The prince was thankful for the evening, when the darkness hid the sun, when the shadows strolled over his back, when the aurora’s glistening hues all bound together in one sweeping, seething inferno, and he could stare at the hues, pace relentlessly, and carve a name for himself in their colors.
 
He would someday. There was no question about it, no quandary, no enigma. He’d triumph, he’d conquer, he’d be better, stronger, faster, and wiser than the rest, slashing his sword across their napes, spouting truths and lies, convictions and promises, resolutions and oaths. The certainty had been molded into his brow, into his restless heart, into the gallant, intrepid knighthood gradually wearing itself into a thin line – one more step over the dashed sanction and he’d be a blackguard, proud and belligerent, seething and unattainable. But he’d be where he craved, where he twisted, where he contorted, deep in those wily calculations, in those carnivore machinations, swindling any force, any enemy, any opponent who deigned to get in his way. It’d be glorious, he told himself as Orsino and he stretched across the blank canvas, as they stole the midnight shades of the evening and wore them like a cloak, beautiful and commanding, a warrior intent on destruction.
 
Then he smiled, reaching his destination with a wild, effervescent grin, possessing the lake all to himself. The sable kitsune at his side glinted, emboldened too, audacious in the presence of everything and anything, lingering along the embankment as Erebos found a location suitable to his task. Instead of thrusting his rapier, his frame, his figure, out along the water, poised to destroy, to ruin, to ravage, he knelt down beside a few long blades of grass, curling his forelegs beneath his chest, eyeing the verdant pieces of greenery as if they had just threatened his family. “I haven’t practiced in a long time,” he murmured to the onyx fox, who merely arched a brow, because the boy had rehearsed, polished, all sorts of savage moments and motions; but he knew what he meant through their connection. The scion had neglected other forms of vehemence in his search for prowess and potential; he’d have to utilize all of them in his pursuits.
 
So the kitsune became quiet, and the youth became incensed, allowing the coiling, the curling, sensation of embers, of brimstone, of legacies scorched and emblazoned, to layer and lacquer down through his skin. They pulsed with vibrancy, with hesitancy (because he’d forgotten their power, their sensation), until he carved a bestial hold on them and felt the invocations surge at the challenge; sparking and sizzling, smoldering and seething – and when he pressed his maw on the length of grass, he watched them ignite into a conflagration. Orsino, wiser than the boy, swept a series of water droplets upon the blaze before they ate away at the ground, before they ran rampant through the Basin and caught everything on fire. Thereafter, when everything had dimmed, they glanced at one another and pieced together the same notion, motion.
 
Again.

  The intensity snaked at his seams, tying and knotting, gnarling and coiling, over the ramparts of his invocations. He summoned them again and again, waited for the inferno at one, sinuous, glorious touch upon a tall blade, watched it simmer, crumple, wither into blackened bits and fade into the midnight allure. Orsino would extinguish it, then they’d start anew, and the boy’s eyes reflected the majesty, the beauty, and the danger before him, blue orbs turned red, flickering and disastrous. Eventually, the movements were swift, quick, rapid, unfolding in tempestuous beats, turbulent swirls, and he’d control them with an instant monstrosity, bending to the commands of Orsino’s fiendish faster, faster. The savagery would radiate, pervade, and glisten, massive and momentous, and he wondered, pondered, how devastating it could be when it rippled across the hides of his opponents, as it whittled down their pelts, as it made them cry out in agony, in misery, in defeat, as they bowed against the ground and withered away to nothing. At his last, marvelous flame, both demons laughed, and only extinguished the beautiful, noxious bloom of treachery and vehemence when another’s movements came from beyond – drawn back into darkness, into shadow, into Stygian wares and subterfuge daggers.
 
It’d been too late though. They’d been spotted, heralding another who was drawn to flames (a moth?), who was sculpted from fire (he glanced at her back, watched the embers lick the air, fanned by nothing but her existence). The boy ignored the bird for now (but Orsino didn’t, beginning his feral hissing and growling before they were even a yard away), rendering and riveting his stare, back to its oceanic depths (blue, blue, and blue, like his mother’s, like his father’s, no longer ensconced in combustion), towards the child. He didn’t know her. He didn’t recognize her markings, her form, or her figure – and since they were striking, full of ash and brimstone, he would’ve remembered her if she’d hastened across his view; but he’d been too preoccupied to dance and waltz with the newest crop of babes and foals. Instead of playing amidst their gatherings or laughing with their antics, providing them with some new ones, he’d been battling, chipping away at the realm, awaiting a moment for justice and revenge, chasing down fiends and infidels too much like himself. The prince missed those days more often than not, when all they did was learn and neglect, feast their eyes on the empire like it was theirs for the taking, giggle and chortle, snort and guffaw, gallop across the vast plains without a single worry for the world, for the future. They’d been carefree, savage and wanting, craving absolution and defiance, and when they’d finally received it, when they’d seen the empires for what they truly were…the results had been shattering.
 
So he smiled, grinned, smirked, and pretended he hadn’t been up to no good, training for moments when his enemies would beg him for mercy (and he’d leave them in the dust, in the ashes, smoking and smoldering, sculpted down into nothing). “I’m practicing my magic.” He glanced at her, the bold features, the spotted hind, the pale forelock, then the dark tassels, speculating on where she’d come from. “I can summon fire, but not like you.” The boy winked, childish and juvenile again, curled amidst the wild grass, born upon the solid, stoic earth, an heir, a scion, a warrior meant for decadence, appeasing the girl who was already coated in flame. “Is it always there? Does it hurt?” He swung his crown towards her spine, where the element burned, intriguing and enigmatic. 

  Erebos would always admit to being fascinated by another’s power. Magic and invocations on their own were intriguing, enticing, and alluring, because they seemed so vast, so endless, so potent and persuasive. He knew his own capabilities and talents, had dug deep into the unrelenting core of his stature, understood what was nestled down in the depths of his veins and the fury of his heart, but to witness what others had, how others could strike, how others could command, demand, and unleash was an entirely different, fascinating emblem, and his gaze rendered all captivation as her fires altered. They could become all sorts of things – the boy watched, eager, fervent fascination lit upon his face, his Cheshire grin, as she morphed the flames to an assemblage of distortions: elephants flapping their massive ears, rabbits hopping, flickering as she described how they were determined by her mood. If she became angry, did they take the shape of an enormous beast? If she were sad, did they wilt, cry, send sparks and shards of tears? He was utterly riveted by the strange embers that didn’t hurt, that didn’t flay, that didn’t burn and seethe and tear down the world – just simply existed, a vector of the child’s choosing.
 
Her excitement was catching, and the boy steadfastly ignored Orsino’s griping for the zealous, ardent foils of sagacity and freedom. Perhaps her enchantments were much like his ability to stay still upon water, only wielded and beneficial to him, to her, not harming, not maiming, anyone else. They’d been gifted and anointed in various ways, and the notion of such consecrations made his smile soften, a more boyish, youthful glow instead of a fox bearing his teeth. “Very interesting,” he stated, meaning the phrase entirely, rising from his curled, prone position and regaining his strong, virile stature, continuing to stare on the rim and fringes of her back, tilting his crown from side to side in quiet perusal. “But it doesn't hurt anyone. Hm.” The gentle blue of his eyes rummaged over hers, pondering over the use of the inferno – wanting to tell her of his own abilities, how much more he’d be and what he’d become, but she’d already begun grinning and unraveling, removing composure for excitement, straining to delight in tales of names and princesses.
 
The grin remained, and a low chuckle glided from his throat, thoroughly amused. She could’ve been for all he knew – it seemed every land had a King, had a Queen, and he only trusted his sire was not the girl’s. She could’ve been born to any wilderness, any peak, any hidden hill, and he nearly asked her of her parentage, of whom she called father, of whom she heralded mother, which rulers sent their children to the Basin (heirs to ice and caverns; they’d all once been, before they were picked and torn apart by time, by space, by cretins). He entreated her, lowered his cranium to stare at her fully, to fixate his gaze on hers again, charming and charismatic, effervescent and obliging, pretending that the name of royalty, that the lineage and legions of sovereignty, ever truly mattered in the scheme of Helovia and its dark, blackened outreaches. “I’m Erebos, and I’m a prince.”
 
He paused, delighting in the play, in the youthful ambience, of days and children who hadn’t been lost to the foreboding acrimony of the lands. “When you are Queen,” he winked, wondering how far she’d actually climb up those throne steps, if she’d trip, if she’d stumbled, if someone else would claim the position well before her and if she’d push them off a cliff for her coronet, “What sort of flame will you show your subjects?”

  The boy flickered back into his quiet, studious flame, watching, waiting, a pupil, a scholar, to enriched patterns and diabolical schemes; notions and sentiments first modeled from his father, then battering down his skull in each and every sweeping moment of his life (the ones not filled and fueled by rage). His eyes took in the gestures of her fire – their lion pride waltzing on giant paws, flexing claws, yawning, intending to consume and swallow the world when their mistress grew – and his smile didn’t fray or fall away. It grew slowly, amused, entertained, by the ways their generations always fell into place. There were others following prior footsteps, bounding for glory, for hallelujahs, for triumph, for fragments of victory that seemed eternal and tangible, attainable because they didn’t know better, because they didn’t understand the impact of loss or heartache, betrayal or greed, cunning or bestowal. It’d started the same for her, and he hoped for the girl’s sake she wouldn’t ever come to comprehend the things he’d seen: Gods turned to monsters, murderers craving debauchery, havoc, and bedlam, crumpled forms of those one never had a chance to cherish, the eerie, soul-splitting revelations of wrath (how they intertwined, how they mauled, how they felt just right, echoing and ricocheting, reverberating and resounding). Or maybe she wanted to be a heathen, and Helovia would be the place for it, for there was always someone howling, waiting at the gates, brewing and concocting, hoping for a chance to ruin, to unravel, to strike the weak.
 
He couldn’t tell what she’d be, not now, when she bounced and buzzed in excitement, revealing and proclaiming her lineage and heritage before he’d even uttered the query. She’d have to be careful, in time, not susceptible to the cunning reaches of those who lavished information just as much as violence, but he took it all in stride, with the same easygoing, charming grin, arching a brow as regally as he could – his veneer the very definition of a prince, hiding all the murky things underneath. “My father is Deimos, the Lord of the Basin.” It was interesting and intriguing to note she’d come from the Edge King’s blood, but didn’t reside there (and he shouldn’t been able to put the pieces together then and there, for he’d fought her mother in the dust and fog, played a part in strengthening the Thief for future endeavors, but he failed to see, to correlate their familiarity). “Do you meet with your dad often?” He inquired, polite, partially curious about the Edge King. The scion had never been told much about him; the only sovereign from the land of clifftops and legends had been Mauja – Tembovu was as much of a mystery as the rest of the layered world.
 
Then she seemed drawn back into the unknown. Perhaps his question had been too much; she hadn’t seen enough of the sovereigns to decide how they’d bow, how they’d quiver, how they’d tremble in her wake. Erebos was half-tempted to tell her how he would show the realms just what he was capable of – let them see, let them feel, let them touch and taste and know the weight of his fury, of his ferocity, of his quiet, unholy, smoldering contempt and abhorrence, but then she seemed settled, sketching out the fires, the intentions, and he was left to be a witness again. Her infernos were an interesting mix he didn’t quite comprehend; the lions stayed, gaping mouths wide and powerful, joined by griffons (winged beasts he’d dreamed of coveting for himself – Orsino grimaced and growled all at once), and otters, jumping, splashing, playing. Maybe she intended to be a peaceful monarch, reigning in serenity and tranquility, a potent staff at her side for when someone displayed the slightest subversion. He tilted his head to scrutinize them with more conviction, eyeing the grind of potent jaws and the wise, omniscient stares. The warrior so wanted to lace and lance his stroke into the nearest set of brush and tell her I’d show them this and watch as the world erupted into one volcanic, seething plunge; but he’d tied himself to control and composure, to deceit and speciousness, for too long to pull himself apart now. Instead, the charismatic reverie of his nature commanded, demanded, an adequate response, and his tongue toiled, furnished by jubilant tones. “Quite a forceful combination. Will your followers fear or cherish you?”

   A part of him wondered what it would’ve been like to have never met his father, and it was difficult to fathom. The Reaper had been a key portion of his life since the very beginning, when he opened his eyes and was struck by the very definition of power and might, life and death, corruption and protection, in the form of one singular beast. He’d loved him, cherished him, walked beside him as they roamed the grounds of their winter home, enjoyed his presence and the small, singular touches his sire had to offer – so little but so grand – and he’d never imagined leaving his shadow. It was a massive one to fill, and he’d accompanied it for many seasons, glancing at its definition, at its control, at its ability to seethe and simmer and safeguard all at once. He’d never admonished the Lord’s figure, yearned to eclipse or destroy it – he simply yearned for it to always be there. Would he have grown so strong, so mighty, so ambitious without Deimos nearby? Without his guidance, his shield, his devotion? They were different cretins, different demons, different souls, but he couldn’t imagine a moment without his father, a tower, a Colossus of the Basin, wreaking havoc and distortion by existing, by compelling unholy fathoms, and by rooting himself deep into the core of the wintery earth to ensure their survival. “I’m sure you will, soon enough,” he assured her through all the fires, the flames, the mercies of his mother’s tact and kindness.
 
But he’d never thought of following in his footsteps, of becoming King and Lord and all mighty ruler of a world frozen and resolved. His ambitions were for power, but of divergent nature: no throne, no crown, no scepter. The howling, ferocious intentions laced and intertwined throughout his core were for vengeance and disaster, plunging those who’d wronged him, his friends, his beloved compatriots, into ruin and rubble. He longed for the fine pinnacles of revolution, where his enemies were slain and torn apart, molded back into dust for the earth to swallow, where he could stomp upon their souls and laugh when everything came apart. He yearned for subversion and sedition, where the worlds of his enemies crumbled and sank into the mud, where he could laugh as they begged for mercy, as they pleaded for their lives (and he wouldn’t give it to them, he decided, he wouldn’t give them a damn thing but the menacing, cheeky glimpse of his Cheshire grin). He desired for the days, the hours, the moments, the instances, where they couldn’t remember who he was and he’d remind them of the lives they took before he took theirs – an eye for an eye, a life for a life. The boy couldn’t help but smile when her words echoed through the halls (they’d be smart to stay on my good side) because it would’ve been wise for anyone to stay on his too, where he loved instead of hated.
 
“I don’t aspire to it,” he answered her questions honestly, shrugging his shoulders, gazing at the mountains. They were his, all of theirs, in a way – they lived and breathed the chilling air and the summit squalls, protected and safeguarded the frozen earth. “My ambitions come from power, but not for ruling.” Erebos glanced at her then, a bit more determined, a bit more malicious, a bit more wicked, pressing at her with an otherworldly stare, letting her see there was more to him than a mere prince - that perhaps he could be feared or admired in the future, but not because of a title. His actions, his plots, his schemes, would drum inspiration or apprehension – and as long as he succeeded in vanquishing his foes, the rest would fall into place. 

She was confused – he watched her complexion change, falter, furrow down into thought and bewilderment, as if she’d never thought of other ways to gain prowess and prestige; but the boy had been around for longer, had seen more of the sovereigns, had rested on his laurels one too many times, had seen Gods fall, had watched lives altered, changed, for better, for worse, because of their avaricious tongues and their hungry wiles. “No.” He shook his head, smiled gently, gleamed in that dangerous, Cheshire way; as if he knew each and every secret of the world, when he’d truly only learned from the depths of the mountains and the scalding of sands, the rising of ocean tides and the simmering world of Machiavellian prospects. But he didn’t chide her, didn’t scold her, didn’t mock or growl – his voice was soothing, a quiet, considerate tone his mother would’ve used when her children cut their knees and bruised their chins. “Ruling doesn’t make you powerful. Having command over someone doesn’t make you omniscient. Monarchs can be just as weak as the rest of us, just as indecisive, just as unsure.” The Reaper, while not meek, while not yielding, still fumbled every now and then – because all of them were flawed, imperfect, but it was those that could overcome their faults that truly resounded, truly reverberated, truly held dominion and authority. They didn’t need to hold a scepter, didn’t need bodies to direct, didn’t need souls to be vanquished – but potency from within. He’d learned that at the very least, while watching beasts slay deities, while witnessing cretins march and pray, while becoming another part of the hollowed hills and the contorted flesh; the youth always knew what he yearned and longed for, knew what he desired and coveted. His quest for power didn’t require a throne or a crown, a medallion or praise; but simple, utter vengeance, justice for those who’d fallen, who’d never been given an option or an opportunity to fight back. He wanted to be strong, he wanted to be feared, and all of those things would come with a price, with glory, with triumph, and with defeats nestled and tucked together.
 
But he continued before she got too lost in the thick of it: grinning and wise, as if he were a sage from the summits and peaks, instead of a soldier deigning to eradicate those who’d wronged him. “What makes us strong is buried in your soul, in your might, in your commitment to the things you want, the things you crave.” Erebos' maw pointed towards her chest, where her heart was coiled and beating between bones, muscles, and marrow, where her entity and essence were bound for rapture, reverence, or chaos. Then it glided in the air, near her head, never quite touching, but illustrating a point. “The ability to use your mind can make you powerful. Can you overcome your enemies? Can you think faster than them? Can you outwit them at their own game?” Are you willing to completely destroy them? He pondered further, but didn’t admit aloud, because then he’d give a part of himself away too – how much he hankered for violence and destruction, ruin and treachery, to assail and condemn the deserving. His pause was short-lived, unwinding more and more of his thoughts, beliefs, and directions. “The ability to use your strength, your fortitude, or your endurance can make you powerful. Can you still strive for a throne, even when the world is falling apart around you?” Then the warrior’s head tilted, staring over her magic and all its transformations – if it would give away her emotions to the rest of the world, if it would note her weaknesses so her enemies knew where to shoot, where to kill. “Even magic and how you wield it can make you powerful.”