Finally Found

Chapter 46 - Rhistel

Everything has gone so wrong since the damn Rialians got involved. They started this damn war and have ruined everything that I've worked for over the last century to free the people of my country from the control of the Gods. For too long they've caused nothing but pain and suffering to those that worship them and I intend to end it. By any means necessary.

It seemed at first that I was the only one to see the curse the Gods placed on us when they created the Stones but over time I found others who knew the truth. We spread slowly throughout Nerkise finding like minded people until we finally had enough power to start planning our take over, which went very well. Eliminating the Council turned out to simpler than we thought but the rebellions that sprung up after were not. No sooner than we put one down than another began.

Then I started getting reports from my spies in Rialria that their army was moving north but none of the spies could tell me exactly where the army was. Not that I had the man power to do anything about it while trying to maintain control of Nerkise. And to top it all off they had crowned the Lords Ruikor, Belath and Lilas along with their newfound human mate Emilia as the rulers of Rialria.

The main threat out of them though is Ruikor, a trained warrior and one of the oldest living creatures giving him plenty of time to hone his skills. Both he and Lilas were there when the Stones were created being relatives of the Gods but they weren't the only ones there. My father being one of Filarion's grandchildren, the only child of his eldest son, was there along with my mother his wife.

Like all the others there they were honoured to witness the Gods final gift to us not knowing that it would become a curse to my family. Unlike Kor and Lilas my parents didn't receive their Stones that day instead they would find them centuries later after I was born. Father found his first and we were so sure that mother would find the matching Stone, only she didn't. It had already been claimed by a low born human man that father was all too happy to leave us to be with. Never mind the thousand or so years that he'd been a loving husband to my mother or that I was still young, the Gods had chosen this man for him. How could he defy their wishes?

I saw little of my father after that day when he left our home to create a new one. Now I can't even picture his face it's been so long since I last saw him, the last news I received about him was over a thousand years ago. Apparently he'd settled in one of the elvish towns in the south west of Nerkise with that man, living a simple life as he was some common elf rather than the Lord he was born as. Even though he likely doesn't still live their I took great joy in burning that town to ashes when I took over.

The torment of the Gods knows no end though as mother eventually found her own Stone and Soulmate to go along with it. Another elf who agreed to stay by her side but brought with him his bastard children, which we didn't mind. It give mother more children and I had finally had siblings to play with. But my mother's soulmate didn't intend to stop his affairs just because he'd found his soulmate. To him my sweet, devoted mother was nothing more than someone to cook and clean for him and to care for his children while he chased after anyone who caught his eye. Bringing back more bastards each time as he was somehow incredible fertile for an elf.

Eventually the torture of her soulmate having countless affairs and expecting her to raise the by-product became too much for my mother. At that time I was grown and living in my own home yet it was weeks before I knew what had happened. In her madness mother had killed herself but not before killing her soulmate, and all of his bastard children still living with them. She'd left me a letter apologising for leaving me with such a burden but that she had no other way out.

Just as she'd written the gossip of being her son has followed me ever since. Never really dying down no matter where I went it would find me, whispers of whose son I am. A killer's son. Child-murder. Be wary of that one, his mother was mad. I've spent many years travelling since then trying to outrun the talk but I can never get far enough away. It only made my hatred of the Gods fester more.