We’ll Never Know

Author's Note: I'm warning you about the coarse language, and the fact that I'm a big Rhen/Lars person. I really like the pairing. XD.

Anyways, this is written for the canon ending, and sorry for the big skip in time in the middle part. I haven't played very far into Aveyond, and all my information on the later parts of the stories was derived from people talking about it on the Internet.

Aveyond is a great game, go buy it. I own nothing, obviously.

She comes into the house bedraggled, with soiled clothing and the slave trader leading her by the arm, while she cries and sobs about something to do with a priestess.

“Master Lars, here is your newest slave,”

Not actually caring to have a look at the thing, I sign the papers off and pull the girl inside, out of the pouring rain and the humid air.

She takes one look at me, and attempts to take a swing at my face, but is in such terrible condition all she can do is sink to the floor and sob more.

“Stand up.”

“Priestess… I’m not… Ma! Pa!”

I yank her violently to her feet, and stare straight into her eyes, cold, unfeeling, and annoyed. “Shut up, and do not speak, slave, until I order you to. Do you understand?”

She nods, gulping audibly, as I hold her away from me. Her arms and legs are thin, like sticks, and she has a very bewildered expression crossing her features. Pretty enough, I suppose.

“Now, tell me, where do you come from?”

“Clearwater.”

“Never heard of it. What is your name?”

“Rhen.”

“Mine’s Lars, Lars Tenobor. My mother is mistress Rona Tenobor, and she is going to be the one whose orders are to be followed at all costs.”

“What about your father?” her mouth opens halfway before she clamps it shut again, and with surprising force, I slap her and she staggers backwards, careening into the table. Teacups slide towards the ground, and they all wobble unsteadily as the tablecloth gradually inches into disequilibrium.

Slowly, though, the table regains its balance, and we are left three feet apart, glaring at each other.

“Don’t speak unless spoken to, slave,” I hiss, retiring to my room, “and above all, do not mention my father.”

The door slams shut behind me, for some reason with far more force than I intended.

I do not know why this particular slave infuriates me so.

She doesn’t seem to mind that I am supposed to be her master, but instead she treats me like an annoying kid brother, a gnat to swat away.

I peek around the corner of the kitchen to find her sweeping up the mess that I had made earlier, flour collecting around her ankles and the stupid little bracelet she always wears sliding up and down her arm as she moves the broom methodically.

“Have you finished sweeping yet?”

“Go away, Lars.” She rolls her eyes in my direction as I lean against the doorframe, bouncing a bright, red, juicy apple in my hand. I know for a fact that she has not had any breakfast, and even her eyes betray her, dancing over the gleaming surface with a hungry glitter settling in her expression.

“Do you want this?” I ask innocently, taking a bite out of it, as she winces at the crunch noise. “You can have it after I’m done.”

“Your spit’s all over it, I think I’ll pass,” she replies, still sweeping.

“What’s wrong with my spit?”

“Well, it’s spit, for one thing,” says Rhen, “and it’s your spit. That means it’s extra gross.”

My eyes narrow. “Be glad I’m not having you flogged for that.”

“Lars, get a life.”

“You get a life.”

“I already have a life. I’m your slave, remember? You’re just a rich kid who won’t know what to do with himself once he goes into the real world!”

“Shut up! I’m going to be a sorcerer!”

“Yeah, well, why don’t you use some of your damned sorcery on me, huh? Why don’t you freaking blast me off the face of the planet? Maybe I’d be happier than here.” The dust goes flying with a vengeance.

I want to strike her, to fling her into nonexistence with some arcane spell that I don’t know yet, but I can’t find it within myself to hurt her, even a little bit. Instead, I stalk off, angrily, and hear the broom clatter to the floor and someone else running away.

She is a mere slave, but I fear that I am one of the far worse kinds of human that exist in this world.

In the middle of the night, there is a shuffling and a snuffling noise.

She lives in the attic above us, the moldy, spider-infested attic where all she has is a stick, half of a baton that was broken in half, courtesy of myself. Sometimes you can hear her rolling about in bed, and sometimes you listen to the deathlike silence above, hearing the clocks around the house tick in almost-unison.

I know that my mother is off somewhere gambling for the night, and it is raining again. Lightning and thunder strikes in various places outside of the house, and I run a hand through my mop of dark emerald hair, sitting up in bed and listening to the girl who lives just above me.

In various ways, we both have matured. She is a little taller, though still shorter than I, and holds herself prouder and her gaze is fiercer and she is, in every way, becoming more like a tigress with each step.

However, I, I do not change. I am still selfish, bratty, conceited, and purely self-motivated, but I wonder if this is only a front to cover up for any kinds of insecurities I may feel. I am solid as a rock, the petty, avaricious Lars.

So this is what happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object. Like in the Greek myth, the hound that never gives up the hunt, and the fox that never allows itself to be caught.

I can hear her whining now. It’s pitiful, like a dog’s, and high-pitched. There is a scream, and a little bump as a spider has just met its end, I assume.

More crying echoes throughout the house, until I can’t stand it anymore.

“RHEN! BE QUIET!”

I lean back against my expensive mahogany headboard, and the sounds retreat for a little while. But only for a little while, because it soon starts up again.

Angrily, I curse my fortune and walk upstairs, into the midst of the black attic. Death, mold, and decay are spread throughout the place. It smells like a rotting carcass.

“Rhen?”

“Lars?”

A light turns on, and there is Rhen, huddled by her nightstand. The moldy pallet is infested with numerous insects, and I almost empty my stomach of the stroganoff I had just ingested at dinner. “What are you doing here?”

Her voice is hard and unflinching, but there are still tears running down her face, in rivulets, dripping onto the floor and slowly forming a little pool.

“Leave me alone.”

“Oh, now, really? I want you to be quiet first.”

“I am quiet.”

“No, you’ve been crying.” I smile haughtily, and she merely watches, curiously cocking her head sideways like an inquisitive bird.

“Well, then, what does it matter?”

“I can’t sleep. You’re making too much noise.”

“Okay.” She curls up sideways and buries her face into the linen. “Have me whipped tomorrow, will you?”

“What?”

“I want to die.”

“Shut up, Rhen, you don’t really mean that,” I snap, “God, I thought you were better than that.”

“Better than what? You? Don’t make me laugh.”

“Of course you’re not better than me, lowly-born slave. I meant that you were better than just… wanting to die, is all I meant.”

“Really, Lars.” Her voice is muffled, and I can hear the pain escaping in short gasps. “I’ve been taken away from my family—everything I knew is long gone... all I can see in the future is death. Cold, pointed death.”

“Yeah, well, whatever.” I turn to leave, but stand in the doorway, pausing contemplatively, for just a moment. “I’m not going to let you die, you know.”

“Please, just—“

“Much too valuable of a slave,” I reply coldly. “The matter is settled. You are not going to die.”

“But I want to—“ she says, sitting up, and in a fit of rage, I stride towards her and shake her by the shoulders. Her cold, thin, pale shoulders. She’s fragile as a butterfly, ready to snap in half under my grasp.

“Don’t die, dammit! Find something to believe in! Don’t you have anything to believe it”

She responds with a pained whimper, head sinking against my chest in a relieved way, and I freeze on the spot. Her arms curl around me, and I continue listening to her shuddering heartbeat, until it slows and she’s asleep.

Turning the lights off, I walk downstairs and prepare my things for my departure to Shadwood Academy.

There won’t be any more sleep for me tonight.

“She reminds me of something.”

“What?” I ask, holding out Rhen’s arm with the bracelet jangling on it. “Like, a skunk or something?”

“No,” my friend says, laughing. “My pet dog, Peta.”

“Oh, Peta. That’s a good name.”

“Don’t call me that!” she shouts, trying to twist away, as a bright light erupts around her arm and the bracelet falls smoking to the ground, snapped cleanly in two.

“You could have killed me!”

“You’re just a slave. I can buy dozens more.”

“Lars, you bully!” she shouts, picking up the stick lying in the grass next to her. “You idiot! How can you hurt such a poor boy!”

Even the waif has long since scampered off, and I lash out with one foot and try to kick her away, but she angrily pokes me with the stick.

What’s a stick going to do?

Suddenly, my whole body feels like I’ve been lightly zapped with electricity. Hair on end, I prepare to deal her some serious damage, until two adults walk up and break up the fight. I respond angrily, in turn, only to realize that they are emissaries from Shadwood Academy.

Mother is going to kill me, I think, running off like the coward I am.

At Shadwood, the training is hard, but I work at it with a vengeance. I must prove myself to the rest of the country, and I soon become the star sorcery pupil, albeit spoiled and not very nice to boot.

I wonder what became of my little Peta sometimes, as I sit and peruse books on ancient necromancy and divination techniques. Sitting in the library, all is quiet as I turn the page to a giant skull picture. The skull grins at me, in a near-omen as the accursed slave girl bumps into me, and drops about fifteen pounds of books onto my foot.

“OUCH!”

“Lars?”

“Peta?”

“Don’t call me that,” she growls, picking up all the books she dropped. “As you know, I’m the star Sword Singer.”

“Yeah, whatever that is,” I sniff and reply flippantly, “Seriously. ‘Sword Singer’ is such a tacky name. Nobody’s going to fear you when you introduce yourself as ‘Peta, the might Sword Singer’.”

“Can it, Lars.” She drops an even larger book on my foot for good measure. “You won’t be talking like that when I’m a revered hero and queen of some far-off empire.”

“Remember, I can exorcise you into another dimension.”

“I’d like to see you try, asshole.” She walks off, leaving me staring at the skull again.

“Damn you,” I tell the skull, and it doesn’t do anything but smile back.

I think she looks a little surprised when I offer to come with her on her quest. It’s a stupid quest, certainly, but I can’t let a stupid slave girl have the fate of the nations in our hands. My cousin, the empress, nods, and I find her glaring at me.

As we leave, she asks, “I hope you’re up for saving the world.”

“Like hell I am.”

The inn is a seedy place, and you can hear the snow whirling outside. I look at the one bed, bored, and watch as Rhen throws a few blankets onto the floor to make some sort of mat.

“You can have the bed.”

“What?”

“I said, you can take the bed.” I yawn and pull a chair up next to the bed. “I can sleep fine sitting up.”

“Your back is going to hurt in the morning.”

“I’m young, arthritis is a long time away.”

“But…”

“Ladies get the bed.”

“Whatever, Lars,” she says, plopping onto the cushioned goose down monster and shutting the lights off.

“Good night.”

“Sweet dreams.”

“I hope you didn’t just say that.”

“Yes, I did, but in a mocking tone. Because you know, I’m going to push you off the bed while you’re sleeping and get on it myself, and you’ll wake up on the floor.”

The light clicks on again, revealing her shocked face. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“Go to sleep, Rhen,” I yawn, “it’s way too late to be arguing.”

With a suspicious glance my way, the light shuts off and I resume my sleeping position in the chair.

The funny thing is, I fall asleep so fast I never actually end up doing anything I threatened.

It’s so obviously fatigue, because I’m not getting soft.

“Lars! Behind you!” she shouts, as a crow dives at us, careening through the bracken and rising up like a black phoenix, angry eyes trained directly on Rhen. She cries out as it slashes through her armor, a red line of blood seeping through.

I watch the crow, and a glowing pentacle encircles me as a black vortex comes from nothingness and gobbles the thing up, spitting out its body onto the forest floor.

Rhen goes over and kicks it. The bird doesn’t move, limply lying there, various feathers missing.

“Sending stuff through portals to Hell works pretty well,” she says, admiration showing through her voice.

A funny feeling spreads through me, but I push it away.

What do I care what a lowly slave thinks of me?

Days, months, go by almost like a thunderbolt. I take no notice until I suddenly find myself in an inn with a vampire, a wild, whip-wielding woman, a pirate, and a certain Sun Druid known as Dameon.

Dameon is, to put it frankly, half-bald. I really, really don’t like him. He’s annoying, and keeps fawning over Rhen.

Not that I care.

But it’s rather awkward to watch him flirt with her. Seriously. Why is Rhen even paying attention to him?

God. You’d think that after all this time in better clothes and with our pockets filled, she’d have at least some taste in men.

And for some reason, I still don’t trust him. I don’t think I ever will trust him. He has that aura that means bad things, that reeks of hatred and mass killings and is possibly simply a figment of my paranoid imagination.

“Lars?” asks Rhen, jerking me out of dreamland for a minute. “What are you scowling at?”

“Nobody in particular,” I lie easily, as Dameon, lady-charmer extraordinaire, sidles over and kisses Rhen’s palm.

“Anything for you, milady,” he intones with that stupid chocolate voice that I don’t have, leading Rhen away. And she’s giggling and blushing.

Giggling and blushing.

It’s not like I want her to do that at me, nor would I even consider kissing her hand, for one second. Even if it was to save my life.

Okay, that’s a different matter, but there’s no way in Hell I’d kiss the hand of a slave girl like her.

Something in me can tell.

It upsets me.

I don’t like it.

And yet…

Something in me knows, that, in the end, he’ll have it all.

I was right.

I was absolutely right.

And you know what?

I don’t care.

I don’t give a dragon’s ass who that piece of shit slave-girl-turned-savior-of-the-known-world Rhen marries.

I don’t.

I really don’t.

“We have come to unite…”

My head is spinning.

“Daemon Maurva…”

I can’t stand this.

“…And Rhen Darzon…”

What the hell is wrong with me?

“…In marriage.”

Marriage.

This fast?

All she did was dump fairy dust on him, and she’s marrying him?

Rhen has poor taste.

But, if she’s happy, I’m happy.

Of course, I can’t help but laugh at myself.

Always the stupid, selfish Lars that I am, I wanted her all to myself. I want everything all to myself. I want to get what I desire, and I suppose, in a way, I desired for her to be mine.

Mine and mine only.

It’s not in the simple objective way you might think.

Maybe I loved her.

Maybe she could have loved me.

We’ll never know, now, will we?