The Caverns of Vërdas: Prologue

The Caverns of Vërdas

Prologue:

They were coming. She could hear the clumsy yet relentless pounding of their heavy footfalls in the ruins above her as she crouched, gasping, the blood pounding in her ears, so weakened by battle and the terrible wounds they had already inflicted on her that she had barely the strength to keep from crying out with the pain and rising terror. She was the last, she was certain of that now. All those who could had fled via the moon-gate, passing to where, she did not know.

She whimpered again as she shifted, the terrible burns that covered her face and body from the dreadful waters of the white lord's high-priest sending numbing screaming tides of agony through her at every desperate beat of her heart. It would not be long now. The dreadful magic of the weapons of the white lord would find her, of that she was sure. With no hope of escape, she could only pray to the goddess and to her divine, lost mother that, by their power, she might take with her as many of them as her lust for vengeance would grant ere they overwhelmed and destroyed her at last.

"Nothing here." Came a low voice from above.

"Very well." Came another and she shuddered yet again as she recognised it. "See that the imperial apartments are blessed-bound beyond her reach, then assemble the congregation by the servants' stairway. She has to be in the vaults. We have her trapped at last."

"Cardinal-general." The first answered quietly.

A moment later she felt an additional stab of pain as yet more of the imperial palace was slashed viciously from her perception.

Stifling her rising panic, trying desperately to ease her ragged breathing and hold her gasping, choking sobs in check, she shifted once more, crouching lower in the warm darkness of the vault, baring her teeth in a low desperate snarl as she watched the chink of brighter light that shone from beneath the locked and iron-bound door. Behind her, the vault stretched into the gentle darkness, but she would not cower there to be cornered and taken like a rat at its farther end. Just let them try to enter and she would have vengeance enough for this last, bitter end. There could be nothing more.

"Another child!" Came a wild gruff cry from above. "A girl. How many more!"

"Kill her." Came the deadly voice of the cardinal-general. "She is already cursed. Free her soul; we shall burn her body at dawn."

"But she is young. She--"

"Kill her." Came the seemingly implacable command, the edge of horror in its speaker's tone lost to her as she listened. "Do it as swiftly and painlessly as you can, but kill her, now."

"Cardinal-general." Came the answer, the man's voice tinged with a raw edge of pity and disgust.

But she did not hear it. She knew only that yet another of the once beaming, laughing children of the palace had met her end, a faint desperate cry, suddenly cut off.

Rage blazed afresh within her burned and battered body. Why! What had they done that the goddess should have brought their world to this, and why had they not made certain all the children were through the gate ere the final assault began? So much! There was so much horror this last dreadful day that it seemed almost inconceivable that the world could ever again know peace or laughter.

But it had been so horribly, impossibly swift. The first assault in the very midst of moon-time when all had agreed that not even the protected favourites of the white lord would dare the imperial guard, battered and exhausted though they were. Then the frantic panicked terror of the children whilst the imperial family fought desperately to gather all that was precious, and dear Vîda, youngest of the imperial daughters and barely more than a child herself, struggled alone to open the moon-gate to the unknown that lay beyond. She had plunged into oblivion, using her own raw, unfocussed power to draw screaming children and desperately savage adults wild with terror, after her until of a sudden the gate had fractured and blank nothingness had taken its place with many slaves, children, nobles and the rest of the imperial family still trapped upon the wrong side. Gerredan had tried to reopen it, but, being a man although second to the high-priest and a favourite of the goddess, he did not have the nature to reach to what was needed to maintain the gate. For a moment it had opened, shivering, for a heart-beat in which as many of the warriors and priestesses as could reach it had been hurled through in the vain hope that they might stave off its collapse. Then it had failed once more, splintering into oblivion whilst she screamed and screamed her lost sister's name and that the rest of the children should have been passed through before warrior or priestess. Then the imperial throne-room had been filled with the terrible men and women of the white lord and she had seen more death and horror in that last sickening battle than she could have imagined could exist outside the dreadful realm of the terrible enemy emperor himself. They had fled at last, those few that were still able to fight, beaten back by the fanatical, relentless onslaught, retreating in impotent rage whilst the creatures who had once been their slaves screamed and fought with a maniacal religious fervour, hurling all the hideous magic of their accursed protector against them, raging and shrieking with a hatred that seemed beyond anything even she could comprehend.

She did not remember much more. In the madness she had found herself grappling desperately with a tall, white-robed figure. She had almost reached his throat, tearing snarling at the sheath that protected it. Then the waters had poured over her and she had screamed, releasing her hold, blind and burning as she turned wildly away, clawing her way with a savagery born of agony through the seething mass of the enemy. How many she had torn apart in that last desperate struggle she could not guess.

She had found clean water to wash away the blazing, clinging waters of the white lord and the blood and gore of the enemies she had slain, whilst ever and again she would hear the screaming, agonised death of a sister or brother, or perhaps some helpless, barely-trained slave of the palace, feeling each death as yet another twisting knife-wound in her breaking, splintering heart. At last she had fled the imperial apartments and reached the vaults just as the first of the long-prepared charges exploded, bringing down the north tower and, she prayed, destroying all those of the enemy still searching its chambers and passages.

They were almost directly over-head now. She could hear them, their voices low and wary and their movements subdued as they gathered, the leaders standing, she supposed, at the head of the servants' stairway, crying to their terrible lord as they prepared to move towards her. Then they were advancing, beginning to chant and sing once more as they moved down the long, curving staircase towards the entrance to the vaults.

With a silent prayer, she readied herself, crouching lower, every muscle tensing, every sense straining as she prepared to fight and to die. Then they were at the doors, weapons rattling and heavy rams pounding in time to the fey, terrible singing as the doors quivered, cracked and in a splintering crash, burst asunder.

For one last moment she seemed to see them as though frozen, the robed figures of the leading men and women standing out stark and cold against the lights of the myriad torches behind them. Then she was leaping high, her head thrown back, green eyes blazing with a hatred beyond life or hope, baring her teeth in a last desperate snarl of maniac defiance as she plunged screaming into the ranks of the destroyers of her people.