The scream of Ayla echoed by the forest.
The sight before their eyes was like a slaughterhouse. The picture they remembered yesterday was completely wiped out.
The ground was covered with pools of blood. Insects flew back and forth on the bodies.
As Riox took the first steps from the house, the smell of blood on the first breath, broke into his nose and lungs, made him vomit in an instant.
Ayla's voice trailed off because of her scream, and her normal talk sounded as she whispered.
Riox wiped his mouth with, he looked up. The place of the festival seemed like a warzone. Broken furniture, overturned tables and chairs, half burned houses ... It was not a dream nor a joke. The horror of reality.
*Which world has no dark side? Which world has no cruelty? NO ONE!*
Riox asked himself. Their attention turned a wild left turn as a table which was broken in half, on half of it collapsed. A sudden fear went through Riox's body and as a spear pierced his chest.
Ayla couldn't do anything, just followed Riox with a silent cry. Their shoes soaked in blood as they walked.
Not far from the collapsed table, Riox saw someone. From the deepest parts of his heart, shouted a name filled with emotions of sorrow.
- MIRAAAA!!
Not caring where he stepped, he rushed next to Mira who just lay on the ground between the pieces of the broken table. Riox couldn't help it, just fell on his knees next to the lying Mira.
Her body was covered in blood, 3 huge wounds gaped on her belly. A little trail of blood flew from her corner of mouth, not to mention the pool of blood under her back.
A soft groan filled with pain left Mira's mouth. She opened her eyes slowly. Her sight was blurry, her hearing was dimmed, but she recognized the voice of Riox.
As Riox leaned closer to Mira, he noticed the brightness from her eyes were gone. He put his trembling left hand under Mira's head to lift a bit. His heart beated as a war drum.
Riox couldn't hold back his deeply locked emotions anymore. Mira slowly raised her right hand, Riox caught it before it fell back to the ground. He felt her smooth yet cold skin.
Ayla gathered her courage and sat next to Riox, and took Mira's hand from Riox. She cried. Her emotions reflected back from her face as an opened book.
- Ri...ox. You ... need ... to ... prot...ect ... your ... sis..ter ... Will ... you ... do ... it? - Mira asked him with a whispering voice.
Riox nodded.
- Auntie! Please, don't leave us! You ... you are the only one we have!! - Riox held back his voice but it was clear he wanted to shout. Teardrops appeared in the corner, his eyes that fell down to Mira's skin, washed away the dried blood.
Mira just smiled.
- I ... happy ... I ... fin...ally .. saw ... your ... real ... side! I'm ... so ... happy ... - Mira hardly said the words she wanted. The blood pool under her body just got bigger and bigger while her skin got paler.
- NO! DON'T LEAVE US! PLEASE! WE NEED YOU! - without holding back, Riox shouted at Mira.
- Auntie ... - Ayla just coughed her name up, she left no power to say something aloud.
- I ... love ... you ... - Mira's cheek formed a smile as her last words left her lips. Her eyes slowly closed and the last breath left her lungs. She's gone.
- MIRAAAAAA! - the scream of Riox filled the whole area with sadness.
Riox shed his tears as a never ending waterfall. He hugged Mira for the last time with sadness and sorrow. When he lifted her down, he watched his blood-soaked hands covered with Mira's blood. His hands trembled.
Mira's care for them created a thin glass inside him, as the sign of his will to live. The glass of his soul broke apart. His falling tears washed away the dried blood from his hands.
Ayla stood up and ran away without a word.
Riox just kneeled next to Mira's body. He was silent.
Nearly an hour later, he stood up. Something new appeared inside his heart, doing a rampaging dance in his chest. His emotions from his face slowly faded away, but his heart raged in fire as a ready-to-erupt volcano. His new, never experienced feelings consumed his sadness.
A raging volcano filled with anger and hatred. The darkness inside him from his previous life awakened his desire to take revenge, to trample on everyone who dared to make him feel pain again.
- Thank you ... for everything ... Auntie! - he said with a low voice and turned around. He walked forward to Dreng's workshop, not caring about his surroundings.
The door of the blacksmith was torn off and it was completely empty, not even a shovel left. His sight noticed a small, one handed pickaxe with a little bag next to it. He took the pickaxe, but as he turned to leave, a paper showed up in the corner of his vision. He read it fast.
*Kiddo', even if it's not too many, please accept this bag of gifts, as for my thanks to you. And before you ask, I wrote this letter because I'll be drunk as f'ck tomorrow.*
Riox grabbed the medium ball sized bag and took a look inside.
- You old geezer ... this was the reason you were off in the winter time? You idiot geezer ... I'll gladly accept your gift. Thank you, Dreng!
The bag was filled with pieces of meteorite iron. even a bigger shard of Zaragh crystal lay in it and 4 little colored gems. A piece of sapphire, an emerald, a ruby and a topaz.
He swung the small bag on his shoulder and left.
While he walked back to home, he noticed the homes of others were untouched, but the workshops and warehouses were plundered.
*They took every item they found. But if they robbed the village, why were they slaughtered ... the villagers ...*
When the word of slaughtered echoed in his thoughts, the blood started to boil in his veins and couldn't think of anything but revenge.
As he walked back to their home, he noticed Ayla sat on the bench. He moved before her and called her name, but nothing more, because he knew the feelings of her heart were raging like a thunderstorm and he didn't know what should he say at that moment.
- Ayla ...
He got no answer nor a gesture. Ayla just sat before him and looked at the ground between her legs.
- Ayla ... we ...
She didn't want to hear anything, stood up in a moment and ran inside the house.
She let her voice out, the clear heartbreaking sound of her crying. Riox walked after her.
She sat in the middle of the first room, with her face buried between her legs. Riox crouched before her and called her again as softly as a feather caresses the skin.
- Ayla ... we ...
- Leave me alone! - she pushed the words out.
- Ayla. But we ... - Riox tried to talk with her.
- LEAVE ME! - Ayla shouted at him. She didn't want to hear anything. Her feelings were as messy as a battlefield.
Riox didn't intend to leave her. Riox seemed calm, but his calmness danced on a line of string, a little impact could made him collapse. With the haste of his emotions he grabbed both arms of Ayla. She raised her head immediately as their skin touched and Riox let out his voice filled with anger and sorrow.
- AYLA! WE NEED TO LEAVE! NOT JUST ME, NOT JUST YOU! WE NEED! TOGETHER! - talked to her as he shouted.
Ayla just looked inside Riox's eyes. They were wide open and tears poured in the corner of it.
- Why do you cry? - she asked him.
- I-I am ... crying? - Riox looked down and saw a little puddle of water under his head.
He looked in the eyes of the girl before him. His emotions somehow found a way and made him cry.
- I ... I have nothing ... and nobody ... but you! I wanted to ... leave you ... because I didn't ... want to ... I wanted ... nobody attached to me ... I'm not ...
Riox tears poured faster and faster as he opened his heart, maybe ... for the last time.
- I ... you are my everything ... if you didn't stand beside me on that day, I would be already ... - Riox sobbed out his words.
Ayla's eyes shone in its true red colors. She felt something about Riox as he opened himself to her. Before this, she didn't see him show his emotions or feelings, not even a simple smile, yet he cried before her as his current life's last pillar.
The beats of her heart increased as she saw this side of Riox. As she saw him at that moment, she just wanted to see him smile at her, like he did when he talked with Mira the last time. She felt some jealousy because Riox didn't do anything like she was just a ghost.
They lived and slept together, next to each other, yet Riox not even once greeted her with a good morning or said good night in the evening.
When Riox closed his eyes to take a deep breath, without hesitating, Ayla straightened her back and pushed her lips to his. She felt this was the only chance for her to do so.
As she kissed him, Riox's body tensed in an instant. The kiss only took 2 seconds. She blushed from the moment their lips parted away, while Riox just stared at her without saying a word.
- We will fight, live and die together, from now on until the end! - Ayla got enough bravery to say the words that broke the awkward silence between them, showing an expression Riox had never seen before.
Riox's mind was similar to a deep and endless sea, where the lights never have been. The moment Ayla's lips touched his, a little light of hope appeared in the darkness. He swam as fast as he could in the sea of his mind, and on the surface of the water, like a savior of a drowning kid, showed her hands to fight for his life, to grab her hands, one more time.
- Yes, together ... until the end ... - Riox smiled at her and then kissed her.
Surrounded by death and cruelty, soaked in tears and blood, filled with emotions of sorrow and sadness.
On this terrible day, they found the last piece of hope as their hearts are connected into one, turning them the pair of the dark and the light.