Sealed Away

The Exiled - Ch. 4 : part 3/5

2010-02-11T12:27:00.003+02:00

"Wait," I murmured, "Wait, wait, wait, w a i t! I am tired of waiting!"

The golden goblet I was holding a moment ago bounced off from the cold stone floor and it's movements echoed through the hall where it finally came to a stop against one of the many dark walls. I could still hear it roll from side to side and see the dent the bounce had left in it.

"My Maker, please... you mustn't... you are still too weak to-..." Ira begun, almost trembling with fear, yet she kept pushing the matter.

"Guard your tongue, woman, or I will cut it out and feed it to your sister and Gula. Do not speak unless I ask for your opinion. Who do you think you are to call me weak?" I lifted her face with my hand. She would not look me in the eye. More than a man yet less than a woman she was, I found myself thinking back on the day I had made her and her sister. Two flaming redheads, so similar yet so different. She had been the fiercer one. She even tried to hold me back so her sister could flee. A good one second it gave Luxuria. A good one second. I had to admit back then I had been much stronger. The constant blood draining left me weakened now inside the depths of my base. Ira still looked the same as she did back then, I thought as I turned her face from side to side. Looked the same, but she was not the same. She was my first and I had her sit on the chair and watch as I played with her sister, prettier one of the two. Still drugged from the poison of my blood she sat there, silver eyed and watched in silence as I ripped the clothes from her crying sister. I had been so raw, with the taste of freedom, revenge and wrath still fresh on my lips. My hands had left red lines on Luxuria's body as I ran my fingers over her breasts and stomach. I did not mean to be rough. It was just difficult to control my strength back then. More than once I almost killed the poor woman. She was so delicate and so tender. So weak.

"Maker?" Ira's shivering voice brought me back to the current. I was more often away than not lately and it did not make me happy. I let go of her face and sat back deeply into the miserably uncomfortable stone product one would call a throne.

"I might not be at the peak of my strength but rotting here will do me no good either. You worry too much, woman. It will still take more than an army of hariérs to bring me down. A little hunting can only do me good."

"At least allow me to accompany you, my Maker."

"I don't need you on my way. Your sister is still fresh awake from her sleep, I'll let you come with me to the town and fetch her some food but no more."

"My Maker-..."

"I did not realize you cared so little about your tongue, Ira. Imagine how difficult it will be for you to complain and whine once it is no longer placed in it's original location," I gave her a warning look and she hit her eyes to the ground once again.

"Your safety is my only concern, my Maker. A tongue is a small price to pay."

"What could you possibly hope to accomplish, woman? Even as I am now I am stronger than ten of you, if not hundred. You would be in my way, no more. Now keep your jaws shut or I might take a bit extra as I free you from that tongue of yours."

She bowed her head in defeat and retreated away from me backwards before turning around and walking away. Today I was going to hunt by myself.

"There is truth to the words she speaks, boy," the irritating voice in my head begun once again. It seemed to grow louder by day. I grunted. Cutting out a tongue was not an option when the voices were inside your own head.

"Now that's a smart thought. Seriously. I swear you take by the human form you wear more and more every day. If it was not for me-..."

"Silence!" I thought, "The human form I wear is just a mask as we both know all too well. I needed a shell."

"That may be so, but it is still no more than a human form. It will bleed when cut."

"I regenerate," I reminded her dully.

"Silver," she reminded me, "Right now you are no better than when you were back then. Raw and freshly free from the grip of the Seal. You are not thinking with reason. You are ought to be cautious even when there is no threat. This body is the only chance you have, better not waste it on something as stupid as hunting."

As much as it hurt my pride, I had to admit she had a point. The long waiting in the base had made me tired. My body ached for some action. My human body. I squeezed my hand into a fist.

"It is taking a toll on you. All that blood you spent to revive the followers. However I do not deny you hunting. It will only do you good to move around a bit and explore for yourself rather than have them for your ears and eyes. Ever since that incident with Avaritia-..."

"Word has spread of the Nightwalkers. I know. Mostly every bigger place is to have guards with silvered weapons. I also know. However that is all they have. Men with spikes and swords and rumors of creatures unseen that are as fast as wind, as dark as shadows and as deadly as poison. I know it all. Considering how truthful those rumors are how do you think some men can even as much as spot me, yet alone scratch me with their silver edges?"

She took her time before she responded.

"It is indeed most unlikely. But so was the incident with Avaritia. The hariérs are full of surprises. Do not forget who created them. You thought you knew Her too."

Her words stabbed and then turned the pure silver dagger inside my chest. I had not forgotten and she did me no kindness to remind. I could feel my blood dripping from my fist. I was squeezing too hard.

"I will free Her along with myself. I will ask Her forgiveness for my sins. Then we will return to nothingness and hariérs won't be as much as a memory."

"What if She does not forgive you?"

"She will," I said, loudly to my surprise. She would forgive me. For certain. We had been one long time ago and we could be that again. I longed for it more than I longed for freedom. I had known Her better than I had known myself and the same for Her. We had both suffered from Her curse. She will want it to end as much as I. I knew it. Did I? No response came from my head. Not my own, not the woman's. I looked up to see Luxuria pick up the golden goblet. So Ira had sent her sister to convince me. It almost made me smirk.

"Come here," I told her and she came towards me and bowed down before me, her long red hair flowing over her head like fire. She was still very weak and so hungry it even made me hungry.

"Do you remember the night I made you mine?" I asked her.

"Vividly," she replied, voice echoing like a chime.

"Then tell me, as vividly as you possibly can and come closer."

She rose to her feet and walked towards me.

"It was a cold night with no moon or stars. It was raining and I was just about to close the window when I thought I saw something in the shadows. I called my sister to look but she would not come, saying it was probably a stray cat. I kept looking for some time and after a while something was looking back at me. This was no cat. A pair of eyes that reflected like liquid silver, only there was no moon. My Maker was looking right at me, through me even. Through my silken gown, through my flesh and bone. My Maker's eyes were scratching my soul. I was too stunned to make a sound or close the window."

"And I saw a beautiful maiden, smelling like the best kind of dessert you could imagine. I had been hungry for two weeks and this was the first town that far in the north. I climbed up the wall and your eyes could no longer follow. I was standing behind you before you understood what had happened. The cold had made your nipples hard and you shivered. I almost thought it was of desire but when I pressed myself against your delicate body, you started calling for your sister," I said and touched her waist. Her nipples were hard again. This time I knew it could not be of cold.

"She came... angry about the noise I was making. Then she saw us, and she grabbed for the silver knife on my dinner plate. The maids had not taken it yet. In an instant you let go of me and you were behind her, twisting her hand in yours with ease. She shouted for me to run but I could not move. I watched as you sank your fangs into her neck and how her white nightgown turned pink and red. She wouldn't even scream. Her face expressed what I was feeling. Horror."

"I see you no longer feel the same way," I said and slid my hand upward to her breast and stroke it gently with my fingers. She was ever so soft. I could smell her wetness when I took her nipple between my fingers and squeezed it roughly. She did not let the sigh escape her half opened lips.

"Don't let me distract you now, carry on. I want to hear the whole story from your point of view."

"You had your eyes on mine the entire time you fed on my sister. Only once did you turn your gaze and at that moment my legs failed me and I found myself sitting on the floor. A few moments later you pulled me up by my arm and threw me on the bed. You were not gentle. My sister was lying on the floor in a pool of her own blood, silver knife a meter away from her. I could see her crawling towards it but so could you and you grabbed her neck. I thought you were going to kill her so I pleaded you to take me instead of her. You gave me a smile and said both of us were to die eventually anyways, and that you would do us a favor by killing us at such a beautiful age. Then I swore to give you anything you wanted if you granted us lives. And you said..."I shall hold you to your word then, you will love it, and you will love me as you love your sister, more even.""

"Ah, I really said that, didn't I? I was so raw. But you did love it, to my surprise," I moved my hand from her breast down to her stomach and then between her thighs under her short red dress. Her juice was dripping from my fingers. I slid two inside her and she let out a deep sigh. I could see the first time I took her in front of my eyes as if it had been yesterday. But I wanted her version of it. I knew mine. Bitch inside my mind had given it to me with all the juicy details after I had fed on Annabel's sweet blood. I started moving my fingers inside her and fingered her button with my thumb. She dropped the goblet she had been holding the entire time. Once again it bounced off from the ground and rolled towards the same wall. Perhaps the floor was tilted.

"You... you bit your wrist and grabbed my sister's hair, then pulled her head backward and forced the wrist to her mouth. You made her swallow three times before you covered her mouth. You were grinning and I thought you were evil. Then she begun to scream behind your hand. It seemed to go on forever and I covered my ears and closed my eyes. The next time I looked she was passed out between your arms. I asked what had you done and you simply told me to wait and see. So I did and a while later she came back to life, with eyes like yours, my Maker. Cursed... ah... cursed silver you called them," she finished with heavy breathing. I now had three fingers inside her. The scent from her juice was filling the hall. It was a good scent.

"Go on," I told her and took out my fingers after she had given me the moan of pleasure. I licked her juice off of my fingers.

"You sat her... on the chair next to my bed," she continued, catching her breath, "and then you came to me. I started to weep, thinking you would do the same to me, but you had other plans. When you ripped off my gown and stripped me of my panties, I knew. I looked toward my sister for help, but she just looked at me and said: "Enjoy it sister. It does not have to feel bad." I could hardly believe what I was hearing but there was truth in it. And much like today your fingers were between my legs, only then it had felt really cold and painful when you touched my skin. You told me to listen to my sister and be a good girl. You wiped away my tears, almost gently. Then you showed me the two fingers you had had between my legs, slick with some liquid I knew to be mine. "Taste yourself, girl," you told me, and I did. Somehow the taste of me and the feel of your cold fingers in my mouth was not all so bad I had expected. I remember helping you undo your belt. A few moments later you thrust inside me. Hard and deep. My maidenhead broke painfully and there was blood. I started crying again but you no longer cared. You said I smelled good. I tried to fight you off but you held my both hands with one of yours with such ease. And you took me. I was shivering, mostly from the cold. I could feel every inch of you moving inside me each thrust until it was no longer painful.

"You should be honored, sister. The man you were to wed was not half as handsome." I heard my sister say. I was to wed a son of a lord, from a family I despised. More than once the ugly son and his brothers and even his father had tried to take me before we were wed. My sister had saved me each time. This time with you she was sitting and watching. She did not help me. Then you kissed me. It came to me like a lightning from the clear sky. Realization of who you were. How much better than anyone else you were. Even my own sister would tell me to enjoy. The coldness inside me, the scent of you on my lips and even the feel of my sister's blood on your face, the more I thought of it, the better it started to feel. And finally, when I kissed you back, I also enjoyed. At the moment of my climax you bit my neck. The pain with the pleasure. I had felt nothing quite so good. And at the moment of your pleasure, you fed me your blood. Fully aware of the pain to follow, I swallowed. This was all I desired," she finished. I now looked down on her. She was kneeling between my legs, undoing my belt as she had done before.

"Allow me to repay you for the kindness and the pleasures," she said when she had my hardness between her delicate fingers. Ira was a smart woman and the voice inside me agreed. For the moment I had no desire to hunt. Not with Luxuria's lips around me and with her skilled tongue. I found myself wondering how two sisters could be so similar and yet so different. Not long ago I had threatened to rip out Ira's tongue, and here was the sister, using the same part of the body to give me pleasure. Perhaps Ira could learn from her sister. But that did not matter for now. Currently, all that mattered was this moment. I closed my eyes with a sigh and even the annoying giggling in my mind could not ruin this.

The Exiled - Ch. 4 : part 2/5

2010-02-04T23:59:00.011+02:00

"Oh good times, good times," echoed in my head as the memory ended. I was once again staring into the empty pentagram room with the book open on my lap. Good thing I could not feel the cold of the stone throne, but it was uncomfortable regardless. Annabel's name ringed a bell. She was the very first one I resurrected upon my arrival. A pretty young lady. I could even recall her taste, sweet and pure, untainted... honest. Avaritia's taste had been much worse. It was like she desired everything in the world, she even wanted to make me her own, her possession. Feeling of gloating pleasure had oozed from her when I turned her. Even thinking of that took my hunger for blood. I figured I could use that next time I feel too hungry.

"So, did you learn something?" the voice asked me curiously.

"Luckily for you it did give me some good ideas. It hardly counts for a proper memory though. Why don't you give me a real one? It has been long enough," I tried my luck and touched my lips, once again recalling Annabel's sweet taste.

"I would, but are you sure you want to doze off now? Ira is coming," she replied. It took a couple of seconds before I could feel Ira coming as well. It was interesting how my inner self had better senses than actual me.

"Maker," Ira said when she had reached me and knelt down on both legs in front of me.

"What is it, Ira?" I asked and looked if she had brought me my food. She had not.

"I was out hunting for hariérs with some of the sisters. We.. we have failed you, Maker," she said and swallowed loudly before she bent down so low I could not see her face.

"I assume the problem is more serious than simply not being able to catch one. Not that the later one isn't serious.." I muttered and sat more comfortably to hear the rest of it.

"A...Avaritia was seen. She was chasing this man and... It seems our visits to the village have not gone unnoticed. The man had a weapon, a knife I think. He managed to wound Avaritia and escape unharmed. Avaritia is not regenerating..." she was almost crying.

"Fools!" my inner self shouted, "A silver knife. Not just silver, a BLESSED silver knife. Careless creatures! And to be seen.. and let him escape. You should punish them. Punish them hard. Rip them into parts and leave them hanging! Separate their heart from their body!"

Her anger was so fierce I could feel it running down my spine. Even Ira sensed it. I could see her shiver when she fixed her gaze down to my feet, not daring to look up.

"This is... most unfortunate," I said with a disappointed voice. Ira seemed to be ready to be beheaded on spot. It almost looked funny.

"KILL HER!" my inner self shouted, "We have no use of failures!"

"How badly is Avaritia hurt?" I asked, not really caring.

"It is just a wound in her stomach, Maker. The only issue is that it is not regenerating. We tried everything. Perhaps your blood..." she silenced in horror when she felt the angry aura that my inner self was emitting.

"My blood?" I chuckled, "As if I'd give my blood for the likes of Avaritia. Bring her to me."

Ira got up instantly and rushed to get Avaritia for me.

"You should have ripped her insides out and fed them to her! I hope you will not be playing a gentleman once this Avaritia arrives."

"Sorry to disappoint but I have no intentions of murdering her, brutally or otherwise," I thought to myself while turning the pages of the book.

"What do you intend to do? Question her about the man and let her go?" she sounded rather displeased.

"Not quite. Since you failed to mention the dangers of silver or blessed silver any earlier, then it is your fault anyways. It is interesting how you keep all kinds of endangering information from me till the last moment. As a part of me you should be helping me but instead you are holding me back. Do you really want the Seal broken?" I asked her in my mind with a normal tone. I had no doubt she would still sense the suspicion in it. It took a while before she responded.

"Of course I want the Seal broken. We can not be free before that. Fine, handle Avaritia as you wish. I will not say anything. But do not say I did not warn you about being too gentle with them," she said calmly.

"I expect a useful memory once this is dealt with," I replied as Ira arrived with Avaritia. Avaritia was holding her hand to her stomach and the smell of her blood was instantly all over the place. Disgusted by it, I winced and leaned back on my ice cold seat.

"Maker, I... I was so hungry... he smelt soooo good... I didn't notice.. I..." Avaritia started with her excuses as I had expected.

"Silence, woman. The degree of your mischief is way beyond the worth of your existence," I said coldly, mostly guided by the emotions of my other self. Avaritia fell to her knees and Ira backed off from her. I could taste Avaritia's fear in the air.

"I'll do... anything... I will give all my jewelry... my blood, my everything, so please, Maker.... have mercy," she was about to cry. I stood up, desperate to stretch myself from the long sitting. I walked to her and lifted up her chin. Her tears started to pour down as soon as she set her frightened eyes on my angry face. Her smell was almost revolting.

"Anything..." she managed to whisper before I slapped the back of my hand against her cheek. It was the first time I knew myself to lift my hand against one of the cursed. My hit was so strong it sent Avaritia flying for two meters before her flight was blocked by the wall. Her body left a dent in it. I looked at my hand, surprised by my own strength. Even though I held back and only laid a soft hit, it nearly broke her neck. She was coughing up blood next to the wall. Some dust was still falling from the ceiling.

"Do not think anything you own could make up for your mistake. Not that you own anything to begin with," I said silently and walked to her. Her coughs had stopped but she was still panting when I lifted her up by her throat and pushed her against the same wall she had hit, "Your entire being belongs to me. Just because I let you have a few toys and allow you to go outside does not mean you possess anything in this world."

"Very impressive speech," my inner self commented excitedly. Avaritia had difficulties with breathing. Her eyes were filled with despair when she looked at me, her hands were weak around my wrist. I let go of her before I would have killed her. Again. Her gasping for air was so annoying I wanted to kick my foot in her lungs just to make her stop. Instead, I walked back to my seat and picked up the book which had dropped when I stood up.

"I will not heal your wound. Sew it up like a hariér and heal like one since you are about as worthless as one. Even worse I'd say. If you survive, consider yourself spared from the worst. If not.." I sat back down, "Consider yourself lucky."

"Yes, Maker. I.. I will take your punishment and learn from it. Another mistake will never happen again. I swear to you, Maker. On your name, Maker," she knelt down in front of me and bowed her head down to the ground.

"Filthy! Do not dirty my name with your wretched promises. Now get out of my sight. You stink," I motioned with my hand for her to go away. She was gone quicker than expected. The smell was still there however. She had bled all over the place. I noticed that Ira was still there.

"Clean up the mess and bring me something fresh. Better yet, bring me Annabel," I told her and touched my lips again.

"You called for me, Maker?" Annabel stood in front of me, head lowered and about to kneel down.

"So I did, come here," I told her before she could kneel. She listened like an obedient little girl should and walked closer to my seat. Her sweet scent covered up the stench Avaritia had left behind. I took a deep breath when she reached me. Poor thing was shivering.

"Are you frightened?" I asked her curiously.

"No, Maker. It is my love for you and the rare chance to be so close to you that is giving me the chills," she said kindly and made me smug. I reached out my hand for her to take it and she laid her soft palm on top of mine.

"But you should be frightened. You should be shivering from fear and respect like the rest of them," I told her playfully and pulled her to sit on my lap. She was so light I could hardly believe she was real.

"I shiver from fear when I am not near you, my Maker. I am frightened when I see others near you. I envy anyone that gets too close to you to ruin your perfection. My respect for you could not be higher and I feel.. so.. complete, when I get to sit on your lap like this. I'd kill them... I can not stand them... the others," her voice went from sweet innocent to murderous. I raised my brow.

"Even now?" I wondered.

"No," she said sweetly again, "not now. Now the whole world I know has gathered here. I do not care about the others. They have nothing. I have it all. Your perfection... you share it with me, my Maker. I could feel nothing but my love for you. Even if I do feel jealous for not being as perfect..."

"Is that so," I laughed, "Such feelings, Annabel, I did not know you had them."

"I.. I apologize.. I.." she muttered.

"Do not apologize for envying others that share your curse. You should envy them every moment they spend near me. Every moment they spend completing my orders. But there is something you are better at than all of them."

"What is it, Maker?" she asked excitedly and looked into my eyes with hers. She reminded me of a puppy that was once lost and had now found a home.

"No hariér or cursed smells quite as delicious as you. I can not tell what it is that enchants me so. Perhaps it is your envy. Pure and honest envy for the success of others. One of the greatest damnations I placed upon the land. Nothing can quite compare to the sweet taste of others misfortune," I said to her and sniffed her neck. The pure sensation from her was divine. My words had given her the satisfaction of victory. Something she was good for, much more than anyone else. I could hear her moan silently through her teeth when my cold lips pressed against her skin. I could taste her pleasure on my lips when I ran my tongue over them.

"Drink of me, my Maker. This body belongs to you entirely. Use it as you please, anything that satisfies you..." she said through her heavy breathing.

"I shall," I whispered to her ear before I sank my fangs into her neck. Her moan echoed from the walls. The sweet scent of her blood filled my nose and the taste of it quickly spread in my mouth. It had been a while since I had something this good. I had to hold myself back not to chew through her neck. Her envy and her pleasure, I drank from it. The scent blocked out everything else. For a moment it was just me and her blood.

"Oh, this tastes good! By the way about the next memory. I think I have a perfect one. You will love it," my irritating semi-personality had decided this was the perfect time for chitchat. I growled loudly and pulled my teeth out of Annabel. Without noticing I had drank so much she was close to pass out. Her scent still held me charmed as I watched the blood run down her neck and drip on her face from my chin. The bite marks slowly regenerated when I set her down from my lap. Somehow she managed to stand.

"Go back to others, I am not to be disturbed till I call," I told her. She nodded in silence and left. The smell of her blood lingered and I closed my eyes to take the last of it.

"Your timing could not be worse. Now then, show me what you have," I muttered and wiped the dripping blood from my chin with my thumb. My inner self giggled gallingly when I licked my finger.

"Don't get too addicted. Here, this is much better..."

The Exiled - Ch. 4 : part 1/5

2010-01-28T23:59:00.006+02:00

Finally my solitude had ended. I had found my companions, ones that were bound to me by a common curse. Curse which their ancestors had placed upon me and which I now returned to them. Every single one of them knew the importance of the Seal now, as they all felt the same pain.

“Maker? It is time to wake another,” Ira quietly whispered to me. That's right - I had arrived just in time to wake some of the strongest. Since two months ago they no longer heard me, no matter how much I called. Yet Ira insisted that I kept trying.

"Don't you think it is time to give up? They have long since stopped hearing my voice. Lost beyond my reach," I asked and turned my head towards her. She was one of the first I resurrected and each night ever since she would go out during the night and come back with a hariér for me to feed on. Tonight was no different. Unconscious young lady was lying on the cold floor next to her, barely breathing.

“Please Maker, Luxuria is still asleep. I am certain she out of all would hear your voice,” Ira pleaded me and turned her gaze towards the woman on the ground. I knew how hungry she was. Even now it took all her self control to restrain herself from feeding.

“If you insist,” I sighed and stood up from my stone throne. Most of my time I spent in the pentagram shaped room, simply sitting and thinking. Occasionally my inner self would amuse me with some sharp comments.

“This is taking way too much time. You have probably awaken everyone you could by now. Isn't there anything more useful to do?” the elderly lady inside my head hissed. Ira picked up the woman from the ground and followed me to one of the chambers where my companions lied in their restless sleep. This base of ours was built deep inside the mountains. Countless stairs and corridors formed a gigantic maze. My time spent here was barely enough to discover and learn every part of it. Most of the rooms looked the same, empty and cold.

“This place could use some furniture. I wouldn't say no to a proper wooden chair even,” I said when we were walking through yet another faceless corridor.

“Luxuria would love nothing more than to be your interior designer, Maker," Ira replied, causing me to sigh. Lately all I did or said was followed by a drawn-out sigh. Realizing that caused me to sigh again.

“Here, Maker. That's where we were left off," she walked to a coffin, placed the woman next to it and then lifted the cover from it.

“Can't you just find Luxuria's one?” I asked her and took a look inside the coffin. The creature inside of it could have been a humanoid at some point. Another sigh, this time from Ira.

“I have tried that, Maker. Their appearance has changed completely. I can not recognize any of them. Only you are able to identify them somehow.”

I had to admit she was right. They all looked like burnt corpses and only I could somehow distinguish their essence between a hundred of others. Even my schizophrenic part could only shrug and say things like "looked prettier before" and "let me think, hmmm, oh! Beyond Reach?"

“Maker?” Ira's voice called me back from my thoughts, "There is one."

I went to the coffin she had just opened. The creature inside was not as deformed as the rest. It had still kept the basic humanoid form though nothing else was there to even identify the gender. Ira forced it's mouth open by breaking it's jaw.

“Great, just great," I mumbled and covered my mouth and nose with my sleeve when the horrid smell reached me.

“Please, Maker...” Ira sounded desperate. I nodded to her and bit my wrist to do what I had done about two hundred times by now. I closed my eyes and dripped my blood into the creature's mouth. The whispers were very distant now, echoing somewhere far away. I focused harder and gasped in surprise when I realized who it was.

“Gula?” I thought to myself. My inner self started laughing uncontrollably. I ignored her and called out for Gula again and again. Just before I was about to give up I found his essence.

“Mine... my name... my own. Maker gave it to me, yes. Maker gave Gula his name for the artifact. Yes, yes! Gula made a gateway of the artifact. My name, yes. Gula, my own...” his voice sounded loud and clear to my ears. I pushed my essence through his body.

“Yes Gula, and now I need you once more. Return to me!”

“I SEE IT!” he shouted and pushed out my essence as he reclaimed his body.

“Amazing, fascinating, most intriguing! To be able to return in such state! It will take a lot of blood to regenerate him,” the lady inside my head was truly pleased. I bit my wrist again very deeply and squeezed blood out into Gula's mouth. It took a while before he gained the ability to swallow. His body regenerated slowly. Every cell was destroyed and remade by my essence. Just like when they were first made. One could call it the true rebirth.

“Gula...” the disappointment in Ira's voice was unmistakable when Gula's face finally started to look like his. My wrist regenerated again, but before I could pull away to bite it, Gula's sharp teeth sank into it with more force than I could have expected from someone with a broken jaw. Ira gave it one disgusted look and then continued to pull off lids from the coffins.

It took a lot of my blood before Gula could move on his own again. I felt extremely weak and tired. I just wanted to lie down and close my eyes.

“Maker! No, don't... Here, feed on her!” Ira shouted and shoved something into my face. Without thinking anything I bit it and warm blood filled my mouth. Essence of a wife, mother of three, youngest child being barely a year old. I grabbed her and sank my fangs deeper into her neck. Worry for her family, fear for her life, apologies for her husband. I swallowed it all, consuming every part of her, until she looked like a dried grape. It was not nearly enough to fill me, but it was enough to keep me functioning.

"Gula..." I said when I finally let go of the remains of the woman. Gula looked at me, eyes reflecting hunger, "Ira will show you to the rest. Wait there. Food will be brought to you shortly."

Ira threw another wooden lid against the wall, breaking it into pieces. It was the last one in this room.

"Useless! Why did YOU make it?" she shouted and pointed her finger towards Gula.

“Gula heard Maker's voice!" he replied, also pointing a finger to his chest.

"ARGH!" Ira did not bother to hide her anger and kicked in a few more coffins on her way out of the door. The smell in the room did not get any better.

"Wait for Gula! Gula is still weak!" he wheezed and started crawling towards the door on all fours. Ira rolled her eyes, gave me a "do I have to?" look and went to help Gula on his feet.

"Today was interesting. I took Ira and Luxuria with me to a small trip to the east. Their youth was entertaining to watch. Whenever a fox or a rabbit was too close, they would chase it while singing a song they composed especially for hunting. They would chase the poor thing till it couldn't run anymore and then fight over which one gets to eat it. I wouldn't be surprised if the forest would shortly be renamed. Witches Hunt perhaps? Quite suitable. Though we were probably too deep in the forest for the hariérs to hear us. Watching over the two... it's like babysitting. They enchant me in the strangest ways. Just within a few months they sang lyrics that would frighten most mortals close to death. Let me quote them.

"Run little creature, run!
Escape poor mortal,
entertain me!

Can you jump high enough?
Can you run fast enough?
Can you hide silent enough?

You are too weak, little creature!
Too slow for our cursed legs!
Your heartbeat is too loud for our ears!

We can smell you behind that tree,
We can hear you in that cave,
We can see you through the night!

Boo!

Run little creature, run!
What's wrong?
Ran out of breath?

I'll sink my teeth through your neck!
I'll make your essence mine!
Your sweet blood, down my throat!

You are too weak, little creature!
Barely enough to count for fun!
Scream, little creature, scream!

My fangs pierce through your flesh,
You start to lose your sight,
Feel the power of Maker's might!"

Beautiful. We were getting too close to a hariér town so I asked them to return to the the cave where we currently reside. It was too soon for them to go to a town. Being too young they would have no control over their instincts. I had no intention of massacring the entire population. Good girls like they are, they listened. Myself, I went to the town. Rabbits and foxes could not power me, nor did they provide enough entertainment..."

“Want to see it?” a voice inside me distracted my reading.

"See what?" I asked her and rose my eyes to look at the empty room around me.

"The part you are reading. What happened in the town. I am getting slightly bored of simply sitting here," she said and did indeed sound extremely bored.

“Another memory? Is it just for your entertainment or can I actually learn something from it?”

“You can learn something from everything if you only want, my boy," she said and laughed.

“My boy, my boy. You are supposed to be part of me. Thats not a way to address yourself,” I said and closed the Book.

“I have to address you somehow. Else you would think I am talking to myself. See the irony in that?” she replied and laughed again.

"Just show me the memory," I sighed.

“As Master commands!” she said mockingly and with a familiar silvery flash the reality was turned into a memory.

I was walking in the town, rather aimlessly. A dog started barking at me and followed me to a smaller street, where I broke it's neck. A loud scream startled me. I hadn't noticed a woman taking a smoke out of the second floor window. It took me three seconds to get up there and through her window and another two to silence her. I didn't kill her. I wasn't the type to waste something so valuable. Instead I flipped her over my shoulder and made my escape. She started moving again when I was already in the forest. Annoyed by it, I placed her down.

“Monster!” she whispered and tried to run from me. I pinned her against a tree. She could not see my silver colored eyes from underneath my hood, but my smirk left her paralyzed.

"It would have been wiser to stay silent when you saw me kill that barker," I told her and made sure she saw my fangs.

"What will you do to me?" she asked and surprisingly did not sound very afraid.

"Are you not afraid for your life?" I asked her and held her against the tree by her throat.

“What kind of a question is that! Of course I am. Can't you see I am shivering?” she said. She was not shivering.

"I could kill you any second," I hissed at her and held her neck tighter. She choked a bit.

“If you wanted to kill me, you would have done so already. Which means you have another goal. You want something. Everyone wants something!”

"Quite right," I replied and let go of her neck, "But there is nothing that would stop me from killing you after I get what I want."

“Shivering and begging would surely help then. What do you want, monster?” she was very bold and that made her more interesting. I decided to play around for a while.

"Just your soul," I told her and licked over her cheek.

"What kind of a sick game is this?" she asked and tried to push me away.

“Sick game for you, foreplay for me," I said and held her hands against the tree with my right hand. With my left I turned her head from side to side and confirmed there was no sign of fear.

“Foreplay? You must be insane! My soul? I will not give it to you! Ask for something else!"

“How about all your jewelry and gold then?” I asked, noticing she was wearing quite a lot of it.

“What? No! Most of them are antique or inherited from my ancestors! A few are worth more than my life! Not going to happen."

“Would you trade me a life of your best friend then?"

“Annabel's? Fine. But Let me go then. And do not touch my jewelry! Or my soul!"

"A little greedy, are we? Sacrificing your best friend for the sake of a few material pleasures?"

"We only have one life. I want to make it a good one. For myself," she said and I could hear her heartbeats getting faster.

"Even if I take your friend's life, I can not let you go. You are going to die either way. But I promise not to touch your jewels," I told her and took off my hood. Finally she showed some signs of fear and her eyes went wide open.

"Is there no other way? I have no use of my jewels when I am dead. And Annabel would die for nothing."

"You would like to live for eternity if you could, right?"

"Absolutely!"

"You are selfish, greedy and cruel. Willing to sacrifice anyone for your own benefit. Luckily for you that is exactly what I need. You will get all the jewelry you only want, but you will have no friends. Then again you probably didn't really have any to begin with. You will have sisters and brothers who share the same sin you do. You will not age and you will feed off of other hariérs."

"This... this sounds too good to be true! I would be young forever and have all the jewelry? Say, monster, what do you want in return? My soul? Annabel?" she sounded truly happy.

"I will claim both. Your soul and Annabel's. Though only one of them is yours to give. Now take me to her, Avaritia..."

Shade - Ch. 3 : part 5/5

2010-01-21T23:55:00.014+02:00

Ahead of me was a long corridor. There was no source of light; however I could still see everything as usual. Small openings were craved irregularly into the walls next to me, covering both sides from the ground to the ceiling. On first sight it looked as if small frozen waterfalls were pouring from each but when I walked past them, I noticed the dusty remains of candles. It seemed they were never properly replaced but instead a new one was put on top of the dying one. Massive amounts of long cold and solid candle wax ran down the walls, making them look ghostly. My own footsteps echoed loudly and every breath I took was drawn out in the cold air. I felt like I was disturbing some deadly peace, someone's final resting place. The corridor ended with a stone door. It had no handle or knob. On a closer look I could see that something had once been written on it, with what I identified as blood. It was hard to make out the words since the blood had blended in with the stone over time. Somehow I still managed to distinguish: “Forgive me.” I ran my fingers across the text and took a look over my shoulder to see where I had entered from. Apparently I had walked through the wall because the corridor behind me ended with solid stone; there was no portal, no gate, and no door. Only then did I notice the traces of old blood all over the place. The walls were covered with messages.

“So hungry. Blood. Let us go. Give us death. Pain. Agony. Why us? I can not take this any longer. You left us behind. Why did you do this? Return! Please.. Kill!”

The disturbing messages which I didn't even notice before were now scratching my eyes. They were everywhere, written in blood and almost craved into the stone. I could feel the depth of the letters like they were put there by fingernails. I backed against the door when the accusations and pain hidden in a form of text reached me in their full force. I heard them whisper, not in my head but into my ear. Even against the door it felt like the souls of the dead were whispering behind me, sometimes so close I could feel their breath on my neck.

“You left us to starve.”

“So much agony!”

“This agony, it is unreal!”

“Unfair. UNFAIR! You should feel it too!”

“No, stop this,” I covered my ears. It did not change anything.

“Why did you turn us, left us, with no food?”

“I didn't… I returned. I planned to return!”

“You took so long, this torture, this pain. My existence was being ripped apart!”

“No, STOP!” I shouted and fell down to my knees.

“This agony is unfair, Maker! You should have taken us with you!”

I could feel their lingering spirits rushing through my body, making me feel their pain each time. The hunger was unimaginable. I was ready to kill anything that contained blood, even a werewolf. Their disgusting black essence suddenly felt mouthwatering.

“STOP THIS, STOP, S T O P!” I gasped for air and bit myself in the wrist to suck my own blood. Of course the hunger did not vanish.

“The suffering, the pain, the hunger! Why, Maker!”

“AAAHHH!” I had lost any sense of reality. The hunger and the whispers controlled me completely. I was shut with no way out. Self-destruction was the only thing in my mind. I just wanted it to end.

“Oh, come on! Snap out of it!” a familiar voice echoed somewhere very deep inside me. I reached for it. And suddenly it was over. The pain and hunger, even the whispers – all gone without a trace. Panting, I rose from the floor and took a look around. The messages were still there but everything was silent once again, apart from my uneven breathing.

“Where are the corpses? I mean the dust,” I whispered to myself.

“You really are weak. This is pathetic. They are not as dead as they seem. Not all at least. Just hibernating,” my inner self replied, clearly not amused.

“Hibernating? But their spirits, what is this, a trick of my mind?”

“You could say that. Their essence runs loose around this place. You are like a magnet to it, since you are the source. Naturally they are attracted to you.”

“Attracted? I was being attacked!” I said aloud, wiped some dust off of my pants and turned back to face the door.

“It's because you are so weak. Don't let everything inside you that easily. Now hurry up and wake them. There is no telling how long they have been sleeping already. If you waste much more time they might never wake up again,” the voice nagged as I touched the door again.

“How does this open?” I asked and kept looking for some sort of an opening.

“Did you hit your head very hard when you fell from the mountains? You push it.”

So I did. And indeed the door slowly slid inwards. It was heavy and a hariér wouldn't have had a chance to move it. With a loud squeak I finally pushed it all the way open.

“What was this message on the door about? What should I forgive?” I asked and walked into the next room. It was empty and the air was even more still than in the corridor. The room was big and a hole was craved for candles in each of the walls. Solid candle wax covered quite a bit of the floor in front of them. In the middle of the room was a pillar with some meaningless carvings. And once again the bloody messages covered the walls.

“I guess they tried to wait for you as long as they could. Hibernating is not exactly something I would suggest. They had to use that as the last resort, when their wish to die was about to overcome the command you gave them. You see hibernation for us means no bodily function. In short that means temporary death. But it is not the peaceful type death you would imagine. It is the feeling you had earlier, constantly. But they can not move and are thus unable to kill themselves. Your direct order for them was to survive, even if it meant suffering to insanity. If left in this state for too long, there is a chance their essence can no longer hear your call. Then their agony would be eternal. Burning their bodies would ease it a bit, but their essence would continue to linger in search of their bodies and food.”

While listening to the old woman inside me, I walked across the room to open another stone door. No spider webs or much dust had gathered even though a while had passed. It was simply too cold in here, and too little oxygen for most of the living creatures. I could hear some water dripping in the distance. Just how big was this place? This door did not open like the previous; instead it rotated around its axis. The next room was oddly shaped and the walls seemed to go randomly. Two walls ran into each other to my left and continued to run diagonally to my right where they suddenly disappeared. After some wide open area two walls once again ran diagonally and their ends met with the ends of some other walls, which I could not see from my position. I stepped inside and noticed a stone throne to my left, where the walls met. It was previously hidden from my view by the door I had opened, but I could now see its strong structure and the small stairs leading to it. While still looking at it I walked towards the only open way, to my right.

“A pentagram!” the lady inside me cheered, “How amusing!”

I had reached to what seemed to be the center of the room. Walls ran in all directions and indeed they formed five corners of a pentagram. At the end of each corner was a stone throne, identical to its brothers. I turned my eyes to the floor and noticed the ground had changed from dark rocky surface to solid and polished tiles. Lines between the tiles that started from the center ran straight to each corner of the pentagram, one into each. I could smell petroleum in the air. I raised my eyes again to see five unused torches attached to the inner corners of the pentagram.

“What is all this? We have no need for light,” I asked myself.

“For the fun of it? I wouldn't know,” I got for the answer.

After exploring the room for some more I discovered well hidden doors in each of the corners, just like the one I had entered from. I chose one randomly and pushed it. It rotated rather silently and I let myself into the next room. This was the biggest room so far and did not contain any candles or torches. Instead wooden and stone coffins evenly covered the ground. I counted at least twenty before giving up. There were about a hundred of those.

“This many?” I gasped.

“Many? This is probably the first of them. There is much more to come. An army means an army, my boy. A hundred is barely enough to count as bodyguards. It is just too bad that you will end up with much less than you originally had. I do not expect all to return. Ah, I mean you can't even wake everyone right away. You only have this much blood, you know. So shall we start? I'd say the left side of this room looks pretty tempting. Stone coffins. I doubt you could lift the lids of those after the first ones wake, so leave the wooden ones for that,” she said and laughed.

“I just feed them my blood?” I asked and went to the left side of the room.

“Well… not exactly. The dead cannot feed.”

While wondering how I should force my blood down a dead person's throat, I opened the first lid. After carefully placing it to the side of the coffin I took a look at the contents. The remains of this vampire were so dry I could hardly make a difference between the genders. He had colored dark and looked more like a humanoid raisin than an actual vampire.

“How am I supposed to feed my blood to something like this?”

“You are not. Like I said, in some cases it is already too late. This is one of those cases. He is beyond our reach. Open the next one and hope that this time you can actually make a difference between various body parts. Nasty sight. Poor fellow. Either way, no time to waste. Go on,” she said and sounded more amused than disgusted. I sighed and took off the lid from the next coffin. A very pale and discolored female was lying there. Her face was reflecting pain and her blood vessels were like black lines running all over her face and crossed arms.

“How about her?”

“Between the current and beyond just like the rest. I can tell where her face is, so I'd say give it a try.”

I took a deep breath and opened the woman's mouth. Her sharp teeth were still there but her tongue looked like she had tried to chew it off. I bit my wrist and let some of my blood drip into her mouth. I watched as it dropped on her lip, on her teeth, finally on her destroyed tongue and then how it slid down her throat. I held my breath and everything was quiet again, except for the distant dripping of the water. My bite had regenerated. Nothing happened.

“Did you call for her?” a voice asked inside me after some time had passed.

“What? No. You didn't tell me…”

“I keep forgetting you just can't grasp the obvious. Call for her now.”

“How? Do I just shout her name?”

“That is one way, though I was more like thinking of the inner calling. It's not like she can actually HEAR you, if you understand what I mean.”

“I am not sure I do. You also forget I do not have most of my memories.”

“Just try to reach her essence and bind it to the body again. She is called Annabel if I am not completely mistaken. They all look the same when dead.”

I didn't even bother to answer. Instead I closed my eyes and focused on attracting their essences once more. I tried to recall their messages on the walls. It was easier than I had expected and the whispers began haunting me like before. I did my best to ignore them.

“ANNABEL!” I called for her in my mind. For that moment the whispers became distant and I couldn't tell what they were saying.

“ANNABEL, I HAVE COME FOR YOU! HEAR MY CALL AND RETURN TO YOUR BODY!” I shouted in my head and grabbed her arm between mine. The whispers felt like a far away wind. Just one was close by.

“Maker? Maker, I can hear you! This pain is dulling my senses. Aid me!”

“Feel my presence, Annabel. Return to me. Follow the path I have laid out for you,” I whispered and forced a little bit of my own essence through her shell. It was empty and dark inside. I could feel death with every single sense of mine.

“Come, Annabel. Come now!” I whispered again and opened my eyes. My presence inside her body was being gently pushed out by her own. She had returned.

“Annabel?” I asked silently and withdrew my essence completely. She had opened her eyes and was now looking at me in agony. I bit my wrist once again and placed it on her lips.

“Ahhhhh…” she said and closed her eyes again before sinking her fangs into my arm.

Shade - Ch. 3 : part 4/5

2010-01-14T23:55:00.009+02:00

Almost there. Just a little more. My destination was near. Over time the patterns of the ground had changed from deep forests to vast open plains, from dangerous rainforests to rocky surface where only cactuses could find enough support to grow, and then back to the timberland again. And once again the time of the full moon had arrived. I was now used to it and could calculate it's next appearence, thus I was prepared. As expected, howls came with the moon. The savages announced my presence to their humanoid brethren. I had to change my course as I did not want to lead them directly to the Gateway. It did not take them long to sniff me out, even in the middle of a forest this deep.

"For your sake, I hope you have a plan," my inner self conforted me when the reek of of the fleabags reached me. Their numbers seemed to grow each time they appeared, no matter how many I killed. Today I smelt at least fifty. This was either going to be a lot of fun or not at all. Their only tactic ever seemed to be to surround me. One would think they had learned from their many failed attempts. I smirked to myself, transformed and started making my way through the beasts. After ripping off two heads, five paws and one tail - they backed off, leaving me an open route. Something didn't smell right.

Their scents started to fade when they fled, disappearing completely after a minute or two. I slowed my steps, trying to catch a suspicious odor or a suspicious movement but everything was quiet. Too quiet. There was no sound in the night. Not a single breath of a frightened rabbit, not even a mouse. It was so silent I could hear my own heart beating inside my chest. A raincloud started to block out the moon, making every shadow look like it was about to attack me. I turned around, feeling something behind me, but no one was there. Not even the wind. Not even the slightest breeze. After moving a few steps backwards I took my humanoid form again. My ability to detect movement was much better with my silvery eyes. I looked around and finally noticed it. Quite far behind the trees were three figures. Too far to smell them, too far to tell if they were animals or hariérs. I could only see their contures. I would have mistaken them for oddly shaped trees moving in the wind, if there had been any wind.

"The Exiled..." a female voice hissed inside my mind, "So they finally appear. Deserters. Traitors..."

"The Exiled? Should I be worried?" I asked in my mind.

"Perhaps. Let's find out, shall we?"

I took a deep breath and started walking towards the Exiled. I remained in my humanoid form so I wouldn't lose them, even though they were hardly moving.

Three men in red capes had sat down on the grassy ground next to a lake. The mist hovering above the lake was spreading it's wings over the edges. All three raised their heads to look at me when I stepped out of the shadows and neither of them seemed overly surprised.

"So you return, Maker," one of them said and removed his hood, revealing his dark skin and silvery eyes.

"And so I do, Tristitia. Why are you out here?" I looked at the other two. They had not taken off their hoods. Tristitia I could remember now. He had never smelt very appealing but I was very desperate at the time. Hungry and wandering between the plains, digging myself under the ground from the sun. Tristitia, a farmer at the time, had decided to plow his land significantly later than usual that day, almost running me over before the sun set. He proved to be a good material. Very good for a mere farmer.

Tristitia laughed and got up to his feet.

"We got bored of waiting for you, Maker. And please, call me Acedia now," the way he called me did not make much sense. It was clear he no longer considered me his Maker in any way.

"There is someone much better than you out there. I can feel HER!" he laughed again right before I grabbed his throat and shoved his back against a tree. The other two jumped up.

"Careful, you forget I gave you this life and nothing is stopping me from taking it back." I sibilated.

"You are wrong," he wheezed and I let go of his throat.

"You can not kill us. Just like we can not kill you. Because you gave us this cursed form of life," he panted and massaged his neck, which still had my fingerprints on it.

"So it is easier if we just stay out of eachothers paths, don't you think?" he had the guts to ask me.

"I don't care what you do as long as it does not interfere with my plans. But remember, as soon as it does, I will immure your ashes into the great wall of Nél-Eliër," I warned him and this time he did not laugh.

"Do not worry, Maker. Our goals are the same. We too want the Seal to break. However we don't want it for you, we want to set Her free. Sadly you are a package."

"And how do you plan to achieve this on your own?"

"We will find Her fragment first."

I stood in silence for a moment.

"Go and never appear before me again or your fate will be grim."

"We only want Her," Tristitia or Acedia said and gave me a slight nod with his head. It almost looked like a bow. Then he left with his two companions.

"You should have reduced their existence into the form of dust," the voice in my head sighed and I agreed in silence. However I was hoping that they would be able to find Her fragment for me. I wanted to see Her again. So much. My gaze wandered across the mistly lake. A bright glitter in the middle of it caught my attention.

"Is this the Gate?" I asked myself but got no response. With a sigh I squatted down next to the lake and touched the surface of the water with my finger. Before I could pull my hand back, I ended up with an open wound on my left cheek. As soon as the tip of my finger had touched the water, the mist above it had attacked me. I covered my bleeding cheek with my palm and felt it regenerate.

"Sweet. Good thing I didn't decide to go for a swim. Though perhaps I should," I muttered while staring at the mist. Someone chuckled inside me.

"Very funny indeed," I said and sprinted into the water, diving under. The mist attacked me again and sliced my every limb before it was blocked by the water. It did not follow me under. The glowing was even more intense now. So the Gate was underwater. I swam towards the center of the lake. Or more like walked over it's bottom.

The Gate was tall and wide enough for me to walk through. The only problem was that there was nothing beyond it. It was simply an open arch at the bottom of the empty lake, with a sign "Gate" glowing on it's keystone. Before it was water and behind it was water. Even in the middle of it was water. I walked through it and amazingly ended up... on the other side of it.

"Does it even work?" I thought to myself before I remembered a line from the book - "Name is the password."

"The name... What name?"

"Your name," the voice answered.

"What is my name? Stranger. Ancient... God?"

"Shade..." the voice hissed, clearly displeased with my guesses. It felt like I ruined her plans to make me guess for even longer. I was rather happy with this solution.

"Shade?" I asked.

"Yes. Now open the Gateway already."

I touched the "Gate" symbol with my hand and whispered: "Shade."

A big bubble exited my mouth but nothing else happened. I started to feel stupid.

"Are you making fun of me?" I thought angrily.

"You are too stupid for me to make fun over you. Use the blood. YOUR blood if it was not clear yet," I could almost feel her rolling her eyes. I bit my thumb and ran it across the glowing symbol and whispered my name again. Yet another bubble raised above and probably exploded on contact with the surface. The glow on the symbol took the color of my blood and the shine rushed down from it's sides, activating the rest of the glyphs. The glyphs on the archway now formed a full sentence: "The Enchanted Gateway to Anywhere."

"Convenient," I thought to myself. The water inside the arch had formed some sort of a golden barrier, looking like the surface of the water.

"I just step into it, right? It seems too easy."

"I am sure you can come up with five harder ways to enter it, but please don't. It really is that easy," the voice seemed annoyed and eager to get inside. I felt the same way so I shrugged and walked through.

Shade - Ch. 3 : part 3/5

2010-01-07T23:59:00.012+02:00

With Sélie gone I was left alone once again. I hardly spent any time to mourn her passing. Finally, I had started to realize it was always going to be just me. I could not keep anyone by my side. They would simply be a burden and easy targets. I had no time to play around. Direct path was laid ahead of me. Sélie did not matter in the long run. Nobody did. There was a girl out there that needed to be found and there was an army somewhere waiting for my return. Not too fond of my reoccurring meetings with the wolves recently I decided to go for the army first. The Book was everything but helpful. Messages written in it were like some sort of a code. Once again I had to ask help from my inner self. This event was less pleasant each time.

This time the little cottage was restored to perfection. It looked quite a bit different though. Inside was a dining table with two benches on each side and the fireplace was in a different location. The fire was not on. I could smell a chicken or a turkey cooking. Apparently this was a kitchen. The food smell was coming from the oven.

"Care for a snack?" my inner female version greeted me and turned over. She was wearing an apron. It was getting dirty. Her hair was more black than it was silvery and she looked much younger. More energetic, that's for sure.

"Not really," I replied and sat down behind the table. She placed a cup of tea in front of me.

"Are you mocking me?" I asked her.

"Just trying to be nice. Your visits here are not too often," she said and sat down across of me.

"I am here now and I need more memories. Can't you just give me all of them?"

"No, I can not. It is complicated. But, I can give you some again today," she said and smiled wickedly. I was disgusted to admit that this person was somehow supposed to reflect my inner being.

"I want to find what I left behind. I need a location," I went directly to the point.

"Fair enough. Today's lesson - placing a base. Enjoy the show!"

And just like that I was in a memory of mine. Running in my humanoid form in a dark forest. This was an early memory, I could tell. I had just recently started my research on "spreading the disease". Why was I running? Because I could. Nobody was chasing me. Ira was running next to my right and Luxuria next to my left. They were my first. Two sisters that had instantly enchanted me. I just had to make more out of them than a mere meal. They were fresh, perhaps a year had passed? They were strong and beautiful.

"Maker, where are we running to?" Ira asked. She had flaming red hair and silvery eyes like mine. Her body was strong and flexible. She used the trees as her leg extensions and was probably faster than I was, though she kept her distance behind me.

"I do not know yet," I replied and looked at Luxuria. She was the prettier sister. Her hair was also flaming red and her eyes also silvery, but her body was smaller and more fragile. She never talked much, only when I directly asked something.

"Where would you like to go, Luxuria?" I asked her and she turned her enchanting gaze at me. Just like a doll I thought.

"I will follow you anywhere, Maker. But if you must ask, I would like somewhere near water or somewhere up high or somewhere really deep. I would like to be somewhere where the Golden Plague doesn't reach," she said and her voice was just as sweet as her appearance. Yes, Golden Plague was our problem now. Too bad our hideout was discovered. And we had less than half a night to find a new one.

"What are you babbling about, sister. Near water? The only part that actually made sense was about the Golden Plague. You will go where ever the Maker goes. To the end of the dimension if needed!" Ira shouted. Ah, yes... they did not get along. I decided to ignore the rest of the argument between them.

"You crazy hag! There is no way we..." Ira would never let a fight drop if she could help it.

"Silence!" I ordered them and they stopped instantly.

"My apologizes, Maker," they said together.

"There is someone ahead. A male hariér. Are you hungry, girls?" I smirked. Of course they were and me mentioning food only got them more excited. I motioned with my hand, that they are free to go and they flew past me like the wind.

"Aah! What is this?!" little hariér did not sound amused. I wondered why? Two lovely girls fighting over him...

"Mine!" I heard Ira's voice as I walked closer.

"NO MINE! MINE MINE MINE MINE!" the man shouted insanely. Then I saw the girls fighting each other, pulling hairs and clawing. And what did the man do? He stood there, hugging something tightly to his chest, claiming it to be his.

"What is it that you have there, little hariér?" I asked him. The girls stopped fighting and took their positions next to me.

"Mine! It is mine!" he looked mad.

"I understand that, but what is it, that is yours?" I walked closer to him, making him take a few steps back and almost fall into a lake behind him.

"It is... it is very very valuable artifact. It has a power, oh yes! It came from the Dead Desert! But now it's mine!"

"The Dead Desert you say? Hmm... what kind of a power does it have?" the case was curious. He could be lunatic but making up something like this...

"Yes, yes, the Dead Desert. The power, yes, it is amazing! This is a fragment of a God! It fulfills wishes!" he said and nodded repeatedly. His words stung me deep and Ira hissed loudly.

"Give it to me," I said coldly and reached out my hand.

"No, it's mine! You can not have it! It's mine!" he said and this time shook his head excessively. I nodded at Ira and she charged at the man to rip whatever he was holding from his arms. To my, and definitely Ira's surprise, this attempt failed. Ira bounced against an invisible barrier and was almost knocked out by her own force. It took her a moment to collect what had happened and get back on her feet again. The man laughed.

"Fragment you said... Well in that case..," I walked to the man, reached out my hand and touched a piece of that artifact that showed from between his arms.

"How, but... how?" he mumbled and gave me a confused look. I pulled out the rock he was hugging. It looked like a part of a really ancient building and there was something engraved over that particular piece.

"Gate," I said and sighed, "Of course. Remains of some hariér kingdom. The so called "power" it has is nothing more than my essence. Why it resides in this worthless piece of rock, I do not know."

"You... you... it is mine!" he reached his shaking hand out.

"Why is it yours? If anything, then it is mine. It has my essence in it, hariér."

"No, no. I am no hariér. No. I am the guardian of this Artifact!"

"You? Really..."

"Yes, yes really! I found this Artifact in the Dead Desert. I did, yes! And it whispered to me. It said it protects me! It protects me until I find it's master, yes. And you can touch it! You must be the master!"

"What if I am? I do not care to be a master of a rock," I handed the rock back to the man.

"Not just a rock! It is Artifact. It holds terrific energy!"

"I am aware of that, but it is no use for me," I said and was about to let the girls finish their job.

"No! You need it. If you are the master, you need it! It was once gate, it can be so again!" he gasped. I turned to look at him.

"Why would I need a gate?"

"Not just a gate! A gate anywhere, master!"

"Who are you?"

"I research Artifacts, master. And this is my finest piece! This rock holds power so great it could transfer a man from one side of the world to another!" his eyes glittered.

"Now that's interesting. How do you know all this?"

"The rock whispered. It has a bond with master. It then transfered me here! It said I need to be here and wait. And it would protect me!"

"The rock... my essence speaks? What kind of a joke is this..." I was not completely certain.

"Give me a week, master! I can make this rock to be a gateway to anywhere!"

"Why would I trust a hariér?" I snorted and was about to rip the man apart myself.

"You need a hideout from the light, yes? The rock whispers me. You want to be near water, somewhere high and somewhere deep. The rock whispers me, yes. I know. I can make this!" he said and Luxuria started to jump excitedly.

"You have a week, hariér. Ira and Luxuria will trace you down should you betray us," I said.

"I will not betray the master, no. I will not betray the power! It will be done in a week! Master, master, there is a cave over there. Please reside in there until I am done, right? Master will not need to fear light in that cave. It is as deep as earth runs!"

"Right.." I gave the man one more suspicious look and walked in the direction he had pointed me to. The rock certainly held magnificent powers, as it was part of my perfection. It would not be impossible some of my old essence was stored. If so, I might have just found myself a base. A base located just anywhere. A perfect location.

I woke up instantly and transformed. The day was long over. I now knew where to go. Ira and Luxuria would be waiting. And perhaps Gula as well. My reward to the man for succeeding with the gateway - I made him into one of us. Still, Gula remained mentally challenged. And his already big eyes had almost popped out when I gave him his second task - to craft me the greatest kingdom. I wondered if he ever succeeded?

Shade - Ch. 3 : part 2/5

2009-12-31T23:59:00.135+02:00

"Werewolves are the guardians of my Seal. I just need to follow their trace to find it. And once I have the location of the Seal, things will get easier. Eliërs are my concern now. Apparently they know about the Seal. Even if they do not know the details, they know the basic and that's bad enough. I do not think they would side with me in this fight. They seem isolated enough. It is best to keep it that way. As long as I won't go and poke them in the eye, they should have no reason to come into the open either. Win-win?

Later same day:

Something interesting happened today. Out of the ordinary. I was out of the town hunting for animals and my hunt took me to the east. I could smell a lot of goats. Would they notice if one was missing? It was an isolated place in the mountains, one hut, quite lovely actually. I took my humanoid form and walked towards the hut. Funny enough a sign on the road before had pointed in that direction saying "The right way". The goats seemed to be behind the hut, but people in it weren't sleeping yet. I was too hungry to wait for them to go to sleep. Hungry enough to eat them instead of the goats.

"Stop sitting in that shade and come inside," a woman suddenly announced from the door. It amazed me she saw me from my hiding spot.

"And don't bite me just yet. I might have something you need," she continued and left the door open. This dazzled me even more. Why not, I thought. This does not happen every day. I went into the hut. It was one room, pretty much like the one in my dreams, but much more cozy. As soon as I entered the woman pointed on a mug on the table.

"Drink this. I killed a goat two hours ago. It might not be the freshest but it is the best you are going to get. And sit down. You are creepy," she said and I looked over to the table, wondering why I couldn't smell anything. Then I noticed the massive amounts of garlic hanging over the doorway.

"What a lovely welcome," I replied and sat down on a wooden chair next to the table. The liquid in the mug certainly looked like blood and tasted like blood. However the lady did not seem to realize the blood is not something that can be stored over hours or even minutes. As soon as the owner of the blood was dead, the effect of the blood would vanish. I need fresh source, alive one. I feed on life-force not on blood. The best access to a persons life-force is simply through it's blood. If I was into weird rituals I could of course do it the hard way. I left the mug alone after tasting the contents.

"I am surprised you saw me there, lady," I told her. She looked like an ordinary woman, living alone in the mountains with her goats. Her apron was getting dirty.

"I didn't. I just knew you would be lurking in the shade tonight," she said and sat down across of me, investigating my silvery eyes.

"Just knew?" I asked and raised an eyebrow to make it look more dramatic.

"Well of course there was a chance you would not come but it was a very small one. You were hungry and I had what you needed in a perfectly isolated place. It was just a matter of time.

"What are you?" I asked the woman.

"What? How rude. I am a person. But do not be mistaken. I am no hariér. I am a Seer. The Seer actually, since I am the only living one. I sense you require my services mister..?"

"Stranger."

"What kind of a name is that?"

"So they call me."

"A Stranger?"

"The Stranger," and an awkward silence followed.

"I can not call you that," she then announced in full seriousness.

"You can call me what ever you like, madame."

"Is that so? Hmm... then I shall call you Shade. The Shade if you so prefer."

"As you wish. What makes you think I require any kind of service, Seer?"

"Just guessing. People who end up here either bring me the weekly newspaper or require some psychic services."

"Are you saying you can see the future? I do not buy this. Something like future is too uncertain. Uncertain enough to make prophecies look like mere guidelines."

"You are correct. I do not see the actual future, I simply see the... options. The paths that open before you depending on which decision you make. Many come here when they have a difficult decision at hand. It really helps to know what one or other path brings in the end."

"There is only one possible path for me. There are no options and no alternatives. There is only a chance of fail or success and unless you can tell me which it is going to be, I think you have nothing to offer."

"The goal might be one, but there are still many paths leading to it. Or can you say you have chosen a certain one to follow and know it will lead you to where you desire?" I took a moment to think over her words.

"If they all lead to the same goal, what difference does it make which I choose?"

"Oh, but it does. You see, Shade, the future is something too uncertain. Just like you said. And those paths leading to that goal can be altered by others, broken by coincidences and they can vanish in the middle for an unknown reason. If that happens it is good to know which path to take next. It is good to know how far away from the goal you are," she looked at me sharply.

"You seem to know more than is good for you, woman. And if you do indeed know too much, what is the reason for me to let you live?"

"I have answers to many questions. Questions about the paths and future. But I can not answer them unless directly asked. So unless someone is going to ask me if Shade here is the cause of all evil in the world, I am not going to be able to tell them that. I can not simply share the paths of others with you either. This is the oath I took when I became the Seer and this oath is not possible to be broken."

"I'll put that to test then. How does this... seeing... work?" I was curious. If she was indeed the real deal...

"To put it bluntly - I will activate my epic Seer mode and you will ask anything you desire. The more specific the question, the more specific the answer. Care to try?" she seemed to enjoy this.

"Very well. Activate this... mode," I was still hungry and in a rush. Then she focused her eyes on mine and they started to glow, silvery to me, possibly some other color to hariérs.

"So... You are the Seer?" I asked, not knowing where to start."

"Yes," came a simple answer.

"That was easy. Do you know who I am?"

"You are Shade."

"So you named me... How do you know what I feed on?"

"I have previously seen you in someones path."

"Really? So someone I ate for dinner came here to ask about her future? What did you tell her? There is a mean silver eyed man and he is going to seduce you and then suck the blood out of you?"

"Really. No it was not someone you ate for dinner and not someone to ask about her future. I told her nothing."

"I see. Why did you not tell her anything?"

"She did not ask."

"Why did she not ask?"

"She was never here."

"So you are able to see peoples paths even when they are not asking for it?"

"I am."

"Why?"

"Strong paths that affect the course of the world visualize in my dreams."

"And you saw me on her path?"

"Yes."

"And she remained alive afterwards?"

"After the first time, yes."

"I met her more than once?"

"Yes."

"Have I met her yet?" I figured there was the chance, considering all the future stuff she was talking about.

"No," she said as expected.

"Who is she?"

"She is Lauré, daughter the Southern King of the hariérs conceived before his older brother passed away and he had to take over the throne."

"The current Southern King is well and healthy. And I have read the history. There has been no such cases where a younger brother had to take over the throne. Explain."

"It has not happened yet," she stated the obvious. Thinking back, why was I asking so stupid questions? I could have asked something far more useful, like where is the Seal. Instead I kept babbling about paths that would lead to the Seal. Why not just ask, really? I am certain she would have told me. I was probably dumbstruck by the fact I could get all the answers simply by asking and her path story brainwashed me into seeing... paths. New goal: going back there as soon as possible. As soon as those wolves stop tailing me day and night!

"So you saw into this far of this path? Chances are this child will never be born."

"Yes. This path is very clear. It is almost impossible to alter it. She will most likely be born."

"I could easily stop it."

"That is correct. In that case the path will be destroyed."

"When will this child be born?"

"Two years from now."

"Where will I meet her?"

"Near the Ancient Bridge."

"And where is that? I have not heard of it. Or let me guess, the bridge does not exist yet."

"The bridge is located west from the Southern Capital. It exists. It is not ancient yet."

"How old will the girl be when I meet her?"

"Sixteen."

"Will I bite her?"

"Not at this time."

"Why?"

"You will be distracted."

"By whom?"

"The Exiled."

"What are the exiled? These strange races just keep piling up."

"The Exiled are creatures like yourself, who feed on life-force to keep themselves functioning. But they no longer follow you. Their path leads elsewhere."

"How will they distract me?"

"They will try to perform a ritual on the girl to exorcise the Mother."

"The Mother?"

"Her."

"Her? HER? You've got to be... This is insane!"

"Her," she repeated. I noticed she had not blinked since I started asking the questions. I took a moment to calm down.

"So the girl will get away?"

"Yes."

"Will I get away?"

"Yes."

"How is this girl connected to me?"

"Your paths cross."

"Fine... What role does she play on my path to break the Seal?" I was tired of playing around. This woman obviously knew things.

"She will either assist you or stop you."

"Which is it?"

"There are two paths. There are very little paths about someone who has not yet born into this world. More will open as her personality takes shape."

"Why do I need her?"

"You don't."

"Then why would I spare her life?"

"You can make a path to need her."

"Make a path? How?"

"Yes. You can use her position in your benefit."

"What good can a bastard do?"

"All paths can be changed. The path of a bastard as well."

"She could be a queen? Now that's interesting. As a queen she would have the power. I would easily get the location of the Seal, assuming I haven't found it by then and if I owned the hariérs no eliër or wolf would come between my goals..."

"She could be a queen or she could be something more."

"More?"

"She could be a fragment of your perfection."

"That she could... Future this far away is very confusing. I need to make things more certain. Take this, this is the blade I forged myself. I will know it at any time. Make sure this ends up in the hands of that girl. I know you can do this. When she comes before me, with this very blade. I will come back to you. This is a fixed path. Do you see it?" I put my self crafted weapon on the table.

"I see it."

"I will come with this girl and you will look into her eyes, like you look into mine and you will tell me her role in my future."

"That is a possibility, but the path is blurry."

"I will come. As long as I am safe for now. I've waited an eternity. I can wait eighteen more years."

"You might come. You are not safe for now..."

"What? The wolves again?"

"You are not safe for now. It is the wolves. They have followed you here."

"There is still night left. I will make my escape. Will you give the blade to the girl?"

"I will make sure she gets it."

"It's called... Dragon's Breath. I will seek for a girl that owns this blade. This future is certain, Seer, so start having nightmares about the end of the world!" I told her and shape-sifted, breaking the chair in the process. Then I ran out of the door, into the pack of wolves..."

Just too bad I had, for some reason, ripped out most of the page in the past. The only part I actually saw now from the remains of the page was: "It's called... Dragon's Breath. I will seek for a girl that owns this blade. This future is certain, Seer, so start having nightmares about the end of the world!" and the lines about the transforming and the wolves. Those lines were all there was to guide me. Some blade called Dragon's Breath and a girl with it. And ultimately finding this girl would lead to the end of the world. Sounded like a good start to me. About my promise to return with the girl, I had no idea.

Shade - Ch. 3 : part 1/5

2009-12-24T23:59:00.014+02:00

"Stranger... Hey! STRANGER!" Sélie slapped me across my face. She was still not used to her own power and thus her slap was very painful.

"OUCH! What the heck are you doing?" I shouted and gave her an angry look. She looked just as angry as me if not angrier. That surprised me enough to make me lose my grumpy expression.

"What?" I asked her and frowned when she bent closer to my face.

"I.. AM... H U N G R Y !" she shouted. I backed away from her.

"Yes, yes. I get it. There was no need to hit me because of that." I said and massaged my hurting cheek.

"Well you wouldn't react to anything else. You have been spacing out a lot lately. What's going on?" she asked and turned my face to face hers. She could be really lovely while she wasn't busy laying hits on my face. I didn't look her in the eye.

"Nothing you should be concerned about." I told her as usual and as usual she wouldn't let it go.

"You always say the same thing but we both know something is going on. You are not the only one anymore who can feel it, you know. I can too..." Sélie said and lowered her hand from my face. I took it and held it back against my cheek. It was somehow comforting to know I was no longer alone in this.

"I'm sorry. We will go hunt you some food as soon as it's safe outside." I told her, thinking it was probably night already. I was feeling uneasy tonight.

"It is already time, Stranger," she said and caressed my cheek, "You've been non-responsive for about ten hours now. Can you imagine how bored I was? Sealed in this dirty basement with no one else to talk to then your nodding body that sometimes dropped a line like "Yes" or "No". Just for your information they did not match any of my questions at all." I smirked. That annoyed her even more and she pulled her hand away.

"Oh come on Sélie, don't be like this. Like you said, you can feel it too. It just lands harder on me. It is difficult to focus. I'll try to be more... responsive from now on. How's that sound?"

"Sounds like you are lying through your teeth," she hissed at me but was clearly happier. I smiled at her and got up on my feet. The basement was the same one as all previous weeks. The owner had not yet realized that two vampires had been using his potato-storage as their personal daytime nesting place. However it was time to move on. Feeding two people took more resource than feeding one person. If we stayed here much longer the entire city would die out. I had not made any more of us for the same reason and it would get crowded in the basement. Hariérs were also getting suspicious about me. More than one of them blamed the silver eyed night-stalker on the disappearances. I couldn't blame them because it really was I who lured out the target for us to feed on. Sometimes I stalked them into their houses and killed them there. Once I even brought meal back to the basement but cleaning up the mess was more trouble than the delivery was worth. At least Sélie had found it amusing.

"Well? Are you done spacing out yet?" she demanded.

"Yes, let's go." I said and held out my hand to help her up.

It really was dark outside, probably, not that day time had ever looked different to me. And probably cold, though neither of us could feel it. She was pale and beautiful in her white dress and her dark hair flowing in the northern wind. She sniffed the air.

"Smells like dessert," she told me. Her favorite type was drunk men. I could not understand what she found in them, to me they smelled revolting. I preferred young women. Especially when they were still virgin. But not too young.

"Ugh, what do you find in them? That's just disgusting," I told her with a matching expression.

"Revenge I guess. For my dad you know," she shrugged, "What about you? Young virgins? What are you, some sort of a demon?"

"Hah! Jealous?" I grinned at her. She turned her face away.

"As if!" she said. I didn't buy it.

"Are you sure? Because I could swear I just smelt a tasty virgin within radius," I kept picking on her, fully aware she was very jealous.

"Do what you want!" she said and ran off. She wore no shoes and her white legs flashed before my eyes as she rushed into the nearest ally.

"Jail-bait.., " I said to myself and sighed. She had improved a lot in a short time. It almost seemed like she was meant for this life and she seemed happy with it. I did not want to ruin this for her with my problems. My returning memories often caused me to blank out but I had not told her about them yet. The Book was also hardly helpful. The entries were getting shorter and shorter, some being only one or two sentences long. I must have been really busy back then. However I had finally found one of use.

"Under the ground and to the south I left them. Gateway. Name is the password."

I knew "them" meant my army. This was pretty much the only thing I had written about for half of the Book. Describing some of the new "materials" or new functions I had found out about them. Example the smell of garlic or some other strong odor could activate an automatic self defense system within our brains that completely shut off our sense of smell. Along with that most of our visual ability would disappear as well. I had not realized before, that we saw scents, unlike normal people. Sélie was the one to tell me the difference. I ran after her into the night. I could already smell the blood. She did not like to play around. I reached her as she was standing over a male body, wiping her chin and looking satisfied. The man was still moving.

"He is still alive," I told her. She had not noticed me coming and gasped.

"Stop sneaking up on me like this. I was just about to finish," she snorted and looked at me.

"P... please," the man on the ground exhaled. Somehow he was still able to talk even though Sélie had pierced pretty deep through his neck. Blood came gushing out as he tried to move. Sélie gave him a disgusted look, bent down and broke his neck in one quick movement.

"There, done," she then told me. Her brutality never failed to surprise me.

"Even I am not as vile as you are," I told her with a raised eyebrow. The good thing was we never had to worry about corpses. My toxic essence would turn a dead body into ashes in the matter of minutes. I bent down and took the mans arm to give it the decomposing bite. It disgusted me to bite a male but her poison was not good enough for the job.

"Then you have a lot to learn. Come, let's go," she grabbed my hand and started running towards the next alley. Just when did she become the leader? I smiled to myself and let her guide me through the shadows.

"I haven't eaten yet," I reminded her.

"I know. I picked something special out for you!"

"Something special?"

"You'll see!" she said and sounded excited. I was getting curious as well. Then I smelt it.

"No way!" I couldn't believe she would actually let me feed on a virgin while she was around.

"I suppose you deserve one every now and then. Just don't be too gentle!" she smiled and needlessly guided me to the house I knew this amazing scent to come from.

"It is a shame to admit but even I think they smell good. If you share you can have one," she said and started to climb up the wall, finding the uneven rocky surface to be perfect support for her bare legs. I sniffed the air once more.

"You're kidding. Twins?" I had to hold back a wide smile. Sélie was just brilliant.

"Come on already, or there will be none left!" she whispered from the second floor window and silently opened it. I had taught her well. She slipped through the window soundlessly like a white shadow and I followed her up.

"DON'T COME! IT'S A TR..." she suddenly shouted from the inside. Then I heard the sound of a blade slashing through the air, through her flesh. I smelt her blood. I felt her pain inside me. I was frozen solid on the wall of the house. No muscle of mine would move even if I wanted it to. My mind did not yet process what just happened.

"Did you think you were safe without your memories? No, they are still hunting. Disappearances in this city were just the sign they were waiting for," an elderly female voice said in my head while my own thoughts were still frozen. My shock was quickly replaced by despair and anger. I knew the wolves were inside waiting for me and I looked down. Just as expected they were surrounding me from the ground as well. They were in their humanoid form, it was only new moon. I let go of the wall and fell right on top of one of them. In my naiveness I had not equipped myself with any weapons, thinking my fangs were all I needed. Somehow they had blocked out their scents. Even on top of them I could not smell their reek. Only the scent of the twin virgins occupied my nose. Then I understood the vital mistake I had made. When Sélie had said even she thought they smelled good. There was no way she would think virgins smelled good. That was not her taste at all. The wolves had found a way to trick our keen senses. Somehow I was still able to see them. But of course! It was them who smelt like two virgins. Split into ten... Beasts!

I was idle for too long. The one under me stabbed me. I managed to dodge and the dagger only wounded my shoulder. The virgin scent was now mixed with Sélie's blood. I could hardly feel anything but agony. Her death, if she was dead, felt like losing a part of myself. Then they attacked me at once. I had no fighting skills. What could I possibly do? I could only rely on my instincts. I set a goal; to get Sélie or what remains of her and to get away from the wolves. As the first wolf-man stuck his dagger through my back, I transformed.

"He remembers! Fall back! FALL BACK!" someone shouted from above. I shook myself and the dagger slipped out. I then jumped on the closest running fleabag and cracked his skull against the rocks of the street. I had no time to hunt down the rest. My goal was to get Sélie. I jumped and pushed myself off from the opposing house wall and right through the second floor window, breaking it's glass and frame. Sélie's body was lying motionlessly on the floor, neck sliced through and another dagger in her heart. She was dead beyond repair. Of course no sign of the wolves. They had escaped through the door. I gently placed Sélie's body over my back and held her hand between my jaws. I also took the doorway out and I could still see the fleeing dogs when I got outside. They split up between the streets. As if I had the desire to stalk them down, no, I had to get away from them. With regret aching in my wounded chest, I started to run. The city wall suddenly didn't seem so high anymore. I jumped onto the closest roof and then over the wall, landing softly on the slippery grass on the other side. Then I ran into the forest. My chest was still aching..

The Essence - Ch. 2 : part 5/5

2009-12-23T23:59:00.010+02:00

"It has been five weeks now since I started my investigation about the eliërs. Here is what I have found out:

1. Their birth occurs once every five years and usually no more than five at once.

2. They are marked with symbols which can be found anywhere on their body.

3. Their symbols are always different.

4. Marked babies are titled as the Highborn and they will be taken to Nél-Eliër.

("High" City - translation: Nél - City; Eliër - Highborn, Importance, Sacred etc. in their own language to which hariérs later adapted to)

Some history: Eliërs were first noticed about five thousand years ago and there is no evidence of them existing before that time. As far as I am concerned it was my sealing which created them. I am almost certain they are the same people to whom I revealed myself. There couldn't have been more than a few hundred back then and just about as many eliërs exist at once. The system is flawless - throughout ages eliërs who reach the age of 500 would pass away, that means 5 eliërs after every 5 years. If an illness or other cause would take a life of an eliër much earlier, more than five would be born next time. I checked all the records I could get my hands on and this system has functioned so far.

Later same day:

I also checked some drawings of the symbols and I am now absolutely certain I am right. It is the language we originally created. My essence has marked them, I can read it everywhere. Moonlight, Healing Touch, Visions... One marking to symbolize powerful words...

One eliër in specific caught my interest. This one did not die once she turned 500. There are no records of her passing. I did check her birth though and her marking was drawn there. What amazes me is that this marking was never supposed to be part of the original language. It was in my own mind for a very long time, but I never shared it with Her. It marked Perfection. Perfection however for me was something ultimate, which is why I would never dare to put it in words. It remained in my head alone. Not even with my essence would it get out. It was far too sacred back then. This eliër... she is not marked by me. It has to have something to do with Her. The only one who could possibly know my every thought without me speaking them loud. Only she could have marked down Perfection. If that's the case... I don't know what it means... Maybe my Seal is not the only one leaking... Could it be?

Night time:

I fed in the forest where I found some animals. I have to keep away from hariérs for a while. They might start to suspect something. A fleabag showed up while I was feeding. He was alone and said he was a leader of some pack - Bahil he called himself. They have been chasing me for a long time now. I thought I had gotten away when there was no sign of them for a while. So, being curious I figured I could at least ask him what he wanted of me before killing him. I couldn't let my secret out, now could I? He said he knew what I was and not to worry, he would not spill it out to the hariérs. He and his pack were hated amongst hariérs anyways, apparently they brought bad luck. Additionally he explained me that his little transformation to wolf and back again was not all that common as I had thought. It seems hariérs are not capable of doing that, which adds another mysterious race. And I thought eliërs were a weird case. Either way he knew I was strong, he knew what I fed on and most of all - he knew about the Prophecy. I thought only I knew, but it seems the wolf-men are well informed. I also found out eliërs knew about it. This one didn't surprise me as much. Being a part of my essence I would be amazed if they didn't know who made them.

Cutting the long story short - Bahil leads a pack. Pack contains people who are able to transform into wolves. It does not happen at will like I mistakenly thought, but only during the full moon. And no, they have no connection to my essence. They call themselves the Werewolves. And they had named me a Vampire - a bloodsucker. Charming. He babbled on about his race and I was thinking what is the best way to kill him when something he said stung my mind. "We exist because you don't. Our purpose is to make sure the Seal stays shut. You are what has leaked out." he told me. And when I asked why does he bother to tell me all this instead of killing me he responded: "I may be the leader of my pack but there is a force behind us that controls everything. It was an order that I would make sure you know everything before I finish you off. Dying while unaware why, has no meaning."

Two things were certain at that point. They were the enemy and eliërs were the enemy. From his story I managed to pick up that they were also enemies with the eliërs. What a triangle. I tried to ask him who was the one giving the orders but he seemed to think I knew enough to die now. There was no full moon so I wondered if he would attempt to talk me to death. Instead he pulled out two silver daggers. I had to go all out. Poor Bahil picked a bad time. I had just fed. Even though it was life force of a bear, it was still fresh. I let him pierce his daggers though my stomach before I forced him down. I let him watch as my wounds healed. I told him he could not kill me. Then the damn thing bit my arm. I could feel HIS presence trying to take over mine. So that was his plan all along. I grabbed his own daggers from my stomach and attempted to cut his head off. But I couldn't... His presence was awfully strong in me. I only wounded his face. My own essence was busy healing the wounds in my stomach. I only had my will to fight his entire being. So I fled. Like a dog with it's tail between it's legs. What a shame..."

My later entries described my fight with Bahil's essence. I had only written down a few agonizing sentences. It seemed I had been in pain for a long time but finally managed to overpower his being. Still, it would not leave my body. It was with me even now. Little did Bahil know I would make his curse into my strength. I had bent his presence in me till it was part of me. That is when I gained my ability to transform into a black panther. And unlike him and his pack, I could do it at will. The only minus side was my limited thinking ability while transformed. I could have one goal and very little sane mind. In general this form was only good for traveling long distances and fighting, where it wouldn't matter who dies. I had to use it as rarely as possible to avoid his presence taking over mine. Even now I could feel him linger around, waiting his moment. Even in death he haunted me. With a sigh I put the book on the muddy floor and took a look towards Sélie. She looked pretty in this pink dress. And she was hungry again. I could tell from the way she looked at me. She was hardly ever satisfied.

"You have to wait till night time, Sélie," I told her and motioned her to come to me. She sat down next to me, ruining her pretty dress again with mud. Perhaps someone's basement wasn't the best place to hide. We had no need for light. Even more - we could not stand it. Now that I had awakened. Purity of the light would kill me. And her. But my innocence was not a high price to pay for my memories.

The Essence - Ch. 2 : part 4/5

2009-12-22T23:53:00.009+02:00

Her blood tasted delicious. I could feel it with all my senses. I could smell it's light golden aroma, I could taste it's strengthening power, I could feel it's warmth dripping down my chin and her neck, I could hear her heartbeats slowing down, I could see the blood flowing throughout her body and... I could sense her thoughts. It was not really her thought's I was sensing, more like her feelings. I could tell she was in pain and she was frightened. I could tell she was sorry for her father and yet she despised him. I could tell she thought this was the best outcome for her and she was glad she didn't have to put up with anything worse. She was not worried about what I was or why I fed on her. However there was a tiny spark of wonder in her which caught my attention. She was wondering if she could have ever been like me - powerful, beautiful, strong... Her thoughts and her life force were fading slowly just like the rhythm of her heart. No, they were not fading really. I was sucking them out. Her tiny existence was good enough to power me for days. Her pure blood could keep me living for weeks. My cells were transforming with every sip I took. It was as if they were renewed by her blood. I felt strong again. And as a bonus, my cells now remembered their alternative form.

She was still breathing when I pulled my fangs out of her. I wasn't completely satisfied but I had the control over my instincts again. I also managed to bite myself in the lower lip since I was still unused to the fangs. They would not go away again. My "normality" ended tonight.

"Why did you stop?" she whispered. I hadn't realized she was still conscious, though barely.

"What if I told you, that you can be like me? You can be strong, beautiful and powerful. The only cost you pay is that you feed on everyone else's life force. To keep yourself functioning, you will need to drink their blood just like I drank yours now," I asked her while sorting between the various memories that just returned to me. The materials I had been collecting were people. Strong willed people who would make a great army. The way to to find such a person was simple - I just had to drink their blood to know if they were worthy. Their feelings would tell me all I needed to know. And then I would feed them my own blood. My sins, my power, my goals and my instincts... they would become a part of them. My tainted blood was the only "cure" against my bite. I was poisonous. My toxic essence would turn them into mindless creatures with only their instincts to guide them. But if they were strong enough, with my blood, they would keep their sanity.

"Is that possible... I... I would like that," she said and closed her eyes. She was not worthy. Her will to live was not there. But I was tired of roaming around alone. She could be my company. Perhaps her desire to be like me was strong enough for her to take in the effects of my blood. It was worth a try. I could always kill her if she turned into something else.

"Drink," I told her and bit my wrist. It was rather painful actually. She opened her mouth and I placed my wrist over it, dripping my blood into her mouth. She swallowed once, then twice, then thrice... and then she felt it inside her. My blood taking the control over her. I covered her mouth to prevent the screaming that was about to come. The transformation was painful. My blood ate away her essence and replaced it with my own. It transformed her cells to make them function like mine. Every single bit of her must of been hurting insanely. Her expression was all I needed, to know that she was in agonizing pain. It reminded me of my own experiences, it reminded me of the day I was sealed.

The pain was too much to her and she passed out, falling unconsciously between my arms. The process still continued. I watched as her heart stopped and her blood flow froze. Her sweet scent turned into one similar to my own, still delicious but not what it was before. I laid her down and observed the growth of her fangs as I ran my thumb across her soft lips to prevent the fangs from piercing into it. She seemed more alive in death than she had been in life, even though her face was much paler now. Her hair was prettier than before and it looked healthier. Small flaws in her skin had disappeared, which made me look at my wrist. The bite wound was almost fully healed. However her heart still remained motionless. My blood had transformed her, but she had no will left to live. She was dead, for good. I got up and looked at her one last time before turning around.

"I'm hungry," she suddenly said when I had started to walk away. So she was alive? I turned around. She was sitting up now, eyes glowing silvery like mine. She was not mindless. Her ability to speak had confirmed as much.

"Just how hungry are you?" I asked her and walked closer.

"Hungry enough to drink even your blood," she replied and ran her tongue over her upper lip, scratching it with her fangs.

"Is that so? I will give you a bit to satisfy you for now, but my blood will not be your food," I said and squatted down next to her. She eyed my neck and bit her lips.

"Here," I shoved my arm under her eyes. She grabbed it instantly and hit her fangs into it. Her heart was now beating. It was very silent but I could still hear it. Just like I could hear her gulp down my blood.

"That is enough, Sélie," I told her after a minute had passed. She did not let go.

"ENOUGH!" I shouted and pulled my arm. Her fangs ran deep wounds over it before she finally pulled away, looking at me like a lost puppy. I sighed.

"I'm still hungry," she said and glared at me.

"I know. You will probably never feel full. There is always going to be something missing. There is never enough. If you are satisfied, that is enough for now."

"What are we?" she asked me and stood up, wiping the blood off of her chin. The wound on her neck had healed but she was still covered in her own blood as well as mine. My wound on my wrist was again almost completely healed.

"We are fragments of perfection, doomed to fulfill a certain Prophecy. Should we fail, we will disappear. Just like that."

"Fragments of Perfection. I like that name. What is your name?" she asked and left me stunned for a moment.

"I have no name," I finally said.

"How can that be? Don't you have a family who named you?" she seemed honestly confused.

"I was not born into this world the same way you were. I was originally created with no name. If you wish you can call me Stranger like everyone else."

"Stranger? I can call you that. So, Stranger, what do we do next?" she came and stood next to me. Her dress was ripped, dirty and covered in blood but she looked beautiful despite that.

"First, I am going to get us something less bloody to wear. Then we.. Hey! Give that to me," I said and watched her pick up my Book. I must of have dropped it when I lost myself to the hunger. She obediently handed it to me.

"What is this. Your diary?" she asked.

"Yes, that's exactly what it is. So it is private. Stay away from it," I gave her a warning look and she seemed to understand.

"I won't touch it," she said.

"Good. We should go now. Remain in shadows and make sure nobody sees you. Our existence isn't exactly known to the world yet and I'd prefer if it stayed that way," I had regained some of my original personality and some more memories along with it. I knew how to take my animal form but this was not the place for it. First things first. I had to get us some clothes.

The Essence - Ch. 2 : part 3/5

2009-12-21T23:22:00.013+02:00

It took me a few moments to realize the memory ended there and I was once again in the desert, with my back against the cold metal pile. I quickly reached for the Book under my shirt. It was still there. I opened it and flipped through the pages till the part I was looking for.

"Met this girl. She said there was an explosion that made eliërs. I have checked their borders. I suspect they are infected with me. I think it might persist through lifetimes. It is worth testing. I wonder what they feed on? I need to find out more about them.

I finished off the girl. Her words hurt me. I had the luck to find a material. I suppose they are nothing like eliërs after all. I heard something about markings. Mine don't have any. But... Well I still need to investigate this. I don't know why, but I feel a strange connection to those eliër things. They must be related to me somehow. Or to the Prophecy. They better not stand in my way. Tomorrow I will go and see if someone in the city knows more about them. "They are pretty and with tattoos" is not really the kind of information I am looking for. Ah, and the wolves did not show today. I suppose they are still far behind."

That explained a few things. However it did not tell me how to transform or where the army was. I did have a direction now though. I knew the city was to the south from here. With the Book safely back under my arm, I got up and continued my way over the ashes, towards the city.

I started to see the city at the beginning of the second week. I was worn out and hungry. Even though I had figured out what I should feed on, this did not seem like a pleasant thing to do. I planned to stick with the regular food for as long as I could.

The desert finally ended with a straight line of grass plains. There was no road to connect to the town, so I started to walk over the plains. The time then was around midday and by midnight I reached the city wall. It was like I had remembered it, high and made of stones. Partly covered in moss, partly in weeds. The entrance was on the other side. Walking around the wall took me two hours.

"Halt! There is no entrance to the town during the night, sir!" the guard shouted and pointed his sword towards me.

"Easy now, I am tired, hungry and I need a place to stay. You can't possibly leave me out here?" I said, wondering if they would still remember me. Even though he was older now, it was definitely the same guard as when I first time came here.

"I don't care. Rules are... Wait a minute. Aren't you the same guy who came by few years ago? The mysterious one?" he stepped closer to look at my face, then looked around me and then again my face. I saw him staring at my scars for a moment.

"You haven't aged a day, lad. So, came over the desert again? Just what are you doing there, sneaking around Nél-Eliër?" he said. So, he remembered me. This could be a good thing. It seemed no connection had been made between me and mysteriously disappearing people.

"I like exploring. Could you let me in now? I am r e a l l y tired."

"Oh, well... I guess I could. But you owe me one. And if I get into trouble because of you..."

"...you will come and beat me up. Yes, I remember the deal." I finished his sentence. He smiled at me and opened the smaller gate inside the bigger one to let me in. The city gates were the same as before. Old wooden ones with metallic edges and with the Kingdom crest painted over them. I said my thanks and went inside the town, instantly towards the familiar tavern. I had to eat and fast. And preferably something other than... Perhaps it was already too late. I could still smell the guard. Lucky for him he was not appealing. But now more scents were getting to me, more alluring ones, feminine scents. I instinctively turned away from my original direction, to this tight alley, lured by more than one feminine scent. Someone had left a door open.

"Hello, good Sir. What brings you to these parts?" a familiar female voice greeted me at the door. She was a bit chubby mid aged woman with curly dark hair and she was smoking a pipe. Her scent was a mixture of tobacco and food.

"Grinny..." I mumbled her name, recalling some more of my memories. This was the local brothel.

"Yes? Oh my... OH MY! You are the Stranger!" she coughed.

"A Stranger everywhere I go, yet everyone seems to know a thing or two about me," I smirked and looked her in the eyes.

"I will never forget those silvery eyes. So what brought you here? Fancy a little girl perhaps?" she laughed and breathed some smoke into my face.

"Actually yes. Do you have some recommendations?" I figured there was no escape from it now anyways, might as well give in to the nature.

"We have the old fish and we have some new ones. Actually a fresh one was brought in tonight. Maybe you want to bless her in?" she motioned me to come inside. I closed the door behind me as I entered. The brothel was as I had remembered it. Sweetly smelling of women.

"Is she young?" I asked her while distinguishing between different scents.

"Quite. Not the youngest there is, but quite," she said and escorted me to the upper floor where new girls were kept.

"Would you like her here or would you like to take her somewhere?" she asked me when we reached a door. I could smell some men in other rooms.

"Here... No, I'll take her with me."

"Ha ha! Well bring her back by... tomorrow same time. How will you pay?" she unlocked the door. I could hear the girl cry.

"Cash, when I return her," I said, wondering where I would get some money. Then again it wouldn't matter. I had no intention of sticking around here.

"Only because you are a good client," she said and opened the door. The room behind it included just a bed, like all rooms. The girl was wearing a short dress. She had long dark hair and pale skin and she smelled divine.

"Sorry about that. I thought they had dressed her up by now. Still want her?" Grinny asked me and the girl rose her face to look at me. Her eyes were red from tears.

"Yes, it's fine."

"Come here little kitty. This is your first job. If you do well your daddy can pay the debt and you can live happily ever after. You are very lucky he is so handsome not some old fart," Grinny said and motioned to the girl to come to us. Little shy thing got up and slowly walked towards me, still crying.

"Wipe the tears. If you don't please the client, they will not pay. You do not want that, now do you?" The girl instantly wiped her tears and shook her head.

"I... I am sorry. How can I please you, Sir?" she took a deep breath and looked me in the eye. I felt slightly sorry for her.

"You will go with the man now and he will bring you back when he is done. Off you go!" she shoved the shivering girl between my arms. My sympathy for her disappeared at the same moment. I was just too hungry. I left with her as fast as I could, not even listening to what Grinny was telling me. I half dragged the girl with me, out of the brothel alley, straight to the next. I knew this one to be empty, hardly used street. It still was. Nobody was around. They thought it was haunted here. Perhaps it was...

The girl started crying again but I could hardly hear her. I pushed her against the wall, maybe a little too hard.

"Sir, it hurts! Please be more gentle.." she cried. I tried to keep my head clean and I focused on her lips, kissing them violently. She didn't resist. I could feel her tears on my face and she was shaking. Of course she was, it was cold outside. I let go of her for a moment, torn between giving her my coat and satisfying my hunger.

"It... it is my first time.." she said silently and looked at my chest. Perhaps she was lucky it was me then. I would finish her off, there was no need for her to be taken by some old fat men.

"What's your name?" I asked her, not really interested. I was stalling for some odd reason. I could not tell why.

"Sélie, Sir."

"Sélie... I am not going to... ah, I am going to do something much worse. I am going to kill you Sélie. Because I am hungry. And you are my food," I pulled her chin up so she would look me in the eye. To my surprise she had stopped crying.

"Alright," is all she said.

"Are you really fine with that? Don't you want to live?" I asked in disbelief, feeling her sweet scent, knowing I could not resist much longer.

"It would not change anything, would it? Maybe things would be better after death. I don't like this life. I don't want to live like this. Kill me!" she pleaded me. I did not wait for her to ask me twice. My instincts had kicked in. Once again I shoved her against the wall and bent down towards her neck. I could see her blood flow. Not just smell it. I could see it pulsate through her veins. My eyes had gained a new function. I located the best place and bit her. My two sharp teeth sank into her soft flesh and the warm blood came gushing out. She didn't make a sound. Then I fed...

The Essence - Ch. 2 : part 2/5

2009-12-20T23:35:00.006+02:00

A week had passed or perhaps two weeks, maybe even three. I had lost the track on time. The fields of ashes seemed endless. They were everywhere around me. Sometimes the sun burned me, killing me slowly, but the nights were peaceful around here. I had no need for sleep, not even after all this time. However I also had no food or water and thus no energy to carry on and I finally had to rest.

I had stolen the Book from lady Cerilyne's chamber right after I had recollected some of my memories. I could tell the eliërs were not my friends and I had to get out of there as soon as possible. They had not yet realized what I was. Or perhaps they had. Lady Cerilyne had suggested the option once before. I was lucky back then when I sneaked into her chamber. She had left the door unlocked and she was not in the room. Almost as if she knew my intentions and allowed me to succeed. The Book was also in the open, right on top of her bed. I grabbed it and half sneaked half ran out of the Main House, to the Center Fountain, to the east, to the Dead Desert... where all of it had begun.

The part of my memory which was returned to me did not just include the visual understanding of what happened. My thoughts at the time, my feelings, my intentions - they were all in my head now. Even the missing pieces couldn't change those facts. Still, I was unsure of what I was, but now I had a theory, and with each line I read from this Book, my theory slowly proved itself. The Ancient was sealed behind the Gate of Oblivion by the one he loved most, and for trying to please her. If the Seal would break, he would undoubtedly turn the world back into nothingness it originally was. Leaving only him and her to exist in perfection. The Book was a part of him that had leaked out when the Seal started to give in, along with myself. I was merely a fragment of someones perfection, cast into the outside world with hopes to succeed the Prophecy and with a book to guide it through. According to my memory I also kept the book as a diary to have the latest data at hand, should it ever be needed. And it was needed. It was this book and my fragment now, with a goal - To survive and to succeed the Prophecy.

The Ancient had to be released. No, I had to be released. Eliërs and wolf-men would not be able to stop me. I now knew what I had left behind, if they were still alive... My fragment could infect others just like my essence would burn hariérs long ago. I had created myself an infected army to fight the wolves, because they had the numbers. Only a few problems remained now. I was still stuck in this gigantic battlefield, where my loved one once cursed me, I had no idea where the location of my army was and I still could not remember how to transform into my animal form.

Yet another long moment had passed when I remembered, I could recollect my memories in my dreams. I sat down next to a burnt pile of metal and hid the book under my shirt just in case. With my arms tightly around it, I fell asleep.

"So, you finally return. Took you long enough to remember the basic," the old lady had lost a bit of her age. She still had wrinkles but her voice sounded more alive than before.

"I had a lot on my mind and I was reading the book. Most of it includes my thoughts when I was materialized, they hardly make any sense. I suppose I would understand them more if I could regain some more of my memories." I told her and sat down on the arm-chair. The room had changed. The fire was out and it was not warm anymore. The house itself was burnt and smelled like ashes. The arm-chair also felt uncomfortable.

"Yes, the book is made of some deep feelings that the Ancient held and of your thoughts from when you still had your memory. I see you now understand, you are nothing more than a fragment. Just a little piece that needs to fall in place to release what can actually make a difference."

"I want to open the Seal. I want to be free. I want to be perfect again. You need to give me more memories!" I looked around for the cat while saying that.

"The panther is no longer here. He has been returned to you," the lady said.

"I don't know how to transform and I could really use some boost to get out of this... desert."

"Ah, the Dead Desert. That is how they named the place after the battle that occurred there almost five hundred millenniums ago. You've read a few lines about it, but they are just messy thoughts, written in haste. I think this memory is what should be returned now."

I nodded, not knowing how it would help me. As soon as I did that, the room around me vanished, the lady vanished and I was sitting on a much more comfortable sofa. My dream had turned into a memory. I knew where I was - this was where she had invited me. The girl I had met in a tavern when I was searching myself some food and potential army materials. She was now sitting next to me, unbuttoning my shirt.

"You are so mysterious. They say in the bar that you came across the Dead Desert. Did you see Nél-Eliër?" she asked me and caressed my chest with her hands.

"Do you know the story behind the Dead Desert? I would love to hear about it," I replied and touched her cheek. It was so warm.

"Well, they say it has been like this since ages ago. Something happened there that ended all wars. Some say that the first eliërs were born there and their magical energy is what caused the explosion," she explained and reached towards my face to kiss me. I held her chin softly. I still had things I needed to know from her.

"Explosion you say? Could you be more detailed, please?" I asked and probably sounded a bit cold, because she pulled back and looked disappointed.

"I only know the legend like everyone else. Old Kings had their wars and they pissed off the Gods and the Gods blew them up, leaving this desert and creating eliërs," she said hastily and started to caress my chest again. Her words about Gods had stung me. So this was the place, where my love damned me. According to the legend at least. Eliërs though? It could be something that was added to spice up the story. But those creatures were suspicious. I had checked out their borders but I did not enter their town. I had a strong feeling they were what I was creating now. People, infected with my essence. Perhaps this persisted through multiple lifetimes?

"Are you okay?" she asked me. I then noticed I had been staring at one spot for a while.

"Ah, yes. Where were we?" I smirked at her. She had fulfilled her role for now. The night was still young. Perhaps I could find myself some materials after I was done with her. I gently stroke her cheek and pulled her closer to me. I kissed her red lips and her neck. She was shivering and I... I was so hungry...

The Essence - Ch. 2 : part 1/5

2009-12-19T23:37:00.010+02:00

"This will now be my truth, the source of my being, the container of my very soul, my essence... or what ever remains of it. I will write myself into this book. Let it be the link between the current and beyond...

It all ended when the Gates closed before my eyes, forged with the Seal of Binding, forcing me to the Oblivion which still exists somewhere under. But what was before? What was I? Why did they Seal me? I'll say...

I am the Ancient, the beginning of all things and I shall be the end. And no, I am no God. But I was before there was Time. I was before there was Dimension. I was a thought within the Oblivion. Yet this does not make me a God. Something had created me, call it God or Devil, but it had made me. Along with me it had made another, just as perfect, perhaps even better... I was a He, the other was a She. This is what one should call perfection. The true co-existence. Nothing was missing and nothing was extra. Then the Dimensions were created. Yes, more than one. The Universe was created within each. Planets, stars, solar systems and... life. Along with it came the Time. I still remember how everything started to change with the coming of the Time. We remained untouched, for a while... We named things that came to be, we named the Universes, we named the stars, the planets... She took a liking in one in particular. I still do not know why. We were perfect as it was, but... She had found a planet with water and earth, with air and fire. Life there was short and it enchanted Her.

"Look how everything disappears and new will grow," She told me. I looked and saw death next to life. It even enchanted me for a moment, but not in a way it had enchanted Her. I did not like what I was seeing. The disappearance of things I had just seen being born.

"I want to go there," She said and Her wish was granted. I couldn't possibly leave Her, thus I went along. We were born into bodies on a land we called ours. We saw things disappear with our eyes. Or She saw. I only saw Her and I was glad I had come. Out of everything I had seen, She was even beyond the perfection we had experienced together. I had no regrets and no worries. The time could not touch us. We were there before there was Time.

"There should be more," She said once again, "More life, more beauty, similar to us!"

And once again Her wish came true. Little creatures were created, looking much like us. Hariérs She called them. But Hariérs had never experienced the perfection we had. Their eyes only saw what surrounded them. They saw the trees and they used them for their benefit, ending their already too short lives. They saw the water and drank from it, dirtying it. They felt the air and breathed it, ruining it's course. They found the fire and used it, changing everything. They cracked the ground and built from it, bending it's texture. They hated each other and blood settled on the surface of the earth. I watched in horror as Her tears started to flow. By the time the first tear dropped, Hariérs had already killed many of their kin.

"This has to stop," I told Her and for the first time I felt pain. Her sorrow had touched me. I was desperate and I sinned, showing myself to the Hariérs, telling them their actions were wrong and they had saddened Her. I do not think they understood me, but I understood them. They thought I was the God who had created them and She was their salvation from their sins. I couldn't make them understand the truth. They did not know the Essence. But the wars had stopped and Her tears had cleansed the blood soaked grounds. I took a look towards Her to see Her smile, but it was not there.

"Are you not happy?" I asked Her while She was looking at me with hatred on Her beautiful face. Was I wrong? This was the first time the Sun started to set. The light colored red and everything I saw was red, golden, silver and black.

"Look what you have done!" She said and motioned Her hand for me to look around. The Hariérs who had seen me were now tainted by my essence. I had not considered that they were so much smaller, so much weaker, so impure. My purity and perfection were affecting them, burning their eyes, leaving marks on their body. Yet they did not turn their gaze away from me, thus taking in more of me than they could handle.

“Thou shalt be exiled from the ground,
Thou shalt be forgotten from their mind,
Thou shalt be sealed into the darkness,
Thou shalt perish into the oblivion for ages to come.
Only after millenniums have passed for five hundred times,
Thou shalt regain thy rights for life,
Freed from thy unjust agony,
The seal binding thou from the essence of thine existence,
It shalt be undone.”

...these were the last lines I heard Her say before the ground under me cracked and opened the Gate to the Oblivion. Hariérs were now burning with the flames of my substance, dying, and not even noticing it. And then I fell, through unimaginable depths, losing Her from my sight. The pain was unbearable, it was tearing me apart, cutting me mentally and physically. It was not because I was being sealed or falling trough space with no essence, no. It was not because I was being ripped from my body and because my soul was broken into million pieces, no. It was because She had not realized, that by sealing me She would ultimately seal Herself. One could not exist without the other. This was the law of our perfection. By sealing me She had cut it apart, thus sealing us both. I was torn, knowing our connection was vanishing, knowing She would face the same fate She had appointed on me. With this agony twirling inside me, I watched the Gate starting close before me, severing our bond for eternity. We were now cursed by our never ending life and made unable to withstand the source of it - our beloved Light, we were forced into the darkness, descended to the depths of the ground, where the Gates of Oblivion finally closed shut and separated us into different Dimensions. And with the remains of my own physical self, my blood, the Seal was forged over the Gate. And with parts of my suffering soul, Sealed Away was engraved over it. I was now back in the Oblivion, but I was alone. The perfection was gone. All that remained was the echo of Her last curse and the passing of Time, which I could feel sharper than ever. Never before had Time felt so long. It had always been so short, with all the death. But I could not die, for I was not alive. I swore to myself to wait till I get out. I would then end it all. It would again be just me and Her. Just perfection. There would be no extra..."

Bits of the Past - Ch. 1 : part 5/5

2009-12-18T21:12:00.015+02:00

With another flash of light the memory changed. It had fast forwarded to the day I had reached the forbidden border of Nél-Eliër. I was rushing through the woods on all fours, moving faster than any human being. My pads were sore from all the running and my usually soft and furry coat was dirty and matted, but the book was safely between my jaws, making breathing more difficult. Today was going to be the showdown. The full moon was almost out. I sped up, making a few jumps over the roots and suddenly stopped on a large rock. The air around here was filled with the scent of those fleabags. So they had finally caught up with me. Yes, their black smoke like reek was unmistakable. There had to be at least ten of them. I dropped the book next to the rock, into a bush and took a look around, scanning between the trees and the brushwood. One of them finally showed himself, appearing from between two large oaks. I crooked my back and hissed at him warningly. He was the leader, the cross shaped scar I had given him way back was unmistakable, leaving him blind from his left eye forever. Poor old Bahil, yes, old he was. I had forgotten how quickly living creatures age.

The gray hairball was now closing in on me, accompanied by nine others, as I had assumed. Younger wolves held farther away. Smart little ones, or perhaps just afraid. I hissed once more and yowled, announcing my intentions to fight till the death. They probably knew this already. Old Bahil was not afraid of me, even though the others backed off a bit. He prepared to attack me, I could tell by the way he placed his paws, ready to move to my right, where his blind left eye would not be so much of a bother. As if that would work! I was one step ahead and jumped off the rock, meeting the old geezer in midair, his claws scratching my chest and my fangs closed deep in his neck. Our roaring was deafening. The other shape-shifters had formed a circle around us. They had this honor codex in their pack, leader always fought alone. Good for me, I stood a chance that way. Me and the excuse of a dog fell down, me on top and I was going to keep it that way. Accompanied by some disapproving howling, I used my back legs to scratch Bahil's sides, while with my front legs I violently held him pinned to the ground, not letting go of his neck either. I heard him make some suffocating noises and in his desperate attempt to get me off of him, kicked me in the lungs with his paws. But I could already smell his blood, the black smoke was pretty much oozing out of his sides and his neck, giving me a sample of disgusting taste in my mouth. I had to let go. He tasted so bad I was ready to throw up. However he was still pinned down by my front legs, which looked gigantic on his human form. Old geezer had transformed back. His neck was bleeding rapidly and his sides were rather ripped. He stared at me in pain.

"You will never succeed. I was old, but my brethren are young. Even if you manage to escape, there is more of my kin. We will find you, anywhere!" he coughed up some blood, ruining my perfectly black fur. This stench would never come off! I finished him off by breaking his neck with my yaws. Next thing I knew, I was under a pile of smelly werewolves, all trying to get a bite of me, probably biting each other at the same time. This was bad, I had to get free. Making it to Nél-Eliër safely was out of the question. Making it there in one piece was most unlikely. My only goal was to drop the book over the border. The last thing I needed was for the wolves to have it. I had to make it, at the cost of my life. It did not matter anyways. Nothing mattered besides the Prophecy. I had to succeed it, cursed Eliërs, why did they always have to get in my way! The only thing worse was this PILE on top of me! While thinking that I made a strong push from the ground, somehow shaking off all of the wolves and charged towards the rock, grabbing the book between my jaws again. One of them made a jump, but so did I. He was not big enough and was easy for me to knock off course, making him land hard against one of the two oaks. I thought I heard a few bones crack there. Hah! My joy was short though, as at the same moment the rest of them started to chase me. They were not as slow as I had hoped, but I could see the mountains now! The forest was almost through and the impassable Western alps were right ahead. That was my only way now. To get over the mountains...

Yet another flash of light reminded me it was just a memory and not currently happening, taking me onward in time, one hour and few deeper wounds later...

Finally, I was in the middle of the mountains, jumping from rock to rock, slipping back down as much as I got up. Being ripped by the remaining five wolves. My body would not be able to take much more of this. I turned around and hit the wolf who was trying to bite me with my paw in his face. He fell down a few meters with a whine, but was up the same instant he landed. Persistent bastards. I tried using my claws to climb upward on the slippery rocks. It was still half way to go and the ice was just ahead. There was no way...

Flash of the silvery light shook my consciousness once more. Only three of the wolves remained, severely wounded. I was disabled and they were surrounding me. The book didn't let me breath, most of my bones were broken, my ribs were hurting me, I felt like coughing up blood and on top of everything it was morning already. I could sense the sun coming up any moment. Was this it? I had somehow made it to the top of the mountain, using up my back legs as much as they were now completely unusable. Based on pure will, did I make it up here, but now my physical condition made it impossible to continue. They were going to kill me, just like that. Or let the sun do it. Oh, but I still had the book. I just had to activate the seal. Bloody seals everywhere. Just for once, couldn't I do without? I could feel them eating flesh off of my body. Anything functional about me gave in. I was transformed back to my humanoid form and the book dropped from between my jaws. This was like a wakeup call. My front paws, no my hands were still moving. Before any of the wolves could blink, I grabbed the book and held it tight against my chest. They noticed it and ravished my arms, not that I could feel anything anymore. I was dead. With that I activated the seal on the book. The force it opened with was greater than I had expected. It flew the wolves off the side of the cliffs and me to the other side. I was over the border now, or at least my body was. I could sense it falling downwards. I was not alive, nor conscious, but the will of my mind was still with me, or it was the will of the seal I had released. I felt it sucking out my presence, my being, my essence. I had to keep my sane mind till it was done, I could not afford to lose any of the information. I was going to come back. There was no way they could stop me. I was gonna come here and get the book and.... what book? Why was I resisting so much? Wasn't it easier to just let go..?

"I did not know what was time or dimension and the only proof of my existence were my confusing thoughts..."

Bits of the Past - Ch. 1 : part 4/5

2009-12-17T23:59:00.030+02:00

I took a look outside. From the window in my room the lonely lake next to the Main House stood out nicely, reflecting the stars and the full moon on it's perfectly solid surface. I stood there quietly, looking over the lake, when I noticed something was not right. A figure I had assumed to be the reflection of the moonlight suddenly moved. It appeared to be a person dressed in silvery white and it was now rising it's arms towards the sky. I almost pressed my face against the glass to get a better look. The figure was wearing something dress like, it was flowing in the air even though judging by the solid water and trees, there was no wind outside. Quickly grabbing my coat from the chair, I rushed outside and towards the lake. Nobody was moving. They were probably sleeping. When I finally reached the lake, the figure was still there. I slowed down, sneaking my way towards it from the side of the lake. I noticed the person was not reflected in the water. Getting closer I realized the person was the same girl I had met at the Center Fountain. However she was glowing like moonlight and she was holding her hands up. She seemed really ghostly with her dress and hair flowing like this. I stopped barely in the hearing range from her and hid in the shadows that some rosebushes were casting. She was mumbling in a language I did not know. Then she went quiet and lowered her hands. I waited in silence.

"You can come out now, Stranger" she said suddenly and stopped glowing. Her dress and hair stopped flowing as well.

"How did you notice me?" I asked and came out from the shadows.

"But of course, your presence is as strong as this moonlight," she said and turned around to face me. She looked normal now and was also reflected by the water.

"What did you just do, you were glowing," I asked her and came closer.

"I was greeting the Moon. It may sound weird to you, but not all eliërs have the same likings. I personally like the Moon more than the Sun," she replied and took a look towards the sky. I did the same. The moon really was pretty like this.

"But why did you glow like this? And your hair and dress were flowing in the air while there was no wind," I asked her when I lowered my eyes to face her again.

"This is part of my abilities. Like lady Délyrin is the Ayër of the Healing Touch, lady Cerilyne is the Ayër of the Pure-Blood, I am the Ayër of the Moonlight. For your information there are total of eleven Ayërs," she informed me.

"Eleven? I knew there was ten," I got confused.

"No, eleven, but one is never spoken of."

"Why is that?"

"I suppose I can tell you a few things," she announced and turned her back to me, facing towards the lake. I stood next to her.

"Now you know three Ayërs by name. And you probably have not met the rest. The fourth is lady Emmelin - Ayër of the Land. She specializes in growing things and living creatures. She arranges that our food grows and that our animals get fed and live well. Fifth is lord Draen - Ayër of the Visions. His ability is quite mysterious, but he always seems to know what happens around the town as well as outside of it. In fact he also saw you when lady Délyrin found you, so he was able to inform us before you actually reached here. That is when lady Cerilyne announced your immunity to the usual death-sentence. Sixth is lord Quelon - Ayër of the Knowledge. He is the author of most of the books you find around here and he also owns something known as the Academy. Young eliërs such as myself gain their knowledge of our culture from there. Seventh is lord Caliél - Ayër of the Elements. He is able to control fire, water, air and earth to use them as he sees fit. His ability is mostly used to build houses and such. As you can see we are not at all that normal as you might think," she told me while looking over the water. I listened in silence, thinking there is still so much I do not know about them.

"So, do only Ayërs possess such amazing abilities or can all eliërs do something like this?" I asked.

"Not everyone can do something special, but not only Ayërs either. Ayërs can just do something beneficial. Except for me and lady Cerilyne, but that is another story. Going back to the Ayërs though, the eighth is lady Yali - Ayër of the Insight. Her ability is to see inside people, their thoughts, their intentions, their memories. She scanned you upon your arrival, saying she sees nothing. You really were stripped blank back then. And before you ask, no she can not always see peoples thoughts. She must have eye contact with them," she continued to explain things to me.

"That is one scary ability," I told her, while thinking I really do not want to meet lady Yali.

"All abilities are in one way or other. Either way ninth is lord Euri - Ayër of the Control. His ability is even scarier than all the previous. He is able to take control of a persons mind upon eye contact. But he almost never uses it. He is currently something we here consider a leader. He has exceptional leading powers even without his ability. And tenth is lord Serdan - Ayër of the Protection. He is able to create invisible shields. For an example, he has created one around this entire town, so that nothing can come in or go out without his knowing. Which makes another mystery; he says he never felt you coming through. So there you go, five ladies; Healing Touch, Pure-Blood, Moonlight, Land and Insight. Then five lords; Visions, Knowledge, Elements, Control and Protection."

"What about the eleventh one?"

"The eleventh one is never spoken of. He or she is someone really mysterious and I only know about it's existence because I am an Ayër. Other eliërs are not informed about it."

"You said everyone else has useful powers, except you and lady Cerilyne, right?"

"So I said. What about it?"

"Why are you Ayërs then?"

"Well, about lady Cerilyne it is rather obvious, isn't it? She is the pure-blood. That is all there is to it. About me though... It is fear. They fear my difference, so they've made me into an Ayër. It is easier to keep an eye on me that way. All Ayërs you see, need to live in the palace. Except for lady Cerilyne of course as she is completely harmless and lady Délyrin, who needs the Main House for herself. She uses it for all the people who need her tending services."

"How come you are out here then, and you were in the town before too," I frowned at her. She was still gazing over the lake.
"You are not the only one who wants to escape. I go out at the night of the full moon. They know of it and they have accepted it. But even now their eyes are on me. You as well. They know your every move."

"It was day time when I met you."

"Ah... I felt something out of the ordinary was going to happen, so I just followed my inner feelings. It was pure luck I was not stopped on my way out of the palace. Sneaking back in went just as well. I am thinking, maybe they intentionally let me go out, to see what I would do. I hope I did not disappoint them," she smirked and looked towards me.

"Oh, and they are here. Apparently our meetings are happening too often for them to ignore," she looked behind us. I also turned my head to see a group of people standing behind us. When did they get there? I had heard nothing.

"Lady Eliéfa, care to explain us your constant meetings with the Stranger?" one of them asked. They were all wearing red capes so it was hard to make any difference between them, but this one was male and had long silvery hair coming out from beneath the hood he had over his head. Not all of them had hoods on. One female had short red hair and her marking was under her chin, on her neck. She was looking at me curiously. I suddenly felt her presence trying to get inside me. Like at the day of my "rebirth", when my mind could freely flow, now this persons mind was trying to flow into me. I couldn't let that happen. I tried to push her out, closing my eyes. Her presence vanished.

"Coincidence," I heard the little girl say with no much interest. She walked past me towards the group. I opened my eyes. The red haired woman was now staring at the girl.

"She is being honest. She had no intention of meeting him today," she said. I identified her as the Ayër of the Insight and looked at others, counting them. There was seven, with the little girl counted.

"I see. Very well then. I assume you are done with the Moon ritual, please return to the palace. Lord Serdan, please escort her," the silver haired man said.

"Right away, lord Euri," another man said and placed his arm on the girls shoulder. So this was lord Serdan, the one who made the protective shield around Nél-Eliër. And the silver haired person was lord Euri, the so called leader. I looked down. The last thing I needed was for lord Euri to mind-control me.

"You should return to the Main House, Stranger," lord Euri commanded me.

"I will do so. I merely came to see why was someone glowing out here at this hour," I said, feeling really small. I heard them turning around and leaving so I rose my head and followed their backs with my gaze, till they disappeared from my vision. That was a lot of information to take in at once, I thought, and headed back to the Main House. Everyone was still sleeping and I quietly went to my room. After placing the coat back on the chair I took the book I was reading from my nightstand. For the first time I actually looked at the name of the author. Lord Ayër Quelon stood there in golden text, as expected. I sighed and sat down on my bed, putting together the picture of everything I knew about eliërs. The picture came out like a puzzle, missing a few pieces. Who was the eleventh mysterious Ayër and why didn't even the fellow Ayërs know about this person? Maybe the girl was still too young to know, or they didn't trust her enough? Why even keep someone in the secret like that? Ayër of the.... Whatever. Bah, it could be anything. I lied down, staring at the ceiling. According to my dream, I kind of fell into the forest. How did I get through the protective barrier? Maybe it was only surrounding the town from the sides and I came from above. That would explain the crashing down part. How did I get up there? Battle with the shape-shifters couldn't have taken me into the air, unless wolf-men could fly. Or maybe I could? None of it was making any sense. I placed my hand on my forehead, feeling mentally tired. The granny in my dream had called me weak. Did she mean mentally or physically? Maybe both. How would I get stronger? Would I need to work out? I felt like falling asleep, just to continue that dream, so I closed my eyes. The pictures of the prophecy instantly came to me, accompanied by the whispers of the actual lines. They were as realistic as if someone in my room would have whispered them. Unable to stand it, I opened my eyes again. The old lady had said it was all a dream. A creation of my mind. I should be able to convert those prophecies into the cottage again. While turning over to face the window I closed my eyes again, trying to keep the full moon as last thing in my mind. For a moment a visualized image of the moon was in my head, then it turned red and "Sealed Away" was written over it. I frowned and tried to force the image to turn into a cottage. The Seal started to blur. I focused on the cottage more carefully. After a few minutes of hard mind work, the Seal finally turned into the desired cottage. It was in the middle of nowhere. Imagining the forest around it was much easier. I felt at ease as I imagined the road to lead to the cottage. As soon as I was finished and relaxed my mind, everything I had created started to burn in hot flames. They were hurting me for real. I gasped for air and opened my eyes, realizing I had somehow fallen down from my bed and hurt my left side in the progress. This was what I had thought to be the burning of the flames. I got up again just in time to see my door open.

"Are you okay?" lady Délyrin whispered and her hand holding a candle appeared from the doorway.

"Yes, I am sorry. I fell down from the bed. Did it wake you?" I said and walked towards the door. She was standing there, obviously still sleepy.

"Were you trying to sleep? It is still night, my dear," she told me and yawned.

"Ah, lady Cerilyne gave me..." I started to say "rum for better sleep", then I remembered.

"Never mind, I am fine, really," I said instead and smiled.

"Just what did lady Cerilyne give you then?" she smiled back at me.

"I am not supposed to talk about anything that takes place in her chamber, I am sorry."

"I see, again one of those things. Well it was not just your falling that woke me up. It sounded more like you were in agonizing pain. You were screaming and probably woke up many more than just me."

"What? I must of done that in my sleep..." I didn't sound so sure of myself.

"Must be. Again those....dreams?" she didn't smile.

"Yes, they are getting worse," I admitted.

"Stay awake for now. It seems sleeping during the day is better for you. You stay silent then. Now I recall, you weren't exactly quiet when sleeping at night before either. That is the main reason I allowed your sleeping to take place at the day time."

"Lady Délyrin, do you know anything about the eleventh Ayër?" I suddenly asked her, waiting for yet another response of "no, nothing". She looked me for a long time, then she smiled.

"I do, but it is not a knowledge I can share with you. I am fairly surprised you even know there is the eleventh Ayër."

"I met the little girl at the lake tonight. The one who likes the Moon. She told me quite a bit about Ayërs."

"Did she? Oh well. It is nothing you should worry about. I am rather tired at the moment, so why don't you read a book or do something other than screaming. I will talk to you in the morning if you still have questions," she yawned again.

"Of course. I am sorry for waking you up like this," I said and bowed my head. She smiled at me, then closed the door and walked away. I went back to my bed and picked up the book again. It was called "The regular life of the hariérs" and I did not think there could be anything more boring than this. Excluding actually reading about it. It was then, when the first flashback of my old life came to me. While I was sitting on my bed, disappointed by the book, considering to actually finish reading it. Silver light flashed in front of my eyes and the room was gone. Then I was sitting behind a desk, writing something. It was most certainly a memory, because I could not control anything. I wasn't even thinking about what I was seeing. I was thinking about what I was writing. And my hand was shaking, because it was getting tired. I had written so much already. It was the few final pages of the Book. But everything I had written so far was cut out of the memory. I could only recall what I was currently seeing.

"...where they will be waiting for me. I have made them and should something happen to me, they will know. I left them, saying I will one day return and they must not come out until then. It would be a disaster, should someone see them before the time comes. The Time of the Prophecy is closing and the eliërs are starting to get anxious. As am I. I know they will soon head to re-seal me. I can not let this happen. I must act. I would of taken them with me, but they are still too young, too weak, too...out of control. I wonder if they will still exist once I am back? Not that it makes any difference really. I know! I am going to make this...diary...take my memories, should wolves catch up with me. There is no way anyone can open this, besides me. But even if I die, the book remains. I make sure of it. Hah! I KNOW! I'll take it to THEM. Oh yes, and they will notice the cover. Poor little eliërs. There is no way they will destroy this, once they see the Gates. They will keep it sacred, taking it as some sort of a reminder. Little will they know, by this they will do me a favor. Should the wolves kill me, I will return. I will collect my memories from them and continue where I left off..."

I could then feel the werewolves getting closer. I wrote down...

"They come again!"

...and closed the book, looking up. I had written on a dressing-table and when I rose my eyes, I was looking at myself in the mirror. I looked the same, only with no scars and my eyes were deep silver, with no hint of violet. And I looked serious, coldblooded. I looked to my left, where a woman was lying on a queen-sized bed between the white sheets. The sheets had colored partly red over time. Of course they had, she hadn't stopped bleeding yet. I smirked and said: "Poor fools." The wolves were about to barge into the house, so I grabbed the book and jumped out of the window to my right. I had left it open before on purpose. Third floor was nothing and they came from the door. Useless in their human form. Be blessed moonless night! I landed perfectly on my feet, barely taking any damage and then I ran. I was in a town, but none of the houses was like eliërs had. This was a town of the hariérs. Licking over my lips with my tongue and still feeling the taste of the woman I smiled to myself, and with my current speed I was out of the town already, making the turn towards the forest, leaving the shape-shifters behind. To examine the remains of my food.

Bits of the Past - Ch. 1 : part 3/5

2009-12-10T23:57:00.009+02:00

My dream was like any other I suppose. I did not think it was real nor did it seem real. It seemed like a perfect creation of my own mind till the very end. At first I was in a forest, not a familiar one, just some forest. And there was a road so I started to walk, curious where it would lead me. It did not feel weird or anything, it was a completely natural thing to do. At the end of the road there was a little cottage, also something I had never seen before. I knocked on the small wooden door.
"Yes, please enter. I have been expecting you," an elderly female voice gladly invited me, so I opened the door and let myself in. The cottage was not big, it only had one room. Flames in the fireplace were dancing and the room was warm. An old silver haired lady was sitting in a rug covered arm-chair, petting a black cat on her lap. I did not notice the rest of the room.

"Greetings, honored lady," I said and bowed a bit, not knowing why I would do such a thing.

"Please, sit down," she said and I sat down on a similar looking arm-chair across of her. The cat started to purr.
"It has been long since we last met, or perhaps we never did," she said and I was not confused. In the dreams the making sense part was not relevant.

"I do not remember you, so I doubt we have met," I replied and looked at the cat. The animal was looking back at me with it's golden eyes.

"You like him?" she asked me suddenly and I nodded. The cat then proceeded to jump off of the granny's lap and started to grow. Soon he looked like a black panther.

"Whoa! Big kitty," I said and dropped a bit deeper into the arm-chair.

"No need to be afraid, he will not harm you, for he IS you," the lady said and patted the cat.

"He is me? How can that be?" I asked and looked at the panther which did not resemble me in any way.

"The time will come. This is just a dream. Not everything here has to make sense," she said, laughed a bit and then coughed.

"Are you related to the Prophecy too? Is everything about me related to it?" I just had to ask.

"Oh yes, me, you, this cat, this cottage, this forest and everything you do not yet see. It is all connected to this sacred... No, c u r s e d Prophecy. Everything is. It can change the world," she told me and started scratching the over-sized cat behind it's ear. It was purring so loudly I thought it was roaring.

"Is it something certain? The Prophecy I mean. Or can the future be altered?"

"Future is never certain. The Prophecies are made, considering what might happen if nobody tries to prevent it from happening. Should someone get involved, the future may vary. But it does set a straight perspective of things that need to be dealt with in order to either succeed or fail the prophecy."

"So this Seal thing, what happens if it remains shut after the millenniums pass?"

"Well, nothing if they are lucky. When nothing is changed, nothing will change."

"They? You mean me. I am the one whose life hangs on this tight leash."

"No, you are lucky if the Seal is finally broken. So long have you waited for it, yet you forget so quickly. You melted into the enemy lines and in such haste forgot all about the very essence of your being. Try to remember. The reason of your existence. Was it not this Prophecy? Did you not want it to succeed?"

"What? No...Who are you?"

"I am a dream. A dream is a recreation of your own inner self. Your inner thoughts and experiences. This forest symbolizes the location you remember first, the location where they found you. This cottage symbolizes the comfort you feel while living with them. The fireplace is the threat, the feeling of uneasiness, the part of you which does not trust them. This is what keeps everything alive and warm. Blind trust would be cold, no tickling. I symbolize things you have forgotten. You know they are out there, old memories, but even if you saw them, you could not recognize them. This kitty here symbolizes your abilities - strong, fearsome, beautiful yet dangerous, unknown and mystical."

"So that's all? I am talking to my inner thoughts which have taken a strange physical form? In that case where are the pictures of Seals and people on fire and those feelings....?"

"They are all here. This is your dream. Which you wish to see, you shall. You sought me out now."

"I did? Not knowingly."

"Oh, but you did. Worried about your life, what it all meant. All questions but no one to ask them from, only yourself. So you asked them. And I shall answer."

"So it is me answering myself, how much smarter can it make me?"

"There is so much you do not even know about yourself. Like I said before, I symbolize your forgotten side. It is still here, even if you do not remember it. You may ask me a question now."

"Well, if you know it all, why don't you tell me what happened on the day of my rebirth?"

"I know and I will tell you, but no knowledge comes for free."

"You said I could ask you something and you will answer, you didn't say anything about paying. Why must I pay myself anyways?"

"It is not a price I set. It is what comes with the knowledge. Once I have told you the truth, many things will not seem the same anymore. Your innocence is the price you pay."

"My innocence? If knowing the truth means knowing I did something bad, I was not innocent to begin with, right?"

"I said I would only answer one question tonight. Releasing too much memory at once can be a bad thing. Have you decided on the question now?" I hesitated for a long moment.

"Yes, fine, I will pay the price. Tell me what happened on that day, please."

"Very well. But do not say I did not warn you," the fireplace lashed out a huge flame as she said it. It made me sink deeper into my arm-chair. This place was creepy.

"A tragic miscalculation happened that day. You had just acquired the Book, which like you see, contains some of the most precious history. This Book is something so valuable you can not even imagine it now, but back then you knew it was worth more than your mortal life. Sadly you were not the only one who knew this. There were other's. Some who were not amused by your possession over the Book. It was the shape-shifters, also known as the wolves of the moon, wolf-men and werewolves. They discovered your location and tracked you down, chasing you through half of the world. There was only one ray of hope left for you and it was eliërs. You reached their boarder on the night the shape-shifters caught up with you. As you were then, as you are now, you stood no chance against them. Your weakness caused your fall. By dumb luck though, you crashed into the eliërs forest. Not completely alive, but not yet dead either. Almost no chance of survival. The Book felt it and took your memories, so that everything would not be completely lost. And yet another case of dumb luck presented itself, when eliërs found you in the middle of a deep forest, swinging back and forth between life and beyond. Saved by the enemy from the enemy. It is enemies all around you, my boy. But somehow it all worked out in a way that still benefits us. If you make the right moves now, that is."
I sat in silence for a very long time. I could not decide which question I should ask first.
"There is so much more I need to know. I do not know where to start," I finally said.

"You have the time to think about it. Till we meet again."

"When is that?"

"Next time you sleep, perhaps. But do wisely and do not mention this dream to eliërs. They would likely reconsider your right to live next to them."

"I will be back. I need to know much more. So much more."

And I woke up. I was wide awake just like that, in my room, and it was night time. Again or already. I surely fell asleep while it was night. While wondering about that, I got up and looked outside. The moon was full and glowing. Somewhere very far away a lonely wolf made its howl. Either in my head or in the night, it echoed.

Bits of the Past - Ch. 1 : part 2/5

2009-12-03T11:14:00.024+02:00

The book was lying innocently on the floor, closed. Some smoke was coming from underneath it with a matching hissing sound, as it's suddenly hot covers started to burn the wooden floor. Lady Cerilyne's sobs finally caught my attention. I saw the anguish in her eyes while she was looking at her hands. They were burnt pretty badly, partially flaking skin and painfully red. I didn't know what to do.

"I'll call lady Délyrin!" I told her after a few seconds and ran towards the door.

"NO!" she shouted and it nailed me on the spot.

"No? But your hands?" I was confused, did she really expect me to be able to do something useful in this situation? I heard her take a deep breath and the sobs stopped.

"I will go by myself. Stay here until I am back. No one must hear about this book," she told me strictly and walked past me towards the door. I quickly opened it for her and stared after her as she walked down the hall, still keeping her dignity even while holding her hands out in front of her.

With this my second deeper meeting with lady Cerilyne had ended. When she returned, her hands had been tightly covered with bandages and she instantly ordered me out of her room, only adding that everything that happened that day in this room had to remain in the same room. And it did. I never spoke of it again, not even when lady Délyrin continuously asked and pleaded me. Lady Cerilyne's wounds quickly healed under the care of lady Délyrin, but ever since she would wear a pair of black silken gloves and was never seen barehanded again. I didn't have the guts to ask anything from her. Not even about the fate of the book.

The rest of my days and nights passed monotonously. I helped lady Délyrin with nursing some of the minor accidents and managed to learn a few things in the progress. On one of those regular days I accidentally overheard a conversation that took place between lady Cerilyne and one of the patients. I identified the patient as the male person who was at my "rebirth" - or so I called the day they found me - with lady Délyrin. He was well built and had a bit darker skin than the rest of the people I had met. His black hair was long and he kept it in a messy ponytail. His clothing usually consisted of simple linen pants and a sleeveless shirt, which clearly revealed his marking all over his right arm. That day he had somehow sprained his foot and by coincidence it was I who had to check it out.

"The Seal is leaking. It is soon time," I heard him say and pulled my hand back from the door knob. I took a few steps back but couldn't make myself to leave. He had mentioned the Seal. Of course it could have been something else but I just had to hear the rest of it.

"What is his connection to all this?" replied lady Cerilyne's worried voice in a tone which suggested she was more-less talking to herself, not to the man.

"He had the book, Cerilyne. I told you, we shouldn't have let him live. The strong will of the Ancient will destroy us all!" said the man, sounding displeased. I couldn't hear what lady Cerilyne replied to him. I was too busy trying to get the adrenaline out of my head. I could almost hear my blood starting to boil.

"Listen, Ceri, We mustn't let the Seal break. We mustn't. Kill the boy if we must. Do it now and there is still hope," the man continued to persuade lady Cerilyne into killing me. I felt my heart beating in my chest, almost trying to get out. It was so loud, I was sure it was going to betray me.

"This is too much... Why must it come to this? There must be some..." lady Cerilyne did not sound insuring at all.

"No! There is no other way! Nor is there time to find one. We must act. It has been long enough!" he shouted and the sound of a punch against the wall made me jump. Some dust fell from the ceiling where I was standing. This man was insanely strong.

"Now, Ceri. Now."

"But I..."

"Now." he repeated and my fate was settled. I could feel my legs again and my head seemed to be crystal clear, telling me only one thing - run for your life. So I did, not bothering to apologize when I almost knocked over lady Délyrin on my way out of the house. I continued to run down the road, not knowing where it would lead me. Never had I gotten this far away from the Main House and the small lake next to it. The road went straight through the town, splitting into multiple smaller ones in the center. I had to decide on one so I took a look around myself. It had to be daytime because people were active and giving me strange looks, whispering, going around to get past me. What did they know? Who did they take me as? The difference between us had never been so obvious.

"Lost?" a girl's voice asked behind me. I turned around to see a small girl sitting on the edge of the Center Fountain. The sculpture on the fountain was unmistakably lady Délyrin's not too successful copy, holding a vase from which the water was gushing out. The girl however looked nothing like the rest of the people. She did not seem afraid of me nor much interested. Actually she seemed rather busy feeding the fish in the fountain.

"Er, not really. Well... maybe a little," I answered her, unsure whether I should ask for directions or just pick my way randomly.

"You want to get out, right?" she took one look at me and then continued to crumble the white bread into the water.

"Is it that obvious?" I asked her, wondering if I looked nervous.

"No, not really. You were running and came to a stop here, looking around. I have never seen you here before so I assumed you were the Stranger. What else would a stranger want, but to get out. You can not leave though," she told me and dropped the last bits into the water. I watched the fish eat all of it.

"Why not? I am not one of you... I could..." I started to think of an acceptable excuse to make her tell me which way was the gate. There had to be a gate.

"You can leave the same way you came in. Unnoticed. But you've already made it impossible now," she got up and looked at me more seriously than I had expected a kid to be able to.

"Who are you?" I asked her after a few moments of silence and looked at her once again. Her marking was small and on her left cheek and her hair was curly golden.

"Me? Just some kid you ran into while trying to escape. Like mentioned before, you can not do so. Everyone has their eyes on you now," she told me and motioned with her hand for me to look around. She was right, every single person had stopped their activities just to glare at me and whisper with their neighbor.

"So, am I supposed to sit still and let them kill me?" I asked her while still looking around me. Anger was getting to me.

"Technically you would be dead anyways if it wasn't for them. You could call it - returning the gift," I looked at her in disbelief. She did not look at me, though something behind me seemed to interest her.

"Gifts are not supposed to be retur...," I said and looked behind me. Lady Cerilyne did not seem any happier than I was. For some reason she still managed to make me feel bad for running away like this and for overhearing their conversation. I looked down.

"Well, well. Running amok, are we? Where did you think you could go? Hide in the forest?" she asked me with a sigh.

"I don't want to die."

"Oh, is that so? The forest is full of deadly creatures, so why would you go there?"

"I overheard you talking with..."

"Rhane, yes. Did we not teach you it is impolite to listen to other peoples conversations? Either way this is not the place to discuss this. Follow me back to the Main House now," she said and turned around in her usual way, without even waiting for me to confirm or decline. I looked around to see the girl again, but she was gone. Not knowing anything better to do, I followed lady Cerilyne in silence, not looking around me. I could still hear them whisper. They weren't going to kill me? She did not sound like that was the plan. Perhaps, just perhaps it was some other boy. Some other Seal...

"Sit down," she ordered me as soon as I was in her room. It looked the same as usual, only a new rug covered the spot where the book had been dropped. I sat on the chair closest to the window, the same as before.

"I am not going to take your life," she announced and a sigh of relief escaped my mouth.

"Not yet at least," she added to that and sat down as well. "Tea?"

"What was all this about? What have I done? Why do you even want to kill me? What is all this about the Seal?" I asked her in one breath and tried to catch her glance. She was busy pouring herself and me some tea.

"Hmm, well you should have been able to guess some part of it by now. There is a Seal, obviously Sealing something and it is somehow connected to you. The Seal is leaking and it is very important to keep it shut," still she did not meet my eyes and pushed a cup of tea towards me.

"But why do you think I am connected to it? Because I could open some stupid book? Fine, maybe I have mystical powers or something but still, that does not connect me to that Seal thing!" I did not turn my gaze from her face.

"Actually it does," she said and finally looked me in the eye, in her full seriousness. "I have investigated the book a bit more and discovered a few things. For instance, the existence of this book alone means tight connection with the Seal, and confirms it's leaking. And well, it was found in your arms. You were protecting it. With your life I may say."

"Assuming I do have something to do with all this, what would my death solve? You would just lose the only person who is actually able to read this book."

"Quite correct. Which is why you are still alive. Until it has been proven that your death is a necessity, I will not execute it. And I would indeed like to know more about the contents of this book," she replied me and took a sip of her tea. I took a sip of mine while progressing the new information in my head.

"What am I?" I asked silently.

"What? No, you are still a person, alive one too. Who are you is the correct question. And I do not know. Possibly some foreign race, which we do not know. Or a new one. Mutation perhaps. Or some sort of a visualized trick of the Seal. Unlikely, but it is a possibility. You see now why it is so important to keep the Seal shut? Things start happening. Weird things. Most likely bad things. You know, Seals are there for a reason."

"What is it Sealing? Or.....who?"

"It is the Seal of the Ancients. I am afraid I can not tell you more than this. For your own safety too, in case your ability to read the book is indeed some special power and not in direct connection with the leaking of the Seal."

"Ancients? Who are they?" I was very curious to know everything now. Now that it actually seemed connected to me. Or was made to be connected to me.

"You read it yourself. Don't you remember? They are the firstborn. Rumored to be the beginning of all things as well as the end. It is the end we fear, should they be released. Which reminds me of one more thing... The words of Prophecy you have been whispering in your sleep. Yes, I am well aware of that, do not give me this look. The reason why Rhane was so angry lies right there. He knows there is no time, according to that prophecy at least. Five hundred millenniums from the Sealing are about to end now. Eliërs can feel it. Maybe hariérs too, I do not know. Can you feel it? You have to pay attention. The feeling of the next day will differ from the previous if you have lived long enough to realize it." she spoke to me like to an equal, or so it felt.

"I haven't noticed, but now that you mention it... I do get strange feelings of uneasiness sometimes. I thought it was because of my memory loss. That said, do you think I could take another look at that book now? Maybe it has some more information, like how to fix the Seal. Where is the Seal located at anyways?" I finished my tea and had pretty much forgotten they had wanted to take my life.

"About the location of the Seal, I can not tell you. Even if I knew I couldn't. This is just something....well let's say it is not exactly information available for everyone. And about reading the book, it is a bit more complicated than just reading in a foreign language. You saw what happened last time. If it had been you holding this book, am I wrong to assume, you would not have stopped reading? I could tell by looking at your face. This book takes you to another world. Another dimension perhaps. We need a secure method to prevent that. Who knows what might happen. It might even be a sort of a Seal on it's own. Sealing you, should you read too much of it." she poured me some more tea. Her own cup was still filled with her previous tea. I started to feel a little dizzy.

"Just what exactly is in this tea?" I asked her, monitoring her movements with suspicion. She looked at me.

"It relaxes you. How would I know that you do not freak out again?"

"I didn't freak... You would run too if someone wanted to kill you for no good reason. Probably even if they had a good reason."

"Drink it now. It does not kill you, if that's what you are worried about. If you are lucky you get a nighttime sleep without a prophecy." That convinced me into drinking more tea. The visions had become more unpleasant since I had read the book. The words of prophecy were now illustrated with sceneries from the book.

"When exactly does this five millenniums come to an end?" I asked her and felt even more dizzy.

"Soon, real soon. It is impossible to tell exactly when, because there was no calendar system back at the time. Sometime in the next decade, that much is sure."

"And how are eliërs connected to this? Wouldn't it be easier to let someone else do the dirty work? Find the Seal and fix it?"

"Who else is there? Hariérs? They do not have enough care. Even if they did, they would just assume it was our job anyways. Highborn, you see, seemingly good for nothing and then there comes a moment to prove one's worth. Or your kind? We don't even know if there is anyone else like you. Can't leave things like this for someone else or the chance." Lady Cerilyne seemed a little bit odd to me and I was getting dizzier myself. The cup before me was empty once again.

"What e x a c t l y is in this tea?" I asked her once more and sniffed my cup. It smelled like tea.

"Rum," she finally told me.

"Rum? You mean like, alcohol?"

"How many other kind of rums do you know? I figured you could use it. Myself too. Sometimes being sober is just too much for one day."

"Do you drink often, lady Cerilyne?" I asked her.

"Me? Occasionally. I can't drink too much. The position I'm on requires me to be sober most of the time. I do drink from time to time though, like now, when being drunk actually eases things." she replied and drank her cup to the bottom.

"I think I've had enough. I am feeling dizzy," I told her and refused her attempt to pour me some more.

"As you wish, I'll have some more though. Anyways, let's get back to the point. You can not leave here. It is impossible. To the north there is the sea and unless you are prepared to sail on a self made boat for weeks, maybe months, I would not suggest trying. To the west there are mountains. Impossible to cross. They are steep and snowy. More like icy. Just impossible. Feel free to try if you do not believe me. Then to the east is the Dead Desert and the name does not lie. It is probably as big as the sea itself. Place of a few great battles. It is not the sand desert you have seen in the picture books here, no. It is simply a dead land. Nothing but ashes and remains of burnt corpses, maybe some metal pieces of armors. Devastating. I can tell you more about the battles that took place there another time. And to the south there is a built wall that separates us from the rest of the world. Actually hariérs are not far away from there. However the wall is guarded by us on this side and by hariérs on the other side. That way we make sure outsiders do not get in and unauthorized people do not get out of here. And yes, that means you. Unless you find a way to regenerate in seconds or develop strength of a thousand men, again, I do not suggest trying. You are to remain here, under our eyes. And if needed, yes we will kill you. But only if it is most certain killing you will change the flow of things." I was too dizzy to perfectly understand everything but I got the main point. I was not going to leave. Not so soon at least. And it was most important to do something about this Seal.

"I should lie down. I am feeling strange," I told her and tried to stop my head from spinning. I failed miserably.

"True that. Well, you may go, but remember - no escaping attempts and no telling others about anything that has been discussed in this room. That includes the rum. I do not want any strange rumors to spread, clear?"

"Ma'am, yes ma'am!" I said and got up. The room was spinning for a moment. Somehow I made it back to my room, leaving lady Cerilyne to pour herself another cup of rum-tea. She was right though, it did help my sleep. It was not completely prophecy free, but it lacked the disturbing visual pictures. Instead I had my very first dream - or so I thought...

Bits of the Past - Ch. 1 : part 1/5

2009-11-26T23:56:00.025+02:00

I haven't looked back to that day ever since even though the gaps from my past tend to affect my present. My healing remained a mystery to myself and to the eliërs who were participating in my remedial. Nobody has told me what happened, nor have I shown much interest about the case. It was enough for me to know that my arms and legs were repaired to perfection, though as far as I understood, they pretty much regenerated on their own. Deep scars all over my body still remained for an eternal reminder.

When I was strong enough to learn to walk again, lady Cerilyne entered my room. This was my first encounter with a pure-blood eliër and she was also unique amongst her kind. Even though she was young, probably even younger than me, she appeared to be a really strict woman.

"I see you have healed rather well," she said to me haughtily and I didn't mind. After all she was an Ayër, most distinguished amongst all eliërs. With a year I had spent there I had managed to learn most of their traditions and culture, although they would never accept as one of them. Eliërs were the highborn, born to be hariérs but with a special tattoo-like marking which instantly gave them the title of a highborn. The symbolizing tattoo could be found anywhere on the body and it was never alike to another eliër's marking. A birth of a highborn itself was a rare sight which occurred maybe once every few years. The highborn infants were taken from their rightful parents and were brought to this special, isolated town of Nél-Eliër, in which I lived now, as an unwelcome guest because only eliërs had the permission to be and live here. No hariér or other stranger had ever stepped on this sacred ground until I showed up. It is most likely that I would have been executed on spot if lady Cerilyne hadn't spoken up. She had said I was no hariér and thus technically not in the "Forbidden" list. This was the only thing about me that everyone seemed to be certain about - I was no hariér nor eliër. What I was, no one seemed to know.

"Yes, my lady. I am ever so honored to have you visit me like this," I replied quickly and did something on my crutches that was supposed to resemble a humble bowing. Lady Cerilyne seemed to approve of it. She was a beautiful woman with straight and long black hair and her eyes were always glowing redly like the setting sun, which was giving me the creeps. Whenever I had the luck to run into her, I never saw her smiling or even smirking. That applied to all Ayërs really, except lady Délyrin of course who was always shining like the full moon. There was a total of ten Ayërs and around a few hundred of eliërs. The title of Ayër meant a special eliër - example lady Cerilyne was the only existing descendant of eliërs who was also an eliër. Usually the babies born between two eliërs were not highborn and were sent out of the town to be adopted by hariérs, usually by a couple who had to give up their highborn baby before. I did not seem to understand the real difference between hariérs and eliërs, except that eliërs had tattoos.

"I hope that you are soon fully recovered. I wish to meet you in private," she announced importantly and probably did not expect any response because she turned right around and with her red-golden silken dress gracefully flowing after her, walked out of the door. I bowed again on my crutches when she was leaving and tried to guess where her marking was. All other eliërs were wearing clothes that revealed their tattoo. It was very honorable amongst this small community. Lady Délyrin's tattoo was on her forehead and thus the most noticeable. She was an Ayër thanks to her exceptional healing abilities. Overall I liked her the most as she seemed to be the only one who wasn't bothered by my questionable intentions or race.

The rest of my contacts with lady Cerilyne were limited to bowing as she passed me. My recovery on the other hand was much more advanced. Learning how to walk again was tough but not as complicated as I had feared it would be. Only after a few weeks from my first meeting with lady Cerilyne, I could walk on my own again.

I still had no clue about time but I had gotten pretty used to the dimension. Time for me was the few moments it took lady Délyrin to replace my bandages or this long period between two meals. Sleep seemed as inevitable and annoying obligation. It was empty and usually disturbing time filled with whispers of the prophecy. I only slept when lady Délyrin asked me to. I didn't feel any need for it. I also made no difference between night and day, even though lady Délyrin spent long time trying to make me understand; it was bright and sunny during the day and dark during the night. Only after some wasted time had passed she realized my vision was limited to black, silver, golden, red and various tones between them and that I was not able to separate darkness from daylight. I saw everything the same, no matter was it night or day. So the green grass remained as it was - a dark surface covering the earth and blue sky was endless black ceiling, in which the stars were glittering and sometimes the moon. Finally I got my chronology fixed by the annoying golden celestial body on the firmament, calculating from the moment it was setting in reddish tones.

The Sun was the most beloved heavenly body for the eliërs but I couldn't stand it. It was probably one of the reasons I could never be like them and also the reason why all my activities took place during the night. Lady Délyrin had to give up, even though she did not back out from her demand that I would sleep. At least I could do it during the day now.

Once I was fully functional, or so lady Délyrin told me, it was finally the time to meet lady Cerilyne. In some ways I had been waiting for it. Waiting, that she has some answers for my endless questions or knows something about the prophecy that has been haunting me. I had once attempted to ask about it from lady Délyrin but she strictly told me to never mention it again. She wasn't smiling.

"I think you are ready to go," said lady Délyrin and gave the last touch to my sleeves. She had especially arranged those clothes to be made for me, saying I needed to look imposing.

"Would you like to see?" she asked me and pointed at the covered mirror at the other side of the room. I very much wanted to see. Lady Délyrin had forbidden mirrors for me till today, saying I did not need to see my wounds and she would prefer if my first impression of myself would be good. Indeed, I still had no clue what I looked like. I gave the mirror a hesitating look before walking over there and pulling off the cover with one quick movement.

I was a dark haired young man whose almost transparent pale face reflected amazement. My hair contained some golden tufts or more like shades. The amazement on my face however wasn't related to my looks but my eyes. They weren't any color I knew before and when I asked lady Délyrin about it, she told me it was called a violet shade. Looking up closer I noticed a more silvery color dominating over the violet shade.

"So how is it?" she asked with curiosity, burning to know whether or not I liked myself. With some difficulties I pulled my gaze away from the new color and continued to investigate the rest of my appearance. The long sleeves of my velvet coat nicely covered all of the scars on my arms. But even lady Délyrins skilled hands and cure had not managed to remove two big scars on my face. One of them started on the right side of my forehead and ran down a little diagonally over my eyebrow and eye. The second one was smaller and ran over the right side of my mouth half way down to my chin.

"Quite scarred I know. They will get better in time," she comforted me needlessly while I was looking at them. I did not have any understanding of the scars as of something ugly and overall impression of myself was - just a normal person. I could not find anything to compliment or disparage, although I did like the color of my eyes. It was different from what I was used to.

"I have pretty eyes," I told her honestly, not understanding it could sound strange. Lady Délyrin giggled and nodded.

"Let's go now. You may not be late," she ordered me with a friendly tone and pulled my sleeve. I walked with her unwillingly, staring towards the mirror over my shoulder as long as my neck was willing to put up with it and until the door jamb blocked my view.

"Close the door," were the first words lady Cerilyne blessed me with as I had entered her chamber, because that's where she had invited me today. I closed the door obediently and tried not to look around her luxurious room too much. I couldn't fail to notice her dressing table and much more comfortable bed than mine.

"Sit," was her second order and she pointed towards a small tea-table and two chairs next to the window. According to my calculations it was currently nighttime. I proceeded to obey to her commands and sat down on the chair closest to the window. Lady Cerilyne seemed nervous and was stamping on the same spot. I observed her in silence. Finally she let out a sigh and turned towards me. Her face was more serious than usually.

"We need to talk," she declared. I had figured that out long time ago and continued to look at her, waiting for her to go on.

"When you were found, you had this," she said and threw something onto the table next to me with an elegant hand movement. It was a book with metallic covers and the tea-set clattered dangerously as the book landed onto the table. I turned to look at the book and it did not seem familiar in any way.

"Oh," was the smartest thing I could come up with. Lady Cerilyne was not impressed.

"What do you remember or know about it? Go on, open it," she told me when I continued to stare at the book expressionlessly. I did as she said and only then did I realize it was a trick-question. The book opened itself as soon as my fingers barely touched it. It made me flinch and I pulled my hand back. Many questions echoed on my face as I looked away from the book and met the lady's gaze. Her face betrayed nothing but I could still understand that she was not able to open this book. Long and embarrassing silence followed. Finally she walked to the table and picked up the opened book, turning it's pages.

"Can you understand this language?" she asked and gave me a strict look over the edge of the book. I got up and stood next to her to look at the text.

"Yes," I admitted. I understood it was not the same language we used to communicate even though I had never read any of the books there.

"Read it loud," she ordered me around and I proceeded to read from that same random page she had opened. My voice sounded distant and unfamiliar even to myself.

"It was not hariérs that first came to be but something far more perfect, something amazingly beautiful and destructively powerful.
The two of them were to exist before time or dimension and thus destined to live forever. Their purity knew no boundaries and their existence was graceful - until the hariérs finally started to populate the land.
Hariérs were similar to the perfect form but much viler and less glorious. They were not a fair match to the two Ancients, whose powers outbalanced them greatly and thus the Ancients were sealed away.
Cursed by their never ending life and made unable to withstand the source of it - their beloved Light, they were forced into the darkness, descended to the depths of the ground..."

Lady Cerilyne's scream would not have disturbed my reading if she hadn't dropped the book in the process. I was pulled back to reality from my trans, leaving me stunned for a moment. I had seen the history happening in front of my very eyes while I was reading, as if it had been happening right now. I had seen the Oblivion but now I could not recall what it had looked like. Oblivion was followed by the Ancients. I only saw one of them - the female. Most beautiful amongst all ladies my eyes had ever seen, for real or imaginary. It only took her appearance to completely blank me out. Without any need for words, I would have done anything for her. I still felt the power she had been emitting and it awakened the feeling of utter respect in me. I had never felt like this before, not even towards lady Cerilyne. This was also the most perfect memory of this vision and the rest only came to me blurred. Hariérs who were taking over the lands and cutting down the forests. Hariérs who were building kingdoms and destroying other's. Great wars. Flames and smoke that was even fading out the Sun. The Ancients did not like this and thus they got involved with hariérs life. It was forbidden. They came into the open, revealing their greatness and hariérs took them as Gods. This was the greatest desecration because the Ancients were not Gods and their purity became tainted. The rest of the story was shattered like broken glass and it was difficult to put the pieces together. A picture of the ground breaking into two and the next picture of people in flames, who did not seem disturbed by the heat. A feeling of falling through unimaginable depths. Regret and pain for someone else. This last feeling had been so strong that I could not even imagine it now. Last picture I saw before lady Cerilyne screamed was devastating. I saw how doors designed by the covers of this very book closed before me, blocking the light. At the line where the doors met, a seal had appeared which I knew to be made of my own blood. It felt like I was being ripped apart. I couldn't remember anymore but either with golden or silver two words were engraved over it - Sealed Away.

My Revival (Prologue)

2009-11-19T12:29:00.048+02:00

I did not know what was time or dimension and the only proof of my existence were my confusing thoughts. They were untraceable, indecipherable, insensible moving pictures of someones experiences and memories. Forgotten, lost in the past and seemingly unimportant although they had certainly meant something once. Long time ago those thoughts and memories formed my very nature, now it was nothing but a distant reminder of what I once was. I watched without much interest as my very self slowly faded before me and finally completely disappeared. Did I still exist? Was I dead? What even happened? The sudden interest for my fate surprised even me. Someones shriek that would have sent chills down my spine if I still had one and the sound of something being dropped onto the soft ground distracted my thoughts. I was amazed as I realized it was not a creation of my own mind and I focused on this outer disturbance more carefully.

"Whaaaaaa..Wha...What...." stuttered a woman's frightened voice somewhere near me and squelching footsteps on the damp moss were coming closer.

"Lady Délyrin! What happened? Did you see a snake?" man's footsteps stopped next to the woman.

"What IS that?" he said with dismay echoing in his voice. I used my thoughts to explore the area around my physical self. I found nothing but damp ground and a couple of roots. The surroundings declared very clearly that I was the cause of their bewilderment and I proceeded to examine my visual shell. As soon as I had directed my thoughts to it I was locked in, unable to ever leave again. But what I sensed made me want to scream like the lady before. My body was barely alive and mostly covered with clotted blood-crust, my hands were ripped apart till my flesh as if some really angry eagle had been ravishing them for hours. Clothes I was wearing were shred to pieces and both of my leg-bones were not just broken but pretty much reduced to powder. I felt something warm dripping down my cheek and determined it's source on top of my head. Even though my head and face were tightly infested with various wounds, it seemed my skull was still more-less fine. The rest of my body was heavily bruised and some more bones were either cracked or broken. On my chest I felt something more. It was hard and cold and my chopped arms were clinging to it. Understanding all this took me merely one tenth of a second and I had just finished feeling myself when my rediscovered consciousness started to fade again.

"Look at his clothes. He is an outsider," the male voice sounded from somewhere far away.

"He is fully covered with blood. We can not be sure unless we actually see him," demanded the female voice. This conversation which started from nowhere was also the last thing I heard before my sensitivity left me again.

Those lines must have been echoing in my empty head for years. They became the only thing I knew about myself, knew about anything. Without noticing, the words of prophecy had slipped through my whispering lips on too many nights. Their meaning was unknown to me and at the same time forged deep into my heart. I only knew one thing - this was now the very purpose of my being.

I was finally capable of feeling my body more accurately and instantly regretted it. I woke up screaming in pain when I realized there wasn't an undamaged spot on my soul-container and every inch of it was hurting sharply.

"Easy! EASY!" a male voice commanded and forced me down to the bed from my shoulders. The pain was agonizing and I could barely breathe. It had also robbed my eyesight. I pressed my teeth together not to start screaming again. A few moments later a really sweet scent of flowers reached my nose and I focused on it, trying to get away from my pains. It worked or at least I felt my body less again. The pain left me overtime, leaving only a dull ache. I dared to open my eyes and while wholeheartedly wishing the blindness wasn't permanent, I took a look around.

As I had managed to confirm before, I was lying in bed. The room itself was rather small and only had one window to my left. It was dark outside and from my position I couldn't see anything. The walls and the ceiling were built of logs, to the floor my eyes couldn't reach. This visual limit started to bother me but I wasn't given the chance to wonder about it.

"How are you feeling? Can you talk?" a female voice asked me and her friendly face appeared into my view. Her golden hair was set into a correct plait and decorated with freshly picked flowers. It seemed to me, it was those flowers that were emitting this too sweet scent, so gladly dulling my pain. The lady's forehead had a strange marking drawn to it. I couldn't appoint any meaning to it.

"Would you like something to drink?" she continued to investigate my needs and abilities, even though I had not responded to her previous questions. I nodded automatically, while not really feeling any special thirst. I more heard than saw how she took the water-jug from the nightstand next to me and poured some into the glass. Without any warning someones strong hands lifted my chest. Tormenting pain rushed through my lungs and I started to choke. I wanted to rise my hand to cover my mouth but I was unable to do so. Actually I wasn't even able to guess their approximate location. Did I still have them?

"Careful!" admonished the woman and glared at the man. I noticed drops of blood on my sheets, dripping from my mouth. Now I could also feel it's sour taste in my throat. The woman had placed the glass back on the nightstand and was now wiping my chin and lips with a towel. I swallowed the blood in my mouth. It was burning my throat and I was now ardently waiting for this glassful of water. When the glass finally touched my lips and it's room-warm water filled my mouth, I realized, it was not at all what I had expected to be drinking. But I did not complain, because the exhaustion overpowered me once again and the water had wiped away the stinging feeling from my throat.

"Rest. You will need a lot of it," suggested the woman and I did as she said. As soon as I had closed my eyes I fell into a deep dreamless sleep. It was the first and also the last time my unconscious being passed without the creepy prophecy.