chapter 25:
The horse stopped abruptly on the edge of a clearing. Kara realized they must be in the right place. The adjacent pine trees were tall and ominous, casting the clearing in shadows on this late afternoon. A dark shadow was pacing around the open field. From time to time, the general would emerge from the darkness engulfing him and destroy a nearby pine. The tree would tumble to the ground, never to reach for the sky again. Kara shuddered to think that maybe, several years ago, there was no clearing. It had been man-made, carve out of anguish. Each year the darkling did not hear from the sun summoner, new trees had fallen.
She did not feel bold enough to go to him, so she attached her horse next to the general's black stallion and sat by the fountain. The two horses settled and grazed. Kara waited almost an hour during which the general's frantic pacing lessened. After a moment, he had stopped moving completely. He stayed facing a young pine tree as if deciding if it needed to be uprooted. He did nothing though. He rested his forehead against it's bark and felt a single tear trickle down his face. He felt like weeping but knew it would change nothing of his predicament. Once again, his feelings had gotten the better of him. Guilt would wash over him going back to the Little Palace, when he would take stock of the damage he had done. Once again, out of pride, he would not dare to apologize. He knew what would follow. He would wallow in self pity and sadness for a few days and then move on. He would through himself into whatever mission the king would dare send his way and push away the pain. One day, the sun summoner would arrive and everything would be different. One day, all this would have been worth it. As he turned around with the intention of walking slowly to his horse, he froze.
Across from the clearing, a pale mare was grazing next to his stallion. A tall slender silhouette was sitting by the fountain. HIS fountain. Anger again writhed within his chest. Who would have to audacity to follow him here? Who would have the nerve to come to this private place in his presence? He walked briskly towards the newcomer and his temper lessened as he distinguished the person. Kara was resting against the fountain, her arms crossed, facing him. She seemed calm, her face showing no particular emotion. Looking into her eyes, he felt uncomfortable, unstable. She was usually very easy to read, her emotions on full display. Now, however, she was closed off, inaccessible.
The general arrived at her level slowly and Kara did her best to focus on breathing. He still had violence and anger flowing in his veins. To taunt an agitated snake was asking to be bitten. So she would have to be smart about initiating the conversation. She decided to stay silent. He looked coldly at her. Why are you here? ,he wanted to ask. However that would let on that he cared about her motives. At this instant he wanted nothing more than an excuse to lash out. Yet her calm composure kept him in check. He decided to go for cool indifference. " You should not be here". His tone was low, broken. She barely blinked in response. "why?" she asked softly. He was struck dumb by the simplicity of the question. She saw him struggle and so she clarified, " Why are you like this?". Alexhander shuddered. His composure was only holding by a thread. He was expecting her to mention his obvious anger, the violence he had unleashed in the clearing. How was it that she seemed to pry to see what was hidden beneath? He felt his anger diminish and he feared how vulnerable he was feeling. He looked away at the horizon, trying to hide his fragility. " Care to take a guess?". Her gaze shifted to the ground. She bit her lip deep in thought.
How was she to deduce what would trigger a century old Grisha? Her life was but a breath compared to his. Despite the few moments they had shared, she did not know him. She looked at him again, " What is the sun-summoner to you?", she whispered. Alexhander's hand shook slightly. He quickly balled his fingers into a fist before she could notice. " The sun summoner is nothing more or less than our future. Once that person is here, The Fold will be annihilated. And maybe, just maybe...Grisha and Otkazat'sya will learn to accept each other." Kara tilted her head to the side, " But that's not all there is to it. There's something more personal at stake". She looked at him more intensely, " I ask again. What is the sun-summoner to YOU". He faced her, his face a mask of anguish, " What are you expecting me to reveal to you? That despite everything I have built, I stand alone? That despite my greatest desire to protect Grisha, I will never be able to trust my comrades?"
The healer was taken aback. Why was he so suspicious even of his own kin? Her eye narrowed, " Why?". Alexhander scoffed, " You sound like a child. I do not have to explain everything to you. It will not help you to understand." Kara was not amused, " Does belittling me make you feel better general? Does it make the guilt of almost blasting me to pieces more bareable? ". Alexhander snapped his head in her direction, suddenly worried, " I... did I hurt you?". Kara stood and stepped closer to him. She was in no mood to play. She had had enough of his avoidance of the subject. She took his hand and opened it, palm upwards. She fished something inside her trouser pocket and gently dropped it inside his hand. She then let go and sat again on the fountain edge. Alexhander was almost afraid to look. How could being hurt or not be explained by something that felt so small?". As he rolled the irregular fragments in his palm, he felt a part bite into his flesh. When he opened his palm, he saw several fragments of broken glass. His memory brought him to the pain and infinite sadness which drove him to destroy everything in his wake. He had not seen Kara as he left his quarters. He tried to recall, but nothing came to him.
She nodded towards the content of his hand, " I pulled these shards of glass from my hair and clothes, as I was waiting for you here." He looked up slowly his face suddenly piecing together a blurry souvenir. " You were on the ground near my quarters". The healer nodded, her blue eyes terribly cold. " You got lucky. Ania got to me before I reached for your door". Alexhander inhaled a trembling breath and shut his eyes. He had in past years, done his best to let the scouts go from his rooms before reacting. He had reined in his beating heart, his boiling blood and his difficult breathing until their scared footsteps were distant. And yet, he had almost pulverized this woman. One of the only Otkazat'sya who seemed to value his thoughts and opinion. She had been kind when others were not. The general felt ashamed but what could he do? No one, however powerful, could change the past.
Kara crossed her arms again, " I think considering my near brush with death, you OWE me an explanation". Alexhander no longer felt like resisting. He knew she was right. He tried to start with her last question, before addressing the deeper confounds of his being. " My mother and I, are not only shadow summoners. We also happen to be amplifiers". Kara raised an eyebrow, " You have a mother?". Alexhander glared at her, " Of all the conundrums of the universe, you want to address that one? Yes I do have a mother and no she is not in the palace. if you are lucky, you will never meet her". He continued, shuffling before the fountain. " Amplifiers allow Grisha to expand their power. It is an easy way, with little to no training, to face a stronger opponent. Since my younger years, other Grisha have tried to kill me for that use. To pull the bones from my cold flesh and use them as powerful amulets". Kara shivered at the thought and closed her eyes to shut away the mental image. Alexhander continued, " when I was about ten, a group of boys tried to drown me. I escaped and vowed never to trust blindly again".
Kara opened her eyes and Alexhander was struck at how sad she looked. However the show of compassion made him recoil. Her gaze was melting away what little armor he still held around his vulnerability. She licked her lips and hesitated. "Alexhander, do you feel...alone?". His laugh was cold and tainted with melancholy. " Loneliness is in the order of things for those gifted with longevity. As for me, it is the only entity which has been by my side since I can remember. It is a form of company". Kara frowned, " One can feel lonely in a crowded room. YOU seem to always have company in one form or another". She tilted her head, placing the pieces together, " So it's not company you lack, its connection with others". Alexhander stopped his pacing and came to sit slowly by her side. He stared intently at her, " Alright. Let us follow your train of thought. Why do I have so few connections with others?". She stared calmly back, " Because you trust no one enough and that if you did, you would be too afraid to lose them in the end".
Alexhander looked away. Indeed she was frighteningly perceptive. They listened to the evening birds chirping for a while. The silence between them was one of mutual reflection. The Darkling was waiting patiently to see what the healer would deduce. The healer was working out how the previous deductions led to a shadow summoner losing his nerves and destroying a part of the Little Palace. She looked at him and thought that the moment she had been on the brink of being eating away by her nightmares, he had stepped forward and extended a hand. " You really do not trust ANYONE?", she whispered finally. Alexhander raised an eyebrow, " I trust to a certain level. Nothing that would place my life into the hands of another." Kara squeezed her eyes shut, trying to link all the elements together. " If I understand. You do not trust anyone and you have a reason to continue on living despite your near immortality. But to what purpose? You do not seek any connections with those around you and yet you crave the feeling". She tapped a finger to her chin, still thinking. " Have you thought perhaps of having children?".
The general felt as if someone had slapped him across the face. He rose up quickly from his seat on the fountain edge and stepped away. " Is that your remedy to my loneliness?! Having children?!". Kara raised her hands in a plea for patience. " I am merely thinking that a line of descendants would be a very good reason to go on living for years on end". Alexhander spat, " Why is it that you must address all the subjects that no one would dare ask me forthright?! You have a penchant for getting yourself involved in things that surpass your comprehension! To what end? To what end are we having this conversation?!" Kara raised herself slowly, her eyes fierce, " Believe it or not I am trying to help you! whatever you are withholding is burning away at you! How else can you explain that you, of all people, would lose your composure concerning a myth/a legend that may never come?!". Alexhander looked at her breathing hard. He could not say the words aloud. If he said why he was upset, she would mock him, find him flawed and ridiculous, just as his mother did. If she wanted to know, she would have to piece the truth together. Therefore he decided to answer her previous question, " I cannot have children". Kara felt her stomach drop. Her body trembled in a form of echo and the ground seemed far from the soles of her feet. Alexhander sighed, " I have no other evidence than in the decades of relations I have had with different Grisha women, none have carried or birthed children. In terms of statistics, I would therefore say that it might be impossible".
He was stunned to see a tear run down Kara's cheek. Why was she crying? Was her compassion so great that she mourned what he could never have? She wiped her face quickly and cleared her throat. " Alright then, so that is not the reason for your self preservation." Something was whispering that she almost had all the clues in her hands to find out the truth. She tried to think of all she had read concerning Small Science in the library. She called to the farthest reaches of her mind. " So, If you have nothing to hold onto now...You are waiting for something in the future." It was dawning on her, that feeling of a completed puzzle. " Maybe you would want someone as powerful and as long lasting as you as a companion. Or maybe you are looking for an exceptional someone. Someone who might be able to give you something no one else can. Maybe this sun summoner could be all that for you". Alexhander was mute. At last...someone knew.
He whispered, " Do you think me foolish?". It was clear he was heart-broken. Kara knew of unaccomplished hopes and dreams. She wished almost everyday she could have kept her parents. Everyday she wished that one day, she would find a place to settle with people she loved. A place where she would truly BELONG. She also knew somethings, how ever much we wanted them, could stay out of reach. Kara walked closer to him and place a hand to his cheek, forcing him to look at her. " I am not one to judge anyone's hopes and dreams. I understand what you seek. I don't understand how you go about seeking it". Alexhander frowned, " What do you mean?". She sighed, " Your projections are built on "ifs". If the sun summoner man/or woman is found whilst you are alive. If that person is willing to train and accomplish his/her destiny. If that person appreciated you and cares about you. If the sun summoner lives long enough for you to share fond memories. but that is one precise scenario. What if that sun-summoner had no intention of becoming your ally/ your friend or even lover? What if that sun summoner is found but you were killed prior? What if you find the sun summoner but he/she is killed quickly after?". She shook her head, "It's a lot of pressure and a lot to expect from one single individual".
Alexhander smiled sadly, " I do know all this. What would you have me do?". She looked at him trying to find the right words. " You should live as best you can NOW. You may technically be near immortal but you don't KNOW how long you will live. What if everything passes you by on your search for this sun-summoner? What memories will you have to recall on your deathday to sooth your passing?". The darkling laughed. It was coarse and cold, " Those are the reflections of one who is haunted by the thought of death. Coming from an Otkazat'sya, it is to be expected." He leaned back, "I have seen events and lived experiences that most people can only hope to see. I have a thousand sunsets in mind, a thousand sparkling seas and a thousand starlit skies. I have experience much. I am little to no surprises left to experience. I have nothing new to look forward to unless it is exceptionnally rare". He trembled, " I have wonderful memories but no one to share them with. And that is my curse".