Chapter Text
The rain crashed down in torrents, dumping so much water on the land that it gathered in pools rather than soak into the earth. Phil loved nights like these; the rain beating down on the window and thunder rumbling in the distance while he relaxed by the fireplace with a book and some tea. It was soothing in an odd sort of way, reminding Phil of vague half formed childhood memories. The only thing missing was his family, but they were on a short vacation to the seaside on the far side of H'Ardcorre, just mother and sons, and would be back by morning. He hoped the storm hadn't ruined the trip.
Still, he enjoyed the brief and rare silence. It was a moment of pure respite that he'd gladly welcome with open arms. He didn't have to think or worry for the evening, his only concern relaxing with his book.
A knock on his chamber door rattled him out of his non-thoughts.
So much for silence. Phil inhaled deliberately to ease his annoyance. "Yes?"
The door squealed open. "There's a young man at the gates requesting an audience, your Majesty.”
Phil frowned and turned in his seat to face who was speaking. "At this hour? In this weather?" he asked incredulously.
"He refuses to leave, he says it's urgent, sir." The Blaze-born guard sounded as bewildered as Phil felt. "Should we tell him to return in the morning?"
"No. Escort him to the throne room." Phil heaved a deep sigh, set his book on his table, and stood. Only truly desperate people would come in the dead of night, in the middle of a thunderstorm. He wrapped himself in his favorite green robe before descending the stairs.
The castle was always cold at night, especially when it rained, despite Phil's many attempts at warming the halls. He kept redstone torches lit along the walls and carpeted the solid marble floors. It hardly made a difference, the stone sapped all heat out of the air and reflected the wet chill of the night. He shivered as he walked to the throne room, pulling his robe closer around himself. Another Blaze-born guard posted at the entrance bowed her head a little before opening the door for Phil.
Between two more guards, standing perfectly at attention and contrasting how lax the adults at his side were, was a piglin boy. He couldn't have been older than sixteen, wearing a red cloak and soaked to the bone. His long pink hair was in a braid draped over his shoulder and dripping rainwater on the smooth tile floor.
The guards bowed to Phil, but the boy knelt on one knee. "Your Majesty, he's been searched. He has no weapons, only this letter." One guard with ram horns gave Phil a wet envelope. It bore no crest or address, but it did have a wax seal on the back in vibrant red, bearing the head of a boar. Phil examined it, then popped the seal and tried to take the paper out carefully. The letter inside was not as soaked as the envelope, the water only had the chance to seep in through the corners.
To His Majesty King Philza Craft of the Kingdom of H'Ardcorre
We humbly present you with our best and most promising weapon, the Blade. Please accept it as our tithe towards the war effort. Put it to whatever use you see fit.
Blood for the Blood God.
"You said he has no weapons?" Phil asked with a frown.
"No sir."
Phil looked at the boy, still kneeling with his head bowed. "Stand up, mate," he said, voice softening at the edges. The boy did so with a quickness. He didn't meet Phil's eyes but he stood flawlessly at attention, like a well trained soldier. How odd for a delivery boy. "Where's the weapon?" Phil asked.
"I am the weapon, sir. At your service." The boy bowed again and straightened out.
A horrid feeling blossomed in Phil's chest. "Come again?"
"The Blade, to be used at your discretion sir." The boy's face and voice were completely void of emotion. He was almost robotic. Red eyes stared directly ahead, perfect like a statue.
If Phil hadn't seen him breathe and blink and speak only a second ago, he would've said the child in front of him was indeed a statue.
He looked to the guards. "Go back to your posts. I'll handle this,” he instructed, his voice level and not matching the rocks churning in his stomach. The guards both inclined their heads gently and then exited the room. The boy didn't move. Phil wasn't sure if he was even breathing.
"Alright, um. Blade, was it?" Phil wrinkled his nose. The idea of calling a child a blade, a thing to be used, filled him with disgust. The fact that the child in question was fine with it was worse. "We're gonna have a little chat, alright?"
"Yes sir." The boy only blinked. Not even a glimpse of emotion was to be found.
Phil bit his lip in thought and concern. "Hm. Come with me." He motioned for the boy to follow him out of the throne room. He did so dutifully.
They walked through the corridors for a short time before Phil could think of what to say. "So. Blade. Shit, uh… how, um. How old are you?" Better start with the basics, he thought. Maybe he looked younger than he was. Phil knew a thing or two about that.
"I'm fifteen, Your Majesty."
Phil's heart sank and sat heavy in his gut. Fifteen. This boy was only two years older than Wilbur, and he was expected to be in battle? No one in the army was under eighteen. Surely whoever sent Blade to him was aware of that.
"That's, uh, a little young to be in the army, innit?" he said carefully.
"I've been training for years, sir. I'm completely and properly prepared for battle, whenever and wherever it pleases you, sir."
He was trembling, ever so slightly but Phil could see the way his muscles tensed under his wet and cold tunic and cloak. Blade clenched his jaw tightly, in fact his entire body was wound up like a spool of string. He was probably freezing, the poor thing, soaked to the bone in an early autumn storm.
"Let's get you out of those wet clothes, hmm? I think you're about the same size as Wilbur, you can borrow some of his pajamas for the night." Phil extended a wing gently to herd Blade to his side. The boy paused, taken off guard by the gesture, but quickly adjusted and kept pace with him. His hooved feet tapped along the ground, perfectly in time with Phil's talons softly clicking like a march.
The rest of the walk to the master suite was silent. Blade was apparently not much for conversation. He followed Phil without even a glimmer of curiosity, and that was also concerning. Everything about this boy concerned Phil.
Rather than intrude on Wilbur's personal rooms, Phil asked the servant who was stoking the fire go and retrieve the largest of Wilbur's sleeping gowns from the laundry room for Blade and something to dry himself with. The boy in question stood by the door, at attention once again. "Um. Go ahead and sit, mate." Phil gestured awkwardly to one of the chairs by the fire.
Blade sat. He looked uncomfortable doing so, the first shadow of emotion Phil had seen in him. "Where are you from?"
"I'm from nowhere, sir. I only exist to serve you." Blade's fingers twitched, just a bit, just enough for Phil to notice.
"Well, now. Surely you have a name?" Phil asked.
"I am the Blade, sir." The boy didn't falter.
"Yes I read. But is that your first name or a last name?"
"It's just my name, Your Majesty."
Phil frowned. "You don't have a surname?"
There was a flicker of something in Blade's eyes. The more he talked, the less rigid he became. "Family names are for people with families, sir."
Something, his heart most likely, shattered in Phil's chest. He knew this war with the Essempi Empire would bring casualties to his people, to the innocent and vulnerable. Phil knew all too well what the cost of war was and he hated it. The wings on his back were a heavy burden, a reminder of the Elytrians he'd been born to and then were ripped away from him by genocide. If he'd had a choice in the matter, or maybe if he had tried harder to appease the old human king, Phil never would've allowed a war at all. But the humans were a superstitious and aggressive kind, they responded to fear with hate and suspicion, and the late King Schlatt was the most cowardly and hateful and suspicious of the lot. The hybrids of H'Ardcorre terrified the humans.
Children were always the ones that suffered the most through war. Rations, absent parents, the constant fear of invasion that occasionally was proven to be very much founded in reality. Orphanages grew overcrowded within months. The war was nearly three years long at this point, and many decades in the making before that.
"I see," Phil said softly. "Who raised you then, if you don't have a family? Did you come from an orphanage, maybe near Flowerfall?"
Blade didn't answer right away. He clenched his jaw and tapped his fingers on his knee. "My superiors raised me, sir," he said finally, voice tight.
"And… who are they?"
The boy's silence was even longer. "It doesn't matter anymore, sir. I'm here now, to fulfill my sacred duty."
Phil's chest tightened. He opened his mouth to ask what, exactly, this boy's duty was, but a knock on the door interrupted him. "Come in," he said instead, a twinge of impatience in his voice.
A servant with long floppy bunny ears came in carrying some gently folded sleepwear and a towel for Blade. Phil thanked them and gestured to Blade. "Go ahead and get changed for the night, mate. Have you had supper? I'm sure there's something in the kitchen that I can have brought up for you."
"I only traveled, sir. I had rations along the way." Blade took the clothes and bowed deeply to the servant. They blinked, a little flustered but they accepted the respect by patting Blade's hair.
"Oh, that won't do. Bring something up, won't you? Don't wake the chef, just anything that's lying around." Phil smiled at the servant as they bowed to him and closed the door behind them. He turned to Blade. "I'll leave you to get changed. I'll just be up in the loft, alright?"
Blade bowed and Phil climbed up to second floor loft that overlooked the rest of his suite. There was a cozy little nest up there, for nights when the family didn't want to split up and head to their own rooms. His boys were still young, Tommy was only seven and Wilbur barely a teen, and they both craved the safety of a nest from time to time. It wasn't a nest in the traditional sense, but the bed was round and had raised cushioned edges all around to keep anyone from rolling off, and it was full of pillows and blankets and the boys' stuffed toys. Friend the sheep stared with black button eyes at Phil as he arranged the covers, alone as Henry the cow was with Tommy currently.
Phil thought about where Blade would be put for the night. Sleeping in the nest was only for family. Maybe he could sleep in one of the guest rooms. But the guest quarters were in the spyres in the east wing, and that was a little far for Phil's comfort. He wanted to keep an eye on the child- and he was a child, no matter what he'd been trained to do or be.
Phil decided on a cot, next to the nest. They still had the one that Wilbur slept in when he got old enough to want to sleep on his own but didn't want to be in his room. It wasn't as secure as the nest but Phil didn't think it was appropriate to hole Blade up in the currently unused nursery. He pulled it out of the storage closet.
A knock at the door distracted Phil. "Go ahead," he called over the balcony of the loft. The same lopeared servant as before entered with a platter of bread and cheese and some fruit.
"I'm sorry, sir, this was all we had on hand at this hour," they apologized.
Phil nodded. "That's fine, leave it on the table for the boy. Thank you." He dismissed them gently, bidding them a good night, and finished setting up the cot. He draped a blanket and pillow on top. If Blade needed more blankets or pillows, he could always ask.
"Your Majesty."
Phil looked over the railing and smiled. Blade stood in the middle of the room, looking significantly warmer in Wilbur's sleepwear. The sleeves and pant legs were a bit short, but they were short on Wil too. There were wrappings around Blade's wrists that caught Phil's eye. That would be a conversation for the morning perhaps. His pink hair was neatly tied up in a bun, and he held his wet clothes and the now wet towel in his arms.
"Oh, those will go in the basket up here," Phil said. "Just bring them up when you come up for bed."
A confused frown passed over Blade's otherwise stoic face. "Oh, yeah, 'course. You can sleep up here tonight, mate. I've got a bed all ready for you. Didn't think you'd appreciate getting shunted off to the guest towers," Phil explained. This was why he had Kristin, his head ran away with his manners sometimes.
Blade blinked in thought, then he seemed to come to some conclusion and nodded. "Yes sir."
Phil smiled. "Come on up when you're ready, alright? There's some snacks for you on the table. I know it's not exactly a five-course meal but go ahead and eat up."
Blade looked at the platter on the table. "Yes sir. Thank you sir."
He didn't get to ask any more questions for the night. It was late, and Phil was tired, and he was sure the boy was too. The things he really wanted to know had effectively locked Blade down. Where he was from, who was in charge of him. The letter had mentioned the Blood God but there were many different sects of that particular faith. It was an ancient religion, and as so often did with old and well worn faiths, different groups had splintered off from the original and then from each other. The Blood God wasn't an unpopular deity either, especially now during a war. People always seemed to gravitate towards Him when there was conflict close to home. Kristin complained about it a little, not that Phil would ever let her catch him calling it complaining.
Phil blew out all but two of the candles at the bedside and nestled into the pillows. He figured Blade would come up when he was done eating. He heard soft murmuring coming from down in the sitting room. He couldn't make out any words but Blade was definitely whispering, breathy and soft.
He tried to wait for Blade, but Phil fell asleep before the boy came up. He woke in the morning to warm, golden sunlight streaming in through the window and birds chirping. Blade wasn't in sight, and the cot was neatly made with militant precision.
Phil stretched and yawned, wings reaching for the sky, before draping his green robe over his shoulders. He stepped down from the loft, only to find Blade standing at attention by the door. "Oh. Morning, mate. How'd you sleep?"
"I'm well rested, sir." Blade looked straight ahead, red eyes trained on some distant spot Phil wasn't privy to.
"Good, that's good. Uh, how long have you been there?"
"I woke up at dawn and took my post immediately, sir." And indeed he had, he was still in the sleep clothes Phil had given to him.
Phil bit his lip. "Right. Uh, there's no need for that, son. I'm sure the guards on the other side of the door are doing their job just fine." He smiled kindly. "What do you say we find some day clothes for you and then go have breakfast? My wife and sons will be home in a few hours."
Blade blinked, and something like confusion passed on his face. It disappeared as soon as Phil recognized it. "Yes sir."