Chapter Twenty-Two, brought to you in the early hours of the morning by a sleep deprived author.
Now that Vinata is finally beginning to make further appearances in Canon (epilogue of the Finite, to be exact!), my "theory," if you can call Courtship of a Phoenix one, has officially been debunked. So Vinata is actually serious and most likely stronger in her female form. It's also unknown whether or not she stays with Garuda after the Kali incident. CoaP will try to adhere to Canon but the ending will most likely be the one I intended for from the beginning.
Countdown: eight!
Disclaimer: There are many things in this world that do not belong to me. Kubera is one of them.
S-C-N-D
Courtship of a Phoenix
…
"I-I'm not quite sure this is a good idea," stammered Myna.
"This is a great idea," proclaimed Vinata, a little too cheerily, as she dangled a squirming baby just off the precipice.
"But—"
"Too late." Vinata let go.
Twenty metres below, Garuda barely started walking before a whir of white and red shot past him. It looked suspiciously like his son. He didn't give it a second thought.
…
Chapter Twenty-Two: When You're Older
N0 - approx. 1000 years
…
"Hey Garuda, who's the cutest baby in the world?"
"Hn."
Sulking at her husband's refusal to play along with her game, Vinata cuddled Maruna closer to her chest and told him, "you are! Oh, yes you are! Daddy's just über jealous of your cuteness." She stuck her tongue out.
"Hn."
Garuda only continued to scan over recent paperwork while pretending to the best of his abilities that that thing inside Vinata's arms wasn't there. Had he looked, he would have seen Maruna's eyes gaze curiously drift from his mother to his father, expression solemn.
"Well," she huffed. "You're no fun."
Vinata rose with her baby and took flight, presumably to find a cave so she could breastfeed him out of sight. At least she was being more considerate than doing it blatantly in broad daylight.
Gone were the days where Garuda only had to vie for Vinata's attention. Now he had to share it. And he would feel better if it was another Nastika he was competing with, because then Garuda could just kill him. But it wasn't. Maruna was a child—his child, and however it displeased him to look at that innocent face, he couldn't resent him enough to physically hurt him.
So it doesn't matter in the big picture, Garuda reasoned with himself. As long as Maruna was alive, Vinata was happy. And when Maruna grew up, Vinata would come back to his arms, where she truly belonged.
That brought a small smirk to his lips.
"Garuda! Garuda!"
See? There she was, already running back to him.
"This is all your fault!" Vinata stomped to him, finger flitting accusingly between him and the little devil. On her tiptoes, she hissed in his face, "why does my baby only have oneexpression?"
Affronted, Garuda said, "I have more than one expression."
She glared. "Right. I forgot. You have one and a half. I can't believe he inherited your disturbingly frigid face!"
Garuda raised an eyebrow.
"Because of you, my baby probably only has five facial muscles!"
"I have more than five facial muscles…" Garuda murmured, but it was lost to Vinata's heated rant.
Usually he'd let her complain as she liked. Sometimes Vinata liked to ramble just to get his attention, and he secretly liked listening to the hum of her voice while he worked. But on that particular day, Maruna just happened to grip his mother's shirt a little tighter. Vinata, lost in the fervor of her cause, didn't notice. Garuda did and suddenly his mood soured tenfold.
"Don't make this about him," he cut her tangent short. "You know better than that."
Vinata's fight disappeared instantly. She retracted her hand from him just as his grip slackened. "You do too," she reminded him.
"…"
He didn't have to wear a disdained face for her to read his thoughts. Vinata smiled sadly and asked, "does he look a little bit like me at all?"
"No," admitted Garuda. "Not really."
"Okay. Then I'll try not to ask any more of you."
Already, Maruna started tugging his mother's hair and demanding her attention, even though it hadn't been five minutes since she started talking to Garuda. He kicked and flailed like a chick with wet feathers.
"What do you know," the king remarked rather bitterly. "He does take after you in some ways after all."
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N0 – approx. 1000 years
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"The Asura Clan does not accept Rakshasas," sniffed Ravana.
For all the billions of years that luck had been his ally, it certainly wasn't this time. Vegavis ventured into the Asura stronghold expecting an audience with the king of insects. Instead, what he got was his infinitely harder to deal with second in command. As if it wasn't hard enough for a Nastika to get Ravana's cooperation. Worse yet, that idiot just happened to be selectively oblivious to every word that didn't boost his already too large ego.
"I'm not here for a membership to your secret tea party. I'm here to look for my father."
That got his attention. A smirk overcoming his face, Ravana finally set down his goblet. "Oh? Are all Garuda Rakshasas so fond of their fathers, I wonder? If only my children were quite as… obedient as you are."
"The queen wants to see him."
The smirk widened. "Vinata? But isn't she already married?" He quickly glanced around him, making sure that his audience was eating up every word. "What business would she have with a male that's not her own husband? Unless you're suggesting your father can provide something Garuda can't?"
The Asura Nastikas whispered loudly amongst themselves and Vegavis shut his eyes painfully, wondering where he had gone wrong—probably engaging in a conversation with Ravana to begin with.
"Very well," Ravana spared Vegavis the ordeal of uttering another word. "Since you're so curious, I'll tell you what happened to your father."
He paused for dramatic effect. Vegavis gestured for him to continue.
"He's dead, because of me." He closed his eyes and thanked his posse of Nastikas even before they began showering him with praises.
"I see. That is fine then. That is all I wanted to know," said Vegavis languidly.
Ravana blinked open one eye to see the Rakshasa already in flight. "That's it?" he complained childishly. "You think so little of my deeds? You won't even praise the great Ravana for his strength and handsomeness? You're not even going to entertain my friends?"
Why would I ever seek the company of pathetic vermin like you? Vegavis wanted to snap, but they are Nastikas while he is a Rakshasa and hopelessly outnumbered to boot. "If there is nothing else to do here," he stated instead, "my king and queen require my services back home."
Ravana followed his retreating figure with a frown, but gave no command to hunt this strange Garuda Rakshasa. After Vegavis left, he banged his goblet and huffed to his posse, "he thinks he can threaten me with Garuda? The Garuda Clan is waning as we speak!"
S-C-N-D
N0 – approx. 900 years
S-C-N-D
"He has not developed," Garuda observed.
"Obviously." Vinata glared at him. It seemed that all she'd been doing was glaring when both he and Maruna were present. Almost always, he was on the receiving end of that glare. "You're rushing him."
"No. Most Rakshasas take less time to develop."
Maruna was large now, not quite first stage but not quite second. Although it had been a long time since he spoke in stutters and wails, he remained silent under his father's scrutiny. He had only ever seen his mother and father argue over him and he didn't want to say a word lest Garuda would use it against Vinata.
Or worse, what if his mother got mad at him?
"He should develop soon."
Maruna unintentionally met Garuda's icy grey eyes. He tried to swallow the nervous lump in his throat inconspicuously, but didn't really succeed. Not that it ever mattered. Garuda only stared at him like he was a passing nuisance anyway.
Please, he prayed, let him go away so I can talk with mom again.
He breathed a sigh of relief when his father began walking away.
But then, not five steps had Garuda taken and his mother went stomping after him, gesticulating wildly. "Why must you make this so much harder for all of us? Have you already forgotten the promise you made or did those words mean nothing at all?"
Garuda shut his eyes and tried to inhale with poise. "I did mean what I said, Vinata. Nothing has changed between us."
"Nothing has changed except you constantly look at Maruna like you hope that he's going to spontaneously combust!"
"Isn't he?" he almost sneered.
Vinata froze, horrified for a split second. Composing herself, she shot back icily, "well if you've been around to see him practicing his Transcendentals, you would know, wouldn't you?"
"I have better things to do than overseeing the Transcendentals of a Rakshasa who can't even reach second stage."
Suddenly deciding that he had enough, Maruna lunged at Garuda, giving him every reason to clobber his son possibly to death. Years of nostalgia wore down Garuda's resolve and now, with temptation dangling in front of him, he could not resist.
Luckily, Vinata anticipated this moment long before it came and jumped in between them. She whipped a hand across Maruna's face, glaring at him heatedly as his eyes teared with betrayal. Without softening her expression, she turned and pulled her husband into a kiss so passionate it was usually reserved for the secrecy of their private caves. Garuda caught a glimpse of despair in Maruna's eyes as he wrapped his arms around her waist. Fueled by this gesture, Vinata clutched him tighter.
It was then that Maruna ran off, crying freely. He stopped just before rounding a cliff to wait for his mother to chase him, but she didn't so he cried harder and continued running.
With the amount of pressure Garuda exerted on Vinata's waist, one would think it'd have snapped by now. She peeled his arms away as they broke apart from each other.
He allowed her one of his rare smiles.
"Don't look so pleased with yourself," Vinata scolded lightly. "Because of you, Maruna thinks we're in a loveless marriage."
"Let him think what he wants."
"That kind of mentality isn't helping my cause, Garuda. I'm trying to get Maruna to see how this world works, but all he sees is a statue of a man he's told to call his father. He doesn't know you like I do. You have to make some allowances, regardless of whether you like him or not."
Garuda sighed, trying to remember how long it'd been since he last had to appease his wife to cooperate with her. Too long, it seemed. "What do you want me to do, acknowledge him every time we see each other? Instigate some kind of father-son bonding?"
"That would be a start," replied Vinata, hands on her hips.
Realizing that she was serious, Garuda grimaced.
She grabbed his hand in encouragement. "It's not that hard. You just have to try."
What Vinata didn't understand was that trying was the hard part.
S-C-N-D
N0 – approx. 900 years
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"I don't—hic—understand," Maruna sobbed.
He sat scrunched up in a ball, face turned to stone because men didn't cry and if they did, they didn't let anyone see them cry. He knew because he overheard his father complaining about it to his mother in one of their many arguments.
Myna wasn't sure if she was the best person for him to talk to about this. She had a feeling that Maruna only came to her because she seemed like the closest friend Vinata had—which, in truth, was not true at all. She only ever carried errands for her queen, and small ones at that.
But she is an Upani and he is a Rakshasa. Hierarchy dictates that she must obey his commands, and since he asked for an ear and an opinion, she had to be there to lend both.
Maruna rubbed at his eyes for the umpteenth time. "Why does mom stay with him?" he wailed. "He's so mean to her. He doesn't love her at all."
Astonished, Myna barely managed, "that's not true."
"Yes it is!" he yelled. "They fight every day and he never says a nice word to her. And she only kisses him so that… so that he wouldn't kill me…"
Myna's eyes grew to the size of saucers. She inched closer and placed a tentative hand on Maruna's shoulder. "What happened?"
Maruna relayed the entire story to her while fighting a losing battle with his tear ducts. Myna caught a few glimpses at his wrinkled face and realized that without proper guidance, this child must be more lost and confused than anyone. The more he told her, the more she realized that Vinata and Garuda both avoided doing what was best for him: deliver the blunt truth. Instead, all three of them were running around in circles, each trying to patch a problem that wasn't there.
Myna was glad that he was only first stage. A first stage Rakshasa wouldn't be strong enough to inflict serious damage on her. Hopefully, by the time he grew up, he would have forgiven her for this conversation.
"Maruna, there isn't any way to put this nicely. Your father doesn't hate Vinata-nim. He hates you."
Maruna nodded numbly.
"You can't be more wrong. He loves Vinata-nim more than anyone. He's also insanely jealous that she pays so much attention to you. To him, the first priority of a female Nastika is to love her husband, but everything Vinata-nim does is going against that and it frustrates him."
Maruna nodded more hesitantly.
"Vinata-nim's maternal instincts urge her to be by your side, which isn't wrong because you need her and you're still too young for independence. Now do you see where the problem comes in?"
Maruna nodded thoughtfully. He lowered his head to swipe away any remaining tears before turning to her. "So everything will be better if I just stay away from my mom?"
"Mostly everything, but that doesn't mean that it's what you should do!" she added quickly. Vinata would have her head if she found out it was Myna's advice to have her son estrange her before he even reached second stage. Maruna only looked more puzzled and Myna sighed. So far, her advice wasn't getting them anywhere at all. "I'm not a male Rakshasa so I wouldn't know, but if I were in your place, I'd start making friends and spend time with them instead of hiding behind my mother all the time. Garuda-nim will stay with Vinata-nim longer than you live, but you won't always have her."
If his puffy cheeks were any indication, Myna would say that Maruna didn't like being told he would eventually lose to his frigid archenemy of a father. He really was just a child after all. How cute.
She allowed herself to overstep her boundaries and ruffle his hair fondly just once, summarizing their conversation in the age old saying, "when you're older, you will understand."
S-C-N-D
And the last line was, of course, inspired by The Fray, because I've been having far too much than a healthy dose of them. It also ties nicely, if you think about it, to Maruna's obsession with wisdom and age which he revealed while battling Kasak.
I inserted a few more twists in the plot so that Vinata will still be the second strongest Nastika by the time of The Finite, which means all your beloved characters will fall. :) Oh yes... You know who death is out for next.
Thanks for reading! Please leave a review!
-SCND