Gomen nasai for not having the last bit of ‘Gundam Wing Does Dracula!’ ready yet, but I just wanted to post this little bit of fluff for all of you out there who like the shojo style stories and the fics dealing with darker themes. There are some religious themes throughout the story, but I in no way, form, or fashion endorse or favor one religion over another. This based mostly off of IN NOMINE (Steve Jackson Games) and my philosophy on the divine and all that fun stuff. I don’t mean to offend anyone, so please put away the stake and the torches. This story (originally called “Noisy, Noisy Silent Night”) is actual something I did for my school’s literary magazine, but since many of you definitely won’t get to see the mag, I decided to put the revised and slightly elongated version on the net. All the characters are mine and the story was inspired by tons of Creed and Slayers NEXT. I hope you all like this.

Unforgiven

Little Alex was awakened by the sound of a piper playing. The haunting music wafted across the snow-blanketed fields. The tempo was slow and mellow, each note echoing clearly through the biting night air and entwining to form the weirdly enchanting melody. It increased in volume as its creator drew closer, weaving his enticing spell of hypnotic longing within the young boy.

He jumped out of bed and pressed his nose against the window, eagerly scanning the woods surrounding the tiny cottage in the hope of glimpsing the unknown musician.

Then, bathed in the silvery moonlight, a tall figure in a dark hooded cloak emerged from the shadows. In his hands shone a truly marvelous syrinx of highly polished ivory, etched with many fine runes and symbols. The pipes light hue was almost perfectly matched by the nearly ghost white skin of the piper’s fingers resting lightly upon it. Beneath the cloak, there was a brilliant flash of a gaudily checked doublet. He stopped playing when he caught sight of the boy with the flaxen hair. Putting the syrinx away, the piper beckoned for Alex to join him.

Curiosity outweighed reason as the boy hurriedly pulled on his clothes and shoes, then tiptoed out of the house. Alex vividly recalled a sermon he had heard a while ago. The village vicar had said something about people who were out playing music in the forest. He had called them ‘wild heathens’ who held ‘foul, un-Christian ceremonies’ in the presence of their unholy master, the Green Man. After the sermon, he had asked the vicar what they called these people. He said that they were called ‘sorcerers’ and ‘witches’. The vicar went on to say that such men and women were wicked and would snatched little children from their homes, but he didn’t believe that. It was the something else the old priest had said that truly caught his interest. These people possessed a wondrously evil and powerful thing called ‘magic’, a thing that could make crops wither into dust, call up storms, create gold from lead, and shape the very essence of one‘s dreams. He had left the chapel with a longing to meet one of these sorcerers. And now, here was one right at his back door, calling out to him no less!

Hopping off the porch, Alex rushed over to the piper and looked up at him in wide-eyed wonder. “Are…are you a real sorcerer?”

“Yes, I am.” The piper chuckled softly, looking at him with a rather eerie smile. “You may call me Thantos.” He reached down and took the boy by the hand. “Come along with me, Alex. We have much to do tonight.”

“Where are we going?” Alex asked as they headed into the forest. “And how did you know my name?”

“Now,” Thantos’ grin widened evilly, his voice as smooth as velvet. “That is a secret.”

~*~*~

Restlessly, Lily tossed and turned in her sleep. She could see the man in her dreams again; still full of the all-consuming hatred he had for her race. She saw him kneeling upon the blood-soaked ground amidst the ravaged corpse of his tribe. Their dark feathered bodies hung like grotesque puppets upon the cold-iron stakes and crosses that loomed all around. The wind moaned mournfully across the land, swirling gray dust and black feathers in miniature cyclones through the putrid air.

She walked through this tragic forest of horror and stood beside him.

The youth turned to face her, cradling a twisted and torn claw with his still human arm. A pair of gigantic, soot-blackened wings sprouted from his shoulders. One dangled limply broken and useless, dragging upon the ground. His long, pale hair and deathly pallid skin were streaked with blood and ash. All across his body are the scars and lesions of many fierce and desperate battles, along with fresh wounds. Both his wrists and ankles bore the deep cuts of the ropes that once held him tight against an iron cross. Painfully he stood up, towering over her like a vengeful fallen god. “Why?” he asked, his voice weary and angry. “Why did you spare my life?”

Lily was at a loss for words. The silent guilt of her deed gnawed at her heart as she looked into his miserable golden eyes. Had she done it out of pity, or did she genuinely want to help this man standing broken before her?

“Then say nothing! Let your silence be my only answer.” He snarled, drawing away from her.

“Wait! Please,” Lily cried. “I…I saved you because I…”

With no warning, a mass of black tendrils shot out of the ground beneath him. He roared as they coiled about him. In vain, he tried to break free of their writhing grasp.

Lily shrieked and raced forward to save him. She manages to grasped hold of his arm and attempts with all her might to pull him free. One of the tendrils lashes out at her, slamming Lily across the chest and sending her flying into the side of an iron stake. Dazed, she can only watch and listen in horror as the man is dragged screaming into the wasted earth.

Slowly, she stumbles to her feet and moves toward the spot where the tendrils were. Lily collapses to her knees and hysterically began tearing at the ground, calling out to him. Realizing it’s too late; she throws her head back with a crazed scream.

~*~*~

He jerked up at the horrifying sound of a woman wailing. Frantically, he looked around, trying to find her.

“Lily?” he gasped hoarsely. “Lily, were are you?” He started shaking, and pulled his knees up under his chin. Wrapping his arms around his legs, he sobbed softly. “I-I’m afraid, Lily. Please, please come back…please come back to me. It’s so dark and cold here. I’m frightened, Lily. I…I’m sorry for running off. Lily, please come back! Please, please! I want to go home!”

The darkness surrounding him seemed to shift, crumpling under the presence of another figure. He was a boy of indeterminable age, very pale, almost corpselike in appearance, and yet supernaturally beautiful.. The boy’s hair was long and pure black, shimmering with an iridescent like the wing of a beetle. His voice was an icy sneer. “Stop your whimpering, devil. It becomes you not.”

He looked up at the figure; eyes wide and teary like a small child’s. The jerkin he wore had diamonds of blood red, dazzling yellow, and brassy green upon a field of black and the billow shirt was the color of bleach bones . His skintight pants were of the same black velvet as his jerkin. A pair of supple, dark leather boots and a massive black wool cloak completed his costume. Vaguely, he recognized him from somewhere but couldn’t put a name to gaunt face that stared down at him with unmoving, coal black eyes. “Who…who are you?”

“She has made you forget us, boy.” The boy purred coldly. “That wicked woman has stolen the very mention of your former allies. Those in whom you trusted; those who you were willing to die for. She has taken it all away! The glory, the power…All of it gone! Leaving you as nothing more than a mere child with no knowledge of the man you once were.” He paused, kneeling down beside him. “Don’t you remember them, Alaistair? The Inquisitors? How they came to killed your band? Do you remember the fires? The terror? The torn bodies? The blood?” He paused. “They screamed as they died. We heard them crying out, begging for help, but when we found them…” The boy turned away, apparently in tears. “We thought you where dead, Alaistair. I searched and searched for you, even after they told me it was useless! I had to be sure. For years it seemed my search was in vain. Oh, but now…” His voice cracked with what must have been sincere joy. “To have found you once again…” Without warning, he pulled Alaistair against himself, embracing him with in a frozen grip. “You don’t now how long I’ve waited for this day. To hold you against my body…To smell your hair, to stroke your skin…To…” A soft moan cut his words as he pressed against the fallen angel. “Oh, Alaistair…”

Alaistair sat there for a moment, his face hidden by a shadow. Suddenly, he viciously slaps the black-haired boy aside and stands. Silent, he walked to the far end of the room and faces the wall.

“What the hell…” The boy sputtered in surprise, wiping the blood from his lip. “Why did you hit me?”

He says nothing as he stares intently at the slime molded rocks. A faint smile plays on his lush lips.

“Dammit, why won’t you answer me!”

“Be quiet!” Alaistair growls. Slowly, he traces the deeply etched runes in the rock. “So this is way you brought me here… To restore my form, eh Thantos?” His laughter rings coldly off the walls like the clash of steel on steel. “And then what were you going to do? Have a little ‘fun’ with me?” He turns to the boy, no longer the frightened child but a demon of long unquenched vengeance. “You’re too hopeful sometimes. Now, begone fool! Or else I will flay you alive!”

~*~*~

Her eyes shot open and she quickly shut them against the brilliant light. Slowly, Lily sets up and brushes her dark auburn hair out of her eyes, very deeply shaken by the dream. From her training as a paladin, she realized it’d had been too vivid to have been a normal dream. ‘But that’s impossible! There no way Alaistair can still be.’ Still, she could not shake the dread from her soul. Dressing quickly, Lily went down the hall toward Alex’s room.

“Alex?” She murmured softly, looking into the room. To her shock, his bed was empty. Franticly, Lily searched the house, calling for the boy. Not finding him inside, she walked out onto the porch.

“ALLLLLEEEEX!” She cried, and then noticed the tiny footprints leading into the forest. Lily snorted indignantly. ‘Why, that rascal must be hiding out in to woods again!’ “Alex!” She growled aloud, trudging toward the trees. “When I find you, I am going to wring…”

Lily froze at the tree line, overwhelmed by the sense of a painfully familiar aura of utter evil. “Oh gods, no!” She gasped. “It can’t…it can’t have been him.”

As if to confirm her worst fears, a second, larger set of tracks appeared along side of the boy’s.

Her heart pounding from terror, Lily took off at a dead run, following the tracks. She ran for what felt like miles before reaching the end.

The tracks came to a stop at the gapping maw of an ancient cavern. Lily nearly fainted from the revolting miasma that seemingly poured from deep within its bowels. Steeling herself for whatever horrors awaited below, Lily made her way into the cave.

She walked carefully through the twisting labyrinth of tunnels, across ledges overlooking bottomless pits, and wadded through foul, stagnant pools. After almost an eternity of wandering, Lily reached the entrance to a ruined underground temple. The very air around it reeked with the foul stench of the demons that once held court inside. Trembling, she forced the massive gates open and walked inside.

“Alex?” She called out softly, scanning the darkness. “Alex, are you in here?”

“Yes…” A cold, hollow voice answered. “And no.”

Lily spun around, yelping in alarm.

Crouched upon a fallen pillar was the broken figure from her dream.

“Alaistair!” She gasped. “This is impossible! You...you were sealed away!”

“Feh-hiss!” With a surprising agility, Alaistair leapt off the pillar and landed right at Lily’s feet. “Well, wasn’t that awfully nice of you?” He snarled, thrusting his face right up to hers. “And you also must have erased my memories too, didn’t you?”

“Alaistair, the reason I did it all was…was to…”

“To spare yourself the guilt of another murder!” He stepped back and turned away in disgust, his eyes blazing with rage and hatred.

“That isn’t true!”

“Then tell me!” He roared, rounding on her. “Tell me why you decided to spare my life.”

“I-I can’t!” Lily sobbed, falling to her hands and knees.

With a roar of anger, Alaistair reared, swinging his claw back, and brought it down toward her.

She flinched, awaiting the deathblow, but nothing happened.

“Lily…” His voice cracked in agony as he gentle raised her chin with the tip of his heavy fore claw. “You…you’re one of the people who obliterated my kith and kin, and yet…even when you were given a chance to finish the Inquisition’s ‘cleansing’, you choose instead to save me; even knowing that I was fallen. You…you risked your life to pull me back for the very brink of the abyss.” He drew back, tears running down his face. “I-I had fallen in my own private Hell of vengeance, and loathing of both mankind…and of myself.” His legs give way, and he stumbled forward into her arms. “Why…” He sobbed, burying his face into her shoulder. “Please tell me why you’ve done this?”

“Alaistair,” She stroked his matted hair, whispering. “I did it all because-

-Because I love you.”