By and down the river...
There were few An’Diels these days. At least those not of the older generation. Kurel and Zelphryin possessed a unique brand of bond as brothers. One that was both loathed and tested as it was tightly clutched and protected. Among the shared grounds of Dead Sun, they gave each other the width of a great wave. Going about their personal lives and dealings, and avoiding personal and professional conflict as necessary. Neither really confided in the other when luck changed or the world turned upside down. They existed. Aware that so too did the other.
Yet once in a distant while, something happened. Something that brought them into sharing the same room. Sometimes for the better. More often than not, for the worse.
It was quiet outside of Zelphryin’s apartment. Kurel even paused to listen for the telling sounds of his brother’s rutting behaviors before finding that the front door opened easily without being locked. Inside, not a single light had been turned on, not that it mattered for the blind Tanari. Only the now late night harbor moon and the surrounding glitter of buildings provided the dimmest of glow. For the last few months Zelphryin had rarely left the sanctuary of his Dead Sun home and he had invited no company to share it with during that time; electing to instead visit other homesteads when he craved companionship or sought it at the harbor’s bustling gaming house and brothel. Even the two girls he paid weekly to clean had been put on hold for the time. His usual sterile, tidy place now in just as much disarray as he.
Kurel’s arrival was the first to break this cycle of solitude and as he entered, calling Zelphryin’s name neutrally, Zelphryin signaled his location from his couch with a bitter sounding smirk. “You stab me. Almost killed me. Never came to check on me after. To see if I was alright, if I was even alive. But I can assume you hear that the Stormwind Guard plucks my unconscious body from off the street and you no doubt become worried that someone else may have made a run at taking me out of this world before you succeed at it.” There was a soft click as he placed the now still Amaranthine cube and a house key onto his coffee table. “Only an An’Diel can kill an An’Diel, right? Yet who knew that the soul of one could be utterly eviscerated by someone not.” “Eilithe sai’ you looked disheveled. Tha’ you hadn’t slep’. S’no’ really like you to be any of those things.” Kurel moved through the house slowly as he was unfamiliar with it, until he found the same stretch of sofa and sat at the furthest distance from Zelphryin. “Do you wan’ to tell me wha’ happened?” Zelphryin scoffed and looked, almost painfully across the distance to Kurel. “Do you -need- me too?” Kurel’s head shook slightly. The strained sound of Zelphryin’s voice was rare.
“Do you wan’ me to leave then?” Kurel asked and there was a long pause that settled. “Want….” Zelphryin repeated that word. Pausing on it for a minute of heartbeats, before his voice broke the awkward silence again. “Do you know why I resented you for so long?” He looked from the coffee table to the far wall of shelves filled with old books and knick knacks. “Father always needed you. Saudria always needed you. Thelonas always needed you-- everyone -always- needed you… I needed you. “Since I can remember you filled my days with pain and terror. I lived in absolute fear of you barreling around a corner when we were children. Constantly looking over my shoulder before I made the slightest step. Wounded and watching as you took Vekryin under your guidance. As Thelonas and the others followed at your heels. As father paraded you about like the greatest specimen he had ever sired. Saudria worshiped you. The people cheered for you, like you were some sort of god to them. All of you needed each other, but none of you ever needed me.” Zelphryin shrugged, even though Kurel didn’t see the gesture. “That was all I ever wanted. To be needed, by any one of you. All of you fell into a formula that… never had need of me. So I thought I could change it or find a way to fit into the equation of it. “You were all always getting hurt. I convinced myself that if I could mend your broken bones, stop your gashes from bleeding, prevent your life from expiring, then perhaps I would fit into that formula. Not just yours, but everybody's. Somewhere among all of that I would be needed. Just as much as everybody needed you.” Zelphryin sat forward as he continued. Resting his elbows on his knees while gesturing with his hands, though he knew the emphasis was lost to Kurel. “For every life I saved, every death I prevented, I felt one step closer to purpose. One step closer to being needed. It was not exclusive, But it was enough. Until I could find where I might be so invaluable. Irreplaceable, to at least something or someone. Some… cause, even.” Zelphryin looked over and across that distance to Kurel once again. “We are losing, brother. In more wars than you are privy to. I thought I had found what I had always wanted. I believed that and I gave it everything.” Zelphryin swallowed thickly. “Only to be betrayed. Again. Used. Distracted. Misled. And now I have lost… everything. Each day that passes, this family grows one ounce weaker than it was the day before. I have been feeling it. For months. And it is not just me who knows...”
Kurel looked concerned. Having sat quietly and almost motionless. “Wha’ do you mean, Zelphryin?”
Zelphryin licked his lips with hesitation, “I have to show you something.” Always careful with his verbiage when he was around his brother, Zelphryin had deliberately phrased his statement so. He stood. Plucking the house key from off his coffee table and placing it among the trinkets on the shelves as he passed by them while leading Kurel down the hallway to the bedroom at the end. As the door to the room was opened the smell of decay hit Kurel like a punch to his senses. A hand rose quickly to cover his mouth and nose. “Wha’s tha’ smell?” Kurel asked, though Zelphryin didn’t answer. On the far side of the room was a large oak shipping crate. One large enough to have fit the deconstructed pieces of a bed frame.
Zelphryin laid a hand gently over the center of Kurel’s back where a soft channeling of shadow magic was used to ignite the runes in the back of Kurel’s eye sockets. Giving him a moment of spectral vision to see the lid of the crate drawn back and inside, a body. “Is tha’....” “Mishi.” Zelphryin answered. “I have. Lost control. Both of the sect and of my means to oversee it all.” There was no burst of rage. No accusations. Not even questions. There was just a calm silence between them at that moment. As Zelphryin withdrew his magic from Kurel, casting him back into his world of sightlessness the lid of the crate was restored.
Zelphryin felt the heat of Kurel’s hand move the back of his head. He braced for the worst, but felt only the soft collision of Kurel’s forehead to his own. “I have to tell Eilithe abou’ this, Zelphryin’.” Kurel spoke in as low a tone as he was capable of. “She will excommunicate me from here and then where will I go?” “No.” Kurel replied. “Because I nee’ you. I nee’ you here. Keepin’ people of this harbor alive. You’ll come to the house tonigh’. You can sleep in Karkah’s room. Ge’ some res’. In the mornin’, You can tell us everythin’ tha’ has brough’ you to this poin’. We’ll figure ou’ wha’ to do abou’ the body then too.”
@eilitheandiel











