49th of Ymiden 719
Kalortah was on his way through Athartian territory now, having flown south for many days to reach the edge of the jungle. At some points, he’d been edging the desert, but the heat of it put him in a mood, so he kept mainly to the cool weather above the Crescent Sea.
A few trials into his venture through the Athartian wilderness, Kalortah thought he could detect familiar air signatures.
In time, he began to suspect that perhaps his grandfather, or someone else was watching him. When he made camp one night, he noticed a familiar little creature at the edge of his firelight.
He noted it’s owl-like appearance, and realized it was the same creature that had led him to Ravkel, when he’d forcibly initiated him into magic.
Before Kalortah saw him, he heard him. His unique sonic signature of his breathing, his rhythmic footsteps, and the sweep of his wings. It was indeed Ravkel that was visiting him.
He stood up from where he sat, and turned around, to see the mage. His grandfather.
”It’s time we paid respects to your ancestors, Kalortah. Will you accompany me to our ancestral tomb?”
It was a far gone conclusion that Kalortah would go with him. So he followed without words. Did they really have an ancestral tomb? Kalortah was intrigued.
They took to the wing, and flew over the ruins in the Northern jungle. While they made their way along the air currents, Ravkel told him more about the lore of the temple they were to attend. It was unlike any other avriel structure. More tomb than memorial. It was built in a time from when the Avriel used to honor their dead, their vanquished. It must have been far in the past, Kalortah reflected, because his people were far different these days. They tended to dispose of the dead through burning, and scattering the ashes to the sacred winds of the world.
Kalortah always wondered about that ritual. Whether it was meant as an insult to Delroth, or perhaps a yearning to see him accept their remains, as he would never accept a living avriel. Except perhaps for Kalortah and a few others.
The avriel sighed as he flew along. Soon enough, Ravkel was leading the way down to the ground, where the stones were more carved and constructed than naturally formed. This was definitely having the looks of a ruin.
A yawning entrance opened up in the earth. Kalortah groaned inwardly, not liking this prospect the slightest bit. Nevertheless he followed his grandfather into the belly of the tomb.
There, they found the temple catacombs, the place where Ravkel said that his ancestors were held, their remains. Kalortah had to admit to a level of curiosity that flew against his sense of vanity and self-absorption. He was not one to dwell on the past, much like the rest of his kind, but a strange twinge of pride stirred in him, as he observed the carvings in these stone catacombs.
”These stones tell the stories of our family, a family that has been in Athart since the Avriel made it their own.”
Kalortah snorted as he walked along, glancing at the stonework of winged beings and the groundlings beneath them. He’d heard rumors that the Avriel did not own Athart, but had invaded at some undetermined point in the distant past. That they’d been exiled from their true homeland, which now belonged to the Eternal Empire. The avriel’s mind twisted in anger at the thought of that terrible force, that lay just to the North of Yaralon. Never had a more decadent and indolent society existed, which deserved so richly a defeat.
”Where did the Avriel come from, then? If not from Athart.”
”You’ve heard the rumors. I’m afraid, given much of our kind’s disregard for the art of preserving history, the truth has been lost to the sands of time.” Ravkel murmured from behind Kalortah. ”Perhaps we will never know.”
Kalortah shrugged, his wings cramped from being folded so close in. He hated delving dungeons such as these. And come to that, why would Avriel ever choose such a cramped quarters to make their dead’s eternal home?
They wound their way, further into the crypt. Kalortah had long since lost sight of any vestige of light, and was making his way by his sense of the wind, it’s shape and weft and how it moved through these corridors. He hummed to himself whenever those air waves faded, if only to watch as the air bounced off the walls. Thus, he made his way through these corridros in perfect black darkness.
After a few more bits of delving into those catacombs, Ravkel stopped Kalortah in his tracks, putting a hand on his shoulder. ”It’s time to see your mettle. Hopefully your spark has not progressed so far that you will not be able to take to the new powers I’m going to impart to you… But there’s only one way to find out. Are you sure you wish to do this?”
”Would I have followed you to this spoor hole If I didn’t?” Kalortah snorted.
So having been satisfied with his answer, Ravkel took a ritual knife to his palm, and then nodded toward Kalortah, holding his hand out for the grandson’s hand. Kalortah felt a swift cut of his hand, and then they grasped each other by the hand, their blood mingling. The blood they shared, and now in more ways than one. Grandfather lent his grandson the spark that had made a recluse of him, it traveled through his veins, and into Kalortah’s.
Within a few bits, the ritual was completed, and Kalortah was now with the Necromantic spark. Yet, that wasn’t the end of initiation. There was another step.
”So, when shall I meet our long deceased ancestor?” Kalortah asked, letting go of his grandfather’s hand. He felt the Guardian of Glory in his abrogation spark rebelling against the intrusion of this necromantic spark. Yet, after a time, it came to accept the intrusion. But not before it settled some ground rules. The main rule being the preservation and glorification of the host.
”You will meet him now. But he’s no relative. He’s more… an ancestral foe that I learned of, from the etchings of the temple above…”
So saying, a stone slab slid shut. Kalortah turned to see, only too late, his grandfather disappearing behind the stone trap door.
A groaning emerged from behind Kalortah.
Without waiting, he unsheathed his saber, rounding on the appearance of the husk that was now confronting him. The husk was wearing tribal regalia, with all manner of treasure festooning its corpse. In its hands, no weapons other than sharpened bone claws.
As usual, Ravkel’s teaching method included little in the way of instruction. Kalortah was thrown into the flames of trial, and expected to sort everything out for himself.
The husk lurched forward, reaching for the avriel. Kalortah flew backward, swinging his saber and trying to thwart it’s attempt to grab at him. He didn’t cut off it’s hand, but did manage to make a wound, from which issued a slow flowing ichor.
Panic began growing in Kalortah’s heart. Yet he knew his grandfather wouldn’t set him up for failure. Was he to take up this thrall for his own? To wrest control of him through the lineage of his newfound necromantic spark?
He didn’t have much breathing room to consider these questions, flying backward from the husk. Unexpectedly, in the dark he flew against the wall, and knocked himself to the ground in trying to evade the husk. The thing lurched forward, lowering itself onto Kalortah.
He gripped it by the ichor-leaking wound, with his wounded hand. Then, the idea occurred to him. There was a subtle music to the way the husk had moved, a rhythm that reverberated over the air waves.
Kalortah’s mind raced, trying to put the husk’s glorious history to words, his defeat at the hands of Kalortah’s ancestor, to where they had claimed the temple above by sword and flechette and flight and bravery.
He sang his song thus:
”The Nameless Chieftain was laid to rest,
Beneath the tomb of Satra.
His bones, skin and flesh, preserved with honey
Beneath the tomb of Satra.
Now hear your vanquisher’s voice reflected in his sons,
Beneath the tomb of Satra.
And obey your conquerer’s echo.”
Having sung the song, the husk halted it’s attack. As long as Kalortah hummed the tune he’d struck with the song, he found he was able to coerce the creature to follow his mental orders. He had conquered his first thrall.
Time of Day/Night: Evening
Weapons: Average+ Steel Saber
Armor: Blood Metal T4 Masterwork
Weapons: Average+ Steel Saber
Armor: Blood Metal T4 Masterwork
Injuries: None
Illness: None
Ether Exhaustion: Abrogation Newly awakening
Illness: None
Ether Exhaustion: Abrogation Newly awakening
