Bacorium Legacy

by Nicholas Alexander

  Chapter XV

  Phantom Pain

  "At long last!" Selphie declared. "I'm almost home!"

  They were nearing the border of Saeticia and Sono. The road, strangely empty today, led up to the guard outpost that watched over the border. A stone wall followed along the border, separating the two kingdoms. It was a relic from an old time, when the lands were filled with great towers and machines that flew through the sky.

  As they drew closer to the guard station, the banner of Sono could be seen flying high atop it.

  "Once we pass through there, we'll be in Sono," Selphie informed them enthusiastically. "I'm sure the guards here will be relieved to see me back. We passed through here on our way to Allma Temple, and I'm sure they've heard by now what happened there, and at Serenite."

  No guards came out to greet them, however. As they reached the station, there were no sounds.

  "Odd..." Selphie muttered. "Where are the guards?"

  "We should check inside," Jared suggested.

  Emila, who was walking at Luca's side, suddenly looked worried. He noticed, and gave her a reassuring nod.

  Once inside the guards' station, however, they saw what was wrong. The guards had not come out to greet them because they were all dead.

  In total, there had been ten guards. All that remained of them was their armour, and large amounts of dried blood covering the walls and floor.

  Jared looked furious. "Someone will pay for this," he swore quietly.

  "Who could have done this?" Selphie asked.

  Brand approached the scene of the crime and looked it over. "The blood is already pretty dry. I would say this happened a day ago, maybe two."

  "An entire group of people would be needed to overpower this many men," Wiosna said.

  "Take a look at the armour," Brand said. "There are no cuts in the paint. These men were killed by a bludgeoning weapon. A mace, or..."

  Brand slowly picked up a breastplate. There was a perfect fist-shaped hole punched through it.

  "...or someone's fist," he concluded grimly.

  "There's no way someone could have done this with their fists," Wiosna insisted.

  Brand was examining another piece of armour now; a helmet. It was also punched in at the side. "Perhaps they used reinforcement magick on themselves."

  Jared shook his head, and said, "Even so, that's not possible. I'm an Earth-form magus myself, and I've used reinforcement many times. You can only strengthen your skin with it, in order to block external damage. But your bones and internal organs are still just as vulnerable; the magick would keep a sword or spear from drawing blood, but it would not stop a mace or hammer from hurting you. Therefore, a punch with enough force to put such a dent in reinforced plate mail would undoubtedly have still broken his hand. He could not have done it twice, much less ten times."

  Brand set down the helm. "It looks like all the armour in here has damage like that. So how else could he have done this?"

  Jared scratched his trimmed black goatee, thinking. "The question isn't how it was done, but by whom and for what reason."

  "Trunda," Emila said immediately. "It had to be Trunda."

  Everyone in the room looked at Emila. Under the pressure of their gazes, she shrank back a little bit.

  "That Trunda guy was certainly big and tough," Wiosna said. "But I don't think even he could so this..."

  "Putting that aside, it makes no sense that Trunda would have gone through here," Selphie said. "Why would he flee into Sono, and not back to Acaria? He'll be the most wanted man in the entire Alliance soon, and he doesn't exactly blend into a crowd."

  Luca looked to the small girl, who was standing close to him. Something was definitely bothering her of late. She had grown very quiet, sticking close to him often. Now, at her mentioning of Trunda, this behaviour had gotten worse. "Emila, what makes you so sure that it's Trunda?"

  She hesitated, and then said, "Because this didn't need to be done. He could have easily slipped through, or climbed over the wall. But Trunda... he knows what he's doing. You could see it in his eyes. The things we think are mistakes are just part of his plan. Killing these guards like this; it was a message for us."

  "A message?" Selphie repeated quietly. "You think he'd trying to tell us something by this? Like he's trying to frighten us?"

  "I don't know what the message is supposed to be," Emila said quietly. "I just know that he's ahead of us, and he knew we would be coming through here. He wanted us to see this."

  Everyone pondered her words silently for a few minutes.

  "Now that we're out of Serenite, he may be going after you for real this time," Jared said to Selphie. "He could be picking up where Dreevius left off."

  "Then why announce it like this?" Selphie asked him. "Why sacrifice the element of surprise?"

  "Perhaps he has a degree of honour?" Jared muttered, before glancing around the blood-stained room. "Hard to believe a man who would kill so many innocent people could believe himself honourable, but I've seen men who have their own twisted view of the concept."

  "In any case, we should clean this place up," the princess said to everyone. "It wouldn't be right to leave it like this, when other travellers could come through and see this. They likely have messenger ravens here. I'll write a letter to my father and let him know what happened."

  Luca looked to Emila, who had grown quiet once again. Her eyes were downcast, like she was doing her best to avoid looking at the blood before her. She had an unreadable expression on her face; a mix of fear, disgust, and guilt.

 

  After finishing their business in the guard station, they crossed the border and Luca found himself on Sonoian soil for the first time. In his travels with his father, they had never passed through the largest and most populated of the eight kingdoms of Bacoria. They had often stuck to the inhospitable southern nations, and later, the far north of Arimos. But he had never gone through Sono before, so he was excited to see what it was like.

  For the first few hours of their trip, it was much of the same; green fields and farms. They were travelling on the highway, which led straight from Serenite to T'Saw. There were enough small towns between them and T'Saw that they would no longer need to camp in the woods. So many travellers used the highway that inns set up by it had little difficulty staying open.

  They spoke little as they walked, the guard station having left a bad taste in everyone's mouths. Emila had her head bowed, and she said nothing the entire time.

  The sun had just set when they reached the town of Reven. It was a quaint little village beside a river, which did well enough for itself off the business of the travellers who passed through on the highway. As they walked in, the streets were all but empty. The inn, which was conveniently placed at the town entrance, glowed golden from within.

  They went in, paid for their rooms, and sat down to eat. All except for Selphie and Jared, who left the inn and went into the town for something.

  Luca, Emila, Ash, Brand, and Wiosna sat at their table in an uncomfortable silence, picking at their food while they waited for the princess to return. Brand initially tried to get a conversation going, but when the others responded with only short answers and grunts, eventually he gave up.

  Ash was the first to leave, as usual. Wiosna followed shortly after, and Brand some time after her, leaving Emila and Luca alone at the table.

  Noticing he was looking at the door once again, Emila asked Luca, "What do you think is taking them?"

  "I don't know," he replied. "I don't know what they left to do."

  "Do you think we should go look for them?"

  He shook his head. "Selphie said to stay here."

  Emila looked worried. Luca turned and saw the worry in her eyes, and he took her hand in his and gave her a reassuring smile.

  It was late; everyone else staying at the inn had already gone to bed. Even the innkeeper had gone to bed already. They were the only ones around. Their seclusion was suddenly strongly felt.

/>   He didn't say anything to her, he just put his arm around her and pulled her close. She did not object. She closed her eyes and rested her head against his chest. They remained like that for a while; neither of them could say just how long.

  Knowing that he was concerned for her, she spoke to him in a soft voice, "Luca, I'm afraid."

  "I know you are," he replied.

  "That man won't stop. Nothing is going to stop him."

  "Trunda?" he asked.

  She shook her head, still against his chest. "Zinoro."

  He didn't know what to say.

  "You have nothing to fear from him. He's... he's my enemy, not yours."

  Her hand tightened around his cloak. She looked like she was about to cry. "I wish we could just leave. That we could just forget about Zinoro and go away. Somewhere far away, where he would never bother us."

  She sounded like Lodin, in those last moments before his death.

  He didn't voice those thoughts. "We could never hide from him. And I could never hide from him. Not after what he did to my father. He has to pay."

  "Why?" she whispered.

  He looked down at Emila like she had just uttered something incomprehensible. She looked up and met his gaze, her eyes silently pleading.

  "What?" Luca asked her.

  "Can't you just let it go?" she asked him.

  "How could I just let it go?" he demanded. "He killed my father. If I just... forgave him for that, I would be betraying his legacy."

  "You don't have to forgive him," Emila said. "Just... don't become a monster in the name of revenge. You're a good person. Don't throw that away..."

  An image flashed in his mind's eye. He remembered himself, standing over the dying form of Dreevius, whom he had thrown into the mud. He remembered the horrible, cruel way he had let Dreevius die, his justification for it, and his disregard for his prior code of honour.

  "Emila, you seem to be wrong about me," he said. "Whatever it is you see in me, you're mistaken. I am a killer. I always was. I killed Dreevius, and if Trunda comes after us again I'll kill him, too. And when the time comes, I'm going to either kill Zinoro or be killed by him. Regardless, the man must pay. I will not turn away from my father's justice." He didn't quite believe those words, but he hoped Emila would.

  "It is easy to excuse atrocities in the name of justice," Emila said slowly, her lip trembling. "Please, Luca. I can see the path you're on. Don't become him. Please."

  He blinked. "Become him? Become who? What do you mean?"

  "Sometimes I see the things you do and the things you say, and I'm frightened by how similar you are." A single tear had gone down her cheek. "I'm not afraid of what Zinoro can do, Luca. I'm afraid of you, because you're turning into him."

  Luca stood up. He was staring at Emila like she had just plunged a knife into him.

  "You're wrong," he insisted, as much to himself as to her. "I'm not him. I'll never be him. He killed my father, Emila! Don't you understand that?"

  "Your father killed his father," she countered, wiping her tear away.

  "That's different, it-"

  No, it wasn't different at all, he realised. At least not to Zinoro.

  "Luca, I'm so torn," Emila continued, her eyes growing hazy again with the coming of yet more tears. "I can't follow you to Acaria, but I can't leave you, either. If I just abandon you to die, I'll have failed at my last chance to do something good."

  "So this has all just been you trying to save me?" he demanded. "All I ever was to you was just something broken to fix?"

  "It's not like that! It was never like that..." She looked heartbroken. The tears were running down her cheeks freely. Luca felt a sharp stab of guilt in his chest, knowing that he was the reason she was in so much pain.

  "Then what has this all been for, then?" he asked her, refusing to back down even at this point. "Why did you save me at that town? Why did you follow me to Allma, and continue to follow me after the temple was destroyed? Why are you still here, pleading with me to give up my mission, if not because you feel you need to fix something that's wrong with me?"

  "Because I care about you, damn it!" she all but shouted. "Because I-!"

  At that moment, the door to the inn swung open, cutting their argument short. The silhouettes of Selphie and Jared stepped in, looking tired and disappointed.

  "I'm sorry. Are we interrupting something?" Selphie asked. The words were not sarcastic; she was actually concerned.

  "It's nothing. We're fine." Emila had turned away from them, presumably to hide that she was crying.

  Selphie frowned. She didn't look convinced, but she seemed to understand that the matter was personal, and she had no right to get between them. The young princess turned to Jared. "I'll be going to bed now," she said to him.

  Jared nodded. "I'll be up in a bit. I need a drink before I retire."

  Selphie nodded and smiled.

  "I'm going to bed, too," Emila said, before starting up the stairs, not waiting for anyone else.

  Luca watched her go, wondering if he should perhaps follow her and apologise. She vanished up the stairs before he could make a decision. A moment later, he felt Selphie's hand on his shoulder.

  "Everything will be alright," Selphie said to him. Despite how tired she looked, her smile was not diminished in the slightest.

  Luca nodded in reply, and Selphie went up the stairs as well. Luca knew that Selphie's words were not just a kind lie to cheer him up. The princess was a true optimist, much like Emila. She genuinely believed that things would work out fine if they just believed they would. The two girls were a lot alike, but they had their differences. Selphie was an optimist because she was naive; all her experience came from her father's teachings in the palace. Emila, on the other hand, had experienced awful things; things she had yet to fully tell him about, and perhaps never would. All Luca knew was that the Acarians had destroyed her home, and that she had lost her family. Emila knew what people were capable of; she just chose to believe they were good at heart in spite of that.

  Luca didn't know how much of Selphie's cause Emila believed in, if any of it at all. She wanted to run away with him. Perhaps, like Wiosna, she believed that the war with Acaria was inevitable. What did the others think? Did Brand believe in the cause? Ash certainly didn't.

  Sighing, Luca turned away from the stairs. Jared had found his way over to the bar, where he had poured himself a beer from the tap. His halberd had been placed against the wall beside him. Luca went over and sat next to Jared, pouring a drink for himself.

  "What were you two doing out there?" he asked.

  "We went to the town's mayor," Jared replied. "We talked with him about the guards at the border station, and about Trunda. We asked if there had been any sightings of the Acarian nearby."

  Jared took a drink from his glass. "He said there were none."

  "Do you believe him?"

  "He didn't seem to be lying. There was no fear in his eyes. But I'm wondering where else Trunda could have gone, if not here. Eventually, he would run out of supplies. Hunting for food is tough in Sono, where we have paid hunters whose job it is to keep monster populations low. Out here, it is harder to come by such things. Sooner or later, he will have to show his face."

  "Perhaps he isn't in Sono, then," Luca suggested. "Emila thinks that those guards back at that station were a message for us. Maybe, whatever that message was, he left it and went back home. Perhaps he's playing games with us, just like he was at Serenite."

  Jared frowned and stared deep into his mug, as though the answer were hidden deep within the golden drink inside. "Perhaps," he finally concluded. "Either way, we must be careful. Even here in our homeland, there are still enemies. We must protect Selphie until she is safe, back in T'Saw."

  Luca took a drink from his own glass. He set it down, feeling tired and melancholy. "And then what?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "When we get to T'Saw, what happens next?"

  Jared thought about it. "At tha
t point, it will come to what King Zaow decides for us. By the time we get there, he will likely have received a letter from either King Edmund or King Marcus requesting his presence at the Elder Hall to discuss the possibility of invading Acaria. Whatever he decides to do, it is my duty, as well as Selphie's, to carry out his orders and support him. I don't know what his plan for you and the Allmans was, but if he still wishes to carry it out, then we shall do that."

  What Jared hadn't said was that Zaow would have two options once he got that letter. Either he could go and meet with the other kings, and give the support of his armies to the war with Acaria, or he could refuse. But if he did refuse, then once Saeticia and Torachi were done with Acaria, it would be Sono they invaded next.

  Zaow, the king who preached peace in a world of bloodshed, would not want two of Bacoria's most powerful nations marching on his very doorstep. It was said that King Zaow cared for his kingdom and his people more than he cared for anything else. There was little chance that Zaow would refuse Edmund and Marcus and become their next enemy. What Zaow had been trying to do was delay the summon as long as he could, sending Selphie to Serenite to try and convince Marcus against the war. He had been trying to hold things off until he found a way to stop the war from happening.

  So did sending for the Allmans mean that he had figured it out? Did Zaow have some sort of secret plan to stop the war from happening even as it knocked on his door, demanding that he come and face it?

  Was Luca the answer? It was odd timing, that the son of the man who had killed Manorith would appear just as Zaow sent for a team to deal with Manorith's son. Did Zaow believe that he could somehow do to Zinoro what Lodin had done to Manorith?

  "She has a lot of weight on her shoulders," Jared continued, after taking another drink. "And yet she remains so strong, so full of hope and belief. She really believes in her father's words... that peace really can exist, even in a world like this. It's a shame that she has to give up so much for her cause. She doesn't deserve the burden that has been placed upon her."

  Luca looked over at Jared. The man's eyes were cast down on the wood of the bar he was leaning on, distant and filled with longing and regret. Luca knew why he felt the way he did. They all did. The way he doted on her, and rushed to protect her from even the slightest of threats...

  "She really means a lot to you," Luca said to him, thinking of his own connection with Emila.

  Jared nodded. "We grew up together. From an early age, I was trained to be her protector. Normally, I would not have seen her much, being the princess and all, but she was no ordinary princess. She had a fire in her, and the captain of the guard, Gareth... he trained her in secret. Well, I'm sure that the king knew, but he pretended not to notice. In any case, Selphie and I spent a lot of time together. We were close friends, in spite of the fact that I was a commoner, and she was the princess of my kingdom."

  He took a long drink - longer than any of the others - and when he set his mug down, he had finished it off.

  "But no matter what we feel, we can never be together. She is the princess, and she will sacrifice her personal happiness for the sake of her kingdom... and for her people. She has already been sworn to something that is not me."

  Luca blinked. The way he said that; it seemed the feelings were reciprocated. Or at least they would be, were it not for duty getting in their way.

  Jared looked down at his empty mug and pushed it away. He seemed to have realised how much the alcohol had loosened his tongue, because the next thing he said was, "I'm going to sleep now. We've another long day of travel ahead of us. You should do the same."

  The guard rose, picking up his massive halberd and taking it with him upstairs. Luca sat alone at the bar, feeling his solitude.

  He looked down at the mug of beer in his hands. He finished it off in a few drinks, and then poured himself another. After finishing that, he poured a third. And then a fourth. After finishing that, he set the mug aside. His head was spinning, and he felt like he would throw up if he drank anymore.

  Luca couldn't be sure how much time had passed since Jared had left. It was certainly quite late, but he had no desire to go to sleep. Part of that had to do with the fact that, once again, he was sharing a room with Emila. And he was rather afraid of what might happen if he went up there now. She was likely already asleep. But perhaps she was not, and if he went up there now, they would end up fighting again. Or they might make up, and then his intoxicated mind might lead him to do something he would regret in the morning.

  Instead, Luca decided that a little fresh air would do him good. He stepped outside, the night air cool but not cold. It was just refreshing enough to clear his head a bit. He started to wander. He stumbled a bit at first, but eventually he managed to find his footing.

  He was filled with so many doubts. Doubts about his father, doubts about his plans of revenge, doubts about Emila, doubts about Selphie's mission of peace. He felt lost, wandering through life without a clear focus.

  Things used to be so much simpler, back in the old days when it was just him and his father. They had passed through so many odd places; Samgo, Sendora, Mainyu, and lastly, the Arimos. They had fought so many enemies, from monsters to bandits. Nothing had ever deterred Lodin. The man had been a fighter unlike any Luca had ever seen, his age and world-weariness doing nothing to slow him down. Luca used to watch him with awe, cutting down groups of armed men like they were made of butter, and once finished, sheathing his sword with a grin. Luca now knew how much pain Lodin had hid behind that grin, but he had never let his regrets burden him. Though he had spent fourteen years hiding from Zinoro, Lodin had never been haunted by him.

  It had already been months since that day, when Luca had watched Zinoro kill his father in that frozen hell-hole. He was still plagued by nightmares. Luca didn't understand how one could just let that go. He didn't understand how Lodin had forsaken his wife and second child, all to save his firstborn son. Had Lodin truly been free of the guilt, or had he just been good at hiding it?

  Ash had spoken ill of Lodin. Marcus had spoken ill of Lodin. But Luca would not forsake his father's legacy. They had not known the man. He had. He could judge Lodin where they could not.

  Lodin deserved justice. And if Luca just left with Emila, to go hide somewhere, Lodin would never get it.

  Luca had wandered, so lost in his thoughts he had not been paying attention to where he was going. He was in the woods, quite a distance away from town. He was walking alongside a river, making his way up a tall hill. The change in elevation was what had caught his attention; his tired and sluggish body requiring extra effort to get up the hill. Turning around, he could see the faint orange twinkle of the few lights that remained lit in the town at the late hour. He really ought to go back now, and return to the inn and go to sleep.

  He could hear a sound, though, coming from the atop the hill. It was a loud roaring sound; probably a waterfall. He took a few more steps, going up the hill a bit more until he could see it - there, at the top of the hill was indeed a small waterfall that was feeding the river he had been following. Well, he had come this far already; he might as well go see the falls.

  He continued his way up the hill, forcing his exhausted feet to keep moving. Why he was making himself go up this hill to see this waterfall was beyond him; he didn't really care that much about it. Perhaps he was stalling. Perhaps he really didn't want to go back.

  Luca stopped.

  What was he doing? He couldn't run away. Even if he really wanted to, he was still bound to Emila through the Soul Tether. Even now he could feel the beginning of the strains that came when he drifted too far from her.

  He could not leave her. Especially not now, when she so clearly needed his support. He couldn't give her what she really wanted, which was to give up on killing Zinoro and leave with her. But he could still be there for her. He could try to understand why she felt the way she did. She'd given up so much for him already, and she would continue to give to save him. How heartl
ess would he be to take advantage of that?

  There was a time when the thought would not have crossed his mind. Not too long ago, he was more than willing to drag Emila with him all the way to Acarienthia if he had to, taking advantage of what she had given him to be able to fight Zinoro without the chance of losing.

  But something had changed. Whether it was the magick of the tether affecting his mind, or just his own foolishness, he had allowed himself to let this girl grow on him. And now the thought of hurting her pained him. He couldn't run away with her, but he couldn't take her with him either.

  So the obvious solution was that he needed to leave her.

  That was it, he decided. She would have to stay behind. Not here, though. It wasn't safe. Once they got to T'Saw, he would make her stay there. Emila would stay in T'Saw, while he would go with Selphie and Zaow and the others to the Elder Hall, and then onward to the inevitable conflict with Zinoro. There, he would avenge Lodin, and whatever happened to him afterward would happen. But at least he could do so without hurting Emila any more.

  It wasn't what Luca wanted, and it certainly was not what Emila wanted, but it was for the best.

  Now that he had gotten that out of his mind, he turned back around to return to the town.

  Or he would have, were it not for the man standing on the path before him.

  The figure blocking his path stood only a few paces away, wearing a black cloak with the hood drawn over his head. The man pulled back the hood, revealing a face with short black hair and a trimmed beard.

  "Did you get my message?" Trunda asked.

  "Y-you!" Luca exclaimed. He reached for his sword, his trembling hand only managing to grasp it after a few tries.

  "Yes, me," Trunda replied, approaching him with slow, confident strides. "Did you think I would just vanish? I told the princess, back in Serenite, that we would meet again. And I am here to pick things up where I left them. And the first part of that is getting you out of the way."

  Trunda charged forth like an uncoiled spring. Luca pulled Siora free from its sheath, but he was unable to swing in time. His body was simply moving too slowly; his combat reflexes were entire seconds off. Trunda brought his fist down, delivering a punch to Luca's gut that felt like a strike from a sledgehammer. Luca heard a crack, and even in his inebriated mind he knew that that was the sound of bones breaking.

  Another punch - this one to Luca's sword arm - and he felt something shatter. When he looked over at his arm he saw it was bent in a way it should not have been. Thankfully he wasn't really feeling any pain. Perhaps he was simply in so much pain that his mind just couldn't handle it.

  He wasn't thinking logically. He should be trying to get away. He couldn't fight Trunda as he was now; in fact, he wasn't even trying to fight now. He was backing away on legs that didn't feel strong enough to hold him up. Trunda simply continued to approach him, his steps confident. Luca saw now that Trunda wore no armour, having only the most basic of leather clothes to protect him. Not that it mattered; there was no way Luca could fight him now. All he could do was get away.

  Trunda was upon him in seconds, delivering a series of brutal punches that sent Luca falling back, collapsing in the dirt and spitting out blood. He lay there for a moment, no longer able to even move, while Trunda stepped up and stood over him, staring down at his conquest.

  Luca could definitely feel the pain now. And he felt guilty, because he knew that Emila had to be feeling the same pain he was.

  "Pathetic," said the man above him. "You stumbled out here, alone and drunk, knowing full well that I was after you? This is the second time I've beaten you so easily. What protection could you possible offer the princess when you can't even take care of yourself?"

  The next thing Luca felt was Trunda's hand grabbing the back of his head, and then he was being dragged up the hill, towards the top of the waterfall he had been approaching earlier.

  Unlike before, the connection with Emila was not growing weaker as he was taken away from her. He realised there was only one reason why that could be, but he prayed he was wrong.

  "Weaklings like you have no place in this world," Trunda said as he dragged Luca up the hill. "My king warned us about you. He said we were to take you to him if we found you. That he and he alone would be the one to kill you. But I will not dishonour my king by presenting him with such a pathetic sight. You can die here, along with your companions and that girl you're so fond of, and Zinoro's legacy will be secure."

  The sound of the waterfall was deafening now. They had stopped going uphill; they must have reached the top.

  Luca opened his eyes to see his head was close to a tree trunk. Trunda pulled his head back a bit, and then hit him off the hard bark of the tree. His vision grew hazy, and everything was spinning. And then Trunda hit him off the tree again. And again. And again. And again. He lost count of how many times Trunda bashed the side of his head off the tree. But when it was finally over, Luca was barely conscious, and a thick red pool of blood ran down the side of the tree.

  Trunda said something else; Luca could no longer make out his words. And then he felt the man's hands grabbing the front of his cloak and dragging him somewhere. He felt himself being dropped into running water.

  Now he was drifting. It was a kind mercy compared to the head-bashing from before. He opened his eyes - or one of them, as one was too swollen to open - and he looked up at the stars above in the sky.

  He drifted for a few seconds more before he went over the edge of the waterfall.

 

  Trunda stared down at the body before him.

  The son of Lodin did not move. The side of his head was split open, his arm was broken, as were at least a few of his ribs. He had just taken a dive over the edge of the waterfall, and spent a few minutes underwater before he had resurfaced.

  He should be dead. And yet he was not.

  Trunda scratched his beard. The boy had endured all that, and yet his body had not vanished. He was still there, floating by face-down in the river. He could not possibly have been breathing.

  Somehow, the boy was not dead.

  Trunda had heard the rumours of what had happened at Allma Temple, but he had assumed those to be born of a combination of hero-worship and Dreevius' incredible ineptitude. But the proof was right before him.

  Perhaps this was why Zinoro had wanted the boy for himself. Perhaps Zinoro sought to make himself unkillable in the same way Lodin's son was. And perhaps to do that, he needed the boy to be brought before him.

  But what need was there for that? Zinoro already had a guarantee. An Absolute Truth, spoken to him by that prophet from Mainyu. Only the firstborn son of Lodin, or a member of his own kin could slay him. And Zinoro had already taken care of one of those two uncertainties, so why would he risk leaving another open?

  Well, sometimes even the greatest leaders made mistakes. Trunda would not allow his king to be slain in some sort of prophecy twist. He would make sure the chance died here, with Lodin's son. Even if he could not truly kill the boy, he could ensure that the boy was made to be no threat to Zinoro. It would be messy, but if the boy were separated into many pieces, even the greatest healing magick could not bring him back.

  He may not be able to die, but he would certainly wish he could.

  Trunda stepped into the river. He would have to hurry and get this done; he still had to get back to town and finish things with the princess, after all.

  An arrow buried itself in Trunda's back before he could take another step.

  He spun around, gritting his teeth through the pain. Running down the path towards him were six figures, each with weapons drawn. The one who had fired the arrow was the black-haired girl, whose face grew pale when she saw Lodin's son floating in the water.

  "Luca!" Emila cried.

  She ran past Trunda, tossing aside her bow and wading into the water where Luca was floating face-down in the river. She had no worries about the Acarian attacking her, as the remaining five members of her grou
p - Brand, Wiosna, Ash, Jared, and Princess Selphie - immediately surrounded Trunda.

  "Give it up," the princess said. "You cannot fight all of us."

  Trunda smirked, like he didn't quite believe that, but he raised his hands in surrender anyway.

  "Luca!" Emila cried out again, in shock at the state she'd found him in. She pulled his unbroken arm over her shoulder, and was carrying him out of the river as best she could. Trunda looked over to her with disdain.

  "Let's get him out of here," Brand said to the princess.

  "Yeah." Selphie nodded. "Emila, are you alright?"

  Emila put on a strong face, though she looked like she was about to break out in tears at any moment. "I can heal him. Get Trunda out of here."

  The Acarian was led away by the others, while Emila and Luca remained beside the river.

  Trunda smiled once again, his eyes amused with secret knowledge.

 

  He felt himself returning to the waking world, carried back by a soft, comforting voice. As he opened his eyes, he saw a dark-haired beauty sitting beside him, her green eyes filled with regrets and unshed tears. She was holding his hand in her own, her thumb tracing circles in his palm. Her words were quiet, so quiet he could not make them out. But he could hear the sound of her voice, even if he could not make out the words they spoke, and it was so beautiful to him that he could have fallen back asleep right there. But he could see she was worried, so he made his lucidity known by sitting up.

  "L-Luca..." Emila said slowly, surprised by his sudden awakening. The worry was still there in her eyes, but it was now being replaced by relief.

  "I'm okay," he said to her, wanting to dispel that worry as quickly as he could. His body ached, especially his head and chest. There was a large wet spot on the ground close by, where he seemed to have coughed up a lot of water. But otherwise, he was fine.

  She smiled. "I was really worried about you. I-I felt a lot of pain, and I knew something was happening to you, so I woke the others. It looked like we were just in time..."

  "What happened?" he asked. His head only hurt more when he tried to remember.

  "It was Trunda. He attacked you. He beat you really bad, and it looked like he was trying to drown you."

  Those words jolted his memory. He remembered everything. Trunda breaking his arm, bashing his head against the tree, and pushing him into the river to fall over the waterfall. And with those memories, came the accompanying feelings of guilt.

  "I'm sorry," he said to her. "I'm sorry you had to feel that. It was my fault. I shouldn't have gone off on my own like that..."

  "Luca, no..." Emila said softly. She moved closer to him, wrapping her arms around him and embracing him tightly. "It wasn't your fault at all. I-If I hadn't felt that pain, I would never have know you were in trouble. When we got to you, I was so worried. I though that he might have done something to you, something that even the tether could not have saved you from. I didn't know if you could survive drowning or not. I was so afraid, because if you were gone, then our last words would have been that fight at the inn."

  She was so close to him, he could feel her heartbeat. It was racing, much like his own was. He realised something then, something that he had known for a while, but had not seen. Or perhaps he had just been denying it. But he realised just how much this girl had come to mean to him, and how much he had come to rely on her, not just because of the tether, but because of the warmth she brought into his cold life.

  He knew that if he didn't push her away - if he didn't stop what was growing between them now before it had the chance to grow into something more - that it would make the time when he had to leave her all the harder.

  "I know you can't forgive him," she said, holding him closely like she was worried he would disappear right then and there. "You have to avenge your father. It was wrong of me to ask you to throw that away. I don't care where you go, I'll go with you. Just please don't leave me. Don't go. Please... Please..."

  He could not answer, because that was the one thing he could not promise her. So he remained silent, while she held him close and wept into his shoulder.

  Emila could not see that he shed tears of his own.