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 Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2013 1:48 pm
Shatann's clouded face turned into one of mild confusion, curiosity. There had been three statues before, but the one most important, the one who had given him his Blessing, was not upon her pedestal. The Goddesses, after all, were their purpose, their final hope perhaps...and he was unsure how he could serve a being if she was not there to give him direction.
Ah. There she was.
As he accepted the bag from her, he peered within its depths, only to look back up at her quizzically.
A mistake.
Well that made sense then.
She wanted him to fetch a heart. The heart of something that no longer needed it. Well that was quite strange, but Shatann took the words at face value. Perhaps what he had forgotten would come around pleasantly, and make sense of the Goddesses' request.
Surely it could not do terrible harm. She had asked...
...and he was at her beck and call, his own Blessing a vibrant reminder of such.
He clutched the scissors to his shadowy frame. Resolve a tiny but comforting emotion. Shatann would prove himself of worth to this glowing goddess. He, after all, would succeed. He had to. And that simple drive was enough.
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Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2013 2:32 pm
As the door....the third, malicious door, swung shut behind him, Shatann fumbled about in the blackness.
This door had seemed the most likely to hold what he needed. Always the most terrible, a great, malevolent ache in the fabric of the world.
As his fingers found the crate, he knew full well that there was another being here, the steady palpitations of the heart within granting even this strange little specter the knowledge of life. But this one, the Goddess said, had not made it. Had not made it, and this failure held something that Shatann needed.
It was with gritted teeth, eyes shut tight, that he stabbed as deep as he could into the figure with his scissors, cutting away so as to unearth the glowing core. "Justthispiecejustthispiece..." A whisper to himself.
"Thannas!" It was barked, a shrill, agonized cry that still demanded attention, and Shatann nearly dropped the scissors as the figure's hands clawed at him, as though desperate in their need for him to cease.
A tall, flaxen-haired man in glasses is standing there before him, hair swept up into an updo that pulls it back starkly from his features. "Thannas! I see you've been wasting your time again, hnn?" There is a subtle sneer in the words, a callous look of enduring disapproval. "I wonder what your mother might have said about this. Such an insolent son." A long-fingered, clawed hand reached for him, and Thannas shied away...instinctively fearful.
The Goddess' messenger went rigid, until the arm dropped away, the figure limp and unmoving as they had been before. Shaking off the terrible, sickening foreboding (as who was he, to have reason to heed that call?), he cut all the deeper. No person, this, merely a shell of organs and waste. There is a crack as he pushed back the last obstacle.
Shattered.
Only the heart remains. It seems serene, almost, after what was done to excavate it. There is another wash of memory this time, pictures and images, and Shatann becomes lost.
--
His father stands beside the bed, a figure familiar only for the racial traits that the both of them share. The man is staring dispassionately at the figure 'neath the bed-sheets...it has been only moments since her chest has ceased to rise and fall. His cold, hourglass eyes turn, and Thannas freezes in mid-sob, half-bent onto the sheets as he can feel the warmth fleeing from the woman's flesh. His mother, the Reaper. A quiet death at home, not what she would have wished for, but the best they could offer.
"So I suppose you're my responsibility now..." It is clinical, assessing, there is neither pleasure nor disapproval as Orias, the elder, contemplates the pup. There was never really supposed to be any lasting after-effects of his union with Alyra...but then, his mistake, that indiscretion. She had been beautiful, vibrant in life, and even the most frigid hearts sought warmth.
Than could feel the chill that seemed to emanate from the elder Fae-Hound, and it stopped his tears, turning them into a pitiful whimper that even his six-year-old pride immediately regretted. "Y-Yes....maybe...?" There was the softest flicker at his tail-tip, wondering if some part of his father could be won-over. Mother had always said that he was strong, confident.
But now she was gone, and even that didn't seem to matter.
It was just the two in the room. Her corpse surely would not listen, blue eyes half-lidded and unseeing. Than's trembling hand reached out to close them, as was tradition, but stern fingers wrapped 'round his wrist, forbidding the motion. "No. You don't possess her abilities, am I correct?"
There was a slow blink of violet eyes. "No, Father." Soft confusion, trying to fathom the motive of the question.
"Then we will amend that." Orias' smile was not at all reassuring.
And that was the first time that Thannas had ever been afraid of his sire.
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Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2013 2:49 pm
Shatann scampered along, hoping for an easy exit...too much to hope for in this place, twould seem. The footsteps at his back incited terror, but even a glance over his shoulder proved that absolutely nothing was behind him.
"Please give it back." More a demand than a request.
Still nothing.
Praying that this was indeed water surrounding him, he pushed until he could push no further, unless he had suddenly become enamored with the idea of drowning, that is. He willed away the further words, telling himself that it was nothing but a figment.
And then there were hands, pressing them both down, into the depths, a terrible glassy gaze meeting his own as they struggled. Shatann knew panic as the figure demanded back its heart, the one item that Shatann knew full well he could not relinquish, for the goddess had demanded it.
The pain had dulled now, his left eye socket numb, not the shattering spikes of agony that even the slightest motion had created in the weeks previous. Even the idea of exposing the wound to the light caused him to cringe.
And yet he did not fight his father when the bandages were unwound. Obediently he opened his eye, the throbbing mockery of a transplant, and though it wept silent tears, Thannas discovered with some astonishment that he could see out of it...though oddly, there was still something off about the replacement. It caused his head to spin. Yet no strange powers seemed to have been gifted to him, merely discomfort.
"Can you see, Thannas?" A demand, and the pup knew better than to ignore it.
"Than...Than can see..." He whispered, as he affixed his eyes, one blue, one violet, on the only family he had left.
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Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2013 2:57 pm
But the Goddess needed him to survive. She needed this heart.
With a cry he surfaced from the memories, lashing out with the only weapon he had at his disposal, thrusting forth the scissors again and again. Perhaps he'd come back, to see what was so hideous, to figure out this puzzle of memory and loathsome choice.
But not today.
Striking upwards again, the figure dissipated with one last chilling howl.
Hacking liquid from his lungs, Shatann stumbled onwards, only glancing back one last time, a flicker of an image, an almost-figure stared back in baleful hatred, clutching the scissors with defiant, unnerving purpose.
It was beyond time to return to his Goddess.
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