In an instant, it seemed as if Turquine filled the room, not physically, for he remained much the same size, but in sheer presence. The effect was utter and stifling, the inhuman form pressing hard on Galahad's very psyche, threatening to shatter it.
Galahad started to run, not away from the abomination, but towards it. Every instinct, hardwired into him by centuries of evolution, told him to run, but to run was to submit to death. He knew this as instinctively as the baked in need to flee. He could see the whip-arm, moving of its own accord, as if driven by thought or magic.
The weapon came down, cutting through air, so fast it would slice flesh from bone. It was so fast Galahad could barely perceive it. An Astartes or Aeldari would be able to follow it perfectly, but Galahad had to rely on instinct, faith, and most of all courage.
He sprang to the side, feeling the whip just missing his skin. He swung out with his sword and hacked open Sir Turquine's leg. The flesh was unyielding, and the sword was sharp yet of mortal make. Galahad had to wrench it to force it through, the wound heavy and gushing blood.
Somehow, Galahad was ready for the counter-attack. He leaned back just enough so Turquine's own sword barely grazed his throat. The instant the sword passed, he pressed the attack, unwilling to back down.
It was like attacking a mountain, Turquine didn't give ground even as Galahad cut into him. His blood flew everywhere as Galahad chopped and slashed. The occasional blow was languid, and easy to dodge.
There was a rising giggle through the air. Galahad got the sense he was being mocked, that he might as well be hacking down a tree with a kitchen knife. At last he hesitated, his heedless courage arrested.
It wasn't the voice of Turquine that giggled and screamed and laughed. Yet it also very clearly was.
"You hesitate." A different, more masculine, voice rumbled under the other voice. "You are weak."
The whip-arm seemed to move with a life of its own, wrapping suddenly and painfully around his leg. The pain was immediate and blood flowed thickly down Galahad's leg.
"Perhaps you could have grown to be a true knight, but right now you are just a whelp, and whelps get their heads torn off and their organs devoured. They are nothing, at most you exist to pleasure the faithful of Slaanesh." The whip pulled and yanked Galahad upwards. Blood splattering onto the floor.
Galahad didn't scream. He dropped his sword so it clattered on the floor, chipping near a notch on its edge.
Turquine slowly raised his own blade, and brought it down slowly and languidly, just missing. Each stroke came closer and closer. The anticipation of pain was as tortuous as the true stroke. It would drive many of the boldest of men to terror and distraction.
In this moment, Galahad showed his true mettle. He didn't succumb to panic. Fear had hung over him the entire time, and he had never let it consume him. Even as his blood rushed into his head, he was calmly aware that he had one more weapon on hand, though it hadn't seemed like a weapon when it was given to him.
Distracted by his drive to torture, Turquine didn't notice as Galahad unwound the Tuathan rope from around his waist. The tool, woven in arcane fashion from the very hair of Galahad's strange benefactor, was still tied into a loop from when he had used it to climb into the keep. What he did next was instant, he didn't even consider if it would work.
He threw the rope, so it looped perfectly around the Chaos Lord's neck. In the perfect instance of imbalance he pulled down as hard as he could. He let out a sound now, a guttural grunt of exertion, as he yanked upon the rope. It felt as if more than mere physical meat was held against him.
Yet he refused to surrender, and as he pulled Turquine staggered, unbalanced as he raised his blade. He didn't fall over, but he stumbled, sinking to one knee. And in the same moment, the whip round Galahad's leg loosened.
Galahad couldn't fully escape, but he had the ability to scoop up his dropped sword. There was a point he could see on the Chaos-engorged monster that was Sir Turquine that remained human. That was where he shoved the sword. The gouge in the ancient breastplate the corrupted Lord wore.
The blood that burst out around the sword wasn't the white sap-like stuff that had previously spilled from the mutants in the keep, it was bright red as any human's. Turquine's scream was that of a man's as well, wailing and filled with agony. For the first time, Galahad felt a terrible pity well up within him, which he forced out of himself in an instant. The whip spasmed and he dropped, letting go of the sword hilt and leaving the blade impaled in the Chaos Lord.
He fell hard on his shoulder, and rolled back to his feet. He snatched up the rope on the floor. He glared up at Turquine, focusing for a moment on the hilt protruding like a flagpole buried deep into the ground.
Turquine screamed again, a human's scream of pain and hatred. The thing in the Warp mirrored the scream, a hideous wail like a banshee. It still sounded distant, but even so Galahad felt his ears ring, and some of his wounds felt like they were beginning to split wider.
The bulbs on Turquine's body began to bulge, and Galahad had a flash of memory, when the Chaos Lord's terrible mount had done the same trick, the same magic, to defeat his brother. Galahad had no idea how to counter magic, he only had his own body. The bulbs exploded and a dozen more whips hurtled outward, toward him.
But Galahad had already moved. Gripping the rope tight, he dove forward, sliding between Turquine's slim legs like he had done a hundred times playing running games with his family and friends back in the hold. The rope tugged hard, and again Turquine staggered, off balance.
He was past the Chaos Lord now, closer to Lionel. Galahad ran toward the table. Lionel was strapped tight to it, his buttocks bloody and brutalized. Turquine rallied quickly, and the scream as he spun toward them was sickening and loud, the Warp-echo seeming to grow closer and closer.
Galahad felt helpless before the bounds. He should have kept a grip on his sword. He felt helpless. He needed more time. He looked desperately for anything he could use…and his eyes alighted on an orb lying in the corner of the room, a perfectly formed round gemstone, a pearl the size of Galahad's head. He ran for it. As his hand closed around it, the thing began to glow.
******************
In the midst of the
riastrad Turquine felt only the frenzy. The need to rip and tear and torture. The child had proven slippery and cunning, and had dealt several terrible blows upon him. The sword in his chest would have killed him, but he was held together by warp sorcery, not the petty biological realities of a human body.
Turquine hurtled forward, blood both human and mutant streaming from his body. The rope around his neck felt like a ring of lava, but he ignored that, he could sever it later. He lifted his sword.
The child had given up on freeing his brother, and was huddling in the corner, clearly surrendering, succumbing to despair. At last. He would make it slow and perfect.
Galahad turned. His dirty face was firm, he was bleeding heavily from a dozen wounds. In his hand was the orb. The orb, designed by the Tzeentch High Priestess to read the very soul of a man and alight at the sight of a certain destiny, was glowing bright.
And the vestige of Turquine's humanity made him stop, as the shock set in. That what he had been seeking was right in front of him. Not a man grown was the true Lancelot, the Champion of the Planet. He was but a boy. His potential was blinding, his destiny terrible to behold.
Slaanesh, or one of Slaanesh's Dukes, screamed at him to not hesitate. Those who followed Slaanesh never hesitated, they always took what they desired. But it was too late.
Galahad threw the orb right into Turquine's face.
****************
The pearl had felt strong, and Galahad had expected when he had lobbed it that it would bounce off the enemy, hopefully stun him for a moment in which he could find another action to perform. Rip out the sword and cut his brother loose, find more objects to throw, even run away if need be.
Instead the orb shattered like it was made of fragile glass. The light within once exposed to open air seemed to burst out as a sheet of flame. Turquine caught on fire like he was a dead tree struck by lightning. He screamed, a purely human shriek of agony, there was no warp echo anymore.
Galahad covered his eyes, for the flame was agony to look upon, flaring in colors never seen on earth as it devoured the corrupted matter of Sir Turquine. Still, Galahad surged forward one final time. He grabbed the sword and yanked it out of the screaming Chaos Lord's body. The weapon broke off at the center, but the edge still hacked through Lionel's bounds easily.
Galahad forced a smile, as he helped Lionel up. "You lied to me brother," he said dully. He could feel something hot running down his face. Blood or tears. "Wielding a sword wasn't hard at all."
Exhaustion took him then, he collapsed and the last he heard was Turquine's screams and Lionel lifting him high and running. Away and away. Until he was in the open air, hanging in Lionel's arms, watching as the keep seemed to crumble away from the white cliffs, burning in unknown colors, sinking into the sea as if to escape the burning, Turquine's screams still moving through the very air.
*********************
"Galahad?" Lionors' voice was gentle. "We are almost to my father. You seem distracted dear Prince."
Galahad shook his head. He smiled. "I'm ok Lionors!" The story and the memories had indeed distracted him, as they ever did. His leg ached, where he still bore the scars from Turquine's whip. The screams were still in his mind. His brother had gained the credit for the deed, but Galahad hadn't resisted or complained. That had been a far worse day for Lionel, for Juliana, for all those men. They needed the lie, and Galahad was content to not speak of it, to not brag of it.
"I'm ok Lionors!" And Galahad smiled. He would forever have his courage, that he knew absolutely. So he would and could face anything in the universe. "Just remembered something."
[Definitely the longest segment in the fic so far and the one I had the most trouble with writing. Things should be a little faster to post now, since I have it a bit quicker now.]
