ADARA

Sunbeams pierced the mist of morning to cast a hopeful glow over Sungrove and the surrounding hills and ridges. The fog from before dissipated with ease and left them alone to reveal the sprouting beauty underneath. Grass swayed with the wind coming off the distant sea, but she frowned at the two Storm Wardens in front of her. Time escaped her from when she first escaped Prunal with their help — their synchronised teamwork against any enemy, and she sucked in her cheeks at the new chill over her shoulders. Their journey took a toll on them, that much was plain. For her, she savoured in the wonder, the heart pounding adventure of Tara and Jisa's books. On one end of their small clearing, Fenrer rubbed the side of his head and kept his back to both of them.

At the creek, Yuven ruffled droplets through his feathers with a couple quick shakes of his head. Adara waited for his customary bite for movement, and for Fenrer to not argue and follow him meekly, without argument next to Yuven's abrasive personality. Yuven twisted on his knee to send one last whisk of water through his feathers, and opened his mouth.

Fenrer gave him a blank-faced side-eye, barely moving his head to look Yuven straight in the eye.

"Good morning," Adara interrupted the cooling of the world.

Both of them broke their ice-cold staredown to return to their morning rituals. "I need—" Yuven spoke up, but he went quiet when Fenrer held out a phial of the starlit liquid, choosing to stare upwards at dawn breaking through the natural entrance into Sungrove. Yuven scowled, and held out his fingers. White twine whisked through the world, and Fenrer's blank face dropped into annoyance when one of the wispy tangles pushed him in the brow as it grabbed the phial from his hands and brought it to Yuven, who took it from the air.

Adara readied her shawl as Fenrer kept himself facing the manor to rub his fingers into his temples. "I see," she said and clapped her hands against her hips. "Anyone want to talk about how their sleep went? I didn't have nightmares, thank you for asking. And thanks to a certain someone, I feel less like death when I get up earlier than I used to."

Icy silence.

Adara folded her arms as Yuven downed the medication and stuck out his tongue with a scrunch of his nose. Meanwhile, Fenrer adjusted his runic expanders with a click of the circuitry before taking out the Resonator off his belt to open it. Yuven waddled over as he pushed the phial into one of the leather straps on his armor. He slinked closer to Fenrer, then loomed over him. Fenrer blinked, then closed the Resonator with another quiet click.

"Any Derelicts?" she asked.

Fenrer looked at her. "No."

You're killing me. Adara stretched and joined them, placing herself in the gap to break their staredown. "So, what's next, Yuven? You've been the driver this whole time, I'm sure you have something in mind," she pushed as his feathers fluffed out.

"We're staying."

That... is not what I was expecting him to say. Adara raised an eyebrow when Fenrer took a swing from his water bladder. "I thought you wanted to get to Sivaport as fast as possible. It's looking to be a nice day, shouldn't we hurry in case there's another storm?"

"I have decided if we're to make this trip bearable for everyone, we have to rest a little longer."

What?

"Don't do that, Yuven," Fenrer murmured.

"Do what? I do not know what you are talking about," Yuven said as Fenrer got off his knees and brushed the side of his head. "You—" He snarled with a prod into Fenrer's chest with a bounce of his head. "—were hurt, Fenrer."

"I—" Fenrer echoed out his flat tone. "—am fine, Yuven."

"I think—" Adara pushed between them. "We should take a minute to gather ourselves after what happened last night. We are all tired, but we're close to Sivaport... apparently," she corrected, not knowing how far or close said city was, but anything to keep the peace between Yuven and Fenrer when they were at the last hurdle of their journey. "Is there anything we need to do before we head out?" She aimed her question at Fenrer, but he tucked his hands on his belt and kept his gaze trained on Yuven, who pursed his lips and his pupils thinned into beads. "Look, we've had a rough night, can we not do this so early in the morn?" Adara snapped her fingers in front of their continued staredown. "You can blink."

Both of them blinked.

"Fenrer, if there's anything you need to do before we leave, you have time," she said, causing his attention to shift to her. "Yuven's right, you were hurt, and you need a minute. We can leave afterwards. Unless Yuven has a different idea," she said, waiting for his regular stream of complaints. None came, and she frowned when Fenrer bowed his head and left them at their haphazard campsite to head for the manor on the hill. Adara chewed on her lower lip, then checked on Yuven, who scowled at her.

"You going to blame me for that, too?" she asked.

"No. First time you talk sense since we met," Yuven said and stomped to the creek to refill his own waterskin.

His words from last night haunted her, and he referred to himself as a monster. Things clicked in her mind; his behaviour at the Elder Conclave made sense with the context he gave her. Adara pinched the tips of her fingers one by one as he remained at the bank of the dawntouched creek. I wonder if that's why he's in such a rush. He's sick. One more pinch for good measure, she crept closer to him while he sent one last flick of droplets through his feathers and hair. "You haven't let me get a word in to talk sense into you two," she pointed out, but stepped back when he straightened himself out and eyed her. "You know I don't hate you, Yuven."

He squeezed the bladder and stepped past her.

"Even if you are an abrasive arsehole."

Yuven hooked the bladder on his belt and shook his head. "If I am not as I am, people will hesitate — people will die," he said and sat against one of the streaming willow trees. "Hesitation costs lives. Derelicts won't hesitate. Now you have seen other things won't hesitate, even with someone like Fenrer trying desperately to ward them off." He set his arms against his stomach and stretched. "Besides, I thought I told you to walk away. I do not want to have this conversation with you, Adara."

"Is that what you told yourself at the Summit?" she asked. "When you sent all those people as fodder?"

"Notice how everyone else stood there like dumbstuck squirrels without a plan of their own?" he remarked. "You will learn. You will see that we never have opportunity to think when it comes to Derelicts. I do what I must, though people will curse my decisions, including you, but I do not care. I do not need your approval. I have responsibility to the world, so what you should ask yourself, Sazaka, is what you're willing to give up to live in it." He lifted himself off the ground and flicked his feathers. "Because I know my answer, and I told you to walk away from it. I am going to check the area and we shall meet at the separation of the knolls." He pointed to where the sun crawled its way across the ridges.

"Yuven."

He twisted on his heel with a flourish and became nothing more than a snowflecked ghost along the grass. Alone in the clearing of their campsite, the water licked into an erosion of life. Irritation washed out into weariness as she refilled her own waterskin, careful to use the tip of her finger as a pathway for cleansing flames. Smoke twirled into the hide. Silver tendrils pushed through the material, and she drew her hand back when it burned at her skin. Her power, immense, but her ability to wield it, no better than a babe. Adara squeezed the overheated bladder. Droplets oozed from the opening and dampened her fingers, but she closed it in full to tuck it on her belt with her food container.

Her steps from the creek took her back to the manor who stood vigil on the plateau over Sungrove. Its stone guardians scorched from the flames of magick, she ascended the steps to reach the huge front doors, open to allow visitors inside the foyer. "Fenrer?" she called out, then stepped over the threshold. Warm air tangled into her lungs and the mist of the night never came from her lips. It was freezing before... Adara studied the rafters, where old, tanned pelts hung against the walls of hunts. Without the thick dread permeating the air, the manor spread a more comforting, gentle feeling like its occupants before. Her boot squeaked a loose floorboard, and she hesitated to listen for a second set of lumbering footsteps. The thump of her heartbeat calmed at the silence of a different texture in her ears. Without fear of the door slamming shut behind her, she stood beneath the storied rafters, where the posts held up the staircase with expert carpentry for efficiency and space. In a carved frame on the wall, a map of Haneka, she traced the river, where the delta split to the south and then the greater ocean. Sivaport sat in the gulf, where it split into a crescent curve. In the other frame on the other wall, Sungrove and the immediate county.

There is more beyond the border of Tebora, that isn't scary or dangerous, she mouthed the words she told Jisa when she stole a shredded piece of the world from Prunal castle from underneath the king's nose. Adara rubbed the bridge of her nose and fought down a weary sob. It came out a slow sigh instead, and she studied the map to commit it to memory. Someday... I'll go back and tell you all about it. The things and places I've seen. I just wish you were here to see it, Jisa. You deserved this more than I did.

A shadow flitted in her peripheral.

She threw her arms up in the air when Fenrer came in the visage of his father, and she blinked out the terror of the night when he stood there, a confused quirk to his lips.

"Gods, you scared me." Adara set her hand over her heart and tried to catch her breath.

"I apologise," Fenrer said and came to stand beside her. "Sivaport is a couple days away. Where is Yuven?"

"He said we were going to meet where the knolls separated." Adara pointed outside the closest window, and Fenrer nodded.

"The dawnroad?"

"Is that what it's called?"

Fenrer headed for the window to point to where they arrived. "There's two main entrances into Sungrove. We took the duskpath, which has the easiest access into the Goldwood and the surrounding area. The dawn road leads straight to Sivaport."

Adara nodded, but frowned at his empty expression. "Are you alright, Fenrer?"

"I'm hale and whole. I needed to pay my respects to the shrine, I also needed to find something."

"Can I help? What are you looking for?"

Fenrer smiled at her, then motioned at her to follow him through the foyer. Questions threatened to burst from her lips, but she held them back to gauge Fenrer's state of mind. Floorboards creaked with their harmonic footsteps as he stopped outside a pair of beautiful redwood doors. "What I'm looking for should be in here," he said, then opened it.

Stacks of wood tucked inside sections of the stone wall, where old runes lined the inside of each section. On the farthest wall, a large, elaborate station for woodworking. Tools lined the racks, and Adara avoided wood shavings left on the floor from someone's haphazard attempt to brush them aside. Her head spun at the complexity, and she traced the markings made over generations of woodworkers. Fenrer moved for the smaller cubicles. He studied the runic writing on the handles before opening one. Adara left the table behind when he rifled through it to tug out a light-cream, smoothed block of wood with streaks of brown within its grain, small enough to fit in his hand.

Fenrer spun it between his fingers and smiled with a nod.

"You were looking for a block of wood?" Adara questioned.

"It must seem a little silly," he admitted before tucking it into his small pack. "But I feel better having it." His shoulders slumped, but he held himself tall, but not at the height of his father. "Let's go meet with Yuven."

"Fenrer."

Unlike Yuven, he stopped.

"Do you need to talk about it?" she asked.

He scratched the back of his neck. "I just need some time for my thoughts."

"Is that what the block of wood is for?"

He beamed, brighter than the morning sun. "Yes."

"Are you going to whack Yuven over the head with it?" Adara found herself smiling to echo him.

"No." He chuckled, the sound soft on her ears. "I'm fine, Adara. I appreciate the concern, but you should focus on yourself for the time being." Adara followed him outside the manor and through the abandoned town, where the sun continued to cast beams of light along the canopy to spread the light of home. With their back to where the sun set, he guided her to the dawn. Yuven sat outside another shattered gate, and stood up to meet them.

"Are we ready?" he asked.

"Yes, I'll get us there," Fenrer acknowledged Yuven, and ushered them onto the road outside of Sungrove.

The chilly atmosphere between Fenrer and Yuven stuck to her bones, but she bathed in the warmth and longing of the sun in the sky, for her own dawn to arrive across the horizon.