The sky seen above the Mount of Fear was also of a dark purple, almost black actually when at that late hour of the afternoon the sun should have been of a dark reddish, hurrying up to go to bed, and this made everything around look weird and as weird as the sky was acting, the animals, the insects, and even the plants were also acting this way, somehow confused about that unexpected caprice of nature. That’s why they crowded to exit their hide-out and looked around with fear while the plants became spiky as if preparing for a battle.
Then, suddenly, a damn cold wind started to blow from nowhere, parching everything around, and a scary shout, as if of revenge, pierced the horizon.
A few moments later, two red foxes, clenched into each other, rolled on an inclined slope, heading at full speed down the valley. Even so, none of the foxes was content with only holding on to the fur of the other, but they also managed, from time to time, to deeply bite the other one’s flesh.
„Mayar! Inmar! Stop it!” Morena’s voice has been heard somewhere on the top of the mount to be also seen a few moments later, running after the two foxes that looked as if fighting for death and life.
A net, appeared from nowhere and that was stretching on dozen of meters in front, like a net used for surrounding a place, forcing the two foxes to stop their furious rolling, and, due to the impact with the unusual net, they have been thrown far apart and forced to separate thus.
After the impact, both confused because of that turn of events, they stood up on their front legs, and, when a kind of blue air has been thrown over them, they took their human body back, and, to stand up, they pushed their body up by using their hands.
A few moments later, Ahi showed up between the two, furiously watching them: „did you cool your soul now?” He shouted, looking at how pathetic they looked: shock-headed, with their face, neck, and arms scratched, and, here and there on their clothes, blood stains and teeth marks could be seen, caused by the bites they shared while rolling on that slope.
„I did nothing,” Inmar furiously snarled. „You also saw that she has been who attacked me first, brother as if she was controlled by the devil, not another.”
„I saw, but… you aren’t also better than her. Did you need to remind her about the past?” Ahi hissed through his teeth.
Mayar grinned, showing her fangs: „she always does this - asking for mercy while appealing to feelings.”
„You… small, ungrateful girl,” Inmar shouted, suddenly standing up. „Did you forget who raised you?”
„If not because of you and your beloved brother, Mannar, I would have grown up next to my mother, in a village of humans, and not wandering the world while following you,” Mayar told her furiously while still sitting on the ground.
„And do you think you would have survived there? Among humans, I mean. With your… character?” Inmar hissed through her teeth. „The blood inside you, the one which quickly flows through your veins, asking for more blood, wouldn’t have left you alone ever. It would have submitted you and, instead of chickens, you would have killed those humans. This is called savage instinct, Mayar. Each of us has it, even humans. And you aren’t an exception for sure.”
„Maybe you’re right, but yet… I would have chosen my destiny and I wouldn’t have been the monster I’m today. You don’t even know how much I regret being part of your family and having your blood, flowing through my veins,” Mayar, snarled, standing up, and intending to leave.
„Mayar! Stop it!” Morena shouted, being stopped only a few meters from them. „You can’t deny your family, as you can’t hate the blood that flows through your veins.”
Inmar looked thunderstruck at Mayar, for such confession confused her a lot, for she never expected that Mayar will ever find out about their kin.
Ahi instead stood in the same place where he showed up before this, with his eyes fixed on the horizon. But no trace of amazement, fear, or remorse was seen on his face as if he expected the girl to find out about his secret.
„Why? Since when the blood that flows through our veins makes us a family? I thought that what gathers a family is love, mutual respect, and… being afraid for the other. But… as I never knew what all this means, thanks to them, I can’t say that I know it for sure. Maybe… I’m wrong too,” Mayar murmured furiously.
Ahi bitterly smiled. „We are guilty now for your unfulfillment, you say?! But… why did you live in the shadows all these years then?”
Mayar looked at him, furious and confused at the same time, not being aware of what he was talking about.
„I’m talking about the ghost forest hidden in your soul. A forest created by you to hide from your nature,” and Ahi finally looked at his daughter while the anger was seen in his eyes, anger born from her ingratitude and the reproach for her words. „Maybe Mannar changed your destiny, but it hasn’t been for sure because of our request.”
„Then? Thanks to whom I’m the monster I’m today?”
„Eris! Maranam! Parca! The Titans! What do I know?! The only certain thing is that you were born as my daughter and that I’m responsible for it, as I’d been there while you grew up. Nothing more.”
„And… should I call you father only for this?”
„Mayar!” murmured Morena, trying to make her daughter come to her senses. But Mayar didn't hear her at that moment, being completely blinded by her hatred for the entire world, by her complaint that she had been scanted of her freedom, and because she has never had the chance to live her life.
She always thought that she lived someone else’s life when what she wanted the most was to choose her own path onto which to walk, to feel happiness, to feel that she was loved, a fact that actually made her really hate Samaya, for she considered her a rival for having a real family, and not for sharing the same face or having a different power.
„I don’t need to hear the word „father” from your mouth to know that I’m your father,” said Ahi in a hissing tone and full of anger. „The simple fact that you showed up in this world thanks to me should be enough for you to show me respect and have your gratitude.”
Mayar completely turned toward him when she was half turned from him till that moment, staring at him with a glance full of hatred. Then, she took a few steps toward him while saying: „both the respect and the gratitude are gained and not begged.”
Ahi suddenly moved his left hand, and that movement threw Mayar a few meters away from him as if someone kicked her stomach hard.
„To beg? I?” Ahi suddenly shouted in a thundering voice. Then, his power, which he couldn’t control anymore, made him really look scary: his hair raised in the air, slowly floating around him as if being moved by the wind as it happened to the skirts of his cloak while his eyes became shiny from black because Ahi was squeezing his fists.
„I don’t need to beg to have something. I’m more than proud of who I am,” he roared, standing up and horizontally floating in the air while slowly approaching Mayar, who was still sitting on the ground, touching her stomach with both hands, for she felt it really painful, that hit of Ahi.
But Mayar was different from all Ahi’s enemies with who he fought during his life and, as he always did while fighting with Mannar in Coallar’s grotto, looking straight into his enemy’s eyes without bowing his head, the same did Mayar at that moment and, unnoticed, she threw a fireball toward her father, which hit the one thrown by Ahi.
And when the two balls hit the other, a gust of hot air, as if it was hot magma, scattered all around, forcing Inmar and Morena to cover their faces with their arms and throw themselves to the ground to survive, for none of them was powerful enough to face the power created by the hatred between a father and a daughter.
Taking advantage that the two fireballs were still floating in the air, barely touching each other and looking as if lurking on what the other was doing, Mayar stood up, not losing sight of Ahi, and, slapping her hips, she also jerked in the air, floating at the same height as Ahi, but vertically.
Spotting his daughter’s movement, only from the corner of his eye, Ahi decided that it was time to become rational, for even if he wanted to teach his daughter a lesson, he didn’t want to hurt the earth, especially being aware of Mayar's huge power and how destructive could be the force of her mind, just as he didn’t know why she was so upset with Inmar when they had such arguments before, but never such violent.
„What do you intend?” Ahi asked her eventually, spotting the red thread coming out of Mayar’s right palm.
„To destroy you!” Mayar hissed through her teeth and her eyes suddenly turned mad as if she really lost her mind, and the thread from her palm, which was barely formed, suddenly jerked in the air and joined the fireball created by her, as if pushing it toward Ahi.
„Mayar, come to your senses!” He demanded her, seeing how the red ball of the girl, in contact with the thread, started to split on one side as if it opened its mouth to swallow something.
„Why? Are you afraid?” Mayar said, grinning, but her weird voice, somehow unexpected, made Ahi curious.
„This is not you, Mayar. But… who are you? Show up!” Ahi furiously ordered, and his mad roar, as if scaring the two fireballs, made them swallow each other.
But the balls became one only due to Mayar’s power, something well felt by Ahi, who, as if powerless, fell on his knees at the moment a single fireball was seen floating in the air.
Painful and helpless, Ahi looked up and watched Mayar, who seemed so calm while still floating in the air.
Then, as if trying to see how far it will get her madness, Mayar descended to the ground and started to walk toward her father, but still not losing sight of him, who was watching her without even blinking.
„It’ll be a little bit hard for me to answer this question,” Mayar ironically said and, snapping her fingers, she changed places with Ahi, but not the position they had at that moment: she continued standing, confidently walking toward him while Ahi continued on his knees. Yet, Ahi could see Morena and Inmar lying on the ground, unconscious.
„What have you done to them?” Ahi hissed through his teeth.
„I? Nothing! Let’s just say that I didn’t want to leave witnesses of your disappearance,” and Mayar suddenly stopped.
„Disappearance? What the hell are you talking about?”
„That you always stood in my path when I wanted to get something, that you always followed my footsteps just to find out what I was planning, and that you always beat me with my own weapons just to feel yourself a gainer,” Mayar hissed the words while her eyes started to move in small, black circles as if they were the entrance into a black hole, rotating somehow in a spiral, a kind of black hole formed in Mayar’s soul.
„Parca!” Ahi snarled eventually. „It was you! And I wondered what the hell happened to Mayar that she attacked her family.”
„Ah, busy-body!” Mayar furiously whispered and, moving her head from one shoulder to the other one, as if trying to chase the numbness away from her neck, a deaf sound has been heard around them, and Parca has been right away thrown out of Mayar’s body.
Yet, even though they split up, Mayar continued to stay in place, with a lost glance while squeezing her fists and a barely heard gnashing was heard coming out from her mouth.
Ahi looked at his daughter for a few moments, trying to understand what had happened to her, for all this was too weird to be true. Only after a few moments of staring at her, did he murmur: „it was a trap! It wasn’t Mayar who we took out of that forest along with Morena.”
„Who knows?! Maybe yes, maybe no, or maybe it was just me, the one with a lot of faces, pretending to be vulnerable, so eager to be protected by my… father,” Parca said in mockery.
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„What are you trying to do, Parca? I don’t think that’s because of all the fights we fought during the millennia. If it had been this way, we would have destroyed each other, and long ago actually.”
„And… you’re right, for it wasn’t my intention to destroy you. Not until having what I always wanted, and one of the things I wanted so badly was the birth of this child. Or what… did you think that you decided by yourself to have that mortal at any cost?”
„You?! But… how is this possible? I’ve never been influenced by you,” Ahi murmured confusedly.
„And you’re again right. But… you forget that I have control over the humans and… I also have the power to control your pretty sister, who, being half-born from humans, is submitted to me,” Parca said, laughing. „Thanks to Inmar, you met Morena, and also thanks to Inmar you felt the desire awakening inside you and, when you couldn’t control yourself anymore, you seduced the woman and put a seed of great power in her womb, for… at the moment Chaos and Life decided Samaya’s birth, I decided Mayar’s, for it was too cruel what they were planning: to bring a soul without a shadow into this world. That’s why Mayar was born: to be always Samaya’s shadow, her darker part, the one who’s always trying to subdue her, to destroy her, the one who won’t ever let her freely breathe and who’ll kill her eventually.”
„But… how did you manage to control Mannar?” Ahi murmured barely heard when a wave of pain, controlled by Parca, pierced his body, making him gasp several times while that wave of pain was crossing his body from his mind to his heart and back.
„Mannar? I never controlled him. And… do you know why? Because I was born from his energy,” and the Titanide of Fate’s words amazed Ahi so much, who looked thunderstruck at her.
„Did you born from Mannar’s energy? But… how is this possible?”
„Well, it hadn’t been actually that difficult, for, at the moment Yggdrasil, Chaos, Lodur, and the rest who decided my birth, at Shiman’s suggestion, the king of Cyclops, others took care to „suggest” them the right place for my birth - the Glade of Mannar, the place where he was imprisoned, and when that blessing wave of energy, created by Gaea and the rest, started to slowly float above his cell, the black energy of Mannar came alone out of his palm and, joining the other energy, they created the egg which I’ve been born from. Thus, mine and your brother's Fate is the same, having a single purpose in this life.”
„Maranam’s freedom,” murmured Ahi, as if finally understanding Parca’s mean purpose.
„No. Maranam is already free and not because we did something. Our purpose is other: to put Maranam on the throne and, after this, to control the world,” shouted Parca when her darker side took completely over her, and the energy caused by her shout made the horizon shudder.
Yet, even if she intended to turn Ahi to dust and ashes with her madness, at the moment a fire sword appeared in her hand and she hit the air, intending to decapitate him, the two fireballs, created by Mayar and Ahi’s power, joined into one, suddenly exploded, creating a kind of ovoid portal, not big, about half meter, with serrated edges, and a mysterious power dragged both Parca and Mayar inside of it.
Only Parca’s mad shout has still been heard for a while inside the Portal, which closed as quickly as it appeared, and this was due to Mayar’s power, for even if Parca controlled her body and mind, she has been also deceived by her Fate, which she bragged so much of creating it: she couldn’t control Mayar’s inner eye, the one which was protecting the girl and which didn’t want to let her destroy her own family.
But not only Parca has been surprised by that unexpected turn of events. This also happened to Ahi, who could look around only after that powerful light, caused by the explosion, which blinded him for a while, vanished. Yet, even if he was clearly seeing all around, he could see neither Parca and Mayar nor the fireballs - only Morena and Inmar were still lying on the ground, controlled by an unseen force.
Suddenly, Ahi looked in the distance, at the sky that was sparkling under the light of the intermittent thunders, which were so cruelly piercing the sky’s vault.
„Maranam!” Ahi hissed through his teeth. „You decided to use my child for your mean purposes. But you forget a thing: you messed with the Titans and with the whole world now, threatening to destroy us, to kneel us in front of you, making us your slaves. But… there’s no place left in this world for you, for despite our rivalry and nature, we are still respecting the others’territory, the others’power, and family, whatever if that person is an evil Mago, a simple witcher, or a simple blade grass. You instead trampled everything under your feet and you’ll be punished for this, even if I must deal with the devil himself.”
„And… what do you want to do?” Ahi heard his mother’s voice behind him, for Tenebre showed up there so suddenly, only like a projection, controlled by the power of her Palantir while she kept hiding in her den.
Ahi slowly turned toward his mother, looking with hatred at her, for he knew that only due to her insane desire to help Eris, did she expose Mannar, to later subdue them all, and he hadn’t the minimal desire to be her puppet or of someone else.
„What will I do?” He said, ironically grinning while feeling the hatred boiling inside his chest. „I’ll destroy all those that try to subdue me and this might start with you if you stay against me.”
Tenebre also grinned, for even if she never loved Ahi, she still considered him her son and she would have wanted him fighting by her side and not against her. „I don't have the slightest doubt that you are more than capable of something like this, Ahi. But… you forget one thing: the blood never turns into water. That’s why you try to destroy Parca. For what she did to Mayar.”
„And also for this, you try to release Mannar. Also using Mayar.”
„I don’t see anything mean in this. We’re a family…”
„You’re trying to kill her. That’s all. Don’t look for an excuse for your mean deeds, for I know very well that if Mayar releases Mannar she’ll be killed or her power will be taken by Mannar or Maranam, making them invincible.”
„Does a small sacrifice for a noble cause mean that much?” Tenebre murmured, looking with superiority at her son. „You’re immortal, Ahi. Even if you lose a daughter, you can have another one.”
„As long as there’s still life on earth, I’ll have another child, yes. But… I doubt that Maranam will leave something alive here after subduing us all because I'm more than sure that it’ll be only darkness and ruin all around.”
„It’ll be our era. It’ll be our glorious kingdom, and with Eris on the throne…,” Tenebre furiously shouted, for she couldn’t understand at all her son’s stubbornness and that he didn't see that great future she dreamt about.
„Eris?! Queen?! On the throne?!” Ahi said and burst into a peel of hysterical laughter. „If you think that Maranam will be Eris’s slave, you are so wrong, for Maranam was born as a king and he’ll die as a king, and Eris will be rather destroyed than crowned.”
„You’re lying! You’re wrong, for…”
„No, mother, I’m not wrong at all, for no matter how strong the master of darkness isn’t, he can't subdue light forever, not while there are still humans in this world, not while there is still Life there, in the Cosmos, that will always fight to turn the darkness back to the same bottomless hole which it exited from,” Ahi hissed through his teeth, vanishing soon after.
Tenebre’s projection also vanished, for she was really upset with what she heard and saw. That’s why she roared like a mad person and hit the Palantir, which rolled on the floor, hiding eventually in a corner.
„Useless!” Tenebre eventually said as if snarling the words. „The same father, the same son! Both got crazy for a mortal - one is ready to die for a daughter, who was born to make him king, while the other one is hiding like a coward in his den, afraid to see the daylight. But… I’ll make it, what you couldn’t do: I’ll make Eris queen, but I’ll release Mannar first, and I must have that child for this, Mayar, no matter where Parca is hiding her,” and, snapping the fingers, she vanished.
***
„What’s going on?” murmured Morena after coming back to her senses and looking at Inmar, who was standing, with her back at her, and staring at the scorched soil above which the Portal had been before.
„Life is changing. Like the camps,” murmured Inmar, without taking her glance from that circle with serrated edges, as the Portal had.
„The camps?” Morena murmured, confused. After that, she forced herself to stand up and approach Inmar. „Great Lord, what’s this?” The woman asked, frightened, finally spotting the scorched ground.
„Mayar’s hatred, for everything that happened to her. And now, controlled by Parca, who is poisoning her mind and soul against us, I think she’s capable of everything.”
„Parca? The Titanide of Fate? But… I don’t understand. Why does she need Mayar?”
Bending and taking a white feather from off the ground, one of those which were often falling from Parca’s body when she was transforming into a bird, Inmar squeezed it in her hand, hissing through her teeth: „Everyone wants the power and, for having it, they are ready to lose their minds. But… I doubt she’ll make it. Especially having such a big power against them.”
„Do you mean Ahi?”
„No. Even if my brother is powerful, yet, he can't face everybody alone. That’s why he’ll look for allies, especially to the North,” and Inmar looked over there, where the sky was seen sparkling above those places.
Also watching over there, Morena murmured: „The Rophion Forest.”
„Exactly. Rophions always had a big future written in the stars, but nobody ever thought about what big cause they are fighting for. Now instead, we all must face the reality against which we have always fought and which we have also denied. But it seems that we must join them if we want to fulfill the prophecy written by the sky and save this world and the souls still closed in Aeon.”
„But… what you say is impossible. Even if humans don’t know much about magic and the rest of the things that happen in your world, they all know about the rivalry that exists between the Rophions and the red foxes, especially about Ahi’s hatred for his brother Island, who is actually fighting by Dike’s side, the king of Rophions.”
Inmar sketched a bitter smile: „when a deadly danger waits for us at the edge of a forest, we all forget about stupid rivalry and egos and we join our forces just to survive. This is something common for us and for them. That’s why, since today, the red foxes will swallow their pride, will lick their wounds, forgetting their past, at least for a while, and will only look in front.”
„Yet, you’re afraid,” Morena murmured, feeling Inmar’s hand shaking when she touched it.
„I won’t deny this, Morena. I won’t deny that I’m afraid of death, of Rophions, as I won’t deny that I won’t ever consider them my friends or I’ll forget the rivalry that exists between us. But… I must bow my head and swallow the bitterness from my soul only to see the daylight once again, for… if Maranam controls the world, we won’t have what living for anymore. So… let’s go to the camp till Ahi won’t go and tell him that we will be by his side. I know he needs us. That’s why he must accept us, for there where are many, fighting for a single cause, there's also a success, but when only one fights then there's no chance to succeed.”
Visibly walking with a limp, for she hurt her leg while fighting with Mayar, and with the explosion, Inmar headed toward the top of the mount where their camp was.
Morena instead continued in the same place for a few minutes more, staring both at the scorched ground and the madly sparkling sky. Then she said: „oh, Great Chaos, protect us from that evil that’s lurking on us, and don’t let us alone, the sinners.”
Then, Morena slowly followed Inmar, for even if she didn’t have a soft spot for her as she didn’t consider her a friend as it happened before, the woman still knew that the fox was right: only together the humans and the other creatures still had a chance to survive.
***
„What will you do?” Anaya asked Ahi in half a voice, entering the small room in which he stopped after leaving the battlespace.
He was sitting on a big chair, made from precious stone, with his hands supporting his head and extremely thoughtful. „I don’t know, to be honest,” he murmured, after a few moments of silence. „For the first time in my life, I don’t know what to do or where to go.”
„Then… listen to your heart, if your mind is stubborn,” Anaya confidently said, heading toward him.
Ahi raised his glance and looked at her for a while, for that old fox, that has been human once, managed to become wise in time, much wiser than he managed to be after so many centuries of life. Then, he also appreciated her for her ability to read his soul, even if there were things he liked to keep secret, even from him. „But… to do that, I must trample my ego under my feet.”
„But… what’s more important for you: the ego or Mayar?”
„Both. Actually, I can’t give up on none of them.”
„Then… you’ll lose them both, and you know that, for without compromises in a war, it means to lose. That’s why you must choose,” the old lady said, sitting on that small, cubic stone that was not that far from that blind window carved in the wall, for even if it wasn’t heading outside, Ahi could still see through it due to his power, when he wanted to stay hidden.
Anaya instead didn’t have that power: to see through the wall as if looking through a window. But, even so, sitting on that stone, with her chin supported on her palms and with her elbows well-stuck on her knees, the old woman was looking at that window, comparing it with the window of her soul, for both were blind and not allow her to look at the past as if it was the border which she had forbidden to step over. „And… there is one more important thing one must do if he wants to succeed, no matter if it’s wartime or not,” she murmured.
„Like?”
„Listening to your wisdom and you know this very well, for no matter how hard you don’t hate Island as you hate anyone else that’s standing by his side, you must accept that they never hated you or wanted you bad.”
„But it’s insane what you say, old fox, for…”
„Did they ever attack you without a reason? Did they hurt you only because they wanted to hurt you or did Island fight with you only for winning?”
„I must say no. But, even so, I can’t deny that our father put us against each other.”
„You said this: It has been Coallar who made you hate each other. But who continued that dangerous game was you,” Anaya calmly said, watching him.
Ahi instead couldn’t look for long into the woman’s eyes and quickly looked elsewhere.
Though she noticed that strange movement, Anaya didn’t consider it a personal triumph. She only kindly smiled and continued her thought: „who always attacked has been you and you must accept it, as you must accept that Island fought with your hatred, showing anger only to protect his people and his land. You instead did this for your ego. But… I won’t reproach you for this as you mustn’t do that. The reason why you did this is something of the past and if you are taking the can back it’s because you’ll deserve it. And if I insist on this is to make you see the strong points of an alliance with Dike and Island.”
„And… may I know which are the advantages?”
„One of them and the most important in my opinion: you’ll still have a head on your shoulders, something you’ll lose for sure if being alone in the fight with Maranam, for if doing this, you must face Mannar one day, who even if completely lost his mind and doesn’t know who he is, he still feels the hatred for you and he’ll do everything to kill you. And the second advantage: you’ll save Mayar from darkness and she’ll finally fulfill her purpose in this world.”
„Purpose? What purpose?” Ahi asked in amazement, for since he has known Mayar, he could never clearly see what was her destiny. The old fox instead seemed to know this or at least she could guess.
„Everything will be revealed at the right time, Ahi. Don’t rush the Wheel of Time. And the third advantage, also important for all those involved in this horrible war, but fighting against Maranam, will be survival, and when the world is back to normal, you can keep your advantages in front of others.”
„Advantages? What advantages?”
Anaya looked at that blind window carved in stone and again smiled. Then, her lips murmured, barely heard: „to possibly be the father of a new Maranam.”