I noticed one of the Ghaundians glance over. Was it their watchful silence that reminded me of Cole?
"You'll leave?" I asked him.
He only nodded; as if he knew, that even I knew, he was going. "I still have some things to ready, since I'm going tonight, and... well, I'm tired as well. I might try to rest."
"It'll be hard to rest, outside the city. In those tents," I admitted. That was where he would be tonight. Outside Akadia.
"Most everyone's been there for days now," he replied. "I can manage it... I'm only sorry that I'll be away from you that long."
This admittance made my breath spike. Not that it should have, for it was always, and not any less since we returned from Genbu, that he said such things. Baraduce, behind us, had finally gotten the leaders settled on the original plan, for the Echrians to verse the Wyverns. It sounded as if everyone were leaning towards planning for their presence. If Cole's idea worked well, then it wouldn't matter anyways.
"Ellia, will you come to me before I go?" he asked.
I frowned, but he didn't pause.
"You'll be done here, before I have to leave. I only want to see you once more."
"I told you, I'll come to see you tomorrow."
"I know. You don't have to, just if you're done."
I stood still, not answering. I heard Lucian saying, exasperated, that there would be no further talk over who would attack the Wyverns. It drew a portion of my attention, and then Cole was moving off, through past the crowd, out the doors.
But here he was, even after he'd said he would try to sleep, standing down with Minstrel. Had they been talking the whole time we'd met? It had taken less hours further, than I could have hoped following that, to finish matters up with the meeting. Then I'd said all official farewells, first to the Genbuans, then the Democedians, who'd given me a kiss each in turn, for my cheek, then the Byakoans, who'd kissed me as well, seeing how the Democedians had done so. The Ghaundians replied with no more than a wave. Carceron remained extra moments to speak with me, but Leddy was gone by then. Nain, I planned to see in the morning, so I'd left him and the Selkians to their goodbyes to his princess.
Was he having his weapon sharpened? I did not know which weapons Cole planned to take to battle. Last time, he'd arrived so late, he'd been stuck with a Selkian axe, and then had acquired knives in midst of the battle. Perhaps those were his proffered weapon; I'd never even thought to ask him.
"Then Gael and Ellia, you'll leave before that, with Tory and Alek," Lucian finished up, drawing my gaze back to the room. He'd gone through, backwards from himself and Estrid, which Warriors would be leaving when tomorrow. I was along so early, in case there was trouble between the rulers within a night. Also Gael needed to have time to be shown to the treasures gathered up to bribe the goblins. It wasn't only Cole, but Ghaund as well, who'd suggested such a thing for the goblins. We'd had the necessary time to gather things from Karatel's land as a sign of good faith for the goblins—should they even listen well enough to hear our bribes. It was something the Ghaundians themselves had done already. Thus far, those bargains they'd made, the goblins had honored. It seemed, that where the benefit was greater not to fight, the goblins didn't mind it; they only wanted their spoils.
"Ellia, have you briefed Gael through the ruler's meeting?" Lucian checked.
"Yes, yes," I answered, at the same time Gael said, "She has."
I smiled for it.
"So isn't that it, Master Denathar?" Estrid asked—with much less teasing than she would have in any other circumstance. In this, these meetings, since we'd come to Karatel, she was very serious. I knew she was afraid; for Lucian, not herself. She rarely left his side.
Lucian spread his hands out.
The room seemed to exhale, whether it was for fear or calm, I couldn't tell.
"It's still early, we'll have plenty time for rest then," Alek said approvingly.
Amalia behind him, in the corner, had her arms crossed tight. She didn't speak much; mostly she watched her son, while I saw and heard her each time she was near, as she'd been outside of Tobias's room, begging him to be careful; she had that sort of strain about her.
"As for those chimera still training, best make sure, they're stopped," Lucian added. "Gael, will you see to that?"
He nodded.
"Japsin, can go along."
The fourth-ranked Warrior, with his concerns unmet, nodded grimly.
"The chimera are so powerful now," Lyrie added, for all those present, "It's a much greater advantage than we ever thought we would have, isn't it? I wish Elminster were here—for he would delight to see it."
Baraduce gave a sort of humph, while Alek laughed, "To think, we can show him, on our return. Yanartas will certainly become a bright sort of place."
"They'll be thinking we have terrible storms always," Tory added, holding at his elbow.
"Perhaps it will keep so many of them from crowding in our Isle," Kalhiir added. He was that one, one of the first-order Warriors, who never said much, unless it was something negative. What had he said when I'd first come to the Isle? Something about Estrid and Minstrel likely being spies. And that thing which had sparked my outburst, just before seeing Lucian that first moment, thinking he was Tobias come back to life.
"You can't expect us to attack Akadia," he'd laughed.
I'd nearly jumped upon them, that was how angry I'd been. "You're the Warriors of Cirali. Of course I expect that of you! You're supposed to be brave. You have the chimera. Who will stop the Akadians if you don't?"
"I know that my Sheil, for one, will never complain of it," Alec went on, here in the present. "He's taking to using lighting as a fish to water. And to think even all that time, even as we'd known Savras, our chimera had owned this ability."
"Somewhere hidden very deep," Gael remarked, unabashedly—then even less so: "Anyways, we have the princess to thank for this. She's proven as fine a Warrior as any Yanartian—now she's given us the greatest advantage we could have hoped for."
"She's given more than that," Estrid added, "She's brought the whole of the armies, together, hasn't she?"
I ducked my head—between the two of them, wishing that they wouldn't. But then Lucian spoke, just as greatly to my commendation. "Yes; so all of this I think we should have known from the start. You're a fine Warrior, Princess Solidor."
"Aye," added Alec, just beside him.
He bowed his head to me. Then it was Tory next. Then Japsin, and so many of the second-orders. By then Lucian had bowed as well, with Estrid. Even Baraduce, and once I saw Gael's head dip, that was when I meant to stop them, only I found that my throat was too locked up to. I wanted to tell them that they shouldn't be commending me, that it was the other way around. They had, none of them, a stake in attacking Akadia. Lucian, perhaps it could be argued, only I knew that he had no wish to be a ruler at all. And Amalia's hopes had all moved on to him; just that he would survive, I saw it in her.
Since the very moment, I'd come down from the mountain with Luffie, and they'd chosen to go on to Karatel, to help to defend it, they'd taken up the cause of protecting the lands; and now they were to fight in the largest battle of a century. There was something since the shards had been given to the chimera, a light which glowed within the Warriors; I could see it now, in their eyes, and as they spoke. It was a fierceness with said they were heroes, not simply men and women, but something beyond themselves; for all they'd given up of themselves.
"And I shall be glad to be counted among you, for what days I have left," I told them.
And so, I bowed to them in return, my eyes damp with tears.
CYRIC:
The first time I'd noticed her watching me, had been days ago. Not long, after the chimeras had been given their abilities by Ellia. In those times when there was lightning raging all around. There in those flashes of blue and white, while everyone had been busy training on the fields, I'd left off to the nearby woods. It wasn't so far that I couldn't hear the rumbling thunder
the lightning caused, but it was dense enough that Tosch would not be spotted. And I was glad for it, especially, since if I'd been asked to describe my greeting for him, there would have been nothing better for it than to say, I'd raced up and hugged him outright.
He'd been very still in waiting for me. But his mind had not, and so I'd felt it, even at a distance, like a pesky itch, I only realized the meaning for once he'd come close. Then, holding him, with branches above us, and smoke coming off his coat, there wasn't anything that needed to be said. He knew it all, and I knew he knew it all; and it was just that simple. Maybe it would have been even more simple, except that he was the only one that knew me like that, and so I felt more like a kid than I had in a long time.
"You've been good?" I asked him, outright, then, pulling back, my hand going from his neck to his shoulder. "I tried to tell you, we would go to Genbu. I tried to think it as loud as I could."
He whinnied, that tender sort of way to it, that he never took care in using. His eyes burnt dark, so I knew he wasn't seeing anything. And what read I could get from him, in answer to my question, wasn't much apart from excitement. But then he knocked his head suddenly against me, and I got that instant wave of emotion that couldn't have been mine, shocking me still.
It made my voice strained when I replied. "You're right, I also tried to tell you not to come."
His head went knocking to mine again. I was reminded of standing out in the fields, beside the lake with him, just before our assault on Akadia. His steadiness.
I pulled the wraps off my head in a rush, determined to spend a while with him. As soon as I had, dropping them clear to ground, I turned against him, and just leaned back. He stayed strong like that, while I looked up at the branches. Blackish for the winter, and hardly a slip of grey sky showing through, but where it did, there were flashes of blue and white.
"I'm still crazy about her, Tosch. Tell me I shouldn't have told her yet who I am."
His answer was a rumble to his chest. But then my mind, I wasn't sure on my own, fell to memories, first of riding beside Ellia and Fauna on the fields not far north from here, on our way to Echren. And then on our return, anger in my voice and coiling in my body over everything; yelling for my soldiers, yelling even at Tosch. I remembered something I'd never seen before, Ellia standing outside the chupacabra's cave in that great cavern—just between Tosch and Fauna. I saw her with her cheeks flustered, and her eyes wet with fierce sorts of tears, and her fists balled. I saw her as I'd never seen her or anyone, in the darkness, lit but not lit. I couldn't even conceive of it. For I could see her, though there was only darkness there covering her, or something dim like star or moonlight. But rather than turning things blurry, as the darkness did for me—the dimmer the more blurry it became, the brighter, the more defined. It was defined, she was defined, even in darkness. Those tears in her eyes, had sparkling to them, from the sky above, but not to any degree I could have told for myself before. It was as if there were all these shades within darkness, that I hadn't known were there. I saw black. But between something like the color of Tosch's mane in the sunlight—a silvering, darkish grey—and that pitch black of his eyes, there were hundreds of shades, and they told an image. Her hair was the brightest, even yellow. It was strange, because her eyes weren't glowing as they did for me in darkness; her skin was the palest after her hair. It was like a shade of color, I'd never seen before. Shadowed white.
When had this been? Just after she'd left me beside the fire. I'd told her she was foolish for thinking that I would have wanted to carry her. Then she'd said she'd already known so—so why was I even saying it. And I'd told her that I would say it as often as I wanted; and I would, because if she was a fool, then the things she said didn't have to matter to me. If I could only keep thinking it over, and over, and over. But then she'd shouted, something about saying whatever she liked, since it didn't matter; since I could tell what she felt anyways. Oh, and I could. She'd been right. If there'd ever been a time I hadn't known how Ellia loved me, I couldn't remember it. I'd told Tosch on the fields, how in those days when we were younger, when she'd made herself so obvious, when I hadn't even been thinking of such things as love. And I hadn't. But that didn't have to do with knowing. Thinking and knowing were two different things. I was sure, if I'd learned anything in all these mistakes, that was one of them. Because I'd always known I loved Ellia, but I'd rarely thought so for myself... I'd thought that I didn't want to be with her, but I'd known that I did, so I'd been miserable while she'd been away. I'd thought that Lox was right, but I'd known that he wasn't, that he was evil. And I'd thought that I wanted nothing more to be gone from Shaundakul, but I'd known all along that it was my home—that I'd hated never having been accepted, almost as badly as I'd hated watching it fall from a high tower, where I could do nothing.
Now, I was sure, that Ellia knew who I was, that Cole was Cyric, even though she didn't think he was. She knew me, that was why she loved me.
"I'm scared, Tosch," I said, not knowing how much of that he'd meant for me to see, whether it was supposed to be some sort of answer, whether he was a granted animal or not. I thought of Tongon, below Genbu, telling about how granted animals were those that had helped to protect the lands. I didn't know about all that, but I knew that Tosch, for himself, would be counted among the bravest souls I'd known—so long as he was fighting for his own cause. "Ellia said when we were gone in Genbu, that she was only a little kid. But I think I am too. I miss Silos, and I miss Scholar Padril, and I miss sitting in my bed in the Scholars' tower—fearing dances above all things. She won't be with me for the battle, and I understand, since she'll be safest with Luffie. I wouldn't want her below with me. But what will I do if she gets hurt? She's the only thing I'm good for."
Tosch's reply was a huff, and with that discontent of his past proposition; how he might make it to the battle himself. This had been... first given by him outside of Byako, and then again before I'd ridden him to Selket—so that he might be able to fight with me in Karatel. He wanted me to try to cover him with armor—and for the marks on his face, mud or coal. I never had agreed to it, since, as Ellia had told me once: Cyric, he has smoke pouring off of him. And secondly, because at that time, it had been disconcerting enough to realize that my horse was suggesting something to me.
Now he had a new one for me, even as I turned back to face him, smirking so he knew I wouldn't be covering him in mud—and smiling also a little for the feel of cool wind on my face; which I'd truly taken for granted too long. But my smile shortly fell.
"No, I haven't thought about that," I replied.
He kicked his hoof. I gave time to looking at it, more to make a point, or perhaps an excuse to ignore his pestering than for any other reason. I looked back at him with my brows high. "I just don't think it matters."
He gave a snort, showed himself, snapping back at those frightening, cruel, ivoronsu which used to mistreat him.
"Do you think it's such a simple sort of posturing, between men, Tosch? It's not a one on one sort of thing. There are thousands of people here. The battle will be made or lost by them."
His response was short, a rolling snort.
"Can't you tell all that I told the Yanartians? I gave them everything I could. Do you know how long I spent drawing maps? I'm not a map-maker, Tosch. I'm not even good with directions. For the battle, I'm going to stay where I can see Ellia. That's where I'm supposed to be."
I got the feeling, of standing side, by, side, arms-crossed, with a man whose eyes were blue almost as bright as Ellia's turquoise. I remembered him with Lox's hand on his shoulder, then grimacing while I stood, chained, on the granted mountain. He was a Lieutenant now; I'd learned that much in the meetings; I didn't know whether Ellia recognized him by his name alone, or that he'd taken my place in Lox's battalion. I had my own designs for that, and I tried to make them out to Tosch, but he didn't even care, he only continued to press on about his previous subject.
"It's not my place, Tosch
," I finally said, decidedly. "There are too many others that have it better. I'll stay where I'm needed. And you, you stay away from the whole of it, or you're liable to get killed by someone on our side."
I knocked my palm against his jaw, below his ear, patting there. Then after a few seconds of looking him over, thinking some of his presence outside of Palum's Keep where I hadn't killed Raand and Jaxom, I moved my fingers up to his ear, scratching behind it. Then I dropped down to gather up a few handfuls of dirt to tell him we would try, at least, and see if he could be disguised.
We'd spent the better part of two more hours laughing, and it was a good thing I had my mask to put back on, or some might wonder when or with whom I'd had a mud fight. As it was, no one really noticed me having left, or seemed to care that my robes had gotten a touch smudged—especially since, I hadn't gone straight back to where Ellia'd been training. I'd gone to the city. And that was where I'd seen the Echrians, standing near a ring of perched firebirds. And that was where Leddy had been standing among them, in a dress like the last I'd seen her in, reminding me only a little of Ellia's vermillion-red dress, since it was nearly the same color. Leddy's hands had been pressed to the folds at her hips, as if there were pockets there, and her expression had been a pout more than anything.
Though she stood out bright against the greyness of Karatel, I'd barely given her a second's notice—until her gaze had shifted onto me. Her hands went loose then. She straightened up. I looked behind me to tell if I was missing something, then glanced down to see how dirtied my robes really were; I even put a hand up to my head, to tell that I had reattached my mask right. All was in place, and still she looked, not at someone else, at me. Carceron was beside her. She bumped his arm, then his gaze turned as well, spotted on me. I began to march on, just to be clear I wasn't drawing attention, staring, but I glanced back, enough to tell Leddy smiling, then Carceron gave me an unhappy sort of furrow before turning back to Nain's attendants.
I'd left them after that, hoping they simply had something against Kanthians. But then, during all the meetings following, her eyes were for me mostly. The red bird, the one which had stood perched on Carceron's arm, it stared too.
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