Post by Aeric Ecrai on May 23, 2009 21:28:14 GMT -5
Foreward: I know, seems like emo writing for me, but I felt the need to contrast evil and good. Things are not exlpained in detail, but I hope this turns out to be a good (albiet somewhat disturbing) read. I will admit, writing some of this made my a little queasy in the stomach. Portraying evil in this way is tricky. I plan to make this a multiple part series, perhaps a trilogy or perhaps five parts. Enjoy.
First, there was darkness...
Darkness. Just like every other day. The dark mist, boiling and hissing on the streets and overhead, permeating the allies and corners, flowing past the small stone huts the villagers called their homes. Such sights were common to everyone, this blessed darkness that covered the horizon. The gods said that was the way it had always been, that the mist was sacred, and they should respect it and the darkness it embodied. The gods also taught other things, such as to submit to the will of any Dark One, for they were superior. They also taught to never look at a Red One, for they were the messengers of the gods and were sacred. Protectors of the peace, the Red Ones kept out the false prophets and the hated light ones, or "brights", as the children called them. Such slang was common in Noir, on the east side of what the history books taught to be the Sacred Land of the Necomancer.
This is where our story begins. In the dark capital city of Noir, during a time known now as the Reign of Mist.* * *
The day had started out normally. Dirk had woken up and given the daily blood offering to the gods. They taught to relish the pain, to enjoy the sensation of jagged metal tearing at your wrist, of the red blood flowing into a bowl by your bedside. Dirk was sure that in their infinite wisdom, the gods were correct, for everyone followed their teachings. He had always been scolded by his parents when he was a boy for not doing this, because "the Red Ones will come take you away at night". Mentioned in the teachings of the Necromancer, the Red Ones were fabled beings, held in high honor by all the people of Noir and the rest who followed the gods in their rites. Each scar on one's wrist was a badge of honor that they had performed their holy duty to the gods.
Dirk then moved to his looking glass, the smudged, reflective surface on which he looked at himself everyday. As usual, his dark hair was tauseled from sleep, the scars on his arms and face clearly visible. The Dark Ones said they were religious badges of honor, proclaiming that each child belonged to the Necromancer. His dark eyes stared back at him, bloodshot with brown pupils. He had heard once from an adult that the ground was once brown instead of it's usual black. This was obviously a lie, for the teachings said that the ground had always been black and charred, a result of the great war against the light that the Necromancer had won long ago. He had never seen the man again. Perhaps a Red One got him.
Now he prepared to depart his house for the Holy School of the Necromancer. At thirteen, he was expected by his peers to attend the studies of the world and the glory of the Necromancer. Dully, he moved towards the door, his wrist still wet. Something felt off today...
As he approached the door, he reeled back and gasped sharply.
There, scrawled on the inside of his door, was one of the most horrible things he had ever seen.
The death god is false and the red ones are his agents of chaos
How had this...how had this gotten on his door?! Had he written such a blasphemous thing in his sleep? The Dark Ones would publicly execute him even if he had not done this! He dashed to his looking glass, grabbed a cloth, and ran it in the murky water that sat in the bowl, splashing some onto his shirt in the process. Racing the the door, he tried scrubbing at the message, his hand hurriedly moving and pressing hard against the stone, but it remained adamant. It appeared to be etched into the very rock of his room, as a prisoner would etch years into the wall of a holding cell.
The death god is false and the red ones are his agents of chaos
...
He would just have to leave it. School started soon, and he would be whipped until he bled if he was late. Sliding the stone door aside (for he hoped that if he left the door to his room open, the message would remain unseen), he dashed through his small house. He lived alone, because his parents had both been sacrificed to the Necromancer for being brights, or so that was what the Dark Ones had told him in their raspy, hissing voices. He had no choice to obey the Superior Ones and had to watch as they were publicly bludgeoned to death. He was told it was supposed to be a religious experience, but he had his doubts. Unspoken doubts, for such words would get him killed as well.
As he reached the door to leave his house, another message glared back at him.
To deny the light is to deny yourself. You must ascend from darkness...
Had some zealous bright gotten into his house overnight? The light was hated by all in Noir. He had one friend who said a bright had let him experience it, and that he had lost his sight. Probably a devilish trick, for it was obvious that his eyes had been gouged. The light served as a deceptive tool to draw them away from the blessed darkness.
Still, he felt a spark inside him, something like a sickness that he wanted to snuff out. Something that told him that what he was going through day to day was wrong. Was the opposite of what he thought everything was.
Where did that thought come from? He had to squash these thoughts before they got him killed...* * *
School had progressed normally enough. They had the traditional moment of darkness, where they could offer their prayers to the Red Ones, but he kept silent. The emotions he had felt earlier had flared up in that instant, and he had been unable to speak.
Something was seeming more and more wrong about the way things went on during the day. He dared not think it, or even acknowledge that he was thinking it, but something in him told him that the bright ones were-
Thump
He had collided with someone. A man, it looked like, but the strangest man he had ever seen. A cape that swept down to his knees and a hat with a small feather stuck in it rested on his head. In one hand, he carried a cane. His skin was pale, his hair blonde and his eyes a striking blue.
Blue. Where had that word come from? He knew not, but that was what the color was. And green, he realized. The cape and hat were green. Everything in his world was black.
Black and red...
There was another man with him, with blazing orange-bronze hair, in a simpler leather coat that was fastened around his waist with a belt. A small, incredibly thin sword was fastened to his side. A rapier used in fencing, perhaps? An old book he had found in an alley had detailed fencing. A friend had taken it from him and burned it, saying knowledge of that sort was sacreligious. The man's skin was the same pale, and his eyes were as green as the first's cape.
And then he realized. Before he could think about what effect it would have, he blurted:
"You're brights..."To be continued
