The Pyromancer
The heavy metallic footfalls of Ignatious pre Virtutem echoed almost painfully loud alone the polished marble staircase of the north tower. Each step pulled the heavily armored alvain higher into the guts of the painfully decorated stairwell, his battle-scarred white armour in stark justaposition to the velvet tapestried walls around him. Each tapestry seemed to depict a great deed accomplished by the ancestral family of this tower's owner - a shining warrior vanquishing a great multi-headed beast on one tapestry adjacent to another that depicted some singificant meeting between two elder human men with a crowd of people bowing before them; each tapestry a meticulous and beautiful recapturing of the Stanier's long lasting family legacy. But Ignatious cared little for art, and cared even less for the self-indulgent and exaggerated laurels of short-lived human nobles. The tapestries wounded the length of the tower's spiral staircase, each one depictating a great year or season in the families life - but the story woven by the silk tapestries ended long before the marble staircase did - and instead were replaced by oil paintings of grey-haired and stern faced human men, encased in tastelessly elaborate golden frames that stole the eye's attention from the subject of each painting.
When at long last Ignatious reached the top of the marble staircase it opened up into a wide room in the shape of a semi circle - with the evening moonlight pouring in through the tower's embrasures and dancing playfully on the polished stone of the room's floor. Two guard stood at attention next to the staircase's landing, human knights adorned in shining platemail and silk capes that pooled dramatically on the floor beneath them and rested carelessly over the the hilts of the guard's swords. Each of the humans stared forward from the positions in an apparent attempt to appear alert and disciplined - but Ignatious' heightened senses could hear the men's rapid breathing even through the armored helmet that concealed his own face.
Ignatious continued his march forward, the hilt of his battlestaff now striking the ground with irregular metallic "twangs" with each of his armored footsteps. Another human male - this one dressed in fine cloth and without weapons - fiddled nervously with his hands as he stood anxiously next to heavy wooden desk at the half-circled room's back wall. Next to him was a woman looking equally anxious and struggling to catch her breath. The page has proceeded Ignatious up the tower's steps at a significantly faster speed than him in a poorly concealed attempt to warn the nervous looking man about his arrival. Ignatious did not mind the woman's interference however - in fact he almost delighted in it. At least someone in this damned tower still feared the Alvain.
Ignatious continued his march forward, intending to stride past the desk to the heavy set of doors behind it. They were sealed shut and flanked by yet another set of highly-polished knights, but Ignatious could easily make out the sound of laughter and music from behind them. For the briefest of moments the nervous human seemed to step out in front of Ignatius to blocked his path - but reconsidered hastily and instead merely cleared his throat and croaked a stammered greeting. "l-lord Ignatious pre Virtutem - what a pleasure to graced by anther visit. Lord Stanier is currently in military council and has asked not to be disturbed. Perhaps if Lord Abrony.. " but the man's voice trailed off mid-sentance - his attempt to assuade Ignatious silenced with a mere raise of the alvain's gauntleted hand.
"I request that you alert the Lord Stanier of my arrival in Genovia Cross, and that you impose upon him my immediate need for a audience with him." Ignatious' voice seemed to almost darken the room around him when he spoke, echoing deeply through the plating in his helmeted mask and casting his words in an uncomfortable metallic grit. He noticed with satisfaction as one of the knight's behind the manservant shuffled ever so slightly with discomfort. Ignatious towered over the human, his already tall frame expanded upon by the heavy layers of plate upon him.
The manservant gave a panicked look to the woman beside him - her face still flushed with exertion - and settled his gave back on Ignatious, his eyes falling just shy of the alvain's helmet face. "Uhmm... of course I will let my lord know. But as I said... he has asked not be disturbed by anyone short of Lord Abronycius and..." Once again the manservant's voice failed him and Ignatious merely tightened his grip on the heavy staff in his right hand - his masked face giving no hint to the alvain's state.
"I would ask your name manservant." The statement was polite, formal, and devoid of all emotion. The preferred form of discourse for alvain and human nobility alike. yet all the same the man seemed rebuked as if by some invisible threat.
"My name is Osfrid sir, I come from the city of Pere-" but the man was once again cut short was a slight raise of Ignatious' hand.
"Osfrid. Your intention is to serve your lord - a loyalty in your kind that I both value and respect." Ignatious left the statement hang in the air for a heartbeat before continuing "But my presence in Genovia Cross is at the direct request of The Alvain Assembly and the Loyalist Alliance." Osfird gulped almost comically as Ignatious continued. "So you may rest assured that by following my commands you are indeed serving the interest of your Lord Stanier." Ignatious turned his attention to the two knights guarding the door, "So either you can ask these men to step aside of I shall instead. Which is the preference of Lord Stanier?"
The knights both turned their heads ever so slightly to look at each other before placing their hands on the hilts of their swords with a tentative slowness to the motion - but the tension that had been pouring into the room since Ignatious' arrival seemed at long last become unbearable for Osfird. "No - no!' the man said - panicked at first before quickly slipping back into the polite appeasement that his kind seemed spill with everytime they spoke. "P-please just allow me a moment to alert Lord Stanier of your presence."
Ignatious nodded politely to Osfrid with this concession, his metallic voice growling as the man strode briskly to the heavy set of doors behind him. "Then I shall wait here while you announce me, but I recommend you advise the Lord Stanier to receive me quickly. I am immortal but I am not patient."
Osfrid pulled the heavy doors aside and slipped into the small gap he opened between them - the laughter and music from within being suddenly amplified before being snuffed back down again as the doors slung shut behind him. For a handful of moments the alvain stood silently in the half-circle room. The only sound other than the muffled music being the page's labored breathing only now begging to return to her control. Ignatious merely took this time to furhter inspect the pair of knights that stood before him. The helmets they wore hide their face much like his own mask, but even then Ingatious knew the guards were not able to meet his gaze. Behind him however he felt the stares of the two stairway guards boring a hole into the back of his armour. He briefly considered turning his attention back to those two, to see if they would continue their watchful sentry under his own gaze or look away in deference when the music in the room abruptly stopped - replaced instead with the hushed clamor of a group of people intending to whisper but failing to control the volume of their voice. A few moments later the heavy doors were pulled back as Osfrid slipped back into the room - the tense black silence of the room behind him clinging to him like a fog.
"Lord Stanier is delighted to hear of your.... unexpected arrival in Genovia Cross Lord Ignatious pre Virtutem. He is meeting with his generals and military strategists currently and - " Osfrid nearly leaped aside as Ignatious purposley strode past the manservant, covering the distance to doors with a speed that defied his impressive stature. The door guard furthest to Ignatious merely froze as the towering alvain strode towards him but the closer of the two foolishly stepped forward and placed an arm out to stop the alvian. With a casual backhand Ignatious merely pushed the armored knight into the stone wall behind him, watching with pitiful disappointment as the trained knight trained in vain to regain his footing as his ridiculously long cloak became entangled with the tapestried wall behind him. None of the room's other inhabitants seemed prepared to react - let alone intervene - as Ignatious effortlessly pulled apart the heavy double doors and exposed the room's contents. Olfrid seemed to offer some complaint or protest at the alvain's intrusion - but the word's that had been eluding him all evening seemed to have long last deserted him altogether. He heard the sound of panicked footsteps behind him as the stair guards began to round up behind Ignatious, but he merely held his empty hand out behind him and the two guards approaching him instinctively stopped - suddenly unsure of how to proceed. To his right Osfrid was hissing hushed commands to page and guards behind him in a futile attempt to regain some form of control over the chaos Ignatious' arrival was causing. Beneath his helmeted mask, Ignatious merely shook his head and stepped through the open doorway in front of him - leaving Osfrid to begin struggling to detangle the disheveled knight on the ground behind him.
The room before Ignatious held the same semi-circle shape as the one behind him, except only about two thirds of the side. It's contents were dominated by a long elegant table of polished wood, it's sides hand carved with intricate patterns. Scattered around the table's edge was a half score of human men, many of which bore the disheveled clothing and red-skinned faces of intoxication. Sure enough, Ignatious could not fail to notice the scattered array of fine bronze and copper jugs of wine mixed in with a disorderly pile of dirty plates and cutlery. The dishes and half eaten food were scattered all along the table, burying various stacks of parchment under their squalor. A few scrolls had even been piled carelessly at the table edge closest to Ignatious, and a few had already fallen from their perch the be trampled and torn underfoot - the writings they bore now indistinguishable from the shit and dirt that marred their faces. The room itself was dimly lit by a handful of candles in a manner that suggested the men had begun their collaboration before sun fall and had been too taken in with the day's affairs to notice the room's ever growing darkness. Skirting the outside of the room were three human women clad in thin silks that hung low on their necks - each carrying yet another jug of wine - and a nervous looked young-man in the far corner who held a fiddle in his hand - clearly unsure whether to continue playing. A fourth woman had seemingly abandoned all sense of presumptive servitude and was simply perched on a heavy-set bearded man near the end of the table, her drunken and glassy eyes dancing carelessly over the room - seemingly oblivious to the sudden tension that had entered the room with Ignatious. At the head table sat Lord Stanier. ruler of the city of Genovia Cross and owner of the northern tower and it's surrounding castle. Lord Stanier was a wide faced human face with long brown hair that had begun thinning at his forehead. Under normal circumstance the lord would normally cut an impressive figure, albeit by human standards, with his towering height and finely crafted tunics, but this particularly evening found the man as red-faced and swollen lipped as his companions, with a splattering of greasy stains marking the front of normally pristine tunic. The men and women surrounding Lord Stanier seemed frozen in place, one so far as holding his goblet out in front of his open mouth while his eyes gapped up nervously at the heavily-armoured Alvain. Not a single noise seemed to emanant from the room besides Ignatious' heavy metallic breathing - the humans seemingly under the impression that if they didn't move then perhaps the alvain wouldn't be able to see them. Lord Stainer's face held no hint of surprise however, instead carrying the haughty arrogance and contempt that only the human nobility could truly master. The silence and tension were both broken simultaneously however with the panting stammer of Osfrid slithering through the door behind Ignatious, the four guarding knights shuffling precariously behind him.
"My lord! A thousand apologies - I asked Lord Ignatious to wait but he would -" but Lord Stanier too was able to control these with merely a gesture. Osfrid stammered to a close when Stanier lifted his hand and shooed the manservant away.
"No need to apologize for Lord Ignatious' poor manners Osfrid - I'm sure our unexpected guest has an urgent and pressing matter to bring to my attention this time. Especially seeing as he found it fit the assault my staff and break down my fucking door." Lord Stanier's voice lifted with anger at the end of his sentence, the drunk women on his guest's lap slowly slipping to her feet and slinking back against the wall with her peers. The other men around the table merely shuffled uncomfortably, suddenly overly interested in various parchments on the table around them or even clumps of hlaf eaten food on their plates. Ignatious neither moved nor spoke. Instead merely watching the human lord, his own expression indistinguishable behind his mask. Osfrid merely slunk away to the reception area, the four knights taking positions on the outskirts of his peripherals. The knight closest to Ignatius's left was taking quick and angered breaths - struggling to compose and discipline himself after the embarrassment of his tumble.
Stanier shook his head sarcastically as he continued, "Well? What do you want Ignatious? Why are you here without my Invitation?"
Ignatious cocked his head slightly at this statement, his voice cooing deeply with the threat of laughter. "Invitation?" Ignatious took another step forward, his staff clanging heavily on the stone floor, the four guards behind him taking a half step with him. "Why... my Lord Stanier... a millennia ago I walked the among the fields and hills of the very land this tower is built upon. I can recall easily when this country was unspoiled and undotted by your species clumsy architecture."
Ignatious took another long step, this time bringing his massive armored physique to the foot of the table, causing the man closest to him to shift uncomfortably to furthest edge of his chair. Ignatious placed a hand down casually onto the wooden table, brushing aside food scraps to reveal a parchment underneath. He brought the parchment to his face and examined it. It was report on grain and oat harvest projections to the frontline for the surrounding countryside, with an empty space at the bottom for Lord Stanier's signature.
Ignatious growled, "So you must forgive my reluctance to accept that I require your "invitation" to return the very lands that we grant you residence."
Stanier's face curled in disgust, but his tone at last seemed to have found it's place. "Of course my lord." Stainer grimaced, "I, like my forefathers before me can only express our gratitude for the guidance and support of The Alvain Alliance ... I only meant that Abronycius did not send word that you would be visiting us Ignatious. We haven't had to proper time to prepare for you arrival. I mean, i can put togeter a report but it may take a few days for us -"
Ignatious interrupted sharply, his voice booming deeply over the small confines of the room. "That is Lord Abronycius para Invantis and Lord Ignatious pre Virtutem. Surely I do not need to explain to the lord of Genovia Cross about the importance of respected titles."
Stanier ground his teeth, respoding in kind through their grit, "Of course not. My sincerest apologies Lord Ignatious pre Virtutem. I meant no disrespect to yourself or Lord Abronycious. I simplyy must insist however that you return tomorrow so we are bettered prepared to discuss... whatever it is you deemed worthy of visiting for. See, we almost exclusively deal with Lord Abronycious, and he didn't inform me that he was sending you."
"The treaties your ancestors signed are clear Lord Stanier. As the leader of the demnse of Genovia Cross you answer to the Alvain Assembly through the ambassadorship of Abronycious, not to Abronycious para Invantis directly." Ignatious discarded the neglected report onto the ground at his feet and returned his sights on the man at the head of the table. "And despite what Abronycious para Virtutem may have told you I most assuradly do not answer to him" Ignatious twisted the heavy staff in his hand once again, it's metal frame grinding loudly against the stone beneath his feet. At the tip of the staff the flume of fire perputually burning at the heart of the staff blossomed briefly between the jagged forks at the staff's head before simmering back into their nest once again.
Lord Stanier merely chuckled under his breath and took a long swip of the wine in his cup before signaling a nervous looking young woman to refill it. The woman refilled his glass while the entire room watch, her hands tremoring as the wine filled her lord's cup. Ignatious merely picked up another parchment, examining it with the same casual curiosity as the first. It was a written summary of legal complaint featuring a pretty dispute between two minor human nobles. The parchment was wine stained and crumpled, and it too had the disappointed air of a parchment that would never be read.
"I have been asked to inquire on behalf of the Alvain Assembly as to recent irregularities in supply shipment's from Genovia Cross. I have been lead to believe that we are now on the third consecutive month of missed quotoas on both coarse grains and crossbow ammunition." Ignatious discarded the parchment in his head and took in the room's inhabitants once again. Everyone but Lord Stanier was staring down meekly at their plates and the serving women were pressed up against the wall with an intensity that implied they were trying to pass through the gaps in the mortar. "The Assembly and I were hoping we could better understand the conditions here in Genovia Cross."
"The conditions here in Genovia Cross?!" Stanier parroted back at him. "The conditions are that we are at fucking war my lord. Surely that should be apparent to anyone of your station by now. It's been nearly eight fucking years of your war nowm and quite frankly were running short on both patience and men to work the fields." Ignatious heard a few murmurs of agreement from the men seated around him - the first signs of life from these bloated wrecks since Ignatious had first entered the room.
"My war?" Ignatious purred menacingly, "I do not believe that it was I who killed my brother and stole his title and lands. That was the man you now call the "Traitor King" wasn't it? Nor was it the Alvain who caused the famine in Bareshield."
Marcius shook his head softly, the metal plate of his helmeted mask looking even more menacing in the dim dance of lantern-light.
"No, it was you humans who did that. It was you humans behind a list of atrocities since before your grandfather's grandfather stacked the first stones of this wretched tower."
Marcius idly ran his gloved fingers along the rim of the table. It truly was a marvelous piece of furniture. Nearly twenty feet long and carved from a single piece of wood. Ignatious even felt a ping of pity that the craftsman responsible for its construction was likely long dead - yet another recipient of the lesser races' great gift of mortality.
"Make no mistake Lord Stanier. This is humanity's war, and history will not care one war or another which noble houses sided one way or the next if the destruction of this continent continues."
Stanier growled in contempt and tossed the empty plate in front of him carelessly aside. "This is ridiculous Ignatious. I refuse to be lectured and belittled by anyone in my own fucking castle." Stanier gestiulated wildly, "Why are you even here? Where is Lord Abronycius?! Abronycius handles my family's relationship with Alvantes - not you! He has worked with my family since by great-grandfather held my title. He understands me, he understands my people, and you he understand the sacrifices I've made to ensure people like... you can continue to use this war for your own private benefit!"
Stanier was growing increasingly angry, and his sour mood seemed to trickle down to the men at his side. They too were now glaring down the long table at Ignatious pre Virtutem, they're plump ugly faces distorted with sneers and villainous thoughts. "You think that I don't know about you Ignatious - but I do! Abronycius told me all about you... he told me you're a sniveling coward who relies on cunning and brute force because you're too stupid or stubborn to accomplish anything of merit. He says you wear that armour because you think it makes you look strong, but inside that shell you're a weak, immaciated runt who's grasp of the arcane arts is less than a human arcanist."
Ignatious felt the crackle of electricty uncurl slowly within his chest - a shivering snake of patient rage that had begun to quicken at the sign of a new release. Stanier did not notice the change in Ignatious however - how could it when the alvain was concealed completely in his suit of armor. So the Lord of Genova Cross pressed on. "Abronycius told me everything about you. He said despite all your posturing and projection you do waht you're told and consider yourself his rival despite never stepping an inch outside of his shadow. He said he knew you when you were a child, and that when you were young you -" Ignatious cut him off suddenly, his voice hissing like the heated edge on sharprened blade.
"Abronycius para Invantis is dead."
A silence rushed into the room with a force that seemed to pull the air out of Lord Stanier's lungs. The colour drained from his face, and he slunk down pathetically into his chair. "W-what?"
"Abronycious' position was overrun by rebel forces and he was forced to make his escape via the sea. From what I understand he was harassed by the Stormbreak Island Navy and refused to surrender. His vessel sunk a dozen miles from shore and there were few survivors. One of them saw Abronycius dissapear beneath the waves and not resurface."
The room was speechless, it's inhabitants unable to meet each other's eyes. Along the wall to his left Ignatious heard a woman sobbed softly into her hands. "A ceremony will be held in his honor in Alvantes. I understand the entire Alvain Assembly will be in attendance." Ignatious sighed loudly, "While I must give admittance that Abronycius para Invantis and I had found ourselves at... disagreement as of late, the death of any immortal is of incomprehisble horror for me. The Kaldari must pay for this atrocity, and the countless before it."
Ignatious took another deep breath, feeling the jittery crackle of arcane power smolder once again deep in his chest. "Which is why it is imperative that Genovia Cross continues to do it's part for the war effort."
"Our part?!" Stanier barked, his arms flailing about him dramatically as he spoke, "I've sent a generation of my demesne's son and daughters to fight in this war! Goddess' Mercy Ignatious I buried my brother and nephew in this last year alone! What more could we possibly give to you that has not been taken already?!"
Stanier's words rang along the stone walls, drowned out only by the affirmative grumbles and urges of agreement from the table, the men flanking Stanier at the table seemed to have at long last found their mettle. The guard to Ignatious' left lowered his hand a half inch closer to the sword at his side.
"I understand the pain of your loss Lord Stanier. But while your family has the sympathies of Alvantes I have been sent here to remind you that your responsibilites here at Genovia Cross take precedence of your... slow descent into decadence, gluttony, and... self-pity." Ignatious gestured broadly to the room around him.
The silence now gripped the room with such intensity that the only sound that could be heard was flickering candlelight on the table between them, anchored down by slow, rythmatic rings of Ignatious' echoing breath filtered through the steel carapace of his helmet. Stanier merely stared at Ignatious - red faced and clenched jawed - with the mix of arrogance and disgust that only the highest born form of humanity seemed capable of mustering.
"Get."
"The fuck."
"Out."
The silence poured back into the room as quickly as Stanier's words had chased it away. Ignatious' breathing hissing in and out through the steel filters in his mask in objective defiance to the deafening spell cast on the room.
"I hope for your sake Stanier, that you are far drunker than you appear, because if you would think for a moment that - "
"GET OUT!"
Stanier hurled his goblet across the table, falling short of the table's edge and splashing the final legs of it's volume along the table's length and causing the men seated around it to wince suddenly and flinch away from the projectile. Sensing the moment to redeem his earlier embarrassment, the knight to Ignatious' left reached at last for the sword at his hip.
Ignatious was far too fast for the man.
Before the hilt had been pulled more than a few inches from the scabbard Ignatious' left hand clamped around the guard's forearm, locking it in place. The man grunted in surprise for half a hearbeat before Ignatious squeezed. The plate on the man's arm held for the briefest of moments before crumpling under the Alvain's powerful grip. The man's forearm was a trivial matter after that and he screamed in surprise and pain as the bones in his arm shattered. Ignatious heard something incomprehensible from the guard to his right - a plea to stop perhaps?
It was far too late for that of course.
The crackle of power had been building in Ignatious' chest had been building since he begin his climb to the top of the north tower, and now it was screaming within him - an insatiable inferno of rage, hunger, and vindication that was as at long last being unchained.
Ignatious looked at the man before him, wailing and whimpering in pain - his ill advised attempt at redemption only a few seconds ago already forgotten to him. "You were a fool to try."
Ignatious released his hold on the hungering flame within his soul, and shuttered as it erupted within him and filled his body with a ecstatic surge of magical arcane power. Ignatious surged that power through him and into his left arm, muttering a chorus of spell under his breath as he did so.
The knight exploded in whirlwind of flame - incinerating him into a pile of ash and red iron before the man had the time to sream. The flames exploded outward from the epicenter in long lashing whips of white hot flame, igniting tapestries and filling the room with blinding hot light that caused those further from the blast to shield their face and caused the unfortunate nobleman sitting closest to the blast to scream in pain as hot red blisters formed and seared on his now leathery red face. The guard behind the incinerated knight was caught directly in the chest by the lash - a vertical streak of pure heat that melt the outer layer of his plate armour from his hip to his shoulder - causing the man to howl incomprihensibly in pain as the metal shell on his chest melted into his boiling skin. The man crumpled to the ground flailing wildly as the ashen corpses of the first guard already began to crumble under the weight of it's scorched and cindering armour.
The room was in a storm of chaos now, men and women pushing and fighting to simultaneously get away from the inferno while somehow moving to the exit behind Ignatious. At the end of the room, Lord Stanier merely sat in his chair the end of the table, his eyes wide and his mouth half open in shocked horror.
To his right, Ignatious saw the glimmer of movement and the flash of steel before the guard to his right brought his sword down against Ignatious - aiming high to remove the towering Alvain's head from his pauldrons. Ignatious merely shifted his weight slightly and tipped to head of his staff to intercept the man's aggressive blow. The sword caught the staff high, just before it's clawed, crown like tip - ringing sharply as the steel of his sword met the with heavily enchanted and reinforced frame of Ignatious' Pyromancer Warstaff. The man's sword cracked loudly a piece of the blade flew across the room, causing a women to gasp in surprise as it found home in her flesh. The fire within Ignatious burned hotter, salivating with liquid flame at the new acquisition. A spout of flame licked hungrily upwards from the tip of the warstaff, and Ignatious brought the weapon's massive metal frame around his body with a inhuman speed - crashing it horizontally against the knight's frame and crumpling the man's body and armour with a sickening wrench of metal and cracking shatter of spine.
Ignatious stepped over the man's lifeless body without concern, rounding now on the final guard - his sword drawn and held out in front of him with shaking hands. Briefly, in the back of his mind Ignatious considered letting the man live. He had not attacked Ignatious yet - and was no doubt merely wishing to protect and serve his liege lord. Loyalty was a trait he admired in his humans after all.
But The Pyromancer had been unleashed now, and there would be no considerations for the preservation of assets until the Pyromancer had been appeased.
Ignatious reached out with his left hand - feeling out through the space between them with his mind - probing for the man's body through through arcana - muttering the incantations softly as he did so. The steel in the last knight's armour made him easy to find, and the fear radiating from him like a stench made his body's natural magical defenses easy to overcome. Ignatious effortlessly lifted the man - armour plate and cloaked - three feet into the air. The man whimpered in surprise his fear now running out from him in heavy waves. Ignatious savored the man's powerlessness for a second. Then another.
Then the Pyromancer ignited the man; he began to scream.
The room filled with firelight once again, this time an oppressively wall of heat and light that filled every corner of the room and chased the shadows of the room into the deepest shallows and corners. The room's panicked increased, as the remaining inhabitants justled and screamed as they nearly trampled each other in their selfish escape from the pyromancer and his flames. Some of the room's inhabitants had already succumbed to flames and smoke and were now slumped over each other lifelessly on the ground or crawling along the floor aimlessly as whimpering bags of cindering clothing and melting skin. The majority were screaming in panic as they slipped through the double doors behind Ignatious, the heavy black smoke pouring through the archway behind them.
But Ignatious simply watched the knight burn as the poor souls' body was kept levitated in the air with a negligible fraction of the Alvain's power. At some point the knight had stopped screaming, either because the man had given into shock and unconsciousness or the flames had simply seared off his remaining nerve endings and he no longer felt their burning kiss. It didn't matter. Ignatious took no joy in the suffering of humans. No more than he took joy in their happiness at any rate. No... the pyromancer merely watched as his flames danced along the man's body, confusing his flesh and cloth and twisting the melting slags of his armour into a dripping pool of molten metal beneath him.
It was beautiful. It was always beautiful.
Ignatious watched the display for a time - either a heartbeat or an eternity, he knew not which. But when the flames had had their fill and retreated from the knight's charred husk the burning power inside Ignatious has simmered down to a slow boil as well.
Ignatious sighed deeply, suddenly feeling the fatigue of the past few weeks settle in. This release was good. He had needed it.
He turned his attention back to room before him. The entire left wall was engulfed in flames, the heavy tapestry cascading down it's length an orgy of fuel for the inferno he had unleashed. Flames and dark sinister smoke swirled around the room - the heavy wooden frame of the tower's ceiling groaning from the heat. But within his seal armoured the pyromancer was at peace.
Ignatious' gaze fell upon the sihoutte of a man at the back of the room, coughing and pressed up against the back wall, his features obscured by unmistakable through the smog.
"Lord Stanier. it would have been wiser for you to have fled with the rest of your advisors." Ignatious strode slowly towards the Lord of Genovia Cross, the weakened floorboard's beneath his heavy form wheeping in protest from his weight. Ignatious approached the long, heavy table between himself and Stanier, and with a single hand he lifted it's end off the ground and hurled it's immense frame against the flame infested wall to his left. The table shattered on impact, cracking with an explosion to rival thunder as flaming wooden shrapnel hurled out to patter harmlessly against the pyromancer's armour. Lord Stanier was not so fortunate however, and yelped with pain as a piece of flaming debris found it's mark in his thigh. With nothing between them now, Ignatious closed the distance across the room with a few strides of his long legs.
Lord Stanier gasped for air amidst choking on the soot and smoke now coating every surface of the room. Tossing his frantic attention rapidly from the wooden steak now impaled in his right left, to the advancing armoured pyromancer approaching him rapidly, and the wideset open window he was half pressed against in consideration of escape. Ignatious almost laughed at the idea. They had climbed at least a hundred stairs to reach the top of this tower and the window Stanier was pressed against opened out high above the battlements below them. A good seventy foot drop at least - more than enough to ensure a fatal fall and a slow death.
But the lord of Genovia Cross had just seen what the pyromancer was capable of, and was no doubt only a few moments away from deciding which form of death was better than the other, but Ignatious was upon the man before he could make his decision. Ignatious wrapped his massive hand around the man's bird-like neck and lifted his weight off the ground like it was nothing. Ignatious stared into the man's eyes... they were cold, grey and filled with the panic and fear that all men had when they knew they were in their final minutes.
Lord Stanier's hands flailed helplessly against Ignatious' arm, his fingernails scraping against the pearl white paint of his armored forearm. The man stuttered a few sounds through his suffocation - getting only a handful of syllables out before Ignatious could slowly choke them away.
"P-please.... I'm... s-s-sorry..."
Ignatious shook his head. A slow purposeful movement that held none of the anger and rage he had unleashed only a few moments ago. There was a time when this might have been personal for Ignatious. When the thought of tearing the doors down on the arrogant human nobility to rip them screaming and burning from their stone bunkers. Ignatious had dreamed of such moments in the past - even dreamt about them at time. But now he just felt numb to the pointlessness of the ordeal. The whole experience was rather... disappointing.
"I'm afraid the time for deference and appeasement has passed Lord Stanier. Your opportunities to remedy the situation have been exhausted and it is now clean to me that a change in leadership is required in Genovia Cross."
Ignatious released his grip by a fraction, just enough to let Stanier speak. The man's face was now brihgt red and his eyes were bloodshot and bulging. He even had tears streaming down the side of his face now. "How curious," Ignatious thought.
"P-please.... my lord... don't.... don't do this." Each syllable seemed to cost Stanier a portion of oxygeon that he was rapidly in short supply of. Between each word the man's mouth was opening and closing like a stupid fish run up against hte shore. He was dying and he knew it. Ignatious tightened his grip.
"P-please... I have... a family. M-my... son." The tears were now flowing freely down Stanier's face, the burning inferno of flames that now surrounded them reflected on their surface like they were tiny glass mirrors. It was beautiful.
"Then I hope for you family's sake the new Lord of Genovia Cross is more prepared for his responsibilities than his late father."
Stanier was now kicking wildly at ignatious, his feed bouncing feebly against his thick steel plate, fighting against the certainly of a the death now promised to him.
"Goodbye Lord Stanier."
Ignatious reached out in his mind, once again nudging the cracking electricty deep in his chest. The inferno was still there, napping sluggishly after it's recent expenditure - but it roared to life within him at it's beckon, filling his body and limbs with the same intoxicating power and vitality as before.
The flame at the end of Ignatious' staff was now fully ignited, blasting forth with a white hot intensity that drowned out even the burning room around them.
Stanier screamed as he burned.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
A dozen knights stood at the bottom of the staircase of the north tower in Genovia Cross, their swords drawn and ready, and shields raised towards the stairs. The long ceremonial capes the knights ussually wore had been removed, and were now pooled among themselves in haphazard islands of fine cloth in scattered collections of cloth on the hall's polished stone floors. Osfrid looked nervously from the knights in front of him to the hall's large archy way to his back. He had sent a servant to summon the Lord's reserve bodyguards, the gate guards, and the east tower's garrison - but even then he didn't think it would be enough. Osfrid made sure to keep as many of the knights between himself and the staircase as possible. Each of the men was a trained warrior - sworn and prepared to give their life in defense of thier lord and lands. But Osfrid has seen how the Alvain moved through the knights at the tower's height. He saw the man shatter steel with his bare hands and ignite two of the lord's bodyguard in a single moment. Osfird could still hear their screaming but that wasn't what made his hands keep shaking. No - it was the smell that was doing that. The unmistakable smell of burning flesh slung to the inside of his nostril like an invasive layer of soot and brine. Each breath of air he took in filled his lungs with the crackling flesh and bone. Osfrid had tried to breath through his nose instead, hoping that if he did so he could escape the haunting smell.
Instead he could taste it.
Osfrid took another long breath of air through his nose. Setting himself to stop his trembling hands from shaking and considering how foolish it would look if he were to empty his stomach in the middle of the hall right now. Poor Millie had polished the floor just this past 4th - she would have a fit if he was to vomit on her floor now.
Osfrid laughed. A short high pitched yelp of a laugh that surprised him and drew the curious glance of the two knight's closest to him. "Have I gone mad?" Osfrid thought? He hoped not, but considering what he had witnessed in the tower just ten minutes prior it was a possibility worth considering at a later time. "If you get a later time" Osfrid correct himself.
Yes, quite possible mad.
Osfrid returned his attention to the room around him, the guards each engaged with each other in a well-practiced defensive position. Their swords were all angled towards the base of the narrow stone staircase - ready to stab forward as a single unit should the Alvain assailant prove to have somehow surivved the inferno he had unleashed. "Perhaps he simply flew away? Or perhaps he hopped off the top of the tower and is already on his way back to Alvantes? Can his kind fly? For the life of him Osfrid couldn't remember. He was certain he knew the answer, but for some reason he just couldn't stack the thoughts together properly in his head. It was if the world disarranged itself in the last few minutes and he was suddenly a stranger in a new country.
It suddenly occurred to Osfird that he didn't really have a reason to be there anymore. He was not a warrior, nor was he a general. He had done what could have been expected of him. He ran and gathered the knights he could - even thought that summon the reinforcements while the other of the lord's advisors were content to scramble and flee for the perceived safety of their own person guards. Osfrid could leave... He could even slip out the back quietly, the knight's attention was focused intently on the stairway before them. If anyone asked he could simply say he left to check on the reinforcements. I mean... what more could they expect from him? If the alvain was capable of both unleashing the horror on the north tower and surviving it and cutting his way through the dozen guards that sat between... Godess knows Osfrid certainly wouldn't be able to stop the armored behemoth.
Clang.... Clang... Clang...
The sound echoed down the staircase. The knights raised their shields in tense anticpation. "This can't be possible." Osfrid thought.
But the sound grew louder.
Clang.... Clang... Clang...
It immistakbel. THe heavy methodic ringing of that accursed alf's armor. The heavy clang of metal on stone with each step and strike of his murdeous weapon.
Clang.... Clang... Clang...
The Alvain was coming. He was alive and he was going to murder last one of them in this fucking castle.
Clang.... Clang... Clang...
"Why are you still here?" The more sensible part of Osfrid's mind asked him. Osfrid didn't reply. He may have gone mad but that didn't' mean he was just going to give in and start talking to himself.
Clang.... Clang... Clang...
The steps were closer now, he was surely about to round the final bend. This was his chance to leave. His last chance to live. But he stayed, his ash covered feet either unwiling or unable to unroot him from this spot. He wanted to be. He had to be sure. Ignatious had to be dead.
Clang.
The sound stopped. The alvain had reached the bottom of the stairs and was no doubt concealed it he deep shadow that permeated the staircase beyond the faint torch of the hall's lighting. The knights between the stairwell and Osrid shuffled slightly - a tense and nervous energy that seemed to almost scream in rhyme with the similar silence in the north tower.
Then the shadow moved, and Osfrid realized in horror that Ignatious was not concealed in the deep shadows of the stairwell - he simple was the shadow. A massive black form shuffled slowly into the hall. A towering suit of nightblack armor wielding a massive warstaff that swayed forward with the man with a visible weight. Ignatious' once pearl-white plate armor was now coated in a thick layer of black-grey ash, gibing him a haunting shapeless figure of soft black. The massive alvain strode slowly forward, his pace the slow and purposeful stalk of death itself - his expression unreadbale behind the steel helmet that conceal his face.
Every inch of the man's armour was chalky and black. Expect for his his eyes. The lenses on his helmet were thin and sharp, but they glowed faintly orange - like the last lingering embers of smoldering fire.
The knights closest to Ignatious took a half step backwards. The another. Their swords were drawn and pointed but the order to attack was not given. The hall was filled with a silence that olly Ingatious' heavy mettalic breaths seemed to fill. Osfrid knew at that moment that if he lived throughtonight he woudl hear those breaths in his dreams until the day that he died.
A knight at the flank of the formation tire gus eyes from Ignatious to glance apprehensively at his peers. A few returned the glance with nervous consideration. It suddenly occured to Osfrid that these men would not - could not - bring themsleves to bring their sword against an alvain. Even one that had jsut gruesomely murdered a half dozen of thier kin. "Obedience will be our downfall," Osfrid throught.
Whether Ignatious realized this truth about the armed men before him, or simply bore no concern about the deadly threat of their blades, Osfrid coudl not be sure. But Ignatious merely looked down at his soiled armor and patted himself clumsily with his left hand, stirring a thin cloud of soot and ash into the air around him. A knight coughed quietly, a violation of the oath of silence the entire room seemed to be apart of.
"Manservant." Ignatious croaked. A low guttural growl that somehow sounded both regal and barbaric at the same time.
"Y-yes my Lord." Osfrid responded, almost impulsively.
"I request your forgiveness, but in all of the excitement earlier I seem to have forgotten your name."
Osfrid simply stared at the Alvain, his mouth hanging half open with confusion and disbelief. Perhaps he was madder than he thought?
"M-my name, m'lord?"
Ignatious nodded slowly. The knights between them lowered their swords a fraction of an inch.
"My name is Osfrid. If it pleases you."
What possible reason could he want to know this? Why doesn't he just kill us already?
"Osfird. Yes. I remember now. Thank you." Ignatious strode slowly forward, passing his way through the thickest portion of the knight's formation, each of the men-at-arms circling slowly out of his but still with their swords drawn. Ignatious continued to close the distance, seemingly oblivious to or uninterested in the knight's intent.
"Osfrid, am I to understand that in the absence of the Lord of Genevoia Cross, it is yourself who is in charge of this land's administration?" Ignatious asked with surprising air of curiosity.
"M-me my lord? I mean... for certain matter I suppose. But for military concerns the matter would be -" Ignatious sileneced Osfrid with a wave of his hand.
"No matter Osfrid, your consideration for duty will suffice for now."
Osfrid swallowed, and he considered yet again whether it woudl be appropriate for him to throw up right now.
"I regret to inform you all that Lord Stanier has been found guilty of dereliction of his duties and been executated on suspicion for holding sympathies with enemies of the Alvain Loyalist Alliance."
The knights surrounding Ignatious gasped in despair, raising their blades up once again and stepping a half inch closer to the alvian. Osfrid wished they would stop.
"I'm sorry to hear of... of Lord Stanier's... condition... Lord Ignatious pre Virtutem."
Ignatious sighed heavily. A raspy metallic sound that made the singed hair on the back of Osfrid's neck stand up. "Under the hereditary inheritance laws of Genovia Cross and The Kingdom of Astoria, it his the lord's oldest son who is now in charge of the demesne of Genovia Cross, is it not?
Osfrid nodded. "Yes. He is but a boy though. Only his eleventh winter."
"Of course. But I understand you humans grow up rather quickly, don't you ?" Osfrid had no idea how he was supposed to respond to that. So he just nodded. Thankfully that seemed to appease the alvain.
"Since the new Lord of Genova Cross will no doubt require time to grieve the death of his late father, I think it best that I leave my instructions with you Osfrid."
"Your... instructions... sir?"
"Yes," Ignatious replied patiently, "the instructions I came all the way to Genova Cross to delver myself."
Osfird nodded sharply, the knot in the pit of his stomach slowly loosening. Perhaps he doesn't intend to kill us after all...
Ignatious spoke, slowly and clearly to ensure the entire room could hear him. "The Grand Marshall believes we are in the stages of this war, and an aggressive push now will mean we have the opportunity to end this treasonous rebellion now instead of in the next decade. Do you understand me so far Osfrid?"
He nodded slowly.
"Genova Cross has missed fourteen of the last twenty two quotas. This is detrimental to the war effort and must be remedied at once."
Osfrid nodded again.
"If Genova Cross fails to meet its obligations to it's countrymen, the alvain, and the Grand Marshall - I will return here myself and replace the new Lord Stanier with someone who can meet this land's obligations."
Osfrid nodded. The knights around him had lowered their swords to their waists.
Ignatious began his purposeful march again, strolling past Osfrid and leaving him and the dozen knights behind - a dense trail of ash and soot tailing behind the alvain as he made his way to the hall's exit. The room's inhabitants simply walked the man leave, seemingly incapable of mustering the will to even offer to pretense of protest of his violation of their home. Right before he exited through the archway Ignatious stopped - and Osfrid felt himself and the knights to his side tense up immediately.
But Ignatious merely turned her black-scarred masks and set his glowering amber eyes on Osfird. "I will see you again Osfrid. I trust for your sake it will be under more polite circumstances than this."
Ingatious left, leaving nothing behind but his trail of ashen footprints and the heavy mettalic clang of his armour fadiing down the hallway.
Then - suddenly and with little warning - Osfrid puked.
Comments