"By Yarathea, that's ridiculous! What kind of parents would be so heartless?" Jashad asked, taking a step back in shock. "Apparently they knew it would work as well as it did due to mine and Truls' difficult relationship," Leona began, struggling to find the right word to describe her former marriage.
"Rumors had spread around the castle about the state of our relationship, and it would seem someone took advantage of that in hopes of gaining favor with whoever would be the most likely to take our places," she concluded, realizing the weight of her words as she spoke them.
"It was you," she said, the words catching in her throat. "You told them of our struggles and made a deal with the Harutians to help pave the way for the Masked One with his promises of power," she said, blankly gazing back and forth as the puzzle pieces fell into place.
"Correct on all accounts, except one," Mourtis began, waving a bony finger in the air to Gwili. "You see, the rumors of your struggling relationship had already spread far beyond the reaches of Coltend Castle. The only thing I did was offer Zari and Bashaa a way to restore their country to its former glory, but I didn't account for Truls going so far as to murder Bashir in cold blood," he concluded, prompting Leona to begin breathing heavily.
"You thought that by getting in their good graces, as well as that of the Masked One, you'd be in a position to play both sides of that board, manipulating each to serve your own purposes better," Bernar said, his anger beginning to flare as he, too, began to piece everything together.
"You see, I once told Leona that perdition was coming, but she failed to see the bigger picture," Mourtis began. "What's that supposed to mean?" Bernar asked, putting a hand in the middle of Leona's back and pushing mana into her body to help calm her down.
She's taking the mana extremely well, he thought for a moment as he began to push more into her core.
"It seems not even the prodigy Bernar Fayren knows what I'm about to say," Mourtis began with a self-satisfied chuckle. "I was to help pave the way for the Masked One so he could serve his own master by retrieving the Gwynnleaf, while the Harutians would follow behind and take over the political side of things if everything had gone according to plan," he continued dryly.
"But what did the Masked One need the Gwynnleaf for in the first place? I'm sure it wasn't just to get rid of the Synners you seem to hate so much," Bernar asked, cocking his head to the side. "That was part of it, but it was also to provide a fighting force for the Undergod capable of holding your kind at arm's length while he enacted his plan," Mourtis said smugly.
"And what plan was that?" Bernar asked, his rage beginning to boil over like an unattended pot of stew. "To challenge Mideia, who would be forced to descend upon the land when he realized that Nexis Pelantyr had broken out of his prison, of course," Mourtis said with a self-satisfied grin hidden in the shadows of the cell.
Without another word, Bernar removed his hand from Leona's back and thrust it towards the stone wall. His eyes glowed like twin suns in the dark of the cell as a massive amount of earth and fire mana bent to his will and turned the cell's wall into a thick pane of glass.
Before Gwili could even react, Bernar had shattered the pane of glass and held his hands around the old man's throat, pinning him to the opposite wall about a meter off the ground.
"Do you have any idea what you've actually done, you wrinkly old bag of smashed assholes?" Bernar asked through gritted teeth as Mourtis began to struggle against him. He lashed his thin, lanky arms at Bernar's face but failed to make contact with the scowling features before him.
"Bernar, no!" Gwili said but was immediately pushed back by Bernar's aura of pure Ethereal mana. "You've put Leona through hell, indirectly murdered thousands of people, and put him in a position to come back to this realm, and for what? To kneel beside a table, at which you hold no power, just to lick the shit off your masters' boots? What the fuck were you thinking?" Bernar seethed as the mana surrounding him began to crack Mourtis' ribs due to the pressure it exerted.
"Mideia," Mourtis wheezed as he struggled, scraping his bony fingers across Bernar's clavicle. "What about him? Speak!" Bernar commanded, lessening the pressure of his mana just enough to allow the old man to take a breath to respond. "Mideia would defeat him. I know he would. The Wardens imprisoned and cursed him as a warning to others who would think to do the same as he did over a millennia ago," the old man replied weakly.
"You put too much faith in a god who doesn't give a single weasel shit about our realm," Bernar began, his words laced with rage. "You really think that Mideia, being as powerful as he supposedly is, would actually care about what happens to our home? Our people? Where the fuck was he when it happened the first time, huh?" he asked, shaking him at the end of his string of questions.
Fuck, that means Thoma's going to be caught in the middle of this shit-storm if he's still alive, isn't he? Bernar thought, feeling his anger begin to rise to even greater heights.
"Bernar," Leona's voice rang out distantly as if she couldn't believe what she was hearing.
Or seeing, for that matter.
Mourtis managed a weak, gurgling chuckle before he responded. "I guess you'll just have to find out when he arrives," he said, blood dripping from the corner of the wry, toothless grin he held in defiance.
Not going to get much more out of him, am I? Bernar thought as he scowled at the old man.
"You said before that you would give us the information at the expense of your freedom. Let me walk you out," he said, drawing an intense amount of mana that he began to push through his hand and into Mourtis' body. "N-no, wait!" the old man exclaimed just before his eyes began to burn in their sockets as a white-hot flame erupted from his mouth. His body suddenly burst into charred, bloodied chunks that splattered against the stone wall behind him, coating Bernar in a sheen of steaming blood and shards of bone.
"What, and I cannot stress this enough, the fuck?" Gwili asked, wiping away a handful of entrails that had splashed across his face before looking up at his friend. "Oh, shit," he said, his features growing instantly pale at the sight now before him.
Bernar sighed heavily, as what could only be described as steam left his mouth before he turned to face Gwili. "Sorry about that," he said awkwardly. "Never mind the exploding carcass; I've seen that before, but what the fuck happened to you?" Leona's voice rang out while the others stood by, too shocked to form any cohesive words.
"What do you mean?" Bernar asked with visible confusion. "Where is my Bernar?" she asked, stepping forward through the shattered glass wall. "Brother," Gwili whispered, gesturing in a circular manner to his own collar.
Bernar glanced at him curiously for a heartbeat, then immediately felt for the pendant that was once around his neck. Glancing down at what remained of Mourtis' hand, he found what he was looking for. It was shattered and what little remained was tightly clenched between charred fingers.
"Ah, shit," he said to himself before turning to face Leona, who had nothing but confusion written on her face. "Sur…prise?" he said with a chagrined smile, spreading his arms out beside him. "Y-you're an elf?" she asked, noticing the pointed ears that stuck closely to the now steel-colored hair matted with blood. "When the hell were you planning on telling me that?" she asked, jabbing him with a balled fist on the shoulder.
"Half-elf, but I promise I was going to; I just never found the right time to do so," he said, raising his hands in defense of another series of punches. "When would have been the right time? At our wedding when your mother, the apparent Commander of the Caegweni Royal Guard, showed up in full elven attire?" she asked, spreading her arms widely before taking a step back in realization.
"B-by the Graces. What about Thoma?" she asked with widened eyes. "He had a seal placed on his core as a child, but it was broken when we first arrived in Caegwen. My mother, with no small amount of help from Queen Aurae, was able to reveal his true form," Bernar said with a sigh. "He'd rather hoped to tell you himself, but…" he trailed off with a shake of his head.
"I-I see," she said, recalling what the elven messenger had said on the Rhydian Pass. "You two have a lot of explaining to do when he gets back," she began, authoritatively putting her hands on her hips before her eyes widened again. "Gods, Meliss is going to absolutely loseit when she finds out," she said, already imagining the scene.
"Yeeaah, about that," Bernar winced, thinning his lips and prompting Leona to look at him with poorly hidden curiosity. "Wait, she never sent you a letter?" he asked, only receiving an upturned lip and a shake of her head in response. "Nevermind, then. It's probably not the right time to tell you about that," he said with a dismissive wave.
Leona, of course, raised an eyebrow and turned her eyelids into thin, expectant slits.
"Really? Of all the revelations today, that's what you choose not to tell me?" she asked bluntly, tapping her foot on the shattered glass beneath it. "They, rather she, ended the relationship," Bernar sighed, shaking his head as he turned away. "Whaaaat?" Leona, Neko, Marte, and even Thorsen asked in shocked unison.
Damn it, I forgot they were even there for a minute, he thought, hearing their voices cut through his muddled thoughts.