There will be a slight level of Schizo Tech (trope name). This means there will be a little bit of technology not appropriate to the 1910s but I'll use that pretty sparingly. It's because magic has allowed people to figure out certain things before it was historically appropriate.

This fic will feature a small amount of actual Edwardian slang. All slang will be explained in the chapter's end notes.

And a thousand words / One thousand confessions / Will cradle you / Making all of your pain seem so far away / They'll hold you forever

I still relive that day / You've been there with me all the way / I still hear you say

"Don't you worry 'cause I'll write to you" / I could see you speaking / As you looked away / I acted strong to hide the love

But now I'm not afraid to do what's in my heart

'Cause a thousand words / Call out through the ages / They'll fly to you / Even though I can't see / I know they're reaching you / Suspended on silver wings

Seven years later…

Ear-piercing screams jarred Weiss awake and she felt Elior's and Ana's souls contract. "Damn it, Avram…" she muttered. What time was it? The sun was well past the horizon, so it had to be later than six. She was so sick of his screaming when he didn't get his way.

She got out of bed and threw her housecoat on over her bare skin. She glanced at Elior who groaned and sat up. Ana covered her head with a pillow. "Sorry, Analise… I guess we wore ourselves out a bit more than we thought." The night had been fun but it was well past Avram and Lilias' breakfast time. They usually got their chop about seven, seven thirty at latest.

"Go stop the screaming, please," the other girl groaned.

Weiss nodded and headed out of the room, then opened the door to the birds' room. Avram flew over and perched on her shoulder. "Geeze, Weiss! What took you so long?! It's been close to two hours since you should have fed us!" His white feathers puffed up and she saw dust fly everywhere in the daylight that filtered through the doorway.

"I told you that I'd probably be late today. We were busy." She'd put the birds to bed at five per usual so she, Elior, and Ana could have their fun uninterrupted. It could often go on for a while when the three of them got together… She had warned Avram that he might not get breakfast on time this morning. Plus, she'd just gotten back from a long job. She'd missed being with Elior so they had a lot of lost time to make up for. Having Ana in there had been a nice little bonus…

"It's not fair! You're neglecting us!" he whined. Weiss rolled her eyes.

"Breakfast a few hours later is far from neglect." She fed him right about the same time every morning and each night. They had their own room in the house. She always brought them on her jobs. She spent almost every waking moment with them. That was hardly neglect. "Come on, Lilias." She held her hand out and the black cockatoo landed on it.

She headed into the kitchen and opened the fridge, then portioned out some chop in a bowl. She left the two birds to eat then headed back to her room.

She leaned against the doorway and rolled her eyes. "You two cannot keep your hands off each other, can you?" They were already getting frisky again despite the rude awakening. They already had their hands all over each other in the two minutes she'd been gone despite the ungodly cockatoo screams. Avram awakenings were never fun but Elior and Ana sure could take them in stride…

Elior flushed. "Uh, it's just nice to be together again…"

"You wanna stick around for breakfast, Ana?" Weiss had to concur but…good grief, those two really couldn't slow down even for a minute sometimes.

"Honestly, I probably should get going… I have to be at work at ten and it's past nine already." She flushed and pulled her clothes back on. She kissed Weiss' cheek as she left the room, leaving Weiss and Elior alone.

"That bird has no patience." He sighed, pulling his pants on. Weiss let her housecoat fall off then pulled her shirt and pants on.

"Seriously. Anyway, what do you want?" She nodded out toward the kitchen. Elior tilted his head as he followed her out.

"Whatever you want to cook." Of course. That was almost always the answer. She hated deciding on what to cook everyday when this happened. Why did she even bother to ask anymore? It'd been like this for the past four years. She loved Elior dearly, but he could still sometimes get on her nerves. She didn't want to make the decision every time. It was the same for dinner… Always on her unless he decided to treat her, but that was pretty rare. He did like cooking, but he always foisted it on her.

She got in the fridge and cooked, setting the table after she finished. She sprinkled some scrambled eggs into the birds' chop, then settled down. "Sorry I was gone so long… I really didn't intend that." It'd been three months. It was only supposed to have been maybe three weeks, a month at most.

Elior smiled and took her hand. "You ran into some difficulties with the older forms of Chilese, right? I can't really blame you for that."

Weiss nodded and rubbed her neck. "Still… I wasn't planning on being away so long. I missed you so much." She hated it when her jobs ran over like that. Some were unable to articulate how long they'd be like her parents' current jobs. She had gotten messages from them that they'd be away. Freelance historian was quite the odd job to have, but she enjoyed it. She enjoyed traveling to other countries and helping out people unravel ancient mysteries. She couldn't imagine living any other way. She had the freedom to do what she wanted when she wanted. She was kind of a nobody, but she had connections to some of the most important noble families in the world.

"I missed you too." He did grin a bit. "Feel up to a quick session after breakfast?"

She shook her head. "I only got back a few days ago. My internal clock is all out of whack." The one downside to traveling so much was having her internal clock out of order so often. Her mother had said she'd get used to it in time, but she'd been traveling by herself for five years. She never got used to all of the crazy stuff travel did to her. Her birds were quicker to adapt to time changes than she was. She needed some more sleep especially with as crazy as the three of them had gotten last night.

Elior nodded. "Well, all right. You get some more rest, okay?" He smiled and she returned it. Even if he could sometimes drive her up the wall, she really did love him. A lot of partners wouldn't quite be so understanding. The birds could put a huge strain on their relationship with as needy as Avram was. Plus, she could sometimes spend up to eight consecutive months away. She'd spent that time away with the nomadic eagle hunters over in tribal territories. Even their teibas couldn't keep them in contact with as far out as she'd been… It'd been eight long months with not contact with the outside world.

"I will. I'll have to wash the sheets after I wake up, though…" She sighed. Laundry was such a pain and took all damn day. Boiling the water, making the soap, and everything else. It was the one downside of the nights they decided to have a lot of sex. The linen sheets got really dirty and were not fun to clean.

"Wish I could help, but I need to be to work at ten thirty." He offered her an apologetic smile. She shrugged. She knew he was busy with his job, so there was no real point in making him feel bad. She had the down time now, so she'd take care of it once she got a few more hours of sleep.

"Avram, Lilias, will you two make sure I get up at eleven?" Sometimes the birds could be useful. She didn't like the ear-bleeding screams they could produce, but they were definitely good alarm clocks. A small cockatoo nip was more than enough to get her up. She was glad they were usually so gentle with her, though… Avram could get particularly nasty if he went into breeding mode and found a potential nesting site somewhere…

Lilias raised a wing. "All right. We'll keep an eye on the clock."

"Thanks." She smiled at her and put the dishes in the bucket. She looked at them. Hm. That was a lot dishes. Should she—

"I'll take care of them while you sleep." Elior smiled at her and she reciprocated.

"Thanks. I appreciate it. Let's go, Lilias, Avram." The two cockatoos landed on her and she headed into her parents' room. They landed on the headboard and Weiss curled up on the bed. It took only a few minutes for her to fall into slumber, the sounds of her breathing mixing with the ticking of the clock.

#φ

Weiss winced when she felt a sharp nip to her finger. She was ready to glower at Avram, but then she remembered that she'd asked him to do so. "Thanks." She really did depend on these two to help keep her functioning at times. Sometimes she could get absentminded and lose track of time with what she was doing. It was simply too easy to get absorbed in her work or even reading for pleasure.

She headed into the kitchen and looked at the washing cupboard. She looked over at the ingredients and sighed. They were out of one of the core ingredients she needed to make soap and wash the sheets. "I need to head out to the general store. You two want to come?" They'd mostly bene stuck in her room with her for the past few months, so she'd give them a chance to get outside and stretch their wings.

Both landing on either shoulder was her answer to the question. "All right; let me get dressed first."

Though, as she looked at her closet, she was faced with a choice. Honestly, she wasn't feeling either masculine or feminine in presentation today. Decisions, decisions. Pants or dress? Neither was really appealing to her right now. Well, a dress would mean she could go without tights and let her skin be exposed to the air, so she'd be a little cooler that way. Oh, but that also meant a corset which was more trouble than it was for a quick trip to the general store… Nothing felt great to her right now.

She sighed and grabbed one of her suits. It would be quicker and easier than dealing with a corset and all the bustle pads that would involve. Dressing feminine as far more trouble than it was worth sometimes…

After she was dressed, she placed the birds on her shoulders and grabbed her wallet. Honestly, a walk would be refreshing. Her job kept her inside far too much a lot of the time. She closed the door behind her and took in a breath. It felt good to be back in the tropical heat of Vobron. She always missed being home when gone for extended periods like that. It was good to be back. She'd have to stop by her grandparents' house at some point to say hello to them and see her little brother.

As she walked on the planked walkway, she said hello to innumerable people. The community in Vobron was a decent size—around five thousand people—but she could recognise most people on sight. She really didn't know most of them personally, but it was nice to live in such a tight-knit community.

As she passed a saloon, though, a drunk man stumbled out and almost bowled her over. "Bunk, jackass!" He could have hurt Lilias or Avram with his carelessness! And she didn't recognise him either.

"W-Wahsh where yer walkin'! He had a non-Vobrese accent. He was probably from the mainland. Visiting extended family maybe.

"You're the one that needs to watch it! You could have hurt my birds!" She wasn't worried about herself. She could more than take somebody in a fight and her soul would protect her from harm. It would hurt, but she could handle it. She was a Tenth Order soul flowerer. She could easily handle a punch by a man that didn't have his soul unlocked.

He cocked his arm back and Weiss shot in, putting her hand up to stop it from going past his shoulder. She followed it quickly with a swift knee to the groin then bashed her head into his nose.

She saw blood start to spurt from his nose as he lay prone.

The saloon door opened. "Weiss, are you okay?" The owner looked at her, concerned.

"I"m fine. I thought you would have refused to serve him before he got to this point, Matt." He was a pretty good server. Once people started to get a little tipsy, he stopped serving them. If people started to really slur their words, he kicked them out. Far too many of these frontier men liked to get drunk and get into fights. Some of the other saloons served people until they were as drunk as this guy… There was a reason she went to Matt's on the rare occasion she wanted to drink socially.

"Unfortunately, there's a party going on and it's hard to keep track of individual people. I'm about to tell the others to bunk. If one guy is this drunk, I can only imagine how some of the others are." Weiss nodded. She could imagine it was hard to keep track of guys when there were so many of them. She tended to go during the day to avoid the evening crowds. It was often really stifling to be in a saloon when all of the men were trickling in from a hard day's labor.

"Need any help getting them out?" She cracked her knuckles. She might be a bit small, but anybody native to Voboron would know not to mess with her. She was not one to play nice if people started getting too rowdy or such.

"Donal ain't here tonight, so I'd appreciate it, Weiss. I'll give ya twenty for the help." Twenty for one job? She wouldn't say no to that!

"You two wait out here." She pointed to the horse-hitching post and the two birds settled on it. They were not combat trained like a lot of other awakened animals were. They could be hurt easily due to not really knowing how to work their souls. They could probably learn to hold their own eventually, but training an awakened animal for combat took some time. Plus, she didn't want to potentially have them harmed again. Finding anybody that knew anything about healing birds was incredibly difficult.

She followed Matt into the saloon and saw a large knot of men surrounding several tables. They were incredibly loud and obviously many of them very drunk. She put her fingers in her mouth and let out an ear-piercing whistle. Almost everyone inside turned to look at her. "Gentlemen, Matt has informed me he wants you to leave. Either we can do this the easy way with your leaving of your own accord, or we can do this the hard way with me smashing your heads in. What will our choice be?"

For the most part, they all murmured and looked at each other, shaking their heads. They knew that going up against a Tenth Order soul flowerer would not end well. Her Similitude was not one to mess around with. It might be simple but it was flexible and multifaceted. Facing off against it wasn't something any of them wanted to do.

But one man stumbled over and squinted at her. "Why…Why you guys so…so schkared? You…You can take her! Lookit how tiny she is! And who…who she think she ish…order men around?" Weiss' eyes narrowed at that. She saw the others that knew her exchanging unnerved glances. She did not handle sexism well. Whela and Vobron were places where that sort of behavior was not tolerated.

"Oh, you think you can take me on? Why don't you prove it, then, you big, strong man?" She hated men like this. Probably moved for work especially since he didn't have a Vobrese accent.

He wound up his arm and swung it, but Weiss didn't even move. The sound of crunching bone was punctuated by the man's howls of pain. "W-Wha' was tha'?! There ain't nothin' there!"

Weiss smiled and held her hand up, revealing a decently sized rectangle floating in the air. "Barriers. Simple in concept, but quite useful in execution." She pushed the barrier to his throat and her a strangling noise. Three more barriers appeared around his neck. She wouldn't kill him because that would be terrible. There was no point in such a mindless killing. "I would suggest against moving unless you want you throat slit." Again, not that she would kill so senselessly, but it wasn't like he knew that. She simply treated to put him in his place. Women (or those designated women at birth) were just as capable as those designated men at birth. She was as rough and tumble as any of the men were in Vobron.

She slowly raised the barriers and he danced on his tiptoes. Some of the other men started to laugh. Weiss just smirked. He was going to remember this as long as he lived. He was drunk now but his buddies would never let him live this down.

"I-I'm sh-orry! I'll leave!"

Weiss let her barriers fall and the man dropped to the floor. "Good. Now get your ass out of here. That goes for all of you. Or do you need a repeat of what happened here?" She looked at the group of men who shook their heads.

"No, ma'am, we do not." She recognised the one talking—Arley, head of the lumber mill. Probably should have been at work unless he was on a day off. It wasn't like she kept track of everyone's schedules on the small continent. He was pretty important in Vobron so this was setting good precedent for the other men. "Well, lads, let's head home!" The knot of men filed out of the saloon and Weiss watched them go. It was always nice when she didn't have to use too much force to get people to comply. Sometimes, though, force was the only language people in Vobron spoke. It was a fairly lawless place so people did a lot of things that wouldn't be acceptable else where.

Matt slipped behind the counter and got in the register, holding out a couple bills for her. "Here ya go, Weiss. Two zuni for your troubles."

She dropped them in her wallet and smiled. "Thanks, Matt. That should let me round out my clothes washing supplies." It would let her more than double up what hse needed. She might as well restock the whole cabinet while she was at the general store. It'd make her parents happy to have more supplies than what they left with (assuming they got back before too long). She should probably go retrieve her little brother after she got back from the store but she really wanted the house to herself for a few more days… She so rarely had any sort of time truly alone like this.

She quickly retrieved the birds and made the round trip to the general store, then returned home. She gathered up the sheets and the dirty clothes, then turned the knob and the stove to turn the fire up. She was in for a very long day…

Bunk: To tell somebody to go away angrily