AN: Just in case anyone's wondering about the title of the ~previous~ chapter (six - Chaos Theory), I'm really referring to the butterfly effect used to explain chaos theory, which is that a butterfly flapping its wings on one side of the world causes something to happen on the other side of the world (hurricane, tornado etc.). The 'butterfly' is Caraway's assassination, and the effects are the decisions of the Shumi and Trabians. Obscure, yes, but I'd already got plans for the other title I came up with for six...

Anyway, on with the fic!

Book Three of the Sorcerer Arc ~ Battle Lines ~ Chapter Seven ~ Galahabria

As events turned out, Squall's requested distraction was entirely unnecessary. Edea and Nida, both unaware of Squall's conversation with Ifrit, had made a sole appearance in Galbadia. Or, more precisely, in Timber. Timber, which Rinoa had based most of her life around freeing from Galbadian 'oppression'. Timber, once again under siege...

***

"What's happening?" The brunette woman jumped at Rinoa's question, spinning in surprise and looking uncertain whether to run or fight. Then she recognised the raven-haired sorceress, and she sighed in relief.

"Rinoa, sweetheart, you know better than to do that to my old heart." She glared, but relented at the genuine confusion evident in Rinoa's expression. "You really are out of the loop, not to know that Galbadia's gunning for us again." Confusion was swept away by anger.

"That damned ~man~." She hissed. "Does he think to curry favour with SeeD by using Timber against me?" The leader of the Forest Fox resistance group felt a chill run down her spine, but she was too experienced to let it show. Instead she let her surprise win out over her fear, and shook her head in disagreement.

"Didn't you hear? That new sorceress SeeD's fighting, she got Deling's son to kill Caraway. Only, just like his father, he thinks the way to stabilise the chaos ~that~ caused, is to set the military on us and Dollet - keep them too busy to think of staging a coup in retaliation, kind of thing." Rinoa, who had frozen at the mention of Kylari, fixed the brunette with a suspicious glare.

"And what else do you expect ~SeeD~ to tell you?" But her vehemence was fading, and her uncertainty growing. Part of her remembered that Caraway was - or had been, if he had really been assassinated - her father, and that he had loved her and forgiven her, despite the way she had tried to humiliate him at every turn. But another part couldn't remember a father at all, not even a step-father, or a father figure. Easier, and less conflicting, to believe that Deling had taken over...

"But...~we~ told ~SeeD~." The leader of the Forest Fox pointed out. Rinoa's mind whirled again. Part of her knew a lot about SeeD - except the 'true purpose', which no one seemed to know - but the other didn't know ~SeeD~, just Squall, Seifer, Quistis and Zell. And them mainly by appearance alone. That part only knew that they were mercenaries, soldiers of a sort, and a school as well - a veritable hotbed of hated authority. Rinoa had experienced that authority under the best, and worst, conditions. She had found it a close-knit environment, where no one was shunned because of who their parents were, or because they didn't have parents, but where everyone was measured by their academic abilities.

/Would SeeD have taken me? If they existed then?/ The thought, suddenly so distinct and separate in a mind that had thought itself whole, took Rinoa by surprise.

She added the last thought somewhat bitterly. There was a mental shrug.

/Parents don't deserve to live./ There was no sense of shock at the blunt statement, just an acceptance based on the shared experiences of a shared mind. Whatever degree of separation Rinoa had achieved, accidentally, was gone.

"What are the Galbadian positions?" Rinoa demanded, her expression grim.

"I'll fetch the latest plans." The leader of the Forest Fox turned away, hiding a grim smile. SeeD undoubtedly knew Rinoa was harbouring a vendetta against them - some of the communications between the Gardens that they'd caught supported that idea - but it couldn't hurt them overmuch if two of their problems sorted themselves out into one, and if Timber made a point about its freedom at the same time...well, so much the better.

***

"Sir! Scouts from C and D companies have returned."

"Didn't I order companies C, D ~and~ E back - in their entirety?" The aide winced slightly at the Colonel's growl.

"Yes sir, but... I think you'd better see them for yourself." Muttering under his breath, Colonel Grent followed the aide out of the command tent, and smack into a swarm of medical personnel. He paused for a moment, surprised despite himself, but quickly regained his frowning composure.

"Report!" The battlefield-honed bellow sliced easily through the chaos before him, and a field surgeon was quickly pushed in his direction. Grent raised an eyebrow in question.

"Ah, uh, Colonel." The man stammered, clearly uncertain as to what he should say or do. Grent bit his tongue to stop himself from commenting on civilians in the army. Fortunately for the surgeon, and despite the protests of the medical personnel, one of the scouts managed to push his way through to the Colonel.

"Sir! Scout company D reporting, sir!" The Colonel sighed in relief, and returned the scout's salute. "Sir, the forest is swarming with powerful and high-level monsters that ~shouldn't~ be here - and at least one species that hasn't been identified." Grent nodded. "The Timber resistance forces seem to have withdrawn, so I can't say for certain whether the monsters are something to do with them, or whether some other factor has come into play..."

"Medic!" The scream drifted faintly across to the medical personnel outside the command tent, who instantly stampeded in its direction. Grent turned his attention back to the scout.

"So where's your company? And what of the other scouts and ~their~ companies?" The scout's expression darkened.

"I ~am~ D company. All that remains of it anyway. C company's scout made it back with me, but the medics were too late to save him - C company is ~gone~. As for E company..." He shrugged. "I don't know about their scout, he got separated from us when the Malboro...well, we got separated. The rest of the company weren't doing so bad when we left - if anyone can get survivors back, they'll be from E company I'd guess."

"Sir!" Another aide, who had gone with the medics to investigate the new medical emergency, had returned. She was red in the face, and her eyes were wide with fear. Grent acknowledged her appearance with a wordless grunt, and waited patiently as she caught her breath. "The scout from E company just arrived. He...he says the Timber resistance has been joined by a sorceress!"

***

Esthar was in chaos when Edea and Nida appeared, seemingly out of nowhere - the barrier to the city worked both ways. Fortunately she was known to some of the aides in charge, and so, whilst they were disapproving of her breach of the barrier, they politely escorted her and her knight into a presidential waiting room. They waited there for several hours without seeing anyone. Then a young servant stuck her head into the room and inquired if they wanted anything to eat or drink. Edea smiled and declined, Nida requested a glass of water and turned back to the book he was inspecting as the girl left, stiletto throwing knife eased back into its sheath as unobtrusively as it had left.

It was an aide Nida recognised who returned, bearing his glass of water. They automatically greeted each other with the same formal greetings they used over the video links, shared a grin for the force of habit. Then the aide introduced himself to Edea, and she to him - although he knew well enough who she was. They had located Odine, the aide informed them, when the unintentionally elusive scientist had tried to commandeer more volunteer workers to help clear up the ruined parts of his laboratory. The question was, would they prefer to see him in the palace, meaning he would have to be brought to them, or would they prefer to see him in the intact part of his laboratory, meaning they would have to go to him. Either way, the aide pointed out, reminding them of the ban on magic within Esthar itself - now the monsters from the lunar cry had all been pushed back into the wilderness - it would be another two hours before they met Odine face to face.

Edea opted for the laboratory, closer to the border if they needed to leave in a hurry, although Nida pointed out that security was tighter in the palace. The aide grimaced, and also pointed out that no one had been able to stop Odine talking about anything, wherever and with whomever asked. Decided, the aide led them to the rear of the palace, where a sleek vehicle - only really large enough for two passengers and a driver - awaited them. Briefly he spoke to the driver, informing her of the destination, and then he exchanged brief goodbyes with Edea and Nida before heading back into the palace as they departed.

***

"Ah! More volunteers! Gut, gut. Zey need a hand over zere." Odine waved vaguely at a couple of people moving smaller chunks of rubble, frowning when Edea and Nida made no move to go and assist. "Vell? Vat iz it?"

"I am the sorceress Edea..." Odine's face lit up in delight.

"Even better!" He exclaimed. "Zere iz a large chunk of ceiling zat can only be moved by ze larger cranes... or magic." He held up a hand, stopping Edea from speaking. "I know, I know. Magic iz now forbidden vithin ze city. But," he leaned closer, lowering his voice conspiratorially. "Zere are no sensorz to detect ze use of magic!" Straightening, Odine began to walk away, obviously heading for the chunk of ceiling he'd mentioned, forcing Edea and Nida to follow him or risk losing him again.

The shy SeeD, flourishing as a knight, grinned, and stepped out a bit faster, easily drawing level with Odine, who was chattering on as he walked.

Hidden by the maze of rubble and debris that the scientist had led them into, there was no one to see as Nida put a friendly arm across Odine's shoulders, bringing both words and motion to an abrupt halt. Slowly he turned them around, and Edea could see the knife resting with its flat against the scientist's throat.

"Now," Nida murmured. "Stop talking and ~listen~." Odine swallowed, the knife bobbing slightly with the movement of his adam's apple. Edea smirked slightly.

"I have come to ask a question of you, Doctor Odine. You know that a fragment of personality is passed along with a sorceress's powers?" There was a hesitant nod. "If such fragments were large enough to form a separate personality, and that separate personality were grafted onto another sorceress's mind, what would be the consequences of that sorceress's demise?" Nida moved the knife away, but his arm remained across Odine's shoulders. The scientist looked thoughtful, and then shrugged ruefully.

"I vould have to know to vat extent ze two personalities had melded. Othervise, I cannot say vith any certainty..." Edea frowned.

"The two extremes then, a complete meld, and no meld at all." Odine's eyes widened.

"You vish me to...guess?" He said the word as though it were something repulsive. Nida rolled his eyes.

"Hypothesize." The knight muttered curtly. Odine's expression turned thoughtful.

"Vell zen... If ze two mindz are not melded, zere vill be a constant struggle for domination. Killing a sorceress in zis state could result in ze powerz being split and going to different recipientz. If ze meld is complete, zen ze sorceress's death could result in ze powerz finding zere vay back to ze sorceress who grafted ze personality." Edea nodded, as though her own thinking had resulted in a similar conclusion.

"Thank you. Come Nida."

Odine watched them leave with a sigh. He'd have to find ~some~ way to recruit a crane operator to his clean-up crew. Almost wistfully he thought back to Adel's reign, and the unlimited prison labour. Ah well, he'd just have to make do with what he had, and what he could scrounge.

***

Finding their vehicle and driver still waiting, Edea and Nida availed themselves of the easy transport, and were driven back to the palace. The driver radioed ahead that they were returning, and so the two found the communications aide waiting for them.

"I hope the doctor was able to help you." He greeted them, bowing slightly. Edea smiled slightly, accepting Nida's hand to aid her out of the vehicle.

"He was of some use, yes. Thank you." After brushing out some wrinkles in her dress, she looked up and continued. "But now I should like to ask you for news of Ellone." A shadow passed over the aide's face, and he looked away, unable to maintain either eye- contact or his pleasant attitude.

"We lost contact with the rescue team whilst you were gone." He admitted. "They were under attack by the same group that attacked the Lunar Base..." His voice trailed off as he looked back at Edea. The sorceress had gone completely still, pieces of the puzzle finally clicking into place. She blanched, a tremor running through her frame.

"Forgive me." She whispered, reaching to take Nida's hand in her own. The aide stared blankly at the space before him, a space suddenly empty of both sorceress and knight, still uncertain whether she had been asking forgiveness of him, or some higher power... Finally he shrugged and turned away. There was no way to prevent magic, the ban was merely a matter of courtesy, and with the sorceress having teleported away, there was no one to reprimand either. Still, from the way in which she had blanched, and the tone in which she had whispered her apology, it might just be that the situation warranted her expeditious departure.

***

"Edea?" The hesitant tone was filled with her knight's confusion and concern. She ignored it as she cast around with her senses, normal and sorceress, discovering that they were at the point where Ellone's capsule had landed, but that the rescue team had made it away from the site before they had come under attack. "Edea." Nida repeated, more firmly this time. Irritation and panic mingled into an expression that had her knight catching his breath.

"The Centra know that Ellone is related to the sorcerer, although I don't think they know who the sorcerer is...yet." She began, striding in the direction of the vehicle tracks, forcing Nida to follow her or be left behind. "When I created SeeD to act as neutral and independent mercenaries, so that any country could apply to them for help, whether against revolutionaries, dictators or malign sorceresses, I didn't know the truth about sorcerers. So I created the White SeeD, separate from SeeD, and with a different purpose entirely. They were to combat any sorcerers I happened across." Nida's breath hissed between his teeth, and she knew he had realised the implications. "I can only hope that we find Ellone before any other, interested, parties."

The vehicle was in sight now, although it was not an encouraging sight. Bodies, both in Estharian uniform and black robes, were scattered around the car, whose engine was still giving off a small plume of smoke. The stench hit them as they got closer. Scorched metal and burnt plastic from the car, blood and sweat, and the metallic taste of gunpowder in the air coming from the corpses and the area of the fight. But there was no sign of Ellone, either for good or ill...

"Trouble." It was Nida who spoke, spotting the figures heading towards them. Edea looked up, and went still.

"Centra." She muttered. "They may defer to me - I am a sorceress after all..." Nida nodded, surreptitiously easing all of his weapons in their sheathes. It seemed that Edea's guess was correct, for the group visibly relaxed once they became aware of her status, becoming almost reverential.

"Daughter of Hyne, well met." The leader of the group said, bowing deeply, whilst those behind him dropped to their knees, inclining themselves so that their foreheads touched the sand. Edea stared at him regally, finally inclining her head slightly in response.

"Well met." Apparently it was the response the group expected, for they all straightened, although none but the leader looked at Edea, the others keeping their eyes fixed on the ground. "What is your business here with these Estharians? Is there some quarrel with Esthar that I do not know of?"

"No quarrel Daughter. Merely a dispute involving the custody of a very dangerous girl." Edea's eyebrow arched.

"Another sorceress? Surely that should not provoke your interest so. That is our business." The leader bowed deeply again, clearly expecting to be punished, but just as clearly determined to explain.

"A sorceress perhaps, but one with the cursed blood of the sorcerers running through her veins." Nida felt Edea's hopes soar, it sounded as though the Centra did not have Ellone, but did that mean she was alone, or had some of the Estharian soldiers managed to survive the attack?

"You do not have her yet." Edea made the question a statement, allowing her tone to sharpen. As impossible as it should have been, the leader's bow deepened until he was bent almost double, staring at his own knees.

"We do not." He admitted. "We managed to kill all of the Esthar scum, but we were forced to seek reinforcements. The girl is now gone, but she cannot be far, and she is alone now."

"Excuses are not tolerated. Failure is not tolerated." The words came from nowhere, preceding Kylari's appearance off to one side. Nida tensed, glaring at her as she shot him an amused glance. "Atonement, however, might be possible." The Centra were all on their knees at her words, foreheads pressed to the ground as though pressing hard enough would save them from the new sorceress's wrath.

"We are yours to command, beloved Daughter of Hyne, scourge of Sorcerers." The leader's words were muffled by sand and his robe, but no less fervent for it. Kylari grinned like a Fastitocalon, a chilling gesture.

"This sorceress and her knight are traitors. They aid the sorcerer and seek his favour by returning his kin." There was a low growl from the Centra. Kylari's grin widened. "Kill them, and perhaps I will overlook your failure to take the girl." Slowly the Centra stood, pulling their kukris from their sheathes. Kylari laughed, and turned to Edea. "I would stay and make this personal, but I have a wayward self to bring back into line. It seems I allowed her too much leniency, but I can afford her hatred now." She shook her head. "You could have won, so easily, and yet you all went chasing after the little things, denying me petty victories but handing me the war." With a final confused frown, Kylari vanished again.

As if her leaving had been a signal, the Centra charged...

***

At first the fight was fairly even. Somehow their black robes seemed to absorb magic attacks, so Edea was left on the defensive, shielding herself and Nida against their attacks. Nida himself was holding his own fairly well, since he didn't have to worry about incoming projectiles thanks to Edea's shields. But once the Centra realised that it was really only Nida they had to worry about, the fight became a stalemate, the SeeD/knight forced to retreat completely behind Edea's shield by the Centra's greater numbers.

"Give up!" Nida shouted. "You can't win!" The Centra paused in their relentless hammering against Edea's shields, looking to their leader. He simply straightened with a proud toss of his head.

"We are the Kenthra." He declared. "We win or die, but we ~never~ give up." Nida felt the shock that was Edea's response to the situation, and saw the shields flicker for the briefest moment. But it was a moment that the Kenthra also saw, and seized advantage of.

Nida found himself fighting for his life, unable to even see Edea through the black-cloaked opponents that had him surrounded, but somehow certain that she had managed to shield herself once more. As he lashed out at those before him, he moved towards them, trying to limit the opportunities those at his back had to strike. Inside he knew it was futile, he'd seen what the Kenthra had done to Laguna and the others at the Lunar Base, and the evidence of how the fight against trained Estharian soldiers - in an equally numbered fight - had gone. There was no way he could hope to win out over the odds stacked against him. But he was damned well going to take some of them with him.

Baring his teeth in a snarl, Nida let his instincts take over, turning him and his twin fighting knives into a whirling ball of flashing steel that tore through anything in its path. But still, he was surrounded, his back constantly to one or more enemies, and finally one of them got through, burying a kukri deep into his back, slipping between his ribs and slicing into a lung. Nida staggered, suddenly coughing and choking up blood. He knew it was possible to survive with only one lung, but not whilst fighting. A second kukri was driven into his side as he tried to recover his balance, a third, more carefully aimed now that he was barely able to fight back, sliced through his spine just above the pelvis. He toppled to the ground, legs paralysed with the severing of his spinal cord.

Abandoning the two fighting knives, Nida managed to kill one overly- confident Kenthra with a throwing knife before another contemptuously flicked a shiruken into his neck. Air and blood gurgled in his throat, stifling the scream as one of the Kenthra sank a kukri deep into his heart. Nida jerked once and was still, his left hand falling limply to his side, revealing a crumpled phoenix feather...

***

Edea stifled her sobs and anguish as the Kenthra managed to leap through the brief gap in her shields. Separated from her knight, she could only build her shields around herself and watch as the Kenthra surrounding him moved backwards and forwards. He was fighting superbly, she could tell from the way the ranks of the Kenthra were thinning, until only six surrounded him. But he was also drawing close to the limits of his endurance. As she looked on, unable to do anything except maintain her own shields, Edea felt the first sharp flare of pain, the Kenthra had finally broken through Nida's defence.

It didn't take long after that. She felt the pain of the second knife, fell to her own knees as the third cut Nida's spine and brought him down, clutched her neck as the shiruken robbed him of his voice, and screamed where he could not as the Kenthra finally finished him off.

Edea could not see the phoenix feather, but she could feel the bond between them waver and begin to fade away. Eyes bright with unshed tears, Edea reached deep inside herself and found the core of her sorrow. With another heart-wrenching cry of anguish, Edea let her shields drop and flung her sorrow outwards.

A powerful emotion, cast out by a sorceress as a weapon, Edea's sorrow took physical form. A rolling wave of air and sand, given an unstoppable force by magic, expanded outwards from her position, flinging the remaining Kenthra away from both the sorceress and her fallen knight. Four were killed by the force of their landing, the others were smothered by the sand forced into their lungs. All were burned as the phoenix GF exploded from the ground to hover protectively over Nida's lifeless form.

Edea watched, slightly awestruck, as the phoenix's healing flames washed again and again over her knight. Already she could feel the bond between them, which had not quite faded, strengthening once more, and she was aware, once the kukri was forced out of his body, of Nida's heart taking up a slow beat. She revelled in the pain of the sensation of the kukri in his spine being forced free, because the pain meant he was alive, and if he was alive, it meant she might yet be able to save him. To save herself. She had killed Cid to save him from Kylari's depraved tortures, a fact that had, just barely, enabled her to live with herself and cope with her grief. Now she would do her utmost to save her new knight, her new love, and redress the balance in however slight a way.

As the phoenix faded away, she dragged her exhausted self across to where Nida lay, too anxious for her knight, and too lacking in energy to flinch away from crawling over the charred corpses of the Kenthra he had killed. He was struggling to breathe, blood from the punctured lung still threatening to drown him, a gruesomely ironic way to die in the heart of a desert. Using the little energy she could spare, Edea tried to heal him and stop the worst of the blood flow, an effort that was only partially successful. Unable to do any more, she hunched herself over Nida's battered and bleeding form, slipping an arm beneath his shoulders, and the other across his chest to cradle him closer to her body, she drew heavily on her reserves, and teleported them both back to the Estharian Presidential Palace.

***

They appeared on the floor of the communications room, startling the communications aide from his attempts to raise the Estharian recovery team. As his urgent shouts for medical aid rang through the room, Edea let herself slide into unconsciousness, knowing that she would either wake with her knight, or not at all...

AN: Wow... that has to be the most...~to plan~ chapter I've ever written... or at least it was *glares at muses* Damn things screwed up the timeline on me...~again~...so I had to swap over a huge chunk from the next chapter, otherwise events would have been so out of sequence that even time compression would've made more sense *looks for muse to blame*
Muses: *sweatdrop*
RxR - or the muse gets it!