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He’s turned to face you now as he paces backwards, cheeks and the tips of his ears dusted with a rosy flush, grinning as he playfully mocks your woeful stamina. Now slowing his pace, Tartaglia falls into a comfortable step beside you and gestures ahead — a humble cabin glowing warmly in the distance, its windows blazing like beacons… The glacial silence that once stretched between you softens, filled instead with your breath of relief and his laughter as you make way towards his sanctuary.

The door creaks open beneath his gloved hand, and warmth immediately spills out to greet you first.

Inside, the house bears the distinguishable mark of its homeland; thick stone walls reinforced with dark wooden beams, hardwood floors that groan under pressure… fur-lined rugs are strewn across the floor to trap heat, their edges softened by years of padding children around the house. A hearth, as you settle on last, crackles at the center of the residency, its fire casting an amber glow across shelves stacked with worn books and the odd trinkets gathered from familiar lands. The air smells faintly of cinder and something hearty simmering deeper within the house.

Tartaglia calls out to his siblings as he steps inside, few names you recognize from his longing spouts overseas. He insists on helping you first, carefully unraveling the scarf from your neck and hanging your heavy coat beside his own — both damp with melted snow.

In that beat of a moment standing less a foot apart, his expression was unrecognizable. A contradiction he became under that household, you read; with a face battered and worn of war, his eyes read nothing short of warmth.

Before you can fully take in your surroundings, three sets of hurried footsteps echo down the hall.

His younger siblings come barreling toward him, the corners of the rugs peeling under shoves and slips (unsurprisingly). They latch onto his legs with shrieks of joy and call him a name — not a title, nor some foreign alias — you’ve only ever seen on letters from home. It felt forbidden to hear.

Bubbling with intoxicating laughter, Ajax scoops them up one by one, albeit the set of twins (from your deduction) requiring some extra strain even from a Harbinger. When the fire-haired trio finally stills, he turns to you without hesitation, introducing you with unmistakable pride.

A glimmer of recognition contradicts the now-knitted glare on Ajax’s face towards the three children. What was that expression? One of admonishment?

The three make sure not to shorten you on their warm welcome. Tonia, the young girl which you deducted from Ajax’s earlier warmhearted greetings, seems to reserve her questions away from her older brother’s testing gaze.

The two boys, however, care not to relent: The single familiar face being Teucer serves as Anthon’s tour guide, tugging excitedly at your satchel for hidden gifts and trinkets for uncovering.

Anthon narrows in on you like a vulture, testingly inspecting your vision and shooting accusations at you narrowingly. “You don’t look all that scary,” eyes bright with an unconfined excitement. “You defeated my brother? How’d you do it? Did he let you win?”

“I told you two to behave,” Ajax shakes his head through a resigned laugh, swatting off Teucer’s prying hands. His words only seem to amplify their curiosity towards the foreign visitor.

There’s a quiet, unreadable softness in Ajax’s’ expression as he watches each of them find their way to you in their own time-teasing pride, his face giving way to something… steadier.

As for you? You could read that it would potentially take days to satisfy the admiration burning in their eyes, each requiring their own satiation of stories and tales.

For once, it feels as though you have all the time in the world.

—

Ajax is the bane of every punchline during your stay. Between hearty dinners or afternoon chores, his siblings constantly rat out the boy for ‘never stacking the firewood’ or ‘never sharing his food’. Oh, he hates it.

The miserable conditions outside won’t dare to dampen the agenda Ajax set out for your visit, whether it’s a forced round of snowball-fighting with the kids or a late-night walk (or trudge, for you) into the nearby town. He was lucky enough to get you here in the first place— he doubts you’ll find time again to come again soon.

Ajax serves as the translator for most of his family’s dialect. As he’s come to learn during your visit, however, Schneznayan sayings don’t seem to translate over as well as he anticipated. “You’ll catch on,” he fails to reason. You won’t.

Anthon doesn’t believe a word you put in his head. Defeating archons? Overthrowing governments? Conquering Celestia? If it doesn’t have a scar to the story, he’s sputtering and kicking his legs in a giddy disbelief. He still insists to sit next to you at dinner, despite his dramatics.

Teucer assumes you’re staying for the long run. Ajax lended you his own room during your stay, but Teucer muses that you could move into one of their older siblings’ rooms for the time being.

Despite her usual quiet observation, Tonia has a beautiful attentiveness once you get her to warm up. She already knows plenty of you from her brother’s letters home, but she’s infatuated to learn how you fit into his world. She, of course, is the slowest to fatigue with any story.

It’s rare you get a moment alone with his mother. She thanks you for salvaging a piece of her son despite all that may change within him.

He talks a little faster, laughs a little louder with an unfamiliar warmth in his tone you’ve never heard of — The cold of the outside’s demands doesn’t reach Ajax here.

The tactic council’s meet extended until midnight. Energy -2.

We rescheduled our meetings for every other second day instead of each fortnight. You had always hated those meetings—always silent until the shrine had run empty, only to put your thoughts in long past their departures. I haven’t forgotten your silence yet.

We have refuged a vessel-worth of getaways from the city. Energy +2.

Each small victory comes with a small loss, but stability is viable. That is what we strive for.

I have received your letter. Energy +5.

I had read it three times before I finally returned to my breach of directives… was it I that smeared the ink?

You told me that you were safe, that the Shogunate’s grip could never batter your fight, and you reassured me to rest my thoughts. I could near hear it in your voice.

I will continue to review my directives. Between the lines, I will think of you and you alone.

The Decree tightens and spreads its plague across even outlying lands, and each one of our victories runs thinner than the last. Energy -3.

I must appear unshaken. Diplomacy is served with a side of theatrics, I have best learned—I will only gain their trust if I, the performer, puts on her greatest act.

Sleep must elude me this evening, even when you plea of me to follow fit.

Your pillow still retains your scent. Only then is it not so bad to be awake. Energy +1.

Reports rumor that captured soldiers of the island have been forced into silence, and I’m afraid it won’t be long until I lose my own. Energy -3.

Our last day together is etched into my very being. When I go to sleep, I see your heavy eyes and how you asked of me to wait for your return. The promise becomes heavier every evening without you.

I wrote to you again. Do my messages no longer reach your tides? Energy -4.

It spoke none of strategy or commands, but rather words only for us to know. Such thoughts have become too heavy for me to hold alone.

I had miscalculated a tactical move in my latest report. It has been years since that last happened. Energy -3.

I have been scratching for answers as to what to credit such a mistake to, may it be exhaustion or distraction. I fear it is the latter.

My ancestors forewarned me how love may bleed into diplomacy. Now, it’s the only thing keeping me sane.

Energy -1.

I review my old entries, mourning the loss of who I once was.

I used to write only of hope for the island. Now I can only write of you.

I must bury myself deeper into duty.

The end of the Decree is nigh; the ocean herself is holding her breath tonight. Energy +2.

It has been months since I have been out to our shore. The fishing routes had long been halted due to naval hazards, and all is quiet across the water. Has the island lost it’s sound, or is it myself that hasn’t been listening all this time?

If She is as merciful as She commands, She will return you safely to me.

The coral will guide you home, my sanctuary. Until then, I will keep watch of the horizon.

I love you. Energy +10.

I love you. You’re here, and you’re smiling, and I thought I could never love you any more.

After the liberation of the Decree, life pulses once more in our island of Watatsumi. The streets are lined with flags of our freedom, and the dining halls groan with food only fit for Celestia. It is short of what they truly deserve.

I was sure the ocean lost her breath once more the moment we were reunited. Your belongings had nearly fallen off the pier when we booked and collapsed for one another’s arms.

While several of your men drained kegs like water until the coral lost it’s nightly glow, I watched you celebrate as if the weight of the war had no strain on your shoulders. I love you.

I am the Divine Priestess of this free island. Tonight, however, I will not care for directives or tactical reports.

Tonight, you will rest soundlessly beside me, albeit drunkenly.