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A golden lock of hair curls around a tan face. Crystal blue eyes glint, travelling down the other boy’s torn blue coat, his drooping head.
Rhian and Rafal, meant to be Good and Evil.
Except it’s all wrong now. The pretty, warm sibling is Evil. And the cold one is Good. They just don’t know it yet.
“For Good,” says Rhian, standing tall as he looks down at his twin, “you must go, Rafal.”
Snow-white hair is pushed out of the disheveled boy’s eyes by Rhian’s hand.
“You said balance.” mouths Rafal. He sits against the twisting trunk of the tree, not even trying to fight back. “You and me. Good and Evil in perfect balance. That’s the only way we can lead the school together.”
The school in question, two castles, one for the Good students and one for the Evil, stands behind them in rippling dawn mist.
Rhian smiles bitterly.
“I’m sorry, Rafal,” he sighs, with the razor-sharp pen, the Storian, in hand, prepared to bring on his brother’s demise, “but killing you is the Good thing to do, you see.”
Rafal blinks. Once. Twice.
He curls up tighter, pulling his knees to his chest, blue-and-gold suit stained with blood and dirt. His voice starts to crack.
“Please.” he gasps. He reaches out his hand to clutch his brother’s, his own emerald eyes watering with hurt. “I died once for you. I may be Evil, Rhian, but I need you. We need each other to keep this world in balance. To keep each other in balance.”
Rhian’s lip curls. “Captain Hook- no, Dean Hook told me that killing you is the only way to keep the balance.”
“Since when do you listen to Hook?” mutters Rafal halfheartedly.
“Since you stopped trusting me.” Rhian scoffs, fiddling with the Storian, silent and obedient in his palm. Like the Storian is scared of him.
Rafal’s heart shrinks. “I never stopped trusting you.”
Rhian thinks of that day, a scene in the courtyard of the School for Evil. He doesn’t remember how long it’s been. He just remembers the Storian plunging towards his heart, prepared to kill him, and Rafal’s body colliding with his, and blood, so much blood, red spilling onto lush grass, and his brother. He remembers his brother’s quick, shy smile that flits across his face, but gone as quickly as it came.
His Evil brother. Saving him from everyone who wants to hurt him.
Rhian grits his teeth. There isn’t time to be sentimental.
“I’m Good. You’re Evil.” he repeats to Rafal. “You broke the balance.”
He raises the magical pen above his brother’s chest.
Rafal starts trembling.
Please, Rhian.
Please don’t do this to yourself.
It’s not about me. It’s about you. You’re Good. If you do this, you’ll be Evil.
I don’t want you to be Evil.
You’re the purest Good there is. I trusted you. I still trust you.
But all these words are left unsaid.
Rafal fights back tears, heart shriveling into pieces.
“Please don’t.”
Rhian stalks closer, pen in hand. The Storian gleams in the morning light, metal tip aimed for the defenseless boy’s heart, about to shatter it entirely.
Slumping against the tree, Rafal gives up. He’s about to be killed by his own brother’s hand. His brother, whom he still needs, still loves, even though there’s no love left in Rhian’s eyes.
“Brother-” his words are cut short by the flash of red that blooms at his chest, and the Storian stabbing out of his heart, planting a seed that grows into a scarlet flower, dripping, dripping everywhere.
Rafal lets himself cry. Just a little.
He doesn’t scream.
“I-”
He coughs. Slumps to the floor.
What keeps him immortal is the love between him and his brother.
He still loves his brother, but Rhian doesn’t love him anymore.
He’s mortal now.
Rafal can’t finish his sentence.
Brokenhearted green irises stare up, with a hint of sadness in them that speaks all the words that he never had the chance to say. A tear is halfway down his cheek.
Rhian drops the Storian. It clutters to the ground, and stands again, sketching the image in front of itself in the dirt of the Endless Woods right outside the School for Good and Evil. A drawing of a youthful boy and a dead one.
There is no grief felt by Rhian.
He still believes he’s Good, while Rafal died believing he was Evil.
Rhian slowly shapeshifts, his blond hair turning the color of snow, skin draining to white, until he’s the perfect replica of his dead brother- except for his eyes, which stay a cold, icy blue.
But the Storian knows .
It stays there, stiffly drawing in the dirt, until Rhian snatches it up and tucks it within his pocket.
Fire curls around his palm, touching the real Rafal’s body until it incinerates whole into the breeze, not a trace left behind.
“Evil has been vanquished.” Rhian says to himself.
He turns and runs, while Rafal’s voice carries on in the wind, barely a whisper, expressing nothing but love for the brother who just murdered him in cold blood- surely proof enough that Rafal’s heart has always been formed from the hand of Good.
No one will ever know the real Rafal.
He speaks anyway, to the nature, the clouds and sky, earth and animals, yearning for his twin, his other half, because in his heart, he still believes he’s the worst kind of Evil.
I love you, Rhian.