There were seven families who felt a great pull on their hearts as the night waned away. Seven families who felt oddly worried for the sake of their kingdom on this cold, lonely, night.
Taran Masam looked out the window as the gentle tap-tap-tap of more meteorite pieces klinked against it. He saw as finally the blazing ball he had known was coming landed. He was a simple merchant, but he knew when something important had happened. He pulled on his jacket, woke his wife, and the both hurried out into the night.
Six other families joined the Masams. None of them thought it odd that not a one of them had children. It was odd within this village so dependant on the young, seven families would have no children.
Taran leaned close to the glowing mass that lay before them. "It's a meteorite..." he awed.
"Taran... It's more than that..." His wife, Mela, leaned next to him. "It's children..."
As the glow dimmed, they saw what Mela meant. Standing, the only one able to, in the center was a boy of maybe one and a half with startling, haunting, blue eyes. His blonde hair was pulled back in a taught ponytail. Surrounding him were nine children, each fair of face and each with a name tag around his or her neck.
"Zyphon... To the family of Masam..." Mela read from around the blonde boy's neck. "These children are presents from the goddess Rarato..."
"Mela... A second..." Taran held up the tag of another boy, this one with red hair. "Nors... To the Masam family..."
"Exxsalata... To the Sorn family... That's us!" The couple picked up the little girl proudly.
"Mishii family... Tracana... and Moraca..." A man and woman picked up a set of girl twins.
Each family looked at the other once. The eyes of the Sorns briefly locked with that of Mela and Taran. Zyphon stared at the purple haired girl in Mrs. Sorn's arms and gave her a brief smile.
Exxsalata smiled back shyly. She waved as her family decided to leave and watched as long as she could as Zyphon waved back.
"Hm... I sense an ill-tiding that will come about in the fullness of time..." Taran looked into the sky as the stars began to gradually appear. "These children are special...."
***
"Zyphon... ZYPHON!"
The blonde haired boy opened his blue eyes and looked into the brown of his younger brother. "What is it Nors?" he asked sleepily.
"The armies are marching in today... We have to leave... Lots of families are packing up... We're going to be traveling with some of them..."
"Which ones?" Zyphon gently pried, fixing his hair as he spoke.
"The Mishiis... And... The Sorns..."
Zyphon froze in fear. "Did.. .You say the Sorns?"
"Yes..."
"No..." Zyphon shook his head violently. "No... No, no, no! Not her!"
"I understand that you and Exxsalata don't get along... That the last time she and you got in the same room, it ended with a few black eyes and bruises... But she's older now... She's fifteen and you're sixteen... I'm sure you'll be ok..."
"Do you recall that I was the one with all the bruises and black eyes, Nors?!"
"Our parents are waiting for us with the two families, Zyphon." With that final word, Nors left the room.
Zyphon grumbled for a few minutes before quickly pulling on some clothing. Then he left the room that had been his for a whole of sixteen years.
The Masams had prospered and flourished since the arrival of their two sons. The name of Masam was associated with good trading skills. Nors's mother and father had been happy to discover he had an odd sense of prediction for what would sell and what wouldn't. They wondered briefly why the two were so different. Nors came by everything so easily and yet Zyphon was an eternal struggle.
Zyphon entered the elaborate parlor to see something that left him with his mouth gaping. "Beautiful..."
"You didn't do too bad yourself... It's been ten years Zyphon... I'd like to say I'm sorry about last time.." Exxsalata smiled at him.
"I didn't really mean what I said..." Zyphon admitted.
"I'm... Glad.." Exxsalata looked away. "Not only that you accept my appology, but that you like what you see..."
Zyphon cocked his head to the right and gave her an odd look. "Why?"
"Because my parents have promised me as payment for the favor of traveling with your family..." She looked downward.
Zyphon shook his head, not understanding. "They're... Selling you to my parents?"
"No, Zyphon..." Taran, Zyphon's father entered the parlor. "They're giving her as a gift... To you..."
"To me...?"
"Yes... To you... I objected... But they insist... She is yours to deal with... I suppose she must obey you... Do what you think is right, Zyphon." Taran left the two alone.
For a moment, Zyphon stared at her, his eyes running up and down over her, knowing that she now supposedly belonged to him. It was a time when such slavery wasn't uncommon. For a moment Zyphon thought about things that at sixteen, he shouldn't of been, things he could order Exxsalata to do, things that he had wanted to do the moment he set his sights on her this time. He looked downward, ashamed.
Exxsalata stood there, waiting. She had been warned about men who were given such gifts by her mother, who had been a gift to her father. She wondered if Zyphon was the type of man who would think of such things. The shamed look on his face told her the answer she wanted. Gently she untied the top of her dress, allowing it to fall to reveal the undercloth that covered her chest.
"No... I can't... I don't want to order you around..." Zyphon gently waved her with his hand. "You're free... Go ahead... Go..."
Exxsalata ignored him and continued sliding the dress off. "I don't need you to order me Zyphon... This is your last night in your own house... Do you not want to make it memorable?" The outer layer dropped and she was standing clothed only in undergarments. Zyphon backed up.
"Of course I do..." After a second though he drew closer, kneeled before her and kissed her hand. "But I refuse to be a slave master..."
"Then let me own you for a night..." Exxsalata took him by the hand and led him back up the staircase.
***
Arkon Sorn sat by the fire reading. He knew that his bold and daring daughter was exactly the type of girl Zyphon couldn't refuse. If he didn't make the move, she would. Arkon, for this reason, continued reading, not worried about where his daughter was.
Mela sipped tea gently. "I wonder where Zyphon is..."
Nors shrugged. "I don't know, Mom..."
"I wouldn't worry about him for today..." Arkon remarked rather calmly.
Zyphon, at that moment, walked into the room, his pale face becoming slightly red at the sight of Arkon. "Mr. Sorn..."
"I would just like you to know Young Master Masam... It's not payment for your father. It's a late birthday gift. Welcome to the world of adults, Zyphon." He stood up, setting aside his reading material, walked over to Zyphon and patted him on the back. "Sixteen... My how you've grown... We've spent years training and refining our daughter... Hoping to make a wonderful gift for your sixteenth birthday... I can tell when a person will do great things, Zyphon... You will do great things."
Zyphon opened his mouth to object, but closed it when Exxsalata walked in and put her arms around him. He whispered something to her and for a while they talked like that, each whispering to the other. She gently played with his hair once he was finished talking, gently running a hand down it.
Nors gave the two a cold look. He then proceeded in mouthing the words 'How could you?' to his brother.
Zyphon tilted his head, giving Nors a puzzled look. He didn't quite understand what was upsetting his brother, but then Zyphon had never understood Nors.
Taran and Mela gave each other worried glances. Then Taran shook his head. He had thought better of his son than that, but he suppose it didn't matter. In the morning he knew what had to happen. The boys would be seperated. Nors would become a gift to lord Seelin and eventually Taran knew Nors would become the Chief Advisor of the lord.
"Nors... Pack anything you cannot bare to leave behind... Keep everything of yours seperate from ours..." Taran sighed and rubbed his brow. He didn't want to lose Nors, but he had to give up his son for the greater cause of the kingdom.
"What...?" Zyphon stared at his father dumbfounded. "Nors isn't going with us?!"
"Nors is to become our Lord Seelin's visionary..."
"No... NO!" It was a firestorm of rage that burst forth from Zyphon's finger tips, a firestorm of creation and destruction hand in hand. As his left hand created monsters, his right destroyed them, each in turn, and then the rage poured forth not only from his fingers, but his very soul, and then it was gone. He felt strange. "What... What was that?"
"Zyphon..." Mela looked at him in horror.
Arkon smiled. "I told you I know when people will do great things..."
Zyphon stared at his own hands, unbelieving. He looked up, shocked. "Mother... Father..."
"Zyphon, my brother... You are the lord of creation and destruction I have forseen..." Nors said thoughtfully. "You too have the powers... Yet our mother and father do not... If I may, may I make the guess that we are not truly your children?"
Taran nodded his head. Mela looked downward, ashamed they hadn't told the boys earlier.
Exxsalata hugged Zyphon, a show of affection that Zyphon didn't feel like returning at that moment. He felt dangerous, on the verge of losing the control over himself. "You would send my brother... My defenseless, undertrained brother... Youngest of a family of merchants into the middle of a war... So some damned lord can use and abuse his powers of sight?!" Zyphon didn't care about the newly revealed fact that he was adopted. He meerly cared about Nors at the moment.
"Zyphon... We realize Nors is not a soldier... But he will be well protected there... Better than us, even." Mela tried to comfort.
"I won't allow this!" The words came forth without thought, without inspiration, without knowledge. Zyphon was simply uttering them. "Through crimson of blood, through blade of steel, I pledge to walk, to fight. May a binding be formed with the powers of flame, extending from heart and soul, a branch of fire can be a sweet caress. I swear on the holy lands, by the forging of fire, Visionary and Fire Lord are one and so shall be in later years. I give thee, oh holy form made of two united, thy name. Chimu, from the depths of the Earth, when two destined joined by bonds and vows bring thee forth, Zyphon and Nors will be reunited!"
Nors shook his head. "Yes, we will be reunited Zyphon... But you will find it a bitter curse when, full of pain and vengeance, I destroy all you have... You are a fool to bring forth this curse... I will kill all you love, you damn fool!"
For a moment, Zyphon saw what Nors meant. For a moment he saw a man six year Nors's elder in place of his younger brother. Fire red hair was this man trademark. He turned with eyes of passionate brown, smiled sweetly at Zyphon, and then drew his sword. Drew his sword to kill the parents of a child Zyphon had just sealed the fate for. Yes, Nors and he would be reunited, reunited through the lines of their blood and that reunion would bring tears and blood and shattered dreams. The child Chimu who Zyphon had so passionately named as a Fire Visionary would lose everything to this man Nors would be, he would lose his parents, he would lose his home, he would lose his place, he would lose his heart and then, then he would lose his life. "No..."
Nors sighed and nodded his head. "Now you see... But all too late..." Nors then turned to look at Exxsalata. "If you had not done what you have done... If you had not been so thirsty for the touch of my brother... You would not be giving him the cruel fate now before him. Chimu is cursed. Zyphon is damned."
"What... What do you mean by that?" Zyphon dropped his arms to his sides almost lifelessly. "Nors..." Zyphon grabbed a hold of his brother's shoulders. "Nors, what lies before me?! Am I truly damned for eternity because of one night?"
"Exxsalata, you wretch..." Nors's voice trembled. "You've damned yourself as well! It would have been best if the two of you had gone on hating each other!"
Exxsalata looked at Nors shocked. "Nors... Nors... What's going to happen to us?"
"I CAN'T TELL YOU!" Nors screamed, running out of the room.
Exxsalata turned to look at Zyphon, who she had heard weeping, and stepped back in shock and horror looking at him.
Zyphon had his eyes closed, and it was true that he was crying, but it wasn't saltwater that trickled down his face. Tears of blood rolled down his cheeks, blood of an unnatural and eerie color.
"Zyphon... Zyphon..." Exxsalata, her handkerchief in hand, quickly began to wipe the blood away. "Zyphon... You're going to hurt yourself... Please stop..."
"I don't give a damn if I go blind... I'm damned no matter what, aren't I?!" He snapped at her. Then he put his hand on her wrist. "I'm sorry..."
"Zyphon..." Mela gently embraced the boy she had raised as her son. "Nors once told me when he was a small boy something of your future... He asked me to tell you when the time was right... I think now is the time.." She gently ran a hand through Zyphon's hair. "But please stop crying... You need to control your powers..."
Zyphon nodded, wiping the blood from his eyes and silencing himself in one deep breath. He felt a strange calm over come him.
"Nors told me, Zyphon... You will serve in the army... You will become Lord Seelin's second in command.... Then Seelin will die... And you will be Lord... You will win this battle... At great loss... You will be Prince... But I will never see it... You will father a child by Exxsalata... But alone... You will see Nors one more time with the eyes you hold now... But he will not speak, he will not breathe, he will not live..."
"I truly am damned, aren't I? Damned to live alone..." Zyphon tugged at his hair. "My lord-leige and master will die... Then my parents..." Zyphon felt his face tremble with terror as he looked at Exxsalata. "Everyone... It's already begun..." Zyphon looked downward on Exxsalata, knowing well that the child he was to father was already forming, that within nine months, he would be a father. He looked at Arkon who had gone strangely silent and thoughtful in the conversation .
"So this is how it will be..." Arkon shook his head. "I lost my wife last year to illness, Zyphon... I didn't tell you that, did I? Exxsalata and I only have each other... And you now..." Arkon looked downward. "I am going to offer my services... I will not live to see my grandchild... I have nothing left to live for, Zyphon... I want to see my precious Larna again..."
At that moment the Mishii twins ran in, both girls looked horrified. "The soldiers are marching on the city!" both shouted in unison.
Zyphon put on his cape. "Mother, Father... I'm going... This war is mine... I will win the trust of Seelin, I will take on my fate with a brave heart."