Scorpio reached the edge of the necropolis as the sun set, and in the twilight, he did something he had rarely done since Hiathuna's death, and prayed to the Totems to give him the power and skill to end this abomination. He was not sure if they could truly hear him here, even after seeing their presence in the glade of the unknown goddess. But that visitation had reminded him of the obligations of a clansman, to honor the Totem of the clan, to respect the Totems of the other clans, and to cherish nature, the source of all that lived. So he said a simple prayer, asking for the strength to deal with the vampires, and the fortune to carry him back to the prairies he loved to die.
It was right after his simple askance of the gods, that Scorpio realized that the gods were here, and listening. As the hunter moved towards the canal again, he came upon the tracks of an otter. Definitely not a native species, for in all his years wandering the forests and swamps around Cosarali, he had never seen them, nor any of their signs. Deep within him, the primal hunter that had been Tagrun thrilled at the totems taking a hand in his life again. But the Scorpion was not so sure. The scorpion knew that night was for the hunters, and traps were not always for prey.
With the stillness learned hunting the beasts across the mountains, he waited, patiently, his eyes tracing out every possible trap, and finding them disarmed or missing. There was something that just did not feel right about the area. He studied the canal, and then caught the head of the otter, looking towards a tomb a few spear throws into the abode of the damned. Following that creature's gaze, he saw a motion of the grass, just a twitch, as if another hunter had felt him out here, and shifted slightly, just as Scorpio's eyes had glanced there.
More patience showed him things as the least moon raced up the sky, fading into a crescent as it chased the sun again. Each movement of the foe told him more. This one was dead, for no mosquitoes clouded over him, and he had a long sword, the kind only the nobles and great warriors of the land held by law, leaning against the mausoleum's wall. A sword he knew.
He sighed, knowing from the first day he had entered the town, this day would come. The day the samurai who had scoffed at his weapons on entering the town would challenge him. But he had never dreamed that warrior would stain his family's honor by submitting to the embrace of the undead to gain more power. But the fool had already been known to believe his destiny was to be the next Daimyo of the prefecture. Pride was driving him to force this fight. Scorpio only hoped he could indeed hold out against the creature he would face once crossing the log.
A movement on the broken roof of the tomb took his attention next. Golden eyes, and the shape he knew so well. Kenrathi, an eagle, the totem of his clan, looking down upon the foe. Down, as it would from the blue when soaring, to find the small creatures of the field or the dead corpses the eagles sometimes scavenged.
He sighed, and adjusted his gear. Making sure of one piece in particular. He had long dreaded this fight, not because of fear, but sorrow. The once-a-man he now would face had the skills he admired, the weapons he lusted for himself from time to time, and class and skill with women the hunter could never gain. Despite their conflict, and the arrogance of Noro Ishi, he had a small case of hero worship for his exploits, which in many ways surpassed his own.
Once satisfied, the hunter moved, silently, stalking his way to the point nearest the fallen tree. He would trust the old ways again, and no longer deny his full heritage. If the Totems guided him to this fight, he would enter it, and hope they were not taking him to his end before the job was done. It took several minutes, and the samurai did not seem to notice the movement he cautiously made. But with one skilled in the arts of war, one could never really tell. Surprise was one of a true soldier's tools, not something one gained by just luck. You had to know how to use it, develop the touch in knowing when to pay close attention, while pretending to ignore what was coming. How to lull an enemy into something rash or thinking they had the element of surprise on their side.
And one had to learn to wait for things to come to them. Had it not been for the presence of the Totem avatars, the Kenrai clansman would have turned back into the woods, and waited to choose another crossing. Ishi had chosen this ground, for some reason, that the hunter could not fathom yet. The samurai wanted this battle here, at this time. Yet so did the gods of the man from the grasses. The man once known as Tagrun could only do what he could do. No more, no less.
But he would not go into the ground without one last look to see what it was that had made the samurai choose this ground and this moment. His eyes strained to see in the pale and waning light of the fast moving moon. The greater moon would not rise for another hand across the sky in the dance of the stars, so only it, the stars and the faint glow of late summer twilight to the northwest still lit the sky to illuminate the ground. It took several moments before he saw the reason. To the south, just right of the trees upturned roots on the necropolis shore, the earth was moving as if alive. And that earth was tinted blue, not by just the twilight, but what moved there.
Kaliangars, the great blue centipedes of the land. A swarm of them, big enough to strip the flesh off a man within minutes of his falling, before he was truly dead. The beasts were of many hues of blue, ranging in size from fingers up to a forearm. They were common in the marshes and various graveyards and cities of the dead of this land, feeding on the corpses given to them in those places. A single sting of even the smallest of them was enough to paralyze a full grown man in a couple hundred heartbeats. And once paralyzed, their feast would begin.
If this was the reason, then the hunter could cross, just trying to keep in mind where that deadly spot was. And attempt to make the foe forget it was there in rage or pain. Scorpio parted the brush in time with a gust of wind from some distant storm, not even visible on the horizon now. He was into the long dead and now brittle branches in short order. Then came the challenge of working his way to the trunk, without making more noise. He was rewarded by a deer dashing along into the brush he had come from, spooked by what creature, the hunter had no clue, but many thanks for.
He could go no further without noise, and was still several steps shy of the trunk. It came to him then, that perhaps this way of silent fighting without words he had seen Ishi use so many times before could be done with words. Scorpio's experiences with his prey in the past had taught him that people often either spoke with some conviction before a fight, or attempted to bluster their way out of a situation. Speaking with conviction, that might work now, but he was not sure. Until the eagle suddenly screeched, and danced on the roof of the mausoleum, as if some creature had come too near it.
The bounty hunter knew this was his moment. He broke through the twigs and branches of dead wood, leapt to the main body of the uprooted tree, and danced across it quickly. Once across the canal and clear of the mud around it, he stepped down to the left, and moved towards the still distracted samurai. It was only once he reached a point two spears lengths from the tomb, that the eagle settled down, and Noro Ishi returned his focus to the crossing, only to find it blocked by the hunter.
"Is it truly a good day to die, Ishi? This argument is one sided, only your false honor has kept it going." Scorpio's voice was a whisper among the singing of crickets, and the faint clicking that reminded the hunter of the danger behind him.
The samurai stood slowly, his features no longer the soft golden brown they had been, but now a pale white. It marked his new status as undead. That and the lack of the mosquitoes that started to rise from the little pools in the weeds and ivy ground cover around the clansman. The sword from the wall was in his hand and drawn in a single, easy movement, and took up the same position Scorpio had held his short sword on the thug in town.
The hunter's answer baffled him, as the barbarian boy stuck his spear in the ground, then removed his belt, balancing it on the upended butt of the spear. The hunter then did something unexpected to the vampire warrior. He reached over his shoulder, and produced another sword. This one was as long as his, also with a slight curve in its length, but thinner, and with a reddish green sheen to the blade. The hiss of the disdain from the undead samurai told Scorpio he had scored. He would fight this battle with his uncle's sword, the elven made blade of a metal blend called by that folk chablys. A metal with no iron, and thus the samurai's disgust.
"Yes, it is the day you will die, boy" The voice was no longer as rough, it had the sibilant tones of seduction built into it. "And my honor is not false, for you and your kind understand nothing of honor." He did not move, as he spoke, but stood like a rock, ready for combat.
The hunter merely shrugged. "Very well, I will have to defend the honor of Kenrai. But this will end eventually."
The samurai spat at the young clansman. "Yes, assassin, it is known, and has been, that you are of the damned group of honor forsaken killers. But here you are alone, there are no others to stab me in the back."
The hunter gave no words back, instead assuming the middle, defensive position with his sword, holding it with both hands, lightly. Neither man moved for a long time afterwards. This was the contest of wills, and the loser would make the first blow, or sheath his weapon. The culture of the tiny empire of Ankhgor was based on the samurai's ways, and their strange codes. To Ishi, this was something he had lived, breathed and ate for all his fifty years on the earth. While that was still four hands of years more than the clansman had, Scorpio had been raised a hunter, drilled in the importance of patience, and waiting until the right moment to strike one's prey. In his past the still living man had faced off for hours with the great sloths of the plains, fang cats, and once, a long-nosed tusk beast.
And the young hunter still stalked his prey. But only twice had he thus faced an undead beast like the vampire before him now. And those fights he had won by luck and the arrogance of his foe. This time he vowed to himself, he would be the victor, by his skill and determination. Occasionally his muscles would twitch at the bite of some insect, but other than that the hunter was still. The samurai turned vampire was utterly motionless. for no such thing plagued him.
Yet it was that very nature that made him immune to the insects that was breaking his will. The feast of the girl had not been enough, nor of the three others afterwards. The blood lust was rising in him now. The desire for blood, and soon. His attempts to reach into the hunter's mind had failed, as he was still learning to project his will onto others. Those seeking the thrill of the draughts of spilled blood when he had feasted were weak minded fools, he was discovering, easily swayed. This half human, half elf was something else. He was neither a peasant to be beaten down, or a coward to be scared off.
A smile touched Scopio's face, tugging at his lips. He sensed the change, even before the movement came. He had one the first engagement. Now all that was left was to survive the trial of metals and skills. Noro Ishi's blade dipped into a feint, followed by the real attack from the recovery. His blade shot to the left, and swung in violently towards the hunter's chest. And met only air, as the young man at last put to use skills he had never had to use, ones taught to him by the elf who had left him the blade.
A fight is as much a dance as a contest of strength, and the hunter had the blood of elves running in his veins as well as that of humans. To him the moves came naturally, and his body was more limber, for without a feast of blood on a regular basis, a vampire lost its youth and vigor. Priming a dying human also took more than he had fed upon afterwards. His reflexes were not what they were only hours before, when he had made the decision that sealed his fate now. But his gods had infused the hunter with fullness of rest and health, as had the unknown goddess.
Scorpio began to move his feet in the steps he had learned from his mother's brother, in that short time they had been together, hunting a necromancer, after the youth had left his tribe to find the foul mage. With each step he took, the memories of those drills with Galen came back to him. The pace quickened and soon the hunter was pressing the samurai in ways the vampire had not faced before. Metal rang on metal, and the slap of feet on the ground as well as limbs on bodies filled the air.
The samurai got the first good cut on his opponent a hand of the least moons race across the sky, which was less than a finger's motion of the stars. A simple slice on the upper arm, barely breaking the skin, but still enough to draw blood. But it cost him to get the touch, as with a spin away followed by a step in, the chablys blade cut him in the same spot. But deeper, and with something else. Fire raced through the arm of the blood thirsty fiend with that cut, the fires of hell summoning him home. Chablys, Ishi discovered, was made with silver in the mix, and metal seared his undead flesh like a torch. The skin on his exposed arm turned black around the wound, and smoke wafted away. Only the fact that chablys was an alloy, not pure silver, saved the arm from burning away.
He took two great steps back from the hunter to his north, as Scorpio danced out to a stop, several paces away, and towards the canal to the west. The hunter took deep breaths, but was not winded yet, merely finding the right amount of air to sustain the pace of the fight. Eyes met again, this time not in a contest of wills, but a gauging of the others condition. The red fires of hell were dimmed a bit in the vampire, while the bronze, cat's eyes of the hunter seemed to glow to his foe, with something that he could not understand, and never would. It was the power of gods, not the anger of man, and that strength was letting the hunter stand against his own undead might.
The two stood again in silent stillness, waiting again for the moment to attack. This time it was Scorpio who moved first, his coppery skin slick with the sweat of his exertions in the damp air, his face calm, the smile gone, for now he had to slay someone he had once admired, for his skills if not his personality. The beads on his leathers rattled lightly in the motions, like the buzz of the snakes of the distant grey sanded desert. The sound the soles of his boots made on the overgrown cobbles was that of the skittering of his namesake over rocks and barren ground, hunting for its prey.
Ishi blocked the first six blows, two over hands, three slashes and an undercut from a feint so excellent that the samurai smiled in appreciation. He could feel it, he had lost, but at least his final fight would be against an opponent worthy of his skills. The vampire tried his own cut, only to get another agonizing rip on his left thigh. The destroyed flesh would not heal until he had drunk blood, he knew. And there was no others around for him to race off to drain, even if the barbarian let him. He had recognized the style at once, and no admired the skill with which it was executed. The boy was a blade dancer.
In all the years he had known the boy, since that meeting at the gates of Cosarali, he had never dreamed the hunter had learned the ways of the elven fighting techniques. Even in the initial fight, which the boy had lost, no hints of this had come. The samurai was certain he had learned in in the last few months away from town. He was now crippled that in order to win, he would have to resort back to the trick he had set up initially to capture what he had thought was a fool. He made a move to attack, leaving himself open to a rushing thrust, to lure the boy to his doom.
The boy stepped up and lunged, but twisted around to his left, turning it to a flying spin, aimed at the vampire's neck. Ishi back pedaled three steps. Three very damning steps. The vampire felt the surprise he had planned for the crawling up his legs, stinging as they went. The kaliangars swarmed over his body. Being undead the stings were not a problem. But his flesh was already dead, so they began their feast. The bites were horrid, something he had never thought before came over the samurai as he tried to move, finding his body not responding. He knew fear. Fear so great, it forced him to use the only power he had truly mastered, that of turning to the misty ash of the other form. It got him away from the pain, as the centipedes fell to the ground, his substance no longer cohesive enough to support their weight. But they took parts of him with them. And with each missing bite, more of his energy was gone.
The winds were kind, moving the fog he had become to the north, right at the hunter, who had lowered his guard. Ishi concentrated hard, to reform with the sword extended. But in his return to the fullness of the solid world, he heard the sound of steel entering dirt, and knew the fight was over. The out stretched hand was empty, and the assassin had moved to the side as he coalesced.
The chablys blade chopped off the reaching arm, and returned to lop off his head. Then the vampire discovered the disadvantage to his new state of being. He felt each blow, even though his head was no longer physically connected to his body, as the elven blade burned through his distant flesh, cauterizing the wounds it made, to prevent his reassembly. He cursed the half elf with every blow, until his eyes where filled with the face, and a hand shoved a clove of garlic into his mouth to sear his tongue silent.
Scorpio did not laugh or taunt his foe, but moved the body parts to a spot where a game trail crossed the overgrown road into the heart of the necropolis, and slowly drove branches into each, to hold them there, for the rising of the morning sun. As he moved on into the darkening night, he prayed aloud that the spirits of the families of the town would forgive his desecration of their graves, and grant him some aid in stopping their town from being destroyed.
Behind him, the canals and pools boiled, as those prayers were answered, and the lesser gods of the various families awoke from their long slumbers.
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