Hard Light (NaNoWriMo15)

Chapter 27 - Reunited

"I understand," said Leah, tentatively accepting Asriel's hand to stand off the bed. "Can I ask why Iyarin was posted outside my room? I'm not sure I feel entirely safe."

"Iyarin is a here under Emrys's orders," said Asriel quietly. "And believe me, there is no one else you'd be safer with. Iyarin is one of the five Slayers, warriors of the League who possess an extraordinary command over Light. They are dedicated to exterminating the Lightless forever."

Slayers. Leah committed that term to mind while noting how unhappy Iyarin seemed to be about finding herself on guard duty.

Iyarin followed Leah and Asriel through the League. Surprisingly, Asriel didn't lead her to the military wing, nor somewhere else in the medical wing. It was the research lab she soon found herself in, changing into the strange, shimmering research suits and entering the shadowless room.

"We believe the cure was successful," said Asriel as they moved through the research lab. "But as a precaution, we are keeping a twenty-four hour watch on Kieran until we are sure the parasite has been removed in its entirety. So far, it looks promising. The ritual you uncovered was truly the final piece we needed, even if the process is far from efficient. It'll be something that we work on streamlining once we're confident in our method."

Leah glanced around the room. She recognised Emrys, Illiya and a few others among the thirty or so Radiants, but none of them seemed to have an orb. "Did you manage to find a way to dismiss the orb after you'd used it?"

"The orb was not a necessary part of the ritual, as it turns out," said Asriel. "It was the layout and particular positioning of crystals and other instruments to refract the Light of the Spire that was key to it all. We believe the orb has another purpose, one Emrys is keen to discover."

The uneasy feeling twisted a little deeper into Leah's stomach.

It tightened as soon as she saw Kieran.

He was on the other side of a transparent crystalite wall, sitting on some cushions in the corner, completely absorbed with a book. His face was the same, the research robes he wore irrelevant, and Leah's eyes kept settling back on his hair. No longer was it a dark brown tipped in blues. Every drop of colour had been bleached from it leaving it a pure, snowy white.

Leah blanched. 

Asriel, after a quick word with Emrys, moved to open the door. With the crystal lit, the door slid aside, and at the noise, Kieran glanced up.

"You may enter," said Asriel. "We'll keep a close eye on things, don't worry."

Leah almost didn't have the courage to step forward. Flashbacks of Sef kept playing through her head. If she heard that same silky, strange voice that'd come from Sef's mouth come out of Kieran's, she didn't know what she'd do.

But as Kieran dropped the book and got to his feet with those graceful movements she'd come to expect from him, Leah couldn't stop herself. She ran through the door, nearly falling in those final few steps trying to slow herself enough to not crash into him.

"Leah," he said, one word that made her heart sing. It was the same, the same as it'd been in the darkness of the chamber or the training grounds, yet it had a... calmer edge to it. Like he'd found peace. "You're awake."

"Um, yea," said Leah. What did she say? How long did they leave you in the dark? What did they mean by a cure? Are you still you? "How... how are you feeling?"

His smile was unrestrained, stretching across his face. It was almost enough to make her forget about his hair. "I feel amazing. I've never felt like this, Leah--not even before I turned Lightless. It's like the ritual completely cleansed my being."