Grayson kicked his feet back and forth, dangling them over the wall as he drank from the waterskin. He wiped the back of his hand across his lip, exhaling hard as he caught his breath.

He still had a couple hours of daylight before supper would be served in his father's palace, but he was going to have to be quick if he wanted to make it home in time to ask some more questions to the Skull before dinner. The skull was the only one who seemed to know as much as his father about the things that mattered.

He desperately wanted to learn those things so that his father would one day call him son. He wanted to be able to tell his father that he loved him. But how do you earn the love of a god?

The Lord Warden Dre'su'den the Ha'ri had plucked him from the streets of Delmak and brought him out of starvation and into a life of privilege that he'd never realized was even an option. Grayson had a bed, a room, new clothes, spending money and even writing lessons. He would one day become a scribe in the grandest Library in all the galaxy. He was going to immortalize the words of the Gods themselves.

He was one of many children the Warden had seen something special in. Not the oldest, but the first. He was the first human child of the Lord Warden.

That mattered.

It had to matter.

His mother's doted on them. Children were blessed in the Lord Warden's realm. His father passed wisdom to his people circumspectly, teaching his own children lessons that were then passed along to the rest of the world through the writings of the scribes.

Grayson almost dreaded the responsibility of being the first person to learn a story from his father. His mothers would interrogate him afterwards to dissect the tale, asking Grayson and his siblings to repeat the story verbatim - generally asking intense questions about what prompted the story to be told.

Grayson's accounts often had holes in them. He didn't like admitting that he often asked for specific stories or more tales about his favorites. His father favored the Spiderman when able, but Grayson always wanted to hear stories about Batman and his wards.

They gave him hope.

The Lord Warden was an all powerful and all knowing God King, but when Grayson closed his eyes he could almost imagine that the Lord Warden really was the human father he had never met. He just seemed so normal. The man carried eternity in his eyes but he played games of chase and sport with human children often - teaching them new ways of having fun.

He taught Grayson Baseball, and had even given him a mitt and bat so that he could practice. It had been a special occasion for Grayson, but he was sad that it hadn't been a uniquely special moment. He had to share his father with the rest of his adoptive siblings whenever they met.

It was why Grayson was out in the blistering heat, hours after the rest of his siblings had given up and headed home. He knew that if he worked harder his father would finally notice him and give him what he wanted most in the world - another round of catch.

His father had used Grayson to demonstrate how to throw and catch the ball with the Mitt, starting show and speeding up as Grayson got the hang of it. His heart swelled in memory of the envy in his siblings eyes as his father praised him for catching a fast throw

He wanted that again. He wanted it do much that it hurt sometimes.

He didn't talk about it with his siblings much. It felt petty given what they'd seen and lived through. Grayson remembered the Dragons and the Grey Man - they'd been terrifying. But the worst of what he saw was nothing compared to those who survived Chronos' men.

His hurt was no less real, but he could sleep without screaming. He'd been too young to remember his parents deaths - let alone climb over their glory bodies.

He told himself that his father would not approve of his selfish desire to swap places with his youngest sister when she woke from her night terrors and was whisked away by his mothers to sleep in their father's quarters. He cringed at envy of his brother Abda, the cripple, who his father occasionally carried on his shoulders so that they could round the bases together.

But the truth was that Grayson wasn't broken, so Grayson had to stay strong for his siblings. Family was there for each other. He just sometimes wished that the give and take of family would sometimes give him more.

He was lonely if he was being honest.

Grayson didn't even really understand the language of his siblings that well. It was similar enough to Delmak's common tongue to understand, but he missed talking in his native language.

Baseball didn't care that he had a funny accent or tease him for not liking spicy food. It was just him and the game.

He drank another drag from the waterskin and willed his body to not be bothered by the sun. His skin, long accustomed to the subterranean tunnels of Delmak's metropolis, was ill equipped for the desert. The linen shirt and wide-brimmed cap he favored looked ridiculous, but they were the only thing protecting him from the painful red burns he got if he tried to wear the local fashion. He would perhaps have been self conscious about his pallor by comparison with the mahogany and ebony shades of his siblings if his father hadn't been a virtual specter of a man.

He twitched in shock as he felt something moving under his legs before remembering that he'd brought Artoo with him. Artoo was a squat six legged lizard that was favored by the residents of Nekheb as a pet. It would one day grow large enough for him to ride but it was barely larger than his foot at the moment. Supposedly the wild ones grew larger than a house. It looked up at him with yellow green eyes, flicking its tongue out contentedly in the warm sun.

Artoo was better suited for the heat than Grayson. The creature puffed out it's fat cheeks, making a warbling "grawrp" of pleasure as Grayson reached down to scratch beneath the creature's face. He would rather have had a cat, but cats weren't "pets" on Nekeb. They were just sort of free roaming - and woe betide anyone that his mothers caught preventing a cat from doing as it wished.

There was a fluttering noise to Grayson's right and he flinched as something landed on the bench next to him. Grayson had to resist the urge to cry out as a Furling stat down on the bench - reminding himself that the Furlings while dangerous, were invited guests of his father. He still clutched the bat tighter protectively nudging his pet away from the creature with his foot.

The small fair skinned little man was a handsome, if scaled down, older man. His hair was exceptionally long and streaked with fine, symmetrical lines of glowing silver. The jewels along his fingers and brow complimented the fine, midnight blue of his flowing gown. He looked at the baseball diamond approvingly, clicking his little tongue before facing Grayson. The handsome little man's eyes flashed with literal sparking motes of silver as he saw the bat and asked. "Ye be a fan of the sport, do ye lad?"

Grayson sat still, not quite sure what to do. Father had forbidden his children from seeking out interactions with the Furlings. He'd told them "Fairy Tales" that always seemed to end gruesomely for mortals who chose to deal with the Furlings incautiously. That being said, rudeness seemed equally likely to end poorly.

"Yes sir. I like Baseball very much." Grayson replied nervously.

"Ah - Forgive me lad, I forget that it can be overwhelming to meet such a august person as a King of the Tylwth Teg." The little man rested his palm against his forehead. "I am Gwyn ap Nudd. But since ye like baseball and since we be alone, ye may call me Gwyn instead of 'Yer Majesty.' I scarcely expected one of the Wyrm's worlds to have the Great Game upon it."

"They play baseball elsewhere?" Grayson asked eagerly. He'd actually believed it an invention of his father.

"Aye lad - there be an entire planet… well two nations worth speaking of, with entire leagues to the great sport. But other than the occasional Softbank Hawks game the second isn't much to speak of." The man tutted his tongue. "How long have ye been playing the sport?"

"Father taught it to us a couple months ago. We've got three teams, and we're pretty good." Grayson replied, relaxing his hands on the bat but not letting go of it. The man didn't appear to wish him harm, but one could not trust in the good will of demons.

"Would ye like to see a real game of the sport?" The man waggled his brows exaggeratedly. "I could show you one, American League - Yankees versus Red Sox. I was going to watch by myself but you seem like a decent companion."

"What do you want for that?" Grayson's mouth went dry at the idea of seeing actual teams play. Father had mentioned "Yankees" once, in a tone he normally reserved for Vampires.

"I do not want anything. Just promise that you will keep loving the game." The little man beamed. "Not many have the spirit for it. You do. Mayhaps you'll share the love with others and I'll have two planets worth of games to watch."

"You really like Baseball that much?" Grayson queried.

"I like the Great Game, but it's more than that lad." Gwyn smiled. "I invest - ye see. In playing cards, in memorabilia for the Great Game, but that's just a side business. What interests me most is people. Give interesting people a chance ta' shine and they tend to bring you dividends for doing so. I get the sense that yer going to be very interesting."

Grayson kept his lips shut, avoiding eye contact with the man out of embarrassment. "I'm not special."

"Really? For someone who doesn't aspire to be intersting, yer spending a whole lot of time by yourself trying to become great." The man chortled. "So - who are ye trying to impress? Yer father or yer girl?"

"Girl?" Grayson blushed. "I haven't got a girl?"

"Aye?" The man looked past grayson, his eyes focusing on something closer to the city walls. "Well, yer popular for someone without a girl then."

"Child!" Barked the harsh noise of furiously angry woman's voice. "Cease speaking with that creature at once!"

Grayson winced, he'd been hoping that Novice Khadija wouldn't be able to figure out where he was till long after he'd been able to get home and wash up for supper. He wasn't entirely comfortable interacting with her under the best of circumstances. She treated him like an infant - an incompetent one at that - in spite of only being a couple years older than he.

Some of the uncomfortable nature of their relationship stemmed from a couple embarrassing attempts to flirt with her before he realized that she was planning to marry his Father. It was… awkward to say the least. Girls were confusing, and Khadija seemed to be the most confusing one of them he'd met so far. Hopefully when she spiritually married his Father he'd be able to stop himself from having embarrassing thoughts about her.

It hadn't worked for the rest of his mothers yet, but he could hope that she'd be the exception.

She wasn't yet initiated fully into the clergy yet, so she wasn't one of his mothers, but she brow beat him more than the rest of his mother's combined. He didn't know why she was so focused on him but he could scarcely turn around without her being in at his heels, chastising him for not obeying some arbitrary rule of conduct on Nekheb.

He hoped she wouldn't actually pass the rites of devotion. He didn't think he'd be able to survive having that woman as a mother. It came as some comfort that none of the novices had been fully initiated since his father took over. The clergy was still struggling to understand his father well enough to understand what he was babbling about, let alone to decide that other were qualified to do so.

"Novice Khadija," Grayson gritted his teeth into a forced smile. "Have you come to play?"

"Get away from that creature." The novice wasn't able to hide her open contempt for the magical creature as she crossed her arms. "It can't be trusted."

"He is beginning to tire of being called an it." The small man's eyes narrowed. "I'm in a good mood so I'm going to give ye a chance to apologize fer that slip of the tongue, lass. Yer a child and it's generally wise to exercise caution with beings of power."

"Get away from it." The Novice held up a iron pentagram within a circle, a necklace made in imitation of his father's only piece of jewelry. "Before it hurts you."

"She's not a very good listener, is she?" The man looked at Grayson, seemingly baffled that she would escalate the situation. "Ye need to apologize, lass - this won't end well for ye unless ye do."

"She doesn't mean it." Grayson gulped, realizing that the iron symbol wasn't even registering to the little man as a threat. Lea, the scary woman who father sometimes met with, was the only one he'd seen not flinch when someone held up iron. Father seemed to regard her as a peer. "She's only trying to help."

"She can speak for herself, lad." Gwyn sighed. "Thrice I ask and done - do ye apologize."

"Go away demon." The novice hissed.

"Ye brought this on yerself lass." The man said, a wicked glint in his eyes as he snapped his fingers and there was a sound like ringing bells that came from his fingers. Khadija blinked in confusion as she tried to walk forwards, and was unable to move. Her eyes bugged in horror as vines sprouted out from the ground, piercing her skin and wrapping up her, moving through her bare flesh like wriggling worms. She screamed as thorns burst out of her skin, bright red punctures coming out from the wriggling shapes under her flesh.

"Oh no - oh gods no." Grayson tripped over Artoo as he tried to stand up and help her, falling on his bottom and earning a bite from the frightened reptile. "Khadija!"

His heart hammered in his chest as he watched her writhe in pain as wooden bark wrapped around her body, trapping her in a human shaped trunk of white wood. She was an annoying know-it-all of a girl, but she wasn't that bad - just a little bit opinionated. She certainly didn't deserve to die.

"Your Majesty!" Grayson called out, using the creature's proper title in an effort to appease its ego. "Please don't kill her! Let her go!"

"Kill her - lad - I'm not going to kill her." The man shook his head. "She'll be fine, whole and healthy." He waved his hand as the bark almost closed over the girl's face. There were tears in her eyes as she struggled and failed to move her head. "But I'm nay gonna leave without teaching her a lesson in manners."

He grinned, his little teeth glimmering with sharkish amusement. "In fact I think I can teach two lessons with his one."

Grayson flinched as Gwyn reached down to help him up, but didn't dare strike at the man. He was capable of things he'd only seen his father do. The man's hand touched Grayson's skin and the horrific vision he'd seen disappeared in an instant to be replaced by a young woman standing in place, eyes wide and flinching.

"But - but she was - I saw you… She's ok?" Grayson swallowed nervously.

"Well…. Not ok." The man pursed his lips. "The illusion is supposed to just irritate her - she is mentally inflicting upon herself the crime she feels is commensurate with the insult she's just given. It's always the religious loonies lad - no sense of proportion."

"She's doing this to herself?" Grayson touched her shoulder nervously. Her skin was clammy even in the blazing heat.

"Not really - I am the one who cursed her. But the particulars of the illusion are created by the mind of the cursed. They young lass needs to seriously consider therapy." The man tutted.

"What is therapy?" Grayson inquired. Father had referenced the term at times but never clarified it.

"About three thousand years of collective social sciences and the humanities trying to replace the preceding fifteen thousand years of collective family grudges," The King tutted his tongue. "She's got issues that she's not dealing with."

"She's a priestess. She's due to spend her life in service of a divine being with a divine purpose? What issues could she have?" Grayson scoffed.

"Lad, ye be the ward of that same god. Feel ye like there are no problems in your heart?" Gwyn snorted.

"Ah." It wasn't much of a response, but Grayson didn't feel up to the task of matching wits with the fairy King. "So… can you let her go?"

"No, but you can." The man grinned.

"How?"

"She's doing this to herself lad. Ye need to bring her out." He grabbed Grayson by the shirt and pulled him down to eye level, staring at him intently. "Hold her head. Get real close - face to face, and look into her eyes."

Grayson blushed deep enough to be seen under the pink of his sunburn at the idea of being that close to her. "How close?"

"Lad, don't get all twisted up trying not to go Oedipal on her. Yer looking at her, nay marrying her." The man laughed. "Ye will know when ye be close enough."

Grayson looked into her eyes, and felt a powerful tug in the back of his mind as he was sucked into the now seemingly endless pools of dark green. As he felt his mind leave his body entirely, he heard the voice of the Fairy King in the distance.

"Well, father or woman - I think ye'll be very interesting to them indeed."