CHAPTER Black Death

1351...

Exhausted, Lady Anjael looked down at the stone forms of the Britany clan she had sheltered with on and off since the Westernmost Cruor Clan of her mother was decimated. The sun was just past mid-afternoon as she landed. As one of only five day-walkers she worked both day and night to prepare for the coming battle. Gently, she lowered the woven pods holding several Vampyri to the ground. The heavy woven 'sacks' allowed them to rest and travel without the risk of sun-exposure. She was glad a few of the covens had joined the war. Their specie's initial refusal to fight against their cousins, the Nosferatu, had earned them many enemies until it was discovered the enemies of all that lived were not sparing the covens either.

"Lady Anjael," the grandson of the first Lycani Alpha King grinned at her as he unloaded Ouroboros' stone gargoyle.

"Greeting, King Arthuros." Glancing up at the afternoon sun, she asked, "Shall I bring a meal when I come back?"

The giant with him grinned, "Can you carry enough to meat and mead us both and the last of the Isle Avalon Coven?"

"Meat yes, mead no, I refuse to be near you or the smells you make after you've had mead, Giant Fyrllen," she refused with dramatic youthfulness, and those around them laughed then a rumble on the horizon drew everyone's attention.

Silence except for the distant thunder, they could see the dark clouds created by the twin devas helping the Black Death, as the army of their enemy was called. A cold wind rushed toward them carrying an oppressive feeling of hopelessness. They could almost hear the devouring gods whispering to them to surrender.

"Go to hell!" Anjael shrieked at darkness. "We're not afraid of you!"

"Easy, lass," Fyrllen said as a monk came up.

The human stared at the afront to his god and the devas of all the species here. His words here haunting, "And lo, the seal was broken and the sky rolled back like a scroll." He placed his hand gently on Anjael's trembling arm. "Find peace through prayer, my child. The lord will bless us with victory. His will be done."

"On earth as it is in heaven," Anjael added then she launched herself skyward toward the rear of the battle lines.

"Friar John, do you not find it odd that a Cruor worships your god and not the god or goddess of their own kind?" Arthuros asked. The lack of involvement of his father's goddess in this apocalypse disturbed him greatly.

"The Bibre Cruor have no deity to watch over them. It has been my honor and privilege to foster Anjael's faith as her teacher and confessor for the last three decades. Unlike others of the great church, I believe all who live have souls to be saved, including you and yours, wolf king." Friar John Began to set a tent up around the heavily woven pod holding the slumbering vampires. "I will be holding a Mass at sunset before the battle. Even though you serve a goddess, you may come, my son."

"Ye'll not convert me to your messiah, Friar, the goddess Brigid will watch over my people tonight," Fyrllen insisted then he went back to unloading the carts holding the petrified Cruor.

"I'll still pray for you," John called after the fifteen foot tall humanoid. Shaking his head, he turned from to the wolf, "And I will pray for you as well, young king."

"Thank you, Friar. I would like to think some god cares for my soul and answers my prayers. This evil has killed almost as many wolves as men," he sounded hopeless for one so young.

Friar John tipped his head at the Lycani. "I was born a Wicce, the holy mother of our lord called to me in the sacred grotto of the Abbey St Martin-du-canigou. I have served ever since. To serve those who would sacrifice themselves or their children comforts me because I know that they have also known suffering... Let me tell you about them."

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Around Anjael Anutari, the surviving clans of the Bibre Cruor roared to life, shattering the protective stone outer layer of their hides. The Lycani, Humans, and Giants had labored to place them ahead of the advance of the Black Death on two sides with Selkies and Sierens, or Merfolk as men called them, on the third, seaward side prepared to drag those who tried to escape by sea into the deep as fodder for the krakens. The Dragons, Phoenixes, Far Eastern Stone-Lion Cruor clans, and the united Griffon-Sphinx prides were attacking from behind, to burn or maul all who attempted to escape by retreating, but the bulk of hand-to-hand combat would be done by the Cruor and Giants who were mostly immune to physical and spiritual damage caused by the Deamones. The Vampyri who could not be spiritual damaged by the Unicorns and were to kill as many as they could while the Lycani, whose blood was poisonous to the Nosferatu, would destroy the undead army of necromanced humans and their sires.

It was a dangerous gambit because those fighting would have to attack and kill specific enemies while being protected by and protecting their allies from those who would harm them. The battle of skill and will was made more terrifying by the fact the Deamones outnumbered the Cruor and Giants who were the only ones who could kill them. Many had already accepted that this battle would be a battle to the death for the species involved. Untold millions had already died as the unholy alliance of Unicorns, Deamones, and Nosferatu as their mad twin gods who sought to enslave and consume all who lived on the continent.

"Niece." Ouroboros greeted her after he stretched. He laid his dark hand on her pale shoulder. "You look so much like Nyxx and Ino. Someday you will be the most beautiful of the Queens."

"She already is, Lord Ouroboros." Queen Echidna slithered up on her serpentine tail with her consort and kin. She smiled at Anjael with motherly concern, "Did you rest at all, dear child?"

"I will rest after we fight, Queen Echidna," Anjael assured her.

Echidna frowned disapprovingly then turned to Ouroboros. "You should let me send her to safety with my clan. She is too young to be here."

Shaking his head in refusal, Ouroboros insisted "She has been helping hunt feral unicorns for half a century. She can fight well enough to join the war."

"She is the youngest female of our kind after the French Eclipse Disaster, she is the future of our kind," Echidna declared as her tail vibrated in hostile agitation. "Let my kin escort her to my territory for her safety."

"Anjael shall pick up the mantle of the Western Queens. She is heir to both my sister Nyxx's territory and my half-sister Ino's territory. All of Brittanni is hers. If she goes to your Mediterranean territory, she will only be seen as a breeder."

The dozen remaining of the late Queen Ino's clan began to gather behind Ouroboros, prepared to attack the larger clan of the gorgon queen. As Ino's heir, Anjael was expected to provide them with her first eggs before honoring the traditional egg exchange between the clans.

"I would never allow such a thing," Echinda hissed at him. "Anjael is a treasure. She is like a daughter to me. She would be treated like a princess. Not forced to live among humans and worship their devas or spend her days as the companion of Lycani." She pointed at the ash-smudge of a cross on Anjael's forehead and the necklace of Lycani coins.

"They do not abuse her as your clan would," Ouroboros snarled.

"You dare disrespect me, male! Accuse me of deceit?!" Echidna shrieked, enraged by his accusation and disrespect.

"Please don't fight," Anjael begged in distress, getting between the two clans. "Uncle Ouroboros, Queen Echidna cares about me, she only wants me safe as you do... Queen Echidna, I must stay to fight in place of my mother and aunt. Thank you for being so concerned."

In the distance, a horn sounded, then another closer, then one past them. It was time.

Echidna reached out and hugged Anjael suddenly in a surprisingly human or Lycani show of affection. "Stay close to me, I will protect you."

Anjael grinned up at her. Pointed mother of pearl teeth gleamed in the moonlight. "Not if I protect you first."

Echidna's four-tailed consort Typhon interrupted with a chuckle, "I told you, my green one... She is as brave as you were in your youth. Do not worry about her. We will all watch over her."

Ouroboros pulled her away from the gorgons and dragged her skyward. In a low voice, he muttered, "Anjael, I am begging you. Be very cautious. Study Nyxx and Ino's memories of Echidna, she is not to be trusted."

The young Cruor shook her head, refuting him, "I have, and when I asked her about them, Echinda explained how her intentions were misunderstood. My mother resented breeding with Typhon to give them an egg. From her own memories, I have seen how she hoarded more eggs than she could protect."

"Anjael, Nyxx could lay many eggs because we had a clan to protect them. We did not know we would be betrayed, and the Abbey burned around us. Emerald tipped arrows were used to wound many and kill your sire. Your father and the others died so your mother and I could escape with you." Ouroboros sighed then revealed, "There were many who wanted your egg, you were the first queen egg laid in over five centuries. Do not forget when those templars kidnapped you. Someone paid them in Assyrian gold, and we still do not know whom they were waiting on to retrieve you but there are three clans..."

"Enough, Uncle... Queen Echidna would never hurt me," Anjael insisted. She slapped her wings harder to get ahead of her uncle. She was so tired of him disparaging her friends, first her Lycani companions and then the queen who befriended her and seemed to be the only one who understood the struggles Anjael was going through as the only surviving female on the western side of the continent.

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The tide of the battle was at a stalemate since the second watch and if they did not win it by dawn, the Unicorns and Deamones would have a chance to smash the sun-petrified night-walker Cruor. They were slaying the last and most powerful Deamones. A fourth of the Cruor and half the army had been slain already. So many had died tonight that her soul was in agony. From the messages transmitted across the battlefield, she knew the Griffons and Sphinxes had suffered heavy losses. The Wicce, Merfolk, and Selkies seemed to be fairing the best because the priests of the humans' messiah deva had blessed the water in someway and it was burning the flesh off the Deamones and Nosferatu.

The Principality Deamon knocked her away as Cruor Typhon attacked. Anjael collided with the Unicorn charging Arthuros and John who were fighting several Nosferatu. The Lycani maimed them as the Wicci turned priest burned them. She was badly bruise, but it was almost dawn. She grappled with the Unicorn, ripping its head off before it could clamber to its hooves.

Beating her wings, she gained altitude with her gruesome trophy then dived on the Deamon as Typhon bellowed in agony. Angeal saw in horror that the consort of Echidna had an emerald spear sticking completely through his body. She slammed the unicorn head, horn down into the Deamon's throat, then stabbed him repeatedly. Slamming the gruesome weapon into the place below the neck where the Deamon's brain rested, she continued until the horn was broken while she shrieked and trilled for Echidna to come quickly. Her talons tore the elongated muscle lined arteries from its chest and legs because Deamones had no heart. A Nosferatu tackled her, so she flipped it as she stabbed it with the broken horn. It convulsed and foamed at the mouth and from the wound. When it was dead, she ran over to Typhon, while covered in the Principality's thick black blood.

"Echidna, hurry! Your consort is dying." Anjeal shrieked above the cacophony of the battle then murmured, "Hold on, Typhon. She'll come... hold on!" Staring at the emerald spearhead and emerald encrusted shaft, Anjael sobbed.

"You look so much... like your mother," Typhon wheezed out. He touched her cheek, leaving a streak of blood. "Tell Echidna, I accept my death and the truth of my place in her heart."

"I'll tell her, I promise."

"You are... too kind." Typhon murmured as Friar John and Lycani King Arthuros reached her.

"I can give you my blood, Consort Typhon. You'll heal," Arthuros offered quickly.

"Too late... Listen, wolf, don't... don't let... Anjael... go east." He died but there wasn't a moment to mourn because another higher Deamon charged them.

"No!" Anjael cried then she ripped the emerald spear from his body. "Give him last rites," she snarled at Friar John as she stalked toward the last Deamon close to her.

The three Cruor who had been battling it were lying on the bloody earth like they were dead. She ignored the burn of emerald against her palm as she wielded the spear like a polearm. The Deamon screamed as she sliced and stabbed it.

"How... how can you touch that, Cruor Queen?" It demanded as she leapt back from its thrashing tail.

"I am not like other queens," Anjael snarled then she stabbed it below the neck and drove it backwards.

As it fell over it seized her by the waist to fling her away, but her toe-claws anchored her to it. It kept punching her until she coughed blood as she stabbed it again and again.

"Anjael!" Arthuros shouted then he jumped to the Deamon stabbing it with a Unicorn's horn.

"Get back," she shouted as it tried to knock the Lycani's soul from his body. Her wing blocked the blow, but the wing joint cracked like the snap of a whip. She screamed then slammed her fist on the protruding horn. The Deamon collapsed.

Friar John rushed up to it, pouring blessed water on its head and praying. The water boiled on the profane flesh as Anjael yanked the emerald spear out. She looked at Arthuros and demanded, "Gather all the Unicorn horns you can. We need them to kill the higher Deamons."

She trilled, whistled, and clicked her discovery to the other Bibre Cruor. Arthuros howled the information to the surviving Lycani as she shouted to the Vampyri to spread the word. At last, they had a way to kill the Deamones without dismembering them. The last hour of the battle was bloodier than the eight before. Packs of Lycani and groups of Human and Vampyri Knights used the horns taken from the corpses of the Unicorns to slay the remaining Nosferatu as the Cruor attacked the Deamones. As the sun rose, the Black Death was defeated.

Modern Times...

Anjael inhaled as she woke when the plane landed in Las Vegas. The twin devas fled after maiming three of their kind. No Nosferatu survived the battle.The Deamones and Unicorn were reduced to the point they would be hunted into extinction over the next century. Three other species were pushed beyond the cusp of survival, Sphinxes, Giants, and Griffons all became extinct. She wondered if the Sunwolf and his burning aura meant a Deva she and her tiny clan once banished was back.

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