Who what where when. I LIVE.
Since we're looking into the lives of the Bloodkin lords, I might as well post this gem I've been working on.
Blood-curdling shrieks filled the grand chamber. They were the shrieks of the lost, the damned, and the insane. And they never stopped. Even with a dwarf's internal clock to tell night from day, there was nothing reliable to mark the passage of time down in the depths. Those who managed to fall sleep in the infernal cacophony prayed to Armok that they would never wake up.
Row upon row of dwarves, elves, humans and goblins, chained to the wall, the floor, and each other. Though plenty of them had been abducted from the surface, a significant portion had been born in the farms. Most of them did not know how to speak. They certainly knew how to scream though.
The dwarves were the worst. Or the best, in Shank's perspective. Especially those that failed their moods. They lost their minds, screamed, flailed and heaved. The ones that went berserk were particularly fun. They thrashed about, foaming at the lips, yet their heavy shackles kept them from harming the other cattle, which only infuriated them further.
Shank traversed the hallway for the millionth time, savoring the music of his monumental work. He could all but taste the suffering in the air, and it made his mouth water. It clung to every surface and refused to go away, like a dead man's blood.
At the far end of the stone corridor, the rows of shackles gave way to a silver-paved road, its luster maintained by the servants of the Four. At the end of the road, a set of gem-encrusted silver doors opened on a grand hallway, a monument to decadence dressed in all the splendor of dwarven wealth. In a bygone era, this was Chainbell's Noble Quarter. Now it housed the Four and their retainers. Shank walked to his chambers, opened the once-golden door to his personal space.
His throne room was a marvel to behold. In Chainbell's heyday, before Shank was even born, the miners of Chainbell had dug the chamber straight from a vein of gold in the heart of the mountain. They had cut the ceiling as high as it would go within the ore deposit, extracted what ore they could, engraved every surface, and filled it with luxurious furniture. The place had become a sort of summer home for the monarchs of the Gloves of Admiring. How fitting, then, that it now housed their last queen.
Twitching and shuffling about was a single Kin, golden eyes jumping in all directions, never still. Shank approached the once-dwarf, eager to hear of news.
The lunatic fidgeted, hugged himself. His words came in a shattered, reedy warble, the voice of a long-broken creature. "Hello Uncle. I kept Auntie company while you were gone. Did I do good?"
"Very good. You seem more agitated than usual, Stinthad," Shank chirped. "Have you seen things in your dreams?"
The creature named Stinthad seemed to shrink inwards. "Yes, Uncle. I saw things. Strange things, things from far away."
"What have you seen, broken one?"
"I saw food-dwarves, and a fortress of saints and madmen. They guard one of the Old Doors. I saw a bed of silver, long forgotten in the company of deep-fish."
"Go on, Stinthad," Shank urged. The mad creature before him had a thing for forgetting where he was if he wasn't egged on.
"The bed was in the mad-fortress. The sleeper woke up after a long pain-nap. I know the sleeper's face! I saw it before. Long before, when all was well and the Four were Four."
"Go on." Shank had a pretty good idea of where this was headed.
"I remember him, Uncle," Stinthad warbled, shrinking inward again. "He was there when our campaign ended, when the False Heroes struck down the General."
"Yes, who is he?"
Stinthad whimpered. He was seated on the floor now, wild eyes darting through the shadows. The memories of his visions always made him lose control of his extremities.
"Speak to me, Stinthad. Who is he?" As if Shank didn't already know.
"Father! Father has risen, Uncle! He's coming back!" Stinthad hugged himself, rocked and spasmed on the floor.
Just as he suspected. "You did well, Stinthad. Rest now." From a pouch at his belt, Shank pulled two tiny skulls, ancient and bleached. He clicked them together to draw the broken creature's attention.
"Here you go, my friend." Shank tossed the skulls onto Stinthad's lap. The demented seer gasped, lifted the skulls into his arms and cradled them against his chest, humming a lullaby.
"Father is coming, little ones," the mad dwarf told the skulls. "Oh, no, he's not like me. I'm your father, darlings, but he is Father of us all."
Shank watched the rambling loon as one would watch a troupe of actors. There was something immensely satisfying about witnessing that shattered mind spill its contents all over the floor. Perhaps because it was yet another thing Shank had enjoyed destroying.
"Why yes, dearies, I had a father too," Stinthad continued. He raised his head to speak to Shank. "You knew my father, didn't you Uncle?"
"Yes, I knew your father, Stinthad."
"He was a good dwarf wasn't he? Oh, but no good now, since we aren't dwarves anymore. Dwarves are too tasty."
"Yes, mad one, he was a good dwarf," Shank replied, grinning like a maniac. He knew Stinthad's father alright. That was part of what made this all so satisfying.
He left the broken seer to play with his dead daughters and walked further into the chamber. Heaped upon a throne of carven obsidian was a mangled skeleton, an amalgamation of bones stolen from dwarves, goblins and humans.
"Hello my dear," Shank told the bone heap. "Have you heard the news from our pet lunatic?"
"I have now. You know how tightlipped he can be when you're not around."
"Yes, yes he can. I suppose we should infrorm Asmoth," Shank pondered.
"Could you do that, dear heart? I need to speak to our old friend Amsan."
"Very well. Let's see if I can't find the old witch."
With that, Shank turned and headed for the door. Behind him he could hear the rolling clatter of bone and sinew as his darling queen made a heap of herself. He passed Stinthad and ripped the child skulls from the broken one's grasp. The deranged old bat fell over as if dead, and started snoring. Once outside the throne room, Shank peered down his tunic and spoke into his chest.
"Oh, I know. I was counting on it. Corley works best on his own. And this way we don't even lose troops."
Seconds went by, and Shank listened to the silence.
"Yes, I believe we can. We may have to deploy immediately though. If all goes well, they'll be distracted by Corley's forces and won't be expecting us."
More silence. Shank listened, nodding every few seconds.
"Well, that is unfortunate. I'll miss my darling. Suppose I'll have to do the burial myself. We can think on how to handle those phantoms later."
More silence. More listening.
"Yes. I understand. Your will be done."
He straightened, smoothed his tunic, and marched on down the hall. The screams of the damned engulfed him, drowned out the voice in his chest. Shank hummed softly to himself and stroked the golden mask through his tunic.
He had a war to plan.
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Topic: Demongate: Wrapping up the Loose Ends. (Read 697298 times)