Ishtar weaved through the thick tree trunks of the forest, following the sounds of screaming. It wasn't too long before she came upon an interesting scene. An unknown cabin, possibly an abandoned hunting shack, sat nestled amongst trees and ivy. The door was swung wide open, and a young man was inside — obviously not a Shedim of the Dark.
The scarlet-haired woman lingered in the shadows, watching the scene unfold. She was only there to deal with the Okan; the family of Dark Shedim did not matter. Though, she was not going to make her presence known quite yet. Ishtar wanted to know what they were truly up to before she spilled their blood for the deity that blessed her bloodline. Something was interesting about the Soul-Devourer Okan before her — neither sported the shadowed-silver hair and eyes all Soul-Devourers were known for, and the pair were brothers. However, Ishtar could feel that they only shared one parent.
The young man standing at the doorway of the cabin breathed deeply through his nose, copper eyes hooded with ecstasy. One hand was tangled in his mixed faded-clay-and-dark-grey hair. The other young man, merely a teenager, stood outside the cabin. His bronze gaze darted back and forth between his brother and the Shedim of the Dark, silver-tipped fingers splayed wide.
For a moment, Ishtar didn't understand why the Shedim of the Dark were standing still until her eyes locked on the silver fingers of the younger Okan. Even though Meek heritage ran through his blood, just like his brother, seeing as neither possessed the silver eyes or hair of a pure-blooded Okan, he was still a terrifying race of soul manipulator. Ishtar's gaze drifted to the near-black shadowed-silver lines that adorned the older brother's chin and throat; it was obvious that the younger one was more terrifying.
The younger was a Soul-Threader — someone who could manipulate the threads of a soul. This meant they could easily sever the threads, killing someone in the blink of an eye, but they could also reattach the threads of a dying person. And that ability to sever soul threads was why the Dark Shedim were at a standstill. A Devourer had to be near, almost touching a person to do anything with a soul, and it could take them more than a few seconds to wrench a soul from a body. A Threader had a much longer range.
Even though the threat of the Soul-Threader Okan stood before them, an infant's cry stirred them into action. It was horrifyingly obvious whose soul the older Okan was after. The mother lurched forward from where she had been rooted in fear outside the cabin. Obscenities shrieked from her mouth as she lunged for the brown-haired teenager, claws of darkness shaped on her outstretched fingers.
The fear grew in those bronze eyes as the Soul-Threader Okan stepped back, his silver-tipped fingers twitching. Even to the eyes of the non-Okan, the slight silvery cyan glow of the soul strings were just visible in the darkness of the night. They flickered on the teenager's fingertips, dancing in the moonlight before he wrenched his hand back in fear, strings stretching taut. If someone could hear souls, there would have been an audible snap as the now loose soul strings shimmered and danced in the cool autumn air, no longer tethered.
The shadowed-cinnamon-haired mother collapsed with a gasp. Shaking hands clutched her chest as her mouth gasped for air. Her chest heaved, and her pale hands grasped at the Soul-Threader Okan, claws of darkness no longer adorning her fingertips. A strangled growl wretched its way from her throat as she pulled herself upwards, only for her world to fall away, and she tumbled back to the ground.
"Mahika! Mahika!" Her shadowed-azure-haired husband screamed. "Fuck! Mahika!" Those burnt-jade eyes locked with copper.
The teenaged Okan stumbled back, tears brimming in his eyes. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. She just— I'm sorry." He covered his face, a shuddering breath racking his shoulders as Mahika struggled on the ground. Voice muffled against his hands, he continued to speak. "I didn't snap all of them. I promise. It was only a few. Just a few."
"Edwin!" The older Okan brother snarled from where he stood in the cabin doorway. "Stop blubbering and focus."
"I'm sorry, Sarlic, I'm sorry. I can't do this anymore," Edwin whimpered, wiping tears from his face.
As he peered through his fingers, the woman he had brought down was on her feet again, breathing hard as pure rage burned in her goldenrod eyes. The darkness once more gathered around her fingers, lengthening into deadly claws. Slowly, she stumbled those last few steps towards Edwin, her senses swimming, chest aching as if a spear had been plunged through it, and limbs tingling. She lunged, but the lanky teenager was faster, and she fell to her hands and knees.
"Mahika!" Her blue-haired husband was beside her, hands resting on her shoulders. He pulled her into a sitting position but would not let her stand.
"Let me slaughter him, Fisher."
"No. He's just a kid himself. Look at how terrified he is." Fisher glanced up at Edwin, who had backed himself against the cabin, tears streaking his fair face.
"He's old enough to know that you shouldn't eat children's souls!" Mahika shrieked.
As the couple dealt with the Soul-Threader, the Soul-Devourer brother finally slipped into the cabin. The little girl who had followed Ishtar through the forest snuck closer to the cabin, her blade of darkness clutched tightly in her hand. However, she did not enter, her eyes darting between her parents and the cabin where the crying of infants filled the air.
A sharp curse sounded, and the brown-and-grey-haired Sarlic stumbled out of the cabin, holding a hand close to his chest. Scarlet blood dripped down his arm from a deep gash, a shard of a blade of darkness lodged in the wound. Strange black smoke wafted from the shard until it dissipated into thin air. Sarlic slumped against the doorway, blood continuing to drip down his arm as he waited for the darkness to disappear. When it was gone, he shakily pushed himself upright, his hand pressed to his head as he tried to focus on the task before him. The malaise of the Shedim's darkness wasn't quite gone.
A child younger than the blue-haired girl burst from the cabin, shrieking and brandishing another blade of darkness. "Get away from my little brother and sisters! You can't have them, soul-eater!"
"Fucking brat," Sarlic snarled, grabbing the girl by her shadowed-cinnamon hair and tossing her aside. For a fleeting second, he stared her down, licking his lips only for the infant's wail within the cabin to break his attention back to the much sweeter meal inside.
"No!" The girl scrambled to her feet, claws of darkness adorning her fingers.
Sarlic turned just as claws of darkness sliced deep into the back of his thigh. He howled in pain, slumping against the doorframe as the chilling malaise took over once more. Not only could Shedim of the Dark shape darkness into constructs, but because of their demonic nature, when those constructs made contact with flesh, a malaise like a bad flu settled upon the victim.
"Edwin! Help me, brother!"
The Soul-Threader looked between everyone gathered, mouth quivering as he gasped for words. His brother came first. He rushed at the little cinnamon-haired girl, those soul threads catching the moonlight as he tugged at them.
"Bastard!"
Fisher, the blue-haired father, plunged his blade of darkness into Edwin's lower back. He twisted and pulled the blade out, letting it vanish into the night as he reached to gather his daughter into his arms. Then a searing pain exploded from his chest, limbs tingling before his world went black.
"Fisher!" Mahika scrambled to her feet, driving her shoulder into the earth as she collapsed beside him, not recovered from the snapping of her soul strings. "Fisher! Oh, my gods! Fisher!" She pressed her ear to his chest and held a hand to his wrist.
His heart was still beating, and breath still whispered from his lungs.
"Daddy?" The cinnamon-haired girl whimpered, crawling closer to her father. She touched the blood leaking from his mouth and nose, her burnt-jade-green gaze slowly raising to meet Edwin's horrified bronze eyes. "What did you do to my daddy!"
She sprang to her feet only to be brought down by her older, blue-haired sister. "No. Aivi. You can't. Look at what he did to Daddy. You can't. He'll kill you. He's an Okan."
"Get off me, Nevoa! He hurt our dad, and he deserves to be hurt."
With the adults and troublesome child of the family handled, Sarlic limped back into the cabin, leaving a trail of blood. Nothing would deter him from that sweet, sweet flavor. As his footsteps on the cabin's wooden floor seemed to echo through the forest, there was a flash of darkness and a scream.
"Fucking brats! I'll kill you all!"
A dagger was slung outside the door, missing the little shadowed-azure-haired boy sprinting from it. Tears streamed down his face as he collided with his two older sisters and parents. He wailed, jumbled words spilling from his mouth.
Barely illuminated by the moonlight, Sarlic was slumped in the hallway, gaze unfocused, a massive shard of darkness stabbed through his abdomen. Other shards of darkness, most at least half the man's height, protruded from the floor in all directions, but all of their bases were at a center point. Blood gushed from his wounds and dripped from his mouth. Those bright orange copper eyes wavered in and out of focus until they locked on his younger teenage brother. "Edwin. Heal me."
"I…I don't know if I can, Sar." Edwin stumbled forward, face wet with tears as he collapsed in a pool of his brother's blood. "That's not…this isn't how threading works." But even as he spoke, Edwin raised his hands. Those silvery cyan threads danced in the moonlight, loose and free. Some stuck to his silver fingertips while others whispered past, too destroyed to be reconnected. Slowly, those loose threads that did attach tightened, thrumming with energy.
All the family of Dark Shedim could do was watch in horror.
Sarlic's wounds were still wide open, but blood no longer ran from them. He stood, ignoring the pain as he turned to the whimpers deeper within the cabin. He would finally have his meal. Aivi, the girl with the shadowed-cinnamon hair and second oldest, rushed forward with a blade of darkness. Edwin stood just outside the cabin, those silver fingers splayed, but Sarlic merely turned on her, baring his teeth that seemed to be sharper than before.
Aivi stopped in her tracks, angry tears glittering in her eyes. She hissed back at him, but her blade slowly lost shape.
"Why are you eating their souls?" A weak voice asked. "Soul-Devourer Okan don't need to eat souls to survive. I know that. And why children? You won't learn anything from them. Their lives have only just begun. They don't have many memories or great powers. …leave my children alone… Why my children?" Fisher pushed half his body off the ground, eyes still unfocused and arms trembling to hold his body weight.
"Because…" Sarlic licked his lips, copper eyes dancing with malice. "They are delectable. The sweetest things I've ever tasted." He hobbled forward, droplets of blood still dripping from his wounds as he moved. "They are untainted by the world and the horrors they will see and torments they will endure." He pointed to the three trembling children, each with a varying mix of hate and fear in their faces. "Their souls are already bittered, even the little boy. All that fear, all those terrible thoughts. Or the other girl's soul is already too spicy for my taste with her temper. Now…an infant's soul…so sweet, so succulent. It is everything."
The clay-brown-and-grey-haired man turned away. With a flick of his hand, he gestured for his brother to follow, Edwin already nervously digging into his packs. The whimpers and cries of children filled the air. All the family could do was tearfully listen; neither parent was in any state to stand, let alone fight. Aivi was the only one who stood, angry tears streaming down her face, but her siblings and parents kept her rooted to her spot.
And then, there was silence.
The brothers emerged from the cabin, Edwin holding two small jars close to his chest. Just visible to the non-Okan were flitting silvery-cyan lights of the children's souls that had been ripped from their bodies.
"Give my babies back! You bastards!" Mahika screeched. She stood but crumbled. Nonetheless, she slammed her hands to the ground, tendrils of darkness rising and wrapping around the Okan's legs, burrowing into their flesh. "Put their souls back!"
"No can do." Sarlic wrenched a leg from the darkness, seeming the least bothered by the darkness or the fresh blood dripping from his ankle. "I ripped these souls so hard out of your children's bodies that even my little brother wouldn't be able to reattach enough soul strings. All of them are too damaged to be sown back into their bodies."
"Fucking…" Mahika was on her feet again, one hand pressed to her chest, goldenrod eyes narrowed in pain. She stumbled forward, a blade of darkness gripped in her other hand, slowly growing in length and shade. Shadows wrapped around her, more and more, until her figure was concealed in the darkness of the night. A patch of black, darker than the night, ducked and weaved through the trees.
Sarlic bared his teeth, eyes trying to keep track of the woman shrouded in darkness. But he wasn't fast enough.
That blade of darkness was plunged deep into his lower back. Mahika then turned her blazing goldenrod gaze onto the teenager holding the jars containing her children's souls. With a screech, she lunged for him, hand grasping his shoulder even though he was a good head taller than her and plunging her blade deep. He screamed, nearly dropping the jars. Sarlic swooped in, seemingly unbothered by his bloody wound.
Sarlic didn't bother to deal with Mahika, who still had a blade in his brother's back. He slipped into the shadows of the night, copper eyes nearly glowing in the darkness as he watched and waited, the jars of faintly glowing souls held close to his chest.
Fisher was finally on his feet, watching as his wife mercilessly stabbed the teenager in the back, her face twisted with rage. He glanced at Sarlic in the shadows, the Okan licking his lips as he stared Fisher down. Cursing under his breath, Fisher hobbled forward, his blade of darkness taking shape in his hand. He could at least help his wife finish off one of them.
However, as Fisher ran for Edwin, his chest clenched, like a hand was holding his heart, and he skidded into the ground. He coughed and coughed, blood speckling the ground as the pain continued to grow. His vision turned dark as a silvery cyan light followed. He shot a look at Sarlic, a sly smile on the copper-eyed man's face. Cursing, his consciousness wavering, Fisher slammed a fist into the ground. He could only manage one, but that was all he needed.
A spear of darkness shot up from the ground, impaling Sarlic's foot. Sarlic cursed, that delight for his soon-to-be meal and mocking Fisher, turning into rage. Those eyes snapped to his teenage brother, who was still struggling with the hysterical woman. "Kill that bitch, Edwin! Kill her now!"
Fisher scrambled to his feet, squinting as his world tilted around him. He watched as Edwin lay flat on the ground, fingers twitching. Those silvery-cyan threads snapped tight, and Mahika gasped, hand clutched to her chest. The darkness around her dissipated as she stumbled back, choking on her breath.
"Even if I die for her…" Fisher mumbled under his breath, trying to keep himself steady as he hauled himself to his feet. "These evils need to be taken out of this world." He pushed himself forward, gathering the darkness around him into many needles.
Somehow, Edwin dodged all of them. And Fisher couldn't stop his forward momentum as he nearly slammed into the teenager. And the bad things kept happening. A strange glove on one of Edwin's hands extended as he instinctively pressed the middle of his palm. Cat claws slid across his knuckles. As Fisher tried to disentangle himself from the taller teenager, his face was met with four blades. The claws scored him deep across the face, Edwin's fist making contact and shoving Fisher off onto his side.
Blinded by his blood, Fisher sat up, body aching with pain and exhaustion. He couldn't fight anymore. He just couldn't. Weakly, he called for his wife and children. "Mahika, Nevoa, Aivi, Irving." Without a word, the three children gathered around him, his two daughters sending out wisps of darkness ready to be condensed at any needed second. Little Irving clung to his father, tears streaking his face as he shivered like a leaf in the wind.
"Mahika…" Fisher called again. "Mahika! That's enough…" his voice cracked, a tear escaping his good eye. "Just stop, Mahika. Please, stop. They've got our baby's souls. There's nothing else we can do. What if we do get their souls back? Then what? We can't bring them back. We're just going to get ourselves killed if we try to get their souls. Just…just stop Mahika before you get yourself killed! Think of your living children!"
But Mahika wasn't giving up. She twisted the blade deeper into Edwin's back. Edwin cried out in pain, those silvery cyan threads shimmering in the air as they grew taut once more. Then, he froze. Blood leaked from his nose, and dripped from his mouth. In disbelief, he touched where he felt the warm wetness, withdrawing his hand to see scarlet blood on his fingers.
"Her."
With a desperate thrash, he dislodged Mahika and streaked off into the forest.
The shadowed-cinnamon-haired woman landed on her back with a heavy thud, the air knocked from her lungs. She struggled and turned to the older Okan in the shadows. Sarlic grinned, the two jars of souls glowing in his grasp. He moved deeper into the shadows as she gave him a rage-filled hiss, but that grin never left his lips.
"Too late. Your children's souls will be devoured by sunrise." His copper eyes lifted away from her gaze, glinting as they met with something beyond the family. "And you will be dead before the sun rises, Shedim of the Dark." With those words, he vanished into the trees.
Mahika stared in horror as his form disappeared. The world around her crashed. She had not only lost her children but their souls, and their souls would be devoured. She would never see them again. The pain of all her wounds rushed to her, and she crumbled to the ground. Fisher was beside her, in a worse state than she. His face was marred with a four-clawed gash, blood still running down his face. Nonetheless, he helped her sit up as their three older children cautiously gathered around them.
"They…they took our children... Fisher, they took our babies." Mahika looked up at her husband, tears finally flowing. "We'll never see them again. Not even in the afterlife." She slumped against him, sobs racking her shoulders, a wail rising into the warm night air, filled with sorrow and rage.