A cold winter wind blew over the slain, bringing ice, and making those watching shiver.
When it was over, Kell sank to the ground, rolling gently to his side and closing his eyes. Vilias moved tenderly to the old warrior, the old man, the old soldier. No longer did he look like Kell the Legend. Now, he just looked old and withdrawn and lost.
"Well?" snapped Grak, frowning.
Vilias looked up. "Holy Mother! He's dead, Grak! Kell's dead!"
Kell stood before the Keepers of the Chaos Halls. He scowled and clutched Ilanna tight, and looked from one, to the next, to the next, and they surveyed him with eyes of silver, unspeaking, unmoving, uncaring.
Is this it, then? Is this where I die? Is this where the game ends? Is this my new eternity?
No. It was Ilanna. Her voice was honey in his brain, and she was weaving her dark magick once more. This is not punishment, Kell. This is reward. This is not where you die. This is where you choose to live!
Choose to live?
So there's a bloody choice?
Kell braced himself, staring up at the five Keepers. They exuded a lack of emotion. A neutrality. They were neither good, nor evil. They simply were. Kell scowled.
"Can I do something for you sorry-looking fuckers? Eh, lads? Or maybe you'd like a good kick to get you started?"
"You are to be congratulated," said one of the Keepers. Its voice was low but musical, and without threat. "Without your help, we would not have all the Vampire Warlords back in our custody."
"What about Meshwar? He's in Vor…"
"He is with us, now," said the Keeper. "You are not the only creature with the power to open a portal to the Chaos Halls. Although, it would seem, you are the most… efficient."
Kell considered this, then gave a single nod. Then he seemed to deflate. He remembered Nienna. Bitterness washed through him like a fast-flood of liquid cancer.
"Why am I here?"
"We have one last task for you."
"And suppose I don't want to accept your task? Suppose I'm sick of these games? Suppose I'm just a bitter and lonely old man, who wants nothing more than to die?"
The Keeper moved close, and bent down until its face was a finger's breadth from Kell's face. Those silver eyes drilled into him and in those swirling silver depths Kell saw something impossible, something eternal, something truly godlike. The voice was a gentle breath across his face, and he inhaled the words, sucked them straight down into his soul… "You are lost at the moment, Kell, lost to the sadness and for that I still grant you life for foolish words and foolish thoughts. But do not think to test us, for we are the Keepers and we hold the Key to All Life. The Vampire Warlords should never have broken free – and one day, there will a reckoning for that abomination. But still, in Gollothrim, the vampires roam, the spawn of Bhu Vanesh… you can go there, we will give you the tools to take it back. You can save thousands, Kell. Either that…" The Keeper pulled back, silver orbs still fixed on Kell who coughed, and dropped to one knee, choking as if on heavy woodsmoke. "Either that, or you can stay here and be our guest for an eternity."
The sky went dark, struck through with huge zig-zags of crimson. The falling corpses fell faster, and screams rent the sky, screams of pure anguish like nothing Kell had ever heard. Nor would want to hear again.
"There is always a reckoning," said the Keeper. "Nothing goes unseen. Nothing goes unpunished. Remember that, Kell, the Legend, when you finally seek our forgiveness."
Kell nodded, but could not speak. The world tilted, the Chaos Halls spun away into a tiny black dot and Kell fell through light and opened his eyes, lying on his back, next to the fast-cooling corpse of Nienna.
Three horses picked their way across a pastel landscape of white, greys and subtle cold blues. The beasts entered a sprawling forest of pine, and it was half a day before they emerged again on the flanks of a hill, climbing, following old farmers' trails high into the hills east of the Gantarak Marshes. From here, the glittering, ancient sprawl of Vor could be spied far, far to the south, and Kell reined his mount and sat for a while, staring at the distant city; staring at the new home of the Ankarok.
Saark watched him for a while, then glanced at Myriam, who shrugged, pushing out her lower lip.
"You want to visit?" asked Saark, eventually.
"No."
"Do you trust Skanda?"
"No."
"He claims all the Ankarok want is that one, single city. He delivered Meshwar to the Vampire Warlords, turned the vampire slaves back into people, and set them gently outside the city gates. He did everything he promised. More. He gave them food, supplies, money. It's a small price to pay, I think, for saving so many lives."
Kell said nothing, continuing to scowl. Eventually he coughed, rubbed his beard, then his weary eyes, and said, "Only bad things will come of this, you mark my words. This is not the last we've heard of Skanda, nor the damned Ankarok. I have a bad feeling in my bones, Saark. A bad feeling that runs right down into the sour roots of Falanor."
"We could ride down," said Saark, eyes glittering. "Take the city! Single-handed! Just like the old days, eh, Myriam? Eh?"
Kell shook his head. "The battle for Vor. It is a battle for another day. I'm tired, Saark. Too tired. Too old. I saw my daughter die, and I saw my granddaughter die." He turned, and there were tears in the old soldier's eyes. "It shouldn't be like this. You should never outlive your children. Sometimes, Saark, I fear I will never laugh again."
"At least the scourge of the Vampire Warlords has ended, Kell. Nienna died defending the land she loved. She did it for the good of Falanor, for its people, its history, its honour."
"Doesn't make it any easier to swallow," growled Kell, still staring at the haze of Vor.
"We are free of oppression," said Saark, forcing a false brightness into his voice. As ever, he was dressed in silk; bright green, this time, in an attempt to "blend with forest hues".
"Yeah," snarled Kell, curling his lips into an evil grimace. "But for how long? The Keepers, down in the Chaos Halls, told me that a war is coming. The vachine from Silva Valley – they were just the beginning. There are more, many more, far to the north, far beyond the Black Pike Mountains where no man has trodden for ten thousand years. They have a vast, corrupt, vachine empire built in the ice. And they want revenge, for what happened to the vachine of Silva Valley."
"You think a war is coming?" said Saark, quietly.
"There is always a war coming," said Kell, impassively.
"What shall we do?"
"What can we do?" said Kell, voice and eyes bleak, tears running down his cheeks as he thought about Nienna for the hundredth time, thought about the terrible axe blades of Ilanna and tried to persuade himself tried to convince himself that the axe had nothing to do with the young woman's death. After all, Ilanna was just steel. Cold black steel. Nothing more, nothing less.
"Time to leave," said Myriam, glancing up at the sky. "There's a storm coming."
Kell nodded, and dug heels to the flanks of his mount, cantering ahead of the small group.
Myriam glanced at Saark. "Do you think he'll be all right?" she said. "I mean. We thought he was dead, back there."
Saark gave a single nod. "Maybe he did die. A little bit. Lost a part of his soul."
"But will he be all right?"
"Of course he will. He's Kell. Kell, the Legend."
Spring was coming to Falanor. The cold winds from the north grew mild, and snow and ice began a long melt, gradually freeing up the Great North Road for easier passage; of both people and supplies.
Over the coming months, slowly, the cities of Falanor rebuilt themselves, and the thousands of people who'd fled the horrors, first of the albino Army of Iron, the Harvesters, and later the Vampire Warlords, the refugees, the outcasts, slowly they drifted back and populations began once again to grow, to build, to prosper.