Brothers of the Guerres

Slices from the "Whose Memories" Roleplay.

--

// Chalice //

You could never see the stars from down here. Not the skies nor clouds. Never mind if the cages in this forest were suspended some fifty or more feet above ground, the bars made of an enchanted sort of vine said to be blessed by the god of this area who takes prisoners and does not let them leave. I never believed this. I never believed him. The only feeling that I have developed for him was a certain loathing because, in all honesty, his myth might be true. I was still trapped here. I couldn't get out. I had tried to get out but nothing had become of that.

For almost three years, according to my own count, that is in estimates I kept making at least, my routine consisted of the same things: confinement. Training. More confinement. Discipline. And. War. When we were not tucked away in these circular 'shelters' at most times of the day, conveniently stripped to minimal to ensure we had not the slightest advantage to use for escape, we would be sent to unfamiliar territories as a vanguard to taking down prior defenses. From where I could not see anything else, not when the smoke of the guerre was clouding my sight, the deafening sounds of battle cries and blades, weapons clashing blocking my ears.

Had. To. Focus. Or else any next war would be my last war. I had seen many die this way had I not? It was my first lesson the first day I had been tossed into the jaws of a conquering. A massacre was what I met. A sword that I had to take in a hand to kill someone lest he killed me. That day was still vivid in my mind. . .

I still could never see the stars.

But then what does it matter anymore? What does it do me to be pitied by these loving lights when for all I knew I would be trapped here for all eternity? I had nowhere to go. I had nothing to live for. My past was something which eluded me every time I tried to think on it. A blank was what it is. I had that void within me and I could never fill it. Yet somehow there was a promise to not forget somewhere that I was supposed to keep. But not forget what?

' Don't forget me. . . '

Never forget who? Who? Who was it?

I had been looking at my hands for a long time now, the night chirping around us to the hymn of groans and utter discontent, the other prisoners kept in the cages with me mumbling to themselves in a daze, already insane, and some in a catatonic state, the continuous isolation pushing them to the brink of crazy more and more. Not I however. I had regarded the situation with a strong sense of pity and then resignation and then apathy finally, although there were nights that when I realize that said void in my chest, in said nights such as this, I would find myself in mourning. The only time I had cried again. After so long a while since I last learned to take a life with my bare hands.

Why now of all nights? I had a guerre to deal with tomorrow. I had a battle to begin and survive. Why now think of the memories that I have a feeling I would never get back?

"I heard you had a mission in the Berain District. How'd that go?"

A voice stalled me to gaping, wide eyes turning towards the source but finding it a bit difficult to peer through the tangle of the vines of my own small space. I had to look harder, knuckles hurriedly wiping at the tears straying but not really saying anything in return. Just movement, making the circular confinement creak and swing, weightless and not weightless at the same time. "Who. . ." I finally opened my mouth and said something but it seemed like a dream to my ears. Or was I now beginning to hear things?

"What? You thought everyone had already lost their minds up here?"

There it was again. I looked over my bare shoulders, shivering slightly from the cold as I tried to find a better spot to position myself. I felt sore all over. Every muscle seemed to scream in revolt from the crown of my head to the soles of my naked feet. But there was that voice. I somehow wanted to know where it came from yet I feared it could have come from my head. Then again, if it were a voice in my head, maybe now I had the license to go insane like everyone else here. The last straw near to getting burned to cinders.

"N-not really," I found the voice to answer it, as meek as it sounded, as I tried to open up the space between the vines. "It's just I've never spoken to anyone else here before."

To my relief, from the other cage just to the right of me I saw an eye peek out. In this light, he had the clouds in his eyes. Was I looking at a storm? Those I knew that had from time to time escaped and poured upon us. It made the atmosphere even darker around here. That first glance into his eyes reminded me of them.

"Well I thought you were a goner too for a while now, the way you have been like deathly quiet all these years we have been up here. I was kind of apprehensive," the voice not my own said back. ". . .but then you cry like I do sometimes after all. First time I saw you did though. Thought you were stone."

I blinked the strain out of my eyes, rubbed at them to adjust more to the blackness. Had he been watching me all this time? Who was he?

He volunteered a name.

"Vance," he laughed at my silence and I heard his own cage quiver. "Vance Kial. You?"

"C-Chalice. Averque," somehow the concept of conversation had become alien to me. I never knew the names of the beings known as my brothers-in-arms in this unprivileged troupe. We were nameless faces. This would have been the first time I met someone. Someone whose face I could not fully see.

"Put it there."

But he took the effort to reach out, a hand forced through the gaps of the vine bars that he left hanging for me to grasp. I hesitated then and there, but then did the same and reached for him as well. Another warm creature. I was not going out of my mind. There was someone else still 'alive' here in the forest. He seemed to mirror my relief. "Glad I ain't have to go talking to air now. These cages do stuff to you. Sometimes I could hear a voice in my head." He was jesting. Or maybe there was some semblance of truth to that. I knew well enough people mentally died here. They were gone before they were actually dead.

I shivered again.

Somehow, I want to feel a different cold than this. Something white. White. What white? What was I thinking? I hugged myself.

"Are you. . ." I trailed off. I was somehow not going to ask the obvious but he said it anyway, "A captive like you? Yeah. Same. I was part of around eight prisoners taken as spoils of a war from my Realm."

I leaned my back against the bars. "Where are the others?"

His voice paused for a while that I thought he had fallen asleep or maybe had some injuries that had drained him. Since when had I felt a close emotion to fear? Not in years but only in a few minutes with a stranger I barely met. "I don't know. One moment they were here, the next. . .you know how we have to assume the worst. They had been sent off and none has returned."

Like the lives of most of us. We were expendable. "But tell me about you? How'd you get those set of eyes? They look like the colour of the sunset in one place I've been."

Was he able to look at the skies unlike I? How did he manage that? I felt silent again. He called out to me: "You don't remember?" I shook my head although I was very much aware he may not see it. I have not the slightest recollection of anything since being here. Vance appeared to have been responding to me by instinct.

"Blessed amnesia. You're lucky! Some of us here wish we could forget. That's why they go insane," he remarked with a small voice, trailing behind with enough meaning that it made me turn to spy through the gaps again, fingers clasping the small leaves that had overgrown. Cursed god of the forest. Someday I will end up killing him for this, a part of me cussed. Then invariably, something caught my eye. It was the form of someone I knew was one of 'them'. The beings that put us here. I glared at him.

Was he not the one they called Les? His twin swords were strapped crossed over each other behind him, the handles easily accessed just somewhere his rib level. Such an air of confidence. He had a domineering aura about him. I despised him. Like all of t h e m.

"You know what I want to be in another year or so?" Vance's voice echoed with the quiet and I realized he was also looking at the form that had passed by below, the latter's boots crushing the tundra under. It obeyed him somehow. There still hung that unanswered question which my new acquaintance did not hesitate to respond to, "That. . ." he was mouthing.

"A Legionnaire?" I did not understand.

He chuckled and swung his cage to bump into mine and I held on. "What? You have to admit, the only thing that would get us out of these cages is if we become Trinity.

"Don't say you want to be a prisoner all your life?"

I saw his smile through the layers separating us and I visibly swallowed. He. . .felt like a dangerous being to me all of the sudden. Something unsure and could erupt. I had no words. He still had some.

"I hope you rest well. I feel a storm coming, whispering against my skin."

// Vance //

My days in the cages were long and restless. At least that's what recollection served me. I knew I had been thrown there long before everyone else was. And by the time people were losing their sanity I had already crossed over mine. I had been having relapses in fact. The many moments alone and apart to which I had witnessed countless others die that death. That slow and agonizing deterioration that consumed so many of us here.

I had seen the others perish. In a way I had also died inside. But unlike the mad and crazed fools surrounding me during many an eerie night in these forests, my suffering was a little personal. It was silent. I had shrunk into myself. I had hallucinated of certain days and in restless sleep had memorized my own nightmares. Enough that once they let me run outside I was perfectly the monster. I had no regard as to who or what needed to be done. I just did it. As soon as I could. That way right after I could look up and pray though no gods heard me.

Or had it been that my lamentations were answered a little too late?

I had been the lone survivor of a pack of eight. I had been counting off my brethren one by one as they left, sent to these useless confrontations we had not wanted to be part of. Until the last had turned his gaze at me and with a maniacal grin bid me live. How? When I knew for sure that when they do leave there was not a chance for them to have survived alive. Because I knew the Legionnaires were thorough. Good if any of our lot had managed to escape but I doubted that. The most likely would be that they had died. Most of my tribe were already half-broken to begin with. What was a push more to make them collapse like a doll pile.

As was going to happen to me. I accepted that finally. As the cries of the angry and the depraved rose in chorus around me. Imploration heard by none but ourselves. I. ..was also on the brink of that mindset. Dangling above the grounds of sanity and just thinking.. .thinking that any moment now. That bare connection would sever and I would plummet into the same darkness.

It did not happen.

I had seen him one day. This youth that was almost the same age as I was with his blank eyes looking out in contemplation. I got curious, ripping through the vines to stare at his expression. He was confused. But he had a knowing thought in him. A spark still there that, unlike everyone else here, remained. Even after years that we had been tossed and thrown about. Damned these hands that dragged our chains and fetters to places cursed.

It took me a while to make a friend out of him. Frankly because I was scared to some degree. What if he also died? What if like those I had come here with he too would not come back one day? I was so afraid. I didn't want to make that connection when in any moment it could be torn off. Yet to my surprise, he endured. He had stayed alive and came back every time. Like a stubborn weed under the sunlight. We became kin without meeting. I felt for him like we had been brothers. Then when he was finally moved to the cage beside me, I decided to break the quiet.

He had been crying that day. I don't know why but I had grown unhappy of hearing the sobs of others. This state of being pathetic unnerved me. So I talked to him. And he responded in kind. In a sense, that would have been the first time I had felt relief here in a very long time. I had met someone who shared my fate. And like myself he was not happy about it.

----------

Three weeks after that encounter and him and I were always dragged around together. The many times we had been sent to guerres, we were part of the same team. He saved me as many times as I may have saved him. Our weapons were used to help each other survive. Then unexpectedly, from the other side of the cages, we met another like us. He had been moved to join our little cluster up the trees after almost all of the ones on that said side had dropped dead. Like so many gnats and flies. They had no choice but to let him join those still living. If that was what you called the 'existence' Chalice and I had.. .

I was just maybe watching the world decompose before my eyes. The stench of burning corpses and flesh just now being eaten slowly by nature rising that for a moment I could not tell if this was still purgatory or hell had arrived. The battle field we fell into was vast. Too vast in fact that I could see mounds of the departed scaling like hills all around. Red earth. Black skies. Everything. Blood-soaked. Like the weather had rained this shade.

I dragged a dirtied hand through my hair. And heaved what amount of air there was left. I choked on my own blood. I could taste it in my mouth that I had to spit it out. Taking a seat on a small pile of bodies dripping whatever fluid there was to drip. I didn't care anymore. It was all a case of self-preservation. If I had not killed them, they would have killed me. Or us as I groaned in frustration and shook my head at the other two with me. Roman and Chalice. They had been arguing again. This time it had been a rather violently physical one.

"Are you both done now?" With an impatience I was waving the sword before dropping its point down to the ground. Palm resting on the hilt to support my forward leaning form. I was frowning at them. "Do you ever realize that you do not have any use for each other dead?"

Well at least at that time they had released one another. Spent in a fist-fight, they were both just a panting mess left and right before me. Cuts and bruises all over even disaster-ridden faces. I scratched at my nape. Gnats were starting to claim homes in the cadavers. Means we have been here a while. I didn't like being insect bait. I stood up.

"You two better break it up," I had gone to one and the other, pulling them to their feet by their arms. They still had strength left. Like myself, we had gone through the battle as efficiently as we could have. We had watched each other's backs. And while the rest were goners in the last few hours, we stayed safe. Fighting to the last minute but safe.

I was looking towards that looming direction now. The cavalry's here to pick us up. As a flash of white and something glorious came riding a prison carriage to where we were. I urged them then. I had pushed them both up. "Come on you two. Time to go home." I could not help but snort at the word. Home? What home?

My gaze had met that of the Clergy then. Rochis was his name. We could not address him personally. But though he was not supposed to be here, he was. He always was and was the first to say the same thing: "You three are still alive I see."

"Yeah well hell didn't like to have us yet. Maybe for tea?" I spat sarcasm back as Chalice spat blood to the ground. Somehow he had broken a rib or two. I could sense it on them both. They were worse for wear than I was.

"No, let me," and I volunteered to take their weapons and surrender them to the Legionnaires before they had chained us off into the prison carriage. Searching us down for anything we may have concealed. Our thankless work was done. Still going to be a bumpy ride back though.

----------

The trip was mostly wrought in silence. As the hours ticked and the carriage's movements became steady coming into the flatter terrain of the road to the cages, I looked at the other two before me. A marred hand grabbing at the chain of the shackle around one ankle. Tugging at it a bit. Too tight. It wasn't like we could escape under these conditions. We were all exhausted already. Hungry. Thirsting. I could feel the skin peel from my lips. It was that dry. Now I was being rubbed raw around my wrists and ankles too. Neck braced with iron that it was sore there as well.

I knew they also shared the sentiment. But then from where the two were, they kept quiet. This was not right. Were they still arguing? I pulled myself to their side.

"Hey. .." I gave them both a grin. ".. .what's that cliche expression they use to describe this again? Oh yeah! Like you two are cat and dog chasing each other." I peered at them both, flinching from the tight constrictions but just trying my best to get them to notice what I was doing. With the same haggard expression they finally turned to me. I grinned on. "You know what though? I feel like the old dog needing to watch the both of you constantly. And you two are these cats always arguing. The felines of the forest fit you both better."

This time, I reached for Roman and tousled his darker hair. Then drew him by his nape to knock my forehead with his before I did the same to Chalice. A hand out to bring him closer that way I could press my forehead to his too. "There's only three of us left now. Make peace or we'll be having a difficult time. All right? We're supposed to be brothers."

I let them go and piled back to my own spot. Just because the chains had allowed me all that I could be allowed. I heard their own links clatter.

"Sorry," Roman had whispered before dropping his face into the arms he had drawn around his knees. Chalice was looking elsewhere in the dim confinement. But he too followed that. "Sorry. . ."

I grinned again, feeling more like the older brother here though we may have been just the same in age. Orphaned prisoners. We had met the same cruel fates. Yet glad to have found a companion to our suffering. "Ain't so hard eh?" I chuckled. Before my face lost all its colour as suddenly I felt a shift outside. The carriage. It was moving a different way.

I watched them register the same look. A bewilderment as Roman crawled up on his knees to press an ear to the walls of the box they put us in. "You felt that?" he said, palms running against the wood. His chains rattling with the rest of ours.

"This isn't the way to the cages is it?" Chalice whispered and Roman shook his head. "I can't feel the cold anymore. We are riding away from the forests!" The latter said back.

I had been jogged into wondering, "Where are they taking us-" that before I saw one of us pull at his shackles and then immediately banging against the front wall where the Legionnaires were surely seated. Driving on. "Oh hey Chalice!"

"Hey! The hell are you taking us!? Where are we going!!" he demanded in a voice I knew was in panic. I could feel his fear and in a sense I was almost infected by it. But letting him rage in here would get us punishment. We had no use for that today.

"Hey hey. ..Chal. Cut it out," I had to slap him into waking. "It doesn't matter." I was muttering repeatedly now. I had to. I was telling myself that as well. I held him back by his arms and steadied him. "It doesn't matter. We don't have a choice in this. Settle down. Save your energy.

"We'll need it if they're thinking of sending us to another mission."

He was catching his breath and I too was. For a few seconds making us stand there stock-still. Then the exhaustion finally sinking us both to the floor. I rolled on my back. He had his turned to me. I reached a hand to ruffle his sticky mop of hair. If he had been bathed and clean, he would look like a cherub with these locks. Anyone of us would. "Hey. It's fine. We'll survive. Let's get as much rest as we can all right?" I was finally suggesting, the tiredness wrapping my form that my sight was swimming. I got walloped real bad in that stunt earlier. I don't doubt I have a clot in the head somewhere now.

I just wanted to sleep finally. My body was in agreement and arranging itself where it could be at least slightly comfortable. I could not stop my lids from drooping. I yawned. I think Chalice had fallen asleep before I could. But Roman. Rome was brooding in this void we were kept in.

I think it was his voice that I heard last. Had I been looking at him? At his form that had resumed its previous position? Curled against a corner like that.

"They'll keep sending us off to these places. We'll die in a guerre eventually.

"It's only a matter of when and where."

For a second there. I believed him to be right. Rather it was most likely.

// Captain Shion Claudius //

I was in blatant discontent.

Even with victories heaped at every side, this was not good enough for me, ambitious as I was and determined...determined to build a strong group of beings that made all my pursuits as relentless. My avarice unquenched like a fire burning day and night. And very much destructive to all who had been involved, even my own Men, the Muses we had steward over. But my greatest penchant was in picking out the slaves. It was always from them that I expected more. I expected more from their line a certain stone to polish, a diamond if there could be, prepared to lose every single one of them for the sake of finding the rarity whose mettle had been tempered through and through by several trials.

I was cruel, I knew, but I was likewise young and worse than any god, was never half decisive. I stayed on my path with a one-track mind, could not be anything else less than myself! Thus everyone around me must never be less the same way in my eyes.

That day I recall I had gathered them again, in a small banquet where victories were getting celebrated, just for the thirty-six others in my presence. Also to mourn the dead as a few of us had departed.

"Take the Muses out of the room please," I had told the Protectors, glad that at least these were the young Gems and not the Flowers. Bless them they had such tender hearts that they did not need the harm of the little details of what I had in mind that night. What I had in mind while drunk on the strength of liquor and some other brew that put those lower servants to sleep easy on the first cup. I had developed a taste for alcohol so neither myself nor these beings I had chosen to surround myself with were expected to be in repose soon. They were here for reasons. My very best. They had sworn to me and that in itself was a powerful feeling.

"Yes Captain."

And just like that, the females were filed on out, their sweet, convivial voices chattering through the corridors as they would be sent to their rooms for the night, to continue their own parties away from the Men. Save for the rest that were left in the room with me: Vanaela, in particular, playing with a staff and some enchantments she had been polishing; Lestat behind me in a way seemingly falling asleep as he leaned against the farther wall but was actually stuck in a contemplative state; and Rochis, my cousin, quietly seated and reading through his bibles, turning the pages with care.

I was having the last slaves called in today. The last because the most disappointing news had reached my knowing. Out of more than two hundred captives, only three remained in the cages. That means the casualties had doubled since the last guerre. I was more than annoyed...I was furious! Yet these three were still three more tested souls. They could do well as additions but how would they fare?

"There were still some at the other cages but their sanity is up for debate," Vanae was cleaning her short staff, tapping the sphere crowning its top to gaze into the fortunes there.

She had been making divination as of late, and they had become rather accurate by the day, accurate enough that I trusted it when she said that now would be the best time to call forth new blood. And call forth I did as one by one, these ragged forms were dragged into our presence, chained to each other and then sank to the rug before us, some of the forty making bets and guesses, a few harsh murmurings I silenced as I stood up and paced forward.

"So these three?" I pulled out a sword that had been decorating the side of my seat, pressing its flat-end to the one who had the most defiant look on his face among them all.

"Hey watch it!" he snapped back with a growl and immediately at least two of my other Legionnaires stood from their seats with a scowl on their faces. I stopped them part of the way. Nothing I could not handle, I assured them.

"You're spunky," I grinned down at him, making him look up at me by the point of the blade, pressing it deep enough to draw blood. "I'll handle this one. Les and Rochis can pick one of the other two."

I turned my golden eyes towards the lone Fighting Muse in the room. "Vanae?"

She shrugged past me and stood with her curves in a stride, tucking her staff under an arm, halting to tell me something I knew she would always say, "I'll pass. I have some work on the Muses needing to be done.

"Enjoy your toys."

Cold as ever. Refined like ice. She made me smile. The reason maybe that she did not want to teach *it* anymore, although as all the Legion knew she was a very stunning teacher. She stuck to the League of the Fighting Muses these days however, refusing to nurture anything else. Call it loyalty maybe.

"You have no humour..." I found myself chuckling, making that roaring slave before me crane his head up more and I could visibly see him bristle like a wild animal, the storm dancing in his eyes.

He would make a stunning Trinity. Behind the dirt and traces of malnutrition, the soot of war and disaster, the smell of death clinging, he did not look bad at all.

But then that was when I had noticed from the corner of my eyes, my brethren making his move.

"Rochis?"

He had overstepped Les who was perhaps still not entirely out of his thoughts just yet, the latter raising a brow of curiosity. He stood before then fell to a knee in front the one at the center of the three, a gloved hand reaching to lift that face, the owner of whom met him with no resistance. Or rather had not the strength left to resist. I could notice him labouring for breath. The signs of injuries. Him and the one beside him. I did not know their names but I was sure they were badly mangled.

"I'll take this one if it's all right Captain," Rochis volunteered and my brows creased, dropping the sword to release my pick of the litter to look at my cousin's choice.

Then I stared into his emerald eyes with the question, met only by the response of his seriousness and the sincerity behind his words. That was when I realized that this was that gem-eyed child. He had survived...

"Are you serious?" but he knew what and how to handle these. They were his specialty weren't they? I gave it a second thought however, although I ended up sighing, waving Les to stand down. "Very well. I am sure your counterpart doesn't mind."

I motioned at my right hand. The Dual Wielder just smirked and shook his head, going for the other slave then, inspecting him, pressing fingers to feel the ribs and the other visibly groaned out in pain. This confirmed it. They were damaged beyond what we had been realizing.

"Hey! Wait! Where are you taking us!"

I had expected to be met by protest. I had them separated that day, the links of their confinement broken though the chains stayed on. "Chalice! Roman!"

The other two had been escorted off as it was time to tame each of our own subjects. I tugged at the hair of mine sharply, getting his attention by fisting my hand there.

"I suggest you hold your tongue lest you lose it. Keep quiet." And I slipped a blindfold around his eyes. "Worry about yourself instead of them."

// Chalice //

I felt the silence. It felt colder now. It felt even more isolating.

I knew we had been separated because I could no longer sense them both, my brothers in this circumstance, they were gone where I am uncertain of. As I am uncertain of my own here. Blindfolded and led off to somewhere. I knew voicing out anything might get me a hard smack, so I just bit down my tongue, became mute and although cautious was exhausted beyond degree. I could hardly walk. I could hardly feel my sides. I must be bruised all over. I have not checked on my injuries really. Just aware that certain places on me were numb and others were entirely sore, places that had me flinching and stumbling every now and then, still in chains, the blood where they marked all dried up now, all dried up like the patches of others, not my body's own, from our earlier guerre. I was hungry. I was dying. I wish I did die today.

Suddenly I felt a tug, almost tumbling as bare feet and toes hit rock and boulder, flinching again and taking a knee to catch my breath. We halted. Where was I now? Where was this place now?

"Come. . ." hands. Icy. And that voice. It was the Battle Priest drawing me to my feet and by my shoulders turning me to face a direction. Where was this direction? I kept panting, finding it harder and harder to take in air. Was I really that badly hurt? My insides felt like they have been shredded somewhere.

His hands were gone a minute, only to latch onto the iron circles digging into my wrists, the sort with dull spikes lining inside to trap you in place. It does not cut but moving around with it too much is abrasive. More blood slipping. New scars. I felt his breath against my ear and I went stock-still. "Listen. . ." an order. I swallowed nothing down a parched throat. "I'll take these off, but do not run. If you do, you'll give me every right to hurt you.

"Understood?"

I had no choice. I nodded weakly, unable to find my voice. I'd have done anything at this point to be released from these shackles. They were making me feel faint. My consciousness was barely holding on. Thankfully he did let me go, something clicking against metal to loosen those chains and I could move again. My next instinct was to run, but feeling his looming presence even behind blinded eyes, I sank to my knees then sat down, clutching at my side, my other hand grasping moist earth. Roots. Plants. I felt leaves. Like those that poke around you in the cages. Where. . .was I?

I nearly tore the blindfold off, but it took the best of my efforts as the bare movement of it put more pressure on wounds which I already had. I kept my eyes closed for a bit, scared to see what was before me. That was when I caught wind of a certain scent, a scent that was unlike anything in the forest god's domain that for a moment the sweetness of it stopped me, made my head reel. It finally urged me to peek, slowly lifting my lids to darkness before I had blinked repeatedly to clear my view. Then gaped. I was staring up at the largeness of a very blue moon and around it, all over us both, glowing flowers that shone as bright as the Luna they were paying tribute to.

A breeze blew in. Petals ruffled about and I was distracted by them like so many stars, its constellations dwarfing the background of the clearest skies, but they paled by comparison. The moon got to me more as I sat there without knowing what to do, my mind in a haze, my heart beating loudly. What was this feeling? I was outside for the first time in eons, hands reaching to touch the many blossoms about. Flowers. So many flowers. . .sudden laughter. I turned towards the source of it confused and the Priest stood there with much composure, looking up at the same sky I had found myself enamoured with.

"Beautiful isn't it?" he said with a smile. "Do you like it?" Was he really asking me? My lips parted to make the words but my voice was not there. I could do nothing but nodded and in a way he understood. He walked to tower beside me.

"Would you like see places like this more often? Chalice?" He knew my name? But how? The warring sklaves kept in the cages were not called by any name, or known as anything else but the petty weapons they were. We lived and died every day yet here my name passed his lips so easily, a Legionnaire addressing me like he knew me since then. I stared into his eyes. Such a shade of green they were almost emerald, or could it be the moon? His gaze was absorbing the light.

I did not get what he wanted from me. I was even more confused and cast my attentions elsewhere to find answers I could not grasp in the moment, my mind wandering around. Then I felt his hand again, on my wrist this time and I hissed in pain, my arm drawn out so he could check the marks and other bruises there. I did not dare look up at him again, fingers curling. I was not going to chance anything to disobedience or to the lack of any upbringing and be tossed back to where I had been. At least that was what a voice behind my head was whispering. This man, now inspecting my injuries as he knelt before me, can throw me behind solitude for years again. I shivered at that. I was fearful of everything. Where were they? Vance and Roman? What is happening to them now?

"Nothing a little potion and some ointments cannot heal. I can use the Legion Specific if needed. Are you hungry?" My body was reminded and my insides churned, growling like a feral animal that I clutched at it again. But that nourishment was not the only thing he had in mind. "Are you hungry Chalice?" he again repeated, fingers tipping my face up so I was staring at him again, at his eyes filled with light. "Do you want. . .your freedom?"

// Vance //

[[ Since my Memory logs are reserved for when it is all about me, let's time-skip to the next relevant log. ]]

We stood on an overhanging and the blasted storms were breaking through the horizon. So much rain and lightning. My kind of weather. It had been three months since that day. Never a guerre again after that. Just the personal touches of Legionnaire training with myself, Chalice and Roman brought under the wings of the very people who thrust us upon this road in the first place. But it was fine by me. I could care less because it allowed us some freedom. And last month I was reunited with them.. .

It was at the same ballroom where we had been separated.

I had been schooled into obedience and was walking right behind the one everyone called Captain. He was actually a very powerful man. I had matched fists with him while he taught me and I was easily outclassed. He could outclass anyone in Legion as a matter of fact. A magnificent tactician. A determined head. He moved his troops about with purpose. Most always got what he wanted. And he wanted all the power he could. Even if he meant to destroy and trample others. He taught me how cruel he can become. How utterly merciless it terrified me to my core.

I would never forget it.

"Vance are you listening?"

I had to shake myself up from dreaming. He had been standing before me with a scowl on his face. I did not want to get into trouble again. I often displeased him he said. "Ye-yes Captain." I kept my head low, following him in silence once he'd turned a heel and led us forward again.

We were headed towards the building I now know to be Legionhold. Passing by the familiar path towards the cages but we did not take that and for a moment I was wondering what had happened to the others. What was happening there now? Were there new ones like us in there? In worry I wondered if they were both back there again.

"Vance," again, the Captain stopped to chastise me. But with just that sharp eye over a shoulder. It was enough to demand my silence and all my attention. I listened. "Look ahead. Not behind. Not at memories. You'll keep stumbling over and over that way."

He was right. I was where I had to be and I agreed. I was determined to submit to any and all his lessons to get to the place where he wanted me. To be as powerful as he needed to keep me here. And out of those cages. I did not want to go back. My greatest fear was that. Though at the back of my head I was still worried. I was worried for them. I despaired almost.

It had been a few minutes before we reached Legionhold. I was told there was news everyone needed to hear. I took to the stairs with a heavy heart. Recollecting was not pleasant. It left a bitter taste in my mouth that I was needing to hurl. I felt sick. For a moment I was about to collapse. But a hand steadied me when I could not take another step.

"Easy. You look like you were about to fall," said the voice behind that grip and I looked up to thank whoever it was. To my surprise, a priestly smile greeted me, his face familiar immediately. Saint Rochis. It was him. He was here.

He had visited a few times while I was confined to the Captain's Palace. I could not speak to him that time though. I tried to run away my first few nights that the Captain found it necessary to collar me to the wall in my room where I learned the Legion Laws. The keys kept conveniently away. The only good thing was that the place had so many large windows. I could see outside. At the visitors that came and went. At the view of the open skies.. .

I returned a smile as best I could to the Priest. I tried to say thanks. He stole my words with his own. "Why are you not hurrying to see them inside?" he gave me a pat of encouragement. "Chalice and Roman have been waiting."

My storm eyes might have been as large as the moon of this country that day. When he mentioned them and I was certain he did, all I could do was run. I ran in and almost slipped at the threshold. I ran until I could see them both. My heart racing. I was longing for the company again but most importantly they were safe. They were there and safe.

Seated opposite each other along one of the tables, looking better than I had remembered them, I could not deny the grin on my face at the realization that they had made it. W e made it. W e had survived the worse.. .

"Chal.. .Rome. .."

They turned to look at me just as surprised. A slow moment. A moment trapped in my memory. It would stay to be one of the most cherished. Us three. No longer in the centre of more guerres.

So we all thought.. .

Three months after. It was a mission they had told us to undertake. But only after we had all done learning enough. But unlike most of the guerres we have been in before this one made me feel excited. Why would it not when from that height I was looking down at one of those very legendary things. Creature Classes they were called. Each explosive and destructive. They had power we needed to claim for our own. Another god reared them. Or rather they were born somewhere special and this god matches them to the right being who will later become a Legionnaire. That god was present. He was watching. The storm had mellowed down somehow.

"It's electric. A Weather Beast? I want that one," I smiled over to the two who were in the same way eyeing them below. Their faces looked so serious. Yet Chalice had his gem eyes trained on the god.

"He does not have my faith. Why would he let me claim his Creature?"

I immediately hooked an arm around his neck and pulled him close so we could knock heads. "You don't need to believe in a god to take the power he is offering.

"Come on you two. This is our chance!"

I would always be the conscience of enthusiasm. We all wanted this. I knew behind their stoic faces they were also thinking the same way. "Let's survive this. Let's Ascend together. We'll be Legionnaires on top of the world!" I dragged my weapon out of its sheath.

"Such energy. You might die you realize?" Rome with a frown gripped at the handles of his dual Arsenal and followed. More like he seemed to be having no choice. I was ready to jump.

Chalice shook his head and chuckled, finally, breaking into a smile I had not seen these few months. "Leap of fate?" he said, pun intended. I conceded with an approving nod: "Leap of fate."

And with not a second thought more to spare, lest we had a change of heart, the three of us who were nothing threw everything we got into the task that day. We were not going to leave until we earned what we deserved. After all we had gone through.

We deserved to become Trinity.

// Chalice //

My head thrummed. At the beginning there was a steady pulse, a small drumming which began from my temples that little by little grew to hammer at the sides of my head and all too suddenly shot through my brain, an ache that had me as quickly awakened to sitting up with a scream almost. Too soon as the room spun and whirled around me, hands grabbing my head, only for another separate pair reaching out to steady me. It was Rochis. His words at first made no sense but I caught ". . .head injury. . ." in his statement and I have to make an effort to focus on the rest. What happened? Was I out cold? He slid a palm under the loose strands hung down my forehead and felt for any signs of fever, which I appeared to have but slightly. I was urged to lay back down. I didn't fight that, gladly going neath the pleasant feel of sheets and crisp linen, minute by minute allowing myself to adjust to the situation. I was at the infirmary.

"Do not get up too soon. You have been asleep for a while and might not have strength in your limbs yet," it was my mentor speaking as he reached for a small ornate knife nearby, starting to peel an apple from a pile among baskets of fruits. I had been told I was in recovery, and these were from the Muses who heard of what happened. "You are most popular with our females. They were asking how you were." He chuckled.

How was I? I don't really know. I can't even recall anything in the last few minutes and admittedly was in such a disoriented state that I could not give him proper answers. My body ached certain pains, the discomfort making me dizzy again that all I could do was stare at the ceiling. What happened? I did my best at recalling but then could recall nothing except that dream that had been persisting in my thoughts, my mind's eye looking from another's perspective at my own unconscious body, lain comfortably in sleep against a large and very bright Feline, one I had not seen before. It was. . .watching over me. A Creature that now felt familiar to me.

A Creature.

I shot up in realization and Rochis did laugh this time as I again groaned and fell backwards, an arm dropping over my eyes to hide my embarrassment. I kept forgetting I was injured. "Now Apparent. Did I not just say you needed to take it easy? You have just woken up from being out cold for a while."

"How long had I been sleeping?" My voice came out raspy, throat dry that all I could was whisper that. My mentor helped me to some water while he was explaining, "A week at most. But can you not feel that? You are no longer alone."

I was not alone. He was right. My claim to being Trinity had started with an argument because the forest god forced his will to the creature god and picked my spirit for me yet in the end that never mattered too much. Not now under these circumstances. The title 'Apparent' never sounded so good to my ears that it made me burst into tears, sobbing quietly like a child in the presence of my teacher who was telling me that I did well, that he always knew I could do it, that without any doubt his belief of me never faltered even once. My tears were to thank him, for relief finally and for those many years lost in a sea of near-endless brutality. I had just really felt that freedom he'd promised. I was not going back and was not going back alone to its memories.

"Chalice! You're awake!" Vance's voice. I hurriedly wiped those tears upon the bandages and peered from under that arm, seeing them hurrying in past the Trinity healers and fumbling before Rochis quieted them down. My other two comrades, one of them according to the creature god was my brother to the Creature Class. He was jesting about my 'misfortune', that my Creature was the twin of his, "We thought you weren't going to wake up Ru. You were sleeping like a log." And telling me that with such a straight face, the barest of smiles turning the corner of his lips but visibly enough that I knew he had also been relieved like I was. We have all surpassed a trial. We had made it successfully. Vance was bragging about it. You can't keep him hushed.

"Look at these!" He showed us his back and flexed a bit, the markings there still healing and some were in fact raw. I remember now. He stood between the Weather Beast and us. These were where the claws of that Creature had sank in because, what were his words, "I'll choose my friends over your pathetic test you worthless god." Ironic when he wanted all of this more badly than I or Rome would, but then he actually would stay with us despite having the option to choose his own destiny. I am glad that these were they that I had spent my life with. As agreed, nein, vowed, we will be Trinity together.

I couldn't help but smile.

Rome was laughing however as my teacher gave Vance a harmless smack on the head with the crook of his Ferula. "Child, I said, keep it down! Do you want to be thrown out?" The interesting life as an Heir Apparent thus began for all of us.

// Vance //

We had been running. A good two, three hours maybe. But farther and farther from Legionhold and our home. We had not intended to run away. Far from that, this escape had its own reasons. Except the others might truly view it like that. Because Chalice had been feeding everyone the wrong ideas and we were going to earn ourselves a one-way ticket back to the cages for sure.

Something happened to him in the last few months. It had been subtle almost in the first few days but then he had gone darker and violent every week. Enough that he had caused plenty of disturbance among those older than us. He had been tolerated to an extent. However the outbursts kept erupting from him that it had become increasingly difficult to understand what was happening. Like there was a looming shadow over Chalice's persona for a time now which only began to manifest itself. It was after becoming an Apparent. With the steady flow of the days he seemed to have ceased becoming himself. We had asked if it had been the Creature? Was it poisoned? No one could tell. Not even the god who granted it.

With his change, Roman and I resolved to get him out of harm's way. We kept close company of him and steered him out and off of trouble as best as we could especially since the older Trinity had been voicing complaints. We had been to Blind Obedience at least twice now. But Chalice was a rebel to it like he did not care. He said the life in those cages was better than here. He'd rather die there than be a sklave here.

That was a shock to everyone. Chalice would never say such a thing.. .

"I thought you were watching him!?"

Rome made a frustrated growl directed at me, the fatigue reaching his voice as he spat out, "Fuck that! I have been watching him! How would I know that he would do this?"

Chalice ran away today finally. But not before making sure he had left some lasting damage that would get us likewise tossed back or executed. Forcing us to follow after him as we did now. To drag him back home and have him explain the treachery done. How we lost a guerre because of it.

This was not like Chalice at all! The one we had been through the trials of Conversion with was far from this warmonger who was reckless with his comrades. Something was off. We decided finally. That we had now better put our heads at stake to find the cause. But then he just had to beat us to it. He left chaos back in Legionhold. We chased after him but now we feel like fugitives. Where would we go after we catch up to him? I had been trying to calm myself down numerous times but the fears were rising again.

"It's this way. Feel that?"

Rome was better at all this tracking than I was. He was after all the twin of Chal's Creature. My Weather Beast though had been incredibly restless. Maybe because I was most certain I'd beat that Feline to his senses once I get a hold of him. I felt angry at him for once, "If he was going to self-destruct, he should not have dragged us with him. This is.. ." I sounded murderous for the first time in a while. I didn't mean it though. I was just really worried.

But then fate had a way for us to find out the truth without meaning to. That day when we had chanced upon Chalice again, we had seen something we were not supposed to have encountered.

We don't know what i t was. But its presence was like a nightmare that dimmed out all light. Everything seemed to die at its embrace and, as we looked harder, in its fervent clutches was our friend, all his strength gone. This.. .thing. It was consuming him!

Then right there you realize this was that darkness. It was the very same looming over Chalice at every passing day. The same that had perhaps poisoned his mind. I was trapped with indecision as to what to do about it though. This monster. It scared me. It drew certain horrors from in me.

"Vance! Snap out of it!! He's going to kill Chalice!"

Instinct maybe. Or just those words hitting hard at me. I didn't want to lose any more of my family. Not to the situation and not to the thing that was trying to eat them. I don't know how my body managed to move. But I recall becoming faster than the very lightning coursing the skies.

"Let. Chalice. GO!"

I knew I had used a skill I was not very familiar with that day. But the area rose and fell with thunder. My first storm. It was hell on earth. I had snatched Chalice out of his captor. Roman making the dive to reach him in time before he was flung so far off and into the explosion of my powers gone berserk. I stared into this Darkness then. It grinned back at me.

"Why are Trinity sooo powerful? Sooo d e l i c i o u s?" It was the deep voice of lunacy. This was.. .a monster. One who laid its hands on my only known family and now laid a hand to touch me with its taint. I hated it. I hissed. I gnashed my teeth at it. I did not want it near anyone I cared for.

Raising a summon to lightning, I wanted to just blow it to oblivion. I despised it so much that in that day as the streaks fell, I never stopped until everything.. .until every single thing.. .

Was covered with light.

// Captain Shion Claudius //

The mass fall of lightning was a telltale sign of where they were and where we had to go, myself with around fourteen other Legionnaires armed to the teeth and ready, having dealt and quelled an earlier uproar caused by our Dark Bossers, from whose group we actually determined that indeed that 'being' had returned home, only that cunningly he had avoided detection up until now, hijacking Chalice's mental state more or less since he may not have been able to reach Legionhold in his own body. Throne would have trapped him. Throne which was this said being's prison continent along with others of his kind, the outer rim of our country which kept certain things out, and kept certain creatures in. I was more or less infuriated that day I recall, because I had found out that due to this I was almost near to losing three of our best Apparents, and putting at risk my other men with Darkness' return. Chalice ran away. Roman and my own disciple, Vance, upped and also left and I would never have that. These were my Trinity to-be. I would not let anything as dangerous as a Darkling lay fingers upon my tools of war -they were mine. They belonged to Legion and I would take them back for Legion regardless if we ended up confronting one of our own mistakes. We just had to find those three before h e did something to them; by the looks of it he already was doing something to them, the crazed beat of lightning clearly causing so much destruction before it ebbed down to calmer thunder.

I sent the men fanning out, surrounding the area, though by the time we had arrived it was all over, Chalice safe in Roman's charge as Vance stood panting, his arms dark with burns at his first try of using the Weather Beast's skills. Powerful. Perfect. But he was trembling, body shivering as I approached him. He looked up at me with a blank stare before realizing who I was and, snapping out of his frenzied state, began to fearfully apologize.

"It wasn't us Captain. There was a being. He was trying to take Chalice away and I...we had to...we didn't-"

"We know Vance. Do not worry," I interjected to assure him we understood what happened. I reached hands to lay them on his shoulders, looking at him closely to tell him he had done well before he collapsed from sheer exhaustion, myself letting his form slump itself against my own so he would not meet rocky ground razed by his still unpredictable power. Rochis had been urging the same of Roman whom, trapped up by his own instinct and adrenaline, refused to let go of his weaponry, protective of the unconscious Chalice whose countenance looked too pale for words. He was obviously ill. All three of them were. Darkness and his disease. I frowned.

----

"Had h e been found?"

Lestat shook his head that night when I met him and his hunting party, a capable set of pursuers who were going out again to scour the area for the threat. He had been admitting to how difficult it was becoming, especially since this was a Dark Bosser that was no more than an essence with no form: he could appear once more any moment or he could have already fled, evading our traps and efforts again.

"Who knew one Darkling could be so much trouble; irksome to think he managed to very easily slip under our watch and get to one of our Apparents," Les had voiced with irritation. "We'll go on another sweep. The Fighting Muses are being secured as we speak. The Flowers more importantly. We will make sure that they stay in the Garden Palace with enough watchful eyes."

With that he left, Rochis from the other side of the room having that look colouring his features as he settled an empty potion bottle to the bedside. He was personally nursing Chalice to health, massive Spell Circles of Light and Grand Exorcism casting an ethereal glow on his features from below. He frowned at me.

"You knew he would come back for this one," he motioned to the Feline in bed. "What more now that he had sensed Chalice to have acquired power?"

"Don't tell me you are in doubt Roc? A Priest should have more faith."

"I have more than enough, Captain, but there is trouble in paradise we cannot control," he sighed. "I do not want to use my own student as the bait to seduce catastrophe."

I narrowed my eyes at his words. "Then make him even more powerful. Make him Ascend. Then he would be the snare that will latch onto the monster you seem to fear in Darkness."

I was not jesting. I envisioned both Vance and Roman in the other rooms as we had visited them earlier to take the same path and graduate to Trinship without fail. Let's see if after that Darkness would still be able to tamper with any of their minds.

Chalice stirred out of his feverish confusion and in a sudden and unexpected move reached a hand out deliriously, "Sa-Salem..." I was mirroring the same shock on Rochis' face. "He took...Salem..." was he recalling it all? "He has Salem...

"He has my brother..."