The Marvelous Melchior. Conquest itself. Son of Philautia.

Gods what has he fallen to.

His hands were never this dry, never this rough. It is not a sword or even reigns that have filed his skin and muscle down to this. It was age as much as he hated to remember. But the lightness of his hair is a constant in reflections. And he has seen his far too many times. Statues, paintings, writing. He who has never uttered the King's name has only not lived long enough to learn to.

And what is he now? What has the man of poems, the man of legends come to? He is as his father was in his olden days. He'll turn more dull, slower, weaker.

"Dear," Melchior feels the growing need to call, to stop thinking of only the bad. His glory may be ending, but his son's is only to begin. If anything, a part of Melchior will continue on in Cassander and his siblings. In the way Nephalion fights as a commander, Amalia protects in her calling as a knight. In how Helena pulls her thread and Anthemion writes even sick in bed.

His hands, which used to be so strong, set down the old news pamphlet he's been reminiscing over. "I am not so ancient yet, am I? This old man still has some glory to him even without the crown does he not?"