"Nadir: Apollo´s Story" by A. Artemis Heart

Let the shards of your memory rip me apart...

I skimmed close to the tree line, wingtips brushing the gentle canopy as I flew. Guilt and sadness had emptied me; it had taken from me the joy of flight and the joy of freedom. Sighing heavily I realized that as quickly as I was free of one chain I was bound by another, and idly I wondered if I would ever truly be free…

I was lost in thought, burdened by grief and sadness, so I did not hear the whistle of wind as Artemis approached me, the grievous notes of the breeze as it met, once more, the one who had fallen.

I knew that he was there only when I felt the burning impact of a fireball. I gasped when it hit me, feeling the searing pain spread outward from the spot in the centre of my back to the rest of my body. I faltered in the sky, my blood pumping with sudden ferocity. A weak cry escaped me as I dipped yet again, struggling to maintain my position.

“Must I always remind you never to turn your back on an enemy?” Artemis growled and I could feel his gaze on my back. I trembled as I remembered that stare, the cold cruelty, the fierce burning of his insanity.

I turned, the pain was fainter now, “You shan’t have to remind me after this, Artemis.” My words were simple, spoken in a soft, almost gentle tone that surprised me. We both knew the promises behind my words.

The rush of battle swept around us once more and I forced myself to face him again, to face those haunting eyes – the frightening truth. My body hummed with tension as I confronted him for what had to be the last time.

***

The immediacy with which the fight begun startled me, but in that moment reflexes took over, and a shimmering shield was before me. The fireball nearly penetrated the shield and in that split second when it seemed as though it would hit me, my heart stopped, and then the fireball dissolved. I let down the barrier a moment later, remember his words – I would not hide, I would not cower. I shot forward, gliding ever nearer my brother. The wind rushed around me, soaring, and calling its challenge, Artemis’s challenge. I met the challenge with a determined grimace and a shift of stance.

I had barely settled into the unaccustomed defensive, before I was forced aside by an orb of dark fire. I roared into the night, frustrated and weary of…everything. He mocked me without words, he laughed at me without sound as his eyes followed me; such dark promises hidden in his insanity. I closed my eyes against the glittering intensity, but it threatened to swallow me even in the darkness beneath my lids and I closed my eyes.

I flew nearer Artemis, regarding him. He waited for me…to use the last reserves of my strength before he destroyed me. My smile was wry and twisted; my destruction would be complete, I knew. My eyes were blurred slightly with weariness and with the beginnings of tears. They seared me, hot, sharp, trickling transparency. My lids were tightly shut, bitter, acrid smoke filling my throat. I could feel my fiercoeur straining as I fought to find fire enough and with a final exhalation of flame I blasted my brother with a rippling, swirling effusion of incandescent fire.

The blast against his chest knocked a cry from his throat – a harsh, almost surprised sound as wild and threatening as the insanity that lingered in his eyes. The emotions with which I was suddenly filled surprised me and my teeth cut against my tongue. The sensation of blood – its taste, its smell – became part of the smoke – a noxious solution. It was a taste of a poison that I had created. I swallowed, gagging on the combined taste of smoke and blood, so that the crimson ran over my maw. I did not stop the steady trickle. I let it flow. I would not drink the remnants of this poison. There was too much toxicity already in my veins. The smoke curled up and the blood dripped down and I stayed in between.

I breathed deeply to clear my head and glanced at Artemis. His wings – the continuous beating of his wings – had slowed his fall so that he was suspended, just as I was…in some ways. Slowly, he moved, so that he hovered vertically in the air, and once more my brother brought himself to my level.

“Strength is wasted on you. You have no passion, no ambition…you have nothing, but this power – and to me it is nothing. You know that, Apollo, do you not?” This voice, these words – they did not belong to Artemis…they belonged to this insanity.

“I know that you underestimate me, Artemis.” My voice trembled with the desire to scream, but I repressed the telltale shuddering with what little strength I had. It was useless to me now.

“I have never underestimated you, little brother.”

He hurled an orb of blackish fire towards me and I moved aside, it was too late, however, to move past the sphere of flame that he had aimed in anticipation of that movement. I cried out as the cold ache spread across my body once more. Artemis had me then, his hand encircling my throat with all the brutality of an enemy. He looked into my eyes, commanded my attention with that wavering…thing. Damn his insanity. “Insanity becomes you, brother. Why does it become you?” My tone was desperate and so vulnerable. Staining my death with the dishonour that had become me. He gazed at me for an instant and then in one earth-shattering motion I was pinned to the earth, feeling the dewy grass beneath my scales, little comfort against the burning pain. Artemis held his claw against my fiercoeur and I gasped. The look in my brother’s eyes challenged me to breathe, to speak. It challenged me to make a motion. Fool that I was I rose to his challenge. “Would you kill me?”

“Be not a fool, Apollo. I may despise your choices, but I understand. You cannot be held responsible for your weakness; I would make your death quick – easy. No, I will not kill you yet. Not yet…brother…” Such vindictive control in his words, such silken cruelty as he mocked me, laughed at me without sound somehow it hurt much more than the first time, but I was almost used to it now. Like a battle-weary dragon bearing hit after hit for his cause, but I was no battle-weary dragon and I bore the pain because I had no choice. No kind of choice, anyway.

“You pretend you would ease my suffering, yet you will not end it.”

His smile illuminated the blackness of his eyes, the utter unbalance, and I felt an emotion-filled bellow gurgling past my throat, but I bit it back with my remaining strength. I would not satisfy the black light within him; I would not make it stronger.

“Would you have me end it, Apollo? Would you be just another shadow unable to contest the strength of the light? Would you be a failure?”

“No. I would not have you end it. I cannot be a failure. I know my duty. I merely ask why you claim to understand, why you would prolong my suffering if you do not blame me? If you believe my release is in death, why not kill me?”

“Do not question the good fortune that I have bestowed upon you, Apollo.” His voice was as an icicle and I felt a shiver run up my spine, but it was taunting, as well.

“I must…brother – one dragon’s fortune is another’s loss.” Why I said that I do not know, but I did.

“I seek to make you less than a dragon. Less than Heavensfire, but more than Earthsfire…I seek to make you nothing and everything.”

Through some silent communication he understood my unasked question and he shook his head. “Ignorance is the child of your people.” And with one sharp movement my Fiercoeur was broken. I felt the dam bursting and the torrent flowing, and the pain…such incredible pain. It was almost beautiful…the river of pure, molten fire unlike any thing I had seen or heard of. There might have been a shout, rising like a soaring star, but I wasn’t sure, in the end it would only to fall back into the pulse of the fire. All I could see was the brilliant shades of orange and all I could feel was the sharpness as my heritage gushed forth from me. I was bathed in it and surrounded in it and I was almost, almost pure…