Page 33

A time unknown, but in the presence of an unwanted guest

Staring up at the blue sky, the yellow sun, and the white fluffy clouds that passed over and offered shade, Weldir floated above the rocky edge of a deathly fall. Well, not deathly for him, who could not die – nor truly live.

His physical form coalesced, and he perceived the pressure of the oily texture moving. He even saw it when he looked down at his upturned palms. Yet, his mate did not see it, even though he stood barely a metre from her.

Then again, here on Earth, she never did.

Weldir only ever had the capabilities to visit her here, in this world, if she joined him in his mist that bordered the Veil.

She didn’t do so often. Perhaps once a year, visiting to give him the souls she collected, which he harvested from her person as soon as she entered the cloud of his mana.

Then she would leave without offering a word, unaware that Weldir would meet her on the fringes every time – waking from his frequent slumbers to greet her.

It had become a ritual of his over the years.

Lindiwe, his mate in name and spirit, but no longer in body, never saw him, as he refused to use the power of a soul to truly be here.

She never heard him, as he never spoke. Not once had she ever sensed he was just out of reach, just out of sight, but he hoped one day she may squint through the boundaries that separated them, the very veils that masked him to her, and reach out.

Like he’d done moments ago, Lindiwe lifted her face towards the sky and let its warmth shower over her.

Although she didn’t look a day older than when he’d acquired her soul and trapped her within his realm, she looked.

.. hardened, more mature. The hint of shyness, of innocence she’d often worn, had dissipated over the years.

Her eyes were sharpening with each year, growing more insightful.

Her hearing had improved significantly, as if she’d been training her ears, so even the smallest twig snapping in the distance had her head jerking that way.

A gloomy downturn had become present in her pretty lips.

Weldir peeked down at her worn boots, noticing that the soles of them had begun to tear. How long had she had this pair? He couldn’t quite remember, but they were old enough to appear so frayed.

Even her black leather breeches were worn, the inner thighs of them lighter in colour from rubbing.

Her tunic was an off-white and no longer crisp in colour.

The cloak around her shoulders was black and light – designed only to shield one from the wind and hot sun, but not enough to provide true warmth.

Or, rather, he assumed this from the many human memories he’d sifted through.

Lindiwe stood at the border of the Veil, and the mesmerising deep pools of her brown eyes narrowed at the vast canyon before her. With the sun on them, the flecks of amber were bright, making them appear much lighter than usual.

He inspected them up close, coming right to her before floating around her body to settle behind her. Then she tsked and turned in such a way that the flap of her cloak waved around her and lifted.

His mist reacted to her, spreading out when she passed right through his intangible, incomprehensible form. He would have sighed, but he didn’t want to alert her to his presence.

It irks me when that happens.

He didn’t like being passed through as if he didn’t exist.

She has brought me more souls, he noted, disregarding his ire to hover in a circle and watch her leave. Not once did she spare him or the Veil another glance as she entered the forest and disappeared from sight.

Weldir could have followed her a short distance, leaving his mist for a little while, but today he decided against it.

Instead, he faced the Veil and wondered what had annoyed her so.

Can she tell that the Veil has grown much since she was last here? Just as he thought this, a large chunk of rock broke off and fell towards the ground.

He leaned over the edge to watch as it narrowly missed the trunk of a fallen tree that was already being eaten up by the flora below.

The Veil’s forest was growing just as rapidly as its sunken home, the area constantly heavy and thick with green-and-yellow magic that twinkled just on the fringe of his sight.

As he often did, Weldir searched for those who were responsible for such growth and change. One being in particular was to blame, his companions assisting by lending him power through a unity of mana.

Jabeziryth’s power is becoming formidable for such a young man. The male was barely nineteen and already he wielded much strength. He was surprisingly determined and patient in his creation of this haven for himself and his fellow Demons, despite being a halfling of sorts.

In some ways, Weldir related to Jabeziryth’s justifiable anger. He sympathised with a creature who had been locked away as a child, much like Weldir himself. Both were scorned for things they could not control, hated for things they had done without meaning to.

Trapped. Their minds decaying, their bodies in disuse, their mana being stifled with no outlet, running rampant throughout their bodies to whirl as chaotic energy.

He’d never spoken with the boy, but Weldir had been made aware of him – his pain, his suffering, as well as his crimes. He’d also been watching Jabeziryth from the moment he stepped foot upon Earth, since it was that fateful day that also brought Weldir’s own freedom.

Although Weldir’s freedom was a lie, since he was still trapped, just within his own realm. Tenebris was a prison as much as a haven – one he’d been shaping for what he thought might be close to the past decade.

This world is changing just as much as my own. If the forests surrounding the Veil continued to expand, it wouldn’t be long before Demons had the means to cross the land and hunt humans freely.

Even the desert has begun to disappear. Replacing it was more life, more flora, and even fauna.

The Veil had grown exponentially. What had started off as a small crack in the earth now spanned thousands of kilometres in width, and quadruple that in length. Its expansion was beginning to slow, as if Jabeziryth and his companions were pleased with its size.

Along with this, the halfling alone had been growing the forest inside the canyon, while his companions grew the one above the Veil’s surface with a mana stone.

It was mildly humorous that they had followed similar paths, as Weldir had been doing the same in Tenebris – shaping earth and growing flora, for himself and those around him.

Except Weldir sought to protect the souls that Jabeziryth’s companions created.

Something has happened, he contemplated, noticing the uptick in tainted souls that he pilfered off unaware Demons.

More of those void-flesh creatures had begun arriving through the portal Jabeziryth had made to join him on Earth. Weldir doubted it had anything to do with the half-Demon, half-Elf. No, something else was pushing them to this realm.

He had an inclination that it had something to do with his fellow Elven deities.

They can be rather meddlesome.

Perhaps that was due to the overwhelming energy he could currently feel loitering in his mist. Weldir felt everything moving through his essence, and this was far stronger and unearthly than anything he’d ever perceived before.

It appears I’m being sought out.

Rather than going to them right away, Weldir had chosen to greet his mate in one of the rare and infrequent times she – unknowingly – visited him. The loitering entity could wait, just as he’d impatiently waited to be released from the confines of his entrapment.

He was also untrusting of the presence. Why, after over two human decades, would his fellow Elven deities seek him out? Only once had he ever been spoken to, and that was by the Evergreen Servant. This presence was... different from that flora-encrusted male.

It meant he knew exactly who waited to greet him.

Still, once the beauty of Lindiwe and her mesmerising and confusing expressions disappeared from sight, he finally produced a sigh. Weldir immaterialised in order to travel to another location within his mist, thousands of kilometres passing in the blink of an eye.

Within the floating, although nearly invisible, mass of his cloud, a figure sat cross-legged on the rocky ground with his back turned to the forest. With his eyes closed, blue eyelashes created a fan of shade against his round cheekbones.

The same colour of light blue swayed from on top of his head, the hair short except for the two thinly braided tails coming from right behind his long, pointed ears to rest down his broad chest.

Rokul, also known as the god of force, was a rather cheerful male, despite that half his body had once deteriorated from the sickness that had decimated his fellow deities.

A sickness Weldir had brought forth with his birthing.

Now, though, he appeared as whole and as strong as ever, his lavender skin having a pastel hue to it.

His formal midnight robe, which had silver etchings and swirls stitched into it as elegant patterns, covered his entire body.

It was tight against his arms like a form-fitting tunic, while the skirt of it was thick as it lay across his folded legs.

Black strapping had been placed around his big toes and threaded around his ankles to give the impression of soleless shoes.

Five silver barbel piercings going up the crest of both his pointed ears glinted in the sunlight, while hanging flag-like adornments dangling from his lobes fluttered in the wind, white but appearing as though the ends had been messily dipped in silver.

More barbels adorned his face, one on both sides of his bottom lip, each nostril, and one just behind the upper arch of each of his blue eyebrows.

It was obvious by his hair and jewellery that he valued symmetry on his person.