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The fire danced in that lone, alabaster eye.
Hojo'to Zuginoch sat beside the dying flames of a small fire. His back rested against the trunk of a tree and his hands were in his lap. The sun shone through the branches above as they swayed in a steady wind that threatened to snuff out the dying fire.
The smell of roasted fruit was thick on the air and a small skillet was cooling in the dirt beside Hojo's improvised cooking fire.
The great bear of a miqo'te was lethargic and even the blinking of his eye was labored and slow. The whites of his eyes where blood shot from lack of sleep and he fought from dozing off.
The bell in his left ear flicked and he rolled his eyes open to look around.
He was beside a small, dirt road some miles from the ruin of William's estate. It had been a moonless night and Hojo had spent longer than he had intended trying to navigate by the celestial heavens. It wasn't until the sun's first rays began to illuminate the horizon that the Keeper had decided there was enough distance between himself and the burnt out husk to stop to eat and rest.
Hojo's eye saw the bag and he sniffed. Already the hint of decay could be caught around the bloody head. The smell had attracted a pair of flies whom danced in unison around the bloody sack. Hojo watched them.
Such was life. From king to beggar, in the end, everyone became ash and fly shit.
Well, unless they engaged in cavorting with the powers of the Void like William had.
Hojo leaned his head against the tree trunk, his white hair sweeping across his face as the breeze grew stronger.
Taking William's head had been both pleasure and necessity. Even before Hojo had seen the horrors the old hyur had been inflicting upon random victims, the bounty hunter had known the man to be a cult leader. The evidence had been presented to him in droves and the Keeper had happily accepted the work. But to see the way William and his cult had twisted those bodies of women and children into void warped monstrosities made his stomach sick. He took in a deep breath as he recalled having to put them out their misery.
Hojo grunted as one child's face stood out in his memory. The watery, bulging optics had looked up at him as the broken mouths that had grown across its warped flesh begged to be free of the ruined, mortal coil. Hojo had obliged the boy. Hojo could only hope the soul of the child was free of the taint his body had been forced to succumb to.
Hojo closed his eyes and sucked in another breath.
The wind blew and the fire died.
And the cackling began.
A twisted, ruined sound that was a horrible, sick imitation of mirth.
"Well, well, what a treat/
Once again we do meet/
Been time since we did talk/
One they call Zuginoch?"
Hojo's eye flared open and he surged onto his feet as if he had been struck by lighting, his armor rattling and chain mail grinding as his axe spun through his hands. His heart was hammering as he gazed around, looking frantically for the source of that voice. A voice from his past. The voice of the voidspawn he called 'Rhyme'.Â
Hojo's left ear was flicking wildly, ringing the bell bolted to it so he could hear that sweet, musical sound. The only sound that might calm him and keep his nightmares from rolling over him and consuming him.
"You!" Hojo shouted, snarling, acting more aggressive than he felt. "You can't be herrre!"
"O, now, is that a fact/
Then at whom are you yelling at/
If not here I be, then where/
Perhaps lodged in your underwear?"
The voice began to laugh and sing the last word over and over as the white ears of the miqo'te located the source of the terrible rhymes.
The bag with the head.
The sack was shuddering atop the stump and Hojo had just enough time to realize what was going on before the head rolled itself out of the bag. The severed mass of bone, brain and organs spilled onto the ground and rolled several feet before it came to rest. William's eyes flew open, revealing two, black, soulless orbs where eyes should be. Bloody, purplish lips moved and William's mouth spoke in a voice not his own.
"Do you believe me now that it is I/
Or the facts do you still deny?/
I know not what else to do/
Except say "Tis is true! Tis true!"
The horrible rhyming. The giggles, the cackles. It was just like before when Hojo had met Rhythm two years ago. In Kerhiem. One of the many voidspawn whom had been summoned there. And the one whom had tormented Hojo the most.Â
But this abomination and it's kin where sealed. Trapped away. This should not be possible!
"I saw you sealed!" Hojo growled. "All of you. You werrre beaten!"
The head laughed wildly, trembling as it did so.
"Beaten true, but not defeated/
For history shall be repeated/
Me and kin are leaking out/
Thanks to many a foolish lout."
"How! You werrre hidden and sealed. Yourrr cell was hidden beyond this worrrld!" Hojo was staring down at the head as his fist clenched the haft of his axe tightly
Hojo had to know. This was wrong. All wrong.
Two years ago he and a band of exorcists and paladins had taken on a job to help protect a small hamlet deep in the mountains from a serious of attacks of a supernatural bent. But, upon arrival, the true degree of horror the town was afflicted with had become evident. For seven months the villagers and Hojo's band had slowly been devoured, possessed, or driven mad by the horrors there. In the end, it had taken a herculean effort of faith and will to defeat the horrors. Most of the survivors had perished in their efforts to ensure the ritual was completed. The ritual had bound the pack of voidspawn beyond the veil, trapped and cut off in a prison of the head priest's designs.
"Tornel bound you all! I was therrre! The prrrison was sound!"
Hojo kept saying that, trying to convince himself it was true.
The head cackled.
"Sound, sound, sound all around/
Even deep within the ground./
But you fools were all deceived/
For from this prison we are retrieved.
By those whom -she- has taught the skills/
And so upon this world we shall inflict our ills/
In exchange for obedience to her will/
And so we serve her still."
"Shut up!" Hojo roared, his anger and confusion bursting out of him as furious roar. The terrible, broken rhymes were only adding to the frustration.
"Little miqo'te almost broken,/
I see you wear the musical token./
Tell, does silence still disturb you so?/
Should have gotten over that long ago."
Hojo swallowed and he was sweating as his bell danced faster and faster in his ear as he tried to keep himself calm. He had to keep that noise going. Any noise. If the silence found him, especially now, he would lose it. And this thing might then work whatever fowl magics it would. Hojo had so many more questions. But this was not the one to ask.
"Enough!" Hojo surged forward and hefted the axe above his head.
The twisted eyes in William's skull went wide as Rhyme began to cackle wildly.
"Its seems our reunion is at an end/
We we shall meet again, that is the trend./
So till that time I laugh with you again/
I wish you well my friend."
The axe fell and the head exploded in a shower of bone fragments and grey matter. Ruined flesh and icor ran down Hojo's cheeks and he breathed wildly, frantically, the bell in his ear dancing and ringing wildly. He couldn't stop that sound. He needed that sound.
The bear of a miqo'te, whom seemed so often immune to fear, trembled wildly as he released his axe. He fell to his knees and hugged himself as he be began to choke back sobs. His eyes watered as he stared at the ground.
"Not again...not again...not again..."
Hojo clutched his head and screamed.
The fire danced in that lone, alabaster eye.
Hojo'to Zuginoch sat beside the dying flames of a small fire. His back rested against the trunk of a tree and his hands were in his lap. The sun shone through the branches above as they swayed in a steady wind that threatened to snuff out the dying fire.
The smell of roasted fruit was thick on the air and a small skillet was cooling in the dirt beside Hojo's improvised cooking fire.
The great bear of a miqo'te was lethargic and even the blinking of his eye was labored and slow. The whites of his eyes where blood shot from lack of sleep and he fought from dozing off.
The bell in his left ear flicked and he rolled his eyes open to look around.
He was beside a small, dirt road some miles from the ruin of William's estate. It had been a moonless night and Hojo had spent longer than he had intended trying to navigate by the celestial heavens. It wasn't until the sun's first rays began to illuminate the horizon that the Keeper had decided there was enough distance between himself and the burnt out husk to stop to eat and rest.
Hojo's eye saw the bag and he sniffed. Already the hint of decay could be caught around the bloody head. The smell had attracted a pair of flies whom danced in unison around the bloody sack. Hojo watched them.
Such was life. From king to beggar, in the end, everyone became ash and fly shit.
Well, unless they engaged in cavorting with the powers of the Void like William had.
Hojo leaned his head against the tree trunk, his white hair sweeping across his face as the breeze grew stronger.
Taking William's head had been both pleasure and necessity. Even before Hojo had seen the horrors the old hyur had been inflicting upon random victims, the bounty hunter had known the man to be a cult leader. The evidence had been presented to him in droves and the Keeper had happily accepted the work. But to see the way William and his cult had twisted those bodies of women and children into void warped monstrosities made his stomach sick. He took in a deep breath as he recalled having to put them out their misery.
Hojo grunted as one child's face stood out in his memory. The watery, bulging optics had looked up at him as the broken mouths that had grown across its warped flesh begged to be free of the ruined, mortal coil. Hojo had obliged the boy. Hojo could only hope the soul of the child was free of the taint his body had been forced to succumb to.
Hojo closed his eyes and sucked in another breath.
The wind blew and the fire died.
And the cackling began.
A twisted, ruined sound that was a horrible, sick imitation of mirth.
"Well, well, what a treat/
Once again we do meet/
Been time since we did talk/
One they call Zuginoch?"
Hojo's eye flared open and he surged onto his feet as if he had been struck by lighting, his armor rattling and chain mail grinding as his axe spun through his hands. His heart was hammering as he gazed around, looking frantically for the source of that voice. A voice from his past. The voice of the voidspawn he called 'Rhyme'.Â
Hojo's left ear was flicking wildly, ringing the bell bolted to it so he could hear that sweet, musical sound. The only sound that might calm him and keep his nightmares from rolling over him and consuming him.
"You!" Hojo shouted, snarling, acting more aggressive than he felt. "You can't be herrre!"
"O, now, is that a fact/
Then at whom are you yelling at/
If not here I be, then where/
Perhaps lodged in your underwear?"
The voice began to laugh and sing the last word over and over as the white ears of the miqo'te located the source of the terrible rhymes.
The bag with the head.
The sack was shuddering atop the stump and Hojo had just enough time to realize what was going on before the head rolled itself out of the bag. The severed mass of bone, brain and organs spilled onto the ground and rolled several feet before it came to rest. William's eyes flew open, revealing two, black, soulless orbs where eyes should be. Bloody, purplish lips moved and William's mouth spoke in a voice not his own.
"Do you believe me now that it is I/
Or the facts do you still deny?/
I know not what else to do/
Except say "Tis is true! Tis true!"
The horrible rhyming. The giggles, the cackles. It was just like before when Hojo had met Rhythm two years ago. In Kerhiem. One of the many voidspawn whom had been summoned there. And the one whom had tormented Hojo the most.Â
But this abomination and it's kin where sealed. Trapped away. This should not be possible!
"I saw you sealed!" Hojo growled. "All of you. You werrre beaten!"
The head laughed wildly, trembling as it did so.
"Beaten true, but not defeated/
For history shall be repeated/
Me and kin are leaking out/
Thanks to many a foolish lout."
"How! You werrre hidden and sealed. Yourrr cell was hidden beyond this worrrld!" Hojo was staring down at the head as his fist clenched the haft of his axe tightly
Hojo had to know. This was wrong. All wrong.
Two years ago he and a band of exorcists and paladins had taken on a job to help protect a small hamlet deep in the mountains from a serious of attacks of a supernatural bent. But, upon arrival, the true degree of horror the town was afflicted with had become evident. For seven months the villagers and Hojo's band had slowly been devoured, possessed, or driven mad by the horrors there. In the end, it had taken a herculean effort of faith and will to defeat the horrors. Most of the survivors had perished in their efforts to ensure the ritual was completed. The ritual had bound the pack of voidspawn beyond the veil, trapped and cut off in a prison of the head priest's designs.
"Tornel bound you all! I was therrre! The prrrison was sound!"
Hojo kept saying that, trying to convince himself it was true.
The head cackled.
"Sound, sound, sound all around/
Even deep within the ground./
But you fools were all deceived/
For from this prison we are retrieved.
By those whom -she- has taught the skills/
And so upon this world we shall inflict our ills/
In exchange for obedience to her will/
And so we serve her still."
"Shut up!" Hojo roared, his anger and confusion bursting out of him as furious roar. The terrible, broken rhymes were only adding to the frustration.
"Little miqo'te almost broken,/
I see you wear the musical token./
Tell, does silence still disturb you so?/
Should have gotten over that long ago."
Hojo swallowed and he was sweating as his bell danced faster and faster in his ear as he tried to keep himself calm. He had to keep that noise going. Any noise. If the silence found him, especially now, he would lose it. And this thing might then work whatever fowl magics it would. Hojo had so many more questions. But this was not the one to ask.
"Enough!" Hojo surged forward and hefted the axe above his head.
The twisted eyes in William's skull went wide as Rhyme began to cackle wildly.
"Its seems our reunion is at an end/
We we shall meet again, that is the trend./
So till that time I laugh with you again/
I wish you well my friend."
The axe fell and the head exploded in a shower of bone fragments and grey matter. Ruined flesh and icor ran down Hojo's cheeks and he breathed wildly, frantically, the bell in his ear dancing and ringing wildly. He couldn't stop that sound. He needed that sound.
The bear of a miqo'te, whom seemed so often immune to fear, trembled wildly as he released his axe. He fell to his knees and hugged himself as he be began to choke back sobs. His eyes watered as he stared at the ground.
"Not again...not again...not again..."
Hojo clutched his head and screamed.