Chapter Eighteen: Agnus Immolatus Dei
Sara finds herself out of doors at the foot of a lengthy minatory staircase, carpet the stark crimson of blood descending down them, exposed to the elements, breath coming in icy clouds of frost as she begins her ascent, and as the wind whips her tattered cloak, she uncinches its clasp, abandons it to flutter through the wind.
The thing hardly retains its usefulness, in any case.
And Sara forces open the large doors to find a large circular room with but a single man inside.
No. Not a man. A vampire.
He sits, dispassionate, upon a throne in the far end of the room, before adjusting as Sara enters the room.
The man is towering, to a degree plainly owing to his inhuman nature, with hair the hue of a bright, raging flame, though with none of its warmth. He bears large plated armor of deep burnished vermillion, ornate and garish unlike any Sara has seen before.
“Welcome!” he states, his voice ominous as it echoes through the chamber.
“You must be Lord Bernhard.”
“That I am. Welcome to my castle, Madame Trantoul.”
Sara feels a spike of anxiety strike her. “You know of me?”
“The betrothed of a man I arranged to have killed months past, though he lived regardless. Perhaps I may have finished him myself, once, but I found I wished to see what a man who thinks himself so righteous might do upon finding himself among the ranks of the damned."
"My beloved's life is... but a game to you?" Sara had been told of this, had known this, and yet...
The man only laughs. "Of a fashion. Ah, but it drew you here, did it not? Had events unfolded differently, perhaps it would be he who chased after you.”
“Except?”
“Except I do not abide traitors and their games, nor do I take kindly to being manipulated as a pawn.”
Sara knows not to what he refers, but she feels an uncontrollable shiver work its way up her back at the foreboding feeling which cloaks her mind. But she puts this aside, as she knows now to be past such a time for words or explanations from a man who sought to kill her fiance.
She reaches for her whip.
“A silver whip—Rinaldo’s, is it?” He laughs. “It shall do you no good.”
“Then it would appear we find ourselves at something of an impasse." Sara announces. "You cannot die, and I cannot, will not, leave this place until your death,” Sara announces.
Walter laughs. “Very well! Shall we dance?”
Sara leaps into battle in answer, the metal of her whip crossing in front of her as she makes to strike him.
He allows the lashes to deflect from his armor, appearing bored.
“Come now, surely you’ve not made it so far with such… droll, futile attacks.”
In truth, however, Sara finds she can hardly think to answer. Where once was a woman who prided herself on her ability to keep a mind clear of malice in even situations which might bring most sane persons to hysterics, she has but hardly ever felt wroth such as this. Its nature, all-consuming, seeping through her attacks, the way in which she carries herself, filling her very thoughts till she finds she can hardly think.
And as such, instead of the response one of culture such as herself might at most times be expected to give, Sara merely growls in response to his jab at her abilities.
She lashes faster, harder, and does all but naught to the impenetrable armor Walter wears; her blows simply sliding off of him as though unable to find purchase upon the armor.
She prays only that Joachim will find opportunity to weave his magic to shatter such an enchantment soon.
Walter appears to withdraw for a moment; at this point Sara had learned from Joachim of what preparation for a magical attack appears as, and so awaits an opportunity, and makes to dodge.
Fortunate for her, she succeeds in dodging. Less so, is that she had not anticipated an immediate attack to follow.
Her chin and shoulder sting where he slashes her, and her world is set aspin as some manner of strange feeling infiltrating the wound, crawling beneath her flesh, as ruby red rivulets drip upon the marble.
She huffs as thinks to hear him laughing cruelly. She must hold herself with more care than that should she seek to live through this duel.
As Sara regains her bearings, pulling upright, she is left but hardly the time to counter Walter’s next attack.
Sara dances from his reach as he paces toward her lazily, dashing this way and that.
She has relinquished any notion of using her whip against him, for it will prove to be no use until the enchantment has been dispelled.
Yet she tires, and she can only perpetuate this charade of playing at a duel for such a time.
Walter ambles toward her, unhurried, and he cocks his head, before lunging to slash at Sara's stomach as she leaps backward, and as he rears for a second attack, a miniscule, grey object catapults its frame aloft, flitting over Sara’s shoulder.
“Clea!” Sara cries as the small fowl enters the room and lands upon the face of Walter, scratching at his eyes and pecking at his head, making angered coos as she flaps her wings in his face, obscuring his vision.
“Loathesome—!” Walter growls, and seizes the bird harshly, hurling her upon the ground with a sickening crack.
"Clea!" Sara cries, and as time slows, Sara cannot tell if her dear fowl yet breathes.
But she has served her intent.
As Sara refocuses herself upon the current struggle, she makes note of the subtle dissolution of the magic upon Walter’s armor—a dispelling he himself seems not to have taken notice of.
She turns to search behind, and sees Joachim afloat over the dead—or simply unconscious?—body of that Melchior, smug look plastered upon his face.
And Sara finds herself of renewed vigor. This is not simply to be a fool’s errand then, this can be done.
Sara can defeat him.
With new purpose, Sara feigns to his left, then turns to lash back.
“WHAT!” Walter roars.
“That is for my beloved, Leon!”
“YOU—”
But Sara has not finished.
“And this,” she leaps toward him, unleashing a strike at his face, “is for Clea!”
Walter seems to near stumble a bit, an action which appears uncommon to him, as he appears filled of shock and anger.
He stands tall and strides toward her, and his eyes begin aglow as hot coals. Sara finds she cannot look away.
And yet as he begins to speak, she feels a hand so cold as death cover her eyes, and she hears her name pass familiar lips.
“Sara.”
“Leon?”
Yet just as quickly as he had appeared, he moves to join the battle.
But he is still heavily wounded.
“You,” Walter snarls, “would have done well to die a human, fledgeling.”
And with this, he tosses Leon across the room with seeming ease, plucking Leon’s own sword from its scabbard and makes to stab him directly in the torso with his own blade.
But Sara chooses this moment to attack Walter with a sharp blow to his head.
Leon appears delirious, as the blade, while sent off its original course, still managed reach vital regions, only narrowly missing his heart, it would seem.
Sara idly wonders, worriedly, if such a wound could even still prove fatal to Leon, when Walter appears to cast some sort of magic circle beneath Sara’s feet.
She knows exactly where a spell such as this leads.
Sara vaults out of its path, as more appear in her wake, leaving her to dodge and dive out of the trail they follow. She awaits the last, then rushes at Walter, jumping as she spins the whip, then pivoting on her heel to use the whip’s continued speed to build a backlash with which she catches Walter. She makes another attack, leaping in the air to slam down upon him, and regains her bearings as he makes another magical attack, sending three balls of fire toward her, which Sara manages to catch with her whip, sending them bolting back to collide directly into Walter’s face with explosive force.
She finds his face scarred, though quick to heal these scars, as he glares evilly at Sara.
He makes attempt to approach, but Sara begins to spin her whip, speed growing and growing as she steps forward to hit him in its spin. She manages several hits before he snarls and usurps her whip of her grasp, hand aburn, and, assuming his goal an attempt to wrest it of her, she tightens her grip upon it.
This instead proves itself a mistake, instead utilizing his grip to wrench Sara to the ground, approaching with great speed in his step.
Sara grasps at the floor, attempting to gain her bearings and crawl her way away.
But she does not succeed, as she finds herself grasped by the throat and lifted aloft.
“You have done well to make it so far as a mere human,” he muses, smugness in his voice as Sara claws fruitless at her throat, but Walter’s hand holds an iron grip of it. “But you will make it no further. And once I have made a meal of you for your beloved to watch, I shall kill him as well.”
Sara continues to grasp at her neck, kicking out at the vampire, finding herself growing weak.
And suddenly she remembers. Hope still remains.
Though her bow may be long gone, she still yet has a single arrow.
Hurriedly, she clutches, grasping for it, and with what remains of Sara’s strength, she plunges it deep into Walter’s neck.
He roars out, droppin her in shock, and vanishes into a cloud of bats.
He reappears in the far end of the room, just in front his throne, staggering, hardly standing, but refuse to be fell.
With naught but a hateful fury in his eyes, he states “this farce has gone on long enough. Let us end this.” And with these words, he sends a goliath ball of flame to scourge the room.
It erupts into burning, raging hellfire, seeming no corner of the room left untouched.
Sara finds Leon in the far end of the room, nearest the door, and shields him-only to find the blast only just falls short of they two.
Sara faintly thinks to hear the opening of the nearby door, paying it no mind, as she observes the smug, triumphant look plastered across Walter's face fade into anger and confusion, she turns to address him.
“I concur. 'Tis time for an end to all this.”
And Sara walks, slow at first, then hastens, with growing and growing urgency, until she sprints openly.
As Sara lets out a battle cry, a cry of a war fought and won in but one single night, a war of months of uncertainty and fear, of inability to move forward without Leon, of grief and rage and loss and fear and hatred and agony and anger.
And as Sara feels all these emotions, as they cloud her mind, she remembers the enchantment Mathias imparted her with, along with his instructions. And she pulls upon its string in her mind, pulls until it comes apart, and is rebound, until she feels the force of her own life bind to that of another and she pulls that string tight until it cannot bear this force and it snaps—
And as she lashes, a final time, at Walter, the room is brought alight with a light that is not quite seen or felt yet is there all the same, around and without and within all things.
And then all is dark.