El-Vador's Travels (42 page)

Sounds came to him after a time, faint but distinct all
the same. Footsteps from guards perhaps, signalling another potential
visitor. Perhaps the time for his execution was already at hand,
assuming that Harg had decided against leaving him rotting here
eternally.

The door opened and El-Vador restored his sight swiftly,
causing the room to explode in a white light that pierced his corneas
and made him blink. Eventually he made out two distinct shapes,
guards he had previously seen escorting Salvarius and Harg. They were
stock still and staring at him blankly, were they waiting for someone
else to enter the room?

A shadowy figure proceeded through the doors and between
the guards, thinking it a trick of his eyes, El-Vador focused further
upon the figure but could not see past the swirling shadows that
seemed to accompany him.

'When first I saw you traipsing your way toward the
Orcish burrow, I wondered what it was you hoped to achieve with such
a direct approach. Then when you entered the sewers after following
that armoured figure I had hope. Your clash with the beast displayed
the undeniable prowess of your power, yet you are now captured and
make no attempt to escape. This leaves me most confused.'

El-Vador knew that voice immediately, he just couldn't
understand why it had been following him. 'What business have you
with me, Anacletus? Are you also in league with the Orcs? Have you
come to gloat over my captivity and implore me to extend my powers
further?'

Anacletus laughed at him, tapping one of the stock-still
guards on the shoulder with a wispy arm before waving smoke in the
Orc's eyes. The guard did not so much as blink.

'These simpletons are easy to control, I am no great
friend of the Orcs, especially after my previous encounter with
Sarvacts.' he made his way closer to the bars now, more gliding than
walking. 'My powers have doubled since that débâcle, and
I have you in part to thank for that. We may have been even when we
parted ways, that much seemed apparent to us both, but in no small
part thanks to further repercussions, I feel that in my mind there is
still this one act to perform to atone for all the trouble you went
through in accidentally saving me.'

El-Vador deciphered the strange man's sentence
eventually, and wondered briefly if he had come to kill him.

Anacletus divested a sack from somewhere within his
shadowy robes and placed it upon the floor, rifling through it he
removed the Elf's weapons and laid them out before him.

'Your journey has not yet run its course, these are the
tools of your trade now, killer.'

El-Vador stared at him suspiciously. 'You're breaking me
out of here?'

The man offered him an easy smile that he wouldn't have
seen but for his enhanced sight. 'We are very much even now, Elf.
When we next meet it will most likely be as foes. The guards will
remain inanimate for a few moments after my departure, do what you
wish with them and then embrace the potential I have seen in you.'

'Why are you actively seeking to make someone who would
be your enemy in future more powerful?' El-Vador asked, still
suspicious that he may be walking into an even greater trap by
complying with Anacletus' wishes.

'We live in a post-antediluvian world, Elf. There are
few of us left from the great fall and even fewer living that yet
remember. I may well regret freeing you from these bonds should we
come into contact once more, but it is a risk I must take for the
sake of the upcoming war.'

The Elf blinked as Anacletus robbed one of the
statuesque guards of his keys. 'What war do you speak of?

'Nothing so childish as a war of darkness and light, but
merely that of the forces that conquered once before and the forces
that seek to conquer in their absence.'

The man spoke in riddles, and El-Vador cared not for war
while locked away in this cell. All he had left to do was escape this
place and plan his vengeance, events of the world at large mattered
little. When the cell door opened and he gathered his weaponry, he
offered Anacletus no response to his words of war and conquest.

'I see you feel this does not concern you, Elf. It will
in time, mark my words.'

Before El-Vador could respond, the man had slipped away
into shadow and beyond sight.

The cuts were swift, and stemmed from anger at being
locked away for such a length of time, the Orcish blood steamed on
the floor as the guards slumped down with blank looks still etched
upon their dead faces. Now he had to plan his retreat and then map
out further attacks upon this burrow somehow.

'No, you don't.'

The voice had finally spoken, now that he was free of
this place it chose to communicate with him.

'Only Harg sees you as a genuine threat, and that is
because he is a dream-addled fool that has laid importance upon you
more out of luck than realisation. Now you will show the rest of
these spawn exactly how much of a threat you can be.'

Finally the voice was empowering him, at last he was
being given a chance to exact retribution for all that had been done
to him and his people. He said nothing, waiting further instruction
as to just how he would do this.

'Stretch out your limbs and place your palms upward.'

Never before had El-Vador received such a strangely
specific command from the voice, he immediately obeyed, sensing the
importance of the action.

'Now quest out with your thoughts, and latch on to the
patches that burn brightest, my pawn.'

He refused to bristle at being called a mere pawn once
again, knowing that in the grip of power the voice could punish him
severely. Instead he did as was asked of him and sent his thoughts
outward, questing into the space above while closing his eyes and
extinguishing his sight in deep concentration.

'Good,' the voice crooned at him unnervingly. 'Now
search amongst that darkness for those patches, and seize what is
yours by right.'

It was a strange sensation, as if he were walking in
another plane of existence where darkness reigned eternal. His form
was not corporeal, he drifted from place to place and he saw the
world through eyes that were not his own. The patches the voice spoke
of grew over time in brightness as his own detached senses became
attuned with what they were witnessing.

'I see one of them.' El-Vador said.

'Silence!' the voice boomed back at him. 'You cannot
speak in this realm, do not attempt it further.'

Stinging at the harsh rebuke, the Elf instead chose to
drift closer to one of these multitudinous patches of light.

'Now assume the form that I had indicated to you prior,'
the voice instructed.

He did so, and the light came streaming toward him, the
sound of a faintly exhaled breath brushing his senses as it became
one with his own consciousness.

'Good. Good,' the voice crooned in pleasure. 'Now
continue with your ministrations to these lights until there are none
left.'

El-Vador complied, finding that he moved swifter now
through the darkness. He also discovered that amongst the bright
blaze of the previous patches were lesser hints of colour and form,
barely perceptible to what he assumed was his sight.

After the third joining with the patches of light, new
dots were appearing in the blackness, was he meant to harvest them as
well?

'Ignore them,' the voice said, reading his thoughts.
'You cannot tarry here overly long.'

The Elf complied, moving even faster and removing all
the brightened patches from this realm of shadow.

'Good. Good,' the voice repeated. 'Now cease your
efforts at concentration and allow yourself to slowly slide back into
corporeality.'

It was a strange sensation, as if he were pouring his
old self into a wooden cup, a fleshy vessel that once held his
spirit.

Opening his eyes, he reignited his sight and stared
about him. He felt no different than before.

A familiar chuckle bounced about his head. 'No, you will
not begin to see the effects of your endeavours immediately. First
you must take some time to recover, there will be no rush. The guards
are too dead to check up on you.'

A wry smile crept across El-Vador's face, he had time to
kill and sentries he already had, the endless hours didn't seem as
dark knowing that power would soon blossom within him.

'Go,' the voice said after a time. 'You should have
enough to escape the burrow, then you can hide in the plains for a
time.'

The Elf frowned. 'If I have enough power, why should I
need to hide anywhere?'

'You have a modicum of power, enough to venture outside
this burrow. You will do battle in the open plains against the Orcs,
rather than in the burrows they know so well. By then your power will
have manifested fully.'

The voice clearly knew what it was talking about,
El-Vador chose not to question it any further and started to head for
the hole leading back into the cavern below.

'No, that way is too heavily guarded at this hour. They
will be expecting you to attempt an escape through there, since you
have already breached their burrow that way. You must go through
other paths, I shall guide you.'

El-Vador did not question how the voice knew the layout
of this particular burrow, he slipped out of the prison door as lithe
as a panther on his silent feet and greeted the burrow with blade
drawn.

The first guard he came across had his back turned to
him, and El-Vador glided as effortlessly toward him as his weapon did
when sheathed in the Orc's back.

He made his way further down what would have been a
pitch-black corridor but for his enhanced sight, his feet guided by a
strong premonition which aided in choosing which path to tread. It
was after traversing down another corridor that he came to a stop at
a corner, his first real threat lay ahead.

Two Orcs, both heavily-armed brutes, stood in muttered
conversation with each other. There was no way that the Elf could
bury his blade in both of them without the other retaliating. Nor was
El-Vador so confident in his skills that he could simply dispatch
both of them alone with any degree of certainty.

The voice came to his aid, sensing the indecision that
the Elf's mind was fraught with. 'Kill the first with your bow, lay
waste to the second with the power you unleashed upon the monster of
the pit.'

El-Vador nodded, taking a quiet breath and unstrapping
the longbow from his back, carefully stringing it so that the limbs
did not creak overly loud in the corridor and attract unwanted
attention.

He peered around the corner and waited for a moment
where both Orc's backs were turned, then ghosted forth with the
string drawn to his lobe.

A thunk sound was all the Orcs heard, one of them had
been foolish enough to remove his helm and El-Vador's shot did not
err from this range. The other turned rapidly, a fearsome snarl
replacing the look of shock on his face as he licked at the
splattered gore of his companion dotting his features.

The oncoming assault was not tactful, the Orc raised a
large axe high above his head and clearly aimed to cleave the
intruder in twain before he could mount a sufficient riposte.

The attacker had not been anticipating the oily black
deluge that spewed from the hands of his foe. The impact was a wet
slap that pinned him to the wall, the tar-like substance entering the
gaping mouth and pouring past rows of chipped teeth that looked more
like tusks to El-Vador's eyes.

It seemed to catch fire, without the typical hiss and
crackle of flames upon flesh and with a potency that was sickening to
behold.

His victim writhed silently, shrieking wordless nothings
as he remained pinned to the wall. Then as he stilled, the substance
ate away what was left and vanished.

And El-Vador felt revitalised.

A shiver ran up his spine at what he had witnessed, yet
it had been against a foe that was willing to kill him regardless of
what he did. He rebuked himself harshly for questioning his actions,
it was an Orc, it merited death for that reason alone.

At least, he thought the rebuke had come from him,
hadn't it?

Shaking his head, he proceeded down the corridor and
continued with his predetermined path out of the confines of the
burrow.

Those few sentries he met, he killed in the same manner
as the last. His revulsion had died down now that he saw the benefits
that such extermination had on his power. By the time he reached the
gate he was positively aglow with it and brimming with an urge to
kill even more of the Orcs.

It was a large and typically unadorned stone structure
that had been set into the front of the cavern on gigantic hinges. To
either side of the gate were ramps leading up to what looked to be
sentry towers. Presumably the trigger mechanism to the burrow gates
lay within one of these structures, he was under no illusion that
they'd both be guarded.

'Kneel,' the voice said, as insistent in its commands as
always. El-Vador complied once more.