The Citadel still smouldered in the distance, far now to the North West. The humans were still plundering the city for anything of value. Eventually when their piracy was all done they would leave, the mass majority of them having no interest in social revolution beyond the opportunities for looting.
Ajatar stood on the far bank of that inland sea, watching after the quietly diminishing capital of the Ancients. With the Citadel taken, the Vampire nation had been struck a blow from which it would never recover. The eventual extinction of the blue skinned and winged vampires might take several more centuries but it was inevitable now. The race would fade, leaving only one of their kind left, the line Guardian and survivor – Janos Audron.
Even the Serioli, who survived till now due to their rejection of the mainstream faith in the Wheel of Fate, would fade away to be replaced by their fledglings and then still the humans.
“I will have to return to my warriors.” His said without turning around. “I will lead them somewhere secluded, somewhere defensible… where none of this will reach us.” She spoke without conviction and Kain knew, just as he did, that her words were hollow. There was no place for them to go. Their era was over.
What was it that the young Moebius had said? This was the age of Man? Perhaps so. Kain remembered, only distantly, vague myths told in the court of Coorhagen where he had grown up. They were stories of valiant warriors beginning the first dynasty of human rule in Nosgoth by slaying the cruel demonic overlords that once dominated them.
Seeing that same tale from a far different perspective now, Kain saw the inert flaw of man. They simply could not accept responsibility for their own actions. They had to continually find a pretext, an excuse and a scapegoat to blame all the evil they were capable of on.
That had born the concept of the devil, a source of all sin and thus has been a fictional character mankind could blame for its own evils. Vampires of course, being inconvenient on the whole for them, had been forever tied to the fictional darkness in the minds of their species.
Perhaps one day there MIGHT be an accord between human and vampire that forever ended hostiles between the two races.
But somehow, Kain very much doubted the likelihood of so benevolent an outcome.
The grandmaster drew herself up and then turned to face him.
“Very well then.” She began, holding out to him their prize. “Now that we have a free moment, this belongs to you.”
In her hands was the Third Tablet of Dark Fable, wrenched from the thieving hands of the young Mortanious. Looking at it, Kain noticed a difference he had not noticed before. The first tablet had been a very dark shade of blue, the second a black red and this third one was more of a brown colour.
Four Tablets… four elements?
Surely it could not be that simple?
And yet as he approached, now paying full attention to details; he saw the ancient symbol for earth etched into the top of the stone.
Had that first tablet been aligned to the power of water? Had that been why absorbing it had rendered him immune to water’s touch?
That pull was there again, the yearning and over eager excitement. Ajatar offered him the tablet with arms outstretched and he gladly took it in both hands.
The expected rush of power was there once more, surging through him and into his very soul.
Still grasping the tablet, Kain dropped down to his knees on the sodden earth; eyes wide as he felt the power pulsate within.
As the two others before, this tablet began to break apart; dissolving into fragments that were drawn through Kain’s skin and into his body. When the last of it fed into him, the onset of the visions began.
 “The heart that serves its function.”
Again he heard that booming, unearthly voice as his eyes saw other things than the world around him.
He saw himself as a corpse, human and recently murdered, lying on a stone slab. He was clad in the white steel armour that had shown his human allegiance to the kingdom of Willendorf. The chest plate had been removed and his ribcage wrenched open, the hideous cavity beyond thick with blood.
Standing beside his body, was Mortanious; now far older and fully matured. In one hand the necromancer held a thick serrated scalpel that was caked in blood and had fragments of bone stuck here and there. In the other he held the heart which he had just removed, the human heart.
This he placed to one side into a waiting box and from a separate side dais he lifted up another organ; a heart black in coloration and slimmer. The Heart of Darkness, the heart that rightfully belonged to Janos.
With surgical precision he began to install the heart in his new home; heaving the veins and arteries together like threads. When he was finished, he withdrew his hands and then proceeded to bind the rib cages began together; employing his magic to fuse the bones and repair the torn flesh. When he was finally done with the entire procedure, the only mark on the human Kain’s body was the scar inflicted by his cruel impalement.
Slowly, Kain’s body began to change, the flesh loosing its bright colour and becoming a paler grey. The black colour leached itself out of his hair, changing it forever to a bright snow white.
The touch of the Necromancer’s hand changed the armour he was as well and its colour morphed; the pure white giving way to a raven black.
“Prophecy in Motion.”
Those before him faded as the voice echoed. Before him now was a dead wasteland, one he recognised all too well. The Nosgoth before him was dust, infertile soil and motionless air. The sky was permanently overcast, clogged with smoke from the very smokestacks Kain had ordered built.
Kain found himself looking down a valley of some kind, with an extensive set of ruins nestled in the middle. From above, he recognised the outline of the old city and perceived it to be what remained of Avernus. The old city had been reduced to rubble long ago in an attack led by Zephon and now even its mighty cathedral was a relic, a shadow of its former self.
As Kain watched, the earth began to strain. The sky overhead darkened even more and the clouds themselves almost seemed to tremble. Kain watched in awe as holes tore in the sky itself, letting through flashes of sickly green lightning.
Those lightning bolts tore into the ground surrounded Avernus, ripping holes in the earth itself. Some great and terrible power had been unleashed and the ground received that power, opening up a passage into hell.
Dozens, hundreds, thousands of doorways cracked open in the dead earth and out of those doorways marched the Hylden.
They were running, running as fast as they could to jump with glee into even this dead land’s embrace. Some of them were weeping, others laughing almost insanely. This was no invasion although there were many warriors with him, but a migration. All of the Hylden, every single one of their kind which had been banished eons ago were leaving the demon dimension and occupying a dead Nosgoth.
“Upon the alter of the world.”
With a flash, this was gone and nine pure marble pillars lanced up into the sky. The Pillars of Nosgoth stood immutable, but despite this sight all was not well.
Their base was awash with blood.
Corpses littered the land around its base, fledglings, humans, winged ancients; all of them wearing the Serioi Armour and carrying weapons forged by the order. At the foot of the pillar of balance, slumped the broke and battered form of the warrior Ajatar had called Ansu.
Parts of him smouldered as if cooked and his wings had been violently torn off, the remnant scattered to either side.
Grasped in the hands of his corpse however was another tablet… the final tablet of Dark Fable. Blood ran down its black surface but it was indeed the final one. As expected, faintly carved into its top was the ancient symbol for Air.
Hopefully, once Kain had it, the riddle surrounding his destiny would finally be answered and he would know for sure what role he would play as Scion of Balance.
Suddenly, everything around was clouds. He was now in the middle of a vast sea of mist, floating high in the sky. Above, he could faintly make out the rays of the sun and below the land were a few dark smudges against the blue sea.
That did not attracted his attention as much as the movement he could see in those clouds, swirling wisps of it indicating that something large was encircling him; swimming in the clouds like a fish in the water.
Occasionally Kain could see illumination, turning to face him as if cast from the eyes of some colossal creature.
“Come forth, monstrosity!” Kain demanded, his voice sounding hollow and echoing as if down to the bottom of some unfathomable deep well.
Whatever was out there was huge, twisting up and over the cloud and then diving back down again, like a whale bursting froth from the sea. Kain caught only glimpses of the creature, seeing a fantastically long dark body. Kain marvelled at how so large a beast could move so quickly.
Then those distant pale lights turned to face him completely. For a moment they hung suspended, and then they became to grow. The lights grew in brilliance, growing larger and their light brighter.
And it was then Kain realised that they were not getting bigger but they were getting closer. Those lights, those eyes, grew impossibly large as the ends of two rows of tusk burst forth from the cloud cover.
“The blood of the first born.”
That same voice declared, almost triumphantly and this time Kain saw that the voice came from directly in front of him; from the baleen covered lips of the creature emerging before him. 
Before that face emerged completely, Kain awoke from his trance. It was heavily raining of him, matting his hair and soaking it with mud from the ground. It was the first rain of the new spring, melting all the snow of the winter. The sky was an angry black and grey, the distant call of thunder in the distance.
The Scion of Balance hoisted himself up. Once more there was the sense of time having past, but not as much as before.
Ajatar was still there, standing there watching him with a hopeless expression over her wet face.
“If you are who I think you are...” She began in a dead tone, without even waiting for him to fully rise. “Then what good are you coming in such a late hour?”
Kain swung his head, trying to flick the wet dirt out of his hair.
“Why did you bother coming, Kain?” She demanded of him, her black hair hung over her eyes to hide them. “Just to give us hope when it could not possibly make the least bit of difference?”
“I do whatever I deem necessary to secure the future of the Vampires.” He said. Ajatar drew in a sharp breath.
“What future?!” The grandmaster asked with a somewhat hoarse voice. “Have you been blind to all that has taken place around us?”
Kain said nothing to that. Ajatar fluttered her wings, allowing her feathers to rustle in profound irritation. Then they settled and her shoulders slumped.
“Our time is over. The humans will kill us all. This is the twilight of the Vampire race.”
There was a silence, and then Kain chuckled.
“Far from it.” This remark caused her to look up at him sharply. “In fact, this is only the beginning for our kind.”
The grandmaster looked back over her shoulder at the ruined remains of the Citadel, her expression portraying her thought that Kain was mad for saying such a thing with that plain in sight.
“You can not see beyond tomorrow, but I can and have. Our kind will thrive despite all attempts to eradicate us.”
He turned then to gaze directly north, towards the nearer towering spectacle of the Pillars that lanced up from the earth to stab into the sky itself.
“And we have one last place to go before we can realise that future.”
Ajatar looked at him, her dead eyes maintained but with some effort. The edges of her mouth twitched involuntarily.
“Then you know where the last of the Tablets is?” She asked rhetorically. Kain gave no immediately answer but instead he began to wonder to himself, what incite might he gain from the last tablet? Would all his questions be answered just like that?
He was not stupid enough to entertain even the thought of something that convenient.  But still he had come so far now and with the end of this journey coming into sight, he could not slow down.
“Your warriors have recovered it.” He said simply. “And they await us at the Pillars.” He would say no more. If they were all dead when they got there then he could simply deny all foreknowledge. Ajatar looked up towards the north, following his gaze.
“Very well then.” She stated with her eyes in that direction.
With a growing sense of trepidation, Kain set his sights firmly on the pillars and his body dissolved again into bats.
The swarm flew high into the sky, beating their wings almost in unison in their desire to reach the end of their quest.
This time, not startled by Kain’s ability to shape shift, Ajatar followed close behind soaring after him on her already tired wings.
The Pillar’s beckoned them on and the sight of them was like fire in Kain’s blood, making him push his bats harder than they had ever been pushed before. He did not care if he ended up breaking all their wings.
Ajatar pushed herself as well, flying as hard as she could in order to keep up with him. She fell a little behind but Kain did not let up for a moment, his destiny almost within reach.