Consider this a late Chanukah/Thanksgivukkah/ early Christmas/Kwanzaa gift.
A Word On The Text - A Babi ngepet is a type of magical, evil swine.
Also, you all should know that Word keeps telling me that a made several of these words up. As a general rule, I don't care, but for your sakes, I thought I'd make a note of it. If you put the word 'tremoring' in an essay, don't be surprised if the teacher writes 'not a real word' in red pen in the margin (this frequently happens to me).
My editor is on hiatus so if you see any mistakes please feel free to message me about them.
NicoleDaughterofPoseidon – If you kill me, you'll never know how it ends.
Disclaimer: *Riffles through back-pack, shuffles desk papers, looks doubtfully under the bed* No legal documents to speak of. Seems I didn't buy the rights to Fablehaven from Mr. Mull and co.
"Seth?" Kendra's throat tasted of smoke and ash. Her head throbbed. She could hear a low-key buzz in her ear. It seemed to her it was the electricity radiating off of her body.
Kendra inclined her head to the side. She could see the cobra dragon and Gavin battling. The heat of their fire was increasing the humidity and Kendra was having trouble finding air to breathe. The ground quaked, the walls shook, rocks and stalagmites rained from above as the two slammed each other around. With each blow they exchanged roars, hurling them back and forth like insults.
She whimpered in pain. Her body trembled. She felt his anger, his frenzy magnetically drawing her in. A warm sensation in her chest threatened to spread, and consume her, body and soul. It demanded she let the fierce emotions overtake her, to let them rule her. She struggled to maintain control over herself.
Kendra comprehended then that forever more, every waking moment was going to be an undertaking. Her body was diseased. She had been infected by the darkness of Gavin. And she would have to fight off that infection with her dying breath.
It had been said to her in the past that she was her own worst enemy; but never had she considered it possible for that to become literally true. Your mind, your spirit, these were things that made who you are. If you had nothing in life, you had them. They were free, in at least that they were wholly yours.
For anyone, learning how to handle your own dark feelings and hatreds is a difficult thing – it's a continuous conflict. That is, if you resolve to be bigger than your fears – to be good.
Kendra Sorenson was faced with a problem none had ever undergone. She was going to have to learn to manage an entirety of emotions, memories, and prejudices, which ran deeper than her own, and which she had developed no defenses against. Every day she would have to be the stronger person of the two, lest she be overcome by the other. Kendra Sorenson was now answering for two people, now simultaneously fighting for, and against two people.
To envision a life where she was suddenly faced with years of resolve to indulge fears, to fuel hatreds, to erase any indication that there had ever been purity or innocence inside, was impossible. Yet there she lay. The words tattooed onto skin spelt out the end of everything she'd ever cherished and the beginning of a new, dreary day.
There would never be an end to the torment, to the pain. She would never cease to be emotionally exhausted. So many doors softly closed in her mind with a decided click of the lock.
She stared out across that abyss.
No. She would not despair. She would continue to fight the good fight. For the sake of the girl she had been, and for those she still loved. Her friends and family.
She propped herself up on wobbly elbows and focused on Seth's face. Was he an apparition of her imagination? Hadn't Gavin said that those on the Eternal list had been eliminated?
Yet there he brother stood. He couldn't be anything less than real, because if he were he would have looked less like he'd been rolling around with the satyrs in the pig pens of the Babi ngepet. Her brother's face was ruddy. His eyes were bright with tears. His face was awash with relief and happiness.
Part of her inwardly recoiled from him. She could feel Gavin's revulsion of him. Mistrust and bitterness boiled beneath her skin, tumultuously raging against the feelings of love she had for her brother. Dread seeped into her bones. The pervasive thought that she was playing a nasty trick on Seth grinded hard on her conscience. Tears pooled in her eyes. "Seth. I – Gavin – You don't…"
"Shhh, Kendra." To Kendra's wide-eyed amazement Vanessa and Warren – also very much alive – came into focus behind Seth.
The darkness within her churned with greater gusto.
Warren was looking down at her in concern, but Vanessa's eyes were trained on the fighting dragons. All three were panting, their hair plastered to their foreheads.
As glad as she was to see them, she hated that she was the cause of the danger they were presently in. What was more, Kendra doubted whether or not she could trust herself anymore around her friends.
The words pushed out of Kendra despite herself. "You all look awful."
Warren snorted, but his eyes smiled. "However – bad – we look – you look a thousand times – worse." His words were interrupted by wheezing gasps. It was a joke, but the lines around his mouth grew taught when he looked at the markings she'd been branded with.
"We're here to rescue you!" Seth breathed out, grinning.
"We have to leave now." Vanessa's flushed face turned to them.
Kendra would have cried if she had the energy. "I can't."
Gavin forced the cobra dragon's tail into the scorching waters of the river. The cobra dragon hissed loudly in displeasure. Quick as lightning he was on Gavin again. Their flames bounced off the surface of the river, filling the cavern with more steam and humidity.
Seth sniffed. "Come again?"
Kendra closed her eyes, and lifted her quivering hand to hover over the warm spot. "If I do I will die."
Seth's mouth scrunched up horribly.
Vanessa's hardened. "And if," she caught her breath, "if you stay you will also die."
Kendra whimpered again. "No. It is worse than that."
Vanessa's eyes narrowed. She pointed at the ceiling. "Look how the ceiling trembles even when they are not hitting it."
Kendra hadn't noticed it, but Vanessa was right. In fact, the whole cave was shaking like it was going through an earthquake.
"What's happening?" Kendra whispered.
"Patton's Fail-Safe." Seth said, causing his sister to knit her brow in confusion. "Kendra, you have to come with us. This whole place is going to be reminiscent of a pile of rubble in minutes."
"Actually it'll eat through the rubble too." Warren shrugged at his wife's glare. "Just saying."
"I - I..." Kendra stuttered.
Warren looked at Vanessa. She nodded. Warren scooped up the weak, and unable to protest, Kendra. "Bracken's waiting."
Kendra's head swam. "Bracken's here too?"
"Mhm. And if we don't - don't get you out of here soon kid I think he may keel over from the – from the suspense."
"Wait," Kendra had to stop as she coughed. "If you guys are here, you must have gotten my note." She looked directly at her brother. Waiting.
Seth shifted uncomfortably. "Um, yes. We did."
"Which means T.C. found you." The unasked question hung in the air.
"Look he ran off okay. We didn't have time to look for him!" Seth blurted out.
"Seth," she groaned.
Seth held up his hands. "But it's okay, because I'm pretty sure that…"
Just then the dragons crashed into the ground. Vanessa, Warren, and Seth stumbled and barely managed to stay upright. Kendra had to cling to Warren to avoid bouncing out of his arms.
The trio jogged as quickly as they could, huffing and puffing, sweating, hearts pounding from lack of oxygen all the while. They had just reached the foot of the stairs when the dreaded figure they'd all hoped was otherwise preoccupied appeared before them.
Her companions collectively breathe in a sharp intake of breathe. They took a moment to process the shadowy entity, his swirling metallic robes and unnerving, warped face, in all its terrifying, obscure glory.
He stood arms, head held high, exuding an air of condescending victorious-ness, blocking the entrance. The Father of All Hatchlings smiled down at them, with the perverted look of a grandfather preparing to scold naughty children. Kendra closed her eyes, trying to efface the disturbing image from her mind.
He ignored the tremoring ground beneath him. "It's seems as though you've set out to lay ruin my prison. And I can't thank you enough. You've saved me the trouble of destroying it myself." She heard him cackle."Oh, would you look at that."
Kendra felt Warren turn. She opened her eyes.
Gavin's back end was to them. He stood stock still, his massive shoulders hunched over, his wings folded, overlapping across his black, glistening back. From his mouth the limp neck of the cobra dragon hung. Blood poured forth from in a steady trickle from the corner of his busted jaw. His eyes had been clawed out; the flaps of his neck were striped with great gashes. His severed body lay partially on the bank, and partially in the steaming water.
"All better." Anata Boga clapped his hands enthusiastically five times. "Navarog, come greet your old friends."
Warren quickly spun them around so as to catch Gavin's eye. Out of the corner of her eye, Kendra watched Vanessa do the same. Wait – where was Seth?
Kendra looked at Warren, but if Warren noticed her brother's absence he didn't betray any sign of concern.
Gavin approached them in his dragon form. Kendra risked a glance in his direction. When he came to stand next to them, his eyes were carefully set on his Master. He was avoiding looking at her, she could tell. She hated that the pounding of heart eased slightly from his nearness. She did want to derive any form of comfort from his presence, yet her body betrayed her.
Anata Boga's threw back his head in laughter.
Kendra looked at Gavin again. She willed herself to not be afraid.
His eyes met hers. To her relief, Kendra discovered she wasn't paralyzed by dragon fear. She saw a flash in his eyes, and read in them the expression she had seen before.
Kendra felt a difference in the emotions. She felt his pain, and the flaming desire for something more than what he had been given in his life. It took her breath away. She understood what Gavin needed. "Oh, Gavin," she whispered. "I'm so sorry."
She had meant to say something else. The words wouldn't form in her mouth. But Gavin heard her meaning them nonetheless.
Kendra, frightened for completely different reasons than before, turned back to Anata Boga.
She turned just in time to see the dark wizard lifting his hand, his cruel smile contorted in sadistic glee. In an instance of thought, she knew his intention. He was going to cast a spell, and kill her friends. Before Kendra could even think to protest, the First King stumbled forward and fell to the ground off of the stairs. She glimpsed the glint of a silver knife sticking out of his back. Seth stood in Anata Boga's place, a grim sort of satisfaction spread out across his face.
"Shadow charmer." Hissed the First King. "Deserter! Disloyalty for your kind to the Lord Chaos is treachery!" He stood wobbling to his feet. He chuckled darkly. "No matter. No matter." He repeated. "I can only be slayed by an enchanted adamantine blade."
Kendra's heart was sinking with the Father of All Hatchling's every word – until she saw Seth's face. The corner of Seth's mouth twitched upward. Kendra was taken aback by how old and noble he looked. He didn't look like her little brother Seth, a young man nervous and eager to prove himself. He looked like Seth, Shadow Charmer Extraordinaire, the confident and triumphant adventurer.
"Well I suppose it's my lucky day." He spoke calmly, but fire danced in his eyes. "You see that happens to be exactly what that blade is made of. It was a gift from a friend I made in Romania. He guaranteed me it could kill any creature of darkness with even the slightest cut. It's poisonous to those of your ilk. So far it's worked on all sorts of nasty demons and wraiths – I figured it would work on you too."
The First King stared in bewilderment at him, his face greyed. Perhaps he was astounded for the first time in a millennium.
"After all those years of biding my time, after I forever assumed this awful, lowly form in order to attain my revenge - You cannot do this! I, Lord of Chaos, I die at the hands of an insolent boy? Never!"
Seth shrugged his shoulders. "Hey man, that's life for you –" He titled his head and squinted his eyes. "Or, I guess I should say that's death for you…"
The First King growled like a dragon. His eyes narrowed to slits. Even Gavin took a precautionary step backward. Which unfortunately, got his Master's attention. "Navarog! Finish them! Avenge me!" he growled.
But Gavin made no move to obey. His deliberate stillness spoke volumes. His yellow eyes glittered with sparkling distaste. Anata Boga hollered in outrage.
"What do you think you're doing? Fool!" He raised his hand at Gavin, a series of nasty words visible on the tip of his tongue. "I, Anata Boga, First King of the Draconic Race, Father of All Hatchlings, hereby curse you and your…"
A large chunk of rock and stalactites from the back wall extricated itself from the farthest back cave wall, and bounced down on the shore of the river, rolled over slowly several times to stop next to where the dragon and the wizard stood. When the dust cleared, on top of the large mound, stood a very estranged looking, very decidedly naked, dwarf. The First King paused mid-sentence to consider this new development.
"T.C!" Kendra yelled in elation at the sight of her friend alive. The naked dwarf smiled at her.
"¡Los malditos hija!" He joyously called back to her.
Then his attention was drawn to the snarling king. The Cursed's expression turned unpleasant. His eyes widened in unexpected fury.
"AGHHH!" He cried as he launched himself at the First King. He latched himself onto the body of the wizard and commenced pounding his robust little fists on Anata Boga's doughy face. The First King tried to pull him off, but T.C. kicked him, bit him, and scratched him all over with animalistic, impassioned enthusiasm.
If the situation was not so dire, it would have been extremely hilarious to watch the Lord of Chaos get beat-up by a crazed, naked dwarf.
Gavin didn't look away from the scene, but he discreetly nodded his snout in the direction of the door.
Kendra watched Seth shiver slightly and blink several times like he'd recovered from a daze. Then, he ran.
Vanessa and Warren, with Kendra still in his arms, were quick to follow.
"No!" Kendra screamed in realization, but her friends kept running, leaving T.C. and Gavin alone with the vengeful, dying First King.
As they desperately tried to escape the destruction of the dragon prison they dodged dislodged portions of the caves, falling stalactites, with many close calls along the way. Kendra tried to fight her way out of Warren's arms, but he held onto her with an iron grip. She screamed for T.C. and yelled at her friends to let her go back for him. She pleaded with them, telling them that they didn't understand, but she needed Gavin.
Her pleas fell on deaf ears. Vanessa, Warren, and Seth had gone into survival mode.
The further she got from Gavin, the more the warm sensation in her chest scalded her.
Suddenly, felt a breeze upon her face. The walls were gone, as was the ceiling. Sizzling, green goo created a perimeter that gnawed away the earthen prison.
"Don't let any of it get on you!" Warren yelled to the others.
Kendra smelt them long before she saw them. The heaps of dragon corpses that littered the floor, their gruesome disfigurement and dismemberment, it was all too much for her. Gaping chasms were recently formed in the floor. Goo dripped on them as well, spreading like wildfire, dissolving their bodies. Seth yelped as he narrowly avoided being likewise dissolved by a drop of the goo.
In turn, they lept over a two or so foot wide hole in the ground.
Kendra's fever spread to her stomach. She leaned over Warren's shoulder and retched. Vanessa was barely able to sidestep her sickness. To his credit, Warren didn't miss a beat.
He kept his pace till the rock underfoot had changed into grass. Then he slowed to a jog.
She looked back over Warren's shoulder at the receding image of the crumbling plateau. The falls were no more. Water ran every which way off of the top in trickles and streams. There was a yawning hole, in the middle of mountain.
As they came upon the outside world, Kendra breathed deeply, momentarily enjoying the taste of fresh air. It would have been better had her throat not been so constricted.
"Kendra!" Bracken was standing, leaning against a tree. He shuffled to the side so that Warren could lay her in the grass and prop her up against the trunk.
"Bracken?" Her voice was barely above a whisper as she craned her neck to look at him.
Kendra watched Warren punch Seth in the shoulder. "When were you going to tell you had an enchanted adamantine blade in your possession?"
Seth grinned lopsidedly. "Whenever it came up in conversation. I always keep it on me. I call it - Seth's Fail-Safe"
Warren shook his head in apparent disbelief, but smiled nonetheless.
Seth tilted his head. His eyes returned to his sister. She was glad Warren had said something to him, because she was proud of Seth too. She just couldn't have said so at that moment.
Bracken leaned down and gently touched her face in sweet reverence that made Kendra blush. The spot where his skin made contact with hers was cooler for a moment, but soon reverted to the high temperature it had been. Then he saw the markings.
He gasped. "What devilry is this?" He looked at Seth. "Can you read these words?"
Seth scrunched his brow in confusion. "Um, a few of them. They don't make any sense though."
"Tell me. Please." Bracken sounded strained.
"This one says something like 'ownership', this phrase might be 'bring together', and the one two words down from it says 'soul'."
"Here." Vanessa procured a blank piece of paper that Kendra winced to see. "I'm not sure if this will help. It's blank, but it was lying near her on the ground."
Bracken took the paper and hid it in his white shirt without revealing his thoughts on it.
"What kind of demon tongue can a shadow charmer not read?" Vanessa asked Bracken in a hushed tone.
"The kind that was made before shadow charmers even were thought of," he murmured. "This is no demon tongue. This is the language of Chaos."
"Can't you heal her? Isn't that your thing? You know, as a unicorn?" Seth demanded.
In answer, Bracken looked down at Kendra. His warm, concerned gaze searched hers. "Do you know what they did to you?"
Kendra nodded. "Anata Boga," Bracken's jaw tightened, "He cast a spell that bound mine and Gavin's spirits. When he dies…" She trailed off unable to finish. It was now only a matter of minutes away.
Her friends paled. "I tried to tell you," she apologized. Seth looked like he was about to cry. Kendra reached for his hand. He knelt down, hung his head, and took his sister's small hand in his. She tried to reassure him. "It's okay. I'll be alright. You'll be okay." She listened to the muffled sounds of his sobs.
Vanessa turned away, cursing loudly. Warren looked at the skies, and said nothing.
Bracken lightly brushed Kendra's fore-head with a kiss. His white hair fell around her face and veiled them from the others.
"I love you." He breathed out and Kendra breathed in. "I wanted to tell you sooner, but I was afraid of being to forward. I was waiting for you to become an immortal, but I should have acted sooner."
"I forgive you." Kendra raised her parched lips to his and kissed him. He kissed her back. It was wonderful, pure, and loving, just like she always thought her first kiss would be.
He pulled back giving Kendra a perfect view of the plateau as it finally collapsed upon itself. Kendra cried out and knew no more.
*.*.*.*.*
Gavin thoughtfully watched his Master finally crumple under the dwarf (which he was still uncertain as to how or why the aforementioned was there).
The dwarf howled in triumph and looked Gavin as though he were not a giant, evil dragon, but a fellow conspirator. He waggled his eyebrows and thrust his arms at the king as if to say Look, I killed the bad guy!
Of course, it was the poison that had done his former master in, but Gavin figured he'd let the dwarf run with that one.
He'd let her go. He watched the only man he'd ever served in his life, the only person with whom he had any connection with in the world, die. Why? He tried to convince himself he had been to demotivated to do otherwise.
Clearly, letting Kendra live was his only choice. Her death would mean his.
He felt her absence sorely, as loathe as he was to admit it. A warm discomfort flared up in his chest the moment she'd left. It was growing steadily more painful.
Presently though, he was trying to decide if he was really going to die. Meaning, did he want try to make the effort to survive, when in fact it may have already been too late to save himself? Did living matter that much to him? And again, Kendra would die too, wherever she was.
Not that he cared.
Gavin stared out across that abyss – and then he was assaulted by a naked dwarf.
The dwarf slammed Gavin's neck. Gavin roared in surprise and anger. A boulder sized rock dropped onto his shoulder, causing him to roar again. Gavin turned and snarled at the dwarf but stopped himself.
He turned back to the rock. If the dwarf hadn't made Gavin's head move, he would have just been knocked out. Then he would have surely died. Had the dwarf just saved his life? On purpose?
He leered down suspiciously at the dwarf, but to his complete and utter shock, the dwarf just stared right back at him unfazed.
What was the point of dragon fear if it wasn't going to work on anybody?
The dwarf nodded towards the stairs impatiently and looked at Gavin expectantly.
Gavin sighed. A dragon's sigh sounds a lot like the hiss of the brakes of a bus, only it occurs a lot less frequently.
The dwarf morphed into a bat. A skin-walker. Gavin was hardly astonished. Clearly there was more to him than met the eye.
He flew speedily toward the hole in the back wall. Gavin flew closely behind him. The pain in his shoulder flared up with the beating of his wings. They came out at the back end of the jungle. The flew on about a mile, when they heard the collapse of the dragon prison. They stopped to look back.
The bat treaded air next to Gavin. Gavin hovered above the treetops.
He looked at the little brown bat, wondering, what happens now?
Indeed – What does happen now?
If there is anything that you all would like to see tied up - either in general from the Fablehaven series, or if it's something you would like to remind me to finish up from my story specifically, you can comment about it in your reviews. I'm not sure if I can make it all work, but I will do my best. I would have this story be as close as anything I could ever manage to an accurate spin-off of the series. ALSO - I guess now is as good a time as any to mention I'm thinking about doing a spin-off of my spin-off. The focus would be on Seth. Thoughts, comments, cries of protest?