AN: Ok, here is the next bit, I would have had it up sooner but I only just got it to sound right yesterday. The next bit won't be another four weeks away, it'll come up sooner than that. Oh, and I have another two drabbles I'll be putting up soon, though they are a bit weird… then again, I did write them when I was feeling like something you would scrape off the bottom of your boot… I had a nasty ear infection last week, so enough said about that. I would like to see at least three reviews for this bit, even if they are just questions. It's not too much to ask for, what with having 60 hits for the first chapter. I do need motivation here, and one review, no matter how encouraging, is a bit disheartening.
P.S. Taking Mimic Shalle's suggestion, I tried breaking up the paragraphs a bit, no matter how odd it looks on Word documents. If it makes it easier to read, I'm willing to give it a try.
February 2013 – rewrite complete!
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Previously:
Had anyone else been in the room, they would have been unable to explain the Marquise sudden loss of consciousness. One moment he was touching Rush's shoulder, the next he was a crumpled heap on the floor, the muscles of his hand twitching slightly as residual energy still scorched through his nerves.
Had they looked closer, they would have seen the light from the sleeping boy travel up David's arm and diffuse into his body in a split second, eyes clouding with a green tint before he collapsed. The boy in the bed didn't even shift in reaction to the touch, couldn't shift caught as he was in an unnatural sleep.
David was completely unaware of his loss of consciousness, his mind and soul lost within another.
The first thing that struck him was, oddly enough, that he was naked. Well, not so much naked as bare. His clothes were gone, but how he was aware of that, he didn't know.
He could feel his body, but looking down just showed a vague outline, blurry and indistinct like peering through frosted glass.
The second thing that struck him was the feeling of being immersed totally in something that pushed and pulled and dragged him along, like being underwater and caught in a strong current. It didn't feel heavy like water though, it seemed to tingle on his skin almost like static electricity, and he certainly wasn't in any risk of drowning, breathing coming easily.
Looking around him, he couldn't see much. Everything was shrouded in an odd mist, and he was nearly blinded by an intense light that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. Drifting in eddies of the current surrounding him, David was at a loss as to how he had ended up here.
Indeed, he didn't remember much of what happened the last few days. He remembered the older things and the important details like the war against the Conqueror, but everything else was a blur, just as obscured by mist as his surroundings.
Abruptly the current strengthened, pulling him along with much greater force. Buffeted by the swirling energy all around him he started to see shapes in the mist, indistinct at first, but jumping into sharp relief a second later.
More than a little confused by what he was seeing, David witnessed flashes of people and creatures, a parade of images where their forms seemed to hang, suspended in the seething maelstrom of light all around them. Some of them were clear and detailed, but many were blurred and indistinct, impossible to make out in the scant seconds they were there.
Following them were images, scenes of places seemingly frozen in time. They were like visistone pictures, but so much better at the same time, three dimensional and incredibly real.
Unlike the people these were all crystal clear, but they only lingered for an instant, barely long enough to get a brief impression before being whipped away like leaves in an autumn gale.
Some of the clear detailed images David recognised, like the tall, four-armed form of Torgal, the bustling market of Balterossa and the ivy covered walkways of Melphina but there were others he didn't recognise.
A Mitra in gleaming silver armour with eyes so blue they glowed, in hand a strikingly familiar golden sword that rippled with light, runes burning brightly on its surface.
A beautiful female Mitra clothed in flowing blue silk with droplets of water suspended against the material, frozen in place like dewdrops on flower petals. Her eyes were as cold and dazzling as ice and her long pale hair was threaded through with glittering crystal.
A black Yama with shining golden eyes wearing iron grey robes, red flames dancing along the hems, muscles straining as he seemed to hold back an invisible force.
This seemed to go on forever, a constant parade of images. Struggling to latch onto anything familiar, David found himself pulled towards one image in particular, which lingered far longer than any of the others. It was a cliff top meadow covered in blooming wildflowers, looking down over a vast expanse of ocean. The sky was a breathtaking pallet of colours, the setting sun painting the sky in indigo, violet, red, orange and gold.
It was a scene he was sure he had never laid eyes on before, yet it felt… almost like home. Confused by this, but glad for the brief respite, David tried to place where the strange sense of warmth and familiarity was coming from.
As odd as it seemed, the feeling wasn't coming from him, it was coming from an outside source. He knew because he could still feel his own reaction to the scene. The other feelings were more like echoes, strong, but with an odd dissonance to them.
As though this revelation was the trigger, the scene fragmented before his eyes, exploding outwards with no warning, the light surrounding him growing even brighter than before. Almost like a delayed reaction, the echoes of emotion that should have accompanied the previous images hit him all at once.
Like a rampaging dragon they bombarded his senses, foreign emotions overwhelming the carefully constructed mental barriers he'd used to control his own emotions for years. Love, sorrow, pain, fear, hate, joy, respect, contentment, satisfaction, they all invaded his soul and left his mind in tatters, his head aching as though it were trapped in a slowly tightening vice.
Unable to stop them, all David could do was ride out the worst of it and pray it would end soon. After what felt like an age, the deluge of emotions finally seemed to be slowing.
Mind scraped raw from the torrent of foreign feelings, David didn't see the light around him dimming, nor feel the random currents of power pulling him along weakening until they reached a standstill. His only thought for the pounding headache behind his eyes, he never noticed something move within the dimming light.
Buried deep beneath the memories and emotions, something stirred. Shifting slightly, it stretched as much as it was able, it's insubstantial essence taking on form and substance as it woke. Lethargy making it sluggish it took a moment to realise it was awake, having been locked in slumber for years.
The weight of more than a dozen thick spell chains still bound it, burning wherever they touched, their blue-white power looking deceptively gentle even as they held it painfully tight. The tattered edge of it's essence was still raw from where it had been split from the rest of it's soul, even after so many years.
Realising something had woken it, it felt a spark of excitement even as the chains grew tighter at the thought, maybe this was a chance to free itself!
Fighting through the suffocating fog of magic induced sleep, the creature grasped desperately for what it once was, unwilling to let itself forget again in magical slumber.
The entity had no name, for it's True Mother never had the chance to give it one before it was sundered, having once been part of a bright newborn soul. It was ancient knowledge, power and the need to protect those it claimed; animal instinct honed to near lethal perfection.
Now it was split, bound within the other part of it's own spirit and kept separate only by those infernal chains, crafted by a young woman in a moment of fear and longing.
Reaching out it felt for the presence that woke it and found something intriguing, something… new, a human soul drifting aimlessly through the other half of it's spirit. It could sense the soul's confusion, it's weakness... but also the mouth watering scent of life within it.
All too aware of it's own weakened condition the creature realised what an opportunity that lost soul presented. With an enormous effort, it pushed up against the chains that had bound it since shortly after it had been found within the Sacred lands.
Putting all it's being into the effort, it heaved like it never had before. Again and again it fought its bindings, it's power and remaining strength bleeding away with each attempt.
Desperate to escape it's chains, it put all it's strength into one last monumental effort and finally broke free, the thick links of blue-white power shattering under the strain.
Spreading out, it began the process of rejoining with its other half, feeling positively giddy with its new freedom before searching for the one that had disturbed it. It couldn't let this intrusion go unexploited and for the first time in it's life, it felt the deep stirrings of an insatiable hunger, a primal instinct to consume everything not claimed by it, to rectify it's own shameful weakness with the fount of life giving energy that soul contained.
That stumbling animal had no idea how unlucky it was, to be so close and utterly defenceless when the creature had such need it ached for a taste...
That ill fated human would be the one that would help to sate the raging hunger that grew within it. It wouldn't be enough, yet it would be wasteful to finish it in one bite, when it could draw things out a bit and savour the experience...
