Author's Note: Here's the next chapter with the story of how Yuri came to join Lilia's troops. As well as a little something at the end. I hope you enjoy.

An Explanatory Story

Diasomnia

Lilia Vanrouge sighed as he took in Sebek's pale complexion across the lounge. Diasomnia's welcome party was winding down and it wouldn't be long before everyone made their way to their rooms. "Did something happen at Orientation?" Silver asks softly, auroral eyes not leaving his childhood friend who was staying in the corner. Very unlike the outspoken and loud boy. It was rather concerning.

Lilia sighed again. "Yes, actually. It was my fault, so I'll go talk to him." Lilia smiled at his son before heading off to his protégé. "Sebek."

The boy flinched. "Lilia sir!" He yelped. Lilia held back his wince. Yeah, he was really going to need to apologize to the boy.

"Sebek, let's go talk. Okay?" He requested. Sebek nodded and followed his teacher to an upstairs corridor. Only when he was sure they were alone did Lilia speak up again as they stood before one of the many windows. "I'm sorry for what happened earlier Sebek."

"What? No, sir it's-" Sebek stopped himself at the amused look the older one sent his way.

"It's okay Sebek. I know it was... unusual for me. I usually have better control over my emotions. Tonight just... It was a big shock, and I hadn't been prepared for it." Lilia admitted. "But that is no excuse for losing myself as I did and for scaring you. So, I am sorry." Lilia told the boy.

"Can I ask who he was?" Sebek asked after a minute of silence. Lilia sighed. He would need to tell his boys eventually. They knew that he and Baur had fought side by side with a human before. And they also knew that the human was the reason Lilia was still there. He knows he would have died if Yuri had not pushed him off that piece of crumbling cliff, not with how weak the battle before had left him. Along with Malleus, though he hasn't informed the young prince of that detail. If he's honest, he's afraid to do so.

"Do you remember Baur and myself speaking of a comrade we once shared?" Lilia decides to ask, noticing how Silver has come to join them. Obviously worried about both his father and childhood friend.

"One that saved your lives." Sebek replies, also noting Silver but refraining from saying anything about it right then.

"Well, we thought he was a simple human. We first came across him fighting a beast that had attacked human and fey settlements indiscriminately in Briar. We had planned on taking it down ourselves. But we were curious to see what a human could do. He defeated the beast, only to be besieged upon by soldiers. The same ones we were fighting at the time. And as I'm sure the two of you know, fey honor their debts."

The two boys nodded, Silver coming closer to them, now that he'd been acknowledged. "We aided him, though quite a few of us were reluctant to do so. But he had helped out the Briar Lands, so we were honor bound to return that. We won and then the strangest thing happened. He asked if he could join us in our fight. In fey."

"What?!" The two boys were shocked. Humans couldn't speak or understand fey. Their anatomy wasn't built right for such a thing.

"Indeed. It was quite the shock, let me tell you. I didn't want to let him join for many reasons at first, among them being that he was a human child. Or so we thought."

"He wasn't human?" Silver asked, head tilted in curiosity.

Lilia chuckled. "No. He was human. He wasn't a child. He was either blessed or cursed- I'm not sure which- to remain that age for some reason. The other reason was because he was a human among fey. Surely, he wouldn't be able to keep up with us. He would only hold us back. He was determined to join us though. So, I issued a challenge."

"A challenge? What kind of challenge?" Malleus's voice asked, startling the group. Even Lilia.

"You've gotten very good at sneaking up on people Malleus." Lilia chuckled, though it was clearly praise. "I was wondering where you were. You arrived rather late." Lilia scolded lightly.

"I apologize. I was lost in thought." Lilia nodded. He's sure.

"I see. But yes, a challenge. If he could land a hit on me- or brush a strand of hair even- I would allow him to join us. If he couldn't, he would return to wherever he had come from." Lilia huffed, eyes out the window and on the moon above them.

"As I'm sure you've surmised, we underestimated him. But his skills were impressive. He not only landed a hit. But he actually managed to steal my weapon and knock my mask off as well."

"What?!" The trio were shocked. Even Malleus struggled to touch Lilia during spars or training when he joined them. Lilia chuckled.

"Yes, that was quite a similar reaction for the rest of us. So, honor bound by words, we allowed a human to join our troop. And he was a part of our troop for a decade. He was something else, let me tell you. He kept up with us at every turn, revealing that he wasn't a stranger to such treks, so we were never held back. He could handle wild beasts like nothing else. Sometimes he would talk with them, convincing them to leave, or they would run from him in fear just catching a whiff of his scent. One time, he even convinced a hoard of beast to aid us in a particularly grueling fight."

"The times we wound up in fey villages, despite being human, he was adored by children and even their parents. He was infuriatingly good at ambush and stealth tactics. Especially for a human. He was adept with medicine and potions. It took some time for everyone to warm up to him, but he became a core member of the troop. He was even promoted to be my secondary lieutenant- meaning his orders fell just behind Baur's and sometimes before depending on the situation- during his fourth year with us." Lilia smiled at their shocked looks.

"After spending so long with us, our fey scents had started to cover up his own human scent. And he hardly ever got hurt. Honestly, I think we forgot he was even human. Until..." Lilia sighed, allowing his head to fall into his hands.

"Father?" Silver asked, worriedly. None of them had seen the older fey like this before.

"We... It was only his second year with us. Our troop was on the move when he told us that something was off. He was right, of course, but we were nearing Rose Castle. And it would have been our first time back since we had gained our new companion. We were impatient and thought we could make it before anything happened. As a result, we were ambushed." Three sets of eyes widened in shock. "The fight was rather bloody, but thanks to his potions and the warnings he was able to call out to us, we didn't lose anyone. There was a particularly strong weapon with them. An iron fighter. I guess the term for it now a days would be puppet."

"The puppet went after me and at some point, I was too overwhelmed to properly defend myself. Using my focus being on the puppet, the leader of their troop had tried to pull a sneak attack on me. I couldn't move out of the way though, due to being in a locked standstill with the puppet. So, as I'm sure you've guessed by now, he took the hit for me. He managed to disarm and defeat the leading soldier himself. I had just managed to destroy the stupid puppet then." Lilia sighed.

"Seeing both their new weapon and their leader fall, the rest ran away. There was no celebrating their retreat though. Not with one of our own now bleeding out from a sword piercing his stomach. He collapsed and it was like a sudden revelation to us: He was human. And humans were more fragile than we were. They die easily." Lilia looked at his three wards, a sad look on his face as he gazed at them. "We were reminded of that far too abruptly."

"We rushed to the castle, shocking several with our overbearing protectiveness of a mere human. The princess and her consort must have realized though, because he was given proper and fair treatment. He nearly died multiple times. It wasn't like we were used to treating a human's injuries after all. But he pulled through. He would need a couple months or so to fully recover and our troop was made to take a rest while he recovered, as we hadn't had a break in years. And there was no fighting the princess's orders on the matter." he smiled at that before stretching himself.

"He recovered quicker than predicted, which was a good thing. Especially since some of the fey in the castle couldn't stand that there was a human in it. I believe there were two assassination attempts that month. I tried to convince him to leave the war. He had almost died after all. Surely that was a wakeup call to get out while he could, right?" Lilia asked no one in particular. "His reply was that he would see this war through. He was a stubborn one." Lilia shook his head. "We were rather protective at that point though. He had to remind us that he wasn't fragile as glass to get us back on track. But we were all a little more aware of it after that."

Lilia turned, looking at his three charges. He still wasn't able to talk about how Yuri hadn't just saved him, but Malleus as well. So far, he had been able to avoid getting too detailed about the human fey war where he had lost his two best friends, Yuri, and almost Malleus and Baur. Instead, he finished the story with a simple closing. "400 years ago, towards the end of the war, I was severely injured. On our way to Dragonopolis, Briar Valley's capitol, there was an earthquake. I was on the edge of a cliff when it happened. I wasn't able to move from the crumbling cliff in time. So, he pushed me to safety at the cost of his own life. Unable to move, due to the injuries, I could only watch as he fell to his death. Or so I thought."

Lilia smiled softly. "I don't know what miracle allowed it to happen, but that soldier is Yuri, the same human from Orientation." He gave Sebek a glance whose own eyes had widened as he understood. "I thought him dead for 400 years. By all rights, he should have died that night and yet, he woke up in a gate to Night Raven College 400 years from the moment he fell. Officially a part of our school and Diasomnia even. I was upset, Sebek, because of the shock and the head mage's decisions involving Yuri. I don't think he will be given residence in Diasomnia, though I am not sure of the head mage's reasons for making such a decision. Yuri will be coming here tomorrow, so I'll ask him then."

"Have you told Grandfather yet about Yuri being alive?" Sebek asked, curious.

Lilia winced. "Um. I'll be sending him a letter tonight. I expect, if anything, he'll arrive during the October inter dorm spell drive tournament." Lilia chuckled sheepishly before his magenta eyes fell on the moon's position. "It's late and growing children should all be in bed, don't you agree? I believe it's time for the party to end so our students can get settled into their rooms." Lilia said, giving none of them a chance to reply as he made his way back to the lounge. It was late. And Lilia needed some time alone to cope and sort through his tangle of emotions. The others followed in silent rumination.

Ramshackle House: Silent Woods

Yuri glanced around the still forest. It was unusually quiet and still, causing him to tense in preparation for an attack. It wasn't natural. He slowly crept through the woods, not willing to take the open and obvious path. He spotted an old, dilapidated cottage in the distance. He couldn't sense anything from it though, so he chose to continue onwards.

It was a mine entrance. The mouth of the mine was large, dark, and ominous. And the ambient magic felt... gross and slick on his skin. It made his hair stand. But he knew what ever this was about was inside. His eyes narrowed as he slipped inside, staying close to the wall and peaking around the corners. He wasn't sure how long he had moved through the twists and turns of the shafts before a sparkle caught his eye. He couldn't tell what exactly it was at this distance, but it felt magical. And not in the same way the magic of the shafts did. Before he could go to inspect it though, he was brought to his knees as a sudden and vile wave of magic reached his senses, almost causing him to throw up.

It was so disgusting. He could feel the magic slip down his spine like oil. And the taste of rot and taint on his tongue was almost too much to ignore. He knew these feelings, but for the life of him, he could not put a name to them.

Then he saw it. A large shadowy creature he couldn't make out any details of. He knows this is not something he can face in that moment. So, he turns and goes back the way he came. He stops abruptly at the pained keen. It's coming from somewhere down another shaft and really, Yuri can't ignore it. So, he rushes down it. He wonders why he hadn't noticed the magic of the creature, until he realizes that it's magic is so depleted that the ambient wrongness of the mines has covered it. He just catches a glimpse of cerulean before-

Yuri shoots up in his bed, breathing harshly. He wonders what the faded dream had been about, and why he feels like he needs to find something precious before it's gone.