[djo]

Vanheim turn 60...



In which we conclude.


Vethru


We're finally there. Our scouts say Ulm tore itself apart trying to storm the citadel last month. Even better, before they were defeated, they took down about 90% of the defenders, too. I love it when two enemies beat each other up.

Now we're on the field, and Belletennares is leading an army of dead toward the Ulmites. They're a rag-tag bunch, some infantry, some religious fanatics, a couple templars, a priest. That's it.

You've got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em. Ulm waited too long. So did Marignon. I never make that mistake. I always get out right when I have what I want. Around here, that could be just a few more days. Then I'll go *poof*, and probably that'll make them worship me even more. Distant gods are the best gods, in a practical sense.

"Hey, boss," says Quellian Ji. "Is that who I think it is?"

And great googly-moogly, it is. Pherios is over on the far side of the battlefield. There's a dead thing acting as his bodyguard. And he's fighting Ulm.

"What in Hel could he be up to?" I wonder. I don't think he's here to help me, but I doubt he'd try to tip the battle the other way, not with his uncle here, and an undefended path to Vanheim behind us.

It doesn't matter. I can feel the power of this place. We're almost there.

I lose sight of Pherios in the battle. All I can see are great blasts of dark energy coming from his position. So I send great blasts of fire into Ulm's ranks, because I don't want to be a copycat, and when Pherios calls up the wailing winds, the armored Ulmite fools run in terror. Vanheim wouldn't have. We're comfortable with the dead.

Crap. Have to watch that. I'm starting to identify with them. That's bad policy.

So we're advancing down the center, chasing down the stragglers, and suddenly Ji says, "Look out!"

I'm almost blindsided by a horrific angelic being with a big-*** sword. She tried to poke me with it and almost succeeds. The sword wants to eat my soul. Big surprise for it, nothing there to eat.

But the damned thing is sharp nonetheless. I jump back a pace and Kestumaia interposes herself, stabbing at the lammashta. Lorakeia is already dead behind her. Hood's breath, what's going on? Where's my security detail?

They're gone. Belletennares is gone. And I know where the demon ladies came from. Pherios, the second most powerful necromancer on the battlefield. House Alteion's betrayed me. Titania's tits, what did I do to deserve this?

What did I ever do to them? I made one of them my prophet, and I put most of the family in positions of power. Sure, Galameteia got killed, but that wasn't my fault. And I tried to bring her back, I really did. It's a tricky thing. I've taught courses, written textbooks on the matter. I did my best. But Pherios wouldn't let her go. So instead of killing him, I almost-kill him--a great gift, right? No, he doesn't like that either. Frelling ungrateful worshippers.

And then he goes and takes it personally. Doesn't he see what I can do for his nation? What does he think would happen without me? Dinner parties with the two red dragons? Tea with the mad angel of Marignon? No, they'd get steamrolled by that psycho enchantress ***** Selena. See if they think that would be any better than me. I think not.

Cripes, my old man's mind is wandering, and then Kestumaia screams and dies, and the she-devil slashes her sword through my neck. I guess I deserve that for not paying attention.

She gets Ji, too.


Pherios

I stay near the edge of the battle. I've got one wight guarding me. It claims it's an ancestor of mine, and it fends off the Ulmish infantry so I can work.

We're winning, but I need to make sure we'll win by a lot, because the balance is going to change dramatically in a few minutes. I throw some shadow blasts into the enemy, and they dissolve under the dark energy. I see the fear in their eyes, and I decide to take advantage of it. I call the voices of our forebears to cry through the curtain of night and wail in the minds of the Ulmites.

They can't take much of this, I know. Their lines start to break. I look over to my uncle and meet his eyes. He nods. I nod back. It's done. He and his forces quietly start their retreat behind Vethru. They will escape and leave us behind.

My uncle Belletennares is a wise man, and a kind one. When I told him my plan, he did not try to talk me out of it. He treated me as an equal, and he accepted that I knew what must be done. He trusted my judgement and accepted the sacrifice I was planning to make.

There are a few more gems in my pouch, enough for the last spell. My hand shakes. After all this, after all that I've seen and been through, my fears still grip me. And my regrets. There are mortal beings on the field of battle, and they too will pay my price. Sgt. Rock, our faithful cave drake, and Vethru's Valkyries, Kestumaia and Lorakeia. I fear they will not survive.

I have been halfway down that path myself. I prepare myself to go all the way. I crush the gems and call forth the lammashtas.

There is a dark rip in the air, and they step out. The first cuts down my wight and turns its empty eyes to me. The other flies across the field in an instant and silently impales Lorakeia. She is drawn to Vethru's power, just as her sister is drawn to mine.

In that instant of distraction, when I look to see Vethru's fate, I am slain.

I awaken some moments later, I don't know how many, in a dense grey mist. There are myriad bright sparks swirling through it. One of them whispers to me.

Vethru is there. He looks pretty much the same. He sees me and laughs. "Interesting tactic. But you've got to know I can find my way back from here in no time. It's the first trick I learned when I died."

He's happy. I don't understand why. He answers my unasked question. "Ermor has fallen. I'll have my prize. You helped, too. There's no reason for us to be fighting. I'll have what I want, and I'll leave Vanheim. I'll even help you get back to your home and family. How about it?"

He hasn't figured it out. I don't intend to go back. I'm not going to let this monster back into my world, or let him have any power that may be hidden there. I'm going to stop him.

I reach out to them. The sparks swirling in the mist around us. Vethru hasn't noticed, or maybe he doesn't care, but there are more and more of them building up. They are collecting around us in a bright cyclone. I know them, and they know me. They know me like they know my Aunt Tilneia. They are the souls of the dead of Vanheim, from all of our history. And they are on my side.

Vethru is a powerful necromancer, and powerful in many other ways of sorcery and wizardry. But he has only been in Vanheim for five years. We were born here. We are part of this world, and we know it far better than he does. What's more, our world likes us. It does not like him.

We push at him, and turn him around, and he pushes back. There are more of us. We nudge him from a million directions out, out, out of our world. He tries to strike, but we swirl away.

He slips toward the living world again, and I feel my Aunt Tilneia holding fast from the other side.

Vethru is angry now. We don't give him any time to react. Another wave of spirits joins us, and another, and another. We weave ourselves into the fabric of our world, our afterlife, and we eject Vethru from it.

Although we watch for hours, a day, he doesn't try to come back. He knows the limits of his power, and ours. We have the advantage here. It's over. He's gone.

After it's been quiet for some time, the sparks begin to swirl around me again. They are agitated. They are worried. They are afraid that I will go back to the land of the living and leave them alone again.

I reassure them. I am not a lich, nor a vampire, nor do I desire to be any other dead thing that walks among the living, even if I knew how. I tell them I will stay with them.

They scatter to the wind, and I believe the mist brightens. It is a new day in a new place. I wonder what I will find here.

I turn toward an interesting gray shape on the horizon and begin to walk, wondering, hoping that I may possibly, just possibly, come across the spirit of the lost Valkyrie that I love.


Belletennares

Some would say my power has left me, with the death of god, and it is true: I am his vessel no longer. But within me still lies the experiences of my 846 years. I am still a Vanjarl. I am still of house Alteion. My magic is with me again. I do not want for power. I still lead Vanheim's armies, now scattered and tattered across our northern frontiers. It is still my responsibility to defend my nation in this new world.

There was no trace of their bodies in Ermor. I do not retreat from battle easily; not once in all the years of this war did I turn from my enemies. At the behest of my nephew Pherios, who suffered greatly on his own path through the time of ascension, though, I did, and gladly, to exile the pretender Vethru from this world. For my small part of Alteion's gift of prophesy never showed me a path until I walked it. I gladly followed Pherios, and Galameteia, and Molly, all of whom saw our future paths more clearly than I.

There were no bodies in Ermor, not my nephew's, not Vethru's, nor any of the dead we brought to the fray. Their bodies had dissolved. It was as if nature had reclaimed its land, and curious, I traced the hints of green grass in the dead soil through the shattered weapons and empty armor, until I entered the citadel.

In its terrible yard I found fresh ruins, and a gate limned with skulls lay crumbled on the ground. Underneath I found the skeletons of two humans. One's armbones still bore the chains whose ends, it seems, were once anchored in the maw of the gate.

The smaller skeleton was surrounded by green. The grass was lush around the bones, and it spread, reaching out to swallow the death that permeates the earth here, to smother it with life. I wondered if this were a miracle, and if so, by whose hand. But it is not my place to speak of it. My days of miracles are over. The dead lands were blooming again, and if that miracle could be accomplished by men, not gods, I would be glad, for I saw that the intervention of the gods rarely benefitted us to the degree our prayers entreat. So let it bloom, and hope that Vans, men, and lizards can heal this world.

I turned and left Ermor, taking our forces with me. The lands, whether green or gray, we did not need. I turned homeward, to my wife, my brother, my newly-returned sister. I rode for the hills and shores of Vanheim, to await the next stirring of the universe, and to hope that my life was long, long, long, but no so long to see it.