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Cera looked to see if Maewyn would clarify, but Sidryne was already pressing on.
"When you feel prepared, you will lay on your side, and he will come to you. He will meditate on your body and prepare himself to enter you. You must be still and silent so as not to break his focus."
"I must stay silent throughout?"
"Yes," Sidryne and Maewyn said in unison.
Maewyn added, "You must stay focused and clear of purpose. You are not a beast to be grunting and braying. Your energy and intention should be set to creating a child."
Sidryne said, "You need to be strong of mind if you will give the aesolin a child. If he believes you do not focus, he will do unproductive things."
"Unproductive things?"
Maewyn nodded gravely. Her voice lowered, she said, "It is in his nature, not to approach childbearing seriously. With as long as they lived, the Ishvalindic elves were never in a hurry to conceive. It made them develop...strange notions about what should be done in a bed."
Cera perked up. "How long did they live?"
"Who can say?" Sidryne said with a graceful roll of her shoulders. "All we know of them is from stories."
"But you have Lord Isael," Cera pointed out.
Sidryne laughed, the sound like a tinkling bell. "Should we use a phoenix to presume on pigeons?"
"She means that the high lord is not like others of his house," Maewyn supplied. "He did not inherit Ishvalier by virtue of being the last of his people. He was already the heir of Ishvalier before the war. He is the son of Isoldyr, the descendant of Trianus and Hesobin."
Cera frowned. "Trianus and Hesobin? Do you mean Trian and Hesola, from the fairy tale?"
She couldn't make assumptions about other Ateran children, but she thought most must know the story. Even Cera, with her unusual upbringing, had heard several variations of the pagan story.
Hesola had been the daughter of an ancient king, said to be the fairest woman in all the lands. Many men vied for her hand in marriage, particularly a feared warlord who was known for his cruelty. When Hesola's father refused to marry her to the warlord, the warlord besieged Hesola's city. Desperate to spare herself and her kingdom, Hesola went to the lake behind the castle to drown herself.
Most Ateran children's stories would end there, leaving Hesola to become another tale of filial piety, and perhaps a cautionary tale for little girls that were inclined toward vanity.
But Hesola's story was memorable because its ending was not tragic. As the fair maiden had gone to drown herself, her beauty had roused the old god that slumbered beneath the lake. Before she could drown, Trian kissed her, granting her the ability to breathe underwater. He then pulled her down into his underwater kingdom, where she would become his bride, safe from all those who would seek to harm her. She bore him many sons, all of whom would rise up from the lake and go on to be a great king or hero of myth.
Upon reflection as an adult, Cera supposed it was a rather fitting Ateran tale, after all. She wondered how many problematic daughters might have been encouraged to drown themselves with the promise of being a water god's bride.
"I do not know those names, but Trianus and Hesobin were not characters in a fairy tale," Maewyn said. "Trianus is one of the gods of our people. An ancient fae king, who took the elf Hesobin as his lover. He poured his power and his seed into her, creating the first elves of Ishvalier. Their magic came from him.
"The aesolin's father and mother were the most powerful elves of Ishvalier, Isoldyr and Yaela. Isoldyr put two children in Yaela's womb. Twins. She carried them for a year, meditating day and night, consolidating the power into a single vessel. Lord Isael was that vessel."
"What about the other baby?" Cera asked.
"That was the high lord's twin, Erael. He lived a good life, but was weak and of no consequence. Died in the war, with the rest of his people."
Maewyn went on to explain how Isael, having been born with the power of two elves, was trained and groomed to lead his people. It was interesting, but Cera's thoughts still lingered on his brother and parents. If the story was true, then they'd deliberately sacrificed the potential of one child for the sake of another. She didn't understand why, and she wondered what sort of upbringing Isael must have had.
Sidryne recaptured Cera's attention when she said, "The aesolin was the strongest of us, even before he could call the dragon wind."
"What exactly can the dragon wind do?" Cera asked. "Everyone speaks of how powerful it is, but it's all so vague."
Sidryne nodded at Maewyn. "Tell her how you met Isael Aesolin. I should like to hear it in Ateran."
Maewyn pursed her lips. "Quickly, then. There is not time to waste."
In spite of her apparent reluctance to tell the tale, Maewyn proceeded to plunge into a long story, the details of which she recounted with the ease of one who'd repeated it many times.
Maewyn had met Isael at the end of the war. That fact alone surprised Cera, as the war had ended five centuries earlier. She had known Isael was that old, but Maewyn looked only a few years older than Cera.
