Love, War, Blood & Brothers

[Treshure 5818]

 

 

Dearest Robert,

 

I see now that in my aging breath, the people are not the same as you and I. These streets and corners were a different love ten years past. I once carried a sword, and you a spear;  nothing in all of Atlas could have stopped our brave hearts. We belonged to the Human spirit that drove its youthful armies. It preached love, it preached war, it preached blood, and it preached the bond of brothers.

 

How that dream has died. Nobody knew how my leg was crippled. None of the legionaries remembered the Rurikid spearing my calf. Nonetheless, I was cruelly judged. My ailing violated their sunny disposition; my gait was an offense to the flawless warrior - forever young.

 

 

In these cold nights, my thought wanders to you. If I wasn’t crippled prior, I would’ve died by your side. And perhaps death was the better sentence. For I have seen the life you left behind, and it was none to desire beyond the grave. The maid you laid with has now grown fat and with child. The once delicious beauty only lingers in her eyes now.

Your brothers in battle are crippled as I. More oft, they lie beneath the ground as you do - claimed in battle from Humanity’s endless endeavors. For them, a battle survived was no victory at all. Only one more gamble with death for anther day.

 

Today would have been your fortieth. The sunny alleys and warm festivals of the Capital remain as warm, aye, but filled with the youth and life of our children. Their world is the one we left behind. Their Emperor is young. The governors are warriors themselves. Yet here we sit: fading, watching, waiting.

 

The time will never come when I am young again. At night, I wish I was you; tragically fallen, immortalized in stone, and forever young. But I will not scorn your memory by lingering on what cannot be changed. There is word of a settlement named Leuven, beyond the Capital and into the warm summer fields beneath Haense. 

 

The men who leave for it say it is a land without past. Any who settle it start anew. They even whisper that there, the blood of Ashford lives yet. It speaks of a time far before ours; one I am exceedingly hopeful for. I write with bags of clothing floored and horses stirring outside. Come the morn, I ride.

 

The boy has grown. Our dream is gone.

But I will never be comfortably numb. If there was ever a new life to live, I will do it now. For me, and for you.

 

Gwyn

 

 

 

[lev 627]

“But I am alive and well?” Laertes asked his cousin Cecil Ashes, utterly perplexed by this letter. 

[Salvo 1852]

“The blood of Ashford still lives?” a hulking, aged knight comments, hearing of the rumors.

                                    

 

“I shall venture to this place they speak of. Olivier’s memory will not be tarnished, not while I draw breath.”

[lawnmowerman 3040]

2 minutes ago, lev said:

“But I am alive and well?” Laertes asked his cousin Cecil Ashes, utterly perplexed by this letter. 

 

Cecil offers a bewildered shrug in response, gnawing on a stray piece of hay from the flourishing Leuven fields.

[seannie 7443]

Armand sips on the finest of Aeldinic Red from within the newly established Helbroke Tavern upon the County of Leuven, blissfully unaware of the these interactions involving his family. He reaches for a fresh oyster, cracking open its shell with a knife of his, enjoying himself in the tavern mood.

 

[mitch dharma 438]

An abominable creature, long condemned to a land that is, and is not, and yet is, awakens from his eternal slumber. He exited his cave, glowing and strong, like a morning sun coming out of gloomy mountains.

 

“You really fucked up, pal.”

[osumanduas 1442]

Moved to The Great Library. It shall be sorted into the appropriate category shortly.

 

If you feel this is a mistake, please contact myself or any FM and we'll restore it.