The Chaos Gate
Chapter One: The Servant Girl's Fate
Demon of the Sky
The young woman entered the room as quietly as the old cottage door would allow and was assured she had avoided notice when the five men continued their discussion undisturbed and quickly hid herself behind a few mead barrels to listen in. “This information should fetch me some decent treatment from the Mistress, maybe even the leftovers from her meals,” the servant girl thought, rubbing her stomach in anticipation.
Being a servant in a country Manor, she was treated and even fed according to the value of her services. She had seen others starve and die under such a system, unable to properly please their Mistress or Master. Information on, or rather the secrets of, opposing or important parties was often a viable source of appeasement and servants were often sent directly for spying purposes.
“Are you mad? You actually wish for me to patrol that cursed place?” one of the men said, his voice trembling slightly.
“Are you turning tail, Mardigan?” another chimed in, a sneer in his voice.
“You dare suggest cowardice when you're so quick to volunteer another mans' life!” The first man shouted, banging his fist on the table so hard the servant girl had to fight down a surprised squeak. An argument erupted between the the two men and it seemed as if they were close to coming to blows. The servant girl was absorbing every bit of it with a pleasant smile.
“A rift between the Five Keepers! To the abyss with her leftovers, I'll be dining with her, maybe even share her quarters once more!” Another loud bang on the table shook her from the pleasing reverie.
“Cease this useless fighting at once! You're quickly losing sight of the purpose behind this meeting and I will not stand for it!” The heated breaths of the angered men slowed and eventually turned to grumbles of acceptance as they slid their chairs back up to the table. “These are dark times we face gentleman, let us do so with calm and dignity.”
“My apologies, Gaza.”
“My apologies as well, the tension seems to be getting the best of us.”
The servant girl shuddered. “Dead Steps Gaza...” Leader of a five man band of mercenaries known simply as the Keepers. While he was revered by the common people who knew only of his protection she knew the truth behind the facade. Everything she had learned from late night deals in the beds of his maids had painted a picture that was anything but heroic. She would have been sick at the thought of her village being protected by such a bloodthirsty man if he didn't do such a good job of it.
“It's understandable given the gravity of the situation, however we cannot afford to make rash decisions in these trying times.” Gaza pushed his chair back from the table and stood, stroking his hairless chin. “Things certainly have been getting worse in recent years have they not?” A general murmur of consensus rose from the men at the table. “At the rate the occurrences are increasing the five of us here will no longer be enough to protect this town, even using the more able villagers as reserves.” The silence from the men at the table was deafening. “I submit to you gentlemen, that if the occurrences do not cease after the Blood Letting on tomorrows eve, that we abandon this village and head for Cartha.”
The servant girl's gasp was far louder then she would have liked but thankfully it appeared to have gone unnoticed. “Abandon! Without the Keepers we have no hope of lasting a month!” Another thought struck as the information she had just gleaned was absorbed. “Blood Letting? I've never heard of such a thing.” She was quickly beginning to wonder if she was getting more information then was wanted and she would have fled if it would not mean a swift and brutal punishment from her Mistress.
“Ah yes, it is that time of year, I'd nearly forgotten... or wish I had rather. My sleep is still haunted from that poor girl's screams,” one of the men commented. She could hear him shake himself for composure. “Ah, that reminds me, who is it to supply the offering this year?”
“It falls to Lady Maxima this year, she tells me she's already chosen one of her servants for the sacrifice,” Gaza answered in a flat, emotionless voice. “The girl should be arriving here tonight.”
The servant girl was struck cold as the words of her Mistress telling her of the meeting and that she was expected to attend repeated over and over in her mind. What she had mistaken as a request for secrets had really been an order to go and be taken for some cruel ritual. “Mistress... how could you... I must flee from here!” All pretense of stealth left her as the fear gripped her heart. She quickly gathered herself up and made for the door and her freedom, but it was not to be. The instant her hand found the latch she could feel the presence behind her.
“Or perhaps she's already here.” Gaza's words drifted lazily over her shoulder. She didn't even have time to wonder how he had come to be so close so quickly before a blade passed within a hair's breadth of her neck, the tip coming to rest against the door. “Why do you run girl?” His voice was like cold steel.
A single tear slid down her cheek as she answered simply, “You mean to kill me.”
“That's simply not true my dear girl. You are to die, that much is certain, but with a glorious purpose, one far beyond that which a servant such as yourself could dream. As a sacrifice to the darkness that stalks these lands, your flesh will pay for the lives of all that live here. Is not a death such as this something to be accepted with pride and dignity?”
His vainglorious words rang on deaf ears, and only served to add fire to the cornered girl. “You dare speak of pride when you have every intention of running like a coward and leaving innocent people to die!” Her tears now streamed freely down her face and she began to tremble with anger as the idea of what she had to do resounded within her. She turned slowly, eyes trailing along the blade at her neck to it's source at the back of the man's gauntlet. She did not meet the mans' eyes out of fear of showing him her intentions. “However, I will not run like you.” She held her hands in front of her to show her submission.
“Though I do not appreciate your tongue, servant, I deeply respect your resolve.” He lowered his arm and retracted the blade back into his gauntlet. The servant girls heart was threatening to beat out of her chest as his arms came up to capture her wrists. The moment before he could grab them, she made her move.
She looked up into his eyes and screamed as she brought her hands up to rake her nails down his face as hard as she could, feeling his flesh peel away under the attack. The man reeled back and she threw all her weight into him, taking advantage of his lack of balance to send him crashing backwards over the barrels she had used for cover. Without daring to glance at the other men in the room, she turned and threw open the door and fled into the night, a single thought on her mind.
“Mistress...”
~
Entering the Manor without being seen was easy enough for the servant girl, her duties had regularly forced her to move about without being noticed by others. She quickly made her way to her chambers and cast herself onto the worn pile of straw that was her bed and began to weep bitter tears.
“Ten cycles of my life I devoted to her.. every day, every night, every hour I have served her as best I could!” She pounded both her fists against the straw. “I taught myself to read just so I could speak to her of sweet stories and poetry!” Again she slammed her fists into the makeshift bed. “I-I let her break me before I was ready... and she!” slam “sends!” slam “me!” slam “to be slaughtered!” She lay trembling there, the moon casting an eerie light to her lowered face.
“They'll be coming here to get me,” she said, voice hallow. She reached deep under the straw to remove something and tuck it into the folds of her sleeve. “I want answers before I die.” She stood to leave but paused and turned to a small wooden pedestal and bowed her head to the small carved figure of a winged woman that stood atop it. She raised her head and turned to leave but stopped once again and glanced sideways at the figurine for a long while before walking over and tucking it too into the folds of her sleeves. She took a deep breath and whispered, “protect me,” before stepping out into the hall and towards her former Mistress' chambers.
~
“That little bitch!” Gaza roared, glaring at his marred reflection in the mirror. The servant girls nails had made a mess of his once handsome face. Eight very deep, angry red lines trailed from his forehead to his chin. “When I get my hands on that little bitch she's dead!” he screamed, throwing his arms downwards, causing the blades concealed in his gauntlets to slide free.
“Silence you fool.” Gaza whirled around to glare at the old man who had spoken.
“Watch your tongue old man,” he hissed, extending his arm so the tip of his blade lay inches from the mans throat, “Village Elder or not, I'll take the head of any man who stands between me and my vengeance!” The old man didn't even blink.
“You'll do no such thing.”
“Oh, and why is that?” Gaza sneered.
“There are worse monsters then you out there, Gaza, and you know what they do when someone interferes with their sacrifice.” These words stopped Gaza cold. “You will not touch a single hair on that girls head lest you and the entire village pay the consequences.”
Gaza chose his words carefully before speaking again, much calmer then before. “Has she been found?”
“I sent the other four to retrieve her while the healer tended to your wounds. They should be arriving at Maxima's manner as we speak.”
“Good,” Gaza said, jerking his shoulders to retract the blades back into concealment and turned back to the mirror, “if I can't kill her myself I'll simply enjoy the next best thing.” His ruined face a perfect reflection of the blood lust he felt inside.
~
The servant girl took a short rest outside of her Mistress' quarters to prepare herself for what she was about to do. She took a deep breath, pushed open the doors, and walked into the dimly lit room.
Even in the flickering light of a few near dead candles, the fine quality of the furnishings of the house Mistress' room could easily be seen. Everywhere a person could sit or lay was covered in a thick purple colored silky material that the Mistress adored so much. The writing desk, bed, chairs, everything made from the finest quality wood, and of the best craftsmanship. The bed was especially incredible, it was the softest, most wonderful place the servant girl had ever been. She would have been lost in her memories at the sight of it if not for the nightmare that lay atop it.
“How could you...”
At the foot of the bed, trembling and naked, lay a small, much too thin girl who couldn't be more then fourteen cycles, a small pool of blood had formed between her legs. Leaning against the headboard of the bed lay her sleeping Mistress. Blood, the young girl's virgin blood, was smeared across her perfect breasts and left to dry in the night air. The memories... the nightmares of her own breaking ceremony came fresh to her mind but she shook them away. She did not have time to mourn her broken past, and the horrors before her only furthered her resolve.
Reaching into her sleeve she pulled the curved dagger she kept hidden under her bedding. She screamed like a wild animal, the pain of a lifetime of injustice shattering all restraint. She leaped onto the barely waking Mistress and drove the dagger into the womans stomach all the way to the hilt and twisted it hard. The woman's eyes shot open and a low chocking scream tore through her. The woman's hands made for the knife in her belly but the servant girl grabbed them and pinned them against the headboard.
“Why! Why did you send me to die!” the servant girl screamed, burying her face into the womans neck. “I loved you, I would have done anything for you! Why did you send me to die?!” The woman, seemingly resigned to her fate, took a few ragged breaths, blood trickling from the corner of her mouth, and spoke.
“You have become so very old, I could not lay with you anymore.” The servant girl lifted off the woman so their eyes could meet.
“So you send me to die and take her to your bed... she's but a child!”
The woman smiled grimly. “You should know by now where my desires lay, and that you can no longer fill them. Using you for the Blood Letting was the only way you could continue to ser..” she coughed up a large amount of blood, her eyes beginning to dim, “the only way you could serve me. I thought it would make you... happy.”
The large doors behind them burst open, the servant girl turned to see four of the keepers rush into the room. The man leading them blanched at the sight of the young girl and averted his gaze. “You two, get her off of the Mistress!” one of them directed, “and you, fetch the healer, tell her Lady Maxima has been wounded grievously!” The servant girl was lifted from the dying woman's body and forced onto her knees in front of the bed.
“Tell me girl,” the leading man said, moving around to stand in front of her, his back to the bed. She looked up to see Mardigan, the most reserved of the five, looking down on her. “Do you intend to resist further?”
“No,” the servant girl said quietly, “I told Gaza before, I will not cower from what fate has handed me. There is no longer anything for me here, take me to be sacrificed or whatever, it no longer matters.” The man's eye twitched.
“Very well,” he said, “take her away.”
“Oh, one more thing,” the servant girl managed as she was hauled to her feet, her eyes looking past the man to the bed. “The healer's services will not be needed.” And with those final words, she was dragged from the room, an empty smile on her face.
Mardigan turned to the bed and blanched. The young girl had crawled atop the Mistress' body and was repeatedly plunging the dagger into the womans chest, tears rolling off her cheeks into the wounds.
~
The hard ride while bound and thrown over the back of a horse should have been painful but the servant girl could feel nothing. Worry, fear, pain, she doubted any of those things could lay claim to her anymore. Her whole life had been one form of torture after another and she was beginning to feel that this was how it should end. One final act of cruelty.
She stood now, shackled to a post in the ground at the edge of a massive clearing surrounded by trees. She was looking upwards and standing very still, appearing almost as a statue. So captivated was she by what she saw that everything else seemed as a blur. After all, she had never seen it so close and it took but a quick glance to decide that the stories of those that had completely failed to ascribe the amazement she felt now.
The Chaos Gate. A massive tear in the sky. The swirling inky black pit from which all that was foul came to be. The breeding ground of fell beasts and dark spirits. No common person knew how, why, or when it had appeared, only that it was the source of the misery that gripped them and the madness that threatened to tear the world apart.
Gaza's final words as he had tightened the locks to their limits around her ankle drifted aimlessly in the back of her mind. "I'm going to enjoy watching this. You'll pay for scarring me in a most... delicious way." The memory shook her enough to pull her eyes away from the swirling darkness and noticed that the day had started to wane into the twilight hour. She looked to the edges of the clearing, and could just barely make out the five men laying in wait. Her eyes narrowed.
“Keepers of peace.. such foolishness!” she thought to herself bitterly. “If I wasn't bound here I would..” The thought would never be finished.
A flash of dark purple light emanated from the Gate and spread across the sky around it. The servant girl's eyes locked onto the void, her whole body trembling as the swirling darkness slowed to a halt and a low hum filled the air around her. Brilliant white cracks began to spread across the darkness, a stark contrast against the deep black. The girl's skin prickled and sweat formed on her brow as the hum grew stronger and stronger, vibrating through her body as if to shake her to pieces. She gritted her teeth and forced her gaze to stay on the sky, the cracks now glowing so brightly it hurt to look at them but she had to know what was coming.
It all came to a crescendo with the sudden stop of the vibrations. The silence only lasted a few short seconds before an ear shattering shriek tore it's way from the void and the darkness shattered. The servant girl stared, awestruck, as massive shards of what looked to be black glass riddled the clearing in front of her. Before her mind could wrap itself around the fact that she'd nearly been dashed to pieces, the shards of the black sky melted into an inky pool and dissolved into a thick layer of dust. The shock of even this was not to last as a loud, bestial roar echoed through the sky.
~
“I don't have time for this!”
Thump Thump
'Damn you'
Thump Thump
'This can't be happening... this can't be happening!'
Thump Thump
'How can it be so fast! I can't break away!'
Thump Thump
'If I can just reach the Gate!'
Thump Thump
'There! There it is!”
Thump Thump
'Why.. why can't I move! How can I be so overwhelmed!'
Thump Thump
“First you steal something precious and then you flee like a coward. You will pay for your insolence!”
Thump..
~
The waning light caught her executioner perfectly for just a moment before it crashed to the ground, sending up a massive plume of black dust and obscuring it from view. However, that seconds long sight was more then enough to take the breath from her lungs and shatter her resolve. She collapsed to her knees, trembling to her very core as her oldest nightmare flashed before her eyes.
Her executioner, a towering beast the size of a small cottage. It's body rippled with thick cords of sinewy muscles that it's torn, rotted flesh and scattered clumps of gore matted fur did little to conceal. The monster had four massive legs, as thick as tree trunks, it's huge paws ending with five long, razor sharp, black claws. Most horrible of all were the beasts three snarling wolf heads, each baring fangs like daggers and glaring, hatred filled red eyes, each shedding scarlet tears.
She hugged her arms tightly to herself, only to recoil them as something sharp jabbed her chest.
“Protect me..”
The memory fell like a hammer blow on her mind and she frantically searched the folds of her sleeve for the figurine. “You've given me strength so many times before...” Now free from it's confines she held it with one hand and stroked it lovingly with the other. “Please!” she said, closing her eyes and thrusting it towards the fading cloud of ash, “protect me once more!” If the tiny statue planned to do anything, it did so silently, the only sound that could be heard was a deep panting sound coming from the monster. When nothing happened for some time, the servant girl dared open her eyes and saw something she did not expect to see.
The monster had landed on its back and was pawing at the air, groaning pitifully. Seeing it so close she realized that the beast was grievously wounded. A myriad of deep cuts lined the beasts' left side, its front left paw appeared to have been smashed and several of the claws seemed to be hanging on by mere threads of sinew. Most severe of all was the left most head, it's eyes were dim and it's tongue lulled limp into the ash beneath it. Its skull appeared to have been crushed inward into its brains and a large bone stuck out from its neck as if the head had been forced inward until it snapped.
“MERCY!” The beasts two living heads howled in unison, the voices booming and guttural.
The girl, frightened from the beasts outburst tried to jump backwards only to be forced down by the shackle on her leg, slamming her head against the ground in the process. She lay still, eyes closed, waiting for the shooting pain to cease. She began to wonder if the blow had knocked her senseless when the clear and melodious voice of a woman called out from the sky above.
“There will be no mercy for stray dogs tonight, I've long yet to pay you back for what you stole from me!”
The girl opened her eyes, bleary from the impact, and searched for the source of the voice. She found the figure above her and squinted, waiting for her vision to clear. When at last she could see her breath caught in her throat and she gripped the figurine tight to her chest, tears sliding down her cheeks.
Descending from the sky was a woman with beautiful black feathered wings.
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