Lord save me from my friends; I can take care of my enemies. Voltaire 1668 - 1774

Huge gray clouds loomed over the capital city of Alusia threatening to burst with water anytime soon. Chilly winds swept the empty, dusty streets that were bustling few minutes before.

From his crouching spot in the woods, ten year old Gabriel looked at the threatening clouds in the sky and muttered;

"Who knew it would be harder to lose those guards than before? Now the rain is coming in early and I'm yet to reach the spring."

Gabriel stood up and walked deeper into the forest. His golden hair hardly swayed and his soft blue eyes shone with a firmness not normally seen in a ten year old. Half of his face was covered by an iron mask but he didn't seem bothered about it. The mask had been there since he could remember. He had never seen that half of his face and no one had.

Suddenly Gabriel stopped and his brow wrinkled. He looked around, not wishing to believe his thoughts. But a wish was, after all, a wish. He was lost.

He began to retrace his steps but it was useless. Green trees surrounded him on all sides. Suddenly, his mask glowed with a negligible green light which went unnoticed by the wearer and the space before him began to warp until it was completely distorted.

Gabriel loved his life more than anything else and just couldn't see the need for warriors to explore potentially dangerous areas but he reasoned that any progress was better than none at all so he went in anyways. As he stepped into the distorted space, his vision went black before it shone with a brilliant white. Soon enough, he was in a grassy plain covered with flowers of all kinds. At the middle stood a little cottage.

Gabriel looked about and was about to move to the cottage when he heard the soft padding of footsteps and a loud voice.

"Lola, get back here!"

As he twirled about to see who it was, a white fur ball smacked right into his chest, making his head spin and his vision blur.

Just before he fainted,he thought; oh my! What a foolish idea it was to explore. Now I'm going to die here and my precious life would be a waste!

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Valerina looked down at the boy Lola had knocked unconscious and blinked. Soon she began to cry.

"Oh I've killed someone! Oh Lola! Oh wait! What had aunt Margaret told me to do in this sort of situation? Oh right! Check the pulse."

Valerina bent and wrapped her hand very amateurly round his wrist, pulled it back half a second later and said;

"I've never really learnt to take a pulse have I Lola?"

Lola, the cat, rolled its eyes at its master's mutterings before sniffing the boy and meowing. Valerina stopped her muttering and looked wide eyed at the cat.

"He's not dead? Ah good, let's take him into the cottage," she said and picked the boy. The boy looked lean but weighed quite a lot. After a lot of tussling and tumbling and dragging, they arrived at the cottage.

Valerina lit a lamp and heaved the boy unto a bed in the room then sat down on a chair, exhausted. The bed was the one aunt Margaret usually used but she was out and would return in a week's time. The house was really lonely without aunt Margaret but her scent lingered in the room.

Valerina's eyes looked around the room before landing on the boy. She drew a sharp breath and leaned in in a hurry. Valerina had never seen another male apart from her father who only visited once in a while but she was sure the boy was a topnotch beauty.

His golden hair was long and as smooth as silk and his lips were thin and red. She couldn't see his eyes but she was sure they were beautiful.

Valerina was still immersed in her fantasies when Gabriel awoke. His eyes were just slightly open so Valerina took no notice.

Immediately he opened his eyes, he closed them and gulped. He knew he was handsome but the girl in front of him was just gawking so much that all remained was for her to begin drooling!

Valerina traced his face with her eyes and frowned when she saw the iron mask on his face. It took all her training as a well bred lady not to try to remove the mask.

Though the mask blocked the boy's face, it was still beautiful in its own way. A flower was drawn - petals, stem, root and it seemed extremely life-like. She dazedly traced the drawing and felt her head spin when she got to the root.

Suddenly, the boy stirred and she immediately retracted her finger. The boy opened his soft blue eyes with a dazed expression. Just immediately, Lola sprang up and swiped at his neck with lightening speed.

Who knows if it was by coincidence or not but the boy suddenly tilted his head and the cat barely missed his neck and slammed head first onto the wooden headboard and was knocked back. The little feline stumbled and began to walk off the bed. She hadn't taken two steps when her eyes rolled back and she lay down, unconscious.

Gabriel shifted uneasily on the bed while Valerina just stared wide eyed

"Well, that was......unexpected," Valerina began. "I'm Valerina by the way," she said and stretched out her hand.

"Gabriel," replied the boy absentmindedly.

After that they fell into an awkward silence until Valerina decided to break the silence.

"So.......want some tea?"

"I'd like some thank you."

Moments later they were seated at the table, Valerina directly across Gabriel.

"You came from Pionel woods didn't you?" Valerina said, referring to the woods he had been lost in.

"Yes," he answered.

"So how is it out there? Is it beautiful?"

Gabriel grimaced as a plethora of scenes flashed through his mind.

"It's beautiful enough," he said irritatedly.

"I heard everything out there is beautiful....and there's no much wars....." Gabriel's mouth twitched. The girl's words tore at his wounds. Oh well, it was because it was the twelfth of the month.

"....or deaths or large scale violence......"

"It's not!" Gabriel couldn't bear the girl's naive thoughts anymore and snapped. "It's a place filled with deaths,wars and horrible bloodsucking demons called razatches." He leaned in. "Its a hard,cruel world so you better get out of your fantasy," he finished and walked out.

Valerina sat there, dazed for a second before coming back to reality. What Gabriel had said had a toll on her mind. After all,what she had said was what her aunt Margaret had told her. Could aunt Margaret be lying?

Valerina shook her head. What was she thinking? Aunt Margaret would never lie.

"Jerk,"she said and snorted.

She didn't want to believe it but most of the books she had been forbidden to read, which she had read at one point in time, spoke of deaths and violence and an ancient group called the ethereal four and bloodsucking razatches. Valerina had taken them as a fantasy. Now the question still remained. Valerina shook her head again. Aunt Margaret couldn't be lying right?

Gabriel stood in front of the cottage, staring far, far away. His eyes were distant and tears threatened to spill. He had once believed in Valerina's perfect world but it was crushed in a sea of blood and corpses. The royal family didn't know he knew but he did. He knew of that secret. He knew he was actually the emperor's nephew, his sister's son. Valerina's mindless blabbering had made him recall a memory. A memory of blood and corpses. Then he snapped. He hadn't meant to. After all, it wasn't her fault. She was still a ten year old, like himself, but hadn't seen the world like he had, but he had snapped. And now he felt guilty. Terribly guilty.

€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€

Night time, Xerdes

Ellen wound her cloak round herself as she ran down the stairs. It was a cold, rainy night and the wind blew heavily and hard but Ellen didn't mind since she had no intention to go out.

Reaching the bottom of the stairs she took a left, a right next, up a swirly staircase, up another one and got to a huge door. Opening the door a little, she poked her head into the room.

"Grandpa?" She called out in a childish voice. A husky voice greeted her and invited her in.

She softly padded across the dimly lit room and swiftly entered her grandfather's embrace.

"Why are you here my little misha?"

Ellen giggled softly. She loved when her grandfather called her his little misha.

"I'm scared," she said.

"Alright,don't be scared. Grandpa Antonio is here for you," old Antonio said as he patted the little girl's hair.

Ellen's silver hair glimmered like Antonio's but her mother had given her a set of bewitching purple eyes.

"Grandpa?"

"Hmm?"

"Tell me a story."

Antonio smiled. This was already more or less a routine. When Ellen was still small, during rainy nights, she would come to her grandfather's room because she was scared of lightening and Antonio would always tell her a story. Even now, at ten, Ellen still could not overcome this habit.

Antonio exhaled loudly; a sign that he was about to start a story.

"Once the world was a pitch black endless space, stretching as far as the eye could see. It was just an endless void. After endless years the spirit of the creator hovered in the pitch black darkness. The creator created the earth and everything in it. The lands were barren so he sent water to make the soil moist. The water was the only element at the time so it became arrogant and made the whole earth a domain of water, thinking itself the overlord of the world.

The creator saw it's arrogance and sent down the earth to subdue water. Earth descended and subdued water and part of water became ice. Soon, plants sprang up on the earth surface but everywhere was eerily quiet so the woods begged the creator to send them a companion. The creator sent wind as their companion. Wind descended, freely moving from a corner of the world to another. The trees rattled and sound was made.

The sun, being fire, grew jealous and descended upon the earth in a fury, enveloping the earth. At the same time, ice melted and rushed in in waves, extinguishing the fire before becoming ice one more.

From then, a new era begun. The water had pushed fire down to the middle of the earth and droplets of ice mixed with earth and was tempered by the flames of fire and, becoming crystals. After years, metal was formed under the earth h and life appeared in the form of insects and animals. But living things were foolish so the creator created the concept of time and with time, the various lived ng things developed a mind to think for themselves and so the world began....."

"Grandpa?" Ellen interrupted.

"Yes?"

"Do you think the creator loves me?"

"Mhmm. He loves all his blessed creations."

Ellen pouted.

"Then the creator won't love me for long."

"Don't say that my little misha. The creator's love is eternal," Antonio said solemnly.

Lightening flashed at the windows and Ellen snuggled deeper into Antonio's embrace and for a short while, Antonio was relieved Ellen was not.......