Chapter 39: Out in the Open
The human adolescents swarmed like parasites. They flocked together in groups, swept across the land, and settled down to exchange their meaningless banter. None of them would amount to anything and to see so much potential locked inside those bodies disgusted him. Too many humans were ignorant of the gifts they had been given, of the advantages of the flesh anchor that bound them to this world. To think that he had worked so hard to gain a body, only to find these children lazing around in the ones they’d had since birth…
If there was one thing he hated more than hard work, it was those who gained everything for doing nothing.
“Are you sure you’re up to the task, Tirio?”
Tirio cast his glare sideways at his fellow renegade faerie. Dyfrio’s face wore that self-assured grin that ground against Tirio’s nerves like waves crashing against rock.
“If I were not, I would not be here,” he replied, “Perhaps it is time you cast aside your attachment to the girl. You are no longer Ophion, as I am no longer Bezalel,”
“To think a former Earth faerie – Prince even – is telling me to let go,” said the rogue Water faerie, “Look at yourself, ‘Tirio’. You may have acquired yourself a body but you’ve reshaped it to resemble your old form.”
Tirio looked down at his left hand. Once it had been the hand of a worthless human with no future, who spent its days living on the edge of despair out in the wastelands. Now that human was a fleeting memory on the desert winds and Tirio walked the Outerworld in its place. That hand, once wizened and weathered from years spent out in the harsh winds of the dying Earth, was now strong. Whereas once it had been tanned from overexposure to the sun’s radiation, now it was the earthen hue of his element. Tirio didn’t like change. Dyfrio, an ever-changing, ever-adaptive Water-elemental, always took great delight in this fact.
“You have no purpose here,” said Tirio, “Leave now.”
“It would be logical for us to combine our talents,” said Dyfrio.
“Your logic and mine are not compatible. You have your orders, as I have mine.”
Dyfrio’s face screwed up in frustration. In his years as Prince Bezalel, Tirio had dealt with Water faeries on many an occasion and anticipated their behaviour, even if it made little sense. He followed orders, keeping faith in those who gave them. Those Water-elementals, though, they liked to be the ones giving out orders based on their own over-analytical ponderings.
“You’ll see,” said Dyfrio as his body began to dissolve, “Strength alone won’t be enough to deal with Princess Phantasia. You’ll be needing my help sooner or later.”
Tirio grunted his disapproval and looked down at the sharp-angled manikin in his right hand. It was his task to put this Phantasia and her strange, unknown powers to the test – and there was no greater test of a person than that of battle.
***
