34A/N: here you go. Now I know why a certain someon who asked to be friended in LJ never actually commented there...smile101 kyoko. Meh. I wandered where you got to. Why didn't you say so earlier? Thanks everyone for reviewing so far and staying on top...
Chapter 1
Calen knew he was dead for real this time. He was in the nothingness again, the same as before. Only now, it was all black. That was how he knew that it was real. He couldn't stay alive enough long enough for Darian to come for him. Jaymin had killed him, just like that. Why was he here? Where was the Death God? Wasn't he supposed to take Calen to his realm not that he was dead?
He sat there for hours on end, because there was nothing he could do in the place of in between. Wherever he went to it was still empty. So empty. There was no one to talk to, no one to keep company. He was so lonely here and he missed Darian. He wanted to go back again.
Ironic wasn't it? That when befofe, he did not want to go back, the gods had insisted that he went back. And he had come to realise that it was good for him. And for Darian that he had lived. But now, when he wanted to go back, Calen knew that he was really dead and that there was no going back to that time before. He had not even been able to say "I love you." to Darian. All of that was lost now. Calen curled up into a fetal position, drawing up his knees and hugging them with his arms. And he cried for what he had lost, for not realising it fast enough to stop what had happened.
Calen was crying so hard he didn't even notice that the black nothingness had begun to grow lighter and lighter, revealing a pantheon of gods in a circle about him. Gradually he realised that it was light now and not dark, as it was before. He looked up and saw them through tear filled eyes. They looked back at him with impassive faces, all silent and watching him. He waited for them to say something. The gods did not come and talk to mere mortals - even souls- without a reason.
"Your bond with the Lord of Castle Zionen is one of the truest bonds we have seen in time. We have reached and agreement and have decided that you can return once again," the god of war told him.
"Don't play games with me," Calen snarled at them. "The gods only give their favors once. Why are you doing this for me - for us - again?"
"It is a true lifebond. That kind of bond is rare enough without monsters like that king killing you all off," the goddess explained him. "It does mean however that there will be obligations to go with it. You can't return as yourself. You are officially dead now."
"A ghost?" calen asked in disbelief. "I won't go back as a ghost."
"Not a ghost," the goddess told him, "As a different person. A body that we will provide you. And you can not tell anyone who you were in your past life. When you meet with the Lord again, he has to recognize you as who you are, even with that body. You must do nothing to tell him of who you really are. Nothing."
Calen stared at her, feeling hope and despair clash in his heart. "What good is it to go back if he won't recognize me?"
"It is a true bond," she told him gently. "He will recognize you for who you are in time."
"The body," Calen asked. "Is it someone who is still alive or dead?"
"Neither," the goddess told him. "It is the seeming that the God of War takes when he mingles with humans. You will take it, until some such time that Lord Darian recognizes you and then you will have your old body back."
Calen looked at them hopelessly. "That's impossible," he told them in a flat tone of voice.
"You have a choice," the goddess reminded him. "You can stay and journey to the Death Realms, or go back and hope that he knows who you are. If the bond is true, he will recognize you. If not, you perish."
"How long?" Calen asked.
"As long as it takes," she told him.
Calen looked at her and answered simply, "I will go back."
As one, the gods intoned, "It is done." And he knew nothing more.
Calen woke up in the Dark Forest. He knew it was the Dark Forest because he was surrounded by big grandfather trees. And he would know the forest at anytime at all; he had taken refuge from it for five years after all. The next thing he noticed was that he was buck naked. Was this how the War God walked in Fincayra? In nothing but his skin? Didn't he know that that form of fashion had been obsolete a few hundred years ago? Obviously not if none of the gods had thought to dress him up after a fashion. Anything would have been better than being out here in nothing but his skin.
He stood up shakily and wondered what in the world was he supposed to be doing next? Calen remembered that Xander had told him there was going to be a man out and about here somewhere who would help him along in his quest. A hopeless quest, but Calen had to see Darian, to know that he was alright, even if he couldn't have the man again. Xander had also said that he could not use his name. when the goddess had said no telling anyone anything, of course the giving of his name was out of the question.
Just as he was thinking that, who should come but the man that Xander promised would appear. The man was whistling happily away, without a care in the world it seemed. And when he saw Calen wearing nothing but his skin, he stopped abruptly and stared incredulously at him.
"What are you doing out here buck naked?" he asked Calen - demanding rather.
Calen had a few options, tell him everything - which would mean he would end up back at the nothingness again, or lie. So he lied. He affected a confused expression, looking around in puzzlement.
"Where's here?" Calen asked, trying to find out where exactly he was.
"What do you mean where's here?" the man asked him, astounded by the question.
"I can't seem to remember..." Calen said, letting his sentence hang. "What happened?"
"Do you remember anything at all?" the man said, raising an eyebrow in question. "Your name? How old you are? Where you come from?"
"My name," Calen asked, his expression brightening.
"Let's start by introducing ourselves then," the man said. "I'm Nikolai, son of Tristan."
"Don't you have a last name?" Calen asked in a curious voice.
The man, Nikolai, smiled. "Yes, but I don't want to disclose that fact at the moment."
"Constantine Fiornelus," Calen told him, inventing a nobleman's name at the last instant.
"Fiornelus..." Nikolai said, frowning in thought. "I don't think I've heard of here it before."
"But where's here," Calen asked again.
"Makri, in the Empire of Florien," Nikolai told him, a patient expression on his face.
"Makri?" Calen said, frowning, only stopping himself in time from giving a start of surprise because he knew where this place was now. "I don't remember ever coming this way."
"So do you remember where you came from then?" Nikolai asked him casually.
"No," Calen told him, looking him in the eyes. "And uh... might I trouble you with some spare clothes?"
Calen had not forgotten of the fact that he was naked. Nikolai seemed to have. The man really looked at him and blushed, stammering out a yes and telling Calen to wait there because people didn't tolerate a man walking out in the open, naked. So Calen waited and Nikolai eventually returned to him with and armful of clothing, he had even thought to bring a pair of boots. He dressed in a blue long sleeved shirt along with black trousers and matching black boots. Now he looked more decent.
"That's definitely better," Nikolai told him. "Now I can look at you properly without thinking of it as improper - not that I like men. But anyone who has your body is bound to get stared at."
"How do I look like?" Calen asked. Now he knew why Xander came down to Fincayra. To capture some women and have his way with them.
Nikolai cocked his head to the side, assessing Calen. "You have really blue eyes, like the sky on a good day. Really pale hair and skin the color of ivory. All in all, a fascinating package to the women. Not to mention, you look positively dashing in those clothes."
Calen raised his eyebrows. "I thought you said you prefered women?"
"I do," Nikolai told him. "Doesn't mean I can't recognize a good specimen when I see one. And right now, you're one of them."
"An artist then, are you?" Calen asked, making light of the conversation.
"You could say that," Nikolai told him. "Come on. People are going to wonder where it is I've been disappearing into. We can get you settled in Castle Makri until your brain chooses to remember the pass event that brought you here. Or hm...you could come with me when we leave for the next city."
"Not unless I could work. I wouldn't want to be a baggage," Calen told him. "I don't care if my memory decides to return or not. I think I'd rather worry about right now."
"Be careful what you wish for," Nikolai told him. "What if you had murdered someone and couldn't remember it? What then?"
Calen thought about it, and then answered, "I don't know. Run?"
Nikolai laughed, turning to face him. "You're certainly refreshing. So honest."
"Glad you think so," Calen told him drily, wondering as he did so, what was going to happen next. When was he going to be able to see Darian again? Even in this form. When?