A/N: So I have decided to take on the 100 themes challenge! Meep, I've a feeling I'll never finish it. Oh well. I realised that I had already done theme 69 (Smile) without realising it. But I'll probably think of something new to write for this; if not I'll just copy and paste that over to this fic.

As for the title of the fic...I called it Symphony because well, it's a medley of themes, right? (HAHA I am so lame) But lameness aside, some of the themes do remind me of...music. Like classical music.

Theme 1: Lord

Character(s): Raven

Genre: General/Angst

Lord.

How he despised that title.

It was an irritating word, a burdensome prefix to the names of those who supposedly were more sagely, more graceful, more noble than those "mere commoners", forcing them to take responsibility for everything that had happened; it was a meaningless word, one that did not reflect anything in the person save a profound sense of elitism; but above all it was a fearsome word, one that not only evoked intimidated reverence in the so-called "commoners", but one that embroiled oneself in the entangling web of political turmoil, of tyranny and corruption and shrewd, calculating manipulation.

It was the title of the green-haired girl, half-Sacaen, who possessed nothing more than a pretty face and some skill with a sword: none of the graces, none of the decorous behaviour of the nobility. It was the title of that vermilion-haired youth, whom everyone thought to be so brilliant, so regal, so perfectly chivalrous, but couldn't survive for two seconds on the battlefield without that old knight of his covering his back. It was also the title of the youth's lumbering friend, the son of his nemesis, the one who had singlehandedly caused the destruction of his family, the collapse of House Cornwell. And that reason alone was enough for him to scorn the title.

And yet, it had once been his title as well.

It was the title which had bound him, tortured him, sundered him from his kin, and driven him from his country. It was the title that caused him to witness the death of his parents. It was the title which had forced his sister to be sent away to Etruria. All because of the fact that he was nobility, because his parents had control over some land and some political power, because they failed to assert their full authority over that land. Human avarice was unrelenting, and any House that was debilitating would have to go.

That was why he had resolved to dispose of it; and once he had done so, it was like breaking through some concrete chrysalis that had restricted him all along: he was free. Free from the condescension of the other Houses, free from the political burdens, free to do anything he wanted without the other nobles scrutinizing every single move of his. For a delirious period of time, he had thought that he had managed to get rid of it forever.

But then reality came back, and he realized that he was never really freed from it; his sister was still alive, and Lucius still acted stubbornly as though House Cornwell still existed. He knew that he had to answer to them, to answer to his fallen house; he knew that he had to seek vengeance for his parents, for his House, for his sister, for himself. It was just another responsibility, one that he could not shirk, because of what he had once been. And that was the reason, above all others, why he had loathed the title so much.

Because he could never run away from it.