One ice-bound Faunia Vleren stumbled through a dark, humid place encroached with hanging vines, soaring trees, and dense overgrowth. She raised a frosty machete in one hand, hacked and chopped through the thick of it as she carefully climbed over fat stumps, ducked beneath thick branches, wove through every available route toward her quarry.

It was not a desperate hunt. Not today. She wasn't even labored, instead resolving to a methodical calm more deserved of Ithlo’vatis than herself. Her quarry — there was no doubt in her mind that he was here, waiting for her. There was nowhere else for him anyway — she'd already searched every single other place he could have been hiding. She'd already once again gone to every place they'd ever been together.

Faunia stopped with a tired sigh before a particularly thick wall of green sashes. She cast a wary glance at her machete, then to her empty offhand. There was a slight pause before she reached her open hand for the vines.

The vines receded into a wide opening at her mere mental request. She first shuddered at the thought, but eventually worked up the courage to step through the gap she'd created. Through into the clearing lay a massive statue of a man carved in dark stone, crumbled sideways and succumbed to moss and fungi from decades past. And just like that, she knew he was here. The hunt was done.

Faunia covered her face with an icy forearm to block the sun, to see that naked, bestial man elevated so high above her on the state's face. A man who had given up on everything. A man who had nothing else to lose. A man... she would still have liked to call her friend.

“Cedric,” called Faunia. He turned around to her — though he hardly looked the same anymore beneath his dense brown beard, and the jungled overgrowth of long hair atop his head. “Come down from there, would you? And please put some clothes on.”

“Don't pretend you've never imagined it,” he joked, and gestured a crass display of his overly tattooed body. And though a very large part of him was glad to see her again… the rest of him knew that she should turn around, leave forever. Because he knew what was coming next. And he knew well where their inevitable journey would end.

He leapt into the open air and tucked his legs in tight. Serkukan's crimson robes plumed out from him in midair, covered his body completely in an instant.

And down from the statue he came, with all the grace of a cat, a gymnast... or a god. Something he'd learned from Tartys, maybe.

Ch. 58

Losers

Thirteenth of Dwi [3], 208CA

“Lunus is gone, Faunia. Did you notice that?”

Faunia crossed her legs — her ice armor crackled away to reveal a brown and beige set of expedition clothes beneath, perfect for the humid weather of Alisa’s jungled woods. They sat across from each other on two stumps, a large log laid on its side between them as some sort of table.

And that wasn't all — she glanced around disdainfully at their surroundings, a roof of giant leaves, moss draped over the openings as faux doors, not a single light except the ceiling holes through which the lurid sunlight fluttered in… Another set of leaves were piled up toward where a ‘bedroom’ was made up; it looked like the sort of blanket fort Faunia had constructed a thousand times with her father as a child, albeit a lot more damp.

Finally, she cleared her throat, returned her gaze to the hairy man across from her. His eyes lit up, but his expression did not. Eventually, Faunia said, “We've all noticed. It's been replaced by a smaller moon — astrologers in Calamon agree that the first moon was Tartys by the way the tides reacted to his move.”

"And the second moon?"

Faunia's eyes narrowed. "I believe it's Ithlo'vatis. But that's not for me to decide. It's smaller, and blue..."

Cedric looked away. He rubbed his arm uncomfortably.

“Are you not coming back to Calamon?”

“You saw what happened…”

Faunia hesitated for a moment. Then she said, “The total death count was actually in our favor.”

Cedric's glare came back fierce.

“We lost Hunters. We lost Calamonians… but Serkukan's flames also destroyed the Alisan troops tearing through our defenses. If he hadn't done that, we would have lost more. Many more.”

“You're saying it's justified.”

It was her own turn to scowl. “I'm not saying that. I'm saying that we have to make the best of a bad situation. Those people in the north of the city were mostly soldiers, they'd already sworn—”

“People, Faunia. People died. Again. Every time, any time I do anything, people end up dead. In Cromer, in Calamon, in Haketh…”

She blinked.

Cedric buried his head into his hands. “...I just want it all to end!”

“So you've chosen to become a naturalist?” Faunia waved her hand dismissively at the surrounding environment.

He nodded. “They're kinder people here. They don't make trouble, they don't have trouble. I can handle this…”

“Until Serkukan cuts loose again. And then?”

Cedric winced.

“You're just choosing not to think about it? So when Kogar finds you, rips up the ley barrier again, you'll just…” she shrugged, “kill them all?”

“Stop.”

“There's another solution—”

“Enough! We tried to use them as tools, we failed! That's exactly what Kogar uses them for… I don't want the responsibility… I can't be a king!”

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

“I'm not asking you to be a king.” She stood from the stump and came around to his side, slid onto the stump beside him. Her leg pressed against his own, she took his rough hands in hers. “I'm asking you to be my friend. In Calamon. Against the Twelve. We can resist Serkukan together, we can keep him in check.”

His lip quivered. He struggled, but eventually managed to lift his eyes to hers. “...How?”

“I'll only tell you if you agree to shave that horrible beard.”

Faunia pushed out of his tent’s leafy embrace to a scene of about half-a-dozen more naked villagers milling about. There was a mix of curiosity and worry in their gazes, a small anxiety that had worked through the feeble population of the settlement. She blushed, shielded her eyes and averted her gaze. “I found him!”

Then came her ensemble: Ayla, Vim, the azar Viltar whom Cedric had met before the first siege in Calamon, all followed closely by a group of five Hunter-garbed sel — Ekzire bowed as Faunia approached.

Then Cedric popped his hairy head out from within his leafy tent. The group all bowed low for their king — Faunia hissed out her discontent, and at least some of them corrected the mistake.

Then Cedric approached, still sheltered in his crimson robes. As he wandered closer, his beard began to shrink, the hair on his head receded until he was once again wearing that familiar short brown hair, and just the stubble they were so accustomed to.

“It's great to see you again, Cedric.” said Ekzire, coming out of his bow.

“I thought you'd be busy with the…” his voice trailed off.

The sel man shook his head. “We disbanded the Knights. Tyverius was the only survivor, anyhow, and we… reappropriated his Etherian.”

Faunia displayed her verdant green amulet to him. Cedric nodded in contentment. “That leaves one of them alive… See to it that he's… Nevermind.”

“Well compensated? He will be.” finished Ekzire.

Cedric gave a hesitant nod. It was no longer his place to be giving orders.

Viltar smacked Cedric's shoulder hard and lovingly. He said “Boy—” then something unintelligible in the Alisan tongue, a big smile across his maw. Cedric warped reality — and then it was that he could understand.

「Our paths have crossed again. Such is the will of Oul.」

Cedric answered, 「The Alisan gods must be wise to bring me back into your care.」

Viltar’s eyes widened in amazement. “You speak the Alisan tongue? You speak it better than me!”

Faunia's eyebrow twitched. Such a careless draw upon the ley… She looked to the sky. No sign of false gods. Then she interjected, “There's a carriage waiting for us, Cedric. The rest will follow behind.”

“Where are we going?”

“Azar'kara. You promised, remember?”

He looked weary at the thought. But he nodded, managed the smallest of smiles. “I remember.”

And she gestured for him to follow, the ensemble close behind.

X

The ride out of Alisa was a bumpy one. The leaders of their three covered wagons were Hunters, though they looked like new blood to his eyes. He was slouched down into a seat across from the upright Faunia in their solitary wagon, the light flittering across them both through the canvas overhead, through the leaves above.

“Smells like dung out here,” Faunia said after the silence began to make her uncomfortable.

“Mm,” replied Cedric, “but you get used to it.”

Then another long pause. “You use Serkukan so frivolously... You're not afraid of Kogar anymore?”

He shrugged, tossed his head over to the other side.

“...Or you're waiting for him to kill you.”

“If I hadn't used my powers, you wouldn't have found me.”

“Not that you wanted me to. Would you tell me if I was right?”

No answer.

"You gave up, huh?"

"I never said that."

Faunia waited for a long pause after that, but eventually pulled her legs in close, pried each one of her boots off, and stretched her legs out again with a sigh. She began to fan herself with her hand, to pull her collar out over her collarbone in an attempt to cool down.

Cedric stayed slumped into himself, balled up almost like a child.

“We're not mortal anymore, Faunia.” he finally said.

She raised an eyebrow.

“I have these dreams… My dreams are enough to kill a mortal man, or at least drive him insane. Nightmares, I should call them, but I can't really say I've ever been afraid…”

Faunia clutched her chest. She thought of Tirolith, the frosty girl who, even now, was keeping her temperature in check.

The carriage dropped suddenly and rumbled as it slipped over a series of vibrating bumps, shook Faunia and Cedric left and then right.

Cedric placed a firm hand on Faunia's leg, held her steady. Faunia felt her face grow hot.

“I… I'm sorry, Faunia. The truth is that I was afraid of you, too. After what happened, after Ithlo’vatis was…”

Faunia poked Cedric's side with her toe to get the attention of his eyes. She smiled at him.

Finally, a more genuine smile seemed to unravel on Cedric's face. “I missed you.”

“I missed you too, you bastard.”

X

「Here we are, King Cedric. Azar'kara.」 Viltar helped Faunia down from the high carriage, then offered the same help to Cedric who hopped down on his own.

They both turned to see it: that magnificent bronze pyramid over the coursing river, that giant plateau on top where once soldiers trained for years to become fit to protect the continent. It had all been a trick. All a lie.

Faunia nodded to herself. “To think that the whole thing was orchestrated by the Twelve. Nothing that we did here was real…”

“I was just thinking the same thing. But hey, at least the time we spent together in Kylinstrom meant something. Didn't it?”

Faunia smiled at him. “It did.”

They both took a deep inhale of the familiar place, that same old stink of rotting trees, of damp mildew, and that faint twinge of metal in the back of their mouths... Not too cold, not too warm… Spring had nearly arrived, and the skies hanging over them through the trees were clear, vibrant blue. The chattering of birds, the shadows sweeping overhead, the rustling of leaves all swelled their senses with both comfort… and anxiety.

“Ready?” Faunia softly punched his arm.

Cedric nodded. “Ready.”

And onward, into Azar'kara they ventured…