From Beyond the Dark
A chill wind blew through the mountains. A young woman, likely no older than her mid-twenties, stumbled haphazardly through the rocks and and brush, led only by moonlight. Her form was shrouded in a heavy cloak, but it did no more than keep out the cold of the night; if she was spotted, she would be recognised instantly. If she kept moving, however, maybe - just maybe, she hoped and prayed, though she knew not to whom - they wouldn’t catch her.
She stumbled as her thoughts began to wander, and her foot caught on a loose rock. She fell and hit the ground hard, able to do little more in her surprise than fall into a roll, tucking in to keep from injuring herself too badly. As she came to a stop some few feet down the rocky hillside, she found that the rock she’d overturned had bounced off and down further, vanishing over a small drop. Picking herself up and ignoring the searing pain in her ankle, the cloaked woman hobbled her way down to the cliff’s edge to peer over.
Hours had passed, she knew, and between the tiredness in her legs and the pain she felt from her fall, radiating up her calf and pulsating up her side, she resolved to let this tiny bit of cover be her rest stop. Working her way down and around the small outcropping of rock on which she stood, she sighed in relief at the sight: a cave, littered with old bones and smelling faintly of wet fur. She’d stumbled upon a bear’s den, more than likely, but its inhabitant, blessedly, seemed to be away. Tucking in, she slipped inside to find a chamber, slightly larger than the opening, beyond.
Quietly, the woman stepped inside, righting herself as she kicked some bones and brush aside. She had no provisions, no food or water, nothing for warmth but the heavy cloak which had become altogether too stifling in her flight. In the enclosed space, she finally pulled back the heavy hood that hid her features, revealing, at first, long, dark blond hair and skin pale as the moonlight that shone through the den’s entrance. Glinting against the light were steely blue eyes, irises limned with an odd, almost luminescent violet hue, with dark, heavy circles beneath them showing signs of a long history of exhaustion, spanning, likely, back to before her escape.
The blonde sighed softly, and her next step brought with it a wince and a muffled grunt of pain. With her adrenaline wearing off in the temporary safe space, the pain in her side and, especially, in her ankle, had become all the more noticeable. At this, an instinct welled up in her: the darkness - no, something beyond the darkness - called out to her, begged for her acknowledgement. Her left arm shot with pain and she hissed, shaking it as if to rid it of a temporary ache. Eventually, the feeling passed, however, and her mind quieted, leaving her alone in the darkness of the cave to slowly lower herself to the ground, sitting against the rocky wall at the back.
She’d had no time to reminisce, to ponder her flight from them, but there she was. She remembered nothing from her previous life, from before them. She knew she was different than they were. She looked different, knew different things, even spoke different words, but she knew no one else. The last thing she could remember was hands on her, chilling her, reaching through her flesh to embrace her very soul. It was a feeling of emptiness, as if something had been taken away, though she knew, in her mind, that it was quite the opposite. Something had been changed in her, added to her, making her not more or less but different. She knew she was different, at least from how she was before. However, there was a new familiarity with it, and it had called from beyond the dark then, too. She didn’t know what it meant, then, and she still didn’t know. She wasn’t even sure she wanted to know.
Halinara, as she was called, was less a name than a title, or perhaps a role: a Child of Shadow. There were others called the same, but they were all called upon as though it was a name for them, and none ever remembered what they were truly called. They’d invented nicknames for each other, she and the other children, in order to communicate clearly. She was Steel, after her blue eyes that shone like a new blade in the pale violet light of the braziers on the stone walls of the only place she knew as home. She didn’t like it, but it was the only way to identify each other. They followed that line of thinking too, taking names for their eyes. Steel, Amber, Jade, Sea, and Black, they were called. The elders paid no mind, and it didn’t always matter, anyway; they were always “you,” or “it,” or “the Child.” She had cast all of it aside, now. She was no longer a child, no longer a tool, no longer the girl called “Steel” who had been forced into this role.
Pain roused the blonde from her reflection for just a moment, her side and ankle throbbing again, as if to remind her of the urgent matter that the otherwise benign hurts would become if she was found in that little den, by man or beast. The darkness around her called again as cloud cover caused the moonlight filtering through the opening to dim and falter. Something comforting lay beyond, and all she had to do, she knew, was reach for it. It was tempting, and she began to weigh her options. Would giving in make her less of herself? Would it harm her more than it would help? The pain down her arm turned from a sting to a burn. It was a familiar burn - cold, deep, far below the flesh and crawling through her very bones into her core - that had evolved over time. At first it was hot, searing, her flesh scarred and twisted by the molten black stone that had been used to inscribe the runes across her chest and left arm, down to her very fingers, another pushed into her flesh right above her heart where it yet remained, half grown-over with scars. It always burned when the call in her mind began to tempt her. Its siren song called her to draw upon it, to take it into herself and become one.
She feared that nameless, formless entity beyond the dark. It was unknown to her, spoken of only in hushed whispers and tongues beyond her understanding. She knew the words, heard them repeated thousands of times in chants and rituals, sometimes even in conversation among the elders, but she knew so little of what any of them meant, it was all lost. All she knew was the burn, the calling, and the temptation to use what was offered by that which beckoned and the fear of it that came with the call.
It would make her better, they’d told her. It would hurt, but it was necessary - it was all necessary, every time - and that the pain gave her strength to fulfill her destiny. It didn’t matter if that destiny was something she wanted or not. Destiny is not chosen by the destined, they would tell her. She had no say, they would tell her. They were wrong, she knew, but she could do nothing to fight it. Where had she to go? To whom would she run? They made her situation clear: they, together with this “destiny” of hers, were her best chance of survival in a cruel, dark world, stranded as she was in the vast range of mountains, nothing but rock on all sides.
That didn’t matter anymore. Even if she had nowhere to run, she would keep running until, eventually, she tired. She was tired. Her legs and lungs alike burned with a heat that contrasted the cold creeping up to her chest from the runic brands on her arm. She wondered what they were: seals? Perhaps they were a beacon to draw whatever was in the dark. That thought made her shudder. If they were a beacon, would they know where to find her?
The call in the back of her mind strengthened, growing louder, adding thoughts to her own. It told her that she needn’t fear if she accepted it. Gift or curse, it was hers to bear, whether she wanted it or not… and it could be her only chance of survival. That made the young woman nervous. Whether the thoughts were her own or not, they felt alien enough to distract her, causing her to peer about at the gloomy interior of the den again. No one was there to greet her but the darkness and a stray beam of moonlight.
It wouldn’t matter, she realised. Anxiety and exhaustion were weighing heavy. Even her pain, the cold burn fading with the call’s silence once more, her ankle, and all else, began to dull as consciousness slipped from her mind. She’d been running since dusk, and the siren song of the early morning birds, sparse as they were, lulled her off to sleep against that back wall.
Her dreams weren’t always the same, but some were certainly more frequent than others. Some were memories, relieved as if time was rewound, with the pain and torment renewed. Some were memories of another person - another time, even - long ago, perhaps, always from the eyes of a child. Others were indistinguishable. Darkness, shadowy images on a shadowy backdrop, unfamiliar silhouettes, and unintelligible thoughts would run through her head, forgotten by her waking and were left as but brief glimpses back to her dreaming when she woke.
The dream she had that night, however, felt particularly real. As dreams often do, it was mashed together, various concepts and times intertwining chaotically. She found that even she was in flux. She felt younger, perhaps, but found herself out of place with the child she felt she was, stuck once more in the cold, stone prison that once held her after the first manifestation of that dark presence. The bricks of the wall felt nearly as large as she was, painted in blood - her blood - with runes, the bars stained dark red in the same manner. The way the room undulated with every step brought to mind the woozy, faint feeling of having lost so much blood. Another step brought more swaying, the room pitching sharply from side to side, tossing her to the floor. She felt the stones beneath her, followed by nothingness. She was a monster, locked away for her own good. A magical creature made to be penned and used, forgotten until she had another duty, another purpose. It had felt like forever that she’d been trapped. Yet, even with her suffering, she knew no better. There could be no better, not for her.
When her vision returned, the stones were falling away with a horrible creaking, flames of violet mixing with crimson and brilliant yellow to create a cacophony of colour, heat and cold colliding to create fluctuating wind currents that practically sucked the air from place to place and made it hard to breathe, especially as smoke whipped around in the violent gusts. The bars were open and one of the elders stood above her. As he neared to speak to her, his breath was hot upon her face. He exhaled, then choked, flecks blood from between his lips spattering out across her face.
She woke with a start at that feeling. When she brought a hand to her face, she felt something wet. When she breathed, she breathed warm air. She heard another heavy breath, coming large and deep as it washed over her face, and when she opened her eyes, she was at once blinded by the sunlight filtering in through the light behind the form of a large bear before it reared up, blocking the light. With a mighty roar, it attempted to bring a massive, clawed fore-paw down on her.
Thankfully, the start the young blonde was given woke her enough to react. However, the reaction was impulsive. It was instinctive. She knew it without knowing. She did it without thinking. The darkness called… and she answered.
In one instant, she was beneath the downswing of those vicious claws. In the next, she was a shadowy blur that carried her through the bear’s body to it’s other side, where she took form once again, ebon and violet smoke wreathing her form, her pupils narrowed to slits and irises glowing a dark purple. She bared her teeth and struck out with both hands, thrusting them forward and sending a powerful blast of pure dark magic into the beast’s back, sending it flying, bodily, into the wall with a meaty thud. Turning another upward, spears of gloom erupted from beneath it, skewering it multiple times over and leaving the quickly-expiring bear to lay bleeding on the ground with a low, weak rumble.
In a flurry of thought and chaos, it began, and it ended in almost a direct inverse. The sun on her back, even through her cloak, was intolerable, the illuminated stone around her simply too bright to handle. With a sharp inhalation, she darted back out of the light, retreating to the shadows off to the side and stumbling over her twisted ankle, hissing in pain as she nearly tumbled to the ground again. The bleeding bear now occupied her previous resting place, its breathing ceased. The shadowy haze that had engulfed her was lifting and her otherworldly features had begun to recede to bare hints in her otherwise human appearance. Drawing on the last of the shadowy power that had practically infused her from beyond the darkness in that cave, she felt the wounded ankle ease in its throbbing. Yet, even with those shadows - like home, a friend - her mind raced with hypothetical scenarios, the worst of all being that she could be located through her outburst.
She sat back against the wall of the cave, staring at the bear’s smoking wounds. It wasn’t, of course, smoke, but residual dark magic seeping out of it. It would stop, eventually, she knew. It wasn’t her first kill, not like this or otherwise. It had always been beasts, however. She’d never brought herself to kill another sapient being. She didn’t care to think about it any more than that. She found she just didn’t care. Whether it was taught, trained, or just inherent to her for being some kind of killer creature, it didn’t matter.
It was, paradoxically, her lack of concern that concerned her the most. She tried not to dwell on it, however. Her ankle was healed, and she had to keep moving. To where, it didn’t matter; she just had to run. She pulled her hood back over her head and, tentatively, rushed out to greet the sunlight with squinting and pained noises as her eyes found they had no ability to truly tolerate it. In moments, she found herself back in the dark’s embrace, sitting back and cursing to herself. She would have to wait until nightfall, but then, she would move again. For the time being, she made her way over to the fallen bear, pushing it with her feet, back to the wall, to make space for herself and the keep the blood from pooling to that side. It smelled awful, the smell of blood bringing back horrid memories of that prison cell again, but it was warm and it would do. It would have to until she could begin running again… and she had to run.