Be nice! I know these are getting very short and rather suspenseful. I cannot help it! My stupid Writer's Block hits at the worst of times! So, please be kind....
The gods began to wage their war on each other. Down in the mortal realms, their wars raged far hotter than that of even the Smith God’s own forge. Nothing seemed to be able to cool these hot tempers and hotter blades of death, justice, pain, suffering, and of the hottest death anyone had to bring—eternal suffering.
When the Elementals had time to spare, they took Alanna’s dead body, and extracted the feeble ball of light that was the soul of her child—a child who was suppose to be dead or not even created. Sapphire exhausted herself giving the child life, and then making her grow to that of the age of eighteen.
Her name was Mekala.
She was beautiful. Her eyes were a bright violet-hazel. Her copper hair was flowing, long, silk, and beautiful. Her body exceptionally thin, her waist small, her body curved in all the right places. Her face was beautifully carved, as if a master sculptor had worked for several days, hours, and minutes carving just one section of the face that seemed to belong to a goddess.
Her lips with full and luscious—some would claim they were the lips of a goddess. Her eyes were almond shaped, but not to big. Her lashes were dark and long, her cheekbones prominent, but fitting. She was tall, but not lanky—never clumsy. She moved as if she had no bones, as if she thought about every carefully placed moved before she carried through the act of moving.
She was perfect for what the gods needed her to do.
They sent her down to Tortall.
To Thom—who was thought to still be loyal.
To George—who was in a fit of grief.
To Jonathan—who could not help but feel guilty for the death of his friend.
To a populous who now hated the gods and wanted nothing more to destroy them.
Mekala walked through the street, avoiding the bodies of the dead and wounded. She had no care for these souls who would soon descend to the Realms of the Dead, and then their shells would be burned together in large piles.
She had no care for she had never been mortal before now. She didn’t remember her mother, her father, her past at all. She had woken up under a large oak tree, with a cut on her head. A wandering Healer who was fleeing Corus—where the worst of the fighting took place, had treated her.
So that was where Mekala was headed—the Royal Palace of King Jonathan the Third of Contè and his wife, Queen Thayet of Sarain. Maybe, she thought, they had some answers.
She was clad like that of the night—in black. She wore daggers and a sword, but she couldn’t remember ever learning how to use them. She just knew how. Her wore tight fitting leggings, a tight fitting shirt, and black trapper’s boots. No one could hear her walk. She had on a chain mail belt and she had chain mail on her black kid riding gloves. They had a strange emblem on them, and she had the feeling they had the key to her past. Her hair was bound slightly, it was bound into a bun, and then the rest was left to flow to her buttock.
She heard someone moan as she walked by. The reached out and grabbed her black leather boot. Mekala jerked her foot free, violet-hazel eyes wide with terror.
“Off of me, you fiend!” she cried.
“Help me,” the person moaned. “Please, help me!”
“I will help no one!” Mekala cried, scared.
The person looked at her. “Alanna?” he asked, as if he couldn’t believe it.
“Who are you talking about, Old Man? My name is Mekala. That is all I remember! Who are you?”
“Do ye not remember the one who raised ye?” the old man asked. “Coram Smythesson.”
“Who?” Mekala asked. “I know of no person.”
“Nay, ye aren’t Alanna. Ye only be a girl who looks like her,” Coram sighed. “Can ye get me somethin’ to drink?”
“I do not involve myself with those stupid enough to fight,” Mekala spat.
A man with copper hair and glowing violet eyes knelt down beside the old man.
“Coram, drink this,” the man said, holding out a waterskin.
“Thom?” he asked in disbelief. As the man—Thom—nodded, Coram drank deeply from the waterskin. “Thank ye,” he murmured.
“I’ll get a priestess down her to get you to a Healer,” Thom said, rising. “And who are you?” he asked, looking at her.
“My name is Mekala.”
“Anything more?”
“I know nothing more.”
Thom snorted and grabbed her arm. “Follow me.”
Mekala’s eyes flashed and she threw Thom over her hip, he went flying, then hung in the air. The air around him began to pulse and was colored violet.
“That,” Thom said, as he looked up, “was stupid.” His entire face was lit by the deadly violet-red glow of his eyes. His face was set in an expression of hatred.
Mekala was terrified. She did the only thing she could think of—she shielded herself from the blast of raw energy that Thom threw at her.
Thom stared at her, his eyes lost their glow and went to a normal violet, not the red-violet they had been. “Who are you?” he breathed. “Only Alanna could block something like that.”
“Who is this Alanna?” Mekala demanded, falling to her knees.
“Come with me, Mekala,” Thom said softly, extending his hand as he set foot onto the ground once more. “There are people you need to meet.”
Jonathan sighed, and watched as everyone in the room stayed quiet. He wanted some one to speak badly. Why couldn’t they say what was on their mind? Why couldn’t they say what was on everyone’s mind? It was nerve-wracking, staying in this silence!
The door opened, and everyone jumped from the sound that echoed through the King’s study.
It was Thom.
And he had a girl with him.
A girl that looked like Alanna.
George stared, and he wasn’t the only one. “What’s going on?” he demanded.
Thom smiled. “Sapphire seems to have been desperate for help.”
“Meaning what?” Raoul demanded.
“Meaning that Mekala, this girl, is George and Alanna’s child.”
“When did she get pregnant?” George demanded.
“She didn’t. Or, she did. She was when she died, and Mekala is the out come of Sapphire speeding aging up so that they would have a powerful ally since they cannot raise Alanna—and won’t raise her,” Thom said, ushering Mekala over to George.
Mekala—who still didn’t understand—moved over to her father stiffly. “Da,” she murmured.
George stood looking at her in shock. She looked so much like Alanna it was scary.
“Do you know how to fight?” Jonathan asked.
“Yes,” Mekala said.
“Powerful Gift as well,” Thom added in. When he got a glare as his only response, he smiled grimly. “Fine.” He disappeared in a puff of smoke.
Alianne’s forehead glimmered with sweat. This workout her brothers were giving her was hard! Thom attacked her in a direct sword pattern, while Alan parried with complex. It was a three-on-two affect that all three sibs were fighting all out on each other, trying to improve skills.
Suddenly, there was clapping. Only one set, but there was clapping. The three lowered their swords and turned to see their mother’s bother—their uncle Thom—standing on the sidelines, clapping.
“What do you want?” Thom panted, whipping his face with his sleeve.
“To talk is all.”
“About what?”
“Justice,” Uncle Thom said quietly. Silence followed for a few minutes.
“What kind of justice—and to whom?” Thom asked his uncle, sword still in hand.
“The justice deserved for your mother’s death.”
Thom’s hand gripped his sword tightly. Alan dropped his sword and left the room. Alianne stood there and gripped her brother’s arm.
“Why do you bring up my Ma?”
“Your ma? She’s my sister—my twin should I have to remind you!” their uncle hissed. “When she died, I felt it! You should be bloody well glad you didn’t feel the pain, the surprise, or the guilt. Most of all the pain.”
Thom’s face hardened. “And what do you want me to do about all this?”
“I want you, and your sibs, to help me. Help me get revenge on the ones who are keeping your mother dead. The ones who refuse to let her live her life. Who refuse to be the mother and wife she yearns to be.”
“And who is that?”
“Sapphire, Lael, and Loki. The rest of the Elementals,” Uncle Thom said simply.
“Are you mad?” Alianne yelled.
“No, I am not. Daemos is not against everything. He wants to help. He promised he’d raise Alanna, and I believe him.”
“You raised Roger of Contè, why should we trust you?” Thom spat.
Thom of Trebond smiled grimly. “You haven’t heard what Sapphire did to your mother’s body?”
“What did she do?” Alianne whispered.
“She stole it. And your parents had created life before Alanna as killed, and that life almost died within Alanna. Sapphire ripped it out and now it’s here. Alive. At the age of eighteen. Older than you, nephew, I believe.”
Thom and Alianne paled. “Why?” was all they could stutter out.
“Because they are desperate to drive out freewill and your gods. Mithros, The Great Mother, all of them. Sapphire, Lael, Loki, the rest hate them without fear. They are desperate to win this war so that they may make the mortal realms once again their slaves.
“You will have heard of a time called the ‘Dark Age.’ That was when Sapphire and Loki ruled a long time ago. It was horrible. There was death, blood, wars, and famines… Disaster everywhere. You couldn’t go anywhere without running into immortals who were destroying lives, where wars weren’t ripping the lands to pieces, where bandits weren’t killing whole families and burning them alive. Where one was burned alive simply for speaking their mind.
“Life was horrible. Nothing could be done right. No one could live. The Ysandir were plague upon the world. True, Daemos created them—but because they were needed. He fed the souls of bandits and the like to them. And then they broke free. And I will remind you that this is the life of the Old Ones. Those Guardians who are here now, Sapphire and Loki and Lael all created. The Old Ones hated and feared their gods. They were almost rejoicing when Mithros and Selene overthrew them.
“And life then existed in peace. Until Sapphire was doubled with your mother’s soul, and Lael with mine. That trapped us as them for a long time. They had us for so long in their grasp, and only now have we gotten free will. And I am ever so grateful. You have no idea what it means to be truly free from a rule of one who does nothing but command.
“And now, and now, I help Daemos rid the world of the Elemental gods’ rules and chains.”
Thom and Alianne stared at their uncle. Thom looked at his sister. She nodded—Thom of Trebond was telling the truth… The complete, utter truth.
“I’ll go get Alan,” Alianne muttered and ran off. Thom watched his uncle.
“In short, we’ll join you and Daemos. I want my Ma back.”
Thom of Trebond nodded.
Then Daemos appeared, just as Alan and Alianne came into the room. “So, you have decided to revenge your mother? A wise choice.”
Thom looked from his uncle to the god standing before him. “I’m doing this because I want my Ma back. If you win, I will get her back, no?”
“Yes, of course. When this is all over.”
“Why not now?” Thom demanded.
“Nephew, she would only be killed in this war. She would ignore what all says if only to save a life of them that do not hold regard for their lives. Alanna would only be killed again,” Thom said bitterly, turning away from his niece and nephews.
Daemos was nodding. “Your uncle has the right of it, child. Now, come here.”
All three did. Thom was not going to watch Daemos take the souls of Alanna’s children as he had done to Thom himself.
For someone who doesn’t care, Thom thought bitterly, I feel like I am taking away their lives. I have no soul, why should I feel this way?
Suddenly, two sharp gasps came, and Daemos staggered back. “I can’t,” he murmured in awe.
“Can’t what?” Thom snapped at the god.
“I can’t… Someone is protecting them. Something not of this world, never of this world,” Daemos gasped for breath that no god breathed.
Thom’s brow furrowed. “What are you talking about? You are a god, what could stop you?”
Daemos stood there, black eyes wide as he panted. “I don’t know.”
“Love,” echoed a word in the room.
The three children looked around, tears in their eyes. “Ma!” Alan yelled out, tears spilling down his face.
Thom watched as his sister’s soul tried to manifest. It couldn’t. “Alanna,” Thom moaned, falling to his knees. “No, please,” he cried out. The three children watched him. “NO! Don’t you dare leave!” He was crying now, and didn’t care. Daemos had vanished.
Alanna’s soul won. She manifested near her brother and would have touched him, but her hand went right through him. She cried softly. “Thom, don’t do this,” she told him. “Don’t. Daemos won’t keep his promise!”
“No!” Thom cried, getting to his feet and looking at the very see-through ghost. “No, he will! He promised! He can’t break it! No god can break their sworn word!”
“For your sake, my brother, I hope you are right,” Alanna said, softly.
“Ma?” Alan asked, coming over to his mother. She tried to touch her children, but couldn’t.
“My dears,” she whispered. She looked up at her brother, “Look after them?”
Thom turned away from his sister. “What? Not afraid they turn traitor like me?”
“You have your reasons,” Alanna said with exasperation. “Daemos can use them against Sapphire without stealing their souls!”
“Was that what he was trying to do?” Alianne asked. “I felt like he was trying to kill me! The pain was so great!”
Thom didn’t say anything. Alanna moved—no, floated—over to him. “My sweet,” she whispered to him. No one else heard. “You were so willing. He won you, didn’t he?”
Thom’s hazel eyes had tears in them. Tears he could no longer shed. “You will live again. No god can stop me!” he told her defiantly.
Alanna nodded, and—for an instant—gained enough power to make herself solid that she could kiss his cheek lightly. Then she vanished. But Thom remembered the words she had whispered before she left, “May all the gods hold and protect you, my sweet. You will need that strength.”
Mekala sighed and watched the people in the room. They didn’t seem to need her—nor did they seem to see her. Well, that is of course, except for George. He saw her very well, and was very uneasy with all this sudden commotion.
After all, his wife had just been killed months before, and now suddenly his daughter—one who wasn’t even supposed to be alive—is here, and she is alive! And there was someone leaking information out to Daemos and his cronies. That someone had to have a close tie into all these talks and was someone who could be bribed easily.
Thom drifted into the room, looking almost smug. George watched him. This was not the behavior fitting for someone who had just lost his twin sister—his little sister at that. If anything, George thought, he looks like he’s gotten not the perfect revenge, but the perfect vengeance.
George couldn’t help but muse the idea over. Was it possible that Thom was the traitor? That Daemos had bought him off saying he’d restore Alanna to full life again? And what of the Ysandir? Why hadn’t they begun to attack again? The Guardians were all but magick minders. They fought, if the occasion called for it—but not unless it did.
Had all the world gone mad? Had the gods suddenly begun to love their game of meddling too much? Why didn’t Daemos, so fired up and ready to do battle, not stormed over the entire world and set flame to it? Why hadn’t anyone begun to care about this infernal war?
Was Tortall the only country that cared about this?
Was Tortall the only insane one?
Or was it just the people?
With their revenge, that was insane?
