Illumin0sity

Journey to the East

Aimee perked a brow at Elann’s suggestion, partly wondering why she offered it up. “There’s not that much time left,” Aimee said. “Besides, I don’t even know if he’d leave you for that long, especially after the bandit attack, whether anything will happen or not. Anyway, that’s like asking us to leave one of our other family members; we’d never. A little more ‘boredom’ won’t hurt. We’ve been on the road so long already.”

Aimee couldn’t speak perfectly for her brother but she knew herself and felt she knew the Kelvic bond well enough. She had also observed her brother and knew how his protectiveness of those close to him, regardless of his own feelings. She spoke with confidence when saying she didn’t think Noah would leave Elann for what she thought was a long amount of time.

“If he says he wants to go, then we’ll go,” she said in the end, shrugging.

Journey to the East

“Surely,” Aimee affirmed. “You take a wrong turn here, or miscount a block, the worst thing you have to look forward to is traffic and being late to dinner or an appointment.” She laughed lightheartedly.

“It’ll be a little overwhelming, I think,” Aimee admitted about Zeltiva. “There’s a lot to learn; where everything is, where you should and shouldn’t go, when you should leave so you arrive somewhere on time, how to operate the water taps. I think you’ll catch on rather quickly though. The city is bigger than Syliras though and sprawls out along the coast with various docks and harbors. There’re also the colonies further down by the mouth of the bay and along the coast by the ocean. I didn’t realize it before, but I guess Zeltiva has a lot of things that the rest of the world doesn’t.”

Aimee bunched up her hair and put it behind her back. She drew quiet, unsure of what else to bring up for the conversation. She was figuring that Elann was the conversing type. Aimee didn’t mind it, able to both talk and not depending on who her company was.

Journey to the East

“It’s totally possible. I know in Syliras you had to get water from the wells and stuff, but you don’t have to in Zeltiva,” Aimee explained again. “Fresh water in your home, it’s amazing and mornings are easier because you don’t have to lug around buckets, unless you’re getting a lot from the markets. Of course you still have to heat it up for cooking and bathing, but getting it is no longer a hassle. It’s much easier to take a bath every day without going to a bathhouse too.”

Aimee met Elann’s piqued interest with somewhat of a prideful smile, glad her hometown had a great deal more than Syliras did. “We have a better sewer system as well. There’re gutters in the road so you can just throw out liquid waste from cooking or whatever down the gutter and it’ll flow on away. I guess that’s another reason why I didn’t stay in Syliras for that long. You’d think they were living years in the past. There’s a reason Zeltiva’s called the City of Knowledge after all, thanks to the University and all the smartminds there.”

“I think you’ll enjoy having to do less, able to do more of what you want to do,” Aimee finished

Journey to the East

Aimee laughed aloud at Elann calling her brothers pains. “They can be,” she agreed. “They pull their weight though and they are lovable up until the point they aren’t. I’ve dealt with them for years, and really Noah can be no different when they have their influences on him. I love them though, love them all.”

“Outerbody,” Aimee repeated, smiling at Elann’s uncertainty. “I guess that makes sense. You didn’t have anywhere to exactly go in the desert but home. I mean, you could die anywhere else but there. Maybe you’ll become an ‘outerbody’ person now that you’re north with all the green and the water. You won’t even have to fetch water in Zeltiva. There’s an aqueduct system that brings water in from the rivers at the top of the mountain range.”

Aimee paused, figuring that Elann may not know what aqueducts were. “The aqueducts are like... tubes of water that flow from the mountains, fresh water from melted snow and rivers. It’s brought directly to the city and fuels the fountains and bathhouses. Most personal homes have water brought to them as well. Like in our home, you go to the room with the bath and just pull a lever to open the duct, water comes out. It’s wonderful.”

Journey to the East

Aimee smiled politely to Elann in reply, laughing some at the Benshira’s sarcasm. “Maybe he was thinking,” she said quietly, knowing that it wasn’t totally unknown of Noah’s seeming disregard of conversation in order to think on it.

The topic switch to something else, giving Aimee pause as she considered the question posed. “More or less,” she answered. “I wish we weren’t on the road as long, but I know you don’t have the capabilities that we do. It’s been nice having time to know you before everyone else does though. I do like being at home though, with my sister, mother, and father. My brothers sometimes too, when they aren’t being annoyances.”

“What of you? I take you as more the homebody type,” she asked in reply.

Aimee drew the assumption based of what Elann liked to do, and the Benshira revealed she would stay inside and make rugs in her youth. She still liked to do that apparently, so Aimee assumed she also liked to stay inside moreso than she or her family members. Her home was also very comfortable looking, leading Aimee to believe she stayed there whenever she wasn’t working.

Journey to the East

Elann pulling her hand away from Aimee’s drew the wolf’s attention to the Benshira. The flower caught Aimee’s sights all the more. She finished what she had to say then listened as Elann spoke as well. There was a nod of thankfulness and understanding from Aimee, grateful that Elann was the one who encouraged him to write the letter.

“Yeah, I didn’t think he would do it on his own. I had an inkling that it was you or Liam that got him to write it after all, since he spoke of you two so much in it,” she said, pausing as she considered Elann’s question.

“He almost didn’t do it,” she revealed. “Said something about not wanting to because he didn’t feel like it, but that was a lie, I knew. I just waited though, I brought it up and told him about how much I knew he missed it: flying, hunting, being with Zulrav or whatever he does when he flies. I think he was scared, honestly. He told me about the falcon, how low he felt, and how afraid he was something was going to happen to him again. He said the lightning struck the falcon out of nowhere, that it was Zulrav protecting him, so I told him Zulrav would protect him again, and I would to.”

Aimee shrugged nonchalantly. “I think he was concerned about you too, if he ignored you when you mentioned it. I mean, it’s always about the bondmate and how they’ll look at us. At least, that’s what I was concerned about when I was bonded, how my bondmate would look at me.

Getting him to change took all night though, he would just watch me or stare off into space, no talking. He was relatively silent all night.”

Journey to the East

Aimee laughed lightly at Elann’s words. “Thank you, but I think I’ll leave the fighting to my brothers. I don’t think I’d be that good of a warrior.” Elann’s words were flattering, that much was seen.

Aimee raised her brows at Elann’s admittance, it was another interesting thing. “Perhaps,” Aimee said with confidence, despite being uncertain.

Her free hand came up and combed through her hair again from root to tip, lingering on the tips as she twirled them between her fingers idly. There was a little pause of silence before Elann interrupted it by speaking of the closeness to Zeltiva and how Syliras was a seemingly toxic place. The Kelvic hummed thoughtfully, nodding some.

“It’s not the best place in the world, that’s for certain. I could be biased, being a Kelvic and only ever living in Zeltiva aside from Syliras, but I hated it too. I can understand why Noah hates it, I even tried to warn him but he didn’t listen to me either. He said he wanted to see it for himself. I thought he liked it, the way he was seemingly growing cheerier whenever he would write us, up until he stopped entirely.”

Aimee shrugged. “I almost thought something happened to him but my mother said if something happened she would know. It was a happy day when his letter came in, telling us about how he met you and how he had been doing over the past year. He told us about Liam and how they had been friends for so long. He told us a lot in the letter, kept saying that he loved us and he missed us too. It was the longest one he had written to us ever, a few pages long.”

She looked over to Elann. “At least you never have to go back if you don’t want to. You can also say you’ve been there, therefore you’ve no reason to go back.”

Journey to the East

Aimee nodded in understanding. It was interesting Elann brought up her reimancy, but the comparison was valid enough to not evoke anything but understanding from the Kelvic. “I had stopped, actually,” she said, slightly smiling to show there were no hard feelings. “After my teacher died, I stopped practicing, probably against their wishes but the Djed storm was terrible, it killed a lot of mages. I was lucky to survive, my teacher wasn’t. I was terrified of using it for a long time, but not so much anymore.

“I only used it to protect Noah, then you, then the others because you were protecting Noah and he was protecting you. I understand though, wanting to hone the ability.”

Aimee took a breath, continuing on before Elann was able to answer. “Maybe the darkness isn’t you. You said it was connected to you but the only person personally connected to you is Noah, through his bond. I mean, it’s just an inkling of mine, you can nevermind it. I wanted to bring it up though, just to give you something to think about since it’s already so vague.”

Journey to the East

Aimee was glad her words found some sort of purchase in Elann, she was hesitant to give them, unsure how the sensitive girl would react. She knew she had a jaded view of the world and knew many didn’t share it. People died and the very same people that were killed by the bandits, and the bandits that were killed by the people, would’ve been taken at some point in time. Death wasn’t something to be controlled but prepared for in her mind.

Elann spoke of another tremble in the passage of time, something she said felt eerily personal. It worried Aimee because she was unsure of what it meant, and it didn’t help Elann didn’t seem to know what it was either. Elann called her gift a blessing and curse, Aimee couldn’t help but agree now. The vagueness of the future seemed nigh useless to her; if it couldn’t be definite, what was the point of being filled with worry. The offer came from Elann, to which Aimee shook her head in declination.

“I’d rather leave it where it is,” she admitted, meaning no offense to Elann’s powers. “It happened for a reason, whether I know that reason or not is irrelevant to me. So long as I am alive, I am grateful.”

Aimee nodded along with Elann’s words. There was plenty of room in Aimee’s mind. Noah had very few possessions as it was, and his old room had been reverted to storage since he showed no signs of coming home. His room was small anyway, the smallest room in their with a bed large enough for a single person, though now it was doubtful he could fit on it given his stature.

“A few days is better than none at all,” she said with a smile. “Is all you know about your feeling is that it’s very personal to you?”

Journey to the East

“He’s terrible,” Aimee joked.

The humor in the joke was short lived on Aimee’s part as Elann expressed what seemed like guilt to the wolf. “You’re too good for your own good,” Aimee said, attempting to keep the humor around. “Even if you had a feeling that something was going to happen, it’s not your fault for not warning anyone. You didn’t know it was bandits or how bad it was going to be. You protecting people in the middle of the fight is more than anyone can ask for. Besides, if the bandits never came, the people would have died sooner or later and those bandits would’ve only attacked the next caravan on the road, and I doubt you’d be on it to forewarn anyone.”

Aimee flexed her grip on Elann’s hand a few times in reassurance. “The bandits will think twice about attacking a caravan. Their numbers are weaker because of you, Noah, me, and anyone else who as much as swung a sword.”

She took a little breath. “I was joking about Ryon anyway. Donavan is gone so his room is free. He’ll be gone for a long time, he went all the was north to Mura after all. Then there’s Noah’s old room too. It’s highly unlikely you’ll eat us out of food. Noah’s appetite has been the same since he was little and you hardly eat anything as it is. My family will adjust and buy extra food if we need it, it’s not like we’re struggling for coin anyway,” she assured. “So, whatever Noah decides, since you’re leaving it in his hands, I’m more than sure we’ll be glad to have you for even a day.”