Chapter 5: The hunter

A black cloaked stranger stopped, sniffed the air warily then moved on. He made a muffled clicking noise as he moved, like metal bumping metal. "Marik you bastard, I've hunted you for twenty long years! You will fall at the end of my sword, you, the oldest of your cursed kind! To the gods I swear this, I will not rest until you're ash!" The hunter shouted into the darkness.

I awoke the next night, not knowing what to expect. I wanted to wake up and have Hatarett's face looming over mine, but I had no such luck. I sat and waited for what seemed to be an eternity, three nights, I think. By the fourth night, my thirst had overtaken all reason. I bashed against the walls of my prison, in a state of near madness, until I found the door stone, perfectly sanded and shaped to hide amongst the others, but it had one flaw; it was hollow. I pushed with all my strength and it gave way opening into a long corridor, I stepped out hesitantly, again not certain what to expect.

I took a few steps, nothing happened, good, I thought. I then caught a scent so alluring as to overtake what was left of my self-control, fresh blood. I followed the scent; it led me down the corridor to a doorway leading outside. I stepped into the sand for the first time with my vampiric senses. All of Egypt was alive in the dead of night, cattle stirred, men moaned in bed, I could hear the great Nile flowing like blood through my countries veins. I was almost overwhelmed, but the scent of fresh blood brought me back to my senses. I looked to my left and discovered its source, my creator; Hatarett, lay face down in a pool of her own blood while a man cloaked in black stood over her. Before I could stop him, he pulled a sickle from his cloak and cut Hatarett's head off, her body turned to dust. He turned to me, I saw hate in his eyes. "Foul demon, you are not welcome in Egypt." He spat, then lunged at me. I cursed as he sliced my arm open spilling more vampiric blood onto the sand.

"Damnit! What did you do that for! Bastard!" I dashed at him, as I ran my nails grew into bird-like claws. I slashed at him catching him across the chest.

"Demon! I call the power of Ra to smite you!" He was dying, he knew it. He pulled a long golden rod out of his cloak, the udjat eye on the head of it glowed, he searched the sky hopefully, but nothing happened.

I laughed, a horrible soulless laugh, because I knew whatever he tried wouldn't work. I reached over and grabbed him, pulling him close to me. I didn't even know what I meant to do, but my body did, my fangs grew longer and I sank them into his neck. He fought, but my preternatural strength kept him in my grip. I was lost in the stream of memories and thoughts flowing out of him into me with his blood. Then it hit me, his death, like a fist to the gut. I sat there for a moment waiting for my head to clear; my mind in that time put together what I had just learned about the stranger that attacked Hatarett and me. I had a hunch, so I moved over to his lifeless body and pulled back the hood of his cloak. A face I had seen countless times before stared blankly up at me and pointy tri-colored hair shone in the pale moonlight. Oh fuck Ra, I just killed pharaoh Yami! I'm so dead I thought. I just realized, I was alone utterly and completely, there was no one I could turn to now, even if I wasn't a monster. The object he tried to use against me was lying abandoned in the sand, I took a closer look at it and realized it was the millennium rod, the item my family was assigned to protect. Well I couldn't just leave that lying around, now could I. so I picked it up and fled Egypt. The horror of the ordeal finally dawned upon me on the second night of my escape, my mentor was dead, I had killed the pharaoh, and I was probably wanted for his death all over upper and Lower Egypt. That night I hunted a small village just outside of my hometown. The people there were sparse in number so one missing would draw attention, but I didn't care, I wanted to die, I had nothing to live for. I had started to cry, right in the middle of the village when someone approached me. I couldn't see who it was through my misery, but she spoke and I immediately recognized her as my sister Ishizu. She wrapped me in her arms and told me not to cry for it would be all right, whatever it was. Suddenly I had an overwhelming urge to tell her what I had become, or better yet, make her like me! But the tragedy from the night before banished that thought, and I solemnly vowed never to make another like me, so they wouldn't have to suffer as I did.

That night will haunt me through out all eternity, it already has for most of my undead life.

"Marik… I don't know what to say,"

"Just say you forgive me for that horrible mistake and bringing you into it with me." Marik sighed, and shifted his head to the left, staring blankly at the looming darkness just beyond the trees.

"Why are you looking to me for forgiveness? Only you can forgive what you did that night." There was a brief shuffling noise, and the screech of an owl then the night was silent again.

"I'll never be free of that first trauma…" Marik walked over to Kekouro and sat down next to her. "Please don't pull away," He said wrapping his arms around her "I just want to feel your skin against mine, it's been so long…"

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Danielle: I am soooooo sorry this took so long. I will have another chapter up soon, if my computer will stop being an arse. Thank you for all of your paitence with me and my crappy computer.