She was perched against a small block of ruins. They had found what could be an entrance to the plateau they sought, but the winding and maze like ruins seemed to block the way forward with a series of strange ghostly barriers. Marika believed the Evergaol they had found could potentially hold a key forward, but they all needed time to puzzle out the mechanics of the structure before they plunged head in. Luna had been placed on the first night's watch as the others slept.
"So. When do we get to say hello?" She spoke, but the voice was altered. Sharper, harsher, yet more intensely feminine.
"Heiress..." She spoke in her own voice again, sighing quietly.
"Remember me now. Seems some things are starting to fill back in." She chuckled lowly.
"Guess that means we are getting close." She took a slow swig of her water jug.
"You know what Melina plans to do." She had a worried muttered in her harsher tone.
"I do. She won't succeed. I am gonna do it." She sighed, relaxing at the cool chill as she let down the mask she kept up of mortality around the others.
"Sure that won't show our ass just a little bit?" She chuckled lowly.
"Nah. I don't have everything, but the flames are a biological trait. Even if I can't use them now, the giant's god's flame shouldn't be able to supercede my control. It'll hurt, especially given the fire will not like me," she grinned, "but when has that stopped us before?"
"You truly are a masochist." She took a swig this time.
"No. I just refuse to let people suffer. These people. These lands. They've hurt for so long. Marika has shown a desire to be better. Grow. Why shouldn't I do everything I can, then, to facilitate that?" She stretched out a leg, groaning lightly at the pop of her bone.
"I suppose, given our job, we would rather good stories, well lived, than pointless ends." She cracked her knee softly, sighing at the feeling of relief.
"Exactly." She leaned back against along the stonework.
"Does she know?"
"Which part?"
"Who your son will be."
"I am sure she has suspicions, even if she doesn't think the culprit would be me."
"You don't think she will be mad?"
"No. If anything, I'd imagine she will cry when he's around three, maybe four, and realization strikes her."
"You always have been one to plan things." She reached onto her coat, drawing out a small bar of wheat, coffee beans, and pastry made into a simple energy bar before snacking on it.
"I don't like uncertainty. Anxiety. It makes me wonder about their safety. Their lives." She took a healthy bite.
"For someone so violently detesting of fate, you certainly have a similar mindset to the old Yxthethal." She swallowed softly, savoring the taste that Fia had taken extra care to get right.
"Our house of cards beat that one down already. Took its place as Choice." She grinned at the memory while the hints of blueberry made her think on the blue lips of one of her closest loves.
"That is going to be a conversation when we get home. Explaining all of it."
"Ya, but we've had it before. Dozens of times even."
"Mm. Well. Enjoy giving it then."
"Wha- no, you lot are gonna help me!"
"Sorry, think our powers waning again. Can't quite..."
"I'm not stupid, Heiress, I can see you inside tiptoeing away." She sighed.
"Damnit." She finished of the bar before licking her fingers clean. Her off hand tapped at her water tin in an always repeating pattern of fours.
"I can feel what's coming might drag you out. Be interesting to explain when I suddenly turn brunette." She chuckled, just picturing Marika's reaction.
"Sure, our hair will be the biggest thing they are rather focused on." She grinned for a moment.
"You'll get your chance to show off, but remember that wenhave limits here. Don't go bull rushing and end up running dry because you forgot that we aren't invincible out on a mission. Again." She crossed her arms in stern indignation.
"Hey, it was one time. Besides, Harrow found it charming." She gave a chuckle.
"That is NOT the point at hand, Heiress."
"Yes, yes. Make sure to keep myself under control."
"Good."
Both sighed in the same breath before turning their gaze to the stars as a smile swept across Luna's face. She savored the soft glow of the moonlight. It was so rare here to have a clear sky. She had missed its glow. Even if it was not the moon she loved. It was beautiful none the less.
She knew Ranni had similar thoughts to her. They had bonded a little over notes as Ranni was relearning magic. Luna had even begun to show her how to use her own world's magic. She took to it like a fish to water. It was a curve to show her how to weave mana while her own body was limited heavily in its own use to ensure this trial had been fair. That hadn't made it any less enjoyable, especially when the princess learned about her own favorite school of magic. Haze magic.
A fusion of ice, wind, and plasma magics, it created fields of such sudden intense cold that creep like clouds that it can make a battlefield become a frozen fog. It took heavy concentration to not just end up freezing yourself, so it was a school best saved for a supportive or disruptive role. Ranni enjoyed that quite a lot. She had a clear fondness for plucking at strings.
Her fingers ran lightly along the stones, briefly flashing back to a place she had been a few years ago. She remembered the little bird she had held in a cave, chirping gently as its life faded away. A dying world where she had been sent to be its mercy killer. Another bloody task. Another history lost that only her eyes would ever bore witness to again. It was pain unlike any could imagine.
She flinched, hand moving away as she struggled to keep the memories quiet. She had been in such a good mood, yet the red on her hands began to show again. She shuddered quietly, closing her eyes and resting her head back against the stonework as she tried to calm her thoughts. The soft glow of the moon helped her, but it was sadly of little reprieve as slumber overtook her.
She opened her eyes to an all too familiar place. She had been upon these burned battlefields so many times that she had lost count of how many were simply one city and how many had been entire worlds. She felt the brush of burning flesh graze her nostrils and melting steel. She was on Hiliarc again during the last days of the old empire. She could see the armies marching slowly across a seemingly endless plain of corpses while she was knelt amidst a charred pyre of once proud soldiers. She shuddered quietly, hands covered to her shoulders in ash and blood.
What was the worst part was not that she was ashamed. Not that she was upset. No. The smells. The sights. The feeling of so much death around her. It excited her. That was what she was truly ashamed of.
She let out a terrible scream, rumbling to stand as charred hands suddenly grabbed and snatched at her ankles. She could hear their voices without a sound. She could feel their names, their souls passing through her with every crooked and broken snap of burn bone and charred flesh that threw itself to snatch at her and hold her down. She could hear their final moments like a bell in her ear. Every hand seemed to grip with the force of her own guilt.
Guilt at having helped with such a massacre. No matter how beautiful a paradise world had become, Luna and Bri alone knew the toll that had come to secure it.
"I'm sorry...! I am sorry we didn't try harder...!" She felt her face well with tears as the clawing hands seened to drag her into the darkness. She felt so heavy, so crushed. Swirling conflict of rushing adrenaline at such violence with the awful guilt of such actions, such feelings, sent her into a spiral as she screamed down and down. Buried beneath a mountain of corpses.
She snapped away, panting quietly as she touched her cheek. She felt a cold sweat trickled inside of her scarf and a twitch in her every muscle. She fought to hush her breathing, to calm its surging need as she hugged herself closely.