10: Fresh Air

Golden sunlight filtered from the tips of leaves on the highest bough of the highest tree Alexandrie could find to her face, eyes sparkling with relief. With a deep, deep intake of breath, those silent tears fell from grateful grieving eyes. A little of the constriction (just a little) in her chest released as she looked up into the infinite sky and drank in the colours she saw there. The gift she had been given by Re’ne’shi sat lightly in her hands, inert as the daylight reached it. 

With Lucas so far away, Re’ne’shi and Re’ne’mala so far below, Chevalier gone (for now), Grandmère, Maman et Papa almost a world away now…whatever it was that La Chanson wanted was close. The little thread that had tugged her out of Shining Capital was a golden lasso now, the music - once so far away - now filled caverns and frightened away the things in the dark (or drew them closer). She was so far from everything she knew, but now…looking up…she was still beneath the same sky. No longer underground, the feel of warmth on her skin but not the same at all - a breeze? Moving, cool air after the oppressive still warmth.

Another deep breath and she let herself smile at the dawn.

Maybe everything would be alright. Spider said he wouldn’t leave, Mysel and Heofonræsele would be with her until they got Chevalier back…

She hadn’t been joking - or lying - when she said she appreciated Mysel for his age. It was hard to explain, but she often felt as though she was also two things at once:

Elves lived a long time, and so the perspective of maturity was very different to that of humans. Humans had such a brief lifetime that they moved on with adulthood very quickly. Sometimes Alexa wondered (just to herself) whether being a half elf meant she was both things, one or neither. Her ears were not as long and pointed as Papa’s, but they were not rounded. The others her age in court - human and Dragonborn both - had been more mature than she. She knew because Maman had lamented and Papa had expected it. Her age in summers meant she had lived long enough to contribute to society, but she was still very much a young adolescent by elvish standards.

Which was where Mysel fit in. He was on his way backward. Much slower, of course, but still.

All the teenagers she knew had fought so hard to look grown up. To act grown up. Mysel didn’t bother with that. Probably because he’d already done it…but even so.

It was nice. It was nice to have a conversation with someone and not feel belittled or mocked or…placated. She wished she’d had friends her age before. 

Maybe it would have been alright to have a sibling.

Maybe.

Standing at the elevator, Alexa had been both desperate to climb on and reticent to move her feet. The discussion over dinner had left her very confused about how to read the way people treated her, and she wasn’t sure if Re’ne’shi blushed for positive or negative reasons, but Alexa was sure she wasn’t as happy about leaving as she should be. She still didn’t understand Shi. She certainly didn’t understand Mala, and now she would be travelling with arguably more confusing people who didn’t seem to mind being confusing.

Mala had been entirely incorrect in her assumption, but Alexa didn’t really care. In truth, the half elf couldn’t tell if people liked her or not, so the easiest thing to do was assume they didn’t - it was less painful this way. There had been a brief time she had thought she and Ellinora could be friends - and that had gone very poorly. If anything, Alexandrie spent a lot of time trying not to care too much - as Shi had said, be too nice and people would use you (something Maman had said that had proven very true). 

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. 

She had expected for so much to go wrong. She just didn’t know what…and she hadn’t expected things to go that wrong, so 

It was nice to leave. 

But it was nice to have friends.

Just for a little while.

Even with all that had happened it was nice not to be alone.

And Mysel was right - she could find someone who could find Mala and Shi. They were friends now. Maybe they would see them again. If they passed back.

Her fingers closed around the orb. It would only work in the dark, but she asked the question anyway:

Will you look after them?

No.

The response baffled her. The siblings had looked after them. The siblings were the reason they had got this far. Did they not need La Chanson’s help - or were they too far away? Or did La Chanson not care about them? Was it looking after Spider? Was it looking after her?

Yes. It was. It had sent a dragon. A mythical creature had been sent to her aid. What more could it do? And it gave her the ability to help those around her. To…to change the world for them, perhaps. Save the world…

What if it had poured all its ability into her…what if it couldn’t even talk properly because it was so much effort to put everything it had into her. Shouldn’t she be grateful?

Grateful for what, though? Being led through the world, into the Oonderverld and out again like all those storybooks? Like Grandmère’s stories…

Grandmère’s stories had never sounded so difficult. Grandmère’s stories had a lot less death, a lot less loss, more people…why? Why hide the truth? Did it really think she wouldn’t go to it if she weren’t told the truth? 

Would you have?

She didn’t know. She knew something needed to be done, and she was here to do it. If she’d known it would lead to such heartache…?

Whatever it needed must be important. For it to risk all this, and call a dragon and a boy to help her. To call a young adult with no experience…whatever it wantedd, it didn’t want her influenced. 

Well, she’d been influenced now. 

By so much.

Now what?

Above ground, (relatively) familiar sights and sounds and smells around her, she could consider the practical consequences of helping La Chanson. The practical consequences of…of using it. For doing with it what she did. Eyes on the line of mountains, she traced the jagged edges of the world.

A giant maw preparing to eat them up.

She didn’t truly expect to come back, but she didn’t think of that often. Not anymore. Easier to hope and keep moving.

Was Lucas somewhere over those mountains? Training with - training an army? 

An army…

Don’t kill the guy up front. Kill the leader until no one wants to lead. 

Did this always work? Who was Genofeva working for? Who had tried to erase Heo and Mysel? Was someone trying to kill La Chanson? Could La Chanson die? Was it the leader - or was she? And if she were, that meant more arrows pointed at her.

Mala was good with a bow. Very good. But she couldn’t possibly be the only one. Others were good with bows and wanted Alexandrie dead.

The hair on the back of her neck prickled, but she refused to climb down.

So long in the dark - so long hiding - so long trying to learn who she was and who she wanted to be.

She’d learned only two absolute truths of herself:

Unlike the rose she had given Shi, she thrived on daylight. 

And she was very stubborn indeed.

9: Good Grief

Alexandrie said nothing, but looked at the boy expressionlessly as they continued to move through the dark. It was in the moment that curiosity overtook her that she realised, sharply and suddenly, that she owed nothing at all to any of the people around her. Of course, there was a shared need for survival in the present moment, a somewhat shared set of objectives and an expectation that they would all keep watch when necessary. That had not changed. But with Vee gone, she didn’t owe any of them any more than a person might owe a stranger. So she said nothing, and decided instead to wait and see how La Chanson handled the situation. A masterclass in oaths. 

The last time Alexandrie Donadieu actively lied, she was very young and it had resulted in one of the cook’s sons in a great deal of trouble. Fingerprints on an expertly decorated cake for Grandmère’s birthday may have been funny - or at least excused - if the darling granddaughter of the matriarch were the cause, but for an 8 year old, she had lied so well the boy’s parents had been cautioned and she had seen his misery firsthand. She’d told Grandmère later, afraid of what Maman would say.

She had been punished, but it was preferable to the hurt she could have caused.

Passive lying was different. Alexandrie kept a lot of what she observed and thought to herself, because there were only so many questions people would allow her to ask - or that they would answer. And many of her questions were not deemed necessary or appropriate.  La Chanson was included in this. It seemed willing to answer questions, but only when worded in a particular way - which frustrated Alexa. Her preference for “why” could never be sated if it only responded with yes or no, and questions of this nature were inherently limited - what if the answer was “maybe”, or there were things she forgot to include? As they grew closer to where La Chanson called her, she wondered whether she would ever be able to ask better questions. 

The words she had whispered to La Chanson days before rang through her mind:

“What good are you, really?” 

And it was a question she still hadn’t fully answered. Or answered at all. Why did something (or someone) powerful enough to give her the ability to do so much need help? What did it need her to do? What was the difference between creating and… bringing back a Praetorian? Especially since Heofonræsele did not think Chevalier was dead. More than anything, she wanted the answer to that question: the difference between creation and restoration… she had been preoccupied with it for some time even before Chevalier had - even before they’d left home. They had spoken about it often when she was younger - the question of whether Grandmère had restored Chevalier or made him who he was…created? Was that creation? Who had he been before? What? She’d spent a lot of time in the bough over the pond thinking about the fact that she’d never seen any other Praetorian…that there was only one. She’d earnestly told Chevalier on many occasions that she would help him find his people if there were a way.

The important thing for now was that La Chanson wanted to help her get him back. Heofonræsele used strange language, but what had been La Chanson’s instructions? Did they matter? 

Yes, they did. As far as she’d come, and as much as she’d changed in the Oondeverld, and as much as she’d tried to distance herself from La Chanson in more recent days - she still cared about it - still cared about what it thought of her and her friends. And…what it felt. It didn’t even necessarily make sense, considering the way music felt, but if it had feelings, it could be sad or happy or angry or…

Or wary.

Wary the way it had been with Mysel’s magic. Was it Mysel’s magic that it was wary of, though? Or was it warning her that a dragon was also there - or not there, but there, somehow? Was it wary because they were not to be trusted, or because they should not have existed in this time? What was the cycle? Did it….was it…?

It was difficult finding words for things that only existed on a loose scale - more, things that were not designed to exist in her head. Were the gods disdainful of Mysel and Heofonræsele’s existence? Was La Chanson a divinity? If so, could it take physical form? If it were a god, why did it not have more…other…adherents? Was it wary of them the way it stayed away from the temples in Glitter Delta Cove? If it didn’t agree with the pantheon, why call Grandmère?

Alexandrie knew of the Prime Divinities and Ascended Saints - everyone did. It was part of everyone’s basic education. But her family had never worshipped on a more personal level.

Was La Chanson a deity? 

What was it about Grandmère (and by extension, Alexandrie) that drew its attention? And why the one refrain? Did others hear other music? She thought back, trying to draw the music close enough to analyse. It had been louder, more powerful, softer - and different people encouraged different instruments almost - except around Spider and that river. Spider prompted a metronome…A ticking clock. Maybe not a clock, but regular, constant. She’d heard it when she’d asked if Lucas was alive. And the previous time, it was like the Song had been…broken? Almost like Genofeva was nearby…

As Mala threw the stone she carried and disappeared to the top of a cliff, Alexandrie looked at Spider, who prepared to walk up the wall. She wasn’t sure whether she should bring it up. Spider didn’t understand magic. It would likely frighten him. 

There was enough of that already. 

Admittedly, there would be less with Heofonræsele and Mysel. Well - less of her being the frightening one. Maybe.

Mysel and Heofonræsele. A child and a somewhat…young dragon. How had he earned the name? Sky Born…Solution? Conclusion? Solution. What had he done as an adult to earn such a name - or been given it?

She was, after all, a child of Progress, and everyone in the Progress had to contribute. What did Heofonræsele contribute before the time of giants? What did they do? How did they live? What was it like to live in a time of giants and dragons? Where did such large people come from? Conversely, why were the people who existed today so small? 

Did Giantkin have Ascended Saints?

Leaping to grab a rock, she swung on it for a moment, hooked her toe under a crumbling foothold and used it to push herself to another handhold. Flicking her legs out as she grabbed one rock gave her the momentum to reach for a flat surface to roll her body onto. Almost slipping, the thought also slipped her mind as well as she reached up, caught a ledge and and monkey ran her way to the top. She didn’t think about it again until they were eating.

What did the giants think of the Prime Divinities? The founding beliefs, the ones central to who she was came from her family, mired in the culture of Progress, and shaped by the teachings of the Divinities and Saints:

Be kind. Be honest. Work hard. Be brave. Give back to those who gave. 

Those were the foundations of her family, but they were also, beneath all the conflicting, problematic aspects, the foundation of the Progress Confederacy. Silver and Steel made everything more efficient, but the premise was one of equality, which was based in giving to the community.

Did Giantkin think that way?

Perhaps. Once.

The closer Alexandrie came to the source of the music in her mind, the more curious she became of its origins. She couldn’t think so far ahead when they were in Glitter Delta Cove. Everything was bright and new and different. They had been underground for weeks now, and without Chevalier’s reassurance, she was beginning to lose track of…of her sense of self, the objectivity of thought…what was a thought and what was possible. Everything was dark. And new. And different. It wasn’t about that at all, but it also was and she missed having Chevalier to tap her on the elbow, or put a hand on her shoulder. He hadn’t often needed to say anything…it was his constant presence. Like losing a limb.

As they ate, she thought about getting him back. They had all looked at her expectantly, as though she should be happy, but she knew, even if they didn’t think it the case, that La Chanson did not unconditionally give her what she wanted. She desperately wanted to believe it would happen, but…but the fear of disappointment held her back. Fate had brought them together, perhaps, but fate had done a lot of other things too. 

Why did it need to work this way, and why had his body gone? Where had his body gone? If he wasn’t dead, where was he? With La Chanson? And would it give him back freely? She would pay, if she needed to - gladly pay - what he was worth to her.

The same could be said of Lucas. 

They would get them back.

A child of the Progress, after all.

Silver or Steel.

La Chanson had to know that.

If Silver was enough, there was no need for Steel.

As she thought, her hands moved of their own accord, pulling silvery threads of music from the air. She hardly paid attention to what she was doing as she wove, threads shifting into the vibrant infra-red tones she could not have seen without her glasses. Stranger perhaps to Mala and Shi then, when she took her glasses off and continued to weave, creating a delicate rose by feel alone. 

Gently placing it by the group, she whispered goodnight and crawled into her bedroll.

***

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: La Chanson could not wait, and she could not choose to do nothing - he was family, and she had failed to protect him. Besides - La Chanson had sent help to get him back. There was no need to grieve. She didn’t have time to grieve - more, she didn’t want to take time to grieve. She hadn’t grieved and she wouldn’t because there was too much to do and it would hurt too much and she could not be weak when she needed to be strong and brave and still and grown up and it took her a few moments to realised that the foggy glasses on her nose still worked - she couldn’t see because her eyes were pressed tightly closed, her mouth open in a silent wail as she shook. 

She forgot, after a time, why she was crying. The grief of Chevalier blurred into the grief of leaving home, which blurred into the grief of leaving childhood behind which blurred with the loss of normality and the sickly fear that she was forgetting the perfect blue of the sky.

***

Later, much later, when everyone else was quiet (or still), she rolled over. Before her, the red rose looked as thought it had just bloomed. As if Grandmère had cut it that morning and lay it on the table in Alexa’s place, as she was wont to do, where the morning light would make dew drops gleam gold as the girl arrived to join her family for breakfast. 

When - if - when she got home, would she grow flowers? Would she sit in the solarium telling her grandchildren about these adventures?

Would she be able to tell anyone about them, or would La Chanson hold her tongue, too?

Her fingertips dancing across the petals, she drew it close to her and sat up, closing her eyes. Tilting her head back in the gloom, she considered that somewhere, many kilometres above her, the sun offered life to the world. 

Starting at its most outflung edge, Alexandrie imagined the sun touching the rose. As she did, her other hand wove music, strands and strands of it hanging in the air to be woven as she worked, eyes closed, humming slightly.

When she was finished, she held two roses growing from the same stalk: 

One in her light spectrum - a deep, deep red - the other a vibrant infra hue she could not see.

Shi had given her sunlight.

She owed this.

8: Unknown and Unknowable

Looking up at the enormous dragon, last of his kind, newly transformed from a twelve year old boy, Alexandrie Aerith Vanessa Elamys Normaer Donadieu took a step back, but did not run or hide.

She had faced so much in her short years - Court, Edgewaters, Lizardfolk, Tallman, Genofeva, Vel’bla’dran… losing Vee…

She looked at the magnificent creature, and though she stepped back, her thoughts turned inward. She knew not to run. La Chanson said not to. Besides, she hadn’t got anywhere on this journey by running away. So she stood and looked at her feet. If she were to die, it would be quick and she didn’t need to watch death approach. If not, the size of the beast clouded her mind. Either way, looking at the ground was easier.

He spoke with a slow confidence as he told them he had been sent to protect Spider and her, and Alexa’s mind returned to Spider’s words the day or two before: 

“Look - the song sent you a new bodyguard.”

As if a dragon could even begin to compare to Vee.

The frustration, hurt, insult, disgust she felt at both the proclamation and the speed La Chanson had seemingly decided to replace her friend battled with the training her mother and grandmother had given her. So it was with tightly held calm that she told the creature, which had its own reasons to undertake whatever task it had been contracted to provide that she was neither impressed or interested in the service.

Alexandrie knew he had a job to do and would do it. She’d had bodyguards before. She knew they would carry out the task. Nowhere in their contract, however, did it state she must like or respect the entities involved in that contract - and perhaps that was part of Heofonræsele’s issue: she was not obliged to be impressed or excited by the fact that he was a dragon. She had only ever had two bodyguards - one, in fact, for Vee was family - who she had respected. The more self impressed they had been, the more concerted her effort to rid herself of them. Pranks, tantrums, hiding, running, climbing…all had been part of her childhood repertoire. 

A dragon and a twelve year old from a millennia ago? All it told her was that the boring practice of self-importance had existed for longer than she’d thought.

When Alexandrie spoke, it was with honesty and based on the facts. Yes, she was beautiful. Yes, she expected to be looked at. Yes, she was different. She did not, however, overstate those things. She spoke of leading trends because she did. She noted when people stared at her because she was trained to control the gazes of those around her, but she didn’t tell people she was a fighter when she first met them. She didn’t tell them she was good at anything she could not prove was true. Heofonræsele gave her no indication of his ability to do anything, and though he was indeed magnificent and beautiful looking, and yes she appreciated the gleam of his scales, the shine of his antlers, and how bright his teeth and claws were, he seemed to presume this was important when the task was not based on aesthetic. To Alexandrie, being unique was not, of itself, a reason to fawn over someone. No one had seen Chevalier before either, and they had not fawned over him - even though he was kind and gentle and thoughtful, qualities she had yet to see from this dragon, pretty or not.

Why, she asked, had La Chanson sent a protector when what she needed was a friend?

Her friend. Not Bodyguard 10.

The longer she travelled, the less she understood La Chanson, the less she understood what was happening and how much she could trust anything. Anyone. Everything was a meat trap in the dark, and perhaps it was because it had been so long since the sun had touched her face, but perhaps everything was a meat trap and she should be wary. And yet she couldn’t shake the sheer amount of responsibilities she felt weighing on her. What was she expected to do with the information she had been given?

Lucas had gone with the elf to wherever it was they were now.

Spider withheld something (Spider withheld everything) but wanted, more than anything, to be with his brother. She knew this.

Mysel and Heofonræsele wanted to return to the cycle of life after…after she couldn’t comprehend how long. They wanted to die? Was that what this meant? They wanted to complete whatever task they had to complete that involved her so they could…die? More death. Always more death. Always more endings and goodbyes. 

What point was there to growing used to anything? What benefit was there to leaning on others when they would do what they needed to do and for them - only them? Even talking to Shi had been in fear that someone Alexandrie was growing attached to would leave. Selfishness. Perhaps Shi should have left while she could. Alexandrie could tell that curiosity would hold the Ebon elf now, bind her to the party until it was too weak to contain the fear. Mala would do the job because it was what she was trained to do and seemed to be a response borne of instinct. Alexandrie could see that too. Having seen all these siblings, she was both jealous and disdainful of the understanding siblings seemed to share.

La Chanson on the other hand…La Chanson showed her…what? 

What did it show? 

Was it the future? 

Was it what would happen if she didn’t do as told? 

Would it happen even if she did? 

Was it a warning? 

A threat? 

A threat for who?

Be ready. For What?

What could she do against an army? Why did it advance? When was it? Was she to move toward the army or away from it? 

Why was there an army at all? 

For what nation? 

No matter.

Spider would want to save Lucas…had Lucas chosen to be there or was he forced? 

Why was he there? 

Would he want to leave? 

Would Spider join him? 

Was La Chanson with him now? 

Would it stay with him? 

Even as he advanced? 

Was he afraid?

Excited? 

Desperate? 

Would he be willing to harm them?

She knew Spider would happily harm her if it were necessary.

And a sly, quiet voice in the back of her mind whispered:

This is all your fault.

If she hadn’t forced him to learn how to use La Chanson, he wouldn’t have been a target. He and Spider were on a journey to see family. That was all. They wanted to find their grandfather. She had dragged them into this. Somehow.

Before she’d left home, she had planned to go entirely alone. But Vee had been there, things packed. Ready to leave.

And now he wasn’t - 

And everything had been so much easier before Genofeva had returned. Instinctively Alexandrie had known she wouldn’t be in the scene because Genofeva fought for Genofeva. She wanted everything. All of it. The entire scene. Dead.

La Chanson taken and Alexandrie’s death.

“Why me?” The unhelpful words slipped from her mouth quietly as the dragon and the boy went through the crackling slow process of conversing.

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…

Her eyes flicked to Mysel

The two would not be returned to the cycle.

Then to Spider

The two would not be reunited.

Then to Mala and Shi

The two would not be safe from whatever turmoil would be on the surface.

Then at her fingers, absently twisting and stroking the locket around her neck.

And nor would my family.

Had Grandmère faced an army?

How many faced an army and lived to speak of it?

How many faced an army, lived to speak of it, but chose not to?

A laugh bubbled up out of her throat to meet the darkness humourlessly. 

Just that morning she had sent a letter to Grandmère:

“I am lost.” It had read.

Well, at least now she wasn’t lost.

How could she be lost when the path lay carved out before her, thickly framed by dense thorny brambles, longer and sharper than those that grew outside her bedroom window back home? And just like home, there was no sneaking out. There was no way to other path to safety. 

Warning of what was to come or warning of what could happen if she didn’t do as told - wholesale fabrication or wholly true - it didn’t matter. It didn’t matter at all if anything La Chanson told her or showed her was true.

La Chanson needed her somewhere. The dragon from an untold past and the child so innocent it made her heart break would make sure she was there.

She no longer needed to trust anything or anyone. The requirement had been removed in favour of setting her on a path she must walk - or suffer the consequences.

Whatever Grandmère had chosen - whatever she'd done had led to this. La Chanson had left Grandmère and called to her.

An unknown, unknowable entity was part of her. Some part of her was unknown and unknowable in turn.

Fitting.

What if Lucas was right all along?

Don't trust La Chanson. Use it.
Her jaw clenched a little.
Use it: The way it uses me?
Perhaps. 

7: Questions and Itchy Fingers

Looking at Mysel made Alexandrie’s fingers itch. 

She’d never really understood what Maman meant when she used that phrase. When she used it, it had always ended with her sitting on the floor while Maman sat on a chair unbraiding and re-braiding, teaching Alexa how to braid her own hair; or scrubbing, filing and buffing Alexandrie’s nails to a shine; or teaching Alexa to pick clothes that would make her look just different enough that people wanted to emulate her. 

She had never felt her fingers itch, but looking at the boy’s mess of curls, she understood perfectly.

How long had it been since those locks had been trimmed? His hair had not clumped into dreadlocks so he did something. He said he’d lived with people - did they brush his hair - teach him how to groom himself? Teach him how to live? Did he wander or was he told to leave? As strange as he was, she didn’t get the sense he was a bad child - quite the opposite. Why then, was he only with a friend? What about the rest of his family? He had been kinder to her than most other children or people her age…most people, so she didn’t understand why he wandered. 

Most people were apathique…they did not care. Spider was one such, to her mind. Others were actively cruel - Ellinora and Genofeva were like this. Others still were nice when they wanted something, like Lucas. Most people in court were like Lucas, so most of the people she had been exposed to in Shining Capital were like Lucas. She understood this behaviour the most, even if it hurt. Which was why Mysel confused her. What did he want? How did he get there?

Shi (when did she become ‘Shi’?) was so frustrated by her interest in his clothes, but clothes told her a lot about people. If someone sold him a jacket that was so far out of fashion, did it mean they had taken advantage of him? It truly looked awful, though she could see (if she squinted) that he tried to do something. Being unable to see was no reason to allow someone to look bad. To Alexandrie’s mind, there was untapped potential. He was a cute kid, but he looked like a cute kid with no one to help him, and he had both a ‘friend’ and La Chanson in his proximity, so he should not look unaided, even if he could not see.

And so her fingers itched to braid his hair and get it out of his face, even if he couldn’t see. If nothing else, he smiled a lot and it was nice. Not entirely infectious - Alexa was given more to solemnity these days - but nice. Different. It didn’t seem to exist to manipulate… only because that was how he felt. Different.

It had been a strange day. 

She’d gone to the wall when the Vel’bla’dran attacked. 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.

She didn’t want to hear them. 

She had so many questions - questions she’d told Shi and questions she hadn’t.

Shi had asked a question and so rapidly taken it back - if they’d paused, Alexa would have answered.

Was she happy to make the journey? 

Yes - but she didn’t know why, exactly. She didn’t know if it was because La Chanson made the journey toward it so much sweeter than thinking of going away - or perhaps she was simply excited to get away from Shining Capital with its people like Lucas who were nice if they wanted something. Or maybe she wanted to see the world and La Chanson gave her an excuse. She had seen some marvellous things that she certainly would not have seen if she had stayed home. Or maybe she was happy to make the journey because it was an excuse to run from being Sinrou and all the attempts to make Maman happy. 

They were going to the centre of the continent…nothing would be there. No one to impress, no one to dress well for, no one to judge her for how different her family was. 

No one would be there.

Unless La Chanson had a body.

Perhaps it was all of those things.

Was she happy? Probably happier than if she had stayed home. Perhaps La Chanson fed on her desire to leave. If so, she was grateful. Fulfilled? She didn’t know enough about La Chanson to feel fulfilled, and within herself was such an abundance of questions, how was she to feel fulfilled by the knowledge she had gained?

Why come on the journey? Because Grandmère had been saddened by something that had happened. Alexandrie was on her way to fix what Grandmère could not. She did it for Grandmère - for the grandmother who had cried when told her granddaughter heard the most beautiful sound she could imagine. She imagined that Grandmère had tried to help La Chanson because it had called to her for help - nothing more, nothing less. Whether it was true, she didn’t know, but this was her belief. Alexandrie did not see that in herself. She did not think she was selfless like Grandmère: learning about La Chanson was not fulfilling by itself. It was the chance to learn about Grandmère’s experience.

The fulfilment was in the completion of the task - whatever that was.

Where she’d asked “what is fulfilled?” she had meant “what is fulfilled to you?” She wanted to know how Shi interpreted it.

Fulfilment to Alexandrie was being able to do what she had been trained to do: flirt successfully - it was garnering attention and information, it was having people swoon and do what she needed done. It was not telling family secrets but telling people about La Chanson, it was caring for family above all else. It was about family.

Family was fulfilment.

Closing her eyes briefly, she thought of the Soul in her arms, the picture within it - a picture of family - smiling together before bad times took them away.

She thought about the twelve year old orphan and had no ability to empathise. She could sympathise, yes, but she could not even imagine what it would be like to lose her entire family when losing one member hurt so much.

With no news, did her family assume she was fine? Or did they assume she was dead until they received a letter?

Gods, she missed them so much! She missed being able to ask all the painful questions she could not ask,

and she carefully avoided questions she knew she could ask - because what if La Chanson answered?

Was Vee truly dead and gone forever?

Would she be able to go home after?

Would La Chanson leave her?

Was she worthy of the task?

Would things be better after she had done it?

Would it end the tension between the three countries?

Could La Chanson change the bad things about Le Progrès?

Did it need her to dedicate her life to it? 

Would she ever see Vee again?

Could it bring Aunt Aerith back?

Would she become like Genofeva?

On and on went the list of questions she was not brave enough to ask: 

Would they find Lucas?

Would Spider ever like her?

Would she ever understand jokes?

Was she on her way to bring about the end of the world?

Would she see it if she did?

Did La Chanson like her?

Some of the questions were absurd and unnecessary, but all of them brought an element of fear:

Would Mysel ever be cruel to her?

Would Re’ne’mala ever stop teasing her?

Would Shi ever make sense?

So many contradictions. Alexandrie did not understand why she yearned to have friends when the experience of them was one of discomfort and hurt. Even unintended. 

Like Vee.

Perhaps she needed to ask less questions and be more…more bold. Take answers.

Chevalier could not protect her now. Anything she faced, she faced alone.

Why Mysel was travelling with this friend and what their motivation was, was none of her business. Alexa had a goal to fulfil, a praetorian to try to bring home, an Edgewater to save (maybe)…

And perhaps friends to make?

Why did Shi want to know if she would be a good Waywalker? She seemed happy enough with books…

What was Spider doing for all those long hours in solitude?

No more questions!

And yet her fingers itched…

6: Music and Sadness

The more Alexandrie thought about Sky Anvil Mountain and the strange child placidly holding her hand, the more confused she became. Why or how she was being searched for, even down here, underground -

And why send a child? Why send anyone? It had been three days. Three hellish days. The first she hadn’t slept, the second, with all the hiking and climbing, she had simply lost consciousness when they stopped. The third, wrapped in warm blankets with a town outside, she couldn’t. Towns were beginning to make Alexa uneasy. They had been found and attacked in towns. Genofeva seemingly tracked her through cities - or there were people who could find them there. Whoever that elf with the storm portal had been, he’d managed to find them at the inn - had known they would pass through, perhaps. Were they related? Was Lucas with Genofeva now?

Soft beds, light, walls and doors. She used to think they made her feel safe, but…but it had been Chevalier in the room…Chevalier nearby who had done that. And he wasn’t here. He wasn’t here and he wouldn’t be he could never be because he was gone

He was gone.

He was gone and she was far from a home she couldn’t return to because there was something she had to do.

And to do it she had to live. 

To live she had to sleep.

Sleep.

She’d squeezed her eyes shut, one arm cradling Chevalier’s Soul, the other resting near the hand crossbow on the bed beside her. The murmur of life outside invaded her consciousness, the husky timbre of otherness. She dozed, but it was fitful. She had no sense of time passing down here, and despite being told to go to sleep she didn’t know when she was expected to wake.

So when Shi had knocked on the door, Alexa had been looking at it. When they’d gone to the archive, it had been out of a need to think about something else - but Shi was preoccupied with the strange minutiae of Alexa’s life. Not magic books that could teach Alexandrie something of what she could do, but magic books that told them about the dangers, the concerns, the consequences Alexandrie could face if she failed in what she attempted - in other words, the opposite of a distraction.

When she was young, she’d been so frustrated with Grandmère for not telling her more about Sky Anvil Mountain. She’d pleaded and begged and thought Grandmère was trying to be mysterious. She’d even thought to ask when La Chanson began to curl its way through her mind - but had been distracted by something and had forgotten. Zut. Why did Shi need to know everything? Why did everyone ask her about La Chanson’s intentions? Eventually everyone did…did they ask as much about their gods? Did they ask whether the magic they harnessed was being given by an entity they did not and could not know they could trust?

Was Grandmère’s inability to tell Alexandrie about the interior of the mountain a joke? It had hurt Grandmère. She had tried to tell Alexa what was there even before Alexa had heard La Chanson and hadn’t been able to. Had Grandmère known Alexandrie would eventually follow that same path? Could she talk about it with anyone else? Had Chevalier known? Would she have warned Alexa or told her not to go if she could have? How widespread was…whatever it was stopping her from talking? Was there any guarantee it was La Chanson? Would Alexa have to go into the mountain alone? Could she? How long for? What was so important Grandmère couldn’t be allowed to tell her? What was so important she couldn’t be told, even as a child, in case it compromised future attempts? What was so important it was worth hurting Grandmère for?

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. And it had sent a child who had a friend who knew La Chanson. The child couldn’t hear La Chanson, but La Chanson was uneasy with the kind of magic Mysel used…why uneasy? And he couldn’t see the way she could, he only see them as…he saw them as…he saw whatever he saw. And it was disconcerting, because it felt accurate. She didn’t like it. She didn’t like being defined as Music and Sadness. She didn’t like that it was visible or that there were words for how she felt. And really, she wasn’t sure how long she’d felt this way, but when she thought hard, it likely pre-dated losing Chevalier. 

She missed home. Or at least, missed being ignorant of all this. She missed being able to think of adventure as fun. She missed Lucas. She missed him being kind - when he decided to be kind. She missed finding comfort in being protected, she missed feeling safe she missed all sorts of things and now there was a child sent through some “friend” by La Chanson - some “friend” who made La Chanson uneasy, and did La Chanson feeling uneasy mean she should feel uneasy or uncomfortable? There were only a few things she had encountered that affected La Chanson and if that were the case why would Mysel’s friend be sending Mysel to retrieve them, knowing his magic would make it uneasy. Why send a child to find them? 

To do what? 

Replace Chevalier? 

No. The child could not do that. Not ever. 

Replace her?

Perhaps.

And which was worse, the feeling that the child was here to replace her, or the fact that perhaps being replaced wouldn’t be so bad? The child was cheerful and relaxed and seemed very aware of himself and comfortable with a lot of things she was not. Mysel was a strange child, but in all the fantasy stories an orphan wandering the world with strange abilities seemed a lot more practical than a Sinrou who knew very little of the world outside even her home city. Why choose her? Even Grandmère had been of the common folk before she’d heard La Chanson. 

The further she got from home, the more Alexandrie was resolved to do what she had left to do. But why?

Because she believed she should?

Or was it because she believed she had no other choice?

An unasked question floated through Alexa’s mind as it had a number of times:

If I die, am I easily replaced?

To a degree, with the appearance of Mysel and soon his friend, Alexa reasoned that the answer must be yes…but if that were the case, why choose her to begin with? What was it about Alexa that was also true of Grandmère but not true of Maman? Ultimately, it didn’t matter, because if La Chanson was with her now, it could be for as long as it wanted, so -

Genofeva would hunt her regardless. 

She couldn’t risk going home and having Genofeva follow her there. And she couldn’t - as much as he may be better equipped - she couldn’t leave a twelve year old to deal with the situation even as she considered it. La Chanson could be taken from her, and with everything they had read about Genofeva, she couldn’t allow that. Alexa didn’t understand the nature of La Chanson, she didn’t understand how magic worked, or how La Chanson chose her or why, or how it could be taken from her, or whether it had a physical form or what she was going to do, or

Or whether she would survive what she was on her way to do.

But she knew that Genofeva could not be allowed to take La Chanson. 

She had no doubt that if it could hear her thoughts, it knew she would do as it asked simply to keep Genofeva from it. She could loathe it, she could fear it were the worst thing in existence and only biding its time until it would consume her and she would still go to it because as long as she had it, Genofeva didn’t and though she was not certain she was a good person as Mysel said, she was certain she was not a bad person, like Genofeva. Genofeva desired things only for herself and revelled in death and suffering. Alexandrie, for all her belief that Chevalier should not have had to sacrifice himself for the people at the inn, had not wanted others to die either. That was the difference between them, and so she would do what she could to keep Genofeva from La Chanson. 

Or try to. How could she stop a woman who had been scourged from the planet? She’d come from the Deliverance of the Dawn. How had Genofeva managed to survive when people had been so determined to kill her? More - how had she lived so long?

La Chanson was trying to get her to it, but Genofeva’s magic interrupted it. As though it could distort it. How could magic be distorted?

Storm flavoured…that’s what Shi called it. So La Chanson was music flavoured, presumably. How did people who learned magic decide what kind to use? She simply thought of magic and used it. Or at least, she thought of magic and used it. Or at least, she thought of what she was trying to do and did it…

What was La Chanson? Did it have to learn how to use itself? Was she being offered the vapours of a steaming bath or did it directly watch and hand her the tools she needed? Why didn’t all her spells work? Did La Chanson choose not to help or was it as unsure of what occurred as she? 

Why had it left her when he 

Respect, or something else?

Her discomfort with the idea that La Chanson could read her thoughts was intensified by Mysel’s voice in her head - and she remembered a time Maman had sighed as she finished wrapping a young Alexandrie’s wrist in bandage (for the second time in a month. Different wrists, but still).

“If it makes you uncomfortable to consider how you’re going to explain what happened to me, perhaps you shouldn’t be doing it, Alexandrie.”

“Mais Maman,” Alexandrie had protested, “Et si je dois faire des choses dangereuses pour apprendre des choses magiques? How do I learn to be magical if I do not ask dangerous questions?” 

At this, Maman had kissed Alexandrie on the forehead and drawn her close, patting the sprained wrist.

“Alexa, your grandmother had one of me, and I only have one of you. The world only has one of you, and we are greedy. Some questions are dangerous, some things are dangerous…and you can try them, but they still won’t make you magical. They will just frighten your father and I.” But she moved her lips down to Alexandrie’s ear and said, “Your instincts will grow as you do but they are still young now, so be careful. For now, trust my instincts. If you think I would think something could be a bad idea…” 

“Don’t do it.” Alexandrie had intoned.

She was much older now, but it was difficult to trust her instincts when she didn’t have enough information, or know which information she needed, and when she was constantly reminded that people deliberately enjoyed misleading her. Everything was muddled in her mind and it was as though she had no control over the things she’d once had control over: her thoughts, her expectations, how to behave…she’d tried to tell a joke, but it hadn’t worked and she felt that perhaps it hadn’t worked because it wasn’t funny, but neither were the jokes the others told, they just seemed hurtful. Was this how jokes should be? Were they jokes if they did not hurt anyone?It was harder to follow instincts on the words and actions of others than it was to instinctively leap to a new bough just before she heard the creak of one about to snap. 

Just because Mysel said he would not read her thoughts didn’t mean he would not, and his placid nature disconcerted her more than the warning of Vel’ble’dran. 

People did not like her when they first met her, and Mysel had not only said she was a good person but had held her hand. 

She’d flinched - 

it was the first time anyone had held her hand since Chevalier - 

and the first breathing person since home. She’d felt intensely uncomfortable for a moment and had half jerked her hand away but then…hadn’t.

He’s just a kid.

Was he? He knew a lot for a child. Orphan. Was this how orphans acted? That seemed like a rude question, so she didn’t ask, but she did wonder. Mysel was so carefree he reminded her of the foresters her age back in Breezy Point Bay.

As though there was no point in worrying about danger.

And that was strange in itself. As strange as dawnsfolk becoming evil demon worshippers. 

As strange as a hive attack only days after Vel’ble’dran had been let into their last stopping point. Only days after they had killed two.

5: Distractions and Crises

As she wandered the streets of Kru’ser’ds, Spider silently in tow, Alexandrie thought on what Re’ne’mala had said. Crisis of faith? What was a crisis of faith? How was she to know she was in one? Could it be a crisis of faith when she felt she had been hurt by what felt like a part of herself? She’d told Lucas that La Chanson became a part of you with time, and when she’d said it she’d meant it, but…

But she felt betrayed. And hurt. As though by a friend. Or a reflection. Not a god. 

Gods were distant, gods were all-powerful, gods were…gods did not put their hope in Sinrou teenagers.

Why was Lucas taken to Anvil Mountain, while she…

Alexandrie had so many questions and no one but herself to trust to answer them. Without Chevalier, someone she trusted to bridge the gap between she and the world outside of the rigid rules of nobility, Alexandrie was adrift. 

As Shi bound her ankle, complaining at it and her the whole time, Alexandrie considered that she needed to learn how to fend for herself - and quickly - but she wasn’t sure she wanted to use magic to do it. Like clothing that was too tight or too loose, the spells felt strange in her mouth. Her hands felt at once too fast and too slow - too jerky to continue. And in the present situation, where La Chanson was supposed to be her primary source of protection, this could get her killed. So she shifted her hand crossbow into a more accessible position just in case, her eyes roaming the dark through rose coloured glass that felt oddly heavy and not rose coloured enough to hide the dark world she saw. 

That first night, she had taken the box - Chevalier’s soul - from her bag and placed it beside her as she tried to sleep, but having it beside her reminded her so much of the fact that he was not in the room with her that she’d ended up holding it to her protectively. If he couldn’t look after her, she would look after him. She knew full well she had yet to read the letter addressed to her. Whatever he might have said would be designed, if she knew Vee, to make her feel better. To tell her she was capable, or that whatever had happened wasn’t her fault, perhaps a way to tell Grandmère what had happened…advice. 

Advice.

She could use some advice.

But to take comfort in that letter was to accept that everything was as bleak as it felt.

And since Vee had been made by La Chanson, what did this mean?

Things he hadn’t known about himself, things La Chanson obviously built into him that could happen without his knowledge… she hated herself for it, but she was afraid that to read that letter would be to begin to think about all the things Chevalier was and how it may have been information she was given because La Chanson wanted her to have it. She didn’t like questioning everything the praetorian had told her over her life - and wondering if - 

She hated the question she had asked almost as much as she hated the response.

La Chanson could have saved him. La Chanson chose not to. It chose. Didn’t it? If Chevalier was one of its own, why hadn’t it done more to help him try - at least try - to prioritise self-protection? Chevalier was a marvel of machinery, yes, but that was a golem and she had seen those before and that was irrelevant. Chevalier was a person - a person with no more care and thought and heart and soul than most who breathed and

And why create a creature whose desire was to protect others? Protect the people who gawked through windows and in doorways

People who would forget within the week, the ten-day, forget how close they had come to  

She hadn’t said it to Re’ne’mala, but they didn’t deserve that sacrifice. What had they done to deserve it? 

Even Spider - who had fought, who had the benefit of her respect - her care… Chevalier had stepped in front. She had seen it all. 

Vee hadn’t even thought about the consequences. 

About what could happen.

And she was angry at him for it.

But she was more angry at his creator.

Because he was a person.

And people wanted to survive.

And even worse - she knew Vee would not want her thinking this way, but she couldn’t help it and Vee wasn’t here to stop her.

So she hadn’t slept. She’d wanted to - the tooth Shi had given her was in her pocket. She thought about what the Ebon elf had said: destroying a part of the thing that hurt her might help. 

The tooth in her pocket was a keepsake, but it wasn’t what she wanted to destroy. As much as Re’ne’mala thought she would have a vendetta on the Vel’ble’dran, she didn’t care about them. It had been cornered and had reacted the way creatures did when they were cornered. And from her limited understanding, whoever had taken Lucas had let it in?

Eyes dry, she blinked behind heart-framed lenses. She knew she needed rest (it had been days since she’d last slept), and this was the safest they would be for some time, but sleep was…

She didn’t cry that night, or the days following. She hadn’t cried since she’d dropped the barrier spell, since she’d last seen Chevalier. It was as if the magic that had taken him had taken with it her ability to express what she felt in its fullness. Or perhaps it was training. She was Sinrou after all, and Sinrou were not weak.  So tears were locked away, leaving words that she used sparingly. Honest words, because that was what she had. As Mala pointed out, those who told the truth were inexperienced with the world and she, Alexandrie, was most certainly inexperienced enough to need a companion to guide her. 

That had been Chevalier’s role. And now he was gone. 

 Re’ne’mala had thought Alexa was stubborn, but the truth was that she simply hadn’t noticed the pain. What she had noticed was the uncomfortable swelling restricting her foot in her boot as she scrambled up a precipice. Was it stubbornness if you weren’t aware of loose and broken bones? And though she told Shi she was hurting, how was she supposed to explain that Pèrepère had been the last death in the family, a decade ago? How was she supposed to explain that a fractured bone was an inconvenience compared to the empty pit in her stomach?

Watching food vendors expertly slice hair thin pieces of meat onto a plate, she observed the skill involved - a skill she knew Chevalier would have appreciated. Watching Ebon elves whirl around, an impromptu ball before her, her gaze was almost dispassionate. As if she were recording behaviour for analysis later - which, as she realised with a blink, was exactly what she was doing. Her face a mask of neutrality, the dancers span, food was sold, instruments plucked, beaten, thrummed, and then it was gone, leaving she and Spider behind - Spider who…hovered nearby?

She wasn’t entirely sure what to make of Araignée standing so close: he had largely kept his distance, had other things to do or decided to do other things. They hadn’t often spoken in depth and truth be told, since the first river incident he’d seemed a little afraid of her.

But here he was, even after the second incident, a step or two away in distance. Closing her eyes, she brought the heels of her hands to them, realising again that Lucas was not here. Spider, she guessed, must feel as lost as she…but at least they knew Lucas was alive. A stone in a raging river, there with Chevalier. Until they could get Lucas back (at least Lucas), she’d protect both Chevalier’s soul and Spider to the best of her ability. Which didn’t feel like much, but it was the best she could offer to either. Given Chevalier’s sacrifice, keeping Spider alive was crucial (if La Chanson willed it).

Spider wanted to accompany her, rather than see if Alexa wanted to accompany him, which was the strange thing to her. She had somewhere to be, but she was the younger and held no sway over Spider…

If La Chanson really wanted her to get to it, she thought savagely, perhaps it shouldn’t take from her all those who might best help her get there alive. And as usual, with that thought she listened to La Chanson singing in the back of her mind.

What did it want? How long had it been trying to achieve what it wanted?

Why leave only her left leg soaking wet? 

What did it mean that the stones were there?

And for the first time, a new question:

What was all this worth to La Chanson?

How important? What would it take not to do what La Chanson wanted? What would it cost to do what La Chanson wanted? Could she bargain? 

Idly she wondered whether La Chanson could read her thoughts.

Did it know how she felt about it at that moment?

Was it aware that as much as she desperately clung to the belief that she cared for it and it for her, she wanted to hurt it the way Re’ne’shi suggested? 

Would it abandon her to Genofeva’s wrath if it knew?

Was that who Genofeva was? Someone who had lost everything doing what La Chanson asked? Was that her choice? Be like Grandmère and fail or like Genofeva and succeed at a cost? 

Or the third option - to be like Chevalier, an unknowing weapon to attack and destroy at La Chanson’s bidding?

And then they were walking back and she remembered what Mala had said:

Another guide would take them from here.

Exhausted, Alexandrie wanted to curl up in bed and hide forever. No one liked her when they first met her. She’d been raised in court to stand, look, respond and act as though she belonged there. To anyone outside of court, though, she had two options: Act the way they expected her to, or say nothing and have them assume it anyway. It didn’t matter. Their guide had a task to do, so she would simply tolerate what was assumed and get out of the dark.

He hadn’t even died under an open sky.

As she climbed into bed fully clothed with a loaded crossbow she aimed at the door and put her arms around Vee’s Soul, the half cloud-elf hoped that when she died she would be able to see the stars.

4: Sleepless

Alexandrie was six the first time she tried to sleep standing up.

Well, she’d protested at the time, she was six and a half. The half mattered, of course. She was six and a half, Père père had gently reminded her, as he tucked her into bed. Chevalier was at least 40. How could she expect to sleep standing at only six and a half? She was not old enough at all.

This was a reasonable point to make, so she was eight before she made her next attempts, to Maman’s frustration. An eight year old Sinrou should not have the number of bruises Alexa gained in that stubborn two month stint. Finally, in frustration, Maman had told her that Chevalier did not sleep. He was not really alive, she said, not really dead, so he did not sleep and did not count as someone to imitate in this regard.

Which begat a whole slew of new questions as Alexa asked whether plants and trees and insects and the frog spawn she’d collected that day (hidden in her wardrobe until she got time alone to investigate) could sleep.

And to Alexa’s great interest, Maman got in trouble when Grandmère overheard the following the next day:

“Chevalier, Maman says you’re not alive. Are you alive?”

“I guess it would depend on how you define being alive. I do not eat or drink. I do not sleep. Is that what it means to be alive? But then I still think. I feel. I laugh, I love. I experience joy and I experience sadness. Are those perhaps better indicators of being alive? I like to think they are, but different people will have different opinions on the matter.”

He was, Grandmère pronounced, most certainly alive - and she knew because she had been there on his birthday. Which made Grandmère very very old, but this wasn’t the point. Despite what he said, Chevalier must (if he were alive and even had a birthday) sleep. And he did it standing. Which meant Alexa could too, if she were only disciplined enough.

So she tried leaning against walls, propping herself up with cushions…in desperation one night, she asked Chevalier to wake her should she fall, which of course he agreed to do.

Her experiments didn’t work. The problem, largely, was that Alexandrie was very good, very very good at sleeping. She slept so very well that by magic, it seemed, she would wake in her bed no matter where she fell asleep or how she arranged herself. At eight she never considered that she wasn’t too heavy for a seven foot praetorian to lift, or that as she fell asleep someone would catch her and tuck her into bed. And no one told her that’s what was happening.

She began to get a sneaking suspicion that maybe Maman was right - that maybe Chevalier, despite what he said, was not alive and therefore did not sleep.

And thus the experiment was born.

Chevalier did not lie down to sleep, but sometimes he was still in the hallways, or in his room. She knew he could hear her - from the time she could escape her crib she had taken his hand to accompany her to the kitchen for a snack if she woke in the night. If she had a nightmare, he was often the first to soothe her and tell her it was alright to go back to sleep.

Unlike Maman et Papa, Chevalier didn’t try to rationalise bad dreams - he would just listen to them.

But the experiment:

One afternoon, while the household was quiet, Alexa crept up to Chevalier, who stood still, apparently sleeping. She knew if she were too loud, he would hear her, so she tiptoed as quietly as an eight year old could. 

If he slept, she reasoned, he would be just as prone to falling as she or anything else that lived.

She just had to push.

So she did.

And nothing happened.

But Chevalier was very heavy - especially for an eight year old.

And this was an experiment, after all. 

So she pushed again.

Nothing happened. Again.

Frustrated, she huffed and frowned. What did this mean? That he was awake, or asleep?

Inconclusive.

So she pushed again.

And Chevalier fell.

Seven feet of porcelainesque plates and metal crashed sideways to the floor, thundering with the weight of a felled tree.

And didn’t move.
“Chevalier?” She’d whispered when she got hold of her senses.

No response.

Panic began to flood the little girl, and she ran to the one who had been there on his birthday. When Grandmère saw Chevalier she looked gravely at Alexandrie.

“Oh, Alexa,” she said quietly. “Haven’t you ever heard that you must never try to wake a sleeping praetorian?”

“No…” Alexandrie replied. “Shouldn’t we be doing something to help him? Did I hurt him? How do I wake him?”

Seeing Alexa’s panic, Grandmère crouched and kissed Chevalier, seeming to whisper something to him. Then she put her arms around the girl.

“It’s ok, Alexandrie. Chevalier in fact, does not sleep. Vieillard, you can get up, now.”

So she knew. 

She knew.

Jumping out of the window and landing poorly.

She knew.

Ignoring a fractured ankle to run to Chevalier’s side, she knew.

Even as he’d explained the process that parts of him would shed to protect his core, she knew.

She’d known since she was eight.

Chevalier. Didn’t. Sleep.

When she was exhausted, she slept and it made her feel better.

Chevalier didn’t sleep.

He had processes that would help him recreate and refit his armour. She just had to give him time.

But the fight had been gruelling.

And he’d locked himself in with the Vel’bla’dran

And La Chanson had been useless.

She’d been useless.

Chevalier needed to protect.

It’s almost as though he didn’t care about himself.

And if that were the case

If that were the case, she needed to protect him.

But he was so exhausted.

And the fight was still happening.

It wasn’t safe.

He needed time.

So she did what he would do: Drones to protect.

He needed time.

But he was so tired.

And he doesn’t sleep. Didn’t sleep. Doesn’t.

Why did he look like he was sleeping?

Healing did nothing. He was just

Exhausted.

He looked just like he had the day of the experiment.

It was just an experiment. She’d learned.

Chevalier doesn’t sleep.

So why wouldn’t he wake up?

Why was she making drones? He did it.

She was just giving him time to sleep.

They were safe here.

He’d fought so hard

He was just

Tired.

What if he was having a nightmare?

She couldn’t protect him from that.

Not from here.

Not if he wouldn’t wake up.

“Is he afraid?”

She wasn’t even really asking La Chanson, but she got a reply anyway.

“No.”

Good. At least he was sleeping peacefully.

Chevalier doesn’t sleep.

Why was he lying down?

8 and 18 reached out in confusion, hands finding the sigil on his forehead, the faceplate he’d crafted. Her hand moved down his arm to hold his.

The hand shifted, began to become motes, particles.

No.

No. Chevalier doesn’t sleep. Not lying down, not standing up. 

Are things that don’t sleep alive?

Yes. They laugh, they love. They experience joy and they experience sadness.

The harder she tried to hold onto Chevalier, the faster he disappeared until he was gone. All except…

It wasn’t until she was carefully placing the box and faceplate into her bag that she heard La Chanson creeping into her head, and her hands shook slightly as she pushed the box out of view.

It was dark and still and she was alone with La Chanson.

She hadn’t even noticed the silence until it was replaced with a powerful, ever present entity. One that had called her so far from home, and led her so far underground.

“What good are you, though?”

3: The Music in the Child

Why Alexandrie showed Re’ne’shi the extent of the power La Chanson had to offer, she wasn’t entirely sure. It wasn’t so much showing off as it was a need for Re’ne’shi to understand that La Chanson wasn’t just in her head. That wasn’t just insanity or foolishness or…or…

What was it about how Re’ne’shi had asked her question that had led to any of this? She already knew magic…

She already knew magic. So the entire conversation skipped what she was used to: Suspicion. Re’ne’shi had disbelieved what La Chanson was, but not that she was given its power, nor that it existed at all. Re’ne’shi’s first question hadn’t been about what it wanted or how to manipulate it, either… She hadn’t assumed it wanted something - or, if she had, she had assumed that whatever it wanted was a cost Alexandrie was willing to pay.

That was new, and it was…it was nice.

Everyone she’d encountered (or almost everyone)  treated her like a child.

She understood the inclination: she had only recently come of age in human years after all (and was even more immature in elven years, Papa had been quick to note when she acted impulsively), and there were a number of things she hadn’t experienced. Play had been in the form of time spent with adults. She had no siblings so she had been steeped in the adult histories and cultures of both cloud elves and humans without really living in either. Papa had almost babied her. Maman had treated her as an adult at 12 summers. Grandmère hadn’t forced anything on her but the name Donadieu conferred a certain je ne sais quoi, and so she had been taught at an early age to curate her image.

“Choose what you will be known for,” Maman had said curtly one evening as she braided Alexa’s hair, “or others will choose for you.”

On the whole, this was easier said than done. Leaving home looking the way she did seemed either to help too much or be entirely counter to her intent. All these experiences and teachings resulted in a teenager who was perhaps immature but laden with responsibility that translated surprisingly well from running a Sinrou household. 

She wished she had the ability Lucas did to look at the world so simply. Not to care about order or propriety. Not to need to worry about inheriting the entire burden of a name. There was an immense weight, she supposed, in being an Edgewater, but it was shared among the children. She carried the Donadieu name alone. 

So this child who was not a child was treated like a child playing with a mace, when the reality was that she very carefully chose how she used the magic because she knew just how powerful it was. And while sometimes it was overly enthusiastic that more people weren’t dead was a testament to her control over so vast a well of power.

There was a small part of her hoping the Ebon elf could explain it to her, but Re’ne’shi seemed just as confused (if not more so) than Alexa or anyone else. It was rare that she shared La Chanson so boldly. Even Chevalier was surprised enough to shake him out of his more human characteristics. It had been part frustration, part hope, the intensity with which she called on La Chanson - hope that Re’ne’shi would take her seriously. Alexa hadn’t ever spoken with anyone else who knew magic. Not to this extent. And certainly not so differently. Alexa didn’t want to learn the theory behind the magic Re’ne’shi used, but she did want to understand how it worked…and now everything was more confusing than it had started. Re’ne’shi seemed to borrow from the world around them to cast spells, but their magic did not come from La Chanson du Monde, which was perhaps not La Chanson du Monde, but an entity that did not live in her mind. Or not only in her mind. It had a location - not just a direction she followed, but an origin point, or a centre, or a…did La Chanson have a body? Arms, legs, a head? An actual voice beyond the feeling of a response?

Which led to more confusion. If she was going to actually meet La Chanson, what did it - they - he - she…what did it want? She hadn’t considered that the presence leading her was leading her to it - she’d presumed it had something it needed her to do for it.

She should have known, really, that asking for help to prove its majesty had resulted in an extreme reaction, but she was sick of being treated as a child, and by a few months in, she needed to be able to show just how intensely she had to fight to focus and direct this other part of her. 

This other part she had yet to meet. 

This other part she was on her way to meet.

She didn’t know whether to feel more nervous or less, and now that she knew it resided somewhere, all sorts of question arose: 

Did it have a physical form? 

Was it at full power?

Could it be more powerful?

Why did it not choose Maman?

Why Lucas?

Why Alexa?

Once she got there and did what had to be done, was there more?

Did it have an enemy?

Would she be expected to just go home?

Would she be able to go home?

Would it return to Grandmère once she had?

Would it simply leave her?

And questions for herself:

What more could she do to make it happy? 

Would she be able to do whatever it asked? 

Would she want to go home?

Could she live without it?

What would happen to the Donadieu name if she perished?

Would she inevitably need to kill Genofeva?

Did she have to kill?

Had Grandmère met La Chanson? What could it want? What kind of entity could reach out and give her so much power - but not be able to move from where it was? It had always been in the same place, whenever she felt that familiar pull.

Was it trapped? Was that why it avoided the deities? Had they trapped it? And if so…why? Why trap something so beautiful? Why treat something so awfully? Why that, and not whatever it was giving Genofeva power - Power enough to disrupt La Chanson. Disrupt or…or sever their connection. 

Did Genofeva feel that same pull? Did she know where La Chanson was? Was the source of her power like La Chanson, or more like Re’ne’shi’s? La Chanson could be truly loud…what if the other entity were just as strong? What if they were trapped together?

What if releasing one meant releasing both? Would Grandmère have one that or chosen not to? 

So many questions she often couldn’t ask any because of the potential for more. 

It was all so complicated, and none of it seemed to be in books. 

It wasn’t even a complete Song.

The music swelled slightly in her mind and she glanced around absently, then up at the dark booth. Something looked strange. Her hand was outstretched to put the glasses back on for a closer look when her mouth fell slack as she was in another place. Close this time. Dark, but where wasn’t? The dragging, sliding, limping gait of the person who had just been above her made her eyebrows furrow and her open mouth curl into a soundless “no”. Whatever this was, it was not good.

2: Just like Home

Alexandrie understood what Re'ne'mala was saying: Focus on the here. Focus on the now. Things were dangerous down here. 

What Re'ne'mala didn’t seem to grasp was that the day before - not 24 hours earlier - they had been attacked in the middle of Glitter Delta Cove, which undoubtedly had more than the 4000 she was concerned about here. Where magic was involved, perhaps the two Ebon elves knew theory and technique, and perhaps they knew how to survive down here, but their biggest fear was still nature - and nature was random. Sometimes things just happened. Yes, she had this thought afraid to look at the blank, skyless space above her, and yes, she was easily startled, but they were afraid of something that may or may not happen.

Genofeva was actively hunting them, and she was powerful. There was a lot to keep track of without being treated like a child, or having her concerns dismissed. Re'ne'mala hadn’t seen how much blood came out of Lucas. She hadn’t watched as the others ran (or prepared to) - and even if she had - this is the life she had chosen! She trained for this. Did she even remember what it was to be afraid? To not know what to do moment to moment? To have a task given she had no choice but to do despite that fear and lack of training? And even if the answer to all that was yes, Alexa was more than capable of fearing multiple things at once.

The thought that the first thing Re'ne'mala thought she would do would be to kill on reflex stung, though it shouldn’t have. The ebon elf thought little of her anyway, and that was not new. She should perhaps have been used to people thinking little of her by now, but it still stung - as if she should have known things she could not have known. It seemed to happen a lot - people making assumptions of her, and she could neither stop it, nor could she seem to change it once it happened.

Now that she knew why Spider lied, it made a great deal of sense - even if the lying still made her uncomfortable. She didn’t know why Re'ne'shi had lied to her, but she suspected it was to make a mockery of her. Was that the same? Or was it that they had made assumptions and decided that Alexandrie needed to be brought down to her level? Based on the way others looked at their sashes, the two seemed to be perceived similarly to her in Shining Capital, so of what benefit was it to mock someone who had no reason not to trust them? All it did now was leave Alexandrie hesitant to believe anything they said. She thought she’d left the stupid subterfuge of court, but apparently it lingered longer than one of Lucas’ farts. 

Things weren’t as different as they thought. 

She would do, physically, as Re'ne'mala directed, but the time to relax had passed. She had a task to do, something Lucas seemed to have forgotten. Again. As wonderful as it was to see new things, she wasn’t travelling to see the world. She was travelling to do something of import. Everyone else seemed to find his behaviour entertaining, charming, but Alexa was concerned: about her own feelings and about…

It didn’t matter. It really didn’t. She sat as far away from the fire and the rest of them as she could, her fingers tracing notes on sheet music. She would have given anything to have a tree to hide in - maybe Emily to talk to. Suddenly she missed her eighth bodyguard dreadfully. She had no idea how old Emily was, but she had never spoken to Alexa the way either Ebon elf did. No one spoke to her like that except Maman, and even Maman was never that…cold? Distant? Disgusted? Despairing? The tone reminded her of someone…

Five days. Less than a month, surely to Lucas and Spider’s destination, if they hurried.

She resolved to stay quiet and simply endure the time, like a long day in court. She would not be down here forever.

It just felt like forever.

Edgewaters. That’s what Re'ne'mala’s tone reminded her of: The way Ellinora Edgewater had spoken to her.

Of course Lucas had reverted to form.

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? 

It had been a very long day, and Alexandrie Donadieu was tired. Who knew whether Genofeva would try to track her through every spell, so she didn’t want to even risk creating something to keep her company. Slipping the music away, she pulled the heart-shaped glasses from her nose, folded her arms on her knees and hid her face: The closest she would get to being alone, where none of these things mattered.

***​

But she could not sleep. Not here. Too much was different and her mind was full of thoughts. The book in her pack, for one: Re'ne'shi had loaned it to her. Full of very practical things to try to use magic, Alexandrie knew one thing immediately, as she flicked through it: If she had not been gifted La Chanson, she would not have learned to use magic. Which led to another realisation: If La Chanson left her, she would no longer use magic.

Not because she was unintelligent and could not learn. She was stubborn enough to keep trying if she'd wanted. She simply didn't find the use of magic without connection interesting. It was as though there were people who wanted to use magic the way others might use a mallet, or play the piano, or swing a sword. Magic to those people was a tool, not a need or a calling. A pastime. 

In essence, magic to those people operated the way Lucas saw magic. 

He didn't trust La Chanson, but he used it in the same way he used his weapons. To do a job.

And yes, she'd been gifted La Chanson for a purpose, but... it was a conversation. A presence. It was there to guide her, or watch her...lead her? Something. And though she was a little upset at it at the moment for reasons she really couldn't place, she was upset at it the way she was sometimes upset at Vee, or Grandmère, or Papa or Maman. A fleeting, familial upset that was fair at the time but had been held for a little too long, losing meaning. 

What this book didn't question was where the materials were coming from. If magic could exist, something was creating it. To play the piano, someone had to build a piano - they needed to source the wood and ivory and strings... to use magic, it had to be given, or loaned. Re'ne'shi's book did not answer that question. How could they all be using mallets without knowing where the mallet came from? At least when she used La Chanson, she knew the mallet would be made of music, and would become sound creating force on the object she struck.

If she used magic. Which, right now...she wasn't sure she should do.

1: The Child and the Song

“A child sings and she calls it magic.”

It wasn’t what Re’ne’shi said that stung. It was, Alexa reflected, that no one moved to tell her she was wrong. Alexa was certainly adult enough to be so far from home, and her magic had been powerful enough that morning that Lucas was coughing up chunks of dead lung because she had grown him a new one. La Chanson and the circlet upon her brow were more than enough proof that what she did was use magic.

But the thought played on her mind anyway. Did the others see her as a baby, a child to be kept from walking into furniture? Was that why Chevalier was really here - not as a protector but as a sitter? Spider seemed to find the assessment hilarious, but did Lucas think the same? He certainly wanted to read Re’ne’shi’s books and learn from the Ebon elf, but did he agree?

For someone already unsure whether she was supposed to be the one chosen for this task, having someone explicitly draw attention to her age threw her back into the courtly uncertainty she was only just beginning to find her way out of. She knew what Chevalier would say to the situation: “she doesn’t know you. She doesn’t know what you’re capable of. Don’t let her get to you.” But the others knew and left her floundering in the sickly sense that Re’ne’shi was right. For once the half-elf usually so quick with replies had none, and she didn’t like it.

As they toured the town, Alexa was quiet. The murmuring of the city was not unlike La Chanson: Try though she might, she could not make the sound fade to the back of her mind. So instead, she listened. Listened to the cadence of the Uondeerveld, listened to the song it tried to sing. Husky, muted, peaceful. It did not invite sleep or alertness, but perhaps…awareness? Re’ne’mala rolled along, babbling about some historical plaque or other while she led them around, uphill in the oppressive dark. As perplexed as she was by how long it took Re’ne’shi to learn how to use something Alexandrie did on a whim, in her household back home, age had brought wisdom - and Re’ne’shi and Re’ne’mala were both older than any of the other mortal members of the party.

A part of her scoffed at the need to study books to connect with whoever or whatever gave her magic, but perhaps Re’ne’shi was simply a little slow to connect with the entity that entrusted her with the abilities she had. It had, after all, taken Alexa a whole year to feel as close to La Chanson as she did now, and Lucas’ experience seemed very different to hers. She made a mental note to watch very closely when Re’ne’shi used their magic. Perhaps they were just a court magician who knew sleight of hand. She had seen a lot of very talented tricksters back home. Maybe that’s what Re’ne’shi meant. That would make sense, at least.

And did Re’ne’shi see magic, or hear it, or smell it? What did their senses tell them? The Ebon elf said they did not need to speak to cast spells…nor did Alexandrie, really. She just…didn’t have anywhere else for La Chanson to go otherwise. A lot of power ran through her when La Chanson was feeling particularly protective - the screaming and humming were a better outlet than tingling in her skin for hours after. Besides, La Chanson was the Song of the World. Surely the world deserved to hear its song at times.

The Song of the whole world. Why was it opposed to the pantheon? And why had it been disrupted by Genofeva’s magic? And how had she found them? And why Lucas but not Spider? And what would they find of Chevalier’s past? And would Lucas and Spider stop travelling with them when they got to Cliffkeep?

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.

Five days they would be with Re’ne’mala and Re’ne’shi. Five days was not enough time to make them believe what she was and what she was doing there. Why did she care? Why did it matter what they thought of her when they would only be taking the group to the crossroads? Not even a week and then they would be gone. She would not be on the surface, that would take more time, but…at least back to the dynamic they had before. One she was beginning to like…

The waterfall washed away thought for a moment. Just a moment, suspended above this cavern between two waterfalls almost gave her clarity. It was almost as though the constant murmuring distracted her, but the waterfall was immediate and beautiful and captivating and she could focus. It would be fine. Five days and they would be halfway through the journey. La Chanson pointed her in the direction of her goal, and peace fell upon her for a moment.

Only a moment.

The wet-warm of the Uondeerveld and the hum of life and thundering of waterfalls were nothing to the icy dagger Alexandrie felt at the back of her neck. How stupid - tellement stupide - to think that there was going to be an end to this journey? How stupid to consider that perhaps she could live a life unafraid of what could be to come, of what might be behind. At first she thought she’d imagined it, but La Chanson was there. No sooner had the circlet gone than someone was there, most certainly there behind her, watching. Searching? Hunting. They were being hunted. They were prey, and there was no rest for prey. Prey were skittish, prey ran. Prey always ran.

Found. Found.

Lucas may be alright with moving forever, but Alexa was the one feeling hated by someone or something.

The worst part was that it didn’t feel far enough away.