The Star, The Demon, and The God - 48. Rude Moon

Luno

“Are you sure about this?” I frown.

Laneer gives a firm nod. “As sure as I’ll ever be.”

I bounce from toe to toe with stress.

“This seems a bit drastic, don't you think?” I say. “I mean...this is your hair! It’s all pretty and long!”

Tobias rolls his eyes and groans. “You are acting like this is some kind of kind of end of the world situation. Just cut his damn hair already!”

Jutting my bottom lip out in a pout, I grab the portion of hair tied up into a bun.

I snip the hair where it all is bunched together with a small thing of string.

The puffball of dark orange hair falls to the ground.

Tobias does a slow clap and I sigh.

“What a shame,” I say with a small smile.

The damage is done! Time to fix the rest.

“I have only ever done this to myself,” I say. “It feels weird doing it to another head.”

Tobias laughs. “With your mess of curls, I find that incredibly surprising.”

I beam up at him but get back to snipping away the unwanted hairs.

Lucky for me, I have a nice picture in my mind that lets me know how Laneer’s hair used to look.

“Do you think he will like it?” Laneer asks. “What if this isn’t enough to make him recognize me?”

It is a bit hard to tell right now because of the beard, but he does look rougher with all those pink scars on his skin.

He has his coat off at the moment for this haircut so his torso is completely out for us to see.

He is a large man. Definitely larger than he looked when he was alive. He is all buff now!

That seems like something Raiyo would enjoy honestly, though I do not know what Yinx would enjoy.

“I think he will,” I smile. “You are handsome after all.”

Tobias scoffs and looks the other way, crossing his arms.

Well it’s true!

There is an awkward silence that follows.

It is the little discussion that we should have had earlier before Laneer’s sudden burst to fix his look for Raiyo.

That alone is worrying to me.

When Laneer woke up and Tobias asked if we could go to Enfierna, it was like something snapped in him and he said he would if we make him presentable.

His reaction did not seem right at all!

“How are you feeling?” I ask him as I snip off a large part of the back of his head.

He shrugs. “I’m fine.”

I glance at Tobias and I see he doesn’t believe that either.

“Are you sure?” I frown as the scissors slice off another chunk of hair. “What you went through was very tough to see.”

More silence follows from Laneer.

Tobias sighs before stepping closer.

“You going to talk about that Yinx memory ghost or what?” He says abruptly.

I glare at him and his rudeness but I don’t say anything.

Laneer tenses underneath my hands.

“What do I need to say? I think we all saw what happened. Yinx died. I couldn’t save him and now I feel like shit inside. Is that what you wanted to hear?”

Tobias shakes his head. “Not just that. Why aren’t you talking about what his death was supposed to do? This could be your chance to finally fix things!”

“Why do you think i’m doing this?” Laneer shouts, making me jump.

“Well we should still talk about it all, you dumb piece of shit!” Tobias shouts back.

I sigh and try my best to not stab the scissors into Laneer’s head. He keeps moving too much now!

It wouldn’t kill him apparently, but I still don’t want to do it.

“He died!” Laneer says. “He died in my arms and we couldn’t do anything about it! I am mad and I want kill Morgoren.”

I blink in surprise when I hear that.

“He did this to us,” Laneer’s voice calms down slightly. “He ruined everything and he must pay the price for it.”

“If this thing with Raiyo doesn’t work, then I am going to kill the Moon God myself. I can’t die so I might as well try.”

Tobias scoffs at his words. “Do you really think we’d let you do that?”

Laneer shrugs. “You could try stopping me.”

This sounds awful!

This is borderline suicidal. He should not be talking this way. It isn’t right! He has so much more to live for!

“We would help you,” Tobi says. “I imagine we would have the other gods at our side, but just know we’d be there too. You don’t have to be stupid and run in alone.”

Laneer smirks and chuckles slightly. “Thanks I guess.”

~~~

Fifteen or so minutes later, Laneer looks a bit like he did when he was human.

The main difference is his body and scars of course.

Laneer inspects his reflection through the silver disk at the top of the pyramid.

He gives a nod of approval.

“Not bad,” He says. “I’ll be seeing you the next time I need a haircut.”

I beam at the praise and glance at Tobi.

He rolls his eyes and wraps an arm around my shoulders.

“We should get going,” Laneer says. “The sooner we get to Enfierna, the better.”

He picks up his bag and starts climbing his way down the pyramid.

I sigh as I watch him.

“He’s a weird one,” Tobias says next to me.

Leaning my head on his shoulder, I close my eyes. “I want to sleep. Can you tell him for me?”

He laughs and rolls my head off him.

“You have a mouth,” He says. “Tell him yourself.”

I groan and turn to shove my face into his chest armor.

He laughs again before he helps guide me to the edge.

“Laneer,” He calls down to the Sailor. “We haven’t slept in forever. Let us have a small break before we go into the open.”

I barely hear Laneer curse from up here, but he agrees with us anyway.

We walk our way back through the twists and turns of the palace. Now that we aren’t being chased down by murderous angel corpses, I can really take in how pretty this place still is after all these years.

It is definitely broken down is some places.

Sand has broken through the stone and filled up rooms and hallways.

It has also worn off some of the murals that were painted by the Serendians long ago. None of there were as fancy as the ones of the last royal family. Especially not the Yinx painting.

They are small images of tiny people bowing down to the moon. Sometimes it shows a demon or two alongside the humans.

Seeing the moon makes my heart beat a little faster.

Tobi’s hand reaches for mine and intertwines our fingers together.

I smile up at him and bring my other hand up to hold onto his arm as well.

To my surprise, Kulu slithers his way up my arm.

Apparently he had been hitching a ride on Tobi this whole time.

Once Kulu wraps around my neck, he falls right back to sleep, as per usual.

It makes me very jealous.

When we reach the room that held all of Raiyo’s treasures, we choose to set up camp here.

At first, Laneer tries to push us to try and keep going until we reach Enfierna.

There is no way we are going to be able to do that right now without passing out in either the desert or the corrupted forest.

Per my request, we end up laying down next to one of those glowing blue stones in the corners of the walls.

The soft glow is rather nice and pulls me closer to sleep.

I am against the wall with Tobias closer beside me.

He says it is to keep me safe, but I am pretty sure he is a little upset I found Laneer attractive.

The jealous little kitty!

Laneer doesn’t lie down.

He sits against a wall and keeps his eyes on the Yinx painting.

Seeing his mournful expression makes me feel awful for him.

Pulling Kulu off my neck, I point the winged serpent towards Laneer.

Thankfully the little thing gets the message and flutters his way over to sad Sailor.

I smile when I see he grabs Laneer’s attention.

Unfortunately I don’t see what comes next when Tobias’ body turns to the side, completely blocking the view with his body.

My stomach feels all fluttery when I see that Tobi has already fallen asleep. He looks so calm and peaceful!

Gently, I lean up to kiss his forehead before I lay my head down for some much needed rest.

~~~
~~~

Tobias

I frown when I see that the sun still isn’t out.

How are we supposed to do this? This is so incredibly dangerous!

There is a vague idea of how we could get there quicker, but I don’t know if we would make it anyways.

“What should we do?” Luno asks while reaching for my arm.

Glancing at Laneer, I mentally groan in annoyance before deciding to share my idea.

“You are going to fly,” I say to Luno. “Laneer is going to ride my back and we are going to go as fast as we can to that lake.”

Luno bites his lip and looks up the small tunnel he made.

Moonlight touches the end of it.

“That is a long run,” Laneer says. “We’d have to go through the forest again.”

Gods, I was hoping I could run around it honestly.

Why couldn’t Luno be a giant buff flying man? Then he would have been able to carry at least one of us.

He had carried Yinx up the pyramid during the angel attack, but I doubt he’d be able to lift me or Laneer.

“It could be safer in there right?” Luno asks.

“I know I wasn’t alert during it,” I say, “but did you both forget we were attacked in that forest as well?”

Whatever those angels were, there could be a new trap in that forest. I sure as hell won’t be seeing it.

“What do you suggest then?” Laneer scoffs. “There aren’t many options. There is a moon glaring down at us if we don’t run through that forest.”

I glare at him. “You think the forest matters that much when we were attacked anyway? Surely that tells you that cover was useless! We were attacking in here as well!”

Laneer nods towards the entrance. “Most likely because Morgoren saw us dig our way into here.”

I swear I want to pull my hair out.

“That still doesn’t mean the forest is going to be any better!” I growl.

Luno reaches for my hand and I go silent.

“Can you both stop fighting?” He says. “We can figure something out as we go! I just really don’t want to stay here any longer.”

He says the last part with a whine in his voice.

I grunt in agreement, only to make the star happy.

All three of us make our way to the entrance of the cave, a mere few inches from the moonlight.

With a deep breath, I step out into the open.

Laneer follows.

Luno hangs back, staring at the light on the stone.

Making my way back to him, I reach out with my hand.

“It’s alright,” I say. “I’ll keep you safe, okay? Nobody is going to touch you.”

His big eyes look into mine and I can see the fear in them.

The world is scarier now than it was yesterday. Who knows what the moon god could do next. Going out under the moon feels a lot scarier than it did the first time around.

“Come with me, Luno,” I say. “We’ll be alright.”

He bites his lip before placing his hand on mine.

I gently tug him into the moonlight. He hitches his breath as it touches him.

When a few moments of silence go by, he lets out a breath he was holding and then he nods to me.

Giving him a small smile, I squeeze his hand before turning to Laneer.

“Take this,” I say, tossing my bags to him.

I don’t even see if he catches them before I crouch down to transform into my tiger form.

Kneeling on the ground, I let Laneer climb onto my back.

This time I don’t feel so against it.

The sooner we get to Enfierna, the better.

Luno steps next to me and gently runs his hands through the fur of my neck.

I rumble in slight annoyance.

I don't want Laneer getting ideas and thinking he can do the same.

Luno smiles before he lifts up into the air.

He is about two feet off the ground and he sticks rather close to me.

Since I am not able to speak, I start off with a small walk that will lead into a run. I don’t want Luno getting too far behind me.

A shiver runs up Luno’s spine when he looks up at the moon and then he follows me.

I go into a full on sprint as my anxiety begins to build with each passing second under this moon.

The only sound I really hear for a good few minutes is the sound of my paws kicking up sand and the gusts of winds carrying Luno.

Lucky for me, we were on pretty tall sand dunes so I had a good view of where the forest is.

If I will be running in there...I don’t think so.

Fuck that place.

Every now and then I check and make sure Luno is still with me.

Each and every time, I see that he is still there.

Why is it that I get scared every time? I keep looking every ten or so seconds!

Gods this running really isn’t adding any good for my heart but I so badly want to get to that lake.

There is also the fact that there is a large man on my back.

~~~

After around fifteen minutes, we are already getting close to the forest.

We were only walking before which explains the time difference, but damn I didn’t think we’d get here this fast!

As much as it pains me, I need a small break.

I am getting out of breath and Laneer’s fat ass isn’t helping.

We stop and I transform back into my regular form.

Not the demon one of course.

“Here,” Luno whispers, handing me my canteen of water.

I nod my thanks and take a big gulp of that cold heaven in a bottle.

While I am sitting on the sand, Laneer goes through his supplies. Luno sits next to me and rests his head on my shoulder.

Kulu somehow ends up licking at my neck when he is wrapped around Luno’s.

We are under the tent right now but honestly, this feels pretty useless.

Morgoren would have seen us set this place up!

Even with that threat hanging, being here makes me want to fall asleep.

I’m tired from running, I’m relaxing, I’ve got Luno with me; it pulls at my eyelids and threatens to make me pass out.

Sadly, all things must come to an end.

I stare at the moonlight that barely peaks along the bottom edges of the sides of the tent.

Is it just me...or does it look brighter than normal?

The tent is all of a sudden swiped out from above our heads and I become blinded by moonlight.

“Tobi,” Luno shouts in fear!

Luno is all of a sudden torn from my arm.

The sound of angels screeching all around me can be heard. They hiss and groan as they hold me down.

I still can’t see!

Where is Luno? What is happening?

Laneer can be heard next to me, he grunts and snarls out at the angels.

I hear the sound of flesh being torn into by a blade.

Blood splatter against my face and I snarl in rage.

Not knowing how else to get out of this hold, I transform into my tiger form.

I swipe out with my claws, not at all caring or knowing what I am hitting.

Circling around me, I swipe out with my claws, sinking them into armor and skin.

“Stop fighting,” A voice says.

When I look for the source, the light all of a sudden dies down.

Luno is in the sky. Above him is Morgoren.

Fragments of shining light have broken away into pieces.

Luno’s arms are spread wide and his eyes glow a bright pale light of their own.

Morgoren smirks at the sight. “Well aren’t you a fighter all of a sudden.”

I roar up at him then pounce high into the air, my claws aimed for his face.

With a flick of his hand, a wave of white magics sends be flying back down to the sand.

“No!” I hear Luno shout.

Moaning from the impact, I glance but up in time to see Luno shoot a beam of light from his hands.

The beam barely manages to hit Morgoren.

He hissing through his teeth as he is sent back a few feet.

A crazed smile comes on his face when he looks up at Luno.

“Perfect,” He says.

Morgoren shoves his hand forward and fist made of light springs forth and slams into Luno.

My heart feels like it has stopped beating as I watch Luno’s body fall to earth.

A boiling rage springs to live inside me and I roar for Morgoren’s blood.

Fire springs to life along the stripes of my body.

I leap for Morgoren again.

This time, I roll my flip my body forward until I am spinning at a rapid pace. My fire spreads around me like a ball and the flames grow larger.

Just when I am about to slam into Morgoren, a group of living angels tackle me as one.

They explode into a cloud of golden dust and I find myself falling onto the sand once again.

How dare he use his angels in such a manner!

When I try to stand again, I find myself struggling to use my back legs.

I stumble and fall onto my side.

Looking up, I see that Morgoren is holding Luno in his arms.

The Moon God smiles down at me before nodding his head and disappearing into a shining portal of moonlight.

All I can do is stare in horror when I realized I lost Luno.