A Letter From Home

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Re: PLEASE READ! PLEASE READ! I KNEW YOUR MOTHER

Dear Sebastean Seraph,

I'm sorry for the crazed subject line, but I needed to get your attention. You showed your address on the news this morning, and I'm sure your inbox is completely flooded. 

You have never met me, but I saw you on the news today and I immediately knew who you must be, before you even said anything. Your eyes told me everything I needed to know. I've seen them, every day of my life, in my own father's face.

My name is Gael, and I am your mother's sister. Your aunt. She was a few years older than me, and I was very young when she left, but I remember her clearly. She left us, twenty years ago, to become a missionary in a place called Halfmoon Grove, a Human town on the shore. The last time I ever saw her, she was climbing onto an airship with two Pteros men, one of whom would end up becoming your father. She was only fifteen, but you know how it is when you're young. Older children seem as wise and powerful as queens, to their smaller siblings. I thought, how brave, how smart, how very mature my sister looks right now. She wore a ceremonial Priesthood robe, and carried a staff of carved wood from our family's home tree. 

And now, as a grown woman, I hold in my mind the image of that fifteen-year-old girl and she still towers over me, strong and caring, representing everything I have ever tried to become since. I know, intellectually, that she was a little girl, and she must have been scared witless, but the memory is a strange thing. It gilds and immortalizes the most unlikely emotions.

Father told us, two years later, that she ran away with some boy, and that we'd probably never see her again. He told us she was acting immorally, that she was a poor example for me, and that it was my responsibility to carry on the family name as a righteous, pious woman. Our family, you see, is sort of like royalty in Seraph society, hence the last name being the name of our race. It's sort of ostentatious, in my opinion, but every civilization needs their foolishness to keep moving. It's like engine grease. 

But things have gotten too greasy, and the gears are starting to slip. Since the Pilgrimage, our people have spiraled farther and farther from reason. Once upon a time, our faith in the gods was what kept our society peaceful and cooperative. We needed guidance. We needed hope, when our race was young and our world huge and intimidating and full of mystery. Once upon a time, faith was what saved us.

But when the mysteries fell away in the face of learning, our people refused to let go of the bedtime stories they'd once needed. We learned our world was round, but we lived as though it was still an infinite plane. Adults sometimes eat the snacks of childhood for comfort... and societies hold on to their fables for the same reason.

It's not a happy thought, that the Universe wasn't made for us. We don't like accepting that we spin around a sun on the edge of the galaxy, that space is vast and uncaring and cold. We don't like being the result of nature; we want to MEAN something. We want to matter. We want it so badly that we've invented a pantheon of parents for ourselves, so that we can throw ourselves into strong arms and sob even when we've grown up... 

I'm rambling. I apologize... especially since I think time may be of the essence.

I watched your broadcast this morning, and I saw a young man in terrible pain. I could tell how hard you were struggling just to keep yourself together... as though you'd fall apart if you relaxed for even an instant. It broke my heart, Sebastean. It broke my heart to see a child so overwhelmed with rage, with hatred, that he's prepared to fight the entire world to let it out. I know you live with Channelers, and that you have a talent for it yourself. I also know that that fact won't stop my father for an instant.

Please don't be offended, but... you're both completely willing to throw your lives away, and both of you are very, very powerful. And very dangerous. I know this seems impossible, but you need to let this go. Nothing good can come of the conflict that you seek.

Killing your parents never brought Dackorec any peace, trust me. For twenty years he's been a miserable, wretched man. Maybe if he'd sat them down and told them why he was mad... even if he'd disowned Elenor, sent her away from us... maybe the wounds could have healed. But he killed them both and then he brought the spear home and hung it on our wall. And he kept that secret and that guilt until today, many years later, when understanding and redemption are too far gone to ever ease his pain.

I'm not saying forgive him. I never will. But let him go. 

Let this crusade end. Fallen is a big place. I've moved into a nice apartment in Demspier, with a good man. Dackorec never comes here, I've checked his itinerary. You'll be safe and loved.

I do love you, Sebastean, though I've never met you. You're the son of my beloved sister, but there's more to it than that. Some people just cry out to be loved. Your eyes... anyone could see you're hungry for something. I just hope you find something worth living for, before it's too late.

If you ever want a home, you have one. 

Please be safe.

Love, 

Gael Seraph.