GoldenCat/BreakingShields
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The Breaking of the Shield
Spire.
Far away, it can be seen, raising from a city, invisible so far away, opaque silver in the diffuse light of the snowy day.
All paths from Windia lead to the Spire. Too close, too close from Windia. On behalf of their treaties, to stop incoming criminals from Windia - and, in truth, to prepare for any incoming invasions - Spire had its defense grid set high. On the mountains facing Windia and two forts closer between it and the city, Alabaster forts stood brimming with power. Amaranthyne had given them the means of stopping Windian criminals and Hanslanti ships - smaller spirits, many-bladed shields, that stood on silver halos around the forts, godly walkways, patrolling, together with winged guards, lending the Windians' sight an uncanny ability to feel when any trespasses.
But the shield lady of Whiteshield was dead, and the shields were now glinting black, covered in black flames.
And only the remains of wings could be seen of the WIndian guards.
Raitons, on the other hand, patrolled over it.... larger than usual, glinting with steel....
Over it all, another part of the wonder that was the interference of Gods on Whiteshield, defiled and darkened, the snow fell... immaculate.
And under it, two ladies white as snow had evaded the forts on the outer mountains, and now within enemy territory, prepared to strike the first blow of a war...
Valencia Silverstar: She looks to the deathknight, nodding toward the fort on the higher ground, giving it a commanding view of the countryside about it. "If you believe in luck, this is the time to wish for it. Before it's too late to invoke such things."
She wasn't armored in plate or chain, though the leotard she wore -- so alike to the Dark Angel's -- seemed more than mere cloth. Winter hung sheathed at her side, her large silvery wings folded tightly at her back, a drape of fabric wrapped about her shoulders and neck, hanging down behind her, around her wings, protecting the exposed wings just a bit.
It was said that the Silver Angel did not fear the cold of the north. That she was at home in it, soaring through the skies clad in little more than what her sense of modesty demanded, and the feathers she received hundreds of years ago when those wings had first flourished on her back. The long brown boots and gloves, stiched up the sides, at least, looked fairly snug.
And not enough to protect her in this weather, to dispell the stories. They'd covered a good deal of ground on foot, apparently unseen. The Silver Angel had learned how to sneak past enemies as well, in her time. Now they are in cover, for the moment.
"Do you sense any specific dead? Nemissaries? Deathknights?"
- She feels it, around the white fort.... ghosts. On the raitons, for sure. But dematerialized as well, flying around... and the magic around there, certainly... which kept the spirits flying. That was a Manse...
Vorpal: The Pale Angel has, once again, returned to that curious mood of silent brooding during which she says little, at least beyond the short, soft-spoken commands she occasionally gives to her staff.
Once again she is clad in her nondescript mercenary leathers. The cloak draped about her shoulders is the same she has always worn, but now the black velvet has miraculously changed to dirty grey, to better match the snowy surroundings. If not for her white skin and the red eyes that stare intently out from under the folds of her hood, she could be any mortal warrior who had found a recruitment among the ranks of Windian soldiers. It is a drastic contrast to the flashiness displayed by her fellow commander.
Once again tapping into the power granted to her by her heritage, she tunes her senses to encompass the land of the dead as well. Raising her head slightly, she peers carefully at the fortifications, her eyes seeking for any detail worth noticing, any weakness that might bring them a step closer to victory.
Valencia Silverstar: Valencia also took a look, steel-gray eyes peering out at the thing. It would be interesting to see if they'd kept the fort up from the last time she'd beheld it. The undead did not typically bother to maintain the dwellings of the living, she thought.
- Just as with the Silver Angel, Vorpal feels... not the Manse, but she feels the ghosts much more accurately. Within the fort. Without, flying close to the raitons, some within the raitons. And some in corpses inside.... many of them, easily as many as the raiding party.
It was easy enough to cultivate ghosts, it seems...
Vorpal: "No shadowland here", she says softly, her voice absolutely calm, one that would be more fitting for pondering a next move in a friendly game of Gateway rather than making preparations for a lightning raid. "There are some nemissary scouts riding the raitons. More riding the the walking dead..." She frowns, her gaze still scanning the lengths of the enemy stronghold. "A lot more. I'd say there are almost as many as we have troops."
Her lips creep up ever so slightly, a tiny shade of a wicked smile. "That can be turned into an advantage."
Valencia Silverstar: "Oh?" The Lunar asks, a bit of snow sliding down one folded wing as she shifts, disturbing the brush near her. "We were prepared for that, of course."
Vorpal: "Walking dead do not feel fear", Vorpal responds. "Ghosts do, if you motivate them properly. A sudden scare in the beginning of the raid will throw them into a disarray, and they won't have time to mount a proper defense before we have taken them down."
She pauses, then tilts her head slightly, examining the ground between them and the fort "The problem would be to somehow get close enough quickly..."
Valencia Silverstar: "Exactly the reason we are doing this as we are." Valencia states, then squints out at the fortress. "We might be able to cross that distance, I am not so sure about our men. Perhaps after we create a disturbance..."
Vorpal: At least does Vorpal shift her gaze away from the fort, turning to regard the Lunar with a mildly mischievous mien. "Could you carry me there?"
Valencia Silverstar: Valencia blinks for a moment, going back to that night, several nights ago. And Selina's envious gaze upon the other Abyssal.
Now, that might actually make her want to fight me.
"Yes, I could." She sizes Vorpal up. "You can't weigh that much."
Vorpal: "Don't ask", the Pale Angel responds, shaking her head and smiling slightly. Then she grows grim once more, and returns to the topic at hand.
"All right, shall we go up to the woods' edge on foot, and take flight from there?" Extending one hand, she points at the base of the wall and the section of clear ground that separates the fortification from the trees.
"Remember, they are anticipating aerial attacks here, so they expect us to come from up to down. But if we take flight from the woods' edge and climb from there to the wall, we would be attacking them from down to up. That should let us avoid most of what they have in store for us."
Valencia Silverstar: "Hmm, that is correct." Valencia says, looking at the fort. "That might work. Or it might not. In any case, let us try climbing the rampart. I do not see many on patrol there."
Valencia thinks for a moment, then smirks at the deathknight. "You climb. Perhaps I will shift to my other form to fly in another way. They can't all be on the lookout for my totem, I rarely use it, and have not since the invasion started."
Then she sneaks off, heading around to another side of the fort, slightly off-angle to the route Vorpal is taking, taking care to keep behind cover as much as possible, her footfalls marking her as one experienced in stealth in the wilderness.
Afterall, those five months she had disappeared when Luna chose her, had given her a good lesson in the art, nevermind her life since.
Vorpal: "Just a moment", she whispers, crouching down and grabbing the Lunar by the shoulder when she attempts to go. "Didn't you listen at all? You are going to carry me up to the wall. Can you do that?"
Valencia Silverstar: Starting, she turns her head. "Very well. Of course, we cannot split up so easily then..." A somewhat wild light enters her eyes as she gauges the distance, and the Pale Angel's height and possible weight. Yes, she could manage that. She'd have to be quick after, though. "Come on then." The Windian opens her arms, ready to carry Vorpal, oddly the same as Selina carried Moon out of Spire. Better than slinging her over her shoulder like a sack, at any rate.
Vorpal: "Right away", she says, unsheathing her sword. Taking a moment to center herself, she then runs her finger alongside the black blade, faintly shimmering motes of crimson essence trailing after gloved hand's wake, drawing mystic sigils along the soulsteel surface as it goes. The moment she reaches the sword's tip, the sigils flicker and vanish, leaving the weapon black once more. Black... and somehow... hungry.
"All right, let's go", she then whispers and, without a slighest moment of hesitation, she steps into the other woman's embrace.
Valencia Silverstar: With a strength that is somewhat surprising given what people have seen of her build -- mostly covered by clothing as it was until this day -- the Windian easily hoists the other woman up, not drawing her sword yet. That, she will do at the last moment.
Valencia la Silverstar spreads her great silvery wings, hurling herself into the air with but a slight puffing noise, and moving through the air toward the fort with a few powerful wingbeats, seeming more like an owl than an eagle for a moment. The trees blur by -- she flies underneath the tops of the boughs, her excellent control keeping them aloft and free of entanglement as the wall seems to rush up at Vorpal as if it is going to crash into them.
They arrive without seemingly anyone noticing them. Valencia puts Vorpal down, then draws her sword quickly, swiftly, the silvery-white blade flashing out to one side as she moves a bit to the side. The Windian looks to Vorpal, ready to go up the moment the deathknight starts climbing. Soon, their troops will follow, once the outer defenses have been disrupted.
Almost as the wall is about to hit them, Valencia veers up sharply, and with another wingbeat or two, propels them both up to the level of the wall. ...And right in front of a patrolling guard. As she lands, the woman knocks him off the rampart with swift kick of her foot, putting the deathknight down a second later, and drawing her own sword, quick as lightning.
Vorpal: The moment her feet touch the stone, Vorpal drops into a fighting crouch, smooth like a large white cat. "Let's create some distraction", she says, Mournful Kiss flickering in the air as she nimbly switches her grip of the weapon's handle. Her eyes scan their surroundings quickly, her mind working in an attempt to decide where to start.
- The ground beneath the angels is slippery, icy.
The body falls to the ground with a loud cracking sound on the icy wood below.
Vorpal feels the ghosts stir. She feels them crying. She feels her kin all around her. Above, on the great floating halo, the shield-spirits crackle obscenely as they begin to hover down, pillars of black flame surrounded by shields... and behind the shields, a sunburst of blades.
The top of the wall is not very large - not enough for three people to walk side-by-side, and the covering so people do not fall goes about up to the Angel's waists. Eight flagpoles line the walls of the Fort, two per direction, where once stood the banners of Spire and Whiteshield.
Now, only the Thurible stands in them.
Not far from the Pale Angel, a stair goes down to the patium below, then down into the Fort, which is a single spire upwards, with many windows from which to shoot arrows and spells from.... with four other minor spires around it, in a pentacle arrangement.
Atop the Fort, two other guards come running towards them, four zombies behind each...
And the shield spirits begin their descent...
Vorpal: "See if you can do anything about those shields", Vorpal says calmly, eyeing the approaching guards, evaluating the distance between them.
Slowly she begins to straighten up, shedding the air of a guerilla warrior like an invisible cloak and revealing the fearsome figure underneath, the terrible Pale Angel preparing to do battle. The black sunburst of her Abyssal Caste glints into existence on her white forehead, and, suddenly, terror fills the air. It flows from her like mist, spreading out into her surroundings, filling every crack and nook, weighing down the shoulders of any who would dare to approach her.
Valencia Silverstar: Valencia spots the shields immediately, focusing on them as the cornerstones of the place's defense. Vorpal hasn't been down more than a few seconds before the Silver Angel hurtles toward them, Winter arcing out in a blow toward the nearest shield as her anima flames to life around her, a silvery-flare that acts as if it were wind instead of fire, her iconic eagle spreading its wings about the Lunar.
- ... And as they do, Silverstar's unit begins flying from the trees, going all towards the fort...
Valencia strikes at one of the shields, that twists in the air, and the many blades behind the shield explode in the air... flowing away in dark fire, all in front of Valencia's blade, trying hard to stop her in a tunnel of blades and fire...
But the blade of ice goes through it, shattering the spirit's material form utterly....
All around the Angels, fear touches the air. Valencia Silverstar feels it, even if it is not directed to her. And all those who oppose the avatar of victory feel the same. The pace to the Nemessaries running toward her begin to get more and more slow... and only the zombies keep their pace.
Each is no more than thirteen yards from her, the guards and their four zombies...
Vorpal: A part of her warrior's awareness picking up the terrible destruction the Silver Angel is wreaking above them, the Pale Angel lifts her sword and glances around. Quickly does she evaluate the distance between the two groups of undead on her both sides... and then she is suddenly moving, her grey cloak flowing around her like dirty snow. She dashes to her left, loping low and quick, covering the seven yards between her and the enemy within a moment. Her boot slamming against the edge of the stone palisade for support, she lauches herself into air, pouncing at the ghost guard, stabbing her sword down at her opponent's midsection like a black lance.
The red glyphs suddenly flare into new life along the length of the black blade as Mournful Kiss rams home. The sword yowls in triumph as the ghost is sent flying at its lesser comrades. A shimmering trail of crimson motes fly in the blade's wake as she pulls the weapon back for a second blow. This one is a mighty overhead chop at the sprawling mass of corpses - perhaps it is aimed at the nemissary again, perhaps she is swinging away at the pile in general...
- Mounrful Kiss destroy the Nemessary and one of the Zombies, hurting severely another below her.... but the Nemessary had only fallen above two of the zombies - the two ones behind that rank are still standing, and jump towards Vorpal, hungrily...
The other Nemessary grips an executioner's axe and rushes towards he Pale Angel, urging his Zombies to him...
Vorpal: She shifts from offensive into a defensive stance within an eyeblink, Mournful Kiss singing its macabre song as it hovers ready, just in case the walking corpses would pose a threat. Her experienced eye reveals that their blows won't penetrate her armor, however, and so she lets them be... for now. Better conserve power for other purposes.... such as handling the nemessary approaching from behind.
- Above, on the Halo, they pick the wind, and from the wind, are formed.
A flying squadron of ghosts, moliated with wings and power.... each a holy angel of a sterile faith, readying themselves for the flying team of Valencia Silverstar...
And yet... they all hesitate.
Even in their fanatic heart, they all feel... fear. Crippling, paralysing fear.
And the Shield-Spirit closest to Valencia Silverstar explodes in motion, a myriad of blades spinning towards the Silver Angel....
Valencia Silverstar: After she dispatches one of the strange spirit-shields, Valencia is suddenly beset by a flurry of blows from the next closest one. With a series of blurred parries and riposites, the Windian stops all but one of the strikes from even touching her. The last goes in, but the wound does not hinder her.
Much.
Winter is sparkling now, as if tiny crystalline flakes of snow dance closely about it, as the Lunar regards the last shield, recovering from their attacks. The light reflecting off the sparkles suddenly turns into a more consistant sheen as the Windian moves in on the damaged shield, striking twice with all the speed she can muster, her sword making no sound as it cuts through the air as cleanly as the finest razor -- and into the material of shield.
After the strikes, Valencia moves back as far as she can, making sure that neither of the others can easily close in on her.
- It parries one attack, but slower, lets another in... weakened, trying to follow... and failing.
Vorpal: Grimacing slightly as yet another of the walking deads' blows glance harmlessly off her armor's powerful protection, the Ghost-Blooded disengages from these foes. Leaving the corpses behind, she instead rushes to meet the other nemissary's charge with her own. In mid-stride she launches her body into a spinning motion, her movement suddenly much quicker than it should be. First comes the horizontal cut, timed to catch the Nemissary's head just as it comes into range. A trail of shadowy afterimages dance in the air as she then swings, spins, jabs and spins again, Mournful Kiss scraping at the stone, drawing streaks of yellow sparks and flying debris with each slash she performs.
- The shields begin to come towards Valencia, three in total.
The Windian troops fly foward.
Two of its sorcerers begin to cast their spells.
The ghosts come towards the Windian troops, and blows begin to be exchanged.
Four Zombies still come towards Vorpal... far away, moving slowly...
And then, something comes rolling over the wall.
Something made of many arms stitched together. A chain of arms that makes a snake... so many hands around it, two trails of eyes on its back, making it so it sees all. They blink, the eyes.
The obscene snake of arms goes through the zombies, making them fall, then rises up, eyes that are two gigantic rubies, masterfully crafted, eyeing Vorpal... as a mouth of hands opens. Eight pairs of hands opening the snake's mouth as if it was some obscene flower, dozens of sharp metal spikes on them... a flower of iron and death.
And the angels begin to hear, within the Fort... a choir... a crystalline choir of innocent voices...
Valencia Silverstar: They approach her...and she answers their challenge. With one powerful beat of her wings the Windian hurls herself at the shields, streaking past them, her white and silver-bladed sword cutting into each one as she does in a shining arc that shatters the ambient light and throws the shards back in a thousand diffuse beams, softer than they were before. Her anima whips the very around them all, buffeting the shields strongly with the force of her passage.
- .... and as she does so, she slices the spirit clean, cutting through the shield, through the soul, and making it fall away, burning its shield and swords before it reaches the ground....
Vorpal recognizes some of the harmonics on the choir that she can faintly hear in the Fort... the wailing voices of the dead are weapons, as she knew. She had heard so much from her mother.... and had seen more than enough sonic devices being used by her Mistress. Although the effects were unknown to her, this is certainly a form of necrotic weaponry just waiting to be taken out of the Fort....
Vorpal: "Tch..."
Not quite yet breathing heavily from the fighting she has done, the Pale Angel takes a step backwards. With one hand she makes a quick swing of her sword, shaking the gore free off her blade and sending it splattering onto the stone.
What the... what is that thing?
The abomination of writhing hands slithers ever closer, and despite herself, the Ghost-Blooded cannot help but to shudder at the sight of its unfurling maw. She had certainly seen many a macabre war engine during her service to the Lover, but this was among the most disgusting she had encountered so far.
A quick glance up to the sky reveals that Valencia has the situation well in hand. A winged commander is a good leader for a winged unit of warriors - there is little Vorpal needs to do up there.
Good, she thinks grimly, lifting her sword once more. Because it's time for me to sin some more.
And suddenly, she dances backwards, Mournful Kiss little more than a black shadow whistling in a series of ritual cuts through the air. She drops into a defensive stance, too graceful, too agile... the beginning stage of her favored maneuver, the Death Sentence.
And then she is moving again, shifting to the second stage, which is an all-out offense. Her anima bursting into cold life around her, her sword sending a blazing arch through the air, she launches herself at the monster, focusing all of her might into a single sweeping cut.
The thing does move as Vorpal comes, but her strike wounds it deeply... making the thing scream and stagger backwards in pain. But although its front is heavily ruptured, it still stands... hands and an ooze that once was blood pouring from it, while the serpent moves back... and from deep behind its maw, comes a jet of something... something dark and toxic, smoking in contact with air, and shooting straight to Vorpal..... showing how it was a weapon in a Fort made to stop flying foes...
Vorpal: The maneuver is called Death Sentence because of the sheer power it can bring to bear when she attacks - there are few things that can stand up to the black blade lit by the searing white flame. This creature, apparently, is one of them.
Oh, damn --
Death Sentence is also defense combined with offense, allowing its wielder to shift from one stance to another quickly like a thought.
Strong and agile like a whip-cord, she dances backwards, whirls around, Mournful Kiss blurring a full circle to defend its mistress. She slams the sword flat-first against the jet of acid, her blow so powerful, the sword's momentum so great that the sheer pressure of it forces the foul liquid off its course.
And that it does. The blow does not only push the acid off the course, it actually hurls the entire jet backwards, the sheer pressure cutting its way through the poison, up, up, upstream along the foul black river, back to its source...
- And the thing begins to stagger back, yelling in a shrieking, inhuman voice....
Above Vorpal, the battle becomes more engaged.
Two spells come out, and Obsidian Butterflies cut through the snow and the wind,
cut through monstrous ghosts and raitons...
Screams, blood, the snowflakes of shattered souls and obsidian butterflies rain down...
Valencia Silverstar: Wheeling about from her previous attack, witnessing the fatally wounded shield crash to ground, Valencia decides to close with the spirits once more. Winter twinkles once more in the light, and the Windian's flowing hair and wings mingle a bit, producing a silvery display of movement with a gust of wind from the west.
The Lunar charges again -- breaking out of her tentative hover with a burst of her anima -- moving so fast that argent afterimages imprint on the vision of all who behold her, daiklave trailing a blur of movement as it arcs toward the first shield. The weapon comes down quick and hard as a sudden onset of the scythe of winter, cold air seeming to freeze in its shining wake. Her arm twists in odd ways as the strike lands, making the parry even more impossible for the spirit, and then Valencia is arcing her flight off toward the other shield, climbing a few feet, then diving back down, moonsilver weapon glittering fell and cold in the additional light her windy anima.
Vorpal: Careful to avoid the drops of acid splattered all across the palisade, Vorpal grits her teeth. Her legs spread wide for balance, she instinctively hunches her shoulders as the glittering wings of a rain of obsidian butterflies tinkle and shatter all around her, but she does not shift her gaze from her enemy.
This is taking longer than she had hoped. Whatever else she might say about the Bishop's forces, they certainly knew how to build their war machines. And every second she wastes fighting against this machine, another machine gains to start up within the keep, accompanied by that... choir of souls.
But I'd better take care of this one first!
The decision steels her resolve, and she leaps forth again, risking it all to a single, lightning-swift jab at the maw of the creature...
- The acid burning all around Vorpal shrouds them in mist.
A noxious, toxic mist.
It was obviously meant to strike targets not at the walls - as Vorpal can feel it eating the earth beneath her very feet, as she strikes the creature...
beheading its great head, making it fall....
Eva: The ranks of the undead are broken by the Obsidian Butterflies, the Windians forces push forth, coming closer to the angels...
In special of their commander, Valencia la Silverstar! Shield in one hand, spear on another, the Magic University graduate, wielding the gift of Essence from Windia flies forth, the essence of the elements crackling on the tip of her spear as she charges towards one of the creatures, red hair blazing amidst the crackling energy - she was but a mortal, but the Magical University gave them the ability to channel their essence and use sorcery - but outside of a single trick, Eva went the way of the Northwind academy - as could be shown by her crackling lighting, as she pushes a Force Blow through the shield and to the flames beneath, to quench it with wind and lighting!
Vorpal: "Sssssht."
The creature is still falling as Vorpal is already sprinting along the palisade, a comet of white flames, heading for the nearest set of stairs that would lead her to the main keep.
Leonas Du Mistlav: Leonas Du Mistlav did not even look down to see the Pale Angel - she had called herself avatar of victory? She had said her authority superceded all? Now she would show as much to them! In his mind was only helping marshall Silverstar... as he lets go of an incantation, one farvored by the Dragon-Blooded of the academy in surgical strikes such as these - to strike at Silverstar's assailant and destroy him without so much as touching his superior.
He finishes the gestures, and closes his eyes, seeing in his mind's eye, knowing where his superior was, where the corrupted spirit was.
All is Essence.
From Essence, I create my weapons.
Of Essence, are my foes.
Their Essence, I shall rend.
He outstretches his palm... and it shines in a most vivid hue, like a pice of the purest ice lit by the sun... and then, something burts through it like a fish breaking the thin ice coat of a river. From it, come a flock of icy birds, all screeching as they go towards the shield at Silvertar's assailant, each going through it, too fast, too many, for the swords and the flames to touch as they become more and more thin as they go... until they are little more than bird-shaped daggers, breaching the shield in so many places.
... wounded, both shield-spirirts become incorporeal, disappearing in the air around the Windians, trying to run somewhere to lick their wounds....
Vorpal: "You handle the enemy out there!" comes the Pale Angel's unmistakeable voice wafting up from the palisades. "I'll shut down that voice!"
Valencia Silverstar: As the shield spirits disappear from sight, Valencia reflects that most could not see through her willingness to fight to the end. Nearly exhausted, she was, but they'd turned away first.
Hovering as steadily as before, the Lunar suddenly picks out and dives at one of the ghosts, sparkling silvery-white sword spearing through the corpus in one smooth motion, windy aura seemingly tearing at the spirit as she impales it.
????: He comes leaping from one of the windows of the fort, and his anima flares vivid icy-blue. Crystals swirl around him, as an icy swan comes to life!
Picking the feahers of the swan, mid-jump, still upside-down in the air, the blonde Dragon-Blooded throws them at the women above... at Eva and Valencia Silverstar, two on each, before landing on one of the lookout towers on the walls, standing tall, long blonde hair flapping on the wind.
"Sorry about the delay..."
Vorpal: She had planned to jump down from the walls, over the mangled creature that is sputtering acid all across the courtyard and to rush into the fortress itself, to shut down whatever is making that noise. The newcomer, however, ruins her plans.
Tch...
Having already been taking a running start for the leap, he screeches to a halt, lifting her gaze just in time to see the crystal feathers flicker through the air.
Another enemy to join the fight. Where does the Bishop get all of them anyways?
All of this flashes through her mind in a split-second, her thoughts already adjusting her plans to meet this new threat.
For a war commander, there can be no hesitation. She turns and dashes along the wall, towards the Dragon-Blooded enemy. She raises her hand even as she goes, and a dozen flickering motes of light come to life around it. They pulse and tremble, then burst into white-hot streams of pure spite, streaking across the parapet and towards the Dragon-Blooded with the sound of water hissing fiercely on hot stones.
????: The Dragon-Blooded dodges, the winds about him freezing the hate...
"You are the Pale Angel, right? Prettier than I had been told..."
Then, he hears the doors to the Fort open. And his eyes widen, as he shouts, "No, you idiots, DON - -"
A little too late, as the few Nemessaries within open the doors, and rush out...
And feel the acid in their faces.
The smell of decaying flesh takes the courtyard of the Fort as Vorpal feels the acid takes both their bodies and souls...
- From the Fort, they come...
The souls of seven boys, moliated together into one entity of terrible angelic aesthetics, beautiful in an artistic sense and totally unsettling in any human sense. It hovers, wings made of their organs and seven mouths echoing together in a crystalline beautific face, singing, singing, singing their pain...
Crying, crying ... in a choir of pain...
Their voices tell their story, of when they died, of how they died, of their pain, of their sorrow. Of how much they suffer for their faith, for their belief, of how much their suffer, never having knowing anything else....
And their suffering touches the Hearts of all who listen, making them stop, filling their hearts and souls with nothing but their sorrow...
????: Too many of them, all around...
But only two Exalted, Celestial Exalted whose animas burned, like the palest Moonlight, like the underworld sun. Pale dames before him, beautiful, powerful, without mercy.
He had to try his best hand.
A storm of ice explodes around him, sending taking four feathers, ice swirling around them until they are barbed knives, throwing four, two on of the angels...
Vorpal: She cannot help it. Her head turns at the sound of the poor souls, her step slowing, her heart shivering under the onslaught of sorrow. So sad, so hopeless, so...
...so much of a lie.
She knows this in her mind, but to make her heart acknowledge the truth is a different matter entirely.
The Dragon-Blood's attack she acknowledges with little more than a glance, reflexively activating one of her powers as a Ghost-Blooded, letting the blows to fly through a phantom body.
Valencia Silverstar: The voices try to rend her heart -- they even make some progress in doing so, causing the Windian to momentarily have her head filled with visions of desolation, hopelessness.
They clear quickly enough, and the general descends, wings spread to soften the controlled fall, Winter ready to stop that thing from affecting the troops any further. Her face is a mask of suppressed fury warring with pity as she strikes out at it, first one blow, than another, continuing until it is dead. "Let me give you rest, children of the grey night."
- Winter cuts through the threads, and the children cry, their tears streaking winter as it cuts the threads that bind them together, break the engine of oblivion and sends them to their rest...
Vorpal: I've lived my life alone.
She grits her ethereal teeth, her eyes scanning the battle taking place in the skies above.
My heart is protected by a shell of soulsteel.
Her hand strays to the hard, cold breast of her armor, gloved fingers resting lightly over the etchings in black metal.
There is no chink in my armor.
She closes her eyes.
You're not going to find any weakness there.
The Pale Angel is not just a rank. It is a concept that trancends all ranks, a role to be played, a task to fulfill.
You're not
Her eyes flash open, red fierce and deadly on a white face. "This is a lie! " she screams on the top of her lungs, every word laced with the authority of the war commander, "A lie of an enemy who knows he is about to be defeated! Laugh at its face, sons and daughters of Windia, for it is the dying cry of your foes!"
The Pale Angel is someone who holds things together. She moves up and down the military hierarchy to fulfill holes where they appear. If the army needs a champion, she becomes one. If the army needs a flank guard, she will be one. If the army needs a drill sergeant, she will be one.
"Squadron one! " She snaps, and her voice is a whip that cracks up to the sky, "Protect the Silver Angel! Other squadrons, gather up! Sweep up the enemy and take them down!"
If the army needs a commander, she will be one.
"Lieutenants Leonas and Eva! " She throws up her arm, her ethereal cloak flapping with the sudden motion. Her fingers pointing at the renegade Dragon-Blooded, she shouts: "Get this filth out of my sight!"
The Pale Angel is someone who ascertains victory. It is simple as that.
Eva: "Gladly! "
Not even stopping to staunch her bleeding wound, Lieutenant Eva smiles as she descends towards the Dragon-Blooded, shimmering with power, her spear charged with energy... normally, she could not reach him, he was out of the limit of most thrown weapons and the reach of melee strikes... but as a Windian, she flies, and with a spear in hand, charges, all of her movement and a stroke to the heart....
????: His best strike, and it simply... passed through the Pale Angel.
Their trump card, and the Silver Angel went through it with ease.
By the time they could even react and come out of the Fort, their forces above were already outmatched and cut through.
And now, he... was still alive?
He could feel his life leaving him as the spear bit deep down... so close to his heart...
Above, no ghosts came close to Valencia as her troops covered her. The ghosts were taken apart...
And soon, he would be the only one left, and it would not take more than a little pushfor him to join the ghosts.
The Silver Angel, so magnificent...
The Pale Angel, radiating fear, darkness, victory.
Clutching the spear, the Dragon-Blooded knelt, coughing blood, trying not to pass out...
"I... I... surren...der..."
Vorpal: "On your belly, Dragon-Blooded", Vorpal commands, her voice no longer echoing as she materializes once more. "spread out your arms. Staunch your own blood. Lieutenant Eva, kill him if he tries something."
She turns slightly raising her gaze and her voice alike. "Lieutenant Leonas! You know what to do! One group to sweep up the stragglers! One group to help the wounded and gather up the dead! One group to get the oil caskets from the camp!"
Eva: Eva throws the Dragon-Blooded from the tower to the walkway below, her spear firmly in place close to his neck.
Valencia Silverstar: The wounds red under her silvery leotard, red where it does not cover, nor her boots and gloves, Valencia Silverstar turns from the dead obscenity. Her steel grey eyes shine balefully at the fortress about her, and her free hand goes to her side, holding one wound. She looks toward the Pale Angel, her voice level. "Well done."
The soldiers are performing well enough, so she does not add her voice to the orders.
Vorpal: "Good job with the shields", the Pale Angel responds with soft tones. "Your wounds?"
Valencia Silverstar: "You kept that...thing...off my back as well." She replies, then rubs one of the wounds. "Doubtlessly, I would have received worse otherwise."
"I can deal with these." The Lunar says simply, not betraying the pain she feels with her tone. She pauses for a moment, and the visible wounds shift, flesh smoothly flowing to cover them, knitting together till only bruises remain.
Vorpal: "Nice trick", Vorpal comments, and there is no humor in her voice. It is as if something is bothering her, wiping away the usual slanted smirk and leaving only grim set of jaw behind. "We must finish quickly here. We'll take our own casualties back with us for proper burial. Whatever we leave behind here, we will burn. It will clean things up, ruin their weaponry and make sure none of these..." She makes a vague gesture at the crushed remains of the walking dead. "...will be used again."
As if as an afterthought, she pulls her hood futher down her face, to better cover the black sigil of her Caste. "Make sure the men clean their wounds well. They have been fighting people who have been practically dead for a very long time."
Valencia Silverstar: "Indeed." She turns to the rest of her troops, looking them up and down, making sure their speed is sufficient. Valencia is not a commander in the habit of yelling at her troops unless she has to. "A pity I do not have more essence left. Sorcery, I guess, can wait."
Vorpal: "I suppose so", Vorpal agrees. Having sheathed her sword, she is now pulling the folds of her cloak forward, to better cover her armored form.
She is silent for a long moment, a still figure veiled in dirty grey. When she speaks again, she seems to sink a little deeper into the folds of her cloak, her very being deflating ever so slightly. "Once we're done, you should lead the men back ahead of me. There is something I need to do here first. I'll catch up with you later."
Valencia Silverstar: "That is not particularly safe." The Windian states, then looks at Vorpal oddly. "What exactly is it you need to do?"
Vorpal: "Repent", she responds, and something in her voice echoes chillingly. Huddling under her cloak, she turns her head slightly, her hood covering her face just enough to let one blood-red eye look out from the shadows. There is a feverish gleam to that gaze, an unexplainable edge of danger - not the powerful, hand-felt danger the Pale Angel could spread out into the hearts of her foes, but something much more vague, a sense of unease that is struggling to rise to the surface.
It is weaker than the Pale Angel's own aura of danger, that is true. But then again, it is so much easier to fear something that you do not know or understand.
"Today, I have sinned", she explains. "I often do, but today more than usual. I must repent, and it'll be safer if I do it away from the rest of you."
Valencia Silverstar: Valencia looks penetratingly at the Pale Angel, thinking for a moment. Wondering what she could have sinned against, then the realization comes. Simple enough to figure out, once she remembers what the woman is. And what she comes from.
"I see." Her tone is quieter, so only the deathknight can hear. "You went against those who made you."
Vorpal: ' "Close enough", the Pale Angel responds with a joyless chuckle. "The world wants so many things from us Chosen. Whenever you wish to have your own head, even once, there will always be a price to pay. Being Exalted only means that you'll get to exchange a shackle of iron and brass to one of gold and silver. A fancy thing, to be sure, but in the end, it's just a shackle..." She pauses, thinking for a moment before adding: "And sometimes, you'll find out that the new shackle is even shorter than the one made of iron and brass."
Valencia Silverstar: "And what it does not want, it demands." Valencia replies with equal grimness, thinking that this is but the encore to something worse. "Shackles of remaining hidden from the Realm."
Yes, cousin.
Your kind has angered the Realm against us in Windia.
And you, perhaps most of all.
Your claim will rouse them. They know it approaches.
"Not merely shackles. Sometimes a swift sword." She looks at the fortress about her, watching their troops for a moment, then turns her steel-grey gaze back to Vorpal. "You and the Dark Angel -- and what I think the Dark Angel may do when this is done -- and your cohorts in death, you all rouse the Realm."
They know of you, Selina de Windia.
You have not fooled them well enough.
"To the North will the Wyld Hunt come soon."
Vorpal: "Then let them come", is all Vorpal says as she strides away, the hems of her cloak fluttering slightly in the wind.
And you do realize Lord Durant will use that opportunity to eliminate you too, yes?
Well... let them come.
- - Back to Fourth Movement
- - Back to A Dance of Angels
