Chapter Two - Tremble
I can feel someone watching me. I open my eyes to see my samara by the entrance, smiling softly at me. I rise, the memories of last night are flooding my brain, and the physical evidence stains my hands. I suddenly feel nauseous, the thought of what I did to those creatures is too much to handle. My head aches, the walls suddenly seeming too close, too confining.
I push past my samara, out into the brightness of day. The sky is light blue, a stark contrast from last night’s velvet depths. I kneel by the stream that runs through my village, calmed by the feel of the earth beneath me, the vastness of the sky above me. The water is cool, washing the blood from my hands away, leaving them clean as if they had never been stained with the blood of the mud men; as if it had never happened. I close my eyes, reveling in the serenity of my home, until my mind conjures up the image of the slayer. It is then, the air grows cold, the sky closes over, and I can no longer hide the truth from myself. I killed. Every one of those creatures I fought, I hunted. Even the strong one. I killed them all.
********
The slayer circles me slowly, her face painted, hand gripping her weapon. She is not fool enough to think her primitive weapon, is enough for to stop me. I can see in her eyes that she knows who I am, what I am: An Ancient. The elite…no, we are the true demon, the purest of our kind. I can see her fear. She attacks suddenly, hoping to catch me unaware. I block her easily, and return with my own attack. My claws slice into her arm, leaving deep thin wounds dripping with blood. She makes no sound, only takes her weapon in her uninjured hand and attacks again. This time she finds her mark, the sharp blade cutting into my side. In my anger, I can hardly feel it. I swing around, catching the back of her head with the heel of my foot. Twisting again, I knee her sharply in her mid-section. I release her, watching as she gasps for air.
Time passes quickly, or is it slowly now? My mind a blur, I can feel her attacks, can feel my own returning assault. I know only that as the sun began to show itself, rising from the horizon, my foe fell. I am wounded, but not nearly as much as the slayer. She rises from the ground slowly, her life force draining away into the earth, slipping away to another like her to be chosen. My hand tightens around her throat, feeling the fragile bones crack in my grasp. Still no sound, she only looks at me calmly. In a moment, it is over. The slayer lies crumpled at my feet. Her eyes have closed, never to open again.
Everything is still; quiet, as if mourning the loss of this life. And for a moment, I do too. It is not right to leave this body here, sprawled out on the ground in such disarray. I know she is only filth, but something tells me I must do something for this, my kill.
Her body burns easily, the blaze consuming the remains faster than I would have thought. I leave the mud men’s fire, and the body of the warrior. I do not look back.
********
Water falls freely from my eyes and I am shamed. I have not shed tears since I was very small, but here I am, mourning for the deaths of meaningless creatures. The feeling is overwhelming, flooding me with its power and pouring down my face. I can feel the pain I have inflicted upon them, and I am horrified to think I caused this suffering.
I cannot understand how the lesser beings bear it. How can they carry this burden of emotion moonrise after moonrise? It is no wonder they die so quickly. I am fortunate, I think, to feel these strange things so rarely. For what is there really, that would inspire them in me? Nothing, I think. Nothing, a little voice mocks, Nothing but the deaths of the mud creatures. To be crying over the deaths of such things, it is humiliating. The slime that eats itself, that is what we call them. The filth that sparkled at night with their fire, hunted in the dark by my kind, by me.
A light touch on my shoulder startles me, and I whip around, ready to attack. My gentle samara’s eyes stare back at me, questioning and afraid. It is the fear that disturbs me. Even she sees the difference in me, the blood that stains my hands forever. That my samara should fear me…I shall not think of it.
Her eyes flick towards my left, and I look up to see the hard face of Mirna, the head of the Elder Council. I rise with her gaze, trembling with fear from the power contained in her being. It did not go unnoticed.
“Why do you shake?” she asked. It was more than a question. Why are you weak? she was asking, Why do I waste my time with you?
“I have fear of you.”
She laughed here, a strange harsh sound. I did not like it. It felt like she was laughing at me. At my stupidity. My honesty.
“You should, little one. Of me you should have great fear.” This I liked even less. True, she had power, but why should she expect fear from me? Demand it, even? But I did fear her, and my fear was so great I could not stop the shivers that ran down my body.
She examined me at length, each fang, each claw, even my hair. Finally she spoke again, “You will come with us.” It was only then that I noticed there were others with her. An old one, in particular, caught my eyes. He was white in his age, with kind, soft eyes. I liked him immediately.
He stepped forward, resting his hand upon my head. It was an odd feeling, this contact. And yet I liked this as well, as if his frail hand could protect me from the cold eyes of Mirna. “I will train this one, Mirna,” he said. She paused a long moment before nodding her acquiescence.
“Take her then.”
He led me away, followed by Mirna and her guards. I looked back over my shoulder, back to the only home I had ever known, to my samara. She was smiling, sadly, I thought. I wanted to break through the barrier Mirna’s guards formed between us, back to the shrove. I could see the wetness on her face, even from here. I wanted her to be happy. Is this not what she wanted for me? Was she not happy to see me leave, to become something great? Was she not happy? Something told me she was not. I looked up to the old one and asked, “When will I return?”
He spoke quietly, “Never, little one. You will stay in the Temple from now on.”
Somehow, the thought of this did not please me. I saw my samara’s face one last time before we turned away, and a strange feeling struck me, deep in my chest. It was worse than anything I had ever felt before, worse than what I felt for the slayer. I would never return here, never see my poor samara again. What would she do without me? With no charge?
I knew my feelings were caused by much more than the thought of my samara having no purpose. As we left my home farther and farther behind, I knew I would miss her. The feeling was unbearable. Yet, remembering Mirna’s cold face and her presence right behind me, I knew I would have to bear it. And I would.
********
The Temple is beautiful. It is calm, quiet…and dead. Be grateful,a voice in my head admonishes, But how can I? How can I enjoy this cold, lifeless thing? How can I think of this place when I may never see my samara, my home again?
Mirna seems to have guessed at my thoughts, as she announces, “This will be your home from now on.”
And I cannot help but be filled with dread.
********
He thought she seemed somewhat upset, if that small line in between her eyes was any indication. He stared at her, the slight downturn of her mouth, the distant look in her cold eyes, and he was filled with resentment for the other life she had taken fro him. She turned her head to face him, in what he thought of as a mockery of indignation.
“You gaze upon me for too long, Wesley.”
“And what will you do, Oh Mighty Illyria?”
Her eyes blazed with fire now, angered by his words, “You dare to mock me? To use my name like any other? You, who crawled from the mud at my feet? You, whose only purpose was to beg for your pitiless lives before I crushed you with a mere thought?”
“I do dare. And what of you? You, Great Queen, who wept for the Slayer? What of you who trembled with fear at the feet of an unknown demon, lost through time?”
She trembled now, with rage instead of fear, “I am not the nameless one I was then. Do not forget, Wesley, I can still kill you now.”
“I am aware of that.”
An tense silence passed, her anger simmering, simmering still, until the thought came upon her that if she killed him now, she would be left with nothing but the half-bloods and the human filth. Wesley, she thought, was none of this. He was, for a reason she did not like to contemplate, different. He would live, she decided, until she tired of him.
“Did you ever see your samara again?”
Pain flashed across her face for a second, so quickly he might not have caught it if he hadn’t spent the last while staring at her.
“No. I did not.”
“Why?”
She breathed deeply, although he sometimes wondered if she really needed it. Perhaps she was so frozen, so cold, her body required no sustenance, no air, no food to survive. He hadn’t yet dared to ask.
“She was killed by Mirna soon after I left.”
She turned away, hiding her face from him. How dared he ask of her? Ask of…her mother, in the words of the small-minded humans. She sometimes thought the pain was still there, distantly. Sometimes she thought she could feel it, tugging at where her heart should have been. This was one of those times.
“Illyria?”
“What do you demand of me, mortal?”
“I demand nothing of you. Only ask.”
“You may ask then, Wesley. Once more, then let us be done with the subject.”
“Do you miss her?”
She shivered, almost imperceptibly. It was something she hadn’t thought of in an eternity.
“Do you suppose I feel such things? Such human things?” The look he gave her told her she would not be able to evade this question. “I did once,” she admitted, quietly, so no one but him could hear. “But no longer.” She straightened, and the shroud of the past and its weaknesses lifted away. “I do not feel such things. It burdens you humans so. Why do you bother with such nonsense?”
He ignored her question, turning instead to the inky darkness outside. “We will continue,” he said, without asking for her consent, a fact she noticed with irritation, “and you will tell me of Kathos.”
Her face broke its usual disdain and detachment, contorting with anger and rage. “How do you know of Kathos? How dare you? How dare you speak his name? His name of all names?”
“Then you recognize it,” he commented dryly.
Her anger grew even hotter now, realizing his ruse. She calmed her body, willing it to still. “How could I not?”
“And you will tell me of him.”
Her mouth stretched into the smallest of smirks, if the word was becoming of a God. Suddenly her anger vanished, replaced by cool satisfaction. “Yes. I will tell you of Kathos and one other.”
“Who?” he asked, although he already knew the answer.
“The one whose body I have taken for my own. The one you call Winifred Burkle.”
There was no reply, only the slightest of nods. She closed her eyes, remembering a time long since past, one she had left behind lifetimes ago. A face shimmered to the surface, and inside, she smiled.
********
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