Daeva: Black Diamond Chrysalis - Danielle Bolger (essential reading txt) 📗

But the feathers settled down, rested on our weapons and as they did they glowed white as silver dust floated through the air around us. Suddenly, through a golden snow-storm, I was left standing face on to this black-haired girl, hands poised in the air with tension but holding nothing.

Our swords had disappeared. No, not disappeared, but evaporated into the energy forms we once took from the world.

"Girls..." A girl to my distant right stated calmly with a hint of sadness. Bewildered I turned to watch this newcomer who walked lightly and possessed porcelain skin and hair that shined almost as golden as the feathers that just fell.

"Do not fight, that would be futile to our cause." She cautioned with a maternal air despite being only around sixteen years of age and a meagre grade above me in the same school. "And it is pointless for you to even attempt now that I am here, for you see, feathers hold a far greater power. Traditionally, they were used with ink to create words of wisdom that would last for eternity - intellect inscribed so profoundly that the masses were capable of feeling. It is for this reason, girls, that you have no more power here anymore, for the pen is far greater, and much stronger, than the sword."

We both leered at the golden-blonde girl.

"Pearl," The black-haired girl stated evenly, "this one has not only been transformed but indoctrinated by Ariel. She is a lost cause to us, fighting against the thing she should be protecting. That leaves us with no other choice but to eliminate her so please, no more interfering."

Pearl sighed sadly, tossing her wavy golden hair over her shoulder. "Rebecca, you really need to learn that you can catch more flies with honey than vinegar..." Then she turned to address me with a smile. "Don't worry, sweetheart, no harm will come to you. You are one of us, after all and with that comes a promise that we will protect each other until the end. That is the way of a daeva-lux, one who is still connected with the light."

I looked furtively between the two, stepped back away and tried to call upon my weapon again but it failed to emerge.

"It's Pearl's feathers." The black-haired girl responded with disdain. "Since they keep falling in the area we cannot use our erosreavers. They disable the co-ordination of aura in the area they float through."

Pearl nodded. "Rebecca explained sublimely, as always she's straight to the point, clear and concise. I'm sorry for using my power on you, Bethanie, but we need to communicate and letting Rebecca kill you..." She shifted uneasily. "Isn't the best communicating method."

I eyed her warily but then a grunt from the other-side of the clearing brought my gaze across to Ariel as she fought the two other dark daevas simultaneously. From what I could see Ariel's arrows were fast and her footing faster, but her opponents were two and so she could only really manage deflective moves.

I made to run across to her aid but then a flurry of gold feathers created a wind so strong in front of me that I stumbled back from the force.

"Bethanie, just leave her for a bit." Pearl pleaded. "I promise, Ariel is too strong to be possibly overcome by those two."

The feathers fluttered away enough so I could see my surroundings more clearly again.

"What's your game?" I asked the blonde cautiously then pointed a finger to Rebecca. "Isn't she on your side? Why stop her? Don't you mean to kill us?!"

Pearl shut her eyes tightly and winced like I had caused her some kind of blow. When she recovered sadness leaked into her voice. "No. No, Bethanie, it's not anything like that! We're not here to kill you, but to save you!"

"Yeah? Then how do you explain her!" I cried pointing a rigid finger at Rebecca.

The black-haired girl, arms crossed, scoffed. "She was trying to kill me." She explained to her companion. "I was just defending myself. Besides, she was so deluded by Ariel she would just work against us until her own chrysalis."

"Killing her is not appropriate, Rebecca!" Pearl reprimanded. Softening she turned to me. "She is our ally, whether she knows it yet or not!"

"I'm not your ally!" I cried hotly. "I'll never ally myself to evil, to you dark daevas!"

Rebecca's eyes shot knives, Pearl however gasped in alarmed.

"Dark daevas?" Pearl breathed. "Oh, no, Bethanie, you have been told some terrible lies!"

"See." Rebecca imparted evenly. "She's brain-washed, no more a pawn to them as one of their shades."

"But far more important to us." Pearl refuted. "She is a daeva-lux and with that she has strength and that can be used for good, so long as she knows where good and evil really lie. Bethanie," Pearl turned to me, "I'm sorry to tell you this, but Rebecca is right. Everything you have learnt about us has been a lie. Ariel there," she pointed across the clearing where a two versus one battle continued, "The rest of her Daeva-nox and Raziel are the enemy. They, in conjunction with the shades, are what we call phantoms, beings that possess only darkness in their diamond cores. They pretend to be your friend, pretend to care for your well-being, even warn you against this dark path, but never once do they tell you of your ultimate fate. You see they want daevas for one reason, to recruit girls from the world of light to become their warriors in the dark."

"No." I uttered meekly, my words losing conviction. "Ariel and Raziel, they fight the dark. They fight the shades!"

Pearl shook her head. "Ariel and the other daeva-noxes have embraced the dark and in doing so have become much more powerful, so powerful that even when fighting two of our kind someone like her could never be defeated. And then as to Raziel, well he hasn't just embraced the dark, he is darkness, incarnated into our world. That's why his blood is black, that's why he has the power to change light to dark and to transform a girl into a daeva."

I stepped back, eyes shifting between Pearl and Rebecca, legs trembling as I did so. "No..." I whispered. "That... that just can't be true..."

Then from across the grass I heard Ariel's voice call across. "Shut up, Pearl! Stop trying to manipulate her, she's too clever for your lies! She'll never turn to the darkness, never!" Ariel ceased talking with a gasp as it seemed like she just evaded another attack.

My face hardened. "Evil lies, it's what it does, a well known fact!"

Pearl blinked slowly then raised her arms as great golden wings sprouted. The next moment the feathers broke away and all swarmed to create a wall between Ariel and the other two daevas and us. Surprisingly, all battle-cries and colliding clashes of weapons became mute. All sound it seemed was shut out, or perhaps dissembled by the golden feathers separating us.

"I know it is hard to understand all this, you must have only taken the seed very recently, but it is imperative that you do not side with them - your very soul is at stake here!" Pearl cried passionately. "I am truly sorry we didn't get to you in time, the fact that you have to bear this fate saddens me immensely..." Here she said it convincingly, where it seemed that pain for my regard was even etched onto her face.

She's lying. I rationalised to myself. And she must be very, very good at it.

"But you're here now, a daeva-lux," she smiled with melancholy. "Entering a realm that is not fair for a young girl like you. This is our fault." She lowered her head, shedding her blue gaze to the darkening grass below us. "If only... if only we acted sooner..." Her voice even broke, like she was about to cry. Then suddenly she yelped as her knees lowered to the ground and, holding her arm, fell further still.

"Pearl!" Rebecca shouted as she ran across and caught the blonde in her arms before she could fall all the way. "Damn it, Pearl! You and your sentimentality! You're going to kill yourself this way!"

The golden feather border shuttered between existence and non-existence, allowing scant flashes of the twilight war waged beyond, until it firmed up again just as Pearl retracted her eyelids.

"I'm fine, Rebecca." Pearl muttered weakly. "Don't you worry, I'm not there yet." Then Pearl pulled herself back up so she was sitting and turned to look back towards me. "You have been fed sweet lies, but cruel ones. Cruel, because you don't understand the despair that is ahead of you." A tear illuminated by the brilliant golden feather border trailed down her cheek. "I'm afraid that your whole perception is warped. Ariel is a daeva-nox, one that desires no more than power and with it she and the other phantoms will herald the destruction of this world. Ariel, is sweet, kind-hearted, and also, the best actress I have ever seen."

I didn't want to remember it, the world made sense, broken but I thought I understood it. But with those last words information began to suddenly flood towards me. A couple of ill-placed glares by Ariel and also, most prominently was Amy's melancholy at the thought of the new girl taking the lead role in the musical for which she aspired to. Amy had admitted that she was a great actress, one that even her talent could not surpass.

I stepped back, one, two, then fell onto my bottom with a thump. The beautiful world that shone in the skies overhead suddenly seemed to lack their lustre. The colours illustrated life, but from excitement it seemed to transform into the display of blood vessels, the circulatory system of the world. These all now seemed to shine red and every time I wanted to pull energy from it I thought I may as well have delved my fangs into someone's throat, since that was all my power was, a vampire to the world.

"No!" I screamed desperately. "You're wrong, you have to be! You're just..." My voice turned vacant. "Evil. And Ariel is my friend. That's it, you're lying!"

"If you don't believe my words, believe what you see." Pearl rationalised. "Ariel, Raziel and the others, have diamond cores so dark that they cannot even hold all the light they absorb from the world. Overfilled the light leaks out of them, from their skin, their hair so they appear porcelain white with silver features. This makes them look angelic, but in reality they are the exact opposite."

Light displayed outwardly to balance the darkness within...

Pearl seemed to whisper something to Rebecca after which the black-haired girl rolled her eyes and reluctantly made her way towards me. Once she stopped she seemed to make an attempt at a smile that failed horribly. "Pearl is right, but not just about the fact that you were lied to, but also that you are one of us. We are not enemies and I will not..." She looked aside here, "hurt you. We're on the same team in trying to protect the world so that means we have no reason to fight."

"You have to be." I uttered to the girl standing over me. "You have to be lying."

Rebecca turned her hostile green gaze back at me. "You're a fool. Protecting creatures that have lost their human souls. I will protect this world, kill the shades, daeva-noxes and I will eliminate all trace of Raziel from this planet. You are a daeva-lux, so you are a natural ally despite your idiocy, but get in my way and I will not hesitate to put you down too."

"Rebecca!" Pearl cried.

And then my thoughts made their way back to the unease I felt as Raziel's eyes glistened with excitement as he handed a black seed to Ariel. He wanted more daevas, that was plain to see, but he didn't want ones to destroy the beings from the dark world for that