A/N: For Iyori on her birthday.
Commencement
by
K'Arthur
The cabinets were cleaned out, the windows were boarded up and the students sent home for the remainder of the year. He bid farewell to each as they walked past him, their pensive eyes asking him if he would return. He did not reply to them nor look away. It was only a kindly fixed gaze with a tepid smile that he offered to the children as they left.
When the last one had filed out of the small building he finally allowed himself a moment to rest. Sitting on the worn and tattered bed in the back of the school his shoulders slouched as he recalled the last words she'd said to him only two weeks ago. "You're such a coward, Mathiu!" The words stung now even more than they did then. He knew she was right. He was not only a coward but a selfish coward, too stuck in his self-righteous exile to even help his desperate sister.
He winced as he recalled just how hard she'd slapped him across the face for his retort to her assertion that he was a recreant. The word he used against her was a hideous word to call someone—especially one's own sister. But he'd done that and he knew that he deserved to be slapped like an impudent child.
His stomach turned as he considered that she might still be alive had he not sent her away. She could've been here smiling at him and sipping tea. She could've been engaging him in a battle of wills and arguing useless points that didn't need to be argued. She could've led her ragtag army to victory. She could've founded a new nation based on her ideals. Most importantly, she could have lived.
Rising to his feet as the despair drowned the room, he lifted his stuffed traveling bag. It was time to go. He glanced around the school and his meager quarters before turning to leave. This is for you, Odessa. Opening the door, he froze in mid-stride, turned around and retreated back into the school. Trudging back to the bedroom, he shook his head in anguish. There was something he had forgotten and something he could not leave without.
With a sigh, he opened the top dresser drawer and took out the lone item it held. It was an old toy cat that had been patched numerous times over the years. It had been her constant companion in childhood. He remembered how she'd talk to the thing expecting an answer and maybe she got one—he didn't know. It was her favorite possession back then, and she'd given it to him when he left to go away to school years ago. The other students at the academy had laughed at him when he sat it on his desk, but never once did he hide it or put it away.
Without a word and barely the hint of a reminiscent smile, he reverently set the toy on top of the clothing in his pack and left to join the others at the castle on Lake Toran.