Queen Shatrina told Azura to go home.

She told her to speak to her mother, and to return if it was what she desired.

And she was so certain that it would be.

So certain that the betrayal would propel her down the path to a future she had perhaps only fantasized about. A future, she believed, could never be more than exactly that.

Azura felt differently, of course.

Overcome with a sense of relief that a strange night and stranger morning was behind her as she ventured into the woods, she followed the familiar winding path that led to the home she had always known. Quietus approached, or, it had arrived. So the leaves were red, golden, and rusted brown. They had fallen from their proud perches among the branches that now swayed barren in the breeze, and would return to the soil as they decayed, fertilizing it for next Nascency - when all would bloom again.

This was Azura’s favorite season.

While many view it as a time of death and often regard it as a somber time of the year because of it. Azura saw death as a constant just the same as life, and just as beautiful.

If the old did not die away, decay, and fertilize the garden of ife for what was new and lovely.

Life would have no room to bloom again.

If a story did not end, then a new one could not begin.

But, Azura had a strange way of looking at life and the things within it. Although her mother regarded it as refreshing, she knew that opinion was entirely biased, and just as… unusual.

Her boots crunched against twigs, dirt, and withering foliage as haphazard steps were taken. One left foot stepping too far to the right, and a right foot doing the same on the left. A thoughtless hand was also outstretched to caress the unkept shrubbery that reached out like fingertips, yearning for the touch of another.

There were few things in life more peaceful than this.

Few things in life that could settle her heart the way this fraction of paradise could.

In her mourning, she had almost forgotten all the most simplistic beauty in life that could heal a heart in need of mending.

As the matted dirt turned to loosely place cobblestone, Azura felt the knot that had been forming in her stomach tighten into something unravelable. There was a large part of her that felt she was just coming down from some drug induced hallucination, but another fraction that believed - that wanted to believe - there was some truth to all those world shattering revelations.

Everyone wanted to believe they held some sort of significance in this life?

Didn’t they?

Even those who convinced others - who convinced themselves - otherwise.

The sound of the chaos within that lopsided abode was calling to her like a familiar voice the closer she drew to that heavy wooden door. When her steps came to a stop and a clammy hand clasped around that cool doorknob, she could feel her pulse quicken. She could feel the beads of sweat form on her temples and chase down to the high plains that were her cheekbones. It was as if she was a teenager again, and after telling her mother she’d be home no later than ten she had instead stayed out all night long. Now, she’d returned, reeking of booze and regret with a rumbling belly and a mouth drier than the Tehtian desert.

It would have been so much simpler if that were the case.

Finally, a reluctant turning of her hand revealed that the door was expectedly unlocked, and as it was pulled open the familiar aroma of breakfast assaulted her nostrils. Azura hadn’t realized just how hungry she was until that smell left her tongue to salivate, and her mind began to fantasize about shoveling whatever freshly cooked concoctions awaited her inside into her mouth.

There was a pause in the noise when the door clicked shut behind her.

The horde had been alerted of her arrival.

“Zura!” A tiny, squeaky voice, called before a matching pair of small feet stomped their way from the kitchen. Passing over creaky wooden floors and sliding their way over to where Azura stood, the young woman soon found herself wrapped in a hug that was far too tight for her typical liking. Yet, she did not struggle against it, because there were certain exceptions to the rule of never invading her personal space.

The Alaris-Lucera household was once upon a time, a modest but not unimpressive establishment. Years ago, they were farther from the poverty line, but now, so few were. It did not help that Azura’s mother, Gaiana, had a tendency to take in orphans, either. However, when she saw those in need, she was compelled to do what she was able to end or ease their suffering.

There were ten children within the house that were not her own, but the one clinging to Azura, Meeshan, was. Aside from the brood of children was Creshlin Lucera, Gaiana’s husband. He was not Azura’s father, but he had acted as one for as long as she could remember. An eccentric man, who could often be found fixing things in the most unorthodox way around their deteriorating house.

“Hey Meesh,” Azura said with a sigh as she offered a somewhat affectionate pat on her head.

“You stink,” she replied remorselessly. It was followed by an endearing giggle that almost softened the blow of the harsh truth of the statement.

Kids were fucking savages when they wanted to be.

“Thanks… Meesh,” Azura grimaced with a much heavier sigh this time.

“Where were you last night, young lady?” Gaiana said as she appeared in the doorway, tossing a well used rag over her right shoulder. She was clearly an aged woman, but it only added to her specific brand of beauty. Her head was the same auburn shade as Azura’s, but her eyes were a striking blue instead. A fair complexion was decorated with lines from years of smiles and worries, and her hands were worn from a lifetime of using them to ensure her children never went hungry.

That they were always safe.

Azura had always regarded her as one of the most beautiful women in the entire world.

Not for the same reasons as a princess or a queen, but because her soul was the light in a world swept with darkness.

Because, often, she was the only reason Azura held on.

Which was why, if it was true, if she had lied to her for her entire life…

She wouldn’t know what to feel.

“Hey… Ma,” Azura’s whole demeanor changed as her eyes met her mother’s for a fraction of a second, and then fell to the floor. It was then that she pried Meeshan from her, and although the rumbling in her belly compelled her to flock to the kitchen to silence its groaning, she walked to her mother instead.

“What’s up, Z?” Gaiana said sweetly, a gentle hand rising to grip one of her daughter’s shoulders as sympathy settled into the furrow of her brows. She could tell something was wrong - she always could.

“There’s something… We need to talk about,” she said hesitantly as she closed the space between them.

Before she responded, Gaiana’s nose scrunched up, and her features pulled into a grimace. “And we can… As soon as you wash up and get something to eat… Meesh is right… You stink,” her voice softened and she laughed, but just the same as Meeshan, it didn’t lessen the blow as much as she probably intended it too.

At the very least, it was probably wise to wash the previous night off of her.

A night that felt like a fever dream.

Cyrus was a blur of heavy breathing and skin on skin, one overshadowed by the fact that apparently, Azura was royalty.

In reality?

She’d bet the contents of her bank account that they had the wrong girl, or that she had just been coming down off of some drugs. Unfortunately, that wouldn’t explain being inside the royal palace, and being escorted out when Queen Shatrina decided the best course of action was to allow her to seek the truth for herself.

It was hard to believe that Gaiana could lie.

Especially one of this… scale.

Azura stared at her mother for a long few moments, fighting some internal battle to blurt out the collection of things that was on her mind, but decided against it. So, she released a deep sigh that saw her posture deflate before she offered the weakest of smiles, and balled her hands into fist before knocking one on the top of the other.

“Right,” she finally said.

Gaiana knew something was wrong, but there’d been something wrong with her daughter for some time. She knew it had something to do with that boy, but she didn’t dare to pry. Azura came to those around her for help when she was ready, and not a moment before. Pushing would never get anyone anywhere, her mother had learned that in her teen years. A time filled with screaming matches and endless failed attempts to understand one another.

Until they both finally gave up and accepted that…

They never would.

It was the trouble with people.

That endless drive to comprehend what exists around them.

Especially those they loved.

The truth was, unfortunately, it was impossible. Even if you could grasp segments and sections of another person, it was impossible to register the entire picture. The field of view of the human eye just couldn’t digest such a grand image.

Yet.

We would endlessly drive ourselves mad trying to comprehend.

Trying to understand.

Even now, as Gaiana stared at her daughter, some part of her ached to know the recesses of her mind.

To know what hurts her and what might just help her.

“I’m gonna go shower,” Azura said with a lazy pointing of her jutted thumb behind her. Then, a graceless turn on her heel led her toward the spiral staircase to the upstairs of the rickety Alandris-Lucera house.

Some, who were used to more, would call the place a dump, and to some degree they were certainly right. There were many things that needed to be repaired that Creshlin hadn’t gotten to, and the things he had repaired were… less than professional. It never had bothered Azura, really. The only time their financial standing began to get to her was when she was old enough to understand that it was a hindrance to her mother’s happiness. That was when she began to craft dreams of being a great sorceress and buying them a sprawling manor in the Hilandri Hills.

She hadn’t quite made it there yet.

Instead, she spent her days working in a cafe along with Sarai, and although her friend made a shift a little less monotonous and soul destroying, she’d always felt as if she was missing something.

As if she was lost.

But didn’t everyone feel that way?

Didn’t - as they approached the midst of their life with nothing to show for it - everyone begin to feel as though they were slipping from their path.

From their purpose.

Whatever that may be…

There was a muted smile on Azura’s lips as she sludged through the hallway. She was admiring the photos on the walls, and losing herself in the memories of her childhood. In the moments written in the floorboards where she ran carelessly down the stairs and had no fear of tomorrow.

Why did we spend our youth hungry for the wisdom of adulthood, only to spend our adulthood hungry for the simplicity of our youth?

Why did wisdom teach us to appreciate all that the lack of it took for granted?

Life had such a wonderful sense of humor, didn’t it?

Azura grabbed a few things from her room, the bathing essentials, and then she meandered her way to the bathroom. Turning the faucet until the water forced its way from the spout, and raising her hand to allow her fingertips tickle its stream and gauge the temperature.

Scalding.

Just as she preferred.

There was no grace in the way she undressed, peeling the night away from her olive and ivory skin one layer at a time. The crimson attire from the night before was thrown aside as though it were little more than a rag before she was left as bare as the day she was born.

When those first few drops of water hit her skin it burned, but she welcomed the feeling. Something about it felt as though she was being cleansed of all her past transgressions - of all of her mistakes and missteps. While the water washed over her she let her mind drift far away. It wandered through the field of possibility that Queen Shatrina had planted with her words, and eventually found its way back to the images of the night before.

It had all felt so surreal.

Electric as they collided and clawed at one another like wild animals.

Blame it on Torpa.

Blame it on a year with the wrong person and a night with the right one.

The right one?

Come on, Z.

The right one could not possibly be a man who kidnapped you and surrendered you to the crown as a glorified hostage.

Not that she was admitting that was actually what happened…

With palms pressed against tile that likely needed replacing, Azura closed her eyes and allowed the steam to invade her nostrils. Hoping that, somehow, it would cleanse away all that ailed her.

All that held her back.

There would be no such luck.

Only time could do that.

Only growth.

She took her time once she exited the shower, carefully running a comb through long auburn hair as she savored the sensation of its teeth against her scalp. Like fingers, thoughtfully brushing through her tresses as she laid on the floor of the forest, absent a care in the world. Although her eyes had fallen closed, eventually they opened, connecting with their reflection in the mirror before her.

Azura didn’t like mirrors.

She felt the person she found within them was a stranger.

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It was always made clearer as she stared into those pools of hazel and wondered.

Who are you?

Given a person was not the same at the end of each day as they were that morning, it was a question that could not be answered.

There it was.

More of that yearning to understand.

The chosen outfit was much more modest that the small vermillion number she had worn the night before. An oversized sweater with holes in the sleeves she could slip her thumbs into, and a pair of tights adorned in patches courtesy of her mother. There was little effort otherwise. Her hair was damp and coated in the oil Gaiana had made to keep her curls hydrated, and her face was without makeup. Aside from the lingering onyx beneath her eyes from the night before that she didn’t care to properly wash off.

Eventually, she made her way down the creaking stairs to find the kitchen empty - almost. Gaiana was still there, cleaning up from the carnage of breakfast as she hummed to herself. An old lullaby that Azura still remembered from her earliest years. She’d sing it to her to put her to sleep, and to soothe her when one of her nightmares eventually woke her up.

For some reason, it tugged at something in her chest.

An old memory.

An old feeling she’d forgotten in all of her adulthood angst.

On the counter, was a plate of food put aside for Azura especially. While Gaiana did not greet her with a turn of her head or words, the dip in the side of her lips was an indication that she was aware she had arrived.

They had a language that was unspoken.

A bond that - presumably - could not be broken.

Those early years were foggy now, but Azura remembered parts of them. Instances where they could never spend a night in more than one location, and where they lived in constant fear.

Of what?

Her mother had told her they were Magi Hunters - Latru. That they were old blood of the Rakanett that had long died out. Natives to Occasus, the old world. The most dangerous parts of Anagénn that no one called home anymore because it held all that was lost. Dragons and other beasts that could topple a city in a fit of rage.

Azura had always wondered why her mother left.

She had always felt some part of her heart yearned for the simplicity of life among their tribe, but she never pried.

She accepted that she had her reasons.

Without a word, she grabbed the plate from the counter, and moved toward the window. In front of it, was a table that had been worn by the years, and two chairs that did not match. Beyond that window was the view of the yard polluted by children. Even when Azura grew frustrated with their own resources spreading too thin, she never did fault her mother from taking them all in.

Her heart was made of the purest of gold.

Rarer than what could be found in the mines of Teht, or on the heads of kings and queens.

Azura picked up her fork and began to poke at her food. It wasn’t that she wasn’t hungry - she was starved. Instead, it was the fear that the knot of anxiety in her chest might just force whatever she attempted to consume to exit soon afterward. Still, eventually, she popped one of those carefully seasoned potatoes into her mouth, and chewed glacially. She’d only barely made a dent when Gaiana turned the faucet to quiet the sink, and began to join her at the table.

Expectedly, there was a cup of coffee clutched in her hand that she placed down gently before taking a seat, tucking one of her lithe legs beneath the other as she released a contented sigh. “Alright,” she began, “what’s on your mind?”

There was no immediate response, but that was expected. Azura tended to pause before she allowed her thoughts to run freely. Otherwise she tended to hurt feelings, or not make any fucking sense.

After a few moments, she looked up, hazel clashing with blue before her lips parted, and her words stumbled out.

“Who is my father.”

The silence that followed was deafening.

Perhaps it was meant to be a question but it was presented as a statement - a demand.

It didn’t take long for a shade of pink to bleed from Gaiana’s features or those blue orbs to defocus. Some part of her knew this day would come, and some part of her expected it would be sooner, but another part of her hoped Azura had just let it go.

That she would simply let the past be the past.

Unfortunately, that was one of her many weaknesses.

The way she would replay the things she could not change over and over until they became a monster. Overanalyzing until it became something it had never been, or never would be.

That was something she did understand about her daughter.

“Why-”

“Just tell me,” Azura said quickly as she dropped the fork in her hand. The clash of metal on ceramic loud against the momentary quiet that followed the secondary demand. “Just tell me the truth,” she added.

Gaiana reached out and pulled that cup of coffee into her grasp, cradling it close to her as it was raised to her mouth. There was no sip taken, however. Only a deep inhale of its decadent aroma before it was placed back down on its perch on the table.

Where to begin?

For all these years, Gaiana had thought she was protecting her daughter, but following the news in Latrenia…

Did he even remember them?

Even remember her?

There had been other children that had followed and had come before. A wife, his Domina, and the growth of his Dominion.

The life she had decided she wanted no part of.

“I’d like to believe that… Long ago… He was not a bad man, but…,” Gaiana’s gaze, so often confident and warm, slipped to the table as she lingered on the word. Thoughtlessly, unkempt fingernails drummed on the side of that steaming cup of coffee as she tried to piece together what she would say.

But what to say?

Azura could feel that knot in her gut tighten further.

She could feel the sinking feeling that she’d been kept in the dark for far too long bloom into a reality.

But why?

The initial reaction was disbelief, but that would grow into anger…

Into resentment.

Certainly, she could see why she might have done it when she was just a child.

To protect her, or…

But when she had grown, when she had become a woman…

Hadn’t it become her chance to make that choice for herself?

So, Azura didn’t say a word. She simply adjusted her posture, eased into her chair but somehow retained rigidity in her posture, and stared at her mother.

Waiting.

“I can’t say that’s true anymore,” she finally continued. “Shit… Maybe it was some delusion all along because I was infatuated,” Galana laughed, but it was more nervous than amused. “Your father is… Dominus Zelarin Zulandri of the Xetus Dominion.”

----------------------------------------

Chu’ghal was a city-state of misfits.

It was a center for airships and the thieves that called them home.

Pirates, marauders, raiders, etc.

Despite that reputation it was a marvel to be admired. Spiraling marketplaces piled on top of one another haphazardly, lit up through all hours of the night, and swept in silence when the sun emerged from its slumbers.

There was never an evening that passed without a party.

Never a night uneclipsed by crime.

By death.

It was the excitement brought on by the fear it elicited that attracted the young adventurer that Gaiana was. Despite the advice of her people, she had departed Occasus in hopes of seeing the world. She’d long dreamed of joining the rest of Anagénn and building a life for herself.

Perhaps becoming a great sorceress requested at even the Tarian court…

The dreams of a young woman were often eerily similar despite the difference in generations.

Gaiana was perched in the midst of that glowing glamor, in a treetop tavern, and was on a winning streak in a game of Teleres. A notorious card game that was typically played among the lower class, and she excelled at it because…

She could read minds.

Although she had learned to silence it, and she often would, she would also use it to her advantage when the perfect opportunity presented itself. Since her departure from her homeland, she had done a good job of funding her adventures, but sometimes she cutting it close. So, when she saw the opportunity to replenish her reserves to the point of overflowing?

She got a little carried away.

Which was why she found herself fleeing from that treetop tavern. Exsiling from one place to another as she was pursued by a group of notorious marauders she had taken far too much coin from. At the moment, she stood in the midst of the parlor of a heavyset man who had just exited a bath. He had been, previously, happily shaking his hips in his towel until a shriek ripped from his core at the unexpected intrusion.

“Terribly sorry,” Gaiana said as she raised a hand to cup the side of her face, but did not stop. Especially as she heard the pounding of fists on the door just before it was forced open. By then, she was leaping from a window with open shutters, laughing as she descended to a canopy of trees below. The adrenaline pumping through her veins and forcing her heartbeat into overdrive had her operating on a high that she had been chasing since she left her tribe.

She had yearned for excitement.

And she had found it.

Even as she fell through that canopy the laughs did not cease. Nor did it when she landed on her back, auburn hair fanned outward to frame her heart shaped face. There was a light in her eyes akin to the glimmer found in the stars, and it stopped the heart of the man who looked down at her, wondering where she had fallen from.

There were stranger things to be seen in Chu’ghal, he supposed.

What was even more captivating was how unbothered she seemed by her circumstances, and the carefree way she reached outward to offer him a hand to help her stand upward. Of course, she had no idea who he was, but even then, the nonchalance was not something he was used to. Zelarin had an intimidating aura, and the rare shade of his piercing iris often soon alerted others of his status, but Gaiana was not so observant - not so knowledgeable. Life in Occasus came with a veil of ignorance that could be both a blessing and a curse.

In this case?

It was perhaps a bit of both.

“A hand,” she inquired with a smile. Beneath that lingering giggle, however, was something that sounded like a demand.

Another thing he was not used to.

It was so unexpected that he hesitated. The great Zelarin Zulandri, stuttered in his step before he offered one strong hand to the woman that laid on her back on the floor in front of him. With a thoughtful narrow to her eyes, and a slight tilt to her head, she placed her hand in his and allowed herself to be pulled upward. Her new upright position revealed his impressive height as she properly took him in. Pale skin, black hair, and a hazel iris she had never seen before in her lifetime. His features were handsome, but not traditionally. There could be an argument made that his nose was much too big for his face, and perhaps beaklike in its appearance. That his top lip was too thin while his bottom one was too pouty, and that his eyebrows were much too bushy - almost as if a caterpillar had taken up residence on his forehead.

However, that jawline, peppered in onyx stubble...

Gaiana was fairly certain it could cut diamonds if he tried it.

“T-thank you…,” she said, losing herself in her analysis for a moment. It was then that she noticed that she was still gripping his hand, and pulled it away almost awkwardly as she cleared her throat.

“Might I ask,” Zelarin began as she clasped his hands before his groin. The way he carried himself spoke of privilege, and as out of touch as Gaiana was, even she noticed it. “Where exactly is it that you have fallen from?” He inquired with an arching of one of those bushy eyebrows?”

“Oh, you see,” Gaiana began as her hands rose to rest on the curves of her hips. “I had always wanted to fly, and I got to wondering how those airships did it… So I figured I’d try it for myself,” she lied proudly.

Zelarin’s eyebrows raised as something like a smile settled into a smirk in the corner of his lips, and a hint of amusement thought to curl them into a grin, but it never did. “Hot air,” he said simply.

“Pardon?” Gaiana replied with a tilt of her head to one side.

“It is not very impressive… How they work. It is simply hot air… It rises in cool air, and the balloon is filled with it, and so… It floats,” he continued with a lazy gesture upward.

“Ah,” Gaiana said with a slow nodding of her head. “I should find some hot air to ingest then, and I may have better luck,” she trailed off as she began to look around awkwardly. Given her tendency to speak without thinking, it was not uncommon she would make a fool of herself.

But this had to be some sort of record.

“Your accent,” Zelarin continued nonchalantly as his hands moved to settle behind his back. “Where are you from?”

There were few rules in regards to Gaiana’s departure from her home.

She could not speak of her people, she could not bring anyone back to them, and heartbroken by what he viewed as a betrayal, her father had added that she could not return. No, she did not desire to be exiled by her people, but she knew to remain in their very small world would eat away at her soul until there was nothing left.

So.

Here she was.

“I am from… Everywhere… and nowhere,” she said as she took a not-so-subtle step away from him now. When those around her began to ask too many questions, it was often her cue to see herself out. Typically, it would take a few days, or even weeks, but it seemed Zelarin had jumped right to the probing questions.

“I have been to many places, and I have met many people… and I have never heard an accent like yours,” he continued as he took a step forward to counter her retreat.

He was right, of course. The emphasis she put on certain syllables was all wrong - foreign and archaic. There was also this effortless roll of her tongue when she encountered certain sounds. It was mesmerizing, as if she was singing a song each time she chose to speak.

That was when he truly noticed her and all of her enticing mystery. The fire of her hair, dancing with the browns found on the leaves of Quietus as they descend to the forest floor. Her skin was a muted olive within a perfect ivory ocean, and the sharpness of her cheekbones rose high upon features that spoke of a kind thought lost to time. While her eyes, as blue as the skies above Chu’ghal in a silent morning, were nestled within almond shaped slivers beneath a prominent brow.

And her lips…

Shaped in a pouty heart, and threatening to harbor softness the young royal wished to savor for himself…

He’d never seen a woman that looked such a way.

And yet?

The desire that flooded his veins was not that of a carnal nature.

He wanted to know who and what she was in excruciating detail.

To unlock her mysteries and lock them away in his memories where they could be savored whenever he pleased.

“I am sure you have never heard of it,” she smiled as she continued her gradual retreat.

Always fleeing.

Always chasing freedom.

However, Zelarin took one great stride forward and invaded the personal space she sought with her every subtle movement away from him. “I might surprise you,” he said in a tone that was much lower than he had used before. “Tell me… Strange beauty… Where are you from?” Zelarin’s hand rose to her chin steadily, where his thumb brushed delicately as he posed the simple query.

All the while, Gaiana felt her form ease into submission, and her mind followed shortly afterward. Whoever he was, whatever he was, she trusted him completely with all of her deepest secrets.

With all that was her.

“I am Gaiana of the lost Rakanett tribe of Occasus… I am far from home and I-...”

“Occasus?” Zelarin pulled his hand away from her as his eyebrows furrowed in interest. “I was told the tribes of those lands were long extinct-”

With the haze of the trance he induced dissipating due to his swift change in focus, Gaiana shook her head, her own eyebrows creasing together as whatever she was feeling turned quickly to anger. Which was why a sudden gust sent Zelarin flying backward, colliding with a collection of crates likely owned by whoever lived within the apartment behind him.

Stunned, but not hurt, he adjusted his coat, and considered what exactly had just happened to him.

What was she? .

Magi were rare, and yet he had found one in the midst of Chu’ghal.

One that had quite literally…

Fallen from the skies.

“I suppose I deserved that,” he said as he cleared his throat.

“Stay away from me with your… Touchy… Mind thingy… And your… Shit!” Gaiana gestured wildly as she took more steps backward, and much swifter than those she had taken previously..

Although Zelarin did not immediately follow her, he did not intend to let her depart. He was simply not without his manners - at times - and did not want to push too far beyond the boundaries he had already broken, and likely far too quickly.

However, when he went to speak again, he found his attempt interrupted by the arrival of those who had previously chased Gaiana here.

“You fuckin’ bitch! Give me back my money or-”

“Now, now,” Zelarin said calmly. “That is no way to speak to a lady...”

“Oh fuck off! You have no idea what you’re-,” his words were cut off as he turned his head, and locked eyes with Zelarin. For most, the color of an iris was a sign of many things.

Money.

Power.

Although Gaiana was ignorant to this fact, the men who chased her were not.

“S-She… She has some sort of power and she cheated,” he began to stutter suddenly as his posture lost its firmness with each shakey syllable.

Zelarin simply inhaled a deep breath, looked over the man and his allies, and then raised a hand to gesture gracefully. “I don’t care,” he quipped nonchalantly.

Although outraged hoped to erupt from the man in response, it was frozen within his lungs as he and his companions were turned into perfectly sculpted statues of ice. It crawled from their boots, ascended their legs, and concluded its path on the tops of their heads as they were left petrified. A few moments later, they were entirely consumed, and turned translucent, as if they had been merely carved and never once lived.

Gaiana could only stare as it unfolded. Stuck somewhere between horror and astonishment as she analyzed the look in their eyes just before the light was eclipsed from them.

Fear.

Fear unlike she had ever witnessed worn by a man or woman.

A fear that should have led her to flee that very moment.

Unfortunately.

Some lessons were taught the hard way.

“Come with me,” Zelarin said as he moved toward her unhurried, but with purpose. “I have a ship, I will take you wherever it is you wish to go… All I ask is that you tell me of your people… Of you,” he offered her a hand that hung in the air alongside his request.

Just the same as others.

Zelarin was led by a hunger for understanding, and for the moment, he hoped to understand her.

Gaiana could do nothing but stare at that offered hand in a heavy silence as she contemplated the path unfolding in front of her. While there was something within her telling her that there was danger ahead, that same hunger overshadowed whatever fear the unknown planted within her.

The truth was?

A life trapped away in Occasus for far too long had ensured that Gaiana was starving, and something about Zelarin told her that perhaps he could feed her unlike anything had before.

That if she wished.

She would never go hungry again.

Which was why, once again, she placed her hand in his, and the two of them vanished from the empty courtyard, leaving only the frigid forms of those who had led her there in their wake.

----------------------------------------

Azura hadn’t said a word.

Her hands had raised, clasped, and hovered before her mouth as her eyes defocused.

She was listening, devouring every detail that fell past her mothers lips, but it all felt so surreal.

It felt like some sort of twisted fairy tale.

“We traveled for years… He showed me the farthest corners of Anagénn and told of their secrets… He taught me how to use my power in a way I did not know I was able and when he found out that I was pregnant,” Gaiana sighed quietly as her eyes fell away again. It was unlike her. Often, her penchant for heavy eye contact left Azura uncomfortable, as she often avoided it. “He told me who he was,” she continued in a softer timber. “He asked me to be his Domina and told me of his family’s plan to bring all of Anagénn under one power,” her stare found Azura’s then, and at last she held it meaningfully. “It was not the first time he frightened me when I told him I would leave, but it was when I knew that I had no other choice… That I could not raise you with the love and compassion that I hoped to if you were left to grow in his shadow and I-”

Then her voice cracked.

In that involuntary sound, Azura could hear the fractures still in her mother’s heart.

She had loved Zelarin, and perhaps she still did.

In some way.

Azura had always felt that you never did stop loving someone, you only taught yourself to forget why you did so it was easier to be without them.

Or.

That love turned to hate.

Because to hate someone.

You must first grow to love them.

“We ran for years, and years… Until he stopped,” Gaiana stared toward the window as she spoke, the emotion drying from her tone. “I don’t know why, or how… But he did, and I thought that I was protecting you when I kept it all a secre-”

In the span of those seconds it took Gaiana to begin to explain, something in Azura snapped.

Some fire that had been dimmed by the heartbreak of recent months was left ablaze once again and it, as fire often did, wanted to devour everything in it path.

It wanted to burn and rise from the ashes.

To start a new free of all the pain and confusion that would turn that blaze into an monstrous inferno.

Her.

The one person she could trust wholly and completely.

Had lied.

Her entire life.

Rational and logic would tell Azura that she did it became she believed it was the right thing to do to in order to protect her.

But rational and logic were gone.

They had fled the building without their shoes with no hope of return.

What the fuck was anything anymore?

“When I was child… But why so long! Why… Always? Why keep me from who I am even when I became old enough to choose who I wanted to be?”

The eruption of emotion caught Gaiana off of her guard, anchoring her attention on her daughter as blue eyes narrowed in focus. Of course, she had always considered what damage a lifetime of lies might cause, but she had truly hoped this moment would never come.

That Azura would forever be free of the knowledge of what darkness lived in her blood.

“Zura I-”

“Why! Why couldn’t I make that choice?”

There were few things Azura hated more than the loss of control.

Then the inability to choose for herself.

The room shook with the impending storm that was Azura’s anger. It rattled up the rickety walls of the old house, and trembled in the ground beneath the feet of the playing orphans outside, forcing them to come to a stop and steady themselves.

The Xetu were a dangerous breed of Magi.

They did not rule their magic, they were ruled by it.

And it, was ruled by their emotion.

It was why, like Zelarin, they were taught to be void of it. Taught not to feel so that they would have complete control over the unspeakable power they could harness.

By keeping Azura from the practices of her father’s people.

From her people.

Gaiana had perhaps done more harm than she ever could have imagined.

The golden veins within her iris began to ignite like lava coursing through the crust of the earth, and bled into the skin the crawled over her cheekbones as she inhaled on shaky breath, trying to calm herself.

Azura was a slave to her ever changing emotions.

When they reached the heights of the many peaks they could climb.

She became someone else.

Something else.

So, as she felt herself losing her grip on that tight hold of control she constantly kept over herself, she rose from the table, and departed her home. Boots crunching into leaves as tears flowed from a burning hazel iris, and traversed the curve of her jawline.

She didn’t know where she was going or why.

She just knew that she needed to get away.

That she needed to run.