Dark, brooding storms lined the horizon distantly visible through the small casement window of the study, storms broken with frequent flashes of flickering light to be followed all too soon by deep, threatening rumbles that shook the window's stained glass.
Oliviana Farseer sat at her candlelit study table, paying no heed to the storm, when her sister returned to the abandoned house they were using. Ghillie Farseer was a Grandmaster Blackguard, expert infiltrator and scout for the armies of Order. The sisters were identical twins though their skills were quite contrasting; for as long as Ghillie could remember they had worked together, combining their abilities to combat the forces of Chaos. They had, at the outset, been tasked, by Queen Adrianne to both infiltrate and research the ongoing threat imposed by the undead forces of Xeru, the Arbiter of Mayong - their part in the war that had been raging for several years - but Xeru was no longer their target; their objective had shifted some years ago when they had discovered a new, dark and powerful threat.
That was Ghillie's sister's expertise; discovering and researching dark and powerful magics of evil. Ghillie fondly acknowledged that her twin sister was quite good at it, not that Livi - as she was known - would ever accept such praise for her work. At least, Ghillie thought, the old Livi wouldn't have.
As Ghillie stepped through the door into the makeshift study, a small room cluttered with parchments and ancient tomes strewn over mostly disused furniture, her sister turned to her to exclaim "I've found it!" with an exultant, almost ecstatic cry. "I've deciphered a method to weaken the barrier!"
With all the dramatic timing of a lead actress entering stage right in the climatic final scene of a bard's play, the heavens outside of the house erupted with a flash of lightning and an immediate shaking boom of thunder as the last word escaped Livi's curled lips. The light flooded and flickered through the window and framed her features, for that split second rendering her beautiful face into a twisted grimace, seemingly unrecognisable from the face Ghillie had known all her life.
Ghillie stepped into the room and approached Livi, noticing her wide eyes were glowing in the contrasting darkness after the thunder clap had subsided. No longer glowing with Livi's usual happy shine or the bright optimism she showed when she'd previously discovered something through her research, but a feverish, slightly sickly fervour.
Ghillie thought back to when they had embarked upon their current quest, five years past almost to the day. They had begun their journey with a routine expedition into the lands of Discord, beyond the Wall of Slaughter and into the darker, gloomier regions of the realm. It had been then that Livi first sensed the power she had now studied since that day; Ghillie surmised that it could only be a determination of fate that they had happened across that otherwise inconspicuous cliffside wall, not unlike any other found in the area.
Livi had stopped suddenly that day, her head turned askew as a bird might stop to ponder the sighting of a distant worm. This particular worm would prove to be infinitely more elusive, however.
"It's singing," Livi had said then, a look of wonderment dancing across her dark features, her silvery white hair swaying in the harsh, icy wind that funneled through the deep ravine. "The stone is singing, sister. Its song is unlike any I have ever heard."
Ghillie had looked to the stone face of the ravine as her sister placed her hand and cheek against it, like a lover might rest upon the chest of their betrothed. It looked like any other stone face in the ravine but her sister had a way; she always found echos of magic and power, past, present or yet to be. Ghillie approached the wall and asked "What is it you sense?"
Her twin seemed momentarily lost for half a moment and then her attention snapped back to Ghillie. In that moment, Livi was all business and focus again; she drew back from the wall, uttered a chant beneath her breath - starting as a silvery whisper calling to the spirits familiar to their family for generations - then rising to a swirling crescendo, seemingly louder than the echoing winds that rushed through them. With the last syllable, she slapped her palms against the wall, a roaring flash of spiralling green magic splintering outwards from her fingers in the form of an ancient rune.
Ghillie's breath caught in her throat. For a moment nothing happened. Then the wall shook, seemed to bulge out against Livi's runes and was just as suddenly still again.
"Nothing?" she asked Livi.
"Not nothing," was the quiet reply. "There's something here, or there will be, and we're not intended to discover it."
"I don't like it, Livi."
"Nor I, sister," Livi whispered. "But I will discover its purpose and I will uncover what it is hiding from us."
Ghillie reflected now on her sister's determination, a strength of will that pushed her to consume the last five years of her life for the promise she had made that day. She had since identified the source of the power that formed the anomaly they'd discovered - the barrier, she had called it - as a dark and ominously powerful force named the Blight. It was a power steeped in corruption and sickness, undeniably evil at the core. That discovery had lead them both to the inevitable conclusion that the barrier was hiding, or protecting, a threat.
Now, in the dusty study, her sister had deciphered a way through. All thoughts of the past dissolved instantly, the objective now clear; they left immediately.
Their journey provided some time for Ghillie to reflect on her sister, for conversation was in short supply. She had changed over the last few years. It was as though her study of the Blight had exposed Livi to its corruption. It had slowly twisted her inwards, gradually taking her sister, energetic and personable, and replacing her with someone else; someone darker. Ghillie's growing concern for her sister was initially dismissed by others, including Livi herself, and their need ever justified the risk. Now was the moment that maybe presented the opportunity to finish this quest and allow them both the chance to end whatever it was that was tainting her.
They arrived at the barrier late on the following day as the sun slid from view. Luclin was weakly shining its light through roiling, heavy clouds above. Livi approached the wall and produced a runestone that she had created; the result of her years of research. She had once told Ghillie that it provided her foresight into the barrier's eternally shifting phases, so that she might break through. She held the runestone against the wall and began casting a spell. The clouds began to boil, funnel and coalesce, as though the elements were reacting to Livi's spell. Lightning began striking at the rock face above them with a showering of splinters and shards of stone. Livi's glowing green rune appeared on the stone, spinning and convulsing as a groaning rumble began to emit from all around them.
Then there was another rune, beneath the green; an incandescent, shuddering orange-red hue that pulsed and rippled beneath, between and over Livi's. Then, suddenly, it was gone; in its place, a rift opened up in the rock face, a splintered black hole with green, flickering flames curling along its edges.
Livi stepped back, her face slick with perspiration, her eyes burning with steely conviction. The rift was shaking, unsteady; even Ghillie knew it wouldn't remain open for long.
"We must go through now, Livi," she urged her sister. "Before it closes!"
Livi shook her head and turned to look at Ghillie. "It's not strong enough to carry us both through. I must go alone," she stated flatly, her voice carrying as much emotion as someone explaining the snows came in the winter and the sun rose in the morning.
Ghillie pleaded for her to stay, to wait until they could create a way to permanently break open the barrier but she knew her pleas were futile; her sister was going through alone and nothing Ghillie said registered, nor did it matter.
Livi turned away from her twin, a small, almost imperceptible smile touched the corner of her lips and then she was gone. As she stepped through the rift, it immediately collapsed behind her, shuddered, twisted into a tiny particle of green fire and vanished. The clouds dissipated, the roaring wind fell, Luclin's light bathed the rock face and all was silent.
Ghillie exhaled slowly, now alone in the ravine. She waited for something, for some sign, for her sister to return and tell her everything was right again but nothing happened. Hours passed, turning to days. Three whole days had passed when Ghillie, running low on supplies, began to prepare herself to turn away, to abandon her sister...
Rumbling came first; low and distant. Tremors shuddered through the earth and stone, fragments of rock began tearing from the cliff side. Something had happened. Ghillie stood up, armed herself and took a defensive stance and watched as the rock ripped into two before her eyes. Green fire, orange-red fire and a sickly black ooze spilled out from the rift with a dark, echoing screech of something impossibly massive tearing apart from beyond the barrier. The earth at her feet and the rocks surrounding her charred and rotted, suddenly covered with a festering lichen.
Then silence again. The rift remained, fluctuating and undulating but nonetheless stable. Her sister must have somehow broken the barrier from inside, she was sure of it.
Ghillie's muscles tensed as she poised to throw herself through the portal. She hesitated; what if whatever lay beyond the barrier was too powerful for her to face alone? It quickly became clear to her that this might be the only chance she had to save her sister. She needed help.
But who could possibly help her beyond the barrier? Who had the strength to defeat the Blight?
