Download Game! Currently 88 players and visitors. Last logged in:SiralpacaPlanNeyOnnifer

Library: Immortal Hunter

Books

Author: hair
Date:Oct 28 2007

My name is Ian-Flannery McKern, and I am 900 years old.  We call ourselves 
immortals, but a drop of the head will bring our death and what we call The 
Quickening.  We all prepare for The Gathering, where the last of our kind 
will meet in battle by the sword, and the final one will receive The Prize.  
There can be only one.

However, I am aware of other immortals not of our kind, that feed off the 
humans of this planet...Earth.  I make it my goal to destroy them, for I 
am more than just a player in The Gathering...I am a Vampire Hunter.

When I became aware of these beasts of the night, it was the early 12th 
century, in Romania.  I was being pursued by another of my kind, when I 
took refuge in a castle in the mountains.  I had many wounds, and despite 
my immortality, I still felt their pain and my fatigue.

This immortal, Lucas Kinard, was a worth opponent, and I was, at the time, 
sword-less.  I had lost it in our last battle, in Prague when it shattered 
from a fall. I was very lucky to get out of that one with my head still 
attached.

The castle was dark and damp, like most, and it seemed to have been 
abandoned for a while.  The décor seemed relatively modern, but dust and 
cobwebs seemed to cover everything.  If I was a greedy man, I could have 
acquired some of the more valuable and portable ornaments that lay about, 
but my center of attention was on an ornate sword that hung above the fire 
place.  An inscription on the sword read "Alkranon, the Vampire Slayer".  
I heard the legends of these creatures called vampires, but did not believe 
them.  But then again, they talk of my kind as if we were also legend.  The 
sword was a large well-crafted one, seemingly well kept.  I removed it from 
its stand.

A sudden chill filled the room as I felt the well-balanced weight of the 
sword in my hands.  It had been so long since I held one, it almost seemed 
alien.  That feeling I perceived as stemming from somewhere else...within 
the sword, possibly.  As I pondered at the craftsmanship of Alkranon, I heard 
a door creak behind me.  Expecting to see Lucas behind me, I turned.

The front door stood open, rain flailing against the stone floor.  Lightning 
flashed, and I could have sworn I saw a four-legged figure, like a dog, in the
doorway, but by the next flash, it was gone.  I slowly moved towards the door,
brandishing the sword.  I felt something as I moved closer.  The sense I 
usually feel when one of my kind is about was causing my spine to shiver; a 
feeling both foreign and familiar, as if there was a person with a long life 
line in my presence, but not of my kind.  This was very new to me.

A stench seemed to dominate the air suddenly...a stench of death, or possibly 
undeath.  As I closed the door, I finally heard his breathing; his breath 
smelled like blood.

"I am Ian-Flannery McKern, I demand you identify yourself."  I had been 
banished from my clan, and disowned.  I could not state my clan, for it was 
no longer mine.

"Your blood smells different, smells old.  Yet you look younger than I look; 
younger than I am for sure.  You are not of my kind, I can tell that, but we 
seem to have something in common."  The voice was cold and inhuman.  I knew 
I had stumbled onto this beasts lair.

"I am here to get out of the rain.  I seek refuge.  If I have imposed in any 
way, I will leave."  I hoped he did not see the sword.

"And leave with the sword.  I think not."  I heard him move.

Sharpening my night perception, I swung the sword in the direction I thought 
he was coming.  I felt the sword mystically vibrate.  It almost seemed to 
emit an iridescent light.  The vibration seemed to cause the hilt to mold 
itself to fit my grip, as if it wanted to belong to me.

The thing before me hissed like a rabid animal, "Noooo!...No mortal can wield 
that sword.  It's power should have engulfed you by now, leaving your 
blood-filled body for me to feed.  You can not be the one..."

The light from the sword finally revealed to me the beast, or was he.  He 
seemed man-like, but with dark features like death, and the teeth that 
extended from his upper jaw over his lips, dripping with the saliva of 
hunger.  The legends were true, as they are of my kind.

The beast did not live long after that.  The sword seemed to burn him where 
he stood, the light searing his flesh beneath the black cloak he wore.  At 
that moment, I felt the tense pull of destiny; the warm voice of fate.  This 
sword was not made for mortals, not made for those who saw time as a river 
rather than a vast ocean.

My life afterwards was spent trying to find the forger, or some sign of his 
legacy other than his sword.  There was none.  But I knew why he made it, and 
I sought out to fulfill that purpose...The Gathering can wait.



Books