Ambition 4: Flight (long with questionable spacing) (567 hits)
Category: NoneRating: 1.86 on 7 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by stardamage (View user info) at 2004-12-07 10:33:30 EST
continued from:
Ambition 1: Awakening - http://www.ubersite.com/m/53093
Ambition 2: Meeting - http://www.ubersite.com/m/53208
Ambition 3: History - http://www.ubersite.com/m/53560
* * *
The months passed as the two vampires discussed possibilities for the future, their plans for the war they knew was coming. They both knew that they would have to flee eventually, but with the Mist Strider centered in Hatskland, they felt it better to wait until he moved on.
One morning they stayed in the hole far into the night, with Kai asking questions about the past and Davoren's downfall which he answered reluctantly. Kai seemed to have been on the very outsides of Davoren's forces, with no real idea of what had happened. Davoren explained it all; the slow rise to power and years of reign, and then the sudden capture by his own soldiers and imprisonment, the torture and exile and finally his retirement to the earth. Davoren lay awake a while after Kai had gone to sleep, turning things over in his mind, after about half an hour succumbing to dreams.
About an hour later, the coffin lid shot open, though silently, and Kai sat straight up, eyes alert and hand on his dagger, bare chest gleaming white. Davoren was immediately awake too. Through the rushing of the water, they could hear an irregularity, as though something were moving through it. Although there were no giveaway splashes, the small sound of feet gliding through the water was enough.
Davoren prodded Kai's mind and found that it was thrown open, waiting for him to connect telepathically. (There's another way out. But we have to be careful; there's no telling who else is around, as they'll have concealed themsel-)
(Right. Where?)
(We have to lift this.)
Kai was already out of his coffin and at the foot of it, and Davoren rose silently to the head. On a silent count of three they lifted it and there was a small hole that went down into blackness. The vampire outside was getting closer; another few minutes would bring her to the edge over which the water fell.
(Go. I'll put this back over behind me.) Davoren slid down into the hole while Kai held the coffin up. The hole was so tight that he could barely wriggle down.
(Do you know how to vaporize? If you can, do it. It'll be too slow otherwise.)
Davoren struggled to remember. He couldn't, and instead tried to wriggle further down. Kai tapped at the edges of his mind and forced the change, forcing Davoren's very being away from itself. He spread out until his being was a cloud of mist that fell down the hole. He felt himself touching Kai's mist and mingling with it as it formed, then Kai broke away. (Can't mix together too much because it'll be too concentrated...)
(Right.)
(But I'm thinking we shouldn't follow the passage all the way up. They might know about it. It opens in a fairly open area, too. But if we go up now, we can probably get into a denser part of the forest and get up into the branches where it'll be harder for them to see.)
(Do it.)
They melted upwards through the ground. Davoren had forgotten the tickle that was almost pain of squeezing past roots, finding those pockets of air to travel through. Some liked the sensation but Davoren had always found it displeasing. He felt waves of almost disgust coming from the young Kai, which only intensified his own.
Soon he reached the surface, the tickling ending as he edged his way out of the last of the earth. Slowly he reformed, the mist becoming denser and darker until it formed the shapes of his body and clothing; some vampires were powerful enough to summon their clothing along with them when they rode the mist. Kai was also clothed as he had been in his coffin when he reappeared, his legs sheathed in black and silver, his chest bare.
(There's not enough time. Look, the sky's getting lighter.)
(As long as we get away somewhere, we will be all right, I think. Are we heading northeast?)
(Try west for a while until we find something; I remember there being a pretty large cliff around here so there should be a place there.)
They ran, making no noise. They became shadows flitting from tree to tree, only Kai's white skin revealing something unnatural. Davoren had his hood thrown up, covering all but his nose and mouth.
Suddenly Kai stopped and motioned for Davoren to do the same. (Do you feel?)
It was a slight vibration, a change in the wind that was blowing their way. Davoren faced it and smelled it. (Someone is coming. The wind...)
(I meant the tension building in whoever's following us, but the wind too. They must be getting close.) Davoren felt a shimmer of energy as Kai threw up his strongest psychic barriers, and Davoren followed suit.
(As soon as we get there, we'll separate. Find wherever you can to hide, and we can regroup later when they go away. If there's only one or two, we can probably take them, but it could be a dozen for all we know.)
Soon they came to a part of the forest that sloped steeply up, and took the hill at a sprint, running for the safety of the boulders and rock faces that jutted like broken teeth from the ground. Davoren reached them first and dove down into a crack between two rocks that had had earth washed out from between them, forming a tiny chamber just big enough for him to crouch in. He was just wriggling down to make himself invisible to anyone looking casually from above, when he heard Kai grunt as though he had been hit. Then he felt/heard Kai sprinting away, and someone following. Kai ran and ran, outrunning his pursuer, leading her farther and farther away from Davoren. The link between minds remained open, and Davoren saw through Kai's eyes the familiar shapes of the trees and then three dark shadows that leapt from behind them, running after him.
He heard a female's cry of rage and pain and they struggled, and then another and another vampire were introduced into the fray, and soon the air was filled with one long scream from Kai, and Davoren's mind was filled with his agony. I'm not much for brute strength...she can easily wear down a strong vampire with sheer force, and has done... Five of their strength against one of Davoren's at full strength would have been little contest, but Kai was younger, smaller and weaker in battle, as he himself had said.
As the battle got further and further away from Davoren, his mind link with Kai faded. He strained to connect it again, but failed. Wriggling out of his hole, he considered going after Kai, but decided against it. It was possible that their enemies had set an ambush for Davoren to fall into. And besides, it was better by far for Davoren to remain outside of the Red Queen's clutches, ready to help Kai, than it was for both of them to be captured while Davoren tried to save him. Biting his lip, he raised the psychic barriers again.
Davoren looked around and noticed a thinning of the trees and a hill and he went towards it. At the base of the hill, the trees thinned and rocks jutted like broken teeth from the land. As the hill went up and up, more and more rocks were exposed and some cracks in the earth that extended into the hill itself at a slight angle. The fact that the sun would shine directly on the rocks for most of the day would keep most vampires, even with sungear on, away.
Davoren climbed around the rocks carefully, looking for a place to sleep the day away, and found a cave further up that had enough of an overbite, as he thought of it, to keep the sun's rays out except for the rays of dawn. The cave's entrance was small enough so that Davoren could use his cloak pins to cover the hole with his cloak, blocking out the sun's rays. He crawled to a back corner of the cave to wait.
User Reviews
Submitted by Vomit (user info) at 2005-01-28 12:11:27 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
catching up....
Submitted by thecaes (user info) at 2005-01-18 19:58:03 EST (#)
Ranking: 1
Good.
Submitted by bigbabylons (user info) at 2004-12-16 17:36:56 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
fabulous
Submitted by munkeypants (user info) at 2004-12-15 12:45:30 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Circe (user info) at 2004-12-08 03:02:42 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
This is great stuff.
Submitted by LadyPlural (user info) at 2004-12-07 14:08:40 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Jolly.
Submitted by AshK (user info) at 2004-12-07 10:52:39 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
I'm hooked.
Your storytelling is excellent and the development pieces aren't tedious, in fact they are enjoyable. That, to me, is harder than writing an interesting action piece and is a mark of a talented writer.
I'm off to be quiet now.