Thinking about the hybern au and the slave's war backstory I have in mind and. God. It was as awful as you'd expect. And. Jurian. Tanwyn. Cassian and Tanwyn. Their history with each other got me fucked.
Imagine you're a fresh faced wingleader, who just got the job beating your predecessor in ritual combat. Your alliances are shaky but tangible. Trade is good. Training is good. Recruits are eager to prove themselves just as the pegasi are to take their first flight. You have yet to find your wingmates, but life is good.
He is a squad captain of one of your longtime allies' warbands, his siphon cracked and faulty, but almost as radiant as the grin on his face. He is blooded as you are bladed but still green in experience; given away by his impatient posturing. But he seems to understand your position better than most and with the way his easygoing nature lights a room, it's natural to fall into step, into orbit.
Nine times out of ten, you beat him in spars, and unlike with the other dragoons of his warband, who leave the ring after first blood during joint trainings with your flight, he gets right back up and demands a rematch. Outside of battle, the boy has little issues barging into your tents, bathhouses, even sacred spots of meditation all to ask "are we sparring today?". It infuriates you. It amuses you. You fall in bed together, love delivered on the edge of your speartip.
Time passes. You grow older and wiser, the fiamma thriving underneath your leadership. You meet his brothers, a shadowsinger of morose continence and of all things, the night lord's heir, whose smiles never reached his eyes. You and your boy share your futures on starfall: yours being that this peace you enjoy be everlasting, his for an affirmation of existence undenied. All is well.
You meet a new recruit. Where you are sharp, she is soft. Where you are quiet, simmering with pride, she is the loudest person in the stronghold; swearing up a storm that can be heard from the depths of the Middle. She makes you laugh, even at your most miserable. And when she is bladed, her ribbon split even, you feel a part of you that you didn't realize was missing complete, like a limb regaining it's feeling. All should be well.
More time passes. And you begin to notice things. You begin to notice looks. The leers from knights of other fiammic orders. The veiled disgust from your closest ally during meetings. The empty, fishlike eyes of humans in the estate of the lords who've hired you. You fear to contemplate about what happens when those eyes become a little too empty for the lord's tastes. You try to broach your concerns, quietly, to your beau, but he tells you not to worry. All is well.
All is not well. There seems to be a sickness, a sweet rot that consumes the eyes and ears of every fae you know. How can they not see it? The way that heads forced down are staring back up in resentment, shackles grown too small for the wrists they encircle. That the opulence, the heavy brocades and grand feasts they consume are stitched and seasoned with innocent blood. How could you have been so blind? How could anyone be, with the stench of fear and misery choking out any air to breathe?
You are not a scholar. Or heir to any noble legacy like the winter knight and summer princess. But you have your wits and battalions and your allies and hopefully, that is enough.
(You considered asking those brothers of your beau for counsel; after all, he said they're family to him and are pleasant enough. But something stays your hand. You don't know why, but unease leaks into your bones thinking about the grimacing prince and his shadow.)
For a time, it is. The magi, with their arcane knowledge and labyrinths of secrets assist at a distance, not wanting their physical presence to be seen as an act of war, in tearing away the collars of field slaves you unshackle. You shatter wards and sow chaos onto battlefields to distract from runaway "property". You feed your growing caravan with loot of abandoned estates, the magic of the crumbling mansions preserving fruit and meats like salt. You argue with camp masters and winglords about the supposed drain on their resources going to "lesser beings". A young man who sought refuge in your caravan thanks you for not letting him be recaptured by his amorous mistress. You reach out your hand to scared, starved little girls, to teach them hope, to never let themselves or their sisters be stolen and broken down again.
It is on starfall you confront your beau. He speaks to you as if misguided and naive, talking down as if you're a thin faced fledgling. He prattles on about circumstances and places, of frivolity and time; as if the present issue could've been resolved though empty promises. You see him as juvenile, bearing seven blinding siphons on his chest as a facade for emptiness underneath. It's polish highlights the rot just beneath. You leave.
You throw yourself into your newfound convictions with a recklessness bordering on suicidal. You seige castles. The caravan becomes a walking city. You ambush estates and steamroll opposing fiamma. You burn plantations, sometimes with its high fae owners inside.
It is during one of these burnings you meet your future blademaster. She is quiet, and calm in presence, even as her eyes burn with rage. Every step she takes with scarred ankles is shadowed by a tiny toddler, eyes as wide as a blue moon. When she splits her ribbon twofold in a single stroke, you finally, finally feel whole. All is not well, but you think you'll be alright.
During your final meetings with the winglords, who demands recompense for the waste of "their" resources, you spot the boy again in the war tent. He cannot meet your gaze, fearing condemnation. And you hold nothing but disappointment for the toy soldier he's become. That is the last time you ever see him.
And decades later, after your body is left to rot in the sun by entitled, petty lords; your history and resources picked clean by vultures both avian and humanoid, a young man kills his former owner and is called mad for it. Causing the war they tried to bury, to explode onto the surface of the planet.
