"Given that Asmodeus played you at least as easily as I played Usein Darre, I don't know if this is the the topic I want to take your advice on," Kahl points out.
His tone is offended, but it doesn't impact the gentle and steady pace of his rowing. "I did have a life before him. And a team that worked very well. Most of the time."
My family, were Patia's last words before she died. It's funny, the things you don't see until you've lost them.
"We called ourselves the Ring of Brass. Avalir - from the beginning it had the seven most powerful mages, and then their fourteen proteges. The Ring of Gold, and of Silver." Aimless bitterness seeps into his voice with that explanation, the sort that would have mellowed with time if so much of it hadn't been spent in Hell. "We had our own separate responsibilities, beneath all of that - Laerryn kept the city flying, and Nydas kept it funded. Patia and Loquatius controlled information, in different ways. Cerrit protected the city from itself, and I defended it from everything else."
All spheres of influence that intersected, at one point or another, and they took advantage of it.
"Between the six of us - we didn't always see eye to eye. We always knew we didn't tell each other everything. But we found ways to work towards the same thing. Even at the end."
A flying city run by a tiny arrogant circle makes him think of Sky, of course; a cold part of him wonders if it was such a bad thing, for it to come to ruin. But he doesn't interrupt Zerxus's grief.
It's the idea of a life he finds alluring, more than the people. He doesn't know how to speak about that.
Before he has to find something to say, though, they're at the lilies, firefly glimmers beginning to flicker.
Zerxus doesn't try to prod him one way or another with questions, though he's considering more details when he recognises the lilies, and his rowing begins to slow.
"We're here." His voice is soft, and he isn't quite looking up at Kahl, not yet. "Grab your cup."
Kahl leans over the side very dubiously, holding his cup delicately in his fingers, looking for all the world like a cat who does not want to touch the water.
As the glow brightens, too strong and golden to be the pale daystone glow of Sky, Kahl almost seems to cast himself in shadows, and more shadows, dark and stark in the eye-watering light, roll away from him, uncurling like vast tentacles, like paper shadow-puppets on a vast scale. The shape of a surging, coiling Kraken is illuminated through him and behind him, trailing into the water.
And in translucent wisps of golden light, there's a boy with a pointed, playful face Zerxus might or might not know from the barge, screaming and howling in silent rage and pain, as the dark tentacles drag him under the water, his hair floating around his head, the last bubbles of his breath escaping.
Kahl, focused on his cup, doesn't appear to see it at all.
Zerxus, meanwhile, has done this enough now that he feels comfortable leaning over to scoop almost casually with that cup, keeping one eye on Kahl.
He does recognise Peter, knows enough about him to realise he isn't seeing a true mortal child being drowned in the dark, but that just means it strikes a different chord of stricken regret.
It makes a dramatic contrast with the vision hovering above him, horned and battle-scarred but more relaxed than he's ever been. He has one arm around Elias, and a hand gently grasping Kahl's; Evandrin is behind them, an ever-shifting silhouette of starlight, arms draped around his husband's shoulders. Tempus is lounging at their feet, purring contentedly.
Kahl makes a weird expression when he catches sight of the vision arrayed around Zerxus. He can't - not believe it, the nature of the light is plainly, intuitively, undeniably obvious. And he can't not want it, with an awful, bottomless longing, a two-thousand-years old longing, a hope that died centuries ago. He doesn't want it back. He survived alone. It's too late to matter. And yet it's there.
For a long moment, he's stuck fast between two impulses. Address what he sees, or understand what Kahl does?
Ultimately he glances behind him, and when his eyes widen it isn't with any sort of surprise; it's just the stunned response of vulnerability exposed, desperate yearning and guilty resignation twined together.
As far as he can fathom, this is another beautiful future he cannot have.
He takes a staggered breath and says, "Do you want to talk about me or Peter first?"
Well, he absolutely doesn't want to talk about that.
He knows where he stands, with Peter, whether Zerxus approves or not. It might even be easier, just to fight with him about it. Kahl sniffs, loftily, and looks away.
Every reason. For Jamie, for Peter's crimes, for the countless lost boys, for Kahl and his own exalted purpose. Because Kahl promised, because he had been waiting for an opportunity, because Corvo called for him. Kahl looks back, meets his eyes.
Kahl surprises himself by missing the other boy. They'd talked so briefly, but Kahl had...liked him.
"Peter devoured children for the pleasure of toying with them," he says quietly. "Children who looked up to him, adored him, trusted him. Children who called him friend. Jamie, he once called his best friend. But he killed Jamie's mother, the better to steal him away, and treated him like a toy, to be played with and forgotten, but that always belonged to him. When Jamie fought him, he cut off his hand, kept him tied to Peter's island, an immortal prisoner, while he chewed up more children, for centuries. Jamie had to bury them all. Peter would have left them tossed aside, broken on the sand. And the Admiral said he was to be saved."
Kahl clenches his hands around the silvered cup. He would have killed more children than Peter, if he'd succeeded in summoning the Maelstrom - he probably killed more children in the collapse of Sky, in mere minutes, than Peter did in all his spiteful, capricious ages. But Kahl had not betrayed them. Had not lured them from their families with promises of flight and adventure and endless summer, had not ever been their friend. No one had ever been a friend to him, before he died.
"He tried to hurt anyone Jamie cared about, to punish him for escaping from Peter's sway. He tried to kill Corvo, when the Enposib crashed. He had pinned him under a heavy cabinet, to taunt, to hurt, to kill slowly. Corvo prayed to me. And I came."
What he says first is, "You know I believe that everyone can be saved. But it was careless, at best, for the Admiral to pull them here at the same time." Killing an inmate would not be his first choice, obviously, and it sits like a stone in his gut that he never would have known, but -
Would Jamie have been able to thrive here, without that balance? Would Corvo have graduated? It's the first time he's ever really thought of vengeance and redemption as part of the same wider tapestry.
What he focuses on next is, "You came when Corvo called. You didn't have to do that."
"He was awful at praying. I had to nag him do it. To use my name when he wanted me to show up. I'd been reminding him I could help all the time. His old god didn't care about him at all, I don't think."
Kahl scowls. Jamie means everything to him, but he cares about Corvo, too.
"And it was the perfect opportunity. Of course I came."
"You proved to him that faith could be worthwhile." There's a shade of melancholy to his smile, because it still very much involved murder and divine retribution has never been a tenant of his own. That doesn't mean he can't recognise a place for it.
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"You could, but this way we're working together."
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How much more does it matter?
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Kahl feels like he's being very reasonable about this.
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My family, were Patia's last words before she died. It's funny, the things you don't see until you've lost them.
"We called ourselves the Ring of Brass. Avalir - from the beginning it had the seven most powerful mages, and then their fourteen proteges. The Ring of Gold, and of Silver." Aimless bitterness seeps into his voice with that explanation, the sort that would have mellowed with time if so much of it hadn't been spent in Hell. "We had our own separate responsibilities, beneath all of that - Laerryn kept the city flying, and Nydas kept it funded. Patia and Loquatius controlled information, in different ways. Cerrit protected the city from itself, and I defended it from everything else."
All spheres of influence that intersected, at one point or another, and they took advantage of it.
"Between the six of us - we didn't always see eye to eye. We always knew we didn't tell each other everything. But we found ways to work towards the same thing. Even at the end."
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It's the idea of a life he finds alluring, more than the people. He doesn't know how to speak about that.
Before he has to find something to say, though, they're at the lilies, firefly glimmers beginning to flicker.
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"We're here." His voice is soft, and he isn't quite looking up at Kahl, not yet. "Grab your cup."
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As the glow brightens, too strong and golden to be the pale daystone glow of Sky, Kahl almost seems to cast himself in shadows, and more shadows, dark and stark in the eye-watering light, roll away from him, uncurling like vast tentacles, like paper shadow-puppets on a vast scale. The shape of a surging, coiling Kraken is illuminated through him and behind him, trailing into the water.
And in translucent wisps of golden light, there's a boy with a pointed, playful face Zerxus might or might not know from the barge, screaming and howling in silent rage and pain, as the dark tentacles drag him under the water, his hair floating around his head, the last bubbles of his breath escaping.
Kahl, focused on his cup, doesn't appear to see it at all.
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He does recognise Peter, knows enough about him to realise he isn't seeing a true mortal child being drowned in the dark, but that just means it strikes a different chord of stricken regret.
It makes a dramatic contrast with the vision hovering above him, horned and battle-scarred but more relaxed than he's ever been. He has one arm around Elias, and a hand gently grasping Kahl's; Evandrin is behind them, an ever-shifting silhouette of starlight, arms draped around his husband's shoulders. Tempus is lounging at their feet, purring contentedly.
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Ultimately he glances behind him, and when his eyes widen it isn't with any sort of surprise; it's just the stunned response of vulnerability exposed, desperate yearning and guilty resignation twined together.
As far as he can fathom, this is another beautiful future he cannot have.
He takes a staggered breath and says, "Do you want to talk about me or Peter first?"
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He knows where he stands, with Peter, whether Zerxus approves or not. It might even be easier, just to fight with him about it. Kahl sniffs, loftily, and looks away.
"Peter, I suppose."
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"Why did you kill him?" Simple and steady, laced with all of that sorrow and guilt but not anger or disappointment.
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"You wouldn't understand," Kahl says flatly.
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Above him, the scene changes. Evandrin and Zerxus fade into the background, lost or trapped or wounded.
Elias's sword blazes with divine wrath, back to back with Kahl.
"That doesn't have to mean condemning it out of hand. And the more you explain to me, the more I can see it from your perspective."
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"Peter devoured children for the pleasure of toying with them," he says quietly. "Children who looked up to him, adored him, trusted him. Children who called him friend. Jamie, he once called his best friend. But he killed Jamie's mother, the better to steal him away, and treated him like a toy, to be played with and forgotten, but that always belonged to him. When Jamie fought him, he cut off his hand, kept him tied to Peter's island, an immortal prisoner, while he chewed up more children, for centuries. Jamie had to bury them all. Peter would have left them tossed aside, broken on the sand. And the Admiral said he was to be saved."
Kahl clenches his hands around the silvered cup. He would have killed more children than Peter, if he'd succeeded in summoning the Maelstrom - he probably killed more children in the collapse of Sky, in mere minutes, than Peter did in all his spiteful, capricious ages. But Kahl had not betrayed them. Had not lured them from their families with promises of flight and adventure and endless summer, had not ever been their friend. No one had ever been a friend to him, before he died.
"He tried to hurt anyone Jamie cared about, to punish him for escaping from Peter's sway. He tried to kill Corvo, when the Enposib crashed. He had pinned him under a heavy cabinet, to taunt, to hurt, to kill slowly. Corvo prayed to me. And I came."
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What he says first is, "You know I believe that everyone can be saved. But it was careless, at best, for the Admiral to pull them here at the same time." Killing an inmate would not be his first choice, obviously, and it sits like a stone in his gut that he never would have known, but -
Would Jamie have been able to thrive here, without that balance? Would Corvo have graduated? It's the first time he's ever really thought of vengeance and redemption as part of the same wider tapestry.
What he focuses on next is, "You came when Corvo called. You didn't have to do that."
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Kahl scowls. Jamie means everything to him, but he cares about Corvo, too.
"And it was the perfect opportunity. Of course I came."
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"With the right god."
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