Burning night
31th October, year 496, Eastern Ireland:
It was the night of Samhain. Those in the village that owned cattle had brought them back from the summer pastures and livestock was slaughtered for winter.
"Alright, time to set out this to the fairies."
As usual, Tiernan and Owen had come home to their birth village to celebrate important festivals in the Celtic calendar. They had done this since Cian first brought them to the Sanctuary, and Pope Darius refused to deny them this link to their origins since Cian himself had traveled back and though between Ireland and Greece throughout all his years as the Lyra Saint.
"Aren't great-uncle Cian here yet, brothers?"
Helping their now eight-year-old sister Brianna to set out offerings of food and drink to the fairies, Tiernan looked around. A shake on the head from Owen confirmed what he thought.
"No, but he is never this late to come here and celebrate Samhain with the whole family, I must admit. Sure, he is rather old by now, but he is still able to keep up with us most of the time…"
The twin brothers did actually share a nervous glare between them over the head of their sister. Had something happened to Cian on the way here, or had it been careless of them to hurry ahead home? He had taken a long time to give Pope Darius and Athena his rapport from the last mission after all, and wanting to come home before the ending days of October, the twins had chosen to travel to Ireland without him for the first time.
"The sun is not setting yet for an hour, he may still be here on time."
Offering to carry Brianna back on his back, Owen told her about how things was for them now as Gold Saints.
~X~X~X~X~X~X
In fact, Cian was doing a separate mission that was more important than celebrating Samhain right now, despite the fact that he had laid out the customary offerings of food and drinks to the fairies just to not offend them tonight.
"I was too careless in thinking that it was a pure coincidence that the village chief's daughter had the same name as the woman who serves Hades! Sure, he married a Christian woman whose family had roots to Greece though being Romans, but I did not think of a possible connection to the Emperor of the Underworld!"
Five years ago, Pandora had become old enough for marriage by Celtic customs and found herself married off to ensure a trade alliance between her home village and a larger village further inland. But this very summer, she had been caught with a lover, a young warrior serving her husband, and after murdering said husband, the warrior had escaped with Pandora, neither one having yet been caught for the murder.
"Without doubt, it must be the host of Wyvern Rhadamanthys that stole her away! While not well documented from previous Holy Wars, enough Saints in older generations have confirmed that those two seem to have a certain habit of always being close to each other, in a way that often speaks of a close bond!"
Mentally cursing, Cian kept playing on his lyre in the hope of acting like a bait for the Specters of Hades. He may be old, but if he could confirm that Hades would soon awaken, this very night was ideal. In Celtic myths, Samhain was a liminal or threshold festival, when the boundary between this world and the Otherworld thinned.
"Something is coming towards me!"
Preparing himself for battle at sensing several unfamiliar people with Cosmo coming closer, Cian took off his cloak that hid his Silver Cloth from view.
~X~X~X~X~X~X
By now, bonfires had been lit across the village to light up the dark autumn night.
"Is it me, or is our grandmother feeling offended over that great-uncle is not here yet?" Brianna wondered aloud, she did not have the same spiritual sense as her brothers, but she was pretty sure that she did sense the soul of the deceased woman in the house. During Samhain, the souls of dead kin would revisit their homes seeking hospitality, which was why they had made a place for her at the table.
"You are not wrong, sis. Grandma is not happy that he is so late," Tieneran confirmed as their mother laid up food in the bowls for the meal.
"Maybe we should see if we can find him, something could have happened due to his old age…"
Suddenly, there was the sound of a deafening explosion from the other side of the village, quickly followed by horrified screams.
"A attack!? On Samhain of all times?!"
Rushing over to the door and opening it, Owen realized that it was not normal enemies showing up.
"Tiernan, the Gemini Cloth! They are the servants of Hades!"
"What?! Here!?"
With Owen summoning the Gemini Cloth and hurried away to try defending the villagers, based on the fact that Tiernan's nearsightedness would hardly help in this situation, the older twin turned to face their family members.
"Mother! Father! Take Brianna and hurry down to the shore! If you escape in the fishing boat Father uses, you can get away from the attackers! I will try and act as a bait for them!"
"Do not be foolish, Tiernan! We have seen that you and your brother have become fine warriors under the care of Cian, but we refuse to let you be killed for our sake!" his father protested, even as his oldest surviving child started to drag him along to the door.
"Would you prefer that all five of us get killed, and Cian to find us among the villagers that could not escape?! Let the boys show that they are not children anymore, but youngsters on their way to become adult men!" his wife protested, already holding the terrified Brianna in one hand.
"Hurry!"
But they did not get far, before a group of Specters blocked the path down to the beach where the boat would be drawn up on land.
"Tiernan, watch out!"
While the Irish twins were the youngest Gold Saints of their generation, it did not mean that they were the weakest ones in terms of power.
"A Saint of Athena …?!"
"A Gold Saint!"
Killing some low-ranking Specters with a Galaxian Explosion was no problem for Owen, though he was not foolish enough to think that he could deal with them all on his own.
"Not good, they are too many for me to handle alone!"
Still, he could feel the Cosmo of his older brother come closer, and that gave him some hope in not being killed.
"What are you fools doing? Kill that Gemini Saint at once so there is one less Saint of Athena for you to deal with!" a feminine voice ordered, and despite it sounding slightly different due to the passing of seven years as well that the twins had avoided the main part of the village on their precious visits home, Owen knew that it could only be Pandora.
"You really have not changed much over the past eight years, have you, Pandora?" he asked, openly showing a face of dislike when his former childhood bully came out among some of the burning houses. She may be an adult woman now, but that sneer on her face when spotting him had not changed. Basically confirming what Cian had told his twin great-nephews:
"Just because a childhood bully may grow up to become a stunningly beautiful woman or a very handsome man, does not mean that they are safe choices for romance. In fact, they may trap their former bullying victims in an abusive relationship, if the victims allow themselves to be naive about them "changing their ways" by pulling on a false act and pretend to be the very opposite of what they could be in childhood."
"And you have not changed that poor respect towards me either, you damn fisherman brat!"
Really, Owen wondered for himself as he ducked for two separate attacks and responded to these, who was the immature one here?
"Pandora, stop acting like a child and let the Specters take that of that Gold Saint," a chilling voice ordered, and a youth stepped forwards, his hair black as the darkest of winter nights and his eyes blank as if he was being possessed by something.
The host of Hades.
"Damn…this is bad!" Owen realized, understanding that he was overmanned here and besides, Athena would need to know.
"Get out of my way, creatures of death!" A voice called out as a Galaxian Explosion cleaned the area of enemies around Owen, and Tiernan showed up next to his twin with a shell-shocked Brianna in his arms, both being dripping wet with sea water yet also having blood on their clothing.
"What…did you not help Father and Mother to…" Owen started in alarm, but stopped at seeing his brother openly crying in anger.
"Father's boat was spotted by Griffin Minos and his men when the houses at the outer edge of the village caught fire too."
Tiernan did not need to mention what had happened. That he held so tightly to Brianna in his arms as she was visibly trembling in her whole body from horror while silently crying and the blooded clothing, was enough details.
"Both the Gemini twins here?" Hades spoke as if he felt amused by the sight in front of him, "Perfect, your heads will be a nice gift for that Goddess you are serving!"
But there was a sound of music being played among all the screams from the yet alive villagers, from a lyre, and it was holding the Specters in one place, unable to move for now.
"BOYS! WHAT ARE YOU TWO DOING HERE WITH YOUR SISTER TO WITNESS THIS BLOODBATH!? GET BACK TO THE SANCTUARY AT ONCE AND TELL ATHENA THAT THE HOLY WAR HAS STARTED THIS VERY NIGHT!"
Everyone looked towards the entrance of the village, where Lyra Cian was standing against a tree for support, gasping for breath and looking half-death with all the visible blood on his mostly broken Silver Cloth. But his hand kept playing on his almost broken lyre, trying to protect the three grandchildren of his sister, the only family members still alive.
"What do you think we were just planning to do, old man!? That we are so irresponsible that we do not realize when it is better to withdraw for a later battle?" Owen responded, creating a dimension behind him and Tiernan hurrying inside with him after.
"Do not let them escape!"
But the twins were not going to let Cian face death without a few lesser opponents at least.
"GALAXIAN EXPLOSION!"
For the first time in five hundred years, because the Holy War in year 4 BC had been having both the Gemini twins alive and fighting together for Athenan, because the "Curse of Gemini" had not been placed on the expected wearers of the Gemini Cloth until the following Holy War 250 years later, the Specters of Hades got a taste of the united force of both the older and younger Gemini twins fighting side by side. Not only was their united power enough to powderize the burning village and a part of the forest around, but the three Judges and Twin Gods had to act quickly with protecting the host of Hades before the boy was hurt.
"Well done with protecting your sister…my great-nephews," Cian smiled, before facing the remaining Specters.
"I may join my men in the afterlife soon enough, but I will not beg for mercy with my final breath!"
Steadying himself for his final stand, to die like the Saint he had been for most of his life, Cian showed no fear as Wyvern Rhadamanthus flew towards him.
~X~X~X~X~X~X
Sanctuary, near the statue of Athena:
Athena and Darius could feel that something was not right tonight.
"Hades have awoken. It can not be any other reason for this strange feeling of dread we all feel," the Virgo Saint, named Ishir, commented as he too looked up at the night sky.
"Yes," Darius confirmed with an unhappy frown around his mouth, recalling events from 250 years ago, "it was the same feeling back then."
"I hope that Cian and the others are not running straight into the Specters. Or that they are anywhere near the birth village of Tiernan and Owen…" Athena whispered, feeling anxious at the mere thought. She did not see any of the Gemini twins in a more romantic scene, they were simply close friends of hers because they were roughly the same age and she knew of the "Curse of Gemini". If the awakening of Hades awoke the curse….
"The other dimension used by the Gemini Saint!"
It was not only the twins showing up with clear signs of having been in battle, but Tiernan was carrying a younger girl who looked so alike that there was no doubt that they must be siblings born from the same set of parents.
"Tiernan! Owen!"
Both were coughing from inhaling smoke, and there was a haunted look in their grey eyes that revealed that something horrible had happened.
"...Cian was right in that Pandora was that older girl from your home village?" Darius asked with dread, and they nodded without any words, only hugging Brianna closer to help her calm down by the physical contact from her brothers.
"I am sorry for what you had to witness. That girl, she is your younger sister that was born the same autumn as you came here?"
Another mute nod. And now both the twins was crying, fully realizing that they would be unable to give their murdered parents a proper burial after this horrible attack on their home village.
"Ishir, help them back to the Gemini Temple. Tell the servants that they have my permission to let their sister stay with them. I am not going to separate a traumatized child from the only familiar faces in this unknown place with strangers."
"Yes, Your Holiness."
Ishir even offered his cloak to Tiernan to wrap up his sister in, so Brianna would not be cold from the night air as the three Gold Saints left for the long walk long the stairs between the Twelve Temples.
"Thank you for your long service for the Sanctuary long before I was born, Cian," Athena spoke with tears in her eyes as the broken and blood-spattered Lyra Cloth showed up in front of her, a clear sign that Cian had been killed, "We will take care of your younger relatives, from now on."
Darius said nothing, but he too was crying, knowing the feeling of when a Saint died in battle. And there was another reason for his tears:
"Lydia, Elena. I will do my best to prevent those Irish twin brothers, your successors in this era, from being separated by death like you two were."
He had failed to prevent Lydia's murder so many years ago, and as a personal punishment for that failure as their Master, having to witness how broken Elena ended up afterwards. If he could prevent the same happening to Tiernan and Owen, if only for a short time, then it would feel like he was lessening that burden of guilt related with the Greek sisters he had freed from a life in slavery.
~X~X~X~X~X~X
Author note: Ishir is a Indian male name that not only means "powerful" and "strong," but also connects to the idea of fire and is even associated with Agni, the Indian god of fire.