Forgotten by the Realms

Chapter 10: Creatures of the Dark

Screaming.
Bloodcurdling screaming.
Sasi clenched their hands over their ears in pain as the woman convulsed and bent her body in an unnatural way her eyes going blank and changing slowly to teal. Sasi's brain told them to run but their feet remained glued to the floor, their eyes unmoving from the transformation happening in front of them.
Spikes as dark as a moonless night, forced their way through the woman's back and they seemed to gleam with blood in the low light. The spikes continued to multiply, and spread to any and all surfaces they could reach, cracking bones and snapping tendons. They elongated into elegant and deadly limbs, no longer recognizable as the poor person they once were. As the creatures head raised up Sasi stared unmoving into its single large teal eye.
"You're a Krill.."
The glowing eye pulsated a second staring at them, before it shifted to a bright scarlet red. Finally Sasi's feet became unglued from the floor, as they dove sideways behind the desk to avoid the long deadly claws reaching towards them. They quickly scrambled off the floor and dashed across the room towards the door as a loud piercing screech followed in hot pursuit.
Sasi slammed the door shut seconds before a loud thump wracked the surface cracking the wood. They scrambled faster and faster down the hallway aimlessly as their heart beat out of their chest. Sasi skidded to a stop in the cafeteria, the foreboding silence pressing again. They climbed underneath a table, suspending themselves carefully in the body of the table so they were practically invisible, as the long harrowing body of the Krill silently slid into the room. They held their breath, slowly losing control of their senses as the seconds dragged on. Several more reptilian figures slid menacingly into the room, following the original. Sasi held back a gasp of panic as they floated around the room searching.
Finally they paused forming a circle, while dark black smoke flowed away in heavy streams from their bodies, forming humans.
"How could you lose the target.... The dark one will make you pay dearly for this...." The tall cloaked form of a man appeared the closest to Sasi's hiding spot, as he addressed another cloaked figure who stood beside the woman who had been behind the desk. She looked different than she had, her eyes completely black and emotionless, as if she forgot everything that had previously happened.
Sasi froze as they heard the transformed Krill's quiet whispery voices arguing about where they could be. They slowly climbed down towards the floor as the Dark Ones servants backs were turned away. Sasi softy crawled across the floor, ducking behind the tables and towards the door.
"This is our one job, let's not disappoint them... The child must be in here somewhere... search!"
The tall cloaked man pointed at the remaining figures as they wordlessly nodded and spread out across the room. Sasi was going to get caught. Like a fish swimming circles in an increasingly smaller pool.
They crawled quicker, breaths coming in shorter frantic gasps as they reached out for the door.
A cold scaly hand rested heavily on their shoulder as they touched the doorknob.
"Here you are... Aryonwyn..."
Sasi wanted to scream but nothing came out. They simply went limp as the cloaked figure dragged them by their long white hair, towards the center of the room followed by sounds of malicious glee from the others. Sasi fought desperately to keep conscious, their mind threatening to shut down.
The tall man smiled a toothy grin as the figure threw them down onto the floor in the center.
"Sasithorn Aryonwyn..... did you think you could hide forever?"
The man leaned over Sasi's shaking form intimidatingly as they scrambled to their feet.
"Get out of my face. Leave me alone." They said pushing him away, before receiving a stinging smack across their cheek. Sasi fell hard back onto the ground, feeling their cheek swell and tasting blood.
"As you can see... you aren't going anywhere... so if you even think about running again it will be worse than a smack."
Sasi felt their breath hitch as one of the figures began transforming back into a krill again, their long serpentine body wrapping slowly around the room to surround the figures.
"What do you want... where are my siblings..."
They asked slowly, being careful not to upset the tall figure.
"The dark one has sent us to bring you back to Eden dead or alive... but we were hoping you knew where your dear remaining family is... we have been trying so desperately to find them."
Sasi shuddered as the remaining figures faded into the mist, transforming into the long dark forms of Krill, as the tall man paced the confines of the circle.
"I... I don't know where they are. But what do you mean remaining... how do you know about my parents!" They yelled, standing up suddenly. The tall figure hissed in disapproval as he shoved them back down onto the cold floor.
"Don't raise your voice at your elders... it shows disrespect. And of course I know about your parents... I'm the one that ended them."
Sasi's mind went blank.
It felt as though someone had crushed them with a rock, the feeling that their ribs were cracking under the pain of his words.
Their parents were killed in a Krill attack. And the murderer was right in front of them.
How Sasi longed to leap up and strangle the man till he gasped out his last wretched breath, but that was next to impossible. They were going to meet the same fate as their parents.
Hopefully Odë and Báye were safe.
Sasi looked desperately at a gap in the circling Krill that lead straight to the door, as the man drew out a long dark sword. The blade as deadly black as the spikes on a Krill.
"Look's like you will die just like them... painfully... slowly... alone..... Wouldn't they be proud to see you now..."
In a last frantic stand of defiance, Sasi kicked out hard at the man's knee, causing him to tumble onto the floor. They leaped up and practically flew through the gap towards the door, followed by the enraged creatures in hot pursuit.
Sasi hit the door with the full force of their escape, knocking it open and swerving down the passageway. They sped past the abandoned woodcarving class as they ducked to avoid chunks of rocks getting hurled in front of them.
Huge sections of walls tumbled down as large boulders careened past their head and into the soft stone.
The open window came into sight as Sasi fell into the classroom. They jumped up quickly and dashed forwards a few steps before a sharp pain in their side stopped them in their tracks.
Sasi looked down to see the black sword lodged in their ribs, stuck in by several inches and already moist with blood.
Their blood.
Sasi collapsed heavily onto their knees grappling at the hilt of the blade as hysteria set in. Their breathing came in short gasps punctuated by the searing pain. It burned like fire, it stung like ice, it quickly delivered death in a few short seconds. Sasi's vision swam as they watched the blurry figure of the tall man stalking closer.
He stood triumphantly over them for a second before reaching down and torturously pulling out the blade. Sasi screamed in pain as the now uninhabited stream of blood came gushing out.
They collapsed in a heap on the cold tiles as darkness threatened to snuff them out.
The corners of their vision became blurrier and blurrier as they slowly slipped into unconsciousness.
Before they passed out a brief bright flicker of light punctured the dark. Large torches of flames leaped high as grey cloaked figures streamed into the room. The tall man hissed in displeasure as he backed away from the waving flames and eventually retreated out the window. The remaining Krill's flying haphazardly away from the piercing light.
Sasi relaxed as the light grew closer and frantic voices reached their ears. They opened their eyes briefly to a group of anxious looking people huddled around them and muttering to themselves. A loud direct voice carried over the rest.
"Give them some air! Clear the way... let me through!"
Sasi couldn't help but smile as Odë's face appeared out of the crowd.
"H...Hi.. Od... ë..." Sasi said before they coughed up a heap of blood onto her cloak.
"Back up Odëthella, let me take care of this..."
A calm voice pushed away Odë's terrified protests as Sasi focused on a blurry figure leaning over them.
They had fluffy white hair messily pulled back in a bun to keep it out of the way. Their face had a nasty scratch along their angled cheek bones, getting dangerously close to their piercing white grey eyes.
"Don't worry Sasithorn, my name is Xanothos and I'm going to take care of you..." Xanothos smiled reassuringly at Sasi as they slowly closed their eyes. The panicked voices of their rescuers faded into white noise as they fell into a tortuous fever dream in which they felt they would never wake from again.