Post by silent.lullaby on May 15, 2009 12:03:59 GMT -5
It took me hours to fall asleep, though I lay motionless and breathing evenly to convince Viktor that I had in fact started to slumber. Eventually though the nightmares pulled me down, greeted me with a vicious grin and horrified me with images of my fallen comrades, starting with Garret and ending with Griever.
Eventually I awoke slowly, my head still in a fog. I felt like I had been put out with one of my knock out needles. I rubbed the back of my neck as I sat up. Viktor was no longer in bed with me. I looked around but found him playing with the twins. Still his face wasn’t an expression of happiness like it usually was around his kin. Instead his face was twisted into a mask, a horribly transparent mask. I could see the worry, the fear lingering underneath.
I looked over to the next bed. Alana was still sitting up watching over her lover. Her mate. The awkward angle of his broken bones made me feel ill, his skin was more of a blueish green rather than the pale of ivory most Night Children had.
Standing I walked over to where the children were, “you guys had breakfast yet?” I asked them before kissing them each on top of their heads.
“Yes,” they both replied, both voices had grown stronger, more distinct. Adeline’s had a bit of a mystical edge to it, her words were like whispers even at full volume. Alaric’s had grown edgier, more like his fathers, he so easily could get the attention of everyone in the room.
“I’m going to go check on my dad,” I whispered as I leaned down next to Viktor to kiss him lightly on the lips, though he grabbed the back of my head and held the kiss for longer. I pulled away with a blush, he simply smiled, but it faded fast and the mask went back on.
I took the time to wash up first, getting dressed in a pair of light weigh pants and a tight fitting top. Douglas showed me which room my father had chosen before he told me he had much to do with the training of the guards. I waited till Douglas was gone before I knocked tentatively. “Dad?”
The door opened slowly and my father stood there fully dressed, “hello Evan.”
I shut the door behind me as I entered, then hugged him. A memory rose from the back of my mind, one when I was young and had hugged him in public, he had shied away quickly and then gave me a lecture when I got home. Girls hugged their fathers, boys did not. I drew away quickly from the hug. “How are you feeling,” the memory still gnawed at me. He still seen me as Evan. Even in clothing that showed I was distinctly feminine, he still saw me as a boy. Maybe it had been so deep seeded he would only ever see me that way.
“Would be better if I hadn’t heard about what you are all planning.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“A resurrection!” My father snapped, “they are dangerous!”
“One hasn’t been succ-“
“Says Viktor,” my father cut me off quickly. “You’d be surprised at what Vincent and Lucid kept from that boy.”
“I won’t let him go if I don’t have to,” I mumbled weakly. Like my father had difficulty seeing me as a girl, I had difficulty talking back to him, to not take his word as law.
“It is incredibly dangerous to all involved,” my father said, I wasn’t positive if he heard me or not. “It is why they were banned.”
“Banned, but Viktor said they just didn’t work.”
“Of course that’s what he said!” My father said taking a seat with a roll of his eyes, “that was what they told him to believe.”
“Can we bring him back or not?” I asked angrily.
My father stared at me with angered eyes, he hated it when I talked back in any form. “Yes.”
“That is all I need to know,” I said pivoting on my heal and storming toward the door.
“Evan.” I froze in place and waited, my hand on the doorknob. “With the blood of three you can resurrect the one. Though it isn’t guaranteed that what you get back will be Griever,” I turned to him, my hair whipping in the sudden movement. “He may have no recollection of life, just a Night Child with no human nor Night Child memories. Simply a hungry vessel.”
“I can’t just do nothing,” I whispered.
“Your children will be there,” my father argued standing and walking over to me, he grabbed my shoulder with such force I had to look up at him and he loosened his grip. “Will you allow them, Viktor, Alana, Helena, will you allow everyone to be massacred. I still believe, despite the power of even Bruce, that Night Children are the strongest, but in their maturity, in the way that they have lived, they don’t need all that strength, they don’t use it. When they are raised with no memory, they have the desire to survive above all else, they have the power, one has killed as many as ten in the ceremony alone before it went on to massacre villages. Why do you think the Moon and Soul Children stopped?”
“And what do you suggest I do?” I snapped back, “just let him die? And Alana won’t be long after everyone sees that!”
“Two dead is better than how many it could be,” my father’s voice was even, I couldn’t believe he was suggesting I just let Griever die when I had all the keys to rescuing him. “Just don’t add your blood, or don’t allow them to take your sons. Your well within your rights.”
I stared at him, John Cross, my father, the man I looked up to. He was telling me to let my friend go. That his death was noble, that, that was the way things were suppose to happen. He shouldn’t have been alive to begin with, Night Children are unnatural. He should have died in his human years, and now he has died again. The last line he whispered in my ear, “who are you to play God?”
He drew away from me and I stared at him. “I’m Evanangelique Cross,” I said drawing out my full name. “I don’t let friends die with out a fight, I believe in miracles. There wouldn’t be a way to resurrect if it wasn’t meant to be used.”
Pulling open the door I found Lukas there his hand in mid-reach for the door, “Angelique? Are you alright?” He asked touching my face lightly wiping away tears I hadn’t realized I’d shed.
“Yeah,” I replied quickly, “I’m fine.” I looked over my shoulder, my father in the room looking angrily at me and Lukas. “What?” I shouted at him, it seemed to startle him. I had never had any act of rebellion, I’d always done what he’d said, what he asked. “Have something to say?” I screamed walking back into the room, “go ahead say it!”
“Lukas should know the real odds of the resurrection.”
“I’m not forcing him to do anything!”
“He doesn’t even know what he is getting himself into!” My father yelled back just as angrily the vein in his temple beating to his pulse, his face going red as he screamed. “Besides just who do you think you are, doing this? Playing God? Risking the life of your son? You are a terrible, reckless mother!”
I wouldn’t have been more shocked if he slapped me.
“What the hell is going on?” My head whipped around at the sound of Viktor’s voice. Alaric and Adeline each holding on to one of his pant legs. “How dare you tell Angel she is a bad mother!”
“Like I had a good example of parenting,” I growled.
“Don’t you talk about your late mother like that!” My father screamed slapping me so hard I fell into Lukas who quickly steadied me.
“I wasn’t talking about mom!” I screamed, “I was talking about you! Even today you can’t call me by my real name, always Evan. I was raised a boy! I was taught to be like a man! I wasn’t taught how to raise children, or cook food, or keep a house! I was taught to be a fighter, a warrior! That’s exactly what I am! I fight for what I believe in dad! I fight for those I love, and Griever is no different!” I was in his face and though he was taller than me, screaming back arguements I never stopped screaming back. “I won’t just stand back and let him die when there is something I can do about it!”
All while I was screaming that, he was screaming back that I could resurrect a lesser being, a killing machine, that I shouldn’t meddle in things that shouldn’t be meddled in. I shouldn’t play God. That I was endangering my child, that I was endangering Lukas.
We both stood staring at each other like the rest of the world had faded to fire and brimstone and all that was left was the argument of the decade. Both of us shook with anger, red faced from screaming. After a moment I shook my head, “you really never grew attached to me.”
This seemed to stun him for a moment, “excuse me.”
“Always calling me Evan, you did it to save yourself, to save Mom. You never though I would live that long though.” I said quietly but it somehow had more intensity than my screaming. “Always kept me at arms reach, never would let me get close to you. Never wanted me around.”
He scoffed, “that isn’t true, one of the happiest days of my life when you were born.”
“Till you realised I was female.” I bit back. He didn’t argue, he stayed quiet just staring at me. “Besides you said I was endangering my child, endangering your King Lukas.” I turned and started toward the door as I spoke my parting words, “you never once mentioned that I was endangering myself.”
I grabbed the hand of each Alaric and Adeline and marched back to my room still angry. A little white light caught my attention and I looked down. Adeline was holding my hand with glowing hands. Then she started to cry suddenly. I knelt down quickly, “Adeline? Honey, are you okay?”
“I...I wanted to heal your insides,” she said wiping her eyes with tiny fists. “You are so sad Mommy! I can’t though!”
“Oh sweety.” I sat down there in the hallway with her, Alaric kneeling down in front of his sister, holding her one hand while I held the other. “We are only human, we feel things and sometimes they make us sad, but sometimes they make us really happy, we can’t make them go away. I would never wish them away. They make us who we are. The are the things that make us realize that some people we should stay away from. Emotions are also the things that make us love one another. We would never want to wish that away.”
Adeline pouted but nodded, “your not bad mommy! Why did Grandpa say that?”
I mulled this over for a moment, I didn’t know what to say. “He doesn’t want to see his grandchildren hurt,” I looked up and seen Viktor who sat down on the other side of Adeline, swooping with ease grabbing Alaric and placing him on his leg. Alaric grinned but then looked to Adeline and seemed troubled again by his sister’s unhappiness and confusion. “I’m sorry you kids seen that, but sometimes adults... loose control of their emotions and get into fights.”
“Like with that evil man?” Alaric asked referring to Bruce.
“Love is a powerful thing my son,” Viktor responded rubbing Alaric’s back.
Eventually I awoke slowly, my head still in a fog. I felt like I had been put out with one of my knock out needles. I rubbed the back of my neck as I sat up. Viktor was no longer in bed with me. I looked around but found him playing with the twins. Still his face wasn’t an expression of happiness like it usually was around his kin. Instead his face was twisted into a mask, a horribly transparent mask. I could see the worry, the fear lingering underneath.
I looked over to the next bed. Alana was still sitting up watching over her lover. Her mate. The awkward angle of his broken bones made me feel ill, his skin was more of a blueish green rather than the pale of ivory most Night Children had.
Standing I walked over to where the children were, “you guys had breakfast yet?” I asked them before kissing them each on top of their heads.
“Yes,” they both replied, both voices had grown stronger, more distinct. Adeline’s had a bit of a mystical edge to it, her words were like whispers even at full volume. Alaric’s had grown edgier, more like his fathers, he so easily could get the attention of everyone in the room.
“I’m going to go check on my dad,” I whispered as I leaned down next to Viktor to kiss him lightly on the lips, though he grabbed the back of my head and held the kiss for longer. I pulled away with a blush, he simply smiled, but it faded fast and the mask went back on.
I took the time to wash up first, getting dressed in a pair of light weigh pants and a tight fitting top. Douglas showed me which room my father had chosen before he told me he had much to do with the training of the guards. I waited till Douglas was gone before I knocked tentatively. “Dad?”
The door opened slowly and my father stood there fully dressed, “hello Evan.”
I shut the door behind me as I entered, then hugged him. A memory rose from the back of my mind, one when I was young and had hugged him in public, he had shied away quickly and then gave me a lecture when I got home. Girls hugged their fathers, boys did not. I drew away quickly from the hug. “How are you feeling,” the memory still gnawed at me. He still seen me as Evan. Even in clothing that showed I was distinctly feminine, he still saw me as a boy. Maybe it had been so deep seeded he would only ever see me that way.
“Would be better if I hadn’t heard about what you are all planning.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“A resurrection!” My father snapped, “they are dangerous!”
“One hasn’t been succ-“
“Says Viktor,” my father cut me off quickly. “You’d be surprised at what Vincent and Lucid kept from that boy.”
“I won’t let him go if I don’t have to,” I mumbled weakly. Like my father had difficulty seeing me as a girl, I had difficulty talking back to him, to not take his word as law.
“It is incredibly dangerous to all involved,” my father said, I wasn’t positive if he heard me or not. “It is why they were banned.”
“Banned, but Viktor said they just didn’t work.”
“Of course that’s what he said!” My father said taking a seat with a roll of his eyes, “that was what they told him to believe.”
“Can we bring him back or not?” I asked angrily.
My father stared at me with angered eyes, he hated it when I talked back in any form. “Yes.”
“That is all I need to know,” I said pivoting on my heal and storming toward the door.
“Evan.” I froze in place and waited, my hand on the doorknob. “With the blood of three you can resurrect the one. Though it isn’t guaranteed that what you get back will be Griever,” I turned to him, my hair whipping in the sudden movement. “He may have no recollection of life, just a Night Child with no human nor Night Child memories. Simply a hungry vessel.”
“I can’t just do nothing,” I whispered.
“Your children will be there,” my father argued standing and walking over to me, he grabbed my shoulder with such force I had to look up at him and he loosened his grip. “Will you allow them, Viktor, Alana, Helena, will you allow everyone to be massacred. I still believe, despite the power of even Bruce, that Night Children are the strongest, but in their maturity, in the way that they have lived, they don’t need all that strength, they don’t use it. When they are raised with no memory, they have the desire to survive above all else, they have the power, one has killed as many as ten in the ceremony alone before it went on to massacre villages. Why do you think the Moon and Soul Children stopped?”
“And what do you suggest I do?” I snapped back, “just let him die? And Alana won’t be long after everyone sees that!”
“Two dead is better than how many it could be,” my father’s voice was even, I couldn’t believe he was suggesting I just let Griever die when I had all the keys to rescuing him. “Just don’t add your blood, or don’t allow them to take your sons. Your well within your rights.”
I stared at him, John Cross, my father, the man I looked up to. He was telling me to let my friend go. That his death was noble, that, that was the way things were suppose to happen. He shouldn’t have been alive to begin with, Night Children are unnatural. He should have died in his human years, and now he has died again. The last line he whispered in my ear, “who are you to play God?”
He drew away from me and I stared at him. “I’m Evanangelique Cross,” I said drawing out my full name. “I don’t let friends die with out a fight, I believe in miracles. There wouldn’t be a way to resurrect if it wasn’t meant to be used.”
Pulling open the door I found Lukas there his hand in mid-reach for the door, “Angelique? Are you alright?” He asked touching my face lightly wiping away tears I hadn’t realized I’d shed.
“Yeah,” I replied quickly, “I’m fine.” I looked over my shoulder, my father in the room looking angrily at me and Lukas. “What?” I shouted at him, it seemed to startle him. I had never had any act of rebellion, I’d always done what he’d said, what he asked. “Have something to say?” I screamed walking back into the room, “go ahead say it!”
“Lukas should know the real odds of the resurrection.”
“I’m not forcing him to do anything!”
“He doesn’t even know what he is getting himself into!” My father yelled back just as angrily the vein in his temple beating to his pulse, his face going red as he screamed. “Besides just who do you think you are, doing this? Playing God? Risking the life of your son? You are a terrible, reckless mother!”
I wouldn’t have been more shocked if he slapped me.
“What the hell is going on?” My head whipped around at the sound of Viktor’s voice. Alaric and Adeline each holding on to one of his pant legs. “How dare you tell Angel she is a bad mother!”
“Like I had a good example of parenting,” I growled.
“Don’t you talk about your late mother like that!” My father screamed slapping me so hard I fell into Lukas who quickly steadied me.
“I wasn’t talking about mom!” I screamed, “I was talking about you! Even today you can’t call me by my real name, always Evan. I was raised a boy! I was taught to be like a man! I wasn’t taught how to raise children, or cook food, or keep a house! I was taught to be a fighter, a warrior! That’s exactly what I am! I fight for what I believe in dad! I fight for those I love, and Griever is no different!” I was in his face and though he was taller than me, screaming back arguements I never stopped screaming back. “I won’t just stand back and let him die when there is something I can do about it!”
All while I was screaming that, he was screaming back that I could resurrect a lesser being, a killing machine, that I shouldn’t meddle in things that shouldn’t be meddled in. I shouldn’t play God. That I was endangering my child, that I was endangering Lukas.
We both stood staring at each other like the rest of the world had faded to fire and brimstone and all that was left was the argument of the decade. Both of us shook with anger, red faced from screaming. After a moment I shook my head, “you really never grew attached to me.”
This seemed to stun him for a moment, “excuse me.”
“Always calling me Evan, you did it to save yourself, to save Mom. You never though I would live that long though.” I said quietly but it somehow had more intensity than my screaming. “Always kept me at arms reach, never would let me get close to you. Never wanted me around.”
He scoffed, “that isn’t true, one of the happiest days of my life when you were born.”
“Till you realised I was female.” I bit back. He didn’t argue, he stayed quiet just staring at me. “Besides you said I was endangering my child, endangering your King Lukas.” I turned and started toward the door as I spoke my parting words, “you never once mentioned that I was endangering myself.”
I grabbed the hand of each Alaric and Adeline and marched back to my room still angry. A little white light caught my attention and I looked down. Adeline was holding my hand with glowing hands. Then she started to cry suddenly. I knelt down quickly, “Adeline? Honey, are you okay?”
“I...I wanted to heal your insides,” she said wiping her eyes with tiny fists. “You are so sad Mommy! I can’t though!”
“Oh sweety.” I sat down there in the hallway with her, Alaric kneeling down in front of his sister, holding her one hand while I held the other. “We are only human, we feel things and sometimes they make us sad, but sometimes they make us really happy, we can’t make them go away. I would never wish them away. They make us who we are. The are the things that make us realize that some people we should stay away from. Emotions are also the things that make us love one another. We would never want to wish that away.”
Adeline pouted but nodded, “your not bad mommy! Why did Grandpa say that?”
I mulled this over for a moment, I didn’t know what to say. “He doesn’t want to see his grandchildren hurt,” I looked up and seen Viktor who sat down on the other side of Adeline, swooping with ease grabbing Alaric and placing him on his leg. Alaric grinned but then looked to Adeline and seemed troubled again by his sister’s unhappiness and confusion. “I’m sorry you kids seen that, but sometimes adults... loose control of their emotions and get into fights.”
“Like with that evil man?” Alaric asked referring to Bruce.
“Love is a powerful thing my son,” Viktor responded rubbing Alaric’s back.