Oriax stared speechless at the durandal
horde.
“Hello? Did you hear me? We need
to go to the Garden, do you have any nexus near it?” asked Zendrius
as the silence stretched on.
“You want to move them all with
you?” asked Oriax in disbelief.
“Yes, is that going to be a
problem?”
“Well, I won’t be able to move
everyone at once and I’ll have to move the durandals one at a time,
due to their size. But it could be done, if you are willing to pay
the price,” said the insect-like creature with well hidden greed.
“How much?”
Zendrius saw Oriax’s violet eyes
dart around as flew into the air and did a quick count of the
assembly before him. He landed with a satisfied smile. “Forty-six
thousand three hundred souls.”
“Isn’t that a bit expensive?”
“It might seem so, my lord. But I
am merely asking my usual toll of a hundred souls, it is your number
that is so great.”
“I guess I can’t argue with that.
Is there some way I can pay you later?”
“That won’t be necessary,”
interrupted Aeon before Oriax could respond.
Zendrius turned to the ancient
durandal mockingly. “Are you hiding souls somewhere I don’t know
about?”
“Yes, for all their technology,
Juria is still incapable of extracting souls from us. And I possess
a fair number.”
“There you have it,” said the
young Dannar to Oriax.
The violet-eyed being bowed. “Then
it will be my honour to be of service. I have to warn you though, I don’t have any nexus as close to the Garden as the first time you
used my services.”
“It’s fine, besides it is not like
we have another option.”
Oriax smiled his sly smile.
“Finally! ‘Not as close’ my ass.
That shifty-eyed bastard, he dropped us barely in the same realm as
the Garden,” raged Zendrius as they came into view of their
destination.
“At least we are here now,” said
Nessha, attempting to soothe her lord’s anger for perhaps the
hundredth time.
“I suppose there is that,” said
Zendrius reluctant to let go of his anger.
“It will be best if we wait here,”
said Aeon as the horde stopped at the border of the Garden.
“What? Why?”
Aeon smiled at young Dannar’s
ignorance. “The Agrarian is not one to be approached lightly, I
suspect you are allowed that courtesy because you are of his blood.
However we will all be killed if we entered unbidden.”
“What about Nessha? She’s been in
and out of the Garden without any problems.”
“Nessha is of the Living Blade, a
faction purely created to find and serve you, a Dannar. She is your
servant and hence under your protection. The Agrarian would only
kill her if the relation between you and him are pugnacious, or if
she is disrespectful towards him.”
Zendrius sighed. “Ok, fine. We
will be back soon.”
Aeon nodded and turned to the horde as
the pair went into the orange and gold forest.
“Someone should really sometime sit
me down and explain all these damn social conventions of Los-Reinar,”
said Zendrius dryly as they progressed through the forest.
Nessha suppressed a smile since it was
the Dannar who created every custom in Los-Reinar and still enforced
them mercilessly despite the human invasion.
They weren’t walking long when the
deafening drone of the Agrarian’s wings announced his approach.
The enormous serpentine body swerved
past a tree and into view. “Nephew! I knew you would be fine. As
if humans could capture a Dannar without him allowing them to. I
told Nessha that you must have had a plan, but she wouldn’t listen,
she even begged me to personally go save you. But I suppose those
with mediocre power could never understand us.”
Zendrius turned to Nessha but she only
awkwardly avoided his gaze.
“So are you here for the nectar of
Eve? You don’t seem any different, have you fulfilled the other
conditions?” asked the Agrarian as he slithered around his nephew
examining him.
“No, actually I haven’t I –”
“You haven’t? Then why is there a
bunch of durandals outside my garden? Also, I can appreciate
thoroughness, but you do know that you will most likely only need a
mouthful, if even that of durandal flesh. You don’t need to
consume such a large amount of them.”
“What? No, no, I freed them from
one of Juria’s outposts.”
“Yes, so you can consume them.”
“No, because they were held there
and treated as if they were nothing but a food source.”
“Wait I’m confused, so you are not
going to consume them?”
“No, I’m not.”
“Why then did you bring them here?”
“Because I wanted to ask you about
these 'areas' of Juria. I intend to free the rest of the
durandals from the humans.”
“Why?”
“Ok uncle, you are confusing me,
what is the problem here?”
“You are confused? Why are you
trying to free the durandals? They are weak and are suffering as the
weak should.”
“They are not weak. I witnessed
their power when they crushed their former captors.”
“Oh I understand, you want an army.
You chose a strange race to be your servants, but I suppose you have
a right to your own taste. So what is it you wanted to know
exactly?”
Zendrius just shook his head at the
strangeness of it all then started to query his uncle about various
things he had considered during his imprisonment.
Alyza dodged the blow and weaved the
appropriate signs, an instant later a shockwave exploded from her
right hand, driving the muscular fallen angel backward.
“That’s enough,” announced
Persephone when Azian was about to retaliate.
The taciturn man stopped mid-swing and
bowed before sheathing his blade.
“You are starting to grasp the use
of magic in a combat situation. It took a little longer than I would
have liked, but I suppose it is to be expected from your human
heritage,” said Zed’s mother as she made her way down the dais.
Alyza was so exhausted that she didn’t
even bother to reply, using rather what little energy she had left to
sit down rather than just fall to the ground.
Persephone stopped next to the spent
girl and lightly stroked her raven hair. “Oh my dear, it is much
too early to rest, your education has only just begun.”
Aeon turned as Zendrius and Nessha
exited the orange and gold forest. “Was your visit fruitful?”
“Very,” said the young Dannar with
a smile.
“Zendrius, I spoke with my brethren
while you were gone and we have all unanimously agreed to pledge our
allegiance to you, the future king of Los-Reinar.”
“Um, ok?”
Aeon smiled at the bizarre youth.
“How may we be of service?”
“Oh about that, you remember I told
you I went to Area 31 because there are these conditions I need to
fulfil before I can become complete?”
“I do.”
“Well the thing is, one of those
conditions kinda require me to eat durandal flesh,” said Zendrius,
looking everywhere but at Aeon.
“I see. Do you need to completely
consume one of us?”
“Not sure, but my uncle doubts it.
He thinks that I will only need a small piece, a ‘mouthful’ as he
put it.”
“I will be honoured to offer some of
my soma for you to consume,” said Aeon before holding out one of
his arms.
“Thank you, Nessha if you will be so
kind,” said Zendrius as he motioned to the gigantic wrist.
Nessha drew her blade, carved out a
fist-sized piece of flesh from Aeon’s wrist and sheathed her sword
in one graceful movement.
Zendrius took the bloody piece of meat
in both hands. “I suppose I should eat it raw.”
“That would probably be best, my
lord,” concurred Nessha.
“Well here goes nothing,” said the
young Dannar before taking a large bite.
From his expression, everyone could see the taste was far removed from being delicious, but he
swallowed it and then continued to consume what was left.
Anticipation hung thick in the air as Zendrius wiped his mouth with
the back of his hand. “Well that wasn’t so bad.”
Then he collapsed.
