Imprisoned Spirit [MadEmperor]

[DragonSong]

Asta winced as the Norbraiths devolved into arguments, Eryck now well and truly backed into a corner. She glanced away, uncomfortable watching it unfold, and caught the way Zephyr was looking at her.

Her brow furrowed, exactly the way Abigail's did, and she raised one eyebrow as she mouthed, What?

Abigail had been a colorful woman: vibrant chestnut hair, freckled olive skin, and bright green eyes, all vivid against her typically modest lady's maid gowns. But if one looked passed that...

Asta could have been her pale, colorless shadow.

[MadEmperor]

Zephyr tore his eyes away, to find Eryck's smug amusement staring at him. The nobleman laughed, though he was obviously disappointed that he hadn't caught Auster in a lie after all. "God, you didn't even know, did you?"

[DragonSong]

Asta suddenly felt distinctly out of the loop. "Know what?" she demanded, scowling at Eryck.

The count sneered. "That you're Hermes' bastard. Which makes you dear Caelan's sister."

Asta snorted, rolling her eyes. "That's not..." Her voice petered out.

Hermes.

Hermes' child.

Except Hermes wasn't real.

Her mouth went dry and she snapped her head around to stare at Zephyr, the question burning in her eyes. "That's not possible," she muttered. "That's—that's not possible, right?"

[MadEmperor]

"I wouldn't have thought so. After me, father was supposed to have been sterile because of... an accident." Zephyr was incredibly perplexed, causing his ability to lie so easily to waver. He could only hope that Eryck didn't take advantage of his thoughtful pause.

[DragonSong]

Asta seemed to have entirely forgotten that they had an audience, let alone one to whom they hadn't told the truth of their identities.

"But that's not possible," she repeated. "Tell me that's not possible."

Eryck, despite his situation, seemed to be delighting in the distress he had caused.

[MadEmperor]

Zephyr couldn't bring himself to answer her or even look her in the eyes.

Ralora glared at her son. "Enough. Who Hermes chose to sleep with is none of our business. He was a fine man, and I will not see his children shamed for it. Do not make your own situation worse. You are fortunate that we do not hand you over to the Mordecai you deceived for him to decide your fate."

Eryck's cruel glee withered as she continued. "I will have your father's final wishes verified, and you will lose your title, along with your inheritance and every bit of your ill-gotten wealth. Then, you will spend the rest of your days working off your sins under the watchful eyes of the Church. Should you leave, the full extent of your crimes will be revealed, and you will be hunted down like a criminal."

[DragonSong]

Eryck bared his teeth at her, but his shoulders were slumped. He was truly trapped by his own misdeeds.

Keryn's eyes were watery, and she shook her head. "It is only to preserve our house's legacy, to honor his original wishes, that you won't be executed yourself for what you did to Father," she hissed at him.

Legacy.

Father.

Asta shook her head, unable to process what was happening. Without another word, she turned on her heel and fled the room.

[MadEmperor]

Zephyr excused himself and ran after her. He could think of nothing else but her, least of all a concept as abstract as justice. If she was his daughter, that changed everything. The world as he knew it would never again be the same.

He looked everywhere for her, asking every staffer he came across if they had seen her. Eventuall, he...

[DragonSong]

The household staff were all in a rather frazzled state, seeing as they had heard some sort of undefined commotion from the private quarters of their employers. They gave Zephyr fractured directions for "Lady Auster", who had fled out into the gardens.

She wanted to keep running, but she didn't know where to go. Or what to be; her human shape was suddenly suffocating, but the idea of a bird—her usual preference when in such a state—brought her too close to the mercy of the wind, and she didn't think she could do that just now. A cat, innocuous and lithe enough to find a good hiding space, was distasteful for similar reasons.

So she found herself slumped on a stone garden bench, head bowed and knees drawn up to her chest, almost childlike as she struggled to control her breathing.

[MadEmperor]

Eventually, he found her. For a few minutes, he just watched her, unsure of what he could possibly say. He could never make it right that he had never been there for her, but what kind of father could a wandering nature spirit be?

Finally he decided to just push through. He approached and quietly sat by her. Softly, he said, "I actually planned to keep in touch with your mother. We even had a system for contacting each other. But she never did. Time slips away from me, and by the time I came looking, she was gone. I never found out where she went."

"If I had known about you—about the possibility of you—I never would have stopped looking. I would have found a way to never forget you were out there."

[DragonSong]

Asta tensed when he sat beside her, but she didn't move away. she shook her head slowly after he spoke--not a denial, not exactly. More...lost.

"I was abandoned," she said dully. "My mother was a shapeshifter who left me to die in the woods. That's what the dryad told me. I--I don't know who Abigail Blythe is. I don't know who you are."

She looked away, arms wrapped tight around her knees. "If--If she wasn't a shapeshifter," she whispered, "if she didn't leave me because I'm bad luck, if she was just some, some woman, just a person with a family and a life, why did she--why was I...?"

She realized she was crying, but she couldn't stop it.

[MadEmperor]

Uncertainly, he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close. "I don't know why she would have abandoned you. It doesn't fit with the wonderful woman she is. But, together, we can find out. I don't know where she is, but I at least know her family took her somewhere closer to Uthlyn to seek treatment for an unspecified illness. I didn't realize that was a pregnancy. I sincerely wish I had."

[DragonSong]

Asta shook her head again, but she let him pull her close. And it was only then that she realized she didn't think she'd ever been truly held in her life.

She devolved into shuddering sobs, curling into Zephyr's side and hiding her face against his chest as her shoulders shook.

Slowly, the sobs passed, and she managed to pull herself away and wipe at her eyes, sniffling. "What...what was she like?" she asked quietly.

[MadEmperor]

Zephyr surprised himself with how much was coming back to him. He smiled fondly. "She was Ralora's lady's maid, but that was only to appease her family. Though she was no mage, her interest in magic worried them. However, to me, her endlessly curious mind was a breath of fresh air in this stifling country. She was a little bookish, but she was also free and even a little wild when she wanted to be."

"I was drawn to her immediately. I didn't know I was capable of romantic love until I met her. At least, that's what I understood to be love. All I can say for certain is that returning to my duty after that period of my life was incredibly difficult."

[DragonSong]

"So, you did...love her, then?" she asked quietly, glancing up at him. He'd said it, but she was still struggling to process the enormity of...well, all of this.

She sniffed and swiped at her eyes again. "Do you think she—she knew? Before you left, did she...know what you are?"

[MadEmperor]

"I don't believe so. But if anyone could have figured it out, it was Abigail. One look at you would have been all the confirmation she needed."

He sighed deeply. "I can only imagine that her family couldn't accept that she'd born a child out of wedlock with a supposed noble that there was no record of. They must have taken you from her."

"I can't bear to think it was her idea to do something so cruel."

[DragonSong]

Asta sniffed again and nodded desolately. She didn't know how to feel about that; she had spent twenty-five years believing that her mother had left her to the mercy of the wilds. And to be perfectly honest, she hadn't given her father much thought in that situation—surely in the tale her dryad foster parent had told her, her father would have simply forgotten her existence once she was suitably abandoned.

The idea that someone might have wanted to keep her, that she may have been taken unwillingly...

She couldn't process that.

"We—" She swallowed thickly. "We should...make sure the Norbraiths are alright. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have run off like that..."

[MadEmperor]

"You were given a lot to process. It's perfectly normal to fear your world being turned upside down. Besides, if you had broken down there, they could have learned that you aren't my sister, but my daughter."

"That said... yes, we should return before they worry too much." He helped her to her feet and they headed back.


After the dust settled, Eryck was lord no longer and was off to the Temple to be made into, if not a better man, a more controllable one. The Norbraith's wished them well, and the two were on their way as mysteriously as they had arrived. Yet, as they headed out of town, something was eating at Zephyr.

[DragonSong]

Asta said a slightly tearful farewell to Windstrider as they departed the manor; the tiny dragon had chosen to remain with Keryn, who nodded very seriously when Asta told her that he preferred chestnuts, and that she should look into finding him additional companionship—they were incredibly social little creatures, after all.

She was so wrapped up in her own thoughts that her took her longer than it might have normally to notice Zephyr's apparent melancholy.

She still didn't know how to feel about what she had learned of their relationship. Father...what did that even mean for them? She wasn't a child, she didn't need a parent—and seeing as she'd never really had one before, she didn't entirely know how she was suppose to react to one.

"...Zephyr?" she tried after a while of walking in silence. "Are you...alright?"

[MadEmperor]

He didn't know how to feel about having a child. Zephyr wasn't exactly promiscuous by any stretch of the imagination, but he had explored the act a few times. Did that mean he could have had others?

And then there was Ralora. Something she said as they left gave him the distinct impression that she knew more about him than he had believed.

suddenly, he noticed Asta speaking. "Oh. Yes. I--did it seem like the Countess had figured out that Hermes and I are the same person? It felt like she did."