Chapter 2 - A Grandfather's Tale

Mom and dad weren’t the kindest people on earth, but I had to live with them regardless.
When I first met Rena, I didn’t really like her, but when I learned how tough she really was, that’s when I asked her to be my friend.
Dad wasn’t too keen of this new friendship.
I would ask to go over to her house and play, but he would just hit me and say that I wasn’t allowed to see her.
By age seven, I learned how to keep myself from crying every time hit struck me.
Dad became more and more ruthless each day, until mom stood in the way of his beatings.
She received the blows in my stead, she didn’t even flinch. How could she stand it? Why did she put herself in my place?
The day came, several weeks later, when they left the house for half of the day and left me home by myself. I wanted to venture the house, visit the places that I wasn’t allowed to see.
I found him there, in the room behind the kitchen, which was usually locked; my grandfather was strapped to a chair.
“Ah, I see that you are the one he chose. Your father was too afraid himself, but he has no problem destroying his only child.” He looked at me.
I cringed when I saw the entirety of his face, for it was half covered in scars. “What happened to your face?” I asked, not knowing how insensitive the question was.
“Ah, so he hasn’t told you yet, has he?” He looked at his weathered hands. “You are the heir he chose not to be, and now I am afraid of his choice, for you might be the one to actually overcome the fear of this eye.” He lifted an un-bound arm to point at his left eye. “It isn’t mine, you see, but it belongs to a demon.”
“A demon?” I had never heard of demons before then, which would surprise anyone. “What is a demon?”
“Oh, my grandson, a demon is a powerful being who can fly, but this demon who gave us this eye was special. He had a heart, as did his father, but his heart was bigger than that. He wanted to kill his father because his father tried to kill the ones he loved, his ‘dragon’ that was actually a wyvern, and his girl.”
“His girl? You mean like a daughter?”
“No, no, not like that. His girl, meaning the one he loved more than anyone else in the world. And our ancestor, the great Lord Katet, knew what love really was and wanted to help him. You see, Lord Katet was more of a father to him than his actual father.
One day, when the demon came back to the kingdom, he was broken, a group of villagers tried to cut off his wings after nailing him to a crucifix. He tore himself free of it, only succeeding in destroying his hands and feet. He tried to confront his father in that pitiful state, but ended up going to our kingdom in search of Lord Katet.
Once he approached the castle, he had already lost a great deal of blood, the only way to save him, was to take away half of his power.”
“What does that mean?” I quickly became interested in this story, as I thought that it was purely fiction, but I would learn that is was not.
“They removed one of his eyes, and took away his ability to speak,” my grandfather sighed. “He would never be able to tell his beloved how he actually felt.”
“Why do you have his eye then?”
“Because after all these many, many years, we’ve kept him alive, by keeping it alive.” He looked at me again. “You Faite are the one who might be able to destroy the fear that comes with this burden.” He laughed a little. “Your uncle was smart enough to run away, he knew that he had to, but I wouldn’t have let him take this anyway, he was too kind, to fragile, and too much like a girl.” He really laughed this time. “And finally, the demon might regain his voice, and this horrible curse will be over for him, and this family.”
“I can’t believe you managed to find him, you idiot child.”
The sound of his voice made me jump.
“Father, you have said way to much, you can’t be telling Faite such nonsense as this!”
“It’s destiny you know.” My grandfather replied calmly. “You can’t fool it.”
“There is no such thing as destiny.” Dad said this strongly.
“Your pride has been hurt hasn’t it? Oh well, my idiot son should’ve known better than to confront the demon king on his own.” Grandfather said, I saw a smile on his face. “You took your empty shell of a wife with you I take it.”
Father didn’t say anything.
“Ah, so you are in fact an idiot. Your brother was smarter than you by far.”
“Do not bring that person into this! Lager is no longer my brother!”
“Sure he is.”
“Faite, leave, now.”
“But dad, I want to listen to grandfather some more.”
“NOW YOU IDIOT CHILD!”
I got up and ran out of the room, I never saw my grandfather until I was seventeen years old.
That was the most painful thing that had ever happened to me in my life.
They couldn’t knock me out with sedatives, but they did numb the area around my eye. It shared me half to death. The next few years, I was a walking shell, trying to remember who I was. The demon’s past tried to become mine.
When I turned twenty, they attached the permanent eye patch with screws and nails, but I had already seen what it looked like.
That horrible eye, it was red, and it wasn’t human at all. It wasn’t like mine either.
I decided that I would take his life away from him, away from my father, and then find her.
She couldn’t be that difficult to find.
I had to find Rena, she had been my only friend, and one of the few people I remembered after the painful operation.

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