Fic: Reluctant Herald (2/4) - The Past
Title: Reluctant Herald
A tale of how the fearsome tyrant, Darken Rahl, learned to keep the true spirit of Rahlmas - and Creatormas - in his heart, and of the reluctant guide who showed him the way.
Characters: Darken Rahl, Sister Verna.
With appearance by: General Egremont, Panis Rahl, Mord’Sith Cara, Richard Cypher Rahl, Kahlan Amnell, Jennsen Rahl, Zeddicus Zorander, Chase Brandstone, Emma Brandstone, Queen Margaret Rahl, Joseph Egremont and the Creator.
Total Length: 15, 500~
Rating: All- with some minor violence consistent with canon.
Spoilers: This story occurs after the events in Fever, but prior to Reckoning.
Beta:
hrhrionastar She was was amazing to help during her exams. My heartfelt thanks for everything, but especially for helping me ponder those pesky plot-holes and for helping me get all of my Cratchits Egremonts straight. Thanks also for letting me use her original idea of Creatormas for my story.
Summary: Miracles are always possible, even for the darkest heart, if one is only willing to take the hand that is offered to you.
The Past
Darken found himself standing by a cradle, looking into clear blue eyes far more innocent than his own. The infant boy was screaming in distress, his dark hair damp with fever.
Then an all too familiar form materialized through the mist, a man whose arrogantly handsome face was set in harsh lines as he stared dispassionately at the squalling child.
A nursemaid then appeared at Darken’s side, oblivious to his presence. ”My Lord, this illness has been inflicted by dark magic. Shouldn’t you send for the wizard? Surely he can heal the child,” she implored.
“Please, Panis! Please help our child.” Another woman was speaking, her form hidden in shadow, her voice hoarse with tears. “If Zeddicus can heal Darken, why won’t you send for him?”
“No,” Panis Rahl replied flatly, turning away from his son. “Let him die.”
++++
Darken’s breath caught in his throat. “I was never told of this. The constant nightmares - I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t haunted by them.”
He felt Verna’s eyes boring into him but said nothing more. Darken would never reveal to a living soul that he had seen the green fires of the Underworld long before he had made his bargain with the Keeper.
++++
The scene before them had shifted again.
Now Darken and Verna stood in a sunlit room filled with fragrance of jasmine. It was a bedchamber in the People’s Palace, but not his own. A small boy, perhaps three years of age, sat on the floor drawing on a ragged piece of parchment when a young woman adorned in a dark red dress danced into the room and swept him up in her arms.
“Happy Rahlmas, my darling? Did you like all your toys?” She nuzzled the boy’s neck causing him to giggle. The woman’s long brown hair mingled with his as she whispered into the child’s ear. He laughed again, as did she, a clear sweet sound.
“Mother” Darken murmured, pierced to the core at the lilt of her voice. His mother’s features had faded in his memory, but never her laugh, or the scent of her hair, or the feel of her arms around him. No portraits of Queen Margaret Rahl hung in the palace, and Darken sometimes wondered if he had conjured up her very existence out of his own desperate longing.
But there she was - so close, so real.
Darken tried to pull away from his companion.
“No, Rahl.” Verna warned. “She is beyond your reach and cannot see you. We are only observers.”
“Put me down, Mama. I want to give you my present,” the child demanded. When the young queen complied, still laughing, the little boy fetched the scrawled drawing he had been laboring over earlier and presented it to her. “Happy Rahlmas, Mama. Do you like it? I made it myself. It’s a picture of our family - even Father.”
Taking the dog-eared parchment in her slender fingers, Margaret exclaimed over its beauty. “It’s wonderful, Darken, just what I wanted. How did you ever know?” She hugged him tight against her. “I have something else for you, sweetheart, but don’t tell your father. You know how he is.” The queen placed a piece of toffee into the child’s hand which he quickly popped in his mouth.
“I’ve warned you against coddling that boy, Margaret.” Panis Rahl strode into the chamber and pulled Darken roughly out of his mother’s arms, plopping him on the floor. Snatching the drawing out of his wife’s hands, the man scowled. “What are these scribbles supposed to be? Drawing is a woman’s frippery, Darken.” With that, Panis ripped the parchment into shreds over the protesting cries of his wife and child.
“Stop crying, both of you,” he ordered. “We have guests, and I won’t tolerate being embarrassed by my wife and child. After Rahlmas, I’m sending Darken away for a few months. He will be well cared for at the Mord’Sith temple, and you, Margaret, will have to learn that your first priority is your husband, not your son. My heir must learn to be strong, and he can’t do that with a scatter-brained woman catering to his every whim.”
As Margaret looked up at her husband, dark eyes wide with mute appeal, her brown hair fell back from her face.
Darken hissed when he saw the healing bruises around her eyes, on her cheek and neck. “The bastard! I wish I could kill him again!” His free hand clenched into a fist as he started forward, this time only to have the figures of his father, mother and Darken’s younger self dissolve around him as if they had never existed.
++++
The boy sat on the floor, his back against the rough stone of the small room, his expression set in a sullen scowl . He could not have been more than nine years of age, Verna surmised, yet she could already recognize in him the features of the man standing next to her.
The only objects surrounding the boy in the tiny chamber were a bare cot, a small table with a pile of books and scrolls, a pitcher of water and a wooden bench.
As Verna watched, the hard-faced blond man who had earlier taken the younger Darken out of his mother’s arms pushed open the door and placed a few sharpened quills along with a bowl of ink down on the table. From Darken’s earlier comment, Verna knew this could only be Panis Rahl, the ruler who had started the endless wars, almost equaling his son in tyranny.
“There! Once you correct your mistakes, I might let you join us for Rahlmas dinner, but that is all. Your presents are right there on that table.” The man growled, obviously impatient to be out of his son’s presence. “It is becoming very apparent that you will never be fit to rule D’Hara. You’re as weak as your mother, notwithstanding the prophecy. I would give anything to have my other boy with me - the son I can take pride in.”
Verna wondered to whom Panis Rahl was referring. As far as she was aware, the previous tyrant had fathered only one child.
Young Darken muttered something under his breath, and Panis yanked him up by the arm. “What did you just say to me, boy?”
“I said that I’m the only son you have whether you like it or not, and I’m the rightful heir,” young Darken spat , his eyes tearing up despite his verbal defiance.
“Perhaps not this year or next, but one day there will be another son - stronger, braver, better than you will ever be. I’ve already told you of the prophecy.” Panis gazed at his child with distaste. “Never think that I don’t know what you are. I see it in your eyes every time I’m forced to look at you. I see the evil in you.”
Dear Spirits! Was the man taunting his own child about the prophecy that had attended Darken’s birth? Verna was trying to make sense of the scene unfolding before her eyes, keenly aware of the barely suppressed rage of the man who watched with her.
What father would do such a thing? Any parent knowing of such a portent would surely have tried to avert it with loving guidance, not belittlement and cruelty. What better method could there be of insuring a child’s hatred?
“If hating you means I’m evil, then I’m glad of it,” the boy countered hotly, not bothering to wipe away the tears streaking down his face. “You killed Mother. I haven’t forgotten, and I’ll never forgive you.”
His father’s answering slap sent Darken sprawling against the wall. “Happy Rahlmas, Darken!” Then Panis turned on his heel and left the room, locking the door behind him as the room went dark.
++++
“Sister Verna, you’ve had the pleasure of observing one of the many joyful Rahlmas Day celebrations of my youth,” Darken tried to quip, but his attempt at flippancy was belied by the catch in his voice. “Can you tell me why I’m being subjected to this? I lived through these events, and I don’t care to be reminded of them.”
Verna could only shake her head. “I am only the conduit for these visions, Rahl, nothing more.” Then her curiosity got the better of her. “What did your father mean - another, better son?”
Darken looked genuinely surprised. “Haven’t you guessed by now, Sister Verna? I thought the Creator knew everything.”
“As She does,” Verna answered. “But that doesn’t mean She has revealed them to me. I am -“
Darken help up his free hand in an imperious gesture, cutting her off. “Wait. Something else is happening.”
++++
Young Darken was slouched over the wooden table in the same dismal room, staring at nothing. Only hours seemed to have passed since his encounter with his father. The quills left to him by Panis Rahl lay scattered and broken on the flagstone floor. Pages out of the lesson books had been torn out, balled up and thrown against the walls. The pitcher had been shattered, its contents pooling around young Darken’s feet.
There was a sound of a key turning in the lock, and the heavy door swung inward to reveal another man, much the same age as Panis Rahl, but clad in the uniform of the Dragon Corps. In his arms the soldier cradled a cloth-covered plate
“My Lord, I managed to slip up here before I have to be at your father’s side. I don’t have much time, but I thought that after so many hours spent over your studies that you might be hungry.” He respectfully set down the plate on the table. Raising his hand it appeared as if he were about to give the boy a comforting pat on the shoulder, but stopped himself. “My wife makes a wonderful dumpling soup, and the roast duck is still warm. She baked fresh bread, too. I know it’s not the royal fare you are accustomed to, but it’s hearty and filling.” As if ashamed of saying too much, the soldier stepped away and started toward the door.
“Thank you, Captain Egremont, but I’m not hungry,” young Darken said, gazing up at the older man’s retreating back. “My father and I had another argument.”
“Yes, I know,” the captain acknowledged quietly. “You shouldn’t take everything your father says to heart, my lord. He has a kingdom to rule and many responsibilities. I’m sure he didn’t mean anything by it.” The man seemed to be trying to convince himself of the truth of his words.
“He means every word, Egremont,” young Darken cried out. “For as long as I can remember Father has called me names - weak, stupid, coward, evil.” The boy’s tears had dried, leaving his face covered by streaks of grime where he had wiped his inky hands over his cheeks. “You’ve known me since I was born. Do you agree with Father ?” he asked, gazing anxiously at the captain. “And don’t just tell me what you think I want to hear.”
Egremont, foregoing protocol for the moment, came back and knelt next to the ink-stained table, looking Darken in the eyes. “I think, young Lord Rahl, that if you can control your anger and learn from your father’s mistakes, you have the makings of a fine ruler. I also know that if you were my son, I would never - ” The captain, whose voice had become progressively hoarse during this recitation, was suddenly overcome of a fit of coughing that prevented him from voicing any more of his thoughts.
Once he had regained his breath, Egremont got to his feet and looked around at the wreckage Darken had made of the chamber. “I think it would be wise, my Lord, to clean up this room before your father returns. I know you can’t repair what’s already broken, but you can at least pick up the pieces.”
“I have to go now, Darken, your father is waiting.” It was the first time the captain had used the boy’s given name, a serious breach of royal protocol, but unremarked upon. “I know you’re not hungry, but I’ll leave this plate here just in case you change your mind.” With obvious reluctance, Egremont turned and left the room, closing the door quietly behind him.
++++
“There goes the father I should have had.” Darken whispered, his voice so low that Verna could hardly make out the words. “But if that had been the case,“ he added, giving her a twisted smile,” I wouldn’t be a Rahl, there would be no prophecy, no Seeker of Truth, the Boxes of Orden would be scattered and where would all of us be today?”
“It would have been better if you had never been born,” Verna shot back, feeling a stab of remorse as soon as the words left her lips. She had been affected more than she would like to admit by the visions she had witnessed thus far.
While Darken’s bleak childhood could never be an excuse for the atrocities he had committed, it did much to explain the man he had become.
“Ah - now you sound just like my father.” Darken appeared to have regained his infamous Rahl composure, his blue eyes now cold and distant. “And look what happened to him.”
As if on cue, the world around them went dark once more as the events of the past swirled around them ever faster.
++++
“It’s done,” Panis Rahl told his fourteen-year old son as they stood in the throne room - empty now, so late at night on Rahlmas Eve. “You were born under a prophecy of evil and now I’ve balanced the scales. The second prophecy has been fulfilled. Your brother, my true son, will be born within the week, and he will mete out the justice and vengeance you deserve for your crimes.”
“What crimes? I’ve done nothing that you haven’t done yourself, Father.” Darken’s features were an expressionless mask as he faced the man who had sired him, and who now announced his death.
“But you will, Darken, you will.” Panis’s face was flushed with exultation and strong drink. “And I will have a son more powerful than you can ever imagine. He will be named the Seeker of Truth, he will destroy you, and he will be the greatest War Wizard in three thousand years. What father could ask more?
“Where will he be born, this magnificent brother of mine?” Darken filled his father’s goblet to the brim with more wine, smiling as Panis threw back his head and downed the contents in one swallow. “Or don’t you know where the mother has gone? How can you be sure some other man hasn’t beaten you to the mark? Maybe this prodigy isn’t your son at all.”
“No other man has had her! I made sure of that. She thinks I’m going to marry her. She’s…she’s… from a purfull - “Panis struggled to form coherent words while holding out the goblet which Darken obligingly filled again. “Her father was wunz my fren…Zee…Zeddicuz Zoorlander - powfur wizardz in tha familee.” Panis waved the cup around, spattering the floors and walls with its contents.
“But where has she gone, Lord Rahl, this mother of your son?” Darken leaned over and whispered in his father’s ear. “Where is she hiding? Maybe she wants to keep you away from the boy. Perhaps she’s laughing at you behind your back - you disgusting drunken fool.”
By now, Panis was so befuddled with drink that his son’s insult barely registered. “I know whur she iz…making shur she and boy are sav - “
“But where? If something happens to you, how will anyone get word to her?” Darken queried, now assuming the guise of a concerned older brother.
“Bre….Brenn….Brennidon.” Panis finally managed to stammer. As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he gaped down in confusion, watching as his life’s blood mingled with the spilled wine on the marble floor.
“Thank you, Father,” Darken purred, withdrawing his blade with one smooth motion as Panis Rahl’s lifeless body slumped against the foot of his throne. “Those are the sweetest words you’ve ever spoken to me.”
++++
Another infant wailed in the dark. But this time there was no cradle, no royal trappings, no nurse, only a young terrified mother clinging to her newborn child as screams filled the air.
The screams of mothers, of fathers, of children.
The screams that never stopped.
++++
“Enough! I’ve seen enough!” Darken tore his fingers out of Sister Verna’s grip and stumbled back to the foot of his bed, where he sagged against the bedpost. “The Prophecy was right, my father was right, you were right. I’m everything you thought and worse. But I had to protect myself, don’t you understand? That was all I could think about. I had to prove I could be strong, that I was ruthless, that I was everything my father wanted me to be.”
Why was he begging this woman for understanding? Darken was the Lord Rahl. He groveled before no one.
Enraged, guilt-stricken and humiliated, wanting to throttle the person who had witnessed and forced him to relive his past sorrows and cruelty, Darken lunged at Verna - and stumbled right through her.
Yet she still remained standing where they had first joined hands, incorporeal once more.
Darken pulled himself off the floor, grabbing onto the edge of the mantle for leverage. He couldn’t bring himself to meet Verna’s stare. He knew what he would find there.
Loathing.
Contempt.
Accusation.
“There are no excuses for the crimes you have committed, Darken Rahl.” Verna declared, her voice so deep with authority that she might have been the Creator Herself.
“I don’t regret what I did to my father, and I never will,” Darken asserted, finally bringing himself to face her judgmental gaze. “But Brennidon….that was different. If I were faced with the choice again, I would have taken a different path. It…haunts me.”
He had never made that admission to anyone in his life.
“And what about the plagues, the quads, the experiments at the Keep of Edron, the murder of the Confessors? Do those also haunt your dreams?” Vera asked, her eyes blazing.
The weariness Darken had felt earlier in the evening was as nothing compared to the bone-crushing fatigue that swept over him now. “We are at war, Sister Verna. I have felt compelled to take certain steps to defend myself and D’Hara. I did not initiate the invasion of the Midlands, but, yes, I have continued it.
“The Seeker - my brother, who, incidentally, now has all three Boxes of Orden - is sworn to kill me. That prophecy has been hanging over my head for decades, and you are fully aware of the prophecy of my monstrosity that preceded my birth. Do you have any idea what it felt like to grow up under such a shadow? Am I on trial here tonight before the Creator? Is that what this is all about? If such is the case, why not just condemn me now and have done with it? I cannot change what I have done.”
Verna didn’t reply, once more seeming to reach inside herself, listening to that voice he couldn’t hear.
The voice Darken had never been able to hear.
++++
Dear Creator, Mother of us all, help me to understand, Verna pleaded. You told me what to do, but not what I would see. Everything has become so complicated. Why didn’t you warn me?
The Seeker and Darken Rahl were brothers, their paths set in conflict before either had been born. It seemed grotesquely unjust, and had sent the world around the two men into chaos and bloodshed. As much as Verna might admire Richard both as the Seeker, and as the wizard he might one day become, she wasn’t enamored by the fact that he now possessed the Boxes of Orden.
What am I supposed to do next? What am I supposed to say?
The silence seemed to stretch on forever as Verna waited for an answer that didn’t come. She recalled the deceptively simple words the Creator had spoken to her earlier.
Past.
Present.
Future.
You will know what to say when the time comes.
“No,” Verna finally answered Darken’s question, “I have no authority to put you on trial. That is not what She wants, or why I’m here. She wants you to see, to listen, to understand.” She then stood silent, gazing into the flames. “And I am to do the same.”
She reached out to her enemy. “Take my hand again. We have left the past behind where it belongs, now we must see the present.”
Wordlessly, driven by an impulse he didn’t comprehend, Darken obeyed.
Next: Part 3 - Present and Future
Read Part 1 Here
A tale of how the fearsome tyrant, Darken Rahl, learned to keep the true spirit of Rahlmas - and Creatormas - in his heart, and of the reluctant guide who showed him the way.
Characters: Darken Rahl, Sister Verna.
With appearance by: General Egremont, Panis Rahl, Mord’Sith Cara, Richard Cypher Rahl, Kahlan Amnell, Jennsen Rahl, Zeddicus Zorander, Chase Brandstone, Emma Brandstone, Queen Margaret Rahl, Joseph Egremont and the Creator.
Total Length: 15, 500~
Rating: All- with some minor violence consistent with canon.
Spoilers: This story occurs after the events in Fever, but prior to Reckoning.
Beta:
hrhrionastar She was was amazing to help during her exams. My heartfelt thanks for everything, but especially for helping me ponder those pesky plot-holes and for helping me get all of my Cratchits Egremonts straight. Thanks also for letting me use her original idea of Creatormas for my story.
Summary: Miracles are always possible, even for the darkest heart, if one is only willing to take the hand that is offered to you.
The Past
Darken found himself standing by a cradle, looking into clear blue eyes far more innocent than his own. The infant boy was screaming in distress, his dark hair damp with fever.
Then an all too familiar form materialized through the mist, a man whose arrogantly handsome face was set in harsh lines as he stared dispassionately at the squalling child.
A nursemaid then appeared at Darken’s side, oblivious to his presence. ”My Lord, this illness has been inflicted by dark magic. Shouldn’t you send for the wizard? Surely he can heal the child,” she implored.
“Please, Panis! Please help our child.” Another woman was speaking, her form hidden in shadow, her voice hoarse with tears. “If Zeddicus can heal Darken, why won’t you send for him?”
“No,” Panis Rahl replied flatly, turning away from his son. “Let him die.”
++++
Darken’s breath caught in his throat. “I was never told of this. The constant nightmares - I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t haunted by them.”
He felt Verna’s eyes boring into him but said nothing more. Darken would never reveal to a living soul that he had seen the green fires of the Underworld long before he had made his bargain with the Keeper.
++++
The scene before them had shifted again.
Now Darken and Verna stood in a sunlit room filled with fragrance of jasmine. It was a bedchamber in the People’s Palace, but not his own. A small boy, perhaps three years of age, sat on the floor drawing on a ragged piece of parchment when a young woman adorned in a dark red dress danced into the room and swept him up in her arms.
“Happy Rahlmas, my darling? Did you like all your toys?” She nuzzled the boy’s neck causing him to giggle. The woman’s long brown hair mingled with his as she whispered into the child’s ear. He laughed again, as did she, a clear sweet sound.
“Mother” Darken murmured, pierced to the core at the lilt of her voice. His mother’s features had faded in his memory, but never her laugh, or the scent of her hair, or the feel of her arms around him. No portraits of Queen Margaret Rahl hung in the palace, and Darken sometimes wondered if he had conjured up her very existence out of his own desperate longing.
But there she was - so close, so real.
Darken tried to pull away from his companion.
“No, Rahl.” Verna warned. “She is beyond your reach and cannot see you. We are only observers.”
“Put me down, Mama. I want to give you my present,” the child demanded. When the young queen complied, still laughing, the little boy fetched the scrawled drawing he had been laboring over earlier and presented it to her. “Happy Rahlmas, Mama. Do you like it? I made it myself. It’s a picture of our family - even Father.”
Taking the dog-eared parchment in her slender fingers, Margaret exclaimed over its beauty. “It’s wonderful, Darken, just what I wanted. How did you ever know?” She hugged him tight against her. “I have something else for you, sweetheart, but don’t tell your father. You know how he is.” The queen placed a piece of toffee into the child’s hand which he quickly popped in his mouth.
“I’ve warned you against coddling that boy, Margaret.” Panis Rahl strode into the chamber and pulled Darken roughly out of his mother’s arms, plopping him on the floor. Snatching the drawing out of his wife’s hands, the man scowled. “What are these scribbles supposed to be? Drawing is a woman’s frippery, Darken.” With that, Panis ripped the parchment into shreds over the protesting cries of his wife and child.
“Stop crying, both of you,” he ordered. “We have guests, and I won’t tolerate being embarrassed by my wife and child. After Rahlmas, I’m sending Darken away for a few months. He will be well cared for at the Mord’Sith temple, and you, Margaret, will have to learn that your first priority is your husband, not your son. My heir must learn to be strong, and he can’t do that with a scatter-brained woman catering to his every whim.”
As Margaret looked up at her husband, dark eyes wide with mute appeal, her brown hair fell back from her face.
Darken hissed when he saw the healing bruises around her eyes, on her cheek and neck. “The bastard! I wish I could kill him again!” His free hand clenched into a fist as he started forward, this time only to have the figures of his father, mother and Darken’s younger self dissolve around him as if they had never existed.
++++
The boy sat on the floor, his back against the rough stone of the small room, his expression set in a sullen scowl . He could not have been more than nine years of age, Verna surmised, yet she could already recognize in him the features of the man standing next to her.
The only objects surrounding the boy in the tiny chamber were a bare cot, a small table with a pile of books and scrolls, a pitcher of water and a wooden bench.
As Verna watched, the hard-faced blond man who had earlier taken the younger Darken out of his mother’s arms pushed open the door and placed a few sharpened quills along with a bowl of ink down on the table. From Darken’s earlier comment, Verna knew this could only be Panis Rahl, the ruler who had started the endless wars, almost equaling his son in tyranny.
“There! Once you correct your mistakes, I might let you join us for Rahlmas dinner, but that is all. Your presents are right there on that table.” The man growled, obviously impatient to be out of his son’s presence. “It is becoming very apparent that you will never be fit to rule D’Hara. You’re as weak as your mother, notwithstanding the prophecy. I would give anything to have my other boy with me - the son I can take pride in.”
Verna wondered to whom Panis Rahl was referring. As far as she was aware, the previous tyrant had fathered only one child.
Young Darken muttered something under his breath, and Panis yanked him up by the arm. “What did you just say to me, boy?”
“I said that I’m the only son you have whether you like it or not, and I’m the rightful heir,” young Darken spat , his eyes tearing up despite his verbal defiance.
“Perhaps not this year or next, but one day there will be another son - stronger, braver, better than you will ever be. I’ve already told you of the prophecy.” Panis gazed at his child with distaste. “Never think that I don’t know what you are. I see it in your eyes every time I’m forced to look at you. I see the evil in you.”
Dear Spirits! Was the man taunting his own child about the prophecy that had attended Darken’s birth? Verna was trying to make sense of the scene unfolding before her eyes, keenly aware of the barely suppressed rage of the man who watched with her.
What father would do such a thing? Any parent knowing of such a portent would surely have tried to avert it with loving guidance, not belittlement and cruelty. What better method could there be of insuring a child’s hatred?
“If hating you means I’m evil, then I’m glad of it,” the boy countered hotly, not bothering to wipe away the tears streaking down his face. “You killed Mother. I haven’t forgotten, and I’ll never forgive you.”
His father’s answering slap sent Darken sprawling against the wall. “Happy Rahlmas, Darken!” Then Panis turned on his heel and left the room, locking the door behind him as the room went dark.
++++
“Sister Verna, you’ve had the pleasure of observing one of the many joyful Rahlmas Day celebrations of my youth,” Darken tried to quip, but his attempt at flippancy was belied by the catch in his voice. “Can you tell me why I’m being subjected to this? I lived through these events, and I don’t care to be reminded of them.”
Verna could only shake her head. “I am only the conduit for these visions, Rahl, nothing more.” Then her curiosity got the better of her. “What did your father mean - another, better son?”
Darken looked genuinely surprised. “Haven’t you guessed by now, Sister Verna? I thought the Creator knew everything.”
“As She does,” Verna answered. “But that doesn’t mean She has revealed them to me. I am -“
Darken help up his free hand in an imperious gesture, cutting her off. “Wait. Something else is happening.”
++++
Young Darken was slouched over the wooden table in the same dismal room, staring at nothing. Only hours seemed to have passed since his encounter with his father. The quills left to him by Panis Rahl lay scattered and broken on the flagstone floor. Pages out of the lesson books had been torn out, balled up and thrown against the walls. The pitcher had been shattered, its contents pooling around young Darken’s feet.
There was a sound of a key turning in the lock, and the heavy door swung inward to reveal another man, much the same age as Panis Rahl, but clad in the uniform of the Dragon Corps. In his arms the soldier cradled a cloth-covered plate
“My Lord, I managed to slip up here before I have to be at your father’s side. I don’t have much time, but I thought that after so many hours spent over your studies that you might be hungry.” He respectfully set down the plate on the table. Raising his hand it appeared as if he were about to give the boy a comforting pat on the shoulder, but stopped himself. “My wife makes a wonderful dumpling soup, and the roast duck is still warm. She baked fresh bread, too. I know it’s not the royal fare you are accustomed to, but it’s hearty and filling.” As if ashamed of saying too much, the soldier stepped away and started toward the door.
“Thank you, Captain Egremont, but I’m not hungry,” young Darken said, gazing up at the older man’s retreating back. “My father and I had another argument.”
“Yes, I know,” the captain acknowledged quietly. “You shouldn’t take everything your father says to heart, my lord. He has a kingdom to rule and many responsibilities. I’m sure he didn’t mean anything by it.” The man seemed to be trying to convince himself of the truth of his words.
“He means every word, Egremont,” young Darken cried out. “For as long as I can remember Father has called me names - weak, stupid, coward, evil.” The boy’s tears had dried, leaving his face covered by streaks of grime where he had wiped his inky hands over his cheeks. “You’ve known me since I was born. Do you agree with Father ?” he asked, gazing anxiously at the captain. “And don’t just tell me what you think I want to hear.”
Egremont, foregoing protocol for the moment, came back and knelt next to the ink-stained table, looking Darken in the eyes. “I think, young Lord Rahl, that if you can control your anger and learn from your father’s mistakes, you have the makings of a fine ruler. I also know that if you were my son, I would never - ” The captain, whose voice had become progressively hoarse during this recitation, was suddenly overcome of a fit of coughing that prevented him from voicing any more of his thoughts.
Once he had regained his breath, Egremont got to his feet and looked around at the wreckage Darken had made of the chamber. “I think it would be wise, my Lord, to clean up this room before your father returns. I know you can’t repair what’s already broken, but you can at least pick up the pieces.”
“I have to go now, Darken, your father is waiting.” It was the first time the captain had used the boy’s given name, a serious breach of royal protocol, but unremarked upon. “I know you’re not hungry, but I’ll leave this plate here just in case you change your mind.” With obvious reluctance, Egremont turned and left the room, closing the door quietly behind him.
++++
“There goes the father I should have had.” Darken whispered, his voice so low that Verna could hardly make out the words. “But if that had been the case,“ he added, giving her a twisted smile,” I wouldn’t be a Rahl, there would be no prophecy, no Seeker of Truth, the Boxes of Orden would be scattered and where would all of us be today?”
“It would have been better if you had never been born,” Verna shot back, feeling a stab of remorse as soon as the words left her lips. She had been affected more than she would like to admit by the visions she had witnessed thus far.
While Darken’s bleak childhood could never be an excuse for the atrocities he had committed, it did much to explain the man he had become.
“Ah - now you sound just like my father.” Darken appeared to have regained his infamous Rahl composure, his blue eyes now cold and distant. “And look what happened to him.”
As if on cue, the world around them went dark once more as the events of the past swirled around them ever faster.
++++
“It’s done,” Panis Rahl told his fourteen-year old son as they stood in the throne room - empty now, so late at night on Rahlmas Eve. “You were born under a prophecy of evil and now I’ve balanced the scales. The second prophecy has been fulfilled. Your brother, my true son, will be born within the week, and he will mete out the justice and vengeance you deserve for your crimes.”
“What crimes? I’ve done nothing that you haven’t done yourself, Father.” Darken’s features were an expressionless mask as he faced the man who had sired him, and who now announced his death.
“But you will, Darken, you will.” Panis’s face was flushed with exultation and strong drink. “And I will have a son more powerful than you can ever imagine. He will be named the Seeker of Truth, he will destroy you, and he will be the greatest War Wizard in three thousand years. What father could ask more?
“Where will he be born, this magnificent brother of mine?” Darken filled his father’s goblet to the brim with more wine, smiling as Panis threw back his head and downed the contents in one swallow. “Or don’t you know where the mother has gone? How can you be sure some other man hasn’t beaten you to the mark? Maybe this prodigy isn’t your son at all.”
“No other man has had her! I made sure of that. She thinks I’m going to marry her. She’s…she’s… from a purfull - “Panis struggled to form coherent words while holding out the goblet which Darken obligingly filled again. “Her father was wunz my fren…Zee…Zeddicuz Zoorlander - powfur wizardz in tha familee.” Panis waved the cup around, spattering the floors and walls with its contents.
“But where has she gone, Lord Rahl, this mother of your son?” Darken leaned over and whispered in his father’s ear. “Where is she hiding? Maybe she wants to keep you away from the boy. Perhaps she’s laughing at you behind your back - you disgusting drunken fool.”
By now, Panis was so befuddled with drink that his son’s insult barely registered. “I know whur she iz…making shur she and boy are sav - “
“But where? If something happens to you, how will anyone get word to her?” Darken queried, now assuming the guise of a concerned older brother.
“Bre….Brenn….Brennidon.” Panis finally managed to stammer. As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he gaped down in confusion, watching as his life’s blood mingled with the spilled wine on the marble floor.
“Thank you, Father,” Darken purred, withdrawing his blade with one smooth motion as Panis Rahl’s lifeless body slumped against the foot of his throne. “Those are the sweetest words you’ve ever spoken to me.”
++++
Another infant wailed in the dark. But this time there was no cradle, no royal trappings, no nurse, only a young terrified mother clinging to her newborn child as screams filled the air.
The screams of mothers, of fathers, of children.
The screams that never stopped.
++++
“Enough! I’ve seen enough!” Darken tore his fingers out of Sister Verna’s grip and stumbled back to the foot of his bed, where he sagged against the bedpost. “The Prophecy was right, my father was right, you were right. I’m everything you thought and worse. But I had to protect myself, don’t you understand? That was all I could think about. I had to prove I could be strong, that I was ruthless, that I was everything my father wanted me to be.”
Why was he begging this woman for understanding? Darken was the Lord Rahl. He groveled before no one.
Enraged, guilt-stricken and humiliated, wanting to throttle the person who had witnessed and forced him to relive his past sorrows and cruelty, Darken lunged at Verna - and stumbled right through her.
Yet she still remained standing where they had first joined hands, incorporeal once more.
Darken pulled himself off the floor, grabbing onto the edge of the mantle for leverage. He couldn’t bring himself to meet Verna’s stare. He knew what he would find there.
Loathing.
Contempt.
Accusation.
“There are no excuses for the crimes you have committed, Darken Rahl.” Verna declared, her voice so deep with authority that she might have been the Creator Herself.
“I don’t regret what I did to my father, and I never will,” Darken asserted, finally bringing himself to face her judgmental gaze. “But Brennidon….that was different. If I were faced with the choice again, I would have taken a different path. It…haunts me.”
He had never made that admission to anyone in his life.
“And what about the plagues, the quads, the experiments at the Keep of Edron, the murder of the Confessors? Do those also haunt your dreams?” Vera asked, her eyes blazing.
The weariness Darken had felt earlier in the evening was as nothing compared to the bone-crushing fatigue that swept over him now. “We are at war, Sister Verna. I have felt compelled to take certain steps to defend myself and D’Hara. I did not initiate the invasion of the Midlands, but, yes, I have continued it.
“The Seeker - my brother, who, incidentally, now has all three Boxes of Orden - is sworn to kill me. That prophecy has been hanging over my head for decades, and you are fully aware of the prophecy of my monstrosity that preceded my birth. Do you have any idea what it felt like to grow up under such a shadow? Am I on trial here tonight before the Creator? Is that what this is all about? If such is the case, why not just condemn me now and have done with it? I cannot change what I have done.”
Verna didn’t reply, once more seeming to reach inside herself, listening to that voice he couldn’t hear.
The voice Darken had never been able to hear.
++++
Dear Creator, Mother of us all, help me to understand, Verna pleaded. You told me what to do, but not what I would see. Everything has become so complicated. Why didn’t you warn me?
The Seeker and Darken Rahl were brothers, their paths set in conflict before either had been born. It seemed grotesquely unjust, and had sent the world around the two men into chaos and bloodshed. As much as Verna might admire Richard both as the Seeker, and as the wizard he might one day become, she wasn’t enamored by the fact that he now possessed the Boxes of Orden.
What am I supposed to do next? What am I supposed to say?
The silence seemed to stretch on forever as Verna waited for an answer that didn’t come. She recalled the deceptively simple words the Creator had spoken to her earlier.
Past.
Present.
Future.
You will know what to say when the time comes.
“No,” Verna finally answered Darken’s question, “I have no authority to put you on trial. That is not what She wants, or why I’m here. She wants you to see, to listen, to understand.” She then stood silent, gazing into the flames. “And I am to do the same.”
She reached out to her enemy. “Take my hand again. We have left the past behind where it belongs, now we must see the present.”
Wordlessly, driven by an impulse he didn’t comprehend, Darken obeyed.
Next: Part 3 - Present and Future
Read Part 1 Here