Such torments could not last forever, Raziel knew. But such was the pain that he became dimly familiar once more with the agony of the Lake of the Dead. How it had twisted his form to its decrepit state, how it had been his ancient tomb for centuries. He screamed for a countless age, tormented by the magic that tried to overrun the solid spell the Elder God had worked on his ravaged corpse.
When he awoke, he was not whole. The night spun overhead, all around him, its sounds and odd smells. The stars spun overhead, and he saw the light trails arc in swooping semi-circles that vanished beyond his sight, beyond the mountains.
Amanda sat herself beside him, nearly sagging over his body with her face tucked into the cowl near his shoulder. She convulsed slightly. Strangely he felt the compelling urge to rest his claw against her shoulder and he did not resist it. When the weight of his touch settled, she raised her face to his own and she smiled weakly. Her face appeared haggard and wane, dark circles under her eyes.
"You took my soul a bit there," she whispered hoarsely. She slid back from him, reaching to touch her throat. It was thin, her hands bony.
Raziel immediately felt a deepening sense of self-loathing. He needn't look to see if the spell had worked. He was looking better - more flesh to his otherwise undead appearance, the muscles and bones having knitted themselves together as humanly possible.
All for a price. Raziel hissed to himself, shaking his head as his eyes expressed a sadness and self-loathing he only felt when he had discovered it was he who had killed his Sarafan brothers and himself so long ago, instead of Vorador that time...
"I'm sorry," he whispered softly, lines of distraught pain in the corners of his gleaming eyes.
"Hey," Amanda responded, perking up slightly. "I told you it was no big deal. How are you feeling...?"
Raziel sat up slightly, tucking his arm around her waist. She leaned against him, her spellbook sitting in her lap with her left hand resting against it. "Surprisingly, I feel... well. I'm functioning well enough... but I'm not whole."
"Of course not! Didn't you hear what I said? I said--" Amanda stopped short in her sentence, taking several deep breaths as she calmed down. "I meant.. that... the more souls you devour - that's what you do, isn't it? - the more your physical appearance shall improve to its former state. Now... I don't know how many souls it might take for you to reach your true self again, but it's an improvement besides."
"Good god...!!" Raziel breathed, before shaking his head. He stirred slightly, stretching out one leg in front of him. It seemed... better somehow, but he couldn't quite put a thought to it.
So it seems improved. But the only way I can see to its truth is to find out for myself. And that would mean I'd have to go on a brief hunting trip.
Which posed another problem. What exactly was he going to eat?
"You can start with those creeps," Amanda said, carefully following his train of thought by what she had told him. "I don't know about you, but in my book I don't think half the people in this little village deserve to live."
Raziel could only chuckle grimly. He stood up, giving her an easy al-ee-oop to get her on her own feet. "Leave that for me to decide... perhaps I needn't have to kill anyone."
He started to walk off. Amanda struggled to follow. "Hey, where are you going!?"
"For a stroll..."
"But--"
"Go home." The command was harsh, quipped with precision to make damned sure she'd listen.
Amanda scowled. Then she turned, book in grasp, to pick her way through the carefully untreaded path of those who hadn't walked before her.
* * * * *
He stalked his prey silently, keeping carefully to the shadows, the whisper of his wings on the wind the only sound - that which could easily be mistaken for leaves on the ground. He followed the river trail for as far as it went before he moved along the treeline, toward a partying group of youngsters. There weren't too many, but there were enough that one could go unnoticed for a few minutes.
A young man finally detached from the throng and staggered off toward the trees to relieve himself. Raziel waited, seeing him stumble toward a stone possibly designated for the purpose of purging unnecessary fluid. There, from the shadow of trees, he sprang the moment he was finished and held him tight, growling as his struggles proved in vain against Raziel's power. He pulled low his clan banner and his soul flickered to his immortal eyes, pulled free as he fed from it.
He could feel himself being slowly restored, hear the bones crackling to wholeness and his flesh grow, muscles shifting and flexing. It was exquisite, a bit painful but not quite unpleasant. He was not compelled to cease until he heard the voices.
"Hey! Zack! Where are you!?"
"Yo, man, where'd you go!? Ya get lost, man?"
Raziel lurched away, shoving the drained youth into the stone with a grimace, feeling himself slipping almost on instinct into the spectral realm. He lost all sense of time as it became irrelevent, and the beings before him froze as though in a time-lapse, eventually slowing down and vanishing from sight entirely. The world warped around him, tilting sickeningly so much so that he felt his insides nearly twist.
He fled through the trees, unable to bat them aside, so he had to squirm and move swiftly back along the trail, whose turns twisted sharper and more dramatically than before. He stopped short, seeing in the middle of the stone pathway a planar portal stood waiting, spinning purple instead of white.
He dashed to it without thinking, seeing ghosts wandering. Sleepless ghosts, their forms twisted and misshapen and they regarded him with baleful, empty eyes. They otherwise appeared harmless. All the same, he stood to the portal, breathed deep, and found himself standing by a rushing river.
Amanda stood nearby, book in hand, hazel eyes glittering with that recognizable pride.
"I guess you're pretty damn glad I stayed, huh? There were no portals for you... So I had to make you one."
"What?" Raziel stepped toward her, growling as he reached out to seize her by the jacket again. Then stopped, staring, in cold wonder at the pale white flesh that was his arm. He swallowed heavily, feeling the throat mechanisms working dryly with no saliva to yet coat his undead throat.
Throat! He had a throat. He reached up, tearing the cowl away and felt his jaw, his chin. A sense of terrible, wonderful joy and mixed feelings swept over him. He was... whole. And naked, perhaps, but whole. His tattered wings hung behind him, surely, bleeding as profusely as the day they had been rendered useless.
The pain was dull but annoying all the same. He quickly replaced his clan banner around his waist and sighed.
Amanda handed him her jacket and motioned for him to follow.
* * * * *
"How am I supposed to fit into these?"
Raziel spoke with mild irritation from outside of her window. He was tucked somewhat beneath the house itself, since it was raised well above the ground. He upheld the baggy pants her mother wore around the house, dark blue which was the only thing that Amanda deemed would fit. Amanda poked her head out, hissing like an agitated cat.
"Look," she spat. "These are the ONLY damn things that will probably fit you - badly - so I wouldn't complain. It's not like I can conjure up money and take you shopping--" She stopped, blinking momentarily as a thought struck here. "--anyway! So just... deal. Here's a sweatshirt. It's called a 'hoodie'. Just slip it on over that and you should look.. semi-normal."
"I don't care about being normal," Raziel grumbled, trying to figure out the workings of this thing called a 'hoodie'.
"No... no, you put your head through... yeah. Crap, the hood is backwards! Here...turn it--"
"I've got it!" Raziel cried, turning around and raising his arms. The sleeves were a big too long, and flopped about his claws like useless bags of blue skin.
Amanda smirked, covering her mouth as she mumbled, "Not quite... but... oh well... Here. Climb into my room." She leaned out, stretching her hand toward him.
He glanced at her hand, then at her face with a look of worry. "I doubt you can lift my full weight, child... Besides, you forget-" He shook a claw at her, "-I'm not human. I can manage my way up there."
Amanda sank back against her pillows, watching him scramble up and manage to squirm his way into her window, and sit crouched on her black and white comforter with gray chinese dragons sewn into it. He closed the window quietly behind him, and turned only to be faced with a large, fat gray cat perched on her dresser above his head.
"He likes you."
Raziel ducked away from the sniffing face, wide twitching ears and ticklish whiskers. "So it seems... away, creature! Why are you still trying to sniff me!? Persistent beast--!"
"Aw... he just wants some love. Come here, baby!" Amanda opened her arms, and the cat jumped, clearing Raziel's folded legs and landing on the blankets. After a bit of coaxing, the independant animal found itself in the loose, though comforting embrace of his master.
"Where are you going to stay...? I'm going to have to deal with school somehow and mom and at the same time..." Amanda sighed, petting the beast quietly, a soft purr emanating from its motionless body.
"It will be fine," he told her. "Go to school tomorrow. Attend your lessons and return. Don't worry about where I am. I'll be here."