When Stars Collide

Chapter 24- When Darkness meets - Magelion

In the span of a week, my brother had charmed Lida and had her wrapped around his finger. Which I couldn’t help but being secretly grateful for. I had avoided Karidas for a whole week, making myself extra busy even though I was worried more now than ever. I heard Maia scream from the mortal world. She had gotten hurt and if that’s the case...

She’s not truly immortal either. Which means that because of me, now she can die. That scares me more than Councilman Enzo who bangs on my door from the other side. I sigh, realizing that Lida’s copy of Maia was probably wreaking chaos. Again.

“Yes?” I answer and when I open the door, he holds a scroll.

“Your father wishes to see you,” he says and I shake my head.

“Tell Karidas that I'm busy and when I turn and hear someone slamming to the ground, I turn and find Karidas glaring at me.

“You’ve been avoiding me for almost two weeks, son. Why is that?”

“Tell me why you never told me I was His son.” I watch him freeze and he strokes his beard.

“You’re my son and-”

“Bullshit!” I scream at him, slamming my hands on the table and my heart races at the adrenaline. The nerves. The darkness called me once again to accept the blood in my veins.

“Alina… wanted to make you a mortal. When she found out that the devil would claim you as a boon, she came to me for help. When she got my help, she said she had things to do and I watched over you. You were just a few days old. When she came back, the devil had been looking for his newborn son and Alina had gotten help to find something that could kill you.”

“I escaped with you and when He tried to wrench you away from me, he cursed Alina to end up in the mortal world. I know I told you many things. I know I told you that she was dead.”

“Where is she?”

“She goes by the name of Yia Yia, a clan leader of thieves. Her goal was to gain the ivorian staff that would grant her the eternal youth she had before as a goddess. She’d claim her youth, her immortality and of course, she’d find a way to get you back,”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I ask him and by then, I can’t stop the frustration in my voice, the glassy eyes with tears about to spill. My mother was an old lady by now. My dad was the devil and the goddess I loved, was one I could never have. Karidas moves closer to me and sighs.

“I’m sorry I never told you about your origins. I wanted to protect you from the darkness and frankly, when you first held onto my hand, I didn’t want to let go. You gave me many great memories. You gave me lots of trouble too, but you’ll always be my son. I’m sorry I couldn’t be better or more honest for you,” he says and by then I just crumple into his arms, sobbing.

“How do we find the traitor now?” I stuttered and he stroked my hair softly, his face thoughtful.

“You’re my son and you always will be. The answer is within you. I can’t give you those answers you seek, but Eris might.” I push Karidas away and glare at him.

“The Blessed queen? You’re crazy,”

“Ask Lucas then. He’ll tell you the same thing. I think a trip to Eris might be necessary at this point in time.”

I look at my map and try to find her kingdom. It was the darkest corner of the heavens, where the clouds were always dark. The land had been just for the Blessed, but all the initiates that won their immortality were here. So, either Eris was here, or in her little corner in the mortal world. I just hoped she was here and not down there. I look at my dad and he looks at a coin he’s holding.

“Maia was here not too long ago.” I turned and looked at my dad with hunger in my eyes. Maia. She was back?

“Why? Is she okay? Did she find the answer?”

“No to all three, dear brother,” Lucas strides in and Karidas grows pale.

“You left the most important thing, Karidas. Now, you can go.” he said dryly and my dad leaves the coin behind. He scrambles out of the room and I look at the Harbinger warily.

We were sons of the devil, but we couldn’t be more different. While we both worked in the shadows, I was more willing to be seen. I had barely seen anything of him until he began to dance with Lida that night. Nobody got killed, luckily… but I didn’t trust him. His wavy dark hair was similar to mine, but where my eyes were violet, his were an ocean blue.

“I brought Maia to a cloud. She got hurt in the mortal world. She has her powers, making her look immortal, but she isn’t invincible there. She can die there, Magelion. Scarlet Thorne entered the game after years of being dormant and if you ask me, I’m more troubled about that.”

“Why? Isn’t she Jamie’s brother? They both work for you.” I ask him and he grunts, making two clouds appear. He plunks down on one of them and motions me to sit on the cloud. I don’t necessarily care if he wants to be kind, since that was just an illusion with him, so I ignored his cloud and made my own. I sat down on it and he laughed at me, noticing the gesture.

“Just so you know, I'm not too happy we’re siblings either, Magelion.”

“I’m trying to find where I asked for your opinion,” I snap at him and he glares at me.

“You’re a lot like Him,” he says breezily and I narrow my eyes.

“Well, isn’t that why we’re related, Lucas?” I retort and he finally falls silent at the comment. He speaks up again, moving back to what we had been discussing… before clouds made my day darker.

“Not for me. Jamie and Scarlet work for my dad, but they need to bow down to me too. Jamie is more on our side than his sister is. She wasn’t supposed to turn on Maia like she did. Maia killed her and she killed not only her lead, but also shook the balance with Jamie. If he finds out Maia killed her, we’ll have a bigger issue than Scarlet being dead and being reborn again,”

That was worse than I thought. At least I imagined she’d be immortal down there. But she had been hurt. Lucas had saved her.

“Why did you save her?”

“Because as much as I don’t get along with you, I know you shaking up the heavens at her death would be more painful to deal with than with her. I owe Alaia a favor and… I need some answers as well.” he finishes and I grab the coin, looking at it.

“Why the coin?”

“Because you’ll be able to communicate with her on two occasions. But she needs to reach out. Because I’m older, she has my coin. So, you can’t use up your chances now.”

“What do you know about Eris?”

“She’s currently residing up here. I think out of all the things you’ve mentioned… this is probably the best idea you could’ve concocted.” he says sarcastically and I get off the cloud, going back to my map and wrapping things up before I leave.

“I’m going to meet with her.” he snickers and I storm up to him, pushing him against the door.

“Are you going to help me or not?” I snarl at him and he looks genuinely surprised. But then he gives me that catty smile and grins more.

“Glad you’re embracing your darkness a little more, dear brother. Lida will go with you, I think she has more of a lead than you do. I will meet you there since I need to finish some things first.” he grins and snaps his fingers, disappearing in a blink. When I knock on Lida’s door, she opens it and stares at me.

“Magelion. We need to talk.”

And boy, do they need to talk.

At last, Karidas finally faced his son. I wish I could tell you all that's all he's hiding, but I wouldn't get too comfortable with that yet. Now that there's a plan to find out more about the traitor (remember the gods aren't aware of Sanderran being the traitor yet. They suspect of him, that's all) a trip to meet the Blessed queen is next. I wanted to leave off this update here since it will build up to next week's update, but I wanted to thank everyone for reading my story.
Toodles,
Sandyfrogy