It started off with a man named Shah.
A man of grand stature. His gaze was known to pierce through the worlds. Gruff in all the right places, his voice rang out in the dark purple ash of his people. The Drakos. His roar was anticipated with fear in Arkadios. There was no man who could best him in a fight. The mere presence of him was enough to destabilize men and women alike. Shah would take what he wanted, whenever he deemed fit. It was his right. The people despised him, but one look from those piercing purple eyes sent them melting, enthralled by his gift.
War has become normalcy in Arkadios. And Shah was the spearhead, splitting the air at mach wind, rushing the charge of his bloody carnal change. All of Arkadios would be for him and his clan. He had a responsibility to his people. They were a dying breed. For thousands of years, The Drakos had been tortured and hunted for their shapeshifting properties. How could a noble breed such as themselves have fallen into such humiliating disarray? How had they let this happen to themselves?
No more. It was time to finish this War, this Campaign, to free his people once and for all.
It was a dark, stormy night out on the rocky fields of the Plainar Largt. The silver sheers and golden sparks of metal crushing metal rang out, reverberating against the rocks of the land like a harbinger of the apocalypse. Thousands of body's lay crushed and flailed, the few hundred still fighting exhausted. Their breath labourious, heavy in their throats, stuck in the humid bog encapsulating them in their helmets. Between their visors, their vision started to fail them at night. Only their survival was in sight. That's the only thing that matters... right? A great giant crunch rang out, silver and blinding, before an ear piercing roar rent the earth beneath the opposing forces in twine.
Shah's right hand had been severed from his wrist. HIS HAND. The mark of HIS PEOPLE, split from HIS BODY. His rage spilled out from between his lips, coated in a ghastly ashy dark purple spit. He threw a spiteful glare up at his assailant. His owner.
A woman. With hair of pale white.
A hint of a radiant smirk shone bright beneath her mouth guard, as she peered down at Shah in mocking contempt. Her armour mirroring that of her smile, a pure white with not a even a scratch nor a dent spoiling it's brilliance. Except, of course, for the top of her helmet, ripped off by the 'Oh so Powerful' Dragon beneath her blade.
"I'll gouge that PUTRID fools gold from your eyes you filth." Shah spat out in disdain between gritting teeth.
"Oh how I'd love to see you try, Dragon." the tall woman in white mocked, snorting in disgust. She would finish what he started. Why should she care about anything this thing had to say. He had slaughtered thousands of her people in this misguided War. Started over what? Ancestral trifles? She wasn't her great great great grandparents. SHE didn't commit any of those atrocities.
The bundle of contorted musculature beneath her puffed and groaned in pain. What a shame that it had to come to this. Look at how his hair was matted and tangled. Look at his beard, once sheered short and well kempt, now a scraggly mess atop this shell of a man... No, not a man. She must remember, that this is a Dragon. The likes of which Arkadios had never seen before.
"Any last words, Dragon?" Her voice soared out against the rocks, reflecting back into Shah's eyes, blinding in their sheen of gold.
"Phah... Haha... Ha...." His laughs were labourious. Thunderous. The ground shook beneath them.
"No, FUCK THIS!" The tall women cried out, the look in her eyes shifting to nervous desperation. Past lives flashed at the back of her mind, warning her to kill this THING right at this moment, before it was too late. She clenched her fists around the handle of her sword, the one she was sworn to by The King himself. A short plunging force would be all that it took.
Why? Why then does she still hesitate??
Slowly Shah glanced up, his eyes narrowing into a smirk. An ashy plume of purple smoke oozed out between his jaws as his laughs reached a fever pitch. "You won't do shit, my Love. You were always too weak. HAH, as if I'd let you anyway!" Shah reeled back in a fit of laughter, mouth agape, the smoke billowing out onto the hard stone beneath him from his exposed vocal cavity.
The White Knight winced, pain and betrayal painted obviously against her face. Her brows furrowed up into a bundle of fury as tears welled up under her eyes, blinding her glow.
Her gut wrenched. A sound resembling that of a mother losing her new born child extracted deep from within her diaphragm burst out, foreign to her as she moved on instinct, driving the tip of her sword in-between the mandibles of the monstrous man, once as grand as a God in her head, now only in tatters on the ground before her. She clenched shut her eyes, tears stinging her blind. Once this is over, everything would be back to normal. This was the only recompense for her Sins. The only way that she and her new family could live in peac-
A confident crunch crashed against her ear drums. The White Knight's eyes shot open wide. She stumbled. Her balance was lost. She was dead. She has to be. There's no other answer. Her gaze met that of the Man in front of her. His eyes ablaze with a glow so brightly purple that she didn't clock that the metal of the tip of her sword was being gnashed between his silver fangs.
The gaze that drew her to him in the first place was now looking back at her again. Without malice, again. Like old times... again.
And just like that, in a flash of lighting, sparked by her reminder that he was alone in this world full of weaker beings, Shah towered over her once again. A Drakos once again. Skin scaled once again. Just like the first time. In that cold dark alley, escaping from the Royal Guard. What had become of them? Fighting each other like strangers in this putrid world.
The White Knight, was stunned to silence, entranced by the grace and elegance by which he dominated the space around him with which, just moments before, he had been humbled upon.
"I'm sorry." the words pillowed out in jet purple puffs of smoke from Shah's lips. "I didn't want to do this. You understand, don't you? Why don't you get up." He demanded. And it was so. Her legs moved on their own. And at once, she was up. She clenched her jaw tight. Fearing that it was the only thing she could still keep in her command.
"You disgust me." she spat at his exposed chest, her saliva sizzling into vapour as it splattered against his scales.
"I know." Shah responded, resigned, sorrow shrouding his tail. "You hate me. You berate me." He took a step closer, slowly reaching out with a claw outstretched. The tip of his talon pressed against the bottom of her chin, gently he raising her head, looking deep down into her eyes, now a clear pool of orange red fire. "Your eyes were always so striking."
"I should strike you down, right now." Her jaw was sore from clenching so hard. The heat from his mere claw radiating through her body, she was weak to his influence. She didn't want to do what she was meant to.
"Why don't you then?" A soft retort from her man. When was the last time she had heard him say that? Her knees had gone weak. "You have to kill me." A silver bullet to her brain, her heart retaliates.
"Let me go..." A pale yellow plead from between her lips rested against the crux of his claw wrapping itself around him, gently pulling his hand back from her jaw.
"I can see it in your eyes, you know." Shah mocked as he watched her pry his talon from her face. "I see the malice burning from your corneas. You've always been so easy to read."
"And you've always been a fucking creep." Her eyes indeed burning with the pure red hatred that he had spoke into existence.
"Then, why don't you strike me down. Now." The command rang out louder and more beautiful than anything she had ever heard before. The most brilliant royal purple. His scales shimmered shamelessly, dazzling her with their corruption. And before long, just like that, they were gone.
And just like that, a man stood before her.
Her man.
Her man. Just like he had looked back then.
Her man. With that mischievous grin like he was still running away from the Royal Guard with her in tow, being dragged along through the dregs of humanities filth.
. . .
"And THUS she was COMPELLED. And THUS her great sword SUNG. And THUS she felled the great DREAD BEAST. Our Knight in White, Santa Maria, had been born under much strife. She was then and there brought into HOLY COMMUNION with GOD. The prize of Victory risen atop the spearhead of her SHATTERED sword."
The crier rang out, preaching to the choir.
"The Severed head of Shah the Vanquisher."
. . .
Her eyes snapped open as her body shot upright in bed. She gasped for air, her skin slick in a cold sweat, her dark ashy purple hair plastered in matted strands against her forehead and shoulders. She heaved in the heavy lukewarm oppression of the Arastrian night. She was safe, in bed. A crooning voice called up to her from the floor below in a lush soft pink haze.
"Dinner's ready, Nahna!"
The words calmed her unsteady heart. The waves of nausea she had been feeling upon waking seemed to be settling. It must have been a dream. Nahna had always had excruciatingly vivid dreams. It didn't matter. As long as she could brush them off the next day. It didn't matter.
Groggy she shifted under her blankets, reaching over with her left hand to pull the sweat soaked sheets off her body. A singe of pain twinged at the back of her hand. She recoiled in pain, her stifled yelp rushing her vision with that oh so familiar entanglement of dazzling yellow and precious purple.
She gazed down at the back of her hand in apprehension, afraid of what she would find.
And time stood still. Fear driven into her heart like a stake to a vampire's.
The brand of her Clan. On the back of her hand. It was clear as day. Still singing. Her flesh still raw with sizzling death.
Her dream was real. And her Father was dead.
Chapter 1 End
A man of grand stature. His gaze was known to pierce through the worlds. Gruff in all the right places, his voice rang out in the dark purple ash of his people. The Drakos. His roar was anticipated with fear in Arkadios. There was no man who could best him in a fight. The mere presence of him was enough to destabilize men and women alike. Shah would take what he wanted, whenever he deemed fit. It was his right. The people despised him, but one look from those piercing purple eyes sent them melting, enthralled by his gift.
War has become normalcy in Arkadios. And Shah was the spearhead, splitting the air at mach wind, rushing the charge of his bloody carnal change. All of Arkadios would be for him and his clan. He had a responsibility to his people. They were a dying breed. For thousands of years, The Drakos had been tortured and hunted for their shapeshifting properties. How could a noble breed such as themselves have fallen into such humiliating disarray? How had they let this happen to themselves?
No more. It was time to finish this War, this Campaign, to free his people once and for all.
It was a dark, stormy night out on the rocky fields of the Plainar Largt. The silver sheers and golden sparks of metal crushing metal rang out, reverberating against the rocks of the land like a harbinger of the apocalypse. Thousands of body's lay crushed and flailed, the few hundred still fighting exhausted. Their breath labourious, heavy in their throats, stuck in the humid bog encapsulating them in their helmets. Between their visors, their vision started to fail them at night. Only their survival was in sight. That's the only thing that matters... right? A great giant crunch rang out, silver and blinding, before an ear piercing roar rent the earth beneath the opposing forces in twine.
Shah's right hand had been severed from his wrist. HIS HAND. The mark of HIS PEOPLE, split from HIS BODY. His rage spilled out from between his lips, coated in a ghastly ashy dark purple spit. He threw a spiteful glare up at his assailant. His owner.
A woman. With hair of pale white.
A hint of a radiant smirk shone bright beneath her mouth guard, as she peered down at Shah in mocking contempt. Her armour mirroring that of her smile, a pure white with not a even a scratch nor a dent spoiling it's brilliance. Except, of course, for the top of her helmet, ripped off by the 'Oh so Powerful' Dragon beneath her blade.
"I'll gouge that PUTRID fools gold from your eyes you filth." Shah spat out in disdain between gritting teeth.
"Oh how I'd love to see you try, Dragon." the tall woman in white mocked, snorting in disgust. She would finish what he started. Why should she care about anything this thing had to say. He had slaughtered thousands of her people in this misguided War. Started over what? Ancestral trifles? She wasn't her great great great grandparents. SHE didn't commit any of those atrocities.
The bundle of contorted musculature beneath her puffed and groaned in pain. What a shame that it had to come to this. Look at how his hair was matted and tangled. Look at his beard, once sheered short and well kempt, now a scraggly mess atop this shell of a man... No, not a man. She must remember, that this is a Dragon. The likes of which Arkadios had never seen before.
"Any last words, Dragon?" Her voice soared out against the rocks, reflecting back into Shah's eyes, blinding in their sheen of gold.
"Phah... Haha... Ha...." His laughs were labourious. Thunderous. The ground shook beneath them.
"No, FUCK THIS!" The tall women cried out, the look in her eyes shifting to nervous desperation. Past lives flashed at the back of her mind, warning her to kill this THING right at this moment, before it was too late. She clenched her fists around the handle of her sword, the one she was sworn to by The King himself. A short plunging force would be all that it took.
Why? Why then does she still hesitate??
Slowly Shah glanced up, his eyes narrowing into a smirk. An ashy plume of purple smoke oozed out between his jaws as his laughs reached a fever pitch. "You won't do shit, my Love. You were always too weak. HAH, as if I'd let you anyway!" Shah reeled back in a fit of laughter, mouth agape, the smoke billowing out onto the hard stone beneath him from his exposed vocal cavity.
The White Knight winced, pain and betrayal painted obviously against her face. Her brows furrowed up into a bundle of fury as tears welled up under her eyes, blinding her glow.
Her gut wrenched. A sound resembling that of a mother losing her new born child extracted deep from within her diaphragm burst out, foreign to her as she moved on instinct, driving the tip of her sword in-between the mandibles of the monstrous man, once as grand as a God in her head, now only in tatters on the ground before her. She clenched shut her eyes, tears stinging her blind. Once this is over, everything would be back to normal. This was the only recompense for her Sins. The only way that she and her new family could live in peac-
A confident crunch crashed against her ear drums. The White Knight's eyes shot open wide. She stumbled. Her balance was lost. She was dead. She has to be. There's no other answer. Her gaze met that of the Man in front of her. His eyes ablaze with a glow so brightly purple that she didn't clock that the metal of the tip of her sword was being gnashed between his silver fangs.
The gaze that drew her to him in the first place was now looking back at her again. Without malice, again. Like old times... again.
And just like that, in a flash of lighting, sparked by her reminder that he was alone in this world full of weaker beings, Shah towered over her once again. A Drakos once again. Skin scaled once again. Just like the first time. In that cold dark alley, escaping from the Royal Guard. What had become of them? Fighting each other like strangers in this putrid world.
The White Knight, was stunned to silence, entranced by the grace and elegance by which he dominated the space around him with which, just moments before, he had been humbled upon.
"I'm sorry." the words pillowed out in jet purple puffs of smoke from Shah's lips. "I didn't want to do this. You understand, don't you? Why don't you get up." He demanded. And it was so. Her legs moved on their own. And at once, she was up. She clenched her jaw tight. Fearing that it was the only thing she could still keep in her command.
"You disgust me." she spat at his exposed chest, her saliva sizzling into vapour as it splattered against his scales.
"I know." Shah responded, resigned, sorrow shrouding his tail. "You hate me. You berate me." He took a step closer, slowly reaching out with a claw outstretched. The tip of his talon pressed against the bottom of her chin, gently he raising her head, looking deep down into her eyes, now a clear pool of orange red fire. "Your eyes were always so striking."
"I should strike you down, right now." Her jaw was sore from clenching so hard. The heat from his mere claw radiating through her body, she was weak to his influence. She didn't want to do what she was meant to.
"Why don't you then?" A soft retort from her man. When was the last time she had heard him say that? Her knees had gone weak. "You have to kill me." A silver bullet to her brain, her heart retaliates.
"Let me go..." A pale yellow plead from between her lips rested against the crux of his claw wrapping itself around him, gently pulling his hand back from her jaw.
"I can see it in your eyes, you know." Shah mocked as he watched her pry his talon from her face. "I see the malice burning from your corneas. You've always been so easy to read."
"And you've always been a fucking creep." Her eyes indeed burning with the pure red hatred that he had spoke into existence.
"Then, why don't you strike me down. Now." The command rang out louder and more beautiful than anything she had ever heard before. The most brilliant royal purple. His scales shimmered shamelessly, dazzling her with their corruption. And before long, just like that, they were gone.
And just like that, a man stood before her.
Her man.
Her man. Just like he had looked back then.
Her man. With that mischievous grin like he was still running away from the Royal Guard with her in tow, being dragged along through the dregs of humanities filth.
. . .
"And THUS she was COMPELLED. And THUS her great sword SUNG. And THUS she felled the great DREAD BEAST. Our Knight in White, Santa Maria, had been born under much strife. She was then and there brought into HOLY COMMUNION with GOD. The prize of Victory risen atop the spearhead of her SHATTERED sword."
The crier rang out, preaching to the choir.
"The Severed head of Shah the Vanquisher."
. . .
Her eyes snapped open as her body shot upright in bed. She gasped for air, her skin slick in a cold sweat, her dark ashy purple hair plastered in matted strands against her forehead and shoulders. She heaved in the heavy lukewarm oppression of the Arastrian night. She was safe, in bed. A crooning voice called up to her from the floor below in a lush soft pink haze.
"Dinner's ready, Nahna!"
The words calmed her unsteady heart. The waves of nausea she had been feeling upon waking seemed to be settling. It must have been a dream. Nahna had always had excruciatingly vivid dreams. It didn't matter. As long as she could brush them off the next day. It didn't matter.
Groggy she shifted under her blankets, reaching over with her left hand to pull the sweat soaked sheets off her body. A singe of pain twinged at the back of her hand. She recoiled in pain, her stifled yelp rushing her vision with that oh so familiar entanglement of dazzling yellow and precious purple.
She gazed down at the back of her hand in apprehension, afraid of what she would find.
And time stood still. Fear driven into her heart like a stake to a vampire's.
The brand of her Clan. On the back of her hand. It was clear as day. Still singing. Her flesh still raw with sizzling death.
Her dream was real. And her Father was dead.
Chapter 1 End
