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To begin, let us get something straight.
Darius rarely ever lost his composure. In fact, he prides himself on being very well put together.
Once Lilith took their one day of vacation and made it a workday, and yet he didn’t kill her. Another time Eberwolf chewed up his cape and left it in shreds, yet he didn't toss him out into the acid rains. He’d even woken Kikimora up from a nap once (unlucky draw) and came out with minimal scratch marks.
Yes, he’s amazing and he knows it.
Still, even someone unbreakable as him had to be shocked at this.
---
“Hey Riri,” he started, still seemingly entranced with the view. Personally, Daiurs didn’t see the point in it. It was just a sunset after all. They got one of those every evening. He’d much rather be binging The Reginalds or something. Still, he’d never turn down a day with his mentor. Especially with how busy things tended to get. To be fair though, mentor was a bit of a misnomer. They were a mere two years apart in age, and he saved the man from himself so many times his "mentor" hardly deserved to be called a functioning being.
The witch was always on errands for the emperor. Really, Darius is kinda proud of him for taking even this much time off, he’d taught him well.
“Do you ever wonder…” he continues without a response, “what the boiling isles must have been like- back when everyone could use whatever kind of magic they wanted?”
“Never even thought about it,” Darius replied, turning from the sunset to look at his mentor. “It was a wildland, wasn’t it? Well, that’s what the textbooks will tell you at least. I’m not sure I buy any of it though, if there’s anything I’ve learned here it’s that the government lies a lot.”
“Yeah, we do, don't we…”
Darius looked at the man, really looked at him. At the face only he was allowed to see. He stared to the point where if anyone else had been looking at him this way Darius would’ve summoned an abomination to wedgie them already. The sun haloed his golden hair, but still, he seemed sadder than usual. His eye bags had grown about two centimeters deeper, and his hair seemed more frazzled than yesterday. This is saying something, as he looked dead on his feet yesterday too.
“Hey,” Darius started, his mentor turned to him, “are you okay?
---
“This is Hunter, my nephew,” Belos announced to them. The alleged ‘Hunter’ appeared nervous, which made sense when you consider the fact he couldn’t have been older than five. “He will be staying with us for the foreseeable future. I hope you treat him as well as I do.”
Then Belos left. As if he hadn’t just presented them- him- with a boy the spitting image of his beloved friend.
Ashton. Who had died just around five years ago.
The child didn’t even cast a glance at the coven heads before scurrying off after the Emporer. Darius didn’t know if that made it hurt worse, or less.
(He just barely made it back to his bathroom before his lunch came back up and out. He didn’t make it to his resting chambers before the tears came. How ugly of him.)
---
“Hey Riri,” Ashton was walking along a decrepit wall, while they were supposed to be patrolling. He’d probably be fine though, long as none of the dirt he was picking up ended up on Darius.
“Don't call me that.” He responded crossly.
Ashton giggled, his laugh still just as pretty annoying as usual. Then he sobered up and spoke with a surprising amount of dignity for one wobbling along a wall.
“What if we ran away?” he asked, seeming almost completely serious if not for the words he spoke. “We could leave the boiling isles tonight, ditch all the patrols and the rules and the pain and finally get a break. A real break. Not the singular vacation day we get a year.”
Darius stared at Ashton. He had been acting odd for a while now. Before, Darius had thought he was incapable of being stressed, especially with him being the emperor’s favorite. But, if he seriously wanted to run away, Ashton’s definitely due in for a break.
“I’d do it,” he played along, “but from where would I get the money?”
“We’d do a heist,” Ashton replied. “Heist of the century!”
“Oh yeah? And who could we rob that’s rich enough to support my more… expensive habits.”
“Why Belos of course, it’d be the heist of the century.”
…Maybe more than just stress.
“You can’t just say that fool!” Darius whispered harshly. “I’m no snitch, but you never know who’s listening.”
The light in Ashton's rosy face dimmed to the point he could tell even with the mask, and Darius immediately regretted even speaking up with how quickly it died. From how quickly his doors shut and his walls grew back up again.
“Yes, I suppose you’re right,” he replied. They didn’t speak again until dinner.
It hurt.
---
SLAM!
Everyone heard the door as it once again closed in young Hunter’s face. A common occurrence at this point. It had already been a year since Hunter was taken in, and Belos was still far from being Parent of the Year, or even the day. That didn’t make the rush to hide from young Hunter, so as to not end up as his playmate, any less competitive.
“Hey, Riri!” Hunter called out to him. Darius stopped so fast that he almost continued on down to the floor. Flashbacks rise up from the familiar voice. The face. But he couldn’t have had a child, he’d have told Darius. They told each other everything, EVERYTHING-
Don't call me that. You don’t have the right imposter. His head screamed at him. He didn’t voice the poisonous thought though. It would be inelegant.
And if he tried hard enough he could imagine it was somebody else calling him that. His heart couldn’t take losing that feeling. Though it couldn't, wouldn’t, last forever.
Naturally, this moment of weakness meant he was caught.
“Um… Uhm…” the child looked around for help, but all the smart souls had already cleared out. They knew the drill. “I- I command you pway with me Sir!”
…The sir kind of took away from the command.
Darius hated children, “pway” -ing, and being ordered around. Still when he looked into the face of an old friend…
He couldn’t resist. He’d lost years before the battle had begun.
“Fine, Hunter.” He bemoaned his own weakness. “What is it that you wish to play?”
Darius already knew the answer.
“Let’s pway cuven heads!” Hunter cheered. The child's ability to believe he was saying the words right was astounding as always. “I’ll be Goldren Gwaurd!”
…It’s going to be a long day indeed.
---
“Hey, Riri?”
“Yes, Ashton?”
“I love you.”
“As you should.”
A laugh.
“...I love you too.”
“I know.”
“Hey, Riri?”
“Yes, Ashton?”
“When- if I die, can you promise to take care of my replacement?”
“You aren’t planning to die on me are you?”
A grim look. A warm embrace.
It felt like goodbye.
“Promise?”
He never could say no to Ashton.
“On my life.”
That was the last time he saw him.
---
Darius sits upon a mountain top and thinks.
Ashton is dead. Hunter is 16 and won Most Emotionally Unstable in the unofficial coven superlatives for his third year in a row. Right before going into Belos’s mind and disappearing off the face of the earth. Darius was now a part of a rebel group with a name as asinine as CATS and was sheltering former coven head Lilith Clawthorne, Raine’s wild witch sort-of-girlfriend, her Steve, her human child, and her titan child. Not to mention the weird bird thing that refused to shut up. His best and only friend at the moment is Eberwolf, the most inelegant person he could possibly find. And worst of all, because of all this chaos, Alador now had five more Penstagram followers than him.
He’d have to nip that last one in the bud fast.
“Oh Ashton,” Darius whispered into the wind. “You’d know what to do.”
He sits until the winds had settled and his melancholic tears have dried. After all, if dog-children can be titans and wild witches can be good parents and humans can do magic and idiots can lead revolutions then-
Can’t each gust of wind carry bits of Ashton to him? Each whisper is a reassurance, each shocking gust a laugh. Each whoosh is a sign that he’s still there, in some form. In the magic he uses. Watching over him from nearby.
If he shuts his eyes tight enough and pushes his imagination just a bit more than usual, each breeze can be a kiss.
After the wind steals away his final regrets, Darius marches off.
He’s never been one for self-reflection anyway.
He’s far too perfect for that.