Prompt: Viren decides to ignore Soren's refusal to being given power, Enya could only watch in horror
Setting: Heart of Cinder episode to The Final Battle episode
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"You dare refuse this?" Viren snarls at Soren as he takes a step back in alarm. "I'm giving you a chance to become better, and you dare refuse it and embarrass me in front of all these soldiers?"
"I don't want to be better, or your version of better!" Soren snaps as he takes another step back before his father suddenly lunges forward to grab his wrist and yanks him forward. "Hey!"
"You will do as you are told!" Viren orders as he shoves him onto his knees. "You have embarrassed me enough!"
"King Viren, if he is unwilling, I will accept this power." Soren hears Kasef say.
"Don't accept it, he'll ruin you!" The teen yells before he feels his father's staff touch the back of his head. "Dad stop! Please, I don't want this!"
"Silence! You will both become the most powerful soldiers of this army, and you will accept it! Prince Kasef, hold him down!" Viren snarls before he begins to chant.
Soren felt Kasef's knee on his back to pin him down and his hand on the back of his head to keep it from moving. He could still see the crowd of soldiers at the base of the hill as purple light began to swarm them both. He hears faint yelling and could see a lone figure trying to race to the front of the crowd, and his heart nearly stops when he realizes it's Enya. Someone is stopping her from running forward as she's screaming his name and reaching out for him.
Please run, please just go. He silently begs her as he gives out a scream of pain as he feels a surge of heat course through his body. His hands are growing and becoming more like claws, the pale skin now turning dark and having a more rocky texture. Kasef is no longer pinning him down, he could hear the prince screaming in pain as he is transforming as well. Soren raises his head and locks eyes with Enya. Please go, please before you expose yourself!
"RUN!" He manages to scream, hoping she understood what he was telling her before he lets out a scream that doesn't even sound human. His body is growing, his clothes are ripping as more of his skin hardens and his thoughts are becoming more violent. Kill, kill, destroy, destroy everything!
Soren gives a sudden loud roar as he jumps to his feet, now fully transformed. He knew nothing, nothing but his one duty: kill anything that crossed his path.
---
"Okay, how about you try explaining what happened, take your time." Callum says as he hands Enya a cup of something warm and steaming.
"Like from when we returned to Katolis or what happened after Viren and the other armies departed?" She asks in a hoarse voice as she accepts the cup and takes a small sip from it.
"How about what happened before you escaped?" Ezran suggested. "What happened to Soren? I thought he'd be with you."
"What are you talking about?" Rayla asks with a frown. "Isn't he on Viren's side with Claudia?"
"He's on our side, he freed Ezran from jail, messaged Lujanne to help us, and got me and a few others out of the kingdom the night before Viren and the armies started their march." Enya explains. "A few nights ago after entering Xadia, Viren had left on his own to the Sunfire elf kingdom and didn't come back until nightfall. When he came back, he had this big creepy bug thing around his shoulder and was carrying this big fancy staff that must have belonged to the Sunfire elves."
"The sun staff?" Ibis asks in surprise, "How did he get his hands on that? It's a sacred relic of the Sunfire elves!"
"I don't know, but that sun magic from the staff mixed with his dark magic allowed him to do something to the soldiers. I was in the crowd when Viren was going on about giving the soldiers power, and he was going to bestow it first to...Soren.
Anciets, she couldn't forget his screams of pain, the horrific image of his body turning to stone as he was screaming at her to run. That pain in her chest that had arose as she watched him change hadn't faded, and she couldn't even sleep those past few days on the run without seeing it happen over and over in her nightmares.
"No!" Ezran exclaims in horror. "Why would Viren do that?!"
"Because he wanted to prove it was "safe" or whatever, and he wanted to show that by transforming his own son." Enya responds, gripping her cup tightly. "I swear, If that man comes anywhere near us, magic or not, I will throttle him myself!"
"Oh no..." Callum murmurs and looks to the others. "Viren has an army, what are we going to do?"
"What are we supposed to do?!" Enya suddenly yells, flinging down her cup and sending the liquid spilling onto the floor. "We can't do anything Callum! We have no backup, your wind magic is limited to three spells, we only have capable fighters, and Ezran can't even lift a sword to defend himself! Viren is coming, and we have no way of stopping him!"
"Hey, calm down!" Rayla yells as the older teen storms away from them. "Where are you going?"
"Outside! Before I accidentally punch something and regret it!"
Enya storms out, ignoring the large moon cat creature and the red dragon resting outside of the Spire, running across the bridge before she reaches the steps and plopped herself down on the top step before breaking down in tears. She couldn't even believe she hadn't done anything to save Soren, she should have ran up that hill and stopped the transformation process before running off with him. Or they should have left before Viren ever came back, being long gone before nightfall. She could have done something, anything to save him. He risked everything getting her, Opeli, Corvus and Barius out of Katolis, getting Ezran help to get him out of Katolis as fast as possible, and she hadn't done anything to save him from his father. She could stand up to an anger fueled prince, but she couldn't even stop a power-hungry and manipulative mage.
She hears a small growl and turns to see the large red dragon standing behind her before it carefully kneels down and grabs her by the back of her armor to pull her back from the stairs. The dragon then gently nudged her to sit down on the ground before laying down to curl around her.
"I messed up, I really messed up." Enya whispers as she leans against the dragon. "I...I couldn't even do anything. I couldn't even save my friend from his dad. I lost my friend, he's nothing but a brainwashed monster. And I just yelled at my friends, this whole week has been nothing but a mess!"
The dragon grunts quietly in response. Okay, what was she expecting, for the dragon to start talking to her and give her advice to make her feel better? Or for it to fly off and bring back her friend, fixed and put back to his normal state?
"What do I do now?" Enya asks the dragon. "What can I even do?"
---
Pain, that's all that she could feel right now. Enya could feel her ears ringing as she laid on the ground while her entire body felt like it had been trampled by a herd of bulls, the sword she had been holding earlier laying a few feet from her grasp as the battle raged around her. It hurt so much to move right now, but she knew she had to get up before one of those soldiers decided to trample or impale her with their weapons, and she needed to fight to keep the enemy from getting up the mountain to where Callum was busy blasting the enemy with his lightning spell to keep them at bay. Her hand reached for her sword, only for someone to kick it away from her grasp. Enya groans in frustration as she tries rolling over on her stomach to get herself up, biting back a scream as her body moves.
"Get up! This is no place to lay!" She hears a Sunfire elf say as a pair of hands try to get her up as another hands her back her sword. "Keep fighting!"
She was still feeling a bit dazed, the ringing in her ears had settled, but even that did not stop her from noticing a recognizable figure barreling towards her. Spotting a Sunfire elf shield nearby, Enya makes a grab for it, and with her left arm, she manages to lift it up just in time as Soren crashes right into her. Like a few nights ago, he was still the same snarling beast she had witnessed him turn into. His tunic was practically torn to shreds, and half of his armor was missing now, and she was growling like some sort of rabid dog as she tried to separate herself from him with her new shield.
"Soren it's me! It's Enya!" She yells as she drops her sword to use both arms to try and push him back with the shield. "I don't want to fight you!"
Soren snarls again, bearing his weight down harder on her and making her nearly slip. With a grunt, Enya tries pushing back, her arms straining under the weight of the beast. She had no way of grabbing her sword, both arms were occupied with holding the shield up, and the elves were too busy with other soldiers to help her. Glancing behind her, she caught Janai fighting with Kasef, now in what she called Heat Mode, and looking almost eerily like the now changed prince with her skin laced with golden cracks. All the two were doing now was punching each other in the face. Then, idea came to mind.
"Sorry Soren, but this is gonna hurt me more than it's gonna hurt you!" Enya yells, removing one hand out from under the shield and curling it into a fist. She swung her fist, ignoring the pain as it connected with Soren's face and used the opportunity to shove him away. The soldier snarls in anger, rubbing his cheek as the tailor dives for her sword and grabs it.
"I'm not going to fight you Soren, I don't want to hurt my best friend!" She yells, hoping he could hear her over the sound of the other soldiers fighting. "If there's any chance of saving you, I will find it! I will fix this! I already lost Claudia, I'm not going to lose you! I love you too much to lose you like this to Viren!"
This earns her a loud snort from Soren, before he starts to walk towards her. Enya raises her shield and prepares to defend herself. If she could knock him out or daze him with the shield, she would try to do it, least violent way possible to stop Soren from fighting and taking out at least one of the two strongest soldiers in the army. He was getting closer now, eight feet...six feet...four feet... Enya closes her eyes and braces herself for the blow, before she feels her shield being torn from her grasp. She opened her eyes to find Soren standing very close to her now, but something was different. There was no longer a malicious glare in his eyes or in his expression, instead there was one of genuine concern before he takes the shield from her and drops it to the floor before grabbing her right hand and holding it to his cheek.
He recognized her. She wanted to cry in relief, he recognized her! Enya stretched her other hand out to gently touch Soren's other cheek, to which he gently leaned his head forward to touch foreheads with her and let out a soft purring noise.
"There you are, my big doof." She whispers, her voice cracking softly from emotion. "I knew you were still there under all that anger."
They both hear a roar and out of the corner of her eye, Enya sees Janai being thrown right at them. She feels Soren grab her and turns to shield her from Janai, nearly knocking them both to the floor along with the knight.
"Soren look out!" Enya yells, peeking around her friend to see Kasef charging right at them. Soren snarls, releasing her from his grasp and whirling around to strike the prince square in the face before the two of them started to trade blows. "Janai! Are you okay?"
"I'm fine, but what in the sun's name was that soldier doing with you?" The elf asks as Enya tries helping her up, her face and arms no longer glowing. "And is it...fighting with that other soldier?"
"That would be Soren, he's on our side now."
"As curious as I am to know how you managed to turn one of the dark mage's soldiers against the other soldiers, we have a fight to finish."
---
"I can't believe you somehow managed to get him to turn against Viren, it's incredible!" Callum says, guesting to Soren as he hovers behind Enya, glancing warily at the Durian and Katolian rebel soldiers who kept glancing at them warily. "How did you do it? He was as crazy and out of control as the other soldiers at the start of the battle!"
The battle was over, Zubeia had awakened and right now everyone was trying to get patched up and resting now. The entire time, Soren wouldn't leave Enya's side, growling softly at strangers who kept glancing at them curiously before they looked away in fear. Earlier he kept growling at poor Ibis, who was trying to fix her injured hand (same one she punched him with), until he finished wrapping it up before giving her something to drink and sending her off to tend to someone else.
"I don't know, maybe when I yelled at him that I was going to try and save him." Enya says with a shrug as Soren lowers his head so his chin was touching the top of her head. "Soren stop it."
Soren lets out a small growl, which sounded almost like a chuckle. Well, she was going to keep her promise on figuring out a way to change him back, but that was probably going to take a while. Enya knew very well she couldn't even understand magic as well as Claudia could, but for Soren's sake, she was going to do whatever she could to fix his current state and hope this new form wouldn't have any bad side effects.
"Do you think he needs to eat anything?" Ezran asks her. "I'm sure he needs some sort of food source to keep him well fed."
"I don't even know, for all I know he can live off raw meat like a dragon." Enya says with a shrug. "I guess we'll have to see."
"Communicating with him might be difficult, all he does is growl, snarl and snort."
"Gren came to me earlier offering to fix that, saying he could try to teach us some basic sign language so either of us can communicate with each other."
"Oh that can work!" Callum says with a grin. "And maybe we can try teaching him to talk again while we're at it - assuming it's possible."
"You hear that Soren? We're already figuring out how to solve your communication problems." Enya laughs, glancing up at her friend. "Soon enough, we'll find a way to get you back to normal. So let's hope there actually is a way to reverse this."