This post's authors have general content warnings that might apply to the current post.
View Flat HTML
View Metadata
Search Post
Jayce turns up some interesting information.
Kiri leaves him in charge of everything and takes Aleko with her. She's closer with Aleko, but Jayce has initiative that Aleko doesn't and is less averse to the idea of running Ardelay business in her absence. Aleko can also draw; he has sketches of the missing prince and can make more.
They cross Soche-Tas, in their own carriage but as part of a merchant convoy that knows the way.
On the far side of Soche-Tas is the little country of Thiyec. Thiyec usually has improbably good weather. People who are less wedded to the culture of Welce than most talk about retiring there.
Thiyec has been getting plenty of rain.
They break off from the convoy and start showing the missing prince's picture to people. People in Thiyec consider nudity no more a remarkable fashion decision than hat-wearing, and it's not a terribly comfortable trip - it doesn't help that only about forty percent of Thiyec's population speaks any Soechin, Kiri's the only one who ever learned Soechin, and nobody in their party knows a lick of Thiyecine.
But eventually, there is a knock on a particular door.
calescent
free-flowing
Loel goes out to the pond, and takes off his shoes, and swims out to the deepest part.
He doesn't know if it's just because he's paying attention now, or if learning he's the prime changed something all by itself, but there's something different about the feeling of water moving over his skin. Like it's alive, almost. Like it's touching him, holding him, wrapping him up like a blanket. It should be uncomfortably cold, but it's not; it feels perfect. He floats on his back and trails his fingers through the water and listens to the ripples and thinks about... everything.
Does he really need to do this? Could he figure it out another way?
Maybe not. Maybe he could. But this is his way, his own, and it feels right. It feels important.
He'll be sorry about the people who grieve for him, if he dies. But that can't be enough to stop him by itself.
He takes a breath, what might be his last breath, and lets it out and swims down. His sense of direction is perfect in the water, even though he can't see a thing; he can feel the air up above and the earth down below, like the whole pond is a part of his body. A dim, half-numb part, that can only barely feel what's beside it, but still enough to tell up from down with definite certainty.
Somewhere in the middle between the two, he turns and looks up. The water is clear enough that he can catch a glimmer that might be the moon; otherwise, everything is dark. He opens his mouth - silver bubbles sparkle their way up to the surface - and breathes.
His lungs fight him immediately; he coughs, not that it could possibly help - there's no air down here to breathe even if he gets rid of the water. It hurts. It feels like he is about to die.
And then, at the moment when he is almost convinced that it really is going to kill him—something happens. A feeling like opening his eyes, like sunrise, like a cool breeze on a hot day. His sense of the water snaps into focus. Every sleepy fish and floating lily moves through his awareness of the water. At the same time, he has a similar awakening to his own body—to the blood that gives him life, moving under his skin, carrying things he can't name from one place to another. He feels what it lacks - not air exactly, but something common to air and water. His lungs are useless for this purpose, understanding only air, but he is the coru prime and blood and water belong to him. He stretches out his arms and relaxes. The coughing stops. He isn't breathing; he doesn't need to. His blood can pull what it needs directly out of the water, everywhere it touches him.
He rises to the surface and moves back to shore. It's not really swimming; he just pulls himself through the water directly. Along the way, he shoos all the water from his lungs and takes a breath of air again - half to check that he still can. It works just fine. His body hasn't forgotten how. But as long as most of him is underwater, it's unnecessary. He doesn't do it again until he climbs out onto the grassy patch where he left his shoes and the water runs off him.
The rain stops while he's putting on his shoes. He doesn't have to do anything dramatic; he just has to... stop the rain. Done. Easy. A lot of things are easy, now that he understands.
Maybe, he muses, starting back toward the house, this is what a dip in the Marisi was supposed to do for him. He doesn't think a dip in the Marisi would have cut it. For him personally, he had to need his powers before he understood them.
He doesn't know if it's just because he's paying attention now, or if learning he's the prime changed something all by itself, but there's something different about the feeling of water moving over his skin. Like it's alive, almost. Like it's touching him, holding him, wrapping him up like a blanket. It should be uncomfortably cold, but it's not; it feels perfect. He floats on his back and trails his fingers through the water and listens to the ripples and thinks about... everything.
Does he really need to do this? Could he figure it out another way?
Maybe not. Maybe he could. But this is his way, his own, and it feels right. It feels important.
He'll be sorry about the people who grieve for him, if he dies. But that can't be enough to stop him by itself.
He takes a breath, what might be his last breath, and lets it out and swims down. His sense of direction is perfect in the water, even though he can't see a thing; he can feel the air up above and the earth down below, like the whole pond is a part of his body. A dim, half-numb part, that can only barely feel what's beside it, but still enough to tell up from down with definite certainty.
Somewhere in the middle between the two, he turns and looks up. The water is clear enough that he can catch a glimmer that might be the moon; otherwise, everything is dark. He opens his mouth - silver bubbles sparkle their way up to the surface - and breathes.
His lungs fight him immediately; he coughs, not that it could possibly help - there's no air down here to breathe even if he gets rid of the water. It hurts. It feels like he is about to die.
And then, at the moment when he is almost convinced that it really is going to kill him—something happens. A feeling like opening his eyes, like sunrise, like a cool breeze on a hot day. His sense of the water snaps into focus. Every sleepy fish and floating lily moves through his awareness of the water. At the same time, he has a similar awakening to his own body—to the blood that gives him life, moving under his skin, carrying things he can't name from one place to another. He feels what it lacks - not air exactly, but something common to air and water. His lungs are useless for this purpose, understanding only air, but he is the coru prime and blood and water belong to him. He stretches out his arms and relaxes. The coughing stops. He isn't breathing; he doesn't need to. His blood can pull what it needs directly out of the water, everywhere it touches him.
He rises to the surface and moves back to shore. It's not really swimming; he just pulls himself through the water directly. Along the way, he shoos all the water from his lungs and takes a breath of air again - half to check that he still can. It works just fine. His body hasn't forgotten how. But as long as most of him is underwater, it's unnecessary. He doesn't do it again until he climbs out onto the grassy patch where he left his shoes and the water runs off him.
The rain stops while he's putting on his shoes. He doesn't have to do anything dramatic; he just has to... stop the rain. Done. Easy. A lot of things are easy, now that he understands.
Maybe, he muses, starting back toward the house, this is what a dip in the Marisi was supposed to do for him. He doesn't think a dip in the Marisi would have cut it. For him personally, he had to need his powers before he understood them.
free-flowing
He grins and shakes his head. "Nope. I just learned how to breathe water. Well, not breathe it, exactly—" and he breaks off into a giggle.
liakoura
"We'll see about that," snorts Aleko. "I'll try, anyway." He lurches back into the house, toes off his shoes, and flops into the makeshift bed.
free-flowing
Loel flops into his own bed on the kitchen floor and goes straight to sleep - although first he stands just outside the kitchen door and convinces all the water on his body and in his shoes and shorts to depart these locations in favour of the ground.
free-flowing
There is the kitchen, and there is Loel, curled up in his blanket nest but firmly awake. He smiles when he sees her.
calescent
She relaxes when she sees him. And steps closer so if he has anything to "tell" her, he can do it without waking Aleko.
free-flowing
In that case, she is welcome to his memories of the whole event, as clearly as he can remember them for her. Which is pretty damn clear.
calescent
"It'll be about a week getting back," says Kiri. "Once we've got you where you're going I need to head back to the palace and cough up whatever the story is - it doesn't even necessarily have to include your identity, if you want to hide particularly thoroughly."
free-flowing
"...I think I'd like that a lot better than the alternative," he says. "I can just be Loel obviously-Lalindar, who you found in Thiyec in the middle of a misplaced rainstorm. No missing princes involved."