“Are you ok?” she asked.
From her posture, he could tell that she was not at a full strength; that she merely wore a façade underneath her soft smile to hide the fatigue she harbored from healing the others.
“I’m fine, Skye. Just doing my watch. Things haven’t been exactly peaceful as of late. Even for our terms. How are the others?”
“The girl, Marona, she’s okay. She’s sleeping now and should be at full strength tomorrow. Emil, he’s sleeping as well. He’s fine physically, but he’s troubled. He’s… sad, you know? There’s a cloud around him and it just lingers. I can feel it, and it bothers me.”
“The village that you saw that night, it was his. What you saw in your vision was him fighting to save both his people and his family from a member of Legion. Emil fought and won, but ultimately they took everything away from him. His family escaped the initial onslaught but was executed by another member. Through the executioner’s abilities, he was forced to live it through her eyes.”
Skye raised her hand to her mouth as her eyes began to well up with tears. “Oh my God,” she whispered faintly.
“Up to this point, it seems that the thought of his family being out there somewhere gave him the strength to carry on, but now I don’t know what to think. While I can’t experience emotion on your level, I do know that I feel his sorrow to the fullest of my capacity.”
“Brother, you know that it’s not your fault. We’d been doing so well, and you just wanted to make sure we stayed safe.”
“Perhaps… but one cannot simply change the way one feels.”
Chapter 11: The Dreamer and the Deceiver
Six Years Ago
“Stay behind me, Boys!”
From inside, the doors came buckling down as their living quarters quickly filled with troops armed with the intent to kill. Once inside, the guards quickly surrounded the incumbents of the household under siege. The father of the household drew his sword with one hand while using the other to shield his wife and his two sons.
“Sir Lancaster.” A voice emerged from the small battalion of guards before them. The crowd parted to make way for a man outfitted in bronze armor that uniquely complemented his brown ponytail that trailed behind him. “The boy, give him to me. You safe guard him even though he is cursed. You of all people should know the dangers that this child brings to our land.” The general’s eyes shifted over to the boy who was partially hidden behind his father’s cloak.
“Though he looks like one of us, do acknowledge that he is not one of us. I’m sure you have seen what the townspeople have spoken of; the unholy aura that this child brings to the world. It brings disease, death, famine… all of these things and yet you hold on to him still. I find it more than a coincidence that you resigned from your position with us under the new orders from the king. What do you plan on doing exactly?”
“Raphael, stop this! You’ve held Emil with your own two hands! You’ve watched him grow! He is but a child!” Emil’s father sternly retorted. “Let him live!”
Raphael scoffed at the father’s sentiment, not even giving a second of his thoughts the time of day. Emil’s father continued on but, no matter how hard he tried plea fell on deaf ears. Raphael was steadfast on his superior’s order.
“The child’s blue hellfire is not of this earth. You know this. Beneath the exterior of that child lies a demon of insurmountable power. If he lives, the deeds of darkness he will learn to commit will be unfathomable. Surrender the child, or surrender your life.”
“Lies! You know what the king speaks of is lies! Emil is no demon! Call off your men!”
“Silence traitor! You were once my brother in arms, but now I only see you as shell of the man you once were. You disappoint me.”
“Raphael, please. You know that Emil is no demon. He is my son… a child. Why do you blindly follow the king’s orders?”
“That’s enough! I do what I am told because I must. His judgment is far more decisive than my own. Give me the boy, and I will let your family live. If not, we will kill your family where you stand.”
Emil’s father turned back and looked into the eyes of both his children and then into the eyes of his loving wife. Emil was now fastened close to his brother. Both boys stood in front of their mother who towered over them. Her eyes filled with tears, knowing that it would be the last time her eyes would meet his. She knew that it was the end for her as well.
“Raphael, you know that I cannot give up my son…”
“Then you will die here today along with your loved ones.”
From both sides of Raphael, his guards placed themselves in front of him. Emil’s father readied his sword, centering it in front of his body and placing his free hand firmly around the handle of his concave blade as he stood before the men that threatened to take everything that he held dear.
“Run!” Emil’s father called out as the guards came forward, but his command was quickly cut off by a rain of blades that cleaved through his skin. The guards of Raphael’s squadron gave him no mercy as he fell to the hands of the enemy. From behind him, the screams of his wife echoed throughout the bloodstained halls as she witnessed the murder of her husband. Emil and his older brother stood mortified as they watched their father’s life slowly slip away.
When the last beat of his heart failed to bring life to his body, the guards approached Emil with the same intent. But before they could lay a hand on him, his mother stepped in front of both her sons, forming a human barricade. The tears flowed like rivers as she served as a wall, separating her offspring from the harm that would inevitably befall her. “Please,” she sobbed. “Just let them live.”
The guards slowly approached her, stepping over her slain husband, but Raphael stopped them from raising their blades once more.
“Very well,” he said as he met her face to face. “I will spare your first born, Arius, who bears no curse. He is innocent. If you give me the abnormal, I will let you and your boy go; free from harm. It was a rather bleak turn of events that your husband passed, but seeing that he blatantly overstepped his bounds, I was left no other choice. You do understand this, right?”
Raphael waited for a response but Emil’s mother remained silent, only sobbing to herself as she stared down the demon in front of her.
“So what will it be Lady Cassandra?” He said as he raised his sword up to her breast.
“Raphael, you know I can’t do that.”
A sudden wisp of air escaped from her lungs as Raphael’s sword sank into her chest. Cold and methodically, he killed her. From her mouth, blood spilled onto the baseboard, coloring her garments on the way down.
“I… love… you both. Take care of each other.”
His eyes remained unfazed as he watched the horror of her fate resonate through her very being, not caring that he had just robbed innocents of their mother.
“I know…and that is why you will die today with your husband,” he commented as she fell to her knees and then face forward onto the floor.
From behind her slain body, a blue light began to fill the room, radiating from Emil. The look on the young boy’s face was no longer that of helplessness or confusion but that of rage; a deep-seeded hatred that could only be purified with their deaths. As the aura around Emil contorted around his body Raphael’s men steadily backed away.
“Do not waiver at the sight of this demon’s true power! He is still just a boy. Hold fast and kill this monster!”
“You killed my mother and father in cold blood, and yet I’m the monster?” Emil said as his aura began to violently shift around him. Slowly, he walked to his father’s deceased body and grasped the sword that lay underneath his lifeless hand. “I’ll kill you all.”
“Formation! We kill him now!” Raphael yelled as his troops aggregated around him, ready to defend their leader.
Twisted with rage, Emil rushed into the battalion responsible for the death of his parents with no concern for the outcome.
“Go!”
&n
bsp; From their defensive ranks three guards charged forward blocking Emil’s path to their commander and initiated an attack of their own. Strategically, they surrounded Emil in a triangle formation and launched their assault from all sides.
“Emil!” Arius cried out as he watched, unable to do anything as he remained immobile and crouched at his mother’s side.
At once, the three swordsmen slashed at Emil, but he dodged them, only being grazed by the last one. Immediately, Emil went for a counter attack and sliced at the guard who stood directly in front of him. The sharp cling of impacted metal followed after his target successfully blocked Emil’s attack. From behind a guard swiped at his back, cutting him and causing him to lunge forward in pain.
“See, the boy can be killed! Do not be afraid of this abomination!” Raphael called out from behind his ranks at the sight of Emil’s mishap.
From above, the blade of the swordsmen that blocked Emil’s attack came down at his extended head. Emil narrowly dodged the blade that aimed to decapitate him and swung at the guard behind him, cutting into his burgundy plated armor. Even at full strength, with his recently manifested powers, at best he was only able to match Raphael’s elite guards in terms of raw power.
“Go, go, go! Kill him!” At the sight of Emil’s apparent weakness, Raphael sent more men towards the wounded boy.
“Rahhhhhh!” Emil yelled as he continued to press on, fighting against the slew of endless opponents Raphael sent his way.
From the foreground, Raphael watched silently, amused with the raw talent that the boy displayed when matched against his best men. Though at first he was able to hold his own, through the shear amount of men that came at Emil, he was slowly beginning to become overwhelmed. The strikes that he would have normally dodged nicked him, and those that would only nick him tore his flesh.
“Well done my boy, but it seems that twelve seems to be your lucky number,” Raphael said from behind his men.
Emil could barely hear him over the sounds of his ragged breaths. On both sides, injuries were taken. Cuts and bruises were scattered across Emil’s body; killing blows that were nullified by the now faint aura that wisped around him. Of Raphael’s men, only about a fourth were wounded, but even still they struck at the opportune time.
“A young boy, at the age of sixteen, holding his own against twelve of my best men. Impressive. But still, today you die. Finish the job, men.”
From all sides they attacked him, waning down on his already nearly depleted stamina. Even with his rage driving his blade, it wasn’t nearly enough to do anything but bide time to avoid the inevitable.
“Stop!” Arius yelled. “Can’t you see he’s had enough?!”
Raphael’s men paid no mind to the normal child’s plea for mercy and continued their assault against his brother. From where he stood, he watched the downfall of his brother, blow after blow, growing in intensity. Like a pack of wolves, they picked at him. They were not going for the kill outright, but instead chipped away at him at the most convenient times. With his attackers present on all sides, there was no chance for escape in his current condition.
“Arius… get out of here while you still can! They’re after me!”
“I can’t just leave you to die!” Arius called out. Ignoring his brother’s request, Arius called out louder to the men who surrounded his wounded brother. “Leave him alone!”
“Get out of here!” Emil yelled from amidst the swarm of men that surrounded him.
Just as Emil finished his sentence, a fist outfitted in iron slammed against his nose, knocking him off his feet and into the air. The light that once thinly danced the line between life and death was no more. As Emil’s suspended body fell to the floor, the aura that once glowed around him flickered then faded altogether. Unable to do anything, Arius watched as his brother’s bruised body fell to the ground.
“Brother!” Arius cried as the guards surrounded Emil’s fallen body. In what seemed like slow motion, the guards seemed to gather, confident in their victory and eager to seek revenge on the boy who defied them. Emil gripped his blade in an attempt to fight back, but one of the guards pressed his heel into his hand, thwarting his efforts. Emil screamed in pain as the guard grinded his steel boot against his knuckles. Using his free hand, Emil swung his body up but was halted by an abrupt knee to the face. Emil’s head violently jolted back as it slammed against the wooden floor, leaving him stunned. The guard over him snickered to himself as he lined his sword with the center of Emil’s forehead.
“If you’re going to do it, then do it.” Emil looked coldly into his assailant’s eyes as he hovered over him.
The guard said nothing, only acknowledging him with a grunt. He pulled back his blade but Emil didn’t flinch. Instead, he maintained eye contact the whole time through.
“STOP!” Arius called out again in desperation.
The guard yelled as he gathered his strength and plunged his blade downward at Emil’s body, but the blade stopped before it could penetrate his flesh.
From the ground, Emil watched as the guardsmen’s blade shook in front of him, unable to move any further. Slightly confused, he studied the look on the guard’s face as he tried to push the blade further.
Emil flashed a smile to himself at the awakening of his older brother’s powers.
Arius… you, too?
Involuntarily, the soldier’s foot let off of Emil’s hand allowing him to spring back to his feet in the moment of confusion.
Thanks, Arius. Now it’s my turn. I just hope I have energy left.
Before the others could react, Emil forced a wave of energy from his body, flinging Raphael’s men to the ground. From his core, his body screamed as he burned through his reserves in a last ditch effort to save both him and his brother.
“Arius, we have to go,” Emil said to his brother as he hunched over in pain but Arius remained frozen, baffled by the extent of his new found powers. “We don’t have much time. I didn’t have enough to do much to them, come on, let’s go!”
It wasn’t till Emil grabbed him by the hand and led him into the forest that Arius returned to the waking world.
Chapter 12: Awakened
Six Years Ago
“So they think they can just swoop in and play God? Killing whatever and whoever just because someone says so?!” Arius said as he continued his long sustained rant that he had begun soon after he felt they were secure. It was nightfall now and Arius and Emil had found shelter in a cave. For some time now, they had been running from The Guard but only recently had they felt safe enough to rest.
“Mom and Dad are gone because of some bullshit propaganda that has no backing. They hunted you down because you couldn’t conceal your powers and ran with it.” Arius paced back and forth on the cavern floor while Emil remained stationary, resting to recover from his wounds that fed into his exhaustion. “You didn’t hurt anybody. You didn’t do anything wrong. They killed our parents because of you… because of us. Because they were afraid!”
A boom echoed through the cavern walls as Arius struck it with his fist. When he retracted his knuckles from the wall a mixture of blood and crumbled stone trickled down his hand before he shook it away.
“How could they do that to us, Emil? How could they look our whole family in the eye and pick us off one by one like we’re some kind of sub-humans?! Like we don’t have feelings, or thoughts, or lives of our own! I watched Dad die; helpless. I watched Mom die; helpless. I watched, paralyzed, as they had their way with them. But you… you stood up to them. At least you fought to avenge them. At least you tried. I wanted to help you. I did, but I was too weak. Too afraid. Imagine me, just some feeble kid, crying in the background as you risked your life for them. Do you know how it feels to be helpless, Emil? To be so crushed, so defeated that you can’t even move if you wanted to? That’s how I felt as I watched them pick at you. The thought of losing you, the thought of being alone, awakened whatever was is inside me and now I want them to pay. I want Raphael to feel th
at way… the same way I felt next time he sees me. With my new abilities, I think I can make that hell his reality.”
Emil watched silently from the cavern floor against the cold stone wall as he quietly absorbed all that his brother said. The contorted cocktail of hurt, anger, and loss spilled freely from the cup of his brother, twisting him with every sip that he took. The once gentle, caring older brother that he had known to love was, at the moment, gone. He was drowned in the sea of hate that flowed from their parent’s blood.
“We should go back, and kill them one by one. Hunt them down like animals. Hunt them like they hunt for us.” Arius continued. Emil remained silent as he watched his brother against the dimly lit fire that illuminated their place of refuge.
“We should get back at them when they least expect it and rip them limb from limb! Ah!” Another boom sounded through the cave as he struck the wall once more. The gash on his knuckle grew wider, allowing for a rivet of blood to tickle from his fingertips and onto the floor before he raised his fist once more. “I’m going to kill them,” Arius said as he stared at his bleeding fist before clenching it. “I’m going to kill them all.”
A cool breeze blew through the hollowed cave and tickled the small flame within. The fire briefly faded, leaving the cave engulfed in darkness momentarily before the flame returned to its former glory. For the time being, Arius’s rage had visibly quelled.
Though his brother no longer lashed out in anger, Emil could feel him quietly burning on the inside as he paced around the barren cavern. He knew how he felt because, to an extent, he felt the same way.
In the silence of his mind, only one question ran through Emil’s head, Why didn’t I act sooner?
The stray thought surfaced a myriad of emotions that tore through his psyche, rendering him ill as he dwelled in the void constructed of his own mind. While Arius’s anger was unleashed to the outside world, Emil’s was a quiet destruction that stirred in his soul. As he lay beaten against the wall, he couldn’t help but think what would have happened if he had acted quicker; what would have happened if he fought to save them rather than to avenge them. His stomach turned at the thought of Raphael walking free from murder without even as much of a scratch.
The Dreamer and the Deceiver (The Last Light Book 1) Page 8
