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The right of Sean McKeown to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted. All rights reserved. No part of these documents may be used, reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical including photocopying, scanning and recording, for any purpose, without the express written consent of Sean McKeown.
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My mind twists and warps at his, using the mental connection he wrought
between us against him. In agony that blinds the both of us, the spell of
abeyance is overcome and broken. Anguish and spite flow freely through me,
filling me and making me whole once more.
Like a shadowy presence, my aura of power blotches the sky until Lim-Dûl
and I fight alone in the preternatural twilight of the void. My anger
simmers, and my mind turns coldly to the task of dispatching with him.
Now is the moment I have long suffered for. A dance of death between me,
and my most hated enemy. With precision, I plan my strategy.
Lim-Dûl is a warrior-mage of incalculable power in the Dark Arts. With a
strong tactical mind and a scrutiny for details, plus his natural hatred of
all things, he is a enemy with seemingly unlimited strength and force. My
powers are finite, and my exacting nature, while similar, is less focused.
To defeat him, I must deprive him of all power, to prevent his strength
from overwhelming mine.
I plunge us further into the nether regions of the void, to the Aether
where even angels fear to tread. Surprise is my most valuable asset, as
Lim-Dûl is already recovering from my mental blows.
"Enemy mine, I have been looking forward to this day for a long, long
time," I say to him.
With a gentle voice, creaking with hidden fear, he answers. "Kaervek,
though my body may wither to ashes at your dark touch, my soul shall become
more powerful than you could ever imagine."
Not at all the reaction I might expect from Lim-Dûl, the Lord Necromancer.
I strike soundlessly, driving away all sight and senses save for the
beating of his heart. My dark presence infests him, crawling through every
fiber of his being to drain the life from him. My soul smiles, pouring
dark mana from its inky abyss. With a fell blow, I turn aside all defenses
with yet another twist of the mind.
The connection closes, and while my rage grows, my mind shuts down in
agony at the deflected spell. I feel grace and honor, the seething burn of
the white mana, and the draining ceases. With a spell of shadow-banishing,
he prevents my draining completely and replenishes his strength with my
used resources.
Not at all the counter I might expect from Lim-Dûl, the Lord Necromancer.
I begin to wonder... what is going on?
Feebly I grope at my memories, pulling together ideas and remembrances
like the scattered beads of a necklace, a clearer view comes to my
scrambled mind. Agonizing memories surface upon the chaos of my mind, and
the truth is revealed once again.
Johan Angelfire and I stand once more on a plane of battle. Dark blood
oozes from my bruised and battered skull, and like a mirror-image Johan
stands, cradling his head that I have abused so with my twists and warps of
the psyche. The shadow’s Bane is healing his wounds with my strength,
taking strength from me and giving it to him, so that he may yet survive
the day. The Aether of this Nether Void twists and flows around our mystic
circle, our plane of battle, forming dark and bulging forms that ride and
turn just beyond the scrutiny of the eye. Fell beasts wander these lost
and hidden paths, the dark children of the fallen Gods of olden-days long
since past.
I chant, drawing power to myself to strengthen my mind as well as my husk
of a body. Phrases flit through my mind, half-remembered runes of power,
chants to the fallen masters of lore that still hold a sway over the realm
of mortal Men, dark inscriptions and darker hymns. I call to me beasts of
the undead, horrors long hidden from the view of the Walkers. I chant the
inscription of Aku, calling its strength in darkness to me. Hymnals to the
Keeper, to Tourach the fallen Master, to the fallen Gods of when the planes
were young. My mind races with the chaos, drawing upon the power of Death
and upon my own dwindling and twisted life-forces to summon creatures of
the night, to draw strength to my body, to add mana to my dark pool of energy.
The Horror long-hidden breaks through the Aether surrounding this plane in
the Void, a gnashing serpent of the fallen, a mockery of the strong and
noble beasts of legend and lore. A wingless dragon, it crashes to the
battlefield between us with a voiceless roar.
Johan scrambles away from the dark beast, gaining ground and attempting to
remove the beast from the field. My incantations of gloom slow him enough
for the spells to remain unformed, and I draw further strength to myself to
heal my body and focus my mind. I decide to do both at once, while Johan
is otherwise occupied with his frustrated attempts to eliminate the Horror.
I return once more to tunnel vision, blotting out all sight save the sight
of vitality and strength. Johan glows faintly against the moving shapes in
the Aether, weakened nearly to the point of exhaustion despite having
borrowed my strength.
With the instincts of a ravaged vampire, my energies attach to his. I tear
into him and his life’s blood, taking back that which was mine at a price
steep by all concerned. With a sensual tingle of ecstasy, his life mingles
with mine, and I take it as my own as I drain his soul. He struggles, like
a beast fighting for its very existence, but strong spells of lapsed memory
and forgetfulness interrupt his thoughts long enough for me to drain him to
the very point of death.
He lays a strong weave of karma around me once again, so strong it makes
my eyes blind with pain and my nerves rebel against the sinews that bind
them to my mind. A stronger pain I have not felt in many long and solitary
years, but even this is not enough. I leave my tortured body behind,
willingly disembodying myself to end the task. In this fire am I tested,
and tempered to new strength.
I bring Johan to the very edge of death, when my control slips and he
manages to break my hold for an instant. I expect him to strike back
savagely... I am not prepared to stop the actions that he takes instead. I
readied myself for a last, feeble offensive. Instead, Johan releases his
soul to join the Aether; to travel haunted passages of the mind forevermore.
The spell of Karma dissipates as his mortal frame dies. With a sighing
gasp, his body falls flat on its back, coming to its final rest.
Preternaturally, his features glow with an air of Elvish beauty. So came
Johan Angelfire, clothed in silken garb beneath a shimmering mail of finest
silver, to wander the Aether as a shade of forgotten power and veiled
strength.
Curse him! for there is naught that I can do to reclaim him. Only the
Keeper, or the Creator if there is one remaining from the Fallen Gods of
the Young Age, can lay claim to him at the end of Time.
With a respect most unnatural for me, I leave my most noble and worthy
adversary’s body unscathed on this plane of the Nether Voids. I Walk,
returning victorious but without my prize. My Thran battle-sword glows,
sated on the life-forces of the fallen.
I ride the beast of Darkness and the Dead, the Hidden Horror, through the
planes between Here and There. Dominia slides by ever slowly, until I
breach the Shard and return to Dominaria. To the Mountain of Henneth
Amuuth I return, and claim finally the dead lands of Arom-Shaleb,
Tekeb-Harai. G’nra’I grows ever stronger on the corpses of the dead. I
grow stronger, but the gain is bitter-sweet.
Johan Angelfire, the Escaped. One day, perhaps, I will have strength
enough to breach the barriers of space and time, and to walk the Aethers as
only a god could.
I stand on the Mountain, gazing ever upwards through the skies of
Dominaria to the heavens above. Beyond the Twinned Moons, beyond even the
infinitely numerous stars of the plane of Dominia.
I stare into the Void longingly, and I become the Void once more.
One day.
One step at a time.
fin.
Sean McKeown
[email protected]