The Shadows

When it falls

He woke up in his bed with the sun in his face and a splitting headache threatening to rip apart his skull from the inside out. He placed his hands on the sides of his head, hoping to ease some of the pain.

He received his sought relief and scanned the room for his mother who was probably tending to some customers down the road in her seer's house. He remembered when she first opened it.

His father had left him and his mother alone with another child on the way to serve in the Legion, the most powerful army the world had ever seen, and the most brutal. He claimed that he would not find self worth unless he proved himself in the field against the shadow beings that fought and killed many Legion soldiers ever year.

So Daniel, Acel's father, left for the front lines.

He died within that week.

His mother grieved for many months before she would do anything as far as provide for herself. He had been 15 then and took it upon himself to take care of her. His efforts provided just enough for them both to survive. Not long in coming, she had another child, his sister. Having a newborn gaze at her with wide, wondering eyes seemed to bring her back from the shadows and back into the light.

Soon after the birth of Kiara, his mother got up and was working around the house. Soon after that, she was working small jobs and saving money for a dream not even Acel knew she had. And then, not even a year after Kiara's birth, she had bought a small building that served as her seer's house. He was 17 now, next summer he would be a man and he would choose his path.

That is, unless the Legion got to him first.

The Legion had been conscripting young men and children almost men for a few months to replenish their war efforts against the shadow beings. Acel wanted no part in the war. It had killed his father extremely quickly and he couldn't leave his mother alone like his father had. He knew that she would not be able to handle his loss. And if she did she wouldn't handle it well.

He walked out into the street and began making his way through the thin river of bodies that blocked his path to his mother's second home. A short distance laterhe came upon her front door, where he knocked on a pattern that was somewhat of a game between him and his younger sister.

His mother opened the door and he stepped into a small space that served as the room where Acel's mother retired between clients. Her tricks could get taxing, especially the kind she did now. But that's all they were.

Tricks.

"Hello, Mother," Acel said. She was not an unattractive woman, with long blonde hair and a cocky, almost devious smile almost omnipresent on her face. He hard eyes told you she meant business and the laugh lines on her face said she's have fun doing it. She didn't look her 43 years of age, and instead loomed more 25, a marvel all the older women in town wished to unravel and use for themselves.

"Good morning, Acel. How is your wound?" Not being much of a gossip or a talkative woman, she cut straight to the point and confronted her worries head on with little deviation.

Even at the mention of the burning side gash it flared, communing it's displeasure at being addressed through a slash of it's fiery claws.

He lied and said, "It seems better than it was before."

"M-hm," was all she replied, obviously dissatisfied with his answer. "If the pain returns, I have some medicine remaining from a client from last week."

"Okay," he replied. She had enough worries to be concerned with that he didn't think she needed his pain with everything else she had.

"How soon will you be heading back out into the woods?" she asked after a moment of silence.

"Soon. I need to check on some things here in town before I go."

"Just don't stay out late like you did last night. You can't risk getting caught by the guards so late."

"I know, mother. I will do my best not to be caught so late."

"Very well, please tell Anna I said hello."

Acel blushed at this, for he and Anna had been together for a long time and his blood still ran hot whenever anyone mentioned her. How his mother knew he would be seeing her before he left was a mystery, but he didn't mind much. Maybe she was actually picking up some psycic skills from her craft.

He left with a swift goodbye and made his way toward their usual meeting place.

* * *
He crossed the stream that he knew now by heart. He had traversed it many times over the course of the last couple years, always with the same feeling, always to the same place. Always headed toward where his heart longed to be.

His wound flared briefly, but it would not disturb him from his present course.

He now stood within the center of town, which was a shrine dedicated to Hiva, godess of nature and the hunt. He had been meeting Anna for months under the trees of this holy shrine. The trees and their branches sheltered them both from the eyes of they who would seek to watch their secret meetings.

He saw her now, though cloaked she was in the thick folds of a dull brown robe. He knew it was her from her proud bearing and womanly curves that the robe did little to hide. He saw her approach him and his heart fluttered.

"Hello, Acel," she said.

"Good day, Anna. I've missed you," Acel replied.

"As I have you, m'love."

They went on for about an hour, not talking about anything and nothing in particular, grasping at anything to stay together for another few brief minutes before she had to leave to her business and Acel to his own.

With effort, they kissed and parted ways, both feeling enchanted from the meeting, both planning when next to meet again. He left her feeling light on his feet, as if walking the sky on a ground as solid as the very clouds that dotted the light blue above.

His wound brought him back down to earth with a fiery retort, angry at having been ignored for so long, and jealous of this girl whom he spent his attention on instead.

He gasped, feeling the wound rake it's claws through his side. He could barely stay standing while his side wound flared and pulsed with jagged knives.

Soon, however, the pain faded and he could once more move.

He wondered briefly what kind of sorcery could make such a wound so powerfully painful. In response his wound flared and the world faded away with the smell and taste of blood on his tongue.