Thalia…
When she felt Ruvick’s fingers press against her forehead to force her to sleep, part of her was angry at him for not staying with her until she fell asleep naturally.
The other part of her though was relieved because she wasn’t sure that she would be able to sleep without his intervention.
The strange, sickening feeling she had watching her brother fight against Moyako, though she couldn’t seem to explain the reasoning for it, felt instinctual.
They shouldn’t have to fight at all.
They shouldn’t!
But then, as quickly as she was put to sleep, she was woken up by the sound of her mother calling out in desperation.
Although she couldn’t make out the words, she could tell it was meant for Marcus for some reason.
Her eyes flung open as she heard a knock at her bedroom door and Marcus’s voice could be heard as he creaked open the door.
“Hey, Thalia? I heard that Ruvick brought you back home because you weren’t feeling well,” he said with concern in his voice.
“I-I’m fine…,” she lied as she pulled herself out of bed and walked over to the door to open it the rest of the way.
Her brother moved out of the way to let her through as she went to grab a glass of water.
“I heard that you fainted,” Marcus said as he followed her into the kitchen.
“I did...but I’m alright now,” she said as she took a drink of water and a long silence followed.
Marcus broke the silence once again as he said, “I won by the way...if you were interested.”
Thalia blinked and turned her head to look him in the eyes as she asked, “You beat Moyako?”
“I did, and I got a little something out of it too,” he said as he reached for something at his waist before he placed a large hammer onto the counter top.
Something about it looked strangely familiar to her, but the idea that it could be what she thought was so ridiculous that she didn’t want to say it out right.
“Is that-?”
“Its Mjolnir.”
She made a choked sound as he confirmed her initial thought about the hammer.
“H-How did you-?!”
“I know…I’m a little shocked myself but...here it is, and its mine now. Those three gods that attend the contest watched my fight and said I earned a reward of my choosing. I asked for Mjolnir, and they gave it to me.”
“But how are you...well, not to be mean, but are you actually worthy?” she asked.
“Apparently it doesn’t work like that. Also, it doesn’t even work that way in the original Norse myths either, its just really really heavy. This one works by taking the weight of the nations the wielder has conquered and increasing the weight based on that. You could probably lift it without any effort, not that it would do you any good in a fight,” he said as he pushed the hammer over to her and smiled a bit.
Unable to resist the urge to act like an excited child, she quickly reached out her arms and took hold of the handle.
To her shock, it moved as if it weighed barely heavier than a regular hammer.
She then held it in front of her with a dramatic pose and shouted, “HO HOH!”
Seeing this, Marcus laughed at her and said, “Alright, that’s enough.”
He reached out his hand to grab it and she frowned as she handed it back to him.
“Putting that aside for a moment...I need to tell you something, and I don’t think you are going to like it, but you need to know anyways,” he said as he took in a deep breath.
Nervous, she dropped her frown and faced him as he said, “I’m going to be moving to Forrosa soon, with Selene, and I want to know if you want to come with me.”
Thalia blinked as she was surprised by the way he had phrased that.
“What do you mean…? Are you asking me if I want to go with you? Are you not going to just take me there?”
Marcus then turned around and put his hands on the counter top as he leaned forward and hung his head, letting out a stressful breath.
When he raised his head once again, he said, “Thalia, I was eight years old when I was forced to be an adult to take care of you, far younger than you are now. But you will be fourteen soon enough, and are already on your way to becoming an adult, so I figured I might as well treat you like one. I can’t be overbearing and overprotective towards you forever. So for that reason, I’m putting that choice in your hands. Do you want to go with me and Selene to Forrosa, or do you want to stay here?”
At first, she reached out her hand and opened her mouth to answer him, excited to go along with him to a new land, but a part of her stopped herself from answering him right away.
Part of what he said about treating her as an adult struck a chord in her that she had been ignoring since she started training with Fayebel.
She wanted to get stronger so that her brother didn’t have to worry about her, so that she could be responsible for herself and he could enjoy living his life without constantly worrying about her.
If she went with him, she would just get stuck in being dependent on him.
She wanted to show him that she could stand on her own two feet and fight off anyone who might try to hurt her so that he could enjoy his life without worry.
“I think...I’ll stay here in Lycea for now,” she said, partly feeling guilty for having said it and partly feeling relieved for being able to say it at all.
Marcus as well, let out a slight sigh of relief while also appearing more worried about leaving her here.
“Well, if anything bad does happen-,” he tried to say but was cut off as Thalia interrupted him.
“Alta and Fayebel will be here to help me.”
“Yes, but even then...if something bad happens, and the three of you can’t handle it, I want you to have something so you can call out to me. With Light Taker, nothing is far away for me,” he said as he waved his hand and a necklace appeared out of thin air. It was made of platinum chains with a black granite pendant, and a glowing red bolt of lightning in the center of it.
He then waved for her to turn around as he put it around her neck and said, “All you need to do is rip the pendant from the chains and I’ll come running from anywhere in the world.”
She was grateful to have it, but was a little confused as she asked, “How am I supposed to break the chains though if they are made of metal? I’m not that strong.”
He turned her around and looked at her with his eyebrows raised as if to say, Are you serious…?
“Thalia...platinum is a soft malleable metal like gold, although I engraved runes into it so that it can only be broken by you. Not only that, but even if platinum was as strong as titanium, when you train to get stronger, shattering metal will be easy to you.”
“Right...that was a stupid question,” she said and he chuckled.
“No it wasn’t. You’re just not used to magic yet, but if you keep up with training so you can be strong, like you said you wanted to be, then you will be. Its inevitable,” he said as he clicked the chain around her neck and let it dangle.
Thalia then turned and looked around the living room as she asked, “Where is Selene? She’s going with you to Forrosa right?”
“She is...she just needs to let Dean know.”
Dean…
Now that the contest of champions had concluded, paperwork and new job requests started to come in and pile up.
Many of the brotherhood members returning to the hall had already started drinking and partying to celebrate Marcus Wright for being the man to win the contest.
Dean wished he could blindly share the sentiment and celebrate alongside them if not for the fear of that very same man he held within himself.
So for the first time in fifteen years, he had unsheathed his Wolfsbane blade so that he might try and gain some wisdom from it.
Once upon a time, when he first gained the sword during the Mordrinite War, he had been able to speak with his ancestors, whose spirits were contained within the blade. They proved to be incredibly useful council even during the worst of times.
Yet towards the final days of the war, while in the middle of his fight against Malthael, Dean had nearly died. His head had been severed by the Archdragon, yet somehow he had been saved in the nick of time to finish the monster off.
Ever since that day, the voices of his ancestors within the Wolfsbane blade had been silent, and the blade felt cold and hollow.
Every now and then, when he went to sleep, he would still find himself in a dream with a boundless landscape of grasslands like he had seen through the Wolfsbane’s power. However, unlike before, with the vibrant sun falling down upon the land and washing it with warmth it was replaced with darkness. Even the light of the stars were blotted out by the all consuming blackness.
Any trace that his ancestors were ever present within the blade had almost entirely vanished.
However, there were some days when, either when asleep or awake, he would hear the sound of his deceased mother calling out to him from within the sword.
He didn’t know why he sometimes heard his mother, albeit incoherent it was, but it was never in response to anything he asked, so he wondered if it was really her or not.
And so, he sat at the bar in the brotherhood hall, with his sword partially unsheathed on the counter next to him, drinking a glass of whiskey as he tried to ignore the growing stack of paperwork.
He stared at the flat of the blade, hoping to hear anything that might help him, but was met with no response.
He then sighed as he was about to take a drink before the sound of papers falling on the counter next to him startled him.
He looked up to see Selene standing at the right of him as she gave him two sets of resignation papers.
He looked down at them with a buzz, barely acknowledging them, not even looking at the names listed on them as he looked up at her and asked, “So…? We have people come and go from the brotherhood all the time. Why are you showing this to me?”
“These resignation forms are Marcus’s and my own. We’re leaving the brotherhood and Duranell,” she explained.
Dean’s eyes widened as he quickly sobered up and realized what was going on.
He stuttered as he scrambled off of his stool and asked, “W-What are you talking about? You’re leaving?! Why?!”
Selene’s expression didn’t change from its calm and determined demeanor as she said, “Marcus was invited...by King Razel Aldia to live as a dignitary in Alken, and I am going with him. I don’t want to live in this city anymore, and put up with this constant work you keep dumping on me.”
It was hard for him to believe, but Selene was being completely serious and genuine in her words.
“You can’t be serious! The two of you can’t just leave!” Dean said, raising his voice and drawing attention from the other members in the hall.
“And why is that?” Selene asked with a slight bit of attitude in her voice.
“First of all, I’m personally against you leaving. Marcus, I could care less where he goes, but I don’t want you leaving. Secondly, the king himself would never allow either of you to go,” he tried to say but Selene just smiled, and upon seeing that look in her eyes, a shiver ran down his spine.
“And what are you going to do to try and stop us? Either approve these forms or don’t. It doesn’t matter either way. We are leaving, and there is no room for an argument,” she said as she turned around and started to leave the hall.
As Dean and the other brotherhood members watched Selene leave, he fell back on his stool in disbelief and the partying mood of the other members collapsed entirely.
He threaded his fingers through his hair as he resisted the urge to rip it out and thought to himself, What in the world is happening…?
Artemis…
She still felt a touch of anger and hostility towards Marcus after seeing him and Selene together after the final match, but she knew that it was not her place to try and force them apart.
The only thing that she could do was make sure that her daughter was happy, and if Selene was happy being with Marcus, then it was something she had to accept.
But then, as she was working a shift in Lysandra’s brotherhood hall serving tables, she spotted Selene walking through the entrance.
Before she could even turn her head to look at Lysandra and ask her for permission to leave, she heard her say, “Go speak with your little girl. I’ll have someone else cover for you.”
Artemis nodded gratefully and rushed over to her as she asked, “What brings you here?”
Selene opened her mouth to speak but then stopped herself as she seemed unsure of how to speak what was on her mind.
“W-Well...I’m leaving Dean’s brotherhood with Marcus and…,” she started to say but trailed off.
Artemis, feeling a sense of discomfort over likely knowing what she was going to say, took in a deep breath to calm herself and said, “Just say what you need to say.”
Selene looked up at her before continuing, “Marcus was invited to live in Forrosa and asked me to go with him, and I said yes.”
The way Selene looked at Artemis made it seem as if she was asking for approval from her when Artemis felt she did not earn the authority to give it.
Instead, she put her hands gently on Selene’s shoulders and asked her, “Do you think you will be happy there, with him?”
Selene blinked in mild surprise as she opened her mouth to speak, but could not find the words to answer her.
“All that matters to me is if you are safe, and if you are happy. I have no doubts about your safety if you are left in Marcus’s hands, surely. He is a force to be reckoned with and no harm would come to you if he is at your side. However, I want to know if you will be happy,” she said softly.
Selene then nodded as she said, “I think I will be. I am already happy being with him now, but I think I will enjoy my life with him even more from here on.”
“Then that is all that matters,” Artemis said as she smiled.
She would have to learn to get over her wariness of Marcus for the time being, so long as her precious daughter is alright.
Just as it seemed that she was satisfied with her answer and was about to turn around and leave, Artemis then spread out her arms and said, “Do not leave without embracing your mother.”
Selene hesitated for a moment but then stepped in closer and hugged Artemis.
“I’m not used to...moments like this with you,” Selene said.
“Hopefully you will be,” Artemis said as she raised her left hand and stroke her hair for a moment while hugging her back.
When Selene finally pulled away, she said, “I can always reappear her whenever I want to visit. So...just know that I’ll never be too far away.”
“I know...but be sure to visit often.”
“I will.”
With those last few words, Artemis said goodbye to her daughter as she left to live another land.