NIGHT OF SAINTS: Act I

((Sign up and OOC goes in the OOC Thread))

ACT I

King Darroth stood before his most elite group of knights. Powerful vassals, each of them. Alone, superior to near all others in the land. Combined, they were an unstoppable force, his ace-in-the-hole for conflicts.

They'd been forged in trial after trial, hardened and strengthened in battles no normal man could survive. Yet even Darroth, with all his faith in his warriors, had some doubt about what was to come.

"The magicians have been strengthening across the land. My couriers and squires are doing their best to suppress information, to keep the kingdom from falling into complete panic, but they're only slowing the inevitable." he began, seated on his throne.

"Magic...monstrous energy that it is...is corrupting things. It's created freaks. Halflings. Hybrids of beasts and men, and its power is seductive. I am confident in your ability...but in lesser knights, I fear they would easily be bested by even meager wizards. Their power is...incredible. I have not seen it firsthand, but my scouts say that some of the monsters have done terrible things."

"I have called you here now. There is something here...someone, something, I know not, that seems to be working this force like a puppetteer."

A man stumbled forward, obviously nervous about being near the king, and pulled out a map with fumbling fingers.

The king unraveled it on the ground, looking it over. He tapped the castle with his foot, then kneeled down, pointing at a spot far to the south.

"There. All our scouts have sent reports back as far as there. And then...they have not returned. Something powerful is there, the combined strength of all that threatens to destroy my kingdom, our way of life. If you make haste, you can reach it in a fortnight. Meanwhile, I'll try to keep word from spreading. If the people know what's going on, I fear panic will tear us apart long before magic does."

Darroth sat back down on the throne, weary. "I went sleepless many nights thinking this over. I do not condone magic. It is uncontrollable, untamable. But I think fighting with fire may be the best course of action, just this once.

We have a small handful of wizards loyal to us, unwavering in discipline and valor. I've kept them under careful watch, but they are all just. They cannot accompany you: I do not know what such powerful magic will do to them, the magically sensitive, but they have bestowed their might upon armor, weapons, your mounts. It should greatly aid your journey. Your horses will not need food nor water, your blades no sharpening or cleaning, and your weapons all improved.

If you aren't comfortable with this, I can understand, but I'm afraid there's nothing I can do about it. You are the Templars. MY Templars. I have no doubt in your ability.

Now ride. Hurry."

He dismissed them with a wave of his hand.


----

Down in the stables, Darroth's daughters were waiting. It was normally a tradition for all the ladies of the land to send off the Templars, but with the secretive nature of their quest, only a few were privy to the details.

Mia, Cae, and Rachel, all of whom were close to the Templars in one way or another, hugged and kissed them as they mounted their horses and left.

As soon as the Templars had cleared the city, however, things began to go awry.

A brilliant flash of light filled the stables, where one of the daughters remained, admiring her personal horse.

"Wh-" Cae said, pale and eyes wide. A figure stood in the stables, eight feet tall with a dark cloak and steel armor. He drew a sword, jagged and pulsating with violet light, and drove it straight through her stomach before she could react.

Instantly, her eyes rolled into her head and the girls' body melted away, as if she had never existed. The horse neighed furiously, and he silenced it with a smach of his gauntlet, sending a sickening "crrunnchchh" through the stables.

He turned and walked up the stairway, into the castle.

Darroths' guards poured into the throne room, and the king angrily stood up. "Wha-"

The figure burst into the room, stopping every arrow sent at him mid-flight and sending them falling harmlessly to the ground.

"My daughters," he spoke to his closest knight. "Find them. Get them to safety." The king drew his blade, rising from the throne.

The figure began a bloody trail to the lord, every guard falling prey to his magic, one by one, killed with a flash of violet light or some invisible force snapping them, breaking them. The throne room was littered with bodies when he turned, facing the king.

There was a deafening blast of thunder and a shockwave of electricity as a lightning bolt unfurled from the man's hand, burning a hole through the king. When the room went quiet, his charred body lay on the floor, sword clutched tightly in his hand.

---

TWO WEEKS LATER

Astraois got off his horse, staring at the field in front of them.

"If the maps were correct...then this should be it." The Templars were all scattered around, some packing up previous nights' camp and others waking up.

"Whatever it is is about a mile due south. I'd say we take the horses, but they all seem skittish." Perhaps the beasts could sense the magic, for they were all neighing anxiously and attempting to pull away from the land in front of them.

It was a huge grassy field, with waist high plants. The sun was obscured by overcast skies, and a chill breeze made the field dance back and forth.

Astraois drew the Claimh Solais and sliced his horse's reins off from their post, setting the beast free. It quickly turned and galloped away.

"Is everyone ready?" he asked quietly, his voice not betraying his inner thoughts. Astraois was afraid, but he kept his voice steady and his demeanor solemn.

Fern Wassef could feel the same undefinable sense of terror that had so pervaded the horses senses, but it got no further in him than its perception. He was not cruel, and so followed his leaders example and with a lightning arm slashed his horses reigns from their post. It too was soon out of sight.

As always, Cho was twitching his muscles, making sure they were always warmed up just in case. He replied to his commander with his usual strict discipline:

"Boss-man, if we were any more ready we would be YOU! And surely no one wants that!"

Reverend Jonath sighed as he carefully pushed dirt over the morning campfire, extinguishing it. He’d finished clearing away the meagre cooking they’d done and had gone through his own personnel prayers. Standing up his heavy armour glinted in the light, his mace hung from a cord wrapped around the waist and it tinged gently whenever he moved. His visor was raised displaying the mark which imbued his sightless eyes with the awesome power of the True God to allow him to use Faith Sight constantly in order to replace his own vision which had been deftly taken by an enemy of the Faith many years ago.
Looking around he could see the faint distortions around the landscape where streams of magic flowed. Faith Sight only allowed him to see the most powerful ones and only very faintly but none the less there were enough of them to daunt a lesser man. Nothing daunted Reverend Jonath. His Faith was his shield, his weapon, his armour and his salvation. He didn’t really need much else beyond it.
He turned and untied the reins before whispering in his horse’s ear. The Gelding was less fearful of the others but it none the less had a little in it which leant it haste as it fled the scene when Jonath told it to.

“It looks like it will be a fine day to deliver the lore of the True God.” He said in his clear, somewhat priestly, baritone voice. He looked around at the group of knights, “So, will any of you be desiring one last blessing from the True God before we ride into holy battle?”

"I'm okay with the blessing, but I'd kill for some mead right now," Astraois muttered under his breath: impressed as he was with Jonath, he was sometimes a bit over the top with the religion. Although his sight; or whatever passed for it did tend to impress upon him quite a bit. If Astraois was ever wounded in combat, he decided, he was crawling to Jonath first.

"We should go now. I want you all to know I can make no guarantees as to your lives or deaths at this point. The enemy we face is large and powerful. We are the Knights TEmplar, and we shall triumph no matter the cost. If any of you are afraid to die, I suggest you turn back now.

We go forth with reckless abandon." He rested the Solais on his shoulder, and it burned with an intense light. The sky was eternally overcast, and whether it was day or night, the world was lit with a greyish, monotone glow from above. The skies didn't seem to move, and the breeze was ever so slight.

Astraois began the long, slow walk down the path. Dead bodies littered the way.

Cho followed his leader with lithe, fluid movements, barely disturbing the grass. It was all too easy to hide in this world of twilight. Technically he supposed he was lying to his commander by following him. He didnt have the slightest fear of death or being dead, but the very idea of dying scared the living daylights out of him. Oh well. Damned if he wasnt takin down every one of those bastards ahead with him.

"If there's one thing I do well, sir, it's reckless abandon," Accalon said with a mirthless grin. He followed behind Astrois near the front of the group. On his back was his shield; in his hands was his weapon, currently expanded into a polearm. He figured he would need the raw power in order to do damage.

At this point, survival was secondary. He had faced the magic before, and it had taken his sight. He had rebounded from that, and here he was back for more. He guessed that was probably just his own particular way of being crazy.

But really, what was he doing here? He'd done some dumb shit before, but this was definitely the dumbest. There was no way they were coming back from this alive; even if they succeeded, would they all wish they were dead afterwards? Accalon had some experience in that department.

But it wasn't about him. It was about his family. His daughter would want to grow up in a world without this abomination, and he was determined to give that to her if it was teh last thing he did.

He looked all around him, with the expression of a man who was saying goodbye - not a final goodbye, but a goodbye just in case.

((Damnit. I wrote this nice big post, and to finish it I copied and pasted it for later. Then I turned the computer off. Fuuuuuuuuuuuuu))

The air turned from mild to downright chilly, the kind of insidious cold that cuts through your clothing and just wraps itself around your bones, like your blood is ice water and you're some flesh covered frost. The wind began to pick up at a brutal pace, Astraois even struggling to put one foot in front of the other at times.

He grasped the Claimh Solais, and it erupted with a brilliant light: he intended to rally the Templars, perhaps one last time, and the flare gave him a bit of confidence as well. He stood a little straighter and looked dead forward.

There, all the corpses lining the road began to increase in number, with a grisly ring formed in front of them. A small obsidian rock jutted from the ground, and everyone there would know this was what they were fighting, as insignificant as it seemed.


The bodies began to quiver, then tremble, then full-on shake, as if some kind of postmortem seizure was wracking their muscles and contorting their spines, and suddenly their bodies burned with an intense violet and the obsidian began to glow as well, pulsing with a sickly light.

A feeling of unease washed over Astraois, and he was sure the others felt it. Nausea, dizziness, the wind was tearing at him now, not a breeze or a gust, but as if it intended to rip off his armor and bore open his chest. He flourished the blade and took one step forward; this merely provoked it.

The maelstrom intensified as violet lightning began to coil from the ground and the bodies into a nexus over the obsidian, and a kind of shadow, like wisps of smoke began to form. Soon, a swirling mass of darkness.

"FIGHT!" Astraois screeched, his voice barely managing to sound over the deafening roar of the Abomination. An invisible grip, like a vise, choked one of the Templars, snapping every bone in his body, imploding his form within a second.

A bolt of lightning struck at Astraois himself, but either incredible reflexes or the sword itself intervened, stopping it without conducting the magic. Astraois steadied himself, digging his heels into the ground and gritting his teeth to keep from succumbing. He threw off the darkness and stepped in, requiring all of his strength to even move against the thing.

Fire, this time, violet and malicious broke from the tip of the obsidian, and it engulfed Astraois whole. Smoking and burnt, yet still on his feet, he stepped back, breathing heavily.

"RALLY! KILL IT!" he roared, his face already weary and a myriad of cuts and bruises adorning his face. He turned back to the Abomination, which was transfiguring itself into a chimera, a serpent, a bear, a leviathan, constantly swirling and moving, all forms of magic lashing out to strike.

The air had turned chilly and now it seemed like it was almost cold enough to freeze the breath that came out of your very mouth. It was the sort of chill that pierced you to the very marrow of your bones and tried to possess you.
“Ah! Just like the mountains of home.” Reverend Jonath stated with satisfaction as he flexed his shoulders with a creak of leather and steel. That was probably the most unexpected comment so far that day. He strode on with the single mindedness of a priest on a mission, which he was but regardless of that that’s the analogy that would be used. It was as if he just ignored the wind, one foot in front of the other over and over again. Blizzards were colder and harder than this. But then the others seemed to be struggling more than he was. The number of corpses was unbelievable for a place where a set piece battle hadn’t been fought; they’d likely built up over a short period of time but over days or weeks not in hours.

The Obsidian rock, not too foreboding but not natural either.

Then the Abomination itself began to appear, judging from reactions of Astraois the magic was causing images in the surroundings to appear. All he could see were corpses being twisted by faint warps in the air; his Faith Sight didn’t allow him to see apparitions because technically he couldn’t see anything so only that which was real was revealed to him. The Abomination for example was all there in its insidious glory.

“Oh lovely…” He muttered to himself before raising one hand to his helmet in open prayer. As Astraois leapt forth to fight its magic of fire and lightening and as it rapidly changed forms Jonath stood nearby and began his prayer.

“Oh Great God who looks over all our works as we toil by day and by night. Who watches the rise and fall of man in all his forms and who observes our works done in your name and ours. Who grants us strength when we need it and rewards our faith when we call for your divine aid. To whom the forces of heaven and earth owe allegiance and for whom we go forth each day. Grant us that you watch over our pitiful actions as we go about our divine task this day and should we fall look favourably upon our souls who, being bloodied in forbidden warfare have sullied ourselves for your glory and the safety of these lands.”
He paused to bat aside some wayward magic before lowering his hand and setting his sights on the Abomination strode through all of its illusions to keep him away and entered the fray near Astraois.