Chapter 2: Two Scions of Two Broken Houses
28 of Elaud,
Year of 1268 of the Sixteenth Cycle
Sparing Ring outside Ravenwatch
’When I entered the City of Song, my heart began to beat. It fluttered like the wings of a Motari, and for the first time in my travels I was sure I had come to the right place. The Eternal Forest had been beautiful, as had mountains of the Great Valley - and even the City of a Thousand Tents and a Thousand Swords had a certain grand majesty to it if you could ignore the sounds of fucking and fighting. But none of them had made me felt as much as a weight in my heart as the City of Song. To all the prospective wanderers of the world, take heed of my words! Visit the lands of the Motari!’
— And So I Shall Wander, p. 120.
“Demonstrate a proper Strike, Kyallan!” booms Father’s voice, reverberating across the training field. I zip my sword up, leaving a small trail of brightly glowing softlight hanging in the air until the apex of my swing before swiftly hardening it, sending it slicing through the air towards Father. He frowns and batters it aside with his own blade. “That strike lacked force, Kyallan. A strike is a potent weapon in your arsenal, particularly when facing other wielders of magic. Try again.”
As I raise my blade above my head, ready to execute a powerful downward strike, I suddenly see a thin blade of Hardlight hurtling towards me in a horizontal direction, meant to counter any attempt to dodge left or right. In a split-second decision, I choose to fall backwards and plant my sword into the ground to avoid being hit.
The Strike whizzes above me as I use my Light in my legs and core, quickly enhancing them and pulling myself back upright. I find my Father's blade already at my throat.
“And thus, you are dead.” He says. He takes the blade away and takes a few steps back. “Strike, Kyallan - and do it properly. Improper form leads to failure.”
“And failure leads to death.” I say, the memories of a year prior jumping back into my mind. He nods. “Your Strike would have been powerful - but you can have all the power of the gods, and it wouldn’t matter if you left yourself wide open for a single quick cut. You tried to recover, to dodge, but you underestimated your opp-“ his voice is cut off by a hacking cough, and he plants his sword into the ground and coughs up a bit of mucus onto the sand. He then looks at me, angry.
“Your opponent left you a perfect opening, and you did nothing?” He says, raising back up to his full height. “Come, Kyallan. Strike me with proper form.”
I prepare myself, feeling the weight of the blade in my hand as I bring it up to a ready position. I bring my weight back onto my back leg, pulling my sword behind my back. A deep breath, and then I’m swinging my blade through the air, a trail of softlight following the tip like I’m rending the air itself. I finish, pulling the blade back up over my head as I harden the light into a sharp edge and let it cut through the air towards him, a perfect round arc.
My form was perfect, precise - deliberate.
My Father smiles, and moves his guard to deflect it, holding the blade aloft but at an angle enough that it can make contact with the Strike and push it upwards - the Ochs.
But I’ve taken another step and thrown another perfect Strike. He takes a step back, Conjuring a wide shield. My second strike crashes into the shield and slices through with ease. He stumbles back, a long gash opening in his chest.
“Good. You struck with precision and power,” he says, his voice calm and steady. “Never hesitate in battle, and never fail in battle, Kyallan. Your opponent won’t hesitate to strike you down.” He gestures to the wound. “This wound would put me out of fighting. In the Das’en’uei, a blow like his is called an escalit - coming from the word escalate. Either I would accept defeat, or it would be considered a duel to the death. What would you have done next?”
I study my Father's stance, searching for any sign of weakness. As he recovers from the blow, I make a swift movement, transitioning from Zornhut to Wechsel guard. With this guard, I can take advantage of the situation and execute more powerful Strikes without compromising my position by entering into his Conjured weapon's range. I hold my ground, poised and ready for the next move. He nods.
"Good, Kyallan," my father says as he Repairs himself. "Remember, Strikes are a powerful tool, but they can't compare to a well-placed hit from a Lightblade. You can't enhance Strikes like you can your muscles - they rely on technique and the amount of Light you put into them. Regular attacks, on the other hand, rely on the strength of the action itself."
He pauses and looks towards the sun, his eyes fixed on the blazing ball of fire in the sky. I follow his gaze and squint, trying to catch a glimpse of the fiery orb. He exhales deeply, almost as if he's in a trance. "I truly pity the lesser races," he says in a soft voice, "those who cannot see the majesty of this god-given light. It pains them to look at it, to truly see it."
“Hurts them? Why?” I ask. He shakes his head. “I suppose they are not as gifted as us. I cannot answer questions meant for the gods. Now, Kyallan - I am required in Edgehaven. Another Das’en’uei has been called - and yet again I am to answer. They stake a claim of something different this time, the only plot of land House Daai still holds in the capital. I expect you to train your Enhancement. The more you use the abilities we have been given, the more efficient you will become.”
I look up at him with pleading eyes. “Please, Father,” I beg. “I promise not to interfere. I just want to learn from you, to see the Das’en’uei and how you handle it.” He shakes his head. “To do that is to announce you as my successor, as the next patriarch, and to do that is to open you up to challenge - which you are not ready for.”
“Father…” I say, but then I feel him close his heart. He simply shakes his head. “You are not ready. Do not forget what happens when you fail.”
A gust of wind blows from the east, so hard it nearly knocks me off my feet. My hair, black like Father's, has grown long. Father continues walking towards the keep like the wind had no effect on him. I want to be like him. I want to be strong.
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13 of Kolta
Year of 1266 of the Sixteenth Cycle
Ravenwatch Keep’s Lightbathing room.
A large oval table made of fused glass glows dimly with light, outmatched and outshone by the great outpourings of the sun that bare down on the lightbathing room. Glass as clear as water replaces the walls from their normal colour of early-morning dawn, seamlessly transitioning between the normal keep and this place.
In the centre of the table lies a great pile of grey stone, the purpose of which Father has never commented, though I see him look at it almost every time he enters the room. It rises to the roof, where at the top is carved the crest of the Bluefeather Ravens — House Daai, a resplendent Raven mid-flight, the blue feathers reflecting the light of the sun.
Carvings run throughout it, telling stories of ages past. I have looked at them for years, but I am no closer to knowing what they are. I pick at the green shrubbery on the white, reflective plate, my stomach growling enough that Mother’s ears prick, but she doesn’t say anything.
She’s cut every piece of food on it into ribbons or squares, occasionally picking up a piece of wilted lettuce or stale bread and eating it with a grace she has never let up. The air is dry and the heat is an absolute in every breath and every piece of movement. The only saving grace is the occasional bit of air that flows through the keep through the two open doors.
It is nice to be in this room. I feel calmer here. The rest of the keep is dusty, the wood is wet and strange, the drapes are frayed and I have only seen the hearth ablaze once before. I Conjure a fork and a knife, making sure the knife is as sharp as I can make it.
Even getting the knife to bite into the bread is difficult, stale as it is. Father and Mother can change their knives to have a serrated edge… I focus on the knife, trying to picture their knives in my head. How the light loops around and continues and continues until it’s like waves across the whole thing.
The mould changes, making uneven loops of Hardlight until it cracks and my Light spills out onto the glass table. I sigh, reforming my knife without the serration and digging into the bread. Eventually, I get it cut open, and I use the fork to stuff the lettuce inside.
A single bite tells me that this will not be a pleasant experience, the sheer dryness of it seems to suck the moisture from my mouth. I swallow, grabbing the cup of water and drinking from it greedily, sending a small prayer to the God of Humans.
“Mother, what has happened?” I ask, and her eyebrows raise. “Why do we eat… this?”
Her jaw clenches, the gauntness of her face showing the strain of the bone beneath. “Our hunting ground has been taken from us. House Kaelis claimed it in the last Das’en’uei. Your Father was unsuccessful in the last Das’en’uei. Game has become scarce without the rest of the grounds. Don’t worry, Kyallan. This will get better. Your Father is still strong, it is simply a matter of reclaiming the land next year.”
After she speaks, a strange silence descends — suffocating, like the thickest of winter mists.
I turn my attention to the only other thing on my plate; boiled potatoes, cutting into one and shovelling it down, the blandness unbearable. — worse than as if it had tasted bad. Mother reaches over, her long fingers gripping around a bowl, bringing it over to me. Her hands tremble.
Inside is a handful of pitch-black berries, positively fragrant compared to the rest of my food. “Eat these for taste, the potatoes of sustenance. Eat the bread. You will need the life it will give you.” She advises, her voice as hollow as the halls of Ravenwatch. Using two fingers, I pick out a blackberry. These must be the last pickings of autumn. I’ve never had them, but they smell good. I put one in my mouth carefully, then another slice of potato.
It almost makes it taste good.
Mother grinds on a piece of bread, ripping it from side to side in her jaw. It looks even staler than the piece she gave me.
A sudden gust of wind blows through the bathing room, catching the sweat on my face, and taking away some of the heat. Father staggers through the connecting hallway, his hand pressed on the dawnstone before he steps out onto the glass.
The stench of alcohol follows him like a band of trumpets announcing the march of an army as he lumbers over to the chair beside Mother, collapsing into it with a deep sigh as it groans under his weight. His eyes land on the boiled potatoes; which stare back at him with an unrepentant gaze.
He lifts a hand, pressing a single finger into the bread, applying more and more pressure until it lets out a crack into the air and splits in half. He looks at Mother. “Did you give me the stalest piece, women?” he growls.
She doesn’t speak — instead, she grabs a piece of her own bread and grinds it between her fingers until it turns to a fine powder that falls like sand onto her plate. With a grunt, Father turns away from her and stabs a fork down into one of them. I hadn’t even noticed him Conjure it.
One whole potato goes in, and then he brings the bottle to his mouth, brown liquid disappearing rapidly from the glass. He slams the bottle down on the table, so hard I look at the table to see if it has cracked, then he wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, smearing the liquid around. A question burns in my mind.
“Father, what happened?” I ask. He freezes as if he's been suspended in time. Just when it seems he would ignore the question, he speaks. “I did not lose… but I did not succeed.”
His tone is heavy with regret. “Four claims were laid against us. One of which was the rest of the hunting grounds — those that have been under House Daai’s control for centuries. I defeated three of the fresh-bloods. They sent their boys to train against me because they know I cannot kill them. I beat their challenges… but when it came to the fourth claim, my Power was exhausted. I did not enter. They would not hesitate to kill me if I had entered with no ability to even Conjure a blade.”
He looks up, the light shining directly into his eyes. “What a strange world this is. That we Lightblades cannot be infinite even under the midday sun.”
He looks at me, his face contorted into a frown, and rises abruptly from his seat. “Kyallan…” he says, raising a hand towards me.
“We have something that must be done.”
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We had gotten dressed quickly, wrapped the furs around our legs, and we had marched out into midday. The sun shines through the thick clouds, but where the bathing room had been sweltering, out in the world the air is frigid. Father has not told me where we were going, but I knew.
I could feel it in his movements. A certain fury burns in his muscles.
He had driven his horse to the point of collapse as too had I; else I would have fallen behind. I have never been this far from Ravenwatch. I have never seen the trees up close except for the large tree in the Yard, and the sparse trees that sprout from the ground near the sparing ring. Leaves of red drop from them, falling to the ground and beginning to decay. It’s here we stop.
“Tie the horse to a tree; any tree. They are too foul for hunting; the prey will smell them from Edgehaven.” He says, and I being tying a decent knot around a tree, then give the horse a pat on the back when it is done.
Father nods, and takes a deep sniff of the air, holding that sniff for what seems like ages. “Father?” I ask, and he stops, looking at me and asking me a question that catches me off-guard. “Enhancing - what is it?”
I blink, confused. “The act of using light to make you stronger?”
He smiles. “Not quite. You are right, but you are wrong. Enhancing allows you to empower your muscles. This doesn’t allow you to make you smell better, but you can enhance your diaphragm to pull in more air than you might normally. More air, more chance of catching a whiff of anything.” He says, then frowns. “I’m not smelling much else other than the horses. Let us stalk for a while, follow the wind.”
We both tread carefully, noise kept to a minimum; as much as possible with the leaves around us. We walk for what must be an hour before we find a river.
“This is the river, Bollen. It’s a tributary to the river that runs through Edgehaven, Sekkha. I’ve caught many a game here; deer comes to drink. Otter and weasel too, on occasion. In spring and summer, all of our fish has come from here — it flies through the water so fast you can barely see it. I’ve had to run off wolves that sit where it curves, biting at the fish until they finally manage to catch one. It is a strange irony considering the new owners of this forest.”
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“House Kaelis?” I ask. “Why is it ironic?”
“They are the House of the Ironfur Wolves. A strange way to say that their emblem is that of a grey wolf.” He says, and then steps into a nearby bush and sits, prompting me to follow suit. When I do, he continues.
“Sometimes, even in winter, you’ll see a stag or wolf venture for water. We will sit here for a while; we will see if the Gods bless us with luck. If not, we will go hungry.”
His words sink into the ground until it is like they were never spoken. Neither of us utters a word or moves a muscle; listening to the world around us. It is near silent, with the only noise being the occasional chirp of some nearby insect or the tweets of birds.
So deep is the silence that I hear my Father’s breathing as though it were a mountain moving. As such, I hear it when it changes to be louder before it comes to a full snore. His posture doesn’t change, holding onto a stick so he can lean forwards. How tired must he be to fall asleep here? I can’t rip my eyes away from him.
I have only ever seen him from the edge of a blade; be it mine or his. There’s a burning in my chest. All the times he’s cut me or smacked me in the fight, all the times I have been pushed onto the sand and kicked. I could Conjure a dagger right now. I could kill him if I wanted to.
I look at my hand.
It would be easy.
He wouldn’t see it coming — would he even suffer?
His eyes snap open, and he looks upwards, speaking in a low voice. “Kyallan… there is game.” He says, and I follow his eyes. What looks to be a stag warily looks around as it passes between two large boulders, ears on a swivel as every sound makes it jump.
It takes tentative steps down the embankment, the small river stones shifting under its weight. Father moves so his mouth is right next to my ear, then he whispers in such a low voice I can barely make out the words. “Now, Kyallan. Conjure a bow, but don’t make it too bright. Aim just behind front legs — that’s where the lungs are.”
I put my hand out, forming a mould of a bow and slowly filling it with light so that the stag is not startled by a sudden flash. When the mould is filled, I Conjure an arrow, placing it carefully on the hold and pressing the notch into the string. The string is difficult to get right, it has to be both soft and strong at the same time. I stand up slowly, pulling the string back, taking aim. Hit the lungs… hit the lungs.
The stag jumps, falling backwards and smashing its legs into the river stones as it runs. I let the arrow go, but it misses the chest and digs itself into the rump. I turn to Father but he’s no longer there, he’s up in the tree beside me.
He leaps to the next, his movements full of power; obviously enhanced. He means to follow. I enhance myself, charging out of the thicket and into the forest, moving fast enough that I have to dodge trees. The stag is leaping with grace and speed despite the arrow sticking from its behind.
I stop still and try to notch another arrow but I’ve lost focus on the Conjuration; the string is too loose and the body doesn’t flex. Father has Conjured his own bow and he lets loose an arrow only for the stag to hop to the side at the last second and flee into the tree line. My hopes disappear but my Father doesn’t stop, flinging himself from the tree and continuing on.
I follow as best I can but I can’t match his pace and soon enough I am alone in the woods, the noise of my Father gradually fading. As I catch my breath, my throat seems to seize up and my heart begins to beat harder. I look around, but all I see are trees that look the exact same over and over again.
Sticks and small dead roots poke through the dirt, and as I take a step back my leg catches and I tumble backwards.
Why? Why am I feeling like this? This fear? This worry?
I hear something move nearby, and I freeze. It makes big sniffs, and the footsteps sound unafraid and so, so heavy. Something comes into view, and a glint reflects in the corner of my eye. I don’t dare to even look.
A voice comes. It is not my Fathers.
“Well… what is this?” a voice speaks; high-pitched but with an obvious authority. “A poacher on our new grounds?”
My heart sinks as the realisation snaps into place in my head. These are members of House Kaelis. I don’t move. I don’t breathe; I don’t even try to think. I hope and hope they think me dead. I hope they move on; a vain wish. They do not.
I hear a strange sound, and then the rush of wind. Instinct forces me to roll clear, and I Conjure a spike, stabbing it into a tree and hauling myself up just in time to see a massive pair of teeth bite around the tree, ripping into bark before it retreats back.
“Aha! Whoever it may be, they certainly have excellent instincts. A second later and Kaela would have had an extra treat.”
He says, and I pop my head around the tree, watching him pat the giant beast on the side, leaning down from a saddle. “Come, boy. You are obviously a Noble; the peasantry do not move with such fluency. I imagine you are one of Ashen’s? They do tend to live up to their namesake; looking for scraps wherever they can. Where is your guardian?”
I don’t speak; I don’t know if it's an instinct borne from fear or a conscious decision. Every part of me screams that they will kill me if they know I am House Daai. Seconds pass, and someone up above laughs. “The boy seems afeared — the wolves must scare him, Ulo.”
“Aye, they must. I wonder if he’s pissed himself yet. Or mayhaps he’s the type to go straight to the shitting.”
They both laugh in unison and then an oppressive silence fills the air. The message is clear; now or never. I run, enhancing my legs to pull me through the thicket as fast as I can go. A voice shouts behind me as giant footsteps begin to pound the earth.
“Oh, child! You should never run from a wolf of House Kaelis!”
Pounding footsteps creep on me as wind rushes through my hair, the coolness of it ripping away my head. My muscles are already tired from chasing the stag, and my mind swims. Where is father?
Tears drop down my eyes, clouding my vision. I keep running, squinting through to see the trees and roots ahead; all ready to trip me. I can feel the teeth behind me, I can feel the eyes in the back of my head. There’s a snap, and I leap forward, Conjuring a spike that I plunge into the wood, pulling myself up and Conjuring another to hold me steady. The teeth slam into the tree below me, growling and tearing pieces of the bark.
“You have luck, boy! If it were not Kaela, you would be food already.” He says, stroking the thick fur of his wolf. It’s a monstrous thing, easily three times the size of the wolves I’ve seen in books. It looks at me with calculating eyes, but the man atop her presses on her back and she looks down.
“Kaela can’t follow you up there anymore. She’s too old for that. You’ve escaped me. Well done.” He smiles, then his eyes flick to the right. I follow the tell, seeing a jaw full of teeth and the head of a predator only feet from me. Eyes watch me for movement as the jaws close, ready to tear into prey.
That’s what I am.
That’s all I am.
Prey.
A foot comes from above, smashing down into the snout of the wolf and following through into the ground. I hear the crack of bone and a yowl of pain as the sheer mass of the wolf is plummeted into the ground, its legs folding over its back and smashing into the tree, a rogue leg kicking out and planting itself squarely into my chest.
I shoot from the tree into the ground below, my back scraping across the ground. I twist over as I hear voices, my nails gripping a tree as I try to pull myself up. There’s no air in my chest; it’s all gone. Everything is gone; my vision blurs, I heave up a slop of berry and bread, and I clutch onto the tree. Only my ears work.
“I accept the results of the Das’en’uei. I only wished my son to see the forest before it was passed over.” My Father says, his voice hard and ready.
The man sitting on the other wolf sounds almost… afraid.
“That’s not how it works; you forfeited any right to be here as soon as you lost. As soon as you did not show up. As soon as you did not dare fight me.”
My Father raises his voice from a low menacing tone to outright shouting. “You are a coward. I had fought three bouts before that; there was no strength left. You are smart enough to know this, Egal. You are smart enough to know that I would slaughter you, here and now, if your wolf had hurt my son.”
Ulo’s voice comes next. “We had thought him one of Ashen’s.”
“Well he is not; he is Daai. You have right to attack me; you may even succeed. But one of you will die. No matter the outcome; no matter the angle you attack, no matter if you call the wolf-riders that you surround me with — one of you dies before you can even blink. Do not mistake your easy victories in the Das’en’uei for your own prowess.”
I pull myself, up and open my eyes, watching my Father. He’s standing right at the snout of two wolves, unconcerned by their low growls. I watch as he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a single two-sided coin.
“Have you ever heard of this; the coin flip?” He asks, nonchalantly. “It’s said that both sides have an equal chance of landing upright. He flips the coin round, showing two sides; one that of a Lion, and the other a Conjured Lightblade held aloft. He flips the coin up, catches it, then puts it on his hand before revealing the coin. He stabs his finger out at Ulo and speaks a single word. “Dead.”
Then he does it again, flipping it over. This time, it must land on a different side because this time he stabs his finger out at the other man. “Dead.”
He flips it again, and again and again, not uttering a word but simply looking at their faces when the coin lands. After the sixth time, Egal spits on the ground. “Be gone, Daai. Take your son and be gone. These are our grounds now. Should we find you here again — you will die.”
The wolves growl, and refuses to turn before the Kaelis men turn pull on the reigns and pull them away. Their heavy footsteps stalk off into the woods until I can no longer hear them. Father walks over to me and puts a hand on my shoulder, giving a short nod before he bends down and puts me over his shoulders and begins to carry me through the forest.
“I am sorry, Kyallan. You were not ready… and I was foolish. I should not have come. I should not have brought you.”
I don’t speak. There’s too much in my chest; it feels as though it will burst. I feel pride and awe and sorrow and hatred and anger all in one swelling cacophony of emotion.
I feel shame burning me above all else.
I was too weak to even save myself. If not for Father… I would be dead. If not for Father… everything would have failed. Without Father’s strength, House Daai would not have even survived for my birth.
I can feel it in his strained movements.
The crushing weight on his shoulders.
I am a burden beyond burdens.
I am something he must carry.
That he has to carry.
I pat my Father on the shoulder, then speak so weakly the shame grows inside me. “Please, Father. Put me down. I wish… I wish to walk.”
He doesn’t respond. He doesn’t put me down.
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I wake only when I am put down into a familiar chair. My plate remains; the leftover scraps of food now freezing cold, as too is my body. The sunbathing room is nowhere near as warm at night; in fact, it may even be colder than the rest of the keep.
I look around for Father, and he is in the next chair over, his eyes closed and his breath misty. He breathes deeply, then opens one eye and looks at me. Shame comes back as my memories do, and I look away.
“Do not avoid my eyes.” He says, but I do not turn. “Look at me.”
I follow the order and look into his hazel eyes, and then I release the breath I was holding. He’s… smiling.
Then he begins to laugh, so hard the glass table shakes in unison. His hand slaps on top of it, so hard I swear I hear the cracks forming even if I cannot see them. When he stops, he looks up at the sky.
“I think it is time for you to know exactly why we are here. Why our House fails; why we must suffer humiliation.” He says, then puts his hand out and projects formless light into the air, illuminating the grey stone which the table surrounds. “This, Kyallan, is both your history and your future. This is our Wall of Memoriam. Each House has one; even those that are dead. It tells of our ancestors both recent and far, far away.”
He points to a name, one with strange symbols carved around it; all planted like seeds into a square around the name. “This is your Grandfather, Maeser. He sired seven sons and no daughters.” He says, pointing to the lines that follow from the box to seven names; six of them with boxes around them. His voice is low, almost reverent.
“These are my brothers. When we are born, a name is carved into the stone. When we die, our name is enclosed in the stone and stories stop being written for us. The year of our death, the month, the day; are recorded. Once, I was the very last of House Daai. Father was dead; my brothers were dead. I was alone.”
I put my hand on the stone. It seems to almost mourn in silence. “What happened to them? How did they die?”
He’s quiet for a moment. “That is both a simple question and a complex one.” He says, running his own fingers over the Memoriam. “Tell me, Kyallan; why do people fight?”
I take a breath, but a sharp pain digs into me and I let out a grunt, clutching my chest. I think I know the answer. “To survive?”
He nods. “That’s one reason. Some fight for survival. Some fight for glory, for honour, for women. Money. Power. All reasons that people fight.”
I look at him. “Which one… do you fight for?”
“Revenge.” He says, his voice hardening and filling with anger before he stops himself. “At least, that is what I wish I could fight for. Instead, I have been relegated to fighting for survival. You must have felt it Kyallan; the age of this keep. The age of the lands surrounding it. You must have felt it in the forest.”
I don’t understand. It must be evident on my face.
“Our history goes back centuries - cycles, even. This keep has stood through wars and famine. It is House Daai’s home, our legacy — but we are a dying House, Kyallan. Today I could not even afford to purchase meat to feed us. In a week, in a month — we might be so poor that grass is our only sustenance. Do you know why this has happened?”
I shake my head, and I can’t rip my eyes from him.
“It was because the other Houses betrayed us. As soon as the Sorcerer-King disappeared, they started to bicker. Impatient fools. Whilst we fought against the lesser races in the War of Rebellion, they schemed. They broke apart what the King had spent decades building. The Motari, the Hrakka — the Varg and Voidorne — they were the hammer and the other Houses were the anvil. My Father fell in the war, and three brothers fell with him. They died best. They died heroes, unknowing of what would come next.”
“What? What came next?”
“Full betrayal. As the war started to close, as defeat loomed, the other Houses bickering turned to feuding. Feuding became infighting and we became a target. None had given more to preserve the image that the Sorcerer-King had built. Not a one!Not even his descendants!”
He stands up, shouting into the air. “We lost men we did not have, spent money we did not own. We had lost brothers, our father!” he says, looking at me. “If you take no other meaning from this; heed these words. No good deed goes unpunished. For our service, the other Houses feasted on our injuries. One after another, my remaining brothers died whilst I could do nothing to help. I was only a year or so older than you; a weak child with no heart. I watched as my House died a slow and painful death. I watched the last member crawl to my feet and die right there on the stone. House Daai wasn’t alone in this fate; oh no.”
He sits back down, the rage turning to seething anger. “The only ally to stay true was House Tarant — the House of your Mother. They were cut down, assassinated or outright disappeared. Soon, it was just your Mother and me. Two Scions of two broken houses. We… eloped. She accepted me into her arms, and we made a pact. We’d stop at nothing to bring retribution. To bring justice. From there, I had no other choice — I still have no other choice. I fight and I fight and I fight again and again. There is no love between your Mother and me. We are both tools, fit to forge a weapon of greatness… to forge you. I was born strong; the strongest of my brothers… but time has stolen away my potential and returned me illness. I am only fit to bring out your potential. You are stronger than I was at the same age.”
He taps the table twice. “You must take heed of my teachings; and those of the Sorcerer-King. You have to be the one to rejuvenate this House and bring damnation to our enemies, Kyallan. I can’t do it. My body begins to falter; the cause unknown,” he says, and talks in a softer tone.
“I have to believe the Gods have chosen you. You were born with a mark on your forehead, glowing ever so brightly in the dark. I have spent so much time surviving instead of succeeding. You have to be it… you have to be.”
I look upon my Father with new light. I can see the weakness; the waning resolve — and I can feel the weight behind him once more. The crushing pressure then seems to sit on him like a giant clings from his shoulders. I feel an ounce of the pain he has gone through and I fear it to be too much. My voice betrays me. I mean to sound strong but I do not. I sound weak.
“I… I am a weapon?”
He nods, seeming ever so tired. “You are the strongest weapon we can forge. Sharper than any sword, stronger than any hammer. But no weapon is complete without tempering. You will hate me. I will hurt you, push you to the brink of what you can handle and then beyond that. You must accept that. When I am dead, you can spit on my grave, carve my name from the Wall, erase me from history — whatever you must do to feel complete. You may even be the one to put me there yourself.”
A flash of memory hits me. My Father asleep on the river bank, my eyes roving for his neck. That feels so… stupid now.
“Whatever you do, you must be stronger than anyone else, or everything disappears. We will exist only in our enemies’ records of conquest. I will not last long enough to see your children, but I will last long enough for you to take my place. You do not have a choice… but in time you may allow for them to have what you could not. Your own daughters may frolic in fertile fields. Your sons may choose to set out upon the word with sword, or sail to distant lands.” He says, then sighs.
“But not you. You must be a blade to rend all foes.”
Tears drop from his eyes. “I had hoped that I would not have to pass this burden on to you. I knew that I would die with an engraving around me — one that would tell of no battles, no glories and no triumphs. I accepted that. I would allow my children to have that. But they never came. Years and years of trying, and you are the only one, Kyallan. I am not strong enough to do it alone. You must be stronger than me or else this cycle will continue.”
He looks down at the ground. I put my hand out, feeling as though it is right to do, and for the first time in my life, I Conjure a sword near-instantly. A true sword, with sharp edges and balanced weight. I hold it above us, and I speak with strength in my voice I didn’t know I had.
“Father, you have been the Shield of House Daai for many years. One day, when I am stronger, I shall be the Sword. Strength Shall Be Forged Anew, Father.”
“Are those to be the words you will take when you are Patriarch? Very well.” He says, Conjuring his own blade, placing it across mine and giving me the rarest commodity he can trade; a smile.
“Strength Shall Be Forged Anew, Kyallan.”