Ten years into the future
He donned the mask at dawn, and decided that there were comforts to be had in admitting one’s own monstrosity.
For once, he knew exactly what he was -- monstrous devil fool -- and exactly where he stood -- in the dark behind the mask unheard and unseen. No more shame. No more despair while faintly clawing to be better better better until he was good enough for his good mother’s table.
Beneath the hooked beak of the mask, the lopsided smile twisting across Firelis’s face was razor sharp. He licked his lips and tasted bitter pall. He wasn’t good enough. He never was. He wasn’t Fallien the way she was and he couldn’t come home with her. He wasn’t strong enough to prevent that despite her most fervent wishes, despite being born to do so, despite that being his only reason for his existence.
His old man once said that he wasn’t sure if Avesta née Tvy’ern as running from her destiny, or running towards it.
Firelis knew now. She had always been living her destiny, and he was the most unfortunate part of it.
You are my instrument, she had said once, quietly, fingers so light upon his cheeks that he hardly felt her at all. She had pulled away immediately afterwards, as though she could barely bear to touch him. She was in front of her people. She could hardly be seen touching him. He had a head of goddamned red hair, and that marked him so clearly as a goddamned foreigner that it pained him to look in a mirror.
I am your instrument, he had echoed back, speaking to no one at all. And he had tried. Dear Jya he had tried.
Now, he was her executioner, her hand, her bloody blade in the dark.
Jya help me. Jya help this whole damned world.