zg_shadows | A spiral story

Daniel made his way through the party, stopping occasionally to laugh with one of the Hoplites or to catch up with Maxine and her kids, the twins were starting to walk and were toddling around after their older brother, whose dark features showed his Shadow lord parentage.

Finally he freed himself from the two young Banshees who were whispering suggestive things to him and strolled up to where Twisted Blade was up to her elbows in a man’s chest. The emergency medical gurney she was using was running with blood.

“I’m surprised you could tear yourself away from your worshippers” she croaked at him.

“Jealous?”

“Hardly - such things do not interest me in these final days.”

He looked at her, eyes narrowed. Her skin was thin and papery, the small crow’s feet around her eyes had expanded and her hair was brittle. He had known she had paid a price for her knowledge, but she had never said what it was. Now watching her age day by day he could see that she had paid dearly.

“Find anything interesting?” he asked.

She gestured at the pile of entrails scattered across her desk.

“More of the same. He is coming, these are the final days. Watch for this, watch for that.”

The man on the gurney coughed and twitched.

“He’s still alive?”

“Of course,” she replied. “How else can you get accurate results?”

Daniel smiled.

“Always the perfectionist. Anyway, I brought you something to eat.”

He handed her a skewer of meat.

“Cooked by Tteeeth," he continued. ”He’s surprisingly good with it. I guess those snacks he always had at moots were beef jerky.”

She smiles back at him, slightly lopsided and completely deranged and takes the skewer.

“So it’s good?”

“Tastes like chicken.”

And the band started up again to the whoops and yells of the cliaths. The army of the Pure Flame boys took turns leaping over the fire pits, scorching themselves on the green flames. Tagg and Badb diced with the Echoes. Soon a discordant howl arose as the revel began to take form around the hulking form of the Lieutenant.

Daniel took his leave of Twisted Blade and, sliding up to Glabro form, shouldered his way roughly through the throng to Electra. He kissed her savagely and then changed. First his bones twisted up into his massive, steel grey crinos form, and then he unleashed his power; balefire burned in his eye sockets, his skin hardened into a blackened carapace and he swelled with power. Finally all of the shadows in the room poured into him as he grew into a shadow wolf beast, jags and spikes of nightmarish visions pouring off him - making the air around him shimmer and distort.

Daniel Final-Night threw back his head and howled a howl that carried across the world, wakening the banes in the walls and the monsters in the furnace rooms, bringing in his Sept and his people. Together they surged out into the night for their last revel, a torrent of nightmares in flesh, spirit and fur.