Dark Priest

by Dale Vice

  The world moved as underwater; Chandor ducked and swayed, parried and deflected without thinking, while his spirit reflected on his sin. Holy Otec, I have been foolish. I have let You down. In my pride, I have forgotten that You give and You take away. I have used your power to glorify myself. He blocked the gargoyles’ claws with his shield. He saw the other gargoyle start to dive, while orcs and goblins surged forward as if in a dream. Every sound seemed to come from miles away. While his body worked, in his mind he bowed his head and repented. Notomok, forgive me! All glory and power are Yours. I commend my soul to you and come willingly to the Gates of Judgement, trusting in your grace and mercy.

  Even as an arrow found a chink in his armour, a supernatural peace flooded him. He accepted that he could not defeat so many foes even with every miracle the Gods had given him. My quest is over. I have failed. May someone more worthy complete it so that Your will may be done.

  Suddenly, knowledge turned to wisdom in his mind. He shouted his epiphany out loud, “May the Gods forgive me; I will be proud and foolish no longer! I cannot defeat you all!”

  He prayed for darkness, using the goblin’s keys as a focal point. The world went black. He was cocooned in a mystical sphere of pitch black sixty feet across, which no light could penetrate. Even the goblin’s night vision would be useless in the supernatural dark. Shouts echoed around him. He heard arrows clatter randomly around him, but he was running as hard as he could for where he remembered the keep doors to be. He had already destroyed the undead that were guarding the doors.

  He knew that if he could make it inside, he might yet survive to find the vampire.

  CHAPTER 31

  Chandor’s Choice

  Hidden by the divine darkness, Chandor felt his way urgently across the iron-bound wooden door. He searched desperately for the large handle he had seen. He didn’t expect the keep door to be locked, since the castle wasn’t under siege. The vampire would be in the crypt under the chapel rather than the keep.

  But if his suspicions were correct, there would be one valuable item that he could find inside the keep.

  His gauntleted hands found the handle. He turned it. The solid door opened easily. He ducked inside, taking a moment to toss the keys and their supernatural sphere of darkness back into the courtyard. It felt good to see again.

  He slammed the thick door shut behind him, then dropped the heavy bar into place. Two bolts, and a lock with the key in it, further secured the door.

  Chandor heaved a sigh of relief – the keep was designed to be virtually impenetrable. He felt sure that those outside would not be able to get in quickly. A moment later, he heard hammering on the door. The hammering ceased as raised voices began to argue outside.

  He sank back against to the door and looked around. To his left, a short corridor led to the door of the tower with the ballista. I hope my snakes have killed the orcs that operated it. To his right, another corridor led away from him. In front of him were beautifully carved double-doors that towered almost ten feet high.

  Temporarily safe, he sank to his knees and thanked the Gods for saving him. Then he prayed for healing. His wounds knitted themselves together and his pain receded. Feeling strong but thoroughly humbled, he walked to ornate double doors of the main hall.

  He pushed one gently. It swung open without a sound, revealing a magnificent great hall. Chandeliers with a hundred lit candles hung from the centre of the high ceiling. Flags swung above the long tables that ran down either side of the room. Rich tapestries covered the wood panelled walls. Statues of powerful monsters stood in each of the four corners of the hall; a dragon, a giant, a phoenix, and a beholder. Two huge fireplaces, each big enough for a man to stand in, were set into the hall’s side walls.

  A tiered dais of marble stood at the far end of the hall. It created three stairs up to a throne which stood in splendid isolation and majesty. The stately throne was made of white marble, flecked with gold. Red velvet cushions made the seat comfortable. The throne’s height meant that the ruler would look down on anyone standing before him.

  Seated upon the throne was a being of pure evil. Swirling black smoke held a vaguely human form. Eyes glowed like red-hot coals. A spectre, Chandor shuddered, the vampire’s general. Kneeling at its feet was a woman wrapped in a thick fur gown. Around the spectre, skeletal and zombie guards stood motionless at attention. Their golden halberds and engraved armour gleaming in the candle light.

  The spectre’s voice was like a thousand screams at the edge of his hearing. Chandor had to strain to hear it.

  “I thought you would go straight to the crypt.”

  Chandor pointed the Silver Sceptre and bellowed, “I rebuke you, in the name of Notomok! Be gone!”

  The undead guards crumbled to dust, their armour clattering to the floor. The spectre remained impassively sitting on the throne.

  It rose into the air, billowing outwards, swirling and swelling with only its red eyes remaining fixed.

  “You do not have authority over me,” it hissed. Its voice was like claws on glass. “You will not take the throne so easily!”

  The spectre swooped down on Chandor.

  Chandor dropped to one knee and bowed his head. He shut his eyes and prayed the common prayer of protection. He looked up to see the spectre rushing towards him, faster than a diving falcon. Chandor lifted the Shadow King’s shield instinctively but with a bell-like clang the spectre crashed into the miraculous force field that shimmered in a ten-foot sphere all around him. Chandor stood, while the spectre clawed at the protective invisible barrier, trying to find a way in.

  Chandor headed for the throne, hoping his hunch was correct.

  The spectre battered at the protective sphere like a moth at a window. “Kill him!” it screamed at the woman, who had watched the entire scene serenely from her position at the foot of the throne. “He’s going to murder your baron!”

  The woman’s eyes widened in horror and she rose to her feet. Glaring at Chandor she demanded, “Why would you do such a thing?”

  “He is a vampire, you foolish woman,” snarled Chandor. “You do not love him. You are merely under his spell.”

  “So! You do intend to kill him, you evil man! I will not let you!” She drew a jewelled knife from within her robe and rushed at Chandor.

  He felt ridiculous. He was in his full armour, while she was dressed in nothing but a robe and armed with just knife. He forced himself not to underestimate her. He moved into a defensive fighting stance, the obsidian Shadow Shield in front of him. If she’s evil, she’ll bounce off the protective barrier. She passed through it easily and Chandor faced a dilemma. Must I kill this innocent woman to continue my quest? he wondered as he raised the Silver Sceptre.

  Her stab was totally ineffective. The knife slid harmlessly off his shield and Chandor wondered if she had ever been in a fight before. He checked his blow. She stabbed again but Chandor barely even had to move his shield to protect himself. Instead of striking her, he hooked the Silver Sceptre to his belt and caught her wrist in his gauntleted hand. Using his strength and weight, he forced her easily to the ground. He shook his head in disbelief as she tried to bite his armoured forearm. Kneeling on top of her, he pinned her to the ground. She tried to stab him again so he twisted the knife from her grip and flung it across the room.

  He placed his hand on her forehead and prayed. “Takatifu Roho, please dispel the evil magic that binds this woman.” He gazed into her eyes and said, “In the name of Notomok, I set you free. You are released.”

  Pain lanced up his arm. He jerked his hand from her head, crying out in agony as needles stabbed his brain. The vampire’s spell was too powerful for him. I cannot break it. I am not experienced enough. With a resigned sigh, he used the belt from her robe to tie her hands behind her back. He tore a strip from her robe and used it to tie her legs.

  She squirmed and Chandor saw Anelle’s broken body beneath him. “Don’t make me hurt you,” he growled as he climbed to his feet.

>   He strode across the hall, trailed by the spectre. He climbed the dais and sat on the throne. If his hunch was correct, the act of taking the throne would make the castle his, and the Fear Aura and gargoyles would immediately change allegiance.

  At the edge of the holy barrier, the spectre laughed. “Did you think it would be that easy?”

  Chandor grunted, I had hoped. He searched around the throne for a key, lever or a magical device. The castle must have some way of determining who to obey. The spectre watched with contempt as Chandor widened his search to each of the statues.

  Chandor became more and more irritated. After fruitless minutes, he eventually stopped and took a deep breath. He calmed himself, and said a simple liturgy he had learned at the church, “The peace of Notomok be with you always.” He repeated it as a meditation until he was totally calm. Even the spectre’s battering no longer bothered him.

  I need a miracle, he thought. Why am I not praying? He lifted his Holy Symbol from around his neck. Stretching out his arm, he prayed for the Gods to guide him to the source of the castle’s protection. The Symbol started to swing in tiny circles, then slowly lifted until it was hanging from his hand at forty-five degrees. It pointed towards the throne as if it were a huge magnet. Chandor started purposefully towards the throne.

  The spectre suddenly swooped down to where the woman lay. “Not a step further, Dark Priest, or I’ll kill this woman.” It hovered over her, radiating evil and malicious intent.

  Chandor glared at it. Its behaviour suggested that his divination was leading him in the right direction. He could soon own the castle. Can I let my quest be halted for a single life?

  A still small voice in his mind said, “Love will find a way. You owe it to Jenna to save her sister.” Stubbornly, he shut out the voice. I am here for revenge. Gritting his teeth, he made his choice.

  “I refuse to be held accountable for your evil. You can kill her. The blood will be on your hands, not mine.” Decision made, Chandor turned his back on the two of them. He followed the tugging Symbol towards the throne. It led him unerringly to a perfectly concealed button.

  He pushed it. The floor in front of the throne started to lower, revealing a secret stairway that led downwards into darkness under the hall.

  Chandor swallowed. He had been sure that the vampire would be asleep in the crypt which was under the castle’s private church next to the keep. However, if there was consecrated ground under the hall, Chandor realised that the vampire could very well be near. He still had no idea how he would destroy it or deal with its troglodyte guards. He headed down the stairs nonetheless, ignoring the spectre’s screams of rage and frustration.

  The light of Chandor’s Holy Symbol revealed a long, wide, bare room. In the very middle, in what he suspected what the exact centre of the keep, stood a head-sized orb on an elaborate stand. Humming with power, it glowed blood red while golden flames flickered around it. Chandor approached cautiously fearing a trap or an ambush, but he made it to the orb without incident.

  Heart pounding, he stretched out his hand and placed it on the orb. The flames curled up his arm. They tingled but did not hurt. A feeling of security, strength and safety swept through his body, taking his breath away. Images of his home in Bronsverj filled his mind; the smell of his mother’s home cooked food, the sense of satisfaction as he snuggled down into his sleeping sack at night; the feeling of security that came from knowing his father was nearby to protect him; the love of his family. Tears poured down his face and the orb started to change.

  The vampire’s colours faded until the orb was clear as glass. A spark of gold took root at the centre of the orb, throbbing with life and goodness. A layer of white coated it like paint. Blackness swirled alarmingly and filled the globe like ink. Finally, searing silver lightning arced from his heart to the orb, where it remained curling and twisting over the surface.

  Letting out a deep breath Chandor removed his hand. It is done. The castle is mine. The fear spell and gargoyles should now turn on the vampire’s minions.

  The thought had barely crossed his mind when the spectre screamed in terror, turned and fled.

  His relief at taking the castle was overridden with worry over the colours of the orb. Is it a reflection of my aura or just of my coat of arms? If it is my aura, then does it mean that I am evil? He shook himself. I don’t have time to worry about that. Once I’ve dealt with the vampire, I’ll spend time in contemplation and reflection.

  He returned to the empty hall. There was no sign of the woman or the spectre. He walked back to the keep entrance and peered through the viewing hole.

  The courtyard appeared deserted, as did the castle walls. At the top of the tower which housed the escape passage, a gargoyle perched as still as a statue. The sphere of supernatural darkness still dominated the centre of the square. A few dead goblins and orcs lay motionless in pools of blood around the square. The courtyard was still.

  Chandor unlocked the door and opened it cautiously, keeping a close eye on the gargoyle. An eerie silence covered the castle. He shivered despite the bright morning sun. When gargoyle did not move, Chandor stepped further out into the courtyard.

  If he hadn’t recognised the arcane symbols of various heathen gods from his studies, he wouldn’t have known the nearby building was the castle’s church. In the Vander Duchy, churches had large stained-glass windows so that sunlight could fill them and so that light could shine out of them. They were places of peace and beauty. The vampire-castle’s church was made of dark, heavy stone. The few small windows had been bricked over. Statues of demons and monsters glared down from the pointed roof. Runes and symbols had been carved into the walls.

  Chandor approached the high double doors, heart pounding. He wondered whether to pray for a blessing in advance of whatever battle was sure to come, but decided he needed to conserve his little remaining spiritual strength until he knew what he was facing.

  He took a deep breath, then kicked the doors open. He immediately ducked to one side. When nothing happened, he peered through the open doorway.

  The inside of the church was dark. Muted chanting came from within. Fires blazed in odd corners, casting leaping shadows across the floor. The smell of burned meat and an unidentifiable nauseating stink filled the room, only partially dampened by the scented smoke which curled upwards from bronze braziers.

  Chandor edged inside. He eyes were drawn to the altar at the far end of the church. In front of it, facing away from him, a six-foot lizard with a short tail stood upright on its long back legs. A comb of red spines ran down from head to tail. Its hands held something dead and dripping over the stone altar. The fact that it had not succumbed to the castle’s Fear Aura told Chandor that it had stronger will power than the baron’s other troops.

  Turning slowly, arms wide, it said, “The bones have foretold your coming.” It spoke with a snakelike hiss as it tried to get a lizard’s mouth to form human words. Its green scaled body was naked except for a tiny loincloth, and it was painted with stripes of thick-caked paint of red and orange. Bits of coloured string were tied around its wrists, ankles, elbows, and knees. It raised its hands, holding up a dead rabbit and a bronze knife. Blood ran down both arms.

  “The weak willed have all fled. Only we, the High Priests of Nuan the Blood Drinker, remain.”

  Suddenly, a second troglodyte appeared next to Chandor as if from nowhere. It sliced at his throat with a wicked golden sickle. Chandor parried with his shield, smashing the sickle aside with an aggressive backhand. From the corner of his eye he saw the spinning dagger just before it reached him. He raised his right hand and the dagger glanced harmlessly off his metal-plated forearm.

  Chandor leapt forward, punching with his shield and whipping his sceptre sideways in a vicious one-two combination that would have left a human opponent dead at his feet. The troglodyte’s face was a bloody mess. Instead of retreating it hissed, leaned forward, and used to sickle’s wickedly hooked point to jab Chandor’s knee. Even as he s
creamed in pain, Chandor swung the Silver Sceptre downwards to connect with the back of the monster’s head, opening it like a melon. Panting heavily, Chandor started forwards.

  The troglodyte at the altar intoned, “The entrails speak of your death. We will sacrifice you upon our sacred altar, and burn your bones upon it.”

  Chandor felt Takatifu Roho prompting him, so he stopped and said, “This is the sign the Lord has declared: The altar will be split apart, and the ashes on it will be poured out.”

  The troglodyte High Priest stretched out his hand and hissed, “Seize him!”

  Two more troglodytes suddenly materialised, one charging forward with a huge two-handed hammer raised high. The other wielded a snake-headed staff. Before either reached Chandor there was a peal of thunder. The troglodytes’ stone altar split in two, spilling the sacrificial remains on the floor.

  “Likarth!” screamed the High Priest and the other troglodytes stopped. The High Priest held out the hand with which it had pointed at Chandor. They could all see that it had been shrivelled into a useless twisted stump. “Sith suar lith silahith. Ish ilith sitalis, salaahisss.” The troglodyte High Priest focused its oval yellow eyes on Chandor, “Intercede with your Gods, Dark Priest. Pray that my hand may be restored to its rightful nature, and we will depart this place.”

  Chandor nodded. He lifted his face to the heavens. “Holy Otec, only true God, heal this creature so that it may know that You are the Lord of all things.” Immediately Chandor felt the power of the Gods flowing out of him and the troglodyte’s hand was healed.

  The three lizard men glanced at each other. As one, they bowed to Chandor. Then they proceeded from the church in a stately manner. They neither shut the door nor glanced back as they exited the church.