Of Lies and Betrayal

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Whisper Shifterdaughter

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Rain pelted down from a gray smothered sky as Whisper fled home on ashen wings. Her heart was beating faster than it ever had before, her wings pumping up and down in a pallid blur. Though her glossy feathers a spray of icy droplets stung her skin, drumming some tuneless chant into her veins as if to numb her fear and confusion but nothing, it seemed, could help her now. In her lifetime she had seen Serpentes do many terrible things, things that no child should ever have to witness but those things had all been so easy to dismiss. They had become a sort of code of life to her, because everything Serpentes had done had been justifiable without a doubt, even if they had been… horrible. But this, what he had done to Estrella, was something no amount of reasoning could right.
 
Sticking heavily to the cover of the shadows, trailed after her, moving as quickly as he could on foot. He was far too tired to Shift again and it wouldn't have done him any good anyway because all of his best Forms were creatures of land, each remarkably powerful in their own way but their traveling speed was nothing in comparison to a flyer as skilled as Whisper.
 
The mansion was dark and empty when Whisper finally reached it and of course all the doors were locked. Finding the window of her mother’s bedroom was an easy task in itself but getting inside took a bit of work. It wasn't until she figured out how to half Shift enough to regain most of her human form while still remaining in the air that she finally managed it.

Her mother's room was dark as well, just as it had always been, her mother a pale form sprawled unmoving in its center. Whisper looked at her miserably as she stood by the window, completeling her Shifting. Her mother could never greet her or hold her, had never utter a word let alone told her that she loved her but she knew that if the woman were fully alive now, these things she would have done in that moment and she took great comfort in that feeling.

Slowly, she crept to her mother's side, running her fingers gently through the woman's silky dark hair. "If you were here with me now, we would run far away from here." She murmured softly. "We would-" She stopped mid-sentence, staring in horror at the exposed flesh of her mother's collarbone.
 
Serpentes finally reached the house, pausing only for the merest secound to smash the front door in. Something was dangerously wrong and he could feel it. With his precious prophacy destroyed, he had only Draven's visions to rely on and much of what the Winterling boy saw was horribly vague. But Draven had warned him that problems were about to arrise between him and Whisper (not in as many words of course because Draven had no idea who Whisper was other than a white bird that followed Serpentes almost everywhere) and vague or no, Draven's visions were never wrong.
 
Whisper could hardly breath, her mind reeling with a thousand thoughts at once. There, at the base of her mother's thoat, a mark of the darkest black marred her perfect, milky skin. There wasn't an ink in the world that could produce such a color and Whisper could tell by the way the mark gleamed that it wasn't just some old tattoo, either. Carefully, as if the slightest touch might shatter the unconcious woman to pieces, Whisper reached out and ran a finger over the mark, wincing as the inky substance burned her skin. It was poison, and not just any run-of-the-mill kind either. The poison of a Shifter, her mind hissed in terror, Serpentes...
 
At that moment, Serpentes threw his full weight into the heavy oaken door, shoving it open so hard that it splinted into pieces when it connected with the wall. He glanced at Whisper for a moment, his eyes narrowed with irritation and blatant disappointment. True, he'd raise the little girl to have the mind and insticts of a warrior, but he'd also made sure that her mind was sharp and quick witted too.

"You're smarter than this, child," he hissed thinly, "You should know by now that all is fair when it comes to war. I..." He froze, letting his voice trail off as his eyes fell on the glittering black mark that lay exposed before the child's sight. This was very bad indeed.
 
Whisper stared at him, her eyes piercing with a deep sadness, the stab of true betrayal throbbing in her gut. Serpentes had raised her like a true-- though somewhat psychotic-- Jaju like a true grandfather. He'd shown her kindness as well as disiplene, morals of life alongside the darkness and short comings. But all along he'd been keeping her from her mother. All along he'd been poisoning the woman she missed so much, just to keep her away.

Slowly, she stepped forward. A true warrior never turns his back upon an opponent, and never runs away. You face what stands against you and drive it to the ground. Failure is never an option, even at the bitter end. The lesson echoed bitterly in her mind now, even though the words were true and wisedom resided well within them, she hated it now, hated it all. Would her mother have wanted her to be a warrior? Would she fear her now if Whisper freed her?
 
"So now you know," Serpentes muttered in a quiet dangerous tone, glancing up to meet the child's gaze, "I suppose I should have known that it would come to this sooner or later."
 
Whisper looked away, her eyes darkening with hot rage as tears began to blur her vision. She had never been angry before and it frightened her a bit, her fist shaking with the turmoil of all the emotions churning through her little form. She looked at her mother and felt her anger errupt. It raced so quickly through her veins and she found it to be an icy feeling, unlike the anger and rage that so many of the books in Serpentes' library described. Perhaps it was different for a person who was naturally docile. The feeling gave her speed it seemed, so much so that when the sting of the Shifter's poison seeped into her finger it took her a moment to realize that she had darted forward and remove the mark from her mother's skin.
 
"No!" Serpentes snarled, darting forward to try and stop her but it was too late. The woman stirred lightly, whimpering something incomprehendable, and then... opened her eyes. Quickly, Serpentes snatching up Whisper and dragged her from the room, bolting the door shut behind them.
 
Whisper didn't go willingly. She kicked and screamed and tried to claw him to pieces but it didn't do any good. "Let me go!" she shreiked like the six year old that she was. "Let me go. I hate you! I hate you!"

Tears streaked down her pale face, which was quickly turning a rosy shade of pink with her distress, her long white hair flying wildly as she struggled. Her mother was alive at last, waking for the first in Whisper's entire life, and Serpentes seemed bent on dragging her as far away from her as possible.
 
"Enough," Serpentes barked, dropping the child on her feet and striking her hard across the face for the first time outside of combat training. "Stop behaving like an infant and use your sense."

He clutched her wrist savagely before she could dart away from him, wrenching her around so she had no choice but to look him in the eyes. "What I have done has never been without reason, and now, thanks to your stupid childishness," he snarled furiously, his grip tightening until the child's bone's creaked dangerously, "We are all in very grave danger."
 
Whisper stared at him, her eyes dark and hollow in the eeriest of ways. She could feel the pain grinding through her arm but she didn't react to it. "You have betrayed me," she murmured in a low, hateful tone. "You have lied to me my entire life, taking from me the thing I wanted most."

With a quick jerk, she wrenched herself free of his grasp but didn't flee. She stood perfectly still, her tiny form trembling from head to toe with her anger. "You are not my friend, you are not my gardian." She hissed quietly, straightening and squaring her shoulders confidently as she spoke. "You are nothing more than an enemy to me now."
 
Serpentes glowered at her, his eyes narrowing sharply. Without warning, he struck her again, baring her teeth in an unflinching expression as she smashed against the wall, crumpling limply to the floor seconds later.

"Then remember this," he snarled through clenched teeth, watching as her eyelids fluttered, her conciouness teetering in a quickly losing battle, "Keep your friends close, child, and your enemies even closer."
 
Serpentes gathered her up easily now, and bolted swiftly down the hall, jumping the entire flight of stairs rather than taking the time to use them. He had to be quick now, had to be certain rather than sorry. If the child's mother woke fully and they remained within her reach... all hell would undoubtedly break loose.

The night air was cool and crisp outside, the rain cold as ice as it pelted vengfully down on them. Serpentes ran silently through the night, heading in no particular direction since he had almost no where to go with Whisper in tote.
 
Draven apparated not far from him, his eyes darting in surprise to the strange child the old man was carrying. He knew he'd never laid eyes on her before but something about her seemed oddly familiar, as if he'd seen her in a dream or something. "What's going on?" he inquired coolly.
 
"Here," Serpentes said quickly, shoving Whisper's unconcious form into Draven's arms and turning away before Draven could even get a proper hold on the child. "Don't ask questions, just get her somewhere safe, somewhere far from here. And don't let her out of your sight!"
 
"Are you kidding?" Draven snorted in disbelief, glancing down at the child with wild eyes. "You're dumping her on me? For how long?"
 
"Great," Draven grumbled, rolling his eyes in annoyance, "Just great."

Turning slightly toward the direction in which Serpentes had come, he shifted his grip on the little girl, moving with awkward care as if she might shatter at the slightest jolt.

"Where the hell did you come from, huh?" He muttered quietly as if the unconcious child might answer, "That creeper doesn't have family. Didn't know he took prisoners, much less children."

He knew it was plausible though, especially since this child obviously wasn't a normal one, with her pale skin and starlight white hair. The fact that she hardly had any baby fat for a child of her age didn't lessen the suspicion either.
 
With a soft whimper, Whisper began to stir. The cold of the rain against her skin quickly began to rouse her back to conciousness and within a minute she opened her eyes, startled to find herself in the arms of a stranger.

She didn't wait for him to react to her waking, did wait to fully grasp the situation. Instead she Shifted. The process was slower this time, though only by a few seconds, mainly because her the form she chose was not her Second Spirit form.

((Second Spirit: a Shifter term for the form they took when they were first awakened as Shifters. Serpentes and I will explain the whole Shifter thing in a later post.))
 
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