{-Koyana-}
No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t hide her excitement. Several people in town mentioned it, though she denied any answer—mostly because she assumed Aither didn’t want them sharing it. Still, with her nature, they shrugged it off and wished her the best of luck on whatever she was going to do.
Suffice to say she probably annoyed Demery about it way too much as he was trying to make dinner. She couldn’t help but wonder what it might be; Aither said it wasn’t anything fantastical, but that didn’t mean it was completely mundane. There were plenty of tales that only started after a slight deviation of plans.
From the look on her brother’s face, Demery couldn’t be happy enough when they both finished dinner.
“We’re going to head out for an hour or so,” he announced blankly as he gathered some things.
“Don’t get into any trouble,” their grandfather grumbled without true care. “If shadows start moving, don’t come back to town.”
“You’ll just get us all killed,” their grandmother muttered in agreement.
Koyana, spending this much of her life with them and stubbornly opposed to taking their words at face value, said, “You won’t need to worry about us! We’ll stay safe.”
Together they mumbled something that sounded like they might not have minded if the siblings didn’t return. She hated how hard they had to make it to keep pretending.
She decided not to consider pestering her brother with questions while they walked—or at least, not a lot of questions. Instead, she just trailed behind him until they left the city. “Where do you think Aither is?”
“If he really wanted us to find him, then he wouldn’t be too far from here,” Demery remarked. “We’re not staying out here if he’s too far from town.”
Rustling caught their attention and, somehow, they both knew that they needed to follow it. There were glimpses of a deer between the scattered trees; though, when they reached the spot where it would’ve been, Aither was standing there.
“I’m glad that caught your attention,” he sighed. “I don’t like doing that any more than I need to… It has a way of drawing in unwanted visitors.”
“Why did you want us to meet you all the way out here?” Demery prompted. It seemed he had no intention of spending any more time here than he needed to.
Aither didn’t waste much time, either. “I’m on a mission to show you something and guide you through the steps of understanding it. It’s nothing too grand, but it isn’t something that should be overlooked, either, not with things as they are…”
“What is it?” Koyana asked eagerly. “Do you have it with you now?”
He shook his head. “There are a lot more people than you’d expect that don’t want those secrets to be revealed—many who are willing to hurt in order to keep you from it. Day didn’t want it to be with me in case one of those people realized I had it. It’s not too far from here though, so it won’t be hard to find again.”
“You know, there’s something about this that I don’t feel all that confident about,” Demery admitted skeptically. “You’re not really giving us a lot of good answers.”
“I’d love to but, trust me, mortals don’t take well to having all of the mysteries shown to them at once. Not to mention there’s certain steps we need to take and they’re not always going to be ready immediately. It’s better for everyone if we take this one step at a time, instead of trying to rush through the whole thing.”
Koyana, never possessing the kind of reluctance of her brother, questioned, “Is it somewhere near here, then? Are we going to get it today?”
“You don’t have even the slightest of bad feelings about this..?” Demery mumbled, glancing at her.
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“I think it’ll be fun,” she defended. “Maybe for a little while we can spend some time away from them.”
“Or as soon as we get back, they’re just going to start making up for the lost time.”
“You’re never gonna relax with that kind of attitude.”
“Yes, but it may keep us alive one day when you fail to recognize reason.”
Aither looked between them for a moment and, deciding it was a good time, actually answered her question. “No, it’s not something that we’ll be able to get today. There’s a couple of things we’ll need to make sure of first, then we’ll be able to get to it.”
“It almost sounds like you weren’t really prepared for this at all,” Demery pointed out.
“I’m actually as prepared as I possibly can be for a task like this.” Aither paused. “Though I’m just as unfamiliar with this kind of stuff as you are. Usually this is the part where they willingly accept to come along, no questions asked…”
“I’m willing to do that,” Koyana offered with a smile.
“You’re going to get yourself killed one day because of it,” Demery mumbled back.
She playfully swatted him and brought her attention back to Aither. “What do we need to do to get to them?”
“We’re going to need to do a bit of traveling,” he explained. “And in order to do that, I’m going to need to talk to your grandparents.” The looks they gave him led him to explain before they asked any more questions. “I’ll be honest, because there’s not really a reason to lie here. I’m one of Danai’s Fos, sent here in order to help you expose a lie for what it really is. I assume you’re both at least familiar with the Commandments, if not followers of them yourselves, so you know the kind of knowledge Orestis holds. We know a lot about what’s going on here—especially when it involves the unfortunate many who find themselves stuck in something they don’t even realize is a trap. And excuse that last ominous bit—I, uh, haven’t really practiced that speech, so maybe I can explain that to you later…” He mumbled something else that nearly undermined whatever confidence he’d built up previously.
Though, Koyana likely took away the wrong part. “So you actually are immortal?”
Aither nodded.
“Does that mean you know all the gods? Are they nice? Oh, do you get to see the Angels, too? What’s Danai like? Is she really as pretty as all of the stained glass makes her look?”
He was quiet for a moment, and she wondered if perhaps she’d asked too many questions. She must have; he only really gave an answer to the last one. “Day’s… Yes. Just like the stained glass.” There was something he wasn’t saying. As curious as she was, she knew she wasn’t going to be the one to get him to tell those secrets.
“More importantly,” Demery began, “our grandparents don’t know you. Why do you think they’ll listen to your explanation of things any more than they’ll listen to ours?”
That was obviously something Aither didn’t want to answer. “That’s… kind of hard to explain, without bringing up a lot more stuff you’re not going to be able to understand yet. To put it simply, I have more information than you do—information that they can’t deny.”
…
Aither had almost taken the lead in their walk back out of the forest, until they got to the town itself. At that point, though things had significantly calmed down as the day came to an end, he stuck close beside the two of them.
Koyana stopped at the door. “This is where we live,” she announced. She tried to ignore Demery’s expression—the look of someone who only assumed this wasn’t going to go well.
Aither took another deep breath before following her inside.
“We’re back,” Demery called as he closed the door behind them. “Koyana brought a guest, too.”
“Why is he my guest..?” Koyana mumbled. “Can’t he just come on his own?”
“It’s a little less suspicious than a random kid, isn’t it?” he returned. “We’ll both get yelled at if this goes poorly anyway.”
“You’re not going to get yelled at for something,” Aither assured them, though it didn’t mean much. “I’m sure they’ll understand.”
“I really don’t think you realize the kind of people our grandparents are.”
Their grandmother wandered in then, giving the three of them one look and sighing. “What did I tell you about inviting children off the street? They’re better off if you direct them to the church. Orestis knows what they must’ve done to end up like that.”
“With all due respect, I’m not a child.” Aither gulped and stepped forward. “Can I talk with you and your husband? It’s about… her.”
Whatever that stood for, she gained a look of concern and care that Koyana couldn’t remember ever seeing before. Their grandmother quickly nodded and gestured for Aither to head into another room. “My apologies. Please, make yourself at home over there and I’ll call him over.” She lost all sense of compassion when she glared at the siblings. “Both of you, go to your rooms. You will regret it if you choose to eavesdrop on us.”