Butterfly Reign - SilentTeyz

29

The thing about twins, one is always complementary.

It seemed that from the moment that Techno and Jared were born, everyone around was concerned about the same thing: which twin would become the Emperor's heir. History knows many stories, bloody and brutal, in which brothers have slayed one another for the throne. As much joy and pride as there was in the faces of their parents, Techno saw something else as well. Fear.

No matter how many years pass – ten, fifteen, or twenty – there will always be one unchanging truth of Techno's life: one of them is meant to rule, and the other to serve.

It began, like all things cataclysmic, simple.

They were playing tag, servants jostling to get out of their way, when Techno's foot caught on nothing and sent him flying down, down, down.

Jared was the one to cry out and call for their parents. Techno hadn't even realized that he fell until he was already on the floor, hiccuping. Scraped knees and a throbbing tailbone seemed to have appeared of their own volition, completely separate from the staircase he just tumbled down from. For the Emperor and the Empress, who weren't normally around to see Techno bumping and crashing into things right in front of him, that was the first clue that something was off.

The physician looked into Techno's eyes for a long time. Forced him to keep them open while he peered at them with strange-looking tools. By the end of it, Techno was a squirming ball of anxiousness, anchored only by Jared's hand clutched in his.

Turned out, Techno's eyesight was bad. Well, they said it was. Techno wouldn't know, the world was always for him this way. Blurry, colors like drips of paint spidering through water. Apparently, it wasn't supposed to be like that.

Jared was excited about Techno getting his first pair of glasses. More than Techno himself, even.

"I want to be the first thing you see," Jared insisted, nearing breaking Techno's nose in the hurry to shove their faces together.

see, right? Just not very well." Techno tried to push Jared away. Feebly, of course, and without much success. Jared's excitement seemed to be like the string of a guitar that was pulled and let loose. Rattling.

Techno sighed.

The physician brought the glasses, two lenses slotted into a metal frame. A foreign weight settled on the bridge of Techno's nose. The world snapped into focus: vivid and full of so many different shapes that he nearly toppled out of his chair trying to grasp it all at once.

Everything else dimmed in comparison with the brightness of Jared's grin.

Later, they went to gaze at the night sky. Father pointed up, where Orion charged his bow and Andromeda lay chained in the void's wafting sea. Polaris blinked at them – a soft, forecasting shimmer. Techno was enchanted. In the future, more than the stargazing itself, he would remember his family: Jared's back secured against his, Father whispering something in Mother's ear and making her laugh. A feeling, expanding beyond the confines of his chest, larger than cosmos. Love.

Techno had what the physicians called albinism.

Like several of his ancestors throughout the centuries, he was kissed by winter, and destined to carry its affections through life. At birth it was easy to mistake his hair and lashes for being simply blond; that and light blue eyes gave him a stark resemblance to his father, the Emperor, so nobody suspected anything for a few years.

But Techno's hair never grew darker from the color of fresh-fallen snow. An hour in the ruthless afternoon sun would typically burn his face to blisters. Intolerant toward sunbathes, Techno's skin gave a new definition to the word ghostly pale.