensity.
"Lend me everything you have." He said in a voice like cold stone, raising to her sight the arcane device on his left arm, the contraption which allowed him to use his shield. The shield, capable of storing and utilising elemental force, was still sparking with energy in random spots. Ajatar looked back at him in a lopsided, dizzy way, slowly grasping what he was suggesting.
"Kain, keep him busy!" Raziel shouted, offering her his arm. She took it in her trembling hands and laid her palm over the device.
"Make it count, Raziel!" Kain called back, wincing as he found himself unable to issue forth any more telekinetic bolts. Even as he discharged the last one, he did not allow his enemy a moment to recover. He took the Reaver in hand and charged straight at Abaddon, the sword raised ready to strike.
Abaddon slapped that last bolt aside with his hand, a thoroughly irritated look flexing the muscles beneath his translucent skin. He met Kain head-on, each swinging their swords and ducking and diving to avoid the attacks of the other. With every swing his enemy made, Kain could hear Ariel's frantic cries from within the burning golden light of that spectral weapon. Cries of terrible anguish, and he believed those cries were not caused by her kidnapping and imprisonment, but by her separation from Raziel.
Growling in anger, Kain swung the Reaver around in an arc aimed directly at Abaddon's head. Abaddon ducked under the swing and then thrust his arm forward, trying to slam his ghostly weapon directly through the Vampire's midsection. Kain, however, had been waiting for the attack and dodged to the side, spinning around fast enough to slam his elbow into Abaddon's face.
The blow forced a grunt out of his enemy and Kain took the opportunity to press in, slamming his weight against Abaddon and trying to knock him over. But Abaddon's footing held and they struggling there, each grabbing the other by the wrist of the hand that held their weapon.
"Is that sympathy I see in your eyes, Kain?" Abaddon asked between gritted teeth as they struggled, each trying to struggle out of the grip of the other. "Do her cries upset you?"
Kain's only answer was a deep frown, his brow furrowing and the corners of his lips curling. Abaddon grunted in response, taking the silence for the answer it was, straining to pull his arm free of Kain's grip.
"You're the last person in existence who gets to feel sorry for her! After all, you're the reason she's still here!" He proclaimed, raising himself up and snapping his wings out wide so they flanked either side of his body. "Had you not been so selfish and accepted the sacrifice, she would have been freed to rejoin the Wheel! Thousands of years of entrapment at the Pillars, sealed in the sword with your firstborn cretin, and now my tool to use as I see fit! You have no one to blame for her circumstances but yourself!"
His words were nothing Kain had not already thought himself. They passed over him like the callous barbs they were. As he stared into that face with its translucent skin, the muscle and bone beneath, he could finally see what he could not before. For all this creature's claims of rebirth and transcendence and for all the changes made, the damnable pettiness was still there.
"Those eyes of yours are like the cold pits of Death itself. I can feel them calling to me, beckoning me to give up." Kain admitted, drawing in a breath as he gazed at the dark orbs which up until this moment had inspired so much fear in him. Now, though?
Now they were just eyes.
"But your words are the same spiteful, vile poison that you have always spewed." His lips curled in disgust. "You haven't changed. And I refuse to be intimidated or judged by the likes of you!"
He let go of Abaddon's arm but as his freed enemy began to draw his ghostly sword back for a thrust, Kain raised one foot and kicked him with all the force he could muster directly between his legs. There was a loud crunch. Abaddon gagged and doubled over and Kain promptly kicked him again, this time right in the face. The blow sent their enemy toppling backwards, crashing to the floor of the bloodstained chamber.
"Kain!" Raziel's cry stopped him before he could a step. Turning, the Vampire quickly saw that he had bought enough time.
Ajatar had laid both hands upon the shield device fixed to the blue wraith's arm, and her entire body shuddered as she exerted a gargantuan effort. Her lips were moving rapidly as though she were speaking a continuous sentence but no sound came from her mouth. Sweat ran down her face as she strained.
Kain could see the result of her labour quite easily. The shield device was glowing, a powerful light bursting forth from every seam within its structure. Raziel was holding as still as he could but even he was straining now, barely able to hold himself together but driven on by anxious desperation.
"Give - me - HER - BACK!" He called out, the light within the device growing more and more intense. Cracks were spreading over it, the entire thing straining and warping. Kain suddenly understood what they were doing. Ajatar was channeling all the elemental force she had left into the shield, all the elements combining within the confines of that tight space. The shield had already absorbed a great deal of power and now that more was being poured in from Ajatar's own reserves, it was clearly more than the device could handle.
Finally the tipping point was reached. The device exploded, erupting forth with a geyser of churning elemental power. Fire, earth, air, and water all surged around each other like writhing snakes and had Raziel not retained enough control to aim the torrent, they would have destroyed the entire chamber.
Kain dispersed his body into bats at once, each one scrambling wildly to get out of the way a mere instant before surging beams of essense shot past with a scream that shook the ground.
-0-
"To feel all the elements unleashed at once, in such raw, unrestricted power, was a sensation I was not in a hurry to sample again."
-0-
Abaddon was not so fortunate. Still climbing back to his feet, their enemy was directly in the path of the blast and was engulfed by it, vanishing in a flash of light so intense that as Kain reformed he was forced to shield his eyes. His ears rang with the sheer power of that unleashing.
Finally the light began to fade, leaving only a churning, sparking mass of freezing flames in its wake and Kain peered through his talons at it. The blast had scored a furrow through the floor of the chamber and punched a hole into the far wall, the edges all crumbling and scorched. There was no sign of Abaddon.
The device Raziel had claimed from his first incarnation fell to the ground, crumbling into pieces at the blue wraith's feet. It had been reduced to brittle flakes of metal that were disintegrating further into dust upon the floor. Raziel stood there for a moment as silent as a statue, his arm outstretched before he too fell to the ground, collapsing into a heap. Behind him, Ajatar tumbled backwards and fell onto her back, struggling for breath.
"Ariel…" Raziel murmured, his eyes near slits. Vainly he tried to rise but as if that physical action had been the tipping point, his body finally gave out. With a sudden rush his form began to vanish, becoming translucent and flimsy before finally vanishing all together. Kain let out a sharp breath. Returned to the spectral realm, Raziel might have a chance to recover and then meet back up with them.
Kain wavered sharply and had to steady himself. His own body was informing him quite firmly that he would need to replenish his own energies and very soon.
There was a sudden crash from the other end of the chamber and Kain spun, eyes widening in disbelief. A hand had been punched through the crumbling black wall from the other side, a hand with talons and translucent skin. Another hand emerged and, gripping the fragile stone, they hauled it to one side, widening the hole until Abaddon emerged from within. His entire body was charred and badly scorched, lanced with glowing cuts across his arms and legs. Ice clung thickly to his hair and wings and parts of him were crackling with small bolts of lightning.
As he pushed free of the hole he descended down onto one knee, struggling for breath, heaving deeply and hoarsely.
"Does nothing put you down?!" Kain demanded, incredulous. Hearing his words, Ajatar hauled herself up and stared with equal incredulity at their enemy's survival of such an assault.
Abaddon did not immediately answer. He stayed down with a hand resting on his knee, his breathing slowly becoming more agitated and intense. Slowly he raised his eyes back up and this time, gazing into those black orbs Kain did not feel the fear of death, but rather a radiating sense of outrage and anger.
"...enough." Their enemy growled, rising slowly back to his feet, his arms dangling beneath him and his legs unsteady. "ENOUGH!" His cry echoed throughout the chamber as he raised his head and bellowed. His right arm flourished, the golden blade forged from Ariel's stolen stole bursting forth with the echoing cry of her anguish.
But their enemy did not move to attack them. Instead he raised his arm high in the air before plunging it down and driving his fist into the ground, punching through the floor of the chamber and his arm up to the elbow.
All about them, the entire room shook and trembled, buckling up as though gripped in the intensity of an earth tremor. Golden light flared from below. Cracks spread rapidly, running across the floor, walls, and ceiling, dust and debris tumbling free to crash into the ground. All around the Melchahim symbols were shattered, breaking apart and falling away. The circular metal cage in the centre of the chamber shuddered and collapsed with a loud clatter.
"I am Abaddon, the angel of destruction!" Their enemy cried over the rumble and boom coming from all around. "And you, are NOTHING!"
"Ajatar, run!" Kain shouted back at her, turning sharply. Ajatar just gawked at him in confusion. With a snarl Kain raised his hand and forced his mind to perform one final act, telekinetically taking hold of her spent body and hurling her with no gentleness back. Too beaten and worn to resist, the Serioli Grandmaster was thrown out of the chamber, landing with a thud in the corridor outside.
"Lord Kain!" She cried out. She was saying something more, the lips on her confused and startled face were moving. But her words were drowned out as Abaddon forced his entire arm down sharply into the ground and the total collapse began. The walls broke apart in a sudden burst, the ceiling shattering like a cracked eggshell, and the floor separating into half a dozen moving pieces.
Above, the massive circular grinding mechanism used by Melchiah for so long as an efficient disposal apparatus of unwanted meat swayed and shuddered as its moorings were broken apart. Finally it lurched to one side, striking the side of the wall before crashing down to the floor. Its impact was the final blow and as it plunged through the floor, it brought the chamber's disintegration to a climax.
The entire room seemed to decide right then and there to go and Kain was caught up in it all, trapped by the crumbling rubble.
-0-
"Faced with such unstoppable force, such immense power, and deprived of any resources or allies there was but one thing I could do. Fall. Tumble blindly and wildly down into the dark recesses of the earth, watching the mountain I knew I had to climb still towering insurmountably over me."
-0-
Kain had one last glimpse of Ajatar's horrified expression gazing down at him, before he was swallowed up by the dark void into which the debris of the bloody chamber fell.