81st of Ash, Year 120
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He could feel it -- its warmth, swelling within him. It wasn't blood... it was something else. He understood now. The rest of the truth came to him in the form of light, as the two men flew ever-nearer to that... Divinity, feeling its glow. Somehow, he could see his father within it; he could feel the loving bond they used to share, as if the man were still right there before him. He felt him, perhaps staring down at him. A thing anyone would've wanted in their death -- that feeling of being wanted, of being loved, of being remembered.
He so did miss them: Liara and Damien, his parents. His beautiful mother and father, covered in filth and corruption yet in so many ways, serene. He remembered the downcast gaze of that woman... but he also remembered her love. "Mother," he whispered softly to himself, as they faced the crystalline sun. He couldn't feel her within it, oddly enough, but the aches of his heart seemed to resound with her memory all the same. He could see her smiling face, contrasted with her grim, sullen one. Somehow, now, he understood... it was because she knew she was going to die.
Taelian understood a lot of things, now. Memories of things he never knew. His father had been corrupted -- somehow; he didn't even know how it had happened, at least not at first. As he drew closer, and closer, the picture became more clear. Memories of their lives came to him, from before he was even born. Cults, secrecy, games, manipulation, rage -- sorrow.
He was not born of his mother. He was born of a wound, extracted from his father's chest, implanted as a mockery by... by... a God. Venadak. A Lord of Bel; a darkening, twisting, hateful force. Suddenly, death's embrace no longer felt so soothing, as he learned of what felt like illusions -- memories that surely, surely had never transpired. His mother, not sharing in his blood; his veins instead filled with latent Divinity?
He'd only briefly heard of these things before -- those sorts of entities. Draedan. Now that he pondered on it, Aldrin had confessed to being one right before Taelian died.
But he wasn't dead... no. He felt a wrist holding his own. The divine glow of the spark faded, and Riven within it, as this unimaginable world receded from his view. His eyes opened, and he stared into the depths of a cold and unfamiliar room. He was in Melitene, but -- not in his own bed. He was in the examination room, for... corpses. For their mutations to be made into artifacts. A creed they all agreed to upon death.
"He has no mutations?" Eloise asked. "How is that possible? I've seen them."
Wylen shook his head. "I don't know," he quietly replied. Lethiril, all the meanwhile, sobbed as he held his hand. His face was buried into his lap; what must've been a cold and miserable sensation. It seemed that no one noticed that he was actually alive.
He didn't know what being a Draedan meant. Was it something he was meant to keep secret? To share, to... use? Why had Aldrin kept it a secret?
There would be no way to hide it from them. They knew he was a mage, and now, suddenly... he couldn't feel that ether anymore. He couldn't even feel his beacon. Instead, he felt something else. As he stared forward, pondering it all, Lethiril's face rose and his eyes stared into his own. He smiled, jubilantly, and shot forward to offer him an embrace. Taelian accepted it, but laid limp as if he were still dead. He looked at his arms, everything; minor traces of that ashen curse still remained on him, but he was recovering. Rapidly. He was... changing, into something else.
"I'm not dead," he finally said. "I'm not dead."
