Path of the Deathless

240 (II) Vengeance [I]

240 (II)Vengeance [I]

Shiv said.

A snort escaped Tulveg.

Tulveg declared.

There was a hint of outrage in the vampire's voice, but then his tone softened. the vampire said, and Shiv knew he was talking about the children.

Shiv said carefully.

he interrupted.

Shiv repeated.

Sage of the Enkindled Heart:

Shiv passed the question around in his mind a few times, and then he chanced a guess:

Silence. For a few moments, Tulveg said nothing. Then, he let out a breath.

Shiv was about to ask something else before Tulveg cut him off.

But before Shiv could respond, Adam spoke up.

Shiv tapped into Adam's memories, and he saw within a pitch-dark room, all corners covered in crawling tumors, consumed and contained within a realm of its own, a lone vampire. One who cast more and more festering cancers out from himself, one that spread his influence from body to body.

Two Pathbearers were kneeling beside him, one woman, one man. The man was bald and had a trident tattooed over his left eye. The woman's eyes were vacant. Her tongue had been bitten off. Blood poured down her lip, and instead of hair, she had a chain of chitinous tendrils growing out from the back of her head. It rested against the floor, the tips sharp like a scorpion's stinger.

Adam gave a hum of confirmation.

Before the two was a massive, vaulted door, warded with so many magical seals that it was nauseating for Shiv to even look at. It seemed to have the same effect on Tulveg as well. Shiv beheld the vampire in his true form now. He wore a silken vest that exposed most of his upper chest. His body was pristine of complexion, his raven hair long and curled, his skin like marble kissed by moonlight. However, he didn't possess that ethereal beauty that Angelo did. In fact, the vampire was positively low on charm, while the expression on his face was one of barely restrained agitation, of frustration and bubbling rage. He wanted something beyond that doorway. .

Tulveg asked Shiv, his words almost a taunt.

Helix said.

Shiv asked, surprised.

Shiv said, cutting the orc off.

Helix almost sputtered, but Shiv turned his attention back on the vampire. Shiv said, starting vaguely.

Rather than prideful, the vampire sounded positively mournful. He shook himself free from his stupor as he recalled the second part of Shiv's statement.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

Adam said to Shiv, taken aback.

Shiv was just as surprised.

To Tulveg, he said, “

the vampire spat.

Adam breathed. The Gate Lord struggled with himself, but then his next thought followed quickly.

Shiv replied.

Shiv said.

Helix said.

Shiv snapped.

Tentatively, Shiv connected the vampire to Adam.

Tulveg replied, his paranoia rising. Shiv could feel the tension resonating from within the speck.

"Hey, Marcus! Marcus, go check the other side of the room!" Maxime suddenly said next to Shiv, pointing at the other children.

Shiv snapped away from his Psychomanctic conversation and looked at her. "Yes, of course," he said. He played the role and walked. The speck followed him, and the conversation continued.

Adam declared, now linked to Tulveg as well.

the vampire said with more than a hint of surprise.

Adam replied after a pause, startled by the vampire's words.

Once more, Adam was shocked.

Adam and Shiv were both listening with rapt attention now.

Adam replied apprehensively.

Tulveg replied with a scoff.

And as soon as the vampire spoke that name, Shiv's Non-Sequitur Skill tremored inside of him, and a vision consumed his perception.

Non-Sequitur: Things weren't supposed to be like this.

She was supposed to meet him at their agreed-upon location. She was supposed to find him in the dark.

She'd promised. He'd promised.

Now her body was cold, and her eyes were open but vacant. Those eyes that hid so much, those eyes that held so much warmth… Vacant.

Blood yet continued to seep through his fingers, pouring from the wound in her chest and mingling with his tears as they landed upon her body. The metal dagger that had dealt the fatal blow lay discarded in the grass beside her since he'd pulled it from her chest, its owner nowhere to be found.

She'd already passed when he found her. Bled out, alone, in the dark.

Her fellow Sisters were strewn across the ground around her, cut down by an unknown assailant. But they weren't drained empty. This wasn't the doing of vampires. No Necromantic damage, so it couldn't have been a Nightstalker. But then, who?

Who?

He wept tears of blood, sobbing as he cried her name out into the dark, uncaring if anyone heard him, uncaring if anyone came to claim his life, uncaring if anyone saw his weakness, his shame. "Mettabon! Mettabon! Do not go where I cannot follow. Mettabon, please!"

His insides were boiling with pure agony. He hadn't known that he could feel such pain, that he could even survive it. What he had known was that it was a mistake, baring his heart for an Umbral, an enemy of his people. But the heart wanted what it wanted, and he was no stronger than his own feelings. No matter how much he deluded himself, no matter how much he used his own Psychomancy on himself, he could not cut away his weakness.

And now, he cradled her close to his chest, and he regretted. He regretted ever caring for her. He regretted never telling her how much he cared. He regretted, and he lamented, and he mourned for everything that could have been and everything that would never be.

"Who's going to tell your children what became of you, Mettabon? Who? I cannot. I cannot. You can't… You can't be dead, you can't be. Please. Please. Please…"

He knew not how long he knelt there, clutching her body.

Tulveg became a hollow ruin. Part of his being left his soul, then, and he drifted further and further away. He stared down at his own pathetic form as he held the pale-skinned Umbral, clinging onto the corpse, yet not biting into it, not feeding on it. He was a vampire, but he'd never been more human, more soft, more supple than in that moment. He'd never been more prey.

But grief was kindred to another emotion, and its name was . Rage so scalding, so overwhelming, that it compelled Tulveg to finally pull away from her, to place her back upon the soft grass, just like he'd found her. He rose from the body of his halfway lover, of his hidden ally, and grief compelled him to take hold of the abandoned blade. He burned its scent into his memory, and then, slowly, shivering as he did, slid the weapon back into the wound in her chest. No matter how deep the action scarred him, he couldn't risk Weave’s Diviners learning of his presence.

As he stumbled away, drawing in the tears he'd spilled with a thought, he looked back at her a final time, and then down at his hands. He was still rank with her death, rank with his sin. And that scent awoke something inside Tulveg.

The beast he'd buried so long ago dug its fangs deep into his soul, and it supped from his hatred. There, he swore upon himself, upon the Great One, and upon every other God that might exist across Integration, that he would tear into the vile vermin for taking his future from him, for taking what was his, what could have been his.

Non-Sequitur 116 > 120