The Brink of Creation

Chapter 14 - The Day of Sacrifice

"Hey, you! Stop!"

The Destroyer followed the hooded figure down the skybridge. Its ankles jostled like keys as it shuffled down the glassy hall. The back of its scarlet-trimmed cloak stretched just slightly over the charred guide's height.

The skyway led into the neighboring spire. It opened into a cylindrical room bordered by sandy-red columns. The whole room was empty, aside from a poured moonstone design in the flooring which was inlaid with silver shield jewels. The figure the Destroyer had been following slowed to a standstill in the center of the sigil.

"I didn't want to believe it was you. All this time you've been alive, and ya couldn't just lemme know?"

The hooded figure turned and lifted his hood from his face. His face etched into solidity, his expression was stoic and unamusing. "Caius. My fated brother. Such that those same fates should bring you back to me. The times are unseeming, and yet alive with mystery. Should you stand the test?"

The Destroyer's footsteps drew to a close. His eyes searched his long-lost brother. His wrists and ankles were bound with jewelry of hanging moonstone trinkets. They draped his hands and feet, clacking against each other as the hooded figure conjured a long pole with a crescent moon at its peak – a magnificent moonstaff.

"Cyrus, how are you still alive? Justice burnt us long ago. Our entire family is gone. How are you still alive? Are you cursed as well?"

The spire shook as Cyrus brought the butt of his staff to the floor. The sigils beneath them began to click and rotate like the stirring mechanisms of a pocket-watch. "Brother, too long has time been unkind to us. It beckons for our intervention. Observe the stars, and how they convene."

The Destroyer lifted his gaze to the ceiling of the spire. Starlight, like the stars of the days time forgot, sparkled from the edges of the sandy columns and into the very air. They rotated with the sigil and merged into grand moonlight, a mystical comet of Cyrus' conjuration. The Destroyer stumbled as the edge of two rotating circles caught each other and he was witlessly pulled into a different direction.

"I am blessed, Caius, as are you. You were never cursed by the Eye. Allow me to show you the truth of what happened on that momentous Day."

The comet plummeted to the floor around The Destroyer. It sparked with unimaginable light, and had it not been for his magmatic form, would have scorched him into a sizzling corpse. Cyrus faded from his sight as the spire opened into a teeming jungle, and laid into a humble city, the heart of the Northern Isles – his beloved home in The World of Life.

"Caius!"

The Destroyer watched from within himself. He was but a boy, just seven years old. He bore a simple goathide tunic with a firegull feather belt. He turned his eyes to the pyramid before them. Square and flat-sided, its apex hollowed into a cylinder of magnificence. A boy was running towards him, dressed in a similar tunic, but with an icegull feather belt.

"Caius, can't you hear me? Today's the day! We've gotta meet Father up at the Pyramid! Let's go!"

"Boys! Don't forget your headdresses! Your father will be furious!" Their mother called out from their abode. It stood level with those of the citizens – royalty in their city had no ground above another. All were equal in the eyes of Justice.

"Yes, mama," the boys called out in unison. Hey'zabeygou looked upon her sons lovingly as they dashed excitedly to their rooms. The house smelled like fresh tomatoes and gleaned wheatberries – she was baking her famed "red bread".

Cyrus stepped out from his green brick-lined room first. His headdress was crafted of soft white opal, and it draped around him like hair that handsomely frames the face. It was banded with a single strip of pure sapphire, wide enough to firmly seat the brow but narrowly hammered for comfort.