1.28

The Young Griffon

As a child grew old in body and soul, walking that crucial transitory bridge between adolescence and adulthood, the first iteration of their identity finally cemented itself. In those formative years a human being laid the foundation for who they would be in their highest highs and lowest lows. Just as the bridges between realms were the most crucial for a cultivator’s development, so too were those formative years critical for the mundane growth that every human being experienced.

Body and soul. The body’s growth was self-evident. Bone and muscle grew into their adult frames, cherubic faces turned lean and angular. Human beings were made in the image of the divine. It simply took time for our worthless clay selves to take the proper shape.

The soul’s growth was less easily observed. In my formative years the development of my body had seen to itself. I’d chiseled it from marble a little more each day, testing myself against all that would stand and fight me. Progress could be measured in practical terms. It could be seen in the definition of my body. But my soul’s development was not so straightforward.

Reason, spirit, and hunger. It was no easy thing for a lion to grow old in a cage. Perhaps a wild childhood wouldn’t have been any better for me, but I doubted it. Growing up within the sterile halls of the Rosy Dawn estates, I had no choice but to refine my burgeoning soul through abstraction. Adventures half-lived through others. Tribulations that I could not undergo myself, lessons that I had not personally suffered in order to learn.

It wasn’t ideal, but I made do with what I was given, as I always had. Just as I chiseled my body from marble, so too did I forge my soul from purest gold. I created myself in the image of those who came before me. I devoured stories of Heroes and Tyrants, drew from them the principles of a virtuous life, and with each and every one the flames of my spirit were fanned higher.

I understood the anatomy of an epic better than most. A story worth telling. For each and every one, the beginning was always the same. Even the Muses needed someone to sing of – before the vile monsters, before the triumphs and the tragedies, you had to prepare your audience for what was to come.

You had to set the stage.

“You say you’re from the Rosy Dawn,” Elissa said, not hesitating to question me. She stepped closer, shoulder to shoulder with Sol, and lowered her voice so that no one else in the agora could overhear. “The Raging Heaven Cult hasn’t seen a fresh face from across the Ionian in nearly two decades. I checked. What’s changed?”

I raised an eyebrow. “Aside from the obvious?”

The Heroine took that about how I expected her to. Beside me on the lip of the odd fountain of rising water, Jason cursed under his breath.

The death of the kyrios still hung, like a funeral shroud, over every interaction within the Half-Step City. Reconstruction efforts could be seen on every residential street, the Tyrant’s last gasp putting countless families out of their homes. There was a profound grief, a bleak pessimism, that permeated every interaction if you looked close enough. It was only natural that our Heroic friends would think first of his passing upon hearing such a suggestive question.

After all, what were the odds that Sol and I had just happened to set sail for Olympia on the day of the kyrios’ passing? Long odds indeed.

“You said that Sol was fighting demons on the western front,” Jason said, choosing to set aside that particular suspicion for the moment. The Hero that Sol had snatched back from the shadows looked searchingly at him. “How far west? And what sort of demons?”

Sol stared at him in silence. That storm flashed in his eyes, his influence lashing out in every direction. It was an unconscious reaction, I knew, but they didn’t. Both Heroic cultivators visibly tensed. Jason set his jaw and leaned forward.

“If you want me to follow you, I have to know where we’re going. And I deserve to know who’s leading me there. Who are you, Solus?”

For a long moment, even I wasn’t sure what he’d say. I wouldn’t lie for any existence on this earth, not even him, but I wouldn’t force him to tell the truth either.

Thankfully, he chose to do so himself. My brother, for all his traumas, was no coward

“There are demons in the city of Carthage. Wolves in the shape of men. They walk on two legs and fight with arms and armor, and they can cultivate. A year and a half ago they consumed the city of Rome. In another year and a half, they’ll have consumed everything west of the Scarlet City.”

Elissa was immediately skeptical. Jason, on the other hand – I saw the sudden fear in his eyes, and the rage, before he overcame both and hid them from view. Ho?

“Monsters of that caliber, in those numbers, and the Scarlet City didn’t see fit to warn her sister cities?” Elissa asked.

“When’s the last time the colonies told us anything?” Jason responded. Elissa inclined her head grudgingly. He continued, almost hopefully, “But if this wasn’t enough for Damon Aetos to break his silence, then he must not consider it a threat to those of us east of the Ionian. Toppling a few barbarian nations is one thing. But a free city-state built by the children of Helen? A monster’s primitive approximation of cultivation simply can’t compare. They’re only wolves.”

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

Sol’s influence rippled.

“You’ve made two assumptions, just now,” I informed the Hero, before my brother snapped. I glanced Elissa’s way. “Both of you.”

Jason frowned. “Enlighten me.”

Gladly. “You asked why the Scarlet City hasn’t sent word of the coming threat,” I said first, savoring their realization. I gestured lazily. “And yet here we are.”

“And the second?” Elissa pressed.

“You assumed that when I said the demons of Carthage could cultivate, I was exaggerating. You decided that I was referring to the unrefined strength of monsters and animals.” Sol said coldly. “I wasn’t.”

Silence.

“Something like that,” Elissa finally whispered. She was unable to vocalize the rest.

“If that’s the case,” Jason picked up for her in a strangled tone, “Why are you telling us here, like this? Why not… someone…”

I chuckled. “In power?”

Elissa’s knuckles were white around the hilt of her blade. “Enough games. What are you here for?”

What could I do but tell them the truth?

“A good time.”

My virtuous heart would accept nothing less.

“You really are mad,” Jason said wonderingly.