The Doomed Bastards: Reckoning (story complete)

[shilsen]

All of that praise being said, there's one little thingy that bugs me: modern expressions. Mostly, it's Dar using them, and while they sound cool and all, I don't think they mesh well with the medieval-fantasy setting they're in. Sure, Dar is the type of character who, in modern times, would say stuff like "effing awesome!", but I just don't feel like it goes well with the world they're in. Just my two copper on the matter, it's not a huge issue for me.

I do try and cut down on the more glaring examples of this, but I'm sure a few sneak in here and there. In many ways dialog is the toughest part of writing, and is one area that I've tried hard to work on in the course of my work. There have been a few places in past stories where I've done accents and other funky speech patterns and they always seem a bit... odd, so I stick to a mostly "modern" style in most of my works.

In many ways, I think the modern expressions are actually more appropriate for the characters than medievalisms. After all, none of these characters are actually speaking English. They're speaking some sort of fantasy language, with the players/author rendering it in English simply because that's what they speak. So everything the characters say is already being translated to not just English but specifically very modern English (e.g. using 20th/21st century English sentence structure and not what would be appropriate in medieval or Renaissance times). When the author uses "He," "she," "the," "sword" or "poo-flinging monkey," he's not actually using the words the characters use but the closest analogues to them in modern English. So using medieval terms which would be archaic for us only makes sense if the PCs are speaking in language which is archaic for them and to the people they are speaking to. So using "Ay, verily - this is a truly splendid treasure" is a whole lot more inappropriate than going "Damn! That is some nice bling!"

Is it obvious that I'm an English teacher now?

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

In many ways, I think the modern expressions are actually more appropriate for the characters than medievalisms. After all, none of these characters are actually speaking English. They're speaking some sort of fantasy language, with the players/author rendering it in English simply because that's what they speak. So everything the characters say is already being translated to not just English but specifically very modern English (e.g. using 20th/21st century English sentence structure and not what would be appropriate in medieval or Renaissance times). When the author uses "He," "she," "the," "sword" or "poo-flinging monkey," he's not actually using the words the characters use but the closest analogues to them in modern English. So using medieval terms which would be archaic for us only makes sense if the PCs are speaking in language which is archaic for them and to the people they are speaking to. So using "Ay, verily - this is a truly splendid treasure" is a whole lot more inappropriate than going "Damn! That is some nice bling!"

Is it obvious that I'm an English teacher now?

Assuming that the PC in question is a real or wannabe thug. Even considering only modern English, the choice of language places a character in a social context and there are an awful lot more choices than gangsta rappa and Ren Faire style faux Elizabethan. For my part, I would argue that regardless of contextualization, a lot of specific modern speech patterns are risky artistic choices because they signify identification in specific social groups that may not exist in the context of the story--and whose attributes are at best only partly appropriate for the characters. Language can bring a lot of baggage that an author does not (or should not if he were wise) intend along with the verisimilitude that it is often assumed to bring.

 

[shilsen]

\Even considering only modern English, the choice of language places a character in a social context and there are an awful lot more choices than gangsta rappa and Ren Faire style faux Elizabethan.

No argument there.

For my part, I would argue that regardless of contextualization, a lot of specific modern speech patterns are risky artistic choices because they signify identification in specific social groups that may not exist in the context of the story--and whose attributes are at best only partly appropriate for the characters. Language can bring a lot of baggage that an author does not (or should not if he were wise) intend along with the verisimilitude that it is often assumed to bring.

True. I was just pointing out that the simple choice to write in English using modern vocabulary and sentence structure already brings a lot of baggage along with it, and that medievalisms and archaisms (which many gamers seem to find somehow more appropriate and authentic for D&D) are actually more jarring in that context than something highly modern, like the jargon used in rap.

 

[Lazybones]

Chapter 345

A TENSE AFTERMATH


The companions, blooded and weary, gathered as Talen’s vampires leapt down from the edge of the reverse gravity effect. Allera drew out her wand of lesser restoration, and started treating those who had been affected by the ghosts’ draining attacks. They were in pretty good shape overall, thanks to their defensive wards and Allera’s mass cures during the battle.

“Well now, that wasn’t so bad,” Talen said. In fact he still felt drained, empty, but his natural regenerative powers were quickly restoring the vitality that had been destroyed by Nelan’s heal spell. Apparently Talen’s slaves felt the same, from the hungry looks on their faces as they watched their living allies, their eyes lingering on the spots of blood on their clothes where the vrocks had managed to cut them through their stoneskins. Hedder and Drudge even started sidling toward Letellia, who looked alarmed until Dar stepped in front of her, his hand on the hilt of Valor. Annoyed, Talen ordered his vampires to guard the door.

“This was just a preliminary test,” Varo said. “To force us to deplete our resources.”

“What else can we expect to face?” Shay asked, wiping the demonic ichor from the head of her spear before the caustic gunk could sear the blade.

“The demon Maphistal still bides his master’s call,” Alderis said.

“And it just wouldn’t be a full day in Rappan Athuk without Navev showing up to hit us with those freaking blasting spells of his,” Dar said. “I swear it, the next time we meet, that bastard’s head is going to be shoved so far up his ass that he’ll have to fart to speak.”

“What else, Varo?” Talen asked.

“Whatever you least expect,” the cleric said enigmatically, meeting the vampire’s gaze squarely, despite the danger there. It was Talen who finally turned away first.

They were distracted by a flash and a loud noise, a deep thump, from the double doors. They turned to see the vampires falling back from the doors in alarm. Or at least most of them; a flare of black light was already dissolving around what was left of Utar, a greasy charcoal smear on the white stone. One of the doors was ajar, only slightly, but enough to identify them as the likely source of the disturbance.

Talen got there first. He didn’t bother to ask what had happened. Instead, he looked at his remaining minions with a cold stare.

“I’d often wondered which of you lot was the most stupid; each day one of you has done something new to take the top slot. Now, however, I know for certain.”

As the others watched, he and Shay applied themselves to the doors, and pulled them open fully, revealing a long hall beyond.

This place was starkly different than the white entry chamber, yet no less remarkable. To the right, the floor was covered in white bricks, separated by only the tiniest of seams. The wall was covered with an intricate mural, so well-crafted that they could not see any missing stones or gaps in its construction. The scenes depicted there were gentle, peaceful, pastoral settings occupied by figures clad in white tunics and flowing robes.

To the left, the hall was quite different.

The bricks there were red, and the scene upon the wall was the antithesis of that on the right. Armies crept along that surface, and men and beasts died in a rage of violence. The workmanship was such that even individual drops of blood could be seen, spraying from the sundered victims of the chaos.

The two sides of the hall were separated by a strip of greenish metal, perhaps two feet wide, that ran from the entrance at their feet to the distance ahead, as far as they could see.

“More writing,” Shay said, indicating the floor. The message, engraved in thin lines of silver, was clearly comprehensible, written in an archaic script form of the common language.

Alderis was standing some distance back, and did not have a clear view of the runes. But the elf spoke the words, his voice oddly thick, as if he’d taken ill.

”The struggles of life for the good are many
For the evil are few and dictate the path chosen
War and peace, one and the same
To fail in war is to lose peace, and war the way
To win it. ‘Tis a fine line the good men walk.”

“What does it mean?” Allera asked.

Varo opened his mouth to say something, but he didn’t get a chance to respond. Hedder had been pushing forward to get a better look, and as the healer asked her question, the vampire stepped over the threshold of the door, onto the red tiles to the left.

There was a flare of power, like an invisible wind that raised goosepimples across the flesh of the companions. A noise that sounded like the braying of warhorns echoed around them, the source everywhere and nowhere at once, or maybe only within their own minds.

But the change that occurred by the mural was anything but imaginary. The scene of war and conflict shimmered and shifted, and for a moment the scene was alive, bodies twisting as they were pierced and shorn and crushed.

One tiny figure within that vista stepped out of the mural, onto the ruddy stones of the hall. A few inches in height when it first emerged, it was somehow a full six feet tall when its boots landed on the floor. Its face was familiar; in fact it was a precise copy of Hedder, down to the yellow teeth and tangled nest of matted black hair.

The duplicate yanked out its shortswords, exact copies of the ones that Hedder carried, screamed, and charged.

 

[Nightbreeze]

Ah well, it would have been worse if it copied allera, varo or talen...

 

[Lazybones]

Hey, I just noticed the advertising in your sig, Nightbreeze; thanks!

* * * * *

Chapter 346

WAR AND PEACE


Varo had been unable to get a warning out in time to stop Hedder, but he made up for that now. “Do not step onto the red stones!” he shouted.

His caution almost came too late, as the other vampiric bandits moved forward reflexively to meet the rush of the duplicate of Hedder. Talen’s fist shot out and smacked hard into Needles’ chest just as the vampire’s foot was crossing the threshold of the hall, knocking him onto his back. Hedder, already standing on the red tiles, looked around confused, but his gaze was drawn back to the copy of himself that was rapidly closing the distance between them.

“Back!” Dar yelled. “Draw it into the room!”

The companions fell back, forming a rough semicircle around the entrance of the hall. The duplicate ignored all of them save Hedder, springing into a high leap that ended with it stabbing both of its blades into the vampire’s chest. Hedder was driven back and fell backward, nearly colliding with Calla as he came down.

The duplicate was on him again in a flash, but before it could strike again the other warriors were there to intervene. Dar and Talen struck within moments of each other, their magical blades cleaving the dead flesh of the duplicate. The thing came apart as the powerful blows carved apart its torso, dissolving into nothing before any part of it could reach the floor.

Talen looked down at Hedder, who was still lying on his back. The rents in his armor were clearly visible, but as before there was no blood, and his vampiric abilities were already working to restore the damage he had suffered.

“Fortunately for you, your stupidity was less costly than Utar’s.” The other bandits helped their companion to his feet, and they followed after Talen and Shay as they returned to the doorway.

“I presume we take the middle path,” Talen said to Varo.

“Yes. Even a single step upon the red or white stones may prove calamitous.”

“What does the white side do, do you think?”

“I do not know. But I doubt it is as benign as it looks.”

“That is true of many things,” Talen said, breaking a smile as he glanced at Calla.

Shay led them forward again, carefully treading upon the narrow path of green-tinged metal plate that bisected the hall. The broad corridor continued for quite some distance, but Shay identified another pair of doors at the end well before the light of their torches revealed it.

There was one other incident upon the walk. They were nearing the doors when Allera let out a warning and pointed toward the white wall. They turned to see Calla walking there, peering closely at the pastoral mural, close enough to reach out and touch it.

“Calla! Get back here, now.” Talen’s voice had the tone of a command, and the girl complied, although she returned without haste to the green line. “What in the hells do you think you were doing?”

“Looking for peace,” she said.

“Do you feel all right?” Allera asked her.

“I didn’t find it, if that’s what you’re asking,” the girl snarled at her.

“Shut up. Keep moving; I don’t want to get trapped on this tightrope,” Talen said.

They reached the doors without incident. It was difficult to open them while remaining on the narrow path, but Shay was able to manage it, using her spear as a lever. They filed through the opening in the doors into another huge chamber.

This place was truly massive. It was round, with a ceiling covered in a flattened dome that was buttressed by several dozen pillars several feet thick. A diffuse golden light suffused it, so they could see clearly across to the far side, some two hundred feet distant.

The chamber’s dominant feature was instantly visible. A huge portal stood in the center of the place, rising up some twenty feet, a freestanding circle that seemed precariously balanced upon the stone floor. The portal was a disk of pure black, like a window onto a scene of pure night. There was a squat stone platform before the portal, an altar of some sort decorated with items not clearly discernable at this distance.

Without speaking, Talen gestured them forward, using sweeps of his sword. They spread out as they warily approached the portal, the vampires to the right, the mortals to the left. They were hyperalert to the threat of another ambush, but nothing stirred, and the diffuse light allowed them to clearly see across the breadth of the chamber, save for behind the portal and the pillars. The place seemed to absorb their presence, their lights blending into the omnipresent glow. Even their bootsteps and the gentle clink of the warriors’ armor seemed muted.

“The black gate,” Alderis said, his voice startling them out of the quiet. “It’s here, the end, the calling, the sacrifice.” He clutched at his chest, where the crystal growth lay under the fabric of his robe.

“For the gods’ sake, keep it together, elf,” Dar growled. But he held Valor naked in his hands, and he had the look of a coiled spring in his stance as he crept forward.

As they passed the first of the pillars, they could see that they were covered in familiar designs of souls in torment. At least they appeared to be mere decorations at first, until they got close enough to see the twisted figures moving, trapped within the black stone.

“By the gods,” Allera whispered, drawing back in revulsion.

“There is nothing that can be done for them now,” Varo said.

As they drew near to the altar they could see that it was slathered in blood, old and dry. There were a few crude knives laid out upon it, and several odd lumps of what might have been porous stone. The surface of the altar was covered in runnels that culminated in three silver bowls set into one side. There were also markings on the altar, spidery runes that crawled around the edge of its surface.

“What do these runes say?” Shay asked, moving closer to investigate, while giving the altar a comfortable berth.

Varo looked at Alderis, but the elf was silent, staring at the portal. “They are instructions,” the cleric said. “For opening the portal. The ritual involves cutting yourself upon the altar, and then covering yourself with your own blood. ‘To pass the portal oblivion, one must cover themselves for the dark god, in only a coat of his own crimson.’”

“The hell we will,” Dar muttered.

“In any case, it will not work. The door above could be fooled by chicanery, but this portal will not open without the express desire of Orcus. It must be forced.”

“Now that is a strategy I can get behind,” Dar said. He started forward, but Varo forestalled him before he could reach for his club.

“No. It is not physical might of which I speak. The way must be opened by...”

But he did not get a chance to finish. Several of them shouted warnings at the same time, and they drew back in alarm as the black surface of the portal came alive. Dark ripples surged within the substance, and a violet corona striated with pulse of black and red erupted from around the edges of the disk.

“Maybe Old Goat Horns is going to save us the trouble!” Dar shouted. Allera invoked her second holy aura, while Letellia and Alderis each cast warding spells about their persons.

But it was Maphistal, not Orcus, who stepped through the portal a moment later.

“IT ENDS HERE,” the demon said, its voice pounding with potency within their minds.

 

[Burningspear]

OOOooo, bitch fight (cool)

 

[Lazybones]

Chapter 347

MAPHISTAL


It may have been something in this place, or the ascendant power of its dark lord, but Maphistal seemed bigger, stronger, more steeped in power. The demon’s skeletal, monstrous appearance was somehow magnified, and the echo of its mental declaration pulsed through their minds like the rumblings of an earthquake.

Demonfear rolled over them like a flooding torrent, but bolstered by Allera’s heroes’ feast, the companions were able to resist its effects. Valor seemed almost alive in Dar’s hand, trembling with steel rage.

The demon was surrounded by a black aura of power that was distinct from the energies still radiating out from the portal. It looked like an unholy aura, but as they watched they could see... things orbiting within that nimbus of darkness. As the demon exulted they spread outward, twining around its arms. It bore its deadly skullcrushing mace like a scepter.

“Undead,” Allera warned the others, indicating the black shapes clinging to Maphistal, while Varo added, “Greater shadows.” The other companions stood tensed, ready, but they hesitated, waiting to see what other surprises might be coming through the portal in the demon’s wake.

“It ends here for you!” Talen shouted back, stepping forward. “You will not stop us from getting to your master, demon!”

Maphistal’s gaze turned slowly to confront Talen. “You arrogant little fool. Do you think you can deny the power of your Master? He who made you what you are!”

Talen’s lips drew back into a snarl, and he took a step forward. But power flashed in the demon’s eyes, and the vampire knight staggered as if struck. The bandits and Calla screamed and collapsed upon the floor, abasing themselves before Maphistal. Shay dropped her spear and clutched her head, swaying back and forth, while Talen grimaced and somehow held his ground. He lifted his sword. “I defy you, Maphistal! I defy you, Orcus!”

The demon’s lips twisted in what might have been a hint of a smile. “You shall have an eternity to repent those words, slave. Do you think that little amulet you wear can protect you from the will of a god?”

Dar whispered to Varo, “Shouldn’t we be attacking this bastard, while it’s distracted?”

“Wait,” the cleric said. He had slid his hands under his armor, clutching something on a throng fixed around his neck.

Talen screamed and tried to press forward, but his legs refused to obey his commands. Again Maphistal’s words crashed through the minds of the living companions, even though the force of it wasn’t directed at them.

“KNEEL, SLAVE.”

And Talen knelt. Behind him, Shay and the other vampires were already on their knees, their faces pressed against the floor.

“You may have cowed him, demon, but you won’t bend our knees quite so easily,” Dar said.

Maphistal turned back to them, and laughed. “It is your very strength that will make your souls so sweet to my Master. Do you think it is happenstance that you are here? You were allowed to live because you were still useful; the Overmind had grown... truculent. Now that it has been disciplined, any need to keep you alive has disappeared.”

“All that has transpired, since your first arrival at Rappan Athuk, has been in accordance with my Master’s plan for your frail little world. Yours will be but the first souls that he shall consume. And once your world is dead, a shriveled husk drained of life, then he will return to the Abyss, and reshape it to his will. Thanatos will reign unrivaled in the multiverse! The dark shadow of unlife will extend across the planes, undeniable!”

“Yeah, yeah, we know all that crap,” Dar said. “Let’s skip ahead to the part where I chop your freaking limbs off.”

”So be it,” Maphistal said. The demon waved a hand, almost casually. “Claim them.”

The shadows surrounding the demon detached and surged toward the companions in a black wave. At the same time, the vampires sprang up and leapt at their former allies, led by a raging Talen Karedes, who brought his sword down upon Corath Dar in a powerful two-handed arc.

 

[Lazybones]

Chapter 348

IT HELPS TO BE PREPARED


As their allies turned on them, and Dar swung to meet the blind rush of Talen, Varo turned, looked at Allera, and nodded.

The healer closed her eyes and let the power she’d been holding course through her. Maphistal tried to intervene, striking her with a wedge of magical power, but Allera had been ready, and the demon was too late to stop her as the mass heal spell blasted outward from her. The spell, designed to provide succor to the injured, was instead a weapon of destruction against the undead that swarmed at them.

She did not need to see to direct the spell, gently directing the power into each of the undead creatures that grated like an abscess upon her senses. A few of the eight greater shadows, protected by Maphistal’s unholy aura, were able to resist her magic, but the majority were riven by the healing fire. The vampires were engulfed by blue flames, turning into pyres as the holy energies blasted away their corrupt and unliving flesh. The spell could not snuff out their existence entirely, but it left all of them critically damaged.

At least until Varo followed Allera’s discharge of power with his own mass cure serious wounds spell.

The second pulse of healing power, following immediately upon the first, had a devastating impact. Varo’s magic was far weaker than Allera’s, but her spell had weakened the undead to the brink of destruction, leaving them crippled and vulnerable.

Six of the shadows came apart, dissolving into nothing. So did Hedder, Needles, and Drudge, followed a second later by Calla, who fell screaming to the ground, crumbling into gray ash. Shay tried to get away, turning and fleeing before the divine magic, but this was an attack that she could not dodge. She staggered and fell as the blue surge blasted her into nothing.

Somehow, Talen survived both attacks, but as he faced Dar his visage was a blackened, ruined mess, his skull clearly visable where his gray flesh had been scored away. His eyes, lips, and hair had been burned away, but somehow he could still sense the presence of his enemy, and words hissed from him as his jaw twitched and worked.

“You... must... finish... it...” he said, even as he lifted his sword and swung at the fighter. Weakened as he was, Talen’s attack was feeble, and Dar easily deflected it. The vampire staggered forward, off-balance, and tried to reach for Dar, to sap life from his body.

Dar spun and with a single cut from Valor cut the vampire in two.

Letellia, recognizing that she had little chance of harming Maphistal, disintegrated one of the shadows as it darted toward them. Alderis started to cast a spell of his own, but before he could finish his magic, the elf’s body clenched, and his clutched at his chest, a terrible scree hissing from his throat. The last shadow dove at him, sensing a vulnerable foe, but its claws passed harmlessly through him, unable to get past the death ward that Allera had placed upon him earlier. The shadow, already seriously damaged by Varo’s mass cure, suffered further from a series of scorching rays from Letellia that bore through the protective ward around it and pierced its unholy substance.

Varo reached drew out his hand from under his breastplate and formed a fist, lifting it high toward Maphistal. Something sparkled between his fingers. His other hand clutched his divine focus, and another object dangled from that wrist, the small silver torch he’d taken from Serah, not so long ago.

“The relics of a dead god will not save you, cleric!” Maphistal roared. But Varo had clearly gotten the demon’s attention. It charged forward, moving with insane quickness, closing the distance between itself and the cleric in a matter of strides.

But its path took it past Corath Dar, and before it could unleash a blow upon the priest, the fighter shouted a battle cry and smote the demon with Valor. The axiomatic blade cut through the demon’s unholy aura like a hot knife through butter, and it bit deep into the thick hide covering the demon’s torso. Maphistal had to outweigh Dar by a factor of at least five or six, but the blow still twisted the demon around, diverting it from its rush.

But that brought its rage down fully upon Dar. Maphistal’s mace came around, its head a blur. Dar’s attempt to block was utterly overwhelmed, and they could all hear the crack as his right arm was crushed from the force of that blow. The fighter went flying, and Valor shone in mid-air for a good second or two before caroming off one of the nearby pillars, and clattering to the floor. Dar followed it a moment later, screaming as he landed on his broken arm, blood spraying from his lips as shards of broken bone worked their way deeper into his lungs.

That obstacle removed, Maphistal turned back toward Varo.

 

[Nightbreeze]

Well...as predicted, Allera unleashed her holy fury. Augh
Nice done, Lazybones...you already gave some suggestion about the fact that Varo and Allera were preparing something, but I didn't expect that.