Jackal Among Snakes

Duke Rovostar crouched at the top of a hill, watching the Dragon Palace radiate shadow with morbid fascination. He, just as all his men, had felt the strange force that emanated outwards… and now witnessed what seemed to pull the world inwards. And as he did, he recalled the conversations with Traugott.

#####

“Why are you doing this?” Rovostar had asked, his scarred face dancing in and out of light as a single torchlight flickered.

Traugott, the dark-skinned Magister, had smiled. “You attended the Order. You know of forces beyond comprehension… but you’ve never experienced them.” His eyes wandered to the torch he held. “I had shelved trying to understand the gods, trying to bear witness… but I realize, now, I struggled on that field because I stared at a shut door. I have been enlightened, recently, by a chance encounter with someone who knows more than I do. Perhaps ‘encounter’ is the wrong word… but I was enlightened nonetheless.”

Rovostar recalled narrowing his eyes back then as they met in the loyalist camp. At the time, he’d thought this was just nonsensical ramblings.

“This realm is just as dangerous to the gods as the gods are dangerous to us,” Traugott said with a smile. “Spirits, gods, souls… all three are interconnected parts of a larger whole. One is transitory—a key. The other two are… symbiotic,” he explained. He examined Rovostar’s face, then laughed. “You don’t have any idea what I’m talking about, do you? Well, it doesn’t matter. Orion is the key to what we both want. I will distract him for your ends, which ultimately serves my ends. That’s the end of the matter.”

“This is a dangerous man we’re talking about,” Rovostar had cautioned. “He crushed the head of some pompous Magister with his bare hands. He makes a habit of brutalizing the arrogant. When he was on my side, it was reassuring. As an enemy, Prince Orion is nightmarish.”

“I’m not intending to fight. I’m intending to distract,” Traugott shook his head. “And I assure you… Orion will have his eyes on nothing else.”

#####

As Rovostar stared at the palace in recollection, Georgina walked up beside him. “I’m ready,” she declared.

“I’m not,” Rovostar said idly, questioning only now if he had too eagerly accepted help because of their desperate position. “But I never have been ready to fight, not really. Let’s recover His Majesty.”

#####

From the beginning of the fight, Orion had the upper hand against Traugott. The Magister was no fighter—the spells he cast were not done at opportune times, his accuracy was off, and his general situational and spatial awareness were not especially high. The only thing enabling this combat to last more than a minute was the Magister’s adroit use of his strange shadow portal.

The longer it went on, the more frustrated Orion became. Even despite calling upon the blessings he loathed, glancing blows alone were a rarity. Perhaps Orion should’ve realized that something was wrong with this strange tactic of his opponent. But under pressure from both Vasquer’s pantheon speaking to him and the Magister’s constant attacks, the cooler head prevailed.

Traugott stood before the throne of Vasquer, arms held wide. “Is this all you’ll amount to?” he questioned calmly, his breathing only slightly uneven. “I wait, Orion.”

Orion rushed angrily. He ran his hands along the ground and waved them forward as though he splashed through an ocean. In response to his whims, ice waved across the floor. Traugott fell backwards gracefully, shrouding his body in shadow once again.

As Traugott disappeared, Orion did not stop his pursuit. Where the man’s body disappeared, he reached, trying to catch him. He had expected his fingers to meet stone… yet instead, they sunk through. Shocked, Orion tried to grip beyond and seize Traugott. His hands wrapped around something solid, and he pulled.

To Orion’s great surprise, and for the first time in recent memory… what he grabbed resisted his strength. And unlike normal, the darkness Traugott had fallen into persisted like a puddle of abyssal ink. Orion put his feet to the ground firmly and pulled with all of his strength, yet still his arms did not budge.

“There we have it,” came Traugott’s voice from behind Orion. “I was beginning to worry this wouldn’t work.”

Orion whipped his head around and prepared to attack as needed, yet suddenly a great scream pierced his ears. It had no source. The prince fell to one knee in shock, and for the first time he could remember, feared what was to come.

“You should be happy,” Traugott continued, his arms still at his side. “You will get what you want, Orion. I never lied. You turned me away all the same.”

“What…” Orion said, not able to say anything more as the screaming echoed through his head. It was a chorus of voices, each and all in extraordinary pain. He released his grip entirely and fought back, yet still his arms refused to move. Pain manifested on his fingers as something ate away at them.

“I have carried with me a door to which only I have the key,” Traugott said calmly. “Yet you, parasite-ridden host that you are… are a skeleton key, Orion.”

Orion managed to come to both feet again, and put all of his full body strength into pulling his arms free. His back, his legs, his arms… all fought to no avail even as a hundred voices screamed in agony in his ears. Then, without warning, he felt a sudden deprivation. His mind felt like a hourglass turned over—as each grain of sand fell, all of the other grains scrambled to fill the space left, each and all pouring out.

Traugott noted, “The spirits leave you, having opened the border. I was right.” The Magister watched in a self-satisfied yet pacific manner.

The screams lessened by the second as Orion’s mind shifted dramatically. The resistance from beyond the inky portal of darkness failed, too, and the prince managed to wrest his arms out somewhat. Slowly, he gained momentum. As the last scream became an echo, Orion came free and collapsed back onto the stone with heavy breath. Most of his fingers were missing, yet they reconstituted as they always did.

Then, from the portal he’d just left behind… a shadowy protrusion jutted out. The light warped around it as though being sucked inside. Whatever emerged writhed. The more light it absorbed, the more clearly defined its form became. Orion barely recognized it as a gargantuan colorless finger with a long uncut nail. It tried to widen the opening, like a finger stuck through a hole in a cloth shirt. And eventually… it succeeded, and a second protrusion rose up. Yet more light rushed to feed it and give it form.

Traugott stepped closer, obviously fascinated. “The opening created by the spirits…” he kneeled down. “The creature struggles, but the opening tries to revert to the mean.”

Orion scrambled to his feet and lunged at Traugott as he stared in fascination. The Magister widened his eyes and tried to step away, but the prince thrust his hand out at his chest. He managed to get a ward up, but Orion broke straight past it and punched the man in the shoulder. He heard cracks and pops as Traugott’s shoulder twisted unnaturally. The man barely grunted in pain, but a mana ripple spread from Traugott’s hand. Orion stepped away as a blast of wind exploded outwards.

The fierce spell put distance between the two of them, and Orion’s armor had been torn to shreds. Traugott held his right shoulder with his left hand, healing magic already working.

“It seems I got overexcited,” Traugott said, coughing up some blood—perhaps the blow had damaged his lungs. “It doesn’t matter. I’ve proven a theory of mine with your help,” he said as his shoulder corrected back into place. His eyes glanced back at the opening on the ground, where a full hand started to free itself. “Now… I’ll watch and learn.”

Traugott fell away into his shadow once again yet did not appear again this time. Orion stood there with a clear mind. The whispers that had troubled him… they were gone, completely and utterly. In this clear weather, he was able to focus on the pressing new issue.

The hand of shadow, now that it had gotten purchase, struggled to fit another appendage. It grabbed onto the portal of inky darkness and pulled, struggling greatly with its unformed body that absorbed all light. Orion started to walk forth, feeling that whatever tried to escape from this opening could not be allowed to do so. He raised both of his hands up, preparing to try and slam it back down. As he neared, something lunged at him, and he instinctually grabbed at it to try and stop it.

Orion held a strange tentacle in one hand. As he held it, all of the color and sensation in his hand drained away. Panicked, he released it. That gave the creature time enough to free itself. As soon as it came through, the opening shut, disappearing into nothingness. The new arrival rose up and kicked at Orion defensively, and the prince jumped back.

The creature of shadow rose to its feet. It was humanoid, standing as tall as the giants of myth. At full height, it nearly broke through the ceiling. Its body was black, gray, or white—the light around it shifted so much as to make it impossible to tell. It arms were long, nearly touching the floor even as it stood straight. Its flat, corklike head was eyeless and noseless, but had a long tentacle as its mouth that pulsated impossibly with a thousand folding teeth.

As Orion watched it, the creature bent its knees and ran its hand along the stone. Whatever it touched turned to black, then regained color when the touch was released. It bunched its fingers together until they formed a single point… then slammed into the stone, overturning a tile and sending it at Orion as it rushed at him soundlessly.

He swatted away the stone tile with one hand, then awaited the coming abomination with braced feet.

#####

Argrave stared at the pulsating darkness emanating out of the Dragon Palace. As recognition of the consequences dawned, his breathing grew faster and his grip around his horse’s reins tightened.

“What in the gods’ name…?” Duke Sumner said, one of the only others to bring his horse under control in a timely fashion. Even Galamon struggled to calm his.

Something from the Shadowlands is here, Argrave knew. That sight was too memorable to ever forget. Beings from the Shadowlands were veritable vacuums—living spaces devoid of matter. And now that it was free of its foul realm of origin, it would be made whole. It would take in light to obtain sight and sounds to obtain hearing. It would consume flesh to obtain touch and souls to obtain taste. As for sound… that, it forever lacked. Consequently, no matter what it consumed, it felt an all-consuming emptiness and would never stop its activities until stopped forcibly.

And to stop one forcibly… Argrave expected to have years to prepare for these things. This was one of the things the player fought at the end. But one was here now. He didn’t know what kind it was, or whether it was alone… but one of those creatures alone was enough to make him shake.

Just then, a great rumbling shook the earth, and Argrave whipped his head to its source. There, a great puff of dust rose up into the air. There was a large opening in the earth, and a small force moved inside. Old bricks fell from a structural weakness in Dirracha where the old sewers and city lay dormant.

“Duke Sumner,” Argrave said loudly. “I am going to seize Dirracha. If you wish to cooperate, I ask you join me. If not…” Argrave turned his horse. “If not, then I fear the city will be lost forever.”

Argrave looked back at his company as Duke Sumner asked for elaboration. Elenore, Anneliese, Galamon, Vasilisa… before he had felt this entourage impossibly secure, but with the new arrival, all he felt was inadequacy. He could not deny the thought of fleeing dominated his mind—with his Blessing of Supersession empty, how could he hope to defeat a foe meant to appear so far in the future?

But the trusting eyes looking to him… that grounded him back, reminded him of what he’d done. And so Argrave said simply, “A problem came up. We have to change plans somewhat.”