Rambunctious ✔

Chapter 7

Fire followed Cassander inaudibly as they tiptoed around Myron's demesne. He finally agreed to help her escape with Lucifer but first he needed to deliver on his promise for Storm and take Fire to her house for one last family assemblage. Fire tried to memorize the bucolic settings around the field where she grew up, but the ephemeral nostalgic memory lane quickly came to an end when they came across Alpha soldiers.

"Myron has been waiting for you." One of the Alpha soldiers simpered before he hit her and Cassander on the head with his rifle causing them to lose consciousness.

Becoming inure to pain, Fire woke up ignoring the painful headache. As her blurred vision became more clear, so did the trenchant, murmurous voices around her. She woke up and found herself in a courtroom and handcuffed.

"Cassander, son of Isidoros and commander in the King Myron's army," the judge announced, "you have being charged and found guilty upon several crimes including High Treason, colliding with the Other Side, helping the chosen one to escape, and having a forbidden intimate relationship with an Astéri." The ripples of fear that started forming in her stomach transformmed into a tsunami of indignation.

"That is false!" Fire screamed from the defense table, "Cassander has never touched me nor laid a finger on me in any inappropriate way!"

"We ask the other defendant Fire, daughter of Storm and Ocean to remain silent until we call on her case." The judge ordered.

"No!" She refused and walked closer to the Jury box, "what is the point of remaining silent? My punishement is clearly going to be the death penalty so why must I show the court any respect?"

Meanwhile, sitting next to her was a broken soldier. Cassander, erstwhile King Myron's favourite commander was now being charged for treason. He did not refuse to join Fire in her small rampage out of fear, but because he was focused on the susurrous criticism by the soldiers he once thought were his friends. He looked the way he feeled: woebegone.

Even though Fire was a speaker of great eloquence and persuasion she could not sway King Myron's decision or the judges' for that matter. Once the judge announced that they will both face the death sentence later tonight, she slowly turned around and looked at him bleakly. She had so much sadness in her that it created a chatoyant effect inside of the courtroom. Her parents' cries filled the room and she did not know who to feel sorry for; her parents who were about to lose their only child or her body that was about to be buried in a home where she has never experienced a sense of hiraeth when she was away with L.

The soldiers handcuffed them and took them both to seperate cells. Fire was back to the same dungeon where she first met L. L... Her lover whom she experienced the best spurious love story with will not be here to share her last moments. The thought of never hearing his mellifluous husky voice again made her cry so many pearls that created an iridescent like light. So long halcyon days in a lonely dusty hut, so long blue butterflies and snowflakes. She told herself.

Cassander stayed still while his father sprinkled holy water

on him with an aspergillum.

"May the Holy Seven Stars guide this soul on his journey to another life," Isidoros cantillated, "May this soul never be found in any of the Seven Hells. May this soul-"

"Just stop." Cassander interrupted, "I am going to be in hell, father."

"Do no speak of such absurd ideas! Why do you have such a weak faith?" Isidoros groused.

"It is not a weak faith, father! I disappointed you for a woman who did not love me back. How can the Holy Seven Stars guide me to Heaven when my father is angry with me? Please father say that you will forgive me before I die." He wailed.

"I wish I could son, but I cannot for I am your barmecide father."

"What do you mean?"

"I am not your real father..." Isidoros's voice cracked.

"Father why do you sound like a blatherskite?"

"Son," he could not resist the cacoethes to say the truth, "you were given to me by King Myron when you were an infant. He has been having an affair outside of wedlock with one of his servants and when she got pregnant and gave birth to you, he killed her fearing that the priests might find out and elect another leader. He was planning to kill you too but I stepped in and decided to claim you as my son in order to protect you."

Hearing this truth was like watching his sanity commit a camisade against his somnolent mind. He was certainly losing his mind, first he discovered that his lover was having an affair with his enemy, then he was sentenced to death, and now he finds out that he is the King's bastard. Why do bad things always come in threes?