Xeol
Skin of a heifer and the kiss of a snake, blending among the crowd was the technique of us snakes. I concealed my identity and nudged along the mass of bodies in a busy bazaar.
I picked up a human ear from the stall. There was a stall for everything. Hands, legs, guts, heads, brains, the most expensive one.
I passed by everything and stood by a shop that read the mystical on the board. I stepped in and immediately met with the distinct smell of cranberry and roasted beef or more like a human.
"The King of Eight Snake"
I recognised the voice before I saw her face. I quickly scanned the room for ogres and looked at her.
"Shhh"
I shushed. She smiled and bowed her head. This entire bazaar was illegally run by ogres and sometimes witches. The customers though varied from demons and angels to humans themselves- the rich ones.
One glare from me was enough to get her moving her feet behind the shop where I met her.
"How much to you owe me?"
She looked concerned and rightfully so. She was a witch who managed this shop, and the only one who could identify the presence of my energy despite the changing appearances. Not only me but anyone. She was an asset not to be lost.
"My life"
I nodded my head, the cloth wrapped around my face seeming a bit uncomfortable.
"How about at the cost of someone else's life"
She had nowhere to go, nowhere to run and hide. My walls slowly closed her in. I chuckled.
"Come on now, you work in this place"
She gritted her teeth and answered hesitatingly.
"Y-Yes"
"Even at the cost of your peers?"
She gapped, blinking her eyes at me.
"H-huh?"
I rolled my eyes and shrugged. One thing I hated was to wait. But I smiled, good fruits came with a lot of patience, did it not? She was trembling by now.
"At the cost of your kind, Mizuna. How much do you owe me?"
She looked shaken up. Poor lady. She saw the knife in my hand, glinting under the moonlight. Then moved her eyes away from me. I caught her by the neck and slammed her on the wall, hard enough that black liquid dripped down the bricked wall. It was her blood.
"Masters of generation couldn't beat me in a million, were you going to defy me, huh?"
I closed up and leaned into her ears. My other hand pointing the knife on her jugular.
"Should I skin you and put a price on your body parts in this shop of yours?"
The first tears fell on my knife and ran down to my hand.
"I'm sorry. I- I'm so sorry. Please"
I let her go. She held the back of her neck, then her gaze shifted towards me and she fell on her knees, crying her eyes out at my feet.
"Anything your highness. I'll do anything"
"Get up"
She looked up at me.
"Get up! I want to know spells regarding curses. Give me all of them. I'll come collect it by next week"
She bowed her head and scurried away like a rat under the light. Now, that part was done. I had to prepare for my next part.
Among the throngs of busybodies, I knocked shoulders with lots but one held me down. I looked right into his eyes and saw a blazing fire instead. His face was covered like mine. I was too enamoured by those eyes that I haven't realise him pushing aside my mask. Then he had the gall to vanish without a trace.
In a split second I fixed my mask and looked for the unknown man in the crowd. A dragon, I realised. Those eyes could only fit to be of a dragon's.
"But they had not been since the Souls of Utan"
Alti said.
The Souls of Utan was a revolution that happened nearly a thousand of years ago. The world was divided into four parts, the Occults, the Angels, the White Warriors and the last was the dragons. By the end of the fight, the dragons were no more, the angels went back to heaven, the occults were the witches and wizards while the white warriors went into the waters and lived in the pit.
Leading the world to split into two sides, the east and the west. The West comprising of the eight kingdoms. The East comprising of six kingdoms, out of which only two were left because of the curse Yomi.
"Something is not right"
Her eyes followed me as I paced back and forth in the balcony.
My eyes couldn't betray me. Now, every time I looked at a blazing fire I remembered the eyes.
"My King"
It was a fine evening when one of my messengers entered the court with an envelope in his hands.
"From the Kingdom of Velare"
I frowned. What would this entail?
"Read it"
"Dear Lord Xeol,
I, Enin Velare, from the Kingdom of Velare would like to have a discussion with you over our most special tea, in my Kingdom on the 14th.
I sincerely request this of you, your highness, your response would be appreciated.
From Lady Enin"
My brows shot up to my hair. Interesting. Very interesting.
I took the message and twirled it in my fingers. Unseemly things have been occurring quite a lot recently. For the first time after sitting on the throne, I went to the bazaar to catch those eyes again. Night after night after night, I walked those filthy streets and endured the stench of raw flesh mingled with sweat.
"Our supplies got stolen again"
Alti walked in the throne room. I tsked.
"Do they love dead this much?"
The first time it happened, the supplies were found on the south side of the Kingdom. The second time, it was back inside the warehouse. This was the third time.
Now, I had made up my mind.