The Interior of Aymon's Heart

> “When the time comes to sing praise, harden not your heart. When the day comes to walk the lonely path, harden not your heart. When the hour comes that you should see God, keep the center of your heart open. God sees into the closed rooms, but those trapped inside cannot look out.”

>

> -from “Eighth Song: Wisdom”

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“You let them go,” Aymon said when Halen finally arrived back in his office. It was the middle of the night, and Aymon had wanted to have this discussion here, rather than in his quarters, to create at least some semblance of professional distance. There wasn't any, but he wanted the veneer of it, the image.

“Only as much as you did,” Halen said, sitting down heavily on the couch. “You could have ordered the First Star to do any number of things.”

“Why didn't I? Why didn't you?”

Halen was silent for a second. “I can only answer that question for myself,” he said. That wasn't true, of course. Both of them knew that Halen knew the interior of Aymon's heart far better than Aymon himself, but this was another semblance of distance, and Aymon was willing to take that.

“Answer it, then,” Aymon snapped, then leaned back in his chair.

“I must imagine Yan happy,” Halen said after a long moment of consideration. Aymon could tell he was choosing his words, far more than usual.

Aymon ran his hand through his hair. “And what does that mean?”

“I told her yesterday that she had a choice. I told her yesterday that I loved her. I have to hope for her sake and mine that she's making the choice that will bring her peace,” Halen said. “Otherwise, everything I said to her would have been a lie and for nothing.”

“She would have been better off here,” Aymon said bitterly.

“Would you have been better off without me?” Halen asked.

“That's not the same. You know it's not the same.”

Halen was silent.

“You're not her, and she's not me. We're not all endlessly treading the same ground, over and over,” Aymon said. “It's not the same.”

“You're right,” Halen said quietly. “It only feels as though it must be.”

“Is there any chance that she'll come back?” Aymon asked.

“Probably not. You know she follows through on decisions once she makes them.”

“So she is our enemy, then.”

“If you want to call it that,” Halen said. “You saw her go, though. She went out of her way not to hurt anyone.”

“If she's sympathizing with Kino, then I don't believe we can trust her to stay that way.”

“Kino never killed anyone either,” Halen said. His voice was so quiet, barely above a whisper.

“Don't tell me you're feeling guilty.”

“I'm not.”

“Then what are you trying to say?”

“I don't know. I'm just pointing out a fact.”

“The fact is that Kino was always against us, and Yan is too, now. That's all that matters.” Aymon stood, shoulders tense, and he paced back and forth in front of his desk.

“Are they a danger?”

“Probably not,” Aymon said. “Whatever little cohort they're going to join up with clearly doesn't have any power, or they would have done something before now.”

Halen stayed silent, waiting for Aymon to continue.

“If they are a danger, though...” Aymon said.

“I'll do what I need to. And so will you.”

“Didn't we both just demonstrate the opposite of that?”

“We'll have time to harden our hearts,” Halen said. “I doubt they'll show their faces around any time soon.”

“True.” Aymon looked at Halen, who looked vaguely like he was in pain. “Are you lying to me when you say that?”

Halen looked at his hands, stretching them out then clenching them. “I told you that I love Yan like a daughter. That isn't a lie. I even could find some lingering affection for Kino within myself, if I tried, no matter how idiotic that is. But I have always loved you more, and I always will. If it comes down to it, I will do what I need to do,” Halen said.

“I'm not asking about your love for me,” Aymon said. “I'm asking about what we will need to do for the Empire.”

Halen looked up at Aymon. “If you think that my love for the Empire extends anywhere beyond you, you've clearly been blind for the past twenty five years.”

“But what will you do, if it comes down to it?”

“I will do what you ask me to do,” Halen said. “Because of how I feel about you. Is that enough? Has that not always been enough?”

“This is bigger than just you and me. This is bigger than you and Yan.”

“Not to me it's not,” Halen said.

Aymon clenched his fist. There were moments, rare, when it was clear just how untethered Halen was from the normal order of things. He had no attachment to the Empire as an organization, no connections to other sensitives through attending the Academy, no family or friends to keep him in place, and even the way he considered God was different from the orthodox-- there was nothing that held him in line aside from Aymon. Most of the time, that was a distinct advantage. Halen had no qualms about doing whatever was necessary. But in this specific situation, the first time that Halen's loyalties had ever been split since the first days he had come to Aymon, it grated.

Aymon didn't doubt that Halen was loyal to him above everything else; that was beyond clear. He didn't even truly wish that that loyalty extended outwards to anything else in the Empire, because he felt a possessiveness towards Halen that kept him close and all to himself. He simply wanted this to be easy. It was not easy, and it never would be.

“One of us has to consider the greater world, then,” Aymon said. “What should I say?”

“Say you sent Kino and the First Star with the Fleet. Call Sid back so that it's not so suspicious.”

“And Yan?”

“We can make it look like a suicide,” Halen said. His voice was still very quiet. “It wouldn't be an unreasonable conclusion to her public story.”

“What if she turns up in public later?”

“If she does that, we'll have far bigger problems than claiming she was dead,” Halen said.

“What about her family?”

Halen was silent for a long moment. “That depends on what enemies you want to make.”

“The Guild wouldn't have to know if we killed them,” Aymon said. “It's more than easy to blame pirates.” There wasn't that much love lost between the BarCarrans and much of the rest of the guild anyway, not since Yan's fiasco aboard the Sky Boat.

“I'm not talking about the Guild,” Halen said.

“She's already our enemy.” Aymon continued pacing the room, still tense.

“You would really make that call again?” Halen asked.

“Are you really going to guilt me about this? Now?” It was true that Aymon had killed Halen's family.

“I'm not saying anything,” Halen said. “I'm just asking what you're willing to do.”

“So I have to trust that you won't be angry if I do say that they need to die.”

Halen looked at him, folded his hands on his lap, and said nothing.

“What?” Aymon asked.

“If Yan is smart, which she is, she's already on her way to tell her family to lay low for a while. You might not be able to catch them, even if you tried.”

“I certainly would,” Aymon said with a sneer. “Ships can be tracked.”

“If they were going to do any damage, the period between when someone started chasing them and the moment they are caught would be the time when they have the least to lose and the most to gain.”

“You're just on her side,” Aymon said. “I can't believe this.”

“I'm not on her side,” Halen said.

“It sounds like you are.” Aymon whirled around and stared at Halen. “She was my apprentice, not yours.”

Halen stood. Apparently that had been the last straw that he had been willing to take from Aymon. At his full standing height, and with his face flushed dark red, Halen was more than intimidating. He was more than a head taller than Aymon, and far wider. Aymon wasn't afraid, simply angry. He came towards Halen, stopping a handsbreadth away from his broad chest.

“If she had really been yours, you would understand what she was going through,” Halen said, staring down at Aymon. “What you're considering putting her through.”

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Aymon shoved Halen, hard, but Halen didn't budge. “You are on her side.”

Aymon found that he couldn't move. Halen's power had seized him. Despite how angry he was, and what a vulnerable position he was in, it was thrilling. The loss of control, the knowledge that Halen could hurt him if he wanted, the surety that Halen wouldn't. He brought his own power up, to fight back against Halen's control of his body, but if there had ever been a point when Aymon was the stronger of the pair, that point was long in the past. Halen turned Aymon's head so that Aymon was looking him in the eye. Aymon's jaw hurt from how hard Halen was squeezing it with the power.

“If I was on her side, I wouldn't be here,” Halen said. “When you're ready to have a conversation where you aren't blaming me, you know where you can find me.”

Halen turned and walked out the door, keeping Aymon in his grip until the door shut behind him. Aymon took a deep breath when the hot hand of Halen's power left his body, and he slumped, no longer held in place. He looked at the now closed door, and considered sending a tendril of his own power out to follow Halen as he retreated down the hallway, but he didn't. He was too proud for that, and the flush of anger and excitement was still within him.

----------------------------------------

Halen didn't appear the next morning, and though Aymon was used to spending the mornings alone, his absence was noticeable as soon as he stepped out of his quarters. The situation could remain in stasis for a while. The media had been given some sort of story about what had happened on the streets and at the airfield, and Aymon had refrained from making a public statement. It was not particularly important what was said, since the official story of what had happened to Yan and Kino would come out far enough from now that the two events would be unconnected. That was the plan, anyway.

Aymon procrastinated, as much as he could allow himself to. Without Halen around... He shook the thought out of his head. He needed to go talk to the Emperor, which he did not like, and did not want to do. But he didn't have much of a choice. The Emperor definitely knew what had happened, being plugged in to all of the goings-on in Stonecourt, but Aymon had no idea what they were feeling about it.

Surely the only reason that he hadn't yet been summoned was that the Emperor was testing him, waiting to see how Aymon would act. Well, Aymon wasn't going to play that game.

So he stood in the antechamber alone, waiting to be let in. The Emperor seemed content to let him stew in his thoughts for a long moment. The more impatient he grew, the more he could imagine his former mentor laughing at him. He took a couple deep breaths, and stilled the jiggling of his leg that he hadn't even noticed.

The door swung open.

Aymon entered and stood in the spotlight. The Emperor did have a flair for the dramatic. He waited to feel the cold touch on his brain.

“So you lost another apprentice,” the Emperor said. “I suppose I should have trusted my instincts after all.”

“What did you think of Yan, when you met her?”

“I liked her very much. It's unfortunate that she was so... unpredictable.”

“Do you see her coming back?”

“No. And I would not suggest taking her back, even if she did.”

“Do you see anything?”

“I am not all seeing, not all knowing. If I were, this would have been prevented.” The Emperor sounded neither angry nor resigned, simply stating a fact. “I am furious,” the Emperor said, catching Aymon's thoughts. “But I know how to control myself.”

Aymon gritted his teeth.

“I have no need to make digs at you when you make them so easily at yourself, my little Aymon,” the Emperor said. “You chose your apprentices badly. Life goes on.”

“I thought that God was calling me to them,” Aymon said. His mouth was dry.

“God?” the Emperor laughed. “You didn't see it?”

In Aymon's mind, there were the three apprentices. Sid, Yan, Kino. On the ground in front of each was their Academy project: Yan's fishbowl, Sid's fear statue, and Kino's blank mirror figure. Out of the shadows behind them came two figures. Behind Sid, there stood Aymon's own mentor, Caron Herrault, and Aymon could see himself reflected in her eyes and in Sid's. Behind Yan stood Halen, with his hands firmly on her shoulders. Kino's mirror figure warped and shifted, taking on a deliberately twisted and mocking appearance: Aymon himself, or what he imagined himself to be, or what he feared, or what he wanted. The Emperor laughed and laughed.

“In hindsight, almost everything is obvious,” the Emperor said.

The image of Yan and Halen, with the fish swimming placidly around in front of them, stayed stuck in Aymon's vision. He held it there deliberately, long after the other two apparitions had faded. He desperately wanted them back. Even though Halen wasn't gone, some of the peace was.

“I told you he would be the death of you, someday.”

“He would never betray me,” Aymon said roughly.

“You seem intent on acting like he would,” the Emperor said. Aymon felt the touch of the Emperor's power, this time, a ghost of what Halen had held him with the night before, simply reminding him that the Emperor could see right through him.

“What passes between Halen and I is none of your business,” Aymon said.

The Emperor was amused. “Perhaps.”

There was a pause in the conversation as the Emperor allowed Aymon time to gather his thoughts. Being reminded of Halen made him fixate on that for a moment, but Halen was not what he was here to talk about. He wasn't even really here to explain himself with regards to Yan. He needed the Emperor to tell him how to move forward.

“You saw what I was arguing about?”

“I don't think there is any reason to kill the Iron Dreams,” the Emperor said. “At least not right away.”

“Why not?”

“The Guild would know, no matter what you say. Thule is no idiot.”

“I'm not concerned with the Guild,” Aymon said. “I'm concerned about knowledge getting away from us.”

“It would certainly be a bad image for the public, to stage a funeral for your apprentice while her family dies under mysterious circumstances. You've had a leak. Let us not make it a flood,” the Emperor said. “Overreacting now will allow your enemies to play their hand.”

“Do you know who they are and what they're doing?”

“No, of course not. How can I know things that I have no information on?” The Emperor's tone was that of an adult addressing a small child. Aymon hated being patronized. “You will see soon enough.”

The reminder that he would someday join the Emperor grated. He had no interest in that, not now, not ever.

“Soon enough,” the Emperor said again.

Aymon shook his head, getting the thoughts out. “So what should I do?”

“Gather your own information. I doubt that Yan will avoid talking to her family. You should put an agent on that ship.”

“With my luck, they'll disappear.”

“You met the captain of that ship. Is he likely to turn to piracy?”

“Did I think that Yan was going to turn to piracy?” Aymon asked.

“Yan had a capacity for fierceness that you never witnessed firsthand,” the Emperor said. “As well as a vivid recollection of the past, and a deep desire to connect with others. Weaknesses and strengths.”

“Are you saying you understand her going off on this crazy--”

“Reading about what happened is not the same as experiencing it, my little Aymon,” the Emperor said, cutting him off. “It is easily understood, but not so easily forgiven.”

“You already said I shouldn't take her back,” Aymon said.

“And I say to you now: she will try to kill you. She is your enemy.”

“How do you know that?”

“The other one will poison her mind,” the Emperor said.

“Are you saying that from knowledge, or are you guessing?” He realized that he was half taking Halen's side from the previous night's conversation. What was it about himself that made him so desperate to argue this from both sides? It was so similar to the way that Sid insisted on being combative, it made Aymon half wince to think about it.

“What is the future but guesses we make about how we should live?” the Emperor asked. “It's a prediction based on the best available information, nothing more. I have seen the whole truth of what was inside their heads at that time. Seeing how Yan acted, I understand how this is likely to play out. It requires further study, of course.”

“Of course,” Aymon said sarcastically. “She's not the killing type.”

“She's not?” the Emperor said. “I thought your memory was stronger.”

“The pirates aren't the same thing,” Aymon said. “Self defense.”

“She was not in imminent danger at the time.”

“Defense of someone else, then.” A realization flashed into Aymon's mind: Yan had been defending Kino. Perhaps that was the same instinct that had driven her aboard the Sky Boat.

“Precisely. Kino will tell her who she needs to defend.”

“There's a difference between the heat of a battle and seeking out your mentor to kill them,” Aymon said. “I find it hard to believe that anyone would do that.”

“Thule killed Vaneik.”

“Can you give it a rest for one second? That's different,” Aymon said, throwing his hands down to his sides. “None of this has any precedent. I don't know why you insist on saying it does.” By 'you', he meant more than just the Emperor-- he meant Halen, and his own traitorous brain that couldn't let go of the past.

“We have all felt the loss of our apprentices,” the Emperor said, a rare note of kindness in their voice. “You are lucky, in a way, that this parting is so bitter.”

“I had to lose her twice, didn't I?”

“I would say to pretend that she had never returned, but I don't believe you capable of such self deception,” the Emperor said, mental voice as dry as chalk.

“How am I supposed to feel?”

“You expect us to answer that question?” the Emperor asked. “You feel what you must. You do what you must, as well. It will be easier with time.”

“And what must I do?”

“The same as you always have. Things aren't going to collapse immediately. You have time to solve problems as they arise. Bring home your Second. You'll want him with you.”

“I will.”

“And harden your heart,” the Emperor said. “Halen is not the only one who has split his feelings.”

“Are you doubting me?” Aymon asked.

“I am saying that you are only human still.”

“And you're not.”

“I am what I am,” the Emperor said. “But I never loved your apprentices like you surely did.”

“Are you angry at me?”

“I am angry at myself, for failing to predict this. I'm angry at your children. I'm angry at those who orchestrated this. And yes, I am angry that you were so blind and foolish, and that you let them get away.”

“Are you going to punish me?”

“What good would that do?” the Emperor asked, sounding amused. “You know what you need to do in the future. If I humiliate you, it wouldn't change anything about that.”

Aymon was silent.

“If you want to be punished, you should talk to your lover,” the Emperor said, still with the light quality in their mental voice that disguised their anger under the surface.

Aymon did not rise to the bait, but he clenched his fist and took a deep breath. Being with the Emperor had a way of making him feel like he was an apprentice again, beholden to the whims of a more powerful master. He was exactly that, of course, but he did not enjoy being reminded of it. He also did not enjoy being reminded of how he would someday be forced to join the Emperor, and what that would mean for his life. But that was neither here nor there.

“I am sad that your little Yan will never join me,” the Emperor said. “She would have been a fine addition.”

“If she is so similar to Halen, do you finally understand what I see in him?”

“Oh, my little Aymon, we have always understood.”

He was confused.

“We all seek out our equals, or our betters. But we must also be prepared to surpass them. That is all we have ever tried to say to you.”

Aymon considered that for a second, then, realized something. “Why don't you say that Kino will try to kill me?” he asked. “Why only Yan?” Did the Emperor think that Yan was the stronger of the two apprentices?

“Because I thought you already understood exactly where little Kino stands,” the Emperor said. “There is no point tilling the ground where wheat is already growing.”

“Is she more dangerous than Yan is?”

“Yan has proven herself. Kino has not. If you are lucky, you will never find out what each of them is truly capable of.”

“Fine.”

“It's not fine, but there have been worse crises. The Empire will survive this, as it has survived every blunder I have made over the past six hundred years.”

Aymon raised an eyebrow, surprised that the Emperor was willing to admit any weakness.

“There have been more than anyone should care to count,” the Emperor said. “Some have hurt much more deeply than this. Count yourself lucky, if this is the worst thing that happens to you.”

“It won't be,” Aymon said, thinking of the inevitable day when Halen would no longer be by his side.

“Of course not,” the Emperor said. “But while you rule, count yourself lucky.”

“Do you have any practical advice?”

“I would have summoned you if I had orders,” the Emperor said. “I always have in the past, even when you have displeased me, my little Aymon.”

“You knew I would come.”

“Of course.”

“Then you should tell me what to do.”

“I have. I trust your judgment for now. You are my hands and Voice, little Aymon. You must go out and do what needs to be done.”

Aymon stood still for a moment, then the Emperor's power nudged him. “You will always be my apprentice, but you are more than that now. Just as your own apprentices are either Second or gone. We make our choices, we grow, we continue on. You should go do what needs to be done.”

“I will,” Aymon said.

The Emperor pushed him out the door.