“He... What?” Tyr wasn't sure whether to be amused, confused, or agitated. “What do you mean he can't participate in the next round?”

The nurse was apologetic, almost nervous. Anxiously playing with the clipboard in her hands while the white faced doctor nearest her remained silent. Regretting the day they'd ever commissioned with the guild to deal with these terrifying, larger than life personalities. It wasn't just the young man, but the hulking form of Samson to add some real steel to the implied threat in his tone.

Tyr didn't mean any threat at all, he was just confused.

“Apologies... Er...?” The nurse paused.

“You're not sure what to call me?” Tyr asked, and she nodded nervously. “Just call me Tyr, I never liked titled to begin with. You have no reason to be nervous around me. Tyr, White Wolf, Meat Man Infinity, the Strongest Primus. Mr. Fantastic, shit, I don't care. Does the name 'Tyr' not elicit enough imagery in your head to make you aware I don't give a single shit about titles while my uncle is squirming in a hospital bed?”

“...Right.” She replied, unconvinced. It was hard to separate the horrifying visage of the men they'd all seen beating their opponents half to death in the arena, protective arrays or not... And this one was a primus... “If he pushes himself any further, he'll be crippled. Even now, I doubt he could fight again in his current state, but we can manage his suffering. Notably, our goal will be to ensure he walks again.”

“Suffering?” Tyr frowned. “Tiber? What does she mean? You look the same as ever.”

“Then your eyes are worse than your consideration for your so called uncle.” Tiber wheezed. “It's my back, it's always troubled me, but now... It's shot. I'm sorry, kid.”

“And this is something even the magic of healers can't fix?” Tyr asked the staff tending to one of the most important people in his life, skeptical. Healing magic could do so many things, if one had the coin for it. Even regrow limbs... And Tyr had a lot of coins. He'd spare any expense for Tiber, always, he might not be capable of honest love but he'd stopped caring about money some time ago.

“That's correct.” The nurse replied. “The problem is in the lumbar region of his back, this is an area few healers are willing to work on due to the obvious risk. If we manage his discomfort, he may walk again, but if we use magic to fix it... It's an eight twenty chance he'll never take another step. Or, it might kill him outright. Spinal procedures like this are beyond modern medicine, even magic.”

“Tiber.”

“Tyr.”

“Do you want to live the rest of your life like a cripple?” Tyr asked. “As a hunch old man with a gray beard begging for some bread?”

“I have a pension, that would never happen.” Tiber chuckled, causing him to erupt into a coughing fit, alarming the nurses. “But no, I would not want for that. I'm not sure what else could be done though, I've seen a dozen mages and none of them have an answer...”

“Alright.” Tyr grunted. “I'll fix you myself, then.”

“And with all due respect, of course, I mean no offense...” The doctor coughed. “How do you plan to do that?”

“That is nothing I cannot do.” Tyr replied succinctly. “I am the first and the last, something like this cannot stop us.”

“Ah... Well... That is excellent to hear... I think...?”

–

Alex.

Alexis Goldmane, to be precise. She was one of those girls who'd grown up in the regimented environment not only of her fathers household, but for all registered mages in the empire. Always the independent tomboy as a child, she'd still been forced to sit through all sorts of instruction on how to be a proper lady of the court. Everything was a mask, and she wore those she had to well enough, like all noblewomen did.

But she didn't like these... Things. Small talk and socializing with strangers. Leda was her best friend, but they were worlds apart in personality and preference. Magic was the only common interest they'd found, and in many ways their differences were what made Alex like her so much. Leda was flowery, enthusiastic, almost childish in her positivity and excitement over such small things.

But Alex wasn't her only friend, there were others.

Sitting across from them at a table and chatting away about the most inane things. Fashion, this or that noble, intrigues of some random political figures, the comings and goings of one young prince or another. As if these people were even worth talking about in the slightest. The world was like that, magic was wondrous but it was so normalized in this region of the continent that the upper class viewed it as little more than a tool or contrivance, a passing novelty.

Even those born to use it, and use it well, were wont to take it for granted. Missing the finer intricacies of the arcane and using it only for convenience or as a show of force.

“Alex...?”

I want to go back to my room and read... Alex frowned, surrounded in a bubble of everything that made her uncomfortable. The false familiarity and social this and that, barely listening to the hubbub around her as part of this 'mixer'. Alex liked reading, going on long, quiet walks...

She loved dogs, listening to the rain, riding and letting the wind run through her hair. Most of all she liked the quiet, staring at the sunset. Jotting her thoughts and amusements down, art. Nothing like poetry or writing, but... Perhaps if she'd fancied herself as having the talent, she'd give it a shot. One day, if not just a technical grimoire for public consumption based on her experience with magic.

She had tried, and given it an honest attempt, this socializing thing. Putting on a mask for an evening was a lot different than being surrounded by it for hours each day. She missed the freedom she used to feel, being able to do as she pleased. Or when not, at least she'd be tending to some task alone and in relative peace and quiet. It just didn't suit her, and these people...

Am I like this...?

They were so... Mean. Unkind. So ready to mock a person they did not know, or in some cases, those they did. Right to their faces, even. There was a difference between doing that and chiding a good friend or colleague out of concern. Alexis might be bold with the way she spoke to people, brash even, but she was not a bully like these people were. She hoped not, in any case.

“...Hello, Alex?”

“Hmm?” Alex realized she'd had her eyes closed, finally letting the light in again. She felt so little in these situations, unable to hold onto that confidence that defined her outward personality. “Sorry, I was thinking about... Uh... Dogs.”

“Dogs?”

“Yes.” Alex nodded. “I miss having a dog.”

“You had a dog?” Leda asked, blinking up at her. She'd known Alex for a few years now, rather intimately, and had never heard her mention a pet. “What kind?”

“More like a wolf.” Alex cleared her throat. “Big, white, fluffy...”

“Oh...” One of the men attending said mixer inserted himself enthusiastically for whatever ungodly reason. “Like that big one bastard one-eye rode in on all dramatically during the opening of the games?”

“They are one in the same.” Alex frowned, her eye twitched slightly but she managed to maintain her composure. This child of a man was a baronet from some successor protectorate she'd never heard of, Shrew or something like that in old Amateus. Alex had learned not to be overly obsessed with title or privilege, but it was a fact that a tiny gnat had no right or basis to talk down about a member of Haran's royal family. Much less a primus. “And he's not a bastard, I'm sure you're aware that--”

Irritatingly, the man didn't seem to grasp so quickly at the point. 'Man'. Well into his twenties, yet with the behavior and mannerisms of a spoiled child. He waved her protest away with a haughty chuckle.

“Actually... My father--”

'Ackshually...'

'My faaatha...'

Gods but Alexis had never met another individual who irritated her so. His enunciation alone was enough to make her wish Tyr was present to hear those words and kick the man in the head. The disgusting rat this baronet was.

“--says that it's all propaganda, that he really is a bastard and the primus is covering his ass after the guy got lucky in the republic. According to my father, everyone knows that. It's common sense, my lady.”

The others chuckled, making various comments about 'the old empires', or how it was too bad about his 'lineage' – because he'd performed so splendidly. The duality of man. They'd celebrate an adventurer for their deeds while putting his past or foundations under a magnifying glass. There was no end to the entitlement and the games...

“You can do better, Alexis. Much better.” One of the other girls smiled. Alex grit her teeth, a baronet insulting a Harani royal in her presence... And now some loose woman parading as a concubine to a minor noble was using her first name as if they were friends? “He's so savage and... Unmannerly. And filthy enough to lay with an orc... Little more than a diseased dog, I envy your loyalty but pity you for it all the same. Tsk.”

She made this singularly irritating noise, every time she spoke, that woman, that sounds like an... 'mm ha'. The enormous nose on her breathing so hard her frilled neckline was waving in the hurricane winds elicited from her nostrils.

“That's right.” One of the boys nodded. Another no-name with sunken cheeks and the eyes of a profligate dreamweed user. “You could do much better. How can you stand to be dishonored so? If not for your impressive position, you'd have been cast out for letting your sorry excuse of a husband run amok the way he has been... A finer man would never do such a thing to such a prize of a lady wife.”

“Hear!” They cheered over that, clacking their glasses together with a bout of laughter at her expense.

“I like a woman that knows her place.” Khurgis Farthing said, the son of a Brotherhood affiliated viscount and the 'ranking noble' of this group. “But isn't it a bit much? Subservience will only get you so far... I thought you an academic, not some dense floozy content with mucking about with lower breeds. Then again, what else can be expected of a Harani? You simply do not know any better.”

“Even so, that Oresundian whore that would dare put horns on a primus... Signe, was that her name? The cow. Color me impressed.” One of the women laughed. All the while, Leda was stunned into silence. It wasn't her fault, Alex knew that, Leda was naive and easily wrapped up in the idea of making new friends. Operating on the assumption that most people were good, always ready to make new friends, and somehow she'd found this bunch.

“It's a shame, regardless.” Khurgis nodded calmly. “Such fine stock and all my lady Alex has to call for family are the heathen barbarians of her homeland. Even so, I'd like to meet this man who managed to fuck the wife of a primus, cow or not, he must be some kind of legend.”

Crack. Like glass, Alex felt the shards of what remained of her patience grinding in her mind. She was not one to claim hierarchy, but it certainly existed. It was a reality of this world.

She could break every person at this table, save Leda, and walk away without punishment. But there was something strange, that man with the instrument in his black mask was standing over their table. Alex glared at him, her eyes telling the man to leave before he wasn't given a chance to. Her teeth were grit so hard that they'd begun to hurt.

“Ha...? Do you need something, bard? Perhaps a nice greeting from one of my retainers for not greeting us with more respect? Begone, peasant.”

“Don't be rude, Khurgis, I want to hear--” The girls words caught in her throat, the stranger who'd been standing so near them removed his mask, and in turn – the wind within their lungs. An 'oh shit' moment, if there ever way one. Leaving them wishing they'd brought the right pants for such an occasion.

Tyr was, among the circles now aware of his existence, a mass murderer. A bloody handed psychopath who killed nobles and commoners alike, no face given to consequence. There were even rumors flying around that he'd struck his own famously brutal father and walked away in one piece...

“W-white...”

It wasn't what he did that surprised them though, rather what he didn't do.

“My lords and ladies.” Tyr bowed, lower than anyone would ever expect him to. “Forgive this bastard for interrupting your meal, it is such an honor to make acquaintance with you all. You are Khurgis Farthing of Brotherhood affiliation are you not?” The young man nodded meekly. He was a tiny thing and that was the problem, Tyr had gone past the point of an interest in breaking men with the bodies of children. They were like ants, but he savored every ounce of the fear coursing through them. So thick he could literally taste it. “I must beg your pardon, but I'm in dire need of my wife's solemn council. Please, my lady?”

Alex took his offered hand without complaint, even at such an awkward angle his entire body felt like an anchor. Immovable. “Please forgive us.” She grinned wolfishly. “It seems the husband I am so subservient to beckons me back to my marital duties.”

She was calm, collected, elegant, and courtly. Only until they left the establishment and made their way into a dark side street, whipping her hand away from Tyr's own and snarling. “Those are not my friends, and I do not agree with anything they said.”

“About my 'whore mother', me being a bastard, and all Harani being dogs and barbarians?” Tyr looked off into space. Somewhere, but she could tell he was visibly troubled, resisting that urge to walk back into that building and do something more... Visceral. “I don't think everything they said was wrong, but it vexes me that such tiny and weak nations would besmirch the empire nearest them. They have grown overly bold. I was going to wait patiently, but I couldn't sit there and listen to that, it grates on me, I'm sorry – but I do think I did you a favor.”

“You're not wrong, on both accounts.” Alex couldn't disagree. “You are a bastard, even if it's not in your blood – and I could do much better than you. But I thank you for pulling me from that mess, I had no idea that was you in the mask. You're so... Talented.” She blushed then, pursing her lips. “I had no idea you had such an ability.”

“I'd prefer to keep it that way for all the others.” Tyr grunted. He was taller now, more sharp and muscular, not in the way of his father – coiled like a predatory cat. Clearer in the eyes and harder in the face, not so prone to snarling when he talked. “But I'll be forging a new identity soon enough and lea--”

Alex slammed him against the wall. First with magic, and then with her hands gripped and shaking on his shoulders. It didn't hurt, just a force projection barrier she had to know that he was well capable of breaking free from. “You made me look like a fool! I supported you when nobody else did! I...”

He stepped free from the arcane prison, sliding through the mana and feeling only the briefest sensation of resistance. Grabbing her by the waist and back of her head, arching her back and kissing her deeply.

Well... He tried to. It had always worked with Jura. Alexis Goldmane wasn't so easily manipulated, it seemed.

Alex might not have been intent on hurting him at first, but she'd always had a rather impressive right hook. She caught him in the jaw with an elbow, rattling his teeth and causing him to erupt into laughter, blood leaving from his battered mouth. 'Impressive', after awakening for the first time she must've continued training, she was far stronger than her frame would suggest.

“Let go of me.” She said softly, and he did. “What do you think you're doing?”

Tyr shrugged, resisting the urge to chuckle at her sudden meekness. “I know how much you like those romance novels. It all seemed to work out better in my head. After all, I am deeply in love with you, trust me.”

“I have no idea what you're on about.” She huffed, turning her face to the side. The streetlights were enough to display the faint blush of embarrassment on her cheeks. To be Harani was to be of the steel, and their people didn't take well to the fine arts, including that of the written variety. She had no idea how Tyr could know of her well hidden hobby. It wasn't just romance novels, it was all fantasies and escapism in the form of text. Painting was her medium, but her dream was to be an author, if only she could find the words. It was just so hard at times.

“You buy things from my account with fair regularity.” Tyr said flatly. “I read all of my... No, actually Ella reads all of my statements and calls me twenty times until I answer... I know what you've been up to, I mean... 50 Lengths of Rope? My Step Brother the Lumberjack? Those texts are illegal in Haran.”

“Our account.” Alex huffed angrily again. She dare not use her own, which was visible to her father – not because he would protest, but her mother might. She didn't want them learning of her deeper secrets, but she'd never expected Tyr to actually look.

“That's true.” Tyr conceded, taking her hand thrice before she stopped jerking it away in disgust, leading her somewhere. “What is mine will always be yours. I don't care what you do, it's good to see you enjoying yourself, or whatever. I'm not really sure what to say, frankly, good thing I don't have a real brother... Wait...”

“You are a liar and a scoundrel.” She protested. “Always. You said that to me before, and look at what you did. Ran away like some scared dog and played me for a fool just as I began to think there was some good inside you.” Her voice was angry, but full of other more complex emotions.

“You're not a weak woman, Alex, and you never were.” Tyr frowned, still dragging her along by the arm. “You have prospered in my absence. I know everything about what you've done. Top of your class by a huge margin, valedictorian pursuing your masters in magic. Well on your track to be an archmage. You've made everyone in association to you proud and you'd have done it with or without me. I don't care if you care, but I am incredibly proud of you.”

“No.” Alex jerked him to a halt. “Not without you. Without what you shared with me of the...” The 'you know what'. I used it, and I flourished, and it makes me even more wroth to know that. I told you how important you were to me, and you did something awful, and then had to gal to insult me to my face! There's no coming back, Tyr, I do not forgive you.”

She'd never betrayed his trust and shared it with anyone else.

“Mmm...” Tyr hummed, looking her full in the face – observing her for who she was. No longer a teenage girl, but a budded woman. Aging like a fine wine, but they all had. Alex's mana in particular was so incredibly potent that he felt energized just standing near it. Beyond his own, but it wasn't that, it was the unconscious pressure of mana and spira in abundance. Not so common, she'd come so much further than he'd ever been able to. “Not correct. You are the most talented mage I have ever met in all of my travels, it's not even close. Better than me, but you always were.”

“Do not honey your words.” Alex scolded him, but she felt some satisfaction at the implied contrition that she was better than him. Tyr liked to whine and mope about, but some of the professors and faculty still talked of his incredible potential at the academy, and Leda shared that information with her freely. She'd already known, naturally. Alex was not an idiot – she was very confident in her intelligence above all things. Tyr had potential, and he wasted it every day, despite being incredibly stupid he'd been born to be unique. Uniquely irritating, perhaps, but that was a talent too. “What do you want?”

Tyr sighed, he shook his head slowly and seated himself at a bench, patting the seat and snorting as she spit on the ground. “So unladylike. You've changed.”

“I hate you.” She said with a resolution. “We are no longer friends.”

“No you don't.” Tyr replied calmly and confidently. “You love me the same way you have since we were children. I remember now, you were the only one who truly did, always. And you'll never stop loving me, because I am your everything and always have been. Which isn't surprising, I am truly a phenomenal man, hero of the republic, and so handsome.”

“...I decidedly do not love you.” Alex rebutted. “You make me sick. A vile man, a rat and a bastard, a rat bastard. You are ugly.”

“That's a lie, too.” Tyr leaned forward, resting his face in his hands. He'd tried to swagger and posture but this was incredibly difficult. He'd been in that restaurant to find Kael, not Alex...

But Kael had not arrived, and Alex... She should've never been there in the first place, he'd made sure to bribe off all the reservations. Low and behold the restaurateur had decided to sell them off anyways and double his price. Tyr would have to have a conversation with the man, or perhaps his building would conveniently burn down with him inside of it. Fraud was a crime.

“You cannot help yourself, maybe it's because you feel sorry for me. Maybe it's because you are just so incredibly good a person that you won't allow yourself to break our promises. It doesn't matter. But I didn't come here to argue with you – I don't even know why I am at this very moment. Why don't you accuse me, or ask me, or say whatever you want – and I swear on my mother that I'll answer honestly? In exchange, you do me one small favor.”

“I already know what I need to know about you.”

“Oh?” Tyr asked. “And what's that?”

“That you are a selfish rat of a man. A coward and a dog who'd rather run away than face his responsibilities after the slightest inconvenience. That you are stupid and impulsive and you have no concept of what it means to be a friend or a husband.” Alex said, all at once. Too fast for Tyr to follow it all, but he understood the gist of things.

“I don't think being literally erased from local existence by my own father is a 'slight inconvenience'.” He sighed, but he knew she was aware of that and was speaking from a place of anger, not what she truly believed. “I thought about it for a long time, you know? How I could've just gone to Amistad and been free and together with everyone. Cowardly? Absolutely, and selfish too. But don't sling your hypocrisy at me, Alex. You saw what happened. You were there.”

“And I would have protected you, whatever happened.” She replied sadly. “Even if my family didn't stand with you, the others might not have, but I tried... I did! I fought him!”

“Yes. I know you did. I was there, too. Saved your life again, never expected a 'thank you' for it.”

“I would have come with you if you had asked.” Alex said. “There are academies and schools of learning in the republic. I...”

“I know.”

“You were my best friend, Tyr. Since we could barely speak, it's always been us. Why did you leave? Why did you... You tried to kill yourself while I was watching! What if you had truly died? You are sick, and I can't fix it, and that bothers me. I don't think you'll ever be happy, anywhere, even with me – and I can't torture myself for a lifetime trying to make you whole again.”

Tyr laughed at that, and she stared at him open mouthed with moist eyes at the rudeness and inconsiderate nature of the exclamation. “Even then, I knew I would not die. I am too cowardly to let go of this world and all my attachments to it, I never wanted it to begin with. That's why I can't leave.”

Alex sat herself beside him, finally.

She was weak in the knees, feeling sick to her stomach. There were so many times where she'd replayed that scenario in her head of lashing Tyr until he gave her an honest apology.

But she was weak. They had been friends and companions for so long, and then he'd changed for the worse – she'd left and he'd become a real and literal monster. Or so she'd thought, before she'd sought understanding. Becoming an adventurer herself and seeing the world for what it really was. A bleak and black place. Now... In this moment... She didn't know what to do, or say, or even how to feel.

“Apologize.” She said finally.

“I am sorry.” Tyr said. “But I'm also not apologetic in the slightest. Apart, we've become better versions of ourselves. You... You've stepped on the path of becoming a real legend. As for me... I am starting to understand what it means to be human, maybe. But at the end of it all, I think it'll be us. Together.”

“Then you'll stay...?”

“Not yet, you have to trust me.” Tyr looked at her, his eyes sincere in their melancholy. “I've no right to, but I'd ask that you trust me when I say that I need you where you are. You can leave, annul things, find another man if you want to. But you are mine, and one day I will come for you.”

“...Yours?” Alex frowned, shaking her head in disgust at words she'd never thought she'd hear. Tyr might've been a real piece of shit but he'd never spoken this way. “What does that even mean!? Your silver tongue irritates me so. Is this what you've learned from taking another wife and dishonoring not only me but my entire family? I am not a possession to be loaded on a cart for later use. I'll have my satisfaction now, or never. Leave again, and we are through.”

“No, you won't.” Tyr repeated. “You'll trust me, because I wasn't your best friend in the past – we are still the best of friends. Those bonds don't just evaporate overnight. People don't truly change even into their adulthood. We're just a mass of experiences regardless of what anyone says, and we behave in the way that behooves us, born to our natures. I regret many thing, but you already know why I do not regret leaving you behind. In the past I would have stunted your growth. You should know that I feel shame at doing it, and ignoring you even when you tried to help, when I deserved nothing of the sort. But as I've said, I will return. You love me, so you'll accept it.

“You can call me stupid, think I am as dumb as any box of rocks. But I was always cunning, good at watching and seeing. You will do what I ask of you, I know you will.”

“But you do not love me.” Alex said. “Because you do not know love of any sort. I accept you now, for all your flaws and faults, but you are a cold and heartless man.”

“Maybe.” Tyr shrugged, sighing at the truth in her words, she really believe he was like that. “Maybe I never will. I just don't know, I am as confused as I'm sure you are – but we were matched even before our birth. I didn't call you here for this, I called you because I need your help. And I'm ready to beg you for it, this is fated.”

“Help?” She scrunched her brow. “Why?”

“Because you're so agitating in your talent. Because you're the best and have talents that I do not, and could never. I'm sorry that I hurt your feelings, and I'll make it up to you eventually – but this is for Tiber, not me.”