Please note some darker things are implied in this chapter. Or perhaps I should say, this is about as dark as my writing will get here on FR.
Feel free to skip it/request a TL:DR of its events should you wish.
Laid Bare
They hadn't spoken much since that night. It wasn't surprising.
Nobody in their right mind would have blamed her for needing time alone.
Though, admittedly, Edan didn't much like it.
He'd done the morning's chores, then taken the rest of the day off. Hunting solo for the entire clan had taken its toll; his body ached, and his body was fatigued in a way he couldn't ignore any longer.
But at the same time, he was anxious. There was too much weighing on his shoulders for him to rest.
The mirror got to his feet, pacing the room before making his way toward the door to the side room, which currently kept him separate from the only other dragon in the house.
He knocked lightly.
"'Run?" he addressed uncertainly, the back of his knuckle rested against the door. "How're you holding up?"
There was a brief shuffling, and then the door opened a crack. Saerun's tired, but otherwise stoic face stared back at him from the gloom.
"Do you - " he paused for a moment. "I think we should talk."
She nodded and stepped back, letting the door swing fully open as she sat on her cot. She thumped her hand on the space next to her and let out a steadying breath. "Here, just... come sit."
The skydancer drew in her legs and wrapped her tail around them as he obliged.
"So," Edan began, only to realize he couldn't find the words for what he wanted to say. "...So..."
Saerun slowly turned to look at him again after a few awkward moments passed.
"Aw hell," he sighed. Reaching to pinch the bridge of his nose before letting his talon drop. "Hell. So, Saerun, I feel like there's a lot you haven't - I feel like there's a lot I don't know about you."
She quickly turned away, picking at a more sparse patch of feathers on her shoulder.
"I don't mean I think you've been lying or anything," he added quickly. "I trust you - I just... I wonder... if I could help more, if I knew more."
Saerun let out something like a quick, sharp laugh, her shoulders heaving with the motion. She shook her head. "Don't think you could."
"I want to
try," he urged. "And aside from that, I'm... worried"
She flinched, but didn't turn back to him. Her shoulders sunk.
"You know I'm not trying to keep anything from you," she said. "The things I haven't said are things I... really don't want to think about."
"Yeah, I..." Edan looked away from her to stare at the ground. "I don't want you to push yourself if it's not worth it. But at the same time... I really feel like there are things you
want to tell me."
He clasped his talons together. "Like that morning when you were asking me about Ila and Marshall and so on... and you brought up your relationship with Ciron."
Saerun had gone very, very still.
"You don't have to tell me," Edan began carefully. "And I won't ask you again if you don't. I'll forget about it. But... is Ciron your son?"
"He..." Saerun took a quick, shuddering breath, still not looking at him. "He
might be."
"'He might'?" Edan repeated to himself, the weight of the words sinking in with each passing moment.
"There were a lot of things I didn't get much of a say in," Saerun said quickly, her tone an uneasy mix of panic and bitterness. "...That we didn't have much control over - or - or... were easier to go along with, even if we didn't want to. I don't know when I started to shut off to it. But I just stopped feeling anything. No sadness, no anger. It just... went away. And I was hollow. And things got easier. For a while."
Edan looked up from his clasped talons, and caught her gaze as she glanced over her shoulder. Her eyes had a hint of the same wildness from when he first met her. She quickly looked away.
"Any eggs we had would be taken away, there were a few people he had around just to mind them," she paused for a moment, rubbing her shoulder. "I preferred it, honestly. Easier not to think about it. But then... I heard about
Ciron hatching."
Once more she met Edan's gaze.
"There was some stupid prophecy - I never believed it. I don't think many there really did, but still, it seemed to be...
fulfilled the moment Ciron opened his eyes."
There was another
thud on the mattress as she drove her fist into it. "It's not even worth saying all of it, but the main line is about a white king and a prince with eyes of fire - I think he must have made it up, or at least bent it to fit. Doesn't matter."
She paused again, taking a deep breath and briefly tilting her head upward, eyes shut.
"Ciron might be mine. The timing fits. But, he also might not be. I knew who else might have been his mother, and they weren't going to do anything. That's not why I took him, anyway," she let out something like a laugh. "I didn't want Ciron to grow up as a pawn for that man, either. Or to end up like him. Gods.
I wanted to
hurt him. He
wanted Ciron. He never cared about anyone else. I saw a chance to make him feel even a
fraction of what I did and I was hellbent on seeing it through.
So I used people. I put on an act. And I tried to take him the moment I could."
She slumped backward, resting her head against the wall.
Edan opened his mouth, then closed it. Saerun did an odd, pained sort of smile at the sight.
"I know," she said, letting out another strange, false chuckle. "And you know what? The damndest thing... I don't know when I started feeling it all again, it's never like there was a moment I realized it, or it all flooded back. But I can feel everything. At some point, everything switched back on and I feel so much...
hatred, so much disgust for myself and everything I can remember that I can't
stand it."
She jerked forward, a wad of blue feathers clutched in her hand.
"I keep going over everything I could have done differently, every chance I could have had to run but didn't take, every horrible choice I made and - " she stopped, briefly holding her head in her hand before shouting an expletive.
"Even
now I know... you could all be safe now, if they never come back, and if I left, I might be able to forget myself again. I've been nothing but bad for you all, you've all been living like fugitives thanks to my choices - "
"I
want you here, Saerun," Edan interrupted. "That aside - I'd already had to deal with that crew before, you have to remember that."
"I know. And I want to be here," she replied, her voice - briefly - soft. "But I can't let him go. That place is bad for him, Altiel is bad for him, that's obvious. But, at some point, I started to..." she paused.
"Love him, I love Ciron. And I love you - all of you. I don't know when that started, but - Gods, I don't even know where I'm going with this - the point is I have to find him. Which means I can't be safe, and if you stick with me, you aren't safe either."
"We all made that choice ages ago, 'Run," Edan said. "And we're not giving up on either of you."
He stood, stretching his wings and beginning to pace as anger began to burn in his chest. "If you think I'd give up after knowing what that...
monster did to you," he snarled. "Well, you've got another thing coming. I'm going to try to track down Reika - she's going to have some competition when it comes time to take him down."
Please note there is also a mini-update posted just above this chapter.
You might notice we've hit a shifting point in the nuzlocke. I thought of putting "End of part 1" at the bottom of Remnants, but in the end due to this being a nuzlocke in which RNG will always have some control I simply cannot predict how many parts we will have, or how long they will be.
A busy time of year is starting for me, but I'm pleased to have hit this point. It means I can go through with a lot of ideas, including hatching a few eggs on my birthday next month that I've been reserving for this portion of the 'locke without being dreadfully behind.
Anyway, thanks for sticking with me, folks.
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