The Gabriel family used to be the top aristocrat of the Noreic mainland people because they were close to the Holy Sea, loved by the royal family and, more legendary, had the blood of the Protoss. Because they can look back and predict the future through the stars in the sky.
But legends are legends after all, and outsiders have no idea that their abilities are acquired by overdrawing their lives.
Palatine’s father, Hill Gabriel, had sky-blue eyes and bright golden hair, but his mother was only a humble maid. So Palatine had only a pair of pale grey eyes, and even though he had blond hair, the color was very dim, like the sudden sunshine of a cloudy day – not noticeable at all, nor a trace of warmth.
This child, the eyes are grey…
The old mammy of the monastery, holding the child who had just opened his eyes, sighed at the pale woman lying in bed.
When the thin woman heard this, the flame of hope in her eyes suddenly went out, as dark and gray as this forcing hut.
The old Mammy looked at the innocent child with her thumb in her arms and her eyes. She was distressed.
Do you want to hold him? After all, the father of the child…
He can grow up like that without a father.
The woman looked out of the window and said coldly,
You take him away, I don’t want to see him.
Alas…
Mammy took the child in her arms and left the house trembling. The baby in her arms seemed to feel something and began to cry in a low voice, but the woman still did not look at him.
Oh, is it hungry?
Mammy patted the baby gently on the back, but could not stop his crying,
Eat some nectar and don’t cry, dear!
The kind old nun pulled down the red wildflowers by the roadside and stuffed the flower tails into the baby’s mouth. The little baby tasted the sweet nectar, swallowed with tears, but no longer cried. The eyes washed with tears were very clear and shiny.
Even though his pupils were grey, he could still see the colorful world.
Mother of the Abbey adopted the abandoned baby, a beautiful little boy! The news spread quickly in the monastery, and people often went to Mammy’s yard to see the beautiful child.
Wow! His hair is golden. I heard it’s the only hair color that nobles can have!
Mammy, what’s his name?
A group of nuns gathered by the crib and looked at the baby who was quietly drinking milk. They felt that their hearts were melting and they were going to fly softly.
The old mother pulled the baby’s hair out lightly and saw the baby’s bright eyes looking at her curiously. She said softly,
Call him Palatine. I hope he is as strong and as brave as a real knight.
But the expectations for Palatine’s were far off because he did not become a strong knight, as Mother of the Monastery had hoped, as a group of angel nuns had hoped, but a weak chicken priest. He could draw, he could play music, and he was very skilled in medicine, but he loved researching illnesses very much. Palatine’s skillful medical skills even made him a famous priest of light in this feudal land, but he couldn’t cure himself.
He didn’t know why.
Maybe it’s because our Palatine is a child of God’s favor.
Mammy, who was too old and could only lie in bed, still raised her hand kindly, trying to touch the young man who was raised by her as a dear child.
God can’t wait for his perfect child to come back to him…
Palatine grabbed Mammy’s hand, put it on his face, and knelt on the ground. His face was even paler than Mammy’s, and his beautiful eyes were full of tears.
I just want to be your child, please… Don’t leave me…
Mammy coughed a few times. Palatine seldom cried, and those eyes, as long as they were wet with tears, would become extraordinarily gentle and fragile.
God loves people, child, promise me to be a kind person…
Okay…
After Mammy’s death, Palatine took over the position of Abbot because not only did the nuns like him very much, but also many women came to the Abbey as nuns to listen to Palatine’s lectures and pray weekly with him.
After finishing today’s lecture, Palatine packed up his things, and the nuns came up to him with flushed cheeks:
Abbot, are you really not an aristocrat?
Of course not,
Palatine answered them gently.
But…
The nuns frowned in distress.
Your hair is golden, my father said. Isn’t it only hair that nobles can have?
Can such hair be called golden?
Palatine looked at a strand of hair that floated in front of him — just pale beige, but he still laughed,
I heard that the hair of the white elves is golden, but they are not nobles either.
Wow! Are you a white elf?
I’m not a white elf. You see, I don’t have sharp ears.
Palatine bent down and touched one of the little nun’s brown curls and quietly left the crowd.
Oh, my God! The Abbot touched me!!!
He just touched your hair! He didn’t touch you at all!
I also want the Abbot to touch my head…
Palatine watched the little nuns make fun of each other and looked at his hair. Although not pure gold, touched a little bit, perhaps he really was loved by God.
With this conviction, Palatine spent twenty years of his life as the Abbot. It was not until one winter night that he was kidnapped on his way home.
Palatine untied the black cloth covering his eyes and saw an aristocrat in the orange light. A man with golden hair and sky-blue eyes, a real aristocrat. But he looked almost the same as him, but his facial features are more indifferent and harder.
Palatine’s hands, hanging in his long robe, grew tighter and tighter. His thin wrist joints protruded, but no one could see them. He just swallowed spittle and tried to ask in a steady voice,
Are you coming to see me for treatment, then you don’t have to kidnap me like this…
I am your father.
The blonde nobleman seemed unwilling to listen to Palatine’s superfluous nonsense and frowned to interrupt his remarks.
Really…
Palatine’s voice began to tremble.
But look at my hair and eyes, they are nothing like yours…
The golden-haired aristocrat turned his head, and indifferently told the guard next to him,
Take him to the astrological tower.
Yes!
Palatine was grabbed by two guards and sent almost overhead to the secret chamber of the astrological tower. Then he was chained by his left ankle with a strong chain:
Actually, I can walk by myself. What are you doing…
Golden-haired aristocrat came up to Palatine and squatted down to look at Palatine lying on the ground. Palatine was not in good health, and there was heavy snow outside. All they felt was a headache, but the aristocrat seemed to be unable to see his pale face. His words were colder than the snow outside:
I am Hill Gabriel, from today on. You will learn astrology in this room.
After these words, without giving Palatine a chance to speak, Hill Gabriel turned and left the room. Palatine struggled to sit up and said,
Why me?
Hill Gabriel had opened the iron door. There was no end to the darkness in front of him. His golden hair was shining brightly in the darkroom. When he heard Palatine’s questions, he just paused and did not look back.
Because I’m your father.
Father… Haha…
Palatine hugged his chest and gasped, leaning against the cold stone wall.
Gabriel… What a sarcastic surname! I’m nothing.
Not God’s beloved child. Not a noble either.
The identity he once had, the priest, the abbot, disappeared from the moment he entered the stone house. Palatine taunted himself by pulling at the chain on his ankle,
You can’t get out of this life…
Almost everyone knew of the Gabriel surname. Of course Palatine knew it, but he didn’t understand why Hill Gabriel wanted to find his son who has been out for years and had never heard of him.
Palatine had many unexplained things, including Hill Gabriel, who did not understand why no blonde blue-faced baby had been born in the Gabriel family in recent years. All the newborn babies had black or brown hair and could not inherit the astrological priesthood of the Gabriel family at all.
The head of the Gabriel family and the priests had to choose the descendants of the blonde and blue-haired to inherit them – to show their noble lineage. But unlike the patriarch, the priest’s hair would turn white later, because he needed to prophesy that the Gabriel family’s external interpretation was that it was a divine punishment, but never said that it would consume the lives of astrologers.
Palatine was not the only one to enter the chamber, but before him, almost everyone had to endure a life expenditure of prophecy. Hill Gabriel had no choice but to retrieve Palatine – after all, his bright priest was not a small man, and such a man should live longer.
From that day on, Palatine was locked in this stone house and never went out again. He studied astrology all day and then, when the Gabriel family needed it, withdrew his life to make a prediction.
Hill Gabriel used the lives of the nuns to threaten Palatine. He could neither resist nor fight.
More than five years of prophecy had made him skinny. There were no windows in the chamber, only an iron door that would never open for him, and a roof that would move only when astrology came.
Palatine’s long-lost sunshine skin was pale. The Gabriel family knew that he was not in good health and feared that he would not die on the astrological table, but by disease. They built a luxurious house for him, with good velvet carpets, and the fire magic stones around it would bake the whole room sweltering.
But he only felt cold. The cold filled every corner of the room and tormented him all day and night, but he couldn’t die.
