Disclaimer: I own the concept of Ashtangi and Shanti, and anything related to them. I also own Seth and Arthur and anyone I
didn't mention that is new in these chapters. AND PLEASE GIVE ME CREDIT IF YOU USE SOMETHING OF MINE LADY PANTHER!!!


Book II - Shanti
Chapter I -

The Voices From the Walls Are Inside My Mind



There were whispers of disease and decay fluttering about the room, although no one could hear them.
A brief flash of lightning and its accompanied thunder shook the windows and rattled the floor. The instantaneous burst of
lighting gave the one who needed it a quick glance at everything that lay before him.
Great. Just don't trip and fall on your face this time.
Dais wandered around the room, getting his feel of it. He hated not having good nocturnal vision, like Cale had.
Maybe he could wake him up and ask for help.
And get laughed at? Never!
'I can make this,' he thought.
His leg brushed the couch closest to the window. It was irritating having to stumble around, looking for a light
switch. And this was getting him nowhere. Now, if he could just make it to the kitchen. Dais knew his way around the kitchen.
As the lightning danced across the sky, it illuminated the room again. He was mere inches from a coffee table.
He could've fallen right then and there. Good thing he didn't. Dais nodded to himself and proceeded onward, groping his way
to the kitchen. He was almost there, when...
"AARGH!!"
Thump!
Dais landed right on his face. How embarrassing. And just a few more feet and he would've been in the kitchen.
Sekhmet chuckled behind him. He had good nocturnal vision. So why didn't Dais? It wasn't fair.
"So, you tried yet again to make it to the kitchen, Spider-chan?"
Dais grumbled into the carpet. "Shut up before I rip thy head off, Snake-boy!"
Sekhmet chuckled again before returning to his room. He and the other ex-Warlords all shared the same house.
It wasn't as bad as it seemed. Dais decided that this journey, this challenge that lay before him could wait another day.
He didn't want to wake up in the morning with rug burn on his face.

The next day, the sun was shining bright and early through the window, illustrating lively the spot on the carpet
where one of their own took a fall that night. It was quite obvious, much to Dais' dismay.
"What in heaven's name is that?" Anubis griped.
There was a rather large space in the floor where the carpet had been forced forward, leaving a wide but short
trail in the Berber.
"Well, I saw...MMF!!" Sekhmet was cut off by Dais' hand smacking him in the face. That was evidence enough as to
whom had created the indentation in the carpeting.
"So, Spider made the skid! Nice going, Graceful!!" Cale laughed aloud.
Dais cursed under his breath and hauled himself to the kitchen.

Rowen paced about the living room in Mia's mansion, almost long enough to create a trail
of worn floorboard in the carpet. Ryo huffed, his mind drawing a blank. It was one day after
Yuli and Sage's disappearance, and no one could figure out what happened and where those
two went. Rowen stood straight, snapping his fingers.
"Hey, guys. We could go back over to the church! Maybe Arthur'll tell us something
now. I mean, he was all weird last time...maybe he's in the mood to talk more."
Sai came in from the kitchen holding a pot in his hand. He happened to overhear the
discussion and nodded. "Sounds good to me," he said, "but let's all eat breakfast first,
shall we?"
Kento grinned as wide as a Cheshire cat and bounded into the kitchen.

Sage all but giggled as he poked Arthur's petrified body with his long, elegant finger. Arthur didn't move,
but the poking was entertainment enough for him. Sage smiled and kept poking as Yuli, his little puppet, sat in a corner
like he was instructed.
All was going according to plan.

Cale grumbled to himself as he trudged past the last bookcase of the public library. He hated libraries...
and he hated books. Reading was satisfactory every once in a while, but Anubis...He couldn't figure out how the red-head's
eyes stayed in their sockets. Dais stood nearby with a book on, of course, spiders. He smiled as he flipped through
the glossy pages like a child. Cale rolled his eyes and found a subtle corner,
untouched by the presence of others. He sighed happily and sat down in the only chair available in his
secluded spot. He cushioned his head in his tanned arms, smiling as he closed his eyes. Anubis
sat, with his black reading glasses on, at a wooden table near a window. All the ex-Warlords
were on the second floor of the public library.
Anubis smiled and scribbled down more notes for his project on ancient history for the university.
Now that he was freed from Talpa's control and the Dynasty was well taken care of by Kayura, he had more important
matters to attend to. Teaching young children about the past was what seemed to him as a calling.
An over-dramatized grunt made him look up from his notes and glare at the green-headed
ex-Warlord in front of him. Sekhmet grinned happily at the other's annoyance and decided to feast
upon it to the fullest.
A deep bass voice greeted him with fangs and hooded eyes. "I found you something for your report."
Sekhmet proudly dropped what seemed to be the New York phone directory in front of his face.
Sekhmet beamed at his accomplishment and made it a mission to bother everyone else on this little 'outing'.
He trudged off in search of more victims.
Anubis rolled his eyes and stared in awe at the large, crimson leather-bound book
on his table. In his workspace.
'How Sekhmet finds these things...' Anubis rubbed his nose as he took off the reading
glasses. 'Nevermind that. Sekhmet is just Sekhmet. Leave it at that...'
Cale felt his heart flutter and blinked his eyes open. He stared straight into
large, beady eyes. They blinked at him, and Cale knew who this was.
"Sekhmet!!!"

Mia sighed as she stared out the window of their green mini-van. The street was
slate gray, as was the sidewalk. Traffic was light today and rain drops danced across the
windshield in a light shower.
Kento whined. "Are we there yet?"
Rowen cursed. "No. Now will you shut up already?!"
The van went silent for a moment, the only sound heard was made by the windshield
wipers across the glass. Sai huffed.
"We're here now..."
He parked the van in the church's only parking lot. Surprisingly, no one else was
there. And it was Sunday. Ryo dismissed it with a shrug.
"C'mon, you guys. Let's go."

Another giggle and a smile emerged in the darkness. Bright white teeth shone through
pale skin and pink lips. Sage tossed his golden head and huffed. Arthur was out cold, scared
almost half to death. Sage studied his body in amusement. Rough, unshaven features and a rounded belly.
No wonder he was so easy to subdue. Sage rose his hand and turned to shine his teeth at Yuli.
Yuli stood and walked slowly to his Master.
"Now, child. Time for a part of your duty. You ready?"
Yuli nodded, his eyes fixated on the wrought iron and rusted door to the secret room they were in.
The Oriental rugs were torn and matted in one dark corner and Mary was torn from the wall. Sage smiled again.
"Good. Here's what I want you to do..."

Ryo walked up the black and white tiled stairs again, getting that horror film sinking
feeling in the pit of his stomach. He turned to face Kento and Rowen, who were fighting again.
Sai was in-between them, trying to get them to stop, but having no such luck. They continued
to fight until Ryo had to yell at them.
"You guys! Enough!"
All three stopped to stare at him in stunned silence. Ryo huffed and motioned them
forward, through the glossed wooden doors of the church. They creaked and moaned with age as
both Ryo and Kento had to push them open to gain entrance.
All five stood in awe at the sight of the church as they came in...

Yuli laughed. A short, childish laugh. He sat upon the Moon in the center of the church.
He stared at the Ronins and Mia with only the interest Sage had told him to. He tilted his
brown head and breathed slowly as Sai approached him.
"Yuli! Yuli, are you alright?"
The others came quickly behind him, gazing up in amazement. Yuli didn't understand
what was so amazing. Death was, and so was the Reaper, but nothing here held any interest
to his eyes. Everything here was old and boring.
Yuli turned back to them in disgust.
"What do you want?"


Anubis huffed as he seated himself on the front steps of the public library, bent on glaring a hole through Cale's
head. The blue-haired ex-warlord sighed, crossed his arms, and leaned against a stone pillar in front of the main doors
to the library. He blinked and looked at Anubis.
"It wasn't entirely my fault, you know. Try waking up to see big, beady eyes in your face..."
This time, it was Sekhmet's turn to glare at him. "You didn't have to yell." He pouted.
"And besides, you weren't doing anything anyway."
"I was taking a nap!"
"So?"
"That's something!"
They continued to bicker in front of the library until Dais yelled at them.
"Enough! Let's just get going, alright? Before we get into more trouble than we're already in..."
True to his word, Dais was right. They had gotten into much more trouble than even they had expected.
Due to the constant yelling of two certain ex-Warlords, the other, rule-abiding ex-Warlords had gotten themselves
kicked out of the library. Anubis huffed as the quartet climbed into their shiney blue Corvet.
'I'll have my revenge....' thought Anubis angrily as he pulled the car into drive.

'Yes....' a Spirit watched from above them, it's energy forcused on a force of Darkness. He was what
was needed to be shielded and protected from the Darkness and the Death his rival could produce. And, no doubt, his
rival had done the same to insure protection against the white-hot Light that he himself could produce. The Spirit
knew the upcoming battle would not be an easily won battle, but a battle that HAD to be won. For Mother and Father's
sake.