Ehlana became a prisoner of Ilanna.
Ehlana became Ilanna.
Kell's eyes flared open, and he understood, and he remembered, and bitterness flooded him and hatred flooded him, and he wanted to scream Why, Ehlana? Why did you do this to us? I never asked for it? I never fucking asked for any of it! But Kuradek's fangs were in his neck, biting, sucking his blood in great thirsty gulps and Kell laughed, and breathed deep, and drew his Svian and rammed it hard into Kuradek's groin. Kuradek squealed high and long like a stuck pig and Kell reached up, grasped the smoky skin of Kuradek's head, and dragged the Vampire Warlord's fangs from his flesh with trembling, smoke-stained fingers…
With a heave, Kell sent Kuradek hurtling across the room. He hit the bed, flipped over it, smashed through two of the supports with crashes of splintering timber. Kell rubbed his neck, where blood flowed from twin vampire bites, and the Days of Blood welled free and wild in his mind.
" I am a pawn no more! " he growled bitterly and found Ilanna and lifted her. She was cold in his hands. Cold as ice. Her shaft and blades glowed with a deep sable black – not a real black, not steel or iron, not burned flesh or the night sky. This black was a portal. This black was an absence. An absence of matter. A pathway.
"Welcome back, husband," said Ilanna, her voice a soft breeze through his mind.
"Why did you do it? I loved you. I worshipped you. And you left me, sitting here in bitterness, self-loathing, believing I destroyed you in a fit of bloody madness! When all the time it was your own dark magick which brought about your death."
"I am not dead, husband," said Ilanna, "I live on, in this axe, in this symbol of strength and freedom, and together we will send back the Vampire Warlords! Together, we will show them what the Legend can do…"
"I do not want this!" screamed Kell, falling to his knees.
"Want is immaterial," said Ilanna.
Kuradek had gained his feet, towering over Kell, and the Vampire Warlord leapt for the old warrior, huge claws closing around him, lifting him into the air.
"I will tear you apart like a worm!" screamed the Warlord.
Kell looked deep into those blood-red eyes. He smiled, showing his bloody teeth. "My name is Kell," he said, pulling free his arms with ease and lifting Ilanna high above his head. Her blades were a dull black hole in reality. "And it's time you went home, laddie."
Ilanna struck Kuradek between the smoke-filled eyes, splitting the Vampire Warlord's head in two. Smoke poured out, a thick black acrid smoke which filled the room in an instant. Kell stood very still as before him Kuradek stood, top half split wide open and wavering like petals on a stalk in a heavy wind. The world seemed to slow, and groan, and a smoke-filled corridor opened up behind Kuradek. It stretched away for a million years. Kell lowered Ilanna to the ground with a thunk, and cracked his knuckles, and stared down the pathway, and waited. The corridor led to a chamber of infinity, endlessly black, and from the sky fell corpses, tumbling down down down through nothingness and unto nothingness. Kuradek's glowing red eyes were fixed on Kell.
"What have you done?" snarled the Vampire Warlord, both halves of his severed, smoke-filled mouth working together from two feet apart. "What have you done to me?"
"I've sent you back," said Kell, almost gently, and there came a distant clanking of chains, and something dark and metal, like a huge hook, came easing along the million year corridor of smoke. Clockwork claws fashioned from old iron, pitted and rusted and huge and unbreakable, closed methodically around Kuradek the Unholy. They crushed him with ratchet clicks. Somewhere, there came a heavy, sombre ticking sound. Gears clicked and stepped. Kuradek screamed, and in the blink of an eye was dragged into acceleration down the corridor. Hot air rushed in, and the portal to the Chaos Halls imploded, all smoke being sucked to a tiny black dot, which flashed out with an almost imperceptible tick.
Kell breathed, and shivered, and rubbed at the bite marks in his neck. He fell to his knees, then used Ilanna to lever himself up once more. "What a bastard," he muttered, legs shaking, and hurried out into the corridor. Myriam was starting to come round, and the first thing her dazed eyes fixed on was Kell's neck.
"He bit you?"
"Don't worry."
"He bit you! You'll turn, you'll see…"
"He's gone," said Kell. "I can't turn into nothing."
"You killed him?"
"He cannot be killed," said Kell, and hefted Ilanna. "The Vampire Warlords are immortal. But I sent him back to the Chaos Halls. Back to the Keepers. I think they were pissed at his escape. I think they had a special present waiting for him."
"What about the rest of the vampires?"
"Let's go see."
Kell and Myriam rushed up steps and onto ice-rimed battlements. A cold wind snapped along, slapping them. Below, on the plain, they watched in stunned silence.
The men of Falanor stood in a tight unit behind their shields, spear points twinkling in the ghost light. By the gates stood a massive horde of vampires, waiting behind ten Harvesters engulfed in wreathes of ice-smoke. The ice-smoke was moving towards the Falanor men, creeping eerily across the churned snow, but at the same time an army of albino soldiers charged, in silence, like a dream, and veered at the last moment from the men of Falanor, slamming into the ranks of Harvesters and vampires, crushing the front lines which went down in a scything sea of descending swords…
"I don't understand," said Myriam.
The Army of Brass clove through the Harvesters and vampires, who started to scream and flee. Thousands of albino soldiers slammed through Kuradek's slaves, killing them mercilessly as they turned to run, swords cutting off heads, ramming through hearts. Within minutes, it became a slaughter.
Kell sat back on the battlements, pressing fingers to his punctured neck.
"What happened?" snapped Myriam. "I thought they would turn back? When you killed Kuradek?"
"But I did not kill him," explained Kell, patiently. He chuckled, and rested his head wearily against the wall. He closed his eyes. "The Vampire Warlords are immortal. Once they turn you into vampire kind, you stay that way. They are a parasite on all life. That's why they were summoned to the Chaos Halls. That's why the dark gods banished them there."
"What about you?" snapped Myriam. "Should I get my knife ready?"
"Me?" Kell opened his eyes. He laughed again, and shrugged. "Hell, woman, you do what you like. It would appear I am blessed. Dark magick. Or something. From back during the Days of Blood. It would appear I was fucking made to fight these creatures. Can you believe that?" He laughed again. A weary laugh. The laugh of the defeated. A laugh of desolation. "Only they did it thirty years too soon. Bloody prophecies. Should have them tattooed on my arse, for all the use they are."
"Prophecies? Blessed? What the hell are you talking about? Who told you all this?"
Kell grinned at Myriam. "The wife. Now be a good girl, go and fetch Saark and Grak, will you? They'll be wondering what happened."
"And I suppose you can tell me why the albinos turned on the vampires?"
Kell shrugged. "No idea, lass. I'm as surprised as you. But I do know one thing."