Chapter 28: Brief History Lesson
As I expected the Fox was waiting for me, and appeared seemingly from nothing as she often did bidding me to follow her to the Temple where Sir Morgan lived.
I followed the little fox into the Temple where she once again led me into the back room where the Fae statues resided. I shuddered when I saw the statue of Taro but didn’t have much time to contemplate it when Milia rounded on me with a serious expression. With a small sigh and a twitch of the ear she spoke.
“Well I promised to tell you a few things, this is going to take a while ‘cause I have to start from the beginning.”
I sighed and sat back against some other statue furthest away from Taro’s. “Alright, I’m listening Ancient one.”
Milia glared at me with a slight twitch of her tail. “I’ll just start from the final battle with Taro. Yasou had been looking into the Shadow Realm, where he had found a disturbance and had come to tell Ellyllon, who was the first wilder of Darksword about it. It was that Taro had been going into the Shadow Realm and manipulating those there. Niamh, who was the current wielder of Halosword, suggested that we should go to the Shadow Realm and stop Taro from there. Seeing as this was the only plan we could think of, Yasou took us to the Shadow Realm. What we saw was…not exactly describable with words…”
The First Alliance then traveled to the Shadow Realm, the first known beings from the outside to set foot into that accursed Realm since its creation. But what they found was not what they expected; it was a world of unending night. Colors were not something seen in this place, aside from the night shades of blue and grey; the only light provided by the two moons that hung low in the inky black sky. No stars were seen in this place, but aside from that it had a mysterious allure to it. The entire Realm seemed brimming with some untapped power.
They had little time to take in the mysterious kingdom of Shadows though. They only had so much time before the Dark Fae made his move. If he were to brake into Mertia from the Shadow Realm, chaos would ensue. With Yasou’s help it took them little time to locate the Dark Fae. He stood in the center of a large forest. A smooth stone platform raised a few feet from the ground created the perfect battle ground; the gateway between the Realms. Two large pillars sat at the far end of the platform and between them was the Dark Fae himself.
Taro awaited their arrival with a calm demeanor, a minute smile tugging his lips as his gold eyes rested on the small Alliance. He looked almost bored, as if they weren’t a threat of any sort and greeted them with a smile and a bow. His long dark cloak floated behind him as he walked forward meeting Ellyllon halfway. His golden eyes seemed to be the only color in this world of perpetual night. With a few words tossed back and forth between them the battle commenced, ending only with the death of Ellyllon and Niamh. The only way for them to stop Taro was to reSeal him, and it took both of their lives to do so. They sealed the Shadow Realm from Mertia, and then Sealed Taro in the center of Mertia once more…
Milia sighed waiting for some reaction from me. I honestly wasn’t sure how to react. From what she was saying this had all happened before. Some blunder from the past was coming back to haunt us with his dark presence. And to think that Milia and Yasou were that old; they were ancient! Silently I wondered why, if they were so old, and obviously in love, they had never had kids. I wouldn’t ever ask that aloud of course. I contemplated having Ankou ask Yasou instead. The Shadow guy seemed much more laid back than Milia. Returning to the situation at hand I huffed.
“I hope you don’t expect me to give my life to reSeal this guy. Die fighting, sure, willingly give my life, no chance.”
Milia almost seemed amused for a moment but merely shook her head. “I wouldn’t expect something so noble from you.”
I snorted, “Good, you should know me at least that well by now.”
She chuckled darkly, tapping her long claws against her nose. “Yea. Well, you should probably get your Alliance back to the mainland; you still have a lot of seals to collect.”
With that she exited the Temple, leaving me with probably more questions than I got answers. With a sigh I headed back to the Inn to retrieve the others. The sooner we left, the sooner we could get back to the nice warm mainland. As soon as I entered the lobby I noticed everyone was now awake and talking with the town people that had been there the previous night. Rsh was speaking in my absence to Seth, thanking him for the supplies donated by the town. I waited in the back while they exchanged pleasantries and then watched the townspeople leave, seeming a lot brighter than when we arrived. Bundles were laid on the floor wrapped in furs and thick blankets. It was a lot of stuff, but we were in need of more supplies. I stepped up, making my presence known to them. Leah smiled at me wishing me a good morning as her ever-cheerful self. Before I could say anything back Aurora stepped up to me with a blank expression.
“Is your offer still open to let me borrow one of your bodices?”
I raised an eyebrow at her present attire. It was a waist length chemise with a floral print bodice, like ones commonly worn by women in this city. Stifling a laugh I raised an eyebrow in question at her. “It was a ‘gift’ from the women here; they thought I needed new clothes.”
At this I couldn’t help but laugh at, seeing the ever bland Aurora in such a feminine smock worn by the common home maker was almost too much for me to handle.
“Don’t laugh too hard, they left one for you too.”
This merely caused me to laugh harder but I quickly caught control of it. “Yea, you can borrow one of mine; I don’t think I could handle seeing you in that for very long.”
After giving Aurora the only bodice I had that would fit her-which happened to be the dark blue one belonging to the Assassin-I headed off to find Fall and Ankou. Leah said Fall was gone when she woke up and Ankou had gone to look for her.
It took nearly an hour to find them. They were just outside of the village where it looked like a house used to be. There was a charred spot in the show where something had been burned, but it looked as though it had happened years before so it wasn’t easy to say what was there before. A few frozen plants remained where once there had been a garden. Fall stood alone by a small rose bush. All that was left were a few twigs poking up out of the frozen earth. Ankou stood a good distance away from her watching, and she hadn’t even seemed to notice him. Stepping closer I made to go get her but was held back by Ankou who just motioned for me to watch. Falls lavender hair stood out in a ghastly contrast to the white snow behind her as she knelt down to the rose with a sad look on her young face. Holding up her hand I saw part of the vine she always wore poke out from under her sleeve. With s small stroke to the wilted leaves the plant suddenly sprang to life, twisting upwards as new green leaves appeared and petals of a lovely yellow rose unfurled. In a gentle motioned Ankou swept forward and lifted the girl into his arms.
Obviously, this chapter isn't all here yet (I've written more, but need to look over it)
Chapter 1: Celeste of Darksword
Chapter 2: Disturbances
Chapter 3: The Elven Realms
Chapter 4: Fayel
Chapter 5: lovers
Chapter 6:Daggers and a Daughter
Chapter 7: Faerytales Requiem
Chapter 8: Far too long
Chapter 9: Shadow Born
Chapter 10: Nightmare
Chapter 11: a Child’s Faerytale
Chapter 12: The Price of Shadow
Chapter 13: Life and Death
Chapter 14: The Dark Fae
Chapter 15: Shining in the Night
Chapter 16: Day and Night
Chapter 17: Endorea
Chapter 18: Dandragen, city of stone
Chapter 19: Golem of the Light Seal
Chapter 20: Taro's Words
Chapter 21: To the North
Chapter 22: Captain
Chapter 23: Land of Ice
Chapter 24: Home Sweet Home
Chapter 25: Milia’s little secret
Chapter 26: Darkest Prison
Chapter 27: Weary
Stumble!