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“Hey… now, don’t be… rash, about this.”
“We are long past rash.”
L’s hands shook, as they held the crossbow level with Light’s heart. Always the heart, with him. And yet, Light knew his hands didn’t shake from fear, L just didn’t normally handle weapons himself, it might be nothing more than his body’s distaste for ever getting his hands dirty.
That was how they differed.
His own hands were steady, beside his shoulders, nothing to hold in them. His own weapons were long since burrowed beneath his flesh. He wondered what L saw, when he looked at him, whether Light’s body had degraded to something monstrous, to an ordinary human, or if he looked every bit as omnipotent as he felt.
“That won’t hurt me.”
Light nodded to the weapon staring into his chest, as L stared into his eyes. His smile was polite, and L’s eyelashes were wet, clinging to themselves. It was impressive, really, that Light could see that well from across the crypt. Another gift of the Spirits.
It was doubtful that L could see him half as well. The only light came from ritual torches that Light lit himself with a wave of his hand, whenever he came down here. He’d gotten quite practised at it, to the point where the habit had persisted even after his humanity had ebbed far enough way that he no longer needed illumination to see.
Even if the fire was sufficient, Light found it hard to believe L was particularly good at perceiving anything outside the tower he sent his life in. The flicking flames sent darting shadows across earthen walls, cracks shot through with moss and carvings, stone pillars cast in dramatic darkness where they lined the curving edges of the circular room. They converged, everything pointing to the centre, to the shrine and grave Light had been found kneeling before.
His blood was still drying on it, having transferred cleanly from his veins, to his knife, to his altar. It left no mark on his skin, anymore. Light doubted there was much left inside him to offer as sacrifice.
When it ran out, that was when he would offer himself at the altar, and hope the Spirits saw him rid enough of the filthy humanity L revelled in to take into their realm.
“I am willing to find out myself.”
L’s grip tightened. Everything about him was tightly wound. How long, Light wondered, had he been waiting for this? Had he known the whole time? Had he been waiting for an opportunity? Had he been working out how to play this? Surely not, because if so, Light thought a little more of L than to imagine he would have planned such a clumsy strategy.
No, the Spirits must have guarded him from L’s watchful eyes. Like the guards he’d grown with protected his secret more than happily, with a little of Light’s lies to smooth over the missing information, his newfound deities had deflected L, until now, when Light could look down on him and see a trembling, shadow-drenched boy, clutching a weapon he’d never handled before.
“Put it down.” A grin spread across Light’s face, testing the feel of command in his own voice. He was born to command. He was born to rise above. “They might accept you, L. Would you really throw away your chance to come with me?”
“Prince Yagami should know he is not going anywhere.” L’s voice was unwavering, more proof of his resolve than his unnervingly spasming fingers. “He will die down here. And, if he does awaken magics, they will cause nothing but harm to this world.”
Stepping forward, Light extended his hand. An olive branch. Perhaps it would be, when he’d drain himself fully of humanity. There wasn’t much left to go, and then the Spirits would let him through into their realm, and he could make himself a force of nature itself. He would remake himself, int he image of the world he would tower above.
Vines crept along the floor, lining the furrows the unenlightened might think were for blood. But the Spirits didn’t care for blood, not of humans. Light only offered his as a promise, as their gift to him, to be willing to accept the filth that flowed in his veins.
He could do the same for L. L’s flesh wasn’t primed, it would tear and stain and turn red, but his blood flowed even more surely than Light’s, and he was sure he could beg the Spirits for forgiveness for the contamination of their altar.
“L. I can show you. You’ve been watching me, you know what this can do for you.”
It could fix the haggard look in his eye, the years beyond his painted beneath them. The Spirits could give him purpose, like Light had found one, after so many years nothing more than a human prince who couldn’t see beyond his castle walls.
“Put the knife down, Prince Yagami.”
L levelled the crossbow up, at his head. Light’s fingers startled around the hilt, temporarily forgotten in his burst of hopefulness. Perhaps it was the Spirits’ kindness in his veins, the urge to do good for L, before he left him here.
“Ok.” Light stepped back, and set it down, lying across the altar, just above where his blood reflected the torchlight. “And… you do the same?”
“I don’t have a knife.”
“The crossbow, then. Or you can shoot me, if you need to prove it won’t do anything.”
Light, in fact, didn’t have full confidence in his own invulnerability. He was no fanatic, thinking his deity would grant him impenetrable immortality. But he trusted L’s hesitancy to prevail. He was always so reluctant to take the telling blow.
The crossbow bolt sailed past him, knocking the dagger off the altar, and skimming through the blood, leaving a mess as the bolt-head smashed into the beige stone.
For a moment, Light stared at it, before his eyes were drawn back to L like moths to a flame. L, who now stood limp, tunic hanging off him like his arm hung at his side, fingers loose on the now-useless crossbow.
“My blood will have no part in this.”
The crossbow fell, just as L’s monotone declaration reached Light’s ears. He didn’t quite flinch, but there was a flicker of something human, surprised, beneath his skin, and he remembered how it felt not to know everything. He could never assume L didn’t have another plan.
“I’m sure I can persuade you.”
“No. You need to leave here, Light. I have guards who are willing to block it off again, as soon as you promise never to return.”
“And why would I do that?”
L’s eyes darkened. Light felt radiant, absorbing the firelight, feeling the vital energy of this place flow into him. L might think he sounded crazy, but he knew he was right. He’d had it proven, he was proof himself. If the Spirits didn’t exist, then Light’s arms would still bleed where he’d sliced them open. But there was no more human inside them to flow from his veins.
“Because you are killing yourself, down here. Do you think no one has noticed?”
“Yes, actually. I’m surprised you did.”
“Prince Light thinks himself immortal. For all I know, he may one day be. But right now, he is sick.”
“Oh, so this is out of the goodness of your heart, is it, L? Pure altruism for your beloved prince?”
“No. The palace may not believe in this place, but I have no reason not to. You are bringing destruction to your home out of selfishness.”
Light’s hand was still outstretched. He nodded to it, redirecting L’s attention, and continued to smile. There was nothing not to smile about. L’s reaction was far from unexpected, and now he was unarmed, they could discuss reasonably.
“Want to see this destruction?”
There was nothing so absurd he could say, such as the Spirits had shown him a new, better world. Only Light had seen that, the vision that lived in his head, where he could conjure a kingdom with the joint power of two realms, and make it perfect.
No, all he was planning right now was to get a grip on L, so he could yank him back to the altar and cut him open. It would be Light’s first proof to the Spirits, that he was above them, when he spilled such contaminated blood as L’s over their shrine and offered his soul as a barbed gift.
Perhaps, if L survived, without whatever gifts the Spirits would take from him as repayment for his filth, Light would make him part of his new world.
For a long, long moment, L just stared. His shoulder hung low, his face without expression. He seemed to be thinking.
There was no way out. If he left, that was fine. Light had no need for civilisation, at this point. Without the crossbow, he had no way to kill Light, and stop his plans here. Light was immovable from his position.
L didn’t matter, unless he took Light’s hand, and surrendered himself.
“Just see. I… came hoping I could convince you of your folly. But Prince Yagami is so, so stubborn.”
L was hoping that would make him cave. That Light was far enough gone he’d rebel against any label bestowed on him by a human.
L underestimated his strength of will.
“You’ll understand why. Just let me show you what they showed me.”
More lies.
L accepted them, because at some point, the language of the Spirits surpassed that of humans. For all Light knew, he was speaking pure siren song, luring L closer, into that dizzying rush of victory that flooded him when a cold, clammy palm slipped into him.
Dark pools blinked up at him, and Light pulled, yanking L across the crypt even as he stumbled, shoving him forward and agains the altar with a near-manic enthusiasm.
“Blood, L. It’s our blood. That’s what makes the Spirits hate us. The trees don’t bleed.”
“Prince-“ L choked, as Light pushed him hard into the stone, grabbing the knife from where it had fallen and winding L in the process, until his voice came out strangled. “Prince Yagami should know he is not a tree.”
Light’s humour came thin, as the flames lining the room wavered, and L was before him like a lamb for slaughter. The Spirits would forgive the intrusion. This was the last lesion he would cut out of the world, because L was the sort who could infect others, if left to his own devices.
“Funny. You need to bleed, L. That’s how you do it. That’s what you think is death.”
“So- if Light bleeds, he will still die? To my eyes?”
“It’s not dying. This is- what you don’t understand. Here, it’s how you get rid of being human.”
“Hm.”
L’s breath shuddered through him, shallow and pained, and Light positioned his own knife in his hand, tracing out where he would strike. All he needed to do was raise his hand, and bring it down, a hammer of justice for this infected kingdom, and L would be the final body he’d step over. He’d cleanse the altar of L’s blood with the last of his own.
Raise his hand. See it drawn downwards, in his mind’s eye. Feel a blade sink into flesh, skin parting like leaves folding into themselves, cold against his ribcage as it struck through bloodless insides.
Mouth open, Light stepped back. Off L’s blade. Away from the boy coughing over the altar, Light’s blood spread across his chest and soaked through his tunic, his wrist angled just upwards enough to have driven the knife through Light’s heart.
“L-“
“I fear I lied, to Prince Yagami. He hadn’t quite yet driven me to truly rash measures.”
“You-“ Light brought a hand to his own chest, and it came away dry, and he marvelled, at how empty his insides were. How cold it was, down here, with the fire so far away. How cold L was, to look upon, expressionless and unmoving, as he straightened, and turned his back on the altar. “You…”
“I am sorry, my Prince. I wish we didn’t have to find out you could die like this.”