"Pour everything out for the blood you have shed, you're wasting your time in appeasing the dead."
- Aeschylus
Hate begets hate, violence begets violence; it's as sure as the sun rising in the east and setting in the west. Uther Pendragon sowed the...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Twenty years pass so quickly when you're not truly living.
Mairead wouldn't call her childhood happy, though there were days of peace and joy; a cloud hung above the Rhyls. Not a cloud, though, a sword. It didn't seem to matter how much time passed; Uther Pendragon's thirst for magical blood would never be slaked.
It was an eternal truth, Mairead decided, as inescapable as birth and death for all living things.
But that didn't mean she had to be happy about it.
Outside of the constant duty of caring for her family and people, keeping what was left of Beladur from dying out, the flame of hatred constantly burned within Mairead. She may have only been two when Beladur was sacked, but memories like those didn't fade with time. They only strengthened. Scores of nights in her childhood were spent with those images playing across her eyelids, the sight of fire and blood inescapable.
But as she grew, they changed into something else entirely. Mairead's dreams shifted into a hope for the future, the hope for revenge.
Such were dark thoughts, some might have called them evil, but Mairead disagreed with such an assessment. How could any evil be greater than that of Uther Pendragon himself? He destroyed generations of innocents in his anger, wiping away an ancient culture and religion. That was often how Mairead excused her hatred of the man, much preferring that explanation to the personal pain he caused her.
Elin Rhyl was just another one of Uther's many victims, faceless to the King of Camelot but not to her family.
Five years past, before the Rhyls returned to the ruins of Beladur; a raid on their camp proved fatal for Elin.
Before that day, it was easy to push aside all that had been taken from the Rhyls; at least they had each other. But the death of Elin Rhyl marked a change. No longer could the family live on the outskirts of a world they once ruled; the hatred for the Pendragons began anew, like an ember stoked by a warm gust of wind.
Such flames kept Mairead going each day, as did the knowledge that it was her and Osian alone responsible for the survival of their family and people.
That day was no different; as midday came and went, the sun sinking slowly towards the horizon, Mairead made her daily rounds.
She woke with the sun, caring for her two younger sisters, all the while making sure those who followed them back to Beladur were well settled. Some days were easier than others. They had been blessed with a good harvest; no one would go hungry that winter, Mairead was assured.
But as dusk approached, Mairead made her way to her most painful duty.
The corridors leading towards the garden were in much the same condition as the rest of the castle, soot-stained walls and crumbling columns, upheld by ancient magic yet tragic looking all the same. Ivy and moss had begun to overtake the structure after many long years, the Rhyls returning just in time before the greenery completely overtook the stone.
