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 "I doubt that very much." The tone suddenly turned serious and despite the cold edge to her voice I couldn’t help but imagine how she would sound groaning with pleasure. That thought alone when it reached my conscious mind seemed to only make my vampiric side grow stronger at the obvious assault on my control. "He will be very much dead in the days to come. As for you? I think I have some far more suitable in mind than being studied by vivisection."
 "You would make a perfect vampire." She said simply, snapping her fingers and motioning for a servant to step forward. The obviously mortal individual carried little more than a platter with a handful of goblets on the surface, the silver of the items ensuring that none of the creatures present could bare the touch.
 "I don’t know whether your lover has told you what it is like to be turned." A delicate arm was lifted and stretched outwards and a second servant stepped forward. The tiny dagger, too small to be of any use other than cracking wax seals on letters was held in a hand steadied from considerable experience. With the utmost precision the tip bit deep into a pale wrist. "I was turned lifetimes ago but I can still remember the way my body writhed under the changes. An intensely painful pleasure as the blood-gift of our lord spread through every vein, every artery and began to change me. It seeps through you, sinking into your muscles and organs and only when it has you entirely in your grip do you finally die and are reborn as something greater."
 The upturned wrist was angled slightly and the pointed blade had cut precisely into the artery, digging through the flesh with a surgeon’s skill and allowing the pulsating liquid to dribble into a goblet. I couldn’t help but remember the sensation of my first feeding, and the weeks of slow, inexorable corruption as the infection slowly seeped into my flesh. The tiny amount of blood that had entered my veins through the scratches on my arm had been enough to corrode the man that I had once been. I knew that most vampiric infections usually lasted two or three days at the most, but my unusual situation had dragged the process out over weeks and kept most of the symptoms hidden and undetectable.
 Several mouthfuls of the Matriarch’s blood dripped into the goblet, and despite myself I could almost taste the raw power that it contained. There was no doubt in any of our minds what it represented. The equivalent of a few drops of vampiric blood had been enough to damn me over several weeks and the amount within the silver etched goblet was enough to ensure that Viconia would be turned in a matter of minutes, if not less.
 A flash of light caught my attention and with a merest gesture the Matriarch healed the wound without a scar to show for it. Both of her fangs were visible now in a smile that was entirely that of a nocturnal predator, especially as she motioned for Viconia to take the offered goblet from the bowing form of her servant.
 There was obviously not the slightest hint of movement from my Drow companion despite the lessening of the paralytic magicka from the hedge wizard. If anything she appeared even more like a statue, not moving other than to continue showing her burning hatred for the creatures around us.
 "I should have expected as much." The Matriarch cooed. "You will drink, and you will turn. But for your insolence your lover will watch."
 A single finger flicked across as though she was turning a page in a book and my head snapped over to the left, twisting despite my attempts of resistance. Between the wizard and the Matriarch there was little I could do but was not going to simply let Viconia suffer my fate without a fight.
 The pressure in the back of my mind increased as the wizard lent his strength to the Matriarch, and despite only being able to see him from the corner of my eye I could tell that he was feeling the strain. The resistance that we were both offering was enough to leave beads of perspiration lining his face which gave me strength, and the stirrings of insanity.
 "Never will anyone say that I am without mercy." The presence of the Matriarch left my skin crawling as she leaned in close enough to whisper in my ear. The pressure in my mind built even further, and all the incense in the world could not mask the death-stink of her flesh. Cold and clammy, the moist sensation of her tongue sliding up my neck would have left me shuddering if I had any control over my body. "Make your last words count, pet."
 My eyes met Viconia’s as the vampire’s will twisted her in place to face me. The goblet of blood sat daintily in hand as though she was attending a noble’s ball, but the yellowed eyes were overwhelmed in fear. It was the only time I had truly seen Viconia terrified despite the mask of hatred and loathing that clad her flesh.
 At that moment I made a decision.
I started laughing, allowing my face to break out into a smile usually reserved for those bereft of sanity or the most devoted followers of Sheogorath. For a moment Viconia seemed even more surprised and confused at my reaction but as I felt my eyes begin to change and my flesh begin tingling the realisation dawned and she openly gaped.
Trapped by the powers of the hedge wizard and unable to move, the rising power of the vampire within my body was excruciating. The times I had called upon its strength and abilities had been discomforting and mildly painful, but never before had I experienced such agony. Nor had I fully utilised the cursed ability of the corrupted flesh. In the depths of the caverns at Lake Arrius I had lost myself to the curse, but the tiniest portion of my mind had grimly held on. Like a handler of a vicious war dog I had managed to pull the creature back under my control with chains of my will, returning my flesh to that of a man and reining in the excesses. The other times I had used my powers I had kept a firm grip on my instincts, figuratively holding the chains tightly and allowing no slack.
Now, faced with my death and a worse fate for Viconia, I released my hold on the vampire. I dropped the chains to the floor, releasing my grip entirely and even taking a few steps away. The effect was almost instantaneous, although it was several seconds before the changes became visible and those surrounding us realised what was occurring.
The raw power of the daedric infused vampire thundered its way to the surface and I began to change. In Viconia’s horrified expression I could see the way my eyes suddenly appeared to fill with blood, the whites of my eyes being lost to a sudden flood of black ichor that turned them blacker than the night. Moisture dripped down my cheeks as it began leaking from my tear ducts, staining my face red-black like running mascara. Even as a handful of the vampires and their thralls realised what was happening the changes began spreading uncontrollably.
Bones snapped, echoing like dried twigs over the cries of alarm and exclamations of surprise. My own growling scream through a constricted throat was inaudible but soon grew in volume as the torturous agony consumed me. Cheeks, jaws, teeth, and most of the bones in my skull cracked and crunched, drowning out my inarticulate howls even as I continued laughing. With the magicka stopping me from moving I was forced to simply ride out the pain, which only seemed to give the beast consuming my body further strength.
My fingers erupted in talons of blackened bone, my jaw dislocating and locking back into place as my entire face lengthened. Within seconds I could feel my veins twisting and writhing under my flesh as they began pulsing noxiously black corruption throughout my body. The unnatural daedric qualities of my vampirism threatened to rip my body apart but with every second I could feel the magical paralysis locking my limbs in place fade.
Staggering backwards in horror, the Matriarch and her lesser willed minions put some distance between themselves and my shifting form. Similar to the reactions of those who had witnessed me in my vampiric form they too were shocked and horrified at my nature. While the armed vampires stepped forward in a ring of steel to protect their mistress, I couldn’t help but notice the way they were glancing to their comrades with unease as I began shuddering with more than just the changes.
Screaming with all the force that my lungs would allow, there was nothing left in my universe except pain and soul rending agony. Every muscle and bone was aflame, every nerve ending dipped in acid and I struggled to remain conscious despite the fact that I was losing myself to the vampire. The only thing that seemed to keep me anchored in reality was Viconia’s terrified yellow eyes staring unblinkingly at me as she witnessed what I truly was for the first time.
"Kill him!" The Matriarch shrieked, stepped backwards behind the enormous forms of her bodyguard as they gripped their claymores tightly. "Kill him now!"
I roared at the press of vampiric flesh around me, my mouth hinging open like a snake and revealing the way how every tooth in my head had turned into razored fangs. My maw was large enough and powerful enough that I could bite through a limb without difficulty.
Magicka twisted and weaved through the air and the building fear of me was replaced with an unnatural calmness. The Wizard was struggling, weaving his hands in ever intricate patterns but as I rose to my feet it was obvious that his magic was no longer working on me. Both he and the vampire Matriarch were casting spells without pause, but while they were still ensuring Viconia was trapped they were trying their best to bolster the minds of their minions.
A pair of vampires died in a second, their unholy flesh rent apart as I hurled myself into the press before me. Some, despite the various spells removing their fear or increasing their bloodlust staggered backwards as I charged, and even as I found myself surrounded in a wall of pallid flesh they hesitated. This hesitation was their undoing as the beast in control of my flesh had no such weakness.
"Kill... Him... It... That thing!" The Matriarch shouted, infusing her potent will into every syllable even as she moved away from the fighting. My appearance was becoming more and more daedric with every second and under my armour I could feel strange protrusions of bone and muscle begin shifting and coursing through my limbs. Even my face was shifting further, the raised protrusions of bone of my brows, cheeks and jaws matching that of a Dremora.
The snarling, armoured visage of a Vampiric guard stepped in front of me, spearing forward into my midsection with his lengthy Halberd. Without even a conscious thought I twisted aside from the attack, grasping the haft with one hand, chopping down with the other and leaving him staring at the length of broken wood in his hands. Weighted and hooked, I flicked the metal head of the halberd across the room, hearing the shriek of pain as it thudded into a chest of a thrall. Before he could react I had pulled the guard forward with my grasp on the broken staff, bunching my taloned hand into a fist that impacted right into the centre of his helmeted face.
Gore exploded in all directions, spraying those closest to us and splattering up the length of my arm as my strike made a complete mockery of the steel helm. With the power of a demon behind it, the punch pulverised the faceplate into his skull and hurled him four metres back through the press.
Before the corpse with the smashed face hit the floor I had added another to the tally. I was faster, stronger and much more vicious that those around me and with the changes consuming my body I ripped them apart. My claws tore throats away, ripped limbs away in sprays of crimson even as the severed arms and legs burst into flames in my grasp. A thrall staggered backwards, shrieking as she clutched at the terrible wound in her face where her eyes and nose once were. Another was picked up and thrown into the air as though I had simply flung a bag of flour over my back.
The brutality of my kills sent fear through the vampires facing me, and only the more truly hardened or brave faced me down. A few blows succeeded in striking me but were wasted on the incredible protection of my ebony and daedroth scale armour. Most I simply twisted and ducked away from or in some cases I even managed to catch blades and maces in my bare hands. One sword I caught in both hands, snapping the metal as though I was breaking a stick before jamming the broken end deep into a stomach. A mace was wrenched from another’s grasp before it pulped its owners face into an unrecognisable mass. My strength and speed was incredible, and was not only greater than the freshly turned vampires of the castle guards but also the more ancient of the Matriarch’s coven.
Another guard tried desperately to tackle me around the waist to grant his comrades an opening. I instead caught him in mid-air, slamming him hard into the floor and gripping his open sallet helm with both clawed hands. In front of all my foes, and ignoring the blows that bounced off my armoured back and spine I gripped him tightly, roaring with the exertion and putting all my weight into my arms. His pained cries were horrific, flailing around with his hands and slapping ineffectively at me as his helmet began crumpling and his head caved in from the pressure. The scream of agony was cut off in mid breath as his head was crushed by my vicing grip, leaving blood leaking from the crushed helmet even as he began to combust.
"Ilhar vith’rellen!" A vampire exploded into burning ash and tumbling bones as I ripped a sword from someone’s grasp and punched it through breastplate, flesh, heart and bone. Another screamed in agony as I punched a kneecap with enough force that the leg snapped in two separate places.
A bolt of magicka caught my arm and I felt the strange tingling sensation course through it. It felt as though I had been laying on my side on rough ground until the limb had gone to sleep. The expression on the Wizard’s face was enough to tell me that it had not been the desired effect of his spell.
Another bolt flashed through the air as he flicked it at me, and I twisted aside from it while ripping a vampires throat out with my claws. One after the other he hurled the paralysis spells at me as quickly as he could, most missing me entirely in the raging melee but those that hit seemed to leave me with little more than pins and needles in my flesh.
Using both hands to cast a more powerful bolt, I grinned through a mouthful of fangs and ripped a serf from the floor as he cast it. The robed servant convulsed for a second as the bolt hit, the sheer potency of the spell seizing his body solid and stopping his heart and lungs in an instant. Despite all of his best spells, I was still killing my way through the press without pause or hesitation and he was trying his best to stop my impossible advance against the full might of the coven.
Behind a semi-rigid wall of her chosen warriors and the toga-clad bodyguards the Matriarch continued casting spells that bolstered her minions that were dying around me. "Stop him Pridir!"
Face suddenly visible from underneath the blackened cowl, the wizard’s mouth dropped and eyes widened as I ripped an arm from a thrall and shattered a vampire’s skull with it. Another paralysis spell hit me square in the chest and didn’t even slow me down as I jammed an elbow into a face with enough force that teeth clattered across the floor.
"I... I... Can’t..." I heard him whisper as another spell failed to do anything more than make me tingle. Desperate, he twisted and flapped his arms in an intricate incantation that shimmered the air like a hot summer’s day. The strength of the firestorm spell built rapidly and embers were born from the very air itself.
The sound of ripping meat stopped the spell before it could fully form, and his arms dropped slackly to his sides. There was horror and dawning realisation in his white filled eyes even as began rolling into the back of his skull.
All movement stopped in the hall, the cringing vampires and their thralls shying away from me as the Matriarch’s spells calming their fears were interrupted. I could sense her presence behind the mass, the spells she had been casting ceasing as she beheld the way I held her pet wizard aloft.
Ripping through flesh, my taloned hand had hooked up under his jaw, my fingers buried to the knuckle in a wash of gore. He was trembling, twitching and shuddering from the agony and the flood of gore that bubbled and ran down his chest and choked him. Like an obscene tongue of blackened ivory my claws had erupted between his lips, shredding tongue, muscle and skin as they curled inside and through his mouth.
"Hard to cast magic without a mouth." I growled, the thickening of my throat and the way my mouth had been twisted by the changes turning my words into something much, much more terrible.
The wizard said nothing, groaning and twitching as I held him up off the floor with the twisted grasp I had on his lower jaw. In front of all of them standing in shocked silence I reached up with my other hand, pressing it to his forehead and ripping his jaw away and half his face with it.
Slamming into the ground with a ruined face, the Wizard begun the painful process of giving up on life but before he had hit the floor I had exploded back into action. With one of the greater threats in the room vanquished I turned my eyes on the others and begun the slaughter anew.
My eyes laid on one individual, and one individual alone. Standing in the depths of the press before his dark master, a single armoured vampire stood grasping an intricate hilt streaked with emerald-green.
"Give me the sword..." I hissed threateningly and I saw the creature shy back from my gaze.
"GIVE! ME! THE! SWORD!"
A Vampire combusted under my grasp as I gripped it by the shoulder and face, ripping its head clean from its shoulders. Another smacked wetly onto the floor, the flesh stripped and torn from where I had ripped its face away in a puff of blood.
For his part, the vampire holding the immaculate Light of Dawn held his ground, staring horrified as I began slaughtering my way through those between us. I was deaf to the cries and shouted orders from the Matriarch at his back as she rallied the coven the best she could. The fear in the undead creatures was a sour taste on my tongue that I revelled in and despite their unnatural natures they were still falling victim to my unholy aura of dread. With the wizard dying messily on the floor she was resorting to every spell and incantation that she knew, using her incredible skills in illusion magicka and her vampiric willpower to counter the effects of my presence. She was the foundation of all the creatures around me but the sheer numbers that I still faced ensured that without assistance I could not win.
A shortsword was plucked from a sheath, decapitating a pair of vampires before tearing the blade deep in its owner’s belly. Even as opened bowels and organs slopped onto the floor I had slit the throat of another thrall that died gurgling and trying to stem the wash of blood.
The vampire holding the Light of Dawn hesitated, watching me with growing fear that overwhelmed the strength of the Matriarch’s enchantments. He knew all too well that I was coming for him, and that there was little that was going to stop me. The burning eyes of the creature stared at the blackened pits of my own and despite everything, despite all the carnage around us he suddenly relaxed and held the immaculate Blade out to me with a dumbfounded smile on his face.
"What are you doing you fool!" The Matriarch spluttered, gesturing to the vampire holding the Light of Dawn. As I punched, clawed and hacked through the press around me a pair of vampires tried to drag the sword from his unwilling grasp. The Matriarch was desperately channelling her magical might into those around us and trying to gain some measure of control over the creature that I had become. It was to no avail and as her servants tried to wrestle the vampire holding the sword to the floor the realisation crept over her features.
Her vampiric servant was no longer wholly hers, and her burning gaze flickered between me and the Vampire being forced to his knees by his comrades. It was a battle of wills and one that the vampire had lost. The same strange ability that had allowed me to feed during the night without killing and had proven so effective against mortals also appeared to have some use against my own kind. Rolling out from the pits of my eyes I had speared my will into the vampire holding my sword, crushing the resistance the creature offered and turning him into a thrall of my own.
Dark incantations suddenly crawled over my flesh, and pausing only briefly enough to break an arm I twisted around. The Matriarch and her bodyguard were retreating up the stairs to the Count’s quarters with only a handful of her servants following. She was not holding back in the slightest, and was no longer relying on simple mind bending tricks and spells to fend me off. Words and phrases that were ancient when Tamriel was still young slithered off her tongue and down her chin as she spoke them, turning the air black and pestilent with their power. The hairs of my head stood on end as I felt the terrible power within the necromantic spell she was casting, ensuring that I did not look too closely at her gestures as she made them.
The temperature within the hall dropped several degrees and a foul black mist wafted up through the stoned floor as her powerful necromancy seeped into the sheer level of death around me. Shapes pressed through the air, twisting the mists into ghostly forms of half remembered shades and the recently dead. They coiled around me, twisting and weaving through the air but as insubstantial as smoke as I waded through them. Skeletal fingers and cloud-wreathed limbs reached for my flesh, the ghosts struggling to grasp me even as my corrupt nature rendered me inviolate to their grasp.
Charred and flame scorched skeletons of the fallen vampires suddenly began tumbling back together, raising themselves to their feet even as I added more to their number. The dead bodies of thralls; those that were still mostly intact at least began twitching and struggling to rise from the pools of blood they lay in. Swaying, staggering and shuddering with unlife they forced themselves to rise as mindless automatons, zombified puppets to the will of the Matriarch. Every creature and enthralled mortal I had killed were suddenly rising once more, staggering towards me as they obeyed their master’s summons.
Infused with unthinking ferocity and hatred and unlike their mortal forms, they were immune to the daedric horror that I emanated. They were however weaker in death than they had been in life. The ashen bones of the vampiric skeletons were battered into dust under my blows and the zombies were infinitely clumsier. One after another I smashed skeletons apart into broken shards, and merely stepped around the staggering forms of the dead trying to walk on shattered bones and torn muscles. They were however slowing my slaughter of her coven and buying her precious time to call upon far greater adversaries.
Over two dozen corpses had risen to their feet like puppets being controlled by an inexperienced hand, staggering and lurching towards me with nothing but milky whiteness filling their blank eyes. Magically-bound Vampire skeletons, held together with smoking blue energies linking their bones reached out for me in a shambling horde. Despite the relative ease it took to destroy the undead forms I was left watching with a curious horror as she began casting a different spell.
Chained and collared, the five naked and emasculated individuals began screaming in unison, the sound of their chains audible even over the sounds of fighting. The Matriarch began weaving a spell of such potency that ice began forming across the floor under her feet, spreading like the onset of winter and clinging to the fabric of her dress. Ripping the energies out of the air and calling upon every scrap of her magicka she twisted and writhed in the ritual of untold power. Even as I tore the head off a zombie I watched the semi-naked slaves fall onto their hands and knees, their screams of agony changing into bestial roars.
Fighting off a sudden group of skeletons that were so recent that the burnt remains of their muscles and skin streamed away in waterfalls of ash, I found myself staring as the werewolves began transforming. Limbs began lengthen, fingers cracking and breaking and growing into a set of claws as long as Sunchild’s edge. Similar to my own recent transformation into a daedric monstrosity, the five cursed beings shifted and were consumed by their own shared curse.
Fur erupted from every pore and every strand of hair lengthened and grew until their flesh was consumed by it. Their bones broke, snapping and ripping apart and expanding to accommodate the shifting changed they were being subjected to. A face akin to a wolf pushed wetly through skin that was stretching and tearing to allow a maw of canines to snap and click together. Whether they were male or female they rippled with primal power and energies, chests broadening with a daedric strength to match a minotaur and every muscles bunched and coiled together.
Gleaming brightly, the crystals imbedded into their chests throbbed with power as the Matriarch fed her will and control into the blood crazed creatures. It was these crystals that allowed her to control the slaved beings. Not only did she control their actions, but she was also forcing them to change when and where she desired. Facing down a foe that was making a complete mockery of her vampiric coven she had forced the beings to change in the middle of the day, calling upon their curse and their strength to do what fifty vampires and their thralls could not.
I exploded, my daedric form shifting and erupting into a billowing cloud of chittering and furred bodies that flowed through the press of living and undead bodies like a liquid. More than one thrall and vampire were borne shrieking to the ground as dozens of fanged mouths worried at exposed flesh and more than one mortal was left drained of their blood as they slumped under a mass of bats. Many struggled to swipe my myriad of forms away, writhing desperately even as I reformed again within an arms distance to the kneeling vampire holding the Light of Dawn and the two trying to wrench it away from him.
His eyes were glazed over, face slack from the strength of my will ripping his mind into shreds. Instead of controlling him I had instead destroyed his sanity, leaving the creature to kneel there with blood trickling down from his nose and utterly unable to control himself as I appeared to claim what was mine.
The two vampires trying to take the sword from him screamed as I appeared before them, ripping the sword from their grasp and ignoring the terrible roars from behind me. The werewolves had gained their true forms and were seeking my blood, but I was no longer to be denied my prize. His mind utterly shattered, there was no resistance from the vampire holding the sword and I tore it out of his grasp.
There was no time for any of them to react as I ripped the enormous curved blade from its sheath and hacked into them. One fell into two separate halves as the Dawn bisected him like the Orc moneylender back in Bravil, and the other stopped in mid motion as she touched the blood that trickled down into her eyes. The confusion on her face was evident even as the entire top half of her head above the eyebrows slid off and she immolated from the head down.
Sucking the corrupted blood into the enchanted metal, the Light of Dawn charged its ability and released it within seconds. The vampire who had claimed such a weapon died in an explosion of ash and burning blood as I punched it to the hilt in his chest. It scoured his bones clean, ripping him apart in an explosion of light that sent the entire coven reeling away in agony. Even the thralls staggered backwards, shielding their eyes and blinking away the afterimages of the weapon’s potency. Filling with shrieks and cries, the room was filled with the smell of cooking meat and singed hair that overwhelmed the stench of gore and opened bowels.
Over the noise there was one sound that reached my ears and managed to fight through the overwhelming desire for destruction that consumed me. An inarticulate cry of rage and hatred that matched and almost exceeded my own was torn forth from a mortal throat; one that I was intimately familiar with.
The burning light of the enchanted sword had given me breathing space, but more importantly it had finally broken the spell that the Matriarch had over Viconia. Through the entirety of the fight she had been trapped helpless, holding the goblet of polluted blood and completely immobile as I slaughtered my way through the room. Now that she was released, the goblet had fallen to the floor and splattered its contents everywhere and she had immediately gone on the offensive.
A vampire shrieked as she punched an energy-wreathed hand through its spine and heart. The same ability that had allowed her to punch through granite making a mockery of steel plate and flesh. A bolt of lightning followed, crisping a thrall and vampire with the static discharge and within seconds the hall was completely consumed by chaos. There was nothing that she hated more than to be helpless, to be trapped by someone or something or even by the strands of fate. To her there was nothing worse, to have no control or ability to resist or struggle to simply survive. I had lost all my restraint at the sight and threat of losing her to the vampiric curse, but she had lost all her restraint as a result of being trapped and left vulnerable.
"Shar! Belbau uns’aa yorn!" She roared, eyes burning brightly with witch-light as she drew power into herself. Both hands were wreathed in energy as she twisted them around and I felt unconsciously felt the strange shift within the darkness around us. Shadows coiled and writhed, almost with a life of their own as she called upon her patron deity.
A group of skeletons staggered to a halt as she thrust her hands towards them, the simmering blue light within the emptiness of their skulls and binding their flame-weakened bones together flickering and dying. The tumbled into destruction and Viconia was moving, twisting aside desperate attacks and destroying her foes with blasts of energy. One of her vampiric foes was born down to the ground as she leapt and straddled his face and chest, hooking her thighs over his shoulders and twisting him to his knees. A hand wreathed in crackling bolts of lightning was jammed into his shrieking features, her fingertips lost in the depths of his eye sockets as she blinded and electrocuted him to death.
Her magicka was not as powerful as what the Matriarch had at her disposal, but it was not subtle. The vampiress relied on trickery and mind control, the ability to command others to do her bidding. Viconia relied on no one but herself, and her magicka showed this without a doubt. She blasted one vampire apart into tiny pieces like what she had done to a werewolf the previous night, scattering chunks of burning flesh and shattered armour across the floor. A pair of thralls died messily as she managed to get hold a sword that left one scooping up their innards and another shuddering as she electrified the blade and used it like a lightning rod to direct her energies. Zombies and skeletons staggered in her direction but at the last second they would stop, either collapsing to the ground like puppets with their strings cut or even in a few cases turning on each other.
Against vampires, their minions and the undead she was unstoppable, but against five fully transformed werewolves was another story.
"Viconia!" I roared, my voice almost unrecognisable from my transformation. There was a flash of white-blond hair as she twisted and wrenched a blade from a shrieking vampire’s groin and as our eyes met I could see her face twisted into an expression of pure hate.
Teeth clenched and lips pulled back into a snarl, she almost looked rabid. There was something disturbing with the darkness that could be seen behind the glowing witch light of her eyes. Somehow the hatred within her was greater than mine. The strength of her hatred was even more alarming, as unlike my own it was not fuelled by a taint; daedric or otherwise.
Our eyes met, the burning lights of her gaze meeting my blood-filled pools. The werewolves were rising to their feet in foul parodies of men and mer, but in that moment there was something akin to satisfaction between the two of us.
The Light of Dawn left my hand, my arm snapping out and tossing the blade through the air towards her. There was no mistaking the intent behind my actions, the way my fang filled maw twisting wider and lips peeling back into something that was somehow enjoyment. I had no need of a weapon, even one as unique and powerful as the Light of Dawn but Viconia did.
The emerald hilt of the weapon was snatched out of the air by as ebony hand, the immaculate weapon twirling around in a blur of shimmering silver and cleaving a thrall into two twitching pieces. I was stronger than Viconia and when using the strength of the beast I was also faster. However, she was by far the greater with a sword. If it had a cutting edge she could, and did use it like an extension of her body and the Light of Dawn was no exception. In seconds the blade was stained with the corrupted blood of the vampiric and light was bursting forth with explosive force.
The werewolves howled, roaring their praises to the daedric lord of the hunt as they charged towards me. They were enormous, massively muscled and several times larger than the original men and women that they had been mere minutes before. Each weighed as much as a four or five fully grown men, were strong enough to wrestle a minotaur and their unnatural claws were strong enough to tear through steel plate. They were unstoppable, horrendous and were unmatched within the bounds of Tamriel.
I took them apart.
My first years in the Legion had left me witness to one of Hircine’s "blessed’ slaughtering most of a veteran squad of legionaries. The night before I had seen their strength in killing several armed men and women despite Viconia’s and my abilities. In the hall of Glenvar Castle and fully lost to the daedric corruption of my soul they were found wanting. The months since I first fed within Kvatch’s Oblivion gate I had killed, ripped people apart and once held a juvenile minotaur at bay for a handful of seconds. I was stronger than what I had any right to be. Now the true depths of my strength were revealed.
One of the rampaging man-beasts was ripped from its feet as I simply tackled it, slamming bodily into its chest and smashing a clawed hand across its salivating maw. Teeth shattered and splintered across in an explosion of gore from my blow and even as the other four bore down I had crushed its skull and ground its face to a pulp. The second died as I dragged a one handed Warhammer from where it had fallen, throwing it so it tumbled end over end and imbedded itself into a furred chest.
The third missed me with its powerful swipes that shattered a nearby skeleton and shredded the chest and face of a hapless vampire cowering nearby. Ducking and weaving with an unnatural skill I flowed around the beast’s attacks, feeling the wind off its furred paws and talons. Its roars were incredible, buffering me with the volume and where they would have left me terrified and frozen to the spot years before I simply ignored them. A furred arm was blocked, its ribs suddenly caved in with a punch that almost lifted it from its feet from the force of my blow and it fell to the floor with an exploded heart.
By now the hall appeared to be hosting a thunderstorm in more ways than one. The light exploding from the enchanted blade in Viconia’s hands was frying vampire flesh with its intensity. Flashing, the scalding light left the bloodsuckers shrieking and trying desperately to flee from its embrace, covering their faces with their hands and leaving themselves unable to defend themselves as Viconia took their lives. The thralls too were starting to try to escape, some trying to haul open the massive doors leading to the castle courtyard. They were set upon by desperate vampires attacking them in an attempt to stop the mortals from opening the doors and letting in sunlight.
The Matriarch was gone, fleeing from the melee into the higher levels of the castle in an effort to escape the touch of the Light of Dawn. Without her willpower and control and Viconia’s spells and abilities against the undead, several of the zombies and skeletons had turned wild, falling upon any and all around them with unthinking savagery. This only added to the absolute chaos that had engulfed the castle as a couple of thralls and even a vampire or two found themselves born down by the grasping hands and fingers. A different timbre of screams ripped through the air as a collection of zombies gnawed and ripped at one of the thralls as he tried to crawl away from their hunger, and a vampire shrieked as she was pulled apart. The scouring flames of her demise ignited the zombies’ flesh as their potential meal burst into flames and it wasn’t long before a couple of figures were seen staggering about aflame.
Rabid and insane, the werewolves had lost some of the Matriarch’s control but they only had eyes for me. Two were already dead and a third was severely injured from the haft of a Warhammer sticking out of a furred chest. It was trying to rise and pull the offending weapon from where it had crushed its way through ribs, a task made more difficult due to the fact that it had been one that had lost a hand to me the night before.
Roaring rage and spittle, the fourth rushed me, moving around my side to allow the last of it kin still on its feet to flank me. Moving like the pack hunters they were they bounded through the pandemonium around us, alternating between running on two legs and all fours. They moved like quicksilver despite their muscled bulk, and I knew all too well what would have been in store for the Legionaries of the 2nd against a horde of the brutes.
They leapt together, rushing me in a wall of fangs and fur and I twisted ducking in and around their strikes as they snarled and swiped at me. One was missing an arm from the bicep down and soon lost the other arm as well as I caught it by the wrist, put a boot to its chest and heaved. Its whines were pitiful as it flopped to the floor in a wash of blood, the vaunted regenerative abilities of the lycanthrope struggling to keep death from blood loss at bay.
A knee snapped under my plated boot and the fifth beast was brought low, growling and trying to bite me. Somehow I managed to move through its flailing blows and latch onto its throat with my own fang filled maw. The taste of beast-flesh filled my mouth as I worried at the massive creature’s neck as though I was an attack dog myself, bearing it down with my bodyweight and crushing its windpipe. Only after I had gripped it tight and ripped my head away did it finally stop fighting and begin dying.
The greatest threat to me and Viconia were left as cooling corpses after I staggered over to the last wounded creature that was still trying to pull the Warhammer from where it was lodged in its chest. It was badly injured but the wounds were healing quickly. If it had managed to remove the offending chunk of metal and wood from its flesh it would had healed within minutes but I never gave it the chance. I stomped over to it, leaping onto its back, grasping it by the front of the jaw and digging my fingers into the roof of its mouth. For a second it flailed helplessly with my boots in its massive shoulders, before I roared and tore its jaw and the top off in a spray of hot blood.
The shout snapped my head around and I witnessed Viconia kick a vampire’s legs out from under it. The blade flashed in the dim light of the hall as the bloodsucker landed heavily on its back and she pinned it squirming to the floor. The searing light turned the vampire to ash and scorched armour and clothes and she gave a quick nod in the direction of the stairs.
"Elgg l"ssindossa!" She shouted, ripping the Light of Dawn from the floor and swiping it at a pair of thralls behind her. For a second one managed to stare at how he was left holding the hilt of his sword after the Light of Dawn had cut the blade away. Before he could react further she had stabbed him in the throat, folding his head over the gleaming bade from the force of the thrust.
She saw my momentary hesitation and snarled. In her fury she had fallen back into speaking Drow rather than common. "Alu! Alu dos wael!"
Spinning around she jammed the enchanted blade into the groin of the second thrall, leaving him dropping to the floor with a pained expression on his face. With a firm grip on his wrist she using his sword to block a blow from a vampire who had lost half his face to the scorching energies of the Light of Dawn.
It died, spitted upon the enchanted blade that seared its flesh from its bones. She kicked its burning remains off the edge of the Light of Dawn, ripping it from the tumbling bones and scattering ash and turning to hunt for more foes. The swarm of undead, thralls and the corrupt seemed all too willing to oblige her hunger for death. By now there were less than two dozen vampires and thralls left standing, and even less undead. The Light of Dawn was carving through them like they were mist, and being wielded by someone of Viconia's skill and ability there were none who could stand before it.
The steaming corpses of the werewolves were left behind me and I plucked a long sword from the floor where its owner had burned into ash and bone. Blazing light from the Light of Dawn and the Viconia’s spells crackled through the hall, and strangely enough I could feel it lending strength to the man within me. The beast was still wholly in control, the blood lust and desire for revenge and death would be insatiable until every last one of the creatures were dead. Out of the horde that had awaited us when we entered, only a pitiful few remained but the Matriarch was still alive. I could smell her rot over the incense and gore lingering in the hall, and even despite it I could smell the fear. Her underlings were dying by the score, her greatest forces ripped into bloody chunks and now there was little between her and the demon that she had thought she had mastery over.
Taking the stairs six at a time I hurdled my way upwards, exploding into bats before I reached the top and swarming my way over the pair of vampires wielding the censers. Their screamed as they felt the dozens of fangs mouths rending the flesh from their bones, tiny mouths worrying and tearing and leaving them coated in their own blood. In an instant I rematerialized, ripped both their heads from their shoulders and swarmed away again before the corpses burst into flames.
"Where are you?" I called out, bounding along the floor as I returned to my daedric form. The sensation of using my more esoteric abilities was indescribable but strangely comforting to the sensation of being clothed in the flesh of a daedra. The man within me was struggling for control but the creature was not having any part in it.
"Where are you?" My words echoed from the halls of the upper levels, the long passageways branching off to the handful of rooms where the most powerful individuals within Glenvar County once lived. Blood and destruction had not been wreaked upon this portion of the castle yet, but my presence heralded coming bloodshed.