Gods of Malcea ✔️

T W E N T Y - T W O

"It is difficult to love someone who loves you, but easy to hate someone who loves you, and love someone who hates you." 

-Xamdú

____________________________________

"Up. Up above, far into the sky... The heavens sing. The earth cries. Can you see? There is much beauty there. Never do they see a day of winter or much suffering as we have."

Karos looked to the dull, gray sky. His eyes narrowed and his lips pursed. He never looked to the skies these days.

 When there was sun, he glanced away. As a fire started, his back turned. Everything blue and warm reminded him of something he lost. All he felt was bitterness. With the cold, chilling air of winter, that bitterness became sadness.

"Dragons are demons born from the fires of the deepest realms of hell." 

"And why is that?" Karos questioned causing his father to stare at him with the same set of glaring, green eyes. 

"The Relic states it. What is written is as so."

"Whether it is a book or fairytales told to scare or warn you, I do not believe in them. I am tired of your tales and lies," Karos said with an abruptness that took his father by surprise. The disdain in his voice was quite apparent and he made no attempt at hiding it from him.

"Lies? You think The Relic is a book of lies now? Has your whore of a mother been spouting more nonsense to you?" 

"She is dead. She is dead because of you. I would be as well if you had it your way." 

"Nonsense." He put up his hand a shooed the idea away. "Such nonsense."

"A demon of hell, as you would say, had saved me from your 'said' heaven."

Karos rose with a fire in his eyes now. 

"You had lied to me. You had lied to everyone!"

"...So you had seen one in human form, had you?"

Karos flicked his eyes back onto his father who sat comfortably, quite calm and relaxed. He hated that most about him. His disposition was fitting for his place of power, but not for a father. 

"You said it had saved your life? It would not have done it out of kindness... You had something it was in need of. That was the only way you could have ever survived an encounter with them in human form."

Karos stayed silent.

"That is when they are the most deadliest."

"And how would you know?" Karos inquired. "Why would you allow us to kill such people? They live and breathe just as us! They think, they feel, and, yet, you passed them off as creatures who mindlessly set fire to our towns and terrorize us."

His father rose from his cushioned chair and walked towards the window.

"Let me tell you a story..." His father's voice was low, barely above a whisper which made Karos sharpen his ears and steel his resolve.

"A story from long, long ago... Because in the beginning, it was not always like this." Karos saw a faint, glimmer of a smile form on his lips.

"We were once friends, lovers, even...the dragons and humans...we are the sole reason why they possess such forms. You and I. Our blood. We began this." 

Karos' lips parted. 

"A dragon fell in love with a human. Our ancestor. That is all that it took to cause the world to burn and sink into depravity and chaos."