Moirstyria slowly awoke feeling her naked pallid feet hanging in the air, her wrists aching from the unyielding grip of the vine-ropes growing forth the domed ceiling of the small hut of flattened, curled tree bark. Though while she felt the cold air of the final season on her body, as she looked down while groaning with the cloth knitted around her mouth, she felt a bit relieved that her leathery attire still hugged her body.

“Good morning, dear child of the One Who Carries Us to the End.” As soon as her muffled grunt reached beyond the sheet hanging over the oblong doorway, her captor the quite gracious looking lievhe walked in with folded arms and an exultant look on his face. “It has been a while since my blades clashed with an equals. Though it is a shame that circumstances denied the satisfaction of ceasing their thirst for your blood.” Moirstyria grunted and fruitlessly lurched at her captor, eliciting a gloating almost childish smile from him.

“One day, they shall taste your sweet blood little dragon. But for now, I’ll need your aid as much as you need mine to defeat our common foe.” The hatred in her eyes shifted into confusion.

“Her taint still lingers in your heart, in your mind, in your soul.” He reached into his pocket and brought out a vial of glowing rouge and twisted off its small top. “Inhale it deeply, then I’ll take the gag out.” When he reached within a few steps, Moirstyria squirmed in her bindings.

A combination of fear and coveting appeared on her pale white face adorned by the onyx scales near her tapering jaw as the taint wrestled with her true self it repressed. “Stay still or I push this vial into your nostrils.” The black locks of her hair violently danced around as she pulled her head away while his palm lit up in an ethereal glow, and the fluid within the translucent confines vaporized, the caustic fruity fumes swirled towards her small nostrils.

Losing his patience, his free hand reached for her head and he roughly straightened it whilst pulling the vial close to her face forced staring down at the ground. “There. Hope you won’t mind this much your excellency.” He added mockingly.

As the fumes floated into her small nostrils, her hung body began to squirm once again as an immense pain assaulted her whole being. She screamed into the cloth firmly coiled around her dark lips, and tears streamed out from her eyes and then when he released his grip, her head slumped forward and remained so. A deep sorrow nestled into her and her eyes for a moment lost their light as she felt something profoundly precious was taken from her, something which clung, rooted itself into her body and soul like some parasite.

Then the repressed memories of the previous month flowed back, his uncle standing over him repeatedly inquiring if she shall be fine on the mission conferred to her by her own father. Months ago the two met up in Nammildum – a smaller colonial town south west to Nidumiath – where Augermil explained that one of her siblings became the victim of the Infaerni preying on the dignified, upstanding titled the Beautiful One who turns her victims towards arrogance, self-deification.

And most importantly when it takes over their bodies, she employs wicked spells of the mind the gather worshippers for herself. The Whisperers’ – a clandestine order of assassins and spies of the Empire – were sent out to the largest colonial cities to deem which one of his children became a victim of the Beautiful One.

“Nnmn nph!” As her mind cleared from the taint of the Beautiful One, she remembered the aevhen man uttering her name and a prayer for her to awake from the trance she was thrusted into the moment she entered the range of the city.

“I’ll see you mind cleared now fully.” The proud lievhe said as he undone the tight knot at the back of her head and pulled the cloth stuffed into her mouth out. “Before we come to any deal, what is your name lievhe?”

He chuckled a little hearing her now almost emotionless, husky voice utter those words with a confidence he detested. “Now you sound just like your siblings.” The vine-ropes severed though remained tightly coiled around her wrists as she landed firmly on the ground kicking up the leaves littering the floor. “Cattuivar by the way. Though as you said before we come to any deal, we should see Him so that you don’t lose yourself once we step out from the forest.”

At first, she raised her eyebrow, then realized that her memories were cut off the moment they stepped out from the forest. “Who is this Him?” She asked while slowly following after Cattuivar.

**

She followed Cattuivar through the village nestled deep in the forest. While her eyes remained strained on the back of her captor – whom mildly intrigued Moirstyria – she expanded her sight, the only thing she could do as the vine-ropes sapped her mana like thirsty strigoii their victims.

Marching through the village, starved by her curiosity, Moirstyria surveyed the people around them doing their daily chores, separating the fruits, leaves and reagents collected during the day, skinned the prey of the hunters and the children playing or aiding their elders.

Like her, the people – many of whom saw any like her for the first time in their lives – gazed at her as she was following after Cattuivar as they traversed through the pathless settlement, heading towards the bright glow that was the Illius partially blocked by the trees. A few of the children including a few of her distant kin ran close to them, but stopped and began to question Cattuivar if this one shall be his mate.

“This one? She is strong, but still not worthy to carry my seed.” He said with a kind, fatherly smile as he patted the head of a Wolven child – a demikin with striking grayish fur and long clawed fingers wrapped around a basket.

“Just so you know, I’m already taken.” She said with hollow prudence as they continued on.

“With the fish man I know.” Cattuivar said nonchalantly, then halted and turned back while tapping his right temple. “We took a little peek into your memories.”

“I know, but more importantly you still haven’t told me who we are meeting? Is he a powerful druid of yours?” She inquired as they reached the last homes “No, he is closer to Aigroth, what you call deos.”

“That is impossible you know that? There is no way a minor deos could overpower the taint of the Beautiful One.”

For a moment the two stopped and Caittuvar looked back over his shoulder. “He is. I’d reckon he is even more powerful than The One Who Stretches Across the World.”

Hearing those heretical words, Moirstyria sighed and doubt began to surface within her. “Well it is natural you don’t believe me. But you shall see it soon.” He interjected just as she wanted to offer calling for his uncle’s aid. From the vine rope a long, thick thread grew forth into his hand and he forcefully pulled her.

Moirstyria decided to humor Caittuvar, to see if such a being can walk on the lands of Elhyrissian without anyone in the Empire noticing it. She followed him in silence until the two reached a clearing where a steep meadow rose before them, covered in eerily pallid shrubbery. Her whole body quivered as she felt warmness and coldness each ceasing to exist beyond the oblongly upended, dim barked and crooked willows with an iridescently white foliage spiraling down as reality seemed to distort in the meadows’ space.

“Come, this way!” Cattuivar pulled on her vine-rope once more as she was stunned at the sight and the weird sensation that made her tremble lightly, feeling as if she was about to walk into the belly of the beast. He led Moirstyria up the slope where the foliage expectantly parted before the two, then they halted on the top.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

“What is this place?” Finally able to speak, Moirstyria inquired raising her voice suddenly which slightly puzzled the elderly Cattuivar.

“Calm down. Remember if we would have wanted you dead, you would already be.” He answered while looking down at the calm lake of utter darkness. Moirstyria walked beside him and stared down at the pallid figure rising from the undisturbed waters swallowing the little light invading the clearing.

Her eyes strained as she looked at the pale figure draped in layers of ivory and dark robes with a large hood cast over his gaunt, angular aevhen head of stained by umbral blisters bleeding forth the cracks adorning the wiry body whence these blisters took the shape of a raging blaze shooting upwards from his nether areas, engulfing his fissure ornated abdomen.

The more she stared at the figure standing in the gloomy shadow of the steeped hill stretching over the shore, the more she felt the voidness of the place crawling into her being and at once she found bosom rising and sinking deeply as the pace of her heart hastened by the chill of emptiness.

“A pleasure to meet with you, Lady Moirstyria. Your tales are quite far reaching.” At once, he appeared before the two and mockingly half-bowed before her. “I hope my friend wasn’t too rough with you. Though I regret we have to meet in such dire times.” His words cold and resonant, shivering her soul, hollow devoid of honesty and deceit seeding her heart with uncertainty.

Her lips trembled, her throat felt heavy, impossible to force words through each yet she let out a soft sigh and recalled the first time she met Ba’atz, a time when she was no different from many of her siblings, kin and looked at him with calm terror and disgust. “The pleasure is mine. Though I know not who I owe this pleasure.” He smiled, and her fear grew as the umbral blister covered epidermis stretching across his throat, crawling up onto his jaw and beyond seemed to swirl in impossible ways.

“Grimslaukh at your service my lady. Though I am afraid niceties must have to wait for another time. Time is off the essence I believe is the saying.” Grimslaukh looked at her, his face devoid of any expression, then snapped his fingers and the vine-rope disappeared, and she was standing once more clad in her pallid silver armor of segmented magnificence.

Moirstyria raised her eyebrows as the portentous words poured out from his darkened lips. “The Beautiful One as you know now took possession of your brother, and more importantly she now plans to fully step into this realm. That we cannot allow we both agree on.”

Without uttering any word, she nodded. “Then shall we make a deal?”

She felt calm, and confused at the sudden egress of fear and uncertainty. “If we do what would be the price you seek from me?”

Grimslaukh’s left hand arose, and in his palm a ring of coiling serpents appeared with a second hand growing forth the center, in its jaw a translucent trapezohedron stood proudly. “Before we speak of the price for my protection, I want you to seal her into this ring instead of your little boxes.”

**

Using the night as their cover, the two dashed across the plain encircling the octagonal city of Nidumiath and passed in through the cylindrical maws of the sewers vomiting cleansed sewage water into the river arranged into the deep, chasm like moat.

Three decades before, Moirstyria with only Akamion and the late Djagbartur were hired by Aerdonim to cleanse the sewer from an infestation of cultists’ worshipping the Nightscale, remnants from the exodus of the hordes’ of slaves who rose up and were offered protection by the eldest child of the Nightscale.

Owing to this assignment Moirstyria had an easy time guiding through the vast sewer system of a stone altered by the Chtonmancers of the Empire to resemble marble, though it lacked its polished, refined luster. They also created false life and imbued it into the stone in the forms of moving, carved silhouettes repeating the same waving motion which both guides and cleanses the waste tainted water starting from the cistern where they keep it from rising to undesirably high levels, are separated and led through the eight archways.

Upon entering the cistern carved directly below the hill, Moirstyria staggered for a short moment as she sensed the taint of the Beautiful One lingering unseen in the air. Whilst she struggled to keep her mind clean, Cattuivar stared up at the stone ladder leading up to the palaces’ treasury whence the light shone down through a small, grated aperture parting the vicious, blinding darkness which stretched over the world, invaded these underground places often lacking in light sources.

“Are you fine?” He then turned back at Moirstyria asking. “I’ll be. Just give me a few seconds.” She said while feeling the unseen profane particles being swallowed by an invisible hunter.

Cattuivar stared back up and a smile beget of excitement formed on his face. “She knows’ we are here. I bet your friends are the ones waiting for us.” Above them, she sensed too their distinct anima length as soon as she poured her mana into her eyes and shaped them into a high grade spell of perception.

“Don’t worry, I won’t kill them.” Said Cattuivar the moment Moirstyria’s gaze pierced him. “Though it is quite rude of us for making them wait.” As he began to climb, Moirstyria grabbed his shoulder and forcefully turned him around.

“They can wait a little. Before we head up, we should formulate a plan don’t you think so?”

Cattuivar shrugged his shoulder then said with half a smile. “Do we? Except for the pale eastern and the fish man, the others’ lack quite in skill.”

“Still it is quicker if we separate them. I’ll take Ba’atz, Fyamon and you take on Akemion and Kaurgh.” She said with her arms folded and staring up solemnly.

“Fine by me, though I hope you point them out to me which is which.” Cauttuivar said mockingly as he began to climb once more. Moirstyria sighed then followed after.

**

In the vast treasury, the resonances of battle slowly dulled as Cattuivar stood victoriously over the panting pallid auburn orkh Kaurgh and the proud eastern warrior, Akamion whose pretty was adorned with patches of purple, red and blue of their respective darker shades.

He watched as Moirstyria gently slammed the plant-folk Fyamon into one of the pillars ornated with a coiling dragon hewn from lucent golden stone against the white marble. His soft yelp echoed through the vast space of the treasury filled with metallic gates ornated with the Avaricious Son, a minor deos of Iuanorh who is said to have created gold by imbuing the light of day into alloys native to Caesselis Archipelago and lush center of Vhalleryon.

With a swift thrust straightly downwards at his soft back of leaf like epidermis tinted in the shades of autumnal seasons. Though as it dug into his body, it remained devoid of wound or blood gushing forth to form a pool beneath and around his slender form. Ivory, translucent mist enveloped her blade, motes of mana particles formed a spell of finality, seizing his consciousness without the granting him entrance into the land of Oneiron.

Then she turned towards Ba’atz blocking the way up the long and widely stretching stairs. His bulging fish eyes focused on her, searing with disgust and anger not of his own. She assumed a defensive position with her blade pointed down, and slowly approached while holding out her hand, naively believing she could free him from the taint. Watching this, Cattuivar pondered for a short moment whether to take down the Deep One magus, but opted to stay out and simply just watch things unfold.

In the end, as he expected, Ba’atz shot thunder forth his staff at Moirstyria who used her blade to swallow the conjured mauve tinted streak of thunder, then became a blurry phantasm swiftly nearing towards him. Cattuivar raised his eyebrow in admiration when her blade enveloped in the translucent ivory mist landed not in his body, but penetrated through the hardened marble, creating a slit aperture in its unblemished alabaster surface.

He sprung into action and leapt before her body, crossing his twin blades of an eerie metal with a strange shade which swallowed the rays of lightning slithering with great velocity towards Moirstyria. “Thanks.” She blurted out before she appeared behind Ba’atz, this time the blade cleaving through his waist.

“No need, I am simply just making sure you don’t die before you pay His price.” He said while sheathing his blades over his back while Moirstyria checked Ba’atz was alright on the ground.

Moirstyria stared daggers at him, then stood up and walked past Cattuivar and hurried up the stairs as the sound of clanking footsteps reached their ears. “Prepare your blades!” Moirstyria said while Cattuivar cracked his fists and neck in preparation.

“So you don’t mind them dying?” Cattuivar inquired. “That’s not what I meant… never mind.”

The gate before them burst open and brave and enchanted legionariir of the ninth legion charged at them. Before the horde of enthralled legionariir could even bellow, the two cleaved through and many of them laid on the stairs dreamlessly unconscious.

“That way.” Moirstyria pointed her blade towards the turn in the vast hallway furnished with busts of Aerdonim after she smote down three legionariir at the same time, leaving them unconscious while their comrades stumbled over their bodies, only to meet the same benign fate.

By the time the two reached the large gate of processed, enchanted glass depicting the profane true form of the Beautiful One standing oozing with divine conceit over kneeling figures, silence settled onto the whole palace. “Let’s finish this!” Cattuivar said and Moirstyria nodded along before the two pushed the gate open and entered to face Her in the round chamber, in the House of the Deossos…