Chapter 4: The Call To Action.
Episode 1: The Burdens Bestowed.
Escaflore couldn't sleep. He spent the entire night thinking. The burdens put on him are pushing him to the brink. Driving him to collapse. He's trapped in a terrible headache, brought about by unhesitating expectations. He struggles against the flashes of pain, to no success. He still persists, and still fails. It consumes him, overwhelms him, drowns him down to the lungs. He's lost, sinking, losing his identity, and his anchor to reality. The thought starts presenting itself to him. The infamous call to change. To end it all. To stop it all. To be free of the world. To be free of himself. A leap of faith is all it takes. A leap he happens to have taken many times before, though in different contexts. In contexts relating to living on. This one in particular, demands the opposite. Why keep living on. Why keep trying. Just give up. Just try to give up. He makes the choice he's made before, many times. The choice to live on. To live on for a reason. To find his reason for living on.
In the morning, he makes the choice to try depending on Lonspear more. To confide in him his burdens. To at least try, blind to how things might go. He tells him of his excursions from last night, in heavy detail.
"Are you familiar with the boon of faith of the 'Deussilus religion'? 'The Incantare', it's called. It's a well-kept secret that most knights wouldn't even be aware of. A secret kept by the royalty themselves. No one knows what shape or appearance it takes, but from what I was taught by the highest level of secret scholars, 'the grand arch secret scholar', is that its main function is changing the perceived appearance of any subject, by forcefully enforcing an enchantment influence on anything that perceives them. It's impossible for any to see through the enchantment. Even if you knew the true identity of the subject, it would override the thought and force its own truth onto your mind. Only greater divinity would be able to see past it and avoid the influence. The only pass to it, is knowing the true name of the subject." Escaflore is lost in his own words. Venting his frustration takes all his focus. It feels needed, though.
"Yes. I know." Lonspear respond, well aware of most things most knights wouldn't be aware of. He knows Escaflore knows that too, but, he wants him to express his aches. It helps with pain by a lot.
"Even if I gave my best to improvising. Gave my very best to protecting everyone that was taken, to protect the identity I can't know, what guarantee is there against the unknown, what are my chances of saving them, even as strong as I am. The first approach to a fight we hunters were taught is to always have the maximum number of advantages possible. To know your enemy. The enemy here goes far beyond what the eye can see. The foe is a complete obscurity. Without any advantages I can stack, it's near impossible to save everyone. Rovenof knew that, when he entrusted their true names to me, to see past the illusion enforced. He thought of me as strong, thought of me as his only hope. I'm not the strongest in the world, not by a long shot. I'm not the strongest, even in this nation, I know that. Truth be told if you and I fought, you'd win against me. I don't have any real experience or much accumulated age, nor do I have anything truly worth fight for. I have no passion for my power nor do I hold any love for my skill. It gives me no joy, being myself, anytime of the day, even with my generational potential. I'd lose a lot of fights against very strong people for that simple reason. If I can't do that much, then who even am I. What am I even worth. What's the point of anything. What's the point of me being me. Nothing terrifies me more than that. Nothing terrifies me more than losing. I'd be forever lost if I did." Lonspear is shocked silent. He chooses to maintain that silence, at the end of it all, he can be there for him. At the end of it all he'll swear to always be there for him. To be a better father to him.
"And, are you aware of the meaning to a 'knight enforced covenant'? It's a pact made with 'the communion of knights', the central command to all that abide as knights. Are you aware of the costs of breaking a covenant enforced by knights?" Lonspear knows it all too well. The penalty inflicted on oathbreakers by knights.
"Death by physical torture. They're physically tortured in the worst way possible, till their spirits fade out or their bodies give in. Whichever comes first. Rovenof was bounded by such an oath. To never reveal the true names of the Lord he serves. Of the prince he protects. A measure to protect the royalty during 'blood-winnowing'. He broke the oath, to give unto them the best chance of individual survival they both could have. To put the realm first. To put them first. The communion will know of the broken oath. The spy was bound to his heart and the heart can never lie. Nor can it bear false witness. They'll send the very best assassins for his spine. Call to specialized hunters to track down his hide. Hire mercenaries and braggart slit-throats for his, well, throat. He's a wanted man and the collectors are not going to forgive the debt. He's a dead man and the last act he did was put me in his debt. Uncaring of the weight I now hold, unremorseful of the cost I'm now tolled. But it's my purpose to fight for the world. It's my onus to endure cruelty and be fald, isn't it?" It's hard to tell if it's a rhetorical question or not.
Lonspear holds Escaflore's hand. Sometimes the best you can do for someone in pain is be there for them. To just be next to them. Variathon, his former vassal, taught him that. He taught him how to be empathetic and caring for the people he loves. He's the one miracle man that found out how to teach an old dog new tricks. Lonspear ends up being right again. He calms Escaflore's temperature down. He eases the pain. Eases the aches. Eases the suffering and depression. He eases the weight and mass, of the burdens bestowed.
Episode 2: The Journey To The Forlorn Keepside.