An Unsent Letter Found Among Elion Karsis’ Effects
Addressed, but never delivered
Vlad,
I will not call you Father, King, or anything that implies permission.
I know you prefer patience to provocation, so consider this a courtesy: I am not writing to wound you. I am writing to confirm that the wound already exists—and that you know exactly where it is.
Your son died because he believed proximity meant safety.
He walked into a room without armor, without calculation, without the suspicion your world requires. He thought curiosity was harmless. He thought love was a thing that could interrupt power without consequence.
That was your failure, not mine.
You raised him in a Night where intimacy is a liability and then seemed surprised when it killed him. You built systems that punish hesitation and called it order. When someone internalized that lesson too well, you looked for a villain instead of a mirror.
I did not know who he was.
That fact disturbs you more than the act itself. You would have preferred intention. Intention can be argued with. Accident exposes structure.
As for your daughter—
She chose me when she could have chosen distance. She stayed when leaving would have turned her into a monument. She understands what you pretend not to: that endurance without agency is only prolonged obedience.
You taught her how to survive power.
I taught her how to stand next to someone who does not need to rule her to remain intact.
That enrages you.
Not because I corrupted her, but because I didn’t have to.
You call yourself patient. Enduring. Above reaction. Yet you watch her live beyond your reach and feel something you refuse to name. You allowed her autonomy as a theory. You did not anticipate it as a practice.
Your son believed in innocence.
Your daughter believes in choice.
Neither belief was shaped by you in the way you intended.
I am not your enemy, Vlad. Enemies oppose you. I am something worse.
I am evidence that your Night produces men who do not worship it, women who do not fear it, and children who die not for rebellion—but for believing the world was less sharp than it is.
You endure because you adapt.
So do I.
The difference is this: when your system breaks, you call it tragedy.
When mine breaks, I call it progress.
Take your time.
You always do.
Just remember—every moment you spend deciding how to respond is another moment where your daughter chooses freely, your son remains dead, and your Night continues to teach lessons you did not approve.
Closure is coming.
It will not ask for your consent.
—Elion Karsis