2: Power

As the light touched the curling spires of Saint’s Rise, Alexa’s eyes held on it, head craning to keep it in view.

Would La Chanson avoid the pantheon here?

Would the Prime Divinities be delighted to hear La Chanson if they could, or would they capture it? If it could be taken from her, what then? Would she learn how to cast spells without the aid of La Chanson? If she asked it to leave, would it?
If it did, what would happen to all the people hunting her?
Would they still want her dead?
What would happen to her family?
Chevalier?
Mysel and Heofonræsele?
Spider?
Lucas?

What would happen to Alexandrie herself? Would La Chanson find another? Would it fade away?

For the first time, Alexandrie became genuinely curious of not just what Genofeva wanted but why she wanted it. People didn’t just want power. They wanted to do something with it. Spider wanted to buy…a place to belong in Shining Capital, as far as she could tell. Lucas had wanted power to protect his brother. Re’ne’shi was curious about what she could do, Aquideon wanted to take back Glitter Delta Cove…she wanted to help Grandmère.

(Or she had)

Why did Genofeva actually want power? And was it she who was hunting for Alexa? That had been the assumption, but…
In the year and a bit since La Chanson had first come to her, she had only experienced silence a few times, and never by choice. It had simply waited outside the temple she had entered in Glitter Delta Cove. Perhaps it would here too and she could run some tests, once Spider, Mysel and now Kazsra were otherwise occupied.

It was nice that the Dash’em’ali family had thought to ask someone to help them, and Alexandrie thought back to the look on the matriarch’s face when she was told Lucas Snr was still alive.

Such was the power she wielded.

She was glad she could give this way, but she still wondered whether this was the life she was expected to live and what - if anything - came next. Mysel spoke passionately about how he had been proud to help people, and how helping people made him feel good. Alexandrie understood that, of course - she’d left home to right a wrong she’d perceived for her grandmother - but a thousand years of helping people who treat you poorly, and Alexandrie wondered how much the child and the dragon truly believed the things so oft repeated. It wasn’t even that she believed they didn’t enjoy helping people: she wondered whether the decision to help people was a form of power they wielded. Though the half elf didn’t want to consider morals anymore - nothing was ever clear cut and it was beginning to frustrate her - she wondered whether helping others because it made one feel good could be considered in itself a morally good thing.

If someone had been so desperate to get rid of one of them they’d been shoved from time itself, what if that had been because that someone had said they didn’t want help but they did something anyway and made it worse? The first conversation she’d had with Heofonræsele had consisted of him telling her they would help, not asking if she wanted help. And since they were sent by La Chanson it all circled back around to the most annoying question of all: Why them? What about them could La Chanson take advantage of (beyond the protection Lucas and Chevalier had provided)? Why should she have been wary of the boy? Because of the strange clock that tocked? Why would that matter?
Spider did it too, so it wasn’t that.

She sighed, breathlessly. Another thing on the long list of things to think about…along with what was in The Birdhouse. Did the Fulxithii really not live within the city? The fact that it was outside the walls made little sense to her until she realised she was in a vehicle being pulled by a flying creature.

What were walls to them?

Spider said Alexa could do whatever she wanted while he did what he needed to do; and while she wasn’t used to an entire lack of restrictions, Alexandrie considered the idea that she hadn’t spent much time alone, that she likely would be soon, and that maybe this was a good place to practice that. So as they landed and entered the city, she took in the strange looking buildings and stranger looking people. She took care not to stare, but her eyes darted to the tops of buildings to see feathered creatures landing here and there; or hopping from building to building. It wasn’t just a horizontally busy place… flying people meant it was above and around her too, and blood thumped in her ears as one of the robins pulled at her ear lobe and the other chattered by her shoulder.

This could be the last chance to learn about La Chanson. She didn’t want to get any closer without knowing more.

She didn’t want to get any closer.

As they approached the inn, the thought of La Chanson made her sick to her stomach - though whether that was nerves, disgust or altitude she couldn’t tell.

What she did know was that she didn’t like the feeling. She didn’t like it, and it was growing. She didn’t like feeling so nervous and unsure. She’d hoped it would go away the closer they got but it was getting worse and it was beginning to scare her.

She needed answers and she needed to make decisions. With sentient music, Alexa didn’t know if she needed a spiritualist or a musician, but the spiritualists were closer, so perhaps there first.

Then a musician.
Then, if all else failed - an academic.

They didn’t seem to understand her form of magic, so she very much hoped it wouldn’t come to that.