The woman seemed to be getting used to his appearance and presence although Raziel did not fail to notice that she remained quite tense, ready to run or call for help at the slightest hint of aggression from him. At least she was prudent.
“Perhaps you find it odd that I’m willing to speak with a Ghoul?” She asked with a nervous sort of tone and twist to her lips. The ghoul in question spread his arms slowly in a short bow, almost mockingly.
“The thought had crossed my mind.”  He admitted.  The woman, who called herself Princess Alicia Ottmar, seemed momentarily taken aback by being addressed so courtly. Perhaps it had not occurred to her that he might respond, if at all, with the crudest sort of speech imaginable. It had always been man’s failing it seemed, to believe that no other species was capable of the same kind of manners they seemed to think they invented.
“Believe me, under ordinary circumstances I wouldn’t...” She said, shuffling a little to keep her fur coat up high around her shoulders as if to protect her vulnerable neck with it. “But to be blunt, I require aid.”
Raziel arched an eyebrow and gave her a penetrating look. What she seemed to be suggesting was ludicrous.
“And you’re asking me?”  He asked in a factious tone.  Alicia nodded.
“The militia say that the blue devil killed a Piper.” She replied. “If that is you then you are the ... unexpected... answer to my prayers.”
Raziel cocked his head with a confused expression.
“Piper?” He asked. The princess cast a glance to the spot where the evening before the creature Raziel had battled had been slain and then back at him, a quick gesture but enough to let Raziel make the connection. It had been a strange creature he had struggled with the night before, like none he had ever seen before. More unsettling then that however had been the brief and disturbing appearance of the Archon spectral entity from its fallen corpse.
“They are beings that the people of Willendorf have feared for centuries.” She said and there was a genuine tinge of fear in her voice. “They, more than anything else, are responsible for the decline of the realm.”
The blue wraith stiffened a little and narrowed his eyes.
“They?” He asked with his voice growing harsh enough to make the princess seem even more apprehensive. “Plural as in more than one?”
Alicia took a moment to gather her courage again. For a normal human she was showing an admirable deal of fortitude, this alone spoke of her desperation for aid no matter what the source.
“They come with the chill of winter.” She began in a low cold tone. “Sometimes travellers see them in the forests when the new snow flies, waiting for the deepest cold to carry them in.” She shuddered a little. “Then they come to take our children away into the darkness.”
The blue wraith remembered what the creature had been doing before he had decided to interfere. Playing upon its bone pipe it had used its strange music to place many human children of Willendorf under a siren spell, luring them from their homes and out into the cold night.
“Truth or fairy tale?” He asked the princess in a sidelong fashion. She looked back at him with an even graver expression then before.
“What do you think?” She asked back. Raziel paused and looked over to where the Piper had fallen again, remembering the battle and how much of a close thing it had been. The piper had been a match for even his enhanced strength and reflexes.
“I am more concerned with the reality then the superstition.” He said. “They are more then you could possibly know.”
The princess tossed her head back and spread her hands apart in a cutting, dismissive gesture.
“I don’t know or, to be honest, care what they are.” Alicia said. “All that concerns me is what they do.”
Raziel sighed; he knew where this was going.
“And I suppose you would like me to rid you of them.” He asked in a tired and resigned sort of voice. The princess paused again and took a quick glance back over her shoulder. From the door of the chapel there was the sound of people, the life of the ordinary citizens of Willendorf continuing while they talked.
“This place is too public.” She concluded, unnecessarily dropping into a whisper. “Someone could walk in at any moment.”
Clearly public appearance meant more to humans then it had to the ruling class of Kain’s empire. As a clan leader he had had privileged enough status to speak to whomever or whatever he wanted in public without consequence.  If anyone, human or vampire, dared to second guess his choice of conversationalists they would be dead within the hour.
“Come to my chambers in the castle at midnight tonight and we can speak freely there. I will leave a candle in the window to mark it.” Even though she said this the greatest hint of reluctance and distaste in her voice, Raziel found himself momentarily taken aback by the suggestion. A human, offering to take him into their home?
This girl was more desperate for allies then he had originally thought.
“Why would I do this?” He asked to cover his confusion. “Simply to indulge you?” A callous show of vampiric indifference to human affairs usually worked to curb enthusiasms.  Only the princess Alicia Ottmar proved to be a tad more shrewd then average. She gestured all around her.
“You came back to the scene of the battle.” She said with a nervous smile. “That says to me you are curious.”
.
“Undeniably true only not for the reasons she might think.”
.
Raziel considered her offer with a frown creasing his forehead. He was more than aware that in all likelihood this might be a trap, that the creature sent to fight him merely to give him incentive to be lured deeper inside. Some part of his mind told him that he should quit this city and venture out to find Kain again or go to the Chronoplast and leave this era altogether.
Pursuing the tentacles of his former master was no duty of his.
Or was it? The presence of an Archon, even one bound in such an absurd physical form, was a great cause for concern. If it were a duty for him to investivate it was a self imposed duty and one had he had not been aware he had even made.
“You would not be wise to trust her, Raziel.” Ariel said, whispering to him silently inside his own mind.  An obvious enough statement hardly, requiring the wisdom of a past Balance Guardianship but still a wise piece of advice.
“I need information and if she is willing to give me it I will indulge her long enough to hear her out.” He replied to her with a though, voicing his own reasoning.  There could be no harm in having a conversation in a more private location and if it did turn out to be a trap, he was confident of his ability to either fight or flee.
“Whatever you have to say ought to be informative in order to make it worth my time.” He told the princess.
Alicia did not appear overly surprised by his reply, if anything she seemed to be relieved if only to quite his disturbing company for a time. She pulled up the hood of her cloak over her head covering her hair.
“Then I will see you tonight, ghoul.” She said.
That ‘ghoul’ was beginning to wear a little thin.
“My name is Raziel.” He corrected her and was gone from the chapel before she had even reached the door.
.
“This was a calculated risk. I had no proof that this scion of the Ottmar line was sincere and more than enough reason to suspect that this might be a trap. But I needed to understand the full extent of the influence these Piper’s had on this realm and where they were coming from. I would just have to be careful.”
.
Prudent caution however was definitely something to adhere by. For a long time Raziel studied the castle of Willendorf city, a fortress set upon the rise of an island in the middle of the lake and connected to the common folks dwellings by a massive bridge. Carved into the buttresses of the castle and across the gateways was the proud emblem of their lion sigils.
But even these marks of past glory were hidden away, obscured by flapping banners of the new age Sarafan and their own Ankh symbol.  This seemed deliberate, as if the occupying force wanted to leave the citizens of Willendorf under no illusions as to who was in charge.
As the sun moved across the sky, the day progressing, Raziel watched the castle from across the water.
.
“Here before me, the castle of the Lion King of Willendorf, was a faded remnant of a bygone age. The stones themselves seemed to drip with the memory of strength and glory. But with the fluttering Sarafan banners of the occupation atop the walls, the castle seemed to be bleeding its memories away into passing time.”
.
Willendorf was in the last days of its own existence, the glory of its reign something to be hidden away behind the marks of the new rising power without objection. Raziel could see this cities death even now, houses abandoned and left to be reclaimed by nature on the outskirts, the busy lived in part of town was run down and filled with waste and even the castle seemed to be crumbling from neglect. If he was any judge he supposed the city had another fifty years of slowly dwindling life left in it before it faded completely.
It was sad to see a once so mighty a capital die, not by the sack of an invading army, but through the decedent decay of men with no hope.
It seemed to be the common mode for mighty empires. They never died in sudden fits of blazing glory. They might have been built by exceptional men with grand visions, but those visions did not last beyond a generation and the reins of power were passed to increasingly petty men only concerned with furthering either their own ends or the ends of their social class.
Kain’s empire had lasted far longer than any dominion before it but even it had eventually decayed, even with immortal leaders to direct it. The enemy of a system built in glory seemed to be the march of time.
Raziel was so caught up in his philosophical musings that he almost didn’t see the single candle set into the window of a high room in the castle. He sat there staring at it for perhaps a whole minute before he blinked and stood up.
Seems the princess was being sincere in her desire to talk to him again, although Raziel approached the castle with a great deal of caution.
He saw nothing out of the ordinary as he swam across the lake from the south towards the island, diving down to avoid being spotted by the archers on the battlements. There were soldiers patrolling the castle battlements and courtyards, but they did not appear to be doing anything besides that nor did there seem to be any more of them then necessary.
Still as Raziel began to scale the outside of the castle walls, sinking his talons into the stone, his sense of something being wrong grew stronger and stronger.
The sun had dipped down low over the edge of the horizon but the stars were winking out, obscured by thick grey clouds coming in from the east. The air carried a faint dusty smell that told of more snow on the way.
He was perhaps about ten feet away from the window when from within, there broke a powerful loud scream.
.
“My hopes for a quiet interview were shattered as a woman’s high pitched screech broke the calm of the night.”
.
Raziel tensed for only a moment and then sprang upward, catching the rim of the windows ledge and hauling himself up onto it with a massive effort. The window baring his way and the candle just beyond it was blown out by a quick telekinetic bolt, sending glass and bits of hot wax cascading into the room.
Inside the room, Alicia Ottmar was pinned up against the side of the wall with terror written and almost engraved into her very face. Looming over her, tall and thin was...
Raziel stared, uncomprehendingly at the creature he had killed last night, restored to life and apparent good health before his eyes.
Slowly, the Piper turned its elongated and twisted head to look back at him over its shoulder. Then he saw his mistake. It was not the same one, very similar to the first but this one had a different number of bony spikes jutting out from either side of its skull and it had a missing tooth.
The pipe made of bone in its hand was longer than the previous one, jagged at one end where the bone had been snapped.
Then, surprisingly, the creature spoke.
“The being that destroyed one of my kin.” It said in a gurgling voice due to its lips being pulled back by the skin around its head. The accusation was more of a question. “This is not your affair, leave and you will not be singled out for retribution.”
Raziel stepped down from the windowsill and the second piper turned to face him. The blue wraith flexed his right arm, flourishing it to one side. With a screech the wraith blade manifested filling the small chamber with its otherworldly glow.