02/07/337

Audra

Audra sat up, confused at her surroundings. That was when she noticed Bora laying, curled up next to the bed she was in. Even curled up like he was, his shoulders were still taller than she was, but only just. She threw her legs over the side and stood up straight, despite what had just happened she felt, a bit strange, but overall, rather well. Though the smell of rot wasn’t very welcoming to her sensitive nose, she was disgustingly getting used to it.

The room she found herself in was very bare, a simple stone floor under a surprisingly comfortable bed. A night stand with a lit lantern stood next to where she was laying. A display case stood next to the large double doors, this caught her eye. Approaching it she found a blade encased in a black scabbard. The handle was made of black metal and the handle was wrapped in a strange leather. It seemed to call out to her, begging for her touch. She felt entranced by the weapon. She didn’t notice she was slowly unlatching the glass case from it’s pedestal. Nor did she realize she was slowly reaching towards it, grasping it’s handle.

Picking up the blade, she found it to be almost as light as a feather. She grabbed the scabbard and unsheathed the weapon. The rapier’s blade was as black as a moonless midnight sky. It looked like it had never been used but her heart beating like it was, and some kind of instinct, told her this weapon had been the cause of great bloodshed in the past. The pale purple eyes of her reflection shown right back at her, a small, excited smile was plastered on it’s face. Bora speaking to her pulled her from the swords loving embrace.

“Are you sure what you’re doing is wise?” She looked over to the demon, “That weapon is one of the only artifacts the demons took back with them, during the War of Dominion. It calls to the one that is destined to carry it, nor does it require sharpening or polishing, the scabbard repairs the blade as long as blood is given to it. Was it calling to you, Stormbringer?” The name gave Audra chills, only then did she truly come to the realization of what was happening to her.

“Y-yeah. I didn’t even know I was holding it, until now.” Audra explained.

“Then it seems Keen Piercer has chosen you.”

“Why does it have a name?”

“Artifacts are the souls of those that have passed Ascension, they usually did so with a singular goal in mind, turning them into an object that can satisfy their goal, though no one knows how they achieved that kind of power.” Bora explained, “Calling them by name is a sign of respect to their latent souls, and because it seems people find the names ‘cool,’ for some reason or another.” Bora finished.

Audra examined the blade more cautiously, this thing was as dangerous as it was tempting. She plunged the rapier back into it’s scabbard and hung it from her waist.

“My lord has requested an audience with you, once you were awake.” Bora explained.

“I don’t want to, but I need to know what’s happening to me. Please, lead the way.” Audra said. The large demon walked by her side as they walked through endless corridors. The walls of the...temple? She wasn’t sure what kind of building she was in. Palace, maybe? Anyways, the walls and floor were made of a dark maroon colored stone with torches lining each side.

Wordlessly, Bora led her through the maze of corridors, unsure as to how the demon could tell where they were going. Only when the smell of rot began to climb to it’s peak did she know they were close.

The giant demon sat on his throne, leaning back, his chin resting on his left fist.

“A pleasure to see you again, Stormbringer.” He chuckled at the name.

“What have you done to me?” Audra demanded, a strange courage allowing her to speak to the devil in such a tone.

“I have tainted your soul, you will carry out my one wish. To bring about the Storm, to call upon this hell, to the realm of the living.”

“And if I don’t?”

“Your newfound bravery answers that question.” He swiped his hand in her direction, a mirror appearing before her. She froze in place at her appearance. Not much had changed, she didn’t grow horns from her head, no claws, no fangs, but the pale purple tint in her eyes gave speeches of what had changed.

“I don’t have a choice...do I? Will I die, when I release it?” Audra asked, looking up at the creature. Runahera gave a questioning gesture with his hand.

“Perhaps, does a key break when it opens a lock? If you die after releasing it, that is your own fault and has nothing to do with the blessing I have given you. You have stayed long enough, I have given you a very powerful artifact. Return to the land of the living.” He made a shooing motion at her. Audra covered her face as scorching winds blew into her.

When the winds turned cool, Audra slowly lowered her guard and found herself in the vast planes that surrounded Daemerall. Large groups of people were outside of the town, exercising, sparring with each other, or just basking in the sun. What she and Vasuki had been doing in solitude was now filled with people who had nothing better to do. She began to, numbly, walk towards the city. None of what was happening felt real to her.

As Audra got close to the city the scent of strawberries filled her nose. Where had she smelled that scent before? It didn’t matter. She kept walking towards the city gate. In the hall of the city gate she noticed two missing persons posters. One of them was a high detailed sketch of Vasuki, he was even given a bit more stubble than usual to make up for the amount of time. The one next to it was a detailed sketch of herself. She turned to one of the guards.

“Sir!” He looked over at her.

“Yes Ma’am?” The guard asked, standing at attention, but eyeing her blue scales for just a second before his eyes returned to her eyes.

“How long has that poster been up?” She asked, pointing to her sketch.

“Since the 31st day of last month. So almost two full days” He looked at her and then over at the poster, then back to her, “Oh dear. It’s you! Commander Cabana has been looking for you! She will be ecstatic to see you again! Allow me to take you there!” The guard claimed.

The guard took her out of the city, and into the farmlands west of the city, then they walked past the farmlands and into a small group of trees. A large stone building stood, hidden, inside the small forest, it had two windows on each side of the stone door. And a single step that led to a small front porch.

“You will find her inside. Miss Sandalious.” The guard bowed, then began to make his way back to the

city. She approached the stone building, a strange scent came off of it; the sickly sweet scent of sin and sweat. She held her knuckle out but stopped just short of knocking, she could hear someone gagging, the gagging stoped and Cabana gave a lustful giggle.

“You like when you make me gag don’t you!?” Cabana’s voice said from the inside of the building. Audra swallowed her shyness and gave three quick knocks. There was silence from the other side, for just a moment, “Were you expecting someone today?” Cabana asked.

“No, it was just supposed to be us today.” Noelem claimed.

“Can you get the door? I need to wipe my mouth! Stop giving me that perverted stare and just go check it out you demon bitch.” Audra’s eyes widened and she could feel blood rush to her face.

“I didn’t mean to interrupt a throat-tickling appointment!” Audra yelled from the outside, surprised at her own forwardness. She heard the two of them begin to quicken the process of cleaning themselves up and getting to the door.

“Audra?” Noelem claimed, the sight of an obsidian covered beast with two giant horns flashed across her vision. He gave her a knowing look,

“Fuck.” He said sadly. She gave him a sad stare.

“It’s bad.” Audra claimed. Without warning she was tackled off of the front step, Cabana held her tightly as they lay on the dirt.

“Where did you go?” Her breath smelled very strange, she had never smelled something like that so close before and didn’t really know what to relate it to, she could assume a lot of things though.

Audra leaned against the wall of the house, as she explained everything to the duo. Including every detail she could remember.

“This isn’t good. Not good at all.” Noelem claimed.

“Points to Runahera for making the person, with Kalano’s chosen warrior as their ascender to be the one to bring out the Storm.” Cabana noted.

“Any signs of Vasuki?” Audra asked, wanting to change her the subject off of her predicament. The two of them looked at each other.

“Yes and no.” Cabana claimed, sadly. Audra bit her lip in anxiety.

“Yesterday a palace in the northern part of the city collapsed. We went to check it out and found a giant body of ice was engulfing the majority of it. A lot of variants were running away from the north towards other parts of the city. Apparently there was a torture prison under it.” Cabana finished.

“What color was the ice?” She didn’t know why she asked that question, something inside of her told her she needed to know. Noelem gave a small smile.

“I guess Lusalene is really influencing your choices now. The ice was unnaturally cold, and the color was dark blue, like the color of cobalt.” He gave her a knowing look.

“Boreal...He’s using Etherea now.” Audra pushed off of the wall and began to walk away.

“Where are you going?” Cabana asked.

“To the palace. If he was there I may be able to catch his scent.” She felt arms wrap around her and the world go black as the Rift surrounded them, then they appeared at the center of Daemerall, they were getting a lot of strange glances from the citizens that surrounded them.

Cabana’s arms slipped from around Audra’s waist.

“I walked too far. Go ahead and go. I’ll be fine. The palace is easily spotted. Just be careful!” Cabana ordered.

“Thank you Cabana, I’ll be sure to find that bastard.” Audra claimed, running towards the north of Daemerall.

Most of the buildings in this sector of the city were all pompous and gaudy. No one needs a three story palace with golden trimmings and designs. But there was one that stuck out like a sore thumb. A three story building, mostly torn apart, was covered in frost. Immediately, she could tell this ice was something far different than what she could do. Mist seemed to come off of it, she was so intrigued by it she found herself lost in it. She could have sworn there were snowflakes dancing about inside of the ice.

“Ma’am please step back, do not touch the ice.” A woman demanded, she was dressed in black armor, the insignia of the Royal Knights was designed over the right side of her chest plate and shoulder plates. She had long blonde hair, wrapped into a ponytail, and a giant bruise on the left side of her head. She was just a tad bit taller than Audra, though that may have had to do with the armored boots the woman wore.

“Sorry, do you know what caused this?” Audra asked.

“A dragon variant, he attacked the palace and left this in his wake. We’ve had a few cases of frostbite from people touching this kind of ice. I have never seen something like this.”

“Did you catch his name?” Audra asked.

“No, if I did I don’t remember it, he had silver scales, brown hair, brown eyes, they changed to blue when he began to ascend.” She assumed the eye change was Boreal’s doing.

“Okay, thank you for the help.” Audra said.

The scent of blood was unmistakable, but the cold air coming from the ice made it hard to focus on anything else. The scents in the area was so vast, yet unmistakable, there had been a large group of variants that had passed through the recently. Most ran south, but there were a few that did not. Vasuki’s scent was there, hidden among the crowd and when she grabbed it she held on to it. A toothy grin formed on her face and she began to ran in his direction.

Vasuki and two other scents were heading northwest towards the aqueducts. As she ran she heard footsteps behind her, quickly approaching. Three men, two wore the same armor as guards, the third wore a long tunic, a long cutlass swung at his hips. She remembered the warning she had been getting since she arrived in Daemerall; Don’t go to the northern part of the city. And yet, here she was.

Audra did her best to ignore her pursuers, and forced her attention on following the trail. She couldn’t lose it, not when she knew she was on the right path. She took a sharp left, as the trail did and slipped over a wet part of the stone ground. She caught herself and found herself looking down a straight away with no other paths, towards the aqueducts. She felt those sparks flowing through her gut once again and ran forward. The darkness surged around her and thrust her forward. She counted her blessing when she reappeared on the other end of the straight path and still had Vasuki’s scent.

Audra jumped over the ledge and into the waterways. She warped to the bottom of the drop, and onto a walkway next to the water of the canal. She breathed heavily, her lungs were on fire and she was quickly expending all of her magic reserves, if she experienced magic fatigue the people chasing her would easily catch up to her. Then finding Vasuki would probably be a lost cause.

“Where the hell did she go!?” A voice asked, forcing a small smile to her lips. She continued to run along the walkway next to the waterways, against the current.

Audra found herself in one of the gateways that surrounded the city, allowing for people entrance, except this one was closed and led to a small lake on the outside of the northern part of the wall allowing water into the city’s waterways.

Continuing to follow the trail, Audra ran North of the city. By now the sun was beginning to set, her lungs felt like they were about to burst. She only came to a walk when the smell of meat over a campfire began to replace every other scent she was following. She came to one of the small groups of trees, until her breath caught in her throat.

Vasuki sat on the ground, his back turned towards her. His back was torn and scarred, scales were growing on his back, as well as over a large portion on his right arm. His left arm was nearly bare, revealing to the world the gray skin, no longer covered in it’s natural armor. He looked much thinner than when she had last saw him. In front of him was a girl, with a shaved tail swaying back and forth as they waited for the food to finish cooking. To his left was a man, another dragon variant, blue scales decorated the man’s right arm, just like hers did.

“Vasuki?” Audra asked, terrified at the thought of what he must have went through. His head turned to the side to look at her. First his emotion was one of shock, then excitement and joy, but quickly changed to a scowl.

“What the fuck do you want?!” He shouted, standing up to face her, his stance was wide. A crag of ice shot from the ground on his right side, he grabbed it and the ice shattered revealing a large black blade. A chill went up her spine.

“I came to find you. W-We’ve been searching for you for so long now.”

“I don’t want to hear your bullshit, Audra.”

“Was this the girl you spoke about?” The fox girl asked. Audra looked at him in confusion.

“Why are you acting like this?” Audra asked, stepping forward, but stopped when he pointed the blade in her direction.

“Because you, Cabana, and Noelem beat me to a pulp and threw me in the damn trash!”

“We would never do that to you!” Audra argued.

“Look at me, Audra! I’ve been tortured, my scales are god knows where by now! You three were the ones that beat me down until I was unconscious, when I woke up you had already given me to some assholes with a prison under their goddamn palace! Do you really want to call me a damn liar!?” Vasuki asked.

Audra didn’t know how to react, her throat was tight.

“B-but, we haven’t seen you since-”

“Get the hell out of here, Audra. Leave me alone.” Vasuki ordered, tears began to fall from his cheeks. He spoke from anger but his face betrayed his sadness.

“It’d be best if you left.” The dragon variant to Vasuki’s left said.

“Stay out of this, Rahzel.” Vasuki barked. The fox girl stood up in response, a large knife was drawn from behind her, “Don’t you fucking think about it, Izenia. She’s my issue.” Vasuki claimed.

"Issue? Vasuki I haven’t done these things to you.”

“First you abandon me out in that fucking field, then I go to you the next day and you kick my ass and throw me to the damn wolves. Now you’re saying you didn’t do these things? What the fuck do you take me for? Some kind of fool!” Audra backed up, she had expected him to be excited to see her, like she was to him. Not this, anything but this.

Audra was shocked to see frost forming on the grass around him. Was he actually going to hurt her. Audra felt tears form in her eyes.

“I would never hurt you, Vasuki. You’re my best friend for fucks sake!” She choked back the knot that formed in her throat.

“I suggest you ready your blade, or leave.” He claimed, she could hear the knot in his own throat.

“Please don’t do this...we’ve been looking for you for so long!”

“You knew where I was, bitch.” Vasuki retorted. The man and woman with him looked at each other, then at Vasuki and began to back away. Audra rubbed the tears from her eyes and felt a chill when she saw, piercing, unnaturally blue eyes staring back at her. She steeled her resolve.

“We’ll explain everything when you come with us. There’s something going on behind the scenes, I swear it!”

“I’m staying right here.” The knot in his throat was gone.

“Then I’ll take you with me by force.” She drew her rapier, she felt power flowing through her from the release of the bloodthirsty blade. Audra wasn’t sure if she could best him, but she was sure as hell going to try.