sir rictor cassul, korporal. (templars) wrote in emillion, |
And only two years ago she might have smiled, pressed, joked, and did you miss me while you were looking for yourself out there? But Rictor stood at the right hand of the Cardinal, and Divina belonged to the dregs of Hell. There was nothing more to say. She wiped the blood off her chin with the back of her hand, turning to leave. “Well, Faram bless and all that rot...” She drifted off, her eyes falling upon a swiftly encroaching mass in the distance. A herd of Iguion, led by a pair of Mindflayers. Bending down briefly to retrieve Deathbringer, she gestured toward their new opponents. Her voice came without any of its usual power, hesitant, in the tone of one who had already been burnt by the Light. “Fight with me.” There was the briefest moment of hesitation, visible if one were watching closely and knew his movements well (which she did). But then Rictor’s jaw set and he readjusted his grip on the sword. Fell was Fell, but an immediate threat to Emillion temporarily outstripped such concerns. So they carved their way into the battle together, blades slicing through rubbery flesh, fire steaming before the torrential downpour extinguished it – the very element that could help them was diminished here. They did not fight as a cohesive unit. They were close, but there was a jarring discordance in their movements, like two dancers moving out-of-step with each other – two athletes who had forgotten each others’ pace and rhythm due to a year apart. But somewhere between the breath being knocked out of Rictor’s lungs and Divina diving past him to block what would have been an assured hit, then Rictor sending one Mindflayer screeching backwards with a Hallowed Bolt before it could muster a spell against his companion, he started to remember. And so did she. Yet the two not only remembered together but also learned together. As Rictor’s Hallowed Bolt was swiftly followed by Divina’s Infernal Strike, slaying the Mindflayer at last, Divina wondered if this had happened before. The last time they had joined blades, they had been Berserker and Holy Knight. Had there ever been an instance in history that a Holy Sword had willingly been extended alongside a Dark one? Probably, but in the moment Divina felt buoyed, fueled by the assumption that there was something here that no one had ever attempted before. Just as the herd of Iguien was dwindling down to its last stragglers, yet another Iron Crab joined the fray. This one was colossal, far larger than any either fighter had previously encountered. The two immediately went for the crab’s glistening mouth, but the crab was fast, sweeping out a huge pincer that the knights evaded only by a hair’s breadth. Behind them, the remaining Iguion cast Regen, their fallen allies rising from the dead with ponderous movements. Rictor hissed a curse under his breath when he saw the toads starting to stir. He shot a glance at the woman beside him. He had managed to push his aside his concerns for the time being, the nagging question of ‘is this right’ – but the two once-friends were still similar in that their hearts beat for battle, all their instincts yearning towards the same goal. Ric could not have turned down this fight if he’d tried, no matter how corrupt and tainted the blade beside him. She was still a member of the Guild; forsaken by the Church, perhaps, but at least she could fight. And besides, the code demanded it. His lips moved silently as he reached for the familiar reassuring warmth of the Light and of Faram. Divine Ruination, he thought, the textbook name for what was a sensation more than anything else: a burning heat between Rictor’s hands, expanding in his chest, welling up until it felt like there was a small sun trapped beneath his ribcage and it was bound to tear him apart, light radiating from his fingertips. It wriggled its way into the gunblade, and when the holy knight moved, there was a temporary blinding brilliance as he threw himself at the monsters. |