Baring the name demi-god went a long walk off a sharp cliff in most people's definition. Well, most people's definition that were from the preternatural world, if you were human it sounded hells of fun. It wasn't. It was burden after burden after bloody beating in constant battle with some other creature of your pantheon. As the unknown daughter to a darkness the likes of which even Nick Gutier couldn't understand, Ryxn had to be careful. Granted she'd been slaughtered when she turned twenty one by a demon hoard out for revenge after escaping her father's prison, but that didn't mean she hadn't been intelligent. She knew of Artemis and the powerful Dark Hunter army she commanded. It had been just that which enticed Ryxn to let her soul wander into the bitch's temple after death. Since her soul had been weighted with powers she'd never unlocked or developed, it had extended her lifeforce slightly longer than that of the average human death. She'd bargained for her soul giving the damned goddess what she'd wanted, a powerful slave dog to take the place of her ex-lover Acheron after his marriage. She'd been brought back bar none with her powers and had steadily refused to use them. One ounce of her bolts could alert her father that she existed and that…she never wanted to do. He needed to believe that she'd died in her mother's womb. If he ever found out…let's just say that the walls to the very universe could implode from his anger and Nior would destroy everything in his path to kill his heir and eventually his predecessor.
As a relatively new dark hunter, Ryxn was being given shitty tasks by Ash that made her want to pound the Atlantien into the nether realm for giving them to her. Babysitting. Specifically babysitting Kyrian's daughter for the night while he and Amanda went out with his friend Julian Alexander and his wife Grace. The small cherub child glanced at her from her lap and was perpetually drawing a vein in Ryxn's temple. She swore if the tiny girl grabbed at her nose stud one more time she'd go nuts. She gently pushed the toddler's hand away.
"No. We don't touch that." To which the little smartass replied.
"You are a meanie." Her eye twitched. Severely twitched. Never having had a childhood Rxyn wasn't good with children herself. She usually tried to avoid them for their own personal benefit as in staying alive.
"I think it's about bedtime kid." She got up cradling the frail body against her own with some motherly instinct, not much though. She fisted her tiny hand in Ryxn's hair giggling.
"NO!" she protested still laughing like tinkling bells which came across as sledgehammers to Ryxn's head. She growled in the back of her throat.
"Little girl, it's bedtime. There is no no about it." She proceeded up the stairs towards the child's bedroom. She was hesitant to go up the stairs however having seen the bloody truth imprint upon them. She could see Kyrian and Amanda dead on the stairs in a distant past that had barely been corrected and put right to avoid the child being an orphan. Thank the gods for loopholes in time and space.
Once in the bedroom she had a hell of a time getting the psychic brat under the covers and staying put. It was like sticking a cat in a pet carrier without a door. It was an hour before she was finally able to descend the stairs for a last time, the baby asleep, and sit on the cough in the living room. She was a dark hunter for all Rome's sake. She didn't want to babysit. However, she knew that Ash had his hands full with a particularly pissed off newly dead Nick and all the other natural bullshit that swirled endlessly around the guy's head. She let her head sink into her hands breathing out a deep sigh of frustration. She was no better off now than she had been as a goddess with locked powers living as a human in disguise running from demons. She was just a dead goddess posing as a dark hunter still running from demons. None had attacked her recently and she was thankful because it was hard to hide the attacks from the others who could smell the demon funk when humans hadn't been able too. Her auburn curled hair fell over her shoulder half out of its ponytail from the brat pulling on it. Her eyes peered through her fingers to the carpeted floor, their emerald glory captured in the moonlight shinning in from the window to the left of the room. She'd turned the lights out and let the TV play on silent. The eerie colors swathed her form gently washing it with tender hues that betrayed her loneliness.
Some time passed as she laid on the couch flipping channels before she heard the four of them approaching the door. She sat up stretching slightly her jeans and black t-shirt needed a slight adjustment. She made sure to do so before Kyrian walked through the door Amanda following him.
"Thank you Ryxn for watching her. She wasn't trouble was she?" she stood shaking her head putting her hands in her pockets as Julian and Grace filed in.
"No, she just wiped my thoughts about bed time clean about six times." She scrunched up her nose. That kid could make you forget your own name if your weren't careful and guarded your mental thoughts. Amanda sighed.
"She's been testing her abilities lately, I'm sorry." Ryxn shook her head tiredly.
"Don't worry about it. I can deal. Good night guys." She headed for the door and stopped stiffening. No. Not here. Dread washed over her and she felt the presence in the room shift.
The stench of the demon Akor was strong. He appeared in front of the group grinning his ugly snarled yellow teeth at them his skin dripped with ichor. Pustules covered his face and his taloned fingers wiggled as his yellow slatted eyes found Ryxn. He let lose a howling laughter that froze the room. Julian was the first to react. He materialized a sword angrily sneering at the demon. Kyrian joined him guarding their women he pulled a sword from a nearby umbrella stand. Akor bellowed smirking his wings adjusting to the size of the room behind him. Outstretched they were nine feet in width holed and scared from years of service to higher demons.
"I've found you, you little shit." He met Ryxn's eyes. She wouldn't use her powers…she couldn't, not in front of these guys. Her father couldn't find her. She took a long deep breath and joined the men in front of her squaring her shoulders a staff appeared in her hands.
"Yeah? Bring it on bitch." She taunted his putrid ass. It probably would have worked too except small footsteps hit the stairs. The baby…oh god…Ryxn felt her heart tear in two as panic seized her. Kyrian screamed rushing the demon as he went for his baby girl but she knew better. Akor slammed him into a wall with his powers since Kyrian was now a human. As Akor went for the child she cussed something fowl making Julian's attention briefly catch her from the corner of his eyes. It was instantaneous.
The entire room lit with hellfire, darkness brimming from every receding corner, power radiating from a single thing like a beating heart. Ryxn felt her powers fully surge for the first time in her life and they were intoxicating. All of hell and unending sadness were swelling deep within her being and darkness protruded from her skin. Black slick armor cascaded silently over her body covered in an ever changing sheen of dark purples and teals over a black base. Metallic spikes formed over her shoulders much like her father's as sharp silver claws formed as a glove off her right hand. A long glowing pulsating sword manifested in her other hand as her eyes narrowed. Mottled black tattoos swirled beautifully over the left side of her body including her face sliding like sinewy spirals. As it had all happened so fast it ended. With one swift motion Ryxn beheaded Akor appearing on the step in front of the child protecting her.
"Hell no." she spat at the demon's bloody body as it fell sideways before dissolving in a nasty lump of flesh and then mist. Julian couldn't believe his eyes and Kyrain barely noticed. He ran for his daughter past Ryxn scooping her up, as Amanda side stepped her as well. Goddess to God met eyes as Julian and Ryxn stared the other down.
"Ash isn't going to…" before the sentence died on his lips, Ash materialized in the room cussing as he saw Ryxn. Anger mounted his patience as he strode towards her.
"You're the daughter of Noir?" he caught her arm gripping the metal hard enough on her armor to slightly dent it.
"Go to hell asshole." She snapped trying to shove him away. "I didn't choose this." He let her shove past him flabbergasted which was definitely saying something since he was eleven thousand years old.
"No, but by using your powers you've alerted every god, goddess, demon, and otherwise to your presence…and they're coming for you." He said solemnly as the heavy air of Adrian Malachai settled near the home. Just as the Malachai entered the home Ryxn felt a horrible pain lacerate her head and she saw the fast images of everyone around her dying…