Theo, Prequel Ch. 03: Forgiveness...

"Fucking hell. All men are the same." She had growled, wandering off. "A little time together...and they come asking to get mixed in my life!"

One of the last dark elf males, Kha'yun was alone. Murderer, now betrayer. With a disgusted sigh, coins clutched in hand, he crumpled against the tree. Kha'yun would sacrifice someone out of love. He would betray him to save his village and his family, right after he'd forgiven him. Even with his jaded sensibilities, he felt like a miserable asshole.

"Why did it have to be me?"

He looked up, his heart feeling being squeezed by an unseen hand. Theo had let him go *after he let his father die in the slave mines*. So Kha'yun had fled the human army coming to the rescue, fleeing north.

Now he was going to backstab the boy again. He repeated to himself it was for his family...

It was not helping. So slammed his head into a tree. Whoever touched the boy got cursed; rumors were already abuzz... Either way, he felt doomed. They would kill the little Lily, heartless Inquisition humans.

"I just want my family alive...Why is it so hard?"

His heart already answered for him.

"You cannot outrun what you did."

He had to lure Theo to his death; else the Inquisition's humans would destroy the village. So he had to hurry. Arzama's patience and temper were proven to be paper thin.

He had a window of opportunity when he realized that shouts and arguments exploded across the surface, AND underground streets. Centaur women rushed around, lifting their lovers and families on their backs, or donning barding armor to protect them. Kha'yun could see every monster girl species band together in a haphazard way, goblin and centaur, harpy and lamia alike grabbing items, utensils, and weapons whenever they could.

He had persuaded him to follow. Now he had to lure him here.

**

"Where the fuck are you!" Theo bellowed as he tried to keep up. "For fuck's sake, our kind isn't built for that kind of jog!"

"Almost there with the Inquisitor's tent."

Kha'yun was visible again.

"For fuck's sake..." Theo panted, slowing down.

Kha'yun kept a brisk jog until they were in a clearing.

"Well? Should I start the blood spell? I can make her talk." Theo was ready, taking out the blood bottles.

"Forgive me, human." Kha'yun looked as if he was about to cry.

"No. You are an asshole, clinging to Maou's skirts, we're through about that. Now, where are the Inquisitors?" Theo drew his sword, concentrating.

"I mean, forgive me for this."

In a moment, Theo's rage exploded in a string of curses when he realized he walked into a trap.

"YOU SCUMFUCKING BETRAYER. I'LL TAKE YOUR HEAD TOO! FUCK YOU AND YOUR RACE!" He was about to stab Kha'yun when several blue ice arrow splashed him, paralyzing him and preventing his blood spells.

Moon ice.

"GET HIM!"

Human warriors swarmed him with nets and clubs.

"YOU FUCKING SON OF A BIT-ow" He was swarmed and clubbed to unconsciousness before he could utter another curse.

Slowly, with a loud rustle from her hiding place, Arzama stepped out of the shadows. "I'm glad, dark elf. I'm glad you chose the right thing." She handed him another purse and walked up to Theo. Her face showed pure hatred.

"You will burn for what you did, Kinslayer." She spat at him, restraining him in wooden stocks to stop his hands. "Burn the asshole, the dark elf goes away."

Kha'yun froze. Burning? That was way out of line. He felt a horrible realization that these humans were insane, out of the line. And now he felt like a total asshole. It was a hard feeling when human lives were at the stake. Abandoning Maou must have changed him.

He could not leave Theo to such a terrible fate after what he had done.

No.

In one split-second, his mind drifted and he found himself in a grey wasteland.

"NO!" He screamed, the ghosts of his past starting to haunt him. Faces of human slaves, dirty and bedraggled, laboring to death. Faces of humans that were experimented on for plagues, lobotomized for work.

They were around him, screaming their hateful grudges until he felt dizzy.

Theo's own angry father was in front of him, spitting in an ethereal bolt.

"BETRAYER! THAT IS MY SON!"

Theo's own mother clawed at his face, shrieking. She screamed in rage at the loss of her son. But she wasn't the only one. Hellas had many local spirits, Daimon, akin to demons but fickle.

Trying to flee in panic, Kha'yun came face to face with a throng behind him, led by three hateful, beautiful women wearing bloody gowns.

The Eumenides themselves were screaming at him.

"MURDERER!"

"OATHBREAKER! MURDERER!" A million angry ghosts were screaming at his face, led by Theo's family, ethereal ghosts in a harrowing vision.

"TRAITOR!"

"YOU WILL BE WITH US WHEN YOU DIE!" Eumenides, angry spirits of vengeance promised doom, kind women in bloody tatters. "FOR WE CLAIM YOUR SOUL WHEN THEO DIES! OATHBREAKER, TWICE-DAMNED SLAVER, YOUR SOUL BELONGS TO THE KIND LADIES!"

"Forgive me..." Kha'yun wept, shaking. The ghosts would have none of it.

"NO."

Kha'yun realized what he had to do to be free. Lips shaking, the dark elf concentrated, held out his hands, and did the gesture to send the ghosts away, who disappeared with a satisfied smirk.

He had to free Theo, to paralyze the mad humans, to run back and to warn them.

"THEO! RUN!" He screamed, unleashing a lightning bolt.

He would hurt them until he felt an iron vice grip on his balls.

Arzama had caught him.

"Not so fast, boy toy." She slugged him in the face, tossing him next to Theo. "You wanna get uppity? Lynch them both."

So the human soldiers set up wood and flint around the immobilized pair, and put on a cage, with worried faces. Would Arzama go this far?

"Burn them both for God and Country!" Arzama started to giggle, and then laugh.

"AND I HAVE THE LAST LAUGH, THEO!"

She started to giggle when she tossed a torch to their cage.

"Hehehe...heehahahahahHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHA!"

**

"Roderick, we bail. This shit isn't for us."

"Ser! Inquisitor..."

"Fook the inquisitor, this shit isn't worth a fooking castle." Ser Brian was out, running. "If you have fookin' sense, she'll burn us both, Rod!!"

The two knights ran in shame and despair.

"Fook this. I'm getting my castle some other way." Brian said. After a few minutes of running, strangely, Roderick felt the same.

Aurelia had gone mad.

**

"What the fuck..." Theo stirred.

They had caged him with Kha'yun, intending to burn them both. He was in stocks and immobilized. The fire was small, yet it was rising in intensity. Kha'yun, his own hands tied, clung to him.

"DO SOMETHING!"

It had no effect on him. As if he knew, Theo sighed and glared in his eyes with hate.

"For what? Looks like a good death. Say hi to Eumenides for me, asshole." Theo spat. He had no energy, no will to break out. "We should both die here, it fits the bill."

Kha'yun was desperate. "I have a daughter, human." His eyes were teary as the inquisitor woman was madly laughing.

"You sold me out TWICE after I called quits." Theo spat in his face. "So shut up and burn."

"Theo! I am begging you!"

Kha'yun was begging indeed. He clung to him, in tears. "Theo! I have a family! I AM SORRY!" He just looked at him as the Inquisitor, who was now the only one with them laughed; the rest of the soldiers retreated, afraid, some clutching their ears.

Each and every last one had the feeling that this was plain wrong.

"BURN! BURN!" Arzama was lost in mad laughing, eyes full of glee and madness when flames licked them both.

Theo was silently looking at Kha'yun, who was crying, begging, out of control.

They were running out of time.

**

In the village, everyone was worried when fires started blazing, spreading out of control.

What were both up to?

Theo and Kha'yun, did they attack the humans? Kraelis felt very, very scared. Lily was in her arms, now starting to cry.

**

"GODS DAMN YOU THEOPHILOS! THEY SAID THEY'D KILL EVERYONE IF I GAVE YOU UP!"

Still, Theo didn't budge.

"Fuck you, at least let me suffocate in peace you shifty fuckwit."

"I am begging you, human..."

The dark elf's voice was full of despair, and indignation. He was crying, not out of fear of his own life, but his family, his newborn daughter. They were going to burn him alive too, the Inquisitor's shit-eating grin making it clear. He screamed, crying and in anguished tears. He was burning alive, realizing in terror that the Hell Lescatie promised was very, very close.

He could almost hear the welcoming laughter of Eumenides, waiting for him in HELL.

He screamed, half in rage, half in sorrow at the wheel of fate crushing him.

"TELL ME THEO! TELL ME!" Kha'yun the Last Male Dark Elf screamed at the top of his lungs:

"IT'S NOT EASY TO STAND BY A SINNER WHEN HE IS STUCK ON THE ROAD TO HELL IS IT?!"

When the fire started to crackle, a sudden thunderclap silenced the shouting and religious litanies.

"It is not." The words came from Theo's mouth in total honesty.

The Inquisitor's grin turned to a grimace, and realizing what happened, to abject terror.

Theophilos was crying in sorrow, sorrow he had sworn never to show to a dark elf again.

He had cut his wrists on the steel nails of his stocks and used his blood to destroy his restraints and the dark elf's own. His lips moved in a strange, otherworldly chant to re-ignite the magic he nearly forswore. When sickly red lightning started to emerge from his eyes, Arzama screamed at the top of her lungs, grasping her mace. Even as she screamed, blood from Theo's wrist had spread in a strange pattern surrounding him:

"KILL HIM! KILL THEM BOTH FOR GOD AND EMPIRE!"

Men bearing arbalests quickly took aim. They were not fast enough as black-red-veined lightning burst from Theo's open mouth and eyes, blasting every wooden article in the surrounding area and starting a hellish conflagration. Men were flung outwards, horses screamed in terror and broke their restraints, stampeding to get away from the sudden explosion.

From Nidavellir, screams of terror and surprise erupted, some of the monster girls and humans who thought they betrayed the two poor exiles, dashed towards the fire to rescue their friends.

When Theo emerged from the witch's pyre, he was carrying the stunned Kha'yun on his back.

"You suffer'd what you owed me. Partially, but I'll make do with half."

Kha'yun's eyes were full of surprise, and concealed gratitude. He was the boy his raiders had taken as a slave, sent his family to die in the mines. Theo could have shrugged, just as Kha'yun shrugged when Theo was crying with despair at the death of his father, back in the slave mines.

The boy had turned to be a man, a monster, and now a monster with a heart.

He had seen Kha'yun's family and found the strength and conviction to, if not forgive, to abstain from killing him in revenge.

"You...human..." Kha'yun's pain, from fire, smoke and lightning prevented him from talking much. "I..."

"Shut up. Just shut the fuck up." Theophilos grunted, carrying his bloodied companion on his back. "You are going home to your daughter today, you Karma cheating darkling shit. Just stop talking." He was ranting in absolute despair, letting go of every inhibition, more to himself and to the world than Kha'yun. "But I don't care. You aren't dying today because I want it so. Not some other god. I ain't taking this revenge when daddy's repentant. Had you stabbed me in the back, I'd just...ram that sword so far up your ass you'd taste the darkling shit on steel, daughter or no daughter." He took another breath. "Maybe it was Fate and Fortune I saw your elfling pup...but..."

He spat in anger towards a burning tree, letting the spittle sizzle.

"I'm not bringing another orphan to the world. I fuck Fate in the ass."

"Thank...you..." Kha'yun fainted on his back.

"Shut up." He elbowed the dark elf on the gut, only to hear him chuckling in resigned fatalism.

Theophilos carried him home, emerging bloodied, maddened and tattered to a shocked crowd of Nidavellir. He was still mumbling when he plopped Kha'yun on a stack of hay.

"Fucking dark elves. A pain in my ass. In every moment of my life. EVERY. LAST. ONE."

Still, he felt like hugging Kraelis, who was crying from joy as she showered him with thanks.

Ron was leading the roused villagers in a haphazard militia, watching over the fires in the distance. He was like an undertaker, solemn but resolute.

"We have to go. Human Inquisition won't let us be in peace. This fire won't spare us."

And so they started moving the whole village up north, removing everything of value.

**

Were it that redemption was that easy.

Theo realized that behind her, a crying, angry woman was crawling to him.

It was Aurelia.

Her armor burnt, she had crawled all the way to the village with a frothing mouth and a mace.

"God curse you, warlock..." She cried, standing up. Immediately, all the armed monster girls surrounded Theo. Seeing it's hopeless, she approached them, inciting a shoving match.

"KILL ME THEN!"

The lizard girl looked in confusion at the injured woman.

"Stay back, zealot!" One squeaked, Arzama retorting:

"YOU TOOK EVERYTHING FROM ME! KILL ME AND BE DONE WITH IT!"

The lizard girl hesitantly replied. "I didn't kill anyone save in self-defense...Look human, we see you are hurt, but we won't take your lif-"

"I DIDN'T MEAN YOU!" She spew magical fire in rage, crying like mad, and struggling in armored hands holding her.

"I MEANT THE BASTARD YOU PROTECT!"

Everyone suddenly looked at Theo, whose heart skipped a beat.

She screamed, cried begged, clearly gone insane.

"KILL ME!"

She screamed, tears flying from her eyes.

...

The monster girls, as battered and embattled, started to feel something for the broken bird.

Pity.

Even as she struggled and screamed, one of them approached Arzama Aurelia slowly.

A sad-faced Hakutaku, tail swishing, approached her.

"Listen, human. I don't know what happened to you, but I don't feel hostility to you." She whined, head tilted.

She gently extended a hand in friendship.

"It doesn't have to end like that."

Arzama's eyes were closed, mouth open in a silent scream.

"I don't know what it was that bent your life out of shape. Maybe I've been there too. Maybe I...we can help. I could rehabilitate you. You needn't suffer anymore. You needn't be alone. We don't have to kill each other."

The Hakutaku's eyes were wet.

"You can live a life you wanted."

"I HAVE NOTHING TO LIVE FOR!" Aurelia screamed in anguish.

A few of the monster girls started crying, realizing what she might be feeling, hiding their tears in their hands.

"THEO YOU BASTARD! WHY DID YOU HAVE TO KILL ROLF!"

The scream reached an uncaring heaven.

**

Theo froze.

"Rolf..." He tried to remember.

Then he did and cursed the universe for letting him remember.

The first knight coming to arrest him after Theo killed Maou, was Rolf. He had cut off his head, and ran, ignoring a scream of anguish when he did. That scream belonged to Aurelia, he realized now.

But then, it was war and self-defense.

Still, he could have blown him away. He could toss people like pins, yet he had lashed out in anger.

He spoke without tone: "I killed Rolf."

The congregation froze.

"I killed him in panic when he was going to impale me with a lance."

Everyone froze, letting Aurelia go.

"THEN KILL ME TOO SO I CAN SEE HIM IN AFTERLIFE YOU BASTARD! DO IT!"

She was screaming until her throat went dry.

The Hakutaku was crying openly now.

"Oh, gods...what have you done?"

"What I had to do," Theo spoke without believing himself and started to walk towards the crying, subdued woman.

"KILL ME! I WANT TO DIE!" She wailed as Theo started chanting.

"DO IT WITH THAT HEATHEN MAGICK YOU SELFISH BASTARD!" Aurelia kept screaming.

"Forgive me." Theo's eyes teared up as he raised is palms.

"I WON'T! I HOPE YOU BURN IN HELL!" She screamed. Theo kept crying.

"Forgive me."

"JUST DO IT YOU BASTARD!"

Some of the monster girls and humans were uneasy. Would they witness an execution?

Theo kept crying and mumbling "Forgive me." When he held Arzama's head.

"Forgive me."

Arzama's eyes went white when her world collapsed, brain blasted with arcane magic.

She shuddered, falling to the ground. And that what broke Theo, for the third time in his life.

Losing all decency, he collapsed, bawling like a child, repeating. "Forgive me!" He kept crying louder and louder, lost in his own agony. He screamed for forgiveness until he fainted.

The villagers understood, yet they had none to spare. One amongst them, a Gandharva harpy, would write the song of "Woman Who Forgot To Forgive."

"The Mother-of-Pearl

Handcrafted by God

You're the tower they built to reach the sky

A White Falcon beauty

My mark on your skin

Follow me down the stairs when we die

Your soul is in heaven

Your body in hell

It doesn't matter much to me

In the night of the unborn

Sound or obscene

Only bonds between you and me..."

**

Like Cain, cursed by God with the Mark of Murder, Theo felt marked. No one would harm him lest Allfather would make sure he was Avenged Sevenfold.

He felt cursed no matter what he did.

The little tryst with Gilly was scant mercy for what he felt that he must do.

**

"Uhh..."

The cart caravan went on, as a woman under the blankets stirred. She was dressed in simple peasant clothes, head pounding from pain. Yet she felt so light and calm.

"What...my head hurts..Where am I?"

"Arry?" A young, male monster extended a slender hand. It was a handsome dark elf.

"Who am I? WHO ARE YOU?" She was growing scared until some monster girls started to soothe her.

"Lie down. You were hit on the head, Arry."

"Arry? My...name?" The former inquisitor, now memories erased, was a simple villager. Theo was crying himself to sleep in another cart, dead drunk. Gilly herself was silent, sitting next to him.

"Of course Arry!" A lizardgirl held her hand with her claws, calming her. "You were hit on the head."

"Strange. No wound..." Arry touched her scalp, confused. "Oh God, what happened? Can't I remember ANYTHING? You..." She looked at the dark elf's face. He was quite the handsome lad.

"Do I know you?"

He feigned shock and sadness, as he was told. "I...uh...we were friends. I'm Gelek, don't you remember me?"

His sorrow and her wiped memories nudged her to pretend she did.

"Yes! Yes, so sorry. I'm sorry, I have to confess something Gelek. I have...forgotten...everything." She mumbled, eyes sad. Perhaps he and she were lovers? "Remind me, please."

She had held his hand tenderly. The Hakutaku on the horse gave a silent thumbs up to the others.

They would nurture her, take care of her as promised. And perhaps the dark elf boy that looked like the younger Kha'yun would inflame her heart...To start again.

Theo prayed Rolf in the afterlife would forgive him, for he needed a lot.

In his drunk haze, he came to an epiphany.

**

The sad monster girls and humans migrated ever north, setting up another village.

Theo would not be there.

He left Gilly. She understood, keeping her tears to her bosom: No one in the village wanted Theo near, after what he did, what he did was revealed.

Taking a horse and supplies, he was galloping south and west, back to the Reik. The Inquisition could not scry him this way, and in the nest of the dragon, he had a score to settle.

Simple revenge. Everyone from the Black Brigade, every last one had to die. He kept chanting their names, remembering every name from Lescatian libraries:

"Tomoko. Shindalla. Azaneal. Lillitu. Shabanash. Karashi. Ravanna. Zapatashura. Zehir. Marina Nosferat."