Bound By Blood (55 page)

             
He choked, “History repeats itself. Love repeats itself. I have suffered, seen her suffer, no more.” His body fell limp. He didn’t move. He didn’t blink. He wouldn’t answer.

             
He died there in her arms as if life didn’t want him
anymore
. It was as if he didn’t matter or wasn’t worth keeping. She beat on his chest while the entire Great Hall fell into silence at her screams. She pulled him up and held him to her breast as though he were a child. She rocked him as she buried her face in his hair trying to find his scent, which seemed lost in all the blood and misery he had been dragged through. The agonizing moment seemed to
last for an eternity until Aréel
began to laugh, a crippling
laugh, which
ended
Samanthŕa’s
screams and cries.
The entire room fell silent and still. All eyes were on Samanthŕa and St
a
phãyn’s body.

             
Samanthŕa
gr
ew still, if not morbid with shock. She laid St
a
phãyn
’s body down gently while her cold
dark eyes rose to look at Aréel
.

             
“Oh my, I forget how mortals die so quickly. Silly me. Oh well, what I said still stands. We have his unborn children left. So what say you,
Samanthŕa
? Will you agree or shall they die
as well?” Aréel’s
cards were on the table. She’d
meant for St
a
phãyn
to die in
Samanthŕa’s
arms. Wanted her to feel that misery and do what those usually did when they lost someone precious. Cling to those they had
left, to their siblings…St
a
phãyn
’s unborn siblings.

             
Samanthŕa
rose slowly. Her eyes never le
ft Aréel
. She nev
er even bothered looking
at Dĩas or Daŕ
ēus
, nor did she know where they were. The room seemed to go black around her and her only thoughts were fueled by pain.

             
“These unborn children?” Her voice seemed to drip with venom as she walked to the woman, who app
eared to be crying. Before Aréel
could answer,
Samanthŕa
jerked the sword from the scabbard of
one of the Veŕatüs
holding her. She swung it hard and swift, cutting him, beheading her. Screams of shock filled the room.

             
The Veŕatü
on the other side dropped his hold over the body. He backed away fearfully. The headless corpse fell to the floor hard and the head itself began to melt and
change. The face of one of Aréel
’s bloodline appeared, a brother, a worthless brot
her not even worth naming. He was the skin walker pretending to be St
a
phãyn’s woman.

             
Aréel
screamed in rage when
Samanthŕa threw the sword at
her,
through the pit of her stomach
. Her eyes burned red
.
A low growl came from her lips,
causing Daŕ
ēus
to smile.

Evil had made one mistake. They had underestimated
Samanthŕa
. They never saw her as a threat. They never tried to bind
her
to the meeting the way they did him. With blackened, hollow
eyes,
Samanthŕa
began to curse her.

“Curse my sisters?

Curse me?

What curse you have hissed, you shall suffer times three.

Be wicked you wench
,
for wicked you shall have.

Beware the priestess
,
who will see you go mad.”

             
The curse left
Samanthŕa’s lips and lashed out at Aréel
. She began to spin around, holding her head tightly. She screamed horribly as the curse of madness began to seep into her head. Those with her tried to grab her and drag her out of the room, but she kicked and clawed at them.

             
Samanthŕa
walked slowly up to her, with her claws extended from the beast which had hungered to emerge.
It finally had its chance now, like her fangs, to peek out into life and take a stab at it. Aréel
’s face froze and her body fell to the floor.
Samanthŕa
ripped open her chest and tore out her black withering heart,
slammed it
on the table and looked around at everyone
who was frozen and still,
in complete shock. They’d
thought Daŕ
ēus
was a threat. They were wrong.
             
“
You will take nothing more from me!”
She then
looked at Dĩas
,
who backed his chair away for she slammed the bloody heart purposely in front of him.
Her cold eyes reflected
nothing but venomous hate. Dĩas
said nothing. He swallowed hard, keeping his face still with an effort.

             
She turned to Daŕ
ēus
, who could do nothing more than look proud.
His beast
was
savagely recognizing the one in her
.
“Will you bring my Brother’s body?”
Samanthŕ
a’s voice was deep and disturbed yet he could still sense her sorrow.

             
Daŕ
ēus
bowed to the Priestess, promi
sing he would. He lifted St
a
phãyn
in his arms and followed her out. She never looked back. She never once cared about what she had done. She never once felt remorse or guilt. She only felt pain and that pain, she channeled into hate.

             
Before Daŕ
ēus left
the Great Hall, he turned one last time to look at them. With
malice
in his voice he growled, “Dark nights lie ahead. Hide yourselves well and expect me. Your trickery failed. Your jest of a truce is now your
demise.” He turned with St
a
phãyn
’s ruined body and vanished.

             
But there was one left to follow
.
Kaléé
slowly walked past and stopped before Dĩas as Rameŕas
strutted by
arm. The large room was suddenly filled with her wicked laughter until it horrifically stopped, eyes fixed on him.

             
“Never under estimate the power of
Vlachŕa
Kaléé
of the Lycãon
, you
pathetic
fool.” She slammed her staff against the floor
while Rameŕas helped her onward. Slowly, wi
thout hurry they walked out. Her wicked laught
er re
new
ed was the only thing left that echoed against the stone.

~
Chapter
18
~

The Willow

***

The Gods they be callin’.

Callin’ you home to walk among the free.

Forget not this maiden mournin’
.

I
carr
y
your heart away with me.

Can you see the hill with the weepin’ willow?

There she stands beneath and do
cry.

Can ye hear her weepin’ neath’ that willow?

Her heart will suffer till the end of time.

***

             
R
ain drizzled from a dreary sky
.
The mournful song of a
Phãegen
was wafting emotion from a cliff above. The soft ancient words clung to the notes of a haunting and distressed tune.

             
The air was cold and damp, befitting the tears falling from wintry cheeks. Bitter kissed hearts, pain’s frigid claw. The four corners were called, the watchtowers invoked, East by air, South by fire, West by water and North by earth.

             
The body of St
a
phãyn
drift
ed silently across the Sea of Abyss
, which seemed oddly calm for the weather.
Its massive boundaries of water were black and thick with salt.
The flames lapping with their heated tongues
at the foundations of his burial ship,
at last caused it to drift no more. Hot steam and smoke blurred the horizon. Gulls crossed the drab empty skies. Sorrow blackened memory. The ceremony faded as though it had been a million years in its passing.

             
Fare well, s
weet St
a
phãyn
. May the Goddess embrace you, fare well.

             
Samanthŕa
silently mourned.
             
Death was not eternal. It wasn’t feared. It was abnormal and alien, without true meaning or definition, until now. When and if one died, they could be brought back, unless some sort of curse or dark reason hung over their head. Normally, within three nights, they could be opening their eyes to a new life or find themselves refreshed in their old one.
Normally.

             
St
a
phãyn
had renounced himself, though.
He had refused life in the end and without her Awakening Samanthŕa could offer none of hers.
There was no bringing him back. There was no knowing what might happen to him. Th
ey were charting unknown g
round and Samanthŕa wavered through a situation, its own meaningless world,
which
she had never before known.

             
Fare well, sweet St
a
phãyn
. May the Goddess embrace you, for I cannot, no matter how hard I try. You have severed your ties to me
, crossed
into a world I may never know. Fare well.

             
Those were the only words
Samanthŕa could think of as she waded
through what seemed to last an eternity. She turned in silence, away from the
darkened, seedless
shores which had stolen what was left of him
.
Those of her bloodlines moved away like spirits haunting the dusk.
Lycãons
shifted and howled from the cliffs above.

Farewell.

             
While all else faded, she went to the one place that held the last of their happy memories, The Willow. It was high on a hill above a clear spring, with nothing else around it but tall grass and endless fields. It had nothing above it but sky and stars. It had nothing below it but earth and dust.

             
Dust,
she thought. Her thoughts were confused and distorted.
Rise from the dust,
St
a
phãyn
. Rise from the womb of the earth. Surprise me. Shock me. Anything except forget me. 

             
Her tears bled from h
er eyes while soulful pain sobbed
out
in sorrowful buckets
. Her body huddled in
to the breast of the tree, rocking back and forth in its state of misery. She wasn’t accustomed or conditioned
for this kind of loss. And
she felt separated from everyone and everything, even her sisters.

             
Immortality didn’t mean forever. She knew that now. It was nothing more than a misunderstanding-- something easily debated, taken for granted, left to be desired without ever knowing its true meaning or worth. It came in phases, like the birth of a tree, from seed to soil, from soil to
air,
breath. From breath came life and then many seasons. Were the seeds its immortality? For the tree sooner or later died. Yet it lived on, didn’t it? Except through another phase of life? Were many lives merely another phase or mask of Immortality?
If so, what mask did St
a
phãyn wear now? Again, she knew not the answers.