Chapter 16: Blood Ties, Part I
Note: Delay, yes, I hope this makes up for it. The first few chapters have been reworked and rearranged to make the story flow better. This chapter deals with Starfire's past and I'm getting creative with the rituals of Tamaraneans in order to get to the hidden depths of this hidden demonic power.
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"You are dead to me."
Starfire never liked looking at dead bodies. A maggot crawling out of a decayed nose is not the prettiest sight in the world and the stench sometimes made her want to join the dead. If Robin didn't pull his head out of his ass, his corpse would be the next one she would have to see.
After several seconds of straining against her restraints, Starfire put her hand on the spot where Robin had stabbed her, but she stopped when she felt it. Blood. There was still fresh blood coming out of the gash on her stomach. How many times had that bastard stabbed her? Three? Four? Ten? She could still hear his screams in her head from when he attacked her. Why could she not kill him? He had destroyed everything precious to himself, to the team, to her.
Starfire had the words formed in a perfect sentence, but she had locked her lips shut and thrown away the key. A salty tear ran down her face as her lips parted. "You are dead to me…nothing but scum."
Her fingernails were not two inches longer anymore. She put her hand on the back of her head to block out that eerie voice that had been telling her strange tales of killing and chaos. Starfire winced and leaned forward when she heard a pop coming from her shoulder. She then let her arm drop alongside the cot when the bone popped out of place.
Before Starfire could drag Robin back by his feet, she had to figure out what was going on inside her body. She looked at her legs and her eyes widened in mild excitement. The wounds had healed themselves in her sleep…hadn't they? Her mouth twitched for a second, but how did this happen? What was it her sister told her?
"This curse is in your blood forever, Koriand'r."
Starfire closed her eyes and tried to regulate her heartbeat. The twisted eyes, the deformed carcass, the noose around his snapped neck, all of those images that she had locked away were beginning to surface again. She clenched her teeth and tried to lock her eyes shut, but the roars and cheers of that crazed crowd were echoing in her ears again.
No, that day had been cemented in her mind forever.
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"Rip her limb from limb!"
"Tear his eyes out of his sockets!"
When she was still named Koriand'r, Starfire's home planet of Tamaran held an annual battle royal where two combatants would fight to the death. One rule: no backing out.
Whenever Tamaraneans needed live entertainment, they found two able bodied people who were willing to kill one another for our amusement. It became a social activity where families could bring their children to see two members of their race demonstrate their ferocity. Sometimes, when the battle was over, the adults would let their children run into the ring to find any souvenirs- missing body parts, torn clothing, an eyeball- to keep as a gift.
"Come on! Break his legs!"
Starfire was seven at the time and still getting used to her position as princess of the empire. Her father tugged at her hand so she could get right up to the cage and see the fight up close, but he let her go and cleared his throat to get everyone's attention.
"My fellow people, I wish to present to you Princess Koriand'r of Tamaran!"
Koriand'r lifted off of the ground and tried floating past the procession of people who cheered her on and threw flowers in her direction. Her flight instructor bowed his head and whispered 'Congratulations' in her ear as she struggled to maintain her balance. Koriand'r could not keep the smile on her face from going away and her eyes brightened as the group encouraged her to levitate even further until she reached the gate. Once Koriand'r grabbed it while still in midair, the level of the applause grew.
After a few seconds of clapping and cheering, the audience turned back to father, who had to announce Koriand'r's sister. "And…her less than perfect counterpart."
Komand'r, dressed in a robe that was not as shiny as Koriand'r's, trudged past the crowd with her head down. Someone in the audience groaned and another sucked their teeth when they saw that the sister of Princess Koriand'r was not flying. The flight instructor tried to start a slow clap, but someone tapped him on the shoulder and shook their head.
A young Tamaranean boy tugged his mother's dress. "Mommy, why isn't Lady Komand'r flying like Princess Koriand'r?"
The mother patted her son on the head and pointed at Lady Komand'r. "Because she's inferior, darling, and she always will be."
Komand'r bit her tongue to keep from screaming. She could not fly, control her powers, or become a princess. In the eyes of everyone else from Tamaran, this made her weaker than her brother even though she was older. Komand'r felt the stares of the uninterested crowd burn into her back. The day to day ridicule was enough when it came from one person, but when half the populace of Tamaran was looking at her like a common criminal, she wished she could kill them all and still not look like a second class reject.
Before Komand'r could approach her sister, she heard an enraged grunt coming from the crowd. She turned around just in time to see a giant dirt clod hurled at her. It hit its target and Komand'r stumbled backwards into the fence.
"That'll teach ya, you bastard!" A drunkard staggered to the front of the crowd to get a look at Komand'r.
Dirt. How low could they bury Komand'r? She wiped across her face to clear her vision, but soil was already in her eyes and teeth. Then she scanned the crowd to find her attacker, but when she did not, she clenched her fists until a starbolt materialized in each hand. Someone in the crowd gasped when the starbolts began to expand with each second as her sister clenched her teeth. "You're all dead…"
Koriand'r gasped as she saw her sister continued to protest as she kicked the ground and fired starbolts into the audience, failing to hit anyone. Her animalistic growls and screams intensified the audience's loathing as someone hissed.
Someone leaned next to another spectator. "Look at her; she cannot even keep her temper down in a civilized manner." He then addressed Koriand'r's father. "King, forgive me for speaking ill about your family, but you need to take the right actions or we will."
Her father stopped straining as Komand'r stopped protesting and let her arms fall to the ground. A death threat was normal, but at least every other time, her father defended her. Koriand'r bit her lip when her sister turned around and locked her gaze with mine. The envy and anger was still on her face as Koriand'r saw her eyes water and muddy tears begin to fall down her face. As far as she knew, everyone, including her, would always be her enemy.
The crowd broke out of its silence when one of the combatants threw the other against the cage. Koriand'r shuddered when the fighter clawed at the cage in an attempt to get out, but his opponent grabbed him by the foot and forced him back to the center of the ring. The sound of his nails dragging through the dirt grated her ears, but her father's hand on her shoulder seemed to calm the pain.
"No, no, princess. You have to watch this in order to remember how our people fight for their lives. Do not forget that you are one of them."
One of them? This hellish living was her life?
The encouraging roars and yells of the crowd were not enough to block out the fighter's agonizing cries when his opponent punched him in the stomach. Koriand'r wanted to turn away, but her father had her head locked in place and he would not let go of her eyes, even when she bit his fingers. She gritted her teeth and wailed as he yanked her hair back and pushed me up to the gate.
"Koriand'r, I would not do this if I did not love you. If you do not understand why we fight and change, you will never be able to participate in this when you grow up."
"FINE!"
Her tirade stopped when she saw one of the fighter's back bulge and turn as his opponent's fist tore through his stomach. The crowd quieted as the exposed warrior spat blood through his teeth, but he could not do that without having to force himself to breath without difficulty.
The male warrior noticed the female had not taken her fist out of his stomach yet. Her hand wormed through his stomach as if it were searching for a piece of gold. The male gritted his teeth and leaned his head back as he held back the urge to scream. His left hand was shaking and he struggled to bring it up to waist level. The crowd, now transfixed on the battle, moved closer to see what the male would do next.
"She is going to rip his heart out," one audience member whispered to a torch wielding medic.
"No." the medic shook her head. "If something like that happened, the victim would be in extreme pain, not moderate."
The male seized the female's arm. His vision faded, but his grip tightened for one futile attempt. He strained as he tried to pull the female's arm out of his chest, but her hand would not budge. The female licked her tongue and grinned when she found her prize. She planted her foot in the ground and tore her hand- now clutching one of the male's lungs- out of his chest. The force of the man's lung being ripped out coupled with the fire now burning in his chest had him doubling over.
He looked down at the gaping hole in his chest where fluids were leaking out. All he knew was that it had grown cold in the past five seconds. It was now taking him three seconds longer to get a puff of air in his mouth and out of the hole in his stomach. His chest heaved in labored puffs as he collapsed, never letting go of his chest.
As the female combatant raised her right hand in victory, the feeling of overconfidence and pride fought for space on her face. "I proclaim to you all today, fellow Tamaraneans, that the female species is not only the most dominant," she pointed to the gasping male fighter, "but the one that is always able to land on its feet in triumph. What say you, feeble little one?"
"Get away from me." Venom coursed through the male's veins and the ground beneath him began to tear away. His head violently jerked back and forth with a wet snap as his teeth elongated and eyes became drenched with a mix of crimson and violet. An expanding black aura became saturated as blood evaporated from the man's wounds and seeped into the darkness.
The confidence in the woman's face was drenched with impending fear that shot all the way to her paralyzed fingers. Like a frightened child who had just wet herself, the woman stood transfixed as the man got on all fours, his handprints causing steam to emit from the ground.
The overwhelming evil and enraged winds nipped at Koriand'r's legs and twisted her vocal chords. She put a hand to mouth and tried to force out a scream, but a stifled gasp was all she could provide before backing to her sister, who remained as stoic as ever. She gave Koriand'r a passing glance and nodded. "It's begun. He's undergoing his transformation."
"Transfor-" Her mouth parted long enough for words to be eclipsed by the man's feral shrieks that mixed with the moaning of the wind. The man became a demon, a demon who wouldn't accept defeat.
The demon stood on his feet and flexed his fingers. The demon became a newborn breaking through the barrier and exploring its newfound territory. The pain and lust to kill…the bane of a Tamaranean's existence, feelings that should never have been let out of their chest were raging to the surface as the male stared down at the frozen woman with flushed eyes. His fear no longer betrayed him, but had made a deal with anger in order to mix into an ocean of madness, a sea of death.
"Die."
The male let rage overwhelm him as he surged forward, followed by a powerful gust that whipped around the audience. He whipped his arm back and clawed at the female's face, opening fresh wounds. She took the full force of the slash and skidded into the gate, hitting her head against it when she thought the pain had stopped.
Never had it occurred to the man or any Tamaranean witness that such hidden power was capable of being in their grasp. As acid dripped down the male's face, the woman had a split second to cover her face before the male brought his claws across her stomach, causing her organs to explode out of her stomach and blood to jump over some combatants who wanted an up close and personal look.
The female felt the force of her internal organs jumping free from their chamber and spilling over the ground. Her right eye rolled around and around until it caught one of her wheezing lungs. She strained to grab it, but the man's left claw severed her right hand as her life burned out of the new hole in her arm. Hell's flames danced throughout her body and brought energy to her legs. Before she could crawl away with one hand, the male seized her leg.
He leaned to her ear and whispered. "Do not forget the rules." With one swift cut, her ear was ripped straight from her head and became the male's morsel before he finished the fight, which he did when he dug his fingers into her skull and lifted her by several loose strands in her hair. There was no screaming, no resignation to death, no grief…her face had frozen once her intestines jumped free. "Land on your feet in triumph tonight."
He brought his right fist down, the aura still bleeding from his fingertips, and smashed the woman's face.
Komand'r closed her eyes and whispered underneath the crowd's silence. "They are both dead now."
Koriand'r raised her head in confusion and was about to ask her what she meant, but the cries of the crowd overtook her question as the male threw the headless stump into the air and fired a starbolt at the lifeless body. A firework display of red clothing and loose limbs scattered, but no child dared to pick up a souvenir.
The male's aura crawled towards his feet and retreated into his body. The simple laughter replaced the pained sighs as his eyes returned to a mild blue and his claws shrunk back to their normal size. The sweet scent of victory drifted into his thoughts just as the fragrance of decaying corpse wafted over the crowd while one child began pocking the woman's body with a stick. As the gates began to run back into the ground of the arena, the man held his bloodied hand up towards the crowd and proclaimed his victory. "I win."
Two empty words…they traveled across the audience out of one person's ear and through the next. Koriand'r's father, the only one smiling with recognition, began a slow clap that was only accompanied by several of his right hand men as he put his arm around the victor, ignoring the blood splattered arms. "Well done; my congratulations to you for realizing that you had the potential in you all along. Now that you have entered the inner sanctum, there is a pressing matter that I wish to discuss with you this evening. Would you mind meeting at the castle?"
Komand'r replayed this conversation in her head five times before Koriand'r's tugging at her shoulder became an annoyance. "What is it?"
"Sister, what did you mean when you said that the two of them are already dead?" She watched as her father led the victor through the procession and back towards the city. As they left, members of the audience watched their children pick through the dead piñata, but some scampered away when flies fought for what they had already claimed for their feast.
"There will be even more later on." Her sister pointed to the onslaught of flies devouring the corpse. "Koriand'r, you don't understand it, do you?"
Koriand'r put her hands on her hips and began walking with her towards the city. "I understand everything, sister. That man is going to become a great service to all Tamaraneans because he became stronger and proved his worth. All Tamaraneans should desire to reach that point of tremendous strength if it means-"
Koriand'r never got to finish her sentence. Komand'r spun on her heel and backhanded me across the face. The force of the blow knocked her off of her feet as she bumped her head on the concrete. Her body shuddered as the pain rang through her ears until it trickled down her cheek. She put her finger to the cut, but her trembling finger would not stop shaking and the blood flew off and landed in a small pool on the ground. She looked up at her sister with pleading eyes. "W-why, sister?"
Komand'r continued glaring at her as the crowd passed. Her ire did not disappear when she grabbed her robe. "Naïve little Koriand'r, you believe that he is going to become a hero for what he did?" She slapped her when she nodded, but dropped her and began walking. "Come with me, sister, and you will see we deal with those who gain great power."
She stood up and ran behind her sister, who now held her head down with an exasperated sigh.
"Soon, dear Koriand'r, you will understand your blood ties."