Excerpt: Kane

He was dead…or at least he assumed he was.

Death was the expected fate of anyone or anything stabbed by an Atlantean dagger, and he had two of them still lodged in his back. He shifted uncomfortably, feeling the bite of the cold blades on his assumedly dead flesh. It figured that not even death would give him any peace. The daggers had been created millennia ago during the Atlantean civil war and were one of the few guaranteed ways to kill an Atlantean, even a none mortal wound by one of them was death to nearly anything alive. So he had to be dead, right?

And yet somehow he had expected death to feel different. As far as he could tell little other than his surroundings had been altered. He still felt the twin blades in his back; the cold stone beneath his body, even the clothing he had worn was intact. He could even feel the trickle of blood winding down his spine from the wounds made by each of the embedded daggers.

He rose to his knees, wincing in pain at the movement, to examine his surroundings. Pitch-black walls were dimly viewable in the darkness that enshrouded the chamber. He could see little else but black stone and darkness. A faint breeze drew his attention, and sudden awareness drifted over him. He spun rising to his feet in one swift move, fighting to ignore the pain shooting through him at every minute movement. He glanced around warily; unable to see the other that every other sense was screaming at him was nearby.

“Ah the great General of Atlantis,” a low voice spoke from next to his ear, as he spun around once more only to find the space behind him as vacant as the rest of the chamber. He remained silent, waiting with a tense and wary stillness for the other to make their next move. A long moment passed before a figure stepped out of the darkness before him.

“Trajan Vasilis, I can honestly say I was not expecting to meet you anytime soon, at least not like this.” The low voice returned as the figure halted just far enough away for the darkness to obscure his features. Trajan remained silent, running through his mind for the potential identity of the man before him.

“Yes, General, you are dead.” The man confirmed before moving forward one final step. His black clothing still blended into the darkness, but now golden brown eyes and honey blonde hair were visible, against the naturally tan skin, which covered the sharp, focused beauty of the man’s face. Trajan stiffened no longer needing an introduction to tell him who now stood before him. No other than Shaitan, the High Lord of Kaelar, or Hell as the humans preferred to call it, God of Death and Darkness, Ruler of the Underworld. Trajan remained still as the man moved to slowly circle around him