A life so changed
_»Every being, as free as it might seem,
is captured in a cage. A cage that is called world.«_
Alcharshis, prince of Thalássa, date unknown
A live so changed
He had never planned on that to find her here. Here, at the Skyfire-tower of Flaviana. What did she do here?
The first rays of the sun desperatelly tried to pierce through the thick featherless of darkness, which has been spread by the night over the entire world. The horizon was aflamed in a deep crimson, a crimson that almost seemed obscure. Gradually, the small, shiny diamonds disappeared, which the night put on the firmament and were used as points of orientation by many creatures at that time. One after another. Even the cadaverous satellite Nibiru, who enlightened the night a bit with its dusky rays, disappeared more and more. Exactly the same thing happened to the fire red moon Luucur. This moon originated with its color the myth it was the blood of the God Hærthilnthras. According to that myth he once revolted with the dragon Scaethra Thiamath against the other Gods, but he was brutally defeated. Scaethra Thiamath was, according to deliverances, sealed away in a place where she should never escape and pass the eternity in a deep sleep ...
The high tower, which seemed to surpass even the sky, lustered shadowy and glared with its smallish side towers in all its glory, in countenance of the rising sun. Its long shadow darkened everything behind it, it went even beyond the little island where the tower stood and immersed the local water in gloominess. At the feet of this tremendous tower, every living being had to be compulsively fulfilled with awe.
On the top level stood Syyri glued at the spot, his eyes rigidly stared at one single thing ...
Syyri was one member of the relatively small family of the Large wing dragons. His race was called Devil's dragon. This name was explained by the sturdy, almost demonish seeming horns, that grew out of the dragons' back of the head. Although they were mainly used in the mating season - therefore the males had the bigger horns, among other things to impress the females - they can also be used as deadly weapons. In cooperation with the mere physical strength to these dragons they were easily able to cause devastating damages and tear terrible, bad-healing wounds.
Apart from this, Syyri's head was adorned with even more natural gifts: A thin row of stings incured from the tip of his muzzle to the neck, where the stings became bigger and wandered down his tail. At the sturdy beginnings of his underjaw were some backward and curved stings, too, several ones as long as a common dagger. If Syyri opened his mouth, a fleshy tongue and deadly fangs were seen, which together have vanished so many lifes to feed the big dragon.
Around his neck was a long, broad and deeply red scarf coiled, made of finest fabrics. It had special matters with that item, was it the present of the only human he loved from deep within his heart. As he've known later, his human girl friend Haiku had to take almost three weeks to sew it. And since she gifted him the scarf as a sign of her affection to him, he weared it, with a kind of ornated disc brooch attached, and hadn't dropped it until now.
The body of the dragon was strong and sturdy built. His with scales vested skin, was dyed in many brownish colors; the arranged, almost over rational long seeming wings was stringed by a thin and sensible flying membrane. Because of their immensive lenght, the wings were not really able to do fast maneouvers, their strong point were in volplaning for hours.
As it was customary for his race, his body skipped over in a long tail, which ended with a broadened, plated and cuneiformed tip. That tip was massive and heavy, Syyri used it sometimes to crush the bodies of his prey. Beside of that it helped him to keep his balance while flying, if he moved the tail in the rhythm of his flaps, and held it not to stiff.
The tetragonal hall, embroidered by many ornaments, was thanks to the high lancet windows of multicolored and sophisticating processed glas flooded with the warm and snug light of the rising sun. The floor was covered by paneled sheets of wood and in the middle of the room stood a yellow lustering stone, as tall as two man, on a with beatgold overdrawn, elaborating chased socket. Swirling and mighty energy waves, going out in regular intervals from that stone, filled the hall and plunged it in a hanging, lightly yellowish fog. Syyri could sense very well how his body was penetrated by that energy, it gave him the feeling of very great power and the ability, he could do whatever he wanted. Nevertheless, this big amounts of energy could easily hide the fact how many life energy he really had, because it affected him from outside and came not from within his body.
Right beside the stone was an almost identical image of himself, with the exception that it was mainly greenish dyed, smaller and not as sturdy built as him. Calmly it riposted his glimpse.
»What are you doing here?«, said Syyri completely surprised and without knowledge, what he should do next.. Something said to him, he should walk across. But his legs seemed to ne filled with plumb. He hadn't seen his beloved little sister since she justly disappeared in the blaze of the town Sanctyde. He thought, she was dead, thought she was eroded by that flames like the other members of his family, although this seemed kind of paradox, because dragons were normally creatures of fire and wind. Now when he saw her there, her body completely without scars or similar things, he was fulfilled with a really euphoria. Tears of infinitely joy were in his eyes and his heart throbbed excited against his with scales covered chest.
»You are ... alive ... Luthra ... », he added with a soundless voice and made a very hesitant step forward.
A hardly noticeable smile pranced over Luthra's chaps before she answered him:
»Yes, brother.« Somehow she sensed that Syyri wouldn't dare to get closer, so she approached him with light feet and a softly wipping tail. A shivering, as if someone had poured icy water over his back, fulfilled him when she tenderly pushed her nostrils against Syyri's ones. Contrary to popular belief, dragons were rough and apathetic, Luthra's touches were poignantelly affectionate. Appreciativelly Syyri closed his eyes and just lived the moment. Tears - small, shiny remnants of his joy - seeked their way to the floor and flowed thereby over his cheeks. His heart skipped a beat when he sensed her tongue tenderly stroking upon his throat. He remembered when she did that to him in past times, mostly if she asked him something or she wanted to apologize when she - as costumary then - brought him in trouble. Or sometimes just because she liked him. Secretely Syyri was glad that she didn't drop that habit.
»I've missed you«, he said loudly to supress a suddenly upcoming sob. It was embarassing to him to cry right in front of his sister, hadn't he cryed for years yet. But in this moment he couldn't resist, he pressed his head against the side of the neck of the female dragon, almost as if he wanted to blend with her. He was still very excited, it was totally inconceivable to him that at least one of his family survided that terrible incident.
Suddenly, as if by command, something leaped in his mind. Terrible pictures ... dreadful pictures ... deeply dark night, that was enlighened by the glow of upwards flickering flames, which slowly consumed the town Sanctyde ... both moons, dense collocated at the sky, ever silent but yet present, watched the purgatory that has been brought to the beings ... pungent, lung-eroding smoke, remains of the things that has been devoured by the flames, cloaked the stars at the firmament with darkness ... breaking down buildings, which buried humans and other beings among themselves and crushed them ... his father laying on the ground who has been poisoned by the smoke ... four years have passed since that ... but the memories are still there ... his blood began to speed faster through his veins and arteries ... his pulse soared rapidly ...
With a loud, sharp snort he savagely shaked his head, whereby his sister wondered flinched with a brandishing move. He didn't want that those feelings gain the mastery, wanted to cast them off, ban from his mind. Wildly he snapped in the air and let hurtle his jaws with a loud noise. So long he had resolved not to live in the past anymore ... but this was more difficult than he thought. Since that incident he was afraid of fire and because of this he didn't even use the natural ability anymore, that was given to nearly all dragons: The ability to spit fire. Syyri's fear of fire by itself and the thought, he could hurt somebody he didn't want to hurt, strictly banned him. Nightmares, dusky parts from the dark corners of his awareness, plagued him regulary, remembered him how bad and fierce fire could be. Even Haiku couldn't prevail on him ever to spit that hotly element, the creator and destroyer of life, again.
»What's wrong with you, brother?«, asked Luthra scared and with a haggard look. Her clear, emerald green eyes met his amber ones and it seemed that inside them a flaring fire has been delighted when the light of the dawn fell through the windows. Flames that burned with the same fuel, the flames of siblings that interconnected them like a thread. Soflty she layed one of her paws upon Syyri's left one and he winced appalled.
»I know that something saddens your heart. What's wrong with you?«, she repeated. Luthra's words calmed him a bit and so he deeply breathed in and then out again. Syyri's nostrils blowed up in so doing and subsequently brew to tight slits again. Then he assessed, still a bit nervous, to his word:
»Don't worry, I'm fine. I only had ... thought about something. Yes. That's all.« His statement wasn't very reliable, yet he hoped she would believe that. Her again deeply looked in his eyes, came very close with her own muzzle to his one and touched very softly his nose with the tip of her tongue. Another sign of the strong affection she had towards him, that she ever did in past times. Her paw found the way to his cheek and rested there.
»You're thinking about that night. That's what you doing, don't you? Don't try to hide that. You know that it's useless, I know you, you are my brother yet. But listen to me, you have to leave that behind. If not you'll spend your whole life in sorrow. Do you really want that? It's not your fault, so stop blaming yourself.«
Syyri said nothing and let her words act on him. He relished the warmth she let him have. Of course he knew that she was right. But it was so difficult for him.
»How you ever survived?«, he asked soundless. »All of them had died yet.« Luthra calmly shaked her head.
»After I got seperated from you I could hide myself under a bridge from the fire. When the blaze waned and all was layed in ashes, I began to seek for you«, she explained. »I've searched in the entire town - or better what there was of it - for you, but I've only found our dead father laying on the soil. You were nowhere to find. So ... I guessed ... that the worst thing was happened and you were also a victim of the flames. But you weren't that. I'm so glad to know that you haven't died by the fire.«
»Do you know how it has broken out?«, Syyri enquired. Luthra shaked her head as a response und Syyri asked along:
»Was it the fault of dragons?«
»I don't exactly know, but I wouldn't see, why, either.«
»I see«, said Syyri thinkfully and plodded slowly to one of the high windows and looked outside, with a moony expression on the face. The sun, which fought itself out from the claws of the horizon, threw a long, flickering bridge of light on the water, which found its end on the shores of the island Flaviana, the island where the tower was. Above the sun Syyri could plainly see how the clouds slowly lost on their rich red, which was replaced by a warm yellow. Some clouds even completely disappeared.
Behind him his sister watched him with a very strange look. On the one hand it was blank, but on the other hand there was a trace of mercy seen in her eyes. Or was it mercy at all? Slowly she strode on inaudible soles to him.
»From whom you've got this scarf from, brother?«, she proclaimed her curiousness. But Syyri didn't answer to her question, he was completely captured in an unknown sea of thoughts. If Luthra looked for him after the fire, why he couldn't sense her? After the death of his father, he hadn't left the body for several hours. Couldn't he smell her, because the smell of charred wood, burned flesh and the smoke that was made by the Phlegethon, stunned his sensible nose? But hold on ... didn't she say she came around the body of his father, when she looked for him? Then he must have seen her. Did she lie on him? But why? He didn't see any sense, why she should lie to him?
»Syyri«, shouted Luthra, her voice was raised up to a distinct higher niveau and she tenderly bit him with the teeth in the forward area of her mouth into the throat. With a twitch, as if he had burned on something, Syyri woke up from his trance-like rigidity and was brought back to the floor of this world again.
»Syyri, I've asked your four times were you've got this scarf from. Why don't you answers me? Are you so deep in thought?«
»I'm sorry, Luthra, I've just gone through something«, justified the young male dragon and turned his head to see his ister into the eyes. One half of her head and her body too, were plunged in a deep shadow and lent her a slightly demonic look.
»I've just wondered about your earlier statement. You said you've passed the body body of my beloved father when you searched for me. But I can't remember seeing you.« Syyris eyes bored deep and stinging into his sister ones.
»I've spent hours on the body of my father but I've neither seen or smelled you. I haven't sensed anything of you. Why, Luthra, why did you lie to me? Is there something I shouldn't know?« His voice sounded disappointed, resentful and unbelieving at the same time.
»What gave you the reason to lie to me? I am your brother.«
After this words the hall was filled with silence. A silence, so intensive, that you almost could have grap it. Infrequentely some deeper breaths interrupted the calm. A particularly deep breath announced that Luthra assessed to speak:
»Syyri, I'm sorry«, she replied and lowered her head. Her voice was filled with distinct regret.
»Please, don't be angry to me, brother, please forgive me. But I' ve learned things since that fire ... since I thought you would have passed on me. I've seen things, so wonderful, that you can't imagine how ... dear brother, I've joined Paradéus. Paradéus has shown me where the right direction is ... therefore, my beloved, my dear big brother, don't step on my dreams. I just want our best. I love you ... I loved you all along ... please ... forgive me ...«
Before he even could proclaim his disappointment about Luthra and ask her, what he should forgive, he feeled her paws on his side. Although she was smaller than him, there were more strenght in her body as it seemed. With a guttural roar, which was so strong reflected by the hall, that it seemed, a whole choir would roar, she raised up on her hindlegs, spread her big wings and thrusted with all her might against Syyri's side. He was so confused by the moment of surprise that he couldn't bridle, so his body caved in the pressure and he broke through the window of the tower ...
He was situated in a free fall, above him Luthras head departed fast ... she was crying. The whistling and cool draught played around his body and quenched it at the same time.
Why? What did he done to Luthra that she acted like this? What have been told to her ... she has ever been so credulous, that's why he loved her. But now ... somebody used her credulity. Paradéus ... he knew that organisation. Their member thought they can free the world from suffering ... what a nonsense ...
Suddenly he saw a face right in front his eye ... a young, long, human face with very long, silvery hair that gleamed like mercury in the twilight. His narrow eyes were very strange, while his left one was soaked in a deep sea blue, his right one was dyed as red as a hell jewel. The face gazed at him ... then it laughed at him ... a high, cold and smug laugh complied Syyris head ... this face ... Alcharshis ...
The area around him blurred, became fuzzy. His mind began to dawn ... was like mesmerised ... he wanted to open his wings ... wanted to save himself .... he couldn't ...
A sharp pain flashed from his back through his entire body, when Syyri dashed against the water surface, before the darkness began wrapping around and slowly devouring him ...
»... sister ...«