The Forgotten Zodiac

L'arc sighed and shook his head, leaning against the wall. He felt absolutely horrible... why had he consented to this plan? Why had he thought of it in the first place?
"I need to go back in there," he said, turning around and heading back to the infirmary. "I have to explain..."

Sylas immediately stood, but it was a terrible idea. His put his hand over the magic stitches on his chest. His hand was bloody again when he reached out for L'arc. "P-please, don't leave, I need you!" He wailed, staggering towards his friend. He wrapped the forest prince in a tight embrace. "L-L'arc...hurt me. Please, hurt me. Do everything you have to, an...anything...I-I'll suffer, I don't care...you're my friend. R-right? Yo-you wouldn't hurt me for no reason..." He leaned heavily against L'arc, tears rolling down his cheeks like rain. "Te-tell me the reason...I-I'll listen..."

"I..." L'arc seemed at a loss for words, but his actions were immidiate. He was quick to direct Sylas back to the bed, making him rest upon it. "Not anymore, Sylas. I'm not going to hurt you again, I didn't... I didn't want to," he murmured. "Just... lay down," he said. "I'll tell you, just lay down and rest..."

"Okay," Sylas murmured, trusting his dear friend. He didn't let go of L'arc's hand, not wanting the forest prince to let go.

"Well," Reetah peeked into the room. "Looks like he just needed a minute to recollect his thoughts. That's good, I suppose...everything went better than expected."

"Go away!" Sylas wailed at the sight of her. She backed away willingly, shrugging a bit. So long as Sylas wasn't freaking out and pushing L'arc away. She couldn't care less what he thought of her...

Although the statues she would punch later would probably say otherwise, if they could speak.

L'arc watched Reetah go, and slowly, the others in the infirmary filed out after her. Gabe was clutching the sending stone in his hand, and from what L'arc could gather of the conversation, the warlock was telling Aries that he and Sylas were awake, and that things were going to be okay.

The prince turned back to Sylas. "Do you want to sleep now? I won't leave," he said.

Sylas looked up at him with his one eye, fear spreading over his face. "No...no, no, no. Don't make me sleep, please..." He whimpered. "The nightmares, I don't want to sleep..." He clung to L'arc desperately, struggling to keep himself awake in spite of his words.

"Shh," L'arc said, grabbing Sylas's other hand so that he was holding both. "I'm not going to make you do anything," he tried to soothe. "Here," he said, pulling the blankets of the bed up to cover Sylas. "Why don't you tell me about the nightmares? It might make you feel better," he said.

Sylas slowly nodded. "They...they were calm at first. All the dreams...you were in a lot of them. But...then there wasn't anyone. The forests burned, the mountains erupted into volcanos, a-and the humans...the humans were overrun. Demons took over everything. They...they weilded weapons that made a loud noise, and made holes in people. Holes! Huge, gaping holes, where flesh and bone had been..." He shuddered, pressing his cheek against L'arc and hugging his friend's middle. "I...I was with them. The demons...they tied me down and made me watch everything. All of it. All the fire, the murder...th-they burned you at the stake, and they turned Bermuda entirely into a fish and held him above water until he died. Th-they made Rush turn into a dragon, but there...there was something wrong with that. It hurt him...he wouldn't stop screaming...not until they slit his throat." He was shaking by this point, pale as a ghost.

L'arc put his arm around Sylas in return, listening. "I see..." he murmured quietly, wishing for a moment that there was someone else in here, to help him keep Sylas calm - but then, at the point, L'arc may have been the only one that would be able to calm Sylas. "It wasn't real," was all the druid could think to say, though he knew it was a small comfort.

"I was scared, L'arc, so scared...I felt..." Sylas trembled as he spoke, leaning against his friend heavily. "I was so miserable. Th-they fed Gabe to orcs, turned Verdi into a hat, used Aries for target practice...and when they were done, they tore out my eye!" He cried. "A-and then...they just left. It was me, all alone, no one else was there. I was alone, so alone, and that scared me more than anything else..."

"Well, you're not alone now," L'arc said, with a faint air of grasping at straws, "I'm here, and I'm not going anywhere... not now. I'm not going to leave you alone, and no one's going to hurt you..." he said, gripping Sylas's hands in his own.

Sylas looked up at his friend, then smiled a bit. "Yeah...just don't leave, okay? I think...I think I'll be okay, just don't...leave." He wiped his eyes, feeling a bit better after that cry. He pushed his pillows up and leaned back against the bedframe, wiping his face on his sleeve. "So, uh...what all did we miss, while we were asleep?"

"Quite frankly, I have no idea - it's a bit early for me to be up, and I think I'm paying for it a bit. I'm not... thinking things through completely," L'arc sufficed to answer. He stood and crossed the room, bringing back a stool and sitting it next to Sylas's bed, then resting himself upon it. "Gabe's gotten better at magic. And we're still the only two here at the Manakete palace... none of the others seem to have made it here."

"Oh...oh, dear." Sylas sighed. "Should we...try to find them, or wait here?" He tilted his head to the side a bit, frowning slightly. Jerod poked his head back into the room, but he pulled back a moment later to leave them alone. They needed time to catch up, the old Manakete had decided. Nothing for it, really.

L'arc turned to the door as the corner of his eye caught movement, but Jerod was gone by the time he looked. He shrugged it off, then turned to L'arc. "I don't know. it seemed like Gabe might know something - I think he was using his sending stone to talk to Aries, so there's that. It worries me that they're not back here, though; it makes me wonder if something's happened to Bermuda, if he wasn't able to warp them here for the winter."

"I dunno..." Sylas frowned. "What if...I dunno." He sighed and looked down, shaking his head. "Anything could have happened. We need to talk to Gabe," He sighed, trying to stand up, but he couldn't do it without help. It was painful...

L'arc shook his head quickly. "We'll ask him when he comes back in. Right now, you need to rest... I insist," he said.

Sylas looked down. "Right. Because...you hurt me. You still haven't told me why." He looked down at his hands, then back up at L'arc. "I know you have a reason...please, tell me, so I don't think ever again that you're a monster or an enemy...I hated thinking that, even though it was only for a minute or two."

L'arc seemed suddenly unable to meet Sylas's gaze. "I..." he began haltingly, trying to think of how to continue. There was no better explanation than the truth, but L'arc wasn't sure how to begin about telling Sylas what had gone on. "It's... just this," he said, finally seeming to settle on the words. "You were... captured... a while back, by a very bad man. He used some form of hypnosis on you, and when we ran into him again, he utilized this hypnosis... he told you that you had to kill me, and Bermuda, and Aries, and well, everyone.

"The reason we had to hurt you was that this... hypnosis, as it is, can only be triggered when you're about to die. In order to under your orders to kill us... we had to give you new ones."

"Who...who?" Sylas blinked. "Bad man? That's not very descriptive...why don't I remember that?" He frowned, shaking his head as though it would help bring out the memories his subconscious had forced him to set aside. "Was it the Phantom? He can remove memories..." Sylas shuddered a bit, grateful that the Phantom hadn't tried to wipe any of their minds yet.