Chapter 50: Fog

Ghosts of stone walls rose and fell out of the fog that surrounded us. The weathered, broken shapes sat forlorn between twisted trees. In the fading evening light, the valley had been beautiful. In the dim predawn light, it was haunting.

I hadn’t noticed the other ruins through the trees yesterday. Last night, the forest seemed thinner and I could have sworn there was nothing but rocky soil and groundcover.

Seyari and I held hands as we walked. Not out of romantic interest, but safety (though I wouldn’t have minded the other reason). The fog was thick, up nearly to Seyari’s shoulders, and getting deeper. Over it, I could see the statues looming ahead. Between the centermost two, a black opening dared us forward.

“Couldn’t you disperse this?” I whispered.

“I will if I need to,” Seyari whispered her reply. “I want to save my mana and my tricks for what lies ahead. You can still see where we’re going, right?”

I nodded.

Together, we walked in silence up to the stone façade. Up close, the fog lowered slightly, down about to my waist and Seyari’s upper chest. The statues were immense. Flanked by columns holding up a small plaza dug into the mountain, the two statues stood opposite a large stone doorway. They were identical, but mirrored.

I could tell the statues had been defaced. The faces of each were hacked to pieces. The shape of the statues was inhuman below the waist. Four legs, like a centaur, but not with the lower body of a horse. The limbs looked almost reptilian with taloned feet, and the tail certainly matched.

The figure depicted wore ornate robes on their upper body and many rings on their feet and tail. Any color the stone once had was long scoured away by wind and time.

I turned my sight to the doorway. All I could make out within was a large chamber.

We walked toward the opening and the statues, passing through the ancient columns. Our footsteps echoed on the cracked stone floor.

Through the yawning doorway, the room inside was a mess. Cracks wound jaggedly through all the surfaces I could see, and the back wall had collapsed. Two other doorways stood open, one to each side.

I didn’t need it to see, but I conjured a bright ball of flame at the end of one of my claws. After a moment, I moved it to the tip of my horn and willed a matching flame to appear on the other.

“Thanks,” Seyari said with a bit of tremble in her voice.

The otherworldly tone she’d had since awakening her angelic side was in full force, rather than controlled and minimized.

I suddenly felt less sure about the idea of exploring here. We might not be able to take whatever lingered within these walls.

I shook my head. The light from my spell swung around the room and danced along the jagged stone rubble.

Why wouldn’t I be able to take whatever’s in here?

The lack of confidence passed and I strode to the center of the room. The rubble-strewn floor looked to be tiled in some sort of pattern too faded to make out. I had an idea of what it would have looked like though, and placed a hand over my symbol.

I turned and looked down the side doors. Hallways, both of them. I turned and saw Seyari standing back near the entrance, at the edge of my light.

“Hey, Sey, you alright?” I asked.

She shook her head and placed a hand on her forehead. “Y-yeah. This place gives me the creeps is all, I guess.”

“You scared of some rocks?” I asked jokingly.

“Of course not.” Seyari walked slowly to stand next to me.

Yeah, I caught that flare of anger.

I gave her a wicked smile. To my surprise, the smile she returned was weak and uncertain. Something about this place was getting to her. And that had me worried.

We took a quick look around the entry room. The carved walls were patterned, but I couldn’t make out anything recognizable beyond an aesthetic purpose. Above us, the ceiling was shallowly domed. Shifting rock had damaged it too much to make out whatever had been carved up there one upon a time. I saw what could be a mountain. Perhaps a carving of this very valley?

The rubble at the back had pieces of statue in it. Seyari found a partial clawed foot, and I found a cylindrical piece of tail. I’d bet the same figure as outside.

“Do you think the statue person was a demon, or a… not-demon” I tripped over trying not to say ‘mortal’.

“I don’t know.” Seyari spoked quietly, with that odd angelic resonance. “I didn’t see a symbol like yours.”

“We should check the statues by the door again.” I set the tail piece back on the pile.

Seyari nodded. We went back outside and looked the statues over. They were large enough that I could walk under the legs of each. I we found a place on the door-side rear haunch that had been heavily damaged and scored on both.

I said ‘we’, but I didn’t notice the area apart from the other damage until Seyari pointed it out.

“You think there might have been a symbol there?” I looked to the doorway and back. The spot was clearly visible.

“We can’t know,” Seyari replied. “But yes, I do.”

“Okay, so probably a demon. Got it.” I hopped down in front of the doorway. “Want to go check out the rest of the inside?”

Seyari looked back out over the fog-covered valley for a moment before replying. “Sure.”

Yeah, something was up.

I tried to sense Seyari’s emotions, but she wasn’t angry anymore and my sense only worked on anger. I tried aura sight. The inside had more of that ice-blue tinge in the air, but I couldn’t identify a source and it seemed weak.

“You want to hold my hand?” I asked, trying to keep from sounding patronizing while sounding just patronizing enough to tease her.

She glared at me a moment, then took one of my lower hands. I dulled my claws. Her grip was tighter than I expected.

We moved from the central chamber and explored the hallways, left first. The place was empty. Square rooms with little adornment and no furnishings. Well, no furnishings that weren’t rubble or decayed into dirt. The doors, at least, were tall enough for me to walk through them without issue.

When we investigated each room, Seyari would let go of my hand. She grabbed it again when we left. I’d find the action cute if it wasn’t so out of character.

The hall was collapsed part-way down, but the last room had a smaller room at the back. It was empty, but had a carving of a symbol much like mine on the rear wall. There was a relief of a faceted stone at the center, but the shape was all wrong to be mine.

Definitely related to demons, or demon-worship. Not related to Wrath was my guess.

“Do you always find demonic iconography at Lost Era ruins?” I asked, carefully tracing the outline of the symbol with a dulled claw.

Seyari shook her head. “Not always. Now that I know what the symbol is, I would say more often than not. I’ve only been to a few sites myself, though. Most of what I know is secondhand from the Church.”

“I wonder if there were more terrestrial demons back then?” I asked the symbol on the wall.

The stone didn’t answer, but Seyari did. “Maybe.” She seemed disinclined to speak more into the tomb-like silence of this place.

I didn’t have that problem. “I think so. Not that that makes demons good in general, but I am certain that amulet made me a demon instead of the normal death I would have had. I certainly would have contributed a fragment of my soul to a demon of wrath, but not the whole thing.”

Seyari hummed in response.

“Are you alright?” I asked again.

“Y-yeah, fine.”

“Bullcrap. You’re acting like me before I became a demon. Afraid. Uncertain. Unconfident.” I used my height to tower over her.

She glared up at me.

Anger. Perfect.

I stoked the emotion gently. Something was influencing her. If I knew Seyari, and I liked to think I did after we spilled our everything to each other, she ranted when she was angry.

Seyari jabbed a finger into my stomach. “You’re right. I’m not fine. Something filled the entire valley with unnatural fog, which is some serious fucking magic. There’s a presence here I can feel, and we both had dreams we shouldn’t have had. I’m not sure we can take whatever’s in here and I think we should leave while we still can. The thing here’s probably crazy fucking strong and would wipe the floor with us!”

I smiled down at her in victory. “You done?”

“Am I done!?” Seyari started to yell, but caught herself.

Oh, right, the anger.

I pulled on it slightly. She resisted, but only for a moment. I was careful not to take too much. I tried to ignore how satisfying this whole exchange felt.

“Sorry. I meant to ask if you feel any better. I want to check out the other hallway and then we can leave.” I rubbed the back of my neck casually.

“Apology accepted.” Seyari closed her eyes and grabbed my hand.

“I’m the Sovereign of Wrath. We can take whatever’s in here.” I added.

And stop whatever it’s doing to Seyari.

“Fine. We check the other hallway and then we leave.” Seyari glared at me.

I nodded. “Understood.”

I tried to keep my tone respectful. Seyari still held my hand as we walked back to the main room, so perhaps I’d done okay.

The other side’s hallway extended further. The first few rooms were empty, but beyond that we found where Hammer must have gotten their hammer. The room wasn’t an armory, but remains of ornate broken weapons and other artifacts were scattered about.

“Ceremonial weapons?” I picked up a bladeless hilt and inspected it.

“Hammer’s weapon seemed functional enough.” Faced with something that interested her, Seyari’s voice gained confidence.

“Let’s see if we can find anything still in one piece!” I suggested enthusiastically.

Seyari smiled weakly and the two of us began to carefully sift through the remains in the room. I kept a watch on her, but as we pulled broken item after broken item from the rubble pile, my partner seemed to gain confidence.

We didn’t just find weapons, either. Despite the small size of the room, the pile was immense and varied. Some bits showed evidence of being burned or melted. Whoever had defaced this place had done so a very long time ago, and had been thorough.

Some of what we found had iconography that matched my symbol (without the gemstone). Others matched the statues. Still others were humanoid, animal, or esoteric.

The variety made me wonder what the purpose of this place had been. It had been more than a temple, that much was clear. I was about to ask Seyari what she thought when I lifted a broken slab of stone and found something mostly whole.

It was a sword. Ornate, and of a dark metal that had not rusted. The guard on the handle was broken, but the blade was whole, if chipped. The metal gleamed dully in the light of my horns’ fire. Under aura sight, There was a very faint magic to the weapon, like the icy edges I’d seen in the fog.

I picked it up by the handle and turned to show the blade to Seyari. “Look what I found!”

She set down a piece of pottery and took a look. “Whoa, not bad! What’s that design on the handle? We should—”

Thicker wisps of icy magic swirled into the room from behind me and wrapped around Seyari.

“—W-we should go. Now.” All the confidence had drained out of her voice.

I turned to the source of the magic. Wisps tried to form around me, but disintegrated. The magic was clearly messing with Seyari’s mind somehow, but now I had a lead on a source.

The rear wall of the room, the direction the magic had come from, was cracked. I turned back to find Seyari had already gone to the door, and the edge of the light.

I wanted to chase the magic and take out its source. But I wasn’t going to leave Seyari. I was reckless in the past, and would probably be reckless in the future, but here and now I could at least make a plan.

I needed a way to get her to stay with me. She was far from fragile, and I might need her help. She’d want to help, too, if she found out something was in her head. I could imagine just how furious she’d be.

Oh. That’ll work.

I hoped she’d be okay with what I was about to do after this was all said and done.

“Hey Seyari?” I asked, and held the sword like I was inspecting it.

“Y-yeah?” Her voice was uncharacteristically nervous. “Come on, let’s go already!”

I shook my head. “Not just yet. I think this sword might be cursed. We can’t leave it in one piece.” Mindful of the enchanted blade, I took it in three hands and made a motion to snap it over one knee.

For just a moment, hot anger pulsed from Seyari.

That moment was all I needed. I didn’t like to practice manipulating anger, but I had been improving quickly when I did. Someone with a strong will could resist, but the better I knew someone, or the more I knew about the focus of their anger, the stronger my ability seemed to be.

I didn’t want to send her into a rage. She needed to be coherent, and I already had serious moral reservations about what I was doing. I thought I was justified to fight fire with fire, so to speak.

I grabbed onto that ember of anger and pushed it into a flame. For a moment, we stared at each other. Seyari’s posture straightened and she fixed me with an intense glare.

“Not. Funny.” She spoke through gritted teeth.

I carefully set the sword at the edge of the room. “Neither is whatever’s been messing with your emotions since we’ve been in here.”

“What are you…” Seyari’s face moved through a series of expressions over a long, awkward silence. She landed on cold neutrality.

That’s… Oh that’s a lot of anger.

Seyari spoke. “Where.”

It wasn’t a question; it was a demand.

I gestured with two thumbs over my shoulder. “Through that wall. Want me to break it?”

“If you don’t, I will.” Seyari’s voice still had its unnatural timbre, but any lack of confidence or fear was buried under her rage.

I smiled wickedly, then turned to the wall. I took a couple steps to run up, and crashed two fists into it as hard as I could.

Stone shattered along the cracks, and the thick wall fell in a heap of rubble. On the other side was the ruins of a grand hall. Soot and cracks covered the rock walls and supporting columns. The faint smell of smoke still lingered in the stale air that washed over us.

I kept my aura sight on in time to see a weak-looking icy wave come crashing toward me from deeper inside. I flicked my tail and sent a wave of fire back at it. My flames sputtered, but the wave lost coherence. Before the magic hit me, a blinding beam of holy light burned the rest of the spell to nothing.

I turned to look at Seyari. Her golden eyes were glowing in rage. And aura sight.

She dashed deeper inside down the newly-opened hall. I was glad for my unnatural speed. There was no way a human would’ve been able to match pace with the more agile woman. Seyari darted around columns and rubble piles. I barreled over or through them. Except the columns. I steered awkwardly around those. Still didn’t want to get buried under a mountain.

I kept up the fire orbs on the tips of my horns. The light from them danced wildly around as we ran, casting jagged shadows over soot-stained walls not seen in centuries.

Ahead of us, the ceiling of the grand hallway had collapsed at some point. Seyari and I followed around through side rooms and halls, all burned. Some still had recognizable ruins of furnishings. I shouldered my way through another wall at a point where we hit a dead end. That wall had been less damaged and my pride took a hit when I didn’t break through on the first try.

The blue aura tried another attack, but Seyari’s holy magic burned it to nothing. The attack’s aura hadn’t looked demonic to me, but I didn’t doubt it was. If there was a pattern for demonic auras, I hadn’t figured it out just yet.

Another, smaller hall took us into a large chamber so thoroughly destroyed it looked to be a rubble-filled cave more than a building. The magic and aura emanated from a blackened, ruined heap at the top of a larger mound.

Before us, the aura coalesced into a figure vaguely like the statues. Their face was missing. The aura drew up and surged forward, galloping directly at Seyari.

I threw a wall of fire at the misty figure. It stumbled and distorted. In front of me, Seyari had drawn her mana into a massive holy spell. Rather than a ball of raw power, the edges and shape of the spell were clearly defined.

She threw the spell onto the blackened heap while the mist was recovering. My eyes burned. I closed them immediately.

Seyari’s holy spell hissed and burned atop the ruined pile. The figure twisted as if in agony, then dissipated. From the walls around us, more of that icy blue aura formed a visible fog. Seyari kept her concentration on her spell. I knew more than enough magic to know to protect her. Not that I wouldn’t do that anyway, if given the chance.

I stood behind her and tried to form my fire into a ring wall around us. Fine control was difficult. I could feel my mana draining as I shaped and maintained a ring of fire around the two of us, wide enough not to burn Seyari.

The mist slammed into my fire. I faltered and almost dropped my spell. Keeping my wall up against the onslaught started to drain me, faster due to how inefficient I knew my spell to be.

I felt magic fatigue start to creep in when the pressure from the aura suddenly cut off. I kept the ring of fire up, just in case.

“It’s over.” Seyari said, sounding exhausted. “You can drop your spell.”

I obliged and dropped the wall of fire. Seyari was sweat-soaked in my arms.

Wait.

When did I?

Before I could think about how I came to be holding her close, Seyari turned in my loose grip and hugged me back.

“Thanks for that back there.” She relaxed into our hug. “Fucking mind magic.”

I let my shoulders relax as well. “I’m sorry I manipulated your anger without asking.”

“Can’t you just say ‘you’re welcome’ like a normal person?” Seyari sighed, but her voice sounded happy.

“We’ve been over this.” I smiled, resting my chin on her head. “I’m not normal.”