Chapter Text
The first step through the portal was a hesitant one. Viego hovered between places for longer than he ought to have, long enough for the yordle in front of him to raise an eyebrow. “You good man?” She asked.
The king stepped all the way through without acknowledging her question. He looked around, turning around himself as he stared up at the caved in ceiling. The highest peak still stood but sunlight filtered through much of the rest of it. The Late afternoon sky and the call of seagulls. Viego closed his eyes. Home. He could almost picture it. Walking across this floor to his throne where he would sit and try to bear the dull requests of his court. All the while his queen was nearby urging him to be patient. It was a vague sort of memory that almost tugged a smile onto his lips. But it was dashed again by the yordle girl picking something up and then knocking it over.
Viego opened his eyes. Alovedra was no more.
He walked further into the room. His throne was gone. Long gone he assumed. Looted all of its jewels and melted for the gold it was made out of it, if he had to guess.
“So, this is like, where you come from? Could use a little darkness don’t ya think?” Vex asked.
“No, it is dark enough,” he insisted. “Without her the light left this place long ago.” Viego turned away and kept walking, out of the room and up the stairs to his old room. It had been torn through as well at some point. There wasn’t much left. He paid that fact very little mind and instead focused in on the seat that had survived by the window. The desk was broken, but a dusty book still sat open on the floor. He picked it up. It wasn’t in Camavoran. He recognized the writing as his wife’s tongue. But the faded brittle pages sported enough illustrations to make it clear that this was a fairytale book.
“Oh, how she loved these…” he sighed. “The stories she could tell. She put even my mind to shame with her tales of heroes and monsters. I wanted nothing more than to be a part of them, whisking her away from danger and into my arms.”
The yordle hopped up on what remained of the bed. “So, like, why love? It’s super lame, and I thought you weren’t.”
He acknowledged her now. It had taken a fair amount of convincing to keep her at his side after that big reveal. “My dear Vex, you do not yet understand. Love is cruel. There can be no greater agony than love . You reject all the joy and light in your people, but you do not yet know the true depths of that rejection because you have not yet had need of it,” he snapped the book shut and placed it on the chair by the window. “It is when you think you have conquered pain and the dark, when you think you have bested it. It is when you seek the light and color of the world at long last–that is love. And to have it snatched away from your hands, be forced to reject it, because it is gone, that is true misery. Until you know it, you do not know true darkness,” he said
The girl didn’t say anything to that, but she frowned with a lack of understanding. He did not need her to understand. She had already proven invaluable to him and though her understanding was not required, her presence was still very much appreciated.
“It is here I will return her to me. My love deserves to come home, not be brought back on that wretched island. Camavor will welcome us back with open arms,” he said with a certainty that old the truly mad could possess. “But come now, Vex.” He turned around and waved her after him “We’ve work to do…”