Post by Lady Hammer on Sept 20, 2007 18:22:44 GMT -5
3: Cataclysm
I lashed out and slapped Aleth across the face in fury, glaring at him like my eyes were knives.
“You watch what you call me,” I warned, viciously. “I am no filthy creature of Chaos. If anyone is filthy, it’s you!” I was looked down on and laughed at, and it was the simplicity of it all that got me boiling. A smirk twisted on Aleth’s lips.
“You wish I wasn’t.”
“Our wishes are the same!” I yelled, baring my teeth. The frigid rain pounded against my back, weighing down the heavy fabric of my dress, and I was beginning to feel the fatigue, but I waited for him to speak again. What a way to ruin Allanis’s party. I felt horrible now, but it seemed to be that once I started, my fury didn’t let me stop. Otherwise, I would’ve quit right then and went inside to enjoy my damn cider.
“Are they?” he asked me.
“Don’t!” I shouted, pointing. “Don’t you shove this on me like I have a reason to be patronized!”
“Tell me Tizzy, did I have a reason to be patronized?” My heart sank. “Did I come back to get exactly what I got before?” I could hardly breathe. “Typical.”
“Shut up!” I clenched my fist, ready to strike, but pulled the reins on my anger just in time. “You know we’re not going to be like that again! You’re just being stubborn! You’re just being an ass!”
That kept him silent for awhile. The rain made pattering sounds on the sleety ground as the hail slowly calmed, easing me a little. Tiny ripples plinked in the mud puddles, and as we stood there for what felt like an eternity, the rain intensified.
“Are you done yet?” he asked me. A droplet of water fell from my eyelash as I blinked up. It rolled off my nose and down my lips as they parted for my reply.
“Are you?”
The rain had become interested in the situation, becoming monotonous and listening in on our conversation, waiting for us to speak. It pounded dully, as if no longer enthused by soaking the earth it washed on.
“I guess I should have stayed away, after all. I knew it was a bad idea to come,” he said, shaking his head in disgust. I threw my hands in the air and sighed, loudly. Why was he being such a jerk? Was there something wrong in just letting bygones be bygones? I have no doubt in my mind that everyone back in the Hallenar House would be more than willing to beg for forgiveness and admit their wrongdoings if… if he just came back.
“Why do you have to be this way?” I yelled, biting my lip. If I wasn’t careful, I was going to start crying…
“You and I are very alike Tizzy!” he suddenly shouted. I shut up, seeing his fists clench. Maybe he felt like saying something now. “We are! There, I said it! I came here tonight because of you!”
What the hell? What significance to I have with any of this? I’m just your run-of-the-mill fed up, annoyed, and unhappy woman waking up every morning to know that I’m living a lie. I guess in the end that might amount to something, but I thought I was just like everyone else.
“You know you think you’re nothing special,” he snapped, his voice starting to break as he paced back and forth, “but that’s only what you think, and you need to stop lying to yourself!”
I would’ve liked very much to know what he was talking about. Maybe I wasn’t so normal like everyone else, after all. I mean, not everyone was a vegetarian, right?
“You know it. You’re just hiding it. When are you going to stop?” he asked. He called me a nightwalker. A nightwalker. I didn’t know what it was, but I knew it was something bad. I had heard things in hushed voices about them, and that’s all I knew. Was he being serious when he called me that, or was he just trying to be an ass?
“Tell me more about this war,” I demanded, ignoring the topic completely.
“Tizzy—” he sighed and shook his head, “forget it. Sandroya has prepared for an attack on the Hallenar House.”
Sandroya? What the hell could a big city full of clerics want with my sister? I still wouldn’t be surprised if Aleth was faking this entire thing.
“Sandroya? That big, huge city at the foot of the northern mountains?” Aleth nodded in response. “The cleric-infested one?”
“The cleric-infested one.”
I wasn’t piecing things together. Then again, I was never good with puzzles. I always ended up getting pissed off and throwing the pieces everywhere.
“Why are they attacking? I’m not understanding.” I doubt he would tell me, but it was worth a try. My brother, if I could call him that anymore, pocketed his hands and looked up into the bleak sky, or the patch of it that was showing through the dense clouds. It was a miracle that the moon was still visible on a night like that.
“I can’t say a whole lot right now,” he said, just like I had suspected, “but you’re going to be victimized. Sandroya is going to put into effect something called the ‘Dark Sweep Act’, and it’ll be passed in just a few days.”
“Who the hell would let something stupid like that be passed?”
Yeah, leave it to the Mirivin mainland to have a biased, idiotic capitol. You see, I lived on this small little mainland, subject to really severe seasonal weather, it seemed. Every mainland has a capitol that’s in charge of passing laws, spreading news, and confirming new orders across the land. Our capitol was this ‘Sandroya’ that Aleth claimed was planning an attack.
“Sandroya’s just trying to rid the mainland of Chaos,” he said. I was about to speak, but I paused. My mind flew by me, and I immediately began to worry about my other brothers.
“Wait… why are you so worried about me? What about Lazarus and Rhett?”
“Their city hasn’t been scoped out for war, yet. When the time comes, I just might consider telling them.” He just might? I blew the drops of rain from my lips and shoved Aleth away from me.
“You’re disgusting!” I shouted. “What do you mean, you just might consider? How could you stand thinking that way?”
“I don’t think I’m the disgusting one, here,” he said calmly.
“You don’t, huh?” I glared at him, but the gaze he gave me was quite serene. My temper wasn’t phasing him at all, which was only making it worse. The equanimity in his eyes was mocking me.
“If it makes you feel any better about this whole situation, I’m not working for Sandroya. I’m not their spy. I’m not a spy for any other town or city, nor am I employed anywhere else.” So what was that supposed to mean? I still couldn’t believe a word he was saying. I couldn’t be gullible like Allanis. Aleth would not make a fool out of me. “But,” he started again, “the story I told Allanis was somewhat of a lie. Sandroya isn’t trying to take over Suradia. They just want to rid the Hallenar House of Chaos.”
I swear, was I the only one on this stupid mainland who saw Chaos as something to build character? I’d certainly be the only one in Sandroya, apparently. But there was no Chaos in the Hallenar House. Lazarus and Rhett didn’t live there, so… what was going on? Was I just dense?
“I lied to save your ass,” Aleth explained. He waited for me to speak. I didn’t. Maybe I did understand, but I just wasn’t letting myself believe whatever I needed to. Who knows? Maybe that’s what I was doing. I was always lying to myself, so it was hard to catch it sometimes. “So the next time you want to call me disgusting, try not to forget that.”
I didn’t care. He still had some nerve coming here tonight. Calling me a nightwalker. I’m no such thing! Was I? My face had to have a look of unfathomable contemplation on it, because that’s what was going through my head, and Aleth was getting impatient. I could tell.
“When you finally decide to talk, you can find me in the town square, early morning. But don’t take your time,” he warned, “because I’m leaving before the sun rises.” I watched him, unaffected by the rain sliding down his white face, stare into my eyes, and leave. I blew the raindrops from my lips, wiped them from my forehead, only to have them waterfall back down again, and felt so much like crying, but I couldn’t. I turned around and trudged through the muddy sleet and tangled trees, and back into the Hallenar House.
The entry hall was longer than I remembered it as I droned down it, a trail of dirty water dripping off of my drenched dress, plastered to my body. Athen would have to clean my trail up tomorrow, because I sure as hell wasn’t going to do it. I came to the feast room.
How dare he. How dare he come here tonight, I thought. He shouldn’t have shown his face if he couldn’t drop the past and spend time with his family, who was, no matter how ignorant you were, obviously glad to see him. What an ass.
I would have ignored everything he said, if what he had to say didn’t have potential to ruin us. Sandroya attacking definitely had potential to ruin us. Still, I didn’t understand Aleth’s words. Were they attacking Allanis? Were they attacking the entire House? Or… were they attacking… me? It was ridiculous for them to be making such a fuss over me! I was not a nightwalker! I was just a normal, albeit annoyed, person.
Still, still, still… I wondered. I was so different from everyone. My family. Years ago, I had dark cherry brown hair, beautiful and curly, and my eyes were brown like most of my brothers’. I had always been fair skinned, but nowhere near as pale as I am now. It could be worse, I thought. I could be pale like Mariette. But, after a fitful night one year, I had started to change. I don’t remember anything of that night, or of most of the events taking place before or after it, but I wasn’t the same after that. My hair became thin and dark as the night, and color was draining from my skin. One day, I looked into the mirror and found these almost red eyes staring back at me. I was also struck down by immense cravings for meat, and that was when I became a vegetarian. As I compressed my cravings, my eyes became less red, and the color very slowly reappeared into my skin. I had an assumption of what had happened, but I didn’t want to believe it.
Aleth’s reappearance awakened the thought in my head. It was almost like the same thing was happening to him. And he said we were alike. Did he mean what I thought he did?
I stood before the family in the feast room. They all turned away from the fire, giving me nothing but perplexed stares. I stood there, unable to further give a damn, and started wringing out my sleeves, the fall of murky rainwater cascading down in obnoxious plunks. I didn’t care if they were looking at me. So what? The hell with them. The hell with whatever they were thinking.
“Was it raining outside?” Rori asked, tugging at a pet curl slung over her shoulder. My glare went straight to her.
“No.” Then, I started wringing out my black hair, more water falling, messing up the nice floors of the feast room. I couldn’t imagine what everyone was staring at. It was wet outside. Was I supposed to emerge from a rainstorm bone-dry? “What?”
“You are going to clean that up, right?” Allanis asked, pursing her lips. I let my hair fall back on my shoulders, gritting my teeth.
“No.” Eyes followed me as I went to sit by the fire, attempting to gain back a little of the body heat that was lost. What was their problem? Did they mind? I know I didn’t appreciate being stared at. But whatever. I didn’t give a damn about Allanis’s little party anymore. She got what she wanted, she got Aleth to show up, so that was good enough.
Lazarus’s smart move was to start a conversation. His not so smart move was to start one about Aleth. I wanted to stand up, walk over to him, and smack him in the face, but my dress was too heavy, and I didn’t feel like trying to stand up. So, I gave up on my frustration and decided to tune out of the conversation as much as possible. This wasn’t fair. But what was? Nothing was fair. Having seven siblings wasn’t fair. Being a middle child wasn’t fair. I didn’t fit in the family, and that’s how I had always felt, one way or another. Never seeing my parents wasn’t fair. Caring for my little sister, doing all the work for her, because she didn’t know how to be an effective ruler, was most definitely not fair. The injustice.
“I wonder what his deal was!” Rhett replied in the middle of the conversation. I agreed. What was up with Aleth? Wouldn’t they all like to know. It felt strange knowing such things that they didn’t, and it was weird having this one up on everyone. They all felt so distant now. Moreso than before. How could Aleth swamp me with such a decision, and with such thoughts? Didn’t that bastard have any consideration for my emotional well-being? That was a stupid question.
“Why does he have to be that way? Why couldn’t he stay for a little while?” Rori asked. Because. Aleth was an idiot. He was rude and uncaring, and had his priorities horridly mixed up. And he couldn’t drop the past. He latched onto it like everyone latched onto Mariette. I was going to get a crowbar and pry him away from it myself, if I had to.
“He scares me, now…” Allanis whispered, biting the rim of her cider glass. He scared me, too. I scared myself. I guess that could be what he meant by “we are alike”. No. No, he didn’t know anything.
“He’s not scary. But he did cause a huge cataclysm by showing up, tonight,” Adeska said. Ho! Did he ever! Too bad no one had any idea of all the cataclysmic action that I had heard.
“Tizzy, are you okay?” Centa asked, glancing at me. He’d better stay out of my business.
“Fine.” I stared into the fire, refusing to meet anyone’s eyes.
“She’s always like that!” Athen said, laughing. My head jerked in his direction, my mouth agape. How rude! Who the hell did he think he was, saying things like that?
“Shut up! I am not!” If there had been any noise in that room, I definitely quieted it. They all stared at me, fuming and quivering, until Allanis turned back to the fire. She was disappointed in me, I could tell. Everyone turned away with her, ignoring me, going back into their own conversations. Was I really always like this? Is that what everyone thought? Maybe… maybe if that was what everyone thought, I really would be better off – maybe they’d be better off – if I looked more into what Aleth was trying to tell me.
I felt a set of staring eyes on me, and glanced, showing my annoyance, to my side. Mariette was still gazing at me, like there was no tomorrow.
“You’re targeted,” was her prophecy this time. I wanted to tell her to shut up, I wanted to say it so bad. She knew nothing. Nothing at all. Now was not the time to be spouting nonsense at me! “And you know what you are.”
That was it. I couldn’t take it anymore. What the hell was wrong with the world? Or was I looking into the matter with a sense too broad? Regardless, I was fed up, and got to my feet, glaring at my now petrified niece.
“Don’t you talk to me. Don’t! Go talk to your stupid friends in the fire! Leave me alone!” I ignored everyone who snapped their heads in my direction, after that. I just wanted to get the hell away before Centa beat me for yelling at his daughter. Who did she think she was? She didn’t know anything, so who did she think she was, telling me all of these prophecies? I felt the eyes of everyone heavy on my back, and then I started running. I ran down the halls, each one almost closing in on me like Judgment. I ran until I reached my room, my sanctuary, and tore open the door, slamming it as hard as I could and falling against it in exhaustion. My fingers, stiff from the cold, flew to the lock and fumbled around, trying to flip the bolt. I then stood before my musty, bare room. I saw it for exactly what it was. There was my plain, blue-blanketed bed, by a window that was never open. The walls were dark and simple wood planks. A dark red rug was between the bed and a tiny fireplace, and there was my poor excuse for a bookshelf. I didn’t know why I ever wanted it – I would never have enough books to fill it. My room was nothing special.
Just like me.
I peeled my drenched dress from my body and placed my clothes in an old woven basket at the foot of my bed, and lit the single candle on my nightstand. The end. That was my room. And it was my room that then and there decided I would be leaving. The candlelight played on my face as I contemplated. Was I really going to do this? I started a meager fire and hung my dress off of the mantle in an attempt to have it dry by morning. It wouldn’t be, I knew this, but I was doing it anyway. Parts of my mind just weren’t listening to each other anymore. I sat there in front of my fire, naked, taking in the heat, trying to talk some sense into myself. But was that sense staying at the Hallenar House, or was it going to Aleth and discovering myself? One way or another, I was going to lose something. My family, or my entirety. Pick a card, Tizzy, pick a card…
I sifted through my clean clothes, or what was left of them, for what I would wear early morning. Maybe I was making an unreasonable decision. Maybe I should’ve thought it over more. But it wasn’t like the family couldn’t get along without me, right? They got along just fine without Aleth. So, whether I was going to stay or go with him, I was still going to end up the same. At least that’s what I was trying to tell myself.
I didn’t find many clean clothes. There was a long, white, long sleeved shirt that would keep me warm, at least a little bit; a cotton skirt, black, that reached down to my calves that would spare me the agitation by not dragging on the ground and getting dirty; and a heavy black coat that reached my ankles. It would do. I tired up my hair once I was dressed and put on my sturdiest boots. Take that, cold autumn weather. I had a few extra clothes that I packed for the hell of it, because after all, what good would they do me at home if I was leaving? I had some food that I kept in my room for when I wanted some solitude and packed that too, and put in a few gold coins for good measure. That was that. The bag was tied shut. But my packing wasn’t done yet.
I got on my knees to pull something ancient from under my bed. I remember why that black blade around Aleth’s waist had struck me the way it did. I had one, too. I completely forgot about it. They both had a story, but Aleth never told me all of it, just that the swords were twins, and the last objects crafted by a famous elf on the Siopenne Mainland before he was killed by a Chaos invasion. They were beautiful swords, and he said that we were meant to have them. Of course, we were very young, so he probably thought everything was meant for us. But I loved that sword so much. I fastened the scabbard around my waist on a belt, slipped the strap of my bag over my shoulder, and lied down in bed just like that. Fully clothed and everything. When I woke up in a few hours, I’d just get up and leave. I figured that if anyone was still awake, they would all be drunk anyway.
You’re targeted.
Shut up. Shut up, little girl. If anyone needed to be targeted, it was her.
You know what you are.
I didn’t know anything, and neither did she. Don’t tell me your nonsense! And what I was was none of her business anyway. It was no one’s business.
The fortitude of the darkness swamped over me, and my skin pricked up under my coat. I followed, my body, shivering, nearly pressing up against the tall figure before me. My breath left my mouth in a wispy cloud, and then, my vision, for an instant, blurred, and I stumbled into the one in front of me, cursing at myself for my clumsiness. Aleth turned around and faced me.
His light reddish-brown eyes gazed down with concern, worry maybe. His lips gave a frown of… sympathy? Sympathy… as he put his frigid hand to my face, lowering his head to look into my eyes. My vision blurred again, and my breath was coming short.
“Just hang on, Tizzy, hang on…” he whispered. His voice was pleading with me to stay conscious, and his warm breath against my forehead was tugging at my will. I looked up at him, and a sensation suddenly swept over me, and my hands started violently shaking, shaking like they never had before. I grabbed onto Aleth’s arm, a pounding in my mouth, and a sharp pain in my head causing me to stumble over. An immense craving surged through me.
“Tizzy, stay with me, you can fight this, you can!” He held me as still as he could, but my head arched back, pain searing up my spine and into my skull.
“No!” I screamed, “No I can’t!” My voice was shrill, shaking almost as bad as the rest of my body was, and tears of frustration and pain spilled from my eyes.
“God dammit,” Aleth said under his breath. I didn’t care, I wouldn’t get mad. He had shown more patience than anyone else ever had with me. Then, he put his hand on the back of my head and held me close to his chest. “Come on, Tizzy. Come on! You can do this!”
Next, I stood in a cold, dark hallway. Dull blue light seeped in through a window at the end… moonlight. In front of me was a door with a small silver handle that fit uncomfortably in my palm. I looked around for Aleth, but he wasn’t anywhere, so I drew in a sharp breath, the coldness irritating my lungs, and turned the handle. As the door opened, I looked down a steep staircase in a narrow, white-walled stairway. I almost had to turn to my side to walk down it. The handrails were freezing, but I grasped them with all the strength I had and slowly descended.
At the bottom, there was a barren room with the same, condescending white walls. The floor was shabby, wooden planks sticking up in some areas, and there was no light, save for the moonlight pouring in from a doorway. Its door was lying, ripped from its hinges, in the grass beyond it. As I stepped outside into the forest yard, my eyes found the most beautiful sight I might’ve ever seen. A pale silver dire wolf turned its head to me, dark sea-colored eyes staring coolly, and a coat that gleamed like the light from the sky.
I lashed out and slapped Aleth across the face in fury, glaring at him like my eyes were knives.
“You watch what you call me,” I warned, viciously. “I am no filthy creature of Chaos. If anyone is filthy, it’s you!” I was looked down on and laughed at, and it was the simplicity of it all that got me boiling. A smirk twisted on Aleth’s lips.
“You wish I wasn’t.”
“Our wishes are the same!” I yelled, baring my teeth. The frigid rain pounded against my back, weighing down the heavy fabric of my dress, and I was beginning to feel the fatigue, but I waited for him to speak again. What a way to ruin Allanis’s party. I felt horrible now, but it seemed to be that once I started, my fury didn’t let me stop. Otherwise, I would’ve quit right then and went inside to enjoy my damn cider.
“Are they?” he asked me.
“Don’t!” I shouted, pointing. “Don’t you shove this on me like I have a reason to be patronized!”
“Tell me Tizzy, did I have a reason to be patronized?” My heart sank. “Did I come back to get exactly what I got before?” I could hardly breathe. “Typical.”
“Shut up!” I clenched my fist, ready to strike, but pulled the reins on my anger just in time. “You know we’re not going to be like that again! You’re just being stubborn! You’re just being an ass!”
That kept him silent for awhile. The rain made pattering sounds on the sleety ground as the hail slowly calmed, easing me a little. Tiny ripples plinked in the mud puddles, and as we stood there for what felt like an eternity, the rain intensified.
“Are you done yet?” he asked me. A droplet of water fell from my eyelash as I blinked up. It rolled off my nose and down my lips as they parted for my reply.
“Are you?”
The rain had become interested in the situation, becoming monotonous and listening in on our conversation, waiting for us to speak. It pounded dully, as if no longer enthused by soaking the earth it washed on.
“I guess I should have stayed away, after all. I knew it was a bad idea to come,” he said, shaking his head in disgust. I threw my hands in the air and sighed, loudly. Why was he being such a jerk? Was there something wrong in just letting bygones be bygones? I have no doubt in my mind that everyone back in the Hallenar House would be more than willing to beg for forgiveness and admit their wrongdoings if… if he just came back.
“Why do you have to be this way?” I yelled, biting my lip. If I wasn’t careful, I was going to start crying…
“You and I are very alike Tizzy!” he suddenly shouted. I shut up, seeing his fists clench. Maybe he felt like saying something now. “We are! There, I said it! I came here tonight because of you!”
What the hell? What significance to I have with any of this? I’m just your run-of-the-mill fed up, annoyed, and unhappy woman waking up every morning to know that I’m living a lie. I guess in the end that might amount to something, but I thought I was just like everyone else.
“You know you think you’re nothing special,” he snapped, his voice starting to break as he paced back and forth, “but that’s only what you think, and you need to stop lying to yourself!”
I would’ve liked very much to know what he was talking about. Maybe I wasn’t so normal like everyone else, after all. I mean, not everyone was a vegetarian, right?
“You know it. You’re just hiding it. When are you going to stop?” he asked. He called me a nightwalker. A nightwalker. I didn’t know what it was, but I knew it was something bad. I had heard things in hushed voices about them, and that’s all I knew. Was he being serious when he called me that, or was he just trying to be an ass?
“Tell me more about this war,” I demanded, ignoring the topic completely.
“Tizzy—” he sighed and shook his head, “forget it. Sandroya has prepared for an attack on the Hallenar House.”
Sandroya? What the hell could a big city full of clerics want with my sister? I still wouldn’t be surprised if Aleth was faking this entire thing.
“Sandroya? That big, huge city at the foot of the northern mountains?” Aleth nodded in response. “The cleric-infested one?”
“The cleric-infested one.”
I wasn’t piecing things together. Then again, I was never good with puzzles. I always ended up getting pissed off and throwing the pieces everywhere.
“Why are they attacking? I’m not understanding.” I doubt he would tell me, but it was worth a try. My brother, if I could call him that anymore, pocketed his hands and looked up into the bleak sky, or the patch of it that was showing through the dense clouds. It was a miracle that the moon was still visible on a night like that.
“I can’t say a whole lot right now,” he said, just like I had suspected, “but you’re going to be victimized. Sandroya is going to put into effect something called the ‘Dark Sweep Act’, and it’ll be passed in just a few days.”
“Who the hell would let something stupid like that be passed?”
Yeah, leave it to the Mirivin mainland to have a biased, idiotic capitol. You see, I lived on this small little mainland, subject to really severe seasonal weather, it seemed. Every mainland has a capitol that’s in charge of passing laws, spreading news, and confirming new orders across the land. Our capitol was this ‘Sandroya’ that Aleth claimed was planning an attack.
“Sandroya’s just trying to rid the mainland of Chaos,” he said. I was about to speak, but I paused. My mind flew by me, and I immediately began to worry about my other brothers.
“Wait… why are you so worried about me? What about Lazarus and Rhett?”
“Their city hasn’t been scoped out for war, yet. When the time comes, I just might consider telling them.” He just might? I blew the drops of rain from my lips and shoved Aleth away from me.
“You’re disgusting!” I shouted. “What do you mean, you just might consider? How could you stand thinking that way?”
“I don’t think I’m the disgusting one, here,” he said calmly.
“You don’t, huh?” I glared at him, but the gaze he gave me was quite serene. My temper wasn’t phasing him at all, which was only making it worse. The equanimity in his eyes was mocking me.
“If it makes you feel any better about this whole situation, I’m not working for Sandroya. I’m not their spy. I’m not a spy for any other town or city, nor am I employed anywhere else.” So what was that supposed to mean? I still couldn’t believe a word he was saying. I couldn’t be gullible like Allanis. Aleth would not make a fool out of me. “But,” he started again, “the story I told Allanis was somewhat of a lie. Sandroya isn’t trying to take over Suradia. They just want to rid the Hallenar House of Chaos.”
I swear, was I the only one on this stupid mainland who saw Chaos as something to build character? I’d certainly be the only one in Sandroya, apparently. But there was no Chaos in the Hallenar House. Lazarus and Rhett didn’t live there, so… what was going on? Was I just dense?
“I lied to save your ass,” Aleth explained. He waited for me to speak. I didn’t. Maybe I did understand, but I just wasn’t letting myself believe whatever I needed to. Who knows? Maybe that’s what I was doing. I was always lying to myself, so it was hard to catch it sometimes. “So the next time you want to call me disgusting, try not to forget that.”
I didn’t care. He still had some nerve coming here tonight. Calling me a nightwalker. I’m no such thing! Was I? My face had to have a look of unfathomable contemplation on it, because that’s what was going through my head, and Aleth was getting impatient. I could tell.
“When you finally decide to talk, you can find me in the town square, early morning. But don’t take your time,” he warned, “because I’m leaving before the sun rises.” I watched him, unaffected by the rain sliding down his white face, stare into my eyes, and leave. I blew the raindrops from my lips, wiped them from my forehead, only to have them waterfall back down again, and felt so much like crying, but I couldn’t. I turned around and trudged through the muddy sleet and tangled trees, and back into the Hallenar House.
The entry hall was longer than I remembered it as I droned down it, a trail of dirty water dripping off of my drenched dress, plastered to my body. Athen would have to clean my trail up tomorrow, because I sure as hell wasn’t going to do it. I came to the feast room.
How dare he. How dare he come here tonight, I thought. He shouldn’t have shown his face if he couldn’t drop the past and spend time with his family, who was, no matter how ignorant you were, obviously glad to see him. What an ass.
I would have ignored everything he said, if what he had to say didn’t have potential to ruin us. Sandroya attacking definitely had potential to ruin us. Still, I didn’t understand Aleth’s words. Were they attacking Allanis? Were they attacking the entire House? Or… were they attacking… me? It was ridiculous for them to be making such a fuss over me! I was not a nightwalker! I was just a normal, albeit annoyed, person.
Still, still, still… I wondered. I was so different from everyone. My family. Years ago, I had dark cherry brown hair, beautiful and curly, and my eyes were brown like most of my brothers’. I had always been fair skinned, but nowhere near as pale as I am now. It could be worse, I thought. I could be pale like Mariette. But, after a fitful night one year, I had started to change. I don’t remember anything of that night, or of most of the events taking place before or after it, but I wasn’t the same after that. My hair became thin and dark as the night, and color was draining from my skin. One day, I looked into the mirror and found these almost red eyes staring back at me. I was also struck down by immense cravings for meat, and that was when I became a vegetarian. As I compressed my cravings, my eyes became less red, and the color very slowly reappeared into my skin. I had an assumption of what had happened, but I didn’t want to believe it.
Aleth’s reappearance awakened the thought in my head. It was almost like the same thing was happening to him. And he said we were alike. Did he mean what I thought he did?
I stood before the family in the feast room. They all turned away from the fire, giving me nothing but perplexed stares. I stood there, unable to further give a damn, and started wringing out my sleeves, the fall of murky rainwater cascading down in obnoxious plunks. I didn’t care if they were looking at me. So what? The hell with them. The hell with whatever they were thinking.
“Was it raining outside?” Rori asked, tugging at a pet curl slung over her shoulder. My glare went straight to her.
“No.” Then, I started wringing out my black hair, more water falling, messing up the nice floors of the feast room. I couldn’t imagine what everyone was staring at. It was wet outside. Was I supposed to emerge from a rainstorm bone-dry? “What?”
“You are going to clean that up, right?” Allanis asked, pursing her lips. I let my hair fall back on my shoulders, gritting my teeth.
“No.” Eyes followed me as I went to sit by the fire, attempting to gain back a little of the body heat that was lost. What was their problem? Did they mind? I know I didn’t appreciate being stared at. But whatever. I didn’t give a damn about Allanis’s little party anymore. She got what she wanted, she got Aleth to show up, so that was good enough.
Lazarus’s smart move was to start a conversation. His not so smart move was to start one about Aleth. I wanted to stand up, walk over to him, and smack him in the face, but my dress was too heavy, and I didn’t feel like trying to stand up. So, I gave up on my frustration and decided to tune out of the conversation as much as possible. This wasn’t fair. But what was? Nothing was fair. Having seven siblings wasn’t fair. Being a middle child wasn’t fair. I didn’t fit in the family, and that’s how I had always felt, one way or another. Never seeing my parents wasn’t fair. Caring for my little sister, doing all the work for her, because she didn’t know how to be an effective ruler, was most definitely not fair. The injustice.
“I wonder what his deal was!” Rhett replied in the middle of the conversation. I agreed. What was up with Aleth? Wouldn’t they all like to know. It felt strange knowing such things that they didn’t, and it was weird having this one up on everyone. They all felt so distant now. Moreso than before. How could Aleth swamp me with such a decision, and with such thoughts? Didn’t that bastard have any consideration for my emotional well-being? That was a stupid question.
“Why does he have to be that way? Why couldn’t he stay for a little while?” Rori asked. Because. Aleth was an idiot. He was rude and uncaring, and had his priorities horridly mixed up. And he couldn’t drop the past. He latched onto it like everyone latched onto Mariette. I was going to get a crowbar and pry him away from it myself, if I had to.
“He scares me, now…” Allanis whispered, biting the rim of her cider glass. He scared me, too. I scared myself. I guess that could be what he meant by “we are alike”. No. No, he didn’t know anything.
“He’s not scary. But he did cause a huge cataclysm by showing up, tonight,” Adeska said. Ho! Did he ever! Too bad no one had any idea of all the cataclysmic action that I had heard.
“Tizzy, are you okay?” Centa asked, glancing at me. He’d better stay out of my business.
“Fine.” I stared into the fire, refusing to meet anyone’s eyes.
“She’s always like that!” Athen said, laughing. My head jerked in his direction, my mouth agape. How rude! Who the hell did he think he was, saying things like that?
“Shut up! I am not!” If there had been any noise in that room, I definitely quieted it. They all stared at me, fuming and quivering, until Allanis turned back to the fire. She was disappointed in me, I could tell. Everyone turned away with her, ignoring me, going back into their own conversations. Was I really always like this? Is that what everyone thought? Maybe… maybe if that was what everyone thought, I really would be better off – maybe they’d be better off – if I looked more into what Aleth was trying to tell me.
I felt a set of staring eyes on me, and glanced, showing my annoyance, to my side. Mariette was still gazing at me, like there was no tomorrow.
“You’re targeted,” was her prophecy this time. I wanted to tell her to shut up, I wanted to say it so bad. She knew nothing. Nothing at all. Now was not the time to be spouting nonsense at me! “And you know what you are.”
That was it. I couldn’t take it anymore. What the hell was wrong with the world? Or was I looking into the matter with a sense too broad? Regardless, I was fed up, and got to my feet, glaring at my now petrified niece.
“Don’t you talk to me. Don’t! Go talk to your stupid friends in the fire! Leave me alone!” I ignored everyone who snapped their heads in my direction, after that. I just wanted to get the hell away before Centa beat me for yelling at his daughter. Who did she think she was? She didn’t know anything, so who did she think she was, telling me all of these prophecies? I felt the eyes of everyone heavy on my back, and then I started running. I ran down the halls, each one almost closing in on me like Judgment. I ran until I reached my room, my sanctuary, and tore open the door, slamming it as hard as I could and falling against it in exhaustion. My fingers, stiff from the cold, flew to the lock and fumbled around, trying to flip the bolt. I then stood before my musty, bare room. I saw it for exactly what it was. There was my plain, blue-blanketed bed, by a window that was never open. The walls were dark and simple wood planks. A dark red rug was between the bed and a tiny fireplace, and there was my poor excuse for a bookshelf. I didn’t know why I ever wanted it – I would never have enough books to fill it. My room was nothing special.
Just like me.
I peeled my drenched dress from my body and placed my clothes in an old woven basket at the foot of my bed, and lit the single candle on my nightstand. The end. That was my room. And it was my room that then and there decided I would be leaving. The candlelight played on my face as I contemplated. Was I really going to do this? I started a meager fire and hung my dress off of the mantle in an attempt to have it dry by morning. It wouldn’t be, I knew this, but I was doing it anyway. Parts of my mind just weren’t listening to each other anymore. I sat there in front of my fire, naked, taking in the heat, trying to talk some sense into myself. But was that sense staying at the Hallenar House, or was it going to Aleth and discovering myself? One way or another, I was going to lose something. My family, or my entirety. Pick a card, Tizzy, pick a card…
I sifted through my clean clothes, or what was left of them, for what I would wear early morning. Maybe I was making an unreasonable decision. Maybe I should’ve thought it over more. But it wasn’t like the family couldn’t get along without me, right? They got along just fine without Aleth. So, whether I was going to stay or go with him, I was still going to end up the same. At least that’s what I was trying to tell myself.
I didn’t find many clean clothes. There was a long, white, long sleeved shirt that would keep me warm, at least a little bit; a cotton skirt, black, that reached down to my calves that would spare me the agitation by not dragging on the ground and getting dirty; and a heavy black coat that reached my ankles. It would do. I tired up my hair once I was dressed and put on my sturdiest boots. Take that, cold autumn weather. I had a few extra clothes that I packed for the hell of it, because after all, what good would they do me at home if I was leaving? I had some food that I kept in my room for when I wanted some solitude and packed that too, and put in a few gold coins for good measure. That was that. The bag was tied shut. But my packing wasn’t done yet.
I got on my knees to pull something ancient from under my bed. I remember why that black blade around Aleth’s waist had struck me the way it did. I had one, too. I completely forgot about it. They both had a story, but Aleth never told me all of it, just that the swords were twins, and the last objects crafted by a famous elf on the Siopenne Mainland before he was killed by a Chaos invasion. They were beautiful swords, and he said that we were meant to have them. Of course, we were very young, so he probably thought everything was meant for us. But I loved that sword so much. I fastened the scabbard around my waist on a belt, slipped the strap of my bag over my shoulder, and lied down in bed just like that. Fully clothed and everything. When I woke up in a few hours, I’d just get up and leave. I figured that if anyone was still awake, they would all be drunk anyway.
You’re targeted.
Shut up. Shut up, little girl. If anyone needed to be targeted, it was her.
You know what you are.
I didn’t know anything, and neither did she. Don’t tell me your nonsense! And what I was was none of her business anyway. It was no one’s business.
The fortitude of the darkness swamped over me, and my skin pricked up under my coat. I followed, my body, shivering, nearly pressing up against the tall figure before me. My breath left my mouth in a wispy cloud, and then, my vision, for an instant, blurred, and I stumbled into the one in front of me, cursing at myself for my clumsiness. Aleth turned around and faced me.
His light reddish-brown eyes gazed down with concern, worry maybe. His lips gave a frown of… sympathy? Sympathy… as he put his frigid hand to my face, lowering his head to look into my eyes. My vision blurred again, and my breath was coming short.
“Just hang on, Tizzy, hang on…” he whispered. His voice was pleading with me to stay conscious, and his warm breath against my forehead was tugging at my will. I looked up at him, and a sensation suddenly swept over me, and my hands started violently shaking, shaking like they never had before. I grabbed onto Aleth’s arm, a pounding in my mouth, and a sharp pain in my head causing me to stumble over. An immense craving surged through me.
“Tizzy, stay with me, you can fight this, you can!” He held me as still as he could, but my head arched back, pain searing up my spine and into my skull.
“No!” I screamed, “No I can’t!” My voice was shrill, shaking almost as bad as the rest of my body was, and tears of frustration and pain spilled from my eyes.
“God dammit,” Aleth said under his breath. I didn’t care, I wouldn’t get mad. He had shown more patience than anyone else ever had with me. Then, he put his hand on the back of my head and held me close to his chest. “Come on, Tizzy. Come on! You can do this!”
Next, I stood in a cold, dark hallway. Dull blue light seeped in through a window at the end… moonlight. In front of me was a door with a small silver handle that fit uncomfortably in my palm. I looked around for Aleth, but he wasn’t anywhere, so I drew in a sharp breath, the coldness irritating my lungs, and turned the handle. As the door opened, I looked down a steep staircase in a narrow, white-walled stairway. I almost had to turn to my side to walk down it. The handrails were freezing, but I grasped them with all the strength I had and slowly descended.
At the bottom, there was a barren room with the same, condescending white walls. The floor was shabby, wooden planks sticking up in some areas, and there was no light, save for the moonlight pouring in from a doorway. Its door was lying, ripped from its hinges, in the grass beyond it. As I stepped outside into the forest yard, my eyes found the most beautiful sight I might’ve ever seen. A pale silver dire wolf turned its head to me, dark sea-colored eyes staring coolly, and a coat that gleamed like the light from the sky.
