 It was their fault. Not one of them had been willing to take her advice or let her help. ‘Go join the king’s guards’ they’d said. She wasn’t welcome. And now they’d gone ahead and leveled the playing field. Styx had been angry at first. She was still angry, but she was no longer as livid as she had been when the creature first broke through the dome as she’d known would happen. She had tried to tell them and now her magic was gone. She was practically a human with a talking owl for a pet. But then, the illustrious Tsi and all the original fairies were practically humans too. Powerless. And she felt old.
She was old.
Styx had been avoiding mirrors and still water and other reflective surfaces since the break, not just because the lack of vision within the surface reminded her that she was basically helpless now, having poured all her energy over the millennia into magic rather than physical prowess as some of her kind had, but also because she didn’t want to see the withering features and decay she was certain would await her in her reflection without the immortality and eternal youth magic had granted her. Her hands had wrinkled and she felt her joints stiffening faster than they would have in normal aging. Her body was attempting to catch up to her age. It needed to end before she, and the originals aged into dust.
And so she left the dark hole she’d grumpily crawled into when her magic had dissipated. Her normally pale complexion was even more ghostlike than it normally was, and she walked slowly and painfully as Noctis flew beside her. Styx kept the air of mystery about her as best she could, keeping her cloak about her and the hood hiding the rather distinguishing mark on her forehead that the magic of her ren had left long years before. Even if the fools of Shaman didn’t know her well, she liked to think they all did. In this condition, Styx would have preferred to die than to let anyone know how far she’d decayed.
Walking among the trees of the olive grove, wincing with each pit she failed to avoid stepping on, the immortal one came across a young man with black hair and skin that she couldn’t quite place. It seemed to shimmer between the natural tones, at times alabaster, but with a blink it would darken and leave the oracle wondering if she’d imagined the previous tone. Slowly, and with great difficulty, Styx sat by a small lake that had been created after a week of rain just outside the commune borders, and watched the man. It seemed, he too was watching her.
Not thirty seconds after she found comfort on a patch of grass (luckily devoid of olive pits), he was making his way to her, striding with a purpose the the woman could only have guessed at. Noctis, who had landed beside her, ruffled his feathers.
“I don’t like him, Styx. He’s not… he’s not right,” the owl muttered. Styx paid him little mind, but kept the observation in the back of her mind. Noctis had never really lost the distaste for others that most familiars felt when their fairies were of little consequence. The man continued, and Styx kept her fairly well-concealed gaze on him until he stood over her. She kept her calm façade, but as the oracle looked at him, looked into his eyes, she felt like her life was draining away. They were as dark and deep as a hole, and seemed to continue beyond the back of the socket – past even his head - into an abyss. Styx’s own pale blue eyes widened as she stared into oblivion, and her mouth parted as the man spoke.
“What is the plan to defeat the monster, Oracle? Is that the reason for the gathering at the oasis? Do they think they can win?” the man asked, though his voice seemed quite unhuman, echoing through Styx’s mind. He knew her?
She had no answers. After offering help and being rejected, she’d shut out the cares and worries of the originals and ordinary fairies of Shaman. She didn’t much care what happened to most of them. She didn’t need to be told by someone with no power beyond her own that she was of no use now either. What the king and council were planning, what they were doing gathering anywhere was beyond her knowledge. But as she continued to stare into him, she realized who, what this man was.
Noctis bit the back of Styx’s hand, and the pain yanked her free from the depths as her own closed and broke contact.
“I don’t know. I cannot see them, as you stole my sight.” She sighed before admitting anything further. “Your presence on Shaman blinded me.” S T Y X
if you close your eyes |
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