#25 of 100: Rejuvenation
Matthaios's palace is besieged by his own son, and his loyal daughter demands to be granted access to the same unnatural power he uncovered decades before.
It is so much harder for me to focus when I’m not at my own laptop. I find the below piece frustrating and inconsistent.
The story does have its roots in truth though. I’ll leave you to ponder how!
Matthaios thumbs his worry beads as his daughter asks him to cause her pain. It is not the core of Sophia’s request, but it is the part he focuses on.
He performed the rejuvenation ritual on himself long before she was even born, but he still remembers the sensation of being devoured, rearranged, and vomited up. He remembers the pain that blazed through him for twenty-four hours, and how his men had strapped him to a bed to stop him from slicing open his own throat.
He doesn’t know if they have twenty-four hours to spare now. The palace whose corridors they pace restlessly through is still stocked with food and well-trained guards, but it was never built to withstand a siege. His son, Vasilios, had made common cause with his enemies, of which there were many, and sought to destroy him.
“Perhaps if you had doled out a smidgen of your power, we wouldn’t be in this situation,” Sophia says, matching her father’s strides with two of her own.
Her words sting him. She has never had to rule a city. She does not understand that an iron fist is necessary, or that citizens need to be saved from their own foolish desires. When he and his fellow explorers discovered the deep salt being at the end of an ancient set of tunnels, he was the only one willing to investigate it further. His lily-livered companions did not deserve the power of youth and impenetrability the being granted him. He had built his palace on top of the tunnels to secure the area, and until now, none had truly challenged him.
“That’s how I’ve raised you, hm? To believe in some egalitarian nonsense like your brother claims to?” Matthaios suspects Vasilios believed nothing of the sort and wanted the power all to himself, but this is now a well-worn conversation between the two of them.
She rolls her eyes and stops beside a twenty-year-old painting of Matthaios atop a horse, striking down those who took arms against him. He looks as youthful in it as he does now. He smiles at the memory of the banquet the night after crushing the rebels, regaling his two small children with the details and letting them have their first sip of wine. He had to put the painter to death the year after, which grieved him, as he had never found another artist quite like him.
“All I’m saying is that such power should be shared with those who have proved themselves. I’ve stuck by you, haven’t I? But what I’m hearing is that I’m not worthy of everlasting youth. That I should wither and decay like any other citizen. Like grandpapa. Or mother.”
“They were not in their right minds when they fell ill!” Matthaios insists. “I couldn’t let them go through the process. You can’t possibly understand what it is like, either.”
“Tell me, then. What is it like?”
Matthaios closes his eyes and runs a palm down his face.
“It is pain that will drive you to do anything to stop it. I barely survived myself. What you now ask of me is to lead you to such pain, and watch you, my daughter, my only daughter, writhing in agony. I do not wish such a thing even on the betrayer.”
She groans at his avoidance of Vasilios’s name. He sees himself in her expression, the same hooked nose twitching, the same bushy eyebrows frowning.
“Vasilios won’t kill me, you know. If - when - he takes the palace, he might just offer me up as a plaything to the enemy. Or perhaps he will forgive me, and the two of us will go down together and figure out the ritual ourselves. You, on the other hand, he will do his best to destroy. I’ve seen the ruins outside the city. Other people claimed this land before. No doubt they, too, thought themselves unkillable.”
Is it a threat? Matthaios wonders. Is this the moment where she decides she is for or against him? It is the same emotional manipulation he has taught her over the years. His heart swells with a mix of fear and pride.
“I show you how to seize the power for yourself, and then you do what with it, exactly?” He regrets the words as soon as they come out. They reek of surrender.
“It simply means my survival is guaranteed. I already know the secret lies behind the warded door in the storeroom by the north guard tower. What I don’t know is what lies beyond that. I imagine there are a number of things that could go wrong if Vasilios and I ventured down without you. The entire family line could be obliterated. Come. Show me.”
Before he can ask anything else, she walks along the corridor to the north side of the palace. He follows her, wondering how he could have obliterated other families without mercy, yet still succumb to his daughter’s demands. She has always had a silver tongue, and has always moved through the world believing others will give in to her. Her unwavering certainty must be why he finds himself scurrying after her, as her steps turn into a run.
When they near the north tower, the ground shudders. Matthaios stumbles, then stops in his tracks. He hears yells coming from the south.
“He must have breached the walls. Come on, father, don’t let this be the end.” Sophia gestures to him, then turns the corner.
He follows. A group of guards rush past them in a corridor, nodding as they stride past. Sophia reaches the storeroom, then stops. She is breathless as she gestures to the trapdoor, runes etched on its outside. The ground shudders a second time.
The deep salt being had taught him how to craft the wards, and how to remove them. Matthaios kneels down and traces the etchings with his fingers in a pattern that is seared into his brain.
Something clicks. Sophia’s eyes grow wide, and she wrenches open the hatch. A ladder leads to darkness.
Matthaios goes first. They have dispensed with words now that the cries of battle seem to be closing in on them. He fumbles around in the damp tunnel for the lantern he left in his previous trip down. The being demanded visits every seven years, but he visited it every five years to be absolutely certain it would not let his youth fade.
With the lamp lit, he grips Sophia’s hand and leads her down the ancient sloping tunnel. There are faint paintings daubed on the stone walls by the previous inhabitants of the land, showing a crowned leader hunting, feasting, killing. He has never let his mind dwell on what had happened to these settlers, but now his son is on his tail he realises no ancient graveyards have ever been uncovered. It gives him a sliver of hope to think they may have simply moved away.
The sounds of battle fade as they wander further, and the musty air turns salty.
“Are we near the sea?” Sophia whispers. Matthaios only shakes his head.
The tunnel opens out into a vast underground cavern, dominated by a black lake. The surface is still. Matthaios sets his lantern down, and Sophia shuffles forward and reaches a hand out to touch the fluid.
“Don’t!” Matthaios warns her. “Not yet. Not until you know what it is.”
“Tell me, father. Help me survive this.”
He tells her of his first trip. Of sensing the consciousness of the liquid and wading through to greet it. His mind was assaulted by something he could not comprehend, and a flurry of thought communications passed between him and the being. He could sense its rage, and its eagerness to destroy him. The only thing that saved him was calling out its name. That earned him its respect.
Xanthos. He had discovered the name in temple ruins that now lay outside the city, and knew it was something the previous inhabitants had worshipped. Xanthos demanded his worship also, and demanded he consume a bit of it every seven years. In return, it promised everlasting youth and impenetrable skin. It did not use the word immortality. Matthaios only realises this as he relays the story to his daughter. He then tells her of the agony afterwards, as if he was experiencing every type of death at once: frozen, burnt, pierced, bludgeoned, poisoned… For a day that felt like a year.
“That’s all there is to it? Tell the being you know its name, promise you will worship it, and then it blesses you? And the pain, obviously, but after that… Youth?”
He nods.
Sophia smiles and looks over his shoulder. Matthaios turns to see his son smiling back at her.
Also, I hate twists. Whenever I write a twist I feel it is a sign I haven’t made the story good enough to stand without one.
GIVE THE READERS TWISTS. WE DEMAND THEM.
But in all seriousness I'd like more of this story if you ever feel inclined to revisit it.