A/N: 2502 words. Sorry this took so long-I went on vacation and I didn't bring my laptop. So yeah, you may hate me but you can't tell me this wasn't expected hehe. Enjoy! Pls vote and comment :)
Oralie
Oralie should've been thinking about the hostage. She should've been thinking about the tall, twisting stone tower the Neverseen occupied, and the fight going on in front of her, flashes of silver weapons and shouts, and the fact there were far too many wounded. The scent of blood was so thick, even the soft breeze tickling her ringlets couldn't brush it away.
Instead, she was thinking about Him.
It was an inconvenience, at times, when her thoughts lingered on him during the Council meetings, or when she was trying to make a dent in the files piling up on her desks. It was dangerous, other times, in instances like this. When there was too much going on and too many things to worry about.
But when a Neverseen member held out their hand, a ball of fire writhing above his palm, her thoughts froze. She froze.
And it was all she could think about. Flames licking at the ceiling, encasing the glittering room. Hands cupping her jaw, soft and warm, his voice whispering in her head, and she clung to it like it was all she had of him.
You were always my reason.
Some days, she wanted to go back in time to say it back. To tell him she loved him. To tell him that he was everything to her. That he was the world to her.
Other days, she wanted to go back in time just to grab him and shake him and demand just what, exactly, he meant.
But death only left behind cruel laughter in her ears and fading memories in her heart. Death did not value closure.
So she was left with a stuffed pink mastodon that smelled like him and nightmares that were the only time she could see him.
"Councillor? Oralie," Elwin said, squeezing her hand, and Oralie startled. Concern flickered across his features. This was not the first time he'd called her name. "Are you okay?"
No. No, there was fire in the water and grief in the air and the world was in ashes. Her world was in ashes.
But she nodded, tracing the circlet on her head with a careful touch.
"Come on," he said softly, steering her towards the battle. She caught sight of Emery and a few others, who were arguing with Mr. Forkle and Granite. Bronte, who saw her first, shot her a glare so sharp, she could've felt it from miles away. Where were you? But a glimmer of relief flickered in his gaze, and she smiled sheepishly. It probably looked like a grimace.
Elwin let go of her hand, shooting her a You're sure you're okay? look before hurrying away to tend to the wounded.
She watched him go, feeling the ground waver like oil beneath her feet. Or the slick, molten crystal of a fallen Eternalia, evidence and vile promise that Kenric was not coming back.
One step in front of the other. She held her head high so her circlet would not fall.
"I heard something about a hostage," she murmured to Bronte, watching the heated argument between Emery and Granite. The former had a familiar look on his face, too stubborn to listen to reason at this point.
"The Neverseen wants time to clear out their hideout. They claim to have an innocent person in their dungeons."
"We choose the hostage, obviously," Oralie said, knowing full well that the other Councillors would call her soft the way they always did. It used to hurt that her own colleagues thought she was not enough. But she'd been called soft too many times for it to matter.
She had the circlet on her head. They could say what they want, but they would always bow to her.
For a time, she loved it. She loved the way they looked at her like she was someone, someone who could do anything. She loved the awe in their eyes when she passed them, the one that said she could truly amount to something grand. It was exhilarating. She was vain.
Before she met Kenric.
Now, when they looked at her like that, she wanted to tear the circlet off and throw it at their faces. She wanted to grind it into the ground with her heel until it was nothing more than a lump of metal. She wanted the world to tremble when she was angry, not look at her with disdain and disappointment. She wanted to be so outrageously imperfect that it changed the course of history, that it rattled even the stars.
But she was not that strong.
"Granite thinks so as well. Mr. Forkle believes they might not even have a hostage, but that's not a risk we're willing to take." Bronte sighed, his gaze lifting to the Neverseen's hideout.
Several Neverseen members were on the ground, fighting with figures who must've been a part of the Black Swan. Flashes of silver weapons gleamed in the sunlight. Dex Dizznee and his abundance of gadgets helped hold them off, but it wasn't enough.
Further away, Sophie Foster lay unconscious. Blood smeared her face and trickled down her hands. Elwin knelt beside her, cleaning it off with a tender touch. It soothed Oralie's wavering heart, but only for a moment.
Children were fighting for the world when it was her place to. Children were going through this pain when she was supposed to protect them. At the very least, they had someone to care for them. But it wasn't enough.
"And what does Emery think?" But she needn't ask.
"We've played their game for long," Emery said to Granite, an unyielding look in his eyes. "We finally have the upper hand. We can't give in to their terms."
"So we just let them die?" Granite shouted.
"Of course not. There must be a way to save them without relenting to the Neverseen," Emery said, as if that solved everything. But there was too much at risk.
"We don't have the time. We have to save them now." Granite glanced at Mr. Forkle for backup, but Forkle's gaze drifted to the crooked tower in the distance, all dark stone and overgrown moss. It was sullen compared to the crystal castles that created the bustling town nearby.
"Perhaps we could propose an alternate deal," Mr. Forkle tried, but Granite let out a groan, suggesting this was not the first time they'd discussed that.
"Don't you see? We don't have the upper hand. We have two options, and the Neverseen has provided both of them. Storm the hideout and let an innocent person die, or let them win, and save the hostage."
"And you? What do you think?" Oralie murmured to Bronte, who had a look in his eyes that struck her blood with something paralyzing. He was afraid. After millenia of watching the world pass by idly while sickening things happened under its careless gaze, he was rarely afraid of anything anymore.
"I don't know," he whispered back, and the limp thing that was once her heart trembled. "If we give into the Neverseen's demands, the war will be prolonged. More innocent people will die. Do we save one life only to lose hundreds more in the future?"
She'd encountered a situation like this when she was in her elite levels, engaged in thoughtful conversation with her mentor. The other time was back when she was a recent Councillor, captured in a heated debate with Kenric that too often disrupted Council meetings until Emery banned them from discussing theoretical moral dilemmas when any other Councillor was present.
But she always hoped she'd never have to deal with one herself. She was too afraid to face the truth when the easy, perfect world masked every scar.
She was no better than the rest of the Council, the rest of the world, no matter how much she convinced herself otherwise.
"Our duty is to our people," she said softly. Several gazes whirled to face her, and her words felt snatched by the breeze.
"So what do we do?" Granite said, glancing between Emery and Forkle.
Sinking disappointment settled somewhere in the back of Oralie's mind, a permanent resident. She'd always waited for the moment that people turned to her, looked at her as a leader. That was why she'd joined the Council. But she'd gotten used to the fact that, no matter how many years it'd been or how much experience she had, she was not important.
What was the point of being a Councillor, of tearing herself agonizingly from the woman in a regal crown, the woman she was supposed to be, if she couldn't change the world? If she couldn't impact lives?
If she couldn't even save one life, the only one that mattered?
Bronte nudged her arm, scowling. Oralie would have to talk to him about how his intended encouragement was not actually encouraging.
She opened her mouth to speak, but a sudden boom rumbled across the world, shuddering through her whole body.
Everything seemed to fall silent for one fleeting, endless moment. The rubble seemed to float in the air. Her words lingered on the tip of her tongue. Orange fire and plumes of smoke were frozen, like they were painted.
Somebody cried out, and everything fell back into place.
"What —"
Oh.
The hideout, silhouetted against the blue sky, exploded.
Something fiery and terrifying flurried through her veins. Chaos erupted around her. Flames burst to life, licking at the air hungrily, an eerie reminder of what she couldn't forget, and the structure collapsed in on itself. Debris rained down, turning the air near the hideout murky with dust.
"What happened?" someone shouted.
"I don't know!"
"What about the hostage?"
"Who did that?"
If it wasn't the Black Swan, and it wasn't the Council . . . Oralie's gaze caught Bronte's beside her, who seemed to know exactly what she was thinking.
Was it a trick? It wouldn't be the first time. The Neverseen claimed to have a hostage, but as the argument raged on outside, they gathered everything of importance and burned down the rest. Hostage or no hostage, it was an efficient tactic in an emergency.
"But that doesn't make sense," Oralie said when Granite voiced the same concerns. "The damage is contained to the east side of the hideout. If they didn't want to leave behind any evidence, they'd destroy it all at once."
"Councillor Oralie is right," Mr. Forkle said, eyebrows furrowing together. "Whoever did this can't be far, but we won't be able to see anything until the dust settles."
Oralie exchanged glances with Bronte before following Mr. Forkle and Granite closer to the rubble of the hideout.
Dust and smoke hung thick in the air, blocking out the sun and casting the world in gray.
"Look!" someone said, and Oralie's head swiveled in the direction they pointed.
Two figures emerged from the haze, silhouetted against the grime and the faint rays of sunlight determined to shine through. The tall, wiry one was cloaked in black, but the shoulder of the fabric was torn out where the Neverseen patch should've been. They leaned heavily against the shorter one, who wore varying layers of vivid blue, lavender purple, and jade green, though her simple hood couldn't hide the messy brown hair tumbling over her shoulders.
Oralie squinted as they drew closer. The dust caked in her throat, though the soft breeze swept the worst of it out of the air in a few minutes.
"Are you okay?" said the one in the bright colors. Her voice sounded young, laced with worry. The taller one nodded, though they looked anything but, wavering as they moved, like a tree in the midst of a storm. They murmured something to the girl, who soldiered on even with their extra weight.
"Probably because they didn't feed you much. Here, sit down."
They crumpled to the grass, legs quaking with the mere weight of their body. They said something again, but it was too soft for Oralie to hear.
"Wait," Forkle said, holding out his arm.
"What do you mean wait?" Oralie whisper-protested. "They're clearly unwell."
"They're Neverseen members."
Granite frowned, studying the odd pair, who faced away from them, towards the remnants of the battle beyond. "They tore off their insignia."
"That may not mean anything," Bronte said.
Oralie tried not to roll her eyes and moved past them before they could notice. The only way they could figure anything out is if they got a move on.
Elves, Kenric would've joked. The only action they know is watching or causing drama.
Which, Oralie had found in the time she and Kenric had fallen in love and the public had been all over their infrequent slip-ups, had been proven right over and over.
Oralie only caught bits and pieces of what the cloaked man was saying — again and again: "I have to — I have to get to them."
"I know. I know, and we will," the girl promised comfortingly. "But you're going to pass out if you keep moving. We should find a doctor, or . . ." She paused, looking around hopelessly. Then her gaze landed on Oralie, and her eyes widened.
"No! I-I have to get to her," the man said more insistently.
No.
That got the girl's attention. "Her? Who's her?"
Oralie knew that voice. She knew . . . No.
She'd recognize that voice anywhere.
She was just mixing it up. Memories flashed across her mind. She'd seen Oblivimyre. She'd seen the Everblaze. She'd been to his Wanderling countless times — it'd been years.
So how was His voice here?
You're mixing it up, her mind coaxed, though her body still moved her closer.
But she couldn't mix this up. Her heart would recognize Him and only Him anywhere. Everywhere.
You're grieving, said a voice in her head, sounding conspicuously like Bronte. You're wrong.
But what if I'm not?
"Hey," the girl said frantically as Oralie approached, but she needn't worry. Whatever possessed her to press forward without a care in the world vanished at the sound of His voice, and paralyzing fear gripped her limbs. "You might want to snap to your senses."
What if . . .
What if it was him?
What then?
The man looked up, then turned to face Oralie. The hood cast a harsh shadow across his pale face, but she could make out long, dirty hair and thin, cracked lips. The faint reminder of a burn on his skin peeked through the folds of the cloak. Even his hands were thin and shaky, like he wouldn't be able to hold a dandelion if someone gave it to him.
She stood there, staring back. The smoke burned her eyes. She had to get closer; she couldn't move.
"Ora," he whispered, and Oralie's heart plunged. The smoke gripped her, choked her, scalded her and froze her. He was the phantom of the past, the voice of a ghost.
The star she was in love with.
"Kenric?"
December 30th, 2023, 4:52 p.m.