Inside the Fire

Chapter 24: Palpitations

We spend the day walking around the city, I asked her extensively about modern civilization and what humanity had been up to. It's one thing to have the memories of the people I killed and another to get a fresh opinion on the world's current affairs. After my light teasing, she was a bit hesitant to answer any questions. But as long as I behaved, she answered them.
A couple centuries ago, the governments of the world had come to a standstill, no one was progessing, except for population size. War was a thing of the distant past, but the human race was craving blood. So why not solve all the problems, and have a period time when war is legal? Science would progress, people would die to keep the population down and the people bloodlust would be satiated. What they didn't predict, was how the age of draft would change. The first wave were volunteer adults. Then it was non-voluntary young adults. After a couple decades of that, the youth were targeted. Now, after all this time, it was social pressure that made youths join in. For four years every ten years, humans ages 12 to 18 could volunteer to make their country great. Except they don't have a choice. Jobs don't hire unless you served and college applications were denied.
A curious solution to their population problem. I know through the memories of the military police that humans don't have the will to oppose their government. Was that a planned or a happy accident. Fai stops and looks into the window of a building, trying to see if there is anything interesting to see or do in it. I wonder what she thinks about the decade wars. The few times she mentioned the people she served with, even though they had died during her four years, there was always an undercurrent of appethetic acceptance of the circumstances.
She catches me staring and a faint blush reddens her cheeks.
"Is it easier to live in captive comfort, or actively try to improve your life?" I ask.
Her freezes, her brain doing gymnastics to catch up.
"Uh, what?"
Looking around at her fellow humans, passing us during the daily change. Then rest my eyes back on her, giving her time to match my tone to the question.
"I was thinking about your world's politics." I clarify.
Fai sighs deeply, letting her eyes fall from my face and turning back to the aimless direction we had been heading in.
"Being comfortable shouldn't get you killed." Her smile is wry.
"But if you play the game and live, life is whatever you want it to be. Within the confines of the cage of course." I scrutinize her features.
A frown threatens at the corner of her lips, her shoulders pull back with her back muscles tightening and one of her eyebrows twitches.
"No cage is nice enough if your forced to be alone."
"You're saying captivity is better if you have a friend?" I push.
"No, well-ugh!" Fai throws her hands in the air, "What do you think? Has life been easier having me around?"
"You think we're friends?" I can hardly hide my surprise.
"I hope we're friends." She amends.
Us? Being friends...
"Do friends react the same way you do, when I flirt with you?" I tease, lightening the subject.
"Sometimes." She grumbles begrudgingly.
"So your physical reaction-" I start.
"Is none of your gods-damn business!" She interrupts me, her face turning red. "I already told you to stop keeping tabs on that."
Oh, so earlier, this is what she had been referring to. Attraction.
"Why do you push me to the edge all the time? Do you crave chaos?" Her voice can barely contain her rage.
I don't think she's asking me, it sounds rhetorical. After everything, do I crave chaos? I'm trying to live peacefully, and I can't go a single day without driving the person nearest to me into a rage.
"I wish I knew." I reply, avoiding looking at her.
"Look," her jaw is clenched, adding a certain harshness to her words, "Just stop ignoring my boundaries, okay?"
I want to tease her again, mock her boundaries. Afterall, why should they mean anything to me? I own her, she can't escape me. It keeps coming back to that, doesn't it?Will I ever be able to respect her enough to take her seriously while i own her soul? God's all this thinking hurts. There must be a way to release her from this forced contract. The how is beyond me. With some effort, I keep a certain someone out of my thoughts. As little as what I know, I don't want help figuring it out. I'll go over my old memories, meditate and study everything I've heard. Ugh, why hadn't I learned to read?
I run a hand through my hair like scales on top of my head in frustration. Fai is looking at me, expectantly. Oh, right.
"Sure sure." I agree, scratching behind my head.
"Thanks, that's sooo reassuring." She rolls her eyes.
After our walk through the city, Fai was pleasantly surprised that she wasn't exhausted. The last time she'd tried something similar, her knees had hurt for days.
"Perks of having the right connections." I answer her unspoken thought. I hold the door to the apartments open for her.
"You're kidding." Her eyes widen. "That would explain a few things."
"Like what?" My curiosity is piqued.
"Like..." Her voice trails off in thought, "Like I don't get tired anymore. I still sleep, but I don't feel like I need to."
"Perks of no longer being completely human." I nod.
"Does that make me some kind of hybrid?" Her voice shakes.
"No." I answer. "My blood may have changed you, and linked you to me, but it dissipates in the process. It's the shape of your soul that has been altered, in order to establish the connection."
She nods, thoughtful,
"Would it be any different if you had killed me?"
I shake my head,
"Again, no. But a larger portion of my soul would be mixed in with yours. Take paint for an example. You're white, I'm blue. There is now a slight tinge of blue to you but you're still technically white. If I'd killed you,-" I pause at her door frame and lean on it, "Albeit a lighter shade of blue compared to me, you would undoubtedly be blue."
"So no horns or wings then." She sighs, wistful.
"Anyone can acquire wings," I huff, "Horns you have to earn."
She's now realizing I'm willing to talk about something she's had questions for her whole life. Questions about her Great Ansestor Uncle and about me. Fai waits until we're back in her room, inviting me in with a wave. Once the door closes behind me, she springs her first question.
    "Why did you do it? All that murder?"
I slump onto her floor with a groan, spreading out onto the rug of her living room.
    "You're still on that? It's not murder to Me." I complain. "Look, the more souls you collect, the more powerful you become."
    "You killed thousands." She whispers.
    "Hundreds of thousands." I correct.
    "You must be powerful." She states, her voice edging on fear.
    "Right, but you already knew that, 'The Destroyer' and all that." I lazily wave a hand as if to dismiss the nickname.
    "So you murdered hundreds of thousands for more power." She tilts her head thoughtfully, "Then the genocide wasn't the point, it was something you did to achieve something?"
    "I wanted my brother's throne," I shrug, "And power seemed the best way to get it."
    Fai pushes her silky black hair with a hand, her eyes incredulous.
    "You shrug like it wasn't a big deal, I still struggle to see why you value human life so little."
    "It doesn't have much worth." I flash her a shit eating grin, she scoffs in disgust. "You have access to all that power too." I finish off-hand.
    "I do?" Her brow furrows.
    "Of course, our bond is similar to a contract. You get my powers, I get your soul."
    "Ugh, please don't remind me." She stalks into her bathroom and starts getting ready to go to bed.
    "You have a better deal than your great ancestor uncle. He's only immortal, you should thank Moran for the difference." I spit out my brother's name, but my voice is otherwise smooth.
    "Does that mean he's still around?" Fai leans out her doorframe, fixing me in her gaze.
    "Yes, he's around on this planet... somewhere..." I find him weeping on public transport, fleeing from some woman he holds in his thoughts. Goddesses, I never took him to get so attached to the opposite sex. Humans really do change with time. "Nemüir just got his heart broken."
    "You can still... hear him?" Her eyes fill with awe.
    "He has no privacy from me." I shut my eyes and my mind from him. Nemüir is on his own now, if he finds his way back to me, we can catch up then. He's a little too depressed for my taste at the moment. "A small downside you don't have to worry about. If I want to hear you, I have to try."
    Not that I have to try with any difficulty to hear her thoughts, she thinks so loud. Like everyone else on this planet, do humans ever know when to close their minds? Even being enclosed in this room, I can hear everyone within a half mile radius with perfect clarity.
    "Okay," She puts a headband on to keep her hair out of her face while she washes it, "Then horns, will I be able to grow any?"
    I snort loudly,
    "As if you'd live that long."
    Her hand pauses it's circles, gripping her wash rag,
    "How long would I have to live?"
    "Considering how low the overall magic is in this world, longer than I have existed. Or you could baptize yourself in my magic for a couple centuries, that might do it." I answer. "You have access to that, you know."
    "Access to?.." Fai starts.
    "God's, My magic. What else would I be talking about." My voice is aggravated, but playful.
    "I can do magic?! That's real?!" She leans out of her doorway again, her eyes sparkling.
    "I'm a fucking Dragon and you didn't know if magic was real or not?" I think I can feel my hairline with my eyebrows.
    "All because one thing is real, it doesn't mean everything is real." She spells out. "What can I do?"
    "Anything, as long as you use the right words in the Primordial language." I say.
    "Like..?"
    Ah, that was a leading answer...
    "This," I write the word for fire in the air, and splayed my hand out, holding a flame the size of a tennis ball for her to see. "When it's a summon like this, supply it with magic. But if it's something like my clothes, you only need to weave it together the one time. Assuming you know the material make-up of course."
    I cut off the supply of magic to the fire.
    "What was that symbol?" She gestures in the air with a sloppy spiral.
    My eyes roll on their own, gods does she know anything?
    "The Primordial language is spoken, and written in spirals. The meaning is the beginning and you draw the following words out from that central point." I slowed down drawing the word again as I explain. "Start with the letter for death, followed by absord, then light, heat and growth."
    A flame sputters to life in my hand again. Fai follows along, her eyes squinting as she finished following along, averting her head as well. Nothing happens.
    "Wow, so cool." Her voice is dead pan, she fixes me with her eyes, unimpressed. "Was this you doing a roundabout way of embarrassing me?"
    I smile widely,
    "No, but I wish I had thought of that." Thinking through why it hadn't worked for her, I realized I hadn't supplied her with the source magic. "Try it again."
    "Really, I'm not going to do a bunch of weird hand signs for nothing?" Her brow raises, quizzical.
    "Something will happen this time," an idea sparks to life, and I fix a serious face on, "I promise."
    Fai watches me warily, but complies. I let a small stream of magic flow into her as she draws out the word, and on her completing it, I flood her system with power. Flames explode out of both her hands, climbing up her forearms and illuminating the room in bright yellow. She screams in shock, falling backward and desperately tries to put the twin flames our. I shake with laughter as her fear turns to confusion.
    "It doesn't, hurt?..." Her eyes wide with disbelief.
    "The flames are an extension of you," I choke out in between laughs, "Whatever you make with your own power cannot hurt you." Idiot.
    "How was I supposed to know that." She looks at the flames with a new appreciation, leaning up and crossing her legs in a sitting position. "Now how do I turn it off?"