Pictures drawn in the sky...
Chapter 42
Cold, heavy, he was surprised to know that the burden in his grip was shaking not from just grief but cold. It was strange, holding Lloyd in his arms, wrapping the boy up in his cloak then topping that with his wings. The act of holding Lloyd was not strange though, that was old, familiar, what was strange was the phantom sensations that he'd feel every time his son brushed against his wings.
For example, cold, he could feel the cold water and it's effects.
It wasn't exactly the same as dealing with it himself, it was as if he were feeling these things in a dream, a dream that Lloyd's pale and trembling form turned into a sur-real reality.
Anna had- Gods even thinking the name made him want to sink to his knees and weep. He steeled himself, that faint need he sensed in his son was enough to make him force down the agony. Anna had tried to describe this to him... Had tried to explain how they were bound. But what had happened to her had been a result of his mana mixing with her fading life in Kvar's ranch.
Impossible, to meet all of those requirements, Lloyd did not wear a cruxis crystal, did not wear an ex-sphere, was not surrounded by the chaotic mana that had wrapped around Anna like a miniature storm. None of those things were going on with Lloyd, and yet...
Impossible, improbable, only a thin line that was the limit of human imagination made them different.
So the case, while highly improbable, was occurring.
He could feel his son's grief, could feel the pain of seeing what should not have been seen.
It was hard to tell that she had been human. Her face was a bloody mess, all along her body marks of a knife left red lines and the never ending rains made that blood run, giving her the illusion of clinging to life by a thread. He bent in the mud, reached with one gloved hand to check her pulse. Nothing, no life was in her. He'd done this too many other times to delude himself, no matter how tempting delusion was in this case. Ignoring the blood, the mutilation. he took her hand, kissed it tenderly, and suppressed the urge to howl like a beast, to give into the madness that had taken him in Triet. With unsteady steps he walked past her, went to the whimpering creature at her side. He was bound to a tree, forced to look only at Anna by way of cruel metal muzzle and chain. Tears fell from that furry face as the protozoan looked on and could not change what had happened. Those mortal tears were washed away by those of the Gods, and it all fell to the earth and mixed with the blood of the world...
Grasping the chain in his hands he tried to rip it apart with his bare hands. Enhanced though his mortal strength was by ex-sphere and cruxis crystal he could not break the chain in his hands. Growling a curse Kratos stood, pulled his blade from it's place on his belt and brought it down on the chains constructed of pure mana. Purple light, deep indigo, the mark of Origin, the mark of Mithos, ran across the chains as they went back to the swirling void that had crafted them. He bent down once more, worked off the complicated mess of screws and bolts that held the muzzle together and... and bound it to Noishe's face. Ignoring the small holes, the multitude of cuts Noishe staggered to his feet and dragged himself to Anna's limp form.
Those howls sounded far too human, they echoed in him, cut through him and almost released the mindless creature that seemed to have taken up residence in his soul.
"Noishe!" Kratos snarled, roughly grabbing one of the protozoan's huge ears and twisting sharply when it became obvious words weren't working.
Yowling Noishe turned on Kratos, fangs bared, eyes totally wild.
"Noshy... Daddy?"
Oh gods.
Kratos turned, saw his son looking at them in confusion, then saw as the boys gaze drifted down to... To what his mother had been...
And he understood... A child less then five years in life saw such mutilation and understood...
"Get him out of here!" Kratos screamed, his voice harsh with pain and tears. He turned on Noishe with a fury so intense the protozoan shook. "Hide him, there are more Desian's out here he has to be kept safe!"
Whimpering Noishe went to Lloyd, tried to pick up the boy who's grief had all but pinned him to the earth. The protozoan tried a nudge, tryed to gently coax him rise. Lloyd only fell into the muck, he didn't even use his hands to catch himself, only allowed himself to be knocked over. Setting aside his pain Kratos rose, went to his son, and gently placed him on the protozoan's back.
He didn't even hear Noishe pad off, did not hear the steps that sank into the earth and rose up with a nauseating sound. He did not, could not, hear the soft sobs that marked his son's departure. Half blind in the rain Kratos dragged himself to his wife's side, gently folded her arms over her chest in an attempt to give this woman, his lover, his soul, a sem-balance of dignity. Despite all of Kvar's attempts to make that impossible.
Forgive me, Anna if you can please forgive me...
Lowering his head the seraphim let his knees buckle and...
"Lights are up ahead." He rocked Lloyd's form, hoping that he'd get a response. A wild gust of wind cut through the trees, cut through him, and Lloyd went off into a wild seizure. He was dying, his son was dying in his arms and if the person who owned that house up ahead dared to even think of turning them out...
There would be another corpse in the woods.
Noishe had whined and whimpered. He'd tripped a number of times, almost knocking the seraphim from his feet. The protozoan's snout brushed against the ground so many times he now looked to be wearing a mask of mud. Noishe's ears were not so much as slicked back but hanging limp. His tail dragged behind him like a forsaken banner and his fur was a tangle of blood and filth.
The only items that had survived the blast were Anna's ex-sphere and cruxis crystal, and Lloyd's toy rabbit. He had taken them all, the last remains of his and Lloyd's past, and pressed on. The rabbit hung on his belt, the water slid off of it as did the mud. Benefits of the spell he had wrought into the fibers and stuffing of the animal the day he'd given it to his son. Irony of ironies the rabbit had 'absorbed' the spell Kratos had cast in his madness, had somehow used the mana to re-fuel the various charms lain on it.
Hopefully Mithos had not done the same...
Not as if the bastard needs more power, he's going to be hard enough to kill as he is.
He stiffened as the earth gave way to cobblestone, then realizing where he was he relaxed. He did not start at the hollow thump of his foot falls crossing wood, nor did he pay much heed to the foaming river under him. Just a few more feet, he managed just enough coherent thought to realize his wings would be very dangerous to make a show of, and sheathed them. At the door he shifted Lloyd around, and knocked, on the second pound the too short door swung open.
Kratos stooped down then coldly shouldered the man who answered it aside. He looked around the small room, stared and did not see anything but the fire. A damn good thing there was a fire going, or the exhausted seraphim would have settled for torching some furniture. Indifferent to the voice, to the other man, Kratos set his son as close to the fire as he could. From far off he was aware of Noishe curling up besides Lloyd, desperate for some heat. Spying a pile of fire wood the seraphim reached for it. A large, labor calloused hand gripped his own.
"Enough lad, you sit by the fire with those two and I'll add the wood on." Numbly Kratos allowed himself to be lead by the short man... no dwarf... the man before him was a dwarf. After keeping friendly contacts with Altessa through the centuries this dwarf gave him a shock that pierced through his grief. Dressed in cotton tunic and heavy leather pants. The face was obscured by a long flowing beard, yet unlike Altessa it was not woven into a series of braids and laced with thin knots of silver. No knots, no braids, and garbed in human style clothes. This dwarf did not wear the dwarvish armor that seemed to shimmer with the fires of the forge even away from the birthing flames of their craft, he was not garbed in the robes of what would have appeared to be liquid metal, steel, or silver as was the garb favored by dwarven steel workers.
A quick glance even in his muddled state told Kratos that this man, who ever he was, was a craftsman of some type. If the unlit forge in the back wall was not a hint then the various shovels, tools, and carving utensils, scattered around the main room's one long table said enough.
"Impressed aye lad?" The dwarf looked up at him, stroked his beard and chuckled. "Gave me quite a fright there you did, thought you were a Desian." A smile cut through the bearded face. "Good thing you weren't."
It was only then that Kratos noticed the long sword... it was strapped over the dwarfs back and would have served as a two handed blade in that short man's grasp. The silver hilt with it's blue sapphire imbedded at the very end of the handle made Kratos think of his own sword that was strapped to his waist with it's golden hilt and ruby...
Once he would have cared, now he was empty, tired and empty.
"A good thing." Kratos sighed, pummeled his brains for a bit, then recalled what he needed to know. "Uth Gonen ayer un auth." Kratos bowed, a sketchy sort of dwarvish bow that Altessa had drilled into him when they had traveled together on that regeneration journey over five hundred years ago.
At that the dark skinned dwarf burst out into rich laughter.
"Lad, I'm no thane so you don't need to bow! I'm just a poor man making his way in a different place because he didn't quite agree with the old ways. Sit, by the fire, and I'll hear no protest from you. Or rather you can protest all you want an the flat of my blade will attend you a heck of a lot closer then you'd want it to!"
So warm and friendly the dwarf's cheer was a little infectious, and Kratos felt his lips turn up in the smallest of smiles.
"Now while I make some tea for you and that lad you can tell me where you come from. After all Dwarven vow number one hundred and five, A visitor of the home is a visitor of the heart."
"I've never heard of the dwarven vows." Kratos admitted wearily as he sat by his sleeping son. Now that he was a little lower his hair wasn't brushing against the ceiling. He closed his eyes and sighed. Where to start, what to say, what lies to tell to this honest man?
"Doubt if you had lad, made them up myself... My name is Dirk Irving, dwarf goldsmith at your service. Figure you knew the "dwarf" part though." The small human like creature strolled out of the seraphim's range of site, ducked behind a small door and Kratos could hear the clatter of kettle and the hiss of a pump being worked. Less then a minute later the dwarf came out from his kitchen. Kratos watched as the dwarf set the kettle over the fire, then threw another log on it for good measure.
Lies, I've lied forever and it has earned me nothing, perhaps the truth will garner me something... and even if it doesn't this recluse will not be bothered by the Desians or Cruxis. He is too insignificant in their eyes.
"My name is Kratos Aurion, this is my son Lloyd Aurion, and our furry companion is Noishe. Tell me something, just how religious are you?"
"Aye, I don't follow that Martel faith, if that's what you mean. My father worked for the Desian's, did projects for them so I know that they have some hold on the church and I'd rather not have my hands in that muck at all, reason why I left home... A lot of good folk were trading with the Desian's and I just..." Dirk made a gesture as if throwing something away and the seraphim nodded.
"Good, then it will make things a lot easier for me to explain..." Kratos reached out, smoothed his boys sopping wet hair. "First let me start by telling you the Desian's do not have so much of a "hold" on the church as they have total control..."
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"Damn..." Dirk whistled through his teeth. "I'll be damned I never... Of all the..." Dirk closed his eyes, lowered his head and sighed. "And you're caught right up in the mess I take it."
Kratos nodded, said nothing, and looked to his son.
"What'll happen if they catch you?"
"If they capture us they will kill me and use my son for something called the Angelus Project, I can not go into more detail." For I am not strong enough to face that pain. "All we need is a few days shelter, then we are gone. What you tell others, if you bother to tell them anything, I leave that in your hands."
"Aye shelter I can give you. The Desian's know not to come here I wont work for them, even if I'm starving, and they know it. They also know that stealing from me's about the same as asking to get cut down." Dirk's eyes were grim. "You wont be bothered, and I'll do the same to those winged half bloods if it comes down to it."
Dirk picked up the kettle from where he set it and poured two cups to the rim with the green liquid and offered one to the seraphim.
"No thank you," Kratos declined the gesture. "I've had my fill for a day at least."
"A piece of toast, a cup of tea and that's it."
Kratos stared somberly at the dwarf, let his silence speak for him.
"You're strange for a human, if you don't mind me saying."
"Believe what you will." Kratos looked to his child, his son, the last piece of his soul, and felt his heart wrench inside of him. "Do you have a guest room or a couch." Kratos looked around pointedly at the multitude of tables, his gaze alone made them insignificant for serving as a bed for his son.
"Yes, I do, ceiling's low though."
"I wouldn't expect anything less." Kratos stood, picked his boy up off the floor. "If you would."
"Only have one bed in the guest room I'm afraid." Dirk fretted. "It's not much of a bed, and a bit small for a human... But the room does have a fire place to it, I think I have some flint... I'll bring you some when you get your boy settled and..."
"That wont be needful, just take us to the room, I'll handle the rest."
"Aye, I wont argue with you when you got that look on your face mercenary."
"Good,"
Kratos grimaced as he had to weave his way through bits of wood and wood carving tools. Organization was not this man's best quality. He resolved, as he settled his son on the lumpy bed and absently tucked him in, that Lloyd would not be leaving this room without his father in attendance. Only a fool would allow a child to run around with sharp knives, saws, and nails scattered around the floor.
Lloyd whimpered a bit as if falling into a nightmare, but under his father's touch sighed, relaxed and drifted into a more peaceful slumber. Another whimper sounded out, one deep voice and a familiar high pitched one scratched at the edges of his awareness. Growling a curse the mercenary left his son for a moment, picked his way through the mess of craft work and came onto a scene that almost made him lose his temper.
"Shoo dog, get, leave them be!"
"BARK!" Noishe bared his teeth. He was obviously trying to work his way around the dwarf without resorting to biting, and it was just as obvious that the protozoan's temper would not hold out for much longer.
"Noishe, at ease."
"Bark whine whine!"
"I understand, settle down."
"Growl..."
"Mr. Irving, the dog stays with us. If you ever try to deny him access to me or my son he will bite you and I will not intervene in any way ever again. Come old friend." Turning from the stunned dwarf Kratos made another trip to the small room, and this time locked the door behind Noishe.
Dirk got the point, and left them alone for what remained of the night.
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Yawning Lloyd rolled over, opened his dark eyes, and started in shock. Kratos smiled, or rather tried to, then sheathed his wings. He had not meant Lloyd to see them again, not so soon after...
After the world decided to fall apart.
"Good morning Lloyd." Habit allowed him to say those words, made him force them out past his pain.
"Daddy." Lloyd reached out, touched him, as if telling himself that his father was real. "Morning." Lloyd's sad eyes told Kratos everything, and perhaps it was too soon for them to even act as if everything was alright. Yes, it was far too soon for that.
He reached, took his son from the bed and held him as the first morning of loneliness dawned for them both. And under the dawns first light they held onto each other and cried.
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"Will you be eating nothing, again?"
Kratos sighed, shook his head. A day had passed and the very smell of food was a trial of his self control. He swallowed as the dwarf waved the plate under his nose, trying to provoke his guests ever reclusive appetite. No such luck, it was only by iron will that Kratos could keep the contents of his stomach.
"Dirk, though you are charitable to the point it could almost be called a fault; know I do not need to eat..."
"A whole day lad, no man can do that to himself and it lead to any good."
"Daddy doesn't eat."
Confused, the dwarf looked to the boy. Lloyd was eating, and his appetite more then made up for his fathers. Reading the confusion Lloyd let out an exasperated sigh that said louder then words that what he was saying should have been obvious and went back to his food.
Noishe rolled his eyes, his expression said louder then words what he was thinking.
Like father like son.
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"Rain rain go away..." Lloyd looked listlessly outside, he had been saying that chant for an hour now while his father looked on. "Come again some other day..."
The voice once so filled with life was dead. So thin and tired sounding that it was only a ghost of itself. Kratos closed his eyes, willed the tears back, and ran his hand over the hilt of his sword. It was so hard to even continue their old routines, to even think or act in the ways that they had before. Every motion, every thought had Anna laced through it. She had been such a foundation in both their lives and the emptiness... Neither said anything, they both felt it in their hearts and both grieved quietly. Alone or together they grieved. Every breath seemed like that, heavy with loss and pain, and it was not a pain halved in sharing merely doubled.
Kratos looked up as the door squeaked open, and corrected his thoughts. It wasn't doubled, but tripled for there were three people who grieved.
"Hi Noshy."
"I presume it is as vile out there as it looks from in here?"
Noishe growled, went to the fire and scooted as close as he could.
"Sorry Noshy, I keep tellin' the rain to go but it wont..."
"Whine?"
"Never mind Noishe, it is a human thing, let us leave it at that."
"Bark." Closing his eyes Noishe rested his head on crossed fore paws, he was almost as listless and depressed as Lloyd.
"Daddy... when's the rain gunna stop?"
"I don't know Lloyd." Kratos sighed as he looked at the grey smear the world have become. "I don't know." The seraphim knew what would happen if he stopped talking, the silence would return.
That wretched entity that made his mind wander and see the past, a past he could not face without tears. Desperate the seraphim said the first thing that came to his mind.
"Why do you ask?"
"I dunno, just cuz." Lloyd sighed, his breath frosted the window and he drew a nonsense symbol on the glass.
Strangely enough that one action nudged something in Kratos, he stood, wandered to the window.
"What are you doing?" Kratos wondered aloud, though it was obvious Lloyd was just entertaining himself.
"Nothin'..."
"Lloyd, you aren't in trouble, I just want to know what you call that..." Kratos gestured at the window.
"Sky writing... Like how you write on paper I write here... see?"
"An... interesting name." Kratos smiled, or tried, each smile on his lips felt like a diseased thing. But he tried, for Lloyd's sake if not his own. Lloyd looked up to him, and he tried to smile back. Kratos was looking at the window, thinking...
All his thoughts came together with a near audible click as Lloyd again breathed on the glass and did another nonsense doodle.
"Hey!" Lloyd protested as his father ruffled his wild hair with a hand. When he looked back to the glass he was surprised to see that little patch of fogged up glass was considerably larger. He looked even more surprised when his father drew a symbol in angelic and drew a rough sketch of a cat underneath it.
"Ick cat! Noshy's better!" Lloyd then drew, or rather tried to draw a picture of Noishe.
Kratos considered the pictures for a long moment then agreed that Noishe did look better then his cat.
"What's that?" Lloyd pointed to a symbol, smudging it and ruining the meaning.
"Oh, nothing now."
"And that?" Lloyd added horns to Kratos' cat.
"An evil cat.. Or an evil little boy..."
"Epp! Your hands cold!"
Lloyd hopped up tried to get away. No such luck. Lloyd squeaked, tried with all his might to run away. Kratos' grip was too firm, and Lloyd watched in shock as his Noshy picture was given a new addition.
"No don't make Noshy have horns!"
It was too late, as the horns were added before the first words came out. Ignoring, or rather working around the fact that he was partially in his father's lap, partially dangling over the floor Lloyd reached out and made an addition to Kratos' cat.
"Wing Kitty!" Lloyd chirped, then stuck his tongue out at his father.
War at that point was declared as father and son tried to out do each other. Soon the original drawings were lost and the fog on the window had to be replaced. Hearing the sounds of happiness after so much gloom Noishe lifted an ear. Realizing it wasn't a dream the protozoan yawned, stretched, and did a half walk half stretch to the Aurion men. For a long moment Noishe stared at the apparent madness then setting his paws on Kratos' shoulders, reared up on his hind legs and barked at the glass. The blast of fog that spread out do to the protozoan's hot breath dwarfed Kratos' own by far.
With another sound of happiness Noishe put his paw right in the center of the glass plane.
"Wow, Noshy's got a big hand!"
Lloyd pressed his own against the glass alongside the protozoans and nodded.
"Noshy's hand's huge!"
"Not as large as mine." Kratos set his own to the panel and was chagrined to see that Noishe did indeed have a much bigger hand then the seraphim. "Humph..." Kratos glared at the protozoan, who only leaned forward to lick Kratos' face. The dog's air was so much of a "there there don't let it get to you" feeling behind it that Kratos could not help but glare harder.
Lloyd giggled at the expression on his Daddy's face, leaned back into the last safe haven in his world. The comforting scent of leather, steel, and sweet was a home to him. Seeing the game was over Kratos sighed, picked his son up, and carried him to bed. In this timeless world of grey and it's attending loneliness there was no way to tell day from night. Unable to sleep Kratos had long lost the ability to gauge how much sleep was too much sleep, so he allowed Lloyd to lay down and rest whenever he wanted.
Looking up at his father, watching him with sleep blurred eyes, Lloyd almost panicked when his father wandered out of the range of his vision. A soft squeak of a finger brushing against glass made him relax, Daddy was just playing with the window, or cleaning it. Daddy was funny like that.
"You don't mind do you?" Daddy's voice drifted over him, far away but near. Lloyd yawned, tried to wake up, but had no luck sleep was dragging him under. "After all you are a member of this family, and have been almost a brother to me for ages uncounted."
"Bark." Noishe shook his head.
"Good," There was another squeak, one that had an almost note of finality to it. "Then I think that's enough for tonight, go to bed Noishe, you look tired."
"Whine..."
"Don't worry I plan on trying to sleep myself." Lloyd heard Daddy yawn, stretch, then say a bad word as he bumped into the ceiling. Then another sound, the hiss of a sword being drawn. From half closed eyes Lloyd watched as Daddy walked across the room once or twice, then finally sat, back propped against a wall, a sword lazily resting in his lap. That red edge, like the red star, followed him into his dreams.
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"Mr. Irving, we can be gone and at Iselia in two hours at most." Kratos leaned against the outer wall of the dwarfs cottage. "The storms wont break until night fall, that is plenty of time to-"
"No, no and no, I've said it over and over, you and your boy are staying here until the last of this died down."
The dwarf brought his awe around and chopped a sizable log in half. He had asked Kratos to help him, and the seraphim had, breaking half of the formidable starting pile of logs first into halves, then into fourths. Dirk was still struggling along with the first part, the first halving of those logs.
"Don't you think about it, you already done enough for the day. How's your boy?"
"Well enough, as well as can be expected." Kratos said nothing more, set his axe to the side and watched the dwarf struggle. He'd already tried to help the man multiple time, and had finally given up after being gruffly ordered to keep to his own task.
"And your ummm dog? It hasn't..."
"Noishe is house trained, there have been no accidents." Kratos said firmly, all the while mentally berating the generous dwarfs thick headed-ness. Noishe was not a dog, and the fact that both humans treated the protozoan as a person clearly upset Dirk. Once Kratos would have been humored by such an attitude but now.. Annoyed, angry Kratos went to the dwarf's house, just aching to be alone for a bit, or to just be with his son, or Noishe. It didn't matter so long as he was with someone who understood the realities of the world, and did not stubbornly cling to illusions.