The Eternal Dance of Light and Dark

by The King of Ravens

Having just survived a nine year long civil war, those of Lucael would be forgiven for entertaining the notion of peace. However, new threats are rising, and as the son of the king, it is Caiellis's job to combat them, despite his youth. But as the leaders of a rival nation declare war and mysterious figures pull strings in the shadows, Cai will be drawn into the fate of the world.

43. Toil and Struggles

Again, sorry for the rather long delay on this chapter, but school started again and the chapters will be smaller than this so that I can get them out more regularly once again (my severe writer's block and lack of inspiration for this one didn't help either). Anyway I hope you enjoy, and thank you for reading.

Also, over a million words! Wow. Since this is a milestone, I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has ever read this story and all those who had followed or set it as one of their favourites, but in particular Foxtrot Agent 21 and Lullaby121 who gave me the motivation to continue with this story and allowed me to consider it from different angles. It wouldn't be the same without their feedback at all. Finally, I would like to give a thank you to the semi-anonymous reviewer u60cf28, who gave me the first review on this story and gave me hope that someone out there liked it. Now I have no idea whether they are still reading or not, but if they are thank you.

Edit: 12/10/2015 - For any who might be wondering, I have not abandoned this story and the new chapter should be coming out soon. The gigantic delay is down to me being extremely busy with sixth form (junior year for confused Americans) and the fact that I was writing two scenes simultaneously (meaning that after this one the next chapter should come relatively soon).

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Hello, my young Summoner. Hello, Caiellis Noctis Lucerna.

I know that you are probably too weak to hear this – as you definitely don't have enough mana to return to the Mind Realm during your slumbers – but I need to say it anyway.

I am proud of you, Cai, even if I don't agree with what you did. I can see why you did it, and I only wish that I had been there to stop you and convince you otherwise … as a guardian angel should.

I cannot see out of you at the moment, your mana is too weak for anything to reach me but the barest and most distorted refraction of the material plane, locked as I am within the lonely cathedral of your mind. But I can sense that things have changed, that sadness has been turned into joy, and for that I am grateful.

I wanted to speak to you so that you are certain that I don't think ill of you in any way, though I will be saying this to you when you recover enough so that you can visit the angel within your head.

Never do anything like that again. Your life is worth living no matter what others think of you, no matter what your father believed you to have done – even though I can detect that not all was as it appeared and that I may have been wrong in my estimation of him. I can see the steadying hand of a father's support, the tender touch of a brother's love made gentle where it would once be firm by sorrow and guilt, the spilled tears of a grieving family, the anguish of loss turned to the relief and happiness of salvation.

You are strong despite your young and frail form, my Summoner. You will get through this. I promise you that, with the support of your family and myself, you will endure and overcome this hardship.

I do not know if you can hear these words or not, drifting as you are through the expanse of exhaustion within your young mind, but I have to say them regardless of that. You will endure. You will overcome this. You are stronger than this, stronger than the demons that hold you down – whether they be the demons of the forsaken darkness of the abyss or the demons formed from the shadows of loss and sadness within your heart that are beginning to be dispelled by the light of acceptance and love.

Go now, Caiellis. You have not been asleep for long, but before this you slept for a dangerously lengthy amount of time as your body attempted to rejuvenate its wounds and preserve your life – though I myself do not know how long. The physical world is calling to you, and you should not deny it. The merriment and affection that you deserve is waiting for you. There will be pain, I do not doubt it, but you are better than the pain and you will rise above it.

Just remember that I will be waiting for you when you are healed.

.*.*.*.

It had only been a few minutes after Marik had reluctant laid his now sleeping youngest son down on the hospital bed proceeding the boy falling back into an exhausted slumber in his father's arms when the youngest Lucerna started to stir again. The two older members of the royal family, Marik and Alexander, sat in the chairs to the left and right respectively of their youngest which had held them in some of their weakest moments, watching over him and then leaning closer the second he started moving again.

"Hey, look who's awake, princess," Alexander stood up, looming over his younger brother and smiling broadly down at the smaller boy the moment his eyes snapped open once more and Caiellis was presented with the interior of the room once again. One hand instantly went up towards the oxygen mask upon his face, grabbing at the glass briefly before the seventeen year old's large hand encircled his four year younger brother's small wrist. He gently caught Cai's thin hand in his and gave it an inspiriting squeeze, uttering, "How about you wait for the doctors to say whether or not you can take that off before you do, little buddy?"
Caiellis looked panicked again, his eyes darting frantically from one corner of the room to another, analysing his smiling older brother before locking on to his father's movements out of the peripherals of his vision, swivelling his head round to the Lucerna patriarch before making a pathetic whimpering noise at the pain assaulting him.

The youth wasn't entirely sure what was transpiring, though the memories were quickly coming back to him as the fog receded from his paradoxically exhausted and sleep deprived mind – as he could recall one of his family members telling him that he had been sleeping for two days since the battle for the capital of the demon worshipping and pleasure obsessed New Empire of Passion, so really he should feel more rested, although he understood why he didn't perfectly well because of how weak he felt and the wounds that he knew his body had sustained – coupled with the numbing sedatives supposed to lessen the pain.

Such advanced thought soon faded in a few seconds when a wave of sheer pain, blisteringly hot and freezing cold in the same instance, washed over his body, focussed in specific locations of agony but otherwise spread out, and the boy immediately found it hard to breathe. The oxygen mask was pressing air down on him in irregular bursts of motion completely out of synchronisation with his normal breathing pattern, and as he started breathing faster as his body reflexively tried to cry out in pain he couldn't get any air to his lungs for a short moment.

Alexander leaned forwards quickly when his younger brother made a noise akin to a choked whimper, Caiellis sobbing, crying and desperate to breathe as his eyes widened and his hand began spasming frantically in his older sibling's grip. The surgeons sprang forwards, as did Marik, worriedly staring down at his youngest son, words making their way to his lips but staying there the moment that the seventeen year old in the room began to speak. He had things to say to his second born, but he knew for certain that if there was someone who would be able to calm him down in this brief transitional period between wakefulness and restorative slumber (although luckily the fact that Caiellis had woken up now confirmed that he would start to recover and awaken at more regular intervals – as it had only been minutes since he fell asleep in his father's arms after the moment of intimacy that they shared which had driven the king to tears) would be his big brother.

At least the fact that Caiellis wasn't panicking as much as he had the first time round, not trying to scream or escape from his father meant that the boy could still remember what had passed between the eldest and littlest Lucernas,

"Hey, hey little brother. Calm down now. The oxygen mask is helping you breathe, little guy, because you aren't strong enough yet to do it on your own. Just breathe with it," Alexander encouraged the younger boy softly, his voice urging and comforting in the same instance as he gently rubbed Caiellis's wrist with his thumb. The youngest Lucerna's mouth was open, gaping silently in an attempt to get air, the other one of his hands holding the wrist of his older brother as tears glistened in his eyes. The pain was all consuming, yet focussed into pinpoints of torment all vying for attention within his brain.

His eyes flicked across the room at a frantic rate before he forced them to lock onto Alexander's face when his brother urgently called his name, noticing that his father and the surgeons (some of whom were busy adjusting dials on machines that he realised must have been attached to him in some way) were stood slightly back and allowing the middle Lucerna to take care of the situation, something which made the youngest member of the royal family feel strangely better – as it wouldn't be some stranger trying to calm him, but his very own older brother.

"That's it, Cai. Just look at me, and concentrate on my voice. Breathe in when I tell you to. Breathe in," Alex encouraged him, and Caiellis tried desperately to accede to his wishes, hacking in a breath as air flowed into him, though he mistimed it somewhat and was still panicking, clawing at his brother's arm to try and pry it off of his wrist and get to the oxygen mask underneath. The seventeen year old moved his other hand around, locking it onto the piece of equipment allowing his brother to breathe in order to ensure that the younger boy would not dislodge it, and stared into Caiellis's wide and frightened yet utterly exhausted green eyes which luckily had none of the abject terror directed at the king present in them that had been there the first time he had properly awakened since the battle for the City of Pleasure, just horror at not being able to breathe properly.

"Keep it on, Caiellis," the older male commanded when his little brother feebly tried to push his hands away so that he could get to the mask, and even though it did scare him slightly it was nothing at all compared to when it had happened the first time and his younger sibling had been unconscious and bleeding from his mouth at the time. Now the glass of the mask was misting up with expelled breath instead of bubbling crimson, and Alexander kept his voice steady and soothing, aware that his younger brother depended entirely upon him to stay collected and not panic right now but fully ready to embrace that duty again after having it denied for what seemed like so long but had only been two days fraught with despair, as he spoke, "Just take nice and steady breaths. Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out."
Caiellis complied, the blurred room and his older brother coming back into focus, although his vision was still hazed somewhat by the pain ravaging his young body, relaxing back against the pillows after coming to terms with the fact that his back had automatically arched and it had only been Alex' restraining grip that had kept him on the bed. He took shaky breaths, still uncomfortable with the blasts of dry air spitting into his face, but aware that he wasn't strong enough to do it on his own. The features of his older sibling, covered in big brotherly familiarity but still tight with worry and tiredness, sharpened as he concentrated on finding the rhythm of his breaths, wondering how he had done it the first time (even whilst crying his eyes out he had still been breathing) and concluding that it had been because he had been focussed upon other things at the time, so stared at his brother.

"You're doing great, Caiellis. Keep it going like that. There we go," Alexander smiled down at him, releasing his grip on the boy's thin wrist and the oxygen mask slowly and instead clutching one of his younger brother's small hands in his own as the boy's breath misted up the oxygen mask when he sank back, the whole effort having exhausted the boy. "What is it with you and that oxygen mask, huh short fry?"
"Sorry," the youngest Lucerna murmured guiltily, his eyes drifting from his older brother to the other part of his family on the other side of his bed, meeting Marik's loving gaze, though underneath that there was parental worry which the man made no effort to conceal. It then hit Caiellis how dishevelled his family looked, as while he was no stranger to seeing his older brother in a similar state to this it was more stark with their dad as the youngest Lucerna had never seen him showing weakness so overtly before – no, it isn't weakness at all, and I know that dad will agree with me there. It isn't weakness to show concern for your loved ones, and it isn't weakness to show love to them either.

The man's cheeks were heavily stubbled, and although Caiellis had seen his father (who preferred to keep clean shaven) with a small dusting of a beard before after what had happened to Alexander and was aware that the man would have looked similar during the war he hadn't ever laid eyes upon his father when the forty year old appeared this bad prior to this. Dark rings encircled sunken eyes, tear tracks barely evident on his pale cheeks where they hadn't been before, or at least Cai hadn't noticed them the last time he had woken up, but when Marik noticed his scrutiny he immediately smiled down at his youngest son, genuine parental love pushing past the worry and making his dad's face light up in a way that he had only witnessed before the civil war.

"It is good to have you back with us, Caiellis," the man said, his deep voice coloured with a slight inflection of emotion, though Cai knew now that such a thing was usual of his dad who didn't have the ability to show as much emotion as other people – though he had heard the same note, just much stronger, in his father's rumbling timbre when they had embraced. The boy was about to reply, before the pain which had faded into the background during his endeavour to breathe rose to near unbearable levels and he had to repress a scream, the noise coming out as a strangled whimper through clenched teeth instead. Every slight movement was sending a series of uncomfortable and throbbing sensations ricocheting throughout his body like they were bouncing through it, but most prominently within his ribcage which seemed to rattle like he was in the midst of some sort of earthquake even though he knew he wasn't moving much.

Unfortunately, ceasing to breathe wasn't a valid option so he was forced to live with it, until much more stinging and agonising torture rushed through him.

"Ah-ah!" Cai tried to hold it in, not wanting to seem even more needy and pathetic than he already must appear, but everyone in the room had already noticed and was reacting to his distress. His father gripped his free hand tightly, demanding, "Where does it hurt, Caiellis?" and when an answer was not forthcoming as the boy couldn't open his mouth without wanting to clamp it shut instantly and shear off his tongue with his teeth he assured him, "It doesn't matter. The pain is going to go soon. The doctors are going to help you, so don't worry. Just make it through this, and it will get better."
Caiellis tried to nod, but remembered belatedly that doing so would cause him more agony halfway into executing the motion, so simply laid back down in his bed and attempted to keep the pained noises to a minimum as he felt some more foreign substances rushing into his veins. Slowly, but surely, the torment began to dissipate, replaced by a kind of numb bliss that made it hard to move but was preferable to the pain, though he didn't like the way that it clouded his mind and befuddled some of his thoughts.

"I apologise, Prince Caiellis. It was my idea to relive you of some of the sedatives after you appeared to be able to cope with the pain the first time you had woken up, as it would increase the frequency at which you would regain consciousness and proper awareness of your surroundings," an aged but vaguely familiar voice broke into his thoughts, and the boy craned his neck to look at the wrinkled features of Surgeon-General Mortan who gazed down at him with a clinical but sympathetic eye. The boy nodded, or at least tried to, feeling the stead progress of the narcotics and numbing mana coursing through his young circulatory system, and the man continued on, "We have only adjusted the proportion of medication slightly so that as much as pain as possible will fade away without you falling back into your curative slumber. However, it would be beneficial to keep you awake so that you can undergo some tests in order for us to assess your current condition."

Although the man kept it hidden, evidently not wanting to worry their young patient, Alexander knew that they were alluding to the fact that Cai's brain could have been permanently damaged by the amount of time he had spent without precious oxygen getting to it as well as referring to the potential for this physical harm being too much for his brother to cope with. He gently squeezed the younger boy's hand, telling him without words that his big brother would be there for him all the way through it, and saw Marik doing the same on the other side of the thirteen year old. With Caiellis's family backing up their youngest, there was nothing that the young teenager wouldn't be able to do.

"We can do these tests whenever you are ready, though I personally think that they should be left a few minutes," Mortan suggested, his face professionally grave which made the youngest Lucerna feel nervous even if he knew that such was the expression which the aged Ordo Medella member habitually wore and so didn't necessarily correlate to his chance of success in these tests. He felt tired, his exhaustion exacerbated by the fact that he had more sedatives pumping through his veins than before, but he was determined to stay awake for his family even if all he wanted to do was to escape from the pain, which while it was diminished was still strong. The surgeons backed off, leaving the Lucerna family in relative privacy even though they were still in the large room with them, and Caiellis looked across the room at them before tilting his head downwards.

More panic, though the edge of desperation was taken off by the narcotics within him, flooded through his mind as he saw the tube sticking out of his stomach, a revolting sight that had him instantly wanting to rip it out, although he managed to restrain himself in that respect. Relaxing his breathing, he turned to his older brother, a question in his wide green eyes that were brimming with tears at the thought of the thing that had been shoved inside of him and into his stomach that he could barely feel but was still there, and Alex smiled back sadly.

"Sorry, short stuff. You have to keep that in as well. How else were we going to make sure that you didn't become even more malnourished?" he replied to the look with that explanation. The contortion of Caiellis's features in utter disgust and revulsion would have been almost comical if not for the haunting tint to his expression and the glaze of tears in his eyes, and the boy mumbled, "I don't like it."
"I don't think any of us do, Cai, even though it makes you look like some form of freaky cyborg from the League of Uveria," Alex joked, gently squeezing his hand again and rubbing his fingers over the thin skin stretched over the bones, attempting to get his brother out of the misery that had descended over his young face in the light of what was being done to him, "And besides, you were already as thin as a stick before this battle, and even though you have become even skinnier – which I didn't think was possible, though you managed to prove me wrong – there would have been nothing left if you hadn't had the gastric tube inserted. Don't look so down, baby bro, it is only temporary. Once you are strong enough to eat it will be taken out."

"Don't call me that," Caiellis replied, his lips forming a small pout of petty little brother that was entirely eclipsed by the melancholy sadness of his features as he came to terms with how broken he was, just how many machines had been thrust into him in an attempt to help him and how many wounds he had picked up. He had known that he had been hurt in every single place imaginable by the Lord of Riots which he didn't remember killing but knew that he had, but back then his emotions had been much more pressing than his physical sense and he had ceased to care what had happened to his body because at the time he had wanted to die.

Now that he didn't, now that he knew the truth, knew that his father loved him and his big brother more than anything in the world and had been manipulated by a spawn of the abyss, the fact that he had survived so many wounds honestly shocked him. Although I guess I know that Alex or dad would have easily got through them, because apart from the fucking stupid wound I inflicted myself Alexander was harmed far more than I was by the last vampire Aksua, but I am weak compared to them.

"I'll call you what I want, little dude," Alexander stuck his tongue out at his brother, and though Marik was aware that he was trying to distract the younger boy from his predicament and force him to indulge in the brotherly banter, the king decided that he would intervene on his youngest son's behalf at any rate due to the fact that he wanted to reaffirm his love for the boy and ensure that the thirteen year old knew, "No you won't Alexander. You can call him any of your nicknames for him apart from the ones that are out of order. Otherwise you will have me to answer to."

The seventeen year old raised an amused eyebrow at his father, knowing that he was doing it solely to make Caiellis feel better, and turned back to the despondent thirteen year old. He was completely aware that trying too hard to make Cai feel happy about the admittedly quite dire (though nowhere near as bad as it could have been without his baby brother's tenacity and strength in spite of his wasted frame) situation would end in failure, as it had done in the past when he had pushed his sibling too hard to be cheerful, but even so he was still going to try up until the point where he would conclude that it wouldn't make any more difference.

The boy pulled his head up off the cushion underneath it, wincing at the pain of the motions and hoping that his family hadn't honed in on that, and pulled his hands out of the two older Lucerna's strong but comforting grips as he manoeuvred his body so that he was sat upright, his back resting upon the hospital pillow which was against the headboard behind it. He shook his head at his older brother when the boy moved forwards to offer assistance, although the pain must have shown on his young features as the seventeen year old decided to aid him anyway, placing a strong and underneath his younger brother's armpit and helping him in sitting upright.

Caiellis wanted to glower at his older brother and tell him that he wasn't an invalid even if he was heavily wounded, but he was grateful for the older male's assistance as he wasn't sure if the pain would have been too much for him or not. Instead he murmured, "Thanks, Alex."

"No problem at all, Cai," the boy responded, grinning at his younger brother as the smaller adolescent adjusted his position slightly, shifting like he would usually whilst in bed. Yes, this was definitely better than having Caiellis still and nearly dead and having to contend with his grief as well as stay strong for his younger brother, even if the youngest Lucerna was understandably sad and confused by what was going on all around him. Caiellis brought his hands to his stomach, unconsciously fiddling with the tube in it before dragging his prodding fingers away before either his brother or his father decided to, placing them on the bed instead and gripping hold of the mattress. He shot a glance over to his father again, the man flashing another smile at him, still not used to having the novelty of the man caring about him openly even if he knew that his dad had cared about him even before the horror's possession, only not showing as much as he had been the king.

He wasn't entirely sure whether or not his father would stay in this loving and affectionate mode that occasionally brought up fragmented pieces of memory from Cai's past that he could barely remember as it had been seen through the eyes of a four year old, or if once the threat of his youngest dying or being permanently hurt had faded into the background he would go back to how he was before – but even if he did, they had shared something special the last time that they had spoken in privacy to one another, a bond of intimacy between father and youngest son had been forged after it had laid, strewn aside, unattended to and broken, for so long, something that the littlest Lucerna wouldn't ever forget.

Caiellis also knew that their father wouldn't be as harsh or violent towards him as he had been during the war with Welkas, as that was when he had been possessed by the horror – rather if he did go back, it would be to the way that he had been acting before the negotiations at the Scholaria Magnus, which wasn't too bad as he had been trying to form a relationship with his second child and had given him the Sword of Glass (which had been destroyed, most likely in the final blow which had rent the Lord of Riots asunder, and although the boy felt slightly guilt about being the cause of the loss of a four hundred year old relic he supposed that it had ended the existence of an Archdemon so had met a worthy end) at the time.

However, he would always remember that his father did love him no matter how the man acted, he had been told so by Marik himself who had explicated stated that, that his love for his sons would often be concealed under his kingly visage and his veneer of an unstoppable monarch that he wore when ruling the Kingdom of Light to the point where Cai had often been questioning if it even existed or not. He knew now that even in their arguments, deep down his dad did want him and did love him, even if this state of him being an affectionate and doting father ended when Cai recovered.

"Everything is going to be ok, Caiellis. You just need to relax and get better as your body recuperates from its injuries," Marik told him, pulling his seat closer so that he could be nearer to his youngest son and incredibly tempted to gather the small boy into his arms again and never let go of him, aware that Caiellis wouldn't know that he had only spent about twenty minutes asleep since he had woken up before and that it would seem like much longer to the youngest Lucerna.

He leaned over the boy, not missing how the thirteen year old suppressed an instinctual reaction of flinching back and aware that it would be a few days at the very least until the youth could repress that completely, that the experience the boy had undergone was still too fresh in his mind, and pressed a firm kiss to the top of the youngster's head which had him blushing slightly at the attention.

"Besides, Alexander needs his little brother to run circles around him to put him in his place," the king joked, pulling back to ensure that he didn't overstay his welcome in the boy's personal space even if he could have easily held his youngest son for hours. His son's eyes met his for a moment, bleak despondency warring with love and understanding for supremacy in the emerald orbs, though they did not change at his father's attempts at humour. Alexander snorted, "Yeah, like that has ever happened. The only way in which shortie will be running circles around me on those tiny legs of his will be with his Geek Boy reading."

Caiellis paid little attention to his family's conversation, as while he wouldn't admit it focussing on that and his own thoughts at the same time was hard with the numbness of his mind. It was just good to have them talking to each other, to have them around him and showering him with easy love, to have a sense of normality (not that dad deigning to join in, let alone starting the conversations with them, was anything close to common) around him instead of the utter anguish which had suffused his young form and mind in his final moments of battle with the Archdemon Rakdos which still flared in his mind – although his psyche had already locked away some of the memories within cages of thought, unwilling to allow him to revisit the trauma of that time, even if they would emerge during his nightmares or other moments of weakness.

He loved seeing dad like this, having him by his side and supporting him like he had so many years in the past and like Alexander did in the present and had done throughout the horrible civil war instead of condemning, censuring and harshly berating him for any misdemeanours he might make, even if the man's parental love was slightly awkward due to lack of use. His big brother and father could have been speaking in a different language for all that he cared, because it was enough to have them here, safe and happy enough (although he could see the sadness barely hidden in their eyes and given more lease to tint their weary gazes when they thought that he wasn't looking). It was much better than them not being able to talk.

It was extremely comforting to have both his brother and his father here now, particularly so now that the eldest Lucerna was supporting him instead of shouting at him. There was a certain amount of relief present in knowing that he no longer had to fight against the anguish and the pain all alone, in knowing that someone else would take the weight off of his shoulders instead of leaving him to deal with it by himself. He was aware that independence was something that he should always strive for if he wanted to act as a good Lucerna prince, but right now he didn't care and that did not mean that he couldn't have the older members of his family here to protect him.

"Are you both ok?" he asked, quietly, when the conversation faded into silence halfway through Marik's reply when he probably realised that his youngest son hadn't been joining in at all, and Alexander's mouth opened to speak before Marik instantly cut in, although Caiellis knew for a fact that the seventeen year old would have said the exact same thing that their father was in the process of doing so, "Yes, my son, we are absolutely fine. You don't have to worry about us, focus on yourself and your own recovery (Caiellis thought that there was quite a heavy for once implied at the end of that sentence, which was ironic considering what all of his family did and that he thought himself to be the most selfish and self-centred). I'm not going to lie to you, we didn't get through the battle for Usnaan entirely unscathed, but it was nothing bad. For myself, at any rate, Alexander will have to be resting like you are – which is none of your concern and nothing you have to worry about."
Alexander's glower cut into his father's side, not wanting to start the inevitable process of Cai feeling guilty over all that had happened – as if there was someone who should (and did) feel contrite it would be the ones who had failed to protect their youngest and most fragile family member. Marik returned it stonily for a moment, understanding Alexander's concern somewhat even if he was not as familiar with Caiellis's urge to blame himself for everything as the boy's older brother, but wanting to make sure that now that Caiellis was awake the seventeen year old did not have to act like he wasn't in any pain or was an invulnerable older brother so that his sibling didn't worry.

"Yeah, like dad said. We are fine," he said with a hint of finality directed at his father, as the man didn't know as well as he did that Cai had a penchant for worrying about everything in a way that Alexander had decided that little brothers shouldn't have to. Caiellis's sleepy gaze kept switching between them, and even though his throat felt hoarse and he didn't fail to notice how his family winced empathetically whenever he croaked out something, though the hellish soreness of his vocal cords which he hadn't been able to pay attention to the last time he had woken up was dissipating more and more whenever he used them, he spoke, "Are you s-sure? I mean … you both look awful ..."

"You are hardly in a state of divine beauty yourself, little buddy," Alex replied, rewarded with a harsh glance from his dad and Caiellis's eyes falling to the bed in shame, so to rectify the situation he grinned down at the younger boy and patted him gently on the shoulder, "We're fine, Cai. Stop worrying about us. You need to be focussed on yourself, because there is nothing wrong with me or dad, ok?"

Caiellis rolled his eyes, nodding anyway but keeping all movement to a minimum as to minimise any pain that he might feel, as even if he wanted to be stronger and to be able to endure more torment causing himself undue torture was not an efficient way of getting about life in his current condition – and it would definitely be picked up on by his older brother if perhaps not his father, both of whom were already worried about his health.

"Ok … ok. Wh-what happened to the army in Usnaan?" Cai then asked, taking a few breaths between the words as his family waited patiently, the look in their eyes suggesting that they understood well how much effort it was taking for the youngest Lucerna to stay awake, let alone speak to them and communicate his worries. However, nothing was going to stop him from finding out what had happened within the Welkalite capital city that he had fought within, even if the version of the news that he would get would be as gentle as possible, probably omitting the amount of death there had been in the slaughter to appeal to his sensibilities. Caiellis didn't mind, he was too tired and already too sad to want to have to deal with all of that guilt right now, and he was too tired to even care about the way that he was being treated like a young child – which, he reflected, he supposed he was.

It was a rare occasion indeed that Marik would behave towards him in such a way, so he was determined to make the most of it and ensure that his dad didn't feel too much guilt over all that had happened to them, and while Alex regarding him as a child wasn't exactly uncommon a part of him still wanted to revel in it as he was grateful that his older brother was still alive and well, even if he did look awful and like he hadn't slept properly in days. Cai was well aware that he would appear much worse, but it didn't prevent him from being concerned for the welfare of his family – just because he was the youngest didn't mean that he couldn't be.

Marik and Alexander shared a glance, telling one another without the usage of words that neither of them would be revealing the complete truth about what had happened (although neither of them knew the true total of death and only Marik was truly aware of what had happened within the City of Pleasure since Alexander hadn't left Caiellis's room to go and communicate with the Lucerna family's generals back within Welkas after their hasty exit from the New Empire of Passion to get Caiellis to the hospital which he had been in for the past two days, so in essence the seventeen year old knew just as much as his younger brother did about the ending of the battle and the Lucaelian victory).

"Thanks to you, son, the Tempest of Craving and the demonic taint in the city was destroyed when you annihilated the Archdemon that the Welkalite Orders of Passion had Summoned within their capital, leading to a Lucaelian triumph and peace being restored. Even now there are talks of a truce between our own Kingdom of Light and the newly instated leaders of the Welkalite Empire, although I do not yet know the exact specifics," Marik coolly informed his youngest son, watching as the boy nodded in response, his eyes betraying little of his thoughts and only the constant sadness and pain as well as relief that he was with his family.

Marik squeezed the boy's shoulder gently as he took in the news silently, wondering whether or not his youngest son remembered the killing of the unholy Defiler which had almost ended him and had caused nearly all of these wounds (although there were still many which had been inflicted by Marik's own hand which made him feel utterly sick to even think about), anything to keep his restless hands occupied. He was quite nervous for the state of his and Emili's second child, and he wasn't sure how but he managed hide his anxiousness from his sons under a veneer of concerned calm which he wasn't sure was working.

It was not that he didn't want his boys to see that he was worried for them and loved them, as might have been part of his reasoning for hiding his emotion from them in the past, he just didn't want the true extent of his fear to be communicated to them as his empathetic sons would become even more frightened (for each other, not for themselves) if they sensed it.

Marik would keep all of the true anguish and terror that he had been confronted with himself so that his children would be spared from it, his darkest moments in the past few days when he had been confronted with a dead youngest son before the Angel of the Black Sun had saved him from the coldness of death's embrace. He knew that his sons were aware now that he cared deeply about them (even if Alexander had been before now when Caiellis had been labouring under the misconception which the king had done nothing to disabuse him of that his father didn't love him and in fact resented his presence after the debacle of the abduction and the seventeen year old's near death experience at the hands of Aksua), and he wouldn't hesitate to show his love and fondness of them, but they didn't overtly need to see how scared he had become (although Alexander already had and Caiellis might have done when his older brother had been hurt).

Caiellis had expected that the Lucaelians would be victorious, even if a part of him deep down insisted that the fact that they were here had meant that they had retreated after being repulsed from the City of Pleasure, but he hadn't confronted the thoughts very much, too wrapped up in his own misery to even consider what had happened as he had convinced himself (in no small part due to the manipulation of his father and what the man had been forced to say to him) that all of the deaths in this war were his fault – as he hadn't just been too weak to fight off his kidnappers and drag his older brother into the abduction as well, but he had abandoned the soldiers in his attempts to end the battle for Usnaan quickly and in his failure to prevent the unholy ascension of the Lord of Riots which he could still see whenever he shut his eyelids.

It still wasn't a glorious victory, no victory ever was when it concerned the murder of human beings, and Caiellis didn't feel at all happy or proud that he had had a potent role in it. He just felt the same sensation of hollow emptiness that had occurred whenever he had led the Scientia Mos army to triumph over the forces of the darkness (apart from when he had executed the Merciless Eviction on the army outside of Jeksaan and had believed that he was a horrible mass murderer). That was always followed by depression, but at the moment the youngest Lucerna did not want to confront these issues, he only wanted to revel in the company of his family for once.

He was almost too tired to even think like this, having to fight to keep his eyelids open due to the fact that he knew the doctors wanted to perform tests on him whilst he was still awake. A brief cough made his throat feel like it was on fire, and he turned to his older brother when the boy immediately asked, "Is there anything that you need, Cai? Anything that we can get you?"

"W-water … please," he croaked out, feeling as it the refreshing liquid would allow him to erase the sensation that felt like sand being poured down his throat, and the older Lucerna nodded his head. The fact that he was being fed gastrically meant that he wouldn't be dehydrated even if he felt like he was, but it also meant that his mouth and throat wasn't feeling the effects of any of the water inside of him. Caiellis didn't even want to think about how the doctors had prevented him from needing to get up and go to the toilet, as such a thing only made him feel horrified and even more distraught.

Alexander turned to leave and fetch his brother a drink, but then a slender hand latched around (although it couldn't fit the full way round) his wrist and he spun back around to Caiellis, the boy's green eyes silently pleading for him to stay and for someone else to get it. He smiled, depositing himself back in the seat and dragging it closer to his brother's bed, one of the orderlies having heard the youngest prince's request and departing briefly to obey it. He hoped that his blue eyes conveyed the fact that he was not going to leave his younger brother if the smaller boy didn't want it (and even if he did it was unlikely that in the next few days he would), and gently pulled Caiellis's hand away from his wrist so that he could hold it again, "Alright, squirt. I'll stay here."

Caiellis nodded in response, lifting his head slightly so that he could look over and silently thank the man who brought the glass of water over to him, depositing it in his father's grip when the man reached out for it. Marik leaned over, asking, "Do you think that you are strong enough to be able to drink it yourself? You will have to take of the oxygen mask briefly to be able to."

"Yeah … I can do it," Caiellis replied, although to be honest he had no idea whether he could or not because even small movements seemed to require energy that his exhausted body just didn't have, and reached out a shaking hand towards the glass that his father held out for him to take. Marik eyed him dubiously for a moment, gently passing it to him after a brief delay. Caiellis grabbed hold of the cup, the lightweight glass feeling immensely heavy in his weak hand, and almost instantaneously dropped it before his father's hand shot out and grabbed hold of it. His face burning in shame, the youngest Lucerna slumped back against the bed, consciously repressing the tears that threatened to drip out of his eyes and feeling his family's pitying gazes spearing into him.

He knew that it had only been a few minutes since he had first woken up by a coma after almost dying, but he still felt completely useless and utterly helpless as his father took the drink away from him, saying, "Right then. I will help you with the drinking, my son."
He moved forwards, perfectly willing to hold the cup for his youngest son whilst the boy drank in a way that he hadn't done since the boy was a child and hadn't been able to do it himself, but Caiellis shrank back, embarrassed. He smiled at the boy, and said, "Caiellis, there is not shame in accepting help from your family. I am truly sorry if anything that I said was the cause of you being embarrassed to take help when it is offered to you, but you should know that me and your brother are always willing to help you when you need it."
The youngest Lucerna hung his head, but moved towards his dad when the man motioned in his direction with the drink, biting his lip and fighting back against the sting of sudden tears. "I'm sorry," he muttered softly, hating the fact that he couldn't even have a drink on his own without having to force someone else to help him.

His older brother sat on the edge of the bed gently, avoiding all of the trailing leads from the machines plugged into the smallest occupant of the hospital room, and gently rubbed his arm, "Aww, Caiellis, it will get better. You are still very weak now. There is nothing to be sorry for here."

To the thirteen year old's dismay, a huge tear dripped down his face, one that he instantly wiped away, cringing in shame all of the while even though he was well aware that he had sobbed himself to pieces in his father's arms not too long ago. He looked over at his father, the man's smile still plastered onto his face even though the youngest Lucerna knew that some of it was forced, or at least thought that it was. Marik stared back at his son, holding the glass in his hand, hating how utterly dejected Caiellis's young and pale face looked but knowing that it would take a while for the youngster to recover from all that had happened to him, before a small and incredibly strained smile split the thirteen year old's young face and he grinned back at his dad.

There was still a haunted tint to his emerald eyes, but Marik was glad that his son was making the effort to try and be happy instead of wallowing within despair even if he didn't blame the boy for it and would help him at every opportunity now that he was awake, and Caiellis broke the brief silence that had descended with a soft, "Alright."

He was reluctant to allow his dad to help him drink, the thought of the man seeing him as pathetic and a burden still fresh in his mind even if he knew now that it wasn't the truth, so instead quietly protested, "Um … Can Alex do it instead, dad? S-sorry..."

Marik pushed back the twinge of disappointment and utter self-loathing that he felt, knowing that his son was far more comfortable with his older brother helping him than his father after all that had passed between them and growing up with only Alexander at his side, and he tried not to let it bother him or hurt his fatherly pride. Caiellis lowered his gaze guiltily, afraid that he had offended his father by saying that, as it wasn't the man's fault for the civil war and the fact that Caiellis hadn't seen him for nine of the thirteen years of his life, but he felt more comfortable having his older brother do it even though he was sure that their dad would have done so in the past.

"Of course, Caiellis. Whatever makes you the most comfortable," Marik replied smoothly after a pregnant pause had fallen before he had realised that his two sons were waiting on his response to the youngest Lucerna's request, regulating his voice as much as possible so that the deep sadness that he felt in his heart wasn't reflected within it. He had missed out on so much of his sons' lives, but instead of that being an excuse for him to succumb to grief and wonder what might have happened had he been able to anticipate the civil war and protect his family better it was merely another powerful reason for him to be with them now, to support Alexander through his ascent into adulthood and to aid Caiellis through puberty and his teenage years now that he had breached into them.

He handed his eldest son the drink, not missing the flash of shame in his youngest's eyes and hating himself for it, resolving to gently grip hold of the boy's far too thin shoulder for a moment in an attempt to confer solidarity and comfort as well as understanding for Caiellis's decision. Alexander grinned at his brother who turned his gaze over to him, grasping hold of the bottom of the oxygen mask in order to start the preparation for lifting it up so that his younger sibling could drink (as judging by the lack of interruption or intervention from any of the Ordo Medella professionals it was perfectly fine for them to allow Cai to drink and to briefly take off the mask).

"Dad is right, little bro. There is absolutely no shame in allowing your big brother or dad to help you out. Not that I won't use this as comedic material at some point, but I think you deserve at least … three month's grace?" he winked at his younger brother. Caiellis actually scoffed at that, though the noise sounded painful and wilted because of his sore and heavily bruised throat. Alex winced in sympathy, knowing that the painful bruises on his own neck were trivial in comparison to the black and red marks on his brother's, as his brother replied, "You won't last a week."

Marik grinned at his eldest son's almost casual teasing of his youngest. It was fascinating to see that even though there were some signs, as in the seventeen year old being more gentle with it than Marik assumed he would normally be, but instead of acting like Caiellis was a patient who had come perilously close to death and was still not out of danger yet (as while the king didn't want to consider it there still remained a possibility of his youngest son deteriorating further once again, though that was massively reduced by him waking up) he treated the younger boy like they were both perfectly healthy and that this was just a normal day to them.

Even if it might irritate Caiellis slightly, which Marik assumed that it wouldn't because it made a nice change to all of the arguments and pent up anger that they had been privy too recently as second son drifted further and further away from father as the gap between them widened ever more, it would still be an efficient way of injecting normalcy into the boy's life, as well as happiness and causality – something which he desperately needed to make it through this. Teasing the youngest of the Lucerna family gave him a perfect excuse and apt method of not focussing on what had transpired in the past few weeks, the destruction and danger which had first peaked in their abduction and the injuries sustained by Alexander and had culminated two days ago when Caiellis's body had given out after his saddened choice to take his own life.

"Whatever. Tell me when you are ready," Alexander stated, sat next to his brother on the bed and trying not to unconsciously compare his own size to his sibling's because of how perilously thin the thirteen year old was. Gastric nourishment was no substitute for proper solid food, not that Caiellis had ever really eaten a good diet and had always blanched at the idea of consuming as much as his older brother did. The youngest Lucerna had been scrawny and thin for as long as his older brother could remember because of the fact that they had an age difference of four years, but currently that was even more pronounced than usual due to his inability to take in solid food at the moment and his body's need to use all of the energy that might have been converted into stores of fat or muscle to restore his mana pool and heal itself over time.

Caiellis's thin hand encircled his brother's broad wrist again, past caring or being annoyed about the fact that his digits didn't go all the way round, the youngest Lucerna using it as leverage to pull himself up more so that it would be easier to drink as his brother held the cup in front of him, his face set in a mask of helpful comfort that belied his earlier words. Cai knew that the situation was embarrassing and awkward for them both, because they were both teenage boys and Alexander was almost an adult, in spite of the fact that his older brother seemed perfectly fine with it all.

"Ready," he uttered, hoping that the very brief removal of the oxygen mask wouldn't be as traumatic or scary as he was envisioning it to be. Alexander gently lifted off the bottom of the mask, pressing the rim of the cup to Caiellis's lips as the boy begin to drink greedily. The seemingly freezing cold (even though it was simply mildly cold and not the temperature of ice) water touching his lips and trickling down his throat was one of the best experiences of his life even if he couldn't breathe for a short time, and he gulped for more.

"Not too much, kid," Alexander warned him, pulling the cup back after Caiellis started sipping rapidly at the water (as the older boy had only tilted the glass slightly in order to make it easier for his brother to drink in short sips instead of having the water rush inside of him), spluttering in small amounts as he did so. The oxygen mask was fastened over his face again, and the youngest Lucerna let out a mewl of discontent as the water was pulled away from him, presented by the face of his big brother who shook his head at him, telling him, "You need to take it in short sips, Cai. You don't want to drink too much and make yourself sick, do you?"
The boy frowned at his older brother, pouting in a way that Alex thought he might never witness again from his younger brother if he hadn't woken up and only got worse instead, but what the middle Lucerna had said made logical sense even if it did seem cruel to him. He was about to ask for more water, his thirst for the refreshing liquid still not satiated, before both Choirmaster Esmelde and Surgeon-General Mortan made their way over to his bed, the former holding slips of paper in her hands and a pen that she would presumably utilise to write down the results of the tests that Caiellis underwent.

Alexander shifted off of the bed, placing the water glass on one of the desks next to Cai's abode of the past few days, looking up as the doctors approached and grasping for his brother's hand again, clasping it reassuringly so that his sibling didn't feel as nervous as he undoubtedly would be knowing the thirteen year old. Marik, who had remained silent as his eldest son helped his youngest drink and recalling a time when he had done the same for both (even if Emili with her position as the mother had done it more), stood up, sending a watchful eye over to all of the monitors that stated his son's condition for anyone to see and glad to see that nothing had changed since he had first properly woken up an hour or so ago, that the lines of colour which meant so much more than their physical forms could ever represent were still going strong, though their curves and bends were nowhere near as pronounced as they should be in a healthy young boy.

"Are you ready to begin the tests now, Prince Caiellis?" the Surgeon-General asked the boy, taking in the faces of his other rulers before glancing down at the slender youth on the bed who blinked tiredly up at him, rubbing his eyes with one hand and adjusting the oxygen mask slightly, though he didn't keep his hands on it long enough to provoke a reaction from his ever vigilant older brother. He nodded, although he must have looked tired, as Marik's deep but not cold or emotionless voice spoke into the air as he said, "You don't have to do them now, Caiellis. If you are too tired then just say so."

"No. I'm fine," he replied, though he wasn't just telling his dad as he rested up on his elbows, the fact that he was the centre of attention the only thing restraining the temptation to fiddle with all of the tubes and wires attached to him that he couldn't feel too much of because of the sedatives within him. He wanted to get these assessments over and done with so that his family could be reassured and so that he could spend more time with them, still not fully convinced that the situation would stay like this forever, therefore making him adamant to make the most of this opportunity to have his big brother and dad here. Besides, he wanted to complete the tests as well for his own personal sense of pride, as while he hadn't spent very long conscious in this bed at all he wanted to be able to be active because he hated being in this position – though not as much as his older brother did.

Mortan cocked an eyebrow at him, moving forwards and saying, "I think you forget, my young prince, that your father there invented the word "fine". There is absolutely no purpose to hiding your pain, and while I know that you want to follow your family's bad example in not showing any weakness – an admirable trait in any different situation – there is no conceding the fact that you are undoubtedly in pain and that you are in a hospital bed. I am a doctor, Prince Caiellis, and I have been in this profession longer than your father has been alive, so believe me when I say that I can tell whether or not you are in pain."

Caiellis chewed his lip slightly, turning away from the gaze that was piercing into him from the clinical eyes of the head doctor glancing at Choirmaster Esmelde instead who smiled down at the prince with a mixture of motherly and doctor based concern that put him more at ease. She rolled his eyes, voicing, "I did tell you that he sometimes went on rants, didn't I?"
Alexander smiled and Caiellis gave a tiny and tired smirk as Marik squinted his eyes in a bit of confusion, assuming correctly that this must have occurred whilst the two boys had been on their own during the time period where Alexander had been in a similar situation to his younger brother. Puzzled as to what the doctors were going to test him on, having already collected what he knew about medical tests into his mind beforehand as a preliminary measure in order to help his youngest son as much as he could (as he knew that it would most likely be painful for the boy, involving exercises of pained and cramped limbs as well as the probing and examination of wounds to ensure that they were recovering very well), he leaned forwards in his chair.

His son's condition was his condition, and he had a very clear notion in his mind that these appraisals of Caiellis's state would be much more arduous than the ones that Alexander had been forced to go through only less than two weeks ago. He wondered whether it would be worth it or not to offer comfort to his youngest son right now, contemplating gripping hold of his shoulder to not only give the boy the solidarity of his touch (since the thirteen year old had slid out of his hand) and to metaphorically assert that he was backing him up in everything, but such a thing might only serve to get in the path of the doctors so could end up being a waste of his effort.

No, what am I thinking? Of course it isn't a waste of my effort to help reassure my youngest son – or either of them, for that matter. That line of thinking is what ended with us in this situation in the first place. Even if the comfort is only brief, it will still be worth it for Caiellis – and besides, that train of reasoning implies that the boy's emotions are something mathematical and quantifiable, that they can be adjusted in ways that have a clear effect and that the smallest actions might not have unforeseen implications. I may think that there is no point in putting my hand on his shoulder if I have to take it off within a few seconds is purposeless, but to my son it might mean a large amount since it shows him that I am here for him, that I will do everything in my power to aid him through this and that I have learnt from my mistakes.

I need to start trusting my instincts and fatherly urges more instead of pushing them aside or attempting to use logic to analyse and refute their merit. However, that obviously does not mean that I don't have to think about anything, especially not in times akin to our arguments before (as of course I will argue with my sons again – such a thing is without a doubt considering we all have stubborn personalities, they are both teenagers and I haven't exactly been impactful as a father), and that I should blindly follow the first thing that enters my mind heedless of the consequences, but I do have the ability to be a father inside of me and I need to nurture that just as I nurture my own children. For example, take the last time Caiellis awakened: I did not act out of thought but out of my love for him, and it showed.

The king sent a short glance over to his eldest son, examining what the seventeen year old was doing to help his younger brother through what was to come without making it evident, although Alexander was simply sat and looking at the doctors. He was not afraid to admit to himself that he had started using Alexander's actions as a basis for his own in dealing with the youngest member of their family – as they quite clearly had merit and worked, although the fact that Caiellis had spent much more time with his older brother and was therefore much more familiar with him was a large defining factor of that -, taking visual cues from what the seventeen year old was doing because he knew better how to make the thirteen year old member of their family feel more comfortable and at ease.

His intentions were not to completely mimic what his eldest son was doing, as simply becoming a faulty replica of the youngest Lucerna's older brother had no purpose and would only end in Caiellis finding the whole situation strange, as well as the fact that Marik couldn't be Alexander as they were different people – the relationship between brothers was of course different to the relationship between a father and a son, and Marik wouldn't have it any other way as there was no way that he would imitate some of the actions his eldest son undertook when interacting with their youngest (such as pulling him into wrestling holds) – but to simply have more of a foundation on what worked with Caiellis and what didn't, although he had already started that through his own conversations with him.

Furthermore, the king was not aspiring to change anything but the way that he had acted around Caiellis and the souring of their already almost shattered and distant relationship which was nothing near how he had originally imagined it before Emili had been murdered and his children whisked away from him by the ravages and perils of war, as he wasn't going to invent an entirely new persona for dealing with his son or anything ludicrous and guaranteed to fail like that.

No, he only wanted to show the boy the true way that he felt about him instead of hiding it away and simply assuming that Caiellis would know since he was his son, and he fully intended to create his own connection with the adolescent instead of borrowing Alexander's or engendering an inferior version of the bond between brothers, but it wouldn't hurt to have prior knowledge as to what worked and what didn't. Right now Alexander was more experienced with Caiellis, which meant that Marik could probably strive to learn a lot for him in order to avoid any massive misdemeanours. Whilst he wasn't exactly afraid of making mistakes and knew that both of them would, he ideally didn't want to do anything that could compromise Caiellis's emotional state too much or push them further apart.

He would be careful, but not to the point of no longer being genuine. The king shook himself out of the reverie that he had fallen into, deciding that he could think about all of the multifaceted thoughts revolving around within his sleep-deprived mind once both of his sons had gone to sleep and people stopped talking to him. Right now he needed to focus upon the plight and trials of his youngest son, so placed his hand on Caiellis's shoulder anyway in spite of what he might have thought earlier.

"Before we undergo the physical tests we would first like to begin a mental examination," the Choirmaster explained, her voice laced with understanding and a comforting note that made her perfect for dealing with children and adults alike, even if Caiellis wasn't sure whether or not to class the tone of her voice as patronising to him or not. He supposed that he would appear as awful and fragile as he felt inside, so that meant others would take pity on him, especially those who had fought to save his life from the death that had been close to claiming it. He nodded in response, contemplating what they would want him to do, assuming that this was related to the fact that he had suffered a serious concussion and was most likely due to him missing out on vital oxygen for however long he had done.

The thought of being brain damaged or having his thoughts locked within his head sent a shudder down his spine, one that was evidently noticed by those in the room around him as his big brother was quick to assure him with, "Don't worry, Cai. This is only a precautionary measure to make sure that you haven't been damaged in the head to make sure that the doctors don't have to focus their healing there."

Cai would like to say that he felt reassured by that, but he knew that his older brother was hiding the fact that it was a large possibility he would have suffered some form of mental injury that would affect him for the rest of his life. Alexander was omitting the part where the youngest Lucerna might have undergone permanent brain damage that could not be healed by the doctors of the proficient Ordo Medella which had saved his life and the life of his older brother.

The seventeen year old didn't want him to worry as much as he already was, and although it was a fruitless endeavour Cai couldn't help but feel more safe now that his elder sibling was here, as if Alex somehow had the power to repair his mind if it had been broken by the lack of air, and although Caiellis might have believed that in the past he was no longer the impressionable youth that truthfully thought his seemingly invincible big brother could do anything almost as well (and sometimes better) than his parents could (especially in the civil war when no parents were around and when Cai had refused to believe that Uncle Tristram (who the boy was wondering about now at the back of his mind, as well as Uncle Tybalt) was as good as Alex or dad).

He didn't feel brain damaged, in spite of the reality that his mind was fogged and some of his memories were distorted slightly and warped within his head, although all of those that were happened whilst he was fighting the Archdemon so he didn't blame his psyche from trying as hard as it could to erase them or lessen the horror of the incident, but that didn't mean that he wasn't.

"Firstly, we would like you to verbally answer these mathematical questions in order to ascertain the state of your cognitive and logical functions," Esmelde told him whilst Mortan transcribed some information from some of the monitors of the devices surveying Caiellis's condition onto a sheet of paper in front of him with his quill, most probably those that were regulating and examining his brain waves. Even though the woman spoke in a voice that Cai had heard before, directed at him because he was a small child from many of the citizens of the Kingdom of light, she didn't spare any details or conceal the medical terminology under the veneer of attempting to be kind. Evidently she knew that he wasn't an idiot even if he was young.

The boy frowned, wondering what sort of questions the sheet that she was holding would entail, his mind already pre-emptively awash with thoughts about different types of mathematics and ways of solving equations, though he hoped that they would account for his exhaustion and the fact that they had him on the mild sedatives for any mistakes that he might make, as well as the reality that his emotions had been torn to pieces and his mental state was slightly frayed at the moment by all that had happened. Alex patted him on the arm gently, avoiding any of the spots that had been hurt or had wires from machines that he hoped would be taken out soon as he did so, and exclaimed, "That should be right up your street, Caiellis."
Should being the operative word here. This seems slightly random, although I suppose that it will help them in understanding if anything has happened to my brain. I can already sense the presence of some small amounts of Blue mana within me that are most likely surveilling my mental strength and the power of my thoughts, although my sensory capabilities are tremendously weak currently as I cannot generate any mana at all and I'm surprised that I can detect the magic of thought in the first place – I can barely even feel dad or Alex, and they had huge mana pools that I should be able to perceive from quite far away. Anyway, enough of that, I am already tired and allowing my mind to wander will simply reduce my ability to complete these questions. I presume that there will be some memory tests next to assess how much I remember, so once – of I – I finish these I should prepare for them.

Alexander didn't particularly like the way that Caiellis's expression was extremely anxious, despite the fact that he knew it would mirror his own even if he had smoothed his features into a supportive grin as much as he could in order to instil confidence within his younger sibling. He didn't think for a second that his younger brother would have been mentally damaged even if he had spent time without air, because he could see the clarity in his emerald eyes despite the fact that they were vaguely misted up as a result of his tiredness and the tears which had spilled out of it earlier, but only time would tell and he was still worried about the younger boy.

He would never be not worried about Caiellis, as his little brother was a gravitational mass that simply attracted trouble from all around him (being a Lucerna, a small child and a Lucaelian – but not just that, a royal family member as well – that could use Black mana tended to make the spawn of the darkness want to target the younger brother of Alexander), especially not now when he still felt the seemingly endless hours of loneliness and despair when his brother hadn't been awake keenly (as he had only been around an awake Caiellis for less than an hour), the all consuming and crushing sorrow that had threatened to swallow him up from the inside and replace his heart and happiness with a gaping void longing to be filled, but right now he was concerned for the younger boy because he knew precisely how badly Caiellis had become.

He tried not to let his younger brother on to that, as did his repentant and guilt ridden father who remained holding the boy's shoulder and kept his expression carefully concerned but without the fear the seventeen year old knew would be within, as Cai was perceptive as well as empathetic and any worry that he picked up on would simply make him more scared, which was something that the thirteen year old ill needed at this time.

"Would you like to begin?" the voice of Esmelde broke into all of their thoughts, and Caiellis nodded, attempting but failing to infuse the gesture with eagerness and instead making it appear hugely apprehensive. The woman began reading out the questions as well as turning the paper round so that he could look at them himself – they were challenging, but not too advanced or complicated and probably that way in order to avoid him exerting too much pressure on his mind to solve them or overworking it and hurting him. He answered quickly, though not hastily or before he was sure that he had completed them properly, but by the end of it a massive grin was splitting his older brother's face.

"Angels above, you are such a nerd," the seventeen year old teased, and Cai was sure that his big brother would already have him wrapped in a playful headlock if he hadn't been so wounded or hurt. He let out a small smile, a flash of his adorable dimples that had Alexander wanting to grin even wider, glad for his younger brother's sake even though he had not been fully cleared yet of permanent damage. Marik nodded, impressed at his thirteen year old's capability for the questions even though he was exhausted and had other things on his mind, and was about to congratulate him before the Choirmaster did so herself and began a second interrogation, suddenly asking the youngest Lucerna a question that seemed quite random but was cleverly concocted to make him think deeply into it.

Caiellis answered, hopefully with the right answer after being taken aback slightly, and Esmelde smiled encouragingly at him, "Perfect. You have completed everything so far with an utterly flawless degree of accuracy. We will be able to have the results of all of these tests in no time at all if you continue on like this."

The youngest Lucerna nodded again, silently wondering how many times he had done it on this night (well, he assumed it was night, though he wasn't entirely sure and his sense of time was understandably inaccurate and awry due to the amount of time he had spent in a slumbering state) because it was easier than speaking with how pained his throat felt from all of the abuse it had received. He wasn't able to stop himself yawning, quite loudly in fact, and was met with four sympathetic smiles when he did so.

"If you are too tired to continue, then you do not have to my prince. Do not pressure yourself too much into doing this if you do not feel up to it, as not only is there the possibility of the results being affected by your exhaustion in a way that they may not be, say, tomorrow, you risk overworking yourself and tiring youngest out even more," the Surgeon-General told him, briefly looking up from the numerous panels of information that laid out Caiellis's vital signs and anything else they would want to know about him to gaze at the youngest prince, who replied quickly, "No. It's alright. I'm just a bit tired, that's all."

"Even so, we are not going to undergo physical tests today, my lord," Esmelde cut in, the words inflected with a note of finality and interlaced with a doctor's authority over their patient which extended to the Lucerna family the many times where their vaunted endurance could not protect them and they required proper medical aid and the healing of professionals. Caiellis was about to respond, wanting to do everything in his power so that he could recover faster and get his older brother and father out of the worry that they had been steeped in recently and would be hurting them as well, with the fact that he was already acting as a Lucerna shouldn't (he couldn't remember Alexander ever not fighting against not doing exercises when he was wounded) burning in his mind, before his father stepped in, "The Choirmaster is correct, my son. Unnecessarily and prematurely stressing your body out could have potentially disastrous consequences as well as inevitably causing you (and therefore me and your brother, although you do not have to know that and should continue to focus upon yourself) more pain. If you still feel up to it, I will allow you to complete the mental examination today, but you will not be doing the physical exercises tonight, Caiellis, and that is final."

"Ok..." Cai acquiesced to his wishes, his expression turning from a mixture of protestation and relief that he had at least preserved his skill at mathematics to one of sorrow as he shrunk back, and with a pang of painful clarity Marik belatedly realised that he had made the words far too harsh, unnecessarily so. His voice had been suffused in his concern for his youngest son which had made the proclamation seem unduly strict and severe.

His son didn't quite pull out of the gentle grip that his father still had on his shoulder, though as he slumped slightly in defeat he almost slipped out of it, and Marik leaned forwards on the seat that he sat on so that he was closer to his son, ensuring that his face was showing all of the pride and love that he felt for the boy – whilst others might carefully sculpt their features to give off a specific impression, Marik often had to force them into simply showing positive emotion when he felt it due to his expression habitually becoming grim and cold when not angry because it had often needed to be like that during the dark days of the civil war.

"Caiellis. I was not trying to say that I think that you are in any way unsuitable for it or too weak to do it. I only want to do what is best for you, my son, and what your body is the most comfortable with. I wasn't at all trying to imply that you are inadequate, or that there is a problem if you are too tired to exercise your body at the moment. All I want for you is to recover at the pace that is best suited for you and for you not to push yourself too hard because you think that you have something to prove, because you do not. I want you to take it nice and slowly instead of rushing into it, is that alright Caiellis?" Marik asked, smiling at his son when the boy looked around to him, his green eyes fixed upon his father's face as if assessing it to ensure that the words coming out of his mouth were the truth.

The king kept his features open, because (apart from the fact that he was still scared for the boy – Caiellis knew, but that fear wouldn't do him any good) there was nothing to hide from him, and eventually his son nodded solemnly in response, the hint of a small smile of pure content tugging at the corners of his mouth before he turned back to the doctors, but not before murmuring, "Thanks, dad."

The man grinned warmly, glad that he had made his point heard to his youngest son and that the way he spoke to the boy was beginning to become more and more friendly instead of abrasive, and that he was becoming as eloquent with his second child as he was with his first. The almost unrestrained joy he felt in being able to be a father again surpassed anything that he had ever felt since the death of his wife, giving him a taste of the time before the unfolding treachery of his twin brother and three cities of Lucael turning to the darkness in their betrayal of the Lucerna throne, although he knew well how fragile that happiness was and how much it had to be protected.

Furthermore, despite the reality that right in this moment and for the next few days he wanted to be almost solely focussed on both of his precious sons, he was well aware that he would have to push aside that joy and contentment when it came for him to fight the final battles against Johnias when his twin brother rose his head again out of the reviled darkness which he had made his residence within after the bloody conflict and the defeat of the Fallen outside of the walls of the City of Swords. His sons were his greatest strength, but also his greatest weakness, and while he wouldn't have it any other way he still had to take measure to protect them that would come above any personal wants or need to see them and spend time with them – as it had been during the nine years of the civil war.

After a few minutes of the Ordo Medella operatives quizzing the youngest Lucerna on a multitude of different topics, the Choirmaster turned to Marik for a moment, briefly bowing her head in respect before stating, "That is enough for one night, my king. If you would like to join us then we can discuss Caiellis's results in greater detail in private."

"Why? Is there something wrong?" Alexander immediately asked, standing up out of his chair, an expression of worry instantly etched onto his young face that to Marik made the boy appear more like a father than an older brother depending on how he looked at it, although he knew that his children were closer than most (if not all) brothers were and that Alexander had every right to be worried about his younger brother as well. The doctor smiled back at him, diffusing some of his tension as he gazed into her eyes, examining them intently – not caring if the actions were friendly or not with the health of his little brother concerned - to ensure that there was nothing that she was concealing from him and concluding that if she was he wouldn't be able to find it out from her right now.

"No, not at all Prince Alexander. The results of the tests are fantastic, as you already know, and I think that we can just about clear him from the risk of any significant brain damage – or even minor damage, though we will have to look into that more. I only thought that it would be prudent to tell your father out of earshot, as it seems that Prince Caiellis is already falling asleep and I would not want to unintentionally keep him awake," she responded, inclining her head in the direction of the youngest Lucerna who had phased out of the world, his eyes struggling to stay open. Cai blinked and looked up when he heard his name, immediately registering that he had zoned out from the world, too wrapped up in his own thoughts and too tired to stop himself from falling into them, his vision clearing and his eyes presented with all of the members of the room looking down at him, which instantly made him feel shy and have the sudden, childish urge to hide behind his big brother. He didn't know exactly what had been said, but they were gazing at him expectantly, so he nervously and sleepily inquired, "Wh-wha?"

Alex snorted, smiling at his younger sibling as the boy rubbed his eyes in the way that made him seem younger – although, Alexander reminded himself, Cai was still only thirteen years of age and had been for just more than a full month, so was technically still very young despite how adult he often acted. Caiellis narrowed his eyes in confusion at his older brother, who simply winked back as if the two were sharing a private joke that they had devised together, although Cai had no knowledge of this and hoped it hadn't had something to do with what was said.

"Alright then. I will be back shortly, Caiellis. And I will be bringing some supper for you, Alexander," Marik told his sons, who nodded in reply, although Alex didn't particularly fancy the prospect of food he couldn't deny that even though his mind didn't relish having to eat, aware that he might throw it up and still worried sick for his ill younger brother (despite the fact that much of his despair had been alleviated by the fact that Cai had woken up and could talk to them), his body was physically starving and could do with some nourishment. At any rate, he wouldn't be able to help his little brother if he continued to neglect himself, and now that Caiellis was able to wake up and was no longer slowly dying with no way for his family to help him he could stomach eating again.

The thirteen year old watched his father and the Choirmaster depart the room, Mortan adjusting a few dials as Caiellis felt more pain relief being mana and substances (as there was only so much magical energy that his body could take without it becoming detrimental to his health, so the White mana had to be blended with curative materials and medicines in order to heal patients like him properly) pumped into his system which helped take the stinging edge off of the pain which was his constant companion. He had endeavoured not to show it to anyone, but quite clearly he had been unsuccessful in fooling the venerable doctor, who quickly winked at the youngest Lucerna before departing after his medical compatriot, leaving the two brothers mostly alone apart from a surgeon and Ordo Medella orderly/nurse who remained within the room in case of emergency.

"Go to sleep if you are tired, Cai. Don't force yourself to stay awake because you think that it stops us from worrying about you, squirt," Alexander informed him, the casual resonance to his voice stopping the words from turning into a command and instead converting them into advice. He glanced round at his older brother, still sat up in the bed, one of his hands automatically going to the tube in his stomach before a larger one belonging to his sibling shot around his wrist and gently forced it back to his side, Alex shaking his head at him slightly but still smiling.

"Na-ah. I'm going to stay awake as long as I can," Caiellis responded, shaking his head in a way that made Alexander smirk at his brother acting his age. Cai didn't need to elaborate upon that, the seventeen year old already knew that firstly his little brother wanted to spend as much time with his family as possible now that the differences between them were staring to be solved and conciliations were made, instinctively scared that somehow something would end this time of happiness so wanting to hold onto it for as long as possible because he couldn't quite believe it to be true – something that Alexander could empathise with immensely – and secondly so that he could delay from having to enter his nightmares.

Alex didn't know whether or not his brother had had any whilst he was in his coma that he had broken out of today, of if he was too deep into slumber and took weak to even have fever dreams of the awakened world, nor if he would experience his normally frequent nightmares if he slept now that his extended and involuntary slumber was over, but he could not blame his sibling at all for wanting to avoid even the chance of it after what Caiellis had gone through. Fighting an Archdemon would be utterly unlike anything that Alexander had ever experienced before, and though he wished that he had been the one to battle against Rakdos, not his frailer younger brother, he wasn't sure if he would have been able to kill it and obliterate its entire existence like Cai had.

But the middle Lucerna could still see the fear in his baby brother's eyes, the haunting melancholy that lay under every expression and every emotion within his large green orbs, and knew that the terror he had faced – as well as the emotional abuse at the sight of his father betraying him that had led him to suicide along with whatever the bastard demon had done to him or shown him – would continue to burden him for a while, and some of what had happened would stay with him the rest of his life even if he did overcome it and gain the ability to push it away.

Caiellis was still scared, his eyes flicking to the location of every noise that was made despite his tiredness, especially whenever their father made a movement as it was evidently hard for him to adjust to the man exhibiting the love for his family that the king's eldest son had believed in all along and had seen much more than his brother. It appealed to Alexander's want to protect him and give him a sense of security, though it was also a reason why he would want to stay awake so that the those who could protect him within the conscious world could continue to do so and ward off his terror that would have no compunctions about assaulting him when he slipped into sleep.

Besides, Alex shared Cai's sentiment of wanting to stay as far away from his unconscious psyche as possible, as every time he looked away from his younger brother or blinked he could see Caiellis, still and broken in his father's arms as the man cried silent tears over him, could still see his baby brother thrashing and seizing and bleeding and dying as he had almost done on this very day before the doctors managed to stabilise his condition again – which had led to him waking up, so had been a blessing in disguise, although Alex was hesitant to view it in that way.

"Whatever you say, little bro," the eldest prince replied to his brother's insistence that he would stay awake even though every few seconds Cai's eyelids would droop and he was sure that his sibling wouldn't be able to fight the pull of rest. However, it seemed that, like in a lot of things, Caiellis would continue to be defiant of it, and he was about to say something to his younger brother (not that he wasn't fine with the companionable silence between them, he just wanted to hear his brother's voice as he hadn't had the opportunity before an hour ago) before the younger boy glanced quizzically to something on Alexander's previous seat on the opposite side of the room, asking, "What is that?"

The seventeen year old followed his brother's bemused gaze to the other wall of the room, smirking when he saw the rabbit teddy sat dolefully on the seat which he had vacated in his haste to see his younger brother and sit beside him after the most recent time he had almost died. He had only bought the thing this morning, but the hours that had passed since then felt like weeks to the prince, who stood up and walked towards the bunny, stretching as he did so. He grinned as he brought it back to his younger brother, who cocked an eyebrow in dubiety at him as he settled down in his seat again, holding the teddy out in front of him and patting it on the head.

"Here. I bought it for you whilst you were in your coma," Alexander smirked at his brother's face, which had twisted into an indignant frown, adding, "I thought it suited you. Doesn't it look cute?"

Caiellis stared at the soft toy for a moment, eyebrow still arched at is, as if by gazing intently at it he could ascertain his brother's motives behind such an act as well as discern the precise type of materials that had been used to make the rabbit, evaluating it like he would an enemy before combat to assess its capabilities and potential movements or tactics, before he smiled at it. Alexander was right. It was cute.

He knew that he was far too old for soft toys now, he was a teenager for angels' sake, but he couldn't help finding the fact that his macho older brother (who did admittedly have a soft spot for him even if he sometimes complained about Cai being more emotional and sensitive to words and actions and teased him for it – no matter that Alex might deny it, he had cuddled up against his older brother too many times for him to ever profess that he didn't care about his younger sibling) had gone and bought him a soft toy out of his worry for him endearing. He beamed at his big brother for a moment, who looked vaguely taken aback by that, having probably expected that Caiellis would berate him for it and inform him that he was far too old for it, "Thanks, Alex. It is cute. I mean, I am a bit too old for soft toys now, but I appreciate the sentiment."
Alexander let out a little smile at his brother for that, having anticipated a verbal lashing from the thirteen year old as he could have assumed that Alex had only done it to irritate or demean him, or to treat him as younger than he was, but instead of jumping to conclusions Cai had looked deeper into it, seeing the reasons for the action and the gift as what they truly were and appearing grateful for that. He was thankful for that in a way, as even though it did show Caiellis how worried he had become (not that that was a bad thing as his younger brother had almost died on several occasions and he was allowed to be concerned about him) it also meant that his brother had more of an understanding of how much Alex cared about him without the seventeen year old having to say it and creating more emotional situations – like this one was perilously close to becoming.

"In that case," Alexander replied, shifting onto Caiellis's bed again so that he was closer to his younger brother and holding the teddy rabbit out in front of him, before tickling Cai's cheek with the soft toy's long ear as he thrust it towards him, "You won't mind having it in your bed all of the time?"

Caiellis sniggered, the automatic reaction to having something so soft brushing against the tender regions of his face, which provoked a wider smirk from his older brother as the boy carefully leaned over, his hands over the rabbit's stumpy legs as he walked it over his sibling's leg who tittered within the bed, though Alexander ensured to go nowhere near the normal length of tickling his younger brother as he usually would as he didn't want to exacerbate Cai's wounds at all or cause the younger male any form of pain. "St-stop it, Alex."

The way in which Caiellis said it made the seventeen year old certain that he was not causing his little brother distress of any kind (apart from embarrassment as he could see one of the doctors and the youngish nurse that he had made friends with when it had been him hospitalised looking over at them out of the corner of his vision, though they paid little attention to it out of respect for their patients' privacy), as if Cai asked him to stop in a different way then he would, instantly. But it wouldn't hurt for the youngest Lucerna to be the subject of some brotherly teasing, even if the intensity was massively reduced. Snickering to himself, Alexander did his best rendition of a high pitched voice, not dissimilar to how he occasionally and mockingly mimicked Caiellis's own voice when doing impressions of his younger brother to irritate the boy, "I'm not Alex, I'm Bunny! I just want to be friends with you, Cai!"

The look on Caiellis's face for a short moment after he first said the words was completely priceless, and even though they had a delay the seventeen year old was disappointed that he didn't have a mana camera with him so that he could have captured the image for future reference (and subsequent bargaining with his little brother), before the younger boy laughed, the sound music to Alexander's ears after the constant silence punctuated only by weak beeping noises, the quiet activities of the Ordo Medella healers, the extremely faint breathing of his younger brother and his own broken sobs that had been the only sounds in the gaps between his father trying to speak to him.

Instead of prolonging his little brother's suffering further, still deeply concerned about the boy and how weak he still sounded, he settled down the rabbit on the youngster's skinny chest (away from anything that could possibly be affected by it, such as still healing broken ribs), as the boy exclaimed in amusement, "So you've called him Bunny? How original, Alexander."

"You can give him a different name if you dislike it. I think that the simplicity quite suits him," Alexander responded, entertained by the fact that his younger brother had already decided that the soft toy had a gender but not by the fact that it was thicker than his little brother was, though he refused to think about that right now and simply provide the diversion from the predicament he was in for Cai.

He moved the teddy's arms round so that it was hugging against the thirteen year old, who began to laugh again, the noise one that Alex had feared he would never be able to hear for the rest of his life and one that he hadn't really been able to provoke from his little brother recently unless one counted the tickling which, before the time they had talked the day that he had discovered Cai's self-harming, he hadn't subjected his sibling to in years. Although the first time he had done it the adolescent had nearly choked on his vocal cords (as it probably hadn't been the best idea considering his throat was still relatively raw as well), Alexander still replicated his high pitched tones again, the fact that it had made his little brother feel happier making it worth the pain that was bearable anyway, and squealed, "Your brother didn't call me Bunny at all! My parents, Rabbit and Hare, named me!"

Before Caiellis could respond with an explanation that the rabbits and hares of Lucael (or the species in Yentar which varied wildly from the rare Lucaelian variety and were far more common as domesticated pets within the Republic – as animals did not necessarily need to be equipped with tools to survive and kill out of the abyss if their owners protected them instead, whereas within Lucael the only animals that survived were ones that wouldn't be killed, such as hounds) couldn't breed with one another (meaning that unless Bunny's parents had names which did not correspond to their species then it was likely that Caiellis's teddy was adopted – not that it really mattered since it was an inanimate object) the nose and ears of the soft toy were nuzzling against him and made him laugh even louder, one which quickly worsened into a worrying cough that forced the youngest Lucerna to scrunch up his eyes in what seemed like pain.

"Don't be antagonising the patient, Prince Alexander, or aggravating his injuries further," the nurse came over to their side, a bulky man around the size of Uncle Tristram that reminded Caiellis that the Guardian and Hierarch would still be in Usnaan, with short black hair cropped close to his skull and intelligent eyes the colour of amber gemstone. Caiellis, once the small coughing fit that hurt his ribs (though the pain was much more tolerable than what he had expected due to the substances that he was pumped full of keeping every second from being one suffused with unbearable agony), pulled away shyly, unfamiliar with the man despite seeing him a few times, his sunken cheeks tinged a slight shade of crimson that did nothing to alleviate the unhealthy paleness of his young features.

Alexander, who had already pulled away the teddy and had turned instantly from a tormenting sibling into a concerned big brother that had been ready and willing to help his youngest family member at any opportunity or call for one of the Ordo Medella professionals still in the room to come and aid Caiellis, smirked at the older man who couldn't have been much past twenty (although he had never asked him his exact age since it hadn't come up in many of their conversations) that Caiellis assumed was probably Alex's type of person even though he was a doctor and so wouldn't be as "suck it up" as his older brother usually was.

The young man stuck a large hand out to the youngest prince, who wondered despite himself whether or not he would have been training for battle or not since he seemed quite big and with the proportions usually seen from those who had undergone the rigorous training of the Lucaelian legionaries, introducing himself as, "Hello, my lord. I am Ralvar Manus, a healer of the Ordo Medella, and I have tended to both your brother when he was wounded and you. It has truly been a pleasure to serve the Lucerna family in this way, Prince Caiellis."

Caiellis would have gone red if his cheeks weren't so ashen from the weakness of his body, but instead he timidly cowered behind his older brother by shifting his body slightly behind his and making himself look smaller. He wasn't the best (one of the worst, in fact) at talking to people that he didn't know, especially when they used his titles and paid respects to him, but the fact that he was in a hospital bed and that the man had helped operate on him made it even more awkward. He reached out to grasp hold of the man's hand, figuring that it would be polite to acknowledge Ralvar's gesture of respect and shake his hand, and murmured shyly, "Thank you for helping to save me and my brother."

Alexander snorted at the youngest Lucerna's bashful sheepishness, gently clapping him on the back and moving round the bed so that he was sat by Caiellis's side instead of next to him and facing the smaller boy who barely took up any space at all on the large hospital operating table/bed, allowing Ralvar to shake his hand properly and uttering, "You don't have to be so shy, Cai. Ralvar isn't exactly going to hurt you."
"Not exactly," the other young man grinned, releasing the youngest Lucerna and checking all of the vital signs as per his profession. He knew quite a bit about Caiellis, more than the thirteen year old would envision at any rate, due to his conversations with Alexander when the boy had been wounded and having to do medical exercises and take tests to ensure that he was recovering well – which he should technically still be doing, although he knew better than to pester the seventeen year old about it now. They weren't exactly close friends, though he had spoken to the younger boy before the time he had been hurt after the abduction of the princes by the Welkalites who had met their deserved fate according to the exalted king, since he had been training underneath one of the other healers during the civil war as a combat medic and a much younger Alexander had been hurt at that point as well.

They were simply friends through circumstance, having conversations between one another to help the seventeen year old relax and to keep him from getting too bored, allowing the prince to talk and relieve some of his boredom at not being able to be active and do the things that they had wanted to. The friendly and amiable Lucerna was open and talkative, unlike his younger sibling who obviously much preferred to keep most of his thoughts to himself and was reticent to speak with strangers. The eldest prince was easy to form a sort of bond with and even easier to admire.

As Ralvar had helped in the assessments of Prince Alexander's condition and explained some of the exercises to him, they had discussed a wide selection of topics, ranging from ranking the female Ordo Medella professionals on a number of different attributes which probably weren't appropriate for the youngest Lucerna (although he was thirteen, a teenager now) to talking about Alexander's health. The older brother had been perfectly willing to say some things about his younger brother as well, although not anything too personal, and so far everything that he had said seemed to match with what Ralvar had seen as of yet.

However, in the time that the youngest prince had almost died and had been trapped within the weakness of his own body, the healer (who had finished his studying and wielding of magic but not yet the combat training which would have allowed him to join in the war against the corrupt New Empire of Passion) had seen a complete change in the confident and charismatic son of the king, watched him be reduced to utter despair and his young face filled with crushing sorrow at the condition of his little brother.

It was evident to any who had seen the two princes together or listened to one talk about the other that they were extremely close, apparently far closer than blessed King Marik and the Arch-Heretic had been according to his teacher, and it was well known that the two had spent years without their father – so any who bothered to consider the implications of it would be aware that it was very likely Alexander had raised his sibling from the age of four alongside Guardian Tristram and Hierarch Tybalt.

Ralvar was personally glad that Caiellis had started on the long road to recovery, and not just because he was a Lucerna prince or because he was a young child or even because he was an innocent human being who served the good and had almost died protecting other people – but because it had breathed life back into Alexander and given the boy a purpose once again. Even though he did not know the two princes very intimately, and most likely never would, he felt like he had been given a glimpse into a very different and very human Lucerna family, which simply made him respect them all even more than he already venerated them.

Alex shifted within the bed, draping a muscular arm around his younger brother's bony shoulders and gently pulling the smaller boy closer to him, quietly asking him, "Is this ok, Cai? I'm not hurting you, am I?"
"No, you aren't," Caiellis replied quickly, grasping hold of Alexander's arm despite the fact that he knew there was no way that his older brother would put him in any form of painful or humiliating wrestling hold with the arm that was slung loosely around his shoulders and making him feel safer and more protected. Ralvar smiled at the two, pondering telling Alexander to be careful and concluding that such an act would be pointless as the seventeen year old would already know and he wouldn't be rough with his little brother. He himself was an only child, so had never experienced anything like this in his own personal life, although he had been liable to treat one of his smaller friends in a similar way before the two had parted ways a few years ago when she had been killed in one of the battles within Civitas Sol.

Ralvar hadn't been able to save her, not at that time when he had still been a teenager, desperately trying to restart the younger Lucaelian's heart and channelling his White mana into her heavily bleeding form, and it had been the thing that had motivated him to join the Ordo Medella instead of the legion as he had originally been intending to – though he technically still would, as once he completed his combat trials he could fight alongside the soldiers whilst tending to their wounds and healing them.

That sheer uselessness and despair that he had felt had been something that he never wanted to feel again, and although he had personally murdered the bastard who had stabbed his best friend, pummelling the man's face into a bloody pulp after he disarmed Ralvar, he hadn't been able to save her, and she had died in his arms. Now he was repaying his debt to her by saving others, and he was glad that he had been able to help (even if he personally thought that he hadn't done much) and have a part in restoring Prince Caiellis's health and bringing light back into Alexander's eyes.

Cai shifted awkwardly, though it wasn't his older brother who was making him (physically) uncomfortable, it was the numerous tubes that were allowing the medicines to enter his bloodstream, providing him with hydration and feeding him which made him feel disgusted. Alex accommodated for his movements, glancing up at the healer who was still stood near them and looking into the older male's eyes, smiling all the while but hoping that his expression could communicate what he didn't exactly want to say. Ralvar nodded, taking the hint from the eldest son of King Marik that he wanted to be as alone as he could be with his little brother so that the thirteen year old didn't feel as nervous and could relax properly, something that was needed considering how exhausted he appeared.

"Alex, what time is it?" Caiellis suddenly asked, his small voice piping up from where he laid against the pillows (still sat upright) as his brother looked down at him, tempted to rest his chin on the smaller boy's unruly mop of soft brown hair but deciding not to do so right now, reaching over to the chronometer that his dad had uncharacteristically left in his seat (and even though he avoiding his younger brother as he did so the boy still arched his eyebrows in annoyance as Alexander leaned his arm and shoulder over him and blocked out his vision, something typical of the sort of person his big brother was – especially when he was with Caiellis).

"Quarter past eleven," the boy answered as he flipped open the intricate lid of his father's timekeeping device and examined the interior of the clockwork device as he located the spinning hands. It was a beautiful thing, one that the boy was sure he could remember his mother buying and lovingly enchanting for dad on one of the man's birthdays before Caiellis had been born as he sat on her knee and watched her weave the golden-white magic into the exquisite metal which had been hand-crafted by artisans of the Lucerna family, mentioning that daddy did like to keep a precise track of time and that he had broken the watch which he had used before that when atypically left it on during one of his rigorous training sessions.

In that, the youngest and eldest of the royal family shared another trait, as Alexander knew well that Cai also liked to know what time it currently was to satisfy his mind – as evidenced by what he had just asked for. The elder Lucerna then joked, "Way past your bed time, little guy, but then I think we can excuse that tonight."

"Not funny, Alexander," Caiellis instantly reprimanded his older sibling, who pouted in an exaggerated manner that was the result of him mimicking what Cai had done in the past when the younger him had been acting petulantly about something that they had been forced to do in the civil war (such as helping with chores when he wanted to read), though that had nothing on the "bitch face" his smaller sibling had pulled when he was even more irritated and had grown older and more predisposed to showing his negative emotions, still something that he did now although that had recently been replaced with genuine anger directed at their father which was much more serious than the kind of defiant irritation he had shown towards Tristram whenever the man had wanted him to go through physical training when it didn't suit Cai or when Alexander did something which irked the little man.

"Hey, I wasn't trying to be. I was just stating that since you have spent so long asleep, I can forgive you for staying up at this point when, in any normal day, you would have been in bed at this time," he protested when his younger brother half heartedly glowered at him for a moment, most likely slightly annoyed by the fact that Alexander had stated that this was after his "bed time" like he had a prescribed one – which he didn't, but Cai was still only thirteen years of age and he needed his sleep (even if it did normally involve nightmares). "Angels, Cai. Quit giving me that look just because I said that you, a thirteen year old, would have a bed time before eleven o'clock."
"I don't have a bed time," Caiellis sleepily protested, repressing a yawn which would give little credence to his words, which made Alex smiled when he heard his brother doing it. He placed the metre back in his father's seat, the fact that he had left it there a testament to the reality that Marik had much greater concerns even if he did treasure the gift from his late wife, responding with, "You do really. But we have been noticeably lax in enforcing it recently."

"Anyway, thanks for the teddy," Cai murmured, and Alex chose not to tease him about it, instead ruffling his hair affectionately and keeping his hand away from the bump on the back of Caiellis's head where it had been split open and most likely inflicted him with a painful concussion which would have made it even harder to fight, "Not a problem, kid."

They sat for a few minutes in the companionable silence, Alexander deciding on a whim to pull his younger brother slightly closer and rest his chin on his head anyway, the grip around the skeletal form of the youngest Lucerna tight and protective but gentle and tender nonetheless. Caiellis didn't complain, not that he would in a normal circumstance anyway unless he was really not in the mood – he only ever protested when the hugs were so tight that they squeezed the air out of him and made him feel like he was being crushed or when they were otherwise more uncomfortable than usual (as he was sure that his older brother purposefully made them that way in their usual embraces).

He understood that Alexander would want to hold him close, especially with what had happened to him and how close his big brother had come to losing him, and he was grateful for it because it reminded him of why he had to get better and why he never should have tried to end his own life in the first place. He rested his own head on the older boy's broad shoulder, though he didn't fall asleep. He was tempted to cry again, so pushed down the notion, ignoring his sorrow even if he had plenty to be sad about. It wouldn't be very appropriate for him to start sobbing his eyes out into his older brother again, irrespective of how many times he had done it and the last time being in the same day.

He would hold his older brother close as well, in his own, different way since he couldn't exactly wrap his skinny arms around Alexander and make the older boy feel safe, and he would be sure not to leave him alone when they were in danger any time soon. His ribs hurt, to the point where it was hard to catch his breath, though there was nothing that anyone could do about it since they had been broken and all of the measures to enhance their healing had already been put in place, and his vocal cords ached from unfamiliar use, but he wasn't sure if he could have been any happier considering the circumstance that they were in.

"I'm going to protect you, little brother," Alexander murmured softly, though the thirteen year old wasn't sure whether or not it was meant for his ears or even if his older brother had meant to say it. However, it still made him smile, and he snuggled up as close as he could to his big brother without damaging any of the wires temporarily embedded into his skin and the needles in his veins or forcing the older boy to hug him like he had done the first time he had woken up and had made Alex have to calm him down since he had still believed that his father was still out to kill him and still truly hated him more than he hated an Archdemon, "I'm going to make sure that you are safe, Cai. I'm sorry for failing you, but I won't ever do it again."

"You didn't fail me at all!" Caiellis instantly exclaimed, his brother pulling back slightly and looking down at him with a surprised and incredulous expression. Truth be told, he had thought that his younger brother had fallen asleep and he was whispering the words to him without even thinking about them, still in the mindset that his brother wouldn't be able to hear him and was still unconscious as he had been before his tumultuous and sudden awakening to a moderate degree, which meant that he would have to quickly snap out of it whenever his brother was actually awake – as it was, to a certain degree, quite embarrassing for Cai to hear his confessions even if they were directed at the thirteen year old. It was all for his ears at any rate, but the seventeen year old didn't appreciate the fact that he had been caught off guard in one of his rare moments of vocal introspection.

"You weren't even there through all of what happened, and I left you instead of it being the other way round, remember? It was my fault for not being near you and leaving you alone in the City of Pleasure, so you shouldn't blame yourself for what occurred whilst you weren't there. It isn't your fault at all, Alex," of course Cai would insist that it was his own fault, not the fault of the older brother who should have been protecting him, and though the middle Lucerna didn't exactly want to debate it now, not with other people in the room (not that he actually minded them listening to him as they already had done, even if it did change their impressions of him, but it was a private family issue and not one he really wanted relative strangers to know about – the fact that his family was the Lucerna family irrelevant to that desire, although that was another reason in itself), he had to disabuse his younger brother of that notion immediately.

"No, Cai. None of this is your fault, not in any way or any form. But I should have been able to stop you from going to the centre of Usnaan alone, and I should have been able to get to where you and dad were fighting instead of being bogged down and delayed by enemies weaker than what you were fighting against. I should have been strong enough to defeat that bastard the Master of Violence before he fled. If I had just followed dad instead of taking off on my own to try and get to you … I might have been there to stop it (he didn't think that mentioning the supreme monarch of the Kingdom of Light being possessed by a horror of the darkness was particularly prudent or appropriate for the other people in the room – whether or not they were listening to the conversation or not). If I had been a better brother … you might not have … I should have given you more of a reason not to..." Alexander's voice cracked, and the boy squeezed back tears that were pricking at his eyes, turning away from his younger brother in order to compose himself, cursing his own weakness all of the while.

Get it together, Alexander Ensis Lucerna! You aren't the one who felt like killing themselves and went through with it, and you aren't the one who almost died on numerous occasions and thought that their father hated them! I know that I was sad, angels, sad doesn't do justice to the misery that I felt watching him slowly give out, it doesn't go anywhere near encapsulating the freezing terror and drowning anguish that I felt, but I have to stay strong for him. Angels above, anyone who looked into our life the past few weeks would think that he is the older brother here, not me.

The boy hadn't wanted to voice the words, and that had nothing to do with the fact that others were listening. He simply couldn't bear to say them, especially in front of his younger brother who watched as his sibling's face became resolute again, the almost unbreakable solidarity that Alexander had exhibited when he had given his quiet confession back over the momentary lapse of weakness that he knew his older brother wanted to conceal from him even if Alex didn't mind him knowing how worried he had been and still was for him.

"You're wrong!" Caiellis almost yelled the words, not quite sure why his emotions were reacting with such anger at his older brother and a part of him fleetingly pondering whether or not this was what Alexander felt when endeavouring to stop Cai thinking similar things about himself. He was exhausted, physically and mentally drained by the whole ordeal, and all of his emotions were frayed and were retaliating towards different mental stimuli in ways that he couldn't predict and that took him by surprise, and hissed in pain as he protested against his sibling's assertion that he wasn't a good big brother.

Alex reacted immediately, gently holding his brother down, his blue eyes watching the younger boy worriedly and making his voice significantly more soothing as he spoke, "Hey, hey, stop that. Don't hurt yourself, Cai. I get what you are saying, alright? You don't want to be harming yourself any more than you already are, ok little dude? You are going to hurt yourself if you get so worked up. You are still healing, and I'm guessing that those ribs of yours didn't like that at all, did they? Do you want me to ask the doctors to increase the dosage of sedative to reduce the pain?"
"No … no. I'm fine. It is going now," Caiellis replied through gritted teeth, relaxing back against his older brother and breathing slowly as to not hurt himself further, though it still annoyed him how Alexander had managed to blame himself for all that had happened to the youngest Lucerna. He knew what Alex had alluded to – he had been trying to say that if the seventeen year old had been a better older brother, then Cai wouldn't have chosen to end his own life, and he wanted to tell him that he was one of the main factors in him not wanting to do it but the fact that he had put him in danger and constantly dragged him down, a burden on his shoulders and a weight around his neck, had helped tip him over the edge, amongst other things of course.

But Alexander would argue against that as well (well, hopefully he would, although I'm not really sure why he would want to deny the truth) and would assert that Cai had done nothing wrong just like the boy thought his big brother was utterly blameless in all of this misery to befall upon the Lucerna family as well, but because Caiellis wasn't in the shape for arguing his points would stand whereas the youngest Lucerna's wouldn't; they would falter and fall flat on their faces. Besides, he was reasonably confident that his older brother didn't yet know about the true extent of what had been said, and Cai wasn't sure if he ever wanted to tell the larger boy for fear of how he would react and how guilt-ridden he might become. Right now that was only between him and his dad, and unless Cai changed his mind and felt his big brother needed to know it was going to stay that way.

The boy eyed his big brother dolefully. He wanted to say so much to his sibling, to share his thoughts with Alex, but talking hurt and he couldn't arrange many of his tired mind processes into the correct and cohesive order. Instead he settled back down against him, only glad that he could spend this time with his older brother and supposing that if the situation had been reversed then he would be guiltily tearing into himself as well – just like he had (and still was doing) because of not being able to stop the last vampire from hurting his beloved brother despite the fact that he had been there in his presence as he was being fed upon and hurt.

But then, that was different. There was no way that Alex could have helped me in the battle of Usnaan, not with me Voidwalking from the outset to slay Tradax on my own, whereas when Aksua almost killed him and almost drained him dry of blood I was there with him, just too weak to escape from her horror's foul embrace and too stupid to figure out the dream world for what it was, too convinced by the fact that mum was still alive in it to bother to think about how she hadn't aged at all and that I could still remember her dying even if I did think that the real world was just a dream. So I was to blame for that, no matter what he says, and he wasn't to blame for this – no one is apart from the horror that took control of dad.

Alexander gave a little wave to the Ordo Medella operatives who were gazing in concern at their patient, signalling that nothing was wrong and that he had it under control, as his brother muttered, "I suppose we can call it even then, despite the fact that you're wrong about it being your fault. I failed you when Aksua hurt me, you "failed" (Alexander heard the audible quotation marks in his brother's voice) me a few days ago."

"Alright. But we aren't having this conversation now," Alexander told him flatly, determined to make sure his brother wouldn't hurt himself or build up any more stress within himself to add to what was already present in amounts too large for Alex's comfort. It wasn't that he didn't want to listen to his brother, although Caiellis's self-deprecation wasn't something that he enjoyed hearing as little brothers shouldn't have to feel like that unless they made genuine mistakes and it sometimes hurt to see how almost non-existent Cai's self-esteem was even if a lot of his tendency to blame himself for things reflected a significant amount of Alex's own mostly internalised thoughts.

What he had said which had sparked this whole conversation and ruined his brother's relaxed state had been the truth, but he wished that he hadn't said it, accidentally voicing his thoughts since his brother hadn't moved in a few minutes and with his chin on the smaller teenager's head he hadn't been able to see his eyes.

"Ok, Alex … I just want you to know that I truly think that you are an amazing big brother, and that you were the main reason for making me … for making me want to stay" Caiellis told him somnolently, his soft tone carrying a level of compassion that took the older boy only slightly by surprise, lowering his voice to a drowsy whisper for the last part, rubbing his left eye with a tiny fist made of thin fingers and yawning again as he did so. Alexander smiled, though part of his expression was tainted by sadness as his younger brother sat in the bed beside him with his arm around the smaller boy's shoulders, although he tried not to show that to his sibling who had been through so much but was still fighting against it.

"Angels, Cai. A little bit of medicine and you turn into a complete girl," Alexander joked, to distract slightly from the fact that the words of his younger brother had touched his heart and reminded him that even if he would continue to believe that he had failed the littlest Lucerna he had done some good in helping Caiellis and made the boy feel slightly wanted, and because he didn't want to spend all of their time being emotional. Because he could have the opportunity to tease his little brother in a way that he hadn't been able to do for days, in a way that might have been stolen from him. He could practically hear his younger brother rolling his eyes at that statement, retaliating snarkily, "Yeah, so what is your excuse?"
The seventeen year old chuckled at the retort, ruffling his little brother's hair again with the hand attached to the arm curled gently but tightly around his shoulders, replying, "Good comeback, for once. It seems that my efforts to educate you on the art of verbal sparring have not entirely been in vain."

He leaned over and kissed his younger brother on the forehead, which had the younger boy's eyes widening in confusion and surprise at the sudden action, rare from his older brother who preferred to show his love for his younger sibling in different, often more subtle ways to displays of outright affection (apart from hugs that he gave out to his brother after or during times of stress, danger or sadness), and he made a half hearted squealing noise of disgust that he didn't truly feel. "Eww."

"Thanks, little bro," Alexander responded with a grin, the patented smile etched onto his young but dishevelled features, and added quietly, his voice barely above a whisper, "And I think that you are awesome as well. For a little brother, at any rate. But you are my little brother, and that means I'm going to keep you safe."
It wasn't too often Alexander said things along the lines of what he had just stated, although Caiellis knew that it was true and in the most recent couple of weeks that had elapsed it had been said more often than before that. Usually the older brother of the youngest Lucerna would show it in other ways other than outright stating it, exhibiting his fondness for his little brother through affectionately teasing him and in their normal conversations. Normally it didn't need to be said, since Cai already knew all of these things, knew what his older brother thought of him even if sometimes he had let other factors get in the way of that and mask his belief that his big brother wanted him around, but after all they had gone through it was good for the youngest Lucerna to hear Alexander voice the words.

He sat against his older brother, listening to all of the sounds around him and suddenly immeasurably glad that the doctors had managed to save him so that he could be within all of this again. Angels above, what had I been thinking? Even if I thought that dad and mum had never wanted me born, even if I blamed myself for my mother's death, for the danger my big brother was placed within in two consecutive occasions and the deaths in the Lucaelian force, I shouldn't have given up so easily. I am a Lucerna; I'm not supposed to be a coward. I know perfectly well why I did it, and I can't say that I wouldn't do the same if I had to go through it all again, but it was still disgraceful and stupid of me.

I can't believe I didn't truly realise how much it would hurt Alex, but what dad said was true even if I don't want to believe that. I know that suicide isn't justified, but at the time I thought that I had put everyone that I had ever loved in danger – which is still partly the truth – and that many of the people that I should have been protecting had died because of my weakness. I know that what I did was wrong, and I can't say that I wouldn't do it again, but I am glad that I am alive now – for my sake, dad's sake and Alexander's sake.

You're my little brother, Alex thought, sappily, before inwardly and outwardly smirking at his own sentimentality. He held his younger brother close, vowing that he wouldn't let the younger boy get so lost and anguished and hurt as he had done, that he would be Caiellis's light to shine upon the path ahead and guide the boy's way, his shield and protector to guard him against the evil and cruelty present in the foulest regions of the two worlds out for his brother's (and his) blood and his confidante and friend who he could always trust and always share his most private worries with.

I'm so happy that he is alive. I don't know what I would have done without him.

.*.*.*.

Marik followed the Choirmaster out of the room to the waiting room adjacent that would allow him to observe his sons and satiate the niggling feeling at the back of his mind that they were in danger, his face set in a granite mask of concern for his youngest son and apprehension for what the woman might say to him that had been important or significant enough to hide from Caiellis.

"Is there something wrong with my youngest son?" he immediately asked, cutting straight to the point and dispensing with any of the pleasantries or anything else that might have got in the way of it, his father's fear making his voice sound harsher and more scathing than he had intended it to, twisting the genuine question into a demand. To her credit Esmelde didn't seem fazed at all, and didn't even bother gesturing for the king to sit because she knew that the forty year old wouldn't have deigned to, and even though her tone started positive her face reflected little of that now that her features were drawn into a serious expression, as he questioned, "Is it the results of the mental scans? Has Caiellis … has he suffered some form of brain damage?"
The king didn't care in the slightest that he had let not just a little of his concern leak into his voice, his desire to ensure the safety and health of both of his children having overridden any care of presenting himself as a good Lucerna, though Esmelde had already seen him in some of his weakest moments and her opinion of him hadn't seemed to change through that so it wouldn't be affected by this.

Besides, even if she wasn't a parent, she would understand his worry after all that had happened to his sons, and the possibility of Caiellis having sustained permanent damage would have put a dark spin on the relief and joy he felt at the boy's recovery when he had been slipping slowly into death with seemingly no way to halt his constant deterioration and infect the sheer happiness at seeing Caiellis awake and being able to finally give the boy the affection and proper attention he should have started showering him (well, perhaps not quite to that extent since I still had my duty as a king to attend to, as I do now although that can wait until I am certain of Caiellis's full recovery – both physically, mentally and emotionally, as whilst I may have been able to convince the boy that I do truly love him the relationship we have has only just begun to become one of mutual love and there is still a long way to go before I can repair it fully) with as soon as the civil war ended with increase amounts of self-loathing and more guilt.

The fact that there was a chance that Caiellis may never be the same again because of what Marik had done to him – under the control of a denizen of the abyss or not – sent icy shivers of combined contrition, hatred directed towards himself and horror stabbing up and down his spine, conjoining with the truth that his youngest son could still easily get worse and his condition could degrade once again (something that he didn't even want to consider it was that awful a possibility, but something that he knew would break him and Alexander again even if they had been able to speak to their youngest family member and make him feel safer).

Nevertheless, the fact that Esmelde had asked for him to come out here had definitely ruined the feeling of pride and delight he had felt whilst watching his intelligent little boy answering all of the questions put forwards to him.

"No, or at least I don't think so – though as I said we do need to perform some more tests just to be one-hundred percent certain that his mind has not been affected, or at least not emotionally. All of his higher reasoning skills seem to be present, and his limited withdrawal seems mostly psychological. I am still worried about the fact that he fought an Archdemon and sustained these wounds by doing so, as that undoubtedly would have caused a significant amount of trauma and mental damage, but there is nothing that we as doctors can do about that and your son will have to confront the memories of that battle himself – with you and Prince Alexander at his side, of course," Esmelde informed him, her voice clinical and professional yet coloured with sympathy and solace, and Marik had to physically prevent himself from sagging with relief, actively stopping the stress and tension from leaving his aching limbs that he hadn't exercised properly in days because of the fact that there must have been some form of concern if Esmelde hadn't wanted to say it in front of his sons (as he didn't exactly believe her entirely when she had stated that there were no problems and that she simply wanted to discuss the test results outside so that they didn't stop Cai from drifting back into sleep) as the woman continued,

"And although there may still be physical wounds that take longer than expected to heal if they ever do, you already know about the potential for permanent physical impairment and before we can subject Prince Caiellis to more examinations and until his body truly starts the healing process we cannot offer more than out best estimations at this point. No, that is not what I wanted to talk to you about, my lord."

"Then what is what you wanted to discuss?" Marik asked, his voice terse and strung like the tightly pulled rope of a forlorn adventurer using it to climb up perilous mountains, extremely tense and ready to snap at any moment, plunging the king into the chasm of gloom and defeat he had only recently managed to rise out of, and the woman's eyes reflected the mixture of apprehension combined with somewhat maternal concern for her patient that made the forty year old want to shake the information out of the smaller Lucaelian that he towered over, although she showed no fear and knew that the king was behaving in this manner because one of his sons was in danger.

"We wanted to discuss Prince Caiellis's Black mana," a stern voice broke into the king's thoughts, and the man spun around to see the aged Surgeon-General Mortan standing at the other side of the room, the man's eyes close to harsh but not quite there in the clinical way that the king had become used to over the years, although there was no prejudice or barely-concealed hatred in the man's eyes that Marik was grateful for, although it was possible that the venerable healer of the Ordo Medella who was the official director of this hospital and all those within the City of the Sun had been able to hide the instinctive Lucaelian detestation of the darkness which so often applied to poor Caiellis as well.

However, if the man did have any resentment directed towards the youngest prince because of his Summoning as many in Civitas Sol, the metropolis which had suffered the worst in the reign of Xarius, did, he didn't show it and his loyalty to the Lucerna family as well as his desire to help his patients overwhelmed it if it was there.

"As you already know, my king, because of the scarcity of Black mana appearing within the citizens of Lucael – the forever damned Emperor of Light was the only Lucaelian to have been naturally born with the darkness inside of them before your son – no disrespect intended, my lord – instead of having to obtain it through contracts with the denizens of the forsaken night – we have never operated on a patient with the ability to wield the magic of darkness before," the Surgeon-General began, his voice perfectly even and bereft of even the barest hint of emotion, reminding the king of his own cold father in the past although Mortan was much warmer than the man had ever been for as long as Marik had known him, and Marik nodded, suppressing the automatic defensive reaction that had been present in side of him ever since his youngest son's birth whenever someone mentioned his youngest's Black mana – as usually it was done in a derogatory manner and insinuating that his precious baby boy was similar to the self-styled Emperor of Light, even if it was often concealed by a veil of civility and respect for the royal bloodline and the most recent descendent of Matalis Ortus Lucerna.

He had not had to deal with it much during the civil war since there were more pressing concerns than his youngest son's darkness which had been shown for the first time in annihilating the demons which had murdered the four year old's mother and hurt his brother in spite of the fact that it could make him a target by those interested in the powers of darkness – such as the youth's traitorous uncle – and he had pushed thoughts of his children away so that he could concentrate on the prosecution of the war and enacting vengeance in the name of all those who had been lost.

Before that, he had only had to argue against the absurd suggestions of some of the Light-bearers and was certain that they had kept their concerns to themselves or others who thought in a similar way to them due to the fact that they were under no illusions of what their king would do if he heard more of it. However, right now nothing Mortan was saying was related to the discrimination and loneliness that his youngest son must have faced due to something that he had been born with and the past actions of a being who had chosen to be his guardian angel that he couldn't change, and it was only borne of a desire to aid their young patient.

He nodded again, though his gaze shifted from the wrinkled features of the older man to look upon his youngest and eldest son for a moment, the younger of the two's Lucerna birthmark which was stark but weak and faded on his right cheek barely visible to the king underneath the misty glass of the oxygen mask which his baby boy's breath had condensed upon, highlighting to all that his breathing was strongest now it had ever been since he had been brought here and that they would be able to take it off him soon and allow the thirteen year old to breathe for himself – though right now he was clearly too weak to. He turned back as the old man crossed the room to stand next to his fellow high ranking operative in the echelons of the Ordo Medella, allowing the king to look at them both instead of having to turn between them as they spoke.

"This means that we have no knowledge of how it could react to the different treatments, if it is generated in a different way to his White mana or generally any information about it apart from the way it has been utilised by our foes – which is not helpful, as I am sure that you can guess. All that we have to work upon is the limited knowledge Choirmaster Esmelde was able to gather when she treated the prince's burn wounds four days ago and some of what we have seen so far, which doesn't suggest anything at all. I will ask you now: do you know any information concerning the Black mana within your youngest son, my king?" the doctor inquired, and Marik shook his head sadly, feeling like he was missing out on something that he should have been intimate with, that he wasn't aware of something that was an intrinsic part of his youngest son.

All he did know was how his second son had taken the treatment the doctors had given the then baby before the civil war, but that was before his mana had been generated in any significant amounts as to affect anything or have a noticeable impact. The doctor nodded, neither surprised nor pleased by that, and carried on with his relaying of their concerns, "That is entirely understandable, my lord. We are all aware that you were not able to care for your sons in the civil war. We would ask Prince Alexander also, but we do not want to put him under undue stress at the moment and would prefer it if you did so – or you could even ask Prince Caiellis. Besides that, I am assuming that only Hierarch Tybalt and Guardian Tristram are aware of any potential complications, but obtaining contact with them is currently infeasible as you well know."

Marik nodded again, licking the inside of his dry mouth, as all of the moisture within it had been sucked out of it when the Choirmaster had asked him to accompany her away from his two sons who were currently sat together with Alexander next to his brother on the operating bed on which he had almost lost his youngest son, a part of him, several times. He hoped that something which had haunted his youngest son ever since his birth and the Angelic Descent of the Angel of the Black Sun wouldn't aid in his undoing now or compound the recovery which they all desperately needed to happen.

No. I cannot think of it in that way – and I am not going to. The Black mana has not cursed my youngest son, neither has Orzhova – the only negative thing (well, that is a bit of an overstatement as obviously I do not know what it has affected and the extent of what it might have done – as it could easily be a cause of his migraines which I hope stop and stay far away from him now) that the magic of darkness, not evil, has done is invoke the resentment and instinctual hatred of his peers and elders. Besides, Orzhova saved his life, for which I will be eternally grateful, and from what I have seen of her she is still an exemplary – if unusual and unorthodox – First Sisterhood angel in spite of her past with her previous Summoner.

I already know that the darkness in my son is simply another power he has access to, not something that defines him, and apart from his hatred of the demons and evil of the world none of his personality works with it – he is not arrogant, neither is he self-serving or selfish (despite what I may have told him during our arguments) in any way even if the fact that he is a teenager going through puberty and the tumultuous ascent into adolescence could sometimes make him seen that way when we argue. He is not evil, in no sense of the word, and never will be – he is compassionate, kind and gentle, not murderous or greedy.

"However, we do not know anything for certain yet. Our concerns may yet prove to be completely unfounded and his Black mana may not affect any of the treatments or the magic used to heal him – as the prince still does have large amounts of White mana within him that will aid in the healing process once they build up inside of his empty mana pool. Prince Alexander's Red mana does not inhibit the application of our healing spells and we have no reason to believe that Lord Caiellis's Black energy react any differently once it is regenerated, as at the moment he has none of either type of mana within him as you already know. Combined with his White mana, there is a high possibility that nothing will change. We only thought that we should bring it to your attention instead of keeping it to ourselves," Esmelde explained carefully, the king staring her straight in the eyes as he played the words within his head, before nodding for the third time.

"I see. Thank you for sharing this with me," he replied succinctly, some of the worry that he felt retreating for the moment, ready to rise up again if anything potentially detrimental to his little boy's health arose or any other complications emerged. He exited the room through the door that led to the outer corridor after shooting a brief glance into the operating theatre to see Alexander plant a small kiss on his little brother's head, something that he had only seen his eldest son do before the battle for Usnaan began and the two had embraced then, although he had done it before the civil war when copying his parents.

The loving ministrations of his older son brought a fond smile to the king's face; his eldest boy was holding his youngest with a patient tenderness that most would not expect from the masculine seventeen year old, one that most would never see because it was reserved solely for Caiellis. The sight of his little boys together reminded him how lucky he was that he had sons such as these, that both of them had survived the immense danger over the years that had seen them both brush acutely close to death – that only earlier today he had feared that he might never be able to see his sons together and happy again.

Alexander and Caiellis had always been close for as long as he could remember, although when they had been younger they weren't even as close as they were now even if they had still had their brotherly bond and their relationship was friendly with one another (as the younger Alexander hadn't reacted badly or with any form of jealously to the new arrival in their family, seemingly happy with four years of being the centre of attention wherever he went and glad that someone else could take that so he could spend time playing instead, which was good as Caiellis's premature birth had made the parents of the youngest Lucerna worried enough without having to be concerned about their other son accidentally hurting him). He recalled fond evenings with Emili where the two had watched their children play and had sometimes joined in with them, although Marik could remember watching them with his beloved wife more prominently since those were the times that he cherished as well.

The queen and king had sat by the side of one another, not speaking apart from to occasionally fawn over their children or make sure that all of the other members of their perfect family were in perfect condition, watching their children play and feeling their love for one another. Emili had given him two brilliant sons, and his wife had loved being a mother more than anything else in the world just like Marik was realising that he had felt the same about being a father – his love for Emili had been immeasurable and indescribable, but his love for his children had surpassed that without him thinking of it. He had known, even though she had never stated that because she was a kind woman and wouldn't have wanted to hurt her beloved husband's feelings, that the mother of his children had loved him more than anything – but loved her children a tiny bit more than that.

That was only natural, however, and he hadn't resented her for it at all because through loving Alexander and Caiellis she was loving him as well – and it was vice versa for the king and his love of his children. She would be so proud of them, so adoring of the young men that her little boys had grown and matured into (even if Caiellis was still a small teenager and Alexander wasn't an adult yet), and Marik wished that she had been here with them instead of him – despite the fact that he had the power of a Lucerna king and a First Sisterhood angel and she had not, and that the Kingdom of Light would have definitely fallen to Johnias without him.

No. Do not think like that. Emili is still here with us, in my heart and the hearts of my sons and watching over us all from her place in the highest and most perfect paradise that she deserved to go to. She would be proud of them, and is proud of them, and I promise you, my wife, that although I have failed them – especially our youngest – I will do everything in my power to make it up to them and keep them safe.

He strode through the corridors of the interior of the Ordo Medella hospital which had become familiar to him, although he had memorised its layout the first time he had visited this one several years ago so now he could walk through it without even having to think of the correct path to take for his destination or read any of the signs. The king descended the stairs, knowing that there was a more confident resonance to his footfalls and movements than the way that he had trudged when out of sight of other people, the fact that his son had woken up removing some of the despair which had slumped his posture even if it hadn't gone and he hadn't allowed it to affect him like his eldest son because he had a duty of care to the seventeen year old which had allowed him to focus his thoughts.

Now that Alexander had the same as him, the same responsibility (and though it was in a slightly different form in essence it was still the same) to protect his younger brother, the boy's purpose had been renewed and he had been revitalised by the turbulent awakening of his little brother, and he was beginning to change back into the young man that Marik had become familiar with – although he would love Alexander the same no matter what side of his personality he showed to his father.

Marik was immensely glad that there were other people that were attuned to the needs of his youngest son in a way that he wasn't, because even in his time of being most confident as a father he had always harboured doubts about the way that he was dealing with his second born – that was just the sort of person that he was, and had learnt to ignore a significant portion of his self-critical side and trust in his fatherly instincts, but they had deserted him completely (well, he had locked them away and trapped them in a cage borne of the cold and eternal need for vengeance) through the civil war and he had treated his son like a disobedient soldier instead of a person.

He was akin to a blundering fool when trying to deal with or comfort his youngest son, and hoped that working with him rather than against him would allow him to build up the familiarity needed for him to be able to accustom himself to Caiellis's needs and the subtleties of his emotional moods as he went through his teenage years. Instead of forging ahead and assuming he was right because he had not time for children, Marik would take more time to consider what the implications of the things he did when interacting with his youngest were. However, that did not mean he would hesitate to embrace his fatherly instincts at all when Caiellis needed him.

Emili would have known what to do instantly to soothe her baby son, and even though Marik knew that the teenage years of a person changed them drastically he was certain that his wife wouldn't have struggled as he did to account for the hormonal imbalances of their youngest son. Or perhaps Marik simply couldn't see it that way as to him his wife was perfect, perhaps she would have difficulty doing it just as he did – additionally, if Emili was still alive then it would be likely that he would have been with his youngest son all through his life as well so it wouldn't have been as hard to connect with him despite the reality that it still would have been difficult.

The Lucerna patriarch crossed the room to the kitchen of the hospital, hoping that there were still culinary products available despite how late it was – as otherwise he would have to make his way to one of the taverns outside of the hospital and ideally he wanted to avoid staying away from his children as much as possible. Luckily, there was one chef still around, a tired woman with wispy grey hair that went down to her shoulders, and she took his order for two oxen steak sandwiches that he knew Alexander liked to eat from the amount that he had devoured in his own stay at the same hospital. She smiled at him, obviously thinking the same thing as him, and within a few minutes the king was climbing the stairs again, the meals in his hands.

Marik generally didn't eat around this time as it was unhealthy and he was sure that he had read somewhere (before the civil war when he had more time to read books not pertaining to warfare, magic, history or ruling) that it could potentially affect the body's internal monitor, but he figured that he and his eldest son could make an exception to that rule tonight since neither of them had eaten a substantial meal since before the battle within the sprawling, sand covered streets and garish avenues of the City of Pleasure and if they were going to keep up their strength and retain their physicality it was required of them.

Tristram had told him that Alexander would eat anything that wasn't associated with a vegetable or fruit, and he was inclined to believe that from what he had witnessed of his eldest son's monstrous (but not excessively unhealthy for a growing boy seeking to put on more muscle like he was) appetite and love of food, whereas Caiellis had always eaten less than his older brother and his tendency to eat large meals (when they were available) had steadily declined over the past few years until it had become as virtually non-existent as it was now.

When he entered the room again, nodding to the Choirmaster and the Surgeon-General who had remained at the side of the room far away from their patient, uncomfortable at leaving him when he was still in such a critical condition but likewise not wanting to intrude on his and his brother's privacy, the king wasn't particularly shocked to see that his youngest son was still awake, laid in almost the exact position he had been when Marik had left the waiting room to get the food, his sleepy gaze making its way over to the man who entered the operating theatre. Alexander looked over as well, the mouth watering smell of the steak burgers which his father must have purchased making his almost empty stomach grumble in expectation of the meal, acutely reminding him of how hungry he was even if he didn't feel it.

Smiling at the noise which was audible from where he was stood, Marik smoothed out his features and reduced the intensity of the grin on his face, though his voice wasn't near strident when he spoke, asking even though he knew the answer, "Are you still awake, Caiellis?"
"Yeah, dad. I wanted to stay up until you came back," his son replied lethargically, his heavy-eyed and tired gaze taking his father in from where he was propped up against the pillows resting on the headboard behind his bed that had the dual purpose of being both an operating table and a relatively comfortable place to sleep, the thin blanket that had been thrown over his son the second night of him sleeping here covering almost equally thin legs. Marik smiled at that, wondering what he had done to deserve such kind boys, and would have ruffled his hair if he hadn't been holding the late supper he had obtained for himself and his eldest son, although it wasn't certain that Caiellis would react in a positive manner to that even though Marik personally thought he would since he accepted it from other people.

He turned his gaze to his eldest son, the other one of his children having looked up at his entrance as well with his arm around his younger brother's shoulders, though Marik didn't fail to realise that Alexander had placed himself in the optimum place for evading causing any form of discomfort to his younger brother yet still being able to offer consolation to Caiellis. Marik walked over to the other side of the bed, figuring it would be easier that way instead of having his eldest son disentangle himself from his younger brother, and handed Alexander the sandwich, giving the boy a look which told him that refusing to eat would not be tolerated, especially now that Caiellis was awake.

Marik knew that in spite of the fact that the younger boy would probably not fall into a deep slumber like he had been in for the past two days Alexander would most likely stay with his smaller brother precisely the same amount of time as he had been before the rousing of the youngest Lucerna. He would stayed perched next to his bed as he had been before he had left his coma, waiting to see his eyes and greet him with the familiar smile that Alexander often wore around his little brother. That was exactly how he had been in the brief time between Caiellis waking up for the first time and the second, and it would be how he would act unless Marik urged him to take care of himself as well.

"Here, Alexander. I assumed that you liked these considering the amount that you ate the last time we were here," Marik voiced, adding as much nonchalance to his voice as he could muster, the words of the highest ranking Ordo Medella personnel brooding within his mind as he glanced at his youngest son who was looking at the food. A pang of sympathy made him wince at the longing tinge to his son's dewy and tired green eyes, even though Caiellis probably wouldn't even like the type of food that they were about to eat. Alex was about to bite straight into his burger, suddenly coming to terms with how hungry he physically was despite the reality that he was still worried, but a pointed cough from his father made him pause as he glanced over at his younger brother and the sadness in his eyes.

"Sorry, little bro. We'll take the food outside," Alexander instantly apologised, guilt worming its way within him. His kid brother was still obtaining his own sustenance through gastric feeding; eating hot and solid food in front of him seemed exceedingly unfair. But when Alex made to move and get up, though he was tempted to ignore the food in favour of remaining with his younger brother until he fell asleep again, Cai's small fingers held onto the wrist of the arm around his shoulders like a vice. The boy shook his head slightly, and his big brother read the silent message easily enough. It's ok. Please don't go.

Alexander settled back down again, removing his arm that was slung around his brother's shoulders so that he could grip the bread buns created from wheat grown in the underground photo-refectories where those with the ability to utilise Green mana but didn't have a predilection towards violence or combat spent their time growing and nurturing crops with both hands. He tried to eat it as gracefully as he could, which provoked Cai staring at him with wide eyed intent, a tiny grin forming underneath the misty glass oxygen mask that suggested he couldn't quite believe what he was seeing.

Alexander with table (although he isn't exactly sat at a table, so I should probably use the word culinary instead – not that it really matters) manners? The wonders never cease. He glanced over at his dad again who had taken a bite out of his own meal, chewing it contemplatively as he stared at his sons, blinking to focus his gaze when he saw one of them looking at him. He correctly interpreted the wonder in Caiellis's eyes to be directed at the fact that Alex was eating in the most dignified manner he had ever seen the seventeen year old, assuming that the way in which he had seen the boy eat before this when his appetite returned was indicative of how he usually did it – with little respect for any forms of etiquette or proper eating decorum, despite the fact that he remembered teaching his son table manners when he had been younger.

The forty year old smiled at his youngest boy's amazement, quickly finishing his own meal and wiping his greasy hands on a cloth before reaching out to clasp hold of the youngest Lucerna's small hand in one of his much larger ones, his lips which had already formed a smile on his face twinging into a more sympathetic one when Caiellis unthinkingly flinched away before his tired conscious had even registered the movement, though the boy quickly rectified that and held his dad's hand.

We are going to have to work hard to get through this, my son. I know that it will be a while before you can force yourself to overcome the fear of me that the damned horror forced to grow inside of you, the fear that I did nothing to stop and was borne from my initial disapproval of your inability to Summon when the civil war ended. It hurt him inside to see his son unconsciously reacting with fright whenever his dad reached towards him before he brought himself under control and let the man complete whatever fatherly action he had been intending to, although he did not blame Caiellis at all for that since the boy had almost been strangled to death by his hands, had suffered numerous awful wounds such as broken ribs and a concussion because of him, and had been told that his father wanted him dead and that he should have left him to die with the mother whose death had most likely traumatized him for the rest of his life.

The boy's hand was cold, though not quite as freezing as it had been before this, and Marik automatically began rubbing it in order to warm his son up – as it was likely that the boy would be quite cold tonight even if another blanket was brought up (and he had no doubts in his mind that Alexander was thinking of donating his own thicker one to his younger brother) as it wasn't entirely practical for the doctors to give him a thick, fluffy quilt, not with all of the medical equipment that had been put into him which could be affected by it if it got tangled up.

The youngest Lucerna yawned again, looking much more like the thirteen year old that he was rather than the adult that everyone expected him to be, and Marik knew this tired version of Caiellis that he had witnessing now was one of the very few occasions he had seen his youngest son acting and appearing around his own age when he wasn't asleep and became innocence personified then. Alexander, once he had finished his own meal, snorted, "Go to sleep, Caiellis. There is no point in you forcing yourself to be awake."

"I want to … I want to stay up with you two," the younger boy objected tiredly, rubbing his eyes again which was a clear sign (if any more were needed) that he was exhausted from this ordeal and needed to go back to sleep. Marik didn't quite have the heart to force him to go to sleep right now, not when he seemed adamant on staying awake to be with the family that had missed him so much when he was gone, and it would only be a few minutes until he drifted off naturally anyway.

Alexander rolled his eyes, quietly asking his brother if he was alright every so often to ensure that he wasn't in any pain as Marik watched the two lovingly. All of the people that had talked to Caiellis since he had woken up for the second time only less than an hour ago had worn him down, and his eyelids languidly drooped once, twice, before shutting fully the third time as he was evidently too tired to pull them open once more. The hand gripping Alex's relaxed as sleep claimed him again, creeping up on him once more without him realising it as the boy's head rested on his big brother's chest as he slumped. Alexander smiled adoringly, smirking over at his father who was grinning silently as well, wanting to stay like this for a long time but knowing that he would have to move soon so that he could get his younger brother properly in bed instead of leaning on him.

The seventeen year old would have been perfectly fine snuggling in with his little brother for the night and sleeping alongside him so that he could keep his protective grip around the younger boy's thin body and assure himself that the thirteen year old Lucerna was safe and sound with him, but the fact that Caiellis was so wounded meant that he was incredibly reluctant to do so – Cai had spent the night with him after his abuse and torture at the hands of Aksua, but that had been different as he was less beaten up than his younger brother was now and significantly less fragile than the youngest Lucerna was. He didn't want to get in the way, or be the cause of more of his little brother's suffering, so gently pulled the small boy away from him, tenderly placing him back down in the bed and shifting the pillow so that it was still underneath his head.

Caiellis instantly reacted, waking up again with confusion and fear in his wide but slitted green eyes that were still filled with exhaustion, breathing heavily through the oxygen mask and thrashing for a second against the strong but gentle grip on him before his brother reacted to calm him down, soothing, "Shh. Shh shh shh. You're safe, Cai. It was just me moving. Calm down, baby brother."

His eyes fixed upon the older boy's face and the affectionate smile upon it, the boy's taut body relaxing and resting back against the bed as he tiredly and subconsciously looked at his big brother for guidance that the seventeen year old was only too happy to provide, his breathing slowing down again. "Go to sleep, little buddy. I'll be right here when you wake up – we will be here when you wake up."

"Yes, we will indeed. So go to sleep, my son," Marik added, his deep voice coloured with love for his children that made him realise why he had become so cold and motivated only by the need to avenge the wrongs inflicted upon his kingdom by the traitorous Fallen without them by his side and without them to care for and look after – even though they were no longer small children (despite the fact that Caiellis was small for his age) and were teenagers instead. Caiellis didn't turn around to acknowledge his father, too tired to do so, but he knew from the way that his son reacted, almost imperceptibly, that he had heard.

Caiellis gazed gratefully up at his big brother one last time before his eyes slid shut. Alexander gently brushed the hair from the younger boy's eyes even though they were shut, letting go of his little brother's hand and sitting back in his own chair which was still next to the side of the bed so that he could easily react to any signs of distress from his younger brother instantly.

He turned to his father, a moment of silent understanding passing between them again where the man gave up on his idea to force his eldest son into going to sleep in a proper bed as that would have been too cruel for the traumatized boy who deserved to be with his family as well. No, splitting any of them up was not going to happen on this night, and the words that he had spoken with his youngest son the first time he had properly roused from his deep slumber (he didn't count the extremely brief awakening which had heralded the boy going back into his seizures and almost dying again a few hours ago) playing around in his head, the guilt that Caiellis had built up inside of him which had only been exacerbated by his father and what the horror creature had made him say.

"You should follow his example, Alexander," Marik told his eldest son, who nodded, feeling the strain of the past few days bearing down on him as well and supposing that he should try and catch some rest now that he had been able to properly talk with and comfort Cai, although it was still likely that he would have nightmares of the things that had happened recently and had been seared into his mind – with the sight of his younger brother briefly waking up, trying to speak and failing and almost dying again one that would definitely join with those of his little brother in his father's arms and having to breathe for the younger boy.

He settled back in his chair, casting a watchful eye over his baby brother, before asking his dad in a quiet tone, "Are you going to be getting to sleep as well, dad? You need it just as much as I do."
The man smiled at his thoughtful son, rubbing a hand through his own blonde hair which was starting to turn white and was lighter than his eldest son's, before replying, "I will." even though he knew that it was unlikely that he would be able to sleep for more than a few minutes before the thoughts of his youngest son and the desire to check on both of his children overrode his body's need for rest. He watched as Alexander slowly fell asleep as well, determined to keep up his own silent vigil over his sleeping sons for as long as possible – for it was what they deserved.

.*.*.*.

The darkness inside of the cavern was cloying, suffocating, wrapping around her as she waded through the sticky liquid that clogged up the spaces between her toes and saturated the leather armour that she wore, making all of her movements sluggish and slow. The only light in the area was the flickering orange glow of the dim flame conjured above her pale hand, the wan illumination cascading over the throbbing walls, making the shadows dance and shift within the underground tunnel. It reflected off of the pool of dark red that Ilentia waded through, a canvas of crimson liquid that glistened in the orange light of her flames.

The shadows moved in ways that no natural shadow would, twirling in their own mad reverie as they reached towards the Master of Gluttony, if such a title still existed, hungrily grasping at her as she battered them away with the sword she held in her other hand. They were ravenous and endless, seeking to feast upon her body and her soul, but nothing more than a simple distraction that did little to dissuade the woman from her path, merely a mindless extension of the malevolent will at the centre of the underground network of tunnels with no will of their own.

She remembered this place, a fractured recollection of a time long ago that showed her broken memories and unfocused images. But back then it had been different, less tainted by the darkness that pulsed like veins in spider web patterns of black and red criss crossed across the stone walls and pulsated to the heartbeat of the creature at the centre of tunnels, the convergence of the many passageways within the Mind Realm of the Welkalite.

Before her dark resurrection at the hands of the now dead Archlord of Rapture, the Mind Realm of the woman who had been known as Guena had possessed the same structure of the one that Ilentia was traversing now, only the rock of the interior of the cave had been barren and bare instead of seeping with a darkness of no natural origin and covered with shifting occult symbols that twisted and unravelled under Ilentia's gaze, stitching themselves together and pulling themselves apart to form new and ever more malicious glyphs the further she descended into the darkness.

Years ago, this had been one of the places that the girl she had been had hated the most and feared almost more than any other, as she had often walked through the tunnels that intertwined and curved over one another like a rock version of an internal intestinal structure, which had never been a particularly comfortable image for the slender youth that she had been. She had been transported here in her dreams, dragged unwillingly into this realm of humidity and claustrophobia, and although she had been placed within many of the twisting tunnels of the Mind Realm they all led to the exact same location – the former feeding grounds of her nameless cyclops.

The girl Ilentia had once been before Tradax Yulica had ripped her former personality to shreds and elevated her being to what she was now had at first tried to flee from the cyclops when it learnt of her intrusion and rampaged through its territory to drag her back into the cavernous maw in which it made its residence, her desperation making her attempt to fight off the massive and gluttonous beast which she would come to understand had been assigned as her Summoning, though for what reason she nor the stupid creature that did not have thought processes past food and survival and as such did not have the ability to communicate in anything past grunts, bellowing roars and pathetic mewls of pain had known.

Every time she had woken up screaming, dragging herself out of her mind before she was eaten by the creature that took its residence within it, and it was only when her desire for power had first awakened within her so that she could secure herself and her younger brother a future she had entered the realm of her unconscious psyche willingly and confronted the cyclops, forcing it to bend to her fiery will as she burnt the brand of her name onto its skin – though at the time it had not been her name as the girl she had been had never been taught how to read anything more than the symbols drilled into the heads of the menial servants of the Order of Gluttony so that they could better follow orders.

She had subdued the disgusting beast and forced it to serve her as she propelled through the ranks of the consumption based Order of Passion, feeding it the pulped remains of many of her rivals who had attempted to stop her before she had reached the position that she had held before her master who had given her his patronage, Ershun Firefist, had been slain by the Lucaelian princes that he had attempted to prevent leaving the city, grossly unprepared for the amount of power that the two boys and their sanctimonious angels had wielded in comparison to the strength of his personal greater demon.

The woman could not list a comprehensive account of all of her past experiences, and what she did know was broken and distorted by the darkness within her heart, but walking through this place which was the expression of her mind and the closest she would ever come to delving into it brought up barely repressed memories, bringing unformed words and fractured ideas to the tip of her tongue and pressing against the barriers of her mind, almost there but not quite in a way that made Ilentia feel uncomfortable like little else did. Flashes of images of a time long passed spiralled and flashed beneath her eyelids and in the furthest recesses of her mind, seeping out of the cage of unknown dark power that they were locked within and teasing her with the promise of understanding her past.

If Ilentia had cared at all about the woman that she had once been, the temptation to give into the enticing images and let her mind be overridden by them might have been convincing, but to her it was nothing more than a slight inconvenience and made her feel somewhat disconcerted.

Now instead of bare rock that dripped with the products of perspiration the interior skin of the cavern was crusted by blood and covered in malignant patterns stretching across the stone. Crimson gore sloshed against Ilentia's legs like the acidic fluids of the digestive tract which would help in ingesting the products of consumption, and while the former her had often thought that she was walking into the lair of the beast and that she was nothing more than an unwilling meal now she was entering her Mind Realm for the first time since she had brought her previous Summoning under her control and established herself as its master by bringing it to heel with the power of her defiance and anger of her own volition.

The darkness wrapped around her yet did not touch her, fingers of shadowy substance ghosting over the tunnels around her and reaching towards her before she batted it away with the sword held in her right hand, her left conjuring the small flame that lit the way in the abject blackness which solidified and increased in intensity the closer she got to the dark heart of this underground cavern, the new beast at the centre of her Mind Realm who was calling to her with tendrils of its malevolent will.

The sword was not one of her own, a simple steel blade that she had managed to birth into this world with through her own defiant will, an extension of her desire to wreak violence, and the clothes that she wore had nothing on the light armour she was clad in within physical reality even though they were not as defensive nor protective as the armour of other nations, particularly the plate armour of the Lucaelians who had overcome the Welkalite resistance within their capital of the City of Pleasure. Malice and Fire, whilst powerful weapons, were not representative of her mental self, and the thick and simple blade that she carried now was. In the world of the physical, such a conventional weapon would have no affect on the being that she wished to fight, but as this was her Mind Realm (although she somewhat doubted that it solely belonged to her) the sword was merely a manifestation of her own mental strength.

The small flame that flickered in her left hand was weak and spluttering with small sparks, nothing compared to the roaring infernos of pyromantic strength that she could conjure up within reality, and whereas in the past her Mind Realm had reacted to her rage and allowed her to channel the powerful fires of her heart within it the darkness which had permeated through this place and saturated everything with its pollution, spread by the demon that resided at the centre of it, was much stronger than her Red mana here.

Arrapackxia, ever one for the melodramatic in Ilentia's experience, was making a statement, that her fiery will would do nothing against its Black magic and demonic power, but that did nothing to deter the Master of Gluttony from enacting what she had planned to do ever since her hasty retreat from Usnaan.

Black fluids with the consistency and texture of writing ink trickled down the walls of the cavern like the perspiration which had gathered on Ilentia's brow when she had been known as Guena, coldly sweating out of her fear and the heat of the underground network, but now the woman was perfectly cool and unfazed by the prospect of what she might face – as she was intending to face it.

The inky liquid dripped into the pools of blood that the woman splashed through as she descended through the claustrophobic subterranean passages, turning the crimson blood of those that the demon bound to her by Tradax in the terms of the Infernal Contract had slain and feasted upon to an even darker red, the unnatural and yet perfectly human ichor pooling around Ilentia's feet and drifting along her path with her, drawn to the presence of the insatiable creature at her heart which had disobeyed her far too many times.

The darkness of her demon whispered to her, words of an ancient and brutal language intermingling with those of a human dialogue that she could understand, although she could still work out what the miasmic aura of the greater demon was trying to communicate to her. It was a purposeful act by the beast she was intending to confront combined with the unnatural will of the tainted shadows of this place, simultaneously automatic and designed to dissuade her from continuing or to inspire even a small amount of fear within her as well as impress Arrapackxia's power upon her.

Come … come … Master of Gluttony … come … come to me … Raktashcar …

The woman might have been tempted to smile if she was prone to displays of emotion. I am coming, you demon scum. But I would not be encouraging myself if I was you. The shadows rippled around her, the darkness billowing around the woman's lithe body, the intensity and loudness of the paradoxically barely audible yet screaming whispers of madness and desire forbidden by those labouring under the constraints of morality increasing, and she knew that Arrapackxia would have heard her since it was connected to her mind and lived within it – which was why it had to obey her will, not act in whatever way it wanted to.

I will feast … feast … eat … fargaddan … consume … kaz'nack …. join us … join us … I hunger … we hunger … Gamchicoth ….

The woman knew from her past memories that she was nearing the cavernous space at the approximate centre of her Mind Realm where the greater demon bound to her would dwell in the crude resting place which had once belonged to her gluttonous cyclops beast of the Sancturia mountains, although she was expecting it to have changed significantly due to the warping and corrupting influence of Arrapackxia.

She recalled that when she had been known as Guena that there had always been a sweltering heat to this place, a fiery warmth produced by the extreme temperatures of her Red mana that she had come to embrace instead of being frightened by, and within that warmth there had been a desire to consume all, a desire to endlessly devour and eat all of the food that she could get her hands on. The heat was the same, as well as that endless lust for consumption, but instead of it being a passion for feasting upon the banquets of the material world it was an insatiable hunger for souls that suffused the Mind Realm of the Master of Gluttony, a ravenous intent to gorge upon the lives and essences of human beings, to feast upon the angelic enemies of the spawn of the darkness in Sancturia that could never be satiated.

There was evidence of taint everywhere, and while that did not particularly bother Ilentia as she had nothing against using any and every power available to achieve her goals the power of the corruption was a testament to how much of a hold Arrapackxia had obtained upon her mind and soul, how much its malevolent influence was permeating throughout her body and how much control it had on her – or at least thought that it had. Ilentia knew that the demon Summoning within her had been anticipating this ever since she had survived the battle for Usnaan in which it had abandoned her and abjectly refused to obey her commands, as while she had been expecting that because she had not been presuming that Arrapackxia had any form of loyalty towards her (as that sort of relationship was entirely mutual and her former Summoning hadn't had any inclination to help her past her forcing it to either) it still meant that she would have to reaffirm who the master of her Summoning was.

The black lines of taint pulsed like veins carrying the contaminated blood of the demon as she waded through the blood that stuck to her pale legs, her own blood vessels that were blackened by the corruption within her pulsating in time to the malignant heartbeat at the centre of her Mind Realm. Ilentia, in her form as Guena, might have been disturbed at what had happened to herself – she was pale, ghostly so, with fiery red eyes locked in that moment of final defiance which had stayed with her and made her mind incredibly sharp and full of adrenaline no matter where she was, and her blood was black with the magic of darkness running through her circulatory system and corrupting it. But then she had always been extremely ambitious, even in her former life when she had wanted to look out for her last remaining family member, her younger brother, and had wanted to gain power so that she could secure his future as well, and hadn't cared whether or not the power that she obtained would have any price.

Ilentia was not at all perturbed by it, as it was her body and that was how she had always known it to be, and while she wouldn't class the desire to survive above all else and the will to do anything to ensure that she kept living now that she had been given a second chance as ambitious now that she was free of her chains, free of the shackles that had bound her to the Archlord of Rapture, she could claim power and do whatever she wanted – when she forced her greater demon to serve her until it was time to get rid of it.

I hunger … azazael … I hunger … chaockma … come to me …

The words were a horrifying mixture of human sounds and unnatural syllables mixed together that would have split open the mind of any who did not possess a demon or another denizen of the darkness of the other world inside of them and at their discretion to Summon, whispers of madness and of dark things that no human should ever have known, although if they were supposed to inspire dread within the Master of Gluttony (Ilentia reminded herself to stop calling herself that ridiculous title) then that had failed.

More likely Arrapackxia was doing it to entertain and amuse itself, as well as wanting to show some of its power in its arrogance. Ilentia could see the maw of the large cavern in her mind, the central chamber of her Summoning's residence that seethed with dark power which she would wrestle under her control and truly gain dominion over so that there would be no more disobedience or dissidence from Arrapackxia.

There had never been any bones or the remnants of bodies at the entrance to the cavern, and this time it was no different. Both of her resident Sancturia creatures were far too greedy and ravenous not to consume every single part of the food that they could get their hands upon, leaving no evidence that there had been anything devoured within the cave at all. However, what had been exacerbated by the demon's presence was the stench of rot and partially digested bodies exuded by the mouth to the lair of her Summoning, strong enough to make the former her gag and vomit up unreal substance, as she vaguely recalled her cyclops making itself eject the foul contents of its gigantic stomach, spewing it out of its gaping maw so that it could continue to attempt to satisfy its endless hunger for more.

She assumed that Arrapackxia would not being doing the same, that the demon had no such constraints as her cyclops had and could constantly feed upon the remnants of the meals of the souls of those it had devoured when Summoned by Ilentia. But instead the smell was off foetid taint, sickly sweet blight blended with the scent of endless death into a sickening aroma that had even Ilentia curling her nose in disgust at the being that inhabited this foetid swamp cave within her mind.

The earth at the mouth of the cave entrance was a sopping quagmire of blood and sticky black liquid, the blurred impressions of a time long past interspersing over the sight of what Ilentia was looking upon now, the tracks of her former Summoning still visible in the sodden rock despite being covered in blood.

She discerned the tactic for what it was, the demon within her forcing her to remember the past of a woman she no longer was and who Ilentia had never been, when she had not been so strong and when she had been so much more vulnerable than this. Arrapackxia, whether it was doing it intentionally in order to weaken her or not, was subjecting her to the fractured recall of her past life before her near death and dark rejuvenation, trying to distract her and make her believe that she was still weak. The echoes of the whispering darkness were joined by a low, wet growl of something large, hungry, and depraved that was carried up into the tunnels and resonated throughout the dripping walls of rock in a way that no natural sound was.

It was however not primal, not the natural hunger of a large predator eager to eat, simply atavistic and cruel and infused with a longing to sink its claws deeper into Ilentia's soul that it already had a grasp upon and to claim it at the moment of her death – and to make the moment occur in the near future. The demon lusted for her blood, for her soul, and Ilentia would not let it have either of them.

The small flame in the palm of her left hand shimmered and flickered, the fiery passion of her Red mana unable to penetrate this far into the tenebrosity that shrouded this central area of the catacombs, and then went out. Ilentia had to physically repress a sigh that encapsulated her utter lack of amusement, and attempted to conjure up the flame again so that she would have some illumination. She wasn't surprised when she couldn't, and this time the woman couldn't stop herself from rolling her eyes at the spiteful and hungry laughter that boomed up the passageway.

The tunnel that Ilentia had been placed within when she entered the Mind Realm corkscrewed into the wider entrance to the central chamber where her greater demon would be waiting for her, widening as it do so. She pressed on until she reached the threshold of entering the true realm of Arrapackxia which it had inherited from the Summoning she had sacrificed to obtain the greater demon through the terms of the Archlord of Rapture's Infernal Contract that some would consider as unholy which she hadn't truly understood at the time, her new mind reeling at the new body she had been given and the new consciousness that had thrust itself into her form.

Moisture, black and sickly saccharine, drizzled in the air, pattering in trickling droplets of pure darkness upon Ilentia's clothing and running down her sword as she paused before entering the chamber containing the demon expecting her – she wasn't nervous, nor felt any fear at the thought of confronting the atavistic beast within, but she still wanted to collect her thoughts and remove any possibility of her being distracted by the fleeting glimpses of a world through eyes that were not locked forever within crimson defiance; this battle would be extremely dangerous as it was and any mistakes or brief hesitations could cost her dearly.

She started moving again, her splashing footsteps impossibly loud despite being joined by the raving murmurs of thousands of different voices, yet all of the voices were the same – her own. Ilentia pushed past the memories that threatened to rise up all around her, the sound of her past self's screaming intermingling with the disgusting noise of an unnatural tongue sliding over impossibly sharp teeth belonging to a being that wanted her soul.

The maw of the cavern was a rugged mouth of dripping stalactites and shimmering, blade-esque stalagmites. Some ran together in oddly conjoined columns which she didn't remember from her broken recollections of this place – evidently Arrapackxia's malicious aura had warped the shape of her Mind Realm – wet and glistening like malformed bones or the sinews of gigantic predators. The sounds of inhuman breath rasping over dripping fangs came again, and it occurred to Ilentia that the oily and ink-like darkness was akin to the saliva of a beast borne of the darkest regions of the twinned worlds. It drew Ilentia on, beckoning her in so that she could assert her control of her Summoning once more and remind it who it belonged to even as some primal part of her brain told her that whatever lurked within the darkness of the mountains caves of her mind was something that she could not defeat.

The thought was so alien to her that she stopped in her tracks once again, hesitating on the cusp of the final chamber as the darkness shifted and twisted in tenebrous arcs of midnight corruption over her pale form as flashing images of her time as a normal human made a sudden resurgence within her head, blindingly bright yet dim and blurry. The intrusion to her psyche was so subtle that only a thought so incongruous to the self image she had built up of herself which was amplified within her own mind allowed her to register it and reveal its presence.

Arrapackxia … you clever bastard … Ilentia forced the memories down again, although this time it was much easier because of instead of having to concentrate upon suffocating each and every individual fragment of her fractured recollection of experiences that someone who was essentially and to all intents and purposes another person had gone through she could focus on blocking out the demon's invasive will now that she had confirmed that it had a hold upon her mind and how this mental manifestation of her thought, isolating and removing each of the tendrils of spiteful will that had infested her mind as she stopped, instinctually knowing that Arrapackxia wanted her to come to him and that it would not leave its domain until she confronted it.

She could not dislodge the demon's influence completely, as it was residing within her mind due to its position as her Summoning, but she could dramatically lessen the effects and control that it had over her thoughts and fears, reducing the amount that her greater demon could manipulate the memories of her past self and use them to distract her. Ilentia, knowing that she had hesitated long enough and not wanting to spend longer than necessary within her Mind Realm due to her acute awareness that it meant she was unconscious within reality, stepped forwards, into the darkness.

The only reason that she could see was a combination of the fact that she was impressing her own will to have control of her mind upon this place and her greater demon's want for her to witness it and the area around it. Ilentia descended quickly into the cavern, her red eyes piercing through the darkness that shifted and danced to the tune of a pounding heart, the beating heightened by unnatural fear and ravenous expectation. A stagnant lake of blood and blackness filled the centre of the cavern, its surface a crimson mirror of gore and basalt darkness. The ambient temperature, despite still being uncomfortably hot, dropped by several degrees, and plumes of breath that twirled alongside the twisting shadows feathered before Ilentia.

Her pale skin tingled at the power of her greater demon as it always had done, the revulsion within her mind no less reduced now that she was in what it would like to think of as its domain, and as her gaze swept through the cavern which had changed since she had lasted visited and brought her previous Summoning under her control in what she would later learn to be classed as a "Summoning trial" (although vastly different from the ones undergone by the humans connected with Sancturia creatures made of different colours of mana, as while others had to complete specific tasks or prove their worth in a way in which the Summoning saw fit Ilentia had simply had to defeat her cyclops and impose her will upon it), the darkness of her greater demon moulding it to his will even if it still retained the overall shape and structure of what it had been before the Infernal Contract.

Blotching globules of darkness, some larger than Ilentia herself, covered the walls and the floor, expanding and contracting in irregular yet somehow synchronous sequences, spewing out the black liquid that covered everything else as they did so. The centre of the cave that was filled with blood and inky darkness was a crude alter, covered in words that hurt Ilentia's eyes to look at even as she did so, items of dark symbolism that she did not know of scattered around the central, spike-like plinth that was birthed into the room by the shadows, ethereal yet corporeal in the same moment and covered in sigils that would have burned themselves into Ilentia's retinas had she looked upon them in reality and not been the Summoner of a demon.

And there, hunched over next to the altar and with the blood of souls dripping down its lips, was Arrapackxia, his lymphatic and pallid skin dripping with the black liquid that the cascade of darkness from above bathed it within as he gazed up at Ilentia, a predatory smile playing over his twisted lips before they contorted into a snarl of condescension mixed with a voracious hunger. The demon bit into the neck of the writhing body that it held, the crunch of breaking bones resounding throughout the cavern and eclipsing the endless drip drop melody of thick blood splashing into more blood, and flung it across the cave where it crashed into the moist rock walls, spraying jetting and unnatural crimson everywhere around it as the soul body's spine cracked and shattered.

Ilentia had to resist the temptation to roll her eyes again, keeping herself fully focussed on the greater demon within her that she would have to defeat or subdue to get it under control and obeying her orders once more, as any distractions could easily be fatal within the realm of the mind – and, while wounds that were inflicted and suffered within this mental space were not carried over into the physical world and would not afflict Ilentia's mortal form, death was permanent and it would give Arrapackxia her soul, or whatever was left of it.

She did not believe for a second that her ravenous greater demon was partial to savouring his meals and slowly torturing and consuming them like others of his foul breed would, and that meant that Arrapackxia had specifically saved the soul that he had just now devoured in order to attempt to intimidate his Summoner, something which had not worked and something that it must have known wouldn't, unless it paid absolutely no attention to Ilentia which was likely considering the fact that the demon had forgotten about the teleportation device Eras had given her. Arrapackxia had obviously wanted to at least make her feel some doubt, some hesitation that he could exacerbate through the fear inducing and exacerbating properties of Black mana that all demons were made from and possessed the magic of – even though her demon did not specialise in the causing of terror like some of his spiteful siblings did.

"Ah, Ilentia, the forlorn Master of Gluttony," the demon hissed, his voice an arrogant mixture of derisive scorn and voracious intent as it leaned forwards, baring fangs covered in the dark crimson blood of souls and grinning at the woman across the cavern from it, Ilentia raising her blade and glaring silently back at the beast and it stretched two massive arms wide. "It is an honour, my pleasure in fact, to welcome you to this humble abode of mine-"
The Welkalite had already leapt forwards, wielding the power that she knew she possessed within her mind to launch her agile body into the air, her savage blade whistling as it whipped through the foetid and sickly atmosphere of the corrupted cavern. Arrapackxia reacted quickly, his unnatural reflexes augmented with the dark vitality that filled those of demonic origin and the speed of the abyss, bringing up one monstrously clawed hand to block the simple sword on his talons.

He laughed, the white pits of his eyes swirling with a combination of dark mirth and hatred directed at the bonds that bound him to his current Summoner, the restrictions imposed upon him by the form of Infernal Contract which the late Master of Rapture and Arrapackxia's demonic sibling Carramoshk had utilised to drag him out of his hunting grounds within the outer territories of the void and constrain him to the current Master of Gluttony.

The talons scraped against Ilentia's blade in a screaming spray of sparks that guttered as they hungrily spat onto the ground, even something as mundane as small flashes of fire warped and distorted by the malevolent and edacious demon, and the young woman quickly pulled away as her crude sword began to bend at an unnatural and inefficient angle under the strength of the greater demon that stood at over double Ilentia's height.

"What, Ilentia, no introductions or pleasantries before we got down to business? I know that you are dour and boring, but this is pushing it even for you, my dear," the greater demon cackled, the blackened liquid trickling like streams of ink down its freakishly pale skin, joining the blood that was already streaming down its chin from Arrapackxia's gaping jaw and mingling with it as the demon beckoned outwards with both arms.

The woman didn't reply after having sprung away, her agility in the physical world carried over into the Mind Realm as that was her mental representation of herself (luckily she wasn't turned into what her past self would have been manifested as because that would have made her unable to fight), aware that had Arrapackxia wanted to he could have curled his large hand around the blade and ripped it in half or disarmed her, although she might have been able to cause some damage due to the fact that this was her Mind Realm and conventional weaponry was much more than that within this somewhat familiar place.

She glowered back silently, not wanting to indulge the demon with any of her words and attempting to shut off as much of her mind as possible when the woman felt the tendrils of malignancy extending into her psyche, attempting to wedge open her mental defences so that the greater demon within her could manipulate the fear of her past self against the Ilentia of the present and use it as a weapon as one would use a sword.

Ilentia could not stop it from opening up some of the locked doors to her fractured past that she could not even unseal herself nor had any inclination to, as Arrapackxia resided within her psyche and his influence had spread deep within her being, souring whatever her soul now consisted off and corrupting her mind and body, and the image of the demon's ravenous visage and the corrupted cavern flickered, the memories of her Mind Realm when it had been inhabited by the cyclops she had also brought to heel and had been the place of Guena's greatest fears occasionally superimposed over the current one.

The demon rose to its full and impressive height that was smaller than others of its kind but larger than a significant number of them, the huge black wings that burst out of his back, showering demonic blood behind them in an expulsion of vile corruption that made Ilentia want to vomit, scraping against the top of the cave as he stared down his Summoner.

Shadows curled round his horns that reflected the dark majesty of his demonic power, a malevolent and tainted distortion of the stately and natural magnificence of other beings of impressive might, fingers of pure darkness reaching round and stroking the demon in their accursed caress. Ilentia felt the power levels of her greater demon rising exponentially, which she had expected – Arrapackxia, while it was a vile being which Ilentia wanted rid of as soon as possible when it outlived its usefulness even if she didn't see it as unholy, was certainly not foolish, and had saved its meal of the plentiful amount of souls harvested within the siege of the City of Pleasure so that it could be as strong as possible for when its Summoner inevitably confronted it to bring it in line and under her dominion once again.

The meat of humans and the substance of their souls within realms other than the one that Ilentia and the rest of her species lived within were apparently interchangeable, and her own greater demon required the former within the material world or the latter when within the strange realm of Sancturia or the Mind Realm of his Summoner to unlock his true potential.

While fighting her Summoning when he was weakened by not having the flesh of humans (whether it was physical or borne from their souls) to feast upon would have been much easier for Ilentia, the Welkalite was in fact somewhat glad that Arrapackxia would be at his full power for this upcoming battle between Summoner and Summoning – as not only would it allow her to establish her dominance over him and force him to submit to her will once again, it would also show her demon that even in his most powerful state he could not defeat her or disobey her orders like the being usually would within the material realm after having eaten. Arrapackxia had a clear tangent of only listening to her imperatives when necessary and when he was not strong enough to break out of her chains of the demonic bargain that connected them, and that was risking Ilentia's survival – so it was therefore something that had to be stopped.

She focussed some of her consciousness and the mental power that was contained within it back within her mind, wielding it in a way that she hadn't done in several years to attempt to leave the Mind Realm and return to the world of the awakened, but was not surprised to see that her passageway out of her anima was blocked off by an invasive and unnatural force. Ilentia had not expected to be able to retreat from this battle, flee from the seemingly physical manifestation of her mind and escape the demon's clutches, nor had she wanted to – as if she ignored this threat to her health in the form of her disobedient Summoner now it would prove to be detrimental in the long run.

No, this was something that she could not ignore, and if Ilentia was not strong enough to defeat her greater demon then she would not be powerful enough to survive within the world and forge her own path through it.

Arrapackxia laughed again, the noise saturated with unearthly amounts of inhuman malevolence that no being should ever have been filled with, although it was nothing compared to what the demon's Summoner had heard whilst she had fought within Usnaan and Tradax's foul and reckless plan had unfolded, a roar of much greater magnitude and maddening power than anything her own Sancturia being could ever muster up crashing across the entire battlefield and filling her with the sadistic bloodthirst which had been one of the few positive sensations within her since the day of her dark revival. He spat, the blood mixing with his acidic saliva that dissolved a hole in the rock that it landed up before congealing into a strange, scarlet substance that Ilentia had no intentions of touching, before his spiteful voice rang out, "Are you trying to flee from me, my dear? How cute. How utterly pathetic. Do you really think that you can escape from this realm, Ilentia? Your mind is mine now, and I will not let you leave until I have finished devouring your insignificant little soul!"
It raised a claw hand, the shadows coalescing more prevalently around it as Ilentia felt a tingling on her skin that it took her a moment to identify, although she was reasonably shocked when she discerned what it was – fear. Not any form of terror directed against the demon, as Ilentia was not scared of Arrapackxia in any way and knew that his psychological barbs would have no affect upon her, but her mental body's natural reaction to the emission of unreal Black mana – especially within the mind.

Even though the woman who would have been the Master of Gluttony had the Orders of Passion not been rent asunder by the unyielding hammer of the Lucaelian legions and devoured under the resistance of the Welkalites that capitalised upon their greatly weakened power was quite far removed from the standard definition of human, Ilentia still belonged to that race and the instinctual, base dread that the power of a greater demon sparked within her was something that could not be repressed no matter how hard she tried, although she refused to let it distract her or prevent her from being able to properly fight against Arrapackxia. No, she would wield her fear as a weapon, turn it into adrenaline even though both were not real within this realm of thought and emotion and use that to defeat the demon within her head.

"Enough with words. I will feast upon your soul, and there is nothing that a mortal can do to stop me!" the demon cried, irrespective of the fact that Ilentia had said a total of nothing since entering the cavern, the walls of the chamber making his voice echo as it blared out at the Summoner of the demon in question and surrounded her with a wall of malicious sound that battered at her mental defences and would have made her recoil in fear had she not been the Summoner of a greater demon. The darkness, collected into a ball that rippled with dark intent and grew wriggling spines of tenebrosity out of it, and the demon flung them at the woman. The shadows burst forth from where they had been collected together, rippling through the air as they lanced towards Ilentia, the woman flipping away from them and sweeping her sword round.

She tried to reach into herself, reach into the burning heart of who she was and fling the fire of her mind at the darkness that burst forth from her greater demon, but the corruption of the being of the abyss inside of her smothered the flames that were inside of her and prevented her from accessing the Red mana around her. This was the demon's realm, and the raging inferno that was a part of her being could not penetrate past the taint that saturated this foetid place. She had not expected to be able to use it without significant amounts of power being placed behind it, something that she did not have the time for with the greater demon bearing down on her, but it did not bode well at all for the outcome of this battle that she could not even utilise a modicum of her power.

The sharding bolts of darkness cut through the air, ripping into the walls behind where Ilentia had been stood and tearing chunks of contaminated rock out of them as she somersaulted to the side. She was fast, but not fast enough to avoid the tendrils of pure gloom that sliced into her right arm and ripped holes across her as they pierced her stomach.

Ilentia snarled in more anger than pain, pushing back the agony of the wounds that were exacerbated by their origin and forcing the injuries that were weeping black blood to close through sheer force of will – as what had been hurt was not her body, merely the representation of herself within the Mind Realm, and as such she knew that she could manipulate it at will and avoid some debilitating effects that would have crippled her back in the material plane.

She couldn't, however, elude death simply by focussing all of her mental might on not dying, and that meant she had to fight back against the greater demon that was already closing in on her, Arrapackxia's wings furled close to his body that was a dark perversion of sculptural proportions that would be held in high regard within some human cultures that venerated physical strength to augment his speed and ensure that they would not get in the way in the relatively claustrophobic confines of the central cavern even though the world warped and deformed around them as Arrapackxia's grip on the mind of the Summoner it was bound to solidified and strengthened.

Ilentia hissed in fury as her wounds were closed up, the fact that she had been able to regenerate the injuries inflicted upon her internal form doing nothing to lessen their excruciating pain despite the fact that she found it nowhere near as enfeebling as lesser humans would. She glared at her greater demon, her red eyes alight and suffused with her hatred of the being that had been bound to her in a time when she had not known what implications such an Infernal Contract would entail and had been loyal to Tradax since he had only just resurrected her, the hatred that she felt towards all those who would seek to impede her path to continued survival and the freedom to do whatever she chose to that was now directed at her own demon.

Ilentia grasped onto this loathing of hers, holding it tight within her mind so that she could focus it onto the demon that was quickly approaching her, the dark waters of blood that were in the cavern splashing across the walls and painting them red the few places that weren't already covered in viscera. She could feel the power swelling up inside of her, the dark magic coursing through her veins and filling it with the Black energy that tinted every stimulus with the familiar sting of the shadows that she had become accustomed to, and squeezed her hands tightly into fists as the shadows formed around them.

With a hiss of hatred, she blasted the mental power that she had charged up inside of her at the greater demon, her detestation manifesting as a tendril of shadow that burst out of the space in front of her and launched itself towards Arrapackxia. The demon grinned, and then laughed, its booming and baleful voice echoing across the caverns and making the entire cave shake with its power, the tenebrosity that was around Ilentia screaming in tandem with the roaring bellow of their master in a multitude of shadowy voices. Arrapackxia battered the lance of pure darkness away with the back of one monstrous hand, stalking forwards as he did so, his eyes suffused with hunger and amusement as the woman staring up at him repressed her shock at her attack having absolutely no effect.

"Oh, Ilentia my dear, did you really think that such a thing would harm me, the Archdemon of Greed?! Did you truly believe that your futile attack would have any affect on a creature borne of the darkness that you were wielding against me?! I will feast upon your soul, wench, and I will make you pay for taking me from my hunting grounds and forcing me to be your slave in battle!" the demon shrieked, his voice impossibly deep yet simultaneously extremely high pitched, the screaming tones amplified by the shadows around the woman who had held the position as Master of the Order of Gluttony, and launched forwards. Ilentia's retaliatory attack ripped a line of blackness across the demon's thick forearm as her sword drew its blood, but as her body twisted away from the greater demon its massive hand wrapped around her waist.

A wave of revulsion flooded through the woman's mind, Ilentia fighting the urge to throw up at the demon's foul touch as it wrenched her back, dragging her lithe form through the air as she angled herself in its grasp so that she could repeatedly stab at it with her sword, the blows infused with her hatred and anger as the demon squeezed her, attempting to snap the woman in half and crush the internal organs of her mental representation and slay her. Ilentia rained down violent attacks upon the hand that held her as she was quickly pulled through the air, inflicting numerous blows within the space of a few seconds as her blade was covered in a sheen of violent darkness that hearkened to the wounding of the demon and the administration of pain, the malicious force behind the partly desperate strikes ripping slices of darkness across the demon's sinewy pallid flesh.

However, it did not dissuade Arrapackxia, whose venomous claws stabbed into his Summoner's lower stomach and chest, slicing through the pale skin and with each agonising incision accentuated by the spiteful aura saturating the Mind Realm, drawing blood that spattered to the floor and covered everything in more of the sticky black liquid that was akin to ink and symbolised a form of corruption.

With a cry of pre hatred, the Welkalite woman rammed her sword into the thumb of the demon, the talon it was belonging to threatening to disembowel her by eviscerating her stomach as it tore through her clothes and crushed some of her bones to a fine powder that she could still regenerate within this realm of thought if she could focus enough on it. The demon shrieked in a mixture of pain, rapturous bliss, and its own form of malevolent loathing directed towards the woman it had been bound to and forced to serve, vindictively hurling its Summoner away from it and instantly launching an orb of concentrated darkness at her as she crashed into the wall.

Ilentia's mind was filled with pain, agonising, torturous pain that stung all of her senses and overwhelmed any other stimuli her body might have been exposed to at the time, and she heard some of her bones cracking as she was bodily flung into the bloody rock at the other side of the cavern, luckily managing to twist her body enough through the air so that she landed still facing her rebellious demon, although that meant that her back had smashed into the solid rock and she could have been paralysed even though her body was more resilient than a normal human's due to the dark vitality that had been instilled into it both by her unholy resurrection at the hands of her former commander the Master of Rapture and her Infernal Contract which had imbued her form with the ability to endure wounds that would have murdered most other members of her species without the type of mana allowing them to be durable in the face of attack and the fact that that was increased further due to the combat taking place within her own mind – giving Ilentia the ability to quickly recover from injuries she might not have been able to regenerate in the material world.

Nonetheless, she was still in extreme danger, and she saw the rough sphere of darkness that was a blot within the already gloomy cavern which approached her at a paradoxically seemingly ponderous but intensely fast rate just before it hit her. Her teeth gritted within the pain that she was already in, her blackened blood a concomitantly sour and sweet tang within her mouth (although she could easily ignore the foul taste as well as the connotations of it since for a start she didn't care and secondly she had far more pressing issues at the moment), Ilentia tried to drag herself away for a moment before her mind registered how much her body had been hurt and a burst of white hot pain around her lower back and stomach forced her to come to terms with the fact that for the moment she couldn't move, her legs and back in agony and twisted at a somewhat unnatural angle.

An emotion that took her a while to identify coursed through her mind, the adrenalized sheen of her body's reaction to its predicament slowing everything within her Mind Realm down yet speeding it up in the same instant, amplifying every sensation and this strange emotion that had suddenly sprung up within her and welled up in her head. It was panic, the first time she had felt anything close to that since she had been brought back to life by the Master of Rapture that had bound this dangerous and arrogant demon to her and forced it into her mind with the sacrifice of her former Summoning, and the sheer unfamiliarity of the sensation almost made her want to pause and consider it if she had been in any other situation.

She raised her hands, the sheer panic and the development of that into fear for her life distracting her as the shadows within her head capitalised upon it and exacerbated the hesitation within Ilentia and making it hard to do anything but what her instincts told her to, pulling up the pulsating darkness from around her – as this was her realm as much as it was her demon's and the Black energy within it belonged to them both – and attempting to form a shield of solid night around her form that would nullify the affects of Arrapackxia's magical assault. But Black mana had never been a particularly defensive tool even though it could be employed as one and had been done so by many over the thousands of years it had been available to humanity and the creatures that were borne of it within the other world, and within the demon's residence her intent to protect herself was warped and distorted by the malevolent power of the being inside of her, weakened significantly as the ravenous orb crashed into her downed form.

Ilentia's world exploded into darkness and pain, the teeth of the shadows that ripped into her and drained both her essence and blood impossibly painful as the release of gluttonous mana from the sphere that had surrounded her with tenebrous arcs of hunger incarnate fed upon her. She screamed, the pain too much to ignore and the agony that was suffusing her consciousness the worst thing that she had ever felt. Ilentia did not quite know what the dark energy that rippled around her and was quickly doing was factually doing to her, what sort of malevolent curses it would inflict upon her mental manifestation or what damage it would do, nor how fast it would kill her as it was already undoubtedly doing, although time had suddenly lost all meaning as the concept of it had been overwhelmed by the sheer torment that had become her entire being.

It was torment made manifest, but unlike some other pain that she had experienced in the past it was not exquisite, nor was there any semblance of a positive stimulus hidden within the agony as bite marks from unreal teeth rippled across her flesh, black blood spilling out of the tears in her pale skin before it was glutted upon by the tongues of shadow that lapped up at it and ran their tainted substance over her. The agony blossomed all around her, darker and brighter and stronger than she had ever felt in this new life of hers.

Everything faded away from her, ripped apart by the pain and slowly overridden by the sensation of pure agony, everything apart from the pure, unadulterated terror that had wrenched open her mind and had her screaming in a mixture of the utter horror at the thought of dying that she had never witnessed before despite knowing how much she prioritised her own survival and only wanted to live on within the world now that she had been given a second chance at life and the suffering that was rushing through her and amplified by every single bit from fanged maws of shadow that tore her flesh open. The adrenaline of her body combined with the fear as the darkness consumed her, forcing Ilentia to be unable to see anything. She didn't know what she would be doing, did not know how her body would be acting in this world of the mind, nor if she was making any sound or not, but too much of her advanced thought processes had dissolved under the torment for her to care any longer.

I refuse … the last remaining part of Ilentia's mind that had not yet been consumed by the trauma that had afflicted the rest of it thought as the darkness and the pain wrapped around her, blotting out her vision and the rest of her thoughts and experiences as it devoured sections of her consciousness and overwhelmed her senses with tenebrous energy.

I refuse... to give in … She thought again, the words spoken into a void empty of all but pitch black pain, and endless sea of undulating midnight that screamed in longing for whatever remained of her soul within the shell of her was all, it devoured all, the dark magic of her greater demon filling her mind and blinding her senses to anything but the fear and the pain that flooded throughout her form.

I refuse … to die … The words were a brief glimmer of light, a small spark of defiance within an abyss of ravenous intent and the hunger of beings too terrible for any mortal to comprehend, the hunger of the being that was locked inside of her which ached to sink its teeth into her soul and make a banquet out of her was tiny, imperceptibly small within the vast expanse of voracious blackness, but it was there, although it threatened to be crushed to nothing within any second.

I refuse … to give in to this ... It was a minute and obstinate source of fire, the refusal to give into her fate and let the death that she had refused to touch her ever since her time as Guena and her survival throughout the danger of both of her lives that had been strengthened into something tangible but ultimately desperate when she had been almost killed, her fire almost smothered, by the now dead Master of Rapture, before becoming intensely more selfish and focussed upon herself instead of Guena and the ones that she had cared about (which only amounted to her younger brother who could have died or survived for all that Ilentia cared) after she was brought back by the dark magic that she sensed Tradax had not understood properly at all.

I refuse … to let Arrapackxia get the better of me … The small spark of defiance within all of the pain was close to being extinguished as the endless waves of gloaming washed over it, quickly dying in the face of the overwhelming power as the demon's magic poured through her and his influence over her mind and soul was exerted, utilised to make Ilentia feel all of the pain and the fear that she should have done. And when it died, so too would the woman who had once been known as Guena and was now known as Ilentia, the defiance of death that had defined her ever since the day of her dark reincarnation and Arrapackxia's binding to her squeezed tight and gnawed upon until it dissipated into nothing at all and left Ilentia's soul ripe for the taking.

No … I will not let anyone stop me from living … I will not let anyone control me … I will not die … The flames withered within the darkness, unable to sustain themselves with no energy or passionate emotion to feast upon, languishing like a dying flower of incandescence, a rose that had lost its thorns and consigned to death in a realm of shadow and insatiable hunger that eroded its petals to dust as it fed upon them. No … no … NO!

The flames died, leaving only coldness in their wake. The flower wilted, petals turned to tiny particles of nothingness that were swallowed up by the endlessly insatiable darkness that feasted upon it. The defiance was snuffed out at the source.

NO!

The flame rose again, but this time it was no longer a flickering fire – it was part of the darkness itself, blazing up out of the ashes as the malevolent shadows wrapped around it, the fear combining with her need to survive instead of being opposing forces that had distracted one another when the first had originated. Her determination returned, mixing with the darkness truly this time, becoming one with the blighted canker which had been placed within her heart as she truly embraced the power that was inside of her. The demon had meant to crush her, feast upon her soul and her desire to keep living, but it had only made her stronger.

Ilentia's mind exploded into darkness and fire, the memories of her time before she had been turned into what she was now by the capricious whims of the Master of Rapture erupting in excruciating clarity within her head as the thousands of images of two lives combined flashed before her eyes and in her mind. She was Ilentia, and yet she now knew who Guena was, what she had done in the past, what her hopes and dreams had been and who she had loved and hated – but, more importantly, she now knew the last thoughts that had ran through the agonised mind of the gluttonous woman had once been, the last words of defiance against death that her psyche had spoken to herself that had allowed her to remain alive for much longer than expected and had infused her with defiance ever since.

She was Ilentia, and she did not care at all for Guena, for what Guena had thought and what Guena had done – she was as uninteresting and dull as any other nameless human was – as it was in the past and was was irrelevant to her current situation, but knowing what Guena knew now that she had smashed past the barriers in her head which had prevented her from accessing the memories even though they currently seemed like past events which had happened to someone else (which was in essence the truth of the situation) gave her more power and allowed to be no longer distracted by the fragmented slivers of the past that had blurred behind her eyes in this place of the mind.

The rose twisted as it grew from the corpse of what it had once been, thorns bursting once more out of its skin and dripping with Ilentia's venomous hatred of those who would try to stop her, resplendent in its new darkness that was the spawn of her fear that she had embraced instead of believing that it didn't exist, her fear that she was now brutally murdering and slaughtering inside of her so that she would be free of that, just as she would be free of the demon's magic now.

Sight returned to the Summoner of Arrapackxia, the intensification of the dark magic which had blocked out everything else removed and replaced by the omnipresent and tainted gloom which had pervaded the Mind Realm of Ilentia ever since it had been inhabited by the greater demon that was now attempting to end her so that it could free itself from the Infernal Contract and feast upon her soul in an endeavour to quench some of its limitless hunger for the souls and flesh of mortals. She rose to her feet, the pain radiating through her as her own form of darkness pushed the demon's away and ripped it to shreds, her flaming pyromancy that Ilentia had been able to access ever since she had passed her first Summoning trial combined with her new gift of Black mana and swirling around her in alternate ribbons of midnight and burning crimson. This was not new, as she had utilised both Red and Black mana in the same instance before, but it was more powerful than ever and the fire inside of her had managed to reach the demon's realm.

However, instead of reacting incredulously to this new development and hesitating, or even waiting for its magic to finish with its Summoner, Arrapackxia had already leapt forwards, his leathery wings stretched wide as he sprang towards the Welkalite who had shakily risen back to a standing position, forcing her wounds to be repaired as she pushed back the pain. Ilentia looked up, and then cried out as the demon smashed into her, evidently having begun the attack the second the spawn of the abyss had cast the spell which had forced Ilentia to battle through it. One of his hands ripped a brutal wound in her side, the other crashing into her upper chest, fracturing bones and almost entirely crushing her larynx to shards of dust as the space between the demon's thumb and forefinger pressed into the woman's throat and slamming her into the wall, making her cough up blood as she tried to fight back.

Ilentia was grateful that she had managed to keep a hold of her sword throughout her ordeal in enduring the demon's magic, her fingers having tightened around the handle to the point where blood had been drawn from them pressing into the crude material of the blade's hilt with such force. She fulminated her power into the weapon, the shadows that twisted and solidified around it able to augment the brutal cleaver sword and turning the metal black and poisonous as she ripped it across the demon's arm, inflicting more incisions as they both blasted dark power at each other. Arrapackxia spat curses in words of a language so vile and depraved it made Ilentia's ears bleed to hear it, attempting to crush his Summoner's throat and be done with the whole combat but restrained by tendrils of darkness that wrapped around huge digits on a pale hand and pulling it away from her neck as she spat blood at it.

"You dare to defy me, you foolish mortal scum?! You dare to think that you can command me, that I will willingly submit to you and be your slave?!" the demon shrieked, all semblance of humanity gone from its voice as it howled into Ilentia's face in words that she shouldn't have been able to understand, words that could never be uttered by a mortal tongue. The fighting between them was close and savage, an onslaught of blows and crude, formless magical attacks directed against one another with no thought for their surroundings or their own safety as they rained down blows on one another. Ilentia's black blade carved a bloody rent in the demon's left hand, ripping off two of the being's fingers that would regenerate further, as Arrapackxia pulled her back from the wall and slammed her into it again, snapping bones and rupturing organs as Ilentia was viciously man-handled.

Tendrils of shadow from two different points of origin but borne from the same wellspring of hatred danced in a brutal embrace of wriggling blackness as they tore at one another. There was no elegance, not skill in battle involved, only brutality and strength and the willingness to do anything to force the opposition to submit. Arrapackxia's venomous claws rammed through Ilentia's stomach again and again, her own sword ripping a line of darkness across the greater demon's through that fountained black ink over her as it did so, the corrosive blood of the spawn of the shadows melting her clothes and skin as it dissolved them like digestive juices would.

It was pure, unadulterated violence, liberated from any forms of strategy or pathetic codes of honour that would slow down others from other nations, and Ilentia could well empathise with those from the savage Order of Violence that revelled in the utter bloodshed between them. However, in a battle of sheer power and physical strength, there could only be one victor between them both.

The demon's claws sliced across her face as her sword stuck in its chest, the Black mana surrounding the cleaver blade and augmenting its destructive force unable to penetrate through the unnaturally fused bones of the demon that were in a different place to how a human's skeleton would have formed, jarring her wrist painfully and the blade bounced off of the bones and stuck fast within the greater lord of the darkness's rapidly regenerating skin. The talons ripped into her eyes, hacking across the red irises and tearing them out of their sockets in an explosion of unnatural and contaminated black blood (although it was nowhere near as corrupt as the demon's), the sight of the dim and dingy cavern replaced by pure darkness, although Ilentia was not concerned.

She could still sense the malevolent presence of the demon right in front of her, one hand having ripped into her face and the other holding her off of the ground with savage clams rammed through her stomach; her senses were far more attuned to the Mind Realm then they could ever be to the physical world – and even then they were augmented heavily by her demonic gifts. She could hear the demon's movements even as she perceived them in her magical sense, smell the rancid corruption of Arrapackxia underneath the sickly sweetness of the aroma that did nothing to conceal the rotten core of taint, feel its hot breath one her shoulders as time seemed to slow down. Her body was a fiery inferno of agonising pain, her ruptured stomach and her brutalised eye sockets screaming at her, but that was nothing compared to the anger and the hatred that was flooding through her, filling her near broken body with dark strength.

"Yes," she replied, her words spoken with an otherworldly resonance as the demon's hand shot back across the air, claws that were suffused with midnight poison aiming to ram into her head and end Ilentia once and for all, and the shifting shadows that filled the room which had previously been under the greater demon's sway repeated that defiant statement in a multitude of different tones and timbres that all carried the same loathing and unstoppable fury within it.

Ilentia let go of her sword, grasping onto the scarlet and black rose that burned with flames of blood inside of her. The rose's thorns cut into her mind, ripping into her soul and making it bleed, ramming its spines into her psyche and exacting a toll on her body as she mentally concentrated upon it, feeding it with her blood and life so that it could grow within her, the spark, the seed, of hatred and defiance at the heart of the flower swelling with the life force that she was trading away for more power and its nectar the dark strength to allow her to channel energies that she had never been able to access before.

"I will defy you, demonic beast! I will command you, for you are mine to command, and I will force you to submit to me and do whatever tasks I give you!" she shouted, blind but still gazing at the demon as her hand shot up, wreathed in bloody fire and crimson darkness, grabbing hold of Arrapackxia's massive hand which was missing two fingers and holding it back from slamming into her head. The demon's monumental, inhuman strength strained against her own, but power was blossoming inside of Ilentia, stronger than she had ever experienced before, and she could feel the talons of its other hand twisting within her stomach, ripping upwards through her organs and scraping against the bottom rung of her ribs, grazing at her spine as he attempted to kill her as fast as possible. Ilentia was stronger, and she could feel the unnatural fear seeping off of her demon as she grabbed its other wrist in her second, crushing it with the power of her grip as dark and furious energies cascaded through her and bled out of her wounds. She wrenched it out of her stomach, the wounds already beginning to repair themselves as control of the Mind Realm began to shift from Arrapackxia towards her, sensing that she had more power than the greater demon and aiding her because of it to avoid her displeasure.

"What-" the demon didn't even get chance to finish its incredulous and loathing filled demand before a wave of Red and Black mana in the form of bloody, scarlet flames burst out of Ilentia, searing the flesh of Arrapackxia and forcing the demon back as it was forcibly shoved across the room. The beast pulled its leathery wings in front of itself to defend it from the release of power, ravenous darkness forming up in front of it and saturating the air with as much defensive Black mana as the creature could muster up. Ilentia fell to the ground, her feet splashing as they crashed into the blood pooled beneath them on the floor of the cavern, and she felt her wounds regenerating as she held the rose of power inside of her tight, caring not for the fact that it cut into her and drank her essence as it did so because it gave her more strength, strength that she could use to bring her greater demon in line.

Her wounds were regenerating as she stepped forwards, the sanguinary darkness that was swirling around her reknitting her flesh, weaving the strands of sinew and flesh together again as one eye formed, then another, allowing her to glare at the demon who was prowling around the edges of the room, insatiable tenebrosity that snapped hungrily at the air gathering around Ilentia's Summoning as it prepared to fight back against her. Her sword was still stuck in its chest, the wounds resealed around it, but she cared not for a weapon that did not exist.

With a scream of rage and hatred, the demon launched itself at her, a gigantic blast of pure, unadulterated hunger crashing out of its outstretched hands that would bring ruin and death to the woman it was targeted at. A cry of her own on her bloody lips that streamed with black gore from the exacting power that she was wielding, Ilentia responded with her own screaming pillar of bloody flames, an inferno of rage and hatred meeting the demon's in an explosion of dark magic that had the entire cavern shaking and the inky, viscera-esque liquid evaporating into blackened steam and ash as Ilentia poured more and more power into the attack.

The flames overcame Arrapackxia's gluttonous scourge, wreathing the demon and immolating him as he screamed in pain and hatred, ear splitting shrieking noises that made Ilentia feel vindicated inside bringing a sense of satisfaction to the whole endeavour as she stepped forwards, feeling more alive than she ever had done in the past and with every sensation rendered so base and atavistic as to be sublime to her enhanced senses even though she knew that this feeling of power and strength would only last as long as she fuelled it with life and she would rather like to keep that in reserve until she fought in the material world against any potential enemies there. When the scathingly bright yet caliginous flames that had covered the demon dissipated, returning their energy to their master, Ilentia beheld the blackened ruin of Arrapackxia again.

His wings had been incinerated completely, turned to dust that sloughed away from him, and although they would be able to regenerate as most wounds inflicted within this Mind Realm were superficial it was a testament to the amount of power Ilentia had been able to use that she had burnt off the symbols of her demon's ascension after feasting upon mortal flesh or essence, forcing it back into its weaker form. A sheen of ash covered the demon's skin as it breathed heavily, panting and snarling as Ilentia approached it without fear.

Arrapackxia hissed at her, a wounded animal in all but name, and made to leap at her, but Ilentia was quick to react by reaching into the power that her Infernal Contract with such a being gave her to conjure up the chains she had used to restrain the demon before – although instead of being formed purely from solid shadow as they had been in the past this time they were composed of claret darkness ringed with bloody flames which burnt at the demon's skin as they wrapped around it. Arrapackxia thrashed, screaming vile curses and unknown words in defiance as it pulled at the chains around its neck and shoulders and legs before more wrapped around its arms and yanked them to its side.

"It seems that you were all bark and no bite, weren't you Arrapackxia?" Ilentia asked, no mirth whatsoever in her voice, unable to resist taunting the demon as it alternated between snarling promises of pain and howling in pain as she tightened the grip of her burning chains, the repugnant smell of raw and roasting flesh oozing from the greater demon as it thrashed. She walked towards it, flames and dark energy still wrapped around her hands and an aura of defiance was exuded by her as the demon automatically tried to reach up and harm her to protect itself. Ilentia tightened the grip of her flaming restraints upon the blighted beast within her mind, forcing it back into the ground and pressing its chest into its legs so that Arrapackxia was bowed in a gesture of unwilling supplication, although hunched over it was still nearly as tall as her.

The smell of burnt flesh would have once given her pause, or alternatively would have once made her mouth water in anticipation of a meal at the height of Guena's power, but now it only made Ilentia feel slightly satisfied that she was causing her greater demon actual pain – as it would make Arrapackxia more obedient in the future. She stepped forwards, utterly confident that there was no way the demon would be able to harm her now that her power was forcing it into submission, and drew her sword from where it was stuck fast within the demon's flesh – the metal of the blade instantly becoming bloody and molten when she touched it as her power conducted into it, allowing it to easily slide out of where it had been trapped within the demon's renewed body.

"You will not defy me any longer. You will obey me, Arrapackxia, for as long as I live. Your servitude is my right, and nothing you can do will allow you to break free of it," Ilentia snarled, grabbing hold of one distended horn and dragging Arrapackxia's monstrous head up with her free hand that was suffused with power and forcing the demon to stare defiantly into her eyes. The demon smirked at her, although the visage of contempt belied a greater hatred within the Summoning, though it knew better than to spit on her. She switched her grip on her blade, pouring power into it as she rammed it straight into the demon's forehead, drawing blood as she did so with the greater demon's writhing held still by her fiery and bloody chains that repressed the motions.

When Ilentia pulled back the blade, the ancient Welkalite symbol for enslavement was branded onto the being's forehead – and it would not fade, not even when Ilentia died and Arrapackxia would be able to feast on her soul. It was a permanent mark, a grave insult to her demon, but also an expression of her dominance over the Summoning within her mind. It growled at her, malevolent pits of eyes filled with the desire to kill Ilentia, and she couldn't help but smile maliciously and vindictively back at the demon. She would pay for that when her life came to an end, but then she had already traded her soul's journey to whatever afterlife might have been waiting for it for power in this world and so it would have already ended up in the demon's spiteful clutches. The brand would allow her to assert her might over her demon whenever she wished – and although Arrapackxia was subservient for now, as she released her chains and allowed the demon to freely move (though he elected to stay bowed) it was unrealistic to think that it would not try to betray her in the future given the chance.

Ilentia didn't care. It was what she had expected, what she would have done in the same position, and for now and for the foreseeable future she had power over her greater demon. She sheathed her sword at the scabbard on her waist, turning around and preparing to leave, when the demon's voice pierced into her back, "Just what did that fool Tradax create when he made you?"
Ilentia spun around angrily, preparing to question her resident demon on what it meant by that, before Arrapackxia's features twisted into a grin and it told her, "I wouldn't waste any more time here if I was you. There is danger in the material plane that I would preferably like to avoid, as I'm sure that you would too."

To any casual observer the demon would appear completely nonplussed by all that had happened, but to Ilentia it was obvious that he was suppressing his agony as well as his anger and rage that would be bubbling up inside of him so that he didn't give into the temptation to lash out and force his Summoner to respond to that.

Nodding, and not in the mood for questioning Arrapackxia on what he meant by these rather vague statements, Ilentia departed the Mind Realm, feeling the addictive rush of the power she had harnessed fading from her as she did so.