Did Destane even realize he had gone?
So absorbed was he in his doubts and speculations,
He barely felt a hand touch his shoulder.
The surprised scream had almost leapt from his throat when he felt a hand
cover his mouth
He blushed as his captor urged him quietly to hush.
A wrinkled hand attempted to provide an explanation with an insistent point
out the alleyway,
Mozenrath followed with his eyes and saw a flock of guards silently marching
past,
They were out of sight, Mozenrath and the stranger, as long as they didn't
draw any attention to themselves.
Shutters banged shut,
Doors were bolting the same in rapid procession and the stoic men made their
way down the city,
Occasionally knocking without the air of a question onto doors, and
returning to the line with the resident in hand.
Mozenrath was let go as soon as they passed out of view and hearing range.
Before he could start his indignant tirade,
He found himself at the end of a tired scolding,
"What is the matter with you child? Don't tell me you forgot the collecting
was today! By Allah's grace, I've never seen something so stupid. Where were
you running to in such a hurry I might ask!" she continued, hands on her
aproned hips," You know as perfectly well as the rest of us if your too far
from home at these times, you can just run in with the rest of us".
The speaker was a quick speaker, her thin set grimace of annoyance spouting
off in such a manner that Mozenrath could only stare with a look that
clearly said he had no idea what she was talking about.
She was on old woman; someone you could tell was mother, grandmother,
perhaps with even great grandchildren engraved into her heart. A stout
figure in her plain brown dress and weary gray eyes, she tucked back stray
string of white hair impatiently into the blue scrap piece of cloth that
held her hair back.
" So where do you live kid?"
When she didn't get a quick answer, she sighed and threw up her hands,
exclaiming more to herself when she said,
" Lovely! I've got me a mute! I swear, the old bat up there needs to…"
"I'm not a mute! I don't even know who you are! " Mozenrath practically
yelled just as exasperated.
The old woman gave him a calculating look, studying his unfamiliar face as
if she just realized it,
"Who are you?" she asked with the air of someone who already had a guess.
" I am Mozen-" but he stopped his instinctual answer,
Would it be wise to let on who he was…?
But the old lady had already seemed to catch on,
" Your Citadel master's kid!" she said with a gasp, hand flying to her
mouth.
" I am not his son! Not by any fabrication," Mozenrath protested, offended
by the very notion.
" No, No, I know that, " her eyes searched around as she talked, growing
strength in the urgency of the gesture.
She took his wrist in hand,
" Come with me," She started, puling him behind her as she made her way down
the streets, eyes always moving and feet trained in their own path.
"Wait ', Mozenrath demanded, pulling away from her, "What are you doing?"
"We have to get inside child, now hurry before the guards come back!" she
demanded with just as much force.
He snapped his lips shut, remembering his predicament in the fire of her
gaze.
He followed her, dodging into alleyways of the dead streets at her request.
At last, she stopped at one of the simple little domiciles Mozenrath had
admired from afar from what seemed like long ago.
The idea panicked him for a moment, as the woman worked on the lock of the
house and pulled him inside.
How long had he been here? It couldn't have been more than a couple months,
right?
Right?
"Amin! Amin! Its ok, its me!", the woman called into the softened dark of
the house
Mozenrath looked around as the woman left him to lock and bolt the door
behind her,
Too fascinated by the utter quaint and spare quality of the home.
The ceiling was almost too short for his growing height,
The room they had come into from the doorway was small, an open turn into a
kitchen and hallway from there.
And that was it.
So he couldn't help but wonder where the kids upon kids who emerged
seemingly from every nook and cranny had come from.
They gathered around the old woman like ducklings.
They had almost out of place clean faces, taking into consideration their
diminutive age, but their clothes were as old as the woman's, worn soft to
the look. And they scurried about in bare feet, the boys with silent,
unmoving expressions, shooting Mozenrath dirty looks when they caught his
eyes, the girls clinging to makeshift cloth dolls, gazing needing up into
the woman's worried countenance.
He realized now she was speaking to a man who had appeared from the more
dimly lit part of the house,
" He just was there Amin! Do you think the old bat let him…"
"-Go? I doubt it Farla,"
The man's gaze that shifted to Mozenrath made the apprentice uncomfortable
and he looked away.
It was not like the man was imposing.
He was regular in stature, but with the look of one who had seen too much he
would have cared too, carrying the posture of an solider before his time,
fallen too many times to complain off his horse.
No doubt the man was kind, at least in sense of the kids that sought shelter
behind his legs, much like sons and daughters will, but Mozenrath could see
in his eyes Amin, what the old woman called him, would not hesitate to do
what needed to be done if it benefited his keep.
" You are his student aren't you?" he asked without making it a question.
Well, if it seemed like they already knew, it wouldn't make sense to deny
it. His magic crackled restlessly, nervously, in the pit of his fingertips.
"Yes." He answered, figuring "old bat" referred to Destane. He smirked
internally; it was appropriate at the least
"Could you possibly tell me what's going on, where is everybody? What did
you mean earlier, Farla was it? ------------"
The old woman, now identified, nodded.
" What did you mean earlier by "collecting" What are the guards doing out
here?"
Amin and Farla shot each other bewildered looks.
Farla turned to him,
" You don't know about the collecting child?"
"Farla, -", Amin warned.
She turned on him.
" Don't you believe he deserves to know? If he was that protective of his
master's "honor", he would have showed it at the several times we spoke as
his master as the old bat, you counted"
Amin looked humbled.
" Fine"
" The collecting is," she started motioning for Mozenrath to follow her suit
in taking a seat on a weathered pair of chairs.
" Well, it's a monthly thing. Every 30 days or so, your master needs
specimens, specifically, new ones, for his experimenting, and sends his
guards down into the city to fetch them for him. They usually have no
discretion over who they select, but it all around benefits us to be inside,
because the more convenient you are to get, the more appealing you are to
them."
"These aren't your children, are they?" Mozenrath asked, knowing partly the
answer he would get.
"No. These are the leftovers of your master's un-relentless cleansing of our
people, all for the sake of his twisted little games," she added bitterly
"We take them in. They have a permanent home here, my husband and I no
longer fear being taken, in the eyes of your master, we are beyond
expendable", Amin continued for Farla.
Mozenrath wished he could be floored by the news, at least be able to show
some shock, as the situation seemed to call for it. But Mozenrath wasn't
surprised in the least. He didn't know about it, granted, but the fact that
Destane would do something like that wasn't odd at all. Mozenrath didn't put
it below him.
But he did feel something that he wasn't quite in the habit of doing.
Remorse.
But more importantly,
Guilt.
Sure, he may not have been the one dragging these people out of their homes,
but he was, if not loosely or unwillingly, tied to the person who was.
But what could he have done?
"I didn't know, really, I mean, I wouldn't put it past Destane-".
That utterance of his name earned several unexpected gasps from the children
and Farla alike.
Some of the children left.
"What?"
He looked at Farla, at Amin, for answers.
What did he do wrong?
"You can say his name child!"
Farla openly gaped at him, while Amin's brow furrowed as he ushered the
children out of the room.
"Of course I can." Mozenrath scoffed nervously, "Why wouldn't I?"
If he was looking for assurance in the couple's faces, he didn't get it.
"Why, cant you?" Mozenrath asked with a tone of absurdity.
It wasn't that hard of a pronunciation, was it?
"You really don't know, do you?" Farla asked, her own eyebrows coming
together in the same expression of anxious turbulence.
"No-------."
"We can't speak his name, no one in the city can." Amin explained angrily.
"Well why ever not?"
There was silence in the room for a fraction of a lightening style second.
Mozenrath had sounded just like Destane.
He got a sick feeling in his stomach.
"We never have!", Amin yelled angrily.
"Your master, boy, sees it fit to tyrannically restrict even our freedoms.
The spell that keeps us from speaking his name has been suffocating this
city from the very beginning!"
Mozenrath took a step back from the force of the man's anger, a force that
could only have been built from many a year of repression.
"The only reason you can is-".
But Farla stopped him with an amount of measure control.
She laid her hand over Mozenrath's.
" Only those close to your master can speak his name."
" But, But I'm not close to that maniac, I mean-", Mozenrath started
stumbling for words.
It didn't make sense,
With the way Destane acted, the only reason he didn't kill Mozenrath was
because of his obligation.
That's all he was, right?
To Destane, he was an obligation.
And Mozenrath liked it that way, because even considering he could be more
induced a jump of nausea in his stomach.
Amin didn't seem to be buying it.
He grumbled to himself, returning to the kitchen to be with his own
thoughts.
"You believe me right?" he asked, turning to Farla who had been tending
quietly to one of the children who had come up, tugging on her hem.
He caught a sight of her contemplating expression; her movements' mandatory
has her eyes moved restlessly once more.
" Tell me,"
she said, turning sharply to Mozenrath.
" What are you doing out in the city?"
"I'm…I'm getting out of here." He said, confident this makeshift had not
threatening loyalties to Destane.
He rose, remembering his mission,
His need.
But he stopped to watch in interest the instant change of relief on Farla's
face.
" Of course", she said smiling.
She suddenly griped his arm, a surprisingly young light of mischief in her
eyes, a corrupt enjoyment.
" I bet you don't give a damn about that overbearing crone, do you?" she
asked in a whisper.
He looked at her in surprise but she was on a roll.
" I'll tell you what, I'll help you get out of here."
She gave him a knowing smile as she turned to get her shawl hanging on a
makeshift rack on the wall.
" Ahhh, I'd give it all to see that buzzard miffed"
"Farla! Where are you going?"
They turned to see Amin back once more, suspicion clear.
" I'm going to help him get out of this Allah forsaken city," she said in a
business like manner that offered no room for arguing.
Apparently Amin didn't know that.
" Farla! Would you actually think about this? Try and consider that maybe
news of your "help" may reach back to him. Hell, the kid might tell him
himself!"
"I am in not in league with Destane!" Mozenrath shouted, trying to convey
the absurdity of the implication.
" I just want to go home!"
Amin was about to respond when a thunder like sound, a crash, and screams
broke the silence's stifling hold on the city.
One of the kids started to cry.
"What the hell was that?"
While Amin went to the door, Mozenrath, following Farla's request, helped
round up the kids and bring them to a room in the back hallway.
Note to self, Mozenrath thought as he found his hair and flesh pulled in
every direction by grubby hands, never have children.
"What was that?" Mozenrath asked, coming to the door.
Amin stepped aside silently, an indefinable emotion radiating off him.
Mozenrath's jaw was most assuredly hitting the ground when he saw what was
rampaging with an insanely calm smile down the street, almost whistling in
his merriment as the guards dragged people out of the house, demanding to
know...
"Where is the kid?"
Amin looked at Mozenrath's expression of stock still fear, the white
knuckled grip he had on the door, and the cog wheel hum of a panicked mind
he could almost hear from him.
That's when he made his decision.
This kid was no friend of Destane.
"Farla, stay with the children, hide them if you must,"
She nodded as Amin rushed out the door with Mozenrath in tow.
"C'mon kid, were getting you out of here."
Mozenrath grimaced as he was dragged along; the growing sound of terror and
wild despair, the crackling flames that licked the sky as houses were set
aflame he saw as he looked back,
It was because of him.
It was his fault.
He could see the city's boundaries approaching, felt the almost desperate
relief build in him and then..
"Little kitten", he couldn't even turn to face what he feared as a blast to
his back sent him sprawling into the sand.
He heard Amin cry out and knew he was hit as well.
He scrambled up and there he was, Destane, grinning against a hectic
background, a glint reserved for Mozenrath dancing in his eyes.
"Little kitten, you disappoint me. Did I really upset you that much?"
Mozenrath felt a wave of outrage, renewed from the short time it dissipated,
at the mocking mention of his maiming.
"You're a mad man Destane, and I no longer have any business with you."
"Oh but kitten, surely you don't believe your training is done? We have so
much more to do in respects to your education, my presumptuous little
amateur"
He was thrown back again by another blast.
His eyes blazed as he rose once more to the chorus of Destane's laughter,
his audience growing as curious onlookers gathered.
He was tired of it.
Tired of being a punching bag.
Even without the concentration it normally took, his power sprang to life,
shifting a cracking in a blue outline around his body.
Destane raised an eyebrow.
"Do you dare little kitten?"
Mozenrath growled in disgust at the unwanted pet name.
"I am not a little kitten!" he screamed, throwing a tumultuous blue blast at
Destane, ignoring the burn in his hands from the lack of preparation.
Destane's expression went from amused to cold in seconds, his fists turned
his signature eerie black, as he swatted the fierce thing away.
Mozenrath practically roared in fury, sending blast after blast at Destane.
Destane blinked in confusion and some admiration as he parried every one of
Mozenrath's attacks with not so much ease. Mozenrath's rage was incredible
when pushed to the limit. If only he knew how to control that. Every time
his power peaked, it was in response to emotion. Destane knew he would be a
force to be reckoned with if he knew how to harvest that. But for know, he'd
let Mozenrath's spurt wear itself out, and judging by the sweat that beaded
on his forehead and the slight pant that accompanied his tirade, that wasn't
too far away.
"I think it's about time to stop this nonsense, don't you?" Destane said to
Mozenrath who was currently in a pause of his attacks, resisting the urge to
rest upon his knees, swaying a bit on his feet.
He had strained any abilities he had.
The revolt had come to a shuddering halt.
Mozenrath could only look up tiredly as Destane smiled at him patronizingly,
a large menacingly red-rimmed blast forming in his palms.
The coup-de-gras.
Mozenrath wondered faintly if it would kill him, half heartedly trying to
form a barrier of some kind with his own magic.
Destane almost felt pity, the key word being almost. He hurled it at his
apprentice.
Mozenrath started to back up, fighting the urge to face his punishment
close-eyed.
That's when he felt the push.
Felt his back connect with the wall.
And heard a scream that wasn't his.
He looked up into an ashen-faced Amin, whose eyes were wide open in shock.
A faint smoke was rising from his back.
"You took the blow," Mozenrath said not believing.
He earned a slip of Amin's weak standings, wincing as a loose brick from the
wall he was slammed into dug into his back.
"You took the blow", he repeated.
"Dammit kid, use some common sense and get out of here", came the hoarse
reply from the sinking dying man.
"But why did." He was cut off as the man screamed, a merciless blast from
Destane who had been making his way over.
Mozenrath watched horrified as the man sunk to the ground, eyes wide open.
Dead.
Destane looked down in disgust.
"Street trash." He turned to one of his guards. "Get this stain off my
street".
Mozenrath turned.
And flew.
He heard an exclamation from Destane,
And didn't care.
He was running like it was the only thing he was born to do, his legs
working on an energy restore he didn't have.
No joy came to him as he saw his destination coming up to him faster than he
would have believed.
But home.
Ahhmal.
His friends.
Ahhmal.
He took on a burst of speed as he came upon the borders.
He never expected to collide with an invisible solid. He never expected,
further more, to be encapsulated by the solid, still not visible.
And he certainly didn't expect to feel Hell ravage his body in pain.
He screamed. He was screaming in agony, he was screaming in shock, and he
was screaming in the disappointment of it all. Through quickly blinding
eyes, he saw the normal sands of the desert, beyond Necropolis.
He writhed, his own body's instinct to escape, but he was stuck.
That is, until a hand jerked him from the barrier's hold and onto the
ground.
He convulsed, turning onto his side to wretch everything he ever ate onto
the horribly familiar black sand.
He kept on till only dry heaves wracked his body, his vision returning at a
painfully slow rate.
" Poor little kitten. Did you really think I wouldn't have any way of
keeping you here? Try and remember, you stupid boy, back to the first day
you came here", Destane urged above him, swimming in and out of focus.
And Mozenrath did remember, he remembered something being implanted in his
hand, which was now, singed a glistening black.
Destane had called it a security measure.
He was jerked up by his hair.
" Of course," Destane continued, that mad glint a light in the darkening
sky, " I do think a little reprimanding is in order…………"
Mozenrath never did find out if Farla had survived, if her house was one of
the few that didn't burst into flame in pursuit of him. He never found out,
either, the fate of those children, in the many years he spent with Destane,
on his many journeys that followed out into the city to escape Destane's
wrath, if even for a futile moment, hiding out among the city until one of
the backstabbing towns people dragged him back in hopes of a reward, he
never saw her or them again.
Perhaps she had died of grief as she was asked to carry on without her
husband.
Mozenrath could only hope, if not vainly, that she didn't blame him.
Dean
So absorbed was he in his doubts and speculations,
He barely felt a hand touch his shoulder.
The surprised scream had almost leapt from his throat when he felt a hand
cover his mouth
He blushed as his captor urged him quietly to hush.
A wrinkled hand attempted to provide an explanation with an insistent point
out the alleyway,
Mozenrath followed with his eyes and saw a flock of guards silently marching
past,
They were out of sight, Mozenrath and the stranger, as long as they didn't
draw any attention to themselves.
Shutters banged shut,
Doors were bolting the same in rapid procession and the stoic men made their
way down the city,
Occasionally knocking without the air of a question onto doors, and
returning to the line with the resident in hand.
Mozenrath was let go as soon as they passed out of view and hearing range.
Before he could start his indignant tirade,
He found himself at the end of a tired scolding,
"What is the matter with you child? Don't tell me you forgot the collecting
was today! By Allah's grace, I've never seen something so stupid. Where were
you running to in such a hurry I might ask!" she continued, hands on her
aproned hips," You know as perfectly well as the rest of us if your too far
from home at these times, you can just run in with the rest of us".
The speaker was a quick speaker, her thin set grimace of annoyance spouting
off in such a manner that Mozenrath could only stare with a look that
clearly said he had no idea what she was talking about.
She was on old woman; someone you could tell was mother, grandmother,
perhaps with even great grandchildren engraved into her heart. A stout
figure in her plain brown dress and weary gray eyes, she tucked back stray
string of white hair impatiently into the blue scrap piece of cloth that
held her hair back.
" So where do you live kid?"
When she didn't get a quick answer, she sighed and threw up her hands,
exclaiming more to herself when she said,
" Lovely! I've got me a mute! I swear, the old bat up there needs to…"
"I'm not a mute! I don't even know who you are! " Mozenrath practically
yelled just as exasperated.
The old woman gave him a calculating look, studying his unfamiliar face as
if she just realized it,
"Who are you?" she asked with the air of someone who already had a guess.
" I am Mozen-" but he stopped his instinctual answer,
Would it be wise to let on who he was…?
But the old lady had already seemed to catch on,
" Your Citadel master's kid!" she said with a gasp, hand flying to her
mouth.
" I am not his son! Not by any fabrication," Mozenrath protested, offended
by the very notion.
" No, No, I know that, " her eyes searched around as she talked, growing
strength in the urgency of the gesture.
She took his wrist in hand,
" Come with me," She started, puling him behind her as she made her way down
the streets, eyes always moving and feet trained in their own path.
"Wait ', Mozenrath demanded, pulling away from her, "What are you doing?"
"We have to get inside child, now hurry before the guards come back!" she
demanded with just as much force.
He snapped his lips shut, remembering his predicament in the fire of her
gaze.
He followed her, dodging into alleyways of the dead streets at her request.
At last, she stopped at one of the simple little domiciles Mozenrath had
admired from afar from what seemed like long ago.
The idea panicked him for a moment, as the woman worked on the lock of the
house and pulled him inside.
How long had he been here? It couldn't have been more than a couple months,
right?
Right?
"Amin! Amin! Its ok, its me!", the woman called into the softened dark of
the house
Mozenrath looked around as the woman left him to lock and bolt the door
behind her,
Too fascinated by the utter quaint and spare quality of the home.
The ceiling was almost too short for his growing height,
The room they had come into from the doorway was small, an open turn into a
kitchen and hallway from there.
And that was it.
So he couldn't help but wonder where the kids upon kids who emerged
seemingly from every nook and cranny had come from.
They gathered around the old woman like ducklings.
They had almost out of place clean faces, taking into consideration their
diminutive age, but their clothes were as old as the woman's, worn soft to
the look. And they scurried about in bare feet, the boys with silent,
unmoving expressions, shooting Mozenrath dirty looks when they caught his
eyes, the girls clinging to makeshift cloth dolls, gazing needing up into
the woman's worried countenance.
He realized now she was speaking to a man who had appeared from the more
dimly lit part of the house,
" He just was there Amin! Do you think the old bat let him…"
"-Go? I doubt it Farla,"
The man's gaze that shifted to Mozenrath made the apprentice uncomfortable
and he looked away.
It was not like the man was imposing.
He was regular in stature, but with the look of one who had seen too much he
would have cared too, carrying the posture of an solider before his time,
fallen too many times to complain off his horse.
No doubt the man was kind, at least in sense of the kids that sought shelter
behind his legs, much like sons and daughters will, but Mozenrath could see
in his eyes Amin, what the old woman called him, would not hesitate to do
what needed to be done if it benefited his keep.
" You are his student aren't you?" he asked without making it a question.
Well, if it seemed like they already knew, it wouldn't make sense to deny
it. His magic crackled restlessly, nervously, in the pit of his fingertips.
"Yes." He answered, figuring "old bat" referred to Destane. He smirked
internally; it was appropriate at the least
"Could you possibly tell me what's going on, where is everybody? What did
you mean earlier, Farla was it? ------------"
The old woman, now identified, nodded.
" What did you mean earlier by "collecting" What are the guards doing out
here?"
Amin and Farla shot each other bewildered looks.
Farla turned to him,
" You don't know about the collecting child?"
"Farla, -", Amin warned.
She turned on him.
" Don't you believe he deserves to know? If he was that protective of his
master's "honor", he would have showed it at the several times we spoke as
his master as the old bat, you counted"
Amin looked humbled.
" Fine"
" The collecting is," she started motioning for Mozenrath to follow her suit
in taking a seat on a weathered pair of chairs.
" Well, it's a monthly thing. Every 30 days or so, your master needs
specimens, specifically, new ones, for his experimenting, and sends his
guards down into the city to fetch them for him. They usually have no
discretion over who they select, but it all around benefits us to be inside,
because the more convenient you are to get, the more appealing you are to
them."
"These aren't your children, are they?" Mozenrath asked, knowing partly the
answer he would get.
"No. These are the leftovers of your master's un-relentless cleansing of our
people, all for the sake of his twisted little games," she added bitterly
"We take them in. They have a permanent home here, my husband and I no
longer fear being taken, in the eyes of your master, we are beyond
expendable", Amin continued for Farla.
Mozenrath wished he could be floored by the news, at least be able to show
some shock, as the situation seemed to call for it. But Mozenrath wasn't
surprised in the least. He didn't know about it, granted, but the fact that
Destane would do something like that wasn't odd at all. Mozenrath didn't put
it below him.
But he did feel something that he wasn't quite in the habit of doing.
Remorse.
But more importantly,
Guilt.
Sure, he may not have been the one dragging these people out of their homes,
but he was, if not loosely or unwillingly, tied to the person who was.
But what could he have done?
"I didn't know, really, I mean, I wouldn't put it past Destane-".
That utterance of his name earned several unexpected gasps from the children
and Farla alike.
Some of the children left.
"What?"
He looked at Farla, at Amin, for answers.
What did he do wrong?
"You can say his name child!"
Farla openly gaped at him, while Amin's brow furrowed as he ushered the
children out of the room.
"Of course I can." Mozenrath scoffed nervously, "Why wouldn't I?"
If he was looking for assurance in the couple's faces, he didn't get it.
"Why, cant you?" Mozenrath asked with a tone of absurdity.
It wasn't that hard of a pronunciation, was it?
"You really don't know, do you?" Farla asked, her own eyebrows coming
together in the same expression of anxious turbulence.
"No-------."
"We can't speak his name, no one in the city can." Amin explained angrily.
"Well why ever not?"
There was silence in the room for a fraction of a lightening style second.
Mozenrath had sounded just like Destane.
He got a sick feeling in his stomach.
"We never have!", Amin yelled angrily.
"Your master, boy, sees it fit to tyrannically restrict even our freedoms.
The spell that keeps us from speaking his name has been suffocating this
city from the very beginning!"
Mozenrath took a step back from the force of the man's anger, a force that
could only have been built from many a year of repression.
"The only reason you can is-".
But Farla stopped him with an amount of measure control.
She laid her hand over Mozenrath's.
" Only those close to your master can speak his name."
" But, But I'm not close to that maniac, I mean-", Mozenrath started
stumbling for words.
It didn't make sense,
With the way Destane acted, the only reason he didn't kill Mozenrath was
because of his obligation.
That's all he was, right?
To Destane, he was an obligation.
And Mozenrath liked it that way, because even considering he could be more
induced a jump of nausea in his stomach.
Amin didn't seem to be buying it.
He grumbled to himself, returning to the kitchen to be with his own
thoughts.
"You believe me right?" he asked, turning to Farla who had been tending
quietly to one of the children who had come up, tugging on her hem.
He caught a sight of her contemplating expression; her movements' mandatory
has her eyes moved restlessly once more.
" Tell me,"
she said, turning sharply to Mozenrath.
" What are you doing out in the city?"
"I'm…I'm getting out of here." He said, confident this makeshift had not
threatening loyalties to Destane.
He rose, remembering his mission,
His need.
But he stopped to watch in interest the instant change of relief on Farla's
face.
" Of course", she said smiling.
She suddenly griped his arm, a surprisingly young light of mischief in her
eyes, a corrupt enjoyment.
" I bet you don't give a damn about that overbearing crone, do you?" she
asked in a whisper.
He looked at her in surprise but she was on a roll.
" I'll tell you what, I'll help you get out of here."
She gave him a knowing smile as she turned to get her shawl hanging on a
makeshift rack on the wall.
" Ahhh, I'd give it all to see that buzzard miffed"
"Farla! Where are you going?"
They turned to see Amin back once more, suspicion clear.
" I'm going to help him get out of this Allah forsaken city," she said in a
business like manner that offered no room for arguing.
Apparently Amin didn't know that.
" Farla! Would you actually think about this? Try and consider that maybe
news of your "help" may reach back to him. Hell, the kid might tell him
himself!"
"I am in not in league with Destane!" Mozenrath shouted, trying to convey
the absurdity of the implication.
" I just want to go home!"
Amin was about to respond when a thunder like sound, a crash, and screams
broke the silence's stifling hold on the city.
One of the kids started to cry.
"What the hell was that?"
While Amin went to the door, Mozenrath, following Farla's request, helped
round up the kids and bring them to a room in the back hallway.
Note to self, Mozenrath thought as he found his hair and flesh pulled in
every direction by grubby hands, never have children.
"What was that?" Mozenrath asked, coming to the door.
Amin stepped aside silently, an indefinable emotion radiating off him.
Mozenrath's jaw was most assuredly hitting the ground when he saw what was
rampaging with an insanely calm smile down the street, almost whistling in
his merriment as the guards dragged people out of the house, demanding to
know...
"Where is the kid?"
Amin looked at Mozenrath's expression of stock still fear, the white
knuckled grip he had on the door, and the cog wheel hum of a panicked mind
he could almost hear from him.
That's when he made his decision.
This kid was no friend of Destane.
"Farla, stay with the children, hide them if you must,"
She nodded as Amin rushed out the door with Mozenrath in tow.
"C'mon kid, were getting you out of here."
Mozenrath grimaced as he was dragged along; the growing sound of terror and
wild despair, the crackling flames that licked the sky as houses were set
aflame he saw as he looked back,
It was because of him.
It was his fault.
He could see the city's boundaries approaching, felt the almost desperate
relief build in him and then..
"Little kitten", he couldn't even turn to face what he feared as a blast to
his back sent him sprawling into the sand.
He heard Amin cry out and knew he was hit as well.
He scrambled up and there he was, Destane, grinning against a hectic
background, a glint reserved for Mozenrath dancing in his eyes.
"Little kitten, you disappoint me. Did I really upset you that much?"
Mozenrath felt a wave of outrage, renewed from the short time it dissipated,
at the mocking mention of his maiming.
"You're a mad man Destane, and I no longer have any business with you."
"Oh but kitten, surely you don't believe your training is done? We have so
much more to do in respects to your education, my presumptuous little
amateur"
He was thrown back again by another blast.
His eyes blazed as he rose once more to the chorus of Destane's laughter,
his audience growing as curious onlookers gathered.
He was tired of it.
Tired of being a punching bag.
Even without the concentration it normally took, his power sprang to life,
shifting a cracking in a blue outline around his body.
Destane raised an eyebrow.
"Do you dare little kitten?"
Mozenrath growled in disgust at the unwanted pet name.
"I am not a little kitten!" he screamed, throwing a tumultuous blue blast at
Destane, ignoring the burn in his hands from the lack of preparation.
Destane's expression went from amused to cold in seconds, his fists turned
his signature eerie black, as he swatted the fierce thing away.
Mozenrath practically roared in fury, sending blast after blast at Destane.
Destane blinked in confusion and some admiration as he parried every one of
Mozenrath's attacks with not so much ease. Mozenrath's rage was incredible
when pushed to the limit. If only he knew how to control that. Every time
his power peaked, it was in response to emotion. Destane knew he would be a
force to be reckoned with if he knew how to harvest that. But for know, he'd
let Mozenrath's spurt wear itself out, and judging by the sweat that beaded
on his forehead and the slight pant that accompanied his tirade, that wasn't
too far away.
"I think it's about time to stop this nonsense, don't you?" Destane said to
Mozenrath who was currently in a pause of his attacks, resisting the urge to
rest upon his knees, swaying a bit on his feet.
He had strained any abilities he had.
The revolt had come to a shuddering halt.
Mozenrath could only look up tiredly as Destane smiled at him patronizingly,
a large menacingly red-rimmed blast forming in his palms.
The coup-de-gras.
Mozenrath wondered faintly if it would kill him, half heartedly trying to
form a barrier of some kind with his own magic.
Destane almost felt pity, the key word being almost. He hurled it at his
apprentice.
Mozenrath started to back up, fighting the urge to face his punishment
close-eyed.
That's when he felt the push.
Felt his back connect with the wall.
And heard a scream that wasn't his.
He looked up into an ashen-faced Amin, whose eyes were wide open in shock.
A faint smoke was rising from his back.
"You took the blow," Mozenrath said not believing.
He earned a slip of Amin's weak standings, wincing as a loose brick from the
wall he was slammed into dug into his back.
"You took the blow", he repeated.
"Dammit kid, use some common sense and get out of here", came the hoarse
reply from the sinking dying man.
"But why did." He was cut off as the man screamed, a merciless blast from
Destane who had been making his way over.
Mozenrath watched horrified as the man sunk to the ground, eyes wide open.
Dead.
Destane looked down in disgust.
"Street trash." He turned to one of his guards. "Get this stain off my
street".
Mozenrath turned.
And flew.
He heard an exclamation from Destane,
And didn't care.
He was running like it was the only thing he was born to do, his legs
working on an energy restore he didn't have.
No joy came to him as he saw his destination coming up to him faster than he
would have believed.
But home.
Ahhmal.
His friends.
Ahhmal.
He took on a burst of speed as he came upon the borders.
He never expected to collide with an invisible solid. He never expected,
further more, to be encapsulated by the solid, still not visible.
And he certainly didn't expect to feel Hell ravage his body in pain.
He screamed. He was screaming in agony, he was screaming in shock, and he
was screaming in the disappointment of it all. Through quickly blinding
eyes, he saw the normal sands of the desert, beyond Necropolis.
He writhed, his own body's instinct to escape, but he was stuck.
That is, until a hand jerked him from the barrier's hold and onto the
ground.
He convulsed, turning onto his side to wretch everything he ever ate onto
the horribly familiar black sand.
He kept on till only dry heaves wracked his body, his vision returning at a
painfully slow rate.
" Poor little kitten. Did you really think I wouldn't have any way of
keeping you here? Try and remember, you stupid boy, back to the first day
you came here", Destane urged above him, swimming in and out of focus.
And Mozenrath did remember, he remembered something being implanted in his
hand, which was now, singed a glistening black.
Destane had called it a security measure.
He was jerked up by his hair.
" Of course," Destane continued, that mad glint a light in the darkening
sky, " I do think a little reprimanding is in order…………"
Mozenrath never did find out if Farla had survived, if her house was one of
the few that didn't burst into flame in pursuit of him. He never found out,
either, the fate of those children, in the many years he spent with Destane,
on his many journeys that followed out into the city to escape Destane's
wrath, if even for a futile moment, hiding out among the city until one of
the backstabbing towns people dragged him back in hopes of a reward, he
never saw her or them again.
Perhaps she had died of grief as she was asked to carry on without her
husband.
Mozenrath could only hope, if not vainly, that she didn't blame him.
Dean