"It begins long ago," he took a deep breath, "when the people who would become known as blood were mostly a mystery, a rumored far away power. It was in those days that my sister and I were born."

"We were born within 10 minutes of each other, carried to term in the same pregnancy. It was rare enough then, nearly unheard of now. They called children like us "twins" which in an old language of ours means "being of two parts."

"We were not a wealthy family, we scraped together meals more often than not, but there were those worse off than us. My father had great ambitions, though. At the first sign that I might excel at it, he sent me to study Marks at the port city far away.

"No. Wait. I've begun it all wrong." He shook his head wearily. "I should have started further back than that."

"It's alright if you want to begin again." Surreal got him water in a glass she'd somehow managed not to break, remembering how he's said it was a courtesy to give him something to drink.

"Thank you" he took a long drink, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "To begin again. We were frightened of the Blood, who we knew so little about. What we heard of them were only terrifying tales. That they were born of spiders. That they could take to the air on great wings. That they drank the blood of their enemies. We began to call the people who lived under their rule "Landens," a close variant of our word that means "to be weighed down by a heavy burden." My family lived far in the countryside where news was slow to reach. When I arrived in the port city to learn Marks, I was surprised to find hatred of the Blood had led to distrust for those who made Marks, even though Marks were an old, old tradition among us. A rumor had circulated that the Blood actually came from Marks. That Marks made them become what they were.

"Did they treat you badly?" She asked in the pause while he took another drink.

"Oh yes. They were cruel to any they suspected of having ties the Marks. But I was a child and I didn't truly understand. I yearned for my simple childhood home. When I was given leave to visit there, my sister and I would run into the woods and I would teach her all the Marks I had learned. She was quick to pick up what took me ages to accomplish. She was better than me because she had no reason to doubt that she would be. If I had not made a false start of it, here I would try to tell you of how we were born twins. But I think I could not make you understand it. If she felt pain I felt it too. And joy, the same. There's was no thought that one of us could begin to say that the other wasn't ready to finish. We knew each other that well. We were truely two parts of the same person.

"Marks were the only happiness in her life. And since her joy was mine, I taught her every one I knew. It was not enough for her. She began sneaking in to shops that sold books of Marks and stealing out with them hidden in the folds of her dress. She learned ones that we were taught to stay away from, knowledge she was not meant to have with no proper training. I went to see her after she had married and lived in her own house to the North, after years of being apart. She was not the girl she had been. She'd become a hard woman with cruelty reflected in her eyes. This is no easy thing for me to say. She had been such a sunshine child, full of carefree smiles. It was strange to see her with lines around her mouth from so much frowning.

"She'd refined the art of using the very hardest Marks in terrible ways. She turned the hands of one servant around backwards, stole the voice of another, replaced the feet of a third with those of an oxen. The way they stared at me, their eyes so full of helpless sorrow, I will never forget.

"She had to be stopped." He took a heavy breath. "And who could do it but me? Anyone else would only kill her and I refused to believe it was too late for her to be saved. So I made the prison right by her home. To hold her until I could help her change back to the way she had been. And I went to see her. And we fought a great battle. She was better than me but I surprised her. How we fought. Both of us bleeding, the walls of her home falling into ruin, both of us in such pain felt double by it being between us. She fell unconscious first but the prison would heal her. I was taking her there. There was a girl outside the town. A peasant girl with a pleasant face. She saw that I was hurt and had with me another injured person. She offered me water to drink. I thought it was only kindness. I tasted the poison in it with the first drink but could not stop from falling.

"When I woke, they already secured my hands, already made me powerless in the prison of my own making. My beautiful sister was there, held by them, her eyes just starting to open. They were so frightened of us, afraid of what we were, our noble Marks tainted by their association to Blood. But it was more than that, of course. They'd seen what she'd done. The person she'd become while I had been so long away.

"They slit her throat while I scream till my voice was raw and wrists bloody from trying to pull free and her blood spilled onto the floor just outside where the stasis began. What things I yelled I don't even know, what oaths I swore I can't recall. But the blood and the violence made the fear flow from the Marks I'd added to safeguard the room. And how they fled then.

"And her body lay there already starting to smell of decay. I watched her fall to nothing. You stepped on the dust of her bones, all of her that remains. My beautiful sister gone."

Surreal reached out to touch his shoulder but he pulled away. "No. You have no right to comfort me. You, who forced this story from me, like a tooth that wasn't yet ready to be pulled."

"When would you have been ready?" she said. "You've had all these years to get over it and if sitting alone wallowing in grief didn't do it then maybe it was time to try something else. Hmm?"

"It is your right to make me do your bidding. And for me there is only to obey."

"You are not a slave to me." Surreal grabbed his hands, closing her fingers tightly before he could pull away again. "I'm sorry I asked you to do this thing you didn't want to. It was selfish of me. You might have told me on your own. But now we'll never know."

He said nothing. And she thought, maybe this is how it will be between us. Maybe I can't go back.

"Nevertheless," she persisted, "I'm glad that now I know. Because now I can say this to you. Even if you don't believe me. Or want to hear it from me. Or pretend not to care. I can say that it is not your fault that she died. You did everything you could for her. You are not to blame."

Something changed, his face softened, his eyes lightened, his fingers closed around hers.

"Let's get some rest." She said standing. "Come stay in my room for a while and tomorrow I'll make you up a bed in the guest room." He followed her up the stairs and they lay side by side in her large bed, not touching or speaking, exhaustion taking over. But then.

"Surreal," he whispered.

"Yes."

"How do I live in a world like this?"

She reached for his hand. "You and me. We'll figure it out together."

Hello Reader! I hope I'm not interupting too much! I just wanted to say if you've read this and left a review, Thank You! I love hearing from you! It makes it seem more real that there are actual poeple out there reading words that I wrote. And if you read this and didn't leave a review, also Thank You! You are lovely and I hope you have wonderful days and weeks and breakfasts and bus commutes and first period math classes or whatever you may have that could be better!

-Archersand