The half-elven girl faced her father with a look of disgust on her face.
"Why have you brought me here?" she asked.
"Saria'sadarian." The dark elf chuckled lazily. "Did she eve tell you
that it was me who named you? 'Light into darkness..."
Saria fought back tears at the mention of her mother, murdered just a scant eight months ago by the man who stood before her. "How could you kill her? She loved you, and you sent her away. That would have been enough, but no. You had to kill her!" The tears fell now, hot and angry.
"It's all about power, you know. When the gods left, taking their magic
with them, Shalin Kinjarii began gathering up all the artifacts from the Fourth age for herself. That kept the power from being used by others more deserving, others like myself." He smiled. Saria said quietly, "You don't deserve to keep breathing, much less
anything else, Dalamar Argent." His eyes blazed. "And who are you to make that decision? A halfbreed mongrel??"
"This 'halfbreed mongrel' is your daughter."
"Since that is, the case, I will not kill you as I did your unlamented
mother. I will, however, put you in a secure place where you will not cause me any grief."
"You- put me somewhere, like- like-"
"Stop stuttering like a l;ackwit and at least act as if you have some honor!" Dalamar ordered.
"Honor? You've not the concept! I-"
"Shut up." Dalamar waved his hand at the hal-elf, and she fell to the ground.
*Paralysis spell..* Saria thought.
"In case you are wondering, you are to reside within a plane known as na'Thel'Hhyra, or the Night Realms. You cannot, under any circumstances, open a gate back to Krynn from there, though you may find a way out. You have magic-use it." With that, the evil elf triggered the dimensional doorway and sent his only child from him, forever. Colors washed around Saria, flowing from one end of the spectrum to
another. She couldn't see, couldn't feel, until all went black around her.
Dalamar's paralysis spell released her, and she fell, hitting her4 head on
something hard and unyielding.
******
The room was bare, because it really wasn't a room in the first place.
the lighting was sparse, encouraging the shadows to reach for the slumped
form of a halfblood sorceress on the floor. The spirit that had been here for a minute or a millennium (he wasn't sure) drifted over toward the girl. She was injured, he noted, and he brushed his hand over her face. Her eyes opened. Saria screamed and flung a magebolt at the startled spirit.
"You'll not take over MY body, shade!" Saria tried to stand, but waves
of dizziness forced her back to a sitting position.
"S-shade..?" The spirit's voice was quiet, low, and had a quality that
suggested that he had not spoken in some time. Saria looked at the spirit. "How are you called?" He stared at he uncomprehendingly.
"What's your name?" she asked again, exasperated.
"Name?" The spirit looked like he was struggling with something within himself, and he wasn't having an easy time of it.
"What's wrong??" Saria' Empath training told her that he was distressed, worried for someone other than himself, and more than a little angry. "Were you murdered?"
"No!" The spirit shook itself violently, and then reformed into an image of a tall, handsome young man, around nineteen years old. "I was separated from my body while I was still alive."
"Ouch." Saira was sympathetic.
"The one who did it...his name...Damn! I can't remember!"
"Do you remember yours??"
"I am Seto Kaiba."
"What kind of name is that?" Saria asked tactlessly. "I'm Saria'sadarian
Kinjarii, Wizard of the Red Robes."
"And you say my name's strange?" Kaiba returned.
"I'm elven! Half, anyway."
"There are no such things as elves. Even my little...brother....." Kaiba trailed off. His eyes lost their animation, and he seemed to shrink in upon himself.
"Mokuba! You must help me! He's- I couldn't- a Millennium Eye-I-" Saria took his hand, and said in a low, soothing voice,
"Calm, Seto Kaiba. I know not who or what has your kin in thrall, yet I
will help you if I can. You have been alone for far too long, before you
were sent here, even, and I will not leave you." She looked into his eyes,
a startling blue, and said firmly, "I am a wizard."
Kaiba's eyes narrowed skeptically. "You? You're just a kid!"
"I'm older than YOU are, sweet Kaiba."
He shook his head. "Magic's what got me here- I want nothing more to do with it."
"Magic's your only way out, you great idiot! You-"
Kaiba was angry. "Don't you know who I am?"
"Am I supposed to care?"
"You'll care in about five seconds-"
":As if you're a threat to me-"
"Little fool-"
Saria screamed, "SILENCE!!"
Seto Kaiba looked at the half-elf, astonishment plain on his face. "There's only one way out of here for us both, and it requires magic. A lot of magic."
"It won't work anyway." Seto looked hopeless. "You don't have my
soul-card."
"Your what?"
"Soul-card. The one who sent me here put my soul in a Duel Monsters card- my physical form is somewhere in his compound. In order to restore me, you must have both."
"What's a Duel Monster?" Saria wanted to know.
"It's a game, but it's far more than just a diversion. I am -was- World
Champion, never defeated, until the day I dueled Yugi Moto."
"At the time, I hated him for it. I know now that it was the best thing that could have happened to me. There was a darkness within me that craved more and more power and control, and it would have consumed me if I had let it. Yugi drove that part of me away with an ancient magic, that of his Millennium Puzzle." Saria sat attentively, motioning for Kaiba to continue.
"There are seven Millenniun Artifacts. Maximmillian Pegasus, who claims
to have created Duel Monsters, possesses one of them. Yugi has the Puzzle, and
Bakura the Ring. Pegasus uses his for evil. He kidnapped my little brother, Mokuba, because he wanted my computer company. He was to kill me and use Mokuba as a puppet. I made Pegasus believe that I had committed suicide, then I showed up in his castle.
"Once we finally dueled, he toyed with me, taking two of my Blue-eyes,
and then he sent me here, after he made sure that I knew what a failure I had
been."
"I desire revenge." Seto's eyes blazed cobalt fire.
He faced the beautiful mage. "Help me." Saria sighed. "You're going to have to merge with me- it'll be a problem- and I have to remember how to draw a planar gate."
Kaiba was curious. "Why is merging going to be 'such a problem'?"
Saria stared at him. "Because you....you'll be IN my mind. You'll be able to see everything that I am." *And that's not what I need right now...* Saria thought to herself.
The spirit handed her a strange deck of cards. "Here."
"What am I supposed to do with these? Throw 'em at him?" Saria asked.
"They're Duel Monster cards. MY deck, to be exact." Kaiba smirked. "Pegasus
just THOUGHT he took it from me." Saria looked through the cards. The combination of the fantastic and just plain weird (what IS that thing, anyway??) engaged her, and she came upon a beautiful rendering of a ..
"Is this the Blue-eyes you spoke of earlier?" She brandished the Blue-eyes White Dragon card under his nose.
"Yes. My favorite card, a card I identify with strongly." He smiled,
making him look five years younger and twice as handsome..... Saria quickly ended that line of thought.
"So how do you play?" Saria asked, wanting (illogically) to keep his attention.Seto Kaiba explained the game to her in great detail, and the more he spoke, the more Saria began drifting off into ideas. That was a dangerous thing. She was trying to figure out how to hide her mind from the young duelist, so that she might not be exposed by her true feelings. Her face turned red.
"Saria, why are you blushing?" Seto asked.
"Never mind."
He nodded once and asked her, "Do you understand?"
She replied, "Yes, I hope so," even though she hadn't precisely been paying attention to what he had been talking about.
"Do you remember the spell?" As a matter of fact, the planar gate was the furthest thing from her mind. This caused her to blurt out, "No, I'm too busy being fascinated by
you....." She trailed off, realizing exactly what she had said. "Oh, shit.
Kaiba,
I...." Saria'sadarian turned and took off."Don't go, Saria..." He watched her go, a strange expression on his face.
**********
The half-elf ran, unsure of where she was going. It wasn't like it
mattered, anyway- it all looked the same. Her footfalls echoed dully, as if
her feet were wrapped in cotton. Saria flopped down on the floor, her face in her hands, and whispered, "Who the hell is he, anyway?" She'd never met anyone quite like him before. One minute, he was driving her to disraction, and the next- well, it was distraction, all right.
"Too much." She raised her head and sighed. Saria didn't know WHAT it
was- all she knew is that she didn't like it one bit.
"Damn him."
"Too late- I think it's already happened." Saria turned, furious. "Seto Kaiba, how dare you sneak up on me in a place like this?!"
He grinned, unrepentant. "Well, it's not like there's anyone else here."
He DID have a point. "No shit, Sherlock." Kaiba'a eyes widened, and he
let out a chuckle.
"What? she asked. He shook his head helplessly, shaking with repressed laughter.
"Come on, it's something my grandam Shalandra says...then again, she IS over fifteen hundred years old...." Saria drifted off.
"It's- it's your...accent.." he managed.
"And what's wrong with how I talk??" Saria bristled, standing as tall
as she could ( a mere five feet). She stalked towards Kaiba, stepping back
so she could look him in the eye. She muttered a curse in Elvish, and her golden-green eyes caught his blue ones.
All thoughts of murder, mayhem, or malice disappeared when her Empath talent felt Seto's pain. Saria was frozen in place, wrapped in visions and feelings that were not her own: two young boys, obviously related, playing in a yard; a man, stern and forbidden, next to a woman with piercing blue eyes; a strange machine, wires and glass and coils sprouting from all directions; hot anger directed a someone with a golden eye; a young boy , crying, yelling, "Seto! Help me...."; and most of all, a loneliness and longing kept hidden for far too long.....
"I didn't know..." Tears coursed down the half-elf's face, and a ghostly hand bushed them away.
"It doesn't matter."
"Yes, it does! You care. You LOVE, you FEEL, dammit, and if you think
that you don't matter, in all this going on, then you need more help than
I can give!"She looked at her feet. "I- I am unable."
She faced him again. "I will take you to your realm, in my form, though
it may kill us both."
"How could this harm you?" Kaiba wanted to know.
"Well, the merge may not work. If it does, you could get trapped, unable to leave my mind, or you could somehow wrest control from me and subsume me completely. I'm putting a lot of trust in you on very short notice."
She lloked at him. "Don't let me down."
"I have no intention of taking your body, Saria." She blushed again, and Kaiba knew why, this time. He kept his mouth shut, in the interest of diplomacy.
"We need to leave, soon." She looked at the duelist.
"Yes." He was quiet now, thinking about something.
"I remember the spell. I need your direction, to make sure we don't end
up in the bowels of Takhisis' toilet." Kaiba wisely refrained from asking
just where or what that was. She looked at him. He looked as if he were in physical form now, except for a faint glow surrounding him. He was certainly tall enough, standing
well over a foot taller than she, and he was handsome in a careless way. He carried himself as if the eyes of the world were constantly upon him. If what he had told her was true, they were...
"Seto." When he turned towards her, she said, "Let's do this."
He nodded once and stood before her. "What do I do?"
"Hold still and shut up."
Saria closed her eyes and began to sing. Her words were in a language
very few, if any, in Kaiba's world could understand, but he caught a glimpse
of a realm so beautiful it hurt just to gaze upon it. His form melted, merging with Saria's in a wash of opalescent fire. It took no tine, or it took forever- Seto didn't know. When the light cleared, Saria conjured a mirror and gazed at her
reflection. As she expected, her eyes had turned blue. Other than that, she
looked as she always had- short burgundy hair, small frame, and light blue
sorceress's gown.
"Now, where are we going?" Two voices spoke from Saria's mouth. "AAAAAAAAAuuuuuggghh!!" Again: discordance.
*Come on, you've got to stop it! We can't talk to people like THAT!* Saria thought.
*Oh, all right. We're going to an island known as Duelist Kingdom* He visualized it, providing the sorceress with all that she needed to transport them. Except, of course, luck.
*Get ready......* Saria warned before the world caved in.
***********
Magical forces threatened to tear Saria apart. She screamed in two voices,
terrified that she'd be lost to the Material Plane. Suddenly, a voice, half-forgotten, intruded on her shielded mind. *Ah, Saria'sadarian....mi alshanna....my child....."
*Mother??* Another presence was ther, too...a vision of long chestnut hair, blue eyes, and a ready smile that so rarely graced the face of the son who so resembled her.
*We will aid you.* Mai-Lin Kaiba promised her son.
The mothers gathered up all the force in the immediate vicinity, and Saria could hear the whine of overstressed magical energy. *It has to go somewhere..* She felt a violent surge.
*Goodbye...* Shalin Kinjarii-Argent kissed her daughter.
"*My son...* Mai-Lin Kaiba held her son.
*NO!!!* The mental cry was wrenced from them both. The colors whirled faster, compacting themselves into a single coruscating pinpoint of light, flashing all the colors of the rainbow...Saria reached. Abruptly and with no fanfare she landed six inches from the edge of a cliff.
"That was close, in more ways than one." she said to the air. The vision of her mother had given her strength and resolve to do this, and do it right. She looked to her left, and found an open-air pavilion. Young men and women were milling about, all with only one thing in common: A violet glove. There was a place to put golden stars on the glove's cuff, and some had more or less of these. She looked at her own, and saw that she had eight of the stars.
*I guess that's good.....now what?* Saria wondered.
*Ignore the chips-we're going straight in.* Kaiba told her.
*************
*He did WHAT?!* Saria was feeling more than a bit ambivalent at the thought of having to meet with, and talk to, the one-eyed man. They were almost to the castle, and she was beginning to think that this really wasn't a good idea.
*Ummm...Seto? What if he kills me?*
The duelist sounded ceratin. *Murder's not his way. He'd just send you back to the Shadow Realm.* They approached the door, and Saria cast a sleep spell on the guard who demanded her Star Chips. The girl walked in. Seto, giving her directions, soon uided her to a large white room. It was dominated by a long white table, and the person who sat at the end of this table was Maximillian J. Pegasus. The white-haired man laughed. It was horrid, unnatural sound.
"So this is what finally makes it to me. A little girl." His tone was
mocking. Saria spoke without thinking. "I am not a little girl, you one-eyed freak.
I am Saria'sadarian Kinjarii-Kaiba."
"Oh, a little girl playing at magic. Wait-" His good eye narrowed. "Did you say....Kaiba?"
*No!* Seto thought as Saria said, "Yes!"
*Damn it...*
"So what are you? A sister? Cousin?"
*If you love life, don't answer!* Seto's mental tone was urgent. *He wants
KaibaCorp, and he'll do almost anything to get it. Why do you think I ended up here?* Saria's answer was slight smile.
"I imagine that you want them back?" He conjured two Duel Monster cards.
One had the proud profile of Seto Kaiba on it, but the other....a terrified-looking
child stared at her, piecing her to the bone.
"Mokuba!" Saria cried.
*I'll kill him....* Seto tried to break through.
"No!" Saria called, and her eyes shifed from golden-green to blue and
back again.
"Eyes that change color in five seconds...?" His Millenium Eye glowed.
"There are two souls in your body! One is your own, but the other-?!"{ Pegasus looked a Saria strangely.
"Get out of my mind, magescum!" Saria flung up a mental shield and simultaneously heaved a levinbolt at Pegasus. She heard the sound of muttered curses, and she was satisfied.
He laughed. "It doesn't matter who the other soul belongs to! The only
way to win their souls is to duel me, and if you lose, you'll be joining the rest of the Kaiba clan in the Shadow Realm!"
"I accept your offer to duel. If I win, however, you WILL release the souls of my kinsmen and will trouble the Kaiba line no more!" Saria's words fell like chunks of ice from her lips.
"If YOU defeat ME, I'll fall over dead of astonishment." Pegasus snapped.
"Now would be a good time for me, how about you?"
Pegasus snbapped his fingers, and floor opened beneath them. Saria barely avoided being crushed by a red platform.
*Oh Goddess, help me now....* Saria thought.
*Remember, don't look at your cards.*
*Ok, then exactly HOW am I supposed to duel when I can't see what I'm playing?* Saria's tone was sour.
*Use your heart instead of your eyes.* Seto said quietly. She allowed Kaiba to use her hand to set up her end of the dueling field, and she tried to hide the fact that she was more nervous than she had ever been in her entire life.
"Are you finished with your nap?" Pegasus sneered.
Saria lost it. "You know, you one-eyed fourth rate human scumbag, you
need to go fu-"
*SARIA!*
*What? I was just starting to enjoy myself!*
To Pegasus she said, "Cut the crap and let's duel already!"
She drew five cards, hiding them from her eyes as instructed. Kaiba's voice sounded in her mind: *Play the fourth card face-up and the first one face down.*
She did, calling out, "Lord of Dragons! Attack Mode!" The humanoid
appearded on the field, and Pegasus said, "Oh. Lord of Dragons. Well, I
prefer...unique cards. Faerie Sorcerer, defense!"
*Defense....?* Kaiba was puzzled.
*Now what?*
*Destroy it, Life Points or not. One less card to bother us later.*
She direced her card to attak, and the Faerie Sorcerer exploded in a shower of sparks.
The comments flying across the table grew less and less cordial as the
duel wore on, ans the stress was starting to get to the half-elf.
*Seto, I'm out of my league here, and we all know it. What am I going
to do?*
*I don't know.*
"Is that the best you can do, 'I don't know?'"
"Who are you talking to, girl?" Pegasus snaped.
"None of your business, freak!" Seto Kaiba said from Saria's lips.
The magician's good eye narrowed. "Kaiba...."
Light flashed from the Millenium Eye, and Saria was laid defenseless.
She could feel the evil man in her mind, searching for one displaced duelist. She tried to force him out, to no avail. All her secret thoughts went
spilling down the pathways of her mind, until she felt a tearing within her.
"NO!!!" She screamed, felling as if she had been torn in half.
"Saria!" Seto cried, now knowing at last what it was that she was hiding from him.
Saria's mind was being defiled. She tried to attack the weird sorcerer, but he had somehow cut off her access to the magic within her.
"A-HA!" Pegasus' smile was triumphant. He gestured. Saria screamed in
two voices as the soul of Seto Kaiba was sucked from her body. He stood
next to her now, holding her limp form up so that she could stand.
"Your fight is with ME-leave her out of this." the spirit demanded.
"How did YOU get here?" Pegasus asked in dismay.
"With Saria." Kaiba glared at the other man. Saria passed out unable to stand the wailings of her own tormented mind.
"Through a child? From the Shadow Realm? Impossible!"
"Not as impossible as you think. She's far more than YOU'LL ever realize."
The yound duelist gazed down at Saria's unconscious form. He smiled gently.
"What, do you love her?" Pegasus was incredulous.
"No." Kaiba lowered his head. "I could, in a different time, a new place,
strange circumstances. But not here." He refused to look the evil mage in the eye. Cerulean eyes locked onto the white-haired man's face. "Do what you will
with me, but leave her out of it. I ask one thing of you."
"And that is?"
Seto whispered, "Don't let her remember me."
"Why?"
Kaiba got angry. "Does it matter?"
"It may." Pegasus shrugged.
"I- She's falling in love with me!" Pegasus looked strangely at the spirit.
"I don't want to see her get hurt. She was brought to this world by her own father, who tried to kill her, and she wanted to help me." He shrugged. She's done nothing to you." Pegasus wasn't listening. He was thinking about love, and of loss.... He heard her laughter, saw the long fall of blonde hair, and the sparkle in her eyes when she saw his face....and then she was gone, another sacrifice on his road to greater power. Pegasus paled visibly. Kaiba knelt beside Saria, touched her face. "I wish...it could have been...different..." He kissed her forehead. "I-....." He shook his head, trying to rid himself of emotinos that he didn't understand. Kaiba faced the other man. "Do what is right for once."
Pegasus flicked a finger at Kaiba. "I'm sending you back."
Seto said nothing.
The Millenium Eye glowed and Seto Kaiba faded from view. Pegasus lowered the dueling platforms and went to Saria's side. He touched her on the forehead, and she frowned in her slumber.
"Neither will remember- I can do that much for them." Pegasus stood alone in the room.
************
Saria'sadarian Kinjarii didn't know where she was. It was a beautiful place, and the people were friendly, but something was missing. Out of the corner of her eyes, there was a tall shadow, and it had blue eyes.......
*************
The spirit was alone. He drifted through his astral prison, seeking for
a way out that wasn't there.
He saw something gleaming on the floor. He bent to retrieve the object- a tiny ring, engraved with three crescent moons and a name: Saria'sadarian Kinjarii. The spirit held the ring tightly in his hand, without knowing exactly why........
God, I hope you like it...I am SO SORRY that it took so freakin' long. Let me know what you think, k? SARIA KAIBA