Chapter Text
If everything went perfectly, they would cry for as long as they needed. Tyrus wouldn’t have to break away for a moment to cough up a bit more congealed blood. Astarion would have one more healing potion for Tyrus’s scarring chest. They would know exactly what to do next.
Then again, if everything had gone perfectly, Tyrus and 7,006 other spawn would already be slaughtered.
Instead, in the imperfect world they’d chosen, Astarion tensed in Tyrus’s arms and pulled back much too soon, noticing just before Tyrus did as their spawn siblings were released from the rite’s power and landed on the platform floor unharmed.
All eyes were trained on the corpse in the middle of the ritual circle. All save Tyrus’s, anyway. He felt an aversion to the sight—something unexplainably far too gruesome about Cazador’s limp, carved up body, lying there with a haunting stillness only death could explain. Instead he watched the other spawn wearily approach, Dalyria closest and least tentatively, just as the lingering glow in their eyes faded.
Tyrus glanced at Astarion and noticed with a surge of relief that his irises had already gone back to their dark crimson shade as well.
“Is he . . .” Dalyria paused, cringing back for a moment as if all this could still be some terrible trick. “Will he rise again?”
“He’s gone,” Astarion confirmed in a hoarse but firm tone, standing, and Tyrus struggled to his feet with Astarion’s help as well. Tyrus noted a heavy, distant sort of sadness in his love’s eyes then, and leaned against him for comfort just as much as his own support.
Petras, at Dalyria’s heels, stopped just behind her and stared open-mouthed at Cazador’s body. “I’ve never seen him bleed before—I didn’t know that was possible,” he said with wide eyes, clearly not an exaggeration by how his gaze flickered over the blood pool.
But though it still gave off a somewhat tempting scent, the sheer potency of Cazador’s blood seemed to have died with him.
“You—you destroyed him,” Aurelia whispered from where she stood much farther back, looking entirely unmoored. “The master. Gone.” Her eyes narrowed, almost accusatory at Astarion and Tyrus. “How were you able to do this?”
Apparently they hadn’t been aware enough to watch Cazador’s downfall. Tyrus could feel Astarion tense, about to respond, and gave his arm a squeeze before he spoke first with a strength he didn’t quite feel: “It doesn’t matter. It’s done. You’re free.”
Astarion gave him a look, Tyrus saw in his peripheral, but didn’t argue. Accepting that Tyrus had no desire to let the other spawn know what he was capable of.
They already seemed to fear his words enough. Aurelia shrunk back; Petras’s shoulders hunched as he asked, “F-free? What . . . what does that mean?”
“It means you have a choice,” Astarion cut in sharply, brow furrowing low over his eyes as he looked over them all. “You can continue living here in the shadows like parasites, or you can be more than he intended for us. The consequences are on your head either way.”
Leon had stayed quiet up until this moment, but at these words stepped forward. “Victoria needs me. If we’re free to go our own way . . .” he took a few testing steps towards the stairway, looking at Tyrus in askance for whatever reason. And when Tyrus did not oppose, the eldest spawn waited no longer before dashing towards the stairs.
The others seemed even more lost and confused, watching him ascend to the main exit.
And then Dalyria’s eyes widened further. “And . . . what does it mean for them?” she nodded up at the stairs and the cells they led to, then motioned a hand at the cages still swinging ever-so-slightly around them. Her brows pulled together, looking both frightened and worried as she implored, “What are you going to do with the ones we brought here?”
At this point, all Tyrus really wanted to do was wrap his arms around Astarion and rest for a tenday straight, not decide the fate of thousands. He wanted someone else to lead, to choose. Already, the few decisions he’d made in the last hour had left him as mentally exhausted as the disease had left his body weak.
But that was likely why the rest all looked to him and Astarion now. Choice was a hard gift—especially after so long. None of them knew what to do with this ‘freedom’ save Leon, thanks to his devotion to his daughter. And Tyrus, despite his current state, it seemed had still been assessed as the most powerful among them. A spawn hierarchy, still.
Even Astarion grimaced and glanced over to him. “Ah. Now that is a question . . . seven thousand spawn, unleashed on Baldur’s Gate.”
Tyrus wondered if he should propose a vote—and then nearly laughed at such a civilized, humane thought, after planning to kill them all for nearly four years.
But if Astarion and the rest wanted him to decide, this one instance Tyrus would take advantage in securing the fate of thousands.
First, he thought of the most rabid of the celled spawn and shuddered. Some were too dangerous, and better off dead. The rest would be ravenous, weak yet feral, especially after so many decades. But worthy of death?
I just don’t want to die down here . . . he heard Sebastian’s plea echo in his mind once more.
“Let’s release them,” he said, watching as Astarion nodded without surprise, Dalyria gave the cells a longing yet hesitant look, and Aurelia, Yousen, and Petras’s faces twisted in fear. “They deserve the same chance we’ve got.”
Tyrus glanced at Woe and grimaced. He wasn’t sure if he leaned down whether he’d have the strength to get up again. But he also felt an irrational urge to keep a grip on Astarion. It took much more strength of will than body to let go and gesture at the staff, asking, “Help me?”
“You’re right,” Astarion sighed as he nodded and went to retrieve it. “The poor wretches shouldn’t have to suffer, just because we . . . lured them here,” he finished while giving Woe to Tyrus, a displeased but stalwart frown on his face.
It took every bit of Tyrus’s remaining energy to plant Woe on the ground, leaning heavily upon it as he concentrated on the thrumming power within. His power, all of it, channeled through him and Chatterteeth over the course of months to bind the entirety of the rite to a conduit. And now he could feel the threads of the magic he’d woven, could spy out which to pluck for which intended outcome—to enact the Rite of Profane Ascension, or to unseal all the runes carved into hundreds of cages and cells. He could even feel the flaw in the tapestry, a loose thread that, if snapped, would kill everything inside of them instead.
The staff glowed, a bright, unholy red one last time, as he mentally unsealed the runes and the Depths echoed with the groan and creak of metal.
At first one by one, and then all at once, the giant chains around them began to uncoil. Bodies writhed between the bars, spawn waking up as the cages descended toward the flat bottom of the Depths and their tops unlocked with a click as well. Cell doors opened with a jarring screech up ahead, the dangerous and special spawn released all at once.
Tyrus collapsed to his knees again when it was done. He felt his body teeter backward even further, too weak to keep himself upright—only to feel his back hit something much softer and more comfortable than the stone floor.
“They’ll need someone to lead them. Those that survive, anyway,” Tyrus heard Astarion say as if from a great distance, though he could feel his strong arms close around him. “The Gur mentioned tunnels that lead from the sewers into the Underdark. Guide them there.”
Petras’s voice protested: “Us!? No–we can’t—”
“We’ll join you in a tenday or less,” Astarion cut him off impatiently. “We’ll help find somewhere…well, not safe, but less perilous. But Tyrus can’t travel like this. He needs rest.”
Tyrus hadn’t even realized his eyes were closed. He blinked them open just in time to see the blurry visage of Aurelia, her tail fluttering anxiously at her heels as she took a hesitant step closer. “Please . . . master? May I call you master?” she leaned down and asked, and before Tyrus could answer, plowed on, “Which of us should lead them, until your arrival?”
Given his past with the spawn, Tyrus could recognize the irony that his first thought was Leon. But the man was rightly attending to his duties of fatherhood—who knew if they’d ever even see him again. “I . . . I don’t . . .” he shook his head, then grimaced at another sharp flare of pain, this time in his skull.
“Dalyria, take them . . . they’ll need . . .” he thought he heard fragments of Astarion ordering them instead, and the eventual patter of feet, differing words and voices smearing together beyond recognition in Tyrus’s head: “Thank you, brother . . . we will find a new way . . . Praise Kelemvor . . . Cazador is dust, and Violet blooms! . . . Tyrus? . . . darling, not again . . .”
It wasn’t like falling unconscious from injury and blood loss, or the oblivion of Feign Death. Tyrus’s mind still lapsed in and out of awareness around the pain, though his limbs had grown too stiff and sluggish to move. He probably needed better blood in his system—but he had no means of communicating that anymore. He didn’t even have the energy to breathe.
And then, some indeterminate amount of time later, he could again. Doubled over, coughing up more gobs of black, useless blood, an arm around his middle and a wide, familiar hand smacking his back from behind to help clear his lungs.
“. . . what ails him?” a gruff, feminine voice was asking.
Astarion let out an angry scoff near Tyrus’s ear. “What does it f*cking matter? You said you could cure any disease!”
“I want answers first, spawn—”
“I don’t know, alright? But he won't be in any state to inform you either until you help!”
A pause, then, “Fine. Cassivora?”
Much closer to him, a voice whispered an arcane incantation he didn’t recognize, “Vincere est vivere!” just before Tyrus felt a brief, small touch on his shoulder.
At once, the pain in Tyrus’s head and pelvis faded. The leadened state of his limbs lightened, his lungs suddenly able to pull in fresh, clear gulps of air.
Tyrus coughed one last time and sat up, only to be faced with the sharp end of a golden greataxe.
Ulma the Gur looked down at him with sharp suspicion, her face blood-speckled and dirty with a newer scar over the bridge of her nose. “Tell me what plagued you, spawn,” she demanded, moving the weapon just under Tyrus’s chin.
Tyrus could feel Astarion’s arm slip out from around his waist, the other man’s whole body tensing for a fight—so he answered as quickly as he could, “Red Thrombosis.” He sat up and looked straight at Ulma, so she might see the genuineness in his eyes, while offering, “I can write out a description, what to look for, and such?”
Ulma’s ax lowered in small increments, her scowl fading. “Make sure that you do.” Her eyes flickered over to the four remaining skeletons behind them, and then the rest of her group—and Tyrus was surprised to note Leon, standing tied and gagged in between two of the largest Gur. “Before we let this one run off into the night, though, you’ve got some explaining to do.”
Astarion scoffed next to him. “Explaining?” he repeated in disbelief, though his expression was much softer as he helped Tyrus up a second time. “After we slayed an evil vampire lord for you?” he continued over his shoulder.
“You killed one vampire, yes,” Ulma said, her face growing angry again as she turned to answer Astarion, “and then released thousands of his spawn! Have you lost all sense?”
“They were innocents! It would have been a greater crime to kill them—”
“And so you will leave the crime to us? How many decades will it take to hunt them all down—”
“I released them,” Tyrus interrupted before the two could continue bickering. And though Ulma’s anger didn’t fade, she looked less ready to throw her ax when regarding him. “You can come with us, if you’d like—ensure there’s as little carnage as possible. Cull the rabid ones. Help those who wish to gain control of themselves . . . including your children.”
Ulma went slack-jawed for a moment, while the other hunters around her all tensed. She sucked in a breath, her voice cracking half-way through the question, “They—they survived?”
Astarion clicked his tongue. “That depends on how you define survived, really—”
“They’re free,” Tyrus interrupted. Though he couldn’t say much more without turning to check with Astarion: “How long has it been?”
Astarion took his hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. “You’ve been rather in and out of it for an hour, now, darling. They’re all making their way into the Underdark as we speak.”
“The Underdark?” one of the Gur hissed, while another said a bit louder, “That monster Turned them?”
Ulma raised a hand, and immediately the group fell quiet. “This is . . . difficult news,” she said, looking much older under the cold glow of the Depths’ eerie light. “We will need to decide what it means. What must be done.”
This time it was Chessa’s voice echoing in his mind: I’m not a child. I’m evil. I’m an evil monster!
Tyrus found himself taking a step forward, begging, “Please. They aren’t monsters. They may not have control—but I swear, that’s something any of us can gain.” Tyrus thought of Lady Amanita’s isolation, and added, “Especially with the help and support of others.”
Ulma let out a long, slow sigh. She didn’t immediately reassure him of their intentions—but she didn’t argue with him either. Only answered, “Thank you for what you have done. Though the killing blow was dealt without us, slaying Cazador was a great justice. For my brother Gandrel’s sake, for what has been done to my people. As for the rest . . . well. Time will tell.”
Ulma turned to look at Leon, then, a disgruntled resignation on her face as she added, “And I suppose we’re to trust this wayward one isn’t about to go stalking the city streets?”
There was a desperation to Leon’s eyes, wide and pleading at Tyrus. Everything he once might have reveled in, having power over the eldest spawn.
Now he shook his head quickly. “He can be trusted. We can go up with him—there may be a few werewolves and fanatical servants yet to deal with.”
“Very well,” Ulma nodded, gesturing at the two Gur holding him. As Leon’s bonds were loosed, she added to Tyrus and Astarion, “This won’t be the last you see of us. We will come to see the children, or—well, whatever they’ve become. And I have questions for you, spawn, about the disease you suffered, and also the rite you so perfectly executed despite your master’s hold,” she nodded with a grim smile at Cazador’s corpse lying not far.
Tyrus’s hand tightened in Astarion’s. “We didn’t defeat him that way,” he shook his head, and felt a smile ghost across his lips at the soft, pleased look Astarion gave him.
“Oh?” Ulma asked, raising a brow.
Astarion lifted their clasped hands and kissed the back of Tyrus’s. Then declared in a warm, indulgent tone: “No, just with trust, and love, and hope, and all that gushy nonsense, I’m afraid.”
Eventually the Gur left to inform the rest of their tribe of all that had occurred. Astarion and Leon went to retrieve their shirts and jackets, while Tyrus commanded his skeletons back to his side and approached Chatterteeth’s bones.
He wished silently that he had a bag of holding. Instead, he ended up fetching the Cloak of Dragomir first, folding it into a makeshift sack as he collected each piece of her. And shook his head when Astarion approached and inquired about raising her back up from the dead. “Just want to bury her somewhere that’s not here,” he nodded at their surroundings, before moving towards the stairs.
“I might know of a good place,” Astarion replied as he followed.
Leon was silent and focused as they trekked up the stairs, through the empty passage and up the dais back into the palace. He slowed his pace only at hearing rough, growling voices on the other side of the door to Cazador’s wing—and the three of them made quick work of those who remained after the ballroom massacre. With the combination of Astarion’s knife work, Tyrus’s skeletons and magic, and Leon’s mind-altering sorcery, the three werewolves stood little chance.
Even then, they still had to unseal the doors and travel down the long flight of stairs to reach the main guest bedchamber. When at last the group arrived, Leon’s breaths were coming in loud and fast, his eyes wide with desperate fear as he tried the door and it wouldn’t budge, calling, “Victoria! Victoria!”
He burst past them the second Astarion had picked the lock for him, head swiveling about the room for his daughter.
For a moment, all that could be seen was a frighteningly large pool of blood stained into the carpet—then, just as Tyrus noted where more blood smears led to, a soft, whimpering voice replied, “Daddy?”
She struggled from under the bed, neck and hair caked in blood, eyes wide but hopeful as she took in her father and Tyrus and Astarion at the door.
The reunion of father and daughter was a simple but poignant one as Leon gathered her up in his arms, inspected her wound, whispered her reassurances. Hushing her, when Victoria whispered, “I would have given her some blood, if she just asked.”
Tyrus wouldn’t think to intrude on such a moment, if not for how weak and frail she looked despite the wound no longer bleeding. And so he offered, “She could use some healing,” when the two had finished reuniting.
Leon gave him a confused frown, his hand pausing in stroking through her hair. “You . . . you know how to heal?”
Tyrus just gave him a tight smile and took a few steps forward, hand outraised in offering. And after a dubious moment of suspicion, Leon relaxed, giving a short nod. Victoria only gave Tyrus a small, friendly smile as he reached forward and gently touched her shoulder.
Soft, green energy glowed from his palm as he whispered the incantation for Life Transference, feeling his only recently-restored energy leach from him while the remaining wounds on Victoria’s neck knit themselves entirely back together.
Leon’s eyes narrowed at first, and then began to widen as he watched, but he didn’t question the magic further. Just said, once Tyrus leaned back, “Dawn is close.”
Tyrus thought of the second party planned for Cazador’s intended Ascension and grimaced. Guests would be arriving in about an hour—important guests, with either enough power or influence to bring retribution upon anyone they saw as culprits of so much carnage. “Yes,” he agreed. “Best we all leave quickly.”
“And this city . . . it has been our prison,” Leon shook his head. “I have hunted and been hunted here for far too long. You said the others escaped into the Underdark?”
“Yes,” Astarion replied first. “It may not be the safest place—but I wouldn’t count our old hunting ground as such either.”
Leon nodded, standing up with Victoria cradled still in his arms. “We’ll find a place of our own,” he told her, exuding a confidence Tyrus had long associated the eldest spawn with, and yet a tenderness that seemed entirely alien coming from Leon.
But perhaps that was yet more evidence of love’s transformative power, Tyrus mused. 'Love and pain were inseparable,' perhaps, but that didn't mean it had ever been a force to blame for evil—the true culprit had been fear, driving Leon’s treatment of his fellow spawn, and yet again to blame for Tyrus’s spiral into despair, darkness, and misplaced vengeance.
Their circ*mstances, however bleak still, felt almost blindingly filled with light in comparison, as Victoria regarded Tyrus with a bright smile. “Thanks, skeleton man!” she said, feeling at her healed neck. “If you ever need blood for experiments, just let me know!”
Tyrus blinked, taking this in—one last piece falling into place, this time about how exactly Lady Amanita might have solved the puzzle for radiant immunity.
“Do not offer your blood to a vampire again, Tori,” Leon sighed. Then, as he looked Tyrus directly in the eyes, he echoed, “But . . . thank you, Tyrus. Both of you,” he nodded at Astarion. “I’m sure we’ll meet again.”
As Leon carried her out, Tyrus heard Victoria whisper, “I counted the number of minutes, Daddy. It’s been a whole 387 before you returned, and 191 since Dalyria came and wanted my blood . . .”
Astarion watched them go with a contemplative look on his face. “We don’t have to follow,” he pointed out.
Tyrus held up the makeshift sack of bones, agreeing, “I do need to bury her somewhere.”
“No, I mean generally,” Astarion said with an exasperated laugh, closing in. He reached out and cupped Tyrus’s cheek, continuing, “You know you don’t owe them anything, love. The spawn all have their freedom. What more could they ask of us?”
Tyrus’s brow furrowed as he searched Astarion’s face, at a loss. “What else could we do?”
Astarion laughed again before he urged, “Anything, darling! Travel Faerun and beyond, make names for ourselves, maybe settle down in our favorite place one day. But to start . . . head east, along the Chionthar. Visit each town,” and then his smile saddened a bit, as he finished, “ask around, perhaps, for a Cynda Aman’del?”
Tyrus remembered anew, suddenly, the revelation of Cynda’s letters amidst so much chaos. He’d pushed away any thoughts of the name during his plans for a perfect slaughter. But he did have a sister out there somewhere. And she was still thinking of him, it seemed.
He squeezed his eyes shut tight, heart clenching in his chest at the empty longing that surrounded the name, if nothing else tangible. But how on earth could he expect to fill it? Whatever sweet, childish relationship he’d once had with this Cynda, what hope did he have of restoring it now?
She’d probably take one look at him and turn Tyrus away—or even call for a cleric once he explained. And she’d be right to do so, Tyrus thought, counting all the lives he’d claimed now. One more innocent especially: the diseased man he’d drained without a second thought.
Tyrus pulled back, Astarion’s hand lingering in the air between them. “I was the one who decided to release so many spawn,” he said, only voicing the practical argument for now. Avoiding eye contact as he added, “I can’t just wash my hands of that. Not for a while, at least.”
Astarion sighed, slowly dropping the hand. But then he put on a bright smile, agreeing, “Very well. The spawn will need someone to lead them—and they are expecting us in a tenday or less. Without guidance they’ll just be a murderous, blood-sucking horde!” His eyes flickered about the room, narrowing with intent before he said, “That gives us a tenday for a few errands, though . . . and I think we can clean up one particular mess right away.”
When Tyrus raised a brow in question, his love gave him a dark, sharpened smile in return.
Twenty or so minutes later, they hurried outside to the south ramparts while smoke billowed and flame licked along the wallpaper and paintings. Thanks to magic and the unreasonable amount of alcohol always stowed away in most rooms, it’d been easy to set the Szarr Palace aflame. And Astarion had raided Cazador’s personal chests as they went as well, picking up gold, precious gemstones, and a particular key that had him smiling all the wider.
Tyrus paused right as they opened the door, however, considering for a moment before he pulled the arcane crystal off his neck. Ignoring Astarion’s questioning look in favor of tossing it over the handrail, watching the dark stone and its gold chain disappear into the burning dormitory stairs below.
Astarion let out a small scoff, remarking, “We could have at least sold that, darling.”
“I’d call it more replaceable than our favorite book,” Tyrus said as they shut the door behind them.
“Oh fine, I’ll add it to the list,” Astarion huffed, though he had a small smirk on his face again.
“List?” Tyrus asked, blinking away the stinging smoke from his eyes in favor of the fresh night air. There was still likely an hour before dawn, he noted while peering at the sky.
“Well—first we’ll need a trip to the Counting House come dawn,” Astarion said with a giddy sort of excitement, twirling that large golden key between his fingers, “and then something besides black in your wardrobe, maybe a bit of armor, the whole drawn-out series of the Drizzt Chronicles if you want to lug three dozen books into the Underdark with us, some hair ribbons, more of those radiant immunity potions—or better yet, the recipe, if your mysterious trader will sell that—”
“She’s gone,” Tyrus shook his head quickly, stiffening his face before it could crumble in sudden grief. And though he could guess at the potion’s main ingredients now, he had no desire to ever use Victoria for such a thing.
Whatever expression remained on his face, it made Astarion open his mouth only briefly before he shut it, not questioning Tyrus further for now. “Very well,” he nodded after a moment, “we still have one left if we’re ever in a pinch. And with your current immunity, and me borrowing that cloak for a bit . . . well, I thought we might bury old Chatters and then watch the sun rise, in a little place I know.” He inclined his head, his smile softening as he added, “It’s not far.”
At such an early hour, there wasn’t a proverbial soul around as Astarion led Tyrus by the hand into a nearby cemetery. Which was probably the only reason Tyrus hadn’t entirely crumpled into a ball of panic at being so surrounded by the unknown. Streets he may have walked just the once, on his way to the palace, brought no familiarity now. He still found himself jumping at every small noise of a creaking sign or shifting crates, cats shrieking and beggars snoring in corners, and held Astarion’s hand all the tighter until they arrived.
In the cemetery at least, there were walls and fences to steady his nerves. And without hesitation, Astarion grabbed a shovel near a closed-up flower cart and began to dig—right beside an old grave Tyrus realized he recognized the name of.
Astarion Ancunin. 229 - 268 NR.
Thirty-nine years old then, when he was Turned. Just a bit older than Tyrus now.
When the small grave was appropriately deep enough, Tyrus untied the cloak, gently letting Chatterteeth’s bones clatter to the bottom before raking the dirt back on top with his bare hands. Thinking all the while that he had kept his promise, both to her and to himself at once: he’d freed Astarion and resisted the urge to control him, all in one single, defining moment that had changed the course of everything.
What little else he could say for himself, Tyrus had managed to be better than Cazador. And so, in turn, had Astarion.
When he picked a couple of flowers and laid them over the small dirt mound, the pale elf gave him an amused look and replied, “Cute. Though I do wonder if she might not have minded coming back, you know, just to help us with a few more loose ends—”
“The cycle of bloodshed and slaughter is over,” Tyrus shook his head. “I think that’s all she came back to life for.”
“None of us were living in that place,” Astarion scoffed as he knelt in front of the two graves, though behind the light-heartedness that heavy, deep sadness had returned to his eyes. Still, he offered a small smile when Tyrus knelt next to him. “But perhaps we have a chance now.”
Tyrus shook out the dirt from the cloak and placed it around Astarion’s shoulders—his first blatant disregard of Cazador’s commands. And though Astarion harrumphed a bit about the terrible leech on his strength, it wasn’t until Tyrus agreed, “A second chance for both of us,” that he looked truly unsure.
He interlaced their hands between them as the sky began to lighten, the first of the birds up to chirp their morning songs. “And now that we do?” he pressed, brow furrowing low over his eyes as he nodded between them. “Is . . . this what you want?”
Tyrus almost wanted to laugh at such a ludicrous question. Instead, he answered, “Hm. I hadn’t even considered that.” Before Astarion’s face could truly fall, however, Tyrus leaned in and kissed him, smiling against his partner’s lips at how quickly Astarion melted into it before pulling back to murmur, “Because there’s nothing I want more.”
Astarion smiled back, teasing, “Oh, he’s got a wicked sense of humor now,” before kissing Tyrus back even more enthusiastically. “I suppose there’s just no point in resisting, is there?” he said as morning light began to stream into the cemetery. His dark eyes a shade warmer in the sun, Tyrus noted with a fond ache in his chest, while Astarion murmured, “Not if I trust him with my very soul.”
Soon after, the two leaned back against his tombstone with their heads inclined together and fingers interlaced. Starting their first day of freedom watching the remnants of Szarr Palace, still visible up on the hill, alight in smoldering flames under the warmth and cheer of dawn.
