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[Omen of the Witchblade] Chapter 52 – Ashes Raining Down
🕑 Added 2025-01-07 00:28:56 +0000 UTCWarren leaned back and looked up at the stars above, wondering if there was something he could have done differently. Flurries of ash swirled overhead and landed on his weathered face, staining his skin.
The reports had trickled in at first, then flooded as rumor spread, in that curious way it always seemed to.
The Bloodletters were dead. The strongest force the Stolst gang had was no more, and they were done in by a single wisp of a woman. No one else. Not any other of the Stolst gang’s various enemies.
Nobody claimed responsibility.
Whole plateaus being blocked off was nothing compared to this. It didn’t matter that they struggled to claim greater territory when they were faced with utter annihilation.
Warren was beginning to understand how little his Stolst gang truly achieved.
“No two reports agree on all the details,” Allen said, “but all agree that a young woman fitting Mel’s–” Warren issued a warning grunt and Allen promptly corrected himself. “–Her description. She was seen by several eyewitnesses entering the swamp behind the caravan and then leaving hours later, alone. Those that went into the swamp plateau found the wreckage of the caravan, and a brutal scene where the Bloodletters had clearly met a force far greater than they expected. They were, quite literally I’m told, torn apart.”
Warren nodded and waved away his squire. The young lad bowed and backed out of the cordoned off area where Warren liked to stargaze at night.
The Stolst gang was hardly hanging on by its fingernails. They were sorely pressed on all sides. Paradise Oblivion was burning and torching their supplies while simultaneously headhunting their most promising rookies.
The Crownsworn were countering their maneuvers at every step, forcing Warren and his personal guard to engage more and more in petty fights like it was the first week of the Convocation all over again.
His men were tired, hungry, and had little to show for all their efforts, despite how much they had gained. The bad news had only grown worse when some fool had been both stupid and unlucky enough to attack a camp at night for some baking bread. Because of course, who else was making that bread?
Gwen, the very werewolf that was off limits!
By now, she had come to be known as the Dreadwolf. She took out the fool’s entire scouting party in retaliation. She didn’t even need to change to get the job done. The Archer that had spied on the rampage from the safety of another plateau had resigned after leaving his message.
Demons on one side, werewolves on the other. He sighed. Between the two women, he was losing more men to rumor and fear mongering than anything else.
Warren made a gesture with his hand, bringing up the current standings for groups in the trial.
[Group Convocation Standing]
(1) Blackrose
(2) Purification
(3) Vile Covenant
(4) Goretide Covenant
===(5) Stolst Gang===
(6) Departed Honor
(7) Paradise Oblivion
(8) Crownsworn
(9) Stonecloaks
(10) la Tyrannie des Rejetés
Warren snarled and swatted at the text overlaid upon his vision. They had been third! As they spent more and more time countering the annoying things that woman did, the other groups surged ahead.
At least the group standing didn’t mean anything worthwhile. They were bragging rights for groups that had accomplished the first three quests in what looked to be a very long series of guild formation quests. They offered no tangible rewards.
“I’ve spent so long building this up, and it’s all slipping through my fingers. And why? Because of one slip of a girl? I would have had her buried in a shallow grave before, but now she’s running circles around my strongest men.” Warren hung his head.
He turned the gold ring on his hand. Its heavy, sickly green gemstone glinted evilly in the starlight. The Vile Covenant had offered a way out, but only for Warren.
The Stolst gang would be no more if he accepted the offer.
His mind swirled back to that fateful meeting when he had been doing little more than entertaining alternatives. He had been sure that the Bloodletters would kill Mel and with any luck she’d take a few out too, rectifying the imbalance he had been noticing.
Yok’sal, the emissary of the Vile Covenant, walked into the tent and greeted him, spreading his arms wide and smiling toothily. For some reason, Warren had expected the man to have yellow or black teeth.
In fact, the presentation of the green-robed man was immaculate. He made Warren feel like he’d just come off the streets.
He had told Yok’sal in no uncertain terms that if the Vile Covenant wanted war with his people, then they’d have to get in line. If the Stolst gang had to fight everybody, he would gladly do it.
Yok’sal had grinned and sat down without permission, pressing Warren to the brink. “My dear Warren,” he said, “I have not come for war. I have come to offer you a way out.”
“A way out of what?” Warren asked, teetering on the edge of explosive rage.
“Soon, you will come to a crossroads. You can…what is the saying? ‘Go down with the ship’? Yes, I believe that it is. Or, you can survive, for a modest price.”
“Why would I ever need to leave?”
The man shrugged. His silken robes slithered back and forth on his shoulders like a second skin. There was something decidedly unsettling about it that Warren couldn’t pinpoint.
“You have made a grave error.” Yok’sal raised a hand to forestall the outburst of anger. “I say this not as an admonishment. We do not judge. Instead, we offer a token of friendship. From one…organization to another, we have great experience with such individuals.”
“What individuals?”
Yok’sal looked at Warren through hooded eyes. “We can dispense with the pleasantries, yes? I speak of this Magi you have angered. The very one that is rampaging across your lands and destroying your fledgling supply lines. A lone individual, but a Magi alone is perhaps more dangerous than in a group.”
Warren’s confusion blunted his rage. “What the hell is a Magi?”
“That is immaterial,” Yok’sal explained at length. “Suffice to say we have seen where this course leads. Either you will face her in open combat and fall, or you will flee. However, should you flee, she will give chase. We are unfamiliar with this particular Magi, but they are all the same. The way they hold on to grudges is a thing of spiteful beauty that even the Old Ones would be envious of.”
Yok’sal reached into his robes and pulled out a heavy gold ring with a putrid looking gemstone. “When that time comes, and you have decided to save yourself, you need only prick your finger and place a droplet of your blood on this gem.”
Warren stared at it as if it were a live snake. “Why would I do that?”
“Because you want to survive.”
He shook his head. “I’m no stranger to doublespeak. Tell me plainly, what will happen to me?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?” Warren asked, his eyes squinting suspiciously.
Yok’sal nodded. “You will not be harmed at all. There. Is that sufficiently clear?”
Warren took the ring, examining it carefully.
[Vile Contract]
(Copper Rank, Armor)
(Epic)
An unknown gold alloy with a gem of unknown make and origin. Vile things swirl and slither beneath its surface. The Vile Covenant is one of the oldest and strongest from Old Lormar before the gods and their stewards were slain.
Imprint: Place a droplet of blood on the gem to trigger an unknown ritual spell.
Warren broke out in a cold sweat. He had never seen an item that didn’t fully reveal itself to his examination.
“What do you get out of this?” Warren asked. “Nobody does anything without benefiting.”
Yok’sal shook his head, still smiling unsettlingly. The way his smile never reached his eyes made it look like a mask. Warren was afraid that if he kept looking, he might actually see what was under that mask.
Some small ancient part of his mammalian brain gibbered fearfully that he did not want to see what was beyond the facade. Warren mastered his fear and slipped the ring onto his left pinky. It resized perfectly.
“As I have said,” Yok’sal continued, “we have seen where this leads. Whether you believe it or not, your order is done for. This way, at least some of what you built can be…repurposed.”
Warren opened his mouth to press the man further, but found that the small gibbering part of his brain had grown considerably. It was battering at the considerable wall of willpower he built around his base instincts.
Now his instincts were screaming at him to throw down the ring and run far, far away. He shut his mind to the noise, refusing to yield.
“The Stolst gang will be dissolved, won’t it?” Warren guessed, unable to stop himself.
“Very apt wording, yes.”
The way he kept smiling grew more unsettling by the minute. “That is all you wished to speak to me about?”
“That is all,” Yok’sal agreed. “We will be here when you need us, Warren Stolst. The Fates once had a bright future for you, but unknown forces have led your path astray. Should you accept our aid, you may yet survive your encounter with this Magi.”
“You’ll kill her?” Warren asked, an eyebrow quirking up.
“Hardly,” Yok’sal said, pushing away from the table and standing. His robes slithered and shifted more than they should have. “We have learned from our mistakes. We understand how to deal with Magi.”
“How?” Warren asked. “If Mel is a Magi…how do I deal with her?”
Yok’sal shook his head and turned to leave. He looked over his shoulder at Warren. “Once a Magi’s ire has been roused, there is little left to do. By all accounts, this Magi is extraordinary even by the long measure of her peers. It is a shame. Do remember the ring. You will not want to wait to use it. Time is of the essence.”
Warren looked back up at the stars. That had been less than a week ago, and already so much had changed. By the sounds of it, things were getting worse.
He was sure that Allen was hiding the most distressing news from him. The boy was too loyal for his own good. He thought he could shield Warren from the truth, but he had eyes and ears that heard and saw everything.
Times were tough for the Stolst gang, but he could turn it around. He was sure of it. The false trails had been set, his forces were spread wide to avoid any cluster being taken out at once.
It meant that the Stolst gang would lose their position faster, but it was a necessary evil if he was going to stall Mel’s advance until he found a way to kill her.
Surely the rumors of the Bloodletters being killed by her were exaggerated. People loved nothing more than a folk hero.
One little girl going up against the cruelest group of fighters ever witnessed, only to be the lone survivor, was too good to pass up. They had latched onto it and Mel’s strength doubled with every telling until she sounded like she farted rainbows and pissed sunshine.
The alarm gongs rang out in the distance, spreading through the craggy mountainside that Warren had holed up in with his strongest and best.
Allen slipped between the partitions and looked apprehensively at Warren. “She’s here.”
Warren nodded, the picture of the perfect leader. Strong and stoic, he stood and followed his squire’s lead to the small rise where he could view the foul demoness’ death.
A mournful wind blew through the mountain pass as Allen passed Warren his most prized possession. A spyglass.
He put the brass tube to his eye and fixated on the lower reaches of the path carved just for such an occasion. It was filled with mist, her usual tactic.
“How droll,” he said with a snort of derision. “She only has the one trick, it would seem.”
Warren’s smile froze as his guards held firm and went into the fog, slashing and stabbing, just as they had trained.
An orb of darkness fell over them, the sounds of tortured screaming accompanied the expansion of the strange black sphere. His men didn’t come back out.
Warren couldn’t help but hear Yok’sal’s words about Magi. The Vile Covenant was one of the strongest groups, and if they were afraid of these Magi, what hope did he have?
The mist flowed into the mountain pass. He expected it to flow over the side, but the mist hung in the air in open defiance of gravity. Another orb of darkness streaked through the sky, hitting a group of Archers over 100 feet up on a higher, supposedly unreachable ledge.
Their screams echoed across the mountains until it sounded like an entire battalion of men had just lost their lives.
Warren turned the ring on his finger nervously. He could survive. He should survive.
My gang is meant to serve me, and only me. It is their sole use, Warren thought, coming to a cold and logical decision. One that wasn’t too difficult to make. It was fueled by a mixture of desperation and greed. If they can serve me in death, then they should be glad for it.
He gave a look of pity for Allen, then passed him the spyglass. “A gift. Enjoy.”
Warren fled without turning back, no matter how Allen shouted and called after him. The clash of steel and the screams of the dying filled his ears as he pricked his thumb on a dagger and jabbed his bloody digit onto the putrid ring’s gem.
Once he reached the secret cave he had discovered and subsequently hid so he could flee if things took a turn, Warren chanced a look at the chaos behind himself.
The vision immediately turned his stomach, and he lost his dinner all over his boots. By God, what have I done?!
Warren looked at the ring on his finger. The jewel was dead and gray. There was no way to undo the horrible magic.
A wet, slapping sound drew his attention back to the opening of the cave. Standing in the doorway was the cruelly misshapen form of Allen. Gray skin sloughed off in thick patches, his face hung unevenly from his skull like dirty laundry carelessly slung over the back of a chair.
He incomprehensibly slurred a question aimed at Warren, but the thing that used to be Allen couldn’t form words with a mouth that was fast rotting from within and slack lips that refused his mind’s call. The hurt in his jaundiced eyes was more than Warren could bear.
Warren couldn’t stand to look at him. He summoned his sword and ran the man through.
It was the only mercy he could give him.
The inhuman howls chased him deep into the cave tunnels that would carry him safely away from the worst of it. It didn’t matter that the Stolst gang was gone or that all of its members had turned into unholy abominations.
Warren had survived.
Comments
Edward Ravenbear
Cheap.
