V I L L O R I K

[Xarkly 17299]

 

edit by @UnBaed

 

Spoiler

 

 

The punch connected with the boy’s chin.

 

The nine-year-old’s vision washed out with stars, and he felt himself crash to the dusty floor of the fighting pit. The pain that throbbed through his face, though, was nothing compared to the sound that followed: the cheering from the spectator’s stands, and the umpire’s proclamation.

 

“AAAAND THE WINNER IS THE YOUNG LORD KORTREVICH!”

 

Rage swelled in the boy as he shakily clambered to his feet, oblivious to the dirt that stained his once fine-garb as much as he was to the blood trailing down his nose. He jabbed a finger at his opponent - the Kortrevich, a year or two older than him, with teeth bared in a smug grin as he waved to the cheering onlookers. He didn’t even notice the boy.

 

“Hey!” the boy barked, drawing the Kortrevich’s eyes. His own vision still swam, like the world had become watercolour. “I’m not … I’m not finished … with …” He only became aware he had collapsed to the ground again when the crowd’s cheers turned to laughs. 

 

Damn it! Get up! he scolded himself as he blinked the stars out of his eyes. His hands clawed at the ground for balance, but he froze abruptly when he felt his hand grab something. Another hand - warm, and gentle. 

 

“Would you stop that?” tutted a young girl’s voice. “You’re going to get badly hurt, carrying on like this.”

 

The boy focused his blurry eyes on the hand, then the arm to which it connected, and then the body to which it belonged. A girl - as young as he - stood over him, trying to ease him up to his feet. “I … I’m not finished with him,” the boy managed weakly. He could taste blood in his mouth. 

 

“Well,” she hummed, and glanced up to the stands. The only looks cast in the boy’s directions were a few scant pitiful ones, “I think he’s finished with you, so come on.” Despite her age, she gave him a look that brooked no nonsense, and yet her eyes … They’re so … light. “Let’s take a look at that nose. You might have gone and broken it in that last round.” 

 

“F-fine.” His whole body ached as he let the girl help him up. It was only now once he could a good look at her face, framed by silken dark hair, that he realised what a state he must have looked himself, with dishevelled hair, his dirtied waistcoat, and blood smeared across her face. “But I’m going straight back in after! I’m not done!” 

 

The girl side-eyed him sceptically as she supported his stiff hobble out of the fighting pit. She wore a dress of a fine cut, but she seemed to have no regard for getting it dirtied in the pit. “Why? You’d be lucky if all you escaped with from that beat-down is a fractured nose.” 

 

“Because,” the boy seethed as they moved through the stands, “I’m a warrior! A strong one!”

 

“Really?” The girl began to laugh, but then cut off as the boy’s withering glare, as if only realising that he had not been joking. “You’re not very good, though.” 

 

The boy let out an indignant, vexed squeak. “I - I - I am good!” 

 

The girl led him to a small stool and table, set against the back wall of the tavern, away from all the onlookers. It had taken some effort for the boy to resist swinging at some of the older folk who glanced at him in amusement after his loss, but, judging by the fresh bouts of cheering, another fight had started now. “I don’t think you landed a single punch in that last round.” 

 

“I - well - that - that’s because - he, he was - he was cheating!” 

 

“With his fists?” The girl made a vain attempt to hide her smile as she reached into a knapsack at her waist, and pulled out a linen cloth. “I’m not trying to insult you, you know. Why do you want to be a warrior, anyway?” 

 

“Because,” the boy rebut sullenly as he watched the girl dampen the cloth. “My sisters … Elizaveta and Petra - they need me!”

 

He recoiled as she moved it towards her face, but after a flat look from her, he acquiesced. He winced at the sensation as she began to wipe the blood from his cheek. “Why? Where are they?”

 

The boy’s lip quivered, from equal parts pain - in spite of the girl’s gentle touch - and the answer to her question. “They’re …” the words, and his anger, died in his throat. He remembered the day his mother had roared at him between her grieving wails; they’re dead, you fool, and they’re never coming back. “… not here anymore.”

 

“ … Oh,” the girl’s voice was quiet, soft. Her face went still. She can tell. 

 

“Yeah. ‘Oh’,” the boy hissed through his teeth. “I have to become strong, strong enough to kill all of God’s enemies. Norlanders, Elves, all of them. Then, when I kill enough, God … He’ll answer my prayers. He’ll have to. And then …” He paused when he noticed his breath quickening. He gave the girl a sharp look, and calmed himself. “ … He’ll give Elizaveta and Petra back.”

 

“If you say so,” the girl muttered, and, after a moment, resumed her careful motion with the cloth around his burst lip. “But, if you ask me, there’s already enough killing in the world.” Her voice became soft, almost reverent. “Do you think they’d really want that? For you to kill all those people?” 

 

The boy narrowed his eyes at her. The cloth smushed his lips, distorting his words. “Why wouldn’t they? That’s how the world works. If you want something, you have to take it.”

 

“Well … maybe it’s not how it should work.” She stepped back, the cloth coated in blood. The boy hadn’t realised he had been bleeding that badly. “Wouldn’t you rather do something to make the world better? Don’t you think that would make your sisters happier, watching from the Skies?” 

 

The boy was silent. He searched for an angry retort, to teach her, but he never found it. Instead, he just watched as she wrung his blood out of the cloth into a bowl, while the crowd cheered behind them as the next fight ended, and men counted out wagered coins. “What’s your name, anyway?” he asked her begrudgingly. 

 

“Amaya.” She rinsed her own hands in the bowl, and glanced back at him with those light eyes. “What about you?”

 

“ … I’m Villorik.”

 

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Spoiler

 

 

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Villorik stared down at the spot where Amaya had died.

 

Wouldn’t you rather do something to make the world better?

Don’t you think that would make your sisters happier, watching from the Skies?

 

Beneath his winged helmet, Villorik sighed. The wildflowers - the ones that Amaya can come to see on her last day alive - stirred in the gentle midsummer wind, their petals glowing with a soft hue as the sunlight caught them through the forest canopy. Nearly a century had passed since Amaya had spoken those words to him as a boy, but it had taken Villorik half a century to truly understand what she meant.

 

“Bah,” he grumbled to the flowers as he eased himself down on his knees, his mail creaking with each movement. He propped his glaive in the crook of his arm, the tip agleam in the morning light. “You always were the smarter one anyway. You and Caius, both.” 

 

For all the lords and kings Villorik had met in his long life, Caius and Amaya had been the only ones he had sworn his true service to. Even now, as he watched the flowers toss their heads in the breeze as the birdsong echoed through the woods, he could still picture their eyes. 

 

Amaya’s were warm like the rising sun. For all the hardship she had endured, for all the tragedy of the Covenant War she had witnessed, that look of undistilled kindness had never left her. Even as a young child, since that day in the fighting pit, she had already understood what it had taken Villorik decades to comprehend: the value of kindness in an unkind world. 

 

Caius’ eyes had been the same, but different. When the rest of the world had lost themselves in their mortal squabbles - their wars, their pride, their vanity - Caius had been the sole man blessed to see past that, past the follies of the here and now. Past all that never really mattered. He alone could find the way forward through the mud. 

 

The wind gusted, stirring the leaf-laden branches overhead. 

What was it that you two were looking at?

 

────⇌•✟•⇋────

by @ivery

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Of course, Villorik knew now.

 

Caius and Amaya had seen beyond what the world in front of them was. Beyond the tragedy, beyond the war. Beyond - to something greater. Something better. They had lived and toiled each day, their eyes on that unseeable horizon, so that they would move a little closer towards it. Step by step. Sacrifice by sacrifice. 

 

A world better than the one in which we live today.

 

Gently, Villorik closed his eyes. To have served the two of them had been a blissful existence; Villorik had not been blessed with their vision, their eyes, their hearts. He had just been another fool with a blade … and yet, so he needed only swing that blade where they pointed, and he could sleep soundly knowing that he was part of that journey to the horizon. Part of that journey to beyond.

 

And then, they died.

 

Carry my memory -- not as a weight, but as a lantern to guide you through this darkness. Live, Villorik. For me, and for yourself. 

 

I will cherish you always. 

 

I will be with you, Villorik.

 

✟

 

We are but caretakers of the flame, keeping it alive for those who will come after.

 

You are not alone. The Light endures, and it endures through you. Carry it forwards.

 

I will be with you, Villorik.

 

Their final words - their final message - were etched into Villorik’s soul.

 

“Tsch.” He scrunched his closed eyes. “How did you expect me to do that? You knew … knew that I could never see what you saw.” He exhaled with a hiss through his teeth. “I tried. You saw where it got me.” 

 

As if to argue with the dead, Villorik dredged up the memories within himself. He saw himself standing on the snow-capped slopes overlooking the holds of Murkwater, the white-gold banner of the White Comet rippling in the blizzard wind, and he heard himself call, “Begin the attack. Leave none alive.” He saw himself with those same holds, shattered and burning, with the lesser Shadowspawn dead at his feet - salvation denied. 

 

He saw himself standing atop a ridge in the Haeseni tundra, looking back at a masked man he had once called his student, to a red-skinned devil child called Reinhard, with horns curling above his petrified eyes. “I can help him,” he heard himself say, “but only for a price. Only for your aid in my mission.” 

 

He watched himself slump over a bed, his eyes staring into nothingness as the letter that carried the news of Sermi’s death slipped from his hand. Dead and condemned, before he could find a way to save his soul. He saw his blade glide through the neck of the Devil Knight of Dunkeld. He saw himself galloping from the Hexicanum’s walls, Timofei’s corpse in tow. He saw himself sitting on this very spot, cradling Amaya’s smiling corpse. 

 

Slowly, Villorik opened his eyes again.

 

────⇌•✟•⇋────

by @Trinn

 

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 “Why was it I who lived?”

 

“When we went to battle against Gashadokuro … why wasn’t it I who died, so that you would live?” he asked Caius quietly. “When Sermi and Laelia came for you, why couldn’t it have been me who perished in your defence?” he asked Amaya. 

 

A moment later, his shoulders shook with a bitter, but genuine, laugh. “I suppose you would give me some profound answer.” His eyes scaled the haft of his glaive, climbing up to its broad, shimmering blade. “Yes. That would be just like you.” 

 

Whether it was the answer they would have given or not, Villorik could find it in other memories. 

 

He saw himself staring down at Laelia with a boiling rage, and barely tamed the overwhelming urge to sever her head from her shoulders. He saw himself looking at those same eyes, only this time set in Nohr’s face and framed by that same blanch hair, as she stood at this side on the fringes of Belvedere as they faced a true demon. 

 

He saw himself standing aloof and statuesque as Milena’s words echoed around him. “Please, Villorik. That monster gave him a prophecy.” So too did he see himself, arms crossed in his study, as he looked down at a whelp of a boy, clutching a sword meant for a man twice his height. “What’s your name, boy?” he had asked, and the boy had answered, “Sigmar.” 

 

He saw himself standing in the Royal Court of Lesanov as white-gold flames whipped in a vortex, only to leave a young man lying unscathed at its epicenter when the flames cleared. “Still, I’m curious,” echoed Raguel’s rumble, impatience mixed with vexation, “why did you do it?” Villorik saw himself stare out across the moonlit rooftops of Valdev, and answered, “Because he was someone worth saving.” 

 

He saw himself standing astride the river, coursing beneath the crimson walls of New Valdev, with a dark-haired Ruthern at his side as she said, “You were always more than my uncle.”  He saw himself standing in the old basilica, staring through his visor at a dour-faced Andrey. “Join the White Comet, then, boy. Become a warrior; one worthy of avenging his father by duelling me.” 

 

Most of all, though, he saw himself sitting on a thatched rooftop in a lonely hamlet. He saw himself sitting, watching the sun set behind the towering pines, and a woman leaning on his shoulder. A woman who, like him, lacked the eyes of those they had once followed … 

 

… but who tried to pick out their tracks in the mud nonetheless. 

 

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Spoiler

 

 

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But Caius and Amaya had never been wrong.

Even now, Villorik was not alone.

 

As he blinked away his encumbering thoughts, his eyes shifted to the two others who had joined him in the bloom-cloaked clearing with him. Standing over the flowers, his arms crossed over his breastplate and his raven tresses twisting in the wind, Sigmar Lorik’s expression was solemn. The Blade of Jophiael was belted at his side -- all those years ago, it had been far too big for him in both body and soul. And yet he grew to it. 

 

Then, there was her - Deia, sat at his side, watching the roses, strands of her pale hair sticking out from her shawl. Despite the uncertainty etched into each and every inch of her face, her eyes carried in them the same light that Amaya’s had. Villorik would have never failed to recognise that light -- not in a thousand years. 

 

“It’s … nice to imagine that there’s something weaving it all together,” Deia was saying quietly, as the three of them watched the flowers. “That the people who need to find each other … that they will, eventually.” 

 

“I wonder.” With a creak, Villorik lifted his winged helmet from his head, and sat it carefully amongst the flowers. His iron-grey hair, long and unkempt, spilled around his gaunt, scor-pocked face. “I think about all that happened, to lead us to this moment - why I did not die, instead of them.” 

 

As the birds continued their chorus, there was a weight to Sigmar’s eyes as he watched quietly. Deia’s voice carried with it a hopeful lilt as she answered, “I couldn’t stand it, if you were gone in their place.” 

 

So seldomly without his helmet, Villorik felt … exposed as the wind strewn through his own hair. He shook his head, gazing absently at the flowers. “I could not do what they did. I … could not see the path to the future that they could.” 

 

Deia’s smile was a helpless one - one she could not contain, no matter her skittishness. “You remained,” she echoed quietly. “Amaya, she … was perfect. But, for all she and Caius saw in the future, they missed so much happening - happening in front of them, in the present.” She trailed off, mumbling absent-mindedly. “ … But you never missed a thing.” 

 

The warpriest’s lips - unshadowed by his helmet, now - twitched into a soft, sad smile. “There’s been no shortage of mistakes along the way. But … well. That you two are here with me, at the end, is evident enough that something went right. That fate was kind to us.” 

 

Yes, Villorik assured himself as he looked between the two.

Amaya. Caius. They are gone, but the light of their eyes remains. Deia. Sigmar.

 

────⇌•✟•⇋────

 

────⇌•✟•⇋────

 

With a whoosh, Villorik tossed his glaive through the air.

 

Sigmar caught the haft into his chest, but the sheer weight of the polearm eked a winded grunt from him. 

 

“You must be the blade of Caius, now, Sigmar,” Villorik said solemnly. “The Shadow is culled for a time, but not forever.” He locked eyes with the Prince, and, in that shared gaze, Villorik saw it all in a flash. That boy, standing before him with the weight of Raguel’s prophecy on his meek shoulders; that boy, learning to swing a weapon against the very glaive he now held; that boy, born anew within phoenix-flame in the Haeseni Court; that boy, striking in coordination with Villorik against the twisted form of Krodha; that boy, riding at the head of a Canonist cavalcade on the fens of Nevaehlen; that boy, his blade slick with Rakir as they stormed the walls of Belvedere.

 

Sigmar’s eyes shone with that same determination that Villorik had followed in Caius, decades before Sigmar was ever born. The two nodded. “I know, Patriarch,” the Prince avowed simply. Along the haft of the glaive, trailing threads of ethereal white-gold light glimmered, tracing along Sigmar’s hands before dissipating. 

 

Villorik needed ask no more; the eyes that carried Caius’ will said it all. I will not fail. "Just don't go forgetting your other promise to me, alright? I didn't drag your ass through all those battlefields just so you could spend the rest of your days scowling like me. Sigmar - you marry that Amador girl. You raise a family. You live a good life." He narrowed his eyes, as if daring a challenge. "You hear me, Prince of Galahar?"

 

"I ..." Sigmar cleared his throat. The look in his eyes now was all him, and not the dutiful ones of Caius. "Yes, Patriarch."

 

Deia stirred, her breath catching in her throat. “Villorik …” 

 

“And that brings us to the next torch to be passed.” Unveiled by his helmet, his eyes slid to Deia, though the reflection of Sigmar’s flashes of gold still lingered in his eyes. Despite everything, his eyes could not help but soften on her. “You must be Amaya's inheritor, Deia. The unyielding source of kindness in the darkest place.” Just as he had when he looked into Sigmar’s eyes, she saw the truth of Deia in her own irises. Her smile, mirroring Amaya; the gaggle of children of the Lesanov Court, gathered around her with radiant expressions; and the lost and the outcast, who found a room under Deia’s roof when they could find no other in the entire world. “You,” he gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze, “only you are capable of this.” 

 

Deia’s hand  trembled slightly as they wove through Villorik’s hair, as if to anchor herself. “I will,” she whispers. “I’ll never stop trying. I - … I don’t think I could.” 

 

“ … Good,” he whispered. Slowly, he tugged around the polar bearskin he wore as a cloak, and draped it after Deia as she leaned her head against his armoured shoulder. He could feel it, now - tugging at the corners of his eyes like a baying dream. He had felt it for a while, but he would not succumb - not until the right moment. Not until now. 

 

“We’ve carried them with our hearts this far,” Villorik murmured then as the sun climbed higher, flooding the flowered clearing with light. 

 

“Do you think they’re watching?”

 

─⇌•✟•⇋─

 

At the foot of the landbridge, Villorik raised his glaive from which the Demonbane Banner - Caius’ banner - flew.

 

“WARRIORS OF REINMAR! EXALTED KNIGHTS! WHITE COMET!” his roar peeled across the river, “TODAY, BELVEDERE FALLS!”

 

⇌•✟•⇋

 

 “Everyone we saved. Everyone who saved us.”

 

⇌•✟•⇋

 

 Atop the slopes of Barrowmount, in the courtyards of Villorik’s home, his blade drew sparks against the blade of a King, before - at last - Villorik struck the sword from Ivan VIII’s hand.

 

He levelled his sabre at the King’s face as he drew heavy breaths. Villorik wanted to slay him; it would be no less than he deserved, for cursing Andrey with a bastard’s existence.

 

⇌•✟•⇋

 

 “ … Those we couldn’t save …”

 

⇌•✟•⇋

 

 “Are we fools, Villorik?” Caius grumbled as they watched Haus in the courtyard below, studying the world with eyes untainted by the Void. “Are they just abusing our mercy?”

 

“ … Most of them, yes,” Villorik intoned. “But … even if we are wrong.” He thought of Elizaveta and Petra, still watching. “I would rather be wrong in giving mercy, every time.”

 

⇌•✟•⇋

 

 “ … and those we had to kill ourselves.”

 

⇌•✟•⇋

 

 “Siegmund … no, Aden.”

 

Blossoms curled through the air as Villorik glared back at the Demon - at the Prince of Carrion. “Abandon your visions of fire. The prophecies of Raguel and Jophiael … their ink is not yet dry.”

 

“Return to Lichtenwald, Aden. Love your wife. Forget your fire.”

 

⇌•✟•⇋

 

Deia’s grip on Villorik tightened protectively.

“Of course they are,” she whispered. “They … they have faith in us.”

 

Villorik’s eyes slowly slid closed, lulled by the dream. 

“Deia …  Sigmar …”

 

⇌•✟•⇋

 

As the snow swirled in the air around them, Villorik studied O’zen through his visor.

 

“Before I kill you, Sermi,” he vowed, grip flexing on his glaive, “I am going to find a way to save your soul.”

 

⇌•✟•⇋

 

“... In the end, out of everyone …”

 

⇌•✟•⇋

 

“Tell me your name.”

 

In the hall of the Basilica, the faces flickered, shifting.

“I am Caspian.” “Rhys.” “ … Andrey.” “Rezalisa.” “Josef!” “Milena.” “Tatiyana.” “Asif.” “Siegmund.” 

 

⇌•✟•⇋

 

" ... I'm glad ... you could be saved."

 

by @ivery

 

[Halt 3021]

 

“ … How strange. Never did I think I would part with a student like this. Most lost their ways … or their lives.”

 

-VILLORIK CARDINAL JORENUS

Naf zwy 7th hag i Vzmey ag Hynk i 566 E.S.

 

 

It was one of those clouded nights when the stars lay hidden behind a veil. The kind of night one could get lost in—without constellations to guide a Prince of Galahar’s northern way home. Cloudy nights often gave themselves to foggy mornings, and this one would be no different. He had fallen asleep and woken up the same way—holding the reins of Villorik’s horse. Again.

 

Daydreams were the only dreams his mind knew, the favored refuge of any child. This week marked Sigmar’s ninth winter. His eighth had been marked by his first kill—a soldier twice his age and twice his height, but only half his spirit. Sigmar had watched as that man’s soul slipped into the stream. That moment would be forever stained in his memory. He would continue to see him, that lingering specter of half-light haunting his periphery. But the boy felt little pity; perhaps a consequence of the accursed crown he wore. Reining in the horse, he resolved that the ghost would soon have company. So long as this was the road he was bid to follow—Villorik’s road—there would be more. And for a while longer, he would have to brave it. Some lessons had yet to be learned, and some truths yet to be told.

 

He learned that a man’s worth could be measured by the care he gave his horse. He learned of the fragile threads of fate, and how easily they were severed. He learned to wield a sword, and that it was his mother’s grace that made it swing true.

 

As for truth? That was less about learning and more about instruction. He had been taught these things, not through words but instead by example.

 

---

 

Villorik had sown a seed, and perhaps that was why the boy was forever addressed as a sapling. The Patriarch revealed little of himself—his givings were anonymous, the purest form of charity. It had taken relentless prying for Sigmar to glean even that much.

 

By their final campaigns, Villorik’s gait had slowed. He no longer led the charge—he only directed it. For all the times His Eminence’s glaive had saved Sigmar from certain death, by the end, it was Sigmar’s gilded blade that rose to save Villorik’s life.

 

Any soldier—any decent one—knew to make peace with death from early. And from a distance, it had always been clear to Sigmar: Villorik had died long ago. The first time, when his heart broke. The second, when his spirit did. When one Amaya of Venzia passed. When the late Pontiff fell. The light in his eyes had begged for an early reunion. But Sigmar had denied him that—until he didn’t.

 

Villorik had stolen him from the safe fold of his mother’s robes and never returned him—at least not as he found him. In doing so, he had unmade a prophecy that destined the prince for fiery ruin. Yet, through this, Sigmar was given another chance at life. When some fiery ruin did come—from the maw of a wyvern—it was once again Villorik’s grace that saved him. By merit of his worth, Sigmar, the second son of Josef, was afforded more time.

 

The seed Villorik planted would be sown. And if another of Barbov’s blood was made to face the same trials by fire, this prince would shepherd them as he had been shepherded. After all, the purest form of giving was anonymous, and so it would remain. For the all the time and effort Villorik had so freely given to an overprivileged, provincially-driven boy—Sigmar resolved it was only right to repay that debt in full. In the same manner, with every care for propriety and courtesy afforded to this undertaking.

 

Those who knew, knew. Those who did not, were never meant to.

[ferdaboy 3472]

Jealousy festered in the Oracle’s heart, a bitter rot that threatened to consume him. He knew with certainty that he would never be mourned as Villorik was. 

 

He had been the father Sigmar never had. The father Josef could never be.

 

Yet within the depth of his selfish heart, there lingered the Little Oracle. The boy that Josef had once been, that stood before Villorik with awe. The boy that had defied the Patriarch and ventured into the crypt of a necromancer. The boy that had dreamt of joining the White Comet.

 

Josef, the Oracle felt little at the Patriarch’s death.

 

But the Little Oracle, the child buried within him, mourned

[Karina 1881]

⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘
Blessed had been the silence that held her now. In the darkness of Mordrings embrace, only the sweet peace of sleep resounded in her thoughts. For the being that was once Sermi, and then O’zen'jkastum had long fallen silent. If she knew, would she have come to mourn the passing of Villorik? Would she clutch his memory close to her chest, or discard it entirely?

All that was certain was the emptiness. Nothing existed, where she once did. The one he couldn't save. Guilt never weighed on her as heavily as it did Laelia, for she saw her role as acting. To be the monster eschewed the burden of her crimes, it was justifiable; eventually, one would come. One with the grace and strength of the Light.

Long had those two talked and battered each other. From the earliest memories she held of the man, who had known her only in cursed form. He had challenged her beliefs, knew the misery that existed within her heart. Saw the hate that was piled on her, in the pursuit of justice. In another world, perhaps she would have stood aside him. 

Of all who made her doubt, he had come the closest. When she lied to him, it was with a heavy heart. Figments of truth swore through her words, even as far removed from the full picture as they were. Always just enough to express her guilt, her sadness, her sorrows. For much blood had been shed, and neither of them had grown from it. 

Perhaps, somewhere in that wretchedly peaceful sleep; did she think of him. That long gaze, cast upon the wheat. Her fields had long fallen to ash, that not a single stalk of grain grew. Some wounds could not so easily be patched by time. Not those she inflicted upon Deia, nor Sarryn. There was no welcome to the Skies, from her. No parting words, nothing but emptiness. 

Yet, one question remained unanswered. Buried in the deepest reaches of her mind. The memory had played, over and over; Amayas death. Her true ascension to Princehood, that came with such heavy sorrow. Did he ever learn the truth? She had tried to shield him, from it. For at least, perhaps, Laelia could be saved. It had been far too easy to agree to her plans. Even simpler, to burn hellfire and cast it upon them all.

She would be the villain they thought she was. But the cursed fenn deserved better then that, then her. Then the world offered all of them. Maybe now, their memory could finally rest. 
 

⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘

[__Stal27 2126]

From across the continent, the story of the Patriarch has come to be well known through the stories told by the Cardinal Ivan Lotharia. Feared, revered, whatever they thought about him mattered naught as his tale was well known. Thus as the champion of light succumbed as was his fated time, a candle lit was lit in honour and reverence by the Balianese Prince alongside the Lotharian Cardinal.

[sarahbarah 7105]

Spoiler

 

 

SHE WAS ALWAYS THERE. The reddened wildflowers that stirred in the wind, the chirping of bluebirds in the treeline -- it was her all along. She watched from beyond the veil, her presence woven into the quiet moments that softened the weight he bore. 

 

The girl in the fighting pits of Karosgrad - the Queen who had once stood proud yet lay broken among white blooms stained with her blood - had never left Villorik.

 

Not in spirit. She watched him endure. Through grief, through war, through the weight of a glaive that sat too heavily in his hand. And though she could not reach him, she lingered in the spaces between heartbeats, in the silent prayers he never spoke aloud.

 

But when at last his glaive was set aside, when his weary hands no longer clenched in restless duty, she saw something that filled the vast eternity with peace. Reprieve. For the first time since she had departed, Villorik found rest. And so, at last, did she.

 

If only she could smile at him one last time.

[lemonke 6014]

"NOOO! TOO SOON! COME BACK PLEASE. NOOOOOOOOO,  VILLORIK. YOU BASTARD!" Smilebone, the necromancer and past student of Kryndomere would cry. She was going through her training arc to increase her level power and fight those who are now stronger than her! Alas, she was too slow to be important under the eyes of the holy knight.

 

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[MunaZaldrizoti 8037]

Princess Milena clutched a wrinkled letter in her pale fingers, peering over words she had read half a dozen times since it arrived within her chambers.

 

Dead?

 

How many times had Villorik presented his blade to her, bidding her end his life to atone for his stealing away her youngest son? Sigmar had been molded into a soldier of battle, to fight the Patriarch's crusades and risk his life for a man who had allowed so many others to die in pursuit of his approval and pride. In her youth, she had admired him. One of those same children, seeking even a moment that might seem like a bestowing of praise upon a girl who felt otherwise overlooked. As a woman, she had hated him for all he seemed to represent and all he kept hidden beneath an emotionless mask. For his glittering armor and feathered cloak, he carried with him an air of death which that Oracleborn had come to know her entire life.

 

But he had restored her son. At his bedside, they had wept together and hoped for his recovery. Her kinsman, her aedypapej, had ensured her child built for himself a legend worthy of his ancient bloodline.

 

So her shock gave way to a new feeling of uncertainty, a renewed fear for her son's survival. That was enough to bring tears to her eyes...but she wept for him too. Their vigilant protector.

[KillerMaid 636]

Malna Loa'chil had remembered their last talk... how she wanted him to be safe. The only thing she felt right now was anger. Anger at how she didn't get to see him one last time, how no matter what happened they seemed to have pleasant talks. How she confided in him and now the one human friend she thought would not leave soon has left her. A small part of her that she had when she handed that gift to him in Kaethul, a part that knew nothing of the pain she felt now was gone.

 

"you said you'd be SAFE... why? WHY?" she had yelled, a painting ripped from her wall as she fell. Anger turned into sobs. She had nothing to remember him by, only now a shakily drawn portrait in charcoal... a smile on his face with his name underneath.

 

 

".... Please remember to say hello."

 

So there she was, left in her home with one more picture on the wall, and one less piece left.

 

[xo31 3979]

A selfish mage of the Void felt a little safer.

 

Perhaps in another life, he was on a different side.

 

He stoked the flames of that fireplace in his snowy cottage, in deep hiding from the Xionists he'd deserted.

[KillerMaid 636]

Malna Loa'chil had remembered their last talk... how she wanted him to be safe. The only thing she felt right now was anger. Anger at how she didn't get to see him one last time, how no matter what happened they seemed to have pleasant talks. How she confided in him and now the one human friend she thought would not leave soon has left her. A small part of her that she had when she handed that gift to him in Kaethul, a part that knew nothing of the pain she felt now was gone.

 

"you said you'd be SAFE... why? WHY?" she had yelled, a painting ripped from her wall as she fell. Anger turned into sobs. She had nothing to remember him by, only now a shakily drawn portrait in charcoal... a smile on his face with his name underneath.

 

 

".... Please remember to say hello."

 

So there she was, left in her home with one more picture on the wall, and one less piece left.

 

[Frawlic 1602]

A worn woman, outgrowing the fears of adolescence in her incessant wandering, did not know of the Patriarch's end. She knew little more of him than she had in her entire life, only beholden to the mercy he had once granted her. The aged scars of malflame and the inky voids that consumed her forearms crossed over Amaya's chest plate.

While there was a shyness of fulfillment in her time, she could be happy in the end, knowing at least one person had tried to save her. But, she had forsaken her words and only hoped he might have slayed the demons he asked of.

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The little Kovachev often pushed past unease and discomfort, as that was necessary to truly find the answers one was hoping for. She had idled on that bridge for some time, watching with hidden familiarity, waiting for a time to pass. It was not found as a young girl meandered to her side and spoke of evil, tears, and death. The topics were torn from any other page in her book, though her lungs felt weighted at the topic in correlation to those she had witnessed. So, when the child departed, so did she, in search, in hope, and in absolute foolishness.

Karoswald were woods she passed by often, but never through. She pressed through the depths, the moonlight streaking through the creaking trees, soft winds brushing up her boots. The echo of a name she never thought she'd say left her a multitude of times before she found who she was looking for. And then another. Her eyes befell the scene, and a twisting sensation settled in her throat and stomach, a subtle choking through whatever words she found herself saying, not that she could remember. And then she left, struggling to find a hold of silence until it loosed upon Sigmar.

How many times did she apologize? Would he grow tired of it in their slivers of time?

[DahStalker 3692]

Into the winter winds spoke a voice, mellow in contrast to its typical intensity. “We are the same,” Ljúfvina recalled that glee, that comfort in connecting with others, upon escaping her hellscape. A man whom she thought similar. “We are angry.” But for what? Alas, there was no point in finding out. Gently a smile braced her lips, and she would tend to her donkeys.

[Lortime 1153]

Alaric, found himself genuflecting before the tabernacle of the St. Joren and the Broken chains when the news first reached him. He had no response for several minutes as he eyes, carefully, slowly, methodically read the missive. Ser Mikhail Valkonen, was a terribly absent Father. From the earliest age, Alaric knew he was a miserable lout. For the rest of his life, after both of his parents had perished, he had searched for a proper Papej, but time and time again; they would fail him, they would die, they would leave.

 

It was upon his pilgrimage, at the tender age of 14, that he would find the first in a series of men that would fill the utter void of guidance and compassion he scarcely recieved as a child. The first priest who comforted him in the way of his mamej's death, was one of those. Other spirtual leaders of the faith would prove to be more real of a family to him then he had as a child.

 

Villorik, was one of those few. Alaric doubted he ever knew it, but from the second he set eyes upon the glistening, winged helm; at the funeral of the dearly departed Caius, he admired the Var Ruthern. It would not be long after that he aided Villorik in his first ever task as a church-man, the cleansing of a body; nessecary after the unfortunate rite Villorik nessecarily needed to perform, for an unforgiveable act beyond salvation that he took no joy in doing. 

The years would pass by, and Alaric, still a young man, would request and be taking into the mentorship of Villorik. It would not be particularly long after, that the Patriarch reccomended the Valkonen for his first real test, his first true post: the Bishop of Andrikev, later renamed altamirano.

 

It was this man who guided, and helped fufuill the simple dreams of absolute service to GODAN and a hand in the administration of the faith, that Alaric had desired for the past 40 years. He owed his entire career, the thing he valued most in his life, to Villork Var Ruthern. 

 

The only thing Alaric could do, to save himself from spiralling into a well of inescapable darkness, was to prepare for what came next.

 

The Man had to be honored.

The Office needed to be Filled.

 

Yet, alaric knew he could only ever be what villorik had spent his entire life fighting:

 

A Shadow of a man greater than himself. 

 

 

"Alaric, your brothers will scheme, bicker, and politic. But you must raise yourself above them." He spoke, placing a gauntleted grip on Alaric's Shoulder.

 

He turned to his elder brother, looking him directly in the eyes through the Visor of his helm, with a nod of wordless recognition and affirmation.

 

"I shall."

 

 

 

 

 

[MadOne 4945]

"What did you look at?" 

 

Above the Firmament, beyond the veil of time, high on the cragged heights of the ancient pass, Caius ascended with a measured indifference, as if the petty clamour of mortal strife had long since faded from his bones. Below, in the memories of a life left behind; a world steeped in blood and ceaseless quarrel, it was as if Villorik’s yearning question carried itself to him with the winds, echoed faintly in the recesses of time.

 

For as long as Caius could remember, there had been a vague yet persistent vision that danced at the edges of his waking thoughts - a realm hinted at in dreams and half-remembered shadows, a place both brutal and breath-taking. It was a vision that had never been fully named, only felt, like a distant melody carried on a winter wind. It was the kind of truth that one might catch a glimpse of when the world is at its quietest, when the clamour of battle has receded to nothing more than a whisper.

 

He crested the peak, then, as the swirling mists parted to unveil a vista bathed in gentle, otherworldly radiance, the sight that unfolded was not a fortress of iron and stone as it had been in life, but a quiet expanse suffused with soft light and tender hues. It was as though the very air shimmered with ancient promise - a secret locked, a covenant kept, a mystery woven through the ages of all who had come before him.

 

Caius regarded this celestial expanse with an indifference born of long detachment from the toil of his former life. Here, at this edge of eternity, the old question found its answer. An answer that he often sought himself. An answer that may never reach Villorik. This place always had called to him, always had been on the back of his mind. Something that had always been there, subtle, a secret uttered to the wind. And though Villorik’s voice demanded a simple answer, here at the edge of all that is known, Caius offered no neat reply. The sight was a truth to be felt rather than explained, a subtle assurance that all the blood and clamour of his past had led him to this quiet, cryptic place. Here, in the silence of the Seven Skies.

 

Caius-Brandt exhaled, though no breath left his lips, for he had been freed from such burdens. His raiment was white as the snow of Villorik's homeland, his brow furrowed with the wisdom of ages, and his gaze as a brand searing through the mist. There, he saw it finally, for the first time. “You ask what I beheld. . .” Caius spake, more unto himself, for no sound reached mortal ears.

 

The wind stirred, and the field whispered with a voice unbidden and the weight of things unsaid pressed upon the veil between worlds.

 

“I beheld the Kingdom.”