Khyber and his two children managed to flee from Alys. They fled much further than they should have, mostly kept safe by the rapidly waning remnants of Alys’s own aspect, which caused the Enforcers to not go far enough in finding them.

They hid out in a cave for a few weeks, with Khyber occasionally venturing out for supplies – either to hunt or to purchase. Eventually, the White-Bound had seen the missives, and reward offered, by the Enforcers and grew more interested. The merchant from earlier also found this and tried to go out and warn them. The mob had formed and it was much too late.

Khyber saw the mob coming and attempted to flee, though he knew without any kind of shelter it was only a matter of time before they died of the elements. He was drawn to a towering structure in the distance, and made it to the base of the only tree he’d seen so far in this hellscape.

The merchant got there before the mob, but there was no hiding from them. Khyber gathered what little strength he could and went out to take them on. His heart was not in it, though. The futility of the fight combined with the knowledge that these people were desperate and opportunistic, not necessarily malicious, killed most of his motivation.

Khyber took down several of the mob, but not enough. He died.

Junior watched on from the distance, under the certain knowledge that this was all his fault. If he had not gone out to follow his father, it was likely that his mother would not have been caught and burned. The Enforcers would not have sent the mob, and this fate would have been avoided.

And at that moment, both of the children bound. For different reasons.

Junior was consumed with grief, self-hatred, rage, and futility. His aspect, which was in the process of forming, focused all of that on his surroundings as he focused on himself. All the souls of those around him were stripped from their body and drawn into the boy. The mob fell to the ground, lifeless. And as Junior himself fell into a coma despite the lifeforce of dozens of people within him, his body began to turn black. Instead of binding to any of the Titans, a small but powerful star responsible for wholesale destruction had found him instead.

Junior’s release should have killed his younger sister and the merchant, but it did not. The tree, with its slow-moving mind, saw the signs and knew that it would succumb to the forming aspect as well. So, it reached out for someone, and found the small child – not even a year old. It offered its soul to the girl, and the girl bound to the tree. In moments, she had transformed into a treekin – an almost unheard-of binding at this point. While she may have been able to comprehend her surroundings given enough time, the tree itself took over and protected itself. As its new protector was barely cognizant of the world around her, she had no aspect yet. The tree just wished everyone to go away, and the aspect formed – a rejection force. It created a field around the girl and tree and, luckily, the merchant as well.

The merchant left the girl and her tree, as the girl refused to leave, and took the small boy away. The chaos of this kingdom was not worth his life, but at least he could attempt to take the boy to safety along with him.