They approached the broken ruin that had once been a proudly standing fort many years previous. D’Arden remembered from that time that there was talk about sending an Arbiter to Calessa to destroy an evil that had inhabited this old place, but he had been on mission at the time, and was not informed about who had finally been sent.
It would have had to be someone powerful, he thought as he gazed upward at the ruined spires. The place was impressive and awe-inspiring even in its broken and run-down condition. The manna currents curled around and flowed through it, turning red and raw as they touched the building and passed along its side. He heard Elisa draw in a breath beside him.
“I’ve lived in the shadow of this place my whole life, but I’ve never seen it this way before,” she said softly.
“The currents tell us many things that the normal eye cannot see,” D’Arden said, following her gaze as it traveled up the dark towers that reached toward the cold blue sky. It was incongruous, the vision before them, of a silhouette which was not a silhouette, black stone against the clear and cloudless blue that caused a sharp contrast, with the blue and reddened manna flowing within and without, ebbing and flowing all around them in its desire to permeate and find the shortest path for complete immersion. “This place has much corruption within its walls. It will be dangerous within; there may be many demons, many dangers lurking inside. I realize that your skills are lacking, Elisa, and this will be both frightening and harrowing for you. The corruption may tease and tempt your conscience and your soul, daring you to step out of my protective circle so that you might embrace a long-lost loved one, but you simply must ignore these visions. They are as unreal as a dream, and a thousand times more dangerous.”
“Will it try to tempt you as well?” she asked him innocently.
D’Arden clenched his jaw firmly for a long moment, his eyes looking through the fortress as though at something far in the distance, and then answered, “Yes.”
Without another word, they proceeded forward up the black stone stairway that led to the desiccated door which would take them inside. His instincts screamed at him to leave this place, to run and hide. Crossing this threshold would be like crossing into the land of the dead itself, and he did not relish that thought.
For a few moments, they simply stared at the open doorway, leading inward into what looked like a very normal stone reception room or cloakroom. D’Arden held out one hand cautiously, and lifted the other to draw his manna blade from the sheath on his back, which came free with a low rasp. Only a few seconds later, there was another, slightly higher rasp as Elisa drew her own manna blade free from her back. The pure energy that radiated outward from their blades helped to keep back some of the corrupted manna that flowed around them, making him feel ill. She was still young enough that the feeling of the corrupted manna would feel like power to her, instead of noxious.
He would need to keep a close eye on his new protege.
“Come, Elisa. There is nothing to be gained by standing here on the landing,” D’Arden said, as much for his own benefit as for hers.
Together, they stepped through the doorway.
Immediately a feeling of claustrophobia set in on them. It was dark, and the light from the cold sun outside had vanished entirely as if it had never existed. It felt as though the walls were pressing in on them, though he could feel nothing. The light from their blades was reduced merely to a dim glow, barely visible even for their brightness in normal conditions. It reminded D’Arden uncomfortably of the darkness in the cellar of the low quarter, but far more constricting.
He felt Elisa beside him struggling to breathe. He laid a comforting hand on her shoulder as he tried to regulate his own air intake, and she seemed to breathe a little easier when she felt his hand on her.
They took a step forward, and then another. D’Arden tried to remember what the room had looked like from outside, but the utter inky darkness erased all memory of the place from his mind. It was only when he found his outstretched hand pressed up against a cool stone wall that he could even remember that he had a hand.
The darkness seemed to be pressing in further, weighing on his mind in such a way that might make him forget who he was, if he stayed within it long enough. The corruption in this place was unthinkably bad, and if he’d been able to read any of the fonts in the city at all, if the whole city hadn’t just blended into one horrid puddle of twisted manna, he would have known to come here first. That thought made him dread even worse, for if there was indeed an Arbiter down here who’d embraced such terrible power, this battle was going to be more difficult than everything he’d been through over the past few days combined.
Finally, his groping hand found the doorway, and he pulled Elisa through it along with him. When they reached the other side of the threshold, the pressing darkness vanished, leaving them standing, panting desperately for air, in a circle of radiant blue light. He looked over at Elisa, who returned his gaze with a nod.
He believed that she might be beginning to understand what was in store for them.
D’Arden looked around this next room, wondering what could possibly lie ahead of that deep, despairing darkness, and how much they would have to endure to reach the self-appointed master of this dismal fortress. He dared not voice these thoughts aloud to Elisa, for her own fear was great enough without knowing exactly what sort of horrors might lie ahead for them.
“Elisa,” he murmured softly, his voice echoing unnaturally in the room. “Be on your guard. We don’t know what might be next.” She deserved at least that much of a warning. He saw her nod with acknowledgement.
Without warning, the room suddenly filled with a chattering sound that was so loud, it drowned out all hope of communicating verbally with each other. They stood back-to-back like two surrounded wolves, each guarding the flank of the other and holding out their blades protectively as the volume of the sound reached near-unbearable levels. It at first sounded intelligible, then began to blend into a sound like a thousand voices speaking in ancient, forgotten tongues all at once, and then became a sort of strange insectoid buzzing that filled their ears. Elisa might have cried out, but D’Arden could hear nothing over the horrendous noise.
Then, from out of the darkness, they came. Demons of all shapes and sizes, at least a dozen of them, as this sound echoed all around them in the room. The demons approached slowly, with lopsided, slavering grins on their faces. These were minions, not deadly, but certainly dangerous to his acolyte. The cacophony was not just distracting, it would cause one to make a fatal mistake if they were not careful.
He shouted an order to Elisa, but it was lost amongst the sound of tens of thousands of buzzing insect wings in their ears. Making sure to stay where he could feel her presence or see the glow from her blade, he struck outward at one of the slowly approaching demons, who easily rolled aside, out of the way of his attempted attack. They closed in ever closer in a deadly ring. Though it would be dangerous for her, he could not help but silently thank the land for providing him with a second blade that could fight against the corruption. It would make all the difference, he knew, in this encounter and every encounter going forward into this awful place.
That was, of course, assuming that she didn’t get killed.
It became more difficult even to hear himself think as the sound seemed, impossibly enough, to grow louder. The sound was supplemented by the thick smell of rotting flesh and decaying bone, most likely whatever it was that these demons had eaten last. One of them approached too closely, and D’Arden struck outward, catching the demon squarely in the shoulder with a passing cut. The demon shrieked – at least, he imagined that it did – as the blade cut through the flesh of the arm and ignited a purifying fire there. These were no mundane demons, these were creatures spawned wholly from the corrupted manna that permeated this place, and they had little to no resistance against the azure flames from his manna blade. They took root in the wound immediately, consuming outward in a rapid blaze that flared up brightly as they dug into the demon’s body, wriggling into every gap in its armor in an attempt to purify all of the evil within.
It staggered backwards, its mouth hanging open, exposing a deep black throat and ragged yellow teeth. The cobalt fire leapt down the demon’s throat as it left that entryway open and exposed, devouring the beast from the inside out. It collapsed to the ground as the manna fire ate at it from within, its face still frozen in what appeared to D’Arden to be a silent mask of agony.
One down, still a dozen to go.
His head was beginning to ring from the impossibly loud buzzing sound that surrounded them. He forced his brain to stay focused on the task, trying to focus on the sound of blood in his ears to drown out some of the outside sounds, but to little avail. His only choice, then, was to strike quickly in hopes that he could destroy the demons before the buzzing disrupted his thinking too much.
Immediately he struck outward again, and another of the demons – which had apparently in no way anticipated an attack at that moment – was caught by the edge of his manna blade. It was just deep enough to leave a long red slit across its throat below its disgusting visage, and the manna flames ignited in the same second, burrowing inward, seeking the corruption that lay within. The demon stumbled away from him, screaming in the same silent agony that he imagined would have been much louder, if he could have heard it at all.
His attacks became a dance of sorts, a series of flowing movements with the most deadly intent. He struck and they parried, and he moved to strike again or to strike another. Each of his movements flowed perfectly into the next, and though the buzzing in his ears was almost deafening him, he began to imagine that he heard a rhythm in the sound that he used to time his movements. Cut, step, strike… the pattern of movements took him back to his fencing days at the Arbiter’s Tower in the clean warm air, in those golden days of youth that are always remembered fondly. He struck down demon after demon, the blue flames igniting eagerly at each successful stroke, consuming the demons from head to toe in a matter of seconds.
As suddenly as it had started, the noise ceased.
His head continued to ring. The sudden silence was almost more deafening than the noise itself. He turned to find Elisa, down on one knee and holding her sword almost desperately before her, shaking her head to try and clear it of the ringing that remained behind.
“Are you all right?” he asked, and his voice sounded strange as it echoed in the stone chamber.
She nodded slowly, and then climbed back to her feet. Bright red blood showed on her tunic from where a demon had cut her across the arm, but she showed no other obvious injury. Acolytes always wore white, so that injuries could be more easily spotted. The manna would not start to heal her wounds automatically for several years yet – in the meantime, she would have to rely on her body’s natural healing ability.
“What was that awful sound?” she asked.
He gave a half-shrug and shook his head. “I have no idea. That’s the nature of this place, though… it will do whatever it can, whatever it has to, so that it can win the fight. Whoever – or whatever – is the master of this place does not control these happenings any more than you or I can. These are creations of the corrupted manna, spun from whole cloth in order to drive out the purity that’s crossed its gates.”
“What might be next?” she asked, a hint of fear in her voice.
“I don’t know,” was all he could answer.
The doorway that led back to the room of perfect darkness was visible, and there was another doorway directly across from them that led into yet another unknowable chamber. Anything could lie beyond that threshold – even the certainty of their own deaths – and yet he was compelled to travel onward, to discover what had brought this place so deeply into corruption, and to drive it out.
He glanced at his young student, who returned his gaze bravely. “Are you ready?”
“Will I ever be ready to take that step?” she asked rhetorically.
“I’ll let you know if I ever get there,” he said grimly.
Together, they stepped across the next threshold.
Flames surrounded them. D’Arden could feel their heat, blinding him and searing his flesh. He heard Elisa cry out beside him. The fire had not been there only seconds ago, but now it was all too real. He could feel his skin as it blackened and burst where the flames touched him. He gave a shout of agony as well that echoed in the chamber above the sound of the roaring flames.
He got a glimpse, ahead of them, of a doorway that seemed impossibly far away. The floor was made of hot coals and embers, and fire flared all around them on every side. The heat was so intense that he felt as though he might simply die on the spot. Sweat poured from every part of his body and yet it was immediately evaporated. There was no way to survive.
This was the end.
D’Arden clenched his hand down on the sharp edges of his manna blade. Blood surged forth from the wound, and he cried out yet again. The pain from the wound in his hand, however, made the flames in the room flicker slightly. He felt cooler, and the azure fire of the manna blade danced around him. His flesh no longer felt as though it were being seared. He could still see the flames, but they seemed more distant somehow.
“Elisa!” he cried out. “Let pain be your guide!”
He heard her sob to his right, and he turned to look. She had collapsed to the ground, and though he could now see that she was suffering no real injury, she truly believed that she was. The illusion here was very strong. She had given up screaming now, and was only barely whimpering.
She was not strong enough for this.
He knelt down beside her as the flames continued to retreat for him, their heat dissipating rapidly. D’Arden took hold of her hand and sliced his blade along it, drawing a thin line of red forth. She yelped, a pitiful sound of the dying caused yet more pain, but he could see that the heat was beginning to fade for her as well.
Slowly, she sat up at last. There was a haunted look in her eyes that reminded him of the night they had first met, which seemed far longer ago than it was. “Is this the kind of thing you deal with every day?”
“Not exactly,” he admitted. “I haven’t encountered this much corruption in many years.”
“When was the last time?” she asked.
“Mount Tzoggoth,” he replied immediately, offering a hand to help her up.
She accepted it and rose to her feet, a bit unsteady but otherwise looking unharmed. She gripped the handle of her manna blade as though it were her only lifeline, and perhaps in a way it was. She was still not fully attuned to the blade, and it would take a few years of training before she would completely understand its power, but for now her simple prowess with the sword would be enough.
They approached the next doorway. As D’Arden looked through it, he saw only what seemed to be an endless procession of doorways attached to square stone rooms. They appeared to go infinitely into each other, vanishing eventually into the darkness. He shook his head. He did not know how long that they would last with these trials. Eventually, an illusion would fool himself or his student completely, and they would be lost forever inside the bowels of this ancient fortress.
Laughter echoed through the stone halls, its source unseen but the sound unmistakable. It was not maniacal laughter, not the laugh of the truly mad, but instead the cold, calculated sound of a mastermind who was enjoying the results of his plan too well.
“Are you enjoying my maze, little ones?” a voice asked.
The Arbiter’s head snapped around as he searched for the source of the voice. It sounded all too familiar, and the words sunk deep into him and filled him with a dread that was entirely unspeakable, a feeling that could not be put into words. His knees felt weak, and sweat began to bead on his forehead.
Elisa looked at him strangely. “Are you all right?”
D’Arden felt as though it was difficult to breathe, and there was no illusion causing that feeling. He coughed, and the light from his manna blade flickered angrily in response to his sudden stress.
“We’re in a lot of trouble,” he murmured when once again he could finally speak.
“Do you know that voice?” she asked.
“Yes, tell her, D’Arden,” the voice mocked from its ethereal position. “Tell her that you know exactly who was sent to Calessa five years ago. Tell her that you know exactly who I am, and what I intend to do to the both of you before the day is out. Tell her all the things she wants to know, because in a very short amount of time, she won’t be hearing anything any longer.”
“Who is it?” Elisa asked, a note of fear rising in her voice.
“I haven’t heard that voice in many years,” D’Arden said softly, his brain still stammering uselessly as the realization of exactly what he was in for sunk in. “It’s been almost twenty long years since I’ve heard that cadence, those words, that voice. There was a time when it would comfort me, when it would reassure my fears away, and when I might have felt better for hearing it.
“Now my heart fills only with dread, and with sorrow, for many questions have now been answered, but so many more have become apparent.”
D’Arden took a step forward and held his head high, bringing up his manna blade before him and staring deeply into the light, hoping there to find some sort of comfort.
“Come out, Havox Khaine!” he intoned, making his voice as deep and confident as he possibly could. “Drop this ridiculous charade and make some semblance of the honor that you once carried as a member of our illustrious Order! Stop hiding behind your traps and your illusions, you coward! Come out and fight!”
“Are you sure that’s what you want to do?” Elisa asked as the disembodied laughter echoed around them once again. “Who is he? Who is Havox Khaine?”
D’Arden bowed his head.
“My mentor. My teacher. My… friend.”
The stone room dissolved around them, and suddenly D’Arden saw through the illusion as it began to fade. The tiny stone rooms had never existed at all; in fact, they had fallen right into the trap laid by Khaine, the man who’d been his first Master as an Arbiter – the man who’d taught him nearly everything he knew about wielding the manna blade, purity and the danger of corruption.
They stood instead in a great chamber, with crumbled remains lying where before the stone walls of the interior of the fortress had stood. They had obviously been demolished in an effort to create what was in fact some kind of massive, twisted throne room.
Before them stretched a long staircase, constructed entirely of glossy black stone that resembled obsidian, but glowed softly with an ominous red light. It sparkled in the light in tones of red and orange. His eyes traveled up the massive stairway to the top, where sat his mentor, the first person who’d ever spoken to him in an official capacity as an Arbiter, the man who’d trained him and put him on the course to righteousness and purity, in a giant throne made of red and gold. So massive was the throne itself, so arrogant was its presentation that Khaine himself nearly disappeared when the entirety of it was viewed as a whole.
“Do you like my kingdom, young one?” Khaine’s voice boomed in the chamber, echoing and reverberating several times off of the walls. “Soon all of Calessa will be under my control, and then my power will spread farther yet. No more will the Arbiters bow a knee in fealty to the broken throne at Hartsknell. We shall rule with an iron fist, and the manna shall transform all who resist into our servants – or else they shall die. I have discovered true purity, my student – true purity lies in absolute power.”
“So that wolf I slew in the low quarter truly was your servant,” D’Arden sneered, finding no trace of the man he once respected and loved as a father in the apparition that sat before him. “It too spoke of power as purity. You are lost, Khaine. I may once have been your student, but this student has become more than his master obviously could ever have become. I have surpassed you. My dedication is to the land, and your ‘purity of power’ is killing this land and its inhabitants. What is power if there is no one left alive to rule over?”
Khaine laughed, a terrible sound that at once reminded D’Arden of the kindly laughter of his mentor and the screeching sound made by a demon all too amused by its prey. “Power is in the hand of those who hold it, Tal. You would not dare to stand against the power that I wield now. It is only with power that we can truly be free. You ask me what is power? I say that it is the ultimate goal of life, that which can only be attained through the death of those who stand in your way. Tell me, Tal, do you stand in my way?”
“I do,” D’Arden said, his voice proudly defiant.
Khaine clucked his tongue reproachfully. “I thought that you had much potential, D’Arden, when you were my student. I see now that I taught you the lessons of the Arbiters all too well. You cling to their false ideals like a child clings to its mother’s teat. You were not fit to be my apprentice.”
The figure rose from its seat atop the dais and slowly began to descend the staircase. As it came into view more closely, D’Arden could see that it was in fact the image of the man he’d loved so dearly. The same red hair, though it was graying around the temples. The same kind eyes, though they had been hardened and carried many more wrinkles now than they had the last time D’Arden had seen the man. Once an apprenticeship ended, an Arbiter was not likely to see their mentor again unless there were some kind of extenuating circumstances.
D’Arden wished they’d met again under different ones.
“What about your little acolyte there, Tal?” Khaine asked him. “Does she see the world the same way you do? How long has she been an Arbiter? Does she know that the Arbiter’s Tower has sent her to her certain death?”
“I’ve never been to the Arbiter’s Tower,” Elisa said before D’Arden could stop her. D’Arden mentally smacked his own forehead. There was no way that Elisa had been properly prepared for an encounter of this magnitude.
Khaine’s head tilted in an approximation of surprise. “You hold a manna blade. You wear the robes of an acolyte. Tell me, child, how is it that you have never before been to the Arbiter’s Tower?”
Elisa looked toward D’Arden for some sort of help, having realized that she’d said something wrong. He gave her a shrug in return; there was no helping it now. The truth might as well come out.
“I’ve been an Arbiter for less than a day,” she said, somewhat bitterly. D’Arden ached for her, having to face a confrontation like this so soon after her ordainment. Acolytes needed training; he’d been a fool to bring her here.
Khaine’s eyes blazed with interest and amusement. “How is that possible?”
“I have no idea, Khaine,” D’Arden said, echoing the bitter tone of Elisa’s statement. “She’d been bitten by a manna spinner. I gave her a dose from the heartblade to try and save her life. When I offered her body to the font, it revived her instead of dissolving her.”
"Interesting," Khaine mused, stroking his chin. As he approached closer, D'Arden could see that the cool blue eyes that had once belonged to his mentor were gone entirely – instead there blazed bright red light that usurped the entirety of his eyes. He was built more powerfully than D'Arden remembered, his arms bulging with muscles and blazing with strange red tattoos that appeared to be some sort of ancient language, all alive and burning with the power of the corrupted manna that had overtaken him.
"What say you, little one? Do you still stand beside him now that you have seen the power that I wield?" Khaine finally reached the bottom of the staircase and reached out one hand towards Elisa. She stiffened, but wisely she did not move as the disproportionately large hand stroked her cheek almost tenderly. "You have none of the training that my misguided former apprentice carries, none of the values of 'purity' and 'light' that would keep him from attaining all of his goals in life in a matter of moments. What say you?"
D'Arden felt himself tensing with rage also, his knuckles turning white as they gripped the handle of his manna blade. How dare he touch her with his corrupted fingertips, allowing the corrupted manna to flow through her? D'Arden knew though that Khaine well understood what he was doing; Elisa was not properly exposed to the pure manna yet – she'd only had two doses from the heartblade and would barely be considered an infant by the standards of the Arbiters. She was much more susceptible to his corrupted touch.
"Get away from her!" D'Arden shouted, swinging his blade at Khaine. The older man stepped backward quickly, and the blade sliced through the air only inches from Elisa's face. She flinched backwards and stumbled a step or two away as the manna blade cut through the air before her.
Khaine laughed again at his ineffectual attack. "You see, dear child," he said to Elisa, "This is what those values achieve and attain: nothing more than a blind attack that could have just as easily taken off your head as mine."
D'Arden found rage welling up inside him. This man had been everything to him once, and now he was openly mocking the very ideals he'd taught D'Arden to believe in. He struggled to fight back the anger, knowing that it would only blind him to Khaine's next illusion, whatever it might be.
"I knew they'd send an Arbiter," Khaine said, studying one hand dispassionately. "Of course they would, once they felt my power growing here. I never expected, though, that they would send you, Tal. Did the Grand Master even tell you that I was the one who'd been sent here five years ago? Did they even begin to hint at what you might find here in Calessa?"
"Of course they told me," D'Arden lied boldly. "I knew exactly what was going on here, and so did they. In fact, I volunteered to come here just so that I could be the one to put you down."
Khaine laughed again, and the sound boomed off the walls. "Such a brave boy, lying to your Master like that. The manna tells me more than you would ever imagine, Tal. Did you know that once you learn to see the manna clearly, you can see how it changes in a person? Even the poorest, most miserable of peasants has manna within them, and that manna can be changed or it can be manipulated, and those people can be utilized in ways that you would never imagine."
"That's ridiculous," D'Arden spat. "Only the Arbiters have enough manna within them to be read. The amount of manna in the normal person is miniscule, undetectable even by the most well-trained eye."
Khaine wagged a finger at D'Arden reproachfully. "Oh, how little you know. The manna itself is within everything, within everyone in the same amount. Arbiters have no more manna inside of them than anyone else."
"You're not making sense, Khaine," D'Arden said, narrowing his eyes. "Of course an Arbiter has more manna within them. That's why the heartblade exists, that's why regular exposure to the fonts is so necessary. That's how we survive, by tipping the balance of our bodies and our souls toward the manna."
Elisa was merely standing back, a few steps away, watching the two of them. There was fear in her eyes, and she seemed to be regarding both D'Arden and Khaine with the same amount of fear. That only enraged him more. He was supposed to help this girl, now that he'd inadvertently cursed her with the heartblade. This was supposed to be her chance for a better life. He'd be lucky if she would ever let him near her again after an experience like this.
"You're wrong, Tal." Khaine said this in such a way that brooked no argument; it was not a counter to D'Arden's statement, but simply a statement of fact. "The heartblade is a special enchantment. It does not contain manna, but instead an agent that at once both lends resistance to the deadly energy of raw manna and forms an instant addiction that cannot be broken. It draws you back to it with its own energy, requiring you to take sustenance from it. The manna from those fonts is killing you as surely as time is killing you. It dissolves your being, a tiny mote at a time, relieving you of your humanity until one day your soul is swept away in the font, and you are gone forever from this place.
"Don't you see, Tal? The manna is not pure or corrupted. All of it is deadly. Every exposed font in this gods-forsaken world is deadly. All of it is corruption, and we are all a part of that corruption. Humans are not meant to live in a world like this, we are not meant to exist in a place with this kind of energy. The Arbiters simply fight to keep the balance tipped towards the side that they have chosen, so that they can more easily control the power of the land to their own ends. Once my power spreads and all of your 'pure' manna is driven from it, new things will grow in the shadow of the Red.
"Men will adapt, just as they always have."
D'Arden fell back a step, thunderstruck. He could not believe the words that were flowing from the mouth of the visage of his old mentor, and yet somehow, everything seemed true. His head was reeling. If any of this were true, it would invalidate his entire existence. Everything he had fought for, bled for, nearly died for would be completely gone.
"What about Calessa Heights?" D'Arden demanded. "That is not adaptation! That's nothing but madness!"
"An unfortunate side effect of a cleansing fire is that some things get burned," Khaine replied patiently. "There were some there who did not respond to the power of the Red, and it spread like a sickness. The good Captain Mor was good enough to board up the place to keep it from spreading further – after, of course, he spoke with me."
Damn it! D'Arden cursed himself inwardly. Even Mor is in the pocket of this monster! How did I not see it?
A broad smile spread over Khaine's face, revealing wickedly sharpened teeth. "I see you realize the depths of your plight now, Tal. Yes, I have been watching you since the moment you stepped foot in my city. At first I was amazed that they had sent you, so naive and so unwitting into this place. Then, as you began to realize just what was going on here, I began to get angry. I had Mor plant that boy with you, all the while intending that he would die, to see if I could break your resolve." The smile darkened into a dangerous frown. "I see now that it was pointless. Instead, somehow, you found one of the few who my power had not touched at all, and somehow cast her dice in your favor, though it is supposed to be impossible."
So even Khaine hadn't known about the heartblade's secret; that it could even change someone later in their life and give them the power of the Arbiter. That helped D'Arden to feel slightly better, and he was able to pull back his blinding rage from the edge of a foolhardy attack on his enemy. He stole a glance at Elisa, who was still watching the both of them fearfully, and shook his head.
"Words are words, Khaine," D'Arden said at last. "You stand here before me and speak of things of which you have no way of proving. It matters little how much your words ring of truth. Even if they were lies but you believed them fully it would change the manna in your favor, and the both of us know it."
"Would you then like a taste of my power, Tal?" Khaine grinned wickedly once more. "I would be happy to demonstrate it for you."
D'Arden lowered himself into a combat crouch, gripping the handle of his manna blade tightly in both fists. "Show me."
Khaine reached to his back and pulled free a sword that was unlike any manna weapon D'Arden had even seen. The blade was twice as wide as his own, and curved wickedly near the end, glowing brightly with the red light of the corruption. It shone on both himself and on Elisa, and he did his best not to flinch as he felt the twisted power rain down upon him. Instead he focused his own energy into his manna blade, brightening the glow of the pure blue power that he wielded in order to fend it off, and took a step closer to Elisa so that she might benefit from its protective shield as well.
"Not so fast," Khaine said with a smirk, throwing out one hand. A burst of crimson light shot forth from his fingertips, rocketing toward Elisa with incredible speed. She let out a shriek that was cut short as the light surrounded her.
D'Arden whirled around, but she appeared unharmed – simply immobilized in a glowing cage of red power. "What have you done, Khaine?"
"Simply removed an element from the equation," said the monster which had replaced the man he'd once known. "Her soul now hangs in the balance, Tal. Do you have the strength to save her?"
"My power is stronger than yours," D'Arden said evenly.
"I will show you my power!" Khaine bellowed. His strange blade shone brightly, almost white-hot at the center, and his eyes did the same. He drew back with both hands and struck forth at D'Arden wielding that strange and terrible blade. It was a slow and clumsy attack, and D'Arden knew that his opponent was capable of better. He brought up an almost disinterested parry to easily deflect the oncoming stroke.
When the blades met, D'Arden felt a shock run through his bones that he'd never felt before. The two sides of the manna were warring within him. He nearly cried out in agony as pain filled him like never before. He wondered if his opponent felt the same, but when he looked upon the face of his former mentor, twisted and changed by the corrupted manna, he saw there only malice and no signs of weakness in the unnaturally-stretched grin.
D'Arden shoved the other blade away from him, and as they disengaged, the feeling of the war inside him dimmed but did not vanish. He had no time to recover, though, as Khaine began to press the attack in earnest. No longer were the strokes slow and cumbersome – that had obviously been a ploy to show D'Arden the exact extent of the power that he was up against. Now they were rapid, blows flying in quick succession, and it was all D'Arden could do to get his blade up in time to defend each one. He tried to take the moment of defense to analyze his opponent, to find some sort of weakness in his defense, but the pain that lanced through him every time he parried a strike made it difficult to concentrate on anything but each successive attack and counter.
Khaine's attacks were each a deadly stroke, and there were some that D'Arden only parried just in time to save from his chest being pierced or his neck from being severed. He managed to get in a few counterattacks, but they were weak and Khaine easily batted them away. D'Arden quickly realized that no matter what his prowess with the blade was, Khaine's corrupted energy was assisting him in a way that the pure manna never could. D'Arden did everything he could to draw on his reserves, but the corruption that filled the very air around him prevented him from drawing any more from anywhere. Khaine had a limitless supply of his own power, and D'Arden had to carefully manage his own so as not to expend too much of it, lest he be left completely powerless before this madman.
With each step backward he took, a realization became more and more clear to him. He was losing this fight, and he stood no chance on this uneven ground where his opponent wielded so much more power than he.
"Khaine!" he shouted, his own voice echoing in the chamber, though not so much as his opponent's manna-assisted bellows did. "You coward! You would never be fighting me if you weren't in your own, self-appointed kingdom! You know that my power is stronger than yours, and that's why you fight here, on this uneven and biased ground! You're not fit to be any sort of king – you're nothing but a wretch who can't stand the thought of being beaten!"
"Fool!" Khaine roared, pressing his attack even harder. D'Arden felt his arms weakening – if he could not get his opponent to stop this assault he would be dead in seconds, not minutes. "You think that since you cannot best me with the sword, that you will best me with words! Ridiculous!"
“Come on, Khaine,” D’Arden sneered, trying not to let the weakness in his voice show through. “It’s not even a contest, here in your palace. You know you’re going to win. Wouldn’t you rather prove your power in a place where I actually stand a chance?”
Abruptly, the relentless assault simply stopped. Khaine took a step backward, lowering his blade and staring into D’Arden’s manna-blue eyes. “Ridiculous as it sounds, Tal, you’re right. It is pointless to fight you here. Perhaps if you see the truth of my power, I will not have to kill you. Perhaps once you see the truth, you’ll join me instead of fighting me.”
We’ll see about that, D’Arden thought, but said nothing aloud.
“You propose an Ether battle, then?” Khaine asked.
D’Arden nodded. “There’s no other way to truly prove it. On the ground we’re either firmly in your territory or mine. If you really believe that your Red is stronger, then prove it in the only place where neither one of us has an advantage.”
“You’re going to die, Tal,” Khaine said, once again sporting that terrifying grin. “Once you die, or decide that the proper place is with me, the Arbiters won’t be able to stand against my power any longer.”
“Then so be it,” D’Arden shrugged, acting disimpassioned. “If that’s the will of the land, then that is what is shall be.”
“The land knows nothing but what it is told,” Khaine said angrily.
“We shall see,” D’Arden answered.
They stepped back from each other, and for a moment, simply regarded the other, as if expecting some sort of treachery. At last, they each sheathed their respective weapons. D’Arden glanced at Elisa, and she met his eyes with less fear now, and nodded, still holding her manna blade. It was clear that Khaine regarded her as no kind of a threat, and had simply ignored her so far in the battle.
Despite what Khaine had said previously, D’Arden did not believe that their power was simply two sides of the same coin. He had seen the death and the destruction that the corrupted manna had caused. The angry red glow did not speak simply of a different kind of purity. The madness that seemed to engulf all that the corruption touched – the living corpses, the rising dead, the insane fel creatures that walked the world – did not speak of purity of any kind, but only of evil and of danger. Though he was saddened by the loss of his mentor to this terrible power, he knew that he could not waver in his resolve simply because he now fought against someone that he had once known.
Havox Khaine was gone. In his place was a monster, nothing more than a fel beast.
D’Arden hoped that he could continue to believe that.
They lifted out their arms together. The Ether battle was an ancient tradition, a duel between Arbiters who could not settle their differences. Battling in the Ether meant that neither side had direct access to the power that drove them; they had to summon it, to draw it to themselves and wield it. Their physical bodies would be left behind; there would be no blades, no strength – only energy. It was the final rite of passage to be fully ordained as a Master Arbiter. D’Arden thought that he must be the first Arbiter in many centuries, and possibly in time, to fight the Ether battle against a corrupted Arbiter.
The world began to fade around him as his spirit rushed towards the Ether. He felt Khaine’s presence following him, only a second behind. They would meet in the Ether, and D’Arden would wield the power of the pure manna against his foe. If he could not win here, then the world was truly lost.
They arrived in the Ether; a nebulous place that appeared as though they existed in a cloud. It was grey, ever-shifting and never the same for more than a moment. Looking into it was like looking into a thick fog; one could see a short distance and then everything simply faded to gray.
D’Arden saw himself in the Ether as an azure beacon of light and purity, and this is how he appeared. Every movement left a trail behind him, and he appeared like a shining star, blazing as brightly as the sun.
Khaine appeared in the Ether a moment later, and appeared to D’Arden as a bright red fireball, full of anger and hatred. He burned even brighter, blindingly white at the center and fading to orange and red flames toward the outside.
There were no words in the Ether, no taunts could be exchanged, no strategies revealed. There were only feelings and flashes of light exchanged between the two parties, and somehow there always seemed to be a kind of implicit understanding.
The battle was begun.
D’Arden summoned up the power from the land beneath him, drinking and drawing in the purity that he could feel from wherever he could feel it. It mattered little where the power came from, and he shaped it into a shield that he held before him. Only seconds later, Khaine’s first attack slammed into the shield and exploded in white and red around him. He was driven backwards from the force of it, but the shield held firm.
He drew in another stream of power from the land below, and shaped it into a lance that he hurled with one hand at his opponent. It flew straight and true like an arrow sent sailing from the finest bow, but the red energy leapt up and devoured it before it ever reached its target.
To any spectator who could have witnessed the event, it would have appeared that two stars had decided simply to battle it out in the heavens. The Ether was invisible from the world and could not be viewed by normal means, but D’Arden was certain that the Arbiter’s Tower was aware of the conflict. He made many of his attacks as spectacular as possible, hoping to draw the attention of his fellow arbiters so that even if he fell, that they would know of his valiant efforts to stop this corruption before it spread further, and so they might also be aware of the danger that faced them if he should fail.
As the battle raged on, D’Arden became aware of the fact that he was winning. Explosions rattled the Ether where the two of them fought, but it became clear to D’Arden that he was slowly winning victory over his opponent. Khaine’s attacks began to lose power – not all at once, but each attack seemed to be progressively weaker, while D’Arden felt himself growing stronger each time he tapped the land for its energy. He could not fathom how exactly that he was winning, only that he was, and he rejoiced in the victory. If he could truly defeat Khaine’s corrupted energy here in the Ether, he would be severely weakened back on the mortal plane, and D’Arden would be able to extinguish the corruption in Calessa once and for all.
He continued to throw attacks at Khaine, drawing more and more energy from the land to beat down his former mentor’s corruption. He’d lost all hope of purifying the man, to bring him back from the insanity – if D’Arden had come here years ago, he might have had a chance to save Khaine from the depths of the corruption, but alas, he knew that it was now too late.
Suddenly, D’Arden could no longer feel Khaine’s presence.
Had he won?
He rushed back down to the mortal world, relinquishing his hold on his spiritual form and racing back towards his body at alarming speeds. He crashed back into his body just in time to see a grinning Khaine driving the wickedly curved manna weapon towards his heart.
He hadn’t won.
Khaine had resorted to treachery.
The world seemed to slow to a crawl. Khaine’s death grin face bore down upon him, the glowing red blade coming closer with every second that ticked by. It was at critical mass – there was no way that D’Arden would be able to draw his sword and block the attack. In the face of his power, his former mentor – the most honorable man that he’d once known – had opted out of losing in the Ether battle and had come back here to drive the sword through D’Arden’s unwitting heart.
There was no honor, no power in Khaine’s desperate attack.
It pained D’Arden deeply to be defeated by it.
He could not be defeated by it.
Drawing on every ounce of strength he possessed, D'Arden twisted aside and the blade merely sliced along the flesh of his collar and the base of his neck, drawing blood and cobalt flames from the wound. It was no fatal blow like Khaine had intended, but the pain that flared in his chest disrupted his concentration. He stumbled away, rolling along the ground before regaining his feet, somewhat unsteadily.
They circled each other for a moment, and then D’Arden stepped in with his manna blade and cut downward at Khaine. It looked like a simple downward cut, and Khaine gave a horrible grin as he moved to parry. Instead, D'Arden changed his sword's trajectory at the last moment, slicing under his opponent's guard. Khaine tried to block, but could not bring his sword to intercept in time. The blade sank deep into the flesh of Khaine’s shoulder and alit with the azure flames. The larger man stumbled backward with a shriek of agony that rumbled the very foundations of the building as blood flowed and the blue fire consumed the droplets.
He pressed his attack then, aware of his growing advantage. Short one arm, which now hung limply by his side, Khaine’s parries were slower and his attacks less effective. D’Arden was as clearly winning the sword battle as he had been winning the Ether battle.
A perfectly-timed swing by D’Arden disarmed his opponent. The red manna blade skittered across the floor to rest several feet away, and D’Arden planted one heavy boot in his opponent’s chest, sending him to land backward on the marble floor. Blood was flowing now both from the deep wound in his shoulder and from multiple other shallow wounds that D’Arden had inflicted.
He stepped up then to stand over his former mentor, whose eyes still blazed with the red flames of the corrupted manna. “I’m sure you’re very proud of yourself, Tal. That was quite the tricky attack with your sword. Where did you learn something like that?"
“I’m not proud at all,” D’Arden said, staring into the eyes of his former master, ignoring the jibe at his swordsmanship. “I am disgusted, humiliated and disappointed that the man who once trained me and taught me everything that I know has fallen to such a low level.” He placed one boot firmly on Khaine’s chest as he began to struggle and pressed downward until he felt the sternum begin to snap. “I am revolted by you. This is your elegy, Khaine. If the Arbiter’s Tower wasn’t already aware of what you’d become, thanks to the Ether battle, I would come back to them singing your praises about how you had waged a war against the corruption and fallen bravely to it, fallen in battle like a true warrior. I alone would have carried the burden of your madness, your corruption – the burden of all of those who have died under your watch. Your arrogance has driven you to this, your hubris was your downfall. I am not proud. I do this only because I must.”
“Then you will rot in Hell itself!” Khaine said, grabbing hold of D’Arden’s boot and shoving him backwards. Khaine scrambled back and once again took up his blade, fighting with renewed vigor. He was drawing again on the power of his palace, and D’Arden could see the wound in his opponent’s shoulder healing. Soon Khaine was fighting with two arms, and D’Arden found himself in the losing position once more. He cursed himself for talking instead of taking the chance he had to end this madness.
This time, it was D’Arden who found himself disarmed. His manna blade clattered to the ground, and though it was not far from him, there was no way that he could retrieve it without Khaine impaling him.
“As it should be at last,” Khaine said, lowering his blade only slightly. “The master has outperformed the student. I win, Tal. It’s over now. You and your little bitch die today, and I will personally cut the hearts out of every one of the Arbiter’s at the tower. Your power will feed mine, and when I finally control an army of undead Arbiters, the world will fall at my feet!”
D’Arden felt despair rising in him. How could he have failed, when he had come so close to victory? It seemed hopeless.
He could feel the corrupted mana flowing over him, seeking a way past his defenses. It had been hours since his last spark from the heartblade, and he feared that the corruption might find a crack in his mental armor.
Could he beat Khaine, he wondered, if he let the corruption in? Was it possible to use Khaine’s own power against him?
For the briefest of moments, he considered the possibility.
Then it was too late.
Khaine’s curved manna blade drove through his chest. Explosive agony filled his world. He tried to scream, but it only came forth as a ragged cough. Blood and traces azure flame danced on his lips.
He could feel the life draining out of him as Khaine’s power surged through him, consuming the blue fire that drove his life-essence.
His mind became suddenly clear. If he was going to die here, he did not intend to let Khaine win.
With one hand, D’Arden grasped Khaine’s blade, close to where it had entered his chest. He forced his other hand to wrap around the blade farther up.
“What are you doing?” The corrupted Khaine stared at him, red eyes wide.
Using every ounce of strength he could muster, D’Arden dragged himself along Khaine’s blade. He felt the crystal scrape against his ribs, and more blood and azure flame poured from the wound.
“When did this happen to you, Khaine?” D’Arden gasped. “What changed you from the man who taught me?”
Khaine was so shocked that he hadn’t moved. He simply stood there, dumbfounded, staring at D’Arden.
Once again, D’Arden dragged his body along the blade. Closer.
“What evil touched your heart so deeply that you chose the path of corruption?” D’Arden’s voice was ragged, labored. He stared into the eyes of the man he’d known and cherished, searching for some sign that he might still be in there.
There was nothing. Only madness.
“I have done nothing but open my eyes to the truth of the universe,” Khaine sneered, though D’Arden could see a flicker of panic in the elder man’s insane glare.
“I don’t believe you. What happened to you, Havox? ”
“Just die!” Khaine shrieked.
Khaine wrenched his sword around and released the handle, dumping D'Arden and the blade onto the ground. D'Arden wrapped his hands around the hilt and tried to wrench it from where it had lodged in his breastbone, but the conflict between the red energy that flowed from Khaine's crystalline sword and the pure blue manna which filled D'Arden's veins was too strong. His fingers were weak, slipping along the edges as he tried in vain to pull it free.
"My power will consume you in short order, Tal," Khaine said, turning away. D'Arden looked up weakly, watching as crimson flames crept over Khaine's body, healing his wounds and restoring his strength. The blade lodged in D'Arden's chest burned with the corrupted power as it sought to overcome his will. The pure manna which pulsed within him refused to succumb, battling against its opposite. He gasped desperately, trying to pull air into his damaged lungs, but he could not breathe.
Khaine turned to the immobilized Elisa, and with a gesture, released her from her prison. D'Arden watched helplessly as she collapsed to the ground on her knees, breathing heavily. She struggled to rise, but he could see that Khaine's power was beginning to overwhelm her.
"Now you see the truth, little one," Khaine said, raising his arms expansively. "Now you see whose power is the stronger."
Elisa looked up at the twisted monster before her with wide eyes, glowing with the azure fire that D'Arden had instilled in her. "I see."
Agony gripped D'Arden's mind, agony stronger than that which immobilized his body. He closed his eyes for a moment, and then opened them again to watch.
Khaine approached Elisa, dropping his bulging arms back to his sides. "There is a greater power here than you imagine. You, who have only been introduced to the manna within the last few days, have a greater potential than any who have been suppressed by the heartblade. It is more than a drug, you know… more than anything, it is designed to limit the power of those who are gifted with the ability to see the manna flow."
D'Arden strained to see Khaine, to see if perhaps his former mentor was telling lies, but Khaine's back was to him. The heartblade was designed to limit his power? How much could he have gained without it?
"So… I could be even more powerful than you?" Elisa asked.
"Indeed," Khaine said, nodding his grotesque visage sagely. "You may become my apprentice, child – follow me and my power, and we shall remake the world in the image we desire. My power is limited – but yours is without constraint. All it requires is time and training."
Elisa rose to her feet slowly, still gripping her crystal sword in her hand. The cobalt power within her radiated outward as an aura, but as D'Arden watched, it began to slowly take on an amethyst cast. She was succumbing to temptation.
Khaine laughed – a horrible sound which echoed off of the walls of the chamber, ringing in D'Arden's ears. It felt as though his brain might begin to bleed as the monstrous laughter infected his mind. "You see, Tal? Even your apprentice can see the truth! If only you could have seen it before I was forced to kill you!"
D'Arden felt his vision beginning to darken. With Elisa losing her focus and willpower, the last bastion of his own power was rapidly disappearing. He was going to have nothing left to draw on shortly, and then he would die, vanishing forever into the flow of corrupted manna which had taken over the city of Calessa. Khaine would be victorious, and all would be lost.
Khaine turned back to D'Arden, staring down at him from his massive, inflamed height. "You should have accepted my offer, Tal."
"Never," D'Arden managed to spit.
"Fool!" Khaine thundered. "Even now you refuse to admit that my power is the greater?"
"Forever, Khaine. You are… a failure," the Arbiter wheezed.
His former mentor's red eyes blazed hot white. "A failure, am I? Who lies dying upon the floor, and who stands victorious? Who failed to stop me from conquering Calessa? Who is the one who refuses to see truth when it stands before his very eyes?"
"You failed… your ideals. You failed… your friends. You failed… me," D'Arden choked out around the pain in his chest.
"I have seen truth!" Khaine proclaimed righteously. "I have seen the truth of the universe, and now you will die without ever seeing it for yourself!"
"You may be right, Khaine," D'Arden said, though he felt himself disappearing rapidly. He was going to die. "But there's something you… didn't count on."
"What?" Khaine demanded.
"You overplayed…your hand. Overestimated… your power."
Khaine laughed again. "I've done no such thing. I've won, Tal. What could I have possibly overlooked? I've…"
He never saw the blade that Elisa drove down through the back of his neck, severing his spine and protruding from a point just above his navel. Khaine stopped mid-sentence and gave a choking cough. He looked down to see the blazing blue crystal of Elisa's sword sticking out amid blood and crimson flame.
Azure fire rolled off Elisa in waves. Any trace of violet was gone from her blazing aura, replaced by the pure blue of the uncorrupted manna font.
Khaine dropped to his knees as Elisa drove her sword further through his body. He choked again, blood spouting from his lips as he opened them.
"It was me," she said, her voice cold as midwinter.
D'Arden met her eyes over Khaine's shoulder, and he gave her a weak, but approving nod.
Cobalt fire burned over Khaine's entire body, rapidly consuming the crimson that tried to fight back. As Khaine toppled over to the ground, Elisa rushed past him and knelt down beside D'Arden.
"I'm going to… die," he gasped.
She stood once more and, with both hands, grabbed the protruding handle of Khaine's curved manna blade, and placed one foot against D'Arden's chest. She pulled with all of her strength, and though D'Arden gave a hoarse cry of agony as she did, the sword scraped free of his breastbone and came away covered in blood and weak curls of blue fire.
Elisa tossed the blade away, where it landed several feet from both them and Khaine.
"Don't die, D'Arden," she said, kneeling down beside him again. "You can't die. I just saved you."
He coughed. He was able to draw on her power once more, but it was too late. He could feel himself beginning to slip away. There was not enough power within him to heal the deadly wound. It was a miracle he had survived this long.
"I'm sorry, Elisa," he whispered. "The Tower is to the north. Go there, and…"
"I'm not going anywhere without you," she said fiercely. With one hand, she reached into his vest and fished about, finally pulling free the heartblade. It glimmered weakly, the corruption having leached the power from it as he lay there.
"There's… not enough," he said.
"Like hell there isn't!" she exclaimed. The heartblade glimmered brighter. "There damn well better be enough here to save you, because I am not leaving without you."
D'Arden watched as the glow of the heartblade slowly changed from the tiny glint of a faded star to a blazing white light nearly worthy of the sun itself. "Elisa…"
How was she doing that? The heartblade could only be recharged on a font…
There was so much he did not understand.
She concentrated on the tiny, needle-like dagger until the light from it was enough to hurt his eyes. Then, without a word, she thrust it into his chest.
The spark from the heartblade leapt into him as though he'd been struck by lightning. His body spasmed and pain flooded him again, but this time it was not the pain of death. It was the pain of life.
Familiar, warming blue flame began to creep through the wounds he'd suffered as the heartblade's power began to knit him back together. It was excruciating, but he could slowly feel life returning. His breathing began to ease until it no longer pained him to draw in air.
"It worked," he said, and the words didn't hurt to speak.
He pulled himself into a sitting position, and looked to the spot where Khaine had fallen. His mentor had vanished, consumed by the pure manna from Elisa's sword and her will. Her blade lay on the cold stone floor, glowing a dull, angry crimson with purpose.
His words, though, echoed in D'Arden's mind.
You, who have only been introduced to the manna within the last few days, have a greater potential than any who have been suppressed by the heartblade…
A cold shudder went through him as Elisa helped him to his feet.
"I think we won," she said softly.
D'Arden stared at her. The natural green of her eyes was completely overtaken by the shining, burning blue of the manna that radiated outward from her. It was almost eerie looking at her, the newest of his Order… and wondering at what unimaginable potential lay behind those eyes.
"I think you're right," he answered after a moment.