Alev Rayj

[Paragon]

The Fury of Alev Rayj

(Torn from the Journal of Alev Rayj and discarded)

I remember everything now, but it makes no difference. I cannot return to what I was once before. I consoled myself with memories of my past, my legacy, with promises of an honorable death, but they did not let me die.

Once I was a paladin, a veritable paragon of honor and virtue, bleeding for the souls of weaklings who had not the courage to fight for themselves, and crying to the gods for whatever paltry bits of power they would lend me. Apparently my barbarian of a great-grandfather, sinner that he was, had delivered an angel from bondage. For this deed of whimsy, he was promised that all of his descendants would serve as paladins.

I embraced the myth, followed Torm like the stupid sheep that I was, bleating words like "duty" and "righteousness." While my younger brothers played, I prayed. While Acab hunted, I copied manuscripts. While Adav played at love, I knelt in the church, begging in all the fervor of righteous lunacy for divine guidance. What was my reward for all of this? In one moment I lost all of my inheritance, for a moment of pleasure, a hasty word!

Even now the bile rises in my throat to think on that damned day! Every year my father held a harvest feast to worship that fool of a god, Chauntea, inviting all of the stupid peasant scum as a reward for their gullibility and servitude. My brothers goaded me to relax, and to partake of the harvest wine with them. Being a paladin, and prone to trusting other paladins, (what a fool I was!) I drank deeply of the wine while they regaled me with stories of their adventures and conquests in the hunt, in tourney and the courting of fair maidens. Each of them outdid the other with tales of great skill and courage...and I had no stories or quests of my own to boast of, and in a moment of drunken piety I swore the fateful vow, a vow for which later I cursed both my lips and tongue for it's utterance...I swore to find and destroy the source of evil.

A year passed, and I had forgotten my foolishness, but my god had not, nor had he forgiven me of it. During the harvest feast, a prophet of Torm, blithering in idiocy like Cyric himself, charging me with sloth, demanded that I fulfill my duty, and to begin in distant Cormyr. With one word, I had condemned myself to a life of struggle, rather than the life of wealth and power that was my rightful inheritance.

For months I slogged through the filthy countryside of Cormyr, dragging my limbs through thankless labours, battling beasts and hapless bandits. Finally, I came upon a cavern filled with fell creatures that defy description. Down, down I journeyed, swinging my blade in such a way that wold have put my brothers' combined skills to shame. Suddenly I was beset by something that I recognized immediately, though I had never seen before...it was an archdevil. Ordinary men would have run, perhaps hid themselves, but filled with the guile of the promises of Torm, I charged the thing, and after bellowing pious oaths at it, attacked it.

I awoke to find myself within the swirling mists of limbo, seeking to go into the light, as I had been indoctrinated to do if ever I found myself dead. For hours I wandered, (or was it years,) before I heard a tumult of voices crying to me. I had found the wall of faithless. Fool that I was, I began to pull as many of them out as I could manage, seeking to deliver souls that had already rejected their salvation. How long I laboured at this futile thing I know not, but finally someone who bore the image of a man came to me and asked what it was that I sought more than any other thing. I revealed to him that it was to destroy the source of all evil, and soon lamented, for he revealed himself to me, and cried "Then find it ye shall!" before casting me into the depths of the abyss.

It was then that the miserable and horrifying truth enlightened me, that I was not dead at all, but alive! How long I fell through the fiery abyss, I know not. Bebilith and Succubi plied their temptations upon me, as well as other things that would burn paper if their names were put upon it. They marked my flesh as theirs with scar and ink, as well as intangible marks that can not be seen by the eyes of mortals. I resisted with everything that I was, consoling myself with memories of my past, my legacy, with promises of an honorable death, though as I have said, they did not let me die. Mercifully, at last, I forgot myself...all of my dreams and memories, for but a moment were lost, enough to have the strange peace that is madness. Suddenly, swirling all around me like demented dancers in an abyssal ballroom, I saw devils and demons battling, evil against evil...a house divided.

In the midst of them a figure stood before me. "Torm!" I cried, but he was not Torm. In a moment I knew, that he could give me the power that Torm had only promised falsely...that same false god who had expected me to keep my promises to him, but delivered nothing in return.

"Will you serve me?" his black voice spoke like a thousand voids, it's darkness resting within my soul, extinguishing all but the tiniest ember of the absurd light.

"YES!" I cried, and I was born anew. I saw the source of evil as it was, the weakness in the hearts of men, the madness of the promises of false gods and the folly of the maelstrom of chaos. At last I am free, free to destroy those who would mock me, to crush them beneath my heel and bring the fire of my god to all Faerun! Not one moment more shall I spend in futility and doubt!

Yet still... (the page is torn here.)

[Paragon]

The Demise of Alev Rayj

Madness drove him forward, running heedlessly along the roadside, casting about fearfully. The hymns of the celestial choir, a song long forgotten, now an ominous tone, rang in his head. Fear, such fear, and he had not felt this since his childhood, when Torm had taken away his ability to feel it. Hope drained from his heart as a voice rang out above the cacophony in his skull. "JUDGMENT COMES!"

Out of a dark and tumultuous sky a light broke, (but the sky itself was not dark, it was only that this presence made it seem so,) and in it's midst an indescribable figure descended. Softly it alighted upon the earth in front of where he cowered, it's face a mask of gentle sorrow.

Alev Rayj, fallen paladin of Torm, donned his helm. "Are you sent from Torm?"

"Your perception is correct," the being said quietly.

Mustering all his remaining courage, Alev took the stance of readiness, passed down to him from his ancestors. "...I shall not yield me. He has betrayed me, not I him!"

"Judgment is passed upon you, Betrayer!" The being began quietly, then emphasized the epitaph in a voice that rung as though it re-writ his true name.

"I will pass judgment on him!" Alev cried, then added, as if a child clinging to some last hope that he might escape punishment, "Have you come to cast me down?"

"As you have turned your back on your god...all you are, all you have become by his grace, He reclaims."

"Come then, take it if you can!" shouted Alev defiantly, an act of bravado that sounded weak, even to him. Then cringing, added "Will you strike at me then?"

The being extended it's hand, palm down, and continued as though Alev had not spoken, saying "Everything that you are, is of the true one's blessing. The god of loyalty, demands all that he has given..." The being paused dramatically... "...Shall be returned!"

"...I am who I am of strength and birthright alone, you cannot take it!" His voice sounded hollow as he spoke to the divine being, and his eyes were filled with fear and regret.

"Alev Rayj, today is thy judgment day. Prepare yourself, Betrayer!"

"Have at thee then!" Alev cried, and threw a flash bomb at the avenger, following with a mighty sword strike, into which he put all of his strength. To his horror, the sword broke in two as it struck the celestial's armor. The celestial raised it's weapon above it's head, slowly, almost casually, and sliced through Alev's breastplate, cleaving his heart in twain. A moment before the blood exploded in a shower outwards from his corpse, Alev saw his heart perfectly divided in his breast.

A few moments later, Alev awoke, to the luminescent face of the being floating above him. He sat up, painfully, and removed his helmet, pouring blood out of it onto great puddle of it on the ground beneath him. "The sentence has been executed. Torm has declared that you are not to be put to death. That is not his way. He reclaims, however, all he has given thee. Farewell, mortal. Pray we do not meet again." It ascended back into the clouds as it spoke, disappearing as it said it's final word.

Humbled and filled with emptiness, Alev remained on the ground for a few moments after the sky had returned to it's normal hue. He then struggled to his feet, weakly, his strength all but faded. He had fought a wraith a few days earlier, and had a portion of his soul sucked, something that had troubled him greatly. This was far, far worse. Not only that, but somehow, the angel's strike had taken the magic from all of his possessions, rendering them worthless. Now he was reduced to the pauper that he had always feared that he would become. He cursed himself again for making that foolish vow, and then cursed Torm for rendering him impotent.

There was nothing to do now but to struggle back to that stinking little village where it seemed, that for some reason, all the adventurers in the region would gather. There at least he could begin his questing again, perhaps purchase a new sword.

He had only taken a few steps, when, a small bear, perhaps drawn to the scent of blood, or to the commotion of the fight, appeared, and charged, bearing down on him. Alev grinned arrogantly. Even without his sword or mail, this creature was no match for him...

...the hungry bear dragged the corpse to it's cave, where it was sated on human flesh, cracking open the bones of it's victim and feasting on his marrow.