Sky's arm was healed in a few painful minutes and he was invited to stay at Seto's home in the city. It would be empty except for he and Deadlox, since the general had to stay to deal with the war. Sky wanted to stay with Mitch, but the idea of the first real bed in weeks helped him figure out that his friend would be fine on his own.
The city home was only a minute or two away, and, since the streets were dark and empty minus a few late-night attenders of restaurants, they didn't see many people. Brice had apparently become something like their guide and led the two immortals down a street lined with very nice-looking houses. The sky was still dark when they entered the house, signaling that they hadn't been in what turned out to be the city hall for very long.
The trio stopped into front of one of the smaller houses and Brice muttered something under his breath. The elegant spruce door gave a small click and the blonde pushed it open.
Lavender and white streams of light filled the room as soon as Sky stepped inside, crisscrossing and curling beautifully across the ceiling and illuminating the room. A large, comfortable-looking grey couch bordered one wall, a similar-looking chair to its left at an angle to fit in the corner. A low table sat in the middle on a rug that matched the one in Seto's office. A set of stairs lay on the opposite side of the room and the door that they had just come through was in the middle of the wall, facing the furniture.
Brice grinned. "Pretty sweet, isn't it? The lights automatically appear when someone goes through the doorframe." He pointed to the place he spoke of, and Sky saw a small, dimly glowing symbol right above the door.
"Anyway, there are two rooms: one for each of you. Unless," Brice smirked at them, "you'd like to share one."
They ended up going into their separate rooms with red faces and no further conversation.
Sky stood in a field of grass.
It was a calm tan color, reaching up to his waist and swaying gently in a light breeze that he couldn't feel.
Across the field, a faint black mist was approaching, and Sky got that dream-like feeling that something bad was going to happen and there was nothing he could do to stop it from happening.
The grass rustled behind him, and Sky whirled around, terror striking him when he recognized Jason.
"Get away!" Sky cried, and Jason held his hands out, eyes wide.
"No, you don't understand!" he pleaded, taking a step towards the brine. "It's not me! It's not me killing i-"
"Get out of my head!" Sky screamed, stumbling backwards and turning around.
"Wait!" Jason's voice echoed after him, but Sky ran headlong into the black mist and it swallowed him up, taking him deeper into his dreams.
He now felt talons digging into him, where his arm was torn open in days previous. He tried to run but his feet couldn't get a grip on the slippery stone and he fell to the ground, wings beating in his ears and a beastly roar of victory shattering the last of his bravery. A gust of wind blew him backwards, and he tumbled and slipped off of the edge of the pale stone and into the dark void of nothing.
And as he fell, he touched his hand to his chest and discovered that his amulet wasn't there. Instantly, all he could see was the blinding white light and the image of his friend pinned beneath him and the knowledge of a fury and hatred so incredible that Sly had been about to deliver the killing blow to the boy-
Sky flew upright in the bed, panting. His hand immediately reached for the familiar weight of the amulet and he let out a small breath of relief to know that it was still there; yet he still couldn't get that twisted knot of fear out of his gut. He was sweating, burning up and when he touched the sides of his face he discovered that tears had been running down his cheeks.
He tried to slow his breathing, to adjust to the heat and relieve his fear, but to no avail. The amulet was like a small heater and the warm room didn't help either. A quick glance out of the only window told him that it was still dark, so he hadn't been asleep long. But if it was nighttime, especially with the cold seasons approaching, why did he feel like he was surrounded by fire?
Unconsciously, not even knowing what he was doing or where he was going, Sky slipped out of the finely made bed and out of the door to the room. Just across the hall was another door, almost identical to his. He tried the handle, but it was locked. The late night must have been messing with his emotions because he needed to open this door and he absolutely had to see him because the last place he saw him was in the memory of his own brutality.
The door handle clicked and opened. Sky stared at it for a moment, then decided he would figure this out the next day and silently entered the room. Inside was a large bed and a smaller figure that didn't even fill it up halfway. His head bleary and eyes already beginning to close again from exhaustion, Sky only had time to crawl onto the other side and pull the blankets over himself before he fell back into sleep, the heat ebbing from the cold emitted by the other person.
-
Deadlox felt someone climb into his bed and, faster than a mortal could blink, he had a kitchen knife in his hand and had it poised over the intruder's heart. He stopped himself when he glimpsed the facial features of the person, and couldn't help but let out a soft smile, slipping the knife back under his pillow. It wasn't someone coming to kill him. It wasn't someone coming to capture him. It was simply his best friend and newfound home.
-
They spoke no words when they woke in the same bed. They said nothing when they dressed themselves in Seto's spare clothes and ate their first meals in quite a while. Their lips were sealed when Brice appeared at the doorstep to guide them back to the city hall, telling them that they needed to meet with Seto for an important discussion.
The streets were much more crowded in the daylight, though this was obviously the nicer part of the city. Sky, personally, appreciated the architecture but preferred and loved watching all of the different and diverse citizens. He loved the thought that they each had their own individual, chaotic life that made life worth living for them. Many of them probably had family.
Or will soon, he thought amusedly, seeing an immortal and a human hand in hand. He brushed away the thought of he and his friend with their hands entwined before he could think over it.
The capital building was much more beautiful in the daylight, a towering mansion of spruce wood and elegantly carved stone. Banners flew atop spiraling towers, white and lavender with a blooming allium insignia. The archway they walked through to enter was engraved with strange symbols. It looked more like a castle than a capitol building.
Brice's hands began to glow, and he suddenly thrust them outwards towards the huge double doors, causing them to slam open. He swayed for a moment, then grinned, striding in confidently with his black tunic billowing out behind him.
"Show-off," Sky muttered, but smiled nonetheless. The boy really was skilled at magic and obviously had a liking of dramatic entrances. Several of the people they passed on the way in had a hand pressed to their chest and their eyes wide, as if startled by Brice's sudden arrival.
The golden-haired boy led the duo down the extensive hallways that now teemed with staff and visitors. Sky and Deadlox got several surprised looks, as if they had never seen immortals of their kind before. Deadlox didn't seem fazed, but Sky couldn't help but shudder and wish for his glasses.
"What does Seto want to talk to us about?" Sky asked once the amount of people thinned out.
"I can't answer that," Brice said after a hesitation. "Just...please be open-minded. What he'll say to you—well, you know he's an incredibly powerful sorcerer. And almost two years ago...well, he'll tell you."
"Come on, you can tell us," Sky coaxed, quickening his pace to keep up with Brice, who shook his head.
"It's not my place to tell," he told the brine, and then they were in front of the elegant spruce door that led into Seto's office. Brice pushed the door open and held it for the two other boys, then left, the door clicking shut.
Seto, who had been seated behind his desk, rose to his feet and came around the side of the desk to walk calmly over to the table on the other side of the room, beckoning Sky and Deadlox to follow.
"Good morning," he smiled, but Sky could tell it was forced. "I apologize for my sudden leave last night. I had...matters to face."
"The war?" Sky said gloomily. Seto sighed.
"Brice told you?" They nodded. "We're not technically at war just yet. However, our sister city is likely about to, so we-"
"He told us the whole story," Deadlox cut in. "Why did you summon us here?"
Seto sighed again, pulling out and sitting down on one of the stools that was tucked under the table. The other two boys followed suit.
Smoothing out his black tunic, Seto took a deep breath and began. "Almost two years ago—well, one year, seven months, and three days to be exact—I received a vision or message of sorts. I was training alone by the coast—actually, where you two arrived—and I felt something. A break, a ripple, a wave, I'm not sure how to describe it. Some sort of magical disturbance. Upon later investigation, it turned out that Brice and other magic-users in the city felt it as well."
Sky would have laughed had he not been faintly aware that he had spawned exactly one year, seven months, and three days ago.
"I felt like something was poking the inside of my head for the rest of the day, trying to get my attention. I would have ignored it all, brushed it off as an ill feeling, had I not had a strange dream the night before." He gestured subconsciously, waving and fidgeting his hands. "I dreamed of a man with eyes of fire. Bodies lay scattered about him, and I recognized some of them, horrified at the realization that he knew every one of them. He was laughing, and then there was fire everywhere." He quieted, taking a deep breath as if to calm himself. Sky faintly wondered if one of those faces had been Brice.
"Then the fire started to die, and the man simply blinked out of existence. The flames turned into cold, hard obsidian that pulsed with light as if enchanted—light like that sword on the wall over there. Everything else was dark, but then I saw a pair of glowing violet eyes. Out of the darkness came a gigantic beast, with fangs as long as my hand and claws like knives."
He shuddered. "It suddenly caught fire and its roar of pain almost tossed me out of my dream. It began fighting the returned man and the two of them fought while I watched in that helpless dream state.
"Then grey smoke surrounded them both, and they stopped and I knew they were suffocating. Something else was trying to end them both. My dream-self hoped that the two could find a way out of their predicament, for I could sense that even the evil of the first two were better of that of the third. And perhaps they did, because there was a great flash of light and I woke in a cold sweat."
Seto folded his hands neatly on the table, gazing at each of the boys for several seconds. "I may be mistaken—though that's a rare occasion—but I believe this to be foreshadowing, a warning of what's to come." He leaned forward. "Tell me, Sky, when did you spawn?"
"One year, seven months, and three days ago," Sky murmured. Deadlox's gaze snapped to Sky.
"And you, Deadlox?" Seto asked, a faint hint of a smirk on his face.
Deadlox was quiet before answering in a shocked tone, as if he had just realized something important. "One year, seven months, and...three days ago."
Seto leaned back, a small, satisfied smile resting upon his features. "A spawn always remembers their date of existence," he murmured. "Mine was fifteen years and twenty-eight days ago. But what's unusual is that you two spawned on the same date, and likely even the same time. Likely, as well, at the same time of the magical disturbance.
"You two are meant for something great," Seto whispered, the lights in the room brightening slightly and illuminating the general's face in a captivating way. "You are immortals, possessing power beyond your wildest dreams; you are the physical manifestation of legends, the return of the very beings that built this city and its partner. You are the alternate sides of each other; you are like day and night." He reached forward and Sky did not protest when he took Sky's hand in his and Deadlox's in the other. "And you have power capable of destroying the good in this realm or destroying the evil in it. We would help you."
Without speaking the words, Sky knew that he was talking about Jason. He also knew what Seto was silently hoping: that they would join his war.
"However," Seto continued, surprising Sky. "your destiny is yours to choose. You two will be eternally connected, but you may choose to go separate ways. You may choose to leave this city and its inhabitants behind. You can let us fight our own war and who knows? Maybe Jason will not give us more trouble."
Unlikely, Sky thought.
"This is not the part where I tell you that it's your destiny to defeat evil, or that it's your destiny to be evil. You both will choose your own path, and you will always have that right. I cannot tell you that I'm giving you this choice, because you've always had it. Leave, settle down in a quiet place, leave the war and its pain and grief far behind. Or stay and aid us our struggle."
The lights dimmed again, and Seto sighed and ran his hands through his hair. "Thank you for listening. And thank you for not immediately brushing this off as the conspiracy theory of a stressed sorcerer."
"Thank you for telling us," Sky replied quietly, and Seto's chocolate eyes met his own. "I'm...I'm still not sure if you're right. But...I-I'm staying." He ignored Deadlox's shocked look. "I could leave, yeah. But I'd never rest until I knew Jason was defeated and I'd be afraid of him forever. Plus," he added, "I've never been in a place where I've been so accepted, minus my home with my team. In this place..." At a loss for words, he just gestured around him and smiled.
Seto matched his smile, an expression of gratitude on his face. "Thank you." He held out his hand, and Sky shook it. "Welcome aboard."