* * *
Cade
* * *
I ignore the weepy head-case in the special padded cell down the hall. He's making enough ruckus to keep anyone distracted from me, bless his crazy buzzard brain. Not much of anyone notices me. Not when I don't want them to. And my master, he's calling me home now. I feel the pull, feel him beckoning. All should be forgiven. I've kept my sad skin alive long enough to serve another day, after all. Who should care if I've fraternized with the Radians? Let the Peacekeeper and the Advocate think I'm turning tattle on my master. I'm the only one who can be Nul's Herald, and it looks like that hasn't gone forgotten.
I had worried for a little. Had started to wonder just how I'd manage to go on living without him... looks like there was no reason to worry, after all. There's been a change. Something's twisted, or likely Nul's found something to be pleased with. It does feel odd in here. Warped. As if someone's slipped on my bonds. Surely not the Judge and his unforgiving heart? No, that can't be it. The Advocate's touch is gone from my wards. I do wonder what happened to her. I don't wonder for long. I just make myself unnoticeable enough to slip out of my chains, and then approach my cell door with the same intent. It won't be the first time I've slipped right out from under the Judge's nose. Like as not won't be the last. I imagine my body as a fine mist. I push against the bars, or rather push through them. My body's like water, or like it's not there at all. Then I turn to sneak off down this hall and leave that squawking loon to cry out about whatever's got his brain this time around.
I walk straight into someone, and get a hand 'round my throat for my troubles. There's an arrow pressed into my back, sharp and insistent. I feel the touch of Arms in it. I swallow, my Adam's apple bobbing up against Camden's palm.
His eyes stare into mine. We have a few moments where perhaps something goes unsaid between us. Then he opens the door to my cell, his trainee keeping that arrow pointed at me the whole time, and he pitches me back inside.
The cell door clangs shut. For all of me, I cringe. I can hear my master howling. I can hear him fret. It's difficult to hear Camden's voice over it, but the damned Rhivendish accent cuts through my thoughts all the same.
"Stay in there and wait. Ye've got things to do here in Radia. Now's no time to leave it." His words are so casual, but his voice is so cutting and final that I've got to wonder just what those things are that I've yet to do. I wonder if I'll actually have to go through with them. The thought of a Trial terrifies me.
I don't want to die. Never have.
* * *
Rocsui
* * *
I wake up shivering. Why? Why am I cold, when it's so warm in here? I push the sheets down to find myself covered in sweat from head to toe.
Then I curl up, burying my head into the nest of my folded arms, and cry. I blink in confusion against my forearm as the tears come. Why am I sweating? Why am I crying like this? Did I have a dream? It's like something is gone. Something I didn't even notice, like how I never notice my own breathing until some idiot calls my attention to it, and then I can't ignore it.
I hear the door open. "Rahellene?" says a male voice. The Jhe o'Radia. So strangely kind when addressing me. I look up, confusion written across my face. His only shows sad understanding. He folds me up in his arms. I start to understand.
I don't know why he's comforting me when his daughter's just died, or why I feel my sister's death. I'm so confused these days. Nothing is ever clear-cut, nothing in this life makes sense. But I have my cry into Jhe Luciprochoros's chest, and he strokes my hair, and I must feel better because sleep takes me soon after.
* * *
'Sy
* * *
I awake to the inside of my skull burning my brain matter from my forehead and on inward. With each pulse - probably my blood, which is probably boiling behind my eyeballs - the pain grows worse, then eases, then grows worse again. Fucking heartbeat. Fucking hangover. Fucking wine. Why am I lying on the floor? Was I that drunk? Am I still that drunk? Where are the children?
Something cold, rough and slimy slides over the tip of my nose. I scream. No, it was a roar, really. A roar of anger. I... I don't scream. Ever.
I open one eye to behold the world with, and I'm now staring right into a kitten's asshole. Somewhere, Tia, Lady of the Void, mother of two of my daughters, is mocking me with her tittering laughter.
The kitten turns around, blinks at the revelation that the Pile of 'Sy might have moved, and then mews at me. It bumps its tiny nose into mine, and curse my blighted heart, that was kind of cute. It's a good thing no one's here to see that. I do a mental check. ...Yes. Nobody is here but me and the - check for wings - shenanigan. Good.
...What the fuck is that thing doing here? I spy a curl of paper tucked into its collar. I tug it out while trying to avoid repetitive purring headbutts against my palm. I unroll the tiny scroll, hold it up to my face, and remember how to read.
My office at earliest convenience. Most urgent. - E Next to the initial is a quick sketched-out version of Elete's personal seal.
The shenanigan squirms a bit and then nips at my finger. I scowl at it and hold back the urge to swat at it. What's it want? It growls at me, then glares, and then vanishes.
I stand up. Time is of the essence, I gather. I can't even tell what time it is right now. I stretch, arms up over my head, and then shriek as a clump of my hair is almost yanked out of my scalp. The damned thing's taken a mouthful and started pulling it!
Fine. I teleport into Elete's combination bedroom and office with all due haste and without changing from these smelly, bloody, torn clothes.
The Poet King looks up at me from his bed, several shenanigans snuggled up around him. His eyebrows shoot up when he takes in my bedraggled appearance, but he says nothing. He doesn't even act all haughty. He simply hands me a knife, hilt-first. Something about his expression combines with the weight of the knife in my hand. By the time I realize whose knife it is, I've already sobered up.
"I apologize for the rude awakening. I was told to stay in this bed until Stevane or you came here and instructed me otherwise. I swore on her knife. That was several hours ago, and I fear for the worst." His eyes have that far-off look and dread is creeping up in my stomach. No. Just... no. "You need to go and find out if there's anything left of Katherine, 'Sy. If those two are gone--"
"Those two?" I ask, my mind going numb.
"Stevane and Lyric. They went together to Katherine's aid. The worst has come to pass. I am telling you this now so that you don't waste time that you could be spending making things right. Worry later over what happened. I can tell you more after the necessary deeds have been done. Now go and do what you must."
I look down at him. "Elete. You look... much more cogent today than you have in a long time." For all the gods and hells they dug I want him to be wrong, but his eyes aren't clouded, and he looks to be in perfect command of his senses.
He nods, regarding me as calmly as when he first met me. "I possess perfect forward recall currently. It does not reach out for very long, but for the span of time that I can see, we must make as much use of it as possible."
"How long?" I ask. The worst coming to pass. In how many ways?
He shrugs, almost nonchalant about it, and strokes one of the shenanigans in his lap. "Perhaps days. Maybe even a week. Who knows how long I'll last? The future is a fluid thing, so it is not that certain, even when I can see it clearly. The next Poet King will be just as competent, so I've no worries." That far-off look again. That tingle down my spine. The perfect sense of urgency... "Go, 'Sy. I won't matter by the end of the month. She will."
* * *
My study has been ripped apart. That's convenient, then, because what I am doing now is ripping it apart. I have to find some part of her. I have to find anything of Katherine that might have been left behind.
Carpet's been shredded and torn up. Furniture is destroyed - the wood splintered and twisted, the cushions ripped in a flurry of scattered stuffing. Piano wire is embedded in the plaster of the ceiling. Stray strands of hair are tangled up in it. Unfortunately, I'm not looking for hair. I need more than that. If Elete sent me to find bits of her, it means her body isn't worth looking for. Somehow they destroyed it, and I'll just have to find out how later.
Torn paper, ripped and scattered in little bits along the floor. Books that we killed last night. And why? For what? So that I could be right? I'm beginning to get the awful, sneaking suspicion that I was not right at all. Elete dances through my thoughts at the mention of books. Losing Elete. Losing Katherine. I can save one. The other?
Death shouldn't be an issue for us, not when there's a body left behind. So why is he going on about the next Poet King? What is wrong with him? Why now?
The paper bits form a trail, and at the end of the trail I find what I'm looking for. I pick it up.
A sliver of wineglass. A tiny chunk of the bowl, attached to a broken stem. It's like a glass spoon. Welled in the hollow is something red. Red like the wine from last night. Still wet. Her blood. I know it's hers, and not mine. I know the look and smell of her blood, but most of all I remember her crashing to the floor and crushing this glass, the shard digging up into her knee.
The blood is fresh. Recent. It is the best we have, in fact all we have. It shall have to do.
* * *
I tuck away Stevane's knife. Herald. Temporary Arms. I'll need it later. Him, not it, she has managed to impress quite a bit of personality into what is a regular blade. I'll question him later. If I needed to do anything with Herald now, Elete would have informed me. Now, I must walk into Luciprochoros's quarters and request his presence at an urgent meeting.
He is waiting for me, his clothing somber and his eyes shadowed. "I am ready."
I don't ask how he knew. I don't say anything in apology, or to explain my beaten appearance. The aura in here is high-strung, almost humming in my ears. He might strike at me, if I say anything. I know he's angry. Every time she dies, it's my fault. That's fair enough, and I hate even thinking the word 'fair'.
We vanish, then. Time is of the essence.
* * *
END
* * *
