Authoress's Note: OKAY! We're back after a very long wait! Well, I had the play to do, which is why this didn't get updated. Our school did The Sounds of Music. I was the Reverend Mother. On top of that, I had to dress people during quick costume changes, so I have had no time to do anything but homework, play, and flute lately. Now I have so much time after school that I hardly know what I can do with it… maybe get a little farther on the third part…
Well, this is the debut of Part II, and thank you to everyone who has been reading this. Oh, and if you have not already guessed, Pegasus is bi. There will be a lot more homosexual relationships in this part, but they are also kind of key to the plot. ; - ) I also probably don't need to say that Pegasus still loves Cynthia, and that will be a key thing that prevents him from doing things in this part.
Disclaimer: I do not own "Yu-Gi-Oh," but I do own this poem I will be using fragments of during this part of the story.
Now sit back, enjoy, and become one with the Force…
"A glance – then he is gone,
A phantom of the ancient past."
– From "The White Shadow," written by me.
The underground labyrinth was as silent as the grave, and I blundered blindly through it with noting to guide me but my weak feet. Fatigued, beaten and famished; they had done all they could to prevent my escape.
A man's spirit can be broken very easily.
Broken, maybe, but not without hope. It was hope I saw in the predawn light as I signed my name to the book that had been my only real companion. Words poured from my broken soul like blood from a fatal wound.
What had I done to deserve this? I thought about it the rest of the day, and the more I thought about it the more I knew what peace could be. Death: peaceful oblivion. I am afraid of peace, just as I am afraid of living one more day in this place. Life is what I knew I deserved in those moments or the memories I kept would fade away forever; no paper can hold sway for very long.
I threw the book out the window, and I heard it fall into the sand. Someday, someone might pick it up and read those words, unaware of the illusionary barrier that prevented them from seeing inside the dark prison where I spent my final days and nights.
My move was made somewhere around midday, of course, when I had gathered all of my will into making my dead limbs move. Midnight's blood had helped me a lot. I knew he could find me no matter what sanctuary I found, such is the bond of blood, but I did not fear that. Somewhere in my cold, disconnected heart I felt something for him. The heart that had lost love after love, life after life, cold and dead at one time and quickened once more by that gentile caress in the darkness, cold sculpture against warm flesh. Cold words whispering in the darkness: "He is the one you have been searching for."
How could I have dared to think it was a dream?
After a while of feeling around, I felt my fingers close on a cold ladder. I reasoned it out in my mind. I was on an upper level, and the way out had to be somewhere lower. Of course they would put the dying, screaming prisoners as far away from themselves as humanly possible! Yet I heard no screams, though there was shifting in the other cells. When I passed, I sometimes saw dull, soulless eyes.
I still see them whenever I close my eyes.
My fingers felt around the ladder until I found how I could get onto it. Total darkness, this place; how could Midnight and "Master" see in this? Shifting in the cells, a small whisper calling out to me, "White-haired angel, deliver us."
No.
Some time later I realized I was completely lost with no hope of finding my way back. I wondered if I could light one of the torches that I felt the walls for; they had been extinguished so none of the prisoners would be allowed to escape. And that was a big problem for me. The sunset would be coming fast, and when they realized I was not there, I would have a really big problem.
Note to self: next time I am captured, I will bring a flashlight. Nice, modern, something I couldn't have had back in 1805. But with great improvements come great sacrifices: no more tights. Lace shirts seem to be making a comeback, though. I like to think that I started the fashion trend. We all need egos sometimes, me probably more than others. But it is more common for me to have a nightmare than an ego, all because of those vacant eyes; they say that facing your fear is the best medicine.
On the other hand, when they discovered I was gone, they might have decided I was salvageable, or they could make me like the others in the cells. That thought almost made me retch. Instead of the bile, I felt something against my cheek.
My hand reached up with surprise and smeared across my cheek. "Tears," I said softly. They stung my eyes. I felt myself slide down the wall and onto the floor. I buried my face in my hands. How could I be in a place like this?
I read the note many times after I received it from her father; it was sealed with her fingerprint and I recognized her tiny handwriting.
"Dearest love,
I cannot help but think. I am writing this and I do not regret that I have kept it from you. I had a dream, my love, and it told me what I should do. An angel came for me and kissed me on the forehead. You must think me mad; I am perfectly sane. I did see an angel.
Your daughter's name is Jasmine Pegasus. She looks a lot like you with the white hair, but she has my father's eyes; brown, almost black. I sent Lynn away; he has her with him. Do not try to find them. I am trying to protect her from a corrupted world. They will be safe in France.
Please give me one last thing. I know I have deceived you, but I need you to do something for me. Go to Egypt. I have wanted to see the sands ever since I heard about the people we found there. There are ruins from the ancient times everywhere. Promise me you will go.
Your dearest love,
Cynthia"
How many times had I read that letter? I had committed it to memory; I could see her bent over the stationary at her desk before she was too ill to leave her bed. The wax from the red candle must have looked like blood.
I opened my eyes and was surprised to see a soft illumination surrounding me. It was a small lantern, and I looked around but saw no one there. A soft hand at my cheek, though, and his soft words telling me to come with him; I was still in tears. He held me in his arms like a small child and I told him things.
"I know," he told me. "Life is terrible for you. You feel it like no other creature because you have known pain. You don't want it to go on."
"No."
The dark curls fell into his face. I wanted to brush them away.
I felt his emotion then, how he desired me almost as much as I desired him. There was a small shimmer around him; life force. Sometimes colors if the emotion is strong enough, other times only a faint ripple. Around vampires it is a darkening in the immediate area, and around the changing it is a faint flicker that darkens with each passing second.
Something greater was at stake. I could tell that just by looking into his eyes.
Now.
I would have to choose now.
Two paths open before me, like she said. One led to certain death, and another was the one that I wanted.
I found his lips in the dark, somber light. He stiffened and I felt his arms reach upwards in astonishment before they closed around me. I was lifted to my feet and he broke the kiss, but he still held me very close.
His lips went to his wrist, and I smelled the dark elixir flowing in the dark expanse of the room. He pressed it to my lips. "Drink from me, Pegasus."
I took swallow after swallow, and after a while I felt giddy. He wrenched his wrist away from me and he held me close to him. There was blood staining my mouth, and he licked off what I could not reach with my tongue.
"We will go to Shadi now."
Shadi. So that was his name! I imagined painting him sometimes; he looked like a truly fascinating subject. Such harsh contradiction in one body! So young and yet it was so obvious that he was very old!