Authors Note: Okay. First off I'd like to say that this story is almost at the halfway point so I'd like to thank all of my reviewers for making this much possible with your reviews. Things are gong to start to pick up as far as action goes as the group begins to learn where they must go to collect the remaining pieces of the Soul Calibur and Soul Edge. We have much more to do.
Soul Calibur II: Of Souls And Swords
Chapter Forty Four: Return From Purgatory
As it had been predicted, the rain did begin to fall and the clouds did begin to clash with their lightning which left the seekers of the shards stranded in the church for the time being. Being at the peak of a small mountain the rain would surely loosen the soil which would come forward in mud slides which could end up being a true problem. There was also the fact that Link was completely unconscious and they couldn't seem to wake him up by any means of shock or sound. They had decided that the best course of action would be to hold their ground until the rain stopped, or until Link returned to the waking world.
Kyle Strife breathed as he held his seat in once of the ancient wooden pews on the first floor keeping his eyes on the securely frozen hell spawn, that was the job the Four Blades had been charged with. Mina was with him and Raphael and Yunsung were standing near the large doors keeping watch on the outside in the event that hostilities might come. Siegfried, Sophitia and Mitsurugi were nearby setting up a large fire where they could gather around when the cold of the evening began to bear down upon them. Maxi had stowed their supplies in the corner and was standing watch over them, frequently Talim would appear and retrieve something simple for Kilik, Xianghua, Taki and Cassandra who were watching over their still sleeping comrade.
"Do you think he will wake up?" Kyle looked up as Mina asked him this clearly concerned. He breathed before speaking "Link took on that monster in Istanbul, he fought that Charade thing and later Nightmare. If he could survive after what happened to him I have no worries." Mina shook her head announcing that she wasn't worried about Link, she was talking about their icy prisoner. Kyle looked at the Hellspawn. His power was very low but his eyes were open and were glowing, he was conscious but there was nothing he was able to do while he was trapped behind a sheet of solid ice. "Drake is also beginning to worry me." she followed up.
Kyle breathed as he looked to one of the still intact windows where the young wind warrior sat cleaving a stone over the edge of his blade, he was brooding over something and it was all a blur to Kyle as to what it could possibly be. "Hurph. Let him sulk all he wants, I think he's losing his nerve." Yunsung looked away as Mina looked towards him. Kyle breathed "Your pathetic sometimes, you know that." Yunsung simply huffed and continued to stand his post with Raphael who dismissed this all together. He wanted to ask Link exactly what was going on. After watching him come from such an immense power, he wanted to know exactly what was going on.
After reorganizing they had moved Link to one of the rooms on the second level of the cathedral where they had taken the liberty of patching up a few of his remaining scratches and scraps. Kilik and Xianghua's knowledge from their travels provided the fact he was exhausted from everything that had happened and that he was in a very deep sleep. Deep enough that they had given up on waking him and decided to let him get his rest. Taki felt relieved as well as she still hadn't paid him back for the inner peace he had brought her back in Venice. Cassandra meanwhile was just happy that he was still with them, but it was a joy that she couldn't possibly begin to bring to words.
It was getting late into the evening when Cassandra found herself left alone to watch over Link, the others decided to discuss what to do next with Siegfriend and Sophitia, who had become the unofficial leaders of the group. It was likely that they would be returning to Athens as many of them were exhausted and they needed a place to concentrate on what to do next. There was clearly little left to do in the north and it was likely that they would have to move towards the east before they found anymore shards. Lost in her thought she barely realized how heavy her eyes had become and drifted off herself.
She woke up a questionable amount of time later, anywhere between seconds and minutes to be greeted with a sight she had not expected to see. Link was sitting up, the bandages on his shirtless chest catching the light from the full moon. His hair stretched down covering his eyes as one hand held over the general area he had been stabbed in while the other rested on his forehead. He sucked in a breathed before twisting his neck which sounded off in a tense cracking sound clearly preparing himself for whatever the day ahead would bring. His hands then slowly moved to his head and he let out a light groaned of discomfort.
He looked around taking in his surroundings and the air. He murmured something in a dialect she couldn't understand whatsoever, he breathed out before he looked up towards the younger of the sisters and blinked once before speaking. Her names was mixed in with that some language but it was clearly a question. Her confused eyes said it all as Link spoke again "Sorry, I forgot myself... "Cassandra? What have I been missing?" he asked rather casually. Cassandra's heart skipped a beat as she jumped up and moved towards him losing her balance and falling towards him. Cassandra sucked in a sharp breath as Link caught her around her waist, her own arms moved around his neck almost by instinct. Cassandra pulled in his scent, trying to cleanse herself of any doubt that he had returned to them...to her.
Link returned Cassandra's embrace as he knew that whatever amount of time had passed, his body had been used to some means by the essence which had been hold up in the back of his mind for a great amount of time. Cassandra looked up into Link's eyes and she breathed "Are you really back?" she questioned him, slowly, her voice stumbling over the simple question. Link breathed looking at her "It certainly looks that way." he said with a forced smile, clearly still in a great deal of pain from his ordeals.
Cassandra hugged him again and backed off as Link breathed looking up at her able to read her like a book "I know you must have questions. I'll try to answer them but first..." his stomach let out a demanding growl and Cassandra couldn't help but laugh loudly at this. It could be assumed that whatever had been using Link's body didn't exactly sit down for a meal. Cassandra smiled before helping Link to his feet "It has been three weeks since the mansion, everybody is downstairs. You can try to explain everything to them too." Link nodded as he followed Cassadra, not bothering to recover his tunic. There was no real point.
Within moments everybody in the group had caught Cassandra's announcement and were sitting around the fire that was burning where the altar would normally be, all eyes focused on Link who was taking bite after bite from a loaf of bread clearly famished. The other seekers had gathered around the fire on the first floor, a number of them sitting on the fallen pieces of the structure that that Spawn creature and Link's strange second identity had knocked down. Those who knew Link better sat closer to him and the others were just behind them, Drake however sat off to the sides. He narrowed his eyes at Link "I'll bet I get blamed for this." he caught the gaze of Yunsung and huffed before looking back out the window.
Sophitia waited until Link managed to fulfill his three week hunger before she finally asked what everybody else was thinking "Can you tell us exactly what happened to you? Where you have been and who was that man was earlier?" Link breathed as he starred into the crackling fire, his eyes still lightly glowing, evidence of his recovered power. "To be honest I really haven't a clue what my body has been doing in the conscious world. The last things I remember is being pierced on that cliff, falling back and hitting the water, the next time I open my eyes I have this demon coming after my head." he said thumbing back to the Hellspawn.
"I still don't understand how such wounds could be healed in three weeks. Mind explaining that?" Taki requested clearly suspicious of him. Link leaned forward bringing his hands together "It was likely the work of another entity that has been hibernating in the back of my mind, he took refuge within me after I invoked his power in a battle with a creature called Majora. The mask his power and spirit had been stored in was left vacant. He apparently has some connection to the Soul Calibur and some sort of vendetta against the Soul Edge, that is probably why he hunted down this creature." he said looking towards the hellspawn.
Link breathed "As for where I have been." he said pushing the reference to himself "I have spent the last three weeks in the back of my own mind attempting to do as I was told. Finding the power that had gone missing on my journey here." he explained. Cassandra remembered Arus'Nei saying something along those lines. Before long she would need to ask what the truth was behind them. Mina looked at him "Mind explaining to us exactly what happened to you, as a presence?" Link breathed as he nodded his head and picked up from when he fell from the cliff...
Link wasn't exactly thrilled about telling them about his apparent vision, this dream had been a nightmare on so many levels that chewed at his very soul, a literal translation of his entire life flashing before his eyes. As he felt his consciousness slip, the salt of the ocean burning in his wounds and the warmth departing from his blood he was still falling. He fell into darkness and felt the icy claws of death snatch out at him. Link's mind had blurred as the shadows saturated his being. His body grew numb and his eyes were pulled shut. An endless sleep took him one that would not be broken so easily as the last.
"A voice called out to me from the darkness, one that I could never forget no matter how much I have been through. She has always been by my side as a friend and ally. I didn't question what was going on. I only forced myself to my feet and made my way through the darkness ignoring my wounds." Link hand seemed to move to where he had once been injured but he continued none the less "Her voice called me over the void urging me forward until a light was before me. I looked up as something massive struck the ground in the distance and a wall of flame washed over me throwing me back." he looked as the gripped eyes around him "Like many things, it makes no sense to me..."
"I regained consciousness and found myself in the middle of a grassy field which seemed to stretch on forever. Several fading faces from my past looked back at me before rushing towards a large three that came from what seemed to be the center of this valley. They were my friend from my home, though their physical states were that of around twelve years ago...my own fears and anxiety were attempting to destroy me even as I was pulling at the veil to the afterlife..." Link took a deep breath clearly somewhat in distress over what he was describing "Skip it." a voice suddenly snapped. He looked to Mitsurugi who sat there next to Taki and Raphael "If it will bring you so much discomfort, such things are none of our business. Skip to the end Link." he ordered.
Link gave a light smile feeling very relieved and picked up on his second awakening, when a voice called out to him as he was ready to give himself to death. The darkness melted away and he found himself standing in a place he had never been before. A pyramid of sorts in the center of an island which was surrounded by a field of clouds and clear skies. The city around him was of buildings constructed from white marble and how a light emanated from the crown of the pyramid "I cannot describe the feeling that I experienced while standing in this place. It was like I had been there before, but had been blind at the time. A breathless voice urged me to the crown of the pyramid." he said. Several of them were gripping such a story.
"I found myself able to stand to my own feet and the feeling of moisture had left my wounds, somehow they had healed and closed without my knowledge. Wanting answers I scaled the pyramid and found a platform at the top that held an alter of sorts, the light shot to the sky from this. And laying at the base of the light was the shard of the Soul Calibur. The one my 'brother' had passed on to me earlier." everybody was now officially confused, wondering how the holy blade had any connection to Link. The elven warrior looked up "Then he stepped forward..." everybody listened.
"A man decked out in black stepped from behind the light an ominous power following him as he appeared before me saying that I had to recover my former power if I was to face my shadow again." Cassandra breathed as it was a clear reference to Arus'Nei. Link continued "He then proceeded to tell me how the Soul Calibur is the only thing that could possibly destroy the Soul Edge for good. It is apparently the only way to eliminate the threat in your world and my own. He seemed to carry me over your world in the blink of an eye and showed me several places and people, claiming they carried the fragments. He then returned and said he would give me the time to rediscover my power, in this holy place where I stood. He also claimed that he would work towards my goals in the meantime." he said.
Kilik spoke up "Those goals would be finding and retrieving the shards of the Soul Edge and Soul Blade, correct?" Link nodded his head and announced that is why he was where he was, tracking the demon from Venice. Maxi swallowed at this "So you mean to tell me that the warrior from before, it was this guy using your body? Why didn't you tell us you had that much power?!" everybody looked to Link for an answer, aside from Yunsung who was eyes the melancholy Drake.
Link shook his head before speaking "As I said before this isn't the first time this has happened. I remained where I was, in the back of my own mind attempting to find my own absent power. I cannot begin to guess his motives, but I am sure it is more than just him trying to preserve my life and his own existence. He has a connection to either the Soul Calibur or Soul Edge and probably has goals of his own. The last thing I remember before waking here is him urging me to retrieve the Soul Calibur and put an end to the eternal war fought between it and the Soul Edge." he said. Clearly something was going on.
Siegfried took a deep breath before speaking "A second soul making its housing within your body, not something I'd normally trust but it doesn't seem to be against us, and you did say it needed your pass before he could take your body." Link nodded his head at the knight's question "It isn't like I had much of a choice, the energy in this place made it so much easier to search myself. The energy of this land is still very strange to me. But now I should be able to at least match Arus'Nei without trouble." everybody seemed enthused by this.
"This is all good news and with that kind of a power on our side it shouldn't be too hard to take the Black Wind down, right?" Raphael questioned. Link exhaled and shook his head "I doubt he will be coming out again. He warned me that this was a one shot deal. He claimed that what little energy he had wouldn't last long once he became involved in a fight." Xianghua nodded and announced how he was using the Soul Calibur shard as a base for his power. The fragment was recovering but it didn't have nearly the amount of energy that it did and would probably be useless until they got the others.
Kilik breathed as he looked at Link "If he took the energy from the fragment as well as whatever amount he might have gotten from you it would explain why your body is so thrashed. My guess is that if he takes directly from you without any assistance your body won't be able to handle it." Link chuckled lightly at this "So I should be careful not to fall off any more cliffs." he received an angry leer from Cassandra, Taki, Kilik and Talim as a result. Link also recieved an open palm upside his head from the annoyed Kyle Strife "Not funny long ears." he spat.
Link shrugged brushing off their glares "It won't be happening again. I don't think I need any more time to myself and I don't plan on coming that close to my end anytime soon. But with my body as thrashed as it is I probably won't be much use to you for a few weeks." he explained. His muscles ached and had become weak. The amount of battle Mythran put his body through left his body without much stamina and it was unlikely he'd be lifting a sword without a good deal of rest. But the good news was that everybody seemed to be in better spirits with his return to them and after the storm passed they would be on the move back to Athens.
Sophitia sucked in a breath as the thunder roared "Looks like we're going to be here a while. Some of us can stand guard down here and the rest of us can take shifts resting. Link you should get some rest." Link shook his head at this "My body might have been active, but I feel like I've been asleep the last three weeks, besides I need to get them down while they are still fresh in my mind." he said before he stood and headed up the stairs. He returned a few moments later with what appeared to be a large flat piece of wood and several sheets of paper on it, he held a long black instrument which seemed to be a piece of soft metal.
He took a seat in the corner on one of the rocks and then began to trace out a number of expertly sketched lines which appeared to be going into a pattern of sorts "What exactly are you doing Link?" Talim questioned. Link chuckled before holding up the drawing instrument "Another skill I learned in my homeland when tracking certain people. Once I see a face I can draw it out and then question their whereabouts. It might be helpful." he said as he continued tracing the lines which seemed to be making up into a roof "Oh yeah. You said that the spirit showed you who had the fragments and where they are!" Talim burst out.
Link nodded his head "Thats right. And just considering how the Soul Calibur seeks out the strongest will to destroy the Soul Edge, perhaps some of our group has knowledge of these people. Thus I will give as much detail as possible." Taki chuckled lightly at this, for all the skills she had learned and been forced to learn through scenario, this kid was really beginning to make her and some of the others look bad. Taki and Mitsurugi decided to take first watch along with Yunsung and Drake who didn't seem to anxious to be moving. Taki however couldn't help but raise and eyebrow as Cassandra followed Link up the stairs. She gave a light smile at the younger athenian as her depression and sorrow had been lifted.
Link worked on four different sketches at a time not wanting to lose them if his memory gave out on him, all of them were buildings at this point as he claimed that he knew he'd forget them first. Cassandra watched his movements as they had taken up on a large room on the third floor, a lantern rested beside them giving them light. Cassandra rested her head on Link's shoulder which he seemed to accept as he was finishing the rough outline of a building, she breathed in his scent unable to put to words how happy she was. Suddenly he spoke "How did you find me?" he asked suddenly "I know that the Soul Edge shards were first priority, how did you guys know where I was going to be?" he asked as he lifted his pencil.
"Arus'Nei told us." Link looked up and then over to her. She looked to the floor as she moved off his shoulder and brought her hands together "Not long after everything had happened we followed the Soul Calibur fragment. Arus'Nei confronted us and told us of a warrior that moved through a town which we suspected was him, there were no deaths so we shouldn't have bothered suspecting him." Link took in a breathed before shaking his head "He is obsessed over taking revenge by destroying me, it is likely that he watched even after I was struck down at the cliffs. He wouldn't be able to accept that." he explained.
Cassandra looked back up at him "He said a great deal more as well. Link, please tell me the truth. Are you two really brothers by the same blood?" she questioned. Link placed his sketch down on the floor and took in a breath "It all depends upon how you look at such things, we have the same parents and others have confirmed that I once had a twin. Records of my birth however show that my parents only had one child and some of those that knew my parents try to avoid the subject all together. He is my brother in some way or form, but I can no longer recall it. I didn't want it messing up my life." Cassandra moved closer to him.
Link breathed before punching his fist into the ground weakly "After he appeared and threatened Hyrule and I had apparently slain him, I tossed it from my mind. I didn't want to know of it. I didn't want to remember it. It was a sickening memory that betrayed something I had always believed. One way or another he is my brother, my twin and my blood. At the same time he is my darkness that now only exists to see my end. There is no getting through to him, but it isn't all his fault. Whatever happened to him has driven him into an anger that cannot be quenched by anything short of my death. My own brother is my worst enemy, and our only true agreement is that one must be destroyed." Link breathed out.
Cassandra moved closer to Link and wrapped her arms around him which took him aback, he moved his arms slowly up around her "You've been through too much to be forced through such a thing. He went on about how your existence is the reason for his suffering, don't believe him. Whatever happened to him is not your fault." Link held her close to him "I do not have the grace to pity him after all he has done. I don't know what he has been through, I assume forget the past and move on. He isn't going to let it go. I must fight him." Cassandra hugged him again "Please. Don't do anything stupid." Link kissed her head softly in response "I promise." he said.
Next Chapter: Turn Of The Winds
(Voice of Talim) The winds are known to weave and turn without warning. Moving from a gentle breeze one moment to a destructive force the very next. As the winds of fortune has returned our friend, the winds of betrayal must take another from us. As a long lost friend turns to an enemy I find myself losing my grip on the quest. An enemy is one that fights against another for completely different ideals, but what is a person who fights against another to protect those he cares about...Don't do this to us, Drake.