p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Chapter 141: /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Time in the Otherworld worked differently. It flowed less like a river towards the sea and much more like the drowning machine which churns in on itself over a low-head dam, and thus it was only midafternoon when Orotrushit stepped from the underground. A million different pathways stretched before him. A million different possibilities. Many of them led to the same places. All of them he ignored. He was agitated. Heading towards the futility which stretched wide before him; his path the line which crosses a bottomless gorge. There was no turning back now. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The lightning dragon slayer, emLaxus /em– even thinking it made venomous distaste snap at his insides – was the worst kind of bleeding heart. Self-sacrifice, throwing his life down for his lover… it emoozed /emwith pretentious selflessness. Watch the wretch fling himself into the sea after the murder of Gajeel, unable to live without his emone true love/em. It was sickening. What had love ever done but display death's grace and power and, yes, even his beauty? Perhaps time speeds for her. But even with love walking beside him throughout eternity, death always comes alone in the end./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Poor, poor little man trapped in a cage. He was too shortsighted to realize how beneficial letting the High Priest die would have been. Or perhaps he knew and chose mercy despite it. Did he not know that mercy in times like these meant doom?/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Oh, how he emhated /emmen like that. Men who had never been forced to make a hard decision and so chose mercy because it was the right thing, the emgood /emthing to do. It was so common in wizards, this delusional chivalry. They built a world to serve themselves. Even the villains refrained from taking life most of the time. They pit power against power, decide the victor. What does an honor code get you when a god calls for blood? Nothing except the weight of guilt that grows with each life taken. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Unfortunately for Laxus, Orotrushit had killed the part of him that cared years ago in a tiny chamber with blue fire that turned gold and a knife that cut out the still beating heart of his childhood friend. The first time he had ever tasted blood. The first born coming to his own, as he was supposed to. emThat /emwas a hard decision. And every decision after that. Taking his own eye. Watching his mother leave for the Golden Chamber. Not saving his little brother from what he knew was quick to follow. And, yes, even drawing Father's attention from a emvery /emimportant ritual when that same little brother was supposed to take his own final Rite.../spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"em...why had he done that? He hardly remembered why. That was against Father, against their goals.../em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"It didn't matter. Sometimes Orotrushit got mixed up in his own scheming and who could blame him? There were so many. But it would all be fixed soon, yes. Every sacrifice, emevery /emsordid plot would be worth it soon./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He climbed the staircases in the Temple of the Sun, his breath whisking in and out, in and out, like a scared animal. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"This wasn't the first time he'd lost Father's favor. He knew emexactly /emwhat awaited him when he drew back the curtain and strode into the his chambers. The demon stood there before the relief, his bottomless blue eyes swinging wildly towards him and landing on him like a starved man coming face to face with a wasted meal. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Marinus..." Orotrushit hissed, "You are not allowed here." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Oh, but I am..." he hummed, grinning. Demons did not have a glamour, but still Marinus was scarily good at hiding his true nature. His power rippled around him, diffusing a foreign chill into the room. A crazed sycophant, his voice trembled with emotion, "Father has gifted me, emme!/em A vision! A vision of dark water...!" /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit straightened his spine, drawing his strength from his core, "You're mad." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emNot that he had room to talk. /em/spanspan class="normaltextrun"Quiet./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""I am emanointed/em," Marinus beamed, sweeping his hands out in a grand gesture. He paused, sucking in a calming breath. Chilly humidity swelled to the point Orotrushit found it difficult to breathe, "You, my dear priest, are not." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Water burst forth. Tendrils of it leapt for him but he was swift and the demon was out of practice, emand yes/em, weak. Orotrushit's eye opened and every possibility flooded his mind. He had taken the Rite of Healing. The bones of the man, the tendons and muscles and sinews were a map he could read. Every ache and pain the elderly demon had that kept him up at night, revealed themselves. Orotrushit crossed the distance. A violet brand which burned against pale skin from an ancient wound called out to him. The mark of the fire demon was still burning hundreds of years after it had caused fatality, and now it suffered a mystical touch which called it back to its height of suffering. Marinus shrieked and fell back onto the ground. Water coalesced around them both as Orotrushit reared back his head. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The Temple of the Sun was not blessed by Father. It was blessed by the Sun. And so he didn't emneed /emFather to call the living power which burned deep in the stones of the pyramid. He didn't emneed /emFather to drive the screaming breath from the depths of the caldera beneath the temple to come surging up and scatter the demon's spell. He didn't emneed Father /emto defeat Marinus half-drunk on power he didn't understand and certainly couldn't control. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit gripped the pastor by his shirt and lifted him up into the light of the sun which came in between the slots carved into the stone. The sun which hit the relief of the Rebirth of the Aurincarae and made it glitter like a jewel on fire. Marinus winced, shrinking back like a fish to deeper water. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Do not forget who dragged you from the ashes of your father, emMarinus/em," Orotrushit hissed, "I will put you back, if I must." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He dropped him. Marinus cried out from pain, holding his wound and shivering, "You... y-y-you don't have... his blessing..."/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Not the first time. It will be returned shortly, once Father hears the offering that is in store," Orotrushit replied coldly, staring down at the demon with the full weight of his Sight, "A new body should sway Its favor, I should think. And if not? A sacrifice for my brother's transformation surely will." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Marinus clenched his jaw, a look of bald hatred on his face as he glared up at Orotrushit, "You lie." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""I do not," Orotrushit grinned, a surge of satisfaction coiling in his chest to see the demon brought so low, "What exactly have emyou /emdone with your high honor, Marinus? Nothing?" /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""I will make an army," he growled as his eyes glowed with intensity, a deep cobalt which made his already pale face appear dead-white. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit cocked his head to the side, feigning interest, "Will?" /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Marinus's hair whipped back from his face. His perfect styling parted to reveal the horns he always kept so carefully hidden. If looks could kill, Orotrushit would be dead... though Marinus certainly wouldn't have been the first to try it, and not half as justified. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Don't tell me you need... help?" Orotrushit crouched down. He smirked, reaching forward and getting a thrill from the way Marinus flinched as he patted his cheek once, twice, "Keep your dirty demon hands out of my consecrated river." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He let his fingers draw down the line of Marinus's jaw, his claws threatening the soft flesh beneath as he tilted the demon's chin up. Oh, how much strength it took not to puncture skin and draw blood. The angle forced Marinus to glare down his nose to keep Orotrushit's eye, but he dare not make a move. Even devoid of Father, Orotrushit was still far too powerful to be killed in his own temple. The High Priest knew his sacred home well, and knew the demon had been rightfully put in his place. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit was a good High Priest. Excellent, even. And extremely thorough./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Now that we have an understanding," Orotrushit grinned, "I have work to attend to." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He left the demon where he lay. He knew the path Marinus would take to leave, how he would skulk and smolder but put on a congenial face for the wizards who were already beginning to gather in the void beneath the Temple of the Sun. Marinus's hatred grew with each thwarting of his grasp for more power, but without the power to bring the High Priest down, he could make no more moves. Knowing this, Orotrushit closed his eye to him and opened it towards the future. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"People avoided him, looking through him or hiding from his approach. Orotrushit preferred it this way, emyes/em, this ostracism. It gave him time to think, to emsee/em. This was where he spent most of his time, his mind palace, his web which he had expertly weaved over these short thirty-eight years of his life. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"When the last of the council went into meditation seeking Oros, and of course finding the god quiet, they had left nothing. There were no successors. No structure. None to take their place or maintain order. They couldn't even turn to the heads of the three houses, broken as they were. The Yaoyo's Master had been killed by his own bastard child, the Qaholom's Master had taken her tribe deep into the underground caves and refused to return, the Master of the Yohual was part of the council and blinded by golden eyes, slowly wasting away, staring into an endless eternity for something that had abandoned them long ago. And just when things couldn't possibly get worse, Orthinos, emDavian/em, The Favorite Son of the Aurincarae had gone. So that left only Orotrushit to gather the crumbling remains of his people. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emHe /em/spanspan class="normaltextrun"had built them back to glory, practically brick by brick. Him, the motherless bastard son of the Aurincarae who wasn't even a fullblood, took control where others shrank back. It was Orotrushit who first suggested Rhuntak take the House, and then Orotrushit brought forth the idea of strengthening ties with the other nations around them. Perhaps the work was beneath them but it brought trade, emresources/em. Soon, there was gold and jade, there was food other than fish and scavenged fruits. They relearned cultivation, restored the Temples. He had been on hands and knees digging ash and broken pottery from the tunnels leading to the tops of the temples himself, reconsecrating ground, spilling his own blood, recreating each broken circle, each blemished relief. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He'd spearheaded the need for a market. It was the good reputation the protection of Rhuntak and his House had yielded them and the beauty of the restoration which made them a trading hub. More nations joined by the season. The Temple of the Sun and the Moon, such fabled deities, still garnered worship and respect. Pilgrimages which had gone untrodden for millennia started anew. And then finally, after long last, Orotrushit hung the curtains, found the stone altars, and it was under emhis /emdirection that they began feeding the gods once again. Accepting tribute. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"And it was all thanks to emhim/em.../spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"...and Father's guidance. Father guided his hand. Yes. He held no personal claim to anything. But he worked emhard/em. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Yes... Father had been the one to drive him, to empush /emhim to ascend higher and higher. It was his duty as the eldest son, chosen for the Rites, to shoulder the burdens of their future. Why else would he see the future but to mold it to best fit their shapes? To emreclaim /emwhat wizards had stolen from them. Orotrushit was different from them, he was embetter/em, and he would take back what belonged truly to him and his people! It was justice. It was righteousness. It was emwar/em. And he needed people who believed in his vision to accomplish it all. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"But the influx of empeople /emhad awoken Orotrushit to a fact which began as a whisper and blossomed to and undeniable scream. He wasn't like them. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He was used to the berth given to him by members of his own kind but it was when he'd first endeavored to build the hospital that the divide between him and emthem /embecame insurmountable. He had been striking his ears, his tongue, his wrists for years so what was pain to him? He'd watched his mother march to her death, driven his brother away for reasons he didn't remember, and resided in his solitude and the soothing call of Father from the darkness and now he felt everyone around him danced in colored flames while he stood a pillar of ash. He couldn't feel... and the only person who offered him solace from this knowledge was Father. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"It whispered to him, softly, kindly. Why fear the pain? Why grieve the dead? Why rejoice in the miracle? He had witnessed it all already. This perpetual string of inevitabilities woven through time offered him emnothing/em. It was an echo chamber. Reality was a blanket of slate grey. He felt like the walking dead but Father emunderstood/em./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit found excitement in leaning into Its grooming, in keeping Father's favor. If he grew the flock, if he was a good High Priest, if he met every failure his brother had left behind then all Father would need was him. Just him. No one else. Yes, that's what he wanted. What had to happen. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emDon't need anyone else/em/spanspan class="normaltextrun". emIt can't need anyone else or else-/em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit understood It, you see. The closer and closer they became the more it was clear. They were the same, both seeing the eons stretching before them with all its lackluster potential until blood was spilt and then suddenly there was emcolor./em Father emloved /emthe color. Just a moment to live vicariously... what was the harm? Just a moment... a moment longer... The red. emOh, the red/em. And he craved m-more, but not emtoo /emmuch because it belonged to Father. The red belonged to Father. He had no real claim on anything, it was all for emFather/em despite how much he emcraved the feeling especially when It was close to him-/em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The first murder is always the hardest. That's the one that haunts, that stares at you when you sleep. The second one is easier. The first five are harder than the first ten. Suddenly, he was making sacrifice every month. emEvery full moon/em. He would carve out the heart and roll the body down the steps and pray. There was celebration that the old ways had returned, that the gods were turning their gaze back on those that had been left behind, that like the phoenix they would rise again and… and…/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"em…and that is right. This was their land, their kingdom. Grow it. Cultivate it. Sow the seeds for a large harvest, yes. Soon, soon, the reaper will come with his scythe to-/em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit snapped back to reality. An acolyte brushed him. The boy, barely old enough to stand at his heels, looked terrified as he garnered Orotrushit's attention. How long had he been standing there in the stairwell? In the emdark/em. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""H-High Priest…" he squeaked pathetically, and bowed, "Y-you asked me to…"/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Do not touch me," Orotrushit replied stoically, "I'll lash out." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The boy bowed again and then scurried away, desperate to put distance between them. Even when he was gentle, they still ran. Such his reputation had become. Few didn't anymore, relegated to those who practiced and were also monstrous in their own ways. Three hundred years without the touch of the gods does that. People forget how horrible they are. What is the trifles of mortals to those who breathe the world into existence? He also never stepped around an ant in his path. In fact, he had grown to quite enjoy the pop beneath his feet. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He resumed his path, shaken. It was the wizard who had done this to him. All that talk of emfree will/em and emseparating from Father /emhad made him nervous. He emcouldn't /embe separated from Father. Not for long. It was... bad. Though, he couldn't quite remember why.../spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit shook the feeling from him. The Temple of the Sun was a safe place, far from the reaches of wizards and their mawkish chivalry and their magic which only destroyed. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"It wasn't that he emneeded /emFather's favor. He enjoyed it. Yes, that was it. He basked in the pride and joy that radiated from his father whenever he had accomplished some task set before him. The apathy Orotrushit felt for everyone around him was useful, preferred. It kept him from questioning, from feeling guilt, from being distracted from chasing Father's heart. And none of it was without reward. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He learned new rituals, filled his own Grimoire. Never mind that others began using his name less and less, that he was being called emThe Hungry One/em, because his true name became synonymous with summoning death himself. Each life he took meant Father grew stronger and in turn so did he. And power means freedom. Freedom from loneliness, from fear, from pain, from being the next to die./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"There was a time he thought Father could be satisfied. That one day Orotrushit would murder a witless fool deep in the underground where none could see, and the beast which craved and howled for blood would finally quiet. But It didn't, and now he knew It never would. It just wanted more. More blood. More pain. It wasn't enough to just kill, to just consume, now it needed to be drawn out, to emlast. /emLet It savor the taste more, longer… /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The more gruesome the death, the more pain he could inflict, the more Father purred with excitement. It ate with abandon and instructed him to hurt more until the hours blurred together. He began craving the blood, the screams. Reveling in the many ways he could tear someone apart. Each noise was a new and exciting color, each way the body reacted a spiritual experience drawing a strange passion, an enthrall from a place he thought was dead. He'd awake as if from a stupor, when the person strapped to the table was long dead and the blood was turning from hot to warm to tepid./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Perhaps it was the fifth one dead in that way that made him realize this wasn't ritual. No. This was just murder. And once you've killed so many, what does one more matter? He was above them all. He was Father's son. emThe Hungry One/em. And he felt starved. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He hated himself. He hated that he was becoming his Father. He emhated /emthat lucidity fled him so often... stealing long stretches of his time. emThe memories are fading. You are lucid now/em. strongQuiet/strong. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He had become so caught up in chasing Father's fleeting favor, so jealous that the obvious escaped him. The thing that had stared him in his face since that fateful day his mother had walked to the Golden Chamber. He would never be enough. Father wanted the Favorite Son to return. Orthinos. emDavian/em. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"But Orotrushit was the oldest. He was the High Priest. emHe /emhad built back the temples, had brought them prosperity. Orotrushit was healing the sick. Seeing the future. Leading the flock. emHe /emwas prophet, pastor, and priest! He shouldered every burdened given to him. Exceeded expectations. emHe /emhad done it all! The Yohual were learning ritual again, teaching their sons to aid in the priesthood and their daughters to become seers. The Yaoyo had structure. They guarded their people once again, regaining their lost pride. Even the Qaholom had broken their silence! The daughter of the elderly matriarch, now blind, had appeared for the latest addressing of order. It was all thanks to emhim/em. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"But Orotrushit wasn't what Father wanted. He never had been. emWeak in body./em Too much like his mother, proved the day Orthinos strongemDavian /em/stronghad first opened his eyes to reveal Father's gold. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emYou need to do something. /em/spanspan class="normaltextrun"A quiet voice whispered, foreign and strange but… but familiar. emYou're awake. Do something./em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Do what? What needed doing? He'd already done emeverything/em./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit stumbled into the Temple. He was confused and agitated. One of the young acolytes scurried from his sight as he approached, nearly diving for the steps to stay from his way. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"There was nothing that needed emdoing/em. Unless... perhaps a sacrifice? Did he need to feed Father? Or... no... wait... emhe needed to do something.../em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He had brought the place to rights since his fight with the dragon slayers, so that wasn't it. Sunlight streamed in through the parted curtains. There was incense burning. Did he need cleansed? It was... it was in the back room, wasn't it? /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He slammed his knife to the counter and marched back towards the where the relics were kept, those that he had been able to gather over the years. Amongst them, sacred feathers, dust-covered amulets, rings, the bones of ancestors. He was reaching for his regalia when the sharp shimmer of darkness caught his attention./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"A scrying mirror. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He saw himself inside of it, the inky likeness of himself staring suspiciously at him. He looked like a shadow. He had lost weight. The hunger had been almost constant now, maddening. It wasn't usually like that. It usually came in waves, or phases, like the moon, increasing with intensity until it ebbed away and he became... lucid. The last life he had taken had been the small wizard, the one he'd flayed alive. It had been a disappointment. The colors of screams not as satisfactory. Something inside of him... had changed. It had changed though he didn't know why. He had thought that perhaps it was because Father's gaze had shifted but, no, that couldn't be. They were nearly intertwined now. Father's will was emhis /emwill. He was God's Hunger. He was the emdrive, /emthe emdirection. /emBut despite the craving, he found blood didn't satisfy. It made the craving emworse/em./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emYou don't want Orthinos to have what you've built. You know the truth./em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun" He clenched his jaw. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emYou've been keeping secrets./em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"No-no, he kept emno /emsecrets because he emneeded /emFather's favor. Above all else, keep Father's gaze. He had to. Or else… or else…/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emYou've been keeping secrets. /em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He pretended he didn't hear it. He knelt down before the obsidian surface, dashing away a nervous twinge in the base of his stomach. He felt compelled, like he didn't have a choice. Something tugged there at the base of his heart, telling him he needed to do this. That it was emimportant./em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Show me..." he hesitated. He didn't have Father's favor. Its eyes would be far from him now, but still he whispered his request, "Show me... the High Priestess." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The surface muddied and then clouded. The longer he stared, the more he began to glimpse a figure. First a shadow, a silhouette, and then the shock of scarlet hair. Four forms moved near her, their faces blurred because of his lack of focus though he could tell easily they were children. He knew intrinsically that the eldest son was sixteen, his sister was twelve, the other boy was just nine, and the last was a girl of seven. All of them had dark hair and skin, looking near nothing like their mother except the littlest whose hair shimmered auburn in the desert sun. A cupid's bow here, a button nose on one of the girls, her lithe bone structure in the eldest boy, but all in all they all had his high cheeks, and his eyes, and blue scales and sacred feathers. No one could deny the children's father. They all looked just like him. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Celeste swung her gaze to him. She whispered something to the youngest and stood, scooping her own scrying mirror from where it sat in her tent. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""High Priest," she regarded him formally, tucking a wild curl behind her ear. She appeared guarded; her eyes narrowed. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"His throat was dry. He was... confused. So confused. He stared at her without blinking for a time, until the milk white of her skin blurred like the storm ring which surrounds the moon on humid nights. He felt pressure in the back of his skull. He didn't realize how she was looking at him, that her face had relaxed to one of relief and then concern. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Orotrushit..." she began, and then dropped her voice until he could barely hear it, "Casismir." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"His hands began to shake. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He had... held his daughter in his hands when he'd slipped back. It was the blood. The blood had done it. They had known it would happen when her water broke. They had tried to get her back to the camp, to get emanyone /emelse to do the delivery. He had fallen back to Father's side... and had never been able to escape again./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""I've been gone... for seven years?" he asked. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"She didn't respond, but her eyes spoke in her silence. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The memories of the last seven years now felt like a dream. He was aware of them, but they didn't feel like emhim/em. They emdisgusted him/em. He was just like his Father.../spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He closed his eye and took a deep breath through his nose. He let it out slowly. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Tell me about them, Celeste. What have I missed?" /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"She did. She told him all about how Lucian had nearly completed his Grimoire, now. How he was gifted, perhaps as much as Orotrushit was, and that he hadn't found a deity which called to him yet but she was sure it would happen soon. Cassia had given up on her Grimoire, and instead was interested in studying history. She'd learned three languages now, and wanted to travel Fiore. The Sphynxes had taken a liking to her, so maybe she'd take a trip to study in one of their greater libraries next summer when the caravan split as they annually did. Reuben was finally beginning to settle down. She had worried for his temper, and but suddenly he'd shifted. He was so kind-hearted now, even shying away from killing bugs which would sneak into the tent. He had taken a liking to moths and wanted to catch them any chance he could. The boy wouldn't eat anything given to him for dinner and she didn't understand how he survived sometimes. And then Sirena, little Sirena, well she was stubborn just like her mother and wanted to adopt a cat despite the fact there were several shared cats on the compound. She was asking questions, too, all the children were except for Lucien... asking about him. Sirena had never met her father, and Reuben hardly remembered him. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit found he didn't want to hear any more, and so he struggled to speak through the tightness in his throat, refusing to look at her. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""The desert is going to flood. You and all of your sisters need to leave immediately." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Her eyes widened with alarm. She glanced behind her, "Now?"/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Yes," he replied. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""I'll tell the Madame," she said, "We can be moving in the next three hours." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Good." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He realized she was looking for his eyes. The corner of her lip was tugging downwards with disapproval. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Shall we come to you?" she asked, cocking her head slightly. It was meant to be stubborn, but he could see the hope in her eyes, "Yours is the closest temple to the goddess." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""No." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"She frowned but didn't relent. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Your children are not safe here, Celeste," he said strictly. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""My children are curious... especially the oldest," she replied, and then softer, "He is an intelligent boy, Orotrushit." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Then he has nothing to be curious of." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""It is his right to be curious. As well as his brother and sisters." she said, her voice lilting in that way that usually charmed men, "Will you rob them of what may be their only chance to meet their father?"/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""I would have preferred to have never met mine." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He flinched, his soul constricting. He winced the way a child would expecting a strike. His heart hammered in his chest. The words... they didn't even feel like his own. It was like he'd been possessed. They'd just slipped out of him on their own. He hadn't meant it. It was an accident. emIt was an accident/em. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""They're not safe here," Orotrushit said, "Leave the desert, Celeste. Don't come here."/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He banished her visage and sat in the darkness for what felt like an eternity. The aching sorrow in his chest burned out to that washed-out grey he was familiar with. He rose shakily to his feet again and shuffling dreamlike out into the temple. Strike the match, light the incense. Cleanse the water. Prepare the offering. He was moving without thinking. His heart still pounding as he awaited the cruel punishment he knew was sure to come. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"But Father wasn't here. Its attention was on the foolish demon and his burgeoning plot. Orotrushit was fine. He had done no wrong. Father wasn't here. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit found himself standing in the beam of sunlight, letting its warmth banish the fear that turned his bones to lead. The wind blew the curtains. He drifted towards the entrance, eyes following the hundreds of steps down to the ground. He was standing on the edge. The market was full to bursting. Travellers were buying goods, beaded works, handmade blankets, foods and herbs found nowhere else in Fiore. Freshly caught sacrifices were being carted in to be sold or to bolster his own menagerie. Hundreds talked and laughed and bartered and worshipped all in the shadows of the temples. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit choked on a broken sound deep in his throat. His shoulders heaved. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Forty years ago, trees had choked through the stones. Ferns and flowers and vines covered the stalls. Entire stone structures were concealed by forest. And now, his work was evident. There was wealth. There were fans of beautiful feathers, jade and obsidian encrusted works. They were creating art again, carving reliefs. It wasn't back to its formal glory but it was almost there... all thanks to him. Except it wasn't his. He didn't have claim to anything. It would all go to emDavian/em. And Davian didn't even want it./span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Something strange and euphoric bubbled up inside of him. It started as a chuckle and began to grow. It hurt. It hurt so badly. Why did it hurt so badly? /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Hundreds of lifetimes opened up under his gaze. A million different paths spread out before him. He saw it all, watched it and reveled in everything he would never witness with his own two eyes. He could watch it all but never touch it, never hold it in his hands. Like his own children, his own emlife/em. This cursed bloodline just kept giving and giving and yet he had claim to emnothing/em. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""How... H-How can you claim them all...?" Orotrushit breathed, choked, suddenly finding it nearly impossible to breathe, "They're emmine/em."/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emThe first time he had met Laxus, he'd held the wizard against a wall. Drunk on his need for blood, he'd intended to kill him before he had realized the true value he was pinning to the wall with a knife. No... that wasn't right. He knew what was inside the wizard. strongFather /strongcompelled him to desire blood. But now he was lucid. Now, he was awake. /em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"em"It's the dawn of a new age, pet. It's such a shame you won't get to see it." /em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Clarity ebbed into the back of his skull. Clarity which had been gone from him for a long time now. Everything he had been working toward would soon be worth it./span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Time in the Otherworld worked differently. It flowed less like a river towards the sea and much more like the drowning machine which churns in on itself over a low-head dam, and thus it was only midafternoon when Orotrushit stepped from the underground. A million different pathways stretched before him. A million different possibilities. Many of them led to the same places. All of them he ignored. He was agitated. Heading towards the futility which stretched wide before him; his path the line which crosses a bottomless gorge. There was no turning back now. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The lightning dragon slayer, emLaxus /em– even thinking it made venomous distaste snap at his insides – was the worst kind of bleeding heart. Self-sacrifice, throwing his life down for his lover… it emoozed /emwith pretentious selflessness. Watch the wretch fling himself into the sea after the murder of Gajeel, unable to live without his emone true love/em. It was sickening. What had love ever done but display death's grace and power and, yes, even his beauty? Perhaps time speeds for her. But even with love walking beside him throughout eternity, death always comes alone in the end./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Poor, poor little man trapped in a cage. He was too shortsighted to realize how beneficial letting the High Priest die would have been. Or perhaps he knew and chose mercy despite it. Did he not know that mercy in times like these meant doom?/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Oh, how he emhated /emmen like that. Men who had never been forced to make a hard decision and so chose mercy because it was the right thing, the emgood /emthing to do. It was so common in wizards, this delusional chivalry. They built a world to serve themselves. Even the villains refrained from taking life most of the time. They pit power against power, decide the victor. What does an honor code get you when a god calls for blood? Nothing except the weight of guilt that grows with each life taken. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Unfortunately for Laxus, Orotrushit had killed the part of him that cared years ago in a tiny chamber with blue fire that turned gold and a knife that cut out the still beating heart of his childhood friend. The first time he had ever tasted blood. The first born coming to his own, as he was supposed to. emThat /emwas a hard decision. And every decision after that. Taking his own eye. Watching his mother leave for the Golden Chamber. Not saving his little brother from what he knew was quick to follow. And, yes, even drawing Father's attention from a emvery /emimportant ritual when that same little brother was supposed to take his own final Rite.../spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"em...why had he done that? He hardly remembered why. That was against Father, against their goals.../em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"It didn't matter. Sometimes Orotrushit got mixed up in his own scheming and who could blame him? There were so many. But it would all be fixed soon, yes. Every sacrifice, emevery /emsordid plot would be worth it soon./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He climbed the staircases in the Temple of the Sun, his breath whisking in and out, in and out, like a scared animal. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"This wasn't the first time he'd lost Father's favor. He knew emexactly /emwhat awaited him when he drew back the curtain and strode into the his chambers. The demon stood there before the relief, his bottomless blue eyes swinging wildly towards him and landing on him like a starved man coming face to face with a wasted meal. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Marinus..." Orotrushit hissed, "You are not allowed here." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Oh, but I am..." he hummed, grinning. Demons did not have a glamour, but still Marinus was scarily good at hiding his true nature. His power rippled around him, diffusing a foreign chill into the room. A crazed sycophant, his voice trembled with emotion, "Father has gifted me, emme!/em A vision! A vision of dark water...!" /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit straightened his spine, drawing his strength from his core, "You're mad." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emNot that he had room to talk. /em/spanspan class="normaltextrun"Quiet./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""I am emanointed/em," Marinus beamed, sweeping his hands out in a grand gesture. He paused, sucking in a calming breath. Chilly humidity swelled to the point Orotrushit found it difficult to breathe, "You, my dear priest, are not." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Water burst forth. Tendrils of it leapt for him but he was swift and the demon was out of practice, emand yes/em, weak. Orotrushit's eye opened and every possibility flooded his mind. He had taken the Rite of Healing. The bones of the man, the tendons and muscles and sinews were a map he could read. Every ache and pain the elderly demon had that kept him up at night, revealed themselves. Orotrushit crossed the distance. A violet brand which burned against pale skin from an ancient wound called out to him. The mark of the fire demon was still burning hundreds of years after it had caused fatality, and now it suffered a mystical touch which called it back to its height of suffering. Marinus shrieked and fell back onto the ground. Water coalesced around them both as Orotrushit reared back his head. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The Temple of the Sun was not blessed by Father. It was blessed by the Sun. And so he didn't emneed /emFather to call the living power which burned deep in the stones of the pyramid. He didn't emneed /emFather to drive the screaming breath from the depths of the caldera beneath the temple to come surging up and scatter the demon's spell. He didn't emneed Father /emto defeat Marinus half-drunk on power he didn't understand and certainly couldn't control. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit gripped the pastor by his shirt and lifted him up into the light of the sun which came in between the slots carved into the stone. The sun which hit the relief of the Rebirth of the Aurincarae and made it glitter like a jewel on fire. Marinus winced, shrinking back like a fish to deeper water. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Do not forget who dragged you from the ashes of your father, emMarinus/em," Orotrushit hissed, "I will put you back, if I must." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He dropped him. Marinus cried out from pain, holding his wound and shivering, "You... y-y-you don't have... his blessing..."/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Not the first time. It will be returned shortly, once Father hears the offering that is in store," Orotrushit replied coldly, staring down at the demon with the full weight of his Sight, "A new body should sway Its favor, I should think. And if not? A sacrifice for my brother's transformation surely will." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Marinus clenched his jaw, a look of bald hatred on his face as he glared up at Orotrushit, "You lie." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""I do not," Orotrushit grinned, a surge of satisfaction coiling in his chest to see the demon brought so low, "What exactly have emyou /emdone with your high honor, Marinus? Nothing?" /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""I will make an army," he growled as his eyes glowed with intensity, a deep cobalt which made his already pale face appear dead-white. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit cocked his head to the side, feigning interest, "Will?" /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Marinus's hair whipped back from his face. His perfect styling parted to reveal the horns he always kept so carefully hidden. If looks could kill, Orotrushit would be dead... though Marinus certainly wouldn't have been the first to try it, and not half as justified. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Don't tell me you need... help?" Orotrushit crouched down. He smirked, reaching forward and getting a thrill from the way Marinus flinched as he patted his cheek once, twice, "Keep your dirty demon hands out of my consecrated river." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He let his fingers draw down the line of Marinus's jaw, his claws threatening the soft flesh beneath as he tilted the demon's chin up. Oh, how much strength it took not to puncture skin and draw blood. The angle forced Marinus to glare down his nose to keep Orotrushit's eye, but he dare not make a move. Even devoid of Father, Orotrushit was still far too powerful to be killed in his own temple. The High Priest knew his sacred home well, and knew the demon had been rightfully put in his place. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit was a good High Priest. Excellent, even. And extremely thorough./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Now that we have an understanding," Orotrushit grinned, "I have work to attend to." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He left the demon where he lay. He knew the path Marinus would take to leave, how he would skulk and smolder but put on a congenial face for the wizards who were already beginning to gather in the void beneath the Temple of the Sun. Marinus's hatred grew with each thwarting of his grasp for more power, but without the power to bring the High Priest down, he could make no more moves. Knowing this, Orotrushit closed his eye to him and opened it towards the future. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"People avoided him, looking through him or hiding from his approach. Orotrushit preferred it this way, emyes/em, this ostracism. It gave him time to think, to emsee/em. This was where he spent most of his time, his mind palace, his web which he had expertly weaved over these short thirty-eight years of his life. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"When the last of the council went into meditation seeking Oros, and of course finding the god quiet, they had left nothing. There were no successors. No structure. None to take their place or maintain order. They couldn't even turn to the heads of the three houses, broken as they were. The Yaoyo's Master had been killed by his own bastard child, the Qaholom's Master had taken her tribe deep into the underground caves and refused to return, the Master of the Yohual was part of the council and blinded by golden eyes, slowly wasting away, staring into an endless eternity for something that had abandoned them long ago. And just when things couldn't possibly get worse, Orthinos, emDavian/em, The Favorite Son of the Aurincarae had gone. So that left only Orotrushit to gather the crumbling remains of his people. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emHe /em/spanspan class="normaltextrun"had built them back to glory, practically brick by brick. Him, the motherless bastard son of the Aurincarae who wasn't even a fullblood, took control where others shrank back. It was Orotrushit who first suggested Rhuntak take the House, and then Orotrushit brought forth the idea of strengthening ties with the other nations around them. Perhaps the work was beneath them but it brought trade, emresources/em. Soon, there was gold and jade, there was food other than fish and scavenged fruits. They relearned cultivation, restored the Temples. He had been on hands and knees digging ash and broken pottery from the tunnels leading to the tops of the temples himself, reconsecrating ground, spilling his own blood, recreating each broken circle, each blemished relief. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He'd spearheaded the need for a market. It was the good reputation the protection of Rhuntak and his House had yielded them and the beauty of the restoration which made them a trading hub. More nations joined by the season. The Temple of the Sun and the Moon, such fabled deities, still garnered worship and respect. Pilgrimages which had gone untrodden for millennia started anew. And then finally, after long last, Orotrushit hung the curtains, found the stone altars, and it was under emhis /emdirection that they began feeding the gods once again. Accepting tribute. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"And it was all thanks to emhim/em.../spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"...and Father's guidance. Father guided his hand. Yes. He held no personal claim to anything. But he worked emhard/em. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Yes... Father had been the one to drive him, to empush /emhim to ascend higher and higher. It was his duty as the eldest son, chosen for the Rites, to shoulder the burdens of their future. Why else would he see the future but to mold it to best fit their shapes? To emreclaim /emwhat wizards had stolen from them. Orotrushit was different from them, he was embetter/em, and he would take back what belonged truly to him and his people! It was justice. It was righteousness. It was emwar/em. And he needed people who believed in his vision to accomplish it all. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"But the influx of empeople /emhad awoken Orotrushit to a fact which began as a whisper and blossomed to and undeniable scream. He wasn't like them. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He was used to the berth given to him by members of his own kind but it was when he'd first endeavored to build the hospital that the divide between him and emthem /embecame insurmountable. He had been striking his ears, his tongue, his wrists for years so what was pain to him? He'd watched his mother march to her death, driven his brother away for reasons he didn't remember, and resided in his solitude and the soothing call of Father from the darkness and now he felt everyone around him danced in colored flames while he stood a pillar of ash. He couldn't feel... and the only person who offered him solace from this knowledge was Father. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"It whispered to him, softly, kindly. Why fear the pain? Why grieve the dead? Why rejoice in the miracle? He had witnessed it all already. This perpetual string of inevitabilities woven through time offered him emnothing/em. It was an echo chamber. Reality was a blanket of slate grey. He felt like the walking dead but Father emunderstood/em./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit found excitement in leaning into Its grooming, in keeping Father's favor. If he grew the flock, if he was a good High Priest, if he met every failure his brother had left behind then all Father would need was him. Just him. No one else. Yes, that's what he wanted. What had to happen. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emDon't need anyone else/em/spanspan class="normaltextrun". emIt can't need anyone else or else-/em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit understood It, you see. The closer and closer they became the more it was clear. They were the same, both seeing the eons stretching before them with all its lackluster potential until blood was spilt and then suddenly there was emcolor./em Father emloved /emthe color. Just a moment to live vicariously... what was the harm? Just a moment... a moment longer... The red. emOh, the red/em. And he craved m-more, but not emtoo /emmuch because it belonged to Father. The red belonged to Father. He had no real claim on anything, it was all for emFather/em despite how much he emcraved the feeling especially when It was close to him-/em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The first murder is always the hardest. That's the one that haunts, that stares at you when you sleep. The second one is easier. The first five are harder than the first ten. Suddenly, he was making sacrifice every month. emEvery full moon/em. He would carve out the heart and roll the body down the steps and pray. There was celebration that the old ways had returned, that the gods were turning their gaze back on those that had been left behind, that like the phoenix they would rise again and… and…/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"em…and that is right. This was their land, their kingdom. Grow it. Cultivate it. Sow the seeds for a large harvest, yes. Soon, soon, the reaper will come with his scythe to-/em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit snapped back to reality. An acolyte brushed him. The boy, barely old enough to stand at his heels, looked terrified as he garnered Orotrushit's attention. How long had he been standing there in the stairwell? In the emdark/em. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""H-High Priest…" he squeaked pathetically, and bowed, "Y-you asked me to…"/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Do not touch me," Orotrushit replied stoically, "I'll lash out." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The boy bowed again and then scurried away, desperate to put distance between them. Even when he was gentle, they still ran. Such his reputation had become. Few didn't anymore, relegated to those who practiced and were also monstrous in their own ways. Three hundred years without the touch of the gods does that. People forget how horrible they are. What is the trifles of mortals to those who breathe the world into existence? He also never stepped around an ant in his path. In fact, he had grown to quite enjoy the pop beneath his feet. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He resumed his path, shaken. It was the wizard who had done this to him. All that talk of emfree will/em and emseparating from Father /emhad made him nervous. He emcouldn't /embe separated from Father. Not for long. It was... bad. Though, he couldn't quite remember why.../spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit shook the feeling from him. The Temple of the Sun was a safe place, far from the reaches of wizards and their mawkish chivalry and their magic which only destroyed. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"It wasn't that he emneeded /emFather's favor. He enjoyed it. Yes, that was it. He basked in the pride and joy that radiated from his father whenever he had accomplished some task set before him. The apathy Orotrushit felt for everyone around him was useful, preferred. It kept him from questioning, from feeling guilt, from being distracted from chasing Father's heart. And none of it was without reward. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He learned new rituals, filled his own Grimoire. Never mind that others began using his name less and less, that he was being called emThe Hungry One/em, because his true name became synonymous with summoning death himself. Each life he took meant Father grew stronger and in turn so did he. And power means freedom. Freedom from loneliness, from fear, from pain, from being the next to die./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"There was a time he thought Father could be satisfied. That one day Orotrushit would murder a witless fool deep in the underground where none could see, and the beast which craved and howled for blood would finally quiet. But It didn't, and now he knew It never would. It just wanted more. More blood. More pain. It wasn't enough to just kill, to just consume, now it needed to be drawn out, to emlast. /emLet It savor the taste more, longer… /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The more gruesome the death, the more pain he could inflict, the more Father purred with excitement. It ate with abandon and instructed him to hurt more until the hours blurred together. He began craving the blood, the screams. Reveling in the many ways he could tear someone apart. Each noise was a new and exciting color, each way the body reacted a spiritual experience drawing a strange passion, an enthrall from a place he thought was dead. He'd awake as if from a stupor, when the person strapped to the table was long dead and the blood was turning from hot to warm to tepid./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Perhaps it was the fifth one dead in that way that made him realize this wasn't ritual. No. This was just murder. And once you've killed so many, what does one more matter? He was above them all. He was Father's son. emThe Hungry One/em. And he felt starved. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He hated himself. He hated that he was becoming his Father. He emhated /emthat lucidity fled him so often... stealing long stretches of his time. emThe memories are fading. You are lucid now/em. strongQuiet/strong. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He had become so caught up in chasing Father's fleeting favor, so jealous that the obvious escaped him. The thing that had stared him in his face since that fateful day his mother had walked to the Golden Chamber. He would never be enough. Father wanted the Favorite Son to return. Orthinos. emDavian/em. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"But Orotrushit was the oldest. He was the High Priest. emHe /emhad built back the temples, had brought them prosperity. Orotrushit was healing the sick. Seeing the future. Leading the flock. emHe /emwas prophet, pastor, and priest! He shouldered every burdened given to him. Exceeded expectations. emHe /emhad done it all! The Yohual were learning ritual again, teaching their sons to aid in the priesthood and their daughters to become seers. The Yaoyo had structure. They guarded their people once again, regaining their lost pride. Even the Qaholom had broken their silence! The daughter of the elderly matriarch, now blind, had appeared for the latest addressing of order. It was all thanks to emhim/em. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"But Orotrushit wasn't what Father wanted. He never had been. emWeak in body./em Too much like his mother, proved the day Orthinos strongemDavian /em/stronghad first opened his eyes to reveal Father's gold. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emYou need to do something. /em/spanspan class="normaltextrun"A quiet voice whispered, foreign and strange but… but familiar. emYou're awake. Do something./em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Do what? What needed doing? He'd already done emeverything/em./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit stumbled into the Temple. He was confused and agitated. One of the young acolytes scurried from his sight as he approached, nearly diving for the steps to stay from his way. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"There was nothing that needed emdoing/em. Unless... perhaps a sacrifice? Did he need to feed Father? Or... no... wait... emhe needed to do something.../em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He had brought the place to rights since his fight with the dragon slayers, so that wasn't it. Sunlight streamed in through the parted curtains. There was incense burning. Did he need cleansed? It was... it was in the back room, wasn't it? /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He slammed his knife to the counter and marched back towards the where the relics were kept, those that he had been able to gather over the years. Amongst them, sacred feathers, dust-covered amulets, rings, the bones of ancestors. He was reaching for his regalia when the sharp shimmer of darkness caught his attention./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"A scrying mirror. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He saw himself inside of it, the inky likeness of himself staring suspiciously at him. He looked like a shadow. He had lost weight. The hunger had been almost constant now, maddening. It wasn't usually like that. It usually came in waves, or phases, like the moon, increasing with intensity until it ebbed away and he became... lucid. The last life he had taken had been the small wizard, the one he'd flayed alive. It had been a disappointment. The colors of screams not as satisfactory. Something inside of him... had changed. It had changed though he didn't know why. He had thought that perhaps it was because Father's gaze had shifted but, no, that couldn't be. They were nearly intertwined now. Father's will was emhis /emwill. He was God's Hunger. He was the emdrive, /emthe emdirection. /emBut despite the craving, he found blood didn't satisfy. It made the craving emworse/em./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emYou don't want Orthinos to have what you've built. You know the truth./em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun" He clenched his jaw. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emYou've been keeping secrets./em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"No-no, he kept emno /emsecrets because he emneeded /emFather's favor. Above all else, keep Father's gaze. He had to. Or else… or else…/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emYou've been keeping secrets. /em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He pretended he didn't hear it. He knelt down before the obsidian surface, dashing away a nervous twinge in the base of his stomach. He felt compelled, like he didn't have a choice. Something tugged there at the base of his heart, telling him he needed to do this. That it was emimportant./em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Show me..." he hesitated. He didn't have Father's favor. Its eyes would be far from him now, but still he whispered his request, "Show me... the High Priestess." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The surface muddied and then clouded. The longer he stared, the more he began to glimpse a figure. First a shadow, a silhouette, and then the shock of scarlet hair. Four forms moved near her, their faces blurred because of his lack of focus though he could tell easily they were children. He knew intrinsically that the eldest son was sixteen, his sister was twelve, the other boy was just nine, and the last was a girl of seven. All of them had dark hair and skin, looking near nothing like their mother except the littlest whose hair shimmered auburn in the desert sun. A cupid's bow here, a button nose on one of the girls, her lithe bone structure in the eldest boy, but all in all they all had his high cheeks, and his eyes, and blue scales and sacred feathers. No one could deny the children's father. They all looked just like him. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Celeste swung her gaze to him. She whispered something to the youngest and stood, scooping her own scrying mirror from where it sat in her tent. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""High Priest," she regarded him formally, tucking a wild curl behind her ear. She appeared guarded; her eyes narrowed. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"His throat was dry. He was... confused. So confused. He stared at her without blinking for a time, until the milk white of her skin blurred like the storm ring which surrounds the moon on humid nights. He felt pressure in the back of his skull. He didn't realize how she was looking at him, that her face had relaxed to one of relief and then concern. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Orotrushit..." she began, and then dropped her voice until he could barely hear it, "Casismir." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"His hands began to shake. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He had... held his daughter in his hands when he'd slipped back. It was the blood. The blood had done it. They had known it would happen when her water broke. They had tried to get her back to the camp, to get emanyone /emelse to do the delivery. He had fallen back to Father's side... and had never been able to escape again./spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""I've been gone... for seven years?" he asked. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"She didn't respond, but her eyes spoke in her silence. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"The memories of the last seven years now felt like a dream. He was aware of them, but they didn't feel like emhim/em. They emdisgusted him/em. He was just like his Father.../spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He closed his eye and took a deep breath through his nose. He let it out slowly. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Tell me about them, Celeste. What have I missed?" /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"She did. She told him all about how Lucian had nearly completed his Grimoire, now. How he was gifted, perhaps as much as Orotrushit was, and that he hadn't found a deity which called to him yet but she was sure it would happen soon. Cassia had given up on her Grimoire, and instead was interested in studying history. She'd learned three languages now, and wanted to travel Fiore. The Sphynxes had taken a liking to her, so maybe she'd take a trip to study in one of their greater libraries next summer when the caravan split as they annually did. Reuben was finally beginning to settle down. She had worried for his temper, and but suddenly he'd shifted. He was so kind-hearted now, even shying away from killing bugs which would sneak into the tent. He had taken a liking to moths and wanted to catch them any chance he could. The boy wouldn't eat anything given to him for dinner and she didn't understand how he survived sometimes. And then Sirena, little Sirena, well she was stubborn just like her mother and wanted to adopt a cat despite the fact there were several shared cats on the compound. She was asking questions, too, all the children were except for Lucien... asking about him. Sirena had never met her father, and Reuben hardly remembered him. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit found he didn't want to hear any more, and so he struggled to speak through the tightness in his throat, refusing to look at her. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""The desert is going to flood. You and all of your sisters need to leave immediately." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Her eyes widened with alarm. She glanced behind her, "Now?"/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Yes," he replied. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""I'll tell the Madame," she said, "We can be moving in the next three hours." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Good." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He realized she was looking for his eyes. The corner of her lip was tugging downwards with disapproval. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Shall we come to you?" she asked, cocking her head slightly. It was meant to be stubborn, but he could see the hope in her eyes, "Yours is the closest temple to the goddess." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""No." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"She frowned but didn't relent. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Your children are not safe here, Celeste," he said strictly. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""My children are curious... especially the oldest," she replied, and then softer, "He is an intelligent boy, Orotrushit." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""Then he has nothing to be curious of." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""It is his right to be curious. As well as his brother and sisters." she said, her voice lilting in that way that usually charmed men, "Will you rob them of what may be their only chance to meet their father?"/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""I would have preferred to have never met mine." /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He flinched, his soul constricting. He winced the way a child would expecting a strike. His heart hammered in his chest. The words... they didn't even feel like his own. It was like he'd been possessed. They'd just slipped out of him on their own. He hadn't meant it. It was an accident. emIt was an accident/em. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""They're not safe here," Orotrushit said, "Leave the desert, Celeste. Don't come here."/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"He banished her visage and sat in the darkness for what felt like an eternity. The aching sorrow in his chest burned out to that washed-out grey he was familiar with. He rose shakily to his feet again and shuffling dreamlike out into the temple. Strike the match, light the incense. Cleanse the water. Prepare the offering. He was moving without thinking. His heart still pounding as he awaited the cruel punishment he knew was sure to come. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"But Father wasn't here. Its attention was on the foolish demon and his burgeoning plot. Orotrushit was fine. He had done no wrong. Father wasn't here. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit found himself standing in the beam of sunlight, letting its warmth banish the fear that turned his bones to lead. The wind blew the curtains. He drifted towards the entrance, eyes following the hundreds of steps down to the ground. He was standing on the edge. The market was full to bursting. Travellers were buying goods, beaded works, handmade blankets, foods and herbs found nowhere else in Fiore. Freshly caught sacrifices were being carted in to be sold or to bolster his own menagerie. Hundreds talked and laughed and bartered and worshipped all in the shadows of the temples. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Orotrushit choked on a broken sound deep in his throat. His shoulders heaved. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Forty years ago, trees had choked through the stones. Ferns and flowers and vines covered the stalls. Entire stone structures were concealed by forest. And now, his work was evident. There was wealth. There were fans of beautiful feathers, jade and obsidian encrusted works. They were creating art again, carving reliefs. It wasn't back to its formal glory but it was almost there... all thanks to him. Except it wasn't his. He didn't have claim to anything. It would all go to emDavian/em. And Davian didn't even want it./span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Something strange and euphoric bubbled up inside of him. It started as a chuckle and began to grow. It hurt. It hurt so badly. Why did it hurt so badly? /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Hundreds of lifetimes opened up under his gaze. A million different paths spread out before him. He saw it all, watched it and reveled in everything he would never witness with his own two eyes. He could watch it all but never touch it, never hold it in his hands. Like his own children, his own emlife/em. This cursed bloodline just kept giving and giving and yet he had claim to emnothing/em. /spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun""How... H-How can you claim them all...?" Orotrushit breathed, choked, suddenly finding it nearly impossible to breathe, "They're emmine/em."/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"emThe first time he had met Laxus, he'd held the wizard against a wall. Drunk on his need for blood, he'd intended to kill him before he had realized the true value he was pinning to the wall with a knife. No... that wasn't right. He knew what was inside the wizard. strongFather /strongcompelled him to desire blood. But now he was lucid. Now, he was awake. /em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"em"It's the dawn of a new age, pet. It's such a shame you won't get to see it." /em/spanspan class="eop" /span/p
p class="paragraph"span class="normaltextrun"Clarity ebbed into the back of his skull. Clarity which had been gone from him for a long time now. Everything he had been working toward would soon be worth it./span/p