After That Starry Night
Right after Patriarch Shion revealed his choice of the next Patriarch
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Note: Just one more chapter and it's done, pretty.
How exactly Saga killed the Patriarch would be in another separate story.
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With every steps down to his palace, Aiolos was throttled by guilt.
"Holy Athena, please give me the strength to carry these news to him."
Aiolos stopped to take a deep breath, gathering his inner cosmo. As if the appointment of him as the next Patriarch was not bad enough, master Shion had made him agreed to choose another saint to be his second-in-command and also another saint to be the reader of the star during his future ruling era. A star reader, Aiolos could easily think of the Aquarius saint.
"But my second-in-command and adviser other than Saga? This is crazy."
At this time, with some doubts Aiolos was thinking of Pisces Mu, as a direct student of master Shion who surely would have a vast knowledge and hidden knowledge about the Sanctuary, to be the strongest contender for the position beside the powerful yet wise Virgo Shaka.
"Goddess, they are all still too young to share this serious task of not only ruling the Sanctuary, but also to prepare for the coming Holy War." Without realizing that he was arriving at his palace, Aiolos kept muttering to himself. "Even master Shion made me promised to never allow Saga get into the Star Hill. What is this all about between them?"
The Sagittarius saint had expected that his friend would want to talk about the blow with him, most probably right now. However, there was no sight of him or the trace of his cosmo in Sagittarius palace. Aiolos wondered if the Gemini has gone back to his own Gemini Palace. Although, being shaken by the unexpected news, Aiolos doubted that Saga would go there and risking his twin Kanon to dig out of what had happened.
So he took the turn to go to a secret path between his Palace and the highest palace of the Patriarch. In the middle of the way, there was a hidden natural pool with a small waterfall. It was always Saga's favorite place to hide, meditate or read his books, and of course for bathing and relaxing. So Aiolos tried his luck of finding the wounded Gemini there.
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Just as what he was hoping, the Gemini saint was sitting between the giant roots of the trees beside the pond. Half of his Gemini's face was hidden by the shadows of the trees under the moonlight.
"Saga, " called Aiolos softly, gently like holding a thin glass.
The Gemini Saint turned his face towards his call. And Aiolos could now see the other eye of the Gemini and shuddered. He thought it must have been his imagination out of fear of Saga's anger, but Saga's tainted eye was more shining than usual, and it was shining red. However, Aiolos was surprised to find that Saga looked calmer and better than what he thought it would be.
The Gemini Saint did not say anything, waiting Aiolos to speak. And he turned his face away when Aiolos was not saying anything yet, and looked up to the Star Hill. To that point, Aiolos realized that he should deliver the news in one go, because Saga only cared about what it meant for Kanon rather than the glory of being a ruler. Or so he, thought.
Aiolos could see Saga's face became harder without changing his sight of the Star Hill above them. After the last news about him being banned from the Star Hill, there was a slight curve on his lips. A smile of irony.
Then the silence dropped between them, like there was a rift of another dimension building between them. Aiolos wanted to hug his friend to comfort him and ask his forgiveness of taking all the very thing in the world that his best friend ever wanted, but the silence separated them away.
"Saga, talk to me, my friend." Aiolos dropped on his knee, whispering. He saw Saga slowly lifted his hand to rub his right forehead and temple Aiolos almost could feel the pain that Saga was in. And he felt being crushed when finally Saga answered him in a lifeless tone.
"I have locked him in that cave, Aiolos."
"What? Kan-?"
They both knew what it meant. Cape Sounion was not a prison for no reason. It was already a big question of how Saga could open the place to put someone in. It already meant that the cave had considered Saga worthy, or that his judgement on the person to be put in was legit and was accepted by the divine power of that place. To release a prisoner was never heard of, at least during their era and the previous one.
"I had no choice. He has started to show the cursed path." Saga gave him a cynical smile, then turned his face to confront Aiolos'. His still beautiful Aegean-sea eye was glistening by a hanging tear, while the tainted one shone in red. His voice, however, was still calm and collected. "And now you are telling me that I should just let him stay in there without doing nothing, while the in the Star hill the solution to this curse could have been just laying around without anyone ever noticing it ?"
Aiolos swallowed. "I will look for it, what you're looking for, Saga. As...as, erm, as Patriarch I can-"
"With all the respect, Your Excellency, you cannot even finish a book in one night, let alone to remember all of the content. How do you know what you are looking at?" Saga gave a dry laugh.
"Fair enough. But I have a star reader and an adviser to assist me, and help me with your indirect guide. I will find it for you, Saga."
"Who can you pick beside me as your adviser, tell me. Shura? Aphrodite? Oh, maybe even Dante? How ridiculous." Saga's tone was sweet and bitter and the time.
"In time, Camus would also be a good adviser as well as a star reader, if that can assure you better, my friend."
"He is still a child to me. By the time he finds something-if he ever will-my brother has been a food for those fishes already the year before." Now the hanging tears were falling down slowly.
But Saga never produced other than a flat tone. Which gave Aiolos a shiver. The Sagittarius saint would prefer to see Saga yelling, cursing and sobbing, anything, anything that would show him a human side. Not this eerie young man with one red eye and a beautiful-yet threatening smile, a mask.
Desperate to win his friend over, Aiolos answered back. "I know, by gods I do know it, that you are the best choice for a star reader or an adviser, Saga. Hell, even you are the best choice for a Patriarch! I admit it." Aiolos inhaled and exhaled to calm himself. "Honestly, I still cannot comprehend it. But...listen to me...there must be a reason for all of this. You and I just don't understand it yet." Aiolos approached his friend, breaking the rift between them. "The important thing is this, Saga. Master Shion told me that it is all Athena's will, for she will finally arrive here among us in the Sanctuary!" Aiolos pleaded. "The signs are strong, that's what he told me. Just be patient, Saga. Together, we will work this out for your brother. Together, you and me, with our goddess power and wisdom."
Saga raised from his seat between the roots. He was talking in half dreaming, turning his body to walk towards the pond."Yes, of course...Athena. How can I forget that, Aio?" He started to take off his clothes, leaving Aiolos the sight of a bare back covered with the long blue hair. With a grace movement, the Gemini saint entered the shimmering ripples of the pond under the bright moonlight. He sat there chest-deep. "You must forgive me, Aio. I still haven't spread the great news about you, what our Patriarch asked me. I want...I must first clear my head."
Aiolos reached to touch Saga's shoulder from the back. "Do what you must, my friend. No one will care for any news during this hour. Just...just do that early in the morning, will you? So that master Shion will not take this as another disobedience of yours. I...I consider that we are in this together. So please be happy for me, Saga."
"Just leave me to think, Aio." Saga was still with his lifeless tone, resting his head on the side of the pond. Now he was a neck deep inside the water with his face bathing on the moonlight. He closed his eyes.
Aiolos cleared his throat, seeing his friend like that. With closed eyes, without seeing that eerie tainted eye, Saga looked very handsome, calm and angelic. A perfect mask to hide all the fears, anguish and despair underneath. "I am sorry...for Kanon." Aiolos retreated, turning his body to leave his meditating friend. Just after one step, Aiolos already stopped, hesitating for a minute. "Saga...this is the very secret that master Shion shared only to his successor. I only tell this to you because of Kanon. Keep it to yourself." Aiolos waited for a reaction. But nothing apart from a soft rippled from the pond responded to him. He continued anyway. "Actually, our goddess Athena has arrived among us. A moment before master Shion summoned us." Aiolos sighed. " Although, she is still a baby. I tell you this so you can be sure that the help is near. She will grow up soon, just give our goddess a time, my dear Saga." Aiolos waited for another response but got none. So he resumed walking back to his palace, giving Saga a peace to contemplate.
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Saga sat upright in the water. He did not know for how long it has been after Aiolos leaving him there in the pond.
Saga's hand was playing with the water, making small circles, one at time that would grow into a big one across the pond. He laughed softly. Bitterly. Infuriated.
"Baby Athena...my goddess Athena. Baby Athena...baby...what a sweet baby."
A baby goddess was equal as a death punishment for his evil twin, Kanon.
He slowly went outside the pond, put his clothes and walked along the secret path to the Palace of the Patriarch. On the half way before reaching the highest Palace, Saga summoned his Gemini armor. Then he turned a discreet big stone to reveal a golden dagger that he had stolen from the highest Palace days before. He calmly hid the beautiful dagger behind his majestic cloak and resumed climbing past the highest palace, towards the Star Hill, where the Patriarch would spend the night on specific nights as usual, the ritual that Saga knew.
A baby Athena. Shion should be able to deliver him a clear and satisfactory explanation about the whole situation. Because a baby means death for his innocent evil twin.
"Unless…." Saga muttered under his breaths.
Unless he is the Patriarch.
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As the history revealed itself, that night the old Patriarch had fallen, losing a discreet battle on the Star Hill to a Gemini Saint Saga who held the divine gold dagger.
Star Hill stood there that night when the Gemini Saint stole the ring of Gyges, took the Patriarch robe and great mask, holding a gold dagger towards the room where a sweet baby slept peacefully.
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The Star Hill watched in silence how the great Sagittarius Aiolos fought to his death that night, to save the baby from his best friend who donned the Patriarch Mask.
Aiolos fought to his death to save a baby that he believed in the future would save his best friend from the god of war that had consumed his body. The tainted eye that had swallowed his kind-heart friend in full into evilness.
Tears were falling down his cheeks when he blew Saga into his fall during their fight over the baby. The tears were down his cheeks when the obedient Shura attacked him following an order from the false Patriarch, giving him those fatal blows that cut through his cosmo and his tired body. The fatal and unforgiving attack of the Excalibur.
The Star Hill watched in silence that night, when the Virgo Saint Shaka was deceived by the combination of Saga's astral projection as a Patriach and the untraceable cosmo of Gemini around the projection with the help of the Gyges ring that Saga had stolen. The gold saints watched the fall of the Gemini Saint from the fight with the traitor of the Sanctuary, and has gone missing since then.
The Star Hill watched in silence that night, when the fallen Sagittarius saint spent his last, dying breaths to tell Mitsumasa Kido about the baby Athena.
"She is a goddess...Athena….she will grow...to save the world...from evil and destruction...and she will...save...my...fri-...end."
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Saga, my gem, your star will be free from the curse. You'll see. Stay faithful to our Athena, my friend. I give this life for you...and Kanon.
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