[Tales of Symphonia] A Pawn in Exile, 3/?
A Pawn in Exile
Author: Myaru
Fandom: Tales of Symphonia
Rating: really doesn't need one
Notes: Divergent Timeline, no beta, fewer fucks to give than ever before.
More notes: Life is not treating us kindly. I need something to do.
It’s been so long since I visited Derris Kharlan in-game that I forgot what it looked like, and had to dredge up some screenshots. But that’s okay. You all know I’m in the habit of making shit up anyway if there are holes in the story, or world-building, or dungeon design, or--when I feel like it. I’m sure you’ll deal.
I’ve got a whooooole mythology worked out for this world, of course. Pre-”history” mythology, since, you know, Cruxis. I also have a batshit fangirly string of ideas for how to connect the world of ToS to the world of Berseria, but that’s another story.
I’m probably not the only one who reasoned something like that out, but whatever.
*
Why aren’t there any windows?
Windows are dangerous.
How? I thought this place was run by Cruxis.
A pause. Vinheim was originally a deep space installation. There is a dome, but windows were not included in most quarters for safety reasons.
But--but it isn’t now. In deep space I mean, moving.
We are still far above the atmosphere. If the dome were to break...
Genis knew he slept because the clock--what they called a ‘chronometer’--kept changing, but if anyone had asked (which they didn’t), he would have been convinced he’d been up since being shown to his room. Not a cell, the girl who escorted him insisted, and yet the walls were bare, there was nothing to do, and he wasn’t stupid enough to leave.
Or--maybe he was stupid to not leave and try to escape, whatever that doctor said about the tracking crystal. But deep space installation, he remembered, and high above the atmosphere, which implied there was no air past the dome, and he didn’t know how far that went. All the way to the angel city? He kind of needed air.
There was a legend that Raine told him a long time ago, back when he asked where elves and humans came from. Martel, of course, or the great tree. He knew that. But Genis had wanted to know how, and because Raine probably wasn’t prepared to tell him how babies were made, just then, she said that at home, mother taught her that elves came to Aselia from another planet, and planted the mana tree to bring it to life. Aselia was a bare rock, she said. No trees, no water, no air. The tree took care of all of that, and the great spirits were born from its fruit, the seeds planted so their yield would birth familiar elementals to make sure everything flourished.
Mother’s story didn’t say anything about why the elves left their previous world, or whether humans came with them, or separately. Elves tended not to mention humans unless they had to, Raine said, and then she got annoyed when he kept asking questions about it. Maybe humans were a trial from Martel, she’d said tartly, because they were certainly a trial for her, and so was Genis.
The church taught that Martel created them all, but that couldn’t be true. Not if Martel was just a half-elf, although that would make a weird sort of sense, thinking in terms of fairy tales. He wondered if the libraries Iri said they had passed, on the way to his room, contained some book, scroll, or other means of reading that answered his question.
Since it was boring to sit still, and impossible to escape if there was no air past Vinheim, Genis let himself be lured out by the prospect of knowledge.
The hall was freezing. Iri had found a heavy coat in his size when he complained about that a few days ago (two? three? more?), but the air bit his arms even through the heavy wool. His toes were ice cubes molded into the shape of his boots. The first time he’d seen the palace, all the lights glowed sunny and bright, giving everything a golden sheen; this time they were turned low, blue, like the air rasping in his lungs, and he hoped it was just a reflection of the time. One thirty in the morning, instead of one thirty in the afternoon, as he’d guessed before he left, the lights merely symbolic representation of the time. He told himself that was clever, that it matched the violet glow from the windows, the rumble of the mana storm beyond the barriers, still audible, the power fluctuations enough to make the hair on his arms stand on end. He didn’t think it’d calmed once since he got here.
Turn right at the first corner. Down these stairs. Follow this hall, then turn at the painting of the volcano, and then--doors. The right ones? Genis swallowed, and found out how dry his throat had become. His breath puffed, frosty, when he exhaled. His boots sounded even louder than before, and the low-pitched whine of the door he’d chosen sliding open could have been a dragon’s screech.
But it was warmer inside. The books insulated it. Dumb, Genis told himself, but if dumb ideas kept him warm, so be it.
You could run, his mind helpfully informed him. Actually run. You know where the teleporter is. They’re not expecting trouble from you.
There isn’t even a guard at the door.
Except for a slight tightness of the skin, Genis didn’t notice the crystal anymore. He purposely didn’t see it when he changed clothes. He didn’t touch it now. But he knew it was there, and he’d already tried prying it off. His hands went numb at the thought, and he had to stand at the edge of the red, fringed carpet and focus on how he wasn’t going to do that, definitely wasn’t, it was just a stupid, stray thought, for crying out loud.
The books would distract him. Books always did. Genis looked around.
Blue wasn’t great reading light. He squinted, chose a shelf, moved. Latheon, 388.1 - 390.8, read a label near eye level. The name sounded familiar, so he lingered. Atlas of Latheon. History of the Freyr Family Since Assimilation. Culture and Customs of the Elves of Latheon.
Wait, what?
Obviously, at the time of the publication of these books, Latheon was some sort of country or city state. Assimilation--by whom? The dates at the beginning were incomprehensible, which might mean they were very, very old, because he wasn’t such a rube that he’d neglected to learn the current Tethe’alla calendar. He’d been run off by Raine more than once to make inn reservations while everybody else did something dangerous or fun, and you couldn’t do that without knowing the date. But he didn’t know for sure if his hypothesis was right, of course, and maybe this Latheon place--ah, that’s right. Genis flipped to the table of contents. Latheon Gorge, south of Altessa’s by some way.
So apparently elves had lived there? The map that came with the front matter didn’t feature a ravine or indentation anywhere, or even a river in the general area he was thinking of. Which was… unsettling. The ground didn’t just open up any old place without compelling reasons. Like great spirits, or lights of judgment--
The door slid open. Behind him the room got noticeably colder for the space of a puff of air, like a breath, and then it closed again. Genis’s insides were frozen now, too. He decided to hope. “Iri,” he said out loud, pretending his reading of the map hadn’t come to a screeching halt with the whine of the door, “I can’t make sense of these dates. Could you--”
“Help? Of course.”
Not Iri’s voice.
Oh Martel, he thought, using her name out of habit, and that fluttery feeling dropped back into his stomach. His legs felt like rubber again, ready to drop him the moment his knees weren’t locked. Genis knew she wasn’t real, but prayed anyway. Martel could’ve helped him if the stories were true, but nope, she was just a great exercise in how nations or powers could deify their founders over the course of hundreds of years as long as all the evidence was destroyed--
Mithos, still appearing as they’d known each other at Altessa’s, came even with him after an eternity, tucking hair behind his ear. He peered over Genis’s shoulder, then at the shelf. “Latheon lost their sovereignty about a hundred years into the war,” Mithos said, tone casual, as if they were discussing one of Raine’s textbooks over the table at Altessa’s house. “The dates are slippery, because they followed an elven calendar before that, but they were forced to switch to Tethe’alla’s calendar when they were assimilated, and then they insisted on using the international system for all of their publications.” He shrugged. “This means--” he turned back to the front matter. “It was published about fifty years before the end of the war.”
The Kharlan War, Genis guessed. There weren’t any others--were there? “So the dates change after that. Makes sense.”
“Differently in the two regions, as well,” Mithos confirmed. He looked at Genis, his gaze half-obscured by golden hair. “What is it that caught your interest about it?”
Genis snapped the book shut because his hands wanted to shake, and he didn’t want it to show. He put it back on the shelf. “I was just curious.” He stared at the shelf, the different colored spines pressed neatly together in a chaotic rainbow. “I just--” Just what? Wanted something to do? Wanted to escape? Literally or figuratively would be fine. “I can’t sleep. I started walking.”
Mithos relieved him of his regard, tracing the spine of the atlas. “You weren’t in your room, so I wondered.”
“Wondered what?” Genis forced a laugh, which didn’t come out as casual as he hoped. There was more scorn in it than he intended, all turned toward himself. “Wondered if I was trying to escape? You know me better than that. I’m too much of a coward to risk anything.”
“Why do you say that about yourself?” Mithos turned on him suddenly, looking suddenly infinitely taller, his narrow eyes infinitely sharper. “You’re not fooling anyone.”
What? Genis turned his head, wished he hadn’t when he caught the full weight of the other boy’s gaze. Boy. Not a boy, no, not anywhere near that. Sometimes the truth felt so obvious that he couldn’t believe they’d all missed it--like when it stared him in the face with more force than Raine when she was pissed that he snuck out the window at night. “I’m not trying to fool you,” he said, determined not to flinch.
Mithos watched him for a few long seconds. “Why do you think you’re a coward?”
Genis clenched his teeth around the urge to shout, but the answer came out anyway. “Because I’m scared of everything, can’t you tell?” He looked down at his shaking hands. Then he shoved them into his pockets and glared at the books, because they were safe. “Lloyd wouldn’t have been afraid to talk to you about the pipes,” he explained when he saw, in his peripheral vision, Mithos lift his brows like he didn’t understand. “Lloyd would have been out of his room in a flash to escape, he’d be down on the surface again already, he’d--he’d not have been--” Been caught, become a hostage, or a prisoner, or whatever Genis was.
“So you were afraid? I couldn’t tell at the time, to be honest with you. Come here.” Mithos gripped one of Genis’s shoulders and pulled him away from the shelves, across the rug. There was a couch--that’s right; he remembered seeing it when he walked in and then dismissed it, thinking it looked uncomfortable. And anyway, it was too far away from the books. Mithos led him that way and pressed down on his shoulders until Genis let his knees give way and he plopped down on the cushion. “Lloyd isn’t here, and you are,” Mithos said, sitting down. “I’d much rather have you.”
Genis stared at his hands, wished for gloves. His fingers were freezing just like his toes. “Why?” His voice trembled, and he hated it, and himself. It wasn’t tears. This was a stupid thing to get weepy about, but--he reminded himself firmly, nobody could be blamed for being scared out of their mind in this place. “All I’m good for is a hostage trade for Colette--”
“I want you to know that I wouldn’t put up with this foolishness from anyone else,” Mithos said sharply. He sighed when he felt Genis flinch. “Genis, a coward wouldn’t have confronted me about the panpipes.” For a moment, his lips flattened to a line. “A coward wouldn’t have thrown that spell at me when I threatened his friends in the sacrificial temple downstairs.”
The sacrificial what? Oh, right--the floor of the tower.
The image sent another chill to his belly. Sacrificial chamber… “I had to,” Genis said. His voice scraped, or maybe that was the cold air in his throat. “If I had been wrong…”
Well, he’d been afraid of hurting Mithos, that night. The idea was absurd now. Stupid, even. Genis knew he wasn’t bad with artes, not bad at all, but he couldn’t imagine winning a fight against Mithos while alone, and his words--anything he might have said--were probably as strong as spitballs hitting a chalkboard. If Genis hadn’t run out of ways to call himself an idiot over that, he’d still be at it.
“If you had been wrong--then what?”
Genis wanted to laugh, and managed a cough. He never imagined they’d have this conversation. “Well if I had been wrong, and you were just an innocent kid, being accused--”
He let it hang there, an awkward ending.
I hate this. Why am I even talking? Genis felt his eyes grow hot again. I should shut up and go to my room.
Sun-warm, soft, dry, firm, Mithos’s hands pressed into his, thawing the ice. “Maybe,” he said more softly, “you should consider my point of view on the matter of cowardice.” His tone persuaded Genis to look up, look at him, to find an expression carefully blank except for one eyebrow that arched slightly when Mithos added, “and you may as well get used to the idea that I’m usually right.”
For a moment, Genis wanted to laugh. It wasn’t a joke; he knew it wasn’t, but in any other circumstance, someone claiming to be right all the time was asking for a takedown. “You’re crazy.” He wasn’t sure if he meant it or not.
“Others have said so,” Mithos replied. “Most of them are dead, but I like you too much for that.” There wasn’t a threat in his voice; at least, Genis didn’t think he heard one. His hands dropped in his lap, but only because Mithos slid an arm around his waist to pull him up. “Now, you need sleep, so come on.”
*
Wherever he was when he woke up, Genis felt warm. Crisp sheets against one arm, and heavy, velvety blankets under the other, told him he definitely wasn’t in his assigned room. That bed was decent, but not comfortable. He didn’t sink into that mattress like he sank into this one. This room, this bed, smelled like a gentle breeze through a forest of fir and aspen, warmed by an early autumn sun. Like fresh linens dried in the sun-drenched lavender fields outside Iselia. He opened his eyes.
That’s right.
This bedchamber was proof of how much Mithos liked green. Green, gold, and blues of every shade. The blanket his right hand had traced was a velvety brocade of lighter green leaves on a deep green field, and subtle, thread-of-gold accents. If Genis let his eyes unfocus slightly, he could imagine the bed sat in a little pocket of forest, with the bronzed curtains and their white linings being trees and the spaces between, the thick green rugs as grass, the bluish tint of the flagstone floor beneath as the hint of a stream creeping along the walls.
Briefly, as he sat up, Genis ran his hands over the blanket and tried to get his mind back on track with thinking important things. Escape. No, gaining trust, and then escape. No, sneaking out of here without drawing attention, so he could get lost trying to find his room again. No--instead, his imagination nagged him with questions like, why are there curtains when this place is at the heart of the building and there are no windows? Because that mattered. Yeah, that was of the utmost importance.
He scowled. But why did Mithos even have a bed, or a room? Genis thought angels didn’t have to sleep. And yet, Mithos had often slept with him when they traveled together, so maybe--?
Of course, said the part of his mind that called itself Common Sense, he could have been play-acting. Once you were out he could just sit up and leave. Everyone knows you sleep like a rock.
He told that voice to shut up.
Genis did not sleep like a rock. He didn’t pop up at the slightest sound like his sister did, that was all.
A long, diagonal crease made his shirt hang slightly off kilter when he got up and tried to straighten his clothes. Uniforms invited certain expectations from the viewer, which was why he’d always hated formal wear like this, but the wrinkles bothered him. The jacket hid them mostly, though he didn’t button it up. His coat wasn’t anywhere he could find it.
The air in the next room felt slightly cooler on Genis’s cheeks, but not cold. Walls, carpet, curtains, they were all white, made him feel like he stood out in black, but there were nice touches that made the room feel less sterile, like a deep green blanket on the arm of a chair, gold embroidery on the sofa pillows, golden light from a lamp hanging from the ceiling on a brass chain, its paper shade painted with leaves and flower shapes that looked vaguely familiar. Mithos reclined on the sofa with his feet braced on a low table, still wearing the shape Genis was most familiar with. He held a book up with both hands; the purple cover hid his face from this angle. The title stood out in bold white letters: Culture and Customs of the Elves of Latheon.
Genis padded closer. His fingers twitched. “I thought elves lived in Heimdall,” he said softly, because the quiet of the room demanded a low voice.
Mithos lowered the book and quickly sat up, place kept with one finger between the pages. “How are you feeling now?” He accepted a shrug in response, though he stared intently for a few seconds that felt like forever, before he looked down at the book and answered Genis’s unspoken question. “There were settlements by different family groups,” Mithos said. “Mostly on that central continent, around the tower. Almost all of them were gone by the time I was born.”
There was no point in standing there, like he’d been called to the teacher’s office. Genis went to sit on the sofa, hesitating only slightly before he sat down. Way better than the one in the library, he decided. Softer. Meant for lounging, the way Mithos had been doing. “Why?”
“We don’t know.” Mithos found the ribbon sewn into the cover and used it to mark his place. “There have been studies. Low birth rates, some say. The war. Half-elves.”
The last suggestion came with a roll of the eyes. Genis ripped his own gaze back to the book. “Do you… do you have those studies?”
“We have everything. Everything we can get our hands on.” Mithos offered the book to him. “I marked the place you should start.”
Everything. Not possible, Genis’s common sense claimed. But Iri had mentioned libraries in the plural, indicating the entire corridor--and it wasn’t a short corridor. And there was a lot of data in the computers. He could tell from the length of the table of contents, though he didn’t know how to access all of it. “How?”
“I like books.” Mithos got up and stretched, leaving the book on the cushions between them. He stared at the ceiling. “There isn’t much to do during the long intervals. Plenty of time to catch up on recent publications.”
Genis touched the book, ran his fingers along the cover. “Even though it’s all mostly written by humans, huh.”
“Humans are resourceful. If they would stop being such prejudiced--”
He looked up, not expecting that Mithos would stop. But his host only straightened his posture, clasped his hands at his back,and shrugged.
Genis didn’t disagree, but that criticism of humans cut the other way, too. “How many rooms--I mean…?”
“Seventeen, plus the data banks I promised on the Kharlan War. I guarantee you’ll never find a resource this good anywhere else.”
His mouth dropped open. Seventeen libraries? That was insane! Even that wouldn’t be close to enough if they really had everything, but… but Genis made his mouth close and held onto the volume of Culture and Customs with his fingertips. Was it an original? A book that dated back to the great war, that escaped the destruction of the ages? Would his greasy, unangelic fingers damage the paper?
That was a thought. Originals, in a bookcase without shielding--there was no dust in the air, no moisture if his flaky dry lips were good indication, so maybe an ancient book would be okay, but if he cared about preservation at all--
“You know,” Mithos said casually, “you were asleep for seventeen hours.”
Genis’s speculations dug their heels in and skidded to a stop. “What?” he asked intelligently.
Mithos wasn’t smiling, though the corner of his mouth did twitch up slightly at the stupid response. “Tell me the truth, Genis: have you been sleeping?”
“Of course.” He went to bed at the same time every night, according to the clock. Genis frowned. “I don’t know exactly how long. I can’t tell the difference…” He couldn’t tell the difference between night and day. If the lighting in the halls was symbolic, it was the first he’d seen one way or the other.
“Please understand,” Mithos said. “We’ve been keeping an eye on your vital signs because of some problems with our location. They don’t affect angels, but you’re different. And--they say you’re not sleeping or eating enough.”
Genis had always been different, and never in a good way. That was nothing new. “So you’re spying on me, basically.”
“Kenaz said he told you about that.”
Yeah, and there was Iri, so it wasn’t like Genis felt surprised. In fact, what surprised him was how much he couldn’t scrape up the urge to care.
“You’re having trouble. Are you scared?”
Why should he care? And wasn’t that a dumb question when Genis had just told him--seventeen hours ago--that he was scared of everything? The stupid storm never stopped. It was always humming in the background like a hive of bees, making the air feel like static shock and making his skin itch at weird intervals, like water skimmers skittering all over his back. Sometimes he heard a distant drumbeat of thunder, the crack of lightning, maybe dancing across the dome as it sought a way in, to break the glass. As a child Genis learned to master his fear of storms by sitting still and trying to suss out the different elements at play: the gentle smell of the rain, the surge of mana with each gust of wind. From the center of a study circle, which let him feel and even see mana, lightning appeared just like it did when his eyes were open, in a flash of power and brightness that fizzed out like a fire under a heavy drizzle.
Derris Kharlan’s storm had no element. It was a single sheet of brightness across the windows, if ice could be made of light.
“Who wouldn’t be?” he finally said.
Mithos came back to the sofa, this time sitting on the other side, squished between the arm and Genis so he was a warm pressure, with their arms pressed together, the jut of their hips, their feet touching. “I’m so used to this place it never occurred to me. I’m sorry.”
The apology didn’t fit him. Genis told himself he was lucky to get one, but stared at Mithos, at his pale profile and the gleam of lamplight on his green eyes, and tried to remind himself of other times he’d heard an apology from the other boy. Not the laughing sorry, sorry! when a wave smashed them together at the beach, but a real admission that something wasn’t right. This is the lord of Cruxis, Genis reminded himself. This was Yggdrasil. Did Yggdrasil apologize to people and mean it? “It’s--there’s no reason for you to have known.”
“Of course there is.” The tone Mithos came back with was uncompromising, befitting the image Genis tried to force back into his own head to remind himself who he was speaking to. “If you were a prisoner, I’d want you to sweat a little. This is different.”
That was a little more honest than Genis wanted. He tried to say everything was okay, but nothing came out of his mouth.
“Is it better in here?”
Genis blinked over at him. The room? He watched Mithos tilt his head at the bedroom door, as if he’d heard the question. “It’s… quieter.”
“Can you still feel the storm?”
“A--a little bit.” His skin wasn’t crawling. Definitely a plus.
If he hadn’t known better, known who was sitting next to him and holding his hand again, the smile Mithos turned on him would have been sweet. Warm. “Would you like to stay here instead?”
Genis wasn’t stupid. HIs heart sprang in his chest, but he thought about going back to his room, told himself he should get out and do that, right now. He’d find the way by himself. Or maybe he’d call Iri and get her to guide him, to translate terminals for him.
His lips formed the answer, his voice coming out in jolt. “Yes.”
*
Half-expecting to be confronted by a paragraph on elven prejudices against other races, when he opened the book Mithos had tempted him with the night before, Genis discovered a genealogy chart. Five important families, their traits and ranks and known talents, names for places they went off to when they abandoned the first colony to start others--none of which existed now. The book didn’t know where they were either, and speculated about so-called modern locations to match ancient names. A little further, there was a chapter on spirit worship. Then language, and then artes.
He flipped straight to that one after perusing the generational charts. Raine knew the basics of training because their mother taught her, but there was too much she didn’t get to learn. Genis had to experiment on his own, try to figure out the nuances of each element, hope he could put out fires when he made a mistake. Literal fires. He burned Raine’s rose bushes to the ground once, and gotten the whopping of his lifetime to date, but he knew it could have been much worse. It could’ve been their house on fire because he made a mistake. Or his hair.
Iri appeared while he was reading that chapter, with a white plastic box in her arms. Food, she told him with the usual lack of inflection; she was told he hadn’t been eating enough, and was sent to gather ingredients he might like better. The rooms Mithos lived in were equipped with a kitchen, almost like a normal apartment, although Genis knew when they entered that it had never been used--or rarely was. Too clean. The pans were perfect, spotless, new. The sink and faucet reflected his distorted shape with mirror-like silvery steel unmarred by a single trace of water staining or fingerprints. The cupboards were empty except for dishes, glassware, silverware.
“I thought nobody could leave,” Genis said.
Iri shrugged. “Desians cultivate food on certain levels of the tower while they wait for the balance to turn,” she said.
He’d never thought about it. Just assumed that as soon as the regeneration was complete in one world, they hopped over to the other and started up operations. “How can you stand them?”
She paused, hands in the box. Looked at him. For a few seconds Genis thought she might glare at him, but Iri had a good, hard stare, the kind that would feel disapproving or downright scary if she bothered to express any other emotion. “I do not associate with them often,” she said finally. “There is bad blood.”
Genis watched her unpack: canvas bags stuffed with produce like leeks, onions, spinach, squash, some fruit; a clear, hard package of a dozen eggs, jars of brightly-colored pickles in yellow, pink, green. A sack of grain that rustled when she set it down. A heavy jug of something. Pots of spices, though he couldn’t tell which off the top of his head because their scents had mixed together into a pungent wall of nose-tickling smell.
“There won’t be meat for a while,” Iri said, leading the way to the cold storage. “Not until surface access is restored.”
So they couldn’t cultivate livestock in the tower. Made sense. But Genis wanted to know more about the other thing she said. “Do Desians and angels not get along?” For real, he thought; not just because of the upper ranks.
Iri unbuttoned her jacket, laid it over one of the high chairs pushed in at the island counter. A hint of a golden choker showed above the high collar of her blouse. “Can you cook?” she asked instead of answering.
Of course he could. Genis wasn’t a spoiled child, no matter what Zelos said about him. You want to talk about spoiled, Genis had once said; I don’t have a butler to do everything for me. Can you use the chamber pot by yourself?
Oh, that had been a good row, funny and satisfying, even if the idiot Chosen had also gotten in a few good zingers.
Iri said she’d do the chopping, so he gave her the leeks and the spinach, and found other stuff: flour, butter, sugar, salt. Enough to make a crust. Genis hunted around for a bowl and wondered if everyone had been captured by the Renegades. Mithos never said. They had to be looking for Genis by now. It had been what, a week? Maybe less, but nobody would tell him that, either. Somehow Mithos always managed to distract him. They knew he was gone, that was for sure. Either they were in a bunch of cells in one of those bases, or--or.
Or what? There weren’t many possibilities. No matter how cowardly Genis was, he’d never have run away and deserted them if he knew there was trouble, and Lloyd would know that. Raine would know.
If Colette were missing, and Genis still there, he’d speculate one of the two opposing groups. Possibly Tethe’alla, because they had reasons to want her dead, but that was on the outside edge of being likely, and absolutely irrelevant if they were looking for him.
“What are we making?”
Genis glanced at Iri, fingers caked with flour and butter. It must have been a long time since she’d eaten if she didn’t recognize the ingredients on the counter. “Quiche,” he said. “It might not be as good without cheese, though.”
She looked down at the cutting board. The leeks were sliced paper thin and gathered in a mound at the corner. She washed and patted the spinach dry when he instructed her to. “I will remember to look for some next time,” she said.
It wasn’t a big deal, he told her, cleaning his hands, measuring out water. Dough was supposed to chill before being baked, but Genis felt his stomach rumble, and he decided to just press it into the pan. Chilling it was usually only possible during the winter anyway, so he wouldn’t bother. The crust would be crumbly but tasty. “Are you allowed to answer questions?”
Iri gathered the leeks and dropped them into the bowl he pointed to. “That depends on the question.”
Genis tried to crack the eggs gently, but ended up having to fish bits of shell out of the bowl. “All the angels I’ve met have been like you: quiet and--and…” And motionless? Heartless? “Just, calm,” he decided, fumbling for a better word. “Except for Remiel. Why? Was he--abnormal?”
Besides the obvious, that is.
She added the spinach. When he looked at her, a line had appeared between her brows, like she didn’t understand. “Why do you want to know…?”
Was that actually a borderline question? “Because Colette seems completely normal now that she has a keycrest--”
“You traveled with the Chosen?” Iri said sharply.
Genis almost jumped. Almost. An expression finally painted her face, like it did her voice: alarm. “Um--” he said helpfully.
Iri spun around and strode for the door so fast he couldn’t get any other words out. It whirred closed behind her. A few seconds of breathing later, the sound of the outer door reached him.
“I guess she didn’t know,” Genis said to the empty room. Yellow egg dripped from the whisk in long ropes, curling back into the bowl. His stomach growled, reminding him the oven was on and he had better get going if he wanted to eat.
Still. What was that about?
*
Several hours later, Genis heard the outer doors open again. He was on the couch with the book on elves, leftover quiche in the cold storage cabinet that he still didn’t have a name for. This wouldn’t be Mithos, surely, because he said he’d be gone for a while--again. No--it was Iri. Her mask was back in place, a solid lack of expression that dared him to surprise her again.
“I thought you knew,” Genis said. “I’m sorry.”
“You’ve done nothing wrong,” Iri said.
Her voice didn’t match her face. It still had expression in it, but Genis didn’t know what. “Remiel was a real jerk,” he said, looking down at the book without seeing the pages. “I wanted to know why, that’s all.” Why he faked his relation to Colette, for example, or why he felt the need to kill them all even before Lloyd provoked him.
“I have never liked him,” Iri said. “The previous Herald was better. Kinder.”
Genis watched her face. Still nothing, but she didn’t quite look at him--more at a point over his shoulder, where curtains covered some sort of screen. “There are others?” They’d gotten stuck with the bad one?
Iri glanced at him quickly, a flick of her eyes. She didn’t sit, even when he pointed to the couch, the chairs, choosing to stand before him like a student before an angry teacher. “Were,” she corrected. “Cassiel died during a--an abnormal ritual, similar to the one you experienced.”
As far as Genis knew, nothing about the ‘ritual’ in the tower had been abnormal, except for the fact they fought back. The hair on his arms stood up. Priests usually accompanied the Chosen, Kratos told them a long time ago. But because of the attack on the temple, too many were injured or dead, and then there were the mysterious assassins. Kratos and Raine were supposed to accompany them, and then became the only companions still standing.
Priests wouldn’t have rebelled. Colette would be dead if not for the Renegades attacking Iselia.
“Your Chosen is a beacon of hope,” Iri said. “For us as well.”
“Is?” Genis asked. They’d been calling her “useless” before.
Iri flicked her gaze to him again, then back to the curtains. “You must think we are all cold and cruel. That all in Cruxis care only for the vessel, and not the lives lost in the process of reviving Martel.”
Yeah. Every single thing ever said to Genis by an angel expressed those very feelings.
His expression must have said it all--the things he thought, the ones he just felt. She turned her gaze down, so all he got was the brassy glint of her pale lashes in the overhead light. “You may be right,” she said slowly, as if picking her words carefully. “But if your Chosen is not the vessel we hope, she may still get up and walk away.”
Genis felt his throat go tight. “That’s not what it sounded like to me. Those coffins…”
“Many die,” Iri confirmed. “Some go mad long before they reach the tower. But those of us who come closest to Lord Yggdrasil’s ideal are not consumed.”
“I’ve never heard of another Chosen leaving the tower,” Genis said. “Never. Everybody would know it if they did.” Well, except for Spiritua, but she’d been set loose in Tethe’alla apparently, not--wait. Something she’d said nagged him, made him pause. Those of us who come closest. Genis heard the paper crackle in his fist and looked down, made himself snap the book closed before he tore a page. “Sent to the other world?”
Wait a minute.
“Yes.”
“But--” Genis searched for a hint of an expression in Iri’s face, and found none. “You?”
“Yes.”
“Why? Why are you working with--for--?”
“I hoped to see someone else accomplish what I could not. Perhaps your friend Colette will be the one. But if she is not…”
Then she can survive. Genis felt a bubble of hope and swallowed it. “But if she is the one, then she dies.”
“Then no one else will suffer,” Iri corrected. “A successful transfer means an end to suffering.”
Not for him. Not for Lloyd, or Sheena, or Colette’s parents. If the so-called emptiness created by Colette’s crystal meant what he thought it did, then when Martel took root in her body, Colette would suffer too, forever, unable to speak or talk or move, unable to see or feel, forbidden from living in her own body. “Weren’t you locked into your crystal?” Genis said, wondering how to make her see sense.
“For a time.” Iri wove her fingers together, still refusing to meet his stare. “He woke me to see if--to ask for a final request.”
So life wasn’t a guarantee, then. Genis wondered if she realized what she’d said when she paused, but she went on.
“I said I wanted to be an angel. He did not deny me, as you see.”
Genis stared at her collar, wondered if the choker was a key crest, if it looked like the crystal Colette wore.
“Others sleep. I don’t know how many. Perhaps only one or two. A close match like myself and your friend is not common.”
More Chosen. Others like Colette, who had experienced what she did, knew her pain. He wondered what they would say if someone awakened them; if they would believe--or pretend to believe--what Iri said, that they were honored to serve and hoped one of their own would bring an end to suffering.
“Were you from Tethe’alla?” Genis finally asked. She shook her head. Silvarant, then, only he didn’t recall any Chosen named Iri, and he had memorized all of the names for school. “So what’s your name?”
“Spiritua,” she said.
*
Author: Myaru
Fandom: Tales of Symphonia
Rating: really doesn't need one
Notes: Divergent Timeline, no beta, fewer fucks to give than ever before.
More notes: Life is not treating us kindly. I need something to do.
It’s been so long since I visited Derris Kharlan in-game that I forgot what it looked like, and had to dredge up some screenshots. But that’s okay. You all know I’m in the habit of making shit up anyway if there are holes in the story, or world-building, or dungeon design, or--when I feel like it. I’m sure you’ll deal.
I’ve got a whooooole mythology worked out for this world, of course. Pre-”history” mythology, since, you know, Cruxis. I also have a batshit fangirly string of ideas for how to connect the world of ToS to the world of Berseria, but that’s another story.
I’m probably not the only one who reasoned something like that out, but whatever.
*
Why aren’t there any windows?
Windows are dangerous.
How? I thought this place was run by Cruxis.
A pause. Vinheim was originally a deep space installation. There is a dome, but windows were not included in most quarters for safety reasons.
But--but it isn’t now. In deep space I mean, moving.
We are still far above the atmosphere. If the dome were to break...
Genis knew he slept because the clock--what they called a ‘chronometer’--kept changing, but if anyone had asked (which they didn’t), he would have been convinced he’d been up since being shown to his room. Not a cell, the girl who escorted him insisted, and yet the walls were bare, there was nothing to do, and he wasn’t stupid enough to leave.
Or--maybe he was stupid to not leave and try to escape, whatever that doctor said about the tracking crystal. But deep space installation, he remembered, and high above the atmosphere, which implied there was no air past the dome, and he didn’t know how far that went. All the way to the angel city? He kind of needed air.
There was a legend that Raine told him a long time ago, back when he asked where elves and humans came from. Martel, of course, or the great tree. He knew that. But Genis had wanted to know how, and because Raine probably wasn’t prepared to tell him how babies were made, just then, she said that at home, mother taught her that elves came to Aselia from another planet, and planted the mana tree to bring it to life. Aselia was a bare rock, she said. No trees, no water, no air. The tree took care of all of that, and the great spirits were born from its fruit, the seeds planted so their yield would birth familiar elementals to make sure everything flourished.
Mother’s story didn’t say anything about why the elves left their previous world, or whether humans came with them, or separately. Elves tended not to mention humans unless they had to, Raine said, and then she got annoyed when he kept asking questions about it. Maybe humans were a trial from Martel, she’d said tartly, because they were certainly a trial for her, and so was Genis.
The church taught that Martel created them all, but that couldn’t be true. Not if Martel was just a half-elf, although that would make a weird sort of sense, thinking in terms of fairy tales. He wondered if the libraries Iri said they had passed, on the way to his room, contained some book, scroll, or other means of reading that answered his question.
Since it was boring to sit still, and impossible to escape if there was no air past Vinheim, Genis let himself be lured out by the prospect of knowledge.
The hall was freezing. Iri had found a heavy coat in his size when he complained about that a few days ago (two? three? more?), but the air bit his arms even through the heavy wool. His toes were ice cubes molded into the shape of his boots. The first time he’d seen the palace, all the lights glowed sunny and bright, giving everything a golden sheen; this time they were turned low, blue, like the air rasping in his lungs, and he hoped it was just a reflection of the time. One thirty in the morning, instead of one thirty in the afternoon, as he’d guessed before he left, the lights merely symbolic representation of the time. He told himself that was clever, that it matched the violet glow from the windows, the rumble of the mana storm beyond the barriers, still audible, the power fluctuations enough to make the hair on his arms stand on end. He didn’t think it’d calmed once since he got here.
Turn right at the first corner. Down these stairs. Follow this hall, then turn at the painting of the volcano, and then--doors. The right ones? Genis swallowed, and found out how dry his throat had become. His breath puffed, frosty, when he exhaled. His boots sounded even louder than before, and the low-pitched whine of the door he’d chosen sliding open could have been a dragon’s screech.
But it was warmer inside. The books insulated it. Dumb, Genis told himself, but if dumb ideas kept him warm, so be it.
You could run, his mind helpfully informed him. Actually run. You know where the teleporter is. They’re not expecting trouble from you.
There isn’t even a guard at the door.
Except for a slight tightness of the skin, Genis didn’t notice the crystal anymore. He purposely didn’t see it when he changed clothes. He didn’t touch it now. But he knew it was there, and he’d already tried prying it off. His hands went numb at the thought, and he had to stand at the edge of the red, fringed carpet and focus on how he wasn’t going to do that, definitely wasn’t, it was just a stupid, stray thought, for crying out loud.
The books would distract him. Books always did. Genis looked around.
Blue wasn’t great reading light. He squinted, chose a shelf, moved. Latheon, 388.1 - 390.8, read a label near eye level. The name sounded familiar, so he lingered. Atlas of Latheon. History of the Freyr Family Since Assimilation. Culture and Customs of the Elves of Latheon.
Wait, what?
Obviously, at the time of the publication of these books, Latheon was some sort of country or city state. Assimilation--by whom? The dates at the beginning were incomprehensible, which might mean they were very, very old, because he wasn’t such a rube that he’d neglected to learn the current Tethe’alla calendar. He’d been run off by Raine more than once to make inn reservations while everybody else did something dangerous or fun, and you couldn’t do that without knowing the date. But he didn’t know for sure if his hypothesis was right, of course, and maybe this Latheon place--ah, that’s right. Genis flipped to the table of contents. Latheon Gorge, south of Altessa’s by some way.
So apparently elves had lived there? The map that came with the front matter didn’t feature a ravine or indentation anywhere, or even a river in the general area he was thinking of. Which was… unsettling. The ground didn’t just open up any old place without compelling reasons. Like great spirits, or lights of judgment--
The door slid open. Behind him the room got noticeably colder for the space of a puff of air, like a breath, and then it closed again. Genis’s insides were frozen now, too. He decided to hope. “Iri,” he said out loud, pretending his reading of the map hadn’t come to a screeching halt with the whine of the door, “I can’t make sense of these dates. Could you--”
“Help? Of course.”
Not Iri’s voice.
Oh Martel, he thought, using her name out of habit, and that fluttery feeling dropped back into his stomach. His legs felt like rubber again, ready to drop him the moment his knees weren’t locked. Genis knew she wasn’t real, but prayed anyway. Martel could’ve helped him if the stories were true, but nope, she was just a great exercise in how nations or powers could deify their founders over the course of hundreds of years as long as all the evidence was destroyed--
Mithos, still appearing as they’d known each other at Altessa’s, came even with him after an eternity, tucking hair behind his ear. He peered over Genis’s shoulder, then at the shelf. “Latheon lost their sovereignty about a hundred years into the war,” Mithos said, tone casual, as if they were discussing one of Raine’s textbooks over the table at Altessa’s house. “The dates are slippery, because they followed an elven calendar before that, but they were forced to switch to Tethe’alla’s calendar when they were assimilated, and then they insisted on using the international system for all of their publications.” He shrugged. “This means--” he turned back to the front matter. “It was published about fifty years before the end of the war.”
The Kharlan War, Genis guessed. There weren’t any others--were there? “So the dates change after that. Makes sense.”
“Differently in the two regions, as well,” Mithos confirmed. He looked at Genis, his gaze half-obscured by golden hair. “What is it that caught your interest about it?”
Genis snapped the book shut because his hands wanted to shake, and he didn’t want it to show. He put it back on the shelf. “I was just curious.” He stared at the shelf, the different colored spines pressed neatly together in a chaotic rainbow. “I just--” Just what? Wanted something to do? Wanted to escape? Literally or figuratively would be fine. “I can’t sleep. I started walking.”
Mithos relieved him of his regard, tracing the spine of the atlas. “You weren’t in your room, so I wondered.”
“Wondered what?” Genis forced a laugh, which didn’t come out as casual as he hoped. There was more scorn in it than he intended, all turned toward himself. “Wondered if I was trying to escape? You know me better than that. I’m too much of a coward to risk anything.”
“Why do you say that about yourself?” Mithos turned on him suddenly, looking suddenly infinitely taller, his narrow eyes infinitely sharper. “You’re not fooling anyone.”
What? Genis turned his head, wished he hadn’t when he caught the full weight of the other boy’s gaze. Boy. Not a boy, no, not anywhere near that. Sometimes the truth felt so obvious that he couldn’t believe they’d all missed it--like when it stared him in the face with more force than Raine when she was pissed that he snuck out the window at night. “I’m not trying to fool you,” he said, determined not to flinch.
Mithos watched him for a few long seconds. “Why do you think you’re a coward?”
Genis clenched his teeth around the urge to shout, but the answer came out anyway. “Because I’m scared of everything, can’t you tell?” He looked down at his shaking hands. Then he shoved them into his pockets and glared at the books, because they were safe. “Lloyd wouldn’t have been afraid to talk to you about the pipes,” he explained when he saw, in his peripheral vision, Mithos lift his brows like he didn’t understand. “Lloyd would have been out of his room in a flash to escape, he’d be down on the surface again already, he’d--he’d not have been--” Been caught, become a hostage, or a prisoner, or whatever Genis was.
“So you were afraid? I couldn’t tell at the time, to be honest with you. Come here.” Mithos gripped one of Genis’s shoulders and pulled him away from the shelves, across the rug. There was a couch--that’s right; he remembered seeing it when he walked in and then dismissed it, thinking it looked uncomfortable. And anyway, it was too far away from the books. Mithos led him that way and pressed down on his shoulders until Genis let his knees give way and he plopped down on the cushion. “Lloyd isn’t here, and you are,” Mithos said, sitting down. “I’d much rather have you.”
Genis stared at his hands, wished for gloves. His fingers were freezing just like his toes. “Why?” His voice trembled, and he hated it, and himself. It wasn’t tears. This was a stupid thing to get weepy about, but--he reminded himself firmly, nobody could be blamed for being scared out of their mind in this place. “All I’m good for is a hostage trade for Colette--”
“I want you to know that I wouldn’t put up with this foolishness from anyone else,” Mithos said sharply. He sighed when he felt Genis flinch. “Genis, a coward wouldn’t have confronted me about the panpipes.” For a moment, his lips flattened to a line. “A coward wouldn’t have thrown that spell at me when I threatened his friends in the sacrificial temple downstairs.”
The sacrificial what? Oh, right--the floor of the tower.
The image sent another chill to his belly. Sacrificial chamber… “I had to,” Genis said. His voice scraped, or maybe that was the cold air in his throat. “If I had been wrong…”
Well, he’d been afraid of hurting Mithos, that night. The idea was absurd now. Stupid, even. Genis knew he wasn’t bad with artes, not bad at all, but he couldn’t imagine winning a fight against Mithos while alone, and his words--anything he might have said--were probably as strong as spitballs hitting a chalkboard. If Genis hadn’t run out of ways to call himself an idiot over that, he’d still be at it.
“If you had been wrong--then what?”
Genis wanted to laugh, and managed a cough. He never imagined they’d have this conversation. “Well if I had been wrong, and you were just an innocent kid, being accused--”
He let it hang there, an awkward ending.
I hate this. Why am I even talking? Genis felt his eyes grow hot again. I should shut up and go to my room.
Sun-warm, soft, dry, firm, Mithos’s hands pressed into his, thawing the ice. “Maybe,” he said more softly, “you should consider my point of view on the matter of cowardice.” His tone persuaded Genis to look up, look at him, to find an expression carefully blank except for one eyebrow that arched slightly when Mithos added, “and you may as well get used to the idea that I’m usually right.”
For a moment, Genis wanted to laugh. It wasn’t a joke; he knew it wasn’t, but in any other circumstance, someone claiming to be right all the time was asking for a takedown. “You’re crazy.” He wasn’t sure if he meant it or not.
“Others have said so,” Mithos replied. “Most of them are dead, but I like you too much for that.” There wasn’t a threat in his voice; at least, Genis didn’t think he heard one. His hands dropped in his lap, but only because Mithos slid an arm around his waist to pull him up. “Now, you need sleep, so come on.”
*
Wherever he was when he woke up, Genis felt warm. Crisp sheets against one arm, and heavy, velvety blankets under the other, told him he definitely wasn’t in his assigned room. That bed was decent, but not comfortable. He didn’t sink into that mattress like he sank into this one. This room, this bed, smelled like a gentle breeze through a forest of fir and aspen, warmed by an early autumn sun. Like fresh linens dried in the sun-drenched lavender fields outside Iselia. He opened his eyes.
That’s right.
This bedchamber was proof of how much Mithos liked green. Green, gold, and blues of every shade. The blanket his right hand had traced was a velvety brocade of lighter green leaves on a deep green field, and subtle, thread-of-gold accents. If Genis let his eyes unfocus slightly, he could imagine the bed sat in a little pocket of forest, with the bronzed curtains and their white linings being trees and the spaces between, the thick green rugs as grass, the bluish tint of the flagstone floor beneath as the hint of a stream creeping along the walls.
Briefly, as he sat up, Genis ran his hands over the blanket and tried to get his mind back on track with thinking important things. Escape. No, gaining trust, and then escape. No, sneaking out of here without drawing attention, so he could get lost trying to find his room again. No--instead, his imagination nagged him with questions like, why are there curtains when this place is at the heart of the building and there are no windows? Because that mattered. Yeah, that was of the utmost importance.
He scowled. But why did Mithos even have a bed, or a room? Genis thought angels didn’t have to sleep. And yet, Mithos had often slept with him when they traveled together, so maybe--?
Of course, said the part of his mind that called itself Common Sense, he could have been play-acting. Once you were out he could just sit up and leave. Everyone knows you sleep like a rock.
He told that voice to shut up.
Genis did not sleep like a rock. He didn’t pop up at the slightest sound like his sister did, that was all.
A long, diagonal crease made his shirt hang slightly off kilter when he got up and tried to straighten his clothes. Uniforms invited certain expectations from the viewer, which was why he’d always hated formal wear like this, but the wrinkles bothered him. The jacket hid them mostly, though he didn’t button it up. His coat wasn’t anywhere he could find it.
The air in the next room felt slightly cooler on Genis’s cheeks, but not cold. Walls, carpet, curtains, they were all white, made him feel like he stood out in black, but there were nice touches that made the room feel less sterile, like a deep green blanket on the arm of a chair, gold embroidery on the sofa pillows, golden light from a lamp hanging from the ceiling on a brass chain, its paper shade painted with leaves and flower shapes that looked vaguely familiar. Mithos reclined on the sofa with his feet braced on a low table, still wearing the shape Genis was most familiar with. He held a book up with both hands; the purple cover hid his face from this angle. The title stood out in bold white letters: Culture and Customs of the Elves of Latheon.
Genis padded closer. His fingers twitched. “I thought elves lived in Heimdall,” he said softly, because the quiet of the room demanded a low voice.
Mithos lowered the book and quickly sat up, place kept with one finger between the pages. “How are you feeling now?” He accepted a shrug in response, though he stared intently for a few seconds that felt like forever, before he looked down at the book and answered Genis’s unspoken question. “There were settlements by different family groups,” Mithos said. “Mostly on that central continent, around the tower. Almost all of them were gone by the time I was born.”
There was no point in standing there, like he’d been called to the teacher’s office. Genis went to sit on the sofa, hesitating only slightly before he sat down. Way better than the one in the library, he decided. Softer. Meant for lounging, the way Mithos had been doing. “Why?”
“We don’t know.” Mithos found the ribbon sewn into the cover and used it to mark his place. “There have been studies. Low birth rates, some say. The war. Half-elves.”
The last suggestion came with a roll of the eyes. Genis ripped his own gaze back to the book. “Do you… do you have those studies?”
“We have everything. Everything we can get our hands on.” Mithos offered the book to him. “I marked the place you should start.”
Everything. Not possible, Genis’s common sense claimed. But Iri had mentioned libraries in the plural, indicating the entire corridor--and it wasn’t a short corridor. And there was a lot of data in the computers. He could tell from the length of the table of contents, though he didn’t know how to access all of it. “How?”
“I like books.” Mithos got up and stretched, leaving the book on the cushions between them. He stared at the ceiling. “There isn’t much to do during the long intervals. Plenty of time to catch up on recent publications.”
Genis touched the book, ran his fingers along the cover. “Even though it’s all mostly written by humans, huh.”
“Humans are resourceful. If they would stop being such prejudiced--”
He looked up, not expecting that Mithos would stop. But his host only straightened his posture, clasped his hands at his back,and shrugged.
Genis didn’t disagree, but that criticism of humans cut the other way, too. “How many rooms--I mean…?”
“Seventeen, plus the data banks I promised on the Kharlan War. I guarantee you’ll never find a resource this good anywhere else.”
His mouth dropped open. Seventeen libraries? That was insane! Even that wouldn’t be close to enough if they really had everything, but… but Genis made his mouth close and held onto the volume of Culture and Customs with his fingertips. Was it an original? A book that dated back to the great war, that escaped the destruction of the ages? Would his greasy, unangelic fingers damage the paper?
That was a thought. Originals, in a bookcase without shielding--there was no dust in the air, no moisture if his flaky dry lips were good indication, so maybe an ancient book would be okay, but if he cared about preservation at all--
“You know,” Mithos said casually, “you were asleep for seventeen hours.”
Genis’s speculations dug their heels in and skidded to a stop. “What?” he asked intelligently.
Mithos wasn’t smiling, though the corner of his mouth did twitch up slightly at the stupid response. “Tell me the truth, Genis: have you been sleeping?”
“Of course.” He went to bed at the same time every night, according to the clock. Genis frowned. “I don’t know exactly how long. I can’t tell the difference…” He couldn’t tell the difference between night and day. If the lighting in the halls was symbolic, it was the first he’d seen one way or the other.
“Please understand,” Mithos said. “We’ve been keeping an eye on your vital signs because of some problems with our location. They don’t affect angels, but you’re different. And--they say you’re not sleeping or eating enough.”
Genis had always been different, and never in a good way. That was nothing new. “So you’re spying on me, basically.”
“Kenaz said he told you about that.”
Yeah, and there was Iri, so it wasn’t like Genis felt surprised. In fact, what surprised him was how much he couldn’t scrape up the urge to care.
“You’re having trouble. Are you scared?”
Why should he care? And wasn’t that a dumb question when Genis had just told him--seventeen hours ago--that he was scared of everything? The stupid storm never stopped. It was always humming in the background like a hive of bees, making the air feel like static shock and making his skin itch at weird intervals, like water skimmers skittering all over his back. Sometimes he heard a distant drumbeat of thunder, the crack of lightning, maybe dancing across the dome as it sought a way in, to break the glass. As a child Genis learned to master his fear of storms by sitting still and trying to suss out the different elements at play: the gentle smell of the rain, the surge of mana with each gust of wind. From the center of a study circle, which let him feel and even see mana, lightning appeared just like it did when his eyes were open, in a flash of power and brightness that fizzed out like a fire under a heavy drizzle.
Derris Kharlan’s storm had no element. It was a single sheet of brightness across the windows, if ice could be made of light.
“Who wouldn’t be?” he finally said.
Mithos came back to the sofa, this time sitting on the other side, squished between the arm and Genis so he was a warm pressure, with their arms pressed together, the jut of their hips, their feet touching. “I’m so used to this place it never occurred to me. I’m sorry.”
The apology didn’t fit him. Genis told himself he was lucky to get one, but stared at Mithos, at his pale profile and the gleam of lamplight on his green eyes, and tried to remind himself of other times he’d heard an apology from the other boy. Not the laughing sorry, sorry! when a wave smashed them together at the beach, but a real admission that something wasn’t right. This is the lord of Cruxis, Genis reminded himself. This was Yggdrasil. Did Yggdrasil apologize to people and mean it? “It’s--there’s no reason for you to have known.”
“Of course there is.” The tone Mithos came back with was uncompromising, befitting the image Genis tried to force back into his own head to remind himself who he was speaking to. “If you were a prisoner, I’d want you to sweat a little. This is different.”
That was a little more honest than Genis wanted. He tried to say everything was okay, but nothing came out of his mouth.
“Is it better in here?”
Genis blinked over at him. The room? He watched Mithos tilt his head at the bedroom door, as if he’d heard the question. “It’s… quieter.”
“Can you still feel the storm?”
“A--a little bit.” His skin wasn’t crawling. Definitely a plus.
If he hadn’t known better, known who was sitting next to him and holding his hand again, the smile Mithos turned on him would have been sweet. Warm. “Would you like to stay here instead?”
Genis wasn’t stupid. HIs heart sprang in his chest, but he thought about going back to his room, told himself he should get out and do that, right now. He’d find the way by himself. Or maybe he’d call Iri and get her to guide him, to translate terminals for him.
His lips formed the answer, his voice coming out in jolt. “Yes.”
*
Half-expecting to be confronted by a paragraph on elven prejudices against other races, when he opened the book Mithos had tempted him with the night before, Genis discovered a genealogy chart. Five important families, their traits and ranks and known talents, names for places they went off to when they abandoned the first colony to start others--none of which existed now. The book didn’t know where they were either, and speculated about so-called modern locations to match ancient names. A little further, there was a chapter on spirit worship. Then language, and then artes.
He flipped straight to that one after perusing the generational charts. Raine knew the basics of training because their mother taught her, but there was too much she didn’t get to learn. Genis had to experiment on his own, try to figure out the nuances of each element, hope he could put out fires when he made a mistake. Literal fires. He burned Raine’s rose bushes to the ground once, and gotten the whopping of his lifetime to date, but he knew it could have been much worse. It could’ve been their house on fire because he made a mistake. Or his hair.
Iri appeared while he was reading that chapter, with a white plastic box in her arms. Food, she told him with the usual lack of inflection; she was told he hadn’t been eating enough, and was sent to gather ingredients he might like better. The rooms Mithos lived in were equipped with a kitchen, almost like a normal apartment, although Genis knew when they entered that it had never been used--or rarely was. Too clean. The pans were perfect, spotless, new. The sink and faucet reflected his distorted shape with mirror-like silvery steel unmarred by a single trace of water staining or fingerprints. The cupboards were empty except for dishes, glassware, silverware.
“I thought nobody could leave,” Genis said.
Iri shrugged. “Desians cultivate food on certain levels of the tower while they wait for the balance to turn,” she said.
He’d never thought about it. Just assumed that as soon as the regeneration was complete in one world, they hopped over to the other and started up operations. “How can you stand them?”
She paused, hands in the box. Looked at him. For a few seconds Genis thought she might glare at him, but Iri had a good, hard stare, the kind that would feel disapproving or downright scary if she bothered to express any other emotion. “I do not associate with them often,” she said finally. “There is bad blood.”
Genis watched her unpack: canvas bags stuffed with produce like leeks, onions, spinach, squash, some fruit; a clear, hard package of a dozen eggs, jars of brightly-colored pickles in yellow, pink, green. A sack of grain that rustled when she set it down. A heavy jug of something. Pots of spices, though he couldn’t tell which off the top of his head because their scents had mixed together into a pungent wall of nose-tickling smell.
“There won’t be meat for a while,” Iri said, leading the way to the cold storage. “Not until surface access is restored.”
So they couldn’t cultivate livestock in the tower. Made sense. But Genis wanted to know more about the other thing she said. “Do Desians and angels not get along?” For real, he thought; not just because of the upper ranks.
Iri unbuttoned her jacket, laid it over one of the high chairs pushed in at the island counter. A hint of a golden choker showed above the high collar of her blouse. “Can you cook?” she asked instead of answering.
Of course he could. Genis wasn’t a spoiled child, no matter what Zelos said about him. You want to talk about spoiled, Genis had once said; I don’t have a butler to do everything for me. Can you use the chamber pot by yourself?
Oh, that had been a good row, funny and satisfying, even if the idiot Chosen had also gotten in a few good zingers.
Iri said she’d do the chopping, so he gave her the leeks and the spinach, and found other stuff: flour, butter, sugar, salt. Enough to make a crust. Genis hunted around for a bowl and wondered if everyone had been captured by the Renegades. Mithos never said. They had to be looking for Genis by now. It had been what, a week? Maybe less, but nobody would tell him that, either. Somehow Mithos always managed to distract him. They knew he was gone, that was for sure. Either they were in a bunch of cells in one of those bases, or--or.
Or what? There weren’t many possibilities. No matter how cowardly Genis was, he’d never have run away and deserted them if he knew there was trouble, and Lloyd would know that. Raine would know.
If Colette were missing, and Genis still there, he’d speculate one of the two opposing groups. Possibly Tethe’alla, because they had reasons to want her dead, but that was on the outside edge of being likely, and absolutely irrelevant if they were looking for him.
“What are we making?”
Genis glanced at Iri, fingers caked with flour and butter. It must have been a long time since she’d eaten if she didn’t recognize the ingredients on the counter. “Quiche,” he said. “It might not be as good without cheese, though.”
She looked down at the cutting board. The leeks were sliced paper thin and gathered in a mound at the corner. She washed and patted the spinach dry when he instructed her to. “I will remember to look for some next time,” she said.
It wasn’t a big deal, he told her, cleaning his hands, measuring out water. Dough was supposed to chill before being baked, but Genis felt his stomach rumble, and he decided to just press it into the pan. Chilling it was usually only possible during the winter anyway, so he wouldn’t bother. The crust would be crumbly but tasty. “Are you allowed to answer questions?”
Iri gathered the leeks and dropped them into the bowl he pointed to. “That depends on the question.”
Genis tried to crack the eggs gently, but ended up having to fish bits of shell out of the bowl. “All the angels I’ve met have been like you: quiet and--and…” And motionless? Heartless? “Just, calm,” he decided, fumbling for a better word. “Except for Remiel. Why? Was he--abnormal?”
Besides the obvious, that is.
She added the spinach. When he looked at her, a line had appeared between her brows, like she didn’t understand. “Why do you want to know…?”
Was that actually a borderline question? “Because Colette seems completely normal now that she has a keycrest--”
“You traveled with the Chosen?” Iri said sharply.
Genis almost jumped. Almost. An expression finally painted her face, like it did her voice: alarm. “Um--” he said helpfully.
Iri spun around and strode for the door so fast he couldn’t get any other words out. It whirred closed behind her. A few seconds of breathing later, the sound of the outer door reached him.
“I guess she didn’t know,” Genis said to the empty room. Yellow egg dripped from the whisk in long ropes, curling back into the bowl. His stomach growled, reminding him the oven was on and he had better get going if he wanted to eat.
Still. What was that about?
*
Several hours later, Genis heard the outer doors open again. He was on the couch with the book on elves, leftover quiche in the cold storage cabinet that he still didn’t have a name for. This wouldn’t be Mithos, surely, because he said he’d be gone for a while--again. No--it was Iri. Her mask was back in place, a solid lack of expression that dared him to surprise her again.
“I thought you knew,” Genis said. “I’m sorry.”
“You’ve done nothing wrong,” Iri said.
Her voice didn’t match her face. It still had expression in it, but Genis didn’t know what. “Remiel was a real jerk,” he said, looking down at the book without seeing the pages. “I wanted to know why, that’s all.” Why he faked his relation to Colette, for example, or why he felt the need to kill them all even before Lloyd provoked him.
“I have never liked him,” Iri said. “The previous Herald was better. Kinder.”
Genis watched her face. Still nothing, but she didn’t quite look at him--more at a point over his shoulder, where curtains covered some sort of screen. “There are others?” They’d gotten stuck with the bad one?
Iri glanced at him quickly, a flick of her eyes. She didn’t sit, even when he pointed to the couch, the chairs, choosing to stand before him like a student before an angry teacher. “Were,” she corrected. “Cassiel died during a--an abnormal ritual, similar to the one you experienced.”
As far as Genis knew, nothing about the ‘ritual’ in the tower had been abnormal, except for the fact they fought back. The hair on his arms stood up. Priests usually accompanied the Chosen, Kratos told them a long time ago. But because of the attack on the temple, too many were injured or dead, and then there were the mysterious assassins. Kratos and Raine were supposed to accompany them, and then became the only companions still standing.
Priests wouldn’t have rebelled. Colette would be dead if not for the Renegades attacking Iselia.
“Your Chosen is a beacon of hope,” Iri said. “For us as well.”
“Is?” Genis asked. They’d been calling her “useless” before.
Iri flicked her gaze to him again, then back to the curtains. “You must think we are all cold and cruel. That all in Cruxis care only for the vessel, and not the lives lost in the process of reviving Martel.”
Yeah. Every single thing ever said to Genis by an angel expressed those very feelings.
His expression must have said it all--the things he thought, the ones he just felt. She turned her gaze down, so all he got was the brassy glint of her pale lashes in the overhead light. “You may be right,” she said slowly, as if picking her words carefully. “But if your Chosen is not the vessel we hope, she may still get up and walk away.”
Genis felt his throat go tight. “That’s not what it sounded like to me. Those coffins…”
“Many die,” Iri confirmed. “Some go mad long before they reach the tower. But those of us who come closest to Lord Yggdrasil’s ideal are not consumed.”
“I’ve never heard of another Chosen leaving the tower,” Genis said. “Never. Everybody would know it if they did.” Well, except for Spiritua, but she’d been set loose in Tethe’alla apparently, not--wait. Something she’d said nagged him, made him pause. Those of us who come closest. Genis heard the paper crackle in his fist and looked down, made himself snap the book closed before he tore a page. “Sent to the other world?”
Wait a minute.
“Yes.”
“But--” Genis searched for a hint of an expression in Iri’s face, and found none. “You?”
“Yes.”
“Why? Why are you working with--for--?”
“I hoped to see someone else accomplish what I could not. Perhaps your friend Colette will be the one. But if she is not…”
Then she can survive. Genis felt a bubble of hope and swallowed it. “But if she is the one, then she dies.”
“Then no one else will suffer,” Iri corrected. “A successful transfer means an end to suffering.”
Not for him. Not for Lloyd, or Sheena, or Colette’s parents. If the so-called emptiness created by Colette’s crystal meant what he thought it did, then when Martel took root in her body, Colette would suffer too, forever, unable to speak or talk or move, unable to see or feel, forbidden from living in her own body. “Weren’t you locked into your crystal?” Genis said, wondering how to make her see sense.
“For a time.” Iri wove her fingers together, still refusing to meet his stare. “He woke me to see if--to ask for a final request.”
So life wasn’t a guarantee, then. Genis wondered if she realized what she’d said when she paused, but she went on.
“I said I wanted to be an angel. He did not deny me, as you see.”
Genis stared at her collar, wondered if the choker was a key crest, if it looked like the crystal Colette wore.
“Others sleep. I don’t know how many. Perhaps only one or two. A close match like myself and your friend is not common.”
More Chosen. Others like Colette, who had experienced what she did, knew her pain. He wondered what they would say if someone awakened them; if they would believe--or pretend to believe--what Iri said, that they were honored to serve and hoped one of their own would bring an end to suffering.
“Were you from Tethe’alla?” Genis finally asked. She shook her head. Silvarant, then, only he didn’t recall any Chosen named Iri, and he had memorized all of the names for school. “So what’s your name?”
“Spiritua,” she said.
*