The Forgotten Zodiac

Forin didn't calm down for a few very long minutes. When he did, he stood and sat on the couch, accepting a handkerchief from Lily (though he did glare at it skeptically for a long while). He finally steadied his voice enough to talk, and explained himself. "The Tartaran named Cern, the one who took Luen...he took Diana. We managed to get Luen to tell us where he went...but going into the Hadaarak Desert without means of transportation is...well, insane. So we need Spy. We need him to help us track down Zephyr. And then we need him to help us track down Diana. And...I was wondering if perhaps you would come with us as well, Jag. You're a good fighter, we could use your skill..." He glanced up at Lily and offered her handkerchief back to her; but his glance quickly turned into a bewildered stare as he finally noticed Lily's swelled stomach.

"What on earth have you been eating?" He questioned, rather rudely.

"What?" Lily blinked at him.

"You're much more...well, you're...fat."

"What?" Lily flushed, then laughed when she realized what he was talking about. "No, silly! I have a child in here, a beautiful baby boy."

Forin stared for a while longer. "It's...eh...illegal to eat humans on Tartarus, I didn't think that such things were in practice here..."

Jag stared flatly at him, then said "She didn't eat someone, idiot. She's pregnant. Females from our world carry their young in a part inside their bodies called the womb, where the baby is kept safe from harm. The baby stays in there until it's big and strong enough to live outside. Am I going too fast for you?"

Welk raised a hand.

"Half-cat?" Jag said.

"How did you get the baby inside Lily?" Welk asked.

Jag stared at him for several long seconds, then said "You don't...know?"

Welk shook his head. "No," he answered. "Cynyr never talked about babies or anything like that, and I've never heard anyone talk about it."

Jag facepalmed and said "I knew you were clueless, but this..." He sighed deeply, then motioned at Welk with a hand and said "Come here. It's time someone told you how certain things work." He and Welk moved away, where Jag spoke in a low, hushed voice to the half-cat.

After only mere moments of hearing Jag talk, Welk's eyes grew wide and disgusted. "Gross!" he said, quickly scurrying away. "I didn't know having kids was so much trouble!"

Jag laughed away, moving over to wrap one arm around Lily's shoulders, kissing the top of her head gently and lovingly.

Welk stared at them for a moment, then his hair bristled out in a ruffled look. "...So!" he said, making an effort to forget about what he had just heard. "When are you having the baby, Lily?"

((I want her to have it some time during the course of this book or the next. :la:))

Forin tilted his head to one side, still a bit confused. He knew the process and whatnot of the conception itself, but he thought that the females laid eggs, like birds or dragons. Lily smiled when Welk asked his question. "About two months," Lily nodded happily. "He's well on his way."

"Oh. I think I get it now." Forin sighed, running his fingers through his hair momentarily. "Anyways...what do you say, Jag, Spy? You two up for helping out a...an old acquaintance? For Diana's sake...?"

"Of course, I'll help!" Spy squeaked. "I'll help so much, I'll help and help and help! I'm good at helping."

Jag mulled it over for a moment, then fluffed out his blue-jay feathered crest and said "...I don't want to, but I guess I'll come. Having one more person along with increase your chances for getting Diana back. Especially with my abilites." He spawned several swords and weapons, watching them clatter to the ground.

Welk jumped at the sound, his hair fluffing out again.

Jag grinned at him, then said "You can use those weapons, but they'll despawn after a certain period of time, unless it's synced with you, like my bow is." He spawned his bow, which wasn't just a normal weapon like those he had created. The bow was delicate and magically enhanced, along with his arrows. "Tada," he said, hefting the bow. He smiled and put the weapons away, turning to Lily. "Will you be okay here while I'm gone?" he asked, his normally hard voice growing soft and concerned.

"I'll be fine. I'll go and stay with Alicia, no worries." Lily smiled happily. "Go and save Diana. She needs you more than I do, believe it or not."

Spy skittered over to the wet spots on the floor from Forin's tears. "Hey, I think that fortune teller lady was right, kind of." He giggled, trotting in a circle around the tears and hopping up into Jag's arms with excitement. "We're going on another adventure!"

Jag 'oofed' as Spy jumped into his arms, quickly movings his hands up to hold Spy gently against his chest. "Careful there, snack," he warned, using a clawed hand to scratch Spy's yellow-brown fur. He curled his fingers around under Spy's chin, scratching the chimera's neck. "That settles it, then," he said, flaring his blue-jay wings. "We're going."

"Great. We're leaving now, there's no time to waste." Forin stood, wiping his eyes on his sleeve one last time. "I might kill that stupid horse before the day is done...either way, we really do need to go. Spy, here," Forin allowed the Chimera to sniff the scale from Zephyr.

Spy ran around in circles for a few minutes, then looked up. "I know where to find him! He's up in the mountains behind the castle. Mountaaaaiinnnssss!" He squealed with joy, running around in circles.

"Good. We can stop by the castle to check on Werr and get a fresh horse or something..." Forin nodded thoughtfully.

Back in said castle, Werr was still sleeping like a log. Obelisk was nowhere to be seen, but they had a different visitor; it was Ophile, the head-guard and advocate of affairs related to Tartarus. He was sitting at the foot of Cynyr's bed, sniffing the half-cat's injuries sadly. He hadn't been able to move in to help; he would have been useless, after all. That was why he was upset. Werr was more or less okay, albeit hurt, but Cynyr...

Slowly, the half-cat opened his eyes, one sun-yellow and one empty and gaping. He shifted slightly and tried to sit up, only to find that he couldn't move. Why couldn't he move? His legs felt weighted, along with his right arm. His chest felt...odd. Like someone had dropped a rock on him. A really, really big rock. He quickly remembered the wyvern fight and immediately struggled to heave himself upright, only to nearly scream as his entire body throbbed painfully. He flopped back down on the covers, his eye wide as he panted. He glanced down at himself, spotting the thickly wrapped casts around his legs, with space between for his knees to bend. He had a simlar one around his arm, though this one was unable to bend. It sprawled from just under his shoulder to his wrist, where it then wrapped around his fingers. One attempt at twitching the fingers on that hand brought tears to Cynyr's eyes with the resulting pain. Broken. Broken, broken, broken. His chest was wrapped so thickly with the white bandages that Cynyr felt like he was wearing a really tight winter coat. His cloak was gone, along with his shirt. Though with the amount of bandages around his chest, he didn't seem to notice the absence of the article of clothing.

"You are damaged," Ophile spoke, announcing his presence. He moved over to the side of Cynyr's good eye, nosing Cynyr's hand ever so gently. "Seria is not here, either. Doubly unfortunate..." He rested his head on the bed next to Cynyr's arm, careful not to touch or jostle anything. "Yet you are alive. I still question when your luck will run out. You are about as difficult to kill as a cockroach. No offense meant, of course."

Cynyr flinched slightly at the wolf's voice, then managed to turn his head and stare at the creature. Slowly, the edge of Cynyr's mouth turned up into a slight smile. Surprisingly, he was actually a little glad to see the wolf. A little. He liked the head-guard Tartaran to some extent; the wolf understood the half-cat. After flexing the muscles in his relatively uninjured arm to make sure it wasn't hurt, he carefully raised that arm and gently rubbed a hand over Ophile's head, moving it in a stroking pattern. "I think a cockroach is a little more difficult to kill than me," Cynyr said, "A little." He sighed, closing his eyes out of exhaustion as he continued to stroke Ophile's head, more to reassure himself than anything else.

Ophile nuzzled Cynyr's hand again. "Thank you for the update. It's been awhile since you pet me last. My information was outdated." The wolf nipped Cynyr's hand gently, merely a sign that he cared. "So...Amnesia. Tricky..." Ophile said thoughtfully. "You know, I do believe there may be something that can help you both. There's a young Gypsie woman, a fortune teller, traveling from place to place. Many people don't believe much of what she says, but her fortunes always seem to come true. I've heard that she's helped many ill people be rid of their ailments. Perhaps she could restore Werr's mind..." Ophile shook his head. "But it would be far too difficult to find her...she could be anywhere in the kingdom. Or even, perhaps, the entire continent..."

Cynyr's smile faded as the wolf spoke, taking on a look of wonder. He tried to sit up at those words, his voice breaking painfully as he said "We have to find her...!" His body started to shake violently within a few seconds of him forcing himself upright, so he had to flop back down and pant. He groaned and put his uninjured hand over his face, muttering "Why did I have to break both legs?" He sighed and moved his hand, glaring up at the ceiling as if it were the cause of his troubles. He glanced over to Ophile and moved his hand out again, pulling the wolf closer so he wouldn't have to strain to pet him. Cynyr felt like the world was pressing in on him, that his responsabilties were wearing him down day-by-day. Maybe he really was too attached to people like Werr and Welk. He absently petted Ophile's head again, not caring that the wolf had seen all of his memories. Ophile was the only person in the entire universe that had seen it all; every last memory Cynyr had, the wolf had seen. Sure, Cynyr had told the others of his past and what had happened to him to cause his scars, but Ophile had seen those and more.

And the wolf had understood.

Before he could stop himself, Cynyr suddenly wrapped his arm around Ophile's neck and had pulled the wolf close, burying his face in the wolf's furry neck.

"There, there," Ophile said softly, turning his head to cradle Cynyr's head somewhat. He was quiet, happy to be of comfort to Cynyr. "All good things must come to an end, but not all bad things have an eternity to stay on this world." He then fell quiet again.

Ophile stood there and continued to comfort Cynyr, not saying a word for a long time. It was a little odd, for a wolf to be an object of comfort to a half-cat, but Ophile understood. In fact, there was so much that Ophile understood, it was perhaps a bit scary. If anyone could know everything, it could possibly be Ophile.

When the half-cat finally let go, Ophile gave him a gentle lick on his hand, then said, "If you wish, I can search for the woman. But it will take time...I feel that it would be more beneficial to get Seria back here, first...which would you have me do?"

Cynyr sighed deeply, feeling a little better having released some of his tensions. He closed his eyes, able to lay still now, then said "...Werr's more important than me. Find the woman first. As you...probably know, I've lived through worse than a few broken bones." A few was a severe understatement, of course. His left arm alone had two major breaks and a hairline fracture. And then there was his legs, then his ribs and insides. Not to mention... He stuck his uninjured hand inside his mouth and took hold of something, then gave a quick tug and brought out a sharp panther tooth. Wonderful. He set the tooth down on the nightstand nearby, running his hand through his hair. He glanced back to Ophile and said "The woman first and foremost, if you can find her, unless Seria is needed for Werr. Either way, do whichever helps Werr more." He pressed his fingers against his temple, trying to think.

Ophile turned and sniffed at Werr curiously. "His wounds seem well treated, but I sense an infection coming on. He should...be okay for a few days, but I cannot say how long. The infection is too deep for your human doctor to reach without seriously damaging Werr both in mind and in body." He sighed, thinking hard for a few moments. "I will see what I can do about the gypsy first, but if it takes longer than three days, I will set my sights on getting Seria back before the infection can kill him."

He turned his head back to Werr sharply as the boy shifted, moving his hand to Ophile's head. "Good dog," The human smiled groggily before turning over as much as his damaged chest would allow, falling back asleep.

Ophile was silent for a long while, sitting down. "I see. Cynyr, how much do you know about Werr's past, before he met you?" He asked, flicking his ears curiously. "I would be gone already, but I've seen something interesting."

"Well if Werr's in danger, get Seria first. I'd rather have Werr be healthy and alive, than sick and later dead. I can last with his current state for a while longer," the panther said. He listened as Ophile spoke, then said "Not too much, I'm afraid. Just that he lived in the same town as us and that he was a real homebody. With a major curious streak. A general, all-around nerd. At least, that's what I first thought about him." He sighed, then said "He lived with his mother, Heather Grehi. But...if I'm quite frank..." He hesitated, wondering if Ophile would think he was crazy, then said "Heather never really struck me as...well...they didn't seem...related." He covered his eye with his hand, which helped with the bit of embarrassment he felt, then said "I mean, they looked fairly similar. Both had black hair and everything, but...well, they didn't act like how I've seen familes interact. It just wasn't...there." He went quiet, then said "I know I've always been sharp-eyed, but...sometimes I think my mind is playing tricks on me." He shrugged with his good shoulder, running his hand through his hair again.

"No, your eyes were not decieving you at the time. Heather and Werr really were not related at all. He was raised in a different town entirely, in fact." Ophile explained. "He mentioned that he 'hated fire', before. Yet he has never expressed such a distaste for it previously. Before his amnesia, he remembered very little about his young childhood; just that there was a fire that separated him from his parents. I'm not certain, but I believe he was aware that he and the Grehis were not of the same family. He must have guessed that his precious Council hadn't actually searched for his family at all; they just placed him where they needed him when the time came. Which led to a problem; if Heather and Darius Grehi were not his family...then who was he fighting for?

"So he kept quiet. He said nothing of this inner ordeal for quite some time. He had forgotten who his original parents were, knowing nothing but the fire that tore them apart. That fire caused a memory lapse. And then there's this wound here...this one that has caused his current amnesia has set his memory back; he remembers up to the fire, yet nothing further. Which also means he remembers his parents. Which is not a very good thing.

"Sylas and Kiri Rowe. They were a rather disfunctional couple, and when Werr came along, they became rather disfuctional parents. Sylas left fairly regularly; he still sought to fill his life with adventure. And Kiri blamed Werr for it; she was rather...abusive. The scars are long gone, but they remain still on his once again young mind. He begged for his father, for his father was the only one who ever defended him. Her 'punishment' once led to his arm and leg being broken when she tripped him and he fell down the stairs. She claimed that he had fallen off the swing at the park. When a friend of Kiri's came over and he tried to tell her that Kiri had broken his bones, Kiri sent her friend off and punished Werr all the more.

"It was nowhere near as tragic as your...'punishments'. Just needless beatings and never ending chores, shouting and objects thrown at his head. But the worst happened when Sylas decided to return home permanantly; Kiri and he got into a screaming match that night. Neither of them realized that the fireplace had caught the rug ablaze in the next room, where Werr was hiding. When he ran out to tell them, he was sent to his room; he hid in the dining room instead, terrified.

"Pretty soon, the entire room was ablaze, and soon to be the house itself. And Kiri saw this as her chance. She knocked Sylas unconscious, then went after Werr. She tipped the cabinet over onto him, leaving him pinned and helpless. She went to drag Sylas into the burning room, but he had woken up by this time; he wound up being the one dragging her out of the house, supposedly where he tied her down. He went back in to try and find Werr, I assume; but the boy was not in his room. He had managed to worm his way out from under the cabinet after most of it burned away, and he slipped out of a window. At this time, he remembered not a thing from what happened before, his mind scrambled from the smoke and shock of the incident. He wandered off to the next town, where he was found by the queen of Alastor. I assume you know the rest; he was soon appointed the eighth member of the Alastorian Council, then placed with the Grehis, and now he's here."

Ophile finished, standing up and shaking himself off. "I'll leave you to determine what that means in regards to you and Werr. For now...I have a gypsy to track down." He moved towards the door, but paused for a moment to see if Cynyr had any questions.

Cynyr just blinked, letting what he had heard sink in. Werr... What did he think of the boy now that he knew these things? Had anything...changed? Slowly, the answer came to the panther; yes, something had changed.

Cynyr felt closer to Werr.

As Ophile understood Cynyr, now so did the mage understand the human. He felt sad for the boy, but he couldn't help but feel closer to him. Carefully, Cynyr forced himself up with his single working arm, pushing back against the pillows so he could sit up without much pain. He reached out with his arm and stroked Werr's shoulder, feeling his trepidation and fears at dealing with a 'small child' vanish. If this was permanent, then Cynyr suddenly felt like he could deal with it. Like he could live with Werr being this way, though he would rather have the boy back to normal. He ignored the pain in his broken limbs, gently pulling Werr close. He nestled the boy against his side, resting his chin on the top of the human's black hair. "It's okay," he murmured, closing his eyes. "Everything will be okay now, Werr." He smiled slightly, then whispered "Werr Rowe."

Werr stirred again, opening his eyes just as Ophile moved out the door. He whimpered, struggling weakly to get out of Cynyr's grip. He was terrified; Cynyr might hurt him, he thought. The half-cat might have remembered his comments moments before Grey had attacked; 'You're just like mother!'

Now that Cynyr understood what Werr's mother had been like, the sentence made a great deal more sense.

"Werr."

Cynyr's voice was calm and gentle, taking on a soothing tone.

"I'm sorry for how I acted towards you. I'm not normally like that. Really, I'm..." He hesitated for a moment, then said "...a nice person. I came off the wrong way towards you and I'm very, very...upset over that. It was my fault. I thought something was going to hurt you, and..." He sighed deeply. "...the last thing I ever want to see is you get hurt." Something wet slipped down the side of his face, catching in the grooves that were the scars on his face. He reached up and brushed the tears away, hating himself for crying. He had only cried once in his scarred life, and that had been a long time ago, when he had told the group of his past. "You don't have to forgive me," he said, letting the boy go. "I won't force you to stay with me. It's just..."

More tears.

More hating himself for being weak.

"...I miss you," he murmured, flicking his ears back sadly against his head. And he looked away, unable to face the boy anymore, wincing as he legs throbbed. Cynyr briefly wondered if the breaks would effect his ability to walk and jump. Probably.