Work Text:
It wasn’t talked about much, how could it be? Tye Loe still remembered the day it happened. He was nineteen, he already had experience as a saint but Mazen? He had no idea how to act himself much less how to make someone else act.
The two girls, Talyra Tarick and Leta Kaltis, were young, barely six years old, the two of them. But thinking back about it now, if they were young then what was Mazen, a mere decade their elder? What knowledge had he gathered by being ten years older? But then again, what about Tye Loe, who held the crown of only three more years than that. His own mentor had been older than he is now when he took him in, was that not obvious to him now?
The girls grew and learned, of course they did, but that was not to say it wasn’t difficult. These girls, six years old, what was Tye Loe doing six years prior other than mourning the death of his mentor? They would never live in a world where Soren was still alive, how unfair that Tye Loe got him and these girls got them, he thought bitterly to himself. Why were they given such young lives to watch over when some saints still ran around with no student for them to mentor, to help learn. Tye Loe had never felt resentment towards the saints before, in fact he rarely did, but his bitter thoughts still fogged his mind whenever he saw the faces of those two young girls.
Talyra was Mazen’s student while Leta was Tye Loe’s. But that didn’t matter on whose student was whose, as they both viewed their students the same: sisters, daughters, family.
When the girls had reached fourteen, they were no longer the tough but terrified children they had once been, they were angry, Talyra more than Leta but still, anger burned itself deep into their souls like anything else would have hurt them more. Leta’s anger was a silent one, she did not speak out of tone but it was still there, hidden under red eyes and sharp teeth. But Talyra did not hide her anger, there was no need, she had taken on Mazen’s words as her own, his mannerism as her own. Even if she could not see it, parts of Mazen had been sewn into Talyra’s mind like a troubled riddle. But she did not express her anger to Mazen, no, instead it was Tye Loe who listened to the frustration and pain in her life.
It was what brought them to this moment, standing mere feet from one another as Talyra paced the room, venom hissing through her words. Despite not spending long on this plane, she still spoke like she had seen everything and anything that life could ever try to offer to her.
“And he acts like I should be doing what he wants but I know my own mind, and I know what’s the truth.” Tye Loe hummed along. Normally with these sorts of rants from Talyra, they would end slowly with her words becoming only in her mind instead of out loud. “He can’t do anything, he’s not my father, he’s not anything.”
“He’s your mentor.” Tye Loe reminded her. She turned back around to face him, despite being shorter than him, she was still able to seem menacing like she was ready to detonate at any given moment, when given any opportunity to do so.
“Well what about your mentor, did you speak your mind freely to him?” She questioned, taking a few paces to be closer to him.
Tye Loe let out a small scoff, crossing his arms like he had done many times before when speaking to those younger than him. He wondered whether it was Soren or one of the many that came after him that he learned that from.
“That’s different. My mentor was gone before I was the age you are now and besides, I was just a frightened boy.” Talyra nodded her head to his words.
“Well, did you ever disagree with what was said?”
“Of course I did, everyone did.”
“Then why didn’t you say anything?” Her question was heavy on his mind, and maybe that was what led to his answer. He hadn’t meant for the answer he had given to be so harsh, but he could not have controlled what he had said once he had begun.
“Please, after Soren’s death I was more a burden than a student.” It felt like the room was frozen, the whole building maybe. It felt like if Tye Loe had left the room at that very moment, he would have seen everything and everyone frozen where they stood.
Talyra’s fury was hissing, it was terrifying for someone so young to be so knowledgeable in what life had given her.
“Is that what I am, what Leta is? A burden?” Tye Loe shook his head.
“I didn’t mean it like that, Talyra-”
“Didn’t mean it like that, sure you didn’t. Whose burden am I? His or yours, am I your burden, Tye Loe?”
He couldn’t find the words to say what he wanted, perhaps he didn’t want to say anything. Would it have been better had he said something to her? Would it have repaired what was already damaged, what couldn’t have been fixed? He couldn’t say yet again.
But as Tye Loe stood, cradling a tiny newborn in his arms with a protective embrace, the words from only a year before came flooding back to him. Would this baby grow up to be seen as just another burden? A child he had to take in and raise for Mazen’s sake? The whole idea made him feel dizzy, he couldn’t say anything about it. Instead, he held the newborn close, making those last painful steps to join the other survivors and escape. No one was to be a burden in Tye Loe’s life, there was no such word in his vocabulary anymore. Sitting down on the ship and moving the blanket out of the child’s face, he didn’t see a burden.
Instead he saw the same thing which he had seen with Talyra and Leta: A daughter.