Chapter 5 Alternatives #2
But was Vex his friend anymore? Hadn’t Ailduin and Vex become enemies in the end? And hadn’t Vex forced his mother into some ridiculous bargain to save him this time around? What kind of friend did that?
“Did you kill her?” Aquilan asked. His voice was ragged with emotion. “And my father? Did you kill him, too?”
Vex’s eyebrows lifted slightly. “You never did like small talk.”
“Did they go against you? Did they not want to honor the bargain they made?” Aquilan asked. “Is that why you killed them when they came to you?”
That would make sense. His parents could have gone to try and convince Vex to give up his rights to Aquilan. To let the bargain go. And if Vex had not agreed, his parents might have… acted. And lost…
Vex tilted his head to the side. “So you admit that I would have been in my rights to kill them for doing that?”
“I admit nothing! Tell me! Did you… did you kill them?” Aquilan demanded.
He was trembling. His hand tightened on Glorandal. It glowed brighter.
Vex glanced down at it and pursed his lips. But he made no move to protect himself or attack Aquilan. “Would it make you feel better to believe that I killed them?”
“Would it… no! I want the truth!”
Vex put up a hand much like he had with Aquilan’s mother. “Do not be so hasty. You do not know the alternative to it being me.”
“What… what alternative?” Aquilan stared. “They were coming to find you. To negotiate a peace or… something. Probably to save me and you… you would not negotiate so they must have… must have…”
“Your memory, my old friend, is not something to be trusted,” Vex said almost sadly. He rubbed the fingers of his right hand together and magic ignited there. A virulent green. “I’m afraid that’s partially my doing.”
Aquilan’s eyes flickered between the green flames and Vex’s red eyes. “You took my memories of my time as Ailduin not as–”
“Sometimes they bleed together,” Vex grimaced. “Sometimes one cannot be taken without the other.”
“You’re saying that I… I don’t remember things correctly from my past? Or at all?” Aquilan was rapidly blinking.
“What I know is that memories are not all they're cracked up to be,” Vex laughed softly. Sadly. “It’s strange, you know, I came here to find out the truth too. And now I’m beginning to realize that the old adage applies to me as well.”
Vex extinguished the green flames. He crossed his arms behind his back at the wrists and walked a little around the plinth. He grimaced as the webbing, looking very displeased as if the webbing was a personal affront.
“They’ve killed some of my lichen,” Vex tutted. “That is so hard to replace!”
Aquilan thought of the Sunstone that he had considered using down here not so long ago. That would have fried the lichen.
“Your lichen is the least of what the Leviathan have killed,” Aquilan answered tightly. “They decimated humanity. But I think you must know that though you did nothing to stop it.”
“Ah, yes, but you were their great savior, were you not?” Vex flashed him a toothy smile. “Arriving on a white horse. Using the power of the Sun to obliterate the Leviathan by the tens of thousands. Who needed me when they had you?”
“I had no choice,” Aquilan answered, feeling suddenly uneasy by having his war against the Leviathan be described that way. As if it was a slaughter and not something he had reluctantly done. “They would not leave. They insisted on continuing their butchery of humanity. So I… ended them instead.”
Vex paused in his perusal of the web and lifted an eyebrow. “So bloodthirsty! You almost sound like–”
“Ailduin?”
“No, no, like… me.” Vex flashed him another smile.
Aquilan blinked. “I was protecting the innocent.”
“And growing your Empire!” He wagged a finger at Ailduin. “And perhaps… assuaging your conscience.”
Aquilan swallowed. Vex must know of the Kindreth he killed. Had Vex sent them? That seemed unlikely. “Is there nothing you do not know?”
To his surprise, Vex’s teasing aspect fell away for a moment and he looked a little lost. “I thought I knew it all. But Rahven… he is quite cross with me.”
“Rahven?” Aquilan frowned in confusion, but then he realized who that was, “Declan. You mean Declan.”
“I mean Rahven. That name he bears now is ridiculous! Declan Wilde, indeed! That is the dream. Not Rahven. And to think he wishes to keep living in the dream!” Vex’s hands suddenly flew up into the air.
“Wants to pretend he’s not my son! That he’s not the Night Prince! That he’s just some–some bartender!”
“There is nothing wrong with being a bartender. And he appears to be a very good one,” Aquilan protested.
Vex gave him a narrow-eyed look, but then he laughed. “Well, working for Hein is likely a good job. I might work at the Dawn to sample his malt beer or eat his roast beef. Yes, I suppose there is something to be said for working under his roof.”
“Helgrom. You mean Helgrom. Hein’s grandson,” Aquilan corrected gently.
Vex just smiled at him, but then went back to his rant about Declan, “You know that he–he turned his back on me. He just… walked away. And he had no regrets.”
Vex was staring off in the distance. There was almost a comical look of shock and dismay on his handsome face.
He clearly had not been denied anything in quite a long time.
But Declan had not cared to bend the knee.
Aquilan was not surprised. Declan was a leader in his own right.
He gave respect only after it had been earned.
He imagined that if Vex had demanded Declan accept his demands…
Well, Declan would have rejected him. Evidently, had rejected him.
“Where is Declan? Is he all right?” Like with Vex, Aquilan believed he would know if Declan were gone.
He cannot be gone.
Declan’s beautiful face flashed before Aquilan’s mind’s eye. That moment in the palace when Declan had been close enough to kiss… as Declan told him to make his home in the rising Sun…
“Oh, he’s fine.” Vex waved a hand as if that were no nevermind that his son was wandering somewhere in the Under Dark on his own. But, then again, seeing how Declan fought against the Leviathan that was likely true. “You know earlier when I said he was cross with me?”
“Yes, you did–”
“That was a lie!” Vex let out a sharp laugh. “I don’t believe he is! Because I don’t matter enough to him for him to be angry with me! Can you believe that? I am his father! I am–”
“Who he didn’t know about until today,” Aquilan gently redirected the Night King.
Vex stared at the plinth. “It shouldn’t matter. All boys need their father.”
“He had one, I believe. A human who… who died. And there is another who loves him… He was hardly without male guidance and love in his life,” Aquilan pointed out.
“But they are not me!” Vex snapped. But there was more bewilderment than anger in his voice. “They are not me.”
“No, they are not. But you are not you to him yet either,” Aquilan pointed out. “You are a stranger to him, King Vex.”
Just like you are a stranger to me. And yet…
He kept studying that face, expecting memories to rise, but they stubbornly did not.
“He claims to want nothing, Ailduin.” Vex’s bewilderment grew. “No power. No title. No money. No family history. Nothing.”
Aquilan did not correct him on the name. “And you believe him?”
“If I did not, he would not have left that crater… Ah, well, he… he perplexes me!” Vex let out a tight laugh and once more those hands rose in the air.
Aquilan wondered what Vex had left out of that statement. “We were talking about my parents.”
“Yes, yes, who killed them. All the alternatives to me!” Vex chuckled. “Believe me when I say this, Ailduin, that you do not want to know what happened in the past. Because if you do, you’ll have to act.”
“Against you?” Aquilan stiffened.
“Against your own nature,” Vex corrected. “And that… that doesn’t work so well.”
Aquilan’s mouth opened and shut half a dozen times before he said lamely, “But my parents… cannot be unavenged.”
“Can’t they?” Vex challenged.
Aquilan stood there and thought of the blind hatred that had allowed him to strike down the Kindreth who had come to the Lieran Plane.
He still did not know why. To warn him? Of his parents’ bargain with Vex?
Did Vex still want to collect on that bargain?
Was that why he was here in part? Not just to collect his son, but to collect Aquilan?
He was the Sun King now. His life was not his own.
Unless I cede the throne to Vesslan…
But he almost physically revolted against the thought. Guilt assailed him at the same time. Surely, Vesslan would be a good ruler! An uninspiring one, but one very dedicated to all the… details of ruling. He’d have that cabbage issue worked out in triplicate, Aquilan was certain.
“Oh, dear, it looks like the Leviathan have finally realized that there’s someone on their doorstep,” Vex said, gesturing with one hand behind Aquilan.
He spun around to look where Vex indicated. His mouth went very dry as he saw movement between the webs. The strands were all quivering as Leviathan made their way towards him and Vex. No matter where he looked there was movement.
“Please don’t kill my lichen, Ailduin,” Vex said.
Aquilan turned back. “What do you suggest… Vex? King Vex?”
No one answered him. For the Night King was gone.