Chapter 20.2

Author's Notes: 1,994 words.

The border station, Terasu thought, didn't live up to its reputation.

Two on each side of the river, the small earth and stone mounds protruded from the earth like pebbles in a field, their insides marked by a measly gathering of soldiers and weapons. Their archers aimed their weapons at the caravan from the small holes set towards the top of the mound. Since she was standing right below them, it was easy to spot.

"Now we can get into the action," she said, pushing aside her hair and leaning on one side against the wall as she looked sweetly up to Jonathan, who crossed his hands and focused his gaze away from her.

"Alarick said-" Jonathan began, but Terasu laughed off his comment. Her voice was loud and erratic.

"As if you ever listen to what that old fart says." She replied, poking him in the arm. "We haven't been on an adventure in a long time."

Jonathan shrugged. "Point."

Terasu didn't mind his silence - it was part of the package. His apathy frustrated her. Weren't they friends? Hadn't they both lost a piece of them in Rowland? "You've kept your promise, right?" she said, leaning towards him and beaming. "You haven't seen her, I know."

"That wasn't a promise," he said, turning around. "You just told me not to." The bags under his eyes looked bigger than normal.

Flames reached their way up the tips of her fingers. "So you have?" she said, clasping her hands together and avoiding the temptation of slapping Jonathan in the face. "Well, promise me!"

"Don't be like this," Jonathan said, placing his hands on her shoulders and staring down at her. "She's good."

"Good enough to kill!" Terasu spat back, spreading her hands back and glaring at him. "And even you treat me like a kid? She's killed Rowland and, and -" she spotted Yorew standing against the wall on the other side of the entrance to the fort - "bringing in creeps like him! Hey, old guy!"

Terasu had heard his name in her conversations with Alarick; she just cared about how emotionless Yorew was. In her eyes, Yorew was Jonathan, if the latter were older and didn't have any friends. Besides, Yorew was Eremia’s servant, so he couldn’t possibly be good.

She shouted the epithet a few more times before Yorew finally seemed to notice her, craning his head to look over Jonathan. "Hm?" he said.

"Like being her pet?" Terasu called, ignoring Jonathan trying to block her with his arm as she stepped around him. "Don't you have anything better to do?"

Still no response. He looked away.

"Hello?" she said, louder. As she walked towards Yorew, she could see Jonathan silently moving towards her, trying to intercept her. A quick burst of flame on the ground halted him. Terasu knew that he was glaring at her in those widened, furious eyes he only saved for special occasions. Not that it had ever stopped her, though the hairs on the back of her neck stood up.

"Who do you even think you are?" Terasu said, staring up at Yorew's expressionless face. "Just that freak's to use as she wants?"

There were an assembly of soldiers gathered some distance from the fort, standing about in neat rank-and-file. Out of the corner of her yee, Terasu spotted a pair of horns wading through them. Terasu shoved at Yorew, still to no effect. "You're no fun," she said, spinning around to point at the horns. "Maybe I'll just ask him how bad of a servant you are."

"Alarick wanted that the generals and generals-to-be talk to the bordermen," Yorew said, before a ring of fire that flashed in front of his eyes.

Terasu, hands balled into fists and widening her stance, yelled at him, "As if I care!"

The flames that grew on her hands vanished in the instant that Jonathan grabbed her and yanked her away, allowing Ceinen to march up to Yorew and engage in a staring contest.

"Don't do this," Jonathan growled, turning Terasu to face him as they stood towards the edge of one of the walls. "You're not alright."

"Oh, really?" said Terasu as she smiled menacingly at him. "I'm not alright? Well, I wonder why?" She started up the side of the mound, gripping the earth between her fingers and leaving black marks on the ground in her wake. "Maybe because my boyfriend's dead and you're all keeping the bitch who killed him?"

Jonathan watched her, crossing his arms. "It wasn’t her. You know that."

As she neared the top of the mound, she became increasingly aware that the long ring of hills extending in either direction had the same holes that marked hers. She realized that, since there were no other hills beyond the ring, this was part of an elaborate series of forts. Terasu didn’t pay the thought much attention. "Oh, I know?  She couldn't be bothered to trust me, she was closest to that stupid kid, she was the first person to "fight" him when he went crazy-”

"What do you remember?" Jonathan cupped his mouth and called up to her as she reached the top of the hill and stood assertively, hands on her hips as she spun in a circle to see all the landscape. "She got thrown through a wagon!"

"You weren't even there!" Terasu said as she span around, caught by the brief and sudden feeling of euphoria at not being able to clearly see anything. The blurrier the world, the less she saw its faults. "For all we know, her little creature turned on her - as she deserved!"

She stopped and fell onto her knees, gripping the grass. The world continued to turn, disorienting her by its violent rocking. Beneath her, she could see what looked like Ceinen failing to shove Yorew and demanding that the latter was needed back at the hospital.

Her vision fixed itself on Jonathan when he spoke again. "This isn't coping. It's hurting you."

"I'm already hurting!" Terasu shot back, pulling herself down the face of the mound so that she neared the entrance. "And do you think you're any better? Alarick's making you into him, and you don't have the spine to say no."

He hesitated. "You're going to kill someone," he said at last, as Terasu rested over the entrance and dangled her feet off the edge.

Terasu laughed, fighting back tears. "I kill lots of people," she retorted, voice cracking. "So have you. They always had it coming."

Now she could hear the conversation between Yorew and Ceinen growing louder, as Ceinen asked for the whereabouts of a certain someone. She knew that someone was right beneath her. She wanted so hard to jump down and set the inside of the mound on fire. It would be so easy, so simple, so cathartic.

"Not this time," Jonathan said, the muscles on his neck visible. "You know who she is. You want to kill her? It'll help your parents."

She silenced, face paling. "You don't mean that," she shouted, voice fading fast. "You don't -"

Jonathan looked pained, eyes widening as he moved his hands behind his head. "I do," he said slowly, paling. "You're going to screw her over? Fine. I can't stop you. But you won't kill her. It won't help. Rowland died because of himself."

And, with that, he ran off. Terasu blinked, the color gradually returning to her face as she started to think again. She hardly noticed the sound of somebody running into her boots until a voice called up from below, "Who, by the Creator, is up there?!"

Pulling her head forward and looking down, Terasu saw the face of Alarick peering up at her, frowning more than usual. "Me," she said, propping her chin on her hands and frowning. "Just waiting for the all clear."

Alarick relaxed, the tension on his shoulders wearing away. “The guards gave their approval, so we'll be off before the hour's done. I would’ve liked that they see all our generals, but I suppose it couldn’t be helped."

"What are you out here for, anyway?" said Terasu, the inklings of an idea forming in the back of her head and bringing back her smile. "Bored? Is that even possible with you?"

"Some must have had told Ceinen that she was here," Alarick said, "And they've been bickering about deities for the past half-hour. Katerina's betting the lead guard let us through just so he could stop listening to them."

"And you're not taking sides?" Terasu said, leaning forward and smirking. That Alarick kept his promise to never mention the freak’s name was telling.

Alarick glared at her. "I'd rather not have both of them shouting at me," he said, grabbing Terasu's outstretched hands and lifting her down onto the ground.

He let go, and Terasu walked as far away from the entrance as she could. Even if the freak was too distracted to notice her, it was better not to take any chances. "She's making things so much more complicated, isn't she?" Terasu said, propping an elbow on the wall and resting her cheek against her hand.

Alarick pinched his nose and nodded. "As though keeping an eye on all of you wasn't hard enough," he half-mumbled. "At least she wants to be a general, unlike Jonathan. I'd rather that she give him her spirit."

"Do you want her to be a general?" Terasu raised an eyebrow. The question popped out of her mouth.

Loud voices began to draw towards the entrance from inside the mound, muffled by thick earthen walls. Waving Terasu away, Alarick clasped his hands together and stood as firm as a statue, looking inside firmly. "If it keeps her busy," he mumbled as Terasu pulled herself up on the mound and layed her head back against the grass, watching the sky. Her ears patiently scanned the conversation for anything useful. She couldn't stand to hear her enemy's voice; it inspired flames to appear on the crown of her head and project themselves in little flickering wisps that wafted upwards.

"That interpretation is utterly blasphemous! The Creator is omnipotent; he cannot possibly exist in any pantheon whose members are on an equal level to him."

"Y-yet, well, he's not all-powerful, you know, because no one m-man could create everything. And it's - it's stupid to think that only the humans g-get a god."

"One who exists before the universe did, and had enough time, can create everything. Besides, he did create the other species and their leaders - those he did not pacify, of course, from the influence of The Corruption."

"But, but, if that were the case, he would s-still be building it! Universes t-take time, you know. And if that were so, why, why are the humans not as s-strong as the others? Why didn't he make h-his 'images,' like you call them, p-powerful?”

Through this endless flood of arguments, the familiar, weary tones of Madeleine reached Terasu's ears. "Give Katerina some candy or whatever it is she wants, Alarick. She won the bet. We'll be leaving the country now. Hopefully we can leave those two behind, because they will never shut up."

It had been the first time in years since Terasu had left the Confederacy's walls. Terasu smiled as she stood up, brushed the grass stains off of her clothes, and walked towards the river. She had a few strategies now; the freak was being a nuisance, and Alarick hadn't been entirely honest about making her a general. As she checked to make sure that the conversationalists were far enough away for her to walk back to her soldiers without coming across either of them (a definite yes, as Ceinen's horns poked among the crowd in the distance), she looked at her frail reflection in the muddy river. The reflection was about as solid as she felt.

She wanted to make the water clearer.