by Greg Dragon
Lancert walked forward and took her strong, slender hands inside his gauntleted palm. He raised them to his lips and kissed them, then knelt before her with sadness in his eyes. “Alysia, I do not tell you these things to create confusion or pain for you, my dear. I tell you these things to educate you on our history, the Ert history. There is no prime good or prime evil here. No gods or devils, no Satan, just regular demons and the angels who protect this world. There may be similarities in what you were taught but it is coincidence. Do you understand me?”
“I do,” Alysia admitted, and she tried her best to pull him up to his feet. “Doesn’t change the fact that in this former life I was a traitor, but I accept you letting me know that I am not Satan.” She turned around to face her friends, who had been eerily quiet for the better part of an hour. “Hey, Amarah, were you a knight in this place?” she asked.
“I’ve been a knight for a really long time, CeeCee,” she said, “but, not a high Ert like Lancert. Only the elite of our order can access the palace. It was like that for this one, and it’s like that for the new one, wherever it is. The rest of us are down here just like you are, trying to make a mark against our enemies.”
Alysia bit her tongue against any other questions, and their silent group pushed on until they reached the large double doors. When they got close enough to it for details to be seen, Alysia’s mouth fell open from the sheer beauty of the portal.
The artwork reminded her of Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel. There was so much going on that it would take her an entire day to follow it, but she couldn’t help but balk at how amazing it was. The door itself was built from a black metal, inlaid with wood, and the carvings in the center of its panels were made from wood also. There were no doorknobs or panels for entry that Alysia was accustomed to. This was just a tall barrier, with no clear way that she could see for them to gain access.
“Well, I guess this will be a new experience for all of us. Except Lancert, then,” Alysia said. “So, my former self was almost made into an angel with full access to this room. How ironic is it that I am about to see them now, when I am Alysia? Is this where Bliss has been taken?”
Lancert didn’t meet her eyes but stepped towards the door and removed his gauntlets. “Unless another high lord brought the old sword here, they would not have had access to hide it inside. What this room can do for us, however, is tell us the location of it.”
He placed both hands on the door and a shower of dust fell from above it, forcing the party to cover their faces, but Lancert did not flinch. The ornate door began to collapse upon itself, as if it were a segmented mat and all the segments were folding in towards the high lord’s palms. The effect looked strangely digital to Alysia, and before long there was nothing. A bright light shone from the portal that was now in front of them where the doors once stood, and without saying anything to them, Lancert stepped inside.
Amarah shrugged and followed him through, then Orwan, Bortex and Cyrio. Alysia paused for a time to look around the room, taking in the architecture and trying to imagine hundreds of Ert lords like Lancert standing around in groups, talking quietly with one another.
“I was one of them,” she said, and shook her head, wondering why it was she couldn’t feel anything familiar about the place. Reluctantly, she turned to the light and stepped inside, wondering at what she would find when she got there.
Alysia’s eyes were shocked by the brightness of the light within the portal, and when she emerged, her pupils hurt, and she saw large spots within her vision. “Hurry up before he sees you, CeeCee!” Cyrio whispered, and out of instinct, she ducked her head and scrambled towards his voice.
The spots and pain faded away to show that they were at the bottom of a large staircase. The stairs seemed to be made of crystal, and the column that they hid behind was a smooth, black obelisk that went all the way up into—Alysia couldn’t believe her eyes. There was no longer a ceiling above them. What she saw was the night sky, filled with earthly constellations that were like nothing she had seen since arriving in Yalem.
They were in a field of low grass, and the place was illuminated by a glow that seemed to come from the stairs. She hunkered down behind Lancert who had his great sword drawn, and she looked around to see if she could assess the situation. From what she could see, the field was expansive, endless in its stretch towards the starry black line of the horizon. There was no sign of the portal that they had come through, and it seemed as if the stairs stood alone in the middle of a field, with two large obelisks to keep it company.
“What are we hiding from?” Alysia asked, but before anyone could answer a loud scream came from above them, something high-pitched and monstrous that made the hair on her arms stand up.
The noise continued to grow, then suddenly it stopped and Lancert peeked around the corner to see. The ground began to vibrate and Alysia found herself being dragged away from the obelisk.
“He's on to us. Look out, CeeCee!” she heard Bortex yell. There were dark portals opening up all around them, and Amarah was in a fighting stance bouncing in anticipation of something.
From out of the portals poured twisted creatures that looked like old witches with snake tails for legs. Not snake bodies like a Naga or certain depictions of Medusa and her gorgons, but twin snakes, extended from wrinkled, naked, golden bodies, their hair so long that it wrapped about them like clothes.
Alysia unsheathed the sword and prepared herself. It felt as if every muscle in her body ached, and she was exhausted. Lancert’s lordly status as an Ert probably removed minor mortal annoyances such as hunger, energy, and lust, but the rest of them needed a break, and she was hoping that this room would have been the place for it.
Lancert spun and cut at two of the creatures, causing them to explode into black ash when his enormous great sword made contact with their flesh. Amarah jumped away from the whip of a tail and somersaulted forward, landing her blade on the crest of one of the creatures, which resulted in a noise that reminded her of a watermelon being cut.
The creature did not explode like the ones that Lancert killed, but it was certainly dead, falling below the woman’s feet and twitching violently as the life fought against the physical body, which seemed unwilling to let it pass.
Bortex and his brother were poetry in motion. The big man would punch, head butt, and throw one of the creatures into the other, and Cyrio would follow it up with his long slender epee, poking holes into their chests or slashing gashes into their throats.
Alysia only had a moment’s hesitation to observe what her friends were doing because the creatures were on her in an instant, and she too had to fight for her life. But something was wrong when she raised Euphoria. The sword felt heavy and her arms ached, and she found that her energy was—
“CEECEE!” Orwan screamed, but she could barely hear him. He grabbed one of the creatures by her slender waist and borrowed forward through several more. The one he grabbed had been mortally wounded, so when he got to Alysia and let her go, she crumbled to the ground, dead and slashed up by the nails of her sisters, who wanted to stop Orwan in his charge.
The knight thrust his sword at Alysia, missing her face by inches, but crunching into something that had been behind her. Alysia felt some relief, but her legs gave out and she fell. From the ground she saw that Orwan had put his blade through the face of another form of creature. This one was slender, black, and male—in fact, it looked very similar to the one that had controlled Arlan Fo.
“An Incubus,” Orwan said, as he pulled her to her feet. “It latched on to you when the fight started, draining your essence in order to prevent you from fighting.”
“That shadow drake above us is building up electricity to fry us down here,” Lancert said to nobody in particular. He stood gripping his glowing great sword, with ashes piled high all around him, the creatures circling him looking for an opening, but none of them brave enough to try. “This is a decoy while he gathers power. Prepare yourselves
, this will hurt!”
Lancert raised his sword and shouted a command, to Alysia it sounded as if he said “sun of the morning,” but she knew that he was speaking in a different tongue than the one that she could understand. He slammed the blade into the ground, as if to snap it in two, but the ground shook from his impact, knocking everyone down, including the Erts.
A series of cracks formed a web of fissures on the ground, and blue fire erupted from where it split. Alysia expected to be consumed, but the ring reacted and wrapped her in armor, and a soft light surrounded her and the other Erts, which made them invincible to the flames.
Every creature was burnt black within the cobalt fire, and Lancert stood up and whipped the blade to the side before bringing it once again before him in preparation for anything else. As the creatures burned their ashes rose, and it produced a sulphuric stink reminiscent of rotten eggs.
Alysia climbed to her feet and took in her surroundings. The green field now looked like the aftermath of a great bonfire. She found Lancert and studied him, noticing for the first time that he looked tired, weakened by the magic that he had used to destroy the snake-like creatures.
“Are you okay, Lancert?” she asked, and the big man smiled and nodded.
“Couldn’t be better, CeeCee,” he said. “It has been a long time since I had to fight this powerful of a V’Kosha. Look up there. We aren’t in the clear, yet. That beast is an ancient form of demon, one that has terrorized not only Yalem in the past, but your former worlds since it has the ability to travel across the planes of existence.”
He called me CeeCee, Alysia observed before glancing to the heavens, where a large, winged creature was flying circles through the blackened clouds, lightning illuminating its movement. “That’s a dragon!” she said, and exchanged glances with Amarah.
“Yes,” the demon woman said, as she dusted ashes from her tattered leggings. “Intelligent people run when they see that manner of monster.”
“But not us, eh, Lancert?” Orwan remarked.
“Not us,” the high knight replied, resting his hand on the smaller man’s shoulder.
“How much time do we have before it comes for us?” asked Cyrio.
“Should be any time now,” Lancert said with the cool confidence that was his trademark.
“Well, it’s going around again, so we have time. Let us form a healing circle so that we are at our best when we fight it,” said Cyrio. He extended his hands and Amarah and his brother took them, then Orwan joined with Amarah’s and finally Alysia and Lancert completed the circle.
They sat on the ground and closed their eyes as Cyrio began to chant a series of strange words. Alysia expected to feel something; she had experienced healing from the Twilight Sword, Chaos’s gifted blade, and it had given her a sensation of ice slipping through her veins, leaving her rejuvenated whenever she would kill a demon. But Cyrio’s chants were only chants, and her lack of sleep began to cause her mind to drift.
Soon the man’s words were low and mumbled, and Alysia Knight drifted off into another world of her mind. Sleep always felt good, especially the kind when you dream. Alysia forgot all of the negativity that took her away from her friends and made her seek refuge in her loneliness to cope with the news about her history.
It was just peace within that blackness of her mind, no more pain, no burning sensation in her neck where the incubus had sunk his teeth, and no calluses on her hands from a life of swordplay. She felt young, new, and fresh, a girl who needed to be loved, lost in a deep void of nothingness. Still, it was pleasant, even though there was nothing else. She tried to remember where she was and what it was that she was doing, but nothing came to her, only the blackness and the cool feeling it gave her. She wanted to stay like this forever.
Chapter Three
The smell was what she noticed first. Even before she could see her surroundings, Alysia could smell the familiar scent of turkey bacon and eggs. She opened her eyes, hoping—no, more like wishing—that everything before had been a part of an elaborate and complicated nightmare.
Maybe she had been in a coma for weeks. Since dreams that merely lasted a few minutes seemed to span hours due to their complexity, couldn’t a coma span a year in the land of dreams? A year of giants attacking your city, and you being made into a demon samurai of some sort?
Alysia mulled this over before opening her mind to the reality. She was in her room, not the dorm room of her university, but the bedroom that she had grown up in with her parents. She sat up and rubbed her eyes, then examined her palms for the familiar callouses. Everything was as she remembered it; she could even see the scar from her fight with the Archon.
If I’m back in my parent’s house, then why am I me? she wondered.
She looked at the walls, smiling despite herself at how normal everything looked. Posters of her favorite bands, actors, and models papered the room. Like many attractive little girls she had wanted to become a model, but James Knight was not trying to hear it and "tiger mom" was of the same mind. Fifty-five trophies took up all of the real estate in her open closet. Golden statues with stamped bases bearing her name and first place accolades in sports ranging from martial arts to classic ballet.
She remembered just how busy she had been as a child. "It will keep her out of trouble," was her father's excuse whenever another activity was added in.
Alysia stood up. The dull ache that she’d felt in her shoulders from Arlan Fo was now gone, but she still felt exhausted. She stretched hard, throwing her hands up above her head and arching her back to the point where each vertebra sang a song of joy. When she straightened up it felt as if the blood in her body coursed towards her head. The room spun and she collapsed, a squeal of relief pushing past her lips.
The door to her bedroom flew open with a thud, and stepping in was James Knight, her father—a younger, more intimidating version of him, at least.
"Who are you, and what are you doing in my daughter's room?" he asked, looking around to see if anyone else was in there.
Alysia didn't know what to say. She was elated to see him, to the point where her hands were shaking, but she had changed, and she knew it. She wondered how she would make him recognize her, make him see beyond the demon that she had become. Standing up and straightening her tunic, she tried. "It's me, Daddy. Don't you recognize your CeeCee?"
James Knight stepped inside the room. He had a pistol in his hand, which he secured and placed in the small of his back as he looked over the strange woman sitting on his daughter’s bed. The look on his face was one of disbelief, but as he studied her face and the small, hopeful smile reflected on her lips it was as if he finally recognized her.
“Wait, what?” he said as confusion settled in. “Alysia’s at school. I just spoke to her this morning. This is a prank, right? You have to be a cousin or long lost sibling of Kendra’s. I see the resemblance, but there is no way in hell you’re CeeCee.”
“I’m not CeeCee, huh? Okay, how’s this for me not being CeeCee? My first boyfriend was in sixth grade. You found out about him and contacted his parents to get him in trouble. I was so embarrassed that I didn’t talk to you for a week. How would I know that?”
James walked in and pulled out the computer chair from Alysia’s desk and took a seat, never taking his eyes off the strange woman with his daughter’s face. “So, you know Alysia, she shared some family history, and now you’re here trying to prank me into falling for whatever this is.”
Alysia tried to think of something that she could never share with a long lost aunt, something that only she and James would know. There was the martial arts training that was a strong connection for them, but there were also personal events, important events in her life that would make him believe her, but right now she was running a blank.
“Look, Dad, I can go through all of the advice you gave me when we worked out, or the embarrassing things you did to keep me away from boys, but I don’t think you would believe me. I know th
at you love children; it is what made you give up a career in sports to go fight for our country when you were eighteen. I also know that themes of brotherhood and sacrifice in movies make you emotional, and I know that your favorite ice cream is strawberry cheesecake.”
James Knight smiled but he wasn’t convinced. “Very good, but these are all things that Alysia could have told you.”
Doh! Alysia thought, I have to tell him something that he alone knows, something that I would never tell anyone. “Okay, Dad, here it is. I know that you have episodes that make you really sad. Sometimes you won’t even talk to Mom the entire day and you go to the bar or somewhere else to deal with it. I found out about it when my friends told me that they saw you drinking alone at—”
“Christ,” James Knight said, the look of confusion returning to his eyes. “CeeCee knows that telling anyone else about that would hurt me, deeply. What’s going on? How is it that you look so much older, and look so…beat up?”
Alysia took a deep breath before answering. “If you think my appearance is hard to believe, then you definitely will not believe my explanation.”
“You’re here for a reason, believable story or not, so forget about what you assume that I will believe. I want to hear it.”
“Okay, Dad, but, how can I put it? I…I…in my past, my version of the past, I lost Mom without saying goodbye. I want to see her more than anything else and I think that she would like to hear this as much as you do.”
“See,” James Knight said, “now I’m really confused. If you know about Kendra’s passing, why would you wait on her to return here when you know that it’s not going to happen?”
“What?”
“Kendra died four years ago, CeeCee. If you’re who you say you are, how is it that you don’t know this?”
“Because, in my reality, Mom died during the attack. I had two parents when I went off to college, and you gave me the bad news over the phone while I hid out with a friend. If the past has changed then I don’t know what else would have changed. I thought that somehow I had been thrown backwards to get a chance to talk to you, but now I wonder if you are even you, or if this is some other twisted portal that Chaos is using to punish me.”
