Ballad of the Blue Roses
Chapter One
Shattered to the Core
Sightless, she met his eyes. His distinctive, crimson fingerprints stood out on her pale cheek, but the blood had long since spilled over, dribbling down her neck. Her chest was torn open, which bothered him, but in a peripheral way.
"It doesn't make sense..." She was dead – her core was gone – yet she hadn't turned to sand. Her body remained... and she was dead. He looked up and found Esmerelda stricken, face in hands. She looked like he felt – lost and hurting.
But they weren't alone anymore, and that made all the difference.
"Get Pearl," he told her, "And Agatha – and tell Diana."
"You aren't going to stay down here alone..." she said, hesitant to ask. But the lilt in her voice gave to the question, Are you? The Jumi girl let her hands drop, pressing them to her chest as her anxious gaze darted around the grotto.
"No, I..." Elazul stood, and caught sight of the blood that marred his fingers. He couldn't just wipe it away, and it frightened him, "I know what to do. Trust me."
---
The longer they sat watching, the harder it was to do the right thing. They huddled amongst the roots, and the draping shadow of Trent's canopy kept them well hidden. Across the yard, an impatient caller was repeatedly pounding on their front door. They knew him by sight, and he was certainly in a mood.
"He's been knocking like that for, like, an hour," Bud estimated. "Must be really important."
"Yeah." Lisa stood up and brushed off her robe. Someone had to be responsible, after all. "We really should see what it's about."
"But-" Abruptly, her brother pulled her back down. Pointing down the path, he hissed, "Wait, look; she's back!"
Slowed by the sight, the woman paused completely to take stock of the situation. She tapped her fingers against the thin staff in her hand, and her cautious gaze drifted over the fields, and back over their hiding place. Looking again to their as-of-yet-unaware guest, she took slow measured steps up the path. Elazul had stopped, abruptly, and nearly backed into her. But she must have said something because he spun on his heel and narrowly avoided it.
From where he was, Bud could hear the thin murmur of the Jumi's voice, punctuated by wild gesticulation. Wild, by comparison to Thea's stone-stillness anyway. Whatever she said was too low to hear – something about hawking if his lip-reading was right, but that didn't make much sense at all.
Elazul moved aside as she brushed past, and he followed her into the house. ... and out of sight.
"Darn," Bud pouted. It was an inconvenient turn, but easily remedied.
"Wait, maybe we shouldn't-" Lisa spoke too late, for her errant sibling had already made a dash for the tree-home. Hitching up her robes, she matched his pace and stopped when he did. The door was open, and the afternoon sunlight spilled over the threshold. Unable to see into the dimly lit interior, aside the stray light from the window, the boy crept over the doorstop and paused. By the hearth was their guest, staring his way with a guarded expression. Beside him was their Master, leaning heavily against the table; her back was to them, and Bud decided by that stance that hiding would be a most wise idea.
"What have I said," the boy had nearly made it to the study before her voice stopped him in his tracks, "about answering the door?"
"Er... Hey, 'Thea." He might have liked to think of himself as the best actor on the world stage, but when she turned to face him, he knew she could see right through him. "What's up? Company, huh? Wow, we sure haven't seen him in a while!"
The woman's gaze shifted to the girl beside him. Lisa had been with him from the beginning; no matter what, she'd never let him down. Galathea stared between them, and asked, "Well?"
"Never for strangers," Lisa began, and paused. The woman waited five patient beats before pressing for the second half.
"And?"
"And Elazul's stranger than most," Bud supplied helpfully. The boy giggled at his own joke, and his sister covered her mouth with both hands. The Jumi scowled, but Galathea's eyes narrowed ever slightly.
"I see," she said. There were two ways to interpret her expression – anger and amusement – and each twin might have figured for one and the other. The woman breathed a long inward sigh, and leaned back against the table. "If you are coming inside now, please remember your shoes..."
She didn't have to finish, do not belong in the house, before the children had dropped to the floor to remove their footwear.
"You're not mad?" Lisa asked apprehensively, while Bud tried to shush her before she blew their luck.
"What's done is done," Galathea replied. That was the end of it, and the elves retreated upstairs. Out of sight, Bud stopped to listen; so his plans may have changed, but rarely was he forced to abandon one altogether. Lying himself at the top of the staircase, he held his breath and waited.
Galathea pushed Elazul's patience, arranging a row of seeds and second of metal coins on the table. However well organized they appeared, it seemed they weren't good enough. But by the time he thought to speak and break the silence himself, she was finished.
"Let me guess," she said, observing her handiwork with crossed arms. Abruptly, she held up a hand to recant. "No, let me ballpark. Is the world in danger?"
"Er." Elazul wasn't sure what to honestly say to that, and checked himself. "No; I mean... I don't think it is."
"Hmm." Galathea left her arrangements, and moved past him to the mantle. Nonchalantly, as if it were an everyday conversation, she ventured, "The Jumi are in danger, then?"
Wanting to scream, Yes! he again checked himself. Individuality didn't come to him easily, but he was learning – one death didn't mean there was a danger to the whole. All the same, he wouldn't have come if he hadn't wanted guidance. "I... don't know."
"No? Why don't you know?" Yet if there was something he admired about Galathea, it was her certainty. Unlike others of her world, she spoke what she meant and meant what she spoke. He had seen her speak to liars and princes, all the same way; if not dependable, she was nothing. "It must be important, if you were willing to knock down my door for it."
Still, it was difficult to admit. While she hung a kettle over the fireplace, he examined one of the coins from the table in the palm of his hand. It seemed to bear the emblem of a lady-fish... and he swore he'd seen that image somewhere before. "There was a killing."
"Alright." She spoke to him like she spoke to the children. She pressed on only when he failed to do so, "And?"
Elazul replaced the coin to the table, and tried to follow her lead. "It's like nothing I've ever seen."
"Was it a hunter?"
With her now-full mug in hand, Galathea pulled out a chair and stopped short. Before sitting down, she placed the tea aside and put the Undine coin back where it belonged. The woman could have sworn she'd had them all in order, only a moment prior.
"I..."
"Elazul," she said, reclining now and warming her hands on the earthen vessel, "You know me. I'm not going to turn anyone away, least of all you. Just tell me what you know – what you want me to do – and I'll look into it."
---
Pensive, she studied the grotto – little more than a niche in the lower cliffs below Etansel. It was understandable for the Jumi to be skittish, but she wasn't sure what they wanted her for. The body was gone... little specks of blood were there, but only because she had an inkling on where to look in the dusky torchlight.
"So you found her here." Galathea knelt, much as Elazul had done, and inspected the floor. "No core. A Jumi always disappears?" From her limited perspective, that was the case, but she didn't know if there was a known, perhaps famous exception.
"Always."
Always, except this one, the woman thought. She considered the possibilities, dismissing all but one. "Could she have been part human?"
The Jumi knight shook his head, and sighed, fixing his gaze on the cavern floor. "Doesn't happen."
Galathea adjusted her gauntlet, frowning deeply. Something about the site tickled her mind, but she just couldn't grasp it. She stared at the blood, and eventually shook her head to clear it. Whatever was bothering her, wasn't coming up again.
"Where's the body now?" she asked. Elazul was still staring at his feet, she noticed, but he looked to answer.
"They probably moved it."
"Find out where," she instructed. Standing, she dusted herself off and glanced around, almost paranoid. "Don't tell them I'm here, yet."
The Jumi paused, mid-turn. "Why not?"
"Trust me." She clasped a hand to his shoulder, pressing him forward into the rain. "I'll be waiting."
---
Once having learned of the body's location, he returned swiftly. Galathea moved with wraithlike efficiency through Etansel, avoiding everyone else by way of the Jumi's guidance and the night's overcast sky, although he wasn't sure why. Once they arrived, Galathea took two steps into the room and stopped. Her fingers tightened, knuckles white against her staff, but she stood death-still, gaze locked onto the dead girl's face.
"What's her name?" she asked, and the question softly cracked.
"Peri," Pearl answered, from beside the deathbed. Galathea barely nodded; there was nothing she could do... not now. The pieces she needed weren't here, and to find them – if she could find them – was dangerous at best.
"I don't know who could have done this," she admitted, giving council best she could, "It could be an isolated incident, or it could be the start of a whole new hunt."
"If you let them know I'm here... it'll scare them off, I'm sure, and we might never find them. If you don't, he might strike again, and it could very well be too soon." She sighed softly, and added, "Either way can be dangerous."
"You should talk to Diana. I... You know she has better judgement," Elazul suggested, and she couldn't argue. And besides which, Diana might have known something – about the girl, about the current Jumi life – that might have had some weight.
"I'll do that now," the woman decided. Turning to leave, she dismissed them offhand, "Keep sharp; I'll find you if I need you."
"Thea..." Elazul caused her to hesitate; soft, worried, uncertain. "We don't... know, don't die, like this," he gestured to Peri, laid out as she'd been found. "What do you do with a body?"
They were both looking for that answer, waiting with frightful resignation. Galathea smiled grimly; her eyes were perilously bright in the refracted light, and her voice thick. "You burn them."
---
There was a rhythmic tapping along the outer walk, beyond the door. Rubens looked to Diana, and waited – familiarity was nothing, and could get one killed in dire times. He stood before the door, ready to defend it if absolutely necessary. The sound was tempting, unbearable.
It seemed that everything moved slowly – the tapping stopped, door opened inward, and from the embrace of darkness, the far-famed Heroine of Fa'Diel appeared, staff in hand. For a moment in time, it felt that she had never left; he had never been afraid. Behind him, he heard Florina sigh and Diana take up the role of leader and earned friend.
"I thought you might appear," she said by way of greeting, "And I suppose I know why you're here."
"You should," Galathea replied in her typical blunt way.
"Whenever it is that Elazul finds need," Diana announced dryly, "it is often that he seeks the comfort of an outsider than that he turns toward his brethren."
"Mustn't be often at all, then," the woman said.
"No. It is..." the diamond Jumi sought the word, and found one adequate enough, "Peculiar."
"You don't want my help, then?"
"I did not say that." Diana smiled faintly. "We forget ourselves. How have you been, my friend?"
"Better than you, I regret to say." Pleasantries were not her strong point, although she might have tried for the sake of the audience, she felt better cutting to the point, especially seeing as it was merely the three of them. "What do you know of this terror that haunts your city? Who harms the Jumi while I still draw breath?"
"We do not know." Galathea gripped her staff and hung her head. Of course not; that would be too easy. "It's not Sandra, we suspect that much."
"Different handscript, for one," Rubens added, and the woman's head snapped up. She stared at him, and it frightened him.
"You found a note?"
"With the body," Diana replied for him, and he was grateful for her drawing that startled gaze.
"Oh." The diamond Jumi reached into the pocket of her blouse, and held it forth. Galathea stepped forward, apprehensively, to take the scrap of paper with steady fingers. She didn't recognize the elegance of the paper, or the script itself, but there was a message there. There were two in fact, one more hidden than the other, and it filled her with sick dread. "Oh, Galathea you fool."
Diana called after her, but she was already gone.
---
Elazul took a moment alone to collect his wits. The valleys below were serene, encased in the morning fog, as he stared out over the rocky dawn. Something brushed against his arm, fluttering down to catch against the rocks. He stared at it, not recognizing it at first, but on closer inspection...
A scrap of paper. It was odd, and made his skin crawl; Jumi didn't keep records, but memories in living rock. He chased it as it flitted down the path, apprehending it underfoot as it animately sought to get away. First Sandra, now...
Stooping to pick it up, he examined it closely, and found folded within a message, just like the first. Upon reading it, he cried out softly, and, started, let the paper slip to the wind. Recapturing it didn't matter, although he tried at first – he had seen what it had read. And as the words sunk in, he shook his head, denying it softly. "No!"
A/N: Hey. Long time no write. I've been around, right, but mostly all of lurking and occasionally commenting. I've had ideas, but... most of 'em been tidbits up 'til now. I have an idea of where this is going, and I have an idea of where it'll end. Hopefully this one won't take four years.
A couple of important notes: I haven't played LoM for a while – I have a good memory, for games at least, but maybe not a good enough memory. So I might contradict things. As far as Jumi stuff goes... let me say this – I'm not sure where some of the conventions come from, and how accurate they are. Again, I'm going by what I found in the game, and I'm going by what makes the most sense to me. All in all, if I make a mistake... feel free to point it out to me.
Glad to be back... well, you know. Writing Seiken Densetsu stuff... somehow it always feels like coming home. Heh.