Many years have passed since me and my father have spoken. When I turned two and twenty I refused to take over my fathers employment plans for my future. My father is and I guess now was a wealthy man. He ran several estates and was likely to be named a new viscount if his temper ever subsided enough for him to be a pleasant man. My father was never an easy person to work with. The king himself figured this out, however, my father could turn a gold coin into a chest if given the chance. He could turn a famine into the most lucrative food source around. My father once even profited from losing three ships in a bad storm. How? No one knows, but my father somehow did it.

Now I am being told by this boy. This messenger who was sent to find me out and tell me that my father is dead. This boy must have known my family for he is on the edge of crying. Me. I’m feeling a mixture of things. Relief, loss, anger, and maybe even at the brink of laughter. For you see, my father has made me head of his household. My father who banished me to this piece of dirt that I have been at for five years. My father who said I would not be worthy of the worms on his lands to eat of my flesh once I have passed away from ruin. My father my nemesis in life. The thorn in his side and mine. He has now made me the very thing I refused to be. The worst of it is now if I don’t take up this mantle my mother and sisters will be of ruin and no prospects of marriage. He has now had the last laugh. Knowing I will step up to save my family.

I now hold the house ring. Riding in a carriage back to my family estate to await my life I didn’t want. The ring a black Onyx wrapped in gold with a raven in the middle. This decision has not made me unprepared because my father made me prepared for anything from the time I could walk and talk. I just know from this day forward I will turn into the very thing I tried so desperately to destroy …..my father. I will go mad. I will become dead on the inside. I will become my father because he is inevitable. My father my keeper.