Cataclysm War | Chapter 62: Father and Son (First Draft)

This Chapter frustrated me for about 6 hours. Feedback highly appreciated.

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Friday, August 5, 4 S.E.

Reginald’s eyes widened as he and Maryanne followed Kairi through the gates of Dawnhaven.

He had first realized how organized the town—no, city—was when their daughter had escorted him and Maryanne across the ruined landscape of Michigan, and he’d witnessed the daunting professionalism of the Royal Army in action. He’d initially been slightly skeptical of Kairi’s claims of total power when she’d made them during the initial meeting, and had said as much to Lykinea and Brutus—but that sense of doubt had eroded rapidly.

The Haelfenn of the Royal Army fought like veterans of the System, which they doubtlessly were. Manabeasts had attacked them during their travel back to Dawnhaven, and the armored warriors of Dawnhaven’s military had dispatched them with a well-oiled collective lethality that had left him, his wife, and the Coalition representatives who had bravely accompanied them speechless.

Now, walking through the City’s immense gates, he realized how little he and the Coalition’s Terran idealists had truly understood.

Dawnhaven sprawled out from the twin lakes with interconnected bridges adjoining its massive palace, like something out of one of his favorite fantasy novels. The architecture, the eclectic mix of people, and the nascent Kingdom Capital's overarching vibe were breathtaking. Everywhere he looked, Reginald spotted a thorough mix of Fantasies and Terrans blended together with a peaceful air that the Coalition still lacked.

Their own home, secured on the outskirts of New York City, was at best a pale imitation of Dawnhaven’s easy grandeur—at worst, a jest of a comparison. Reginald and Maryanne had worked tirelessly to help develop Liberty into a place where others could feel welcomed and at ease from their travails, but upon seeing the scale of what true preparedness could bring, he was reminded of something Lykinea had told him weeks prior.

“This place is a fine example of intent, Reginald, but it lacks the soul of a true Sanctuary. One day, when you see what others of my kind have wrought, you will understand.”

And he did. Finally, embarrassingly and shamefully, he did.

Dawnhaven was everything Liberty aspired to be, but infinitely grander.

“Dad, Mom, stop gawking,” Kairi’s voice interjected, cutting through his quiet wonder at the City as his daughter gestured to them impatiently. “We’ve got a ways to go yet, and I don’t want you getting separated.”

Reginald glanced at his wife and beckoned to their comrades, who hurried up with them as they caught up to his reticent younger child.

Kairi had changed since the Incursion, and in ways that Reginald still found decidedly tragic.

The bright, happy girl he’d used to take for ice cream or send off to the mall with her Mother had become a hard, scarred survivor. Her stance, her coiled readiness, and the flat, unforgiving steel in her eyes were all specters of what she’d endured—what she’d survived, when he and Maryanne had left to help their friends. He’d wanted her to come with them, but leaving her with his parents had seemed a safe choice.

When he and Maryanne had learned of her departure, he’d been devastated.

He still hadn’t forgiven his mother and father for that departure from reason.

The group of them followed Kairi as she prowled through the streets, moving aside pedestrians with force of will as much as a passive kind of menace that threaded ahead of her. His daughter’s [Reaper’s Domain] was likely active but half-muted, forcing a path through the crowd by passive instilling of unease as she led them onward.

Still, he couldn’t help but be proud of her—his little girl, now a force of nature.

When they passed a bona fide hotdog cart, Reginald felt his mouth water, but his wife dragged him forward without more than a glance, and he mentally memorized its location for when he had time to explore. He would have one of those hotdogs. He hadn’t found a good one since Derrick’s Dog Cart had been lost. That was a true travesty of the Incursion, among the rest.

Their group passed through what seemed like the main thoroughfare with only the occasional curious glance directed at them, though those looks quickly evaporated when noting the Royal Army forces marching with them in sync. Reginald couldn’t entirely decide if their presence was comforting or disconcerting—instead, he settled on both mentally and tucked his hands into his pockets by force of habit.

“This place, Reggie…” Maryanne said beside him, drawing his attention to her. “It’s like something out of a Manga.”

“I know,” he agreed simply, keeping pace with his armored wife as the pair of them followed their daughter. “It’s unbelievable. To think our son is—hey, wait, Mary, do you think Ace will let me get some hotdogs later? That cart looked—”

His wife fixed him with a flat look, and Reginald trailed off with a mutter of ‘never mind’ while reaching up to rub his short black hair.

Well, I’m the one who fell in love with a hardass, he thought wryly.

The first sign of complication, however, reared its head a moment later as they passed what Reginald identified as the main thoroughfare and entered a large square, near which a colossal arena stood, visible before only as a large feature above the buildings of the main road.

A large group of golden-armored Haelfenn—a Dagger, he mentally noted—had stopped Kairi, who was joined by Tyros, Larissa, and Parnym.

Reginald glanced at Maryanne, and the pair of them approached, both curious and wary.

“...doing marching through the city, Lance-Master Varen?” the lead figure in gold was asking flatly. “It has already caused multiple reports of concern from the nobility and citizenry.”

“That’s none of your business, asshole,” Kairi said flatly, causing Reginald and Maryanne to share a grim glance as their daughter continued. “It’s above your paygrade.”

“That is not going to help your situation, resident,” the golden-armored Haelfar in the lead said flatly, as his comrades fanned out behind him. “As a Dagger-Master of the Dawnguard, I have full authority to detain—”

The man cut off abruptly when one of the golden warriors hurried forward and spoke to him urgently in their musical language, gesturing to Kairi and shaking her head rapidly.

The Dagger-Master, as he identified himself, froze at the whispered words and seemed to deflate slightly as he stared at Kairi.

“You’re the Black Knight’s sister?”

Reginald blinked at the sudden change, and then felt even more stunned when Kairi answered.

“I’m the Reaper’s Shadow, you golden jackass,” Kairi said boldly, her voice holding a vicious edge. “Being that moron’s sister is just my day job.”

The entire Dawnguard Dagger seemed to ripple at that realization, but instead of drawing weapons, they almost seemed to rush to get out of her way, despite the fact that they walked with discipline the entire time.

“My apologies, Lady Paendrag, I didn’t know who you were.”

“As if that makes it better,” Kairi said venomously. “When will you social-ladder-climbing pricks learn to think before you act? Braedon’s dead, idiot. My dweeb brother killed him three days ago in front of the entire city, and you jackasses still don’t seem to have gotten the fucking memo. Stop. Bothering. People. You think he’s bad? I’m a fucking nightmare by comparison.”

She punctuated the ‘nightmare’ statement with a forceful jab of her finger into the Dagger-Master’s breastplate, hard enough to stagger him as a reminder of her Elite rank Tempering that neither Reginald nor his wife nor companions missed.

More disturbing was her mention of Leonidas, his gentle son, killing someone. Reginald knew, rationally, that Leonidas had been through hell in whatever Transmigration had captured him—a truth that Reginald still felt vindicated in prophesying—from Earth, but the idea of his kindhearted boy killing someone in what vaguely sounded like ritual combat made him deeply uncomfortable.

Judging from the worried look on Maryanne’s face, his wife felt the same.

The Dagger-Master seemed to get the message, however, because he stepped aside without another word after Kairi’s outburst, his pale face flushed red with a mix of embarrassment, anger, and what Reginald almost thought was shame as he did. Kairi just stared at him for a moment longer, and then abruptly shifted to face Tyros.

“I think you probably should go your own way from here, though, Tyros,” his daughter said in a much more amicable tone. “I appreciate the escort, but the Vanguards and I can handle it from here, and if anyone does cause an issue, I’ll just start dropping bodies until Ace gets here.”

Reginald saw the Dawnguard stiffen at that, but none of them reacted beyond quiet murmurs, and he spied a look of satisfaction on his precocious daughter’s face when she heard them.

The Royal Army Lance-Master, meanwhile, simply bowed his head.

“As you say, Lady Paendrag. Fair winds to you, and give my respects to Her Majesty and the Earl.”

Kairi nodded and—in a remarkable display of cultural adaptation—bumped fists with the Lance-Master, who promptly saluted more formally, fist-to-heart, and then turned on his heel to sweep away with his military forces following, giving a nod to Reginald and Maryanne as he passed.

“Hurry up!” Kairi called, snapping Reginald out of his admiration of the towering Haelfar as he and Maryanne turned and hurried to catch up to their daughter, glancing at the chagrined Dawnguard in turn as the entire Dagger continued on while determinedly meeting none of their eyes.

“Kairi, dear, was that really necessary?” Maryanne asked as they set off again, taking an arcing left toward a far less populated thoroughfare, one which seemed to lead directly to the beautiful, fantasy-perfect Elven palace at the heart of the city—towering where it was built between both lakes inside the city limits.

“What, the Dawnguard?” Kairi asked as they walked, her cold gaze affixing to her mother. “They’re jackasses.”

“That doesn’t mean you need to antagonize them, dear,” Maryanne said with maternal patience. “What if they decide to come back at you later? It could lead to problems for—”

Kairi let out a quiet snort and turned away, cutting off her mother in the process.

“If you’re worried about Ace, Mom, you don’t need to be,” Kairi said icily. “This city is more scared of him than it is of me.”

“Is he already an Elite, as well?” Reginald asked, with undisguised surprise, putting a hand on his wife’s arm to steady her look of mingled outrage and motherly hurt—their daughter’s continued reticence toward them was especially hurtful to Maryanne. Kairi and her Mother had been extremely close before the Incursion.

“Ace? No,” Kairi said dismissively, “but he put one of them in the dirt three days ago.”

Reginald paused at that and glanced at his wife, who met his gaze with equal uncertainty.

“Well, if he did that, he must at least be a Contender, I assume?” Reginald ventured with an upswell of undeniable pride at the thought of his son’s growth.

“Initiate,” Kairi said flatly as they started to faintly ascend, crossing a large arched bridge leading to the Palace’s outer bailey gates. “He’s probably the strongest Initiate on the planet, at this point, though.”

Reginald paused again at that revelation, and his brow furrowed.

No matter how strong he is, how does an Initiate kill an Elite?

“I take it you are referring to this Braedon?” Maryanne asked, her voice strained. “Was he a great villain, or a Demon, or—”

“He was just an asshole, Mom,” Kairi said flatly as they crossed the bridge and started descending along its far side. “Braedon was the Prince-Royal. He challenged Aylar, his older sister, for the Crown. Ace stepped in as her Champion because of their engagement, and Braedon wanted it to be a deathmatch. Ace accepted, and the rest is bloody history in the Arena.”

Reginald blinked rapidly at the information and felt himself momentarily lost in the Shakespearean drama of it. Dynastic conflicts? Arena duels? It sounded like something out of an alternate history Roman Empire fantasy novel.

“Is that going to cause any strife between them?” Maryanne asked with immediate maternal instinct. “Killing his future brother-in-law may not really be the best for their m-marriage,” the woman finished, drawing a sympathetic look from Reginald and a loving squeeze of her hand. He was still as shocked by the whole situation as she was.

“Given he saved her life in the act, Mom, I think Aylar will get over it,” Kairi said blithely in response as they reached the Palace gates, and the Dagger of ornately adorned golden guards outside of it turned their helmets to her. Each of them was wearing reinforced armor similar to the Dawnguard’s, though in the case of these warriors, their warplate was not simply highlighted in gold; it was plated in it, with backswept wings on each helmet and every pair of immense pauldrons.

The wealth on display just in their warplate was shocking.

“Lady Paendrag,” the woman in the center said in greeting, her helmet plumed to distinguish her. “I take it you are here for the Earl?”

“He’s expecting me, Lyria,” Kairi responded casually.

“And your guests?” the Haelfar asked, her grey eyes rising within her conical helmet to appraise Reginald, Maryanne, and their accompaniment with a look that held no illusion of mercy if provoked.

Reginald felt his wife tense subtly at his side, and he squeezed her hand again.

“A mission he sent me on,” Kairi answered simply. “Queen’s orders, to boot.”

The Guardswoman, Lyria, looked back at Kairi when she answered and then nodded, gesturing something to the other gilded defenders and stepping aside.

“Give our regards to the Earl, my lady,” the Guardswoman said stoically. “His victory in the Arena has made the Thronehold far safer.”

“Sure,” Kairi said with a nod as the massive gates opened with a rumble of motion, rolling inward on wheels through grooves seamlessly cut into the stone they rested on.

Reginald forced himself to follow Kairi despite his desperate desire to more deeply assess the mechanics behind the gates, and after a half-minute of walking, started when the gates abruptly slammed shut behind them. The inner courtyard behind the outer wall was a hub of activity as Kairi led them forward, around a gleaming fountain built into the white marble beneath their feet, and past drilling daggers of golden-armored warriors and what appeared to be a full complement of Palace staff going about their duties.

Reginald noted, distantly, how rare Terrans were this deep into the heart of the city, but was given little time to dwell on it as Kairi led them up the stairs ahead of them to the front doors of the Palace and the second Dagger of Royal Guards guarding it. This interaction proceeded without a word spoken, and the plumed Dagger-Master of the Guards on duty simply nodded Kairi through the massive open doors, toward the domed great hall beyond.

Reginald tried not to gawk as they walked through the hall, his eyes taking in the sheer wealth on display with no small amount of stunned disbelief.

“Reggie,” Mary said beside him, her hand gripping his so hard his fingers were going numb, “it’s a palace, Reggie. A real one. Just like in I Died And Reincarnated As The Ninth Son Of—”

“I know, Mary,” Reginald cut her off before she could finish, his voice faintly baffled to his own ears. “I feel like a bumpkin instead of the Professor I was. I used to teach about this stuff, and now we’re—we’re in it! Our son lives here, Mary, our son!”

His wife nodded in shock as Reginald turned to their companions and saw equal looks of awed wonder and no small amount of intimidation on their faces. The Royal Guard, he noted belatedly, were everywhere. There wasn’t a hallway or a corner without one of the gilded warriors present, and their helmets turned to follow them with silent intensity. Every stare seemed to be assessing him and those with him as targets, and Reginald found himself momentarily overwhelmed.

You’re fine, Reg. If Ace can deal with all of this, you can. You’re a Contender!

The self-assurance was poor quality, in truth, and he forced himself to keep it together outwardly.

When Kairi led them across the length of the expansive foyer to a set of immense doors set into the wall opposite, flanked by two staircases that led deeper into the Palace, Reginald glanced at his wife and then at his daughter.

“Kairi, where are we going?” he asked with a mix of curiosity and suspicion.

“The Throne Room,” Kairi said simply. “That’s where Ace is.”

Reginald slowed at Kairi’s words and looked at his wife in alarm.

“I’m sure it’ll be fine, Reginald,” Maryanne said with a tense smile, “we’re just visiting our son, no need for any worries.”

“I—yes, I suppose so,” Reginald agreed. “Um, Kairi? What Rank are these Guards, out of curiosity?”

“The Royal Guard are all Contenders,” Kairi said with a glance back. “It’s their minimum requirement.”

Reginald and Maryanne exchanged shock looks at that, and it was his wife who spoke.

“So many! That would make them the strongest force in—”

Her words cut off when the doors opened, and both Paendrags and their companions were given the view within.

Marble pillars matched in equidistant pairs along the sides of the expansive chamber, each gap playing host to two of the Royal Guard standing with halberds at attention, toward a dais with three tiers. Atop it sat an elegant throne, worked with golden veins, flanked by a pair of elegant eagles.

The throne itself was occupied, bearing the proud figure of a Haelfar woman in a flowing white dress slashed with blue, adorned by sapphirine gems at the apex of her corset and inlaid onto the golden armbands that held the diaphanous material covering her toned biceps.

She was young to Reginald’s Tempered eyes, her features bearing no signs of age or weariness, and vibrant with the power of youthful vitality. Her cheekbones were sharp, with full pink lips and an expression of mirthful amusement on her ethereally beautiful features as she spoke to a tall man in a black and silver suit, with a remarkably familiar head of shoulder-length black hair, standing to her left.

On her head, nestled among flowing golden locks, was a silver diadem marked with sapphires—a Princess’ crown, Reginald noted in a daze, not a Queen’s.

“Reggie,” Maryanne whispered in wonder, “Reggie, she’s stunning.”

The woman in question turned when they entered, before Reginald could do more than nod, and the man beside the throne turned as well.

Reginald and Maryanne slowed to a halt when he did.

Leonidas. Their son.

The young man’s features had changed, but not in the purely physical sense. There was an existential weight to his bearing now, a sense of gravitas and easy authority that seemed to emanate from the man, no longer a boy, who looked at them. Leonidas was the image of Reginald’s bloodline, yet somehow cut sharper, more austere, more imperious. His features were artisanal, not merely handsome, and Reginald felt some measure of grief at how much they had evidently missed.

His son met his gaze, and Reginald felt his heart skip in his chest.

Those eyes were not a boy’s eyes, not any longer. They had seen death.

He’d first thought as much when he’d met Leonidas almost a month prior outside the very City in whose heart they now walked, but Reginald realized for the first time that they’d only seen the surface. There was a wisdom in his son’s gaze, a sense of time and experience that no month alone could have fomented.

When the man—no, the Knight—that Reginald recognized as his eldest child stepped down from the dais, there was a casually powerful confidence to how he moved.

He had seen enough of the alien emigrants to recognize the walk his son embodied, equal parts unnatural grace and lethal finesse. At his side, Maryanne was frozen in stunned silence, and Reginald couldn’t blame her. In some part of his mind, he’d expected to find the bright-eyed College student that he and Maryanne had last seen, hugging them goodbye and promising to call them from campus.

That boy, he realized, was gone—as absent as the daughter that had once blushed at every handsome young boy that passed them in the streets.

Reginald watched in captivated stillness as Leonidas turned from them with a faint smile, so like Artur’s that Reginald almost forgot he was looking at his son, and watched as the boy they’d raised—now a man—offered his right hand to the woman on the throne. She took it without hesitation, sliding her feminine fingers into his and descending from her seat with a faint click of heeled feet.

Reginald and Maryanne stepped forward, leaving their uncertain companions behind as Kairi strolled on ahead of them and nodded to the pair, receiving a wry grin from her brother and a mirthful smile from the blonde. As they closed, Reginald distantly realized how tall the Haelfar woman was—at least six feet or maybe taller, though she looked diminutively feminine next to Leonidas.

When the Archmage and his wife halted before the pair, he and Maryanne looked between them in stunned silence once more, uncertainty clawing at them both until Leonidas spoke.

“Mom, Dad,” he said warmly, so warmly that it seemed to dispel the trepidation in an instant, “I’d like you to meet Aylar Taleria Lux Fortuna Eldormer. She’s going to be your daughter-in-law.”

Before Reginald could do more than nod in shock, Maryanne burst forth and wrapped her arms around the Queen with a choked sob.

Reginald’s eyes immediately darted to the Royal Guard, who had snapped into posture the second the contact occurred, and then blinked when they froze. His eyes moved back to Leonidas, who was simply looking at them. No words, no actions, just a look.

It was enough.

Every one of the wing-helmed defenders reset to their stance, and Reginald felt some part of himself hesitate at the spectacle. His son, his boy, had just commanded a dozen or more Contenders to stand down with no more than a glance, and in truth, the father in him was as proud as he’d ever been—while simultaneously feeling blindsided.

“Are you…” Reginald began, and then swallowed. “Are you really Leonidas?”

The dark-haired man turned back to him at the words, while Maryanne and Aylar were in the midst of exchanging soft discourse, and smiled in a way that warmed Reginald’s soul.

“Yeah, Dad,” he said softly. “I’m still me, I just grew up.”

Reginald felt the last of his unspoken fear shatter at those words and surged forward, pulling his taller son into a hug.

“My son,” he said as the tears came, flowing from some forgotten grief that had finally found its release. “My boy.”

Leonidas hugged him back tightly.

“I’m home, Dad. Sorry for making you worry.”

Reginald shook his head and said nothing to that.

In truth, there was nothing more to say.