by S. J. Wist
Yri looked into the distance still trembling, where the massive black shadow of a Cael cut through the cold air for Toria.
14: BEAUTIFUL IN DEATH
The phelan had calmed down by the time they reached the Efereal Mountains. Kas wasn’t sure what to expect from the Chimera Mother. Even in his past life he had never seen Nephena up close. When he did accompany his sister to the battlefields on the Torian Continent, he usually kept order at the back lines. Asil and Damek were always enough to deal with anything that dared to take them on together at the front.
Together. The very word with their names in the same sentence made him shudder. He had never been grateful for his soultwin’s lack of memories until now. Sybl had forgotten much of how she had once favored Damek. If she sided with him now, their circumstances would be propelling in the direction of disaster. They had all changed so much, and he prayed that they had changed for the better.
He split off from the Pack to try and find out why it was so quiet. Kas was getting increasingly concerned, as he couldn’t find Xirel’s psi anywhere in the tunnels and caverns of the frozen Efereal Mountains.
“So we come together in meeting, dark Fay. It has been a long time since I smelled you.”
Kas shuddered and looked into the dark, snow-carved hallway where the voice came from. He never felt so alone in his life, against this abnormality of Aragmoth’s will that Nephena was. His manners might be the only thing that could save him now, and anything he had learned from Sybl about dealing with her. “Chimera Mother,” Kas said, giving a small bow of respect.
Nephena moved again, and the face of her lion’s head was the first to come into the light of the cavern he waited in. She wore a mane like a male lion but had the voice of a female. She was a female, as far as logic and reasoning could explain, despite the goat’s and snake’s head both being male.
The goat’s head appeared next, bearded like an old man with the wisdom to match. It eyed Kas curiously, before it looked at the serpent tail who had brought its eyes into the light to get a closer look at him. “He is undead. Can the Caelestis still not cure this?”
“Why is Aragmoth putting the Fate of the world on one Fay, when he has simply to fix the second?” the snake added in a hiss.
The lion’s head remained silent, as it watched him curiously under her other heads’ bickering.
A cold chill went down Kas back as he remembered a moment back at the Sanctus, and the time he had spent with his sister in the gardens. He remembered her playful mockery of his appearance. She was only teasing him. He prayed that she had only been teasing him. Kas pulled his courage together before it could scatter off entirely. “Am I not beautiful, Chimera Mother?”
“You are the walking dead,” the lion’s head finally spoke, and flatly at that.
“Death can be beautiful as well,” Kas said in his defense.
“Death is beautiful when it is silent and still,” Nephena replied, taking another step forward on her lion paws. “Does Asil think you are beautiful?”
Kas replied a hasty, “Yes.”
‘Then I too think you are beautiful.”
Kas gave a small bow of a thank you, and began pondering how best to discover what had happened to Xirel. “Will Xirel not be joining us?”
“Xirel is being disciplined for his actions against me. He has not only imprisoned me for quite some time, but has questioned the Caelestis. That is punishable by death, softened only by these softer times and conditions that I have awakened to.”
“I know my sister very well, and I know she puts Xirel in high favor. If he were harmed she would not be pleased. May he be released?”
Nephena’s goat and snake head whispered amongst themselves until one of them sent out the order by psi for the chimera Awl to be brought to them.
Kas looked to another corridor and quickly ran to Xirel’s aid as he was dragged to him by his white hair by a bear, and dropped into his arms. Kas quickly began to mend the injuries around his head, fearing his frailer friend had endured an extreme punishment not meant for his delicate nature.
“Why is Asil not with you?” Nephena asked.
Kas gave Xirel to two of his Callers who continued mending his open wounds and bruises. Fay or not, Kas knew that he was still a shadow of his sister. A shadow who could be snuffed out if Nephena deemed him an insignificant loss to the light of his soultwin that made him relevant. “She is with Moon, looking for a means to stop Damek.”
“Ah yes, Damek,” Nephena replied. “My memory is getting slow with the rest of me. You should take the rest of your forces with you and aid her.”
That is what I am hoping to do. Kas looked at Jru, and his mentor quickly sent out the orders by psi to get everyone together to leave immediately. The old phelan somnus feared just as Kas did, that their welcome relied on how much sanity remained in Nephena. Kas let out a breath of relief when the massive Chimera Mother turned in the hallway to leave. But his relief was short lived when she came to a sudden stop. What now? Kas asked himself, as he didn’t like not being able to predict what the Chimera Mother was thinking.
Nephena walked over to Kas, and her lion’s and goat’s head looked down at him. “What is that strange scent on you?”
Kas didn’t know what she was talking about, until her goat’s head grabbed him by the back of his breastplate and spun him around. Then it ripped it right off his back all at once with his tunic, sending pieces of the leather straps and white fabric falling to the ground.
“You are marked by Damek,” Nephena said on seeing the Curse glyph on his back. “You are a servant of him!”
“No,” Kas replied with a calm tone. “I am not controlled by him or would ever serve him.”
“Lies! All lies!” Nephena shouted, rearing her lion’s head back with a roar. “Contain him! He is a servant of our enemy!”
Kas didn’t so much as get his hand to his sword, before the bear that had dragged Xirel into the hall sent a swipe of his claws at him. The strike hurled Kas against the ice cavern’s wall hard enough to throw him unconscious.
15: ICE AND FIRE
When Sybl couldn’t get any response from Cirrus, she decided to take a break and catch her breath to ponder just what she was doing. The snow and ice burst upwards as the Aur storm turned the frozen Eternal Waters into a minefield behind her. She stepped back on the Torian beach when shards of sharp ice and snow came flying at her. The True had already run off in fear of the dragon’s continent that they were now on, and would wait out the storm for their chance to return to the Suzerain.
“You ran here all by yourself?”
Sybl jumped as another explosion of ice hit in time with Loki’s scolding. “I…uh... I beat the storm, so it’s alright.” But something was undoubtedly different when she looked at the dragoon Awl. He was furious and his orange eyes glowed with it.
“I’m going to kill Cirrus. How could he let you cross that by yourself?” he said, referring to the storm behind her.
“Loki—”
“No, enough is enough. Sybl…” Loki took a step closer, before he stopped and regained his composure with a long exhale. “I want to show you something.”
Sybl didn’t want to fight with him, and didn’t sense any wayward intent, so she let him touch and pull her into his somn.
She opened her eyes to a massive waterfall what felt like a short time later, and saw that they were under the rocks of a tunnel. “Where did you kidnap me to this time?”
“This is the Bedlam Waterway. I thought you should see this place. Normally, we burn the dead so the Ancients can move on and whatnot, but we buried Serena here.”
Sybl followed Loki inside. They came to a cave with a hole in the ceiling that allowed the weak light of the Soph Aur through. She looked at the sandy ground then where a tombstone was erected in the center of the cave. It had no words on it. “Why did no one put her name on it?”
“Honestly, we didn’t know what last name to inscribe. It’s customary for Earth women
to take their husband’s last name on marriage, right?” Loki asked.
“Yes. Well, assuming she came from the same side of Earth as me.”
“Well we don’t have last names, and there was a rather angry debate whether to write her first name in Torian or in English.”
Sybl knelt down before the tombstone. “Why not just write it in pluma Thread?”
“Hmm…” Loki unsheathed one of his daggers. He cut a few strands of his light green hair, then held them with his fingers as he used his aeri to fuse it to the stone. Then he stepped back and looked at the strange glyph it had created.
Sybl touched it, and immediately she was brought to a moment where Loki had looked at Serena for a while. Long enough to get her to smile.
“She never got used to the markings on my eyes.” Loki sighed. “I think she would just try and stare them off of me sometimes.”
She looked at the green, star-like markings around his eyes and found it interesting that he didn’t use his illusion weave to hide them.
“I thought about it, but then I remembered how much you liked them. So I kept my stars for you.”
Sybl smiled, as the memory was perfect. “Thank you, Loki.”
“Mhm. Now let’s get going to Toria. I have a whole castle to show you and the world isn’t giving me much time to work with.”
Sybl got to her feet and followed him, giving one last look back at her mother’s grave. Its glyph glowed a light green, which lifted the spirits in her a bit more.
“What’s wrong?”
Sybl snapped back to attention, and looked to where Loki waited with the waterfall behind him. “I’m just worried. I don’t know if I can stop Damek.”
“Well it’s obvious what he’s doing by picking off everyone you care about to make you think that.”
“Maybe I should head back to the Suzerain Continent,” Sybl said. “I’ve asked so much from you as it is, and I have no right to.”
“Princess, stop. Just because you are with Cirrus, doesn’t change anything but my determination. That and we’re on the same side.” Loki shifted his feet to look outside. “I’ll tell you what, we’ll go to Toria for now and let its aeri refresh you a bit. Then you can make up your mind to where you want to go.”
Sybl watched the waterfall for a while as she thought on it. She could feel the Mei on her arm pulsing with Cirrus’ distance from her pulling on it. Toria needed him. No one else needed her minus what she was here for, and that was to stop Damek and prevent the destruction of Aster.
Loki held out his hand, and when she took it he somned with her. He sprung off the ledge and into the white mists, flying out of the waterway. Then the dragon turned his light green wings in the air towards Toria.
16: BREAKDOWN
Cirrus hit the wall of his room with all the anger and despair that had built up in him. The frustration of feeling like he could do nothing would tear him apart. Then Damek would be right there to scrape up what was left of him to put to use. Cirrus didn’t have it in him to go on if something happened to Sybl or if he was turned into her enemy. He felt so out of place in it all. There was a knock at the door, and he quickly mopped the tears from his face with his hands. “Come in.”
Cecil opened the door, and turned his senses to where he heard Cirrus. Then his sphere of water floated into the room to give the blind dragoon sight. “You alright?”
“I’ve been better.”
Cecil closed the door behind him and walked a few steps closer. “I think you’re overreacting. You haven’t so much as given her a chance to explain anything.”
Cirrus wasn’t understanding what Cecil was talking about. He was angry at himself, and he couldn’t begin to guess what Sybl could ever do wrong to make him angry at all.
“They aren’t much like they were thousands of years ago,” Cecil continued. “Even if they were, I think you’re overreacting.”
He finally caught up to what Cecil was talking about. “You think I would be jealous of her feelings for Kas? That’s ridiculous, Cecil. He’s the only family she has, next to us.”
“Well I don’t mean Kas as much as I mean Sybl being able to have a child.”
Cirrus blinked at Cecil, then looked at Moon. He had never thought about that till Cecil mentioned it. “If she can craft Daath back to life from a mere bone, I’m sure she can have a child.”
Moon lightly shook his head.
“Why not?” Cirrus asked.
“Her energy is too turbulent,” Cecil explained in the Eminor’s place. “A child can’t grow in her while battling her aeri and estus energy that she can switch between instantaneously.”
“It doesn’t change anything. It’s not like I would risk having a child with her after I killed my own mother by being born. I wouldn’t chance my bloodline being Cursed for it.”
“Well if that’s not what you’re upset about, then what?” Cecil asked.
Cirrus swayed on his feet, before sitting down on his bed and dropping his head to his hands. “Every one of my thoughts keeps going over what Damek said. That I can’t keep her without his help. Sybl’s going to find a way to free Nafury from Daath, with or without me.”
“That thing was not Nafury. It’s the monster that destroyed him so it could weaken you. If either of you breaks, this war is over. You have to find a way to do what I didn’t see in time to do with Rose. If she had died… I don’t know what I would have done. But I know what I felt and what I was thinking when you struck the Phoenix out of the sky.”
Cirrus calmed down and listened.
“I…” Cecil turned away, and he closed his clouded, orange eyes. “I felt that something was different. It was as if our Mei had become a meaningless mark.” He looked at his wrist, where the silver marking now glowed strongly again. “It was like everything between us suddenly died. But you can still feel Sybl, right? So make her listen to you before it’s too late.”
Cirrus looked at the glyph on his right arm that glowed as he thought about Sybl.
Cecil thought on the matter in silence for a while, before turning to Moon who lay down near the wall. “What if you gave the fight to him?”
“What?” Cirrus asked, baffled by the idea. “You mean go berserk on purpose? That’s insane, even for me.”
“Moon can destroy Damek. It’s in him. But it’s not in you and it’s not in Sybl.”
“Moon is an Eminor,” Cirrus argued.
“An intelligent one fashioned for war. An Eminor who isn’t a slave to the festra. With Sybl’s Aur near him, he’s untouchable even against Damek. Nothing can stop Sybl if we use her in the right way.”
“She’s not a weapon of war!” Cirrus shouted at Cecil. “Aside from the Sylvan Aur within her, she’s just a human girl!”
“She is the reincarnation of Asil, the Caelestis of War. Aragmoth is a planet of Eminor created for vengeance, so what do you think his right hand is!? Think, dammit Cirrus. If you don’t want her to be that weapon, then stop being such a blasted coward! Simera and the Nafury we knew aren’t here to tell you what to do anymore. Now it’s your turn. Cause that’s all that’s left of Fate now,” Cecil said, as his water globe floated near Moon. “She’s calling you, now get up and answer her. I expect Sybl to be there for your inauguration.”
“My what? As General?”
“No, you dimwit. Seriously? Did no one tell you?”
Cirrus just looked at him blankly.
“Your father was Simera.”
17: MERSAEL
The sound of ticking invaded Kas’ psi and his body struggled to escape the darkness of being unconscious. What is that? His vision returned, and he looked to where Sybl slept on her bed on Earth. Kas picked up the clock on her nightstand as it continued in its steady rhythm and then set it back down. A few moments after it suddenly shot out an alarm that startled him.
Sybl only growled and reached out her hand to it, before picking it up and nearly striking him in the head when she tossed it across the room.
Kas looke
d at the clock and went to pick it up as it was silent now. “Why do you wish to break it?”
“You’re as relentless as that stupid clock. Too bad it’s the only thing I can throw across the room.”
Kas examined the metal clock and found that it was still in one piece despite it all. He set it back on her table and watched if she would pick it up again. He hated to see her sleep all day because she was depressed, but she was awake and looking at the clock now. “What is the matter?”
“It just occurred to me that you can pick up a clock, yet you can’t touch me…”
