Among Shattered Stars, I May Fall: Book 1.

Chapter 13- Cleansing: Part 2.

"A name can say a lot about the keeper, so choose wisely."

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"God of War."

Marco almost flinched at the name. She recognised the voice too, but it wasn't as soft before.
Only now did she notice how her heart was clattering around in her ribcage, and when she looked at who had spoken, it felt like her heart had stopped completely. Diana. It was Diana smiling at her with her brightly painted lips. Her dress was clean and neat, as if she hadn't been stabbed. No. But she had been stabbed. Diana was dead. Marco shook her head but struggled to move anything else.
"You're not real." Marco's throat was raw so her voice came out rough.
There was an awkward pause. Eye contact between the two held strong but was shattered as Diana lifted her chin and laughed to the ceiling. Marco shook at the sound. It sounded unnatural- her laugh. It had formed a ghostly hand which rattled her ribcage and planted tears in her eyes.
Scrunching her face up, Marco shook her head. Diana was dead. This was just a hallucination. The Cleansing had sent her mad rather than save her.
"Sweetie," Diana's clicked against the roof of her mouth as if she were telling her off, then she crouched down, holding her hand out. "I wish for you to dance with me."
This time, Marco flinched. It had only been a few days since Diana had been murdered so that very sentence, which had left a scar in her mind, hadn't been given time to fade yet.
I wish for you to dance with me.
"Darling?" The space around the two began to change. The statues of the Gods melted and rose and molded into the pillars that had towered over the dancers in the Satellite's hall. The cold stone from the floor rose too and twisted into human figures, every single one of them cold grey. All surrounding the two in a large circle, all grinning with their sharp teeth to show, and all wearing grey gowns or suits. Marco suddenly felt ill. I wish for you to dance with me. Come on, God of War. Dance, dance. Dance with me.
But this time the voice wasn't coming from Diana- no. It was echoing all around Marco, as if the grey people were speakers, the words amplifying at every loop.
"Be quiet! Be quiet, please!" Marco choked on her own words, the tears beginning to take over. "Diana, you're dead. You're not alive. I saw-"
"Saw what?" The echoing had paused, so now it was just Diana talking. "What did you see happen?"
Marco wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand, sniffed then gulped. "You...you were stabbed."
"Stabbed?" Diana spun on the heel of her shoe so her left side was facing Marco as she slowly looked up. "Stabbed." Sticking out at a 90 degree angle of Diana's back was the vicious sword. Dried blood crusted the part of the blade which had crushed through her ribcage, and then there was the tip only just poking out the front of her chest and the stench of dried blood suddenly filled Marco's nose. This time she really did throw up.

Diana wrinkled up her nose a little, but the grey people grinned all the same. "Stabbed."

XXX

"Harmony, please take your place on the edge of the pool." Mona had her head lowered the whole time Marco had been in the Cleansing. She felt like a crappy friend for not doing anything to comfort her.
"But Marco isn't back yet-"

"Marcoletta will be fine. I have someone who will guide her back." She furrowed her eyebrows. Mona knew the process of the Cleansing and it never involved having to be brought back by someone else. One always had to find their own path.
Before she could ask anymore questions, Mother Cygnus quickly added: "It seems that she has gone a little farther than expected."

XXX

"You were too lazy. Much Sloth." Diana managed to maintain a perfect posture even with the sword. The skirts of her gown sweeped across the misty floor: the grave of the stone which had molded the people, but she was careful not to let her dress get anywhere near the vomit. The stench in the hall was intoxicating.
"How..."
"Hm?"
She didn't look at the woman- her presence already too much. "How...was I lazy? I granted your wish and I weren't to know that...you would be-"