The Beauty of Us Two
Summary: (Support conversations between Caellach and Amelia) She was an innocent yet resolute recruit while he was hardened, embittered warrior. She espied his scarred soul and wanted to help him. He wasn't too certain if he should let her. Amazing on what a few, simple talks can create. (CaellachxAmelia)
Support B: Sand Burials and Floral Requiems
Text:
"Speech"
Thoughts
Flashback
Songs/Music:
"This Life" by Juli
"The Poet and the Pendulum, V. Mother & Father" by Nightwish
Disclaimer: Sacred Stones would have been a much different game than the one we are familiar with today. I'm talking about handing over the spotlight to a couple of villains, have them rise to the occasion, and then kick some collective arse. I'll stop there.
"I'm cold, my path is empty
This night is grey and cold and hard
It holds me tight
And it won't give me away
I'm caught
I'm not waking up
And the last lights will soon go out
I see myself falling
But I won't give up."
-This Life, Juli
Sand. Endless, sweeping mounds of ochroleucous sand complimented with the scalding desert sun pending in the cyaneous sky was all his vision could gift him at the moment. Just sand and putrid bones from beast and man alike.
And who was the buffoon that said the enemy was near? When I find that idiotic poltroon he's going to be wallowing in his own chagrin once I'm through with him. He'll be a scout no more, the fool.
"Bloody hell, they all can just rot," Caellach cursed and uncouthly kicked a femur from an animal skeleton aside, scanning the torrid horizon for the oncoming army. His body was restless and he itched to affront some of those ridiculous knights of Rausten. Given to Riev's ardent spewing of the theocracy's zeal on righteousness the Raustans sounded like utter half-wits and delusional mooncalves.
"General Tiger Eye!"
Pivoting violently around from the sound of his name, the said general came face-to-face with Boelthor, the same Pegasus rider he sent to search for an oasis. The rugged individual wiped off a trickle of sweat from his swarthy visage after saluting Caellach (who responded half-heartedly) and then commenced with his report.
"The foe is near, General Caellach, barely two leagues ahead of us. From here, we should reach them in approximately ten minutes." An ecstatic beam split Caellach's face in two and he unhooked the silver axe from his lustrous claret shield.
"Music to my ears. Tell the lads the good news so they'll be aroused and ready to engage the enemy at first sight."
Boelthor bobbled his head thusly. "Right away, sir. As soon as possible." Departing from Caellach, the disheveled rider strolled over to the clustered bevy of grumbling Grado warriors with his albicant Pegasus trotting vigilantly behind him.
The Tiger Eye ran his finger lightly against the sharpen blade of his axe, his body tingling with anticipation and exuberance. Finally, the armies would collide and they could hack at each other as long they wanted. Only one side would merge victorious and that side, of course, would be his. He had too much to gain to lose to those trivial, flippant Rausten knights. Like those before them, they solely would serve him as his stepping stones towards greatness. One astounding victory at a time will eventually award him with a crown and the sovereignty over an entire nation.
Dame Fortune could very generous indeed, if one played their cards right.
Strident screams and detrimental moans of the dying echoed forebodingly through the arid vicinity, steel clashing steel, armor smashing against armor, and flesh chafing flesh. Crimson pools and sanguinary streams seeped through the sand, staining the once pure leucochroic desert with a sinister, definitive garnet hue. Bodies were strewn across the torrid, partly corrugated terrain, behemoth vultures and other birds of prey already feasting on the corpses. The ebony feathered scavengers voraciously plucked the eyeballs from their putrescent victims, their ill-begotten, petulant squawks conveying their ebullience to this newly founded, scrumptious meal.
Caellach dexterously swung his axe around, the deadly silver blade smoothly slicing through armor, flesh, and bone as if his adversary was simply constructed out of pudding. Blood squirted out of the mortal wound like a jocund, cramoisy fountain. His opponent, a well-hewn general, let loose an agonized groan before sagging forward from the painful affliction. The doomed general weakly thrust his lance in the hero's direction yet the Tiger Eye easily evaded the inadequate attack. "Burned out already? How pathetic."
"May the Devil seize your rotten soul!" hissed the Rausten general, seething eyes ablaze and highlighted by the shadows of his visor.
"Heh, I don't think that's ever going to happen," replied Caellach divertingly as he curved his gleaming axe towards his foe's neck, blessing him with a swift, argent death. He didn't spare a single glance at his grisly accomplishment as the general's dismembered head gradually rolled off his blood-soaked shoulders, tumbling onto the fervid white sand.
Trudging through the vast, blotchy terrain of faded khaki and vivid cerise, Caellach scoured the skirmish up ahead, mentally noting his rather lengthy distance from majority of the combat. Victory appeared to be favoring his men, the adamant soldiers of Grado which bodes well for him. Thoroughly pleased with the outcomes of the onslaught, Caellach ambled his way through the scorching desert plains, relishing the succinct moments when a pleasant, refreshing zephyr would fondly encompass him, sporadically cooling his perspiring body down to a reasonable temperature.
Unexpectedly, his right foot crashed into a long bulky mound of sand, promptly halting his haughty gait and inducing a throbbing sore in his toes. Swearing as he stumbled, Caellach whipped his head around to face the terrestrial object that tripped him. Shadowed, badious eyes dilated slightly at the prosaic sight of the manmade landmark, the torrential, tawny gaze of the Tiger Eye glued to the monument of sand and stone. In front of the mound was a roughly shaped tombstone with crudely carven words. Caellach grudgingly approached the headstone, reaching down to half-heartedly trace the blemished epitaph of death:
Raisa Anderson
-My Beloved Mother-
Caellach jadedly shifted his scrutiny from his mother's tomb towards the two smaller, subsequent graves, the final resting places of his two younger sisters. His eyes grazed over Windy and then, Jeanine.The phrase 'my beloved sister' was also engraved right under their names.
He rapidly glancing over his left and right shoulder and then double-checked that none of his men were around to bear witness to this sacred, covert spectacle. He wouldn't want his reputation of being an indurated, brusque, and terrifying commander be soiled via a mere act of paying one's respects to the dead. He will have to bang a lot more skulls together if he was ever accused of going "soft".
Once satisfied he was the sole being in the area, Caellach reached in from his pouch and conjured out three beautiful, vibrant desert flowers. Bending over, he placed a placid cliffrose over his mother's grave, then a woolly daisy on Windy's, and lastly, a desert lily on Jeanine's. Those flowers were their absolute favorites. During his times as a mercenary he would annually sojourn to their tombs and set their ideal blossoms beside the gravestones, saying nothing but stare soberly at the burial grounds while ruminating how they were torn apart from him so soon, so ruthlessly. When he left Jehanna and had been promoted, Caellach eliminated his yearly excursions to his makeshift family crypt simply because he was trying to forget and move on in his life. He was a Grado general now and sooner or later, a king. He wanted no such ties to his wretched, pitiful excuse of a homeland and compressing the memories of his family was a sacrifice he was willingly to execute. That is, until pasty-faced Vigarde assigned him to efface Jehanna's Sacred Stone.
"Caellach. Riev. Shatter the remaining Sacred Stones. Caellach, take Jehanna."
The hero scowled darkly in remembrance of the unsavory stint, hands clenching into partial fists. Trust the laconic emperor to evoke a decree like that to him. It was those moments when Caellach steadfastly believed that the Demon King really had catatonic, twisted sense of humor and was delightfully in love with irony.
"And so here I am, back in this putrid place. The very same abysmal desert that robbed me of my life and snatch you three away from me." he mused bitterly to the trio of headstones, gripping his axe a little more tightly than usual. "Well, I know this probably sounds completely awful but you know I'm not much of nostalgic man." Except towards you, Mother, and Jeanine and Windy. He wanted to correct himself yet found the feat difficult to do so. Although he was no longer the fifteen-year-old boy who saw them perish and the years as a soldier of fortune changed him into the cynical, ambitious man he is today, he fervently wanted to confess to them he still carried remnants of their presences in his heart, his very soul. They were permanently etched in his beating heart, just as their names had been inscribed in stone by his bleeding, calloused hands.
"Ah, hell, forget this. I was never a man with words. You three understand what I was trying to say." Caellach turned his back away from the tombs and returned to the heat of the battle, his axe claiming nearly as many lives as the Jehanna desert snuffs out in a week.
He never noticed during his whole reunion with his family a pair of radiant azuline orbs were watching the whole scene with zealous curiosity. The owner of such lucid eyes felt her heart cracking at the sight of the jaded, embittered man fighting the ghosts of his past and inner demons within him.
But how can I, a mere soldier, help him?
Fate would soon have her answer.
It had been least a half an hour since the onset started and finally, the Rausten troops were showing signs of disconcertment. The rallying cries of the self-righteous brigade had dwindled considerably and the Grado regiment successfully managed to gain more ground than their opponents and were now pushing them back. It wouldn't be long before the Raustans would be sounding a retreat.
"Keep on shoving them back, boys! We got them where we want them!" The gruff yet puckish timbre of the Tiger Eye galvanized the Grado warriors to fight and march on, emboldening them to drive the enemy thither, back to where they came from. They were soldiers of Grado and as soldiers of Grado they were relentless, puissant, and would sacrifice their lives just so victory and glory would be in Grado's name, that their compatriots at home would live to see another day, and their prospering nation would thrive and cultivate aplenty from their valiant self-immolation. They were simply good men heeding their ruler's wishes, that was all. Tragically enough, their arcane, ambiguous monarch was not who he seems to be and was just as manipulated as they were.
All of them were puppets dancing on the precarious, caprice strings of the fiendish puppeteer, the infamous Demon King himself.
Caellach grasped this de facto knowledge that he, unfortunately, was one of those marionettes himself. Yet when the time is ripe he'll shear those damnable strings connecting him to the satanical monster's control and then reign as king without the Demon King hovering over him like a dark, ill-begotten shroud of filth and malignant.
Shrieking, agonized wails and the incessant din of combat snared his focus back to the predicament at hand. Thrusting all notions and retrospections back into the corners of his mind, Caellach advanced and easily sliced through a callow monk assaying to shower a blast of lightning in his direction. Once he felt his axe sinking into the chest of the presently dead monk, the aeneous haired hero ripped his prime weapon out of the carcass and swiftly pivoted on the balls of his feet to lacerate a death-marked rogue sneaking up behind him, hoping to stab him in the back while he wasn't looking.
"This is getting really boring," he muttered after idly tearing his axe from the rogue's cadaver, "can't these stupid Raustans either retreat or surrender? Make my day so much easier." He hacked away at several more oncoming adversaries, kicking disseminated, bloody corpses aside to grant him more ground to beset.
"Who's next?" he roared, humor ringing in his taunting query. A shallow groan reached the hero general's ears and solid thud followed. He quickly rotated his head around to assess what had just transpired. A mop of a blonde hair entered his realm of vision and Caellach espied a young, petite female yanking a slender iron lance from the abdomen of an archer. Isn't that Am—what's-her-name?
Lance in hand, the feminine recruit turned back towards the onrushing army, azuline eyes rife with moxie and an astonishingly level of aplomb. For someone her age she carried more intrepidity than one could have expected. Caellach couldn't help it but grin amusingly at the small yet fierce female's tour de force.
Two swordsmen raced towards them, flourishing their blades helter-skelter. One, a myrmidon with spiky violet hair, affronted Caellach while his partner, a wayward thief garbed in a croceate cloak, assailed the young female. The ianthine haired myrmidon slashed his curved sword at Caellach's stomach and the hero maneuvered his torso around to evade the attack and then slammed his axe directly on his opponent's forearm. The myrmidon jerked his arm back before it could have been amputated. Regaining his footing, Caellach belligerently advanced upon his foe, discarding his silver axe so he could unsheathe the steel blade strapped to his belt. Sword clanged against sword and the two men were locked into a parlous bout of swordplay. Sweat trickled down Caellach's brow and he gripped the sword's handle in cool anticipation, wondering whether the myrmidon would confront him first or not. He didn't have to contemplate long, the swordsman came rushing speedily to him, sword positioned in a dangerous angle. Analyzing his enemy's motive Caellach brandish his steel blade in an intricate yet impregnable arch and blocked the assault with his shield. With a flick of his wrist, his sword swept across the doomed myrmidon, leaving an elongate, gruesome gash from shoulder to shoulder and the upper chest as a crimson farewell gift. For the final measure Caellach stabbed the soldier squarely in chest, the edge of his sword bursting through the myrmidon's back.
Like a river of ruby water, blood cascaded from both grievous wounds dealt by the Tiger Eye and modena streamlets vehemently poured out of the dying man's nostrils and mouth. He gurgled briefly, then sagged against Caellach's sword, dead.
Withdrawing his blade from the carcass, Caellach picked up his fallen axe and sheathed his sword back into its scabbard. Once again, another victory. This is becoming a tad bit too lenient for me; can't these Rausten pansies do anything?
"General Caellach! Are you all right?"
The said general turned to face the addresser and saw the recruit had dispatched her aggressor as well. Cuts and scraps adorned her lithe frame and she was panting heavily however the sedulous aura encircling her was still present and sharp.
"Amelia, isn't it?" he asked, walking over to his female companion. She nodded, resting her lance at her side. Caellach eyed the various injures littering her body, inwardly noting the degree of attention they each needed.
"You know," he began, "you might want to get those taken care of." He gestured to the bleeding abrasions on her body. Succinctly staring down and realizing what he was referring to, Amelia nodded once more and dug through her satchel in search of a vulnerary.
"So, how've you been?" she asked pleasantly, rummaging through the burlap sack's contents. Slightly taken aback by her endeavor to engage in small talk, Caellach didn't respond immediately.
"I've been…all right," he professed after a few seconds. Amelia smiled jovially at his words as she finally pulled out a vulnerary from her mundane portmanteau.
"That's good to hear." she said cheerfully. Tilting her head back she quaffed the convalescing liquid down and when finished, wiped a drop away from the corner of her mouth. Soon enough, the sizzling sonance of wounds being mended and skin being knitted back together permeated the air, marking a sheer indication that the healing potion was running its course and doing its job.
"Is the battle over, General Caellach?" she questioned, motioning towards the Grado Imperial Army overwhelming the Rausten force. From where he was standing, it appeared that the Raustans were fleeing.
"By the looks of it, aye," answered the Tiger Eye thusly. He glanced back at Amelia, who wore a look of relief on her flushed, weary visage.
"We won…." she whispered breathlessly, "We managed to defeat them."
Grunting noncommittally, Caellach just slipped his axe back into his dented shield and walked back to camp, with Amelia tailing right beside him. Funnily enough, he didn't mind her shadowing him so much. Her presence was rather comforting…soothing now that he thought about it.
Frowning, Caellach brushed the inane thought away and attempted to ignore the sparkling, invigorating mein belonging to a certain sandy haired soldier flanking him. He was still executing the strategy even after they reached encampment, after she flashed him a beam so amiable that the blissful smile titillated his blood and ardently stirred foreign feelings inside him and after her cerulean orbs gazed at him with such sincerity and intense longing which abruptly made his mouth dry.
"Be happy, Caellach," was all she said to him before leaving to do her portion of the scouting. Coercing what felt like sand down his throat, Caellach dubiously called out to her:
"Be careful, lass. Don't wander off."
The celestial, appeasing smile returned and Amelia nodded affirmatively.
"I won't, Caellach. I won't."
He specifically told her not to scout around the campsite too far. And look where her carelessness lead her: Captivity.
"Heh, we got a small fry right here," mused a sordid Rausten cavalier, "is Grado now sending children to fight us?" He sniggered at his disparaging joke as he finished tying the ropes around Amelia's wrist. Tenaciously fidgeting against her bonds, she roughly kicked the man in the shins as hard as she feasibly could. He swore, stumbled back, and then regained stability. A spark of pure, raw contempt exploded across his face and he approached the entrapped recruit with excessive hostility.
"Think you're so clever, you little hussy!" he snarled, raising his hand up in preparation to strike her. Amelia squint her eyes shut and tensed up to possibly alleviate the caustic sting of the soldier's impending blow.
"Quinn, leave the hostage alone. She's not worth our time." chided one of the said man's fellow Raustans, flipping a vellum page from his light tome.
Grumbling a string of oaths and insults directed towards her under his breath, the soldier called Quinn shot one last glower in Amelia's direction and stormed off. Another soldier came by to tether her to their supply wagon. "Try and keep up, girl," he sneered prior to mounting his horse and rousing the remaining men of the platoon to pack their bindles and move out. As if on cue, the wagon haphazardly lurched forward and Amelia went along with it. Glimpsing back at the horizon behind her, Amelia prayed with all her heart that her regiment would catch wind of her and a few other Grado soldiers' dismal predicament. Thank the gods my scout partner managed to slip away unseen by the Raustans. Hopefully he'll deliver our plight to General Caellach and the rest of the Imperial Army and they will come and save us!
"Hurry onward, brave and valiant warriors of Rausten! We can't let those Grado bastards discover us!" hollered the Raustan commander, a veteran paladin with a retroussè nose and fairly pointy mustache. Dutifully, the troops rapidly cleared the campground and started marching. Vigils assigned to the Grado soldiers roughly prodded and hassled Amelia and the other Grado prisoners along, compelling them to keep up with the erratic, fast gait of the Rausten army.
As they tarried on, Amelia wonder what would become of her, her fellow warriors, and the fate of General Caellach's legion still camped a few leagues away from here, completely unaware of her dire situation. Clasping her hands together in a final act of desperation and reassurance, Amelia muttered a silent prayer to the gods, imploring for their assistance and divine intervention.
Please help us, gods. Send a sign or anything that will tell us that we shall be rescued. Anything!
For who knows what the enemy could have in store for her and the other Grado captives.
Caellach couldn't decide which was more confounding: The way the youth burst into his tent without warning (he truly would have killed the lad if he was in the middle of undressing) or the news he brought.
"General Caellach, the Rausten army we defeated today has taken many of our men captive! They're abandoning their campsite as I speak and are relocating somewhere else." the young scout reported feverishly, his angelic mulberry eyes round and frantic.
Releasing a breath of frustration, Caellach raked a hand through his auburn hair. "How many?"
"About seventeen, sir. One of them is Amelia, my scout partner. At the cost of her own freedom she warned me of the Raustan dogs' appearance and was able to distract them while I ran back here with this message." he replied automatically.
Caellach froze at the mentioning of Amelia's name and felt his body turn numb. Time seemed to have stopped and all he could hear at the moment was the rigorous pulsating of his sporadic heartbeat. He knew he shouldn't care at all about the imprisoned men–it was their own sorry fault they were captured–but a part of his mind was roaring in protest of concept that he would abandon Amelia to her unknown, flagrant kismet.
Will you do it? Are you going forsake her? Are you just like Jehanna, indifferent to everything and everyone?
Inwardly blocking his conscious, the Tiger Eye grinded his teeth together and already was curling one hand into a taut, rigid fist. Why should he care about a mere girl?
But she's not just "a mere girl". She can see through your rough-hewn mask and you like her for that.
"Your orders, General Tiger Eye?"
This was it. It all came down to his decision whether to go after the retreating Rausten army and take back the prisoners or leave his men to their fate by waiting for whatever the enemy wanted with them. Sighing exasperatedly, Caellach turned to the awaiting lad, his mind finally made up and the portentous dictate at the tip of his tongue.
I better not regret this in the near future. God's wounds, I'm probably going daft–no thanks to the lass.
"Inform the captains to rouse their men and get into their stations. We're going to pursue those damned Raustan gnats and squash them once and for all."
"Be still, my son
You're home
Oh when did you become so cold?
The blade will keep on descending
All you need is to feel my love
Search for beauty, find your shore
Try to save them all, bleed no more
You have such oceans within
In the end
I will always love you."
-The Poet and the Pendulum, V. Mother & Father, Nightwish
Color Glossary:
Ochroleucous- yellowish white
Cyaneous- sky blue
Albicant- white
Leucochroic- white or pale colored
Cramoisy- crimson
Argent- silver (or white)
Badious- chestnut colored
Azuline- blue
Aeneous- bronze
Croceate- saffron colored
Ianthine- violet colored
Modena- crimson
(Let me know if I missed any other obscure colors.)
Well, there you go. Chapter two is done and over, which means the real fun commences in the next chapter (what I mean by 'fun' is a major battle scene! Huzzah!). I have pretty good idea what will occur the last support conversation and then in the epilogue so hopefully the last two chapters of this story and My Damned Soul Needs Fire, My Damsel Breaths Fire will be out as soon as possible. With no school to restrain my time, it can be done.
Just as a side note, Raisa means 'rose' in Yiddish. Thought it fitting since Caellach gives his mother a cliffrose. And yes, the challenge is still around. You can still participate if you're intrigued and have nothing else better to do.
You know my policy: Review, critique, fave, alert, but no flames. Flamers shall be sojourned by a Demon King with his notorious fruit cake. Fear the Demon King and his impregnable fruit cake! One bite and all your teeth come falling out.
:SpeedDemon315: