Dry, bleached stalks of brush raked across her calves...

Dry, bleached stalks of brush raked across her calves as she trudged through the ever-undulating snow drifts. In places, the wind-blown snow was nearly as deep as her waist, dropping out beneath her with a suddenness that seemed almost perversely malicious. In others, the frigid powder barely covered the cold, packed earth of the Black Forest's sparse floor. The hem of her thick, winter over-skirt dripped with slush that stuck to her like clammy palms of dead men. She could not let these elements of the land slow her pace. She had to get out of the dark boughs as quickly as possible.

This was not a good place to be once the moon rose.

Her lantern sputtered feebly. Even the barest shutter over the lamp would have done so much to aid in keeping the flame intact. It did not matter. It had to be this way...it would be over soon enough, she supposed.

Almost as if on cue, she heard the howl split the freezing cold wind. No, this was no mere howl. She had grown up hearing howls. This sound was far more than just a call by some hungry forest predator. It was as though someone was disemboweling the wind itself: a shriek that turned even her guts to water and threatened to give her leave of all her senses. There was a latent madness wound up in that howl; it was a horrific sound from somewhere Beyond. It held a distinct quality that began unraveling the very reality into which the discordant intonation had been thrust.

She quickened her pace, her footfalls crunching through the flimsy ice which coated the deeper snow. She stumbled, thinking how her crunching steps mimicked the thing's arrival. It had broken through the flimsy Curtain that separated her world from it's own dark demesne.

Her quick, gasping breaths trailed behind her in long white streamers caught upon a pale wind. She knew what was out there. She'd heard the stories. She knew what hunted her this night.

A deep growl trickled and rippled over her shoulder, slipping into her ear like wet, wiry wool. It itched and tickled and dampened every other sound all at the same time. She turned, lifting her pitiful lantern. Again, almost as if preordained by some Higher Power, at that exact moment, a shaft of brumal moonlight stabbed through the leaf-stripped branches.

The moon's pallid glow joined with the flickering flame of her beacon, casting an odd mixture of fire and ice upon the creature that towered above her. If it had been able to stand to its full height, four times her own height and more it would have soared, but its musculature and physical structure denied it that privilege. It was not by any means a lesser creature, however, with limbs as thick as hundred-year-old oaks, weight greater than a massive stone bridge, and shoulders as wide as most barns were long. There could be little doubt that the vlkčlověk**** before her was a lord over all it encountered. She would not be surprised that the furred and fanged horror might even be the One True Lord of its own Kin in all the known worlds, so titanic and terrible was its form and might.

Again came the deep rumble that made her own teeth rattle. The resound was followed by words, spoken in English, old of form. "Thou hast chosen poorly, she-chattle. Thou hast lost thy way in my wood this eventide. Think thee not that I wilt spare thee merely for being a Daughter of Eve. Thine blood will slake my thirst, and thy flesh will ease my hunger, doltish wench!"

The massive wolf-demon lunged for her with a slavering, blood-curdling howl.

It was in that moment that Roksana let her ruse drop and whipped Scythe, her sliver-edged shamshir from beneath her peasant disguise into a wide, pain-dealing arc before her. In a voice empowered by the Eternal Foe of her Enemy, she trumpeted, "Tak pojďte! Dine a pak navždy spát, bestie."***

*** - From Czech: "Come then! Dine and then forever sleep, beast!"

**** - From Czech: wolf-man

Art Source: "The Werewolf" (c)/by Niconoff

Story and Characters: (c)/by Brannon Hollingsworth

#MMWW, #Makes, #Me, #Wanna, #Write, #BrannonHollingsworth, #Roksana, #Sectof7, #wolfdemon, #werewolf

Tenet ran as fast as he could toward the Usher of Death

Tenet ran as fast as he could toward the Usher of Death.

Thanatos beat his wings like peals of thunder, and he drew in the fruit to his center. His other hands gestured in various signs, while their eyes glowered with danger and warning. The "Betrayer" ignored these, though he stumbled as if buffeted by gales and whiplashes. Sicol gleamed with a pale light as Tenet strode forcefully forward.

Wisps of dirt spun up and became half-formed people. Gaps in the spinning grit became shadowy eyes and mouths. Voices slashed out and their words cut like blades across Tenet's tunic and skin.

"Found your courage in the Pit, Oath-breaker?" accused a fiery female.

"Do you repay my hospitality by defiling both my home and my resting place?" an islander railed in stilted Arabic.

"How dishonorable you have become since you failed me, Mage-slayer," Wei Zhi growled.

A grit-figure grew horns, drew a katana, and raised the weapon to slice Tenet in half. Before Tenet could react, a long blade ripped through the creature's chest. The shadowy samurai shattered and flew into the dust storm. Rhad' nodded to Tenet through the dissipated attacker and swung out against another two phantoms that grew in Wei Zhi's place.

Tenet saw holes open in some other figures as black darts passed through them. A channel opened for him to press his attack and he dove into the eye of the raging winds.

Thanatos drifted over the still waters of the Styx and menaced at his assailant. "You have secured their names in the Ledger, Betrayer, and a visit to the Throne for yourself this day."

Tenet stopped at the shoreline and panted. Molten blood streaked from various gashes and scrapes, singing his tattered tunic. He dared to gaze into Thanatos' eyes, and immediately felt as though he tumbled down an endless abyss. He simultaneously felt he walked a corridor in a smoky labyrinth, from which their was no hope of escape or dawn. He heard familiar voices, crying out for help but just out of reach.

"Walk or run, you are Lost, and Lost you will for ever be, Exile," Thanatos pronounced.

Tenet listened past the Scribe's harrowing thunder to the roar of the wind. In desperation, he drew deep on the Power that kindled in all of his kind. Then, with the last of his might he channeled the Force of Creation into Sicol and threw it at his enemy.

Tenet cried out as he did so, "He has made us competent ministers of a new covenant--not of the Writ but of the Wind. For the Writ kills, but the One-Who-Is-Wind gives life...and the Wind of Heaven rushed over the waters."

The blade spun and flashed over the waters, as the cycling winds shifted to rush behind it. Sicol split both the Book's spine and the fruit to the core. The raging winds lifted the unbound pages. At that moment, an amphora smashed against the Book's skin-cover. A blue flame ate greedily and splintered into many tongues as the pages scattered. Those that fell to the churning Styx spread the inferno. The grey waters hissed at the sacred flames' transforming touch.

Thanatos shrieked, which sounded like a mountain splitting in two. His many hands clutched at stray pages and pieces of the fruit. Yet, the inflamed Wind tore him and bore him rapidly away. The pages that survived billowed in opposite directions as the gale fragmented toward all the cardinal points and lessened.

Tenet slumped onto the strand of slate. Giovanni rushed forward and gripped his shoulder. The Exile's silver-and-black eyes peered up at the priest's worried face. Tenet muttered, "I will be fine. I just need to rest."

Giovanni answered, "The grave may be no place to rest, especially when we have burnt Death's dark Book and kindled his River."

"If only it were his," Rhad' replied solemnly. "We have upset more than Thanatos, and we have far to go."

Art Source: "Azrael, Angel of Death" by PeteMohrbacher

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

What purpose do these living have in the Realm of the Dead?

The prow cut across the last waves and ran aground on hard stone. Giovanni and Rhad' leapt out of opposite sides of the craft and pulled it further ashore before helping the others disembark. Tenet whispered as he reached within the inner lining of his belt and withdrew something. He placed the small bag within the bottom of the boat and pushed it back into the current. The wooden vessel slipped quietly and quickly into the fog.

"Why did you cast off our means of escape?" Giovanni wondered.

Tenet turned his strange eyes on the priest. "It was part of the agreement with its owner."

A tense silence followed as the two studied one another before they joined the others. The beach stretched out as a barren landscape of broken stone that rose into craggy terraces. Then the shroud parted and what had looked like a massive stalagmite took shape. Roksana and Giovanni crossed themselves reflexively while every member drew weapons, save Tenet.

Many black wings the size and manner of a Rukk's wings dominated the space behind the figure. Some fluttered lazily like a bird of prey. The rest simply adorned the man-shaped being. Three sets of arms stretched out also from his body, and each palm bore a piercing eye. A garish ruby fruit hovered over one hand, while a massive book lay open under another. Blood-rimmed eyes peered from under a black hood. Scores of tentacles writhed independently from between his pale lips.

A thundering cascade bellowed, snapping loose papers into a gyre around the hovering form. "Declare your name and your manner of departure, mortals."

It paused and its bone-rattling voice came again, "State your purpose for straying into our lands, Betrayer."

The voice crashed against their souls as much as their flesh, grinding both like a mortar in a pestle. Kadir fell to one knee from the pain. The rest looked as though the weight of living became a mountain heaped upon their shoulders.

Tenet however stood with shoulders drooped by a different burden. His strained face expressed it as he viewed the agony of the others. Whispers of names and familiar voices flickered from the giant book in front of the Fallen before him. Tenet clenched his fists.

Finally, he answered, "No, Wei Zhi. I did not intend this end for you...I warned...I...defended..."

Giovanni stepped to his side and spoke. His usually robust speech sounded frail in the aftershock of the Scribe. "I am Giovanni Battista, and I have yet to journey into death, but I will not come to these lands. My home is elsewhere, as is my friends'."

The creature merely arched its brow in thought, which seemed to add to the crushing weight on Giovanni's back. The priest's knees buckled. Then the thought passed and the thunder answered, "The end of man is known only in the Books, and you are no Scholar in their Script. One among you is already writ here, and another is promised to join them."

Tenet's whispers became insistent and then he spoke with a new voice, filled with clarity and Power. "The Scales are in the hands of Another, Thanatos. Only One can open and read the Books that Seal all ends. Neither you nor I are Him."

The dark brooding figure glowered. Tenet reeled as if lashed by one of its large tentacles. "So you speak to more than the departed, Betrayer. What purpose do these living have in the Realm of the Dead?"

Tenet answered, "Their business is to merely pass through and return alive."

The Exile seemed to grow a bit as he stood upright. His hand slipped behind his back and a faint shimmer fit a slender blade into his grip.

"Mine is to seal this Passage once and for all."

Art Source: "Azrael" by PeteMohrbacher
Story and Characters: (c)/by Corey Blankenship, Tenet, Giovanni, Roksana, Kadir, (c) Brannon Hollingsworth

"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

"Damn you, Deacon," Rachel growled through clenched teeth.

"Damn you, Deacon," Rachel growled through clenched teeth. She had no idea how the man did it, but somehow her partner had a knack for getting her into the worst situations. Soaked to the bone, stalking a psychotic murderer outside an abandoned meat packing plant, this time was no exception.

The man--Deacon called him "a fiend" and refused to refer to him as anything else--had already murdered seven homeless people and an entire family: three little girls no less. He had to be stopped. The man seemed to have a penchant for torture. All of his victims had been found in positions of subjugation and terror, mouths frozen in silent rictus screams. What they'd not been able to figure out what exactly how they had died, none of the victims had a mark on them, but that didn't make them any less dead.

Rachel was pretty sure that Deacon had an idea of how they'd died, but he wasn't giving anything up. They'd been partners for a long time: going on seven years, or was it eight? She could not remember, but she'd spent enough long, tension-filled nights with the man to know a thing or two about him. The first was that if he didn't want to give something up, you were wasting your time trying to break or make him. She'd never seen a will so strong in another human. She said will to herself, but she'd never admit that to Deacon, if he were here, she'd call it thick-or-hard-headedness. Despite her mounting terror at what she was about to do, Rachel allowed a small smile to peek out at the edge of her mouth.

Rachel wished that he was here with her.

"Damn you, Deacon," she said, getting a tighter grip on her Glock 22, she flung herself away from the single street light and into the shadow of death and darkness.

Art Source: "Red Light Heat" (c)/by Benef

Story and Characters: (c)/by Brannon Hollingsworth

#MMWW, #Makes, #Me, #Wanna, #Write, #BrannonHollingsworth, #Deacon, #Fallen, #Imran, #TenetsTales, #Sector7, #Sectof7, #Cleatus, #Rachel

All I could see was Rachel’s face: blood-spattered, pale, and still.

All I could see was Rachel’s face: blood-spattered, pale, and still. It was the stillness that gives a body the feeling that someone has driven a spike of frozen iron into your lower back. The kind of stillness that is simply NOT natural. All things move, even when they are still, if you get my meaning. If you don’t believe me, try staying crouched and hidden sometime--you’ll quickly begin to waver and tremble, your body making tiny, subtle movements as you try to remain still.

I bet Rachel had crouched somewhere in the dark, trying to hide from the Imran. I bet she’d shivered and trembled, legs and body quaking. I bet she’d stifled her cries. Hand over her mouth, snot running out of her cute pug nose, pushing back the gasps, tears streaming out of her bewitching hazel eyes.

I bet the Imran--that was the old name for it--had lapped up her fear. They’re known by many names: Popobawa, Khalid Khanzada, Zain Haiders--I had my own name for them, but it was the sort of name that isn’t used in polite society. Regardless of what you called them, they were sadistic, sinister, and sick-and-twisted fu… -- sorry, again, old habits, you know. In the Grand Scheme, they were roughly classified as Mid-listers among the Fallen; they feed off of raw fear and they delight in the causing of it among mortals. Metaphysically speaking, they are the wine-snobs of fear: they know how to make it, and the love everything about its production and consumption. And the sonufa… --sorry...it...it...it had gotten my girl.

I closed her eyes with one hand and with the other, pulled Donkey, my custom built .500 Linebaugh, and mechanically dropped out its normal load (my 385 grain “Mulekickers”). I crossed her still-warm arms across her chest while simultaneously popped in six rounds of my hand-made 535 grain “Derailers” with my speed-loader. My old, steel grey eyes drooped shut, and I bowed my head, whispering some soft words and wiping some water off my gritty, stubbled cheeks.

Like I said, my eyes are old. They leak sometimes.

I felt the thrum of the Power slide into me. It’s an ambient thing--like standing too close to highly charged power lines. I had a pretty good idea where the Imran had gone to hide. It would be waiting for me, in the place where I’d first encountered it, three days ago. If only I hadn’t been so stupid and so damned cocky. If only I had burned the old meat-packing plant to the ground. If I’d’a done that, then maybe the Fallen would not have been able to gain strength, take on a mortal form, and cross-over into our world.

It was on me - all of it. Rachel; the homeless folks downtown; that poor, unsuspecting family. It was all on me. Sign me up, teacher, and put my name on the board.

‘Deacon did it, Teacher! It’s Deacon’s fault!’

With a flick of my anaconda-thick-wrist, I snapped Donkey’s chamber back into place and slipped it into its well-worn holster in the hollow under my left arm. It felt good there, a reassuring and constant weight--and old friend beckoning from beneath my threadbare trench coat.

Yea, it was my fault; my mess.

I grinned sardonically.

But that meant I got to clean it up, too.

Art Source: "Horror Art" (c)/by Jan Ditlev

Story and Characters: (c)/by Brannon Hollingsworth

#MMWW, #Makes, #Me, #Wanna, #Write, #BrannonHollingsworth, #Deacon, #Donkey, #Fallen, #Imran, #TenetsTales, #Sector7, #Sectof7, #Cleatus, #Rachel

I don't expect them to understand. After all, I am a living...well, technically, unliving...contradiction.

'I don't expect them to understand. After all, I am a living...well, technically, unliving...contradiction.'

Roksana shifted ever-so-slightly, feeling the stirring of the cold winter wind, but not sensing its bite. She stared down the length of the arrow's shaft, still--even after all these years--expecting to see the ever-so slight quaver in the arrow's tip. She'd not dealt with muscle fatigue for a long, long time. Being a 'vampir' (as the Germans were calling her kind now) did have its benefits, she mused.

But there was still part of her that was stubbornly--

'Alive and willful,' would have been Deacon's words.

She missed her mentor. Lost to the Ravages, now, she supposed. The thought of her dearest friend and teacher in their twisted claws, suffering, steeled her resolve all the more. She would stand and guard this church until Doomsday if need be. Michael himself would need to sound his silver trump in her undead face before she would drop her arrow's point. She woul--

"S-s-s-shoot him in the face!", the Fallen hissed in her ear, words dissolving into slithering laughter. She flinched, and her stín-šipka, her ebony-shafted shadow arrow, whisked into the darkness.

"Shush, Idzi!" Roksana spat the words through gritted teeth that were far too long and sharp to be human. She coiled her will, like unyielding leaden chains, around the demonic presence inside her. The will flowed into words, spoken and living with a Power all their own: "For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places."

Idzi screamed and hissed and fought, as he always did. But he was no match for the Word of God when applied through the will of one of His children.

Even if she was a vampir.

She knew she had to control herself. Self-control was one of the Fruits. Only through them could the Light be manifested. And these people in this village--the same people who hated her, spat upon her, and tried to kill her--they needed her control, her powers. They needed her to be what she was, even if they hated her; for they needed her protection this night, if they wanted to see the dawn that she herself could no longer behold.

It was then that Roksana heard the howls. The živá mrtvola vlkodlaci (zombie werewolves) were coming...and they would be hungry. An ebon arrow slapped against her bow, and with the battle against the spirit won, the battle against the flesh began. 

Art Source: "Archer" (c)/by Haryarti

Story and Characters: (c)/by Brannon Hollingsworth

#MMWW, #Makes, #Me, #Wanna, #Write, #BrannonHollingsworth, #Tenet, #TenetTales, #Sectof7, #Roksana, #Deacon

Ija the Indestructible

Ija the Indestructible

Abhorrent. Abased.

"They call me the Hitman of Heaven, and the Hitman of Hell."

Bitter. Blistered.

"Pain is my bread and butter, baby..."

Cold. Calculating.

"I'm a rock 'til th' target's locked."

Disgraced. Degenerate.

"Oh, my how the mighty have fallen..."

Killer-for-hire. Keen-as-a-knife.

"You got the coin, I'll make the kill."

Mountainous. Murderous.

"I'm the fear-maker, the back-breaker, and the earth-quaker!"

Perverse. Petulant.

"I'mma stone cold killer. If you don't like it, you can suck it."

Revolting. Rotten.

"Heh. I'm just a product of my environment..."

Sinister. Sickening.

"Thanks for all the compliments."

Twisted. Tortured.

"Do your worst."

Unstoppable. Un-killable.

"Enemy of Satan. Enemy of God. Employable by All.

Vitrolic. Vile.

"Happy and nice is for suckers."

Weapon-smith. Wicked.

"Fire, ice, blade, or vice...they're all just weapons to me."

Art Source: "Goblin" (c)/by Kisufisu

Story and Characters: (c)/by Brannon Hollingsworth

#MMWW, #Makes, #Me, #Wanna, #Write, #BrannonHollingsworth, #Tenet, #TenetTales, #Sectof7, #Sector7, #Ija, #fromhisownmouth

"Th' name's Deacon. What's it to ya?"

"Th' name's Deacon. What's it to ya?" the mountain-of-a-man turned as he grumbled, a look of irritation on his face.

There was something else there, something other than the petulance at being bothered after a long day's watch. Sadness, perhaps. The vampir opened herself up to the damnable thing that stirred within her. Idzi needed no prompting. The horrid thing came screaming and clawing its way up out of its hunger-lined pit. Roksana used the thing's power and drew in a deep breath and even beyond the filth, refuse, offal, and stench of close-air and unwashed bodies, she could detect the delicious aroma of this man's sadness. To her, it was her very life. So, sadness it was; of this, Roksana was now certain. Steeling her will and muttering a prayer to the Christ, she spiritually threw the demon back into a cage inside her and continued. "I was told I would find you here," she said.

"Yeah? An' who told ya that?" Deacon cocked his shaggy brown head and looked off to one side, as if someone else was speaking to him. He raised a ham-sized fist toward Roksana and one finger as thick as an axe handle appeared. The pale, waif-like woman held her tongue and waited. She'd been told that he would be like this. The man nodded his massive, block-like head slowly and furrowed his brow a bit. The hand lowered, and he indicated that she should continue.

"He said you would not know him by name, but that you would recognize him," she said, licking rose petal lips nervously.

"And?" Deacon said, his patience quickly expiring.

"Slightly taller than average, somewhat thin and bookish. Bald and very pale of skin," Roksana pointed her shapely chin toward Deacon and made a pulling motion with her fingers as she continued speaking. "A longish chin-beard, dark like old charcoal but with two silver streaks. He wears a grey monk's robe, woolen, with a hood and-"

"And odd silver and black eyes like none ya've ever seen," Deacon finished. He again looked to the side and nodded. "Yea, Cleatus, it's him." The massive man then looked to Roksana. "And I know his name, now - he's called Tenet, and he's generally a large pain in the arse. What does he want now?"

A smile crept into Roksana's dark grey eyes, but she stoically kept it from her lips. "He wants you to train me and says that in return, I might be able to help you..."

Deacon walked away, cursing out loud. Roksana was not sure if it was to himself, or to the other--Cleatus--that he'd just mentioned. She wondered briefly if Deacon also battled against his own personal, internal demons.

The giant-of-a-man got to the end of the alley and turned back to her and shouted. "Well, ya comin' or ain't ya?" He didn't wait for her to reply, just stumped away, cursing.

Art Source: "Mercenary For Hire" (c)/by Njay

Story and Characters: (c)/by Brannon Hollingsworth

#MMWW, #Makes, #Me, #Wanna, #Write, #BrannonHollingsworth, #Tenet, #TenetTales, #Sectof7, #Roksana, #Deacon, #Cleatus

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

#MMWW, #Makes, #Me, #Wanna, #Write, #BrannonHollingsworth, #Tenet, #Tenetstales, #Serbia, #OttomanEmpire, #Sectof7, #Roksana, #Giovanni, #Edenson, #Johann, #Jawbone, #Kadir, #Ormolus