Tales of the Five Nations 1-Scarblade

Chapter 9-No Ties

"No! I am not Spirit-Tying with anyone!" Alban didn't know what made her so against Spirit-Tying with someone, but the thought of her doing it with anyone just broke something in her mind.

"Alban, we're just trying to help—"

"NO!"

"What's wrong with it?" Damon questioned, only trying to help, just like he had said. Alban stood up so quickly that she smacked Feris in the chin, but didn't apologize.

"'WHAT'S WRONG WITH IT?' WHAT'S WRONG WITH IT IS THAT MY MOM AND DAD DID THAT AND LOOK AT WHAT HAPPENED TO THEM!"

"Alban, that's not why they died, and you know that. We're trying to help you because we love you."

"DON'T YOU DARE TELL ME THAT!"

"That we love you? It's the truth. Would you rather have us lie about it?"

"Yes."

Damon sighed, and his shoulders slumped. "Why would you want us not to love you?"

"Because you aren't my dad, Damon! And you aren't my mother, Eliada! The last people who loved me were my parents, and they're dead now! You hear me? THEY'RE DEAD! And I don't want to love anyone like that again! Not after what happened to them!"

Tears were dripping onto the floor from her face as Feris walked in front of her, and he was crying nearly as hard as she was.

"Alban, I miss your parents, too!" His face was a faded red color, and seemed to feel exactly what Alban was feeling right at that moment. "I know how you feel about it and I don't want you to feel like this! I saw them die, too!"

The words hit Alban like a rock. "You did," she choked.

"Yeah, I did. I knew your parents, too. We all did. And we miss them."

"We do," Eliada said. She was holding on to Damon's hand as if it were his life she was hanging on to. Alban narrowed her eyes at their hands as a memory of her parents stepped into her mind.

They were holding onto each other's hands, and a little five-year old Alban was standing at the cracked, but not closed, door. She was spying on her parents as a game. They were talking to each other, and this is what Alban could hear, their calm, but worriedly sweet voices:

"Fadil, you really think that we should've done that? She'll get a headache every time she uses her Powers. What if it finally becomes too much for her to handle?"

"She'll be able to do it, Morana, and we'll help her through it, if we can," Fadil, Alban's dad, assured—he was trying to comfort Morana, her mother.

"Are you sure?"

Alban snapped out of the memory. Why hadn't she seen that before? Her parents were talking about her father giving her his Powers!

She put her hand to her mouth. "Alban, what did you just remember?"

"Nothing," she lied. Why would Feris need to know?

"Why are you lying to me?!"

"I need to go take a walk."

"Please, do whatever you need to calm down, Alban," Damon said.

Alban walked out of the front door, and Feris got down onto his knees and covered his face with his hands.

"Why did you suggest Spirit-Tying?"

"Because the Darkness is going to take over her soon, and if she doesn't bond with a Light spirit, we don't know what's going to happen," Teagan explained. But he didn't look like he liked the idea much, either.

Eliada started making suggestions. "Maybe she could Tie with Sasithorn—no, that would not go well." She looked around the room, seeing if there were any other good options. "Savitri, maybe?"

"Maybe she could Tie Spirits with you, Eliada." Damon put his hand on his wife's shoulder.

"Okay, I know what Spirit-Tying is, but not as good as all of you do. Somebody explain." Feris felt confused—not just about the subject, but why Alban seemed so distressed over it.

"Spirit-Tying is serious business," Teagan said, staring at the other members of the Zan with a half-angry half-worried look. "When you Spirit-Tie with someone, it means that you trade half of your spirit with your Tie, or the person you've shared with. Then you can sometimes talk to them telepathically, or share Powers, but you always share emotions, like pain, or sadness. If one Tie is deeply affected by something, physically or mentally, the other Tie can feel the same thing. Usually, Ties actually love each other"—he corrected himself when Feris gave him a deadly glare—"not always like a husband and wife would. They see their Tie as a part of themselves. And most Ties start picking up traits of their Tie."

"What happens if one of the Ties dies?!" He was alarmed by his own question.

Teagan looked away, and said quietly, "Then their Tie dies with them."