Coming of the Darkstar

Ch1-7 Crimson Tide

The souls of countless victims swept around her.

The salty breeze was strangely calm once the swelling tides subsided. The waves lapped gently at the shoulders of the tower-top where Joran perched. On all sides, the ocean breathed in a quiet rhythmic cadence.

Foam-licked forms drifted upon the water's surface. Some had already gathered a trailing of seaweed.

One floated only feet away — an upturned face, tinged blue in the sallow sunlight. The skin was pock-marked, eaten away by the deluge of acidic rain that had washed down over the city only an hour ago. One eye socket was hollowed from the stroke of salt water fingers. The other eye stared glassily off into the sky, an expression of pleading agony captured forever within its hazel depths.

The face had once belonged to a young boy. His white robes were spread over the plain of deep blue-green in an angelic arc behind him.

Stretching to the horizon, many more figures ebbed and flowed. Eventually they became nothing more than dark patches of water in the distance. But she knew.

Incrytan held her testimony.

The soft glow within its heart had turned a deep, reproachful red. The peaceful melody that usually accompanied its light had grown doleful and somber.

The Crystal was weeping.

The ghostly screams of the dying still echoed behind her ears. The sound grew louder by the second. From within the chorus of torment, a lone voice chanted.

'How is it you remain while the innocents suffered?'

The eddying waters churned long patterns of red drawn across deep azure. In slow deliberation, the boy's corpse began to drift nearer. With the shifting of tide, the head dropped below the surface of the water. Sandy-gold hair fanned out, mingling with the oozing pool of dark crimson.

'What gives you the right to live while they perished by your actions?'

The head bobbed up, breaking the surface of the waves once more. The pale face languidly turned. Its glassy eye fixed upon her.

'How many?'

A growing sickness tore her insides, threatening to buckle her knees. Joran had never seen a dead person — Lunar or Human — so closely before.

'How many have suffered?'

The eye focused, growing clearer.

'How many have died?'

The throb of Incrytan increased in her hands. It became a jolting beat twinned in time with her own rapid pulse. Her breath grew ragged and short. It shook through every bone in her body.

'And for what purpose?'

In a slow, conscious motion the boy's head tilted, revealing a wormy underside of acid-eaten flesh.

'Mourn for them now, though it means nothing. It is too late to undo what you have done.'

Joran gagged as the reek of decay struck her. Her throat constricted as a putrid taste filled her mouth.

'You thought you could wield an instrument of power crafted from such a baneful heart? You have become no better than the Man of Darkness that you strive to transform.'

The ashen face contorted casting a skeletal leer at her.

'Joran SuKi, you are a murderer!'

The girl staggered backwards, one hand over her mouth. Her eyes clamped shut. Still the image remained, burned into her memory. Dropping to her knees, Joran buried her face into her hands.