The wedding was in a couple of hours and Lizzie was beginning to regret letting Scott walk out of their lives again. Not only because she would have loved to have him at the wedding, but also because he was skilled at calming people down, even though he seemed cold and heartless.
She knew he wasn't going to be there. He had made it clear he wouldn't be returning, the implication of forever laying between them, sat on his tongue, waiting to be true. And Lizzie knew it was for the best, she couldn't let the work he had put in, the sacrifices he had made for the safety of the remaining 11 rulers, go to waste.
- - - -
Jimmy wanted to be in Joel's place as he fiddled with the latter's tie. He wanted to be the one marrying the love of his life and stressing that everything wasn't perfect, or that he would get to the alter and his fiancé would reject him and run, never to be seen again. That was kind of Scott, although they weren't married yet and Jimmy woke up with nothing but a goodbye note and an empty bed.
"Jimmy the tie looks fine." Jimmy just met his eyes, sighed, and relented. Joel was old enough to fix it by himself, he just wanted a taste of what his own wedding could have looked like. "Also please stop staring into space, what's on your mind mate?"
How did he exaplin to Joel he was currently engaged to a man they haven't seen in two years and could possibly be dead. "Just..thinking 'bout Scott. Lizzie wanted everyone here." Joel nodded, smiling at him before saying, "Yeah. I'm sure if he had known, he would have come."
- - - -
Joel despises lying to Jimmy, about Scott and having no clue, about how Jimmy is under the impression no one has seen Scott since he disappeared. He knew he had to, otherwise he would have the issue of keeping Jimmy from going to look for him, just because he wants Lizzie's wedding to be perfect, and to make sure he came home safe to his friends and alliances.
Because that's who Jimmy was, a crowd pleaser who hated seeing anyone upset unless he was blinded by his own emotions to catch anyone else's. Joel admired that about his soon-to-be brother-in-law.
- - - -
They decided to have their wedding in the church of Aeor to have something of Scott's with them, or around them, as they got married. They put up a couple of the Mezalea and Ocean Kingdom banners, but left the majority of the Rivendell ones, in respect of their friend.
Lizzie hadn't realized how pretty it looked until she was walking down the aisle towards Joel.
- - - -
Xornoth hated weddings. They were happy days that bonded two people for life in the eyes of the law. Sometimes that bond was forever, and other times it broke apart. He saw them as pointless events of cake, dancing, dresses and overpriced decorations and planning.
He was quite happy to ruin it.
- - - -
The doors to the church flew open just as Lizzie had gotten to the alter. The figure that stood there wasn't human. It was covered in black, with tall horns. It had red eyes that stared into Jimmy's eyes as he returned it. The figure smirked as well, stepping forwards before stopping, eyes constantly trained on him, then to Joel, Lizzie and back to him.
It made Jimmy uncomfortable. He didn't know if this was his imagination, some hallucination because he was so stressed and happy and upset and overwhelmed, yet looking at anyone, heads turned towards it, he knew it was reality.
"Mortals." He sounded scarily similar to Scott. The accent almost identical, if not for the rough way they spoke. The colors were almost opposites to Scott's - that was knowledge he learnt in an art class one time. It had so many likeness' to Scott, but at the same time it was easy to see the differences. It seemed cruel and cold hearted, condescending and evil. None of that was Scott, not in any universe Jimmy could conjure in his mind.
"Sorry to burst your happy bubble, but I have news about your beloved King of Rivendell." The room seemed to tense, the feel of it suffocating. The way it was said, the glint in its eye, Jimmy wasn't looking forward to what it was going to say next, but he didn't think he would ever hear the words it said, "He's dead."
- - - -
Lizzie looked at the being in pure horror. She wondered if this was Scott's hunter. Why he had been driven from his home and his friends and family, because this, thing, wanted him dead.
And she realized, it was her fault in a way. It stung, it stabbed her, opened wounds that flooded her senses with empty pain she wished would swallow her whole. She allowed him to stay, she ignored the warning signs, the fidgeting. She didn't offer to give him some form of transport to get him further away from the country.
She had arms around her before she realized she was crying. She gave a solemn look to Joel. He was looking to his side, towards Jimmy.
- - - -
Jimmy had never once thought he would face a day where Scott wasn't alive. He had faced years without him around, but never once did he consider he was dead. Jimmy didn't even know how recent this was, if it had been painful and slow, if it had been quick and painless, its cause. He knew nothing apart from a stranger with a murderous look of glee was waiting for someone to say something to it.
And in that moment he knew it was their fault.
"How?"
"He fell off the edge of the end, straight into the void."
Jimmy couldn't even see his body because it was lost. He never got to say goodbye, never got to hold his hand as Scott's life slowly seeped away from him. He was going to be sick, he wanted to cry, to scream. Nothing came. Just numb grief.
"Why?"
"Why what?"
"Why did he fall. Scott isn't clumsy. What. Did. You. Do." Jimmy glared at it, watching it mull over the answer for a few moments, hoping to find some reluctance or regret. He found nothing.
"I didn't push him, just walked towards him as he walked backwards. He fell off the edge without even screaming."
Jimmy didn't know what to make of it. His fiance was gone and he was fairly sure whoever, or whatever this monster of a being was, it wasn't stopping at Scott. It probably wasn't stopping until the world was its own.
- - - -
Scott could hear Jimmy shouting at his Brother before he was even inside the building. He had decided to take the secret entrance not even his advisors knew about. He hd built it himself shortly after his parents had died for when he needed a quiet moment without the guards granting him access before telling his staff - the first and only time he had made that mistake was embarrassing enough. It led him to the alter, where he had better vantage of hearing and guessing where his brother was stood in the church.
"Why kill him?" Jimmy was arguing.
"Because he was the only one powerful enough to save you all, whether he knew it or not. But he's dead now, I can do what I please with you all, starting with yourself, fish boy."
"What are you going to do to him?" He couldn't tell if that was Lizzie or someone else, their voice was too thick from crying.
"Oh, you know, torture him, starve him, the usual."
- - - -
Jimmy was about to protest - or beg for mercy, he wasn't decided - before a voice sounded behind him, so familiar he almost didn't want to believe it was real. "Touch him and I swear brother, I'll do more than kill you."
"I thought you were dead."
"Please, you failed to check whether there was stone under me to fall onto, spoiler, there was."
"Pity. No matter, you can also watch your precious Cod boy suf-"
Scott didn't give him time to finish the sentence as he was striking Xornoth with his newfound magic whilst also throwing his sword at him, before firing arrows for safe measure. He fell to the ground, bleeding and shivering, trying to fight the shock, writhing in deaths hands as it dragged him away.
Xornoth stilled just before he started to go dizzy himself, the injuries from their other fight weighing him down. And if this is where he was dying, having saved everyone and everything, he would be content. Because maybe this had been the purpose he had been searching for since his parents died. Maybe this is what fate had always intended for him to be, another hero with a tragic ending, surrounded by blurring voices as his body hit the floor. He had never known the sense of being untroubled before, always restless to find his place in the world, the people who needed him and cared about him in the same way he did so them. But he knew it now, the feeling of fulfilling what he was destined for, the one good thing he could do to repay the kindness of the people he had ruled alongside with for decades.
He didn't hear the frantic voices and rushing feet of his medical team as his eyes closed and everything went black for what he thought would be the final time.
- - - -
War was always going to be a part of life, because morals clashed and the greed for power wasn't in the realms of being sated for most. Sometimes it was plagued in gunshots and cries, other times it was the meeting of two forces that had equal amounts of power with endless puppets at their disposal to fight as mortal people.
In this case, it was a battle that had been fought by three generations, the first being the two Gods themselves, drifting slowly apart until one was consumed by the evil of power and desire for death and destruction.
The second were two brothers, forced to fight until they were both killed, one by the other, the other because they had lived long enough and served their purpose to allow the world to fall back into normality and peace for a while.
The 3rd, also being two brothers. Although one had never known the other, and he hadn't regretted killing the latter, just like his other half hadn't cared when his limp body fell over the edge into death.
And as the dust finally settles, the battlefield is laid with poppies, bodies of the fallen buried under forgiving and freeing soil, finally giving troubled souls their escape from the grasps of dark power and magic.
- - - -
And the one who remains alive, a halo of poppies around his head like a victors crown, lays to rest as his body heals. For him, life isn't ready to let him leave the living just yet.
Because sometimes the fights and the losses and the sacrifices, are worth it.
~ ~ ~ ~
He's finally DEAD!
(not proof-read)