The sickle moon drifted high in the night sky, its silver blade of light only half visible over the rim of the high canyon walls. Half the great city was bathed in a pale, almost serene luminescence, the buildings glowing gently in the moonlight, with the other half below the cliff closest to the moon dipped into shadow. It was something anyone would have found strangely beautiful, hauntingly so. Twisted, jagged walls, polished slate roofs, and the deep, onyx base of all Vemn Enox synergized with the night, became a part of it.
It was in the deepest shadows of that sleeping city that a young changeling stumbled his way through the alleyways packed with refuse. His breaths came in ragged gasps, and every few steps he was forced to fall against the side of a building or tumble into a pile of trash just to hold himself upright, or cushion his landing when he fell. It was hard to walk with the cold of the desert night seeping into his bones, and with his front hooves clutching an equally cold body to his chest.
He stopped, gasping from a mixture of his efforts and his unending sobs. Twin rivers of tears shined in the sparse light that reached this end of the city so late into the night, more washing over and adding to those already frozen to his chilled hide, coating his fangs in a thin layer of ice as the embodiment of his sorrow clung to him.
“Meika...” he sobbed, burying his frost-lined muzzle in the mane of his beloved friend. He sobbed her name over and over as he clutched her body tightly to his own, sliding down the wall he had come to rest against, unable to hold himself up any longer. He had been strong this far, but that was the limit of his fortitude, both physical and emotional.
"I’m sorry...” he cried, his teeth chattering with the force of his sorrow, and the bite of the cold. New tears frosted his coat to hers as he held her close, gritting his teeth to stop the chattering. What did it matter what he said? She couldn’t hear him anymore, couldn’t forgive him. Why had he waited this long to tell her that he was sorry? Why hadn’t he begged her forgiveness when she had been alive?
“I should have been stronger,” he wept, now leaning on her body in his hooves as much as holding it. “I should have saved you... I’m so sorry...”
“The poor girl,” a gruff, adult voice called from further down the alleyway, and though such words were generally intended to be sympathetic, the tone behind them was not.
The young changeling whipped his head in the direction of the unexpected speaker, unable to see anything through the water in his eyes, and the deeper shadows further down the alleyway.
An older changeling stepped out of the shadows slowly, revealing himself at last. The young changeling couldn’t see the older one’s eyes, for they were buried in the shadows of a deep hood, which flowed into a wide, black cloak that covered his entire body. It was no wonder he had been difficult to see in the dim light.
“What do you want?” the young changeling asked, his tone defeated and his eyes returning forlornly to the corpse cradled in his forelegs.
“Nothing,” the older changeling replied simply, standing a respectable distance away from the obviously pained child. “The same cannot be said of you, though.”
“What?” the child inquired, too focused on other things to understand what his visitor was implying.
“What is it that you want?” he asked patiently.
The young changeling never took his eyes from the peaceful, lifeless face of his beloved Meika. “If I had just been stronger, I could have saved her... None of this would have happened...” he reiterated quietly, talking as much to himself as to his visitor.
“Had been,” his visitor replied, his tone a verbal shrug of the shoulders: dismissive and uninterested. “Could have,” he continued. “What does it matter?”
“I loved her!” the young changeling roared, ice crackling as his head snapped away fiercely from the place it had been slowly freezing to the corpse. He fixed his bloodshot, suddenly furious gaze on his intruder. “It is all that matters! I loved her...” he whispered shakily, his rage short-lived, the pain in his heart far stronger and older.
His unexpected visitor moved closer, the cloak flowing gently with each step until he came to rest directly in front of the pair, one living and one dead. “What’s done is done,” he intoned seriously. “What could have been... has not been,” he whispered, and for the first time his tone showed the faintest hints of sympathy. “You cannot change it now. But I can grant you at least one of your wishes.”
“What are you saying?” the young changeling asked, his eyes falling back on the body in his hooves, despite the older changeling’s new proximity.
“I can make you stronger,” he clarified, his words quiet and severe. There was a darkness to them, not unlike the darkness seeping into the young changeling’s heart through the portal of grief. “It is not too late for that much.”
“It wouldn’t matter,” the young changeling replied, his words choking momentarily before he gained the composure to continue. “She’s gone... No matter how strong you make me, I can’t go back to save her.”
“No. But you can go forward, and avenge her,” the older changeling replied, reaching a hoof to a pouch hidden under his cloak. In the blink of an eye, and a flash of silver, a dagger leapt into his hoof. He held it up between them, the sharp point of the blade gleaming in the meager light from the mage-lamps on the main streets not so far away.
“This is my gift to you,” he declared simply, turning the dagger over and dropping it, the point sliding easily into the sandstone floor of the alleyway and holding it in place. “You can use it however you like... if you take your own life with it, then I cannot make you stronger,” he said seriously. “But if you take it and avenge her, then there is much I can teach you.”
The young changeling’s eyes followed the dagger all the while, locked onto it even when it had stopped moving, embedded in the ground. Slowly, hesitantly at first, he reached over Meika’s body, grasping at it. He pulled it up in front of his eyes, looking it over as if he wasn’t even sure what it was. In reality his mind was racing. With a weapon like that, he could have protected Meika...
With a weapon like that, he could kill the changelings who had killed her.
He gripped it tighter with new resolve, his eyes filling not with hope, but with simple purpose, and with anger, as they at last found the eyes of his strange visitor, glowing green beneath the deep hood.
“I’ll kill them all for what they’ve done...” the young changeling whispered darkly, letting the hoof holding the dagger drop to his side slowly, his grip never relaxing.
“Then what is your name?” the older changeling asked, the slightly brighter grey of his fangs showing in a smirk beneath the cowl of his cloak.
The young changeling looked at the body in his hooves once more, his hardened gaze softening for a moment, before he tore his eyes away and looked back at the dagger. The scowl of his determination and the clenching of his fangs returned as he looked at it in silence for many moments, until finally he answered.
“She called me Malik.”
Malik’s eyes snapped open as the dream ended, his gaze trailing the ceiling overhead. He didn’t gasp or cry out, or bolt upright in his bed. He simply laid there, eyes open and hooves at his sides as he easily recalled the memory that he had relived as a dream many times before. He sighed to himself, closing his eyes and not the least surprised to find that tears rolled down the sides of his head as they were blinked free.
He stayed there with his eyes closed for a time, trying to clear his head. At last he felt he had put the dream behind him, as he had so many times before, and sat up, turning his hind legs off the bed and resting his hooves on the floor.
“Will it never end?” he grumbled, leaning forward and putting his head into his hooves, rubbing his eyes. With another sigh he got up at long last from the bed, heading straight for the door. There was little else in the simple room to draw his attention, despite the fact that what items it did have were of incredible quality.
He made his way out into the hall, which was as busy as it ever was. Here and there servants polished the high windows or swept the hall clean of the sand that always seemed to find a way in, even three floors above the dunes below. Guards held posts that had likely never been vacated in changeling history, as far as Malik could tell, for there always seemed to be someone standing in those exact same places, no matter what time of day it was.
“Sir,” one of the guards greeted him idly, as the guards had been doing every morning for the last two days since he had begun staying there.
Malik just nodded once, still unsure of how to take being called ‘sir’. Korrick had much to do with it, doubtless, or so Malik thought as he made his way down the hallway. A look past a maid and out one of the grand windows she was cleaning told him that it was late morning: much later than he usually slept... unless he was having one of his nightmares.
There were many of them, and no matter which one he had, it always affected him the same way. Unless something woke him up from outside the dream, he would continue to sleep until the memory was over. It had always been like that, as far back as he could remember, and so it didn’t surprise him to learn what time it was as he passed a room that always had its door wide open, a clock on the far wall of the unused guest quarters.
The room was nicer than the one Malik was staying in, but he preferred the smaller room. It was further into the wing of the castle, and provided him more privacy, even if it wasn’t incredibly plush compared to other rooms in Cliffcrest Castle.
He continued on his way, jagged half-pillars of polished onyx stone breaking the marble walls and various murals at even intervals, the black marble tile beneath his hooves polished to a shine, as always. It was certainly a majestic place. Almost too much for his taste, though he had to admit that given time he could get used to life in such a grand place.
The hallway exited into the enormous main hall that housed the central staircase, which tapered gently the higher it went, widest at its base. Great obsidian pillars soared to the ceiling still fifty-some feet above him, where tasteful glass skylights filtered the morning sun into the expansive room. At each landing the floors swept outward, creating wide balconies with high railings that looked down into the vast expanse of the hall. The towering pillars that supported the roof high above passed through each of the balconies as well, lending their considerable strength to the structure.
He took in the sight with the same awe he had since the beginning of his stay, and honestly wondered if he would ever be able to enter the main hall of Cliffcrest Castle without pausing to take it all in. He certainly hoped that he would never take such a sight for granted, for the rest of his days.
Malik sighed contentedly as he finished surveying the masterwork of changeling architecture, loathe to leave the sight behind as he turned up the stairs, heading up two more tall floors to the fifth. At the top of the stairs, an enormous set of ornate doors barred entry to the throne room many yards across the landing, a wide, gold-embroidered red carpet running from the top of the stairs to the doors.
Something was new about the fifth floor landing that morning, Malik noted. The carpet passed around a wide, recently installed black stone platform, changelings moving around on the floor below it as well as atop it with blueprints and tools in their hooves. A large table nearby showed many more drawings and schematics spread about its surface. It was clear that some kind of monument was under construction, a project that had likely started overnight, or perhaps early that morning.
One changeling in particular caught Malik’s attention as he paused at the top of the stairs. The older changeling female was clearly missing her horn, an unmistakable physical trait, in recent days, of Councilor Morelda Dugrann.
“No, no, no,” she complained, wadding up a blueprint and tossing it aside, bossy to a fault. “It should be more like this one here, but somewhat like this one.” She pointed between two other designs, clearly exasperated. “The king should appear more elegant, and Gerd’s defeat should be more apparent. This makes it look like an even battle,” she huffed.
“It was an even battle, Excellency,” one of the changelings working on the statue design in question clarified, drawing her scathing glare.
“U-until King Aurus unleashed the wild magic,” the designer corrected hastily, withering under her unrelenting stare. “Then it was over in a blaze of glory,” he admitted. That much was true at the very least.
“And that’s what we’re trying to capture, not how much of a struggle it was,” she muttered distastefully. “The history books will cover that part. Understand?”
“Yes, Excellency,” the designer replied dutifully, her point made and orders clear.
Malik chuckled as he kept his distance, heading west down another hallway and away from the bustling project. Fortunately his destination wasn’t the throne room, he thought wryly; else he might have been in for the-hells-knew-what kind of talk with the overbearing female.
It wasn’t long before he reached his destination, the closed door of the room no different from the countless others in the various hallways of Cliffcrest Castle. He pushed it open slowly, careful to be quiet. He was equally careful closing it behind him, though he knew it was a wasted effort.
He sighed in mixed relief and resignation as he beheld the situation within. Relief because the faces that looked up at him showed only concern, and no signs of grief, yet resignation because it was exactly as it had been for the last two days.
Aurus lay in his bed, his body bandaged and his wings bound tightly to his back. Though it was concealed under the blankets, Malik could see the slightly larger lump where Aurus’ back right leg would have been, still in a splint. His eyes were closed serenely, as they had been since his collapse after the destruction of Gerd Gallock.
All around him stood his close friends, the mares from Ponyville, as well as Korrick Varal, the recently reinstated High Councilor. His family was there as well, with his younger sister standing at the side of the bed and holding his hoof gently between her two smaller ones, her head pressed against the mattress as she was forced to lean all the way out just to make contact with him and still keep her back hooves on the floor.
Applejack stood with Aria next to the bed, her hoof on the same one the young changeling girl was holding, the other placed gently on Aria’s shoulders in silent support.
Tired smiles greeted Malik as he entered, and he returned them all with a worried one of his own. “How is he?” he asked cautiously, keeping his voice low. It didn’t really matter of course, for nothing they had tried so far had been able to wake Aurus from his slumber. The concern was great that it was some sort of self-inflicted magical coma, an unforeseen symptom of his use of powerful wild magic.
“Better,” Korrick replied, his own voice similarly quiet. It had become a habit for all who visited Aurus in this state, even if it was meaningless. “The healers were able to do much more with his leg this morning, and the bone is at the least healing properly now.”
“He still won’t wake up, though,” Twilight added, joining the two changelings by the door while the rest of her friends talked to Aurus’ family or to one another, doing what they could to keep their hopes up. “It’s been two days already, and he hasn’t so much as moved in his sleep. He could just be exhausted, especially after what he’s been through, but it’s not natural. I’m starting to agree with the healers... this might be a result of the wild magic,” she said worriedly.
“Which means we don’t know how to fix it,” Malik concluded, having picked up a great deal listening to various conversations between his more magically-educated friends and the healers that visited Aurus almost hourly.
“Right...” Twilight admitted with a tired sigh. She’d tried many things herself to wake Aurus, but even her considerable magical abilities had not been enough to unlock the secret of his ailment. “Whatever it is, it’s in his hooves now. All we can do is patch his body up for when his mind gets back.”
“He is coming back, right?” Malik whispered quietly, too quietly for anyone else in the room but Twilight and Korrick to hear.
Twilight looked over her shoulder to her sleeping friend, a worried look passing over her face. “We don’t know...”
“Bah!” Korrick huffed, startling her and Malik out of their darkening mood. “Of course he’ll come back. He has a history of coming back to those who need him,” the old changeling chuckled, his volume louder than anyone had spoken in days, his tone light hearted.
Malik and Twilight allowed themselves small smiles at his words. Nobody was fooled, of course; Korrick couldn’t know for certain anymore than the rest of them could. Yet his faith in the face of worry was something that all of them had needed to hear.
“He’ll be back,” Aria echoed, her gentle voice sounding determined, more sure, as she squeezed her brother’s hoof tighter. “I know he will.”
“He’s jus’ tired from all the fight he put up,” Applejack agreed, she and Aria flashing one another warm smiles. It was no secret that the two of them were taking Aurus’ condition the hardest, though Aria kept up a typical barrier of childhood optimism to hide it as best she could. One that Applejack did her best to match, ever the strong one.
Malik let his smile linger, along with the first comfortable silence the room of friends and family had shared in a long time.
“You know Aurus is going to be upset when he wakes up, don’t you?” Malik asked Korrick suddenly, unable to deny himself a quiet laugh as he pictured Aurus’ reaction to the statue that was under construction in front of the throne room.
“If you’re talking about the monument, I had nothing to do with it,” Korrick harrumphed. “The council pushed for it on their own.”
“But you’re the High Councilor...” Malik teased, knowing that if the council pushed for anything, Korrick could likely push back, especially with the recent boost to his influence following the council’s admission of false accusations against him.
The old changeling just hummed to himself and raised his eyebrows, wagging his head slightly from side to side in a wordless half-agreement. “True. But the council is a body governed by majority vote. I certainly didn’t vote for it.”
“But you didn’t vote against it either,” Malik chuckled, knowing he was right.
Korrick laughed as well, but said nothing more on the matter, confirming Malik’s suspicions. “He’s earned it, even if he won’t see it that way. Or like it.”
Malik stood by him since Twilight had already wandered off to talk to other friends, leaving him more or less alone with the High Councilor.
The silence grew between them, the moment passed. Malik found himself swept up in his own thoughts, his gaze fixed on Aurus’ sleeping face. The good mood that had slowly been building was little more than a hazy memory as his mind took a grimmer and more personal turn.
He, like all of the others, was deeply hoping that the king would come back to them. Aurus was the man who had saved Malik from continuing down a path of damnation, after all. Malik respected Aurus more than he had respected anyone in his entire life. The young changeling man had, in his own way, become dear to Malik.
Yet he couldn’t deny a certain level of trepidation that coupled itself to his thoughts of the king’s return. He’d spent the months since meeting Aurus and leading up to the fight with Gerd assisting the king: spying on Gerd and the council, delivering intelligence, and doing his part. He’d helped to lead the assassins off the trail, and for all of that time he had been focused on the present, his duty to Aurus’ cause.
Now, with his work done, he had had many days to reflect on other things. The rush of purpose had slowed to nothing, leaving him empty and only looking backward. He couldn’t deny the truth about himself; no matter what aid he had given the king in his time of need, he was still a criminal. No matter his change of heart, he was a murderer, and that was well known by Aurus and Korrick, both figures of power and bound by the law.
Malik sighed to himself, making his way to the door of the room and out into the hall, feeling the need to separate himself from the visage of his sleeping king. He wasn’t surprised, however, to hear the door to Aurus’ room open and close again behind him before he had even gone three steps.
A quick glance over his shoulder told him what he had already known he would see: Korrick standing with his back to the door and looking at Malik with concern.
“What’s wrong?” the old changeling asked quietly.
Malik sighed and took a few more steps away from the door. Korrick followed him patiently, as if sensing that proximity to Aurus’ room was paramount to helping Malik think.
“Korrick... what’s going to happen to me?” Malik asked at last, his tone reluctant as he came to a halt, thinking they’d moved far enough down the hall to keep their conversation private.
It took the councilor only a few moments to discover the meaning behind Malik’s words. “I can’t say for certain,” Korrick replied cautiously. “There’s no denying that you were a criminal, Malik. But you know as well as I do what kind of person our king is, and though I could have the council judge you, I will not. You put your fate in his hooves a long time ago, and since that time you have been loyal. What becomes of you will rest on his decision, regardless of the law.”
Regardless of the law? Malik almost chuckled at that. What was the purpose of the law, if it could be so easily disregarded? He was a murderer. By all rights he should have been sentenced to death already, and yet even Korrick, who served in Aurus’ stead as steward for the time being, was willing to wait for the king’s judgment, even if there was no telling that Aurus would wake, much less when.
His life would once more fall into Aurus’ hooves for molding, it seemed.
“He told me he forgave me, once,” Malik said at length, his tone low and serious. “But what did he forgive me for? Does he know? He hardly knows me, so how can I know he understood... or that he meant it?”
“Of course he meant it,” Korrick scolded. “Even if he doesn’t know you, you know him. You know he wouldn’t lie about something as serious as forgiveness for a man who lived the life you have. What purpose would that have served?”
“But I’ve killed!” Malik groaned, desperate to make Korrick understand his worry. “I could be executed, or at the absolute least rot my life away in prison for the things I’ve done, and it would hardly be enough...”
“So could I,” Korrick replied quietly, his tone sad as he suddenly put a hoof on the ex-assassin’s shoulder. “I was a soldier once. Many hearts beat their last around the blade of my spear, when I was young,” he said gravely. “Even Aurus has taken a life, after all of this.”
“It’s not the same,” Malik retorted, a slight bite to his words.
“Taking a life is always the same,” Korrick shot back sternly. “It is the reason that changes. No cause is great enough to block the pain of killing, in the end. It is a sin that can never be good. It can only be just... Necessary at times, to save other lives,” he said simply. “The lives you’ve taken, no matter how many, and no matter the purpose, are your sin. He has forgiven you once. He’ll forgive you again, when he wakes. He trusts you, as do the rest of us,” Korrick finished.
A long silence followed, Malik staring intently at his hooves as he took in Korrick’s words. Ever since the moment he had pledged to follow Aurus’ path of peace and give up his life as an assassin, he had wondered if he would have to pay his life for the sins he had committed some day. He had done his best to prepare himself against that worry, to accept that possible fate, and yet it still turned his stomach to ice.
“I’m afraid,” Malik admitted tiredly. “Ever since that day, I’ve been able to see my sin clearly. I can’t hide in the dark like I used to, and pretend I can’t see my own failure,” he whispered. “I’m afraid of what he will say, now that he no longer needs my help. I’m afraid to be judged by the man who opened my eyes. Now that I have seen the better road, I am afraid I won’t get the chance to tread on it.”
“He has already judged you,” Korrick said with a sigh of finality. “If he hadn’t, your eyes wouldn’t have been opened to begin with. You can’t go back and save yourself. You can only go forward,” he finished with a smile.
Malik stiffened at that declaration, the similarity to the words in his memory, his dream, too real; almost too convenient.
“I can’t go back to save her...”
“You can only go forward to avenge her...”
In a different life, he had persevered for the sake of revenge. What would he move forward for now?
“You’ll see, Malik. Trust him,” Korrick said simply, his hoofsteps echoing for a short time before the sound of the door opening and closing signaled his departure, leaving Malik alone to his thoughts.
Malik sighed to himself, standing in the light from the window above him as he looked at his sunbathed right hoof, where too many times before a dagger had rested. “I’ll try,” he whispered quietly.
It was night by the time Malik had returned to Cliffcrest Castle, the chill of the dark desert driving him back to its warm interior. Shortly after his talk with Korrick he’d left the castle and the city altogether for a short while, venturing out to the well-remembered cave that he had often escaped to to contact Aurus or Korrick behind Gerd’s back in recent weeks. He’d simply wanted to be alone to think. Alone was his most familiar state, and once his most comfortable. It was becoming less so, as the days drew on.
He’d reached the end of his thoughts, taken them as far as he could take them. In the end, he had decided to accept that Korrick was right. He had known from the moment the old changeling had spoken that he was, but had not wanted to admit it.
He needed to trust Aurus. When he awoke, his will would decide Malik’s fate. He had forgiven him once before, but for Malik that was not enough. He needed to be certain, to know for his own sake that Aurus understood what he was forgiving him of. When the king awoke, Malik would confess everything. Only when he had heard it, down to the last drop of blood Malik had spilled, could Malik truly accept his judgment.
No matter what he commanded at the end of his tale, Malik would abide it. If Aurus commanded him to die for his sins, he would not fight it. If Aurus commanded him to atone somehow, he would dedicate his life to doing so.
He sighed heavily to himself, standing at the door to the king’s room. He pushed it open quietly, having hesitated long enough. He knew it would serve no purpose, that inside Aurus would still be sleeping, and yet he wanted to see him. To face him with the new resolve he had spent the day forging.
The room was far from empty, even at that late hour. Applejack was asleep at the bedside, sitting on the floor with her front legs crossed to rest her head on. Even in slumber lines of worry creased her brow, and that quietly made Malik’s heart ache. That ache deepened even more as he noted Aria, sleeping on the bed next to her brother, her little frame holding his front leg in a gentle embrace as she dreamed.
He was so loved, Malik thought. All the fear, so much so that they could not bring themselves to leave his side, proved to Malik just how deep that love ran. Applejack was tired, it showed on her face daily, and even Aria’s endless childhood zeal was wearing thin after days of worry. They didn’t want Aurus to be alone in his room when he awoke, no matter what moment it happened.
Malik was careful to step lightly, to avoid making noise and waking the slumbering guests as he edged around to the far side of the bed. He wasn’t surprised to find a third guest sleeping in Aurus’ room that evening, for she had done so many times before. Fluttershy was curled up on the sofa that faced the empty fireplace, her breathing slow and even.
Malik hadn’t known any of the ponies that had accompanied Aurus very long, or very deeply. Yet recent days had taught him much about them. Fluttershy was a worrier, timid and easily hurt. The fear ran deep in her that Aurus would never return, though she would never have said it out loud. It wasn’t a mystery why she, like Applejack, had decided to stay close to Aurus in this troubling time.
Malik paused at the side of the bed, taking his eyes away from Fluttershy and looking down at Aurus. He was young, younger even than Malik, though perhaps only barely. Too young to suffer the fate of a mind wandered too far to return, he thought.
“I understand why they worry,” he whispered to Aurus, though he knew he couldn’t hear him. “I worry too,” he admitted with a heavy sigh.
His words were followed by a rustling over by the sofa, drawing his attention. A cream-yellow nose poked up over the back of the couch, followed shortly by Fluttershy’s pink mane and her half-open teal eyes. “Aurus?” she asked quietly, barely able to keep her eyes open as she scanned the room.
Malik was unable to deny himself a small smile as he put two and two together. She was subconsciously wired to wake up for even the smallest sounds, waiting for Aurus to mutter in his sleep or wake up, and so even his faint whisper to the king had been enough to wake her.
“Just me,” he whispered apologetically, drawing her gaze to him with his words.
Her eyes were still only half open as she dragged her chin along the top of the couch, turning to look at him. “Oh, Malik,” she yawned, clearly only barely registering it. “What time is it?”
Malik smiled at first, but his smile shrank slowly as he began to see her reaction in a different light. Would he have behaved so casually if he awoke to the sight of a known assassin standing by the king’s bed? It certainly would have startled him awake, if he were in her position.
The realization of how this situation would have looked to him gave him mixed feelings. On the one hoof, he was appalled that he hadn’t realized sooner the possible interpretation. On the other he was quietly relieved, and even a little uplifted, that not even Fluttershy had thought such a thing. Of all the ponies she was the most easily frightened, the easiest to worry, and so if she thought nothing of it, then perhaps...
He let his thoughts fade as his smile returned, this time slightly apologetic. “It’s still late,” he explained quietly. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“Oh... okay,” she murmured simply, her chin sliding off the top of the couch and plopping back down to the cushions, clearly intent on falling back asleep.
Malik was careful to keep his chuckle inaudible, his shoulders shaking slightly with the gentle laughter. He almost couldn’t believe the normalcy she had treated him with. It was as if she didn’t know he had been a murderer once. As if she had forgotten.
“As if I’m a different person from the Malik I used to be,” he whispered quietly, turning his gaze back to Aurus. “I’ve felt like a different person for some time now... I never expected anyone to see it. To see the change,” he admitted with a sigh. “You saw the change in me before it had even come to pass. You coaxed it out of me. How clearly must I be wearing it now?” he asked. He knew he wouldn’t get an answer, but he silently wished for one.
“Will you still see the change in me, when you awaken?”
The young changeling girl cried out as the hoof slammed into the side of her head, slapping her to the alley floor, the half-deep chuckles of adolescent male changelings mocking her pain. The stars danced above in the sliver of night sky visible between the serrated edges of the stone roofs high above, the moon obscured by the cliff side even further beyond, leaving the alleyway in the dim light of the streetlamps far away.
“Please...” the young female sobbed, curling into herself defensively as the three older changeling males advanced on her once more. She tried to beg again, but her words were cut off in a sharp cry of pain as she was yanked up by her mane, her hooves scrabbling to get underneath her and push herself up to stop the pull and the agony that came with it.
“Dumb bitch!” the male who had grabbed her roared, slapping her hard again while his cohorts laughed. The female cried out again and slammed into the side of a building, slumping down the wall, trying her best to sob despite the pain robbing her of her breath and the panic seizing her lungs.
“Don’t you get it? A houseless bitch like you don’t get a say in anything,” the oldest boy in the group of three, the obvious leader, growled. “You don’t get to tell us what we can and can’t do, get it? There’s only one law out here, and that’s that the strong can have what they want.”
“Yeah, and we want to warm ourselves up,” one of the other two males chuckled. “It’s pretty cold out tonight, you know?”
“Who’s going first?” the other asked with a dark chuckle.
“I think Fik,” the other added with an equally disgusting laugh. “He’s doin’ all the work this time.”
“I do all the work all the time,” the oldest added, the three of them laughing while the girl wept and tried to crawl away.
“Uh oh, she’s getting away,” Fik guffawed, his tone clearly sarcastic as he grabbed the shoulders of the beaten girl, dragging her back towards him.
“Be a good girl and just keep quiet,” he hissed, causing the cry rising in her throat to die out as he drew her nearer. “It’ll end better for you that way.”
“Let’s get this party start-,” one of the other boys began eagerly, before a sharp cracking sound issued from where he was standing, followed by a loud thud. All the commotion stole the attention of the other two rapists, who turned to see what had happened.
A young changeling male stood atop the body of their companion, the legs of the corpse sprawled at weird angles, blood pooling beneath him from the hole in the back of his neck, right at the base of his skull. A dagger covered in that same blood glinted in the meager light as the changeling slowly pulled it up, looking at it with a fire in his eyes.
“It works,” he whispered quietly. “It really works...”
“What the hell?” the other younger male cried out in panic, looking at his dead friend. “He killed Beck!”
“I know that little shit,” Fik growled in realization, tossing the female he had been about to mount aside in his anger, and whirling on the young male holding the dagger. “He was the little fucker with that girl we done last week.”
“The girl you ‘done’...” the young changeling echoed quietly, the dagger held tightly in his hoof. “That’s all she was to you,” he muttered darkly. “But she was my everything. She was everything to me!” he roared suddenly, leaping for the other changeling close by.
The other rapist barely dodged the mad swipe of the dagger, his eyes wide with panic. “Shit!” he gasped, jumping back a step as another swing came in, the razor’s edge of the dagger slicing through his hide and drawing blood.
“Stop dancing around and grab the damned kid!” Fik growled, stalking forward to become a part of the fight. He stopped suddenly though as his other friend froze stiff as a board and tumbled to his side.
“Artez, what the hell are you doin’?” Fik yelled at his friend, who was simply laying on the ground as the young changeling with the blade stalked closer and closer, his steps measured and sure.
“I-I can’t move!” Artez screamed in panic, his eyes darting between Fik and the advancing changeling for a moment before locking onto the dagger that hovered right in front of his face.
“My new friend said that would happen,” the young changeling whispered darkly, his eyes sunken and far away; dead, except for the rage burning inside the black depths of his pupil. An anger Artez could clearly see, even in the darkness of the desert night. “He said if I cut you, you would lay down.”
“No, don’t!” Artez cried out as the dagger raced upward. “Please don’t!”
His cry echoed off the alley walls, punctuated by the sharp crack of the dagger punching through his shell and burying itself in the side of his neck. Tears of agony welled in the changeling’s eyes as he gasped, his throat filled with steel. He longed to cry out, but nothing came. He longed to lash out, but his limbs wouldn’t obey him.
He longed for nothing else as the young changeling with the dagger gave the knife a sharp pull, the keen edge passing through flesh and changeling hide like paper, carving its way out the front of its victim’s neck, blood gushing fiercely for a moment before the flow slowed to a trickle.
“By the hells...” Fik whispered, even his violent mind shocked by the carnage, the sheer violence of what had happened. He snapped back to reality though through force of will and adrenaline, knowing that he would be next if he didn’t do something.
“You fucking runt!” he roared, taking the initiative and lunging at the littler changeling, who was still facing the latest corpse he had made. “I’m gonna rip that dagger out of your hooves and into your skinny little neck!”
The little changeling didn’t resist, and Fik bowled into him, wrapping him in a crushing embrace. He pinned the dagger-wielder’s forelegs at his sides, and squeezed even harder. At that range, there was no way that little needle of a blade could do any real damage to a guy his size. Even so, he felt a prick of pain as the knife bit into his side.
“Got you, you shit!” he roared triumphantly, jerking his target to the side in a quick twist and sending him flying. The dagger turned with its owner at first, and Fik grunted in pain as it twisted for a moment before the pressure released, the dagger stuck into his side still as the changeling who wielded it was forced to let go.
Fik gasped as he yanked the dagger out of his side, panting from the pain. He hefted the dagger up as he stalked towards the changeling who had attacked his cohorts, ready to strike down.
“I’ll kill you,” he huffed, his hooves and his tongue suddenly very heavy. “I’ll...” he stopped his advance abruptly, tumbling as his back leg dragged for a moment and then went limp. He could feel the leg there, could feel it dragging on the sandstone floor of the alley, but couldn’t move it. The dagger bounced from his grasp, which had grown as weak as his legs.
The young changeling picked himself up slowly, taking his time retrieving the dagger. “What did you do to me?” Fik hiss through his clenched teeth. The gash in his side burned like hellfire as the young changeling advanced on him, holding the handle of the dagger in his fangs. With his hooves free, he rolled the immobile Fik over onto his back.
Fik’s eyes darted over the scene again and again in panic, just like Artez’s had. “What the hell did you do to me?” he cried out, the fear clear in his tone.
“You can’t move either,” the young changeling said, his tone dark and sinister, yet tinged with a hint of awe. “Even though you’re strong... even you can’t move,” he said, and suddenly he laughed. It was a terrifying sound. It was the laugh of a maniac, of a changeling who had lost his mind. “It’s because I’m so strong!” he cackled, hoisting the dagger high. “Stronger than you!”
“W-wait,” Fik cried weakly, trying his hardest to get his hooves up and defend himself. “Wait!”
The dagger plunged down, biting into his chest. Fik screamed in pain as the blade cracked bone and tore flesh, but his scream turned into a wheeze as the edge sliced through his left lung.
The dagger yanked free suddenly, Fik gasping like a fish out of water, blood pooling in his punctured lung.
“Oh no...” the young killer whispered, sounding disappointed. “I went too far. Now you can’t scream,” he sighed, hefting the dagger high again.
“No,” Fik tried to beg, but it only came out as a weak, slow gurgle. The gurgle sped up in a rush of air as the dagger plunged into his groin and he tried to scream. The pain still lingered as the dagger yanked free, and if not for the burning in his wounds, Fik knew that he would have passed out from the air he could no longer acquire, drowning in his own blood. Between one working lung and the adrenaline coursing through him, the merciful blackness wouldn’t come.
“That was for her,” the changeling whispered in Fik’s ear, the dagger suddenly hovering over his eyes. “Do you remember her? What she felt like?” he asked, as if to mock the damage dealt to Fik’s manhood.
The dagger slowly dug into his right eye, and blood raced down his cheeks as he tried to scream once more, the crimson fluid escaping as the air rushed voicelessly out of his throat.
“Do you remember what she looked like?” the young changeling roared, yanking the dagger out of Fik’s ruined eye suddenly.
Fik was barely hanging on, his one remaining pupil dilating and expanding again as the world came in and out of focus, very nearly fading to black.
“You don’t remember...” the murderer finished with a nod, the dagger that had been hovering over Fik’s destroyed eye rising high. “That’s okay. You’ll never see her again. No one will,” he whispered sadly, and with those final words he drove the dagger down hard, burying it to the hilt in Fik’s only remaining eye. The gurgling in his throat stopped, the bloody froth in his mouth reaching a state of motionlessness as the bubbles slowly popped, no new ones coming to replace them, their maker dead at long last.
The young changeling girl had been frozen in shock the entire while, unable to make a sound or move an inch. Everything had happened so fast. Everything had been so unreal, like a nightmare since the three had descended on her, had tried to take her. She lost all strength as she collapsed, tears still running down her cheeks as the young changeling who had killed her attackers stood from his kneeling position by Fik’s corpse, leaving the dagger buried in the dead changeling’s eye.
“Thank you,” she whispered again and again, unable to think of anything else to say. What those three had gotten, no matter how grim, they had deserved. “Thank you...”
The young changeling didn’t answer her at first. He simply turned to walk away, his hoofsteps uneven. His words echoed back to her on the alley floor as he headed into the darker shadows far away.
“I didn’t do it for you... I did it for Meika.”
Malik’s eyes snapped open, his breathing heavy. From the way his chest ached, he assumed he must have been breathing in that panicked fashion for some time. Such heavy breathing would have woken most any other sleeper after a time, but it never did with Malik. His breathing slowed as he registered the room around him, coming out of the vivid memory. They were always so clear, this particular one always so violent.
Something in the background hammered away, but he paid it no mind. He closed his eyes and forced himself to relax, the tension all over his body slowly fading as he held his hooves to his sides and opened his eyes, just staring at the ceiling: his morning ritual for recovering from the nightmares. “Will it never end?” he asked himself, as he had so often in recent years.
At last he fully noticed the pounding at his door, which stole his attention and brought the tension back to his shoulders for a moment. He eyed the door for a time, only to have the intense knocking come again. With a heavy sigh, Malik pushed himself out of his bed, throwing the portal open.
A guard stood there, a worried look on his face. It slowly faded as the door opened and Malik looked him up and down. Malik hardly recognized the guard, who looked exactly like any one of the other hundreds he had seen around the castle.
“Yes?” Malik asked, his dark dream leaving an edge to his tone. He was not fully recovered from that particular memory, the most gruesome and vivid one he had of that time.
“You had me worried, sir,” the guard explained with a slight note of relief. “I’ve been trying to reach you all morning.”
“For what? And I’m not your sir,” Malik muttered with a scowl, eying the guard with a look that portrayed pure impatience.
“I was told to come and alert you right away. The king has finally awakened,” the guard explained quickly, his tone clearly eager.
Malik’s distaste following his dream shifted to a different negative emotion; the fear he had so familiarized himself with from the day before. On the one hoof he was glad that Aurus had awakened. Many hearts would be at ease because of that. Yet on the other hoof it meant that the judgment he had resolved to face would not be far away.
“Sir?” the guard asked, apparently noting something out of place in Malik’s expression.
“That’s... excellent news,” Malik explained with a forced smile, doing his best to make it seem sincere. He pulled on all of the positive feelings he had regarding the king’s awakening to make that happen. “Thank you. I will go see him immediately.”
“You’re welcome, sir,” the guard replied excitedly, giving him a salute before turning and trotting off, presumably to alert someone else on a long list of people who needed to be told.
Malik let his smile drop once the guard was gone, shutting the door. He left his hoof lingering on the handle, closing his eyes as his thoughts raced. He had already been over it once before; had already made his resolution. That resolve to face the judgment needed to be unwavering, he knew. Still, the fact that it might very well finally be at hoof...
“I’ll trust him,” he whispered quietly, his grip tightening on the door handle. “When that time comes, I will trust him, but right now...” he finished, giving the handle a turn as he sighed, letting the tension go. “Right now, I just want to see my friend.”