Morning seven
Eva brings two chairs and makes some coffee. You sit there next to the gory tub. Killing children, even vampires, is not easy. You feel numb. No telling how Eva feels. You look at the dried blood on your hands. Your clothes are filthy. Stained with sweat. The coffee does little more than just keep you awake. You suspect it will take all day for Father Thias to be revived from the dead.
A couple of
birds are chirping in the morning light. It does nothing to
warm your heart which feels cold and distant. Like a fog on the
horizon. You are wondering if you took a wrong turn. Self
doubt is not your style, but somehow killing monsters and doing right
should feel better than this. You think about all the natural
creatures you killed on your journey here. That seemed O.K.
You did it for food or self defence. Even then you could cook
and eat the meat. Once you kill a vampire, eating it is the
last thing you would want to do.
"Amen."
a voice says in your head. "Lubik, its' me. Omni.
The wizard." You look at Eva. She is sleeping in the
chair. Coffee cup still in hand. It seems to have gotten
on to midday. You must have fallen asleep. "Lubik,
you're not sleeping. I'm here, in the astral plane."
You sit up straight and wide awake.
"I
hear you," you say.
"It's me,
the wizard Omni. I'm checking on you. It is the seventh
day since you left. I am standing next to both of you.
Communicating with telepathy. I see Eva. She is still
alive. You did well. You still have one thing to do.
You never actually re-consecrated the altar. Do that."
"I will," you say. Your
voice is echoed in your mind and he hears it.
"After I rest I will join you. We will open a gate, and
reconnect the village to the parish. You must re-consecrate the
altar." The presence in your mind seems to fade. You
are sitting in your chair. The gory tub is still there before
you.
You get up
like a zombie, go in the house and get a bucket. You start
carrying water to a tub in one of the other houses. Once full
you strip and take a bath. It is just what you needed.
The cool water makes you feel alive again. Real. You
scrub hard and start to feel clean again. After, you empty this
other tub, and carry new water. Once full you go and wake Eva.
"Eva, get up. You must wash. Clean all the blood
off." She follows you like a mindless soul. You
leave here in the other house with the clean tub and head for the
church.
The shadows are starting to get
a little longer. You enter, light some candles and begin the
ritual. It takes an hour. Once done, you feel completely
alive again. You head back to Eva's house. You can smell
food cooking in the kitchen. The sound of a light hearted
whistling comes from within.
At the gory
tub you find that the two chairs you were siting in have also been
cleaned. The blood that spilled out of the tub has been
scrubbed clean. The tub seems just as deep as before, but the
body of Father Thias doesn't seem as shrivled. You sit down and
wait.
Later Eva calls you inside to
eat. The meal is great. Corn bread, fresh salad, baked
fish, and a bit of rabbit stew followed by a glass of wine. The
two of you feel human again.
At sunset
you hear a moan from the tub. It seems that they can revive
themselves. You go out. Father Thias is still bound,
mostly submerged in blood. He blinks at you. "Who
are you?" He asks.
Standing
over him you speak "Father Thias, I am Father Lubik. I was
sent to replace you. Why do they want your book, and what is
it's importance?" He doesn't look like he trusts you, or
that he is going to answer.
Suddenly you
hear a thunder clap in the church. Literally. It sounds
like a bolt of lightning exploded inside the chapel. So you
walk away from the tub. As you do you hear Father Thias calling
out "Wait, I'll talk. Come back. Don't leave me."
You decide he's not going anywhere, so you continue on to the church.
Inside you find a wizard standing before
the altar. He has a huge diamond on a necklace, black robes and
he is pointing his staff at you. It's Omni. "Lubik!
I was worried when you weren't here." He relaxes his staff
and strides over to meet you. You tell him everything about
last night. He says “I know,” but he lets you
talk. When you finally run out of steam he says "Lets go
get the other end of this gate up. My apprentices are waiting."
As y'all walk outside the chapel Father
Thias is floating there waiting for you. He still has his hands
behind his back and his feet are still bound. He is just
hovering there a meter off the ground. "So that's what
happened." He looks at you accusingly. "That
thing tried to convert you! Thought you would help him with my
book. Where is it?"
Wizard
Omni says "The book can wait." He strides over to a
clearing in the grass. It looks like a path that goes nowhere.
You go with him and Father Thias hovers along. Omni goes into a
ritual. Moving and chanting. He places one hand on the
huge diamond he wears. Suddenly he turns and casts the spell on
the floating form of Father Thias.
A
more heart wrenching scream has never fallen on your ears.
Thias crumples to the ground. You look at Omni questioningly.
He answeres your question "I cleansed him. It knocked him
out, but he will be whole again." He takes a deep breath,
holds it, and then lets it out. He turns back to face the place
where he is going to open the gate.
You
suddenly regret staking the hearts of the children. If only you
had known. Eva will never forgive you.
Omni turns on you and grabs you by the collar. He shakes you.
"Snap out of it! I know what you are thinking. You
are wrong. Just wait. Wait for my apprentices. When
they get here, show them the graves. They have already been
briefed." He turns back and begins a new ritual.
He places his hand on the diamond, speaks some sounds, then stretches
forth his staff describing a shape in the air. It glimmers then
glows. Wizards start coming through. Thirteen in all,
followed by crates, wagons and workers. You take the
apprentices to the grave yard. As you are leaving you see Omni
dragging his tired body to one of the houses. He looks like he
is headed for bed.
As you near the grave
yard one of the apprentices speaks to you. "We brought
wishes. Enough wishes. It is not too late. Now be
still while we work." You watch as the workers are
called. As they dig up the eight fresh graves. Each child
has the steak removed from its heart by a different apprentice who
then wishes its heart whole again. One of the workers has
brought the cart and the bodies are stacked there. The cart is
rolled over behind Eva's house. There you find more workers
have assembled all the tubs in town. The remaining blood of the
gory tub has been redistributed to eight of them, the rest with fresh
water. A body is laid in each of the bloody ones.
The apprentices watch. Arrow wounds seem to start healing.
The bodies seem to start reviving themselves. You
overhear some of the conversation of the apprentices. "It
does work." "Still doesn't help those who died
human." "But the hour limit is beaten."
"What good, except for vampires?" "Still, we're
a step closer."
As the first child
opens his eyes and sits up Omni appears. He casts Cleansing on
it. This immediately strikes the child unconscious. One
of the apprentices takes the child and lays it in a fresh water tub
for a cleaning. After he wishes the child healed. Other
apprentices start to aid Omni as he casts cleansing over and over.
All the children are revived one at a time by a different
apprentice. This is too good to be true.
You bring all the children to Eva. For a moment she looks like
she is going to faint, then she cries. Tears of Joy.
[Get eighty experience for the releaved expression on Evas' face.]