PICKS AND CHOICES (Ch. 4)

"How?" Elslaine questions with calm vexation, her teeth gnashed, hands clenched,

"How what?" comes Sven's sneering reply, "how I know?" he mocks further, "My dear dear Elslaine, knowing the things i do i'd be an imbecile to be unable to piece that out?" he concludes, her hands extend to the side emitting a blue hue, empowered by magik, the room rattles as the pressure mounts, despite his amusement Sven's eyes glimmer in irritation,

(if it were anyone else they're head would've gone flying, i've missed pissing you off Elly, just like old times) he mules, his unconcealed amusement aggravates her and books go flying as shelves tumble and with a sharp glow of his eyes her body weakens and she tumbles backwards, Sven catches her by the waist, an ever-present grin irritating her, she pushes out if his arms while pondering questioningly,

(how?), she wonders to herself,(was that a mental attack?, sight based?, but how is he able to get pass my defenses?, we don't have a mental bridge connecting us though),

{We very well do my dear, you should learn to govern your thoughts} Sven replies through their mental connection,

"How!" Elslaine seethes, the presence of such an intimate connection with a 'stranger' a justifiably worrying situation,

(She doesn't remember, i suspected but...),

"anyone there?" her words interrupt his thoughts as Sven refocuses his gaze on those amethyst orbs,

(There is much to think over), "There is much for us to talk about, but today is not the day" Sven replies, a gust of wind and a blur latter he's gone.

Freya steps into Elslaine's room quick to notice her demeanor,

"Tell me child, what has your mind captive?".

"His eyes" came her solemn reply choosing suitably to hide the precense of the mental bridge, Freya smiles well aware of who Elslaine alludes to,

"He's a pure-blooded one, but surprisingly he wasn't born that way, he's achieved all he has through blood and war, how much do you know of the Night realms and their ascension rites?" She inquires,

"Very little my Queen" Elslaine replies,

"Sven has fought his way and achieved bloodline purification through continuous victory, a quite remarkable journey, from a peasant to Highlord and king of all the Night realms" she states,

"From what i've learnt the more powerful the being the more nature pushes against their multiplication, essentially, the ability to conceive" she replies, Freya smiles giving a light nod before proceeding,

"supernaturals do not conceive easily, the more powerful one is the more difficult it is, the laws of nature can only accommodate so much, if we could we would've long over taken the human realms."

The following morning they'd reconvened to conclude the prior day's meeting,

"She's late" Lucca states,

"Let us begin" Sylvia responds, "Deamon Sestson has knowledge of the holy swords whereabouts,

secondly we can infer that he intends on using them to unseal the fallen one from Abaddon and lastly, in doing this it will mark the start of the third holy War as the keys will bridge the Gap between realms there by inter twining our realms with the human one, despite all this i fail to understand his personal motives, i know for a fact he owes that being no loyalty, so the question becomes why?" Sylvia concludes,

"He wants what he always has" Freya replies, we are all subsets of Demon and human blood intertwined, the originals, humans who had made deals with the fallen one for power, immortality, wealth and whatsoever their hearts desire in exchange for their souls, latter come to be known as we are, 'The Damned', on the other side of this coin are humans possessing Ichor blood" Freya pauses,

(Human's with Angel blood?) Elslaine ponders, (is that really possible?),

"When in contact with or within our bodies will either kill us or cure us though the latter has never been witnessed, there are exceptions, those who meet certain unknown criterias will retain their powers but lose their weaknesses " ,

"Damphirs" Lucca interjects,

"Precisely" Sylvia replies,

"What those criteria's are exactly we must find out" Lucca interjects,

"Enough off your obsession child!" Sylvia reprimands,

"What kind of army does Deamon lead?" Sven states

"Vampires, Zoanthropes, Warlocks, Hybrids and any other supernatural in existence" Sylvia replies,

"That's not possible" Sven replies,

"I understand your reluctance to accept this as fact, i assure you, your mental and spiritual domination over zoans hold no sweat over his troops, of this i assure you, how he's achieved such a feat i cannot tell" she concludes,

"Insanity" Lucca exclaims with reluctant acceptance, Sevn's eyes narrow his mouth pressed in a thin lined frown as he ponders briefly before speaking,

"And how did he happen to achieve the creation of such an army?" he questions, Freya eyes freeze as she recalls memories of what were one fond times

"Daemon and i were together for a time, the few things i recall about his tight lipped research was the fact that he'd always state that the current supernaturals are far weaker than the generations past, he ran countless experiments interbreeding captured targets, it's probably taken him centuries to create these warriors, but i suspect he aims to use the holy swords to reforge himself as perhaps a..."

"Nephalem" Elslaine interjects,

"Wait!, this would imply he knows exactly what the given criteria's are!" Lucca exclaims,

"It would" Freya responds, "He has lived for hundreds of years barely shy a thousand, if anyone it would definitely be him" she concludes, "If he gets even one of the holy blades he's almost guaranteed to succeed, if he can reforge himself then recreating 'them' is no foolish dream" (that's if he already hasn't) she concludes,

"He wants to recreate the originals?" Elslaine inquires

"He seeks to rule them, without a doubt i'm certain a piece of our ancestors, the originals are in his hands" Freya concludes as both Lucca and Sven's auras flare

"that's quite the ambitious goal he has" Sven sneers,

(But should he succeed...) they each pondered silently to themselves.

A sharp knock on the library doors accross the dimly lit hall connecting to the library resounds across the walls.

"Come in" Sylvia's voice echoes across the walls, the doors slowly push open to reveal a uniformed vampire, he makes his way towards the group with brisk steps before speaking up in an agitated tone,

"My King!, the Vatican just confirmed an attack!"

"Deamon!" Sven growls,

Sylvia bites her ower lip seemingly while pondering contemplatively

"What's the Vatican's status" Freya replies eyes closed and lips set in a deep frown,

"They were hit hard, he took two holy swords hidden away by he Vatican, he must have known ahead of time" the uniformed vampire states, "the swords were stored in the Vatican's heavily defended auxiliary vaults and is as of now engaged with the paladin,

(If he wins...) the group ponder darkly,

"His hate for humans has alway's stemmed from his jealousy of them" Freya states,

"Why would he be? Lucca inquires,

"Because they get the chance we never will, a road to Heaven, when we die we're sent straight to Abaddon, this is the bane of the sins of our ancestors, the eternal punishment we serve, he can never be human, but human's are not the only one's with an open path" Freya states,

"Those who meet the criteria's parameters and become cleansed" Elslaine replies, "Nephalem" she concludes,

"Achieving this allows for two possible options, smite the 'MAKER' or work for a place in Heaven, these two are the only two plausible realities" Sylvia speaks,

"I do feel for the humans, I'm sure he'll be attacking the hunters next, when the hunters fall the humanities return to the bottom of the food chain becomes a certainty" states the messenger,

"You underestimate the hunters young one" Freya rebuttals, "they might be smaller in number but they are very much stronger than the Vatican, the current Inquisitor is frankly speaking a Monster and the hunters council of Ajundicators are very much included"

"how is that even possible?, they only posses one of the seven swords" Sven interjects,

"That may be so, but they maje up for it with something far more suitable than being worthy of a sword" she begins, "Ichor blood" she declares causing the faces of those present to contort, even more so they're in contact with the angels, it is with absolute certainty that i say the current inquisitor is a man blessed by the archangel Michael."

"An archangels blessing?" Sylvia exclaims a fresh frown taking place,

"Even without Temperance he's already a walking holy weapon, add that to the hunters runes of empowerment and bloodline powers and you have a human supernatural who rivals the originals, even some of the Ajundicators have also been blessed by archangels, even Deamon is well aware it would be suicide for him to go to battle with the hunters, if anything he'll lay low for a while" she concludes,

"Does he not fear a collaborative effort?" Sven questions,

"No, a partnership between the two will never come to be, simply because those of the Vatican believe the hunters to be monsters similar to us" Freya replies, "Though one must posses Ichor blood to show the brilliance of a holy sword in it's fullest extent a worthy human in exchange with his life force can achieve the same" Freya concludes,

"That's why paladins never live long" Sylvia states, "Although they are a pain to deal with an enemy of my enemy is a friend, letting them take continuous damage is ultimately of detriment to our goals, now more than ever we need a plan of action" Sylvia states,

"I will establish contact with the Vatican, for that i will need to return" came Freya's interjection,

"I do have a question" Lucca calls as his curious gaze landing on Freya,

"Go ahead young one" Freya smiles

"If the hunters are so strong why haven't they subdued us yet?" He questions, Freya's eyes crease in amusement her smile widening,

"For a plethora of reasons my dear child, for one they can not, maybe after the blood of the damned weakens for several generations more, for another they're nothing more than fancy guard dogs, their job being to maintain balance not to rule, serving as the bridge between our realms and the human realms, apart from the Keys only they have a way to travel through our realm and the human one, another would be their limited numbers, i could go on, but the point is clear, for now should take a rest, it's all quite a lot to ponder." Freya concludes,

"We'll converse once more at dinner" Sylvia follows, and with that the meeting had adjourned, with al exiting the library's meeting chamber and making for their quarters with much to ponder.