My uncles and father stood within the sacred ring of fire. The smoke curling into the twilight sky as the elders sat in silence. Each wore the furs of their lineage, feathers braided with bone and bark, their eyes sharpened by decades of judgement. The fire crackled with unease not just heat, but the energy of something unseen, something stirring.
Father stood tall, one hand resting on the haft of his ceremonial spear. He was prepared not just as a warrior, or chief, but as a father. A father standing between his blood and the storm.
“Your son broke the sacred law,” spat Elder Bran, his voice like dry bark in winter. “He entered the hut of an ostracised man without escort. That law is older than your title, Chief Conan.”
“He must be punished,” added Elder Tarn, slamming his staff into the scorched earth. “Compassion does not absolve disobedience. Rules are not bent for favoured blood.”
A silence fell taut as a bowstring before Drax stepped ahead. Gaunt, but no longer wild, his words rang with clarity.
“He saved my life.”
Gasps and murmurs broke across the council. Even those who had long abandoned hope for Drax looked at him now with flickers of wonder, or wariness.
“I would be dead if not for him,” Drax continued. “I felt it something leave me. A darkness burned away. I am… clear.”
Lore moved to stand beside our father. “He is barely one year old,” he said. “Yet he speaks in tongues, walks like a hunter, and heals the broken with words no one taught him.”
“This is what troubles us!” snapped Elder Ysra, rising in her many-layered cloak of ash and iron charms. “Power like this does not come without price. The last child marked by the storm brought famine, flood, and war.”
“We do not know what mark he carries,” my father replied, eyes level. “But I will not see my son punished for compassion.”
Ysra stepped ahead, face drawn like flint. “It was not just compassion. It was prophecy in motion. And prophecy unguarded is wildfire in a dry forest.”
Behind them, Morrigan and Boldolph stood watch just beyond the fire’s reach. The black wolf growled low, a rumble of warning. while Morrigan’s gaze stayed fixed on the chief’s hut where Taranis slept, gripped by fever.
The fire hissed and popped. Somewhere nearby, a nightbird called.
Elder Bran raised his staff. “The child shall remain under close watch, isolated from others but housed within the chief’s care. He will be marked not as cursed, but as unknown. No more unsanctioned visits. If he breaches this again”
“We will not exile a babe,” my father growled.
“No,” said Ysra coldly. “But we may exile what grows inside him.”
The flames danced higher, wind tugging at the circle as if the fire spirits themselves had stirred.
Lore bowed his head slowly. “Then we shall walk the knife’s edge between reverence and fear. But mark my words if you turn on him too soon, you lose more than trust. You lose the only light left.”
As the council slowly dispersed, dusk settled like a shroud. The camp held its breath. Only the crackle of fire and the quiet steps of retreating warriors broke the silence.
Later, beneath the stars, young Nyx turned to our father. “So what happens now, Father?”
“Isolation. No one speaks to him unless permitted. He’ll be watched not as punishment, but out of fear. They don’t understand what he is. And people fear what they do not understand.”
“If we don’t talk to him… won’t that break him?”
Conan’s voice was low. “That is what I fear most.”
Just then, the elders returned with the boy. His fever had broken. Taranis walked unaided into the firelight, eyes drowsy but glowing faintly.
“What is going on?” Conan asked, rising quickly.
“He entered the eternal sleep,” Elder Ysra whispered. “But then… he came back.”
Even the fire seemed to pause.
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