Hearts Ache :: Another Beckoning

I wasn't sure what was up or down, not even left nor right any longer. I knew what I'd been created for, by Gods and Totems alike, I knew. Savior. Redeemer. If all went as was hoped, Creator. How many would have to die before that came to be left me feeling bereft. I hadn't known Arathos for even a full day and still he had risked his life once for me and then flat out given it that I might survive. Damn them for sending me with emotions, and damn them again for not giving me some type of guide book to go with them. So many had been lost today, ones that even I in all of my uniqueness could not bring back. It was so simple as that there were rules I could not break, order in place that even I could not weasel my way past no matter how much I might want to. The tears burned again at the backs of my eyes as I looked down at the bracer that had rebuilt itself to properly fit my much more delicate wrist.

Why, Arathos, why me ?

The words were silent. A thought more than anything else as I tried to make logic of it all. For once I couldn't just run into something, absorb an ability and make the world tremble before me. I, Daughter of Rayos and everything else that came along with it was as helpless as the rest of them and it terrified me. Couldn't they see what was happening ? How was it that they didn't understand what was sitting here slapping them in the face, time and time again ? Dad and mom, well one of my Dad's at least had been sent off to a private room and I was thankful that I couldn't hear what was going on inside. Things were bad enough without adding that mess to the lot. There were times, more often than not lately where I wondered if I would be enough. Not just that, but if by the time all was said and done, if there would be enough left to be worth saving.

Starfish.

A quiet hiss of sound escaped my lips as the marking that rested just over my heart seemed to flare to a life of it's own and for a moment I heard my Grandmama's voice whispering into my ear as if I were still sitting before her for one of the many lessons she had taken the time to instill within me. There were many times that she would repeat certain ones over and over as if she were afraid that somehow I would forget them. My eyes closed and for a moment I did nothing more than wish that things were different. That I wasn't just some test tube baby that had been sent to a version of Mortalis that needed saving. Did they not have enough of their own champions in place ? I knew that answer all too quickly. If they did, I wouldn't have been created, now would I ? There wouldn't still be the call that had me transporting myself via their gift to bring in heroes from other locations.

You would leave him here while you go after another ?

My eyes drifted to where my dirty gypsy still hung, pinned to and shackled to the wall of the temple where we had been put to slumber. Of course he still slumbered, put there and kept in the lock of dreams by a Goddess herself. Surely he would be safe, his place in the Prophecy his insurance that no one would harm him in my absence. If they tried...Angry as I may be, confused as I may be by his actions, they would pay for being foolish enough to lay a finger upon him. It was my place to work things through with him, not others to lay blame upon his head for my weaknesses. Fingers reached up and crept the line of his jaw, a quiet kiss being leveled upon his lips before I turned and began walking. That marking of birth would not still be humming, tingling the way it was if there weren't another to be found and brought forth.

I didn't hear words anymore, not a voice to tell me which paths to avoid or which to frolic down in my journey. It was simply assumed that I knew where I was needed to go and how to get there. I stopped in the shadow of a crumbled wreckage of a temple, the markings on it's front unknown. At this point I didn't know that I cared. For once I was doing it my way. Come what may I was going to forego everything I'd been taught and simply run things how I thought that they should be. It wouldn't be forever, but it would be enough to hopefully assuage what I needed to put me back on track. It wasn't as if any of the Gods or Goddesses, the true rulers of Olympus were here to stop me. They were off fighting two more of those Damned Primordial and one could only hope that they had enough juice to at least stand toe to toe if not weaken them enough for the kids with the big guns to come in and demolish them.

So I let my eyes bleed over to the mix of colors that they were becoming with each and every new being that I absorbed, every gift that I took in, leaving it's mark on me in one fashion or form. Putting enough distance between myself and where they rested at the moment, I finally came to a stop at a pool that must have at one time been pristine and clear. Taking the time then, I began removing chunks of rubble, filtering out as much of the debris that came along with it as I could. A good couple of hours passed before I was anywhere near done, and even then it still wasn't as clear as I had hoped. It'd have to do. It still reflected enough back at me that I could see my image, even if it was a bit crackly. Still that mark throbbed insistently, growing more annoying by the moment as if someone were watching over my shoulder and saying that I was taking too long.

I didn't know what words to chant, nor if there was a cadence that would make a difference. Then again, what was chanting other than vocalized intent ? Extending both of my hands, I let bare toes brush and dip at the pool, giving as much connection to the liquid as I could without submerging myself completely. Thinking rather than speaking, projecting rather than singing some ancient rhythmic and rhyme, I beckoned the pool to open for me. To show me what it was that I sought to see.