Rage

Bakura lay sprawled out on his bed, staring at the ceiling with eyes that burned dangerously. His stomach grumbled but he ignored it, not wanting to face Myrtle like this. The rage that had consumed him in Egypt that had driven him to swear his revenge on the Pharaoh for the crimes his father had perpetrated and that had been the death of many other innocent people had returned.

It was different this time, but the slow burning in his chest, and the pain in his eyes was the same. This time he felt… alone. Always before the rage had been accompanied by the voices of his people and the strange, niggling sensation of someone watching him. Now it was only himself and the burning fury he felt at knowing the Pharaoh lived.

There was no reason for him to feel this way. It wasn't even this Pharaoh that had given the order; he had been only a child at the time. The way he felt was irrational and Bakura knew it, but that didn't stop him from hating the man, or from wanting to tear him apart and listen to him scream.

Even worse than that was the fact that if he did so he would be making himself as bad as the Pharaoh had been. This Pharaoh had done nothing to merit his enmity, unless you counted throwing him in the dungeons when he'd tried to kill the god-king, which Bakura felt he probably deserved. Without the voices screaming at him for revenge and pleading to be sent on to the afterlife which had been denied them he could think clearly – clearly enough to realize just how despicable his actions had been.

Swearing, he gave up on trying to reason himself out of it and headed up through the castle to the Great Hall, feeling his wet hair dripping down his back. Things took so long to dry in this cold country. Shivering slightly, he took his accustomed seat next to Myrtle and reached for the food.

"Did you sleep through the bell or something?" Myrtle asked him curiously, pushing away her empty plate. "There's only a few minutes left before we have to leave for our first class."

Despite the fact that he didn't really want to be questioned about this, he smiled. Myrtle was finally starting to think for herself and go after what she wanted. "I lost track of the time," he lied smoothly, digging into his food. "If I hadn't gotten so hungry I don't know whether I would have come down at all." Myrtle laughed, her attention successfully diverted, and changed the subject.

"You know, yesterday in class Professor Binns mentioned something about a split between merpeople and wizards. I didn't know that they had been close once, did you?"

Bakura snorted, and shook his head. "Myrtle, it's my first year and I never even heard of the wizarding world when Dippet found me. How exactly am I supposed to have heard about something like that?" He was smiling though, cheered up by her cheerful attitude and innocent assumption of his goodness. Bakura himself might not have believed that he was a good person, but as far as he could tell Myrtle had never even thought that he might not be, and that was more comforting than he liked to admit.

He shoved the last of his toast into his mouth, nodded to her, and fled, trying to get himself together before the first class. His hands were shaking as he stuffed the last of his books into his bag, grabbed a quill and inkpot and headed out to his first class, and he held them in front of his face as he walked, glaring until he felt his anger burn out the last of the reaction. It had been so long – and at the same time such a little while ago that he had been trying to kill the Pharaoh with a single-minded determination that had scared him even then. Now that he knew the man was still alive how could he not react to it?

The real question, he decided as he took his seat and let his quill take the teacher's dictation, was how could he stop himself from falling into that pattern again? He could feel that it was more than just his own anger that was fueling this desire to kill, but he couldn't tell what, nor was his memory of the past clear enough for him to say whether or not this other force had been active at the time. If he got rid of this presence, however… Bakura smiled, bowing his head to hide the disturbing expression, and made a note to himself. It was time to return to the library.