Rebirth and Second Chances

Chapter 49: Choices Made

Accept or decline?

Both seemed fraught with danger.

If I accepted would I be trapped and bound to the Wild Hunt forever? And if I declined, would I be judged and found wanting, instead become a target of the hunt? I wasn't really sure about that kin-slayer claim in our summoning ritual. The words had been guided by and reinforced with magic from the Wild Magic. But I doubt ap Nudd would accept, 'The Wild Magic made me do it,' as an excuse.

The rules for the Wild Hunt were clear, and those rules bound the Wild Hunt, as much as they bound those that cried out for help. Those who would summon and demand justice, would themselves be judged. It is well known that justice is blind. And Lady Justice's sword cared not how it was wielded, or who it slew. Justice would be done.

I tried sending a message to Caraid for advice, but that connection that had existed since before I breathed life was missing. It seemed not only time had frozen. Communications were completely disabled, even an attempt to speak aloud and ask Cedric was impossible.

The Wild Hunt wanted me to make this decision and refused to allow me to renege, after the fact, by trying to offload responsibility to my Vassals or Caraid.

I realized, I really only had one option. Choosing to decline, I based my decision finally on honor. I'd been given a second chance, barely lived a second of the eternity I'd envisioned. But in this life, I wanted to make a difference. I didn't want to blindly accept injustice as I had in my past life.

If I wanted to make a difference in the here and now, I couldn't forsake this life to the ambiguous uncertainty of a shadow of the Hunt. In a way, my choice was consistent and part of the reason I'd built up enough Karma to meet SYSTEM. I'd often acted to intervene and keep my step-father from abusing my brothers and sisters, in that past life, taking the abuse upon myself. Hoping to deflect his anger.

This was really no different. My reasoning may have been self-aggrandizing. Perhaps I was rationalizing, and my choice was completely selfish. But I'd just started living this life, I wasn't ready to spend eternity in those fleeting moments of blind justice.

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No warmth. No emotion. No future. The Wild Hunt had its place. But I didn't believe I was part of it.

I chose to stay and fight, not only because it was the right and honorable thing to do. I chose to stay because Caraid deserved to have at least one person in his life that would share his burdens. At its root, his death during that ascension chamber occurred in some way due to greed and jealousy. His story was one of tragedy and grief, and unlike the Iliad, there would be no voice to give rise to another Homer epic. No moral tale of woe to guide and enlighten future generations.

Caraid had already sacrificed his chance for reincarnation, placing his faith in SYSTEM and I that we would further his goals, right his wrongs. To choose the Hunt invalidated that choice. It made inconsequential what was a huge gift, his chance at reincarnation.

He had been betrayed enough. I would not be added to that list of those that disparaged and belittled his abnegation.

The fog that had gathered and coalesced as he summoned his men, once again flowed like water to embrace me, acknowledging my choice. As it enveloped me, it began to change.

Precipitation.

The cycle of evaporation, condensation, and rain repeated itself. Accelerated condensation as the fog became a summer storm, rainwater to quench and give life to a barren land.

As temperatures plummeted, that rain became snow. Gentle at first, then the Wild Magic was released, and that gentle rain and snow became a tempest, a blizzard of ice, sleet, rain, and snow.

For those that had been judged and found innocent, for those that had refused the Wild Hunt's offer, the snow and ice accumulated around them, protecting them in layers of crystal coldness.

For me, it was as if I'd spent too long out in the snow and ice. The heat leeching from my body. Peaceful. My breathing slowing, my metabolism adjusting. And Belenos' Aura mutating, the cold of liquid nitrogen consumed, and instead of melting the ice, the aura welcomed it.

A fire could burn. But so too could ice. And Belenos' Aura now burned with the biting cold of absolute zero.

Cold fire.

Just as dangerous and deadly as heat. No longer the gentle warmth of home and hearth. No longer healing. Potential destruction bound and constrained by my will. A harbinger of death, responsive and ready to destroy.

I stood betwixt and between. Not part of the Hunt, but not separate. My refusal to join the Hunt had not exempted my judgment. My summons had been found worthy, and as claimant, I would stand on the side of the Hunt to deliver justice.

Moving to stand at the right hand of Gwyn ap Nudd, I turned to face the dais, Lord Kel and Lady Patricia. My movement was the impetus to set time in motion. Like a soap bubble popping, time was restored momentum. With me as its epicenter, combatants that were engaged in battle before The Wild Hunt was summoned, those deemed guilty, found their opponents frozen in icy tombs, impervious to both weapon and spell.

Confusion and uncertainty circulated within the room, as those that had been judged and found guilty realized that something had changed.

Lady Patricia was the only one who seemed indifferent to the actions around her, as if she had expected this outcome at some point. Her indifference was not a performance, it was a prelude. A determination to act. Opening her palms, she began tossing handfuls of something to the ground. Small and white, resembling seeds or pellets, she tossed and scattered these items.

One handful. Two. Three. Until finally the ground was saturated and littered with the objects.

Spreading out my perception, I focused on one of the objects that had landed near me, concerned because where they landed, the fog dispersed.

[Ismenian Drakon Tooth - A tooth, harvested from a giant serpent that has been tasked with guarding the sacred spring of Ares]

"Arise!" Patricia's command invoked the magic hidden in each one of the teeth.

"Arise and fight!

"I release you from all constraints. Form up. Remember your ancient inheritance. You the shadow guards of Dragon.

"Ismenian Legion, you are called forth!

"Destroy those that we may strike at our enemies heart!"