As I Descend
Chapter Four: Lofty Goals
"Contrary to Chrollo's belief, I was not cast out from heaven—thrown form paradise. I like to think I fell much like a star: bright, burning, furious…and with no regrets. I can't see why I would have any when all I've ever wanted was to join him in his darkness."
The park was one of the few places in the city that tourists would flock to, however, today, although sunny and bright, the park was almost empty. This was mostly due to Helia's father contacting the right people and having access limited. Roland Wintermute did not like the idea of his daughter interacting with the 'unseemly.' At this point, Azyel imagined her mother rolling her eyes. Her father would laugh of course, urging Azyel not to have such smallminded ideals. She took his advice when she was in the mind.
Yet, and still, when Azyel crossed the small wooden bridge overlooking the koi pond, she was not surprised to meet his gaze. To Azyel, he had such an annoying look, the look of someone who knew everything and nothing and could not be bothered to be upset about either. Even a year—two—in his presence had not managed to darken the etherealness attached to his aura. He'd captured a magic and wonder even the wealthiest could not afford.
It infuriated her. Despite this, when he said, "Hello, Azyel," in that soft, knowing voice of his, she forgot her name.
That made her even more angry. You—You—YOU!
She scowled at him, and he chuckled as if she had told the most wonderful joke.
Azyel turned her head, snatching herself from his eyes, the wicked boy. "Hello." She said coolly, and continued on. She was a little disappointed that they had soon reached their destination. She was hoping for at least a five minute walk away from him. That would teach him.
"Who was that boy?" Helia asked as Chrollo met her gaze again before falling back into his book. They settled near him, and Azyel had but to turn her head to see the depth of his eyes.
Feeling quite pleased with herself, Azyel answered, "No one you'd know. He's a friend of mine."
"Oh," Helia's cheeks pinkened slightly as her lips pouted out and she attempted to make herself more regal, her back straightening. "He isn't from our circle, is he? I'd know him then."
Azyel refused to answer, she didn't like the girl's assumption, nor did she appreciate the look of ownership Helia threw over to him as she twisted a golden lock around her finger. Her eyes green like pea soup.
"Did you hear me, Azyel?" Helia tapped a finger against the iron white table between them. she spun her white, lacey parasol as she peeked over her shoulder. "How do you suppose it would feel to kiss him?"
Azyel hid her gasp as she looked to Mrs. Wintermute, Helia's "grand" mother-dearest. she paid them no mind, flipping through her magazine while her personal bodyguard, Nod, fanned her behind a pair of black sunglasses. Azyel turned her attention back to Helia who was glowing with a scandalous smile.
Finally, her cheeks warming, Azyel giggled, "I haven't thought about it."
Helia gave her a look of imperial maturity, "You're nine now, almost an adult. You should think about it, unless you want to be a baby forever?" Helia gave a gracious nod over her shoulder, "If not him, you should experiment with one of the boys we know, the older ones. The boys our age still think we're made of poison. My mother-dearest said so."
Really? Azyel eyed the older woman. Her own mother would never encourage such a thing, especially since she was trying for a betrothal to a wealthy powerful family somewhere in the Republic of Padokea. "The best for the best," she'd said as she explained the ordeal. It wasn't until after she'd snuck out and spoken to Chrollo that the proposal sounded like a bad idea.
"Would you really marry someone you don't know?" He'd asked with that soft voice of his, demanding and yet…patient. Always patient.
She crossed her arms, scoffing, "What would you have me do?"
He never said, and his silence made her shiver. She shivered now as she reminded the way his eyes held her fast to the bridge's ledge. She tore her eyes away from him, she hadn't realized she'd found him again. It was as if a small part of her own aura unconsciously, endlessly searched for his own. It would not stop until it found purchase.
Mrs. Wintermute lowered the magazine, "If you're so interested in the boy, Dear, invite him over for dinner." She pressed her finger to her lips, tilting her head for a better look, "the boy at least looks clean, your father would not object to your having multiple suitors. You are a Wintermute, afterall." Mrs. Wintermute cast her gaze over the body guard, a slight curl in her lips. "It's expected."
Helia squealed, "Yes mother, straightaway! Azyel, what is this boy's name?"
Azyel felt betrayed, like someone had come into her playroom and robbed her of all her favorite toys, leaving her only a broken doll's head to play with. She would not accept such treatment. Her lips pressed for a moment, and she decided then what to do. She managed a haughty smile, "You should ask him yourself. He wouldn't want me telling you."
Helia leapt from her seat and started over without a second's more thought.
Azyel tried her best not to watch them, appearing completely unaffected, the way she would ignore the unfortunate next to the street. At least, she was trying. Her temper was bursting to spring forth. She was shivering with the force of it. she clutched her porcelain cup to her lips, and it shook. She had to grip it, scolding her little fingers to keep the tea from spilling. The whole exchange took far too many seconds for Azyel's comfort. When Helia returned, bouncing in her steps, a demure swing of her hair, she announced that Chrollo would be joining them tomorrow.
Azyel placed her cup firmly on the saucer, taking her own air of superiority, one that held a curiosity that she did not mean, and an edge she was hiding. "A strange thing, inviting strange boys to your home. Not something I would do."
"He won't be strange for long, "Mrs. Wintermute smartly told her, "Such a handsome boy, it would be a shame to let him stay a stranger. Right, Nod?"
That night, Azyel did not go to their usual meeting place on the bridge. For two years they'd been meeting on and off. He'd find her, he was good at that apparently, world class really. "I'm something of a professional," he'd said with a gleam in his gaze that made her want to shove him from his seat and then smile. Chrollo would show up (appearing out of thin air) and that would mean it was time to meet. He'd spend a week, maybe two in the city before disappearing again. He brought her books most of the time, "To nurture your wickedness." He whispered teasingly, pressing volume after volume into her grasp. Chrollo would then have her show him her progress, everything she'd been learning. He liked to improve upon her fighting techniques, suggesting speed where she would favor power like her father, correcting a dodge in favor for a feint, little things. He'd bring a woman with him sometimes, or a man, at least, they appeared that way to Azyel—their being so much taller than she. Apparently, he was a full nine years older than her, with his boyish face and gentle smile, she would not have guessed. He was taller than her, sure, but he wasn't nearly as tall as her father who towered over most men.
Regardless of their rules, she was not in the mood for him. If he wanted company, she wondered why he couldn't contact Helia? Was she not just as close? They were neighbors were they not?
She heard a tapping at her window all the same. Sitting on the edge of her bed, drawing by the glow of her bed lamp, she ignored it.
Tap…tap…tap…tap.
She'd just sketched a pair of luminescent eyes when she finally paused and ripped the page.
"Have you not heard me knocking, Azyel?"
Azyel jumped. She was not surprised he had gotten in, soundlessly, she may add (for she had left the window cracked) but she was surprised that he had come in without her expressly allowing it.
Being popular had made him impertinent.
"What's this?" Her sketch book had been pried from her fingers by an unseen force, a force she refused to see. "It's quite good, but your art always has a certain professional quality to it. Any good thief would recognize its value. It's something I've always admired."
She set her gaze on her ornate desk chair, across the length of her bedroom. The room was large, larger than many houses Chrollo had told her. Where he came from, such a room was rare. Azyel tried to take pride in it now, the stark difference in their position, but it did not satisfy. It only further poisoned her mood for him to be so special and yet come from nothing, from the dirt of Meteor City. A mystery blown from air to shining diamond. It only piled on her current resentment.
"You're upset with me." He stated quietly, sitting at the foot of her bed. The nighttime favored him, giving him this unearthly glow, she usually admired. Tonight, it burned her. "Shall I guess why?"
"Why did you accept the invitation?" she asked with a snap, she'd tried for impassivity, but missed the mark.
"Why does it bother you?" His voice gave no inclination of his mood, but that's probably because nothing—not one word—could spoil it.
She would try, of course.
Azyel rolled her eyes hard, "Don't avoid the question, you know I detest that."
He gave her a playful smile, one she pretended to miss. "She's your friend, isn't she?"
"Yes."
"Despite my thinking it's a bad idea?"
She smirked at that, responding wickedly, "Yes."
His smile spread like poison into his gaze, "Then that's why, although, truthfully, I can't understand why you'd be upset—"
"I'm not!"
He wasted not a moment more, "Are you jealous, Azyel?"
"Don't flatter yourself, "Azyel scoffed, "I have far too many friends to be so petty. In fact, your friends seem to prefer me even to you." She told him, hoping for something, knowing she'd get nothing. She didn't think that was true, but lies were so easy to tell. Chrollo encouraged them even, but never to him. Oh, that would not do.
"Never lie to me," He'd said, his light fingers tilting her chin up, "I would always know."
She pursed her lips.
"It's settled then. If you have no objections, I will go."
His eyes filled up every inch of the room, held her down as she drowned.
She turned her head from him, "I'm tired, and you're beginning to bore me." She lied.
"As you wish," He stood to leave, making no argument.
She grabbed his arm.
He sat back down, smiling. Not a second had passed.
"Fine. You can go…but I do not like it." she admitted.
Chuckling he told her, "You shouldn't fret, Azyel. You and that girl are not comparable. Replacing you would be impossible. You are one of four in the world." He leaned forward, pressing the back of his fingers softly against her cheeks, she closed her eyes. "Even then, you are without equal. Priceless."
Without equal.
Priceless.
A mantra to live by.
Azyel found pigs to be utterly useless creatures, except where it concerned bacon and dishes prepared with the fat of bacon. They were quite delicious, impossible to execute of course.
"Do we know each other?" she finally asked the stranger who had not left her side. He carried her pig on the top of his own with an ease that spoke of great strength. When the pigs charged them, he'd taken them both out simultaneously.
"Would you remember if we did?"
"Your face is hardly a forgettable one, " she told him, Unless that's the point. "But surely you would have difficulties remembering me?"
He decided to ask his own questions, "Is there a reason you aren't leaving?"
"You are darkness," Azyel felt no need to dance, so told him the honest truth, a first in a long time. "You can disappear if you want to, into the void where no one could find you. Sometimes I envy the talent."
"Only sometimes?"
"I don't always mind being found. Disappearing makes that difficult." She made a reach for him, her finger lightly grazing the pins on this shoulder, he was much taller than she. "Those pins of yours…do you use them on people besides yourself?"
"Yes."
"If they incapacitate or kill people, what do they do for you?"
His ever present grin seemed to widen, his head tilted as if to show his inner self. "If I tell you, wouldn't I have to kill you?"
"You wouldn't." Azyel said, and then shrugged, "No one's allowed to. You have someone like that too, don't you? Someone who isn't allowed to die? To be killed? I hear its common for people like us."
"People like us?" Gittarackur asked, Azyel didn't appreciate the name. She'd have to think of a new one for him.
She stepped toward him, "The wicked."
"Do you always play this way?" He asked, his face barely shifting expression, only his tone gave her anything. Curiosity. "In this game of yours?"
She paused, her head idling to the left and right, her fingers playing with a curl of hair. She held her head up toward the sky, her fingers brushing against the graceful slope of her neck. She looked up from beneath her lashes to find him still staring, "You would think I do it without realizing it, but…I'm playing with you for a single reason."
He only looked at her, waiting for more words to spill like blood from a pretty neck.
"I need to pass this exam. And I need your help to do it." she held his beady gaze, her honey eyes bright, alive, a stark contrast to him. He would not miss it. They were a juxtaposition and like moth to flame, he would follow her light…until she burned him that is. And she would, it was her nature. "That's not so horrible, is it?"
Silence followed them, but silence was never her enemy. It was almost nice, a change from dissection and quiet calculative stares watching her movements, keeping her caged.
Azyel really didn't understand how to work without a cage, if she were to be completely honest with herself. She lived for the concept of freedom without actually testing her means. She had the means, but would she use them?
She looked on at her newfound partner. He had not denied her request, but instead said nothing. If not him, then her four friends would do, but….She would not want that. That…made her a little apprehensive, a little guilty. She wouldn't use children, she—although crafted in his image—was not Chrollo.
Azyel Uriel. The one of two left in the world.
She paused, the wind picking up at her hair, a chill making her shake. The hate came back again, biting and clawing, the determination followed soon after.
Azyel, after presenting her cooked meat, lost as expected. Well, she didn't lose so much as failed.
Hisoka's showboating laughter made it feel like more of a loss than anything.
"Not a word," She hissed at him as he gallantly hid his smile between his clawed fingers. Hisoka zipped his lips.
She found Kurapika with his arms crossed, his head set in that haughtiness of his, "I'm a little surprised at my failing."
"Not me," She told him, "You don't seem to have much taste in anything."
Kurapika glared at her, "And what exactly does that mean for you? If you recall, you also failed."
Graciously, she waved away his concerns, "We covered this. I let those who can…do. Keep up."
"Like carrying your pig?" He asked, and then his brow furrowed, "How do you even know him?"
"I don't."
He gave her a sound close to an impressed huff, "Your first direct answer."
"Is it? I could find that adorable, your keeping track like that-" Azyel said and then suddenly seized his shoulder, "Hey, what are they going to do if everyone fails?"
Kurapika paused, "The Hunter Exam hasn't been known to be very forgiving. But I hope this wouldn't be the end."
"Why? You have some lofty goal in mind?" She asked teasingly.
"What are you guys talking about?" Leorio cut in.
Azyel made room for him, "Kurapika's lofty goals."
"Well, hey, I plan to become a doctor," Leorio puffed out his chest, earning an enthusiastic pat on the arm from her.
"My dad's a pro-hunter," Gon chirped up with a smile, "I need a license to find him."
"That's incredible, Gon." Azyel said, "Is he lost or…?"
"Nope!"
"Oh," she said, quickly avoiding his eyes not to show her surprise. Who would willingly leave such a bright, sweet child like Gon? A monster? She knew the kind.
Azyel set her eyes on Kurapika who looked at her for a moment before looking down, "I'm looking for something that was stolen from my people." That was all.
"And you, Azyel?" Leorio asked, leaning into her with an upbeat grin, "Why are you here?"
"Yeah, why are you taking the exam, Azyel?" Gon asked, brown eyes boring into hers. He had the eyes of someone not forced to grow up faster than was natural. Untainted innocence.
Perhaps it was his gaze that made her drop all pretense, made her cease her skipping and skirting. Perhaps, she hadn't dropped all pretense at all. Perhaps it was just all part of the game she played. It was growing very difficult to tell. And, she was growing very, very tired.
Azyel felt her chest squeeze, "I'm looking for the means to find someone as well. Someone I believed to be dead."
"I see! How did you find out they were alive?" Gon asked.
"Have you ever heard the phrase, 'loose lips sink ships'?" She asked her companions, her eyes bouncing around their faces, her eyes holding a brightness now, spurred on by that hate—that anger.
"Yes." Kurapika gazed at her curiously.
"Well, unfortunately for my friends, that phrase is all too true." Azyel finished, her grin widening without her permission.
"Is that why you're so unforthcoming?" Kurapika asked, understanding seeming to soften his voice. "You've learned from experience." It wasn't a question.
"Experience is a cruel teacher," Azyel agreed, "Another cool phrase to remember." She then laughed, throwing her arms around Gon's shoulders to pull him close. He laughed as she asked, "Now, who is it you're looking for? Perhaps I know him?"
"His name is Ging Freecss."
"Hmm…I don't believe I know him," she said, feeling his shoulders drop a little, "But my experience with pro-hunters have been limited to assassinations and bloodbaths."
Everyone, collectively, looked at her for a moment before they released a chorus of uneasy giggles.
"Err, that's some joke, Azyel," Leorio commented.
"Especially since I haven't seen you lift a finger this whole exam." Kurapika, ever the nice one, added.
"Sure she has!" Gon came to her defense, "there was that one time she…um…and then…hmmm, wow, I guess I haven't been paying attention."
"Yeah, you have, Gon." Killua said, sounding slightly impressed as he looked over to her, "She really hasn't done anything."
Azyel laughed, "You guys have been mother hens this whole time! How can I?"
"Not in the forest," Killua said.
Gon spun from her grip, turning on her, "That's right! You went off by yourself!
"Yeah, and came back with that weird, scary guy." Leorio puckered his lips, remembering.
"I'd hardly consider him scary. He's only the near embodiment of darkness cloaked with obsession and a touch of balanced madness…" she trailed off, her voice low, "That's all."
"Oh…kay," Leorio just blinked at her, "Whatever you say." He then muttered, "He's not the only one with a touch of madness."
"Actually, she said a touch of balanced madness, Leorio." Gon kindly corrected him.
"Like it matters!"
Sneaking close to her, Kurapika whispered, "All according to plan?"
Azyel had to try her hardest not to grin like an outlaw.
"You think too much of me, I much prefer whimsy to planning." Azyel liked where this was going, he no longer had that heated suspicion in his gaze now, now, it was only mild curiosity. A mind wanting to unravel a puzzle.
"Not that you don't do it." Kurapika said with insistance.
"No," She agreed with a nod, feeling a smile tug at her lips, "I didn't say that."
Author's Note: Apologies for the long wait. I was having trouble with this piece here. I'd written ahead, and I'd skipped a huge chunk (this part) I wasn't sure how I would go from three to the fifth. Anyway, thanks for all the love!
Back Alley guest: Aww! Thank you so much! It's always great to see that compliment, especially if you have a particular style for writing that isn't necessarily 'normal'.
Mash: Thank you as well! Azyel is definitely out there, in another anime she may not fit, but in the world of grey characters she seems right at home lol.
Dreamsphere: Thanks! I'm curious as well, but Azyel is all too careful when it comes to that. Their learning anything will definitely come from 'loose lips' or a lapse in judgement…or a crack in sanity? Who knows?