Teajan: Return

Chapter Nine

Paladii Commander Rorvia Vycian

Blackrift

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"Father how good it is to see you again!" I said upon escort into his study, the guard at the door was not the scarred one, what was his name? Hale? Halst? What was his name? In any matter neither he nor the other head guards from my youth were here. I had guessed my fathers hand perfectly when talking to the Huntress, and her brother Jale. He has sent them with his golden children to Teajan.

"Why, my little tulip has grown up! Not only a Paladin, but a Commander! I'm proud of you, your mother would be proud of you." He said, his eyes watering slightly as he gave me a hug. I could stab him here. He wouldn't see it coming, but it wouldn't be the same, no he has to see everything, just as I did.

Twenty years ago he sent my mother and I to the camp of a Wtevh clan whose Elder had recently offered a peace with Blackrift and the Empire, the Elder's words weren't worth the shit of his horses and my mother was dead and my thumb severed before the rear guard could dismount their horses. Father, of course, was absent from the gathering and it was The Huntress, not Terrus Vycian, Brenin of Blackrift who lead the purge of the Wtevh.

In my position I could see the fires rising throughout the city, the buildings burning with fires brighter than the legends of Itenton. I release the embrace and with the back of my hand also my father's left cheek hard enough to turn his face to the window. I rip his sash from his waist and form it into a noose around his neck, his tears pooling in the grooves of my gauntlets.

The doors are thrown open by a guard all too late, no later then he shouts for the Brenin's attention is he impaled by the broken banner of the man he swore to protect.

Tying the free end of the sash to the decorative spear of my great grand-father, I drag my father to the glass, separating him from the ruins below, and throw him through. positioning the spear between the frames I hang my father above the inferno that has become of my home. In this moment my destiny and fate are sealed.