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PART IV
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Jadeite had to admit that they weren't exactly inconspicuous.
It would have been hard to stay unnoticed by passerby -- even if Dhearec hadn't been over seven feet tall; even if Jadeite's face hadn't once appeared in the Tokyo night skyline; and even if they hadn't been still wearing their military uniforms.
This was because of Aneiron.
In downtown Tokyo, it was somewhat hard to ignore someone with milk-white skin, jade-green eyes, and blood-red hair. Even if all of that was somehow overlooked, there still remained the fact that Aneiron was singing, in a surprisingly tuneful light tenor, "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" in English. At the top of his lungs.
Heads turned in fascination wherever they walked or wherever Aneiron's song drifted. By the time they reached the ice-cream parlor where Tsukino Usagi and her Senshi-brat friends usually hung out, Jadeite was surprised that the prime minister of Japan hadn't wandered by and caught a glimpse of them.
He really didn't care by this point; all he wanted was to take one sadistic look at the Senshi so he would be able to adequately picture their faces when he conjured up fantasies of them begging for mercy. Which, of course, he would not grant them -- really, what would be the point in that? Mercy was for people who hadn't been locked into crystals for bloody years.
"Ah," said Dhearec, under Aneiron's noisy chorus, "are those the Senshi, my lord?" He indicated a gaggle of teenagers sitting just inside the ice-cream parlor.
To all normal onlookers, they would be merely a normal gathering of teens. To someone looking through MageSight, the little group blazed with power, none more so than the black-haired young man and the golden-blonde girl with an unusual hairstyle, leaning into him contentedly.
Jadeite looked, nodded, allowed himself to be vaguely surprised at how much stronger the Senshi seemed, and then turned his face away hurriedly as one of the girls looked at him and pointed. "We may go back now," he said, lips white. "Their auras are still the same, albeit stronger; all of my traps in the Dark Kingdom will be keyed to them as soon as I put in the auras of the two unfamiliar Senshi -- that blonde with the red bow in her hair, and the tall girl with a chestnut ponytail."
Aneiron finished: "Glory, glory, halle-lu-uja, glory glory to-ooo the Looooord," and abruptly stopped. Passerby sighed in disappointment, and, with last furtive and amazed headshakes, went back about their business.
"Hey," said the diminutive redhead, peering back at the ice-cream parlor. "One of 'em is coming out. Maybe she liked my song," he added hopefully.
Jadeite cursed under his breath; he sensed the angry fiery spirit of Sailormars. "I don't think so," he said, right before a hand clamped down on his shoulder and whirled him around.
"How dare you, Jadeite," hissed the raven-haired hellion who held him. "How dare you!"
Behind him, he heard Aneiron asking with interest, "Do you think we ought to be taking this girl seriously?"
Dhearec's solemn reply, which didn't help Jadeite in the slightest, was: "She does appear to be rather worked up."
Hino Rei shook his shoulder hard. "Answer me, you son of a youma! How dare you show your face in Tokyo again!"
"Remove your hand," said Jadeite coldly. The voice in his mind gasped, How lovely -- how unbearably beautiful she still is. Oh, my Rei!
She went right on, heedlessly. "You have a lot of nerve, coming back after we defeated your Queen Beryl! Now in the name of Mars-"
Before she could say that she was going to chastise him, or whatever she might have said, Jadeite sent a jolt of fiery heat through her hand. She screamed, snatching her hand back from his shoulder as if it were red-hot -- which, for her, it had been.
"I told you to remove your hand," Jadeite said mildly, looking at the weeping girl with a faint smile.
Aneiron tapped him politely on the shoulder. He turned. "Hmm?"
"Begging your pardon, my lord," Aneiron said, pointing at the ice-cream parlor, "but there's more of 'em coming." The small redhead grinned the madman's smile that had made him infamous. "Can I have the next one? Please?"
Jadeite felt like smiling himself. Good old Aneiron. Far more dependable than Zoisite had ever been, and with a comparable vicious streak. "You may," he said indulgently. "But the Mars bitch here is mine."
Oh, my Rei! wept the voice in his brain. How can I hurt you again, after betraying you already?
A swarm of teenagers was upon them: a blonde holding a white cat; the blue-haired genius; an odango'd blonde with eyes of celestial blue, clutching her tall boyfriend in a panic; a tall lithe beauty with a chestnut-brown ponytail. A black cat with a crescent-moon mark on its forehead danced in between the pounding feet, urging everyone, in a distinctly human voice, not to transform here.
Jadeite shook his head bemusedly. As if everyone wasn't looking at them anyway. "Aneiron," he said without turning his head to look, "I'd advise going after either of the blondes first." He himself aimed a careful blast of scintillating blue sparks at the blue-haired girl, who was caught off guard and took the pillar of blue fire full in the chest. She fell backwards, gasping in agony.
Jadeite felt the familiar rush of adrenaline coming through him; under its cover, it was easy to ignore the voice in his mind, now screaming and screaming and not being able to stop screaming.
Endymion! Prince! Master! Help me, help me, I don't know who I am! Rei, oh, my Rei, please help me, forgive me, oh Rei.....
"You might as well transform now," he head the black cat say. "After all, in all this ruckus it's unlikely that anyone would recognize you anyway."
No sooner were the words out of the cat's mouth than the Sailor Senshi transformed.
"Mercury Crystal Power!"
"Venus Crystal Power!"
"Moon Eternal Power!'
"Mars Crystal Power!"
"Jupiter Crystal Power!"
Then, a chorus of "MAKE UP!"
Aneiron came up to watch, leaning on Jadeite's shoulder, which the Dark King permitted. Aneiron seemed to think better when he was touching someone else, almost as if he were siphoning off the other's brain waves.
"So," said the redhead, watching with an expression halfway between disbelief and hilarity, "this is what they do, then?"
"Basically," said Jadeite. "We can't attack while they transform; there's a shield -- "
He paused, blue eyes narrowing. Slowly, he began to smile.
Jadeite wove a quick tight shield around the transformation shield of Sailormars; he tightened it, keyed it, and stepped back to observe.
Dhearec asked him quietly, "My lord -- was that wise?"
For the first time, Jadeite heard an emotion in the stoic Shondarin's deep cold voice. He didn't like what he heard: stark disapproval.
"It was," he snapped. "Just watch, Gheomoren." Gheomoren: Dhearec's soldier-name. Black Death.
The Madros lord accepted the rebuke stoically; he said no more.
The Senshi finished transforming. Jadeite didn't bother to look at them; they weren't going to attack yet. First they had to tell him that they would punish him, or whatever. His eyes narrowed as he counted; where was Tuxedo Kamen? Then, in rising panic: Where was Tuxedo Kamen?
"Preying on innocent girls who'd thought that all their headaches were over --"
"Well, until that thingy that Neo-Queen Serenity's supposed to heal in the beginning of the thirtieth century --"
"Shh! You're wrecking my speech!"
"Gomen..."
"Well, anyway, we will not forgive you!"
"In the name of Mercury - "
"In the name of Venus - "
"In the name of the Moon - "
"For the sake of Mars - "
"And for Jupiter also - "
"WE WILL PUNISH YOU!"
"Are they for real?" Aneiron asked. "Can I throw a fireball at 'em?"
"No," said Jadeite.
"Just one?" begged the redhead. "I'm really good, I've been practicing, don't listen to Dhearec, he's just jealous."
"I said no," said Jadeite. "I've seen what your fireballs can do. Watch Sailormars."
Aneiron sulked. "But it all grew back," he muttered.
All of the Senshi went into their various poses - and then Sailormars stopped, her motions beginning to go sluggish. She looked for all the world like she was moving through molasses.
"Mercury?" she gasped. "Sailormoon! Luna! Artemis! What's happening to me?"
Jadeite grinned mercilessly. Oh, this would be the best part; that she didn't know what was going to happen. That was all right, better for the others to know, and her to go into an unknown terror.
"Well, if I can't throw a fireball," Aneiron persisted, "can I at least peg that guy on the rooftop who's getting ready to throw a rose at you?"
"What?!"
"Too late," said Aneiron, pulling Jadeite out of the way before the blonde general could become a thorny mess. The rose struck the pavement and stuck there, quivering.
Jadeite looked up in white hatred. "Tuxedo Kamen," he snarled. "Aneiron, release me!"
"Um," said the redhead. He looked at Dhearec for support. "Junior, I think we ought to get out of here, what do you say?"
"If it be Lord Jadeite's will," responded the Madros lord without changing expression.
"It is my will that you release me so I can destroy Tuxedo Kamen!" Jadeite commanded in fury. He struggled, but the slender Aneiron was surprisingly strong.
"My lord," said Aneiron urgently, "the Senshi are getting ready. We're outnumbered. I can sense a power in them that could level a city. I ain't laughing."
Jadeite calmed instantly, glanced at Sailormars. She was completely frozen; already he could see the outlines of the crystal sealing itself around her. His spell wouldn't work as quickly as had Beryl's; he still didn't have enough power, no matter how many lessons Dhearec drilled into him.
Oh, well. It was the result that mattered. "Grab the crystal with Sailormars inside," he ordered the golden-skinned giant Dhearec. "Aneiron, prepare to teleport us back."
He glanced at the Senshi, massing for attack. He grinned mirthlessly. "Sorry, girls," he murmured. "Playtime's over."
He sent a blue orb of energy right into the middle of them. Stupid of them, really, to cluster so closely together against an enemy who specialized in incendiary magic.
Jadeite released the orb's trigger, watched in pure satisfaction as dark energy exploded over the Senshi. Not enough to seriously inconvenience them, no; but enough to stun them and probably give all of them with the exception of the visored Sailormercury a damned throbbing migraine headache.
Aneiron, Dhearec, Jadeite, and the crystalline prison of Sailormars vanished.
The youma sobbed in frustration. Not in all the quarries of the Dark Kingdom had she managed to find even a trace of the delicately lilac gemstone kunzite. And without that gem, she couldn't speak the charm, couldn't resurrect Lord Kunzite or his beloved Lord Zoisite.
Lord Kunzite's quarries had long ago run out of the gem, for the silver-haired general's own magickal experiments; Lord Zoisite's had been plundered for the same purpose. Lord Nephrite had had no mines or quarries; his magic had been of the mind and stars, needing no physical foci. Even Queen Beryl's own royal quarries had had no kunzite, although it had yielded the diligent youma some of the translucent white stone zoisite.
The youma had to find some kunzite!
Here, in Lord Jadeite's small quarry, so carefully hidden away that even Beryl had never found it to loot it, the youma slid past spell-traps, wriggled cautiously by the Wyrrm-dens, finally crept into the main pit.
She gazed around in wonder, huge gray eyes pained by the brilliance of the exposed gems.
Surely here she would find the stones she sought!
Jadeite sat on his bed, gazing at the delicate, terror-stricken features of Sailormars, frozen into a crystal. Just as he had been frozen for so long.
Dhearec would be back later, to tutor him in the Shondarin way of magic. Not that Jadeite could perform the Shondarin sorcery, not yet; for that, he would need a link to the Soul of Shondar. He still didn't understand exactly what the Soul of Shondar was; from what little he'd been able to gather, it was the Emperor himself -- yet Dhearec had mentioned once that the Soul of Shondar was all the energy, all the souls, all the knowledge in the Empire combined into one single entity.
Jadeite shook his head angrily. It didn't matter. He wasn't a Shondarin, no matter how many pacts he sealed with the Dai Shahre.
He was very much afraid that he wasn't going to be much of anything, in the very near future. He was afraid that he was going mad.
He reached out in longing to Sailormars: his beloved Rei, Princess of the red planet....
Jadeite froze, snatching back his hand in total panic. See! Things like that: thinking well of his enemies; catching himself yearning for Rei's smile; wanting to throw himself on Endymion's mercy, begging forgiveness for his betrayal.
That voice in his mind just wouldn't leave him alone! Half of him resolutely said that he was General Jadeite of the Dark Kingdom, and had never been anyone else. But the other half of him maintained with equal certainty that once he had been Lord General Jadeite of Earth, main tactician and swordmaster to Prince Endymion, the chosen consort of the Mars Princess Rei.
He held his head in his hands and nearly wept with frustration. He was losing his mind, and there was no one he could turn to. Even if he unfroze Sailormars/his beloved Rei, she wouldn't be able to help him. That is, assuming that she would want to help him, rather than turn him into a crispy critter with that Fire Soul of hers.
Lately, the split seemed more pronounced; the voice was there constantly, instead of just piping up whenever a Senshi or Tuxedo Kamen was mentioned. Lately, the other voice in his head was right there along with the man he remembered being, Jadeite of the Dark Kingdom.
Great Metallia! Lately, he wasn't sure who he was at all!
There was only one thing that he was absolutely certain of: that he had allied himself with the Dai Shahre of Shondar, in order to destroy Metallia, Whom the Dai Shahre claimed was an ArchDemon, and Whom Jadeite knew to be the only obstacle keeping him from being sole ruler of the Dark Kingdom.
Jadeite moaned out loud with the sheer pressure of it all.
A throat cleared.
Startled, he looked up, a defensive spell on his lips.
It fell away as he looked into the face of a goddess.
Tall, golden, slender; her thick braid of fire-golden hair reached almost her midcalves. Her skin was pale gold, her clothing was muted amber and vivid scarlet, her features quite simply the most beautiful he had ever seen. Even her eyes were inhumanly beautiful: the color of the liquid gold in a forge.
He knew which goddess it had to be: "Amaterasu," he said reverently. Amaterasu Omikami, the patron goddess of Prince Endymion's imperial line.
The goddess looked startled, then grinned. "No, I'm not the sun goddess," she said in a voice like warm sunlight. "But thank you for saying so. My name is Amberlin Jalia, and I'm -- well -- I'm the Imperial Princess of Shondar. One of them, anyway."
She sat down in midair, crossing her legs; Jadeite unconsciously leaned forward. All thoughts of Rei fled.
"You are Lord Jadeite," she said thoughtfully, looking at him with lovely brow furrowed. "I really can't understand why you'd do a stupid thing like seal an alliance pact with Meran, but you did and I can't undo it." She shrugged., then grinned impishly and said, "Tell me, Lord Jadeite, what is the thing you want most in all the worlds?"
"I want my mind to be my own again," he blurted, then stopped, his eyes wide. That hadn't been what he had wanted to say.
Amberlin Jalia grinned even wider, looking as if she were enjoying herself hugely. For a fleeting second, he was reminded of another red-headed Shondarin: Aneiron Jander. "Interesting," she said. "I would have thought for certain that you wanted the Dark Kingdom to be your own again, instead of all the Silver Flames cluttering it up. Well, let me touch your mind and see if I can't do something about it." She reached out a slender hand to touch his brow.
Jadeite shied away from her touch, uncertain himself why he did so.
She looked nonplussed. "Lord Jadeite, did anyone tell you anything about me?" she asked suspiciously. "Specifically, did the Dai Shahre say anything about me? If he did, you shouldn't believe him, honestly, Meran's a lovely man but he has just the smallest wee prejudice against me because I happened to kill someone he was fond of, even though she was an awful mouse and needed killing because, honestly, an al'Wyastri, and he'd throw me over for her? Please."
"No, the Dai Shahre didn't say anything against you," he admitted, watching her in sheer amazement. She was the most exhausting person he'd ever met.
"Hmm.... Well, then why don't you trust me?" she demanded, frowning. "I mean you no harm -- I want to help! Lord Jadeite, not to sound conceited or anything, but I'm the greatest magician in all the history of Shondar, and if anyone can help you, I can. I have a Healing Gift, for Lalandra's sake. I want to help you, so why don't you let me?"
"Why?"
"'Why,' he says," she grumbled. Even in anger, she was impossibly lovely. "Why? Because, you son of a sojar, if I don't do something quick, I'm going to be passed over for the Iron Throne, that's why! I have to do something damned spectacular before I achieve Balance and marriageable age, or else I'll have to marry Merolan, and I don't want to!"
Jadeite tried to figure this out, and failed. "What?"
"Oh, mice," Amberlin Jalia swore. "Here. Super-condensed story of my life. I'm the younger twin, which means that my older sister Amberyl will be Empress, not me. I really like it better this way; I think that if I were Empress, the Empire would be in serious trouble because I'd get bored, and Amberyl is a better ruler than I am anyway. I want to be Dai Shahre and Warlord, Princess of the Iron Throne. But I can't as long as Merolan still holds it, and he can't be removed other than by dying or stepping down of his own accord. He won't admit that I'm better than he is, even though I've beaten him in every way you can imagine. But he still knows that I'm a threat to his supremacy, so he bloody offered to marry me, and Roidan -- that's my brother, you know, the Emperor -- couldn't figure out what else to do with me, so he agreed. So I have to marry Merolan so I can't take away the Iron Throne from him." She paused. "Got it so far?"
"I think so, yes," he said.
"Good. The only way that I can make Merolan step down is by beating him to something that he's already committed to do. So if, for instance, I defeat this ArchDemon before he does, then my brother will have to agree that I'm a more formidable war leader than Merolan is, and Merolan will have to retire. I'd have the Iron Throne then, and Merolan wouldn't, so I wouldn't have to marry him. I really, really, don't want to marry Meran -- he's quite attractive, as I'm sure you've noticed, but he hates me. Even though I rather like him now, I'm not sure that I still will after being married to him for years and having him hate me at close quarters for so long. So you see? I have to Heal you of being insane, or whatever, and you have to help me defeat the ArchDemon, and then you'll have the Dark Kingdom, I'll have the Iron Throne, and Merolan won't have to marry me, and everyone is happy except the ArchDemon, but that's Its own fault for being evil. Makes sense?"
Jadeite regarded the goddess with admiration. That had to be the most convoluted explanation he'd ever heard, even from Zoisite when the little weasel was trying to confuse Queen Beryl out of a punishment.
"It does," he said gently. "But, Princess - "
"Call me Amberlin Jalia," she interrupted cheerfully. "Or just Amberlin. Or just Jalia. I consider that someone who knows my life story and whom I'm going to Heal ought to be allowed to call me by my name."
"Amberlin Jalia," Jadeite said carefully, "I've sworn an oath to the Dai Shahre."
She snorted most indelicately. She still managed to make it lovely. "I'm probably the only one who can put your mind back together," she pointed out. "Just let me do that, and then you can make your decision. And besides, if you help me or let me help you, you won't be forswearing yourself to Meran. All he wants is for the ArchDemon to be defeated. And..." She smiled the happy grin of the incredibly naive person who thinks she's just been incredibly sly. "I doubt he specified just who was supposed to defeat it, now did he?"
"No," Jadeite was forced to admit. This time, when she reached out to him, he didn't shy away.
He screamed in sudden pain, as a golden aura surrounded both of them. Amberlin Jalia didn't pay any attention to him, but continued probing his mind with a look of concentration on her beautiful golden face. He had to admit, she was trying to be gentle; she couldn't help it that she was jouncing around all of his memories, and forcing both halves of his mind to confront each other at last.
"Interesting," she said, biting her lip and finally withdrawing. "Here's my hanky; I didn't mean to make you cry."
Jadeite wiped away the tears of agony that had rolled down his cheeks; that had been worse even than the torment of the crystal. He cleared his throat and said steadily, "What did you find?"
"Your mind's divided into two separate tracks," she said concisely. "One track is -- forgive me -- the thoughts of a heartless, cold, mean bastard; the other one -- " she winked at him - " -- is of a charming young man, right up until a lady with red hair and a singularly unpleasant smile confronts him, and it continued right after a short hiatus, something about a crystal." She waited.
Jadeite wasn't about to enlighten her. "I see," he said. "Will you wipe out one of them?"
"That would be an efficient way of getting rid of the problem, yes," she agreed. "It won't be exactly healthy, but you'll survive with a reasonably sane mind. You want me to get rid of the bastard, right?"
"No," Jadeite said, smiling painfully. He glanced at frozen Sailormars at the foot of his bed, where he could gaze at his beloved/enemy's horrified face right before he went to sleep. "I am the bastard, Amberlin Jalia. I want to get rid of the weakling of Earth."
Amberlin Jalia looked at him in dismay. "I can't do that, Lord Jadeite," she said. "That's murder."
"So's the other," said Jadeite relentlessly. "Why is killing the weak one murder, and not the bastard - the real me?"
"Because he's not weak," said Amberlin Jalia patiently. "I don't know; killing the mean you is rather like killing him in battle, or in a duel. Yes, exactly like a duel. I can handle duels." A swift shadow of pain flew across her lovely face. "But killing the nice you, the one I like, that is like murder because -- well, because I like him, and I can't hate him enough to make it seem like a duel."
"Deal with it," Jadeite said shortly. "Wipe him out. I command it."
"I'll ignore the order, which you have no right to give to me," said Amberlin Jalia. "But that's another problem. You keep saying 'him' as if it's a different person. It's not. Jadeite, both people are you. The 'weak' one, as you call him, is you of a different time, and that you is actually quite a bit stronger than the you talking to me right now. For one thing -- " she glared at him -- "he's not quite as bloody-minded stubborn. For another thing, he doesn't have a - taint, for lack of a better word. This Metallia taints the bastard you, and won't let you think quite clearly. The other you can focus better. He is a terrific tactician -- I'd dearly love to play shra'velen against him."
"I the bastard beat Gurean Forsotar at shra'velen," Jadeite said dryly. "Everyone seems to think that he's pretty good."
"Oh, Gurean," said Amberlin dismissively. "I suppose -- but what was the score?"
He told her; she giggled in disbelief. "Well. That is good. But the other you would have jacked up the score by at least a thousand."
Jadeite declined to comment.
"But in any case, Jadeite," she said persuasively, "there's a better way to Heal you. More efficient. It'll leave you with both yous, intact, and you'll be a stronger person for having both. I'm going to fuse both halves of you, make the Jadeite that results into a slightly meaner, slightly colder version of the charming Earth you."
"No," said Jadeite.
"Don't be silly. It's the only feasible solution, because I absolutely refuse to destroy either of your subpersonas."
"Dhearec will do it for me, if I command it," said Jadeite with assurance.
"I wouldn't be too certain," Amberlin Jalia warned him. "Dhearec's sometimes aggravatingly literal -- believe me, I know; he was my tutor for nineteen years -- but if he thinks that it would harm you, he won't follow your order. And he will know that it would harm you, because Dhearec's a Healing Adept."
Jadeite eyed her, torn. "Which memories of... the Senshi would I have?" he asked.
Amberlin Jalia understood; she had been leafing through his memories, after all. She looked sympathetically at the crystalline prison of Sailormars. "She is lovely," said the most beautiful woman that Jadeite had ever seen. "And you'll remember her as a lovely, fiery, engaging girl. But I'm afraid that even though you'll have both sets of memories, as lover and as enemy, they won't really be real for you. They'll be more... objective. You'll remember the events, but not the emotions that accompanied them. I'm sorry."
Jadeite bit his lip. To be free of the memories, to be free of this terrible yearning for forgiveness and absolution -- that was the most desirable thing that he could imagine. If the price that he must pay for it was integration with a lesser half, fusion with a weakling, then Jadeite would pay.
"I agree," he said at last. "Heal me, Amberlin Jalia."
The Shondarin beauty laughed. "Good," she said blithely. "This won't take but a moment, and you'll just fall asleep afterwards. Hold still, Lord Jadeite."
She reached out and took his head between her hands, looked down at him with blazing intensity.
The last thing that Jadeite saw before blackness claimed him was the frozen face of Sailormars.
She seemed to be waiting.
The youma gasped in terrible hope. Was that a gleam of violet she saw?
She scrabbled with her long claws in the stone, inch by painful inch freeing the gem from its earthen prison.
Oh, it was real, the lilac gemstone she'd sought for so long! The youma continued digging with a renewed frenzy. If she could only pry it free....
Finally, the youma's bloody hands a mute testimony to her devotion to gone Lord Kunzite, the softly-glowing purple stone was free.
The youma scooped it up, trembling in equal parts triumph and exhaustion. She had fulfilled her duty, given her by Lords Kunzite and Zoisite so long ago. She pulled out a white crystal from her pouch, held up the white and purple gems together. Zoisite and kunzite, the soulstones of Lord Zoisite and Lord Kunzite.
Yes. Now all she needed to do was take these stones to Lord Kunzite's old castle, deep in the abandoned heart of the Dark Kingdom, and lay the stones in the massive laboratory of the dead silver-haired general. She would speak the charm over them, and Lord Kunzite and his beloved Lord Zoisite would live again.
And she would be rewarded for her fidelity.
Amberlin Jalia carefully arranged the body on the bed, stood back, and looked down at her handiwork. She frowned. Something was not quite right.
She brightened. She knew what was missing! The Shondarin girl riffled through her memory for what she'd seen in Jadeite's mind, the weapon that he coveted.
She concentrated, wove a spell whose dizzying complexity would have daunted many an older, more experienced sorcerer, and held in her hands a long, highly-polished staff. At the butt, it was spiked with copper, suitable for staving in an enemy's head; at the other end, it held a long, slightly-curved blade.
Amberlin Jalia carefully placed the staff by Jadeite's side, and frowned again. Something still wasn't right. She glanced at the gray uniform of the sleeping man, and pursed her lips. That was part of it, sure enough. She touched the left breast of the gray tunic; under her flat palm, the emblem of a golden sun-in-glory, adorned with a scarlet rose in full thorny bloom, took shape. Amberlin Jalia looked at her own sigil affixed to Jadeite's uniform and grinned. That ought to teach Meran. She'd dearly love to see Meran's face when Jadeite appeared before him wearing the sigil of Merolan's rival and bride. Ha. All was fair in love and war. Sort of.
She decided to give Jadeite another gift, and reluctantly pulled more power out of the Soul of Shondar. "You were a swordmaster once, under this Prince Endymion," she told the sleeping figure as her spell took on reality in her hands. "So you'll need a good sword now. I'll give you a good blade, Lord Jadeite -- this was the Blade of Fire that my Housemother Lalandra used to kill ShadowPrince Kisayith. You'd better take good care of it."
A long, scarlet-hilted katana was in Amberlin's hands. She stooped and placed the hilt in Jadeite's left fist. Even in his sleep, he gripped the weapon securely, as if he had been born to it.
But... as extravagant as a sword and a staff were, Amberlin dithered. For some perverse reason, she enjoyed annoying dai'Merolan, and all of this -- Healing Jadeite, trying to subvert the attractive general to her own ends, even dowering him with Saint Lalandra's own sword -- still wasn't enough to make Merolan really angry. She'd never seen Merolan angry, and she wanted to know what it was like. Everyone said that there was nothing quite as interesting as an al'Ledo lord in a rage, and Meran was sure to be more interesting than any other al'Ledo lord to ever live. She knew exactly what would annoy him, too....
She bent over Jadeite, pulling an immense amount of power out of the Soul of Shondar. The sheer quantity of pulsating, raw, chaotic power would have burned out any other sorcerer but a Tamyrlin; only a mage as powerful as a Star Wizard could handle this much. She leaned down, and brushed her lips across Jadeite's, at the same time channeling power into him, into the exact center of his mind, the very nexus of his soul.
She felt the link take hold, felt it connect. She fell back, gasping. Sweet Lalandra, that had been tiring. She'd better not do anything else.
Amberlin Jalia smiled. Now everything was right. She just didn't feel comfortable about leaving anyone without at least three readily accessible weapons.
She vanished.
Dhearec sat before Metallia's crimson plinth, staring straight into the heart of it. He never blinked, never took his icy eyes away from the prison of the ArchDemon.
"Who are You?" he asked It patiently. "What is Your Name?"
The megalith stared back at him sullenly. He had been at this for days; his only absence had been during that curious mission of Lord Jadeite's, a few hours earlier. A lesser man might have grown impatient at this long vigil with no visible progress.
Dhearec was actually quite satisfied with what he had accomplished. There was no doubt but that the ArchDemon responded to him; every time he asked his never-varying questions, the red stone briefly showed a face, a face of unspeakable beauty, of horrific ugliness, a face that screamed in anguish, a face that beckoned in its calm serenity.
It never spoke to him; he didn't expect It to. After all, his ancestor, Saint Madros, had been one of the principal thorns in the side of the Shadow, so long ago. It would hardly be decorous for an ArchDemon to speak to a descendant of the Lord of Twilight.
But he would coax Its Name from It; the Dai Shahre wanted that Name, and it never even occurred to Dhearec that what the Dai Shahre wanted might be impossible to carry out.
"What is Your Name?" he intoned unemotionally. "Who are You?"
The crimson visage appeared, screamed, drifted over the face of the massive red pillar. This time, Its mouth opened as if to reply. Before It could, a tremor of titanic proportions shook the Dark Kingdom, threatening to tear apart the midplane.
The face vanished.
Dhearec sighed. And bent his mind again to conquering the ArchDemon.
"Who are You? What is Your Name?"
The youma -- tired, hungry, footsore -- collapsed in the great hall of Kunzite's abandoned castle.
Slowly, painfully, the loyal youma made her way to the top of the great central tower, the place wherein most of Lord Kunzite's power had been focussed. Under the lavender dome of the laboratory, the youma reverently placed the two soulstones together on a cushioned table.
She spoke the charm that Lord Kunzite had taught her long ago, patiently drilling it into her head:
"When the color of light inverts
yellow remembered as violet
green as the red of the blood unveiled
as the blood spilled over Beryl's hearthstone
White lost in the incandescence of zoisite,
kunzite drowned in an attar of violets:
My love and I come home."
The youma watched the two soulstones carefully, saw the exact instant when they began to glow.
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Well, you know what they say: "Show me a fanfic writer, and I'll show you someone who'll rip her work apart later and revise it within an inch of its damned life." Yeah. That is what they say. Yo. But if you've heard another version, feel free to mail me with it.