With a loud crash of shattering stained glass, Raziel was thrown clear through the window. He thumbed head over heels before dropping down to the stone floor between the rows of pews, rolling until he struck his head against the alter at the far end of the chapel. His vision flashed white and then swam as if he were looking at everything from under water.
The blow had caught him almost entirely by surprise with its speed and impact power. He had not expected the creature, with its near skeletal frame, to be capable of hitting him that hard.
Shaking himself free from the stunned daze the impact had knocked him into, the blue wraith managed to get to his feet; fragments of coloured glass dropping to the ground.
Perhaps intervening had not been the wisest course of action. He supposed that in all logic he should have waited and observed the strange creature more before deciding whether or not to engage it. That way he could have determined its strength and powers.
But when he had seen it luring the children out into the night, some deep part of him had spurred him into action before his more rational side could override, perhaps a vestigial remnant of both his human and vampire existences that protected their young.
Through the shattered window about the main chapel door snow as flying, flakes settling down over the pews and seats.
Then the shape of that strange creature blocked the light, its long legs spaced wide apart in an almost spider like stance that avoided all the jagged glass still stuck in the window.
Its long elongated head was turned to regard Raziel firmly, staring at him through beady wicked eyes. In his left hand it held the pipe made of bone it had been using to bewitch the children, grasped deceptively casually but the blue wraith suspected it capable of bringing the instrument to its lips in a flash.
The ‘piper’, for Raziel could think of no other term for the being, leapt forward and did an acrobatic spin in mid air. It rebounded off the rafters above and landed with catlike silence on the stone floor.
“What sort of ghoul are you?” The blue wraith demanded, holding his arms out to either side with his talons spread in anticipation of a lunge.
The piper did not answer; indeed its mouth with its pulled back cheeks and lips seemed incapable of forming words. In fact Raziel wondered how it managed to use its instrument at all with such a mouth.
Instead it leaned backwards and its head tilted to one side and had an air of curiosity about itself and Raziel had the feeling that he was being studied.
The silence endured before perhaps several seconds and Raziel hesitated at the intense stare being directed at him. Without actually realising he was doing it, he took a step backwards.
That had been the hesitation the Piper had been waiting for. With surprising swiftness it shot forward, an arm shooting forward clenched in a fist.
It was instincts forced through centuries of combat that saved Raziel from the blow. The blue wraith leapt backwards out of the way, somersaulting up over the alter.
The piper came after him again, his other fist with the pipe still clenched in it flying at his ribcage. Raziel danced out of the way, kept on the defensive by the Pipers unanticipated speed.
Catching hold of one arm with his talons, Raziel draw his opponent in close and drove the talons on his other hand forward. But the piper caught his hand with his own free one, forced to drop its pipe to save itself from being impaled.
The two of them struggled, each of them trying to outdo the other in terms of physical strength.
It quickly became obvious that while the creature was faster then Raziel, it was not stronger. Slowly the blue wraith began to force it backwards until the back of its legs slide into the stone alter.
For a moment Raziel thought that he might be able to pin it down but then the piper turned his own strength against him and bend backwards, quickly slamming its own body back against the alter.
Raziel was thrown by the momentum back across the chapel, slamming into the ground and rolling a short distance; sinking his talons into the stone to slow himself down.
As the blue wraith got back up to his feet he quickly began re-evaluating his strategy. He preferred to strike first, rushing his enemies and hitting them hard and fast before they had a chance to retaliate, preferably dealing them mortal wounds if that was possible. With the quickness, agility and flexibility of the Piper that was not a viable option.
He would not be able to out manoeuvre his enemy.
After retrieving its instrument from the ground, the Piper leapt to the top of the alter. With a flourish it brought the bone pipe to its mouth and its head morphed, pushing down with a snap of bone to allow the lips to pucker around it.
Almost instantly came forth that haunting, luring melody Raziel had heard before; the song the creature had been using in its attempt to lead the human children astray.
The sound echoed inside the chapel, resonating up and out with the remaining stained glass windows rattling in response. Raziel swayed back, fighting the music’s pulling urge. He did not think the melody could affect him as it did the human children but it was distracting enough.
Then movement caught Raziel’s eye and he turned his head to see that out of various cracks in the walls all around him were coming rats, thick bodied vermin that swarmed out of their holes in larger and larger numbers all gathering towards the alter
The blue wraith had to move out of the way as they ran around his feet, high pitched squeaks mixing in a counter harmony to the piper’s song to create an overall sound that was far more ominous.
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 “The true scope of the creature’s abilities were revealed. Its powers were not limited to the bewitchment of defenceless children but it could summon varied unwilling hosts to do battle on its behalf.”
-
With its eyes still fixed on Raziel, the Piper’s song reached a crescendo and the rats gathered around the rat turned as one to face the blue wraith as well; perhaps a hundred pairs of rodent eyes glaring at him savagely.
Then they attacked, running forward with multiple squeaking cries, some of them leaping to the pews to attack him from higher up.
The blue wraith kicked a few of them away but soon they swarmed around him, surging together and up his legs. The bit and clawed as they went scrabbling up as he struggled to get them off. While a rodent’s bite was no significant injury in itself, dozens of small rodent bites all over his body were almost literally nibbling away at the energy required to hold the wraiths body together.
To free himself, Raziel cupped his hands together and unleashed a bolt of compressed telekinetic force. The powerful shockwave sent dazed rats flying in all directions, the rodent horde screeching in angered protest.
Leaping up to the top of a pew, Raziel kicked a rat still clinging to his foot away from him and began leaping from bench to bench ahead of the swarming rodents. The piper followed his every movement, fingers almost blurring on its bone instrument and the rats responded to each note.
Leaping at a stone pillar that ran up to the rafters, Raziel quickly sank his talons in and quickly scaled it hoping that the elevation would keep him safe from the rats.
But as he pulled himself up onto a rafter, an unwelcome squeak caught his attention and he saw that there were more small holes were yet more rats were coming; racing out onto the far rafters and making their way quickly towards him.
Raziel kept moving, leaping from rafter to rafter with his head half turned as he watched the rats pursue him. The rats down on the ground were running back to their holes on ground level, no doubt to move up through the walls to join their fellows above. This left the blue wraith with a brief moment of opportunity to act.
Still running he flourished his right hand and summoned the wraith blade, feeling the taxing pull the weapon had on his energy reserves.
Bringing his blade down he sliced through a rafter. The Reaver in its wraith blade form was not a physical weapon but rather a destructive form of energy. A slash to wood caused the building material to burst where contact was made, so fragments and splinters flew everywhere and the two larger pieces collapsed.
The Piper’s song faltered sharply as the debris fell towards it and the being was forced to leap clear as it came down with a tremendous crash on the alter.
Raziel wasted no time, diving through the billowing cloud of dust and driving his wraith blade directly into the creature’s chest.
The piper sagged forward but made no sound. Raziel capitalised on the injury he had made and dragged his hand to the side; burning through the creature’s chest and leaving it tilted to one side.
With its torso sliced nearly in half, the piper fell forward as if all the strength had been cut from its body. The blue wraith kicked the body back so it fell with a loud thump to the ground.
The piper lay there after the impact, arms wide spread but still its grip on the bone pipe did not waver.
After a moment of silence, Raziel recalled the wraith blade and looked around. What rats were left were all hurriedly fleeing, running for the relative and dubious safety of their holes. Without the piper’s song to compel them they would not stay not stay and fight.
The piper lay there motionless and Raziel craned forward to get a better look at the features of this strange, alien being.
“Raziel, behind you!” Ariel’s voice screamed into his mind. Turning, Raziel managed to catch the descending stuff in his hand. Holding the other end was a human, a priest if Raziel judged by his white clothes. Just behind him stood too more humans, armed with staffs, none of the three warriors and elderly men.
They all had that same vacant and absent expression that the children had had when bewitched by the song of the Piper.
Remembering that creature and its powers Raziel turned his head to see the creature back on its feet. Its chest was still almost cleaved in half but it didn’t bleed, as if its body were made of something other then flesh and blood.
Its bone pipe to its lips it was trilling out its siren song once more and the humans, now clearly its replacement puppets, responded by stabbing at Raziel with their staffs.
Raziel ducked under their lunged, rolling and blowing the first of them over. Grabbing the man he slammed him into the floor with enough strength to shatter his skull, the head bursting open into bloody fragments.
The second priest stabbed at him again with the staff in his hands attempting to strike him across the shoulders.
The blue wraith dived out of the way easily, spinning around and landing a kick to the man’s jaw. The priest staggered back from the blow, clearly dazed despite the Piper’s control over him. Raziel ran at him quickly, throwing his talons forward and puncturing his chest.
The man’s soul came free from the body as the corpse slumped down and the blue wraith drew down his cowl, swallowing it whole; the action reflexive but supplying him with a boast of strength.
Spinning around he grasped the staff of the third priest and tackled him backwards, struggling with him for a moment.
Then the Piper itself entered the fray, attacking from the side. Raziel half turned and took the kick directly to the chest. The blow was sharp and strong, no amount of the beings strength being lost to its injury.
Raziel tumbled across the stone floor before he managed to right himself, dragging his talons to slow his momentum.
Its dark luring song continuing, the piper gestured with its elbow towards the blue wraith and the priest obeyed; charging Raziel with its staff at the ready to strike.
“So this is the extent of it is it?” The blue wraith asked contemptuously. “When children are not available as prey, you choose to puppet vermin and old men?”
He dived to the left as the priests staff came down to clash on the stone and as the old man turned, Raziel brought his legs sharply around and knocked his feet out from under him. As the priest toppled backwards, he grabbed a hold of the man’s ankle and dragged him up. Using the momentum of the fall itself Raziel threw the man directly at his puppet master, the human tumbled across the floor once before slamming into the Piper.
The priest had broken his neck when he struck the floor but his body served its purpose, causing the Piper itself to stagger backwards now dangerously off balance.
Raziel rushed it, summoning the wraith blade again. When he engaged the creature this time he left nothing to change.
Grabbing the Piper’s jacket in his left hand he drove the Reaver directly into the creatures head.
There was a blinding white flash along with a thunderous detonation, causing all the chapels windows to rattle.
The Piper’s head exploded into pieces that flew off and struck the walls, its pipe also; splintering until breaking entirely down the middle.
The body stayed on its feet, swaying back and forth as if it were going to fall over at any moment. Raziel backed off, still holding the wraith blade at the ready in case the creature might survive even this.
Then, from out of the gaping hole of the neck, a new ethereal form seemed to burst forth like a snake from a tunnel.
.
“Before the creature’s physical being was destroyed, I caught a glimpse of its true form; one I was quite familiar with.”
.
The thrashing creature erupting forth from the wound in the Piper’s body was an Archon. Raziel had seen them before and knew them all too well. They were hunters of the Spectral Realm, barely sentient incorporeal entities that stalked the lost souls of the underworld. Much like himself they were spirit devourers, taking some small part of the soul for themselves and sending the lion share of its energy back to the Elder to feed both him and his Wheel.
It wailed, its pincer arms thrashing wildly as if it was trying to claw its way out from the strange body in which it had been encased. In the physical world, Raziel could only behold its form as a faint outline and even that was growing less distinct.
Finally the Archon disappeared all together, perhaps returning to its native realm and when it did the Piper’s body promptly collapsed into dust. Whatever force had been holding it together dissipated and it shifted to the floor, bellowing out in a small cloud.
Raziel stood there, the wraith blade still shimmering around his arm and breathing heavily.
This encounter had left him confused and more then a little disturbed. What strange techniques were their enemies playing now that the servants of the Elder sought corporal form this way?
And why had it, before he had interfered, been trying to steel away human children? Now he had more questions that needed answers then he was comfortable with.
Was this some ploy by the Divus? Or something far more insidious?
Suddenly there was a loud clanking of metal on metal accompanied by the sound of many running footsteps. Raziel spun and turned in alarm, seeing that running in through the now open doors of the chapel were dozens of heavily armed men. They were all clad in armour, breast plates and helmets polished marble white over thick chainmail painted red. They all had swords, some simple long blades others claymores and each of them clearly knew how to use it from the way they were being held.
Quickly they encircled him, swords pointed forward and forming a tight circle of blades to block off any means of escape.
“Hold there creature!” One of them said, his voice echoing metallically from within the helmet.
Raziel stood very still, looking around at the men and seeing the clear anger in their stances and manner.