As they crossed the plaza in front of the palace, the cab slowed down. Half the city seemed to be there, staring up at the sickly green light in the northern sky. Suddenly a pillar of white light stabbed down, and two figures descended, a white-winged one carrying the limp body of a black-winged one. The light faded, and the white-winged figure sank to its knees, dark hair brushing against the bared chest of-
'Folken!' Carenza screamed, and leaping out of the cab she stumbled over to them.
Folken lay still and deathly pale in the arms of his rescuer.
'Is he -?' She looked up, into familiar violet eyes. 'Queen...Varie?'
'Later,' she murmured. 'Please, help me save my son.'
'Yes, of course, I -' She looked around for Millerna.
'Millerna! Millerna, get your medical bag! Hurry!'
To her credit Millerna responded without question. Carenza turned back to the two Draconians.
'What happened? Where have you been all this time?'
'I..I'm not sure,' Varie replied. 'When I went out to look for Folken, I found myself surrounded by Zaibach soldiers...'
She began to tremble, and Carenza feared she might drop Folken.
'Here, let me take him.'
She slipped her right arm under Folken's left shoulder, feeling the brush of feathers against her hand, and helped Varie lower his legs to the ground. Her blistered shins screamed in protest as she knelt, but she looked into the face of her beloved and the pain melted away. Despite their care, however, the swordtip embedded in his chest moved slightly, and a thread of blood trickled down to soak into Carenza's gown. He moaned faintly and his lips moved to form a single word. Brother.
'Van did this?' she whispered.
'No,' sighed Varie, withdrawing her wings with a grimace. 'Van was not there. It was an accident of fate. This is the point of Folken's own sword; it broke off when he attacked the thing that called itself Emperor Dornkirk.'
'But you were there.'
'Yes. The Zaibach sorcerors captured me.' A look of pain crossed her face, then her lips curved in a bitter smile. 'They thought that they could use a descendant of Atlantis to power their experiments, but I was skilled enough to evade them. They could do as they wished with my body -' She paused, and a shadow of pain crossed her delicate features. And they did, didn't they, thought Carenza in horror. '- but my soul was mine to take where I wished it to go. I watched my sons from afar, especially Van, and helped them where I could.' She smiled down at her elder son. 'I tried so many times to reach him, but they hurt him so badly he would not let anyone in. Except perhaps you.'
And I really screwed that one up, didn't I? Carenza thought bitterly.
Millerna arrived and took control with the authority of the profession she aspired to.
'Hold him still,' she said, and examined the wound. Then she felt his pulse and temperature. 'He's fading. I daren't give him a sedative for this operation, we'll lose him. Can you lower him - gently! If that point moves more than a finger's breadth it will kill him.'
They lowered Folken to the ground, folding his wings beneath him as best they could, and one of the bystanders hurried forward with a folded jacket to place under his head. A guard offered his cloak to Queen Varie, who was wearing only the thin cotton shift used in Zaibach hospitals; she accepted it with an absentminded murmur of thanks, her eyes never leaving her son.
'Hold him down,' instructed Millerna. 'He may be weak, but this will hurt and I don't want him to move an inch.'
The bystanders eyed Folken's mechanical arm nervously. Carenza knelt by his right side and held it against the ground by wrist and shoulder. After a moment three men moved to secure his legs and left arm. Millerna prised Folken's mouth open and slipped a wad of leather between his teeth.
'To stop him biting his own tongue in half,' she explained.
She took out a pair of forceps and carefully removed the fragment of sword blade. A little blood trickled out, but not much. Folken did not move. Millerna felt his throat.
'I'm sorry,' she said, shaking her head, 'he's gone.'
'No!' Carenza cried. She looked at her hand. The Heart of Fanel was as dark as night. 'Folken!'
Without conscious thought she placed her hand over his heart.
'Please, my love, live!' she whispered. 'This is not your fate.'
The energist fragment began to glow red, then pink, then a blinding white. Folken convulsed under her hand, like a sleeper on the threshold of a dream, and his heart began to beat again. Blood spurted up between her fingers.
'I have to close the wound,' Millerna gasped, 'or we'll lose him for good.'
There followed several anxious minutes as Carenza held Folken down with blood-slick hands whilst Millerna clamped and sutured the artery.
'All those hours spent on embroidery weren't wasted after all,' Millerna panted, grinning at Carenza through the blood streaking her face. She rinsed the wound with a dose of plain alcohol, causing Folken to shudder beneath Carenza's hands. Finally the princess threaded another needle with heavy black silk and closed the wound, then washed her hands and bandaged his chest.
'All right, he can have the opiate now; he'll be in a lot of pain when he comes round otherwise.'
Carenza wiped her own hands and then removed the wad of leather from Folken's mouth. Whilst his mouth was still open, Millerna tipped the contents of a small vial between his lips and stroked his throat to make him swallow. He coughed, and his eyes fluttered open.
'Beloved?' he whispered.
'Ssh, rest now.' Carenza brushed a strand of blue-grey hair from his forehead, and kissed his brow.
More servants came with a stretcher and carefully lifted Folken onto it. After a glance at the queen, Millerna ordered a second stretcher, and the two Draconians were carried into the palace.
Millerna insisted on keeping Folken and Varie at the palace.
'The hospitals are full in any case,' she said. 'And the air in there is unclean, filled with the miasma of sickness. My royal patients are too precious to risk to such a place.'
After a week's rest whilst her own reopened wounds healed, Carenza was allowed in to see Folken. He lay propped up on a heap of pillows, his wings now retracted. Someone had washed his blood-matted hair and it flopped in his eyes, just as she remembered from their first meeting.
She limped over to the chair next to the bed and sat down.
'Looks like we've both been in the wars,' he said ruefully.
She smiled.
'I really thought I'd lost you, this time. You're starting to make a bad habit of it.'
'I'm sorry. And thank you. For bringing me back.'
'It was your mother who saved you. If she hadn't brought you to Palas...'
A shadow passed over his face.
'When I find the bastards who captured her-' He grimaced, and began to cough.
She reached over to the bedside table and poured him a glass of water.
'Don't,' she warned him. 'You know what happens when people get set on revenge.'
He nodded and took a grateful sip.
'Dilandau...'
'He's gone back to being Celena.,' she said. 'We hope the reversal is permanent.'
They sat in silent for a few moments. Then Folken looked into the distance and sighed.
'So, Hitomi was right. I went to Zaibach and I died...'
'I don't like all this talk about dying, it's creepy and ill-omened.'
He raised an eyebrow.
'It's important. I died and fulfilled my fate...now the Atlantis Machine is destroyed, the fate it created is gone, and a new fate awaits me...the reversal of fortune is itself reversed. Does that mean...?' He picked up a black feather that lay on the bedside table. 'It is possible...'
'What?'
'That my wings are...not black any more.'
'Don't you know?'
He shook his head.
'I've been too afraid to look.'
'I think you should find out. Dammit, I have to know if I have you back for good or not!'
'All right. But you'll have to look first and tell me.' He climbed out of bed, pulling off the sheet to wrap selfconsciously about his lower half. He closed his eyes and with a grunt of effort unfurled his wings.
'Well?' he asked nervously.
Carenza picked up a shed feather and tickled his nose with it. His eyes opened.
'You're not kidding me?' he breathed.
'See for yourself,' she grinned.
He looked up and over his shoulder at the snowy wings spreading almost to the ceiling. Carenza squeaked in protest as he grabbed her in a bear hug.
'Watch those claws!' she protested.
'Sorry.'
'So, what happens now?'
'I don't know,' he sighed. 'Van wants me to go back to Fanelia with him and help with the rebuilding...'
'That's a great idea! You could try out some of those engineering plans you used to tell me about.'
He shook his head.
'I don't think I can face going back there just yet. Van needs to lift his people's morale, not insult them by welcoming the man who destroyed Fanelia.'
Carenza grinned suddenly.
'I know someone who would welcome you with open arms,' she said.
'Who?'
'I'll tell you later. Right now I just want you to concentrate on getting better. So back to bed with you.' She looked up at him, and caught him grinning slyly. 'On your own!' she exclaimed. 'Millerna says you're not to exert yourself until your wound is fully healed.'
'All right,' he said, pulling his wings back in with a final rain of white feathers. 'But you will stay with me for a while?'
'As long as you want me.' She settled her head against his good shoulder.
'Always,' he murmured into her hair.
END OF PART THREE
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PLEA TO REVIEWERS! Given the dramatic plot twist in these closing chapters, I'd really appreciate it if you didn't post spoilers in your reviews. If you want to comment on the ending, please email me directly at nariya@vione.co.uk. Thanks.