Memories
Disclaimer: Legacy of
Kain belongs to Edios and
Rating: PG-13
Part: one of one
Setting: Post Blood omen two pre soul
reaver.
Authoress note: god knows
what inspired this. No really I have no idea; I just sat down put hands on the
keyboard and look what happened. It’s kind of odd when you think about it.
Italics =
thoughts and flashbacks
~
The ruins
of some ancient building loomed in the distance.
He stopped
walking just to look at it, and for a moment Raziel fancied it looked rather like
a giant rib cage, one that had been cracked open and left, dry and dead. He
shivered despite the fact that it was not cold. It was the air in this place,
it felt . . . hollow, the way the air felt in a violated graveyard or a village
shortly after a vampire attack.
Full of old and half-forgotten tension.
Something
important had occurred here, possibly something horrific, but it didn’t appear
so. The building was a ruin now, but it looked like a time-worn ruin, not a
ruin that had been brought into being by some ancient catastrophe. Yet the
tension in the air was still thick, even after the thousands of years that had
obviously passed since this ruin had been a building.
He paused
again, slowing his approach. The air was full of old scents, many of which
mingled together, making a web of old scents so thick it was impossible to tell
them apart. Yet one scent did override the mass of others. He knew his father
was here somewhere.
He
continued his slow approach, eyes wide and alert, looking for any sign of
movement.
He had
half followed his father here, worried for him.
Kain had
been quiet. That in itself wasn’t unusual; Kain was somewhat erratic and could
at times talk for hours without stopping about any subject that popped into his
mind, while at other times he could fall silent for days, brooding over something.
Raziel wasn’t sure what it was.
But it had
been different this time - he had appeared almost sad.
He had
seen Kain angry before, he’d seen him emotionless, hiding behind the blank mask
he so often employed as of late, and he had seen what he supposed that passed
for happy in Kain’s emotional spectrum. And yet, not once had he seen him truly
low.
The clan meeting
had been pointless and had ultimately been cut short, ending with Kain standing
and walking briskly out without a word. The tension inside him was extremely
obvious, which was unusual; Kain normally hid things so well. He had followed
his father through the Sanctuary’s echoing corridors, having to run to catch up
to him; he had ungracefully collided with his father when Kain had turned
around to see what he wanted.
The
collision had sent him to the ground, while Kain had stood perfectly still and just
appeared confused and a little rumpled. His emotionless stare had caused Raziel
to blush for the first time in over two hundred years.
“I came to
see you,” Raziel had managed once he was back on his
feet, reaching about himself trying to sort his now tussled appearance.
“You just
saw me” Kain replied while he reached, across moving some of Raziel’s hair over.
Raziel huffed quietly.
“You seem,”
he began, treading carefully, “bothered by something. I thought maybe I could
help.”
Kain
smiled slightly at his child’s words, yet the smile caused Raziel to hiss
quietly under his breath. It was not an appreciative smile, it was patronising.
He could almost imagine his father’s thoughts of “Oh, ha, ha, brainless little child thinks he can help me with my
massive problem, oh, har, har, har”.
He hated
it when his father made him feel like a newborn.
So he had
left, angry and somewhat disappointed. Wandering into the lands that still held
some kind of foliage, half-heartedly hunting out a human trapper who would be
trying in vain to catch what little of Nosgoth wildlife has remained.
He had
wandered slowly, following the obvious tracks of a mortal; he had wondered
briefly if he was ambling into a trap, these tracks were amazingly clear. Yet
the thought didn’t bother him, he knew he could look after himself and a fight
would clear his head. Of course it could always just be that humans were
growing dim.
Yet as he had
continued on while contemplating how low human intelligence had sunk, something
had caught his eye, a flash of pristine white. He had turned fully to catch a
glimpse of his father disappearing deeper into the wood and, on instinct, he
had followed.
Despite
the patronising front he had been given in the Sanctuary, he knew something was
bothering his father and he was worried for him.
His winced
suddenly as he stood on something breakable.
Looking
down, he was surprised to find the ground surrounding the ruin was littered
with old items, broken vases, clumps of unrecognisable wood, part of what
appeared to be a picture frame, along with old shredded curtains or carpet.
Briefly he
wondered why his father had come to this strange place. There was nothing here.
What had once been a great mansion filled with wealth was now a little more
than a hollow shell. Why would his father come here?
He pressed
against the old
Fallen
stone littered the cobbles. What had once been proud dragon-carved pillars were
now little more than fragments. The door to the building was missing, as was a
good portion of the wall; yet fallen rubble prevented his entry.
Eventually,
he found a window that had been broken in that was large enough to slip
through. He blinked, noting a shred of new red fabric snagged on the shattered
glass edges. He sighed, lifting it, his father was definitely
here somewhere.
The roof
was gone completely, as was most of what had once been a second floor. He stood
in what had once been a hall and looked up, seeing the sky, and what remained
of the rooms on the second floor. A loud creak caused him to spin around. Leaping
back, he barley missed being buried under stone and
wood as a large part of the upper floor fell in.
Shaking
dust from himself, he turned and made his way on.
Pushing a
large chunk of wall out of his way, he emerged in what appeared to be a garden.
He took a sharp
breath; it looked like some great creature had flown over the mansion, lifted
the roof and most of the second floor, broke it apart then dumped it all in the
garden.
Walls
stuck up at odd angles from the grass-covered ground; glass littered the ground
everywhere, furniture, paintings, fabric, all of it looked as if it had fallen
from the sky.
But he
smiled a little in relief; his father was perched on a high slanted surface,
looking down at his hands. The patterned paper covering the surface singled it
out as an old wall that had half fallen over. Raziel was relieved; he was
beginning to wonder if his father wasn’t still inside, half buried under
falling rubble, for it seemed the ruin was still collapsing at a fast rate. He’d
had three narrow misses and had seen countless parts collapsing at a distance.
He half considered
trying to surprise his Lord, sneaking up from behind, but changed his mind and
stood straight and coughed, exposing himself, while trying to quietly announce
his presence. Kain did not move, did not look at him, did not acknowledge his
presence in any way, and so he approached further.
When he
reached the foot of the fallen wall, Kain still did not acknowledge him, so he
clambered surprisingly gracefully up. When he was within touching distance of
his father, Kain’s head jerked up, his eyes flickered and suddenly Raziel was
pinned to a tree six feet away with a snarling master vampire glaring at him
and a talon rapidly tightening around his throat.
It took
his mind a second to catch up with what was happening,
it always frightened him just how fast Kain could move when he wanted to. It was
an easy thing to forget.
The talon
now cutting off his air abruptly loosened, the anger bled from Kain’s face and
surprise took its place. Raziel had never seen his
Lord surprised before, his oxygen deprived mind half whispered that today was
just full of surprises.
Kain drew
back, moving slowly backwards while Raziel attempted to retrieve his breath.
Kain’s hands were shaking.
After a
few brief moments, Kain turned and returned to his perch atop the fallen wall. Raziel followed.
“What it this place?” Raziel asked after a moment of
silence.
Kain did
not reply but tilted his child’s head upwards, checking around his throat for
marks. When he was satisfied, he let go and returned to staring at
nothing.
After another
few moments of silence, Kain finally spoke.
“I haven’t
come here in years,” he whispered, “but running is never a good thing, it makes
you sick.”
Raziel
snorted a laugh despite himself, causing Kain to turn suddenly, looking at him
sharply, eyes glowing golden, his expression saying what he wanted.
“Then you
come back and it tries to get you to kill your childe,” Raziel
snorted, smiling a little. Idly, he tucked a longer strand of hair behind his
ear.
“I wasn’t
expecting company,” Kain muttered, perfectly serious, with a light shrug as he
turned away from looking at his child and instead stared at the ruin.
He was
rather confused when his first born snorted into laughter again.
The End
Authoress note: just a short little ditty to
celebrate 300 hits on my site.
Sorry if it made no sense and was
rather pointless, and for those who didn’t get it the ruin was Vorador’s
mansion, the brief descriptions were made using the defiance game as source
material.
Please review.