Rias pendragon
Talia tied a small purple bow into the plume, she thought she needed also to braid. The golden plume that was fused to my helm reached just above my waist, the length would vary depending on if I cut it or magically changed the length. This time I kept it the same length it always was, to me the length didn’t matter so much however the ‘experts’ said it wasn’t practical.
“You better win. Show them who their saint of war is.” From beneath my helm, a smile graced my lips seeing Talia’s look of determination as she now held Rain in her arms. Even though Rain was only a few months old I felt the urge to make her feel proud. Maybe it was the feeling of being a mother in another life, twice to be exact but this time. This time I felt more like a father. I couldn’t focus on these feelings even if I wanted to, the event that was starting today stood waiting, this was a several-hour-long event that could last days. Things could arise here and there which could make it last longer one such time this event lasted a week.
Four bells rang one after the other with a low-toned chime accompanied by throat chanting from southern druids of Tramon. Turning to face the cyan portal I felt the cold rush of snow overload my senses, yuletide now in full swing with the heavy downpour of black rain and pale snow blanketing every area of Numena. With a longer-than-needed breath, I stepped through the portal, not knowing the location as it was random for everyone. I could step onto the wild plains of the north or right beside the eventide on the beach.
However, that wasn’t the case. I happened to land in the southern region of the staging grounds near the edges of the forest. To my knowledge I was near two possible locations where some laurels were placed, collect as many laurels as possible whilst defending them from my assailants is my single objective. Laurels are the most important thing in this event, collecting the most was the aim to get either first or second. Those who got first and second would get a chance of having a wish fulfilled, wishes could be anything but they could also be denied as a cruel twist of fate.
“I should move before I'm attacked from behind.” My voice muffled from the metallic plating of my helm and the cushion material of the inside squeezing my cheeks closer together. With every step from my heavy-clad raven steel armour, the snow crunched in that familiar sound of breaking bone and cracking twists of branches. Sounds of war, the knights of old would call them, used to the sound of the battlefield that were replicated by many everyday items.
Some were numb to those feelings, others weren’t so lucky as they would jump at the clatter of steel, the snapping of branches or the cough of phlegm. I had to admit that though I was somewhat numb, a few things could trigger a flinch, it wasn’t regular but it happens every so often. ‘I must focus…’ pulling my thoughts away from the shellshock, I carried on toward the first point of interest in my line of sight. An old monument to the kindest of the Talos gods, my mother of that life Angelica. I may give the Talos gods a bad rep for how they treated me, nonetheless my mother was different and so was kaliryn once upon a time.
Angelica my mother was the first goddess born from the corpse of a dying sun-key. She like me had fair pale skin that radiated a thin ray of gold alongside the vibrant tint of gold from her eyes. My mother didn’t live long as a goddess since my father’s constant ambition to have absolute power within his grasp. Angelica the sun goddess lived for two centuries guiding the dead to the land of peace, yet that wasn’t always her role as she was once the one who also took on the role of being how the night would come or go.
All this however was a fabrication as we Talos gods were nothing more than proxies for higher beings, the eldritch. Slaves to powers who bound us to truths not our own, my father wanting absolute power made a deal with oryan that meant if my mother was sacrificed, he would have absolute control over us. Without missing a beat my father took this deal killing my mother Angelica in the process, castil under Talos’s orders destroyed every remnant of Angelica.
“Look what’s happened to us now Mother. Our families split.” Kaliryn stepped out of the shadows to face me standing by the monument of a dead past. All that remained was a cracked façade of a statue that stood its ground against the onslaught by Talos’s hand. All that remained beside the statue was a small flower bed of lilies frozen in time due to someone's tears. Tears of a child who couldn’t live without her mother, who watched as everyone turned against her even those, she thought were her friends.
“Imagine how Mother Angelica would feel seeing her star now? Anger? Hate? Pain? Maybe happiness?... ha I doubt it. I bet she’d be disappointed don’t you think sister?” Kaliryn jumped in my face her hands, clasped behind her as she stared intently into my eyes. Kaliryn looked almost disappointed at herself seeing as I didn’t respond, nor did I move in away as I did as the naïve child of the sun. I wasn’t going to entertain any sick game she wanted to play with that broken mind of hers.
“Shame. It is. I came with an offer. Nothing more. Nothing less.” She outstretched her gangly sharp nailed left hand as if she was the beast masquerading as a jester. Her appearance matched this, though she was pale-skinned the rest of her matched the cliché look of a devil. Shiny black long hair, and crimson eyes matching the glow of rubies with the aura of a snake pulling in a potential victim. ‘Deal with the devil’ Kaliryn with a slight crook of the head stepped back once more towards our ‘mothers’ statue.
“Ugh! You are no fun. I’ll tell you the offer. I’ll help you kill castil and Imra… if you do something for me.”
“Why would I help you after everything you’ve done? I don’t need your help I can kill you on my own. I won't entertain your game, Kali.” My reply was stern, I made my position known. With a heavy sigh, she materialized two chairs and a table within a dark space devoid of all life except my fleeting one and hers. Against my will she sat me down on a leather oak-bound crimson-furnished bergère, my strength faded soon after that like I was bound to this chair until the deal was done.
Slamming her hand down on the table between us, drew my focus to a paged deal that was written in blood. Her signature style of drawing up official documents that would involve a soul or two. This time was different this deal worked in both of our Favors according to her, she would help rid of those two thorns on my side if I gave her something she wanted, the stone I had on me. I knew exactly what she was referring to, the very thing that I suspect houses the soul of Hela.
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“No.”
“Worth of a shot… … …fine this is the real one.” She sounded almost bored clicking her fingers and making another piece of paper appear from thin air. The restraints binding me faded allowing my strength to return but not enough for me to lunge at her if the need arises. Crossing her legs she then placed the second deal on the table before looking at it, leaning over I took the paper into my hands to read it carefully even though I wasn’t going to agree with it. ‘Kaliryn the host of the deal gives unfiltered access to onrath in exchange for Rain’s soul’ Though I read them inside my head, kaliryn read them aloud to reinforce the point.
“Wait! Wait, wait, wait!” she yelled feeling the weight of me grip her suddenly.
“If you think I’ll give you Rain’s soul you have another thing coming.”
“Read it through fully, there is always a fine print!” she continued to yell, picking up the paper and pointing towards a small string of words at the bottom of the page. ‘Fine print my ass… that’s barely fucking visible.’ In what kaliryn called fine print was well something else. ‘If rain’s soul can't be provided something of equal value can be given away’. There was nothing of equal value to Rain’s soul not even my own if that remained after so long of being silent inside me. Removing my vice-like grip from kaliryn I stared her down with the familiar look of disgust I gave her when I grew older as Marin.
“Now that’s a look I remember fondly. The disgust you feel will fade eventually, won't it? I think an explanation is needed then… fuckin’ ‘ell. It wasn’t meant to be this difficult. You were just meant to take the deal and we’d go our separate ways but your morality gets in the fuckin’ way as usual.” Kaliryn rubbed the back of her neck feeling the ever-constant presence I gave her when I was around. “Father is back but he isn't the same. He goes by Talon now… the father of understanding what a stupid title! He is far more powerful than he was back then… from what I’ve gathered he has ascended to godhood.”
Cursing in my head I knew what exactly she meant by the term ascended. To the Talos gods and eldritch or not, ascension was pretty much true godhood. This meant my father was as close to becoming a primordial or could be considered one, whether I could determine this was true or not is yet to be seen, the way Kaliryn sank her head at this made me suspicious of her involvement. Taking one step my hand involuntarily drifted towards her sternum, sinking onto it with my index I pressed mana against her but there was. Nothing.
“You see it now, don’t ya? Father was unsealed by brother, by taking the key you planted in my chest. My mana core and soul are gone replaced with fake imitations not better than chew toys for the dead.” One mana core and soul shouldn’t be enough to unseal Talos well nothing should be able to as the other two keys are gone, shattered into the infinite. I made sure of this before my reincarnation was to have two of the keys destroyed because I could never bring myself to kill kaliryn or have her killed.
“How’d he accomplish something that should be impossible?” Kaliryn didn’t answer only placing her hand on my chest making me experience it for myself. My mind shifted to a time forgotten, this was a few hundred centuries after Talos was sealed, beneath the depths of Onrath a single girl lived in seclusion needing the life essence and blood of others to survive. Kaliryn a shell of her former self was rotting away alone with her fleeting sanity. I watched as the days went by turning from weeks to years then turning into decades, then into centuries.
Kaliryn was alone for all that time having survived like a beast becoming an urban legend of the people above. She tried to interact with them to no avail this led her down a spiral of hating the humans that she came across. Close to my reincarnation to become artura, castil appeared, his body taking on the form of an old wise scholar, my father’s aide. I watched him speak of profound glory and wanting the most respect in the world. He seduced kaliryn with promises of power and control of her powers that were driving her deeper into madness.
Kaliryn was desperate she listened to his words and did everything he asked due to her weakened mind she couldn’t see the lies he was speaking, none of them seemed off to her. Just like I had done with sophra, kaliryn never stopped to think if anything was wrong. The snake would visit kaliryn every week giving her rewards for her helping him find things he needed, he would even mess with her mind to gain access to what he truly needed. The key that would unseal Talos, her heart or more accurately her core.
When I was born as artura, was the day Castil struck with the might of a thousand dark spells. Those spells formed into one single spell that he named the raven’s call, that spell split kaliryn, her soul was destroyed never to be retrieved. Her frail body remained rotting into nothingness and her mind became fractured. Her core was stolen, the key was then used to unseal Talos in the very spot kaliryn lay in the dark musty caves of Riel’s undergrowth.
“Well done my son, now we will finish what we started. This girl who is she?” Talos’s voice seemed disinterested, but he questioned who kaliryn was. Castil explained who exactly she was and Talos just hummed to himself kicking her a couple of times to the stone wall that stood behind them. Kali in her incredibly weakened state looked up at the man before her who she once called father. “I should have killed you when I killed your mother… a shame your sister won't be here to see you die.”
Before he could kill her though, castil explained to his father that the place was about to collapse, and they had to get out quickly before they would perish. They both left kaliryn to die in the depths but somehow, she was able to save herself fleeing into deeper depths far below onrath unseen by all. A hidden world of life slowly being devoured by death and non-existence, a singular being sat in this place offering a place to kaliryn. With no soul, a broken mind and a frail body she made her slowed way towards this figure clad in black cloth.
“Come here, my child.” The being spoke stretching her hands out ready to embrace the broken million or more-years-old being. Time after elapsed travelling faster than I could watch it, kaliryn never found a new soul but she was able to fix her mind and become strong with her body once more through the very same ways she used to survive those centuries alone. Eventually, this figure would leave kaliryn to her own devices, kali had questions for this being and she answered as many as she could before she disappeared, but a name stuck out to me. She called herself Ihwa.
She explained she wasn’t of this world or any other universe that could be held, she was from a time long lost to all like her two sisters. Ihwa just before disappearing spoke of her past living a world more advanced than this one far beyond our comprehension. There she lived with her sister and her nieces Yuson, Karina and Cha. She didn’t say much more than that leaving kaliryn with more questions, but she let them be for now. After a few moments, I returned to the reality. No longer inside the black world but real world with kaliryn in her true form, not that devilish façade.
She sat on the ground before the monument to Angelica, her glowing white hair on full display, Kaliryn’s golden eyes more vibrant than my own gleaming beautifully in the snow. Her pale skin radiated an angelic light like that of a divine being coming down from the heavens, kaliryn was Mar- My twin. Yes, the clothes she wore showed less skin looking more like a sentinel berserker, but she still looked like me in every way besides. As of this moment, she wore a nomadic ranger outfit with rolled-up sleeves the last outfit she wore before Talos was sealed.
On her uncovered arms were barbaric inked runes in a scratched manner even covering her hand entirely in ink from fingertip to wrist. Even her uncovered neck was covered in barbaric runes, two tribal raves were inked into the shaved sides of her braided pearl pale white hair, all these inked markings, runes and symbols gave me a sense of familiar similarity. That golden under glow the runes on my body tended to show.
“You see now don’t you, why I need you to take any deal I offer whether it's my life on the line or yours. I can’t keep up this appearance no matter how much I try because I lost the key to that bastard’s prison. Losing one’s heart has ridden this body of a true form even some get lost in the unknown reaches of a broken mind. The deals I've shown so far are just a test. The real deal I want to propose is in more your favour than anything, I’ll give everything I didn’t and did give castil… I’ll give more. I just want one thing in return.”
For a moment she paused not speaking only lifting her head to meet my gaze. All the while I was still not offering an answer to any of her deals I was quiet for the moment listening to every word that left her mouth. She didn’t speak in unknown terms or broken languages but one we could both understand clearly, tramonic a version of it so old not even the eldritch would understand it. A language once made up by two fools who wanted to speak in code so others couldn’t suspect.
Kaliryn looked at me. Waiting for me to do something that would show her I was truly listening, with no other choice I removed my helm from off my head. With my full current appearance on full show, I looked at Kaliryn who glanced from the highlights in my hair to the full length of it, to the hollowness in my eyes.
“All I want from this deal is for you to free me.”