A first attempt at fanfic. Probably a few parts long.
Prologue
A man doesn't have to marry to have a family. No woman ever came along that I could call the love of my life; my work, the people I serve, they were my loves. I have served the same family all my life and my father before me and his father before that. I have seen births, deaths, and tragedies, without ever having once said a word. I was the silent spectator to the horror. My eyes saw the tragedy that would unfold as others blindly stumbled down the path toward destruction, oblivious to the fate that was so clear to the objective bystander, powerless to intervene. My ears heard the malicious whispers and heartbroken wails that were drowned out behind thick doors of the wealthy elite, as if the words were never uttered. My heart felt the fleeting joy and the ever present pain caused by the death of a beautiful soul on a stormy winter night so many years ago. My soul is forever stained with the tears of the young and the wicked deeds of the old.
I have watched my master grow up to be a strong and ferocious man but unlike the rest of the world, I've seen his vulnerable side too. I've seen his heartache; I've seen what drives him. I never had a son. In many ways my master was like the son I never had, when he was younger and I more like a father than a manservant.
I wonder, sitting in this godforsaken cottage at the peak of a cold cliff, if I'll ever see him again.
My eye sight is failing, my hearing near gone but it is my tired old heart that tells me that I won't.
I was one of the first people to lay eyes on the child when he was born. In the dead of winter as the clock struck twelve he made his dramatic entrance into the world; the tiniest thing I had ever seen that made the most unholy racket until he was placed in the arms of his weak and fragile mother, too ill to know if she was holding her child or not. The Lady Gabriella had nearly lost her life giving birth to him and as the doctors attended to her, I was charged with the task of taking the newborn to the master, Lord Agonese.
As the fierce wind howled around the thick stone walls of The Manor, I remember cradling him close, swathed in the finest cashmere blankets imported from the Empire, as I carried him down the vast and cavernous corridors. Above us on the walls hung portraits of his father's ancestors, stern and proud with conceited sneers on pale white faces framed with the darkest hair and angriest of brows glared down upon us. The child, nestled in my arms and crying lustily, bore not the slightest resemblance to any of his father's predecessors. He was the picture of perfection in my arms: deep, dark blue eyes and pale blond hair framed his face that, but for the scowl upon his tiny features, would have made him look like an angel.
Even his scowl that caused his newborn brow to furrow in despair was not the dark and dangerous glare of his father but the sneer of cool command that would from time to time grace his mother's exquisite features. He was every inch his mother's child, now torn from her warm and tender embraces and thrust into the cold and dangerous world of his father.
A tall and proud man, full of scorn and evil thought to the extent that hatred rather than blood flowed through his veins, he showed not the slightest interest in his newborn child. Until the day I depart this world, I will never forget the look on Lord Agonese's face when I informed him it was a son. There was no love nor fatherly affection; rather a deep seated hatred and contempt flashed through those deadened grey eyes as they slithered over the bundle in my arms. His daemon hissed, uncoiling herself from around his neck and arching her head as those black beads glistened and narrowed to glimmering slits.
"It's a boy. M'Lord." I had stated after the Butler showed me into his study where he stood with his back to the window.
"A son?" he had replied in his acrid tones.
"Healthy enough. The Good Lady Gabriella is weak but alive."
"I don't recall asking after the bitch." His angry snarl made all the more disturbing by the hiss from his powerful daemon as she slid with a dangerous grace from his arm and onto the floor. "Didn't kill her off then? More's the pity."
"She's asked to name the boy Asriel, M'Lord." I added, my eyes never once leaving his daemon as she began to sway her hypnotic dance. The child in my arms, having fallen silent the moment we had entered the room lay mesmerized. "After the Authority's angels since he spared their lives."
"Religion!" he had snorted. "One of the girl's many faults. Tell her to do as she pleases; she usually does so anyway! I couldn't care less!" He turned away from the window, as his daemon slithered towards him, entwining herself with him as she slid back into position draped across his shoulders.
"M'Lord."
"And remove that - that - thing at once. I don't want to lay eyes on it, do you hear, Thorold?" He barked, his eyes narrowing as his daemon, the cursed thing that she was hissed softly into his ear, pointed tongue flickering and beaded eyes glittering with a savage hate.
"M'Lord."
I'm not ashamed to admit I fled from the room as fast as my legs would carry me, my daemon cowering at my feet. That daemon was by far the most terrifying thing I have ever had the misfortune of encountering in my life; far more disturbing even than the creatures that haunt the cliffs of Svalbard. Had I not seen it with my own eyes I would never have believed there existed a daemon with such a dark power as Lord Agonese's albino python. For when the snake began to sway and caught the attention of her victim, he was powerless to look away, his own daemon left limp and defenseless as the python slithered towards it and crushed it to death in its deadly embrace. For a moment, standing before my master, I had felt myself go, unable to move or speak as I felt my arms loosen around the child, knowing that in another second that malevolent ghost would have the infant daemon, that small ball of exposed and vulnerable fur tucked away deep in the folds of the blankets near the infant's heart, unable to hear or see or shape change in its newborn bliss. Another second and the flame that had only just begun to burn would be extinguished forever with one soul destroying squeeze.
I made a vow as I hurried back to my Mistress's room not to leave the child's side until such time as I knew if his mother were to live or die.
By day break, we had our answer.
