Supreme Magus

Chapter 3738: Exclusive Club (Part 1)

Each time Lith and Jormun met, they learned something more about the other, but they also grew more distant. Whatever Valeron’s mother was doing posed a threat to Lith, especially her dealings with a man called Meln.

Valeron had only a vague memory of the man called Meln, and it wasn’t a good one. He remembered the revulsion both Jormun and Thrud felt for him and how they had tried to keep Meln as far away from Valeron as possible.

Such was his father’s disdain for Meln that it had led to the only pacific confrontation between Jormun and Lith after he escaped from the Golden Griffon.

Instead of fighting, they discussed their differences and found an acceptable compromise. A compromise that allowed them both to go back home to their respective children.

After the meeting in Meln’s secret lair, came their final encounter.

Neither of them wanted to fight, and they expressed it with words and Dragon Scales. Lith meant Jormun and Valeron no harm, but Thrud had to be stopped to protect Elysia. Jormun wanted to protect Lith and offered him the safety of the Golden Griffon.

This time, there was no possible compromise. In the brief embrace they shared before the fight, they came to mutual understanding. They wanted the same thing, but the methods they had chosen to achieve it were irreconcilable.

They wanted a world where their respective children would grow up safe and happy with their parents. If Thrud won, Elysia would have been born an orphan and lived in exile. If Lith won, that same fate would belong to Valeron, and so it had been.

Jormun knew how dangerous Mogar would have been for Valeron if Thrud’s plan failed and she accompanied her husband in death. It was the reason Jormun had asked Lith to take care of Valeron, and he smiled at the Tiamat during their final handshake.

Jormun the Emerald Dragon had died with a smile on his face because he knew he could trust his estranged little brother. That even though they had spent most of the little time they had together as enemies, they parted ways as fellow fathers.

The stream of consciousness ended, leaving Valeron free to mull over what he had noticed and compare it with what he knew.

The realization that two men so different could also be so similar amazed him. They had different motives to join the War of the Griffons and had chosen opposing sides, but they had fought for the same reason.

They didn’t belong to the same race, but they were identical in the way they looked at Valeron, held, and loved him. Jormun and Lith had done everything they could to protect Valeron, even at the cost of putting their lives on the line.

The outcomes differed, but the will was the same.

"Ran?" Valeron asked, his voice feeble.

"Ran?" Lith echoed. "Don’t you mean, Ral?"

Lith pointed at Kamila’s womb, and she took a step forward.

"No, Ran." Valeron pointed at Lith’s hip. "Ra... nahroc."

"Ragnarök?" Lith asked, and the baby boy nodded.

Lith usually kept the angry blade away from the kids. It was no toy, and Lith feared what might happen if Elysia or Valeron touched its hilt.

Lith took Ragnarök out of his pocket dimension, making sure it floated at a safe distance from the babies, and with its blood sheath shut tight.

"Ran?" Valeron asked.

"Protect the daughter. Protect the son." Ragnarök’s voice was inhuman yet filled with pride as it stated its purpose with a matter-of-fact tone, like a herald reading a royal decree.

The angry blade tilted slightly in a bow to Elysia, Valeron, and then Kamila’s baby bump.

Valeron nodded at Ragnarök and then turned to Lith.

"Dad?" The word itself was the question.

"Son?" Lith’s answer wasn’t a question, just an expression of surprise and disbelief.

"Dad." Valeron extended his little arms toward Lith, asking his father to pick him up like he had done countless times in the past.

"Yes, son." Lith lifted the baby boy in his arms, using the Dragon Scales to make sure it was real and not a misunderstanding.

"Dad!" Valeron’s feelings dispelled all of Lith’s doubts like fog under the sun.

The membranous wings popped out of Lith’s back and wrapped around the baby boy in a warm embrace,

Valeron was now certain that even though Jormun the Emerald Dragon, his father, was gone, he wasn’t dead. Jormun still lived in the hearts of Valeron, Protheus, Ufyl, and Lith.

Valeron started to cry, happy because even though his parents were dead, he wasn’t left an orphan. Valeron was happy because every time he would miss his father, he would find him in Lith’s arms.

The left arm would always hold Valeron close to Lith’s chest, while the right would always be ready to wield the angry blade and protect him from the rest of Mogar.

***

Verhen Mansion, later in the evening, during dinner.

It had taken just a few minutes for Valeron to mend fences with his parents and for his parents to share with him how much the separation had pained them.

The rest of the afternoon had been spent in the privacy of the master bedroom, simply because the reunited family wanted to be left alone with their joy.

When they met with the others for dinner, everyone had found their smile again, even Shargein. The Wyrmling was as exhausted as Valeron, but for a completely different reason.

While the baby boy suffered from the fatigue of the emotional roller coaster of the afternoon, Shargein had endured a long earful that his parents had taken turns delivering.

Salaark and Leegaain had made no mystery of how much they didn’t like the whelp rummaging through their research papers and learning their secret codes. The two Guardians had taken their sweet time explaining to Shargein the importance of secrecy and the dangers of magic.

The Wyrmling’s head was still ringing from the hours of nagging, and he couldn’t wait for that horrible day to end.

As for Valeron, he was back sitting beside Elysia, near his parents. Or rather, that had been the idea. Solus’ pain and care for him had moved the baby boy, who had decided to have the meal in her arms.

"Hungry, Mom. Hungry." Valeron pointed at the baby food and then to himself.

’By my Mom, I think I might have overshared.’ She thought.

"Of course, sweetie. Eat as much as you want." She actually said, trying to act normal.

"Wah! Wah!" Elysia happily chanted, making her parents struggle to feed her. "Wah!"

She was proudly talking about her brothers and her metal friend, who was still at Lith’s hip by Valeron’s request.

"Wah?" Shargein tutted. "Val, Ral, Ragn. Not Wah, Wah, Wah. Names different."

Elysia turned to a bright shade of purple in humiliation.

"Wah!" She grunted. "Nir’aku! Sem’ray!"

She shapeshifted into a small Tiamat to speak the last two words in Dragontongue, making her parents, the Guardians, Aran, Leria, the triplets, and Baba Yaga spit out their food in shock.

"Who taught her to speak like that?" Lith was flabbergasted.

"Bad Elysia!" Kamila forced the baby girl to look at her to understand how serious she was. "Never say that again, especially to a friend!"

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