Penthesilea
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 Warrior Queen, DarkLady, Phoenix, Ghostbuster
Posts: 47422
Location: The Castle.....
Joined: Jun 21 st, 2006
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Re: Penthesilea's Castle...posts 2100 to 2299
Reply #94 - Mar 8th, 2008 at 11:15pm
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#2194 [Rewritten by Penthesilea]
In the badlands..
Kodiak awoke, bruised and aching, in absolute darkness. He laid there for a time working on remembering what had happened immediately prior to awakening on hard stone in the dark. It didn’t take long for him to remember once his head cleared. Cautiously, he felt his way around and discovered that he was at the bottom of a slope too unstable to climb. Or at least it was where he was standing. He would have to find another way out.
Kodiak’s abilities in magick were severely limited but he had some skills and making a mage light was one of them. He conjured a tiny one, he didn’t need much light, and set out to find a way out of the cave. He had the survival kit that was always on his person and his training. He was confident that he would find a way out and then make his way back to the Castle. In the depths of the cave, time seemed to stand still and if it were not for his illuminated wristwatch, Kodiak would not have known what day it was, let alone what time. As it was, after nearly three hours of searching, Kodiak found a promising passage. He could smell both water and fresh air and he followed those scents cautiously, since he did not know what he would find when he reached the source. He’d only gone a short distance when he picked up the unmistakable scent of something else. Somewhere up ahead there was spilled blood and lots of it. Kodiak’s caution increased. There were few places in the world where he could remember the scent of blood being so strong and those places were battlefields.
The passage angled upward and Kodiak took that as a hopeful sign despite the smell of death. He would work his way past whatever blocked his way and continue on to the surface. That is what he firmly told himself as he came to the end of the passage and looked out into the space beyond. Laid out before him was what at first glance appeared to be a cavern but it was lit as if by the light of a full moon and the air that brought the scent of blood to him was fresh. He could see green growing things: trees, grass and flowers and the splashing sound of falling water came from a small fountain a few feet inside the cavern. Cautiously, Kodiak slipped into the cavern. He felt an odd sensation as he did so as if he were passing though some sort of barrier but it felt nothing like any magickal or technological ward that he had ever encountered so he filed it in his mind for future reference and concentrated on his search for a passage to the surface.
Kodiak’s nose told him that he should be stepping onto a battlefield, the scent of blood was so strong, but the scene around him was peaceful and serene with neither sight nor sound of conflict to mar its perfection. He proceeded cautiously with the intention of keeping to cover but quickly found that to be impossible. Whenever he attempted to leave the path some force firmly guided him back to it. The short hairs on the back of the Lord Marshall’s neck began to stir as the implications of the situation began to form in his mind. He was reminded entirely too much of some livestock handling facilities that he had seen in his travels. Kodiak decided that perhaps another route would be wiser and turned to retrace his steps only to find the way solidly blocked by the same force that kept him on the path. Having no choice, he continued on with every sense alert for whatever might be lurking beyond his range of vision. The path angled to the left and Kodiak approached the bend carefully. Then he stopped in his tracks and moved off the path as much as the barrier would let him. He heard voices and other sounds that were hauntingly familiar but that he couldn’t immediately place. Kodiak peered around the bend and looked out on a scene that filled his soul, long accustomed to horror, with revulsion. The path he stood on was one of dozens that led to a large circular area bounded high hedges. In the center were several large troughs of the type normally used to water livestock. Only these troughs were filled with blood and the splashing that Kodiak had heard was blood flowing from the slashed throats of several human bodies hanging over them. The troughs were surrounded by some forty vampires who were dipping cups of the hot blood from them and drinking.
Kodiak’s sense of self-preservation kicked into high gear. He had no illusions about what would happen if they caught him. He had no real desire to kill them, despite what they were doing, since he knew too well that they were doing only what was necessary to survive. He just would not permit himself, or anyone under his protection, to serve as the means of their survival! He took quick inventory. He had his long survival knife strapped to his thigh as his only weapon beyond his hands, feet and fangs against forty vampires. He did not like the odds. The barrier that had prevented him from retreating was pressing against his back, trying to force him into the clearing. Kodiak had no choice. He would have to enter the clearing and skirt the edge, avoiding detection, until he reached another path that he prayed would allow him to enter.
Kodiak picked a moment when all the vampires were involved in feeding and stepped into the clearing. He stayed in the shadows along the edge of the clearing, moving as quickly and as quietly as he could. Vampire ears were supernaturally sharp as was the sense of smell. Kodiak hoped that the presence of so much blood would mask his scent and their preoccupation with feeding would keep them from hearing him.
The first path would not permit him to enter. Neither would the second. Kodiak’s mind was filled with a combination of prayer and curses as he approached the third opening. He didn’t hear the sound that gave him away. Maybe it was an unseen twig snapping under his boot, maybe it was the sound of his breathing or his heartbeat but suddenly a vampire looked up from her feeding and saw him and shouted to her companions in a language that Kodiak couldn’t understand. The message, however, was clear enough as those vampires closest to him dropped their empty cups and charged him. Kodiak’s knife cleared its sheath and he slashed the throat of first vampire to reach him before his conscious mind had even registered the fact of the attack, spraying him with the vampire’s freshly consumed meal. Then the others were upon him and for Kodiak there was nothing but the Darkness rising in him and the drive to survive!
How long the battle continued, Kodiak had no idea. One moment, he was fighting for his life and the next, he was standing amid the corpses of the dead. A distant detached part of his mind noted that the vampires had not disintegrated as they usually did. Their bodies remained more or less intact where they had fallen giving mute testimony to Kodiak’s warrior prowess. The greater portion of him mind was being filled with an ever greater urgency to escape -- to run! Kodiak turned to the opening that he had been approaching when he had been discovered. He pushed against the barrier that he found there and it gave way. Not wishing to press his luck, Kodiak headed down the path, breaking into a run as the urge to escape approached panic. Kodiak ran as hard and as fast as he could, his mind filled with nothing but the need to escape and return to the Castle. The Castle and its Lady filled his mind as the world turned inside out and then went black.....
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Penthesilea's Castle...posts 2100 to 2299 (Read 16344 times)
