* * *
Aaren
* * *
I really want to lie on my stomach. I've been lying on my back, or sometimes my side, for a couple months now. Schiphael dealt me some pretty heavy wounds. I insisted on letting them heal naturally. Sometimes we Armed do that. Raven kept that scar across his face, says it was a lesson. I have one on my face, too, and across my chest, and that big one from the wound that almost spilled my guts out. For me, it's a reminder of...
Of...
Just, stuff. Damn. It's still so hard not to think about it, but I'm trying. Mental wounds scar worse than the physical ones, and heal so much slower. But at least the physical ones have healed by now. I might feel comfortable lying on my stomach in a few days, or maybe a week. I can go without the bandages now, and tracing over the scars is a weirdly intriguing habit I'm starting to develop. I have divots in me, like canyons, and they go all down me.
And they're never going away.
I reflect on it as I trace down the big dried-up riverbed that goes from my ribs all the way down to my waistband. Just a gentle tracing, up and down, as I reflect, and then realize that my mind is strangely quiet. That's strange, Emily hardly ever stops talking.
Emily?
There's the sense of a startle. Oh, there she is. She's been there the whole time, watching me think as I trace my scars. Silly girl, what's so interesting about that?
Sorry. I was distracted. She sounds so flustered. I've been thinking about the whole... mission thing. It's a little weird to hear that we'll be picking up orders from the Peacock King.
I smile. It's strange, sometimes, to hear all the different names for the ruler. I've been on both sides, in varying roles, and heard so many names for Jhe o'Audiva Rocale. Often the names say a lot about the person using them.
It's also really weird to know that he's down the damn hall from you, Aaren. Her tone is colored with worry. That doesn't sound like the safest thing for anyone involved. He's a dangerous man.
I stifle a laugh. You're concerned for me?
Of course I'm concerned, Aaren! She sounds so angry. It's weird to hear, she's usually such a mellow girl. He's almost destroyed entire countries! You just got the bandages off, and-- There's a pause, and then I realize it's not a pause. She just stopped talking.
I hazard a mental poke at her. She's... quiet. I realize after a moment that she's refusing to speak to me, and it hurts more than I expect. I... Emily? Is something wrong?
She shakes her head, then pokes back at me. It started as our version of checking to make sure the other is there, but now it's... sort of like a hug. It's definitely a comfort. I'm sorry Aaren. I just got worried. I saw your scars for the first time today, and then we got orders from, well, the Kommissar of all people, which I suppose is our job... She sighs. Maybe I'm not cut out for this type of stuff.
I give her the mental nudge again, but it's more of a shoulder-pat. I think you're cut out for this stuff better than I am. You sure think a heck of a lot more than I do. You're just emotional every now and then. Maybe it's just your period or something.
The mental glare she gives me singes my ears. I grin, though. The first time I had to go through her having her period is something I'm going to look back on for the rest of my life as the best entertainment I've ever had.
Maybe next time I have my period, I'll let you have the cramps! She still sounds miffed, but there's a chuckle under it. Same old Emily again. That's a comfort. Get some sleep, you lazy lump.
I laugh. I'm a convalescent! You're not being fair at all. I sigh. Writing tonight? I could use some nice dreams.
Yeah. Just a little. It'll be nice to kick back and stop thinking about this spying stuff for a bit. I get the impression of her stretching her arms over her head as she sits at her desk. Pirate stories tonight, I think. Getting a hunch about that.
Oh? I poke. Poets don't just write for no reason, even when they think they do.
She shakes her head, then pushes me away. Go to sleep, and then you can dream it and I can write it. No sense speculating on some whisper of an idea.
I sigh, then close my eyes. Enough dwelling on scars. There's always something new to look forward to.
* * *
'Sy
* * *
Aaren sent me word earlier that his mission is proceeding just fine, which is the one thing I can feel relieved about. Everything must be fine at home as well - no one's sent me any alerts to the contrary. Everything will be fine out here, too. I'm sure it'll all turn out for the best.
But it sounds the tiniest bit like I'm lying to myself - I can hear Diyn chuckling somewhere in the back of my head.
"Hm. Well, I'll give you credit where it's due, Jhe h'Akribastes - your son Lyric is a clever one."
Gerude just growls as he looks out over the desert. So far, any of his attempts to find Lyric with his Aim have ended with frustration and empty hands. I can understand his grief - he's certain Lyric's Guilty, but his Arms can't sniff out that guilt.
Of course, I know that he can't Aim for Lyric because that guilt isn't really there, but I can't tell Gerude that. I can't blow Lyric's cover. It's bad enough that he's in the position he's in already. I refuse to make it even harder for him to survive. He shouldn't even be out there at all!
I sigh, then turn my horse in the opposite direction. "Civilization is this way. He'll have to head there sooner or later, and when he does, we'll be waiting for him." Robinstead. We need to get to Robinstead.
* * *
Gerude
* * *
I glare down at the sand as if it were what I was Aiming for. It's so hard, trying to find my brother. I think my emotions are getting in the way of it, and that angers me the most. I should be able to hunt him just like any other criminal, but...
Something's stopping me, and it can't be my Arms. It must be something inside of me. Letting my heart cloud my judgement... and right in front of Father. He's not impressed with anything I do, and I can tell he's getting mad at my poor results. That he can't find Lyric either is no consolation - he's Lyric's Father too, of course he has trouble admitting that Lyric's a danger. Dad always goes easy on his kids.
I should be able to make up for that, though. I should be able to do this! ...But I can't.
"Hm." Erynn looks over the sands and out to the horizon.
I just sigh. Time to follow Father. There's nothing else I can do here, nothing else that Father's willing to do...
Wait.
I look up to Erynn. "Hey, is Lyric a Poet? I know he got some training in the Poet Hall, but I... is there something that makes it official, or is it like Armed where you are one or you aren't?"
Erynn grins at me. "It's funny to hear you ask that question. Armed usually seem to think Poetry is a sort of contagious disease. Finally getting comfortable with the idea that you've been around me too long?" He laughs at my cross look. I think my face is turning red. "I get what you're asking, and don't worry - you're not a Poet, as far as I know. But we don't really have a real definite test for that sort of thing, so don't just let your guard down all of a sudden. Lyric, now..." He closes his eyes. His horse shifts from foot to foot in a slow dance as the Poet concentrates. It's weird - when Erynn uses his gifts from Poetry, he actually looks serious.
"Gerude? Erynn?" Father calls back to me, turning. I guess he expected us to follow him. He glances at Erynn and rolls his eyes when it's apparent that our party's Poet is in some sort of trance. "Figures," he mutters, but he doesn't stray any further from the pair of us.
Erynn's eyes snap open. He points to the rocks that lie far towards the horizon, to the south, not quite in the direction of Robinstead but not straying much farther away from it either. "He's reading something over there."
I blink. "How the heck can you know that?"
Erynn's brow creases. "Because he's a Poet, and he's reading Poetry that wants to be read. He's got a knack for sneaking about, but I bet he's never been trained not to read Poetry too loud. Most Poets innately know to write quietly, but they don't think about the same thing as applied to reading. It's helped us discover some Poet trainees before, so it's not a very surprising mistake for a rookie." He smirks. "Guess he should have stuck around for more training before turning traitor."
I look to Father. His expression is hard to read, and as he thinks the situation over, I wonder if he'll just call it off anyway. To be honest, part of me hopes he will, but that's a part I don't want to admit still exists.
* * *
‘Sy
* * *
Damn that Poet boy, damn his affinity for Gerude, and damn Elete for having trained him so well in the first place.
It's tempting to just wave off Jhe Blackirons's observations as Poetic nonsense, especially among Armed. But doing so would be blatantly lying in front of my son, and not only do I not want to do that, but I'm certain he'd see through it. No, right now a Poet's competence is forcing my hand, and I like it less than when Elete's incompetence would do the same thing.
Maybe it's not too late to explain things to Gerude. But then I'll have to explain them to the Poet as well. The Blackirons boy talks too fucking much. I can't trust him not to blow Lyric's cover eventually.
Lyric's with Myles right now, and Myles can keep him safe. Right. They're both very clever, I'm sure they'll find a way out of this mess.
"Well, that settles it. Let's go and bring him in."
* * *
Myles
* * *
"And by all that is still good in this... in this god-damned world..."
Lyric's voice cuts through the dim light in here like a knife, chilling the air as it does so. How could he read that all aloud? My guts turned to ice at least halfway through. Come to think of it... I feel a little funny now.
Must be the cave. Or the Poetry, for that matter. Lyric's hunched low, reading what looks to be the last of it. It's hard to tell - I could barely make out that there were words at all. Too much mess in here. And it just feels dark, somehow. Thete won't even talk about it.
"...I hunger too. Here in the dark... I hunger too." Lyric swallows after the final line, then composes himself. "He's warning us to get out of here, you know."
"Yeah. But they're down at the other end of the cave system by now. There's a lot of exits out of this thing... or entries, depending on how you look at it." I sigh. "I don't know if this is the best place to stay... but they keep following us. I figure they won't think to look for us somewhere in their own lair."
Lyric's skin has a gray cast to it, but he doesn't disagree. He just hides that little lantern of his so that there's the barest glow in here. It's probably best that way - the things will sneak up on us in the dark. Something tells me that those white eyes get their sight from something else besides light. "Sandalfas mentioned your friend Kiley in this poem. Did you know him, too?"
"Yeah. A little. He was a nice guy, I trained with him." I frown. "I wonder what happened to Maerin. Did he say in the poem that he dropped her?"
"Yeah." Lyric's voice is extra shaken in that confirmation. "I don't know what happened to her. Gerald's Arms went to me when Jhe Ebrellin-i captured him. Would Sandalfas's Arms have gone to Father?"
I shake my head. "Sandalfas was never confirmed dead. That's usually how Jhe h'Akribastes confirms someone's died in the field, but there's been a lot of Armed that have gone missing without their Arms appearing in the Hall afterward. We're not sure yet exactly what's happening with that."
Lyric contemplates that. "Yeah, Cade was kidnapping a lot of Armed and Poets. He tried to take Gerald." He shudders. "I wonder if Gerald would have ended up here instead of with Thelea?"
My stomach turns again, but I try to ignore it. "We need to find Maerin. If we do, she could tell us a lot. And we might as well be useful while we're stuck in here."
Lyric doesn't reply, but I swear I can sense that he doesn't think I've got the best idea there.
"Look, I can search around for her. She'll know me, if she's still... awake. She'll know Thete. Sandalphas and I sparred in training. Arms remember that just like Armed do. You stay near the entrance and keep an eye out for any more of Kiley's pack."
"Okay." Lyric is quiet in a way that unsettles me, but it's enough. I take my own lantern out, set it as dim as I can bear, and then plunge into the cave's depths.
* * *
Lyric
* * *
Myles has worked his way far enough into the cave that I can't sense any sign of him. I sit on a rock and let my thoughts clear for a moment. That Poetry made it hard to even think, and it was hard to even answer Myles whenever he'd speak to me. It's easier, now that I'm alone, now that it's quiet. The only problem is now that my mind's clearer, I can sense other things. Not any Eaters, thank goodness. They seem to be far clear of this area. Pickings must have been slim here, or perhaps they themselves are uncomfortable looking at Sandalphas's Poetry now. No... the bad feeling I have is something else. It's a kind of certainty, and the worst thing about it is that it is so very clear and so very unchangeable.
Myles needed to go into the cave. He needs to go in there and... do whatever it is he does. It's just that him having to do that means him leaving me here, which...
Well, it's not good. I'm weighing my options, feeling out my premonitions for each choice I could make from here. Following Myles is absolutely a no-go. He's about to deal with something that I can't handle. And I don't want to go deeper into this cave anyway. But leaving the cave would also be very dangerous - maybe it means Myles and I get split up permanently, and then I run across something I can't handle. Whatever it is, I get the feeling that I shouldn't leave my current location. I should stay right here. I should stay here and...
No, that wouldn't be a good idea. But... strangely, I'm still quite certain of it. It doesn't make any sense, but it's what I do next. I shrug my shoulders. I suppose I've done stranger things before on a hunch.
I turn the little wheel on my lantern that raises the wick, then open its case all the way. It lets out the most light possible. I take a quick look around. Sometimes hunches can save your life. Maybe there's something within view now that I would have missed.
A click, cold, hard, and metallic, rings through my ears. I'm familiar by now with the sound of a gun being cocked. I also know that there's no good reason for anyone who means business to not already have cocked their gun if they wanted to sneak up on someone and then shoot them. No, only someone with a sense of the dramatic cocks their gun just so their target can hear it.
I raise my hands above my head.
"Good. Now you're going to step out here before Gerude has to produce any more useless theatrics with his Arms. They really don't quite like that." Jhe Erynn's voice is good-humored and calm. I'm almost convinced that I'll be safe, just from the tone of it. I also realize what a fool I've been in the past few minutes - I've been alert to the Eaters, and to Nul's dangers, and all sorts of other things. I did not think to counter simple Poetry. Instead I just let myself think that it was a good idea to crank up my lantern, and thus tip off Erynn and Gerude to my exact location.
I step out of the cave. Erynn and Gerude are waiting just a few horselengths from the entrance. It's Father who steps up from behind me, right where he was concealed at the side of the cave's mouth. It's Father who ties my hands, and it's Father who consoles me with, of all things...
"Good, don't bother to make a fuss. You're in the hands of the Law now."
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