Blade(Part 1): Dawn

Chapter 32: Dameon

Shala sat in the vast library of the Celestial Sword from the middle of yesterday, all through the night, to the middle of the next day. Dameon kept a watchful eye over her, because even though he wasn't a Guardian, he could tell that she had something bad on her mind. He watched her flip through book after book, probably pretending not to notice him. Suddenly, Shala did look up from her books and turned towards Dameon.

"I saw Kai yesterday," she said. Dameon widened his eyes.

"You did?" he gasped. "What happened?"

"We talked," Shala answered, with a sadness in her voice. "He had some doubt that he was my brother, though."

"What makes you say that?" Dameon wondered.

"I sensed it," said Shala. "And the look on his face. He had no idea who I was, Dameon. Aziz must have done something to him. I watched his head get cut off. He was dead. He should be dead." Dameon knew that Aziz was cruel, but he never imagined something like this. If every Shadow had a story like Kai's, then that meant they were killed during the Colonial War, brought back to life by the Abyss, and wiped of any memories about their friends and families. They were turned into monsters to serve the Dark One's will, which seemed to be the same as King Aziz's will, which seemed to be to conquer all of Zenartha. As if the Skaolan Empire hadn't run out of ways to make Dameon sick. Killing the Shadows wouldn't hurt Aziz, though. He prided himself with taking innocence away. Dameon's was gone, but the Shadows' could be regained. Kai's could be regained. Whatever Shala was looking for clearly wasn't in the giant pile of ancient books beside her, and it probably wasn't in any of the other thick, leather-bound books that were sitting on the dozens of shelves in the Guardians' library.

"Oh, Dameon," Shala suddenly said, reaching under her table.

"What?" Dameon wondered. The Guardian pulled out a large, black bow and placed it on the table, and then reached under again and took out two large, black bracers with fingerless gloves on the ends made from leather.

"What are these?" asked Dameon.

"Mai and I found them on our patrol, yesterday," said Shala. "From somewhat of an encampment. Look at the symbols on them." Dameon picked up the black bow and examined it closely. It was a compound bow, with wheels on either end that allowed the string to be pulled back even further than that of a normal bow. A dial was on the grip that had small crystals of storm, flame, and frost malakyte that allowed arrows of either type to form in it when the bowstring was pulled back. It was a bow worthy of a Huntsman or Huntress, but Dameon found a sigil on the grip that told him it wasn't made by them. It was the sigil of a silver blade with points on both sides that were black at the tips. The bow was of the Blades of Midnight. When Dameon looked at the leather bracers, he saw that they had the same sigil.

"Look at what else is on the bracers," Shala encouraged. Dameon looked closer at one of the bracers, seeing a short string with a loop was hanging from the ring finger sockets of the fingerless gloves. He picked one up and reached to pull on the string, and Shala quickly grabbed his hand and stopped him.

"Put it on, first," Shala warned.

"Alright," said Dameon. He slipped the bracer onto his right hand, letting his ring finger into the loop of the string. He then bent his hand upward, pulling the string. Suddenly, a short, straight blade came from the bottom of the bracer, and when Dameon put his hand back down, the blade retracted.

"Woah," Dameon gasped.

"I just couldn't help but think that these are more worthy of an assassin than a rifle or pistol," said Shala. "But you should keep the sword."