Realm of Monsters - Chapter 627: Mortem Part 1

Chapter 627: Mortem Part 1

  “Who are you?” Stryg whispered and took a step back.

  Mort stepped closer until he was within hand’s reach. He smiled, his eyes flickering into a shade of lilac. “You know who I am.”

  Stryg swallowed. “Mort… Mortem, the Blood Sovereign. You’re the Traveler, Stjerne. You’re Death.”

  He winked. “You can just call me Father. Or Dad. Whatever you prefer, I have many names.”

  “What about stranger?”

  “Ah.” Death’s expression turned solemn.

  “Or outsider? No, how about the man who took one look at me and decided I wasn’t worth it?”

  He took a step back and nodded. “You’re angry.”

  Stryg glared at him. “You abandoned me. Am I supposed to feel grateful?”

  “Is that what you think? Stryg, you were born without chaos coursing through your veins. Ordinarily, that would mean you did not inherit my powers, which means you’d be mortal.”

  “And in your eyes that makes me worthless?” Stryg accused him.

  “I am a Calamity. The sheer amount of chaos coursing through me warps the world around me. I am Death and it follows me everywhere. Staying near a mortal infant would have spelled their end. Leaving any of my mortal children behind is a mercy. It would be better to let them live out their ordinary lives than be the cause of their demise. Would you not agree?”

  “…You could have left me a note. So I could know you were out there, that somebody cared,” Stryg whispered, his eyes burning. “The village hated me. Even my own mother refused to claim me.”

  “From what I heard, Aurelia watched over you.”

  “You think that’s the same?” Stryg chuckled bitterly. “Do you know what that felt like? When you are raised in a tribe that puts the pack first above all, but you know that you will never be one of them. Sigte was the only one who cared about me and when he died no one even bothered to make a grave, they didn’t even acknowledge he was gone. It was only me. It was always just me.”

  Stryg balled his fists as tears burned down his cheeks. “I was alone. Do you have any idea what that does to a child?”

  Death placed his hand on his son’s shoulder. “You were never meant to be on your own. Your mother, she—”

  Stryg shoved Death’s hand away. “What about you? Not once in all these years did you ever bother to send a single fucking note!? You’re a god for fuck’s sake! Would it have been so difficult to scribble a few lines?”

  Death sighed. “You were supposed to be told.”

  “Told what exactly?”

  “I’ve had many children throughout the ages, most of them mortal, a few of them not. But in every instance, the child is left in the mother’s care, or if the mother dies in childbirth, then the child is entrusted to a guardian. My children are informed of their parentage from a very young age. When they come of age, I have someone sent to find them and offer them a choice to come and join me in my sanctuary. Just as Seren invited Melantha. You were never meant to stay in the dark. Aurelia never told you about me, did she?” 

  Stryg furrowed his brow. He had only just gotten his mother back. He still hadn’t gotten a chance to speak with her about his father. Had she known all this time about him? Had she kept the truth from him? She hadn’t told Stryg about being his own mother, hiding the identity of his father didn’t seem so far-fetched.

  “Why wouldn’t she tell me?” Stryg asked.

  “I do not know. But if I had to guess, it is because she and I ended things on a very— poor note.”

  “Poor how?”

  “Your maternal grandmother did not approve of our union. When Nalindra discovered that Aurelia was pregnant with you, she was horrified. Nalindra advised your mother to not have you, she even offered an elixir to do it. Your mother refused obviously. I thought Aurelia would have told you the truth since she decided to keep you, but it seems she did not.”

  A bundle of mixed feelings burned in Stryg’s chest. Was Death telling the truth? Stryg shook his head. “Even if my mother didn’t say anything, why didn’t you ever come to check up on me?”

  “As I said, it is customary to wait until you were an adult. I also had a bit of a spat with Lunae, suffice it to say she didn’t want me around. Nonetheless, you are right. I should have visited, even if from afar.”

  “But now you’re here… Why?”

  “It’s your birthday, is it not? And as you so aptly put it, I’ve missed quite a few. Did you like my gift?”

  “Your gift?” he asked warily.

  “Your heart’s greatest desire. Your mother’s recovery.”

  Stryg’s eyes widened. “That was you? You were the goblin merchant? You’re Fenwick?”

  Death bowed with a flourish. “In the flesh. I meant no deceit, I simply enjoy a bit of theatrics. That and I worried our meeting might influence your wish.”

  “So you really did come just for my birthday,” Stryg whispered.

  “Well, that and I thought it best to come personally after you rejected my last invitation.”

  “Your… last invitation?” Stryg cocked his head to the side.

  “You say that as if you have no idea what I am speaking about.”

  “That’s because I don’t. I think I would remember the father I believed to have been dead my whole life suddenly inviting me anywhere. When was this? Where was this?”

  “I told you, when my children come of age I have someone sent out to extend them an invitation. Your sister, Thalia. She visited you in Vulture Woods 3 years ago.”

  Stryg slowly shook his head. “No one came to visit me 3 years ago— Wait. I was kidnapped a few days after my trials. They were poachers. One of them told me they had all been hired by a woman to bring me to her, but they never saw her face. Are you telling me that was my sister?”

  Death narrowed his eyes. “Thalia was supposed to visit you in person, not send some mortals to kidnap you. I was not aware of this. There will be consequences for her actions.”

  “Then you really did try…”

  “Of course, I did. I would not abandon my own son.” Death grabbed Stryg’s shoulders and looked him in the eyes. “I am sorry your life has been filled with loneliness and difficulties, but you are not alone, not anymore. There is a home waiting for you, where you will be accepted for who you truly are. A place where I can show you to master the abilities you fear.”

  “What about the others?”

  “Your friends will be waiting for you when you come back. You will not be gone forever.”

  “…Are there others like me there?”

  “There are few of my children left, the civil war in the Scarlet Realm took most of their lives. But yes, you will meet the remaining few, if you so wish.”

  Stryg glanced at the night sky. He didn’t know what to say. Everything he had wanted was right in front of him. All he had to do was accept and he would gain the answers to a million questions and the power to resolve his problems.

  A bolt of lightning ripped him from his thoughts. The lightning struck Death in the back and sent him flying. Holo appeared behind Stryg in a splash of Orange sparks. “Stryg, are you okay!?” 

  “Holo, get him out of here.” Melantha was by their side, another lightning bolt at the ready.

  Death landed softly on his feet as if gravity had slowed around him. He was unharmed, save for a burning hole on the back of his tunic. He dusted off his shoulder and glanced at his children with a calm, confident smile. “Hello, Melantha, Seren. It’s been too long.”

  “Holo, take Stryg and go!” Melantha repeated herself and drew her orichalcum sword and shield off her back.

  “I must decline.” Death snapped his fingers and a wave of chaos surged out from him and rolled through the gardens. The lightning coursing around Melantha’s hands fizzled and sputtered out.

  “I can’t Flicker,” Holo said.

  “He’s destroying our spell weaves even before we finish forming them,” Melantha confirmed grimly.

  “Lyrae,” Holo called out and her scythe flew into the garden and landed in front of her. She grabbed Lyrae with one hand and pushed Stryg behind her with the other.

  “There is no need for this. I don’t wish to fight you,” said Death.

  “Is that why you’ve had people trying to track me down for centuries?” Melantha asked.

  “Whatever you think you know, it no longer matters. Things have changed. Events have started that neither of us can stop. I did not come here as your enemy,” Death replied.

  “Why should we believe you after everything?” Melantha asked.

  “If I wanted to get to you, Melantha, all I would have to do is hurt her,” Death pointed at Holo. “I helped her build the walls of this city. Unlike other gods, I could have always entered past the barrier. It would have been easy to slaughter this entire city and capture Holo. You would have come for her and I’d have you right where I wanted. If that’s what I had wanted. But I don’t and I have never cared to destroy this city either, so here we are.”

  “You may not have destroyed this city, but how many other cities did you raze to the ground in the Scarlet Realm? How many thousands of innocent lives did you take?” Melantha asked.

  “Mel, I am Death, do you think killing bothers me? The World Soul made me quite literally to not feel such things. But you… It still haunts you, doesn’t it? All those dead. You accuse me of what haunts you. You were the one who started the civil war. You may not have killed them all with your own hands but the blood is on your hands just the same,” noted Death.

  “…I know,” Melantha whispered in a broken voice. Her expression hardened with resolve and she pointed her sword at him. “That’s why I fight. That’s why I will never give up. For their sake.”

  He clicked his tongue. “Oh, daughter. I don’t remind you to hurt you. I tell you all of this so that you might embrace it and move on. They were mortals. Mortals die. Our duty is not to keep them alive, but to ensure the survival of life on this planet.”

  “And how many would you sacrifice for your duty?” Melantha growled.

  “Are you asking me which life I value more? The World Soul’s or mortal kind? It isn’t even worthy of debate.”

  “Their lives still have meaning!” Melantha charged him.

  Death didn’t so much move as vanish; he was in one place and then he wasn’t. A loud bang like a hammer hitting steel rang in the air and Melantha crashed into the fountain, the stone shattering from the blow. Death stood over her, standing on the last remaining bits of marble. “I agree, but that doesn’t change what must be and what cannot be. You really must let go of the past, before your guilt consumes you.”

  “At least I’m capable of feeling guilt,” Melantha coughed and struggled to sit up in the water.

  “I do feel guilt. Just not for this.” Death was suddenly atop her and he slammed his foot on her chest, sending her back down, and crushing her sternum with a loud crack. She gasped for a breath that did not come as water filled her lungs.

  “Sister!” Holo struck Death from behind.

  But he caught the shaft of her scythe mid-swing and ripped it out of her hands, and tossed it aside. Before Holo could jump back, Death snatched her up by the throat. “Melantha, I understand. She is young. But you should know better than to fight me, Seren.”

  “Let them go!” Stryg said.

  Death glanced at his son and frowned. “You do not know our ways. It is time you begin to learn.” He flexed his hand and snapped Holo’s neck.

  “No!” Stryg screamed.

  Death dropped Holo’s limp body and stepped off Melantha’s broken form, the latter’s blood was already beginning to dye the entire fountain a dark purple.

  Stryg fell to his knees. “What have you done?”

  “They are not dead, child.”

  “What?” Stryg rubbed the tears from his eyes and rushed over to Holo. Her neck was twisted at a wrong angle and the bone was pushing at the skin, threatening to rip through. He leaned in close and listened for a breath. There was none, but he heard faint squelching noises coming from her neck. “She’s… healing?”

  “Lesson number one, it will take more than a simple broken neck to kill one of mine. Your sisters will recover in time. Now,” Death crossed his hands behind his back, “Where were we?”

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