Dynasty of Blood and Flame

Chapter 6

Their third child was born cold. He still cried when he emerged into the world, he still ate, but his skin was cold as ice. His eyes were pale, near colorless and the little hair he had was shock white. The downy beginnings of black feathers dusted his shoulders. Gareth could practically hear the wolf at his door. He could feel it, this one had a connection to something. Gareth just prayed it wasn’t something that would hurt him. Like his siblings, he was so small, it was unfair such a responsibility had been thrust upon one so tiny.

“Would you like to be the one to name him?” Mohg asked. He could sense the king’s worry. Mohg was worried as well, for both of them. All children eventually grow apart from their parents, they form their own opinions and have their own private experiences that shape them beyond the will of their guardians. That is simply a part of life. However, for this little one, that natural part of life might lead to their deaths one day. He was still Mohg’s son, he would rather die himself than let something happen to any of his children, but it wasn’t himself he was worried about. Marika/Radagon hadn’t killed any of their empyrean children, merely shackled Ranni and Blaidd together, making sure she knew that if she went seeking her destiny, her beloved brother would be forced to kill her. Gods from other realms did not always extend their children the same mercy. Gareth was devoted, yes, but also pragmatic. Mohg held the child tightly, half expecting to fight.

“Gerard.” Mohg relaxed slightly. The twins had been given names that marked him as their father, abiding by the tradition of naming established for the nobility. This child was named as Gareth’s son.

Gareth faintly remembered what Hewg had once said to him, no empyrean goes long without changing their body. This name would likely be temporary, discarded when the child came into himself, but he still wished him to understand that he would always consider himself his father. No matter what power he came into, Garreth would love him, would try to protect him, even if at the end he would put a blade to his father’s throat.

When he was old enough to begin learning a weapon, Gareth began the same way he had begun with the twins. He had picked up hundreds of weapons during his journey across the lands between. Though he only used a select few of them during his journey, he was a habitual hoarder, only selling duplicates just in case he found some theoretical use for them. However in a situation like this, the variety was useful. He turned to his son, “Take your pick.”

“I can choose anything?” Gerard’s colorless eyes scanned the arrayed arms.

“Anything you wish. Whatever you feel calls to you.” Each of them had approached this problem differently. Meinir had closed her eyes, reaching out with her magic until she felt something resonate sympathetically, and finally drew a simple Erdsteel dagger from its sheath. Myrddin had taken several weapons in his hand, weighing them against his natural strength until he found an iron greatsword, more a hunk of iron than a sword, a mundane echo of the Carian made greatsword he favored now. Gerard did neither of these things. He was drawn immediately to a single weapon as if he was one half of a magnet and it was the other. Gareth believed he knew what he was feeling. It was the same as when he’d discovered Vyke’s spear, something deep inside him had known that he’d touched it before, felt the imprint of the missing half of his soul upon it. Gerard lifted what looked like a simple wooden staff from the rack. He seemed to know instinctively that the straight end was the part he ought to grip, not the curved, slightly charred end, rendering it a hook rather than a cane. As he took it in his hands a cold flame flared on the curved end, suffusing the room with the grayish light of ghost flame. Gerard dropped the poker in surprise and frost crawled along the floor before the cold flame flickered and went out. He stared at it on the ground with a mix of fear and wonder. Gareth knelt down to his son’s level. “It’s alright. Reach for it again.”

“I felt something, like there was a piece of myself inside it, but it also wasn’t me, it was something beyond me.”

“I know.” he patted his long white hair. “And I promise, no matter what happens, I’ll be right here.” Gerard reached again for the poker. Ghost flame erupted once again, traveling up its wooden length before slowly trailing up his fingers and up his arm like a curious animal. He looked to his father, his eyes normally so piercing, as if he could see into a person’s soul were full of fear. Gareth held his son’s hand, feeling the cold tongues of the ghost flame licking at him as well. “It’s going to be alright.” The freezing flame covered them both and Gareth felt the cold burn him, but still he gripped tighter. He had promised it would be alright. The flames slowly receded though the chill of frostbite still clung to his skin. They seemed to melt into his child rather than retreating back inside the poker. He was unharmed, but as the flames disappeared he began to cry in shock.

Garreth quickly pulled him into a hug. “You’re not hurt are you?” He asked. Gerald didn’t answer, he just held tightly to his father. It took him a moment to collect himself.

“I saw things. Death, endless death burned within a cold flame, but at the same time I was the flame and death burned inside me.”

“Did that upset you?”

“It didn’t.” He began crying harder. “It felt completely natural.”

“Then why are you crying?” He pulled his human face over the flame so that Gerard could see his sympathetic smile.

“Because it should have been terrifying! I know it to be so! I should have recoiled from all of that death, but I didn’t. Is that not unnatural?”

“Look at me.” He brushed away his son’s tears and let the mask fall. “Look at me, not as your father but as I truly am.” Even his husband and children had difficulty looking directly at the flame for too long without feeling talons of madness begin to claw at the backs of their minds. “If anyone is in a position to understand it is me. What is natural to us may not seem natural by anyone else’s standards.”

“What do you mean, us?” He was fourteen, Gareth hadn’t wanted him to have to be confronted with this so early, but the poker had forced his hand.

“You and I, we were born with connections to the outer gods. Beings that exist beyond our world but influence life here in various ways. People like us are called empyreans. Before I became king and god of the Lands Between I was the empyrean of the outer god of Frenzied Flame.”

“Aren’t you the god of Frenzied Flame?”

“Yes, I’m both Gareth the empyrean and the outer god of Frenzied Flame. Both parts existed independently of each other for a time but when the part of me that was Gareth accepted the part of me that was the flame into himself I was reunited. I am the sum of those seperate pieces and the separate pieces were always part of one whole. Although I had to wait longer than most for my pieces to slot together, due to the sealing away of the flame. For most it happens slowly over the course of a lifetime as they discover who and what they are. I was forced to coalesce all at once rather than gradually as others are allowed to.”

“So then, this is the beginning for me.” He gripped the poker tighter.

“Far from it, you have been edging closer and closer since the moment you were born, this is just the first time you became aware of it. Look at your arms.” His dark feathers had trailed further down from his shoulders all the way to his wrists as the flame receded.

“But doesn’t Meinir also…”

“Not from birth, her wings came in when she was sixteen.” He paused for a moment, hoping some of it would sink in before he continued. “You will likely change even further as you grow closer to uniting. It can be frightening to experience it alone, but I will always be here to help you through it if you wish. Now, tell me more about what you saw and felt so I can figure out how best to help you.”

“I felt a flame within a kiln and that flame was me. Birds with wings of colorless flame attended it, feeding it with the dead. The birds used pokers to draw the ashes from the flame and I could feel the spirits within. Monks gathered them and sifted through them, separating them into piles. I raised my head and I felt that there were two of them and then the vision ended.”

“And how did it make you feel?”

“I knew somehow that everything that was happening was part of a cycle. That the dead needed to be burned so that they could return anew. Being part of that cycle of rebirth felt right somehow.”

“And how does that make you feel now that you’ve come back to yourself?”

“I’m scared.”

“And why are you scared?”

“Because things like what I saw ought to be frightening but they weren’t to me.”

“Did you not feel that it was a natural part of the cycle of life?”

“Yes, but…”

“Did it conflict with your personal morals in any way?”

“No, but that’s the problem, isn't it.” He tried to avoid eye contact with his father.

“You fear that you are warped then.”

“…yes.”

“Like you said yourself, death is a natural part of life. Some people may fear it, yes, but that doesn’t make it unnatural. Recognizing that, especially if you may one day become part of that cycle, is strength not perversion.”

“Dad?”

“Yes?”

“There was something else.” Gareth had expected there might be.

“It relates to the two headed bird right?” He excused himself for a moment digging through the armory until he found a shield. A red and blue kite shield emblazoned with an icon of the creature. “This right?”

His child took the shield, eyes flickering in recognition. “I think so.”

“She is the twin bird, the envoy of the Ghost Flame and mother of the Death Birds that tend it. Inhabiting her made you feel something you liked?”

“Yes.”

“What would you like me to refer to you, my child.”

“Could you call me your daughter and, as for a name, Gwyneth?” Gareth felt his flame warm. She’d chosen to still be named as his daughter.

“Of course I can! Would you like me to tell your father and siblings or would you like to tell them yourself?”

“I can tell them.” Gareth hugged Gwyneth again.

“What you did today wasn’t easy. I want you to know that I’m incredibly proud of you. If you would like, I could introduce you to someone who would be able to alter your body to better suit you, provided that’s something you’d actually want. I chose to do so, but your father didn’t feel the need. You also don’t need to know right now, take as much time as you need to figure things out.” Oh fuck he was probably overwhelming her with information wasn’t he.

“Thanks, dad. I’ll give it some thought.” She hid a laugh at him tripping over himself. Things were going to be alright. She was smart, he knew she would grow into her responsibility well. He would still always worry, but she had accepted herself easily and the Ghost Flame would not tear itself apart as rot did. Gwyneth was safe and she was happy. That was the best he could hope for.