The Eternal Knight

Rated E10+ Ten and Up

There once was a warrior who wielded a sword so powerful it could cut through the world itself. The magic of this earth, the world they named Anlám, granted him the gift (or curse) to live another life after his death. Whenever his time would come, he’d awaken the next day in the body of a newborn babe. While he’d always need to relearn to walk and talk, lost not were his memories and knowledge. The boy would regrow into a man again and again, seeking out his blade to resume his campaigns of violence and glory.

Then came the day he thought up a scheme so vile it would go on to define the very name he sought to conquer. The lands of Anlám feature a magical phenomenon where that which is passed down becomes more powerful in the hands of the inheritor than it was in his father’s. The warrior sought to exploit such a happening by finding a mate and reincarnating as his own son. In this way, his blade would become more powerful with every life he lived. And so it was for more than a thousand years.

He witnessed the war mongering of the early orcish Horde. He fought alongside the old human chieftains as they drove Olnath’s forces back into the forbidden east of Fearanndi. He alone contested the elven empire of the north when their conquest made its way to realms of man. At his peak, he could have taken Anlám for himself. Fortunately for the world, his honor held out long enough for him to be humbled by the great Thairgoleir, humanity’s first true king. It was under he who united the land of men and named it Ronnagan that the warrior was made an official knight. After many years of exemplary service, he acquired great riches and fame across the four realms of Ronnagan and beyond.

But the king knew of the warrior’s secret. “Your blade soaks in the blood of your abominable lineage. You were given a gift by the world’s magic yet you used it for your own personal gain. I must advise that this life be the last you live as wielder of the red blade, eternal knight.”

The knight was bewildered. “You would have me throw away that which has protected our people since the second millennium? Since before you yourself came to rule us?”

“You will not find happiness in the power you wield. The purpose of a sword is to be used. What then will you do in the coming time of peace?”

“You…” The knight stumbled backward. “You foresee I will seek out death.”

King Thargoleir bowed his head, a grave look on his face. The knight ran out of the mountaintop castle and rode his steed out into the central plains west of Mount Corofath. It was then he saw for himself the vision of his future. His blade would cut through the innocent just to quench his thirst for purpose.

The knight made his way across the western seas that separated man from beastfolk. He journeyed up past the twin peaks of the Hairleniar and collapsed upon entering Asalen, an elvish port town at the edge of the empire. When he awoke, he was being cared for by a half-elven maiden with a smile like the subtlest crescent. Suddenly, he saw a new vision. One of content. One to cleanse his tampered bloodline.

The two were married not a year and half to the day they met. Together, they bore two sons: Cian the older and Fionn the younger. They were raised to be honorable and never learned of their father’s horrible secret.

On the day of Cian’s thirteenth year, his father led him up a mountain just east of town. When they reached the top, the knight said to his son, “It is this year of your life, boy, that you become a man. My first father explained this to me.”

Then, he unsheathed his legendary sword. The eternal knight knelt before his firstborn and held up the sword for him to take it.

“He gave me this,” he said. “Claiom’athar. A great king once called it the ‘red blade’. Let it be your greatest inheritance.”

Cian beamed widely as he reached out for the hilt. “Thank you, Father.”

The moment Cian took hold of the Red Blade, its magic that had been built up across thousands of years of reincarnation filled his young body. Unable to endure, the knight’s heir breathed his last and fell to the earth. The eternal knight collapsed onto his son with the wails of a banshee spirit. He shuddered and shook like old bones horse drawn over gravel. The summit has since been named Naranach, the “lonely one”.

He carried the corpse of his eldest down the mountain and back home where his wife fell faint at the sight. Fionn watched like ice as his father laid his older brother’s body on a bed and left with nothing but a chest of gold and the Red Blade.

“Take care of your mother, son,” he said to Fionn. “I swear on every life I’ve lived I’ll be back in ten years time.”

The knight sailed even further west to the holy state of Seineilean; home of the greatest scholars, craftsmen, and wizards the world would ever know. It was there he hired the best architects and mages he could find to build on the far off island of Solas a palace of magnificent splendor. A palace to serve as a tomb for the Red Blade. The knight oversaw its construction up until the last brick was set. A brilliant elvish castle heavily inspired by the dwarven citadels of the south. It took exactly ten years to complete.

Just before the boats were to make back for Seineilean, the eternal knight plunged the Red Blade into a pedestal at the center of the palace throne room.

At its base read in the human, elvish, and dwarven languages, “For he who dares wield this red blade, you will not find happiness in its power.”

The knight returned to Asalen pleased to find his wife and Fionn were still alive and well. Having missed the last ten years, however, there was a certain bitterness in every word; a lingering grudge at every meal. Fionn, then well into his young manhood, refused to speak with his father alone until finally, years later, the knight was on his deathbed. Fionn, astonished at how peaceful his father seemed at the end of his days, asked him what he spent all those years doing.

The eternal knight looked at his youngest child with a wrinkly smile. “Your inheritance.”

Fionn’s mother tightened her grip on the knight’s withered hand. Tears filled the springs of her eyelids.

“For too long have I lived and died only to lose all sense of value for what such things meant,” the knight said. “Now, because of you and your mother, I finally feel as if I can say this is the end.”

Fionn knelt beside the bed. “What are you saying, Father?”

The knight looked deep into the eyes of his heir and said, “When the time is right for you to leave this land, go to the west beyond the holy city. There you will find what I hope will always remind you of my love. For you...and your brother.”

On the eve of the fourth millennium, the eternal knight--he who wielded the Red Blade against the forces of light and darkness alike--passed away in the embrace of his son and loving wife. It is said that the spell that reincarnated him was broken on that day. That’s what they say, at least.

Fionn went on to marry an elvish woman with whom he had many children and lived a happy life. Only once did he visit the castle his father built for him. At the end of his own life, he passed down the tomb of the Red Blade to his eldest daughter who’d pass it down to her son and his son after him. So was the line of the Second Son in charge of the eternal knight’s castle. With every generation, the island was shrouded in layers of mist and mystery. Eventually, Solas was lost, and the name itself, along with its accompanying legend, became not but a myth.

Until the day the Second Son’s cry rang out across all the earth.