The bite of the wind, the kiss of the sky.

Pallas squinted her eyes slightly, the light of the outside managing to pierce through the flesh of her eyelids.

The shaking of the floor, the billowing of a sail.

She shifted slightly, feeling as hardwood pushed on her back. The only part of her body spared from the discomfort was her head, snugly cushioned in between two soft pillows.

A hand through her hair, the distant yell of her brother.

She rolled-

Soleiman?

She jolted awake, seizing slightly as her eyes shot open. Immediately, all the sights, smells and sounds of her new environment struck her all at once, bedazzling her for a moment and leaving her in a stupor while she processed what was happening.

Amidst everything, though, she recognised the face staring directly back at her; the bandages wrapped about it now fully loose and really only present around her neck.

“...Qingxi?”

“Pallas,” Qingxi smiled back at her, the whites of her fringe flapping wildly about in the wind.

“She’s awake?” She heard Soleiman yell again.

This time, Pallas lifted herself off of Qingxi’s lap, sitting cluelessly in place upon the small sailship as she saw her brother glance back at her excitedly from beyond the mast.

“Soleiman!”

She scrambled to her feet, hurriedly lowering herself when she realised she was at real risk of falling overboard and tumbling a metre or so onto the rushing earth beneath. She scurried forward, quickly stopping herself as she got to the mast to turn back and peck Qingxi on the forehead.

Exchanging a simple smile with her for the meantime, she returned to frantically rushing to her brother’s side.

“Soleiman!” she threw her arms about him, knocking the wind out of him and keeping it out of him as she tightened her hold.

“Ogh- hold on,” he gasped, desperately fighting for air the moment she loosened up a bit.

He pulled a few levers situated before him at the very front of the ship, locking the lines that controlled the ship’s singular sail in place, before finally turning to return her hug.

“Are you okay?” he asked, taking advantage of a brief reprieve Pallas had weaved into her bearhug of an embrace.

“Yes!” she dragged him back into the hug, hearing him croak slightly from the air that left his lungs. “I-”

Where was she?

For a brief moment it was as if the world had frozen in place, not the snowy hills before them nor the evergreen forests to their flanks nor the cloudy sky above head moving.

Her arms lost a little bit of strength, and Soleiman could breathe again.

“...Pallas?” he asked, tilting his head to try and get a look at her face.

“Where are we?” she asked, pulling away from the embrace.

“On our way back to Shirobanegawa,” he responded, lighting up at the mere mention of the Shrine’s name. “We left this morning, but we couldn’t wake you up– so Qingxi just carried you and put you on the ship with us.”

Pallas looked back at Qingxi, snorting slightly when the near blank-faced Chitite gave two thumbs up from her hands resting on her lap.

Huh. So this wasn’t a dream. The four of them had never ridden on a sailship all by themselves before.

Pallas paused for a moment, slowly turning back to the direction they were headed.

…Four?

“Where’s Rumi?” she shook Soleiman gently, her nose almost touching his.

To which he tilted his head slightly, gesturing to the very crest of the hill they were currently racing towards.

Upon which stood a golden steed, and a cloaked– yet golden-haired– figure sat atop it.

Squinting slightly, Pallas could make out the vague shape of an eyepiece clutched in her left hand and a scrunched up map in her right.

“She wanted to be our vanguard,” Soleiman said. “So she’s going out in front and giving me instructions on where to steer this thing.”

“Ooh,” Pallas mused. “Wait, what happened to-”

“They took her away,” he shrugged, before unlocking and picking the lines to the sail back up again, the things vibrating slightly as they passed through the hoops on the floor to lead to the mast. “They wanted a little compensation for the fact they were just giving away one of their sailships, so…”

Pallas looked around, making sure she had a good understanding of the vehicle they would have to use to travel about for the foreseeable future.

The thing was built well, sure, each and every plank interlocked and nailed together to perfection. The mast was secure, fastened impeccably onto the rest of the ship such that it didn’t move about in ways it shouldn’t’ve. The wheels were well built too, sturdy and strong enough to withstand the wear of racing across the snowy hills– the suspension system built in to accompany them doing a fair job of doing its part too.

But none of this changed the fact that their ship was miniscule.

Okay, perhaps not miniscule, but certainly not large enough to fit the four of them comfortably. It was about four metres in length, and at its widest it really only measured up to one and a half metres in length.

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Not one of them could lie down in it, unless they all aligned themselves with the length of the ship.

And what about their stuff-

“Our stuff’s kept under the floor, in little hidden compartments,” Soleiman somehow answered. “And they made an attachable roof for us too, if it gets a bit rainy.”

“I… see…”

Pallas wasn’t entirely convinced. But realistically there wasn’t much she could do about it now. Especially since their old wagon had been reduced to a pile of ash and soot by the Hundred Burning Embers.

“So,” Soleiman stated plainly, pausing to think about what to say next. “How was your stay?”

Pallas exhaled, starting into the distance for a moment.

She hardly remembered anything, really, save for the time she had spent with Lauka. Or that one conversation with one of the other patients.

“It was…” she began, struggling to summarise what amounted to nothing. “Okay, I-”

The dream.

“Right! The flower crowns!” Her eyes widened. “We need to make more flower crowns!”

“Flower crown- ohh! Those ones?” He asked, smiling incredulously at the sudden surge of nostalgia and long forgotten memories.

Pallas smiled, nodding violently in response.

“Okay, okay,” he said, turning back to the front to try and give Rumi a wider berth as they approached her. “Wow. It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”

“Too long.”

As they drew closer to the Solean, she gently nudged Strapi forwards, gradually picking up speed until she directly matched the pace of the sailship when it caught up to her.

There, Pallas shuffled on over to the gunwale, leaning over slightly to call out to her.

“Rumi!”

“Pallas?”

She took a while to take her eyes off of the horizon, but when she did– her eyes landing on her friend– her face immediately brightened up.

“Pallas!”

She quickly turned back forward again, hurriedly holstering her eyepiece onto her belt to grab a hold of Strapi’s reins with her left hand– holding it between her thumb and her palm so as to not rely on the use of her stubby fingers.

There was a pistol holstered to the right side of her hip, which Pallas recognised as the one Lauka had used during their recreational firing practice. The Firebird, as she so decided to call it.

Because apparently its relatively short, wide barrel gave it the look of a fat pigeon– that when shot, is given the appearance of breathing fire.

“Hello!” Pallas excitedly waved at Rumi. She didn’t really know exactly what to do or say, but given that Rumi wouldn’t give a second thought about being awkward around her she decided not to as well.

“Pallas!”

It was almost as if she were savouring saying her name.

“You doing okay?” Rumi asked, glancing briefly over her shoulders.

“Mhm!” She hummed, putting extra force into it so that she could hear her over the wind. “What about you? You look great!”

Rumi nodded happily, her smile visible even as she kept her eyes forward.

“All thanks to Soleiman!”

He blushed slightly, making a half-attempt to look away to hide the flustered smile on his face.

“Being able to navigate out here,” she yelled, her cloak flapping behind her. “On horseback, free to go wherever I want? It’s a whole nother feeling! It’s just… so…”

Pallas leaned forward slightly, compensating for Rumi’s sudden drop in volume.

Rumi turned to face her, a thin sheen just barely visible on her eyes– glimmering with the soft golds of her irises.

“Freeing.”

She turned back to the front, Pallas following suit as the two of them simply stared in silence at the ever distant horizon.

“Uhm…” Soleiman struggled, fiddling with the control lines slightly. “Rumi?”

“Oh! Right, yeah,” she shook herself. “Just follow me round the cluster there,” she said, gesturing to the cluster of trees to their eleven o’ clock. “Go wide, the ground by the trees looks a little bumpy!”

“Understood, Miss!”

He looked positively delighted at having gotten to call Rumi, ‘Miss’.

A feeling that was evidently reciprocated, given that Rumi’s giggles still reached them even through the rushing winds.

“Okay, see you later, Pallas!”

“Bye!”

Pallas put a hand up, waving away Rumi as she did much the same before pulling away and to their left.

“My,” Pallas sighed, sitting back onto the ship’s deck. “She’s really grown, hasn’t she?”

“Mhm,” Soleiman hummed, taking his eyes off of managing the lines to watch Rumi ride ahead. “And I’m so proud of her.”

Pallas took her eyes off of Rumi, turning back to see Soleiman almost entirely enamoured by the sight before his eyes.

A… a little too enamoured.

“Okay…” Pallas awkwardly interjected. “I’m going to go sit with Qingxi now, alright?”

“Huh? Oh, yeah. Take care.”

Pallas crawled her way back towards Qingxi, ducking under the mast before moving to take a seat beside her.

Though, the wood she sat on was awfully soft, not at all like the hard planks her legs rested on.

Qingxi had put a cushion down for her.

“Oh, thank you, Qingxi,” she said.

“I’m just happy to see you again,” she responded, her Chitite ears flopping over.

“And I you,” Pallas said softly, putting her hand on top of Qingxi’s. “Anything I missed?”

“Not much,” Qingxi leaned forwards, popping open a hatch in the floor to reveal the storage compartment underneath.

In the little space were several miscellaneous items all stored together– albeit neatly. There was the snagharpoon and fishing rod they had used on their expedition, the logs and books Lauka had given Soleiman to both read and compensate the Library of Shirobanegawa with, and even a few boxes filled with paper cartridges– both prepared and not.

There was a little toolkit, one with Lauka’s name written on it atop an aged, peeling bit of paper, and there were a bunch of latticed blades with attachments that could grab onto their boots.

And of course, there was a pair of red shoes, neatly arranged and placed in a quiet corner of the compartment.

“Whose are those?” Pallas asked, pointing to the shoes specifically.

“Rumi wanted to bring them along,” Qingxi said. “They used to belong to a little girl we helped out while on expedition, but…”

“No,” Pallas’ face dropped.

“Well, she wasn’t exactly human,” Qingxi struggled, shifting uncomfortably in place. “I don’t like what they did, but there’s not much we could’ve done to stop them.”

“Not… exactly human?”

“Mmm…”

“It’s okay, I’ll just ask Soleiman later,” Pallas said. “Is Rumi okay?”

“Yeah, mostly. Sometimes she remembers what happened, though,” Qingxi looked off into the distance, trying to spot the distant riding Solean. “And it affects her quite a bit.”

“...Why did she bring them, then?”

“To remember her,” Qingxi said, pulling her gaze back to Pallas. “She said it didn’t feel like that girl had any attachment to this world. That not even the family we found her with wanted her.”

Qingxi leaned forward, grabbing a hold of the hatch’s edge.

“So,” she said, beginning to close the storage compartment. “She said that she’d be the one to remember her.”

The hatch creaked shut.

“...Even if it hurt her.”