Post by xaen on Jun 4, 2011 4:14:06 GMT 1
Atlymaer cheerily nodded his understanding of Vyse’s choice to not allow the mage to teleport the entire army back with his magic for sure it would be disturbing to learn of the impending threat so abruptly, and the teleportation would probably scare the soldiers close to death.
The old mage in his false form idly listened as Vyse continued to say that he would await the arrival of the shapeshifter, and before Atlymaer could volunteer himself for the job the nercomancer leaped from her seat shouting an exuberant “Yes!”.
Then the foolish girl rambled through her mild embarrassment and then promptly banged her head solidly against Vyse’s sturdy bench; Atlymaer arched a curious eyebrow at this peculiar reaction to Vyse’s answer to her own suggestion, such a wild reaction hinting at underlying motives that Atlymaer had already suspected since her suggestion.
As to the purpose or meaning of those plans, he didn’t know, but the old mage decided to make preparations to avoid any negative side effects of this necromancer’s plans.
The less than subtle woman continued to act suspiciously as she backed out of the room still facing the assembly with a almost panicky look in her eyes, an expression that told Atlymaer that she badly wished to be gone from the chamber.
And then in an eye blink the door was closed and Marya had successfully fled from the chamber, the old wizard mentally sighing at himself for entangling himself in such an unpredictable mess.
For the second time in a row the old wizard was dissuaded from volunteering once again this time from Kat the parasite, who before any rejections could be voiced she chased after the aloof necromancer.
Sighing aloud this time, Atlymaer rose gingerly from his seat; his old bones creaking in protest despite his younger form, magic can’t cure everything.
“I must be going myself, please forgive my hasty retreat Vyse,” He politely apologized before following the two ladies course for the door and into the halls beyond.
Though Atlymaer went deeper into the castle instead of leaving it, going all the way to his personnel chamber on the far end of the massive structure.
Bolting the door shut behind himself, Atlymaer gathered a few peaces of black chalk and a smooth crystal ball.
After using a minor spell with at a thought to shift the double poster bed off to the side, the old wizard actually dropped his form altering spell.
His long brown hair grew longer and faded to a cream white, his smooth skin dried and wrinkled, and his entire body became incredibly thin and fragile looking.
Even though the wizard appeared ancient, he could still move with the fluid grace that his youth spell provided him.
Drawing an elaborate pattern of swirling shapes and symbols with the bizarrely coloured chalk on the stone floor, having already removed any carpets or rugs from the bedchamber the previous evening.
Eyeing his finished artwork with a scrutinizing glare, the wizard nodded satisfactorily at his handy work and carefully placed the crystal ball at the center of the wide ring of symbols.
Moving out side the ring the antique of a mage started to chant softly with an upraised hand before him with the middle and index fingers standing straight while the others curled into a tight fist.
After an uninterrupted half hour of whispering arcane words, the orb rose gently from the cold floor to float at eye level and then two beams of blue light zoomed out of the orb.
The light created a floating frame in front of the wizard outside of the black chalk pattern, and the area within this frame shimmered and shifted as if it was alive.
Muttering under his breath, Atlymaer touched the shimmer with his index and middle fingers; making the blur focus upon two men that steadily approached the castle through the forest at the base of the mountains.
Confused by the image, the wizard stared long and hard at both trainees until he noticed that one of them moved in the fashion more suitable of a veteran soldier than a trainee.
The old mage quickly understood that his life long friend the Archangel Sahtsienriel had assumed a human form to travel along side one of the trainees in order to gain entrance to the castle; how the angel had guessed the wizard’s location was beyond Atlymaer’s understanding, so he calmly watched the angel-man and trainee jog their way through the forest.
The man that Sahtsienriel had nearly scared to death called himself Dagger, Swordsman Extraordinaire.
Every since assuming a human form and “stumbling” upon the unconscious soldier and firmly persuading the man that he had passed out from dehydration and had not seen an angel.
He has had to put up with the man’s endless boasting of false occurrences and tales of personnel fancy, that made the time old archangel want to throttle this man that called himself Dagger; the fool’s name barely made sense for crying out loud!
For the past few hours, Sin jogged quietly along side the chatty trainee who could run and talk endlessly at the same time; seeming to have found some imaginary friendship with the silent angel-man.
Sin was quickly beginning to regret his idea of searching the castle by pretending to be one of the trainees sent out by the ruling steward Lord Vyse Arson.
“Why does Atlymaer have to make things difficult?” The angel in human form demanded of the sky, but was answered by his horribly annoying travelling companion.
“Eh what’s that?” The Swordsman Extraordinaire asked stupidly having barely heard Sin’s comment as the pair continued to trudge along the unbeaten path back to the castle.
Simply grunting in answer to hopefully silence the man, Sin quickened the pace to something slightly short of a flat out sprint and somehow to his shock the human kept pace.
And proceeded to talk his immortal ears off all the way to the castle gate hours later, night having already come and gone turning into the first rays of daylight.
Not once during that evening did the imbecile Dagger inquire as to why his companion could see so incredibly well in the pitch black night, Sin couldn‘t wait to be rid of him.
After arriving at the castle gates and being admitted through them, Sin quickly put as much castle between himself and Dagger as fast as he could manage in the short instance the two-bit idiot wandered to off to relieve himself.
Atlymaer staggered back from his magic window shortly after watching the angel began to prowl the castle’s halls as magical probe locked onto his magical essence, the wizard quickly guessed the source of the disturbance as the drow Raedifinn; but as to why the man was searching for the Archmage, Atlymaer hardly had a clue and didn’t really care as to why since he had larger immediate problems to deal with.
An image of an infuriated archangel came to mind as the old mage discarded this strange occurrence to quickly dispel his magic scrying window.
The blue lines retreated with the shimmer as the crystal ball descended slowly back to the floor and the black anti-angel ruins fading into the stone floor as if they never existed in the first place.
Thinking quickly the Archmage teleported back to his private abode in the secluded forest south of Erumara city, after coming to the conclusion that since Sin was there and he now was not; the angel would move on in his search to another continent or something.
Unwittingly providing his friends with a person for their shifter to imitate, the assassin Kyrris Syul’Deil.
Sun rays barely leaked through his shuttered window when Raedifinn was rudely awakened by his cutthroat counterpart, and a bucket of ice cold water up his nose.
Sputtering and cursing furiously the drow jerked upright and scanned angrily at his attacker, the cheerily grinning Kaelyrian that calmly placed his weapon of choice on the small rooms only dresser.
First glaring at the bucket and then Kyrris, Raedifinn attempted to snap a sharp remark before being abruptly cut off by the assassin’s faster retort.
“Shut up and come along,” Kyrris commanded coldly of the now wide awake wizard, even after all these years he still had absolutely no love for magic-wielders of any kind.
Loudly clomping away from the room and swiftly descending the stairs without a sound, the assassin waited for his drow mage to quickly dress and cast the spell that would locate the man that Kyrris now hunted for the Lord Dracafrey.
After a few minutes, a still relatively damp Raedifinn stormed out of his room wearing his purple robes and a condescending look that hardly scratched the stone cold killer’s exterior.
“Cast a clairvoyance to find my target Atlymaer Draynzar,” He demanded in an emotionless voice suitable for his trade, once the drow stood within arms reach of the seasoned assassin.
Without a word the drow began to chant and wave his arms in an almost wild fashion, making Kyrris wonder how much was necessary for the spell and how much was theatrical performance.
Then the drow closed his eyes and remained perfectly still for several agonizing minutes, before opening them once again and looking hatefully at his undesirable superior.
“Atlymaer is in the guest quarters of Erumara Castle,” Raedifinn grudgingly informed his Kaelyrian counterpart, who nodded his understanding before turning and heading for the door.
The drow was infuriated by this since he had to walk all the way here, spend a single night in an uncomfortable and then brutally awoken by a bucket of ice water.
“That’s it!?!” He screamed at the assassin’s back as the man continued undeterred by the drow’s shout as he reached the door.
“All of this waiting and anticipation for one simple spell!?!” The incredibly irritated drow wizard bellowed as Kyrris stopped at the door and turned on his heels to stare incredulously at the riled up dark elf, who had flushed an angry crimson colour.
“Yes. Yes it was, now go back and join our happy friends,” Kyrris fondly replied to the hollering Raedifinn in a sombre tone as he shut the door firmly behind him, effectively muffling the drow’s following ranting string of curses and threats.
Smiling contently at himself, Kyrris wandered along the cobblestone road that led to the castle gate.
Hardly bothering to change form, since the only people who had seen him the last time he was here in his true form had been permanently silenced by his rapier.
Ironically passing a group of three women in the courtyard as he entered the castle, and from there taking a direct route to guest chambers.
For hours since his arrival, Sin had extensively searched every conceivable portion of the castle aside from the guest chambers which he had decided to check last.
Grumbling spiteful words about the elusive Archmage, the archangel stalked the elaborately decorated hallways barging into every room to find his prey.
He was heavily distracted by his search that he walked full tilt into a gentlemen in a long black cloak and black leather jerkin, knocking the man flat on his rump since he still possessed his angelic strength in his deceptive human form.
“Watch where your going!!” The man snapped rising from the ground and brushing himself clean as he straightened his cloak, Sin quickly noticed the rapier and poniard sheathed at the man’s waist an odd combo for a castle guard.
Sin finally turned his full attention to the upset gentleman he had accidentally bowled over, and unintentional gasped allowed; it was the Kaelyrian from the roof tops a day earlier!
“You!” Sahtsienriel snarled at Kyrris who stared first perplexedly at the human version of the angel and then defensively grabbed the hilt of his rapier fearing that he had been recognized by a survivor of his last mission.
Before any words could be exchanged, Kyrris drew his rapier and thrust the thin blade straight for Sin’s heart.
Hardly surprised by the manoeuvre, since rapiers tend to have a limited amount of effective combat moves thrusts being one of them; Sin sidestepped the straight forward lunge, drawing his own larger and stronger blade.
The Kaelyrian skilled beyond most rapier fighters did not follow the thrust all the way through, instead he had diverted its path halfway through the lunge in the direction his opponent had shifted to.
The rapier poked through the soft tissue of Sahtsienriel’s shoulder, the blade sliding five inches deep before the assassin retracted it; Sin grunting through the sharp pain, cursing himself for leaving his armour behind with his soldiers before returning to the unconscious trainee.
The wound darkened his light sand coloured tunic with blood as he sent a backhanded swing of his claymore Kyrris’ way, forcing the Kaelyrian to roll backwards under the horizontal cut.
Suddenly an agonizing wave of burning pain shot through his wounded arm, numbing the appendage completely and making it unresponsive to his commands; the magic of Kyrris’ celestial fire ring taking effect, causing the assassin to momentarily pause as he witnessed his opponent’s reaction to the minor injury.
Taking advantage of Kyrris’ hesitation, Sahtsienriel swung the heavy claymore single-handedly in a seemingly endless barrage of blows meant to rend the Kaelyrian limb from limb.
The nimbly assassin ducked and dodged most of the frenzied blows of his opponent, even attempting to parry or block a few of the strikes; but gave up on that idea after both his parrying dagger arm and rapier arm went numb upon connecting with the powerful claymore.
Kyrris having drawn the conclusion that he now faced the angel from before, from the effect of his emerald studded ring and the fact the man now swung his massive two-handed blade like it was a stick.
The Assassin quickly plotted the best possible escape routes available as he continued to avoid being hit by the enraged angel, but those plans quickly died in his mind when three dozen of the castle guards came around the corner swords drawn clearly reacting to the sound of combat.
The Erumaran soldiers quickly circled around the engaged pair pointing their blades at both combatants, one man separated himself from the others to command in an authoritarian tone, “Lay down your arms or perish!”
The angel having released his rage in that violent onslaught of powerful attacks promptly dropped his claymore, and the Assassin followed suit after seeing his assailant relinquish his sword.
The commander of the guards grinned coldly at the pair as he motioned for the combatants to be shackled and searched for concealed weapons, saying to the capture duo, “You will now be taken before the Lord Vyse for questioning and to receive your punishment for fighting in these royal halls!”
Kyrris chuckling evilly thinking that the fool didn’t even know that his lordship was dead as his bandolier of throwing knives was removed, along with several concealed daggers by a pair of dumbstruck guardsmen who continued to find knives hidden inside the assassin’s leather jerkin.
Under armed guard the pair of troublemakers were marched to meet the Lord Vyse, who was still kicking despite Kyrris’ belief in the alternative.
The old mage in his false form idly listened as Vyse continued to say that he would await the arrival of the shapeshifter, and before Atlymaer could volunteer himself for the job the nercomancer leaped from her seat shouting an exuberant “Yes!”.
Then the foolish girl rambled through her mild embarrassment and then promptly banged her head solidly against Vyse’s sturdy bench; Atlymaer arched a curious eyebrow at this peculiar reaction to Vyse’s answer to her own suggestion, such a wild reaction hinting at underlying motives that Atlymaer had already suspected since her suggestion.
As to the purpose or meaning of those plans, he didn’t know, but the old mage decided to make preparations to avoid any negative side effects of this necromancer’s plans.
The less than subtle woman continued to act suspiciously as she backed out of the room still facing the assembly with a almost panicky look in her eyes, an expression that told Atlymaer that she badly wished to be gone from the chamber.
And then in an eye blink the door was closed and Marya had successfully fled from the chamber, the old wizard mentally sighing at himself for entangling himself in such an unpredictable mess.
For the second time in a row the old wizard was dissuaded from volunteering once again this time from Kat the parasite, who before any rejections could be voiced she chased after the aloof necromancer.
Sighing aloud this time, Atlymaer rose gingerly from his seat; his old bones creaking in protest despite his younger form, magic can’t cure everything.
“I must be going myself, please forgive my hasty retreat Vyse,” He politely apologized before following the two ladies course for the door and into the halls beyond.
Though Atlymaer went deeper into the castle instead of leaving it, going all the way to his personnel chamber on the far end of the massive structure.
Bolting the door shut behind himself, Atlymaer gathered a few peaces of black chalk and a smooth crystal ball.
After using a minor spell with at a thought to shift the double poster bed off to the side, the old wizard actually dropped his form altering spell.
His long brown hair grew longer and faded to a cream white, his smooth skin dried and wrinkled, and his entire body became incredibly thin and fragile looking.
Even though the wizard appeared ancient, he could still move with the fluid grace that his youth spell provided him.
Drawing an elaborate pattern of swirling shapes and symbols with the bizarrely coloured chalk on the stone floor, having already removed any carpets or rugs from the bedchamber the previous evening.
Eyeing his finished artwork with a scrutinizing glare, the wizard nodded satisfactorily at his handy work and carefully placed the crystal ball at the center of the wide ring of symbols.
Moving out side the ring the antique of a mage started to chant softly with an upraised hand before him with the middle and index fingers standing straight while the others curled into a tight fist.
After an uninterrupted half hour of whispering arcane words, the orb rose gently from the cold floor to float at eye level and then two beams of blue light zoomed out of the orb.
The light created a floating frame in front of the wizard outside of the black chalk pattern, and the area within this frame shimmered and shifted as if it was alive.
Muttering under his breath, Atlymaer touched the shimmer with his index and middle fingers; making the blur focus upon two men that steadily approached the castle through the forest at the base of the mountains.
Confused by the image, the wizard stared long and hard at both trainees until he noticed that one of them moved in the fashion more suitable of a veteran soldier than a trainee.
The old mage quickly understood that his life long friend the Archangel Sahtsienriel had assumed a human form to travel along side one of the trainees in order to gain entrance to the castle; how the angel had guessed the wizard’s location was beyond Atlymaer’s understanding, so he calmly watched the angel-man and trainee jog their way through the forest.
The man that Sahtsienriel had nearly scared to death called himself Dagger, Swordsman Extraordinaire.
Every since assuming a human form and “stumbling” upon the unconscious soldier and firmly persuading the man that he had passed out from dehydration and had not seen an angel.
He has had to put up with the man’s endless boasting of false occurrences and tales of personnel fancy, that made the time old archangel want to throttle this man that called himself Dagger; the fool’s name barely made sense for crying out loud!
For the past few hours, Sin jogged quietly along side the chatty trainee who could run and talk endlessly at the same time; seeming to have found some imaginary friendship with the silent angel-man.
Sin was quickly beginning to regret his idea of searching the castle by pretending to be one of the trainees sent out by the ruling steward Lord Vyse Arson.
“Why does Atlymaer have to make things difficult?” The angel in human form demanded of the sky, but was answered by his horribly annoying travelling companion.
“Eh what’s that?” The Swordsman Extraordinaire asked stupidly having barely heard Sin’s comment as the pair continued to trudge along the unbeaten path back to the castle.
Simply grunting in answer to hopefully silence the man, Sin quickened the pace to something slightly short of a flat out sprint and somehow to his shock the human kept pace.
And proceeded to talk his immortal ears off all the way to the castle gate hours later, night having already come and gone turning into the first rays of daylight.
Not once during that evening did the imbecile Dagger inquire as to why his companion could see so incredibly well in the pitch black night, Sin couldn‘t wait to be rid of him.
After arriving at the castle gates and being admitted through them, Sin quickly put as much castle between himself and Dagger as fast as he could manage in the short instance the two-bit idiot wandered to off to relieve himself.
Atlymaer staggered back from his magic window shortly after watching the angel began to prowl the castle’s halls as magical probe locked onto his magical essence, the wizard quickly guessed the source of the disturbance as the drow Raedifinn; but as to why the man was searching for the Archmage, Atlymaer hardly had a clue and didn’t really care as to why since he had larger immediate problems to deal with.
An image of an infuriated archangel came to mind as the old mage discarded this strange occurrence to quickly dispel his magic scrying window.
The blue lines retreated with the shimmer as the crystal ball descended slowly back to the floor and the black anti-angel ruins fading into the stone floor as if they never existed in the first place.
Thinking quickly the Archmage teleported back to his private abode in the secluded forest south of Erumara city, after coming to the conclusion that since Sin was there and he now was not; the angel would move on in his search to another continent or something.
Unwittingly providing his friends with a person for their shifter to imitate, the assassin Kyrris Syul’Deil.
Sun rays barely leaked through his shuttered window when Raedifinn was rudely awakened by his cutthroat counterpart, and a bucket of ice cold water up his nose.
Sputtering and cursing furiously the drow jerked upright and scanned angrily at his attacker, the cheerily grinning Kaelyrian that calmly placed his weapon of choice on the small rooms only dresser.
First glaring at the bucket and then Kyrris, Raedifinn attempted to snap a sharp remark before being abruptly cut off by the assassin’s faster retort.
“Shut up and come along,” Kyrris commanded coldly of the now wide awake wizard, even after all these years he still had absolutely no love for magic-wielders of any kind.
Loudly clomping away from the room and swiftly descending the stairs without a sound, the assassin waited for his drow mage to quickly dress and cast the spell that would locate the man that Kyrris now hunted for the Lord Dracafrey.
After a few minutes, a still relatively damp Raedifinn stormed out of his room wearing his purple robes and a condescending look that hardly scratched the stone cold killer’s exterior.
“Cast a clairvoyance to find my target Atlymaer Draynzar,” He demanded in an emotionless voice suitable for his trade, once the drow stood within arms reach of the seasoned assassin.
Without a word the drow began to chant and wave his arms in an almost wild fashion, making Kyrris wonder how much was necessary for the spell and how much was theatrical performance.
Then the drow closed his eyes and remained perfectly still for several agonizing minutes, before opening them once again and looking hatefully at his undesirable superior.
“Atlymaer is in the guest quarters of Erumara Castle,” Raedifinn grudgingly informed his Kaelyrian counterpart, who nodded his understanding before turning and heading for the door.
The drow was infuriated by this since he had to walk all the way here, spend a single night in an uncomfortable and then brutally awoken by a bucket of ice water.
“That’s it!?!” He screamed at the assassin’s back as the man continued undeterred by the drow’s shout as he reached the door.
“All of this waiting and anticipation for one simple spell!?!” The incredibly irritated drow wizard bellowed as Kyrris stopped at the door and turned on his heels to stare incredulously at the riled up dark elf, who had flushed an angry crimson colour.
“Yes. Yes it was, now go back and join our happy friends,” Kyrris fondly replied to the hollering Raedifinn in a sombre tone as he shut the door firmly behind him, effectively muffling the drow’s following ranting string of curses and threats.
Smiling contently at himself, Kyrris wandered along the cobblestone road that led to the castle gate.
Hardly bothering to change form, since the only people who had seen him the last time he was here in his true form had been permanently silenced by his rapier.
Ironically passing a group of three women in the courtyard as he entered the castle, and from there taking a direct route to guest chambers.
For hours since his arrival, Sin had extensively searched every conceivable portion of the castle aside from the guest chambers which he had decided to check last.
Grumbling spiteful words about the elusive Archmage, the archangel stalked the elaborately decorated hallways barging into every room to find his prey.
He was heavily distracted by his search that he walked full tilt into a gentlemen in a long black cloak and black leather jerkin, knocking the man flat on his rump since he still possessed his angelic strength in his deceptive human form.
“Watch where your going!!” The man snapped rising from the ground and brushing himself clean as he straightened his cloak, Sin quickly noticed the rapier and poniard sheathed at the man’s waist an odd combo for a castle guard.
Sin finally turned his full attention to the upset gentleman he had accidentally bowled over, and unintentional gasped allowed; it was the Kaelyrian from the roof tops a day earlier!
“You!” Sahtsienriel snarled at Kyrris who stared first perplexedly at the human version of the angel and then defensively grabbed the hilt of his rapier fearing that he had been recognized by a survivor of his last mission.
Before any words could be exchanged, Kyrris drew his rapier and thrust the thin blade straight for Sin’s heart.
Hardly surprised by the manoeuvre, since rapiers tend to have a limited amount of effective combat moves thrusts being one of them; Sin sidestepped the straight forward lunge, drawing his own larger and stronger blade.
The Kaelyrian skilled beyond most rapier fighters did not follow the thrust all the way through, instead he had diverted its path halfway through the lunge in the direction his opponent had shifted to.
The rapier poked through the soft tissue of Sahtsienriel’s shoulder, the blade sliding five inches deep before the assassin retracted it; Sin grunting through the sharp pain, cursing himself for leaving his armour behind with his soldiers before returning to the unconscious trainee.
The wound darkened his light sand coloured tunic with blood as he sent a backhanded swing of his claymore Kyrris’ way, forcing the Kaelyrian to roll backwards under the horizontal cut.
Suddenly an agonizing wave of burning pain shot through his wounded arm, numbing the appendage completely and making it unresponsive to his commands; the magic of Kyrris’ celestial fire ring taking effect, causing the assassin to momentarily pause as he witnessed his opponent’s reaction to the minor injury.
Taking advantage of Kyrris’ hesitation, Sahtsienriel swung the heavy claymore single-handedly in a seemingly endless barrage of blows meant to rend the Kaelyrian limb from limb.
The nimbly assassin ducked and dodged most of the frenzied blows of his opponent, even attempting to parry or block a few of the strikes; but gave up on that idea after both his parrying dagger arm and rapier arm went numb upon connecting with the powerful claymore.
Kyrris having drawn the conclusion that he now faced the angel from before, from the effect of his emerald studded ring and the fact the man now swung his massive two-handed blade like it was a stick.
The Assassin quickly plotted the best possible escape routes available as he continued to avoid being hit by the enraged angel, but those plans quickly died in his mind when three dozen of the castle guards came around the corner swords drawn clearly reacting to the sound of combat.
The Erumaran soldiers quickly circled around the engaged pair pointing their blades at both combatants, one man separated himself from the others to command in an authoritarian tone, “Lay down your arms or perish!”
The angel having released his rage in that violent onslaught of powerful attacks promptly dropped his claymore, and the Assassin followed suit after seeing his assailant relinquish his sword.
The commander of the guards grinned coldly at the pair as he motioned for the combatants to be shackled and searched for concealed weapons, saying to the capture duo, “You will now be taken before the Lord Vyse for questioning and to receive your punishment for fighting in these royal halls!”
Kyrris chuckling evilly thinking that the fool didn’t even know that his lordship was dead as his bandolier of throwing knives was removed, along with several concealed daggers by a pair of dumbstruck guardsmen who continued to find knives hidden inside the assassin’s leather jerkin.
Under armed guard the pair of troublemakers were marched to meet the Lord Vyse, who was still kicking despite Kyrris’ belief in the alternative.