[Suzerain of Sheol]

Even as he drove his sword through the first fiend's viscid heart – splitting the plates of its mottled, exoskeletal breastbone and driving downward – its sibling's axe descended behind Kyarr in a crashing arc. He twisted in desperation, letting go his hold on his own weapon and dropping to his knees, but the blow was true, driven with unholy strength through shrieking air and into Kyarr's back.

His face collided with the charred and bloody tiles of the chapel. There was no sound, and for a moment Kyarr was aware only of the ruin of his body, the concussive squall of pain riding from a snapped spine, from organs lacerated by molten links of burst maille, punctured lungs and shattered ribs, rising in a convulsive gasp that spewed wet, red vomit.

He realized his eyes were open, and the last sight of his mortal moments would be her. It was all he could ask for at the end – he'd followed her as far as he could, and to look upon her now, as the life poured from him by seconds...

Skeye stood defiant before the Apostate as his black power assailed her – he could not touch her, and she would never fall here. Kyarr smiled, weak and wet. She was glorious. Theurgy wrapped his sister in a chrysalis of prismatic lightning, writhing over her armor and weeping from her sword. The sigh of thunder and judgment in her every breath. A spear of power streaked scorching over where Kyarr lay and struck the demon that had laid him open and rendered it to ash.

She looked briefly in his direction, only barely met his gaze as a spasm of black-sparking anguish wracked him and his eyes seized shut. Kyarr screamed what he knew would be his last breath...

And awoke to sunlight.

Drew another breath. Without pain.

A clear sky greeted Kyarr as his eyes slid open, and he could hear the chatter of mockingbirds nearby. Taking a moment to assure himself that he was, in fact, alive, Kyarr sat up from the wild grass and dared to touch his back.

His fingers met bare flesh, but whole. He could feel the tattered edges of his maille, rent and useless, describing the extent of the wound he'd taken.

I should not be alive.

Peeling off the wreckage of his armor, Kyarr looked to the forest around him, but recognized nothing. The lands around the monastery at Eroth had been naked plains, dotted with settlements and heavily trafficked. Wherever he was, Skeye was not here, that much was evident. He could feel her absence as a palpable thing, and almost crumpled at the thought.

If this is Heaven, it will be... lonely.

The wind began to stir,and Kyarr forced himself to move along the trail that led into the trees, as much to avoid thinking of his plight as hope of finding civilization. He wasn't sure he wanted to see a living soul out here, wherever it was.

An hour later, he was deep among the woods, the sun a mere suggestion of day above the thick boughs. Kyarr was aware of his lack of provisions, but he'd seen precious little that he might eat, and no sign of water thus far. The thought was driven from his mind, though, as he rounded a great elm and came to a sparse clearing.

Something is dead here, he realized, inhaling the smell of rot. It took Kyarr a moment to discover the source of the stench, seeing no fallen bodies, but the sight of it when he did was enough to give him pause.

It had been a child, before someone had mutilated it beyond almost any recognition. Spear-sharp stakes had been driven through its wrists, holding it aloft between the trees like a carious marionette. The top of its skull from the bottom of its eyes had been flayed to bone and the crown of the child's brow sawn open. The killer had driven an azure candle into the wound, though the significance of it was lost on Kyarr.

Perhaps this is Hell, instead....

He had seen worse, the mauled and eaten corpses of Eroth's clergy, for one; nonetheless, though, he felt bile rising behind his throat the longer he looked at the savage scene. He made to turn away, but a movement in the brush left him frozen still, eyes darting, hand reaching for his sword only to slap against the empty scabbard at his belt.

Kyarr glanced around the clearing, seeing no obvious avenue of escape, and planted his feet, braced for whatever it was that stalked him. The corpse was far too long dead for it to be the killer, but even so, or perhaps because of it, he was wary for the first time since waking up in this strange place.