/ ! \ : The gaps in between the writing indicate a point-of-view change. Also, there is a warning of violence/gore for those of you who are a little like Eustace and do not like hearing about battles and the horrible wounds that come with them. (the injuries are a little more extreme than past chapters) ;)
The message was clear and direct. It was the answer to all.
Corner and kill.
Two words that explained everything and left no questions unanswered. It was a mission now, a task that was left in the hands of Graydon. The Magi had entrusted him with this job that would make everyone in all the Realms mutter his name in horror and fear, and the Dark Magician simply could not resist to have that ego spread like a horrible plague.
His feet cut through the earthy path like a newly sharpened sword. His pace quick and silent, making a gust of wind rush and disturb sleeping leaves every time he turned past a hedge's end. After what felt like miles and miles of endless passageways, Graydon had spotted what he was looking for. His long, ugly fingernails dug into the bark of the tree he was hiding behind, his prey completely unaware it was being watched.
The golden-haired Anveena had found herself terribly uncomfortable sleeping that evening. Everything ached and hurt as if she had preformed some sort of intense labor just a few hours earlier, her brain was restless not in thought, but in exhausting emptiness. She thought perhaps fresh, night air would diminish the thick barrier that blocked her from the good-night sleep she needed. Knowing no one would be out at this hour, she threw on a soft, warm robe to cover her flimsy night attire before stepping out.
The moon's glow was incredibly bright this night. It's cold, silvery light scorched her sleepy eyes, keeping them open wide in irritation. The Empress was beginning to think that it would have been better just to walk around the empty halls instead of coming out here under this horrible shine, but she never could walk around the halls anymore at night. Not since a haunting night of not so long ago when Dark had broken into the castle. Against her will, the memory began to play out in front of her eyes again; taunting her, making her feel like the most despicable vermin in the world. Was that why she was so protective of the oldest Prince? To make up for not trying to stop the snake?
No. She thought to herself, shaking her head. Your fault or not, you wouldn't have gone about it any other way then you are right now. That reassurance had made her cool again as she slouched comfortably on the cool concrete rim of the fountain, staring up at the enormous lion, who drooled water from his mighty mouth into the pool below his pedestal. A small smile had bent her lips.
"Irony." She mumbled as her eyes blinked away.
Graydon kept his eye on his victim like any predator should if it expects to make a kill. He stepped out from his hiding spot and paused, making sure his quarry hadn't noticed something move out of the corner of its eye. Again, another step and pause. No response. Another two steps, his hands slowly bending up in front of him as he thought of the perfect spell to snare in his prey. He began to deliberate. Fast or slow kill? Quick and clean or quick and bloody? Just an easy slit or a vicious stabbing?
A loud, piercing scream had made Graydon return to reality. He had turned his attention away from his catch for only just a moment. A great mistake. A white, orb light blinded the Dark Magician. He felt his body accelerate, flying back into the cutting brambles and branches of a tall bush. His first thought was to regain himself but found he was stuck to the hedge, for it had come to life and bound him up to itself.
Graydon hissed and spat curses at his prey for outsmarting him.
The catch that got away spoke. "Silence yourself!" She ordered, approaching the Magician who was dangling in the air, restrained by rough, tight boughs of the hedge. "I sensed you the whole time, Graydon. Did you honestly think you could just sneak up on the Empress as if she was a dumb beast? Well, you stand corrected."
"Let all the horrors of the world fall upon you, spoiled witch! May your children die from a disease that turns their corrupt blood into dust and let the Lord of Hell call upon your ruthless husband tonight as he sleeps!" Graydon howled at her, angered that her majesty was already gloating of her greatness right in front of his face.
"I give you two options, follower of the Serpent. Either I let you free and you return to wherever you came from or I kill you right here. What is your decision?"
Her answer hit the Empress right in the face. An enormous, gross, wet glob of spit was shot straight at her, muddling her eyesight. It fizzled like boiling water as the disgusting saliva remained on her face before she took in the fact she was just spit at. A quick motion of her sleeve wiped off the demeaning gesture. The amber in her irises began to boil and swirl like a horrible cauldron of gold brew.
"Death it is then." She restated, confirming Graydon's answer.
"Yes." He answered quietly, his voice coming from the shadow of the hood he wore. Anveena could not see the malicious look in his eyes. As she spoke, his foot was able to slip out of the hold of one of the branches, the Empress' magic hadn't noticed the sneaky move. "For you!"
He pulled his weight back, generating enough momentum and force to kick his free leg up. He hit Anveena square in the chest, knocking the wind out of her. Her spell dissipated instantly and the Dark Magician was free.
His clammy, white hands violently grabbed the golden locks of her Majesty's hair, pulling ruthlessly even when she screamed for him to stop. "I will show you how to fear the Darkness, Empress Anveena." He whispered into her ear.
"And I will show you how to fear me." she threw her hand out until she was able to feel his bony chest. Graydon was thrown back again, plunging into the freezing cold water of the fountain. He felt a horrible pain inside his rib cage, a scorching, burning feeling like is heart had caught fire and the blaze was burning him from the inside out.
The Dark Magician howled in pain, violently convulsing in the water like a dying fish. Anveena watched, waiting for the intruder to fall to his awaiting death.
Dark! My Magi, My lord. Help me! Graydon cried in his thoughts to his master. There was no response. The follower of the snake was on his own, Dark was not going to attend to him like an overprotective parent. It was at that realization the Dark Magician shook away his panic and said a spell that rid the pain from his chest. A cold sensation came over the burned organs, resetting them to their original, healthy state.
Graydon leapt out of the water and faced the Empress again, she stood unmoved and focused a few feet away. Her gold eyes always on him.
The Dark Magician moved first. His cloak fell as if he had just used a vanishing spell. However, something had caught the cloth midway into its drop, a large, hunched figure judging by the silhouette made by the black shroud. A low growling sound rippled as a thin, long muzzle popped out from under Graydon's cloak. It's face, then front legs, and the whole rest appeared in the moonlight. A grey beast, the size of an Alsatian with great white teeth and deep brown eyes. Wolf.
The beast charged, snarling madly as drool foamed from the blackened gums of his teeth. His opponent did not move, she stood as tall and fearless as she was before. He grinned in delight seeing she wasn't fleeing in fear. The Empress must have truly been stupid, she must have wanted to kill herself. Once the wolf was close enough, he squat down onto his back paws and then pounced into the air towards her majesty. His mouth gaping open now, in moments about to bite and strangle his opponent's beautiful thin neck.
Graydon felt the earth back on his paws as he landed. In disbelief, he turned back, thinking to see the back of Anveena. There was no one there. She had vanished, disappeared. The easiest trick known to harvesters of magic and Graydon fell for it.
Find her. Dark's threatening voice came into his head. You must get to her before she gets to the Emperor.
The Empress ran through the castle halls, her slippers clicking quietly on the marble floors. Her fright and anxiousness made her forgetful of where she was going. Kalecgos! She thought multiple times over, trying to find the enormous, double doors that led to the Emperor's chambers. Must get to Kalec. Sweat was dripping down her forehead into her eyes. She panted hard and unevenly. The shadows of night that lingered in the halls heightened her paranoia; even with the guide of the lighted chandeliers Anveena felt she was running blindly through a never-ending maze, there was no way out. No way out.
She noticed a huge gap of moonlight coming up around the bend of the hallway. A full wall of the hall was panes of stained glass windows, each one showing the image of one of the Magi, the Emperors, or their heirs. She was nearing the council room, if she continued this route she could lock herself in there and then clear her mind to think of what to do next. She wasted no time bickering with her mind about it, the Empress was now functioning on pure impulse. Save yourself now, worry of what to do later.
The unexpected explosion of the window just in front of her made Anveena halt dead in her tracks. The red, blue, yellow, green shards of glass went flying into the air; the moon's rays giving them one last glisten before they shattered on the floor and perished. The Empress covered her ears as the bombarding continued. It went on until all the panes were broken and a sea of glass engrossed the floor around her Majesty's feet.
Silence now. Instinct kicked in again and it sent the Empress running over the glass pieces on the floor, her footing cautious to not step on a sharp edge of a shard. She neared the end of the river of broken panes when something had unsuspectingly grabbed her from one of the open windows.
A rush of pain made her scrunch her face up in restraint when she felt herself hit the floor. Her arms, her back, even her neck were all cut from the shards scattered on the ground. Her head throbbed, probably from the force of slamming into the floor but it didn't seem any glass had cut her there.
The Dark Magician stood over Anveena. Her beautiful face twisted in worry and agony, it was a look Graydon couldn't help but smile at. Finally, the Empress looked like a true human; vulnerable and powerless. Her regal air had all but dissolved and she stared into his eyes.
"Come now, Anveena, you'll have to do much better than that." He snickered as his form began to change again.
The Empress heaved herself up, despite how much it hurt. Hastily, she mumbled a healing spell to herself. The blood clotted and then the cuts faded all together. As she looked back up to Graydon she froze. Fear itself lingered around her and a nightmare come to life was standing before her. Something she had never seen before but something that could only be created by Hell's king himself.
This monster stood amongst a cloud of smoke that smelled like rotting corpses. It had the body of a man but it's face was replaced with the head of a bird of prey. Oily, black feathers were plastered to its face and body. It's beak long and curved at the end and then a pair of huge eyes, like that of an owl's, that were like the color of hot lava that ringed the entire kingdom of Hell. The creature had four, bony, elongated arms. All five fingers were replaced with sharp, black talons; so sharp they could cut a block of steel in half.
The thing rose it's head up and gave a piercing screech like that of its bird-like appearance. Anveena cupped her ears and shut her eyes. Graydon must have been mad to dare take the form of a dweller of Hell.
The creature was renowned in many stories of the followers of Dark. It was considered the most cold-blooded being in all the Realms. It was a minion of the Lord of Hell, which meant its diet retained to the greatest piece of creation the Nameless Emperor gave birth to. It only ate man's blood; both magically gifted and not. It only acted on torture and torment. It will kill someone for no reason. It had no thoughts, no reason; only instinct, and that single instinct was to kill.
It spoke the tongue of its home country, a language Anveena was proud she wasn't fluent in. Its first arm rose high above its head, just barley touching the arched ceiling. The Empress watched the huge talons, saw them speeding towards her. She spun herself away of the demon's attack, hearing the painful sound of its claws digging into the hard floor. It jerked fiercely, trying to free its arm. The creature hadn't realized the marble floor had molded around its hand. It was trapped.
The monster squawked in frustration, its bird eye at times glancing over towards the Empress to make sure its prey hadn't gotten away. It continued to try and pull its arm free but finding the struggle to be a failure. Its huge bird eye focused on Anveena again. This was of her doing. She outsmarted it, and now she was too dumbstruck to flee for her life. Oh, once its hand was free she would regret not running away when she had the chance!
That time came quickly. A bolt of gold was approaching the creature, only making itself visible when it came into beams of the outside light and then hid again in the shadows of the walls. It moved at incredible speed and when it was on top of the demon, it struck the creature with unbelievable force. Whatever had came at the demon now had it against the ground, pinning four arms out of seven. The bird-monster could just see its eighth arm still cemented into the floor, a puddle of murky, soiled blood dripping from the frayed flesh on the end of its limb. It dangled without life but still stood straight up as if it hadn't realized it was torn off from the rest of its previous body.
"Aslan!" The Empress muttered in disbelief, seeing the Lion standing over the devilish creature with such fearlessness in his face that he looked like one of the holy warrior angels themselves slaying the creature.
"Begone, monster!" The Prince snarled as he pressed his paws harder on the demon's arms to stop its struggling. "And take your unlawful business with you, in the name of Jesu, and the Great-Emperor-Beyond-the-Sea!"
"It's far too late for that." It replied in the language the Prince and his mother could understand. Aslan stared into the horrible eyes of the bird-demon. Its eyes burned like the flames of hell, it had the look of the Lord of Hell himself in them. They showed him all the evil in the world; everything he had ever known to be wrong, all that stained the goodness of life with unholy, evil motives. He could feel the trace of coldness tinge the air, gusts of winds blowing at him mercilessly. The smell of rotting corpses charred his nose. Flames danced around him, people screaming, spitting, cursing! Blood being thrown into the air in joyous celebration. What the great cat saw was scarred in his memory for all of time. The monster's eye who allowed him to see this evil also lived on in his mind, evoking a sense of fright and nervousness every time the slightest thought of the creature crossed his thoughts.
The monster reached out his free arm towards the Lion. It was able to scratch him, leaving five red streaks of blood right across his shoulder. The great cat pulled back his grip, unintentionally allowing the demon to move once more. It towered over the great cat, its shadow draping Aslan's form in darkness. The Lion hunched down low onto his paws, his huge eyes watching the demon bird as it raised one of its many arms.
The lunge was too slow for the Lion. The Prince pounced forward well out of the way of a red spark of magic that shot out from the middle of the monster's hand. The Lion rammed himself into the chest of the demon. It fell back; not realizing a spell was put on the carpet of glass behind it to make the pieces raise their blades up like quills on a fighting porcupine.
The soft sound of choking stifled through the creature's sharp beak. Its blood seeping out and staining the colored glass that were lodged deep into the monster's coarse skin.
"You missed." Aslan panted, pressing his paw onto his opponent's body, causing the shards to slice farther into the demon, making it squeal. The Lion curled his lips back to show his white canines, ready to give the final blow.
The demon-bird chirped its final words in an exhausting whisper, its large eyes glowing with triumph.
"I missed you."
The great cat had paused and took in what this creature said. It was then that Aslan's eyes grew larger than they ever were as his regal face turned back to where the Empress was originally sitting.
The petrified roar from the Prince made the monster chuckle in pleasure. Well done, Graydon. Dark's words hissed proudly in the Dark Magician's thoughts. The monster began to slowly disintegrate, vanishing in the shadows of what would soon become the place of death. Graydon was gone, returned to wherever he came from and left no remains of his presence on the floor. Well done.
"Mother!" The great cat called in anxiety as he padded up to the Empress with incredible haste. The bird-demon's magic was cast upon her. She was thrown off into a corner away from the sea of broken glass, huddled within herself like she was outside in the middle of winter. Aslan continued calling out to Anveena until he had finally gotten a response.
"Aslan." The Empress mumbled weakly. She opened herself up, revealing a long, red stain on her white robe.
"You're hurt!" He exclaimed in fright, seeing that the blood was begging to seep slowly into the cracks in the marble floor. "Mother, hold still I can reverse this."
The Lion nudged his muzzle to the gash but felt her hand push it away in protest. "No, Aslan." She said solemnly, her hand gently stroking his now red nose. "This is what was meant to happen."
"No!" The Prince snarled in a mix of upset and frustration. "Mother please, do not speak such words! I will not let you die not like this."
"I know what I am doing, son." She said calmly, her hand now running through his mane in the way only a mother would- to soothe her frightened child. "You have to trust me for this must be done."
"Mother," Aslan whispered as he curled up beside her, his face next to hers. The huge, sparkling lion tears rolling off his long nose. The Empress looked into her eldest son's liquid gold eyes, her eyes.
"Shh," She hushed soothingly as her hands wiped his large drops of tears away. "Courage, my beloved Aslan, courage. Be the Prince that your father and I raised you to be. Promise me you will not avert from your path, my Second Jesu."
"Of course." He answered, nudging her cheek.
"And Aslan?"
"Mother?"
"The dream..."
"What dream?"
"Your dream."
"Yes, what about it?"
"Promise me you will see it through?" The Empress requested, struggling to keep her voice just at a whisper. The Lion felt her touch becoming colder against his warm fur. "It was always such a beautiful dream to me, my dear, such a-." Her eyes began to flutter as she strived to allow time to keep her away from the Shadows for just a few moments longer.
"Yes! Yes! I will." The Lion quickly responded, thinking if he answered her fast enough that her life would be spared. "I will create it, please, Mother, do not leave me just yet.''
"I love you, my darling." Anveena smiled, her eyes beginning to look filmy. "Be proud of what you are for it was what you always were-even when you didn't actually look it. Tell Stelan and your Father that I love them both as well."
Aslan found himself lost for words staring into his conceiver's pale face. His wet tears stained and matted the fur around his eyes.
"I will. I love you, Mother. I can never thank you enough for everything you had ever done for me. Mum-" Aslan felt if he said anymore he would be able to control himself. Instead, he pressed his body closer to her own, not caring when he felt the hot liquid blood splash at his paws. He laid his great head beside hers, quietly breathing into her own golden mane. "I will not leave you tonight."
There was no answer from the Empress.
Hours and hours seemed to go by in this dead calm, Aslan barely noticing the body of Anveena slowly becoming colder and colder. There was no sound except the quiet weeping of the Lion as he kept vigil of his mother. He placed a heavy paw over her shoulder and hugged his conceiver one last time. The sorrow that hung in the air is something that simply cannot be written in words but felt for ourselves. This was how our Lion felt now. There was nothing more he felt he could do except watch over his dying mother, just as she did two times before as he stood on the verge of death.
Eventually, the silence and loneliness had lulled the great cat to sleep. Morning's light appeared silently and slowly to the sleeping isle, awakening Mohthelieum with the echoes of a mourning Great Emperor and his youngest son as they were the first to find the Prince huddled beside the dead Empress Anveena in a pool of her blood. The very same blood that ringed about Aslan's great muzzle where shining tears were still spilling out from his exhausted and heartbroken golden eyes.
A/N: Anyone want to guess what 'Madi Ao' means?
-Second to last paragraph has descriptions found in The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. Most of that paragraph is C.S. Lewis' with a few alterations of my own. Thank you for reading and don't forget to review!