Welcome to Gaia! ::

“I am devout.”

The metallic THUNK-CLANK of a metal goblet hitting hardwood tabletop sounded up the steps to the second story loft where Malikai ought to have been sleeping. Instead, he lay awake, back to the thin cot and worn sheets that made up his sleeping space and eyes open, counting splinters on the wooden rafters over his head. His father’s voice rose in volume at a rate proportional to how much alcohol he consumed. At its current decibel, he judged the man had more likelihood of passing out in his own saliva than of toning down on his own before sleep.

Eventually, Malik slipped off of his cot, careful not to bang his mechanical leg on the hardwood and accidentally rouse the attention of those before. Not that they were being particularly attentive to begin with. They were, realistically, unlikely to notice if anything less than a kargoth were stomping around overhead, but it never hurt to use an extra pinch of caution. He made it to the cut in the flooring that lead to a wooden ladder running down to the bottom floor, and Malik eased himself through the hole and down several rungs so that he could sit, and watch, leaving his younger sister to sleep peacefully on a cot tucked but a hand’s breadth away from his own.

She, miraculously, managed to sleep through most all of them. Not that he wasn’t used to them, too, but his mind would always linger on his father’s rants, and that — in addition to the raw volume — made it near impossible to get to sleep unless and until raw exhaustion took over. So on those nights, he would observe, and listen.

“I…am devout,” Rondin repeated, slower but not much quieter as he lifted his drink again, a heavy sway to his step. “I am a soldier for my goddess. You all know it!” A clamour of voices answered him in similarly-slurred tones. The usual crowd. His father typically had anywhere between one and three nights a week where the main floor of their home became an impromptu political platform and drunken rambling scene mixed into one. “Seren…is our light. We’ve all fought for her. Spilt blood for her…worshipped the ground she created for us and the dawn that still rises each morning…”

More murmured, and shouted, calls of agreement.

“But what—what of this…woman…that she charged with our direction?” Rondin demanded, banging his goblet again with each emphasized word. “Aevah Avi once lead us into battle!”

Rallying shouts of, “Here, here!” and “That she did!” followed in the statement’s wake.

“She was our general, the general she was assigned to be by Seren herself! She took us across the desert, lead us to the warfront, and with her as our commander we once slaughtered those shadow-skinned, black-blooded, soulless monstrosities who still sully the name of what it means to be a Magescian!”

For nearly half a minute, the roar of approval was near-deafening, and Malikai shifted his weight to get more comfortable, catching to frame of the ladder with one arm and rubbing at an ear with the other.

“But Aevah has gone soft,” Rondin spat. “Do you think Draco forgets? Far across the sea and the desert and more sea, do you think he waits idly by as she has these past years, do you think he is content with peace as it stands?” After barely a half-second pause, he answered his own question, “No. Those…creatures…were built, born, and bred for war and nothing else! Do you think they will lie quiet forever?”

The resounding, “No!” came in drunken echoes, his father’s friends piping up and adding their own curse-heavy language.

“There are whispers of a secret on our side, something in construction for us, but what is so secret that her own people cannot know of it? We are not the puppets that Draco wields! We should not be kept in the dark! We will not stand idly by while—”

The chorus continued on as such for over an hour, perhaps more, before Malik’s eyes began to dip, the need for sleep finally filling his young body and threatening to take over. At ten years old, he had heard his father’s political rants so many times, he could recite most of them by rote memory. The oblivionites were coming. Aevah was an ineffective leader. War would inevitably return again, and again, until the darkness, the ‘disease’ of Magesc was finally snuffed out permanently. Such were the laws of history.

And so on. And so on.

What bothered Malikai, though, was not the rants themselves. He trusted his father’s judgement, and from what he had heard of oblivionites personally, even from outside sources, his father’s predictions seemed all but inevitable. His rants were fact, in Malikai’s eyes, as strange as it was to imagine something that lived and breathed in the world they did and still managed to harbour pure evil. It was the hypocrisy in the disconnect between his father’s words and actions that frustrated him.

Malik’s family was not wealthy. They lived in the sections of Ashen City that never made it into history or the paintings of orderite elegance. The parts where on better days the sky was brown-blue and on worse days the streets were black with soot from the mechanics of livelier districts that could afford to pump their waste elsewhere. The Dorran family did not have a great house to its name or a fortune which they would pass to him; on harder winters, it did not always have the coin to put a full meal on the table.

What it did have was a history of military performance. His father, his grandfather before him, and even great-grandfather before that had all fought for their goddess and been recognized for their accomplishments with many of his blood relatives achieving rank in the once-proud orderite army. As such, Malikai felt it was in his blood to fight, his destiny to take up arms against the enemy in the inevitable event of the war’s return. This, at least, would give him purpose. Someone, something worthwhile to be strong for.

His father, however, insisted upon him following the civilian route: taking over the family business. An “honorable” path for the younger son, he said, whenever Malik dared to complain about it. But it wasn’t the path Malik wanted, and he knew it. Every time he listened to his father give his speech or some variant, his resolve solidified. He would learn to carry a blade, somehow. He would learn to be strong, and one day protect his family and his people and do his goddess honor.

He had to.

This thought still stirring restlessly in his mind on repeat, Malik crawled back under the thin sheet atop his cot and shut his eyes. One day, his family would understand.

Word Count: 1,189

Dear Journal,

I met a lovely girl today - Lady Laesara Wimrath. Laesara. That's such a pretty name, isn't it? She was golden. Like a sunrise. And her hair was pink-orange, too. I'll probably never see her again, but it was so nice to once.

Dear Journal,

My mum was working in the Wymrith estate again today and after a short bit of being there, I ended up called on to help the house staff. I didn't mind that so much, since it gave me something to do if nothing else. It also lead to me seeing lady Laesara again when I got sent in to the stables. I met a hastar of hers, Liora. She was a beautiful creature. I'd never seen one up so close before! I never thought I'd get to be so near, let alone touch her, but I did, and of all things, lady Lae said she could mayhaps even teach me to ride.

I dare not think on it too much, since I fear if I do, maybe the whole thing will turn out imagined.

Word Count: 1,297

Word Count: 1,908

Word Count: 2,915

Dear Journal,

Since being taken on as lady Lae's squire, I've had a great lot to learn - and still have so far to go, being that I don't know a bit about real swordplay. My brother's begun teaching me what he knows, though, and now Laesara is also. Today we were in her father's armory, practicing back and forth with blades. She had to leave early to see a tutor, and in her absence, I know I ought not have touched anything, but something just wouldn't let me not, and, well...

It seems I imprinted on one of her father's trophy swords.

Word Count: -