"Tell me about the Curse."
Thane appears beside the cot, the moonlight lending strength to his mirage, making him look almost human. "Normal people would ask who their birth mother was."
I play with the flames on the candle. "My mother is Rhea Ironfang."
Thane sighs. "Very well, Valka." His fingertips stir the air in the room, blowing the candles out. Shadows whisper as the wind begins to take shape on his fingers, little figures coming alive with the light of the moon reflecting through them. "What do you know of the first Ebonheart king?"
I search the corners of history I've been forced to learn, half-remembered books I'd consumed out of sheer boredom while looking after father. "Tiber Draemont was borne of Queen Aurelia and her assigned guardian who fell in love with her. An abomination even the Goddess frowned upon, such that she cast out her most first and most favoured son, Thandric, cursing him to live as a mortal. And even after his death, she condemned him to spend all eternity alone."
A sad smile spreads on Thane's lips. "She was beautiful. Aurelia..." He blinks and like magic, whatever shadow came over him clears.
But something about it chafes. The fondness with which he speaks her name like he knew her.
He doesn't dwell on it, however. His hands paint motion across the room. A boy with bronze hair, a crown too heavy for his shoulders, stomps, laughing with brothers. The spears and arrows being thrown at the bronze boy who runs, barely escaping.
"Humans and werewolves are not so different, you see," Thane says sagely. "They fear that which they cannot control or understand. Prince Tiber couldn't be a part of a pack as his gifts surpassed any Alphas' to ever live. He was bigger, faster, stronger. A feared and respected warrior.
"Until they discovered how different he really was. Only then was it revealed that Tiber was no son of man or wolf."
Tiber's figure takes a different shape. Something black, grotesque and red eyed. Terrifying enough to haunt dreams and own nightmares. "The Moon Goddess knew that having a child of a god on earth was hardly a wise option. So, upon Tiber's birth, she had locked three thirds of his powers within his body, the seal only to be broken when Tiber made his first kill.
"Tiber and his brothers often fought over the smallest things. With age, the rift caused by being heirs of the royal family tripled and Tiber soon found himself fighting a duel with his younger brother for who might inherit the throne.
"Some say it was an accident. Other accounts say Tiber despised Baldric and took that opportunity to kill him. From my vantage point, it was indeed an accident. The second Tiber killed Baldric, he shifted."
He pinches the air and the figure convulses. The boy transforming into that beast. Flesh rips, bone flashes, a scream that is not quite a sound cuts the air. It's ugly and magnificent at once. "He was barely fifteen and couldn't control the evil within him. He killed every man present, carving a path of bodies through out the arena, and when he was done, he wandered off into the wilds, stuck in that body, stuck in a curse he had no means of undoing.
"He was hunted, prodded, drained of his blood by hunters who wished to understand how to eradicate the beast. Two decades later, he somehow regained his form with no recollection of what he'd done. Upon returning to the only home he knew, he was met with resistance. He learned that shortly after his rampage, his mother had been stoned to death for cheating on her King and laying with whatever demon had spawned him. As a result of Baldric's death, his youngest brother was sat on the throne, now King.
"And there was nothing more King Solaris wanted more than to end Tiber, the only other contestant for the throne. So, he demanded that his brother's head be brought to him, setting bounty hunters after Tiber.
"Left with no choice, Tiber fled, putting the distance of lands and oceans between him and his vengeful brother." The wind-figures become maps and sea-lines and a nameless village on a coast. The conjured Tiber kneels, a lover at a hearth. "He fell for a human and she bore his four sons and two daughters. But his found joy was short-lived as the humans sold him out to his pursuers for the prize placed on his head."
Thane's voice thickens, forming on a small growl as he continues, "They killed his wife, Nia, and two of his children, burning their bodies to ashes. And even then, they stayed on his tail in hot pursuit until Tiber and his children vanished."
Time compresses in his hands. "Several years passed. Decades. Centuries. Nothing was heard of Tiber and soon, he became a forgotten part of history. A classic myth. When an entire generation wishes to bury history, you'd be surprised at how swiftly names become forgotten. In doing so, the old kings of Silvermoor sentenced their descendants to death.
"As you can predict, when Silvermoor was hit almost a millennium later, they found that they knew nothing of their unkillable enemy with such monstrous strength and a thirst for violence and blood. The first wave of attack halved the population of humans and took a quarter from the werewolves. And as the war waged on for years, Silvermoor retreated, while the monsters took prisoners and multiplied. From a family of four survivors, a village was formed. And from that village, a Kingdom grew. Ebonheart. A home for the cursed."
The conjured shapes fall back into nothing. The room smells suddenly of iron and damp earth and the candles are lit once more. "They are called Lycans, Valka, and you have their blood in your veins."
I exhale a cold breath. "I didn't shift after killing that man. You could be mistaken."
"I cannot say for sure why the curse hasn't taken effect," Thane confesses. "But there have been instances where one with Lycan blood doesn't trigger the curse, even after a kill. One, the cursed blood in you is too thinned to make the shift. Two, the dead being a direct kin of the killer. Three, the Goddess has a dark sense of humour and loves to play games with her children, holding off the shift until the worst moment possible."
Sleep weighs heavy on my puffy eyes and I fall back on the thin mattress, much better than my assigned bed in the dormitories. "And if I do not want to be one of them? A monster?"
"While I cannot directly influence your line of thoughts or the decisions you make," Thane's mouth curves into that sad smile again. "You mus understand that there are no wrong sides in this war--"
"You do not think it ruthless of the Demonic King to wipe out a village of innocents--children! My brothers were innocent. They had dreams. All upended for the sake of vengeance? There was nothing left of them to bury! No wrong sides? Fuck that." I raise my hands into the space ahead, fury flaring in my heart. "I will end this useless war, Thane. When every last one of them is dead, there will be no more bloodshed. I may have their foul blood but I hold no sympathy for those savages. I will cut out the heart of their king and dance in his ashes."
Thane's eyes glow strangely in the dark as he acknowledges my words. And maybe it goes from my lips to the Goddess's ears as well, because when I eventually push back the chaos from my mind and fall asleep, I get a visit from the devil himself in my dreams.