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-
-
- S h a d o w S t a l k e r
- **
- P a r t - O n e
-
- by Keith Smith
-
-
- A dark, massive citadel looms over the horizon line. Evil
- dwells within. These are the times of Shadow Stalker. A dark and
- evil time.....
- With a massive crash of metal against wood the drawbridge
- comes crashing down to the ground. With a rattle the main gates come
- open. Out tramps a large company of hill and frost giants. Leading the
- column is a hill giant clad in chain mail with six dire wolves
- running around his feet. A long oaken club bound in bands of mithral rests
- upon his shoulders as he strides across the drawbridge. Around his
- neck is a band of mithral.
- In the deepest, darkest shadows at the base of the citadel a
- dark rip starts developing in the very substance of the shadows. A
- tall, black robed figure exits the rip. He looks at the troops
- marching out from the citadel. He then examines the fortress itself. A
- white flag flutters highest in the wind upon the tallest tower. It is
- white with a spray of silver frost on its surface. Lower down is a
- flag of brown with a symbol of a dark rock.
- He then chants a few mystic words and cups his hands together.
- A ball of shadowy blackness appears in his hand. He throws it towards
- the gate. It sails slowly through the air. It reaches the gate. The
- globe billows forth to grow. It instantly destroys the poisonous
- contents of the moat. A vast scintillating silver-black to grey oval
- totally blocks the gate.
- The shadowy figure is gone, thru the rift in shadow. . . .
-
-
- S h a d o w S t a l k e r
- **
- P a r t - T w o
-
-
- Deep in the depths of the Citadel. A group meets in quiet.
- "Deathnight and Grandmaster have you found out who hasss
- blocked are gateway so thoughly," hissed Bloodclaw, his pale undead
- shimmering the moonlight.
- "I've found no clue, Bloodclaw," whispers Deathnight, quietly.
- "I have discovered something thru my resources," Grandmaster
- states unemotioniously.
- "Welll, what did you find!," snarles Bloodclaw.
- "This unknown being made his escape via the shadow plane,
- that's all we were able to discover. All divination methods have
- failed utterly to find one clue about this shadow being, that's all we
- were able to find out."
- "This isn't good enough!, the GrandLord won't be pleased with
- you. You must find and exterminate this pest to us!, NOW!." Bloodclaw
- pulsed with red light . . .
-
- S h a d o w S t a l k e r
- **
- P a r t - T w o (2)
-
-
- The clear, merry, bubbling of the brook soothed the nerves of
- the beautiful, silver-white creature. She slowly lowered her neck to
- the brook, gently sipping water from the crystal clear stream. Her
- ears flicked up to better catch a soft sound she could faintly
- hear....no further sound was made over the sounds of the forest. Her
- neck reached down for another drink. The water, gently soothing the
- parchness of her throat. She shifted her four hooves to become more
- "I have you now, pretty unicorn!" A hand to a 26 foot tall
- giant points at her. A bolt of crackling negative energy pulses to
- strike the unicorn in the side. Her pure white coat fades to grey as
- the bolt saps at her life energies. She can barely move herself, the
- drain is to much. A cruel face leers down at her.
- "Before you die, I want you to know that Maelstrom is your
- undoing!", laughter belows across the confines of the clearing. A
- lightning bolt cracks forth to finish the unicorn off.
- "A storm giant....?", she saids to herself. "Why?"
- She dies on the cool forest floor.
-
-
- S h a d o w S t a l k e r
- **
- P a r t - T h r e e
-
- A massive maelstrom, of silvery black, swirls through the
- plane of shadow. That place where negative and positive energies meet,
- to form - shadow, neither light nor dark but somewhere in between. A
- black cloaked figure seemingly strides through mid-air, if shadow can
- be known to have such. His pace is swift and sure as he moves through
- the stuff of shadow. He pauses, he looks at his surroundings. Nothing
- moves in the eternal twilight. His black eyes stare with intense
- concentration.
- Pulling forth a wand of black adamantite tipped with a milky
- white gem, he barks a command. The gem begins to pulsate, slowly, with
- grey light. The dark-robed figure holds the wand before him and begins
- to trace a large oval with it. Glowing, whit light follows it's path
- through the air. He scribes runes upon the edges of the oval.
- White-silver light rushes in to fill the oval. The surface of the
- glowing outline shimmers and turns totally clear revealing the world
- he had taken leave of. . .
-
-
- In the dark of the night, when the power of darkness is
- greatest, a force of evil gathers. The stillness of this black is
- broken by the quiet hissing of dragon's wings.
- The first to arrive, a red dragon, swifebony running through
- it's core. He crosses his arms, cover in red dragon mail, and waits
- for his fellows to arrive. . .
-
-
- rider. The GrandLord Redscar dismounts from his mount, Firefang. He
- crosses over the graves of fallen to stand at the head of an unholy
- altar; glistening purple with veins of deepest b
-
- S h a d o w S t a l k e r
- **
- P a r t - F o u r
-
- In the dark of the night, when the power of darkness is
- greatest, a force of evil gathers. The stillness of this ebon night is
- broken by the quiet hissing of a dragon's wings.
- Arriving on the night's wind a great wyrm, red dragon, swiftly
- glides to the ground. GrandLord Redscar dismounts from his massive
- mount, Firefang. He crosses over the graves of the fallen to stand at
- the head of an unholy altar; glistening ribbons of purple with veins
- of deep black running through the core.
- He crosses his arms, covered in red dragon mail. Bloodly red
- light seeps from his form, as his cambion face leers at night sky. He
- raises his palms as he summons his fellows.
- A pillar of black light, oozes forth from his palms, visible
- only to evil. To those of evil the light seems to pulse out a summons,
- only to a select few. They are here. They are here. . .
-
- S h a d o w S t a l k e r
- **
- P a r t - F o u r
-
-
-
- One bright morning, inside an inn's room, in a fairly normal town...
-
- "I heard plenty of noise from the dogs outside last night Kila, were
- you up to your usual naughtyness?," he said while staring at the grey furred
- lynx standing in front of him. "You know that your rompings a night get
- us in trouble with the locals. It would be good if we left town for a while,
- besides, there's no work here and I'm getting a little bored, what do you
- think?"
- He knows people usually look strangely at him, as it isn't an
- everyday event that somebody with a lynx walks into town, "talking" with it.
- Or for that matter that a cat should be chasing away dogs instead of the other
- way around.
- Taaka gathers all his stuff, hangs his faithful longsword on his belt,
- then ever so carefully hangs his ten daggers around his waist. He then dons his
-
- cloak atop his leather armor; he wears a cloak over himself to obsure the fact
- that he is carrying ten daggers. Why look for trouble.
- Taaka takes a little gold neckchain with a ring on it and puts it
- around his neck.
- "This little thing has saved me plenty of times, hasen't it Kila?," he
- murmurs while he finishes puttingng everything in his backpack. Taaka then
- walks down stairs.
- "Two breakfasts," he tells the bartender.
- "Dat cat ain't gonna to eat on the table, it ain't allowed"
- "You better allow it, or I'll have to let her prance into your
- kitchen and let her help herself, free of charge."
- The bartender looks at Kila, who has a certain malicious grin on her
- face, did she really understand what he was saying?
- "I'd better bring two rations right now, did you see what she did to
- the dogs last night?"
-
- Taaka left two silver coins on the table, pulled his cloak over his
- head and went out to his horse.
- "C'mon Kila, jump! That's it"
- His horse had already grown accustomed to the cat riding behind the
- boy, in fact, he had fashioned a leather mat where she could hold on tight
- without hurting the horse; it's a rather strange sight and he knows that
- people stare at him alot when he's around, but it only makes him smile to
- himself.
- Already out of town, Taaka is peacefully riding down a lonely
- road when a little boy comes running up to him.
- "Sir!, Sir! Help us!"
- "What the...", Taaka turns his horse around and sees the little boy,
- about eight years old, running toward him.
- "What's wrong?", he asks.
- "Four bad men are in my house, and my father is very hurt, my mom
- pulled him into the cellar so they wouldn't hurt him any more. You have to
- help us."
- Taaka dismounts his horse and gives it to the boy.
- "Here, keep the horse with you, don't follow me, because it is very
- dangerous and I don't want you to get into trouble too." He then walked over
- to a small span of trees, abnormally dark and dense for such a little area.
- Kila stalked silently behind him at a safe distance to watch for ambushes.
- "Hmm.. It's quite dark, I wonder, it look good for an ambush..," he
- barely finished saying that when suddenly.
- "Argh!! My eyes! HEEELPP!! Take this beast away from me!," as Kila
- appeared from behind a tree with blood on her claws and teeth.
- "It cost him dearly to follow the boy, didn't it?," he said with a
- smile on his face, "Thanks Kila"
- "Look, I can see the house, I suppose thet the other's are inside, I
- think we should go around the house, or charge inside, or...," a women's voice
-
- suddenly sends a shout into the air.
- "No time to think, run Kila!"
- Running as fast as he could, he bashes the door clean off the hinges,
- longsword in one hand, dagger in the other.
- "I was waiting for you, you fool!," a voice said from beside the
- entrance, when suddenly Kila jumped out of nowhere on to the attacker's head,
- tearing into the man's neck and eyes with her claws and teeth.
- "One down, now it's your turn," he said as he turned to the man with
- the woman, when he saw the other on unseathing his sword; the sound of a blade
-
- through the air made his legs instinctively retract, lowering his head enough
- to free himself from the hit. He lifted his blade up and plunged it deep into
- his assailant, at the same time as he got up and with a flick of his left wrist
-
- sent the dagger deep into the third one's forehead, quieting him forever. None
- remained alive, that was quite normal when he had a job to do, for when his
- instincts took over his body in combat it was too late for the opponents to get
-
- away, maybe someday even too late for him to get away from his own instincts.
- He went to the man, obiously the boy's father, and lifted him with
- ease, placing him upon the bed.
- It's going to take awhile for him to recover, but he is strong, give
- him plenty of rest, and maybe by tomorrow he'll be able to sit, although he'll
-
- hurt all over," he said to the man's wife.
- "WHat is that?," she said looking at Kila.
- "*She* is Kila, she's my companion, she isn't normally violent, neither
-
- am I, but sometimes strong measures are called for. I'll help you clean up, let
-
- me take this garbage out," he said. Referring to the bandits bodies.
-
- It was now well into the afternoon.
- "Thank you for the meal, 'twas delicious, it's been some time
- since I've eaten in a real home."
- "You're welcome to stay for a few day if you want to," the boy's mom
- told Taaka.
- "Yes! Please stay!," said the little boy.
- Taaka got down so as to be the same height as the boy and said, "Sorry,
-
- I can't, I have to go to the next town to look for a job, besides, Kila here
- would get restless in a few days if she doesn't get any dogs to chase around,"
-
- he said smiling.
- "Will you come back later then?"
- "Maybe, some day we'll meet again, ok?"
- "Ok.. But when I'm older you'll have to teach me to use swords and
- things like you do, promise?"
- "Ok, I promise..," he said as he took the boys arm and saluted him as
- rangers and scouts do, by grabbing their forearms.
- Then he got up and went outside to his horse.
- "It's your job to take care of your mother until your father's well,
- ok? "
- "Ok," said the boy as he waved good-bye to Taaka.
-
- After several hours of riding Taaka came to were the next town was
- suppossed to be. Instead of the town, there was merely a small clump of trees,
-
- black with silver leaves. With a deeper blackness within the center of the
- trees.
- "What do you think Kila?," but she was busy looking at the surroundings
-
- , into the trees; it was already dark and in the tiny forest they were going to
-
- cross there was a even darker spot, straight in front of them, and in the
- process of paying too close of attension to their immediate surroundings they
- didn't notice that they had ridden straight into the ebon oval.
- Suddenly, everything was different. . .
-
- Deep into the gateway they were sucked. Images for many worlds
- and places flashed before their eyes as they came closer to the end of
- their trip. With a trail of shimmering radience they exited the other
- end of the gateway and found themselves within an empty moat and above
- rose the Citadel. And in front of it's main gate was the same
- shimmering black oval that they had passed though.
-
- "Where are we Kila?," Taaka asks his cat.
-
-