A: Ch. 9.1

Chapter IX

“I need to see it.”

“Be patient.”

“How am I to do that? Even a fat slab of meat ready to be barbequed wasn’t enough to change him!”

“Aru—“

“No. I’m going this time.”

It was beautiful. Entrancing. Thrilling. He never tired of it. The organic nature of the chaos, yet the controlled and predictable course the flames took. Thousands of years he had watched it now, yet it never lost its magic. Magic, indeed.

Lazuris perched himself behind one of the smaller falls and gazed at the distorted dancing lights through the water. Curious how through the lens of flowing liquid, the destruction of an entire city seemed rather… droll.

The man curled his neck back ‘round the falls, his face falling slightly. It was a beautiful castle, and quite a shame to see it go. No one used wood so beautifully anymore. It was all marble, plaster, and steel. At least this glorious example of human architecture met a fitting end. Fire was the most honorable of deaths.

A sparkling ember danced away from the conflagration and zipped toward him.

“Did he find her?” Lazuris asked. He leapt lightly from his viewing spot to a set of slippery rocks below. The water burned away long before his feet touched down on it.

“He was distracted for a moment. He found the two,” answered a surprisingly deep female voice. It crackled and grumbled, like the burning embers of a fire. Or was that just an echo from the castle? Yet this voice did not resonate off the walls, nor was it drowned out by the falls. It was as distinct and pure as if spoken in an empty chapel.

“What did he do?” Lazuris asked. He watched the castle intently, his eyes fixed on the north tower. Smoke was pouring out from cracked windows and the faint glow of amber light penetrated the darkness.

“He wanted them. Nearly changed. The knight has infuriated him before, apparently. The fires have made him unstable.” The glittering moth landed on the tall man’s shoulder. A soft veil of steam clouded it as the moth’s wings singed the sputtering water from the waterfall away.

“And this is who he wants?” Lazuris asked. He was doubtful. He never got along with Lycaons. They were hot-headed and extremely rigid. Intelligent? To a point. It didn’t help that they had the libido of rabbit. Lazuris silently smirked at that comment. All they needed was a little cotton tail.

“Taerce is adamant about this,” the moth insisted.

“I suppose,” Lazuris said languidly. The Spirit had to be serious if he was turning to his… subordinates. And Lazuris had been so close the Southern Isles. It had been nearly four hundred years since he had visited. But his darling forced him to come back.

“Lazuris. Look.”

The man tilted his chin up, his eyes darting back to the castle. A small form had appeared at the cracked window. Lazuris leaned forward; it was a habit from staying on the lower lands for so long. His eyes were perfect at night.

It was the woman. He could sense from his Fire Friends that her door was blocked—which was quite intentional—so she was attempting her escape through the window. Her right hand appeared injured and the bandage she had wrapped around it was frayed and charred.

Lazuris could have predicted it as easily as the position of the stars each night. He groaned as the girl snagged her linen bandage on the shattered glass of the window. Desperate to escape, she tugged and tried to rip away. In a distressed state, she failed to realize how the backward force would adversely affect the already questionable stability of her feet.

Unsurprisingly, as the girl finally freed herself, her backward momentum knocked her away from the lip of stone she had been standing on. Her arms flailed and she grappled at empty air.

“Shall I—?”

“Wait,” the moth insisted, though even she appeared concerned.

 The guised princess began to tumble back, her arms flapping wildly as her hair streamed around her. Shame the girl concealed her true form with such unwavering attention to detail. If her hair had remained its ginger hue, the image would be perfect. A girl of flame falling into the falls.

Lazuris paused, his eyes narrowing as the Princess fell. “Is this Aru’mat’s plan?” he asked, lowering himself, ready to pounce. He thought it was the Lycaon? Why would he take that one?

“Wait!” hissed the voice from his shoulder.

Lazuris’ gaze fell down, following the trajectory that the girl was sure to take. She was falling between a pair of turrets. Jagged rocks and spires awaited her but—Ah. So that was his plan.

General Noden was at the bottom of one of the towers, balanced on a balcony, watching with fierce concentration at the alarming descent of the Princess. The Lycaon eased back, waited, and then leaped with rapid acceleration straight across the divide between the two towers.

The General snatched the girl out of the air before crashing through a window on the other side. It was perfect timing, especially given the hundreds of variables. The girl could easily have twisted away from her original path, causing her to be just out of reach at that moment, or the flames within the castle could have changed the pressure resulting in a massive explosion from breaking that window.

But Lazuris wouldn’t have allowed the latter, at least. That area was still free of his precious little Friends. For now.

“Velrin?” Lazuris inquired.

“Surprisingly, no.”

Curious. Perhaps this one would be suitable for fastidious Aru’mat.

“You told me that you took him to her. Why did you leave him before he got to the tower?” Lazuris asked, turning to glare softly at the little puff of flame on his shoulder.

“I said no such thing. Besides, we aren’t supposed to intervene unless we’re instructed to.”

“Think she survived that… rescue mission?”

“Did the Lycaon have any other option?”

“True,” Lazuris whispered. The force of his tackle would at minimum blow the wind out of her, at worst snap her neck, and most likely knocked her unconscious. Shame. He still had his big finale to perform.

A tickling sensation prickled along Lazuris’ arms. He knew it well; it was familiar and comforting. He closed his eyes and allowed the strings of his consciousness to be twisted and pulled. With vivid yet haphazard snippets, his precious flames gave him glimpses of the castle, the areas they had taken and where they were going.

“He’s going down,” Lazuris said curiously. He didn’t have to speak. His darling already knew. “She’s unconscious, as expected.”

Oh, how Lazuris reveled in that moment. The lightness of fire, how free and weightless it felt as it leapt from space to space. No constraints, not even from the laws of physics he had studied so long. Seeing as the flames saw, feeling as their fingers felt… it was the only time he felt like a Watcher. The twang of guilt and the latching grasp of remorse tugged at Lazuris’ heart.

“How long has it been, Karst?” he asked longingly.

“It’s not worth asking anymore. I am you, and you are me.”

The hairs on Lazuris’ arm began to burn away and he quickly returned his attention back to the tugging wires from his many Friends. It was almost like a spider’s web with hundreds of threads. Each of his flames held a thread and could tug at the strings to get his attention.

Some were more impatient than others, as demonstrated by his hair-free arms.

He followed the trails back through his mind. His Friends were chattering; the crackles of embers were now a harmonious symphony to Lazuris’ trained ear. The whispers, though complex, could easily be picked apart.

“Both the male and the female are in the prisoner’s cells,” Lazuris noted.

“Lazuris,” the moth called.

“These humans always take the strangest of routes. His only option is to leap into the falls. Well, he’s not human, is he? He acts like one.”

“Lazuris,” she repeated, urgently, this time.

“She’s waking, now. Just in time to see my friends devour the last of her castle. Look at this, Karst, all they can do is scream at each other! The floor is quite literally about to melt beneath their feet and they’re yelling like a pair of toddlers. I can’t even distinguish it. Is she angry that he saved her life?”

“LAZURIS!”

But that time, Lazuris didn’t need Karst calling him. A sharp, dagger-like pain streamed from his temples down to his chest. A piercing screech scratched at his ears and clawed deep into his mind. His breath caught in his throat and his toes went numb before his vision blurred in and out of focus with each painful throb of his heart.

Lazuris couldn’t stand it. He fell to one knee. His balance wavered and for a moment he wondered if even he would fall prey to the hungry beasts within the falls. However, his precious, his darling friend, saved him. She wouldn’t let him go.

The tall silver-haired man looked up at the landing several dozen feet above him. Fear, something very foreign to Lazuris, crippled him.

Aru’mat the Baleful had come to visit. 

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