An angel’s road to hell

33. Of rituals, diversions and a little bit of portents

Cassandra Pendragon

I had no clue what kept me going. The last few hours had been a constant struggle, topped off with a little despair and garnished with shavings of hope and happiness right now. I felt completely overburdened and I was thirsting for a chance to digest what was going on. But I couldn’t afford it, not right now anyways.

Whatever the red and purple light had been, I was willing to bet anything you’d like that I’d come to regret its existence. Ahri and me were safe for the moment but Boseiju was still shuddering, I didn’t even want to picture what had happened around the stairs and we still had no clue what the highest floor of the tower contained. To top it all off, my companion couldn’t use magic anymore, she was pretty much stuck at the same stage of development I was at. I didn’t want to belittle our prowess, but we were miles away from where we had started and galaxies from a two-kitsune army. Maybe I could just fall asleep and everything would be solved once I woke up…

I scrambled to my feet and offered her a hand.

“Ahri…Aurora, wow, I don’t even know what to call you…”

“Ahri is fine, you know how it works.”

“Honestly, I have no clue. But it can wait. What should we do now? I want to look for the others and make sure they’re still alive after the spell. But this is also our best chance to snoop around the second palace and I’m worried about Boseiju. The roots are its heart, someone should pay Greta’s cavern a visit as well, see if we can help.”

“No offence, but I’ve always been the better fighter. I’ll go check out the stairs, you take a look around here and head for the cavern afterward, my blast should have obliterated any dark creature that still lurked about. You won’t fall prey to a spell or enchantment that might have been left behind and should be able to break the curse on Boseiju, if it can be done at all.” That sounded convincing, but I really hated the idea of being on my own, I wanted to stay with her and I wanted to make sure my family was okay:

“What about you and the others? You might need me.” She saw right through me. I thought she had found a compliment somewhere in there because she answered with a small smile:

“Right now I have access to most of my memories, you don’t. There isn’t much you can do to help them that I can’t, but judging from the amount of energy that was poured into Boseiju, I suspect your wings are the only things that can make a dent into the magic.” She hugged me tightly. “I’ll keep them safe for you and rush to your side as fast as I can. Promise.” Damn it!

I felt like I had to be everywhere at the same time. Somehow I feared it would all go to shit if I wasn’t around, despite my less than perfect contributions in the past. I couldn’t bear the idea of one of them dying just because I wasn’t around. It was utter bullshit, if what Ahri had said was true, she wouldn’t need me, not at all. Basically it came down to whether or not I trusted her. And despite the revelations of the last moments, or maybe because of them, I did, more so than any other person in existence. Than why couldn’t I let it go? Heavens, I was torn but I had to say something.

“Go. I’ll see you soon, my l…” I couldn’t get the words out, my voice broke. I fought against the tears for a moment but then I allowed them to flow freely and threw myself against her. She whispered into my ear: “my love” and with a gentle push she broke the embrace. Her wings flared bright as the sun, hot winds blew back my hair and like a burning star she ascended into the night. It was the most wondrous sight I had ever had the luck to behold and for a moment I thought it had all been worth it. While Ahri became smaller but no less bright I felt a memory tickle the far reaches of my consciousness. I didn’t have the time, I had a job to do.

I turned away from a companion I had thought lost and focused on the tower. Flames and light still spilled from the ground floor. Further up Ahri’s blast had annihilated the glyphs and runes carved into the walls. The windows were gone but the building hadn’t caught fire. The top floor was untouched. Reflective windows threw back the uncaring light of stars and the orange glow from below made it impossible to get a glimpse of what was beyond. A sharp line cut across the tower where the enchantments had become to powerful for Ahri to overcome. While everything below was blackened and partly molten the top floor look just the same it had a couple of minutes ago.

I had no interest in examining every nook and cranny of the tower and the mutilated bodies I was sure to find. I intended to go directly for the summit, skipping the atrocities piled on my way. With a thought I rose into the air, much slower than Ahri had, and headed for a huge window directly above me. The rooms on the lower floors I passed by were empty but showed signs of the devastating blast and a fierce struggle. I could see broken swords and halberds, a dented helm and black blood spatters between smashed furniture and shredded canvases. The floor below the top was something else entirely. The window I passed led into a large room, it had probably been the bedchamber of one the royals before. The furniture had been removed and a huge tridecagram had been carved into the floor. The lines had been filled with a silvery metal, probably mithril and at each point of the formation a smaller pentagram had been drawn with blood. Within each pentagram a mutilated kitsune was nailed to the floor, the wounds and cuts over their bodies formed signs I couldn’t decipher. There wasn’t much left of their faces, the eyes had been taken, the ears cut, the noses broken and the mouths sewn shut but the horrendous contortions of their corpses showed the agony they had been in before they had died. Bile rose in my throat and I nearly lost control of my flight. Why? Why would anyone do such a thing? I had to a avert my eyes but I couldn’t forget the image burned into my mind. Oh, he would pay. However long it might take, however far I might have to go, I’d make sure no one else would have to go through what we had to endure. This wasn’t about revenge or even justice anymore, he was a monster and he had to be slain or all his future deeds would stain my hands as well. A being capable of causing so much suffering had to be stopped.

I felt another memory sluggishly rising from the depths but I suppressed it again. I had to be careful, if past experiences were anything to go by, the memories were closely linked to my next evolution and Mephisto had told me I wouldn’t survive another one so soon. I had to calm down. I closed my eyes and tried to take a deep breath but I was assaulted by the gruesome scene immediately. Blood pooled into a puddle on the floor, the stench of excrements and violence was present again and the empty eye sockets stared at me accusingly. My eyes fluttered open and I focused on my racing heart. Calm down, damn it! With all my will power I pushed the lump of emotions as far down as I could and focused on the looming window above me. Hopefully I would find a guard or two who were left behind. Or maybe even his ugliness himself, that would be a treat!

I took great care that my wings weren’t visible from within and peeked over the sill through half closed eyes so their glow wouldn’t alert anyone to my presence. I couldn’t see a damned thing! The enchantments had survived and still protected everything within, blocking my view and probably also stopping all kinds of energy. I wasn’t entirely surprised and had already thought about what I would do when it came down to breaking into a sealed space. My previous failures at teleportation were, I guessed, caused by my inability to perceive space and interact directly with it. The perception I had used to find the emblem might circumvent the problem.

I stretched out my wings as far as I could and wormed my way into the room. I felt a tiny prick and a small resistance when I encountered the barrier but it didn’t pose a problem. Additionally my torrents of energy were small enough to not trigger any alarms or cause visible damage to the protections. I closed my eyes and slowly the room in front of me lit up, at least half of it, I didn’t have the reach for more.

I had been prepared for more atrocities, maybe a flaming throne or a towering golem. There was none of that. The room appeared mostly untouched and largely unchanged. It was a mixture of a laboratory and a meditation chamber. The walls were covered in bookshelves, countless volumes arranged in neat little rows. I couldn’t see colours, nor could I read through this form of vision but I expected spell tomes, recipes and magical treaties to make up most of the contents. Towards the centre, the floor was inlaid with intricate formations of glyphs and runes, some forming calling circles I recognised, some provided elemental functions and others could be used for divination. In the middle I perceived half of a huge tridecagram, one of its corners directly above the one full of sacrifices and a floor below. The mithril strands that made up its lines had been overloaded and still hummed with an overabundance of energy the molten metal slowly cooled down as the energy dispersed. A stone portal stood at the centre, grey granite filled with flickering energy. I didn’t hesitate.

I focused on my connection to the spot next to the portal, willing myself to travel there, to be there and my vision disappeared. It felt like I was part of a river, rushing through space. I experienced each of my wings as a gateway, allowing me to dive through and reach for the space beyond. With a mental twist I flowed along the glowing current and materialised inside the room. No sound, no light had been projected only a quiet displacement of air heralded my arrival. My eyes flew open and I ducked, expecting a trap to trigger the moment I had arrived, but everything remained quiet, even the sounds from outside were cut off.

The second half of the room mirrored the one I had seen perfectly but my focus clung to the stone arch in front of me. It was covered in black symbols and this close I could feel the remnants of massive amounts of soul energy that had passed through, not too long ago. But that was all that was left, the traces of great magics, but like with the tridecagram the magic was gone now, most of it consumed during the last casting. It was getting better and better.

The portal was probably the one Mordred had stumbled upon, a physical connection to the emperor. Somehow they had brought it here and sent massive amounts of energy through. Did he come here in person? And if so, where had he gone? I slung my wings around the portal, I didn’t intend to destroy it so I didn’t push down on the enchantments I felt but I tried to understand as much as I could. It took me a couple of minutes full of frustration until I found something. The sheer amount of energy that had been channeled through had contained enough souls to imprint some memories onto the arch. With my wings I was able to interact with the tiny motes of individuality, still stubbornly clinging to existence. I had to hurry, soon they would fade to nothingness. I closed my eyes again and allowed my perception to switch back to silvery forms and radiating light.

Where ever the tip of one of my wings touched one of the memories, I felt a soft tug and images rose before my mind’s eye. They were blurry and disconnected but it was enough to reconstruct the last chapter of a sad tale.

During the night after my birthday, disaster had struck. It had already been strange when the youngest prince, John, had petitioned for the right to designate a major-domos for himself, granting the person in question the right to represent the prince in all aspects. Usually the privilege was used to organise a royal’s everyday life, but it wasn’t limited to mundane affairs. When the appointed major-domos first act had been to issue a challenge and nearly kill the princess of another family a crisis meeting had been called at the first opportunity, including each member of the royal family as well as the highest ranking soldiers and political advisers. They had retreated to the library and sealed their fate. The room had been prepared in advance and poison had quickly overwhelmed everybody present. When they woke up, ugly marks had been branded to the base of their necks and their wills had no longer been their own. And thus they had prepared the bloodiest night in kitsune history.

While everyone else had been busy with my trial and the additional strife the controlled second king had caused two rituals had been prepared in the second palace. The first would create an army of shadows form the souls of some kitsune to wreak havoc all over Boseiju and the garden. To add to the chaos, the humans, who had already proven to be of dubious morales, had been paid off with gold and promises of further riches. Unfortunately I couldn’t gather any information on why they had kidnapped our children and had hauled them off the island. The second ritual was ingenious in design and cruel in nature. The shadows had gathered as many sacrifices as they had been able to get their hands on, even their own essence had been channeled to feed the magic’s unbound hunger. The effect was twofold: the energy I had seen previously would cling to any life force and soul it encountered and feed off of it, channeling the largest part back into the ritual itself. The afflicted beings would turn into a form of… well, zombie, without a soul and driven mad by hunger for life. I suspected the glyphs I had seen on the ones downstairs had been there to make sure they wouldn’t run amok and to keep them on a tight leash.

The amount of energy contained in the ritual had risen further and further but I couldn’t see the climax, the second stage remained a mystery. The last soul had been consumed before it had gotten that far. The final memory showed the very room I was in, flooded with light. Manifestations of energy in the form of blue lightning strikes, dancing flames and small gusts of air distorted my vision. Each point of the now brightly shining tridecagram channeled immense amounts of power from below. Before my world turned into darkness as the soul dissipated I could see the ghostly manifestation of a large cherry tree appear in the centre, the energies twisted around it and slowly invaded Boseiju’s mirror image.

I opened my eyes again as the strongest tremor up until now traveled along the mighty branch the tower was built upon. I could hear the creaking of old wood, even through the palace’s enchantments. White blossoms and leafs filled the air behind the window as the ancient tree shook and trembled down to its roots. A wailing sound pierced the barriers around me and I thought it carried a myriad of different voices, crying out in pain, with it. I was in the wrong place, I had to get to Greta’s cavern. Now.