@Sembas:
Jonas beams at your mention of his prize pupil. “Faran is brilliant. Very powerful and full of potential.” Jonas leans closer to whisper conspiratorially. “But don’t tell him I said that.” He leans back in his chair again, crossing his arms over his chest. “He is also very stubborn, easily offended, and easily the most headstrong person I have ever met! He would tell you the sky is green for the sake of argument!” Jonas chuckles. “But I believe his training is going quite well. I must admit I have a great affection for the boy. His boldness reminds me somewhat of myself. I suppose the likeness is both annoying and endearing.”
At your mention of the trees that grace his yard, he smiles widely. “Ah! The thick squat one, in my country, we call it baobab. Its trunks and roots are very strong, but it’s branches lack the span of the trees you see in these lands. Yet it is hardy… sturdy… It must be so. Had it the small trunk and wide branches of the woods in these lands, it would surely die in my home country.”
“The thin tree, we call that acacia. It looks inviting. It provides food and is quite fragrant. Yet, it is one to be wary of, for its thorns can inflict great pain upon any unsuspecting foe.”
As you mention the animal skin upon the floor, he smiles sadly. “Punda milia in my native language. A rather gentle beast that travels in herds. Its black and white stripes, somehow, help it to hide in the tall grasses of our lands. Its meat has a very soft flavor and is a rare delight amongst the tribes of my homeland.”
When you ask where Jonas hails from, his smile falters ever so slightly. “I know your true purpose, Sembas… you mean to ask me about the Forsaken. Yet, the path of questioning you have chosen is a wise decision. So much of the self is formed by the past. I was a Forsaken, a truth that pains me more than I can begin to express, yet at the time, I thought I fought with righteousness on my side. I thought what I was doing was somehow right. It was only once the Divine truly opened my eyes did I see the error of my ways.”
Jonas sighs heavily. “I will tell you my tale, though it pains me to even share it. Yet, I know if you are to be successful in your mission, this is the way it must be. I owe the Divine and my fellow Ageless that much.”
“I come from the lands in the far south. We call it Chiamaka. It means ‘god is beautiful.’ My tribe was called the Olatunde. Before I was Jonas Philosophy, my name was Ayo Amadi. In my language, Ayo means ‘most beloved,’ and believe me, I truly was. I was the light of my mother’s life. However, Amadi means ‘to seem destined to die at birth.’ I was an only child, and very sickly. No one thought I would survive. Yet my mother held on to the hope I would thrive. My father was a warrior, and he was not around much, so I was all she had. Perhaps the Divine saw fit to answer her prayers. I lived.”
“As I grew I did not have the strength of my peers, but what I lacked in body, I made up for with my mind. This impressed the Elders of my tribe. I remember many times the village Chief would exclaim, ‘This boy would be a great warrior if it were not for his unfortunate size!’ If only he could see me now!” Jonas has a deep, resonating laugh.
“Then… something odd happened. In my eighth year, I began to grow at an alarming rate. By the time I was twelve, I was already six feet tall and my formerly weak limbs were thick with enormous muscles.”
“The warriors who had once scoffed at me eagerly accepted me as their brother. I was trained to wield a spear and javelin for the purposes of both hunting and combat, and by the time I reached my fourteenth year, I was the most skillful warrior in our tribe. Not even our war chiefs could stand against me in battle.”
“Around that time, my father informed me I would undergo the traditional rite of passage. I would have to lead a raid against another tribe. I was never particularly fond of warfare. Despite my strength and skill, I always felt more could be gained with diplomacy. Years of warfare had crippled our numbers. Too much blood had been spilled. I felt we could spare ourselves the horrors of war by working through peace. The village elders politely listened, as I was quite well-spoken, and honestly they were a bit frightened of me. I believed that peace was the only way to resolve conflict.”
“For years, I kept this dream alive, and we managed to unify our people with several other tribes. I fell in love with a woman of the Bolade tribe. Her name was Adanna… and she was the keeper of my heart. She bore me a daughter, Adaeze and a son, Azubuike. I felt so very blessed. I doted upon them. She, my beautiful princess, and he, my strong warrior. They took such delight in the smallest of things. I would carve them creatures from wood. For my daughter, a bird, and for my son, a great cat with an enormous mane, a lion, as they are called by the white man.”
“But the time of peace we worked so hard for would be splintered like a tree by lightning. My father, along with many of our strongest warriors, vanished into thin air. They had left to scout a herd of beasts, and they never returned. To make matters worse, my village was invaded by northern barbarian tribes. They had never ventured that far south before.”
Jonas sighs heavily. “We fought bravely, and many warriors died, I myself was upon death’s door when they took me. The barbarians gathered as many of us as they could. They took me, my wife… our children. They packed us like cattle into their ships, took us back to their lands, and sold us to the highest bidder.”
“Our master… he was a terrible man. He kept us through fear, separating husbands from wives under the promise that if the men attempted to rise against him, he would kill our wives and children. I loved my wife and children more than the air I breathe. I could not let harm come to them.”
“Because we were separated at the compound, I saw my family very infrequently. One day, I was surprised and elated to see my wife, our growing children clasping each of her hands. She smiled at me, and despite the fact she knew it would cause her trouble, she ran towards me and wrapped her arms around me. She couldn’t bear to be parted from me, nor I from her.”
“This act was seen by the owner’s son. Long had I watched him gaze upon my wife with indecency in his eyes. He came to her one night, telling her he would not tell his father she had defied the rules. He would keep quiet if she would but lay with him. He held her down upon the cot as my children screamed for me to help their mother.”
Jonas’s hands clench at his sides and his knuckles grow white with the memory. “ I…”
You notice that blood has begun to trickle from his ear, but he is committed to sharing his tale. “I forced my way into the hut moments before he could force his way into my wife. Bruises covered her face and arms. She had tried to fight against him, but he was determined to take all he could of her. I picked up a woodsman’s axe from the floor and I buried it into his back.”
Jonas grits his teeth and you can tell that simply recounting his acts of violence are beginning to cause him physical pain. “I took my wife and children, and we ran as far and for as long as we could. Yet there were so many looking for us as ‘some ruthless slave had murdered the master’s son.’ They promised freedom to any slave that aided in our capture, so we were hunted by the barbarians and our own. I killed many that day, but in the end, we were captured and forced to return.”
“The owner had other sons and they whipped me until I could scarcely see. There was so much blood… so much pain… But it could not compare to what they did next.” Jonas fights back tears. “They made my wife kneel before me, and the master raised an axe over his head… the same one I had used to kill his son, and he brought it down upon my wife’s back. He wanted me to watch her die.”
“Still, my pain was not great enough. The whipping continued, until more blood had poured from my wounds than my body could bear. My children watched both their parents die that day.”
“The Divine saw fit to give me a second chance, and I used that chance to obliterate anything in my path. I killed the rest of the master’s sons, yet the master himself managed to escape… with my children. His wealth was limitless, and despite the fact I pursued him for years, chasing shadows and whispers of his whereabouts, he always managed to elude me.”
“I became consumed by my hatred. How could a loving god, how could the Divine, give me a second chance to only bring me more pain? The loss of my wife was great, and the loss of my children hardened my heart until there was nothing left. I was in such a state when I was found by Severan Deceit. He promised to help me seek my revenge in exchange for my loyalty.” Jonas winces and his cheeks redden as if he was just slapped. “The crimes I committed in his name scarred my soul. I became that which I hated. I killed without mercy, destroyed without purpose, and punished without cause. Men, women, children… it did not matter. Nothing could fill the gaping hole in my heart.” Jonas clasps his hands to his head and you can see fresh, crimson, tears trickle down his cheeks in sanguine rivulets.
Jonas groans. “Severan was true to his word. I don’t know how he did it, perhaps his pact with the Adversary himself, but one day, he arrived with a slip of paper, and upon it, an address where I could find my old master. I paid him a visit. He claimed he did not fear me. He told me he had taken personal satisfaction in watching as my children were worked to death.”
“As for my master… I made him pay for what he did. Severan trusted me with many of his secrets. He watched me transform from a blithering mess into a heartless executioner, and it was he who taught me the word flay. I flayed my master alive, but unlike I did with Faran, I completed the task. By the time I was done with him, he was little more than piles of skin, flesh, and shattered bones.”
“My revenge complete, I committed myself to aiding Severan, the man who had helped me to bring justice upon my old enemy. One day, Severan ordered me to lead an assault on a port town. They were all mortals. It would be an easy task. I left destruction and chaos in my wake and slaughtered those that begged for mercy upon their knees. Yet… there was a small group of local guards, led by a strong, able-bodied young man. He did not fear me, and that just made me want to slaughter him even more. He was a worthy foe, and at one point, he managed to graze the scars upon my back. They bled uncontrollably, and I thought I just might die again that day. Eventually, I managed to overpower him, and in his final moments, he struck me upon the cheek so hard that it knocked the helm from my head.”
Blood pours down Jonas’s face and you see fresh wounds open upon his arms, soaking his wrists and the backs of his palms. “I saw recognition in his eyes and I heard him gasping as he struggled to pull a small trinket from his pocket. Nothing could mask my horror as he thrust a small, wooden lion into my hands. Azubuike had grown into the brave warrior I had always hoped he would be. In his final moments, he told me where I could find his sister… my daughter… my little princess, Adaeze. He bid me bring the trinket to her, so she knew of his passing.”
Jonas clutches his chest in agony as tears of blood continue to stream down his face. “I held my son in my arms as he died. Nothing could move me from that spot. Nothing. Not Lt. Cauter who asked, then threatened me, then demanded I move at once. Not even the Ageless who arrived to drive out the Forsaken. I had battled the Ageless before. I was sure they would kill me, and I would welcome it. The Butcher of Darastae had killed so many of them. It was only just they take my life for all I had done.”
Jonas takes several deep breaths and his breathing begins to slow. The blood that pours from his eyes and from the seemingly impossible wounds upon his body, begins to recede from where it came. “But there came a warrior beyond compare, one of a name I had heard only in hushed whispers in Darastae. He was clad in golden armor, his hair was raven black, and his piercing blue eyes locked onto mine. He knelt beside me and he whispered in my ear. What he said…” Jonas shakes his head. “Is for me alone to know. I have been loyal to the Archon, the Divine, and my fellow Ageless ever since that day. For the most part, I remain in Avalon, as there is little I could do on the front lines. My blessing was my redemption, but my curse is such that if I even think of causing harm to someone, I endure great pain, thus, I rarely leave Avalon. When I do, it is for the purpose of diplomacy or to aid the unfortunate in the mortal realm.”
Jonas rests his chin upon his fist. “I did as my son asked. I found Adaeze. She was living well in a small town to the east of where Azubuike met his end. She was but a toddler when we had been parted. She did not recognize me, and I was too burdened with the shame of what I had done to reveal myself to her. To this day, it is my greatest regret. I wish I had the courage to tell her who I was… to wrap her in my arms and place a kiss upon her head as I had done when she was a child.”
“I tell you all this so you know the truth of the Forsaken… They are as vulnerable as you or I, and despite all their ills, they are not incapable of redemption. They just need the right motivating factors to turn back to the light. I still believe peace can be achieved, even after all the blood that has spilled between the Ageless and the Forsaken. You, Sembas, just need to find out what it is that keeps the Forsaken from the arms of the Divine. If the wounds of their hearts can be healed, then there is hope for them yet.”
