Helen Ch 7
#7 of Cadi, Volume 7: Helen
Now that they had all gathered, they made their way up to the main entrance to the heart of the temple. Thanks to the brothers, they knew what was waiting for them there.
Through the gates into the central courtyard, Aman was standing in the heart of the space, his face filled with rage as he looked about at his brothers. "So. You've betrayed father, too," he said with a sneer, shaking his head in disgust. "I've told him all along that I'm his truest disciple, and I see that you've all proved me right now."
Lucas was the first to step forward, challenging his brother, "How about the way that you lied to us? The way that you told us you rescued Helen from the island?"
Aman rolled his eyes, scoffing as he shook his head. "And you believed me, so who's the real fool there? It was the story we needed to set people at ease with her disappearance. You've all heard the mutterings since she abandoned us. We were facing a revolt if she didn't return to play her part. She understood that, and she did what she had to in order to make sure that her precious little civilians didn't get hurt... or, as would have more likely happened, decimated."
Beta scowled at him, "I'm sure that would have bothered you loads," he said, glaring across the courtyard at Aman. "We've heard how you talk about them."
Aman laughed, "So? They aren't the warriors that we need to execute father's vision for the world. At best, they are there to feed and clothe our warriors. They should consider themselves lucky that we've given them as much freedom and protection as we have. But I don't expect that father and I will make that mistake again... once we seize the power that we need to finish our work."
Jacob snarled, stepping ahead of the rest of the group. "And what about the rest of us? Just more bodies to be plowed over for your glorious purpose?"
"At this point, yes. You are all traitors to the cause. If you are even allowed to live, you will be prisoners... or, at best slaves."
All five of the brothers looked about ready to tear their eldest sibling to pieces, but before anyone could attack, a powerful voice cut through the crowd. The siblings reacted to it interestingly, their bodies tensing and just about freezing in place as the voice simply said. "Stop. That's enough, boys."
The band of heroes turned to see who had spoken, as it had come from the back of the formation. Behind them, they saw a doorway closing as Cadi strode through, walking with power and purpose forward. The group parted for her, allowing her to step forward to confront Aman, herself.
The six tigers stared at her in shock. The ones who had sided with the Tropicans knew that Cadi was with the Tropicans, but they... had not expected this force of nature that had stepped into the courtyard. The five brothers standing near her had very mixed reactions. Pain, guilt, sadness... they all understood how awful they'd been to her over the years, and they hated themselves for it, even if they hadn't had the strength to stand up to their father over it. Any time they had tried to push back against him, the punishments had been harsh and to the point.
Aman, though... his reaction was interesting. His mask of bravado and confidence was showing cracks, and there was fear starting to poke through. "Mother," he said, trying desperately to regain his composure. "How nice to see you again," he continued... though from the looks of things, he would almost have preferred to see anyone in the world but Cadi.
Cadi didn't gloat or even smile at him as she walked up to stand beside Jacob, putting her hand on his shoulder. She turned her head to give him a soft smile as she purred gently. "Go back with your brothers. Mom's got this," she said, and Jacob walked back to his brothers, doing his best to hide the tears welling up at the corners of his eyes.
After he'd stepped back, Cadi turned her gaze back to Aman, her expression full of nothing but disdain. "I... had really had a lot of hope for you, Aman. What mother wouldn't for her first son?" Her voice was soft... but it had intense power behind it, which made it clearly audible throughout the courtyard. "I remember when you were only a kitten... you were so happy and playful... and so sweet. But, the moment your father started getting into your head..." she said with a sigh, lowering her eyes and shaking her head.
Aman's iron facade was visibly failing, and he was trying to breathe. "Got in my head? He showed me the truth of the world. That the only things that matters are strength and cunning... and the will to use them to get what you need in life. Anything less is... is weakness."
"No," Cadi said, looking back up into Aman's eyes with her piercing golden gaze, which felt as though it was looking deep into his soul, "Those are the lies that the weak tell themselves in order to make themselves feel better about the horrible things their fear tells them to do. But no, what hurts the most is that I know that you are smarter than that. Better than that, to be consumed by your father's fear and pain."
Aman's fear was mixing with pain as his mask continued to shatter. He looked into her eyes for a moment longer before he wrenched his gaze away from hers. "Father isn't weak... father is powerful... I'm..." he said, having to take a very deep breath, "I'm not just some... puppet... doing whatever he wants me to..."
"Aman," Cadi said, her voice echoing through the courtyard, causing his eyes to snap up once more, meeting her gaze again. "You've lived his lie for so long... you've come to believe that it is the unequivocal truth. You've forgotten who you were before he warped and twisted you... before he started shaping you into his perfect weapon. Into his tool."
As she spoke and held his gaze, memories came flooding back from his early childhood. He tried to push them back away, his fear knowing full well that it couldn't stand up to them... but the memories wouldn't stop rushing at him. The way that Cadi played with him, cared for him... loved him... before he had turned on her under his father's influence. Back before then... things had been so... wonderful.
He knew that his betrayal of her was one of the greatest blows that her spirit had suffered. She had never really recovered from it. His father had made him believe that only proved Cadi's fundamental weakness and unworthiness. It was why he had continued to treat her like that. But now... now he was seeing it through her eyes. The pain wasn't from her failing. It was from his.
As they stood there, their eyes locked together, he could see that she had regained her strength. That she had set aside the pain of his betrayal and allowed herself to find new happiness... new community and support. Worst, she only felt sorry for him. She didn't hate him. She was just sad that he was still trapped in the prison that his father had forged around him. The impenetrable armor of self-confidence and arrogance. Only... she'd... found the one weak spot in that armor... and she had struck true.
The others in the courtyard could see the agony in his eyes as tears poured down his cheeks. In the end, he dropped to his knees, still staring up into her gaze as he whimpered and sobbed. "I'm... sorry... mommy..." he said at last.
Cadi smiled softly and walked forward to stand in front of him. His fear made one last-ditch effort to regain control. She's going to punish you... she's going to beat you and bloody you, the way father did. But he knew better and didn't try to run from her. He tensed just a touch as her hand reached out to him, but when he felt her fingers running through his hair, it was as though he was that small cub once more, and he collapsed forward against Cadi's legs, wrapping his arms around them.
His brothers were... surprised. All they had ever known was the fanatic for their father's cause. But they trusted their mother, and they could see how deeply she had struck. All in all... they all just kind of let out a sigh of relief that their changes of heart had come... much easier than Aman's had.
Still, Cadi wasn't rushing him, just loving on him gently the way that he needed for a bit before he let out a soft breath and looked up at her, the look in his eyes so different from before. "Thank you, mom..." he said, his voice soft as he stood up again.
She smiled and pulled him into a big hug while his brothers crowded around as well, all of them surrounding Cadi and Aman in a great big embrace, which no one really tried to break in any kind of a hurry. This was good. This was how things should have been with her sons. It's how things would be going forward.
Eventually, though, they broke the hugs, and looked around at the collective group, smiling with a sense of giddiness and euphoria. "I guess... we should go deal with dad, then," Aman said with a sigh, afraid of what that would mean.
As everyone was re-forming into battle lines, Kestrel came up to Cadi, looking up at her with a raised eyebrow. "I thought... you needed to stay behind to protect the window stone?"
Cadi laughed and sighed, shaking her head. "Apparently, I got some backup. A badger and a squirrel showed up, telling me that I was needed here and that they'd take over protecting the stone."
Kestrel laughed, as did Briar. "Oh, I'm sure they did. Thank you, though. And I'll be sure to thank them when we get home."
The band of heroes was silent as they came into the main building of the temple, every last one of them feeling very uncomfortable with what they were sure was about to happen.
Zaros was sitting on the throne that he'd insisted be built for him atop his grand dais. Helen was standing there beside him, her hands bound in front of her with her head hung low. She showed signs of punishment from her father.
Zaros looked down at them all, his face full of disgust. "You too, Aman. So. Everyone has betrayed me now. Though your sister was the first, I see now."
Aman's eyes flashed, "We've betrayed you? What about the way that you've betrayed all of us for our entire lives? Warping us... twisting us... leading us to inflict pain on others, all while praising us for the horrible things we did?"
Zaros laughed at that, throwing back his head. "The necessary things that you did. Necessary to maintain the proper order in the world," he said to his son before his eyes flicked back to Cadi, the old look of disdain that had served so well to keep her in line back on it once more. "And you... back at last... finally crawling back to me... with your pitiful little band of heroes to try and stop me? I know you... and you'll never do the one thing you would have to do in order to stop me. You'll never truly fight me. You're too pathetic for that. You never understood that the only true power is the the blood of your enemies on your teeth and claws."
The expression that she gave him wasn't the old look of fear. It wasn't even one of disgust or hate. He wasn't quite sure how to handle the disappointment in her gaze, but it didn't break his bravado. "I would destroy you if that was the only choice. But I always believe that there is another choice."
He prepared to snap back at her before something that he had not expected happened. No one in the room had expected it.
As Cadi spoke of there being another choice, Helen had moved, the ropes gone from her wrists as she turned and placed her hands on her father's head. Rather than lash out at her, his eyes rolled back in his head as he slumped against the back of his throne. Everyone watched as he just sat there under Helen's touch, wondering what would happen next.
Within Zaros' mind, though, there was quite a lot going on. He found himself in a great, empty space, looking around in confusion to see what was happening. "You think that you can trap me in my own mind? Pathetic. I will figure out a way to overcome this, and I will tear you limb from limb the way I should have long ago."
But... there was no one there for him to yell at. At least for a long moment. Soon, though, figures started filling his mindscape. He was in the jungle now, surrounded by other children. He realized that he was a child, too. The other young tigers were circling around him, taunting and teasing him. Calling him motherless... outcast...
He could feel the anger welling up inside of him once more, the way that it had all of those years ago. What was more, he wanted to tear these children apart, as much as he'd wanted to do when he'd truly been a child.
He pounced on the nearest one with what, to him at the time, was a mighty roar as he brought his jaws clamping down on the young tiger's throat, his small claws slashing at the other's chest.
His justice would have been complete, had an adult not stepped in and knocked Zaros away from the young tiger before other adults came in to herd the children away from him, leaving him alone once more.
The scenery changed then, to him curled up and sobbing against a large stone slab. It had only been a few weeks earlier. In time, he came to lift his head, seeing the markings on the slab, somehow able to understand them. They weren't in a human script, the way many slabs like it around the jungle were. It was in a much more... primal script. That was how he'd understood it. It was one meant to be understood by creatures like himself.
He read... read of the fundamental brutality of the world... that strength and might were the only masters worth serving. He read and read, just drinking in the words in the pain and grief that he felt there.
But the memory shifted again, and he could recognize what this was. "No." He said, his voice angry, his teeth bared as the memory began. Two adult tigers were fighting. He knew them. They were tigers who should have never fought like this. He couldn't even remember exactly what had triggered it, but as a child, he could do nothing but watch.
When all was said and done, there was blood staining the ground... staining the teeth and claws of his father. It was his mother's blood. He looked up into his father's cold, unforgiving eyes. He understood.
At that point, though, the memories stopped traveling backward in time and started pushing forward. He felt a sense of pride at the body of the tiger who he had attacked as a child, both of them now into adulthood. The tiger's blood staining Zaros' teeth and claws.
And then there was another kill of his. Another tiger. This one an older male. His father's blood stained his teeth and claws.
Only, as that scene was frozen there, he was no longer alone in his mindscape. Helen padded along next to him. "I think I'm starting to understand," she said, her voice calm and patient. "I'm sorry for the pain you experienced, father."
Zaros glared at her fiercely. "I don't need your pity, child. If anything, I deserve your hate. Your teeth buried in my throat."
She looked up at him, her head tilted to one side. "Just as you did to the person who wronged your mother," she said before she shook her head. "No... I don't want that."
He snarled, "Then you are weak."
"Am I? Or am I strong enough to face my pain, rather than bury it in rage directed at everyone and everything around you? Try to force it on everyone in a futile effort to convince yourself that it is justified?" She shook her head, sighing sadly. "You were poisoned by it as a child. And your only way to handle that poison was to force it into everyone that you could. To poison the whole world with your pain, if you could. But no matter how much pain you caused, none of it took away the pain that you felt within yourself. Because, deep down, you know you did exactly the thing that your own mother would have hated."
He roared at her, snarling fiercely. "What does what she would have thought of it matter? She died. She was killed by my own father. So I killed him once I was able to." But even as he said all of that, he was recoiling back, bringing his hands up to clutch his head. "So what if I'm a monster? The world is a monstrous place."
"It really isn't," Helen said calmly, "You just don't let yourself see the beauty... because you hold onto your pain so tightly."
"I can't let it go. I've tried for so long, but I can't let it go."
Helen thought for a moment. "I can't... make it go away. I can't make what you've done to others go away. But I can offer you a second chance."
He looked up at her, confused. "Second chance? What? Forgive and forget, only for my pain to continue to seep out into the world and destroy everything around me?" He sneered at that thought, knowing it was an empty option.
She shook her head. "No. A second chance at a happy life. Where you won't have the pain you've experienced in this life weighing you down. A clean slate. A fresh start."
He looked at her and grimaced, "And how can I be certain that it won't be as bad as the life I've had this time around?"
She shrugged a little, "You can't. Not entirely, at least. But... the pain you experienced at that age was... rather uniquely awful. The odds of that happening again are... very small."
He sat down, his face in his hands as he rubbed at it in agitation. "A chance... just a chance at a better life..." He growled and slapped his hands on his legs before he stood up again, looking grouchily into her eyes. "I suppose that is better than no chance at all. Which is what I've got at this point. And at least it'll spare anyone the poison of my blood on their teeth and claws."
Helen smiled and embraced her father there in the dreamscape as the black void faded to white around them.
In the chamber of the temple, everyone watched the two of them there on the dais, waiting patiently for something to happen.
None of them were prepared for what did happen, though.
Zaros' body began to glow before it shrank to a tiny speck of light in Helen's hands. The young tigress cradled it gently in her hands for a moment before she lifted them up and opened them, letting the mote of light float away.
When she turned to look at the others, she was met by dumbfounded expressions of surprise. Except from Cadi, who was smiling at her. She bowed her head to her daughter as Helen walked down the steps to stand beside Robin, slipping her arm around the vixen's waist. "Is everyone out of the temple?"
Robin snapped to and shook her head a little before she nodded, "Yes. The crew got everyone evacuated, and they're safe on the island."
Helen smiled and nodded her head. "Good. Let's go home, then," she said as a portal opened to take them all back to the island. Once it closed, the temple began to crumble. Not simply to rubble, but into dust.
The world would be better without its own pain acting as a lingering poison.