5: Scorched Earth, Ash and Steel

Attention was hard for Alexandrie. The half-elf’s focus frequently split between how she appeared to others (training, Maman), listening for nuance and meaning (experience, La Chanson), listening to what others were saying or doing or feeling (attempts, everyone), trying to pick through all the information she encountered everyday and make some semblance of use of it (thoughts, herself) and whatever it was the birds wanted or needed at any given time (whatever mental capacity was left, Scramble and Oat).

On most days, this was difficult enough that she often lost track of what others were saying, or ended up lost in La Chanson for a moment, or got distracted by Scramble, who seemed to have learned that if he pecked her left eyebrow it seemed to be more effective than pulling the hair on the right.

On this day, though, so much had happened it all bled into one long, winding thought that splintered and knitted to be folded and kneaded into existing information and re-formed into something else. 

And none of it made any sense. 

Was this how the Song was supposed to end? Was this the part she was missing?
In ash and death and the destruction of… Everything? Or was that the beginning? 
Like Rem’mi’ki had sung.

Ash underfoot.
Orcs and Trolls fighting for what?

Why show her the fall of the Giantkin?
And why was that Ebon elf familiar?
It's hard to fly through Ash.
Even for a dragon – was it Heo?
Would it be hard for Kazsra? 
The one who was literally helping them breathe… 
Maybe. Maybe not.
But what about her family?
They would miss her.

What was she supposed to do? 

Stop it or help the volcano explode? Was it even the eruption?
Was she supposed to engineer the end of all this?
Or was she supposed to stop it?

What did Grandmère do?

It had erupted, so whatever she did led to an eruption and that eruption had only just settled in time for another eruption now.

The ash.

And it was silent during the fall of the Giantkin Empire, but what about the time after?

Spider wanted her to make something that would help him see in the dark –
Something that would make him invisible.

Put the Song into something.

But if she used La Chanson’s power, was she bringing the volcano’s explosion date closer?
She’d thought – expected – she wouldn't get to go home when this was done, but a volcano?
It was more frightening when you could see death approaching. Kazsra was right.

Pieces. 

Warnings sent by Lounkon to make sure she walked the path set.
Trust - she wanted to cry.
It wasn’t just that she couldn’t trust what he said based on the fact that he said it.
La Chanson had brought the party together. 
La Chanson was using her to do as it needed. 
La Chanson knew what she wanted. 
So how could Alexandrie trust anything anyone said as being entirely self-motivated?

She’d told Kazsra that she assumed everyone was telling the truth rather than trying to parse what might be a lie. Her phrasing was wrong, and Spider’s words made her stomach twist. In truth, she assumed everyone said what they needed to say to get what they wanted. She hadn’t always assumed this, but when Chevalier died, she -
And it was getting worse. Or better. She didn’t know. 
Now she assumed La Chanson put them there to say those words to get her to do what it wanted - and she didn’t know what it wanted, so everything was suspect.

Priestess? The Boss?

More than anything, deep down Alexa wanted to simply give into the soothing, easy path of trusting La Chanson - trusting what she’d seen and felt and quietly follow the road built for her, but -

Withering…dying…Dying? Wasting?

If Ebon Elves engineered the end of the Giantkin, why did they live underground? 

Why kill humans? 

Why humans?

She was dangerous. Frightening. Probably right. Even if she didn’t see it.
They were right to think so.
Everything she said - everything she did was influenced by La Chanson, now.

She’d killed two people. Was that her?

Maybe she should go alone.

If she went at all.

They needed to find Lucas.
La Chanson would keep Chevalier hostage. She knew this. Besides, of all the people she could guarantee would be controllable by La Chanson, of course the Praetorian -

Priestess?

The word suggested a God.
La Chanson was not a God. 
It was - had been - a friend.

Now?

Besides, divinities had adherents. She couldn’t have been the only one.

She wasn’t. There had been Grandmère. 

So why her?
Even after Grandmère - 
Was it simply timing?
But why the same family?

Refugees from where? 

And why here?
Why would Kazsra be able to help them breathe? It couldn’t be all Fulxithii…
There was no point to all of them being clouds if they could already breathe.

Were they refugees?

How had they run?
Was she about to make them run again?
Why were they so poorly treated?
They’d done so much -
In the Confederacy, they earned their keep - 
More than earned their keep, but couldn’t fly…

Meritus.

Walking is slow, she’d said.
Wasn’t that a waste of resources?
Or were they grounded for a reason?
If they were grounded for a reason
Why weren’t they protected by the walls?

How were humans like Giantkin?

Why kill humans?
Where had all the peoples come from?
And what - where - was the castle? 
There had been one safe place - and it was poisoned.
Why one castle? Was that the volcano?
Was the Giantkin Empire still in force?
Did they simply grow quiet?

Did they simply grow small?

Why tell her the truth, of all people?

What happened to the bones of the dead? 
Did the volcano bury the giants?
Was she supposed to evacuate everyone? Should she be warning people?

Would they even listen?

What was it about what she was doing that meant she should be harmed?
Preparing for war? Against her?

Scorched earth warfare. 

The divinities had wanted to fight. 

Birthed from war?

Why? She was just a kid.
A kid with La Chanson du Monde.
So she was not just a kid but a threat - a large enough one that an assassin had to kill a lot of people to slow down a full scale war against her.
Who was leading the war? The blond-haired elf?

Cloud elf. Cloud like Kazsra. Cloud elf - like her.

This was where Lucas should be, but he wasn’t.
Not yet. Not at all? Lucas had been - wrong one. 
They had to find him.

Everything would be fine. 

She couldn’t believe that - not with everything happening - and yet Spider said he’d told her more truths than anyone but Lucas. 
Just because it was the truth to him didn’t mean it was accurate, but…
But it was the closest the half-elf had been to comfort for some time.

Even if she couldn’t trust it.