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Title: Tangling
Rating: PG-13
Universe: The Dak Territories
Genre: Adventure/Fantasy
Characters/Pairings: Meruk, Beren, Aruk, Daes Jung, Raidan, Shanra, Gallana, Mellanie, Shaiar
Summary: Gods and daemons introduced, plots beginning to reveal, lives tangling tight
Wordcount: 1134
Prompt: Tangled Lives
Notes: getting complicated here
Claimer: Mine
Tangling
Shadow flooded the temple, rich and dark and unnatural, and Meruk's hand instinctively found his sword, hearing his men find theirs as the shadow covered their eyes and blinded them. A threat, in the very temple of the Sun God! But he should not be surprised, should he? His god was now a mortal, after all, and one of his oldest enemies now a friend. But still. It rankled."You know," a soft voice commented in the darkness, male and bemused. "I didn't actually think he would do it. I didn't think he would have the guts."
There was a laugh, then, gentle and reproving, and Meruk realised with a start that it was Beren's. "You're biased, Raidan," the Guilder chided, and Meruk could hear the familiar smile in his voice. "You've hated him for a long time."
"Raidan?" And that was his God, a thoroughly distinctive roar of anger. Meruk instinctively turned towards the voice. "What have you to do with this, whelp!" Meruk sensed the burly form stride past him, towards the stranger's voice, and he sensed too the rage in him.
"Just looking out for a friend, father," Raidan spat back, suddenly behind Meruk, from right over his damned shoulder, and undignified as it may have been he couldn't help the jump of shock, wishing desperately that he could see. He jabbed the hilt of his sword back towards the voice, and gasped as a chill hand caught his, wrenching his sword free. He heard twin cries of outrage as some unknown force did the same to his men. And then ... the shadow lifted, and he stared into angry, mist-coloured eyes. "Couldn't let you actually kill him, after all," Raidan, god of rain, finished.
"Don't bully him, Raidan," Beren chided, a glint of temper in his voice, and then he was at Meruk's side, pulling the godling's hand away from his arm, gently guiding Meruk back a step. "He's proven himself. They all have."
"Yes, they have."
Meruk turned his head as this new voice sounded, and turned to see Shanra, daemon of shadow, step out from behind Daes, his sword in her hand. That explained the blinding darkness. Gritting his teeth, he looked around, and saw Mellanie, the thief daemon who had stolen his God's divinity, holding Jung's sword, and then, where Raidan had been only moments before, where Aruk had stormed to, was Gallana, the daemon of battle, with Aruk pinned on the ground beneath her feet.
Surrounded, then. Disarmed. It was the slaughter of his Order all over again, and Meruk turned to Beren in anguished betrayal, and rising cynicism. Of course. Of course. Had he ever really expected the Guilder to be his friend, his ally. Of course Beren would not walk into certain death, not for them, not for Aruk. Not for him. Hadn't the man even told him he'd been sent, that it was part of a plan? Why had he ignored that? Why? He glared at the man who held his arm, and there was true hatred in his eyes.
Beren met his gaze, and smiled sadly. "I am sorry," he said, gently. "All of you. But it had to come to this. Aruk had to prove himself, or we were all lost." He shook his head, and when he looked back up Meruk could see a strange loss in his eyes, as if he had been the one betrayed. It made him shake with rage, jerking his arm free furiously, spitting on the damned bastard.
Then chill hands wrapped around his shoulders, and he was yanked back by a furious godling. Raidan turned him in place, and shook him, as if he were an idiot child. "Don't you dare," the rain god hissed. "Don't you dare blame him! After all you made him endure, and you blame him for plans set in motion before he ever met you, let alone allowed himself to care!" He spat. "You think he wouldn't have died for you, idiot! He would, and it would never have been his fault!"
He threw Meruk back in contempt, and arms caught him from behind, wrapped around him to cushion his fall, and he looked up to find it was Beren. "Don't, Raidan!" Hard, cold. Then soft, as the godling looked at him in bewilderment. "Don't. There are too many wounds here. Don't add to them."
"He is right, Rain God," Shanra spoke up. "We are here to stop the fighting, not add to it." She raised her chin, regal and sure, and turned to hand Daes back his weapon before glaring at the daemons holding Jung and Aruk. Mellanie gave way with grace, smiling slightly as she handed Jung his sword, but Gallana cursed, holding tight to the War God's arms. He was her oldest enemy, after all. And she had slaughtered his troops single-handedly before the God tried to intervene on their behalf.
Meruk wished, not for the first time, that Aruk had let them all die.
Then a figure appeared behind Gallana, stern and grey and immovable, and Meruk felt the breath freeze in his lungs, his knees weakening until Beren's grip was the only thing holding him up. Without seeing, he sensed Daes and Jung drop to their knees, Shanra and Mellanie, and even Raidan close behind them. Aruk already knelt, but his face blanched as he looked over his shoulder to see what they knelt for. Only Gallana and Beren did nothing.
{Let him go, Daemon of Battle,} murmured Shaiar, God of Death. {Release my brother.}
Gallana turned, going impossibly still, frozen between hate and fear for a long minute. Then she let go of Aruk's arms, backing away slightly, dropping to one knee. Aruk stayed where he was, only turning to face his dark brother.
Not even daemons, not even gods, challenged this power.
Shaiar looked over them, weary and angry and confused, looked to the altar where a knife had rested, and to Aruk, who feared him in this moment more than he had ever feared anything in his life, who could only think that his time had run out, that the enforced mortality had taken its final toll. He looked at them, and then he looked at Meruk, and a smile creased that grey and dour face, wide and genuine. Meruk stared.
{What have you managed now, my friend?} The God of Death asked, warm and amused, while Meruk blinked in terror and confusion. {What mess have you made?}
"Not my making," a voice above him answered with a laugh, and Meruk turned his disbelieving gaze on Beren's smiling face, blinking at the welcome and relief he saw there, too confused to even try to consider what it meant.
"I didn't make the mess," Beren continued, smiling down at him for a second before meeting the Death God's indulgent smile. "I'm just here to clean it up!"
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