❝this tree was grown with rotted roots.❞
Nerluce is Darkest Shadow. He is that great and terrible entity, prophesied over a thousand years before, more like a hurricane than a man. His hair falls crooked, poorly cut by his family's blade. His finger...
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It was probably wrong to laugh at such an earnest confession.
However, upon hearing that this child—so fragile and naive and stupid—had come all this way, had faced countless dangers, to find him, to help him,Nerluce couldn't not laugh. It surged from him, rising from his chest and bubbling out from his throat. It filled the air, making it vibrate.
The child's cheeks turned red. Did he think that Nerluce was mocking him? Probably. Nerluce hoped the boy had been mocked for this idea. It was beyond stupid. If someone mocked him for it, if someone told him just how stupid that idea was, that meant the child had at least someone sane in his life, someone who cared about him and didn't want to see him hurt or dead or twisted up into a villain.
Rieka growled at Nerluce. The laughter kept coming though, leaving Nerluce warm and breathless. It was a spectacular feeling, even when the child's humiliation was like poison in the air and Rieka's glare wasn't much better.
"Why would Darkest Shadow needs the help of a pup like you?" Rieka asked.
The child looked up, hunting for hostility in their faces. He would find none. Even though Rieka was scowling, it wasn't a threat. She was just treating this child seriously. And Nerluce... well, all he could do was smile as the boy's gaze fell upon him. There was no reason to get upset or want to hurt a kid for being stupid.
Slowly, like watching a flower bloom, the boy straightened his posture. A pride bordering on arrogance was there—or at least the boy was pretending it was. "Darkest Shadow doesn't need the help of anyone," the child said. "But... he said he wanted people to come. People who wanted to change the world." His fingers curled into those fists again. "I know I'm not... much. I'm not a fighter and I'm not a magickian but... I don't care. I'll do whatever he wants me to. I'll- I'll clean stables or count grain or dig graves. Anything."
"Anything?" Nerluce echoed.
"Anything," the child said. "So take me to Darkest Shadow. I know you people must know where he lives."
Nerluce hummed and turned to Rieka, disregarding the child's question entirely. "What do you think? Should Darkest Shadow accept this boy to be his little disciple? He seems quite earnest to me."
"He's a child," Rieka said. "Children are always earnest. It's just that their earnestness does not always last."
She was right. This child's resolve could waver the moment he got hungry or the moment he tasted their usual tea. He could be imagining that Darkest Shadow lived in some great castle hidden in the Ever Forest with an army already at his command. He could just get bored after a couple of months and decide that change wasn't worth the trouble.
"Mine will," the child said.
"Can you guarantee that?" Rieka asked, with a scoff. "You are not a life magickian so you would not gain anything if the world order changed. You could go back and live an easy, peaceful life with your family at any point, no matter the outcome."
