--The Fourth Realm--
A fanfic taking place in the Realms of the Blood, created by
Anne Bishop whom I worship and pay tribute to every day.
Just kidding. Or so you think.
(Written by the Great and Powerful Keski,
spell checked by Microsoft Works Word Processor)
---
Chapter XIV
Grudges
---
Althemen's eyes were trained on the back of Alnevar's head as they walked down the corridor, though his mind was elsewhere. Alnevar was amusing himself by warping his hands into strange shapes and then letting them snap back again. The night was moving forward steadily. Morning would come soon. Althemen and Alnevar had caught up with the rest of the group and were making progress through the castle, tedious if steady. They were forced to check each and every door, and they were lucky not to come across any branching off into more corridors.
The night proceeded uneventfully until Skaviar slowed his pace to walk beside Althemen. Althemen emitted a slight snarl but held his tongue.
"Ooh, still a feisty little bugger, I see," Skaviar said. Althemen didn't respond. "Silent treatment? Aw, too bad for me. But I could always force your hand, you know."
"What do you want, Skaviar?" Althemen growled.
"Oh, just a little smile once and again! You're so somber these days, with the black hair and the clothes like you're attending a funeral. You used to be a handsome, young, blonde boy, searching for a Queen to serve. Yet in under a millennium, you've changed so completely."
"Circumstances have changed a great deal," Althemen muttered.
"Still, haven't you ever heard that every cloud has a silver lining?"
"And every cloud brings a chance of rain, now, will you please leave me be?" Althemen clenched his teeth.
"Oh, don't be mad at me, I haven't done anything wrong." Skaviar smiled widely. Althemen wanted to retch. "Like I said," Skaviar said cheerfully, then dropped his voice, "I could always force your hand."
Althemen paled and clenched his teeth again. "Then what the hell do you want me to do?"
"I've already told you," Skaviar chirped. "Just be a little more cheerful. Shouldn't be that hard for you. You were so happy when you first set your sights on that fine young lady, Tes--"
Althemen snapped. He spun and grabbed Skaviar by the neck with his left hand, the same hand instantly shifting its form to resemble a solid clamp. Skaviar's own left hand solidified to an almost metallicsubstance and cannoned into Althemen's gut. Althemen gasped for breath and stumbled backwards, dropping Skaviar, who grinned sadistically and went at Althemen. An instant later, Skaviar shrieked and collapsed in a heap. He shook slightly, but did not move otherwise.
Althemen had felt a wave of dark energy fly past him and assault Skaviar. When he looked back, he saw Luseik staring calmly at the twitching man on the floor. Luseik slowly rose one hand and aimed it in the general direction of Skaviar, and Althemen scrambled out of the way as Skaviar's body shuddered, rose to a vaguely standing position, emitted another shriek, and vanished. Skaviar's clothing fell to the ground in a heap, along with a soft chink.
Althemen fell upon the heap instantly, pulling from it a small chip of an Ebon-Gray Jewel. Before anyone else could see it, he vanished it and turned to face Luseik.
Luseik didn't seem to see him. The draghan was still staring at the heap of clothing.
Althemen rose slowly to a standing position, his eyes trained on Luseik, and approached the draghan slowly. He stopped about an arm's length away from Luseik, who still seemed to be staring through Althemen at the clothing heap. Althemen vaguely noticed the others staring from up ahead, but nobody was moving.
Althemen cleared his throat. Luseik slowly turned his gaze upward to Althemen's eyes. For a moment they stood silently, each trying to glean whatever information they could from the other's eyes.
Finally, Luseik nodded almost imperceptibly and said, "You owe me for that." With an uncharacteristicallyfriendly grin, he turned and made his way back to the others. Althemen stared after him and then glanced briefly back at where Skaviar had been. He remembered the Jewel chip, and breathed a sigh of relief.
"And now, only Kreethen can pose a problem," he muttered. "Irritating little prick always reminded me of Skaviar, but he works for Menteur, so it shouldn't be too dangerous to let him wield whatever power he can muster over me." He smiled to himself and followed Luseik.
---
The man began to laugh quietly. He played idly with the shard of an Ebon-Gray Jewel he held between the fore- and middle fingers of his right hand.
"Muster?" he whispered. His hand clamped shut on the Jewel piece and a sharp edge sliced through his hand. Blood ran from the wound as he began to laugh louder. The blood dripped on the floor, sizzled gently, and then grew silent. His laugh raised in volume and pitch and his hand did not stop bleeding. A small, steady stream of blood poured from his clenched fist. The growing pool of blood on the floor was burning through the stone, creating a small cloud of smoke about itself that hovered near the area. The man was cackling, and showed no signs of quieting. There was a large hole in the floor, easily large enough for a grown man to fall through. The man was shrieking with high pitched laughter, shaking violently as the acidic blood fell in torrents from his fist. The skin of his hand itself appeared to remain unharmed, though the entire room smelled of burnt flesh. Finally, the laughter was cut off. He moved his fist in front of him and opened it. The blood flow ceased, the Jewel chip fell the floor before him.
"I don't need to muster power," the man snarled. "I don't even have to use my power. And if Menteur hasn't told you of my little defection, well... I'd say you two have grown apart over the years."
He lowered his head to face the ground. His eyes eased closed. "You, Althemen…"
His head snapped back up and he drew his tongue across sharpened fang-like teeth. His lips were drawn back in a hungry, animalistic grin. "You don't know what I am."
Throughout Akarui's entire castle, a howl resounded loudly from the walls.
---
"Awoooo…" Althemen froze instantly, as did the rest of the group.
He can't be here, Althemen thought hastily. "But that's his howl."
Alnevar looked at Althemen. "What?" Alnevar said, tilting his head slightly.
Althemen's eyes widened. "Nothing," he said. Alnevar let it drop, but Althemen could tell he wasn't satisfied.
---
As the prophecy went, Akarui thought resignedly, "Only one of the three can prosper." It's only a shame that I must try to harm those my twobrothers promote.
---
Yachesa slammed into the side of the building. She screamed in agony as the wounds left in her back by the lash reopened. "No!" she screamed. "No, no, Yachesen!"
The boy cowered as the huge man raised his arm and struck the boy across the face. Yachesen cried out and was thrown to the side. Yachesa flew at him and hovered above him. The huge man raised his foot and knocked the girl away.
"No!" Yachesa screamed. "No! Leave Yachesen alone! Don't hurt my brother!" she shrieked through sobs as she tried to get up again.
The huge man kicked her brother. The small boy crumpled and did not move. Yachesa screamed again and tried to crawl toward him. The huge man reached the boy first and picked him up by the shoulders. The boy's head lolled freely. Yachesa's sobs and screams drowned out all other sounds as the huge man easily snapped the boy's neck and tossed the body aside. He turned to Yachesa.
Yachesa hadn't stopped crying. She lay on her side, shaking, racked with sobs, as the huge man approached.
The huge man raised his foot behind him, with a sadistic grin on his face. He brought his foot down in a wide arc.
Yachesa uncurled rapidly, and that movement alone startled the man into a brief stupor. She latched onto his leg and sank her teeth into the back of his leg. Yachesa discharged her Black energy into the man's body and he emitted a scream of his own before he crumpled.
Yachesa trembled and scrambled away from the man. Her surroundings were rippling, undulating. She was losing track of what was real and what was not. She crawled toward her brother and held him in her arms, smoothing his black hair, stroking his young face, still twisted in an expression of unadulterated fear, the tears not yet dried on his cheeks.
It's not done, Yachesa, we can win, it's not over until the final death. Make them, use them. It will be fine. You will have power. We will have power. We can live again. We can take our vengeance on the world that abandoned us. We will rise again.
Die, tainted seeds.
---
Yachesa threw the sheets back and screamed. The door eased open.
"Yachesa? What is wrong?"
Her brother. Her brother. Yachesen. No, no, Yachesen. No, Yachesen. No.
"N-nothing," she whispered.
Yachesen nodded. "Very well." he turned and left the room.
Yachesa stared at the door and shook slightly.
I did this. I did this to him. He's like this and it's my fault. It's my fault. My fault. I did it. I'm to blame. I was supposed to protect him, and I let this happen to him.
No, Yachesen! No! No! It wasn't meant to happen this way! I didn't mean to let you suffer like you did! Yachesen, you…
Yachesa swung her legs off the bed and planted them on the floor. She stared at the far wall. She remembered a time, so many long years ago… She'd woken up from a horrible nightmare and she'd been screaming. It was a faded memory, but she remembered it was cold, so cold. They'd been traveling, they were in Glacia. They were sleeping at an inn in Glacia. That, yes, that was why it was so cold. Yachesa had screamed. So cold. She'd screamed. Her brother had instantly rushed to her side and held her. It was so cold, but her brother, her younger brother's embrace, was so warm, so comforting, that she'd stopped screaming and the tears rolling down her cheeks had stopped. She'd let her brother comfort her until she had forgotten the dream completely.
But now… Yachesen had simply nodded and closed the door.
Her younger brother would not have just closed the door. He would have persisted until she told him of her dream. He would have cheered her up as only he knew how.
And what really hurt was that she needed him to comfort her. She was his older sister, she was the one who was supposed to protect him, to help him, and to keep him safe from harm, and yet she needed him to fall back on when things were too much. Had he always known that? Had Yachesen always known how important he was to her? She'd always let him know that she was there for him, but did she ever make it clear that he was important to her as well? Could he have known…?
She would start crying in a moment, she knew. She always did.
Because she'd failed him, after all. She'd failed in her duty as his older sister, of course. He relied on her, and her alone, to protect him, and she had let him down. And that, she would never live down. How could she? With the evidence of her crime against her brother, her brother himself, never more than a door away, how would she ever forget what she had done? And why, why would she want to forget? If she forgot, what would prevent her from doing it again? What more would she, through her own negligence and stupidity, inflict upon her helpless little brother?
She had a pillow clenched in her hands, pressed to her face, and she was hunched over, sobbing into it.
The door was closed, the room was dark, and she was alone.
Alone.
No concerned little brother. Nothing at all.
She was alone.
She'd really been alone for years, ever since her brother had died and become demon-dead. Something inside of him besides his life had been taken away. She had remained the same after the natural death but he… Something about him had been horribly changed forever.
And now, because of her, her, her, now the damage was irreversible, and now it was big. Something she couldn't just pretend hadn't happened. Her brother was dead inside. And that, that was the horrible truth that she hadn't really admitted until now.
Yachesen, despite his demon-dead body and his intelligence, was dead inside.
And because Yachesa knew it was her fault, she was slowly dying inside too. Every nightmare, every memory she relived stripped away another layer of herself. How much more could she take? How much more of this self-abuse could she take before she gave up, crumbled, became like her brother?
What sickened her beyond anything was the fact that whenever she asked herself that question, the concept of losing her own sanity, her own Self, made her go even colder than the fact that it had already happened to her brother. Did that make her even more of a failure? Could someone as horrible as she even be more of a failure?
The girl was lying on her side, staring blankly at the far wall, still clutching the pillow. Her tears had stopped. Her face was expressionless even as the thoughts raced through her mind. Her face was lifeless. Dead.
Just like her brother.
Yachesa screamed.