Resurrection {NaNoWriMo}

Chapter 12

The world pulsed around him as he struggled to come back into focus. Hazy voices swarmed around him, most hushed and frantic, quickly tumbling out of the people that surrounded him.

"She is a monster."

"She will punish us. That is what she is here to do. They sent her."

"Kill it. Kill it now!"

The voices muddled together, and he swam in the black. Outside, he could feel the warmth enveloping his skin. His heart raced, it pounded in his chest, threatening to break through the chasm of his ribs. It thudded harder and harder, drowning him in the hammering, until it all disappeared.

Gasping, he lurched awake, back curling over as his chest heaved and his body trembled. The bond was eerily silent. Panic shot through him, thick and hot. Where was she? What had they done to her?

He casted the covers from his body, scrambling to his feet, and allowing his eyes to dart throughout the room, noting that it wasn't their quarters, or even the elder's building. It was his room, his dwelling. He frowned and paused. Had it all been a dream?

He paced in circles, eyes shooting through the room. It had the same patterns etched across the walls, and his blade gleamed beneath his bed, the light capturing it at just the right angle. He crouched down and picked it up, wincing as the blade sliced his skin in his carelessness. He wiped his hand on his pants and examined the runes carved into its hilt. It was his knife, of course, but how he had managed to end up back at his house, his items suspiciously still in place, baffled him.

Always the opportunity seeker, he gripped the blade with one hand and gripped a fistful of long hair at the nape of his neck with the other. He jerked his wrist across, felt the hair fall down his spine and to the ground. Repeating the process, he grasped at random bits of long locks, slicing them as he went. Satisfied when it no longer ran down to his neck and ears, felt approximately even, he tucked the blade into the waist of his leather pants and crept out of the room, knowing that if his had hair still been that long, that what had happened the past few weeks had to have still happened.

He maneuvered through the halls with the skill and stealth of a predator, his lethal beauty dragging him into the dark of night. He crept through to his door, ears tuned to every shift in the environment, one hand resting on the hilt of his blade at all times. He paused for a moment, listening and anticipating, before he pulled open the door.

His eyes scoured Community. He saw no people hustling about, but he heard the pitch of whispered voices in the distance. He slinked through the streets, through the narrow alleys he had memorized upon its construction. He remained in the shadows, concealed by the gloom, and comforted by its secrets.

Coming upon the meeting hall, he was struck with a sense of déjà vu as he remembered when he had first been instructed to carry her into the building, and everyone had flocked to see her. They had been set on determining her fate, several willing to kill her, and because of him that had been forbidden. It still was, unless they had come to the executive decision that his life was to be sacrificed for the sake of Community. But he would have to consent to the death. If it came down to it, it would be his choice. Just how far was he willing to go for Community?

Shaking his head in order to concentrate, he skulked nearer. The doors were cracked open, welcome to anyone who sought entrance. He could hear the voice of Raygen swelling above the others. Shouts and cries of furry and terror echoed throughout the building, forming one large incoherently jumbled mess. Unable to discern the voices, he stalked inside, sliding behind the outer rows of the assembled crowd. He used them as a buffer between him and the force he was about to encounter, shielding his magyk and presence from being sensed as they grew over woven with his own.