James Galloway - The Tower of Sorcery

Wake up, a voice seemed to call to him. You have to wake up.

Tarrin's eyes opened. It was night. Deep into night, by the light coming into the window. Tarrin was still laying on his pillow, but he had curled up into a less slapdash position during his slumber. His ears and nose detected no present threats, but Allia's scent lingered in the room from when she had come in a few hours before.

Uncertain of what woke him up, he looked around one more time, and then put his head back down.

Tarrin, you have to wake up now , the voice said sharply.

Ears picking up, Tarrin lifted his head again and looked around. Tarrin, you must get up! the voice said again.

Tarrin finally managed to place that voice, and when he realized who it was, he instantly stood up. "Goddess!" he gasped in the unspoken manner of the cat.

There isn't time, she replied urgently. You must get up and go to the main Tower. Do it now, kitten!

"What's the matter?" he asked as he dropped down from the bed.

Take your staff! she ordered. There is a Doomwalker on the grounds!

"What is that?"

An undead creature, she replied. It has enormous power, my kitten. It has come to kill you, and you must face it on ground of your own choosing.

"To kill me? Another attack?" he asked as he returned to his humanoid form, and then picked his staff up from the corner.

This goes far beyond anything you've yet seen, kitten, she warned. A Doomwalker is nothing to take lightly. The Wraith you fought is like a little baby holding a stick compared to it. You can't run away from it, you can't bargain with it, and unless you fight it on your own terms, you're not going to be able to beat it.

"Why there?" she asked. "I'd rather face an enemy outside, on open ground."

You never fight a Doomwalker when its feet stand on natural earth, she warned him. It can directly draw power from the earth when it is. It has to have metal or stone under its feet to cut it off from that power. You want to be deep in the Tower when it comes for you, so it can't possibly draw you outside. It will definitely want to do that.

Nervous, Tarrin darted from his room and quickly ran down the stairs, then dashed down the corridor and out of the north tower. He passed several guards at the door and on the grounds, then raced into the main Tower through a small entrance that led to the kitchens. If he had to be deep in the Tower proper, he had a good idea of where to go. To the main core chamber that most called the Heart of the Goddess. It was in the exact center of the Tower, and it had both alot of space and alot of vertical openness. If worse came to worst, he could climb or jump up to one of the many balconies that peppered the walls all the way up the Tower. He worried quickly at exactly what this Doomwalker creature was, and he shuddered at how the Goddess had described it. The Wraith had nearly killed him, and if this creature was more dangerous, then he had a good reason to be afraid. But he was Ungardt, and he would face the challenge like any proper warrior would. It was alright to be afraid, so long as he didn't allow his fear to rule him.

He reached the long corridor with its metal gate when he first smelled it. Its scent was that of corruption and decay, like an open grave, but it had a sharp ozone smell that he couldn't identify. It was coming directly towards him, and that smell, that unnatural scent, triggered the Cat into activity. Ears laying back, Tarrin growled in his throat as the Cat registered its hatred of that scent. It reacted much like that whenever he had faced unnatural beings, such as the Wraith. Opening the gate to the chamber, he slipped through it and closed it again, then looked up. The ceiling in the passage was higher than the threshold holding the gate, creating a solid overhang that was nearly three spans long. What a perfect place to lay in ambush.

A short vault up to the ceiling and some claws driven into the stone was all it took. He tucked himself up into the corner and pulled in his tail, holding his staff against the ceiling and going statue-still, using his inhuman strength to hold himself absolutely motionless.

After only a moment, he could hear the sharp metallic sound of armored boots on stone. It was a methodical pace, from the sound of it, coming towards him. As they got louder, the smell of it became stronger and stronger, until it threatened to make him gag. He closed his eyes and reined in his nose, using all his will to deaden and ignore what his nose was telling him, even as he struggled to keep the Cat from charging from its place in the back of his mind and take control, so it could hunt down and destroy the unnatural being it could smell. After a few seconds, he found that he could tolerate that smell, and he had overpowered the instinct to drop down and attack his opponent head-on.

There was a high-pitched, raspy cackle, sound made by vocal cords long dried and in disuse. It was a hollow sound, and it froze Tarrin's spine. "I can smell ye, Were-cat," it said. "You know, you do, that Jegojah has come for you, yes. Clever clever Were-cat, you are."

The gate opened under him. The top of a helmet became visible, as a skeletal being in archaic plate armor stepped through the gate, holding a sword stained heavily with blood. It had obviously killed its way to the Tower, and that no alarm had been raised told Tarrin how good it was. It held a shield in its other hand, and it was advancing into the passage slowly and carefully, head scanning back and forth. But, like most creatures, it never bothered to look up. "Close, ye are, Were-cat, close indeed," it cackled. "Come taste the steel of Jegojah's blade. Come out, and quick and clean I will be, yes. I hold no ill will to ye, but kill ye I must, yes."

Tarrin dealt the first blow. Dropping down from his hiding place, he coiled up and then exploded into motion like a bow, curling his entire body as his arms brought his staff over his head. The end of that staff struck the undead being directly on the top of the helmet, with enough force to cleave a human being in half. But the creature merely staggered forward from the force of it, and Tarrin's staff recoiled from the helmet with enough force to spin him back around and miss putting his feet down. He landed unceremoniously on his rump as the skeletal thing went down to its knees, and both of them returned to a vertical base almost instantly.

Tarrin had to swallow the urge to flee in terror when it turned around. Its face was gray, dead flesh pulled so tautly over the skull that its face was but a mask over the bone beneath. Its eyes were pools of unholy red light, unblinking and steady, and bare yellowed teeth, without lips to cover them, sat below a grisly hole where a nose had once been. It was tall, but still half a head shorter than him. It cackled gleefully as it approached, making Tarrin go into a ready stance. "Foolish boy," it said in that raspy voice, "your stick, it can't dent my armor, no." It raised its sword into a ready position. "Come then, foolish Were-cat, come face Jegojah in honorable combat!"

Hissing, baring his fangs, Tarrin put his ears back and answered the challenge in a primal threat display. Embracing the Cat to keep it from taking control of him, his two halves met to pursue a unified goal, and then rushed in for the attack.

There was little grace to the first blows exchanged, but clear skill showed on both sides. Tarrin was taken aback with the first couple of blocks, when he realized that the creature before him was every bit as strong as he was, if not stronger. It looked ungainly, but it moved with viperlike speed, and what was most important, Tarrin felt he almost recognized the forms the creature was using. It may be an undead creature, but it was fighting with very real skills of sword and shield. And those skills were impeccable. The creature moved sword and shield in perfect harmony, blocking a rapid and savage series of broad strokes of his staff designed to take advantage of his inhuman strength and smash an opponent to the ground. After nearly losing his head in a stunningly fast swipe at his neck in response to that, Tarrin backed up and reassessed his opinion of this opponent. The advantages Tarrin usually enjoyed over an enemy, speed, strength, and skill, were nonexistent here. They were actually in the creature's favor.