CHP21

Briel closed his eyes.

Acryan opened them.

Almost eighteen years ago in another body, another mind.

He watched through golden eyes at the world. The city of Kaltah went silent that evening.

In this life, Acryan stood only six feet tall. Shythe stood taller than him, and by all delightful rights, Sai did as well, just like when they first met. Acryan loved this life. She had born him only one child this reincarnation, and that child had born them a grandchild, Zaien.

His yellow crackling fires came to him only in the past few months, leaving him full of spit and vinegar. Acryan loved him so much.

Acryan, Tuval as they called him in those days, stumbled on his way home from drinking. Shythe and he had gotten sotting drunk, giving his liver a healer’s workout it wouldn’t forget. They were friends then. They were no friends now.

His mana flowed wild and free within him, and he meandered his way back to their palace, full of the notion of tackling Esca, the incarnation of Sai in this life, to their bed and doing things that would warrant new furniture come the next day. A grin and blush came over him, and his swagger drew him to his home.

“Acryan,” A voice whispered to him in the breeze. He twisted around and squinted.

“What in the blackest of ink is going on?” Acryan declared as he heard his name whispered once more.

“Creepy sarsa,” he grumbled, taking another step before he realized that something was off, something was very… very… very off. A breeze always swept through Kaltah, a light cold wind at night. The world stood still; leaves on trees paused in motion.

“Oh no, you don’t. No, no, no,” Acryan said as he swore under his breath and stomped his foot. Sobriety took hold in an instant. “What do you want!?” His face tilted up to the sky, a rude gesture on his hand as he thrust it skywards.

“I want my song returned to me,” the voice on the wind breathed.

“Should have thought about that before abandoning her here and throwing away your precious melody like trash, my sire! I deserve this. She didn’t!”

“You can’t hurt me worse than you already have, son. You abandoned me, and she chose to follow all of you here to save you. She’s the only reason I didn’t close the book, and damn you all.”

“I’ve heard this lecture from you before, sire. You come with a reason to speak to me? Please, tell me so that I can go upstairs to my bedroom and appreciate what a fine gift she is,” Acryan spoke in spitting acid tones. He pulled at his hair, and as he moved in this time-frozen state, he pulled away from his body.

His brown locks, round face, and pleasant smile revealed perfect cherubim-like features and ashen teak curls that fell about his shoulders. A face that bore rich scars spilling from his left temple down his eye and cheek glared up at the creator, at empty skies.

Silence spread for a long moment before the voice whispered once more. No emotion lingered in the tone, just flatness. “I speak to you so that you might make the right decision. You will die tomorrow.”

That had Acryan’s attention, eyes wide as he blinked up.

“I’ve barely had eighty years in this body! She’s finally taller than me once again! This is a good life, a good reincarnation. Why would you do this to us?”

“Do with this information what you will. You die tomorrow.” The voice with no presence whispered away as the world around him came back to life, sucking his spirit back into his body with a jarring sensation.

“Chata! CHATA!” Acryan, in Tuval’s body, spat at the skies and grit his teeth before taking a deep breath.

“Well, unless you have anything to say about it, I’m going to enjoy my last night, sober if I have to!” Acryan said with one last rude gesticulation before storming into his palace.

“May you be tall in your next life,” a quiet whisper on the breeze faded away.

“WOMAN!” He shouted in search of Sai. The sound of flaring wings, toppling furniture, and a few yelps rang through the house until Sai’s soft laughter followed.

True to his word, come morning, the two woke curled to one another in a tight embrace, Tuval tangled in Esca’s long tresses. She radiated mana and life so much that nothing could stop her hair from growing down in long and inescapable locks. She could hack it by the sword at the nape of her neck, and in two weeks, it’d be at her knees and to her feet in days after that. This trait followed her in every body. She emanated life itself, sunshine, air, and Acryan wanted nothing more that morning than to breathe her in and hold her inside his lungs.

In this life, they had been born Anael. Thankfully, they usually came from the same tribe. He pressed his face into her pale chest, nosing up her neck as her slender legs gripped around him so gently. She sighed happily, tugging him to herself before stretching and yawning. He treasured even her morning breath, tinted with the twinge of his own liquored spit. She’d indulged with him that night, and a few bottles littered about the floor. She gazed at him with glassy brown eyes through blonde locks.

“My greatest treasure. My love and stars in the sky. May all ink be worthless that does not write your name,” he breathed up her neck and into her ear, stretching against her. She pulled his mouth to hers, and the kiss she gave him lingered all day. She made sure of that when she bit down hard on his lower lip, so much so that it bled, and he sighed with delight and pleasure.

“If I am to die today, may death greet me sot!” He announced as he made his rounds that day, visiting the friends he held dear from this life. When the night sky dimmed the world, he laid out in one of the garden planters, half crushing some sort of topiary as he watched the stars above him. Shythe had gone to bed hours ago. They had recently brought in a new healer that was jumpy and nervous with a strange accent, and he drank with them, too, listening to his strange Anael accent slur into gibberish.

Sleep claimed him, slowly taking him in. Is this death come to claim me finally? His thoughts slipped away into a dreamless sleep.