Vision Of Escaflowne Fan Fiction ❯ Necromancer ❯ Travelling the Crimson Path ( Chapter 3 )

Chapter Three: Travelling the Crimson Path

Through the bright passageways of the Vione a dark shadow strode confidently against the light. It spun inky veils and draped them from every surface with its passing. A collective stillness suffused the air like a person waiting to breathe. It flickered in the corner of men's eyes and breathed the scent of freshly dug earth into their lungs.

"Dilandau, what is the meaning of all this skulking?" Folken Lakur de Fanel demanded coldly of the pale young man before him. Dilandau smiled eerily and ran a hand through his short silver hair.

"I'm searching, betrayer of man…" He stepped back in alarm and stared at the leader of the Dragonslayers warily. That voice, he had heard it once before. Dilandau, or the entity that inhabited him, cocked his head to one side and regarded the older man inquisitively.

"What are you?"

"You ask? You knew me quite well, betrayer of man…For the briefest moment our souls touched. I almost had you…but he interfered. You have flouted your destiny and my embrace…I wonder how long you will continue?" the creature asked in Dilandau's haughty tenor.

"I order you to leave this boy and this ship." The creature raised a stolen hand and caressed his cheek, tracing the tear shaped scar reverently. He flinched and took another step back. He felt the beginnings of a fear he hadn't felt since he faced down the earth dragon and lost. The creature's voice, he could hear it more distinctly with each word that his subordinate produced. It sounded of boreal winds fleeing between pillars of ruined civilizations and the scream of a thousand anguished souls.

"I do not ask for your fear, betrayer of man…I will discontinue my search and relinquish control of this body…Do not think to defy my will forever. I am the inevitable." The creature's brilliance faded from the pale boy's eyes and he looked around in confusion.

"What the hell am I doing here? Folken?" The man shuddered and brushed past. The darkness of the creature seemed to have sunk into his pores and sped of the degeneration of his body.

* * * *

Dilandau screamed as he glared angrily into the mirror. A translucent face superimposed his own, red eyes dominating his own garnet orbs. Icicle fingers slid carelessly along his ribs and traced the contours of his spine.

"Have you faced the inevitable, killer of men? Are you ready to accept my sweet gift?" the darkness whispered through his mind. He could feel the entity's cold body press against, into and through his own.

"Leave me the hell alone. Get out of my mind. Leave me alone, you bitch." Her soft chuckle wrapped around his ears and flowed into his blood.

"Perhaps I should show you my power…Reveal the beginning? I am something that you shall never be rid of…Death…Yes…They want me to show you…Understand my blessing…my curse."

The pale boy slammed into the ground as consciousness faded.

* * * *

"It started as the dream of a young girl and like all innocent dreams it felt no darkness."

Dilandau found himself standing amid waving stalks of emerald grass. Sweet zephyr brought the scents of a wood burning stove and far off gardens. He turned about, seeing cerulean waters reflect the glowing sun and pale birds winging coltishly through the air streams.

"The girl grew up and knew sorrow. Her world of dreams reflected her bitterness and apocalyptic wars waged. Thousands died for her anguish and the very ground welled crimson."

A bacchanalia of destruction slammed into him. He felt the scorching lick of flames and inhaled the pungent scent of burning flesh and greasy smoke. Screams and shrieks rent the gray air and shadowy figures charged mindlessly, weapons raised in a futile mission. Armies of twisted humanoid creatures slashed each other to dripping ribbons of skin and muscle. Blood flowed in churning rivers to a scarlet ocean.

"She died, eventually, but her dream world continued to exist in the world of her female offspring. Generations breathed and vanished, each carrying this crystal world into new eras of prosperity and degradation."

Around him a thousands scenes of carnage and exultant joy whirled by. He saw cities rise and crumble into the grassy slope that spawned them. For a few minutes great flows of ice covered the landscape and obscured the sun in blinding white clouds.

"From this tortured world of girlhood disillusionment, I was created. I was the first…and last of my kind."

A young girl of six knelt beside the bloodied remains of another person. Her multicolored hair had been scorched in places and hung limply about her sooty face. Dilandau moved around to get a better look at her and the massacre surrounding them. Black smoke curled from burning buildings and the rasping groans of the dying echoed hollowly through the crimson landscape.

"And I ruled the world." The small girl grinned serenely. Dilandau met her glowing red eyes and shuddered. Slowly she lowered her head and pressed her small lips above the corpse's heart. The blackened hulk shuddered, charred limbs twitching spastically.

He gasped, covering his mouth as his bile threatened to climb up his throat, and stepped away from the demonic child. The corpse heaved itself to its feet and stumbled away. From the burning village around them more climbed from the burning tombs and began to walk towards the setting sun.

"My creations. My power." She stood up and held out a delicate hand to the young man. "The girl dreamed my existence and I fulfilled her every wish. I destroyed for her. I ripped the darkness from space and cradled this dying world in soft oblivion." The girl's voice was dulcet and gentle and echoed the husky contralto she would gain with age.

"You are…were human? But how…that's not possible."

"I was never human, killer of men. The nightmares of a frightened girl spawned me. Her terror drew flesh across bone and her tears flow through my veins."

Dilandau screamed as the ground fell away and he found himself submerged in a seething ocean of crimson blood. He struggled for the surface, but a thousand shrieking souls gripped his legs and held him in place. He saw her face above him, smiling with cruel knowledge.

"My armies spread and I consumed all…Then the hunger instilled in me found satiation. The hordes collapsed where they stood and sleep stole across my mind…and I dreamed.

"This dream world continued to pass through the original girl's descendents until the day a race of people aspired to be gods. The Atlanteans drew upon powers they thought they understood in a foolish attempt to surmount the final impediment of mortality. They ripped into an unknowing child's soul and brought this dreamscape into reality. It is true. This world was not of their creating, but merely the solidification of a child's abstraction. They killed the girl giving reality to this world…

"And so your world was born and its people breathed."

* * * *

"Do you see it? Do you understand why I hunger?" Dilandau felt the woman's cool hands stroking his face as her melodious voice slipped through his ears. "I know not if my awakening has come…If my darkness is needed to once again purge the corruption from this earth…But I breathe and I burn to feel humanity's river slow beneath my finger tips."

He moaned softly in despair as a tumult of images whirled haphazardly through his stunned mind. Her icy lips pressed briefly against his and she slid into his mouth, essence flowing back to curl cat-like around his heart.

"Inevitability is all that you have left…I will wait for you patiently, killer of men. Come to me when you want respite from the pain or crave answers…You may wish me gone, but Death will always stalk those who slay the living."

* * * *

I feel guilty for complaining about the lack of reviews. Now people have and…I love you all. You're beautiful, wonderful and this story goes out to you all. Don't worry it ain't over yet, but don't let that discourage you from reviewing. Review!!