The Flower Of Paeonia

Chapter 1: The Beginning Of Always

* N's P.O.V.

"It has started." Those were the first words we heard from our Father when he entered the room this morning. "The war. It has officially started."

Iris just looked up from the meat she's been preparing for lunch. She didn't look startled, or surprised; the look on her face was more like the one full of sarcasm. "Had too much mead last night, have we?"

Father wasn't joking. He stood there just looking at Iris, dead serious. "This isn't really the time for jokes, Iris. I just heard it, down there at the village. The Abrahamists have just declared war on all the Pagans. It's official."

He just called Iris Iris.

He never calls Iris Iris.

Iris, our Mother, insisted that we all call her by her real name. She said she had been born under the rainbow, and that's why our Grandmother named her Iris, like the ancient Goddess of the rainbow and messenger to the Gods. She adored her name, and used to say very often how "calling her by her real name instead of Mother, Sister etc makes her feel forever young".

But this didn't apply to our Father; not at all. Instead of calling her by her name, he always used "Mila", an old Pagan word for your beloved one. Even when he was mad at her, which never lasted long, he didn't call her by her real name; he just reffered to her as "That woman". Which used to be pretty funny sometimes.

So no wonder his words made Iris stand up immediatelly this time. Her voice changed from sarcastic to a very serious tone. She laid the knife she was holding on the table.

"How- Who told you?"

"Bran. You know, the red-haired man who lives in that small cave near the river? Well, I wanted to go roam around the village a little bit earlier this morning, to catch up the news - and I met him near the entrance. He told me to turn around and go back immediately. He said that he had sneaked in some house just a bit earlier, and he heard everything on the TV - how the bigots in the Abrahamian Goverment had decided to declare war on us, and how it wouldn't be the best idea for me, or anyone else from the Paeonian Forests, to go to the village at this moment."

Iris' hand instinctively closed around the pendant she was always wearing around her neck, shaped like the Eye of Ra. Her voice was trembling, but her eyes looked steady.

"So what does this mean? What are we going to do?"

"First, inform Old Sage and Great Enchantress, of course. Then, convene a meeting for all Family Shamans. After that, organize all Hunters and Necromancers." I could see clearly how, despite him trying to hide it, his eyes turned to me at the mention of Necromancers. But I was still pretending to be asleep. So he didn't notice it. "And then... Well, you know, my dear. You've heard the old sagas as well as I have. And you know very well what most likely awaits us."

Iris gasped, then stood up, approached Father, and put her hands over his. "Amaethon", she said. Again with the full name. Iris rarely called our Father by his real name. Probably because she was too lazy to pronounce it. Or she simply didn't like it. In good times, she simply called him Ami.

But these weren't the good times.

"Amaethon... Isn't she too young for this?"

Once again, I could feel both of their looks directed towards me. But I ignored it again.

"I know, Mila, I know... But we should have been ready for this for some time now. You've heard the rumors that has been spreading around for the last few months. And we know the situation has been very tense lately."