Gaea - Chapter 4

Note: Slightly longer then usual, but I just had to make it so. Finally we witness some of the power that Aphonia has and what she really is. Wentz gets completely over powered here as Aphonia's rage finally hurts someone undeserving. This chapter has quite a lot going on, sorry if it overwhelms anyone. Read and Review! I'll do something of yours if you ask me in return!

On to Chapter 4.

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Chapter Four

Wentz led Aphonia outside and onto the catwalk, peering out over the edge and gazing at the several candle and lantern-lit houses built into the trunk of the great trees. A gentle constant breeze blew against them, the air was colder and filled with the howling cries of wolves and songs of nightbirds.

“The most recent stint of trouble arose just in southern Gyuhdin, somewhere along the border between Fegoria and the deadlands between,” Wentz leaned against the ropes, peering down at the ground, “The Ebon Master's reach knows no bounds and they have few if any morals left.”

Aphonia moved behind Wentz and placed her hands on his shoulder, pulling him into her. Silence spoke for her and Wentz continued on, “I know of the Crimson Flame, but he was different. Times were different then.”

Aphonia held Wentz close to her, the soft frills of her skirt danced against his back, poking and exciting him with the slightest touch. Somehow he maintained his focus, unable to face her, “Tenji the Merchant, as he is called was apprehended by an entire division of Temple Knights and only because he went willingly. His crimes, selling lives and holy artifacts among a list of minor offenses.”

“Tenji,” Aphonia's teeth clenched at the very sound of his name.

“He was sentenced to death without trial, by order of the Cardinal under the authority of Religious Crime Laws and Standards. It was a mistake. A terrible, horrible mistake which ended in another Night of Fire.”

Wentz turned and saw Aphonia's tear filled eyes, “Judgement! He has Judgement!”

“Ah. So that's what you call it,” Wentz thought to himself, “Judgement, the weapon of the Crimson Flame. You know of it?”

Aphonia 's tears started to stream down her face as she fought the urge to cry, “He is dead. He's gone... gone...”

Wentz reached up his soft hand and wiped away her tears, “Twenty six years ago, Tenji used that weapon upon the city and ever since anyone has dared capture him. Carn was the most recent town to be destroyed, about forty kilometers north of here. When we visited the site, pets were eating the corpses of their masters and running wild through the pens of chickens and pigs. Raye received his bite from one of those feral and rabid dogs left to their own. Ever since one bit of information has pointed directly to the Ebon Masters, Tenji's appearance causes a spread of the disease. The traveling caravan must be the source of it all.”

Aphonia's tears continued to flow and Wentz tried to wipe them away again, but her hand caught his and she shook her head, “I do not care for them. He must have been killed by Tenji. That spear, that wicked spear must not be allowed to remain in his hands.”

“I didn't know it would pain you so,” Wentz suspected she was aware of the matter, but the man known as the Crimson Flame was just Vale's Executioner to him, “Forgive me, Lady Adina.”

Her hand struck his face with a powerful crack, her words warped by her anger, “Adina?! Where did you hear that name!?” Wind engulfed the catwalk as she stared at Wentz with fury, the child knew now how forbidden that name was. The bridge began to swing and contort around Aphonia, her black hair started to have flecks of silver appear as the dye fell away from her hair.

Wentz stared into her eyes, paralyzed in fear as she grabbed him by the collar of his robe and suddenly everything became a blur as the town faded away, the trees warping and flying past became unrecognizable. Lasting only a few seconds, everything came back into focus as Aphonia set him down against the shore of the lake, far from town. He stuttered in shock, “You... you...”

“Where did you hear MY name?” Her restraint breaking down as the last flecks of black dye fell from her hair, the beauty of her radiant silver hair danced in the moonlight upon the wind. Safely within her barrier, the powerful gusts ripping through the jungle and across the lake did not touch him. The air filled with the sound of the wind's howl and breaking boughs, the terrifying power she possessed unleashed its devastation upon the shore and all it touched.

“You knew the Crimson Flame, you are Lady Adina,” he tried desperately to recall where he heard that name, his knees shaking in fear. The sacred name, a name known only to the angels, he referred to her by that name again!

“Cardinals, beneath us. Speaking our names so casually.” Adina continued, if she had a voice it would have been filled with sheer anger and hate. Her body began to emit a soft pale glow and the sacred wind barrier became hot, bursting into flame and vaporizing the jungle with the slightest touch long before it could burn, “It is sin to say an angel's name!”

To protect himself, Wentz erected his own barrier within hers, drawing in the air and creating a fragile cocoon of hurricane force wind just inches away from the powerful fallen angel now known only as Aphonia. This fragile barrier, a feat remarkable at any other time, was completely outshone by the terrifying size of Aphonia's raw unfocused strength, just as her speed bordered on teleportation, “My father knew it. That's all I know.”

Aphonia's voice filled his head, the sweetest and most fragile memory of her voice implanted itself within his head as she ordered him, “Never utter that name again. Adina is dead, just as Aki the Crimson Flame is dead! That sacrifice those two made allow me to exist here... If you were anyone else, but HIS son I would have killed you already.”

Her voice didn't match her emotion, but Wentz saw her not as the raging fallen angel before him, but a fragile and beautiful woman who was scared. Scared of her name, her past and the memories associated with it.

“I am just as thoughtless and stupid as Raye,” Wentz lowered his head, the barrier dissipating back into the super heated inferno of her own, “I will not speak it again. I did not realize what you were until this moment.”

“A devil,” tears fell down her face, a second barrier within the first engulfed her body in flames, “A fallen angel, unable to heaven, staring up from the pits. Forever reminded of my sin and tormented for a fleeting moment of rage.”

His eyes saw the girl incinerating herself, but his heart revealed the truth for him. Bound in chains of misery and fear, the last thirty years were a mixture of lies and deceptions for a life spent in waiting for redemption. The shadow of herself ruling in this artificial hell, created by her anger and the suffering child within. Her flesh did not burn, but her words did, “My sentence is eternal. Without Aki, I have nothing in this world to live for. I shall kill Tenji and repay my debt. Return home and never speak of our meeting.”

Acting on impulse, Wentz raised his fist and punched through the inferno, his robes and flesh immediately igniting as he passed through and hit her in the face with all his strength. Her eyes widened and the flames died away, she dropped to her knees and grabbed his hand immediately, “Louis!”

She came to her senses at last, but his hand had been reduced to a gored pile of flesh and blood in that moment. As her hand touched his, the skin began to warp and decay immediately, his skin rapidly repairing itself. The light from her body soon faded as his hand was healed, the voice inside his head as she spoke died away, “Louis, I'm so sorry. I am not worthy of the sympathy or honor of your presence.”

“You are more then worthy,” Wentz stared into her tear-filled silver eyes, “It was my fault. Too much, too fast. I am sorry to have scared you.”

“Scared,” she suddenly felt the fear for what it was. His touch was magical, everything about him had reminded him of Aki. That soft red hair, his proud head and level-headed state of mind, yet she had terrified him and burnt his innocent hand over nothing. Throwing herself into his chest she began to cry on him, wrapping her arms around the boy and letting it out all of her pain.

Wentz brushed her hair and looked out across the water where several lights were dancing and skipping across the surface, he watched the faeries watching him. The luminescence of their wings teasing the fish of the lake to the surface, but as their patience was limited, they went so far as to push one another into the water to be gobbled up by a fish so the others could eat. Sometimes human behavior mimicked the animal world all too well, but this compassion did not exist. The compassion he gave to her had begun to heal the wounds of the past, reopened by his words.

Her tears finally stopped after the moon has risen overhead and begun its slow descent into the canopy, the only sound of her tears had filled his ears, the only sight was the top of her silver hair and the only smell of her lovely womanly scent. For this time everything had vanished into a moon laced gray from which chose only to shine upon her.

“Tonight will not be any easier,” Wentz ran his hand through her hair, “I will stay with you, it is my duty-”

Her hand moved up and with the touch of her index finger against his lip, he was silenced. She raised her hand and picked him up in her arms, “No more, Louis. Just don't tell Raye.”

“Right. I promise,” he replied, holding onto her tightly.

Once again that blinding speed blurred the jungle into a whirl of nothingness, he felt the jarring motion of her body as she carried him through the forest, knowing it was not some magical transportation which she possessed over him, but the power of her will effecting an inhuman feat from her perfect body. This power he was capable of as well, but to what extent he did not know, he had resigned himself to political matters all his life, leaving no time for reflection or exploration of his body.

Stopping in front of her door, she set him down carefully upon her feet. Steam poured from her body, the sweat evaporating directly from her skin. Her insides were burning and her leg muscles were strained with engourged blood vessels, swelling up as her body tried desperately to recover.

“You shouldn't have pushed yourself,” Wentz knelt down and reached out for her leg, but Aphonia pulled away, gasping for breath. She had weakened over the years and her body was unable to take the strain of her power for more then a few seconds, she fell to her knees, thrusting her arm into the ground to prevent herself from falling over.

Steam poured out of her mouth with each gasping breath, her soft voice filled his head once more, “Shameful, I became weak again.”

“Your voice,” Wentz gasped, “I can here it! I'm sure of it, it's so beautiful.”

“A lie, its all your head. A crude construction to help you understand these words. If I cov-” the moment she covered her mouth the voice went silent immediately, her voice killed mid sentence.

“Why can't you speak?”

She removed her hand and let out that soft airy laugh, “My throat was cut and with it my voice. The scar sealing it away as I recovered. If it wasn't for your ability to lip read, you would be unable to hear that beautiful voice. Though I know now what you think of me.”

“What is that?”

“Beautiful. You slipped up because you were too busy thinking about me,” she was recovering and her voice had begun to fade again, “Sorry, but I'm really a-”

As he read her lips his eyes widened in shock, “Then... then...”

That beautiful voice was gone once more, “Not me. Oh and I heard what you said in the tavern, but it should come as no surprise.”

Wentz laughed, a blush spreading across his face, “I should have suspected as much. You were aware of us before Raye... Well it is a good thing then since I know you are not-”

“No and no.” she put her finger on his lips again, not even wanting to hear another word, “Angel, devil, beast. I don't care about most words. My true name is another matter, as well as anything connecting me to what I gave up when I died.”

As she stood up and he hugged her tightly, “I understand.” Slowly, she placed her arms around him and embraced him, holding his head close to her rapidly beating heart. Kissing the top of his head, Aphonia opened the door, ushering him in out of the cold night air and into her home.