Chapter 36: Side Story: In-Laws (Special Release!)

What started as a simple swell of congratulations for the newly announced union quickly ballooned into a loud party that sprawled throughout the nearby trees. It had been quite some time since the last celebration of its scale and the elves were full of energy; dancing, drinking, and brawling happening with startling frequency and only serving to increase the crowd’s fervor. Though, ‘quite some time’ meant barely a month. There was always a celebration to be had in the Land of Blood and Wine.

The name was well earned. Being the largest province, their borders encompassed the entrance from the Enchanted Forest and contained a beach that rarely saw visitors from across the sea. The foresters and warriors fought off dangerous manabeasts, their provincial neighbors, aggressive travelers, and often themselves. Not to mention the wyverns.

Though the lesser cousins of the powerful dragons, they were not easily dismissed. Gigantic, serpentine beasts with long necks, two stout hind legs tipped with talons sharper than any sword, and large, leathery wings that could blot out the sky when stretched to their full length above the canopy. After a failed coup to usurp their betters, they were driven from their homes in the Dragon Isles and found refuge in the great branches of the Sacred Tree at the center of the elven continent.

Being draconids, they immediately tried to subjugate the elves. They paid for the offense in a mountain of harvested wyvern skin, walls of wyvern talon daggers, and rivers of valuable draconid blood, the devils of the forest throwing themselves at the powerful creatures with a suicidal abandon for daring to usurp their god.

Since, an uneasy peace had been established between the draconids and the elves but the occasional conflict forced the two sides to remind each other of their strength, the populous Dusk Province bearing the brunt of the duty.

Their land grew wild and the beasts flourished. Unlike the Morning Provinces, Dawn, Day, and High Noon, they had no true cities or walls. They lived where they fought and died. Because of it, they had a love of life and death, a culture that was raw and uninhibited.

In that fashion, events that embodied life and death were held in high esteem. A particularly trying hunt. A war campaign. A union. A birth. All brought out the elves in force.

Morgene sat apart from the noise below, seated upon a branch overlooking the festivities. It wasn’t that the elven general didn’t share their enthusiasm. What mother wouldn’t be happy to see her child happily married? It was the suddenness that made her wary and, something she’d admit only to herself, a bit bitter.

Despite what she let other believes, she wasn’t an unfeeling, wrathful witch. It had been hardlocking her daughter away, but it had been harder watching her Kii, the fiercest of her children, tiptoe around her whenever the subject of trolls came up. She was at her wits end when she concocted the desperate plan and with each year that dragged on, doubt crept into her mind, laying the foundation for a nauseating guilt.

She’d wanted to jump for joy when she did her usual scan and found the trolls gone. Morgene hadn’t been as proud of her daughter since Kierra single-handedly took down an elder wyvern, cementing her place as the third strongest in the Dusk Province and became a feared name throughout the continent. She’d wanted to sit her down and talk it out. Ask her what she’d done for twenty long years.

Maybe apologize for overreacting.

But all of that was waylaid by the appearance of the human and her daughter’s daring announcement.

“There you are.”

Morgene looked aside as Marjoram landed on the wide branch of the tree, Javil at her side. The sky-blue elf carried a large barrel on his shoulder. Nodding to her, he sat the barrel down before dropping off the branch, leaving the sisters alone.

“What are you doing up here by your lonesome?” the queen asked, taking a seat. In her hands, she held two clay goblets. She passed one to her sister before filling her own from a spout on the barrel. “I would think you would want to spend time with Kii. She is planning on leaving as soon as the ceremony is finished.”

“Hmph. I doubt she wants to entertain her mother who locked her away for two decades.” She failed to contain her bitterness, frowning deeply as she filled her own goblet with wine and quickly downed it.

Marjoram rolled her eyes at the display. “You always do this. Every time something doesn’t go your way, you go off on a rampage and when it’s time to face the consequences, you disappear to sulk in a corner.”

“I do not.”

“Really? Shall we remember the time when you challenged our mother? You lashed out and nearly killed her.”

“Hmph. And the old witch had the audacity to name me the next queen.” Morgene downed the rest of her wine at the memory of her mother’s broken bodied and bloodied face that did nothing to hide her crooked smile.

“What else did you expect, thrashing her so soundly? Yet instead of accepting the responsibility, you ran off to the Twilight Province for three decades.”

“I dueled her for my freedom. As if I would be shackled by something so bothersome. Besides, you got the queenship out of it.”

“Yes, the bothersome thing you threw away.”

“You want it. Don’t pretend otherwise.”

“I didn’t want it that way. I had to duel dozens of challengers who thought they could handle the second-best Atainna daughter.”

“Blame mother for that. She should have given it to you in the first place.”

“You’re still skirting around the issue.” Marjoram refilled her own cup, then her sister’s. “The point is that you have a habit of running away from things. You’ve already spent twenty years away from your daughter. Who knows how long she’s going to disappear for this time? Her brother and cousin went galivanting off to Spirit knows where and haven’t sent word in seventy years. Here, just like this.”

Marjoram sat down her cup and jumped to her feet, throwing her arms wide. “Kii~ I missed you my favorite daughter! Please forgive me for being an insensitive boar and locking you away, on your own, for two decades!” She looked down at her sister, chuckling at her scowl.

“You missed your calling to the stage,” Morgene hissed. “Besides, I never said she was my favorite.”

The queen raised a single brow, easily communicating her profound disbelief. Her sister simply grunted. It was true. The little green devil had always been her favorite, from the moment she held the babe in her arms. Not even a day old, the Gardener who had overseen the birth tried to check her teeth and her youngest daughter almost gnawed the finger off, getting a taste for blood. She’d raised hell ever since. “Damn brat has caused me nothing but problems.”

“And you love it.” Marjoram retook her seat. “Honestly, I’m amazed you don’t have a host of hellspawns. Aleesia is an absolute sweety.”

“I don’t know who she gets it from.” Her second-eldest daughter became Marjoram’s aide once she became queen, her serious demeanor a good fit for the organizational work. Nothing at all like her warmonger of a mother or the lothario who she had spent a four-decade long infatuation with when she was younger.

“Haha, none of your kids take after you. Your eldest is a dancer of all things!”

Morgene winced. Raising a daughter who wanted to play with the monsters and dance in fields of flowers had been…trying.

“Not to mention the winemaker—”

“Who can’t make a decent drink.”

“And the priestess—”

“Head is filled with nothing but tree-hugging nonsense.”

“And even a teacher! Hahaha!”

Morgene could only shake her head. If she didn’t so clearly remember pushing each of them out, she would really wonder if someone hadn’t swapped her children. She’d looked forward to having a large family, seeing a chance to raise a host of the Dusk Province’s most fearsome soldiers.

Instead, she got the only children in the village who didn’t want to fight. Two weren’t complete disappointments, choosing to become foresters, but she’d hoped for warriors.

Kierra soothed her shattered expectations. Rather than a warrior, the girl was a demon. No matter the challenge, she ran straight at it. Often, said challenge realized its folly and ran away. Then she hunted it down to its burrow, dug it up, and tore it apart anyway.

But, it only stood to reason that the daughter who took after her would cause the most problems.

“I suppose we should blame it on the fathers. After all, Kierra is the daughter of that man. Where is he anyway? I’d have thought he would be the first one to greet her on her return.”

“He’s still on Green Mountain.” Her husband, the only man she’d married despite her many dalliances, had not taken kindly to the imprisonment of his daughter. They had fought about it, inadvertently adding to the Dusk Province’s coastline. “You should know, you sent him away.”

“I just wanted the idiot to clear his head. He’s the one that decided to go on a journey to get stronger.”

“I think he’s determined to come back and rescue her.” It spoke to their ways that a father having to rescue his daughter from her militant mother didn’t so much as raise an eyebrow.

“Ah ah. How disappointed he’s going to be when he sees a little human girl has done the job for him.” Marjoram paused with her goblet almost touching her lips. “Ah…that might be a problem.”

“Hm?” Hearing the seriousness in her sister’s tone, Morgene paused, turning to her. “What?”

“…didn’t he always say he would destroy anyone who tried to wed his daughter?”

“Now that you mention it, I recall him scaring off a fool who tried asking for his blessing.”

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“…he killed him.”

“Scared him off for good, didn’t it?” Morgene chuckled. “That’s why Rondel was never bolder in his affections. For a warrior, that boy is a little too spineless.”

“Don’t you see where I’m coming from? Kierra is about to get married. How do you think her father is going to react when he comes back to rescue her and finds out she’s bound herself to a human? And is living on the human continent?”

“Ah.” The man was a little too attached to his daughter, though she could hardly blame him. Morgene was the only woman strong enough to pin him down, literally, and Kierra was his only child.

No one expected the ‘Dusk Berserker’ to be a doting father, not even himself. He spoiled Kierra rotten and loathed being away from her, going as far as to forsake the hunts that made him famous because he couldn’t bear to spend the time away from his ‘little sprout’.

How would he react to his treasured daughter being married off and dragged away to another continent? “He’s going to try and kill the human of course,” Morgene replied with a shrug of her shoulders, taking a long swig of her drink.

“You’re awfully calm about this.”

“Kierra challenged me. She’s more than capable of fending off her father.”

“She can but what about her bride? I know you could kill the human before Kii could stop you. What if her father does the same? I’ve barely seen them together but she seems to truly love this girl. What do you think will happen if in his berserk state, he truly kills her love?”

“…she’ll do her very best to kill him.” Morgene felt a little uncomfortable at the thought. Both were quite sturdy. Kierra received her physical affinity from him. With her pure version, she would always have the advantage of speed, but he had experience and tenacity on his side. Morgene once witnessed him reattach his nearly decapitated head and stand up for more. “I doubt either will be able to kill the other.”

“I’m not concerned about that.” Marjoram waved her goblet. “Think about the aftermath of the fight. Your fight with mother destroyed half the village and you have the null affinity.”

“Mm.” With barely a thought, Marjoram circulated her mana. She felt the space around her vibrate. The null affinity, affinity for that which cannot be seen or touched. Something undefinable. Because the concepts of the affinity were so vague, many believed its depths had yet to be fully explored. Rather than explore its full capabilities, Morgene had decided to master an extensively documented aspect of it. The manipulation of space.

Her fighting style focused on suppressing her enemies rather than rampant destruction, but the sheer amount of power behind her spells could decimate the environment if she wasn’t careful. For the two monsters that could uproot the massive trees on the elven continent and swing them around like clubs?

The damage would be catastrophic.

“Two elves rampaging in the human continent. I’m sure whatever human authorities are nearby will attempt to stop them. And will be promptly slaughtered.”

“Mm.” In the midst of battle, the two berserkers would hardly be in the frame of mind to be diplomatic.

“They’ll keep sending warriors until someone important gets killed. At that point, might someone take it as a declaration of war?”

“Ah. I see your point.” The scenario sounded outlandish but Morgene could easily imagine it. To the point she felt a stir of excitement.

“War is not a good thing,” Marjoram sighed.

“Hmph. Not like there’s anything else to do. One can only slay so many wyverns before it gets tiring.”

“Then go fight a dragon! Ah, why is it my own family that always causes me so many problems?” Marjoram threw her cup away in annoyance, grabbing the barrel outright. A precise manipulation of wind cut a hole in the top and she lifted it to her lips, throat distending with her loud gulps.

Morgene scowled at her half-empty cup but wouldn’t dare try to wrestle the barrel away. As much as her younger sister pretended to be a monument of reason amongst savages, she was an Atainna through and through. The last thing she needed was another matriarch foisting queenship on her after a duel.

Marjoram finished the barrel and dropped it carelessly. Javil, waiting patiently at the base of the tree, caught it before retaking his seat.

“Now, listen to me!” The queen pointed an unsteady finger at the general. “Control your man! I am not sucking up to a bunch of humans because of your family issues.”

“Why don’t you do it yourself? Besides, he’s across the sea. How would he know?”

“I don’t know! Just make sure he doesn’t!” She shook her head. “There hasn’t been a war for five hundred years and I’ll be damned if we’re the ones to start it.”

Annoyed, Morgene waved a hand. The queen yelped as she suddenly found herself halfway to the ground, falling fast. A strong burst of wind scattered dead leaves and flower petals as Marjoram launched herself back into the air. She grabbed the branch, nails digging into the bark, and glared up at her sister. “Really?”

“Pardon me, Your Majesty.” She waved her goblet. “My control slips under the influence.”

A howling wind strong enough to lift her off her feet blasted toward Morgene. A completely ineffectual wind as she’d locked the space around her. Not budging an inch, she raised an eyebrow at her sister. “Done?”

“If I have to stomp out the sparks of a war, no. I mean it, Morgie.”

“Don’t call me that. Ugh. Fine. If my dedia comes back, I’ll keep him from storming the human continent. Satisfied?”

“And what if he goes straight there?”

“Remember, he doesn’t know she’s been released. Of course, he’ll come here first.” Morgene finished the rest of her wine. “Stop worrying. I’m going to talk to my daughter.”

“Don’t be crass.”

“You’re the one who told me to!”

“I wanted to snap you out of your mood but I didn’t mean you should do it now. It’s the day before her union, she’s bound to be preoccupied.”

Morgene paused. Then she scowled. A quick spell and the branch separated from the tree, Marjoram cursing as she dropped once again. “Get another barrel to replace the one you hogged!” Morgene shouted, lying sideways as she lounged on an invisible platform of solidified space. With a flick of her fingers, a small leather bag appeared in her hand.

Reaching inside, she pulled out a small journal and pen, pursuing her lips as she ruminated on the proper words for her ‘love letter’.

What did her sister think she would do after putting such an interesting idea in her mind? It was perfectly normal for a wife to write to her estranged spouse in hopes of reconciliation. She’d keep her word, not mentioning a word of their daughter’s union and try to stop from leaving once he found out.

However, who knew what tricks he’d learned fighting creatures around the world for two decades? Who could blame her if he managed to slip past her control and provoked a human king into writing a war declaration?

Somethings were just in the hands of fate.

How she had longed for the days of the Great War, when legendary dragon fire boiled the seas and goblin hordes marched by the millions. She doubted the humans could muster such a challenge, if her daughter’s intended was anything to judge by, but it was better than spending another decade posturing with generals from the other provinces from the safety of their territories.

Besides, marching an army through the Enchanted Forest would give her a good excuse to check up on her daughter. Kierra could split mountains if she didn’t hold back but a mother would always worry.  

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FUN FACTS/ Q:A

Q: I've noticed the author sometimes writes Kierra's family name as D'Atainna and just Atainna at certain times. Am I missing something?

A: You are, dear reader! Kierra's family name is Atainna. The D is tacked on to symbolize they are the current ruling family. D is for Dusk Province. So, when speaking of her family, she uses Atainna, but when referring to herself or a member of her family, she uses D'Atainna.

Q: Eh? Does every elf have a harem? Or just these crazy Atainna women?

A: Harem's a little strong there. For example, Morgene doesn't have a harem. She was simply 'friendly' with a lot of people before getting hitched. Not to mention their relationships are a little looser, a product of both their culture and their long lives. But yes, polyamory is alive and rampant on the elven continent.

Q: ELF SISTERS!? WHERE? WHEN!?

A: Kierra has eight siblings. Four of them are sisters. All of them are older. Will you see them? Maybe...maybe not...who are we kidding? Of course they'll make an appearance! At least one or two. That's later though. Lou and Kierra's adventures are just getting started so make sure to stick around!

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