Angel of Darkness: Chapter 1

Layla was ready. She was always ready to kill. She enjoyed it. Well, no, she didn’t enjoy killing but she did enjoy the thrill of running under the dark covers of night and slipping through the shadows to sneak up on some poor unsuspecting person. She’d always enjoyed sneaking up on people. It used to drive her adoptive parents and brother crazy. Tonight, though she wasn't just innocently sneaking up on someone to pounce and giggle as they shouted and flailed. Tonight, her victims would be lucky if they had enough time to shout before they hit the ground. Still, for her, the only difference between the two was the pay it was much better for actually killing them. Layla looked up at the full moon. It was a little brighter than she would have liked but it would not upset her plans in the least. After all, her skills were way too good for a little more light to really affect them. Even so, she did enjoy the darkness. It really made her skills come out. Layla smirked internally. Her brother had no idea how suiting his nickname for her actually was. As the Angel of Darkness, she was most comfortable when there were fewer lights. Her main ability as an assassin had nothing to do with her skill at weapons. Many of the higher level soldiers could easily match her at that. What made her special was her ability to almost literally become one with the shadows. Even in broad daylight, she could just vanish and make herself unnoticeable by shrouding herself in the darkness of the shadows. She was able to not only hide in shadows but become one -- quiet, dark, and relaxed. Most of her employers would keep their houses fully lit with torches so that she would not be able to sneak up on them.  Little did they know that it would not hinder her much. It insulted her that they thought that it would stop her. She wouldn't kill them though not unless she was paid to do it. That was why Layla's favorite employer was Mr. Khalid Adjo. He seemed to trust her a little, leaving his mansion dark. He seemed to have dealt with many assassins before and was aware of the fact that just because she was an assassin did not mean that she wasn't trustworthy.
As Layla rushed away from his house, through the quiet streets of the town surrounding the palace, she made herself as unnoticeable as possible. The houses were small and dusty much unlike the brilliant fortress they surrounded, their only duty bring to provide the palace with anything it needed. All the other cities in the king’s domain were a few miles off into the desert so that an army entering would have to trudge through a lot of sand to get to the palace and would not have a chance to get more supplies. This, of course, didn't bother Layla, who was a desert rat, and a little sand was no problem for her. As she ran through the narrow, winding streets, a huge palace loomed out of the darkness. The domes on top of the sand colored towers were red and decorated with small plates of gold that curved into beautiful patterns. Tall walls surrounded the palace but walls were never a problem for Layla. As silent as shadows, Layla crept up to the wall and slowly hoisted herself up, finding tiny handholds that others couldn’t have been able to use. Once on the wall, she centered her point of gravity so that climbing the vertical wall became more like crawling along a flat marble floor. It involved centering herself in a way that brought most of her weight towards the wall instead of towards the ground. She had learned the trick when she had tried to escape some guards by climbing up the side of a rock face that should have been way too steep for her to do. She had managed after a lot of tries to thrust all of her weight against it and push herself up. Afterwards she had worked on her skills to hone them.
She made it to the top of the wall with ease and looked across the grounds of the palace. It was the only place in the desert with a thick carpet of vegetation. Irrigation systems and imported soil allowed a soft pillow of grass to cover the gardens. There was a small forest of trees surrounding the palace, which would make sneaking in without being seen so much easier. The moon let off a soft light that allowed her cat-like eyes to see almost everything. Layla allowed herself to drop from the top of the wall, landing on the balls of her feet and bending her knees to absorb the impact. Quickly, she flitted through the jungle of trees over to the palace. It was a little past midnight so the eastern side of the palace was obscured in shadows. Layla surveyed the nearby door that she was going to use to get into the palace. Two guards were standing in front of it. One looked ready to go to sleep but the other stood tall and alert. His hand was on his sword and his eyes scanned the landscape around the palace. He would be annoying to deal with, but not a challenge at all. Layla stole through the trees to the wall adjacent to the door and started to creep along it slowly. Normally she would have climbed the wall and dropped down behind them or climbed through a window but there were guards everywhere in the palace and her dark clothes would stand out harshly against the creme-colored pillars even in the dark of night. She kept on moving towards the guards slowly. Her ability was not infallible. She could still be seen if someone looked directly at her or saw her as she moved. She had to stay still until the guard was looking the other way. The tall guard turned his head her way and she froze, allowing every muscle not begin used to keep her standing, to relax. It was the first thing that she had discovered about walking in shadows; people were less likely to spot her if she ignored her instincts and relaxed. The guard’s eye passed over her without pausing and then it started to turn the other way. She started to move again but before she had even gone two feet, his head started to turn back to her. She stopped again and relaxed.  At this pace she wouldn’t make it to the door till morning. As the guard’s head turned the other way, she slipped a knife out of her belt and threw it at a tree. Her aim was perfect and it hit one of the higher branches with a soft thump. Both men tensed, ready for a fight. When nothing came running out of the trees at them, the taller guard said,
“I’ll go check it out,” in Kemetic.
He moved away quickly and Layla darted to the door. The other guard’s shoulders were slumped and his eyes were dull as he settled back into the same stupor that he had been in before. Layla wouldn’t even need to knock him out. The door he stood in front of was open. In the desert people never closed doors so as to avoid the heat and stuffiness that built up quickly inside closed spaces. Layla thought that she might have forgotten how to open doors and if she ever encountered one, she would have to break it down.
She kept on moving, her boots barely making a sound on the small walkway that surrounded the building. Within seconds she was standing behind the guard and slipping into the palace. Once inside she looked around to get her bearings. The corridors of the palace were lit by rows of torches so she had a pretty good view of the hall that she was in. The hall led to a bunch of hallways that lead to different parts of the castle. Layla didn’t know where the young prince’s chambers were but she did know where the servant quarters were because of the external architecture of the building. In the north, there had been a smaller building with holes in the roof to allow heat and smoke to escape. This was where the kitchens were and chances were that the servants lived near there. She darted down the hallway as fast as she could. There would be guards patrolling the hallways and she did not want to be noticed. Twice, she had to duck into what she hoped was an empty room to escape a guard. Finally, she made it to the servant quarters. Even at night, this part of the palace was hot and during the day it was like the inside of a volcano. Layla slipped into the first room she saw.
“Hello,” she whispered to the sleeping woman before clamping her hand over the woman’s mouth.
The woman woke up with a start, her eyes wide and she started to squirm against Layla’s strong grip.
“Shh,” Layla said in her ear, “I won’t hurt you. I just need some information. Calm down.”
Layla was glad that she had learned Kemetic when she had come there. She was fluent by now and the woman relaxed as she took in her words.
“Where are the prince’s quarters? Where does Oba Ahmose’s son sleep?”
The woman shook her head, her eyes fearful.
"I really need this information and I will stop at nothing to get it. Please tell me."
The woman shook her head again. Layla sighed and pulled a knife out of her belt. Her eyes filling with fear, the woman nodded fiercely and Layla removed her hand.
“At the top of the northeastern tower,” she whispered, tears beginning to stream down her face.
“Thank you. Drink this,” she said slipping a small vial out of one of the pockets in her jacket.
She rarely used these because they were so hard to find. She preferred to kill anyone who saw her face but this woman was innocent. She had just been sleeping when Layla had come in and attacked her. Layla had enough of a conscience that she would not kill her. The liquid in the vial came from a special flower that grew only in the seas surrounding Hellas and it would erase her memory of the last hour. The woman would think that she had slept well through the night. The woman started to squirm again, probably thinking that the vial contained poison but Layla forced it down her throat. The woman’s eye dulled and she fell back against the bed. Layla looked around to room. It was sad. There was one bed that woman barely fit on and a box of clothes. Layla could reach across and touch both walls with her arms. The conditions that she and the other servants lived in were despicable. She shook her head angrily and started to make her way to the northeastern tower. By an annoying coincidence it was right back where she had started. She walked and looked at the hall where the entrance to the tower was. There were four guards in front of the open door; each was looking down a separate hallway that led to the hall. One of them was looking right at her for a second but the hallway was dark enough that he couldn’t see much before she darted backwards. The area where they stood was well lit and, the guards being as alert as they were, there was no way that she could just walk up to the door without being seen. She would have to go the long way around. Layla placed her hands against the wall and started to climb. She went up until the roof was brushing up against the top of her head and then started to crawl sideways into the hall. None of the guards looked up or cried out in alarm. She made it all the way across the room and stopped above the guard on the far right. She wouldn’t be able to just crawl down and walk into the door. It was too well guarded so she dropped to the ground behind the guard. Her boots barely made a noise as she landed and she had pressed a finger in to his neck and shoulders and he fell to the ground, unconscious. Before the guard next to him could turn, he fell to the floor as well. The other two, hearing their companions fall to the floor, looked at her but then froze as two darts embedded themselves into their throats. These darts were deadly. The men had seen her face and there was no way that she could let them live. She took the darts out of their throats and ducked into the doorway that led up the steps. The unconscious guards would stay that way for another two hours so she had to get up and out as quickly as possible. There were no guards in the stairway leading to the tower but there would definitely be some at the top. The torches in the staircase sent flickering shadows across the steps but Layla wasn’t scared of shadows or dark. At the top, there was an open doorway. Layla, feeling sure that someone would be watching it, ducked down near the ground and poked her head around. She saw a small hallway at the end of which there was a door guarded by two heavily armed and very alert men.  They were staring straight at the door and there was no way that she could get to the door without being seen in the bright hallway. The walls were lined with so many bright torches that it almost looked like day. She drew two sleeping darts out of the holder on her leg, and with a flick of her wrist, the two men at the hallway dropped like stones. She darted past them and grabbed the darts out of their necks. Waste not, want not. Black mahogany darts were very rare and hard to get, not to mention easily traceable. Leaving a dart would be like leaving an address for them to find her. She opened to door to the prince’s room quietly and entered. The walls were light blue but in the darkness they looked more like the night sky. All around the room, toys were discarded and thrown about. On a four poster bed across the room, was a little boy, about ten years old.
Suddenly, he sat up.
“Are you going to kill me too?” he asked Layla, looking straight at her.
Despite her abilities as a trained killer, she jumped back in surprise.
“I saw what you did to my guards. I was peeking through the door. They’re dead, aren’t they? Are you going to kill me?” The boy had no fear in his eyes. He just looked curious.
“No one will come and help you and no one will know that I killed you. I will get away and you will die.”
“Okay,” he said.
He spoke in flawless Hellenian and how he had known that she spoke it as well, she wasn’t sure.  Layla stared at him. She wasn’t used to talking to her victims. She preferred to sneak up on them so they never really had a chance to talk. This was different.
“Your guards aren’t going to help.”
“I know, you killed them.”
“I do not. They are just unconscious. Actually, I killed two downstairs.”
The boy’s eyes widened a little but he still grinned at her.
“Okay, but you have to kill me right?”
“Um, yeah, sorry.”
“Okay.”
Layla stared again.
“Why do you want to die?”
“I don’t want to die but I don’t really care if I do you know. I haven’t done anything bad ever so I won’t go to hell. Heaven can’t be so bad.”
Layla continued to stare at him.
“So you don’t mind dying.”
“Nope,” he said.
Layla kept staring at him and reached to the knife in her belt. The boy’s eyes widened but he didn’t move. All of a sudden Layla didn’t want to kill him. She had never not wanted to kill a victim before. She usually had some incentive but this time the money wasn’t going to cut it. The boy’s expression was a strange mix of relief and regret as she took her hand away from the knife.
“Okay, so tell me. Why is it that you’re so accepting of death? Why is it that a eleven year old boy wants to die so badly?”
“My life sucks.”
Layla sighed. Was he just being melodramatic? Or was there actually something bad in his life? She couldn't tell.
“Hey, wait a sec,” the boy said, “How about you help me escape?”
Layla shook her head desperately. This little boy was starting to scare her a little. Who in their right mind would want to escape from their palace with an assassin that had been sent to kill them?
“I have to kill you.”
The little boy pouted.
“How about we fake my death. I have red ink that we can use as fake blood! We can put it on the sheets.”
“Ummmm….”
“Oh, please, please, please.”
Layla looked at his big hopeful eyes a realized that she could no longer kill the little boy. He was too innocent and undeserving. He was also one of the few people who knew she was an assassin and wasn't scared in the slightest. Almost without realizing it, Layla had come up with a plan to save him. There was an assassin known as Mask of Death. He killed his victims and then hid their bodies. Sometimes they showed up again, usually they didn’t. It would help not only the boy, but  the Angel of Darkness as well by relieving her of all suspicion.
“All right, you can come but only if you promise to do exactly as I tell you. Promise?”
The little boy nodded vigorously. Layla eyed him closely.
“Okay, I need that ink.”
The boy took out a bottle of red ink. She carefully spread it out across the sheets in the all too familiar pattern that appeared when she slit someone's throat.
“Okay put these away,” she said, handing him the empty bottles of ink.
She watched as he pitter pattered away. He was barefoot, and in pajamas. He couldn’t go running through the desert in just his PJ’s. Layla walked to his huge closet and searched for some clothes there. She chose a black silk shirt, a pair of black pants and some black moccasins. The moccasins had hard soles that would make noise if he ran but Layla could take them off with her knife. After laying the shirt and pants on the bed, Layla took a knife out of her belt and started to hack away at the string that held the soles to the shoes.
“Wow! That knife is black. I’ve never seen a black knife before.”
Layla just nodded and continued to carefully carve the soles off.
“Whatcha' doing’?” the boy asked.
“I’m taking the soles off of your moccasins so that you won’t make noise when you run. Put that shirt and pants on. The black will hide you."
        The little boy complied quickly. When he was dressed, Layla was surprised at how much he looked like her. Not only because of the black hair and eyes and dark skin, but also his smile the curve of his eyebrows and his regal nose were similar to hers. Looking at him, Layla saw her old self before her parents’ death; before she was forced back to Kemet, where her real parents had lived and died; before she’d escaped from the orphanage and searched the streets for a family and home. Layla shook herself away from the painful memories as the soles finally separated from the shoes.
“Now put these on as well.”
He slipped them on. The soft leather shoes didn’t make a noise on the stone floor.
“Okay, listen to me. If we are going to do this—"
“We are, we have to,” the boy said, his eyes filling unexpectedly with tears. “I can’t do anything here and Papa hurts me. Look at what he did to me.”
The boy pulled up the soft silk short and under it there were two black bruises about the size of a man’s fist. There was also a variety of smaller bruises that looked like a large man's fingers. Layla tried to swallow past the lump in her throat. She could never understand how a parent could do that kind of thing to their child.
“Okay,” she said, “I know, but you have to listen to me. If I’m going to get you out of here, I need you to do exactly as I say. If I tell you to run, you run. If I tell you to hide, you hide. You understand?”
The boy nodded.
“I need you to understand something else as well. I may have to kill someone. Can you handle that?”
“Yeah, totally,” he said, nodding, “My Papa makes me watch executions so that when I’m bigger I can handle it.”
Layla felt her throat closing up again. What sort of sick person makes an eleven-year-old child watch executions? Then she realized that she was probably about to do the same thing.
“Are you ready?”
He nodded.
“Stay quiet or else this won’t work and I will probably have to leave you behind.”
He nodded again. His dark eyes were wide with excitement and a little fear. Fear was good, Layla decided. It would keep him alive.
“Why am I doing this?” she asked herself but she couldn’t find an answer.
She took the boy’s hand and led him out the door. His two guards were sprawled across the floor. The boy stared at them as if trying to decide whether they were still alive or not. Layla tugged a little on his arm and they started down the stairs. The boy stumbled every few steps down the long staircase. Layla reminded herself that he did not have the same night vision that she did. She hadn’t developed it on purpose, like she had with her keen hearing and her intuitive knowledge of when someone was approaching her. Her ability to see relatively well in the dark had come on its own as Layla had spent countless hours practicing melting in the shadows. Almost carrying the boy so that he wouldn’t trip and cause a racket, Layla made her way down the dark stairwell. Finally, they made it to the door. Carefully, Layla peeked through the small crack of the slightly open door. She didn’t see anything except the 4 guards still lying on the floor, so she slipped out with the boy clinging to her hand like a lifeline. Together, they made their way back to the door that she had first come through. Both guards were still there -- one alert and the other snoring. Letting go of the boy’s hand she jabbed her fingers into their pressure points and they dropped like stones. The boy looked at her, his eye wide but not fearful. She grabbed his hand again and they ran through the tress. Layla stopped at the tree that she had thrown her knife at. She loved her knives and was loath to leave it behind. Also, black knives were just as uncommon as black mahogany and just as easily traced. She jumped down, landing gently beside the boy, when suddenly a guard appeared from behind a tall tree. He didn’t see them immediately and Layla allowed herself to relax back into the shadows purely by instinct but she felt the boy tense up next to her. The guards turned his head and saw them. Layla didn’t even think about it as she grabbed a dart out of the leather strap on her thigh and flicked her wrist. This dart would kill. Layla wasn’t sure if the guard and seen her face or not but she was not taking any chances. The boy gasped audibly as the guard’s skin paled and his eyes rolled back into his head. Luckily, there was no one around to hear him. They finished making their way to the wall.
“Climb on my back and hold on like a monkey,” she said kneeling down, allowing the boy to do so.
She swung her quiver around so that it hung in front of her and she took off the strip of darts on her leg and stuffed it in her pocket. The boy carefully avoided the knives around her waist and got on her back. He was surprisingly light but Layla still couldn’t climb the wall as she had before since she couldn't control his center of gravity. Luckily, there were plenty of trees on this side of the wall. She climbed one and used it to hoist herself onto the wall. Once there, she told the boy,
“Let go and sit here for a sec. Jump down when I tell you.”
The boy nodded. Layla let herself fall gently over the wall. She looked up at the boy.
“Jump,” she said as loudly as she dared. The wall was about twelve feet tall and the boy looked a little nervous about dropping that far down but he did anyway. Layla’s strong arms caught him easily. She set him down on the ground, put her quiver and leather straps where they belonged and said to the boy,
“Run with me.” She took his hand and started jogging at a pace that the boy could keep up with.