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Claude’s thick soled combat boots crushed the gravel beneath his feet as he made his way through the dark damp winding tunnels of the catacombs. He was below Sparklieyr. The catacombs of Sparklieyr was strange and different, he could feel the bottled up magic swirling around him. It was all being directed to one place. Claude followed the magic stream, Shadows could see and feel stuff like that, magic streams, sound waves, light waves, energy levels. It was strange, but a handy skill to have, especially when their five senses fail.
Eventually, the tunnel that Claude followed ended with a massive wooden gate. With uncertainty, he reached for the handle. Magic charged into his hand as he grabbed the metal bar, it charged throughout his body and then left without disturbing any of his internal mechanism. He assumed he had passed the test. Some places were like that, a magic flow-through to test for certain things. Sometimes it would be for personality traits, loyalty was a common one, followed by honesty and so forth. Other times, the magic may be tuned to find physical traits or objects on the person. It was the magical way of using locks and keys or fingerprinting and retina scans.
Claude pushed opened the heavy wooden gates with ease. Beyond them were gloomy skies and an ancient looking forest with an eerie, ghastly atmosphere. Most noticeably, the ground had bones and skulls mixed and crushed into the dirt forest floor. The trees were bare and looked to have been dead for centuries, yet they still stood there, strong and unwavering in the harsh wind. As for the flora and fauna, well it didn’t exist.
Ahead, there were five massive trees with a complex treehouse system built in, each tree house looked to be ten or twenty stories tall, with stained glass windows that depicted a story that Claude was very familiar with. The Legend of the Two Qin Masters.
Qin was an ancient multi-stringed instrument favoured by immortals of the eastern tribes of the Nine Rings. Once upon a time, two immortals from different tribes and considerably different upbringings walked through the realms playing their Qin, using it to banish demons that had predictably escaped from hell, as they tend to do on a regular basis, as well as punishing any wrong doers. For a time, they were looked up to by all immortals and held in the highest esteem.
“Wu Hui Jin,” a low raspy sounded from behind Claude. He swung around to see a silver haired young man, with a Qin strapped to his back. He wore the traditional white robes of a Qin musician. “Welcome to realm of no regrets, Prince of Blood, undead son of Queen Mary Tudor the First of England,” said the young man. He had white hollow eyes and appeared to be blind as his steps crunched over the bones of the forest floor.
“Mr Rain,” Claude gasped recognising the man immediately. He looked the same as the statue that Claude had prayed to so frequently back when he was still in the Shadow Paladins.
Mr Rain smiled blankly. “I come here every day to tell myself that I should have no regrets. Tell me, what brings a son of one of the Five Heavenly Queens of Hell to my humble abode?”
Claude gulped, he hated his mother’s title. It often gets shortened to just The Five Queens. The real meaning of it is that the harmony of five of them combined had the power to destroy the Nine Rings, it came originally out of a prophecy. That was a given, something that was foreseen by many prophets. Claude liked to think that he was very distant from that, but it would be a lie that even he could not believe in. Bloody Mary was chosen as one of the Five Queens after her mortal death. It was many years after that when she suddenly decided she wanted children. lots of children, despite not having any during her life. In fact she became hellbent on having “too many” children. Whilst many had guessed why that was the case, no one really knew what she was thinking, not even Claude who had vowed to go against everything his mother wanted from him understood why she did the things she did.
“I heard a rumour,” Claude began, “that you once made a bargain with Destitia.”
Some time prior, when Claude was in the Glisten Fort the second time, he was given the Eternal Chalice by Nyal on orders from King Raynior. In the lining of that box, Claude had found a small scroll with coordinates, which he did not put in there. The coordinates had lead him to an old run down temple for some unnamed Gods of Music that Parisora had forgotten long ago. There, he saw two very familiar statutes, one of Mr Rain and one of Ryuming. On the walls of the temple was the Legend of the Two Qin Masters that Claude had grown up reading. He loved that story. But the walls told of a rather different version.
Mr Rain was tortured genius who understood that the Nine Rings was dying if nothing was done. He fell from the heavens and started the Chaos Wars as means to keep the Nine Rings together. His journey was a painful and lonely one as he could not explain to anyone why he did what he did, for they did not understand, not even Ryuming.
When the gods could not capture him, they turned to his only weakness, Ryuming. To save Ryuming, Mr Rain approached the Destroyer King, Destitia, with a bargain. Then, there were cracks in the wall that erased the next part of the story, the most intriguing part too. The ending however, was just as Claude knew it, Mr Rain was pierced through his heart by Ryuming and he fell from a tall cliff into a deep ravine. Two weeks later, Ryuming took his own life and faded too. That was the tragedy of the two most famous Qin Masters.
The temple hid a map that revealed the location of Wu Hui Jin, Regretless, that would be how Claude would translate the name. It was a realm hidden away from the Nine Rings, a private realm as some would describe it, a realm that bordered the Ring of Abyss and the Outer Ring.
Mr Rain laughed, a gentle yet crackling laughter. “I did make a bargain,” he said rather plainly, “and it got me here.”
“May I ask what?”
“Eternal exile to guard a place that no one even knew existed,” Mr Rain answered. “In return, Destitia would keep Ryuming safe and alive.”
“But he committed suicide,” Claude frowned. Everyone knew that, especially since Ryuming’s younger sister was now a Shadow nicknamed Madam Ghost, she still holds remembrance rites for her brother along with a deep grudge against the Water Summoner Tribe, having sworn to one day avenge the fading of her brother.
“He did, but not before making another bargain with Destitia,” Mr Rain explained. “Bargaining with Destitia is like gambling, I would not recommend it to anyone, not even my worst enemy.”
“But I don’t want to fade just yet,” Claude said. “I want to live, for one more lifetime.”
Mr Rain tiled his head, his long silvery hair glistened despite the lack of a sun in the sky. “I see you really like that mortal Prince, but remember, he will forget you eventually and sooner than you think.”
“I can’t bear his pain,” Claude said, “please, how do I find Destitia?”
Mr Rain looked at him with his glassy white eyes. “Love is cruel on those who do not exist in the normal fold of the Nine Rings.”
“Then you would understand why I must do this.”
“There is no must,” Mr Rain cut him off, “I never regretted my decision to save the Nine Rings, but how many years could it struggle on for? All one could do was postpone the inevitable. I played my part, now it is time for you, for all of Nine Rings, to do the same.”
*
Ace tried not to count the days they’ve spent together, him and Claude. The storm cloud of knowing that Claude did not have long loomed over him and refused to leave.
One morning, Edith ungraciously bursted into his bedroom and violently pulled back the curtains, letting the light pierce through the darkness of the room. “Rise and shine lovebirds,” she sang in strangely cold voice.
Ace groaned as he snuggled further into Claude’s arms. “Can you not?”
“Relax, I’ve walked in on worse,” Edith told him as she floated their clothes off the ground and onto the bed.
“Edith, no,” Claude warned as he sat up. The blanket fell away revealing a bare chest full of old ugly scars that never healed right.
Edith chuckled. “Not here to intentionally make your mornings bad, but delivering some bad news. Morrigan just named her faded son as the 10th ruling God of Death, in retrospect.”
“I know that already,” Claude mumbled in response as he attempted to coax Ace out of bed. “Now tell me something I don’t know.”
“How about Blood Cloud just faded.”
Ace could feel Claude freezing up in shock beside him, he peaked out from beneath the covers just in time to see Claude’s eyes turn from red back to its usual black. He always knew that Claude had an issue of going blood thirsty when he got emotional.
“Says who?” Claude asked with a heavy hint of denial in his voice.
“Well, Angel, his understudy and half apprentice, just took over as Sixth Elder of the Vampire Tribe, everyone else’s positions got shifted up by one given that Blood Cloud was the Second Elder,” Edith told him. “Any news from your leader?” She was referring to the ruling God of Death, Morrigan the 9th.
Claude looked at her coldly. “That’s none of your business.”
Edith clicked her tongue. “So you’re off?” Despite her hatred of her half siblings, Prince was one that she could read reasonably well and she decoded that sentence as I’m going to go die now so you can go back to whatever shit you were doing before and stop bothering Ace!
Ace’s head perked up. “What?”
“Don’t act so surprised, Acelin,” Claude muttered as he slid out of bed fully dressed. “I told you I’m not staying for long.” He turned his attention back to his sister. “Tell Warlock he can have whatever’s left in my storage realm, I owe him that much, and that I’m sorry I never said goodbye.”
“Why would you assume that he knows you didn’t fade?”
“Because you’re here and let’s just say Warlock has a few more braincells than you,” Claude scowled. “Hell even Summer has a few more brain cells than you. As for Mr Rain, alive or not he’s certainly not in this realm and I don’t think it’s up to me to solve that puzzle.” He lied, he could never tell anyone that he’s seen Mr Rain, or what he had discovered. The portrait gave him the idea that Mr Rain may be able to help and in his heart, Claude thanked the fact that Morrigan the 9th had such incredible foresight.
Ace got a headache every time those “mysteries” became the centre of conversation. “Claude are you seriously going to leave? Forever?”
Claude paused whatever it was that he was doing with the little rhinestones attached to his belt. “I don’t know.”
“Of course he is,” Edith scoffed, “a Shadow always knows when they are fading, don’t they?”
Claude seemed a little out of it, actually, he was incredibly out of it. He didn’t even respond to Edith, instead, he pulled out his rapier and threw it hard into the ground, a splatter of black magic appeared around it before dissipating. Claude muttered an ancient protection spell under his breath as the rapier faded out of sight, leaving a dark red seal representing the House of Tudor on the floor.
“You’re kidding me,” Edith rolled her beautiful black eyes.
“I don’t trust you to not kill Clay, Edith, or Ace for that matter,” Claude said sharply. He turned to Ace with a small plead in his eyes. “Please look after Clay, Ace. You’re the only person I trust.”
Ace’s heart skipped a beat as he heard it, it made him feel special. “Of course. But you are coming back, right?”
Claude glared at Edith, some silent message passed between them. Eventually Edith threw her hands in the air with a scoff and left, slamming the door closed with magic behind her.
“Ace, I’m sorry,” Claude said simply. “I don’t know if I can.” There was uncertainty in his voice, his heart exploding with emotions, all the things he wanted to say, yet he could say none of it. He didn’t know what his future looked like, or even if he had one.
Ace looked devastated as he sat in bed half dressed. Eventually he pulled himself out and gave Claude a tight hug, he had been mentally preparing himself for days, but he couldn’t help the tears.
“Oh don’t cry, Ace,” Claude coaxed him gently. “If I don’t return by midnight, then forget I ever existed.” He pushed Ace away and in a whirl of wind disappeared.
*
Almost simultaneously, on the other side of the palace, Edith was erasing traces of her presence with magic, altering memories of the servants as she went. She took great strides as she entered her living quarters where the young Summer was sipping tea and reading a book on the Legend of the Two Qin Masters. Edith frowned but didn’t think much of it, Summer always enjoyed to read about past legends, it was nothing new.
“Pack up, we’re leaving,” Edith announced. “This witch hunt was over the moment I found Prince did not fade.”
Summer did not look overly surprised. “What should I report?” She had a job to report back to the Bounty Hunter League, well technically Edith does as she’s Captain but Edith hated doing it so whenever Summer’s around, that job fell on the young bounty hunter’s shoulders.
“Nothing,” Edith replied shortly.
“Captain, you can’t be serious, you shot all of our comrades! Without a reasonable explanation, we’ll end up under internal investigation very promptly!”
Edith rolled her eyes. “When you’re bounty hunter who is related to Shadows, you ought to get used to killing fellow teammates whose only purpose is to get in your way.” When she saw the look the sensible young lady was giving her, she sighed. “Tell them an unknown Shadow took out our teammates, we live because of Shadow’s honour, Shadows cannot kills us.”
Summer’s mouth twitched as she heard that. “And Prince?”
“He’s gone,” Edith answered. “I’m heading back to my institute, I’ll let you know when I have tips on another witch hunt.”
“Send my regards to Warlock then,” Summer said. “And condolences too.”
“Mother always said Warlock had too much compassion,” Edith muttered as she disappeared through a portal.
Summer let out a light chuckle as she too went on her way. Her visit had been an interesting one, she wondered why Morrigan the 9th ordered Prince to give her the Eternal Chalice, it’s not as if Summer had any connections to the Chalice’s creator, Destitia. In fact, quite the opposite, Destitia was well past the point of legend by the time Summer was born, they were just about forgotten by the entire Nine Rings. In her guts, she knew that something was brewing beneath the surface. Magic was flowing in a strange way these days, and that Morrigan the 9th had selected her to find out. Summer couldn’t help but sigh for she did not feel like Morrigan made the right call at all.
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