Discordant Note | TBATE

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Toren Daen

My exhaustion was soul-deep.

The following days were spent interned in the Divot trying to recover my strength, as per Seris' orders. My heartbeat brought quiet agonies with every pulse, my overuse of Resonant Flow making itself known. Though my heartfire had regenerated and my body was in near-perfect health, it was my very spirit itself that felt worn.

The Brand of the Banished was to blame. Every time Chul's fist had smashed into my face or driven into my chest, the Brand had seared my very soul, burning away my primordial essence. I had spent many days simply meditating in the silent Sea of my Soul, pulling scattered pieces of my soul back into alignment. Memories I hadn't known I'd lost realigned themselves. Foundations for emotions I'd lost drifted back to me.

So it was as I sat, cross-legged, in that endless, black expanse. The Sea beneath me was no longer freshwater kissed by the sunrise. No, now it was an ocean of crimson. My very soul was akin to the aftermath of a battlefield. The scent of copper and metal infused my lungs every time I breathed.

It was hard to see into the Abyss beyond, now. Normally, Aurora's light had cast everything in the healthy glow of a sunrise, but she was… dim, now. I couldn't bear to look at the scarred reflection of her soul as it pulsed weak light across my bloody spirit. It made me think too much of dusk instead of dawn.

Lady Dawn had been injured just as deeply as I during the Breaking of Burim. I knew she was trying to pull herself back, on some subconscious level. I could feel it in how she gravitated toward me, using me as an anchor to try and heal over the parts that had been burned.

Without her light… it was hard to see into the far darkness beyond. No guiding star lit my way at every step as I stared blankly into the soul space, searching for familiarity.

I thought I could see Seris' soul. That pale moon, covered in shadows. But that darkness of ephemeral silk seemed darker somehow. What I would have normally been able to pierce was impossible without Aurora's light.

Cylrit's tower shield of black metal still orbited my Scythe. I could sense flashes of him as it ever-so-slightly caught the light, but they were indistinct. Shadowed and unclear from my weakness.

I felt the temptation to pull on that abyss, to rotate it and show Arthur, Sylvie, and Tessia's souls. I could do it here and now. Perhaps I could gain more insight into what had led Arthur to… making himself King. I still didn't know how to process that. I didn't know if I could ever process that.

So instead, I just laid back in the gloomy shadows of my dusk-touched soul, my hair sinking into the blood below. I could feel the strands as memories and ideals grasped them like drowned sinners, pulling it—and me—deeper into their depths.

If I lay here too long, I thought staring blankly up at the empty darkness, I'll drown.

I brushed my hands across the bloody surface, like a child treading water or splashing in a shallow stream. I watched without much care as the waves rippled and changed, sensing the contents of each droplet of blood.

The soul was a strange, nebulous thing. Each drop of red that brushed across my palms told me a little bit more about myself. Here was an old memory, one that tied to a dozen others. Each splash of scarlet was another knot in an ever-expanding tapestry of my existence, somehow compressed into liquid form.

It was peaceful, in a way. Not the normal peace I experienced in this place. This was the peace of the calm before the storm. It was the sort of stillness that served as a prelude to a fight in a ring, or a duel for your life.

The Brand wasn't innately cruel. It burned my soul, true, but each searing contact with Chul had been a slight warning, starting small. Don't hold your loved ones, it said, pushing one away like a hand lurching from a hot stove. It will get worse if you hold on.

That was what had hurt Aurora so much. Despite the heat, when Chul had been endangered, she'd held on, letting herself break apart.

I pulled myself from the shallows before the ghosts of the dead could pull me under. I sat cross-legged again, closing my eyes as I found the willpower to push back to the real world.

When I opened them again, I was in Seris' room once more, the dark candlelight making me feel like I was still staring into that endless abyss of distant stars.

I was alone. That was normal now. Seris visited sometimes, but she never stayed long. She pressed on my wounds. Checked on my health. Ensured I was still here. And then she'd leave, swiftly as she'd come.

Even as I'd been confined to her bed, I felt a sort of distance between us that had never been there before that ached as much as any of the wounds I'd taken in my battle with Chul. But why wouldn't she distance herself from me? I'd promised her hope. I'd promised her a way forward.

And I'd broken those hopes along with Burim.

"I can't stay in here," I said to myself in slow realization. Seris had commanded me to stay put, presumably for my protection and recovery. But every inhale and every brush of… the city's wound across my ears slowly drove me closer and closer to the edge.

I felt like I was in a cage, denied the light. The darkness outside of Seris' rooms had been enough to terrify me into hiding, at least until the spreading madness of my very own soul finally overrode that fear.

I rose quickly from the bed, stumbling over to Seris' door. I pushed my way outside, reining in my mana signature. The halls were dark as a crypt as my eyes darted about, searching for signs of any other presence.

Aurora, can you sense–

My thoughts cut off abruptly as I recognized what I'd been about to ask. Can you sense any traps or spies?

But she was silent. Gone for now.

That second presence in my mind had always been a source of comfort and warmth. A reassuring little light that affirmed my emotions and drive at every point of the way. Now, without that hand on my shoulder, I felt strangely like a lost child in a house far, far too big for me in the depths of the night.

I exhaled a shuddering breath, then walked across the dreadfully empty halls. And as I walked, the sound I'd been hiding from for so long finally reached my ears. It was like a massive, pulsing wound. It felt as if Mother Earth herself wept from a dozen cuts.

Whenever someone bled, it carried a small trace of their excess heartfire that coasted along the top, glimmering for a time before dissipating into that atmosphere. But this… this was like that, except dark. Like a swath of pestilence that refused to leave the dead, warding away every family that came to mourn. It brushed against my ears like the deepened calls of a mourning dove, making tremors rush along my arms.

I felt cold. Even with the heat of my blood and the warmth of my mana, I couldn't stop the chilling wave that made gooseflesh rise along my skin.

I reached the exit of the Divot easily enough. Part of me was still sure that Seris had tracked me out. In fact, I was certain of it. Even if I didn't know how, I doubted I could escape that cage without her figuring it out somehow.

The Divot was dreadfully silent as I floated above, one foot over the edge of the abyss.

If I float down, I'll see it all, I thought, my fingers clenching at my side. If I look down, I can't pretend it doesn't exist anymore.

I could already hear the aftermath, like one gaping attack on the world itself. But seeing it…

I needed to face it. To see the consequences of my actions, to see them through. I'd promised myself that long ago.

I allowed myself to sink like a stone at the bottom of a river, casting my gaze about the decimated city.

Burim was unrecognizable. Where once lavaducts hung from thick chains in the Overcrofts, providing warm light and flowing life to the entire city, now they swung like disemboweled entrails instead. The hanging stalactites, instead of littering the ceiling in a thousand different places, were now only sparse spears poised to impale the earth even further. What chains were left swung like empty nooses, the corpses long since taken down.

I hovered there in the center of the cavern for a time, utterly undetectable as I observed the devastation, felt the intent.

This is what war between asura is, I thought, feeling as if my flight were slower in the molten sap of lingering death. This is what it leaves behind.

In the aftermath of my battle with Mardeth, the people of East Fiachra had been devastated, feeling each lance of pain deep in their hearts. But there had been hope, too. A strange dichotomy toward the future pervaded their minds and ideals.

But there was none of that here. The intent of every mage just reeked of despair as they trudged across malformed bridges and sifted through rubble far below. Dwarves used their metal, magma, and earth magic to part debris and carve through the tattered landslide that was once the Undercrofts. Streams of lava still flowed malevolently here and there, mocking the survivors.

I didn't know what to feel. Despair? Regret? Anguish? I'd felt all of those already. They'd consumed me. Anger? Some of that, yes. Hate, too. But right now, I just felt tired.

Mordain had warned me and tested my resolve, asking if I was willing to take these chances. Soleil had shown a Bloodtie that stunk of the same dread pain. I'd decried them both internally as cowards too afraid to take the steps necessary to save this world from the Vritra and Indraths.

But seeing this—feeling it deep within—I thought I finally understood them beyond an intellectual level.

How had I been so naive?

I drifted down to a nearby refugee station, silent as the empty wind. I swiped a cloak from a stall while the owner wasn't looking, using it to cover my recognizable features.

And then I set to helping where I could. For hours, I used my telekinesis to clear rubble. I healed whoever I could find. I was a shadow in the crowds, little less than a ghost as I flitted about in half a haze.

High above, the gaping wound in the ceiling where my failed assault on Chul had been deflected into the roof let the morning sun into the cavern, but it didn't feel bright. Sand fell in a constant stream of fine particles along the edges like a waterfall into the dark cavern far below. It made me think of the slow trickle of an hourglass running out of time. I hid amidst the shadows of that lost time as hundreds of feet of destroyed rock passed by.

The people were somber with loss, but they still talked as I drifted among them. A massive Alacryan fleet had arrived practically immediately after the Breaking. They'd been striking north along the Sehz, making a true effort to punch through Sapin to Blackbend. Rumors said a Retainer led it. Maybe even a Scythe.

I half-listened as I worked. I was certain that some picked up on my identity, but not a word was said.

I just kept moving, going from one place that needed a helping hand to another. And as it all sank into my skin like cloying smoke, I felt my thoughts shift back again and again to that understanding of this tragedy. This… This was what happened when asura fought. This was what became of the world when gods did battle.

And Mother Earth continued her work, careless of the lessers beneath her feet, I thought sardonically, stepping away from a small group of dwarven mages as I set down a massive boulder that had been giving them trouble. The Dragon battled her to protect them. But that was the dragon's perspective, wasn't it?

Barth had told me that story, one spoken to all asuran youth. But I wondered, then. How many lessers did Arkanus destroy in his conquest of Geolus?

I was forced to interrupt my work, however, as a familiar pulling sensation brushed against my soul. Not my mind, no—the very sea of crimson that I'd recently left for the land of the living.

Circe? I thought with confusion, remembering the sensation from not long ago when I'd felt her plea. Circe Milview?

The last time I'd answered such a call, I'd been interned deep in the Hearth. Seth had laid dying in Circe's arms, and she'd… pleaded for someone to help. For me to help. And I'd answered, granting her what I could.

And she'd channeled my heartfire healing, somehow. Maybe because of her latent djinni blood? Or perhaps from some insight of her own?

I hadn't had time to truly comprehend what this meant at the time. I'd been too set on trying to win the favor of the Hearth in the Forum to focus on the intricacies of—

Again, that plea for help brushed against the boundaries of my soul. It was so earnest. So pure and trusting in its desire for help and assistance. Even in the depths of my own despair, I couldn't deny it.

I closed my eyes, and I followed that call to the edges of my spirit. I reached Circe's soul, and I sensed the effervescent lifeforce that connected it to her body.

And I followed it down.

Some part of me traveled beyond Burim. Beyond Dicathen and Alacrya, to a place not quite of this realm. Time moved differently there, subject as it was to altered rules of reality. Clocks ticked slower. My heartbeat seemed to take its leisurely time.

Circe's in the Relictombs, I realized as her emotions flowed through me. Just like with how I reached out to Tessia and healed her, I can sense where she is in space.

And the person she was healing… Sevren?! Yes, Circe was channeling what heartfire I had to spare to a familiar man. I couldn't see or truly understand the situation, but I knew this young girl—who had once been so faithful to the Vritra Doctrination—was somehow soothing wounds on Sevren's left arm, which had been mangled to a pulp.

I wanted to learn more. I guided the young girl's aetheric touch where I could, sensing the weaves of intent that reached her and using those to pull us both into alignment with Sevren. But I still felt so weak. Even as my best friend's arm finally pulled itself back together, I struggled to keep my focus on the young sentry.

Against my will, my weakened soul pulled away, wrenched back to the dark and wounded expanse of Burim. I exhaled a ragged breath, my heartbeat stuttering in my chest as I leaned forward.

I'd felt a mote of Circe's emotions as my weakened soul failed to anchor itself any more. What I sensed unnerved me. There was an almost sunny, blinding glow of trust that seared my metaphysical eyes.

Back when I'd healed Tessia Eralith during Bilal and Bivran's attack on Zestier, I hadn't been able to so easily trace her heartfire back to her soul. There was a resistance. I couldn't get in without being allowed in. Thankfully, the elven princess had relented under my insistent, soul-deep request. Afterward, I'd been able to coast along the flow of the heartfire that tied her Soul to her Vessel in an inverse of how I reached my own soul.

But I'd needed to ask. With Tessia, I'd stood at the doorway, and I was granted permission. Something about how Circe was willing to open her very soul to me made my fists clench at my sides.

Nobody should trust that openly, I thought, remembering Seris' eyes in the wake of my broken promises. It only leads to pain.

My damning introspection drifted away as a familiar presence approached me along charred streets. The Undercrofts weren't as dark as they used to be, at least not this section. The holes seared in the ceiling let in too much sunlight for that.

Still, Lusul Hercross blended in well with what shadow was left. There was a darkness to his intent and a subtle rigidity to his emotions I'd never felt before as he strode through the rubble of the Undercrofts towards me.

Dwarven refugees scuttled away from him as if he were a bright light and they were rats. It made the reality of the situation burn even more as he approached.

Lusul had entered this war as a boy. He had been beaten into being a man.

"Sir," he said sharply, standing at attention near me. Even with my cloak, he knew precisely who to address. "I've been sent to talk with you."

His nearly pink eyes shifted around the darkness, almost seeming to glow in contrast with his dark skin. I saw how the edges of his eyes trembled as he took in the shattered stone and melted rock all around us.

The lavatides, strangely, didn't settle down or leave much behind but rubble. They passed over almost supernaturally, pumping their vile fire into the ocean. I would've expected them to cool and solidify as the heat of the lava lessened, but they felt like a hit-and-run driver who didn't care about who they hurt, only fled the scene and left the victims in horrified shock.

Lusul had empathized with these people not long ago. He'd finally been able to dissect the intent of mages as it pressed around him, deciphering it all. He had wept.

He didn't weep now.

"Seris sent you?" I asked, my shoulders slumping. It wasn't a question, not really. We both knew the answer.

Lusul looked away in subtle guilt, unable to bear staring at the refugees. His intent radiated a kindred shame.

How many other Alacryans feel shame at their conquest? I wondered, dusting my hands against my trousers. How many see the truth?

I slowly stood from where I'd been kneeling, mindful of a slight stream of molten rock nearby. The dwarves shuffled away with muttered apologies, their eyes empty.

I knew I wouldn't be able to avoid Seris' notice for long, if I ever had avoided it at all. But still, as I loped up to Lusul, I wondered what he had to say.

"Scythe Seris Vritra has orders for you, Toren," the second son of Named Blood Hercross said lowly. "I don't see why I'm delivering them to you, but…"

I knew why. There was a distance between Seris and me that I couldn't quite grasp or understand. But it appeared that extended to how I now received her orders—through a proxy, instead of directly.

Ironic. Once upon a time, I'd received a letter from Lusul claiming to be orders from Scythe Seris and immediately known it to be a fake. But now, what could I say?

"What does Seris need of me, Captain?" I asked tiredly, noting the badge pinned to the young man's lapel. He'd been promoted again.

Lusul was walking behind me, but his steps slowed enough that I had to stop and turn to look at him. "She's ordered you to be seen," he said after a moment. "She decrees that you will act as you did in the wake of the Plaguefire Incursion."

I observed the young Captain for a moment in somber contemplation. I could see where this was leading, after all. I could pick apart Seris' scheme the moment Lusul said the words.

She wanted to make me a symbol again. Some sort of beacon of hope in the wake of this devastation.

Seris had agreed to only do that once. I'd only agreed to be that once. But now, she'd found me in an impossible position. Because what else could I do? Could I hide forever in her rooms, looking away from all the people that needed my help?

Was this her plan all along? I suddenly wondered, feeling slightly sick. Was she always intending to drive me to help others in this city and become some sort of symbol against my will?

Long ago, Seris had promised me that she would always tell me when she moved me across her political board, but it appeared that she was breaking that promise.

I stared off with Lusul, the young man unable to meet my glowing orange gaze. I wasn't projecting anything through my intent. My control was too iron-clad for that. But he was versed enough in Alacryan politics to know instantly that whatever message he carried had extraordinary weight, even if he didn't understand why.

Can I blame Seris for breaking a promise? I asked myself. Does she think I broke my promises to her? When she looks at me, is she seeing scattered hope?

I exhaled a long, weary sigh. The cavern of Burim seemed to sigh with me, groaning as all the tainted heartfire brushed against my ears in tune.

I turned back around, then began to walk. I didn't have any particular destination, I didn't think. At least not yet.

With every step we took, though, I saw something in my fellow musician's posture crumble more and more. Something that had been bending for a long time was nearing a breaking point. It bled from his intent as he struggled not to ask me something.

"You should know by now that I don't punish questions, Lusul," I said into the dim silence. We were walking toward one of the eastern camps near the edges of Burim's gaping maw. Vaguely, I planned to heal as many dwarves as I could. That was how I could perform the most good in the least amount of time, but I could feel that pressure in the orchestral man's intent as it built. It needed to burst before we finally parted.

We were close to the edge, now. The flickering lights of the tents and makeshift earthen hovels beckoned us.

"What's it for, Toren?" he finally pushed out, stuttering to a stop. "This war, these battles? All that's left behind?"

I stopped walking as the man voiced the single question that had raged inside my skull for so many days. It sank into the stones and the air around us like smoke. Not the black, overwhelming kind, but the sort that was insidiously subtle. This was the kind of smoke that built too fast and too quick for you to realize there was a fire until it was far, far too late.

And no matter how low I crouched, I was unable to avoid the fumes.

Lusul's question wasn't one that I could answer. I think we both knew that, even as he asked it. He just needed to say the words that had been hammering their way through his skull for so long.

Seris thinks I'm supposed to bring these people hope, I thought absently. That's why she wants me to go about and heal them and be visible and everything.

But how could I be the hope of others when I felt so little of it myself?

The moment of silent dread was shattered, however, as thirteen heartbeats brushed against my ears. They were all approaching at a quick pace. They didn't march with a soldier's gait, but certainly one of familiarity with the terrain and path.

I turned, surprised to see a dozen dwarves and humans making their way through the rubble paths. My eyes widened slightly as I took in their disheveled forms, noting their many cuts and exhausted bodies.

They stumbled to a halt as they noticed Lusul and I, many of them seeming nervous and uncertain at my appearance. I only recognized one person among them.

The lead dwarf—a thinner nonmage who was missing a couple fingers and whose eyes were slightly too far apart—took a hesitant, shaky knee as his heart beat with emotion. He took off his hat, clutching it in his hands and revealing a balding scalp.

"Lord Spellsong," he ground out, his voice scratchy. It barely trembled. "If we knew you were here, we would have… Would have presented ourselves better."

I couldn't tell what the man was feeling from that heartbeat. Fear? Awe? Excitement? It unnerved me, how little I could understand of nonmages due to their nonexistent intent. The discomfort from how he knelt at all rankled deep in my mana core.

My eyes scanned over the gathered crowd as Lusul slowly walked to my side, his eyes focusing for a moment on a single member of the crowd. They stared back at him, a solemn smile crossing their face.

Anasia, I remembered. Lusul's Dicathian lover. Her curly hair was nearly flattened from dust, and her hands fidgeted, but the fondness that radiated between the two was blatantly obvious to me.

And Anasia… there was something different about her. There were only twelve people here, but it felt like she had two heartbeats. Was it some sort of effect of the ambient distortions from all the death?

"I don't want you kneeling in front of me," I said honestly, moving towards the dwarven leader. "I'm not like the Alacryans that you might've met who would force you to bow."

My words had the opposite of my intended effect as they rippled through the crowd. It was with discomfort that I noticed more than a few heads lower with respect and reverence in their features as I tried to decipher their emotions.

An uncertain dread churned in my stomach as the man raised his head. I almost recoiled at the light of hope I saw in his eyes.

"I don't bow because of that," he said. "My son… he almost died to that asuran monster, Spellsong. But you fought him off. If you hadn't been here, he would've fallen to that deity. We never had much, but we—my family—we are in your debt. And dwarves of Darv never forget their debts, Morningstar."

Strange, that they call me that, I thought mutely, Only after I've been cast from Paradise.

His words bludgeoned any response I might have had into silence even deeper than before. My eyes roamed across the gathered dwarves. I didn't know where they were going or what they'd been intending to do before they'd stumbled across me, but I felt disturbingly like some sort of golden idol laid before worshippers.

Sensing my frozen indecision, Lusul thankfully cleared his throat. He stepped forward, speaking into the silence. "The refugee camps regularly send out scourers to find new places to rebuild after lavatides," he explained, working to take my mind off what the nameless dwarf had just said. "These few Dicathians are part of one such expedition."

Lusul's interjection, thankfully, allowed me to recover somewhat from my quiet shock. "Oh?" I replied, hoping my voice didn't waver. "I read a little about the protocols in place after lavatides, but never really got the chance to learn more."

The dwarf with missing fingers finally rose from his uncomfortable kneeling position. "Aye, Spellsong," he said with quiet gratitude. "Most lavatides come predictably. Not this time, though. That asura… He made it appear. His mana n' all made it all erupt."

Our mana, I thought, but didn't interrupt. Our mana.

"Our casualties… They are higher. Higher than they've been in living memory. But we carry on as always. It is our way," the dwarf said gruffly. He nodded to me and Lusul, putting his hat back on as he rolled his shoulders. "But we've gotta get back to salvaging and rebuilding. It's the way."

He sent me one last shallow bow, before he began to walk around us. The other eleven followed, most of them sending me simple nods or averting their eyes entirely. Anasia was the only exception. Her fond, loving eyes were reserved only for Lusul as they made a silent promise. Her hands fidgeted, as Lusul told me they always did, but I imagined that they would be calm if the young Hercross but held them. So much passed between them in that single instant, three heartbeats that almost seemed to be one.

They loved each other. So deeply.

And as I was stewing in the depths of my own self-pity and self-blame, it finally clicked. I finally understood what I'd been hearing.

Even as the twelve strode away deeper into the darkness, that strange, weak thirteenth lifeforce clinging to Anasia, I felt a sort of looseness grasp every bone and muscle in my body. I shook slightly, unsure if I should laugh or cry.

"Lusul," I said, my voice low and quiet, "I need you to come with me."

—

Lusul didn't enjoy being hauled behind me with telekinesis as I floated outside of Burim, but he didn't complain. The sun was high in the sky as I finally escaped the darkness for a bare moment. The sweet kiss of that blazing dot in the sky served to make me relax in a way I never expected.

The sea was beautiful. Even with the many steamships that coasted through the Bay of Burim, they failed to banish the ethereal sea of reflective glass that stretched on into infinity before me. I watched it for a short time, finding a small spark of hope in how I could still see beauty in this world.

But this wasn't about the sea. It wasn't about Alacrya, or Dicathen, or any of my personal worries. Right now, none of those mattered. And that was something just as beautiful as the sun in the sky.

I brought us to the cliffside. It wasn't hard to find a slight outcropping of stone that could support us both as it looked out into the distance. I tapped down easily enough, allowing Lusul to tap down a moment later.

The young man looked around warily, testing the ground beneath his feet. I could sense his anxiety, but it wasn't the sort of fear that he'd felt the first time I'd taken him aside. He swallowed, for a moment showing the boy he truly was, before he turned to look more at the view stretching out before us.

"It's beautiful," he said softly, his pink eyes taking on a hue of orange as the sunlight reflected off them. He squinted, still struggling to adjust to the light. "It's been so long since I've been out in the sun. It almost feels strange on my skin."

Indeed, most of those stationed in Burim had been placed here for months on end. I imagined the darkness became a dread routine for them day in and day out.

Hell, just watching the distant sky and tasting the scent of saltwater and the ocean made unseen burdens disappear. The rustle of the sea breeze through my long hair drew an exhale of simple pleasure from my lips.

"You asked me what it was all for," I said, slowly lowering myself down and crossing my legs. I leaned backward on my hands as I stared down from above.

It was so much easier to see it all from the sky. The dark smokestacks of the Alacryan steamships were ugly, but they failed to rip away the majesty of the sea.

Lusul turned to look at me with uncertainty, his hands clenching at his sides. Strangely, I felt his intent rise with a subtle sort of fear as I lounged casually, staring off into the distance.

But for the first time since the Hearth, I managed to achieve something close to… peace. Even with the knowledge that so much loss and suffering brushed against the world itself, sitting here in the mid-afternoon sun and gazing at the sea provided me a sort of clarity that had been gone for so long.

A deep breath in. A deep breath out.

My mind was empty of even Aurora's reassurance. It had left me feeling lost and directionless, but now…

What was it all for?

"I don't have an answer for you, Lusul," I said after a moment, my voice laced with suppressed sorrow. "I don't have an answer for myself, either."

That was the kind of question that could only be answered when it was all over. When every single action could be scanned and scrutinized in a maddening tirade of "Was it all worth it?"

"Then why are we here, Toren?" Lusul asked, sounding almost desperate. He didn't sit. I didn't think he could. "Are you just going to tell me that I need to keep doing what I'm doing? Be a good soldier?"

I didn't respond, still looking out over the sea.

"Or are you going to say that all this will end in the High Sovereign's favor? That's it's all some sort of master–"

"It's about Anasia, Lusul," I said quietly.

The young Hercross lurched backward, seeming surprised by my words. He blinked once in surprise, then in fear. The silence that stretched between us was as vast as the sea beyond us. "What about her, Toren?" he said after a moment. He ground his teeth. "Do we need to cut it off now? Now that this war is starting in earnest?"

I finally turned away from the sea, looking at the young Named Blood. I sensed it deep over his intent: his fear, his worry, and his love.

A fool in love, I thought, a slight smile stretching over his face. He'd throw it all away for her. His position as Captain, his allegiance to Alacrya…

He was naive. Willing to thrust his hand into the fire, willing to be burned. Like I had been.

I hesitated for a moment, remembering how so many of the phoenixes of my once-flock had tried to snuff that fire. For my own good, they'd said. If I could stand among them now, with all I knew… Would I…?

Would I snuff that fire, too?

"She's with child, Lusul," I said into the wind. "She's with child."

Lusul didn't seem to hear me at first. His eyes were still challenging me for a moment, but I could see the moment my words registered. The precise moment that each individual word came together into a sentence that had meaning.

"W… What?" he croaked, his intent crashing into the waves far below.

"She has two heartfires in her body. I sensed them when she saw us," I said after a moment. "One is strong and sure. But the other… It's like a little candlelight, slowly being fed the gift of life."

Lusul fell to his knees. He tried to breathe inward, but all that he managed was a choking cough. His glass-like emotions shattered into a kaleidoscope of everything that made a person human. Wonder and terror and fear and hope and everything fought for supremacy in his mind as his breathing hitched.

He didn't cry. He didn't weep. I wasn't even sure he would ever be able to through the deluge of emotions that assaulted his mind like a volcanic eruption.

It wasn't a panic attack. No, it was an everything attack. There was too much crowding for space inside of Lusul's skull that he had no time to feel anything at all. His heartbeat became so erratic that I feared he might have a heart attack then and there.

For a moment, I felt a hint of fear. I might have miscalculated in telling him so simply. I moved, about to offer a hand or some words to the overwhelmed mage, but he cut me off.

His mana flexed, diving into his dimension ring and withdrawing something familiar.

A violin.

My outstretched hand halted as the young man grasped his instrument like the last bit of driftwood in a howling storm. His teeth were clenched so hard I feared they might shatter, but when he pressed his instrument to his shoulder, something in him changed.

His darting, uncertain eyes met mine for a moment as he held his shaky bow to the strings. They searched my soul for something.

I retracted my hand, my body relaxing as I recognized the answer he'd found. His rapid breathing finally found a level of order as his body tensed, straining against the rigidity of the world and processing the equal wonder and fear coursing through him.

Then he turned to the sea and began to play.

And Lusul's intent sang. It rose and fell and professed itself through every sheer, terrified chord that he echoed. His arm was like lightning as it played through every emotion deep in his soul as they found their escape. Awe. Terror. Love. Uncertainty.

It all flowed in a symphony fit to match any of my own. His intent radiated through the air, louder and more direct than it had been before. I found myself immersed in everything this up-and-coming Alacryan Captain felt about his life and his love.

Lusul wasn't as skilled in a lone show as I was. He was part of an orchestra; one cog in a massive machine. But each of the emotions he burned into the sky in this lone symphony carried the weight of those missing parts. Each was another twisting gear in a great masterpiece, working towards conclusion.

I thought I could see the path of his journey. The growth in his character as he shared his tentative love with Anasia. How he'd told himself it would never work. How it would only doom him and his Blood. Then to a quiet hope as I enabled him, and then back to terror as the Alacryan fleet tightened down on this continent.

And now, there wasn't that same hope as he'd first felt. It wasn't a naive, ignorant hope. But I could feel the spark of something else deep within.

A resolve to make hope. A relentlessness, an unwillingness to leave things as they were. A drive: for himself, for his lover, and for his child.