#efridcct

He was returning from a short patrol: it was a day like any other in the Iron Temple, a walk he had made thousands of times. With the precision of hundreds of years of practice, Saladin removed his armor and laid his weapons aside, but the regular routine was interrupted by the silent package laid on the small table against the far wall.

He stopped what he was doing, eyed it. His steps clanked, boots still on, as he moved to it, narrowing his eyes.

It took a long moment for him to recognize what they were. His heart skipped a beat, uncertain, his eyes unable to move away. Efrideet.

He took a slow turn, examining every inch of his room, trying to decide if anything else was disturbed. Finding nothing, he looked back at the paintbrushes, what he knew to be Efrideet’s prized possessions. A strange feeling had settled over him, and he did not move his hands to shift them, or touch them.

His Ghost orbited slowly around his head, eye focusing on the paintbrushes as well. They stayed silent, but Saladin knew they were restraining themself. They always talked when Saladin didn’t want to hear it, but for once, Ayu stayed silent.

He finished changing, pausing again to gaze at the paintbrushes. His mind whispered all sorts of possibilities, but his instinct reverberated, louder than anything else.

She left these.

Every other part of him wanted to know why, but the tone of his instinctual assumption implied wrongness. Something was wrong.

Stoic, Saladin left his room, Ayu floating curiously behind, and went to Efrideet’s. It was the simplest way to settle it. But the moment he stopped in the doorway, reached out to knock, he saw the door ajar and instead pushed it right open.

It was the emptiest he had ever seen the room since Efrideet had moved in, and a feeling of incorrigible emptiness settled in Saladin’s heart.

“Where is Lady Efrideet?” Ayu wondered out loud, shattering the silence of Saladin’s realization. He turned on his heel, striding down the hallway, Ayu hurrying behind. Out of the stone hallways and out the front of the Temple, going out into the cold, Saladin squinted into the sunlight.

The wolves were up and moving about, not lounging or relaxed, but Saladin saw nothing on the horizon. His eyes came down, closer, to the snow, but there were endless footprints. No way to know.

Again he turned, his stride longer and quicker, as he tried to quash the cacophony of emotions in his chest. Efrideet was gone, it was that simple. But she had left Saladin this gift - and that was not simple.

He stared at them, trying to comprehend, but that was the problem. Saladin had never understood Efrideet, from the moment she had come here. All the others, Saladin understood to a point, even when he thought them foolish or impulsive or ridiculous. But never Efrideet, and they had been at arm’s length for Traveler knew how long, even when they were family.

They still were, weren’t they? Even when she was gone - where had she gone? Why had she gone? Why had she done this? For Saladin, whom she certainly disliked or possibly even hated -

Saladin fury over it all boiled over, and he reached for the so-called gift, as if to cast them off, but something held him back, like it would have been blasphemous. To what? His thoughts demanded, as instead he took the chair and threw it, where it crashed against his armor and the wall. Ayu spluttered something about Saladin and his temper, but Saladin shoved the Ghost aside. Why would it be disrespectful, he fumed, it wasn’t like it mattered.

There was so much in him that he did not want to acknowledge, recognize, give shape. Thoughts he pushed away, to stay stoic and expressionless. Saladin put the gift away, deep in a drawer where he wouldn’t have to look at it, wouldn’t find it unless he sought it out. He couldn’t even make himself think about it, except a constant ‘why’, on repeat. Why had Efrideet done this? Why?

As the drawer closed, Saladin closed the door on the questions and feelings. There was nothing he could do about it, now or ever. He went to find Jolder, to ask her to spar, anything but the silence and contemplation.

Over the next few weeks, the Iron Lords came to the realization that Efrideet was truly gone, and she was not coming home. Saladin didn’t speak much on it. He had known from the moment he had seen the brushes that Efrideet was not returning, but the others had held hope. He reminded Radegast that Efrideet had always been a wanderer, had always done what she wanted. Said to Perun that Efrideet was more than capable and would be safe, acknowledged Skorri’s frustrations with simple agreements, nodded along with Timur’s difficult-to-understand remarks. He did what he could to distract Jolder.

Jolder asked him, some time after Efrideet was gone. She was clearly still on Jolder’s mind, but Saladin had pushed thoughts of Efrideet away.

“Saladin, what do you think? Why would she go?”

Jolder knew Saladin so well - but there were some walls even her strength could not crack, and the one between Saladin and his feelings was one of them. He shrugged, shook his head. “Efrideet and I were always at odds, Jolder. I have never understood her, and I do not understand this.”

They left it at that.

It was a difficult topic for the others, and as more and more time passed, they did not speak of Efrideet. If they did, it was usually with love, but depending on the person, there was always some remorse. Worry. An aghast feeling knowing that in some way, Efrideet had abandoned them, and they may never see her again or know why.

Saladin didn’t want to know. But every once in awhile, he found the paintbrushes, and every piece of him strained to know.

Eventually he just tried harder to forget. So long had passed, and he could not remember everything forever.

Day broke on the worst day of Saladin’s resurrected life as he staggered up the steps to the Iron Temple, alone. Saladin could barely remember the last time he had been entirely alone, a time before he had met Radegast, or had any purpose. But now he was again, the others dead and lost. He wanted to tear the Temple apart in his grief, let loose everything he’d been holding back for so long. Saladin didn’t lose his temper around the others, he only ever grew angry with Ayu, but now there were no other eyes to see. No one to care. Just him.

Thoughts of Efrideet came to him then. He collapsed to his knees before the dead fires, exhausted from the battle and torn to pieces by loss. More emptiness settled into his heart, and all he could think about was Efrideet. Whether she was dead or alive, on this planet or in a star system far away, whether she had wanted to leave them or had done it for another purpose -

And had she left those brushes as a message?

Saladin had never felt so weak in his life. He felt like a ghost in the weeks after, keeping up only the closest and most important patrols. He was forced to hike to Site 6, to make sure that no SIVA had escaped, and it was easier to compartmentalize it and try and forget.

But he couldn’t forget Efrideet anymore.

Not a month after he became the lone survivor, it came to him. It was a devastating realization, utterly terrible. Why had Efrideet left the brushes?

Of course it was a message. He was an idiot. It was plain as day, even if Saladin couldn’t make sense of anything properly at this point, going through the motions of his former life. But he knew - or he thought he did. And that almost hurt more, so again he tried to put it away.

Saladin became the lone sentry, the keeper of an endless vigil. He kept the memories of the others alive, but their story a secret, lest it take more lives. Saladin couldn’t take any more blood on his hands, or death and responsibility on his shoulders.

Afterwards, it was easier to try and forget again. Put away thoughts of Efrideet with thoughts of the others. She was just as far out of his reach as his dead compatriots. There was no worth in wondering anymore.

But Saladin didn’t make her a statue - he held a hope, even a wavering one. He aided the City, trained others, kept his own story a tightly wrapped secret, and worried about the futures of other people while he guarded the past. And while he still did not understand Efrideet, he knew that he alone had needed the message she had left, and she had known that. All the others loved her dearly, while he and her had had a troubled relationship all along. That had been why.

And though he had tried so hard, his best had not been good enough, and graves were dug up that should never have been touched. Everything Saladin had tried so hard to bury returned, and with it came raw feelings that he thought he had long abandoned. He refused to speak of it much, saying only what was needing, and a little more hope was kindled in his heart when the newest Iron Lord rose, with SIVA vanquished once more.

He thought that other things might stay buried, but when he turned one afternoon and found Efrideet striding across the stones like she had never been gone, the rest of the skeletons were out of his closet.

He never had understood Efrideet, and thought he never would. Now the chance to do so stood before him once more, complaining about her lack of a statue.

He crossed his arms, trying not to grapple with his emotions right then.

“The statues are for the dead. I had always hoped you were not among them.”

He had needed the message. Otherwise he would have tried to forget for good. Efrideet wouldn’t have that - he needed to know, so it would force him to admit things.