Chapter 2: The 3rd District's House of God
"It's…so hot…" Teito breathed, his hand rising to shield his eyes from the sun's glaring rays.
"…pyaaa…" A tiny pink-coloured winged dragon with a cross-shaped wound on his forehead whined pitifully as he slouched on the emerald-eyed brunette's shoulder, amethyst eyes drooping, drained of energy. His tail swished pendulously as the human he was perched on dragged his feet through the sand.
"Please endure it for a little longer, Mikage…" Teito covered his precious friend with his other hand, providing a shadow the fyulong could lie beneath. With trouble-magnets as riders, it was no wonder the Hawkzile had to be repaired over and over. Teito couldn't help but wish for the machine now, though. "We'll reach the capital of the 3rd District soon. Right, Frau?" He spoke as he trudged on, tasting salt on his lips. His damp fringe was plastered to his forehead, beads of sweat drenching his skin. The black of his cloak absorbed heat, but he didn't fancy the sunburns he would get if he were to take it off. The temperature was so high the cluster of buildings half a mile before them wavered in this sight. He almost couldn't differentiate a mirage from reality. "Frau?"
There was no answer.
"Frau?" Teito tugged at his hood and turned against the dusty wind that burned against his face. "Frau, are you still there?"
The bishop was lying facedown on the hellish desert soil, his whole body prone.
"FRAU!" Teito Klein ran towards his supposed mentor and turned the body over. The blonde's face was red, baked by the heat of the sand. "Frau!" the apprentice bishop called the tall man repeatedly as he shook his body. "Frau, wake up! Hey! Don't faint on me!" Teito began to panic. "I'll burn your collection of porn if you don't open your eyes now!"
"DOON'T!" The man jolted back to life, his blue eyes darting about frantically. "Not my collection!"
Teito landed a punch on the blonde's head. "Stop playing around, you pervert!"
"Brat!" Frau grabbed the boy by the collar. "Burupya!" Mikage rose to his feet and bit one of the blonde's hands. "Damn!" the man hissed. "This is not the way to treat a de…h-hydrated…" He collapsed again.
"Frau?" Teito was seriously worried, now. There was no way he could carry the bishop to the city to get help. "FRAU!" He slapped the unconscious form. There was no response.
"A…ano…" shadows loomed over the trio, and Teito whipped his head around, gripping his baculus.
There was just a young girl behind them, though, cloaked in a dusty white-coloured fabric that covered most of her body. Teito could only see her rust-coloured eyes and strands of hair the colour of bleached hays covering her tanned cheeks. She was riding a camel, which also carried a few bags of goods.
The girl smiled at Teito when he was studying her. "Would you like to put your companion on my camel?"
"Eh, is that all right?" Teito didn't want to burden a stranger.
"It's completely all right." Teito could see the gentle curve of the girl's lips through the thin veil that covered a part of her face. She had a kind soul; he could see that. "Oh, and I'm lending you this," she rummaged through her sling bag to retrieve a white robe, and handed it to him. "I can tell that you're a traveler. You're ill prepared against such an extreme weather like this."
"I-I can't impose on you further!" Teito shook his head.
"It's all right!" she insisted. "It's for your fyulong, too. Fyulongs normally live at snowcapped mountains…the kid must be suffering from its thick fur."
Teito turned to look at the small dragon, which was back to draping himself over the boy's shoulder and the former sklave smiled sadly. "I'm sorry, Mikage," he patted his friend.
"Pya!" Mikage grinned at him, as though he was telling the brunet that he wasn't blaming Teito.
Teito took off his black cloak and replaced it with the borrowed robe before heaving Frau to the camel's back and letting him drink some water. The girl stepped down and led her animal by the rope loosely tied around the flabby neck.
"I'm Aruna," the tanned girl introduced herself when they were walking side by side through the desert. "Nice to meet you."
"I'm Teito Klein," he took her proffered hand. "And this is Mikage, my best friend."
"Burupya!" Mikage took the effort to stand up and smile at the girl.
"Hi, Mikage," she petted the dragon before gesturing at the camel. "Shin is my friend, too. He has been with me for a long time."
"Were you born in the 3rd District?" Teito asked curiously.
"Yes," Aruna replied, "How about you? Where were you from?"
They fell to a momentary silence. Realising that Teito was reluctant to answer, the girl smiled again. "It's okay. Everyone has something to cover up."
"I'm sorry," the former Prince of Raggs Kingdom was grateful Aruna didn't pry. "I'm an orphan. I lost my memories when I was a child. I'm traveling to regain those memories. The person who took care of me was aiming to get to Seele, so I'm following his track."
Those twin rust irises were filled with compassion. "That must have been difficult, losing both your parents. I still have my mother." Her gaze was downcast. "My father died during the massive drought."
"Drought?" the green-eyed boy inquired.
Aruna nodded. "The 3rd District wasn't always a desert, you know. It used to be a green place with lots of trees and lots of water. My family used to have a farm." She paused, lost in reminiscence, pain entering her expressive eyes. "But around ten years ago, the climate changed drastically. The rain stopped falling. Crops failed. The soil turned arid and infertile. Many people died." When she looked up, the smile was back to her face. "I'm lucky I'm still alive."
'Ten years ago,' Teito pondered, 'wasn't it around the time of the war between Barsburg and Raggs…?'
"Ne, Teito," Aruna broke his musings, "What kind of a place is Seele?"
Teito was taken aback. "Eh…a place where one can be granted an audience with God. That reminds me," Teito quickly added to avoid more questioning, "I need to go to the 3rd District's House of God to obtain the "cursed ticket" to get to Seele. May I ask you how to get there from the city gate?"
"Eh?" Suddenly, the tanned girl looked troubled, "the House of Heiderich…had fallen to ruin."
"Huh?" Teito was shocked. That was the first time he'd ever heard of such a case…other than the Raggs Castle, of course. "How did that happen?"
"No one knew, for sure. It happened right before the drought, though, so people were saying…" Aruna bowed her head, "That we had incurred God's wrath, and the drought was a punishment…"
"But the seven Houses are important, right? They get to choose the Pope and the Emperor…" Teito's brows creased. "Do you mean to say there are only six Houses now? Is there no survivors?"
"There are several relatives of the House of Heiderich who are working for the Empire, but they're living in the 1st District," she answered. "Nobody dared to rebuild the House of God. They say the land's haunted, and anyone who'd tried other locations always came down with some diseases."
The troupe was reaching the capital. The City Gate was already within sight. When Teito showed the guards his pass, Aruna seemed surprised. "You're a bishop?"
"An apprentice," the boy pointed his thumb at the tall blond, who was still out cold on the camel's back. "He's my mentor."
"Wah…" Aruna blinked and covered her mouth. "Erm I'm sorry for my reaction…you…"
"Don't seem the type? Yeah, we get that a lot," Teito grinned at the girl. "I don't mind. It's all right," he gave a dismissive gesture.
The guards granted them clearance, and they toddled off to the centre of the city, meandering through narrow pathways. The town was vastly different from the endless scorching land of dust and sand Teito had just survived through. The tall shops and houses, built like blocks of yellowish Lego, cast shadows on the streets, providing bystanders with cool nooks and crannies to rest. Children ran around an almost dried up fountain at what seemed like a town square, chasing a round rubber ball, tanned skin and white shirts grimy, but everyone seemed happy. Merchants and housewives conversed as they conducted their businesses. In spite of the sizzling heat, people went about healthily.
"What a bustling city…" Teito commented as Aruna helped them purchase water from a stall nearby. "You're all so energetic. It's so wonderful."
The girl looked surprised by the remark before she finally smiled as she passed a leather pouch to Teito. "It's true that we don't have to worry about getting sick," she watched as the brown-haired boy sprinkled some water on his fyulong. "Burupya!" The little pink dragon perked up immediately, gulping down the clear liquid from Teito's cupped palms. "Pya! Pya!" He hopped about, rubbing his head against Teito's cheek, as though showing his gratitude.
"It's refreshing, right, Mikage?" Teito smiled fondly, "I'm glad you're all right."
Aruna was amazed of how close this human and his pet were. Of course, she cared for her camel dearly, because he had been such a big help to their livelihood, and considered him a family member, but the bond between them never went quite as deep. Teito really meant that Mikage was his best friend.
"Teito, have you any idea where you'll be staying?" She helped Teito bring the tall blonde down to the ground at a shaded corner and keep his lips open so the green-eyed boy could pour water down that parched throat.
"Well, I'd been hoping that the House of God would take me in…so no…" Teito replied as he wiped the trail of water that dripped from the side of the unconscious man's lips. After he was hydrated, Frau still seemed to be suffering, his face lost of all colours, the lines of his face taut, his hand clutching his right forearm even in sleep.
Teito frowned, fingers clutching around the handkerchief anxiously. "I don't think this is a simple case of heatstroke."
"Me neither," Aruna rose to her feet in one determined swoop. "We should place him on Shin's back again. He should see Kanariya-san."
"Kanariya-san?" Teito inquired as he got hold of Frau's head and shoulders. Together, they settled him on the camel before the burnt sienna-eyed girl walked ahead, guiding them.
"Kanariya-san is a doctor," Aruna elaborated, her footsteps pattering at a swifter pace as seconds ticked away. "The greatest doctor I've ever known. She came here around ten years ago, and settled here. There is no malady she cannot cure. And she never charges a penny. She's the reason everyone in this city never has to fear death by diseases," she talked a mile a minute, her eyes becoming brighter as she sung her praises. "I look up to her, very much."
The troupe slipped through narrow pathways, streets whose entrances were obscure, unknown to those who weren't natives. Teito and Frau were lucky to have Aruna lend them a hand. They traversed the city through shortcuts and loopholes in record time.
Through dark shadows of building Teito's eyes followed Aruna's billowing white cloak, the tapping rhythm of his feet echoing off brick walls and filling his ears. After reaching the end of one path, suddenly, bright lights and the cawing of birds assailed his senses, an orchestra of vivid colours of dusk hung on the sparse sky.
Under such a setting, stood remnants of a mansion, charred woods and stones littering around a blackened, coal-layered floors, broken tiles and tarnished trinkets strewn all over the foundation. The bottom of a melted tall fence creaked as sandy gusts blew against it. Most of the bulbous roofs of swirling colours had collapsed, leaving behind gaping holes. Ghosts of furniture: tables, chairs and frames of four-poster beds, lingered, crippled and decayed with disuse. All columns were in various states of disintegration, save one large, tall, proud one at the centre, one black line splitting the grayed marble in the middle, two dark curls decorating the top of the line, one swirling in the counter-clockwise direction, and atop it in reverse.
It was a scene, Teito realised, of despair, vehemence and revenge, fury and reproach, frozen in time.
Aruna halted at the lack of footsteps accompanying hers, and turned. "That's the fallen House of God…" she told him.
Teito nodded. "That's one of the seven ghosts' marks."
"Ea-sama's," Aruna approached the green-eyed boy, who seemed to have the burden of the world on his thin, wiry frame. "Come on."
The place the tanned girl brought them to turned out to be a small house merely a couple of blocks away from the site of the cursed land – an ordinary block of building built from bricks made of compacted sand. There were several of people making a beeline to the doorway, people leaning on crutches or friends and families, the first ailing, lethargic bunch Teito had ever seen after entering this city. The sight of untreated, diseased poor was commonplace in other places, but it looked bizarre here.
This doctor's contribution to this city was unparalleled.
"Oh, Aruna-chan," one of the queuing patients, an old, thin woman with long silver hair and a gentle smile, greeted the girl, "just back from trading with neighbouring cities?"
"Yes, Aunty Agnes," Aruna smiled back, "I got you the watermelon and cactus seeds you asked for."
"How about my orders?" the middle-aged man behind Agnes chimed in. "I've been waiting for ages!"
"I got them as well." Aruna's smile widened to a grin, before it vanished completely, her face settling to sobriety. "Ano…This person had been unconscious for half a day. He fainted when he crossed the desert, but the cause wasn't a simple heatstroke. It seems serious. I'm deeply sorry, but may I request that he be treated first…?"
"Why are you being formal with us, Aruna-chan?" Another woman who had her hand in a cast replied. "If he needs help quickly, he should get it quickly," she offered graciously. The others nodded with her.
"Thank you!" Aruna and Teito chorused. He was amazed by the kindness these people possessed. "I owe you," she spoke over her shoulder as the two of them carried Frau down from the camel and got him inside.
They passed an elderly, wrinkled man with a shiny bald head and spotted skin sagging over thin limbs, who were taking large strides, whistling a tune under his breath, and a little dark-skinned girl whose dark hair was tied to two ponytails, running after him. "Grandpa, grandpa!" she called out, "you forgot your canes!" she had the pieces of wood wrapped in her tiny arms.
Teito thought of it astonishing, a man who needed two canes to get here could walk out using his own two feet.
"Next?" a young woman asked, her lithe back facing them, sandy blonde curls tied to a low ponytail by a leather rope, long strands tumbling down the length of the white dress covering said spine. Her skin was the colour of mocha, a lighter brown than that of chocolate. She looked twenty-ish, of average height. "Just lie the patient down on the carpet…" she sounded preoccupied.
Teito and Aruna complied, arranging the tall blonde man on his back. While Teito was rising to his feet, the girl was opening the buttons of Frau's shirt. "What are you doing?" the brown-haired boy gaped.
"Kanariya-san needs to touch the skin above his heart to heal him," Aruna explained. "What else do you think…" roses bloomed on her coffee-coloured cheeks. "I wasn't doing anything like that!" she recoiled away from the bishop, as though they were the same poles of two magnets, her voice becoming more high-pitched.
"A traveler?" the young doctor turned. She had the palest, the clearest blue eyes Teito had ever seen in his whole life, like the colour that swam in his sight when he stared ahead over the desert, a calm, unclouded, spacious summer sky.
Said eyes widened when they landed on Frau. It was only for a fraction of a second, but Teito managed to note it. "Thank you, Aruna," Kanariya-san crouched beside the suffering blonde man, and laid her hands on the flat plane of his cold, cold chest. The doctor had a black fingerless glove covering her right hand, her palm and fingertips spread above Frau's flesh. "You can go home now. I'm sure your mother is waiting."
Aruna stood and bowed. "See you tomorrow."
"See you," Kanariya responded without looking up, concentrating on the zaiphon that circled her wrists. Once she released her magic, a blue-coloured fire started to manifest, consuming the bishop's prone form swiftly, enclosing him in.
"Frau!" Teito exclaimed in shock. His fist was a papery distance away from her head when two arrays of zaiphon shielded her abruptly, sending him back a few steps. "Please don't interrupt me," she stated calmly, professionally, "I have a slightly quirky method of healing, but it works wonders."
"But-!" She raised her hand from Frau's chest when Teito started to protest. The flames subsided just as rapidly, and a moan came from Frau's lips.
"Ugh…" the man moved his head slightly, his lids opening ever so slowly. "W…what happened…?" he asked, his hand coming up to cover his face and push his fringe back. "I felt like I'd been hit by a horde of bulls…" he said blearily, his voice husky with sleep. His skin was no longer clammy, but healthily pinkish.
"Are you sure they're bulls and not the harem of women you so desire?" Kanariya stated nonchalantly as she untied her hair loose and stretched her arms.
"The harem!" Frau sat up quickly his eyes darting around excitedly "Where are they? Where ar-"
Kanariya stopped the movement of his head by cupping both his cheeks, trapping his gaze to hers. She gave him a wide, suspicious Cheshire cat's grin. "Long time no see, Zehel."
The cured man seemed to pale again. "L-long time no see…" he nearly stuttered, "…Ea."
TBC to…
Strength, Noblesse Oblige and the paths one treads to fulfill one's dreams...
Chapter 3: Extracurricular Lessons