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Czeron tossed and turned in his sleep. His thoughts were a chaotic
jumble, a mishmash of misplaced memories and recollections. The dreams
were more than dreams, they were visions. He saw the girl, Lya, and her
mystic orange eyes and braided black hair. He saw her wander into
mist-filled swamps, flit to the ocean shore, wander weary ways. She
searched for something; he knew not what. Her head swivelled from the
left to right in frantic worry. He looked at her again, and saw Anais
in her eyes.
The Ivory Tower glistened in a morning of blood-red sunlight. It
towered immensely high. Walls of white marble cracked and chipped, and
then fell to the ground. The Ivory Tower collapsed in a shower of dust
and rock. Two figures walked from the haze.
Waves of peasants flooded down upon the small valley that held the
dwellings of those of the Order of the Blood. The desperate army fought
savagely, and incurred many losses. Within hours, the Order of the
Blood's valley becomes a lifeless depository of the slain.
He sees Lya calling to him, and he answers....
The day dawned bright, as normal. Hearing the morning's activities,
Czeron dressed and went to the morning ritual. He did not focus on the
incantations and devotions spread to his lord, Ceros Draio, absent for
nearly a week now, dating from Anais' disappearance. Czeron focused
instead on the striking young girl, Lya, who dwelt now in his thoughts
immovably. She chanted and danced and sang, and the assembly followed
her willingly. Every now and then, she would look at him, and he would
avert his eyes, not wishing for her to see his watching her.
Last night, he had finally joined his spirit with Anais'. That was but
another thought that found itself immovable from his head. The strange,
bland taste of the ashes of her head's remains lasted through the night,
and its unforgettable meaning and taste lingered still. Hours passed,
and he was lost in thought still long after the morning ritual had
finished. He came to his senses and found Lya leaning her head against
his shoulder.
He ran his fingers through her hair, thinking more that she were Anais
rather than Lya. He was comforted as he did so. It had been a long
time since he had held Anais, and would now never do so again. He sat
for a time, stroking her hair, and then she got up and left, without a
word or a glance back, disappearing into the confines of the Cathedral
of Blood. He stared after her helplessly.
Loss weighed upon Czeron heavily. His reality was crumbling from his
already fumbling fingers. His wife-to-be was dead, his visions were
shaky now at best, his best friend distanced himself from him day by
day. He was falling in love all over again, with a girl barely old
enough to be an initiate who was rising quite rapidly through the ranks
of the Order. This all defied explanation, defied expectation. The
unexpected became the norm.
Lya crept down into the darkest depths of the Cathedral of Blood. She
carried in her hand a torch that flickered faintly. She had a smirk on
her face, and she congratulated herself on completely befuddling Czeron.
It was so easy to work her way into his heart, to fill the void that had
been left by Anais' death. Or undeath. Her footsteps echoed off of the
bare walls as she descended still even further.
She had twisted her story to fit her means. But she decided to let
Czeron think over things for a while. What he didn't know, wouldn't
affect his relationship with her. Yet.
The newer constructs that made up the walls faded away from the
ornately carved obsidian walls to crumbling brick and finally to dirt
walls and floor. The hallway filled with dust as she passed through it.
She had been led down here once by Ceros, and now had to follow her
previous trails or get lost among the twisting corridors. Her torch
carried only enough light for her to follow to get to the small room she
sought.
Small rats padded lightly through the thick dust, undisturbed except
for her previous passages. Behind her, the hall filled with thick,
choking dust. Clods of dirt that had fallen from the walls or ceiling
lay in bunched piles scattered widely across the floor. The hallway was
pretty straight after the conversion to dirt, but she moved slowly so
the dust wouldn't overcome her as she passed.
Lya's torch was flickering madly in its final futile efforts to fill
the corridor with flowing light when she reached the door she sought.
Carved into the short wooden door were an innumerable amount of magical
sigils, protecting the room from discovery and entrance by all except
those who were expected to find it by the one it contained. The door
had no lock and no handle; hinges were non-existent.
She tapped on the door, and the sigils flared in bright reds and
oranges warning of danger. The noise of her disturbance echoed softly
throughout the corridors. The sigils burned ferociously bright, and the
heat began to sear her skin. She stood there unflinching as the flames
burned into her skin. A raging inferno incinerated much of the dust in
the hallway nearby. This was the door's magic testing her to determine
that she needed to be here.
The conflagration subsided, and Lya laid trembling hands on the sigils
again. This time, they flared white. Lya traced certain ones in the
center and on the outside edges. The door was bitterly cold. She
completed the ritual, and the door vanished. Her own torch had long
since gone out, leaving the door as the only source of illumination.
With the door gone, no light reached her eyes. Magic was weak from here
to her destination; she would be unable to light her path magically, and
the passage was warded against illuminating fire. Her way was unclear,
but she wandered forward, and felt the door frame to either side with
her hands.
She was in a cramped passageway as she pressed forward. Ten steps
forward she went, then turned to her left and walked another fifteen.
The floor slowly descended deeper, and she felt the ceiling graze her
head as the hallway became more cramped. After fifteen steps, she
crouched down, and felt to her right on the wall. She fumbled around
until she felt a cold iron ring. Her hand clasped around it, and she
pulled it free, releasing a portion of the wall just large enough for
her to squeeze through.
Creeping forward slowly, she finally came out in a larger antechamber.
She felt her magic slowly returning, and now, no longer needing to worry
about possible followers, she summoned a will o' the wisp to light the
chamber. It was a cold, comfortless light, highlighting the
monochromatic nature of the room. The antechamber contained a few
bedrolls, old, moldy food, stale water, and long decayed sconces. The
walls were made of cold stone, and the temperature was close to frigid.
Lya peered close to the ground and found her older trail filled in with
dust that had been earlier stirred by her passing. Ceros always made
gaps in her mind; she could remember parts of her journey, but couldn't
remember others. Odd things like "walk ten steps and turn left" she
could remember, but not the simple things like what the door she was
looking for looked like. She was left to determine what she did not
remember with the clues from the past. Putting more pressure on her to
be accurate were traps set into the floor everywhere but the correct
path. Even the very footsteps one must follow were dictated past the
first three feet into the room; only people with the correct foot size
could tread. She passed slowly through the room via twisting pathways
created in days past by her feet.
She approached a wall, bordering an out of the way corner. She gently
blew away the cobwebs and dust that covered it. Lya was no longer
surprised by the way the wall covered itself and prevented discovery by
any means it could think of. If she didn't know the particular sigil
she was looking for that would grant her passage into Ceros' chambers,
she would never be able to find the doorway. She touched her small
fingers to the sigil, and spoke a word. The sigil flared briefly, then
the doorway here vanished as well. Blazing red light assaulted her
through the newly created portal.
Willing the wisp to precede her, she entered Ceros Draio's chamber.
Saet leaned close to Czeron's face. He peered intently, studying his friend.
"You think Lya's up to something, don't you?" He offered up, noticing that Czeron's thoughts were wandering. "You seem quite taken with her,
you know. If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were in love with
her. She's young."
Czeron relaxed his focus on the floor, and glanced up at Saet.
"I've had more visions, Saet. She will need my help soon." He did not
mention that he felt she had more to do with Anais' death than she would
care to admit. "And yes, I do love her. When I'm with her, it seems
like I'm with Anais all over again. I just can't get her out of my
head."
"Can't get who out of your head? Lya or Anais?"
Czeron sighed.
"Both, I suppose. They both seem so...so similar. It's like they're
the same person, but they're not."
A loud knock on the door disrupted their discussion. A young initiate
of the Order, in his early twenties, stood restlessly outside. His
hands were fidgety, and when the door opened to admit him, he was
flooded with relief.
"What is it, Initiate?" Saet questioned. "Czeron is in a state of
grief and would not like to be disturbed."
The initiate hesitated. He had been caught off guard by the question
and its following explanation. He stammered before speaking.
"I, uh, well, you see, I've been, um, asked, no, your presence has
been, uh, um, requested at the, uh, the Ivory Tower." The initiate was
too flustered to put together anything clearer than that almost
incomprehensible sentence.
"Czeron or myself?" Saet asked. "At whose request?"
"The Crimson Mistress herself requests."
The Crimson Mistress was the person in charge of the Ivory Tower. Her
power and influence was second only to that of the Illuminated Mistress,
who until recently had been Anais. A new Illuminated Master or Mistress
had not yet been chosen. Only Ceros Draio himself had more power than
these two, and only Ceros Draio had the power and right to grant the
title. In the past this right had been exercised by summoning Ceros'
spirit, but now that he was alive again, no one knew what to do. Ceros
had disappeared from all sight shortly after his return. Summoning the
dead would prove difficult when the dead in question was now alive
again.
"I'll go. Now." Czeron sprang to his feet. "If the Crimson Mistress
requests your presence, you do not ignore the request. Take us
now, Initiate." Czeron's rank, as Brother, was truly only a little bit
above the initiate's own, but it entitled him to the privilege of
calling the initiate by his title.
They grabbed few things, but took off and ran almost at a sprint
towards the Ivory Tower.
"I'd appreciate knowing what's going on in your head, Czeron. Why do
we need to get to the tower so quickly?" Saet gasped out between breaths
and his fast running pace.
"We are in a game of chaos, Saet. Yes, I've had visions, but as of
late, they have become more cryptic, more...unpredictable. What I see
doesn't necessarily happen. They are erratic. I must accept them all
as the truth, but I can no longer be passive about it. Before Anais'
death, my visions happened as I saw them, every detail was correct.
Now, nothing is set in stone. Something has happened to create this
fluidity in my visions.
"My first visions foretold of the Order of the Blood summoning a great
being to help the world. The visions showed me that only I could defeat
this being, who would be more malevolent than benevolent. I knew the
consequences of the actions I would take. I accepted it as my lot in
life. All this has been called into question; I must act now to
take matters into my own hands. Do you understand?"
Saet nodded. "I only hope you know what you think you're doing,
Czeron."
"So do I."
They reached the Ivory Tower in a very short time, just under ten
minutes. They were admitted at once. The initiate guided them to a
huge room on the first floor. In the center sat the aged Crimson
Mistress. Her small frame was exaggerated by the too-large robe she
wore. With considerable effort, she lifted her head and motioned for
the three to come forward.
They approached her seat rapidly.
"Yes mistress?" Czeron asked.
She looked from the initiate to Czeron, and then to Saet. She closed
her eyes and whispered into Czeron's mind.
"Young Brother. You so recently lost your beloved to foul play.
Your wife's blood now beats in your veins. You two have joined, but
your beloved can be with you no longer. Your life is free?"
Czeron was caught unexpectedly by this.
"Yes, it is."
The Crimson Mistress called him to stand next to her.
"Ceros Draio will destroy the Order of the Blood. A new Illuminated
Mistress has been chosen. I am too old for the conflict that comes. You
will take my place?"
"Yes Mistress. It is your will, and so shall it be done."
"I was hoping you'd say that." She drew from her robe a long
knife and drew it quickly across her wrist. Blood dripped into her
empty drinking glass. Saet jumped forth to aid her, but she waved him
back. The initiate stared. "Drink of my blood, so that we may be
joined. Know that we now defy the will of Ceros Draio, and so you must
destroy him." Her breathing became labored.
"I understand Mistress." Czeron drank from the cup.
"You are now an outlaw from the Order. I have defied Ceros by
giving you my power. Already he takes my remaining life energy. He
cannot take yours as he takes mine; you were created by my hand, not
his. He knows what I have just done. You must defeat the Illuminated
Mistress; only she stands in your path to destroy Ceros."
"Mistress, why did you chose me?"
"Lya is the new Illuminated Mistr..." The Crimson Mistress went
limp.
The new Crimson Master did so as well.