by S L Gassick
Everyone rushed to the window to get a better look and on the empty courtyard of the Valhalla stood two lone figures. One was Nayakax and the other was a figure hidden under a long and tattered black cloak. Dark, smoky flames were floating around his body as if he had just walked out of a burning fire and the huge hood completely covered what must be a face buried somewhere in the deep shadows within. The atmosphere suddenly shifted and it felt like an imposing weight had fallen upon everyone.
Clouds had started to gather as the weather turned and there was a sinister groaning sound in the air, floating on the rising wind. This hooded man, some despicable being, had clearly been trapped by Nayakax and was looking around for an escape.
Upon the walls surrounding the Valhalla stood small ancient statues of Norheath legends that towered over the two isolated, tense and unmoving figures. All were watching what was about to take place with great interest, waiting for the first move.
Rose clung behind Hemero, who looked annoyed.
“What’s going on Miss? Who is that strange man? Why can’t we see him properly?” spoke a voice from the back.
“That,” replied Cyrene “is a shadow from the Dark Clans.”
CHAPTER TWO
“Please stay within your class. Do not attempt to leave. Help is arriving. Please stay within your class.”
Someone was shouting over and over again from the corridors outside the class and whilst the two figures on the courtyard remained still, no help had arrived. Cyrene wondered what was happening and why Nayakax was left out there by himself. No matter how evolved his skill might be, he was still a child.
The hooded man turned to the sea of windows that poured over the Valhalla. There must have been thousands of faces staring back at him and all of them shivered as if they were peering into an icy abyss, the pitch black hole where a face should be.
By now the alarm had stopped and there was an eerie silence. Still no-one had turned up to help, which had started to worry Cyrene. Where was everyone? Why was no-one helping? Would she have to intervene? She walked towards the window and went to open it.
Locked.
She then tried the classroom door but again, it was locked. The school had gone into complete shutdown and there was nothing she could do. Nayakax had clearly made it outside before anyone had noticed and was now left on his own. Why didn’t she keep a better eye on him? She dreaded having to explain this to the Headmaster; she wasn’t exactly his favourite person at the moment either.
Rose was looking on with great interest. She thought Nayakax was incredibly brave to go up against this hooded man and a little flutter of excitement danced across her heart. But from the corner of her eye she sensed some movement coming up onto the courtyard. She saw a small group of what must be the Valhalla elders turn up, led by a huge beast of a man with a black patch covering his left eye and some sort of silver face plate; he stopped and held up his hand to halt his team. Rose could see him more clearly now and he was indeed a strange looking man.
The metal plate concealed his mouth and a blue bandana covered his head. Across the plate were what looked like huge animal scratches, presumably airways to allow him to breathe. On his right arm was an impressive piece of jagged metal armour that ran to a point, like a huge sword attached to his arm. His physique was phenomenal but what little could be seen of his face was as grey as stone. It was clear this man wished to see what would happen between Nayakax and the hooded stranger, both of whom had been standing completely still all this time. The wind blew leaves across their feet. Rose wondered if they would ever move.
Then, like a bolt of lightning, Nayakax flew towards the hooded man. He tried to punch him over and over again, moving so fast it seemed a blur. But the dark figure had guarded every single attack and returned with a well-aimed counter-kick to his stomach. Nayakax reacted and bent back so fast and so far that he saw the man’s foot fly past his nose. He reached out and grabbed the foot and flipped it round so that the hooded man flew spinning in the air, but landed carefully on his feet just to see Nayakax try to land a punch. His efforts were blocked again and again. The hooded man started jumping off the nearby walls to aim a flying punch or kick, but Nayakax was blocking them and was starting to look worried.
“If this keeps up, I won’t be able to block his attacks for much longer,” Nayakax thought as he ran up the classroom wall in front of hundreds of other schoolchildren to one of the balconies in order to buy himself more time.
The hooded man followed him and shot what looked like a long black spike from his wrist. Nayakax jumped over it with fantastic athletic skill and landed on his feet. The spike had been concentrated kyu put into physical form and dispersed as soon as it hit the wall behind him.
“So that’s how he wants to play it?”
Nayakax brought his two palms together in front of him before sending his right hand up and the left hand down as far as he could reach and clapped them together. This caused a bright blue wave of kyu to discharge against the hooded man who flew back against the stone wall leaving it a crumbling mess. Massive chunks of rubble flew across the courtyard and Nayakax was able to crush them into dust with a wall of energy before they caused any damage to himself or his schoolmates.
Once it all settled, the figure was still there - standing completely still.
Nayakax furiously ran towards him, grabbed the sword from his hip and threw himself towards the man.
“There’s no way that didn’t leave a mark. He’s most likely not even made of flesh, perhaps even a shadow,” Naya had realised, “old Dark Clan magic. Probably a spy or a scout.”
The man arched his back and surged forward. From his hands shot out a huge number of black spikes similar to before, except this time they were smaller and there must have been a good hundred or so of them, shooting through the air like a blizzard of needles.
Nayakax ducked and dived for what it was worth until he used his sword to parry the rest. He crawled into a ball and tried to defend himself. The spikes had cut Nayakax across his body but it was nothing he felt he could not handle. They would heal easily. That is, if he survived.
He looked up to see the cloaked shadow approach him and took a deep breath.
Meanwhile inside the classroom, Cyrene was getting restless. She looked at the Elders waiting at the side-lines. They just stood there, waiting. She knew they had been watching Nayakax closely ever since his family had defected from the Dark Clans but this was irresponsible. It had become a test. A test of what Nayakax was truly capable of for such a young lad and a test of his loyalty to Norheath, but she wasn’t so sure if it was a test worth passing.
The hooded figure approached Nayakax and as the boy started to get up, he was punched down. Cyrene gasped. Then another hit landed – and another. The men watching on started to walk in.
Just then, in a fit of fury, Nayakax got up and ran at the cloaked figure with all his might and unleashed a powerful combination of punches and kicks that the shadow could not defend for much longer. The sheer anger behind it became overpowering. The darkness within the cloak seemed to dissipate with each hit that landed. Soon, the dark figure lost his defence and fell back on the floor meekly.
Nayakax approached him slowly, looking down at the dark cloaked figure in front of him. The man suddenly looked pathetic and was crawling back and shaking his hood side to side as if begging for mercy.
“I know what you are.” Nayakax whispered to him. “I know where you come from. I was told a long time ago that the dark absorbs the dark. That it’s just what we do. We don’t die in the Dark Clans, we just become part of one whole. Another part of Gaea. Do you agree? Is that what you think you are?”
Hemero stared on from the classroom in disbelief. He knew Nayakax acted all tough, but here he was standing over a defeated opponent in a real fight. There was no denying it, Hemero knew what was going to come next and he was going to do it. Nayakax was going to kill him.
“Stop this immediately!”
Ev
eryone turned to see the Valhalla Headmaster Theus, standing there glaring at Nayakax. He was an imposing figure at the best of times. He had white hair that fell behind him like a waterfall running along his back and a beard that matched it. He wore a long black jacket over a similar white undergarment. His whole body was luminescent and he stood upright like a statue, but his face and body looked old and haggard. His eyes had grown pale as of late and there was an air of complacency in his recent attitude that the other teachers did not care for. He had aged terribly over the last few years for no apparent reason. In fact, it was a relatively peaceful time between the lands and no great incident had happened for at least a decade, the Dark Clans had been quiet for so long and Theus should be a happy man. But clearly, he was not.
His worsening appearance had caused a huge amount of gossip throughout Norheath. Loose tongues suggested the Valhalla leader was ill and dying, that he was coming into his final spring, others thought he might have been possessed, but it was widely considered that he was just tired and weary. Yet here he was and in such a state, he was still able to command authority.
Nayakax turned back to the hooded man to suddenly see just the frayed cloak laying empty on the stone floor. He lifted it up but it was useless, the shadow had disappeared. Nayakax threw it back down in frustration and Theus walked up beside him and picked it back up for inspection. Rose noticed the man with the eye patch had disappeared along with the others.
“It was a Shade.” Nayakax muttered.
“No,” answered Theus, “It was a Ker.” He sighed. “Far more dangerous. You’re lucky to be alive.”
“Am I?”
Theus stared at Nayakax with a darkness within his eyes that shook the young boy to his core [DG2]– yet he returned the stare as coldly as he could. Suddenly, the sound of kids shouting filled the courtyard and Theus walked off, taking the cloak with him.
“Go play little boy. Go play.”
Nayakax watched him intently. Theus could have dealt with the hooded man himself, but why didn’t he? It was as if the shadow had been given a clear exit and there was no one to be seen during his escape. Had Nayakax not been so bored with Hemero, he might not have caught a glimpse of the movement in the courtyard, the dark within the darkness that his father had taught him many a time to watch out for.
He thought back on how he would be woken up in the middle of the night to be taught again and again about how to watch out for a Dark Clan assassin. However, it was the words of his brother that always stuck with him. He had told him that it was pointless – there’s no way the Dark Clans would let them die so peacefully in their sleep. They were traitors. Defectors. They would receive the worst punishment possible – whatever that may be. To die in your sleep is a blessing saved for the righteous, not for ‘scum’ like them. ‘We’ve disowned the dark,’ he’d said, ‘and for that, we have nowhere to hide.’
“Hm. Looks like you let him get away Naya,” Hemero tutted from beside him. “This… must be embarrassing for you. Never mind.” Hemero patted him on the back as Rose slowly walked up to them.
Nayakax noticed the other kids were looking at the debris and excitedly discussing what had happened whilst some of the older kids were acting as if it wasn’t a big deal. However, Hemero was the only person to come up to him – the only person brave or stupid enough to wind him up after such a display.
Then there was Rose. Nayakax thought she looked so plain and so ordinary. She was pretty, there was no doubt about it, but even for a girl she was just too girly. All ribbons and flowers and smiles. How boring. She also didn’t hide her affection for him much in the same way that Hemero was not hiding his affection for her either. These playground politics were just silly games to him, but he knew it was a game he must play in order to fit in here, to adapt and integrate himself into the society. Something his brother was never very good at.
“I thought you were very brave.” Rose said timidly.
Nayakax turned and walked away without even glancing in her direction. He hated himself for it. Not because it was rude, nor because he was exhausted or angry or trying to figure out why a shadow had got in and out of the Valhalla so quietly, but because it was something his brother would do. His brother who had left him scarred and had returned to the Dark Clans. A traitor’s traitor and the true dark in the darkness. Perhaps his brother might be the assassin sent back to murder his family and do them a service – by politely killing them in their sleep.
CHAPTER THREE
Cyrene had by now gathered her class up and was escorting them outside of the Valhalla gates as protocol stated after an emergency.
Rose looked around her at the top of this mountain and felt overwhelmed by its beauty. The fields were rich and plentiful and flowed like a green river that had paused for an eternity so that generations could gaze on it at this perfect moment in time. The sounds of the bustling village rising up from underneath them filled her with excitement and she could almost taste the sweetness on the wind. She was dizzy from all the senses surrounding her.
She breathed in the cool, fresh air and looked back up at the Valhalla. She couldn’t wait to be able to get to the top and look out over the country. She saw a lone white statue that had pride of place near the top of the building. She wondered what the view was like from up there, overlooking the lands. She knew that the statue was one of the most important men in history, the founder of Norheath, Diega Manstru, who was one of the Fifteen that Gaea had chosen to accompany him, but knew nothing more about the man himself.
She couldn’t quite see him in detail but it looked like he wore a long cloak and held a huge sword imbedded[DG3] firmly in the ground in front of him. It was as if he was keeping watch over everyone in the world, protecting them.
The country was an important one to protect. It was the first place that accepted humans and Titans alike, where they could be found living together in harmony. Since the Great Wars, that was a huge step. Her friends had told her before she moved that once you join Norheath, you’re no longer one of your own, you’re one of them. Some called it paradise and others, a prison.
It was true that hardly anyone here ventured outside of the country. This might be because of the strict border control but it did not mean that you were trapped. In fact, to Rose it seemed everyone was happy here. Why would they leave? The villagers would normally not even travel out of the village, let alone the country. It was peaceful, they worked off the land and it was their home. Out there were unchecked lands, unruly Titans and much worse things that she dared not even entertain the thought of. At least in Norheath, they were safe.
Rose turned around to see Hemero just sitting by himself playing with the grass by skimming his hand over the top of the blades, while the other kids laughed away with their own groups of friends.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
Hemero looked up to see Rose looking over him like an angelic vision against the clear blue sky.
“Nothing.” answered Hemero. He pulled up a clump of grass and threw it in front of him. “I hate Naya.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Out of everyone in my class he’s the only one that speaks to me. Can you believe he’s the closest thing I have to a best friend at school? And I hate him. What does that say? I know it’s not his fault though. Ever since he turned up, when we were little he’s always been the most powerful one. I can’t even do the easy kyu techniques. I don’t know why I bother.”
“Come on now,” said Rose sternly as she hated people feeling sorry for themselves. “It can’t be all that bad.”
“All I have is my friend Phin, but he’s not in my class. Everyone there calls me a freak or an idiot. I don’t know which is worse. It’s because of my eyes, I know it is. I hate them, they’re so ugly.”
“Come on Hemy. You don’t mind if I call you that do you?” Hemero shook his head. Rose smiled and placed a hand on his shoulder. “Good. Now I think you have the most unique eyes I have ever seen. You look like a
cat, and I love cats!” Hemero smiled. “I wish I had eyes like that. I bet that you can see right over the mountains!” She put her arm around him.
“I can actually,” answered Hemero, “I can see far further than anyone else here. Guess that’s something.”
“Well there you go! Surely you beat Naya on that?” said Rose, rocking him gently to one side.
“Yeah. I guess I do.”
“And isn’t the whole point of Gaea that we are all born with the same amount of power? That we’re all born equals?”
“Yeah, but it doesn’t always turn out that way does it?” Hemero stood up and took a deep breath. He placed his hand gently on Rose’s shoulder and smiled.
“You’re It!”
Off he ran like the wind. She watched him playfully dash into a thick forest and hide behind a tree. All the students here, all the Chosen, had to be athletically fit and watching him run like that reminded her of what her Grandmother used to say – ‘If you can’t run fast enough in life, it’ll catch you up’. Although she wasn’t quite sure what that meant.
She followed him and soon they were running through the trees. The sun shone down cutting through the bright green leaves onto the dusty ground creating a golden glow that felt warm against their skin. They ran around chasing one another, laughing and forgetting everything that had happened that morning. But it wasn’t for long.
A loud sound erupted from within the Valhalla. It sounded like an elephant roaring in anger and as they emerged from the forest, they could see the other children going back inside the school gates. They followed quickly and passed between the huge wooden doors and onto the courtyard. They could see Cyrene beckoning them over from the other side, surrounded by their classmates. As they got closer they could hear murmurings of the children – something important was happening.
“Can I have everybody’s attention please?” Cyrene clapped her hands together. “Our leader Theus has announced an emergency meeting in the Great Hall. Now, we go in one class at a time and when you follow me, please walk in two at a time and follow those in front to sit in the appropriate row. Do not just sit where you want! Go in quickly and quietly as Theus will be waiting.”
