When Re’ne’shi handed her the gift, she had been caught entirely by surprise. Shi had been kind when she lost Chevalier, and she was sure they blamed themselves for losing Chevalier and Lucas but so much of what happened was…fate. Destiny. Expected.

Expected.

The letter… was exactly what she needed and exactly what she expected, and holding his Soul, she knew she would read it again.

She disagreed with him, of course - in so many ways:

If she did not do as La Chanson asked

If she were not successful in what it asked

If she were killed before she could do what it asked…

She knew that if the fighting got any closer, she would have needed to run and hide, but Chevalier would have gone and his Soul was in her pack and so he had gone. He had helped. She had helped because he would have and so he had.

She held his Soul, whispering the day’s activities to it. Maybe he heard. She didn’t know. She knew there was a letter but she wasn’t ready - was beginning to wonder if she ever would be.

The last words he would say to her.

Was La Chanson good?

For all that she had been asked that question, her answer had always been yes, it was good. She believed it was good. Or more…she hadn’t needed to consider whether it was good because of how Grandmère spoke of it. She hadn’t needed to consider whether La Chanson was good. It just was.

It just was.

And now she was questioning.

Whatever this was, it was not good.

Did anything ever change? Or did it just move to new locations and repeat? Was that what she was on her way to do? Stop the repeating cycle of horrible treatment? Would it only stop for others, or her too?

And all these thoughts crammed into her mind did not stop the heavy feeling in the pit of her stomach that reminded the half-elf - the half-cloud-elf that she couldn’t see the sky. The open expanse of nothing had been replaced with the weight of the world and it was only the soothing lilt of La Chanson that kept her from dashing back to the elevating device to return her to safety. She wished she’d taken note of the positions of the stars before they’d come down here. She wished there was a way to calm the heart of a somewhat panicked, somewhat hurt, unsure, teenaged half-elf.