Eternity

By Silmuen
 
 

Slow, cautious footsteps echoed in the empty, dimly lit hall. 
The man limped slightly. He allowed himself to, only when unobserved. Again, he was reminded of the burden of his age.
The uneven sound of his footsteps was punctuated by the steady accompaniment of his staff against the stone floor. 
He inhaled slowly, smelling a scent that evoked a small smile on his pale lips. 
Death.
The hall was lit by shivering candlelight that sent a multitude of fretful shadows tremble on the dark walls.
The old man limped on, his face set in a pale mask of grim satisfaction, his eyes locked on something in the middle of the hall. 
A dead body.
A flame-shaped sword.
A small bluish heap of dust. 
The uneven sound of footsteps ceased, as the man approached the body, stooped and  gazed curiously into the glazed eyes frozen wide in a revolting expression of terrible fear and agony. The old man's wrinkled hand slid across the pale, bloodless face of the young Sarafan.
Long, white fingers gently closed the dead eyes.
The old man straightened slowly, straining to pull up the great flame-shaped sword, trembling with effort.
A fervent whisper escaped the withered lips.
"Every great movement requires a few martyrs...I warned you,  Raziel."
That bloody night took many martyrs, their tortured screams still seemed to echo helplessly in the age-darkened walls of the stronghold. 
As he fought with the blade, his hands greedily clutching at the hilt, the old man trampled the blue dust, sending its tiny particles airborne.
They whirled and glittered momentarily in the wavering candlelight, then fell gently onto the floor. 
The old man, however, did not pay attention to anything but the blade. 
He fancied that he saw a flicker of blue light speed along the multicurved blade, and his feverish eyes locked on the hilt from where the light had appeared.
"You were foolish to challenge me, little Raziel." he whispered again, watching the blade intently for answer. 
A faint, bluish haze slid along the blade and vanished. 
 

A long, anguished wail of despair escaped the demon. 
No merciful angel of oblivion descended...
His cries were audible only to himself and echoed painfully in his tortured mind.
Betrayed. Manipulated. Humiliated.
He was trapped beyond salvation in the physical confines of the blade. The spirit’s trembling ceased. His immaterial eyes opened to see nothing but his own spiritual essence; a blue, pulsing orb of light that strove to adapt itself automatically to its material bounds. With a mixture of fascination and horror, he observed his own spirit twist itself into maddened shapes, tearing itself from one form into another, wisps of ethereal energy twitching violently. Raziel saw himself turn into a winged transparent figure, whose features resembled his from the time he had been a vampire...but it was just an illusion. 
Suddenly, he distinguished an echo of the old man's whisper...
"......a few martyrs...."
In answer, he desperately fought to free himself of his corporeal prison.
His mind plunged into despair- a bottomless pit of bitter pain, humiliation and impotent rage.
Damn you, Moebius! May your soul be devoured by the blackest pits of hell! May you have a taste of eternal torment...The pain of betrayal and humiliation...
The spirit flinched as he felt Moebius' touch on the hilt...
".....little Raziel...." the words still echoed derisively in his mind. 
His anguish increased gradually, as his memory labored to reconstruct the last events.
The image of his own Sarafan self flickered before him -the ruthless, repulsive young monster, whose life was solely devoted to the Inquisition and the annihilation of the vampires. Repugnant and evil...yet it was himself. Raziel groaned with pain as truth found its way into his heart. He had never been noble nor worthy...he had always been...himself.
How possibly could he resist erasing that insignificant insect?! That Sarafan boy whose greed for fame blinded him beyond reason? And who, as well, had been manipulated and tricked by Moebius...?
And in the end...how possibly could he avoid his irredeemable destiny, the terrible fate of imprisonment in the Reaver blade? Raziel's soul rebelled against the cruelty of his fate, he rejected it with all his being. 
Why, in bloody hell, did he have to kill Kain?
Insanity was near, it was approaching...he could feel the touch of its fingers...or maybe those were Moebius' colds fingers caressing the hilt... He could not tell...
His memory brought him another torture- his own words he had uttered to Ariel's specter, the anguished balance guardian that haunted the Pillars.
"Know this, about this purgatory from which you long to escape...you are merely at the threshold..."
So was he.

A drop of blood, flying from his lips, a scarlet drop that made a fine arc in the air and  splashed flat on the surface of the blade that pierced him. When one dies, Raziel discovered as his eyes widened in terror, the world slows ridiculously down, its colors brighten, and little details emerge as giants. Fully aware of the nearing death, Raziel reached  blindly out, a gesture purely human but nonsensical.
Seconds before death, Raziel wondered at his inward calmness -he could see from the perspective of eternity now...
A million thoughts flashed through his brain irrelevant now, diminished. A female name he thought he'd remembered. An image of a young Sarafan warrior in shiny mail.
All this flickered and vanished. The avenging blue-skinned demon gazed at him intently. 
Raziel felt betrayed by his fate- although being conditioned to expect and accept death, deep inside he rebelled against the absurdity and brutality of it. He never though he would be denied the unquestionable right to achieve even more, to earn still more fame and glory...There was so much to do...

Why? Why death chose to come so soon? 

Raziel screamed as he felt himself falling with incredible speed...Soon he realized it was only a sensation that his mind gave him, terrified by the experience of death. With a sudden shock, he realized that he was chained to a broken black pillar. As he strove to free himself, he felt the arcane markings of the pillar grow white hot and scald his naked skin. He raised his head to see a looming dark shape tower over him. Giant stones rose into pitch black sky like clawed fingers. A red blaze illuminated the nightmarish fingertips and on their top a familiar black robed figure appeared. It gazed down upon the tiny speck of human flesh that writhed in chains below the stones. The pale face wrinkled in a smile as the dark eyes studied the Sarafan warrior. Raziel’s vision changed and he could see the figure clearly now, registering its pale, condemning smile. Mortanius made a slight gesture with his feeble hand. And Raziel knew he was damned.

The demon spirit trembled with pain, as his mind tortured him with one thought...Before him stretched an empty life of imprisonment, endless, pitiful existence measured by his growing hunger, despair and madness. Soon his consciousness would wane, overpowered by hunger, a new strong entity that would devour his will, his mind and his identity. Hunger was already manifesting itself in a dull pain that grew with every second.

Moebius leaned wearily against a pillar, his fingers opening and closing upon the hilt of the Soul Reaver. His tired gaze shifted from the blade to the dead form sprawled on the stone floor.
"What are the questions, Raziel ?"
A pale, ironic little smile crawled on his face. To the victor go the spoils.
 
 

Thanx to Ravenwing and  Rosebutt

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