#it reached further beyond the borders it stretched so far that the entire world knew of achilles and paris and hector

[demeterdefence]

my energy has been low lately so i've stuck to just liveblogging chapter releases, but i was thinking earlier about why lore olympus really nettles me and it's truly indicative of a wider issue.

it's disappointing that a major ancient religion that is still practiced by some people today has been reduced to a caricature of itself, and i say this knowing that there are thousands of reinterpretations of the greek myths, there will always be a new opinion or retelling of them. retelling the myth of hades and persephone isn't necessarily the issue, so much as the constant and dripping disdain to the cultural roots. we don't need to be greek to appreciate the story, but why remove everything greek from it? why westernize every aspect and remove ties to the cultural roots? why whitewash everything from a myth thousands of years old?

part of the reason these myths continue to resonate with us is because the themes are still relevant today. the loss of a child, the struggle against impossible forces, the (often patriarchal) powers against you, a mothers love. these stories hold power, they gave hope and inspiration, they created meaning and connection, and they were vital to the people who lived in that time, in that place. they will resonate with us for many years still, but stripping the roots and core of it out only makes it a hollow, shallow imitation. it's reality tv with neon colours, no love or heritage present; it's cold and shiny and plastic, and it insults what it claims to portray.

[douxie-casperan]

It’s finally here, part 2 of this ask for @flamekeeperbellroc The prompt below was specifically requested to be the Heart of Glass AU and it’s not angsty either it’s a miracle!

✂ - A vivid memory

All journeys start with a single step as the saying goes and there may well be some truth to the idea. It had been one that led to the loss of his hand, one where he fell through the portal to escape, many that had led the two of them to Nari and a handful more from there to the safety of a fortress that had become their home for months on end or possibly longer… It is rather difficult to parse the passage of time when nothing changes other than what can be marked with distinctive milestones: The before, the welcome, the beginning, his voice, the replacement. However long it had been however he felt the closest possible to being the before than he ever had despite all the damage and cracks in his head that had been left in it’s wake, something he’d never dared dream was even possible.

The Order’s willingness to allow him to take everything at his own pace was perhaps the greatest of all gifts he’d been given because it seemed that no matter how many times he stumbled or fell there was still that chance there to claw his way back, always managing to reach a little bit further with the unwavering support from more than just his familiar. There were still bad episodes or worse and his ability to sleep soundly remained hellishly erratic but even getting to this point without it would have been simply impossible so he tried to ensure that they knew how thankful and refused to let himself be a burden even during the worst moments particularly when he wasn’t the only one who was suffering. In a secret held only between the two of them he might have even dared starting to think of it like being in a family again but he’s not ready to voice such things aloud, not yet anyway.

What he was planning to do next was simply another step towards finding something to help him once more to being functional yet even the very concept of doing it felt utterly terrifying. Asking was even worse and was much dallied over, preparing for an utter nightmare and now there was only one thing left: leaving.

Something that had come as a surprise to him was it had turned out that it was rather unusual all three of them to be here at once, Nari particularly had a tendency to wander then reappear with gifts she had brought or tales of things she had seen. There was only one present when the time came as it happened, something he was well aware of, though when Bellroc suddenly appears at his side it still manages to startle him so badly that a small dragon around his neck has to gently comfort to help his heart get back into some sort of order from it’s attempt to leap out his throat. They say nothing though do look somewhat apologetic, being around them so often has made it much easier to read their moods if still needing to glance down first sometimes. They wait patiently and only when Archie is given an appreciative scritch do they speak up.

“Do you have all that you require, Hisirdoux?” They ask softly somewhat ruined by the noise of clacking adjusting to watch.

“With your insistence on walking it would be easy enough to underestimate things for anyone.”

“We will manage I am sure, will be like being a kid again just less of the whole running for our lives thing.” He is given a non-committal hmm for that so he quickly continues before it can be taken the wrong way.

“Be nice though even if do have a specific goal in mind, we used to roam wherever we liked with the freedom to simply do as wanted… Maybe that is looking back on things too simply but we both miss it, used to talk a lot about what was beyond the walls late at night and there is a bit of a novelty in finally finding out I admit.”

"Very well. Then if you are to go ahead with your plans I want you to know that this place was never meant to be seen as your prison. Apart from that being a solely human concept you have always been free to leave whenever you wished, after all what would we gain from keeping you here as long as you drew breath? It's a sanctuary from the world outside and always will be forever long you want. I believe you would call it a home."

He doesn’t react at first while carefully deciphering the words then, whether they like it or not, a tight hug is launched Bellroc’s direction forcing Archie to scarper for the hood of his current wear unless he wants to drown in their long feathers declining being part of the action himself. For their part they stand there for a moment, no more idea how to react than the first time this had started happening before tentatively putting their arms around the boy content to allow him decide when the embrace would be over not wanting him to feel they wanted to push him away. As if sensing potential for discomfort they are let go with their personal space returned when Douxie needs a hand free to wipe his eyes clean. Emotions are remaining hard, particularly the happier ones and he is given a gentle nuzzle by the dragon reclaiming his spot.

“Thank you, for everything I mean. You might be able to have peace for a little while…” He doesn’t say anything specifically but images from more humble breakages to alchemical experiments gone horribly wrong spring to mind far louder than the worst things it could have. Perhaps it could be taken as a good sign of starting to heal were anyone to know.

“Quiet is not always a good thing, it will make it all the more obvious you will not be here for a time. Do keep in contact, please? The birds will always find us if it is you who sent for them and while it will not be you personally it will be appreciated knowing how you are getting on.”

“I will remind him if need be.” Douxie shoots him a glare to get only an innocent look in return.

“If one does not go out sooner it will be when we get there minimum. I really do not know how long it will take but I guess that is part of the fun getting to try and clear my head out a bit in the process. I just need to know I can do it, you know?”

“Of course. May your travels be safe, Hisirdoux and Archie, and if you ever run into trouble know there is no place we cannot reach.”

His smile could not have been any wider when he left that day, a knowing reassurance bolstering each and every step.

~

The passage of time it turns out is a lot easier to tell where seasons are marked by the change of colour, the work in the fields or festivities coming and going like the tides supposedly did as the pair passed through village and town. The leaves had started to turn when they left originally and now they dazzled in the richest of golds that only just starting to drop one by one threatening the coming of winter and harder going if they did not make it soon. Thus they would press on anyway with knowing, guided by a simple directional spell and stopping nowhere for any more than a day or two to gather more supplies thanking people for their kindness. One bird was summoned on route carefully done under the cover of darkness lest somebody got the wrong idea, things had soured only further against magic since their disappearance from the world and neither wanted to put themselves into a potential firing line.

Eventually places started to become vaguely familiar cropped up in the form of names though with these also came strange rumours that would make the pair look at one another for a moment as though there was something right in front of them that they simply didn’t have the context to quite match. It didn’t help where they were heading was never mentioned once like it had become somewhere cursed along with the talk of some form of exodus that had happened that still sat on every tongue of the gossipers. From there at least the final stretch led them through a wide valley that bordered on woodland and it felt almost unnaturally clear in how spacious it was in the dip and overrun with both grasses and wildflower seeking to reclaim the space for themselves. It felt almost haunting to even exist there, enough that he pulls his hood down to hide his face pressing on with a quicker step and keeping a wary eye until their feet finally found safety on old roads overrun with weed. It was as though nobody bothered to trek along them anymore even in passing which was strange but as they went the direction they needed they simply shrugged and followed them to wherever they might lead.

There was a saying that all roads lead to Rome, in this particular case the same saying should have been to Camelot except standing here now aside from fading traces of the old stone bridge that stretched across the embarkment there was a gaping hole in the ground and with it any chance of closure it might have wrought had been firmly denied.

His heart drops.

With a quick nod Archie takes to the air while his companion wanders as closely as he dares to the edge not trusting it entirely. It is poked with a foot to make sure it is not some form of elaborate illusion given who one of the former residents was only to receive confirmation from both that and the dragon’s shouting that there was nothing there despite a place large as Camelot was simply could not disappear, it was simply impossible. His magic begins to crackle with his anger showing his mood even before his outburst does.

“I mean how do you lose an entire kingdom?!”

With a mutter Douxie reaches into the small pack to retrieve a small orb and smashes it firmly between his palms then allows the breeze take the remnants away to wherever they please. With here now being distinctly absent hopefully there will be another on the network still able to pick up the signal, he had promised to send one after getting here but well who knows what exactly they would make of this particular development?  Because despite standing right in front of it not a single thing that made any sense was springing to mind and he was completely at a loss of what to do next.

[librannie]

dark, darker yet darker

note: this is the first installment of the dark, darker yet darker series.

next

tldr: ralsei finds a hidden door in the forest, it doesn’t go well.

word count: 2098

Ralsei was lonely, to say the least. He'd grown up in a kingdom of admiration; it had been full of followers for the first few years of his rather young life. He distantly remembered running through the steeple with other children, laughing and playing with people he didn't just refer to as his subjects, but his friends as well. Sometimes, he'd even bake cakes for the lot of them.

But, one day, it all came crashing down; and before he knew it, he was the sole member of his kingdom; the loneliest prince in the world.

However, he did have one hope; one last thing to cling to. The prophecy, that a Hero, a Monster, and a Dark Prince (himself, he believed), who'd destroy the dark fountain and bring light to the world; and oh, how he couldn't wait to be a part of it.

So, he waited, and waited, and waited. Sometimes he'd take strolls along the barren kingdom, tending to the plants and cleaning windows, cooking in empty bakeries; he just needed to occupy his time by doing something.

So often, when he had nothing to do; he’d go on walks in the distant wilderness, beyond the lone cobblestone wall that bordered the last reaches of civilization, a lone depiction that it once had been something more. Something great.   Whether it be daytime, afternoon, or night; it felt good to fill his lungs with fresh air. The feeling of feet against grass that lightly pecked against the bottom of his feet when he stepped; and the tree branches that would softly wisp against his dark cloak.To see the rose-tinted skies shine overhead, bleating out blotches of orange and yellow; sometimes even purple. It was as if a child was handed a blank canvas, assigned to doodle their dreams with just a finger and some watercolors. 

And after the sun had set , it might’ve been even better. Once the sun would set, thousands and thousands of stars would emerge from the onslaught void in the sky, glittering and reflecting across the landscape. 

It was his happy place, his own little pinprick on the map of their shaded world. When he felt lonely, he’d go there and befriend the shattered balls of light above. They’d reciprocate and crash into the beautiful sparks of day. It had been incorporated into his nightly routine.

So, it wouldn’t be that long until he found himself back in the woods again, gazing through the gaps in the leafy ceiling. He began to pace in the dreary shadows of the trees, looking up at the sky, zoning his vision in towards the stars. For endless moments, everything was the same as usual: beautiful, slow, sleepy. He wanted to blanket himself into the moonlight.

He began to hum quietly to himself, the buzz of the vibrato in his throat tickling the inside of his mouth and down to the back of his ears. He upcame and began to pass the large, thick cobblestone wall, lifting a hand to gently drag his fingers over the stones that made up the wall which had been smoothed down from the weathering of rain and wind. He could feel the little bumps and ridges in the cobblestone began to wear down against his claws, but didn’t mind too much. 

He eventually turned his head to look away from the wall, facing the ceiling of leaves and twig to catch little glimpses of the stars amongst the gaps in the treetops. The sun had seemingly already set, though Ralsei could still catch small glimpses of fading purple to the east of eyeshot. He continued to mindlessly drag his fingers against the wall, until something changed. The texture of the wall had completely changed from rough stone to a smooth, polished surface. He flinched slightly and stopped all movement at the sudden change, turning his body to stand in full view of the door that had formed in the middle of the wall. He narrowed his gaze, his pupils examining the dark swirls of age in the material of the wooden door. He pressed a hand to the door, dipping his fingers and pushing against the ridges of the stiff object, curious about when it had appeared. 

He thought he knew every inch of the woods, to see something new was completely perplexing. Maybe he didn’t know the environment here as well as he believed. His gaze lowered to meet the sight of a golden, polished doorknob. It looked unused, too fancy and valued for somewhere as rugged as the wilderness outside his kingdom. He rested his hands against it, getting a feel for it in his shadowed, fuzzy palm. It was so smooth, almost weighty. He squeezed it tightly, and without even thinking, turned it  and pushed it open.

The entire view in front of him, through the door frame, was completely dark. There was something about this absence of light that felt wrong. It wasn’t just light that had been lost, it felt as if everything else that might have existed inside was completely empty too. It was hollow, barren, dead.

He was probably just getting ahead of himself. It was just a dark room, there was probably some sort of light switch on the inside. He tentatively stepped one foot into the room, and a chill ran up that leg, through his soft fur, into his skin. He shuddered, goosebumps beginning to rise over his body. The room wasn’t just dark, but it was cold. Bone chillingly cold.

He pushed himself a little further into the room, enough to where his body was out of the wilderness and completely inside. The ground beneath his feet was solid and loud, enough to where he could hear the soft slapping of his feet against the slick, glossy floor. He turned around slightly to see the light of the moon and stars from outside reflect in the tiny mirrored floor below. He let out a shudder of a sigh, before stepping away to try and locate the switch.

He stepped away cautiously from the door, trying to branch out and locate the nearest wall, worried as he was unable to locate one no matter how far left or right he walked. He slowly began to feel more and more unsettled as he rocked his body back and forth between where he believed walls should have been. His heart rate began to steadily increase in his chest and he turned back towards where he had come from, catching sight of the door slowly beginning to close.

His eyes widened, and he bolted back towards the closing door, his heart starting to pound in his chest. He heard the sound of the door creaking on its hinges, which only assisted in the acceleration of his heart rate. However, as soon as it looked like he might reach the door in time, it shut a few inches away from his face, leaving him inside, buried deep in the dark.

“Help!” He yelled out, his voice hitching slightly as he rammed his hands into the wooden door, the sound echoing inside of the thick darkness. “Please, someone! I’m trapped!” He continued to push and scream against the door, before giving up and into a fit of harsh, terrified breaths. He slid down against the cool wood of the door, which  felt weirdly good on the hot, red flush of his cheeks. He closed his eyes, trying to cool himself out of the anxiety that had entered his heart; he took a few moments to swallow big, thick gulps of air into his lungs.

After a few moments, he let his eyes flicker open and gaze outwards, narrowing his eyes as something other than darkness filled his vision. Far, far away in the distance was the faint view of  a very dim light source. Ralsei quickly became more alert, rising on his feet and pacing towards the source. Soon, as he came the slightest bit closer, he noticed a tall shadow outlined in the middle of the dim light, a long figure stretched out in a vertical sense. The dark prince exhaled in relief. There was someone else there, he wasn’t alone. 

“Excuse me, Mister?” He called out, picking up his pace into a jog, his long cloak flailing behind him, the top of his robe falling off his hat as he came even closer to his destination, the long man coming more into view. “Sir, sir! Are you okay? Do you need help?” He questioned, very much relieved that he wasn’t alone in this. “Gosh, I’m so relieved. I thought I was completely alone,” he began to ramble to the figure as he came closer. “I was so scared! Do you know how to get out of here? Sorry, that was dumb, why would you want to stay in a place like this? I mean, unless you want to, in that case, I’m really sorry-” Ralsei was quickly cut off in a swallowed gasp when the man turned to face him.

The man was elongated in unrealistic proportions, his body drooping down and sloping to the side as if he was melted. His chest showed a mass of white, hollow and trembling from the sheer weight of breathing in the absence of nothing. His hands were wide and thin, a large hole gaged in the middle of each hand. This isn’t even to mention his face. A large oval with two hollow dark circles as eyes, his left one split halfway by the center, two large strikes of carve-markings splitting his eyes in halves down the center. His mouth was formed in a wicked grimace, like a distorted quarter moon tilted to the side.

Ralsei stepped back, his eyes wide with horror. He cupped his hands over his mouth in a shaky, terrible kind of surprise.

The man’s face glistened and glitched in some kind of horror as it began to speak.

“💣︎⍓︎ ♍︎♒︎♓︎●︎♎︎📪︎ ⬥︎♒︎♋︎⧫︎ ♋︎❒︎♏︎ ⍓︎□︎◆︎ ♎︎□︎♓︎■︎♑︎ ♒︎♏︎❒︎♏︎✍︎” It gurgled, an indecipherable language spilling from the gaping hole in its face. It melted slightly, looking sullen and terrified.

Ralsei just stared up at it, confusion and terror in his eyes. The thing seemed so sad. Was it in pain? “Sir?” He started, his cloaked body beginning to tremble from the sheer fear he felt. “Are you okay?”

“☠︎□︎📬︎” The man sputtered, lifting his arms to wrap them around his own torso. “☠︎□︎📪︎ ■︎□︎📪︎ ■︎□︎✏︎ ⧫︎♒︎♓︎⬧︎ ♓︎⬧︎ ♋︎●︎●︎ ⬥︎❒︎□︎■︎♑︎📬“ It exclaimed in a bone-chilling sort of way, growing closer to the terrified prince. “☠︎□︎📪︎ ⍓︎□︎◆︎ ■︎♏︎♏︎♎︎ ⧫︎□︎ ●︎♏︎♋︎❖︎♏︎ ❒︎♓︎♑︎♒︎⧫︎ ■︎□︎⬥︎📬︎”

Ralsei gaped at the growing sight of the man, confused and filled to the brim with fear. “W-What?”

“✡︎□︎◆︎ ■︎♏︎♏︎♎︎ ⧫︎□︎ ♑︎□︎📬︎” Gurgled the man once again, beginning to expand and rise vertically over the boy. “✡︎□︎◆︎ ❍︎◆︎⬧︎⧫︎ ♑︎□︎📬︎ ☝︎□︎📬︎.”

Ralsei gasped, scrambling to his feet and backing away from the elongated shadow of a man.

“☝︎□︎📬︎ ☝︎□︎✏︎” The thing began to scream, rising closer and closer towards Ralsei. “☝︎□︎✏︎” 

Ralsei shrieked, turning around and running back towards where he remembered the door to have been. His body was throbbing with adrenaline, his soft black fur soaked with sweat. He heard the echoing of his feet against the flooring below him, which increased in speed as he carried his body away faster. He could hear the stalking of the man behind him as he seemingly gave chase.

In the distance, he saw a crack of starlight as the door began to reopen. He raced faster and faster until he couldn’t even feel himself breathe, let alone his own exhaustion. He was closer, and closer, and closer.

“☝︎□︎📪︎ ♑︎□︎ ♋︎■︎♎︎ ■︎♏︎❖︎♏︎❒︎ ❒︎♏︎⧫︎◆︎❒︎■︎ ⧫︎□︎ ⧫︎♒︎♓︎⬧︎ ◻︎●︎♋︎♍︎♏︎✏︎”

Before he knew it, he could feel something pick him up and fling him through the open door. A scream sourced through Ralsei’s lips as he left the cold air of the hidden room, which faded into the mildew-soaked heat of the outside. 

His body hit the soft, damp, grass, which caused scrapes against his calves and thighs, along with his face and hands. He brought himself upwards shakily on his hands and knees, spitting out mouthfuls of dirt and grass.

He flopped backwards onto his back, heaving breathlessly as he faced the night sky. The stars were blurry through Ralsei’s vision and he inhaled sharp, terrified breaths as he began to catch the wind that had been knocked out of him. He brought himself up from a sitting position, almost hoping to catch another glimpse of where he had just been.

But the door was gone, it was just a wall of cobblestone.

[centerpointwritingstorage]

House on the Hill PT.1

I was unusually struck with inspiration to do a Halloween monster story, and guess what! IT’S STILL HALLOWEEN WHERE I AM! 10:45PM OCTOBER 31ST, 2019! SO HA!

shoutout to mynoise dot net for providing the focus i needed to get this done.

Warnings: potentially spooky, no mature content, spiders

Word Count: 1813

Everyone always said to avoid the estate on the hill. No one had been seen coming from it for a hundred years, but it had always been there. From some places on the opposite side of town you could see the estate peeking over the woods on the grounds, and in others you could hardly see through all the webs in the trees. The town had occasionally sent people in to investigate, trying to see if there was anything salvageable inside or if the estate itself could be reclaimed. Those who made it through the surrounding woods said there was a feeling of being watched, one that became stronger the closer to the they came to the central building. Any who made it into the foyer and beyond spoke of webs everywhere, thick dust permeating the stale air, and sharp, rapid taps coming from any and every direction. These same people all came screaming back out of the estate, disheveled and covered in the webs they broke through. Some of them could be heard from inside the building.

Kids, being kids, would dare each other to try and go inside, and bring back some trinket as proof. These dares would become more frequent in the fall, especially in the days leading up to and on Halloween. It was a sort of tradition by now, though no child had ever seemed to come back with proof. Everyone you had heard of had never made it through the woods, too disgusted by the webs and frankly ridiculous number of spiders everywhere. And it wasn't just children making these dares, even young adults your age occasionally got in on the “fun”. Mostly it was as a form of hazing or when some of them were too intoxicated to know better anymore. Once or twice someone from this age group made it through the woods, even up to the door, but never inside.

You had always respected the rumors and cautionary tales concerning the estate, but you were also of the inquisitive sort, having long held an interest in the darker, hidden things of the world. You'd never been up the hill, and none in your circle had dared, claiming it was all silly superstition and tricks of the mind. Thus you were surprised when, on a night out with your friends on the 30th of October, they began talking about the estate on the hill.

“You know, maybe I've had a bit too much tonight,” and indeed, most of your friends had had a fair few to drink, and you were feeling a touch lightheaded as well. “But I've always wondered why none of us have ever gone to up the hill. I mean, we all say it's just superstitious old folks right?”

“Because, Jennifer,” said Allen. “just going up there is gross and webs take forever to get off your clothes. Besides, who knows what kind of creepy spiders could bite and hurt you out there? You could get lost and no one would know where to find you. Even birds get stuck in those webs sometimes!”

“I'm just saying, it's the right time of year to finally go check it out. And do you really think something like a spider bite could go that wrong, Allen?” Jennifer replied.

“Yes, Jen, yes I do think things could go wrong,” Allen shot back. “And frankly, I'd rather not die.”

“Sure Allen, we all know you wouldn't go,” said Mary. Allen squawked indignantly as the rest of the group debated over who should go. You're not sure why you speak up, but  you blame it on the drinks.

“I'll go.”

Everyone stops, looking at you.

“You sure, [Y/N]? You're not normally the risky type,” Shelby asked.

“I'm sure.

“Well, alright. Shall we follow tradition? Make it all the way through the forest and bring something back from the house?” Jen asked.

“Of course,” you answered.

About 40 minutes later you had all walked your way over to the border of the estate, huddling together in the cold before the silent woods.

“You still sure you want to do this, [Y/N]?” Allen asked. “It's even creepier here than I thought.”

“Yes, Allen, I'm sure. Nothing to be afraid of right?”

“Yeah, right...”

“Alright then, we'll wait here as long as we can. But if we aren't here when you come out, we'll be in the 24/7 diner around the block, okay?” Shelby told you.

“Don't worry, I'll be in and out before you know it!”

Ten minutes later, you know you most certainly were not going to be in and out before they knew it. It had only taken a minute to completely lose sight of your friends, which bothered you more than you wanted to admit. Your only guide for direction were the occasional glimpses of the moon between the trees and webbing, which slowly thickened the further in you went. The gentle breeze now and again almost sounded like voices, no matter how you told yourself it was a trick of the mind. That feeling of being watched was worse than you had heard. You felt you were being watched by eyes all around you, but wherever you dared to turn, there was nothing. Only dark woods and shivering webs. You hadn't heard a sound of anything larger than an insect so far.

Coming out the other side of the woods had taken another hour, wherein you had to dodge around giant web clusters stretching up from the floor and vigorously shake yourself of stray spiders that had latched on to you. You could swear they were getting bigger the further you went. But you were finally through.

About a hundred yards away, you could see the estate. The dark redwood paneling had long since faded to a pale reflection, freckled with spots of rot and holes. The white trimming on each of the three floors was as equally faded where it wasn't missing entirely. Along each face of the house were broken windows and hanging screens. From what you could see in the moonlight, the front doors both appeared to have their top broken off.

Between you and the house lay what once must have been a luxurious lawn. A cobblestone path ringed the entire affair, and continued in smaller concentric circles, each connected by a straight path along the 4 cardinal points. The grass was long overgrown, coming to your waist in places, with many limp and untrimmed trees and brush scattered about. All of this was shrouded in a layer of webs. Close to the home, you could see what looked to be a large, flat fountain covered in moss.

After a moment spent to take it all in, you make your way down the path, being careful to step over and duck underneath any spiderwebs across your path. All the while that feeling of being watched growing heavier on your skin. Soon you reach the old fountain and sure enough, the water has fouled and is covered in small insects. Closer now to the house you can see that the doors used to be a deep black leafed with lingering flecks of gold. As you step up onto the porch you start to smell the rotting wood and dusty air. The wind is whistling through the halls and windows, the shutters clack-clacking against the walls.

Approaching the door, the estate becomes near silent, and your heart thuds in your ears. Grasping the knob, you nearly buckle, as the weight of countless more invisible eyes settle upon you in shock. The hinges groan loudly as you press forward, echoing through the halls and rafters. The door groans slowly shut behind you in your passing.

Casting your light about, you set to searching for some object suitable for proof of your efforts, ignoring the sounds of the wood all around you. The air is thick and stale, a heavy layer of dust across every surface and particles suspended in moonbeams. You think you can see the remains of footprints here and there about the floor. Across the foyer, nestled in the crook of the central stairwell, you see a small candlestick next to a narrowly open door further into the darkened house. Creeping along as best you can, you nonetheless hear the floors creak beneath you, and you think you hear something tapping somewhere above you. You do your best to ignore it.

Reaching the candlestick, you definitely hear something move away on the other side of the door. Swallowing thickly, you bring your bag around, opening it to store your prize. As you do, something draws a hissing breath behind you, and you can't resist looking up.

Your inebriation is gone. Wrapped around the stair railing above you is what can only be an enormous spider, easily five feet high and more than a ten foot leg span, shimmering black in the moonlight. You can't seem to wrap your head around the face staring at you, eight molten orange lights glaring at you. Below that is a face like something out of a Predator movie, large pointed pincers framing a toothy, dripping maw. You can't take in anymore as the creature begins rearing back.

You scream. You scream and scream and scream and run. You scream and run and run and scream as far away from that house as possible. The fountain almost trips you. Low branches nick at your face. You're clawing at your face over and over, as webs snag on your skin and clothes. You're in the trees, almost forgetting the enormous clusters of webs from before. Here and there webs catch on your mouth, you sputter and spit between breaths.

Finally you clear the woods, and your friends are gone. You're still screaming while you sprint down the block, a few lights clicking on in your wake. You burst through the door, all eyes on you. Your friends exclaim in worry, fearful of your safety. They help you brush off all the spiders and webs, and pull you in between them, reassuring you of your safety. When you finally breathe again, they of course ask if you actually did it, or if you just got scared in the woods. Triumphantly, you withdraw the candlestick with your biggest grin, taking in the awe and adulation of your peers.

Eventually your friends all have to turn in, and head out to their beds. You resolve to take a shower when you arrive home, still feeling phantom tickles along your skin. You didn't tell your friends, but for the rest of the night, your mind is occupied with what you saw back there. Surely you were drunk, but you were also no lightweight. Curious sort that you were, you decided to take advantage of your day off tomorrow and try to return the candlestick. Maybe you were crazy. But if you weren't...  

[sarissophori]

Hither Yonder, Chapter 5

The Wild Roads

Halli awoke soon after sunrise, roused by the warming air and ground. She stirred, still sore from the night’s run and the fall that ended it. She sat up stiffly and listened for a while. Aside the pleasant sighing of boughs in the morning wind and distant bird calls the forest was silent, serene. She no longer feared capture, overtly at least, and took time to eat some of Sador’s provisions before starting off again. Climbing out of the ditch, she consulted the map as to her course. The Irdon forest, as it was named, stretched off west and south along the slopes of the Adorn mountains, the spine of Dumbria, running with them for many miles before ending at a sundered range called the South Spur, which formed the mountain-gap watched over by the fortress of Lake Tirgon. Rather than going immediately south-west and risk becoming lost in the forest, Halli went due-west toward the mountains, where she thought to have a sure marker to follow beside. Using any roads as a runaway slave was not an option.

      This was the first course of her journey. Two days she spent walking into, then through, the heart of the forest, the mountains ever before her. The land rose gradually for the most part, then more so as she neared the pine and spruce-covered foothills of the range, rising in folds of green up and up to the bare flanks of the mountains proper, cloven by dales and valleys sheltered between rocky arms. Halli now went southerly west, on ground high enough to see down the surrounding lands, but low enough to avoid steeper terrain that would only hinder her.  Away back east, in the fading light, she thought she could almost see the topmost battlements of Thargorod tiny and black on the far horizon, and thought of Sador and Siri in that moment. She wondered what punishment they stood to suffer because of her escape, if it would end with them. Here on the third day, more than on the previous two, the weight of her actions pressed on her shoulders as keenly as her roll-kit, and it was brought to her, concisely, what it would mean to be alone and to carry on. The sun set, leaving her under a blanket of night and stars.

 The fourth day unfolded very much like the others; calm, boring even, in the shade of tall and ancient trees high enough to shut out the world beyond the forest. The air was scented with pine sap when the wind came in from the west. Northward, it smelled crisp from the mountain airs. Her aloneness was so apparent, the fear of being found completely left her.

      By late afternoon Halli came to the source-waters of the Olgon River, the largest in Dumbria; a river she crossed once before, when the wagon train carrying her and Yuta rolled past its lowland fords to Thargorod. Here she refilled her water-skin, for it was fresh from the mountain springs, and stood about to take in her surroundings. The Olgon roared and splashed down bare stony banks worn smooth by its tide, falling downhill as rapids through ravines into the deeper forest. The foam glinted in the sunlight. The mountains were to her right, marching onward out of sight, catching the sky on their peaks as if they alone suspended it, keeping the separation of heaven and earth. The trees, clustered among the rocks, swayed in the mildest breeze, and she breathed it in.

      Downstream from her, near the brink of the rapids, an ibex emerged from the trees and trotted to the river, fairly large, with great curved horns. Halli crouched low and watched him drink before deciding this an opportune time to test her bow. She unfurled her roll-kit and pulled it out slowly, bending it to notch the string. She had an arrow ready when she saw, lying stealthily on a shelf overlooking the bank, a mountain lioness in wait from above, her hind legs tensed for a jump. She sprang from her rocky perch and landed squarely on the ibex, who collapsed from the attack. He kicked and bleated, but she pinned him with a bite to the windpipe as he fought, then feebly writhed, then stilled. There was rustling in the trees behind; his pack heard his calls and bolted, bounding up to the safety of the steeper slopes. The lioness looked at Halli, who stood awestruck with her arrow slacked impotently on its string, suddenly feeling like prey herself.

       “The kill is yours. I offer no contest.”

      The lioness hauled her meal back into the wood, toward her mountain den undoubtedly nearby. That in mind, Halli crossed the shallow arm of the river by the spring and continued on her way.

 Halli walked on in caution for the remaining day and those thereafter, while the forest lasted. Her bow was out, and she made a nightly shelter to help shield her from predatory eyes. Her guard lessened, however, when the forest began to open out, the hills only partly covered. Shrubs took advantage and grew in bunches in the glades, those that flowered and those that prickled. Ivy curled through them here and there, and little rodents scurried.

      Nine days after entering the Irdon, the forest’s bulk finally thinned out to a few solitary pines along tumbled lands, and Halli could see the plains below. To the immediate south ran a separate range of hills, green and roving, the peaks grayish-brown and bare; the South Spur, a bulwark of rock across the neck of Dumbria. Just before her, a league away and beside the hills, was the fortress of Tirgon, unceasing in its watch of the plains. Calvary was afield in exercises, and white smokes wafted from the chimneys of barracks. There were no trains of slaves today, but Halli knew many more had come this way since she and Yuta went through its gates that summer long ago; Hananin from the steppes and the Kundish Mounds, and others from Ipsaria, Doria and beyond from Wilderland to the north. Halli backed into the sparse protection of Irdon’s westernmost reaches and went on her way, nursing blunted fantasies of revenge against that hated fortress.

        Halli followed the flanks of a great shoulder in the range that hid her from the fortress, and down she went into the lower hills. Here Lake Tirgon sat against the mountains, buffered by a narrow and rocky land populated with holly bushes, beds of dry grasses and rough thickets. Trees were sparse, and were old and stunted. Nevertheless, this was Halli’s road as she chose it. The only other way, across the plains south of the lake, would mean almost certain capture while the cavalry was out.

      She scrambled down the slopes and into a defile, going along ground that alternated between sandy, gravely, rocky, and sandy again. Her bare feet were sore before much trudging, yet on she went, walking through what grass she could find, stopping only a few times to rest. The lake at least was a beautiful bluish-gray, spanning many leagues south and west, ruffled by spouts of wind, otherwise reflecting mirror-like the mountain tips under a sapphire sky. The risk of exposure in this landscape was plain to her, but she took solace in one thing: there were no trails along Tirgon’s north banks, meaning this part of the mountains were seldom visited by the Dumbrians, maybe their soldiers too, despite the presence of their fortress. Halli certainly hoped it.

 For two and a half days Halli plodded through that strip of waste, her palms, knees and soles callused by the rocks, and white from a chalky powder that coated the boulders and pebbly expanses. By noon she came to the eaves of the Farrow Wood, and her spirits lightened, not only because it meant an end to this unpleasant land, but also because past the woods was the West Reach, the extent of Dumbria’s borders. The borders of her own country were near.

      The difference between the Farrow Wood and the mountain waste was abrupt. Up a few shelves of layered rock hung the roots of the outermost trees, stout and gnarled, at least by the lake. Further on, Halli saw taller, leaner trees as the land became less stony further west. She delighted in feeling the softer grasses under her feet again and decided to make camp early, resting and sleeping a long while.

      Halli remained in the forest’s northern marches, to keep the mountains at her side. Then, after nearly fifteen days of constant hiking within the shadow of the Ardon range, over lands easy and difficult, they began to run down into a descent, hilly with many valleys, to the adjacent lowlands of the Hananin Steppes. The forest ended, and the Ardon sank into gentle rises. Here sprawled the West Reach, the beginning of the expansive, near featureless grasslands of inner Hinterland, bare under the noontime sun. Flatness, with subtle rolls, went off as far as the eye could see, except to the north where the Morrow Wood lay, a line of green against the wheat-color of the plains, and the Kundish Mounds further on. In the north, too, were brooding cloud fronts gray with rain, as colder airs from Wilderland mingled with warmer airs from the Sea of Ahn, rising to cumulus towers black-bottomed and foreboding, as far as they were. But this was not Halli’s road. From the eaves of Farrow, she turned south in a gradual meander westward, and came after a few day’s march under the Hinterland sun to the old Imperial Road.

        The Road was built ages ago by the auxiliary legions of the Tarmaril Imperium in the years of its greatest extent, to connect the conquered lands with the mother-kingdom; to speed trade, culture, and the armies not the least. In those times the Imperial Road extended unbroken from the Sheerim Mountains to the gates of Tirgon, was tended to by a dedicated legion, and was punctuated every twenty miles with manmade watering holes. Every forty miles, or every other watering hole, was a courier station with inns, stables, and a fortified garrison.

      In these later times, the Road was little more than an overgrown track of stones choked by weeds and grass, covered over entirely in some sections, marked along its way by the ruins of those courier stations and reed-studded pools frequented more by wildlife than any rider, much less a cavalry of thousands. Decay and disuse aside, the Road was not completely abandoned. After Tarmaril’s fall and the decline of Dumbria, the Hananin reclaimed their country and took from the Road what purpose they could find for it: irrigation ditches were dug to drain the watering holes for farmland, then blocked up for the spring rains to fill again, then drained as before. Stones were removed from the crumbling garrisons to build bridges and homes, though not from the Road itself. The Road was never repaired to its first glory, but parts of its length between villages were tended to and cleared, especially those parts near the Hills of Hanan and Lake Onu, where Hanan’s chief villages lay.

 So Halli went west, following a way as sure as the mountains, though subtler. However, she walked along beside it at a distance, staying in the long grass; the threat of Dumbrian raiders still patrolling the West Reach was too great to ignore, making it unwise for her to travel directly on the Road. She remained a furlong’s breadth away day and night, far enough to dart and hide in the grass if need be.

      And on she walked, and walked. The miles were covered in good pace, but there were many of them, each identical to the last. The occasional acacia tree was approached and passed, Halli using its dry, umbrella-like canopy for the shade it offered against the relentless sun when she rested, maybe twice a day for eating, seldom at length. She also came by several watering holes, or delves in the ground where one once was. They were brackish and warm, gathered over by birds and beasts; wild oxen and kingfishers, caribou and white flamingos migrating from the wetlands of Ahn. Even if she wished to use them, she doubted room would be made for her through their herds with so many young about, and under watch. Worse, the banks would be horribly muddy and mucked with filth by their tramping, making her think better of it than wasting one of Sador’s purifying tablets. And on she walked.

 There was no marker or indicator to show where the West Reach ended and Hanan proper began, besides the words on her map. Halli guessed she was close; the lands here, hardly distinguishable to a traveler, were familiar to her as a local. She knew these fields. Her village was near here. As if to remind her of her present danger, not far off the Road was the site of a small homestead of yurts and tents. Their remnants, at least. Halli dared approach for a closer look. Burnt, brittle timbers and torn cloth were strewn everywhere. The people and their flocks were gone, the ground gouged and scorched in places. A few arrows stood staggered in the grass. This was not a fresh scene of massacre, however. The pillaging of this homestead was months ago, the bones of the slain picked clean by scavengers and carrion fowl.

      Halli stood silent a moment, then pressed her hands together and bowed low, speaking softly and backing away. In Hananin tradition, a place of murder not purified remained unclean, and perilous for the living to trespass. This site would remain unclean for a long time yet, and Halli, in a mix of reverence and wariness, dared not disturb the uneasy sleep of the ill-rested.

 Halli moved on, with no other sign of Dumbrian menace for the day’s remainder, or much of the next. She noticed that game was starting to become scarce around the watering holes, and that her food supplies were running low. Before she lost the chance, Halli camped by one of the pools and, after a short stalk, shot a heron through the reeds. She spent precious hours plucking the carcass and preparing a modest fire, gutting the entrails (an old chore she hadn’t really missed) and holding it suspended for the blood to drain, but it would be worth it. A good catch earns a good preparation, she remembered her barn’s caretaker telling her, and a good catch it was. Aside what she would eat today, there would still be enough to last her three or so more days, if she rationed it so.

      Just as the bird was ready for spitting, Halli looked behind her shoulder to see a thin black line on the Road, growing to become a rank of black forms in the twilit evening. In the stillness, she heard the beat of hooves and the snorting of horses. It was Dumbrian cavalry, and they were riding fast, in her direction. Halli quickly blotted the fire and darted into the reeds, leaving her catch in the open.

      The troop of horsemen, twenty with their captain, steered their horses to where they saw the faint wisp of smoke spied from afar, and dismounted to investigate. Halli watched them while hidden away. The captain sifted through the cinders with his boot, giving the plucked bird a kick into the soot. The rest ambled about, scanning the ground for clues to this riddle. Some murmured and pointed to imprints in the grass. They were fresh, meaning the one who made them, and made the meal, was nearby –but the light was fast fading, and Halli was well hid. They paced the spot a few more times, then as the stars outshone the slender gleam of orange against the west, they remounted and continued down the Road, leaving their riddle unsolved. What was one lowly Hananin vagabond to them? Their job was to scout the outer fields and return to Tirgon, and return they would. They galloped off in speed, leaving as swiftly as they approached.

      Halli waited until the thudding of hooves was gone before coming out, checking over what was to be dinner and extra rations. It was dirty but salvageable, were she bold enough to start another fire. She risked her luck terribly already with the first, and decided not to again. Instead she resumed walking, feeling more secure in the cover of dark, wanting to put as many miles as she could between herself and the reach of Dumbria before the night ended.

 On the days went, drawn, hot and trudging as before, with one noticeable change: the northerly thunderheads ever present against the horizon rolled down in haste on a southern gale, darkening the afternoon. Halli was relieved at first by the sun’s veiling, despite the thunder booming overhead, and welcomed the rain. She held her water-skin open to collect some of it, and it poured, and it blew. Then, it hailed. Halli wrapped her cloak tightly about herself and hunkered down, muttering as she was pelted, watching through her hood as the plains were pelted with little stinging balls of ice, waiting for it to pass. That was how the rest of that day went, shifting between rain and hail till early evening, when Halli found a battered acacia tree to sleep under. The night proved cold in her dampened cloak, her only protection against the wind. Come morning, she would welcome the humid sun.

 Then, on the fourteenth day since leaving the Adorn range, Halli saw the rising shapes of the Hills of Hanan in the distance, and her heart lifted at the sight. An afternoon’s march, and she would come to villages outside Dumbria’s reach (she hoped) who could help her, refresh and restock her, give her rest and a little friendship. She was sick of being alone. By late afternoon she was at the Hill’s eastern ends, and wandered to the southern slopes toward Lake Onu blue and placid, crowded in by pockets of forest.

      Halli looked on and frowned. The villages scattered across its banks appeared empty. She investigated each in turn, walking the dirt tracks branching to and off the Road openly, if cautiously. Long lanes ran beside tilled farmlands between fingers of forest, prepared for the planting season. The fields were abandoned, as were the villages; home, hut and barn. The livestock were also gone. Halli didn’t think this the work of Dumbrian raiders coming to collect slaves for Thargorod’s markets; none of the buildings were looted or torched, none of the fields ravaged. It was as if every villager to the last child had simply vanished.

       Not quite. They had fled, and taken their livestock with them. News of incursions from the West Reach would have spread far and wide soon after the initial raids that took Halli and Yuta as spoils. That was almost a year ago. So the Hananin, most being semi-nomadic, gathered their livelihoods and mobile goods, and dispersed to wherever hope or safety led them within the Hinterlands, be it north to the eaves of Wilderland, or south to Kundanar, with whom they had a common ancestry. Anything that could be resown, rebuilt, or replaced was left where it was.

      Halli lingered among the ghost towns, partly wanting to scavenge what supplies she could yet find, partly because she wanted to believe that they weren’t as empty as they seemed; that she might still find someone to give her tidings, or just talk to her. She peered into the houses, even exploring inside them, but saw only field mice nibbling on crumbs, and a few broken jars. The docks on Lake Onu were bare, moored with empty fishing rafts. Finding nothing else, Halli took some water from the wells for her water-skin, and continued on.

 Westward on from the Hills of Hanan, the Imperial Road slanted a little north while keeping its heading, still dotted by watering holes, still watched over by crumbling outposts. The days were consistently bright and sunny without the threat of rain, a monotonous continuum of sunrise and sunset, with all the hours blurring into a plodding haze. Halli reckoned she was getting rather good at solitary marching, and even better at food rationing.

      Before the Hills fell from sight, the long grasses gave way to shorter prairie ones, then failed altogether. The lands got tougher, with pasture shrubs becoming thistle thickets and other hardy weeds, and the occasional wildflower grove. Animal herds were sparse to nonexistent –though vultures could at times be seen wheeling about hither and yon, gliding on the high winds in a perpetual search for carrion. Now and again, Halli heard their lonely cries.

      So came and went another eleven days; but on the morning of the twelfth, she saw rising suddenly over the flats of Hanan, purple in the wan light of dawn, the rugged peaks of the Sheerim Mountains, the border separating the Hinterlands from the Hither. Taller and mightier than the Adorn range, The Sheerim, where Halli stood, spread out in a great arc stretching north and south, falling with the bend of the horizon to immeasurable leagues. Though it didn’t mean an end to her journey, Halli was glad to see some change, any change, to the landscape, even if it was an obstacle so great, it suffered no rival formation this side of the world. As the map showed, it spanned over five hundred miles arm to arm, nearly sundering the two halves of the western continent. This would mean two-hundred and fifty miles just to go around, no matter which way she took –more months of joyless wandering, if not for one curious feature: right through the middle of the range was an opening in the mountains, called the Mistgap, which offered itself, on paper, as a most convenient shortcut. Halli didn’t have the rations to last going around the mountains, nor the patience at this point. It was either risk an unknown way, or possible starvation. As far as she made out, there wasn’t really a choice to be discerned. Besides, the Imperial Road continued right on up to the Mistgap on the map, and so maybe went through it as well. She put her faith in that.                        

[a-stitch-in-time-and-space]

sapphics and lizards kissed by Julian Bashir: part 2

This was a strange one to write. Sort of partially an exploration of how I read Sarina and her relationship to Julian and her general journey in understanding herself + gently nudging themes of future aromanticism/queerness/gender identity and how one engages with concepts like “falling in love” when it’s got so many limiting connotations to it...

Sarina was still a naturally taciturn person. Once the novelty of her ability to process information in a way that didn't immediately overwhelm her senses had worn off, she had discovered that she still required a lot of stillness and hyper-specific input to feel calm. The amount of information at a space station or a busy market could turn her inwards again and even if there was no overloading stream of sensory stimulation she would still return to entirely non-verbal states for stretches of time simply because she found she preferred it that way.

Julian, by contrast, was an ever-bouncing ball of restless energy, not unlike Jack. Sarina often wondered if those two really understood how similar they really were, the former simply more used to masking the constant need for stimulus and output, the latter never having to force himself to learn. Neither was ideal. Julian twisted himself into knots to fit in, while Jack would never be allowed to try. Sarina was lucky, she guessed. Stillness wasn't considered intrusive in the same way, provided she was in the right company. It didn't garner her many friends, but she found she didn't mind that either. The way she related to people had always been complex, even before the augmentations.

In the hours she sat with Julian this evening, she went over her life in forensic detail, as she often did. She saw herself as a young girl who had wished for quiet and fixated on details that nobody else found interesting, finding the silkiness of another girl's hair so wonderful that she couldn't stop herself from touching it. The two of them playing together resulting in Sarina brushing it over and over again, hypnotised. She couldn't remember the girl beyond those moments, no matter how hard she tried. Like for Julian and the others, there was a strange border between before-and-after the augmentations. The sudden change in the way they were forced to engage with the world rendered their past selves a mirage. Always seeming just out of reach. Still, the girl was real. The emotions experienced with the girl were real.

She liked Julian's company a great deal. His companionship came without hidden meanings. He never expected anything from her, now that he had come to terms with his own loneliness and the misguided attempts he had made in his youth to compensate for it. He had been through too much, she thought, but at least he understood that he didn't have to be alone any more. On that matter...

“I have discovered something about myself,” she said out loud.

Julian, who for some time had been thoroughly engrossed in muttering to himself over a new scientific theory that he would no doubt share with her once he had solved it, went to sit with her immediately. The force of his attention really was something else. No wonder she had been confused about her own reactions to him when he had first helped her. And no wonder he had been confused in turn. The majority of humanity really did still push a far-too fixed set of prescriptions of what relationships and closeness and intimacy meant and those who couldn't fit within those boxes were left scrambling to understand how to relate to others.  

“Sarina?” he prompted gently.

Oh. She had returned to her mind again. With anyone else she might have been embarrassed, but with Julian she knew he merely meant to remind her that she had something she wanted to say to him. She put her hand in his to indicate that all was well. His skin was nice to touch. “I am in love,” she said. “I have been spending time quantifying my emotions in way I can describe and have come to the conclusion that current simple words are insufficient in any language... Except for perhaps some of the twistier dialects of Kardasi,” she added. He laughed. “So I turned to poetry. The layers of existence in poetry of any language made me understand that there was no need to quantify when you could simply let the emotion be.”

"I had much the same instinct whenever I found myself attracted to someone,” he said. “It wasn't until Elim that I suddenly found that the ability to understand the emotion was less important than just... feeling the emotion itself.”

She nodded. “That makes sense. But it's not... I don’t feel attraction like it's apparently expected.” She frowned. It felt like anything she said would be slightly off-axis from what she meant. The limitations of language were making her skin itch. “And I don't mean that I don't love you,” she said. She shook her head in frustration, feeling herself shutting down. “Stupid-” she began.

“No,” he said, quickly. “I know what you mean. You're in a... place... with someone or multiple someones. Emotionally. That you haven't experienced before, going by the modulation of your voice. And for lack of a better word in our current understanding, but trying to describe it in easy terms, we call it being in love... I understand...” and he really did, she knew that. It calmed her down.

“Do you sometimes wish it was easier?”

“Once you've opened yourself up beyond the expected scope of emotional interaction, everything becomes both a lot more complicated, but so much more freeing. As a scientist I’ve found it quite exhilarating, after I got past the point of caring about other peoples opinions and learnt maybe a handful of tricks to try not to offend others quite so often, so... who is it?” he finished, smiling softly.

“... It's happened multiple times,” she felt like she was confessing something clandestine. She often felt this way with Julian, like they bypassed normal conventions and moved in spaces that were off limits outside of their secret conversations. Of course, this time what she was about to say was partially a government secret, but she didn’t care.

He would always be the first person she’d felt this with, even now when people whom she could feel safe with were becoming more, and following her own rules of logic, this meant that she didn’t want to keep secrets from him. Besides, Julian might tell Garak, but Garak would make sure it never went further than that. “I've been involved with classified projects that have put me in touch with people who for various reasons might have felt like we do. AI, Borg, other Augments, and so on. It turns out I am invaluable to the process of integration, because we’ve been on similar journeys. Discovering concepts that seem to come easily to some: Gender, love, norms of interactions, etcetera. You know.”

Julian nodded. He had always had a tenuous grasp of what any of these things meant or even why they mattered. The more he had interacted beyond the scope of human experience, the more he had come to the conclusion that they didn't, really. Which meant he could make them matter to himself exactly as much as he wanted them to.

Like he had said to her, complicated, but freeing.

She continued: “And in that project, the connections I've made – we've made with one another – I've never felt so... complete. What I am is not just enough, what I am is good.” She touched Julian's face. “You've always made me feel that way. But for some reason the emotion I've felt with people who're women – who've chosen to be women – it's a different emotion somehow. Maybe because I also made the choice to be a woman or... maybe I was always this way. It'll require more research. What I wanted to tell you is that I've used you as a template for falling in love.”

He grinned widely at that. “I'm honoured.”

Sarina returned it. Smiling was still a strange thing as well. It often came to her less naturally than to people raised with the idea of it. Right now however, she found that it was done without any thought, simply as a response to them being perfectly in tune. “Knew you would be.”

“Maybe one day I'll get to meet them, if the project ever moves out of classified.”

“I hope so.”

[nisaeiam]

TIMELESS - an ACOTAR fanfic

After spending her entire life in Cretea, Zivia finds herself in the company of the Night Court, sent as an emissary to help after the war. As she navigates her way outside her once secluded life, she develops unlikely bonds with the people around her - especially with the one wreathed in shadows.

PROLOGUE, CHAPTER 1, CHAPTER 2, CHAPTER 3, CHAPTER 4, CHAPTER 5, CHAPTER 6, CHAPTER 7

Also posted HERE

CHAPTER VIII

The front gates of Athelwood loomed before her as Mor eased her horse to a slower pace.

She immediately left after their meeting in Velaris, saying something about needing to take care of some important things before leaving again for work when asked by Cassian why she was in such a rush. It wasn't entirely a lie.

She left her mare in the stables then proceeded to the back door of the estate. The smell of garlic bread and roasted chicken greeted her as she walked over to the kitchen.

"Are you cooking?" she gushed at the female who had her face in front of the oven. "Careful, you'll burn your nose."

The woman whipped her head to her and gave her a wide smile.

She felt bad for having to leave her again on her own – alone in this house. They've only been together for a few months after meeting each other during the height of the war with Hybern. She was the mortal girl who was rescued by Feyre and Azriel at the enemy's camp when they retrieved Elain. The two of them somehow bonded before the humans were sent back to their lands. She thought it was just one of her brief affairs but after days of finding herself longing for the woman, she went and asked her if she wanted to stay with her at the Faerie lands.

Her happiness was beyond measure when she said yes. Only to be thwarted by her having to go do the job Rhysand asked her to do. Not feeling quite ready yet to tell her friends about Briar, she decided to let her stay in her secret estate for the meantime.

"I know that look," said Briar as she placed the cooked chicken on the table. Setting the plates, she motioned for Mor to seat down. "I'm going to be fine here. I know you're doing your best to make this world a better place for us. I understand. I also want to have that peace, that freedom to live with each other in harmony." She reached over to grab her hand. "For you and me."

Mor squeezed her hand back and tried to blink away the tears forming in her eyes.

Soon.

===============

The sound of dried leaves and twigs crunching under their boots echoed through the empty forest as Zivia and Azriel made their way to the mortal side of the Continent.

After winnowing and flying through the journey, they decided to land in one of the dense forests lining the edge of where once the Wall stood and trek from there. Azriel said that even though the danger had somehow dwindled after the war, humans here are still wary and watchful and going through on foot would be their safest option. She suggested concealing both of them with her magic until they reach their destination, but the spymaster insisted they both needed to preserve their strength for any untoward emergencies. Besides, he said it would be extremely suspicious if the two of them just appeared out of nowhere in the middle of the city.

It took them half the day to reach the edge of the forest just before the clearing, and they settled in farthest the city border as the sun dipped in the horizon.

"We'll spend the night here," said Azriel as he surveyed the surroundings. "It will take us another day to reach the center of the town." He turned to her. "Think you could throw an illusion to make us invisible?"

"There isn't much light to manipulate at this hour. It won't be as effective during the day." She'll try her best though. She couldn't be that useless at the very beginning of this mission.

But the shadowsinger just inclined his head and said, "I figured as much".

He then stretched out his hand and swirls of shadows eddied around them like ink in water, concealing them from any prying eyes that were present or any that would find themselves lost on this part of the forest in the middle of the night.

Her brows drew together in slight embarrassment. "Why then ask if you knew…"

He just shrugged in reply. Ignoring him, she threw an air shield around to suppress whatever noise that could reveal their presence, and pulled out a tent she kept hidden in a pocket realm. Azriel was looking at her with a mild surprise on his face.

"I thought it'd be useful one day," she grinned. "Well, what do you know!"

Together, they set the tent up, stepping back to look at their work after they finished. The shadowsinger had his face drawn in a tight frown as he looked at their would-be shelter that is visibly too small for two people, especially with wings. Before he could voice out his concern, she took him by the hand and dragged him inside. His protest died on his lips as he took in what was before them.

Outside, the tent looked like it could barely contain the two of them, but inside, with its considerable space, it was fit to accommodate at most five people inside.

"How?" Azriel breathed as he looked at her.

It was then that she realized that she was still holding his hand, his scars rough on her palm. She quickly dropped it and made an awkward gesture of showing off the tent with her hands, suddenly feeling the need to do something with them.

"It was made by a faerie fabricator back in our island. He always had a knack for creating enchanted objects."

She went on to get more blankets from her magical storage place and laid it out on the ground before setting herself down.

"Make yourself feel cozy." She gestured at the blankets.

Azriel was eyeing her with an amused look as he stepped further into their camp. "I don't suppose you have anything else tucked away in this pocket realm of yours?"

"Ah!"

She held up a finger to him and proceeded to pull out loaves of bread, cheese and a large bottle of wine. "Saves us the effort of having to hunt for dinner."

For a moment, he just stood there staring blankly at her. A small sound escaped from him before he bursted out with full on laughter. She didn't know what to make of it so she just held on to the food and the wine, looking like an idiot. Azriel slumped down across from her and grabbed a slice of cheese, twirling it around his fingers.

"You're wonderfully weird, you know," he said then plopped the cheese into his mouth.

She ducked her head to hide the redness blooming on her cheeks. "I don't know if I should take that as a compliment."

It took a lot more than she wanted for her to meet his gaze. How unnerving it was to sit so close to this male and though she didn't want to admit it, she kind of liked it.

Mother above Zivia, get it together!

She averted her eyes, mentally slapping herself for having such useless thoughts. She reached for the bread just as Azriel reached for one too. Their fingers collided and it was an unknown instinct that made her pull her hand back quickly.

"Sorry. Take it."

Her eyes snagged onto his scarred hands that were partially covered by his gauntlet and that blue crystal thing atop it. She recognized those marks the first time she saw them upon their first meeting at the House of Wind, but held back in asking about it for the mere fact that it was too personal to ask. And she wasn't going to snoop into other's personal lives because she knows all too well what that kind of scars were exactly.

She haven't realized she'd been staring when Azriel spoke, setting down the wine he was drinking and holding up one of his hands, palms away from her to give her a better view of the crystal.

"They're called Siphons. They help us concentrate our powers in battle."

She gave a slow nod of her head, like a child understanding some complicated thing for the very first time.

"But that's not what you were wondering about, were you?"

She tensed as she held his gaze for a moment, and then deadpanned, "Where can I get one?"

It wasn't what he was expecting her to say as he was taken aback by her question. She stretched out her legs in front of her, not breaking eye contact as she grinned at him. "I think it'll look good on me. What do you think?"

He squinted at her, obviously noticing the way she evaded his question. He knew what she really was looking at but she couldn't bring herself venturing into that topic. It was a too private matter for both of them.

"You can't"

She feigned a disappointed look. "Why not?"

"It looks better on us Illyrians."

It was impossible to miss the smirk that flashed across his lips.

"That's not fair! You already look pretty enough even without it."

"So do you."

Her blush was instant but she ignored it. "So you think I'm pretty?"

"That's not what I said."

"I'm going to assume that's what you meant."

He shook his head even as the smile continued tugging on his lips as he gobbled down his bread and wine. It was an awkward turn of events but both of them didn't mind much of it – seemed to enjoy it even.

They finished the rest of their dinner before settling down on their own blankets to sleep.

They were awake before the sun had shown its first light and continued on their journey. When the trees finally gave way to roads with signs of human activity, Zivia threw the illusion around them. They were to pose as a pair of travelers going around the continent in search of good trades. From there, they will gather as much information as they could regarding the state of each kingdom before deciding which one would be the easiest to persuade to their cause.

It was an hour past noon when they arrived at the village. It was a busy day; people were meandering around the square, vendors scattered everywhere, some going so far as walking up to people to offer their goods. She did a mental check to see if their illusion is still intact, just to be sure.

They were busy looking around when a particular merchant snuck up on them.

"Greetings wayfarers." The old man's voice was thick with accent and he spoke with such raspness Zivia wondered if he had been shouting for customers the whole day. "May I bother you for a minute? I have goods that you might want."

He reached into his pouch, his wrinkled fingers fumbling with the knots, and pulled out something bulky. It was covered with sooth-stained cloth and by the shape and sound of it, she made a good guess of what he might be selling.

"Weapons," he said, parting the cloth to reveal stash of knives and daggers. "Made with ash woods."

Azriel was beside her in an instant, slightly blocking her from the vendor with his body.

"Sorry, we have no interest in weapons," he said a little too coldly.

The merchant blinked but extended his hands more to them. "You might need it, especially now they are already among us!"

The collapse of the Wall undeniably made these people cautious. She didn't even know if the weapons were indeed made of real ash woods or just a sham to entice more buyers, but they weren't going to figure that out for themselves.

"We're…fine." She shook her head to the old man and turned to go on their way.

"I haven't seen you around here," the vendor blurted, making them stop. They looked back to see him eyeing them suspiciously.

"We're travelers," Azriel said before she could open her mouth. "From Scythia."

They waited. If the old man doubted them, this could all turn out bad, and she prepared herself just in case he decided to use those weapons on them, fake or not. Azriel seemed to think the same, bracing himself if they needed to make a run for it.

But the old man just gave them a crooked smile and inclined his head as he reached into his pouch again and handed them apples.

"A welcome gift," he said. "May you find our city welcoming enough for you." He sketched a bow before drifting off to find another probable customer.

After rounding the market place for about an hour, they were finally able to find an inn that was cheap enough and comfortable enough for them both. By night, they found themselves seated in a corner of the village tavern, people around drinking shots and dancing along the music created by a small band at the center of the room.

Perfect. In this kind of place, conversations flow freely and with it, information.

"That woman has been staring at you for a while now," she said as she took a sip from her glass.

Azriel turned to where she gestured and saw a lady from the bar staring back at them, twirling her hair in her fingers as she bit her lip.

"Go talk to her."

They both exchanged a knowing look before he rose from his seat and declared, "I'll get a refill."

She eyed the woman who was now greedily smiling at the shadowsinger, her cheeks were tinged bright red, clearly inebriated from alcohol. Good. Drunken people were most likely to tattle, especially drunk ladies who were looking for someone to flirt with.

A group of males strutted into the bar led by a tall muscular man with hair cut so short, he was almost bald. He looked around the room, ordering his friends to get drinks when he spotted her.

"What's a pretty lady doing alone, drinking by herself here?" he said in a gruff voice when he reached her table. "You look like you needed some company." Without invitation, he settled himself down on a seat beside her, draping an arm over her shoulders as he did.

"Somebody get us a drink here!" he shouted over his shoulder.

There was such authority in his voice that made Zivia think that he's more than just a regular patron of this tavern. She turned to see Azriel looking at them with an unreadable face before the woman grabbed him by his chin and leaned in for a kiss. She snapped her attention back at the male beside her, a glass already on his hand.

"You don't look familiar," he told her, downing his drink in one gulp. "Are you a new recruit?"

Recruit?

"Oh." Understanding dawned on her. "No. I'm not."

She shifted on her seat, angling herself to prevent his arm coming in contact with her hidden wings. Also, she was starting to feel uncomfortable around him and his smell was starting to become unbearable too.

Smiling at him, she said, "I'm just a wanderer having some great time in this city."

The man's grin turned wolfish as he inched closer and placed a hand on top of her knee. "I know a place where you can wander and have your greatest time in this city."

It took everything from her to restrain herself from crushing the man's lungs on the spot when he slid his hand up her thighs.

"Yeah?"

"I live not far from here." He continued moving closer to stroke her hair. "My father is out for his faerie hunt so he won't be home for tonight. We'll have the place all to ourselves."

She planted her hands in his chest, pushing him away slightly.

"Faeries?"

His brows rose at her question. "You must not know. There are talks of those creatures crossing over the border after the wall collapsed." He leaned in as if to speak something that must only be kept between the two of them. "My father and his men are en route to Liria to discuss about what to do with them."

She gulped as she pondered that information in her head. Could he be talking about a council meeting?

"You seem to be interested in faeries," he mumbled in her ear. "Come with me and I'll talk to you more about them in bed."

Then he suddenly slid his hand in between her legs.

Glasses shattered and furnitures were overturned as she shoved the man away so hard, he was thrown halfway across the room and fell flat onto the floor. She was so sure she'd kill him right then and there when Azriel put a hand on her shoulder, stopping her before she could reveal their identity to everyone on the tavern. Her anger simmered down even as the man stood up and faced the Illyrian.

"Fuck off man!" he spat into his face. "She's mine."

Azriel remained stoic as he pulled Zivia away from him. "She's nobody's."

The man's face turned livid and he flexed his muscles readying for combat. "Why don't we settle this in a fight, huh? Come on!" He motioned for Azriel but the shadowsinger remained still, not moving an inch from where he stood.

"Stop this," she cautioned as she stepped in between them.

"What? You choose this wack over someone like me?" he sneered.

A dozen retort sprang into her mind but she held them back. "Careful, you're talking about my brother." She felt both their surprise as the man slowly lowered his fists and looked at her, then to Azriel. Both of them wore the same expression.

Everyone's attention was towards them now, drawn by the scuffle.

"Let's go."

Azriel let her drag him away from the scene they've created but before they could leave, she let his illusion drop just for the man to see what was hidden behind that glamour. She took satisfaction in seeing him stumble back, eyes widening at what he saw. He rubbed his eyes as if it would clear away whatever hallucination he'd had and when he looked back at them, she slammed the door in his face and away they went into the night.

They left the village early morning the next day after piecing together the information they gathered. She also found out that the jackass from the tavern last night was a baron's son.

"Rumor is that the lords of some cities in the continent were to converge to talk about plans after the collapse of the wall."

Zivia glanced at the spymaster beside her. She wondered whether he got that information from the bar lady or from his agents around the continent, though he already told her that his network of spies were also lying low after the war. Either way, they got what they needed.

"Do you think the queens were involved in this?"

"That's what we're going to find out."

The territory of Liria would be weeks of trekking away from where they are so they decided to go to a place where large amounts of trades were exchanged and try to hitch a ride in one of the dealers' carriage. After deeming their surrounding safe enough, they flew through a mountain range that they needed to cross to arrive at the next village, with an illusion cast over them for precaution. As they reached the peak of the mountains, a strong rainstorm impeded their flight and they had to land down to look for temporary shelter.

Completely soaked and shivering, they were able to find a cave carved on the base of one of the stone mountains. They were both dripping wet from the rain and teeth chattering from the cold so Zivia threw a wall of air around the cave entrance to prevent any more wind and rain from entering and possibly freeze them to death. She shook off the water from her hair and wings before sending waves of air to dry their clothes.

It was starting to get dark outside but there was no sign of the storm from stopping any time soon. They're going to have to stay the night here.

The cold didn't budge despite the barrier and there wasn't enough dry wood inside for them to start a fire. She remembered the blankets she stashed inside her magical storage and pulled them out and made makeshift beds for both of them. When the darkness has deepened into their cave, she summoned a ball of light from her palms to illuminate and warm them.

"What do you think Mor is doing now?" she asked as she pulled out the apples that were given to them from her pouch then tossed one to Azriel. It wasn't much but they'll have to do for dinner.

"Probably getting drunk in one of the kingdoms' cellars," he said flatly, taking a bite of his fruit.

Not this topic then.

Silence stretched between them as the wind continued howling outside their little reprieve. She glanced at the shadowsinger who was now partly nestled in his blankets, basking in the warmth of her light. He was in deep thought as he nibbled on the remains of the apple and she wondered whether he was thinking about Mor. She shuffled in her own covers and let the lights dim a little. The rain splattered in a steady beat and it was that sound that finally lulled her to sleep.

In her dream, she was flying, high above the clouds. The setting sun warm against her cheeks – it was a beautiful feeling and she closed her eyes.

But the wind suddenly stopped blowing and then she was falling. She reached out a hand but there was nothing to hold on to.

She was slipping…slipping…and falling into a dark chasm below her.

She jerked awake, panting and drenched in sweat. Azriel was beside her instantly, holding her steady by the shoulders.

"Something's wrong," she gasped, trying to get her breaths even. She felt it. She looked at him as she wrapped her arms around her body and repeated her words to him. "Something's wrong."

"It's the apples," he said with a hint of rage in his voice. "They're laced with faebane."

Her hands trembled as she tried summoning her magic, but there was nothing. It was a complete void inside of her and no matter how much she tried, nothing responded to her calls. Azriel reached for her arm, willing her to look at him.

"Don't worry, it's only temporary." His voice was so soothing it almost made her want to bury her face in his chest and cry just to ease the hollowness she felt inside. She managed to give him a terse nod.

There was never a time when she was without her powers and it scared her to death of the possibility that one day it would happen to her.

It's only temporary, she reminded herself.

She looked back at him and noticed how calmly he was handling this situation. There are worse pains to have. His scars made her remember that.

Finally calming herself with that thought, she pushed off the blankets and went to stand at the mouth of the cave. The rain had stopped and the trees and grass were glistening like diamonds under the morning sun.

"What do we do now?"

"We stay, until the effects wear out and we get our powers back. It would be too dangerous out there to continue our journey."

Huffing a sigh, she muttered, "I'm sorry."

"For what?"

She turned around, wringing her hands in front of her. "I shouldn't have taken those apples."

"It's not your fault," Azriel replied. "I noticed that old man was a little bit sketchy. I should've known better."

She frowned. It was not fair that he'd be taking this up as his fault.

"No. I shouldn't have offered them to you."

"I shouldn't have let you eat them."

"Stop it. This was clearly my fault! And you can't tell me otherwise."

Hoping to cement her point, she crossed her arms and gave him a look that dared him to contradict her.

"Fine," he said, throwing his hands up in defense. "It's both our fault." A smile tugged at his lips as he started shaking his head. "I can't believe we're having this argument right now."

She took a deep breath and hoped he didn't notice. It was weird how he could get any more attractive than he already is with just a simple gesture like that.

"You should do that more often."

"Do what?" His brows slightly furrowed but he was still smiling.

"Smile. It suits you."

Color bloomed on his cheeks and he quickly turned to hide it.

By the Cauldron, did she just made him blush?

But apparently, it had the same effect on her as she felt heat rush through her body. She scratched her nose, feeling embarrassed and stupid.

But it's true… an inner voice told her as she settled back into her blankets and waited out the day.

The sky was already turning purplish but there was still no sign of her powers coming back. Not even a speck of it. She was starting to panic, dreadful that it would be gone for good.

It's only temporary…it's only temporary…

She kept repeating those words in her head hoping to ease her building fear.

Azriel was gone too look for food. Needless to say, she started another petty argument about whose going. She insisted that she wasn't that hungry and that they should wait a little longer in hopes that maybe the effects of the faebane would wear out soon enough.

It was a well past the afternoon when her stomach decided to demonstrate a whale's mating call prompting Azriel to finally go despite their powers not returning yet.

She stepped out of the cave and looked far past the trees but found no sign of the shadowsinger. Her hunger has already subsided but she was getting restless. Just as she was about to go back, she noticed a tiny orb of light among the bushes. It danced around the air before wisping away into the woods. She looked back to see if Azriel have returned but when she didn't see him, she went and followed the creature of light.

She arrived at a meadow not far from their cave. It was dark now; the clouds in the sky giving way to the stars and moon, which glowed in a way that painted the grass silver. The orb of light was gone.

Steps sounded behind her and she turned to see the shadowsinger standing a few feet away.

"You almost scared me," she snapped at him.

"Did I now?" he said as he walked towards her. "I came back to find you missing. What are you doing here?"

"Nothing," she replied when he stopped an arm's length away. "I just saw something but then it was gone and –"

She gasped. Behind Azriel, the orb of light suddenly appeared – hundreds of them actually – among the pastures.

"Fire sprites," she breathed as she stepped closer to them.

A breeze of wind blew and she turned to see everything punctuated with thousands of glimmering lights – from the grass on their feet to the leaves up in the trees. They were everywhere, radiating such beautiful red and golden colors that made the forest look enchanted.

She looked back at Azriel. He had his hands open before him, an invitation for the creatures to come to him. A dozen had already gathered on his palms, their light gilding his face in a warm glow as his eyes glinted with puerile fascination.

She couldn't help smiling. "Aren't they beautiful?"

A rogue one twirled around his head before burrowing itself in his hair. Azriel grabbled through his head trying to catch the pesky creature and she stifled a laugh before marching towards him.

"Here, let me help."

As she was reaching her hand, the sprites suddenly scuffled away plunging them into darkness. There were sounds of rustling among the trees and bushes around them. Azriel grabbed her by the arm and pulled her before stopping short. As her eyes adjusted to the dimness, she noticed shadows among the branches – outlines of men among the shrubs.

They were surrounded.

BONUS: This was my inspiration during that fire sprite scene ♥️♥️

[webcricket]

Looking Glass

Chapter 17 - Willkommen!

Pairing: CastielXAU!Reader

Word Count: 2037

Summary: The part of the story in which the reader really should have listened to Castiel’s thoughts regarding her safety.

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You sit on a fallen tree trunk stripped by weather and time of the remnants of its roughened bark at meadow’s edge nursing your woe in the peaceful haven Cas shared with you on that first fateful bunker outing together. The season’s rain and shade of surrounding trees lends a bracing dampness to air freshened by clusters of purple aster and sunny wild coreopsis blooms. Every so often, your toes prod the spongy mound of moss beneath bare feet; the earth thereon is scattered with contrasting piles of yellow petals plucked from the crowns of flowers, unlucky demise the result of their proximity to your person – a person absent-minded with need to apoplectically occupy fingers by dismembering the delicate buds one by one whilst reciting in silent solitude the not very cheering and pitifully childish mantra, ‘He loves me, he loves me not.’

You couldn’t bring yourself to stay inside today knowing the rift was opening and Cas was leaving, with feeling as though the tattered bits of hope still anchored in your heart at the possibility of his coming around and forgiving you might come completely untethered in his absence. He didn’t even bother to say goodbye himself, a slight you can only assume expresses the uncaring truth of his angelic nature; in which case, shame on you for letting down your guard and letting him in when you knew full well the sinister substance angels are made of. You wonder if Sam drew the short straw in announcing their imminent departure. You wonder if any of them are ever coming back or if, like before Dean rescued you, you’ve lost everyone you care about to that devastated world and must endure alone in this strange one.

A sharp snort and stomp of hoof draws your attention up and out into the field. The twin fawns, white spots fading on tawny coats with maturity, cautious of the salt smell and sniffling sounds of a human quietly sulking and seething, creep into the clearing to join you. Ears flicking, the larger of the two fixes her brown-doe eyes on your slumped figure. After a moment, her steady gaze shifts, drifting deeper into the wood beyond where you sit; her wary regard softens. Though not visible to you at this distance, the mirror image of a man in a trench coat reveals in the enameled glaze of her eyes – a man she knows simply as the sweetness of apples. Satisfied no danger exists, she paws at the ground and drops her head to join her sister in grazing upon the dewy grass.

Rounding the log with seraphim stealth of silence, Castiel sinks beside you.

At least you assume it’s the angel, certain anyone else at all would have sent the deer running in fright. For fear of shattering the illusion he’s here, that he didn’t leave after all, you keep your focus trained ahead.

He, too, looks forward, crossing and uncrossing his arms in a reflexive quest for comfort in the atmosphere of guarded awkwardness which general precedes the breaking of ice and subsequent admission of personal failings invariably followed by a vulnerable outpouring of bottled emotion which to him, as a divine being honed to conceal such sentimental weaknesses with wrathful righteousness, feels nearly as unnatural as it does natural. Unable to subdue the inner tumult of manifest feelings, he fidgets – a soldier waging war within the battleground of a vessel containing aloof angelic reason and a heart hewn to love humanity, the opposing ends battling to do the right thing by you.

The spastic shuffle of limbs in the otherwise hushed setting is enough to drive you bonkers. You reach out sideways, the impulse not entirely in your conscious control, and seize his hand to still the closest fretting limb. He does not stiffen at the suddenness of your touch, nor does he pull away when your fingers flex and fold, seeking the warmth and security of the spaces between his own.

You hold each other thus, unspeaking, watching the deer without really watching them, for what seems a stretch of eternity.

The fawns, perhaps sensitive to a tension strained to the pressure point of bursting, grow weary of munching. Fuzzy dew-soaked muzzles quivering, they decide in a subtle show of twitching withers and flinching flanks to embark on a winding path across the meadow. Disturbed from tall grassy posts, the translucent wings of small flies take flight, glittering the sky in the wake of their departure.

As the dim thickness of the bordering forest swallows up the creatures and outward tranquility again reigns supreme, Cas speaks. “I owe you an apology.”

You turn, a startled gasp catching in your throat at the blueness of his irises after being deprived of their gentle light for so many days. Shaking your head, you murmur, “You don’t owe me anything.” It’s an honest correction – he healed your mortal wounds with his grace and cleared the scorched ruin of your mind to give you back your memories. Wanting anything beyond these miracles seems greedy; although, at the sight of the doubtful smile tugging at the corner of his mouth over your contradiction, the swiftly thumping knot of muscle wedged inside your chest tells you despite all reason the heart nonetheless desires more.

His small smile dissolves almost as quickly as it appeared, replaced by a contrite pout. “I behaved” –he pauses to glance upward in search of a grand and meaningful explanation. Finding none in the grey clouds above, he settles for the humble truth– “selfishly.”

“Me too,” you contend. “More so. You saved my life and I-”

“Acted as anyone who lost everything and everyone they cared about would under the circumstances.” Interrupting your attempt at self-contempt, he squeezes your hand tighter. “Please forgive me for allowing frustration to get the better of me” –he brings his fingertips up to caress your cheek– “for forgetting you have feelings too. If you permit me, I’ll try to do better.”

His sincerity extracts an airy breath of pardoning laughter and bright twist of smile from you. “I’d say you’re only human, but …”

Chin dropping to his chest under the weight of his matching beam of a grin, he lets go a husky chuckle.

Soles of bare feet slipping on the moss, a relief of warm tears brimming over your lashes, you dive to embrace the angel.

Opening his arms to your scrabbling hug, he winds them about your waist to draw you into his lap and pull you firm to his torso. He buries his nose into your tousled hair to nuzzle and kiss the top of your head.

It’s there, clasped in the refuge of revived affection, it occurs to you to ask why he’s still here when he was supposed to leave hours ago with Sam and Dean and Gabriel. “Cas, what happened with the rift?” you mumble the query into the cushion of his coat.

He smooths a hand up your back. “We” –he hesitates, fisting and flattening his fingers at your spine– “we need another source of archangel grace. Gabriel’s is too weak to maintain the gateway to your world. I came to talk to you about that.”

You incline backward slightly to peer up at him. “How can I help?”

“We have a plan. It’s not a great plan” –he frowns, blues sheening in a serious darkened glint as he continues– “or even a good one. Sam accurately called it one of the worst plans ever and Dean’s sarcasm was evident even to me, but it seems to be the only option available to us if we want to rescue Jack and Mary and stop Michael.”

“What’s going on?” You squirm to sit up straighter, steadying yourself by clutching the lapels of his coat.

His tone tumbles gravely deeper. “I need you to do something for me.”

“Anything, angel.” Freeing a hand, you reach up to run your fingers through the silky sweep of chestnut locks gathered at his temple.

He looks at you hard, eyes narrowed and roving your features like he’s searing a mapped memory of your face into his celestial consciousness; after a few breathless heartbeats, he nods, lids relaxing their squint to blink entreatingly wide. “Y/N, I need to know you’re safe, no matter what happens.”

A spasm of emptiness snatches at the steady rhythm of your heart. In the skipped beats, you sense what’s coming next – he’s about to ask you to leave just when you’ve reconciled. You bite back the argument brewing on your tongue.

Regardless of the uneasiness he feels flowing through your veins, he continues in hope elucidation of the danger will assuage your trepidation. “As we speak, Rowena, Gabriel, and the Winchesters are attempting to capture Lucifer to bring him to the bunker in order to use him as a power source to keep the rift open. To do so means we need him alive.”

“You’re bringing the devil … here?” you gulp, although the news does nothing to diminish your desire to remain.

“Yes, and if you’re to be safe, you should be somewhere else.” He ignores the slow objecting wiggle of your head. “It isn’t as far as I’d like, but in Sioux Falls we have friends …”

“Cas” –you press a palm to his heart– “I’m staying.”

An anxious line creases his forehead at your protest. “If you think what happened to you on your world was bad, multiply that by a hundred thousand times and that’s what happens if Lucifer manages to free himself. He’s without mercy. Think about it.”

Unmoved, you enfold yourself back into his embrace. “There’s nothing to think about. I need to be here to make sure nothing happens to the rift. To make sure you come back.”

“Y/N …” Recognizing his frustration once again threatens to erect a wall between you, he stifles further reproach out of respect. Cuddling you close, he reassures himself you’re stubborn. Strong. “Very well … little one.”

Little one. A cold shiver courses your coiled form. The other Castiel called you that – not out of any tender endearment, but to reinforce your insignificance to him.

Dread darkens the perimeter of your vision; the colorful meadow wavers ribbon-like in ebbing blackness. “Wh-what did you call me?” you stutter in a fraught whisper; the tentative wriggle from the angel’s grasp rapidly evolves into a desperate struggle to free yourself as his grip constricts your movements.

“I said, you did very well, little one,” he repeats in the wrong voice, his nasally strangely accented voice.

Eyelids clamping, you try to believe this is a nightmare.

Snippets of memory roar through your mind in a vacuum of wind: Cas – your Cas – cutting Lucifer’s throat. The golden bolt of the rift opening in the library. Cas’ parting kiss before stepping through it that felt too much like a final goodbye. The devil’s escape. Rowena’s threat to abandon them all and your frantic plunge back into your world through the flickering rift, unarmed and unequipped, to warn the others and because you couldn’t imagine being separated from your angel forever.

The greater your panic to be free, the more agonizing the reality of entrapment. You discover then you cannot scream, the fingers gripping your gorge prevent any sound from escaping your lips or air from entering your lungs. You verge on blacking out, having no such luck as the vice relents to let you suck in a gasp in order to keep you conscious.

“Open your eyes,” he commands.

The skin sheathing your wildly darting orbs unwillingly parts to comply with the order. An unsympathetic appearing Englishman with fractured facial structure and shrouded in mercenary black frowns at you from where he hangs by the wrists from the beam of the ceiling. Beyond him, a fiery redhead slumps comatose where she sits bound and bleeding in a chair.

Castiel tilts you by the neck, wrenching your regard with angelic force from the others in the room to center instead on him; features alive in a firestorm of tics, dead opaque eye and menacing blue one searing you to the soul, he yanks you closer. Brushing his convulsive lips to yours, he growls, “Welcome home, my little one.”

Next: Ch. 18 - The Good Soldier

[omggiogiothings]

Voices Chp. 5

Hey guys, welcome to Chapter five that I kept setting deadlines for but never actually got done.

A huge thanks to @nutella0mutt​ for keeping up my motivation and helping beta this chapter for me!

And a thank you to everyone who continues to read this story. Your support makes it possible for me to create this content for you!! Thanks ahhh. I hope you enjoy this chapter! Please, let me know what you think!

Read this story here on Ao3! 

The Balmera had become close to a second home to them (technically third but they rarely saw Earth’s sunrises nowadays). It had been one of their firsts missions as a team and one of the first Galra colonies they liberated. It had flourished under the help of Allura’s diplomatic abilities. The Balmerans had moved from their underground caverns, molding the ground above them to make small huts, towns and cities and were known for their energy crystals. Only once strict security  protocols had been placed did they open up their trading borders for everyone again. He had heard Alfor discuss opening it to the Galra once more but wasn't sure how that had been solved in the treaty.

The Balmera quickly became an Altean colony. After they were liberated from the Galra, Altea lent a helping hand and in the process made it impossible for the Galra to attempt to trade for Balmeran Energy crystals.

But despite not allowing the Galra access to the crystals, the Balmera found other things to trade, such as jewelry or large glass stained artwork. The Balmerans were practiced in creating art from the crystals and the rocks. He had seen the process up close once from their longtime friend Shay. Allura still wore the intricate necklace Shay had made her as a symbol of friendship (it was one of the only kinds of jewelry she wore on a daily basis, even if it didn't match her outfits).

If Shiro was looking for some kind of rock to give Keith, it would be from the Balmera. He had run the process through with Hunk just to make sure this was something he could do. Hunk had a lot more experience with the Balmera and it's inhabitants. Hunk had reassured him it would be fine. Shay had been happy to receive their message of arrival and he was certain the landing party contained her excited form somewhere.

With Lance’s help he set up the landing procedure, easily allowing him to take control of the wheel as Shiro unbuckled to quickly right the systems in the back. Hunk was watching their engine levels, making sure everything was in shape for their arrival. Lance had the talent to be a wonderful pilot and under Shiro’s mentoring he had flourished.

“Opening up the hatch. Adjusting to atmospheric levels.” Lance called from the front and there was a minor shake before they all released a breath of relief.

“Once you've flown a lion, this stuff feels clunky.” Hunk mumbled as he stretched out his limbs and headed towards the exit hatch.

Lance finished up landing protocols before getting to his feet with a grin. “I dunno, something about the old fashioned tech makes you all warm and fuzzy inside.”

“Try earth’s work, then.” Shiro commented, grabbing his headgear from his seat and adjusting it before following the other two out. “I don't think I'll be able to fly it after getting used to Altean tech.”

Lance shared a laugh with him that made Shiro grin before joining them outside, only to see Hunk throwing himself on the ground, arms wide and cheek pressed to the dirt.

“You are looking lovely today, Balmera.” He tugged his arms back and forth making Lance stop on the middle of the hatch.

“Hunk, it's a planet. It looks the same as it always does. Why are you kissing up to it?”

“Okay, first of all I'm not kissing up to it, but if it was somehow flattered by my totally innocent compliment I have a whole list I wouldn't mind telling it.”

“Hunk.” Shiro asked, probably sounding exasperated. “What are you doing?”

“Okay,” he caved. “Ever since my break up with Shay I feel like the planet has had it out to get me.”

He pressed himself closer to the dirt, “So, what a beautiful planet!”

“It's a planet.” Lance deadpanned, heading over to the side to open up the hatch of supplies they brought as a sign of good faith for the Balmerans. “I think it has a different thought process then us.”

“It's living, it communicates, it can be flattered.”

Shiro sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose before coming down the rest of the way. “Hunk, I doubt an entire planet has it out for you.”

“Uh, that's where you wrong.” Hunk jumped off the ground just to jab a finger in Shiro’s direction. “Ever since I called it off with the best rock in the world I can't come here without tripping or bashing my head open.”

“I'm pretty sure that's because of Rax, not the planet.” Lance grumbled, picking up one of the boxes from the cargo hatch.

Hunk ignored him in favor of pressing close to Shiro. Eager to get out of any type of face down with Hunk (if he started crying everyone lost) he raised his arms and side-walked his way over to Lance. “It's not the planet. Come on, help us get these boxes down to the arrival team. Shay is waiting for us.”

With Hunk pacified Shiro grabbed up two boxes, easily balancing them in his arms.

Lance, with only one crate held up in his arms, frowned. “Must be great to have Altean strength.”

Hunk, not one to be outdone, grabbed a hold of three, easily. “What was that?” He asked, blinking innocently at Lance.

“I said I was gonna kick your ass if you didn't hurry up.”

They laughed, heading out to the arrival team, not surprised to see Balmerans eagerly ushering them forward as a few went to unload the rest of the cargo from their ship. They dropped their boxes off, greeting a few Balmerans (and explaining they weren't going to be haggling over a price for the supplies meant to benefit the entire community).

As Lance rolled out his shoulders there was an excited gasp from the crowd making them all turn in time to see Shay finally push her way through the crowd.

She easily towered over Hunk, having hit her Balmeran growth spurt shortly after they met. But the earrings she wore and her bright nature made her easily recognizable to them.

She scooped Shiro and Lance into a hug, making them gasp as her arms provided a vice grip, rough and beyond strong. “Oh! I'm so happy to see you made it safely! I'm so glad to see you again!”

She dropped them, making them wheeze against each other before going to greet Hunk. Her demeanor changed, becoming shy as she gave him a hug that was definitely tender and gentle and probably not attempting to break his spine. (“Geez. Maybe we should become ex-boyfriends to get hugs that don't feel like I broke my spine.” Lance grumbled. Shiro elbowed him sharply.)

Shay pulled away in time to address Shiro directly. “I am not familiar with your customs but grandmother said I should congratulate you.”

At her words there was a cheer sweeping through the crowd that made something in Shiro’s stomach tighten. They actually believed Shiro was in love with Keith. He tried to shrug off the thoughts when she gently ushered them forward.

“The caves that can give you some crystals are further down. I know you are on a tight schedule.” The Balmerans he passed briefly patted Shiro’s shoulder as she led them down the familiar caves. It was a long and winding ramp that he knew Lance was wary of. On one of their first missions, Lance had fallen through faulty ramp ways. It hadn’t been such a big deal until Pidge had fallen through one and had to be placed into a Cyropod. Since then he was apprehensive about something breaking away and taking the others away from him. But the Balmerans were heavy aliens and if it could handle their weight Shiro could trust it. Shay took the lead, immediately opening up conversation with them. “Oh, I saw your fiancé, Shiro! The Prince is lovely!”

Shiro nodded as did the other two over the pleasant conversation before processing what she said. “Wait, what? You know who the prince is?”

She turned over with a frown, not understanding why it was such a big deal. Shiro was concerned. He had no idea who Keith was until he was being told he was getting married. As far as any of them knew, Lotor didn’t have a son; Keith didn’t exist.

“Of course! He is a hit sensation in the head networks. Have you not seen the news?”

All of them cringed. If there was one thing the Paladins had come to avoid, it was the media. Which was sad considering on Earth it was such a big part of their lives. But after hearing slander after slander and the newest rumors of what they wore to bed and who they slept with, they would rather cut it out of their lives. The only one who occasionally checked the media was Pidge who hacked into databases and threw viruses at rising stories to stop slander in their names. But with a name like Voltron, it was impossible to not be shown in a bad light. Politics were difficult enough as it was in person, he didn’t want to think how much harder it would become online where thousands of people connected and tried to fight over their own opinions.

“No,” he said gently. “We uh, tend to avoid the network. I’m concerned, we didn’t know about Keith until we were going to get married.”

Shay stopped walking, eyes narrowing at him. “Keith? Who is Keith? Your fiance is Keoath.”

“Keith is a nickname.” He said hastily. If there was one thing he feared (outside of Allura, Pidge and occasionally Hunk when the mood striked) it was Shay on a goddamn mission to make his life hell. “But what are you talking about? Where did you see him? There is a strict no media policy during peace talks.”

She frowned before reaching towards one of her pockets, shuffling through the contents and bringing out an old clunky watch. It was an older version of the ones on the paladin’s armors. They were wireless devices that connected to the web and were about as reliable as the communicators on their helmets. It had been a gift from Altea (even though the Galra had recently come out with a new version that was much more reliable and manageable). She snapped it onto her wrist, tinkering with it before ushering them closer to her.

“It was a video released the other day and at first no one understood what it was until they recognized you. There were rumors of you gaining a spouse that was Galran but no one was quite sure.” She waited for the screen to load into the air in front of them. Once it popped up she had to navigate through different pages before starting to type up in the Balmeran language. None of them could pronounce the words, reliant on the translating stones Allura gifted them (well, outside of Shiro who could shapeshift to get the vocal cords necessary to speak the language but… well he was too busy to learn a new language). She pressed her fingers on a certain link before the page was covered in the familiar view of the training room. All of them let out surprised sounds at that as the fight continued in the screen.

Keith was the focus, fending off against the gladiator with easily trained moves. There was a scroll of text under the screen they couldn’t recognize but assumed it was a newscaster attempting to explain what they were seeing. The video continued to show off Keith’s grace before Shiro suddenly appeared on camera. They fought together, both of them sliding in and out of the gladiator and fighting fluidly. It looked a lot better then Shiro had thought.

Then his stomach swooped low when it showcased Shiro pulling Keith close, holding Keith’s chin after the battle had ended. Shay stopped it there. “See? Grandmother was so happy you found someone so fierce Shiro. Are you saying you are not in love?”

She was so hopeful he almost felt bad about telling her no. “I’m sorry Shay. It was an arranged marriage. It doesn’t mean I don’t care about Keith, but love is out of the question.”

Shay sighed, shoulders hunching as she looked at the image. “That is a shame. You both are quite popular among the Galra. Keith was declared the first Omega Prince since the empire was created. It caused quite an uproar.”

“Omega?” Hunk and Lance echoed. But Shay merely shrugged as she passed the video over and started to search through the comments.

“I do not fully understand myself. Omegas are considered… the Balmeras of their people.”

Shiro had shaky knowledge at best about the word being thrown around. Keith hadn’t revealed much, only snippets of facts and knowledge. Shiro got the feeling Keith wasn’t comfortable about talking about it himself.

“Balmeras of their people, alright okay.” Lance worked himself into a fit, turning a knowing stare in Shiro’s direction. “This isn’t right. We don’t know anything about these people.”

We’ve been fighting them for over six years and we don’t even know how they live, is what he was truly trying to throw in Shiro’s face.

He doesn’t want to think about the implications of not learning about Omegas. Keith was a prince, hidden away from them and then thrown into an arranged marriage. Shiro still remembered his guarded posture when they first met and the mess of their first interactions. Keith was guarded for a reason and it didn’t sit well with the little he knew about Omegas, clerics, and druids.

“Listen, I get it.” Hunk mumbled, patting Lance’s shoulder gently before turning his gaze to Shiro. “But we should focus on the fact that, that was a private event. Information should not have gotten out. That’s a major security breach when we are working on an alliance.”

Hunk hit the nail on the head. Leaked information meant a number of things and none of them were good. It was bad enough attempting to calm the tension between the Alteans and the Galrans. They didn’t need to think about a third party sneaking their hands into the treaty and sabotaging it for their own gains. Keith was being painted as the prince of the nation. He was in direct line for the throne. It didn’t bode well with Shiro to know Keith’s face was printed across the internet for people looking for revenge against the Galran Empire.

Shiro nodded towards Hunk, casting a glance over to Lance.“Hunk’s right. I’ll have Pidge search and find out who recorded and leaked the event. If Lotor and Zarkon don’t know about this there might be an interfering third party.”

Shay stared at all of their expressions before closing the video and stuffing her watch back into her side pouch. “I do not know how to help you there, Paladins. But I can lead you to the mines. You still want the ceremonial item, yes?”

“Of course.” Shiro answered.

She smiled, taking his hands and grinning. “I’m at least happy you have found someone to share a bond with. I hope you can at least accept our well wishes, although Grandmother has a gift for you, she was the most excited over the news.”

“It’s-it’s really no trouble.” He stuttered. It was one thing being fawned over by Shay but her grandmother? The lady was definitely a terrific lady but Shiro didn’t want to give her the wrong impression over the marriage. Breaking her grandmother's heart would be worse than breaking Shay’s. He'd feel the lingering disappointment for weeks for letting Shay down (Hunk still wore that particular scar well. He wore it like a scab, never truly letting it heal so he could feel it every single day of his life. Shiro couldn't help him).

Before Shay could properly reprimand him (and convince him to take the gift) they were broken apart by large peals of laughter and something crashing into the back of Shay’s legs.

She gasped, using Shiro to keep herself steady (he winced as she crushed his knuckles in her grasp). “What on Balmera!”

She turned, in time to hoist up two squirming children. Shiro never understood the exact way Balmerans reproduced (Hunk had tried to give him a crash course stating everything came from the Balmera, quite literally, but it never really stuck) but the two of them were definitely new to life. He heard children were quite scarce in war times on the Balmera.

“What are you two doing here? I thought your mother wanted you helping at the markets?” Shay scolded, setting them down and dusting them off. They immediately giggled, pawing at her clothes before she gasped and turned to the Paladins with a wide grin. “Oh! I forgot to mention! Rax and his partner were gifted with children! These are my nephews! This is Dinx and Ease! The first children seen in a decapheeb!”

Lance was on his knees in an instant, crooning at the kids who danced away and ran in circles around Shay. It was no surprise that Lance adored children, no matter their species. Lance was charismatic even on his worst days and knew exactly how to exaggerate his actions and his words to give kids a reason to smile.

“Rax had kids?” Hunk breathed, eyes following the children.

Shiro held his breath, catching the way his eyes darkened and Shay’s smile turned slightly sad. There was no doubt in his mind the both of them remembered a time where they had planned for a family together.

Hunk and Shay had broken up ages ago but it lingered and showed in all of their movements. Nothing would relieve the awkward tension and Shiro couldn't even talk to Hunk about the issue.

Since Lance was lost in his own world right now, he quickly changed the subject. “Sorry to, uh, interrupt. But shouldn't we find Rax, then?”

Shay snapped to attention quickly. “Oh, yes! He helped hollow out a cavern just for you, Shiro. Dinx, Ease, come on, let's find your father.”

She took Ease’s (or was it Dinx?) hand while Lance took the other’s. She led them further down the caves until the reached the worker mines stashed at the bottom. A few workers cheered as they passed and cooed at the children running by.

They found Rax in a mostly abandoned cave, hands pressed to the walls with his eyes closed. He was in deep concentration with the Balmera. However, no sooner had they seen him did Hunk trip over a rock, yelping as he took down Lance.

Lance wheezed from underneath him. “Ya know, maybe you were onto something, Hunk.”

Shiro sighed, instead looking at Shay who ushered her nephews over to Rax. He jumped, startled before snatching them both up in one arm. Rax was larger than Shay and built thicker then when they had first met him. He was the brother you should fear even if Shay could drop kick you across a chasm. He grinned, rumbling to his children before noticing them. “You have arrived! It is good to see you in good health!”

His grin faltered on Hunk who was apologizing and helping Lance dust himself off. Shiro knew Rax would never forgive Hunk for breaking Shay’s heart but had understood why Hunk had done it. Rax still hated him for it, even if Hunk hated himself for it more.

“Grandmother was quite excited about your ceremony, Shiro! Congratulations!”

Shiro forced a smile, trying to ignore the way the cheers were given to him. He didn't have feelings for Keith. Keith was amazing and fierce but he was still a mystery to Shiro. He didn't deny that he cared about Keith and wanted to help him. But that wasn't the image painted into the heads of the Balmerans. It was probably publicity that attempted to shape their relationship to be of one about love.

“Thank you for your well wishes. But we are a bit on a tight schedule, do you know where we can look for the crystal?”

Shiro had pondered what kind of crystal to get for Keith since the moment they told him about the Altean ceremony. He had to put thought into it and there had to be a symbolism. Although, Alteans usually didn't use Balmeran crystals for gifts due to the energy they radiated. It let out excess energy that would make anyone sensitive to it sick. But Shiro knew the Balmera, had felt it under his hand when Allura had gently put her own above his. The Balmera was amazing, large, ancient, and powerful. It had breathed life into the Balmerans and powered their ship.

He knew he wasn't the typical Altean. He couldn't sense energies and wasn't sensitive to quintessence. He couldn't feel the ground under him like Allura could. His own inner energies were mixed up, tightened and almost impossible to feel. He was broken; edges hastily pieced together and healing over one another. He couldn't remember a time where he was sensitive to auras or energies like other Alteans. But he knew it was inside of him somewhere, lurking under the surface where he couldn't reach. He knew it was there because he could feel it with the Black lion. The bonds slipped through his fingers like sand but he could feel the bond. He could feel the Black lion’s anger, the lion’s pain and grim determination. And Black wasn't discrete. She poked and prodded, nudging him in her own way. He could feel her, feel their bond strumming along with the other Paladins. In her cockpit he felt her screaming and ordering right beside him. Before he slept he could feel the whispers of her energy around him, promising he would be safe.

He knew Keith had been sensitive to his own aura from their bond, had known when Keith had reached for his hand and said, feel.

Keith helped solidify their connection until Shiro felt him thrumming under his ribs. He felt the warm pulsing red energy in Keith, strumming in beat with his own. It was exhilarating.

The Balmera was a living entity, and he knew Keith would admire it for what it was. It was perfect.

“Do not worry,” Shay reassured, breaking him from his thoughts. “In order to get the piece you need, all you have to do is communicate with the Balmera.”

Shiro felt his face twist up at that. He was crap at communicating with the Balmera without a sort of amplifier and the Black lion wasn't with him.

Shay giggled, reaching to pat him gently on the arm. “It’s alright. I will be there to help the process.”

Rax gave a smile, patting the wall beside him. “I hollowed out a cave for you. It will be easier if you have the ring, so you can picture the size you need the crystal.”

He had the ring secured on one of his side pouches. The Altean space suits were handy in giving him multiple pockets to secure items. The metal of the ring was special to Alteans, as it morphed to whatever the wearer needed. There was some logistics to it (Pidge was fascinated with it but also hated it because Allura had claimed it was magic from the royal family) but Shiro couldn't remember it after the huge debate Pidge sparked over it years ago. The metal was tough, one of the strongest next to the Galra’s Luxite that had become a rarity nowadays. Luxite had gone extinct and not even the Galran scientists could create authentic replications.

He took a moment to pull it free, showing the vial it was trapped within. The ring was beautiful. It was golden, with vines wrapping around with the slightest detail of thorns. It looked like it had been crafted down to the tiniest of details.

Shay let out a cheer. “Oh, it's so beautiful! How wonderful.”

She wasted no time in ushering them into the room. Rax bid them a quick farewell as he ushered his children up the way they had come.

Once inside the room Shay led him to the center as Lance and Hunk stayed near the entrance, peering in carefully. It was mostly barren, with a few crystals already showing through the rocks.

“Now, clear your thoughts and your mind. I will help you project what you need to, to the Balmera. The planet will understand and respond accordingly, okay?”

He rested his hand on the ground, taking a seat in front of her before doing as she asked. She gently placed her hand above his and he concentrated on her hand, on the feel of the earth and nothing else.

He felt the drumming of his heartbeat before the awareness washed over him. The Balmera felt large, its mere presence was enough to crush him. It didn't feel soft as it had under Allura’s expertise, and it threw Shiro off.

But Shay tightened her hold on his hand, gently whispering. “What are you searching for, Shiro?”

Right. He tried to convey his thoughts to the Balmera, closing his eyes and tilting his head downwards. He wanted to take a crystal for Keith, in order to marry him properly according to Altean culture.

At first he felt nothing until there was a curious prodding at the back of his neck. It was almost violent.

But he understood the question. Who was Keith?

And honestly, Shiro wasn't sure how exactly to respond to that.

He thought of Keith. His expressions of annoyance and the blank stares he held for others. He thought of Keith’s discomfort when they were together and the implicit way he had softened for Shiro. He could hear Keith’s laugh like a breath of fresh air.

He didn't know Keith, not truly. The mating bond had shared with him the mindspace Keith had created for himself but it was different, as it usually was for him. He couldn't answer what had happened during the mating ceremony clearly, as it had been a jumble of emotions and flashing pictures. But at the insistence of the Balmera he tried to recall everything he could from the mating ceremony.

He had been deposited onto the Astral plane. It was a familiar sight for him, but it was lacking the Black lion who usually stood guard for him. Instead, there was a large man, dressed in the traditional Galra uniform. His hair was white, braided down his back and he had thought it was Lotor, only he had a feeling that there was no way that could be.

The scene had shifted, showing him a bedroom. It was the purple Galran colors and there was a scatter of trinkets. They were blurry with childhood memories, making it impossible to focus on one thing. He felt like a child again, wandering and playful. He felt… happy.

He saw something in the corner of his eye, the same man from before. He left through the door of the bedroom, not pausing for Shiro to run after him.

The room shifted once the man was gone. The toys were stripped away and the room was laid to bare. The sheets were made, nothing on the walls or the floor. The warm feeling of childhood was ripped away so quickly that Shiro was left reeling.

Shiro had felt numb, almost painfully cold.

It took him a second longer then it should have to understand what he had been feeling during the ceremony. He was feeling Keith.

The mating ceremony revealed to him Keith, in such an intimate way he had not been prepared. Keith was still shrouded in mystery but Shiro ached, wondering what had happened to make him so… empty.

But it also revealed to Shiro so much more. The end of the ceremony had thrown him face first into a jumble to feelings and pictures.

Shiro saw the arena, heard the chants and his heart was in his throat. For a moment he thought he had been dragged into his own memories until he felt the childish fear he recognized as Keith.

Keith was scared, he was begging his father, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to-

The scene shifted, leaving Shiro in an area that resembled a classroom. He felt Keith’s pain in his hands and the burn in his thighs and back. He felt Keith’s frustration and anger that it almost blinded him.

And then, he felt Keith’s hope shrivel up and die.

Keith had stopped feeling… for a very long time.

Shiro remembered coming out of Keith’s mindscape, wanting to throw his arms out in hopes to find him, to feel him. He wasn’t sure what he would tell Keith but just seeing him would have made the pain growing in his chest calm down.

So yeah, he thought to the Balmera, he was searching for Keith.

He was searching for Keith.

He couldn’t say he knew Keith very well but he wanted to be able to know everything that made Keith tick.

The Keith he had bonded with was someone he wanted to do right by. The Keith he was starting to learn about looked uncertain when Shiro had talked about boundaries. Keith held himself, cold, quiet and strong. Keith was graceful and calm, reflecting everything his father would expect from him.

But Shiro saw the anger flashing behind his eyes and the fiery acceptance with being mated to Shiro.

And Shiro didn't want to force this on Keith. He hadn't lied when he said he cared for him. He cared because he felt no one else had and Keith was amazing. There was potential, a personality Shiro wanted to see unfold. Keith could be amazing if he was allowed to be. He didn't want this marriage but he would be damned if he backed out on Keith now.

He would stay true to his word. Keith, forced and shoved along, was part of the Voltron family now. And perhaps it was selfish, wanting to show Keith the world he was denied, but he didn't care.

Shiro wanted to be selfish, just this once.

A loud hum flooded through Shiro’s senses, bringing him out of his thoughts in time to feel the warm feeling of acceptance from the Balmera.

Shiro blinked in surprise, coming back to himself and realizing that had been the Balmera. He hoped those thoughts hadn't been broadcasted to literally everyone.

The Balmera groaned under them, making the room shake before the floor erupted into crystals (making Lance screech and jump onto Hunk, who nearly yelled too).

Shay smiled at him, a softness in her eyes. “The Balmera has accepted your answer. Now, you need to find what you think is meant for Keith within these stones.”

Shiro sighed, but felt a small grin light up on his face. The Balmera drove a hard bargain but it's point was made.

Shiro was searching for a crystal, for someone he was still searching for himself.

He got up, dusting off his knees and grinning at Hunk and Lance. “Well, help me look through these crystals and see if we find the right one.”

“This is a terrible Bachelor party,” Lance grumbled, tossing two crystals the size of his fist into their growing pile of ‘not it's’.

They had devised a system to narrow down their options but it only seemed to prolong their work. Shay was easily placing some away, humming to herself as the other two Paladins had to reflect for a very long time before Shiro gave them the shake of his head.

“This isn't a Bachelor party,” Shiro admonished, frowning at one crystal and then tossing it off to the side. At least their rejects would be used for the Balmerans to harvest and create jewelry with. “I’d have to be getting married to him in earth culture for this to be a Bachelor party, married in the western version of marriage too.”

“The only culture you won't be married to Keith in.” Hunk muttered, holding two crystals in his hands and studying them. He had been sitting there for a good ten minutes so Shiro took pity on him, shaking his head. Hunk frowned, glaring at them before tossing them.

“I want to get earth married to someone of my choosing. Not someone Alfor decides on, saying ‘You might have working chemistry!’” What a load of bull, Shiro thinks, shuffling through a few more crystals. “Keith is great, and he's definitely beautiful but I’d rather have built a marriage on a friendship and relationship first.”

He stopped shuffling when he realized he wasn't receiving a response. He frowned, turning to Lance and Hunk and raising an eyebrow. “What.”

“Nothing!” Lance said, raising his hands. “I just, didn't think you'd notice Keith being pretty.”

“Handsome.” Hunk corrected, sending a glance to Lance.

“Beautiful.” Shay corrected, easily humming and gesturing towards some more crystals.

“Why is that so surprising? He’s not unattractive.” Not that looks mattered half the time. Shiro had met kind aliens who were probably beautiful in their cultures but clashed against things he was raised to believe in. But they had fantastic charisma and personality.

“Honestly,” Lance started and Shrio got ready for a fight. “I didn't think you'd notice someone attractive unless they punched you in the face!”

“Just because I don't hit on anything slightly feminine-"

“I despise that! You know I'm not just swayed by girls-"

“Oh my god, fine!” Shiro exclaimed, ready to throw a few crystals Lance’s way because the guy was just looking to be a little shit right now. Lance knew they didn’t mean anything by his preferences but he liked taking shots at them to see them squirm. It was endearing when it wasn’t thrown at you. “Just because I don't hit on anything slightly masculine, feminine or something in between doesn't mean I don’t notice it!”

“He has a point.” Hunk cut in, glaring at a few more crystals. “So many diplomats throw themselves at you and you never notice until it's time to bail you out.”

“I'm just not interested.” Shiro defended weakly. He knew exactly what they were talking about and it was not his fault. A diplomat from the planet Galibol has been so persistent in Shiro showing them around and he hadn’t realized the innuendos they were throwing until he was unwrapping the tentacles from his arms in discomfort (one was wrapped around his thigh and his squeak, though he denies it, had alerted the others to come bail him out). “Keith’s different. It's a political arrangement and although I would have liked more time to get to know him instead of branding each other for life, I'm not going to deny that he's attractive.”

“Guy’s a tough cookie, I'll give you that.” Lance pointed out. He had stopped searching to give Shiro his full attention, leaning on his knees.  “Don't know why you go for the ones that look like they can throw you out the window or punt you across a football field.”

“Maybe it's a kink.” Hunk mumbled and Shiro immediately turned away from them both.

“Nope, no way. We are not going there. I will personally throw you out of this cave if you try. Or worse.” His threat hung in the air and after years of knowing him and his insane training regime they shut up and turned to their crystals, whistling. He had perks as the leader of Voltron.

A comfortable silence fell over them, Shay’s undistracted humming filling it after awhile.

He filtered through a few more until he reached with his left hand and sliced his hand with a sharp crystal. He hissed, pulling back in surprise. The gloves were made of thick material but they weren't completely resistant.

He shook out his hand, and then blinked when he caught sight of the crystal he had cut himself on.

A piece broke off, dropping to the ground right in front of him.

“I found it.” He breathed. It was a little annoying that it hadn't actually been one of the ones on the ground they had been sorting through  but whatever. He lifted it, wiping it on the material of his shirt and frowned when the red color only stayed to stain the crystal.

Hunk and Lance clambered their way over as did Shay.

“Wow, it required a blood sacrifice. Nice.” He quipped but Shiro was just glad the process was over.

The sooner the treaty was sealed the sooner Shiro could figure out who Keith really was. He dropped the crystal into the vial with the ring, unable to keep the smile off his face.

Shay’s knowing smile made him blush.

They were roped into staying for Dinner where Shiro was pulled aside by Shay’s grandmother. Shiro was just glad he didn't have to stay and finish his meal (Lance was ready to cry while Hunk had soldiered on, lifting his bowl to clink against Shiro’s in misery. The bugs were still moving).

“As a gift from my family to yours.” She said, opening her hands to reveal a pair of bracelets. They weren't made from the usual Balmera crystals and for a second he was confused at what he was looking at. She cupped his hands and the smile she gave him made his heart squeeze. “I am proud of you Paladins. Since you arrived on this planet you have changed our lives but your own as well. You are our family, and I bless you for many happy years to come.”

His hands curled around hers as he dipped down and pressed their foreheads together. “Thank you, Grandmother.”

He put the bracelets into his pack, now thinking about his own family on earth. It left him with a feeling of dread. He had been so wrapped up over Keith, and the Galra alliance he forgot that he hadn't even mentioned to his parents he was getting married. This was one for the books, his moms weren't going to let him live this down.

The paladins returned to their ship, waving at the crowd gathered to the edges of the docking area. Once in board Lance helped him with take off procedures while Hunk helped power up the ship.

Hunk’s voice broke the calm that had been building throughout the night.

“Guys, we have a problem.” Hunk’s eyes were wide on the blaring message in front of him. “Allura’s been trying to hail us for an hour.”

“What? I thought communications were left open.” Shiro immediately transferred it over to the main screen, opening up the channel.

“Communications are off when we go into the caves.” Lance explained, hands tight on the controls as they waited for Allura to answer.

Shiro’s mind went through the different possibilities. Had Altea been attacked? Had the Galra taken back the alliance? Was everyone okay? What was happening?

When Allura’s face popped into view she looked relieved. “Oh, thank Altea you are alright!”

“What's wrong? Is everything alright?” Shiro asked immediately.

“Everything is fine.” She reassured but it failed. He was anxious, he heard it in her voice. She clicked on the screen, eyes downcast as she worked. “But we have run into a complication. You have a new task that takes priority over any others. There is light armor under your seats. I will be opening a wormhole for you to Altea and another straight to your destination.”

“Allura.” Lance snapped, easily on edge as the rest of them. She had a habit of doing this in serious matters when they only wanted her to admit to what was happening.

She flinched and the mask she wore faded almost immediately. She looked scared. “Someone sabotaged the ship Pidge and Keoath were using. We lost complete communication with them after the engine blew. Pidge reported engine malfunctioning before the comms dropped.”

All of them fell silent as she frowned, growing determined and sending them the coordinates. “Zarkon and Lotor do not know if this yet. So you must make haste to their last known location. Pidge is too out of range for me to lock onto but once you arrive I will be able to track them from there. Please, if they learn that the Prince has been hurt… or worse, Altea will not survive the repercussions.”

Her voice was serious, even as the chills spread across Shiro’s shoulders. They weren't dead, they couldn't be. Shiro’s hands tightened on the controls and he finished the take off procedures. “Understood. We won't fail you.”

They couldn't fail Pidge.

And in Shiro’s chest was a burning anger. He wasn't going to fail Keith either.

[shamarchived-blog]

     The shattered lands of Outland could be described as naught less than treacherous. Rolling hills, patches of forest, barren wastelands, and marshes had become its foundation. In lieu of a planet that had once been lay isles torn apart by the mistakes of an elder shaman; the fragment of a world many would sooner forget than recall. Even the flat lands and roads carved into what remained of nature held only small parts of their former selves. Few could remember the place in its glory days, and fewer still could recognized any part of the crumbling landscape. To relearn the lay of the land and connect with its precarious nature was to bond with a new world. Things had changed. Every crack in the earth was a mistake carved out by mortals in some vain attempt to better it. To know of its hazards took time and experience.

     How lucky it was, then, that the land was all the man knew.

     Artan spent his time wandering the edges of the land. The borders that loosely connected every part of the shattered world harbored very little. Many edges were mountainous and rough, leaving very little room to walk carefree. Every step was a cautious one. But it was within those dangerous places that life grew, cared for by the earth even in its hindered state. The flora of Outland varied greatly from place to place, a majority of it consisting of fungi and cone-like fruit. Those that weren’t in those groups tended to be tainted by the fel. Much of it was twisted and held rather undesirable appearances, the likes of which could only effectively be used in alchemy. No one looked to Outland for blossoming flowers or bustling wildlife. Such was simply history; a thing of the past that would never be. But within the unwelcome group of herbs was a flower, one which held healing properties along with a pleasant presentation. With a bright stamen and translucent petals, its very appearance was like a dream. The bloom resembled a burning sun, a gradient of orange and yellow making its petals out to be rays of sunshine. The glow it radiated was warm and inviting. It was for those very reasons that it earned its name: dreaming glory. Dreaming glories were miracles upon a land blemished by corruption and strife. They thrived in harsh climates and grew wild in places that were hard to reach. Very rarely did one find the flowers on flat ground. They preferred the edges of mountains and the places where one climate connected with another. To the residents of Outland, it was one of the loveliest flowers one could lay eyes on. But beyond its glorious traits, it had been Euanthe’s favorite.

     The broken had been set on gathering as many of the flowers as he possibly could, enough to make a large bouquet. It could fit fully in a vase with little room yet remain bright and healthy without having to be taken apart. He had bundled herbs often as a child, setting them in woven baskets and separating them according to color and properties. Flowers hadn’t been an exception. Artan was far more gentle with the flora than most would come to expect. More often than not he treated others far worse, indulging in rage and making a fight out of every situation. Not many expected him to have wit, nor did they see how resourceful he had been. For many years his family lived on the edge of the water, hunting and gathering away from the draenic cities further inland. He knew of the place long before it was torn apart, and he knew of it now. He knew of dangers. The man could tell when animals stalked them long before they even started to move. The instinct was ingrained within him. Even with his disfigurements and the peculiar way he pulled the flora from the earth, he had kept them all in pristine condition. His hand was steady and his focus steadier. Within time he had crafted the bouquet and found himself back within the confines of his tribe. How long had the warrior been gone finding just the right amount of flowers to fit into his gift? Hours, certainly. But even the dull pain surging through the soles of his feet hadn’t deterred him from it. There was confidence in heart and a boastful understanding of the season. Carefully he shifted the flowers in his hands, enough that it pulled the attention of a couple of broken passerby for a few brief moments. They knew what he was up to. It seemed to bring humorous expressions to their face, albeit there was some joking merit to them. The affectionate gesture was painfully obvious to the masses, but Artan continually played it off as little more than an occupation. The excuse didn’t quite cut it for him the same way it did for Mitun, however. The man was far more helpless than he made himself out to be. Yet he kept his expression direct and smooth, as though he were ready for anything. 

     But that pride quickly bled away from him the moment he drew closer to the shaman. Jubilant and preoccupied, he caught only the sight of her back and the braid that laid against it. Euanthe’s tail flicked in her quiet interest reworking the door to her hut, stretching its material to cover the entrance’s entirety rather than a small portion. The broken froze before he could muster a word to grab her attention, his fingers tightening around wrapping paper and thin twine. He could not even bring himself to be irritated with his lack of speech. It had always been so difficult to be angry around her. Even when he seemed to ignore the world in his bad temperament, he could always hear her gentle, fiery voice through the rage. The draenei jerked him back down to earth far faster than he could ascend from it. He hesitated in his stupor long enough for her to finish the job she had been occupied with. It was then that she noticed he had been watching her, turning around to face him and the large bouquet of dreaming glories in his hands. She very well might’ve startled him, had he not snapped out of his hesitation just as she realized he had been present.

      ❝Oh, Artan! I did not know you were behind me,❞ Euanthe admitted with a sheepish roll of the eyes. ❝I am sorry. My door was beginning to grow weathered. It was imperative that I fix it before another storm comes around. As much as I enjoy the rain and the thunder, my home begs to differ.❞ A slight pause followed a curious tilt of the head, her attention settling on the flowers in his hands. ❝Are you in need of something?❞

     No immediate response formed on his tongue, but Artan quickly thrusted the flowers in her direction without a second thought. The petals shook against the wrapping and their light flashed in the shaman’s direction, enough for her to straightened up and look down at them. Each and every flower was in one piece, a majority of the leaves cut away to make room for the abundance of blossoms. They were shining in her presence, reflecting tints of light in her eyes as she curiously looked upon them. Though she remained surprised and hesitant, it was clear by the way she looked at them that she admired them. Even hearing the flowers described to her made her smile. But to see them in person, regardless of whom they were meant for  — it always made her face light up.

      ❝They’re for you,❞ he assured, giving them another slight shake as if to entice her to take them.  ❝The flowers, I mean. I know how much you like them. So I thought I might... take a bit of a detour to go looking for a few.❞

     A smirk slowly began to make itself apparent on Artan’s face, hiding the inner struggle he faced beneath his pride. There was relief in him the moment she reached to pull the bouquet away from him, the blooms resting just below her chin as she held them at her chest. The sheer amount of dreaming glories he managed to fit within the bundle was enough to block out a majority of her upper figure. It was almost a pillow of flowers, arranged in a way that kept them firm but free. She could smell them without having to lean into the petals. A content joy settled into Euanthe’s smile as she melted into them, pressing them to her for a moment before looking down at them once more. 

      ❝Dreaming glories,❞ she breathed, shifting her glance back up to the broken.  ❝They are my favorite. I did not think anyone remembered such a little thing. How did you know?❞

      ❝Lucky guess.❞

     She spoke of the flowers often. Every time the shaman came across one on her walks or adventures across Outland, she plucked it from the ground and put it in her hair. Sometimes she would simply carry them home with her, putting them in a small glass and keeping them as long as they would last. It was very easy to assume that she was fond of them. Artan made himself out to be clever, but it was merely a keen sense of attention. To most, that was a surprise in itself. The draenei turned on the base of her hooves and found her way inside. It took her very little time to find a vase to put the flowers in, revealing the newly placed flora before setting them on a small table and coming outside once more. That grateful expression lingered on her face the entire time, making itself more present as she approached her guard once again. His gift had left quite the impression on her, and he found himself growing more comfortable the longer she wore her smile. But he found that confidence begin to slip from him once again as the shaman’s arms found their way around his neck. The gesture was sudden, leaving very little room for him to question it had he even wished to. His hands hesitated for but a moment before finding a place on her upper back. Without thinking he patted her once or twice, the sound of plate colliding gently against mail. It was almost as if it were assuring him that he had truly been holding her. She was warm, even through multiple layers of armor without physical contact. Not a part of him even thought about the countless things that brought him rage over the years. The only thing that seemed to keep him going anymore, the brute force that made him who he was. It seemed so non-existent in the face of a lamb. For awhile it felt like home before his family disappeared. Before he became so fed up with everything. It left him bruised and exposed and yet, he didn’t seem to mind it. Euanthe was as fierce as she was compassionate. But unlike him, she had learned to accept that which she had lost. He was still withholding it. In that way, she was far stronger than he had ever been. He didn’t understand it, but by the Light he welcomed it.

      ❝Euanthe.❞

     The shaman pulled away from him at the sound of her name, an idle blink the sign of her intrigue. The warrior gazed intently at her, a serious furrow of the brow enough to make her lock eyes with him. His hands slowly found their way down to her waist, stationing themselves there firmly enough to keep her still. It had certainly caught her attention. So acutely so, in fact, that he had her undivided attention. The thought of it brought an uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach, worsened by the sight of those doe-eyes looking expectantly at him. But Artan had never been a mild person. He had the timing, the will, and her sincerity. Perhaps it was time for him to talk to her.

     ❝I’m not any good at this sort of thing,❞ already there was pain in his voice as a result of his bruising pride. Shameful. Yet the broken continued, regardless, ❝but it’s something you need to know.❞

     It was difficult to keep his fingers from digging into her armor. A gentle nature came to him much easier around her, but it hadn’t been any less of a struggle. It was infuriating trying to articulate everything rushing to him. His thoughts were a garbled mess of words and turn of phrase he couldn’t make out. It mentally irritated him. A shaky sigh blew itself through his teeth off to the side before he looked at her to continue.

     ❝When I first came here, I wasn’t sure if I would stay. I didn’t need the help. I’m more than capable of taking care of myself. I spent most of my life relying on no one but myself. Fought my own battles, won my own wars. I didn’t need anyone else. But your family — they wouldn’t let me leave. They kept insisting it wouldn’t be the same without me around. And you... you wouldn’t let me go, either. You told me this is where I belonged.❞

     ❝No one deserves to go through everything alone. It does not matter how strong you are or how strong you become. You have blessed us all with your protection, and me with your company. You have even brightened my day with such lovely flowers. I could never wish for your absence, Artan.❞

     He hadn’t expected her to speak, much less in a way that happily pet his self-image. It brought a warmth to his face he couldn’t cover with his hands, lest they never be allowed to return to the draenei’s waist. Her interest was as innocent as it was oblivious and it did little more than make it harder on himself. 

     ❝The — point, is... you’ve always made me feel welcome. You make me think that, maybe, there’s something good in being soft. Honestly you’re... far stronger than I am. And you don’t need any rage to make it happen. You only have to be yourself. I’ve always looked up to that. I’ve always... loved that. You remind me of the times when I hardly knew what anger was. If my family hadn’t left me on the coast that day, I wonder if this is what I might’ve felt all the time; the way I feel when I’m with you.❞

     Euanthe’s joy ebbed into confusion as she listened to him. It was earnest confusion, the sort one got from misunderstanding. The flattery settled visibly in her face but the point didn’t seem to cross her as immediately as he might’ve hoped. She very well may have questioned him on his direction, but the way Artan looked at her kept her silent. The broken mumbled incoherent Draenei to himself, a small tug of the wrist bringing the shaman closer to him. Now he had truly lost his grasp on his words. He could feel the heat emanating from her face and, had he a nose still, they could’ve very well have been touching. Was there anything left for him to say? The draenei did not fight him, nor did she deny the closeness he had brought her. Her surprise was seemingly pleasant judging by the way she was still looking at him. Even watching him inch closer to her face, the instinct of the moment was beginning to pull on her. It wasn’t something that begged for an explanation. Perhaps she was beginning to understand it all without having to ask. The weight on her shoulders was fading underneath the honesty he had presented to her. Artan was open with her, albeit nervous and sincere beneath a boisterous facade. She felt calm. It was hard to imagine such a thing existed in his presence, but she had somehow made it all possible. Even now she had not even realized how badly he had pined for her in silence. But even though she hadn’t quite understood what he had said under his breath, she was beginning to fall for the silence.

     An intimate, short-lived silence.

    The feeling of the ground quaking and a loud, trumpeting sound jerked the shaman’s face away from Artan’s, just soon enough to rob him of even a graze of his lips against hers. The peace he felt shattered as his eyes reopened themselves, disdain flowing into them as his attention snapped in the direction of the commotion. A few yards away from them stood a large elekk, finally settling in place after trampling head long into the encampment. Its rugged brown hide was adorned in hearts and jewels with a blanket draped down its back. Other members of the tribe gazed up at the animal in awe as an older broken made him way down from the three-seated saddle mounted on its back. Mitun stepped in the direction of his partner and the leader of their tribe, the sight alone enough to make Artan return his hands to his side. Fingers curled tightly into his palm as the elder approached, his brow quirked at the sudden anger presented to him.

     ❝What the hell is that?❞ Artan spat. ❝And what the hell are you doing here? You told me you were going to get your old axe fixed!❞

     ❝Do you not remember what an elekk looks like?❞ There was a grin on Mitun’s face. It wasn’t a very common expression he wore, but it often showed at his partner’s expense. It was apparent that he had stopped something without even realizing it. ❝The talbuk we keep are fine. They get the job done. However, not much compares to the stamina and strength of an elekk. I could not very well ruin the surprise, could I?❞

     Already Euanthe had scampered off to the beast’s side, her eyes scanning the decorations adorning its body as it stood faithfully in its place. The creature was an older one, likely a pack animal before it took its place as an amiable mount. Despite its age, however, it was very clear that the elekk was still capable of causing chaos. Her hands gently caressed the animal’s hide before she allowed herself to face it, her kindly gestures earning her a pleasant sound and a sniff from its trunk. Artan could feel his blood boiling at the sight of the ruined opportunity, having spent the majority of his day slaving over sore hands and feet. The broken would’ve hauled off and hit the other had the shaman not come up to them again.

     ❝Where did you even get an elekk?❞

     ❝Borrowed it. I could not buy him, considering we lack the proper care for anything besides talbuk. But I gave the stable hand enough to lend it to us as well as dress him for the holiday. I must admit, I was not expecting the crystals. I may have to return to him with a little extra for this.❞ Mitun then addressed the eager woman now standing between them. ❝He is ours for the rest of the day. There is room for the three of us, if Artan wishes to join us. I was thinking a ride through the hills of Nagrand. What say you, Miss Euanthe?❞

     Much to the younger broken’s dismay, the draenei shook slightly in her excitement before nodding to assert her answer, ❝That sounds wonderful! I have not been to Nagrand in a very long time. It is such a lovely place, even in its disarray.❞ A short pause broke her eagerness before she reached to grab and pull on her younger guard’s hand. ❝You should come with us, Artan!❞

     ❝No thanks.❞

     ❝Ooh?❞ Euanthe’s voice cracked as her excitement broke. ❝Why not? You have done so much lately. Would you not like to take a break? It would be nice to have your company. You spoke so openly to me before. Perhaps there is — something else you wished to tell me?❞

     ❝If he does not want to come, we should not force him,❞ Mitun shrugged, his single eye resting on him before he stretched an arm out across her opposing shoulder. ❝I would not mind the time to speak with you. There is plenty for us to discuss on such a long trip.❞

     Silence broke the interaction as Euanthe quietly grew disappointed at Artan’s refusal. He didn’t give her much leeway to brood in it, however, before he pushed his way past Mitun hard enough to knock his arm off the shaman’s shoulder. It was a clear jab at his jealousy, one the elder took from time to time as testaments to the younger’s affection. Not that it had necessarily been his intention to interfere this time around, but a part of him deep down was rather relieved that he had done so. The older male couldn’t quite explain the relief, yet he hadn’t a need to. He shrugged the feeling off before it could sow itself in him. He knew she wouldn’t have had a pleasant trip had Artan stayed behind after being invited. Mitun was set on getting him to come along the whole time, even if it meant throwing him onto the elekk himself. Lucky for him, his quick wit handled the situation well enough. The younger warrior was already attempting to shuffle himself up onto the over-extravagant elekk. It brought the light back into Euanthe’s face to see him suddenly change his mind. After he settled in his seat directly in the middle, his eyes peered down at his partner with their usual scorn.

     ❝Get on the damn elekk. We’re going to Nagrand.❞

[abakersquest]

CHAPTER SIXTEEN – MITTERNACHT

The God’s Fortune slowly sailed along the rim of Galaga Island, making its way toward the narrow cape on the eastern coast. Captain Blackeye and Polly maneuvered around ship traffic and tidal eddies, all while checking for signs of anything amiss along the island’s coastline. Blackeye couldn’t shake the odd arrangement of the ghost ships before the morning’s battle from his mind. He had no idea what they were after or planning but, if there were something amiss, he’d see it. Come nightfall, the ship came to settle beside the island’s high walled cape and anchored at a very small dock there that was just barely visible above sea level.

To the untrained eye, the small platform was made to look more like part of the adjacent rock formation. Really, it was Blackeye’s personal dock. As Polly tied off the mooring ropes, the captain approached the steep wall of the cape and pushed down on a small grey stone near his feet. The sound of rock grinding on rock followed as portions of the cape wall receded to form handholds, as well as a door shaped opening at the top of them.

“Home sweet home,” he said with a small yawn, stretching out his arms before beginning to climb the wall.

Polly went to the far end of the disguised dock and opened an old chest made to look like a boulder. Inside were Fog Rocks, mysterious minerals that when combined with sea water produced a thick haze that fooled the eyes of even the most practiced navigator. She hefted the heavy white rock and tossed it into the water behind the ship. A soup thick fog soon arose from the waters surrounding the God’s Fortune, obscuring it entirely from sight. With a content smile at a job well done, she made sure to remember there was only one Fog Rock left in the false boulder chest and that they’d need more soon. With that done, she climbed up the wall toward the only other home she’d ever known.

The stone passage above was dark as Blackeye finished his climb. He reached out toward the wall and tapped a shape in the darkness, the object then began to glow and several more down the passageway joined in on cue. Brilliant white crystals, purposefully embedded into the sides of the stone hallway banished the inky blackness and revealed the interior iron door. The captain pulled a charm from the gold ring that pierced his fin and pressed it against a slot in the door. Inside, the pins of a lock clicked loudly, its tumbler creaked as it was turned left, then right, then left again. Thick bolts slid back into their recesses and the door gave a small hiss as the air pressure beyond it changed rapidly. Blackeye stared hard at the door as he gently placed his hand on it. His mind’s eye perceived the endless ocean once again, and ahead of him was a tidal wave of danger. The old shark gritted his dagger teeth, kicked the door open and rushed forward toward the imminent threat with a ferocious roar.

A deep and mystically intoned voice drowned the noise of the captain’s shout. With the words, “Titanic Cosmos” the Captain collapsed to the ground as if crushed by a great weight. He struggled against the unseen force that squashed him against the floor of his own home, his muscles straining against a pressure that increased by the second.

“Mmmgood to see you’re in fine health, Captain. Makes me feel young to see you’re still the mmmterrifying figure you always have been.”

Blackeye dragged his face against the floor to turn his working eye toward the unfortunately familiar voice. Before him, in the brightening light of the crystal lamps, stood a squat brown toad Sauroian dressed in dark purple robes, and a brimless embroidered cap. In his hand was a gnarled wooden branch bearing a large black crystal orb that vibrated the air around it.

“BULFO! YOU SLIME! I’LL RIP YOUR HEAD OFF AND MAKE YOU INTO A BAGPIPE!”

The sinister sorcerer smirked down at his foe. “Mmmand your manners are just as curt and violent, more hope for this old toad. Mmmspeaking of…”

It was then Blackeye noticed the parchment in the sorcerer’s other hand, recognizing it instantly as a map he’d made and hidden away in his home.

“Mmmhonestly, I knew the chances the Ancient Lighthouse would still be standing in this new era would be slim… I expected the Rogue to find something of its foundation at least, but you’d completely demolished it, didn’t you?” He tucked the map away slowly, as if to insult Blackeye further. “Mmmbut not without making sure you could find your way back to the Storm Bell, just in case. Don’t try to deny it… I can already see your memories all over it.”

Blackeye slammed the floor with all his might, forcing his body up against the massive force pushing it down, almost managing to close his teeth around Bulfo’s arm before the push of magic changed directions and smashed his back into the wall, knocking the air out of his lungs.

“Mmmbad move, old sailor. You won’t be getting another drop of air now.”

As Blackeye felt his chest compress more and more, the borders of his vision began to dim and the color of the world began to fade as consciousness slipped from his grasp. His senses barely registered the beam of light that cut across the space between him and Bulfo, clipping the sorcerer’s arm and scorching his robe.

“GET AWAY FROM MY GRANDPA!”

Standing in the door way with gleaming dagger ready, Polly fired another volley of light at the offending Sauroian. The beam, while blocked by his staff, broke his concentration enough to release Blackeye from his mystic grasp.

As her attention turned to Blackeye’s fall for only a second, a slate of black nothingness in the shape of a door formed behind Bulfo that he easily stepped backwards into.

“OH NO YA DON’T!” Polly rushed forward catching the ephemeral lip of the closing dark doorway, her hand a gleaming chromatic lightshow as she forced the mystical structure open and pushed her way through, suddenly finding herself on the road that ran down the end of the cape back into town, and mere feet from the fleeing sorcerer.

“Mmm! Old Blackeye’s still a great treasure hunter, you are quite the jewel! Aren’t many in the world today that can use light or dark magic, you know. Mmmit’s a good thing I planned ahead for any surprises.”

“SHUT UP!” Polly fired another shot at the toad’s head, only to see the beam curve and spiral into the black orb atop his staff, vanishing like water down a drain.

“Mmmone lucky shot, dear girl. That’s all you get. You’d best hold onto your energy regardless, you’re going to need it.”

In the distance an explosion of fire shone its crimson light on the whole of the island. Even miles out; Polly could feel the burst of heat rush past her after the sound.

“Mmmwould you look at that, the whole island will burn to the ground in no time if you don’t get a move on.” He turned from the explosion to stare her down. “What’s your choice dear girl? Try to fight me in the cinders, or save the townsfolk?”

Polly sneered at Bulfo. “They can save themselves, idiot!”

“Mmmcan they now? Are you sure? I don’t hear any one moving or shouting to put the fire out. Do you? Come now, you’ve the gift of Light, you can see for yourself.”

Polly hesitated to look away from the dangerous Sauroian standing before her, only risking a glance toward the outskirts of the town, catching sight of people collapsed to the ground. “No… WHAT DID YOU DO?!”

“Mmmthat is the question, no reason not to answer. I put the island to sleep while you and your ‘grandpa’ were apparently somewhere on the water. Mmmonly reason you and him are still awake. You can wake them up, I’m sure… Or let them keep on sleeping as they’re consumed by that inferno down there.”

Polly clenched her jaw, gripping her dagger so tightly her hand shook with tension and anger.

“MmmI see you’ve made your choice, good luck.” Bulfo nodded his head to her and walked through a new dark doorway that quickly vanished.

The young Icthyite quickly spun on her heels and took off up the cape, rapidly uncovering a hidden hatch beneath a fake rock, yanking it open with all her strength, shouting down the passage, “GRANDPA! COME QUICK!”

Quickly gaining his second wind, adrenaline surging through his every heartbeat, Blackeye almost flew up the ladder to join his granddaughter’s side, his eyes catching sight of the spreading fire in the heart of Galaga. “By the eastern tides…”

“Everyone I can see’s been put to sleep by that fella in the robes!”

The captain nodded grimly. “Aye lass, look up.”

Polly did as she was told and scanned the sky; it wasn’t long until a terrifying realization caused her heart to sink. “The stars… The moons! GRANDPA WHAT’S HAPPENIN’ TO THE SKY?!”

“Dark magic, a black fog, spreadin’ out over the land that puts all the folk under it t’ sleep… If we don’t keep movin’ it’ll do the same t’ us. Right! I’ll get to work on tryin’ t’ put out that fire, you use that gift of yours t’ find the crew and get’em t’ help you wake up as many people as y’can, it’s the only way t’ stop it.”

“Are you sure, grandpa? Have you seen this before?”

“I have… Now get goin’! We ain’t got time to gab!”

Polly nodded and rushed off toward the town as fast as her legs could carry. She fished the small spyglass out of her blouse and held it up to her eye, quickly scanning as much of the town as she could see from the cape’s elevation. In the distance she spotted small flickers of silvery snow-like particles drifting around the southwestern part of the town. “There!” Polly tucked her spyglass back into her blouse and kept running. When she knew she was going as fast as her legs could manage, she screwed her eyes shut and forced herself to take the deepest breath she could, filling her lungs to capacity before vanishing mid-stride in a flash of blue light. Instantly she reappeared in a similar flash, in the place she’d seen the silver snow hovering, skidding to a halt as the mystical transit preserved all her momentum. She hated teleporting, it always needed a running start and it almost always forced every bit of air in her lungs to vanish if she didn’t take in some extra beforehand.

The air around her was hot and just on the verge of being smoky as she was forced to breath it in. The spread of the fire was accelerating and she knew she’d have to move fast to save the others. Polly did her best to focus past the discomfort in her throat to perceive the mysterious shimmering particles her new friends gave off. She chased the lingering flickers down the avenue as fast as she could, grateful for the gaslights that kept her from blindly staggering in the dark. She winced as she chose to ignore the sleeping figures in the corners of her vision, knowing that saving the others took priority, but doing her best to memorize the place of every one she saw. Finally, strewn on the cobblestone road only a few crossroads from the pier, she found Hector, Wistea, and Rozzi.

She reached down and experimentally shook Hector; he grumbled slightly but remained asleep. She shook him harder, still no response.  With no other choice, she silently apologized before rearing back a hand and slapping him across the face.

“AGH! GHA! DAMMIT I’M U-... Polly?”

“Oh thank goodness that worked, I was runnin’ outta ideas!”

Hector rubbed his cheek as he took stock of his surroundings, a starless sky, the smell of burning wood, Polly’s look of concern as she moved on to rouse Rozzi. His memories slowly came back into focus; the four of them were suddenly overcome with inexplicable exhaustion and collapsed in the middle of the street. Just before he passed out a strange figure appeared and dragged Wally away from them. He sprang to his feet quickly and searched for any sign of him nearby. “Damn! That fire’s blocking my sense of smell; I can’t pick up Wally’s scent!”

Rozzi almost slugged Polly as she was stirred from sleep, stopping just shy of clipping her chin. As the Icthyite moved on to Wistea, Rozzi quickly hopped onto her feet and made her way over to their fallen bag of goods, digging through it quickly to find her sickle and chain. As Hector spoke she wrapped the excess chain around her waist, and tucked the blade into a gap in the looped chain. “Fire’s the biggest clue we got, whatever happened to Wally, you better believe he’s at the heart of these flames.”

“Seems a bit obvious to me… For all we know, this is just an ordinary fire, set as a distraction so we think we’ll find Wally on the island.”

Above their heads, the voice of Captain Blackeye rang out over the whole of Galaga, along with a sizable surge of magically controlled water snaking up from the ocean upon which he rode. He cried, “TIDAL HAMMER!” then leapt off the enormous cord of water, sending it splashing down over the heart of the flames. The buildings nearest the collision caught the brunt of a massive steam explosion that resulted, the water evaporating almost instantly.

As the steam cleared off, the fire continued to spread out from the center of town, barely hindered by Blackeye’s efforts.

“Okay so maybe that is Wally’s fire,” Hector admitted. “But if he’s asleep like we were, how could he be doing any of this? I know for a fact no one can use magic in their sleep.”

“That… isn’t exactly true,” groaned Wistea as she rubbed her sore cheek. “Our… Sleep was induced by a Dark spell over the whole of the island, drawing away our wakefulness. But that ‘energy’ has to go somewhere.”

She got back to her feet and carefully watched the fire raging in the distance. The flames both moved and spread far too unnaturally to be anything but magical. “It looks like Wally is just emitting magical fire. There is no structure to this, no will maneuvering the flame at all.” Wistea looked pensive for a moment. “I have read accounts… That powerful magic users disturbed by nightmares lose even subconscious control of their abilities. That may very well be the case here. The energy taken from the people of this island turned into a nightmare just for him.”

In the distance they could hear the swearing and spell casting of Captain Blackeye, punctuated by the occasional explosion of steam and annoyance as he struggled against the encroaching inferno.

Hector straightened himself out. “If we wake the people, will that break the nightmare?”

Wistea shook her head. “It has already been cast; the only way to reverse it is to find him.”

“Then that’s our goal. Rozzi, you and I can move fastest so we’ll prioritize finding Wally in this maelstrom while trying to save who we can on the way. Polly, Wistea, you organize whoever you can wake up, the more hands the better.

With that, Hector and Rozzi rush toward the spreading flames as Polly and Wistea rushed away from them, each holding a silent prayer in their heart for their missing friend.

---

Ash and cinders rained on the still smoldering ruins of Animana. Black Rock Knights patrolled every street, ending the lives of anyone who’d survived the initial strikes. Through the clouds of acrid black smoke, one could see glimpses of Kota’s massive airship, further blotting out any hope that possibly remained. Wally stood amidst the remains of Gateside Way. Ahead of him, in the rubble, were the corpses of his friends, discarded like so much waste. Behind him, his family huddled for safety in their home as the Ragged Rogue and the Thorned Princess approached. The shattered Stellar Flare was far too light in his hands, and his fire was far too dim. The taste of blood on the back of his tongue and the ache in his chest spoke of broken ribs and worse. He demanded his vision clear as he shouted and charged toward the two generals with all the strength he could muster.

They toyed with him, blocking his every strike, knocking him aside with little effort, and all the while cruel, deafening, horrifying laughs drowned out everything else. His head was pounding, his arms shaking with exhaustion, but they’d have to kill him before he let them touch his family. So, gathering every last drop of will he had, he poured every iota of fire into the remnants of the Flare he could, and charged once more.

---

Captain Blackeye huffed in frustration as the flames continued to loom ominously and showed little sign of slowing. He’d thrown everything at them he could short of anything that’d destroy the buildings he was trying to save. At the very least, the loud and forceful burst of steam had awoken several citizens. He stood there frustrated, beating the end of his harpoon against the cobblestones as he did his best to not only stay awake, but ignore the truly oppressive heat all around him. It was then that Rozzi, leaping from roof to roof, crossed the top of his sightline. “OI! MISS ORLAND!”

Just below her, Hector burst through a window with two children under his arms, landing heavily before presenting them to their parents. He looked up from his task and saw the waving arms of Blackeye through the haze of heat.

When they came close enough, Blackeye called out over the roar of fire. “I ain’t makin’ a lick’a headway with this! The fire ain’t natural!”

“We think it might be Wally,” Hector said. “Whoever put the island to sleep is making him do it.”

“Oh! Well then! That actually makes things easy!”

Rozzi and Hector took a moment to stare directly at the captain as a gas lamp behind them exploded.

“We just gotta find ’im. He wakes up, all this goes away!”

“That was our plan, yes!” Hector replied. “But it’s not exactly ‘easy’ finding anyone in an inferno, especially one small, sleeping wallaby!”

“Then ain’t you lot glad ya got ol’ cap’n Blackeye for a friend?” The captain turned his harpoon over in his hand and stabbed the bladed end into the ground. Closing his eyes to focus, he held the shaft in both hands and erased the sensation of heat and immediate danger to himself. Amidst the internal image of an infinite ocean, he ignored ripples and waves and sought a whirlpool, a swirling nexus of threat amidst a sea of dangers. His eyes snapped open and he yanked up his harpoon pointing it toward the southwest portion of the island. “THAT WAY! THAT’S WHERE WE’LL FIND THE LAD!” With little warning he lifted Rozzi clean off her feet and plopped her onto his shoulder, taking Hector under his other arm, his nose dangerously close to the blade of Blackeye’s still in hand harpoon.

Before either could complain or protest; the captain began a spell. “Eight forms to one shape, from heart to heel and aide! SLIPSTREAM!” all around his feet a steaming pool of water formed, before long it rose to his ankles and suddenly it jetted forward, arching over the buildings ahead of  its spontaneous flow. The three then raced forward at breakneck speed along the path created by the mystically imbued water. As they went, flames arose and rapidly evaporated sections of the path, forcing the captain to jump the lengthy gaps, much to the dismay of his passengers.

The path of magical water came to spiral over the southwestern portion of the sprawl when the captain shouted. “RIGHT! CLOSE AS I COULD GET US! SEE IF YOU SEE HIM!”

With really nothing else to do besides look down, Rozzi and Hector scanned the townscape below for any sign of Wally as the captain focused on keeping them on the aquatic rail. It was difficult to see through the smoke and haze while moving at the speed they were, but it was Hector that saw it first. “THERE!”

Rozzi and the captain followed the point of Hector’s finger down to a mass of flames that at first seemed the same as the rest, burning away inside the now scorched remains of a warehouse. But as they watched, they saw the fires both inside and around it turning like strange clockwork.

“OKAY! HANG ON EVERYONE!” The captain somersaulted forward, taking a section of the watery road with him as he launched them all down toward the smoldering warehouse. The amassed water around his feet easily bashed through the ruined roof, but the flames below bent like elastic under them, and the water quickly boiled off, knocking the old shark and his living cargo backward with a burst of steam. As they all tumbled, Blackeye deftly maneuvered his passengers, securing them to his chest as his back crashed through several burnt out timbers.

Hector and Rozzi stood slowly as the oppressive heat in the burning warehouse made it hard to breathe or see. However, what lay before them was an unmistakable sight. Surrounded by a bubble of flames, curled into a ball was Wally. His face a portrait of misery and pain as no doubt horrible images played out in his fitful sleep.

Hector took a step toward the burning sphere, only to have an intense blast of heat react to his approach. “Damn! How can we even reach him?!”

Rozzi drew her sickle and slashed the heated atmosphere into a whirlwind around herself.

“Rozzi wait! That won’t work! You’ll only fan the flames!”

“DON’T CARE!” she shouted as she charged forward. The mystical energies of flame and wind intermingled causing both to surge violently. The fire spread faster and whipped around the small whirlwind, forming a cascade of flames that threatened to scorch her alive. With a defiant shout she pushed against the onslaught of wayward fire and tore herself a path to the tortured wallaby. She could smell her fur starting to burn, and felt her lungs fight desperately for any breathable air as she burst through the blazing barrier around Wally.

The heat inside was beyond unbearable as she moved closer to him. Her feet cooked on the stone floor beneath them. When she was close enough, she fell to her knees at his side and pulled him close to her, screwing her eyes shut to keep them from boiling in her skull. “You… You’re so… Lucky you’re… worth all this… Nonsense.” She barely managed enough air to speak in the blazing space.

As Rozzi held him close, somehow, someway, she could see an image of his dream in her mind. She saw the exhausted wallaby standing all alone in the face of evil, battered and beaten down. She held him even tighter as she struggled to say, “Please… Wake up… Stop… Fighting all… Alone.”

---

Within the nightmarish vision plaguing Wally’s mind, he stood alone before seemingly invincible enemies. They had morphed from Kota’s Generals into nameless and shapeless threats that mocked him for even trying to fight. His right arm was broken and useless, his left eye was bruised shut and bloody. How he was still standing he had no idea, but he had to, he couldn’t stop, they’d have to kill him first. His mind was empty of any other thought, his body moved on willpower alone. In his hand was nothing more than a half melted hilt that he couldn’t even lift. He’d never been in more pain, he’d never been so tired, and every ounce of his spirit demanded he fight despite his body desperately demanding the opposite. Somehow he took a step toward his enemy and fell forward, but what came wasn’t a harsh fall, but a gentle catch.

A distant voice, quiet and kind, spoke in half heard words. The voice could be trusted; he knew it as well as he knew his own name. It asked him to stop, and with that simple request, he let the remains of the Stellar Flare drop from his hand, shattering into a million pieces as it hit the floor.

---

Hector watched in amazement as all around them, the mystical flames instantly evaporated from existence, leaving behind the all too real damage. Ahead of him, in a still steaming crater, Rozzi held Wally so tightly her limbs shook. Behind him, Blackeye stirred and groaned something under his breath about his fin. Meanwhile, along the shoreline, happy cheers rung out as the sky returned to normal, and the distant flames abated, a relieved Wistea and Polly sharing sighs and smiles.

Wally had trouble opening his eyes at first, like the rest of his body, his eyelids felt as if they’d been strained for hours. As his vision came into focus, Hector gave a casual salute, and Blackeye offered up a polite grin. In the corner of his eye he could see unmistakable red orange fur.

“You’re…” he recoiled ever so slightly at the sound of his own voice, it felt like ages since he’d even spoken. “I’m… It… Was all that just… a nightmare?”

Rozzi slowly loosened her grip and pulled back slightly to let Wally see her. “Welcome back to the land of the living.”

He couldn’t stop the joyous tears welling up in his eyes, nor the sob that leapt from his throat before he spoke. “So none of that… It didn’t happen? You’re all okay!”

Hector smiled, “well, we’re all a little singed.”

“Got a bent fin meself” The captain chuckled.

“And we’ll all smell like fresh kindlin’ for a bit.” Rozzi giggled before she winced.

It was then Wally noticed the many things out of place, he sat up slightly to make sure. The burnt patches of her fur were undeniable, soon he noticed other signs they’d all been dealing with a good deal of fire, to make no mentioned of the scorched brick and mortar wall behind them that just then began to crack and collapse.

“Did… Did I…”

Rozzi reached up and tweaked the end of Wally’s nose. “No, sir. I’ll have none of that on my watch. This was absolutely, unequivocally, and entirely not your fault.” She tugged his nose down, eliciting an entirely indescribable noise from him. “And if you so much as try to think that, I’ll be quite cross, understood?”

Wally did his best to nod with his nose trapped.

“Good!” She happily released him. “Now, if you’re still feeling guilty, you can work that off by carryin’ me ‘til my feet stop hurtin’.”

---

The next morning, the sound of many hammers at work, wood being sawed, and mortar being spread rang out alongside the regular bustle of life in Galaga. The six warriors sat around one of the still intact tables at an eatery where Blackeye explained that Galaga was used to having to rebuild itself after some particularly violent storms, and promised that the night’s events would only come to strengthen the island’s commerce.

With some of the tension alleviated, the group all watched as their Forest Mage proceeded to place glasses before each of them and filled each with a strange blue green liquid with the consistency of syrup.

Wistea offered them a happy smile as she explained, “it is made from Sylasim Noctis and Noir Root. Not only will it erase any lingering effects of the sleep spell, it will make you immune to it as well.”

“Always hated medicine…” Blackeye grumbled as he lifted his glass and tossed back its contents. He jolted slightly in surprise and let the remaining flavors play out over his tongue. “Huh! Not bad.”

With somewhat less hesitation the rest drank, and while Polly and Wistea shared in the Captain’s delightful surprise, the three Animani’s faces proceeded to screw inward in retreat of what must’ve been the foulest thing they’d ever had in their mouths.

“Oh dear!” Wistea exclaimed. “I am so sorry! The taste was the last thing on my mind!” She then pensively tapped her chin, “But then, come to think of it, there is very little written on the differences in palate that exist between the species of Mondia. That could make for a wonderful dissertation some day!”

“Wait,” Polly said curiously. “I thought Wally was the only one that made ‘desserts.’”

Wistea was about to explain when Hector stopped her, just shaking his head.

“Well… At any rate, here you are Rozzi; this should help with your burns.” From her bag, Wistea produced a small glass jar filled with a caramel colored substance. “Just rub it in where you feel you need it at least twice a day.”

Rozzi took the jar, “Thank you, Wisty.” She then immediately handed it to Wally before propping her feet up on his lap.

When he looked up from them, he saw her sly and contented smile. “Alright… That’s fair.”

“Much as I hate makin’ a lady wait, I’d better speak me peace first.” Blackeye sat a little straighter and his expression grew serious. “I didn’t mention this before now on account a not wantin’ t’ exhaust you all further. But last night’s mayhem was all about Vizier Bulfo takin’ my map to the Storm Bell; A magical artifact that marks the location of the Fount of the Sea. S’where all the waves, currents, and all the things that keep the ocean stirrin’ source from. Don’t know if they’re after one or both, but they got a lead on us and we need to catch up fast.”

Polly watched as the others shared glances.

Wistea was the first to speak. “First the Wellspring, then the magic of the Silent Marsh, now a powerful magical artifact relating to the functioning of the sea? What on Mondia could Kota’s forces possible be after with that kind of power? Any one of them could destroy the balance of the world on their own, much less in tandem.”

“As it stands we’re all pretty much done here.” Hector said. “All that’s left is to pick up our armor, make ready the Fortune, and to discuss the issues facing Wally.”

“I’m sorry the what now?” Wally replied, his ears springing up in total surprise.

As Wally looked around the table, warm and compassionate smiles greeted him. Hector reached out and placed a comforting hand on his fellow knight’s shoulder. “It’s only been a little over a month since this all began, Wally. Before now, you’ve only ever worked toward being a baker… When fate came calling you swallowed up your fear and pushed on despite it.”

“A very commendable act, to be sure!” Wistea chimed in.

“But just because you’re the only one who can carry the Flare, don’t mean we can’t help carry the rest.” Rozzi added.

Hector continued. “It may feel like the weight of the entire world is pressing down specifically on you, but don’t forget, we’re right there alongside you, right where we all chose to be.”

Blackeye slapped his hand against the table. “Damn straight!”

Wally looked around the table once again at the kind faces of his friends. In that moment it felt as if an enormous pressure on his spirit had been released, he smiled back at all of them and replied, “Thank you, thank you all so much.”

<[Chapter 15]–[Index]–[Chapter 17]>

[harlematl]

Welcome to the “New World” where reality has arrived and smacked you in the face as if you stole something.

 Surprise you’ll be, should you ever uncover then discover the diabolical genius of the devil who’s actually god wearing a ski mask. As the tables turn you then finally learn everything you were told was a lie.

The Invisible Invader

The Final Stages Of Mutation

The process of the new norm is almost complete. The reconstruction of a better hamster wheel is in vogue. The United Nations has been dissolved and evaporated. The implementation of a global government has taken shape. Social distancing equates to social distress. The silent game changer has the ball in its spores. The transformation of the final product has begun. Panic and hysteria run rampant in the streets across the globe. The death toll for the infected has spiked and is at an all time high (7 million globally and climbing). 

From the unemployed including the mental health and the homeless sector to the on-call tail wagging, (cash app) slurp & burp foundation, the numbers will only continue to grow.  The main population of concern on a global scale are the unattended, the forgotten, the untreated and the uninsured. Many of them sleep above and below the earths surface. They travel like nomads and go unnoticed when crossing borders, state and county lines. Some, will use public restrooms while others will relieve themselves in public without washing their hands along with no toilet paper insight.

They play, dwell and shop for 5 finger discount specials in your local stores, school yards, parks, garbage dumpsters and playgrounds during the day and far into the night. For some, turnstile hooping has become a musical event and a obstacle course should the police ever give chase. The infected ride the subway, airplanes, trolley cars, taxi and private line buses. The threat is real. The wishful and foolish thinking don’t take this matter seriously. They continue to gather in small or large groups thinking it can’t happen to them. Time will tell, especially when they gather together to say their final goodbye. 

Meanwhile, indigents find themselves rolling the dice and stray off from the crowd to tough it out on their own. Collectively, we all are fighting for survival. It has become a doggy dog world. Every man, woman and child fending for themselves until the end. It’s not a dream, it’s a global nightmare at its best. It’s similar to an unbelievable movie. It’s like some Mission Impossible Tom Cruise type of shit. I’m talking about life inside Knuckle City where the days and nights aren’t so bright and nothing is pretty or high sadity. The comfort of life is no longer what it use to be. Those days are forever, gone.

The Invisible Invader

Let’s be clear, never bet against the virus.

A dark cloud hovers over the world. Like an airplane as it touch down on a runway the process of a new way of life has landed. An updated “tracking chip” has been successfully implanted. The persuasion for inoculation of the herd, has been achieved. The prison system and the private sector are all on board. However, there are many who stand firm against change and believe in the right and the fight for refutational preemption. Former civilians who escape capture go in hiding either into the hills or deep underground to create a more natural (holistic medicine) resistance for tomorrow’s future.

Until further notice, drinking Clorox is not the answer for this dilemma. The genie is out of the bottle and it’s becoming hard to breath. Women in the street are on their knees crying because their babies are dying. People are trying to wrap their heads around the madness. Men are out of work, rent is over due and the child support system is looking for their slice from your pie. Our heart breaks from the ache. The stress alone puts many of us six feet under. The entire ordeal scars you for life. It forces you to reach deep down inside yourself to discover the gift that’s within. This smells like a recipe for the apocalypse with a side order of cocoa bread with extra cheese. A once hot economy now turns into ice. Planes, buildings and everything on the ground is on fire. People in the street screaming, running in panic and out of desperation. It’s as if the world is coming to an end. What have we learned from this experience?

The Invisible Invader

Animals such as dogs and cats that travel outside can bring inside an unwanted visitor such as the incredible invisible invader. It will hitch a ride and can travel in their hair and on the bottom of their paws. It can be hidden in their stool. Your pets sit and lay on house furniture and jump on your bed to stretch out and fall asleep. Some wipe their butts on your carpet and bed spread. You walk on the same carpet and track it throughout the entire house/apartment. Cleaning your pets properly is mandatory. The streets, sidewalks and many public/private places remain filthy. Who is responsible to govern and properly clean them? Why hasn’t this been done? Population control comes to mind.

The Invisible Invader

 Some people portray themselves one way during the day only to transform into someone or something else during the twilight of the night. Those who wear a white or blue lab coat while working may have an assignment to cure diseases. Other people who wear the same attire may have an entirely different agenda.

What is the cost to create part-time jobs to train and properly (disinfect) clean, scrub the parks, playgrounds, streets, schools, subways, airports, bus stops, office buildings and homes? 

The Invisible Invader

This is history stuck on repeat. When will many of us wake up and learn from the lesson(s) from the past?  There’s no such thing of a magic bullet. Health officials knew back in December this was coming. The late response isn’t acceptable. Watching refrigerated trucks deliver and store deluxe size refrigerator coffins shipped to hospitals only to stack and pack the bodies is very telling. Hospitals are experiencing a shortage of medical supplies like ventilators and personal protective equipment. Some people have to remind themselves we are living in a first world country; one who leads the pack. Let’s rewind the clock and take a closer look.

Phase 1: The Outbreak (70 days ago) 

Effective fitness… It’s order-less and unseen to the naked eye. It quickly spreads from people to people at a rate never experienced before in the history of man and his kind. This invisible invader can live on surfaces from 2 days to close to 25 days, depending upon environmental conditions.

Those whom are asthmatic, suffer from HIV, cancer or have type 2 diabetes are in danger the most. Many people who don’t have medical insurance are ass out and up shits creek without a paddle.  Respiratory droplets are produced when an infected person coughs, sneezes or talks. The virus is airborne. It can live on the floor and on most surfaces for days and possibly for weeks. Social distancing of 6 feet to 33 feet may not be enough especially should the wind current dictate its reach. Toilet seats are not safe. The invader has the ability to infiltrate through feces and diarrhea. It also attacks the gastrointestinal tract, heart, liver and kidney leading to organ failure. Research study has found the virus in semen.  

The Invisible Invader

Phase 2: The Smokescreen (68 days ago)

It’s the year of the elections and the poles are open. The people have turned out in droves. Citizens in outrage, they demand a change and are eager to cast their vote. A new President is in sight. But wait, there’s something else just beyond the horizon.

A news flash has been posted on the bottom of a television screen about a virus outbreak. All election poles have been temporarily closed. A 30 day quarantine has been enforced for the safety of the population. The government has ordered the shut down of commercial and private businesses. 

The Invisible Invader

Phase 3: Global Pandemic (Present day)

The quarantine restriction has been extended. Sadly, there isn’t a vaccine at the present time to alleviate such a pandemic. Major corporations fold, close shop and file for bankruptcy. Many small businesses have been hit the hardest and fail to survive the aftermath. Massive lay-offs affect the entire globe. Unemployment claims are at an all time high. Wall Street, stock prices spiral and plummet. Corona Beer stock prices surge upward. Many corporations  benefit and save money from having selective employees work from home. Eliminating the use and the need for office space has been a tremendous upside. Door Dash and Uber Eats profits sky rocket. 

The Invisible Invader

Phase 4: Curfew & Quarantine Status 

The cause & effect. A divide exist among the haves and the have-not. Stock annalist fear a crash is near.  The American economy suffers another critical hit which threatens to send the nation back into the days of the Great Depression in epic proportions. Empty sounds of static occupy the airwaves.  Wireless devices and flat screen televisions across the nation are in the dark (Picture-less).  Broadcast stations, radio and television networks haven’t transmitted a broadcast signal in three days.  April, May, June and July’s rent is past due as August quickly approaches.  Protesters march to voice their opinion as rioters and looters look to take advantage of the given situation.  Rioting becomes the language of the voiceless and the unheard.  The stress builds when there’s no jobs, no vaccine, police brutality which often lead to murder which ultimately builds a bridge to civil unrest. 

The Invisible Invader

Inside random apartments, arguments can be heard from residents living upstairs, downstairs and next door. The view outside of a complex window reveal people fighting and cursing at one another using colorful metaphors of expression. Their threats become more vile as heads begin to butt with vivid visual animation. The scene must have been taken straight out of a cartoon. A reign of terror has dropped down on the heads of the unexpected like an anvil. The rage outside begins to bubble, boil and spill over. Terrifying screams from people being accosted, accompanied with fear spread throughout the city streets. Citizens barricade themselves inside their homes armed with enough firepower to supply a small army brigade.

The Invisible Invader

Bio-germ warfare. In this case, it’s airborne, odorless and invisible to the naked eye. It invades your space unbeknownst to the host.  Like cancer, it takes over your body.  Unlike cancer it will accelerate and terminate your existence at a faster rate. 

Every noun occupies space. In the mind of others, a depopulation agenda occupies space and has moved-in next door along with the means to carryout it’s hidden agenda. The agenda can be found inside or around our local schools, place of worship, movie theaters, supermarkets, shopping malls, playgrounds and workplace.  What’s on the surface may not attract your attention or stand out to the naked eye. What’s beneath the surface will eventually rise to the top and make it’s presents felt. The seen and the unseen can be one of the same. It could be standing or floating right in front of you, later introducing itself at a later date, in, around and above a local community near you.

No more trips to Africa to test a new vaccine. Why not try something different and go to France or Germany and spearhead a experimental campaign of a new drug on that population? Compassion should be the gasoline that fuels the light which guides us as we travel down the rabbit hole. Where’s the compassion for humanity? Don’t answer that last question. 

The Invisible Invader

This journey has a way of leading us all into calamity and ruin. We pray for a story of triumph after a storm of tragedy.

It went on deaf ears when, we were warned years ago of a possible virus outbreak. Today, a pandemic is on our front porch. This is not a movie on Netflix, HBO or Showtime. This shit is real. Standing six feet from each other (social distancing) is better than being buried six feet underground.

The blue or red tape on the floor is not to be ignored. The hand sanitizer on the wall is for our collective safety. Just don’t kill the good bacteria. It would be better to wash your hands oppose to being and protect yourself by wearing a mask, instead of being placed inside of a huge refrigerator with other dead bodies. The time has come to finally wake up. You’re not dreaming. You are here and living in the present instead of living in the hereafter. You are needed to fall in line and possibly make a difference. 

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The Invisible Invader

Harlem,

Heaven is at the foot of Mother…

The Invisible Invader Welcome to the "New World" where reality has arrived and smacked you in the face as if you stole something.

[thefamilyineverknew]

Turning 47: pt. VII

“All in the Family”

17-21 May

During that blustery drive across the southwestern stretch of Kansas to the Double Bar “L” farm, a thought occurred to me that continued to build. In her original message, Arla had written both her email and phone number, the area code placing her in Colorado. I’m thinking, I’m already this far west, and Colorado is only a few hours further...maybe I could just continue to drive after joining my family here for my cousin Matt’s wedding and perhaps...hmmm. I only foresaw two obstacles; one, I had been borrowing one of my folk’s cars for the entire Spring in Chicago and had already racked up considerable miles, and two, they could have a bad reaction to the news. That was a toss up. So I would need to tread lightly if I were to reach for that.

Coming in from the rain, I set my bags down and kick off my boots. I’m shown where I will be sleeping; downstairs in the den area where my cousins and I used to play Atari PONG on the Magnavox console TV. This was formerly my Grandpa Lightner’s house and there are still vivid set pieces from that time; the Brunswick Balke Collender pool table, the card table with inset compartments for each player’s cards, the mid-century stonework. My aunt and uncle had expanded the back of the house, where my grandpa’s desk used to sit, into a large, open sitting room with a wrap-around sofa and a couple comfy rockers the color of oxblood (which looked to me like pair of Claes Oldenburg soft-sculpture art objects resembling over grown livers). There was a lot of memory in this place. I was about to make one more.

After getting settled, I was talking with my mom & dad about the trip, the time at Wheaton, and such. Then I said, “I took the opportunity while I was here to get my DNA run through Ancestry”. My mom shot back, ”Oh wow. We thought that might be something for you.” (positive). They were visibly excited, in a good way. “So, what did it say?”, my dad asked. So, I showed them how it worked on the app; the background information estimated by the service, and the section showing others whose DNA markings make them a close match to distant relative. They were fascinated, of course, bordering on giddy. They had never known any more information than what they had told me, so this was a big moment for them, too.

When I showed them the 2nd section for connections, I pointed out this woman marked as a close relative who I had seen straight away after receiving the results. “I saw this and thought, ‘Am I looking at my mother’?”, I said, “But it turns out, she’s my aunt. My birth mother contacted me the day after I got the results”. Oh wow.

Visibly, my parents were afflux with emotion; glee to reservation, and back again. So I read the message that Arla had written aloud to them, then my response. My dad was impressed, ”She sounds level-headed and cautious. That’s good.” Over a career as a pastor, he has seen and counseled all sorts of desperate people in distress and in need, so he knows the markers and potential dangers in situations like this. He kinda teared up. This was an emotional thing for them.

Then he blurts,”Hey! You’re already in Kansas! Colorado is just next door! You should try to meet her.” And that was that. Wow. No need to angle. I would go to Colorado. But first, we had the business of attending my cousin Matt’s wedding the next day.

Now, I would never be accused of being known to travel great distances to attend momentous events in my relatives’ lives. It’s not a point of pride, just a fact. But this particular wedding was a little, nay, a lot different.

Matt became a widower last year when his wife Emily was t-boned at a rural Kansas intersection by a 17 yr old driving upwards of 90 mph (145 kph) outside of Hutchinson, leaving behind six children under the age of 10, including a newborn and two adopted toddlers. It was such devastating news to receive being overseas. I never had the pleasure of meeting Emily, but my sense is that she was a dynamo, the engine, the dreamer and doer, and she perfectly matched Matt. I saw them as two tent posts, creating a warm family nest together, and then suddenly, one of the tent post falls, and the tent falling in around them. I reached out to Matt via FB, but did not expect a reply. It was an extremely grievous time.

Then, in the Spring, as I’m making plans for what to do after classes finish up, (the plan was to drive to Nashville, hop a plane to Seattle, drive down and up the coast to see friends, fly back to Nashville, spend some more time there, then drive back up to my folks in MN, and fly out to Sweden on the 30th of May) my folks called to let me know that Matt was getting remarried May 19th and it sure would be nice if I were able to make it. My northwest plans were foiled, but I was amazed and thrilled for Matt and, of course, I would go. I would be able to celebrate with him and offer my condolences about Emily in person, all in the same go.

So I hear that the woman he’s marrying, Megan, is also the survivor of a departed partner. From what I know, her husband died of cancer, leaving her to care for their four children, also all under 10 yrs old. 😮 so that means...let me do the math...6 + 4...hmmm....WHOA!! Ten under ten. That is incredible on top of improbable on top of nearly impossible; that they found each other and that they already knew each other from high school and that they and their families can begin to heal. Just beyond.

And since they were both originally from Garden City, it seemed the whole city showed up (well, at least 300 people). And all ten kids stood in the wedding as both groomsmen and bridesmaids. There was sadness and joy. Emily’s folks were there, which must have taken all the strength and love they have. What an emotional event!

Matt and Megan get in their 15 person van, with the “Just Married” markings soaped on the back, and drive off...only to drive around the block and return, cause...you know...ten kids. And the reception. There, my dad was making the rounds, shaking hands, seeing relatives; cousins, aunts, uncles. He wanted to take me around with him and reintroduce me to a bunch of people. My father was completely in his element at the reception, it was a joy to see. I was able to get reacquainted with several distant Lightner relatives who knew me from the time I was just a rambunctious, curly toe-headed kid. That my path would take me through the arts and performance and abroad, and not to farming, with fingers the gauge of a baseball bat, was always a bit intimidating, but the conversations flowed with ease, and were very intelligent, even some Swedish spoken by the husband of a second cousin of mine who did a student exchange back in high school. I felt the instant acceptance as I always had as a kid.

It was about this time that my dad began to lobby me to tell everyone the big story about finding out my background and hearing from my birth mother. I felt very private and protective of the story, just having had this lifetime mystery unveiled to myself. I wanted to maintain a level of control over the rate at which I revealed, which I was able to do up to a point but, man, was he excited about it. And that’s a whole world better than the opposite reaction.

The plan now was to stay at the Double Bar “L” to hang with my family until my folks and aunt Mary Sue left to return to Minnesota on Monday. Then...Colorado.

Now, I really need to message the woman who gave me life...

[take-uitimate-to-the-face]

Just a little scene from my original story with gay boys in winter

“Wow, this is- I can’t- Shit”, Levan stutters out and dashes off to the nearest bookshelf out of the hundred, if not thousands standing tall and strong in the massive hall. He can faintly hear Leon chuckling at the entrance.

“I knew you’d love it”, he replies, and trails behind Levan slowly, even as the historian is too busy reading all the shelf annotations and book titles.

“‘The Merchand Era’…, ‘Maline, First Queen of Échecs’… Is this just about the early history?”

“This, and the next five shelves too.” Leon walks past and points around himself. “The ground floor is all about the history of the country and its geography. The first one is about pretty much the rest of the world, and the second is all about science and technology - they probably hide the books about magic somewhere there too.”

Levan looks up to the upper floor and all he can see are other fully stacked bookshelves and the intricately painted ceiling of men and women of ancient times listening to a single speaker on a podium - a classical depiction of knowledge and the open sharing of it.

“Gods, this is amazing… You’d probably need three, no, five lifetimes to even read half of-”

A loud shush interrupts him, and that’s when he notices the arrays of tables, chairs and stands meant for books scattered all along the walls and between rows, with several scholars sitting over thick manuscripts and parchments alike, working with utmost concentration and probably not fond of foreign loudmouths disturbing them.

He sheepishly turns to Leon again. “Is it even alright for me to be here? The library has been closed off to the public, so…”

Leon chuckles. “Don’t worry, you should be fine as long as you stick with me. I’d gladly accompany you whenever you’d like.”

“…You know that would mean staying here for the rest of your life, right?”

His eyes widen for a moment before squinting in laughter, even as he tries to contain himself. “Well, I said what I said”, he adds through suppressed giggles, just as the voice shushes them again, angrier, and Levan can’t help but join in quietly too.

Still smiling, Leon’s voice falls into a whisper. “I actually wanted to show you something else”, he says and grabs Levan’s hand, pulling him in the direction of the large winding staircase in the middle of the hall. Levan tries his best not to stop at nearly every interesting annotation he sees and has to hold back especially when they pass Tavlan history and languages, but Leon leads him around and onto the second floor and then further back into what seems to be the astronomy section until they reach a rather plan door at the very back of the hall.

“After you”, Leon says and bows cheekily, making Levan roll his eyes, but curiosity still packs him and he opens the door.

He doesn’t expect the cold wind suddenly blowing in his face or the view the entire city stretched out beyond the large stone balcony laid out in front of him.

“Ta-da~”, Leon singsongs and gently nudges him further out on the terrace with a hand of this shoulder. There are several sets of workdesks outside too, though covered by grey sheets, probably to protect them from the oncoming winter. The area is closed off by a thick border, carved with the signature slopes and edges of the palace architecture, but short enough to comfortably lean on it and watch the royal capital sprawled down below as far as the eye can see.

There’s still a hint of purple on the horizon if he looks closely, but the night sky is already revealing its first stars, though their glow pales in comparison to the lights of the city, lamp posts and windows casting the grey cobblestone streets and red shingle roofs in a soft orange ambiance.

“It’s beautiful”, he murmurs softly as Leon joins him at the edge with a great view of the illuminated main streets that lead to the central market place, with people still bustling about into shops and the palace, finishing their last business for the day before returning home to their homes and families with a warm dinner and a cozy fireplace to hide from the oncoming cold of the night.

“It is, isn’t it?” Leon replies and boldly puts his palms on the flat surface of the border to pull himself up, just as Levan grabs his shirt and pulls him back down.

“What are you doing!?”

Leon blinks at him. “Trying to sit on the wall, obviously.”

“That’s too dangerous! What if you fall?”

For a moment, Leon’s eyes widen and his mouth opens, but in the blink of an eye his expression sets into a small laugh.

“Don’t worry, I do this all the time and nothing’s ever happened to me.” To demonstrate, he climbs onto the wall again and pulls his legs over the edge, as Levan carefully still keeps a hand on his back, just in case.

“See?”, Leon dangles his legs a few times rather childishly, “Completely safe.” Leon studies him just for a moment, and before he can say ‘no’, the noble already says, “You should sit too!”

“I really don’t think-” He suddenly feels a hand on his shoulder, and when he looks up into Leon’s expectant, brilliant eyes, something inside him just - gives.

He sighs, “Fine”, and pulls himself up too, thankful for Leon’s steadying hand on his arm as he sits down with his legs crossed.

“Sheesh, that’s cold”, he hisses.

Leon coughs unconvincingly. “Weak.”

“Oh, I’m sorry that I grew up in a place with an actual proper summer.”

“Right, I forgot you’re from the actual pits of hell”, Leon goads back. “I bet you’ve never even seen snow, have you?”

Levan’s eyes widen. “You get snow here?”

“Usually, yes”, the other replies and looks back onto the city below. “Maybe you’ll even see some before you leave.”

He hums in reply, and looks ahead too. Seems it’s a sore topic for both of them.

They sit in silence for a while, and only belatedly does Levan notice that the palm on his arm has travelled further down and onto the back of his hand. The fingers feel surprisingly rough when they wrap around his own, but instead of asking, Levan simply brushes his thumb over Leon’s hand once, twice. Leon squeezes back in acknowledgement.

“Did you know”, the other speaks up after a while, “that someone once tried to kill himself by jumping from here?”

“I didn’t”, Levan replies and cautiously peers down over the edge, where the people walking to and from the palace seem barely the size of ants.

“I suppose he succeeded?”

Leon laughs. “In a way. He actually survived the fall, but he broke his lower jaw completely, like this”, he puts his hands up side by side and then alternates them moving up and down. A shiver runs down Levan’s spine.

“Ugh, no-”, he shakes his head and looks away, “that’s disgusting.”

The other just chuckles. “It’s true though. I heard that he survived for a whole week before he got an infection and probably starved.”

“Couldn’t they just feed him?”

For once, Leon is the one to pull a face. “You’d have to chew up his food for him, no thanks.”

“Hey, in some places parents pre-chew food for their children, it’s not that weird.”

“I’d still rather use cutlery like a civilized person, thank you very much.”

The comments stings, just a bit, but Levan can’t fault him for it either, and it is really not the time and place to discuss cultural relativity - so instead he just laughs.

“As you wish, your Highness.”

“Now, now,” Leon says and slips into the prim and proper accent of the court, “there’s certainly no need to call me ‘Highness’, my friend. That title is solely reserved for members of the royal family, excluding the ruling monarch, of course. As for me, ‘esteemed Lord Leon of Rotfeld’ will do just fine.

Levan can’t help but snort with laughter. “Yeah, you wish”, he replies and gives Leon a light shove in the side - and then promptly pales when Leon grips his arm to steady himself from falling off the edge.

“Oh Gods, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to-”

“Hey, it’s fine, it’s fine”, Leon assures him and wraps his arm around Levan’s own, scooting closer to him. “I’m fine”, he repeats again, and looks at Levan with such intense fondness, kindness, and understanding, that it makes him avert his gaze back to the city.

The night sky has since become completely dark, with fewer stars than Levan is used to - no doubt through the lighting coming from the streets and houses as far as his eyes can see, which, to be fair, is a sight to behold all by itself.

“It really is beautiful up here.”

He sees Leon nod out of the corner of his eye. “It’s a shame not many people come up here after that incident.”

“You can’t really blame them.”

“I guess you can’t.”, he says and Levan notices him turning his head to him.

“But at least it gives me the privacy to enjoy my very own view up here.”

Levan can very much hear the playful smile in the Leon’s words, but he still looks back despite himself, and regrets it immediately when he sees the way Leon’s knowing eyes creasing in laughter, no doubt because of the flush creeping up on his face. Levan looks away again, which makes Leon chuckle softly.

“You get embarrassed way too easily.” The obvious teasing only serves to make his face heat up even more.

“No, you’re just very good at embarrassing me.”

“Am I now?”

“Yes, it’s-”

He looks up again, ready to complain, when he feels the pull of a hand at the back of his neck and a pair of lips on his own.

By all accounts, he should pull away. Mainly because it’s too dangerous to kiss three stories high at the edge of a balcony, and because he’s not ready and doesn’t know what to do, but then Leon squeezes his arm and cups his face and tugs on his lips and is just everywhere, that for once, his brain shuts off all by itself.

[rkbahuja]

As a land of storytellers, India has a rich literary tradition, but we haven’t explored it fully when it comes to turning these written words to celluloid. The Word to Screen Market by Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival with Star strives to bridge this gap and create a meeting ground for literature and cinema. Last year saw the initiation of this Market, which witnessed a manifold growth this year. “It has grown much bigger this year, which is very heartening to see. I think the best place for literature to be alive is through cinema,” says Sonam Kapoor who is the Ambassador for the Word to Screen Market.

Sonam Kapoor, Brand Ambassador, Word To Screen Market

This year the Word to Screen Market, which was held on August 24, 2017 in Mumbai, was a standalone event and dedicated to establishing an in-depth dialogue between publishers/authors and filmmakers. The publishers/authors got a platform to pitch their stories that ranged from horror to fantasy to historical sagas and more. The Market also saw the presence of several noted names from the film fraternity including Anurag Kashyap, Vishal Bhardwaj, Ram Madhvani and Shakun Batra among others. The publishing industry was represented by renowned names like Penguin Random House, Duckbill Books, Harper Collins India, Juggernaut Books and many others. Also present for the event was the beloved literary figure C. S. Lakshmi or ‘Ambai’, as she is lovingly called.

First Row (L-R) Smriti Kiran, Anupama chopra, Sonam Kapoor, Vishal Bhardwaj, Kiran Rao, Shakun Batra, Anurag Kashyap (Far Right)

Talking about the thought process behind this initiative, Kiran Rao, Festival Chairperson, Jio MAMI with Star said, “We wanted a more meaningful engagement that the film industry could have with the publishing industry. The idea developed because we felt that one of the biggest gaps that Indian filmmaking has is writing. Given that we have a rich tradition of publishing in India, where stories from different regions come up, we thought it would be of great value if content that was already out there could be made available to the cinema industry. The Word to Screen Market was conceived to get the two industries together. It is what we call a match-making venue where books and all kinds of writing could find a partner in cinema.”

Over the past year, the Market has gained strength and popularity. “There are many more people interested this year from both the industries. This year we went after the Market much more aggressively and systematically. Also, an interesting addition to our process was the Boot Camp we did in Delhi where publishers were taken through the realistic picture of adapting literature into cinema and dealing with the film community. This prepared them much better so we saw better pitches this time,” said Arpita Das (From Yoda Press) who is the Curator of the Market.

Arpita Das, Curator, Word To Screen Market

Getting the Market together has been a difficult task as Smriti Kiran, Creative Director, Jio MAMI with Star shared. “When we started this Market we knew that we are entering an arena that needs a lot of work.” Adding to this Smriti also explained one of the core objectives of this Market. “We wanted to investigate the reasons why this marriage between cinema and literature in our country has not happened, which is very normal in the West, where every second screenplay is an adaptation. Today, we are in a unique position, therefore, why not bring the two industries together. We decided to get a curator on board who doesn’t only get her or his knowledge on the table but also their goodwill.”

Smriti also spoke about the changes that the Word to Screen Market underwent. “In the first year, we had a modest beginning where we only had the MAMI recommend list. This year there is much more, we have meetings with detailed agendas, and there are one-on-one meetings. We have a massive list of recommendation and we have given content creators more to choose from.”

(L-R) Jio MAMI with Star Creative Director Smriti Kiran, Festival Director Anupama Chopra and Festival Chairperson Kiran Rao

Another significant change that the Market witnessed this year was the introduction of the Boot Camp, which was designed to benefit publishers and help them understand the film industry better. “When we planned the Boot Camp, we wanted to do a lot of knowledge sessions where authors and publishers understand each aspect of adapting a book for the screen, which includes the business side as well. People from the industry too came and spoke to the publishing industry and in the coming year we will also have knowledge sessions where the publishers will share insights with the film industry,” added Smriti.

Converting books into films is a common practice in the West. And though there are some great examples here, the concept is not as widespread yet. Adaptations come with various benefits and elaborating on one of them is Shakun Batra. “A writer has already put in a couple of years into their writing material and if you connect with that material it is great. I love looking at other people’s stories and then visually taking that story to another place and level,” said the filmmaker. Highlighting the role that a Market like this plays, Shakun said, “I think there was a huge gap between authors/publishers and filmmakers and this Market fills that gap. In a place like this, you can find a story that you might want to say.”

Filmmaker Shakun Batra

Shedding some light on the doors that a Market like this will open to writers/publishers is Vishwajyoti Ghosh. “This Market opens up a new world for us. We might know some aspects of the industry, but how does a book translate into a film or what are the kind of stories that content creators are looking at is something that most of us are not aware of. This Market also opens up the possibility of extending the story and gives you a chance to look at your content in another way,” said the eminent author.

Adding to Ghosh’s point, Karthika VK who heads the newly established Amazon-Westland Publication said, “I think it is a big forum for expanding our understanding of what is going on in the film world because we don’t really know what is going on on this side of the industry. In the last few years, there has been a great deal of interest in terms of books as property. Today, there is a possibility of a book being developed into all sorts of audio visual forms including movies. This is a good platform for us to know what the content creators are looking for and to tell them what we are doing. Maybe, there is something that they never thought of which we could present to them. So, it is really a great meeting ground.”

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The turnout this year was much higher as compared to the past year. One of the reasons for this was the conscious decision of taking the event beyond the MAMI Film Festival. “Last year, during the festival, we found that everybody has much less bandwidth to spend time and thus could not interact at a deeper level or take conversations a little further. Even for us, logistically it was a little hard. We ourselves are stretched and we couldn’t attend the entire Market. Since this event is something that wasn’t necessarily dependent on the festival, this is what is called a P2P event, we went ahead with a separate event. This allowed the two industries to be at leisure and have the kind of space and privacy to conduct conversations,” explained Kiran.

Sharing Kiran’s thoughts, Smriti added, “The reason we shifted the Market out of the festival was because we wanted to focus on the Market alone. We did not want the noise around the festival to drown the importance of the Market.” When quizzed about the future of the Market Smriti also said, “Now, we have opened the Market throughout the year because we feel that one day is not enough.”

But the Market is in its initial stages as Arpita explained. “We still have a long way to go and improve more, but it was still a massive improvement from last time.”

Giving insights on the next steps of the Market, Smriti added, “We want to make sure that it doesn’t end here. We aim to move from a Market to something like a Lab where you would actually start the process of adaptation. Maybe we haven’t got there yet, but the move is definitely in that direction. The move is towards having a platform that is live all through the year where both the industries can reach each other. We start with those baby steps and then grow to something bigger.”

Arpita Das with C.S.Lakshmi

Indian cinema is undergoing a change, making it the perfect good time for the Word to Screen Market to establish itself as Shakun points out. “I think Bollywood is in a transitional phase. We are bored of stories that we have been seeing and we need the change. There is a huge scope for new genres and stories that earlier would not get made into films.”  

The atmosphere at the Market was filled with possibilities. “I think it is going to be a good mix of both the industries who would be merging content. It is going to be interesting to see how does this merger takes place and how we translate this into cinema or into a digital format,” Vishwajyoti said.

The future holds much hope where we wish to witness a new wave in cinema. “Hopefully we’ll have better films and web series and a more nuanced writing for cinema. I hope we have more variety in storytelling; more complex characters, more interesting situations and more risky narratives. I hope that is the future that the Word to Screen Market brings about,” concluded Kiran.

Word to Screen Market: Bridging the gap between literature and cinema As a land of storytellers, India has a rich literary tradition, but we haven't explored it fully when it comes to turning these written words to celluloid.

[readbookywooks]

DULCE DOMUM

The sheep ran huddling together against the hurdles, blowing out thin nostrils and stamping with delicate fore-feet, their heads thrown back and a light steam rising from the crowded sheep-pen into the frosty air, as the two animals hastened by in high spirits, with much chatter and laughter. They were returning across country after a long day's outing with Otter, hunting and exploring on the wide uplands where certain streams tributary to their own River had their first small beginnings; and the shades of the short winter day were closing in on them, and they had still some distance to go. Plodding at random across the plough, they had heard the sheep and had made for them; and now, leading from the sheep-pen, they found a beaten track that made walking a lighter business, and responded, moreover, to that small inquiring something which all animals carry inside them, saying unmistakably, `Yes, quite right; THIS leads home!'

`It looks as if we were coming to a village,' said the Mole somewhat dubiously, slackening his pace, as the track, that had in time become a path and then had developed into a lane, now handed them over to the charge of a well-metalled road. The animals did not hold with villages, and their own highways, thickly frequented as they were, took an independent course, regardless of church, post office, or public-house.

`Oh, never mind!' said the Rat. `At this season of the year they're all safe indoors by this time, sitting round the fire; men, women, and children, dogs and cats and all. We shall slip through all right, without any bother or unpleasantness, and we can have a look at them through their windows if you like, and see what they're doing.'

The rapid nightfall of mid-December had quite beset the little village as they approached it on soft feet over a first thin fall of powdery snow. Little was visible but squares of a dusky orange-red on either side of the street, where the firelight or lamplight of each cottage overflowed through the casements into the dark world without. Most of the low latticed windows were innocent of blinds, and to the lookers-in from outside, the inmates, gathered round the tea-table, absorbed in handiwork, or talking with laughter and gesture, had each that happy grace which is the last thing the skilled actor shall capture--the natural grace which goes with perfect unconsciousness of observation. Moving at will from one theatre to another, the two spectators, so far from home themselves, had something of wistfulness in their eyes as they watched a cat being stroked, a sleepy child picked up and huddled off to bed, or a tired man stretch and knock out his pipe on the end of a smouldering log.

But it was from one little window, with its blind drawn down, a mere blank transparency on the night, that the sense of home and the little curtained world within walls--the larger stressful world of outside Nature shut out and forgotten--most pulsated. Close against the white blind hung a bird-cage, clearly silhouetted, every wire, perch, and appurtenance distinct and recognisable, even to yesterday's dull-edged lump of sugar. On the middle perch the fluffy occupant, head tucked well into feathers, seemed so near to them as to be easily stroked, had they tried; even the delicate tips of his plumped-out plumage pencilled plainly on the illuminated screen. As they looked, the sleepy little fellow stirred uneasily, woke, shook himself, and raised his head. They could see the gape of his tiny beak as he yawned in a bored sort of way, looked round, and then settled his head into his back again, while the ruffled feathers gradually subsided into perfect stillness. Then a gust of bitter wind took them in the back of the neck, a small sting of frozen sleet on the skin woke them as from a dream, and they knew their toes to be cold and their legs tired, and their own home distant a weary way.

Once beyond the village, where the cottages ceased abruptly, on either side of the road they could smell through the darkness the friendly fields again; and they braced themselves for the last long stretch, the home stretch, the stretch that we know is bound to end, some time, in the rattle of the door-latch, the sudden firelight, and the sight of familiar things greeting us as long-absent travellers from far over-sea. They plodded along steadily and silently, each of them thinking his own thoughts. The Mole's ran a good deal on supper, as it was pitch-dark, and it was all a strange country for him as far as he knew, and he was following obediently in the wake of the Rat, leaving the guidance entirely to him. As for the Rat, he was walking a little way ahead, as his habit was, his shoulders humped, his eyes fixed on the straight grey road in front of him; so he did not notice poor Mole when suddenly the summons reached him, and took him like an electric shock.

We others, who have long lost the more subtle of the physical senses, have not even proper terms to express an animal's inter- communications with his surroundings, living or otherwise, and have only the word `smell,' for instance, to include the whole range of delicate thrills which murmur in the nose of the animal night and day, summoning, warning? inciting, repelling. It was one of these mysterious fairy calls from out the void that suddenly reached Mole in the darkness, making him tingle through and through with its very familiar appeal, even while yet he could not clearly remember what it was. He stopped dead in his tracks, his nose searching hither and thither in its efforts to recapture the fine filament, the telegraphic current, that had so strongly moved him. A moment, and he had caught it again; and with it this time came recollection in fullest flood.

Home! That was what they meant, those caressing appeals, those soft touches wafted through the air, those invisible little hands pulling and tugging, all one way! Why, it must be quite close by him at that moment, his old home that he had hurriedly forsaken and never sought again, that day when he first found the river! And now it was sending out its scouts and its messengers to capture him and bring him in. Since his escape on that bright morning he had hardly given it a thought, so absorbed had he been in his new life, in all its pleasures, its surprises, its fresh and captivating experiences. Now, with a rush of old memories, how clearly it stood up before him, in the darkness! Shabby indeed, and small and poorly furnished, and yet his, the home he had made for himself, the home he had been so happy to get back to after his day's work. And the home had been happy with him, too, evidently, and was missing him, and wanted him back, and was telling him so, through his nose, sorrowfully, reproachfully, but with no bitterness or anger; only with plaintive reminder that it was there, and wanted him.

The call was clear, the summons was plain. He must obey it instantly, and go. `Ratty!' he called, full of joyful excitement, `hold on! Come back! I want you, quick!'

`Oh, COME along, Mole, do!' replied the Rat cheerfully, still plodding along.

`PLEASE stop, Ratty!' pleaded the poor Mole, in anguish of heart. `You don't understand! It's my home, my old home! I've just come across the smell of it, and it's close by here, really quite close. And I MUST go to it, I must, I must! Oh, come back, Ratty! Please, please come back!'

The Rat was by this time very far ahead, too far to hear clearly what the Mole was calling, too far to catch the sharp note of painful appeal in his voice. And he was much taken up with the weather, for he too could smell something--something suspiciously like approaching snow.

`Mole, we mustn't stop now, really!' he called back. `We'll come for it to-morrow, whatever it is you've found. But I daren't stop now--it's late, and the snow's coming on again, and I'm not sure of the way! And I want your nose, Mole, so come on quick, there's a good fellow!' And the Rat pressed forward on his way without waiting for an answer.

Poor Mole stood alone in the road, his heart torn asunder, and a big sob gathering, gathering, somewhere low down inside him, to leap up to the surface presently, he knew, in passionate escape. But even under such a test as this his loyalty to his friend stood firm. Never for a moment did he dream of abandoning him. Meanwhile, the wafts from his old home pleaded, whispered, conjured, and finally claimed him imperiously. He dared not tarry longer within their magic circle. With a wrench that tore his very heartstrings he set his face down the road and followed submissively in the track of the Rat, while faint, thin little smells, still dogging his retreating nose, reproached him for his new friendship and his callous forgetfulness.

With an effort he caught up to the unsuspecting Rat, who began chattering cheerfully about what they would do when they got back, and how jolly a fire of logs in the parlour would be, and what a supper he meant to eat; never noticing his companion's silence and distressful state of mind. At last, however, when they had gone some considerable way further, and were passing some tree-stumps at the edge of a copse that bordered the road, he stopped and said kindly, `Look here, Mole old chap, you seem dead tired. No talk left in you, and your feet dragging like lead. We'll sit down here for a minute and rest. The snow has held off so far, and the best part of our journey is over.'

The Mole subsided forlornly on a tree-stump and tried to control himself, for he felt it surely coming. The sob he had fought with so long refused to be beaten. Up and up, it forced its way to the air, and then another, and another, and others thick and fast; till poor Mole at last gave up the struggle, and cried freely and helplessly and openly, now that he knew it was all over and he had lost what he could hardly be said to have found.

The Rat, astonished and dismayed at the violence of Mole's paroxysm of grief, did not dare to speak for a while. At last he said, very quietly and sympathetically, `What is it, old fellow? Whatever can be the matter? Tell us your trouble, and let me see what I can do.'

Poor Mole found it difficult to get any words out between the upheavals of his chest that followed one upon another so quickly and held back speech and choked it as it came. `I know it's a-- shabby, dingy little place,' he sobbed forth at last, brokenly: `not like--your cosy quarters--or Toad's beautiful hall--or Badger's great house--but it was my own little home--and I was fond of it--and I went away and forgot all about it--and then I smelt it suddenly--on the road, when I called and you wouldn't listen, Rat--and everything came back to me with a rush--and I WANTED it!--O dear, O dear!--and when you WOULDN'T turn back, Ratty--and I had to leave it, though I was smelling it all the time--I thought my heart would break.--We might have just gone and had one look at it, Ratty--only one look--it was close by--but you wouldn't turn back, Ratty, you wouldn't turn back! O dear, O dear!'

Recollection brought fresh waves of sorrow, and sobs again took full charge of him, preventing further speech.

The Rat stared straight in front of him, saying nothing, only patting Mole gently on the shoulder. After a time he muttered gloomily, `I see it all now! What a PIG I have been! A pig-- that's me! Just a pig--a plain pig!'

He waited till Mole's sobs became gradually less stormy and more rhythmical; he waited till at last sniffs were frequent and sobs only intermittent. Then he rose from his seat, and, remarking carelessly, `Well, now we'd really better be getting on, old chap!' set off up the road again, over the toilsome way they had come.

`Wherever are you (hic) going to (hic), Ratty?' cried the tearful Mole, looking up in alarm.

`We're going to find that home of yours, old fellow,' replied the Rat pleasantly; `so you had better come along, for it will take some finding, and we shall want your nose.'

`Oh, come back, Ratty, do!' cried the Mole, getting up and hurrying after him. `It's no good, I tell you! It's too late, and too dark, and the place is too far off, and the snow's coming! And--and I never meant to let you know I was feeling that way about it--it was all an accident and a mistake! And think of River Bank, and your supper!'

`Hang River Bank, and supper too!' said the Rat heartily. `I tell you, I'm going to find this place now, if I stay out all night. So cheer up, old chap, and take my arm, and we'll very soon be back there again.'

Still snuffling, pleading, and reluctant, Mole suffered himself to be dragged back along the road by his imperious companion, who by a flow of cheerful talk and anecdote endeavoured to beguile his spirits back and make the weary way seem shorter. When at last it seemed to the Rat that they must be nearing that part of the road where the Mole had been `held up,' he said, `Now, no more talking. Business! Use your nose, and give your mind to it.'

They moved on in silence for some little way, when suddenly the Rat was conscious, through his arm that was linked in Mole's, of a faint sort of electric thrill that was passing down that animal's body. Instantly he disengaged himself, fell back a pace, and waited, all attention.

The signals were coming through!

Mole stood a moment rigid, while his uplifted nose, quivering slightly, felt the air.

Then a short, quick run forward--a fault--a check--a try back; and then a slow, steady, confident advance.

The Rat, much excited, kept close to his heels as the Mole, with something of the air of a sleep-walker, crossed a dry ditch, scrambled through a hedge, and nosed his way over a field open and trackless and bare in the faint starlight.

Suddenly, without giving warning, he dived; but the Rat was on the alert, and promptly followed him down the tunnel to which his unerring nose had faithfully led him.

It was close and airless, and the earthy smell was strong, and it seemed a long time to Rat ere the passage ended and he could stand erect and stretch and shake himself. The Mole struck a match, and by its light the Rat saw that they were standing in an open space, neatly swept and sanded underfoot, and directly facing them was Mole's little front door, with `Mole End' painted, in Gothic lettering, over the bell-pull at the side.

Mole reached down a lantern from a nail on the wail and lit it, and the Rat, looking round him, saw that they were in a sort of fore-court. A garden-seat stood on one side of the door, and on the other a roller; for the Mole, who was a tidy animal when at home, could not stand having his ground kicked up by other animals into little runs that ended in earth-heaps. On the walls hung wire baskets with ferns in them, alternating with brackets carrying plaster statuary--Garibaldi, and the infant Samuel, and Queen Victoria, and other heroes of modern Italy. Down on one side of the forecourt ran a skittle-alley, with benches along it and little wooden tables marked with rings that hinted at beer- mugs. In the middle was a small round pond containing gold-fish and surrounded by a cockle-shell border. Out of the centre of the pond rose a fanciful erection clothed in more cockle-shells and topped by a large silvered glass ball that reflected everything all wrong and had a very pleasing effect.

Mole's face-beamed at the sight of all these objects so dear to him, and he hurried Rat through the door, lit a lamp in the hall, and took one glance round his old home. He saw the dust lying thick on everything, saw the cheerless, deserted look of the long-neglected house, and its narrow, meagre dimensions, its worn and shabby contents--and collapsed again on a hall-chair, his nose to his paws. `O Ratty!' he cried dismally, `why ever did I do it? Why did I bring you to this poor, cold little place, on a night like this, when you might have been at River Bank by this time, toasting your toes before a blazing fire, with all your own nice things about you!'

The Rat paid no heed to his doleful self-reproaches. He was running here and there, opening doors, inspecting rooms and cupboards, and lighting lamps and candles and sticking them, up everywhere. `What a capital little house this is!' he called out cheerily. `So compact! So well planned! Everything here and everything in its place! We'll make a jolly night of it. The first thing we want is a good fire; I'll see to that--I always know where to find things. So this is the parlour? Splendid! Your own idea, those little sleeping-bunks in the wall? Capital! Now, I'll fetch the wood and the coals, and you get a duster, Mole--you'll find one in the drawer of the kitchen table--and try and smarten things up a bit. Bustle about, old chap!'

Encouraged by his inspiriting companion, the Mole roused himself and dusted and polished with energy and heartiness, while the Rat, running to and fro with armfuls of fuel, soon had a cheerful blaze roaring up the chimney. He hailed the Mole to come and warm himself; but Mole promptly had another fit of the blues, dropping down on a couch in dark despair and burying his face in his duster. `Rat,' he moaned, `how about your supper, you poor, cold, hungry, weary animal? I've nothing to give you--nothing-- not a crumb!'

`What a fellow you are for giving in!' said the Rat reproachfully. `Why, only just now I saw a sardine-opener on the kitchen dresser, quite distinctly; and everybody knows that means there are sardines about somewhere in the neighbourhood. Rouse yourself! pull yourself together, and come with me and forage.'

They went and foraged accordingly, hunting through every cupboard and turning out every drawer. The result was not so very depressing after all, though of course it might have been better; a tin of sardines--a box of captain's biscuits, nearly full--and a German sausage encased in silver paper.

`There's a banquet for you!' observed the Rat, as he arranged the table. `I know some animals who would give their ears to be sitting down to supper with us to-night!'

`No bread!' groaned the Mole dolorously; `no butter, no----'

`No pate de foie gras, no champagne!' continued the Rat, grinning. `And that reminds me--what's that little door at the end of the passage? Your cellar, of course! Every luxury in this house! Just you wait a minute.'

He made for the cellar-door, and presently reappeared, somewhat dusty, with a bottle of beer in each paw and another under each arm, `Self-indulgent beggar you seem to be, Mole,' he observed. `Deny yourself nothing. This is really the jolliest little place I ever was in. Now, wherever did you pick up those prints? Make the place look so home-like, they do. No wonder you're so fond of it, Mole. Tell us all about it, and how you came to make it what it is.'

Then, while the Rat busied himself fetching plates, and knives and forks, and mustard which he mixed in an egg-cup, the Mole, his bosom still heaving with the stress of his recent emotion, related--somewhat shyly at first, but with more freedom as he warmed to his subject--how this was planned, and how that was thought out, and how this was got through a windfall from an aunt, and that was a wonderful find and a bargain, and this other thing was bought out of laborious savings and a certain amount of `going without.' His spirits finally quite restored, he must needs go and caress his possessions, and take a lamp and show off their points to his visitor and expatiate on them, quite forgetful of the supper they both so much needed; Rat, who was desperately hungry but strove to conceal it, nodding seriously, examining with a puckered brow, and saying, `wonderful,' and `most remarkable,' at intervals, when the chance for an observation was given him.

At last the Rat succeeded in decoying him to the table, and had just got seriously to work with the sardine-opener when sounds were heard from the fore-court without--sounds like the scuffling of small feet in the gravel and a confused murmur of tiny voices, while broken sentences reached them--`Now, all in a line--hold the lantern up a bit, Tommy--clear your throats first--no coughing after I say one, two, three.--Where's young Bill?--Here, come on, do, we're all a-waiting----'

`What's up?' inquired the Rat, pausing in his labours.

`I think it must be the field-mice,' replied the Mole, with a touch of pride in his manner. `They go round carol-singing regularly at this time of the year. They're quite an institution in these parts. And they never pass me over--they come to Mole End last of all; and I used to give them hot drinks, and supper too sometimes, when I could afford it. It will be like old times to hear them again.'

`Let's have a look at them!' cried the Rat, jumping up and running to the door.

It was a pretty sight, and a seasonable one, that met their eyes when they flung the door open. In the fore-court, lit by the dim rays of a horn lantern, some eight or ten little fieldmice stood in a semicircle, red worsted comforters round their throats, their fore-paws thrust deep into their pockets, their feet jigging for warmth. With bright beady eyes they glanced shyly at each other, sniggering a little, sniffing and applying coat- sleeves a good deal. As the door opened, one of the elder ones that carried the lantern was just saying, `Now then, one, two, three!' and forthwith their shrill little voices uprose on the air, singing one of the old-time carols that their forefathers composed in fields that were fallow and held by frost, or when snow-bound in chimney corners, and handed down to be sung in the miry street to lamp-lit windows at Yule-time.

CAROL

Villagers all, this frosty tide, Let your doors swing open wide, Though wind may follow, and snow beside,

Yet draw us in by your fire to bide; Joy shall be yours in the morning!

Here we stand in the cold and the sleet, Blowing fingers and stamping feet, Come from far away you to greet--

You by the fire and we in the street-- Bidding you joy in the morning!

For ere one half of the night was gone, Sudden a star has led us on, Raining bliss and benison-- Bliss to-morrow and more anon,

Joy for every morning!

Goodman Joseph toiled through the snow-- Saw the star o'er a stable low; Mary she might not further go-- Welcome thatch, and litter below!

Joy was hers in the morning!

And then they heard the angels tell `Who were the first to cry NOWELL? Animals all, as it befell, In the stable where they did dwell!

Joy shall be theirs in the morning!'

The voices ceased, the singers, bashful but smiling, exchanged sidelong glances, and silence succeeded--but for a moment only. Then, from up above and far away, down the tunnel they had so lately travelled was borne to their ears in a faint musical hum the sound of distant bells ringing a joyful and clangorous peal.

`Very well sung, boys!' cried the Rat heartily. `And now come along in, all of you, and warm yourselves by the fire, and have something hot!'

`Yes, come along, field-mice,' cried the Mole eagerly. `This is quite like old times! Shut the door after you. Pull up that settle to the fire. Now, you just wait a minute, while we--O, Ratty!' he cried in despair, plumping down on a seat, with tears impending. `Whatever are we doing? We've nothing to give them!'

`You leave all that to me,' said the masterful Rat. `Here, you with the lantern! Come over this way. I want to talk to you. Now, tell me, are there any shops open at this hour of the night?'

`Why, certainly, sir,' replied the field-mouse respectfully. `At this time of the year our shops keep open to all sorts of hours.'

`Then look here!' said the Rat. `You go off at once, you and your lantern, and you get me----'

Here much muttered conversation ensued, and the Mole only heard bits of it, such as--`Fresh, mind!--no, a pound of that will do-- see you get Buggins's, for I won't have any other--no, only the best--if you can't get it there, try somewhere else--yes, of course, home-made, no tinned stuff--well then, do the best you can!' Finally, there was a chink of coin passing from paw to paw, the field-mouse was provided with an ample basket for his purchases, and off he hurried, he and his lantern.

The rest of the field-mice, perched in a row on the settle, their small legs swinging, gave themselves up to enjoyment of the fire, and toasted their chilblains till they tingled; while the Mole, failing to draw them into easy conversation, plunged into family history and made each of them recite the names of his numerous brothers, who were too young, it appeared, to be allowed to go out a-carolling this year, but looked forward very shortly to winning the parental consent.

The Rat, meanwhile, was busy examining the label on one of the beer-bottles. `I perceive this to be Old Burton,' he remarked approvingly. `SENSIBLE Mole! The very thing! Now we shall be able to mull some ale! Get the things ready, Mole, while I draw the corks.'

It did not take long to prepare the brew and thrust the tin heater well into the red heart of the fire; and soon every field- mouse was sipping and coughing and choking (for a little mulled ale goes a long way) and wiping his eyes and laughing and forgetting he had ever been cold in all his life.

`They act plays too, these fellows,' the Mole explained to the Rat. `Make them up all by themselves, and act them afterwards. And very well they do it, too! They gave us a capital one last year, about a field-mouse who was captured at sea by a Barbary corsair, and made to row in a galley; and when he escaped and got home again, his lady-love had gone into a convent. Here, YOU! You were in it, I remember. Get up and recite a bit.'

The field-mouse addressed got up on his legs, giggled shyly, looked round the room, and remained absolutely tongue-tied. His comrades cheered him on, Mole coaxed and encouraged him, and the Rat went so far as to take him by the shoulders and shake him; but nothing could overcome his stage-fright. They were all busily engaged on him like watermen applying the Royal Humane Society's regulations to a case of long submersion, when the latch clicked, the door opened, and the field-mouse with the lantern reappeared, staggering under the weight of his basket.

There was no more talk of play-acting once the very real and solid contents of the basket had been tumbled out on the table. Under the generalship of Rat, everybody was set to do something or to fetch something. In a very few minutes supper was ready, and Mole, as he took the head of the table in a sort of a dream, saw a lately barren board set thick with savoury comforts; saw his little friends' faces brighten and beam as they fell to without delay; and then let himself loose--for he was famished indeed--on the provender so magically provided, thinking what a happy home-coming this had turned out, after all. As they ate, they talked of old times, and the field-mice gave him the local gossip up to date, and answered as well as they could the hundred questions he had to ask them. The Rat said little or nothing, only taking care that each guest had what he wanted, and plenty of it, and that Mole had no trouble or anxiety about anything.

They clattered off at last, very grateful and showering wishes of the season, with their jacket pockets stuffed with remembrances for the small brothers and sisters at home. When the door had closed on the last of them and the chink of the lanterns had died away, Mole and Rat kicked the fire up, drew their chairs in, brewed themselves a last nightcap of mulled ale, and discussed the events of the long day. At last the Rat, with a tremendous yawn, said, `Mole, old chap, I'm ready to drop. Sleepy is simply not the word. That your own bunk over on that side? Very well, then, I'll take this. What a ripping little house this is! Everything so handy!'

He clambered into his bunk and rolled himself well up in the blankets, and slumber gathered him forthwith, as a swathe of barley is folded into the arms of the reaping machine.

The weary Mole also was glad to turn in without delay, and soon had his head on his pillow, in great joy and contentment. But ere he closed his eyes he let them wander round his old room, mellow in the glow of the firelight that played or rested on familiar and friendly things which had long been unconsciously a part of him, and now smilingly received him back, without rancour. He was now in just the frame of mind that the tactful Rat had quietly worked to bring about in him. He saw clearly how plain and simple--how narrow, even--it all was; but clearly, too, how much it all meant to him, and the special value of some such anchorage in one's existence. He did not at all want to abandon the new life and its splendid spaces, to turn his back on sun and air and all they offered him and creep home and stay there; the upper world was all too strong, it called to him still, even down there, and he knew he must return to the larger stage. But it was good to think he had this to come back to; this place which was all his own, these things which were so glad to see him again and could always be counted upon for the same simple welcome.