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“In the end, there was no need to charge the sword or give your mortal brother any opportunity to use it,” Gorlois observed. “He died. He was not needed. The sword chose you. You bind yourself to it more every day. And here we are.”

“Now what?” I demanded.

“A war has begun. Your allies are angry. They’ve just been attacked. And what do mortals do when they’re unfairly attacked? They gather and rally and then they go on the offensive.” He rubbed his hands together. “I’m sure even now they’re strategizing and plotting and gathering the largest army they can. Perhaps you’ll even lead it.”

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” I said scornfully.

I looked into my father’s cold, gray eyes and saw the bloodlust there. Perhaps it was the only thing which warmed him after millennia of boredom.

He expected us to come against him with our armies, for there to be battle after battle.

He was eager for it. Eager to watch thousands upon thousands of mortals and fae die trying to reach him and fail.

“You think you’re invincible,” I said aloud. “You truly must be in an impervious place, Father.”

I caught a look of satisfaction in the fae patriarch’s eyes, and as I did, I knew what I had to do.

“You are a part of me,” my father intoned, mistaking my expression for one of temptation. “As much as I am a part of you. Come back to us. Come back to your rightful place. Cease these valiant but futile struggles.”

I hesitated, purposely allowing him to glimpse indecision.

When he extended his hand to me, I was expecting it, and this time, I grasped it willingly.

In an instant, my vision warped and contorted.

A whirlwind of ancient memories and deific aspirations I could hardly comprehend flooding my consciousness. I felt the weight of ages, the burden of millennia of knowledge, battles fought in realms beyond mortal ken, the echoes of long-forgotten and broken oaths, and the cosmic majesty of a truly inhuman being.

For a moment, I was a vessel adrift in the vast ocean of my father’s mind. Then I swam within the sea, searching for the insight I desired.

I glimpsed fragments. Fleeting images that hinted at what I sought.

I grasped them to me, clutching them like a drowning person might hold tight to floating pieces of debris.

Meanwhile, my own mind was being rummaged through. It was as if my thoughts were an open library and my father an austere scholar, sifting through the volumes, tossing aside what was of no interest to him.

I struggled to maintain my focus as snippets of my childhood, faces of the ones I loved, and vistas of the places I had seen and things I had done flickered in a disorienting sequence. Emotions surged and receded. Joy, pain, heartbreak, my father ruthlessly riddled through them all.

I delved deeper into him, trying to ignore the sense of invasion as the sacred sanctuary that was my essence was trampled on.

Shadowlike, I traversed the labyrinths of his mind like a mouse, nimble and silent, darting between the towering structures of memories and the more terrifying edifices of his desires. I slipped through the gaps, small and unobtrusive, avoiding his scrutiny while he was distracted with his own search.

And as I slipped through the cracks unnoticed, I found what I was looking for.

With relief, I grasped it like a crumb, then slipped it behind my back, a subtle intruder turned thief.

It was time to go.

I moved to leave... only to find myself chained. Each link tightened with every attempt I made to free myself.

Locked in, the assault continued. My father’s consciousness hammered against mine like a barrage of thunderous waves. Consumed by his own pursuits, he seemed oblivious to my struggle.

Desperation clawed at me as he delved deeper and deeper, penetrating the recesses of my mind with pitiless calculation.

I was unfortified. Untrained. Untaught. A fledgling flapping against a probing storm.

There!

I felt his triumph as he found what he sought. Some confirmation. It was me. I was the one. The true daughter. Not another mere copy, but the source.