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Akubi didn't want to be here. He didn't want to promise, pledge, or whatever was required of him.

Akubi also didn't want to die. He didn't want to lose the sense of himself. The desire to still exist is what brought him here, the desire to live is was foremost and perhaps it was selfish. He was a selfish young man and he bore no regret for it nor did he make excuses.

What was a memory when he could live on? It was a pittance.

Anything to forget the chaos and the feel of an old wrinkled hand pressing him urgently forward against his back, a crone's voice screaming at him to go and to not go back. Anything to forget that she wasn't there ... afterwards.

If wanting to forget something traumatic as that was selfish? Then, he was the most selfish of the bunch. He could rationalize that this was what she wanted, and it likely was.

But that didn't make the survivor's guilt go away. It didn't make him want to remember what had happened.

He stiffly knelt down at the box, “I pledge my service to the Great King and the Great Knights. I will uphold the Knight's Code and protect this kingdom against the darkness."

Akubi could fool himself, in those last glimpses of his memories, that he was doing this for her. The one person he respected and loved more than himself. The one person that was his family. Perhaps he didn't fool himself at all, but now it was too late to look back.

The memory of that one was gone.

Step. Step.

Step. Step.

Step. Step.

The maddening sound echoed and fumbled through her ear canal, disrupting the fleeting thoughts of uncertainty. Did she want this? Was this what she really wanted? The voice had never been particularly loud to begin with, as her decisions had not been her own for a very long time.

Step. Step.

The line grew shorter as the presence of something otherworldly caused her arm hair to prickle. From behind the shoulder of her predecessor, Riyo caught glances of it. Rarely did a single vessel hold an equal amount of precious and disgusting things. She wondered, was a person's sacrifice worth more if they wanted to keep them? Or... Was every sacrifice truly equal? It would be appropriately unfair if so. For... The world was quite skewed that way.

Step... Step.

There it was. Her scarlet vision focused on the box as not a soul was there to hinder it. It was at that moment she became aware of the subconscious apprehension she felt. Riyo couldn't remember a time where she could say she liked herself, or what she had gone through, but all of these things were still her. All of those memories were still her.

"I pledge my service to the Great King and the Great Knights. I will uphold the Knight's Code and protect this kingdom against the darkness."

Her voice was deep, resolute, and... Almost soulless.

It was a beautiful maelstrom of betrayal and manipulation that swirled around her as the words escaped her mouth. She saw the village she grew up in. The first breath of sick and death she had inhaled. Her father teaching her to read next to candlelight as he told her how much he loved her. The sight of his clean-cut corpse after his execution for abandoning his comrades. Her mother's slow descent into madness. The hand that reached out when both of her parents were dead, and the last promise she had ever made.

"Die proud, Riyo."

"Do this for me, for I was robbed my opportunity. Die with your axe facing forward. Die with honor."

I promise.

He couldn't fight back. His body had been robbed of it's ability to do so long ago. Clutching the old hand-me-down axe and tattered battle clothes, she glanced over her shoulder one last time as the horseman impaled her grandfather alive. With his last piecemeal of life, he spat at the monster and fell limp.

Perhaps it was an ironic choice to pledge under a sigil that stood for hope, for the memories that had contained such were gone long before she stood in front of the box.

However, in those last fleeting moments of her former consciousness, Riyo knew without a doubt it was a last ditch effort to find something she had never become acquainted with. An extended arm grasping wildly at the thin branch as she fell. Under the thick sludge that had been caked over her soul, there was still a girl clawing to find the crack of light she needed. A double sided blade, as it would be almost impossible to back out of that promise now.

She could almost see it when her eyes focused. The gentle 'click' of the box brought her to attention, quick to conceal her daze behind her tattered clothes. They were familiar, and the larger size was appropriate, though she couldn't fathom why. The lack of answers, perhaps, left her with a worse attitude than before.

[Enter]

There was a line, a far greater line than Titus really wanted to stand in. It felt more mind numbing than the ordeal he had just left behind. He could still see it in his mind's eye, the chaos and ruin that had once been his town. Titus had never favored it, to be blunt he had despised it and the people that lived there. His family were among the worst; rich land owners who were entitled and self absorbed, but really he was no better. He had learned from the best after all. But despite it all, no matter how much he might have hated them at times..or even most of the time...he never wanted this.

He tilted his head up looking over the crowd of people as they moved forward, eyeing the box that stood in wait for them all and hearing the familiar mantra of an oath as each person in line pledged themselves to the knights and their king. It didn't appear to be much but Titus could sense something about it from here. An odd and eerie magic that he didn't quite understand.

He knew what was going to happen, he knew the price he was about to pay and while part of him was glad to be rid of the memories another part worried he was going to lose himself. Who would he be once everything was gone?

His mouth suddenly felt dry and Titus licked his lips in a futile effort to alleviate the discomfort. Questions began to fill his mind about what he was doing but really what choices did he have? There was nothing for him back in his village....

The more startling realization was the much larger picture that Titus had failed to think about and it hit him all at once. It wasn't that there was nothing for him back in his village, it was that there was no village to go back to. The horseman had come without warning and blanketed their town in fire and death. Titus had been away, aloft as he usually was and avoiding his responsibilities to his family but it was that negligence that had spared him his life. Him and no one else.

Having been lost in thought about the ordeal Titus failed to realize the large gap that had formed between himself and the person ahead of him. He was nudged forward and he turned his head sparkly back to sneer at the person responsible before he trudged along to catch up. The box was closer now, he was only a couple of people away and the nervous tension inside himself continued to grow but he dared not move out of line. There was a silent resolve to being here though Titus really couldn't put his finger on why. He was not so kind a person that he wanted to protect those of the realm and not so absorbed in his loss that he was seeking revenge. Maybe it was more for a means of self preservation, though in a sense that made this a terrible idea. Run from the danger not to it.

No, Titus knew what was coming. He knew it was unavoidable no matter how far he might have wanted to run and he didn't like to back down. If he was going to die he was going to make sure to take someone with him. Spite, that was his driving force.

Suddenly he was next in line and Titus stared at the massive box in front of him knowing exactly what he needed to do and still hesitating to do it. He stood staring at it, swallowing hard against any lingering doubts before he finally stepped forward and knelt.

"I pledge my service to the Great King and the Great Knights. I will uphold the Knight's Code and protect this kingdom against the darkness." The words somehow came so easily, though he had heard them nearly a hundred times already. Just as he began to wonder what was going to happen next and how the price would actually be paid he felt a pull on his mind.

Memories came flooding to the surface old and new, though the new were far more fresh and vivid. The fire that had swept the town and burned it to ash, the lingering embers that were all that remained of his family home. The smell of blood and the sea of red as far as the eye could see. Bodies had been piled up in the streets and he had searched among them until he had found his father and sister. His mother was no where in sight but likely she had been in the house, the house that was now gone.

Each one of those memories came and then suddenly left, fading away into nothingness until Titus was left there feeling a little confused and wondering what he had forgotten. He knew where he was and the purpose he felt behind being there but not the why.

Perhaps the why didn't matter.

Rising he moved aside now that he had pledged himself, knowing there was no going back now.

[ Ezekiel ]

This wasn't something Ezekiel had eagerly jumped at the chance of. This was something more or less forced upon him by fate and circumstance. I was not the best choice but the only real one he had left to him. Which was, in his opinion, no choice at all. He was in a sour mood as he stood in the long, snaking line with the handful of other survivors from their village and tried not focus on he tacky warmth across his face or the aching throb of his left eye. The grimy state of his clothing, the filth that covered his skin, or the stench of others around him. It was a challenge.

Harley, the only beacon of light left to shine. Ezekiel hooked a finger into the back of her tunic to pull her back against him so he could curl an arm over her shoulder, pseudo casual, if not for the tension singing through every taught muscle.

If what they'd been told was to be believed--and why wouldn't it?-- he wouldn't remember her after he pledged his services to the greater cause. The others, friends, were relatively inconsequential. Important, but not essential, not like her. The line moved, his group moved with it, and the Ezekiel turned his head into the soft ginger curls at the side of the girl's head, drawing her in, savoring what precious few minutes they still had.

Then it was time. Quickly, before she could slip away from him, Ezekiel murmured into the shell of a pale ear. "Don't forget about me." Like she had a choice. Like any of them did.

A half smile. A mask.

He knelt, and in the seconds before her had to speak those words he allowed himself a last look at what he would have to say goodbye. Tommy, Horace, and of course, Harley.

"I pledge my service to the Great King and the Great Knights. I will uphold the Knight's Code and protect this kingdom against the darkness." Even to himself the words sounded forced, insincere, but it didn't really matter. There was magic in words, in the box he had knelt beside. It didn't matter if he came willing, eager, or begrudgingly. The world swam in darkness, spreading out and out, then all around him in a soft brush like the softest cotton sheets against bare skin. His breath fell in a sigh.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The pain is sharp and immediate, searing, without any actual heat. Worst pain than he'd ever felt before. It came out in a ragged howl, anger and agony, as Ezekiel pushed Harley behind him, backing the both of them towards the house they'd just darted away from. "What are they?" Shadow, his mind provided, and there wasn't time enough to dispute it. They were surrounded.

He kept backing them up, teeth clenched against the pain and remaining eye squinting, until he very nearly tripped over a split log. A calloused hand closed around the familiar, worn handle of the ax, jerking it out of the stump, and he dropped his other hand away from his face to lend power to a mighty swing at the creatures closing in around them. They shrieked, echoing his earlier howl as they shrank away from the pair, but they didn't die. They didn't even bleed.

"We've got to go." He gave Harley a nudge, then a harder push as the shadows began to regroup. "Now!" Attacking didn't work, they had to get away. Smoke was filling the sky, fires were flaring up around them. Their village was burning, people were dying. "There's nothing left." She protested, but he grabbed her arm, pulling her along with him as he started running along the path towards the edge of town.

It wasn't raining. The mud beneath their boots ran red.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It might have been nice, this oblivion, if not for the grinding, dull ache in the place that his left eye should have been. All the same he drew in a deep, cleansing breath, and released it slowly as she stepped down.

[Zar - Enter]

Zar's feet ached and the milling crowd set him on edge. It was as if his whole life had been pulled out from beneath his feet within the space of a day. He had been expecting to come to the knight gathering on easy terms, his family had always managed to avoid the gathering dangers and darkness, there had been a lot of reassurance that it would not come to their town. But it had caught up to him on the way and now he had no idea if there was anything or anyone left.

And it had made him realise, deeply and viscerally that when everything had been taken away that there had been one person he'd missed more than anyone else, more than his petty parents and their schemes. After all, there weren't many people who cared for him, he was imperfect and generally unwanted. There was Calder, who didn't get involved in the petty noble manoeuvring and then there was...

It had been hard, thinking he was dead, really hard, and that was surprising. Zar wasn't used to regrets but he had found himself regretting every mean word, every spurn, everything that wasn't perfect.

When Barth had caught up, he'd forgotten all of that, there had been a lot of mean words, and a lot of angry crying.

And now they were here, staring down the concept - if the murmurs were true - of losing their memories, all that they ever were. Had it not been for the brief glimmers of happiness, Zar might have gone into the oblivion eagerly, keen to forget his history and failures, but as it was he found himself reluctant and afraid, the fear racing around his thoughts that if they forgot, they would forget their relationships, and he would find himself in a life of solitude that was complete in every way.

"Barth." he said, eyes wide and mouth set in an uncharacteristically grim line.

There weren't options left, they were boxed in, and the only thing to cling to would be that there would be some way to remember, some way to fix all of this and get back the life they had. But he couldn't find the words to say, he just felt sick and there was a lump in his throat that made it impossible to speak.

[ Jack ]

Where he moved, ghosts followed. He understood that concept long before Horsemen, Shadowlings, and Riders flooded his home. The Hawthorn family had always had a penchant for ill-twisted fate, be it in love, in business, or in battle, and it could have been said that sole survivor was all but meant to be Jack's destiny. But he had never been fond of the concept. To find greater purpose in the world was a worthy goal, yes, but to attribute it to something other than the make of his own two hands was inconceivable. If gods and angels existed, they laid only in the minds of those too uncertain of their own abilities and shortcomings; he preferred to have his own name attributed to his actions and words, for better or for worse.

And worse didn't quite cut it here.

(He tries to pay attention, his vision barely obscured as he towers over most of the crowd. He hears words and files them away absently: Camelot, knight-apprentice, sacred weapon. The knights are intimidating even from a distance, commanding respect even without speaking.)

He never would have considered the life of a knight. It was a topic of great concern to his mother whom, incapable of leaving his father for monetary reasons, neither wanted to invite the family curse upon him with a violent death nor wanted him to leave her alone. His hands were a healer's, neither gentle nor rough, dextrous and steady under pressure, stained by herbs and blood alike. Violence had not entered his nature until it was forced upon him as the only option left.

(The line moves. He casts curious glances around, his back slightly hunched to compensate for his height; he is physically and emotionally weary. How many of them will end up dying in service to the Great King? Will what he remembers of his mother's teachings even be useful, or will he discard everything for the sake of being one more number to throw at the onslaught of darkness?)

It was strange feeling alone in such a large crowd. Jack had always been a private person, but the new ache that had been carved in him made him feel even more hollow: the breaths of those around him carried through it and chilled him, reminding him that this was not just an end goal, it was simply the end. One did not simply escape what lurked in the shadows, nor could one run away. He tried to take solace in the fact that fighting back could mean something if he was strong enough.

(For a moment he thinks he sees her, but then...that couldn't be right. He's no stranger to phantasms; maybe his loneliness is hitting a new stage, conjuring up old faces for the sake of his sanity.)

He ducked away to the only knight that could give him a different option than despair when it was his turn. Rejuvenation. Salvation. Preservation. Maybe he could find an option there other than simply dying on the battlefield. There wasn't much thought given to the sacrifice, though the pledge was uttered solemnly as it should be. (It is a contract, signed with his very being. And doesn't he just enjoy that irony, that his fate should have more than his name stamped on it but a part of his very existence, and that a god won't intercede even if he wanted one to.)

He gave up his memories willingly: he forgot who died when and why, he forgot how he escaped, he forgot where he had learned this and that plant's name, he forgot what it meant to be a Hawthorn at all (bittersweets and rumors of a curse, the branch is not to be touched, the thorns hold more than poison) and he forgot about everything else that had been taken from him. What was left wasn't a husk of a man but the skeleton of one that did not hunch over and see ghosts where the living stood. But while the knight's pledge could remove the source of the pain, it couldn't quite knit together the holes they had left.

[Xanther Clavata]

There was once a young rich man, who tended to travel the land in hopes of getting away from it all. This lad was known for his personality rather than his actual riches, since he preferred keeping his identity hidden. Day by day he scorched the taverns for a drink after his usual hunt and associated with those less fortunate than him. Occasionally, he got involved in a few brawls, swept those with beautiful features off their feet and broke their hearts after getting disappointed by them. Yes, he became rather unpopular-- each time he left to another town he'd do the same over and over. Now why would a man with vast riches abandon his privileged lifestyle for a vagabond one?

The infamous young lad was forced to go back to his hometown. A scandal loomed all over the place and since his arrival, the black haired male noticed their curious faces. What had he done that was so shocking? The last last brawl he participated in went completely out of hand once it was discovered he stole the heart of a noble's young lass. He never expected things to get out of hand.

--

Xanther sighed, not even caring what his mother thought. She betrayed his dead father after remarrying another corrupt man just days after they were informed they no longer had any riches.

"Why aren't you saying anything?" She said rather pissed.

He rolled his eyes, kept his distance and directed his attention to a porcelain vase.

"Look at me when I'm talking to you!"

"I'm listening." He said as he continued to play with the vase.
The black haired heard her scoff and pace around the room. Does she have to be so melodramatic? He thought as he once again rolled his eyes.

"Xanther. This is serious! You are giving our family a bad nam- "

"So what?" Xanther spatted. "It's not like you care."

"I do care."Angrily, she took the vase and st it on the table with force.

"Careful... you only have one of those." Xanther chuckled and attempted to find something else to distract himself while his mother lectured him. Just when he was about to pick up another object, she grabbed his wrist.

"No." She said bitterly.

He looked at her a bit confused, shook his head and tried avoiding her stare, but it was inevitable. She grabbed his chin, forcing him to make eye contact.

"Look at me, Xather," As she saw he was still trying to look away, she grabbed him with a greater force. "I am talking to you! How many times must I tell you to stop being so disrespectful towards me?!"

He looked into her eyes-- red pools reflected against each other. He noticed the sadness and distress behind them, as well as she shaking hand. She was indeed frustrated; he enjoyed watching her like that. The very thought of her drenching in such despair made him smile. Do I hate her that much? He couldn't help but smile. She was totally and utter mostly ridiculou-

At that very moment, she slapped him.

The black haired looked at her shocked. Who knew she had the guts?

"Now. Listen to me very clearly... Because it seems I haven't raised you well at all." She approached him as he rubbed his cheek. "Go upstairs, change into something... decent a-and.... we'll discuss this."

Strangely, he did as he was told.


Moments after he made his way upstairs, Xanther heard a loud shriek. He hurried downstairs and noticed everything was trashed and broken. His mother laid cold dead on the floor and he swore he saw something dragging her to the other side of the room. Xanther felt sick to his stomach. He couldn't take his eyes off them. That thing was eating his mother and he watched as it ingested her. Quickly, as it had already finish, he made his way outside, just to see the shadows destroying, feeding.... it was a horrible sight.

He ran as far away as he could, far away from this hell... Knowing, there was nothing he could do to save them...


--

Blinking back to reality, Xanther noticed he was next in line. "Time sure flies when you remember the horrible things that have happened to you." He said as he stood in front a massive box. He tried calming himself down. I made my choice clear, so why am I nervous? I'm just losing my memories. I SHOULD BE GLAD! He shook his head and tried looking back, seeing how impatient the others behind him were. "Ok..." He breathed out. "I should make this... quick."

"I..." He took a deep breath, thinking about his memory loss. What will happen from this point onwards? He thought he shouldn't even worry about his past. It was already too tainted. No matter how he tried to overlook things, his mother died thinking he was a roguish disgrace. He had to redeem himself somehow. I never truly hated her after all. "I pledge my service to the Great King and the Great Knights. I will uphold the Knight's Code and protect this kingdom against the darkness."

With that said and done, his memories replayed through his head. One memory after the other passed quickly and disintegrated. All the names of the people he once knew, all the places he had been, were all gone.

Xanther looked up, feeling rather refreshed and numb. He walked away, allowing someone else to step near that strange box.

He had become a knight... apprentice.