Nightblade (Darkest night)

A cold feeling of dread crept into Morgan's heart. It felt like everything that could go wrong was actually going wrong.

Morgan roughly grabbed Emily, lifting her once more.

After all the running up and down they'd done, he was tired. Very tired.

Luckily, it seemed the wraith hadn't yet noticed them.

The dark mist kept pooling into it.

Within a few moments, the wraith towered over the altar, floating statically in the air.

His eyes frantically darted about the empty building, then he decisively dashed into a large chamber filled with statues and gently set Emily down.

The feeling of dread rapidly increased, the temperature plummeting significantly within the ancient temple.

Morgan's heart thundered in his chest until it reached a point where he was sure the wraith would actually hear him.

He peeked out from the chamber they were hiding in, furtively glancing at the grotesque apparition.

The shadow wraith remained stationary, simply floating above the altar.

The wraith appeared to be in a state of stasis.

" Can't it move? But that doesn't make sense. Why wouldn't it be able to move?"

After a few moments had passed and the wraith hadn't budged, Morgan decided to take a look around the room they were in.

The old smell of dust and age lingered in the air.

Wooden furniture lined the wall, some of it in a state of disrepair.

A few broken chairs were scattered on the floor.

Unlike the rest of the city, the room housed a uniquely different set of statues.

The statues in the hall depicted winged creatures and beasts of different kinds, their likeness carved into the grey stone with expert craftsmanship.

The dark creatures almost seemed alive, just seeming to shift slightly every time he glanced at them out of the corner of his eyes.

Even the four-armed bats were represented, as well as the two-headed creature they had fought.

It was there too, its haunting appearance forever captured in stone.

The two heads of the creature stared him accusingly, their maws frozen in a threatening snarl for eternity.

Morgan slowly crept forward, tracing out the plaques beneath the statues.

" Growler," he whispered, reading the name carved into the plaque embedded underneath the giant two-headed leopard.

The plaques, it seemed, were a description, a documentation of some of the beasts in Tenebris.

The room was a bestiary of sorts, depicting different beasts.

" These are all probably creatures found here in Tenebris. The people who lived here probably honoured or liked to keep records of such things; otherwise, why would they go as far as making statues for them?"

Emily got to her feet with a pained hiss.

She limped forward, standing while using one of the statues to prop herself.

" Look here, it says the four-armed winged monsters are called Bretnar."

Several more statues adorned the hall, giving the whole chamber an ethereal and ghostly feel.

Despite the numerous sculptures, one statue in particular stood out.

At the centre of the room, a giant sculpture of a hooded man stood.

This one was different from the others.

His likeness beneath the hood was slightly curved into a slight, confident, almost smug smile.

The sculpture demanded attention, giving the illusion of emanating power, even though it was simply made of stone.

Morgan stood still in silent awe.

The statue radiated an aura of solemnity and overwhelming might.

Beside him, a giant winged lion stood, with its mouth opened in a vicious snarl.

Emily moved and sat next to him in silence.

" Who do you think this guy was?" Morgan whispered in an almost reverent tone.

Emily threw him an amused glance, scrutinizing the statues with interest.

Morgan squatted in front of the statue, tracing out the dust-covered plaque.

" It also has a plaque, but it's a bit faded.

The plaque read:

"All hail, Al...."

Morgan frowned, his face scrunching up in irritation.

" The last bit was scraped off by someone."

The next line read:

"The first Lord."

" What's a Lord?" Emily asked.

Morgan frowned, vaguely remembering his evenings with Rebecca in the library.

" My aunt, Rebecca, told me a Lord is an assassin who has ascended past the level of a maestro."

Emily stared at him in puzzlement.

" What do you mean, maestro?"

Morgan threw her a quizzical look, then remembered she was a Talented.

" There is a hierarchy of power in the Brotherhood of Shadows. From what I was told, it depends on a person's affinity for umbralis. " He paused briefly, allowing his words to sink in.

"Umbralis is the energy assassins use; that energy is accumulated through contact with Tenebris. So the more energy an assassin can utilize, the higher they rise in the hierarchy. First as an aspirant, then initiate, after that one becomes a novice, then a maestro. Beyond that, we have Lords, but personally, I've never come into contact with one myself."

The shadow wraith in the middle of the building didn't move, no matter how much they moved through the temple.

The rest of the temple was similarly filled with daunting statues of haunting figures and beasts, giving it a hallowed and almost supernatural feel.

Strangely enough, there were no animals within the ancient temple.

After a few hours had passed, Morgan decided to step out to hunt for something to eat after his stomach had growled for the umpteenth time.

" Seriously? We have to hunt?" Emily asked, her green eyes narrowing in disbelief.

Morgan nonchalantly shrugged.

" This whole test was designed for aspirants, not the Talented. I get why you feel a little put off, but I'm honestly not ready to starve to death after spending months preparing for this."

After a brief silence, he rose to his feet.

" You're going to stay here, I'll check if those creatures, what was their name again?

" The Bretnar," Emily replied quietly.

"Yeah, I'll check if they're still outside, see if I can sneak upon them and make us a Bretnar steak, what do you think?"

Emily looked a little queasy at the thought.

" Don't worry, I think I've become a little skilled at this whole hunting and game thing, granted I've never eaten a giant four-armed bat."

A few moments later, Morgan was standing in front of the giant doors of the temple.

He silently pushed the heavy doors open, straining to move them inch by inch. Finally, he took a stealthy peek outside.

The dark crystals outside had dimmed considerably.

The lanterns within the city shone brighter, shrouding the entire city in a golden glow.

The whole place had an ethereal look about it, so much so that it looked straight out of a fairy tale.

" Whoever designed and built this place probably put in a whole lot of time. What the heck?"

Morgan allowed himself a brief pause to take in the enchanting sight of the lost city.

Strange fireflies burned, slowly floating through the air, like the scattered embers of a crackling flame. He could almost picture its magnificence when people still lived in the city.

He shook his head.

" Focus."

There was no room to get distracted.

After all, this simple mission to obtain food could become perilously deadly if he lost concentration for even a second.

The carcasses of the Bretnar he'd killed earlier had been completely devoured, leaving nothing but the bones.

" There goes that plan."

Originally, he'd planned to simply grab some of the remains if there were any, which would be a safer and definitely faster option, but that option had been shattered.

" On to Plan B." He thought silently, creeping forward.

Plan B involved swiftly sneaking up on one of the unsuspecting Bretnars and killing it, just like the assassins of old.

Morgan silently unsheathed the twin blades, his eyes gleaming with determination.

" Nothing fancy, just a clean cut through the throat and spine, and we're home free."

But of course, like most plans, there were bound to be a few, potentially fatal mishaps.

A few Bretnar lingered in the temple courtyard, lazily moving around.

Most of the swarm had departed, judging from the few remaining scattered creatures.

Morgan melded into the shadows cast by the lanterns.

His sleek, dark suit blended in smoothly with the darkness, giving him the appearance of a ghostly phantom.

He slowly crept down the steps, moving behind the pillars supporting the temple roof.

An unsuspecting Bretnar was sprawled in front of the steps, idly flicking a rock around on the ground.

A loud rumble echoed behind it.

In the next moment, its head whipped around in surprise, but it was already too late.

The Blood Reaper exploded through its throat and the back of its neck, brutally severing its windpipe and spine in one fluid movement.

The Bretnar reeled, sinking to the ground with a look of disbelief in its beastly eyes.

The other Bretnars quickly realized something was wrong, taking to the air with frantic screeches.

Morgan frantically hauled his prize onto his shoulders, then desperately bounded up the stairs, running for all he was worth.

" Stupid stomach," He inwardly screamed.

At the last moment, just before he'd finished off the Bretnar, his stomach had grumbled loudly, alerting the otherwise oblivious creature.

Morgan quickly slipped in through the gap between the massive doors, dumping the still twitching corpse to the ground.

He paused just before shoving the doors back in place.

The Bretnar hadn't given chase.

His eyes narrowed in calculation.

"What is going on?"

The creatures skulked around the steps without crossing an unseen barrier.

" That's certainly strange. Are they scared of something within the temple? Can they sense the shadow wraith from that distance?"

He turned around, peering into the darkness of the temple in the direction of the unmoving wraith.

"Or could there actually be something more sinister than the wraith that we haven't yet encountered?"