"Our troubles have only begun."

Giovanni threw his forearm against the broken stump of a petrified tree. He stared back through the vaulted cavern. Roksana braced her lithe body in the hollow of the column, while the shadows seemed to slip over her rather than her into the darkness. Rhad' planted his svärdstav into a divot in the floor and leaned against its long haft. A fine mist revealed their tortured breaths.

"Having glimpsed it, I know their monster's name," Giovanni grunted.

An oily whisper from the dark hollow replied, "It is no trifle that stalks us. I can smell its brimstone musk all about this catacomb."

"You have come to the Gates," Rhad' informed them. "Such portals are their domain."

"By their and it," mused a wearied, refined voice, "You refer to Kerberos, the hounds of hell."

Giovanni cast a gloomy look at the Arab who sat slumped against a boulder. Kadir had been sulking since the plunge and the loss of his talisman. "As it would seem the invaders have allied with Cerberus, we must escape his den quickly."

He studied the man who had feigned to be a mere watchman. Dark shafts remained buried in various places of Rhad's body, though the man showed only the fatigue from the run. The priest continued, "If you truly be Rhadamanthus, by what avenues can we flee?"

Rhad's grey eyes met his as he answered, "Only deeper across the River."

"No mortal should tread those banks before their time," countered Giovanni.

"Have I not announced it is your fate?" The watcher's words fell as a decree, not a question.

Baleful howls rose and dipped, each slightly different and clashing. Everyone strained to peer through the fog, but the call bounded from everywhere. Flashes of sickly yellow lit and vanished between rocky formations, but one could not tell if the source stood ten or a thousand meters away. The ossified grove that sheltered them also masked the predator. Instinctively, Kadir, Giovanni, and Rhad' placed their backs to each other. The Arab nervously tossed a dagger between his hands.

"Do not fret," Giovanni assured him. "The Shepherd will guard us even in the valley of Death."

"I'd prefer not to test that hypothesis in such a literal scenario," the scholar quipped.

Gentle, rhythmic drips struck water somewhere nearby. The splashes came long and regular. The priest recognized the cadence. He reached into the trunk of the tree and pulled Roksana out of the darkness. "Let us go! Heaven has provided a way of escape!"

The act startled the vampir. The sultry flame in her eyes dissipated to a mute tiredness. Exhaustion tinged her words as she asked mid stride, "What do you mean?"

Giovanni noted he had had the effect needed to help Roksana regain control. He did not answer. Each stride took them blindly through the mist. The others followed warily behind him, while the baying increased as the hounds drew nearer.

He let his boots sink into the dark waters and draw him deeper. The priest thought of one of David's songs, which he prayed would come true. He whispered instinctively, "Be a light unto my path..."

Two pale silver stars broke the fog bank. They hovered above a black silhouette that resembled a pillar set into a rocking platform. The river surged to the runner's waists as the shadow took form into a man on a flat boat. The pilot paused his strokes and knelt. Grey skin stood out in the twilight. The ferryman wore only a goat-beard and torn tunic.

Extending a strong hand, the coxswain announced, "Decided to join me and prove your boast true that you'd follow me into the Gates of Hell?"

Giovanni clasped the offered hand and laughed despite himself, "My word is my oath. You live even here border of the grave! Now, can you take all of us in before the hell hounds seize us?"

Roksana exclaimed, "Tenet! How did you escape--and come upon this boat?"

Tenet and Giovanni helped her aboard while the others scrambled over the other side. Tenet answered, "I slipped from its jaws with great effort and took refuge on this boat. That gatekeeper only bays when on the hunt, which I know well. I sensed it pursued a different quarry and decided to lend aid."

"As to the boat...," Tenet hesitated, honor bound to honesty. "I borrowed it from a former colleague."

Giovanni met his black-and-silver eyes for a long moment before a burning breeze that smelled of rot blew across the boat. The makeshift steersman pushed off with his pole. He had only paddled a little ways out when a dreadful keening pierced the mist. The huddled occupants stared astern. Six yellow torches glared back from the shore. Ghostly flames oozed and dripped down and smoked upon the waters. The smouldering lights halted, accompanied by a bitter howl, and then slowly receded into the gloom.

Giovanni crossed himself and finally allowed himself to relax since yesterday's repast. Fatigue claimed him as he heard Tenet darkly announce, "Our troubles have only begun."

Art Source: "Hellhound" by Kajito

Story and Characters: (c)/by Corey Blankenship, Giovanni, Roksana, Kadir, Tenet (c) Brannon Hollingsworth

The Maritsa ran red with blood.

September 27, 1371 A.D.
Chernomen, Serbia

The Maritsa ran red with blood.

"By the hinges of Hell!" I cursed. Bodies, horribly hacked and mutilated, floated around me as I led what remained of the Sect across the river. I knew we had to cross into northern Greece. I knew we had to put as many leagues behind us before the sun rose. There was no telling what the Turks would do once dawn arrived.

"How has this happened, Tenet?" Roksana asked. "How, in the name of Christ, did eight hundred defeat eighty thousand?" Her dark eyes were wild with fear and disbelief. I eyed her carefully, watching for any signs of weakness. We were literally wading through a river of blood - not the best place to be when traveling alongside a vampir, even one who was Christian.

Giovanni answered before I could reply. "Superior tactics, a night raid, and the fact that the King of Serbia and his brother were desperate for revenge, I would expect," he said cooly. The man was oddly detached and calm. The fact that he mentioned King Vukašin Mrnjavčević's brother, Despot Jovan Uglješa, revealed what was on his mind, however. We'd lost Giovanni's brother, Johann, amidst the chaos of the battle. None of us believed he was dead, but there were worse things than death, especially for an Edenson.

Johann was not the only one who was missing. Our own Turk, Kadir, had been captured and I was almost certain that I'd seen Ormolus, our unicum animarum, ripped into pieces. I was not sure if the mechanical man could be made whole again, even if we were able to retrieve all of his parts and pieces. The Sect of Seven had been riven, splintered, and torn.

But that was not the worst of it.

I climbed out of the blood-soaked river and immediately lent a hand to Giovanni. I had no idea how the man had crossed the river Maritsa with the chest on his shoulders. I had barely made it carrying my own weight. Granted, I was gravely wounded from an axe blow to the ribs, but still... "Hand me the chest, Giovanni."

The bearded man grunted and pushed up the lead-lined wooden box and clambered up the slick, muddy slope. Roksana came last, drawing her bow as she did so and immediately began a sweep of the surrounding forest.

"We need a place to rest and tend our wounds, Tenet," the Edenson said, breathless from his exertion.

"I know, but I fear that the Turks will be at our heels when they discover what we have." I shot a look with my odd black-and-silver orbs towards the chest.

Giovanni made a face in confusion. "How will they even know, with all of the chaos?"

"They have Kadir," I replied solemnly.

A hint of fear slid in behind his eyes. "He will not tell them," he hissed.

"He does not have the jawbone, or else they would have never taken him," I said.

The fear started pitching a tent and Giovanni gasped. "I had not realized, but yes..."

I waved my pale-skinned hand in the dark air as if shooing smoke from my face. "The retrieval of the jawbone is a problem for tomorrow. For now, we need to get as far away from here as possible. I suggest south, into Greece."

The Edenson nodded, too weary and wounded to argue.

"There is a hut an arrow's flight from here," came the soft, sibilant voice of Roksana from the dark woods. A shiver ran down my spine at it's sound. I could tell she was leaning heavily upon the strength of That-Which-Was-Within-Her to keep going. The dark-haired vampir would never admit that she needed to stop and rest, but the intent of her words was clear.

I looked from the heavy chest, with its precious cargo, to the panting Edenson lying on the muddy bank, and then back across the blood-and-body filled river towards the burning bones of Chernomen. I ran a hand across my bald scalp and sighed. We needed to run and run far and fast. My companions, though each far more than human, still had their limits. "Very well. Lead us there."

The pale of dawn was beginning to creep into the sky as we stepped into the clearing and saw the small, neat hut before us. A split-rail fence leaned crookedly beside it. In the light of day, I thought for a moment that I saw the hint of something hovering above the hovel, but in my weariness, I dismissed it.

"Good job, Roksana. We will rest here for a bit and then will continue onward."

If I would have only known how wrong I was...

Art Source: "Serbian Mythology - Talason" (c)/by Vanja Todoric
Story and Characters: (c)/by Brannon Hollingsworth

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