The River

Her limbs, however, did not refuse aid in Haven. Alessia briefly clung to the assistance, instinctively, before staggering over her own embarrassment to right herself. "I'm fine, I'm just fine- oh... you." Her tone, instead of any disgust or resentment, was a mixture of shock and resignation. If Alessia hadn't been pale enough, she immediately lost more color. Realizing this woman's identity stunned her enough that she did not continue fighting the helpful support; it was impossible not to let her arm bump right back into Sylvie's and lean on her. Sylvie. Alessia had not learned the woman's name from her own lips, but from all the commotion on the Kossith vessel instead. Once upon a time, Alessia didn't need to know the name of any other unfortunate soul stuck under Iskaran rocks. Most of them became uninhabited bodies anyway. It was mere luck that Sylvie hadn't too.

"It's just a fever. Something something about malnutrition, stress and bobbing around on the ocean for days. Healers said I'm fine. I just need... err..." Despite every attempt to seem coherent, her mind felt slow and foggy. "A seat. A seat is fine."

Sylvie scanned the surrounding woods for anything that might double as a chair, bright blue eyes eventually landing on a stump a few feet away. It wouldn't make the most comfortable seat, but perhaps Sylvie could find Alessia a new one once she was less dizzy. The blonde could maybe carry her, if she tried hard enough - perhaps harnessed some of her infernal strength - but she'd sworn off using her powers after the Kossith had tainted them even further.

"This way! Nice and easy, darling." Slow and steady, Sylvie guided the Witch to the nearest stump, one girl clinging to the other as they crunched through the snow. Gently, she helped Alessia sit down, making sure she was stable before finally removing her touch. Sylvie was somewhat of a healer herself, but again, was too scared to even attempt to channel the One God after the atrocities she'd committed in the Kossith's name, lest her pleads go unanswered.

However, a good school teacher always had a backup plan for any ailments - bumps, bruises, scrapes, fevers. The idea set her in motion quickly, as she took off her scarf and began piling snow into the soft fabric. Once she had enough, she returned to Alessia's side, and carefully the packed scarf against her forehead. "Ice packs can fix almost anything, as long as you think it's working." Usually the placebo was more effective on toddler brains than well developed ones.

Luck and kindness brought Alessia to Haven, worn and ragged, but alive. No news yet of her family's survival. But many familiar faces trailed beside her, and many trailed behind her. Maybe they made it out. (She tried not to think of any heart-wrenching grief.) Alessia was starving, and feverish, and it was hard enough to breath through her congested nose without adding crying. She had been lucky enough to leave the ordeal with nothing but a dislocated arm (fixed on her own), various scraps (cleaned out with salt water), and this exposure illness. Alive, despite everything. Again.

After some soup and water, the healers had insisted that she sleep off the fever, but her skin prickled with the reminder of suffering. Alessia needed clothing that wasn't burnt, wasn't tattered and didn't stink of salt water. She had mustered the strength, and foolhardy confidence, to search for some clothing donations. Bleary eyesight and an unsteady gait did not make it easy, and it was when her legs gave out and her knees hit the floor outside that Alessia had to admit her stubbornness was no stronger than her weakness. She attempted to stand and right herself against the edge of a tree.

As she busied her hands bring meals to and from the clinic, her eyes caught a flash of brunette against the snow. The sight nearly caused her to drop her dishes, but she gently set the empty bowls on the floor before rushing over to the familiar face. "We must stop meeting like this." Her words were playful, but her eyes swam with worry. She hadn't been sure what fate awaited Alessia after she'd pulled her from the sea, but it seemed they were meant to cross paths, yet again. "Up, up. There you go." Her voice was gentle and soothing, as she placed her shoulder under the Witch's arm to support her weight. "And where exactly are you headed, sweetheart, all weak in the knees like this?"

As the ocean rises to meet them, Araceli clings to the hand wrapped around hers. The water is a cold wall, hitting them harshly and stealing the breath away from her, but instinct she only vaguely recalls bubbles to the surface. Pulling the stranger closer, she kicks harder against the tide and swims towards the surface, dragging the other survivor with her. They break against the surface just as her chest begins to burn, and she takes two big gulps of breath as she looks around. 

If only the water could wash away the sins the Burnt Daughter had collected while under the Kossith's control. She'd never swam before, yet more uncharted territory that she couldn't navigate without help, lest she drown first. A kind woman had refused to let go of her hand, dragging Sylvie to the surface whilst she flailed helplessly. Met with fresh air and sunshine above the waves, Sylvie took in a ragged breath, choking on sea water as it splashed into her face. Coughing and wheezing, but alive, she scrambled to wrap her arms around a floating piece of metal. "Thank you. Thank you." She wanted to cry, but that would only make it harder to breathe. "Are we going to die out here?"

She paused only when she noticed another woman struggling out of the corner of her eye. It was beyond Juneau as to why people kept touching the damn collars. Then again, others might not understand why she was so quick to crawl on her belly in near defeat so quickly either. Now, standing still, Juneau’s expression hardened as the older of the two spoke. Anger boiled up in her stomach as she stalked toward the woman, her expression dark and a storm of rage churning behind her eyes. She hated being blamed, being humiliated the way she felt Sylvie was placing responsibility on her shoulders. “I didn’t fucking do anything to you, you did it to your damned self,” Juneau snapped at her, voice venomous and unfriendly.

She slowly uncurled herself as the pain trickled away, but Sylvie winced regardless as the very girl she'd been wanting to help began to yell at her. "S-sorry. You seemed so anxious, I was just trying to help you calm down. I didn't mean to make it worse." She had so little time to practice her magic before it'd been ripped away from her. Accidents happened. Didn't the girl understand? "It won't happen again, miss."

The nausea rolled through him again, as relentless as the thrum of the ship beneath him. He twisted his wrists against the chains that bound him, fingers raw, desperate to summon something - anything - through the absence that now haunted his bones. His magic felt as though it was miles away, lost in the dark reaches of a place he couldn’t follow. His hands flexed, nails scraping against cold, unforgiving metal. Nothing. No warmth, no pulse of power, no tethering light. Only a hollow ache, deep and gnawing, where his connection to the world used to be.

His body shook with the strain of trying again. Another attempt to reach for the magic that had once been as natural to him as breath. Pain flared, a hot, searing line of agony streaking from his spine and ripping through his chest. His vision blurred, the edges of his sight flashing white with the force of it. He tried not to scream again, but it came anyway, splattering into the cold air as it ripped from his throat.

He collapsed sideways, his cheek pressed to the cold metal of the floor. His body was rigid, his limbs heavy, a prisoner to the chains and the collar, a prisoner to his own failure. Every part of him screamed to fight, to lash out.

His head lifted slightly as Sylvie’s voice reached him - a soft plea, one full of pain and fear. He could hear the tremor in it, feel it deep in his chest, but it didn’t move him - it enraged him - maybe enough to get him to continue to struggle by thrumming up whatever the witch had inside to fight back. “They want us to submit,” he growled, the sound so quiet it almost disappeared into the low groan of the ship. “I refuse.” A subtle shake of his head jostled the loose, wet curls on either side of his face. Something akin to a laugh followed, but darker. “Don’t waste your tears,” he rasped. His breath was jagged, rough against the collar that made each word feel like a struggle. “It won’t make a difference.”

Alrik’s body tensed again, his muscles drawn tight as he pulled at the restraint. His hands, slick with sweat, scraped uselessly against the collar, his fingers clawing at the cold, unyielding metal. The collar bit into his skin, pressing deeper against his throat.

"Maybe not to you, but to me, they're a sign I'm still Sylvie. That's my name, by the way." Little did she know, she wouldn't be herself, much longer. At the man's request, she bit her lip to keep it from quivering and forced herself to swallow down another sob. He was the one in pain right now, so she would give him what he asked for. Slowly, she was able to turn her cries into sniffles, and her wet eyes into dry ones.

It was the definition of insanity, wasn't it - To try the same thing over and over yet expect a different result? How many times did the man have to shock himself to realize that? She didn't actually want to know.

"At the very least, try to save your energy. What are you going to do all unconscious?" Not that she had a plan. In fact, she was far from it, still trying to process just how and why she'd gotten here. She wasn't much of a fighter, but she wanted to lend what strength she did have to the others, to support them when it was time to escape. Because they would escape. She had students to get back to.

Alrik came to with a jolt - iron in his throat, iron in his skull.

The floor beneath him was cold metal, slick, and thrumming like a heartbeat, heavy with the pulse of engines and the weight of everything the vessel carried. His mouth was dry, his limbs leaden, and there was something wrong. Not broken. Not bleeding. Bound. He stirred in the dark, the iron scent of blood and sweat thick in his nostrils. Alrik tried to sit up, but a wave of nausea struck hard, and he rolled to his side, retching bile and nothing else.

He reached inward, instinctively, reaching for the warmth that had always been there - like drawing breath, like sunlight on his face - and found nothing. No flicker of fire. No rush of water. No resonance of the runes etched into his bones. His magic wasn't... gone, it was more like he was gone from it.

The collar was cold metal, too snug, pressing against his rune-marked throat. His fingers clawed at it instinctively, teeth bared as if sheer force of will could undo Kossith make. A'dam. He’d heard the word in whispers once - an old threat, buried beneath distance and a litany of other issues.

Runes flared along his arms as he tried to summon his power, tried to will it through muscle and bone like he always had - only to feel it recoil. Nothing answered. No light. No echo. Only searing pain that knifed down his spine and turned his vision white. He screamed through gritted teeth, the sound swallowed by the low groan of the hull. Stubbornly, Alrik dug in again - nails scraping metal - until he retched. Bitter bile filled his mouth and splattered the deck. The taste of copper lingered on his tongue. He shuddered and fell sideways, cheek pressed to the floor, breath rasping between clenched jaws.

He stirred, then tried again. Repeating the result.

Slowly, the prisoners around her had come to the same conclusion. Some were silent and withdrawn, others were angry and lashed out. The latter made her skin crawl, for they couldn't do so without consequence. She had no choice but to watch as the man in the adjacent cell writhed and contorted on the floor, trying to beckon a magic that was now buried too deep to reach. Even with her infernal senses suppressed, she could smell the bile on his lips, see the cold sweat coating his skin.

Tears welled in her eyes, escaping onto her cheeks with each and every one of the man's screams. She placed her hands over her ears and turned away as best she could, only able to distance herself within the limited confines of her cell. She wasn't sure if she was crying for him, or for herself, or for every poor soul chained aboard - but the tears continued to fall. "P-please stop. You're scaring me." she croaked out, her voice likely the only soft thing upon this entire cursed ship. "They wish for you to suffer. D-don't give them what they want."

Arros didn’t have to think about it for long. The weight of that word, Legionnaire, hung heavy around her shoulders, and she had long stopped wearing it with pride. It was a title earned in blood and sacrifice, but not one that felt any warmer because of it. Still, there was no denying the truth of it.

Before she could turn away, the teacher—Sylvie, she assumed—approached her with a practised smile, as though she were about to ask about the weather. Arros’ gaze flicked over Sylvie, noting the soft kindness in her face, then dropped back to the boy, whose eyes were shining with that unearned hope.

“Yes," she said, her voice sharp, as if the word itself weighed too much to say without irritation. "I’m a Legionnaire."

The boy’s excitement only grew, but Arros didn’t share in it. She crossed her arms over her chest, her stance firm, as if ready to turn and leave the moment the conversation was over. She wasn’t here for questions, for idle chatter. She was here to pass through, not to be the subject of some child’s hero worship. "any other questions?"

She and Erik, the young boy by her side, both beamed up at the Legionnaire, neither of them having seen one in person before. Sylvie and her student exchanged excited glances. The woman asked if they had any further questions, and oh, did they. The cambion tried her best not to ramble them all at once, for she didn't want to scare the stranger away just yet. "Why yes, actually! Thanks for asking. Is it true you've a griffon inside Caer Glas?" Sylvie whispered, as if asking it too loudly would cause the mythical creature to vanish on command.

According to the papers, they'd been supposedly extinct until recently. Her students were highly invested in the griffons' return, already demanding to know what their favorite snacks were and if they were potty trained, amongst other pressing questions. Sylvie made a mental note to schedule a field trip to Caer Glas sometime soon, if they would welcome outsiders.

"Oh, and I almost forgot my manners! What's your name, miss?" Perhaps she would have her students send the woman a thank you card once Progress Day was said and done.