A/N: I rewrote this chapter, as I was unhappy with the direction the other story was taking and decided that this would be more interesting. :) Only the first few paragraphs are the same. I apologize for those waiting for a new chapter (heh, if any of you are out there :P), but this is essentially what that is because it’s so different. Sorry, a lot less action. It’s pretty boring, but whatever. It’s needed. :P

But I hope you enjoy it in whatever case!

-Neko

Hidden

Chapter 1 (Revised)

The town of Iyn sat, lonely, isolated by the thick forests and mountains that surrounded it as if the earth itself wished to choke it. Perhaps it was protecting the town from the world, or perhaps it was protecting the world from the town.

No one really knew.

The people in the town were independent, relying on their own resources and upon themselves to create their own food. Currency was not an issue. If you wanted something that the other was unwilling to give up, then that was the end of your interaction. Unless, of course, you stole...and that seemed to be happening all too often.

It had been peaceful once, and it had once gone to the Outside and traded.

But that was before that peacefulness was ripped away, suddenly and unexpectedly, torn without mercy from whatever forces willed it.

That had been so long ago that it was a fleeting knowledge, a brief memory tickling at the back of one’s mind.. Perhaps this day, however, change drifts with the winds...

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The clouds strangled the sunshine, wrapping around the glow until it was no longer visible. Each day it was a battle between the rain and the sun, between dark and light.

Today, darkness won.

The boy’s blue eyes that matched the falling droplets looked to the overcast sky, shockingly white hair standing out in the dreary day. Drenched, his robe clung to his thin form as if attempting to shrink from the rain.

Amidst the stout, crumbling wooden buildings which made up the heart of Iyn he stood, buildings rising up shortly out of the alley’s well-worn dirt. The lack of people wandering the streets on the stormy day drew him out of the territory he knew into the dangerous lands.

The Normal Ones lived here. The perfect ones, the ones without symbols branded on them from their birth.

On the other side of Iyn, beyond where the lucky ones lived, were the Hunters. The very mention of their name sent his skin crawling and his shivers racing up his spine.

Where he was, Skies inhabited the dark mold of shadows, the area where the houses stood less firmly and where the sunshine was afraid to reveal it, scared of what it would find.

Glowing as if to make up for the lack of light, a crooked line began where his heart was hidden beneath his pale skin, hunching angrily. Near its beginning was a circle, and on the other side of that another line lay, curling in on itself as if wishing it could disappear.

But it could not change that it was.

His symbol was blood red, bright with a malevolent intensity.

A gust of air blew his thick hair in a raged frenzy and he attempted to smooth it down, but even as the wind died away, it remained sticking outwards. The breath of wind diverted the rain’s path and droplets scattered as they hit his small form.

Realizing the bundle in his arms could become soaked through from the rain, he hurried back into his alley, shuffling his bare feet through the muddy path. There was nothing around him, no garbage or drunken men as most other alleys possessed.

The roofs on the houses were low and hung brokenly and crookedly, the buildings abandoned and boarded so none could enter. Here was where he’d chosen to live, watching the Normal Ones with curious eyes from the shadows they did not bother to light.

Hurrying his boy’s frame to the end of the alley, a wall rose up in front of him between the backs of the buildings, towering with a mad teetering as though it were a guard just about to spend his last breath.

He barely acknowledged it and continued running, his feet slapping the mud and dirtying his brown, tattered robe and the baggy pants he wore beneath it. He neither slowed nor hesitated.

Without thought he resurfaced a power within him that was dangerous, forbidden, bringing a burning sensation that numbed his fingers. His arm stretched forward and his voice cried out in a language that was not his own, in a time that was not his own, echoing through infinity’s limitless times and worlds.

The cry died away slowly and as he passed through the wall, a whisper of voices murmuring in their lost times reached out to him. He burst through the other side of the end of the alley and ignored the hushed whimpers.

He slowed and nearly stumbled, looking down at the familiar crater with its wide mouth open to the sky as if drinking the tears which fell so angrily. Beyond its lip were a few scattered trees and dead meadows covered with brown-burned grass and weeds which drooped drearily.

In the crater lay metal sick with rust and bent with age.

Cursed metal.

Metal could kill so easily.

And if one was to touch metal the wrong way, blood would drip from their wounds and evil would grip their bodies...

He flung himself down on his stomach and pushed off the edge of the enormous crater, childish glee overcoming him as he raced down its muddy edge.

Nearly crashing into the fearsome metal, the boy with bright white hair reached his free arm forward and sprang off it in a motion seemingly too fluid for a child.

He landed and straightened himself and his eyes gazed at the substance said to be cursed, revisiting the same wonder and awe he felt every time. Long ago had he overcome his fear from the stories the Old Ones told.

It was because of those stories he would never tell any about what he’d found, a secret hidden in the outskirts of Iyn behind a fortress of walls and dead-end alleys. No one would venture outside of the town’s limits because of fear, and he knew his secret was safe.

One piece of metal was shaped oddly, rising upwards from the ground and then sloping into an incline before abruptly forming a hump, where it curved back towards the ground.

Large pieces of glass were cut into the front and back of the bump, and four smaller ones on each side. One of the panels of glass on the side facing him had been broken in his attempt to enter.

Reaching his small arms up, he dropped the bundle of cloth through the opening then grabbed the rim of the metal, careful to avoid shards of glass still left, pulling himself up with an effort.

The blue-eyed boy tumbled onto seats which were nearly decayed, and the strange work of metal smelled as if it longed for the ancient times from whence it came.

Hastily he pulled off his wet robe, now that he was not in public and forced to have such pleasantries such as politeness. He fumbled as he unwrapped the cloth from around his bundle, so excited he could nearly not get it off.

Knowing that he would need it later, he placed the tattered blue cloth carefully in the seat behind him then gazed at what he had brought to his hideout.

His hand trailed over the book’s cover, tracing the markings that must have been words and the uneven texture. He opened it gently to the first page and again he saw the strange markings.

What had drawn him to it he didn’t know, but he had been with his clan of Skies, and he had shown him his alley and they were envious. Alone he stayed in it, having no Parent who was willing to take care of him, but they were jealous of the solitude.

His clan was unusual, for normally clans were based on the similarity of symbols, but his branding was unique in its entirety. Instead, he was grouped with a clan which was small and needed more children in it.

The whole day they had watched Normal Ones come and go, looking at their colorful robes and shirts. They walked with pride and confidence, but he had never heard a single sentence of conversation. Strange sounds had come from them, but never once was an intelligent greeting created.

But the others had tired of this activity he was so fond of and when the sun began to set and the Normal Ones returned home in their fear of the darkness, they danced into the street with hooting calls.

He was appalled and afraid of what the Normal Ones would do, but the other children had merely grinned at him.

It was then he realized that when Skies spoke, they couldn’t hear them. Instead, he saw after observing them later and putting the pieces together, the Normal Ones spoke from their mouths, rather than the air and wind as the Skies used.

So that day, after he realized they couldn’t hear him speak, he ran into the dirt path calling wildly as well, feeling as if he were mad with a strange, secretive glee. They had run through the streets as the sun continued to sink and the sky was splattered with red sunset.

As they leaped and jumped on the narrow, main road of Iyn, they looked into windows of the shops with their faces pressed against the glass and watched it fog, then trailed their fingers through it and drew pictures of crude insult to the Normal Ones.

One of the shops they did this to had a book on display, old and shriveled. It was in its own glass case and rested on a wooden pedestal. His eyes were drawn to the writing on it and for a long while he simply stood and gazed at it until the sun was hidden beneath the horizon completely, and they had to go back.

He’d watch his clan return to their parents and Old Ones but felt no envy, for he did not even know what it was like to have a place to live with other people, or to have a name, so he could not miss it.

Wandering back to his alley in the abandoned part of the Normal Ones’ section of Iyn, his eyes had trailed across the buildings and the shapes of people moving inside against a veil of candlelight. Though he did not envy the other children, he envied the Normal Ones because he was taught to envy them.

He smiled as he looked at the text. Markings were scratched in fluently as if they were paintings turned into words and he pressed his face into the pages, smelling the same ancient smell of the crater.

How badly they must miss the ancient times when they were made.

It was earlier that same rainy day that he had sought out the book again, knowing the Normal Ones avoided the rain as if it would burn their skin should it touch them. He crept through the streets and into the shop with little trouble.

All he’d done was pressed his fingers to the window and called upon the same force as he would at the wall and his arm reached through, knocked the glass case away and ignored its shatter, and grabbed the text. He felt no remorse, as he’d watch Normal Ones steal things from others with more violent efforts in a way to get what they wanted.

No one told him it was wrong.

He’d wrapped it carefully in a blue cloth and walked with a boyish, happy bounce back to his alley, jumping in the occasional puddle and grinning at its splash.

Yawning, he closed the book and tucked it to his chest, curling up in his seat.

Someday he would be able to read it, he vowed in his sleepy mind as he drifted between rest and wakefulness, someday he would unveil its secrets.

Those were his last thoughts before he became victim to sleep, the night falling around the crater as though a midnight veil of darkness.

--------

The next morning dawned on the town of Iyn and the boy awoke in the seat, still clutching his book tightly. Wind whispered past the sickened metal and on it was a call to wake.

Smiling, he tucked his book carefully in the blue cloth and left it, hopping out of the strange sculpture of metal. He threw his robe on hastily, noting it was just about dry.

Now that the rain had been defeated by sunlight, he would visit the Old Ones today and hear their tales of long ago.

The boy with empty eyes colored like the sky, or perhaps the sea thrown into a fit of rage, raced up the slippery edge of the crater that had not yet baked and dried after the rains. He dug his small hands in the mud and relished the gritty substance in between his fingers and toes.

The backs of the abandoned buildings faced him as he reached the top and he gazed at them for a minute, childish fancy overcoming him as he imagined himself living in those buildings.

But he shook the thought from his mind as the sun’s rays became brighter and he turned, running parallel to the Normal Ones’ buildings. As he got to a wall that was nearly collapsing as though it could not hold its age any longer, he came to an abrupt halt.

Automatically he raised his hand, beginning to feel the same burning sensation before he remembered where he was; the reactions to this power, he thought, would be less than appreciative.

His small fist rose and knocked three times on the wooden wall that was nearly entirely decayed from mold. Three more knocks replied and he sent a gust of air in greeting past it. A small, quiet breeze blew past his ear in acceptance.

With a shake, the wooden wall moved and he smiled at the grunts of struggle coming from the Skies as they dragged it away.

He walked through and grinned as he waved at the other white-haired boys, who were throwing stones at targets and seeing who came closest. An invitation whispered past him but he shook his head and the others nodded, going back to their game. They knew that today he was visiting the Old Ones.

As the boy walked into the Sky’s territory others waved, none asking how he got beyond the walls of Iyn to the secret door they only had for him. They rarely ventured away from their territory which they knew, except that one day when he showed his clan his alley.

He knew the town well enough where he was able to sneak through certain alleys and around certain buildings without being caught, and without needing to pass by the crater. However, he found that it was a longer, more tiresome journey and he often tried to avoid the main roads of Iyn.

Clothes hung on lines erected between two buildings and women knelt in front of wash buckets underneath the clotheslines, scrubbing intently.

Unlike men, they had symbols on their cheeks and their hair did not stick out, but grew just as thickly down their backs. Most wore brown or gray dresses which were often the wrong size. Everyone was barefoot.

He waved at them and they nodded back, hands submerged in the murky water. Such water came from a secret spring hidden in an abandoned building, which the Skies had first built their territory around.

Each Sky lived in a building as the Normal Ones, but the buildings were not so grand and often more trouble than to simply sleep in an alley. It wasn’t rare for a floor or roof to fall through from above and bury a parent and child in rubble.

Envy kept the Skies living in them.

His eyes scanned the sides of the path, watching as the walls became diseased and moldy, nearly crumbling from the strain of simple existence. With a sullen, strange likeness, they seemed to imitate the Skies themselves.

Soon enough, the strain would become too much.

Shadows elongated unnaturally and the dirt beneath his feet became unwelcomingly cold, buildings coming closer and yet more deadened. Loose boards hung with a saddened droop from the buildings that could no longer support them.

Hushed, singing murmurings whispered past him eerily, the air trembling slightly. Strange smells lingered in the morning air and a light mist which felt as if it didn’t belong covered the ground.

He followed the mist, his feet retracing the path he knew so well, weaving around buildings. Absently, his small hand trailed across the rotting wood.

The singing became louder, the wind vibrating faster and the mist becoming thicker. With each step he took the smells became stronger, and lingering among them was the same scent of the book and metal.

Shadows flickered across the ground, long and dark even as the sun swam higher through the sky’s vast ocean of blue. His eyes adjusted as the air became thicker, darker, deeper, the walls rising up imposingly around him even as they crumbled.

Light flickered beyond the heavy air and the boy moved forwards, feeling the same, strange sense of a surreal world as every other time he visited.

Hunched shadows flickered across the ground, changing shape with the flames of a small fire. The shadows’ human counterparts sat in ragged blankets near the warmth.

Murmurings came from the Old Ones of a time lost long before, of a time of peace, but the boy did not understand eternity’s tales and could only listen in wonder. He approached quietly, but even so one of them turned to him with the watery, sunken gaze of the old and blind.

“Nokan,” she addressed him with a vague breeze.

He shifted uncomfortably as he always did when they called him that. Ducking his head, he sent a shy greeting back laced with disapproval to the name which he had not been given.

Her shoulders rose briefly in a silent rejection to his protests and fell again, and now the other Old Ones had stopped their singing, waiting for him to sit down and join them.

Head still bowed, the young boy knelt down carefully on the beaten dirt amidst the mist and took a deep breath of the smell of ancient times. He folded his hands politely on his legs and straightened his thin shoulders.

Absolute silence enveloped them, just as every time, each blind gaze studying him without sight.

Then, there was a deep intake of a breath from the Old One sitting next to him and she leaned forward slightly. Her hand steadied his shoulder from leaning away impulsively and her unseeing eyes narrowed at him before softening in understanding.

“You have found a Text.”

The statement was simple, clear, without question, and he jumped slightly before agreeing softly.

It was not his intention for anyone to know; written words of history were taboo among the Skies who had not used Texts since as long as even the Old Ones could remember.

But instead of disgust, only a gentle understanding met him from the women huddled around the fire. Quiet wisdom enveloped their sunken eyes which longed to see again.

Texts, they knew, were different from books; books were fiction, fantasy come to life, but Texts were history, facts and knowledge.

Knowledge was dangerous.

Not here, however. Not with the ones who knew and saw.

That was why he came to them, for they were without bias or envy or rage, instilled with only a calm wisdom gained from seeing many years pass before them, of seeing mistakes and glories alike.

Sometimes it was hard to tell error from success.

Sometimes there was no difference.

He knew that he must have smelled like the ancient times, the times that the Old Ones might have experienced.

However, they rarely spoke of the ancient times, the times even before the time of peace that was lost forever and more. He did not ask but merely listened to what they wanted to tell him, and sometimes they had no stories to tell.

One thing, however, stood out amongst the Old Ones, one thing which he did not understand...

They had no symbols.

Yet, they were not Normal Ones, and they far outlasted any Sky or Normal One he’d met, and all were women.

Often the white-haired boy found himself wondering who they were and where they came from, and where they truly belonged. Never, however, did the questioning wind bring forth these wonderings to them.

A part of him knew that if they should wish it, they would tell him; another part was afraid to know, seeing the dark clouds of past hanging over the Old Ones.

“Nokan.”

The breeze whispered past him gently and he turned slightly to face the one that had sent it, curious and excited as to what she would have to say.

“It is time that you learned something we have held back from you and the Skies, for we fear what may happen should you never find out.”

His eyes became confused.

As the words left her mouth, a harsh, strong breeze blew, carrying all the way out to where the Old Ones and he sat, and on it was a cry which rattled his bones and turned his blood to ice. One word was carried in the scream of terror, alerting all within the Sky territory.

His head snapped towards the direction of the cry and his eyes froze wide in silent horror, back stiffened with the alertness of the prey of an animal.

“And so you will find out on this day,” the Old One said softly.

Hunters.

“We wish you the luck of ancients, Nokan...”

He turned back to the circle of Old Ones and questions hung on the air around him before he paused in astonishment.

They were gone.

No mist lay around him, no ancient smell drifted towards him, no fire sat burning swiftly in the thickened air. It looked as if none had been there at all.

The path between the buildings where they had been was now lightened normally and no strange shadows played across the ground. Each building looked as normal as the others in the Sky territory.

Confused, he looked about him before another cry shook him out of his befuddlement.

The Hunters were upon them.

He leapt to his feet and raced down the path which seemed too normal, running as fast as his small legs could carry him, stumbling on the still muddy path and in his haste. Wind whipped against him and blood rushed in his ears, his child’s mind in a frenzied panic.

As he neared the sounds of terror his pace increased unknowingly, his symbol glowing brighter and the storm in his eyes brewing fiercer.

A strange burning feeling numbed his fingers and arms and he sprang into the main way of the Sky territory, a fierce cry erupting from his throat.

He did not notice the smell of blood, he did not notice the sounds of death that were ahead of him.

All he knew was the numbed burning in his limbs that told him to rage forth as though the angry sea, or the clouds rolling in a summer storm’s first wakening.

And he saw a Hunter, robed, face shrouded by the shadows of its hood, gloved hand stretched out towards a Parent who stood proudly in front of her child. Her chin was lifted defiantly.

A scream of times past exploded from him as the Hunter struck his blow. He ignored the scent of death, ignored the fate that would mark his place.

The boy’s small hand reached out and the anger of a thousand worlds and times lost and yet to be shot forth, united in their rage.

Death

Burning

Pain-

Blood

Why...

And his child’s mind became lost in the whisperings which dragged him from the present into the future and past, split two ways.

A great wind rolled from the heavens themselves and the world fell to darkness.

A/N: Blech. -- Still not very good, but it’s going in a better direction than the previous chapter 1...