CHAPTER 2

Early morning sunlight streamed across the vast green forests of Fanelia, edging the leaves of the trees in soft gold, their boughs resonating with the trilling chorus of birdsong as the shadows of the night retreated before the dawn. Nestled within that wide sea of wilderness, tucked away like a prized jewel among the jagged and steep slopes of the mountainside lay Fanelia's only castle, the ruins of its once proud towers looming over the scattering of settlements that had sprung up beneath its protective wing. As the light poured and seeped over the rock and into the valley it revealed a the charred skeleton of a once peaceful and bustling stronghold, the blackened and crumbling edifices testament to the unexpected and wanton violence that had fallen upon the kingdom not long past. However, the scurrying of figures to and fro and the staccato pounding of hammer against nail also gave signs that all had not been lost; that what misfortune had passed and what lives had been lost here had not all been in vain. Fanelia had been broken, but her people had pressed on with an indefatigable strength and will to see the days ahead healed and whole.

And from his lone vantage atop the castle's hill, their young king watched.

Van Fanel had a lot on his mind.

It wasn't as though he'd wanted to become king. He'd become king because there'd been no other choice. As the second son of his father, he'd always just assumed that he'd spend the rest of his life as a military man drilling and training and sweating it out on the battlefield with the rest of his father's soldiers while his elder brother stepped into the wearying triple roles of diplomat, leader and protector.

It struck him then, rather unpleasantly, as he watched the sun creep over the mountains, that's exactly what they had become. Just not the way that either of them had hoped.

Van had indeed become a warrior; under the harsh and uncompromising tutelage of Swordmaster Balgus he'd been molded in both body and mind into the iron-willed ideal of his forefathers, Fanelian down to the very marrow of his bones, no matter what the court whispered about the cursed Draconian blood passed to him from his mother.

Folken had likewise become a leader. Carried away into the sky as he had lain dying from a dragon attack, he had made his way into Dornkirk's Valhalla of a world without death, a world without violence and struggle. Folken had accepted this vision with the total fervent abandon of a man who had at last glimpsed the face of the god he had so ardently sought. He'd lead, but he'd lead for the wrong side; causing the very suffering that he himself had preached he would end.

It had been a callous and cruel twist of Fate, what had befallen the both of them, Van knew. It was a small, cold comfort that at the very last, Folken had awakened from his zealot's slumber to sacrifice himself on the crumbling altar of Absolute Fortune, his Draconian wings black and heavy with his own sin.

Cursed, Van thought, the word brushing against his ear with the soft touch of an angel's feather. Maybe we were.

His brooding gaze shifted, flickering inwards to where the white armor Escaflowne rested on its dais. Its hulking form crouched within the deepest shadows where the light had yet to touch; Looking at it again only made it seem just as alien and mysterious to Van as the day he had inherited it.

Van shuddered as he recalled the day when he'd made that pact of blood, a pact that had ended up costing far more than just a mere few drops of his life's essence. The bond had reached straight into his soul. And while it had granted him extraordinary power over his enemies, it also had cursed him to share in its suffering. Van remembered all too well what it had felt like to be slashed with a massive Alseides blade; each and every puncture and cut the Escaflowne had brunted had burned their way onto his own flesh. Equally livid was the memory of his blood soaking Millerna's operating table and his agonized shrieking filling Allen's ship with its manic crescendo until the Ispano had been summoned to save his life.

His eyes flowed over the familiar outline of the guymelef, studying the way its giant ruby stone energist gleamed, its smooth ceramic plates. He could, if he concentrated, sense the latent energy within, swimming its way through metal joints and tangled cables in lieu of veins and arteries. He wondered why it had been made, and why it had found its way into his family. The vague sense of unease knotting in his abdomen suggested that perhaps it had wanted to be found.

Indeed, one could never be certain what Escaflowne could do, what the extent of its powers were, or even if it were a conscious being of its own, though Van was willing to testify to that fact. Zaibach had certainly thought it was important enough to ravage his country to get their hands on it. Van tried not to dwell on the particulars, but there were still many questions he had about Escaflowne that had been left unanswered. And they would have to go unanswered, because he himself wasn't so sure how far he wanted to delve. His experiences with the White Dragon had been quite gruesome enough. He was, for the moment, content to leave it waiting and quiescent.

Cursed.

Unable to look at it any further (and thus entertain the idea that it could be looking back), Van shrugged his shoulders and shook his head as if to make that word roll off his spine and fall to the floor where it would be forgotten. He returned his gaze to scene below, hearing the far-off shouts of workmen as they tended to their repairs of the outer wall and of the piping laughter of children as they played in the streets. He felt a small smile tug on his mouth as he listened, feeling the ominous weight of Escaflowne's presence lift with their voices. These were his people. His people that he had given, literally, everything for.

If only you were here too, Hitomi, he thought. You'd see how far we've come, how strong we are.

He closed his eyes, a deep sigh shaking him as he pictured her face. Her lively green eyes. Her short hair and bizarre costume that she had insisted on wearing even when perfectly normal clothes had been at her disposal. What had she called it? A "school uniform?"

It's what I wear to school, she'd explained when he'd asked about it. Only months ago, but to him it had seemed like a lifetime had passed. A sheepish smile had pinched her face as she'd struggled to describe the concept to him. She'd had her work cut out for her. Words like "school" and "uniform" had about as much meaning to a warrior prince as "honesty" did to a law graduate. We go to a place called 'school' where I come from. We go there to learn things about the world. And this is how we know what school we go to. She'd tugged on her blazer for emphasis. Another person from another school would wear something different. Understand?

True to character, Van had answered her in the only way he'd known how. Like soldiers from different countries wearing different armor? She'd paused, staring at him with humored incredulity before bursting into a peal of laughter.

I guess it would be similar, she'd mused, her features flush with merriment, throwing him a fond look from the corners of her eyes. Looking back on that moment now, he was certain that had been the instant he'd fallen in love with her.

An ache pulsed through him then, tight and sharp at the emptiness she'd left behind when The Mystic Moon had called her back to its distant shores. It left Van painfully aware of just how much he had come to depend on Hitomi; on her supportiveness, her kindness and her determination to carry on even through the throes of fear and sorrow. She'd given him the courage to fight for their future.

A future without her in it.

Squeezing his eyes shut against a fresh wave of pain, Van silently chided himself for dwelling on such morbid thoughts. Surely Hitomi would have frowned on it as she had in the past whenever she had caught him sulking. But he found it difficult to pull himself out of his darker moods without her light to guide him to the safety of the shore. He knew he had far more important things to focus on than his own personal woes. There was a nation out there that needed him now more that it ever had.

The Fanelian people would need a king ready and able to guide them towards their new future. A king content to hide himself away in his castle pining for what could never be would be a king this country did not deserve and a king he knew he could not let himself become.

"I thought I'd find you in here."

Van started and spun around at the familiar teasing voice echoing through the Great Hall. A small figure in a yellow dress, hands primly propped on her hips in a no-nonsense attitude strode towards him. A slightly mischievous grin tugged at the corner of her mouth.

"Merle! When did-?"

"I heard you walking around. I am a cat you know." She twitched her large ears to underscore her point. A set of tiny fangs flashed as her grin grew wider. "You're not as stealthy as you think you are."

Van chuckled, the sound landing heavily and humorlessly between them. Merle's smile vanished at his poor attempt to fool her into thinking that he was ready to face the day ahead with strength and spirit. Thirteen years at his side had awarded her with the ability to see past such artifice; she could almost feel his hurt like a stone weighing him down beneath its black waters.

"Are you okay?"

"Mmm," Van answered, forcing a smile on his face that only ended up looking like a grimace. "I just needed…a little time, that's all."

Merle would, at any other time, have scolded him for trying to deceive her not once but twice, but as her gaze searched his, she found she didn't have the heart to do so. Instead, she reached out to touch his arm, as if this single point of contact could suffuse him with the warmth and love she had always held for him.

"You miss her, don't you?"

Van turned his head away to spare her the sight of his pain, his black hair falling to mask the smarting of the tears he tried to tell himself weren't there.

"…Yeah."

Merle drew towards him, sliding her arms around him as tenderly and cautiously as though she were embracing a glass effigy; he stood to shatter into millions of glittering shards if she pressed too hard.

"I'm sorry, Van," she whispered against his shirt. "I wish there was a way to bring her back. I know how happy she made you."

She felt him stiffen at her words, heard the barely suppressed sigh of anguish as Van fought with all his warrior's might to keep his feelings reigned in.

"The Moon wanted her home," he managed to choke out. "That's where she really belongs."

"I guess so," Merle said softly, unsure if she really agreed with that or not. When Hitomi had first arrived, she hadn't been exactly ready to roll out the welcome wagon. Quite the opposite; Merle had met the newcomer with a wagon full of her own seething jealousy. And even though time had softened her feelings, she'd be lying to herself if she didn't acknowledge the fact that she now had Van's full attention once again and was quite happy for it.

But never his heart. She would never have that. Hitomi had captured Van's heart and had taken it with her back to her home in the stars where it would surely remain, forever guarded and out of reach as a golden apple in the garden of the gods.

"She helped us, didn't she, Van? Everyone's working together now. Everyone is happy. She helped us do that."

Merle looked up to see him nod, raising a hand to stubbornly scrub at his eyes. He returned her gaze with a smile that was equal parts fondness and sorrow, patting her affectionately on the head. If there was one thing in this world he could count on, it was the companionship of this little cat girl, this strange yet welcome combination of little sister and nagging mother. Van spared a quiet thanks to his father for having brought her into his life.

"Yes, she did. And I'll never forget her for it."

Merle returned his smile and held him a little tighter.

"Ruhm wanted me to come and get you. It's time for the morning counsel," she said. Pursing her lips, she fixed him with an expression of mock reproach. "And you haven't even had your breakfast yet."

Van laughed, true merriment in his voice this time that made Merle's heart swell. He disentangled himself from her and gave her a nudge towards the door.

"Run ahead and tell him I'll be along."

"Yes, Lord Van."

She began to scamper away, tail twitching, until she paused as though she suddenly remembered something. Turning back slightly, she said, "Van?"

"Yes?"

"I miss her too."

Captivity gave one quite a lot of time to reflect and consider things. It certainly gave one time enough to consider how one had become a captive in the first place, that single humiliating moment that had replayed itself over and over in her mind for the last six months. General Getin would have had her flogged for such failure.

Not that the opinion of General Getin of the Silver Army of Zaibach mattered very much. Neither he nor any of the other Four Generals would be giving their opinions on anything ever again. All of them had been swallowed and burned out of existence; a million searing stars dropped from the sky had filled the whole world with their blinding brilliance, a thing of awe and beauty for the smallest of seconds, before the light had scorched the heavens clean.

Refina Damalis could still picture it clearly. She had been in her Alseides unit, her own squad in formation behind her preparing for their last march against the united armies of Gaea when the stars had fallen and sent them ducking underneath the control panels of their guymelefs the way serpents seek refuge from the bright talons of a hawk. There had been a moment of complete silence; no movement, no men shouting commands, no sounds of battle, a chilling funeral absence of sound. Then there had been a rumbling, a soft and distant vibration that she had felt shuddering through the framework of her guymelef before she'd heard it. Risking a glance out of her periscope, Refina had balked in horror, the sharp lance of fear striking her through the chest as she saw the titanic black shapes of Zaibach floating fortresses hurtle towards the earth, crushing everything beneath them like the footsteps of maddened giants. The rumbling by then had become a near deafening roar of metal and rock raining down around her as the fortresses ripped apart upon impact, debris spraying out like waves from a monstrous storm.

She'd shouted an order to the rest of her squad through her comlink, though whether they had ever gotten her message or had even heard her, Refina would never know. She'd ordered them to disband and scatter, taking wing lest they be crushed along with everyone else. She remembered that she had quietly breathed a prayer for their safety as she had shot skyward and made for whatever clear patch of blue she could find. She'd felt the rage then, pure and boiling beneath her fear, pulsing its way through her very teeth as she'd rolled and dodged past the pieces of machinery that had come whistling past her. It had taken every bit of that rage narrowed down to a single point of awareness to give Refina the reflexes she needed to weave herself through the crumbling bodies of Zaibach ships.

Rather unfortunately, however, Refina had flown herself too near the Asturian fleet; her only focus had been to put distance between herself and certain death, only to have delivered herself over to those who would have put her to death anyway. There hadn't been anything she could have done; there had been no time to put up a defense or change her trajectory. Her Alseides had been too battered by the hailstorm of floating fortress debris, rendering both her flamethrower and crima claws useless. They'd shot her down within seconds of spotting her.

And so I fell from the heavens too, she thought darkly. Asturian ground soliders had quickly surrounded and captured her, and she'd spent the last few months of her life enjoying the inside of the Royal Palace's prison.

Of her squad, she'd heard nothing.

Refina did not know whether to give up hope or not; she knew well enough that in the aftermath of a battle, everything fell into blind chaos. There had been times when a few of her girls had returned days after a skirmish, having either been injured or damaging their guymelefs. (She'd let them have a taste of what such failure meant to her. Subira and Pelagia had been worked to the bone cleaning the entire squad's quarters and repairing their guymelefs on top of their regular duties. Refina had smugly acknowledged quite a drop in mistakes after that.) Her training had certainly prepared her for the possibility that some of her girls, and even Refina herself, might not return home. That was the one thing the Zaibach military had hammered home the most with subtle and efficient cruelty; "Your lives are ours. Be prepared to give them up."

And given it up she had. Quite gladly so, in fact. She'd been thrown into the turbulent rapids of life's river without the benefits of either family or money to steer her into safer waters. She'd been lucky enough to find work in a textile factory where she'd labored from sunup to sundown in the spinning room, sweating in the summer and shivering in the winter. When she'd reached thirteen, after nearly eight years spent huddled three to a bed in the worker's quarters, nearly being crushed by the power looms and breathing in the heat and dust of the factory, Refina had decided to enlist. She'd come to the recruitment offices, whip-thin, underfed, and terrified, but nursing the hope that this first step would lead her to a new future.

And lead her it did, to things she'd never even dreamed of.

To say that her rise through the ranks of the military had been stellar would have been quite an understatement; the army hadn't even wanted her at first, but Refina had applied the same inexhaustible energy and dogged perseverance that had served her so well in the factory to her sword-fighting. Within sixth months her detractors had quickly shut up, nursing the uncomfortable feelings of shame that this little female possessed a tenacity to achieve what she wanted while many of those self-appointed "military men" had in fact bought their positions thanks to surreptitious bags of gidaru and went on to never actually see active duty. Within twelve months General Getin had decided to appoint her as a captain under his command and gave her the leave to create her own special squad of female soldiers and guymelef pilots, The First Zaibach Women's Death Battalion. Soon the spikes of authority graced her shoulders and she had taken her place among The Four Generals during their first war council aboard The Vione, Strategos Folken's personal flagship.

That was where she'd met him.

In the whole of her life, Refina had never seen anything that could be described as beautiful; growing up among the grit and grime of the factory and later the sterile sparseness of a floating fortress had not impressed on her any sense or appreciation of aesthetics. Never had she been moved by either the vivid colors of an artist's painting or stood mesmerized by the exquisite skill of sculptor fashioning soft and fluid forms out of otherwise lifeless and cold marble. So when she'd looked on the boy who'd entered the council room that day, she'd been unprepared to face a living masterpiece, a visceral and vital work of art.

He was the same age as she, but carried himself with a regality and haughtiness of someone ten years older, exuding a similar air of authority and self-confidence that made even his seniors retreat a step or two in his presence. He'd sat himself across from her near the general of his own army, Adelphos Gein, gaze half-lidded and studying the room with a sense of detachment and boredom that nearly bordered on laziness, as if he'd already considered himself superior to everyone else in the room. Refina had felt her breath catch in her throat as she'd studied him from out of the corner of her eye, too stricken to let herself do anything else but drink him in, take in every one of his features in those few minutes before the council had begun; the striking silver of his hair, the elegant and patrician face that seemed born to sneer down at lesser men, the thick fringe of lashes rimming eyes the unnerving color of hellfire.

Dilandau Albatou. The Diabolical Adonis and Zaibach's ideal soldier. Where he went, flames followed, consuming and charring his enemies into naught but ash and smoking cinders. She later learned that he had his own battalion of men, The Dragonslayers, serving as an elite unit within the Red Copper Army. And from that moment on, he'd become everything she'd ever wanted.

When had they first spoken? After the council, when the generals and their respective captains had risen, stretched and grumbled to themselves over the length of the meeting after Strategos Folken had left the room. Dilandau had fixated on her almost immediately, stalking over to where she'd stood at General Getin's side, his stride determined and purposeful; a dragon on the hunt. Ignoring his superior, he'd stared her down as if she were the only one there with him, crimson eyes regarding her in much the same way an exterminator regards a roach just before vaporizing it. Refina had stood rooted to the spot; if he had been beautiful across the table he was all the more magnificent standing so close. She recalled how the intensity of his gaze had left her nearly breathless, head spinning in a mad caper as she had struggled to process the novelty of these strange emotions that had so suddenly been awakened within her by his mere appearance into her otherwise orderly and routine world. Refina had never looked twice at a boy before. Her life had never allowed her the time or the interest in exploring the first tender flushes of adolescence, but Dilandau had managed in the space of only a few minutes to evoke not only a flush, but a full on thundering torrent in which she had no knowledge of how to swim.

"So, you're the captain I've heard so much about," he'd said, not bothering to hide the sneer that had crept into his voice, nor the disdainful curl of his lips. He hadn't even offered her the consideration of a proper introduction; clearly he hadn't found her worth that much, though to be fair, Dilandau had been the sort of person who didn't consider anyone worth much of anything, save his Dragonslayers.

"Funny how they'll let anyone into the military these days," Dilandau had scoffed with an arrogant toss of his silver hair that made the purple gem in his circlet flash in the gaslight. "You think you're so special because you've made it this far, but wait until we actually start fighting. I bet you wouldn't last even one day."

Even though she had been close enough to feel the heat radiating from him, and even though his nearness had been making her feel like she was plummeting from the highest peak of the Floresta Mountains, Refina was not a romantic, and definitely not one to be either goaded, ridiculed or swept away by her emotions. She had retuned his rudeness with a cool glare; his dig at her aptitude, or lack thereof because of her sex, had been nothing that she hadn't heard before. Those middle management swine had been forced to eat their own words once they had seen her attain rank after rank and now she stood above them, quite within her own power to dictate to them as she pleased. She had General Getin at her back, who had not let Dilandau's lack of manners go unnoticed. He'd drawn himself up and moved to stand beside her in an almost paternal gesture, offering his junior a reproachful glare that suggested that it would be a very, very wise thing to remember not to rile either a battle-seasoned veteran or those under his watch.

"Captain," he'd said icily. "Perhaps it is in your interest to mind the safety of your own men and leave the safety of the Silver Army to me."

He'd turned to exit, Refina following his lead, sparing Dilandau one last glance and a disinterested "Captain", shrugging off his attempt to embarrass her and letting the sting of it slide off her back, all the while aware that her heart had been thumping wildly beneath her armor.

"Pay him no mind, girl," Getin had advised her later, and she'd noted the dismissive, almost disgusted tone in his voice. "Adelphos can't even reign him in. Sad lack of discipline on his part. You just keep to your duties."

But it had proven exceedingly difficult not to pay Dilandau any mind. Little had she realized that Dilandau, by dint of being Dilandau, had only been further egged on by her casual dismissal of him. She'd discovered over the course of the next year that one of his hobbies had been terrorizing the stoic and passive Folken when not engaging on the battlefield, and he'd decided to include her in his crosshairs. Any time there was a strategy meeting or some other official function that required the presence of the Four Generals, there he was, always ready with his arsenal of smug grins and underhanded insults.

"Oh, it's you again," he'd comment off-handedly, wearing an expression that had suggested that wading through a pool of filth would have been preferable to being in her presence. "I thought you'd have quit by now. You know how stress is for women."

She hadn't budged. Each assault on her honor had been met with stubborn silence and an equally stubborn refusal to give Dilandau any sort of satisfaction that his petty bullying had any noticeable effect on her. And it wasn't as though it hadn't. Refina had felt the sting of each derogatory remark, quietly enduring him with a stony gaze that had concealed her true feelings. His words had hurt, but at the end of the day, they had just been words, easy to ignore and forget in light of more important matters.

Time eventually had lessened (though by no means erased) Dilandau's desire to provoke a reaction out of her. Once he'd realized how useless the endeavor had been, he'd stuck to more familiar territory (Folken and Adelphos) and took his fun when he could. Refina supposed she could understand his behavior to an extent; life on a floating fortress did not lend itself to much in the way of amusement, and when there was no fighting to be done, there had been the thrilling options of either repetitive drills or mountains of paperwork to be completed and circulated to the right departments. However the ruthlessness of his teasing had always struck her as childish and not in keeping with her idea of how a commanding officer should act. At times she had questioned herself as to why she'd felt anything for someone like that at all, this boy who seemed to hold nothing and no one sacred, who had a capricious way of doing as he pleased seemingly without recrimination.

But then came the time when they had again met on the Vione, crossing paths at the elevator that lead up to the Strategos's quarters. Refina had immediately tensed on seeing him, feeling her shoulders stiffen in preparation for yet another barrage of insults, only to be taken completely aback when Dilandau had eyed her silently and then entered the elevator without so much as a word of acknowledgement. She'd followed with a quiet sigh of relief that at least that day he hadn't seemed in the mood to antagonize her.

They'd spent the first few minutes in awkward silence; Refina surreptitiously studying him from the corner of her eyes, again feeling that delicious dizziness at his closeness and wondering what it would be like to touch him, to reach through the layers of armor and military protocol and make that flesh to flesh contact. Her arms had been crossed defensively over her chest in a feeble attempt to calm the liquid surging of her pulse, a roaring waterfall in her ears that made her wonder if he couldn't hear it himself.

Apparently tired of the lack of conversation, he'd suddenly turned to her, wearing a devious smirk that had promptly dashed her hopes of a peaceful ride against the rocks.

"You know," he'd said, blood-colored eyes pinning her against the corner of the elevator as surely as a cobra fixes its killing gaze on a quivering mouse. "You don't have much to say for yourself."

He's talking to you! her brain had screamed at her through the murky tumult of lust, exasperation and shock. Not teasing you. Not bullying you. Talking!

Shoring up her control, she'd managed to let out a breathy scoff she'd hoped masked her nervousness and curtly replied, "What's to say? I wasn't under the impression you'd be interested."

That had made his smirk grow even wider, a predatory edge to it that only made her heart pound even harder; she sincerely hoped she hadn't been blushing, though considering how suddenly stifled she'd felt in her armor at that moment, Refina realized she probably had been.

"Aren't women supposed to like talking or something?"

Stop acting like an idiot! the sensible part of her brain had screamed at her again. Get yourself together!

Taking a steadying breath, Refina had once more managed to marshal up the strength to lift her head above the hormonal tide and enter the verbal sparring ring to finally accept his challenge. He'd spent all this time throwing the proverbial punches while she had sat in the corner without so much as lifting a finger to retaliate. She'd figured by that point he'd more than deserved a bit of comeuppance. Why not serve it back to him, give him a taste of his own loutishness?

"You haven't known many women, have you?" she'd quipped.

"Why would I need to?" Dilandau had He'd slouched coolly against his side of the elevator, lips pursed into a distasteful pout. He had such pretty lips, Refina noted, forcing herself to concentrate on her need to get back at him rather than her more obscene desire to find out what it would be like to kiss those lips. "Most of them aren't worth talking to. Fuck, most of the people on this ship aren't worth talking to. So what do you do when you're not fighting, braid each other's hair?"

She'd felt herself roll her eyes, jaw working back and forth as finally, finally her overcharged nerves had obliterated her sense of control and propriety and had boiled her thoughts down to a single word: Attack!

"You're one to talk. You look like you spend more time in front of the mirror than I do," Refina had shot back, voice even and icy as she'd begun to take refuge in her newfound sense of audacity. She'd had to admit that it felt good to have been able to turn her tongue into a weapon just as sharp as the sword she'd worn at her side, no matter how petty the reason.

"Heh!" he'd scoffed, though his smirk had held a little less malice than it had before. "Well, well. You've got some bite in you after all. And here I thought you were a fucking drag like Folken. That guy has no sense of humor at all."

Was that what he'd been wanting this whole time? Someone to trade barbs with? Had all of that posturing and hitting below the belt been his attempt, however paltry, to coax her out of her own shell?

Who knows? Refina mused, half-smiling to herself with a bittersweet fondness at her memories. Maybe it was because he was the first boy I'd ever really looked at. Maybe it was because I liked the way he did whatever he wanted. Or maybe I was just being a silly girl.

She stretched, prompting herself to move lest she be caught daydreaming, though, to be fair, she didn't stand to suffer from much embarrassment if she were. What did it matter to her what her captors thought of her? It wasn't as though it were all that difficult to discern their thoughts anyway; the guards had been more than open about their opinions of her in much the same way as Dilandau had been, only these men had the distinction of wanting to see her dead on top of it.

In any case, Refina thought, her grin becoming slier and more knowing, they'd learned to treat her with a lighter and more cautious hand. The feeling was mutual on both sides; she'd already tried to kill her guards twice with pieces of sharp flint gleaned from the courtyard. It was a marvel, really, the way the penal system was set up in Asturia, or rather the lack of a penal system. In Zaibach, prisoners were held in proper prisons, bars and all, their fates quickly decided and acted upon by either Dornkirk or the Imperial Magistrates with that callous efficiency so characteristic of the Empire. Asturia, however, seemed to have gotten things all wrong. Prisoners were held at an isolated wing of the Royal Palace instead of a separate municipal facility, and although men were segregated from women, inmates were generally free to roam about the areas designated for them, though obviously not without supervision. Guards and watchmen had regular patrols and posts, careful to keep all exits blocked. As such, Refina had become quite familiar with the names and faces of her particular cadre.

Ah, there they were now, standing on either side of the small courtyard. Or at least two of them; Durand, a man of about thirty with chin-length brown hair and a proud face, and Andoni, perhaps a few years younger with a swarthy complexion and curly black hair. There were five in total working in rotating shifts. Danel, Izar and Julen would be taking the later shifts today, it seemed.

Refina was a special case, considering her status as both a political prisoner and a former Zaibach army captain; consideration had been given to keep her separate from the other prisoners, though why, Refina could only guess, though she imagined that her presence among the others might induce them to riot or otherwise cause chaos that the Asturian High Council had neither the time nor the energy to deal with. From what she'd been able to gather from the occasional griping of her guards, the Asturian government had been brought to a standstill by King Aston's illness, the outlook for which did not seem to give anyone much hope. He'd been confined to his bed for the last six months and had not showed any signs of recovery. Some of the rumors painted a picture of a king gone mad, who called out in the night for his wife and no longer recognized his own daughters. Other, more gruesome rumors hinted at foul play, a traitor slipping poison into the king's food and drink that would slowly waste him away. At the forefront of an already delicate matter stood a young and inexperienced Queen Regent whom many considered to be ill-prepared for the monumental task of answering the needs of her people and easily manipulated by those who might stand to gain from her tenuous hold on power. There was also the Asturian custom of allowing for the possibility of ransom for a high-ranking prisoner such as herself, an unspoken but deep-seated tradition of bribery that had proven incredibly difficult to abolish; greed had a tendency to prevail over any noble sense of justice. Of course, no one had stepped forward to ransom Refina. She could bet that any of the Zaibach nobles who wanted to remain such had most likely surrendered themselves willingly, and the High Council was undoubtedly anxious to see her dangling from the nearest gibbet.

So here she was, existing in a sort of liminal state, her life literally walking the fine tightrope balance between survival and death, though each passing day made her eventual execution all the more likely.

Refina rolled her shoulders, mulling over whether or not she was ready to face such an eventuality. She was only fifteen, barely into womanhood, but without the structure and support of Zaibach she felt bereft of any purpose. There were none of her girls to surround her, to train, to guide, to grow alongside with.

She counted their names as she stretched, and she struggled to ignore the small, yet deep stabs of pain that punctured her heart as each name flashed through her mind: Subira, Pelagia, Dava, Kotryn, Irja, Pari, Sunnifa, Maral, Tamar, Lusine. All of them gone, at least as far a she knew. Without any of them by her side, without a general to serve and a country to defend, what was her life worth? Was it worth this? This protracted numbness, this day-in-day-out of mindless captivity staring at either the walls of her room or the walls of this cramped yard with no one to talk to? Wouldn't a quick, clean death be preferable? Just end it all with some shred of dignity?

The idea was not without its appeal, but even so, there remained a small, yet ferociously stubborn voice in the back of her head that argued loudly against it. Don't be content to just accept defeat, it whispered. Don't let yourself become complacent. Take action! Fight!

But fight for what? She asked herself as she began to move through the familiar exercises, muscles flowing with easy and practiced grace as she spun about the courtyard, punctuating each stance with sharp kicks and punches. The fighting styles taught to female soldiers differed greatly than that which had been taught to the men; rather than training for offensive tactics and the use of brute force, the women had instead implemented a more indirect approach, using an enemy's energy against them. It was deceptively beautiful and easy to appreciate provided that the practitioner remained too far away to kill you. It was a lesson her guards had learned the hard way. They did not bother to try to disturb her. As excellent a warrior as Refina was, there remained the fact that they were armed and she was not. One hint of hostile behavior and they wouldn't hesitate to gut her right there in the dirt.

What am I fighting for?

For herself? For the possibility that one day she might escape to freedom? For the equally remote possibility that anyone from her squad might yet be alive?

For him? That I might see him again? Dilandau…are you still alive out there somewhere?

Fate is a funny thing. Funny, that is, in the paradoxical sense that it tends to fool with human lives the way a capricious and spoiled child tends to treat their toys; the favored may be granted a privileged place at the table or at the bedside of their master, but at any time they may just as easily and thoughtlessly broken and discarded. So Fate did to mortals, tangling and twisting destinies with a coquettish toss of her head and a poisonous laugh as she lay back to look at the carnage. And little did Refna know that her own thread of fate was careening headlong into another's.

And that Dilandau was far nearer than she realized…