4 Half-Silhouette

Days after the 2nd Prince was born the news of him being blind spread across the Nightray empire like wild fire, and with their many informants the other empires received word as well. they all breathed a sigh of relief; tension was high between the empires after the phenomenon and every one of them was very guarded at the moment do to this. It was true after all that whatever caused that huge disturbance could be anywhere in the Black Dragon continent including their empires.

The Nightray royal clan was even more upset by this news and many people within and outside of the main branch were displeased. Many of them felt the birth of a blind Prince was a huge blow to their prestige; after all the Nightray's were a clan that was feared for their eye abilities and to have a Prince that was blind was unheard of in their clan's long history. Since the emperor was this blind boys' father, however no one dared to voice these opinion's out loud.

Within the Empress's chambers the child in question was snuggled calmly in his mother's embrace unaware of all the conversation surrounding him even if he did know he probably wouldn't care.

"This is sad, I never realized how boring it was being a newborn. my body is too small to move I can only lay here; and to top it off I'm blind as well, this really sucks." He sighed mentally as he lay there staring at the darkness of his eyelids. As he thought about the events on the day of his birth he was still shivered in fear.

When he first opened his eyes that day, he really couldn't control the power his eyes were absorbing. Before, when he was traveling through that star filled space, he also felt his eyes constantly absorbing power, but no matter how long it lasted he didn't feel any discomfort. He guessed that it was because he didn't have a true body yet.

When he was born, however the first moment he opened his eyes they once more began to absorb energy from the air and his body quickly began to fill up with it; if his grand-father didn't seal him he probably would have died in a few more moments. Lucky for him the worse didn't happen but still it was a scary situation for him to be in after he had just been reborn moments earlier.

Now, he had practically been glued to his mother the past couple of days and was forced to hear her ramble on constantly about his new siblings and how she wished that he could meet them, but since he was born in such a weird way, they had to make sure nothing else would happen that would lead to suspicion. However, since it had already been a few days and he had shown no other weird signs the emperor had agreed that it was fine to allow them to meet the young prince.

When late afternoon rolled around even though Riel couldn't see, he could hear the sounds of many feet stomping fast to his location. The footsteps ran for quite a while, Riel thought when he first picked up the sound the people running would get here sooner, but they were still running even now.

"Something must be wrong with me." He thought silently to himself.

After a time, they did arrive at his mother's chambers. "Mother! Where is our little brother!" A young girlish voice sounding very worried but also excited. "Rize don't be so loud you might scare him, you all come over and take a look." With little hesitation all of the children came forth. As the children viewed their new little brother and noticed his eyes tightly shut but still moving every now and then they all felt sad.

"So, it's true what everyone has been saying after all, he is blind." A soft male voice sounded. The other children looked on at their little brother with terribly sad expression's. As the empress saw all of their faces, she was heartbroken. "Leon, he... yes he is blind." The empress had a sad expression when she said this. She couldn't afford to let word get out about Riel, so she was forced to lie to her children in order to protect them.

Everyone was silent after she said that. "Mother, it will be hard for our little brother this way is there nothing we can do?" A calm yet melodic voice said with a sigh. "No, not currently Iris there is nothing we can do, the clan's eyes are very special; no medicine we can get can fix the blindness of a Nightray.

"ahuu... ahuu... mommy I don't want brother to be hurt." A little girl said with tear stained face.

"It's alright Yaya, your little brother is going to be fine, you have to be strong okay! I don't think Riel would like it if you cried for him."

"Oh... Oh. okay mommy I'll listen."

"Good now that goes for all of you don't worry, he will be fine." The empress said smiling.

"No, he won't be fine at all; uncle's children as well as the elder's grandchildren will bully Riel, we all have to get stronger or we won't be able to defend him. If we don't help him, he will suffer." Said Iris sounding more determined than usual.

"Big sister is right for his sake we have to be much stronger than we are now." Said Leon with a smile.

All of the siblings nodded at this, they mutually agreed that they wouldn't let a single hair on their brother's head be touched even if he was blind. After talking to their mother for a bit longer they all silently left the room to begin training.

Once all of the children left the empress felt relief to have such caring children, especially in a clan of royalty such things were very rare to see. The peace she felt finally allowed her to drift off to sleep.

"So, this is my family now hmm..." From his mother's many rambling sessions he understood that his older brother who was the crown prince was 13 years old while his eldest sister known as Iris was 16 his two other sisters Rize and Yara or as his mother loved to call her Yaya, were 7 and 5 respectively.

He didn't expect them to care for him at all especially knowing that he was blind, but even so he wouldn't depend on them for protection he would find a way to help himself. Plus, at the moment he couldn't be sure who really cared for him even if his siblings said those words, he had heard similar things in his previously life so even though they gave him a great impression he wouldn't let it cloud his judgement.

As he thought back to what his sister had said about his other family members his forehead wrinkled. "I've only been here a short time and I already have enemies I can't just sit here and wait to be picked on I have to do something."

As if answering his will he felt a slight fluctuation in his mind and suddenly two balls of energy appeared before him. one was a ball of shining light and the other was made from pure darkness. If Riel didn't feel the energy, he would have thought only one of the balls of light was there.

The two balls of light after appearing in his mind slowly merged together as sounds of electricity sounded within his mind.

bzzt.. bzzt... bzzt...

The two energy forms finally merged together and created a silhouette of a body that was half complete. The body had a horn that hung down from the side of its head and long hair that reached the floor. It also had a wing that stretched out far beyond the length of its body. To Riel, as he observed this imagery, it gave off a very demonic feeling. He felt that this figure didn't regard life very highly, as if eons could pass and the lives it reaped were still nothing but grass on a field.

Oddly enough Riel felt no malice for it as he gazed at its image only a small feeling of closeness to it which to him didn't make sense. If Riel knew what the earring his grandfather placed on him looked like he would notice that it bared a great resemblance to the figures own dark wing attached to its body.

Suddenly from the figure's wing a pitch-black feather began to glow with a purple as it detached itself from the figures body. It flew toward Riel with a slow pace. If Riel wanted to, he could have dodged it, but he felt that it wouldn't harm him at all and allowed it to touch his forehead.

The instant it did, Riel felt information being poured into his mind so much so that he couldn't process it and immediately collapsed.

Within Riel's mind the half-silhouette stood watching all of this unmoved. but after giving Riel the feather the energy inside the silhouette was nearly faded but like candle that refused to go out it still stood suspended within Riel's mind and un-moving it seemed as if it would continue to stand even if the world ended.