Chapter Text
Sethos had always been fast.
As a child, he was smaller than most, and his scrawny figure granted an agility that was difficult to contain. He was light on his feet, and quiet as a mouse, save for the sniggers he failed to keep quiet as he ran down the hallways of the Temple of Silence followed by furious teachers panting like dogs.
They scolded him with a ruler and scroll to the wrist and Sethos pretended to be remorseful, as if he weren’t eyeing the empty corridor behind them that looked like a tempting escape route.
He ran with the wind, bare feet slapping on cool stone in quick leaps. His legs burned with every step; air heaved in his lungs as he laughed; it was freeing.
Well, as freeing as it could be in the confines of those stone walls.
His Grandfather reprimanded him for his mischief, and at every occasion where some important looking priest would carry the boy by the scruff of his little white robe and drop him before their leader with pleading eyes, the man would shake his head, and frown - Sethos couldn’t find it within himself to disobey those tired old eyes. Most of the time.
“Why do you insist on avoiding your lessons, boy? The scholars of Al-Ahmar are the most sacred of educators in all of the desert, you know.” His grandfather would sigh, rubbing the bridge of his nose across the table.
Sethos picked at his food, carefully separating the little scraps of green from the tender meat. He shrugged.
“Don’t like em.”
The old man gave him a pointed look.
“The lessons or the teachers?”
Sethos scooped some rice and meat into his fingers and shoved them into his mouth with a sly grin.
“Bohf,” he said, lips smacking together as he chewed, “’Uaemre ith aulwaygs tehlin’ ‘e wah ou dou.”
The boy swallowed, satisfied and pointed across to his grandfather.
“Eat already, it’s gonna be cold.”
For a moment the man seemed baffled at the order from the boy who sat with his shoulders barely above the table’s surface. He stumbled for words a little before slapping a hand to the wooden surface.
“Don’t try to change the subject, boy!” His grandfather guffawed, “Duaenre is a highly respected member of the Temple – my closest adviser whose job is to tell you what. To. Do! And close your mouth - don’t point at people either, it’s disrespectful!”
Sethos snorted and made a show of eating the next bite with his mouth locked shut.
The man sighed.
“Sometimes I forget you are my heir, with that aloof attitude of yours. Will you at least try to listen to your teachers, hm?” he said tiredly, “You carry great power within you. And you are very fortunate to have been given a body that possesses the ideal environment to host the Glory of Hermanubis, it pains me to watch you waste your days away playing like child, and running from your duties.”
Sethos looked at his lap, hands drawing away from his food.
At that moment in time, he didn’t understand the meaning behind those words. The weight of ‘legacy’ and ‘honour’ and ‘glory.’ But then again, who would at such a young age?
“...sorry,” he said quietly, curling into himself slightly.
His grandfather looked exhausted.
He offered a half-smile, taking a bite from his food at last, “I accept your apology, boy.”
Sethos’s mouth twitched upwards, the forlorn expression on his face slipping a little.
“But only if you attend all your lessons from this day forth-”
The boy cried out in protest.
They were very different, the two of them. Bamoun relied on the wit and cunning of his intellect, strategizing, planning, curt and absolute in all his being. He’d stalk the hallways of the Temple, muttering to himself about things unintelligible to Sethos’s boyish mind, and from where the child sat, hidden behind a shelf, the tensed brow and tight-lipped mouth became a familiar sight to spy. On the odd occasion where the boy would come bounding into the old man’s study with a raggedy looking toy in hand begging to play, only a dismissive hand would answer, or a sigh and nod to the other priests in the room, who would lead the boy out by the wrist. The door would shut, and Sethos wandered off to entertain himself.
Bamoun was a strict and unyielding leader - an unmovable object. Sethos was an unstoppable force.
Over the years, it had become his philosophy, not that he was a particularly philosophical guy, to keep moving. Keep growing. Perhaps it was the confinement of the Temple, or the exhausting weight of ‘secrecy’ and ‘power’ and all words like that that seemed to consume his elder’s whole, that made him so. It was almost frightening to witness.
Whispering murmurs, frantic and behind hands. Shouts of agony, of anger, of betrayal.
Sethos held his toy to his chest and stared into the endlessly thick stone of the walls. Etched into the surface was a crude drawing of the desert, the bounding dunes, the vibrant springs hidden at the topmost cliffs, the warmth of the sun upon skin and the wind whipping at your clothes as you fought against it.
He reached out and traced it all.
Life is a fleeting moment, and so to live as it does, there is more to see, to feel.
So, he ran.
The Right of Duels had been the fight of his life. He saw the same balance in Cyno’s feet, the same twist of the shoulder, bend of his arm in his own movements as he dodged. The blank look of unfamiliarity stung a little as they’d met eyes, out in the dunes. It was a sad kind of nostalgia, Sethos felt.
They had once trained under the same teacher as children after all, friends, in the way that most children tend to gravitate towards one another. Given his age at the time, it was difficult for even himself to recall all the details of their time together, but the soft tickle of the other’s hair that he’d seen grow from the darkest brown to a shock of white, as their heads rested against one another, sat in the warmest corner of the Temple was something that stuck with him. He remembered the smell of him, something indescribably Cyno that was hard to put into words. He remembered lying at the boy’s bedside as he twitched with a fever hotter than the midday desert, hands clutched together, unmoving.
The remaining mice.
Two sides of the same coin.
Seeing him alive and well was rejuvenating.
At the end of the day, Sethos lost, but there was honour in that too, he told himself.
The plan succeeded, and the General Mahamatra left the Temple of Silence carrying twice to fragments he entered it with, a worthy vessel for both.
And yet, Sethos felt as if he’d been cast out into a boundless ocean, adrift as the waters pulled him left to right, at their own will. That surety that had always come to him so easily seemed to slip between his fingers into the clashing waves. His whole life, all the years he had lived within the confines of the Temple, those which he remembered clearly, had all been with the fragment of Hermanubis which he had treasured in his chest. The tingle of its might that tickled through his heart to palm, engulfing its warmth through skin, was gone.
On the first night of its removal, he lay awake, curled into his side. It was cold. He reached within himself, searching, longing. There was nothing.
Seawater seeped into his mouth, and the surrounding ocean batted at his body, carrying it along the thundering currents.
It wasn’t as if he was without purpose, he had a duty to the Temple as his grandfather’s successor. It was an honour to serve as Bamoun had. He had an obligation, a responsibility to care for them all, the people that raised him Djer, Intef, Asenath, all the priests and the scholars that he’d run from along the lengths of the stone hallways, tottering along the endless shelves of scrolls and scriptures - he now led them.
Cyno had chosen him, but the title of ‘leader’ sat oddly in his mouth.
Sethos swallowed it down.
He was no match for Cyno in battle, the man was the General Mahamatra after all, and as he fell to his knees, it was almost relief that shook him.
He had reached into his chest, tugging at the binds of the Ba fragment, it grasped at him as if desperate to stay. It burned like fire. Sethos grit his teeth and pulled harder, and it emerged from his skin, chest ablaze as it seared through. Its glowing aura stung his eyes.
He felt hollow.
Turning to Cyno, he stumbled slightly on his feet, “I give his glory to you.”
Grandfather was dead.
After Cyrus had taken Cyno from the Temple all those years ago, Sethos was the only child who remained in the small community of scholars and priests. Many a night had he laid awake, trying to recall the faces of the children that had sat before him in line, grasping each other’s hands as they inched closer, one by one to where the priests would prepare them for their ‘trial.’
Through the thick stone of the chamber’s wall, he could hear their cries. They’d peak and fall in arching whines, then fizzle out into silence. And then, the priests led another child by hand into the next room.
He played by himself, tottering little dolls around pretending they were warriors or sumpter-beast tamers, talking to himself in mimicking voices and scrawling drawings of great dragons and beasts on the sacred walls of Al-Ahmar. It wasn’t as if he was alone. He had teachers. He had grandfather. He had had friends.
But years had passed, and their faces had long left his memories.
One half of him felt pride seeing the friends Cyno had gathered along the road of life stand beside him with such unwavering loyalty. The other envied him.
Sometimes he’d wished it had been him that Cyrus had stolen in the night. He’d tried to picture what kind of life he’d be living at that current moment. Would he be surrounded with friends? A family? Would he be happier?
The bond between Cyno and his companions swept away those fantasies in an instant, and all of a sudden, he was sure that it was fate that his old friend came to be so good. A successful, respected man who was happy and free.
That Tighnari, and the traveller were close to him in a way he had only imagined. There was a special glint in their eyes, as if communication took no words and they fought as valiantly as they defended one another. The extension of that friendship was a great honour.
Sethos wasn’t sure he was worthy of it.
As he stood, teary eyed at his grandfather’s side, Tighnari pulled their hands together.
He tried not to startle at how warm they felt.
“Next time, why don’t you stay for dinner at Avidya forest. Don’t be a stranger, you’re practically Cyno’s brother, right?” the fox said, smiling slightly.
“That makes you family.”
Sethos cried.
He wasn’t sure if it was from gratefulness or grief.
Deep within him, he ached all through the rest of the day.
He found himself consumed by new responsibilities; he rose with the sun and slept as the moon shone high above the desert’s sky. He lay awake some nights, a strange cold within him and his eyelids drooped as if weighed by lead. Exhaustion seeped into his bones. Asenath left little bowls of dried fruits at his bedside. He nibbled on them numbly.
Some days if felt like his tears had run dry, and his eyes were frustratingly parched. Other days it seemed as if he couldn’t stop crying.
Those nights he would sleep in his grandfather’s old quarters, clutching the old blankets that smelled so painfully familiar with heaving sobs, leaving his eyes puffy and red, hair a tangled mess of curls.
Bamoun came to him in his dreams. Some were more like memories, scenes from his childhood simply talking with the man, propped up on his knee and a hand brushing over his hair. Some were vaguer, feelings, smells that made him wake confused and covered in cold sweat. He started lighting incense that one of the priests had recommended for dreamless sleep.
He sat at his desk, shifting through scrolls and documents, hour after hour. In the chaos that was the obsession that his grandfather had with the plan concerning the Ba fragments, the scriptures and papers which would have usually been attended to were left discarded, scattered across the floor as if struck by a sandstorm. In those final months, Bamoun became slower, and stiller. In many ways, it was a curious process. Morbid and grim, and yet, you couldn’t quite tear your eyes away from the sight, like a scarab crushed under an unsuspecting shoe, squirming until stagnant. And one morning the strength to get out of bed simply...left. The energy that came so simply to youth drained from his limbs, thin and wrinkled, the skin hanging in bleached layers, translucent and veiny. Bamoun’s biting words came forth on occasion, rarer as time passed. He became bedridden and far beyond working in the traditional sense. Sethos came to bring him soft fruits and soups, and chatter away about his day’s doings, and his grandfather listened, quieter than he’d ever been.
During his final weeks, his desk had long been abandoned.
Sethos sat in his place, cold.
He employed the help of several scholars, as well as a visiting student to re-categorise the scripts that were misplaced and to rewrite those that were missing. Each day was longer than the last, Sethos grew tired and weary. He drank little and ate even less.
The edges of his lips became raw and dry, licked over and over and chewed until skin tore and bled. Sethos bathed for hours on end. The water ran cold and he closed his eyes.
When at last order had been restored to the Temple, and the period of transitioning leadership had settled, he made haste to the sands.
He dressed and filled his waterskin, slipping from the hidden entrance with dry breaths.
The sun rose over the bounding dunes of the desert. It glittered like gold: Sethos ran.
The journey felt longer than the last, and as he bordered the luscious green landscape of the rainforest, he brushed off the shakiness from his knees. He’d grown weaker in the confines of the Temple, surely from the lack of exercise.
It was warm - a different kind of warm to the blasting heat of the desert. The air was thick and clung to skin like an over-eager friend; he wiped the sweat from his brow, walking onwards. As he sank deeper into the density of the trees, where all that surrounded him was green and vibrant pinks and oranges, and the gentle trickle of the nearby river, he stopped beside the water and sank to his knees to dip a hand into the rolling stream.
It was cool, but not cold, like the gentle nipping weather of days bordering winter. Water weaved between his fingers as if it were dancing, coming and passing at a leisurely pace like a friend passing in the street, greeting him with a simple hello and goodbye before swimming past into the crowd over and over again. Sethos retracted his hand, letting it fall to his side without shaking it dry.
The water clung to him for a good distance of the journey, slowly evaporating into the surrounding air.
Finding Tighnari had been simple enough, he’d bumped into a forest watcher girl, Collei, her name was, on the paths stretching outside of Avidya forest and she led him to Gandharva Ville with a cheery smile.
“So, you’re a big shot forest watcher in the makin', huh?” Sethos said, as she expertly collected samples of some stringy looking flower from the side of the path.
Collie laughed bashfully, shaking her head, “I’m just a trainee, I don’t think I’ll ever be as good as Master Tighnari. He knows the ins and outs of the entire forest like the back of his hand.”
Sethos hummed, “I did get that impression, he must be a good teacher then.”
The girl nodded enthusiastically, trailing off on a tangent about their adventures in training together, hands gesturing as wildly as she could with the basket under one of her arms.
Sethos listened closely, offering a few joking quips as they journeyed into the village.
She was a sweet kid - happy.
Collie pointed up the carefully crafted wooden path, “Master Tighnari should be waiting for you in that hut there! I’m not sure if the General has arrived yet but you’ll know when he does for sure - Master can hear him from a mile away.”
After a quick thanks, he made his way to the softly glowing hut. It was a small thing, but lit a warm yellow from within. There were small carvings of plants engraved into the outer structure, and through the open windows at the sides, he spied an array of leaves and petals, vibrant greens and pinks and yellows emerging into the air wildly.
Before he could even knock on the wooden beams at the entrance the great leaves covering it swept open.
Tighnari broke out into a smile.
“Sethos! I’m glad you made it; it’s been a while.”
He rubbed the back of his neck, flushing, “Sorry, it’s been busy at the Temple ever since…you visited,” Sethos swallowed down the lump in his throat, “But! Thanks for havin' me, haha! You’ve got a bright student on your hands; I’ll tell you that!”
Tighnari looked at him sympathetically.
He ushered the other in before dishing up their dinner onto little plates, “Yes, it must be hard adjusting to such a change. I didn’t know either of you well at all, but I could see your bond was strong. He must have loved you very much.”
Sethos tore his eyes away from the others’ gaze, his chest ached. He nodded, not trusting himself to speak.
Suddenly he felt very conscious of it all and began to chew at his lips.
“On another note, I’m glad to hear Collei is progressing well. Cyno and I took her in at a young age, she’s truly a bright girl,” the fox continued softly, steering away from the other topic.
With a wave of an ungloved hand, he motioned for Sethos to sit at the table. Sethos sat.
“But stubborn as a mule she is, at times!” Tighnari sighed, “Not sure which one of us she got that from...”
He shook his head, “I don’t suppose you were much better, hm?” Tighnari continued, not unkindly.
Sethos laughed a little, “Well...I wouldn’t say I was an angel, how’d ya guess?”
The fox smiled softly, and took a bite of his food, “Cyno says I have a sixth sense for mischief. It comes with the job, I’ve concluded. There’s certainly no shortage of incompetent scholars trying their hand at forging binds of friendship between humans and tigers, and naughty little children running about the riverside in this forest.”
The image of a poor student coming to the forest watcher with ‘friendly’ injuries upon their body sent a shiver down his spine. In the desert, he’d heard his fair share of horrors, from unfortunate encounters with venomous scorpions to vicious vultures that tore traders apart that strayed from the path, to the corpses of all sorts of visitors who ignored the warnings of the desert guides being flung hundreds of feet in the air by the piercing horn of the Wenut spearing them through.
Across the table, Sethos winced.
“Sounds rough...”
Tighnari shrugged, “It is at times, but it’s what I love to do.”
He smiled, then rolled his eyes a little, “Besides, I’d much rather be here than rotting away at the Akademiya.”
Before Sethos could ask what that meant, the fox shook his head tiredly.
“It’s a long story...anyway,” he paused, frowning slightly, “You haven’t touched your food, are you feeling alright?”
Sethos blinked, he looked down at his plate. It was indeed undisturbed.
“Sorry, I – forgot I guess.”
There was a rock in his stomach, heavy and full.
“Haven’t really had much of an appetite...” he trailed off.
He swallowed.
The fox smiled, looking a little sad, “Don’t apologise, take your time. But try to get some grub in your stomach, you travelled quite the distance to visit and I don’t want you passing out on your way home.”
Sethos caught the other’s eyes and was momentarily stunned by the overwhelming warmth that seemed to radiate from them. He nodded, offering a small smile in return and began to eat.
The forest watcher waited for a moment, before seeming satisfied and resuming his speech. He began telling stories of his travels, with striking similarity to how the girl herself had earlier that evening, albeit in a more composed manner. The fox laughed softly, as he recalled a time when he, his student and the General Mahamatra had gotten lost in the deeper caves of the forests during a particularly unrestrained mushroom-collecting expedition, and found themselves facing an Akademiya student who had somehow drunkenly stumbled from Sumeru city all the way to Gandharva Ville in the span of a few hours. It had turned out said student happened to be a cartographer of sorts, and even in his intoxicated state he had managed to lead all of them safely to the surface without accident or injury. Tighnari noted that he took that as a time to teach Collei about the dangers of alcoholism, a lesson which she took to heart with a serious nod of the head.
Sethos listened contently. It was nice, to hear the joy in his voice. They were, in every sense, a family, those three. He felt pride that Cyno had surrounded himself with good people.
Later in the evening after many tales and laughs, when all on their plates had been cleared and washed, Tighnari’s ear twitched.
“Ah, Cyno’s here.”
And not a few minutes later, the very man entered, wrapped in a dark cloak, and pressing a kiss to Tighnari’s hand clutched in his. He nodded to Sethos in greeting.
“It’s good to see you again,” Cyno said, setting his headset on the table gently.
Sethos smiled - it was softer than he would have liked, but something about the company of friends and to-be-friends made him sappier than he was on the regular night.
“And you,” he replied.
Tighnari tutted at their side, “What have I told you about putting that thing on the table, hm? It’s got all the day’s dirt on it and we’re sitting here eating!” he said half amused-half exasperated.
The General lifted his headpiece up and looked it over in his hands with a funny expression.
“It’s clean,” he paused, then stopped to lick his finger and rub a bit of grime from the rim, “Well, cleaner than it usually is anyway.”
The fox sighed, shaking his head and taking another bite of food.
“What am I going to do with you, silly man…”
It was then that Cyno began to look incredibly smug and he dove forward to snatch something from the plate.
“Don’t worry,” he said seriously, holding the little green legume up, “Pea happy.”
Sethos, who had unfortunately made the decision to take a sip of water at that moment, felt the liquid snort out his nostrils as he laughed involuntarily, choking slightly.
The General looked elated, and he pointed at him with a smile larger than any Sethos had seen before.
“Ha! He laughed!” the man said jovially, looking to Tighnari, “See, my jokes are a thing to behold, Nari. You are simply not on a level of comedic understanding as high as Sethos and I are.”
Sethos, who was still recovering from accidentally waterboarding himself, felt another chuckle creeping up his water-logged throat and his stomach clenched as he tried to contain the laughter, shoulders shaking as he bit his lip.
The fox rolled his eyes, and gave his guest a firm smack on the back, the remnants of his drink spluttering from his convulsing throat.
“Well, if you ask me, you’re on a level lower than the depths of Irminsul,” he drawled slyly, “If the day ever comes where you make a name for yourself as a ‘comedic genius,’ I’ll either be mute or six feet under, got it Mr. Funny?”
After a short debate about Cyno’s comedy skills, which very nearly resulted in a stand-up routine that, according to Tighnari who had apparently witnessed it in all its horror before, was not something Sethos should be subjected to, he was wrapped in a dastardly long Genius Invocation TCG game (which Cyno won). At one-point Collei popped her head into the hut to say goodnight - she gave Sethos a shy smile and quickly left.
They drank wine, a gift from their friend in the city, and sat on the soft blankets quietly conversing into the night.
The forest watcher spoke gently, ushering out answers from his guest. He asked about his grandfather, about the life he’d lived, hidden away for so many years, about the Temple, and its inhabitants.
Sethos found it easy to reply. He recalled tales of his own life, legends of his grandfather’s work - the horrors of it he kept hidden under this tongue. For the first time in weeks, he spoke, rather than talked. Cyno listened intently at his side, offering a comment on occasion, recalling small details he remembered from his boyhood. Sethos spoke of their friendship as children.
The General sipped his wine, and smiled a little.
“It’s a shame I can’t recall that time clearly,” he said uncharacteristically soft, “Perhaps in another life, we could have grown up together. Properly, that is.”
Sethos felt his eyes beginning to water a little, and he laughed wetly.
“Perhaps, yes.”
The sun dipped beneath the horizon, amber glow fading into blue and the curtains were swept shut - the dim lights of lamps casting warm hues over the draping fabric.
At one point, after the second bottle had been drained, Cyno had begun to enact a scene from ‘King of Invocations,’ extravagantly posing as he switched between characters in different voices. Tighnari shook his head fondly, pouring another glass.
“This always happens, he’s been obsessed with that novel since his Akademiya days.”
It was a funny contrast - this serious General Mahamatra stumbling around, enthusiastically slamming down his cards on the table as if they were all still playing the card game.
“Nari! Come dance - you,” Cyno said loudly, pointing, “You cannot escape this, bro. Get up and join us.”
Before he knew it, he was pulled to his feet and spinning in a circle with the two to silent music, aka, Cyno’s drunken ‘singing,’ throwing his head back with laughter as they dizzily fell into the divan, spilling wine over the floor.
Tighnari gasped, “Oh, you silly man, you are definitely cleaning that up!”
The other only laughed, in that stoic sort of way that only he managed to do, “But you looooove me.”
Sethos felt warm.
By the time he made his leave, the moon shone high in the night and Cyno’s face was flushed.
He let out an ‘oomph!’ as the white-haired man engulfed him in his arms. Sethos laughed, hugging back.
“You are my bro, bro,” the other said seriously, words slurred.
Tighnari pulled him away, apologising with a laugh of his own. He bid him goodnight, inviting him to come again.
Sethos smiled as he waved goodbye.
He looked up at the crescent moon, it shimmered. He wiped his eyes.
A brother, huh?
Though his grandfather had been family, he’d often dreamed as a boy about having more. A real family, like in his storybooks. With him gone, he’d honestly never felt more alone. Cyno’s words, though perhaps swayed by alcohol, struck his heart like a pin.
He inhaled shakily.
Maybe he would be okay.
He’d start anew, reborn.
A chrysalis.