***
Mercius had been climbing for so long that he had forgotten the beginning. He no longer knew what he was doing, or why he had come to this dreadful slope. He simply knew that he must climb, always climb. He was hardly recognizable as human now. His flesh had melted and regrown countless times, and each time it lost some of its humanity, and took on the hard, grey look of scales. His feet were bloody pulps with the toes long since sliced away by the jagged lava rocks of the treacherous slope and were being slowly replaced by bony talons. Illuricht still clung stubbornly to his back, solid and singing as it had ever since he had entered the confines of Hell. His eyes were still a burning green, but the whites had been replaced slowly but unstoppably with blood red, so that the fire that always danced in his eyes took on a positively Hellish look. The hair on his scalp had long since been scorched and singed away. His ears, too, had been melted down to gooey lumps of cartilage.
Mercius was unaware of these changes in his physical self. He was entirely consumed with agony and despair, commingled with a steel sense of resolve to reach the summit of the ghastly tower. Through his ascent, the burning, sizzling blood-rain had alternated with no rhythm with frozen lumps of pelting ice that broke his bones and tattered his ever-harried flesh. His fingers were raw from the climb, and the muscles of his hands shone wetly through the skin that was constantly trying to grapht itself back to his body.
He climbed for an eternity. His mind was a wreck of images that he no longer allowed himself to concentrate on. He simply let the ghastly pictures swim through his head, and gave them as little heed as he could; they could only hinder him in his purpose.
Mercius looked constantly upward, but was never able to discern the summit of the tower for the blinding rain or hail, and the ever-present clouds of ash and gloom that burned in the sky around him. He knew only that he must climb, and, though his voice had long ago ceased to function due to the wailing cries of agony that tore from his throat, he mumbled to himself to carry on; Just keep climbing.
Then, with a stark suddenness and unmistakable clarity, there came to him a voice on the fell winds of Hell. It was an agonized, horror-filled voice, but carried with it the surety and confidence of a general on a battlefield.
“Make haste, Mercius,” the voice fluttered on the wind. Mercius stopped dead in his ascent, his ears pricking up and focusing intently on the sound of the voice. In a moment of clarity in which all pain fled from him and he was once again--though only for the briefest of fleeting moments--the man that his friends loved, he knew it was Nephilia, calling to him from high above. In this stunning moment of clarity, Mercius' resolve and purpose came flooding back into him. Fresh tears of blood stung his eyes, and a fresh yell escaped his raw and tormented throat.
The moment passed, and he was once again submerged in agony and chaos. But not before his purpose worked its way into his limbs. He climbed with redoubled fervor, leaping and tearing up the slope like a human spider. His breath came in great ragged gasps as he bound upward through the madness of Hell. His hands and feet were torn and bleeding anew, but he did not care. With the single-minded resolve of a sheer lunatic, Mercius climbed higher into the gloom.
Suddenly, Mercius leapt up to grasp his next handhold, leaping through the air like a flying insect…and there was nowhere else to go. He could travel upward no farther. Instead, he looked in front of him and saw not the jagged wall of rock that had been his horrid company for so long, but a vast expanse of openness. Just as he hauled himself up onto the plateau, the searing rain that melted his flesh ceased, leaving a resounding silence in its wake.
The flesh grew back onto his bones, grey and mottled, and his throat healed itself so that he could painlessly draw a deep intake of breath.
He had reached the summit of the tower of Hell.
Mercius knelt on one knee on the stony ground and gazed at the scene before him. The black cloud of ash and sulfurous gloom whipped and blew chaotically around him. Directly in front of him, Mercius could make out a great, demented palace of bone and darkness. The sharp, knife-edged angles of the thing moaned and hissed, as the souls that were used to construct it wailed their constant torments. The palace was enormous, stretching high and wide into the scorched sky overhead.
With a grunt that was not human, Mercius rose and walked slowly toward the thing. A modicum of sanity had returned to him, now that he was no longer constantly assaulted by the pain of the treacherous slope, but he was still lost in a world of madness; the images that danced behind his eyes were still of ghastly horrors and tormented agony, but he remembered now why he had come. He was here to rescue his angel, Nephilia, and he was going to do just that, although he had no idea how he might accomplish it, or what would become of him once he did. He already felt his soul slipping into the pervading darkness of Hell, and knew that he might be too late already to prevent himself from falling permanently into the darkness of evil and hate.
He approached the palace, and walked up the steps, noticing only in passing that they were carved from human souls, teeth and eyes and screaming mouths visible here and there. At the top of the steps, he halted before a great door of bone and teeth, sculpted into a tableau of the macabre. The door was flanked by two multi-legged eyeless beasts that hissed and snarled at him, but made no move to impede his entry.
So enter Mercius did, and as the doors swung first slowly inward of their own volition, then slowly but loudly shut behind him, Mercius knew that he was about to face the confrontation for which he had come. He entered a high chamber, the ceiling lost in the distance above, lit dimly with flickering shadows of firelight that hung suspended from nothing around the black walls. The walls themselves writhed with the agony of the souls there imprisoned, and there was a keening wail that permeated the chamber, mixed with a constant, jarring buzzing, as of flies on a rotting carcass. The smell was stinging and terrible, but the demon that was slowly rising to the surface of Mercius relished in it, and he took deep, calming breaths of the stench.
Mercius began to stride deeper into the vast room. Against the far wall, just at the edge of his sight, he could see a high throne perched on a dais of writhing flesh. Atop it sat a creature whose details Mercius could not make out, and on one side stood a figure who Mercius could not mistake: Asgoroth. The two were apparently watching his progress, and made no move to stop him. Before them was tied a naked, bleeding figure, and as Mercius approached, Nephilia’s bloody form became more and more clear. She was suspended by her wrists from chains that stretched from nowhere in the darkness above, and her ankles were chained as well to the floor, so that she was spread-eagled a yard from the ground. Her chin hung against her barely moving chest, the once-golden locks, now caked and matted with blood and other foulness, hung down in front of her. Nephilia’s naked form was a mass of bruises and lacerations that showed muscle and tendon and bone clearly.
Even as Mercius watched and walked closer, he saw small beasts rise from the pit below the angel. They were about the size of cats, but were hideous to look upon, being all bone and blood and fangs. Three of them scurried up from underneath and crawled over the pale shivering flesh of Nephilia, scratching and gnawing and tearing away great chunks of muscle and skin.
Until then, Mercius had been, somewhere in the depths of his chaotic mind, horrified that he might be too late, and that the motionless figure was already destroyed by the ghastly ministrations of the keepers of Hell. But, as the wicked things crawled over her body and tore at her, her head rose slowly and a long, tormented wail emanated from her, so loud and strong that it shook the very ground. In this scream, Mercius heard his name. She was on the threshold of death, but she knew that he had come.
His name, mixed with the pain of an eternity of suffering, brought Mercius back to himself. He was suddenly no longer afraid that he had lost his soul to the darkness. He was Mercius, and he had vowed to make his life’s work destroying demons and Hell
-spawn. Now, his angel, the most glorious creature he had ever seen, was screaming his name in fear and agony.
Without hesitation, Mercius leapt into a dead run. He didn’t even realize when he dropped to all fours and galloped like a wolf, with the speed of the fastest horse. Alternating between running on two legs and four, Mercius reached the pit over which Nephilia was sacrilegiously suspended. Rising finally to his feet, Mercius pulled Illuricht from its scabbard at his back and leapt over the pit. In mid air, Mercius swung the black and singing blade. When he landed on the opposite side of the pit, he turned to see two of the creatures fall limp from Nephilia’s body, into the abyss of the pit below. From a standstill, Mercius leapt once more, this time catching himself on the chains that bound Nephilia’s wrists. He sliced judiciously at the third creature and it, too, fell screeching into the darkness below. Hanging from one hand by the chain, Mercius cupped his hand under the angel’s chin and gently pulled her face up. They gazed deeply into one another’s eyes for a long time, and Mercius saw sadness deeply etched in her face.
He broke the stare, as painful as it was to look away from that glorious face, and sliced downward with Illuricht, severing the chains that held Nephilia’s ankles cleanly. Then, pushing his naked body against hers, he swung them, slowly at first, away from the center of the pit. Nephilia, not needing any instruction, wrapped her legs around him in order to secure a grip to her rescuer. Then, when Mercius had gained enough impetus, he used one lightning-quick arc of his blade to slice through the two remaining chains. The two of them arced into the air, and landed heavily but safely on the edge of the pit, opposite the throne.
Before Nephilia could rise, and paying her no mind for the moment, Mercius looked to the dais on the other side of the black pit. There, next to the raised dais and the throne there perched, stood Mercius' father, Asgoroth. He was as hideous as ever, with his black flesh and curling horns, his mouth filled with rows of jagged teeth that now were exposed behind the burnt flesh of his lips, as he grinned wickedly at Mercius. Asgoroth seemed to have taken on even more demonic qualities somehow, which Mercius would not have believed possible. The blackness of his skin was deeper, as if it had taken on a new luster from the environs of Hell. His horns, yellowed as they were, were more solid looking and strong. The red of his eyes was even bloodier than they had appeared on earth, and the fire that constantly burned in their depths was brighter and more sinister.
On the throne itself, was a demon who was terrifying beyond imagining due to the sheer power that Mercius could feel emanating from and residing within the thing. Where Asgoroth was black as sin, this thing was equally white. It’s flesh had no pigment whatsoever. When standing, the thing would be twice as tall as Mercius. At random intervals over its body, the thing was covered with long, deep lacerations that were a dark, bloody red. Its thin lips were curved in an evil smile showing sharp white fangs below sunken cheeks and eyes of pure blackness that held a depth of ancient hatred and evil. His bald pate, also criss-crossed with bloody-not-bleeding lacerations, glimmered in the dancing firelight and gloom. The demon’s torso was bare, but it wore a plaited leather kilt and matching knee-high boots that had the pale look of human flesh.
Mercius felt oily power coming off the white demon in waves of putrescence that nearly knocked him from his feet. Nephilia, huddled in a ball on the ground beside him muttered feebly for him to be careful, as if he needed any warning. Mercius paid her no heed, however, and walked slowly but purposefully around the pit that stood between him and the dais.
He gazed steadily for a long time on the two figures, one seated, the other standing. Both wore grins of pure wicked triumph, as if the battle that Mercius knew was about to take place had already been lost. In Mercius' mind, he supposed that it had; he was no match for the demon that sat upon the throne, with its terrible surges of sickly power floating from it, let alone it and Asgoroth combined. He had already done battle with his father twice, and both times had been extremely lucky to escape with his soul intact. The pair’s might combined, he knew, would crush him swiftly and remorselessly.
Asgoroth was the first to speak, his voice dripping with a new, thicker evil than Mercius had ever heard. It sent shards of pain to his ears and made his head throb.
“You look well, my son,” the black, horned demon pronounced. “I always knew that you would someday come back to us.”
Mercius, as a reply, spat at Asgoroth’s feet. This elicited no response from either demon, except a small chuckle from Asgoroth.
His father continued: “We have your soul now, Mercius. There is no escape once we have you in our clutches. Kneel before the Steward of Hell, and you will be spared the eternity of anguish that awaits you otherwise.”
At the title the Steward of Hell, Mercius cast his gaze on the white demon seated on the blackened throne. The thing simply nodded its alabaster head, very slightly, acknowledging himself as said Steward.
The blackness of the thing’s eyes nearly ripped Mercius' soul apart. He could feel his humanity; his love and compassion and goodness and empathy tugging against the dark, writhing evil that loomed forever concealed inside him. The two, night and day, waged a war, and the black eyes of the Steward fought hard for the side of the darkness. The only thing that kept Mercius from being torn apart at that very moment; both spiritually and physically; was the warm glow of Nephilia’s presence at his back. She lived, and though her power in Hell was much diminished, she still put forth a sample of the glory that he had seen in her since she first came to him.
Mercius turned back to Asgoroth and responded: “I’ve knelt to you before, demon. But never again. I bow to none of your kind. Try to destroy me if you will, but do not insult me with petty demands of obedience and subservience. You know that I will not cringe before you.”
The Steward broke into what could only be called a laugh. It was dry and sibilant, filled with the buzzing of flies, and as Mercius turned toward the thing, insects poured from its mouth with the laughter to cascade down its front and skitter from its lap. The buzzing swelled and faltered as the thing’s laughter continued, then took on a solid sound as it spoke, rasping and twisted: “You are so foolish, Mercius. You think that you have suffered, that you have witnessed suffering, but you are mistaken. I can grant you the horrid pleasures of flesh and soul that are beyond your wildest imaginings. If I require that you kneel, then kneel you shall. There is not a soul created that can withstand me forever, and few that can even wish to try. You belong to us now, as you always have and always will.”
“Never,” Mercius croaked, but it was a feeble sound. He heard the truth in the Steward’s words as he gazed into his haunting eyes. He would not escape from Hell. The best he could do would be to distract these two monsters so that Nephilia could flee. She could then help Griffin and whatever other Arkarum she could find fulfill their purpose of destroying the scourge of demons that plagued the world.
On the heels of that thought, Mercius summoned the Arka into his veins, pulling from the deep well within himself. The power was sick and blackened and twisted as he felt it rush through his body, but potent nonetheless. This time was different, however. Mercius felt the power changing him physically. It welled through his blood and to the top of his head. The Arka rushed down his spine and pushed itself from the flesh of his back, creating a network of bones that grew quickly outward between his shoulder blades. It was excruciatingly painful, but Mercius knew that if he let the power falter, released his hold on the Arka, the sudden absence of its potency would implode his physical body. He therefore gritted his teeth and clenched his fists, an agonized cry of misery bursting from his throat. While he had meant to summon the Arka and unleash one enormous, violent assault on the two demons before him, the pain that surged through his flesh and blood was so overwhelming that he could only close his eyes.
When finally the torment was ended, Mercius allowed the Arka to subside, b
ut did not release it fully. He slowly, painfully opened his eyes, and found that he was on his knees, bent over with his fists upon the stony ground.
The Steward laughed again, a fresh plague of clicking insects falling from his fanged mouth. “You see,” he buzzed, “all bow before Maliphar, the Steward of Hell.”
Mercius rose slowly to his feet, more in defiance of what Maliphar had said than any real purpose. He knew that he would be defeated, if he was not already. Looking over his shoulder to where Nephilia still lay helpless, he saw protruding upward high over his head the taloned tip of a black wing. Spinning his head, he saw another over his other shoulder, and quickly realized that the wings belonged to him. His heart quailed, for he knew that he had been physically transformed into the demon that his father had always wanted him to become. The only thing that remained of his humanity was a small shred of compassion and love, clinging stubbornly onto what was left of his tattered soul.
Asgoroth spoke, and his voice called to the darkness that was waiting to burst from Mercius at every moment: “You see? All aspects of yourself have changed. Kneel now, before the Steward of Hell, and you shall be welcomed among us, your former transgressions punished only slightly. Kneel, and you will help us rule the pitiful world that waits for our taking.”
As Asgoroth was speaking, Mercius felt a tugging. It was slight and terribly subtle, but it was there, in his heart. The Arka he still clung to, ready at a second’s notice to be fully formed within him and unleashed upon his foes. But this was something else. Something that he had felt before, but he could not quite place when or where. The two demons before him showed no hint that they, too, felt this pulling, so Mercius was convinced that it was not another trick of Hell’s power.
Then, startling Mercius, Nephilia was by his side. He had not heard her stir from behind him; he simply felt her, suddenly, next to him, the warm glow of her power diminished, but filled with light and hope nevertheless. Mercius looked at her, his face stern and hard. She smiled and said, simply and so quietly that Mercius almost didn’t hear: “Remember.” With that she clasped his hand, for all the world like they were two childhood sweethearts out for a stroll. The gesture was so incongruous in this hall deep within the heart of Hell, that it wiped suddenly the knowing grins from the demon’s faces.
“Kneel!” Asgoroth repeated his command, taking an intimidating step forward. “Your angel cannot save you now. You are ours, and you have been warned.”
Mercius paid him little heed. The tugging in his breast was growing stronger by the minute. But its familiarity still eluded him. It was not evil, this thing that pulled at him. He could smell the woods and the earth and soft leather, but still his mind grappled uselessly with the thought.
Maliphar spoke, his voice buzzing around the clattering insects that poured from his cavernous mouth with redoubled intensity. “There is no escape from my clutches, Mercius. You know this, deep inside yourself. Your…woman there will be your steed. Even the likes of her you will have power to conquer, if only you join us willingly. If you do not, you will join me nonetheless. But it will be far more painful and will take an eternity. Join us Mercius.”
The simple command brought forth a new wave of agony. Mercius' flesh was suddenly and successively laced with deep lacerations that immediately began dumping pulses of thick, red-black blood down his body. Simultaneously, his head felt as if it would explode from the new blade of pressure that welled up there. He could feel his soul slipping further and further into the trenches of evil, and the only thing that kept him from succumbing immediately was the ever-increasing pull in his heart.
The woods. Smell of green and earth. Sound of breeze through leaves. Thoughts of peace and love and regret. Heat and softness and gentle sighs.
Like an avalanche, the thought came to him; with a suddenness that staggered him back a step, Mercius realized how the tugging was familiar to him. He felt in its pulse the soft skin of Keira; smelled the alluring scent of her sweat as she clung to his side; saw the deepness of her sparkling hazel eyes.
The tugging in his heart was love!
Wide-eyed, he looked to Nephilia, so overcome was he by the apparent absurdity of remembering love at a time and in a place such as this. The angel simply smiled slightly, her cracked lips and broken face spewing blood down her chin and over her naked breasts.
Mercius' eyes burned with bright hate and deep love as he turned back to Asgoroth and Maliphar. He thought he detected the slightest hint of confusion in the former’s red eyes, but he did not wait to verify. With immediate violence and force, Mercius called the Arka fully into his body, his soul, and unleashed it upon the two. The force of the power that flew from his outstretched hand knocked Asgoroth to the ground, and flattened his alabaster steward against his throne. Without hesitation, Mercius tightened his grip upon the angel’s hand and pushed himself into the air with the power of the Arka, carrying her with him.
He soared into the darkness above like a bird taking flight. When the power was spent, however, and the ceiling of the giant chamber was still lost high above him, his ascent was reversed, and the pair began to plummet. He saw, far below him, the two demons, now both standing, looking up at him, and was pleased to see that both were slightly stunned, and had not expected this rapid change in events. Awkwardly, Mercius spread the wings that were now at his back. There were new muscles that operated them, and it was a strange feeling. But when they had spread, their black leathery texture caught the heat of the air and snapped loudly. Mercius was floating through the chamber, Nephilia dangling below him by her single hand.
Setting his face and his resolve, Mercius beat his giant wings and shot with stunning speed back toward the door that had permitted him entrance what seemed like an age ago. Nephilia, for her part, made not a sound, but simply clung to his hand with a strength that belied her broken appearance. Mercius had no idea where he would go, except that he must be free of Asgoroth and Maliphar before they could recover from their shock and give deadly chase. The massive doors of the chamber were quickly in sight, and Mercius pushed for more speed, acquiring it easily now that he had learned the feel of his new wings.
With a blast of the Arka he smashed the massive doors to splinters. As he exited through the towering doorway, the two beasts that had let him pass previously now leapt high into the air, attempting to bring him down. They missed Nephilia’s dangling feet by a hair’s breadth, and Mercius shot out over the cliff face that he had scaled. He surveyed the broken scene below him, but it gave him no inclination of where he should flee.
Below him, Nephilia said in a whisper that somehow penetrated the rush of hot air, “Remember.”
Mercius, knowing what she meant, focused all of his attention onto the tugging in his heart. It was growing louder, and becoming painful, as if it wished to push itself out from his chest. As his attention on the pulling focused, Mercius saw in the distance a great gap in the striated, tumultuous firmament of Hell. The rest of the sky was black and red and aflame with evil. But the spot that he gazed upon now was utterly void of color: a solid blackness that escaped the whirling fire that surrounded it. Mercius, not knowing whether he was leading himself to certain destruction, made his way to the spot. As he did, even as he made up his mind, the tugging within him doubled, then tripled. It continued to increase until Mercius was nearly unable to bear the sharpness of its pull. It was love, he knew now, but it was fraught with pain and risk, and the pain and utter beauty of it threatened to rip his half-demon heart from his chest.
Below him, shouting this time, Nephilia said, “Hurry, Mercius!” There was an urgency in her voice that he hadn’t known she possessed, and it caused him to turn and look behind him. There, flying through the wind with no apparent form of locomotion, was Maliphar. He shot toward Mercius and his charge with terrifying speed; speed that Mercius, with his newly developed wings, couldn’t hope to match or outdistance. Pushing himself
for maximum speed, Mercius' heart beat audibly in his chest. The tugging there was increasing still, and he knew that if he didn’t reach its source soon, he would be torn asunder from the sheer power of it.
After terribly long moments during which the Steward of Hell closed the gap steadily, Mercius came upon the blackness in the sky. It was void of color, but the rushing sound of wind deafened him utterly. Gritting his teeth, Mercius beat his wings violently and pushed himself up into the darkness that waited above, still unsure of what he would find there.
Just as he was about to enter the void and find out, however, his progress was halted with a jolt.
Mercius looked down and saw Maliphar clinging to both of Nephilia’s ankles. Her face, as he looked wide-eyed into it, was a mask of calm knowing. The angel did not sceam or wail her terror, as he himself would do in her situation. She simply gazed up at him, serene as ever he had seen her.
Maliphar, on the other hand, had his visage twisted and distorted into snarls of hate, the insects crawling continually from his mouth, now flying and buzzing around him, creating a cloud of dark clattering around his white head.
“You cannot escape me!” he buzzed with the violence of a maddened shriek.
Mercius looked upon the hideous demon then back to his angel. Silently, her voice laying itself on his thoughts like a warm blanket, she said, “Fear not for me, Mercius. Leave me, and do what you must.”
With that, her grip loosened, and now it was Mercius only that held her. With a madness and conviction that he had never displayed, Mercius shouted, “No!” and pulled Illuricht from his back. Still hovering on slowly flapping wings of leather, Mercius lashed out once, hard and precise, and the tip of his black blade caught the alabaster demon across the eyes, gouging deeply and pulling one of the deep black orbs out in its wake. The buzzing shriek that emanated from Maliphar was this time devoid of crawling insects, and Mercius heard the agony in the scream.
The demon, in his shock and pain, released his hold on Nephilia, and began to plummet away from the fleeing pair, tumbling and screaming through the air.
Mercius wasted no time in continuing his ascent into the blackness above him.