Chapter Text
There was peace at last. The Nikara and Mugenese had settled on a peace treaty; General Hanelai didn’t care much for the specifics (not as much as everyone would’ve wanted her to, anyway). All she knew was that they were, at long last, safe. There was no greater joy than announcing to her people that they could lay down their weapons, rest their anger, douse the calamitous rage of the Phoenix in the waters of peace.
It was mostly an optimist’s words; she knew of the nightmares, the screams, the opium, but it wasn’t like she could just ask them to give up all that tethered them to the earth beneath them for the begrudging respect of the Nikara.
She’d work on all her hypocrisy and her people’s coping mechanisms later: now was time for the thing she truly cared about the most. Her children. Well, her daughter and nephew, but ever since her sister (as well as her husband) had died in the first battle that Daji had demanded the Speerlies helped with, Altan was pretty much her child anyway.
Rin was barely a year old and Altan was nearing his fourth birthday; what a menace they were, even so young (she dreaded to think of what they’d be like once they were grown). Altan had a penchant to be the most destructive, chaotic hurricane in the room, and unfortunately, though she could barely walk without stumbling, Rin had found herself loving every single thing he did.
Altan was her prodigy - even as young as he was, he had decided (quite firmly) that he would use a trident. When Hanelai had other matters to attend to, Altan had stolen her trident and depleted half the population of fish around Speer. He had summoned the fire, once, when the Mugenese were threatening to invade Speer. They had come onto their island, had yelled at General Hanelai for a while, had waved their swords in the air - Altan had set one of their general’s hair on fire. She had apologised profusely to them, waved them away, sent them off. Then, as soon as she was alone on that beach, with Altan’s hand in hers, she cried; he was too young to be using fire, too young to channel the rage of the Phoenix, too young for war. He was not a soldier, he was her baby. Her child.
“Did I do something wrong?” Altan had asked her, his eyes round with fear.
Hanelai had kissed his forehead, “My darling, never, but you should not use the fire. I need you to promise me you won’t use it.”
“Okay, I promise,” Altan said, earnest and eager again, before bouncing off to tell Rin another story or sing her another song.
Rin was her
daughter
- her darling little girl who could never do any wrong. It was an awful way of thinking, Hanelai knew, but how could any mother think any differently about their children? How could she look in Rin’s eyes and see herself? How could she hate this child, though she was born of her hatred and passion and fear? Even if she was Ziya’s child, it was still hers. Her baby. Her daughter. The one
she
carried. The one she loved. The one she raised - and will raise. She would fight a thousand wars to keep Rin and Altan away from the ensnaring clutches of war; but how could she when she was just a woman?
Just a woman with a lot of power, Hanelai reminded herself. She had promised her mother, her grandmother, and her ancestors all the way back to the first queen of Speer that she would do their island justice. What is justice if you lose everything for it?
— Four years later —
Rin laughed, her eyes sparkling with childlike joy untouched by the vestigial horrors of war that every other shaman had faced, her small feet running across the beach as Altan chased after her. Altan could easily outrun Rin in seconds, but he slowed down, had feigned a fall (to which Rin had cackled at) and had ‘lost.’ A hungry nostalgia crawled its way to Hanelai - was this the could be? The before? She barely remembered life when she had not lost everything but her people - her sanity, her body, her mind… It was all gone due to the war. Because of the phoenix.
And yet these children… They were the vessel to a new tomorrow across the boundless ocean of time; no horror would touch her children. It was worth it, really, to protect Altan and Rin. Everything she’d given up.
Rin chanted, “You lost! You lost! You lost!”
Altan rolled his eyes as he slowed down to the finish line (a haphazard belt of rocks) where Rin goaded him. She had a competitive spirit - it reminded Hanelai of herself. Her baby. Her girl. Her daughter. Her flesh, her blood, her everything. It was all worth it for this, wasn’t it?
Rin spotted Hanelai at the top of the beach, “You’re done with work!” She gasped, and sprinted towards her.
Altan followed her, walking - elegantly, like a king, like a general, like her son.
Rin clung onto Hanelai’s legs, taking in all the oxygen nearby, gasping for more and more life in her little lungs. Altan had followed her, smiling at her.
“Hi, Auntie,” He said cheerfully.
“Had a fun time?” She asked, distracted.
Rin cheered, “Yes! I won against Altan!”
Altan grinned at Hanelai, “She did. Very quick. Very speedy. Probably a cheater too, but we love ingenuity.”
Rin blew a raspberry at Altan. He laughed in return.
Motherhood was not a blessing to Hanelai at first; she barely wanted Rin when she found she was pregnant with her. She loathed the pregnancy, hindering her movements in battle, sapping the life out of her body with every passing minute, and so she loathed Ziya too, as he left for Nikara, away from her. When she had heard of Altan, she had despised the very idea of taking care of yet another child she did not want - and yet, here she was. Loving and being loved in return. A mother and her children.
She would never get used to this. The exhaustion, the attention, the eyes on her… But she doesn’t think she could ever have them ripped from her now she has them.
—
The blood moon hung over Speer. She sighed as she watched it; oh, the moon. The stars. The sky. Weren’t they the stuff of poets? She wanted so dearly to be a poet - to write was to feel; to feel every emotion, raw, unadulterated, fresh like a wound reborn, and to make it beautiful again. She was not a poet, she was a warrior.
“Hi,” A soft voice chimed behind her.
She looked: Altan. When did he get so tall? Did eight-year-olds look as old and young as he did?
“Hello,” She replied, “Why aren’t you in bed?”
He shrugged, “Couldn’t sleep.” He sat on the table next to her.
“Are you okay?” She asked him, frowning - why wasn’t he sleeping?
“Yeah, yeah,” He waved her concerns away, gazing at a spot on the wall, “Everything’s fine, Auntie.”
“What’s wrong, Altan? Tell me.”
“Nothing. Just can’t sleep.”
“Tell me, I know something’s wrong.”
“Hanelai-“
“Altan.”
“Will you let me go to Sinegard?” He asked her, his words quick and sudden spilling out like a hot flame.
Her heart stops. She narrows her eyes at him, feeling the anger bubble in her bones. How could he? A betrayal of his homeland - a desecration of everything she’s ever given him. Why would he want to go to that Nikaran trash school anyway, where the only people that prevailed were people like Daji with their glass skin and their unflinching eyes that robbed her of her childhood and her sister?
“Altan,” She said warningly.
He hesitated, but continued, “Auntie, I just want to protect Speer. I think the education at Sinegard Academy will be valuable to me as a soldier and… I want to try. I can pass the Keju, I’ve done some reading on the requirements and-“
“Altan. What you think the Keju is, what Sinegard is, what Nikan is, it’s… It’s not like you’ll hear it be told by the heroes. For you, it’ll be isolating, lonely, dehumanising… No Speerly has ever gone to Sinegard. You’ll be trained to be a shaman here, my child, you’ll be a stellar general in Speer, isn’t that enough?”
Altan looked at her with sad eyes - sadder than a child his age should be. She wondered what he was thinking at that point. “No,” He replied. And that was it, really.
She released a long sigh, “Okay, my child, you can go to Sinegard when you pass the Keju. I… You can’t ever forget us. And don’t think this means you’ll get to skip out on training for books or something.”
“Yes, yes, thank you, I promise I’ll make you proud,” He said, eyes earnest.
She smiled at him - when would she not be? It was all worth it, then, for this? Oh, her prodigy.
It was all worth it, then, for a moment of stillness? A pause in time for peace? A soft hour where one could appreciate the flowers and the grass beneath bare feet and truly living as they breathe the oxygen that expands in their small, gentle lungs? It was all worth it, then, for this - for her children, for her peace, for her motherhood. For all of this, everything was worth it.