Silver and Gold
A/N: First of all, there are snippets from the movies Pirates of the Caribbean and Finding Nemo in here. Just so I'm not stealing copyright or anything.
Secondly, to the reviewers!
Griffinkhan: I hope this didn't go too fast for you! And many thanks for the preread!!
Sandra of Lemuria: Um…you scare me…
Jupiter Sprite: Yes, finally one chapter with no typos!!
Midnight: Thank you for withholding the pizzas. I have enough on my plate as it is. Hope you enjoy this!!
And thirdly: Thank you all for waiting me out. I know this took a while. But here it is!
Chapter Seven: Sun on the Horizon
The world exploded into chaos. Nine Mercury Djinn had just found themselves robbed of an Adept, and they didn't like it. The attack-capable ones unleashed themselves on everything they possibly could, and those that weren't busy attacking called to the Adepts.
Their minds whirled. Their Adept was dead. They had lost a deep connection to someone that they'd planned to be with for the rest of their existence, or perhaps his. As elementals, they did not know physical pain, but every one of them was certain that if it was anything like this, they were no longer even remotely curious about it.
Isaac, still holding tight to Mia, watched this chaos with a blank expression, watched the others' Djinn leave them to join the fray, and felt nine minds detach from his, leaping to aid the Mercury Djinn, eager to get revenge on the people of Alhafra. For the first time in a very long time, Isaac was alone in his own head.
He looked down at his hands, still locked together by the one thing that could render him useless. Kraden's stupid hand-shackles.
Kraden.
Isaac felt anger begin to burn inside him, fury he had never known before building to what felt like an unbearable level. Had he been a Mars Adept, he might have breathed fire. Kraden was going to pay for what he'd done. This, all of this, everything that had happened to any of the Adepts within the past month or so, had been his fault.
Mia let go of Isaac, knowing somehow that something had just become wrong. His hands clenching into fists, he began to walk towards the platform on which Kraden and Eoleo sat, six guards standing menacingly behind them.
"You listen up, old man!" Isaac yelled, ignoring the guards advancing on him. "You're going to pay for this! I swear I'll give you back every single problem you gave us, starting right here! You come down off that stand and do something to make up for the way you got Picard killed!"
"No," Jenna whispered. Until Isaac had said it, in her mind she'd been able to deny it, to say that it wasn't true at all, that it was either a dream or a hallucination. "No…no, it can't…" He can't be dead, her mind screamed, as though it would simply jump free of her head and shout it to the world.
Sheba fell to her knees, unable to fight off tears. Gasping with each movement, Ivan knelt beside her, trying to comfort her through the pain he so obviously felt. Guards were coming to surround them, too, but a virtual wall of Jupiter Djinn would have nothing of it. Lightning split the sky several times, and the thunder overhead was almost enough to drown out Isaac's shouting.
Almost.
"How dare you do this to us! We dragged you all over the world for months, and then we followed your advice and went all the way to Contigo, and then we had to come after you to get here, and not one thing you've told us yet has been worth what occurred here today! It was you who began this, Kraden! You and your infernal curiosity!"
The Mars Djinn, Fury leading the charge, brought fireballs raining down on any guards within their attack range, large flaming orbs that burned right through their armor and hit the skin beneath. Alongside them, allies for a while, but not the first or last time, the Mercury Djinn called upon huge chunks of ice, as well as tiny, razor-sharp shards. Enraged, Picard's nine Djinn had gone past the point of caring whether or not their actions killed someone, even the more peaceful ones like Shade, Spring and Eddy. Indeed, it was Spring, screaming the whole way and never once letting up on her torrent of power, who felt the loss most of all—she had known Picard the longest, and the best. This rage had spread to each and every Djinni, and their attacks were unceasing and merciless.
Isaac's Venus Djinn easily kept any and all guards away from him as he advanced, fury burning in his eyes and in his very soul, the flame of a scream, an emotion too long held back. Gritting his teeth and very nearly growling, he reached the platform and stepped up onto it, ignoring completely the punches from the guards and the pain of one's speartip sinking into his side. With what sounded like a roar, he grabbed Kraden by the front of his robe and lifted him, chair and all, high into the air with a strength that came from a desire for vengeance.
"Look at this, Kraden!" Isaac screamed, his hair whipping in a sudden wind. "Look at what you've done to the people of Alhafra, and to Briggs and his family, and to us. Look at what you've done to Picard."
Kraden's eyes widened behind his spectacles, his face conveying nothing but innocent shock and surprise.
"Don't play the fool with me, Kraden! I know what's happened because of you, I've lived through it! Jenna lost her brother for three years because of you! Saturos and Menardi nearly possessed Alchemy! Karst and Agatio are dead! In a few moments, we all will be, Kraden! All because of what you did!"
"I did nothing!" Kraden protested in a weak voice. He saw them all out there, Mia holding her resolve as best she could, Jenna falling to pieces, Garet shouting as his Mars Djinn did their work, Sheba and Ivan kneeling together amid a whirlwind of Jupiter's might, and Felix still trying to shake himself back into the three-dimensional world. And he saw Picard, and at that he had to turn away; his eyes and heart could not face the tragedy that he knew he had caused.
"You took us into Sol Sanctum!" Isaac's voice boomed. At last he had reached it—the reason the whole quest had ever happened. The starting point on the journey that had brought them to this disastrous moment. And Kraden could deny none of it. He looked up into Isaac's eyes again and saw nothing of the Venus Adept's usual calm and general disposition of mercy. All he saw there was darkness and cold fire, azure flame whose chill burned Kraden worse than even true fire could. And at that moment, over all others, Kraden was truly afraid.
Isaac's Psynergy erupted. In him, it felt almost like a relief, that the time bomb had finally reached the end of its fuse. To Kraden, it was utter agony—the man felt everything, or nearly everything, that Isaac had within the time between the day he'd met Kraden and the current hour. Each heartbreaking experience, and every attack in battle, and the constant sorrow at having to endanger the lives of his best friends, let alone the entire world, all turned into a beacon that seemed to burn into Kraden's soul.
The shackles broke open and fell to the ground. Isaac's Psynergy was entirely used up, however, and Kraden and his chair dropped back to the platform as Isaac swayed and fell over backwards, tumbling off it.
"He did it!" Mia cried, though there was no excitement, not even the faintest trace of hope, in her voice. "He figured out how to break them." Jenna looked up, saw Isaac fall, and made to stand and run after him, but to do that she would have to pass the place where Picard hung still…just the thought of it kept her on the ground.
Felix, however, was coherent again, and was standing with his eyes trained on one man—the mayor of Alhafra, who was taking advantage of the panicked crowd and many distractions to try to slip away to safety. Felix knew he could never reach the man in time to stop him, but his determination wouldn't let him stop watching.
There was a dull thud, and a dagger landed point-first at Felix's feet, buried up to the hilt in the dirt. Frowning, he bent and pulled the dagger from the ground with his shackled hands and turned it over in them. Despite everything, he grinned, running his fingers over the letters that marked the bottom of the hilt.
The Mayor of Alhafra was crawling on all fours between the quickly scattering crowds, so he barely noticed when he bumped into someone's legs headfirst. He didn't even bother to try and apologize—he found such behavior a waste of energy, time and air—and turned to go around. But someone else blocked his way again. After the third such incidence, he looked up at the person blocking his way, planning to chew him out for not moving.
"Now where'd ye think to be goin'?" Barbaus asked, smirking victoriously. "Ye'd not be tryin' to escape the blame fer all ye've done what's been wrong, now were ye?"
About to argue, the mayor of Alhafra looked again at the proud pirate captain. A three-cornered hat rested at a bit of a tilt atop a mass of fiery red curls, and emerald eyes, eyes that he'd been used to seeing as defeated and angry, sparkled as they bore into his with fury surpassed only by Isaac.
"Of course ye're not," Barbaus answered her own question, giving the man a swift kick in the head. "Now, we're here to repay a debt we're owin' to a handful of Adepts. And ye'd be well advised not to stand in me way," Barbaus added, and motioned to a man on her right. "'Ere, boy," she said, and Colin stepped forward. "Hold him. I know ye well enough—he'll not get two steps from here with yer hands the way they are."
Colin smiled and grabbed the mayor's wrists, and the man yelped as an electric charge coursed through him. After a few seconds, Colin dropped him again, but this time he was unconscious and he didn't offer any kind of argument.
Most of the Alhafrans had made it to their homes by now, and the Djinn were making quick work of the guards, though Felix had reasonable doubt that many of those guards were even still living. He didn't like that thought, and the taste of it was bitter, but he had a duty that stood above that, right then. Slowly, still a little dizzy and in no way looking forward to what he had to do, Felix climbed up onto the platform where Picard still hung and spent what was probably a minute but felt like an hour looking at his friend, at how peaceful the Lemurian looked.
"You knew they'd do this before you even started beating him down with your words," Felix accused, clenching his fist. "You knew you'd die. I wish I could ask you why you did it, but I know I can't. So I'm going to repay you for…for everything, I guess." Felix had never really been one to try and explain himself, or even talk much at all, but for some reason he felt he owed it to Picard to say…something. Finished speaking, he gave the Lemurian a final, deferential nod, reached up and cut the rope with Barbaus's dagger, and lowered him gently to the ground.
Isaac, free of the shackles but entirely drained of power, felt himself being pulled to his feet. Looking up dizzily, he smiled, and Victor smiled back. Without either Jupiter Adept to speak through, Isaac couldn't hear what he was thinking. However, he did understand that he had to get the shackles off the rest of the Adepts. The key—no, it wasn't a key, Isaac realized, but a metal lockpick—that Victor held out made clear his intent.
Nodding a wordless thanks, Isaac started for Mia. She stood, watching him, though it was obvious that something stopped her from coming to him. He looked in her eyes and saw the tears held within, but something kept them at bay. Something, whether it was her healer's composure, her natural defiant streak, or the feeling that if she started crying now she'd not stop for the rest of her life, kept those tears from spilling over.
Isaac soon freed her hands, as well as those of Jenna and Garet. But the shackles had drained their Psynergy away, and none of them had more than the barest hint left.
Felix walked over to them then, and Isaac unlocked his hands as well. Felix tried to call on some kind of Psynergy, but though his hands became surrounded by greenish light, nothing else happened. They looked over at Ivan and Sheba, but not even they could have gotten past the barrier of raging wind and bright lightning that surrounded the Jupiter Adepts.
"The guards are all mostly dead," Felix said mildly. "The few left alive probably won't stay that way for long. The Djinn are making this complete, as are the pirates."
"The pirates are here?" Mia asked.
"Yes. Barbaus leads them, and they are doing killing of their own. Everyone wants vengeance today."
"I hate it," Mia whispered, burying her face in Isaac's shoulder. "I hate this killing."
"It's a terrible guilt to have," Briggs said, tossing his own regular iron shackles form hand to hand—he'd managed to escape them. "To have the shadow of taking another's life on your heart."
"And you make it so much better," Garet mumbled, holding one arm with the other one. Then he looked at Felix. "You…you got Picard down…"
"He's dead," Felix said, his voice still the epitome of calm. "Perhaps, in that way, he's better off than the rest of us."
"Felix!" Jenna cried. "You don't mean that!" Felix and Jenna continued to argue back and forth. Isaac listened with only half an ear. In his mind, a plan was forming. It was a desperate plan. Something he might only use if there was no other way, and no other hope.
It was perfect.
"Jenna, Felix, be quiet," he said, and both of them stopped speaking quite abruptly. Isaac was…grinning. "Felix, take this pick, here, and give it to Colin—if Barbaus is here, then so is he. Have Colin step in there and free Sheba and Ivan, and tell Sheba to find Victor. Jenna, you go get Barbaus and bring her here."
"Barbaus?" Jenna exclaimed with disgust.
"Yes, Barbaus. Look…just do it, okay? I…I don't want to give anyone false hope…but…" Jenna and Felix nodded and hurried off.
"Just what…are you planning?" Garet asked through clenched teeth. Isaac turned to him, prepared to respond with something along the lines of 'nothing' or 'it's just an idea, not a plan' but Garet knew him too well.
"I'm going to use Revive," Isaac said, looking down at his hands.
"But…you haven't got any Psynergy! And neither have we! And…don't you need the powers of the Djinn to give you enough strength for a Revive?" Mia demanded. Isaac nodded slowly. "Then…how?"
"You'll see. This has to work." Isaac watched, the plan taking shape in his head, as Felix rounded up Colin, Sheba, Victor and Ivan, and Jenna returned with Barbaus. Briggs, reunited with Chaucha and Eoleo, stood off to the side, watching stoically.
"Should we help them?" Chaucha asked, watching as the Adepts gathered around Picard's body and sat in a circle.
"This is their business," Briggs said in a gruff whisper. "We should leave them be."
"Isaac, you're mad!" Ivan said, rubbing his wrists. Barbaus, Colin and Victor were the only ones with any substantial amount of Psynergy, but that amount was only large when compared to what the rest of the Adepts had. With a long sigh and one last pleading glance at his hands, Isaac faced them all determinedly.
"That has nothing to do with this plan. I was mad long before this."
Without the Djinn, Isaac had decided, he would simply need to draw on the powers of everyone else to generate enough energy for a Revive. He didn't know if he could do it. He didn't know if he could even survive something like this. But he had to do it. Something in him, a voice perhaps, though a voice not his own, told him that he had to do this.
"But Isaac!" Mia protested, still stubbornly fighting not to cry. "It could kill you!"
"How do you know something bad isn't going to happen?" Sheba added, and Victor nodded his agreement. Isaac looked at them all again and spoke without any hesitation in his voice.
"I don't. But with the Djinn off causing mayhem and chaos, and not enough power in any one person…what other choice do I have?"
"What if it doesn't work?" Colin asked hesitantly. "What if…what if we fail?"
"Arr, then ye'd best be good with knowin' ye done all what ye could do," Barbaus said, nodding. "Now are we to be sittin' here all day and waitin' fer this to happen, or are we to be gettin' on with it?"
Isaac knew he could delay it no longer, and he placed his hands on Picard's shoulders, forcing out of his mind the fact that the Lemurian was dead, wasn't alive anymore, wasn't about to just wake up and…yes, he forced that out of his mind. Around him, the Adepts joined hands, with Mia and Jenna placing their hands on Isaac's shoulders.
Isaac reached inside himself for the small amount of power he had left, and felt that power in turn reach for the power within everyone else. Blue, green, red and purple lights twined together, wound all around each other and came back to Isaac as a blazing white light. It was all he could do to even hold that much power.
That's how it is, Isaac, said the voice, a voice that now seemed far more real and less like talking to himself in his head. That's how it must be.
Isaac didn't understand. But he didn't need to. All he needed was to feel the power flowing out of himself and along his arms, out through his fingertips…
"Revive!" he yelled, and there was a blinding flash as all the power he'd held was released violently—the shock of it was enough to throw all of the Adepts several feet back; this put both Ivan and Colin on the ground below the platform, as they had been closest to the edge.
A moment later, the light was gone. Isaac was sitting at the very edge of the far side of the platform, blinking away the spots left behind by the light. He'd never felt such a power before…it was a power he wanted…something he wished he could have at his disposal all the time.
But the thoughts of that power were shaken from his mind as his vision cleared enough to allow him to see Picard. Mia, Victor and Barbaus—now there were three people he'd never have expected to see together—were watching the Lemurian with varied degrees of suspense on their faces.
It was Victor, silent and calm, who saw it first. Both Mia and Barbaus were watching Picard's face, hoping he'd open his eyes or start to breathe or something. And it was beginning to look like their hopes were ill-founded. But Victor saw it, and his grin gave it away.
Picard's fingers twitched, both hands being trapped out to one side because of the shackles. Once, then again. Then his hand clenched into a fist and he gasped, sitting bolt upright and opening his eyes wide. Mia screamed, though it wasn't at all out of fear, and ignored the sensible part of her mind as she embraced the Lemurian.
Picard didn't understand. His neck hurt, his shoulders were sore, his hands were bound, he was dizzy and it felt like he couldn't breathe and hadn't been able to for a few years, perhaps. And his shirt was wet…he looked down to see Mia sobbing into it, her arms wrapped around his shoulders.
"Mia," Picard said quietly, "I do not know what is wrong, but surely it cannot be that bad."
"It isn't bad at all!" she cried, looking at Picard with a smile that threatened to break her face in two. The other Adepts all hurried over, Colin using the lockpick to free Picard of the shackles. He felt his Psynergy return then, what very little of it there was.
"Why are you all looking at me as though I've…" Picard began, but memories hit him like a hammer right then. Memories of his question to the Djinn, whether or not they would attack if he died. Memories of their resounding yes.
"What…what about the Mayor?" Picard asked, looking around. His eyes grew sad when they fell upon the bodies of the guards, and all the Djinn still attacking, pouring their fury into continuous blasts of Psynergy. "Did he get away?"
"No," Colin said proudly. "The pirates have him, and they're holding him."
"Arr," agreed Barbaus. Remembering something, Felix handed the pirate her dagger back.
"Nah," she said, waving his hand away. "'Tis yers fer the keepin'," she added, grinning in her pirate way. "Teach me somethin', ye did, about honor and how ye should be showin' that to everyone, enemy or friend."
"Now if only we could teach her to be rid of that accent," Jenna mumbled. Garet laughed, as he had been close enough to hear, and reached up to brush his hair out of his eyes. With both arms. He looked at them, wondering if he hadn't imagined it all along. But the pain that had been there before was gone, now.
"I say we inform the people of Alhafra of this," Ivan said, standing and brushing himself off. "After all, the overthrow of an overlord usually calls for some sort of celebration." Ivan held out a hand to Picard, who used it to pull himself to his feet. As a very large group, the Adepts, Briggs, Chaucha, Eoleo, Andrew, and half of Barbaus's pirate crew walked to Alahfra's Inn. The Djinn rejoined their Adepts along the way, Picard's nine throwing a party of their own inside his head. And Kraden walked solemnly behind them all, eyes filled with tears of both sadness and joy.
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"Picard."
"Mia."
"Are you certain?"
"If I were not certain, would I have agreed?"
"But…how do you know something bad isn't going to happen?"
It was a week later. The Adepts were still in Alhafra. So were the pirates, and both boats. The mayor had been put in prison, much to the delight of almost every citizen of Alhafra. The position of Mayor was now open, and they were looking for someone with good enough intentions to fill the job.
They'd all heard the story of how Barbaus had woken up in Yallam's sanctum and scared half the village until someone would tell her where the Adepts had gone. She had then taken herself, Colin, the pirate Venus Adept and Chaucha on Picard's ship, and her own ship had followed behind on a mad dash to Alhafra.
However, there was the little matter of what Picard and Mia had been plotting. Sheba had picked up on it, a random thought on the breeze, but a few days ago, and now she stood outside the door, listening intently.
Picard considered Mia's question very carefully. He'd spent one night awake, weighing and balancing the good and bad sides of the plan. If it worked, the good far outweighed the bad. If it didn't, nothing would change. He had said as much to Mia only a few minutes ago.
"I don't."
Sheba chose this moment to walk in, with the rest of the Adepts, including Victor, behind her. Mia and Picard looked at them in surprise, both of them looking as though they wondered if they'd been overheard.
"It's okay," Sheba said, smiling. "I told them. They know what you're planning, and they want to help."
"But Sheba…how did you even know?" Mia asked.
"You both think very loudly when something occupies most of your mind," Sheba said with a little shrug. "I knew you couldn't do it just by yourselves, and certainly you didn't think we wouldn't want to help, did you?"
"We discussed involving you, remember?" Picard asked with a raised eyebrow. "Way back when this whole plan was formed."
"You seriously all want to be in on this?" Mia questioned. All of them, even Victor, nodded with absolute sincerity.
"Of course we do!" Isaac said determinedly.
"Yeah! We want to give Victor his voice back!" Ivan chimed in. Sheba, grinning, nodded again.
"Alright then…" Picard said, his eyes looking around the small room they were in at the Inn. Very slowly, the other Adepts began to look around too, as though curious about what in the world he was trying to find. Picard took that moment to set off the Sleep Bomb at Victor's feet.
"You really do like that little idea, don't you?" Jenna asked dryly. Picard grinned. "I'll have to remember not to share my tricks with you as often. Somehow they always get used for what they weren't designed to be used for."
"Such is the consequence of giving a new idea to an inventive Lemurian mariner," Felix said, he and Isaac pulling Victor off the floor and setting him on the bed. "So, oh great and powerful Adepts of Mercury…what's the plan?"
"A while ago, I figured out exactly why it was Victor could make no sound at all," Mia said, absently tapping her fingers against the wall. "That Venus Adept, the one working with the pirates, figured out how to completely…disintegrate, if you will…his vocal cords."
"Well that complicates things," Picard said, leaning against the opposite wall. "You didn't tell me that part."
"Well I didn't expect you'd ever agree to try this in the first place."
"Always expect the unexpected," Ivan quipped.
"Ah, but Ivan," Picard said cryptically, "does not expecting the unexpected make the unexpected the expected?" Ivan blinked. That had made his head do a flip. "That is what I thought. Anyway, Isaac, I credit you with my agreement."
"You…do?" Isaac asked warily.
"I do. You see…your plan for bringing me back brought to mind the possibility that such a thing might work in other situations. Combining everyone's power to work as we need it to."
The Adepts, especially Garet and Ivan, paused to think about this.
"Um…how much work will it involve?" Garet asked hesitantly. Beside him, Sheba hid her giggles behind her hands. Mia looked down at the floor for a moment, then raised her head again.
"None from you. I just need…your power, I guess…"
"That Sleep Bomb only works for so long, you know," Jenna remarked casually, brushing some imaginary dust or something from one sleeve. She always hated these kinds of uncomfortable situations. Why wouldn't they just get on with it?
"Right," Picard said, pushing himself off of the wall and looking around. "Hopefully this'll be easier than it was for you guys…before." Picard looked at Mia, who closed her eyes and took hold of one of Victor's hands, then reached out her other hand for someone else to take. Isaac's fingers quickly filled the space. Soon all of the Adepts were hand-in-hand, eyes closed.
Sheba and Ivan, at opposite sides of the circle, reached for one another and then for the other Adepts with their minds. Sheba, who was far more used to it than Ivan was, reached as well for Victor, though it wasn't his mind she was searching for—just a link to him that Mia might follow.
Mia didn't need her eyes open. It wouldn't have helped anyway—just messed with what she could now see in her mind. Or perhaps it wasn't in her mind at all. Perhaps it was…something else. But she wasn't entirely sure what it felt like.
'Like you're standing at the edge of a tree branch, or a cliff,' Picard's voice spoke in her mind. 'And you have nowhere else to go.'
'Or like when you can see the apple you're reaching for, just beyond your fingertips, no matter how far you stretch,' Isaac offered.
Yes, Mia thought. Like that. Like something was there, only she couldn't quite reach it. But she reached anyway, acting on an instinct that she didn't even need to question anymore. She felt power, power beyond anything she'd ever known, reaching in front of her.
She stood at one end of a large chasm, facing the other side and wanting to cross. It was much too far to jump, and she certainly couldn't walk. But as she watched, a shimmering silver light began to extend itself before her. Gingerly, she stepped out onto it and found that it would hold her. So she continued walking as the bridge extended itself before her.
Around her, she noticed other silvery lines, coming from both directions. Along each one walked one of the Adepts. Mia wanted to call out to one of them, or wave, or do anything to get their attention, but she found that her voice wouldn't work and she couldn't move other than to keep walking forward.
On the other side of the chasm, Felix, too, was walking, though he didn't know exactly where, only that he desperately wanted to be on the other side. As he walked, a silvery line of light extending before him, he saw that his path was winding itself around several others. Along each other path walked an Adept.
He also tried to call to one of them, but when he found he couldn't, found that he could neither speak nor move anything but his legs, his mind began to panic. What if he was trapped like this, just walking forever and ever?
'Don't worry, Felix,' another mind said in his. 'We're only here for a little while.' Felix relaxed and let himself continue walking.
None of the Adepts could tell how long they walked, back and forth across that great gap, in different places each time, never once meeting up with another person, and never seeming to get anywhere but the other side. And once reaching that other side, all they wanted was to turn around and get back where they had come from.
After what seemed like hours of endless walking, Mia reached the end of her journey—she knew because at once she felt released from the desire to cross the chasm again. Slowly, one by one, looking tired, drained and ragged, came the other Adepts.
'Did it work?' Sheba asked tiredly, her eyes half-closing.
'How could we even tell?' Ivan added.
'For that, we will use a time-tested and guaranteed process of determination,' Picard told them, nodding sleepily.
'And what might that be?' Jenna asked.
'Waiting,' Picard and Mia replied together. If any of them had had the energy, they might've laughed. As it was, they only formed a circle and joined hands again, this time as a means of getting themselves back, getting out of whatever strange place they were in.
They were back in the room at the Inn, except that now, they were all completely drained of power. And Victor was sitting wide-eyed, looking at them all very bewilderedly. None of the Adepts could register more than this, however, as the complete drain on their power—had they gone too far?—caught up to them, and each one of them collapsed unconscious on the floor.
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Isaac stood on the deck of Picard's ship, his hands wrapped tightly around the railing. He was staring at the dark water—the sun was only just rising, and he was facing the west. The events of the previous day were still rather shocking to him.
Mia still hadn't awoken, and shortly after Isaac had come to he'd learned that Victor also had fallen into a deep sleep and could not be roused. But Isaac and the six other Adepts had attempted to make things right again in Alhafra.
They'd apologized to the people for everything that had happened to them. And they'd apologized to Barbaus's pirates, especially those that had lived in Alhafra, for having to follow the orders of one such as Alhafra's former mayor.
Briggs, Chaucha and Eoleo had left the day before, early on in the morning. Briggs had reluctantly thanked them all, even Felix, for doing all they'd done to save his son and to clear his name, for a while at least.
"I owe you my life several times over," he said, shaking Isaac's hand. "Let's hope I can repay it before I die."
"You owe us nothing," Isaac had argued. "You gave us an adventure we're not likely to forget. And you managed to survive Kraden for a little while," he added with a grin. Despite the respect they now shared, it had not been very hard to say farewell to Briggs. It had been quite difficult, however, to bid goodbye to his crewmen.
"Good luck with being an Adept, Colin," Ivan said, shaking his hand and grimacing as the shock coursed through him. "You might want to get a grip on that, though."
"I…I'll try," Colin said, smiling. Andrew had lifted his hand in mockery of a toast, and Picard and Felix had given him a salute back. Their ship had sailed away, doubtless bound for Champa.
Isaac had gone inside the Mayor's chambers to bid farewell to Kraden. The old man was standing at one of the windows, looking out at Alhafra thoughtfully.
"You know, Isaac," he said, "I've not spent much time on the continent of Osenia. I believe this would be an adequate place to continue my research of Alchemy. In fact, the lycanthropes of Garoh have agreed to aid me in my studies if I choose to remain here."
"You're going to live in Alhafra?" Isaac asked, taken aback by Kraden's abrupt statements.
"No. I'm going to govern Alhafra." Kraden turned away from the window and smiled cheerily at Isaac. "I've been offered the position of Mayor, and I've accepted. Besides, I know you kids want to be rid of me."
Isaac stood there, shocked. Sure, Kraden had been an annoyance for the past year or so of Isaac's life, but…well…he didn't doubt that the ship would seem emptier without the man.
"Are…are you sure?" he asked, Kraden nodded.
"And don't worry. I'm not as absentminded as you all seem to think. I can run things, and run them far better than their previous mayor did. There'll be no death sentences, Isaac." Kraden put a hand on Isaac's shoulder. The Venus Adept had nodded and left, heading for the ship.
Picard's ship and Barbaus's had left at the same time, though they were bound for very different ports. Picard had been planning to head to Lalivero, or perhaps Daila, for no reason other than to get as far from Alhafra as possible without expending too much energy. Barbaus was going to return to Madra, Yallam and Izumo to return the men she'd taken on as pirates to their homes.
Felix, at the other end of the ship, recalled his parting with Barbaus and found that it wrenched his heart. He held a certain pity for the pirate captain—she'd not be pirating anymore, and it seemed she had nowhere to return to. They had toasted with drinks in the Inn's dining area.
"I'm fer believin' that ye're a pirate at heart, Felix," Barbaus laughed. Felix scowled at her.
"And why's that?"
"Well, ye suffer from an affliction common to all pirates, boy. Ye're obsessed with treasure."
"I am not obsessed with treasure," Felix argued.
"Not all treasure is silver and gold, mate," Barbaus said. Felix was about to shrug this off as crazy pirate babble, but then he thought about it for a moment. No, he realized. Not all treasure was measured in how shiny or heavy it was.
"Ye'd best be keepin' that heroic attitude of yers, Felix," Barbaus said, raising her glass. "Else ye'd be nothin' but a dirty scalawag pirate like meself."
Felix raised his glass also. "Who's to say that'd be such a bad thing?"
"It are, boy. Believe me, it are." Smiling, she extended her glass toward Felix. "Take what ye can."
"Give nothing back," Felix replied, clinking his glass against hers. Both of them drank.
Felix sighed at the memory. An enemy that became an ally, he thought, looking down into the deep ocean waters.
Isaac's hands gripped the rail even tighter as his thoughts came around again to Mia. She'd used the most strength of them all, and it had taken a great toll on her. Worse, they still had no idea whether or not their attempt had worked.
Picard was at the wheel, lost in his own thoughts. Thoughts of the recent events, of how Spring had insisted on dancing around for hours afterward, how wrong they'd been to ignore the Djinn in the first place, for 'getting them into this mess'. This mess had probably been one of the best stories they'd ever get to tell anyone.
We became pirates so we could ally with pirates to defeat pirates, while none of us were really pirates at all, he thought, smiling at the irony. He began to hum a tune that had come into his head quite suddenly, an old ballad to which he knew the music, but not the words.
Why, then, were the words making themselves known in his head? Picard wondered, turning and searching for the source of the words. He realized it came from below deck, and he stopped the ship, heading below with Isaac and Felix to investigate.
"I wish you the wonder of winter," the voice sang as the three of them descended the stairs. "And days that are golden as grain."
"Who in the world?" Jenna asked sleepily. She and Sheba left their room, intent on tracking down the source of the voice that had woken them up so early.
"All the best things that life has to offer."
Garet yawned, ran his fingers though his hair, and pushed his door open, nearly catching Isaac in the face with it. "Sorry," he said sheepishly, but Isaac motioned for quiet as they continued down the hallway. Shrugging, Garet followed.
"Loving and living."
Ivan was already outside the door when they got there. The grin on his face was unmistakable. Coming up behind him in the hallway was Mia, looking tired and disheveled but perfectly fine otherwise. And she, too, was grinning.
"Hoping and giving."
Slowly, knowing in the back of his mind what he would see but scarcely daring to believe it, Isaac pushed the door open. Victor stood in the center of his room, facing away from the door, singing.
"I wish you till we meet again." Victor turned around as he sang the last few words, smiling. "Thank you," he said, his green eyes spilling over with tears. "My voice has never sounded like this. In fact, it has never been this way before in my life."
"We got it wrong, then?" Ivan asked, disappointed.
"No, not at all," Victor said, still grinning. "This is more than I could have hoped for. I'd thought myself voiceless for eternity, but now I have a voice better than I had even before. I can…I can talk, and hum, and sing!"
"I say we turn this into a party!" said Flint, appearing in Isaac's hair and jumping up and down as only a Venus Djinn could. Isaac groaned.
"Get off of there!" he scolded, and the rest of the Adepts laughed, Victor perhaps hardest of all. Mia chuckled along with the rest of them, but felt like she barely had the energy for it—she was satisfied with feeling accomplished. And it was a very good feeling.
Isaac made his way over to her and put an arm around her shoulder. "You did it, then. I think that breaks the record."
"No," Mia said quietly. "We did it. It took all of us. And I wouldn't have it any other way."
"You know something else is going to come up," Isaac said as Mia leaned her head on his shoulder. "Something that's going to seem insurmountable, but we'll get through it anyway."
"Yes, I know," she said, smiling. "Aren't we used to it by now?"
"I'd imagine so."
Picard watched them all, laughed with them and agreed wholeheartedly that they needed a party, and they'd have one the moment they stopped—they knew now that they were headed for Champa; not originally their goal, but it seemed a worthy one, and it would be worth the looks on Briggs and Chaucha's faces when they saw that it had worked.
"I suppose if we're to party, we'd best get moving," Picard said to himself, turning and walking back out onto the deck. His eyebrows rose in surprise and curiosity as he noticed a white bird perched on the wheel.
"Well hello there," he told it. "Aren't you my uncle's messenger bird? Ah, and you've got a message! Let's see what it says, shall we?" Picard took the message from the bird's leg, unrolled it, and read it, his frown deepening the further he read. When he was finished, a bright smile spread over his face.
"Well now, that's some good news," he said cheerfully, stroking the bird. "I'll write a reply to my uncle and send you back with it when we reach Champa," he said, taking hold of the wheel again.
"Now. Bring me that horizon."
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HA! And you all thought I would really kill him!
I must explain. There is the matter of me telling you that things would be left as had been done. Well, at the time I said that, that potion of this chapter was already typed, and so things were left that way! And I also left this open a bit for their next adventure…
So. Now that you're all not going to kill me…what do you think? If you want to find out (in the next tale) what the message from Lemuria said…you'd better review…
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