[Mkguild] MK: For Whom the Bell Tolls

[Hallan Mirayas]

For Whom the Bell Tolls

By Hallan Mirayas

 

Date Unknown

 

    "Champion!  Champion! 
Champion!"

 

    The creature that strode confidently into
the arena had once been something else. 
Long, long ago, so far in the distant past that he no longer remembered,
he had once walked the mortal plane.  He
had laughed and cried, celebrated and mourned, built up and torn down.  He had been loved.  He had been hated.  He had been feared.  He had fought great battles.  He had borne a great name, famous throughout
the Empire.  Now he was known only as the
Champion of Ba'al, and as he swept the glittering hooded cloak from his elven
shoulders, he savored the heady exultation of the crowd's cheers like a fine
wine before tossing the cloak into the stands. 
He smiled as a trio of succubi instantly fell to fighting over it,
prompting roars of laughter and approval from those around them.  Whether composed of men or demons, the lusts
of the crowd always remained the same. 
They wanted blood, they wanted danger, and above all else they wanted to
be entertained.  He would give it to
them.

 

    He always did.

 

    "Champion!
 Champion!  Champion!"

 

    In return, they would give him power.

 

    They always did.

 

    Drawing his sword with a crowd-pleasing
flourish, he planted its flawless tip on the sandy arena floor at the precise
midpoint between his toes, rested his hands on the diamond-studded pommel, and
waited for the next challenger.  He hoped
this one would be good enough that he wouldn't need to carry the performance
for them both.

 

    But he doubted it.

 

    And deep, deep inside him, buried away in a
mausoleum of old bones and forgotten memories, a tiny fragment of what he had
once been begged again and again for the chance to die. 

 

-----

 

    The arena shook under Revonos' feet with
the baying chant for the Champion of Ba'al. 
The wall against which he leaned rocked from the thunderous stomp of
feet, hooves, tentacles, and whatnot else. 
Revonos' dark-eyed glare bored into the side of Ba'al's shadowy head as
if to blast it to pieces through sheer force of fury alone and splatter the
prince's throne with the remains.  But
the glare was only for show.  Underneath
his surface rage, an unholy glee burned inside the daedra lord.  If the Prince of the Daedra thought a
preemptive challenge would disrupt Revonos' plans, he was badly mistaken.  The Beast was ready.  Laden with untested new enchantments, true,
but Carcarak had shown great ability to learn on the fly before.  He would adapt.  And if he didn't, well, Revonos would just
have to skin him again and start over. 
There was always next time.

 

    "Champion!  Champion! 
Champion!" came the roar and Lord Revonos allowed himself a
smile.

 

    Let the crowds chant.  They would be chanting something else soon
enough.

 

-----

 

    "Champion!  Champion!  Cha-"

 

  Motion at the top of the arena
caught the Champion's eye just before a deafening banshee wail cut through the
chant with the brutality of an axe blow. 
Part challenging howl, part furious roar, part ear-grating scream, it
hacked at the minds of all who heard it like a blunted shovel to the base of the
skull.  Old traumas revived, buried
phobias exploded to the surface, and instinctive terrors broke loose of their
chains.  Weaker minds in the crowd
succumbed to panic and riot, trying to get away, but the majority rode out the
storm and broke into a cheer of approval and excitement.  A dozen giant dire wolves, each soaked in
blood and gore, stalked down the stairs from the stadium rim.  Bared teeth snapped at any who did not make
way fast enough, while the closing ring of glowing golden eyes promised a slow
and painful doom.

 

    The sword in his hand whispered to the
Champion of Ba'al which one of the wolves was real, already tipping his
opponent's hand, but the daedric elf made a show of glancing about with just a
hint of worry.  With that deception done,
he closed his expression down into one of carefully controlled boredom.  So this
is the mighty Beast of Revonos.  I'll
give him this- he knows how to make an entrance.  That impression was only reinforced when the
eleven illusionary wolves and the one real wolf bounded into the arena, uniting
into one in midair before slamming down, battle-ready, on the arena floor.  A wave of hellfire flared outward like an
impact shockwave, ruffling the Champion's hair as it passed before splashing
and dissipating against the arena walls. 
He denied it any further damage, refusing to believe that it had touched
him, and so it did not.  The sword made
it so.

 

    He was the Champion of
Ba'al, the holder of the Sword of Lies.

 

-----

 

    The Beast of Revonos planted
its feet and started to inhale, and the Champion flipped his sword up into a
salute to the High Throne.  In the
process, he also flicked a small rock up into Carcarak's mouth.  It bounced off the wolf's soft palate, making
him gag and choke, and the blast of ice he'd been building up came out instead
in a flurry of snow-spitting coughs. 
"Pay your respects," the Champion of Ba'al snapped, "or
the next one chokes you dead.  I don't
have to miss."  He pitched his voice
so it wouldn't carry over the laughter from the crowd, depending on his
opponent's canine ears to catch the command.

 

    Carcarak scowled and spat
the rock at the Champion's feet, where it shattered into flash-frozen
dust.  Then he half-turned to face the
High Throne of Ba'al and his master beside it, bowing his head and
forequarters.  He tipped his head to the
side to reveal the blackened mark of Akkala... 
and the Champion of Ba'al immediately took advantage of the periphery of
Carcarak's vision by hurling his sword, sidearm, at the Blood Wolf's head.

 

    Carcarak was not so easily
suckered.  Treachery was a cardinal
virtue of Revonos' ethos, and in his time under the daedra lord's care, the
Beast of Revonos had learned it very well indeed.  The instant that he heard the whisper of
fabric in motion, he exploded into a sprint... in twelve directions at
once.  The crowd roared with delight as
the thrown sword sliced through two of the running wolves, revealing them as
illusions, then arced around and sliced through two more before returning to
the Champion's hand.  Hard on its heels
came the ravening pack, and the Champion of Ba'al dodged and danced as if he
couldn't be sure which was real and which were not.

 

    He knew, though.  The sword told him which attacker was the
true threat amidst the storm of chaos and misdirection.  Pirouetting aside from one attacking wolf
only to wind up directly in the path of another, he flipped his sword around
and stabbed backward.  Slavering jaws
closed on his face and passed through harmlessly.  His own attack was not so kind, and would
have skewered its target through the heart if the beast hadn't swerved hastily
aside in a spray of sand.  The Champion
of Ba'al followed after, sword whirring as it flipped back right side forward,
but when he slashed down on his opponent, the blade passed through without
effect.  Another illusion?

 

    No.  The sword whispered the answer.  The illusions had flickered just after
Carcarak dodged aside.  The Champion of
Ba'al drew back into a ready stance, as did the pack, milling and circling just
out of range, each assessing the other anew. 
"You're quick," the Champion complimented.  "Teleporting from illusion to illusion?  Very clever."

 

    Three of the wolves snarled
in reply and attacked.  He dodged two and
cleaved through the third, again striking air. 
He followed up with a kick to the one he'd just cleaved, just in time to
connect with Carcarak's very real ribs. 
At the same moment, the wolf's teeth slid through a gap in the
Champion's golden armor and opened the elf's calf from knee to ankle.  Both stumbled away, one bleeding, one
gasping.

 

    The crowd rumbled.  "First blood to the Beast of
Revonos!" an incautious incubus shouted over the din, and was promptly
shouted down by the home crowd.

 

    "Very quick," the
Champion amended, leaving a blood trail in the sand as he drew back.  He allowed a moment of respect to cross his
face, then slid it into a vicious smirk. 
"Too bad you weren't fast enough to hit me."  The crowd cheered as the gash down his leg undid itself, as if the injury had never
happened.  The blood in the sand blew
away like smoke.  Returning to his ready
stance, he beckoned with an open hand and a triumphant smirk.  "Care to try again?"

 

    After that, the tide of the
battle turned smoothly, inexorably against Carcarak.  How could it not, when his enemy armored
himself with limitless disbelief and foreknowledge of Carcarak's plans the
moment they were conceived?  On top of
all that, the Champion of Ba'al had trained for millenia with that sword, and it showed in his effortless dance
around the larger beast's lunging fangs and slashing claws.  Only two things kept the war wolf of Revonos
within shouting distance of a chance at survival, much less victory:  lightning-fast reflexes and tenacity
bordering on fanaticism.  Still, the
strikes and slashes mounted in tandem with the frenzy of the crowd, and if
Carcarak's fur had not already started the match dripping blood, it would be
doing so now.  "Champion!  Champion!  Champion!" screamed the crowd, but
the Beast fought on.

 

-----

 

    The shadowy figure of Lord
Ba'al sat back in his throne, openly pleased with his champion's
impeccable-as-always performance. 
"I'm impressed with how much you've managed to achieve with this
mortal."  His compliment to Lord
Revonos came with an undertone of princely condescension, and yet still
remained genuine enough to not be a complete slap in the face.  "It's not going to be enough to best my
Champion, but still... well done.  I
would not have thought you capable of doing so much in such a short time."

 

    Revonos snorted.  I
expect to surprise you many more times today.  He held that eager ambition unspoken behind
gritted teeth and glared down at the two combatants in the arena below.  "The fight's not over yet," he
growled, even as Ba'al's champion slashed deep into Carcarak's right foreleg at
the shoulder.

 

    Ba'al waved a dismissive
hand as the crowd cheered.  "It will
be soon enough."

 

-----

 

    It didn't take long for the
prediction to bear fruit.  Hobbled as he
was, Carcarak's advantage in mobility significantly diminished, and Ba'al's
champion strung him along a bit more before following up on his crippling
strike.  Carcarak's severed foreleg
thumped to the arena floor, and Carcarak crumpled in a heap one short teleport
away.  The crowd thundered its approval
as a spreading pool stained the sand, and the Champion of Ba'al grinned and
beckoned to them for more volume.  They
readily complied.  He cupped his ear and
they grew louder still.

 

    A bellowed command cut
through the din.  "STOP PLAYING
AROUND AND END HIM!"  Heads turned and a murmur of unexpected
surprise rumbled through the crowd as the shouter was identified.  Was the Lord of Rage demanding the
destruction of his own champion?

 

    The Champion of Ba'al
snorted a laugh.  "You hear that,
doggy?" he teased, looking to his own master for the signal to finish the
fight.  "Even your own master
wants-"

 

    The sword warned him an
instant before the flame wave hit.  When
he brought his arms down from shielding his face, he found himself encircled in
an arena of hellfire.  Opposite him,
Carcarak stood renewed on all four limbs, ash falling away from his regenerated
injuries.  Fire licked through his fur
without harming it, burning the blood in his fur to soot.  The blackened wolf tipped his head up and
howled, and every creature in earshot with even a hint of canine derivation
immediately went mad.  Snarling
hellhounds snapped their chains. 
Werewolves burst into lupine form and slashed into those around
them.  The crowd exploded into
chaos.  In the midst of it all, the War
Wolf of Revonos reveled in his foe's surprise, gleaming eyes and swishing tail
broadcasting his savage laughter.

 

    The sword's warning came
only an instant before a stunning impact from the side knocked Ba'al's champion
sprawling.  A quick denial restored him
to his feet, only to immediately get knocked down again by another
lightning-fast charge from a different angle. 
Each time, teeth grated across armor, but didn't make it through.  Okay,
he's very, very quick, the
Champion amended, and rolled to his feet rather than set himself up for the
attack he felt threatening.  Carcarak
flashed in anyway, a blur of motion, and the Champion's heel met the wolf's
chin in a rising side kick.

 

    Most of the kick's force
wasted itself on an illusion, but enough landed before the war wolf could
teleport away to buy Ba'al's champion a second to get his feet under him and
get set.  Only a second, and barely
that.  The attacks came in with the fury
of a hellborn hailstorm, from all directions and with barely a fraction of a
second between thought and deed for the sword to warn him in.  As far back as the Champion of Ba'al could
remember, no enemy had ever pressed him with such an ongoing frenzy, and he was
forced to rely on all his reservoirs of skill to keep up while he adjusted to
the new tempo.  Almost against his will,
a genuine smile found its way onto his face. 
Finally, a proper challenge!

 

    Deep, deep inside, the
fragment of what he'd once been almost dared to hope.

 

-----

 

    Few eyes could follow
Carcarak's blitzing speed as anything more than a blurring streak, and fewer
still had any chance of distinguishing the distracting illusions from the real
threat.  Only one spotted the red-hot glow
starting to spread down the chain from his collar, and that person had the
advantage of holding the other end.  In
far too much of a hurry to nurture his champion's ability to fully power the
enchantments with which he'd been gifted, Revonos had turned the chain into a
link for energy flow.  Though Carcarak's
current efforts poured out energy like the great Nagiara Waterfalls of the
mortal plane, they were but a raindrop in the ocean to a daedra lord.  That Carcarak was nevertheless drawing more
than twice what he was using did not bother Revonos... as long as the wolf
won.  If Carcarak lost, well, Revonos
would enjoy wringing every last drop of essence back out of the wretched beast.

 

    The Lord of Rage leaned back
against the wall and smirked.  He loved a
win-win situation.

 

-----

 

    Somewhere inside Carcarak,
something buckled and gave way, but not completely.

 

    Something else socketed in
to take its place, but not properly.

 

    Jagged shards tangled and
jammed.  Broken edges locked and fused.

 

    Carcarak awoke.

 

-----

 

    The Champion of Ba'al was
just about to regain the victorious momentum when the sword failed him.  On the cusp of his victory, its whispering
voice suddenly cut off with a sense of baffled confusion, and the War Wolf of
Revonos ripped through his unprepared defenses with contemptuous ease.  For as long as he could remember, that voice
had been there, far-sighted eyes that had underlain his every plan and
stratagem.  Now, he was struck suddenly
blind.  A hurricane of crushing blows and
slashing fangs closed around him, and he lashed about wildly... and
futilely.  A shoulder like a steel wall
slammed into him, knocking him aside, only for another to bash the wind from
his lungs as the hidden shoulder clasps of his chestplate tore loose, severed
by adamantite-coated teeth.  The sword
was suddenly gone from his hand, ripped loose and- he was airborne, shoulder
wrenched in its socket from the beast's-

 

    TCHUNK.

 

    Erick, adopted son of Ander,
wandering outcast from the elven glades, seeker of glory and adulation, famous
(and infamous) gladiator of the late Suielman Empire, looked down at the
winterkeen sword blade protruding from his chest, dripping crimson... and
smiled.  His lips moved, barely a
whisper.  "Free."  Then his lungs filled with blood and his
bisected heart gave its last quivering twitch. 
His head fell forward on his chest, and he died.

 

    Carcarak was not
satisfied.  This was far too paltry an
end, too faint a praise for his mighty victory. 
The crowd, shocked into silence, needed something to stir it again, and
he knew exactly what to do.  Inhaling
deep, he blasted the corpse with ice, pinning it to the wall even more firmly
than the sword embedded hilt-first in the stones had.  He breathed until the ice was a foot thick
over his defeated enemy... and then reared up and shattered him into gory, frozen
pieces with a single slap of a forepaw.

 

    The ice crunched as he ate
it, and it hissed whenever the white-hot chain hanging from his collar brushed
across an overlooked shard.  For a few
long moments, that was the only sound in the entire arena.  Then, by ones and twos, then dozens, then
hundreds, the crowd began a new chant.

 

    "Carcarak!  Carcarak!  Carcarak!"

 

-----

 

    Lord Ba'al, Prince of the
Daedra, sat back in his throne in stunned disbelief.  How was this poss-

 

    A sword appeared at his
throat, jagged, cruel, and blood-soaked. 
At its other end stood Lord Revonos. 
"It seems you've grown rather weaker than expected, Ba'al.  I think it's time for a change in
leadership."  The chain, still
glowing white hot, materialized in his hand and he gave it a jerk.  "Heel, boy," he commanded with a
triumphant grin.

 

    The Sword of Lies vanished
from the arena wall into which it had been jammed, and reappeared in Lord
Ba'al's hand...  several feet behind
Revonos.  The daedra prince stepped from
the shadows across the room, and the creature at swordpoint on the throne
dissolved into nothingness.  His
expression was scornful.  "Did you
really think I would allow you, the master of betrayal, anywhere near me with
even the remotest possibility of a weapon? 
It seems you've grown more foolish
than expected.  This time, it will cost
you.  The chain is broken."

 

    The links of chain hanging
just below Revonos' hand shattered.  The
sword made it so.  Iron shrapnel hissed
through the air, but dissipated into smoke before it could strike anyone as the
spell unraveled.  The remainder, still
linked at the other end to Carcarak, dropped unmastered to the floor and
vanished.

 

    Furious at being
outmaneuvered so easily, the Lord of Rage slashed out with his sword.  Ba'al parried it with a single word.  "Gone."  In the hands of its true master, the Sword of
Lies banished the usurper's blade as if it had never been.  "You have other problems."

 

    "What-" That was
all Revonos got to say before a runaway wagon full of quarry stone slammed him
to the floor, in the shape of a murderously enraged war beast.  Titanic paws pinned Revonos down, and
Carcarak's slavering jaws slammed to a halt barely a foot from Revonos'
face.  They halted not through any will
of their own, but only because Revonos had managed a desperate grab, one hand
on each jaw, holding them apart and away from his face.  Flush with power, Carcarak strained against
his former master's grip and for a moment the two seemed in balance.  Then Revonos began applying his full
strength, and the wolf's jaws were forced slowly, incrementally wider, fraction
by fraction.  Frost traced down the dark
lord's gauntlets, but did little to delay the inexorable promise of-

 

    Golden eyes gleamed.  Carcarak twisted his head aside... and then
clamped his jaws down on a gap that had opened between Revonos' gauntlet and
armguards.  Cleaving through the
perfectly targeted weak point, his teeth snapped shut with a spray of blood and
a crunch of bone.  Revonos screamed,
rolling away clutching his arm as Carcarak blurred to the far side of the room,
a dripping prize in his mouth that he hastily extricated from its gauntlet and
bolted with savage glee.  Calculating
eyes fixed on the Lord of Rage, and ravenous ambition burned behind them.  I've
gotten one part of you now... how long before I get the rest?

 

    Two guards moved to
intercept the beast.  On Lord Ba'al's
direct orders, they had not interfered with the contest of the two high lords,
but this was a new threat and a dangerous one. 
Twin poleaxes rose to attack, but then something unexpected stopped
them.  Lord Revonos laughed.

 

    The severed stump of his
forearm bound and clutched tight to his body, the master of treachery rocked
the room with his laughter.  "That's
my boy!" he exclaimed.  "He did
exactly what he was supposed to do: take the advantage that was given him.  Leave him alone.  He's mine to deal with."

 

    Lord Ba'al's eyes
narrowed.  "That 'deal with' had
better involve getting rid of him, Revonos," he warned as the Lord of Rage
got to his feet.  "Your dominion
over him is at an end, and I'll not have Klepnos' prophecy coming true.  Throw him out.  Now."

 

    "Without his going away
present?  Not a chance.  Get over here, dog!"

 

    Wary suspicion warred with
torture-trained obedience, but obedience won. 
Carcarak approached, teeth bared but head lowered submissively.  Revonos seized the wolf by the scruff with
his remaining hand, his left, and pulled him up and twisted until the two were
eye to eye.  "I know you were
waiting for something.  Hoping for
something," he intoned, ensnaring the beast's mind with a geas.  "Find it."  Uncaring of the consequences and knowing it
would ensure all of the aedra were watching, he ripped open a portal from the
Ninth Hell directly to the mortal realms. 
He didn't bother with choosing any particular destination.  "And when you find what you're looking
for... kill it."

 

    Then he flung Carcarak
through.

 

Fin. 		 	   		  
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