53

Summum nec metuam diem, nec optem

L.N. 3

I

When Silia took off the headset, nobody spoke. Everybody had already heard or understood. She closed her eyes, put the headphones on the counter, and took a few moments to think.

"I don't know who else to call," she admitted, feeling weird, muffled. "Cor will spread the word. He doesn't sound particularly worried. A delay of twenty-four hours, he said, is plausible. A car breakdown in the middle of nowhere. A long detour for a road infill. A wound that slowed him down. Adrian said he will personally go with a team to scour the Ravatoghan Trail area to see if they find anything."

Neither Ignis, nor Prompto, nor Iris and Talcott replied. Silia was beginning to see panic in Talcott's eyes, anxiety in those of Iris. She was the shitmus test, so she stretched herself with a forced nonchalant gesture, got up from the radio station and patted Talcott's shoulder. "Don't you have something to take care of, you guys? Let's wait for news from Adrian. Cor is right: twenty-four hours are too few to worry. Maybe Gladio is stranded somewhere on the road and is looking for a working scrap to return."

Iris nodded but didn't smile. When they had first met, Gladio's sister was slightly taller than her, but in the last two and a half years she had grown at least six inches and the constant training had made visible changes to her slender body that Silia knew very well. Like her, Iris had adopted a fighting style based on agility, so she had remained lean and toned, but her arms, legs and shoulders had inevitably strengthened. She kept her hair long now, well tied in a tight braid, like her. Talcott was ten years old and he was timidly leaning towards that transitional phase that would turn him into one of those muscular kids who look fifteen or sixteen, until they open their mouths.

"Aren't we going to look for him?" Talcott tried to ask.

"No, it would be useless now. He could be anywhere," replied Silia, and the answer came out with a hint of irritation due to her own desire to do something. "Iris, go back to the greenhouses. Talcott, if you don't have anything else to do, help her. If I know something, I'll call you."

While the not-for-much-longer kids went out without a word, Silia noticed that Prompto was looking at her with an air no less disoriented than theirs. Twenty-three years, the age of Gladio when she had met him, and still he wasn't able to control his emotions. "Nothing to worry about, then?" he asked her, as if expecting a different response intended only for him and Ignis now that they were alone.

"I didn't say that," she retorted, without being able to prevent it. "I said it's still too early to worry. I recommend that if someone at the camp asks what has happened to him, everything is fine. All we need is word spreading that Gladio is missing."

"Good," Ignis replied and started for the exit, confident on his legs. With the same ease, he held out his hand and lowered the handle of the container door at the first attempt. Nothing surprising; soon he would be appointed Sworn Sword and Silia felt proud of him as if she was his mother. "I'm going back to the kitchen to help Takka with the dinner. Silia, please, call me if you know anything."

~~~XV~~~

At eleven o'clock that night Gladio had not yet returned, and when Adrian called, he informed them that they had found no sign of recent struggle in the Ravatoghan Trail area, and his car was nowhere to be seen. Whatever had happened to him, if something had happened to him, had not happened there. Adrian and his team had combed the area for hours. Again, Silia had called the Meldacio outpost in Lestallum to know if Gladio had showed up to deliver the goods, and again she had called Cor, who had told her that he had spread the word as he could and had nothing new to tell her.

"What do we do?" Prompto asked her when she removed her headphones.

"Look for him," Silia answered.

"Silia, I'm as worried as you are," Ignis tried to make her see reason, softly, as if she were running around in panic. "But you said before that it would be useless. What could we do more than Adrian's team? If we leave now, we would be in the area only tomorrow. By then…"

"We can take a hunter with us. A good hunter. We all too often forget that the members of the Meldacio are not bodyguards or exterminators. I know one, if I can find him. And if I can't find him, I'll go anyway." She swallowed bitterness. She kept feeling strangely. It wasn't like her. It was just a stupid accident, as happened every day. Gladio was simply stuck somewhere and unable to communicate and would return the next day.

Or maybe not. Maybe something had happened to him, most fighters almost never die in a glorious battle against a stronger opponent, and in that case, she could do nothing about it. They risked their lives daily and were well aware of it.

No, she told herself, the worst was not if something had happened to him. The worst was not knowing. The worst was the prospect of remaining there in Hammerhead waiting, day after day, for Gladio to return, continuing to take care of the camp and pretending that the torment was not devouring her from the inside. It was already starting. Anxiety, she recognized, rubbing her eyes. She couldn't afford it.

"The two of you want to come with me, I guess?" she asked Ignis and Prompto.

Prompto blinked and looked at Ignis. "Do you really need to ask? We're talking about Gladio. Everything else can wait."

Ignis nodded. "If it's not a problem, Silia, since we're going, I'd like to come too."

"Good." Silia forced herself to smile. She would never admit it, but the idea of sharing that anxiety with someone as close to Gladio as she was made her feel better. "Go get ready and set up a car. I'll look for the hunter."

Left alone, she returned to look for the frequency of the Meldacio HQ in Vesper. The radio operator on duty - she only knew him by his name - told her that as far as he knew Kamal Rohan was at the HQ and to wait until they found him. Silia thanked him and put the call on hold.

One minute passed, then two. Frank, perhaps feeling the cessation of communications, knocked on the door and poked his head in, asking if everything was all right. Silia answered affirmatively but had to hold her left knee with her hand to stop herself from tapping her foot rhythmically on the wooden floor. Frank nodded and retired.

Three minutes. Four. Precious minutes. Silia was starting to get pissed off. Then she remembered that it was almost midnight, she hadn't heard from Kamal for over a year and, as far as she knew, he could be in the HQ infirmary without an arm or a leg.

The radio rasped. Silia hastened to answer.

"Hartwood? Mrs. Hartwood?" Kamal's hoarse voice panted.

Despite herself, Silia smiled. "Enough with that 'mrs' or I'll come and kick your ass. Let me guess, you were drinking at the HQ bar, right? Are you sober?"

"No, ma'am. I mean, I wasn't at the bar, I'm very sober, ma... Hartwood. By the Six, that's a surprise. How are you, Hartwood? We haven't met for more than a year. I know you're doing great in Hammerhead. I had no doubt! Just last week I talked about you with Colby. We thought sooner or later to come and see you."

"Kamal, I didn't call to chat," she stopped him. "Listen to me. I need... a person from Hammerhead is missing. He left on a mission alone, nothing too dangerous, just an easy hunt; he was to return today, but I have no news 'bout him. I wouldn't be worried at all, but he never reached Lestallum, where he was to report yesterday. The last area where someone saw him is the Ravatoghan Trail, the night before yesterday. Three hunters said they came across his car."

"Hm." Kamal was clearly puzzled. She wasn't surprised. "I'm sorry, Hartwood, I don't want to be a defeatist, but..."

Silia anticipated him. "Kamal, even if he's the last of the morons, and probably he is, I leave no stone unturned when it comes to my guys. However, we're talking about the Shield of Prince Noctis. If he's dead, it could be a problem for everyone."

Silence on the other side. "Oh gods, Hartwood, I'm sorry. I know that... well, he's your husband, right?"

Silia opened her mouth to tell him that was not the point, but she felt all the air sucked from her lungs. That was precisely the point. It hadn't been one of her guys to disappear, it hadn't been a man from Prince Noctis' entourage. Her fucking husband had disappeared. "Exactly. So, I will turn over the whole of Eos if it will help. I'll beat every fucking track. I'll kill every fucking daemon. I'll look under the beds and carpets of every fucking survivor community until my husband, his corpse or his clothes, come out."

"Tell me how I can help you, Hartwood."

"They tell me you've become one of the best hunters around. You walk around saying that you are the best. Well, show me: I need a tracker. D'you want a reward? You got it. Ask me whatever you want. The prey is a man of six and half feet and two hundred pounds. Help me track him down."

She clearly heard a snort on the other side of the line. "You haven't changed at all, Hartwood. I'll help you find your husband. But I don't want a reward. I've been waiting for a lifetime to go on a mission with the Coeurl again. Boasting around 'bout it is the greatest reward I can have."

"Stop it, Kamal. Once I close the call, I'll get in the car with the two other comrades of the Prince's and I'll meet you tomorrow at Hulldagh Pyke by Quintinus. And, Kamal?"

"I'm listening, Hartwood."

"Thanks, man."

"Don't even say it, Hartwood."

II

"Ave Maria! Jungfrau mild, Erhöre einer Jungfrau Flehen, Aus diesem Felsen starr und wild Soll mein Gebet zu dir hin wehen. Wir schlafen sicher bis zum Morgen, Ob Menschen noch so grausam sind." *

"That's beautiful!" Prompto exclaimed, leaning on her headrest.

Silia jumped. She hadn't even noticed she was humming. And that song, furthermore. Her mother had sung it when her father died. And so she had done, from a guard tower, the night Hans died. If she had believed in bad omens, that would have been a bad omen. "Sorry," she said, returning to focus actively on the road.

"Why do you apologize? You have a beautiful voice, Silia," Ignis said.

"Oh, I don't think so."

"Believe it. I dare say that I developed a good sense of hearing. What song is it, if I may ask?"

"It's called Ave Maria. I don't know who 'Maria' is, but I think it refers to Shiva. Or maybe to the Oracle. It is a plea to a sort of great mother to protect us."

"Sing another verse, if you would?" Prompto asked, behind her.

Silia satisfied him. "Zum Schlaf, und uns dein Schutz bedeckt, Wird weich der harte Fels uns dünken. Du lächelst, Rosendüfte wehen In dieser dumpfen Felsenkluft. O Mutter, höre Kindes Flehen, O Jungfrau, eine Jungfrau ruft!"

Ignis smiled. "Not a Glaives' song, I guess."

"No. It's a song from Ambrosia, the village where I was born."

"In the mountains northwest of Cleigne, if I am not wrong?"

"Exactly." Silia nodded, slowing down. They were about to reach the point on the highway where a Gargantua had attacked an Old Lestallum van and the wreckage was still there. She was in a hurry, but she had to drive carefully, or they would get a flat. "I thought I would come back and have a look, sooner or later. But larger and better positioned centers than Ambrosia have been annihilated by the Scourge or have been abandoned for safer places. So, it would be useless. The idea had crossed me for a moment when Darius and I went to Cape Noah before the Long Night. We weren't that far apart. But I didn't even propose it. I no longer know anyone there. There's just my father's grave, but I don't care about graves. And besides, we had better things to do."

She remembered perfectly one of their long conversations as they drove half of Lucis on the motorbike; they had talked about his paramour, Alexander, and about Hans. Darius had confessed to her that he rarely thought of Alexander, as if years, not two months, had passed since his death. She had replied that this was how it should be. Well, even Darius was now part of the ranks of the dead she had loved – more and more than the living ones – and whom she thought less and less often. She wondered how Cor felt about it, he who had known Darius for almost twenty years. They had never mentioned him again except by chance.

"Did you know Darius well, Ig?" she asked. Prompto had entered the Crownsguard a few days before their departure for Altissia, he wasn't from a noble family, and she doubted there had been many contacts between them.

Ignis frowned for a moment, perhaps surprised by the question that came from nowhere. "Not so well, I am afraid. There were many years of difference between us. But for a long time, yes."

Silia kept forgetting that Ignis was only twenty-four years old, and that there had been a good deal of age difference between herself and Darius. She had never sensed it. After ten years in war, rarely did anyone manage to make her feel young.

"But Darius helped me with my training," Ignis continued. "In the Guard, the seniors take care of the recruits and then of the juniors. Darius participated in the training of most of the Guards of my age and Gladio's. He was very skilled with the sword. On a purely technical level, perhaps he was second only to the Marshal."

Silia nodded. It was probable that he surpassed her too, but by then there was no way to find out, because they had never seriously measured against each other. She had proposed it in Orior once, but Darius had replied that a crowd would gather to watch them fight and it was not good that people at the camp saw one of them on his or her ass. Better they keep wondering who's stronger, he had smiled, they will respect both more. He had a brain that worked much better than hers.

"He would have still improved," she let out. "He lacked field experience. Clashes where your life is at stake. He would have had plenty of them." She smiled. "But maybe it's a good thing that a swanky noble like him died before being forced to live in this debacle."

Ignis also smiled. "How long did you know him?"

"From the day after I reached Orior. Cor got him on me to make sure that I didn't play tricks. I was still Glaive, and the Kingsglaives had betrayed. I don't think he expected us to..." she shrugged, "well, to bond so much. We got on well even in battle. He was the only one I mentioned about Gladio. It wasn't a secret, but..."

"No, it was definitely not a secret," Ignis interrupted her. "Do not get offended. You were not indiscreet, especially since, if Gladio told the truth, nothing inappropriate happened between the two of you. But a Kingsglaive and the Shield of the Prince of Insomnia hanging around in pubs, cinemas and malls?" Ignis leaned against the window to his right. "People talked about it. Anyway, they weren't too far from the truth, don't you think? You are married now."

"I knew nothing," Prompto denied. "Until you mentioned her, I didn't even know that Gladio knew someone called Hartwood."

"You were not in the Guard, Prompto. There was a lot of jokes about it: 'Where's your girlfriend, Gladio?', 'I met your girlfriend in the hall yesterday, Gladio', 'Are you sure she's...?'" Ignis halted.

"'Are you sure she's'…?" she asked, guessing where the joke would go. She smiled.

"Guys' jokes," Ignis said. "Don't mind."

"Are you sure she's a woman?" she finished for him.

Ignis didn't answer. Silia chuckled. "Old joke," she said, rubbing the back of her neck and almost astonished at not feeling the pleasant rasp of the shave. The last time she had shaved her hair she was on the front, a couple of weeks before the Jormungand ate her leg. She had cut it after that, then and shaved the sides of her head the morning she had moved to Hammerhead, but she had never had it as short after that. "Darius told me that Gladio always replied that his fiancée was Prince Noctis, and that he already required all his time."

"Bah, anyway, one would be blind to mistake you for a guy, Silia," said Prompto.

"You think? Once in Quirm, a girl towed me. I was much younger, though."

Prompto gave an amused exclamation. "Really? And what did you do?"

Silia opened her mouth to reply, then suddenly something came up her throat. She wasn't sure it was a laugh and swallowed it. "I'll tell you another time, Prompto," she replied. There were mornings when she'd wake up with Gladio's arm on her waist or around her shoulders and for a moment she thought it was Sam's, or Caesar's. Hans', even. The new deaths and new worries had pushed the old ones aside, but they had not canceled them. She kept missing her teammates badly, and they were a regular presence in her dreams - more often in her nightmares. Sometimes she wondered what the Long Night would be like with them.

Ignis likely caught the bitter note in her voice, but misunderstood, or maybe not. He gave a half smile. "I'm sure we'll find him, Silia."

"Ig," she got impatient, suddenly in a bad mood. "I don't need assurances based on nothing. I don't know if we'll find him. We will do everything we can to find him." Prompto often pissed her off, but with Ignis she agreed a majority of the time. His calm manner reminded her a little those of Legato. And, as was the case with Legato, it sometimes happened that their nervousness tuned into a competition of free zingers.

"Silia, please don't treat me like one of your guys."

"Then don't behave like them."

"I just wanted to be encouraging."

"Are you sure it's not you who actually need it?"

"Silia," Prompto interrupted them, nervous, probably to distract them from the childish squabble, "do you think this Kamal is able to track Gladio down?"

Silia sighed, returning to focus on driving. "I hope so. I haven't seen him for more than a year. He's an arrogant kid whom I had started training in Orior, but apparently he made his way and climbed the ranks of the Meldacio. They say he's one of the best hunters out there at the moment. He manages to track down beasts that nobody can approach and follows days-old cold tracks. I hope his reputation is well deserved and that they're not rumors swollen by his narcissism. If so, I'll swell him. Every hour is precious."

III

Of all the Crownsguards, Adrian Quintinus was the one who had been entrusted with the fucking furthest outpost. When he had assigned the camps, Cor had decided that they had to spread as far as possible east and west, and had sent him to Cleigne to lead an outpost at the foot of Ravatogh inside a former Imperial base, where the survivors of small towns such as Foglade, Hooddeck, West Praiwoot had gradually converged. Alexandra, who had refused to take responsibility for a camp because she wanted to take care of her family, had gone with him. The Long Night had not forgiven her.

Silia flashed the headlights, raising her head to look at the dark shadow of the volcano looming in the west as the gates of the base were opened to let them in. She was always pleased to see the Ravatogh, even from a distance, because on clear days it had been a constant image when she was a child. She was too young to remember, but she believed that the story that Ifrit's corpse, the Infernian, was there, had been told her by her father.

"I haven't been here since we found the Mace of the Fierce," Prompto said as Silia started the engine again. "I took some good pictures. Good thing. Now you can't see anything. Even the night photos look bad, because it's not really dark."

Silia tilted her head, raising her arm to greet the men on guard. "You know what? I was almost convinced that you would wake up Ifrit, on the Ravatogh."

"I don't think the Infernian will ever offer us his allegiance." Ignis shrugged. "We told you what the Glacian told Noctis in the Magna Fortia. Once..."

"Ifrit, the Infernian, was so fond of mortals that he bestowed them with the gift of fire. Indeed, he admired the fortitude of those ephemeral creatures made in the image and likeness of the Astrals. With fire, humanity prospered until the rise of the Solheim Civilization," Silia completed for him, quoting by heart a line from The Astral War: History and Myth. She wasn't sure, but she thought she had read it in Insomnia during her rehab. "And then someone in Solheim decided that perhaps, after all, even the gods could be challenged and subdued and unleashed the wrath of the Pyreburner and consequently the Astral War. End of the Solheim civilization, according to mythology. History on the other hand is rather inclined to blame the Starscourge. I once agreed with history. Now, honestly, I don't know anymore. My skepticism has resigned."

"Silia Hartwood? Park the car there, please."

Silia nodded, greeting the man with a wave of her hand and pulled the car over. She turned off the engine. "There was no Ifrit's corpse, I guess, on the Ravatogh."

Ignis and Prompto shook their heads. "Who knows why," Ignis went on, getting out of the car, "if there had been, I think something would have happened."

"Ignis! Prompto!"

Alexandra came to meet them in her Crownsguard uniform. Silia had ranks of deaths behind her and a rather disenchanted vision about it, yet, having no children, she could not imagine the agony of seeing them die, so she was always uncomfortable with Alexandra, since the Long Night had begun.

"Hi, Alexandra," Ignis greeted her. "How are you doing?"

Alexandra didn't answer. She was a little younger than her, but those two years seemed to make her appear ten times older. For a moment, Silia hoped that she would bring news, good or bad as they were, but when their eyes met, she merely greeted her with a nod. "The hunter arrived two hours ago, Hartwood. I'll take you to him. Adrian will join us as soon as he can."

Silia wanted to leave at once, but nodded. They, and especially Kamal, needed as much information as possible if they wanted to find Gladio. They followed her.

She had been to Hulldagh Pyke only twice, since the beginning of the Long Night, and just passing through, because when she returned from the Ravatogh, she would rather stop at Old Lestallum to see Balth. Gladio, on the other hand, when in Cleigne, often took the chance to visit his fellows of the Guard. When he hadn't showed up in Hammerhead after chasing Wyverns, she had thought he had stopped in Hulldagh, but nobody had seen him, and he hadn't reached Lestallum.

"No news, I guess?" Prompto asked anyway.

"No. But you'll see, Gladio will jump out. I can't imagine him disappearing into thin air, or dying from a trivial accident," replied Alexandra, leading them among the containers. The base had been adapted to house civilians, but it still was a base and as such it had its pros and cons. Pros included impassable defensive walls that Hammerhead could only dream of and a massive storage of weapons. On the other hand, before they could settle, Adrian and the other hunters had to dismantle and dispose of all the magitek technology left there, mostly inactive, but there had also been berserker units. And the changes they had made in the structure of the base could not erase its true gloomy nature.

Silia shrugged and avoided replying sourly to Alexandra as she had done with Ignis. She didn't want to point out that she wasn't so sure about it, or she wouldn't be there, hundreds of miles far from Hammerhead, looking for traces of her husband. "How's Artur?" she asked instead.

"He's fine," she replied hastily. Gladio had told her that between Alexandra and Adrian it was a continuous argument because the woman refused to allow her son to learn to fight, even though he was already nine years old. She claimed, or so Gladio had told Silia, that nothing would save him from the Scourge if he fell ill, as had happened to her father and sister. Adrian, who had highly ascended in her esteem when Silia had known that he had taken care of their euthanasia, instead continued to protest that people didn't just die of Scourge, an opinion Silia agreed with in full. But there was no way to make her reason.

Alexandra led them into what had once been the table of the Imperial base. When they entered, Silia immediately saw Kamal, who was talking to two girls before the counter, giving them his back. Actually, it was only Kamal who was speaking, theatrically gesticulating, because the other two merely giggled.

"Hm, that guy would be Kamal?" Prompto asked, unconvinced.

"Yup. As you see, he's already hunting."

Silia joined him, placing herself a few steps away with her hands on her hips. "Kamal Rohan, I hope your equipment is fully prepared and you are sober. And I'm not referring to that equipment."

Kamal stiffened as if he had been shot. "Yessir, ma'am!" he exclaimed, taking off his wide-brimmed hat as he turned and making a clumsy military salute. "Everything's ready for our departure, ma'am. I was having two words while waiting for you. I didn't touch a drop, ma'am, word of honor."

Silia hit the hat off his hand. "Kamal, say ma'am again and I will make you swallow this."

"At your command, Hartwood." His lips twitched into an irreverent smile. "You'll allow me? You're damn sexy, as always. But I liked you more with short hair."

"No, I don't allow you," she couldn't help but smile as well, crossing her arms. She had always liked Kamal. Pretty face, cheeky look, shitty humor. Once, in Orior, he had approached her a bit too much and she had put him back in place by tackling his jaw and threatening to give him such a slap as to make him do six somersaults in the air before landing on his ass. Still, he remained a good fellow, one of her guys she liked the most, though actually he was first and foremost a man of Ezma Auburnbrie. "Adrian's coming. Ladies, sorry to interrupt you, but we have things to do. I'll try to bring him back here whole."

Kamal bent to pick his hat up, dusted it off, then put it back on his head. "Rhea, Yara, I'd like to introduce you the Coeurl I was talking about. Silia Hartwood. Kingsglaive, trusted man of Marshal Leonis, Sworn Sword, chief of the Hammerhead outpost. Alas, she's also Gladio Amicitia's wife. Unfortunately. Did I forget something, Hartwood?"

"To close your mouth and get your ass up," she lashed at him, pointing to the door that had just opened. "Here's Adrian. Pleasantries later, after we find out what happened to my idiotic husband."

~~~XV~~~

It took fifteen minutes more before Adrian and the men who had gone with him recapped how they had conducted the research and where. Silia circled the area on the map with a red marker, drew an X on the exact spot where the hunters had crossed Gladio's Dodge Ram and watched it for a long time, listening to Kamal's questions and Adrian's answers.

"Gladio Amicitia's Dodge Ram," Kamal summarized, uncorking a green marker and drawing a dotted line that from Verinas Mart continued along the main road to the X. "The hunters' car," he continued, using a blue marker to trace a supposed route from Lestallum to Verinas Mart. "And your jeep," he concluded, handing a black marker to Adrian. "Draw me the paths you've made as precisely as possible, especially off of the asphalt road."

"Why do you need it?" Adrian asked, frowning, but took the marker. He didn't like Kamal so much. It had been so since back in Orior. Men, unlike women, hardly loved guys like Kamal.

"To know which tracks to discard when I'm there. And I want to see the tires on your jeep."

Adrian looked at Silia for a moment, wary, before bending over the map to do what he was asked. "As you wish. While we talk, Hartwood, my men are loading your car with ammos, lamps and headlights, a megaphone, emergency medical equipment. Take all the men you need."

"Thanks, but there's no need. There's one more useful thing you could do, though: while we are in the Ravatoghan Trail, you can send a team to take a look again at the area between here and Old Lestallum, and ask August if he can send one search team between there and the Secullam Pass."

"It will be done, Hartwood. Don't go too far from the radio; if news arrives, we'll get in touch with you immediately."

IV

Gladio seriously believed he was winding out. He was no longer thirsty, he was no longer hungry, and for some reason he doubted that it was a good sign. He realized it because he was in a moment of clearness, but they were getting shorter and shorter, it seemed to him, as if they were islands eroded by the sea of delirium.

He took advantage of that moment of clarity to move and reactivate the circulation. Head, neck, okay. Fingers, okay. He could feel his ring. Hands, he managed to lift them. Right arm, weak but present. Left, gone. Right foot, fine. Right leg, weak but uninjured. Left leg and foot, gone. He couldn't move anything else. And he was feeling sleepy again.

Maybe it's now I'm delirious, he told himself. All this can't happen. I can't die this way. I just have to wake up. He remembered a speech that Cor, the Marshal, had once made in Insomnia to all the young Crownsguards: to always be careful, because not all fighters die fighting. He didn't believe that it would happen to him.

And instead, it's happening.

Breathing was tiring. His chest hurt. Better to sleep, yes, and wait to wake up in his bed, in Insomnia, with Iris and Talcott's chatter in the other room as they prepared to go to school. Another day of training, annoying tasks, Ignis, Prompto. Noctis. He bloody missed him, as if a rib had been torn out of him. Actually, he probably had some crumbled.

The book, he told himself, I never returned the book to her. What the hell was the title? I left it on my desk, it came to my mind just at Noct's house. I thought I'd tell her to come by and pick it up at my house, when I had found the guts to call her after what had happened, but as soon as we left Insomnia, it slipped my mind. She would have met Jared, maybe Iris, if she had gone to get it.

Six, what a pain. Gladio Amicitia, Sworn Shield of Prince Noctis Lucis Caelum, no, of the Chosen King, was dying because of a broken floor. Of hunger and dehydration and probably of internal bleeding after getting crushed in the Pitioss Ruins.

What was the title of that book again? It was so boring that he had never managed to go beyond the first chapter, and he had never told her that he had found it illegible. She would have teased him. Or maybe she would have told it to him, chapter after chapter, beer after beer, in the midst of Sam's pub mess. Out of the blue, perhaps as early as February, he had realized that, though she'd tell damn exciting stories, he actually liked listening to her talk. And the more he'd listen to her talk, the more he wanted to make her stop talking by kissing her. Why the fuck had he lost all that time in Insomnia? If he really had to die at the bottom of a precipice not even a year after he had managed to persuade her to marry him, he might as well have laid it all on the line in 756.

If only I could go back, he told himself, trying to move his fingers. Yeah, but back to when? When did it all begin? Was there a time when some of us could have done something to stop everything that happened?

V

They had been on the Ravatoghan Trail for almost two hours and had not yet found out anything useful. Silia was as tense as a Coeurl's vibrisse; she had left Kamal to his field observation, and Prompto with the task of calling Gladio from time to time with the megaphone as they moved from one area to another. But no one had reacted to Prompto's voice or to their flashing headlights except for the daemons, which she had gotten rid of with more satisfaction than usual. She had nothing to do but stay in the car waiting for the radio to croak and keep an eye on Kamal in case other daemons arrived. She couldn't even walk around the area, as she would have liked to do, so as not to step on any tracks that might have been useful for Kamal. Those that had not already been messed up by Adrian and his people, at least.

Ignis, sitting in the passenger seat, was drinking from his water bottle. He felt as useless as she did, it was obvious, if not more. "Maybe we should move and look for tracks beyond Hulldagh Pyke, towards Old Lestallum. The hunters came across the Dodge Ram here, but something might have happened elsewhere. Near the Wennath River, for example."

"Maybe Gladio went to Cape Caem," Prompto ventured to say, leaning against the car door beside her. "It's not so many hours from here."

"To do what? A fishing trip?" Silia clicked her tongue. "However reckless, I want to hope he's not an idiot up to this point."

"Vesper?" suggested Prompto then.

"Now we're mouthing off. He could be literally everywhere. Let's think about where he is plausibly."

"Hartwood!" Kamal cupped a hand around his mouth, gesturing toward her. Silia, Ignis and Prompto straightened at once. "Come! Maybe I found something!"

They ran to him. Kamal lit a spot on the loose soil that she would never have noticed by herself. "Look here. Large asymmetric tires. Like those on a Dodge Ram."

"Tons of heavy vehicles could have them," Silia remarked, disappointed.

"Not these. Look at the pattern. It's slightly different from the usual tires on our cars. You said the Dodge Ram is an Imperial one, right?"

"It still could be someone else's Imperial vehicle," Ignis said cautiously. "People looted Imperial bases."

"You're right, but the Ravatoghan Trail's not exactly the most frequented road, Scientia," Kamal pointed out. He got up and went on without listening to them. After fifteen or twenty paces, he crouched down again, lighting the ground with his torch. "They go on. And they are recent."

"How can you know that?"

"Monday's downpour would have erased them. The car must have left voluntarily the road from there," he said, pointing the torchlight at the broken guardrail. "Give me your map, Hartwood."

Silia handed it to him, without knowing what to think. Kamal took a pen from his pocket and uncapped it with his teeth. It marked the point on the map where there the guardrail was, then the one where he had found the first traces. He kept walking with the map rolled up in his hand, bending from time to time, turning and retracing his steps.

"Kamal, wait," Silia stopped him after ten minutes walking. "We're approaching the path that goes to the Sufside Peaks. There's nothing there, just dirt and rocks. Are you sure they're still the same tracks?"

"I'm sure. And, as I told you, they are recent. But not so recent. See these other ones?" he said with a sour smile, pointing the cone of light at furrows that seemed to her absolutely identical. "These are from Quintinus' jeep."

"They're less clear," Prompto noted.

"Right. 'cause that other vehicle drove over a ground that was still soft for the downpour and sunk deeper. Quintinus' jeep, despite the occupants being four, drove on a dry land. I'm sure enough that the heavy vehicle passed through here between Monday and Tuesday. No way to tell if it was Amicitia's, though."

At that moment, Silia would have given the damn Eos and everything in it to have looked at those damn tires. What was their pattern? Had they ever been replaced in the last two years?

"However," Ignis observed, "it's not true that there is nothing in the Sufside Peaks. From there it goes to Pitioss."

Prompto's eyes widened. "Pitioss? Isn't that kind of Solheim circus of horrors we explored after finding the Mace of the Fierce?"

Silia blinked, crossing her arms. "And why would Gladio have gone there, as long as the tires tracks are of the Dodge Ram?"

"He hasn't necessarily gone to Pitioss. Perhaps he saw an unexpected prey here in the Ravatoghan Trail and followed it into the Sufside Peaks," Ignis ventured to say. "He could have met another hunter and gone with him somewhere. He could have met someone looking for help and followed him."

"I have found no recent signs of other off-road cars apart from Quintinus'," Kamal warned them.

"He could have loaded stranded people into the car earlier."

Silia took a deep breath. She looked at the car, looked at the tire tracks, looked at the Sufside Peaks. "Kamal," she said gravely. "It will take hours to explore the Sufside Peaks, if not days. Let alone Pitioss. If those are not the Dodge Ram's tires, if it's a red herring, we'll lose so much time that we'll probably be unable to do anything else for Gladio Amicitia. How enough is your enough?"

Kamal scratched his head, thinking. "Enough to suggest you take the risk. Trust me."

Silia was a down-to-earth person, yet she had always relied on her instinct and it had saved her life several times. She recognized Kamal's look. The one of I can't explain why I know it, but I know it. She winked at him. "I trust you, or I wouldn't have asked you to come. Let's go, guys."

~~~XV~~~

Kamal's enough had been enough, Silia realized three hours later, when they found the abandoned Dodge Ram. Gladio must have left it there on purpose; the mountain paths, beyond that point, narrowed so much that it would have been impossible to continue by car.

"Here it is! Here is the Dodge Ram!" Prompto exclaimed, running forward. "Gladio's really here, then!"

Ignis stopped. He was a little tried by walking in the dark amidst a thousand obstacles and obstructions. "Prom, don't tell me we're back to the Anak-shaped rock?"

"That's the one!" Prompto answered him, opening the door of the Dodge Ram to take a look.

Silia heard the deep and exasperated sigh of Ignis. "That path goes exactly to Pitioss," he said to her and Kamal. "The last time we left the Regalia there as well. Walking for twenty minutes in that direction, we will reach a height where the upper levels of the building are clearly visible."

The relief that Silia had felt when she had seen the car melted like snow in the sun. "I can't believe it. Did he really go to Pitioss without telling anyone?"

"I'm afraid so. At least we're on the right track," Ignis sighed again. "Rohan, thank you very much. I apologize for doubting. You were right."

Kamal smiled, although Ignis could not have seen him, and winked at her. "Lucky me. The Coeurl would have torn me to bits if I was wrong."

"Enough, Kamal," she said gratefully, despite her apprehension. Gladio had been down there for at least two days. Had something happened to him? Did he have water? "You did a great job. Really. I'm grateful."

Prompto stepped out of the Dodge Ram, closing the door behind him. "Nothing out of place in here," he told them. "There's a big load of Wyverns wings on the back seats. The car works and the tires are fine. He just left it."

All four raised their heads towards the path, Ignis included.

"I hope he'll have a really good justification," Ignis said.

"Even if he has one, as soon as we find him, I'll beat him," Prompto warned them.

"You'll have to get him out of my hands first." Silia retrieved her backpack from the car and took the short-range transmitters she always used to give orders to her guys when on a mission. "Kamal, thanks again. We'll take care of it now. Go back to Hulldagh Pyke with our car. Tell Adrian by radio that we've found the Dodge Ram and we're going to Pitioss. Tell him to not send anyone except, as a precaution, the medical car and that it stops here. It's too dangerous."

Again, Kamal exhibited the most seductive of his smiles. "Are you kidding me, Hartwood?"

"No," Ignis backed her. "You have no idea how dangerous Pitioss Ruins are, Rohan."

"I've been into other Solheim dungeons."

"Not this one."

Silia pursed her lips. "Kamal, there are things in there that could kill you beyond our every intervention. A high concentration of thousands-years-old miasma, for example. Daemons you've never seen. Take the car and go back to Hulldagh."

He shook his head. "I've come this far, I'll go with you to Pitioss, Hartwood."

"If you were still one of my guys, I would have kicked your ass already," Silia threatened him. "Unfortunately, you don't account to me, but to Ezma Auburnbrie. Moreover, you did me a huge favor by following the tracks of the Dodge Ram. So, do as you wish, I can't stop you from coming with us. But under one condition, Kamal: no imprudence. Down there, hunter of the Meldacio or not, you obey my orders and listen to my instructions. Have I been clear?"

"Very clear, Boss. At your orders, Boss."

"And don't call me 'boss'." Silia returned to the car to inform Adrian herself.

Prompto pouted his lips. "Kamal, are you sure you want to come with us?"

Kamal smiled again. "I'm about to get lost in an ancient and dangerous Solheim dungeon with the Coeurl, and you ask me if I'm sure? Let's hurry up."

* Schubert's Ave Maria. This is not a literal translation, but the English version of the same lines: Ave Maria, listen to a maiden's prayer. For thou canst hear amid the wild tis thou, tis thou canst save amid despair. We slumber safely till the morrow, though we've by man outcast reviled. Further: The murky cavern's air so heavy. Shall breath of balm if thou hast smiled. Oh, Maiden, hear a maiden's sorrow. Oh, Mother, hear a suppliant child!