Of Soot And Cinders

VI

GRIMM

I would have shoved the doors to my fathers office open if I had the chance, but upon seeing my stormy approach the guards standing by did me the honors. They pulled the doors open at the same time and I didn't stop to thank them. It was in bad form to not remember my manners but I was nearly bursting at the seams.

The office was warmly lit by magic fueled torches along the walls and a fire in the hearth, the tall stained glass window on the furthest wall filtered the moons light, turning it to a soft amber. The curtains were made of heavy blood colored fabric that grew deep shadows where it folded over itself. My  fathers desk sat in the middle of a massive saber-lions hide, a kill from my fathers youth, a rug I had played on since I was a child.

"Father!" I shouted, knowing he wouldn't look up from his work anyway.
It may have been a meeting between the two of us but he was also a busy man and was good at focusing on multiple things at a time. Something I wished I was capable of.

"Caspian." He scratched at the document in front of him with a blue feathered quill.

"I'm going by Grimm now, father." I felt childishly defiant right now, but the feeling— the freedom— the song—that I felt build in my chest when I saw him made me feel as innocent and happy as a child.

"Your goddess given name is Caspian, and I will address you as such."

"Grimm is my—"

"Your mothers maiden name, I am not as ignorant as you would like to portray me to be Caspian. Now please, we have matters to discuss."

I felt the nerves rise in my throat right then. "Yes. The ball."

"Your mating festival." If anyone we're to point out technicalities it would be my father.

I took a breath, he could probably hear my heart race faster. "I want it canceled."

His quill stopped. "Caspian—"

"Father—"

"We've been over this Caspian. And it is too late now, everything is already being set up. Vendors from the Amen Sea and actors from the halls of Permesa and magicians from the Altoe mountains are already on their way or arriving. We have slaughtered a hundred cattle and will slaughter a hundred more for the three days of feasting, and have paid for nymphs to come and grow fresh fruits on the nights of the festivities. This is not— No!" He finally looked up at me, just as I had been about to speak.
"Do not open your mouth to argue. All the planning and preparation have been for you, for the chance for you to find your Mate. Or are you so selfish that it does not matter to you?"

His voice didn't rise, I don't think I'd ever heard his voice rise. But it was clear from his tone that the matter was over. And if I were not my fathers son I would have let it be. But his stubbornness ran strongly through my veins.

"I've found him. The one I want to marry."

Father licked his lips and looked to his left. On the Wall was a large portrait, three times my height, as wide across as four lengths of my shoulders. It was mounted in the center of the wall, watching over us.
My mother.
Her dark hair hanging over her shoulders in soft waves, her hazel eyes shining as brilliantly as the sun. A smile creasing at her eyes and pulling at the corners of her mouth.
It had been a joke between her and my father, a bet of sorts. She had joked that she needed her portrait to be larger than his. He had said she couldn't sit long enough to paint a canvas bigger than his toenail.
Her painted smirk said it all. If what my wet nurse had told me was true, five separate painters had been called to work together because of the size.
It was painted a year before she died.