The Power and the Glory

Book 4 Chapter I: Imrahil

Author's Note: Well, I decided to continue with book four instead of starting the sequel. Once again Lian/Imrahil/Vieraneth is trying to make the whole book about himself and once again it's going in directions I didn't intend. It isn't supposed to be a full-book-flashback to Lian's past, but damn it if he isn't trying to make it one.

Warning: contains animal death, self-harm/attempted suicide (...sort of?) and Lian being creepy.

"When he passed me in the restaurant," he said at last, "I had a curious impression. It was as though a wild animal – an animal savage, but savage! you understand – had passed me by."
"And yet he looked altogether of the most respectable."
"Précisément! The body – the cage – is everything of the most respectable – but through the bars, the wild animal looks out."
-- Agatha Christie, Murder on the Orient Express

The first son of Princess Hartanna and Prince Consort Mihasrin was born in the middle of summer. He was a strange baby, rarely crying and never smiling. As he grew older he smiled more, but no one ever saw him laugh or cry. His parents never noticed anything wrong with him. His older relatives -- aunts, uncles, and his half-brother -- did. If they tried to mention it to the boy's parents they'd be laughed at or told to mind their own business. So most of his relatives shrugged and dismissed their worries. Every family had at least one member who was slightly odd. It didn't mean there was anything truly wrong with him.

His half-brother Gilreon was the exception. He looked at Imrahil and knew there was something terribly wrong here.

The trouble was, if someone came up to him and asked him point blank what was wrong, he couldn't give an answer. It was a hundred tiny things, all unremarkable on their own but which added up to something sinister. It was the way Imrahil as a toddler had a terrible temper but no he never showed any negative emotion stronger than mild disapproval. It was the way he stared at blood as if it was the most interesting thing he'd ever seen. It was the way he was abnormally fond of hunting. It was the moments when Gilreon met Imrahil's eyes and saw nothing behind them -- or rather saw something so incredibly dark and ancient it was more comforting to think he saw nothing. It was the way he seemed to lower the temperature of a room just by walking into it. It was the way he occasionally caught Imrahil staring at him with a cold, calculating look that belonged on an adult's face, not an adolescent's.

It was almost a relief when the mask fell away. It was proof that Gilreon hadn't imagined it all.

No one in Kelthír Palace would ever forget that day. A month ago Uncle Vadhleo had given Imrahil a rabbit. It was an adorable little thing that always reminded Gilreon of a lokmor flower[1]. Imrahil had smiled and thanked his uncle for the present. He'd taken care of it and seemed fond of it.

On a bright, cheerful morning a maid went out to the garden and found Imrahil kneeling on the ground. He held a carving knife and his hands were soaked with blood. The rabbit lay dead in front of him. Its chest was sliced open.

~~~~

"Why did you kill the rabbit?"

Gilreon had never seen his mother so shaken. In the background his stepfather looked like he'd seen a ghost. Imrahil was the only person present who behaved as if nothing was wrong.

"I wanted to see what would happen," he said in his usual calm, even voice.

That voice had always unsettled Gilreon. He'd never been able to explain why before. Now he knew. It seemed to belong to someone much older than Imrahil. It was better suited to an adult than a child.

"You can't go around killing things just to see what will happen!" Mihasrin snapped. He was even paler than normal. He held onto his chair's arms like a drowning man would hold onto a rope, and his hands were shaking.