Razeem and the others were kept under with the assistance of magic. Since Kabel started using corrupt magic he had grown considerably more powerful. It was easy for him to keep them under for the entire journey. Kabel took them east, almost to the border between the empire of Mythos and the Blazing Desert. He took them to quickly put together wooden stronghold that only had one floor and a roof. He brought with him the two dark paladins that had captured Olsyn and Cianna. He had all four of them chained up to the wooden walls and floors. Razeem was the last one to wake up from the sleeping spell.
Razeem looked around the room and took in everything he could. He could see that Gunder, Olsyn, and Cianna were all alive and sighed in relief. He noted the smell of oak was strong, leading him to believe that the walls were freshly cut and placed together. There was only one person in the room that he did not personally know, and that was the dark paladin standing beside the seated Kabel Windrift. He frowned deeply at Kabel when he smiled at him.
"Good morning, my student. You have grown into quite the paladin." Besides sounding older, Kabel's voice had changed very little. He continued to smile at Razeem as if they were long lost friends who had run into each other at a tavern.
Razeem looked away, trying to control his anger. "How in the name of the fallen Soladaris did you survive that fight against Fithris? What happened to you?" Razeem looked back up, pain in his face and voice. He had never felt as betrayed as he did looking at his former teacher, somebody he had always held in such high respect, standing before him in the colors of the dark paladins.
When Kabel stood up he motioned for the other dark paladin to leave them. He left the room without a word, closing the door behind him. Kabel played with his eye patch for a moment before stepping in front of Razeem. He looked down at Razeem, who was unable to do anything but sit or go to his knees due to the length of the chains that held him in place. "I did not expect to live when I fell over the side. I was bleeding heavily from my eye and my face and could barely see. It was nothing but luck that my hands found a ledge as I fell. I managed to pull myself up and back into the strong hold."
"Once inside I was captured by some of the survivors of the stronghold and taken out in a secret underground tunnel that led back to one of the other nearby strongholds we believed to be abandoned. Fithris had me locked away and called for the dark paladins that followed Mythos. They came when they heard I was the one that he had captured. The dark paladins started to torture me. Sometimes they would continue non-stop for days at a time."
"They wanted to force me into using corrupted magic, to turn to the ways of the dark paladins. At first I resisted. I would have preferred death than to turn to use the power of Mythos against the world I protected and loved. Thinking of betraying Giladriis to serve the very person who I thought was trying to destroy it was all that kept me from falling... at first."
Kabel sighed and sat back down. He started writing something down on a piece of paper that sat on an otherwise empty desk to his side. "Eventually, almost two years later, I gave in, just a little bit. I took hold of the corrupted magic that had been tempting me and used it to put my torturer into a magically induced sleep. I felt the rush of the corrupted magic and decided then that I did not want to hold back. I knew that the paladins that once served the fallen Soladaris had been wrong. We needed to use the corrupted magic, not fear it. The dark paladins of Mythos trained me to become the powerful dark paladin I am today."
Kabel drew his sword and smiled, lifting Razeem's chin with the flat section of the blade. "And now, my dear Razeem, you will see what I too was once blind to... and you will join me," he moved the sword so that the sharp point pressed lightly against Razeem's throat, "Or you will die."
Olsyn pulled against the metal cuffs around his wrists, testing their strength. He looked over to Gunder, who was a foot or so to his left, and noticed that the dwarf had already somehow loosened one of the cuffs and removed it. Once Gunder turned more towards him be noticed that he was using a nail that he must have kept on him to pick the locks.
Gunder looked to Olsyn and nodded just lightly enough for it to only be noticeable to the squire. He turned just enough to let Olsyn watch how he was working the lock, hoping that he was able to pick up the technique he was using. The locks were simple, so Gunder knew that his limited skill would be enough. After he had the second cuff totally unlocked he slid the nail over to Olsyn and slowly set the cuffs on the ground behind him.
Olsyn picked up the mail slowly so that his movements would not pick up Kabel's attention. While he tried to work the cuffs free he stared his long lost uncle down. He was disgusted with what he saw. The Kabel he had been told stories about was honorable and worked hard to fight the evil of Mythos, whereas this man had joined it. Now he was trying to convince Razeem, a person he looked at like a father, to join the corruption and betray everything that he had once taught him to fight for. His anger distracted him, and he almost did not realize that both his hands were free now.
Gunder held his hand out as if to tell Olsyn to hold on. They needed to wait for the perfect moment if they wanted to make a surprise attack work. He knew it would be hard for Olsyn to watch his own uncle torture his teacher, but he had hopes that he could wait just a little while.
While they were freeing themselves Kabel had been mercilessly beating on Razeem. He tried at first to push him to use the corrupt magic by bringing out intense pain in him. When he saw that doing so would not work, he decided to try a different approach. He placed his open palm on Razeem's head and closed his eyes, Dark magic pushed into Razeem as Kabel began reading his mind. He smiled wide and pulled his hand away when he found something that he could use.
"Oh, this is interesting." Kabel mumbled as he stepped away from Razeem and moved to stand in front of Cianna. "Don't you dare..." Razeem started to speak but stopped on shock when Kabel backhanded the elven woman. She fell to the ground and was barely able to bring her head back up before Kabel slapped her again. "Stop it you bastard!"
Kabel smiled and landed another smack to the woman's face. "I'll stop if you manage to use the corrupted magic to free yourself. Embrace the corruption and I'll stop..." He struck her again, and then kicked her in the ribs. She tried to cough but was cut off by another kick. "... or you can keep holding back and I'll kill her, and then the dwarf. Then I'll turn your own squire against you."
Razeem fought the urge to use the magic he felt filling him to pull the chains that held him down from the wall. He breathed deeply, his muscles flexing as he slowly lost control. "Stop it, damn you!" He yelled in full anger now, breathing heavily and sobbing. "Damn it all, she's pregnant!"
Kabel brought his hand back as if to hit her again, but before he could Gunder tackled him to the ground. Though he had told Olsyn to wait, his anger flared once he knew she was to have a child, Razeem's child at that. Olsyn took the chance to sprint forward towards the opening door.
The dark paladin guard rushed in when he heard Kabel yell out and hit the floor. He had not been expecting the squire to be ready to take him on. Olsyn tackled the dark paladin to the ground and pulled the enemy's sword out of his hands, stabbing him in the chest with it. After pulling the blade from the corpse's chest he ran to Razeem and knelt down beside him, grabbing his master's head.
"Razeem, snap out of it. Cianna is safe for the moment, don't use that magic!" He pleased with his teacher, who shook his head to clear his thoughts.
"Release me Olsyn! I will fight by the honor of the paladin order, just as I always have!"
That was the answer the squire had been looking for. He lifted the sword up high above his head and bright it down on the chains that held Razeem to the wall. After he was free Razeem was easily able to pull the cuffs off. He took the sword from his squire's hands and charged for Kabel and Gunder.
Gunder had knocked Kabel's sword away from him but was quickly finding himself outmatched. Kabel managed to get up and used his raw strength to pick up the dwarf and threw him against the wall hard. As he stood up Gunder felt Kabel's gauntlets wrap around his throat and squeeze. Kabel picked him up while chocking him. "Hard to believe that any of you survived that day... you must have been a coward to leave your people behind to die while you ran."
Just then Kabel dropped the dwarf and turned to smack Razeem's weapon away with his armored forearm. Gunder crawled over to where Olsyn was trying to free Cianna and gave him a hand. "My fellow dwarves gave their life for your squire, the very same one you have tried to turn against everything you taught him. I too gave my life to Razeem, and I regret nothing!" He shouted out towards Kabel as he watched him and Razeem fight.
After a moment Razeem managed to throw Kabel to the ground. He motioned towards the door and helped Cianna to her feet. "We need to get outside!" He looked back to see Kabel trying to stand up and kicked him in the side of the head.
Once out in the hallway the four of them were able to find their weapons. They had never had their armor taken off, or any of their other possessions taken from them, so gathering their equipment only took a few seconds. With his sword and shield in hand, Razeem took the rear and watched for his fallen teacher to attack again.
They managed to make it outside before they were confronted again by Kabel. One the way out they ran into three more dark paladins. Gunder took one down while Razeem took out the other two. When Razeem faced Kabel he noticed that the dark paladin had his sword and a solid black metal shield in his hands. "I don't want to fight you, Kabel Windrift, but I cannot let your soul continue to be tortured by corruption. I would regret it for the rest of my life."
The two smashed their shields into each other and swung their swords with every ounce of strength they had. Razeem seemed to have more skill but Kabel's strength put him at a disadvantage. Razeem also fought honorably, focusing only on Kabel and using methods that did not involve trickery. Kabel on the other hand was more than willing to use anything he could against his former student.
He pulled a small dagger from his belt and threw it at Olsyn. Razeem threw his shield to the side when Kabel smacked it and held up his free hand toward his squire. A barrier of silver light appeared in front of Olsyn just in time to deflect the dagger. At the same time another dagger dug deep into the back of Razeem's left knee and brought him tumbling down.
Kabel lifted his sword up and moved to behead Razeem, but missed when his former student rolled to the left. He threw his shield down to try and smash Razeem's skull but again missed. Out of anger he called upon the corrupted magic and picked Razeem up with one hand by the front of his armor. Surprised, Razeem whipped his sword at Kabel, who deflected it and knocked it out of Razeem's hand. "You should have joined me, now I will kill them all!"
Kabel drew his sword back and then plunged it deep into Razeem's gut. He let go of the sword and dropped Razeem at the same time. He went to pick up Razeem's sword and pointed it at the others.
"No, no, no! Razeem!" Cianna screamed in terror as she watched the father of her unborn child fall. She pulled back the string of her bow after loading three arrows and shot them towards Kabel.
Kabel held out his hand and a black transparent barrier deflected the arrows away. "I will get to kill Razeem, his love, his child, and his student all in-" Kabel stopped mid-sentence once he realized that Olsyn was nowhere to be seen.
That was when Olsyn struck Kabel in the back of his knees with his new, two handed sword. Kabel yelled out and spun as he fell to his knees, his sword missing Olsyn by over a foot. Olsyn put his full weight and power behind his sword as he pushed it through Kabel's dark armor and into his heart.
Kabel shoved Olsyn away and pulled the sword free. He stumbled as he tried to stand and run, blood pouring out of his chest. He looked back to Olsyn, Gunder, and Cianna before he fell onto his back a foot away from Razeem. "You trained him well, it's a shame you will not be around to see him reach his full potential." Kabel chuckled, though it hurt to do so.
Razeem simply smiled before he said, "Neither will you."
A few seconds later, both men were dead.