The Alpha and the Omega: Act I | Chapter 3
16 Aug 2018User1355
ACT I - CONQUESTCHAPTER 3
The attack was swift, executed without regard to property or life. The Clan Talog was a proud one, stretching across the fertile northern continent and lords of several populous settlements. By dusk those settlements were smoking ruins, the roars of great flames and the cries of great suf ering echoing into the night skies. Ships and warriors littered the surface, woefully inadequate in the face of Sola Morgana’s wrath. Not even the fleeing transports bearing the young and old were spared.
Sola had personally joined in the carnage, her hand as responsible as any other for the desolation that now stretched before her. A part of her had wondered how she would feel once the bloodlust had passed- would victory or remorse have its day?
Now, she knew- and within herself the raven-haired woman felt neither. In fact she felt nothing, even as she strode amid the ash and death, flanked by her most loyal bodyguards and advisors. It was a promise that she had made to herself- that she would never ask anything of her people that she would flinch from doing herself. That she would never shield herself from the consequences of her orders. Silently the woman beheld the desolation around her. Those few who had survived the onslaught had been reduced to a subhuman state, filthy and broken and kneeling for mercy before her. Her boots- common, simple flight boots, were grey with the ashes of everything that the Clan Talog once was and would never be again.
The last traces of the girl that Sola Morgana once was felt tempted to show mercy, to take pity on those pathetic souls beneath her heel. Yet the voice that urged her to spare the survivors was only a whisper, a shadow from a despised past. A new voice slithered into her ear, a familiar one of darkness and wisdom. Its words drowned out the pleas and whimpering of those whose lives hung in the balance.
Hitherto have you come, it whispered, and only a little further until it is done.
Sola looked into the sooty eyes of those kneeling for mercy, the last embers of her heart feeling their anguish. At her sides the warriors of her clan awaited her command.
I can’t, she thought. There must be another way.
The voice within grew indignant. Of course there is, it hissed. The fool’s way. The coward’s way.
The way of one who would spend a lifetime stamping at vermin instead of cleansing their den in one fiery stoke.
Sola looked down. At her side was Arcturus, his eyes wide at the scene of misery and destruction. The presence within Sola intensified.
He will remember this for the rest of his life, it whispered. Would you have this memory of his mother and Matriarch be one of strength or weakness?
The final embers of Sola’s heart faded into the Void. Drawing herself up she gave the orders, in a voice as clear as it was commanding. Before her and her son’s eyes the once-great Clan Talog died amid the ashes of their city. Like before, Sola unsheathed her blade and partook in her own order.
And like before, Sola Morgana felt nothing.
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