10. Epilogue
Oeros was the first to visit. Ardex felt like an eternity had passed. Oeros’ first spoken line, however, proved that couldn’t be true: “Gaia is currently delivering your little sister. Our second child.”
“Great.” Ardex still felt strange, both in appearance and in mind. “When can I leave?”
“That’s … still up for discussion.”
“Gaia attacked me first! I promise I won’t hurt her.”
“I know. That’s why I’m here,” he looked around, “at the only time Gaia will not look for me.”
Ardex smiled, until he remembered Oeros had done nothing to help him. He would have even preferred it if his Father had helped Gaia! Then he would have had clear enemies in the fight! But now … now he wasn’t sure what his Father actually stood for. Or if he could make the tough decisions when the time came.
“You know I’ll break out,” Ardex said as threateningly as possible. “It’s a matter of time. Leave me to rot here and I shall be less friendly.”
“Ardex, please. You should hear yourself talk. If I wanted, I could crush you with a wave of my hand. Do you understand that? Your threats mean nothing and if you ever attack me you’ll be dead on Dalas before you can blink.”
Oeros said he was strong all the time, but he never showed it. But Ardex didn’t dare risk it, for something in Oeros’ energy told him it was the truth.
Great. Both his parents were talking about killing him again.
“I am sorry,” Ardex said. “I don’t know what you gave me, Oeros. But it’s an uncontrollable fire. It’s too much. I want to be a good god and a good son, but sometimes it’s like … I don’t even control myself.”
Oeros sent comforting energy through the magical bars.
“I know. That’s why we gave you the Firering, the first Heavenly Object, and we’re planning to give each child one of those. You might see it as a curse, but it’s a gift. I meant it as a gift anyway. I cannot speak for Gaia’s intentions.”
He made a piece of white cloth appear out of thin air.
“In fact,” he whispered, “I secretly brought a second gift.”
He pulled the cloth away. A frozen flame, as if it was made from glass and stone, floated before him. Inside, Ardex saw tall fires and bright sparks, but most of all a deep black hole, as if the heart of this flame was violently pulled out of it. Light was bend at the edge of the hole, as if looking through a glass of water, while inside of it all light disappeared.
“The Flamefeaster,” Oeros said. “Use it to control the worst fires and tame the worst magic.”
He leaned forward and whispered. “Not a word to Gaia. The rule is one Heavenmatter per child and Gaia doesn’t even want me to talk to you.”
Ardex barely heard it, enamored by the Firefeaster. The moment he touched it, the fires within him calmed down and he … felt no more pain. No more pain. Peace.
“How … how do you make these things?”
He remembered his test. How that one Sunbeamer lion had purposely led him away to an area covered in purple mist. He sighed.
“It has to be voluntary, doesn’t it? I had to voluntarily, with the Firering, run through the purple mist, so you could trap part of my power inside it.”
Oeros sent confirming energy. “And so the Firefeaster was accidentally created when you voluntarily surrendered to Gaia. Yes, we know what you did. Say what you want, but Gaia did design the laws of this world to reward good deeds.”
Ardex couldn’t say anything nice about Gaia. And they were going to test every child from now on? What if one of them failed? What if he wasn’t the monster from the prophecy, but he had to look as they tormented one of his brothers or sisters who turned out to be monstrous?
The silence was the cue for Oeros to leave. He froze in the opening to the tunnel upwards.
“You did the right thing by letting life die and not interfering. You did the right thing by surrendering. In my eyes, Ardex, you’ve only ever done the right things. No life without death, my son.”
Ardex ran towards his Father, but bounced off of the magical wall. He felt something new. Sadness? Happiness? Tears?
Whatever it was, he wanted to keep feeling it. After all that pain and all those fights, the Firefeaster seemed to give him the calm and control he yearned for, along with his Father’s approval.
He gave himself two claws and scratched a message in the stone floor.
No happiness without sadness.
The feeling was cut short by a voice from upstairs. Gaia’s voice.
“Oeros? Help! Help, our next child is—”
And so it was, that life continued …