[IC] The Vampire princes

[gorgenmast]

The gates leading out into Castle Bathory's courtyard creaked open just wide enough to allow Yorrek to step out from the interior of the citadel. Nervous faces of castle servants - women and men too old or weak to fight - peered out from between the iron-banded doors before pulling the gates back shut. Dull, heavy thuds sounded behind the sturdy wooden beams as the servants inside set about barring the gate shut behind Yorrek.

The manicured gardens of the castle's courtyard were unrecognizable from when Yorrek had seen them last. Lush bushes and shrubberies had been buried under a thick blanket of dust and ash, crushed underneath rubble shed by cannonball damage to the citadel's spires, and then trampled underfoot by the Royal Guard gathered in the courtyard for their final stand against Ulrek's forces. Stately trees that had stood since the childhood of Yorrek's great grandfather had been crushed under the weight of so many falling bricks and stones, reduced to splintered stumps poking weakly from underneath the omnipresent rubble. Only one tree - an ancient and gnarled holly tree planted at the very center of the citadel's courtyard - still stood. It too was heavily damaged, with entire boughs snapped off and its glossy leaves caked in dust, but it remained standing, its battered silhouette rising up into a hellish sky cast red and orange by the setting sun and by the fires burning unchecked throughout the city beyond the citadel's ramparts. Stormy gusts had bellowed the flames generated by Ulrek's bombardment and by the Madness the night before, setting significant portions of the Capital ablaze. Ash and dust carried on the wind, as did the cacaphony of battle.

Thousands of shouts and screams melded together into a single, roaring din carrying over the walls. Even now, Ulrek's hordes were charging the walls of the ramparts, their battlecries mixed with barked orders of the defenders on the ramparts who set about thinning the Baron's approaching ranks. Yorrek watched as archers fired through the crenelations on the ramparts, down onto the teeming attackers charging at the walls. Crossbowmen loaded their bows behind the cover of the battlements before pointing the bow out through the crenels, firing off a bolt, and reloading again. A few servants even filled ceramic vessels full of boiled lard from one of the boiling cauldrons placed up on the walls, covered their openings with burning wicks of cloth, and then hurled the vessel over the wall where it would burst with flaming grease amidst the attackers. Ulrek's forces responded in kind with crossbow bolts shot up from over the walls, most of which plinked harmlessly against the battlements. A few bolts from the attackers found their way through the crenels and found their mark on the guardsmen on the ramparts. Anguished shrieks rang out from atop the walls as the occasional arrow embedded itself in an archer. Yorrek winced as a servant manning one of the grease cauldrons caught an arrow to the side and lost his footing, falling with a crunching thud amidst the soldiers gathered in the courtyard.

Yorrek made his way from the gate to a gathering of pikemen gathered in a disorganized cluster before the near-breach in the wall created by the Baron's most recent cannon bombardment. Some two hundred faced the damaged segment of the wall, watching arrows arc over the walls with wide, fearful eyes and filthy dust-caked faces. Anxious, expectant eyes converged upon Yorrek as he approached his soldiers.

"Commander," one of the guard captains recognized as Yorrek approached. "I thought you'd be staying with the Prince."

"You know I couldn't let you lot have all the fun," Yorrek said with a toothy grin, glancing around at the guards around him. Yorrek had expected a round of laughter there, or at least a few genuine chuckles. Yorrek's grin melted away in the face of silent, empty stares from his men.

"I'm not an orator, men," Yorrek admitted with a sigh. "I wish I knew how to give you a rousing address and inspire within you lot some glimmer of hope in this dark hour. But I do not have the words in me, and I regret to say that there is no hope for any of us today. Ulrek's hosts and mercenaries outnumber us more than ten to one, and those Madness-gripped lunatics outnumber us greater still. For those of us inside this courtyard, this will be our last night on this mortal plane, so abandon any notion of mercy or honor when we face Ulrek's gathered multitudes.

"For us Royal Guards, there is no hope. But for our sovereign, for our families and friends beyond those walls, for our children and their children after them, some hope yet remains. If we can destroy his army, if we can kill the Usurper on the field of battle, then our wives and children will never know life under the heavy yoke of King Ulrek Bathory.

"That is what separates us from Ulrek's gathered hosts. The men we will soon be facing are motivated by greed and fear; desire for the freely-flowing gold vespers of the Baron's squandered fortunes, desire to keep their skins attached to their bodies. We are motivated by something greater: hope for our posterity. And so in a few short hours, when death looks you in the eyes and that terrified voice in the back of your head begs you to turn and flee for dear life... drown that pitiful, mewling voice out with one last defiant cry and make death take you thrashing and screaming!

Before Yorrek could incite the men into a rallying cheer, a bellowing roar from over the wall stole the attention of the guards. Frantic eyes went to the walls as archers on the ramparts confirmed everyone's fear.

"Ogres!" Screamed an archer on the wall. "The ogres are coming!"

"Concentrate your fire on them! Give them every-" Before the bowman on the ramparts could finish his command, a giant, wart-covered arm reached over the rampart and seized him, ripping him down off the wall. The archer's command turned into a frenzied scream, punctuated suddenly by a wet, popping crunch that could easily heard even over the sounds of battle. Mammoth ogre arms thrashed through the crenels of the ramparts, clawing at any defender within reach. The defenders on the wall pressed for the guard towers and stairs so as to get down from the walls and away from the reach of the ogres. Another terrible roar, and the wall shook as something heavy on the other side of the half-breached wall collided against it. Bricks tumbled down away from the nearly-breached wall, allowing Yorrek and his pikemen glimpses of the ogre battering against the breach. Yorrek could see the terror in the eyes of the guard, some backing slowly away from the wall.

"Form ranks!" Yorrek ordered, gesturing for a long pike from one of the guardsmen standing nearby. The pikeman handed his weapon to over to Yorrek, who briefly examined its long iron tip before pointing it toward the battered wall, raising it up to a 45 degree angle.

"Do not fear, good men," Yorrek ordered as the guards closed in together in a wide U-shaped formation around the breach, their spearpoints trained against the crumbling wall. "Ogres are strong and and their hide is thick, but do not think for a second that they are invincible! Their hide is thin at the groin, under the arms, and the neck. Press your pikes against these points, and brace the shaft against the ground! Let the brutes impale themselves on our pikes! We can kill them, but we must not fear!"

The ogre roared again as it threw its weight against the wall. The wall heaved and bowed, bricks tumbled off the wall and rolled down to the feet of Yorrek and his gathered pikeman. Yorrek glanced around to his men, and watched their wide and fearful eyes narrow into a furious gaze, their gauntlets tightening upon their pikes.

The ogre gave another roar as it threw itself against the wall one last time. The wall failed at last, bricks and rubble cascading down around the ogre as it stumbled through the gaping breach in the wall. Lumbering in through a curtain of dust was a twelve-foot tall ogre, its broad meaty shouldered embedded with no fewer than 50 arrows. The beast gave a furious roar as it laid eyes upon the gathered pikemen. Yorrek responded with his own battlecry, squelching the terror in the back of his mind as he gripped his pike and charged headlong at the monster.

The ogre was momentarily stunned as the screaming pikemen charged in behind Yorrek, confused as it had never before seen an enemy run toward it. Confusion turned to rabid fury as Yorrek planted his spearpoint deep into the monster's inner thigh, wedging the butt of the pike down into some rubble at his feet. Yorrek abandoned his pike and narrowly evaded the ogre's retaliatory lunge, drawing his sword as he charged toward a second ogre pressing in through the breach.

The ogre behind him howled in pain as it foolishly pressed its weight against the wedged pike. The shaft snapped under the beast's weight, but not before the pike's iron tip was driven through the thick hide down into the bone. It was enough time for the pike-armed guards to converge against it, planting their spearpoints against the distracted ogre's throat and then jabbing in with all their might. Dark red blood gushed forth from the heads of the pikes in spurting pulses, and the ogre slumped over sideways and bled out upon the rubble.

The second ogre was now upon Yorrek, throwing a heavy fist down at the guard leader. Yorrek sidestepped the ogre's blow and hacked at its heel with his sword. It was as if Yorrek had hit his sword against a tree trunk, as his blade only cut through an inch or two of warty, calloused skin. The ogre stepped away and swatted at Yorrek, ripping his red cloak right off his shoulders but narrowly missing him. His men had now caught up with Yorrek, and surrounded the second ogre with a wall of spearpoints, trying to press their spears against the ogre's thin skin under the arms or the neck. The ogre parted through the wall of spearpoints, shrugging off a few that embedded themselves in its shoulder and sternum, and then swatted at the pikemen. Half a dozen men were sent sailing into the air, and another handful were torn apart, their torsos torn from their legs. Horrified screams rang out as the ogre grabbed another soldier and threw him hard against the wall. A spray of blood was left upon the stones where the man impacted, his body tumbled down onto the rubble in a twitching heap.

The ogre snapped the pikes poking out from its skin as easily as dry reeds, stomping down on another pikeman before turning his attention to Yorrek. The ogre tried to grab him, but once again Yorrek stepped just out of reach and retaliated with a powerful chop to the ogre's hand, managing to sever one of the monster's digits. The ogre withdrew his hand and inspected the bloody stump where his index finger hand been seconds before, howling in pain. Taking advantage of the beast's distraction, Yorrek scrambled for a discarded pike laying upon the rubble, hoping for enough time to take up the pike and thrust it up through the ogre's chin. Yorrek had almost seized the pike when a thick bloody hand seized him.

Yorrek winced under the ogre's vicelike grip. He could feel his ribs snapping and collapsing under the ogre's remaining fingers. The ogre held Yorrek up to his wart-pocked, flabby face, regarding the guard leader with a contemptuous sneer. The ogre opened his mouth, revealing an arcade of worn, yellowed teeth, and lowered Yorrek face down into his open maw.

Yorrek tried to wriggle free, but the ogre's grip was unrelenting. Even so, the constant flow of blood oozing out from the ogre's hand provided just enough lubrication for Yorrek to slide his right arm out from under the ogre's fingers. Yorrek felt the monster's disgusting breath hot on his face, his head just inches from the warty lips of the man-eating beast, when he released his arm from the ogre's grip and planted his sword deep into the ogre's temple. The ogre's eyes immediately rolled into the back of its head and its grip tightened. Yorrek felt his ribs all snap, and he tasted blood at the back of his throat. With a throaty wheeze, the ogre tumbled over, collapsing face-first onto the rubble with Yorrek still clenched in his fist.

From the ogre's death grip, Yorrek could only watch as another ogre made its way through the breach. Through the ogre's giant legs, Ulrek's men charged in through the breach, silhouetted through the smoke and dust against the burning city behind them. With a roaring charge, the Baron's men clashed with the guards. The jarring clanging of sword meeting sword rang out as the fighting began in earnest. With each breath tearing at his lungs, Yorrek knew that he would not be able to guide his men through the remainder of the battle.

He hoped that his men fought bravely as his breath weakened.

---

Lord Orrin Goutfoot watched from atop his pony as the front of the Baron's army pressed in toward Castle Bathory. The dwarven lord was far behind Ulrek and the mercenaries at the front of the army, still stuck in the market square after the city's populace turned against the Baron's forces, several hundred paces away from the walls of the citadel. The mob had succeeded in separating the front of Ulrek's army from the rear, and from atop his pony, Goutfoot could see that the Baron was making no effort to try to rendezvous with the beleaguered rear forces. Ulrek's knights and men-at-arms tasked with defending Lord Goutfoot and his cannons had done a respectable job keeping the mob away from the dwarven cannon teams. Even so, Goutfoot's patience had run out.

"The Baron has abandoned us," spat Goutfoot, turning to a few of his dwarves in earshot. "I should have never followed him into the city. This is his battle to fight, not ours. Let's turn around and get out of the gates, I'm not loosing my cannons!"

"As you wish, Lord Goutfoot!" One of the dwarves affirmed, eager to try to escape this madness. "Turn the wagons around, boys, we're leaving!"

Lord Goutfoot guided his pony through the ring of men-at-arms around the cannons toward a mounted knight holding back a gaggle of men armed with tanning knives. The knight brought his sword down on the clavicle of one of the tanners, drew it, and lopped the head off another in a fluid motion.

"Ser knight!" Goutfoot called out, not knowing the knight's name. "We are falling back out of the city to regroup."

"The Baron gave us no such orders," the knight replied.

"The Baron has abandoned us, you boy!" Goutfoot chided. "Your Baron has left us to our fate. Are you going to continue to fight for him, knowing he wouldn't come to your aid?"

"I am not afraid of some enraged serfs," said the knight. "But I am afraid of what will happen to my kin if the Baron knows I deserted him."

"The Baron isn't leaving this place alive. Neither will we if we don't leave now. Help us leave this place."

The knight gave another glance at the castle, and then back at the city gate behind him.

"Retreat!" The knight cried out. "Fall back outside the city!" Horns rang out through the remainder of the Baron's forces, now slowly ceding ground against the surge of enraged citizens. Despite the fact that the majority of the Baron's remaining men were now falling back, the citizenry had no intention of allowing them to escape alive, and their assault remained just as vicious as ever.

Lord Goutfoot watched an old man ignite a grease-soaked table with a torch on a balcony overlooking the main thoroughfare, and threw the burning table down onto the soldiers below. Windblown embers erupted from where the table landed on the cobblestones, carrying on the wind throughout the dwarves and the Baron's men. On the roof of another house, a pair of boys had assembled jars and vases full of pitch. With a torch, they ignited rag wicks coiling down into the jar before casting them down on the retreating army. The jars splattered with with a spray of burning sludge, sticking onto the shields of retreating yeomen and men-at-arms. Embers scattered from each shattered vessel, whipping through the army. Goutfoot, however, noticed some of the sparks come dangerously close to one the wagons laden with firedust. The dwarven lord's eyes widened as the danger of the present situation manifested itself.

"Cover the wagons!" Goutfoot screamed. "COVER THE WAGONS!"

Goutfoot stumbled from his pony and barged through the men at arms pressed tight around the wagons bearing the cannons and their firedust propellant. The dwarf lord scrambled up onto the firedust wagon and frantically drew rolls of leather over the firedust barrels to protect them from errant embers. But the scrambling dwarf must have presented the boys up on the roof with an enticing target, and a well-thrown jar full of burning pitch burst upon the wheels of the wagon. Goutfoot had just enough time to watch an ardent droplet of burning pitch splash up onto a barrel full of firedust. The long, smoky tongues of flame licked at a patch of exposed firedust on the top of the barrel, and in the blink of an eye the world was consumed in a brilliant flash of orange fire.

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Kane saw the sparks, the dwarf frantically trying to shield the load from the wagon, other dwarves scurrying without purpose around the wheels, nearby horsemen kicking mounts forward in an effort to escape what they knew to becoming. It was with an almost detached interest that Kane saw the two boys, ingenious boys, stand to hurl their burning mason jars, so recently filled with mothers jam, down upon the dwarf and his wagon.

The bright orange flash easily lit the face of the dwarf, the terror, the knowledge of his impending death stamped firmly across the rugged features. A roll of leather, still clutched in one gnarled hand, served to protect his face for a millisecond as the rising flame turned his clothes into ash. His beard, then his eyebrows went next, vanishing with the heat until his skin literally melted in an instant as the fire consumed him.

Then the fireball began to grow and expand, swallowing panicking dwarves and men, vengeful peasants who ran toward it with no regard for their own safety. A crow, flying low through the streets, simply burst into flames as the heat struck it, the flaming, screaming, bird sailing through the air to vanish into the streets beyond. Men in armour were crushed as the concussion bent and twisted metal armour. The dwarves long hair, so glorious and well oiled, ignited almost immediately to turn them into short shrieking torches with nowhere to run.

Unarmoured peasants disintegrated as the fireball swept down the streets like some monstrous beast that devoured all in its path. Windows shattered to spray glass in every direction. Stone buildings literally shattered in the intense heat to add flying stone to the shrapnel now filling the streets. Flesh was shredded, clothes torn, bodies literally ripped to bloody ribbons, as the blast expanded outward strike the second and third wagons.

These two were much closer together and exploded within seconds. Their explosions fused into one, so much larger than the first, simply wiping entire buildings off the face of the earth in an instant. Beneath them the earth moved.

The capital had stood for a thousand years. Beneath its streets ran unknown kilometres of long abandoned quarries, ancient tunnels, catacombs, and sewers. As fickle fate would have it, the second explosion occurred over largest of these works and the roof began to collapse. It was not just the explosion of course, a thousand years of digging, building, and progressively larger buildings, had done their part to weaken the ceiling of the ancient quarry and now thousands would pay with their lives.

The fourth wagon, partially shielded from the blasts, tettered and vanished into the rapidly expanding hole in the cobblestone. Only Kane, who saw it all, had the time to notice and an instant to wonder just how bad things were about to get. The fourth wagon, when it hit bottom, exploded much as its fellows had, but this time the blast was hurled deep into the tunnels, shattering ancient support columns and carefully built arches. More streets began to buckle, buildings lurched drunkenly, and the city began to die.

The two initial fireballs rolled into one as their awesome power drove outward, the concussion wave racing ahead of the flame to scatter struggling combatants before it as a great wind might blow leaves. Clothes melted to skin an instant before the skin was turned to ash. Not even skeletons remained of those closest to the blast. Naught but shadows and ash.

In the castle, Yorrek lived long enough to see the huge gatehouse, weakened by the ogres attack, sway alarmingly before giving a mighty groan and crashing down to bury guardsmen and ogres alike beneath hundreds of tonnes of stone. The few spires that had survived the Barons assault were smashed like wooden bowling pins, tumbling down into the citadel below. Everything stopped as men, dwarves, vampires, ogres, and angels alike, turned to stare in dumb fascination at the climbing fireball.

Dust billowed through the streets to blind those who did not turn away in time. The black cloud advanced like an angry shadow, consuming all before it. Behind it, as buildings collapsed and vanished one by one, a great chasm grew across the very centre of the city. It swallowed all, sparing no one or anything it touched.

Kane watched it all, drifting upon the winds, the fire and smoke swirling around him but not touching him. The force of the explosion snapped at his cloak and buffeted his wings but otherwise it was though he was made of stone. Where a people had struggled to be free, nothing remained but charred corpses, or nothing at all. He could see the shadows of some victims, their only legacy, burnt into walls an instant before the ground beneath gave way and everything vanished into the growing dust cloud.

For those who had made it beyond the walls, it looked as though the end had truly come. The fireball still climbed into the sky. Smoke was everywhere as was the choking dust. The concussion tore flags from their brackets on the mighty gatehouses and entire sections of the city wall ceased to exist as they were shaken to their core. Entire lines of buildings, once the pride of the city, just simply slipped from view one by one.

The old quarter, once home to the vampire overlords, gave its own shudder and then, incredibly, another explosion ripped through the earth and the hill, great houses, and palaces, all of it, heaved upward, outward, and then hurled itself across the city. No one could have known that that ancient builders had hidden their own store of firedust, used for blasting the sewers and catacombs, beneath that hill.

The debris rained down across the city, crushing friend and foe alike. More buildings were smashed by blocks of stone the size of a horse and countless of lives were lost as bricks dropped from the sky like rain from a cloud to kill those unlucky enough to be beneath them.

Then the fireball was gone, leaving only smoke, dust, and ruin in its wake. The shaking of the city continued a few more moments but then it too quieted. The streets, torn up and broken as they were, settled once again and a strange silence settled over the city. It was a silence of screams and moans, but anything was better than the crushing, pounding noise of the explosion. Gone with the explosion was the will of many to fight, friend or foe. Men and women who, moments before, had been trying to kill each other, simply staggered away into the dust cloud. No none knew where they were going, only that they needed to get far away that place.

For Kane it was a sign. Enough was enough. He was floating above the massive crater, unable to tear his eyes from the destruction that had been wrought, when the anger hit him. Ulrek. He had planned for such an eventuality and so doomed the entire city. He would die, and now was not soon enough.

The silver sword flashed in Kanes hand and flames rippled along the blade, shield materializing on his left arm. He kissed the sword blade, the flames touching him not at all. Then hee charged toward the citadel and its shattered gateway. The reckoning was coming for Ulrek, and his judgement with it.

[Vampiretwilight]

Edward traveled along with Emily, escorted by the surviving guards/soldiers that had been sent along to escort them and protect them. Emily was frightened. Tears ran down her cheeks. Edward wrapped an arm around her as they walked along the hidden paths that kept them out of sight from those on the battlefield.

In truth, the prince wanted to go back. He wanted to help his people right away. He wanted to fight. But, he could not do so. There were many obvious reasons. A few reasons that were not to obvious existed as well. One such obvious reason was Emily herself. He loved her. He would never risk leaving her alone no matter what. A second was that he needed to practice with his unique special power before it could be useful to help others. It was still a bit unstable.

He needed his hidden power to work in order to ensure his brothers' defeat and save his kingdom.

Anyway, he and his princess continued to flee. They were together now, forever. That was one step out of the way: his fathers' condition. The crown was practically upon his head now. The only thing left to take care of was kane and the baron.

They got as far away as they could from the battlefield and what was left of the castle grounds. They would go to a hidden city, where an old friend of the late king lived. He ruled a rather large colony of hybrids and such that lived underground. They would be more than willing to take them in until they were able to fight back.

Emily prayed that they would win. They needed to. Her heart was breaking at the thought of those lives being lost in vain. Edward felt the same way. They would look at each other with sad eyes.

[gorgenmast]

Ulrek Bathory gave a hateful grunt as he shoved the limp weight of the lifeless warhorse off of his thigh. With his legs free, the Baron staggered to his feet and gave a momentary glance at his slain steed. A crossbow bolt meant for the Baron was buried deep in the stallion's neck, bright red blood oozing from the wound matted the horse's silvery pale coat. Unhorsed early in the charge against the walls, Ulrek missed the ogres breaching the walls and the ensuing melee in the courtyard. The sounds of clashing swords resounded from inside the citadel walls, but the telltale shouting and screaming of combat could be heard all around him. In the thoroughfare behind him, Ulrek could see his men-at-arms and levies engaging the teeming throngs of armed commoners, held back from the attack on Castle Bathory by the citizenry's insatiable bloodthirst. Before him, Ulrek beheld the inner walls of the citadel, battered by cannons and ogres with a dozen ladders resting up against it. Beyond those walls rose the battle-worn spires of Castle Bathory itself: Edwards's last refuge and Ulrek's destination.

The inner wall of the citadel had been breached, though Ulrek could see a savage fight between his men and the remainder of the guard for control of the breach. The Baron had no intention of wading through the fray, intense and crowded as it was, and his eyes fell upon the siege ladders resting upon the walls. His eyes followed the ramparts over to where the spires of the castle met the interior wall, and noted doorways into the castle itself. Deciding this to be the path of least resistance into the castle, Ulrek made his way to the foot of the wall.

The fighting had moved into the castle's courtyard, and the archers up on the ramparts were now focused on firing down on the Baron's forces in the courtyard or fighting against the mercenaries who had scaled the walls. Ulrek took advantage of the shifted attention of the defenders and approached one of the siege ladders. The rungs were slick with grease that had been poured down onto the attackers, still quite warm to the touch. A pile of crumpled bodies lay around of the ladder, victims of some combination of boiled grease, arrowfire, or heavy stones meted out by defenders up on the ramparts. One of Halfbeard's mercenaries lay splayed out at foot of the siege ladder, droplets of boiled lard still steaming upon his breastplate. Gruesome blisters covered the mercenary's face and a heavy rock taken straight to the face had reduced his nose to a bloody mass, though bloodied eyes following Ulrek as he grasped the rungs of the ladder gave proof that the poor soul was still alive.

"Do a me a favor will ya?" Croaked the soldier. "Just go ahead and kill me." Ulrek ignored the dying man and began climbing the ladder up to the ramparts.

Though the fighting on the walls had died down, it had by no means ended. A few dozen feet down the wall from the Baron, an engagement between a castle guard and one of Ulrek's men-at-arms ended with the guard getting thrown off the wall to his death. The man-at-arms had little time to bask in his victory before one of Edward's crossbowmen planted a bolt squarely in the forehead. As Ulrek neared the lip of the rampart he reached for Pthaalma's hilt, knowing full well his entry into the castle would not go unchallenged.

The Baron surged through one of the crenels and up onto the ramparts, planting his feet upon the stone walkway slicked with coagulating blood. Drawing his blade from the scabbard, Ulrek proceeded along the ramparts toward the doorway into the castle on the far side of the wall. On the courtyard side below him, the Vampire prince caught the occasional glimpse of the battle for control of the castle. The castle guards were putting up a redoubtable defense against the onslaught of the ogres and Halfbeard's mercenaries, but it was clear that the guard was losing ground and would eventually be subdued. Despite the favorable course of battle, the Baron paid little attention to the fighting. It did not matter to the Baron if his forces won or lost at this point; his army had succeeded in getting him through to the walls of Castle Bathory. That was all Ulrek ever needed them for.

Up ahead was a knot of men stuck in combat - a pair of guards holding off a claymore-armed mercenary. Ulrek would have preferred to step around the fight and continue on to the castle, but the narrowness of the ramparts here precluded that option. The vampire would have no choice but to fight his way through to the other side.

The Baron came up behind the mercenary and shoved him out of the way, inadvertently casting him off the wall down into the courtyard below. The castle guards now standing before him beheld the sliver-clad being before them with wide, frantic eyes.

"That's the Baron!" Exclaimed one of the guards. "Take him down!"

A halberd-wielding guard lunged at Ulrek, swinging down in an attempt to cleave the vampire prince in twain. Ulrek didn't need to mind-probe the guard to see the attack coming long ago, and stepped off to the side and allowed the halberd's blade to clatter against the rampart's cobblestones. Ulrek planted his boot down on the flat face of the halberd and stepped down hard, pressing the polearm down against the ground. With his weapon immobilized, the halberd-wielder could only watch as Ulrek drove Pthaalma through his chest. Ulrek retracted the blade and allowed the guard to slouch over dead before proceeding to the remaining guard. This one was armed with a broadsword, and immediately slashed against Ulrek's silver and mithril blade. Ulrek probed his opponent's mind, saw in advance where the guard intended to thrust or slash, and easily parried every blow. The guard's fighting style was excessive and showy, foreseeable with predictable slashes meant to attract attention and steer the opponent's blade away from the body before spinning on his heels and delivering a slash to the body. Ulrek's swordplay was more methodical and calculated; anticipating and blocking strikes, moving his blade no more than necessary, allowing his opponent to wear himself down against his meticulous parries and waiting for the guard to make a mistake. The guard swordsman thrust at the Baron once more, but his heel slid on the blood-slicked cobblestones underfoot and overextended his reach. It was a brief error, but it was all Ulrek needed. The vampire's left hand left Pthaalma's hilt and clutched the guard's right wrist. In a brief, fluid motion, Ulrek yanked the guard in close before driving his sword down through the guard's clavicle. The defender spat a wad of blood as Ulrek withdrew his sword and unceremoniously cast his opponent down over the wall.

As the Baron watched his slain enemy tumble down over the wall, a flash of light appeared in his peripheral view. Out in the main thoroughfare, a rosette of glittering sparks manifested into being, followed fractions of a second thereafter by a burning shockwave that radiated out from the epicenter, washing over the embattled masses in the thoroughfare and market square in an infernal wave as a fireball rose skyward. A second tremendous explosion, and almost instantly later, a third. The resulting shockwave did not just fell buildings, but the ground itself. Utterly enrapt, the Baron watched the ground underneath the main thoroughfare collapsed in a billowing tempest of dust and smoke. Houses and shops collapsed and tumbled down into a fiery pit that opened up in the middle of the Capital as yet another flash of sparkling fire burst forth from the newly-formed chasm. This explosion must have destroyed the supports and beams holding up the ceilings of untold leagues of subterranean catacombs, sewers, and other spaces underneath the city, for a network of chasms and ravines radiated outward from this deep central pit, swallowing entire neighborhoods of the capital in billowing clouds of dust and fire. Another chest-rattling explosion was felt, but not seen, as the hill upon which the Old City was built heaved up and then imploded, and the Earth swallowed up the walled compounds of the vampire quarter as tongues of fire spewed out from underground. It was as if the Capital was collapsing into to the very depths of Hell.

The tremendous shaking had not left the citadel unscathed. Behind the baron, the gatehouse into the citadel's courtyard leaned in on itself - weakened perhaps by some collapsed tunnel or sewer below - and fell over into the courtyard. Two ogres thrashing against the spears and halberds of the castle guard were buried under a rain of stones. The outer spires of the castle listed too, crashing against the core structure of Castle Bathory before shattering and raining down on the lower levels of the castle and the courtyard in a rain of heavy stones and dust. A roiling cloud of dust descended over the courtyard and walls of the castle, engulfing the Baron. His mask, difficult to breathe in as it was, made it impossible for the Baron to breathe when the dust cloud descended upon him. Ulrek tore his silver mask off his head and cast it aside, exposing his gaunt, ratlike visage.

The vampire peered through the thick haze of dust, only able to make out the glow of innumerable fires raging through what had been the Capital. In the space of mere minutes, the city had been completely destroyed. Rebuilding after such thorough devastation would take centuries. A regrettable setback to be sure, but vampires lived forever; Ulrek had plenty of time to see through a two or three hundred-year rebuild of the capital. The populace, the Baron assumed, was completely lost. Good, he thought to himself. A suitable punishment for their treachery. Men were fecund and would easily reproduce to replace the lost populace of the city. Better to cull the traitorous populace outright and start anew.

Ulrek squinted through the settling dust and looked upon Castle Bathory, or what remained of it. The towers had all collapsed, but most of the core structure of the citadel remained intact, which meant that the throne chamber had survived. Expecting to find his brother there, Ulrek continued across the rampart to that door leading into the castle's interior.

---

"What a fuckin mess," snarled Halfbeard. "I've seen my share of sieges. I've seen some real messes. But this, boys... This is unprecedented."

Kharald Halfbeard stumbled over the thick rubble through a thick haze of suspended dust, accompanied by two of his personal guard. The scarred dwarf surveyed the devastation of the courtyard. The collapse of the spires had snuffed out all but a handful of the combatants fighting in the courtyard. Kharald had been fighting one of the guard captains when the Earth underfoot began shaking. The guard was struck by a falling stone and collapsed atop Kharald-shielding the mercenary captain from the shower of rubble. Halfbeard emerged from his fallen opponent to find most of the combatants on both sides dead or dying. Most of those that survived happened to be his mercenaries, those that weren't were finished off with a sword to the belly.

"You think the Baron survived?" Asked one of Halfbeard's attendants.

"Probly not," Halfbeard concluded in between deep coughs from the dust in the air.

"We're not getting paid for this, are we?"

"From the Baron, no," Halfbeard said matter-of-factly. "But look where we are, boys. When's the last time you 'ad an unguarded castle all to yourself? Think about all the treasures those bloodsuckers have been hoarding in there over their long lives, and with only a few dying guards to defend it. Fuck the Baron and his payment, each one of us is going to leave this place with a king's ransom."

Kharald and his companions made their way past the broken, barely-standing holly tree in the center of the courtyard on their way to the gates into the castle's interior. Laying before Kharald and his companions, half-buried in rubble, lay one of his ogres face down with a rivulet of dust-caked blood oozing out of a wound in his head. Kharald gave the ogre a tap with the toe of his boot.

"What a shame," Kharald sighed. "These ogres are going to be pain in the arse to replace. There's not a lot of 'em left anymore."

"They didn't even inflict that many casualties," complained one of Halfbeard's companions. "I seen em rout entire armies before. Here? Those five ogres mighta killed 50 men between them."

"Their guards fought like devils," noted Halfbeard's other guard.

"So they did," said Halfbeard dismissively. "And they died all the same. Just take this one 'ere for example. Fought bravely I'm sure, but for what? To die in the hand of this 'ere ogre? Not exactly-"

The telltale thwock of a crossbow discharging interrupted the dwarf mercenary mid-sentence. Halfbeard's eye widened as a crossbow bolt planted itself at the base of the dwarf's neck, just above the clavicle. Through gritted teeth, Kharald tore the arrow out of his neck, eliciting a grimacing wince as the bolt slid out of his flesh. Blood spurted quickly through the arrow's entrance wound, coursing down Halfbeard's armor and staining his lion's pelt cape. Halfbeard inspected the bloodied bolt for a brief moment, noting that the iron bodkin had been cut off, leaving only a whittled tip at the end of the wooden shaft.

Halfbeard's face twisted into a furious scowl. He drew his sword and marched over to the dying guard leader, but the profuse blood loss had already served to dizzy the dwarf. Halfbeard stumbled over the rubble and fell over, bleeding out just a few paces short of Yorrek.

"Not Ulrek," Yorrek rasped from within the clutches of the dead ogre, his crossbow tumbling out from from weak and trembling arms as his eyes shut for the last time. "But you'll do."

[DELETED32084]

I always expected the death of a city to have more grey clouds, screaming wind and even lightening. Kane stood atop of on the citadels outer towers, eyes roving over the shattered stone and gaping chasms that had swallowed a thousand years of history. Instead it's sunny and not a single cloud or errant lighting bolt to be seen. Well, a white cloud anyway...

Indeed the whole countryside was burning. Black plumes of smoke rose into the motionless sky as far as he could see in every direction. It seemed as though Edwards much vaunted allies had not been as loyal as he thought. The death of the King, and the knowledge that a civil war had broken out, was enough for any land hungry regent to launch his own campaign against the weakened kingdom.

Only to the East, toward the ocean, was the sky clear of any signs of war. It would not last however. Kane could already see small black dots swarming across the landscape as they made for the Vampire port used to supply the capital. There would be precious little time for anyone to escape.

The Land Under Shadow is dying. I have done my work well though there is plenty more to do. Ah, and there are survivors! Unbelievably, combatants from both sides staggered from the smoke and dust below, weapons forgotten, all making their way toward the edge of the city. Peasant, foot soldier, knight, even dwarf, all of them seeking only to preserve their own lives as the city burned. Go east, you might stand a chance! It was a minimal chance. But something was better than nothing.

Kane turned his back on the city and stared down into the ruins of the citadel. Even here the bloodlust began to fade as guardsmen and mercenaries alike realized that their leaders were either dead or gone. The violent clash of blades and war cries died away almost like a quick breeze, petering out to nothing until a strange silence fell across the broken grey stone and shattered timbers. Some collapsed into the ruins as the adrenaline wore away and their wounds caught up with them. Others leaned against each other in exhaustion. Some even just sat and wept into their hands.

Hesitant at first, and then in ones and twos, men began to sheath their blades and back slowly away toward the broken gatehouse. A groan from inside the citadel and the resulting alarming shudder of another tower turned the small trickle of fleeing men into a rout. Friend and foe alike fled the confines of the citadel, their only goal survival. The mad scramble up the inside of the breach only paused briefly as they took in the streets that had once been so wide and clean. The moat itself had vanished, the water draining away into the empty maw that had once been the city centre. Only a muddy ditch filled with rotting wooden stakes and dozens of bodies remained.

It looks like a quarry. The interior of the courtyard, once paved with gleaming black stone and edged with red sandstone, was nothing more than a mass of shattered chunks now. Bodies lay twisted everywhere and Kane could make out the broken forms of the Ogres in a couple of places. Smart choice on Ulreks part, but they died as much as everything else did. He was wasted as a Vampire.

The number of dead and the extent of the suffering that had occurred beneath his gaze moved Kane not at all. There is a price that must be paid by all men to be free. Now at least their souls can be saved. How many were wasted before I came. A thousand years to many. He would gladly have paid it again. But only if it meant the end of the Vampire line.

Ulrek. Where are you? Kane stepped from the edge of the tower and began to glide toward the courtyard. A silver glint in the corner of his eye led him to the walltop where, wedged beside the body of a dead dust coated guardsmen, he found the Barons discarded mask. Interesting. Managed to work on your weakness to silver I see. Fire it is.

He tossed the mask into the muddy ditch below and watched with detached interest as it landed with a wet smack before sinking into the ooze. Perhaps someone would find it in a hundred years or more and wonder what it had been for. More than likely they'll melt it down if they have any sense. Some good silver in that. Only when it was gone completely did he continue down the walltop.

No living men remained in the fortress that he could see. Bodies were draped thickly all along the ramparts. Some slain by crossbows, others hacked to death, and more than a few had been boiled alive. A horrible way to die. Still, at least they were dead and not screaming for their mothers. Maybe they had been, but it appeared as though most of the wounded had choked to death on the dust that billowed across the city following the explosion.

Ahead of Kane, torn from its hinges, was a door that led into the interior of the keep. Only one type of being could do such damage and he felt a grin spread across his handsome features. Ulrek. No need to hide. You cannot escape what is coming for you. He strode swiftly across the rampart, his wings vanishing as he ducked his head into the corridor. It was well lit by several gaping holes in one wall that allowed daylight to stream in. He could see footprints in the dust, keeping close to the shadows. He was not invulnerable to sun, yet.

Kane took another pace and then stopped in his tracks. Father in Heaven, what is that? He felt a tremor run through him, and through the fabric of the world. It was the type of thing he had come to associate with great evil and in an instant he knew that something had changed within either Ulrek or Edward. I have not felt this since... Since... The Saundering.

Before his time on earth, Kane had served his father in The Saundering, the great civil war that wrecked Heaven. Lucifer had lost his gamble for the throne and been cast from Heaven into Hell. A broken and tortured land that Lucifer had been doomed to rule for all eternity. I wondered when his power might make itself known. Perhaps it is now. He felt his fingers tighten around the pommel of his sword and, for the first time, something akin to fear fluttered in his chest. It is likely I go to my death, but what a death it shall be. A death worthy of song.

[Vampiretwilight]

Edward and Emily continued to run, to escape. Edward stopped only when Emily needed to rest, to catch her breath. She was panting hard. She was tired out, both from their escape and from everything she saw happen. Edward kept an arm around her until she was ready to go. After a thought, he knew he had to think of a way to escape from there and head to the hidden location where they would be safe until he and his power were both ready for the big fight.

[gorgenmast]

Castle Bathory shuddered and groaned under the very weight of its stones, relieving some of its stress in showers of dust and grit from the vaulted ceilings fracturing overhead. The constant, cacophonous din of battle had died down to sporadic clanging of swords and agonized shouts of dying men echoing through the ravaged corridors and halls of the castle between stretches of relative silence. As the deathly silence descended over the dying castle, a single pair of bootfalls against clattered against the cold, polished floor of the castle as Ulrek Bathory returned to the family's home and seat of power for the second time in five months.

When the Baron had come here five months ago to protest his father's announcement of the ill-fated inheritance challenge, the castle was a different place to be sure. An army of Royal Guards - each clad in standard issue, excellent quality armor and brilliant crimson cloaks - stood vigil at regular posts throughout the castle's corridors and grand halls. When Ulrek left his father's court in a fury, his protests against the inheritance challenge rebuffed, those guards ushering him from the throne chamber seemed such an invulnerable and monolithic force, as unyielding as the Castle they garrisoned and the King they defended. Now the Baron stepped over the crumpled and bloodied corpses of those same guards strewn across the floor of the citadel his own army had all but leveled.

The guard had fought savagely to defend the castle and its master, for each royal guard slain upon the floor was accompanied by the bloodied corpses of one or two of Kharald Halfbeard's mercenaries or the Baron's knights. Each of the guards died heroically, facing their foe head-on until the bitter end to keep them from reaching their rightful king. Edward, Ulrek deduced, would be found in whichever direction the slain guards were facing away from. Ulrek stepped over their corpses and pressed on into the interior of the citadel - to the throne chamber.

Ulrek made his way through the castle's library on his way to the inner stairwell, and was greeted by the stomach-turning sound of papers being rustled quickly and carelessly, interspersed by the sharp tearing of parchment. The vampire prince was dismayed to find a half dozen dwarven mercenaries tearing through the library's collection with the avarice of hogs rooting through autumn leaves in search of acorns. The mercenaries climbed atop stools and ladders to reach the highest shelves of King Zachaeus' private collection of books, scrolls, atlases, and almanacs. The dwarves tore through each and every book, grabbing each tome by its often-delicate binding and vigorously shaking it, hoping to dislodge any valuables that might be wedged within the pages. Individual pages separated from their bindings and fluttered down to the floor before the rest of the tome was unceremoniously cast off to the side. Ulrek was not sure what valuables the dwarves were even hoping to find hidden in the books. Perhaps some of the alcohol-embalmed specimens of deep-sea serpent fingerlings or atlases of distant archipelagoes of the Orient might be sold for a modest sum in a curiosity shop in Aepiranth or some stall in the Grand Bazaar, but there was nothing here that these brutes could hope to quickly pawn off in these lands.

Ulrek watched as the same pages of books he read as boy centuries ago tumbled unceremoniously to the floor as the dwarves- only now aware of the Baron's presence - ceased their pilfering in stunned awe of the vampire in their midst, glancing expectantly at one another for some indication as to whether they should attempt to kill the Baron or flee. Ulrek too regarded the dwarves as he trudged through the litter of pages strewn across the library floor, considering for a moment cutting these dwarves down as punishment for despoiling his father's library - one of the few things that Ulrek cherished in this world. Ultimately, Ulrek decided to leave the dwarves to their looting and continued on toward the throne chamber. Their castigation could wait, but Edward's could not.

As Ulrek progressed into the heart of Castle Bathory, the looting carried out by the surviving remnants of his forces became increasingly widespread. The slain guards were fewer here - perhaps the guard had withdrawn to more defensible portions of the citadel, or perhaps the royal guard had simply given up hope and abandoned their posts to join Ulrek's forces in plundering the castle. In the absence of a substantial defense, Ulrek's knights and mercenaries tore through the various chambers in search of anything they desired. The crashing of furniture being busted apart echoed down the corridors as the Baron's forces began to ransack the castle. Shrill screams rang out somewhere behind Ulrek as a handful of his yeomen discovered a pair of servant girls and set about having their way with them. He paid no mind at all to the complete breakdown of order among what remained of his forces. The levies, knights, and mercenaries got Ulrek inside Castle Bathory; whatever happened to them afterwards was no concern of his.

Ulrek reached the inner stairwell of the castle, whose polished limestone ran with coursing rivulets of congealing blood trickling from guards cut down on the stairs in defense of the throne hall somewhere above. Clashing steel and shouting up the stairway suggested that the guard was still fighting off the attackers attempting to breach the throne room. The last of the guard fighting to protect the throne hall and Prince Edward within, Ulrek assumed. The Baron climbed the stairs and, at the top, encountered a gaggle of dwarven mercenaries weilding bloodied axes and swords and each wearing several pounds worth of fine golden necklaces and amulets around their necks and over their armor. Clearly they had just looted the royal jewelry collections and were making for the exit when they met Ulrek Bathory. The Baron did not need to probe their minds to know their intentions as he practically felt their avaricious eyes crawling up and down his suit of silver plate armor.

"Well if it isn't our esteemed employer, Baron Ulrek Bathory," said a dwarf wearing a ruby-encrusted tiara of rose gold upon a greasy brow. "We succeeded in winning ya yer daddy's castle. Time to pay up."

"Sturin's Beard," another dwarf remarked. "That's a full suit of dwarf-made silver armor. Whaddya think that's worth? Chestpiece alone's probably worth 100 gold vespers."

"'Fraid it ain't gonna fetch that much," yet another dwarf said, lowering his halberd and moving to engage the Baron. "Not when I poke a hole in that pretty piece of foppery and nab the bastard's heart."

The halberd-armed dwarf lowered his weapon and lunged at the Baron. A brief mind probe of the attacker allowed Ulrek to sidestep the polearm. The vampire's sword was unsheathed in a flash of silver and mithril and at once, Pthaalma met the shaft of the dwarf's halberd with a powerful hack. The dwarf attempted to parry Ulrek's sword, but the mithril blade cut effortlessly through the tempered wooden shaft. The disarmed dwarf beheld Ulrek with wide-eyed dismay for a brief moment as the top half of his severed halberd clattered at his feet. Ulrek swung once more and removed the dwarf's head from his shoulders. The dwarf's head blinked as it went down the stairs in a tumbling roll, the last thing he witnessed was his headless corpse collapse at the Baron's feet, dispensing the stolen necklaces and amulets around his stump of a neck into a tangled, bloodied heap on the floor. Without a word, Ulrek stepped around his attacker's stunned companions and continued toward the throne room. Behind him, he heard the dwarves bound down the stairwell in terrified flight, but not before recovering the jewelry from the corpse of their slain companion.

A red-dyed carpet guided Ulrek down the hallway toward the double doors of the throne chamber. Fierce fighting had taken place here not long before. Ulrek's dying knights bled out beside the corpses of fallen guardsmen, some of whom had just enough life in them to watch as the Baron they had given their for carelessly stepped over their bodies. A royal honor guard with a split belly sat against the wall, attempting to gather his spilled entrails back into his body. The Baron's forces had inflicted severe casualties in attempting to breach the throne room, but had only scarcely failed. All of Edward's defenses had now been breached. Now that task Ulrek had set out to accomplish all those months ago - to redress the perceived wronging perpetrated by his father and brother, to claim his rightful inheritance over the whole of the Lands Under Shadow - was at hand. His father's idiotic game would end where it began.

Ulrek threw the doors to the throne hall open and barged within - Pthaalma in hand.

"Edward!" Ulrek declared as the doors slammed against the walls of the atrium, "your hour has come!"

The only responses to Ulrek were his own echoes sounding through the vast, cavernous hall.

The throne hall was empty and silent. The damage to Castle Bathory had collapsed a segment of the far western wall - directly behind King Zachaeus' vacant throne - casting a sunbeam of orange twilight into the normally dimly-lit chamber. Dozens of expansive tapestries hanging from the vaulted ceiling high above fluttered in the breeze on either side of the collonaded walkway leading up to the throne itself.

"Brother!" Ulrek called out once again. "Show yourself!"

No response.

Ulrek examined the throne room as his echoes resounded through the space. The crimson carpet running between the doors and the throne dais was severely faded as if it had been allowed to be sunbleached for many years. The vampire's eyes went up from the carpet to the linen tapestries hanging above him. They too had been severely faded, but Ulrek could still make out the dramatic scenes sewn into the fabric. To his left, the top third depicted a monstrous hag hiding in the shadows of a darkened cave that Ulrek recognized as Nystra: the Mother of Vampires. Ulrek, being well read, knew the origin of his race as thoroughly as any scholar. Nystra was cursed by birth with horrifying hideousness. Cast out from her home and despised by all, the miserable wretch went into the wilderness and lived in a cave. Without a husband to support her and lacking the strength to hunt for her meals, Nystra would stalk the woods at night in search of sleeping beasts and bite their throats to dispatch her prey, as could be seen farther down the tapestry as the crone bit into the neck of a sleeping stag.

Nystra tired of her miserable life and her terrifying hideousness. She prayed fervently that she might be beautiful one day and attract a prosperous husband. Her prayer was one day answered, and she woke one morning to find that she was now a stunningly beautiful maiden. But when she stepped out of the cave into the sunlight, the morning sun burned her skin and sent her fleeing back into the darkness, preventing her from going out and seeking a husband. As she wept in the darkness of her cave, a winged devil appeared before her. Struck by her beauty, the demon took the cursed girl as his wife and gave her a son: Hema. Half man and half demon, he was the first of the vampires.

Ulrek glanced over to the other tapestries as he approached the sunlit throne, seeing the woven illustrations of Hema and his brothers and sisters proliferating across the land. With their demonic blood, the vampires dominated the ancient civilizations of men. Two tapestries were devoted to great battles between the Free Men and the Vampires and their enslaved warrior thralls. At the foot of one tapestry was the woven likeness of a winged vampire warlord standing atop a pile of bloodied corpses, surrounded by bowing figures presenting their crowns with open arms. Even an illiterate simpleton would have immediately recognized the likeness of Nosferas.

The next tapestry depicted Nosferas' thralls under the cracking whips of the vampire vassals. Men toiled under whips, carting blocks of stone to build their master a massive palace. Various scenes of mastery over enthralled man played over the rest of this tapestry, until the end, when a man could be seen attacking Nosferas with a silver spear. Nosferas broke off the silver speartip with his sword, only for the man to stab the vampire lord in the heart with his broken spear. That assassin, Ulrek knew, was Van: the first vampire hunter. The first man to kill a vampire with a wooden stake to the heart.

On the final tapestry, nearest the throne, man and vampire were depicted fighting once again over Nosferas' bloodied corpse. But one of Nosferas' vampire vassals could be seen fighting alongside the men. In the second scene, the vampire watched over the men as they put Nosferas' other lieutenants to silver swords. And in the final scene of the last tapestry, the lone vampire sat upon a great throne, surrounded by human vassals saluting him with their swords.

King Zachaeus, Ulrek recognized. The vampire who liberated man from their fate as cattle under vampiric tyrants.

His father had commissioned these tapestries to cement this story in the minds of the lives of fleeting humans; to paint himself as a liberator and ally of mankind. In return for the subordination of his mortal allies, King Zachaeus kept the dangerous and powerful vampires at bay and secured a peace between man and vampire. A clever machination, Ulrek could not deny. Vampires made poor vassals - they were powerful, long-lived and difficult to kill. Humans were typically weak and easily slain, and even the dangerous ones could be counted upon to die after six or seven decades at the most. They were ideal subjects.

Was that why his father insisted upon this inheritance challenge? Perhaps, Ulrek surmised, Zachaeus had no intention of ever surrendering his throne, but to offer the populace a marriage alliance of sorts between mortal and vampire to officiate his centuries-long peace. Leave his detestable son Ulrek to rot in his keep up in the Weald while one of his dimmer, more-malleable, and more-likeable sons served as a figurehead ruler for the Lands Under Shadow.

Ulrek would never truly know why his father had begun this strange challenge of his. For as the vampire prince stood before the throne, regarding a great sooty stain on the carpet at the base of the dais, Ulrek felt a sharp pain radiate up his spine.

"NOW!" A voice screamed behind him. "TAKE HIM DOWN!"

Guards armed with crossbows leapt out from hiding spots behind the columns of the throne room. Their crossbows discharged, firing another three crossbow bolts into the Baron. Ulrek was jolted as bolts impacted his body, for the crossbow bolts effortlessly pierced his soft silver armor and embedded themselves deep in his flesh. The volley was over as quickly as it began, and silence resumed over the throne chamber as Ulrek stood deathly still.

The Baron's head slowly tilted down, noting a crossbow bolt buried up to the fletching in his chest, mere inches below his heart. He grasped the shaft and winced as he deftly pulled the arrow out and inspected it. Dripping with dark vampiric blood was a crossbow bolt tipped with a silver bodkin.

"Silver?" Ulrek remarked as he twirled the arrow in his gauntlets. "That was your last hope at stopping me? Silver arrows?"

"God deliver us, he's not dying!"

"Reload!"

As the guards furiously set about cranking their crossbow strings back, Ulrek strode over to the nearest guard with Pthaalma in hand. The guard, seeing the vampire prince approaching with arrows protruding from his body, dropped his crossbow and attempted to unsheath his own sword. His fumbling hand scarcely reached the hilt before Ulrek skewered the guard on his blade. The vampire sauntered over to the next guard. This one had wound up his crossbow and reloaded, but missed when he fired at the approaching vampire. Ulrek swatted the crossbow out of his hand when he reached him and grasped him by the throat, shoving the disarmed guard directly between the vampire and his two companions. Having reloaded as well, they fired their crossbows at Ulrek, but instead shot their fellow guard in the back. Ulrek unceremoniously cast his latest victim aside to tumble to the floor before going after the last two.

The last two guards, knowing they would not be able to reload once again before Ulrek was upon them, valiantly charged the Baron. Valiant, perhaps, but foolish and futile nonetheless. Ulrek stepped out of the way of the lunge of the first guard and then decapitated him with a chop to the neck. The final guard parried Ulrek's initial blow, but was unable to block the second swipe. Pthaalma's razor sharp mithril edge cut through the last guard's chainmail cuirass and cut deeply into his right shoulder. Ulrek flicked the blood from Pthaalma's blade as the final guard wailed and released his sword, falling to the floor to clutch his bleeding flesh wound. The vampire stood above his opponent and studied him for a moment before finally speaking.

"Where is my brother?" Ulrek asked, tapping his sword against the guard's pauldron. "If you tell me the truth, I will make it quick."

The wounded guard looked up at the Baron with a hateful glare, and then returned his dejected gaze to the bleeding gash on the shoulder.

"He's left the castle," the guard confessed. "He and his princess went through a tunnel in the undercroft that empties out at the harbor. Probably on a ship to the Orient now. You've wasted all this life and treasure capturing an empty ruin. Congratulations on your victory, Usurper." Ulrek probed the guard's mind and knew he was telling the truth. The Baron's emotionless, stoic visage suddenly contorted into a furious sneer. The vampire raised his sword and in a rage cleaved through the guard, cutting him cleanly down the torso and embedding the blade two inches down into the polished limestone floor beneath him.

"That coward..." Ulrek snarled through gritted fangs. Ulrek had not come this far nor sacrificed this much to simply exile Edward Bathory. Ulrek would never be satisfied until the entirety of his miserable family had been slain. And now, with Edward and his bride perhaps even now boarding a ship to escape the Lands Under Shadow, Ulrek would likely never get the satisfaction of killing his younger brother. Edward and Emily would likely sail away, take on false names and live the rest of their lives on the balmy shores of the Jade Islands or some other exotic locale.

Perhaps Urlek could take solace in the possibility that the reavers of the septentrional Broken Lands might well intercept Edward's ship. It would have to suffice, perhaps, that the northern pirates could be counted upon to ensure Edward met a grisly demise. Ulrek imagined how the reaver longboats might board his escape vessel, hack his vessel's crew to bit and dump their remains into the waves so as to attract the sharks. Then, surely the northern savages would take their turns with his beloved Emily, from the thanes down to the lowest deckhands until everyone had their fill, so that the last thing Edward saw was his bride being deflowered before being cast overboard amidst bloody waters teeming with ravenous sharks. That would have to suffice.

No, decided Ulrek. Revenge shall be mine, and mine alone.

Ulrek unfastened his armor, carelessly shedding his battleworn cuirass and greaves to fall upon the floor with a metallic clang, exposing the undershirt and trousers of black silk beneath his armor. It was a great relief to finally rid himself of the heavy silver plate, but Ulrek did not remove it for his comfort, but out of necessity. The armor would not accommodate him for much longer.

The vampire went over to one of the dying royal guards slumped over the basal pedestal of a column - the one who had taken the two crossbow bolts meant for the Baron - and descended upon him. Though still alive, the guard was to weak to resist as Ulrek removed his helmet and sank his fangs into his neck. The relative silence of the throne room was broken by a sickening slurping and crunching as Ulrek siphoned the guard's lifeblood through his mouth. The color drained from the guard's flesh as Ulrek's belly filled. And as Ulrek's belly swelled, so too did a pair fledgling buds on both of the vampire's scapulae.

Prince Edward, it was rumored, possessed some great strength hidden from the world. But so too did Ulrek. It would be taxing and require positively gluttonous feeding to achieve, but Ulrek - like Edward - could achieve a quasi-demonic form just as their father could. With enough gorging, Ulrek Bathory could sprout batlike wings upon which he could chase Edward across the waves.

Given time, Ulrek would have no problem achieving such power; not with a ruined city filled with corpses to feed upon.

[Vampiretwilight]

-deleted-

[gorgenmast]

Though he could see naught but inky darkness, the chamberlain felt a trickle of blood cooling upon his forehead. It was a feeling distinct enough that the former chamberlain of Felboge Keep - the current sapper of Castle Bathory - knew he was not yet dead.

The chamberlain and his team of sappers had spent many hours in the undercroft with prybars and pickaxes, working to dismantle the load-bearing columns that held up the ceiling of the undercroft and the rest of the castle above it. Many hands had made relatively-light work of destroying all but the last supporting column. Knowing that destroying the last column would topple the entire citadel under its own weight, the chamberlain had dismissed his team of saboteurs to join Edward and Emily in escaping through the sewers while he set about attacking the final column alone. Hacking away at the stubborn granite pillar with a single pickaxe had been slow going. The chamberlain had worked in exhaustive solitude for perhaps an hour or more when a tremendous rumbling shook the undercroft. A devastating cannon shot to the castle, the chamberlain assumed when he first heard the explosion clearly even through so much rock and earth. Just as the chamberlain could hear the subsequent blasts and tremors, a chunk of brick or stone was dislodged from the ceiling and struck him in the forehead. That was the last thing the chamberlain could remember.

He looked over to his side, and found one of his torches burning dimly upon the cold dirt floor of the undercroft. The chamberlain struggled to his feet and then stumbled over rubble dislodged from the ceiling to recover the fallen torch. A bloody lump on his forehead throbbed painfully with each step. The chamberlain counted himself as lucky to have survived as he noted the large, heavy slabs of stone that fell from the undercroft ceiling mere feet from where he had been stricken unconscious. The chamberlain, after some difficulty, recovered his torch and held it up against the darkness of the cavernous undercroft.

The fact that the undercroft still existed, and had not been crushed under thousands of tons of stone and rubble gave proof that the castle above still stood. And that alone was all that the chamberlain knew about what had transpired up above. The chamberlain could only imagine that the Baron had taken the castle and even now, had set about searching the castle for survivors to skin and decorate his new fortress with. How soon would it be before the Baron's men thought to search the undercroft and at last delivered the traitorous chamberlain to his lord Ulrek Bathory? The chamberlain knew he had little time to finish his work before he experienced firsthand the cruelest of Ulrek's punishments.

The chamberlain dropped the torch to the ground beside the final pillar to illuminate his work. In the flickering torchlight, he made an encouraging discovery. During the tremors following the explosions, a fracture had formed in the pick-eroded column: a fresh, jagged crack running clear across the remainder of the column. The chamberlain knew that if he could focus on this fracture - if he could widen it just enough to wedge a prybar inside and pry it just a hair - the column would fail and the castle would tumble down upon them all.

Ignoring the throbbing pain in his head and the sting of blood dripping into his eye, the chamberlain began again, hacking away at the column in the light of the dying torch. For if he succeeded and brought this castle down, Ulrek's terrible reign would be over before it could begin.

---

((A collaboration between @Vampiretwilight and @gorgenmast.))

Waves roared as they crashed into frothy foam against a rocky outcropping where land met sea. Hewn by the ceaseless crashing of waves into gnarled and craggy stones, the rocks were pocked with numerous crags and recesses. Passersby to this desolate cluster of stone on the fringe of the Capital's harbor - infrequent as they were - would never imagine that the numerous sea-caves here in the shadow of a guard tower on the seaside terminus of the city's outer walls might go farther than a few feet into the rock. Only the very highest ranking of Castle Bathory's royal guard could possibly know that one of these narrow, barnacle-encrusted apertures was in fact the mouth of a subterranean rivulet of sewage running all the way back under the city to the undercroft of Castle Bathory. The trickle of filth pouring from this hidden sewer was mixed and diluted by intruding seawater sloshing in from the bigger waves, and the putrid stench of sewage was obfuscated by the natural aroma of tidewater. And so there was not a soul expecting them when Edward, Emily, and their guards and servants stepped out from the darkness of the tunnel onto the rocky shore.

Newly-appointed Guard Commander Bartolomue and Edward led the way, guiding a path over stepping stones slick with sea moss.

Edward and Emily snuck along in the darkness, along with those guards and servants. They would soon approach the boat in the dead of darkness, no enemy knowing that they were there. The boat would take them to another land, where an ally would take them in. With their help, they would make a plan to take back Edwards' home, his kingdom. He and Emily would marry while they were away, to ensure that Edwards' birthright was secured. Emily loved him and was more than willing to marry right away. It was her idea after all. Anyway, they would get onto the boat and prepare to sail away. Edward would sigh and look back one last time, his heart aching for his stolen and nearly destroyed homeland.

Bartolomue and Edward led Emily and the guards off of the rocks and onto the seaside wharf butting right up against the outcropping. Cobblestone jetties spanned the shallow, rocky waters just off the shore and reached out to the deeper waters that could accommodate the deep draughts of merchant cogs laden with foreign goods. Few boats remained in the harbor - most vessels had wisely put out to sea as soon as the Madness took hold over the city - and those few that remained were badly damaged or had been burned at anchor. Edward, Emily, and their retinue quietly walked past the blackened remains of a pair of vessels scorched to the waterline while Bartolomue scanned the harbor for a seaworthy ship.

On a nearby jetty, they found a ship that was unscathed. Easily overlooked, for it had no sails nor mast, it was a shallow-draught dhow of oriental construction, with the only shelter on board provided by a canopy of waxed canvas rigged over the aft of the hull. Bartolomue nearly disregarded the vessel as a very large rowboat that might be used by a wealthy fishmonger, but an audible huff and a diffuse plume of mist shooting out from the water directly before the stern gave proof that this was no mere rowboat. This was a chariot ship. Propelled by neither wind nor oar, but rather a team of three or four tamed porpoises tethered to the fore of the vessel. Light, nimble, and independent of the winds, chariot ships were known to be the fastest things on the sea, able to outrun any sailship even in the most favorable winds. Hailing from from the Orient, where wealthy merchants used them to race through the pirate-infested straits of the Jade Islands, chariot ships were rare indeed in these seas. To stumble upon a seaworthy specimen in the Lands Under Shadow was could only be divine providence.

Bartolomue gestured to the boat, directing the Vampire prince, Emily, and the guards and servants to make their way to the chariot ship at once. The party moved ahead briskly but quietly, thankful that the Madness-gripped citizenry had largely abandoned the harbor and gravitated toward the castle.

Edward and Emily got onto the ship. It would be a few days before they got to their destination. However, they would be safe upon their arrival. The queen who ruled the nation they were heading to was a family friend and had known Edward since he was a baby. The vampire prince knew that she would be more than willing to help him.

Anyway, he escorted Emily as they all got on board the ship. Edward tried not to show sadness but he lost that internal fight.

Emily kissed him on the cheek. She tried to be of comfort. She also tried to reassure him that everything would be alright in the end.

Soon enough, the ship would take off into the sea and they would leave the vampire kingdom behind.

As Emily did her best to comfort Edward, Bartolomue and his guards looked over the ship, ensuring that no Madness-gripped lunatic or would-be assassin was hiding aboard the vessel lying in wait to strike at the vampire prince. Finding nothing on the deck, they went down into the hull to look around. Bartolomue had just tasked the servants with drawing up the anchor of the commandeered ship when a few of his guards could be heard shouting and stumbling about below deck. Bartolomue immediately drew his sword and gestured for Edward and Emily to remain still as he waited for something to emerge from below deck. Much to his relief, it was not a gang of armed peasants, but his unscathed guards that returned from the belly of the vessel, joined by a single captive. Seized tightly by the arms by the royal guards was a swarthy foreigner, clad in a flowing robe of lime-green silk and a yellow, onion-shaped turban was coiled neatly upon his brow as was fashionable among the elite of the Orient. Unkempt stubble and purple bags under the eyes gave proof that this man had spent a considerable time hiding in the hull of this ship.

"P-please, do no kill me!" Stuttered the Easterner in his peculiar, throaty accent. "I have wealth. I have connections in Orient. I make you wealthy men. But please, please, please, please no kill me."

Bartolomue had seen plenty of peasants afflicted with the Madness. Fighting against them, face-to-face, the Guard Commander was well acquainted with their ferocious, dauntless gaze, even in the face of certain death. When he looked in the wide eyes of this man of the Orient, he saw only terror. Immediately, he knew this man was not gripped by the Madness.

"We don't want your money. But we do want this ship. Is it yours?"

"Yes, yes! This my boat. No sail but it go very fast. Pull by... how you say, big fish?"

"Whales." One of the guards holding the easterner by the arm chimed in.

"Yes, yes! Pull by whales. I take you wherever place you want. My crew dead, but maybe you be new crew? Is easy, I show you."

"What happened to your crew?"

"Crazy people. Crazy people come out of house and street and kill everybody. Kill my crew when we go to leave. I hide in ship and they no find me."

"Then let us serve as your crew for this voyage. Take us away from these lands," said Bartolomue, producing a drawstring bag full of golden vespers to show to the merchant, "and we will make you even wealthier."

The easterner's lips drew into a wide smile as he looked upon the purse full of coins with almost-dwarven avarice.

"Yes, very good! Very good! You pull up anchor, I wake up big fish and make them go."

Edward kept his guard up when the guards inspected the ship. His eyes were wide as he saw the exchange between his loyal guards and the owner of the ship. He frowned. He did not condone such behavior. He would never have approved of it if he had known they were going to act that way. Anyway, he knew It would take days before they reached the grounds of their truest of allies. But, it would be worth it once they arrived there.

Emily gasped. Her eyes were wide as well. she stayed close to Edward, acting nervous during that time. She would be quite relieved when the ship finally took off, pulled by those whales. She looked out at the open waters with Edward by her side.

Edward sighed. He would feel homesick already. Edward looked at the guards.
"Let us set out! We must leave quickly! It is going to be a long journey and we must get there before it is too late!" He used the same tone of voice his father used to use when commanding his troops. Emily faintly smiled at Edward.

"You heard his majesty!" Shouted one of the guards in response, rousing his comrades. "Pull that anchor! Let's be off!"

At once, the guards and the servants hoisted the anchor out of the water and up onto the deck as the merchant captain went to the fore of the ship and gave a series of deft tugs on the thick rope reigns that ran from the bow down to the harnessed whales sleeping just below the surface of the water. One by one, the beasts were roused from their slumber, waking with short, irritated puffs of mist from their blowholes. The easterner sang a lilting string of syllables in his native tongue while he pulled and tugged on their reigns with practiced efficiency. Without warning, the ship lurched forward as the whales swam ahead. A foamy wake formed at the bow of the vessel as the sea protested against the rapid speed the ship had built. Within minutes the chariot ship was well into the harbor and the broken skyline of the once-great capital of the Lands Under Shadow shrank behind them.

"No worry, Majesty!" Said the easterner, glancing back from the reigns. "We leave very quickly now. We can get to big city of Aepiranth tomorrow. Twelve day, maybe we get to Orient. Just tell me where to go."

"Our King needs a place to gather allies and support before taking his country back," said Bartolomue. "Are there mercenaries in the Orient?"

"Oh yes! Yes, of course. One hundred mercenary company you can hire in the Grand Bazaar. Assassin mercenary, horse mercenary, elephant mercenary, cannon mercenary... cannon on elephant mercenary! Every mercenary you can hire in Orient!"

"Your Majesty, perhaps we should visit the lands of the Orient, and inquire about purchasing the services of such formidable fighters for your cause." Bartolomue suggested to Edward, even now imagining returning to these shores to battle Ulrek with an army of horsemen and elephants from the Orient, blasting Ulrek's defenses to bits with cannons aboard privateer warships bearing the crimson sails of King Zachaeus.

Edward looked at Bartolomue. He nodded once.
"Very well. We may journey there as well. We shall need all the help that we can get. We must take back our homeland and avenge my father and his good name!"

Emily agreed with him. She stood right by his side. She encouraged him and such.

Edward was determined to accomplish this goal. He glanced back again once more, thinking about his dead father this time. He narrowed his eyes. He vowed to ensure his father and the others who died were avenged. His brother and Kane would both pay for what they had done. He would make sure of that, he thought.

"Then it is decided," affirmed Bartolomue as he turned to the captain of the chariot ship. "Take us to the Orient."

[Vampiretwilight]

Edward sighed. He wrapped an arm around his bride, Emily. Emily looked at him with a saddened frown. She was worried. He felt the same way. It could be seen in his eyes. Soon enough, his eyes would return to the distance ocean, a prayer in his mind. He prayed for a miracle, for an end to this fighting for he wished to not have to use that power of his at all. But, he knew he would have no other choice in the end.

Emily sighed. She turned her eyes towards the distant ocean as well. She continued to hope that they would win the fight. But, until then, they had to flee and not look back...

[gorgenmast]

((A collaboration between TheWyrm and gorgenmast))

Kanes footsteps were soundless as he paced down the long dyed-red carpet that led toward the double doorway of the throne. He could see light streaming through the open doorway, casting a brilliant light upon the corpses of a dead knight and several fallen guardsmen. A fourth corpse lay just beyond the light, tumbled in a corner, entrails spilling across hands that had failed to stuff them back into a vicious stomach wound. A broken sword stuck out from the throne room doorway, a pikehead snapped off just below the shaft lay near a severed leg. There was no sign of the legs owner.

A sudden crash of metal on stone made him pause, his ears straining to hear more of what might be happening beyond. No signs of battle echoed from the room and the breeze that blew strongly through the shattered castles brought only the sickly sweet smell of recent death.

An abrupt crunch and a slurping sound told him all he needed to know. He knew all to well the sound of a feeding Vampire, and just how powerful they could be if they went unchecked. Which of the brothers it might be, he did not know. Nor did it matter. He ripped his sword free of the sheath and stepped into the room.

Ulrek Bathroy was bent over a guardsman who was feebly attempting to escape even as he paled before Kanes eyes. There was no preamble, no attempt at conversation - Kane raised his sword and charged.

It was at the penultimate moment that Ulrek noticed the attacker descending upon him. Only when the vampire hunter had entered Ulrek's peripheral vision did he notice his assailant's presence. With a bestial snarl, Ulrek bolted up from his victim and caught the attacker with a powerful swat to the chest. Nascent claws pierced through the flesh of Ulrek's fingertips, piercing armor and cloth and penetrating down into skin and meat. A percussive thud rang out as Ulrek's reactive swipe catapulted the vampire hunter across the throne chamber. The attacker was slammed into one of the columns with a grimace-inducing thud and then tumbled down to the base of the pillar while his sword clattered onto the tiles a few feet away.

Ulrek studied the would-be assassin laying upon the floor with a bemused scowl. How had this man so-nearly slain Ulrek without his presence being sensed until he was just out of sword's-reach? And how was he still alive after such a blow? Ulrek could sense the attacker's heart beating even now. That furious beat had not slowed a bit; his attacker was not even unconscious - just stunned or unwinded. Ulrek was bewildered and so he probed the attacker's mind, curious to see what sort of a man he was to survive such a blow delivered squarely to the chest.

Nothing.

Ulrek's scowl relaxed into a smile for the first time in a long time indeed. He wiped the blood coating his mouth and lips into the palm of his hand.

"Solomon Kane," Ulrek said, striding across the faded carpet to his sword embedded in the tiles alongside the mangled remains of a slain royal guard. "I have wondered when we would meet again."

"Do you remember when we met, all those months ago? You never introduced yourself, you never gave me your name. But even so, I knew exactly who you were."

"Surely, you know full well that vampires can read the minds of mortal men," Ulrek continued as he drew Pthaalma up from the cracked and broken tile and inspected the blade, holding it up to the beam of orange twilight filtering in from the opening in the crumbling walls. The silver patina was pitted and marred, exposing flecks of bluish mithril underneath. "Vampire hunters know this better than anyone. They know tricks to keep a vampire from knowing their true thoughts - short rhymes repeated in the back of the head - that sort of thing. All of the other vampire hunters you arrived with at my court did these things."

"But not you."

"I knew you were Solomon Kane when I probed your mind and for the first time in my nearly-three hundred years of life saw nothing."

Satisfied with his inspection of the sword, Ulrek casually made his way down the faded carpet toward Kane.

"And when I could not probe your mind, I will admit that for the first time in my life, I knew fear. Fear, perhaps, there was some truth to the stories I had heard of the greatest vampire slayer that had ever lived. And there was indeed some truth to those legends. You are, without doubt, the greatest vampire slayer that has ever lived. You killed my father, my brother Matteas, and all the other vampires that inhabited this city."

As Ulrek approached Kane, he gently kicked Kane's sword well away, denying any hope of the vampire hunter rearming himself.

"But it was foolish of me to fear you, Kane," Ulrek said, raising his sword to plunge down on the vampire slayer. "For even the greatest vampire slayer is helpless against the greatest vampire to ever live."

Suggested Listening

Kane could not have anticipated the strength and power of Ulreks blow. Sheer surprise, followed by burning pain, ripped through his mind and body as he hurtled through the air to slam into a support pillar. Stars exploded before his eyes and he was instantly aware of an agonizing pain throughout his chest. He gasped for air, each breath like a thousand small needles in his chest. His lungs had been punctured. He could not move his legs. His back was broken. There was undoubtedly more damage, more pain, but it paled in comparison to the fire that burned in his chest.

A mere mortal would have died in that moment, but Kane was no mere man. I am the son of God. This is but the beginning. Though the pain remained, he could feel it begin to diminish as his body regenerated the damaged organs and close the vicious wounds to his torso. But this is not the Ulrek I knew all those months ago. There is something else here. Something deathly powerful. I have underestimated him. I was prideful And that was my sin.

He was dimly aware of Ulrek trying to probe his mind. He paid the mental attack no heed. He did not fear such simple vampire tricks, but the sheer raw power was something else altogether. He remained still on the floor. Unmoving, allowing his body to continue healing. Even when Ulrek began to speak, to lecture him, he did not move. Let the fool talk. Every second was another second toward regaining his movement, his ability to fight back. He would not die on this floor amid the ruins of a failed undead dream.

His eyes tracked Ulrek as the Vampire strode to his sword, the famous Pthaalma, where it was embedded in the stone floor. Kane cursed himself for not noticing the weapon when he entered the room. No common vampire would have been able to drive a blade into stone with such force. He had woefully underestimated his enemy. Still, he suspected that Ulrek was similarly unaware of who Kane truly was. A worthy opponent then. Our battle will be legendary!

The pain in his chest had faded to a dull ache by the time Ulrek began to walk toward him, Pthaalma in hand. His own sword, its white and silver colour seemingly dull against the grey stone, was causally kicked aside, skittering across the stone to lodge against the broken tile. No matter. He did not need a sword to fight such a creature as a vampire. Not anymore.

"But it was foolish of me to fear you, Kane," Ulrek said, raising his sword to plunge down on the vampire slayer. "For even the greatest vampire slayer is helpless against the greatest vampire to ever live."

Even as Ulrek began to drive the sword down, Kane moved. He rolled swiftly to his right and was already rising to his feet when the sword slammed into the stone where he had been lying a moment before. More tiles exploded into pieces and Kane had a brief moment to enjoy the look of surprise on Ulreks face before the vampire turned on him with a snarl.

Kane wasted no time as he launched himself at Ulrek. His shoulder slammed into the vampire, sending the undead princeling tumbling away from the blade - leaving it vibrating in the stone - a steady humming sound emanating from the steel. The Prince slammed hard into the wall beneath a tapestry proudly showing a lone vampire sitting upon a great throne, surrounded by human vassals saluting him with their swords. Kane offered Ulrek a broad smile. His armour was torn where Ulreks claws had ripped the mail but no blood leaked down the pure white links of mail. As the vampire watched him warily, Kane reached down and took hold of Pthaalma's hilt.

"Yes, Solomon Kane is my mortal name, and yes, I was a vampire hunter," As he spoke he slowly began to draw the sword from the floor. The vampires eyes widened - the strength a human would need to accomplish such a feat was impossible. "but today, I am judgement. You have undoubtably heard the call of the faithful."

With a sudden jerk he ripped Pthaalma the rest of the way out of the floor and took the blade in one hand, still maintaining hold of the hilt. For a brief second the two glared at each other until, with a voice like thunder, Kane spoke. "God Wills it!" And he snapped Pthaalma in two.

Ulrek's eyes widened as his sword - a nigh-indestructable piece of dwarven mithril - snapped in Kane's hands as though it were made of dryrotten wood. What manner of sorcery did Solomon command to break mithril with his bare hands? Kane did not need to probe Ulrek's mind to see a twinge of of worry on the vampire's face - to know that his fear of the vampire slayer had returned at least in some part.

Ulrek's claws extended another two inches from his fingertips as the blood in the vampire's belly digested. Yellow-white claws of freshly-exposed bone parted the flesh of Ulrek's fingertips, tapering down into sharp points. Ulrek's eyes narrowed as he closed the distance between him and Kane. Kane may have broken a mithril sword with his bare hands, but that still left him bare-handed.

The vampire princeling swiped at the vampire slayer, air whistled around the claws as they sailed inches over Kane's head. The vampire slayer ducked to miss the claws and then lunged up into the vampire's bony chest. Ulrek tumbled backwards onto the carpet as Kane reached for his throat. A vicelike fist clenched down around the vampire's neck as Kane held the vampire to the floor, pressing his knees down into the vampire's torso while his other arm reached for something on his belt: a wooden stake - no doubt.

Just as Kane had found what he was reaching for on his belt, Ulrek freed his left arm and delivered a swipe to Kane's neck. The vampire hunter tumbled aside, releasing his grip from Ulrek's throat and allowing him onto his feet once more. Kane rolled at once and was on his feet - only to meet a powerful clawed blow from the vampire princeling. Kane tumbled through the air once again into one of the hanging tapestries hanging on either side of the chamber. The linen tore from its mounting brackets and tumbled down around Kane in a thick heap as he landed on the floor.

While Kane struggled to free himself from the fallen tapestry, Ulrek went over to Kane's sword laying on the floor just a few feet away. He may have ruined Pthaalma, but Ulrek wouldn't give Kane the chance to break this sword. Ulrek seized the hilt of Kane's sword and allowed its weight to sit in his hand as he assessed the distribution of its weight. As the hilt laid upon his palm, pale yellow flames burst from from Ulrek's hand. The sword felt as though it was just removed from the forge, leaving a sting that radiated up from his hands all the way to his shoulder. Ulrek dropped the sword at once and inspected his palms. White smoke still rising from burns on his hands - burns that were not at all unlike the burns Ulrek received when he began immunizing himself to silver. But there was not a trace of silver on the sword laying at Ulrek's feet.

The musty stench of the tapestry choked the air from Kanes lungs as it enveloped him. A faint smell of burning came from the ancient fabric as he kicked at it, finally managing to heave it off of himself so that it fell against the wall with a thud. He was surprised to find Ulrek staring down at Kanes sword in surprise, the vampires hand smouldering slightly from the touch of the hilt. Kanes eyes narrowed as he saw the elongated claws of on Ulreks fingers.

"Monster..." Kane hissed. He hurled himself across the room, his shoulder catching the vampire just below the sternum in a heavy tackle that sent the two crashing to the ground. Kane recovered quickly and began to pound his fists into the vampires face. He could hear bones begin to break, his or Ulreks he did not know, but he could sense he was hurting his enemy. Blow after blow rained down at the vampire fought to free himself, vicious claws raking across Kanes flanks. Silver scales and blood flecked the floor after every strike - there was no words to describe the pain that consumed them both.

At last Ulreks strikes began to weaken, his face a broken mesh of bone and gore. Kane did not relent as he continued to pummel his enemy, knowing only that the attacks on his flanks had ended. He could feel blood running down his hips and smell the rich iron that came with it. In that moment he lost focus for a brief second and that was enough for the vampire.

The undead prince lunged abruptly, kicking his legs up, forcing Kane down toward him like a lover might do. But there was no kiss, instead he sank his battered fangs into Kanes neck and bit down. In an instant Kane could feel Ulrek begin to drain him. Fear, true horrible fear, shot through him and he tried to shove the vampire away but the beast hung on. Kane scrabbled frantically at his belt and managed to seize upon the hilt of a silver dagger. He wasted no time drawing and ramming it into Ulreks chest.

The vampire shrieked, letting go of Kane at last, and the two fell apart at last. Kane rolled sideways, staggering to his feet and taking up the sword that had lain not five feet away. In its burnished blade he could see the horrible bite mark on his neck and, already spreading, a blackening of his skin. He could feel his neck twitching and he clapped a hand to the wound. He would not heel in time, he would simply need to finish the battle.

As necrotic flesh slowly expanded across Kane's neck, Ulrek's wounded flesh sloughed off of his face. Like a spider emerging from its old molted carapace, the bloodied and damaged face fell away in wads of loose skin and dark vampiric blood to reveal a new and frightful visage. Staring at Kane with a malicious smile was a twisted and demonic caricature of the vampire he had been fighting moments before. Ulrek's already gaunt and pointed face was now pulled taught like the skin of a drum against a skull and jawbone expanding and warping to accommodate the vampire's newfound strength. His gray eyes were now beads of black obsidian, sunken and recessed into deep sockets. His ears, before merely long and slightly pointed, were now as long as a horse's, rippled and throbbing with veins of black vampiric blood. Ulrek's long nose was now a long, fluted proboscis with convoluted grooves and ridges instead of nostrils which protruded over an arcade of sharp fangs still stained with Kane's lifeblood.

Kane's power was godly, and so his lifeblood conferred godly power. As Ulrek digested what little blood he was able to siphon from the vampire slayer, he rapidly approached the zenith of his strength. Vampires were simply hybrid beings of human and demonic parentage, and so as Ulrek's power waxed, his more human characteristics were shed in favor of the demonic traits. Ulrek's black silken shirt tore open from the back with a loud, popping rip, falling to his feet in a tattered heap as a set of clawed and membranous wings unfurled from his back.

"God wills it?" Ulrek said at last, his voice coarse and shrill. He vampire looked over his shoulders, stretching open and gently flapping his new pair of wings as he admired them. "You are mistaken, Kane, for I am God."

Ulrek gave a mighty flap of the wings - launching himself at the vampire slayer. Before Kane could dodge or counter, a clawed hand had struck the vampire slayer and threw him into the nearest column. Crazing cracks spiderwebbed through the stone of the column as Kane's body slammed into it.

Even when thrown against the column, Kane did not fall. Staggered from the blow, but remaining on his feet nonetheless, the vampire slayer propped himself against the crumbling pillar and drew the silver dagger from his belt, holding its blade toward Ulrek as he approached.

Ulrek's claws, now almost a full foot in length, flashed out as Kane made an anemic attempt to lunge at the vampire lord. Ulrek's claws slashed deeply across Kane's fist and arms. The dagger's silver blade was broken off, plinking against the stone tiles and leaving only a jagged stump of a hilt in Kane's fist. Ulrek swung with his other hand, raking up across the vampire slayer's chest in a savage uppercut that once again sent him across the room. Kane landed with a crunching thud at the very foot of King Zacheaus' vacant throne, landing right on top of the sooty stain in the faded red carpet that had been the vampire king days earlier. A dozen silver scales from the vampire slayer's scalemail cuirass littered the carpet around him, bright red blood trickled through the deep gouges in both his armor and chest. Kane's inflating lungs poked through a deep gash in his ribcage with each wheezing breath.

((Suggested listening))

Ulrek sauntered up the carpet toward Solomon Kane, the vampire slayer's sword clutched in his claws. White smoke billowed out from Ulrek's sword hand, leaving a diffuse contrail of smoke in the air as he approached, but the burning did not seem to bother the vampire lord. Not anymore. Even as Ulrek strode through rays of red-orange sunlight filtering into the throne chamber through the opening in the ceiling, and the sunlight set the vampire's skin to smoke and smolder, Ulrek seemed perfectly unfazed.

"A fitting place for you to meet your end, Solomon Kane. The final obstacle between me and the throne of this land."

Ulrek stopped at the foot of the throne and contemplated for a moment the dying vampire slayer laying in front of him, watching Kane's lungs poke out through the wound in his chest with each labored breath. Even as he lay dying, Kane looked up at Ulrek with a hateful glare and gritted teeth, defiant to the very end.

"What a pity that you should die like this. What an asset you could have been. For even now, other vampires draw breath. Fewer now, yet some remain. One thing you and I had in common was hatred for other vampires, yours only slightly greater than mine. I could have made you wealthy beyond your capacity for imagination. I would have rewarded you handsomely to destroy every other vampire in the world while I rebuilt this kingdom - to eliminate every possible threat to my future reign."

"But even then, I suppose, we would find ourselves fighting to the death at the end. I could never abide such a seasoned vampire slayer to live for very long, and you, of course, would never be satisfied until I was dead. And so - sooner than I would have preferred - I must bid you goodbye."

Ulrek stooped down and seized Kane by the neck with his free hand, effortlessly holding the vampire slayer up to his sunken, black eyes. Ulrek looked over his battered adversary as he squirmed against his grip.

"A grievous wound you have taken," noted Ulrek, seeing Kane's lung protrude from the wound in his chest. "I suppose you are no longer able to speak, and of course I cannot probe your mind to know your final thoughts. A pity, for you were a worthy adversary, and I would have liked to have given you the honor of uttering your last words."

Ulrek attempted one last time to probe Kane's mind, and of course, saw nothing. But as Ulrek focused and listened for any thought, another mind's thought boomed through the castle.

Farewell, your majesty!

Ulrek was caught off guard by this strangely familiar mental voice and honed in on it. As he focused, Ulrek recalled it to be that of his former chamberlain from Felboge Keep, who had escaped several months earlier. Ulrek probed his mind just in time to watch through the chamberlain's eyes as he threw a pickaxe with all his might against a pillar of stone. A wide crack ripped through the pillar and buckled, and Ulrek witnessed a thousand tons of stone fall upon him and instantly end his thoughts.

At once, a loud crack resounded throughout the citadel and the whole structure began to shake and tremble violently beneath Ulrek's feet. The supporting pillars in the undercroft - Ulrek quickly remembered. His rogue chamberlain must have sapped the supporting columns in order to sabotage the castle. But how, Ulrek thought?

"God wills it..." Kane croaked at last from underneath Ulrek's choking grip. The vampire lord was so distracted by his chamberlain's last act of treachery, that he did not notice the jagged wooden dagger hilt in Kane's fist until it had been planted deeply and firmly into the pale flesh of Ulrek's bare chest.

Ulrek's dark eyes went wide as black, viscous blood ran down his chest from around the broken hilt planted in his heart. The vampire gasped, spraying spittles of blood out from between his fangs onto Kane's face. The vampire's grasp slackened, releasing Kane to fall to the floor as Ulrek fell over backwards onto the faded carpet carpet. The vampire gulped for air as trembling claws grasped at the wooden hilt sticking out of his chest. After fumbling for several moments, Ulrek finally grabbed the hilt and yanked it from his chest, eliciting a painful wince and spasming of the crumpled wings beneath him. A trembling claw brought the wooden hilt fragment up to Ulrek's eyes to inspect. An improvised wooden stake to the heart - just like the one that killed his forebear Nosferas so long ago. Ulrek had been right to fear Solomon Kane.

The vaulted ceiling above began to buckle from the trembling of the unstable citadel. Blocks of stone began to fall down and crash against the tiles of the throne chamber, freeing one of the pillars damaged by Ulrek and Kane during their duel. Ulrek could do naught but look up into the sky opening up through the ceiling as the column fell over sideways directly on top of Ulrek Bathory. The pillar fell through the floor, opening a yawning chasm mere feet from where Kane lay. From the edge of this gaping hole in the floor, the vampire slayer could see the lower floors of the citadel collapsing down far below into a fast-growing pit of rubble. The fallen pillar that crushed Ulrek fell down into a dark and dusty pit and was quickly buried as the rest of the castle continued to collapse into it.

[gorgenmast]

A length of time passed before consciousness returned. Hours? Or had it been days or even weeks? There was no way of knowing. Darkness and terrible, crushing pain were the only sensations that he was able to perceive. That, and the occasional cracking and popping of countless tons of stone settling on top of him.

Ulrek Bathory had spent the past year scheming and fighting to make Castle Bathory his home and seat of power. It had instead become his tomb. Despite the savage duel with Solomon Kane, the wooden shiv stabbed into his heart, the column of stone collapsing upon him, the Vampire Prince was not yet slain. Perhaps Kane had narrowly missed the vampire's heart, or perhaps Ulrek was simply too powerful to be killed by a wooden stake. Whatever the case, Ulrek had survived, and had been swallowed by the collapsing castle. He had been pinned inside a claustrophobic cavity between two enormous slabs of stone. Sandwiched between two giant masses of rock in a cavity only inches apart, Ulrek's ribs had all been snapped. Had the remains of the castle fallen more neatly on top of him, Ulrek might have been crushed outright and granted the merciful release of death. God, it would seem, had not willed that.

Consciousness returned to Ulrek Bathory and slowly his memories returned to him as well, as if he had found himself sleeping in an unfamiliar bed and tried to remember the previous day. The Siege of Castle Bathory, the Madness of the Capital, the explosions, the final battle with Solomon Kane, and then the ceiling of the throne room collapsing upon him. Slowly, the awful realization dawned on Ulrek: he was buried alive. A horrifying fate for anyone, but for a mortal man, relief would come eventually in the form of death. But for immortal vampires, there would be no such solace. The ruins of Castle Bathory would therefore entomb Ulrek for the rest of time. An eternity of agonizing solitude in the darkness, forever to be famished and suffocated. It was a Hell of the ambitious vampire's own making.

Lesser minds would have succumbed to immediate madness upon realizing such a fate. Weaker beings might have tried to simply will themselves to death through sheer determination. But even when faced with an eternity of agony in the void, Ulrek did not succumb, but instead listened in to the world beyond this smoldering rubble heap, seeking feverishly for any mortal mind to probe. There were precious few that Ulrek could even faintly perceive: straggling survivors of the devastation to the capital of the Lands Under Shadow. From such a distance, it was exceedingly difficult - as if he were listening to a conversation through a well-mortared wall. But with intense and purposeful focus, Ulrek proved able to probe the minds of some of the survivors far above him.

---

Early-morning light filtered dimly through a thick haze of smoke, dust, and the ever-present overcast skies to which the Lands Under Shadow owed its name. Until recently, the Capital had been here - among the most populous and well-fortified cities in all the land. Now, the Capital was naught but a smoking maze of rubble, a forest of still-smoldering timbers of burnt houses and shops. The great firedust explosions had blasted out blackened craters and excavated winding ravines that had once been subterranean tunnels and catacombs. Displaced bricks and corpses littered the ground, both equally numberless. Castle Guards, Conscripts from the Weald, dwarves, horses, ogres, women, and children were all present among the lifeless, bloating corpses strewn across the ruined city now teeming with gluttonous flocks of ravens and seagulls. The dead counted easily over a hundred thousand, but some had miraculously survived the back-to-back catastrophes. The dust-caked survivors wound through the ruined city in shuffling lines winding down paths of least resistance through the rubble and debris out toward the cropland surrounding what remained of the Capital. Torpid and sullen processions of amnesiacs went down ash-caked pathways that had once been alleys and streets of the great city, either shocked into senselessness by the great cataclysm or willfully trying to forget that this ruin had once been their home.

((Finale listening))

One such procession wound its way around the edge of a great hill of pulverized limestone that had once been Castle Bathory. There were no cries of lamentation for the loss of their benevolent vampiric lords who had occupied the towering citadel that had stood here for centuries before; no fear for the warlords and barbarism that would descend upon these lordless lands as surely and voraciously as the carrionbirds feasting upon the corpses at their feet. Only hacking coughs as the surviving paupers trudged around the ruins of the castle.

Buried halfway up the trunk in fallen bricks, the ancient and gnarled holly tree planted in what had once been the courtyard of Castle Bathory had been battered but miraculously remained standing. Whole boughs had been sheared off by fallen debris from the citadel, but the gnarled bole remained, bearing a few stubborn and scraggly limbs of glossy holly leaves. But even the battered tree - now perhaps the tallest thing for several leagues - was not enough to steal the gaze of the sullen survivors from their dirt-caked feet.

Not until a withered and ancient man, so old that he could scarcely walk, stopped in the sooty path through the boulders and rubble to regard the tree. Those walking behind him brushed past, uninterested in whatever had captivated the feeble-minded codger standing in their way. The wizened survivor ignored those bumping into his back to get by. He stood for some moments until something galvanized his feet. With a shaky, wobbling gait, the old man negotiated the rubble and boulders before him and approached the trunk of the holly tree.

The other survivors ambling past were now stopping to regard this old man hobbling up to the twisted and tortured trunk. Blue, cloudy eyes gazed down into the broken stone at his dusty, calloused feet. For a time, the main gazed at the ground in silence, as if carefully considering some crucial decision. A dozen survivors watched in confused silence as their fellow survivor finally laid his hand against the trunk of the holly. And as if enticed out by a knock at the door, a solitary bat clambered out from a knothole high up in the holly tree and fluttered off into the hazy morning sky.

[DELETED32084]

Solomon felt no pain or sorrow, in fact, he felt nothing at all. The great rumbling and crashing that had filled his ears in the final moments his heart pumped its last was gone. He was in perfect silence. He tried to move his hands but they would not follow his commands, nor would his feet and legs. It seemed odd to him that they would disobey him so. His body did not feel broken, yet he did not truly feel as though he was weighed down by such an earthly constraint any longer.

A brilliant white light suddenly burst upon him and Kane looked down to see his body lying twisted and broken beneath him. His head was at an impossible angle, his limbs so badly contorted that he knew there was no way he could have survived the castles collapse.

"So this is death." He said to no one in particular. He felt as though it should have meant more to him, but he felt no anger, not even sadness, at leaving the world of the living behind.

"No, my son, this is the beginning." The voice was oddly familiar. It had a soft lilt to it, almost sing song, and it was most certainly female. Solomon raised his gaze toward the light and saw a human form begin to take shape. He fell to his knees as it to revealed itself to be the most beautiful woman he had ever laid eyes on.

"Mother..." His voice was a rasp, an impossibly weak sound in his own ears, but the woman smiled. Her hair was as golden as the sun itself, her skin as flawless as newly carved marble, her eyes as bright and blue as the finest sapphires. For the first time in his life he felt a lump in his throat as he tried to reach out to her. She took a knee in front of him and smiled into his face, reaching down and drawing his hands up so that she might kiss them.

In an instant he felt something surge through him. Perhaps it was the gift of life but in his heart, Solomon Kane knew that he was dead. This was the end. His time on earth had come to a close and he would be lost to history. It was time to let go.

"No, Solomon. It is time to come home." She spoke without moving her lips, the words echoing throughout his mind as he stood with her. Her touch was gentle, almost a caress, the like of which he had never experienced before in all his life. He slowly became aware of a great pair of pearly white gates opening behind her and more figures appearing amid the light.

Solomon realized that he knew their names, recognized their faces. They were his siblings. The Chosen Children of God. He felt tears begin to coarse down his cheeks even as a choir of angels, unnoticed until this moment, began to sing, their high voices piercing his very soul and causing him to weep.

"Welcome brother." The figures spoke, gently urging him toward the great gate. For a moment he hesitated, his heart hammering in his chest.

"I am not worthy." He began to shake his head, the tears soaking his beard and vanishing as they struck the unseen floor at his feet. "Not worthy."

"You are Solomon Kane, the Vampire Slayer. The Left Hand of God." The voices all spoke in unison and in that moment all doubt fell away from him and, with his mothers hand clutched in his own, he stepped through the gate and into history.

POSTSCRIPT

And so ended the Saga of Solomon Kane: A Land Under Shadow. The rule of the Vampire Princes had been broken and men were free once again to rule their own affairs. Thousands had died, and thousands more would perish in the days of trouble and turmoil to come. A great pestilence would sweep the land, laying waste to the living, and sowing the seeds for the tales yet to come, for our story does not end here, dear friend, oh no.

Evil still abounds so we must look to new men and women to take up the sword and fight for the glory of god.

THE END