Chapter 68: White Silk, Red Roses
The vampire’s claws met roots in a bout of clash for will, roots sprouting new possibilities, and claws desperately flung and froze them. Right swing, skin-shed, left swing, frostbite surged, another root swung for her waist. Dodge, a sharpened vine sprouted from beneath. Chin raised for a narrow dodge, a lone seed shot through the entangled root and hit her neck. Binds coiled her throat. Gasp, her left claw raised to cut off her head, weaves grostesquely stitiching the head a new body mid-air as she rolled aside, glared.
Hounds pooling again summoned, liquid bones cackled a new round as they rushed forward, the swinging roots met the hounds. Splash, the hounds splattered, tars molding and spreading the barks before Manasseh lunged, weaves thinning her body through the miniscule gaps before her claw reached for Adil’s unwavered eye, before a barrier halted the sharpness mid-air and another shaprened vine from beneath lodged into the vampire’s stomach.
Gasping, the vampire screamed as she tore off her waist, sharpened vines surging and following as the upper half rolled to reweave a new half, muds of lush soils marring her bloodlusted expression as her palm glided the soil mid-roll, silky frosts spread over and enveloped the pillars of shapened vines, before she climbed again and lunged for Adil.
A death man’s charge, Adil narrowed her eyes at the foolishness, as hounds summoned again for lunges. Roots swung, tars splattered, Manasseh coiled and neared Adil, her left palm engulfing a sinister black-blue shade, before slamming an ice blast into the barrier, the leaves in the barrier trembled as icy slik impaled them into each other, the Druid’s eye faltering as the vampire’s crazed right claw reached for her stitched stomach.
Yet the falter didn’t last as the Druid swung her staff, the vampire anticipating this retracted mid-swing for forward kick, Adil’s head tilt, the heel spawned icy sharpenels as it lunged down again, sinking into Adil’s shoulder.
Yet without a hint of pain, Adil’s hand swung to grab the leg, the greens sprouting over from the reddied blood as flowers and leaves marring the vampire’s leg. Gritting her teeth, the vampire cut it off again and rolled on the thud, yet a belated shock washed over her as a branch seeped into her bloodied leg from Adil’s shoulder, the root attached from the detached leg as if in a funny vengance against her own for abandonment.
Flowers and greens continued to sprout swiftly along the branch, as it reached the bloodied leg, so the vampire resorted to an old trick she clawed her head, the half-conscious palm grabbed and threw it across the field, vines chasing in shutter as if mirroring Adil’s shock. Head rolled, body reformed, as she rolled and slapped her palm for a landing. Gasping as she watched Adil shrugged the detached leg that betrayed her, the blue veins glowed malice and mockeries for the vampire’s struggle, the very hero’s will she exploited now taunted her of her failure. Sensing her burning lungs, she lunged her claw into her chest, pulling out as the lungs themselves reweave them anew with new oxygen as she lunged again.
A futile bout of struggle. The eerie pulse from the cocoon echoed the soil as Adil’s green fielded and spread over the dry wasteland, the greens chuckling to the elder of the children’s laughter and Selene’s smile, as they washed over Manasseh, flowered vines with lilies curling beneath her dashing steps as they embraced, the vampire coiling her body to silks again against it, yet the icy silks met the falling petals that tainted greyness among the pure ice like ashes she despised.
Silks reformed into the vampire’s body as she screamed, grey lilies sprouting from her soul, along her veins, to her pupils, bright blues flickering, pulsing, laughing, toiling. The half-vampire’s tears rolled down her cheeks, whimpers escaping from the flowery pain yet her will flamed as she glared, Adil’s steady gaze ever far out of reach for her claw to tear through.