Bright Eyes

19.1. I Write This Letter to No One or Anyone

The Other World
21 Years Ago

Sanctuarium, the fifteenth day of the month Dech-Dáu

TO No one or Any one

Where else shall I begin but to mourn for my loss? All in one night, I have lost everything dear to me—Father, Mother, my blood brothers, my home, and my dearest friend Keelin. A month has passed, yet I still find myself in the deepest of sorrows, alone.

Father, you trained me well to be the man I am now. Although your instructions were harsh, your reasons and methods my brothers and I sometimes questioned, you only sought to do us good. We all knew Eoin, the eldest of us eight sons, was to be king in your place, yet you never forsook nor neglected any of us, raising us, disciplining each of us with only the best intentions. You sought that we be humble, valiant servants of our kingdom by the time you and Mother pass, that we be leaders who serve with a heart right before the eyes of Elohim. For that I raise my gratitude to you, and hope this reaches you in Elysium, the Realm Above.

Mother, I miss your tender voice and loving comfort, your gentlest touch when I wept as a child. Father taught us to be strong and valiant men, yet you raised us to be kind and compassionate to even the lowest of servants, taught us that as fellow Crystallians there was never such a hierarchy to begin with. You looked at everyone with love and cared for the entire kingdom. Father was blessed to have had you as a wife; I am blessed to have had you as my mother; the Kingdom of Tiern was blessed to have had you as their queen.

Eoin, Leith, Huiel, Herne, Aidan, Kieran, and Cuinn—my blood brothers. You called me weak, and mocked me for my stature and name. As the youngest and smallest of us brothers, I was never as strong or agile or skilled in battle as any of you. Despite this, you loved me as your brother still, and aided me in my training and lessons—to become a better knight, challenging me each day as I grew more skilled in the art of battle and weaponry, and to be a wiser man to serve and lead our people. I would wish for another hour, another day, another year to spend with you all. However, fate has cut short our time together as brothers in the worst of ways, and I miss you all dearly.

And Keelin, how I wish you were here with me, and how I wish to have told you that I have loved you all this time. All I yearn this moment is to hold your hands in mine, and to reminisce our fondest of memories, to spend hours and days and years more with you ere you leave.

Do you remember as children, after our lessons ended for the day, we would run to the garden and sneak into the forest to explore and weave stories in our minds and play till the last of daylight painted the skies orange and purple? We would then run to our respective homes, and a tapestry of deep indigo would fill the expanse, stars like diamonds embedded in the skies, smiling down upon us. Gazing out my bedroom window, I would think of you, then, and for the rest of the night; sometimes I would see you in my dreams, your soft golden hair swaying in the wind, the sparkle in your emerald eyes, delight etched in your smile—a truth I never told you.

And when we were children no more, the forest had become our rendezvous, where we talked and spilt our secrets. You would tell me of your dreams, of how you wish to better the kingdom, of how it seemed deeply unfair that you would never be an adviser to the king as your father was, for the mere reason of being born a woman. And I would often complain of my blood brothers, and how they would look down on me as the youngest—the weakest of my father's children. My name, one of a language unknown, they would mock even—a curse—glory has departed.

Little did they know that my name, a prophecy, never meant me—that seventeen years ago, on the day of my birth, the Druid—the High Priest—prophesied the downfall of the Kingdom of Tiern, of our home, and that he had told my mother to name me such, for it shall to come to pass.