Strung Part 3

Author: Irk
Title: Strung Part 3

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7

Strung___
Snared in the Lacings___
Part Three___

Rocks. Dirt. The occasional leaf. Roots. Tree. Cape. Feet.
I can hear crickets, but no sight of one. Maybe they've caught wind of my reputation?
Of course. Everything knew what Lina Inverse brought with her wherever she went. Chaos and death rode on her shoulders. Destruction wrapped itself in her shadow. Doom tracked her footsteps when it wanted an exciting romp. Knowing this, evil always watched the horizon for the flash of red eyes that would betray Lina's presence.
All that and even the crickets are afraid of me. Lina felt anger bubbling within her, boiling over into fury. She dug her fingers into the bark of the tree trunk she was slouched on. "What's wrong with all of you?!"
The chirping suddenly ceased.
Lina bit her lip, forcing herself to stop thinking about it. She wasn't going to dwell on it. Her thoughts wouldn't run around in this vicious circle anymore. She would forget about this, she would climb down, and she would get something to eat at the nearby inn. After all, its mashed potatoes were famous throughout these parts.
...Potatoes were yummy.
Amelia and Zelgadis would look there first.
Lina swallowed the turmoil back, refusing to pay attention to it. ...I don't want to see them. Potatoes aren't worth it. She smoothed her cape, wrapping it tighter around herself. As she tugged it arond her shoulders, her fingers brushed the stone on her chest. She stared into the crismon depths of the jewel. The gem was set in worn but untarnished silver, the sister to three identical talismans. It seemed to look back at her, a glistening ruby eye... "Ruby Eye," ...but at the same time a drop of blood... "Demon's Blood."
Lina jerked her head up. Did I just speak out loud?
She didn't feel normal anymore. She never had felt normal, but now it was worse. When had it started? When she cast her last Giga Slave? When she touched the Claire Bible? When she first donned these talismans? The slaying of Zanaffar? The victory over Shubranigdo?
Or maybe it was the first time she had run away from home, fled her sister in mortal terror, scrambled into a tree and looked down at the earth far below...maybe in that eerily familiar moment she had become separate from the rest of humanity.
...Maybe I'm a plague.
Sent from on high to punish the indolent and smite the wicked. Yes. That sounded like her existence. There was no normal material to remember, after all - her first date, her debutante ball, her first love letter...a closet of pretty dresses, a beautiful house, a beloved pet...a job, a husband, a life...
But I could have had that. I could have had that.
Lina felt the bitter heat choke her and finally just let it have its way, letting the hot tears rush down and fall to the dirt far below.
But I killed it.
::Lina lashed out at Gourry. Lina hit him, slapping him again when he plead for an answer. Lina shouted, Lina cursed. Gourry only begged to know what was wrong. What was wrong with him, what was wrong with her? Why was she doing this? Why did she hate him?! Lina gave him no real answers, only insults. Sylphiel grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her. Stop it, stop it! Why are you doing this to him, Lina? We're all friends! Lina slapped her to the ground. Leave me alone! Leave me alone! You don't understand me! Gourry watched, stunned into numb silence.::
Lina hugged herself, trying to blot the memories from her mind.
::Sylphiel screamed at her from the ground. You're crazy! What kind of behavior is this?! He asked you to marry him! What could possibly be wrong with you to make you react like this? Lina clenched her fists, shouting. You don't understand! None of you understand me! Sylphiel jerked Lina down to her knees, facing her, glaring directly into her eyes. I understand you, Lina! I know exactly what your mind revolves around. You don't care about Gourry's feelings. You just wanted his sword, and now it's gone!::
More tears stained the ground below. Lina let out a sob.
::Lina paused, and Sylphiel almost saw her true feelings in her eyes. But Lina's mouth saved her from discovery. You're right. He's a clumsy idiot who can't even keep his own sword. Why would I want to marry that? Why should I even hang around him? He doesn't have anything of value to me anymore. Lina stood, Sylphiel's grip too loose from shock to hold her anymore. You can keep him, Sylphiel. And then Lina left before she started crying.::
Too late. Lina wiped her face with the back of her hand, sniffling. It's too late to go back. I've lost him. It's all gone. The grief hit her again, her chest aching with longing for what was destroyed. She had gone everywhere with him. They had so much fun, so many adventures, so many dinners. Her times with Gourry were the best times she'd ever had. He had followed her, protected her. He was the loyalest, bravest, most honest, most selfless man. She wanted him back. Everything she could ever want was right there with him, and she ached from the loss of it.
But it's so much better this way. Sylphiel can make him happy without getting him killed. It's better he's alive and away than dead with me.
Lina brought destruction wherever she went, after all. She couldn't let Gourry be around her anymore. She could let anyone be around her anymore. She was death. The enemy of all who live.
Stupid Gourry. Swearing to protect me always. Don't you know that the worst thing in the world is having your friends die for you?
* * *
Sleeping in the trees. This was another familiar experience from Lina's rebellious childhood. With a little fluffing, her cape made a very nice pillow. Wedged into the crook of a forking limb, Lina nodded off with the sensation of being in an unusually airy bunk-bed.
As soon as she entered the dream world, Lina knew that something was off. She was not in a story or twisted plot that her subconscious invented to play with her in. She was standing in a vast darkness that never seemed to end. She felt like she wasn't even dreaming, but she knew she was dreaming...but then again, Lina had never been in a dream and known it was a dream. This was strange. She was too alert. She almost felt like she was awake.
"I apologize for the disruption."
Lina whipped around to face a figure so distorted that she could not make out a single specific feature on it. It wasn't that it was mutated...something in her mind told her that what stood before her was completely substantial and mostly normal. But her dream's eyes...they wouldn't give her an honest assessment of this person. They denied her the details...the face and height and build. All that appeared was a shapely cloak of smokey gray. If she turned her head just right, she could barely discern that this figure matched its feminine voice. And there was an impression of very long hair - a chill shot through Lina like a shaft of ice.
The figure shook her head. "I am not the Golden Lord, Lina. I am merely a weak and unimportant messenger."
Lina narrowed her eyes. "If your identity isn't important, why is it a secret?"
The figure paused, its misty shadows rippling in dismay. "Touche', Lina. I'm sorry. To be here I must deny you that information. It is not my choice, I assure you."
"Are you trying to get me to trust you?" Lina crossed her arms, raising an eyebrow.
"To earn your trust is more than I could hope for. I am only here to tell you a story, not to convince you of anything. I am not allowed to harm you, and even if I were, I couldn't here, and even if I could, I wouldn't. Please believe me. All I exist for, right now, is to show you what I know."
The figure's dialouge left Lina in uneasy silence. She had already felt strange after her experiences with gods and weary after her affairs with people. She didn't trust this mysterious woman and her stories. Part of her had been afraid ever since her last adventure ended that she would find more trouble, and this seemed to be the cue for it. She was tired! She didn't want another mad scramble to save the world or her life or both. Why did trouble like her so much?!
"I'm so sorry." The figure's voice seemed ragged, as if she were on the verge of tears. "More trouble will come, and extremely soon. I am not the cause of this trouble, nor is the One who sent me. But I am here because of it."
Lina didn't reply for a long time. When she finally regained her voice, she asked, "What you're here to tell me...will it help me?"
"That is why I was sent."
"Then tell your story." Lina sat on the hazy dark surface below her and crossed her legs. "And it had better be interesting."
The figure seemed to smirk. "Very well, Lina." She walked forward, looking down at the redhead. "Are there any more requests before I start?"
"Yes." Lina looked up at the smoke-woman. "Give me a name to call you."
This startled the woman. Her face was a blur, but it somehow appeared very sad for a moment, then pensive, and lastly almost pleased. "If you have a desire to give me a name, you may call me Veil."
Lina smiled. "Then begin, Veil."
The shadow-woman leaned over and placed her hand on Lina's forehead. "Close your eyes. Open your mind to the world that I will speak of." Veil began her story as darkness fell into Lina's vision.
* * *
Do not be alarmed by your surroundings. This is merely a guided dream, a play in which you are the audience and not a participant.
Lina looked around her, amazed by the vividness of this dream. Unlike her normal dreams, high-speed affairs with low details and intense emotions, this was so like reality that Veil's reassurances were a bit unbelievable. It was as if she were actually in this large, high-ceilinged room. It was painted and draped in the dark blue tones of twilight. The furnishings, elegant marriages of polished bronze and stained wood, were composed of sweeping curves and elaborate patterns. Beneath her, the deep blue carpet was thick enough to silence the angriest footsteps. It was a place of beauty, quiet and somehow shy.
And people were in here. There they stood, gathered around a couch with dark indigo cushions. Lina couldn't take her eyes off of these strange figures. The four of them each gave off an extremely eerie aura. She swore she had never seen them before, but her memory still searched frantically for who they could be, as if it should know.
The one closest to her was a woman...or it had the appearance of a woman, whether it was human or not. Her golden eyes were hooded, a shadow hanging in them, giving Lina the impression of an eternal sadness. She wore a long-sleeved, flowing dress of blue velvet. Her hair fell over her eyes and around her face, tapering down to her feet in a scalloped curtain of midnight blue. She was gazing down at the couch, her attention fixated solely on its occupant. Lina tried to look down at the subject of the woman's attentions, but her gaze was suddenly blurred. It was like trying to look at Veil - she knew something was laying there, perfectly visible to all, but something was obscuring it from her view.
The woman was unaware of the discussion being carried on beside her. Similarly, the two talkers were purposefully ignoring her presence. It was obvious from their postures and movements that the man and woman were very familiar with each other. Familiar in an intimate way, Lina realized with a blush. A glass of wine was perched in the woman's fingers, long red nails clicking and sliding against it as if it were a lover's hand or an enemy's neck. Her red hair flipped over her forehead, bangs neatly cut in a bowl shape. A lip of pink hair fell over the bangs, neatly framing her right cheekbone. Behind her hung a long thin scarlet tail of hair that dragged on the floor. A pink dress, lashed together with red string and dotted with rubies, barely clothed her. Her eyes were also gold, but bright and calculating. She looked pretty enough...but something about her frightened Lina deeply in the way that a mouse naturally fears a cat.
Her companion was a tall, thin man clad in ornate armor and earth-toned silks. He stood in the supremely confident manner that only a very tall man can carry to perfection. He smiled with bold charm and radiated a personal charisma that somehow blinded bystanders to his air of arrogance. His eyes were also gold, but the pupils were slitted and the irises sparkled with more than just the glory that was this man's personality. Warm tan hair fell about his face, striped with bands of black in places, blending to red in others. He grinned at his partner, and all of a sudden Lina felt herself wanting to take the scarlet woman's place. His charm was like emotional magnetism, drawing people to him like flies to honey. And behind him, what was that? Some sort of spindly leathery creature...
...wings?! The man had the wings of a dragon! They were huge!
Before Lina could ponder that odd detail, her eyes glided to the fourth figure. This one stood far to the side, away from the others. Lina could not immediately tell if this isolation was the other figures' imposition or his own choice. But she could see from the man's lonely expression and the quiet sadness hanging about him that he would have preferred to be closer. The sadness of the woman in blue velvet echoed in this man's eyes, the same dull gold irises hanging from the lids. His pale blue hair swirled around his face and rippled down his back, complemented by the dark blue arcs on his white robes. While he was sad, he wasn't quite sullen...actually, the man seemed quite amiable. Lina shrugged. Maybe it was the hat.
That man is Dynast, one of Shubranigdo's five Mazoku Lords. You have met two of those five, and those two stand in this room right now.
Where? I can't see them! Lina felt panic rise within her as she thought of her encounters with Mazoku Lords. What was she here to see that would involve them? And what did that mean to her future?
The man with the dragon wings. He is Gaav. And the woman who stands alone....she is Fibrizo. Veil's voice was bitter as she announced the first, but drew up into sadness with the second.
WHAT? Lina stared in disbelief. Gaav was understandable...he had many incarnations, and assumedly many different faces in those lives. But though Fibrizo's disguise of a young boy had obviously not been the Lord's original appearance, this wasn't anything she could swallow. How could you possibly tell me that and expect me to believe it?!
I understand your confusion more than you know. Fibrizo changed quite a lot after the onslaught of the Kouma War. What you are seeing now takes place 250 years before that.
Lina was silent for a moment. Veil...why am I watching this? I'm getting bad feelings about all of this.
Veil was silent. Lina's attention had no choice but to shift to the scene before her. And the lady in red?
Zelas. Veil spat out the name like it was poison.
Lina decided to wait awhile before asking anything else. The Lords in the room were becoming more active now anyways, and she wanted to watch. The fact that she could watch them made her feel more powerful, as if she had a secret edge on her possible opponents. As her eyes took in the details, Lina walked forward to see and hear more vividly.
"Stay the hell away from us!" Zelas spat at Dynast as he began to walk towards the group. She clutched Gaav's arm. The draconic Lord drew her closer, glaring at Dynast with protective malice and possessive glee. Dynast stopped, the sadness on his face growing heavier.
"You should be glad we even came." Zelas's words burned through the chamber like acid. "Neither I nor Gaav appreciated whatever insanity led to your cursed den being chosen as our gathering place."
"I assure you," Dynast walked to Fibrizo in a wide arc around the fiery pair, "it was not my decision that this take place in Ecwhol Cast. But Fibrizo's needs are extremely important in this matter, and I do not think that her judgement should be questioned. Especially," Dynast turned back towards Zelas, his eyes almost glowing with hate, "in such an impolite manner."
The temperature in the room dropped with his final sentence, and Zelas shrunk against Gaav. The tallest Lord seemed shorter than Dynast for that moment. Both practically vibrated with fear as Dynast's breath hissed through his teeth.
The frozen air of wrath and terror snapped as Fibrizo, oblivious to the entire exchange, gasped with surprise. "Look! Look at him!"
Dynast gazed at the figure on the couch with interest, Zelas with suspicion, and Gaav with nonchalance. Suddenly, Lina's vision shifted, leaping through each mazoku's eyes.
Dynast was acutely interested. He had been an admirer of Fibrizo's work for quite a long time, and when she had requested that a new personal lab be built in his home, he was thrilled. He rarely got any visitors, and couldn't [fogfogfog...The conclusion of Dynast's thoughts was obscured from Lina's mind]. But Fibrizo's presence in Ecwhol Cast was very comforting, even though she was eternally busy with her own work. She even permitted him to visit her at certain times, though didn't allow Dynast to see her creation until it was completed. And now, she had succeeded, and Zelas and Gaav would have to admit to her genius. And then they would get the hell out of Ecwhol Cast before he [FOG]!
Zelas wasn't sure of this. Fibrizo was brilliant, yes, but she was also childish and conversationally stunted. The death magician always played in private, creating toys and games for herself that Zelas could only guess at. This new creation was for all of them to share. Was that a bad thing? Perhaps Fibrizo was sabotaging Gaav and Zelas. After all, she was in Dynast's home now...that murderer. The mere fact that Fibrizo could trust Dynast at all was a warning sign to Zelas. Maybe Dynast was collaborating with her. She was an easily led creature, so susceptible to a kind word or gesture. Dynast had ensnared her, taking her into Ecwhol Cast so that he could finally kill them all off. He wouldn't murder them all now, not in front of Fibrizo...but this new creation... Zelas stared at it with intense distrust until she realized that Dynast might be watching. She smiled. It certainly was a pretty thing, though.
Gaav was certain that this slip of a thing couldn't harm them. It was Fibrizo's, after all. And that was pretty much it.
Fibrizo was so full of pride and joy and love for the figure on the couch that Lina almost doubted she was a mazoku at all, much less Hellmaster. The lady was completely focused on her creation, her beautiful creation, her darling. What did the others matter? She had succeeded. She had made this. Beautiful. Thing, and it was as flawless as the Golden Mother that she yearned to please. Dynast understood her. Dynast thought it was beautiful too, and he would love it just as much as she did. Dynast always understood her unspoken intents and meanings. It was all worth it, now that Dynast could see.
Lina blinked, the shock coming to her. That was love. Not love for a possession or prized work of art. Love for another being who could think and act and say no. Impossible, unconditional, dangerous love.
A tear ran down Lina's cheek. She knew the feeling all too well, and the thought that she could be connected to Fibrizo by the most unexpected thread of all hurt her. It hurt her to think that she had judged this Fibrizo so blindly, and it hurt her to know what this Fibrizo had become. It hurt to know that she had killed this quiet, gentle person, even if she had been something else entirely by the time their battle had begun.
You didn't kill her. The Lord of Nightmares herself decided to end Fibrizo's life, and nothing you could do could stop that.
But...I never knew. I never knew what Fibrizo really was. I always thought Fibrizo was just a crazed, bloodthirsty child with no motivation but the screams of his victims. If I would have known...
That's why you didn't know, Lina.
Suddenly the world around Lina rippled. Veil cursed as the scene faded into the endless darkness in which the dream had started. "I'm sorry, Lina. You're waking up, and there's still so much to tell you. And you can't know any of this story in your waking life until I have finished it."
Lina was alarmed by Veil's regretful tone. "Why? What's so important about all of this? Would it be better if I did know? What danger is coming for me? What's going to happen?!
Veil didn't reply, her smoky features echoing sorrow as Lina faded into the waking world.

You can find more of Irk's works at http://www.mazoku.com/~snapple/ficarc/

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