THE VROL TRILOGY (39 page)

Floating over, Marnn looked down on Draagh's
still form, lying on the stone floor, surveying his sworn enemy and
closest relation in the universe.

"Such a shame that you did not join me,
brother. We could have had so much fun - but no, you had to go and
be the righteous one."

Draagh regained consciousness and
murmured, attempting to sit up, but Marnn simply waved his hand at
him, causing the ancient Primulus to slam back down into the
ground, a massive gash crossing his chest, from which blood soaked
his clothing and spilled out over the cold deck.

"Do
not
attempt to stand up. Just sit
there and relax. Oh, and do not fret, dear brother, I will not let
that ridiculous excuse for a living corpse get anywhere near you. I
have other plans. So, that being said, you will take me to your
grandson. He has caused quite a bit of mischief, and I am afraid I
must dispose of him - while you watch, of course."

"You shall not touch the boy," Draagh
groaned, as he laid back and tried to recoup his strength. "He
shall save his world and his species, and although I know that you
care not for these things, let this be between you and I,
brother."

"Ha! You truly believe that
I would do that? No, no, no. I mean to make you suffer your last
moments of existence on this plane. Nothing would please me more
than to see your loss - the only Primulus and lycan hybrid ever
known of in the long, long history of
existence."


 

Even though Max's father,
Michael, was the Taxiarch, he was, for all intents and purposes, a
Primulus, as his caste level was above that of standard
angels
.

Draagh cued into the armor he had
created for the Dominion. He needed assistance, and he thought of a
way to get it.

"
Donus, can you hear me? I am on the pathway between the west
and north towers. A very powerful mage has taken my staff, and I
need a distraction. I am fading quickly. Please,
brother
."

###

As Krynos waited in the children's
chamber, he heard the sounds of boots going up the stairs. The
scent was of vampire, and even though their stink had permeated the
castle, his nose was sophisticated enough to smell distance and
velocity. Rearing back on his haunches, he prepared to defend his
precious children, who were more than terrified, but had already
been well trained to stay quiet, even in the gravest of
circumstances.

The door burst open and five vampire
troops poured in, attempting to tackle the lycan king so they could
detain him with chains of rhodium, but they were not even close to
being fast enough. Krynos was a blur, instantly clawing and
decapitating three of the invaders, causing them to fall as ashen
piles on the floor. The other two attempted to open a cubbyhole,
only to be met in the face with concentrated garlic water, squirted
out of a bulb with a small nozzle. The two vampires screamed in
agony as their faces burned, giving Krynos a chance to swoop by
them, separating their heads from their bodies with his hind claws,
which were not coated with platinum enhancers, resulting in massive
sprays of blood covering the faces of shocked children locked in
the cubicles close by.

###

Enough troops had gotten over the wall
and survived the mauling claws of Kangor and Donus to open the
drawbridge and allow Vladros to majestically enter, still
surrounded by his protective forces. As they filtered in, Ryder
Johnson ran in from the western side of the castle and lithely
avoided the great whites in the moat. Vladros looked around
gloatingly from his protected position in the castle courtyard,
while Johnson slipped by and ducked into a doorway, intent on
finding Max and Jennie. A vampire soldier quickly approached his
liege to give a status update.

"Lord Vladros, even though we have
suffered losses, we occupy the majority of the castle, and, as you
had predicted, all of the fools have locked themselves into cages
for the duration of the full moon."

The reporting officer had various
slowly healing scratches on his face, a testament to the skill of
his command unit.

"Find Krynos. I want his head on a
platter before we leave this repugnant locale."

"As my Lord orders," said the officer,
as he bowed and backed away.

Vladros looked up to the turrets and in
between the western and northern towers saw great flashes of
lightning and heard thunderous booms.

"Ah, Marnn must have had his family
reunion," he laughed, and hoped that somehow they would kill each
other, saving him the trouble of doing it himself.

###

Still terribly injured, Draagh groaned
and continued, "Marnn, what happened to you? How did I wrong you
so? What brought everything to this point, with you accompanying a
rotting band of walking corpses?"

The fallen dark mage looked down at his
weakened brother, and after giving him a sneer, turned and looked
out over the vast plains to the north.

"Nothing happened to
me
. You were the
problem. Let me ask you this - when was the last time
Jah
addressed you - or
any of us? We are the workhorses, required to fix, create, nurture
and prop up the weak and the undeserving. I simply offered you the
opportunity to help make the universe a better place - to rid it of
the needy and the weak, to support those of strength - those who
would be the foot soldiers of our destiny!"

As his chest wound, which was magical
in nature, only worsened, Draagh felt as though he was going to
puke, and that was saying a lot, as he had not vomited in roughly
1.3 million years. Staying down, and allowing his psychotic brother
to ramble on, he looked around through squinted eyes. His staff was
four meters away, but if he attempted to move his hand to call it
Marnn would see, and then blast him over the edge of the castle
wall.

"Do you actually think that I would have
joined in your plan of madness? We were created to build, improve,
and to nurture. It is our purpose."

"Do you remember Galicon S7? Do you? I
spent 2,500 years helping that pathetic society get to the point
where they could split the atom! Jah sterilized the planet with but
a thought! All of my great works, ruined!"

Draagh stayed in place and weakly shook
his head, appalled that his brother was so nearsighted.

"Marnn, they had interplanetary rockets
and were going to send nuclear bombs to an inhabited moon! Plus,
the attack would have thrown the moon out of the system's orbit and
affected countless billions of lives later on. They had to be
stopped," he whispered, teetering on the edge of
unconsciousness.

As he spun around, the dark mage boomed,
"Bah! It was a sign of strength, and of the natural order of
things. Were we not to support the natural order? Why, you pitiful
fool, you would have taken the teeth from a tiger so that it could
not harm a goat; that which nature intended it to eat!"

Marnn kept his staff training on
Draagh's face, as he started to recite one of the most terrible
cantuses in the entire universe - the one meant to permanently
eradicate a Primulus from all existence.

Draagh gazed upon permanent death. He only
regretted not having assisted in the salvation of mankind. He
closed his eyes and accepted his demise.

"
Morteincantatio permanente
…"

###

Liliana hid for a while in Jennie's
room, the familiar smell comforting her as she stayed under the
large bed and listened for sounds, while staying alert for the
scents of approaching vampires. Unable to detect any imminent
danger, she eventually crawled out and started exploring the room,
looking for anything that could be useful. Still hearing the sounds
of screaming and fighting outside, she knew that there was danger,
but all she wanted to do was to help Jennie. The sparse room
offered nothing to her, until she leaned up against a bookcase and
was nearly clocked in the head with Jennie's power gauntlet, which
had been precariously balanced on a shelf near the top. Startled,
she looked down at the spiked, metal glove and slowly picked it up.
Even though she had played with it before, she had seen Jennie wear
it on her left hand and keep her wand in her right, so she did what
children do best - she imitated Jennie's movements. As she had
previously done with her wand, she wore the gauntlet and attempted
numerous cantuses, unaware if any of them even existed. After
exhaustively trying to make something happen, she dropped the
gauntlet and fell to the floor in despair, tears coming out of her
coffee-brown eyes, which looked surprisingly similar to Jennies. In
fact, if one saw them together it could have been inferred that
they were related, even though Liliana had lighter skin than the
dega.

What can I do? I don't want
to die. Please, Krynos, protect Jennie and Max.

Suddenly, a thought popped into her head. She
remembered what Jennie had said that night when they were shocking
the cat in that very room.

"
Draagh said we could be returned to our day form with a
sufficient electrical shock."

Picking up the gauntlet and placing it on her
hand, she steeled herself and took a deep breath.

"Electrincantatio quassatio!"

A massive electrical shock
shot out from the gauntlet, almost lighting Jennie's bedding on
fire, and causing the little girl's arm to be thrown back from the
force of the cantus. Her face aghast, she thought,
Well, if I use this cantus I might light her on
fire, but it is the only one I know.

She smelled and listened for signs of
vampires, or even phase 3 lycans, and detecting none, bolted out
the door and down the corridor, directly for the access tunnel. She
knew what she was going to do.

###

"…
eterna de prim
oooof!!!
"

Donus hit Marnn squarely in the side of
his torso, full force, after coming in at roughly 50 kilometers per
hour, rendering the fallen Primulus incapable of finishing his
homicidal cantus. With lightning speed Draagh took advantage of the
distraction and reached out, his staff flying into his hand, and
was instantly and unsteadily on his feet, ready to battle his
brother - to the death.

###

In the lower level dungeon, two floors
below the prisoner dungeon, where all of the phase 3s were locked
away, the majority of werewolves were running madly around their
small enclosures, smelling vampires through the air ducts that
brought fresh air down into the depths of the castle. In most cases
at that hour, they would be quietly and happily munching away on
the partial animals hung above their cots, but this night was
different.

Max and Jennie, in their
phase 3 forms, paced around their cells, occasionally running up to
the bars and trying to sniff for indications of any kind of threat.
They only experienced things with animalistic instincts and vague,
black and white imagery in their minds. Base feelings, such as
rage, lust, fear and pain drove them via a genetic fight-or-flight
response. They had both already eaten their venison legs, and were
amped up and ready for anything, although they had no clue as to
what. The other phase 3 werewolves who had not eaten would suffer a
meter tank upon phase 1 conversion, as there were not enough energy
resources available to sustain them once they had changed.
Fortunately, very few of them ever suffered this, as the clan
previously identified them as potential
crashers
, so their meat supply was
always set on the floor instead of being hung from the ceiling.
The
waking team
always provided nourishment shakes to those who needed it.
Alea was on the waking team, and she would be sorely missed that
following morning.

Five floors above, Liliana navigated
through the castle walls, sniffing until she found the proper
vertical access tunnel - the one that would lead her to the lower
dungeon area. She reached over and shook the ladder, just to make
sure it wouldn't fall apart on her, and seeing that it was stable,
began to climb down to the lower depths of the castle with Jennie's
gauntlet on her left hand and the wand in her mouth.

###

Outside and over the
castle, the two
Prīmulī
quickly moved around, suspended in the air, 10
meters above the walkways between the castle towers. For every
cantus that was thrown, an expert defense was provided. It seemed
that Draagh was constantly on the defense, and he knew that if he
were to win the fight he would have to reverse the order of things.
Marnn wasn't just hitting him with grav pushes either - he was
using everything in his arsenal that wouldn't result in his own
incineration. As they were in clear view of anyone in the expansive
open areas of the castle, they were putting on a spectacular show.
It just happened to be one of the deadliest close-quarters combat
shows ever seen in the Orion Spiral Arm of the Milky Way
Galaxy.