The Homunculus Knight

Chapter 50: Knives

“For nine cycles of stars-unfixed did the Sister sing with her wayward self. So beautiful and pure was her song that the shard rejoined the whole and its separation had never been. Sister Sun drank down the people’s prayers and birthed anew the self that hadn’t been self. Reborn as all and none the Sun once again became one. In strange days and strange lights the not-self is self, a piece of the whole and a child of the soul.” Book of Miracles, Truths 4:18.

Cole sat slumped against a boulder, his blood dripping steadily onto the surrounding stone. Teetering on the edge of unconsciousness, he forced himself to stare at the dagger sticking out of his gut. The temptation to yank the cold metal from his innards was staggering, but the bit of Cole’s mind still functioning behind the thick haze of pain knew he’d bleed out the moment the dagger was disturbed. A little deeper or a little shallower, either way it would drain him like a ripped water skin.

Forcing his lolling head to look up at the surrounding madness, Cole watched as his lovers raised hell (literally) to save him. Robbed of his magic by the accursed stargent, Cole couldn’t do much more than stay awake while Natalie and Isabelle fought the monsters. Slowly, he got his more functional hand to his bandolier and belt. Numb, shaky fingers groped at pouches, finding crushed vials and damaged trinkets. There would be no second wind brought on by alchemical wonders, or crafty tricks picked up from years of travel to turn the tide.

Cole glanced over at where he’d lost the battle and could see Requiem shining faintly in the sputtering mage light. The frozen hand Tallclaw trapped the weapon in had melted to soot; distracted by Isabelle’s infernal minions, the strigoi couldn’t keep his severed parts intact as he’d done with his hollowed out warform earlier. A surge of giddy annoyance flared through Cole as his blood-loss addled mind mused on how unfair it was for Tallclaw to use such an odd ability in such a creative way. Robbed of his halberd, Cole’s questing hands found the hunting knife Alia gifted to him. Slowly wrapping shaky fingers around the leather grip, Cole went still as the scrape of bone against bone filled his ears.

Pankrator, or well, Dullahan Marcus loomed over Cole, his broken sword hovering near the Paladin. The headless hunter had been assigned to guard Cole and was in moderately better condition than he was. Letting his hand drop from the hunting knife, Cole found the other gift he’d received the night this whole mess started. The Dullahan didn’t seem to mind Cole wrapping his hand and wrist in the prayer beads which brought the barest hint of a smile to his face. Cole might not be able to use his own magic, but that didn’t mean all arcane power was lost to him.

Elsewhere Isabelle and Natalie dueled Wolfgang, or more accurately, brutalized him. That display of dominance wasn’t heartening to Cole. He needed to be free of Marcus and calm his lovers before mistakes were made. Licking his dry lips, Cole stared at the flickering flame that passed as Marcus’s face. “If I die, burn me with all your might.”

Jerkily, Cole unsheathed the hunting knife and tried to push himself up at Marcus. The Dullahan moved quickly, bringing his shattered blade down towards Cole. To his own surprise, Cole parried the strike, or more accurately intercepted it. Driving the hunting knife into the gap between gauntlet and vambrace, Cole stopped Marcus’s downward strike. The Dullahan should have been more than strong enough to ignore Cole’s desperate jab and finish him, but the numbing power of the prayer beads weakened Marcus. Wrapped around the hand now thrusting the knife into the Dullahan, the enchanted pearls coursed with raw sanctity. Cole couldn’t harness the magic of the beads to cast spells with the stargent in him, but simple contact between holy trinket and tested steel enchanted Alia’s knife just enough.

Unable to strike with his sword, Marcus lunged forward with his stump, bringing it towards Cole. Dodging was impossible, Cole had already gambled enough with his own earlier ‘attack.’ Moving enough to get Marcus to respond without upsetting the dagger in his gut had been risky, but worth it. Wrapping his arm around Marcus’s stump, Cole directed his unwilling foe’s blow. Bone burning with witchfire pressed into Cole’s gut, forcing a quiet noise beyond a scream from him. New and terrible pain flared in Cole as he kept Marcus’s stump around his belly wounds. Green flames seared Cole’s flesh melting skin and fat like wax.

Dancing in and out of unconsciousness, Cole yanked with the hunting knife, knocking Marcus to the ground. All thoughts were driven from Cole’s skull as his body operated on something close to instinct. He was well past the point a mortal would pass out or simply die from shock; but a homunculus wasn’t so limited. Teetering on the edge of madness, Cole was back in the mental state born in Igori’s larder and last unleashed by Petar’s crude psychic assault. Everything was stripped from his mind, everything but his duty and how to fulfill it.

Grappling with Marcus, the Homunculus Knight finally let his foe’s stump fall away, the stargent dagger ‘safely’ stuck in place by a seal of burnt tissue. Wrapping his arm around Marcus’s intact limb, Cole twisted and pulled with his hunting knife. Ignoring the witchfire cooking his flesh, the homunculus got to work finally finishing the fight. It was then when out of the corner of his eye he saw Wolfgang and Natalie topple over, Isabelle’s skull clattering onto the stone.

Wolfgang opened his eyes and let out a low bubbling whimper. He was on his back staring up at the cave ceiling and the sputtering sphere of mage light. Shadows danced across the cavern as the brightness dimmed and darkness reclaimed its territory. Missing an arm, and probably a third of his skin, the Black Fly tried to roll over and get to his feet. Moving slowly, Wolfgang groaned as the chamber spun; his head felt heavy, like a crown of lead lay upon it. Finally, coming up to his knees, Wolfgang looked around the cavern. The battle between Strigoi and Demons raged; victory for the Hellkyn becoming more certain with every second. The Homunculus grappled with the Dullahan, fighting the armored skeleton even as witchfire burned the abomination's ruined flesh. Then, as if drawn by a magnet, Wolfgang’s eyes fell upon the twitching body laying next to him. Natalie, or possibly Isabelle, spasmed silently as the Reaper’s poison did its work.

Seeing his niece and new nemesis opened a floodgate in Wolfgang’s psyche. Memories of a terrible meeting within his mindscape smashed into him, and so did new orders. Flinching away from his encounter with the Reaper, Wolfgang frantically looked along the cave floor for his salvation. He found the Aisan Knife coated in ash, still clutched in his severed hand’s boney grip. Forcing his abused flesh to work, Wolfgang crawled over to the knife and wrapped his remaining fingers around its slightly warm grip. As he did, the terrible pain racking his body eased slightly, a sure sign this was the right course.

With effort Wolfgang stood up and approached the Alukah. Still trapped in her internal world, Natalie spasmed violently as lines of black crept across her skin while a silver mark on her neck glowed. Ignoring the discomfort the holy light caused him, Wolfgang peered into the Aether searching for his goal. Isabelle’s mania was gone, so was the Alukah’s blood fury; in their place Natalie’s soul surged with wild emotions. Fear, panic, and confusion boiled off her like red-tinged steam as a worm of ash burrowed through Natalie’s essence. The poison Wolfgang had been manipulated into delivering was working, digging into Natalie and destabilizing her soul.

A wave of vertigo struck Wolfgang as alien knowledge poured into him. More of the scheme he’d played an unwilling part of became known to him as the Reaper offered insights. Natalie was already hosting a piece of the Reaper’s power. A metaphysical parasite latched onto the Alukah and planted by another ignorant servant. This parasite fed when the Alukah consumed souls, eventually growing strong enough to make itself known and trying to make Natalie lose control. The Tenth God stopped this with some effort, leaving the sealed but still intact parasite waiting for something to break its bindings.

This was why Natalie and Isabelle avoided vampire ash; Master Time anticipated the poison within Wolfgang, but misinterpreted its nature. It hadn’t come as literal ash and blood, but a fragment of the Reaper tucked within Wolfgang’s soul. Now that piece of a Fell God was busy burrowing into Natalie and keeping Isabelle trapped. Soon it would free its fellow shard and the pair would shred Natalie’s psyche, leaving nothing but the Alukah’s hunger aimed by the Reaper’s intent. But before that could happen, Wolfgang needed to collect his prize, a relic the God of Grief sought above all else: Countess Isabelle Gen Silva.

Knife in hand, Wolfgang found the trail of magical power linking Natalie to the cracked skull laying next to her. Shuffling forward, Wolfgang raised the blade, ready to cut the link and take the skull. But before he could, Natalie stopped twitching and the surrounding Aether changed. Wolfgang watched, stunned, as chains of blood and shadow flowed out into the Aether and wrapped around the ash worm burrowing through Natalie. Other chains latched onto the skull while some quested for Wolfgang, their metaphysical links slithering through the Aether like hungry snakes. Stepping back, Wolfgang prepared to cut the approaching chain with his knife when it and its fellows spasmed. The ash worm was violently ejected from Natalie, spewed out from her soul, blood-forged links wrapping its writhing length. As the poison Wolfgang almost died to deliver faded from the Aether into the Beyond, the other chains melted away and Natalie’s soul calmed slightly.

Panicked by this sudden change of events, Wolfgang felt increased pressure on his mind, the Reaper was driving him forward more urgently. Whatever just happened had disrupted the deity’s plans, and he needed to act quickly. Scrambling forward, knife outstretched, Wolfgang ignored the roars, howls and other noises filling the cavern. His vision narrowed upon Natalie and he knew what must be done. Lunging forward, gripping the Aisan knife so tight it hurt, Wolfgang drove the blade into the link between vampire and skull.

Colors of impossible hue bloomed in the Aether, and screams reverberated off Wolfgang’s soul. Gouts of twisting delusion and ruptured memory spilled from the severed linkage, stabbing into Wolfgang’s mind with phantom sensations. Shutting his eyes, trying to block out the storm beating on his soul, Wolfgang fell to his knees and frantically groped for the skull. His fingers found cracked bone pungent with magic. Pulling the relic to him, Wolfgang ignored the biting needle pain of so much arcane discharge grounding itself in his flesh. Getting to his feet, skull under one arm, knife still clutched in numb fingers, Wolfgang fought down a scream as the broken psychic link snapped through the Aether like broken rigging in a storm. Flashes of emotions, memories, and more alien things smeared across his consciousness as the breaking spell spilled its innards.

Stumbling away from Natalie, trying to hold on to the skull, Wolfgang heard a loud crack followed by a voice cold and hard as glacial winter. “NO!”

Whirling about, Wolfgang watched something skid along the cave floor and land near him. It was the Dullahan’s remaining arm. Paladin Cole: the Homunculus Knight, stood atop the broken husk of Marcus, the dying embers of witchfire casting baleful shadows upon the warrior. Eyes widening in horror, Wolfgang watched as death approached. Clad in scorched steel and burned scraps, the Paladin lumbered forward; his flesh a mass of burns, cuts and worse. In the Aether, Cole’s soul glowed white-hot with pain, the agony of all his injuries having stripped away everything but an adamantine core of clear purpose. There were no thoughts, no emotions to the Paladin, nothing but pain and a goal; to protect.

Blood dripped from innumerable wounds, Cole pointed a faintly glowing knife in Wolfgang’s direction. “NO!”

Recoiling from the ruined husk facing him, Wolfgang was horrified to see the stargent dagger still sticking from Cole’s belly as he approached. Vampire and Homunculus locked eyes, both of them tattered parodies of themselves. Letting Isabelle’s skull drop, Wolfgang held out the thread cutter knife and hissed. “Stay back!”

The Homunculus growled and charged. Movements jerky and unsteady, Cole pushed towards Wolfgang, crossing the uneven stone and lashing out with his knife. This close to the dagger, Wolfgang could feel the power leaking from it, a crude imbuement of holy wrath, but enough to truly kill him. Dodging the clumsy strike, Wolfgang tried to call up a spell or other technique but his ragged body and mind wouldn’t respond. Snarling, Wolfgang tried to cut the homunculus, uncertain what his own ensorcelled knife would do to the immortal monster attacking him. While Wolfgang was in moderately better condition than Cole, he was also the far inferior fighter. Avoiding the crude thrust, Cole lashed out with a brutal kick to Wolfgang’s gut. The strike sent the vampire stumbling back and next to Natalie.

Scrambling towards the thankfully still unconscious Alukah, Wolfgang held the thread cutter above her neck. “Stay back! I’ll kill her!”

Cole hesitated, and two things happened. The sphere of magelight illuminating the cavern finally died, and so did Tallclaw. A high pitched maniacal cackle filled the cave as the Aether pulsed with a vampire’s death throes. Still able to see by the faint flickers of Marcus’s embers, Wolfgang watched as the spear-wielding demon crouched atop the rapidly disintegrating hulk of Tallclaw’s warform. A surge of horror filled Wolfgang as a stream of curdled soul-stuff flowed from the ashes of Tallclaw into the feasting demons. The Spear Hellkyn swelled with power, its wild eyes settled on Wolfgang and a pale tongue licked its teeth. The squeals and chitters of dying rats filled the chamber as the hungry loam consumed more and more of Shortooth. Soon both strigoi would be dead and the demons would seek their next meal; Wolfgang.

A stroke of mad inspiration struck the Black Fly then, and he turned his attention back to Natalie. The link between Isabelle and her borrowed body was severed, but not the magic controlling the demons. Bringing his knife down in a cruel slice, Wolfgang tore through the bindings and let the Hellkyn snap their leashes. There was an instant shift in the Aether, the demon’s unchained hunger flowed out in a rancid wave. For a moment, nothing in the cave moved except for the final fleeing rats of Shortooth’s swarm. Demons hungered for souls, gaining power from the cruel, and pleasure from the kind. Glutted upon Tallclaw, the Hellkyn were now interested in different prey; one more akin to the Homunculus and his companions than Wolfgang.

Slowly the spear demon climbed off the remains of Tallclaw, its horned head pointed at the central tower. It sensed something within, probably whoever changed Wolfgang’s detector wards. A nervous noise related to laughter, but from a diseased branch of the family escaped Wolfgang. Cole stood alone in the dark, holding out his dagger, trying to find his foe. Reclaiming Isabelle’s skull, Wolfgang started to slowly walk away from Natalie. The leaden weight in him said she wasn’t his goal, and would only further distract the paladin. Moving silently, the Black Fly scurried towards one of the cave exits. He’d take the path toward Azyge, there would be prey to find-

A pulse in Wolfgang’s skull made him hesitate, one of his wards had just been tripped. Pausing, Wolfgang stared at the tunnel to Azyge, groping at the simple magic he’d cast to alert for patrols. Two humanoids were coming, moving fast but not unnaturally so. Shutting his eyes for the barest moment of relief, Wolfgang had to admit the Reaper was skilled. She’d arranged everything for him, even a meal, to power his escape.

Skulking forward, ignoring the paladin running after the Demon approaching the tower, Wolfgang went to the tunnel mouth, preparing himself for whatever foolish dwarven patrol would feed his now ravenous hunger. Even now he could see the dim glow of the newcomers in the distance, they’d be easy to pounce on when the time came. Tucking Isabelle’s skull in the regrowing elbow of the arm she’d destroyed, Wolfgang gave one final glance back at his disastrous ambush. Cole stood alone in the cave, brandishing his dagger at the two demons now approaching him. Wolfgang knew Igori had never dared feed the homunculus to Hellkyn for fear of empowering them somehow, but right now the Voivode’s concerns were less than worthless to the Black Fly. While it hadn’t been in the way he’d wished, Wolfgang was free of his sire, having been recruited by a much more powerful patron.

Loping down the tunnel, Wolfgang eyed the distant but growing glow of his new victims. Yes, he’d get some more blood and escape this calamity before the rampaging Demons came to someone’s attention. Then, once he was safe… well, he had the trapped soul of one of the most brilliant minds in vampire history and the support of a powerful deity; Wolfgang could do a lot with that. New plans and new possibilities spread out in a growing web in front of Wolfgang. He’d lost much in this ill-fated expedition, but gained so many new opportunities. Perhaps he would return to Duchies, using Isabelle’s knowledge and the Reaper’s patronage to establish himself a true lord. Or maybe he’d stay hidden in the plague-ridden lands of Alidonar, taking advantage of his plague and the fog of war to grow stronger in secrecy. Wolfgang knew the Reaper would have demands, but those could come later and if they proved too much… well he’d already slipped one leash, what was another?

A faint itch played upon Wolfgang’s face, and he paused his scheming. The distant light was brighter now, and something about it felt wrong. Narrowing his eyes, ignoring how the magical illumination hurt his retina, Wolfgang looked into the Aether. The light wasn’t coming from a glowstone as he’d expected; it was a spell of unknown make. A vague sense of discomfort rolled up Wolfgang’s spine, and he got the sense of being watched. The itch was growing worse and Wolfgang rubbed his nose absently, wondering if some noxious fungi was blooming in the tunnel. Wolfgang’s hand came away gray and flakes of disintegrating skin were smeared across his palm.

Icy fear flowed through Wolfgang as old buried memories resurfaced. He knew that itch, its ugly burning pain eternally linked to Wolfgang’s childhood. The training yard of House Tyto was Wolfgang’s youthful hell. A place where he’d been bullied and brutalized by mentors and cousins alike. It was where his intellect had no value and all that mattered was strength of body and the ability to ignore pain. Wolfgang lacked both, and spent many long hours baking in the hot summer afternoon doing pointless punishment exercises until his skin was itchy and red with… with… sunburn.

Eyes wide, Wolfgang spun about and ran as the distant light grew brighter and brighter. Instinctual terror filled Wolfgang, and he raced down the tunnel back into the cave with an impossible dawn at his heels. The itch grew into pain and Wolfgang felt the skin on the back of his neck slough off, crumbling away as tongues of sunlight devoured him piece by piece. Wolfgang became acutely aware of every tear, every hole in his clothes as the dreadful burning slipped into his already wounded flesh.

Trying not to scream, Wolfgang erupted into the cave, uncaring of anything but escaping his imminent incineration. Moving towards the other tunnel, the one leading towards Delve Njolk, Wolfgang pushed himself onward, fueled by animal panic and the Reaper’s prodding. The leaden feeling in his head suddenly surged and Wolfgang stumbled. Barely catching himself, Wolfgang noticed something on the ground shining in the tortuous sunlight. It was the chisel knife of the Gashadokuro. Snatching up the arcane trinket, Wolfgang kept moving, his mind latching onto the knife and its implications.

Asian blade back in its sheath, Isabelle’s skull under one arm, Wolfgang held out his recovered tool and called upon its magic. Vertigo surged through Wolfgang as he desperately coaxed the nightmare bound to the knife awake. A massive invisible hand smashed into Wolfgang’s back, sending him flying forward with bone-snapping force. Sailing through the air, leaving a trail of ash behind him, Wolfgang landed badly at the Njolk tunnel’s entrance. Hobbling forward, unwilling to look back and see the rising sun, Wolfgang screamed as something in one of his legs gave out. Crashing to the ground, he crawled forward, desperately trying to evade the light as it burned him. Already most of his skin was gone and streams of smoke were wafting off Wolfgang’s ruined body. Any moment now, the summoned sunlight would grow strong enough and Wolfgang would burst into flames.

Staring up at the tunnel overhead, Wolfgang let out a defiant wail and stabbed the Gashadokuro dagger into the stone floor. Phantom bones slammed against the rock sending small showers of debris cascading down. Still crawling, Wolfgang used the knife like a climber’s spiked, hauling himself forward with its chisel tip. Every time it struck the stone, the Gasha raged and more pieces of the cave ceiling rained. As the first sparks wafted off his flesh, Wolfgang brought the dagger down one last time. The enchanted steel shattered and the dark power contained within exploded out. Stone shook as the Aether reverberated with unleashed magic. With a groan and great crack the tunnel roof started to collapse.

Falling rocks slammed into the stone around Wolfgang and he found salvation in their growing shadows. Still clutching Isabelle’s skull, Wolfgang pulled himself along the floor as the shaking increased. Somewhere behind him, the light grew as well and the parts of Wolfgang not shielded by the rockfall burned in earnest. A scream erupted from the Black Fly, one answered by the Demons he’d unshackled. Hungry fire danced along Wolfgang’s flesh, burning away dead flesh and leaving scorched bones. Then, in the blackest of mercies, the tunnel finally collapsed, with Wolfgang in it.

It's a terrible thing to be alone in the dark. The mind conjures forth all manner of monsters to fill the deep shadows; and in Cole’s situation, those imagined nightmares weren’t alone. Two Hellkyn, dredged up from the Beyond’s pits, stalked the black, eager to sup upon the souls of Cole’s charges. Faint green sparks and the near-illusionary glow of Alia’s knife were the only sources of light in the damned cave. They were just enough to give impressions of movement, conjuring flickers that might be tricks of the eye or skulking death.

Stumbling forward through the darkness, the Homunculus found Natalie’s prone body. Hoisting her frame onto one shoulder, Cole ran towards the tower, his frayed mind seeking any shelter it might provide. Things whispered in the surrounding shadows, hungry half-voices that murmured words not meant for mortal lips. Cole was being stalked, followed by a pair of predators awaiting the moment to strike. Another time he might have wondered why the demons hadn’t attacked yet, but there wasn’t enough left of the Homunculus to care. All that mattered was protecting Natalie and protecting his comrades.

Something lashed out from the dark and Cole slashed towards it with his enchanted knife. Steel parted a wormy tendril sending its spasming to the ground where it shot forward and wrapped around Cole’s legs, tripping him. Barely avoiding landing face-first, Cole struck hard, Natalie flopping limply to the ground beneath him. Snapping the wriggling tentacle with a kick, Cole pulled himself upright and turned to face the hungering dark. He was maybe two meters away from the tower entrance but that might as well have been two hundred. Even robbed of his magical senses and much of his wits, Cole knew what waited in the blackness.

A high-pitched drawling voice floated through the cave. “What aaaare you?”

Another voice, this one low and gurgling answered. “He zis Paladin, chozen of Death.”

The first voice scoffed, making a noise like a cracked flute. “Yes, yes, but beeneeaath thaaaat! I taaaste… I taaaste a cuuuurse.”

With a phlegmy dismissal the second voice remarked. “Zat zis Alukah. Poor hunter you muzt be, to mix two preyz.”

The hunter snarled, producing a whistling sound. “Noooo! Yoooou taaasted him! Loook beeeneath!”

Both demons were silent for a moment before the gurgler exclaimed. “ABOMINATION! What did zhe make? How could zhe do zis? Not juzt Paladin! Not juzt curze! Not mortal!”

The small part of Cole’s brain still functioning latched onto these words, their implications swirling into a half-formed mix of dread and confusion. Lips parting, he croaked out a question. “What am I?”

Neither demon answered, both seeming to hesitate, almost as if they were uncertain. It was then that something in the cave shifted. A subtle but unmistakable change that Cole knew all too well. The thick darkness thinned into a gray haze, hints of the skulking demons becoming visible. Years upon the open road and years of hunting what stalked the night told Cole what was happening, even if it was impossible. Dawn.

Deep deep beneath the rock and stone of the Alidonian Mountains, in a cave where blood was shed and monsters unleashed, the sun slowly rose. The two demons stood nearby; their terrible features coming into view. One was a mass of gangly bones, ruined flesh and twisted antlers; the other a mound of loam with wizened faces. Both Hellkyn turned their focus onto one of the tunnel mouths, where pale pre-dawn light shone brighter and brighter with every second. Cole watched as the monsters recoiled, drawing in upon themselves, becoming less malignant, more ephemeral.

Standing there, burned and half-broken Cole felt the kiss of early sunlight upon his face. The warm, inviting feeling made him nostalgic for things he’d never experienced. Cole imagined lying in a wheat field in high summer, his hands interlaced with another’s. He heard the laughter of young women as they ran along a beach of pearls. A cooling breeze swept down off rolling hills as Cole walked beside an old friend whose face he couldn’t see in the bright noonday sun. Another shift came in the light and Cole tasted other memories, these ones not imagined or imparted. Of himself standing at the city gates, holding an ancient piece of wood up in recrimination of reckless hate.

Cole barely noticed the crack and rumble of rock in the distance as the rising sun grew to its true blinding magnitude. Forcing himself to stare into its light, Cole caught hints of its origin. A figure stood in the tunnel mouth, dawn flowing from them in golden waves. From behind the small sun, another shape appeared, this one fast and agile, loping along the cave floor and growing with every step. Soon a behemoth of fur and fang fell upon the hunter demon, an axe scored with runes carried in a clawed hand striking the cowering Hellkyn in two. As a horned skull clattered to the ground and dissolved into boiling shadows, the sun-kissed beast struck the hungry loam, tearing through old wormy roots and letting dawn burn the fetid mass.

A thought pulled Cole from his transfixion and he spun about, finding Natalie, the parts of her not cloaked in his shadow, smoking in the brightness. Practically collapsing on top of her, the Homunculus did as he always had, and shielded those he loved. Slowly the light dimmed, decreasing from blinding to merely illuminating. Still cradling Natalie to his chest, Cole turned his head to see what was happening.

Standing atop a mound of sun-baked dirt was a hulking werewolf with gray-brown fur and a massive war-axe. A plain but sturdy hauberk covered the beast’s body, which jingled as it moved. Lupine snout tracking back and forth the werewolf growled. “I think one of them fled and collapsed the tunnel behind him.”

Walking swiftly towards Cole was the werewolf’s companion who was perhaps one of the most beautiful and disturbing women Cole had ever seen. Short and slender, she seemed made of porcelain, with long flaxen hair flowing about her head, its strands gleaming gold in the fiery gloriole radiating from the woman. Clad in simple sun-bleached robes, she held a long gnarled staff in one hand. Her face was painful to look upon, not just because of the corona surrounding her, but the features themselves seemed wrong. They were doll-like in their perfection, reminding Cole of a master sculpture's most fever-mad creations. She should have been inhumanly beautiful, but something about that face rendered her unnerving. It took Cole’s over-taxed mind a moment to realize what he saw that bothered him; the woman’s features were perfectly symmetrical.

Trying his best to shield Natalie without driving the stargent dagger deeper into him, Cole could only stare as the two strangers approached. A mournful look spread across the golden woman’s face, it too rendered unsettling by her perfection. In a soft warm voice she said. “I’m sorry we didn’t arrive earlier, sir Paladin.”

Throat dry, lips burnt, Cole rasped out the simplest of questions. “What?”

Now close enough that Cole could see into her eyes and the deep amber he found there, the woman said. “We’ve been sent to aid you, Paladin Cole. My grandmother and her kin sent Grettir and I to help with your task. Now please, let me see to your injuries.”

Mouthing the word ‘grandmother’ Cole pulled back from the approaching woman. “Your light, it burns, Natalie.”

The woman paused and seemed to notice the unconscious vampire in Cole’s arms. Softly she whispered. “So much suffering… all for what she holds inside of her.”

A ball of paler, more sterile light bubbled off the woman’s staff and her halo dimmed to near non-existence. Nearby the werewolf changed, his body shrinking down into his humanoid form. The ringmail he wore soon draped down over a wiry man with a long sharp face and hair the color of his wolf form’s fur. Adjusting his now ridiculously baggy armor and clothing, the werewolf scratched at his graying stubble before saying. “Can you stand? I’d rather not stay out in the open like this, besides your friends in the tower will react better with you introducing us.”

Forcing himself to his feet, Cole tried to ignore how literally every part of him hurt. The room swam, and the woman rushed forward catching him with surprising strength. Helping him towards the tower entrance, the Woman placed a hand on Cole’s forehead and the pain lessened moderately. For his part the Werewolf found Kit’s unconscious body and hoisted him up on one shoulder, his huge axe on the other. Trying to carry Natalie while the golden woman supported him, Cole finally asked the question his mind had been struggling to form. “Who are you?”

Grunting, the Werewolf said. “I’m Grettir, Grettir of Jokulstead but I’m just the hired muscle.”

Finally inside the tower, Cole slumped against its cold stone, laying Natalie beside him. Movement from the corner of his eye pulled his flagging attention to the tower’s staircase where a nervous-looking Yara stood dagger at the ready. Seeing her, he nodded slightly, an action that nearly pushed him into unconsciousness. The golden woman kneeled down in front of Cole placing warm soft hands on either side of his face. Forced to look into her eyes, Cole felt a wave of vertigo crash into him. He knew something was looking at him out of those eyes, something far greater than the petite woman before him.

Where the woman’s hands touched the burns on Cole’s skin slowly faded, pain returning with regrown nerves but then melting away as flesh healed. Smiling at him, the woman said. “My grandmother is right; you are a strange but righteous one. Let me fix some of the damage, get you to a point where we can discuss matters.”

Gripping her hand, summoning up what little of his strength remained, Cole repeated his question, this time more firmly. “Who are you?”

The slightly sad smile the woman wore became bemused. “I am Deborah; a watcher and warder of mortals. I am soul-child of Anthelioi Nanal, who is soul-child of Sister Sun. I am Seraph-blooded and Saint-marked. Now sent here to help you save this world.”