The Ashen I slew was not Noraan, yet it clasped those pages as if they were more precious than its own life, and perhaps in its eyes, they were. I have not yet found the other pages, and I surmise there are indeed others, yet while part of me yearns to know, another voices cries that I should remain unaware of my comrade's past. My life may depend on it.
Or'do pivoted on his leading foot, one hand lashing out in a vicious right hook, blurring into a silvered arc as it staved in the pale, shambling monster's face. Its pale, gnarled brow crumpled beneath the blow, and the naked beast swayed where it stood, yet did not fall; steam bleeding from its wound, yet its eyes still bright with fury and madness. The ghoul screamed, a long, hollow sound, and lunged again, clawed hand raised, fingers crooked like the talons of a striking falcon. Again it fell back as Or'do dealt a blow that could sunder stone, yet once more it refused to fall. The Deep, which Aleorn had mistakenly called the Dark, fueled this beast just as it tore apart Light's children; each breath Aleorn took was like a lungful of shattered glass, where this monster felt unspeakable power roll through it in a warm, soothing tide.
Yet Or'do, was no longer a child of the Light. As black flame seethed over its frame, Or'do pivoted closer still, his jaw unhinging with an audible crack, closing over the monster's neck amid the crunch of tearing sinew and the deeper, harsher scream of shattering bone. He drew a breath, and the black fire flooded in with it, filling his lungs with blazing chill as if his lungs were filled with frost that with each beat of his heart leaked into his veins. Stoked to furious heights, the Deep Cinder within his chest blazed, a tempest roaring through him, his blood flowing like liquid fire, his eyes two points of darkness so deep the already uncertain torchlight could produce not faintest reflection upon them.
Within his grasp the beast fell limp, color returning to its eyes which then paled in Death's embrace. Releasing it and slashing an arm across his sullied lips, Or'do turned to the portcullis behind which yet another Deep Aspect waited. Three such Ancients lay lifeless in his wake, yet there seemed no end in sight; Aleorn lay dying, starved of the Light that was his sustenance, the breath in his lungs, the fire in his heart. Without Flame, without Light he would perish, yet this place was endless, each stride taking him no closer to freedom than the last.
Or'do sank to his knees, the cold fire kindled in his veins glinting darkly in the depths of his murky eyes. His hands clenched at his sides, the stone freezing beneath him and cracking like struck glass.
Aleorn laying in his arms, blood drifting from his torn neck and parted lips in thin, plaintive tendrils. His eyes stare into the nothingness, cold and lifeless as marble.
"Not here." Or'do rose, crossing to the portcullis. "Not now." He slapped his palm against it, feeling the Deep within the metal, squirming vipers eagerly twitching, writhing beneath his touch as if finding great pleasure in his palm's warmth. Aleorn drifting from his embrace, frail as if cast of glass. Another comrade felled by Or'do's selfishness and hubris. "Not ever again!" He flared the Deep Cinder, its cold fire intensifying the tempest within his veins until it was a cyclone that battered him from within, wailing and pleading, straining with all its might to break free. From his hand swelled a ring of dark fire that drove thin, shadowy filaments like wisps of smoke into the metal bars, bulging like serpents engorged upon prey that yet writhes, drawing the Deep through themselves. With each breath he took the portcullis further corroded, turning ashen beneath his touch and crumbling like piled twigs beneath the ravenous flood, showering the stones with particles of pale brown and glinting silver.
"Not ever again."
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