Cassandra Pendragon
The scene blurred and shifted, colours and shapes became liquid and hazy, like a Dali painting, and for a few moments, it felt as if I was falling, with nothing around me but half forgotten memories. I had already gotten used to the sensation and was beginning to wonder, when and where I'd arrive, but the scintillating sea, composed of my past, didn't appear. Instead, I was directly thrown into another world, spinning beneath a different sun.
My muscles protested, as I rigidly went through another repetition, stubbornly refusing to alleviate the pain and use my core. My fist connected with rock, chipping away yet another sliver, while my blood slowly pooled around my feet. "You aren't strong enough," he had said. "You've lost your edge." I'd show him. I'd show them all. Fear wasn't weakness. Overcoming it was a sign of strength. But try telling that to an unfeeling, uncaring, immortal piece of shit.
"The rock won't yield, you know? Are you punishing yourself or trying to blow off some steam?" I didn't need to turn around to know who stood behind me. Ever since I had escaped from hell, I hadn't been alone. Not that I missed it. Not really. Aurora might be a pain in the ass, but she was also… frustrated, I lunged forward again, a trickle of power escaping my ironclad grip. With a resounding thunderclap, the cliff wall, I had been trying to beat up, exploded, leaving behind noticing but dust, settling into the newly formed crevice.
"Doesn't it," I grumbled and faced her. "Sure looks like it, to me."
"You're cheating," she laughed, her eyes sparkling. "But I guess I shouldn't be surprised. You were never able to control your temper, even before…"
"Even before we poisoned ourselves?"
"Poisoned?" She came closer, her posture tense. "Is that what you think," she whispered.
"Not really." I exhaled sharply and focused on my bleeding hands, willing them to heal. "But sometimes, it sure feels like it. I… I'm doubting myself and that's about the last thing I need, when I'm about to face our siblings. They don't listen to reason, but strength and not the kind I'm struggling with. To them, we're… damaged. Weak. And I'm not even fully convinced, they're wrong. What use is a conscience, when you know you have to get blood on your hands, over and over again?"
"It tells you which lines you can't cross, it prevents you from falling. You know that. What is this really about? It's not like you to lament things, you can't change." I sighed.
"What if he lied to us," I asked quietly. "What if there is no source, what if I can't get in, what if…"
"Then, we'll most likely die, side by side… as traitors. They'll find another way to wage war and creation will never know peace. But I don't think he lied and neither do you. There's no reason…"
"There is. I took the ring. He won't get it back until I'm dead." She gently placed her hand on my shoulder, a sad smile on her face.
"You mean, I made you take the ring and painted a target on your back. Do you regret it?"
"My life has always been a fight, nothing new there. I'd rather fight against my family, with you by my side, than watch them run in circles, while I'm on the outskirts, alone. Which… you wanted to know, what this is about, why I'm beating up mountains? I don't want you to go with me. Here," with a thought, I made the blackened, cold metal band materialise in my hand. "Take it." She stared at it for a full minute, before she caressingly wrapped her fingers around mine and closed my fist over it. She breathed a kiss against my cheek and said:
"I won't, I can't. If you failed, I'd use it and I would succumb. I fear, this is the one burden, I cannot share with you. Don't look so glum. That's actually a good thing."
"What makes you say that? You're no coward. Why would you suddenly want to hide?" She pinched my side, her eyes narrowing in anger.
"I don't want to, but it means he hasn't lied. Do you remember when we first met?"
"No… and neither do you. It was different, then. There was no time, how should I remember?"
"Are you sure? Let me show you." She came closer, her lips brushing against my ear. In a soft voice, almost too quiet to reach me, she sang. Words, I hadn't heard before, but felt, sparked memories I didn't even know were mine and I knew. I knew, Amazeroth hadn't lied to us.
In the vast emptiness, life had meant struggle. Only the strongest had survived, an unending cycle of brith and death, never broken, never changed. Each repetition had only had one survivor, a minuscule spark in the dark, a tiny mote of light, but over uncounted iterations, more and more had filled the cosmos. Ideas, convictions, principles, embodied by the very first creatures to ever live. Us. Unfeeling, uncaring, we had existed, struggled and lived, but there had been no meaning, no choice, not even thought or time.
We hadn't been much different from the most rabid animals, fighting tooth and claw, wing and magic, against everyone and everything, an eternal night without so much as the whisper of a sunrise on the horizon. Until we learned, until we changed and with us, so did the source we had been born from. The night had been long, the path had been dark, but the dawn had finally come.
When I blinked in the soft light of the setting sun, I felt tears, running down my face. It had been aeons, or even longer, since last I had cried, but here I stood, wrapped up in Aurora's embrace, luminescent trails covering my cheeks. I didn't even know, why I was reacting like this, but she didn't seem surprised.
"You spared me," she whispered. "In the very beginning, you saved my life and we finally opened our eyes. He didn't lie, Lucifer. It's real and you can find it. I know you can. You've done it before." My vision shattered again, the beautiful moment gone, replaced by something else, entirely.
"Enough," I said, my voice thundering through the void with the power of creation itself. On my hand, a minuscule star glowed with black light, pulsing with the beat of my heart.
"No more. It's time to make peace." Behind me, my wings whispered in the darkness, translucent, silvery blue torrents of pure energy, fuelled by more than my own strength. "I won't stay by idly, not any more. I will make you see reason, or, by the abyss, I will end this war myself." The Pearly Gates opened, the rustling of feathers a bottled up storm, ready to break free, as my siblings came forth, their wings a warning of power and splendour. Michael stood at their fore, sword in hand. His steely eyes bore into mine, as silence returned, broken only by sharp cracks, as the very substance of the void was torn apart around the transcendent host.
"You've gone too far, brother," he spoke with the conviction of one, who hadn't yet failed. "You can't stand against us without an army and even though you brought the key, you didn't open the door. Did you really think you could face us, as you are, without the demons? You've lost your way, your strength, your resolve. And I'll teach you what that means."
"Will you, now? Oh, brother mine, you couldn't be more wrong. I've lost my strength? Have you been blinded by your pride? Watch and learn, for I'm the one, who has a lesson to teach." A derisive smirk played around his lips, as my wings flickered and disappeared. I closed my eyes and crossed my arms above my heart. "Ex tenebrae Lux," I whispered.
Light, glaring, bright light broke through my skin, blue tendrils of undiluted power twisting and writhing within. The darkness of the void turned into a blinding explosion of white, silver and blue, as my siblings were pushed back and the walls of the Silver City shook on their foundations. There was nothing left, but light and power, the only exception the quickly expanding ring of blackness around my hand. With each second, with each pulse of light, the darkness grew, until I became the centre of a maelstrom of black and white, light and darkness dancing around me in an infinite circle of power. "Watch," I breathed, my voice easily piercing through chaos and energy, reaching each one of my siblings. "I might have changed, but I sure as hell haven't become weaker." A groan, reverberating through my very core, escaped me and I fell to my knees. My form blurred and the storm vanished, leaving behind nothing, but gradually dispersing shadows.
Wings, huge, gargantuan wings, blacker than the night, towered above the heavenly host. They rose from a body, long and snakelike, its tail disappearing in the distance, crowned by a massive, serpentine head with a ring of glowing, silvery blue horns. My fangs were sharp and shimmered in the receding darkness, like daggers of crystallised light. A red, forked tongue tasted the air, every scent an almost painful explosion of information. I threw my head back and roar, my voice strong enough to shatter the flimsy membrane of reality, allowing the void to bleed into existence.
Tongues of bluish, silvery flames shot form my nostrils, a fountain of power, the likes of which hadn't been felt, since we had gained our memories. I was drunk, the sensation, the exhilarating rush, it was indescribable. As was the presence, I suddenly felt. She had almost been gone, a part of me I had known was there, but hadn't been able to reach, a fragment of a dream, half forgotten, but now, I felt her again. As if it was the first time, back in the dungeon, her courage, her valour rushed through me and ignited my every nerve. She was, what allowed me to balance my stolen power, without turning into ash and dust. She was, what had changed me, what had turned me into something alive and now, she gave me the strength to face my siblings.
"Choose, Michael," I didn't speak, but my words were clear and seemed to come form everywhere at once. My voice was different, though. It was lighter, melodious, feminine. It was her voice, the very same timbre I had heard only once, before she had become a part of me. "All of you. Choose. I carry not only the demon's desperation, but also your hope." My core, a solid, unyielding gem in my chest, shone a brilliant white, its light even piercing through my impenetrable scales. "Continue this war and lose your greatest treasure or make peace and receive, what has been stolen. This war ends, now. One way or the other. The nine families are gone and I'll be damned before I watch you ruin the rest of creation."
They stared. Eyes, that had only shown derision or determination before, flickered with doubt and fear. I was an abomination, a transcendent nightmare become flesh and they knew it.
"What do you want?" Michael was the only one, who looked… proud.
"What I always wanted. End it. Leave creation to itself. Allow them a chance to grow and make peace with our cousins. It has been enough. No. More." The last words were accompanied by a wave of flames, which illuminated the Void and drove my siblings to their knees. Great, now all I had to do, was figure out, how to give up most of my power without being killed the second after.
When you wake from a dream, there is this second of disorientation, a moment of confusion, when you're not quite sure, where you are, whether you're awake or sleeping. The room, the bed, it all seems far less real than the world, you've just left and your mind is reeling, trying to figure out, who you are. Ever since I had been forced out of my home, I hadn't had that problem. I had either woken to Ahri's scent or even her touch. I had always had something to hold on to, but this time, it was different. I was alone, alone and cold.
At first, I didn't comprehend what was happening, it simply felt wrong, but when I anxiously shot upright, my gaze trying to pierce through the heavy darkness around me, my memories slowly returned. I knew who I was and what had happened, but I still couldn't figure out, why I was lying on a hard, polished stone slab, alone. A pit opened in the depth of my stomach, as anxiousness slowly turned into fear. Where was everyone? Where was I? Think, Cassy, calm down.
I listened, but there was no sound, except for the frantic beat of my heart and when I focused, the glaring emptiness, where my connections to Ahri and Viyara should have been, felt like a punch in the gut. Even my promises were gone. I was truly alone.
Panicked, I scrambled to my feet, reflexively manifesting my wings and bolstering my vision. It didn't hurt. The curse wasn't there anymore, just like everything else. No bed, no door, no people. I was in a circular chamber, hewn from black, polished crystals, with nothing in it, but a marble altar, covered in the remains of the dress I had been wearing. When I had moved, the withered, ancient cloth had fallen off, like a second, discarded skin. How long had I been asleep?
Tears stung in my eyes, when I frantically pushed more and more power into my body, searching for the tiniest spark, some kind of connection, but the tattoo on my chest remained just that. A pretty painting without any meaning. "Oh, no," I whispered, my voice hoarse but yet disturbingly loud in the empty chamber. What had happened? Why…
A symmetrical shadow caught my attention and when my gaze snapped to the corner, I nearly broke down. On a small pedestal, I saw the bracelets Ahri had given me. They were mangled and deformed, the passage of time had been strong enough to bend even the enchanted metal, but what truly got to me, was the tiny line of runes, etched around them. "I never gave up," they read.
Fear, grief, anger and desperation filled me up and emptied me out again, as I took a few, shaky steps. My fingers hovered above the cold, broken jewellery, afraid to get any closer, unable to move away. Tears threatened to blind me, as I froze, where I stood. They couldn't…
"Ahri," I screamed, an explosion of sound, accompanied by a storm of energy, that shook the whole chamber. "Where are you," I breathed, as the light subsided. Cracks had formed along the walls and my wings had burned deep holes into the crystals, but the small pedestal remained undisturbed. Shivering, I finally found the courage to pick up the bracelets.
They felt frail and worn but hidden deep within, was the tiniest mote of magic, a last reminder of the power, they had once held. Carefully, I extended my senses, pushing just the smallest amount of energy into the metal. Immediately, I knew that it once had been a message, but most of its contents were gone, devoured, forgotten, fallen prey to the insatiable hunger of time. All that remained was a hazy memory of love, pride and guilt, accompanied by the faintest scent of pine trees.
I collapsed, the bracelets clutched to my chest, as if they actually were the one, who had left them for me. Silent sobs shook me and my vision blurred, but at the same time, a steely unyielding voice began whispering in my ear. I didn't know anything, there'd be time to snivel and cry, once I actually knew, what was going on. Until then, I had to get over my self pity and fear and make sure, neither she nor anyone else I knew needed my help. They could have been taken, for all I knew, and here I was, acting like a fucking child. I had to get off my ass and make sure.
It sure as hell seemed like I had been gone for years and years, but she was an immortal. So was Mephisto and my mom and Viyara wouldn't have died of natural causes, either. If even one of them was still around, I had to find them. Along the way, I might even figure out, what had happened and why I had been sealed in a bloody grave. And in case it wasn't as bad as I feared, I'd have to hurry even more. If I had been asleep for only a few hours or days, it'd be all the more important to make sense of this shit.
But first, I had to get out of this goddamned grave.