Writing Prompts Archive/10/K'alayah

*It was dark. No matter what direction her eyes turned, black was the only colour visible to her. Even with the enhanced sight she was gifted with ever since her 'rebirth', there was nothing to see. She couldn't turn her head. No matter how hard she tried, moving was impossible. She gave up long ago. She was in pain, terrible, terrible pain. The pain never ended, it was her only reality in this never-ending darkness. But there was hope.*

*She felt them. Her sisters. They were close by. Very close. She could feel them, and she knew that they too could feel her. But she could not save her. She couldn't move. She couldn't see. Her reality one of darkness and pain.*

*She felt outwards. As difficult as it was. The manor she was in was controlled by the manipulation of aether. Something she knew to do well. There were a couple of people within. Adventurers. They were supposed to die a long time ago, but they didn't. She made sure of it. Traps were all around the manor, but she had changed them. Barriers not meant to be broken. She had offered the tools to break them.*

*The adventurers had made it to the second floor. One of them had died here. They had revived their fallen ally. Now she was controlling her reawakened corpse to the best of her capabilities. She did it! The door to the room she was held in opened. Soon, the adventurers were inside. They fought, they won. There was just one problem.*

*The man, they called him the Revenant, was a piece of this manor. And yet he was free to do as he pleased, now that the manor was freed from her brother's grasp. He moved towards her sisters. He raised his blade. He struck them down.*

*He would have. But Aeryn could not let it happen. Although her strength was fleeting and her reality of constant darkness and pain, there was yet one thing she held dear. Two people. Family. She gathered her aether. The aether that surrounded her. That surrounded them all. And she summoned a barrier to protect them. The revenant's spear shattered into pieces upon impact.*

*"Allow them to hold better lives in the next, that is all that can be done now.", the revenant spoke.*

*"I cannot.", Aeryn replied. Her voice was firm, filled to the brim with determination. Although her lips did not obey her, her magicks did, enough to hold a voice. One last chance. . . to protect those she held dear.*

*"You have no choice."*

*"But you do." One. Last. Chance. The revenant seemed cold and cruel. And yet for some reason she believed there to be more.*

*"You are a thousand years too late to gather sympathy from me."*

*"You are yet a man, not a monster." She had no strength left to fight. All she had was words. Words to decide over the fate of them all.*

*"There is little difference.", the revenant replied, summoning another weapon to his grasp. Was this it? Was she mistaken?*

*"A monster has no choice, a man always has." Her words. . . she did not think, she did only speak. Something within her was guiding her along. . . Some would call it empathy, she thought.*

*"No, they do not." The man seemed to ready himself, for one last strike.*

*"There is nobody taking that choice from you. You yourself are stopping yourself from making your own choice, and rather let the choices of others guide you, no matter their meaning or intention!" It became more and more difficult to upkeep the connection with which she spoke to them. She could not speak for much longer . . . This was the end. For them all. . . If she did not make it now, it would be all over. She wished to cry, and yet no tear escaped her eye.*

*"They cannot help you."*

*"Why won't you refuse a contract you do not wish to fulfill?" Her strength was fading, her last words strained and difficult to speak. She was terrified. Helpless. She could not defend them. Her words did not help. This was it. She proved useless. She proved useless. She proved-*

*"So be it.", the man said. He got out a small bag, and placed her sisters within. He soon moved to a small chest in the room. He opened it. She felt the light stream inside. There she was, bare for him to see. She was alive, and yet. . . Nothing but a head.*

*"Can you survive this?" He spoke. She tried to respond, although little escaped her. "Time shall tell.", the man said then, moving her to a bag, and then to the selfsame pouch her sisters had been stored in.*

*It was in the past now. Aeryn was whole, healed with the aid of a friend to the family. She and her sisters were alive and well, in the Vault that the small pouch lead to. At some time, she had begun to write a journal. Somewhere she could place her memories, so they would never be forgotten. At this moment, she had finished her last sentence. A tear escaped her, and yet she smiled, knowing that she had given everything for her siblings and lived to write the tale.*