Let Your Heir Down

     The dry high altitude air hit the back of his throat as his thoughts, which, as of late, seemed to have developed voices of their own, began to overlap in curious ways.

     A product of stress, he had surmised. That, or a major vitamin deficiency. Whichever the cause, Kass hadn’t the time to comprehend it. His recent usurping had caused shockwaves throughout the citadel, especially within the council (made up of mostly overweening, highly disapproving officers and chairmen). It was crucial to secure their allegiance, however, so preparations to influence them were underway.

     And by any means necessary.

     “Galgarroth is a naysayer,” he thought, no, it was a gruff voice that wasn’t his own.

     “Yes, he must be dealt with,” another said, harsh and agitated.

     The voices were oft-times intrusive in nature, but they were rarely wrong, Kass had to admit. Galgarroth had a big mouth, and his very existence created immense challenges for the Eyrie. Whilst serving under the former Lord Darigan before his demise, the two generals had never seen eye to eye, and now, the Grarrl was as critical as ever, making false claims and declaring loudly to the masses that Kass lacked the moral fibre to rule justly.

     “Yet take him in your stride,” a lighter, sweeter voice spoke, but it still carried a deadly edge, “for he will one day learn the consequences of defying you.”

     Kass’s pace quickened as though the very promise of besting Galgarroth had infused his veins with young blood, and energised him with renewed vitality, his resolve made stronger. A green glow emanated from his chest under his uniform, and his movement stat increased somewhat.

     “Above all, make haste, Kass, for you are the rightful heir to the citadel throne. Stay true to your ambition, and do not dare waver under the council’s disapproving eye.”

     Then, all three voices spoke together, “We will be watching.”

     “General Kass!”

     The large Eyrie paused his stride, his wings briefly catching in the breeze. The voices that weren’t his own were interrupted by another, smaller, higher voice. He blinked as he was brought back to reality, then his gaze settled on the source of the voice.

     Three children — a Techo, Uni, and Ixi — all ostensibly no older than nine, sat in a line on the ground, attending to one another’s hair. The red Techo, sporting brown pig-tails, braided the Darigan Uni’s long mane while the Uni brushed the Darigan Ixi’s mop-top in front of her. Though now their tools remained still as their eyes magnetised to the seven-foot Eyrie before them.

     Kass frowned. They had interrupted his inner monologue, or... ruminations fuelled by a vitamin deficit. Either way.

     “First of all, it’s Lord Kass. Secondly, I—“

     “Your hair is so beautiful,” cooed the Techo.

     Kass blinked, immediately caught off guard, “wh-what?”

     The young Uni, wrapped up in an oversized sweater, angled her brush in his direction.

     “Please may we brush your hair?”

     The Eyrie gawked, and his hand moved automatically to touch the back of his mane, “brush my...“

     He eyed the group with mild fascination. No matter what state the kingdom was in, the children were always their happy selves. Their joy and constant enthusiasm for life eluded him.

     “Yes! Oh, if only my mane were as long and as pretty as yours!” The Uni pouted, pawing at her own hair.

     “I wish my natural colour was like his,” the Techo straightened her dress as she stood, “it looks like salt and pepper.”

     “Or the glistening cold steel of a deadly blade,” said the Ixi, whose low raspy vocal fry countered the sweet sing-song voices of the other girls.

     It didn’t help that the Darigan Citadel, suspended high in the sky, was known for its windy weather. To the girls’ delight, a stray gust tugged at the Eyrie’s mane, sending his hair into a flurry mimicking that of the Usuls in the shampoo commercials.

     Kass blew some hair from his break, and the children gushed.

     He sighed, “Girls, I’ve enough on my plate,” and about-faced.

     “Oh, please!” The Techo begged, tripping a little as she filled the gap between them, “promise we won’t take long!”

     “No.”

     “What if you have dandruff, or,” the Uni gasped, “or breakage!”

     “Girls, I assure you, my hair’s fine,” he took another step, but felt resistance from his lower half.

     “All I see is a bad case of split ends.”

     Kass turned to discover the Ixi clutching his tail tuft, studying the fine hair as if it held the key to all of Neopia’s secrets — which he reclaimed with a “HEY!”

     She wasn’t wrong, though. Admittedly, his hair could use some love. These days, Kass was rarely in the right headspace to properly groom his mane — there were far more important matters to attend to. But if he was being honest with himself, it wouldn’t hurt to look a bit more presentable.

     How would the council take him seriously if he appeared haggard and unkempt? He thought, a thought that he was pretty sure was his own this time.

     When he still didn’t look convinced, the girlies continued.

     “Oh, please, please, pleeaase!” The two girls chimed in unison, gap-toothed with clasped hands, while the Ixi’s eyes still stayed locked onto the end of Kass’s tail.

     If he conceded, maybe he’d win the loyalty of their parents. Now, that was a thought he knew to be his own. Kass needed everyone behind him in the process of winning over the layfolk of the citadel... and the Ixi’s mother was a diplomat.

     Kass groaned in disbelief at what he was about to succumb to.

     “Ughh, very well.”

     - - -

     There was no way he’d allow such an activity to publicly take place in broad daylight. He couldn’t let the general public know— no, ASSUME he was going soft.

     Therefore, Kass trudged along with the three neokids in tow. For every one step he took, the girls did twelve, and he led the trio into the lower levels of the citadel castle — a cosy room, generally used for potion storage among other things.

     Grunting, the large Eyrie resigned to the floor (because how else would the kids reach his locks?), and sat cross-legged with a knee in each hand.

     “Alright, let’s get this over with.”

     “Wow! I’ve never been inside the castle before,” exclaimed the Techo, spinning to take it all in.

     The Ixi caressed a wooden chest of drawers, “Is this real mahogany?”

     A weary sigh, “girls, focus. You’re here to tame my hair, nothing more.”

     “I call dibs on his braids!” The Techo declared, and scrambled upon his right knee.

     The Uni claimed the back of his mane at the same volume, brandishing a spiked purple hair brush as she hovered with her small wings behind him.

     “Ugh, it’s so oily. When did you wash last?”

     Kass cringed and made a thinking sound.

     “Eeeww,” the girls chorused.

     Kass merely shrugged, “I’m a busy guy.”

     “If you don’t look after your hair,” the Uni said from behind him, parting the hair at his nape delicately, “it’ll fall out.”

     “Yeah, like my neighbour. He’s got a big bald spot riiight abooout...”

     Kass winced as the Techo stabbed a finger into his forehead, barely missing his eye, “here.”

     A gasp from behind him interrupted them.

     “I found lice!!”

     “WHAT!?” The others yelled in unison, but Kass was the loudest.

     “Just kidding,” the Uni giggled.

     The sighs of relief were just as audible.

     “Could we please just get to the brushing?” Kass rested a hand on his chest.

     That little joke of hers gave him heart palpitations.

     Almost immediately, Kass felt the telltale signs of knots beginning to unearth themselves, the pulling sensation transporting him back to his childhood. Memories of staring into a large mirror, the reflection of a young Eyrie cringing back while his mother tended to his matted mane. Then, as a reprieve, she would delicately braid two small plaits — a practice that he continued into the present day.

     Like his mother, the Techo took hold of his messy braid closest to her, and began re-plaiting it, starting by separating the strands.

     “What’s your favourite colour?” She asked seemingly without thought, as if it were a normal question to ask a middle-aged man.

     Kass’s brow furrowed, “Oh, I don’t know... maroon?”

     “That’s not a colour,” she laughed, apparently not old enough to know the names of colours outside of ROYGBIV.

     When Kass insisted that it was, the Techo scrunched up her face, “Well, I’ve never heard of it. How old are you?”

     “Pass.”

     “Will I turn into a Slorg if I drink this?”

     From his position, Kass was unable to see what the Ixi was holding, but he could only imagine.

     “Uuh, let’s keep the potions out of our mouths, please.”

     And stay out of my blind spots, he went to say, but was interrupted by the disentangling of a particularly inextricable knot.

     “Argh! Gentle,” he growled.

     “Your hair’s knottier than I thought,” the Uni grunted, wrenching the brush through a barrage of hair clumps, “you really ought to brush daily. Matted hair is no joke, you know.”

     Kass groaned through waves of destructive hairdressing, most so intense it physically pulled his head back.

     The Techo continued with her braiding, “What’s your favourite slushie flavour?”

     “W-watermelon,” Kass replied through gritted teeth.

     “How does the citadel stay up in the sky? Is it magic or science?”

     “Ouch!” He growled, “Both.”

     “I knew it,” she whispered.

     The curse responsible for ripping the fortress from the ground was the very same magic that kept it airborne today. The science referred to the engines that were built into the citadel, sustained by the furnace, granting the kingdom its mobility.

     Kass could feel hands on his tail tuft again.

     “The Trichoptilosis is spreading,” the Ixi suddenly uttered, bleakly.

     “The... what? Ow!”

     Another knot.

     “The what? What’d you say?” Concerned by the big word that might mean disaster for his hair, his eyes darted to the Techo, “What’d she say?”

     “Don’t worry, Mister Eyrie Kass, sir,” the Techo patted his right hand, “you’re in good hands.”

     “It’s Lord Kaa—“ but before he could finish his other hand was stolen.

     His paw settled in the hooves of the Uni who had temporarily given up on his hair. She studied it with intensity.

     “Wow, your claws could use some polish too.”

     “Giiirrrls,” he warned, retracting both limbs from their sticky grasps.

     “And your attitude could use adjusting.”

     “GIRLS!!”

     “Okay, okay.”

     The Techo returned to toying with his braid, the Uni to the back of his mane, and the Ixi to God knows what behind him.

     The Techo looked up at him, “One last thing.”

     Kass deadpanned, “What?”

     “Can we call you Kassy?”

     Kass ran a slow hand over his creased forehead. Decision made, he was never having children.

     - - -

     Finally, silence fell over the group. The Uni and Techo were heavily invested in braiding and brushing, while the Ixi — whatever she was up to — remained disturbingly out of sight. Most likely still transfixed by his tail tuft, Kass predicted — or at least hoped — since something had definitely been touching his tail, and he’d much rather it be the Ixi than a Darigan Tigermouse. Those things had a strong tendency towards biting tails... and were known carriers of Neogitus.

     Once the knots were destroyed, the Uni’s gentle brushing lulled the Eyrie into a zen-like state, and Kass felt unnaturally calm for the first time in a long while. He breathed intentionally, letting time slip by, until the stillness began to bore him, and he allowed his thoughts to meander.

     Kass watched the young girl braiding his hair in his peripheral vision. More and more often, neopians were born on Darigan soil with regular colour variations, like the Techo before him. She was red, a common colour shared by thousands of Neopians in the rest of the world, untouched by the curse. This was a sign that the Orb’s curse was waning. Well, that was the theory, anyway. However, it was believed that those belonging to the older generations, such as himself, had no chance of ever returning to their original selves.

     Kass yearned to be a catalyst for great change in the citadel, to rectify the injustices that were inflicted on both himself and the Darigan people. To get revenge on Meridell. Revenge on Skarl. But Galgarroth... the very thought of him ruffled his feathers. The Grarrl had always been loudly opposed to everything Kass had endeavoured to do — nothing but a massive thorn in his side.

     They often fought like siblings — bickering, lashing out at one another, sometimes even physically — regardless of location or audience. Perhaps it was the inevitable result of spending too much time together in close quarters as Lord Darigan’s generals. Contention only worsened when the then-reigning Lord chose the Grarrl as his second-in-command, without ever explaining to Kass why he hadn’t been deemed worthy of the role. It left the Eyrie with a deep-seated resentment that, left unchecked to fester, developed into a heedless avarice that, he feared, would never be satisfied. And now, the Darigan council had aligned themselves with the General, leaving Kass isolated and condemned as unfit to rule.

     “Galgarroth must be silenced,” Kass thought, or heard three distinct voices say all at once, he wasn’t sure anymore, “and permanently.”

     “Yes, Kass, make an example out of him. Use him to send a message to those who oppose you.”

     “And let them all watch, fear in their eyes, as he endures the long, merciless fall, only to taste the dust-laden earth of the Dark Plains below,” the thought hissed, “moments before becoming one with it.”

     “Kassy?”

     Kass unclenched his jaw.

     “It’s—,“ he gave up correcting her, “yes?”

     “What’s that?”

     A faint green glow radiated from under his uniform at his chest.

     “Oh, uuhh,” Kass cleared his throat and covered it with a paw, “it’s not important.”

     Oh, but it was. Very much so. That old Moehog gave it to him. It was a charm forged from Eyrie blood and bone, thought to enhance the body in ways of strength and agility, among other things. Dubious as to what the public might think of him, Kass wore the stat modifier under his robes, hiding it from plain sight.

     “It’s nothing,” he reiterated when her eyes hadn’t left his chest.

     The Techo fixed him with a silent look. Her head tilted forward in what he believed to be a pout, her eyelashes flickering as she doused him in her own juvenile version of discontent.

     “My mum said you shouldn’t trust charms, spells or magic of any kind,” her arms slowly folded, “unleeeesssss it’s of your own making, or it’s from a good-natured faerie.”

     Kass squinted at the young girl telling him off. Unbeknownst to her, he had been visited by a faerie. In his dreams, anyway. Good-natured? Well, that was up for debate. The lure of the faerie’s power was great, and her very presence felled his insecurities, replacing it with unfettered ambition. Despite this, Kass woke each morning feeling unrested, a symptom he blamed on multiple vitamin deficiencies.

     But the idea that his thoughts and dreams could be influenced by a mere stat modifier was absurd to him. In fact, nobody had ever warned him about the dangers of dark magic — nobody but the nine-year-old currently standing atop his knee, tending to him and his hair with more care and adoration than his own mother ever had. There were only so many multivitamin supplements he could take without improvement, however...

     The Techo unfolded her arms and replaced her frown with an easy smile.

     “Besides, you don’t need magic to be strong,” she slapped a hand playfully against his bicep, “look at them big muscles!”

     The corners of Kass’s beak curled involuntarily, and, possibly for the first time that day, his face crinkled into a smile.

     “I bet you could bench me and all ten of my brothers easy,” the Ixi sniffed, appearing out of nowhere as usual.

     Kass let himself chuckle. The girls had definitely grown on him.

     “Probably. But, I politely decline.”

     “You could lift the giant omelette in Tyrannia!” The Techo mimed the action, complete with dramatic flair.

     “Maybe on a good day.”

     “Or the entire citadel!!”

     “Now, that’s a bit excessive.”

     “Finished!” The Uni called out.

     - - -

     Kass leaned over a potion-stained sink, and observed himself in the ramshackle mirror.

     He ran a clawed hand through the back of his mane. It travelled through the strands without issue. Smooth like butter. Completely tangle-free.

     His silvery braids appeared delicate and tidy, evidently styled by small, caring fingers, unlike the harsh treatment his own large-handed attempts typically inflicted.

     “Hah, I’m impressed, girls!”

     And he genuinely was. Kass couldn’t remember the last time his hair had looked or felt this good.

     “You’re welcome, Kassy,” sang the Techo, rocking from heel to toe, as the Uni pulled a tuft of grey fur from her brush, “promise us you’ll wash it at least twice a week.”

     “Your scalp is in utter peril,” grimly concluded the Ixi.

     Retracting from the mirror, Kass rummaged through his belt pouch.

     “Here,” he revealed three golden coins, “a token of my gratitude.”

     The girls squealed in delight as a single Neopoint appeared in each of their cupped hands and hooves.

     “And this,” he brandished a small sack, “is for your parents. Particularly your mother,” he added in haste to the Ixi.

     Yes, it was a bribe. And no, he had no shame.

     “Woooah! Five hundred!?”

     “I’ve never seen so many Neopoints!”

     While five hundred Neopoints seemed minuscule in comparison to riches of that found in other more bountiful regions of Neopia, that number was a big deal to the poverty-stricken Darigan populace.

     “Yes, well, if your parents ever begin to doubt my leadership,” he rearranged the charm under his uniform out of habit, ”remind them of who babysat you.”

     Convinced that they were now millionaires, the girls were overcome with joy, prancing about and waving around their newfound wealth. Even the Ixi, whose eerie vibes had lifted slightly, looked less sombre than usual.

     “If anything, they babysat you,” sounded a familiar voice from a dark corner, ...“Lord Kassy.”

     The air caught his freshly groomed mane as he spun around at breakneck speed to meet...

     “Morguss?!” He spluttered, “h-how long have you been there?!”

     The devilish smile she brandished was proof enough that she’d seen the whole thing.

     - - -

     After the children were escorted off castle grounds, Kass resumed his original duties that he had planned for the day. On the way to the armoury, he passed by Master Vex, the dungeon warden.

     Kass blinked. Odd. He swore he heard Vex laugh as he walked by.

     Just in case, the Eyrie paused briefly, and served Vex a death glare of immense proportions, sending the Mynci scuttling back down towards the dungeons.

     Then, later, while speaking with his advisor, the Kougra held a look on his face Kass had never seen before. Mild amusement, perhaps? His advisor was usually a solemn man, and Kass couldn’t find anything amusing about long-term financial planning.

     And even when he traversed the cold, dimly lit stairs of the citadel spires late that night, he swore he heard a couple of Eyrie guards stifle a chuckle.

     It was only when Kass reached his living quarters, and glanced in his body long mirror did he notice the light pink ribbon daintily tied around his tail tuft.

     The End.