In Dreams I Lie

Chapter Thirteen: As a Pinprick

With wings, many people would have sought a high place to hide from their tears. Not I. The soil at the shores of the lake is dam under my fingers and bare feet. There is no light in here, other than the faint glow from a bioluminescent moss that cover a tiny fraction of the rocks that spring from the depths. This deep underground, no one will find me.

I stare at the depths of waters. In the south, we didn't have caves like this. The best thing I could do is the storm cellar. Here, who knows what unknown lies beneath the surface. Great fish with teeth the size of my arm, slimy reptiles waiting for their prey to break the surface and jump into their waiting maws? Who knows? Not I. My hand reaches down to stir the water. Nothing bites into my hand, even though it's glow floods the water. Lengthy black leaches squirm and twist their way away from me. The tattoos along my wrist mimic them, becoming the vermin themselves.

I wade further into the lake, letting my wings fan out around my back. No longer can I touch the bottom. My skirts, though they did not cover much to begin with, swirl around me like my wings. How long did I wish for wings to be able to fly alongside the zeppelins? Too many minutes to count. But now? They feel like tumors. If I had a knife, I would cut them from my back and cast them into a fire and burn them with the memory of Sansori. Koen, dead? I sink a few inches lower. God, how did he die? If was killed searching for me, I will never forgive myself.

"Well, well, well. Someone in my pool, and just in time for dinner!"

My eyes burst open, and I surface, coughing water. On the bank hunches a girl. I cannot tell her age, only that she is too emaciated to be living. And yet, like me, she is. Unlike any other human I've seen, she prowls on all fours. Slowly she tilts her head in my direction, letting her tongue hiss between her teeth. I stay where I am, treading water. Magic moves beneath my skin, ready if I need to use it.

She grins at me, revealing pointed and rotten teeth. "Now now, come out of the water so that I can kill you more quickly."

I laugh, a bitter broken sound. "Don't try. It will only end badly for you. I've lifted myself from the land of the dead once. I don't think would be that hard form me to do it again." My wings flap behind me as I conjure the sword once more. Only this time, it is joined by a second in my left, this blade glowing with cold light.

"Ah! I was wondering when Sansori would tire of you, little sister." The girl on the bank cackles. "Happened later than I expected!"

I freeze. "I am not your little sister! You may not use her name!"

"Ha!" She snorts. "I can lay claim to myself, Arcadiel. You were always such a sweet little girl. Didn't you ever wonder how I could have fallen from such great heights?" She snatched a leach out of the water and put down on it, spilling black blood across the floor.

"No." I screech. "No more lies!"

The girl just laughs and peals another flap of skin from her rotting face. "Look at my eyes then." She lifts her head towards me, and I stagger back. Instead of the eyeless pits I expected, golden eyes rimmed with blue stars stare back at me. They are the kind impossible to imitate with magic. I know this because many had tried when she sat on the throne.

"Cadren..." I almost lose my balance in the air. "How are you here?" Looking at the girl on the bank, I can see the remnants of my eldest sister. Shock flies through me. I have not seen her since I was little, only seven. I was the one to cradle her body when I first found her at the base of the tower.

She snarls through closed teeth. "Sansori always liked you better; I told you that. My magic doesn't work like yours. You could pull yourself easily from the land of the ghosts. Me? I had to crawl my way up from the depths of hell one burning hand at a time." The film beneath her eyes cracks slightly, and madness shows through the gaps. Cadren beckons. "Come back to shore, little sister. I have rules against eating family. Unless it's Sansori. Then I will gladly tear apart her flesh."

In a daze, a glide to the banks. My feet settle in the wet sand again. My sister reaches for my face. Her nails are long, more like thick grey talons. Gently, She caresses my cheek. "How you've grown, little Arc."

"Did she kill you?" The words burst out of my mouth before I can stop them.

"You think I jumped off that tower myself?" Cadren asks. "That's what everybody said isn't it?"

No. That's what Sansori said. Sansori, the only one to witness our elder siblings fall, said that she tried to stop the other girl from jumping. Said that she reached out her arms to catch her but Cadren was just a second to fast. She said that Cadren had been overcome with the weight of her magic.

Rage floods me once more. Magic pools to my hands, but this time, I let it. I hurl the amassed ball of  light and dark energies to one of the stalactites. It explodes in a shower of dust and shards.

Cadren claps her hands like a child, eyes lit with insanity. "Oh, what toys you have little sister! But don't bring down my cavern!" She squeals. "No wonder she tired of you in the end! It looks like you might finally be the one to challenge her!"

Shaking with the red hot fires of anger, I lower my hand.  "I'm going to kill." The vow rings through the cavern. "I'm going to make her blood run over the stones of our home."

Cadren applauds again. "Very good! Very good, Arcadiel!"