BLOOD OF THE IMMORTAL,
Chapter 6: "The Song of Ctesias"
By Bill K.
"We have to do something!" howled Pallas. She looked down at
Vesta. The girl was cool and ashen. Her chest barely rose.
"I'm trying, Pallas," Sailor Juno said. She gathered branches and
twigs together, arranging them over Vesta's body. "Ceres, can you grow
some of that moss so this is covered?"
"Yeah," Ceres responded blankly. "But what good will that do?"
"It'll trap her body heat," Juno said distantly. "Keep her from
dying of hypothermia."
"Juno, she's been poisoned!"
"I know that! But if we don't keep her warm, the hypothermia will
get her first!"
Juno gathered more branches together in a pile next to Vesta. She
ripped branches from a nearby bush, enduring scratches that were clearly
painful with stony silence. The girl tore her sailor kerchief from her
neck and wrapped it around the sticks, then took two rocks and snapped
them against each other, trying to produce a spark.
"Juno, Vesta's gonna die!" whimpered Pallas.
"She's not going to die!" roared Juno. "We are not going to let
her die! We've all been through too much!" Juno furiously pounded on
the rocks. By sheer force of will she generated a spark and ignited the
kerchief. Quickly a fire began.
"But how do we stop the poison?" Pallas asked, biting her lip.
"I'm working on it, Pallas," Juno pleaded.
"You don't know, do you?" Pallas whimpered. Juno looked at her
helplessly.
"I know," a voice said timidly.
Pallas turned around. No one seemed to be there.
"Who said that?" Pallas asked.
"Said what?" Ceres queried.
"Somebody said they knew how to stop the poison. Pallas heard
them."
"Do you suppose you 'heard' someone's thoughts?"
"It was like that, but different." Pallas looked down and saw a
small rodent standing by a patch of moss. "Did you talk to me?"
"Pallas, that's a mouse," Ceres grumbled. "I think."
"I did," the rodent said. "If it please you, great one, I can try
to be of assistance."
The girl's face lit up. "Oh yes, Mr. Mousie-Sir! We're ever so
desperate! Pallas doesn't want her big sister to die!"
"Pallas," Ceres scowled. "You're talking - - to a mouse."
"Oh, poo on you!" Pallas barked. "Don't mind her, Mr. Mousie-Sir.
Please tell Pallas how to help Vesta."
The mouse turned and skittered away from them. Pallas followed
diligently. Ceres began to say something, then waved her hand
dismissively.
"Well," the rodent said, hugging the moss beds, "it is said that
the root of the murn bush will stop the poison of the moab." The rodent
hesitated. "I have never seen it with my own eyes, though. Those who
fall to the venom of the moab never live long enough to find one - - at
least none that I have seen. I admit, I have only seen those of my kind
and other prey of the moab fall to the venom. Never have I witnessed
one last so long as your sister." The rodent focused on its path ahead.
"Of course, it should not amaze me. You are gods, after all."
"Pallas isn't a god," giggled Pallas. "She's a girl."
"Here is the murn bush," the rodent said, pointing with its paw to
a sparse brown bush with prickly branches. "But - - forgive me for
disagreeing with you - - but you fought off a moab hunting pride! You
make the wind and the water dance! You make fire from rocks! Surely
you must be gods!"
"Pallas isn't a god," Pallas smiled gently, tugging on the part of
the root exposed to the surface. "Pallas is just special. Sensei tells
her that and he would never lie." Pallas frowned at the bush and then
pointed. "Beautiful Incantation!"
Her telekinetic power seized the bush and ripped it from the
ground. As dirt clods flew, the rodent backed up, awestruck. Pallas
flipped the bush over and dropped it, then broke off a piece of root.
"Come on!" Pallas said, hurrying off. "Pallas has to get this to
Vesta!"
"Truly gods," gasped the rodent, scampering after her.
"What's your name?" Pallas asked as she ran.
"Name? What is name?" the rodent asked.
"A name is what people call you. Or in your case, what the other
mousies call you."
"Call me?"
"You know, who you are."
"I am me," struggled the rodent. "I know nothing else."
"Pallas is very pleased to meet you, Me," Pallas grinned sweetly.
"Pallas hopes she can be your friend."
"Friend?" the rodent asked. "I do not understand."
"Pallas will explain later," Pallas said as they neared the others.
Juno and Ceres were hunched over Vesta. "She's not . . .?" Pallas
gasped.
"Not yet," Juno whispered in defeat.
"Me, what does Pallas do now?" Pallas asked the rodent. Ceres
only stared.
"Put the root in her mouth," Me instructed. "Since she cannot
gnaw on it, she will have to suck on it."
Pallas bent down and forced the root into Vesta's mouth. She
squatted down next to her sister, the rodent by her side.
"What are you doing?" snapped Ceres.
"Pallas is trying to help Vesta get well," Pallas said, her worry
a thing alive.
"What makes you think that'll do anything?" Ceres asked.
"Me told Pallas," Pallas replied.
"What?"
"The Mousie!" huffed Pallas. "His name is Me. He says this will
stop the poison."
"So what is he, a little mouse doctor?" scowled Ceres.
"Pallas doesn't think so," Pallas said blankly. "But she didn't
really ask."
Ceres was about to respond, but Juno caught her arm. "Let her be.
I don't have anything better to try," Juno told her. "Do you?" Ceres
looked down. "Maybe the mouse knows what it's talking about."
"Juno, it's a mouse!" Ceres huffed.
"Stranger things have happened," Juno replied, stroking Vesta's
forehead.
* * * *
Sailor Saturn reached through the narrow bars of her cage, her
fingertips straining for her glaive. The long handle of the blade lay
tantalizingly out of reach. Her arm felt that it was about to pop out
of the shoulder as she stretched for it. It was imperative she reach it.
But the glaive just wouldn't come any closer to her. Out of the corner
of her eye, she could see Sailor Moon straining with her foot to reach
the stone cover over the Crescent Moon Wand that lay on the floor just
out of reach, too. Seeing Sailor Moon's struggles made Saturn try even
harder. She made one last desperate lunge that fell short, then sagged
against the bars.
"I can't reach it," Saturn lamented, slapping the bars in
frustration. "I'm sorry, Sailor Moon."
"Have you tried your mental power?" Sailor Moon asked.
"No. I've never tried to lift anything before. Sensei and I
haven't gotten that far in class yet. I just started." Saturn looked
down, slightly embarrassed. "And I'm still kind of scared to use it."
"It won't hurt to try."
"OK," Saturn said reluctantly.
Concentrating on the glaive, Saturn tried to force her mind to
reach out for it. She strained, hoping to feel the familiar push and at
the same time dreading it. Sweat began to form on her brow. She didn't
want to let her friend down. That seemed to spur her desperation and in
turn kicked her power in gear.
She felt her mind push. The glaive skidded across the floor and
struck the far wall, then came to rest.
"Well that really worked out great," muttered Saturn.
"I fear I am doing no better," Evionne said. She strained again
to pull the bars of her cage apart, to no avail. Frustrated, Evionne
leaned her forehead against the bars. "For all my bluster and anger, I
have done nothing to aid the Chosen One. Nothing!"
"We're not finished yet," Sailor Moon told them, wriggling her
wrists in the manacles in an attempt to slip them. "And Juno and the
others are still around. They haven't been caught - - I don't think."
"You are always so confident," Evionne said. "And everyone trusts
you so. You even managed to turn the evil ones into allies that do your
every whim." Evionne looked down. "He was right to choose you," she
said bitterly. "You have so much more to offer him than I do. All I
have is my eternal devotion to him."
"That's all any man should want," Sailor Moon told her. "Don't
hate yourself, Evionne. What happened between the three of us was never
because you were second rate."
"You even make it difficult to hate you, Princess."
"Well, that's a good thing, too," Sailor Moon grinned
self-consciously. The corners of Evionne's mouth began to curl. The
girls exchanged timid looks and blushing smiles.
Helios began to stir. Everyone held her breath.
"Helios, say something!" Sailor Moon begged.
"I am sorry you were involved in this, Maiden," Helios thought
aloud. The equine shifted weakly. His tone was laced with pain and
fatigue.
"Chosen One, what is all this about? Who is this evil woman?"
asked Evionne.
Helios expelled a sigh. "Ctesias is a sorceress - - a very
powerful sorceress. Her power and knowledge have grown because of her
long life, her research into arcane magicks and her boldness in seizing
power." He sighed again, as if thinking about it burdened him. "But
power and longevity have robbed her of any shred of compassion for
others. All who exist are pawns to her whims. Their suffering is
unimportant in comparison to her desires. Their pain allows her to feel
once more."
"You speak like you know her," Saturn ventured.
"I do not. I was aware of her. Being the guardian of the realm
of dreams gives me access to knowledge from many worlds. I knew of
Ctesias by reputation, of how her lust for power and immortality plunged
this world into corruption and annihilated all who lived here, save for
her and some lower creatures."
"Yeah, we met some of them," Saturn said.
"Immortality?" whispered Evionne. "Chosen One - - you do not mean
. . .?" Helios lowered his head.
"What?" Sailor Moon demanded. "What's Evionne talking about?
What does Ctesias want with you?"
"She wants my blood," Helios replied. Saturn and Sailor Moon
stared in shock. "It is an ancient truth, Maiden. Due to their
pristine innocence, the unicorn was a sacred and divine beast. Because
of this, the blood of the unicorn can bestow prolonged youth and
vitality to those who know how to exploit its properties. Ctesias knows
this all too well."
"Y-Your . . ." Sailor Moon whispered softly, not wanting to even
vocalize the concept. "But you're a pegasus! You're not a unicorn!"
"The blood of the unicorn runs in my veins, Maiden," Helios told
her. "My crystal horn and my equine form are the heritage of that
blood. Though I am not a true unicorn - - they were hunted to
extinction, chief among them by Ctesias herself - - I possess many like
characteristics."
"But the last unicorn sighting was supposedly three thousand years
ago," Saturn said. "How old is Ctesias?"
"Thousands of years old," Helios replied. "Perhaps tens of
thousands. She is older than your mother, Maiden - - older than your
mother's mother. She hunted unicorns for many years to drink their
blood and keep her youth. It was she who killed the last unicorn
centuries ago. His skull is the skull you saw when you entered."
Helios grimaced in pain. "He was my father."
"H-Helios!" gasped Sailor Moon, her heart going out to her love.
"It was a unique romance, possible only in Elysian where all
things are possible," explained Helios, while Evionne hung her head.
"It was a love that spawned and grew between a gentle woman, the chosen
guardian of Elysian - - my mother Candide - - and the last unicorn,
Rysthios, who sought refuge in Elysian when his kind were slaughtered.
She told me stories of his kindness, of his gentleness, of his caring
grace and of his great strength. She told me he was a virtuous soul,
more virtuous than all known virtue. They were very much in love - - so
she told me. I never knew my father."
"What happened?" Sailor Moon asked.
"Mere weeks after my birth, he disappeared. Mother was
devastated. She sensed danger stalked him but, burdened with me, she
could not search for him. In her stead she sent her two temple
man-servants to search. They searched far and wide. They were gone for
years. And through that time she pined for him. She tried to hide her
pain from me, but even at my young age I knew. Then one day she stopped
in the middle of a prayer and began to weep. Her man-servants returned
soon after with no trace of him to report, only to find my mother in
tears. She knew it was too late." Helios paused, gathering his
emotions. "She cried for many days after that. She said she knew he
was dead. She did not know who or where or how or why, but she knew.
Mother lavished even more love upon me to make up for the love she could
no longer give to my father. As I grew older, though, I wished I could
sacrifice some of the love she gave me if it would only fill the hole in
her heart."
Saturn wiped tears from her eyes. She glanced at Evionne. The
temple maiden knew the tale and only bowed her head in respect.
"She's not going to kill you!" Sailor Moon said, straining at her
shackles. "I won't allow it!"
"She will not kill me, Maiden," Helios said in resignation.
"Since my blood is not pure unicorn, its effects do not last. But I am
the last of my kind, so she has nowhere else to turn."
"What's she going to do?" Sailor Moon asked fearfully.
"She plans to keep me alive for all eternity," he told her gently,
"to bleed me when she begins to feel her many years." The pegasus
shuddered. "I will become her captive fountain of youth. And the true
horror is that time passes differently in this place. A day here is as
a moment elsewhere. I have already spent so much time here, alone and
without hope - - and it is but the first moment of the rest of my
eternity."
The girls looked on helplessly.
"And now you are in her clutches as well, doomed to an eternity of
debasement and servitude. And we do not even have the release of death
to look forward to."
Sailor Moon looked at her love, wishing she could do something,
anything to help him. She heard the words of her mother, warning her.
"Not every person in the universe is a nice person." Understated words,
but oh so true. In her blind arrogance and headlong concern for Helios,
she'd ignored the warning and was now paying for it. And what was
worse, so was Helios and Saturn and Evionne.
What she wouldn't give to see her mother and father now.
In her throne room, Ctesias watched the prisoners in her dungeon
through a mystic portal. She absently stroked the moab on her lap while
she watched. Her eyes twinkled in the low light and her mouth pulled
back to reveal white teeth. The feline uttered a low, gutteral sound
that could have been a purr.
"Soon," Ctesias told the feline. "Soon I will come for this
pampered little princess. But she must give way to the hopelessness of
her situation first. I wish to taste her sweet despair. Her horror and
her desperation are but the first ingredients of the wondrous soufflé I
am preparing."
"May I kill the other two?" the creature asked. Ctesias heard him
through the wonders of her magic. The feline stared up at her,
inquiring and hopeful.
"No," she smiled, stroking the cat creature's fur, "you may not
kill the others. Watching them slowly whither away to nothing will make
her pain last that much longer. It will not be as intense as if she
helplessly watched you rend her friends, but it will be more
satisfying."
The feline seemed to growl petulantly at her. "May I at least eat
them when they are dead?" he ventured.
"Yes, my greedy little moab," and she scratched him under his
chin. "You may eat them when they are dead. And you may eat them in
front of the Princess and her consort, too. Her reaction will amuse
me."
The moab seemed mollified momentarily. Then the feline let out a
low warning tone. "What if the others come?"
"What of it? I do not concern myself with lessers," Ctesias said
haughtily. "Should they try to rescue their Princess, I will destroy
them. If they do not, I will not concern myself with them." She looked
down from her portal to the moab. "Do you grow restless again?"
"It has been a while," he replied reproachfully. The moab glanced
up at her, content in his right to feel as he did.
"One day you will overstep yourself, little moab," Ctesias said,
smiling cynically. "Very well."
She snapped her fingers once and some thirty feet in the distance
one of the rodents from outside appeared. Disoriented, it looked
around, its nose sniffing the air, until a blur of motion and a quick
whiff told it that a moab stalked it. Instantly the rodent was off
across the floor, scurrying for any cover it could turn up, the moab
scampering after it. As she watched her pet chase the rodent through
the room, Ctesias felt the young dragon land and perch atop her throne.
Lazily she stuck her hand up into the air. The dragon caught a finger
in its beak and gave it a painful twist, then nuzzled the hand with its
cheek.
"Watch closely, dragon," Ctesias said. "You're going to get your
first lesson in hunting and killing."
The dragon peered down with keen interest.
Continued in chapter 7
Chapter 6: "The Song of Ctesias"
By Bill K.
"We have to do something!" howled Pallas. She looked down at
Vesta. The girl was cool and ashen. Her chest barely rose.
"I'm trying, Pallas," Sailor Juno said. She gathered branches and
twigs together, arranging them over Vesta's body. "Ceres, can you grow
some of that moss so this is covered?"
"Yeah," Ceres responded blankly. "But what good will that do?"
"It'll trap her body heat," Juno said distantly. "Keep her from
dying of hypothermia."
"Juno, she's been poisoned!"
"I know that! But if we don't keep her warm, the hypothermia will
get her first!"
Juno gathered more branches together in a pile next to Vesta. She
ripped branches from a nearby bush, enduring scratches that were clearly
painful with stony silence. The girl tore her sailor kerchief from her
neck and wrapped it around the sticks, then took two rocks and snapped
them against each other, trying to produce a spark.
"Juno, Vesta's gonna die!" whimpered Pallas.
"She's not going to die!" roared Juno. "We are not going to let
her die! We've all been through too much!" Juno furiously pounded on
the rocks. By sheer force of will she generated a spark and ignited the
kerchief. Quickly a fire began.
"But how do we stop the poison?" Pallas asked, biting her lip.
"I'm working on it, Pallas," Juno pleaded.
"You don't know, do you?" Pallas whimpered. Juno looked at her
helplessly.
"I know," a voice said timidly.
Pallas turned around. No one seemed to be there.
"Who said that?" Pallas asked.
"Said what?" Ceres queried.
"Somebody said they knew how to stop the poison. Pallas heard
them."
"Do you suppose you 'heard' someone's thoughts?"
"It was like that, but different." Pallas looked down and saw a
small rodent standing by a patch of moss. "Did you talk to me?"
"Pallas, that's a mouse," Ceres grumbled. "I think."
"I did," the rodent said. "If it please you, great one, I can try
to be of assistance."
The girl's face lit up. "Oh yes, Mr. Mousie-Sir! We're ever so
desperate! Pallas doesn't want her big sister to die!"
"Pallas," Ceres scowled. "You're talking - - to a mouse."
"Oh, poo on you!" Pallas barked. "Don't mind her, Mr. Mousie-Sir.
Please tell Pallas how to help Vesta."
The mouse turned and skittered away from them. Pallas followed
diligently. Ceres began to say something, then waved her hand
dismissively.
"Well," the rodent said, hugging the moss beds, "it is said that
the root of the murn bush will stop the poison of the moab." The rodent
hesitated. "I have never seen it with my own eyes, though. Those who
fall to the venom of the moab never live long enough to find one - - at
least none that I have seen. I admit, I have only seen those of my kind
and other prey of the moab fall to the venom. Never have I witnessed
one last so long as your sister." The rodent focused on its path ahead.
"Of course, it should not amaze me. You are gods, after all."
"Pallas isn't a god," giggled Pallas. "She's a girl."
"Here is the murn bush," the rodent said, pointing with its paw to
a sparse brown bush with prickly branches. "But - - forgive me for
disagreeing with you - - but you fought off a moab hunting pride! You
make the wind and the water dance! You make fire from rocks! Surely
you must be gods!"
"Pallas isn't a god," Pallas smiled gently, tugging on the part of
the root exposed to the surface. "Pallas is just special. Sensei tells
her that and he would never lie." Pallas frowned at the bush and then
pointed. "Beautiful Incantation!"
Her telekinetic power seized the bush and ripped it from the
ground. As dirt clods flew, the rodent backed up, awestruck. Pallas
flipped the bush over and dropped it, then broke off a piece of root.
"Come on!" Pallas said, hurrying off. "Pallas has to get this to
Vesta!"
"Truly gods," gasped the rodent, scampering after her.
"What's your name?" Pallas asked as she ran.
"Name? What is name?" the rodent asked.
"A name is what people call you. Or in your case, what the other
mousies call you."
"Call me?"
"You know, who you are."
"I am me," struggled the rodent. "I know nothing else."
"Pallas is very pleased to meet you, Me," Pallas grinned sweetly.
"Pallas hopes she can be your friend."
"Friend?" the rodent asked. "I do not understand."
"Pallas will explain later," Pallas said as they neared the others.
Juno and Ceres were hunched over Vesta. "She's not . . .?" Pallas
gasped.
"Not yet," Juno whispered in defeat.
"Me, what does Pallas do now?" Pallas asked the rodent. Ceres
only stared.
"Put the root in her mouth," Me instructed. "Since she cannot
gnaw on it, she will have to suck on it."
Pallas bent down and forced the root into Vesta's mouth. She
squatted down next to her sister, the rodent by her side.
"What are you doing?" snapped Ceres.
"Pallas is trying to help Vesta get well," Pallas said, her worry
a thing alive.
"What makes you think that'll do anything?" Ceres asked.
"Me told Pallas," Pallas replied.
"What?"
"The Mousie!" huffed Pallas. "His name is Me. He says this will
stop the poison."
"So what is he, a little mouse doctor?" scowled Ceres.
"Pallas doesn't think so," Pallas said blankly. "But she didn't
really ask."
Ceres was about to respond, but Juno caught her arm. "Let her be.
I don't have anything better to try," Juno told her. "Do you?" Ceres
looked down. "Maybe the mouse knows what it's talking about."
"Juno, it's a mouse!" Ceres huffed.
"Stranger things have happened," Juno replied, stroking Vesta's
forehead.
* * * *
Sailor Saturn reached through the narrow bars of her cage, her
fingertips straining for her glaive. The long handle of the blade lay
tantalizingly out of reach. Her arm felt that it was about to pop out
of the shoulder as she stretched for it. It was imperative she reach it.
But the glaive just wouldn't come any closer to her. Out of the corner
of her eye, she could see Sailor Moon straining with her foot to reach
the stone cover over the Crescent Moon Wand that lay on the floor just
out of reach, too. Seeing Sailor Moon's struggles made Saturn try even
harder. She made one last desperate lunge that fell short, then sagged
against the bars.
"I can't reach it," Saturn lamented, slapping the bars in
frustration. "I'm sorry, Sailor Moon."
"Have you tried your mental power?" Sailor Moon asked.
"No. I've never tried to lift anything before. Sensei and I
haven't gotten that far in class yet. I just started." Saturn looked
down, slightly embarrassed. "And I'm still kind of scared to use it."
"It won't hurt to try."
"OK," Saturn said reluctantly.
Concentrating on the glaive, Saturn tried to force her mind to
reach out for it. She strained, hoping to feel the familiar push and at
the same time dreading it. Sweat began to form on her brow. She didn't
want to let her friend down. That seemed to spur her desperation and in
turn kicked her power in gear.
She felt her mind push. The glaive skidded across the floor and
struck the far wall, then came to rest.
"Well that really worked out great," muttered Saturn.
"I fear I am doing no better," Evionne said. She strained again
to pull the bars of her cage apart, to no avail. Frustrated, Evionne
leaned her forehead against the bars. "For all my bluster and anger, I
have done nothing to aid the Chosen One. Nothing!"
"We're not finished yet," Sailor Moon told them, wriggling her
wrists in the manacles in an attempt to slip them. "And Juno and the
others are still around. They haven't been caught - - I don't think."
"You are always so confident," Evionne said. "And everyone trusts
you so. You even managed to turn the evil ones into allies that do your
every whim." Evionne looked down. "He was right to choose you," she
said bitterly. "You have so much more to offer him than I do. All I
have is my eternal devotion to him."
"That's all any man should want," Sailor Moon told her. "Don't
hate yourself, Evionne. What happened between the three of us was never
because you were second rate."
"You even make it difficult to hate you, Princess."
"Well, that's a good thing, too," Sailor Moon grinned
self-consciously. The corners of Evionne's mouth began to curl. The
girls exchanged timid looks and blushing smiles.
Helios began to stir. Everyone held her breath.
"Helios, say something!" Sailor Moon begged.
"I am sorry you were involved in this, Maiden," Helios thought
aloud. The equine shifted weakly. His tone was laced with pain and
fatigue.
"Chosen One, what is all this about? Who is this evil woman?"
asked Evionne.
Helios expelled a sigh. "Ctesias is a sorceress - - a very
powerful sorceress. Her power and knowledge have grown because of her
long life, her research into arcane magicks and her boldness in seizing
power." He sighed again, as if thinking about it burdened him. "But
power and longevity have robbed her of any shred of compassion for
others. All who exist are pawns to her whims. Their suffering is
unimportant in comparison to her desires. Their pain allows her to feel
once more."
"You speak like you know her," Saturn ventured.
"I do not. I was aware of her. Being the guardian of the realm
of dreams gives me access to knowledge from many worlds. I knew of
Ctesias by reputation, of how her lust for power and immortality plunged
this world into corruption and annihilated all who lived here, save for
her and some lower creatures."
"Yeah, we met some of them," Saturn said.
"Immortality?" whispered Evionne. "Chosen One - - you do not mean
. . .?" Helios lowered his head.
"What?" Sailor Moon demanded. "What's Evionne talking about?
What does Ctesias want with you?"
"She wants my blood," Helios replied. Saturn and Sailor Moon
stared in shock. "It is an ancient truth, Maiden. Due to their
pristine innocence, the unicorn was a sacred and divine beast. Because
of this, the blood of the unicorn can bestow prolonged youth and
vitality to those who know how to exploit its properties. Ctesias knows
this all too well."
"Y-Your . . ." Sailor Moon whispered softly, not wanting to even
vocalize the concept. "But you're a pegasus! You're not a unicorn!"
"The blood of the unicorn runs in my veins, Maiden," Helios told
her. "My crystal horn and my equine form are the heritage of that
blood. Though I am not a true unicorn - - they were hunted to
extinction, chief among them by Ctesias herself - - I possess many like
characteristics."
"But the last unicorn sighting was supposedly three thousand years
ago," Saturn said. "How old is Ctesias?"
"Thousands of years old," Helios replied. "Perhaps tens of
thousands. She is older than your mother, Maiden - - older than your
mother's mother. She hunted unicorns for many years to drink their
blood and keep her youth. It was she who killed the last unicorn
centuries ago. His skull is the skull you saw when you entered."
Helios grimaced in pain. "He was my father."
"H-Helios!" gasped Sailor Moon, her heart going out to her love.
"It was a unique romance, possible only in Elysian where all
things are possible," explained Helios, while Evionne hung her head.
"It was a love that spawned and grew between a gentle woman, the chosen
guardian of Elysian - - my mother Candide - - and the last unicorn,
Rysthios, who sought refuge in Elysian when his kind were slaughtered.
She told me stories of his kindness, of his gentleness, of his caring
grace and of his great strength. She told me he was a virtuous soul,
more virtuous than all known virtue. They were very much in love - - so
she told me. I never knew my father."
"What happened?" Sailor Moon asked.
"Mere weeks after my birth, he disappeared. Mother was
devastated. She sensed danger stalked him but, burdened with me, she
could not search for him. In her stead she sent her two temple
man-servants to search. They searched far and wide. They were gone for
years. And through that time she pined for him. She tried to hide her
pain from me, but even at my young age I knew. Then one day she stopped
in the middle of a prayer and began to weep. Her man-servants returned
soon after with no trace of him to report, only to find my mother in
tears. She knew it was too late." Helios paused, gathering his
emotions. "She cried for many days after that. She said she knew he
was dead. She did not know who or where or how or why, but she knew.
Mother lavished even more love upon me to make up for the love she could
no longer give to my father. As I grew older, though, I wished I could
sacrifice some of the love she gave me if it would only fill the hole in
her heart."
Saturn wiped tears from her eyes. She glanced at Evionne. The
temple maiden knew the tale and only bowed her head in respect.
"She's not going to kill you!" Sailor Moon said, straining at her
shackles. "I won't allow it!"
"She will not kill me, Maiden," Helios said in resignation.
"Since my blood is not pure unicorn, its effects do not last. But I am
the last of my kind, so she has nowhere else to turn."
"What's she going to do?" Sailor Moon asked fearfully.
"She plans to keep me alive for all eternity," he told her gently,
"to bleed me when she begins to feel her many years." The pegasus
shuddered. "I will become her captive fountain of youth. And the true
horror is that time passes differently in this place. A day here is as
a moment elsewhere. I have already spent so much time here, alone and
without hope - - and it is but the first moment of the rest of my
eternity."
The girls looked on helplessly.
"And now you are in her clutches as well, doomed to an eternity of
debasement and servitude. And we do not even have the release of death
to look forward to."
Sailor Moon looked at her love, wishing she could do something,
anything to help him. She heard the words of her mother, warning her.
"Not every person in the universe is a nice person." Understated words,
but oh so true. In her blind arrogance and headlong concern for Helios,
she'd ignored the warning and was now paying for it. And what was
worse, so was Helios and Saturn and Evionne.
What she wouldn't give to see her mother and father now.
In her throne room, Ctesias watched the prisoners in her dungeon
through a mystic portal. She absently stroked the moab on her lap while
she watched. Her eyes twinkled in the low light and her mouth pulled
back to reveal white teeth. The feline uttered a low, gutteral sound
that could have been a purr.
"Soon," Ctesias told the feline. "Soon I will come for this
pampered little princess. But she must give way to the hopelessness of
her situation first. I wish to taste her sweet despair. Her horror and
her desperation are but the first ingredients of the wondrous soufflé I
am preparing."
"May I kill the other two?" the creature asked. Ctesias heard him
through the wonders of her magic. The feline stared up at her,
inquiring and hopeful.
"No," she smiled, stroking the cat creature's fur, "you may not
kill the others. Watching them slowly whither away to nothing will make
her pain last that much longer. It will not be as intense as if she
helplessly watched you rend her friends, but it will be more
satisfying."
The feline seemed to growl petulantly at her. "May I at least eat
them when they are dead?" he ventured.
"Yes, my greedy little moab," and she scratched him under his
chin. "You may eat them when they are dead. And you may eat them in
front of the Princess and her consort, too. Her reaction will amuse
me."
The moab seemed mollified momentarily. Then the feline let out a
low warning tone. "What if the others come?"
"What of it? I do not concern myself with lessers," Ctesias said
haughtily. "Should they try to rescue their Princess, I will destroy
them. If they do not, I will not concern myself with them." She looked
down from her portal to the moab. "Do you grow restless again?"
"It has been a while," he replied reproachfully. The moab glanced
up at her, content in his right to feel as he did.
"One day you will overstep yourself, little moab," Ctesias said,
smiling cynically. "Very well."
She snapped her fingers once and some thirty feet in the distance
one of the rodents from outside appeared. Disoriented, it looked
around, its nose sniffing the air, until a blur of motion and a quick
whiff told it that a moab stalked it. Instantly the rodent was off
across the floor, scurrying for any cover it could turn up, the moab
scampering after it. As she watched her pet chase the rodent through
the room, Ctesias felt the young dragon land and perch atop her throne.
Lazily she stuck her hand up into the air. The dragon caught a finger
in its beak and gave it a painful twist, then nuzzled the hand with its
cheek.
"Watch closely, dragon," Ctesias said. "You're going to get your
first lesson in hunting and killing."
The dragon peered down with keen interest.
Continued in chapter 7