On Sapphire Wings
Chapter 7
If Wink thought that she was overtaken by emotions, Lloyd was off the scale.
There was a long, extremely awkward pause, and then Lloyd stood up off the fallen ivory tree and, in a voice that was soft but somewhat concealed, said, "We should go back now."
Wink nodded speechlessly, and they began the trek back to camp. The silence once again swallowed everything, and this for some reason irritated Lloyd, as he was not used to trying to make conversation. He decided to keep his thoughts to himself as he walked on.
Soon they reached the camp, and with robotic monotony, Lloyd and Wink both sat down where they had been sitting before, saying nothing. They noticed that Miranda was not present, and Luanna explained that they'd sent her to bed because she was worrying too much. Wink nodded wordlessly and stared at things at random quietly.
Luanna looked at Wink a moment, then sighed and busied herself with staring into the fire, and Kianako rolled his eyes and curled up in a blanket Luanna had given him before the Black Man's attack. Luanna waited a moment, and then quietly went into the tent Miranda had made for the two of them and Wink. Miranda had given off a strong feeling of aversion for the two Winglies, and had told them firmly to sleep under the stars.
After one of those contagious long silences that cropped up so often after something bad happened, Kianako piped up.
"So – who was the guy in black?"
Lloyd looked at him, then back at the magnetic fire. "He was a Wingly."
Luanna and Wink both gave him surprised looks. "How do you know?" Wink asked.
"His structure was that of a Wingly." Lloyd paused. "What was left, anyway."
Kianako grinned viciously. "What happened?"
Without the slightest humour, Lloyd replied, "Wink flame broiled him."
Kian stared at him a very long time, and then at Wink, then back at Lloyd, then said, "Uh-huh. Right then."
And then it went quiet again.
Not long later, Wink excused herself and went to sleep. As soon as she was out of hearing range, Kian looked at Lloyd curiously and demanded in the Wingly Tongue,
"What happened?"
Despite everything, the smallest of smiles met Lloyd's face. "You're nosy today."
"Well, c'mon man. You can't be saying that you're always like this." Kian grinned.
"I kind of – confused Wink."
"You can explain better than that." Kian protested.
"She has never hurt anyone before, but she used magic to kill the assassin." Lloyd coughed and looked at the ground. "I tried to comfort her a little."
Kian gave him a funny look, then laughed gently. "Going bi-species, my man?"
"Don't act like you're my friend." Lloyd snapped. "It's not your business."
"Fine, be that way." Kian muttered dejectedly, pulling his blanket close to him despite the fire not far from his head. "I'm just trying to find out what happened, god."
"All you need to worry about is that the assassin was a Wingly, and he's gone now." Lloyd informed him, his voice returning to the normal rough, expressionless tone. "An accomplice of Kyris,' I figure."
"Dammit, hope he really burned good." Kianako growled.
Lloyd said nothing. Kian shook his head.
"You be careful, alright? This is some big stuff your sticking your nose into." Not waiting for a harsh reply, he closed his eyes and yawned. "Nighty night."
Lloyd stared at the dirt a long time, considering his words until sleep finally overtook him.
Her dreams were fitful and very hard to explain. She was on a cliff over the ocean, which was calm and hardly moving at all, it's blue serenity adding a feeling of lightness to her soul. About twenty feet away, right on the edge of the cliff was a figure, watching the blue-green water.
At first it looked like Lloyd, but as she approached, the features began to change, and when she looked into the face, it was a different person looking back at her. He looked a surprising amount like Lloyd, but his eyes were a murderous black and his face was full of anger.
She cried out and took a step back, and behind her the water roared up suddenly like a lunging animal. The man smiled gently, though the smile didn't reach his eyes, and said something in a voice full of death and pain.
"You'll pay." He said. "You'll pay for the pain you brought me for so long."
She hardly had time to wonder what he meant as suddenly Lloyd was there. He was glaring at the other Wingly, and he had a weird scar on his face like the one that had been on Bardel's, a diamond with a crescent in it.
And then she saw that he was bound in metal shackles. It was weird, like every time she noticed something, something else appeared, as was the manner of dreams.
The black-eyed Wingly walked over to Lloyd and without any sign on his face, he dug a knife deep into his gut.
Albert hardly slept at all, and the only consolation for him was that he couldn't be a victim to the nightmares Meru was constantly complaining about.
But for that matter, most people who'd heard about Deningrad didn't sleep, or had horrible nightvisions of death and tears.
Emille knew that it was bad on her husband. His eyes were half-closed and he tended to stare off into space quite often. He seemed to quite often take things like this straight to heart, especially when it involved his friends.
It was a few days later, though how many, she wasn't sure, when suddenly Meru came speeding through the castle, her eyes wide and her voice excited.
"Miranda's here! Albert albert albert albert!"
Albert started in his seat in the throne room as Meru burst through the door, Guaraha hot on her heels.
"What?" Albert asked drowsily.
"Miranda's here! And so're Luanna and Wink and…" Meru looked at the floor and muttered a name.
"Who?" Albert gave her a suspicious look, now fully alert.
"Lloyd…" She stuttered. "And some other guy."
Albert leapt to his feet, and Emille, Meru and Guaraha followed excitedly. They had nearly reached the end of the castle when they found Miranda, who was trudging forward with the normal deep glare on her face.
"Albert!" She smiled lightly.
"Miranda, are you alright?" Albert asked. The two of them exchanged a friendly hug, formality forgotten.
She nodded. "I'm okay, but those damn Winglies killed Theresa and Seti, and every damn well other person in Deningrad."
"I heard. What were the losses."
Miranda shrugged. "How about gigantic? We found nine living citizens, plus us guys."
Meru was looking past her quizzically, and then suddenly cried, "Kian?"
"Meru?" Asked a Wingly behind Miranda, rushing over to Emille and Albert's young Wingly friend. The human language forgotten, they launched into a long conversation in the Wingly language, with Guaraha adding in every once in awhile.
Emille felt a shiver go down her spine at the sight of the Wingly standing beside Wink quietly, having never seen him but knowing him anyway. He caught her eye on him, and looked away nervously.
"He was one of the attackers." Miranda was saying to Albert as Emille's mind settled back on that conversation. "But he got tricked by some guy named Kyris, and had some second thoughts thing going on, so we decided he would help us finding Kyris, who was their leader."
"I see. I'm guessing his name is Kian?" Albert asked.
"Kianako." Luanna nodded.
Out of the corner of her eye, Emille saw Wink walking a little closer to Albert and the Sacred Sisters, and Lloyd was sauntering anxiously over to the Winglies, who were still talking hurriedly. Emille couldn't help but watch him, he made her very nervous.
Meru and Guaraha looked up at him curiously, and Meru said something with an expression of obvious confusion. He spoke for a long moment, and Emille was surprised at how – sturdy his voice was, but how at the same time elegant and treacherous. She almost shivered again, trying not to remember the night that she'd been attacked in the forest in Tiberoa.
Her attention again returned to where Wink, Luanna, and Miranda were explaining the horrific events that happened in the last little while. Wink was currently talking about having helped Lloyd when she found him blind in the forest, and Miranda's face was one of strong anger, as apparently she had not yet been told this story, or maybe she was just still angered by it.
It was hard to guess which really.
Lloyd had picked up that Kianako, Meru, and the other man whom seemed to be named Guaraha had all came from the same place, and they'd had been friends before Kian left the village with Nyissan - who both Winglies were sad to hear had died. After Kianako had explained what had happened up until they reached the castle, Meru began to explain what she'd been doing lately.
"We heard that Albert, who's the…" She stumbled for a word for king. "Leader of this place, was giving refuge to Serdian Winglies, right? So we said we'd come and help. We went around near the Volcano and found a big tribe of hidden Winglies, who were happy to come and build some homes here in Bale, and then we looked around the coast and found a really small little cult of 'em way down south…"
Without any hesitation, Lloyd demanded. "Are they here?"
Meru looked at him a moment, and said. "Yeah. They're resting. There's only a few of 'em, they'd mostly died off from something – monsters or something."
"Where are they now?" Lloyd asked again.
"They're in the infirmary." Meru gave him another funny look and said. "You know them?"
Lloyd nodded a little. "I used to – uh – live there…when I was a kid."
Guaraha nudged Meru in the ribs, and she looked at him a moment before say. "Oh yeah! One of the kids here was named Artewa, you know her? She said she was…"
"Lenus' sister." Lloyd said in unison with her. "I'm glad she's alright."
Meru smiled gently, and Lloyd rebounded with a blank stare much like hers.
"I'm sorry." She said. "It just sounds kinda weird…coming from you, you know?"
Lloyd nodded and said nothing.
"I didn't mean anything rude! I'm just saying, you never really seemed the family sorta guy, you know? Not that I really know you great, but the times I saw you, you were all, world collapse and that kinda stuff and…" She bit her lip. "I'll shut up now."
"Good idea." Kianako grinned. "Touchy stuff."
"No doubt. Wow, it's all quiet suddenly…"
Kianako leaned over with a big grin and muttered in her ear. "Not as bad as the other night when he was all smooching with blondie in the forest…"
Lloyd grabbed him playfully by the neck. "Shut up!"
Meru and Guaraha laughed, and Meru said, "Miranda? I didn't know she felt that way…"
Kian's grin spread. "Nope, guess again."
Meru's own smile grew wider into a big dopey smirk. "Oooh, bad boy!"
It'd been a long time since Lloyd had felt humiliated, and he cheriched it more than most would. Something, a sort of weight, fell off his shoulders. "Thanks Kian." He said sarcastically.
"Don't mention it." Kian beamed.
Guaraha shook his head.
"So, what's happening here?" Meru asked, looking over at the group of humans to illistrate her question.
"I'm not sure." Kian murmured. "I guess we wait for your buddy to tell us what to do."
"Guess so."
They paused as the humans continued talking, and then Albert turned to them and asked, "Do you guys want anything?"
Lloyd shut his mouth and looked over at Meru, the appointed leader. A sadistic anxiety hung in the air, a tention sharper than a blade and more vicious than poison.
Besides, he wasn't much of a leader. He preferred to do things on his own, or otherwise just follow orders. It hardly mattered to him.
"Um, these guys want to see the Coastal guys." Meru said. She was very good at the human language, Lloyd observed, much better than him at least.
Albert paused in thought then said. "Alright, can you bring them there Meru?"
Meru nodded, and returning to her native language, said, "C'mon."
Guaraha, Kian and Lloyd followed her through the castle wordlessly. It was weird to be back at the place after working there so long ago, like every corner had a memory, but none of them were his. He sighed and followed, trying not notice that this was where he started the war that killed hundreds.
A/N: Ick, I don't like that chapter, it was WAY to sappy x.x
Oh well, hope you liked it anyway, I'll have the next up soon. And please, don't tell me about the horrific OOCing on the characters here, I already know.
On a happier note, Merry Christmas!