In the first month of 1276, Terrianis kept to his own plan made after the horrific visions. He slept little, ventured out not from the throne room, leaving everything to his children. When asked, when sought for he simply answered the coming days shall be a test for all of them, to prove their loyalty to Their dream, and their aptitude to navigate chaos, lead their people back into the light, into peace and prosperity like their elders done so before. When they left the great doors, he curled up again on the floor, shivered from the fits of primeval terror. And ponder amidst the delirious flow, what madness drove the Night to such an ally. Had he not wrestled with those first horrors of the Almodo himself? Were things so dire beyond the veil of Elhyrissian?

  He sought respite, observing his children. Observing Drussaev dampen discarded orders and scrolls in his tears. Weeks of weeping he watched, riddled by his own guild and dread, then felt a little pride when Drussaev sought respite in bloodshed, in breaking in homes himself, inquiring for the murderer of his beloved. How he sought the company and wisdom of Angura in curbing down on the traitors.

  Joy seemed a momentary panacea against dread, seeing him command the Talos Legion his fellow brother created and perfected through the last two centuries. A pang of sorrow mixed into his remedy, witnessing the last shreds of Drussaev’s mercy evanescence. Though there were traitors aplenty in their city in the valley, Terrianis himself knew massacring them all shall mar the future generations, even if they shall understood the reason for why blades brushed crimson upon alabaster. Afterall, the pariah-folk of Dusk hesitated not at the call of Night, even if though he bestowed them rights and freedom after centuries of enslavement.

  When sorrow verged on triumph over joy, his all-seeing gaze shifted on Albrion, who along his subordinates soared the skies, rained the many-colored flames, leapt into fray fearless. Pride he felt at Albrion’s austerity, his coldness for not showing mercy upon the worst of the traitors, who began calling forth into the outer gulfs, bringing in horrors of the Night. Yet, there was a lurking suspicion seeing not Albrion follow alongside his fellow praetors of the skies. Wishing not for this seed to bloom, he once again shifted, from one children to another, until he noticed Calaviril, venturing down late in the nights, no longer visiting the adventurer’s chapterhouse to offer aid in these trying times. Instead, she searched, clearly for the one traitor, the weakling boy of some plebeian, who vanished from his cell one night. He continued on, peering at his many children spread across the city, but when the urge came to peek at Aurelithae, he stopped and ceased the spell.

  His mind shifted to darker thoughts as he laid upon the cold marble. Terrianis was no fool. A part of him calculated already the potential of another uprising before Aurelithae’s ascension. One that would have happened even if Mirayroth and his New Dawn festered not within their city in the valley. Most races lacked the patience the Seven blessed his kindred, the dwarves, the djinn and the sylvan-kin with. Beyond that, peace was a finite thing, one demanding sacrifice to be spilled upon its altar every few decades or centuries. Time may have been an enemy concurrently, but even with a dagger in hand, it stood by the side of his people even before their Elevation.

  He sighed, realizing it was a foolish train of thought to dwell on. He sat upright, leaned closer the rim of the platform, and swept his hand, conjuring an aimless reflection to watch for the days to come.

  Terrianis let out a meager chuckle at the foolishness of those who flocked under the doomed shroud of Mirayroth. He could laugh not, still afraid it would echo back from the pond, his gaze focused upon. It reflected not the opulent ceiling, emanating the neutral, white glow but that of the city, where peace often got overruled by their foolishness. A few legionaries too relaxed, too assured in the protection of their gilded panoplies fell to their blades, spells, but the Talos Legion endured. When daggers scraped against their sturdy bosoms, they retaliated without fear and hesitation.

  Blood flown on the streets, and when chaos ceased, creating the illusion of peace, the people went along with their days like before. Terrianis was sure and felt the creeping tendrils forcing many, and he wept not for a single one. They were weak, and he convinced himself in the silence, it was a necessity. He already formulated a speech when triumph shall saunter into their laps, offering its back to be gently patted akin to feline creatures, the children of the Lustrous Empress and the Gleaming King of Magnificence who ruled from a distant land he often wished to visit in his childhood. Even now, just peering at the city, his mind wandered into the solace of his old memories.

  And like a whirlpool or the maws of Charybdis, Terrianis strode with the tide finding himself in his old room, high in the tower with a mesmerizing view of the sprawling city. “Are you excited?” Umbreniel’s soft, mellowing voice breezed his ears, her pleasant scent of dark berries stirred dreamy Terrianis, exhausted from the daily trainings.

  “A little. Though I fear I am inadequate to be Elhyrissiar.” He answered meekly, just returned from the conquest of the far-south, the slaying of the Black Pharaoh’s whose words weakened his confidence. Now he wished nothing more than to regain it, walk the myriad lands of Vhalleryon as he did so for nearly a century.

  She chuckled softly as her pallid arms rested onto the marble banister, light seeping through the twisted columns with pronounced scales carven along the polished alabaster surface. “But you shall be, I have no doubt about that. I think not even Augermil entered this world in full panoply, a shield and blade.” They both chuckled at the absurdity those words conjured into their minds.

  “Most definitely. Regardless, he had the desire to protect, to fight for our future.” Terrianis stopped as he gazed down at the gardens below. “Me, I dream of walking on distant soil, the scent of distant winds, the voices of distant people who see me faceless. I don’t know if I shall ever dream of power, of eternity.”

  “But you shall little brother.” Her voice turned hollow, but he paid no attention to it. “Once I shall be no more, you will covet the power and the end it shall bring upon you.” He seen the glassy eyes of his father stare back at him, felt again his claws tearing open his chest, felt the raucous taste of his twin-heart. And felt his own grew two.

  When he turned to meet her empty gaze, he found himself beyond a thick, mahogany door, carven with the moons of old realms in the center, flakes of snow with branching veins and nearly forty tips falling and ascending towards the rims and the soft arch. Terrianis know not why unease shackled him in place, but he forced himself upon the door, listening to the muffled moans, whimpers filled with true passion he knew only twice in a thousand years. Distinct voice they belonged to, and the faces they fitted were veiled in inky shadows conjured by himself.

  His palm remained on the door’s polished, cold surface and he feared exerting power to open, to see the truth which ached more than an arrow in his sides. Once more he triumphed over himself, and pushed with all the power whilst his lips parted to bellow. But no sound came as his legs weakened, collapsed onto his knees he could just watch the massive form of his brother looming over the pale beauty whose red hair spilled upon pillows and blankets, a few tresses sprawling disorderly over her bewitching face, and the rustled dress drawn to expose her pale and ample breasts.

  Grunts mingled, formed the tones of betrayal. Four hands locked; fingers curled taut with each mighty thrust. The wood moaned in sorrow. Not as deep as his, as old wound widened again. Above the two greatest traitors of his life, the canopy reflected the deep void gazing down at the two expectant, cheering at the seeding of a new life. A life by its design. Oyotarimel moaned loud, muffled by the lips of Augermil pushing onto them.

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  They paid no attention to him, their forbidden love continued for centuries, and his mighty seed blossomed into the children Terrianis expected the most from. “I see, it is your trickery. Traitor!” He screamed towards the slender figure whose cold hand pushed him from behind, whose ivory fingers blackened at the sharp tips kept his head from turning. The benefactor of his treacherous brother, whom he loved and resented still to this day.

  Pale were her arms stretched unquivering, whiter than the old moon, with a divine corpse like excellence to them, whilst her lithe and gaunt form taller than even Augermil draped in layers of the blackest robes, and a long veil hiding her sorrowful countenance only her beloved divine mate and brother could gaze upon–as that was his promised prize. Terrianis could envision, felt the gloat forming upon her long lips, black as the night. Inky tears colder than anything continued their relentless march down her cheeks, dribbled onto his head as she loomed above. In silence, she forced him to watch the horrid melding of Augermil and Oyotarimel into one bulbous horror. One of protoplasmic ooze, spouting hungering maws of a droning laughter, writhing tentacles tearing apart the false reality of this compulsory vision.

  Myriad faces undulated upon its amorphous body, bellowing in one voice constructed from thousands, bleeding his ears and filling his head with the memories of forgotten eons. Of the times before Time marched on. “Enough!” He bellowed with their own three voices.

  Forcing his face away Terrianis fell from his throne, onto the cold snow blanketing the waving hills littered with corpses. Beneath the rigid whiteness, blood and spell marred the soil, the earth grumbled as unnatural flames gnawed at its sturdy flesh, melted the interminable snow, and the cadavers laying all round him. Still, the sound of clashing metal drawn his attention towards gilded and white silhouettes, blurred with each and constant movement, crimson joining in the many other shades when blades rent flesh through and alongside armor. Their spears penetrated into each other whilst their cries bled his ears until they dampened into silence. And above the chaos of battle, the skies blackened, shifted into blue and golden, the clouds rushed towards the south whilst the mighty, gargantuan elders clashed.

  Looking at them, even then and present he wondered if on that accursed day, they all witnessed the forming of day and night, the first hour which followed the interminable nothingness from which the Black Serpent came first.

  Each flap stirred a mighty draught sweeping the melting and thickening snow, awakened the dead from their supposed eternal slumber. Hundreds of them were filled with the blinding glow of the Dawn, whilst the other half emanated the deepest shade of purple tinted at the edges with the utter darkness of night, and they rejoined the fray, bestowing him the desire to stand atop the world as the mightiest of mortal kindred.

  “Once I am no more, you will covet the power…” Umbreniel’s cadaver whispered the words in her hollow tongue, her dark hair still soft as it cascaded in his palms, betwixt his fingers.

  The desire she spoke of then, sprouted so. Her death the nurturing water upon the Seed of Terrianis’s desire. “It is not just your passing, dear sister. Look upon them, and tell me, don’t you feel envious of the power they hold. Why has the Almodo chosen that such power, such elegance should be only theirs and not ours?”

  She chuckled in his arms. “That is his nightmare my beloved brother.” A deep, gravelly whisper joined her whispery voice.

  “Why allow us to witness? Why plant the idea in his children to create their lesser then?” He turned, peered into the empty sockets, and recoiled at the curving lips.

  “Envy is just one of his myriad tools, the one to hook you into your doom, and to his worthless ascension.” When he looked up, he saw the birth of a child. Terrianis groaned in disgust, as golden eyed man embraced the little infant wrapped in wool and fur, sitting beside the aevhen mother.

  Within the child, he sensed something greater. Greater than the clashing, winged titans and his disgust turned into envy, as the child possessed what he truly coveted. Power to bring back all those he lost, to be their true ruler and to bring eternal peace upon all realms. All those within a tarnished vessel, laughing with innocence as he yet to awaken to the horrors and joys of the world he was born into. “Why such an impure child?” The question came from his lips, involuntarily as his emotion reigned over his reason.

  Yet no answer came as he awoke on the cold floor, breathing heavily, a mix of emotions swirling in his form. Anger, sorrow, envy which remained as the months passed as he sat alone on the throne, contemplating. Terrianis recoiled knowing without confidence the visions were lies, meant to broke further down his resolve and his sanity. Not much remained from the latter, that much he felt tearing into his own hair, into his still perfectly aligned tresses.

  Once young, he was envious of Augermil, of the two ancient dragons. Many times, he fought against his own despair, wishing he would not born as the inheritor of the Elhyrissiar, but fate no mortal could combat. Not a single managed to convince the Fateweaver or his servants to alter their threading the Pane of Fate, and it took him centuries to make peace with the truth – he shall never have the chance to wander aimlessly in the realms, fighting in wars where they had no stake but the riches promised, gain the experience of ages and watch and play along as civilizations rise, fall whilst time marches on without care.

  Love he knew and contemplated whilst hundreds died during the next three months. Terrianis still loved both Oyotarimel and Augermil the same, yet it could not soothe the festering wound opened by their betrayal. From its anathemas, poisonous thoughts sprouted, and felt foolish not noticing how none of the children he believed to be his were his brothers.

  Their height, their strength inherited from their true father. All truths he began anew to cloud himself with various lies. The Deossos kindness to grant them the Augermil’s strength and resilience he wished to possess himself before, their kindness to their lesser kindreds, he deluded to be Solemn Shepherd giving her blessings besides Oyotarimel showing faint signs of it. All these lies and many others he repeated, yet none he needed when it came to Aurelithae, the sole child of his and hers. Her scale growths proved enough; she was his solely. She was as cursed as he is with a cursed eternity awaiting her.

  And whilst Terrianis’s thoughts lingered on his inheritor, he once more felt the thrusting cold beneath his naked soles. A sigh escaped his flawlessly sculpted lips, and expectantly looked up towards the interminable hinterlands far in the north. Only to look a fool, when the cadavers strewn across the thickness of the Night ruled lands, wore white instead of golden, azure and brass. A white contrasted by red fabrics beneath, mingling with their blood, whilst a beauty surpassing Oyotarimel and Umbreniel stood at the heart of an adjacent clearing.

  Hair white as the snow, tumbled deep along the black seams perfectly forming a luscious coat, a blend of leather and silken following the asymmetric silhouette preferred by their dark kin. On it, snow white brocades and crisp streaks at the edges loomed over the seaming, tendrils reaching towards the center, veiled by the luxuriant hair. Her frame slender, yet subtle muscles appeared as she raised her arms slowly, the long, narrow cuffed sleeves sliding back a little. At her black clawed fingers, the dim shades of Dusk gathered, slithered along the dead forest, into the cadavers.

  All around they arose, calm and kneeling as they awaited their queen’s command. A gasp escaped Terrianis as she approached towards him, her beauty ever clearer, and her scales in shades darker than the night, an almost familiar pattern at the center of her forehead, a frame of a vertical, angular third eye. One unlike Anessarion’s, adorned within the frame with a hideous eye of the Night, staring right into his soul through time. He could not help but yelp like a scared child when the dead moved onto him at the behest of their liege. They crawled until he saw nothing but their rotten flesh, felt their blackened blood pour onto his face, flow into his mouth and nose suffocating him.

  A lone glint penetrated the darkness, bringing hope, then the agony of metal goring through his flesh in a moment’s notice. His scream echoed in the void, within the throne room where Terrianis flailed about before his magnificent throne.