DARK FAÏZ Book 2: Nothing will ever be the same again

by Sandra L. Kiss

  I lifted my shoulders before adding,

  "I would like the universe to find someone else. Someone like you or your brothers. A person you can count on."

  "You are the only one to have been shaped by the prayers of men and those of the egregore Gods. If you were to disappear, all of humanity would disappear with you. Darkness would then reign supreme."

  "I have no power, no gift, and no faith. Men themselves sabotage their planet. They alone created weapons, hatred, and hell. I'm happy to be just a simple mortal, and I hope to be gone when the end of the world comes. If it's not The Maestro who destroys it, it'll be humans, anyway."

  I looked away from Kayla and pushed myself into my chair as much as possible. My eyes fixed on the fire that consumed the wood in the transparent hearth, hanging in the void. The flames seemed to dance there to the rhythm of the crackling. This almost melodious sound could hypnotize any tormented soul.

  "How did you manage to escape the curse?" I asked, tearing myself away from the contemplation of this spectacle. "The Fairies have fallen and are nicknamed Banshees, condemned to wander and to announce unhappiness here below."

  "I'm one of the few survivors, I admit. Fortunately, there are still some others left on Earth, but not for much longer if we can't stop Athanasius."

  Kayla lowered her head to stare at her hands. Her already fair complexion had just turned a little paler. Sorrow was read in each of her gestures now. I had just touched a sensitive point without wanting to. What a fool you are, Zoe. Making people unhappy is all you can do.

  "I… I'm sorry," I stammered, nervously putting hair behind my ear. "Again, I was clumsy."

  "No, your question is completely legitimate. I owe the salvation of my halo only to Callis. Having it with me and reciting old hymns many times a day kept the evil away. It was then loaned to other Sylphids, discreetly traded in holy places. Unfortunately, too few of us have been fortunate enough to be spared. We have run out of time and are still running out."

  "For the Banshees, it's not your fault," I articulated, tearing out each word. "You did what you could. Even with the best of wills, we can't save what isn't intended to be."

  My words surprised myself, as if my reason were screaming at this moment to abandon this feeling of anger that took root every day a little more in me. Suddenly William reappeared, accompanied by his brother. The latter hastened to hug his sister, visibly happy to find her.

  "I'm glad you two have finally gotten to meet each other," said Julio playfully.

  "I think we were made to get along," replied Kayla, giving me a knowing glance.

  "Zoe, are you staying for the night?" asked Julio.

  "No, I have to go back. Lily and Charles must be waiting for me."

  FAÏZ

  David, Faïz, Inspector Karl Barthey, and an FBI agent were standing in one of the city's federal offices. Despite the tired features on their faces at this late hour of the night, everyone tried somehow to contain their fear listening to David's speech. Indeed, the latter came to bring them a very sad discovery on the part of the Callis.

  "This revelation must stay here, between these four walls," insisted FBI Agent Robert Martin, addressing Faïz and Barthey.

  The inspector couldn't help but swear by clumsily knocking on his colleague's desk and adding,

  "How long can we protect the population before they discover the horror of the situation?"

  "Don't worry about it," replied Martin calmly. "The government has been hiding things from them for decades, things they could not even dream of. All this is beyond their imagination, however overflowing, I grant you, but we will give the change, as usual."

  Silent, Faïz stared at this agent with his piercing eyes. The medium-sized, frail-looking man didn't reassure the young man, who wondered what a guy like him would do if he found himself facing The Maestro. Would he keep that arrogant look on his face? Suddenly his cell phone started to vibrate, which tore him away from his thoughts and questions. Rachelle's name appeared on his screen. He pursed his lip, regretting what had happened the day before, when she had come to pay him yet another visit, in the evening, at his home. He knew full well that he should have refused her advances. Now, consumed with remorse, he felt a sharp pain banging in his chest. Faïz would one day meet Zoe's gaze, a sad and betrayed look which he alone would be behind.

  "You're not answering?" David asked with a hint of reproach in his voice.

  Faïz came back to the present moment and put the phone back in his pocket before leaving to sit on the worn sofa, installed at the end of the dimly lit room.

  "I still think that Zoe should be aware of this part," said David.

  "No way!" Faïz replied furiously, threatening his interlocutor with the darkest glance.

  "She's my friend!" cried David, raising his voice. "I can't hide something that affects her directly."

  Faïz jumped up, pointing his finger at him. Barthey hastened to stand in front of David, lest the situation escalate.

  "I repeat, DO NOT TELL HER. If she's your friend David, if you can give your life for her, like me, then shut up!"

  He then addressed the two other men present in the room.

  "This information won't leave this room! It's out of the question for her to find out the truth. It would destroy her."

  4

  When the SUV stopped on the asphalt of the aerodrome, it took me a while before I decided to take off my seat belt to get out of the vehicle. The jet, on the tarmac, was waiting for us. Lexy ended up opening my door, visibly impatient to see me get out of there. The sun was beating down strongly that afternoon in March. My two friends had finally managed to get their visas for Eros, which had been an easy task. Besides, William had almost given up on the idea of embarking on this adventure, but, according to him, Faïz had strongly insisted that they be on the trip. I couldn't say what was best for me. Indeed, I needed them because they linked me to a world with its share of reality, but knowing that we were putting them in danger was simply unbearable to me.

  "Wow, I'm in a dream," whispered Lexy, amazed, as we walked down the steps of the jet.

  "A dream?" said Asarys, shocked by her words. "I remind you that we have a ruby to steal from Draculette. We have well deserved this little luxury break!"

  I rolled my eyes, exasperated, but at the same time happy to find that they remained themselves. At that moment, William passed in front of us.

  "Okay, let's go. We are just a month behind schedule," he hastened to remind us.

  "Where's Faïz?"

  "Inside," he replied, quickly climbing the stairs, irritated by my question.

  "Are you ready for the reunion?" whispered Lexy, who was following me closely.

  "Of course she is!" murmured Asarys. "They haven't seen each other since…"

  Asarys suddenly fell silent, aware of going too far in her words. My friend didn't want me to relive the painful memories of these past weeks. At that moment, an awkward silence settled between us. Even though I had built a solid shell, I was still unhappy with the absence of Victoria in our lives. Faïz had completely disappeared from the landscape, mostly in New York to escape the heavy family pressure and its heavy atmosphere. He was finishing his last year of university by correspondence, and it was rumored that Rachelle was once again part of his life. I didn't hold it against him. After all, if it could bring him even a tiny fraction of happiness, then it was all the better for him. He deserved it. For my part, I had spent quite a bit of time with William and Kayla, with whom I had gotten closer recently. She loved coming to Elora after school or on weekends. Finally, she had decided to stay in Los Angeles, at the mansion of the Seventh Earth, for the time of our absence. Julio and David would watch over her. I stopped dead after taking three steps in the large cabin of the jet. Faïz was sitting on one of the black leather seats in front of his computer, telephone at his ear.

  "Yes Oscar. Please note, the tools used must be non-competitive… I understand… We will talk about this after my trip…
Yes. See you soon."

  He hung up immediately then ran his palms over his face before getting up to greet us. Faïz held out his hand to William, who reluctantly shook it. He then greeted my two friends with a courteous nod and then his gaze stopped on me. Although he stared at me with bitterness, his eyes ignited mine. I looked away so as not to betray all the feelings I had suppressed for him this last month.

  "The carpet matches the seats," said Asarys, speaking to Lexy, who was already comfortably installed.

  As I looked for an empty seat, Faïz walked towards me.

  "Are you okay?" he asked gravely.

  Troubled by his changing mood, I remained skeptical about the nature of his intentions. Was he sorry about his behavior last time, or did he just want to calm things down to avoid too much tension within the group during the stay on Eros?

  "I'm fine. Let's focus on our mission."

  I didn't bother to give him time to answer and left to sit, taking care to get around him without touching him. The girls on my left stared at me in a daze. Suddenly William stood before us all to speak.

  "Before taking off, I would like to discuss a few important things with you."

  He paused to assess our level of concentration. After a few seconds of silence, he continued. "Eros is an island located between Japan and China, very little known throughout the world. Tourists aren't allowed to stay or visit it. This island has its own government and its own laws."

  William looked around the cabin to make sure he still had our full attention. He rubbed his hands while searching for his words as the atmosphere grew heavier over the minutes.

  "On Eros," William continued, "gravity is less important than anywhere else. To give you an idea, it generally varies between nine point seven seven per square meter per second and nine point eight four. On the island, it's five!"

  "Okay, I'm already lost," said Asarys, crossing her arms with a disappointed pout.

  "If that means that we will weigh double, that could pose a problem for me!" grumbled Lexy.

  "You're not fat!"

  "I have gained at least four pounds in the past three weeks. I haven't—"

  "No, it's the opposite," intervened Faïz, annoyed by this conversation between my two friends. "The weight loss will be impressive. Weather parameters will also have to be considered. On Eros, the thick layer of fog is constant and low. The sun doesn't penetrate the mist enough. This is all due to the spherical imperfection of the planet."

  "Indeed, our Earth is more camouflaged at the poles and more rounded towards the equator," added William.

  "Do you understand?" asked Faïz after a short moment of silence.

  The three of us nodded our heads in unison, but the two young men looked at each other in perplexity, unconvinced of our response. Faïz then let out a long sigh and scratched the back of his head before adding,

  "All right! We will explain all this to you on Eros. William? Where are Barthey and Ray?"

  "They took off an hour ago. They will wait for us before leaving for the inn."

  "What? An inn?" exclaimed Asarys, surprised. "I thought we would be staying at the hotel."

  "It would be too risky," answered William. "The government of Eros is aware of our mission and agrees to collaborate with the United States, but for the Kobolds, the inhabitants of this country, we will be just simple ecologists who study behavior and the functioning of the residents of this island in order to learn how to raise awareness in the rest of the world on the protection of the environment."

  I discovered this information at the same time as my friends. The task seemed to be complicated with a country with an ecosystem distinct from ours and a strange population with completely different customs. I turned my head to look through the window, noting that the jet hadn't moved an inch.

  "Do you have more questions?" asked Faïz, still standing in front of us.

  "For my part, no," I replied without looking away from the small opening.

  "So we can go."

  He then turned to William.

  "Let Ray know we're leaving. I will warn the pilot that we can take off."

  At that moment, my mind escaped through the oval window. I had a feeling that I would miss the Los Angeles sun on Eros, given the weather forecast announced by Faïz. I was far from imagining the reality of this country.

  I woke up a few hours later when I heard loud exclamations around me.

  "Magnificent!" cried Asarys.

  "I can't believe my eyes. It's incredible," added Lexy, her nose almost glued to the window.

  I raised my seat in order to discover what could excite my two friends. Even though it was dark, the spectacle of the beauty of the land below us was simply breathtaking.

  "It can't be real," I whispered in a low voice, gazing at the island that looked like a four-leaf clover.

  The first thing that caught my eye was the vastness of virgin space filled with greenery. Indeed, Eros seemed to be a wilderness devoid of any human population and surrounded, on both sides, by a multitude of waterfalls, like a rampart. These seemed to pour water with fluorescent blue reflections in a dark ocean. As they lost altitude, bright spots began to appear in the center of the island.

  "Few things still happen to amaze me in this world, but there, it must be admitted that no one can remain indifferent to this almost unreal setting."

  Focused on the view of Eros below us, I hadn't heard Faïz coming behind me. Installed in the seat next to me, he leaned over to admire the landscape through my window. Despite his unacceptable behavior and everything he'd told me, I couldn't help but be troubled by this closeness. My gaze went over his shoulder and then swept the cabin. Asarys and Lexy were still in awe of the show below, while William slept tight in the front seat. It was the first time I'd seen him like this, and for good reason. He hadn't stopped in recent weeks. I then returned to Faïz. The regrets could be read in his eyes. Suddenly, the image of him pointing a gun at Ogres shook my thoughts violently. Part of me was almost afraid of this dark brown head while the other still hoped to save him.

  "Fog? Uh…there is no fog on the horizon," I said, short of breath.

  Faïz stepped back and wedged himself in the back of his seat while continuing to stare at me painfully.

  "Eros heats up at night. See the mountains that surround the city in the distance? They are volcanoes. Scientists don't explain it. They get active every night, which warms the earth in this country. The ground is strewn with a multitude of thermal sensors intended to convert this heat into energy and electricity. In the early morning, these volcanoes erupt everywhere on the island."

  My face broke when I heard this revelation.

  "No, don't worry," Faïz immediately reassured me. "They don't emit lava. These are phreatic eruptions. These are, in short, large amounts of water vapor that escape from the craters. This creates, in contact with fresh air, this thick constant fog during the day."

  The captain then left the cockpit, nodding in Faïz's direction. Faïz got up without waiting and immediately went to meet him. They exchanged brief information in a low voice, then Faïz turned to us to speak.

  "We'll be landing shortly. Please buckle up. For your information, please note that there is a sixteen-hour time difference between Eros and Los Angeles."

  William suddenly straightened up, awakened by the voice of his friend, then immediately looked for me.

  "So that you can move around without feeling the gravity problem on the island, you will be given a small box to hang on your wrist. As we explained to you, here the gravitational pull is much less important than anywhere else."

  "Damn bracelet," complained Asarys, tweaking the little white and red thing. "I feel like I'm going to go hunting the Yokai with that!"

  "This thing can't even tell us the time," added Lexy, who was just as annoyed.

  While my two acolytes complained about the box called "Gravity"—not very aesthetic, it had to be admitted—the crew, as well as Faïz and William, were busy gathering our
luggage on the tarmac with only flashlights. The place was deserted. No airport had been built there. Only a runway, intended for take-off and landing of aircraft, contrasted with this wild landscape, an enchanting place preserved by human hands. Suddenly Asarys walked away from us. In the distance, Ray and Inspector Barthey came to meet us. I couldn't help but put a slight smile on the corner of my lips when my friend jumped into the arms of the man who seemed to have missed her so much.

  "Do you think we should remind them that we didn't come here for tourism?" grumbled Lexy.

  "I think the Yokai bracelet will do it," I mocked.

  "Zoe?" Lexy asked me, dumbfounded.

  I immediately pulled myself together, worried about my friend's puzzled expression.

  "You just laughed," said Lexy, still in shock. "Well, I mean you just sincerely laughed!"

  She was right. Without expecting it, I forgot for a moment the sadness that lived in me. Was it really possible to cure everything? If it was, something deep inside me didn't want it. My thoughts were suddenly drowned in a thud that came from the sky. When I looked up, I saw several machines comparable to flying bubbles floating for a moment above our heads and then landing without difficulty in front of us.

  "What are those things?" declared Lexy, stunned.

  "I have no idea. The fourth dimension?" I murmured, just as dumbfounded.

  "This is one of the car models found on Eros," explained William, who had come to join us, luggage under his arm.

  I expected to see men out of these three vehicles in suits and dark glasses like in the movies, but to my surprise there appeared a man dressed in a light tracksuit, and a woman dressed in a simple T-shirt tucked into her jeans.

  "Good evening. Welcome to Eros," the man greeted us with a broad smile.

  He hastened to meet us with a limping step, followed by the much smaller woman.

  "I am Robert Price, the Prime Minister of this country," he introduced himself in a soft voice, then left the floor to his colleague.