Heart of Darkness

100 Picture Challenge #4 Dark



Atton slunk through the Trayus Academy, soaking in the dark energy with grim satisfaction. He could feel his bond to Ianthe drawing him, the deep pain and sickness attracting him like bloody water attracts firaxa. She was in here, somewhere close by, and he would find her. He ducked behind a pillar as a pair Sith Assasins flowed down the hallway and blended in with the shadows. Atton resolved to be even more careful. He didn't want to miss out on the fireworks when Ianthe got ahold of Kreia.

Truth be told, Atton almost had missed the fireworks. He pulled himself up out of his crouch and moaned softly to himself as his side throbbed with dull fire. He stayed in the alcove a moment longer, applying another medpac to the wound along his ribcage where Mical had plunged his lightsaber. Well, the kid wouldn't be a problem anymore. Atton had left him in a heap of robes and blood, grey-faced from more than his brush with the Dark Side. If Mical was still alive, it wouldn't be for long.

Satisfied that his self-ministrations would hold for now, Atton continued down the hallway; his footsteps echoing softly as he went. When he reached a tall door in the central hall, the sick-sweet feeling of his bond to the exile flared with an extra nauseating glow. Relishing the feeling, Atton stood silent and still at the door, willing the feeling to continue. It did, and it strengthened. She was here.

With a soft push of the Force, Atton opened the door and stepped into a deep, cathedral-like room awash in shadows. He slipped into the cavernous space, using the sound of Ianthe's velvet-smooth alto as an echolocator. He could have closed his eyes and been drawn on by her voice; but the sudden golden flare of her lightsaber and the snap-hiss of another saber joining hers stopped him cold. The person she was talking to was now the person she was fighting. Atton considered pulling out his own lightsaber and joining the fray, protecting her so she could do what she came here for...but instead got as close as he dared and watched her from the shadows. Ianthe had never appreciated the whole hero thing. It was why she had hated Mical.

"You've crawled inside my mind," the deep brogue of Darth Sion intoned. His grey face was alight with the burning of two lightsabers and his own pain. "I hate you, because you are beautiful to me."

"Let go, Sion," Ianthe's deep, hypnotic voice answered. All Atton could see of her was the pattern her blade was making and her white face, frowning in concentration. "This is why she hates you and loves me, you know. I gave everything up, and you cannot. Let go, let go. Release your hold on the Force and die, and her regard for you will return." Ianthe drove her blade into where the heart of the...man should have been, and Atton saw him fall. Ianthe stepped back and watched Sion's face, watched his breathing stop. Atton could not see her coal-black almond eyes, but her facial expression was patient, as though she wasn't finished with Sion yet. Atton waited to come out of hiding; something didn't feel right.

After a few moments, Sion writhed and pitched and was back on his feet. Atton gaped in complete astonishment; he'd never seen the like. Apparently Ianthe had, though. She was instantly at him with the spiked heel of her boot and completed the round with her lightsaber. Sion met her blow with one of his own and drove her back. Atton watched in sick fascination as the fight wore on. Finally Ianthe talked Sion down, her soft, patient words wearing him like water over stone. The monster knelt at the feet of the woman, and she kissed the top of his cracked, festering head. Darth Sion crumpled and was still. Ianthe turned away, no longer watching or waiting. It was done.

Atton stared openly as the body on the floor dissipated into black smoke and was gone. If Atton had to die, what better way to go than at the kiss of this dark goddess? The sweet, painful bond to Ianthe twisted in his gut.

"Atton, come out," Ianthe called, somehow managing to make the words sound like a gentle request and an imperious command at the same time. Atton had loved her voice the first time he had heard her speak to him in his prison on Peragus. She was the dark angel that had infected his very being on every level from that moment onward.

Atton came out of hiding like a dog; full of guilt and yet eager to see his master. "Looks like we've both taken care of necessary business," Atton smirked, trying too look carefree but wincing in pain at the straight posture he'd affected.

Ianthe raised a sculpted eyebrow. "So, you have finally eliminated Mical?" She took a step forward, toward him. "Fool," she added affectionately.

Atton didn't know if she'd meant him or Mical, but he couldn't think about it now. His besotted mind was was completely drunk with the sight of her. She stood before him like a statue carved to honor the womanly form; curved where he liked her to be and straight and muscular everywhere else. Her glossy black hair was knotted at her nape and secured with wickedly pointed laquered awls. Her armor gleamed and her cape flashed and she was every twisted fantasy Atton had ever entertained.

"Are we going to take care of the old bag, now?" Atton asked eagerly as she approached. "Not, that you need me or anything, I mean, you handled ole' Crackles just fine by yourself, but-- I wouldn't want to, ya know--"

"We do have things to 'take care of', as you say," she interrupted smoothly, "but Kreia is not one of them."

Atton's throat went dry as she continued to come toward him stealthily. He backed up a bit, unsure of the look in her eye. Ianthe seemed amused, which was never good, but she was reaching for him, which he'd dreamed about for long, cold months. Atton's back hit a pillar in that enormous hallway and Ianthe sandwiched him against it. The only thought left in his mind as she kissed him was he wished she didn't wear such stiff armor...

Ianthe tasted like chocolate, which was completely unexpected and fueled Atton's desire more than he'd thought possible. She bit his lip and the chocolate flavor dissolved into a bloody tang. If Atton had been hot before, he was hotter now. He circled her delicate, white neck with his large hands and squeezed her gently, lovingly, imagining the bright, starry light flaring behind her eyelids, watching her black lashes flutter against her smooth white cheeks. Ianthe hooked one leg around his hip and pressed herself against him, her tight grip causing the wound in his side to flare hot and throb. Atton kissed her harder, squeezed her harder, expecting her to gasp or squirm. He could barely stand the feelings he felt and hoped he could last, hoped they could do this many times before he actually took her life. He didn't want this to be a one-night stand; he loved her so much.

Ianthe broke the kiss first, her breath coming in short spurts, and her eyes opened, looking up at him, unreadable. Blood trickled from the corner of her mouth and Atton knew it was his. The drop ran down her chin, down her neck, and pooled where his hand was still tight around her throat before spilling down his own arm. "I love you, Atton."

A searing pain tore through Atton's own neck and he released hers. Slumping against the pillar, he pulled the laquered awl out of his neck with great difficulty. Atton looked up at Ianthe and wondered at the lovely wealth of her black hair spilling down her shoulders like a second cape. He'd never seen it down before. "I love you, too, Ianthe."

She crouched before him, and Atton realized the breastplate of her armor resembled a heart. He became mesmerized by the sight. His eyes were the only part of him left with any movement and he tracked the pattern of the shiny plates over her lovely curves. Since the first time he had felt love, and the Force, at the hands of the blonde Jedi witch, Atton had never seen or felt or experienced anything as lovely as these last moments with Ianthe. He had planned on taking her life at some point, but this was so much sweeter, so much more poetic. It was so deserved. It was fitting that this woman, whose heart was as dark and full of secrets as his own, was the one to send him into the last embrace of the Force. The Force shall free me, Atton thought. It was a lie. Ianthe freed me.

At the last, he lifted his eyes to her lovely, ghostly face and drank in the darkness of her eyes. Ianthe kissed him softly, and the blackness descended.

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