The Forgotten Zodiac

Marion tucked herself close to him. She didn't really have a bed; she preferred to sleep on Dmitry's wyvern form, soothed by his warmth and touch. "I could use a nap..." She murmured, stroking his chest scales gently. "But...I'm worried. I think we should visit the castle sometime soon. Or at least write a letter. I can't say I ever liked Werr, but Nate...I had grown a little fond of him, you know. He was a very kind and noble man."

Dmitry gave a small nod, licking her cheek again before speaking. "I've spent the last few nights meditating on the roof, something you're well aware of, and I regret to say that I feel...something bad approaching. I can't tell what it is, but...something just isn't right. It's like the world is preparing itself, subtly, for some kind of attack. But my powers aren't mature enough to sense what it is..." He exhaled his warm breath on her, then said "Perhaps a visit to the castle would reveal more. At least, I hope it would."

"It should. Naybrin is there; surely he would have sensed something coming." Marion nodded. "We can head there whenever you're ready. For now, I'm going to nap, okay?" She smiled, then transformed to snake form. She wrapped herself around his neck, like a strange, scaley necklace of some kind.

He tried to ignore the shiver than ran through him at the feeling of her scales against his. He smiled and licked the top of her head, rubbing his chin against her forehead. Whatever was coming, he figured that so long as they were together, they would be just fine.

*

Riordan blinked open his eyes, spending a long moment simply staring at the ceiling before rising, clothing his form in his usual white robes before bending over Valley, stroking her hair back and kissing her forehead. He left without waking her further, deciding to make sure Ink was still secure and sane (as sane as he could be) before attending breakfast.

"Little Brother! You came, just like he said you would. You normally come at night, but today, he said you'd come in the morning. Which is good." Ink beamed, looking up sharply. He had been painting on the floor, his newest favorite activity. His concrete floor was now bright and colorful, just like the walls. And the wonderful thing about paint was the fact that it could be washed off, or painted over. "The most wonderful thing has happened. Do you remember that voice I told you about a month ago? The voice that wouldn't go away, no matter how much medicine Doctor Markar gave me? Well, I made friends with that voice. And that voice is powerful, very, very powerful...he said he would give me a friend. Doctor Markar doesn't think I should listen to the voice...but the voice wants me to kill the doctor for that. How do I kill something, brother? I don't think I know how...I've never done it before."

Ink moved a pillow and started painting a new thing, even though he hadn't finished the other one. He stuck his hands - both of them - in different colors of paint and flicked the blues and yellows all over the floor. Riordan had avoided giving him red paint. A good thing, too; Ink may have mistaken it for blood or something. "Oh!" Ink looked up again. "He told me his name. The voice said his name. His name is Veros!"

Riordan barely concealed the shiver his twin's words caused him. "Ah...Ink, killing someone is bad. Very, very bad. Bad to the point of no one ever talking to you again, or giving you food, or letting you paint. So bad that it wouldn't allow me to ever see you again. It would also make the promise I gave that you would be free go away, not of my own choice. When you kill something, you can never, ever recover from it. It's like a sickness that won't ever go away."

Ink paused and looked down. "Oh...then I should not kill Doctor Markar. Okay." He slowly nodded. "I get it." He continued painting for a moment, then looked back up at Riordan. "Veros wants to help you. And me! That's wonderful, Veros, very wonderful. I want to have a friend, when is he getting here? Soon, soon, very soon..." Ink continued painting the floor. He pushed the blue paint can towards Riordan. "Wanna help me paint? This is a lot of fun."

Riordan frowned, staring down at his clean white robes, and opened his mouth to protest. What he didn't expect was a quiet "...Fine." He blinked sharply, not sure why he had just agreed to do this, but yet he found himself very slowly removing his perfect robes and folding them over a chair, making all sorts of sickened faces as he slid his hand into the blue paint can, getting it all over his hand before pulling it out and starting to work on an empty patch of ground.

He hardly had any truly good memories of time spent with Ink. Secretly, deep down inside, he supposed he craved a relationship with his older sibling. He didn't know why, but he did.

Ink hummed a little tune as he painted, happy and very much oblivious to anything else. Rather suddenly, though, he fixed his eyes on Riordan and said, "I can make you great, O' king of the mountains and sand. I can give your warriors and your people strength. I can further your goals and push you to your aim, king Riordan. I can and will grant this new vessel of mine with strength and power, and I lend the same to you; I, Veros, Titan of Ages, will be returned to my former glory. Aid me in this, and centuries of generations will sing your praises. Fight against me..."

The blue paint on Riordan's hands immediately turned red. It wasn't even paint anymore. It was blood, plain and simple. Ink shook his head and smiled at his brother before looking down at Riordan's hands. "Oh, a new color! Where'd you get it? I want some!"

"No!"

Riordan's voice came out much sharper than he intended, a ringing shout that echoed through the room, and it wasn't known who he had shouted at. He had fallen backwards, panting heavily, grabbing his robes without a care and frantically wiping the red from his hands while speaking to his brother. "It's a bad, bad color, Ink. Do you hear me? This color is bad. If you ever see this color, you should get away from it. The other colors are all better and much nicer than this one. This one is...is just bad, alright?"

Ink stared at Riordan, tilting his head to the side a bit. "Oh...okay." He grabbed a pillowcase and wiped the red from the floor, tossing the dirtied pillowcase to the side and painting over the spot with blue. "I didn't know. I'll stay away from it if you want me to, little brother. I promise." He smiled again. "Oh! Veros said my new friend is here. He's upstairs. I can't go upstairs. Would you go tell him to come down here? I want to meet him!" Ink asked excitedly.

"Y-yeah, sure, whatever," Riordan snapped, not meaning to be upset with Ink, but still unable to hold back. "Just stay here. And don't talk to that thing. I don't like it." He stalked away, not knowing what to do about what he had just heard. He stalked along the halls, rising swiftly up stairs and turning corners, finally nearly walking into someone he had never seen before.

He was just...standing there. He looked almost panicked. He was several years younger than Riordan, but his black hair was streaked with grey. He didn't have a shirt on, revealing scars and a wound that looked like should have been fatal. He had a nasty wound on the side of his face that looked as though someone had taken a saw to his cheek. Yet both injuries were old and dry. He carried the faint scent of dirt (which was caked on here and there) and decay on him, and his eyes...his eyes were a greyish hue, the whites of his eyes turned a rotten yellow color.

His build was lean and slim, but Riordan could tell from the way he moved that he was trained to fight. He was already in a defensive position, as he regarded the older, larger man before him with a certain air of fear and distrust. "You...you are Riordan." He opened his dry, cracked lips and spoke with a voice that hadn't been used in decades, it seemed. "Veros...said to find you. Said you should have me cleaned up and dressed in clothes he would provide..." He looked upset. Like he didn't have a choice but to be here. Like he wanted to be anywhere but here. He didn't belong here, and he didn't want to be here. But he had to be here.

"Riordan, what are these? I found them on our bed. So garish and dull...and they don't even fit you, dearest, they--" Valley stopped short, the black garb clutched in her skinny fingers as she glared at the boy with narrowed eyes. "Who are you?"

"My name is Zex." He replied dully, eying the clothes. Those had to be the ones he would be wearing after getting 'cleaned up'.

"Zex who?"

"...I don't know."

"Well then, why are you here?"

"To protect and serve the man known as Ink." Zex answered her question in stride, but it left her stunned. Valley looked from Zex to Riordan, then back again.

The king exhaled heavily, then walked over to his wife and bent to whisper in her ear, saying quietly "I'll explain all I know later, and it isn't much. Just...bare with me for now. ...I need your help."

He turned, glaring at Zex as if he wanted nothing more than to throw him out of the castle (and the entire land) completely. "Well, come on, then," he said, gesturing for him to follow. "Don't touch anything or wander around."

((Bear with me, not bare. Bare is exposed, bear is to carry. Unless you're talking about a bear, in which you should probably get out of there, because no one likes a shaved bear. o3o))

Valley frowned up at him, then nodded. "Alright..." She murmured, folding the clothes in her hands. She watched curiously as Zex bowed slightly. He would follow orders to the letter. "Well, you're not going to see Ink looking like that," He listened to Valley talk, ignoring the chiding in her voice. "You look like someone tried to kill you, honestly..."

"They did kill me." Zex murmured.

"And you won't be talking like that around Ink, either! He doesn't understand things about death and pain..." Valley hadn't actually met Ink face to face. But Riordan certainly spoke much about him. "Just keep quite about such things, okay? And there's a mask here in this pile of clothes. You're not to take it off, understand?"

"All for the protection of my master." Zex replied dully.

"Good. I'll go draw some bathwater." Valley stormed on ahead, her head held high.

((Whoops. I was having to type really really fast. xD Sorry.))

Riordan stared at Zex for a long time, the two simply standing there in the hallway, waiting for who knew what. Riordan was reluctant to let this...this boy near his brother (he wasn't even sure that he was human). He had just spoken about being killed (which didn't make sense) and they had done well to keep Ink's knowledge of these things on a down-low. Now this...thing potentially threatened to undo all of that.

((Das okay. <3 I try to find humor in little mistakes like those, as you know. Thus...bare bear.))

Zex stared at Riordan in return. He didn't say a thing for the longest time, and when he did, it was almost as though he know what Riordan was thinking. Which, in a sense, he did. The king's eyes spoke for him. "Veros would not have brought me here if he thought that I would be anything but a help to his vessel. Ink will be protected and cared for, and I was told to treat him like I would a child. That is what I will do. Think of me as a playmate for your older brother, and...a servant of Veros. With any luck...we won't be seeing much of each other after this."

((Pah. XD It's a funny image.))

Riordan continued to glare at him, however, distrust prominant in his eyes. "Yes, with lots of luck, I hope," he said, crossing his arms tightly over his chest. "And if I catch so much as a whiff of you or that...Veros thing turning Ink against me..." He didn't finish, merely turning away in order to lead Zex off to clean up.

((But of course. o3o))

"Veros is the Titan of Ages. Time itself. Time does not lie. If he intended upon turning Ink against you, he would not be able to lie about it. So...ask him. Ask him anything. Honesty is bound to his lips like chains, as with any Titan. If I turned against you, I would also be turning against Veros' will; something I am...incapable of." Zex's voice seemed to be smoothing itself over, less rough and broken. He sounded a lot older than he looked, but perhaps that was still lingering effects of not talking for so long. "Riordan, if you have somehow gained the notion that I want to be here doing this...I would like to correct that. This is not my will, but Veros'. Do not mistake my obedience for loyalty."

The king's glare finally lifted somewhat, but he still didn't seem very happy. Once Zex was cleaned up and well-groomed, Riordan led him down to Ink's room, though still hesitant to bring him anywhere near his mentally unstable brother. Still, all it seemed he could hope for at this point was that this 'Titan of Ages' mean no great harm to his family.