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  Shadow Rises

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  Shadow Rises

  A Story of The Thousand Paths

  By Andrew William Tinney

  GODS

  Balar, The One-Eyed, known as the Ancient One, the Father of Earth, King of Allion

  Goannus, The Smith, known as the Forge King, master of metals and invention

  Arayn, The Titan Master, known as the Underlord, ruler of the Cursed and Balar’s twin

  Morigana, Goddess of the Void, the Shadow Witch, Master of the Thousand Paths

  Helwyn, Goddess of the Earth, The Tree Singer, Feathered Crone

  In the heavens, the Titan Wars rage. God battles Titan in celestial conflict, tearing the very stars themselves apart. As consequence, the races of Eiru have been abandoned by the gods. They are watched over only by the indomitable Vigilants; servants of the Ancient God-Father Balar.

  Yet not all the gods have forgotten the mortals of Eriu...

  Followers of Morigana, Shadow Witch and Mistress of the Void, gather, seeking ancient artifacts long thought forgotten. Working in the shadows of the mysterious Thousand Paths, the agents of the Void god are hidden from the sight of the Vigil.

  Cities will fall. Blood will be spilled. The silver raven shall rise, and all shall fade into nothing. All things change

  “When Arayn’s treachery was unveiled, Balar turned his back on races of the world

  Shadow grew, and sister turned on brother, all of creation falling to the madness of the Void.

  Seeing his creation diminish, Balar wept.

  Drawing the god forged dagger, Ulfnir, Balar cut his eye from his head.

  From its divine substance, The Ancient One crafted the Vigilants,

  God-Warriors who would protect his world, and hold the Vigil until his return…”

  Extract from the Tome of Ages, Article II, v thirty-two

  1

  Something drew Vigilant Aurelian out of the serene oblivion offered by his meditation. A whisper, a sinister babble that floated in the recesses his mind. It was wind, rippling along his consciousness. Soft, delicate, yet unmistakably disturbing.

  It spoke to him.

  Aurelian…

  The Vigilant rose to his feet, the scrape of his plate armour against stone slabs echoing through the abandoned chapel of Goannus, the forge god. In his fist, his Sceptre ignited, the pointed staff crackling in his grasp. It sensed some eldritch entity. A Void entity. Through the narrow slits of his seldom removed helm, he scanned gloomy surroundings.

  “Reveal yourself,” he called out, his thunderous rumbling voice resounding through the empty nave.

  Nothing. The rattle of wind in the rafters above his head. The dull clamour of citizens on the streets beyond the sanctum. The scuffle of a rat as it scurried along a freezing stone floor. The air tasted metallic, yet it always was so in the City of Steel, blessed as it was by Goannus. Nothing was out of place.

  As swiftly as it had come, the whisper ebbed.

  Is it an illusion, conjured within my own mind? Am I beginning to sense things that are not there? Has my failure run so deep…?

  The Vigilant cast such thoughts from his mind. Doubt is the workings of Shadow, he reminded himself. He had done his duty, fulfilling the task Balar had required of him. The Amethyst Isles, the home of Goannus’s hoard, were isolated, cut off from humanity. The huge floating peninsula’s hovered over the city of Faris-Manzil abandoned. Their raw eldritch power that had once blighted the landscape and drove men to unspeakable acts was neutralised. That had been his mission, the task given to him by his god.

  Yet so many had perished. Too many…

  Then it came, a flood of instant engulfing darkness. Instinctively Aurelian raised his staff, using the power granted by the Sceptre to ward himself. Images flickered before him, memories of his past, of brothers and sisters dying before him as metallic-hued Void demons overwhelmed them. Claws scraped and tore at the armour of the Vigilants. The god-warriors weapons rose and fell, their shields splintered and shattered. Battle cries in Balar’s name boomed like thunder across the battlefield and still the demons descended. All too real, Aurelian witnessed fountains of blood flare; the deaths of his comrades. The Vigilant saw himself, standing tall amid the onslaught, sword matted in demon gore, armour rent and open. Celestial rays shone from his Sceptre, banishing all creatures born

  of foul energies that fell under its radiance. Yet everything Aurelian mustered, all the power granted to him by Balar the Ancient One, proved futile, and more and more Vigilants met their end. The demon horde persisted until at last he himself was overwhelmed, ripped apart by babbling monstrosities as a feathered giant cast its sinister shadow...

  Aurelian steeled himself, praying inwardly for Balar’s might to shine through and banish this fell magic. The images he witnessed were false. A corruption of the past. He had not fallen. He had not failed. Balar’s power had persevered.

  This is a trick, he knew. An illusion, nothing more.

  The Vigilant’s heavy voice rattled through the chapel. “You hide behind warped memories, demon. Come and face the light. Let your true worth be measured.”

  He stabbed the staff into the stone slabs, cracking ancient granite. Illuminative power burned intensely from the Sceptre’s core. It was a weapon not unlike a conjurors staff, or wizard’s wand, save that it surpassed those tavern trickeries. Sceptre’s were the source of a Vigilant’s strength, the means by which Balar fed his divine might to the god-warriors.

  The images and false memories of battle abruptly ceased. In their wake came an all-encompassing gloom that swallowed even the divinity of the Sceptre. Though his feet remained firmly on the stone ground of the abandoned chapel, Aurelian experienced the sensation of falling through an abyss.

  The Void.

  “Begone, servant of the Shadow,” he called into the emptiness. Tendrils of foul power groped at him, brushing his blessed armour, searching for his soul. Shadows whirled and danced, feral shapes flickering closer to caress him. The whisper came again, enticing in its tone.

  Come…come…See the truth…Come…

  “Never, demon.”

  Set your soul free…let it be lost in the Thousand Paths…

  “My soul belongs to Balar,” he growled. “Show yourself.”

  He was answered by a booming rupture, as if reality itself had been torn asunder. The abyss deepened, a realm of nightmarish endlessness. The shadows disappeared; their absence more terrifying than their manifestation. There was nothing, and yet the deep sound continued, conjured from some unknown existence. Within it, there came the whisper, the same that had drawn him from his contemplations. Where before, it had been the blowing of the wind, a brush against his consciousness, now the voice behind the whisper was mercilessly clear.

  Your end is coming, child of the Ancient One. The Thousand Paths lead to it. All things change.

  The Vigilant began to pray fervently. As he mouthed words, he could sense the divine might of his deity pulsing through him. Drawing on that strength, Aurelian pushed the Sceptre through the dark, stressing the light, seeking to illuminate the evil arrayed before him. The abyss began to recede. “You cower behind shadows and trickery, demon. Reveal yourself and face me.”

  He was answered by a hollow, echoing laugh.

  In seconds the vision ended, and Aurelian was alone in the chapel once more. No, he thought. Not a vision. A taunt. A test to weaken my resolve by reminding me of the past. To see me wallow in self-pity.

  The Vigilant sighed and lowered the Sceptre, its beam dulling. When it
at last evaporated, the grey gloom of the chapel returned, along with all the quiet sounds of a mortal realm undisturbed. Those visions he had seen, those memories, had haunted him before, challenging his will. He closed his eyes. When he did so, Aurelian could still see each brother and sister Vigilant felled by the foul void-demons on the Amethyst Isles. Their names remained embedded in his mind. Garius, Hellas, Flavus, Lepsus, Sevilla…

  He would not think on them. They had died, serving Balar to the last. That was their purpose. Their duty to the mortal world complete. Even now they would fight in the heavens, through the celestial Titan Wars, bearing arms in the Ancient One’s name once more.

  Aurelian knew he would join them, one day. Part of him longed for it, to traverse the stars on the wings of majestic god-eagles, smiting colossal gargants in the war between Balar and the Underlord Arayn. That was the war of eternity, the war all Balar’s god warriors would return to.

  Until then, Aurelian had a duty on the mortal world. He would keep the Vigil, keep humanity safe, until Balar called him home once more.

  The Vigilant opened his eyes, casting his vision upon the nine columns raised on a dais of shimmering metal dominating the central chamber of the ancient chapel. The centre of the structure was scorched black, burned with holy fire, rendered useless. It had once been the Acero Portal, the only means by which travel from the city of Faris-Manzil to the Amethyst Isles was possible. It had once been a blessing of Goannus, a path the forge god created to share his wealth with his followers. The silver men and women of the Manzillian Provence had mined the vast sky-pits of jewels, gold and many other riches. The Amethyst Isles had made the people rich and powerful.

  Yet it had also drawn the attention of Morigana.

  The Shadow Witch coveted all. That was her nature. She saw the beauty of the Amethyst Isles and when Balar in his mighty wisdom turned his attention from Eiru, she had struck. The Acero Portal was the first to feel her taint.

  Through mutating shadow magic, Morigana’s followers transmuted the Acero Portal into a path of madness. She wreathed the floating islands with thick clouds of arcane void mist, annihilating anything that came too close. Even Goannus, with his forge-weapons could not breach the wreathing shadow storms to reclaim his hoard. Driven by greed and the loss of their vast wealth, the Manzilian populace fell upon one another and chaos reigned.

  Aurelian lowered himself to the ground. He recalled the day he had come here first, many decades ago, far from the living memory of any citizen. From glorious heaven borne fury he had come, accompanied by his warrior brother and sister Vigilants. Clad in their blessed plate armour, they had stormed the Acero Portal, seeking to shed light on the mystery that surrounded the curious floating peninsulas.

  What they had found was a land that warped and changed with every passing second. A land born of the void, abhorrent to the benevolence of Balar. Machines of hellish birth fused with nature, so that forests burned bronze and seas ran molten silver. The Isles had become a twisted place, filled with monstrosities of metal and magic combined. Huge lumbering canines on legs of pure silver and fangs of iron shrieked metallic howls to the cold brass moon. Mortals who had been trapped by Morigana’s taint had built settlements there, obsessed with the abundance of wealth they could harvest from the landscape. Those tribes worshipped the land and consorted freely with the chaotic denizens around them. Demons roamed free, feasting on the souls of greed fuelled mortals, whose every essence changed with each rain shower of violet gems…

  The recollections were too much. Damnation was all the Amethyst Isles could provide. So, Aurelian had cut them off, and saved the city from corruption. Now he had set his Vigil, vowing an oath to Balar that his last remaining task would be to guard the very thing he had destroyed and ensure that nothing ever used the Portal again.

  The vision had been a test. Nothing more.

  Yet in the silence the whisper persisted.

  Your end is coming. All things change.

  2

  “Forty sovereigns and not a coin more!”

  The gruff comment came from an irritable merchant, who proceeded to huff and puff discontentedly. The man was portly, a fact exaggerated by an elaborate, voluptuous robe of glowing crimson, dotted with fine golden rivets. He shook his head, wobbling a double chin that was sparsely covered by a wispy grey beard littered with emerald droplets. He attempted to stare down the sky-gnome before him.

  He failed.

  “One hundred was the price we agreed upon, Kahil,” Eresor responded. Though the grey skinned sky-gnome was little more than the height of the merchant’s gut, he was broad and muscled. Threatening, many would have said, particularly when the gnome was clad in his sky-armour, and armed with his dual pistols and sabre, as he was in that moment. “Words are iron, or do I need to remind you?”

  As he spoke, Eresor flexed a thick hand, leather gloves creaking. He made a point to pass it over the pair of pistols that hung from his waist. The merchant was not oblivious to the message.

  “You mean to bully me? Threaten? Huh. You will not succeed. My patron is a man of some standing, and he does not react well to intimidation.” Despite his sudden bravado, Kahil retreated behind his counter, chubby fingers shaking.

  “It’s not him I’m intimidating, merchant; it’s you.”

  Eresor watched the colour drain from Kahil’s face with satisfaction. He took a moment to regard his surroundings. The shop was a curious one. It was wealthy, but small, located in the lesser district of Faris-Manzil, a winding series of spiral streets known as the Solder. Little more than a maze of ruined shacks and gang dens, the Solder ringed the ancient chapel to Goannus, that once housed the fabled Acero Portal. Forge magic rippled in the very air there, rusting the tips of buildings, souring water supplies with metallic fragments. As such, only the poor and desolate slummed in the Solder, scraping out a meagre living in the inhospitable clime. The poor and Kahil, it seemed, which Eresor found a peculiar thing indeed.

  The merchants store was adorned with jewels of all kinds. A lavish two handed Arelian sword was displayed in a glass case on the wall, the hilt embossed with so many rubies that Eresor reckoned he could buy an entire air-fleet with its worth. There was a helm and shield of mirror-gold, a mineral the gnome had thought extinct. These treasures hung behind a series of warded pillars, illuminated by focused Sceptres. Other notable items of wealth hung from brackets or were displayed within heavily secured glass chests. Behind Eresor, a chain of gold and silver bracelets jingled lightly as a tall, slender elf brushed past them.

  “Careful,” the merchant snapped at the elf, “that’s worth more than you!”

  The elf cocked an eyebrow. “That I would highly doubt.” The merchant sneered.

  “You’ve got quite the collection,” the gnome noted, and not without envy. “Your patron must be wealthy indeed.”

  “He is, and powerful. He will not think twice on killing you, or your partner.”

  The sky-gnome grunted. “I’d like to see him try. Nymida here has a knack for cheating death. Luck of the elves, as they say.”

  “This man has no honour, Eresor,” she said. “He would see us cheated, and our throats slit open in some back-alley.”

  “What? What does the elf say?” Kahil was incensed. “How dare she come in here and address me so! No honour? I am a very influential man in this city. You would do well to remember that.”

  Eresor raised a hand. “Nymida meant no offence. She is merely concerned, as I am, that our deal will not be honoured.”

  “She would do well to work on her manners,” Kahil said, “and remember to respect those with means.”

  “I was brought up in a palace of silver towers built within the roots of an ancient world-tree, merchant,” she spat. “I could have bought and sold your miserable mortal soul five times over with but a fraction of my family’s wealth.”

  At that, the merchant’s eyes glimmered. He regarded her appearance; ragged leather armour, a hunting bow and quiver strapped acr
oss her narrow shoulders. Two short blades rested at her waist. Eresor knew that Kahil was not convinced. “You are royalty?”

  The elf’s face shadowed. “I was…once…”

  “We have not come here to dwell on your melancholic past, Nymida,” Eresor interrupted. “Back to the matter at hand. We delivered the staff, and now you will pay us.”

  Kahil examined the object laid out on the counter before him. The staff was made of not of one metal but of a combination of several, and yet not made of metal at all. It shimmered gold one moment, then silver, onyx, ivory steel and so on it went. Its apex was a coiled spiral surrounding a clear undefined jewel that Eresor’s crew determined to be worthless. Arcane energy visibly flowed through the article. It was a curious find, a marvel of Goannus’s forge no doubt. Eresor had been tempted to keep it himself. But Kahil had solicited the gnome and his crew to locate the staff and Eresor had given his word. Gnomes were not hobgoblins, and their word was their bond. Words are iron, he reminded himself.

  Kahil sneered. “You are three days late. I was to have this by moons turning, no later, you do recall. You’re lucky I offered such a generous sum as forty.”

  “The skies are treacherous,” Eresor said sternly, “and that abandoned castle you told us about…well it turned out it wasn’t.”

  Strangely, the merchant looked concerned. “There were others searching for the staff?”

  Nymida grasped the hilt of one of her curved swords. “Searching, no. Defending, possibly. A nest of hobgoblins.” The elf smiled. “Nothing we could not handle.”

  “A setback, nonetheless,” Eresor added. “But we have come, as we said we would. We held to our word. Now you will too.” He took a step forward. “Pay us. One hundred gold sovereigns.”

  “Forty,” the merchant squeaked.

  “One hundred was the agreed price. For the staff, and for our silence.” The merchant had stipulated Eresor tell none of the item’s existence.