Y'all need to stop letting me update shit mid-depressive episode, shit gets weird and the plot disappears.
I couldn't breathe, my legs were in agony, and my feet bleeding. Averin only paused if I had collapsed, yet not letting me rest for more than an hour. It had been nearly two days since we had started and I couldn't even feel my feet anymore. My vision blurry and body heavy, each breath worse than the last as my brain spun.
"Oh gods, don't pass out again," A voice buzzed in my ear, the words hardly getting past my racing heart. "Lilith we're almost there, don't pass out," The voice tried again, only, I was swaying, black spots invading my blurry vision. "Oh come on-" Darkness greeted me as my legs buckled under me once again.
Groaning I rolled in the thick and rough bed, chilled air brushing against my body, as a light flickered not far from me. Blinking I found I was not on a bed, no, I was laying in the dirt. Correction, the dirt was clinging to my cold sticky skin as I lay on a bed of rocks. Struggling to get my shaking arms beneath me I tried to sit up, the shadow next to the fire moving just in time to catch me as my arms failed me.
"You know, there is a limit to how stubborn a person can be," Averin's soft voice said with an indifferent hum. Groaning as he grabbed both my arms and forced me to sit up he left me to lean on him as he went back to staring at the fire.
"... Thanks," I grumbled hardly above a whisper. He didn't say anything, only glancing at me, before offering one of the skewered birds he had roasting around the small but lively flame. Raising a trembling arm we both let out a sigh as it fell not even halfway to the goal.
"I'm not hand-feeding you," he shot, taking a bite out of the bird that would have been mine.
"I didn't ask you to," I shot back, watching as he took a second bite. It took him one more bite before he let out an even louder sigh, his head dropping as his hands hovered in his lap hardly keeping it from the ground.
"For the dragon," He grunted raising it close to my face. Blinking I looked from it to him before looking back to it. "Don't push it," He narrowed his eyes as I quickly took a bite, my head on his shoulder as he supported me.
"What's the dragon got to do with this?" I asked licking my lips before taking a second bite. Silence drew between us for a long moment as I chewed, watching as the firelight flickered against his face, his crimson gaze watching the dancing flames with a frown on his lips.
"... I would have had to be the backup," He hummed before looking to the stars, "I would have been Yastum's backup and even with both of us, protecting the monarchs, mitigating the damages, and distracting the dragon wouldn't have been possible. Let alone killing it," That burning gaze of his turned to look back at me while I paused in taking another bite. The words handing around the statement. Thank you.
"Averin-" cutting myself off I looked back to the bird I was eating. It was a dragon, a true dragon no less, but even with the injuries, even with the damages, it was not a creature difficult to kill. Perhaps it was because I was lucky, maybe I had done everything right from beginning to end, yet... "The dragon wasn't in its right state of mind," I said honestly, the hum of a mana I hadn't known but could practically smell the moment I walked into that hall, a holy beast desperately trying to tell me something, and a dragon far too focused on the hall itself.
"What-" He started, removing my meal from my reach as I shot a soft glare, "the fuck is that supposed to mean?"
"What I said, I had told Yastum the moment we walked in that something was wrong but without a reason, we couldn't evacuate everyone. Something... Someone called a dragon to the ball," I held his racing gaze as he ran over my face looking for some kind of lie- some kind of explanation.
"Lilith that is not something that can just be said there is only one being that can-"
"It wasn't Vixen," I cut him off looking away from him to his fire, "It smelled sweet, Vixen has more of a comforting forest smell," I shook my head, the smell of her mana just like that of a forest floor just after a heavy downpour. "It was sweet, sickly so," I mumbled, the tingle of my nose at the distinct and near vile smell lingered. Yet, I could only think of smelling it again.
"Smell? Lilith, can you smell mana?" My gaze met his once more as I opened my mouth before closing it with a tight frown. No. I wanted to say no, yet the more I thought about it the more I noticed it, the smokey smell of his mana as it danced around us, the thin veil of the trees' soft and subtle mana. Things I hadn't noticed before, things I wouldn't have thought twice about.
"... Do you want to see something interesting Averin?" I asked peeking at him through my lashes as his brow twitched.
"You can't just dodge the fucking-" Heat rushed from my body into the one supporting me as his eyes widened but before he could so much as throw me away a thick and dark magic found his head, swallowing his face with ease as I grumbled upon finding the ground again. He struggled against it as it warped and rippled, looking to settle but being rejected. Unfortunately for him, he was a fire mage, I didn't need to worry about burning him.
After struggling for a bit, he settled down enough to carefully wave his hands out in front of him, making a face as he quite literally touch it, his hand recoiled as I continued to watch from the ground. The more hesitate hand found my face again, grinning I raised my shaking arm against, gently tapping at the front of the obsidian that rippled upon my attention. Falling right off him.
"What-?" He grabbed his face as I hummed, watching as Latro swarmed from the ground, hardly formed and easily clinging to me. His confused face dropped into a still disbelieving one. "That was mana, you showed me what mana looked like," He stated, scrambling away as I raised my hand, watching it shake against the sky as Latro crawled up it, wrapping around my trembling arm and forcing it to keep still.
"Weird isn't it? How strange it is to see, to smell, to feel, mana. Well, you've only seen it, I guess you wouldn't quite understand," I hummed the burning heat of melted obsidian racing to cover my body as I closed my eyes. Opening them again I had nothing but a deep darkness staring back, soft and gentle hues and a distinct glow invading the abyss. A tempting and comforting abyss-
Gasping, it melted away. With heavy breaths, I quickly covered my eyes with a laugh. "Do you think I'm a monster, Averin?"
"... Do you want me to?"
YOU ARE READING
Glass Soldier REWRITTEN
FantasyGlass magic, the weakest of magic, the most fragile, the least effective... Or, it should be but what about a glass soldier that doesn't break? A glass dragon that could easily be considered a real one? She's tired of being looked down on ju...