He saw her in everything. The sea. The golden sand. The blossoming leaves that would turn all the colours of her mood. The glittering stars. The black velvet sky that stretched out before them and far back into the past.
Mostly, he saw her in the sun.
A great sphere of light which brought life and light to the world. A mighty and powerful thing that without which all would wither and die.
She was his sun.
Would it be better if he no longer had to look upon these things? These things that reminded him of her. Reminded him of what he'd lost. Of what they'd taken from him.
And if he ceased to exist, if he were slain, what then? Would it be preferable to this? This black emptiness. Would it be better if he could simply stop fighting and let death take him? Take him to some place where no living thing dwelled and no sun ever rose.
Would he still be able to close his eyes and recall her form as he always had? Would he be able to summon the memory of her touch as he always had? Would he still hear her voice whisper in his ear in the depths of silence?
He was not certain. And no matter how much he contemplated it, his mind could not fathom a world truly absent of her, could not imagine such desolation. The mere thought of it tore a hole through his soul.
And yet, there at the very far recesses of his mind, he knew it would one day be thus. One day soon perhaps.
And there, without her, he would wither and die in the dark.
An eternity of darkness.
He drank absently of his wine and breathed deep, his thoughts boisterous and violent. With his eyes closed his other senses sharpened, so that the footsteps sounded like thunderclaps against the stone floor of the chamber. His brother's earthy scent conjured thoughts of a distant past, where boys rode beasts of wing up into the mountains and down toward sand and sea. Water kicking up spray in laughing faces. Childish thoughts of peace and immortality.
'Please tell me you've come to say goodbye, brother?' he sighed without turning. 'I could not bear any more of your gloating.'
'I thought you rather enjoyed my gloating?'
'When we were children my patience was an endless thing. Now I am weary.' His soul ached for her. It ached as it always did when it was apart from her. He used to consider it a weakness; but no longer. Now he recognised it for what it had been - fortification. For what he had endured these dark days. For what he may have to endure for an eternity to come. A chill swept down his spine.
'Tis not wise to tell me that, Leo — I will only use it against you when I am given the chance.' His brother's voice was droll, relaxed even. When he turned to look upon him Cal's eyes glinted with bittersweet humour as he moved further into the room.
Despite the light that shone from him; glowing sun-kissed skin, burnished bronze hair, bright golden eyes - there was a darkness that seeped from his very core. A darkness that had only grown with age, a taint that bled from his soul. Leo knew where it lingered, knew its potential, had witnessed its release, but Cal strove hard to keep it hidden from most.
'I assume father does not know you're here?' Leo asked. He knew the answer of course but felt the need to ask all the same.
His brother laughed softly. 'You know as well as I that there are a great many things it is better father does not know.' Glancing curiously around the Tower's interior, his brother's golden eyes were impassive. 'I suppose your stone fortress in the sky becomes you. Even if your men are incompetent fools.' He glanced back over his shoulder in the direction he had just come, unimpressed.
'My men would never harm a son of Ethis who did not strike them, or I, first,' he told him.
Cal smiled, nodding once. 'Well, I did not come here to fight you, brother.'
'And I assume you also did not come to return her to me?'
Cal smiled, sadly, before shaking his head.
'So, then why are you here?' Leo asked tersely. He shot a brief glance at where his sword lay dormant by his bed. He was quicker than Cal, and a better swordsman certainly, however, he could not see his brother's sword where he stood. Had he really come here unarmed? Had he really trusted Leo not to harm him? His chest tightened with some unwelcome emotion.
'Can I not come to see how my little brother fares? Are we truly nought but enemies to each other now?' Cal said, the injured look in his eyes making him seem almost boyish. 'You really want to be alone on this darkest of nights?'
'No. I do not want to be alone. I would have her with me on this darkest of nights.' He retorted, pointedly.
'And I, of course, pale in comparison,' Cal nodded apologetically before moving to take a seat. Settling his tall frame in the chair with his usual casual elegance, he let out a deep sigh before moving forward to help himself to a cup of Leo's darkwine. Taking a quiet sip first, he let his eyes land on Leo heavily. There was a sadness in them, a regret, that Leo did not care for. He glanced away from him.
'It did not have to end this way, it still does not — you know this.' His brother said, quietly.
'I know no such thing,' replied Leo, turning to face him once more. 'In fact, it seems to me that it was always going to end this way...'
The mask of his brother's face slipped just a fraction, his eyes darkening to offer him a lance of disdain. 'Well, if that is so then it is because you have always been the weakest of us.'
Leo smiled, bitterly. 'Is that so?'
'It is.'
He raised his glass in mock celebration. 'Well, thank you for your words of comfort on the eve of my greatest battle, Calate, I shan't forget them.' He took a drink and turned back to gaze out across the Verk Depths. The tides were savage and hungry like his men, like his mind. The moon hung heavy in the dense sky. On the morrow, it would be as high as it could be. On the morrow, his power would be as great as it could be. His greatest battle. For the greatest prize. He could not lose.
He would not lose.
'Being a God comes with accepting your weaknesses and turning them into strengths.' Cal's voice cut through the dogged haze of his thoughts, his tone conversational now. As though he were his friend or trusted council. Or indeed, his elder brother.
'She is both. You know nothing of it.' Leo replied, wearily.
'Yes, I know, Leoth. Zy knows. She knows. I think, somewhere, even father knows.'
'Then you will also know that I will not give her up.' Leo turned, his voice as dark as his eyes. 'That I cease to exist without her?'
'And yet, here you are...existing...'
Leo stepped forward, threateningly. 'You came here to add insult to my injury?'
'I came here to reason with you,' replied Cal, his voice soft, reasoned.
'There is no reason without her.'
'Then Ethis will fall.'
Then that will be your doing, not mine.' Leo replied, turning his words out into the wind. I
'Cannot you see it? There is only one way? You and her... it cannot be, Leo - it cannot! If this... foretelling comes to pass we will all fall!' Cal exploded suddenly, banging his cup down. The jug rattled.
'Lies! All of it!! Since when do we believe the words of mountain-dwelling crones Cal??!! ' Leo roared. 'No being but Gods and those deigned by Gods have the foresight, you know this.'
Cal gave him a hopeless look. 'Your obsession has blinded you... I beg you brother, listen to reason...'
'Azura and I will be together, Cal. I will have her returned to me - no matter the cost.'
Cal's shoulders dropped, resigned. 'We all love her, Leo. Just as you do,' his brother said imploringly after a moment. A new tact, clearly.
Leo gave him a loaded look.
'Very well, not... quite... as you do.'
Closing his eyes, Leo called forth her form to the front of his mind. The soft dusk pink of her lips, the smooth silk of her skin. His body throbbed with need. 'It was more than either of us could contain,' he said, unsure of why he felt the need to explain.
'Because you were weak,' Cal ventured. 'Because in the end, you cared more for the pleasures of each others flesh than anything else. Yes brother, I understand...'
'You understand nothing!' Leo roared. The room shook with rage and fury, the tower groaning at its very foundation. Thunder rumbled darkly in the distance, crackling across the turbid night sky. 'How can you understand something greater than ourselves? Something more precious than the last blossom on a barren wasteland? How can you understand the expanse of eternity being humbled in the face of a love that cannot die? To belong so completely to another that your veins run black at the thought of being apart from them.' He took a step closer, his eyes narrowing with accusation. 'You cannot begin to comprehend what it feels like to have your soul drained of its life force. To have your heart stolen from your body. You, brother, understand nothing.'
Cal took his time before speaking, studying his brother hard, momentarily speechless by the display. Rarely had he heard Leo's voice so thick with passion, it's cadence tremulous with such vulnerability. There was a deep pain just beyond the dark anger of his violet eyes, but Cal saw it for what it truly was - weakness. It had always seemed to him that Leo had been given so many gifts. Too many. The most handsome. The most fearsome. The most clever. The most loyal.
And then, as though he had not already possessed enough, he'd been given Her. A Goddess. Not for the first time envy tore through Cal, but it was joined by something new this time: pity.
Leoth was weak. Leoth was blinded by his love. Cal would not make the same mistake. And though it would hurt, and though it would take fortitude and a strength he wasn't yet sure he possessed - Cal knew how to beat him. Cal knew how to win this war.
With a nod he stood, draining the last remnants of wine from the bronze cup.
'Perhaps there are things I do not understand - love has never been much to my tastes, as you know - But I do know that our entire way of life hangs in the balance as you play this game of war with no thought to what comes after.'
Leo took another step closer but this time, Cal did not flinch. 'War was my only choice,' Leo growled, accusation flaming his voice.
'Oh, but you have played it with such vigour, all the same, have you not?' Cal replied.
'I play to win, brother.' Leo warned, darkly.
'And what will you have won, brother? A dead realm? Your 'barren wasteland'?'
'Her. I will have Azura.'
Cal nodded. 'And when it is done, when we are nought but the long-dead gods of a once glorious age, how much does it pain you to know that it will be your name they curse for its destruction?'
'An eternity of curses means nothing if I am able to hold her in my arms once more.' Leo hated the hopelessness in his tone, the uncertainty in it.
'And what of our lands?' His brother asked. 'What of the scores upon scores of our people who already lie dead in your name? If she knew what you had wrought on your own people... on her people... Think you she would thank you for it? Think you she would see that as love?'
The growl tore from Leo's throat as he flew across the room towards his brother.
'You dare question my devotion to her? Or hers to me?!' his hand wrapped around his brother's throat as he pushed him back hard against the stone wall of the chamber. Cal did not fight, did not tense or show fear, but instead stared him straight in the eye as the air was squeezed slowly from his body. Leo's frame rattled from fury. 'You know nothing!'
Through laboured breaths, Cal spoke. 'I know that no matter who is victorious on the morrow this realm will never be the same for it.' Leo squeezed tighter, his eyes black as the night sky outside. From somewhere Cal found another breath. 'I know that if our mother were here you would have broken her heart as you will surely break Azura's,' he finished choking out the words as his breath stalled in his lungs.
Leo loosed his grip slightly as his brother's golden complexion shrunk completely from his skin. Leaving ashen stone. Did he have it within him to end his brother's existence? If not tonight then on the morrow? On the battlefield. With a roar of anguish, he dropped his hands from his brother's throat and stalked across the room.
'Leave me,' Leo spat, before whipping around to face him. 'The next time we meet one of us will die, brother. Of that, you can be sure.'