Reflections Of The Sun/Part 2

Glory watched. That was all he could do since the Demon Ghost had taken his body years ago. All the horror of that day had faded into the background, as had so many other details of the past years. Forgetfulness was his only solace, his only balm.

That and the training. Praise to the Steel Shield, the Warder of Warders, the only God his father had worshipped and the only one Glory knew to pray to. Praise that most of the last years had not been spent in evil, but in training.

He had only been six when the Demon Ghost, Concealed Heraldry, had taken him. From that time until recently, the Demon Ghost had spent all the time in between training and practicing. Though Glory had been an active child, the Demon pushed his body to greater and greater feats over the years. He’d survived in the woods, catching animals and harvesting plants. He had practiced incessantly various forms of hand and foot fighting, not the sword work his father had known, but too many ways to fight unarmed to keep track of.

Only Glory had kept track of it. That was all there was for him. That or madness. And so he learned. It was surprisingly easy. Though the Demon Ghost held his body, Glory could still feel it. So, he felt the full weight of himself when he jumped over a branch. He felt all the muscles shift in just the right way now when the Demon Ghost threw a phantom punch through the air. He felt exactly how to place his feet so as to make no noise at all, and he saw through the Demon’s control of his eyes what things to look for to find someone, to track them.

And the Essence. That was still indescribable. The Demon Ghost brought its own power with it, and much of all the years since had been spent exercising that power. Using Glory’s mortal body as a conduit for its power. At first, the Demon Ghost could do little more than enhance its host. Gradually, he was able to produce darkness. Then illusions so real that Glory would have been deceived, if not for the Demon’s knowledge that it was made.

Years of channeling Essence through his mortal host had made the Demon far stronger than it had been when it first came, and yet Glory had seen and felt the use of that Essence too. He didn’t know where that power came from, he couldn’t touch it, but he knew how it felt and the mark it left upon him.

Only a few years ago, the Demon had stopped for a drink of water from a pool and had caught sight of its mortal host’s face. Glory had seen what the Demon saw, and that was an older face of a youth with mirrors for eyes. And he had heard the Demon say “As it should be” though he didn’t understand why, what it had done to him, or what it would mean for the future.

Glory had long ago resigned himself to being the Demon’s unknowing prisoner until he died or went mad at last. It had been no burden though, for he found comfort in simply perceiving and not thinking. Years had passed without Glory thinking anything beyond observing and learning.

Until recently.

The Demon had traveled from village to village in recent years, sometimes even passing into a larger city. Always, it asked carefully framed questions, always searching for these Sidereal, always for the one, this Concluding Emollient. Always, the Demon’s efforts had been frustrated, no information ever found. And the Demon’s frustration had grown and grown and grown.

Until this last year. The Demon had walked into a village and questioned a local mystic, asking if he knew of the location of books that might pertain to the Sidereals. The mystic had not known. Instead of leaving, the Demon Ghost had struck in anger and slew the mystic with a single blow. When the Demon left, it began killing those he found, men, women and children all. Thirty seven people died that day and yet it was only the beginning.

From that time forward, the Demon Ghost slew everyone it found. Wanderers. Merchants. A guild supply wagon once. A military patrol, which had required amazing feats of skill from the Demon to kill ten soldiers girded with mail and wielding swords with only its hands. Those who ran escaped but those who stood against the Demon died one and all.

It had only been a short while ago that Glory had heard a new name for the Demon Ghost; the Perfect Mirror Demon. That had been uttered from the lips of the first person to see his face, and that person had not survived the naming. Others had cried out that name, others who did manage to escape. Afterwards, the Demon Ghost had chuckled to itself, seemingly amused by the name.

And today, Glory watched. He watched the Demon Ghost in his body walk along the dirt road and into the outskirts of a small village, yet another that had not tasted death from the Perfect Mirror Demon.

This was Rapskillion, a trade town between several larger cities that the Demon had come to before. But it had never looked so deserted. And this time, he saw the Princes of the Earth rise to meet him. Stepping from nearby homes where doors had concealed them, men and women in gleaming smooth jade armor of different colors emerged. Some carried the legendary swords of the Dragon-Blooded, the fearsome Daiklaive itself. Others carried other weapons of jade; axes, maces, shields and bows. Ten of them.

Glory felt…fear. Fear that at last the Demon Ghost had found a challenge that his body wouldn’t survive. That he would die, that the black depths of the underworld would rise up and swallow him down when one of the Princes struck him, and the Demon Ghost would just spring free and find another host. Glory felt panic welling within him for the first time in years and yet he couldn’t cry out. He couldn’t even struggle enough for the Demon to notice him. He had forgotten how.

So Glory watched. Helpless.

“Ahhh, the snake bloods have arrived,” the Demon Ghost said, Glory’s face curving in a contemptuous smirk. “And very pretty too. I’m not surprised that you resort to ambushing a lone traveler. Your kind is so very, very good at striking through treachery.”

The Princes of the Earth scowled and tension crawled through the air and across Glory’s skin, the feeling of the air before a storm. “So, the Perfect Mirror Demon can speak. Know that your heinous crimes have warranted your execution. We, the Wyld Hunt, have come to execute that judgment by executing you. Surrender and we may spare your life but contest us and die in more pain than you can imagine.”

“I’ve already died once to your pathetic Daiklaves, snake blood,” the Demon Ghost spoke. “And only because you struck from surprise and with so many. Even a Solar can be felled by great numbers. Even from such a pathetic substance as jade. Not one of you bear Oricalcum as I once did. Because your polluted blood cannot bear the power. And so you cannot defeat me. You lack the strength.”

Expressions of fear crossed their faces, as well as other emotions Glory had never learned to identify. “Anathema! A true Anathema!” The one who spoke first, the tallest and proudest of them sneered and spoke again. “He is only one and we are many. We have fought the Abyssal before and we can do so again!”

“I’m not an Abyssal,” the Demon Ghost retorted. “Those perversions of the Sun’s creative work. I would destroy them myself, to liberate their corrupted animas if I could. But one thing at a time. Do you know a Sidereal named Concluding Emollient?”

“A Sidereal?” “He knows what the Sidereal are?” “What is he?” The chorus of questions quickly passed through Glory’s ears and he felt the Demon Ghost’s confidence grow.

“Tell your masters that the Perfect Mirror Demon can be slain by no man or woman born but by the Chosen of Endings Concluding Emollient. But should he come, he could very well face final destruction himself for his treachery. Compared to him, you are all children in deceit. Go. I will spare you this time, for the sake of having my name delivered to my betrayer.”

“I think, instead, we shall deliver your head,” spoke a new voice. Glory realized somehow that this man in a dark yet gleaming suit of burnished iron had been there all along, and yet only now did he perceive his presence. A strange mark blazed upon the man’s head and his eyes gleamed with dark and terrible power. “I am Chosen of Endings Winding Contemplation. I do not believe your destiny can be ended only by Chosen Concluding Emollient. I believe your destiny ends here, today. And so it shall be.”

“Your pathetic tricks of destiny are wasted against me, Sidereal,” the Demon Ghost said harshly, and Glory trembled before the drowning tide of black rage and hate at the sight of the man in iron. “I may walk in Creation now, but my present nature lies beyond it, and so beyond your control. Your kind betrayed us all once and all of you will pay for the crimes you committed. I grant you a stay of execution, to inform your master of his imminent destruction. But rest assured, when he is dead, I shall come for all of you. The Realm will be rebuilt and led by those the Sun chose, but we will not make the mistake we once did. We will never trust your kind again, but instead seal you away in chains of starmetal, binding your own power against you. So you may be a reminder to all who thought they could seize power not rightfully theirs!”

The Sidereal’s face grew paler throughout the discourse, then firmed. “I discern you now. The Perfect Mirror Demon is one of the Anathema of the First Age. And so we must destroy him now. Quickly. Before he has a chance to establish more of his power for this battle!”

As one, the Princes of the Earth rushed the Perfect Mirror Demon. Glory tried to scream at the charge, but had no voice to cry out with anymore. It had been lost long ago.

The Perfect Mirror Demon stepped to the side, and yet the burst of Essence he left behind left a Perfect Mirror Demon for the Princes to attack, their Daiklaves bursting through its form uselessly. The Demon seized the first’s sword arm and shattered the elbow with a harsh twist. An axe tore through the air, only to pass over Glory’s head as the Demon ducked. Black welled from his body and in seconds the battle took place in the deepest, blackest gloom.

And yet the Princes fought on valiantly, hardly diminished by the lack of light. Weapon after weapon the Demon dodged, at one point parrying one’s attack with another’s weapon through artful maneuvering. A Prince fired a glittering bolt of jade light at the Perfect Mirror Demon. And that is when the Princes began to die.

The Demon caught the bolt in one hand, spun with its momentum and buried the shaft in a Prince’s throat. Blood spilled over Glory’s hand and the Demon laughed its delight. A Daiklave came crashing down in an overhead arc and yet the Demon slipped under it, grabbing the Prince and heaving along the lines of the swing’s momentum, causing the Prince to follow the path of his own blade and come crashing to the ground.

Fire rimmed the sword of one Prince as he erupted in an onslaught of fierce attacks. Faster than the Prince, the Demon lifted another into the path of the blows and each strike of the Daiklave crumpled more of the captured one’s armor until the Demon dropped the pierced and bleeding body of the one he held to the ground.

Glory felt the body he had long learned feel heavier, slower. As the Perfect Mirror Demon dodged and struck, his hands seemed less sure, his blows weaker…but it was not enough. When a blow to the throat was not enough to fell a Prince, the Demon gripped that one’s throat and tore out his windpipe, laughing deliriously with the carnage. The Demon was not quite quick enough to escape the sting of a Daiklaive, drawing blood from Glory’s body and yet the Prince screamed when the Demon broke his knee, then his arm, then his neck.

So many of the Princes lay dead and dying. One of the remaining few swung broadly in desperation. The Demon jerked to the side to avoid the hit, grabbed the Prince’s arm and spun him around. One of Glory’s arms slipped around the Prince’s neck and the other cradled his head. Pressure applied, and the Prince began to choke.

The Princes fell back and the Sidereal stepped forward, face unreadable.

“I yield,” the Sidereal spoke. “Release my man and we will go and deliver your message.”

“No, I think I’ve changed my mind,” the Demon Ghost spoke. “If Concluding Emollient is such a great Chosen of Endings, he should see how this battle…ends, shouldn’t he? And he will see for himself that only one of his strength can possibly prevail against me. No, I think…your deaths will serve me better.” With a vicious twist, the Perfect Mirror Demon broke the Prince’s neck and left him to die on the ground. “Come, Sidereal. Your kind prided themselves on their fighting skill with the hands once. Show me what you’re made of, show me that your bastard Realm has truly made you greater than you once were.”

“Flee, now!” the Sidereal cried. The three surviving Princes ran, their feet leaving prints of fire as they raced with tremendous speed. The Sidereal himself spun and darted, leaping for the roof of a building.

“Treacherous bastards!” screamed the Demon Ghost after them. “You could never stand against us in battle! So why did you think to stand against our rule?” The enemy fled and yet the Demon continued to talk, long lost rage and anguish welling from his voice. “We were the Sun’s Chosen! We were Solar! We were His Generals against the Primordials! We threw them down! So why couldn’t you trust us? Why couldn’t you let us take care of the Realm as was our place?”

The Demon’s voice fell away as the Princes and the Sidereal were out of earshot, softer now but no less fierce. “Yes, we were…not what we were. Some of us had betrayed our duties. Corruption was rife throughout the system. But we were dealing with it. I was dealing with it. I would have purged the evil from our government, rooted out not only insurrection but negligence from my brethren. I knew the problem. I was dealing with it.”

“But I trusted you, Concluding Emollient. My advisor. You bastard Sidereal, you saw what was coming and you made it happen! Damn you! The Sun curse you and taint you and see you writhe in agony for the next million years for your treachery! Damn you!” The Demon Ghost was screaming again and Glory felt the power of Concealed Heraldry’s wrath as it thundered through his body. “I could have stopped it! I could have saved all those lives but you set me up! You…killed me!”

The Demon’s rage peaked and raw Essence on a scale Glory had never before imagined exploded forth. The houses of the village came apart, shredded before the Demon’s might. The ground was ripped away by such fury, trees broke apart. Lightning shot from the sky, flames erupted across the exposed dirt and everything began to die. Wood crumbled to dust, plants and trees died and decayed into moldering piles in seconds. What wasn’t destroyed, fell into ruin.

And so Rapskillion passed into destruction and was no more. And the Legend of the Perfect Mirror Demon grew…