Emperor of Boukun

Romans had a festival for nearly everything. Which of their many gods this was for, I neither knew nor cared.

I stood in chains with five other gladiators, surrounded by the thick scent of sex. It was obvious why we were there. I caught the eye of one Roman woman admiring me, pretty, fair-haired, and barely into womanhood. My cock hardened thinking of her, but a much older, red-haired woman approached, stroking a bony hand over my chest.

“He’s mine, Julia,” she admonished the younger.

So long without any sex, my own desire barely ebbed as she led me away.

Kazakh steppe, Daniel aged early 20s

Yes, Hsu loved living in the mountains, but being able to gallop across an open, arid steppe would always be freeing and exhilarating. This was where he had grown up, where he had raised his first army. It would always be home.

He stood in his stirrups, turning back at his son and Cody as his pony galloped ahead, and in the dust they kicked up behind them, he could almost see the spirits of those who had followed him centuries ago riding alongside. His smile only showed in his eyes, but on the untamed steppe, he was truly happy.

Another report. Another dozen dead. Lord Hsu Danmei sighed. The fire he stood by could not put out enough heat. Trapped high in these desolate, frozen mountains there was barely enough food for horse or human. Plenty of water, as long as the fires remained. Only ice was in abundance.

Pulling his furs around him, Hsu stepped out into that frigid, blindingly white landscape of nothing and gazed at the miserable camp. The very young and old were the first to die. Now death wasn’t so selective. He would survive this brutal winter, but how many of his tribe would?

The opium made the dream vivid and real, so much that Hsu wished he didn't have to wake from it.

They were, perhaps, twelve or thirteen, and in the study back at the Ranch. Two dark heads hunched over books, and it was clear to him as he watched that Danika was helping her brother as he became frustrated with one particular problem showing him far more patience than Hsu ever could have. Sensing him close by, she looked up, and her smile was so bright, open and happy, it cut into his heart. "Hello, Father!" Daniel's smile was less certain, but he too eventually greeted him quietly. It was all so typical of the differences between them, and yet they could be so alike in more ways than just looks. They were inseparable, and even though she was the eldest by only a few minutes, she was very much the older sister, looking out for her brother. Her confidence compensating for his insecurity.

Hsu met his children's gazes, Daniel's hazel eyes and Danika's a shade darker than his own. "Would you like to come on a ride with me?" This time Daniel's smile was as joyful as his sister's.

It was so different from how he usually dreamed, reliving that day more than three hundred years previously, the day he had last held Danika in his arms, but in its own way, this dream was just as painful as he glimpsed what might have been. And yet, he did not want to wake from it and lose those moments, as imaginary as they were, with both his children.

Each year his subjects treated this day increasingly as an unofficial holiday. A kick-off to the month of reflection and family that marked the Imperial family's own commemoration of the time between the birth of Hsu's children and Danika's death. So far, as long as it didn't infringe on his family, the Boukunians could do what ever the hell they liked.

As it had for the past few years, the event that marked the beginning of this period was broadcast throughout his empire. Prince Daniel's Vigil as it had become known amongst the citizens, although it had no official title, nor would it. It was, and always had been Daniel's way of observing his and his sister's birthday, a sharing of that last time they had been together. Hsu watched the broadcast from his chambers, his own heart heavy as it always was at this time. True, he had long ago moved on from the deep grief, rage, and depression that had haunted him in the years immediately after that tragedy. He withdrew, seeking solitude and opium, and only permitting family as well as those who had been close at the time and in those rage filled years after Danika's death around him.

He watched as, on foot, Daniel walked from the palace to the temple, accompanied only by his bodyguards. Crowds had gathered to watch, hoping to catch a glimpse of the handsome prince, but Hsu knew that Daniel, so uncharacteristically for the rest of the year, would ignore them, his focus on the temple where he was heading.

The commentary accompanying the broadcast was muted, so annoying was the fake solemnity in the the man's voice as he detailed what was happening to an audience that probably already knew, and recounted the official history of his children's birth and Danika's death, which bore little resemblance to the truth.

Once Daniel stepped inside and the mausoleum guards were relieved and his bodyguards dismissed to wait nearby and alert, but allowing Daniel and Danika their privacy, Hsu turned away, intending to spend some time alone with his opium pipe. Something made him look at the screen one last time, and he couldn't believe what he was seeing. He punched the sound back on.

This year we have been granted permission to place a remote camera next to Princess Danika's tomb, so that the people of Boukun may share with the Prince his Vigil for his sister...

Hsu punched his commlink, his shock swiftly giving way to outrage. "MacDonald, shut down all broadcasts from the temple."

"Yes, sir." Andy was clearly puzzled, he had not been personally monitoring the broadcast. Like Hsu he wished that such a fuss hadn't grown around Daniel and Danika's birthday.

"Someone has a camera in the mausoleum. Shut it down and find out who gave this permission."

By now, Andy had turned it on to see Daniel walking around Danika's tomb, running his hand over the cold marble as he found the spot where he would climb up and share his innermost thoughts with her. A second later, he hit the kill switch and was putting a call through to the Boukunian news service to learn who had decided to violate this most intimate of moments for the Hsu family.

Satisfied at his blank screen, Hsu issued three more orders. "Clear the route between here and the temple, implement an immediate curfew, and I will address the Empire tonight." Their grief was not going to become an spectator sport or ratings coup for any network, and he would crack down hard on anyone who tried to infringe on their privacy, especially Daniel's.

Only once that was done did Hsu finally stride to his private chamber.

I've just uploaded a new mood theme to Hsu's journals (both here and on LJ) after working on it for far too long and only just got around to finishing.

I also made one for neidr_melltith which I'll upload tomorrow.

The reason grandchildren and grandparents get along so well is that they have a common enemy. ~Sam Levenson

Hsu's pale eyes met Roma's.

Roma's pale eyes met his.

A small, knowing smirk passed between the two of them as he put an arm around her shoulders.

Her parents would likely be dismayed to learn that certain traits of his had skipped a generation and found a home in her. That same ruthlessness, the bloodlust. He took immense pride in teaching her to refine and control those instincts for when they were best needed.

Of course, they would not understand the pleasure felt when it was unleashed.

And with that smirk came his pride in her. She was truly his.

***

Hsu Danmei
Highlander
100 words

B. Mun Questionaire - Complete the following:

Of all your muses...

1. Which one is the most sexually confident? Hsu, no question, it's that ego of his. Daniel is also confident and at ease with his abilities in the sack.

( Read more... )

OOC: Backdated to around the anniversary of Danika's death...but not set during any specific time period on Boukun.

It had never gone away, and he knew it never would. Inside him there was a hole that could never be filled; a wound that would never fully heal. A little over three hundred years ago, he was forced to do what no father, no parent should ever do. The pain of his grief during those first years after had faded. He no longer needed to block out that pain in a cloud of opium (though, often, at this time of year, he still did), and her presence was a quiet, gentle warmth around his heart now. But that day he took her head, something broke in him, leaving that emptiness inside him.

Over the centuries since then, he had found his son, destroyed those responsible for her death, profited as the Earth became a ravaged wasteland. He had gone out into the stars, and with those closest to him, created an empire with himself at its centre and ruled with an iron fist as it grew in strength and power. Possibly, there were only three who were aware that underneath the armour of steel and cold he surrounded himself with there still was that open wound: Cassandra, who had been there, at his side; Daniel, her brother who also seemed to carry that hole and had a connection with her that twins seemed to possess; and Cody, she was the only who had, literally, seen his pain laid out naked...the only one who had seen that grief at its rawest.

From the palace, one could see the city he had built once the Elders of Boukun had invested him as their Emperor, a city he named for her. In the temple was her mausoleum that in a few hours, he, her grandmother, and her brother would visit and pay their private respects as they had done for so many years on the anniversary of her death.

Her death, and the fact that it came at his hands -- hands so used to death -- had broken something in him, something that could never be fixed. It had changed a man who had not changed in the two thousand years prior, subtly but still changed.

For those that threatened his empire, his people, and more specifically and importantly, his family, they might not realize that those subtle changes meant that there was no such thing as mercy anymore.

x-posted from LJ

1 question...
1 chance...
1 honest answer...

That's all you get. Ask me one question. Any one question, anything, no matter how crazy it is. An honest answer. No catch.

OOC: Honesty may actually vary. Each muse's thread will be considered locked to that muse only.