Shcielle (Draeyer Academy 2)

Chapter 34-A Child's Questions

Icefall City
Arktis Skyland
Northern Space

The sun rose from the large clump of clouds. It painted the entire white landscape of Arktis with various shades of orange and red. The frozen ice covering the bare trees glimmered like diamonds when the light hit them.

Alec would always watch the dawn and appreciate its beauty. But he couldn't do so that morning.

His eyes were too busy watching two pyres covered in large orange flames. A body lay in each, both covered by the ceremonial blue shroud. A few feet to his left, a blue robed man kept reading passages of life, death, and eternal peace, from the copy of the Old Scriptures he held in his gloved hands.

Alec was only half-listening to the priest. Despite the old man's loud voice, the crackling of fire, and the noises of the awakening forest animals, Krizton's suppressed sobs beside him seemed louder than all of those sounds combined.

He couldn't help but feel like the child he was when he lost Alen years ago. He had once stood, alone, in front of his brother's pyre while the priest spoke the same words he was half-hearing in the present. He was alone as he watched the fire turn his brother's body to ash. He was alone as he scattered his brother's remnants on his memorial stone. He was alone as he cried through everything. All he had wanted then was a hand to hold and a shoulder to lean and cry on.

He suddenly found himself giving Krizton the same thing Alec's ten year-old self wanted as he watched his brother's burning.

Alec crouched and held the little one's hand in his much larger one. The child sucked in a harsh breath to silence his sobs, but failed. More tears slid down his face as his mouth parted to let out an anguished cry that rang throughout the forest. A familiar warmth appeared in the edges of Alec's eyes as Krizton leaned on his shoulder, but he held it back and tightened his embrace on the boy.

He looked over and found white-cloaked figures, Areisha, Gael, Kreis, and Headmaster Donovan, watching the two of them with saddened eyes. He saw tears threatening to fall from Areisha's eyes as she took calming breaths. Like him, she was trying her best not to cry too.

He looked back down at Krizton, who had clung to the traditional white cloak he was wearing as the little one's legs gave out from crying. With a soft sigh, he stood and held the boy, cradling him all throughout the ceremony.

———

"Kreis, do you have any news about the people who orphaned Krizton?" Alec asked. His tone was so cold, that Entiny whimpered from beside him. He reached down to stroke her head and quickly appease her.

"So far, we have none," Kreis said, his tone harder than any rock. The man was busy watching Krizton sitting on Iris' back, as the Drae crawled a few feet ahead of them. Elvyra, Emera, Midnight, and Leyan, rode with him as well. Krizton had just finished scattering his father and grandmother's ashes on their stones, and were heading for the exit of the memorial garden. "We're doing everything we can to make them talk."

Alec was careful not to let his anger show on his face, and he was thankful that the white cloak he had on hid how his hands clenched into tight fists. "Can I help make them talk?" he asked. He didn't have to explain what he meant. It was obvious what he was asking Kreis, and the others with them knew what he meant as well.

The silence around them intensified—if that was even possible. It was soon shattered by Headmaster Donovan.

"That won't be good idea, Alec," the old man said. "In the first place, you're not officially qualified to do that. You're also angry. People who do things out of anger, later on do things that they would regret deeply. I don't want that for you."