Drachen sits on top of a tree branch, the size of a small child. The leaves on top of her keep her safe from the sun rays while she watches over the beautifully grown garden before her.
Tall bushes, large flower fields, and vases with extravagant-looking plants of all colors and shapes. The wind blows softly making the leaves rustle gently.
A hooded figure approaches the tree from behind, dragging his long and worn brown cloak on the ground. An interesting-looking staff on his left hand.
"You are late" Drachen throws her words at him with clear annoyance. Don't even bother to turn back and face the man.
"I'm sorry, it was a difficult morning" The raspy, tired voice of the man sighs after the last words.
He drags his body to the tree and sits on the grass, resting his back on the trunk.
He has a little bit of stubble on his face as he looks up to see Drachen's back, a smile slowly grows on his face the more he looks at her.
The two of them remained silent, Drachen purposely looking in the opposite direction from the man even if he is already behind her. But soon she catches something different.
Her expression slowly changes as her eyebrows rise and eyes widen. She turns around and her eyes fall on the bandaged hands of the man, his nails pitch black.
She quickly flies down from the tree branch and grows in size to that of a regular adult. Falling on her knees in between the stretched legs of the man and holding his right hand.
"You did it again" She whispers, her eyelids drooping and her brow as well, her lips pressed together as she scrutinizes the wounded hand.
"I had no choice, this time they were too many" He gently takes his hand away from her.
"Next time, I'm coming with you" She announces pressing her hands and looking at the ground. Her fingers shake as she clenches the grass.
"No. I don't want you to see what I do"The man picks up a white flower from nearby.
"I have seen countless wars and atrocities already, what you do is nothing new and I clearly can't trust you with anything" Her shoulders lightly shake as her voice begins to break.
"I know you have. But I don't want you to see ME like that" The man lets his bronze and wood staff rest on the ground and uses both hands to inspect the flower "Besides, you are too beautiful to be present in such an ugly place" He then places the flower on her left long ear.
"You are killing yourself" She whispers, getting a hold of the hand before he can take it back and pressing it against her left cheek "Why don't you leave? Let that lunatic find someone else to do his genocide"
Drachen then lets go of his hand and falls on top of him, resting her head on his chest as tears fall from her eyes. The man embraces her with both arms, covering their bodies beneath the brown cloak as he gently caresses her head with his right hand.
"It wasn't your fault, you didn't know what you were doing" She says trying to bypass the knot on her throat.
"That doesn't matter, I did it anyway and they started this by trying to subjugate all the continent, to begin with...this is their punishment for their arrogance"
"I haven't seen someone of my kind for centuries and neither do I want to. I guess we have always been solitary...but, don't you feel anything besides hatred towards mages?" She played with a lone strand of his black hair.
"...No" He said coldly "I feel only hatred for my kind. Our very existence brings only pain to everyone and everything once we become too old and our brains rot"
Drachen contemplated his words as the place fell silent for a moment. Only the wind and rustling of the leaves could be heard.
"Forgive me, I wanted to make this occasion joyful after not seeing each other for days "He presses tightly the body of the fairy against him, sinking his face in her sunset-colored hair.
"No, I shouldn't have asked. Just promise me you won't ever again use the curse" She too sank her face as deep as she could on his chest.
"I can't keep that promise, Drachen-" The man then yells as the fairy bites hard at his chest, prompting a loud and genuine laugher soon after "Alright...I promise." He rests his head on the trunk and looks up.
"That's better" She whispers as she closes her eyes, getting lost in the heartbeats of the man she loves.
Soon the rustling of the leaves vanishes and it's only the heartbeat. Is in that moment she becomes confused and opens them again. But she finds herself no longer in the bittersweet shelter of her memories, but instead, sucking Das's blood through his index finger.
The confusion of the moment goes away as her senses return to her. Realizing she is back at the castle, inside the tower the young archmage calls his bedroom.
It must already be late at night, with the only light in the room is the candle resting on the desk where Das is furiously reading through books and scrolls and the moonlight coming from the hole on the wall they sometimes refer to as the window.
Das is immersed in the book he is reading. A piece of parchment laid next to the book, many notes, numbers and names had been written by him as he read through dozens of books and scrolls, if not more, that laid all around the place just how he had left his bedroom earlier that morning.
He however notices the sucking stops and turns to see Drachen stretch while loudly yawing and sticking her long tongue out.
"I'm glad to see you alright, I didn't know what did he do to you but as soon as I gave you blood the pain seemed to go away. Although you didn't wake up" Das lets the quill pen rest on the desk and smiles in relief.
"Thank you for the food! I haven't dreamed in a very long time. Guess whatever it was it really knocked me out" Drachen says as she flies away and grows in size until she looks almost human.
"What did you dreamed of?" Das asks while he returns his attention to the mess in front of him.
"A liar" Drachen floats near the window, looking to the big world outside with a stern expression "You broke the rule, Das" She said turning around to face him.
The scribbling of the pen stops as Dras lets out a long sigh.
"I'm sorry but I had no choice If you had seen-"
"You HAD a choice, we could have-SHOULD have come back and informed Edel of it" Drachen spoke loud and clear, her arms crossed and eyes sticking daggers at Das's back.
"General Edel would have ordered me to go back and deal with it on my own anyway" Das moved his chair to the side so he could see Drachen.
"Not with MY word in the matter! He knows I have more experience than you, he would have believed me" Drachen's
Das pinched the bridge of his nose as he breaths in anticipation of the incoming discussion.
"If you believe that alright, but General Edel doesn't seem like the most forgiving man to me"He replied running his fingers through his hair and taking his hood off in the process.
"You have met him a couple of times in your life Das, what do you know of him?"
"Well, you are right but those times didn't leave a good impression on me" He says with a short snicker.
"This isn't funny, Das" Drachen then walks up to him and grabs his left arm. Lifting it to get a clear view of his entire arm bandaged" This, is not a JOKE. If you use this too much you will die!" She yells, furious.
"I told you I had no choice! There were dozens of mad bandits in the village! Did you saw what they had done to it?!" Das stands up and tries to free his arm from her grasp.
"Did you used it because they were a threat to you or because you let it consume you the moment you saw what they did?" Her eyes narrowed.
"I-I just, it's hard to remember okay?!"
"This" She points at his arm "I can't heal this, no matter what I try or for how long I've researched, this will NEVER go away and will only get worse the more you give in to the curse"
"I already-"
"THIS" She presses her finger on his head "Will grow weaker and more insane the more you give in to the curse! I CAN'T fix that!"
"I KNOW!" He shouts, pulling his arm away from her "I-I I'M THE ONE WHO IS GOING TO DIE YOUNG! WHAT DOES IT MATTER WHEN OR HOW I GO?!" He stomps the ground with his feet.
"IT MATTERS TO ME!" Drachen shouts back at him grabbing him from the collar of his tunic.
Das breathes erratically while he looks away from her glossy eyes.
"You matter to me Das, you are everything I have left in this world" She released him, her lips trembled "I don't want you to go as your father did"
Das sat back on the chair as it creaks under his weight, his head hung low.
"I know that one day you will leave me...it's the shitty part of being immortal" She whispered as tears fell to the ground and she gave Das a weak pained giggle " But I don't want my last memory of you to be that of your father's...Please, never use the curse again"
She held his head and pressed it against her belly, gently caressing his head how his father used to caress hers. Das didn't move away, instead, he held his hand together and squeezed them hard, biting his lower lip as his shoulders rose up and down erratically.
"I-I'm sorry" He whispered back at her with great difficulty "They cut their heads off, the children even and I wasn't-"He spoke fast, taking big breaths "I didn't want to fail and I did it anyway"
"You have nothing to prove to anyone" She replied wiping the tears off her face quickly "You are young and you will learn, I will help you. For real this time"
Both of them remained in that position for a good while, the room falling completely silent as the occasional tear hit the ground from Das's hidden expression.
"Pretty clever move you pulled on that, fart man" Drachen smiled, showing off her pointy teeth as both of them chuckled " How did you figure it out?"
"I...I thought about how the curse affects you and figured that since whatever art he is using must be corrupted, utilizing the opposite from it would disrupt his spell" Das gently pushed her away and stood up once again "I have been trying to find his art in the library but they don't have anything on controlling the dead" He said pointing at the desk before slapping his hands on his sides and resting them on his hips.
"I too have never seen anything like it...but if you think you will find what you need in the royal library you are as dumb as your father" She pulled his ear playfully before returning to her fairy size.
"I figured so I already asked permission to travel to The Festland Dominion tomorrow, General Edel agreed." He replied rubbing his pained ear.
Drachen got close to Das's face and held it like she had done so before he tricked her back at the forest, she looked at him with a serious expression. Her eyes becoming black as the usual orange acted as her iris.
"Listen, I was wrong to try and protect you from the things you will have to face from now on but do not EVER, and I say this very seriously, EVER, do what you did to me at the village again, understand?" She stuck her forehead to his, looking as close as she could to his eyes.
"I know, I will never do it again" Das replied with a tender smile.
"And like I promised, starting tomorrow I will train you as hard as I trained your father, you will wake up at seven in the morning EVERY DAY!" She laughed like an evil maniac flying excitedly out of the window.
"Alright, alright! By the Lightbringer, you sound like my mom" Das said shaking his head lightly before returning to his seat and losing himself on his research.
Drachen looked at the young mage from behind him. Grinning from ear to ear as she saw a reflection of his father in his youth.
So she hovered back to the hole on the wall and sat there, hugging her legs close to her chest and losing her thoughts on the star-filled night sky. The sound of the wind, the scribble of the pen, and the tapping of the desk of a focused Das making her feel like she had gone back in time.
So she relishes at the moment. Closing her eyes with her joyful smile.