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“Oh? Are you awake, my dearest daughter?”
Blinking her eye open, Cherri is surprised to hear her father call out to her, drawing her out of a half-awake state. She’s even more surprised by her surroundings; whilst she is still in her bedroom, there are many more blankets beside her than there had been a few hours ago.
This isn’t the first time Cherri awoke to being bundled up in more sheets than she had gone to slumber with. Some nights, she’d be awake as her father covered her in them. She enjoyed how cozy those nights were.
“Dad?” She mumbled, mouth buried in a blanket. She shoots up to stick her tongue out, spitting out bits of fabric she’d incidentally tasted. When that’s dealt with, she looks to her father. “What’re you doing here?”
Their father sat on the edge of the bed, another blanket in hand.
“No need to worry your little head,” He comforted her, though Cherri doesn’t remember ever saying she was worried. Implied confusion, maybe. “Your father is simply cozying up the place! A Moon Knight let a draft in, you see.”
“What’s that?” Cherri asked. She’s heard some scholars talk about it before, but that didn’t really make much sense in this context. One doesn’t ‘let in’ a piece of writing. Unless you’re delivering letters.
“Oh, perhaps that’ll be a topic for your wonderful mentors to demonstrate another day. One of the wind mages would do a fantastic show of that.” Ren shoved the question away with a ramble oh so typical of him. “I, personally, am not the one to teach you of the weather.”
Cherri nodded and smiled, despite not quite grasping what he said.
Sitting up further, they nudged themselves closer to their father’s side. Placing their hand on the blanket, feeling the intricately woven wool. It was unusually warm, and the hand settling next to their own appeared to be the cause.
She tugged on the blanket, as if she could conjure that warmth too.
Ren laughed. “Do you enjoy the sheep’s gift, my dearest daughter?” He said, “Your mother would always thank each individual member of the flock for the warmth they provide. I imagine you’d do much the same.”
“Uh huh,” Cherri replied distractedly, not following along.
While they truthfully did try their best to listen to every word her father said, admiring his wisdom and kindness, tonight was a night where she couldn’t bear to focus on his monologues. The blanket simply captured her attention more effortlessly than her father’s confusing words did.
“Still dozing off, I see.” Ren mused, endeared by how absorbed in the blanket they appeared to be.
Suddenly, Cherri throws the blanket onto Ren’s head instead of acknowledging him with a response.
Laughing in surprise, the King swiftly pulls the blanket back off. He attempts to settle it around Cherri’s shoulders after the fact, but she’s quick to shrug it off and grab hold of it again.
“I believe nesting doesn’t entail you putting blankets on me,” Ren teased.
Cherri’s eye lit up. “Nesting?” She questioned. “Is that what you do with my blankets? What is nesting?”
Ren blinked, tilting his head in an animalistic nature. “Have I truly never taught you this?”
The Princess shook their head, confirming they have no recollection of the matter. At that, her father pulls her closer, clearing his throat as he prepares his storytime voice. Which is to say, his normal voice, but slightly lower.
Cherri kicks her legs off the edge of the bed, ready to be captivated (and not pretending this time) by the tales he weaves. Oftentimes, it becomes her favourite part of the day, when she isn't distracted by wool blankets or fencing lessons.
“You see, our story begins in a land unlike Soluna.” Ren begins, gesturing dramatically with his hand. “A land of stardust, void, and the cold. There is no castle, there is no King, and there is not one human.”
The Princess tries to envision what it's like to live in a place of which that’s consistently freezing, with no sun to look out to or castle to call her own. It’s hard to imagine. Cherri has always known warmth to mean home, and home to be warm.
She doesn't particularly care for the lack of a King in this story, despite her father being one himself.
“In this cold land, there lived a dragon, the large and foreboding Queen of the realm we now know as The End.” Ren continued. “In contrast to the commanding power She radiated, the Queen was a gentle soul. She mothered the realm and all within it, protecting them as if they were Her own.”
“Father Sun, Mother Moon, the Universe – these are many titles often mistaken as Her’s, as Her love held no bounds the way a creator does for its creations. Despite the confusion, She was as warm as the Universe’s sun, and as cold as the Universe’s moon. They were closely intertwined, never far apart in concept.
“The Queen, being a creature of the void, did not only hold the form of a dragon. But it was the form She took on most!” Ren recites it all with ease, as if he’s told this tale a million times before. “Being a dragon was a powerful thing, as it allowed Her the ability to nurture. She learned, as all beings do, how to raise something of her own.”
Cherri’s eye twinkled with delight, despite many of his words flying straight over her head. She liked the idea of possessing something truly hers. She craved it more than anything.
“What was it?” She asked. Other than the kingdom, she supposed. But Cherri didn't think Ren considered the kingdom to be just his own, at least not the same way one might consider something such as magic their own. His magic is distinctly, individually his.
Ren’s face softened, encompassing warmth, love and pride all in one smile. “It was Her child, an egg in the center of Her world.” He said. “The people She protected then protected the egg, the cycle of love She had created blossoming.”
Tilting her head, she skimmed past the story of familial love; Cherri experiences that everyday already. She decided to be more curious about what other things Ren had to say.
“...Is that ‘nesting’, dad?” The princess asks, after a few moments of silence.
Blinking, Ren looks to her, eyes wide behind his glasses.
“Oh,” He blanked, processing her words. “No, no. Well, not entirely. You see, my dearest daughter, even in a world where humans had long yet to exist, the Queen was as human in nature as we are in species.”
But we’re Her family, Cherri wants to point out, so they obviously can't make that comparison. Besides, Soluna isn’t only home to humans.
“The egg was the brightest star in the void, Her very own Sun, and so She would offer direct protection to the Egg Herself.” Ren continued. The Princess (quite fittingly) beamed at the direct link from them to Her at the mention of the sun.
Since she’d first begun to navigate the world, exploring the Soluna walls she was born in, Cherri has always loved the Sun and Moon imagery. Being the Sun herself was something she will always be thankful for, even if, some days, being the center of attention exhausts her.
Despite how desperately she wants that individuality, Cherri would never say she’s ungrateful for this kingdom.
“In Her acts of protection, She would use Her wings as a means for shelter and security,” he said. “These wings draped around the egg, shielding it from the rest of the realm.”
Cherri imagines the wings are much like the blanket around her now, and the many others which were surrounding her before. The thought is comforting.
She then tries to imagine her father with a pair of wings. Her face scrunches up when all she can picture is his cloak granting him flight. The fluffiness of his cloak seemed unfitting for the descriptions he’s been giving of the Queen.
“In a way, The End’s void was the nest, but Her large wings are what mattered most for the egg.” Ren continued, “Without that ability to protect, to nurture, that she had gained from taking the form of a dragon, She would not be able to calm Her instincts.”
Cherri doesn't get it. “How’s the void a ‘nest’ when the void’s nothing?” She asked with a confused smile, trying her best to engage.
Her father hummed, pondering her question. “Oh, yes, maybe there could’ve been a better analogy. You’re precisely right, my dearest daughter!”
He ruffled her hair playfully, and she laughed with the action. She’s quick to fix the bangs over her other eye when he moves away.
“I had intended to convey that the void is her home, and so the egg’s at home in the void.” Ren explained. Cherri would’ve added that it’s like Soluna then, but that’d compare Soluna to nothing, and that idea felt wrong.
Moving along, her father held up one of the woolen blankets as he continued to speak. The princess is momentarily distracted by the blanket again, wondering if that one was as fluffy as the previous blanket had been.
Perhaps not. Some of them are older than even their father is. Fire magic and incorrectly done washing is bound to change them.
One blanket in their father’s room, however, will never lose its ability to comfort them perfectly. They're sure Ren would agree, as the blanket was one woven and loved by their mother. Some nights, they’ve snuck into her father’s room just to sleep under the blanket, only to find her father had the same idea.
“Consider this blanket being like the void. Despite the lack of physicality, in comparison to the blanket,” Ren attempts to remedy the metaphor, “the void covers them in protection, much like the sheet does. That’s what I do for you, my dearest daughter.”
Cherri is a little bored of hearing the word blanket over and over again. The idea behind this was sweet, however, and she couldn't help smiling up at her father.
“That’s so cool! You act like a human-shaped dragon!” They exclaim, grasping onto a nearby sheet from sheer awe.
Ren laughed, hearty and warm. “So will you, the day you begin nesting,” he said. “It isn’t a practice purely reserved for family, you see. Long before you came along, I had to give the very same lesson to your wonderful mother; I couldn’t stop throwing all my blankets and gold onto her each time we met. I’d done this to some dear friends, too.”
Folding the blanket and settling it to the side, the King cleared his throat and sat up from the bed. Cherri followed the action without thinking, clumsily folding a blanket - one she hadn’t even been holding - and placed it next to his without sparing it a glance, sitting up after him as swiftly as possible.
She preened up to him, hoping he has more to say and praying he isn’t heading to settle for the night.
The King blinked when he met her gaze, face morphing into a look of gentleness only a loving parent could hold. “Quite eager for a tale, aren’t you?” He teased, “Not to worry, I still have much more to explain. Especially in regards to your room.”
Cherri tilted her head. She didn’t realize there was more going on in her room.
Looking around, she admittedly missed it for a moment, expecting it to be something large or insanely dragon-like; with the comparison of blankets to the void, she imagined maybe there was something similar to a giant dragon egg, forgetting she had been what was compared to it before.
“You see, the Queen used magic much like we do, although it took a different form of fire than we use.” Ren said. Cherri ignores the twinge of hurt in her chest. “She’d siphon, if you will, said magic off of large obsidian pillars.”
Obsidian? Cherri would have to ask what that was in the future. If it was a building material, it’s fairly possible she’s seen it before. She always liked learning more about what her kingdom was made out of.
“It granted Her more abilities than just the nature of being a creature of the void did,” The King added, “She healed Herself with it, She healed Her allies and protectors, and She’d fight off intruders with a violet blaze granted to Her by the pillars.”
Their heart dropped when they realized what it was in the room that resembled these pillars.
In a circle in their room, surrounding their bed perfectly, sat lit torches placed onto candle plates. Their eye widened, and they felt the rest of their face burn in reminder of what their foolish attempt at magic cost them.
Her breath quickens. She feels like she has a torch in hand again, messing with it in each and any way possible in an attempt to make her magic work. It burned to the touch, the way the flame had danced around her skin, her eye—
“Much like the pillars, we now use torches as a means of protection,” Ren continued unaware, much to their dismay. “It’s a less obtrusive method of siphoning magic, and more portable, too! Not to mention the direct link to our family’s flames.”
“Dad…” She tried to tell him what was wrong, tears pricking her eye. It’s all she can manage to get out, throat closed up and dry. Cherri tugs at his cloak instead.
At the call, her father whipped around at an unusual speed for the King; the choked up sound of his daughter’s voice alarmed him, the need to tell a story dropped the moment he realized she was in distress.
His eyes widened in realization. “Oh. Oh, my dearest daughter, I’m so sorry.” His voice wavered as he rushed down to her level, pulling her into a hug. “I should have noticed this idea was wrong. I’m so sorry.”
Cherri tried to relax in his hold. They tried so hard to, but they can’t stop thinking about the torches in the room – the torch from the day she got too ambitious. It scorched her so violently, the fire searing into her face and permanently scarring her.
It felt like a punishment for their greed. They tried too hard to take something for themselves, to have magic of their own, even though it’d been made clear before that they will never reach the level of ability as their predecessors before them.
She can’t forget it. It aches, and it aches, and it burns with the same pain feeling useless gave her. Cherri feels queasy, nerves swarming her stomach in a way that only gets worse by the second. She wants to throw up.
The Princess cries in the King’s arms, in the same moment that a child weeps in her father’s; the title of being Princess sometimes felt like a reminder of what she will never be. Cherri can’t be the Queen of Soluna if she can’t ever wield her family’s flame. She’d taint the heritage, bringing dishonour to the King and everything he ever stood for.
Her father, never caring for status, honour, nor perfection, holds his child tighter. “Shhh,” He gently soothes her. “I’m here to protect you, I promise you. You’re safe here.”
He doesn’t let go of her as she sobs. His hold grounds her into the moment as she loses her energy to crying, slowly settling in with exhaustion. She sniffles occasionally, still shaking in fear.
Momentarily, he shifts around, and they tighten their hold on him immediately each time. They’re afraid he’ll leave them like this, and the fire will get them again, and it’ll get so much worse this time. This time, it could also get him.
He hummed. “Dearest, I’d like to snuff out the torches,” Ren said gently, running a hand through his daughter’s hair. Cherri grumbles in displeasure when he tries to move again.
As an alternative, Ren slowly pulls the both of them up, and carries Cherri over to the blankets far from the torches on the floor. She still sniffles and tries to hold onto him tighter, but eventually settles into the bed when she registers what she moved onto.
“Don’t go,” they call out to him, voice breaking. “Please.”
Ren’s eyes crinkled in worry. “I know, I know, I’m still here, Princess.”
“What– What if it gets you, too? The fire?” She asks hurriedly, in raw, genuine fear. The King’s heart breaks, and he squeezes her hand as he steps away.
“It won’t. You know why?” He soothes her worry. “Because your father carries a brilliant flame, a piece of the bigger picture of the Royal Solunian family, much like his dearest daughter. This torch is no brighter than the sun, you hear?”
Cherri sniffles. “How am I like you if it burnt me before?” They choked out. “It was too bright for me. I- I can’t even be the sun right. I don’t have a flame like you do.”
Ren winced, realizing his words could have been chosen better. “Your light could never be dimmed,” He changed tactics, unsure how to go about fixing his words. “I’m sorry you feel like it has. You’ve always shone ever so brightly, my dearest daughter. Your desire for the flame proves this.”
But I should already have it, Cherri wants to refute. I shouldn’t wish to have it. Her throat is dry again, scratchy and stuffy from recently crying – from still sniffling, too. She aches to prove her uselessness, despite how much her father believes in her, despite how much she wants to believe she’s capable of worthiness too.
The king leans towards her again, and gently brushes his calloused hand (littered with burn scars, she notes past her haze. Cherri wondered about the tale behind them.) through her hair. She leans into his touch, pushing further towards him as he leaves again.
At first, they feel their heart lurch in panic. Their eyes widened. The fire is going to get him, and I can't control it, so I won’t be able to stop it. Cherri’s mind echoed fear after fear, yet they’re too exhausted to do anything about it. All they can manage is tightly holding onto the blankets nearby, and praying he will end up okay. They pray he has someone’s wings (Mother’s blanket, they think, even though it’s in the other room) to drape over him in protection too.
Ren walks over to each candle plate, picking them up just as gently as the last and snuffing the torch out as carefully as he can. He ensures Cherri can’t see him holding the torch in front of him, back turned, afraid of worrying his child even more than they already were.
When he’s done, he settles the plates on a nearby wardrobe, and makes his way back over. Cherri visibly relaxes as he sits down next to them. “It’s all safe now,” he says, wrapping his arm around them. “No harm will ever be brought to you again, you hear?”
Cherri is quiet for a moment, taking his words in. Eventually, they slowly nod to acknowledge his words, and bury their head in his side. They hold onto tightly, as if embers would whisk him again the second they let go. Ren hugs her back just the same.
The silence continues. This time, it’s more comfortable, allowing Cherri to calm down in the closeness of her father knowing that there’s no flame out there to burn the both of them anymore. He runs his hand through her hair in gentle strokes, minding the bangs over her eye. Cherri feels how much care he puts into his hold, how lovingly he brushes through her hair, and realizes she wouldn’t care if he did move the bang from her eye – Ren has seen his daughter at her lowest point, vulnerable and useless, and held her just as gently as he did when she still thought she had a chance to be something great. He still sees her as someone great.
Sniffling again, Cherri tears up for another reason now; she felt so utterly cared for that she didn’t know how to handle it in any other way but to cry.
“You’re okay, you’re okay,” Ren cooed, continuing the motions through her hair. “Would you want me to continue the tale, my dearest? Would that be of help?”
After a few seconds, she nods into his side. With the confirmation, Ren is swift to continue. “I believe you’ll enjoy this part,” he starts, voice soft. “When the egg starts to crack open its shell, it’s far from the dragon’s land; humans had arrived long before it ever hatched. They took it from the dragon’s care, defeating the Queen, and opened a portal back into the world we live in now.”
Cherri is failing to see what there is in this story so far that she, specifically, is expected to enjoy.
“The humans were greedy creatures, but that’s a longer story for another time. For now, we’ll focus on the egg,” Ren said. “When the egg hatched, supposedly under the care of a human, it hadn't hatched into a tangible form.”
“Was it a baby? Like… like those weird little birds?” Cherri whispered in question. She liked searching for the birds, as well as any other animal, in the courtyard every spring. She’s witnessed many ‘ugly ducklings’ (though she personally wouldn't call them that) due to this.
Ren laughed, “A great visual! But no, no – it had hatched into a creature of the void, much like the dragon before it, you see.”
Cherri tries to picture it, though she isn't quite sure what the void would look like. All she comes up with is what would be like a hole in the universe; the vague shape of a person, but with no dimensions, no light bouncing off of them, and no details or features. It’s as if they existed at some point, but no one remembers anything about them except the space they had taken up.
They shake the idea off. It felt too grim for them, especially right now.
“Because of the dragon protecting the egg with so much magic, gifted to Her by the pillars, the egg had taken on a purple glimmer in its appearance while a part of the void,” Ren said, gesturing with his right hand as the other still held Cherri. “Already, it had something so unique to it and it alone. While the Queen’s dragon form had hints of purple, Her void was shimmered with cyan, matching the emptiness filling the realm.”
Unique. That word caught Cherri’s attention, causing her to look up towards Ren with more intrigue than before. She kept the lower half of her face buried in his side.
He met her eye, and his smile widened. “You know what it did, when it felt an emotion more human than even the Queen ever had, and realized that it didn’t fit in with anyone in the realm?”
She blinked, caught off-guard. “Um… tried to match them?”
Ren shook his head, before pausing and doing a so-and-so motion with his hand. “Partially! It shifted the void of its body into an anthropomorphic shape, yes, but the egg had also learned of its creator from the knights who protected it alongside the Queen before.”
“Learning of its origins from what we know as endermen, the egg sought for a form resembling its Mother. It asked every endermen it found what She looked like, how She acted, and what She could do, so that it could recreate that.
“Of course, someone who has never met Her before could only imagine so much,” the King said, “and so the egg’s form was still its own, yet it was also an amalgamation of what it had grown to yearn for; fitting into the human world, and being home with its family.”
Cherri pretends to know what the words ‘anthropomorphic’ and ‘amalgamation’ are, nodding along to the story.
“Its form was also that of the love the endermen held for the Queen. Her kindness impacted them, forever taking a place in their memories, and now the egg carried what they remembered of Her on with it.”
Carrying years worth of love in the form it took was really admirable. Cherri glanced briefly at her hands, and then at Ren’s scarred ones. They wondered if they still carry that love now, not having changed once in these hundreds of years. It seemed like a lot to believe in.
It had to be true, though, or else they wouldn't be hearing this story right now. The tale of the dragon’s love would be lost to time if that cycle ceased to continue. Maybe the concept of there being a dragon at all would be a foreign one, or maybe Her story would be alternated to replace Her love for hatred.
“There’s writings of what became of the egg, of it forming wings, large and commanding, with its face warm and kind,” he described, gesturing with his hand again. “Its eyes were a brilliant purple, and its hair never quite settled into any one shape, constantly shifting like the void it’d been born as.”
Purple eyes sounded rather pretty to the Princess. Cherri imagines what she’d look like with them. …Eh. She liked matching with her father.
Ren’s finger gently motioned through the air, as though he were performing the spell. No flame spilt from his hand despite the seamless action. “It was ever-changing, never the same, and it felt little pressure to fit in after a while. It made an identity of its own.”
The Princess is silent; she’s just as quiet as she had already been, yet it feels so much heavier on her tongue. She tries to shake herself out of this soundless spell. Instead of wondering about the words her father said, she attempts to question how their family went from power over the void to controlling flames.
Turns out, the thought makes everything feel just as heavy on her shoulders as Ren’s words did.
“Much like how the egg learned to adapt, our family changed greatly over the years,” the King said, as though he could read their mind. They jumped in surprise at how on-point his words were to their train of thought.
He clenched his fist gently, looking at his own scarred hand with an emotion Cherri couldn't begin to unravel. “Fire was never actually one of our first ancestors' abilities, as the stories go. But rather, what the power of the void began to manifest itself as.”
“It was something to do with the form of a dragon, you see,” he explained. “I don’t know all the details myself. My own teachers back then, my parents, brought up the theory that the void adapted to the magic of our realm. Perhaps its partner could’ve been a mage, who could have also played a hand in this."
“Over the years, it changed to become akin to the fire from the pillars its mother protected it with. Eventually, even the violet hue changed, and you can actually see evidence of this in older portraits! One of our ancestors had quite a powerful magenta tint to their flame.
“Even our family now has some variations in the flame. My grandfather’s was much more red than mine is,” Ren said. Instinctively, he goes to cast the fire, and catches himself just as a spark leaves his hand.
He glances at his daughter. They blink, moving closer to them in confusion. It takes a moment to click in Cherri’s mind; Ren is asking if it’s okay to use his magic so close to them. He’s wondering if his flame is still considered safe and warm.
Their throat feels dry, heavy and aching, as they nod to allow it. They don't feel afraid of his fire. Cherri feels more afraid that their fear is more known to him than the admiration they held used to be.
Has she only ever been something lost and scared lately? A nervous animal to be calmed down? Someone to walk on eggshells around?
It isn't the first time her father has needed to coddle her like a lamb lost from the pasture. She doesn't know if she deserves all these blankets, woven with wool belonging to sheep so much more braver than her. Even they can branch out from the flock. Maybe it’s sillier, though, that she’s comparing her negligence to livestock.
A sheep is just a sheep. Cherri is a royal, but she's not enough to be more than that. She is just a Princess too.
Distracting her from her mind, Ren shifts his hand outwards just as a flame bursts out from his palm. It dances slowly, not as wildly as nature’s fire ever would, and the air around it is not nearly as sweltering either. Her father was correct; his flame leaned to more of an orange in hue.
“As you can see, change is never something set in stone,” he speaks up once more, explaining his point to this part of the story. “Our family has always been adapting. We’ve never been expected to fit perfectly into a preconceived idea of our future. You included, my dearest daughter.”
He looks at her with eyes as warm as the fire blazing in the reflection of his eyes. Her eye looks back at her from his, with the other still aching under her bangs, and she sees someone so much less worthy of that mercy than he must have been.
Her father may be King, and so he must have been the Prince in his life, but Cherri knows he doesn't know what it's like to be the Princess. She doesn't know where to even begin with it, as much as she truly does love Soluna.
She looks at his scarred hands again. Then, at the fire produced from those scars. Maybe he does have a story of his own.
Maybe she still got the short end of the stick regardless, she considered, as she fidgets with a strand of hair next to her bangs. Her father makes it all look so simple. She wished she could feel the passion he speaks of in a way that wouldn't just hurt her again.
“Do you really believe that?” She can't stop herself from asking, looking back to his eyes.
He blinks. “Of course I do,” Ren replied. “You’re the dearest person to me. I couldn't imagine not believing in you.”
Cherri wished she didn't have to change though, despite how badly she feels the want to deep down inside. Why was it so easy for everybody else to do what they're born to do?
Sometimes, she thinks he just believes in her simply because she’s his daughter, and not because there's anything she’s done to prove she’s someone to believe in. It’s a cruel thought for her to have about someone so caring, so she never dares to voice it. Cherri knows he does love her. She just wished it was easier for her mind to trust things these days.
Instead, they smile as strongly as they can muster, “Thank you, dad,” they said. “I’m happy you think so!”
It’s a little easier for them to give the impression of having the courage and spark for passion everyone says they have, than it is to finally give up.
Ren’s smile widens, and he leaves forward to hug them just as the flame in his palm goes out. They hold him tightly, still afraid for him to go as he sits up from the bed.
“You should finally rest now, my dearest,” he said. Cherri slumped in disappointment, chewing the inside of her mouth.
He laughs at her disgruntled expression. “I know, I know, I didn't help much by telling such a long tale! But that does not mean you can stay up the entire night.”
She sighs and goes to grab her blankets, just as he bids her farewell for the night, shutting the door behind him.
“Sweet dreams, Cherri.”
It’s a bit comforting to hear just her name. No extra title, no nickname someone would feel required to give – something that is Cherri’s, and Cherri’s alone.
“Good night, dad,” she calls out to a closed door.
It doesn't get rid of the heaviness in her chest. She feels a little sick as she leans back in her bed, as she looks up at the stars on her ceiling, and feels that sickness build up more as she glances at the dead torches surrounding her room.
Cherri wishes she could be anyone else on nights like these, and over and over again it's been proven that she will never even have that.
She holds the sheep’s wooly gift tighter, and wonders what her mother would think of the scar showcasing her failures.