The War of Ages...

[Alais d Nitesong]

Garl stood at my back in his dragon form. A menacing counterpoint to the friend I'd come to know. His silver scales turning reddish as the sun crept toward the horizon, and reminding me of the sanguine ground below us. It reminded me of the blood spilled; yet I cannot find remorse within myself. Malchor and Rael have killed countless of Tass' people. They have tortured the land to the point where I cannot walk the island without sensing the pain of the land itself. I have no room for remorse.

The casting of the second book was complete. Everything the Annaran's had touched in terms of the land and fell creatures they'd brought into the islands was dead. Saltera was doing very well with these spells, and true to his word, he had learned them well enough to be a strong anchor. Now I have to hope he has enough left to complete the day.

My hands moved upon my staff. Blood oozed between my fingers, for I too held Annaran influences. While I am not Annaran, I have been forever changed by Morrin, and these spells were going to pull me into the beyond and anchor me forever as a hold fast to keep Morrin's people locked into the Hells. This was the last sunset I would ever see, and I glanced at Garl as the sun lowered and tinged him varying shades of red and orange.

Daemonbane writhed against my back and shoulder. It whispered.

The Third book ... it was time.

I did not initially look across the valley. I would when it was time for me to go, when the world would fade and I would end my time here. Then I would watch Saltera, and hope he knows the depth of my gratitude, and my sorrow. He too would perish this day. Something's were worth it, he'd told me. Yes, some things are worth it.

The words flowed into the air, it is not so much the words that I hear, but the feeling of power adding to my own. Blending to create something even more powerful, the making of something stronger and more complex was accomplished between us. Creating something new and stronger that would finish this day's work, but the power is different now. It has a feeling that is familiar, but not what Saltera had been sending to me for the earlier part of the day.

The medallion rested against my chest and was warm. It held a heat that I had not felt in long years. It was comforting almost as it rested next to my heart.

Garl took to the air several times as I focused solely upon the task at hand. I have no doubt that once Malchor realized what was happening, he'd sent demons to destroy me before I could finish. But Garl never let them get close enough to disturb my focus. Garl had his own score to settle with Malchor, but soon Malchor would be gone. If he was not already dead, he would be soon enough.

As the last words were uttered, a shift in the power rocked me through. It felt as if someone had wrenched control out of my focus, and I was affixed to the land, had become an anchor point rather than the focus point! "Morrin!" I breathed. The familiar power signature! My eyes sought the far ridge where Saltera should be, but what I saw instead stopped my heart. The silhouette was unmistakable! The black cloak billowed in the wind as the mists curled around him, and the sudden lightening of the burden upon my back was a stark counterpoint to the heaviness of my heart. Saltera was gone, and in his place stood my teacher. Exhaustion can play tricks on the mind, but this was no trick of the light. Morrin had come, taken control of the spell, and once again was leaving me behind.

Daemonbane had left me to return to Morrin, and Morrin had come to claim his people. I sank to my knees as I watched him fade from my sight again. Could I survive this again? The medallion grew chill as he disappeared into the mists. A soft hint of a whisper crept through my mind, "we will not meet again".

"Naaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!" My hands slid down the staff leaving a bloody trail down the white wood. I have nothing left. Nothing.

Mist closed around me, the fog hid the view of the valley below, and the far ridge could not be discerned. I sank into the land, with no more energy to even raise my head to see my fate approach. The tears that fell into the soil beneath me were crimson, and darkness swallowed me.

[Alais d Nitesong]

The ground was wet. It has been churned into a morass by the clash of armies. Where once there had been verdant hillsides, there was now only torn soil, mud, and blood churned together to form a slippery slope that leads toward the sea. In the setting sun, the silt from the destroyed hillside looks like a trickle of blood as it flows into the azure waters. A wound dissipating into the vastness of the ocean.

The mud covered everything. Nothing escaped it. It found its way into the joints of armor, through leather, soaking into shoes and coating the legs and feet of man and beast alike. It was insidious, creeping of its own volition, and no place was safe from its incursions.

It fouled weapons, leaving a brownish reddish stain upon everything it touched. It rusted even the best steel instantly. Even mithril is dulled by the foul mess and loses its radiance. It is subtle as it coats and covers anything and everything that waded into the battleground. Moving too slowly to be seen, but surprising all with the vastness of its reach.

I feel it. I feel the slow creep of the land. The timeless and inexorable movement of the land as it seeks out the sea. It seeks to rid itself of the contamination of blood and hate and war. We have fouled it. Turned what was green and lush into mud and slime. Corrupted it, turned it into something hideous and ugly and unproductive.

We have done this.

The land spoke to me as I lay curled upon its surface, awaiting the fate I knew was coming with Sai Jon and his group. The land had spoken to me of its suffering. We had done this.

[Kor Jon]

Jacob dropped through the upcoming demons like a stone. He darted from side to side sometimes barely avoiding the swiping claws, other times blasting his way through the swirling mass. The Annarans were dying and not dying well. Just then the dragons joined the fight.

Jacob watched as the Annarans began to writhe and fall to the ground. Malchor seemed unaffected. Suddenly a scream ripped from Tobias' throat and he twitched on the bone spikes that he was impaled on. Blood spurted from his mouth and he faded along with the Annarans. Before Jacob could reach him, Tobias faded into nothingness. Malchor urged his chariot on into the fray laughing as he dodged the fate of his kin.

Jacob swooped down towards Malchor, his mind filled with a murderous rage. Just before he could reach the General a demon blindsided him sending him crashing into the mass of combat. His earpiece suddenly sounded, "Jacob where are you?" Sai Jon yelled through the radio, "They're hitting the front ranks. We need those bombs now!" Jacob dodged away from the demons surrounding him and he launched into the air. Tobias was gone. He had a job to do. Sai Jon would have to be told later. As he climbed through the raging war in the skies he tried to blink the tears from his eyes.

[Alais d Nitesong]

Sounds of battle and chaos echoed across the valley, and yet I cannot find it in me to lift my head. I do not want to see the end coming. I do not want to know when Sai Jon looses his weapons.

The ground beneath me is cool. Not the cold of Riverbend, not the chill of something dead. But it is not the warmth of life either. It has been damaged deeply by these invaders.

The clash of weapons, and the war cries of charging demons is countered by the scream of dragons engaging the invaders. They are terrible sounds. Sounds of challenge, and of dying.

[Kor Jon]

Sai Jon stood at the edge of the battlefield, every instinct told him he should be in the middle of it but he had been tasked with directing the dragon armies and for right now they simply had to contain the undead until Alais could finish her casting. He watched as the front ranks clashed, ripping into each other with equal ferocity.

He focused in on the center of the army, his opponent would be there. He had unfinished business with Malchor. His cybernetic eye zoomed in and he found his prey but his breath caught. Impaled on the front of Malchor's chariot was the Tobi. Sai Jon was moving before anyone could stop him but he stumbled to a stop after only a few paces as he watched the Annarans began to fade, taking Tobias with them. Malchor was laughing loudly the whole while. With a roar of hatred Sai Jon launched himself forward again but this time Tass caught him and held him back.

"Not yet brother," Tass screamed at him.

"IT'S MY SON!" Sai Jon screamed in response but was drowned out as the first of the bombs detonated. The blasts rolled over the landscape like the platonic ideal of thunder. The light was blinding and the dragon armies were forced to turn away as the explosions ripped through the remainder of the undead army.

Sai Jon did not turn away. He didn't even flinch. He simply dropped to his knees and cried.

The undead had been decimated. The bombs had hit near the tightest concentrations of their forces and ripped through them like a machette through tissue paper. There were still a few that had survived and it would take the dragons years to hunt down and kill all of the invaders to their lands but as of that moment the war was over.

Tass knelt next to Sai Jon, who just stared out into the distance. His still human eye was completely black and shiveled, it had been destroyed by the blast. "That was the second time I've been forced to wath my son die." Sai Jon whispered. Tass didn't know to whom his friend was speaking and he wasn't sure Sai Jon did either.

[Alais d Nitesong]

Morrin had come.

I lay curled into a ball upon the suffering land of my island listening to the sounds of battle and confusion below me. I was too weak to rise and join the fight, too exhausted to care when death would take me, too miserable in the knowledge that Morrin's words held a finality I did not wish to face.

The land was crying out beneath me, and I had nothing left to ease it's pain. That pain radiated from the ground into my very bones.

The end would come for me, but I prayed to the Valar that the land would be healed.

My fingers curled around the white staff within my reach. Slowly, painfully, I willed my fingers to close around the warm wood. The dragonette gave a soulful chirrup as it pushed it's head against my cheek. My words were a mere thread of sound as I tried to reassure him. The end would come soon. Soon we could sleep.

Explosions began to roll across the valley. The land rocked beneath me and then long talons curled around my body, lifting me from the place I awaited death. Leathern wings swept upward, and away from the flashes of destruction that had begun on the far side of the valley.

The air reverberated with the manmade thunder behind us, and then the starlit night folded around us as we made our way to the sanctuary where Daemonbane had been held.

[Alais d Nitesong]

There are memories we cherish for a lifetime. Images we commit to memory for the indelible impressions they leave upon us. Some memories we would like to forget. We would like to obliterate them from our minds for all time, yet they linger where they are not wanted. Haunt us in the quiet moments, or break free to run amok at the most in-opportune times.

The images of that valley intrude upon each coherent moment I have. Flooding past the bliss of oblivion, where there is no pain. I try to remain in the warm cocoon of nothingness. I want to keep out the memories, yet they force past the darkness into my thoughts.

I can hear movement beyond the magical construct that surrounds me. It is quiet and purposeful, but not threatening. The ley lines here are magically enhanced by powers way beyond anything I have known before. I do not move. There is too much pain associated with trying to move, and so only my mind works. I have tried to focus on the magic, to keep the unwanted memories at bay, but that endeavor has been without success.

[Tasslehofl Momus]

He could feel Alais deep within the magic of the ground. She had sunk there, broken by the sight of her former mentor, and what that sight had meant. Garl had come and took her for the torn land, and returned her to the home she had started here on the Isles, but she was still within that torn land.

It was a home that had been twisted under the dark hand of a twisted demon… It was something that would take time to change. Yes, it could be simply changed with a few spells, bit it was never good to just forget. Everything needed time to heal… everything.

Heal… Would his wife heal? The days that he had been with her, had worked with his… with the magic of the Isles had shown no change, and in truth, he did not know if she wanted to be healed. That was the only reasoning behind it. His wife did not want to be healed. Perhaps, she would choose it in time, but that was something even he could not see.

And what of his daughter? She had vanished from the Isles. As soon as the boarders were loosened, she had slipped free. He had felt it. She had ran from the destruction that had been cast upon her home… and he feared she would not return.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The war had cost many lives. It was a war that did not need to be fought, but for the foolish act of an old dragon who carelessly had left a door open to a world that needed not see the light of day.

The war had cost him much and more…



(Cross posted between the RDI and RoH boards)