Galekin

Chapter 7, The Immortal Dragon

*Alexander's POV*

I sighed as I looked at the document in front of me. It was written in Lydia's cursive handwriting. Her report of the screening mission so far. She had just left Raebershire along with Sereen and Anna and it suddenly felt a lot quieter in the Order. A lot emptier.

Sereen is a storm that leaves nothing she touches intact. She is wild and animated and for most in the Order, it was relaxing when she finally left again.

But in Lydia's case it is different. She is calm and quiet. But somehow, when Lydia is present the order is a lot livelier. People have hope when she is there. The people in the village love her. The children look up to her. And Lydia calms my heart more than any other person.

I don't know what I will do when Lydia eventually passes.

I sighed again and stared into the warm embers of the fireplace. Remembering how I had managed after losing other dear ones in my life. And for someone who has lived for more than 2000 years, it had been quite a while since I had last been afraid of losing someone.

I was born in a small village close to what is now called Whitecliff. It was a poor village, but it was my home. I grew up as a semi-normal boy. I had the gift of healing, or so I thought back then. Whenever I got injured it healed almost immediately and I had never been sick before.

At the age of 20, I met the love of my life Thalia. I married her a year later. Thalia didn't have a gift, but back then it didn't matter. People lived in harmony, helping each other. Thalia and I had two children. Rosalie and George. And for a while, we were happy. I was incredibly happy. We were poor but we had each other, and nothing else mattered.

Our happiness shattered when I was 34. We were having dinner, one potato shared between the four of us and some rice. It was rare when we had a potato, but we managed to save up money for one tonight. It was a special night after all, it was Rosalie's twelfth birthday. Thalia was telling me about our crops. I worked for the mayor of the village, but Thalia and my two children worked on our farm, providing us with another source of money and food. This year hadn't been as dry and arid as previous years, so our crops would make it, which was good.

We heard a knock on the door, and George, 9 years old, got up and excitedly told us he would open the door.

Before George could even open the door however, it slammed open and three men came in holding knives. Before I was able to even blink, they had stabbed my son, and his lifeless body fell to the ground. My wife and daughter screamed. I stood up and stood before them in a protective stance. I had never used a weapon before at that stage in my life, so I knew I wouldn't be able to do much, but I was 6ft4 so I hoped to at least scared them with my broad frame.

I asked the men what they wanted, telling them we didn't have much. To my horror the men glanced at my wife and daughter and told me they wanted some good women to have fun with a then sell off as slaves. Rage took over my body at that point, I knew I was able to heal fast, so even though they had knives, I had to do what I could to protect my family. I charged at the men and tried to fight them off. It didn't take long before I felt one of their knives pierce my skin, and I winced in pain.

At first, I had managed fairly well against the three men, my tall figure was able to keep them at bay for a few minutes. But as they continued to fight, and as I started to lose more blood, I knew I couldn't hold them for much longer. I told my wife and daughter to run, which sadly didn't work as one of the men had already reached them. My vision had become blurry, but not blurry enough to see one of the dirty men grab my wife, who was standing in front of my daughter. He started playing with her, which filled my rage. I tried to reach her but got held down by one of the men. At this point I had lost so much blood I could barely stand anyway.