[ In an instant, he is somewhere else, someone else. Even with knowledge of the modern world, this seems an absurd situation. The dark and looming sky, the little girl that seems to have the room completely under her control, and a very thinly veiled threat that leaves Toko at a crossroads. What can he do but watch?
Meanwhile, in an instant,
It's Imperial Year 1176 and the reign of King Lambert Egitte Blaiddyd, your father, comes to an abrupt end.
Because as it turns out—the finest knights of the land are still only human. Their blades don't even scrape free of their scabbards before the ambush hits. Some die in the first, shouting struggle. It's the unlucky ones that survive until fire catches through the camp, eating through canvas, carriages, carnage.
The stench of blood is sickly on its own, and it smells worse once it's burning. Smoke has a flavor. As you watch Glenn die, the scent reminds you of leather treated over a flame. It hits your nose, coats your throat; acrid and eerie-sweet. Coppery. Human. Glenn, who was quicker, stronger, nobler than them all, the gleaming future of Faerghus, has an expression so ugly with misery as he goes.
You watch your friend finally fall slack, but there is no racing instinct to survive—no crying or anguished farewells. Your thoughts hit distantly through the shock. Glenn's eyes are glassy now, but his face is agony, his body mangled. You see more overtaken by the flames: friends, tutors, family. Your mother's carriage is swallowed whole in the smoke. A knight who used to sneak you sugared fruits scrapes near your feet, begging for his life, but you cannot even offer him comfort and just stand there frozen through the last of his convulsions.
You stand there through it all, watching.
You take in every rotten face. All the blood, cracked and dry from the heat. You listen to each wretched, pleading word from everyone that falls, because even the bravest man doesn't really want to die for anyone, and they all have so much to say about it, and you're the only one left to listen.
Your father, at least, has the decency not to beg. The king of Faerghus's last words to you, his only son, are not a noble creed, but a scream for vengeance before his head is lopped clean off his neck, a rushed and bloody execution. It isn't as hard to watch as you expect—it doesn't seem real. It's incomprehensible that the strongest man you've ever known could be brought to kneel so easily. It does not make sense that the things you loved and that loved you back could simply cease to be.
You look at the men setting the flames, and dutifully learn those faces too.
"Avenge us! Those who killed us... Tear them apart! Destroy them all!"
It's your father's version of a goodbye, a promise made, and it should give you strength. But a father's words are not a shield. Oaths won't stop a sword. And with no family or friends or knights left to die for you, the blade bears down on you next, and cuts just as easily. ]
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Meanwhile, in an instant,
It's Imperial Year 1176 and the reign of King Lambert Egitte Blaiddyd, your father, comes to an abrupt end.
Because as it turns out—the finest knights of the land are still only human. Their blades don't even scrape free of their scabbards before the ambush hits. Some die in the first, shouting struggle. It's the unlucky ones that survive until fire catches through the camp, eating through canvas, carriages, carnage.
The stench of blood is sickly on its own, and it smells worse once it's burning. Smoke has a flavor. As you watch Glenn die, the scent reminds you of leather treated over a flame. It hits your nose, coats your throat; acrid and eerie-sweet. Coppery. Human. Glenn, who was quicker, stronger, nobler than them all, the gleaming future of Faerghus, has an expression so ugly with misery as he goes.
You watch your friend finally fall slack, but there is no racing instinct to survive—no crying or anguished farewells. Your thoughts hit distantly through the shock. Glenn's eyes are glassy now, but his face is agony, his body mangled. You see more overtaken by the flames: friends, tutors, family. Your mother's carriage is swallowed whole in the smoke. A knight who used to sneak you sugared fruits scrapes near your feet, begging for his life, but you cannot even offer him comfort and just stand there frozen through the last of his convulsions.
You stand there through it all, watching.
You take in every rotten face. All the blood, cracked and dry from the heat. You listen to each wretched, pleading word from everyone that falls, because even the bravest man doesn't really want to die for anyone, and they all have so much to say about it, and you're the only one left to listen.
Your father, at least, has the decency not to beg. The king of Faerghus's last words to you, his only son, are not a noble creed, but a scream for vengeance before his head is lopped clean off his neck, a rushed and bloody execution. It isn't as hard to watch as you expect—it doesn't seem real. It's incomprehensible that the strongest man you've ever known could be brought to kneel so easily. It does not make sense that the things you loved and that loved you back could simply cease to be.
You look at the men setting the flames, and dutifully learn those faces too.
"Avenge us! Those who killed us... Tear them apart! Destroy them all!"
It's your father's version of a goodbye, a promise made, and it should give you strength. But a father's words are not a shield. Oaths won't stop a sword. And with no family or friends or knights left to die for you, the blade bears down on you next, and cuts just as easily. ]