Fate of Nervana

Ch7: Blinded Sight and Bleeding Soul

Its been an hour since we left our camp on the border of the thick trees. So we can get an early start to get to the Dead Wood before the sun gets to high in the sky. The only sounds around us that broke through the silence were the sound of crickets and early birds.I looked up at the clear sky with hardly any clouds until something flew past me until I saw dark gray almost black ash in the air, wait a minute ash? I turned my head and saw a black butterfly flying right next to me so I raised my up and it landed on the back of my pointer finger.

'Ash butterfly...no way it can't be.' I mentally shivered, the butterfly flew away. "That's not good."

I squeezed both sides of my horse so we were speeding past Leon and Hajime.

Both men frantically looked at each other and raced after me. "Ares slow down...what's going on?! What's wrong?!" Leon called out.

When the tree line came into view we quickly stopped. I was the first to jump down to the ground and walked up to the entrance the woods, my hand moved on its own and gently touched the dried up trunk of the near by tree and a female scream verberatrd in my head and skeletal face appeared in the back of my mind after the scream faded, then I removed my hand quickly with my eyes widening.

"What's wrong Ares?" Leon put his hand on my shoulder and felt that I was shaking slightly but I calmed my body.

"I'm going in alone."

"What?"

"No you can't go in there by yourself." Hajime grabbed my shoulders roughly and turned me around.

"Hejime, Leon do you see that butterfly right there on the tree?" I pointed to the long winged butterfly on the trunk and both men nodded their heads. "Well that's a Ash butterfly, if one of them touches you with their wings or even bite you you'll be poisoned."

"At least take one of use with you." Leon exclaimed.

I shook my head while sighing. "Alright fine. Leon then come on."

We were about to head into the woods until Hajime gently grabbed my wrist and then I turned my head towards the worried gaze of the Dragoon which my heart melt into a slushy mess. I smiled and shook my head. He let go and stepped away watching both of us walked deeper into the inky darkness of the Dead Wood.

I looked around trying to figure out our surroundings with just both mine and Leon's breathe was the only sounds that we could hear, no birds or dare I say it no bugs either which is understandable because it is the Dead Wood but was it always this silent? When we thought there was absolutely no end at all to this thick, blackened, inky darkness there was finally some kind of light straight ahead. We looked at each other and ran to the light.

The light started to get bigger and closer  until it turned into a big medium sized pentagram in the middle of the field that was surrounded by a circle of dead trees and a few ash butterflies and blood moths flying around.

While we were looking around tilted my head and moved my eyes a little and then a female voice echoed all around us. "The famous Prince Leon Skyhawk gracing us with his presence and..." The voice laughed. "And he brought with him a Fate Elf. How amusing."

"Well you know who I am but who the hell are you? Why not come out and show yourself." Leon stood in front of me and pulled his sword out of the protection of its skabert holding it in one hand on his side.

A black cloaked figured came out of the boarder of the dead trees with the hood up over her face with only showing her pale chin and dark red lips, and black curls flowing down her shoulders.

"So you must be the Witches of the Dead Wood's Leader, Lotus Black." I spoke up while walking around Leon.

Lotus smiled wickedly, and the rest of the Cult comes out of the shadows wearing the same hooded dark cloak.Within the group of Witches there was on Witch that was blindfolded and a little shorter then the rest, she had a lighter aura to her that seemed a little strange considering the cult in front of us. I was taking in her features this blinded Witch is an Elf, then out of nowhere the woman turned her head towards me which made me hold my breath for a second and blinked my eyes.

It feels like an hour has past since the Witch held onto my gaze until I heard a groan next me so I pulled my eyes away from the blind Elf to the collapsed Prince. My eyes went as wide as they could go. "LEON?!" I fell to my knees next the Prince then something fly out of his cloak, it was an Ash Butterfly.

I pulled the gop of his cloak some and saw a grayish bruise growing around two tiny holes right below his collar bone. "Leon, oh shit you've been poisoned by a Ash Butterfly."

Lotus and the rest of her cult burst out laughing because they know the effects that you can get from a bite of a Ash Butterfly; first a grayish bruise starts appearing with searing fire like pain, then you'll get hallucinations, then your blood starts to slowly burn to ash and last you die.

"Why not just kill him now, I can do it for you." Lotus grinned, while I growled and pulled Leon up into my arms.

The blinded Elf heard and felt the fear and anger in my voice, the ground because my body was shaking uncontrollably. Before Lotus shot the ball of dark energy at us but namely at Leon the blinded Elf quickly stepped in front of us holding out her hands making a magical shield in front of us deflecting the dark energy ball.

"Get out of here, get the Prince to to safely. I'll be right behind you." The blinded Elf called out. "Oh by the way I am Kazi, Kazi Longzing."

I nodded my head. "Thank you Kazi." I picked Leon up in my arms bridal style jumping up into the branches of the trees with Kazi right behind.

[Hey guys I know I just put a major cliffhanger right at the end. Oh well, you just have to be patient.]