The breaking of a man..

[Hugo]

[This story is OOC information and would not be known unless you were involved]

The Templar led in his cell, bound and gagged and still glancing around for some vague hope of escape although it was clearly impossible. Even if he could break free of the ropes that bound him, the heavy iron door would have halted his escape. The dank conditions aggravated his numerous wounds, and he winced; he would have cried out but was stopped by his burning desire not to show weakness in front of the men he would have formerly called his allies and congregation.

He pondered how he had gotten himself into this predicament; though, he never once questioned his faith. He rationalized it the same way he always did, that it was Avatar's will and a test of him. But this time, his eye was caught by a puddle. He could not help but stare intently at himself in the reflection with his one remaining eye in the small murky puddle in the corner of the cell. For the first time, he saw what he had become. His face was burnt and scarred, the right side had adopted the texture of melted candle wax, and he had only one eye remaining. An eye that once held zeal and a burning flame within it, was now just the same as all others.

He glanced down himself further, looking to his once proud tattered tunic and the numerous broken seals. They could barely even be called seals now, they were just dangling shreds of parchment attached by broken red blobs. These seals had warded off evil for so long.  His equally once proud armour was dented and rusted, coloured black in some places with ash and soot as well as now being laced with blood. He tried to avoid thinking of the ancestors who wore this armour, and how he was now failing them.

He freed his one remaining hand from the binds, and clenched the battered heavy oak ankh around his neck, before glancing back to the puddle. He stared at the reflection for a long time although no thoughts really went through his head. Suddenly the reflection was shattered by a thousand ripples. What was this; he started to question in his mind, and as the water became still and calm once more he saw a sight he had never seen. A droplet of moisture in his one eye. Could it be .. A tear?

Hugo dismissed the thought; if anyone else would have suggested such he would have surely had them burnt for heresy. As much as he struggled to deny it in his head, the man of unshakable faith was being pushed to the limit, and maybe even, beyond it.

Images of deeds past danced across his field of vision; he saw burnings and hangings; towns destroyed and children maimed. All these deeds which had at the time seemed so righteous and clear to him now tormented him, stabbing at his heart, deep to the core. The faces of dozens of frightened citizens flickered in his mind, and he struggled against the ropes that bound him, but it was no use. He suddenly felt so very cold. Was it a drop in temperature or did he .. Feel something?

He moved his one free hand down to his belt and looked to the Avatars scriptures. The tome was badly burnt and the pages blood splattered and torn. He opened it eagerly, looking to find reassurance, but there was none to be found. Just empty words. He began to read. "In the beginning, Avatar created man in his own image.." the zeal that usually filled his heart as he read these words was dispelled, and there was just nothing, but a dull pain growing ever and ever stronger.

A rat scurried across the floor, squeaking very quietly, almost so quietly it didn't break the silence of the cell. Hugo scoffed, and returned to his thoughts. Had Avatar really wanted him to be here..? Had Avatar really wanted him to be burned so badly? Had Avatar really willed those victims dead? What of the Order? Where were they now? He looked to the rat. Even the rat was free, Hugo was not.

His questions assumed a new form, he for the first time, tried to contemplate what life for them outside of the Order could have been. What they could have achieved for the people of Sosaria? Great deeds, perhaps? What could he himself done? His thoughts for the past months had been so clouded with his burning desire to subdue the people of Cove and kill the Baron and Commander he hadn't even the time to consider where they had gotten to.

He writhed, now in totally agony. The cutting of his knees, or the breaking of his foot he could deal with. Such injuries he had received a thousand times in the field of battle against Avatars foes. But the cutting and breaking of his heart? He could do nothing against this. And this was a wound, he felt, that was a mortal one indeed.

The cell began to spin, he could hear his own voice inside his head, a desperate defence against this onslaught from a new enemy inside himself. "Emotions are guises of the Guardian.." the voice rang out. "I am Sir Hugo, I am devoid of such things." He remembered saying these things, in days of old.

The pain in his heart intensified, the faces of his victims became more and more clear. The deeds he had done. The deeds of Avatar... The scripture he held in his hand, half fell, half dropped into the puddle; the murky water splattering everywhere.

He looked around the darkened room, even the rat had gone now. And for the first time in his life he finally felt, alone. Even though the room was devoid of light, it was getting darker and darker rapidly. An unnatural dark. A dimness within his very vision.

Was this.. Could it be... Death? Had the Templar finally fallen into the abyss he had preached so radically against..?

He extended a hand for the scripture but the room seemed to elongate and the tome remained out of his reach. He had reached for the stars, and he had fallen short. Avatar was too far away to help him now. Everything was just slightly out of his reach. He saw now for his entire life this had been the case. His quest had been as the tome, just a small distance too far.

He let out a silent sob, a cry of muffled agony. He extended a gauntleted hand upwards towards the celling of the cell, but it fell to the ground, clattering against the hard stone, muddy and mossy floor. His head fell back, smashing against the floor shortly after.

Had that reach for the celling been a final gesture by Avatars most loyal servant..?

[Darath Mithar]

[OOC:] Amazing story mate!

[Samuel West]

[ooc] It was a very fun event [/ooc]

[Calico]

OOC: *cooos wide-eyed at the tale*

[Bayne]

From the dank, cold hewn stone of the dungeon wall, a figure watched and waited, his visage cloaked in shadow. Weary sapphire eyes held the broken Preceptor, unmoved by his death throes, his conquered spirit.

He had once served this man, this disciple of light. Defended the name of his church and on his word killed guilty and innocent as one, like they were no more than the carrion rats that darted to and fro about his feet.
At this notion the knight chuckled silently to himself; mayhaps these rats held the chained souls of those innocents, waiting patiently as he now waited, eager to feast on the once sacred flesh of this fiend who had ordered their wrongful demise. "Irony walks hand in hand with death it seems..." he muttered beneath his breath, each word rising beside the warm vapours, fighting against the bitter chill of the dungeon air in futile desperation but fading away to nothing. Mute.

Still the knight waited, watching intently as the barely recognisable form of Ser Hugo reached up to the shadows of his unlit cell. Clawing for an answer from the God he called 'his own.' Slowly and silently Mikael stepped forward to the cell door, each step measured with grace and purpose, like some solemn coffin bearer, carrying his former Lord to rest.
His gaze passing between the cold bars of the grate, he could see that life had finally left the Preceptor’s shattered guise. Yet Mikael could feel the force of his spirit close by, lingering on in this world to hear a last visitor. A last subject, come to offer confession. The knight smirked and spoke aloud, "I have your answer Sir. You call out for him and wonder why he will not show. Why he will not return to these lands and save the life and spirit of his most loyal servant yes?" the knight paused to smile, content to know that his Lord now listened to his every word. His sermon, "Do not think he does not watch you, he is here in part I know it. Yet what drove his love, his forgiveness away from you was indeed this reckless belief you held so dear. This belief that you were above all others in his eyes. For it is certain the Avatar holds no man above another. To him we are all equal. He created man in his image, we are his children.
I was a fool to follow your judgement. A blind fool. You sent me to a war with no purpose or end and I went without question. You named it ‘holy’ and so I marched. In your name I cast the blood of innocents. I put entire nations to the sword because they stood in defiance of you and in turn I watched my friends and comrades die in vain, offering their lives in hopeless battles with hopeless causes. I am the last of your order Sir Hugo. I am the final, dying echoes of the chance you had in this world. Consider this, in the flames of the Abyss." With that the knight turned from the bound iron door, his plate armour scraping like chalk along the rough, unforgiving stone steps of the dungeon.