#sormikweek

Sorey glanced over his shoulder, swallowing and edging closer to the wall. He pressed his palm against the wall, edging until he was safely under the overhang. He wasn’t human anymore, but he didn’t know how far his powers as a seraph would go. The most he could do was the silver flame, and that was barely in any kind of control. He gave his hands a worried glance. He hadn’t seen the flames of purification hurt anything, but the thought that it might curled his stomach. Besides, he still remembered how Mikleo had reacted to it.

He squeezed his eyes shut, taking deep breaths. He didn’t want to do that, to inflict that pain. Sorey was sure that he had done enough of that already.

He opened on eyes as he heard someone picking their way towards him. Sorey smiled when he saw Selene standing on the walkway, seemingly oblivious to the sheer drop down the side of the mountain.

She tipped her head to the side, the move so like Mikleo it made him ache with the fondness. “No head for heights.”

“It’s not that.” Sorey pushed away from the wall, glancing down at the path. It looked solid enough, or at least without cracks that he could see. Sorey stepped forward cautiously, testing his weight as he moved along. “I climbed this mountain to get to Mikleo the first time.”

He looked up in time to see Selene shake her head. “Climbing the mountain is different than being here. You’re on the edge of the world here.”

Sorey turned to look down. There wasn’t much to see before the mist and the clouds got into the way. Sorey was sure that it would be an inspiring view of the valley that Camlann and Kyfle-on-the-Mountain was in. He might have been able to see Artorious’ Throne clearly, a through that made him shiver.

He rubbed absently as his chest, finally looking away from the clouds. He hadn’t been back to Artorious’ Throne since had had returned, and he had no plans to. He felt like it would be too much, too many memories that he wanted as dead as he had been.

“When I lived here, Dad used to bring me up here all the time.” Sorey turned to look at Selene, watching as she turned and walked back to the dais and mural further back. “I was one of the first places we explored. We try to come up here every time I can come home.”

“You must know this place better than anyone.”

“Almost.” Selene paused, staring back at the mural. Sorey edged along the walkway to stand behind her. He smiled when he saw Mikleo sitting on the dais, sketching the mural that stretched above him. Every once and a while he would look up at the mural and frown, Sorey seeing his lips move as he muttered something to himself.

Selene shifted, Sorey looking over at her as her shoulders twitched. He tipped his head to the side, surprised when he turned back around to look at him. There was a faint smile on her face, but the usual uneasiness was there, like she didn’t know how to approach him.

She held his gaze for a moment before reaching up to touch the wall, her fingers light against the undecorated stone. “Dad says this is old, far older than he is. He says it was built around Destiny Dawn, but I’m sure it’s closer to the Temperance of Avarost. What do you think?”

Sorey turned to look back at the carvings, intending to study them to find out only to come up blank. He stared at the carvings, tracing their patterns down the rows with his stomach curling.

He had known this once. He had spent hours among his books blithely ignoring everything that was going on in the palace. Maybe that had been what Nadia had wanted, to keep him ignorant and out of the way of the horrible things that were happening. 

It had worked for a while, to the point where it had worked as the excuse that got him out of Pendrago when he finally looked up and realized that the world was falling apart around him. And he had decided to do something. After all, he was no threat, he was just interested in old things. If he had hung around villages, it was because he was looking for falling down buildings, not trying to ferment rebellion or help villagers regardless of what side they had fallen on. He had left his history books behind then, and he had never looked at them again.

Sorey tipped his head back, staring at the ornate floral that had been carved between the ceiling and the wall, but his mind wasn’t on it. It was on wondering what had happened to his old books.

They had probably gone into a Pendrago library somewhere. After all, he had been a forgotten prince. No one knew what he had been before he had entered the wars of succession. That was for the best, it meant that they hadn’t been destroyed after he was gone.

He licked his lip, jerking his attention back to the wall, trying to remember anything that could help him. But it was like looking at a language that he didn’t recognize. Even the ancient tongue was piecemeal in his mind.

Sorey sighed, shaking his head. “I…I don’t know.”

Selene sighed. “Yeah, it’s a tough one. Dad swears that he has word of mouth evidence for him being right, but Aunt Melody and Natalie won’t corroborate.”

“They would know best.”

Something in his tone must have caught her attention, because Selene turned her head to look at him. He heard her make a sound, like the start of a word before she quickly corrected herself. “Sorey?”

Sorey shook his head. “I don’t remember much about this anymore.”

“Oh.”

There was nothing to say in the face of that, Sorey turning and making his way over towards the dais. He could feel Selene’s gaze on his back as he went, Sorey almost glad that she didn’t come after him. For one, these walkways weren’t meant for running along, for another, he didn’t know what to tell her. He didn’t know what Mikleo had told her.

He climbed up the three steps to the dais, looking over at Mikleo before waling over to where a sword had been left. Sorey crouched down to look at it, glancing up at the headless statue. The hand looked like it had crumbled away, which explained where the sword had come from. The statues was more protected under the overhang, but time had won out.

Sorey dropped his gaze back to the sword, tracing the odd, waving pattern of the blade.

“It’s a Shepherd’s sword.” Sorey looked over his shoulder at the sound of Mikleo’s voice. The seraph smiled at him, but he didn’t look away from his drawing. “They were never sharp because they were meant for purifying.”

Sorey tipped his head to the side, testing the thickness of the blade before shaking his head. “And bludgeoning.”

Mikleo shrugged. “It would stop a hellion, right?”

Sorey turned to look at Mikleo, his fingers curling around the blade. “One of the smaller ones maybe. I’m not sure about a drake.”

“I’m sure I would have been deterred with a hard smack. Hunger loses its edge when there’s pain involved.”

Sorey stared down at the sword, shaking his head. “I wouldn’t have done that to you.”

“I know.” Mikleo turned to smile at him. “You’ve never hurt me.”

Sorey swallowed, not trusting himself to respond, especially when it wasn’t true. He dropped his gaze back to the sword, tracing the designs. Half of them were so faded that he didn’t know where they would have gone, but he kept tracing out the designs of swirls and circles. It felt right, although that might have just been the design that he had in his own mind. The repetitive motion of it all was calming, although it didn’t stop the swirl of thoughts.

He had wanted to do this with Mikleo before everything had fallen apart. He wanted to show the seraph who had been stuck on a distant mountain the world he had seen. It had only been a small portion of it, but it had been worth seeing. He hadn’t succeeded in that either.

Sorey closed his hand around the blade again, staring down at the artifact without really seeing it. He felt like all of this was not real. Ever since he had been told that he was a Great Lord, the possessor of the flames of purification. Sorey stared at his hand, half expecting the flames to flare up and consume them all, but there was nothing. Sorey wasn’t sure if he was glad of it or not. He had no control of his power, he knew that.

He let up his hold on the sword, his hand quickly jerking towards the hilt when he heard someone coming.

Sorey turned his head, his eyes widening when he saw Selene walking past. With the way her eyes widened, she had seen what his reaction had been.

He swallowed, trying to come up with an explanation. It was habit, something long established form a life on the run. She had startled him. He would have never, he would have stopped himself before he had done anything.

Sorey remained tense as Selene came around to the other side of the dais. She tipped her head to the side, holding his gaze for a moment before dropping her gaze to the sword. Sorey felt like he was holding his breath, waiting for Selene to comment on it.

Instead, she moved closer to stare at the sword. Sorey swallowed, fighting the urge to tell her to back away before he did something regrettable. He had no control over his powers, and he was still half stuck in the past, it was a bad combination.

Sorey met her gaze as Selene glanced at him, not sure if he half imagined the nod that was given to him before Selene turned her attention back to the sword.

She whistled, her fingers tracing the pattern on the blade. “This is way better than some of the one’s you’ve found.”

Mikleo stopped drawing, turning to look at Selene with a raised eyebrow. She giggled and moved away to look at the statue. Sorey settled for looking between the two of them, finally settling on Selene as she started to circle the statue.

Selene frowned and leaned to look at something on the statue. It only held her attention for a moment before she was looking back their direction. “Dad only found hilts and fragments so far. That’s the first whole one from here. Where did you find it?”

Mikleo sighed and gestured towards the front of the dais. “Down there, practically down that hole that leads to…the statue room?”

Selene leaned out before shrugging. “I think. I’d need the map.”

Sorey perked up at that, twisting to look at Mikleo. “You’ve mapped it?”

“Badly.” Mikleo made a face before setting his journal aside. “It’s piecemeal and needs to be put together.”

“Like all the other artifacts.”

“There’s a system.” Mikleo shifted in place, rubbing a hand over his face before sighing. “It needs updating. I’ve let it go recently.”

There was a pause where Mikleo’s gaze flicking away, Sorey grabbing at the blade again. It was part of the seven hundred years that he had missed, but he at least could guess at this. The Lord of Calamity, the horrors that he couldn’t quite prevent in his own time.

He leaned towards Mikleo before pausing, his gaze flicking over to Selene. She was looking back at the statue, dropping down into a crouch to study what was there. She didn’t really react aside from rolling her eyes. “That and the library.” 

Her gaze slid over to him, Sorey not sure how to take the thoughtful look that crossed her face. If he was honest with himself, he didn’t know how to deal with the back and forth between the two of them. Sometimes, it felt like he got it, but other times it was like he slipped between and was left drifting along behind.

Selene looked him up and down before standing up. “You have help though. So, you don’t have to wait for me to come back.”

Mikleo drummed his fingers against his leg, Sorey not sure what that meant. He knew what Mikelo would have done, but all of those tells were impatience and anger. It was what he had mostly directed to people. The rest had been behind closed doors. That Mikleo was very protective, his clothing almost armor. He was more open now, and Sorey found himself lost trying to figure out the body language. He watched Mikleo shift, only belatedly realizing that Mikleo was trying to come up with something to say, and then feeling foolish for it.

He supposed that he was still easy to read, nothing had changed. But he was still looking for the angry and hurt seraph of seven hundred years ago. And Mikleo deserved better than that.

He was so lost in his thoughts that he missed Mikleo scooting closer. It was only when Mikleo bumped up against him that he turned, Sorey surprised to see Mikleo so close. Mikleo seemed just as taken aback, but Mikleo recovered better.

Mikleo leaned in, brushing their shoulders together again. “I could use the help.”

Sorey flicked his gaze up to the mural, surprised at the longing that he felt. He was supposed to be a Great Lord, there were duties that he would eventually have to shoulder. To do that, he needed to be able to control what he had. But he couldn’t refuse this, nor could he refuse Mikleo.

He offered Mikleo a smile, concerned when Mikleo didn’t immediately return the smile. Instead, he sighed and leaned into Sorey, Sorey shifting to take his share of the weight. He looked down at Mikleo’s head on his shoulder, surprised by the longing his felt. 

He had what he wanted, he was free of the empire and sitting in ruins that he would have read about in the Celestial Record. Mikleo was by his side and Selene was there.

He looked over at Selene, watching as she smiled fondly at the two of them before she turned back to the statue. Apparently that was all she needed to be at ease, and Sorey felt a brief flash of envy before it leaked away. It was hard to keep a hold of it when some small part of him whispered that he should be content. It was listening to that voice that was the hard part.

Sorey sighed and let his head rest against Mikleo’s, giving into the longing no matter how guilty he felt about it. It wasn’t like he could move, not with the way that Mikleo’s fingers were twining with his. Moving would mean disrupting Mikleo and more explanations than Sorey wanted to give.