Author's Note: Jeture is the sea god of Asturia.

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The Last Night of the World

Chapter 12

Behind the Mask

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As his youngest daughter requested what he wished for and dreaded the most, Grava Aston wondered for the hundredth time why Jeture had chosen to bless him with three daughters.

When Marlene was first born, Aston had not been worried. Therese was still young and would bear him many more children. Next came Eries, whose manner was serious and unflappable, even in childhood. Four years later, Aston watched with barely contained eagerness as his third child made its way into the world. Excitement faded to disappointment when the midwife announced that the child was female. Disappointment turned to gut-wrenching fear when his wife cried out in pain and the sheets began to bleed.

After Therese's death, Aston's three girls became the apple of his eye. Eries resembled her mother the most in appearance, but Marlene had Therese's mysterious smile and quiet grace. Love them as he might, he never understood them. Marlene became more and more secretive when the youngest knight of Caeli showed up in the palace. Eries had been secretive to begin with. Only Millerna was bubbly and open, reminding him of his youthful days that were once as golden as the curls gracing the crown of her head. She was headstrong, too, fiery and capricious and often clashing wills with him. Perhaps he loved her so much because she was exactly the way he used to be, or because she embodied Therese's last moments on Gaea, the precious life that Therese had given herself up to create.

Having only daughters wreaked havoc with Aston's life and with his political designs. Although he played the part of the aloof but concerned father, he was not blind to the way Marlene looked at Allen Schezar. Nor did he fail to notice that Chid bore no resemblance to the dark-skinned Mahad dar Freid. He felt himself age another ten years when Eries declared her refusal to marry and donned the demure dress of the nuns of Jeture. So his hopes for the succession of the kingdom lay on the shoulders of his youngest daughter, who was still infatuated with the knight who had nearly destroyed Marlene's happiness.

Now Millerna was asking for his permission to accompany Dryden Fassa to Chavant, the capital of Basram. But both of them knew what she was really asking. Earlier that morning, Allen had come to him with the exact same request. Aston had granted his wish, glad to have the man out of his sight and out of his hair. However, things did not go as smoothly as he had planned. Millerna had not mentioned the blond knight, but she did not need to. It was no coincidence.

But they had played this game many times before. When Millerna wanted something he would not approve of, she dressed it up with words to draw his attention elsewhere. Aston would then pry a little deeper with careful questions, which she dodged with a skill that had been cultivated by the years.

Aston tapped a ring-laden finger to his cheek. "You've never wanted to have anything to do with Dryden before. Why change your mind now?"

When Millerna answered, she looked him in the eye, unwavering. "I am engaged to him, but I hardly know him at all. And he has been gone for five years. This will give me the chance to see what kind of a man he is."

"You had the chance to see what kind of a man he was during the war. Was that not enough?"

"He left to live among the people afterwards. People change, Father."

What she said was true. Millerna no longer ran about with children of the palace servants, and she carried herself with more grace than she had as a teenager. Her impetuousness was now tempered by level-headed reasoning and calm discussion. Five years could change people, and they had changed his undisciplined tomboy of a daughter into a woman. But even though she was asking for Aston's permission, her mouth was set and her gray eyes were willful.

"They don't change that much," he replied.

A flash of indignation crossed her face at his blunt statement. She was still the same despite her veneer of aristocratic diplomacy. Millerna might be able to fool others, but she could not fool her father.

"People change more than you think, Father. Their feelings change, too. My feelings have changed."

Aston was not prepared for this reply. Her feelings had changed? What did she mean? She was clearly still in love with Allen; they acted as if they were practically married and that Celena was their child. Could she mean she'd realized that being with Allen was not as idyllic as she imagined it would be? Or that the mysterious allure of a rich, handsome man only grew stronger with distance and time?

"Dryden gave me the choice of making up my own mind," she said. "Because of that, I think he deserves a second chance."

Dryden deserved a second chance? Obviously, Millerna didn't realize that she was the one who had been given the second chance. And somehow she had gotten the idea that she had a choice in the matter. She still did not understand the price of duty that came with being born into a royal station. But since their marriage had never been consummated and had been suspended by Dryden himself, Aston supposed she did have a choice now. Or at least Aston had lost what influence he had left.

If Dryden had not let her go, it would have been different. He shouldn't have let her go so easily. It was an opportunity that might never come again—Dryden clearly did not know flighty Millerna could be. The plan that Aston had carefully concocted with Meiden was now unexpectedly out of his hands. Well, he supposed that this was what happened when children grew up and developed minds of their own. And if he denied Millerna her request, she was going to find a way to go anyway. If he gave her his blessing, at least he would know where she was and wouldn't have to worry.

"All right. You may go to Basram with Dryden."

"Thank you, Father."

But he could not let her go without reminding her of his expectation for her engagement. "And do not forget: the two of you will be representing Asturia as her future king and queen."

Millerna answered without missing a beat. "Yes, Father."

-

Although it was the largest of Dryden's fleet of merchant ships, the Ariel was a small craft. A small but opulent craft. Hitomi fingered the ivory lining one of the rounded windows and wondered if the leviship had been a recent purchase. Dryden had sold his entire convoy during the war. And then he went to live with the common folk. But didn't buying leviships with ivory windows negate the whole point of trying to understand the lives of normal people?

She shouldn't jump to conclusions so quickly. Maybe he owned this ship before the war started. He came from a very wealthy family, after all. But the Ariel was another piece that didn't quite seem to fit the puzzle that was Dryden Fassa. Hitomi never understood him, and she wondered if anyone really did.

This was the first time that everyone was together in the same place again. When she heard that Millerna would be joining them, Hitomi was delighted. It would be like the old days again, when they were united against a common enemy and life was a little less complicated.

But it wasn't the same. She should have known that from the start. Allen and Millerna had the feel of a couple who had been together for so long that they had forgotten why they were together in the first place. Even when they were apart, Millerna's sunny manner was subdued and the awkward air of ex-lovers hung between Hitomi and Allen. Merle was an implacable bundle of resentment. Although Hitomi thought something had changed in the meeting room in Palas, she still couldn't penetrate Van's icy armor. In the end, nothing was the same. When the faces were familiar but the people acted like strangers, it was that much harder to bear.

Hitomi found herself spending much of her time with Celena. She did not know Celena well, having only seen her in Allen's company on occasion before she returned home. The girl behaved like a ghost and made Hitomi uncomfortable, but keeping her company meant that Millerna and Allen would not have to, and it eased the tension between all of them. It was the least Hitomi could do. Her return to Gaea had stirred up old anxieties and worries, and while the strain was most obvious between her and Van, the effect on Millerna and Allen was not small. Allen's declaration of love for Hitomi was a thing of the past, but Allen had not asked Millerna to marry him. The air between Millerna and Hitomi was noticeably cooler when Allen was there, too. So Hitomi stayed with Celena.

The middle deck of the Ariel was two large rooms separated by a narrow hallway. On one end was the steering deck, from where the raucous laughter and shouts of the pilots escaped into the hall. The two women occupied the other end of the ship, which was paneled with windows that reached from the ceiling to the floor. There, they could watch the land below them roll by as the clouds escorted them through the sky. Allen had brought several books to occupy Celena, who alternated between idly flipping through the pages and staring off into space. He kept them company for a while, telling stories about his ascension to knighthood and his life in Asturia, meant more for Celena's ears than anything else. Hitomi suspected Celena had heard most of these stories already, but the brother and sister seemed to gain a sense of comfort just from being in the same room together and listening to the other's voice. It had been five years since Celena returned, but five years did not make up for the lifetime they had lost.

When Allen left to find Millerna, Hitomi was alone with Celena, the muffled humming of the ship's engines forming a wall of sound between them and the steering room. A spiral staircase intersected the level, leading up to the open-air deck or down to the sleeping quarters and engine room. Hanging on the walls was the evidence of Dryden's travels: feathered charms of leather and fur, beads of glass and gems strung together in a mind-twisting pattern. But what caught Hitomi's eye was a column of masks. They lined the section of wall that divided the vast windows at their end of the ship. Their eyes protruded, eggshells of red and yellow and green with clown mouths that grinned or sighed or frowned. They reminded Hitomi of the ritual Japanese masks that used to hang in her grandfather's living room. Her grandfather had been an avid collector of the pieces of Japanese history that had been left by the wayside of the ages. It's like having a piece of someone else's life, he'd said. You never know what you're going to find.

Their painted faces frightened her as a child. Even when she was more grown up, they made her squeamish. Their painted pupils followed her around and the wide, grimacing mouths were ready to devour her once her back was turned. Whose faces did they hide? Who would want to masquerade as a creature from the demon world? When she and Mamoru were little, Mamoru used to chase her around with one until their mother gave them both a tongue-thrashing about crashing recklessly through a room full of antiques.

The masks stood on the wall across from her and Celena. Three velvet armchairs were arranged in a semicircle around a small coffee table facing the windows. Celena occupied the chair in the middle, her pale face bent as she studied the book in her lap. Now that Allen was gone, Hitomi observed her uneasily. Celena had the smooth-cheeked elegance that Hitomi remembered so well in Dilandau, but she lacked the rabid mania that had characterized Folken's right-hand man. In fact, she lacked any emotion at all. She was not sure which one was worse: Celena when she was calm or Celena when she was disturbed. She remembered how Celena had whimpered and clawed at her face during the attack on Palas. Now, despite her placidity, it was only a matter of time before her porcelain face cracked again and the monster came crawling out.

But Celena was sufficiently occupied, so it was best to leave well enough alone. They flew through a cluster of low-hanging clouds, the cottony mist swimming in their wake. They broke out into open air again, and two moons—one small and pale, the other deep oceanic blue—came into view in the afternoon sky. Hitomi was suddenly choked by a wave of homesickness. Earth looked so lonely. It hung in the featureless sky with only the small, silent moon to keep it company. She was supposed to go to a concert at the park with Yukari at the end of July. It was already late August by now. Yukari must have waited forever by the ice cream vendor before she finally left. There were probably a hundred messages piled up in her voicemail. Yutaro must be worried out of his mind, too. They had planned to spend the summer house-hunting, their trips dotted with excursions to estates in the countryside that they could pretend they would one day own. What was supposed to be a bright and happy time in her life had been cut short by the hauntings of her past. There was only fear and sadness, now, in both worlds.

The room was not cold, but Hitomi curled her legs beneath her and hugged herself. She wanted to see them again, Yutaro and Yukari. Her fingers instinctively reached for the purse she wore at her hip, but they only closed around air. Meager hope crumbled into disappointment. Their pictures were in her wallet, the few remnants of the life she had come from, and now they were gone. The sense of loss emptied Hitomi of anything else.

Where could her purse be? She had it with her when she boarded the Ariel. Maybe she left it somewhere by accident. She should go look for it. When she stood up, she realized that going to look for her purse would mean leaving Celena unattended. She vacillated between finding Allen and staying. She didn't want to bother Allen, but her spirits were so heavy that they threatened to drown her. She needed to see their faces again.

But she never had the chance to decide. "Hitomi!" Millerna's voice called, and the heels of her boots echoed across the wooden floorboards. As Hitomi turned at the sound her name, the floor lurched beneath her feet. There was a frightened cry as someone tumbled behind her. The world tilted, and she met the ground with a sharp pain through her hip and elbow. She pushed herself up, but the floor rolled under her again. The hangings on the walls tinkled and clattered as the leviship bobbed through the air. Furniture crowded together and slid away. Celena had fallen out of her chair and her head weaved drunkenly back and forth. The floor swelled again, making Hitomi's stomach lurch. The sudden cacophony of shattering glass made her jump. She looked up and saw that the glass had not been broken after all; the line of masks had fallen on the floor and had smashed like clay pots. The exposed edges were rough and sienna red. They were made of clay after all.

Some of the pieces had skittered close to Celena, who picked one up in her hand. It was the broken upper half of a face, a cobalt blue eye with a bold, thick eyebrow and two stained yellow cubes for teeth. Celena stared back at the eye and her shoulders began to shake. A ragged sob escaped her and she curled up. Hitomi dragged herself across the floor, her legs slipping and sliding as the ship struggled to right itself.

With a loud cry, Celena raised her hand and smashed the mask into the wooden planks. A jagged piece of clay remained in Celena's fist and a line of scarlet flowed down her arm. Hitomi hesitated, her hand caught in midair. Celena's cries climbed in pitch and volume, sirens of distress. Heedless of the girl's wails and bloodied hand, Hitomi crawled closer. She put her arms around Celena, whose thin body rattled so fiercely that Hitomi feared she would fall apart.

It seemed the leviship would never stop its violent rocking, but when it did, Celena's cries quieted to soft whimpers. Hitomi soothingly stroked her shoulder, which eventually ceased its quaking. She drew herself up off the floor, but something tugged on her. Celena's hand was clinging tightly to her dress, blood leaking onto the yellow fabric from a deep gash by her thumb. Hitomi gently loosened the girl's fingers, which automatically curled around Hitomi's hand. Celena's breath came in shudders, and Hitomi held her hand until her red-rimmed eyes were no longer wide and her fingers lost their tension.

Millerna came up behind them, shuffling on her hands and knees, as if standing would be too difficult. "Hitomi, are you all right?" she asked. On seeing the blood staining Hitomi's dress, she gasped. "Are you hurt?"

Hitomi shook her head. "No, I'm fine. Celena cut her hand, though."

The princess gingerly picked up Celena's hand as if she were afraid it might bite her. Celena, who still lay on the ground, watched Millerna calmly as she examined the wound. "This will need stitches," Millerna announced. Then, as if noticing Celena for the first time, she said, with a little more sympathy, "Does it hurt?"

Maybe Celena wasn't used to having so many people concerned about her, or maybe she had never really been acknowledged by anyone else until now, because her eyes were no longer distant and there was a faint warmth to her ivory cheeks that had not been there before. She nodded, pale wisps of hair falling over her face. "Just a little," she whispered.

"I brought my medical bag with me. There's a suture kit in there." Millerna rose to stand. "I'll be right back."

"Wait, Millerna." Hitomi stopped her with a hand on her arm. Millerna had come to look for her right before the ship went out of control. Maybe she had wanted to warn them about something. "What just happened?"

The princess shook her head. "I don't know. Whatever it was, it's probably over." Millerna said this with confidence, but her fingers nervously pinched the lace of her skirt.

"Were we attacked?"

"By Basram? They wouldn't dare violate our treaty. They have too much invested in our economy. And why would they attack a merchant ship?"

"I don't know. It's just…" Hitomi began, and broke off in mid-sentence. A terrifying thought just occurred to her. What if they were seeing the beginnings of another disaster?

"There's nothing to worry about," said a voice behind them. It was Allen. "The currents were a little rough when we flew over the Arges River. We should be reaching Chavant soon."

Turbulence? Hitomi had flown several times in her life, but she had never experienced turbulence like this. But she didn't question him because there was an air of ever-present competence to Allen had that never failed to ease her fears. Maybe it was different with leviships. Airplanes and leviships were not the same thing, after all. It probably had to do with physics or aerodynamics or something like that.

There was a movement beyond Allen's shoulder, and she saw a boot on the top step of the staircase just before it disappeared above deck.

-

Van Fanel was irritated. For the last hour or so, he had suffered the company of Dryden and his head inventor. The former he never cared for, and the latter refused to leave him alone. At first, both of them had talked incessantly about Atlantis, pestered Van with questions about the Draconians (which he mostly could not answer), and competed with each other in their knowledge of ancient myths. At last, Dryden was called away by his crew, and Van thought he would finally be left in peace. Until Wellyn brought up Basram, that is.

"You should at least think about it, Van-sama. For the good of Fanelia."

Van scowled silently at the feathery clouds that tapered into the distance and met the ocean on the horizon. They were standing on the top deck of the Ariel, discussing the Princess Renau. Or rather, Wellyn was discussing her and Van was rebuffing him every chance he could get.

With the world falling into ruin around them, this was not the time to be courting princesses or chasing after myths. But somehow Dryden had convinced him to come, and Wellyn was making his point known. It was true that Basram had been furtively scouting Asturia's borders. There had also been whispers about undisclosed research on the few remains of Dornkirk's fate-alteration machine. The Basramian government's behavior was unusual, that was certain.

According to Wellyn, it would be poor political form if the king of Fanelia entered the capital of Basram unannounced. Van agreed with him on that count. When Wellyn mentioned the meetings he would have to arrange out of courtesy, Van was not pleased but he saw the necessity of formality. It was when Wellyn brought up the Princess Renau that Van's mood began to sour again.

Unlike the other nations of Gaea, Basram was a republic. It was ruled by a prime minister and several bodies of legislature, including a Senate and a Council. This mode of government was relatively new, having been put into motion only three hundred years ago after a long and bloody revolution. The royal family still existed, mostly as a figurehead, but many of its members were still involved in lawmaking and government. As it happened, the Prime Minister himself was a prince, the third son of Queen Alisa. His daughter was Renau de la Baroche, a young Senator who was quickly rising in prominence.

Van was supposed to meet her in the first week of Red. But he was long overdue; it was almost the end of the month. Wellyn was right when he said that marrying Renau would forge a strong bond between two powerful countries, but Van did not see why he had to bring it up now. Marriages and alliances were not priorities at the moment.

But Wellyn had insisted. It was bad enough that Van had missed their appointment, and completely disregarding the princess this time would add insult to injury. Van had protested that he couldn't help missing it, and Wellyn responded by saying that it didn't matter. It was poor political etiquette, he claimed, but Van thought his argument was rather weak. This sort of thing could wait.

"You know, Van-sama," Wellyn had also said at one point, "they say her beauty can make a man forget who he is."

What was the difference? Beautiful or not, courting her would be a waste of time. It would go the way it had gone with all the other noblewomen—awkward and dull. She would make small talk, and he would not know what to say and not care all that much. Well, he tried to care, enough to satisfy the people who were counting on him. Half the time, he asked himself what he was doing in the first place. He had not been around many girls before or known what to do around them. Merle didn't count, because she had been there his whole life and she was like his right arm. The only other girl he had really known was Hitomi, and she—

Van scrubbed a hand through his hair in irritation. He didn't want to think about Hitomi right now. She said she would stay, but in the end, she was still going to leave. And then she was going to marry the man she loved on the Mystic Moon. He did not know why he was thinking about her. There was no point. He didn't want to think about marriage, either, because thoughts of Hitomi crept in every time he did. But he should not see it as an issue of marriage. It was a political alliance, the joining of two nations. That was all. Government, politics, and the good of his kingdom.

He hunched his shoulders as he leaned over the wall of the deck. Maybe if he agreed to see Renau, Wellyn would go away. "I'll think about it," he mumbled miserably.

Wellyn clapped him heartily on the back. "That's more like it, Van-sama. By the way," and he leaned closer as if speaking in confidence, "it would not be a bad opportunity to try and ferret out Basram's motives."

Van gave a grudging nod. Wellyn would not have pressed him so hard if he did not think it would be worthwhile. He would meet with Renau de la Baroche, then. It might prove more fruitful than digging through dusty books in the national libraries.

The sun arced lower in the sky and the River Arges stretched below them like a shimmering road. In the distance, Chavant was nestled in a fork in the river where it split into the Bain and the South Arges. A brisk wind caught Van's hair, and soon the leviship began to shudder as the air currents lifted and swirled. Cries of surprise and dismay drifted up from the steering room. The ship dipped to starboard, knocking Van flat on his back. He grabbed one of the wooden posts buttressing the deck wall to keep from rolling around as the winds bandied the ship about. When the pilots finally brought the Ariel under control, Van stumbled to his feet, slightly nauseous. He leaned against the rail until his head stopped spinning.

What the hell was that? Even though he was not familiar with the wind patterns over Basram, there were certain laws to the way air currents behaved. The patch they just went through was so forceful and disorganized that he would have thought a storm was coming had the sky not been so clear. Now the wind carried them calmly as if nothing had happened. It didn't make sense.

Then Allen ran past him. "Celena!" he cried. That was when Van remembered who else was below deck and why he had avoided going down there.

His boots clomped against the deck and down the stairs. He almost collided with Allen, who had halted in the middle of the stairs, something holding his attention. Van slowed and followed Allen's gaze.

Hitomi lay on the floor with her arms around the white-haired, shuddering heap that was Celena Schezar. She pulled herself up, but Celena's hand had a claw-like grasp on Hitomi's dress. But that was not what threw Van into a rage. There was blood on her dress, a bright patch of red across her midsection. Dilandau. He should have known the monster would not sleep forever. A hand on his sword, he tried to shove Allen aside, but the other man blocked him on the stairs. Allen shook his head firmly. "Look, Van. She's all right. They both are."

Van looked. Hitomi pried the girl's fingers from her dress and cradled her hand, which Van could now see was dripping with blood. He watched as Hitomi quietly sat with Celena, her free hand smoothing back the white hair. Her mouth moved, and though he could not hear the words, he could imagine what they were. He loosened his grip on the hilt of his sword.

"This is why we fell in love with her in the first place, isn't it?" Allen said in a low voice.

Every muscle in Van's body froze. Fell in love? The feelings he had tried so hard to bury welled up, nameless and suffocating in their intensity. He gripped the metal railing. The floor seemed to shift beneath his feet even though the Ariel continued to sail smoothly through the sky.

"Anyone she comes in contact with, she puts their hearts at ease." Allen was watching Van now.

Van kept his eyes trained on the vertical bar of the railing. His heart was not at ease, but he wanted it to be. How deeply he wished it could be. He was almost in that place when he faced Hitomi in the cold of the conference room in Asturia. He wished he could give himself up to the emotion that pushed against his barrier and threatened to carry him away. But it was not something he could want, not as king. Especially when she did not feel the same way. Thoughts like this made him forget why kings marry, made him pine after what would forever be out of reach. When a person was king, he had certain duties and was one with duty and country. There was no room for anything else.

But his father had married his mother, a woman of a cursed people who was not of this world. He married her because he loved her.

He lingered while Allen approached the women, who had been joined by Millerna. They turned in Allen's direction, and Van's breath caught when he thought Hitomi was looking at him. But her gaze brushed past him, seeing only Allen and whatever news he bore. She met Allen with such hope that it pricked Van's heart. Was that how she looked at him, the man she was to marry? She ducked her head and the anxiety in her face melted away as she listened to Allen's assurances. She never did that with Van, not that he could remember. With him, it was always warnings and concern but rarely ever reassurance. It seemed that most things he did made her worried or upset. But Allen never made her upset. Her fiancé probably never did, either. Before she raised her head again, Van hurried up the steps so he would not have to meet her eyes.

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Author's Note #2: I've recently set up a forum for this fic. I'd love it if you checked it out. Questions and comments are more than welcome!