Hearthsoul Chronicles

And by the almighty, he hated duels. He had hated them since the moment his blade first needed to cross that of a brightOne. In the end, Duels were nothing but moments of pointless stupidity.

The Excubitor heaved a breath, steam flowing out the slits of his eye-holes—a rather odd demonstration. What was that?

The thing poised itself. "NONE OF YOU IS TO INTERFERE."

Mist!

The man reared his sword, a silver ring glistening around his right finger. "READY?"

"No?"

The man disappeared. Suddenly flashing into view before Merrin—a giant of a creature, sword raised, swinging down with marvelous fervor. Merrin saw it all. He frowned and countered with his knife. The strength of a vested Caster was somewhat enough for that.

He hoped.

The blades made contact—or so he thought. He was wrong, for in that moment, the Excubitor's sword flowed through his knife, phasing downwards toward Merrin's face. It would kill him, that strike. It would cleave him in half.

Fear surged, cold flushing down his body as instincts roared within his mind. Escape, it said.

Escape he did. With a marshaling of the winds—howling in a split second—he slammed into the grand man, sending him tumbling atop the floating platform. The Guardsmen were stunned at this, many raising their blades in protest, eyes wide with some measure of fury.

Ah…

Merrin understood that. It was the same unspoken deal between masters: he was expected to play the role of the blademaster, not the caster. Honor demanded it. However, despite that glaring knowledge, he could not indulge them in that desire. This man, this Excubitor, was something else.

He recalled men like him with similar rings on their fingers. He had figured them for mere accessories, perhaps some mark of their rank as Excubitors. But now, he knew differently. The ring… he felt the same sensation as the servility ring. This ring was similar, something made by a caster to achieve a desired result. Even he had done something akin to it with the coin from the undermines.

He ‘did’ lose it in the end… Taken, more like.

Regardless, if it were anything comparable to the others, this Excubitor would have some uniqueness to him.

Had that blade done something? It had ignored the counter of his stone knife, cleaving through. No clash, no ringing of metal against metal. Simply nothing.

Hmm?

Merrin glanced around. The Guardsmen were still ready in their actions; the Casters, above or hidden, were likely attempting to use the symbols in some way. There were too many faces to count. Too many faces that each absorbed different forms of data.

deadEyes—yes, that was what the blackEyes called them. Who was to say these men did not have that? Who was to prove that with all these faces and their acquisitiveness, some form of reference could not be created about him? A profile that would negate the point of being a Head of Shadows.

He gritted his teeth. They can't know me!

The Excubitor took to his feet, quick, sword grasped tightly in his hands. This was rage—burning fury at the casualness with which this intruder had felled him. How was he, a creature of such stature, to accept that?

Merrin knew these were the thoughts swirling through the creature's head. And he was right. In a moment, the man was upon him, this time swinging from the side. Merrin jerked, the wind furious against his skin. And that fury he sent toward the Excubitor.

I need distance.

It failed.

The man—that impossible man clad in black, punched his feet into the platform, pinned hard on the spot. He tossed the blade into his left hand and pierced. The blade hit home, blood spilling down.

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Pain. Pain and more pain flooded that deep awareness within. Mist! The sword had struck or slashed his stomach. Not too deep, that was good. Most likely, the man was not an expert with his left hand.

Halo.

Merrin stepped back, hand placed over the wound. Or where it could reach, anyway. Oddly, sweat trickled down his brow. He knew the sure pain, the burning within his belly. But it was the strangeness of it all. He had not expected to be harmed so soon. Not by an Excubitor, at least—not after the strength he had gained since the last one was felled.

So what was this? Was he so weak that without the use of his full force, he could not stop the men in silver helms? That was… insulting.

He frowned, realizing the completion of the swirling data. In there, his mind spun and churned with countless ideations. Among them was one: a need to protect himself. Moeash might have seen him—if that man was Moeash, that is.

But if he had… I cannot give him certainty of it.

Merrin heaved a breath. In through the nose, out through the mouth; calming.

I need to become another.For them…another.

Thus came the newness.

He chuckled, a cold, deep, dry tune humming off his lips. The Guardsmen startled, some leveling their swords against their shoulders.

"YOU ENJOY PAIN?" the Excubitor muttered, flinging his sword. Blood splashing against the sleek, mirror-like surface of the platform.

Merrin ignored the ache. "Please, you overestimate yourself." He flexed his shoulders. "Come, come… try again. Third time might be the charm, no?"

The thing maintained silence.

Merrin smiled, pressing the shadows over his face—deeper, thicker than before. He was making something. A face carved out of the blackness, a mask to wear above his own. He would become this stranger for what was needed for his people.

The darkness went down, tightening around his skin. A cloth of sorts. It flowed out into a longer sleeve, a unique robe with a side-buttoned top. All pictorial, of course, but even that… just that was enough for the moment.

"What the?" A Guardsman, a younger, dark-haired fellow, stepped back.

"Shadowman?" one said. "It's the Shadowman."

"By damnation," another trembled. "Please, don't take my children!"

Merrin watched this and sighed. Yet another superstition. This one, as it turned out, he had never heard of. It surely was not a part of the core teachings of the Theocracy. What then was it?

"SHADOWMAN." The Excubitor pointed his blade. "STRANGE THAT SOMETHING FROM THE DIARIES OF A SAINT CAN STAND BEFORE ME."

Merrin folded his arms. "Oh, a fan…" He smiled, channeling the shadows in accordance. They were required for the structure of the face. "Wait… is that why you touched me with that feeble twig? Because you are a fan?" He chuckled. "You know, a more devoted one would try harder."

Abrupt.

The giant vanished. Merrin saw this, expected it even. The man appeared now, blade in hand, a darkened face reflected over his silver helm. He thought himself the ultimate warrior, the dominator of this battle.

How wrong he was.

The world slowed; data, countless streams of it, flowed into the mind of the caster. He needed something. NOW. A means, a cast to further remove his identity from that of this... Shadowman. After all, even with the different features, the casting was all too similar.

That needed to change. So what was it to become? What power was he to reveal as a means to solidify his trueness in the minds of these people?

The Excubitor was a thing of slowed motions: blade swung back, steadily rearing down for a cleave. His face, mirrored in that silver helm, froze the visage of the caster, Merrin. He was a black thing, sleek, as though his face was a glossy stone. Black. Eyes burning with a tiny, dim whiteness.

The clothes could not be reflected, but he knew what he was. Of what he was becoming. Perhaps, like the El'shadie or the sunBringer, a new lore was to arise from this.

He sighed within, his mind still spinning, churning with those thousand observed pieces of data. Among them, there was one that existed with a recursive trait: the shadow blades of the caster.

He had seen it here before. He had seen it used by the now-dead mine caster. A blade of shadow, a line of blackness on the world. But how was that even achieved? One would wonder.

He knew nothing of the answer. Maybe if they were to use it again, he would pry into their nature. But for now, there was no relevance to be drawn.

So why am I thinking about it?

His eyes remained locked on the slitted holes the Excubitor had for eyes in his helm. He was so intent, wasn't he? To kill, to maim this man, he knew nothing of. How could he even do that? How could he swing his sword, cutting through wind and flesh without a care? Was there nothi—

He paused. The wind.

A smile curled up on his face, listening as the thoughts played themselves. In fact…

Why not imitate what you have seen?

Why not throw a spin on what you have observed?

Why not coat the wind in shadows?

Why not, then, sharpen it?

Why not make it thinner? Cleaner... remaining ever more the wind to him, but to others, it was to be a blade of cutting darkness.

Ah. A smile curled internally.

A mask for the wind.That's it! That was what he needed.

The blade came down, and a sound like the screaming of a bird pierced the air.

What had happened?

The Excubitor looked down, expecting to see a dead or at least cleaved intruder. That was the only acceptable outcome. There was nothing of the sort. Instead, there was... an anomaly.

His hands... His actual hands were gone. The right one slapped down on the floor, blood pooling from the elbow. Strange… What was that doing there?

He looked up, staring into the eyes of this thief... this man wrapped in shadows with eyes of the tiniest whiteness.

He had taken my hands!