The last of the drifting memories seemed to flow from him as any connection to his corporeal form whispered away into nothingness, into their new owner….
Kit's capture had been a simple thing. He had known that sooner or later they would come for him. The appearance of one of their kind in his very tent a moon ago had been signal of their intent. At least out here no innocents could be harmed.
He only wished he had more time to say farewell to his friends and to commune with his God. As the creature tore him from the forests and moved him through space to his deep prison his last view in sunlight was Aurenthil diving to grab at his fading form. He had tried to smile and say farewell.
He had been kept in his cell for two tendays at least. Or was it more?. It was hard to follow the passage of time in this steady chill darkness. All his belongings had been taken from him except his one red amulet given him by the High Priest of his god. He remembered vaguely the smoke and the acrid smell of burning flesh when one of them had grasped that to steal it away.
He had slowly weakened in that darkest pit. While the thin and foul stew they gave him was food, it was not enough to sustain a man of his size for long. The cold also wore him down through the scraps of clothing he had been left with. Often he had stumbled as he paced the uneven floors to keep warm his strength slowly sapping.
But that was not all. He held no fear of the pain they would bring him once below their foul city. But while his body wasted they did not bring any physical grief to him. No. They were weak beings in arm, but their minds were insidious and powerful.
In this deepest dungeon his god would still answered his call and guard him from them. But their hold and strength was great in their domain and soon they would break down those divine barriers to his mind. Then their torture began. One or often two of the creatures would stand outside his cell and look at him with their unblinking eyes. The foul tentacles extending from their faces would twitch and he would hear their cold voices in his head. Then the voices would turn to anguished screams of people from his memories or come as almost physical lances of pain through his mind as their tentacles flicked and slapped against each other. Many times through that dark timeless period his cries and screams had broken the still stale air of the deepest caverns. Many times his captors had used his mind like some cerebral laboratory for their sick psychic experiments, seeming to take pleasure in the use of his thoughts and dreams for their most debauched fancies making him think he himself had committed these most heinous of acts and seeing his suffering. They seemed to feed pleasurably off the self loathing and disgust that this holiest of warriors held for himself before they banished their false thoughts and his tearful eyes remembered who he was and his innocence.
More than just their experiments on his sanity they soon wanted to know more of the human body. Finally one day they came for him speaking to his mind of his insolents and that he would have died a thousand deaths by now had not their master said he be kept alive. The knight hat met their lord….he know even these most powerful and sorcerous creatures were like mere ants to his mastery. He knew they would not disobey him in his house as he soon knew this place to be.
So when finally one came to him wielding a scalpel glinting sharp speaking in his mind of the experiments of the flesh he would do…while keeping him alive he knew his last chance at pride came. The knife suspended in the air by the magic of the flayer came closer and closer to his eye till barely a fingers width away. Finally his prayer was answered and mind freed from the grasp of the creature. His hand swept up to grasp the knife all but severing his fingers on his sword hand. Clicking and slithering sounds filled the chamber and a scream of anger filled his mind as the grasped knife was quickly held to the chest of the illithid. He knew he would be dead….but the command of their lord still held him. And the beast capitulated to take him to his master.
The walk was as he remembered his last time here. Through halls of darkness with corners filled with strange beasts and mounds of moving flesh. More of the Mind Flayers seethed as he walked past with his hostage…..hostage in the loosest sense he had thought grimly to himself. The creatures fell in behind him, flanking is final walk perhaps he had thought to himself.
And finaly he stood before him. The Beast Lord turned to face the knight and his heart quailed. Tho his heart was guarded from fear, this creature reeked of such awesome power and such immense…..age, it was hard not to be awed.
‘So finally you have come Knight of War’ the words spoke in his mind, ‘Release the knife to my minion now, you need it not’.
He knew this was true enough. No knife would aid him now and he handed the knife to his unwilling companion and as the creatures tentacles seethed in rage as he retreated.
‘So you have called me now. You have called your part of the bargain without delivering your own creature of the deep’
The thought resembling a sneer entered his mind. ‘What do you remember of our ‘agreement’ Knight?
‘Your aid would come to Loudwater for my service to you on one occasion. Now you have brought me here no doubt for this service but no aid has been given against the Horde deceiver!’
‘DO NOT SEEK TO INSTRUCT ME MORTAL!’, words crashed through his mind, ‘we made no pact on WHEN I would ask for your service. And as for a deceiver…you know so little of what you speak, so little.’
He knew in his mind the creature was right but it would not stop his anger. He had thought this barter for his soul would deliver victory. He had thought the dark alliance would prove the masterstroke to save the free people of the west. Know…they were once more on their own.
‘The Horde that comes to you human. The horde so great it will wash your puny forces away like shells in the sand. I COMMAND the minds of most of that Horde’ A cold chuckle entered his mind as the Knights heart fell. His planning had not been wrong. His planning had been disastrous. This ‘true lord of the region’ as the Greysword had spoken of him before his death, had not come to their aid, nor left them to themselves…but now came for them!
‘But you know that the Shadows that come will rule over you as well! You will be lost!’. This time the chuckle he heard was far colder far more evil even than before……and it was in his ears not his mind.
The impenetrable darkness behind the Beast Lord suddenly clouded with an even darker shad of black. Cold and evil reeked from the room as the blackness coalesced into the forms of four figures. While the Beast Lord stood still not turning to see what happened behind him, the other illithids slowly moved backwards away from the Knight, their master and what came behind.
To the sides two great soldiers stood encased in black shadowy almost writhing armour. Behind them One in a volumous shadowy robe stood. Face hidden and head bowed towards the man standing before him. Fine black robes shifting in the darkness reflecting shadows that had nothing to cast them. Skin of alabaster white with black markings webbed across his face. Eyes or burning coal looked a the Knight.
Finally, for the first time since his god had taken him as her true Knight….he felt true fear. Terror. Before him stood a dark power with black evil and maliciousness falling from him in palpable waves. His baleful eyes turned again to the Knight as he walked forwards chuckling still.
‘Your foolish strategies are undone pathetic knight. Those you love and protect will soon fall under the horde. The Beast Lord knows the victors of this battle for Toril and has sided wisely.’ His voice likened to moonless and starless night rasped across him.
‘Who….who are you’
Sneering the darkest man again spoke, ‘You are not worth my name. But I will tell you this’ he raised his arms’ I am of the Shadow….we have returned…and now all this world will come to night!’.
Momentarily struck dumb by the sheer force of will the man of shade he floundered in his thoughts. Panic, rage, grief all mingled before he felt the brush of a red lightness and order on the corner of his mind stilling him from chaos.
‘Evil will be undone creature of shade, you WILL be defeated and banished once again! My Lady guard me!’ he cried to the roof.
The Prince of the Shadovar frowned. ‘Proud and noble to the end I see’, black began to coalesce in his raised hands, a ball of dark malevolence trailing streamers of nightmare behind it, ‘ your pathetic god has no sway here…the Lady of Shadow now rules and none shall challenge her power. Now you shall feel it! ‘,his hand moved back the blackness whirling around it like the antithesis of a fireball.
The Beast Lord raised his hand and turned to the Shadowvar and silent words seemed to pass between them.
‘You are right o Beast Lord. Take from him what you need. We go now. You will die now Knight. And in your death you will destroy those you love. Go to your god with that knowledge.’ He turned and strode into the darkness with his entourage…..disappearing as they met the darkest shadows.
A long silence pervaded the room as the distant candle spluttered back into life from where it had been stilled.
Finally, the Beast Lord turned to him.
‘So now you see’
‘Betrayer!’ he responded.
‘Who is it you think I am Knight? Do you confuse me with one of your honourable lords? With the man Greysword that we both knew? I AM EVIL human! I have lived since before your kind wandered from their caves naked and will remain after you are all returned to the earth. I have no concern over who wins this battle, it will be forgotten in the millennia to come as even the victors will become like dust as the ephemeral powers and leaders you mortal creatures so desperately cling to and ride to war for wax and wane.’
‘As I said before you know so little. But you should know this. As the Greysword told you this is MY LAND. And it will remain so. NOONE will rule me.’
He strained to interrupt but felt steel gauntlet close over his damaged hand and a whispered voice ‘Silence my knight for he has more to say’. Looking down he could see no gloved hand…..but his hand was once more whole.
The next minutes the Beast Lord spoke to his mind. He was shocked by the depth of this creature…this demi-god of things evil, the depths of his power, and the depth of his arrogance. But as he listened he saw what this most ancient of creatures wanted and what would be done. He knew then the true danger of the game that was played.
‘Regardless of what was said and what has not been done you have brought me here to claim your half of the bargain havn’t you?’ He said to his tormentor at last.
‘Yes Knight. Tonight you will render me your service weather you will it or not’.
‘And that service is to be?’
‘It is simple for you Knight. You see the Prince of the Shadows was right. You will die tonight’, then mockingly, ‘You see o noble human Your service to me is your body itself until it too withers and is cast aside’, hearing no response from the knight the tentacles twitched and the other illithids left the room as he held out a withered arm, ‘ You see this form grows old. Very old and it is weak of the flesh. Your body will sustain me for many years and will be strong. And you memories will become mine…I will know exactly your pathetic plans and strategies and how the Horde may defeat your poor friends and beyond the frre forces of the west’.
‘You cannot! My Godess has my soul! Red Knight protect your servant!!’
‘I never had your soul Knight. She has always had that…’, he paused looking around the room as if sensing something at the same time as the grip at his sword hand became tighter, ‘ I only want you body and it’s memories. And know brave human…..you will die.
He was frozen as the Beast Lord moved forwards taking on an arcane aura of power, muscles like bands of immovable iron static while tentacles braced around his head bringing with them a scraping and scratching noise inside his very mind. Suddenly sensing his whole being as fading slowly from the noises, away from them, away from his body. In what was left of his mind he screamed.
‘Hush my knight. Do not fear’ His scream stopped as the voice he had almost heard at the edge of his prayers for his whole life embraced his soul like a protective parent.
A calmness settled over his conscious thoughts even as they with his sense of life were peeled away from him layer by familiar layer. He distantly regarded the nimbus of light that slowly folded out of the dark air beside him. Momentarily the desecration of his body ceased before resuming again with renewed vigour, though he was only dimly aware of the tentacles clasping his head and entering his throat.
The numbus then exploded into a deep red haze slowly swirling and coalescing. A great power seemed to shunt him sideways. He welcomed it, shrugging off the mortal shell of his life in his fascination and awe at what came before him.
And then she was there.
Standing before him in bejewelled red armour smiling at him with the beautiful face framed with dark hair. She had come, the object of his lifelong prayers.
He became aware, looking down to his insubstantial and naked body and then next to him to where the fleshy case he had worn still stood in the cold embrace of the Beast Lord. He reached out to his body before a red gauntlet grasped his hand.
‘No my Knight,’ the echoing voice of softness and power issued from her mouth, ‘ your time here has finished as the evil one said. But do not fear your passing as is it ordained.’
He looked again to his ultimate mistress. ‘But the war is not won sweet Lady…..’ He caught himself. Questioning HER!? How does he dare such!
A smooth smile fluttered across her lips.
‘But you see what you have done already Knight. You have turned the war. You have played out the finest of moves to place yourself and your allies above the unbearable foes. You have moved the pieces to the end game. Now you will watch to see the final moves of the great game you help orchestrate and you have sacrificed yourself to achieve.’
He bowed his head. ‘I am no longer able to serve out your will’ He felt shame. So many years to bring her word to Faerun had he lost by his plays.
‘No Knight. For as below so does the war rage above’, a strange smile again, ‘my father also his seen your work and anticipates your presence on the celestial field’.
He felt rather than saw through the numbus the bloom of a darker red. One of awesome power and chaos. One of true battle than the grace of war that stood before him.
‘And so it shall be. You will ride with me in the host. Equipped as a knight of heaven as befits.’
His naked form wavered and reformed. The trappings of his earthly Knighthood gone the blood red armour of his Lady encased him now also. As he slowly rose away from his now ignored body his arm felt the warmth as he looked down upon the sister of his ladies blade Checkmate.
And then he looked up at Her sate on her mighty steed and grasped the reigns of his own vaulting into the saddle as the beast screamed it’s welcome.
The thunderous clash of sword and spear on shield made him turn and peer over the force in red garb before him as they saluted their newest comrade. Past them the innumerable screaming horde of darkness swept towards them over the grey little featured Plane of battle. He laughed aloud rearing the white horse and saluting his mistress before calling his force forward to the first charge of the most perfect war of them all.
The goddess in red armour turned in her saddle and looked back to the distant throne smiling slightly. He who sat there smiled back and settled back to enjoy the battle both above and below. She had chosen this one well……
((ok so poetic license was used and i should probably rewrite bits...but i've lost the will to reread this!. Thankyou again Davlin for making the end of Kit so special. It was a great way to go!!))
and its almost Official....
