Vark

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Salix caught Vark with Helios and his band of adventurers as they returned home from Waterway. She hadn’t seen the golden Wildclaw in months.

The Plaza was filled with hundreds of boxes, creatures and people from Beast Clans who looked around curiously.

‘Helios, did you actually manage to convince everything that lives in the Waterway to come with you?’ She asked, waving at a Maren Shark Hunter swimming in a transport tank.

Vark was going over an inventory log, humming. ‘Certainly looks like it…’

Helios just growled, bad tempered as ever. It only grew worse when Vark started tapping the log.

‘Helios…’

‘No.’ Helios turned his head away from Vark and crossed his arms.

‘Where is it?’ Vark tapped the log.

‘Where’s what?’ Salix asked, looking from one man to another.

Vark took a deep breath and looked up at the growling Helios.

‘Where is the River Muck?’ Vark smiled. ‘Where is it? I can’t find it on the list?’

‘It has eluded me.’ Helios snarled.

Vark lowered the log. ‘It’s been 3 months.’

‘You say that like I’m not aware?’ Helios planted his hands on his hips and turned his head to the side. ‘You think I don’t know how long I’ve spent in the sewer?!

‘How can you not have found a single river muck in 3 months?!’ Vark exclaimed in disbelief. ‘You literally have everything else you can find in the Waterway, except a river muck!’

Helios snarled, looming over the shorter Vark and raised his hands toward Vark’s neck. ‘I will strangle you if you say another word!’

Vark’s face split into a dreamy smile as he leaned forwards, eyes oddly hazy.

‘Do try, Chrys…’

Helios let his hands fall, took several steps backward and fixed Vark with a serious look. ‘Vark.’

Vark just stared up at him with an unsettling amount of fondness.

‘Varkaram.’ Helios called firmly.

‘Hm.’ Vark pulled back suddenly and looked at the log. ‘Hmm. I’ll…um…I’ll inform Vuun about your…’ He waved a hand about, desperately trying to get back on track.

‘Lack of River Muck?’ Salix suggested.

‘Yes!’ Vark nodded. ‘Yes.’ He turned suddenly and headed towards Vuundaris’ Great Hall.

Helios sighed and ordered his people to start moving the boxes into one of the side buildings where they would be gone over and put to use.

‘Chrys?’ Salix asked, taking one of the boxes Helios had picked up. ‘Old name of yours?’

‘No.’ Helios replied, walking towards a set of doors that opened by themselves. ‘Vark gets confused sometimes.’

‘He thinks you’re somebody named Chrys?’

‘No. He believes it.’ Helios broke open a box. ‘He dissociates completely. He’s somewhere else complete when he’s like that. Another world, with another person…’

Salix hummed.

---

Salix found what she thought was Vark’s residence in Anphal after some searching. She frowned. It looked like it had been converted into a museum of sorts.

The hall’s walls told her a story of a nemesis. She mistook him for Helios for a moment. They’re both gold and fierce, handsome, but Helios was grumpier.

The nemesis had an air of heroism about him. Firm and intense eyes, ready to take on whatever the world had in store for him. Helios’ eyes smoldered and burned as they looked at a world that hurt him far too much.

The walls told her of a schoolboy rivalry that had spun out of control. Feuds, fights and battles against each other and the dark followed and so did obsession. Dark, stormy and all consuming obsession that went both ways.

A dark, overwhelming figure appeared on the wall suddenly, a great and dangerous foe. One greater than Vark.

Salix came to a stop as she entered the last hall, spotting Vark sitting on the floor in front of the statue of his nemesis, a massive warhammer resting next to him. His hair fanned out on the floor.

On the wall she saw Vark being cast out by his nemesis. She could almost hear him screaming as he was sent away, grief mingled with fury.

‘He banished you.’ She said, voice echoing in the mostly empty hall.

‘He threw me away like a puppy he was bored off…’ Vark said quietly. ‘Didn’t even let me talk, just…’ Vark flung his hands out. ‘“Away. Done with you!”’

‘Because he thought you’d get in the way…’ Salix moved closer. ‘Join this new foe.’

She got a better look at the statue. It was lined with cracks and what looked like old and dried blood.

Did the statue bleed…?

‘I would have done anything for Chrysafenios.’ Vark hissed, sounding like simply saying the name brought him pain. ‘Anything…’ He looked up at the statue like a man who had lost everything. ‘He should just have asked…he didn’t have to banish me. I would have helped him…’

The lost look on Vark’s face twisted into one of fury in an instant and he shot up, grabbing the warhammer before she could even react. ‘I would have helped him! How could he think otherwise!’

The warhammer took Chrysafenios’ head off in one strike. Another took out half his torso and his arm.

Vark only stopped when the statue’s hips went flying into the nearby wall.

‘Vark…’ Salix called, jolting when he dropped the warhammer, ruining the floor.

‘I can fix it, I can fix it, I can fix anything. I fixed Vuun when I found her in the snow, I can fix-’ Vark muttered and started picking up the pieces of stone, cutting himself on the sharp edges, smearing blood on the ruined stone.

Oh.

Her hands shot out and caught Vark’s wrists, causing the man’s attention to swing to her.

‘There are rules to things.’ Vark said shakily. ‘He is mine and I am his, I would never have done anything to end our game! I would not assist an interloper!’

Salix led the rambling man out his halls and unmade the doors.

Her kin looked on curiously as she arranged for Vark to live with her, little whispers fluttering between them.

Things were calm after the war. Quiet, calm, boring…

She had spent days signing peace agreements and deals of all sorts.

‘How is Whisper?’ Vark asked from across her desk.

‘He’s sulking in a dark cave at the outskirts of Mara’s territory, last I heard.’

‘Oof.’ Vark looked at the invite to a family get together sent by Erroneous. ‘You’re going to that?’

‘Yes. Erroneous thought it would be a good idea for everybody to get a good look at each other. Get to know each other a bit better.’

‘Because nobody knew anything about Whisper until he tried to murder Mara.’

‘Mmhm.’

Vark picked up one of the scrolls she had been signing, humming. ‘I didn’t think Naomies changed their names?’

‘We never did before.’ Salix replied, signing another agreement with Dismas. Formality, really. ‘It’s become quite popular recently…’

‘When are you telling Vuun about your name change?’

Her pen froze mid pen stroke. ‘What?’ She looked up from the paper.

‘You’re changing your name.’ Vark blinked at her, confusion crossing his face. ‘Aren’t you?’

‘No.’ Salix frowned at him. ‘What made you think that?’

Vark turned the scroll around and drew her attention to her signature.

“Saailivaxx.”

Salix blinked a couple of times and looked up at Vark.

‘You’ve written different names on the other documents.’ He picked up a few other scrolls and gave them to her.

“Salvax”, said one scroll. “Sailix,” said another.

‘“Saiv…?’” She frowned at the scroll she had been writing.

‘So, you’re not changing your name…?’

‘No!’ Her eyes darted around, spotting more and more bizarre versions of her name all over the documents. ‘No! No, I’m not!’ She shot up, shoving her chair backwards and wobbled. ‘What in the Void…?’ She felt dizzy.

She felt hands on the back of her head, trailing through her hair, trying to reach her temples.

With a snarl she reached up and a pair of wrists, claws digging into raw magic.

‘Maybe you need to take a -’ She didn’t hear what else Vark had to say as she hit the floor, consciousness leaving her as she left her body.

The Not-wall was behind her and she could see him.

Him and the mirrors he watched things through.

Her brother turned around, face obscured by a mask and dressed in sanddune rags.

‘You!’ Salix hissed and reached for him, almost touching him.

In his magic she saw Ricar towering over her brother and plant fear into his mind and soul, making him so scared that he shut himself away from a world he saw as monstrous and nightmare filled, made all the worse by his powers.

She heard herself yelling a name, one echoed by her siblings.

‘NO!’ He raised his hands against her.

She was blasted backwards with a snarl and-

Salix jolted away to see the ceiling of her room and Vark sitting next to her.

The man she was in the process of “usurping” from Vuundaris sighed in relief and sat back in the chair he had pulled over. ‘Did that have something to do with your “man in the wall”?’ He asked. ‘I detected somethi-’

‘He’s so scared, Varkaram.’ Salix said quietly. ‘He’s so scared.’

Vark ordered her to take it easy. No chasing down missing Naomies that didn’t exist in the records! He even wagged a finger at her!

How dare he?

She let it rest for now, busy enhancing her mental shields.