A/N: Well, no one reviews this story either, but I'll keep writing it as a personal obsession. I told you guys it wasn't over… hehehe, wait till you see the evil I have in store for poor Nikki, and of course a bit more pain for Clow and Yue. Because we all love to see them in pain! MWHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Pity Nia, and who exactly is causing all the trouble, a behind the scenes adversary not yet revealed? Well, someone pretty damn evil and very insane is about to make his appearance…
DISCLAIMER: I own Nickoli and Nia, along with her other creations, and the plot. I also own Tristan, who will be quite a major player in this once it gets going. Everyone else belongs to CLAMP, but the plot is original and mine. Please leave a review, and enjoy!
Chapter 10: Nightmares and HorrorsEventually, Nia found out her protector had been leaving the house at night, and became enraged. She forbid him to leave the manor or its grounds. The farthest away Nickoli could go was the surrounding woods. No one understood her sudden change in attitude, and Clow became uneasy. Still, the mage left Nia on her own, believing if the other truly wanted or needed help she would ask for it.
Nothing was heard from Nia or Nickoli for nearly half a year, until Nia came riding up on an exhausted horse. She practically fell off the animal, and Yue was there just in time to stop her descent to the hard packed earth. Clow crouched close by as Kero came out holding a pail of water in his mouth.
"Nia! Nia what's wrong? What happened?! NIA!" Clow was nearly frantic, and had to stop and calm himself. "Yue, take her inside," he instructed after he took the water and poured some through her parched and swollen lips, which were cracked and bleeding. He also wiped her face a bit, trying to get some of the blood off her features and pull a response from the unconscious woman. "Please be all right," the very distraught mage mumbled, pressing his lips lightly to Nia's forehead before allowing Yue to employ his deceptively large amount of strength to move the woman into his house.
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The high-pitched, piercing scream echoed through the dark halls of the Reed mansion. In one of the many guest rooms, three doors down from the room Nickoli had spent his week in, or at least the first night, an unconscious woman screamed. She was worn out and weak, too thin and too pale. Wounds had been found all over her legs, chest, arms, stomach and back, and she had lost much blood. The woman's back arched as she released another bloodcurdling cry.
Clow ran to the room but stopped in the doorway, staring as he realized it was her nightmares, claiming her once again. Yue came up behind his master, standing silent and still, watching the woman writhe in pain that there was no more outward cause for. Whatever had happened to Nia, she hadn't recovered mentally. The sorceress had come riding in three nights prior, and hadn't woken up once since she collapsed off her mount. The closest she came to consciousness was these grisly nightmares. Who knew what she was seeing? Nia had been hurt and left somewhere for days, no food or water. Somehow she managed to escape, to find a horse and order it to the only place she could go to for help, Clow's home. The screams started last night, early, and continued on and off since then. In the daylight hours she was usually quiet, as if she could feel the comforting sunlight through her closed eyelids. No one was sure if she'd live.
Tonight she started another round, but this time Nia's body moved. That hadn't happened before, she had lain there as if dead, screams tearing her throat every so often, but no other movements. Kero too had arrived, and for a moment Clow was angry with himself for standing there and observing the woman, a close friend of his, in pain, whether it was physical or mental. He felt like scum, watching her as if it was some interesting specimen or one of the shows for children at a carnival. He instead steeled himself and went over next to Nia's bed, grasping her hand firmly and trying to give any reassurance he could. Clow could attempt to calm her with magic, but he body and psyche were far too imbalanced, making it a dangerous move that could permanently damage her mentally and maybe physically.
Finally, after three solid nights and two straight days, Nia awoke. There was one last final scream that brought her to consciousness. Her eyes shot open at the name she herself hollered, and her body went bolt upright and ridged in bed. Yue's own eyes widened and he began to tremble visibly, but he didn't move to the woman as Clow did. Nia just said it again, but this time she whispered, "Nikki... Nickoli..."
"Nia! Nia! What happened? You're going to be all right, you're safe in my house, nothing will come for you here."
"Oh Clow, Clow I *failed* him!" Her frame was wracked with tearing sobs. "When I found him I promised I'd protect him, that he would be able to remain sweet and innocent and happy like he was when he was little, but he's not, he hasn't been, and now Tristan has him, I failed!" She was screaming hysterically, tears streaming down her gaunt cheeks, throat raw and voice scratchy. Her hands shook violently and she sobbed into Clow's shoulder, who was now sitting on the edge of the bed. Nia's proclamation was said in a burst of expression, a sudden outpouring of sounds formed into syllables that made up words and ultimately sentences, noises made by a human throat that were useless to other people half way around the world. This unexpected articulation froze Yue's blood. The moon guardian, along with everyone else, knew whom the 'he' in Nia's ranting was.
"Calm yourself, please my friend, whatever happened you need to tell us and we can hopefully be of assistance." Clow soft voice, and a bit of underlying magic, had a soothing affect on the haggard, injured woman.
"Four days before I escaped, at night actually, I kept having this weird feeling, like someone else was in the house. I searched for Nickoli, but I couldn't find him. I walked upstairs, and I heard noises coming from his rooms. I know I promised not to enter without his permission, but I was worried so I.... Tristan knocked him out just as I opened the door, he knelt by Nickoli and then he smiled at me and said, "Oh, thank you my sister, for taking such good care of my property in my extended absence. I hope you'll excuse my tardiness in picking him up, but I ran into a bit of turbulence. My, but he's grown! So powerful, and very, *very* handsome." Nickoli was on the ground, and he leaned over and kissed him and then he shot at me with those energy blasts, you remember Clow, the ones he learned at the academy, the ones the instructor didn't want to teach him because they were too powerful and no one could defend against them, but the elders made the instructor teach him anyway, because back then they thought Tristan was good, that he'd help people, and he was in advanced training and was already so good at everything else. My mother always said she liked Tristan more than me, that he had more power and more flair and more intelligence, but then he killed her so she couldn't say that, not to me anymore..." Clow of course, had no idea what Nia was talking about, but it apparently had something to do with her past and this person called Tristan.
Clow touched Nia gently, sending some more comforting magic to calm her once again. Yue stepped into the room, leaned down in front of the sorceress and said fiercely, "Who's Tristan, what has he done with Nikki?"
She laughed a little, swaying back and forth, eyes closing momentarily and opening again with a struggle. "It is funny you still call him Nikki," She laughed again, "Calling the dead person by a nickname."
"He's not dead!" Growled the moon guardian, half shouting.
"Hmm, if he's lucky he is." Suddenly the sorceress tensed, and spoke through clenched teeth, "Tristan's *special*, he's always been special. He's younger than me, but even after I created something as close to human as Liletou, he had to go much farther and create Nickoli." Nia's voice lightened into fond remembrance, "I remember when he first brought Nickoli out for mummy and papa and I to see. Nikki looked to be about three or four, and he was such a little darling. He followed Tristan everywhere, did whatever he wanted but was still so cute and amusing, carefree and somehow independent, and Tristan looked at him this way he never looked at anything before, and Nickoli grew so quickly, but not any faster than a normal child." Her voice sank to the tone of a frightened child recalling a bad dream, "I remember when I said, 'Little brother, you've outdone yourself' and he glared at me. I remember when Nickoli was seven and Tristan was fourteen, and he kissed Nickoli square on the lips, and that's when mummy realized there might be something wrong with Tristan, when he did that and started saying weird things... talking in metaphors... No one did anything about it, but when papa stopped Tristan from kissing Nickoli again Tristan killed papa and that made mummy afraid and angry, so she tried to lock him up, but that made Tristan angry so he killed her too. After that I had to seal him."
"Tristan is your brother, isn't he? The man from the portrait you hung in one of Nickoli's rooms. Are you saying that Tristan was really the one to create Nickoli?" Yue was astounded, and looked about ready to throttle out what little life there still was in the worn sorceress. The woman slumped back on the bed, as if her sudden outbursts of events had stripped her of remaining strength, and Yue's deducing the truth had sapped her voice. Clow gently laid her back on the soft mattress.
"Now is not the time, Yue. Let her rest, and then you'll get answers, as will the rest of us." Clow stood, and motioned for his guardians to follow him out the door. He explained what he knew quietly as they walked down the hall. "I knew Tristan was Nia's brother. Met him once, and you wouldn't believe how kind and charming he can seem. His magic is extremely powerful, and could be stronger than my own by now. I also had knowledge that he once had some connection to Nickoli, but I never knew he *created* him. Nickoli himself doesn't even remember Tristan, Nia replaced his memories of his early childhood with some false but believable images. I knew something was amiss, but I should have realized that Tristan had something to do with it. Tristan was sealed away when Nickoli was eight, and that's probably when Nia started taking care of him."
"That explains their lack of a connection," Yue mumbled. The other guardian and Clow gave him curious looks. "Nickoli told me of feeling distant from Nia. He said he had no pull to obey her, couldn't understand her thought process like most guardians can, and didn't even feel like he drew power from her. He'd also been discovering new powers and strengths, but he said they felt evil, like he shouldn't have them and they were rooted in dark magic." Yue purposefully left out the information on Nickoli's inclination towards violence at times.
"Alright," Clow sighed and bowed his head in thought, while quietly ordering, "Yue, would you please make some food for Nia, something light like soup? She needs to eat and build up her strength, but I don't want her having anything that's too rich. Kero, I want you to keep listening, and call me if you hear anything strange."
"Yes Master." Both said shortly, more preoccupied with thinking than niceties. Yue headed off to the kitchen, while Kero stayed on the floor they were housing Nia in. His sharp, animal hearing would pick up any noise from the woman. Clow retreated to a nearby library to think things over and try to piece together what he knew with the information that had been revealed that evening. Not only that, but he had to work through his feelings.
Lately, Clow had been especially worried for Nia, and it made him rethink how much the sorceress meant to him. Was she really just a friend...? // Yes. Because even if I'm thinking of her, all Yue has to do is walk in the room and all other thoughts dissolve. Poor Yue, I really fouled things up this time. If only I had paid attention to his nervous warnings, how he had wanted us to check on Nia and Nickoli. I should have listened to him, but I was so convinced that Nia didn't want us there, or need us there. Or was it something else? Did I not want Yue to see Nickoli again? Maybe my subconscious is playing a part in this... // Clow sat and came up with a million ways of how this was his entire fault.
The next morning, Nia's condition had improved enough for her to be coherent. She had more control over herself, and more strength. After everyone gathered in her room, she began to explain what she had only hinted at before.