The apprentice's vigil appeared to have no end as, for hours long, she was sat in front of where powers and colours were meant to swirl. Verdant pools of a Legion gateway, the same which had swallowed Xorvaros earlier. But in front of her, there was nothing. Only the emptiness of a void chamber of sculpted felsteel, stained with fel, as if veins of it were neatly laced all over it. It gave away the impression that the walls were alive, but it could not be further from the truth. They were dead. Everything there was dead. Everything.
A blanket of black and red was spreading all around the girl, as her dress was trailing behind her and at the front, like a carpet on the dark floor. Her cloak was draped around her shoulders and the hood pulled forth on her lowered head, letting only the two beams of an ill-glowing pair of green eyes escaping from beneath. In stillness, she appeared calm, peaceful, sharing the same tranquility with the dead. An eerie sight. Somewhere deep into the isolation and obsession that staying in the same area where the demon had earlier vanished had pushed her. A restless, silent guard.
But if the illusion of serenity was weaved around the ghostly-looking elf, the anguish of her inner world built a perfect contrast. Every single thought had lost its structure. Not all where her own. Celysiel's wish had eventually been granted; she had opened her arms in welcome, though it was through force that the souls of Val containted in the vesseil trapping them were bound to her. Souls she had known from back in the frozen prison not to have ever found rest. Souls consumed in agony, hatred and the desire for vengeance. Souls lost and twisted, knowing no peace, nor ever be destined to find it. There was no end to their wailing, to their cries and screaming. No end to their desires, all conflicted, clashing into a swirl of madness.
Her fingers twitched, closing in a tight grasp.
Nail marks had bled the apprentice's palm. A form of coping? The voices within offered no silence, merely added to the whispering of the anguished dead.
"... Error in your judgement..."
"... Naive, naive..."
"... Do not trust..."
"... A demon remains demon..."
"... The touch of the Legion..."
"... Suffer... Suffer...."
"... Make them pay, pay..."
"... Kill... KILL!"
Celysiel did not even twitch. She only stayed there and listened. Enduring, she took it all. The cries of vengeance belonging to voices that were not her own. But no, she would not unleash them. There was power within them desired to be used. A sacred bond, for they were hers now. Bound to her and her alone.
Staring at the dead portal, the young elf's eyes thinned. Greater tension, as if her body was not already heavy with it, was built onto her form, stiffening every joint and making her shoulders slouch. However, there was not an inch of shivering, no desire to use her arms to lock herself into a small, little world. No desire to reach for the locket.
Her fingers twitched, closing in a tight grasp.
"Go away." Celysiel hissed. "You are not welcome."
"I have been summoned."
The voice sprouted from behind her, colourless, unwordly, familiar. The apprentice need not turn in order to look at the obscure, hooded figure behind her.
"You are not welcome." she repeated steadily, her voice cold like it had never been before, carrying the chill of Northrend. "You are banished."
"If I were to be banished, I would not be here. You need me, so I am present."
"I do not want you!"
"But you do need me." Keeper calmly responded.
It made her close her eyes briefly. A sting was felt on her palms, but that Celysiel managed to ignore. "You did not see the expression on his face." she mumbled.
"I see what you see." the wraith merely commented, but Celysiel ignored him. She continued.
"He could have hit me, he did not. I was there, but he did not act. He only left, closing the rift behind him. He fled, but first he looked at me and spared me. He looked at me" the apprentice repeated emphatically. "as if he was expecting someone else in my stead."
"You are drawing hasty conclusions."
"Someone to join him."
"You are drawing hasty conclusions."
"Uleese."
The silence that followed was not true. In the empty space between the phantom and the girl, there was no void. Unnerving whispers poked in the nothingness, leaving their mark. A deep scar. Celysiel took a deep breath, opening her eyes for once more. Like before, they were set on where the portal should have been, where the portal was not. Behind her, Keeper remained faithful to his stillness.
"I studied the remnants of her portal in Mac'Aree, by the side of Surveyor Bloodthorn." the girl began to spin the tale again, to someone well aware. "It was the same as this one. It was her creation. She brought Xorvaros to kill us today."
"You do not believe that."
"But I do." the elf replied. "Where was she while we were destroying the stores for Xorvaros' ritual?"
"You did not try to find out. You do not know."
"I did!" Celysiel yelled. "I did, I tried! I was ignored! No one will listen, no one!"
"You only approached one." Keeper calmly reminded her.
"I tried." she repeated. "They were not willing to listen. Uleese is a traitor. I trusted her."
"You do not believe that."
"But I do!"
The creature's form shifted lightly behind her. "You only believe it because they tell you to. Be rid of them, you need not so much power. You have more than you could ask for already."
His words made Celysiel want to reach for the locket hanging from her neck, knowing it was where the wraith pointed his words. A light touch would bring her peace, only at the knowledge that it was hers. That no one else could have it. It would bring clarity...
... It would make her snatch it and toss it onto a wall, crush the heart within with bursts of felfire, find great joy in its destruction. Like burning frost lotuses.
She could not touch that locket.
"It is not enough." the maiden eventually whispered, fear gripping her at what could happen to her precious treasure. "It is not enough."
For once more, Keeper stirred behind her. Though her eyes could not see, she could nearly feel it in her mind, like a headache, a disturbance. And then her chest, for there was only one thing that gesture could ever mean. Disappointment. What follows when one does not live up to the required expectations.
"You have become greedy." he only commented.
"Do you not remember what the fortune-teller said?" she asked, oddly amused. "A bright and prosperous soul shall blacken. Confusion mars your mind, it is a deep swamp, road unclear and unknown. Everything has dulled, seeking the extremes of pleasure and danger."
"Do not hesitate to reach out, let go of pride and ask for help, lest you be consumed by addiction." added Keeper. "Thus, you must also realize, at a point where your limitations lie. To see what can be..."
"... And what cannot be fixed." Celysiel concluded.
"She never said you did not have a choice."
"But she did." the apprentice replied grimly. "Pride is holding you back."
"Then let go."
"Leave me." the girl only whispered, lowering her head. "Leave me."
"There is someone in the mirror." the spectre of her imagination spoke, grimly. "One you fear."
Celysiel did not respond. Patiently, the girl waited for Keeper to elaborate, but the webs of silence had, for once more, come to coat the chamber. It was soon that she came to realize that the creature living in her mind was present no more.
But others were. Obscure dancers clouding the field of sanity. Their voices were cold and painful, but welcome, in the same way the defeated accept infection. Motes of anguished shadow is all these souls had become, clinging onto the bright soul which they had found, with their hands cold, wanting to siphon its warmth, for it had no place among the dead that were kept contained in this fragile shell.
Blackening it.
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