Into Shadows and Escaping Ash ✔️

22.1 | Tattered Memories |

What becomes of them now might be a mystery, but they are safe.

They have to be.

"Your nephew was killed shortly after your collapse... He attempted to ward Kiel off the track from the girls but I cannot say his attempts were successful."

I take a deep breath and numb out the rampaging thoughts in my head. When this being spews more twisted tricks about the world being invented without our creation, there is nothing to believe.

My eyes close and I focus on the sensations around me. The cold metallic table, the moist air in the room, the faint aroma of wet earth seeping in from somewhere nearby.

Steps slip against the pavement outside.

"He's here to end you now."

"You do realize you contradict yourself, Demon. If it had been a year, surely one of you bumbling peasants would have managed to kill me already."

The door to my left screeches open and the hissing wisps of smoke escape from the ceiling again.

Kiel's figure slips in wordlessly, his hands careful and movements measured. He shuts the door and locks it tight behind him, toting a back that lands carefully on the floor. The dark hair fades in and out of focus, dim light shuddering when a small lamp is placed on a table in the corner.

No greeting, no threats.

My fingers run over the grains and scratches from previous thrashings to the metal. Some fairly old and others rather new.

I inspect him, words failing to come out of my mouth while my eyes squint into the faded black looking for clues. No sharp tools come clattering out onto the table, no machines with awful noises and enchantments, not even the blade summoned to be used on me.

A bottle appears eventually. A thin, yellowing paper taped around it with words far from english. The liquid inside rolls like molten iron, with blue glowing edges and specks of swirling greens.

Pausing for a moment, he looks to the side almost as if to stare back at me in acknowledgement. Kiel sighs in wonder.

"I've learned a great many things from studying witches," he mumbles softly. "Which animals have magic in their blood, which plants can save you from sure death... Somehow they're always obsessed with Necromancy and the ingredients to eternal life as if living hundreds of years isn't already enough for them."

Kiel steps aside and traces a circle of Mana around my confinement.

"They'll use whoever they want to meet their ends, trust very few in their own coven, and dawn their appearances according to rank. Scared of few beings, they find attacks that don't require being present, but instead stealth like any human assassin... I find them absolutely fascinating, you see."

A dome of translucent blue light crowns itself over my head and seals downward in a burst of green flame.

"Surely very similar to your obsession with the Fae of our world, whose bloodline runs as close to ours as any other entity can get. Speaking of you Darling pet, I have something of hers."

I swallow, looking around to make sure it doesn't involve grotesque body parts or obscene contraptions.

Though surely, Meika would rather that.

Phasing through the door like a ghost, a silky white haired frame steps toward the edge of light. Their pupils are completely dilated, lacking all color. Small features like scars and lashes are completely absolved.

Haunting memories of a tirade in their wake scrubbed clean.

I am looked through rather than upon.