Reaching For Stars

⚠🗻The First Shadow

A character study on the First Shadow, the equivalent of a manservant for a king, and a test drive for the world building of Kentytii.

The room is a vast one, with cavernous ceiling arching overhead like the wings of a bird sheltering her chicks and walls curving away around a skylighted underground lake, but small compared to the one next door. The space is filled with tapestries of the finest silks depicting our history, curving wooden shelves holding up old tomes, precious glass sculptures, and a myriad of assorted weapons of all kinds.

Veins of silver, gold, precious stones are inlaid in the walls; couches with the pelt of the Zyrink Weft are arranged in strategic places; and a large, strangely plain-looking desk facing away from the floor-to-ceiling-length window, covered in slates, papers, and bottles of ink and quills, sits in the middle of it all.

It is here that I and all those who have come before me, have spent the majority of our time. Here, in this room of riches accumulated over the centuries. Here, where its very size boasts of importance. Here, where the Leader does his work and the First Shadow does his. This is where I am. This is where I will be. This is where I watch, where I wait, I serve, and learn what monster my master will be.

The place I stand now, and always, is behind the great desk in the middle of the room, between two shelves of old tomes. The entirety of the room unfolds out before me in this corner so that I may watch everything that goes on in it and be ready to answer the beckoning of the Leader.

There is almost always a shadow here, and I am grateful for it. I do not want to be seen. I do not want to be in thoughts of the one who sits at the desk, poring over a sheet of paper. There is no telling what he will do; I have not learned his moods yet.

There are things that the rest of Kentytii does not know about their Leader, like his thoughts, motivations, desires, next strike, or next word of praise. Things that are even beyond imagination for those so blinded by careful calculations of our culture. Things that only I, the First Shadow, will know.

I know the Leader is not emotionless; he has moods as deep and strong as hidden riptides that can flare at any given moment and lead to unimaginable pain. I know he is not all-knowing; he has the Ravan to be his ears inside the wall. I know the Leader is born from pain and blood delivered in this very room. He is moulded by the Leader before him by punches and demands, shaped by the fire of the wrath of the Leader before him until, from the ashes, he rises and seizes the Leader's place.

This room is a throne of blood, carved from countless generations of hatred, hurt, and revenge. It is the nest of the phoenix egg, the place of the next reincarnation, filled with the ashes of so many who have lost their lives so another Leader may take his place. And it is the place where I and all the First Shadows have watched, suffered, and served to nurture the successor, bind his wounds, and give him the strength to rise up to be the next.

Like the Leader, we, the First Shadows, are supposed to die when the new Leader takes his place. We have been the fire to harden the hatchling, and when our master has gone, we must leave with him at the new Leader's hand. This is how it has always been. For centuries, this cycle has never been broken.

Until now.

I do not know why the new Leader has kept me alive. I do not know why I am still to serve him. Do I not know his secrets? Does he not harbour anger towards me? What use am I to him, that I remain alive? Would he not like to vanquish the one who never spoke up, who never lifted a finger in his defence—the only one who saw him as weak and could tell the world about it? I am a danger to him and his title. He should kill me like all the other Leaders have done to surviving First Shadows. That is how it has always been.