The Vampire & Her Witch
Chapter 416: The Battle Within (Part Two)

Chapter 416: The Battle Within (Part Two)

"Shubnalu was a hollow man when I was still alive," Kimsel said, looking at Hauke with flat gray eyes that felt empty and devoid of life. "He cared nothing for the lives of people or the families and communities they built. All he ever cared about was... was what?" Kimsel said, her voice trailing off as she found her memories of the ancient vampire were riddled with holes.

"I don’t remember what he wanted either," Eraric said as he inspected the icy blade in his hands. "But I do remember that he cared very little about the world with the exception of people who had become powerful enough to challenge his rule. Anyone who might challenge him, he killed without question or remorse."

"And anyone useful to him," Eugen said from his seat on the cold stone floor. "To his will he binds. Just like us, just like her master," Eugen said, pointing at the image of Ashlynn on the far wall.

"This is why you must find the things that you will fight for at all costs, young Hauke," Eraric said, resting the icy blade across his knees so he could begin inscribing hooked runes into it’s surface, each one glowing with a unique shade of blue, green, white or purple.

"We may be bound to the service of our people," the craftsman said as he worked. "We may even be bound to the service of a more powerful lord. But the instant that someone wishes to strip our horns from us, turning us into beasts to be hunted for their meat... Then we have become less than people in the eyes of the world."

"It has happened before," Kimsel said. "The Frost Walker clan almost vanished from the face of the world until we struck our bargain with the Fangs of Death to slay those who hunted us. Now, the Harbinger of Death has come with her witches, bearing blades forged from our horns."

"Swore to protect our people, we all did," Eugen said. "Right now, all your people, protecting we are. Over soon it will be," he said, pointing in the direction of the wall that showed what was happening in the world outside.

Through the missing wall of the ancestral cavern, Hauke watched helplessly as his body engaged in brutal combat with Ashlynn. The crystalline ice clinging to the cavern walls reflected their the seen more than a dozen times over, making it impossible to look away from once he’d turned away from the stubborn ancestors.

Ansgar, wielding Hauke’s body with frustrated impatience, had encased both of his fists in thick gauntlets of ice that extended halfway up the forearms. There was nothing remotely elegant about his choice of weapon, nothing that could compare to the sword Eraric had painstakingly carved from a single block of ice, but even crude weapons could be effective when used by a warrior as experienced as Ansgar was.

"You should have stood aside, witch," Ansgar’s deep voice bellowed through Hauke’s mouth as he launched a thunderous overhead strike that would have crushed Ashlynn’s skull had it connected.

"You didn’t have to involve yourself in this. Now, how many of your people will die because you chose to protect a defiler?" Ansgar asked as he lashed out with a series of even more punishing blows that would have crushed even Owain’s armored knights beneath his icy fists.

But Ashlynn was no longer the sheltered noblewoman who had arrived in the Vale of Mists with nothing but her determination and the faintest hint of how to use her magic. Months of training with Thane and countless hours sparring with Jacques, Talauia and even Amahle had transformed her into someone who was both formidable and cunning.

For a moment, she feigned a stumble, sliding on the icy ground and drawing the furious ancestor into an over-commited punch before she sidestepped the blow with supernatural speed. The punch missed by less than a handbreadth but it was enough as the ice gauntlet shattered against the stone ground where she had stood just moments before.

"Heila is family," Ashlynn spat back, her emerald eyes flashing with determination even as her breath frosted in the increasingly frigid air. "If you think that I’d stand aside and let you harm her or any member of my coven, then you don’t understand witches at all," she spat.

She lunged forward, her darksteel falchion slashing in a wide, powerful arc that lacked finesse but carried enough force to cleave through almost anything in its path. There was nothing of Thane’s careful training in her movements now, instead, she more closely resembled Jacques in one of his intense, explosive rushes combined with the primal need to protect what was hers.

Ansgar formed another gauntlet instantly, catching the blade between layers of ice that glowed with a dark purple and sapphire radiance. Sparks of blue light erupted where darksteel met enchanted ice, neither yielding to the other.

For a moment, they stood locked together, strength against strength, but the longer they stood pressed together, the more obvious Ansgar’s advantage became as Ines added her own skills, pouring the cold of a blizzard into Ashlynn’s blade and covering her hands in a layer of frost that could cost the witch her hands if she didn’t find a way to escape it.

"You see?" Kimsel whispered within the mental cavern, pointing toward the struggle. "No witch should possess such strength. It is the vampire’s blood that gives her this power, but even with all of her gifts, she cannot resist against Ines and Ansgar working together."

While the ancestral spirits thought the outcome was inevitable, Hauke held a different opinion. He could see that Ansgar was struggling and without Ines timely aid on more than one occasion, Ashlynn might already have overpowered him. The ancestral spirit was used to commanding a body as strong as the mountains themselves, accustomed to overwhelming opponents with sheer physical might combined with the power of his nearly unbreakable ice. But in Hauke’s more modest frame, against an opponent enhanced by vampire blood, and without the same ability to bend ice to his will the way he had when he was alive, the former Lord of the Seven Peaks found himself merely evenly matched with a witch who was barely in her twenties.

Or perhaps, Hauke thought, clinging to hope that the tide would turn even further as the battle wore on. Perhaps even with the combined forces of Ines and Ansgar, it was they who weren’t Ashlynn’s match....