Chapter 13

WARNING: THE LATTTER PARTS OF THIS CHAPTER CONTAINS SPOUSAL AND CHILD ABUSE

Aldos sat on the porch of the house, his purple eyes taking in the beauty of the snow-covered forest that he had grown to love, Ordria's head resting on his lap while his hand ran through her onyx hair, eliciting purrs of pleasure from his wife which in turn gave him the satisfaction he wanted. She opened her eyes to reveal her "crimson balls of fire" as he just nicknamed them, and as he stared at them, he realized that this certainly felt like a breath of fresh air.

Stretching out her hands, she pulled his face close to her which allowed her to plant a chaste kiss on his lips that left her blushing. "This feels perfect" Ordria murmured, staring into his purple orbs that were just as captivating as the first time she saw them years ago. "You, the kids, our home. I never want this to end."

"Ástin mín, I think it's time to take the trip we always talked about" she heard her husband say in a firm tone, interrupting whatever fantasy she was having and causing her to sit up and look at him with a serious expression on her face.

"Are you sure?" she asked, a nervous tone in her voice, "It's only just been six months since you returned and we properly started their training," she argued trying to make him change his mind. "They aren't ready yet"

"And they'll never be if we keep them here" he interjected "There are things they'll never learn because we can't teach them, and there's a limit to how much they can grow as long as we keep them here" he explained to his wife.

After listening to Aldos's reasoning, Ordria couldn't help but let out a tired sigh. She knew that he was right and that the children needed this, but a part of her wanted to keep them as close to her as possible in order to keep them safe. "Fine" she reluctantly agreed, placing her head on his shoulder and closing her eyes. "So when do we leave, where are we going and how long will we be gone?" she asked.

"In two weeks time when summer begins," he answered immediately "I want us to reach the shir fisk before the first star falls" he responded, his answer letting Ordria know that he'd been planning this for a while "I want us to travel the country and if possible, the entire continent and then return here in two years" he finished.

"That would be possible if it was just us, but it's not possible since we're taking them along" Ordria pointed out, desperately grabbing at whatever reason she could find in order to prevent the trip. Though she had agreed to it, she still harbored some small hope that she could change her husband's mind.

"We'll use the roth vihas" he proposed after a moment of deliberation "They're quicker than foot or beast, and they're easy for us to access" he responded.

"It's obvious that you've been planning this for a while" Ordria began after as moment of silence, her voice suddenly dripping with venom "So why bother asking for my opinion?"

"Listen to me ástin mín,"

"No Aldos, you listen to me!" she interrupted him, a furious expression on her face "You always do this. You left me here alone, you missed the birth of our son, his first steps, his first words, his first fight" with each point she raised, she jabbed a finger at his chest. "And every time I try to talk about it, you keep telling me to listen to you or you give me some bullshit reason!" she roared at him as the temperature of their surroundings rose in response to her rage.

"I spent years watching him grow up and doing everything in my power to keep him safe, you can't just make me put him and Synd in harm's way simply because you say so!" the snow around them directly turning to steam.

"I understand Ordria," Aldos told her with a calm expression on his face, indifferent to the increasing temperature. "I know that I haven't been around for most of his life, but I need you to understand that everything I've done has been for his sake and yours" he reached out to touch her, but Ordria moved backwards to avoid his touch.

We aren't going anywhere until you tell me everything" she insisted firmly. "I need to know exactly why you're insisting on this trip, the things you've been doing and the plans you have for our children. And leave nothing out"

Seeing that Ordria wasn't going to relent until she knew everything, Aldos let out a sigh and began to tell her everything that he had learnt and done for the last twelve years. As he explained everything to her, Ordria's expression constantly shifted between fear, anger and sadness while the temperature around them dropped back to normal.

"I don't like it" Ordria told him with a tired expression on her face after he finished explaining everything to her.

"I know Ordria. But life doesn't always go the way we want it" he said, going silent as he remembered some things. After a few minutes of sitting in silence, he began to speak, his voice tainted with something Ordria rarely heard from him; sadness.

"The first time I saw Ozymandias was when he was four. I opened the door and there he was playing with a wooden greataxe" he recalled the memory with great clarity, his eyes moist with tears. "He took one look at me and ran off, screaming for you at the top of his lungs," he chuckled dryly.

"When you came back carrying him in your arms and I saw the fear in his eyes, I should have realized how much I had missed and how much I would miss, but I told myself that everything was for his sake and yours" he told her, the smallest trace of sadness in his voice.

To others, Aldos appeared unapologetic or even apathetic, but to Ordria who had spent years fighting against and beside him, the sadness was apparent to her. "Each time I came back, I was met with a child I knew nothing about. What were his likes and dislikes? His hopes and fears? His successes and challenges? He was growing so fast and I knew nothing about him!"

"Did I do the right thing?" He asked Ordria, his glazed violet eyes seemingly desperate for an answer.

"You did ástin mín" Ordria told him softly, wrapping him in her arms and putting his head against her chest. "You've made some mistakes, but there's no parent that's perfect" she consoled, holding him in her arms.

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The town of Djrowle was founded by Djrowle Silfurtun who led a group of refugees north to escape the ravages of war. In the eight hundred years that it existed, the village had experienced famine, plague, extreme cold, wolf tides and the occasional monster attack, standing firm in the face of adversity and tackling each challenge as one, filling the village with a sense of oneness and warmth that everyone felt regardless of how tough times were.

'It truly is gone,' the thought danced in the old woman's head as she watched a mob two hundred strong gather in the town square, the crisp winter air filled with the ever-present mixture of anger and despair that had seeped into the village. On some days when things got really bad, she swore that she could taste it in the water and food.

Watching the gathering below from her balcony through her one good eye, Birna let out a tired sigh as she stroked the head of her granddaughter who was watching with fear in her eyes. "Vriski what's going on?" she heard her granddaughter ask.

"Our town is falling apart my child" she sighed, resting her wizened hand on her granddaughter's head in order to soothe her. From their balcony above the town square, they watched the inhabitants of the town gathered in the dilapidated town square, taking note of the thin and sickly townsfolk who had been ravaged by famine and sickness and how their rage filled eyes seemingly bulged from their sunken faces.

"You promised us that you would get rid of the witch and her spawn!" they heard a thin woman scream as she held a sickly child in her hands. "You told us that with her gone, we would have food!" she screamed, tears of rage and worry falling from her eyes. "My child is dying and there's nothing I can do!" Her brown eyes stared at Drowle Silfurtun, the current village chief with as much hatred as her weak body could muster.

Startled by the intensity of its mother's voice, the baby let out a wail before suddenly choking as foam began to pour out of its mouth while its body convulsed violently. "No!" Birna and her granddaughter were shocked by the mother's scream. The granddaughter leaned forward to watch with morbid curiosity in her eyes as she watched the woman's rage gave way to fear as she desperately tried to alleviate her baby's condition.

"Don't die, gods above please don't take my baby!" they heard her cry as she dropped to her knees in supplication. Unfortunately for her, her pleas were for naught as the baby stopped moving as it lay dead in her arms.

Unable to handle the death of her child, the woman fell to the floor unconscious, her arms still wrapped around the corpse of her child. Her collapse was the straw that broke the proverbial camel's back, as the gathered crowd lost all semblance of sanity. Roaring as one, they charged forward at the target of their ire; Drowle.

Seeing the charging mob, Drowle's guards moved forward to protect him, only for a raised hand to stop them. "There's no need for violence" he told them before taking a deep breath. "STOP" he exhaled, the word seeping into the ears of the crowd and bringing them to a halt as their bodies stopped obeying them. "RETURN HOME AND FORGET TODAY" he commanded, beads of sweat rolling down his forehead despite the subzero temperatures, a testament to how taxing the ability was.

Obeying his words without any signs of resistance, the entire crowd returned to their homes, their eyes glazed over as they followed Drowle's order. Satisfied with the dispersal of the crowd, Drowle motioned for his guards to follow him as he left the town square and headed home, his stomach growling in hunger.

The fūrkhūva that the Silfurtun family had occupied for the past eight hundred years had seen better days. The proud four-story building that once used to tower over all the other buildings in the down had been reduced to a bungalow which was marred with signs of decay and neglect, an astute reflection of the town's condition. Ordering the guards to stay outside, Drowle pushed open the door to his home and was greeted by the mouthwatering scent of stew which was wafting from the bowl on the table.

Sitting down at the table to eat, Drowle savored the taste of the stew, tearing out chunks of bread to dip inside every once in a while. As he continued his meal, the expression on his face slowly morphed from one of satisfaction to one of rage. "Argatha!" he yelled, his voice reverbing through the house. Receiving no answer from his wife, he bellowed once more; "Argatha!"

"Y-y-yes ve hesrisk" came the timid reply followed by the sound of light footsteps as Argatha walked into the room, her head facing the floor as she avoided meeting her husband's gaze.

"What is this?" she heard her husband ask in a calm tone while pointing to the bowl of stew. Fearfully walking towards her husband, she peeked into the almost empty bowl where her husband was pointing.

"T-t-that's a-a-a b-b-bo" she stuttered, unable to finish the sentence. Taking a deep breath to gather her thoughts and suppress the fear she was feeling, she answered "That's boar ve hesrisk" she finally answered, looking at the small piece of meat in his bowl.

"I know what it is," he snarled "What I'm asking is, why is it so small" he asked, drumming the table with his fingers.

"T-t-the, this w-was the last one and I had to divide it for" she was interrupted by the bowl slamming into her face, thrown by her husband. Doing her best to stop the tears from falling, Argatha kept her face to the floor as the remnants of the stew dripped down her face, wondering where it had all gone wrong.

"If the boar wasn't enough, you should have bought more you stupid, withered hag!" she flinched as he shouted at her, raising her arms to shield herself from him while doing her best to look as small as possible.

"I tr-r-tr" she stuttered "I wanted to but there was none" she managed to spit out after a while. "The forest has been hunted dry" she explained "And with Ordria still" whatever she wanted to say was cut short as Drowle roared in rage, leapt from his seat and punched her across the face, sending her to the floor.

"Are you saying it's my fault!" he roared, blood splattering across the room as his punches rained down on his defenseless wife. "I've done everything for this town" she heard him rant between punches, doing her best to catch his words. If he asked her a question and she couldn't answer, he would get even more violent or worse; turn his anger on Safi.

"Answer me!" she was jolted out of her thoughts by a vicious stomp on her stomach that cracked several of her ribs and forced the air out of her lungs. Rolling on the floor with her arms wrapped around her stomach, she tried her best to breathe, but the pain assaulting her made the action almost impossible.

"Safi show yourself!" Drowle roared as he viciously brought his foot down on Argatha's head, the force of the blow nearly driving her unconscious, but in a display of will and a desire to keep her daughter out of harms way, she managed to maintain consciousness. Weakly grabbing Drowle by his ankle, she tried to keep him from finding her daughter, from hurting the only thing she ever did right in her life.

Effortlessly shaking off his wife's hand, Drowle channeled his kjarna to his voice and spoke "SAFI SHOW YOURSELF!" he bellowed once more, his voice resounding through the entire house.

"V-v-ve hesrisk p-p-p-please" Argatha begged, desperately trying to get her husband's foot off her head to no avail. "I'm the one at fault" she sobbed pinching his legs and screaming in an attempt to turn his wrath towards her "She didn't do anything"

"She was born" Drowle snarled at her, his brown eyes watching the pantry door open and Safi walk out, fear and resistance in her eyes. She was wearing a thin oversized shirt which revealed her scarred arms and chest while doing nothing to stave off the winter cold.

"Yes father" she answered, her thin body shivering as a gust of cold air blew in from outside.

"PICK UP THE POKER" he commanded, pointing to the iron poker which had been left in the fireplace, the long piece of metal now red hot. Obeying her father, Safi reached out to pick the poker by its handle, her body quivering as she tried to resist.

"GRAB IT BY THE SHAFT" she heard her father command.

"Father please!" she begged as her stiff leathery palms wrapped around the poker's shaft, filling the air with the smell of burning flesh. Any normal person would've screamed in pain, but Safi had experienced this too many times to feel anything. Lifting the piece of metal would have been easy for anyone, much less a fourteen-year-old like her, but years of physical abuse and malnutrition had turned this into an ordeal for her.

"BEAT HER" her father commanded, taking his foot off Argatha's head and sitting down on his chair to watch, a sadistic glee in his eyes as he watched his daughter walk over to his wife's prone body.

Looking up to see her daughter standing above her, Argatha felt her heart break a little bit more as she saw her daughter raise the poker above her head with tears flowing out of her eyes. "It's okay Safi" she reassured her daughter, an attempt to ease the guilt she was feeling. "Just close your eyes and it'll be over before you know it"

"I'm sorry!" Safi cried, raising the poker above her head and spreading her legs to properly distribute the weight. "Father please!" she screamed, bringing down the heated piece of metal down on her mother's torso, filling the room with the sickening thud of metal hitting flesh and Safi's cries. The second blow landed on Argatha's knee, cracking the bones which were then shattered by the third blow.

For what felt like hours, Argatha's body was subjected to a rain of blows from the poker held by her daughter as her husband silently watched. Just as she was about to lose consciousness, she heard Drowle command her daughter to stop and go back to her room. Through her swollen eyelids, Argatha watched Safi return to the pantry and lift up the trapdoor that led to the damp and dark space under the house that served as her room.

Once it was close, Drowle stood up and locked the trapdoor after his daughter before going to the room, leaving a bleeding and crying Argatha on the floor. In her room under the house, Safi gingerly dipped her hands into the cold mud that surrounded the pile of hay and rags that served as her bed, whimpering as she relived the entire incident in her head. Pulling her hand out of the mud, she laid down on her bed and curled herself into a ball in an attempt to stave off the cold.

Finding no warmth, she shakingly held out a mud-covered hand and began to focus on filling the space above it with her kjarna like she had been taught. Succeeding in her endeavor, she imagined a warm fire in the kjarna filled space above her hands. At first nothing happened, but after thirty minutes of nonstop focus, a small flame burst to life atop her palm, filling the small space with warmth that drove back the biting cold that the subzero temperatures brought.

"Ozymandias" she murmured as she drifted off to sleep, the flame leaving her hand and floating above her, a silent guardian against the biting cold as Safi dreamt about the only person that truly made her happy.

GLOSSARY

Ástin mín: My love

Lítill risi: Little giant

Shir fisk: Star land

Roth viha(s): Rift gate

Vriski: Grandma

Fūrkhūva: Lord home

Ve hesrisk: My husband