Chapter Text
Khun Eduan was by no means a good person.
If he had been, then perhaps he wouldn’t be the head of a Great Family under the reign of his old friend, Jahad. If they could even be called that anymore. Friends. Such a strange term now… If Eduan had been good, then he might have rebelled, or at least he wouldn’t have so many wives and children whom he couldn’t even bother to remember.
But that was alright. Being a good person wasn’t really something common or expected in the Tower. However, he thought, being uncaring was something a bit less common, in his opinion.
Khun Eduan knew he was by no means a caring man.
Not anymore, at any rate.
And, maybe he was illusioned. Maybe, doing this had been a way to make others and himself believe he did care, even just a little bit, but it was actually all the more obvious that it wasn’t working. That he did not care. He cared for none of them. None of the wives and none of the children. And maybe, when he started doing this, it had been different. Perhaps just a way to hold on that sliver of humanity that had been slowly ebbed away from his core. Back then, maybe he actually cared, when he only had one, two, five to ten wives. Maybe back then it meant something.
Eduan didn’t know why he was doing this anymore. It was just an old tradition. No one was fooled, Khun Eduan didn’t care at all. Not even for the gifts his wives brought him when they came to his door like tonight. He was truly apathetic, deep inside. No true feeling, anger or joy, could touch him.
In his opinion, it was still better than the mad grief and rage Jahad had fallen into and kept swimming in even now, under his mask. When Eduan remembered what heartbreak had done to his former friends, he guessed it wasn’t so bad not having one anymore.
“Is it to your taste?”
The gentle, silky voice made him raise his eyes from the beautifully sculpted scabbard - which had come after an old painting from some renowned passed artist and the head of a powerful creature that Eduan couldn’t even name - to meet the eyes of the sublime lady in front of him. She was, of course, his wife. He had barely made the effort to browse through the lists to find her name again.
Head of the Agnis branch, she had a beauty that could not be described. Her intellect and prowess, along with her sister’s had made the both of them worthy members of his house despite their slightly lesser lineage. He had noticed that she had already come to see him once, with even more lavish gifts, to introduce him to the fetus of their daughter. He did not remember the name she had whispered to him then.
Her eyes were cold, he noticed again. Despite an apparent gentleness, there hid a strong and strict woman, as cold as ice. Many of his wives did not care for the children they bore. He couldn’t tell if she was one of those.
“I am very intrigued,” he told her, inviting her to sit by his side on the couch.
A lie. But for now, the scabbard was indeed the most interesting thing he had at hand. It wasn’t a very high bar. He ached for a glass of wine to alleviate the heavy boredom that constantly clutched at his heart. But this moment was special. At least, it was supposed to be. The least courtesy he could do was to keep his hands away from the wine.
Honestly, he didn’t really care if it was courteous. He itched for a drink, always, and didn’t know why he had first decided to stop himself during these strange and oddly quiet meetings when they first happened. But if anything, Khun Eduan was now a man of regularity. He didn’t like when the order was disrupted. Of course, that did not mean Eduan hadn’t drunk before. He was so used to the feeling of wine in his blood that he wasn’t sure he could make the difference between drunk and sober states anymore. He probably wasn’t sober, hadn’t been in centuries. But he didn’t feel drunk either. His mind was still with him.
Sometimes he wished it wasn’t. There wasn’t much in this Tower for his mind to witness.
“This priceless scabbard was found by pure chance,” Agnis was saying, “by my daughter during her first excursion. It was kept in the hoard of the monster she slayed, the same one whose head I now offer to you.”
Eduan didn’t remember that daughter was old enough to fight to death with a monster. Or maybe she was. He didn’t really care if she wasn’t. God knew how Maschenny had educated her own girl. He hummed passively.
“It revealed itself to have a very strange power,” she added, and Eduan did remember feeling the shinsu swimming in that suspendium scabbard. “It possesses regenerative properties like I have never seen before. It has the ability to mend any broken sword that is laid to rest inside, dagger, or even lighthouse. Should a skewered beast be put inside, it would come out unscathed.”
Such a powerful object was probably just as useful laying down in the obscure cave it had hid in for who knew how long as it would be gathering dust in his coffers now. That was what Eduan thought, his gaze already vacating, humming again.
“I wonder, though,” Agnis mused as she leaned on him delicately, “should a human being fit inside its hold, could it mend their death? Could it mend a broken mind?”
Eduan blinked slowly. Did such questions matter? The scabbard was very large, but it could not hold a fully grown adult entirely in. Neither V nor Arlene would fit, he thought idly to himself.
“I am very proud of my daughter’s accomplishments and discoveries,” Agnis told him, the perfect picture of a caring mother though perhaps just a tad too cold. “She is my treasure.”
As much of a treasure as Eduan kept in his vaults, surely. Useful. Trophies. Whichever. The half-lit chambers and quiet but warm atmosphere made it easy to say such words, and maybe believe in it. Eduan had long stopped paying attention to the words these women would speak to him, no longer caring to discern the false from the true. Not that it had ever mattered to him, surely. Eduan couldn’t remember a time it did matter. There was only one time in his long life that had mattered, as far as he knew, and even that didn’t matter anymore.
“What about this one?” he asked in a murmur, the content atmosphere - though it was truly a snake’s lair - making him sleepy.
“This one is a boy,” Agnis said, in the same tone, and he placed his hand over her prominent belly as she spoke.
This was the tradition, after all. His wife came, offered him precious gifts he couldn’t even bring himself to care for, and they would sit together. She would speak to him - whichever wife it was - and perhaps as a show of respect, he would listen as she told him the name of the new child to be born, a hand feeling for its tiny life. He didn’t know if that respect was still in there, somewhere, but he went on with that tradition, feeling the diverted flow of shinsu that indicated the growth of a life underneath the skin, showed just that one bit of interest even though he would forget soon after.
He wondered, if the teenage boy he once was could see him now, would he be offended at the lack of feeling Eduan felt when he was met with his future children. Would he be disappointed by the apathy Eduan felt even as a father?
But the teenage boy from that other world was long gone, Eduan thought. In the Tower, there was no need for parental affection, parental pride… parental care. Just like there was no need for love. Love, even, was dangerous, in the Tower, he had learned. Really, Eduan didn’t know why this tradition even existed when he never cared for being a father. Maybe, if it had happened before… But it was too late for that. Too late for feelings. Too late for being a father, let alone a good one. Too late for caring about it too.
“He may be smaller than recommended right now,” Agnis was still speaking softly, with an expectant gaze addressed to her stomach, whatever she expected from the child, “but he will grow strong. He will be a good son, my lord, and a good brother.”
Eduan didn’t need to imagine what those words meant. A son wasn’t what these women needed. They wanted daughters, the best tool to climb up ranks. May it be through the Khun hierarchy, or through Jahad’s system. It didn’t matter to Eduan either way. It just meant the sons had to be stronger, strong enough to survive and become true sons, strong enough to be rankers, fighters, guards, scholars… absolutely anything, as long as they weren’t useless. Eduan wouldn’t even need to remember their names. Oftentimes, those who survived and went high enough would find him again to reintroduce themselves… the others would die, and what was the point of remembering the names of fallen sons anyways?
Still, he put his hand on top of the round belly, feeling the warmth and the delicate flow of shinsu giving life to the creature growing inside, and listened as his wife expanded on what she wished her son would be.
“With your blessing, he will inherit your strengths, and with mine, he will earn wisdom.”
He will survive, she meant. He will be useful, she meant.
Truth was, Eduan wouldn’t care if he didn’t, he thought absently.
Just another ghost son. Unmoving, unfeeling, just like the rest of them.
“His name,” she whispered reverently, “is Aguero.”
His son, with a name that echoed silently, ready to be forgotten, as Eduan prepared to move away already.
“Khun Aguero Agnis.”
Then.
Then, something moved.
A pulse, against his fingers. Weak, but sudden… no, not a pulse. An attack? But more importantly, with the… kick, perhaps, was an onslaught of energy that he was well acquainted with.
A soft explosion of shinsu, cracking and icy, showing against his own with vindication. It was small, barely enough for him to feel it, and yet the slithering waves of ice rolling off and onto Eduan’s veins right now were powerful. Or at least, they promised power, with vengeance.
Like an impulse, reacting to his own shinsu, his own emotions.
Eduan found himself unmovinprokeeping his palm on the skin that separated their two shinsus, probing further, curious. But the foreign energy coiled back in its core. It slightly lashed out when Eduan kept bothering it.
Like a small, petulant, “go away.”
Eduan felt his lips twitch. He had completely lost track of what Agnis was saying, entirely focused on the weak and stubborn creature hiding away from him.
His teeny tiny son had just rejected his own father. The thought, although a bit disbelieving, also brought him something else. Something like… amusement.
He resumed probing at his son, making it hiss and bat away at his energy like an annoyed kitten. Was this what it felt like to playfight?
Now, Eduan didn’t really care, but just because he didn’t care didn’t mean he didn’t know. Shinsu was especially powerful when backed with emotion. This was the first time one of Eduan’s children had reacted that way to him. Of course, in this particular case, it felt both like the shinsu of his future son was especially powerful and…
Goodness, Agnis, what did you tell that soul? Even Eduan knew that children could hear their parents’ words and feelings. Eduan could only wonder what Agnis had whispered to his son all throughout his growth. It might explain the resentment it felt and pushed toward Eduan himself.
A little rebel, he mused, as the lifeling refused to be appeased by his touch, turning its metaphorical back to him. Why don’t you like me? He pushed an ounce of his own ice like a tentative touch, to show his kindred they possessed the same essence. But the little one seemed to become more indignant at the thought, pushing back more strongly - like a baby - as if to prove that no, they were different. And true, the shinsu didn’t really have the same quality to it.
Though of course, as of now, the youngest shinsu was far weaker than Eduan’s. It almost made him laugh. He repressed it behind thin lips, frowning instead.
A son… who didn’t want to be a tool.
It is a dangerous game which you are playing, little one. Don’t you know I could kill you right this instant?
A puff of frost answered him. I'm not scared of you, Eduan imagined it meant. You're stupid.
Eduan blinked at the blatant childish derision. It reminded him of the way children behaved in the Outside. The way he thought his children would behave, when he was just a teenager diving in for adventure and happiness.
The shinsu emitted from the tiny creature weakly wrestling with him now felt painfully honest, he didn’t know what to think of it.
Honest, blunt feelings reaching out to his apathy, despite the mean streak of rejection running through it. Eduan had rarely seen this sort of honesty since… himself, a long time ago.
There had probably been more, but he hadn’t been looking. And none come from his own blood.
He couldn’t deny it… this little one was his son.
Somehow, the thought made him pause, uneasy. This little weak thing… was his ?
It was such a strange realization to have. This being ending up as more than the tool or foreign trophy it was supposed to be. Not just related to him but… his… his child?
A shiver ran through his fingers. Caused by the shinsu directly formed from his own. His right heir…
A shinsu that could very well overcome his own, should it be left time to mature, he reminded himself.
Right. He focused on that thought. Such a potential in one of his children could end up being very dangerous for himself.
Someone to keep an eye on, he used.
Unnoticed from his wife, who had now fallen silent, he tore through his own power. A part of himself, a pearl of ice. A tear of shinsu. Traveling through his blood, reaching through his fingertip, and leaving his body to reach the embrace of the young shinsu underneath. It protested, of course, annoyed and prissy, but could only grumble against the invasion. A small quirk of the lips, Eduan didn’t realise he had started smiling as he watched upon his prickly son, emitting soft frost as the manifestation of its sulkiness. It recoiled back in the nest of its mother’s shinsu, refusing to engage further with his amused father.
You are interesting, little one.
With a piece of himself now snugly fitted inside his future son, he could already discern better the inner intricacies of that forming shinsu. It sure had a character, Eduan thought, and it was bold. No one would dare to treat Eduan like that, nevermind a young hatchling. Those were often too scared of his mighty presence. It might be the shinsu bound to become stronger than his own, that made the child so bold. Or it might be because the child… recognized him?
Unlikely.
Bold it was. And to become strong. But for now, it felt small, and so very fragile.
Eduan wondered if it was the connection the young being had inadvertently established between them when it had pushed back, but he found himself hoping this small fragile thing, like glass, would survive, and become stronger.
Nonsense. Eduan had no business protecting any of his children. Tools, enemies, sometimes servants, and oftentimes forgotten. If they couldn’t survive of their own, they weren’t worth his attention. Those were his rules.
He didn’t care, not really. Eduan knew the empathy at its core was too deeply rooted in to be shaken so easily.
But this child… should he survive, he would certainly shake things, even if not Eduan’s heart. He smirked inside.
“My lord?”
“Mh. The child is in good health,” he told her, feeling a bit of his eternal boredom thaw away infinitesimally. “Nurture it well.”
She wouldn’t want it to break prematurely.
Khun Aguero Agnis… Aguero. I shall watch over you for the time being.
I look forward to seeing you grow.