Brittle | MXM Short Story

Chapter 2 - 𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝙗𝙡𝙤𝙤𝙙 𝙤𝙛 𝙖 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙧𝙞𝙤𝙧

CHAPTER TWO

STONE

Living up to the Chief's reputation was not a light task especially when every breath you took you were compared to him. In everyone's eyes I was born to replace the path he paved for me - the unreplaceable legacy - and I did just that with pride.

I wore his blood like a medal. The evening many waited seated in the coliseums for me to prove my strength by defeating the almighty chief, was the evening I became a true Yaekl. The counsellors wrapped my neck in heavy silver preventing my magic from bursting mid battle which would have granted me a win with ease.

Instead it was done with all the will-power one man can possess. A man from the Yaekl bloodline.

I was more of a demon than a mage when it came to my power. I could suck the blood from a body with just the snap of my fingers, even cause intestines to coil with a glare. The list could go one with all of which coming from descendants of my elders.

They shaped me into the man I am today which I was thankful for. That was until it wasn't and became a curse.

The crowd caused the sand floors to crack from their stomping and chants. On the left I vaguely remembered stood all my father's men in command which were soon to be mine. They wore their armours with weapons nearby and were lined neatly on the highest row giving them the clearest view of what was before to them.

The right however was the nobles. The Coven leader of Otlar sat with other foreign men and women surrounding him in the front row. Their natural odours pungent with vampires and mages with their artificial scents making me aware that they were important, most likely royalty that the Count of Otlar invited.

The battle was meant to be raw. I stood with a heaving chest with the sun beating my skin, my muscles bare out for the audience to gawk at showing all my inscriptions and poorly healed scarring. The only article of clothing on my body that day was a loin cloth. My father wore the same as myself, taking me little time to analyse the changes between us. How little inches he had on my height after all these years, his body was wide from bulk with mines close to that exact structure.

If it wasn't for his dark-caramel tone being lighter than mine and that wrinkled face, we would have been identical.

His sweat beamed forehead pressed against mine just seconds before the announcer called for us to begin.

"Make Papa proud." He whispered in a harsh breath causing me to shut my eyes in sync with his, preventing any tears from falling. As much as I loved being a warrior I hated how forbidden it was for him to not spend time with me. Both our minds focused on the future of Otlar before thinking about our actual lives. Now we stood thinking back at the dozens of years wasted only for it to come to this.

The horn blare signalled the fight to begin. Not wanting the powerful man to have the upperhand I swung at his cheekbone which the Chief dipped from effortlessly. What felt like hours were minutes of us sending lashes at one another hoping for it to land. He had gotten the majority of damage with blood seeping from his braided hair, one or two teeth being trampled on by our wrestling and even a large gapping claw on the skin of his chest while only a few bruises were littered on mine. My father wasn't going lightly on me...I was defeating him by pure strength.

It was clear to me that my swift movements were riling the crowd. Soon enough my father sensing his defeat, had me pinned against the stone wall causing my head to fly back on the concrete making my vision blur.

"Finish it. Finish me Stone Yaekl!" The chief roared at me. I didn't even notice when my hands preyed its way to his skull before digging into the bloodied skin. Nothing in the land of Otlar could have made me stop. I bore the holes until satisfied. When father's body remained unresponsive against mine, his grip loose and the whites in his eyes turning velvet, was when I knew that I'd killed him.

My fingers embedded itself into the mush revealing shards of his skull and eventually as I dug deeper, brain. Thick, pink veined, chunks that were coated in red. I moved away from the corpse in front of me letting it slam against the sand concrete making the crowd rampant.

"I, Stone Yaekl, am honoured to be the man my father once was!" My father's remains in my fingers were raised above my head and squeezed, drenching my body in more of his blood, even allowing some to seep into my mouth. My yelling was filled with a voice crack as I already found myself mourning my now ravished father's death. But he wanted this, I didn't but I knew it had to happen.

I completed the tradition just like he did, grandpa and my elders. Now they can look down at me content while I honour their legacy as I was now the 17th chief of the Otlar army.

The 17th Yaekl to do so and the first Yaekl to face its consequences.