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Chapter Text

Generations had passed since Aaravos first set foot on Xadia as a child.
Generations of elves and humans, facing struggle and bounty. None suffered more than humans.

Laurelion’s battle with Shiruach had not helped their despair, turning a large swathe of the continent into a desert of black sand. 

As humanity and elf suffered, Aaravos felt a numb grief as his father vanished from the mortal plane - and rarely returned after his stars realigned. But, he had the mortals, sharing a bond where they were both teacher and student to one another. 

He’d learned the six arcanums, bound his knowledge in books and scrolls and clay, built his vast library. It was thrilling and enlightening. And yet it was not enough as he watched the generations pass. Infants that he cradled grew quickly, had their own children, withered, died. Many became a tapestry of faces he knew, until he could no longer tell where whose features came from who. 

It was not enough to hold all the magic of Xadia in his hands. It was not enough that he was hailed as the greatest mage on the mortal plane and in the Heavens. 
Something was missing. Magic was a profession and a passion. But it was not meaningful.

Aaravos watched the tumultuous bonds between humans and elves ebb and flow like the ocean. Some tribes were bitter foes, fewer tribes swirled in romantic dalliance. 

One tribe of humans settled themselves between the mountain and ocean on the eastern side of Xadia, in the valley named for Elarion, the first great human leader - the human who had, incidentally, taught Aaravos to write on clay tablets when he was very small, long ago, when humans had their first taste of luck.

Now after those few thousand years, Elarion was a modest village, full of thatched roundhouses and surrounded by decent farmland and sheep. It helped that, for now, Moonshadow Elves were amicable.
At least two of the children were halflings. 

Not that the newest child coming to the village was a halfling. They would be human, just as their parents were.

Aaravos suspected that it would be an ordinary birth; it had been a good while since the humans had seen a real tragedy among their children. 

In one moment, the wait was calm. It had been a long time coming for Aaravos’s human companions. Leandra was finally having her own baby after years of work as a midwife. He assumed, foolishly, that it would go well.

The next moment, instead of a baby’s cry, there were scattered voices of panic - and someone calling him from behind the door. 

The bed within was surrounded by some of the other women of the village. The distraught mother was begging for her child, while the midwife’s assistant struggled to encourage her to drink medicine to slow her bleeding. 

And the father…he held the ailing baby in a blanket, sideways to the floor as he struggled in vain to pat her back with enough force to expel something from her body.

“Orson.” Aaravos rushed to him - there was no room or time to see Leandra. “Orson, what’s happened.”

”She can’t breathe. There’s…water stuck in her.” Orson looked up at him, eyes dilated and wet with tears. “You’ve just learned ocean magic, haven’t you? Isn’t there something you can do?”

Memory pinged in Aaravos’s mind from his time at the Tidebound Archipelago.

“My mentor saved a Skywing child from drowning…perhaps I can try what she did.” He nodded.

They were losing time. The child was still struggling to gasp for breath.

“I’ll take her.” Aaravor extended his arms. “Comfort your wife.” Aaravos assured him as sat at the end of the simple straw bed. 

Orson slowly nodded, slipping the baby into his arms. 

Aaravos settled his hold; he’d done it so many times before…but never with one this small, or this fragile.

He could sense foreign fluid lodged in her tiny lungs, just as much as he could hear it rattle, inhibiting her breath. 

The spell had been sitting behind his lips the moment he recalled the event in the Archipelago. 

“Expellere alienam aquam .” He whispered, drawing a small rune on her neck. As it activated, he gently dragged his smallest finger up.

The baby buckled, gasping, as he pulled a shockingly small amount of fluid from her mouth. The moment he tossed it aside into the dirt floor, he lifted her close to his face. He took a deep breath and released it, slowly, delicately, beside her nose. Just as his mentor had.

The baby squirmed for a moment and then, after a sharp gasp, wailed, almost right inside his ear. 

“Oh!” Aaravos jolted. In hindsight, he should have realized that might happen. 

“There you are!” He rubbed his thumb in her thin hair. 

Aarvos stared at this baby girl, enraptured by her beauty. 

Most would not immediately call the child ‘beautiful’. She was still slick and waxy with afterbirth, bright red and swollen, fragile skull distended. 

She was only a newborn, but she wrapped her tiny hand around his thumb. 

“Is that her?!” He heard Leandra gasp through her tears.
”Is that my baby?!” Orson aided her into a sitting position, grabbing her under the arms as she hissed. 

Aaravos snapped alert from his trance. “Yes.” He affirmed, finding his feet, bringing the baby to her. She slipped so easily into her arms. Like they fit. “Yes, it’s her.”

He watched them in rapt attention, thoughts muddled. Could a child of his own fit so easily in the crook of his arms? Was he worthy of fathering a child and raising it?
The ache and love inside him was a perpetual yearning. 

He wanted this.

He needed this. 

The abyss of loneliness was a cave, yawning in its entirety. 

An ache that had been building inside him for so very long gave way, becoming affection. It was yearning he had not felt before. Feelings of loneliness coursed through him. The realization turned his expression somber. 

He fiddled his fingers at the edge of his wrapped tunic, opened just enough that it exposed his star. A star-flecked hand ran idly across his heart star. Aaravos mused on it, imagining a baby inside him. Growing excitement spun within at the heels of his thoughts. 

A child. 

He yearned for one of his own.

He realized his own father had never held him like that.
Never clutched him with rapt, devastating glee. 

Aaravos could be a better father than Laurelion, he knew this. He hoped that it could be true. 

Perhaps…it was time.

Leandra suddenly hooked her arm in Aaravos’. “I don’t know what you did.” She managed to grasp his fingers in hers, bringing them to her cheek. “But thank you.” Aaravos echoed her smile, lost in thoughts of future children. Would he have two, or five? Or just the one?
Seven?
Ten babies?

A delayed answer came to him, “...of course. It was necessary to repay your kindness and generosity over the years.” 

“Generosity and kindness?” Leandra managed a small smile. “That’s what you call all our years of friendship?” 

Aaravos chuckled, watching the baby sneeze. 

Leandra took a glance at her husband, then Aaravos.
”’Esther’ means ‘star’, doesn’t it?” She asked.  Orson nodded his head, tears of joy brimming in his eyes. Aaravos laid a hand to his heart.
”I think we should call her that.” 

“That is an incredible honor I am not worthy of receiving,” he said meekly. Leandra rolled her eyes, and Orson gave him an exasperated sigh. 

“Most people just say ‘thank you,’ Aaravos,” Orson chided.  

Leandra chuckled, clutching the babe - Esther, close to her chest. “I think we both know that Aaravos is not ‘most people.’” Aaravos laughed at the comment. He supposed it was true. 

He did not argue with her verdict, watching Leandra as she turned her attention to feeding her baby. 

※※※※

It was days before Leandra was able to emerge from the roundhouse. The village had prepared a small celebration for her and the now-thriving baby. It lasted well into the night, carrying on even when Leandra meandered back into her home to rest periodically.

In the midst of the starlight revelry, Aaravos had been occupied entertaining the children of the village. He hoped he’d be of some help to their parents, expecting them to be wound down enough to sleep. He’d been levitating each of them just high enough that he could catch them safely when he dropped them from midair. 

“Send me up!” One boy charged at him and made an attempt to jump. Before Aaravos could realize what he was intending, the boy fell face-first in the grass. He slumped, defeated.
“We ought to try again, then?” Aaravos chuckled. 

The other children gave the boy space to stand up and dust himself off. He wiggled all of his limbs before running backwards, to where he started. When he dashed forward again, Aaravos was ready. He braced his legs in a slight crouch, and with a slight wave of Star magic, emptied the gravity beneath the boy’s feet, launching him upward. 

The boy cackled, throwing his arms in the air triumphantly, and dropped into Aaravos’s arms. “YES!” The boy howled. 

The other children looked at one another…Aaravos started to have an uneasy feeling that some of them were also wanting to be launched now. 

But before any could ask, their attention was turned elsewhere.
“Baby!” One of the girls pointed behind Aaravos.
He looked over his shoulder, finding Leandra approaching, with Esther in her arms.

“Well, I hope you don’t play with Esther like this one day.” Leandra gently teased as he gave one boy a light toss in his hands.

Aaravos chuckled, setting the boy on the ground and giving his straw-colored hair a little tussle.
”Back from your rest?” He asked.

Leandra approached him, sliding her baby into his arms. “She’s been doing well.” She smiled.
”Good…” Aaravos gently rested his end finger in Esther’s tiny palm. 

“Run along, now.” Leandra looked at each of the children. “Your parents are needing you to go to bed.”
There were a few little grumbles as the children, though they didn’t protest.
A few said their goodnights as they shuffled past them.

Aaravos chuckled again, crossing his arms. “They should sleep fine.”
He turned his attention to Esther. “Well…I’m glad to hear she’s alright.”

“Would you like to hold her?” Leandra gently offered. “Now that she’s clean.” She teased.
Aaravos rolled his eyes with a crooked smile, taking her against his gold and purple tunic. She fit completely in one arm - and none the wiser that she had been moved.

Esther yawned, her head drooping into the crook of his elbow.
“Oh…” He batted his eyes. “Look at her.” He scooped her tiny head into his hand. Now he could appreciate how soft her skin and hair were, as a sliver of her tiny tongue protruded from her lips. 

“I’ve been thinking.” Leandra looked up at the sky. “About you. And the Great Ones.” 

“Hm?” Aaravos hummed. “Wondering how we are born?” He asked.

Leandra nodded. 

“Well…that depends.” Aaravos looked up. “We’re not confined by the rigidity nature has set for you.”

“Every one of us is born differently, to a different parent’s design. There are those that have two parents. Some that only have one. Very rarely, one will abruptly spawn into life without warning and no parent to speak of.” He extended his hand to the stars. “Others, like my father, take a magical stardust into our bodies and forge it with our own magic to produce a child.” He cleared his throat.
“I…intend on that once I know there are available specimens.” 

He noticed Leandra starting to glaze with exhaustion as she worked to comprehend what he was saying. 

“There - in that star cluster…” He pointed , toward a streak of faint orange clouds. “That contains a heavenly body called the Luminary Creche.” He said. “That is where the magical stardust is collected by prospective parents, until it can burst forth there again…or.” He paused. “In the Star Nexus known as the Star Scraper - far, far into the ice of the Frozen Sea.” 

He looked down at Esther, grunting and already trying to mouth at his clavicle. He chuckled and slipped her back to her mother.

“Most draw their first breath in there. My father, Laurelion, took the form of a giant bay tree within its greenhouse. I came from a fruit amid his branches, though I was born appearing to be over half a year old by your standards.”

He could hear the giggle of a baby that age across the village. The father held him hoisted above his head, wiggling ever so slightly. “Who’s that baby bird?” He clucked, chortling, until the baby seized his curly beard in both hands with a delighted, rasping shriek.

“Why would he do that?” Leandra watched the family as well - the mother now scrambling to help untangle the baby. 

Aaravos shrugged. “He was never…warmly paternal. There was a need for a new child among us and he accepted the call. And then took a form that was easiest for him to bear.” 

“Would you do it that way?” Leandra smoothed her hand over her baby’s hair.

Aaravos looked at the tiny, squishy Esther. After a few days, her body was less swollen. But she still looked red and crinkly. It was unpleasant and adorable all at once like a flickering flame. 

“No.” He shook his head. “No, I would…prefer a child this small.”  

“You’d make a wonderful father.” Leandra grasped his hand. 

“Perhaps…when I can take the opportunity.” Aaravos looked up at the stars. Perhaps…he should take it sooner. 

Sooner than later.

Chapter Text

The Crown of the Star Scraper was high above the reach of the Skywing Elves that served as the acolytes to the Startouch Elves. They could go as far as the Zenith, just as far as the cloud layer. Miles above that was the Crown, hovering so high that its inhabitants could see the curvature of the earth.

The Greenhouse circled its heart, sealing the Crown in the same opaline glass that Aaravos used in his library on Xadia. For many Startouch Elves, it was either a birthplace, or a place to await a birth. Those that were mingling about in the Star Scraper’s greenhouse knew what was about to happen. They all knew he was waiting. Most moved along to where they needed to be in the Star Scraper - each with their own cosmic work to do.

But they knew why Aaravos was struggling to calm his anxiety. 

He was mere moments away from the one that would change his life. 

He paced around the greenhouse, waiting to be escorted where few were allowed. In his reduced form, he lingered expectantly beside the mosaic tiled star denoting where he was to expect his guide.

It was finally happening.

After all these years, it was finally happening.

His patience was about to be rewarded.

He ran his fingers across some white star-shaped flowers - among the few flowers that carried the Star Primal. Their soft petals brought him some sensory awareness as his focus faded out only to his heart racing in anticipation. 

“Aaravos.” A low voice behind him spoke.
”It’s been fifteen years since you’ve asked for Dametar’s aid. You can wait a few more moments.”

He stopped in his tracks, turning to face his father.
Laurelion had continued to insist on wearing his armor. It had been restored from his battle with the archdragon Shiruach. The punctures from her teeth were now filled with bright red steel. He’d left his spear and shield, but he had insisted on being ceremonial for the selection of his grandchild. 

“In the last fifteen years, I’ve watched a human child be born and grow.” Aaravos clasped his hands together. “She’ll probably have a child of her own by the time mine is born.” 

“And your patience will be made even richer.” Laurelion squeezed his shoulder.

“Look where we stand.” He extended his other arm outward. “You’re in your own birthplace.” 

Aaravos looked at the space where he had pointed to. There was a star-shaped pond in the center of the garden, the largest of five within the diamond-shaped outcropping of the floating structure they stood on. There was a patch of land in its center, full of flowers and bushes - and a stone in the center of that.

Before then…there had been a Startouch Elf in the form of a giant golden bay tree, devoting its energy into a single large fruit. 

“Well. I don’t intend on following your exact path.” He shrugged.

“No, I imagined that you would not.” Laurellion patted his shoulder again.
”But just think. The cycle closes and begins again.” 

Aaravos rolled his eyes. “Pogniant, father.” 

At last, there was a glow - a beam of light appearing at the tiles. Another Great One, in her own astral form, emerged from that light. She was significantly older than him. Truly among the first of the First Elves. She struck her jasmine yellow arms out in greeting as she floated gracefully toward him. 

“There you are, young Aaravos.” She grasped his hands. “There. You. Are.” 

Aaravos felt a thrill surge through him. He flung his arms around her, squeezing her close.
Dametar chuckled, patting his back. “There you are indeed.” 

“Ah, look at you.” She pulled back. “It’s been far too long.” She held his cheek. “A brilliant emissary for Xadia…and a more brilliant and accomplished Archmage. You’ve really mastered every Arcanum?” Her thumb ran over the diamonds across the left side of his face. 

“Well, Ocean magic was a struggle, but…I have.” Aaravos nodded confidently.

“I should have known you’d go so far. You, of all the children I have helped.” She smiled warmly.
“I remember when your father came to me, many years ago.” Dametar looked at Laurelion with a familiar nod. She brushed a hand over Aaravos’s cheek. “And now you’re here for your own child.”

“I’ve waited so long for this.” Aaravos beamed, “and I’d like to not waste another moment.”

“I’m glad to see you so eager. Come.” 

Forcing himself to calm, he allowed Dametar to pull him by the hands into the portal tile - and in through a curtain of warm orange clouds. Aaravos glanced over his shoulder at his father, who followed silently, they were within the nebula.

There, among those orange and purple clouds, was what Aaravos was waiting for. He gazed around the orange clouds at a multitude of swirling balls of vapor, each one gleaming rhythmically in their own time. 

“Any of these thirty-one clusters of stardust are ready to take on as your own. I am sorry that you had to wait so long for the time to be ripe to claim one.”
Dametar caught a small, swirling cloud in her hands and let it drift toward Aaravos so he could observe it.

“But now, any of them can become your flesh and blood.” She cradled another between her palms.

“Do you know how you will carry and bear?” She asked. “Will you follow your father’s path?"

“No.” Aaravos shook his head. He wondered when he would be asked if he intended to fight an arch dragon. “It would be similar to humans and mortal elves.” Aaravos let one spin across his fingers. “I don’t think I could handle years of gestating from a womb.” He mused. “But…I intend to be aware of every moment. Nor do I want to put my time on Xadia on hold. I can’t do that in the stasis of a tree.” 

“I see.” Dametar nodded. “And will you seek assistance with rearing your child?”
“Hm? As you assisted Laurelion?” Aaravos frowned; this was not the time for such invasive questions. But, since it was Dametar…

“Surely a mage of your stature doesn’t have the time for nurturing?” Dametar quipped.

“Well, there’s no stopping my mortals from trying to help with upkeep of cleanliness, but…no.” Aaravos shook his head. “I appreciate the help you gave my father, but I will not ask for anyone’s aid for feeding, if that’s what you’re asking.” He pressed a hand to his chest. “I want to ensure as much connection with my own magic for as long as possible.”

Aaravos chuckled. “Not to mention, most of my work is research and archival. I may be the greatest mage to walk Xadia, but I’m more likely to be behind a desk than out performing great feats.” 

He stooped to look at one of the spheres floating past him. Could this be someone to him one day?
Son, daughter, child? A master of magic like him…a scholar or soothsayer? Could they be nothing like him at all but loved no matter what. 

But, running over his fingers, it simply felt like a little spinning orb of stardust. He wondered how anyone else was simply able to choose at random.

“You’ve not made your choice yet.” She observed him meander among the stardust spheres. 

“No…” Aaravos shook his head. “I haven’t felt a draw to any of these yet.”

None beckoned him, none drew him to their cosmic design. They were all the same. They all had the same nothing, the same void of personality.

Except… He noticed one in particular. Floating on its own away from all the others.

It had a soft pink and purple hue. Where every other one spun in a perfect horizontal motion, this one’s gravitational drift was just slightly askew. It spun the same direction as the others, but its tilt was barely pointed diagonally. 

It seemed…lonely. He reached out a hand, gently drifting forward. 

“What…is that one?” He eased toward it. “Oh.” He gasped. “Oh, little one.” He cupped it in his hands. It felt like warm sand, gently wisping in his palms.

Dametar frowned, though raising a curious eyebrow, crossed her arms. “That one?” 

“This one,” he affirmed. His breath caught in his throat. “She needs me.” He brushed his fingers along the edges of the clumsily spinning dust. 

“That one…” Dametar followed him. “Formed differently. It is still an option if you want it. I sense its potential for life. Others like that one are passed from. After my many thousands of years, I’ve never seen what happens when one like that is chosen. They’ve simply been allowed to become ordinary stars.”

Aaravos looked at the rest. They would be surely released back into the cosmos where they had been collected, one with the universe again.

“If it helps your decision…it broke away from an eruption from Xadia’s sun.”
Yes…that was it. This was the one, if it was part of the world he loved.

A confirmation deepened inside him. He could not be swayed to reject it.
”Hello.” It wobbled a little as he lifted it closer, to get a better look. “You’re alright.” He whispered. “I’ve got you.” 

Dametar nodded, though her eyes were half lidded with warning. “You will be uncovering what might happen with one of these clusters. Are you willing to risk despair? An eternity caring for a child that can never be parted for you?”

Aaravos clenched and unclenched his fists, fluttering between holding the cloud protectively and letting it spin idly. 

“Maybe nothing will happen…or maybe it will be a good eternity.” Was all he could muster in defense.

Dametar sighed. “Very well, Aaravos. If that is the one you choose…then perhaps to you, she will be perfect.”

He took one last look at the cloud. He made sure to remember its beautiful hue. 

“I will see you again soon.” He whispered. And gently brought her to his mouth.

※※※※

It was over.
After a final, wrenching scream, after nine aching years, it was over.

He determined that perhaps it would have been easier to bear the other way, from flexible flesh. It would be better than feeling as though he were ripping infant-shaped molten glass from his heart. He hadn’t allowed Dametar to touch her as she emerged - insisting on a Sunfire tradition that he had endeared himself to. 

The labor itself had begun a week ago. He had Leandra, Esther, and other mortals to comfort him through the beginning. Three days ago, he returned to the stars when it became unbearable. He had spent that time in the Crown of the Star Scraper - far above the Xenith, limited to the Skywing Acolytes. It reached into the Heavens themselves, where only Startouch Elves could find breath in their mortal vessels. 

At last, six hours ago, he retreated to the presence of the birth saddle, under the guidance of Laurelion and Dametar - under the uncomfortable presence of dozens of sets of prying, impatient eyes, as the others watched and waited for the newest child to their ranks. 

It was easily the most humiliating and obstructive part of the experience. At least when mortals had crowds, they were doing something useful to help. 

The birth saddle itself was barely more comfortable. It had multiple inclines for resting against - upward at its head for his back or chest - downward for his legs unless his feet were propped in the stirrups under its seat. The head incline had a basket for eventually catching the child as he had desired - ignoring the rounded split at the seat’s other end. It was redundant to him, and didn’t make resting his back any better.

But it was over. Immediate relief ran through him as the adrenaline faded. Exhaustion burned behind his eyes. He collapsed over the basket of the birth saddle, gasping for breath, as he felt the damp shape in his hands jerk. For just a moment, his brand new baby, bright and blue as a night sky, did not cry. But, through the haze in his vision, he watched her bunch her little limbs and squirm in his hands. 

It was over. 

She was finally in his arms. 

Slick, glimmering stardust from her separation from his heart coated her tiny body like vernix. She was still bound to him. A glistening cord gleamed between their bright pink heart stars, like a rope made of pure stardust - it might as well have been the nearest thing to an umbilical cord.

He ignored the whispers waiting for a noise. It was coming - he could see it rising as she gasped. She balked as the shock of her gleaming birth ended - and she sputtered a mewl that rushed into the crying he had been waiting for. 

“Come to Daddy…” he murmured. 

Trembling, he grasped her and pulled the babe in his arms, cradled to his chest. His legs trembled, muscles more fatigued than he has ever known them to be. Her tiny body balked against him, as she keened from shock and cold.

Aaravos could barely feel Laurelion’s hand at his back as he struggled to recover his breath. It was that, or focus on his baby howling in his hands. He grasped around his chest for the robe he thought he had still been wearing with the simple wrap around his hips. He hazily remembered begging for help to remove the robe he had been wearing, as his own body heat consumed him, preparing to expel the magic and stardust that was about to be the baby shrieking against him.

It certainly distracted him from the chatter among the witnesses. His baby was a fragile creature, tiny in his arms. His…daughter. Tears slid from his eyes, exhaustion pulled at him. His chest ached with the pain of childbirth. He had never seen anyone more beautiful. His child. She was his, and his alone. 

He rubbed his thumb along her scalp. He couldn’t feel horn stubs beneath her hair. Blinking, he realized…and ran his thumb over her single horn in the center of her forehead.

“Oh.” He swallowed the tightness in his throat. “Oh, look at you…” He whispered. How had he not noticed right away?
His shoulders shook with laughter, mingled with tears in his eyes. He lifted her to his face, nuzzling his cheek against her, rocking himself in hopes of self-soothing from the ache that remained.

“You’re perfect.” He gasped at last. “You’re absolutely perfect!” 

“Is he delirious?” Someone whispered. Aaravos’s ears twitched at the whispered conversations. 

“And he has such beautiful horns…”

His heart pulled and his joy momentarily faded. As the adrenaline began to wear off, he realized his arms were already aching from the baby in his arms. He looked down at her chubby body, tiny but stout. Her cheeks were puffed up and there were rolls on her little feet and wrists. He gave her a weary smile. At the back of his mind, he could hear the whispers, but nothing mattered. Nothing besides the cooing baby, tired from her own birth. 

Aaravos glanced down at his baby as she nuzzled for warmth. He rested his hand behind her head, bringing her as close as he could. For a moment, he wished he could do it all over again, now that he knew he was better off not bearing her in front of a rotten audience. He should have stayed on Xadia. He should have stayed home and found out what happens to the land when a Startouch Elf is born on it.

He felt Laurelion’s hand squeeze on his shoulder, at long last.  

“I think…” Dametar started to speak up. “It’s time for him to have some time alone with his child.” 

Aaravos glanced up to watch her stand firmly, waving the others to leave.

The astral forms of the other elves fizzled into nothing as her words were heeded.

“One horn, then.” Dametar muttered as she looked at the baby, once the audience was gone. “Well. It’s certainly not what I was expecting from her stardust.” 

Aaravos groaned wearily. “Will you just let me have this moment?” He shivered. 

He slumped forward, at last releasing the heavy sob that had been trapped inside him as he curled over his baby.
Laurelion prodded him into opening his eyes, “Here,” he offered, holding a blanket that had been hung neatly on one side of the saddle, next to the robe that he had worn earlier. “Your little one might need this.” 

Aaravos couldn’t hear the morose rattle in his father’s voice.

Weakly, he accepted the blanket and bundled it around his daughter. It could have been better. He was in no mood to set her in his lap and swaddle her properly. His baby pushed against him, her mouth opened wide as she nestled blindly. With no true umbilical cord or placenta between them, it was understandable that she would be born famished.

”Oh, there, there…” He nudged her chin with his thumb slightly. “Settle down…”

A tired smile graced his lips. He remembered how humans had managed to help their babes, stroking the corner of her mouth. It did not take much convincing for her to latch and nurse. He closed his eyes wearily as he let the new rush of endorphins cascade through him. He could feel the build up of milk in his chest, slowly leeching into his daughter’s hungry mouth. The humiliation and antagonizing comments were soon forgotten as he basked in his daughter’s appearance. She was nothing and everything like him. They were one and the same. And completely separate.

After a pregnancy as difficult as his, all he had wanted was for it to end. The feel of his daughter against his chest was something he had often imagined in the throes of his pregnancy. And now, it became a reality. 

“Lean back.”
Aaravos felt Dametar gently touch his leg, encouraging to turn around into the backrest of his seat. That much he could allow, as she helped him lean into the incline of the saddle. Some of his hair draped into the cradle attached to the head of the saddle.
He reopened his eyes, gazing down at her. She looked so much more serene, her bright pink eyes half lidded as she flexed her tiny fingers over his skin. The sound of her feeding was the sweetest noise he had ever heard. 

There was an odd little flutter against his arm. Her right ear twitched and flicked with every little suck. Aaravos stared at her, enraptured by her beauty. Not all of her freckles had emerged yet - but there was one below her left eyelid in the same way that he had two. And one just on the bridge of her nose.

“It seems that she’s a strong child.” Dametar mused. She circled the saddle, sliding a finger beneath the baby’s chin and tilting it higher. The baby grunted, and nuzzled into her new posture. The pressure wasn’t as sharp now, Aaravos realized, as he pressed his back further into the saddle’s recline. He swallowed, watching the link between their hearts split in two - and crumble into flecks of light.

”There…her birth has ended.” Dametar nodded. “I would have prepared more for the next stage, but…it seems she couldn’t wait.” Dametar circled nearer, her eyes on the baby. “She took better than I thought she would.” She mused. “Her horn may be her one struggle.”

Aaravos curled his fingers protectively around her tiny body. Surely she didn’t mean it like that.

“Aaravos…” His father spoke behind him. “If I may…” 

Aaravos managed to look over his shoulder, realizing just how sore his muscles were from his exertions.

“You chose to give birth to something so tiny and helpless that it will be completely dependent on you.” Laurelion put an arm behind his back. “As much as I could not stand to do that myself…I had this made…some time ago.” He presented something, neatly folded until he opened it.

A long, deep blue tunic, open at its chest, embellished with weighted gold metal. The sleeves were cuffed with the same sheer, transparent material that was infused into the bottom of the tunic. It was beautiful. Aaravos realized he had a belt at home that would accompany it perfectly. 

Laurelion circled behind him, touching his arm. Aaravos extended it enough that he could slip it on, one sleeve at a time so he could continue holding his baby as she nursed. The weighted metal gently hugged around his neck. It was soft and silken against his prickling body.

“Have you chosen her name?” Dametar asked.
Aaravos shut his eyes, took a breath.

He’d tried to name his child Leandra, for the friend who had finalized his desire.

She firmly, but gently declined the offer when it came up in conversation the previous year.
”There’s four other Leandras as it is.” she said. “Let her have her own name.” 

Looking down at his child…that name didn’t suit her, anyway. She did not have the face for it.

No…something crossed his mind. Something that would suit her place in the stars.

“Leola.”

Dametar tilted her head slightly. “Leola? Very well then.” 

She folded her hands behind her back. “I will leave you together.” She whispered. Rather than vanishing from the chamber, she departed on foot.

Silence, and at last, none but his own father to witness this special moment.

Laurelion crossed his arms. After a moment of brooding, his expression turned soft, melting into a smile. He gazed at Leola. “She looks just like her father.”

Aaravos narrowed his eyes, then switched to snuggling his daughter closer to his chest.

He wiped his tear-dampened face with the back of his arm - it was the least coated in stellar viscera.
“Did you feel this way for me?” He asked.

“What do you mean?” Laurelion sounded confused. He could hear Laurelion’s sharp intake of breath. 

“Did you feel this way for me when you first held me?” Aaravos clarified. “When I was taken from the fruit.” 

“Well…you weren’t that small when you were born.” Laurelion sat beside him, though facing the opposite direction. “I was younger than you when I became a father. I did not…” He paused, averting his gaze. Aaravos held his breath, silently urging him to finish.

“I held on to you for so long because I was not ready. But, gravity made the choice for me and…you came out sooner than I would have preferred…” He looked down at Leola; she was starting to shut her eyes with exhaustion, struggling to stay attached.

”I assumed that the extended time would be enough…even if it wasn’t. This.”
His father gave Leola an expression of warmth. It startled Aaravos, to see him like that.
”I had thought…tied together as we were four the time that it was. That it would be this, for us.”

Aaravos ran his fingers in the baby’s thin strands of hair. “It could have been, even with me being born from a fruit. But you did not seek to strengthen a bond between us.” He did, take a moment, to breathe in the awe of the purple and pink. It was more baffling than the single horn.
“You even passed me to Dametar…”

Laurelion bit the inside of his cheek. “We had an agreement.” 

“I thought I was fine, that I had not missed anything with you,” Aaravos continued, “even after centuries of watching mortals. But now that I’m holding her…” Aaravos swallowed. “And she’s so small…” 

Laurelion looked to the side.“I had no intention of hurting you. I did not assume you would feel this absence.” He gestured to the baby. She nuzzled her nose deeper into the crevice between the planes of her father’s chest, soaking in the warmth of his skin.

“I look at her and see a reflection of you,” he whispered. “She is sweet, soft, and vulnerable.” 

“Vulnerable?” 

Laurelion nodded, voice firm. “Vulnerable. Aaravos. Dametar told me in confidence about the stardust you chose. You were warned something might go wrong. And now your child only has one horn.”  

And yet, there was love in his black eyes when he gazed at his granddaughter. So much love, painful in its exuberance. And love every time he spoke to him. 

A storm of emotions writhed within. Confusion, anger, grief, love, everything inside demanded to be heard, clamoring. As a child seeking his father’s adoration. 

“What are you saying?” He stuttered, taken aback. “That I made a mistake?” Aaravos demanded, lifting his chin. His father clenched his fists at his side, unclenching and clenching. He shook his head.
 

“I did not mean that!” He insisted. “Maybe this is a temporary malformation! Perhaps, in time, a second horn will grow. It might not be in the correct location, but she would still-” 

Aaravos’s nostrils flared. “I do not pray for alterations to my daughter’s appearance.” His voice broke, the bass tone scattered. “Why is it such a hardship to accept her differences?” 

“Aaravos, she only has one horn! She is an affront!” Laurelion replied frantically. “And the rest…while you were recovering, I heard the Seeker say that this happened because you spent too much time with mortals! That being on the earthly plane stripped you of your prime to bear a child!”

“My prime,” Aaravos scoffed. His breathing quickened in his anger, and his chest rose and fell with adrenaline. His baby squawked weakly, dragging her tiny fingers over his chest. Aaravos stared down at her, forcing himself to take a long breath.

“Well, you know as well as Dametar. And she’s made her leave.” He rubbed away some of the residual stardust on Leola’s cheek.

“And her horn.” Laurellion whispered. “Nothing has had a single horn since. Her.”

Her.

“She’s a baby.” Aaravos’s voice cracked to a low whisper. “…and you’re comparing her to Shiruach?” He pulled the blanket tighter around her. “Can’t any of you just let me have this precious time with my child!?” 

A silence fell.

The only sound Aaravos cared to listen to were Leola’s tiny grunts as she struggled to stay awake. Her tiny fingers clenched around a long lock of his hair. 

“I simply,” Laurelion dipped his head, fighting tears in his eyes. “Forgive me, my sweet son. I was caught in my initial reaction to your child’s single horn. I did not realize that she would be so…you.” He trailed her forehead with a finger. 

In that moment, a wave of sympathy overcame Aaravos. But it washed away, taken in by the eddying of the tides.

At his breast, Leola wailed, sensing his bubbling rage. Guilt overtook him. Laurelion observed in silence as Aaravos cared for his fussing newborn, switching her to his other side. Contented, she calmed. 

“May I hold her?” Laurellion’s voice softly crackled. “When she’s done?”

Aaravos froze. He wrapped his arms tightly around his daughter. He had some nerve asking.

“I…” he hesitated. His father did not know how to hold a child this small, he was sure of it. And yet, there was love in his black eyes when he gazed at his granddaughter. So much love, painful in its exuberance. And love every time he spoke to him. 

A storm of emotions writhed within. Confusion, anger, grief, love, everything inside demanded to be heard, clamoring. As a child seeking his father’s adoration. 

Paranoia touched on his senses, but he could not bear to detach himself from his child. 

He knew it wasn’t logical. His father didn’t want him as a tiny baby…and he was the one humiliated by the gossip about his own grandchild.

He might take her from him.

“No.”

His father could not be trusted. Laurelion gave him a look of defeat, switching to float near his eye level, sitting cross legged. 

“I understand your hesitation.” He said slowly.

“After everything you’ve just said, you really think…”
Aaravos sighed deeply, then spoke in icy calmness. “I’m going home. Do not follow me”

Laurelion’s eyes flitted. 

Hurt flashed across his father’s face. Both son and father gazed at each other, eyes roaming, studying features. They both knew this would be the end for them. Aaravos had given him a rope to grab, and its edges were fraying. 

“I love you,” Laurelion uttered.

“And I love you. But you are too afraid to accept my daughter.” Aaravos ignored his father’s gasp, “yes, I see it, now. You are apprehensive of something new. It frightens you.” 

Tears pricked at his eyes - matching the ones in his father’s. Exhaustion pulled at him. Exhaustion from adapting to his newfound fatherhood, exhaustion from his deprived connection to his own father, and exhaustion from trying to convince his father to accept his daughter. 

At last, Leola’s energy was spent. Her tiny head dropped limply into the crook of his arm where she was cradled.
“I’m going.” Aaravos’s tone brooked no argument. A threat, unspoken, hung at the tip of his tongue. 

A weary expression flitted across his father’s face, a shadow soon passing. “I understand.” 

Starlight enveloped his body. He caught a glimpse of sorrow across his father’s face as he vanished.

Aaravos wiped furious tears with the back of his hand.

In the depths of his mind, he pondered if he’d ever see him again. He hoped he’d never dare to show his face to him again. 

Would he trade eternity with his daughter for eternity with his father? Gazing fondly at the infant held in the crook of his arms, he could not bear to lose her. 

He vowed he never would. 

※※※※

The stars were bright in the clear, moonless sky. Just as he had anticipated they would be. It made the most sense that Leola would be born at the peak of his power, even high above the land.

Leola was awake, contentedly cooing and flexing her fingers. So far, she had responded well to being shrunk down to mortal size. He had left their larger forms as a forest around his cottage. Leola’s, adorably, took the form of dozens of saplings peppering the ground around the larger ones.

Despite her puffed and pouting expression, she glanced around at the world around her, oblivious to the misery that transpired through what should have been glory. 

He dropped onto the stairsteps up to the cottage, taking in the stars and the peaceful cacophony of Xadian night. The noise was reprieve from the silence of the heavens.
A little family of rootsnoots scuttled out to the grass from underneath the lifted porch, startled by the creaking of his weight above them. The matriarch bleated to the calves as they vanished into the night. 

Aaravos turned his attention away from them, and back to Leola. She had sneezed, startling herself, and was now whimpering in confusion.

”Aaravos!” Someone called from over the hill above his home. A human woman was rushing as quickly and gingerly as she could, a basket in her arm and a sling wrapped close to her body as she carried her own baby. 

Aaravos felt a sting of relief. 

“Esther.” He rose from the edge of the porch where he had been sitting. 

“I saw you come back and shrink! And with your baby!” She panted as she arrived. 

“Yes…she’s here.” Aaravos managed to crack a small smile.

”And just a few months apart from mine.” Esther sat down on the porch with him. “Look at you! You’re glowing so brightly!” She chuckled, looking over the bright stars across his body - and his heart star, still gleaming. 

“Have you named her?” 

Names have power, he mused. He smiled at his daughter in her new gown. The unicorns, in colored strings and patterns, were highlighted by his baby’s darker complexion. 

“Her name is Leola.” 

Esther smiled knowingly. “What a beautiful name she has.”

Esther leaned in gently, taking a peek at Leola. She gasped. 

He waited for the displeasure. The judgement.

“She’s a unicorn!” She cooed. “Oh, she’s adorable!” Esther rubbed the pad of her finger gingerly against the nub of her horn.

Aaravos’s heart leapt. 

A unicorn!

“Yes…yes, I suppose she is.” He never thought of it that way, insults running through his mind were the only description he had received from his own kind. 

“And what a coincidence.” She opened the basket. His eye was immediately drawn to a small bunch of bright red apples. Among the fruit, bread, and cheese she had brought along, there was a long, soft baby gown. With unicorns embroidered along every hem, dancing atop gusts of wind. Tears welled up in his eyes as he ran a hand across the gown.

“It. . . it’s beautiful,” he breathes. His friend laid the basket near his feet, smiling as he took the gown from inside. He levitates it next to his face, peering closely at the gown in full. 

“Well, you made my baby’s gown.” She grinned, pulling back her sling a little to reveal her own little girl, wearing one with hotcats on the hems. Aaravos had made it when he could feel his own child’s birth growing near, when his chest had expanded to a point he never knew it could, when the pain of carrying his child for so very long weighed heavily on him. It had helped calm his anxiety for the labor he was to endure. And now, it is finally over. The weight in arms confirmed that. His beautiful baby girl. 

Leola. 

Esther watched as Aaravos clothed his daughter in the newly acquired dress. She squirmed as fabric wrapped over her skin for the first time.

Aaravos gave her a grateful smile. As much as he enjoyed talking to his friend and sharing in this experience together, he could not help but wish to spend time with his newborn - to become accustomed to this new weight he cradled in his arms. Esther seemed to sense it, rising to her feet. She gently patted her own daughter’s small body. 

“Will you need any help?” She asked. “You’ve been gone for so long…”
Aaravos sighed, picking up one of the apples. “Help is something I was short on.” He turned it over in his hand. “There was an audience…my father was humiliated by their reactions to Leola’s single horn…” He swallowed. “I could not risk staying on Xadia, but if I had the choice…”

Esther squeezed his arm. “Let’s get you inside.” She rubbed it reassuringly. “I’m sure you’re very tired.”
Aaravos’s head fell a little to his shoulder. He was exhausted.

“What do you think, Leola?” She gave him no answer, instead grunting in her sleep. Amused, Aaravos kissed her little forehead. He padded inside with her in his arms, heading for his bedchambers. 

Esther walked with him, holding his arms up the steps.
“Do you want me to stay overnight?” She asked. “If not, I can make you something to eat.”

Aaravos felt something melt away. “Yes…yes, that will do.” He nodded gratefully.
A warm meal would certainly help. “Thank you.” 

Upon entry in the bedroom, Esther started to help pull away the new tunic, and laid it neatly in a nearby chair. Little Esther, who he had saved from death in her first moments, all those years ago…now helping him settle his own new baby.
“I’ll have to get my mother so she can help too…you know she’ll want to see Leola too.” She said as she pulled the blankets over him. He collapsed into his bed. It was firm and plush. Hours of discomfort shed away. He sighed deeply, feeling a pressure he didn’t know he had until then vanish. 

“If you leave…then it will give me time alone with my baby.” Aaravos breathed out. “We’ve had too many eyes upon us.” He looked down at Leola, sound asleep and sucking her thumb.

There was a basket laid neatly on his bed that he’d made weeks before. With each weave of the basket, he imagined how his daughter would fit inside. Bundled in the blanket, Aaravos laid her in it, dropping to lay sideways to watch her. Leola slept in peace, all tension gone from her little body. 

A slight sense of paranoia troubled him. He found he could not bear to be parted from her.
What if someone came from the Stars to take her while they were parted, even just inches apart? Gingerly, he collected her from the basket. He winced as he gathered her close.
There was still soreness in his chest - from the birth, but his affection for her dampened the pain.

“Will you be more comfortable this way?” Esther sat at the side of the bed, wrapping her arms around her own baby.
Aaravos nodded. “We will be fine.”
It seemed that Leola hadn’t cared either way where she was sleeping. But, she squeaked a long, soft sigh and nuzzled into his skin. 

“I must be going,” Esther said, helping him sink more comfortably into his pillow. “If there is anything you require - whether it be clothing for your baby, food, or toys - please, don’t be afraid to let me know.” She rubbed his arm.

He was too tired to think of anything he wanted to eat - and he was sure that Leandra would know, anyway.

“I’ll be back in a few hours.” Esther whispered. “I’ll bring something more than those apples, and I’ll change her linens if you want.” She pulled the blanket higher over his waist before she departed.

The vast difference between the immortal and mortal plane was abundantly clear. Here, he had a community of friends and family. In the heavens, those things did not exist. Even with his own father’s vacillation for care.

Esther’s form faded as she trudged out the door, soon heading for the human villages set in that area. Aaravos knew Leandra would scold his ears off if he did not show her Leola tomorrow. He chuckled to himself, staring at the child wrapped in his arms. In the same blanket his father had given him. Fresh from the birth, she was asleep, just as exhausted as he was. 

His eyelids grew heavy, limbs slow like the dripping of Sunfire molasses. 

Breathing easier, he pulled the larger blanket from his bed and covered himself with it. His eyelids closed. Father and daughter slept, recovering from birth. 

※※※※

The next few days brought a herald of surprises. It was mostly made up of resting and recovering. Humans and ordinary elves alike came to see the new baby, bringing gifts and laudation.
They all had the same response to her.
“Unicorn.”

It was exhausting in a way that the birth hadn’t been.
The humans and the few elves that lived with them were revelrous and inquisitive. Their children were especially enthusiastic. They were children of the children he had played with while celebrating Esther’s birth, and even they were accustomed to the tradition of long-lasting parties to welcome a new baby.

“Does this mean you can’t do Sky Tosses like you do at other baby parties?” One boy peeped quietly.
“How did you have a baby if you’re a boy?!” His sister practically shouted. “Did she come out of your--”
“But if you eat this dumpling, will it become milk for Leola!?” She was interrupted by a Moonshadow Elf child, holding a fried dumpling to him. 

Aaravos chuckled. They certainly were not shy about such invasive inquiries.
“She came from stardust and magic that separated from my heart.” He touched the center of his chest. “And yes, this will help.” He accepted the dumpling.
When he bit into it, he found it had been filled with savory mushrooms and cheese. 

“Let’s not crowd him while the baby’s sleeping.”
Aaravos smiled slowly at the voice behind him. He looked over his shoulder to see Leandra standing at the bench. 

She had aged gracefully, all things considered. Her scars from a childhood disease were faded with her wrinkles and her mousey brown hair was silvered.

“Why don’t you go and have supper with your families?” Leandra suggested to the children. “I’d like to talk with him.”

In scattered affirmations, the children rushed to their parents in other parts of the village.
Aaravos chuckled. “Oh, they’re only going to have more questions.” He gave Leandra more room on the log bench he was sitting on, taking another few bites of the dumpling.
“She’s going to grow slowly…” He looked at Leola as Leandra settled herself. “By the time they’re grown, Leola will still be a baby…”

“That’s true. But think of how many people are going to love her.” Leandra rubbed the back of her finger against Leola’s cheek.  “She’d be like you. Loved by so many for generations.” 

Aaravos looked back at the children with their parents, all chattering and flitting like young birds as they prepared for their meal. Then, back at Leandra while she cooed over Leola. He smiled at them as he finished the small dumpling. 

“Here we are again, I suppose. Like the night we celebrated Esther.” He looked up at the stars. Those stars that had looked coldly upon Leola. Even his own father…

“Would you like to hold her?” He softly loosened his arms so he could slide Leola to Leandra.
“Oh, you know I’ve been waiting.” Leandra accepted her with a youthful giddiness. “I’ve been waiting for years!”

She settled his tiny baby into her reliable, expert arms. Aaravos was sure she had held half the village.
Leola yawned, slumping her cheek against Leandra’s broad shoulder. If the transfer had awakened her, it was not for long. 

“So…how did it go up there?” Leandra was looking up at the stars.
“Well…to put things simply, I would have been better off staying in your care.” Aaravos frowned, crossing his arms. “My brethren and my father did not take well to her single horn.” 

“Oh…I’m sorry…” Leandra rested her hand on top of his.

“Of course, they would have responded the same even if I presented her to them later.” Aaravos chuffed. “There would have been no pleasing them.” 

Before Leandra could speak and offer comfort, she looked up as the night grew darker. Stormclouds gathered rapidly over the sky. The wind was strong enough to extinguish the large fire in its pit at the center of the village, just as heavy raindrops began to fall. 

Some of the villagers managed to collect some of the food containers into buildings, while others covered the rest. One of the children tried to chase after a ceramic plate that had been blown onto the ground and was now being tossed about by the wind. 

Leandra quickly, but carefully, passed Leola back to Aaravos, alarmed.

“Something’s happening.” She gasped, getting up from the bench.
“Yes.” Aaravos rose, tucking Leola into the yellow wrap he was wearing beneath his tunic. 

“I think it’s her.” Leandra glanced around anxiously. Most of the village had already taken shelter in the surrounding roundhouses. 

He heard whispers and panicked shouts. 

The panic all came down to one phrase.
“Sky Fish is coming.”

“I saw Esther and her husband go into your family’s home.” Aaravos squeezed her shoulder. “I will see what the dragon wants.” 

There was a great rattle of wind and a thunder-like boom. His ears twitched, following the sound. Leola awoke, wailing sharply. She nuzzled her face between the round planes of his chest, soothed by his warmth. He pulled the sling higher around her head. His hand cupped the back of her head protectively, covered by the fabric.

He looked up, seeing the source of the violent winds.

Her.

High in the darkening night, the gathering storm clouds shook with the rapid flying of the green archdragon of the Sky that the humans called ‘Sky Fish’. 

Echudyne.

It seemed the archdragon brought along her dragonling, roaming the skies together. It certainly explained the storm that had arrived. The younger dragon - Zubeia, if he recalled correctly, sent playful sparks to her mother, who caught them in her jaws. They tossed sparks of lightning in a game of their own making. Improvising for her lack of wings, the Sky Fish swerved her six legs in the air, catching wind currents. Her sinuous body whipped through the air. 

Zubeia roared in delight, blue wings flapping.

It seemed that they weren’t here to bother the humans, at the very least. It helped that a few of the elves among them were a confident and protective presence, a few of them remaining outside of the roundhouses with Aaravos.

As much as Aaravos did not enjoy the company of dragons, seeing them this far east was confusing. Exhaustion clawed at him, but he forced his body into motion.

Echudyne was starting to spin gently downward, like a twirling ribbon, to the ground before him. Zubeia tailed after her. Until, at last, Echudyne gracefully touched grass, just in front of the village gate.

Aaravos approached her, wrapping his arms around Leola to protect her from the still-billowing wind.

“And what pleasure do I owe to receive the honor of Echduyne herself?” Aaravos greeted, flashing her a lewd smile. “And in the midst of a celebration the villagers were having. You’ve given them quite a fright.”
The Sky Fish chuckled, zaps of lightning dancing by her scales as she landed. 

“Aaravos,” she acknowledged, dipping her head. Zubeia folded her wings, descending. 

“Why are two storm dragons this far from their primal home? I can only assume something is amiss.” 

Echdyune chuckled, shaking her head. 

“It is true that we storm dragons do not often tend to stray from our homes, but I have heard talk of a new startouch elf born into your ranks.” Her eyes were trained on Leola. Her body and the top of her head were covered protectively by the sling, but the archdragon could make out her squirming form tucked inside. Zubeia neared Aaravos, sniffing in curiosity.

“Is this the child?” She inquired. Echudyne took cautious steps forward, talons trampling the meadow grass. 

Aaravos was beaming, happily pushing back the top half covering her head.
“Indeed. I birthed her two weeks ago in the heavens.” 

Echduyne cocked her head. “I heard she was missing something. And that she had too little of it. While I,” she pointed her head to all six of her legs, “had too much.”
Her neck waved as she lifted her head higher. “To think Laurelion’s grandchild has a single horn like his old foe.”

His smile tightened. Ah. That explained some of his father’s behavior earlier.

Echudyne chuckled, a deep rumble far into her thin chest. “Of course, she was an enemy we shared. I’m sure he was quite perturbed.”
 

In cold politeness, he informed her, “my daughter is born with everything she requires to thrive, regardless of whether she has one horn or a full set. And, we have no need to fret about her family history.”

The archdragon dipped her head in understanding. “Forgive me, archmage. I simply remarked on her features. Now,” she brightened, “what is her name?”

“Such a small thing for a babe, no? Or are they all this tiny?” Zubeia murmured, interrupting. Aaravos adjusted his hold on the sling. His shoulder was already sore.

“All newborns appear of similar height and width at this age,” he responded, “but my Leola is slightly daintier than most infants, to say the least.” 

“Leola,” Zubeia echoed. “That name is beautiful.”

Aaravos grinned, watching in fondness as his child slept. All tension fell from her face, relaxed and content. He could not stop basking in her beauty.  

“It is,” Echduyne agreed. “It is a comfort to me, knowing that I am not alone in the disfigurement of my body.”

Disfigurement? 

Aaravos quieted the urge to correct her, knowing it was pointless. 

He would never allow his child to see herself as less than or worthless because of her facial differences. 

“I hope in time Leola will find a friend in you,” Aaravos said. Echduyne smiled, teeth sharp with blood stains on them- perhaps from a recent hunt. 

“Likewise. I wish you the best with your child. There truly is nothing that has fulfilled me more than being a parent.” 

Zubeia sidled closer to her mother, then peered once more at Leola.
“May I ask, why does your daughter only have one horn? Is she a different breed of Startouch elf?” 

“I grew her from my body in a pregnancy that lasted nine years. There are no other breeds of Startouch elves,” he contended. “This is simply how she was formed.”
Cowed, Zubeia dipped her head. Echduyne watched on, spreading her limbs and stretching her talons. 

Echudyne closed her eyes, bowing her head closer. “Thread and shuttle of the great tapestry, unraveled and remade.” She rumbled, her eyes softly closed. 

Aaravos batted his eyes. “A prediction?” He asked.

“Perhaps…” Echudyne’s body wobbled as she stood on her short legs.
“Come, Zubeia. We have lingered here for too long.” She turned to Aaravos.
“Your child is a blessing. I thank you for being willing to present her to us.”

The wind blew as the archdragons took to the skies. The uncomfortable currents whisked Aaravos’s hair, waking Leola. She wailed in protest as Aaravos rocked her in his arms.

There was no point in dwelling on her foresight; it was simply too vague. And Aaravos was exhausted.

“That will be us one day, my unicorn.” He murmured as he watched the dragons soar higher into the clouds.
“But not for a long time, I presume.” Perhaps if she learned to take on a Skywing form…

She gave him no answer, still fussing against him.
A few of the humans peeked out of the houses, having seen her departure through their windows or the cracks of their doors. 

“Is everything alright?” He heard Leandra behind him.
“Yes.” Aaravos assured her, turning. “She wanted to see my baby.”
“She picked a fine time to do it.” Leandra huffed, shaking her head.

“Well…she’s gone now.” Aaravos looked up. The storm clouds had not cleared. “I suppose it would be best to undo her mess before the rain truly comes.”

“We’ll take care of it.” Leandra clasped his hand. “This should be your chance to take Leola home…it seems she’s had enough.” She pointed to Leola, whose face was darkening as she sputtered and whined with frustration. 

“She most certainly has.” Aaravos agreed, stroking her hair.
Leandra handed him a small basket. “Take some more of the dumplings back with you.” She said, “There’s a few good ones left.” 

“You have my thanks…and will see your basket returned soon.” Aaravos extended a free arm to embrace her. She leaned into his shoulder, being careful to avoid Leola. After their parting, Aaravos opened a portal to his cottage, and stepped through it with a farewell wave.

“Well, that was exciting, wasn’t it?” Aaravos stroked Leola’s cheek. After a final tremble, her whining finally belted into a sharp cry. The storm Echudyne and Zubeia carried had come far - and was at last releasing from the sky. 

Aaravos hurried beneath the covered entry of the cottage, just as the rain came down heavily enough to nearly drench him, with no time to cast the shielding spell.

He pulled the sling away from Leola and clasped her to his shoulder, hushing gently.

“It’s alright, my sweet love. Perhaps you’re hungry, no?” He stroked her face as she mewled from the damp. “Yes, perhaps you are.”

Father and daughter entered the comfort of their home. He immediately entered the library, lighting the fireplace bathing in the warm fire crackling in the hearth. At last, Aaravos could at last see some amount of privacy for the next day or so, and settle his stomach with warm food while feeding his newborn. 

And then, they could both truly rest. At last, they could have perfection. 

Chapter Text

It was as if time had slowed. 

No more days simply passed by, leaving centuries of dust in their wake.

Time meant something now.

Aaravos felt like he was in a boat on calm waters after a storm. Calm waters, sticky with the juice and flesh of fruits clumsily devoured.

Leola babbled in his lap as she took tiny offerings of fruit from his fingers. Already at their equal of a yearling, she had taken a great interest in food, not wanting to rely on milk as her only succor. Aaravos was happy to oblige, though the fact that she had reached this stage so fast was bittersweet. In a blink, for him at the very least, she sprouted from newborn to toddler. Today, he hoped she would enjoy something new. She had been fussy as of late with her solid foods. But…so far, today, she was more than content with sweet fruits.

Leola was slightly wall-eyed, and sticky from the fruit she had been eating. She flapped her arms and kicked her legs with a delighted series of babbles. Aaravos sighed internally. Soon, he might have to change her clothes. A bath and washing of his tied up hair was more than needed.

He had not expected their quiet repose to last for so long.

And yet, it was at last disrupted in the form of a knock resounding on the door to his home. It had been for naught, for the entrance opens with the force of another’s hands. 

Clutching Leola close, Aaravos shot upright from his chair, though she was completely unphased, gripping her fruit-stained hands in his hair as she cooed. Before he could pull his library doors open, they were pushed from the other side. He stepped back as a familiar Startouch Elf stepped down the stairs, his face now visible to him, and wearing a dark robe, glinting and glittering as though stars were captured within its threads.

“So. The mighty Laurelion has finally come to visit. And after all this time.” Aaravos tutted, not turning around to Laurelion. He instead returned to his chair. He bounced Leola on his knee, balancing her back to his stomach as he offered small pieces of fruit to her. She cooled eagerly as she chewed it, drool slipping between her lips. She pulled the next one out of his hands, shoving it in her mouth on her own.

“I had anticipated seeing you later at the Star Scraper.” Aaravos chuckled, letting Leola gnaw on his fingers. “Then again, you have barely paid me your presence since your granddaughter was born.” 

“Is this…” Laurelion looked him up and down. “Well. You’ve certainly let yourself go…”

Aaravos was more than aware of the stains on his tunic and the disarray of his home. His bookshelves were always seemingly disorganized - but he liked them that way; there were stray blankets hung over some of his plant pots. Leola’s washed clothes were drying beside the fireplace. There were at least five books in various stages being penned or bound in different sections of the room (and two more in the kitchen that Laurelion had not seen). He did not need the reminder. “I know, I know. It comes with the task of having an infant.” He pushed up the high bun he’d tied his hair into. 

Leola squealed roughly, pulling at the loose strands hanging over his shoulders. They clung together, glued by the sticky fruit remnants stuck to her fingers.
“You’ve missed a great deal of her early life, but it’s not too late to make amends.” It was too much to hope for. “Maybe you’ll be here for her first words?” His voice was tinged with that hope. 

Laurelion clenched his jaw. “I am not here on personal terms.” He stepped off the stairs and faced Aaravos at the opposite side of his desk.
“You’re late to attend the Rupis Premonition.” He watched the toddler grab eagerly at Aaravos’s hand. 

“Late?” Aaravos spat. He tilted his head. “There’s no president for arriving long before the comet arrives.” His low sarcastic drawl turned to a playful gasp as Leola babbled at him. “My child must be prepared for the event.”

She opened and closed her tiny hands, reaching for the plate of carefully sliced fruit. Her eyes were on the verge of tears, so great was her desire for the fruits.

“Oh, you like baked apples, don’t you?” He cooed. “Yeees you dooo!” He kissed her face as she giggled, wiping the bits of fruit from her lips. With a hand, he slipped more pieces of the fire-softened apple in her mouth. She was not yet willing to take from a spoon; Aaravos found himself having to offer the pieces from his fingers. 

Laurelion sighed with irritation. “Why did you not have her ready before?” Laurelion circled behind Leola. “This is the Rupis Premonition. The Staff Holders must be present in order to receive it.” He folded his arms behind his back - just as Aaravos often did. “You should have been accounted for by now. Your delay is…unlike you.” 

“Well, I can give you a myriad of reasons. First, she will be sleeping soon, and I need to ensure that she is before she realizes that she is somewhere strange and cold.” Aaravos ignored his statement. His demeanor shifted rapidly as he set another piece of fruit in his little girl’s mouth. She clapped her hands, dancing in her sitting position.

“She does not care for winter as it is.” Aaravos lifted Leola to look at her face and wiggled her slightly. “And I do not want to linger too long.” Leola gurgled and giggled with the movement. Aaravos scoffed, returning Leola to his lap. He offered Leola a taste from his own meal - rice with finely diced foraged mushrooms and sheep’s cheese from the village, slipping the tip of his wooden spoon against her lips. “She will be asleep during the time of the premonition if I get her settled down enough.”

“So you wait until the last moment?” Laurelion frowned. “You couldn’t get her asleep sooner?” 

“You would know her patterns if you saw her more.” Aaravos frowned. “And you would understand why I am cutting so close.” Aaravos looked at the window. “It is not yet night at the Star Scraper. We can linger longer.” He watched as Leola sank into him with a comfortable sigh. 

“Oh, all done?” He crooned. She giggled gently while he rapidly kissed the top of her head.

“And now we can make ourselves presentable.” Aaravos rose from his chair. He patted Leola’s back.
“I do hate to leave you to linger while we bathe, but as you can see, it is a necessity.” Aaravos ran his hand underneath one of his stickier strands of hair.

The other elf rolled his eyes, the gold glinting with annoyance. “You have lingered far too long.” Laurelion growled.
He grasped Aaravos’s shoulder, squeezing it hard (and recoiling slightly at something damp on the fabric). “And now my patience has run thin.” 

The energy of the stars transported Aaravos and Leola out of the comfort of their cottage home. With no warning, they had been forcefully taken from his place of safety. 

When Aaravos stabilized himself, he realized that Laurelion had moved them into the Star Looms of the Star Scraper. Leola’s eyes turned wide, her little hand grasping for comfort. She wailed sharply, alarmed by her sudden change of scenery and sharp cold of the air. Aaravos tossed a strand of hair over his chest, giving it to his daughter. She twirled the long length of hair in little fingers. 

“You couldn’t even wait?” He wrapped Leola closer, nuzzling his chin next to her horn. “Oh, love, shh.” 

“Yes,” Laurelion said.  He stared at Leola with a dour clench of his jaw. The disdain in his eyes made Aaravos’s breath catch. It was a sort of ire he had never seen before. He clutched his daughter closer to his chest, tightening his hold. 

“This is ridiculous!” Aaravos patted Leola’s back as she fussed. “She’s not going to calm down in time.” He took a breath, readying himself to return. But Leola was frantic…it would take him hours to settle her, well past the premonition.
He noticed the small collective of Skywing Elf acolytes watching them uncomfortably.

“Oh, Great One…do you…need to be shown to the baths?” One of them asked meekly, looking up and down at his dishevelment.
“I would take a basin.” Aaravos turned away from Laurelion. “It is no longer ideal to give her the bathing I intended before the sun sets.”

“We will take you there.” The Skywing elf speaking approached with a submissive bend.
“Your aid is appreciated.” Aaravos immediately set foot after the acolyte. 

He was not led too far from the Star Looms, into what was typically a bed chamber. He ignored the starweaver silk hammocks, heading straight for the basin in the corner of the chamber. Leola snivelled, clinging to his coat. Aaravos sighed. He’d have to set her down to wash the stickiest parts of his hair, as he pulled a comb from his pocket dimension. 

“I’ll bring you a cradle if you wish.” The acolyte peeped, offering a small towel to him.
“It won’t be necessary to waste your energy on that venture. I can manage.” Aaravos sighed, taking the towel. Shuffling Leola from one arm to the next, he slipped out of his tunic’s sleeves and allowed the top half to hang lax over his hips.

The Acolyte gasped bashfully, looking away from Aaravos and his bare torso. She tried to lift her wings high enough to hide her face, forcing herself to bend for more coverage. “Oh goodness,”
“Hmph. No need to be modest on my account.” Aaravos drenched the towel and wrung it. He made haste as he wiped away the worst of the stickiness away from his skin and hair, and combed out the bound locks of hair. When he looked up again, another Skywing Acolyte was present, carrying the gleaming black ceremonial robes.

“Is that the one horned child?” He heard a whisper, just as he wet the other end of the towel, and started wiping down Leola’s face and hands.
“They’ve just arrived. She’s not thrilled to be here.” 

Leola pushed back against him, yowling as she resisted the brisk toweling. 

“There.” He ran a thumb over her face. “That’s better.”
With a flick, he pulled a long purple ribbon from the ether, and lifted his tied back hair into a bun - hoping it looked neater. Leola still tugged at one of the lengths that remained as he stood back up. After that, his crown and bracelets. At the very least, he could slip those on, along with the necklace.

Aaravos snapped his fingers, allowing his tunic to suddenly vanish from around his body - as well as his skirt and pants. He swept on the long gleaming robe, picking it up where the second Acolyte had left it on the hammock behind him. At least it wrapped around his body and tied around the waist. It was not as accommodating as his usual tunic, but if Leola needed milk, it could come open with enough coaxing. She keened, nestling for the skin that was open to her, at his heart. 

“Well, it’s not the presentation I would have liked.” Aaravos pulled the fabric where it was bunched beneath its own belt. “But it will do.” He took note of his reflection in the mirror above the basin, tugging his robe together. Despite his best efforts, they still looked disheveled - and he looked out of place in the ceremonial robe. 

Aaravos felt a quiver down his back - a temptation to just go home. He ought to just take his staff and leave with it out of spite.
But, it was too late for that now. And Leola’s fussiness would certainly draw attention. 

At the very least, perhaps because she was no longer sticky, Leola had calmed her tantrum to grumbling whimpers. She was clearly still unhappy with her situation in the cold, thin air, but nestled against his body, she was settling. 

Aaravos dropped back into the chair with a heavy sigh.
“Just let us be for a few minutes.” He waved away the Acolytes. “I will be there when I see the sunset.”

They departed in a frantic shuffle, leaving Aaravos and Leola alone in the room.
He smoothed his hand down her back as she continued to shiver and whine.
“It won’t be long now.” He sang softly, tucking her inside the black robe to warm her. She was getting too big for this - at least physically. 

Aaravos wondered if there would be a time that she was grown, and he took Titan form to take her in a pocket to keep her warm. It was a ridiculous prospect. But if it meant still being able to hold her…and if it didn’t bother her. 

She blubbered and sniveled, nearly calming.
It helped more when he spent a few minutes pacing and rocking her. Occasionally, Acolytes peered in, curious to see the one-horned baby that was visiting - all agreeing that she certainly was putting up an enormous fuss. 

Aaravos did catch a glimpse of another Star Touch Elf - another one of the staff holders. Aaravos did not know her all that well, but could have sworn she was there for Leola’s birth.

Soon enough, the room darkened with the fading sun. Whether Leola was ready or not, it was time…and Leola was certainly not ready, as much as her cries had reduced to stuffy sniveling. 

“Well. There goes the sun.” Aaravos sighed. “Time to go. If only we had the time we needed at home.”

He departed the room, wrapping Leola tightly in his arms, following the rounded hall back into the Star Looms. There were a few Skywing Elf acolytes remaining in the chamber, all of which snapped to attention when they entered.

Aaravos noticed the glistening spiders hard at work, spinning their silk and crawling across their sheet-like webs. And he noticed his father, waiting where he had been left, observing the spider’s labors. 

“Are you satisfied?” Laurelion asked.
“Not nearly enough.” Aaravos huffed. “She’s not settled like she would be, had you not interfered.”

He ignored Laurelion’s scowl, approaching the elevation platform in the center of the Star Looms.

“Oh, Great Ones, allow me to give you lift to the Xenith, so that you can proceed with your most illuminating premonition.” One of the other acolytes bowed deeply - the one that had brought the robe.

Aaravos shook his head dismissively. He patted Leola as she gnawed the fabric over his shoulder, sure the attending elves would gossip about her presence as they ascended.

“I know the runes. You have no need to aid us.” He stepped onto the tile at the center of the rotunda. A glimpse at the sky runes around it - a lifting platform.
“Orior, Ascendo, Scando, Erigo, Subrigo, Surrigo”. He whispered the spells. The platform rose with ease, ascending gracefully into the pink Gleam surrounding it.  

“Did she…forget he could do that?” He heard one of the Skywing elves whisper, just before the platform rose out of earshot. 

Leola jostled, with a little sputtering as she leaned back in Aaravos’s arms to look at the shimmer.
She stretched her arms out, gasping as the shimmer rushed past her. 

“Well, I suppose you get to see something lovely out of this.” Aaravos sighed, giving her nose a little tap. “Isn’t that right.” He turned her to rest her back against his chest so that she could watch easier. 

Laurelion watched her wordlessly.
She struggled to reach, babbling and squawking with frantic desire.

“I’m afraid there’s no holding this in your hands.” Aaravos kissed the back of her head. “You can only look.” 

The lift completed at the top of the Zenith, beneath its opened dome. The sky was alight with stars; it was often only open for moonless nights…but comets had no regard for the cycle of the moon. Tonight, exceptions had to be made for the waxing gibbous phase - nearing a full moon.

The platform was filled with the selected Startouch Elves. With them, were a few Skywing Elves - perhaps the limited few permitted to be truly among them. They surely could not have known the final section of the Star Scraper - the Heavens section where Leola had been born. 

Finally, and surprisingly…the clouds parted, as Echudyne rose from below, weaving her long body around the Zenith. She must have left Zubeia with her mate. Aaravos could only guess that she had been here the whole time, milling about the cloud layer as she waited for night. 

Echudyne looked down to acknowledge the arrival of the last Startouch Elves to arrive, and nodded solemnly, before she circled herself around the Zenith peak.

Her motion blew cold wind further down into the Just as Aaravos had predicted, she was less than thrilled with the cold of the air high above the Frozen Sea. 

He ignored the eyes staring at him again. The judgement that he had brought his baby was clear.

Aaravos could see the eight silver staffs in their pillars. Each with their differently colored glowing stone in their diamond-shaped centers. Aaravos noticed his own immediately by its purple gem. He stood before the pillar and removed his staff. It had been so long since he had last held it. The last time was before he had decided he was ready for a baby. And now she was clutched in his other arm. She had stopped whimpering long enough to observe the strange new object he was holding.

“Look, Leola. I suppose you might as well see this now.” He pointed the glowing gem toward Leola. She grunted with interest and grasped the center in her little hands and tried to pull it closer to her face.
“Come along, then.” He turned around to face outward, though focusing on carrying Leola. She cooed softly as he joined his father and some others that took their staffs at the same time as him. They stood together in the center of the chamber, around the lift platform. Perhaps he had underestimated how well she would handle the event. 

Aaravos placed himself between Laurelion - and a friend he had not seen in some time. The Merciful One - though they were not known that way then. They nodded at him in greeting, and then spared a glance at the tense Leola. She mouthed his clavicle and her own fingers at the same time, all while grasping a fistful of his hair in her hand.

“I’m glad to see you. And your child.” They whispered. Aaravos gave them a thin smile. His friend extended a hand, gently squeezing. “Are you…alright?” They crinkled their nose, glancing at the fructose dribble staining his tunic and his tied hair. 

“Dear Laurelion decided to drag me from my home before I could put myself together properly.” Aaravos scoffed. His ears flattened. “Not that either of us are particularly fit to participate as it is.” He attempted to hold Leola so she would better cover some of the more unsightly stains Leola’s gown.

“He was frantic to have you here.” they said.
“Well. He certainly wasn’t frantic for his granddaughter’s comfort.” Aaravos frowned, glancing at Laurelion as he turned his staff.

The Merciful One’s eyes flickered. “Aaravos, there’s something I need to say. I’ve received word. I’m to be a council-” 

The heads of the grand Cosmic Council appear before them. The celestial apparitions do not betray their emotions. Aaravos forgot the conversation with his friend, head tilted to gaze at the Cosmic Council. 

“The Rupis Premonition is imminent.” The Elder spoke. “Together, we unite for the best chance of this auspicious divination.” 

Aaravos sighed, tuning him out a bit as Leola choked and started to fuss over the booming voice over their heads. It was a bit much, even for him. This constant presentation of self righteousness and cosmic arrogance was partly why he could not stand to remain in the heavens.  

“Shh.” He brought her upright, so one of her ears was pressed against his chest. He covered the other with a hand, letting the painfully regular explanation pass. He knew it too well, hearing it too many times over the centuries. 

Even Echudyne seemed tired of the routine from her perch. At her old age, it was unsurprising that she would be through with hearing it again. 

Aaravos stared at the stars in wait, gently patting Leola’s back. She babbled aimlessly, as if she were trying to strike up a conversation. She tugged at his hair and ears, oblivious to the cold or awkward stares around her. Aaravos caught a few whispers. 

“Can’t he quiet her down?”  He ignored the comments. It seemed nothing changed after all this time, but that was to be expected. He situated her so she was brought against his shoulder, away from his face.

A few meteors started to pass high above the pillars. He closed his eyes in wait as they traveled, more and more, their tails brighter and pinker and longer they arrived. More and more passed over, until one, bright crimson with a gleaming pink tail, slowly sailed into view.

Each staff carrier raised theirs upward, drawing the three complicated runes necessary to receive the prophecy.

“Providentiam tuam voco.” They chanted together. Eight times, for each staff. And, all at once, they drew a shimmering pink comet-shaped  Star rune with their staffs. He had allowed Leola to grip his hand while he cast the rune. It would surely have been harmless - and she couldn’t speak the spell. She hadn’t spoken much at all for her age. She would have to comprehend what was being said, as a participant. 

Any moment now, someone would receive a premonition. It would be obvious when they did.

He remembered the first premonition he ever experienced - though not with this one. His eyes had glowed white, and he saw before him...ruins. The shadow of many humans performing Primal magic, some of whom had multiple connections to a source. It felt as if he were walking in his vision, a part of the chaos he had witnessed in his mind. He did not muse on that prophecy or its meanings. It had yet to occur. 

Aaravos concentrated on the red comet high above them, floating across the heavens like an acorn in a stream. He closed his eyes, anticipating that it might be him, and held Leola closer, just in case…
No premonition came. However…suddenly, without any warning, without any other signal of distress…Leola shrieked. 

Aaravos gasped, snapping his eyes open and looking into his arms. 

Her eyes glowed a bright white.
The premonition came. To her. 

It came to her, and from the sound of it, she did not know what was happening. Horror struck him, a yawning precipice. His staff clattered to the floor; he’d dropped it in shock. 

“No!” He gasped. Her wailing sounded like a mortal child that had broken a bone so badly that it split through their flesh. A sickening, dreadful sound, made worse now that it was his own child, terrified and confused.

The other staff holders had broken their focus, realizing for themselves what had happened.
“Oh, no!” He grasped her tightly. “Leola!” He cupped her cheek. “Leola, daddy’s here!” His daughter wailed without ceasing, her eyes wide and her limbs flailing. Shaking. She trembled as her eyes still glowed that celestial white, until at last, it ceased. 

It was over. 

Exhausted from the fit of prophecy, Leola collapsed in his arms, her crying only slightly quieter. 

“What in all of Xadia is wrong with that brat?” Someone hissed. Others murmured their complaints, staring. 

Aaravos looked at his friend. They bit their lip, shifting on their feet. Their pink eyes did not meet his gaze. He rocked Leola in his arms, ignoring the erratic beating of his heart. He could not recall if there had been infants experiencing a premonition before. No matter the methods he pursued, he could not seem to settle his child. 

There was nervous chatter. “Now what?” 

“How are we supposed to get the prophecy?” 

“Poor thing!” 

“Whose idea was it to drag them here if this was going to happen?”

Aaravos turned away from the other elves, choosing to ignore the familiar feeling of rage and defensiveness for his daughter building inside him. In this moment, his daughter required a calm and nurturing father. Not one who would go to war against their shared kin. 

He turned his head towards Laurelion, hoping that perhaps, there was a glimpse of the elf he once recognized. Searching his face, Aaravos’s heart sank. The elf he once knew had now died. 

Laurelion was looking away from them - with some humiliation. Shame, perhaps.

Aaravos hoped he’d heard that remark. “Whose idea was this?” Knowing fully well that he was the one that had disrupted their peace and dragged them here. Not considering that his non-speaking grandchild might be the recipient. Of course, Laurelion did not think Leola could have possibly received the prophecy. Aaravos clenched his jaw, turning away from them. He could not handle the weight of their stares.

“Give them leave!”
A silence came following Echudyne’s bellowing demand. “Give them leave and no faults!”

When the muttering had died down and the Elder One began to speak, he at last found an opening to break away from the circle, rushing for the elevation platform.

Leola continued to weep as he sent the platform upwards - toward the Crown and its garden. Though it was so much higher, the garden was a place of calm - which she needed.

It was empty when he arrived - an extra boon; they would be alone.He found a path between ponds, where it was quiet - and hopefully calming.  His feet guided him towards a familiar place of peace and rest. 

To think that it was so long ago that he had waited for her conception here. And, that just a few more meters away, was the spot where his own father had become a bay tree to await his birth. Aaravos dared not look at it as he paced back and forth on the smooth stone path, letting Leola wail into his neck.

“Daddy’s got you, Unicorn.” He nuzzled her cheek. “Daddy’s not letting you go.” He patted her back and down her body soothingly in a gentle rhythm. It seemed to help, on a minuscule level. Her wailing had turned  into sniffles. She put a thumb in her mouth. Aaravos took that as a sign that she was still hungry. 

Perhaps milk would calm her fully. He pressed his back to a nearby pillar and delicately slid to the floor. He crossed his legs, tucking her close to his chest. He could have taken a bench - but he felt more secure closer to the ground with something against his back. He opened the robe that he remembered had been borrowed. 

Leola buckled. Though her eyes were closed tight, she felt the fabric slide away from her hand, leaving warm flesh beneath it. Her tiny body started to relax from being clenched tight as he tucked her to his chest.

He adjusted his hold on his daughter, shifting her into the proper position for feeding. At this point though, what even was “proper” with how much she liked to wiggle? Her toes curled around his waist, then dug into his ribs. The sound of Leola’s suckling did not conceal her misery, still evident in the furrow of her brows. 

“Aaravos?” He heard a soft, familiar voice.

Aaravos growled deep in his throat as the Merciful One approached.

He watched their arrival with a raw silence. He narrowed his eyes.
Of course he’d be interrupted here as well. 

“Do you…know what she saw?” They asked deferentially. They flexed their fingers, uncertain. Their footsteps faltered when they reached his side.  

“No. I have not. And it’s unlikely that I will,” Aaravos scowled.

“Well…” His friend glanced at Leola. “Perhaps when she begins to speak?” The Merciful One watched as Leola deflated as she calmed.

“No.” Aaravos raised a brow. “She might not remember.” He craned his neck downward, choosing to focus on his daughter rather than his…friend. 

“Now, if you wouldn’t mind.” Aaravos rubbed Leola’s back. 

“Oh…I apologize for my intrusion.” The Merciful One shrank away, their arms folded behind their back as they retreated from the garden.

Aaravos breathed deeply. He’d have to retreat to his home soon, if he hoped to not be continually bothered. He pushed himself further against the pillar, rubbing Leola’s back as her tiny body deflated in his arms as she relaxed.

“Daaaa.” Came a little peep.

Aaravos paused, bewildered. 

“Da,” It came again, clearer. 

He stared down in his lap, where Leola was staring back. Her bright pink eyes gazed up at him. She patted her little hands against him.
”Dada.” She reached one up his chest, toward his face. 

“Oh.” His gasp caught in his throat. “Yes, it’s Daddy.” 

He curled in closer, so her hand could at least reach his chin. “Daddy’s here.”

He caught a glance of Laurelion’s approach through the arched entrance, as the Merciful One flitted around him to leave.
Aaravos covered her more with his body as she continued to cheep for him.

“What was that you said about…being there for her first words?” Laurelion asked huskily. “Well. Here I am.” 

Teeth gritted, snarling, like a dragon, Aaravos squeezed Leola closer. 

“I made it clear that she needed to be ready to come.” He hissed.
“It is not my fault that she received the premonition.” Laurelion frowned. 

“But it is your fault that she arrived irritated and restless. If you had allowed me to settle her, she might not have been awake to receive it.” Aaravos stroked Leola’s hair. “And now it is lost to us all.”
He rose, carefully, so as not to unbalance Leola. 

“I suppose this means you are leaving?” Laurelion asked. “Just as you parted from me the last time we were in the Crown.” 

Aaravos remembered…he had indeed left him in a state of offense when Leola was born.
“It does.” He gave a singular, stiff nod. “I must bring her to where she is safe.”

“You won’t quell the commotion?” Laurelion asked. “They want answers.”
“I have none to give.” Aaravos dusted off the robe. He felt certain the Star Scraper would not be getting it back any time soon. But, he snapped his fingers for the retrieval of his jacket, where it appeared in the crook of his arm. “Whether Leola’s vision was for good or for concern, we will never know. But perhaps now we know…that this should never be repeated.”

In a flash of light, they were back in their home. Back in the library, exactly as it had been left. 

The fruit Leola had been eating remained as it had been left. Not that it mattered. She was not going to finish it. In fact, she was patting miserably at the center of his chest - right at his heart star. He watched her blubber and nuzzle against it.

“Daaa.” She continued to whimper. 

Whatever she had seen…it must have involved him. He sighed, leaning back in his chair, allowing her.

Rocking her.

Only the future itself could tell now.

He dropped some of his hair into Leola’s hand as she pawed at the white star in the center of his chest, sniveling miserably as she twirled the strands. Even as she finally, exhausted, fell asleep, she was still unsettled.

Worry spiked within him. 

Just what had his child witnessed? 

Chapter Text

Another summer had come - it was unusually dry and hot.

Whispers had come on the wind that the Archdragon of the Sky, Tiphion, had perished.
It was scattered among the skywing elves around Elarion, as Aaravos traded with them.

The Sky dragons were in a spat over the recent sudden death of one of their Archdragons, Tiphion. They were embroiled in competition for who would take his place as the storm bringer, while his mate and sole offspring grieved. A lack of storms to the south followed. Drought had claimed much of the Elarion region.It certainly explained the heat. The remaining Sky dragons would be in competition for who would take up Tiphon’s mantle as a Storm Bringer - and now drought was consuming the parts of Xadia where Tiphion once carried storms.

Aaravos had not seen Laurelion since the Premonition. Perhaps it was better that way. Better for Laurelion to retreat in his shame for causing that mutual embarrassment. It was certainly better for Leola, anyway, to grow without him.

And surely, she did grow. She was just a small child now. She was walking and speaking and learning how to properly grip eating utensils and writing styluses. Those were clenched in her hand rather than balanced in her fingers. As she walked, she was standing on her toes with her legs tensed, arms tucked to her sides like a bird - or flapping her arms outward from her body…also resembling a bird.

Their mortal neighbors continued to liken her to a unicorn, calling her unusual gait “prancing”.
It certainly suited her. And they were certainly aware of it now, as she played with the children, all blissfully unaware of what was happening in the village, for now. 

Aaravos, confident that Leola was more than distracted in leading an activity that seemed to involve crawling across the ground like inchworms, gathered his nerve. It kept the other children distracted outside, while inside one of the roundhouses, was the aching wait.
Waiting for a death was like waiting for a birth. It stung when it happened to mortals he found himself favorite. It was worse now that it was the one that set the course of his life as it was.

Just as Echudyne and Zubeia grieved Tiphion, Esther’s children and grandchildren were bracing for her death.

She was fading. Rapidly.
There was no breath Aaravos could share with her now. He could only wait, leaning against the wall by the end of her bed while her daughters and son were anchored at her side, waiting. There was silence, aside from Joan’s muffled weeping into the side of her deathbed. 

Esther had slipped into her final sleep, her final crackling words, despite the passage of dawn...
“Love you. Goodnight.”

A few moments passed after this, before a gurgle in her chest, and her body sank.

Aaravos pushed open the boarded window beside him, as her survivors clustered around each other for comfort. He let some tears slip down his cheeks.

He imagined that the final breath that passed from her lips was the first; the very breath he had given her, leaving her body when she could no longer contain it.

※※※※

The ocean took his mind off the burial. It took his mind away for now, just as it kept Leola occupied and alert with curiosity. She rushed between the shore and the tidepools, tottering around in the sand wearing a soft pink gown tied on her shoulder. As she explored, Aaravos prepared a spot for them to rest on and share one of her favorite treats. He lifted a long stone from beneath the sand with Earth magic, and set a blanket on top of that. With a satisfied sigh, he turned his attention back to Leola. 

She was tailing a giant sea slug as it inched across the sand, giggling while clutching his rune cube, outstretched in front of her as it glowed blue. Most of her morning had been spent that way, seeking out plants and animals that would make it light up. Mostly, they had been Ocean, Sky, and Sun. Not that Leola seemed to know the difference - she just wanted to watch the cube glow.

Suddenly she stopped. The cube’s glow switched to the Sky side, away from the prior deep blue of the Ocean. 

Leola pointed upward, bouncing on her toes. “Daddy! Daddy, Sky Fish!” She gawked. 

“Oh.” Aaravos gasped, dropping the reed basket he had been moving. “Echudyne.”

High above them, Echydune descended from the clouds. Her scales, dark green against the bright blue sky, were apparent as she flowed through the air like an eel.

Leola giggled eagerly, watching the sky. “Where’s she going?”

“That…is a good question.” Aaravos wondered. And where was Zubeia…

Her rumbling echoed through the air - bringing Leola to cover her ears with sharp, squeaking wail.
Soon, Echudyne sank her long body into the water, issuing a pained roar.
Aaravos noticed tears down her scales; she was soaking injuries. No blood seeped into the water - the wounds were already clean from her flight. But clearly, needing disinfection.

“Daddy.” Leola whimpered, pointing anxiously. “She’s all cut.”

“Yes. Yes, I see it too…” Aaravos nodded, watching her thrash momentarily; her wounds must have been stinging terribly.

She glanced at them with a hiss.
“You are here before me, Great Ones?” She trembled. “To escape the cruel heat my kin created in their squabble? Whilst even the Dragon King cannot quell them!!”

“What’s happened?” Aaravos knelt and opened his arms for Leola to flatten herself against him, ears still covered to protect herself from Echudyne’s booming voice.

“Viciousness! Aestus Ducissae thought she could gloat! Gloat, when my Tiphion is dead! But I made her regret.” She hissed. Her eyes fell on Leola. The water sloshed about her as she jerked, startled, trying to submerge herself further into the water.

“Do you…need help with your wounds?” Aaravos asked gingerly.

Echudyne swung her enormous head in denial. “The child must be spared the sight of my petty battle!” She spat painfully. “I shall find an empty beach. My Zubeia will find me there.”
She gasped sharply, as another clear pang of stinging salt pierced her wounds. “When she parts from him!”

With a pained gasp, Echudyne heavily hefted herself back into the air, her enormous body sagging wearily like a weasel held on each end of its body. Perhaps, once, there was a time when Echudyne’s rising into the air was a graceful dance. Now at her age, and the concerning state of injury, she was clearly struggling and aching.

She stiffly, snarling in pain, made her way up, only midway to where dragons usually soared. Slowly, sparks gathered around her. They were small at first, until their mass began to crackle, electrified. Water evaporated around her, creating a dazzling rainbow halo until -- where Echudyne had once been in the sky, a trailing rainbow was left behind, rocketing forward toward the horizon. Noise like a volcanic eruption echoed in ripples - so loudly that Leola crumpled with a scream. She fell into the ground, flopping hard enough that she left an indent in the mud. She gaped as she realized she had fallen, before blubbering miserably. 

“Oh! Are you alright, Leola?” Aaravos came down to his knees, prepared to start helping Leola back upright.

“I can do it, Daddy!” She snivelled. “I can get up!”

She staggered, removing herself from the ground. Imprints of her hands, knees, and feet were left deep in the dirt as she returned herself to more solid ground. He noticed she was gripping her toes in the dirt. He sighed. At least they would be going into the water soon. Otherwise, Aaravos would have to spend an eternity getting the dirt from under her nails when he bathed her tonight.

“Well done, Leola!” Aaravos beamed, dusting the dirt from her arms. “All by yourself!” 

“I did!” Leola giggled and clapped her hands together, until she was back in her previous bubbly state.

“Yes. Yes you did.” Aaravos nuzzled the tip of his nose against hers.
“Now…” He had intended on waiting a little longer. But, given what had just happened…
“Let’s say we have something to eat?” He hauled her up to carry on his hip. “I brought striped fruit bread.” He nuzzled his nose against hers. “Just how you like it.”

Leola’s eyes brightened at the prospect of fruit bread. She scuttled ahead of him while he unfolded the wrapped fructose treats from large leaves. 

He carried her to the spot where he had been setting up their break and sat down, giving her room to clamber into his lap. Leola started to chatter about the animals she had seen along the beach - at least as best as she could for her age. She had figured out on her own to not speak while eating. Especially for how enthusiastic she was about one of her favorite treats. 

Eventually, Leola was sprawled sideways over Aaravos’ lap as she chattered about some ants she had been watching that morning.
“And they were all walking in a line and I followed them and there was a yucky looking fruit and they were all crawling all over it!” She babbled. 

“I see! They must have been taking pieces back to their hive.” Aaravos sipped from his little cup.
“No, they were just all eating it.” Leola continued, eating the last bite of her fruit bread.
“Can we swim now?” 

“I believe we can.” Aaravos nodded.
Leola leaned up giddily. “Swimming!” She beamed.

He had anticipated that she would spring up and make a dash for the water. Instead, she rolled, ungracefully, down his legs, landing face-first in the sand. She then propped up her legs behind her, scooting backwards on her feet until she was standing, and, coated in the sand, started bolting with her arms flung behind her, as if she were pretending to be a Moonshadow Assassin - though still trotting on her toes. Leola hopped into a tidepool, scuttling around the barnacles and corals, with the water up to her knees. 

Aaraovs chuckled, rising leisurely and following her to watch gingerly shuffled around. She’d splash more, had she not been around the life within the water.

Suddenly she gasped, scooping up something from the rocks in one hand.
“Daddy-y-y-y!” She squealed giddily.
“Daddy! His house is on his back!” She beamed, scurrying back to him. She extended her arm outward, presenting a hermit crab cupped in her hand. She grasped the rune cube from where she had left it before their snack, and held it to the crab, beaming as it glowed blue with the Ocean mark.

“Ah, yes. They wear these until they grow too big for them, and then they must find a new one.” Aaravos informed her. He knelt beside the pool, leaning over her shoulder to look at the crab.
“Look at that one!” He pointed into the open water. Far away, a gargantuan hermit crab lumbered out from the water, entirely without its shell.

Leola squealed with raucous laughter. “Ew, it’s naked!”
She stumbled back as she laughed, and fell flat on her bottom.
“Where do they get their big shells?” She asked as she calmed herself, giggling between her words.
“Well. Look there, do you see that?” He pointed to a large conch slinking along the beach.
“It’s a snail!” She looked down at the hermit crab in her hand. “Oh! They get shells from them!”
Aaravos nodded, proudly. Very astute.
“Yes, that’s exactly right, Leola.” 

He saw her pink eyes waver a little. She gripped her own damp hair, pulling nervously.
“Do the snails have to die for the crabs to wear them?” She peeped.
Death was a concept she was struggling with, despite it surrounding her in her immortality. In her lifetime, children had grown and died before her eyes. 

“Yes…that is the case.” Aaravos nodded solemnly. “What they leave behind becomes something new for other life to thrive.”
Leola looked down at the hermit crab sitting in her cupped hands, its feelers wavering against her fingertips. 

“Does something like that happen to the people that die?” She peeped.
Aaravos bit his lip. “Well, that’s why they bury their dead so deep. So the Reapers won’t wear them.”
“What’s those?” Leola’s lips curled a little with disgust - but her eyes betrayed curiosity.
“They’re big birds that cover themselves in bones. Usually they like deer.”

“Is something like that going to happen to the dragon that died?” Leola asked after grinding her teeth in thought.
“Oh, certainly not. There’s not a Reaper big enough to wear a dragon’s bones.” Aaravos chuckled.

“Maybe little birds can live in them like a cave.” Leola looked up at the seabirds flying above them.
“Yes, that would be a possibility.” Aaravos shrugged.

“He also wears shells.” Leola pointed in the water. Aaravos spotted a small purple pentapus scuttling across the bottom, with an empty scallop shell surrounding its body.
“Ah, yes he does. And look - a pentapus’s garden in the shade.” He came down on one knee to see the pentapus casting off the shell into a pile of others, and squeezing into a crevice in the rocks.

“He’s got a lot!” Leola giggled. “The crabs will have to swim!”

She gasped sharply, bolting to her feet before Aaravos could ask if something was wrong.
“Oh! Swimming!” She set down the hermit crab and rushed for the waves that she had forgotten she was going to play in.

Aaravos chuckled softly, watching as she entered the water, stopping abruptly once she was knee deep. She let the ocean’s wave bowl her over, knocking her back into the sand. Leola didn’t make as much as a squeak, until she spun around from where she had landed.

“Daddy!” She hollered. “Daddy, are you coming!?”
“I am!” Aaravos carefully rose. As another wave crashed over Leola, he joined her with some leisure, scooping her out of the water into his arms.

“Throw me!” Leola shouted.
“Oh, into the water!” He raised his voice to a high, sing-song pitch.
He complied with a gentle toss…and for extra measure. “Mons Aqueous.” He swiftly drew the spell’s rune.

A pillar of water caught Leola before she fully submerged, lifting her up momentarily.
She howled with laughter, even as the pillar dropped from beneath her. She floated with ease, still giggling as the water beneath her settled. When it stilled, she remained in place, extending her arms out across the water, and floated serenely. Aaravos chuckled, sinking down so he was submerged to his shoulders. 

“Perhaps we can try a shark tail spell?” He suggested. “We can swim easier.”
“Ooh! Tail spell!” She gasped.
“Talented Tidebound mages do it all the time.” Aaravos traced the shape of a shark in the water.
“What’s it?” Leola splashed her feet in the water.
“Cauda Pistris. And the spell looks like-”

He caught a reflection of light shooting across the water behind him. “Daddy! Someone came down!” Leola flipped upright from her floating. “He came down from a light beam!”

Aaravos turned with a slight frown. There was another startouch elf at the beach, already starting to rush for the nearby mountains instead of simply teleporting atop them.
Laurelion. In his full armor.

“Daddy, do you know him?” Leola grabbed him by the shoulders.
“I do.” Aaravos stood, hoisting Leola up. Leola gasped with surprise; perhaps she hadn’t realized his feet had been on the ground the whole time.

He saw Laurelion stop midway and look over his shoulder in surprise.
“Aaravos!?” He called. “Aaravos! I must have a word!”

“Why does he want a word?” Leola asked over Aaravos’s weary sigh. “What word?”
Aaravos wasn’t entirely sure if she was joking as he carried her to the shore.
“He wants to speak with me.” Aaravos clarified.

“Once again, you come unannounced while I’m enjoying my time with my daughter,” he said tartly, setting Leola in the sand. 

Laurelion approached in a frantic rush. “I’m afraid it’s urgent this time, I--” He averted his gaze from Aaravos, his lips curled in discomfort. “Would you mind making yourself decent? There’s a matter of importance we must discuss.” 

Aaravos glanced at his skirted loincloth, the color washed out from the trip in ocean water.
“What’s so important, then?”
With a snap of his fingers, his regular skirt vanished from where it had been hung over a rock, and appeared around his waist. 

“That’s not…” Laurelion huffed, pinching between his brows. “What I meant.” 

“My apologies, I did not realize the importance that must weigh heavy on your heart!” Aaravos sarcastically replied, placing a hand to his heart star. “After all, we were taking a swim.” He pulled the full length of his hair over his shoulders in two parts, so it concealed more of his flesh.

Laurlion glanced at Leola. She was scurrying to hide behind Aaravos’s legs.
“Daddy.” Leola pulled his arm. “He looks like you but all beardy.”
Aaravos smirked; Laurelion did have a resemblance, even with the thin beard down his jawline and chin.

“I suppose he does.”
Aaravos knelt down to stroke her hair reassuringly. “Our talk won’t be long. Now, why don’t you go play with the crabs?” He held her chin on his thumb. He noticed a hermit crab scuttling by their feet, picking it up and setting it in her hand. She cupped it gently, as it tucked itself nervously into its shell.

“I’ll be able to play with you shortly.”

“Okay, Daddy.” Leola closed her eyes as Aaravos kissed her between them, and pranced out between them and the shoreline. “I’ll build a sand house for them!”

“She’s certainly more than we anticipated.” Laurelion observed. “Perhaps she’s far beyond the capabilities her physical condition presents.” 

“Leola enjoys her independent play…she learns well that way.” Aaravos smiled. She had found wet sand and was starting to pull it together into a mound. “But…soon her friends will join us, and she will play with them.”

“There’s still no word on what she saw?” Laurelion asked softly.
“At this point, it is a waking nightmare that she has more than forgotten.” Aaravos shook his head. “Especially when her last nightmare involved disembodied sheep’s eyes.” 

“Sheep’s…” Laurelion raised a concerned brow. 

He watched as she gently set a hermit crab on top of a “tower”...and shrieked with shock when it crumbled under the crab’s miniscule weight.
“I’ll save you!” She wailed, digging up the pile of sand. She scooped up the hermit crab, alive and well, but dusted with sand.

”So what are you here for?” Aaravos asked, crossing his arms.
“It’s Echudyne.” Laurelion looked upward. “Have you seen her?”

Aaravos nodded. “She came here for a moment, and left when she realized she had interrupted us. Why?”

“She’s wounded the Arch Dragon of the Ocean.” Laurelion said gravely.

“I was aware there had been a fight.” Aaravos nodded. “Echudyne was wounded herself. It’s a wonder either of them survived.” 

“The Dragon Prince reported to the council for mediation.” Laurelion added.

“And they sent you?” Aaravos raised a brow. “After the disaster with Shiruach?”

Laurelion did not confirm. “I will avoid a fight if I must, but…since I have found you…” He rested his spear over the sheath on his back. “If you could appeal to her with your own sort of empathy…” He glanced over his shoulder at Leola.  She giggled, squealing when a crab scurried up her arm.

“And what do you expect me to do? Ask her to behave? When she’s been insulted while she’s mourning?” Aaravos protested. He decided not to tell Laurelion about the human he was recently grieving. 

“I cannot risk a confrontation as severe as the last one.” Laurelion rubbed a hand against his neck, his jaw tight and teeth clenched. There should have been scars from Shiruachs’ bite. 

“And if something were to go wrong with my presence?” Aaravos raised a brow. 

“I do not intend to inadvertently orphan…her.” Laurelion peered at Leola as she continued playing with the crabs. She held two crabs together, looking like officiating a marital ceremony. She attempted to bring the crabs close together, as if they would kiss. It did not work. The smaller one retracted into its shell, out of sight from the other one.

Aaravos’s eyes widened at the fluidity of his father’s wording. He stepped back from him.
“Zubeia may no longer be a tiny hatchling, but Leola still needs me! Who will look after her while my stars are realigning!?” He considered the position of his stars…it would be two years. Leola would hardly grow in that time, but the separation would be distressing for her age.
“Certainly not you.”

“Perhaps those humans you favor so much. Now that she no longer requires you to sustain her.” Laurelion looked him up and down, as if he wasn’t entirely sure. “Surely now she’s too old--”

“Oh, there’s much more that she needs from me.” Aaravos frowned, cutting him off. It was true that she had weaned herself some time ago - when the comfort she sought was more work than it was worth. Simply being held and read aloud to was more enough. However, for Laurelion to assume so bluntly…

“I can see you’re still wearing the coat!” Laurelion sputtered, with a pointing strike to where Aaravos’s blue jacket was draped over a boulder, with the rest of his and Leola’s clothes.
“It’s true that it’s no longer seeing its original purpose, but it's quite comfortable. And I find it suits me well.” Aaravos crossed his arms, unsurprised by Laurelion’s slight scowl.

“So the child still sees you bare without purpose?” He asked.
Aaravos looked down at his own flesh. “Obviously.”
“You really think that’s proper?” 

Aaravos bit the inside off his cheek. “I don’t think it matters.”
“Surely if you’re no longer farrowing the child, then--”

Something clicked in Aaravos’s mind. Had “Leola” ever spilled from his father’s mouth?
“She has a name.” Aaravos spat. “You were there when I gave it to her.”
“Yes. I was.” Laurelion flexed his fingers awkwardly.
“I’ve never heard you say it.” Aaravos tilted his head slowly. “Your own granddaughter’s name.”

His brows snapped to a furrow. His frown tightened.
“Say it.” he hissed.
Laurelion stared at Leola, still playing with the hermit crabs, laying on her stomach with her little legs swinging in the air. Aaravos could see his eyes flutter with the attempt to remember.
“Leda.” Laurelion declared, confidently. 

“Leola.” Aaravos frowned. “You’ve never…” He took a breath. “From the moment we saw her horn.” 

“You heard how the rest spoke of her.” Laurelion firmed his stance.
“And you did not protect us.” Aaravos doubled his shoulders, thrust back and fists clenched. “You rushed us to the Rupis Premonition when I told you I had to wait. And then, yet again, you did not defend us when your granddaughter was in distress.” 

Behind him, Leola staggered up out of the sand. She wobbled as she tried to find her footing on her toes, and rushed to him, arched forward, and arms tucked under her chest.

“My granddaughter who runs like a drake?” Laurelion frowned at her approach. “And has never been corrected.”  

“It’s simply how she is…like her horn.” Aaravos felt Leola’s arms squeeze around his leg. She barely breached above his knees, the crown of her head just reaching the end of his thighs. “Besides…I have seen many mortal children do the same. She will grow out of it in time.”

Laurelion prepared to speak again, puffing himself up. “Well…if that is your experience.” His tone was flat. Dismissive.

Of course it was. Aaravos didn’t expect anything better from him. He swallowed the bitter bile. Swallowed the surprising end of his thin patience.

“I think you have gotten your word with me...Leave.” Aaravos spat. “Go chase your dragon.” He waved his hand dismissively.
“Aaravos--” Laurelion took a rushing step nearer.
Aaravos, in turn, took a step back. “Leave.” He repeated. “Just leave me to my peaceful repose with my child.”

Laurelion stepped back, his boots shuffling in the sand.  He grasped the edge of his cape, pulling it away from the ground. Aaravos thought he caught him glancing at Leola, rather than him.
“Then…I shall.”

The relief was followed by a slight sting as Laurelion vanished. Not in light as he arrived, but in a blink. Where once he had been, he was gone.
Only his shallow footprints remained in the sand, but those were filled in by a soft breeze. 

“Daddy!” Leola squeaked, grasping at his fingertips. “You okay?”
She’d pronounced “okay” as “oaky”...he had that to endear him, at least.

Aaravos stooped and pulled his daughter into a tight embrace, rocking her in his arms. Weariness enveloped him, the feeling of it clinging to his bones. Why did he allow hope in his heart, imagining that perhaps there would come a day that would herald Laurelion releasing his pride for Leola?
For him?

He blinked away furious tears, a traitorous amount dampening the corners of his eyes. He wiped some of the wet sand out of Leola’s hair.

“Yes, everything is alright. There is nothing to worry about.” He assured her.

“He was looking for the hurted dragon?” Leola peeped against his shoulder.
“Yes…Echudyne. Because she was angry with another.” Aaravos hoped to not explain the request for aid - they’d come to that another day. 

“Is Echudyne mad because she’s sad?” Leola’s next question came as a surprise. She must have heard a great deal more than he expected.

“Hm…I suppose that’s a good way to describe it.” Aaravos sighed.

“Why’s she sad?” Leola asked again. “Like everyone’s sad about Miss Esther?”
She still had not quite wrapped her head around the concept of romantic or intimate partnership. She hadn’t even comprehended that mortals typically needed two parents to exist. 

“She lost someone who was in her life for a very long, long time. Someone who was her best friend and helped her have her daughter, Zubeia. Someone who did not make her feel bad about not having wings.” Aaravos explained.

“How come she doesn’t have wings?” Leola inquired further.
Her long string of questions had begun.

“Hm. I’d imagine for the same reason you only have one horn.” Aaravos gave her horn a gentle tap at its tip. 

Leola giggled mischievously. “Whyyy?”

“It’s just…the way she is.” Aaravos chuckled, kissing her cheek. “It’s just the way you are.” He nuzzled her nose. “My sweet unicorn.” 

“I am your unicorn!” Leola flung her arms around his neck. 

“Yes, you are!” Aaravos squeezed her closer to more safely spin on his feet. “But do you know what else you could be?”

“What else?” Leola perked.

“My narwhal.” He whispered next to her ear.
Leola laughed. “Daddy! Narwhals live in the ice!”
“Ah! Yes they do.” Aaravos chuckled. “But do you know why you’ll be my little narwhal?”

Leola flapped her hands and rolled her head, with a cheeky smile. “We’re going back in the water with whale tails?”

“We’re going back to the water with the whale tails!” Aaravos swept her off the sand, holding her over his head.
She squealed as she laughed, tossed lightly a few times.
“We’ll just wait for our friends from Elarion. And when you’re tired, we’ll go home.” He carried her back into the waves. 

“Okay, Daddy.” Leola watched eagerly as Aaravos used the water to draw a rune on her hip.
“Cau-da Pis-tris.” He carefully enunciated, in hope that she would remember it.

She gasped excitedly as a glow formed around her legs - which were quickly replaced by a long, blue sparkling tail, fading out to a white fin.
“It IS a tail!” she squealed.
Leola slipped from his arms back into the water, taking a long breath before sinking herself beneath the surface. She popped back up a short distance away.

“I’m so fast!” She gasped.
“It does make you fast!” Aaravos quickly drew the rune on his own thigh, but did not bother to utter the spell - he could only think it. 

Leola hadn’t noticed - and gasped when he disappeared beneath the water after forming his own tail.
He had wondered if he’d be able to surprise her, swimming around her with his powerful new limb.
But, she dove after him, spiraling around him, and then leaning back to admire her tail, beaming brightly. She shimmered beneath the surface of the water, her freckles caught in the sunlight above her. 

He watched her as she wiggled her fins in her hands, her pink eyes wide with enchanted curiosity. She looked down from where he gazed below, and, with a few clumsy flicks of her new tail, dove for him, wrapping her hands over his head. He’d imagine, if she had given him time to cast the spell, that she would be laughing as she hugged him. 

She parted rapidly, now rushing to follow a horseshoe crab scuttling across the sand below them.
He followed, floating gently above her. She flitted about, investigating rocks and fish. Peeking into a crevice, she came face-to-face with an eel that gawked right back at her as she did to it.
When a school of fish caught her eye, she followed them up their path - and back to Aaravos as he extended his arms to her, invitingly.
She slipped into them, easily, swiftly. Her tiny hands grasped his shoulders as best they could in the water.

Leola fit. She fit, as she always did. Squeezed close, her chin pressing hard between his neck and shoulder, hair billowing in the water and -- she was gone again, slipping back down to the sand. Her tail, though unintentionally, slapped him across the face. Aaravos recoiled slightly, but shook it away with an amused smirk.

She was following the horseshoe crab again, up until she reached the long shadow in the rocks and giant corals. Though her body faded, her stars gleamed. She was a patch of night beneath the ocean; even her hair was like a galaxy, softly wafting as she swam. 

“Not too far,” he thought to himself. As if she could go too far. One day, she’d have to venture into Xadia on her own, one day far from now. He reached out, even with Leola too far, and too focused on the animals she was examining. 

She could never go far. They could never be parted, not like Esther had from her parents…or now, herself from her children. 

Her freckles gleamed in the water as he knew in his heart that no matter how far she went…she would always be there.

Nothing could make them truly part.

Chapter Text

Dawn’s first light had passed when Leola woke, as she always did this time of year. She had seen many; she had seen many generations pass - too many. Spring was more of a dear, steady friend than any mortal that she had ever known. She was getting tall, just at the cusp of the awkward stage before what could have been classified as ‘teendom’.

He heard her arrival into the kitchen from their spiral stairway, groggy but bright, already in her playclothes. Her hair was a scruffy mess from her restless sleep, the pink and purple layer was ruffled among the white.

“GoodmorningDaddy.” Leola mumbled, staggering to Aaravos just as he was finishing preparing her breakfast - a few simple hotcakes, streaked with crushed berries - just how she liked them.

“Good morning, love.” Aaravos stepped away from the simple iron stove, just enough to kneel down and embrace her. It was easier now. He didn’t have to stoop so low to her, and she could fall into him with his back straight.

“Did you sleep better?” He stroked her hair.
She’d crawled into his bed in the middle of the night, mumbling that she had a dream that she didn’t like. He didn’t press it - especially when she fell asleep so quickly once settled with him. He only disrupted her sleep once, bringing her up so her head rested on a pillow rather than against his stomach - it was more practical that way.

Leola sank in against his shoulder, sighing deeply, just as she had in the night. Just as she had when she was small. “I didn’t have bad dreams again.”
She nuzzled him for a brief moment and then pulled away, smelling the air.
“You’re making streaky moonberry hotcakes?”

”Yes, I am.” Aaravos kissed the top of her head. “And they’re nearly ready.” He stood, gently parting. He'd already consumed his own, before making Leola's - preferring his own without nearly as many crushed berries as she enjoyed. 
”Go take your seat.” He patted her shoulder. “There’s already tea, just the way you like it.”
Nettle tea, sweetened with barometz sap. It had long been her favorite, since it was introduced by an Earthblood archmage they knew some decades ago - and was now a tender reminder of a friend long passed.

Leola, though her feet remained on the ground, floated sleepily to the dining table, her fluttering hands indicating her excitement as she climbed into her chair, Her eyes barely hung open, a smile crawled on her place when her breakfast was delivered. She’d barely sipped her tea - perhaps waiting for breakfast to be finished - or in hope that she would have fully woken up to enjoy them all at once.

He laid a plate before her at the table, with a number of hotcakes she could tear and eat with her hands.
“These look so good!” She perked, her eyes coming more alight. “Thank you, Daddy!” 

“I knew you would be happy.” Aaravos kissed her cheek as she started peeling one of them in half - and then one of those halves into a quarter. “Now…how would you like your hair today?” He ran his fingers through her tussled hair, so it laid more against her back. 

Leola swung her feet in her chair, musing. “I think I want…” She waggled her head from side to side.
“Two braids. And a half a ponytail. With the big clasp. And the three-star barrettes!” Her energy perked with each declaration.

“Very decisive.” Aaravos nodded, as he retrieved a small ornate box from one of the shelves tucked into the staircase up to their bedrooms. He set it at the table, opening it, and lifting an ornate comb from within. It was simple, moon shaped with a star design on its handle, its teeth holding some wisps of her loose hair - silvery white, and pink and purple wrapped together like the celestial clouds of the Heavens. 

He set out the clasps and barrettes she had asked for, as he started combing her hair, starting at the lowest end first, so he could work his way up.
“So…would you care to tell me about the dream you had? The one that disturbed you so much?”
It didn’t take much to comb out her hair - there were far fewer tangles than he expected for her rough sleep - and she didn’t seem to notice what few snags were present. What few knotted threads simply came loose and entangled with others within the comb’s teeth, without Leola so much as jolting.

Rather, Leola was occupied in swinging her feet in her seat as she decided to herself if she was going to explain her dream.
“Well…” She said after swallowing a bite of hotcake. “I was dancing with a little baby human girl in some melodaisies. But not any little girl I ever, ever knew.” Leola tilted her head just slightly enough that he could plait her hair on one side, but continue her breakfast. 

“But the scary part was that we were by a sea that doesn’t exist. And there was a big eclipse over it!” 

She moved her arm in a broad circling motion, as Aaravos stepped just enough that he could braid another length. “The sky wasn’t even the right color for an eclipse like we saw a few years ago. It was just all black!”

She craned her head backwards to look at him. “What do you think that means, Daddy?” 

Aaravos mused a little to himself as he pondered what she’d said. “Perhaps it means you’ll meet a new friend in a new place at a frightening time.” He said. 

“It must be a prem-en-in-in-in-in-intion” Leola stumbled over the word. “Blech.” She grimaced and rattled her head.
“A prophesy!” She corrected herself, holding her finger in the air to indicate her change to an easier word. 

“It could be that as well.” Aaravos mused, pulling the shorter sides of her hair together until he could wrap the pink clasp into the small ponytail. “It wouldn’t be your first.”
“But I don’t remember that one!” Leola gasped. She tilted her head so he could set the starry barrettes on each side of her head as she had requested.

“There!” He held his hands over each side of her face. “What a lovely idea you had.” He kissed the top of her head. He considered how lucky he was that he could do that, without two horns in the way of where he had planted it. 

“I’m gonna look at it in the window!” Leola chittered as she finished the last bites of her breakfast. Aaravos took the plate off the table.
”Just remember to wash your hands…and I’ll join you in the library for your reading.” 

“I will, Daddy!” She nodded affirmatively, sliding out of the chair with her plate so she could set it in the washing basin herself. 

When Aaravos arrived at the library after washing the plate and skillet, as well as making their beds, he found Leola was not admiring her reflection in the window, but beside the low book shelf, struggling to close his enormous magical tome. She couldn’t have been trying to read it - the insides were blank without his enchanted rune cube - and she had left that on the shelf.

“Now what are you up to?” He teased gently. Leola jumped, spinning to look at him.

“It’s a surprise!” She pointed her chin up with a haughty smirk. She wiggled her shoulders mischievously, arms behind her back.

“Is it now?” Aaravos chuckled. She looked like a mischievous leaflynx kitten arched and preparing to pounce on an unsuspecting beetle. He pulled down a small book from one of the shelves.
“Well, I look forward to it, then.” He passed it to her. 

She took the book eagerly and curled herself beneath the window to read.
“Runic…Forms…for Ocean Spells.” She read the title out loud.

“Yes. It’s Ocean spells today.” Aaravos nodded. “And you finished a book on the last Ocean day.”
“It’s new reading?” Leola beamed, opening it to the first page. “This will be nice.” She ran a finger down the page. 

“Is this a book you made?” She asked, pointing at his desk. “I saw you writing these words. In wintertime.”
“I did.” Aaravos nodded. “And I made it just for you.”
Leola pulled the book closer instead of responding, so delighted that her delightedly wiggling body did the speaking for her. 

The sunlight streaming through the opalescent windows caught on her. On her hair, on her dark blue skin. Aaravos pulled one of his own books from another shelf and carried it to the window, sitting down beside her. He could hear Leola murmuring her reading under her breath, working through difficult words phonetically until she was sure she had it right. Eventually, she leaned into him, more and more, until she was reading with her head in his lap.

She was far too big now to fit with him in the desk chair, at last giving up on even attempting to try.
Aaravos was pondering the possibility of a bench beside the window so they could read together more comfortably. 

It would not be long before her gaggle of friends arrived to play. Starting with Kori, he imagined. She was usually there first, and would let Leola teach her to read. The routine would go as it had. They would read, and he’d give them a snack before sending them outdoors to run wild for a few hours as their other friends arrived, until it was time for an afternoon meal - and sending their guests back to their families. 

But for now, in the bright, quiet morning, he could hold her.

※※※※

‘Let me hold her. Let me hold my baby. Just let me hold her, just one last time, let me hold her!’

Aaravos didn’t know who he was pleading with. 

It looped endlessly in his mind, as smoke and tears stung his eyes. They evaporated from his cheeks before they could come to the ground. He hardly noticed the burn of the salt against his skin.

You won’t find her as she was. Something hissed in the back of his head. You couldn’t hold her even if there was something worth holding.

Her astral form had fallen and destroyed the land. Even at the greatest size this world’s gravity would allow, he would not be able to cradle her if she were intact.
Leola wanted him. She wanted to stay in his arms as she was pulled from him.

He told her to not be afraid.

What else could he do, when it was the only comfort he could offer the further she was pulled from his embrace, floating adrift until…it was more than his inner world that had shattered within moments. It had not even been an entire hour.
The fire was immense. It roared with its devastation; even the ancient trees burned. Soil and rock melted around him. Even some stones, superheated, rained from the sky - thrown upward from the impact of her fall.

Every inch of life as he knew it had been obliterated.

He had yet to even glimpse the edge as he stumbled for it. He hadn’t been able to teleport where she had landed. He didn’t know the exact spot - and he was in a haze of despair.

Aaravos fought the urge to call for her - to scream for her.
As if she could answer. As if she was trapped in the fire, searching for a way out.

Of course she wasn't.

She was its spark, in its heart.

Her name lodged in his throat with the ashes. Begging to be shouted, begging for its owner to be found and cradled and consoled. As if she had taken a tumble and scraped a knee. 

He could take her home, bundle her into bed, and promise her that no one would harm a hair on her head again as he rocked her to sleep. 

Home…

How could he go home now? Without her?
How could he face her friend when he told her that Leola would be alright?
Could he face any of them again?

How could he face Kori? Face any of them?
“Is Leola gonna be okay?” Kori had asked him. He remembered his answer.
He was a fool. A weak, helpless idiot who could not even protect his child from the one thing that could actually harm her. 

“Yes.”

His daughter’s dying scream haunted his mind.

A plague, pulling him into the ocean of despair. He looked to the heavens, hidden by the tapestry of the sun’s dappled fingers, barely visible through the fire’s smog.

Had Kori been one of the humans receiving Leola’s innocent gift of magic?
Was Kori even still alive? Was anyone in the village still alive?
What mortal life still lived where Leola’s fall had not ravaged the land?

What remained where only he drew heavy, desperate breath that would not soothe him?

Surely the Dragon Prince was aware of the devastation his tattling had wrought.
No….that brat would see no consequences for what he had done.
He could never--he saw what she had done. She certainly didn't tell him. 
Why didn't she--

Stone suddenly crumbled beneath Aaravos’s boot, breaking his thought.

There it was, billowing with smoke. He’d nearly rushed off into the crater; he could have fallen, facing insult upon the greater injury of his heart - its starlight rapidly fading to silver, flecks of black poking through.

The more he stared, the more he could see how deeply the crater plunged into the earth. Aaravos stared into the center, searching, seeking. He covered his face with the inside of his elbow, squinting through the haze of hot air and stinging tears that continued to rush down his cheeks.

The shrill gasp that scratched from his throat was one Aaravos never thought was possible from his own voice.

There was something amid the smoke and fire, down into the dark abyss. It could not have been burned trees, nor blackened stone. There was no mistaking the curving shapes that would have towered over him, even in Titan form. A sight he knew no parent would ever want to see. It would have been agony enough for a mortal being. 

He knew it all along, despite his fervent denial, his desperate bargaining. 

He would not hold her again. He could not hold her again.

Never. 

What remained was too fragile now. What remained was still too large.
There would be no clutching her close, as he had when he tore her from his heart long ago. Or as he had  when he was forced to struggle for final words of comfort - forced to rush together as many ways to assure her of his love as he could. 

All Aaravos could do was collapse on his knees, just as he had when he watched her stardust fall. Watched her burn. He could only sag into the superheated earth at the crater’s edge and sob into the burning void, ruing his failure. 

He heaved, shuddering. He clutched his arms around himself. His breath came short, fast. He choked on his smoke, the fire, the smell of her death surrounding him.

Aaravos did not understand the wail that erupted from his body. It was hard to believe that he could even draw air to power that shriek, doubling over on himself, clenching his arms tighter around himself. 

No one would hear him. As his thoughts faded into his despair, he imagined that no one would come.

It was just him and the roaring fire, and her burning bones.

※※※※

Rain poured from the dark sky as Aaravos forced himself to turn his back on the crater.

The sea now. 

She was so far beneath the water. 

He’d paid no heed to when the fires ended, or what weather had come and gone - weather that had helped him envelop what was left of her in his ceaseless tears.

The Merciful One had left him, after their shallow comfort. He let his last tears fall - however long it might have been…until he found that he was too tired to continue grieving. He realized how much his eyes burned. How much his whole body ached from the exhaustion of his ceaseless howling. The ache consumed him; after a hundred years, he found himself unable to weep any longer. He longed to release the pain. And yet, it was as if he had been drained completely. Like a puddle evaporated to nothing. 

A part of Aaravos didn’t want to stop. Another part of him wanted to be held. There, in the crater that had once burned ferociously, consuming all life around them. Another part of him waited for a familiar clasp on his shoulder, and an unfamiliar embrace from one he had long since exiled from his life.

As he hazily departed the crater, he discovered some life and returned. There were trees again. The same blue and yellow birds that had resided there, however long ago, had returned. Aaravos even noticed some fish in the water. There were corals. And kelp. And purple pentapus with their gardens. 

His gut twisted with the thought that crept into his mind. Leola would have loved to be here.
She both was and wasn’t “here”. She was here. This crater…was her. Buried and blanketed by his tears and however many seasons of weather that he had not paid attention to in his despair. 

He stared down at the sea. How could he turn his back? How could he leave her?
Perhaps as if she had gone to bed, he told himself. If she wants me, she can come out. 

If she didn’t come out…she was still asleep.

She was sleeping.

Like she was staying with friends. Her friends were beneath the water  now.

She was sleeping here and he should just go back to his library. He should go home.

Home…

No.

Aaravos could not bring himself to return to that house. Its material would have been protected in the cataclysm, even in the worst of the fires. He had time locked it when he went to recover Leola. Hoping to bring her home. The tea he left behind would be lukewarm at best, even now. The book would still be resting on the table. 

Leola’s final gift was still tucked inside. 

He had to go somewhere. Anywhere. Perhaps the humans…

No…Leola’s human friends would be gone by now. Perhaps…if they were lucky enough to have descendents, had they survived the cataclysm…they would still be there. 

He heaved as he started trying to walk again. His legs ached from his century of kneeling.

With a weary wave, he opened a portal and stumbled through it. It was further from home than he planned, but he could see it over the hill. And the human settlement below. 

It had grown. The houses looked different - bigger, stronger. A few seemed to take some inspiration from his abandoned cottage. There were several lit fires scattered about. In lamps, in communal cooking, in what he realized were fireplaces. 

It was certainly not how he left it. At least it was better off than he anticipated that it would be. But…it wasn’t home anymore. Not without her. None of it was home.
Not his promise unfulfilled. That she would be alright. 

Where else could he go? Who could he speak to that remembered her? Surely there was Gaarlath…but he might be old now if he still lived.
He was too exhausted to think. He had to sleep before he decided.
There was still no going back to his home. There was no one now that he could think of to turn to.

Not even his own father had come to him from the stars.

Aaravos only had one option as he let the final tears fall. He sat atop the hill, pulling his knees close to his body. He curled himself tight, as much as he could upright. Closing his eyes, he released his form, glowing green, until his consciousness faded into a deep, dreamless sleep in stone. For now, he hoped, the pain would cease.

The next morning, the humans realized there was a sudden new formation on their hilltop. News spread that the titan howling in grief at the center of the Sea of the Castout had departed.

There was only one thing clear about what had happened. The Weeping Titan had become the Sleeping Titan.
They wondered all the more if they would ever discover the cause of his terrible loss - the source of the South Star.