Kain, to his own surprise, found that his hands were actual trembling as he approached the tablet. The anticipation would have had his heart working double time if he still had had it. As it was, his body simply settled for the other signs of intense anxiousness.
Was his destiny about to be revealed to him, after all this time? Had Raziel’s sacrifice and final act of free will delivered him to where he needed to be?
There was only one way to find out.
Crossing the short moat to the stone platform, Kain approached the stone. Now that he was closer he could see the work that had gone into carving the delicate and thin writing on its marble smooth surface. If Ba’al had made this stone in the grip of some divine revelations then it must have taken him days. The Tablet lay on its pedestal, surrounded by a faint scarf of finest silk. The Serioli had treated it with the reverence it deserved.
-
“Once again I was compelled to reach forward, as if invited. I could not help myself and even if I had wanted to I could never have refused.”
-
Even his own mind could not summon the thoughts necessary to stop himself. So instead, he watched as his arms reaches out to engulf the Tablet.
With both hands he grasped the Stone and then his mind, his thoughts, his very soul exploded.
He was only briefly aware of what was happening around him at that point. He could see Ajatar’s startled face and between his talons he could see the tablet he held crumbling to dust. The dust hovered between his hands, before in some peculiar method was absorbed into his very being through the skin.
None of that mattered right now though.
“Redeemer and Destroyer.” A titanic voice remarked, echoing through his being. That voice held with it the reinforcement of thousands upon thousands of years of life.
He saw the Citadel of the Ancient Vampires and watched as a young human boy was brought before Janos Audron, who stood watching the struggling human without a great deal of enthusiasm. Without knowing how he knew, Kain instantly perceived that this bald headed youth was in fact Moebius as an adolescent.
The young time streamer had a fresh cut on his forehead, a deliberately carved figure ‘8’sign that dripped blood down his face. His eyes were alight with fanatic zeal.
Janos laid a hand on the boys head and brushed away the blood with his thumb to look closely at the scar. Moebius said something, spitting in rage, but Kain could not perceive exactly what in his detached state.
Janos seemed to recoil slightly so whatever had been said had been sufficient to get his attention. He looked at the young boy pityingly then and gestured to the two other winged Ancients holding them. The two of them nodded once curtly and took Moebius away; the boy kicking and screaming.
Janos stayed behind, before turning to look with anguish at another figure Kain had not noticed.
Ba’al, the first Balance Guardian, put a hand on the Audron’s shoulder in consoling affection.
“Pawn and Messiah.” That same huge voice echoed on.
-
“I could not move images flooded my mind and I could feel the very soul within me churn and toss like a skiff in a gale. I found the experience to be quite… novel.”
-
Kain felt himself being stretched by his hopping around, as if he were in some way physically a part of the ancient Chronoplast as it echoed across time.
There was then the sound of metal striking metal and Kain watched as he saw the fledgling Vorador once again; working tirelessly as he pulled on massive iron valves and pulleys of some vast machine. The chamber he was in showed the tell tale signs of still being in the Citadel.
 Vorador worked alongside many of fledglings, all of them straining to operate the massive contraption. Jets of steam issued forth from pipes lining the top end of what seemed to be a boiler of some kind.
Down one side of the machine were cannels that led away from this boiler to a different section of the same device where Vorador by now was placing a mold directly in its centre, the depression a more than familiar serpentine twisting point.
Vorador gave some inaudible order and several other fledglings turns more valves in response. Pouring down out of the boiler came forth a thick, gelatinous red liquid that let forth thick clouds of white steam as it slid down the canal.
As it began to fill up the mold Kain could see that mixed in with this paste like red substance were fragments of white bone.
Grimly, Vorador shut off the flow from the boiler once the mold was full and then he took up from the work surface nearby a large hammer. This he held over the mold of the Reaver and then began to strike, each blow accompanied by an elemental incantation as he employed Serioli mastery in his forging.
The other fledgling around him paused in their own work to watch him hammer the sword into physical form.
As Vorador toiled in his creation of the sword, Kain could see that placed nearby in his force was another of the Tablets of Dark Fable.
 “Time spanned soul.” The voice continued and its booming presence erased this played out act and opened the way for the next and most spectacular scene yet.
Stars and suns flew past him as a journey of immeasurable distance was crossed in the blink of an eye. He saw Nosgoth as he had never seen her before, a blue orb floating in an inky blankness. Its landmasses only faint visible through obscuring cloud cover.
Kain felt that other awareness wash over his and he saw… something.
Some large titan flew past by him; surging down out of that black void towards the orb that was Nosgoth. This eldritch snake undulated from side to side as if swimming, its bulk too large to see its whole form. All Kain could see was the faint violet skin and fins that sprouted out at either side which were a luminous green.
The beast, if this thing was really live, was so large that in comparison he would have been little bigger than an insect.
Ponderously the serpent approached the blue orb and turned and Kain felt that presence centre entirely on him. Two pairs of eyes were looking directly at him from the fish like head that he could only barely perceive in its massiveness.
“The two shall become one and the Scion of Balance is healed.”
Kain gasped and sat bolt upright, hyperventilating as he shuddered back from such immensity. He held a hand to his breast, feeling all the more disturbed by the lack of a heartbeat in his chest.
-
“I recovered myself, my thoughts and perceptions returning to the here and now. I swam to the surface out a sea of words and found waiting for me; chaos.”
-
He could not explain the things that he had been shown by the Tablet. It had been like a dream but different at the same time, like memories inserted directly into his head of events in history.
Glancing around, he found himself in a separate chamber just off from the room he had collapsed in. The Reaver lay by his side at the end of stone cot bed lined with straw. No one, not even Ajatar, was to be seen either here or in the room beyond.
By the faded light he judged it to be later on the day, perhaps about early afternoon. The afternoon of which day he could be certain.
He could have been out for only a few hours or as long as several days, there was no day of knowing.
Strangely though he felt… different.
Slowly he picked himself up and laid both hands to the side of his head, trying to sort through his groggy and disjointed mind.
Glancing down at his body he saw that he did not look any different than usual. The difference seemed to be in his mind, as if he was looking at everything from a new perspective.
On the physical side, he felt renewed and refreshed as if he has feasted himself on a shower of blood.
But he cast aside these considerations for later contemplation.
If those visions had been intended for him, they had given him little concrete information to work with.
Had they been literal events or merely visual metaphors?
And that thing…that tremendous snake? He could not conceive on the sheer magnitude of that creature could be based in reality. Seeing that beast had shocked him just as much, if not more, than the horrifying sight of the False God.
But what it had shown him for certain was that in Vorador’s forge, the birthplace of the Reaver, was the second tablet of Dark Fable.
Kain did not have time to ponder these things any further. There was a loud whistling noise, followed by a tremendous crash. The ground beneath his feet almost seemed to roll, bucking upwards with the impact.
There was the disjointed harmony of hundreds of voices roaring out in unison and Kain recognised that sound all too well.
Quickly he snatched the Reaver up and ran back out into the chamber. Through the grill like windows lining the outer chamber, Kain could see the reason why he had been left alone and unattended by even a guard.
Outside the Serioli stronghold, surrounding it completely was an army.
Heavy siege weapons were dotted here and there amongst what had to be a thousand men in the armour of the early Sarafan; the Seraphim.
Trebuchets were luring great slabs of rock at the stronghold and the surrounding Cliffside with devastating effect, the ground trembling with each impact. Behind the armour, the Cliffside dwellings of the feral humans were in flames; the rope brides and supports that held their community above the waves collapsing into the ravine.
From the battlements of the fortress, the winged vampires who were not devastated by sunlight’s touch came out to throw spears and fire arrows down at the besiegers. A few of them were even hurling elemental spells into the army of humans.
It was not enough.
Kain saw grimly that against such a force, with only a small amount of defenders able to fight in broad day light, the fortress would not last.
-
“Was this the time for the Serioli to fall? For the original forgers to disappear and humans to take their place? Of that I could not be certain. What I did know however, that the second Tablet of Dark Fable laid waiting for me at Vorador’s forge in the Citadel of Tears. If the humans were laying siege to this stronghold then the Citadel itself must surely be in jeopardy.”
-
He glanced through the metal grill off towards the east. The curvature of the cliffs prevented him from seeing the low lands of the mainland. With no way to tell whether or not the Citadel was under siege as well, Kain was left with no other option but to return and ascertain the situation upon arrival.
That course of action did not appeal to him in the slightest.
But time was against him now. Moebius’ army was moving than he had anticipated. He had to retrieve that second Tablet or risk it being lost forever.
There was another tremendous crash as catapults lobbed giant rocks against the fortress, systematically battering it down. They seemed less interested in capturing this fort than they were in reducing it to rubble.
Kain turned to run, but froze in annoyance to see that the doorway leading into this room had collapsed. The entire passageway was blocked off with fallen debris, leaving him trapped in this room.
Desperately he glanced around, looking for another way out.
The two waterfalls on either side of the room gave him his clue. The water had to drain out somewhere. It would be a risky route to travel with so much water but it could be done.
He walked over and kneeled down by the grate that drained the waterfalls away. He could pass through that as mist but the pipe within was not wide enough to travel down without being in direct contact with the water.
Unfortunate this was the only means out of this room.
Suddenly there was another tremendous crash as the siege engines outside hurled another tremendous stone against the side of the fortress. Already leaning as he was over the pipe Kain stumbled forward and to his horror, his hand past into the stream of water.
Even before he made contact he prepared himself for the pain.
But nothing happened.
Kain froze, staring at this spectacle in shock.
His hand was in direct contact with the water and it wasn’t burning. He could feel the cold sensation of the liquid sliding over his skin and talons. It had been more lifetimes than imaginable since water had allowed him to touch it.
Such a thing was so unimaginable that he found himself simply staring at his hand with wide astonished eyes.
-
“This was a boon I could not ever have expected to befall me. The water paid me no heed, accepting me within its welcoming embrace. The tablet! There could be no other explanation for such a… miracle.”
-
The tablet, he remembered now.
It had past somehow into his very being when it had crumbled into dust. The very idea seemed laughable but there could be nothing else. Carefully he began to push more and more of his arm into the water and still nothing.
The acidic burning touch his body had instinctively learned to accept from the presence of this liquid had been negated.