Chapter 8: Mysterious, Indeed

                                    

                                          
Leo strolled to the courtyard to get some additional training in. It wasn’t because he wasn’t good at fighting because he definitely was, as well as, known as one of the best soldiers in the Petran Army. He just needed to clear his head. He’d just had an unsuccessful conversation with his father. He knew his father had to have had a good reason. But it didn’t keep him from feeling hurt after their conversation.
He’d just snapped at him. So he left before he heard anything else. Julius had seemed so anxious and worried and when Leo spoke with Brooklynn about it, she told him to talk to him about it.
Maybe it had something to do with the safety of the Kingdom? In that case, Leo knew he should know. And at any point, he knew if that was the case Julius would tell him. They had a pretty good relationship. This was unusual for him. Especially for Julius.
Leo knew he needed to get his mind off of the matter. Julius meant well, at least. For now, he should train and take his mind away from the topic.
He readjusted his armor and unsheathed his sword. 
He’d barely begun to train when he spotted Silus, one of King Henry’s High Council members, walking past the courtyard in the shade. Leo was going to say “hi”, but when he noticed something off about him he kept silent so that he could not hear him. 
It wasn’t a feeling, he could literally see something off about him.
There was a dark overshadow on Silus’s face. It seemed that as he walked, he trailed dust from his face.
That wasn’t right.
Leo loosened some of his armor so that he wouldn’t make noise when walking, and he headed on Silus’s trail. He followed him through the halls and into a room where Leo thought, for sure, he was gonna stop. But just as Silus walked up to the wall opposite from the door, he pressed several bricks and stones and the wall cleanly slid open. 
Silus walked through, and Leo followed. 
Finally, he stopped and turned to where Leo could see his entire face, from where he hid without being spotted.
Half of Silus’s face was blackened with rotted features. The other side was working its way to be identical with black veins growing upon it.
That was when Leo realized it, it wasn’t dust Silus was trailing, it was rotting, deteriorating coal black,skin. His skin crumbled to dust as the air hit him. The already rotted half was completely black, his eyes were nonexistent, his nose was dust, and his body looked like a looming shadow. Silus began coughing in violent fits, then winced as if in pain, suddenly crying out. He screamed out and the whole secret tunnel echoed with repeated agony. 
As Leo worriedly focused on his face, the healthier half gained lengthening black veins that spread over it, until the black infection consumed his entire face, crumbling the skin to dust, like fire turning paper to ash. 
The only prominent thing seen on either side now was his ears and growing horns. He was… Elven? But Leo had seen elves, they didn’t look like that. For a scary moment, Silus was quiet. The shadow-like face that had deteriorated Silus’s, lifted and he suddenly looked perfectly healthy. Not a single black vein was to be seen, his ears appeared rounded and human, the horns Leo had sworn had been protruding from his head were nonexistent, and his entire body appeared just as it normally did.
But Leo knew the damage had been done, this wasn’t the Silus everyone knew. 
Leo realized that this meant this thing was gonna head back, which meant if he didn’t split, he’d be caught. Lord knew what this creature would’ve done to him, if he were to get caught. He stood behind the wall where he’d been hiding, and he ran as fast as his legs could quietly carry him.