2407 Rab 5, Velpa

Canelis sped through the familiar halls of the Royal villa, passing by all the ornaments without stopping to admire them. She thought of them as garish and completely unnecessary to the villa's main purpose. The soldiers coming in and out of the rooms lining the corridor gaped at her like they couldn't believe she's here. Well, let them.

It didn't take long before word reached her that she was supposed to be dead or at least presumed to be so. While being disguised as a merchant in Xai-Ren along with Cailen, she gathered all information she could with regards to the situation in the fortress in response to her disappearance. So far, apart from the occasional outburst of curiosity, no one had flagged Yin-Alora about it and the Army was utterly silent about the whole escapade.

They had spent the whole day yesterday dodging patrol units going along the roads in Xai-Ren. Canelis remembered being appalled at the certain lack of responsibility the platoons dispatched in the acgricultural sector were.

If they had been doing half their job, they would have noticed Canelis dressed in a colorful coat she nicked from a passing merchant. They would have noticed that the pixie with her had been wearing a non-traditional armor reminiscent only of a renegade. Canelis was willing to bet half her fortune these soldiers hadn't even seen a renegade up close.

If so, how could they think the renegades were someone deserving to be terrorized? How could any of them?

A soldier was taught to analyze their surroundings first before making a conclusion about the world. What had happened along the way, that people had started to make conclusions first before seeing what was going on in the world?

How as Canelis supposed to fix something like that in a course of what, three days?

She glanced behind her upon feeling a hollow presence creeping towards her. There was nothing but more marquine vases painted with dyed resin and a few glass cases guarding decorative weapons inside. After seeing what the plague looked like yesterday jarred something in her, made her paranoid.

They hadn't even planned on encountering a plague point. As the renegade called it, these points were scattered all over the border between Xai-Ren and Ok-Sa and have been forming a plague line of some sort. Almost all of the eastern side of Ok-Sa was devoured and already unreachable and the western side wouldn't be far behind. As she witness yesterday, one of the plague points have already reached past the outposts in Xai-Ren. It wouldn't be too long before a huge fraction of the city would be affected.

The memory of the swirling black mass of nothingness flashed in Canelis's mind. It's a good thing Cailen had pulled her back before she careened straight into it. After forcing him to take turns on riding the dagrine, she didn't want to admit she might have not seen the plague point until it's too late.

She owed the renegade again.

That's what propelled her out of bed that morning after she turned up at the foot of the Royal villa's stairs, alive and unhurt. As much as she ignored all eyes and turning heads following her up, she ignored the ones with her right now. It's a disgrace to remain indebted to someone for such a long time. Hence, she needed to solve this plague thing first so she could get out of Cailen and the renegades' collective and figurative hairs.

Where was Cailen at this point in time, even? Canelis recalled shoving the renegade into a random alehouse in the country side beyond the fortress, telling him to shut his trap and just drink his tea. She even bought him the most expensive one in the menu with a versal she swiped from the shard fairy merchants just outside the shop.

Let her hope it was enough to calm the renegade well enough to find for himself a place to sleep and give Canelis enough time to secure an audience with the Riogener and to refine the points of interest in her head.

"I'll come back in this spot the first thing after my audience with the Riogener," Canelis had explicitly told Cailen before they parted ways. "Don't talk to anyone. Don't leave this seat, if you must."

She hadn't waited for his answer and just strode out of the door.

Now, her footsteps tramped in muffled protest against the rugs covering the wooden floor—a direct contrast to the booming echoes she experienced back in Ok-Sa. Everything was quiet now that the light was brighter and the corridors were more familiar.

The door to the Riogener's office came into view. Instead of being open and inviting like all the times he was inside, they were closed. The head attendant bowed his head when he noticed Canelis approaching.

"What's going on?" Canelis's gaze flicked to the timeteller ticking in the upper corner of the corridor's wall. She was two minutes earlier than their appointed meeting time. "Where's the Riogener?"

The attendant ducked his head again. "He went out to investigate the commotion in the courtyard."

Canelis knitted her eyebrows. "What commotion in the courtyard?" she asked. "Which one?"

"The Royal Courtyard, Crown General," the attendant answered. "I suggest waiting for the Riogener inside while he deals with the intruder."

The last word sent a spike of concern down Canelis's gut. Intruder. Could it be—

Without acknowledging the attendant's formal, farewell bow, Canelis dashed through the corridor she came from. Her wings fluttered into view as she summoned her magic to the surface to withdraw the cloaking around them. The wind stirred around her as she flapped her wings, making a few vases dance from their podiums.

Then, she was zipping through the corridors until the light from the courtyard and down the Royal villa's steps came to view. She burst through the spaces between bright red pillars holding up the shingled roof, her gaze landing on a crowd of armor on the ground.

"Stop!" her voice speared into the silence of the morning as she tucked her wings. Her feet slapped the cobblestones, propelling her forward in a huffing run. When she got to the rim of the commotion, all of the soldiers present blinked at her like she had just gone crazy. "What's going on?"

"What's got you in a pace, Crown General?" the Riogener's voice bled in Canelis's ears. With wide eyes, she whipped towards him and bowed low, folding her form at the hips. She had never been this close to her boots before. My, how dusty and muddy they had become.

"My liege," she said, drawing her eyes to each and every detail she could register before her bow become awkward. "I didn't know you'd be here. I heard the commotion on my way to your office—"

Her gaze landed on the center of the armored crowd. Cailen Dithal smirked at her even while his arms were pinned behind his back and his knees folded to the ground. A large bruise was already forming in his cheek. His yellow scarf had come undone to the point it was merely draped on his neck and fluttered against his torso. What was he doing here? Didn't Canelis tell him to stay put?

"Do you have anything more to say, Crown General?" the Riogener's voice was patient but had enough inflection in it to signify that he was already annoyed at the whole thing. He had better things to do, after all. "If not, then I must have this traitor executed right on this spot."

Canelis had never whipped out of a bow this fast. Her world righted up as quickly as it did going down. "Wait!" she screamed before pursing her lips together. What was she doing, disrespecting the crown? "I mean, I have a proposition to make regarding my friend here."

She had never looked at the Riogener in the eyes since she was old enough to stand but this time, she risked it. "Please hear me out, Father," she said.

Silence reigned in the courtyard as both the soldiers and Cailen blinked at the sudden drop of kinship honorific in public. Daughters weren't allowed to call the Riogener anything that would adhere to their kinship because, first and foremost, they weren't related, at least by the Army's standards.

Canelis was done with that as much as she was done with the ornaments in the Royal villa.

"Go on," the Riogener jerked his chin at Canelis. He didn't appear miffed that she just called him Father in public. "Let's hear it then."

Canelis blinked. "Right here?"

The Riogener wasn't fazed at her confusion. "Well, he is your friend, right?" he said. "I'm sure he'd love to hear what you're going to say about him."

She tamped down the growing heartbeat that's starting to pound in her chest. "Okay," she swallowed against the lump in her throat. "First, he needs to be freed."

"What for?" the Riogener countered. "He trespassed into our private property without any permit or clearance to be here. He deserved to be arrested for that."

"He is a renegade," Canelis interjected.

Anger flashed in the Riogener's eyes. "Be careful about what you're going to say next, soldier," he said. Not "Crown General". Not even "Officier".

Just "soldier".

"I need him to get my assignment done," Canelis said despite her throat constricting and her tongue refusing to work. "Set him free."

"What's the update with the stock discrepancy in Xai-Ren?" the Riogener said. "Why do the reports from Marshal Bennan say you've vanished to...to Ok-Sa, of all places?"

Canelis blew a breath. Then, the story came spilling out. The Riogener's face remained passive throughout. "They were only stealing for their survival, hence the outposts, being a direct storage center for imported products, being their prime target," she pointed to Cailen whose expression was unreadable now. "They have been holing up in Ok-Sa all this time, under the sunken ruins of an ancient city."

Cailen began squirming as if to lunge and tackle her to the ground. Canelis was grateful when the soldiers slammed his face into the ground and pinning him against it. She brought her gaze back to her father. "That's why my trail is traced in the barren land," she said. "Thankfully, I made a deal with their Elder so now I am back here."

"You shouldn't have cut a deal with those heathens," the Riogener hissed. "What did they tell you to do?"

"To solve the mystery behind how to stop the plague from the ocean," Canelis said. "I thought it was in our interest as well if we helped out in this issue. I have personally seen one plague point reaching the edges of Xai-Ren. This won't stop at the borders of Ok-Sa and I'm sure you know it. Sooner or later, our own people will be affected by it."

The Riogener clasped his hands behind him. "What do you plan to do?" he asked. "What are your terms?"

Canelis narrowed her eyes. Seeing as how he readily agreed without asking more about the plague implied he already knew about it from the beginning. If so, why had he sent her to Xai-Ren in the first place? Was it not to investigate the discrepancy in the stocks at all?

How much had the Riogener known about this?

Still, he asked her a question. She should answer it. "Free my companion and grant him permission to enter Yin-Alora at will. Acknowledge the existence of generational renegades—offsprings of the defectors—and give them the choice to enlist," she clasped her hands behind her, mirroring her father. "Lastly, send forces to help the renegades in stopping the plague from spreading to the rest of Ok-Sa."

"Bring me proof of the renegades' method in stopping the plague," the Riogener said. "Only then will I consider granting your terms."

She cast an unsteady gaze at Cailen. "Even freeing him?"

The Riogener didn't bother glancing at the subject of their discussion. "He will stay with us until we are sure you are upholding your end of the bargain to both the renegades and to the Army," he said. "Do you have any objections?"

Canelis met Cailen's gaze from the ground. For once, real fear flashed in his dark eyes. She exhaled forcefully to calm her nerves. She uttered a silent prayer to the gods for her voice to not shake. "No, sir," she said. "Expect results over the next week. I will need to ride back to Ok-Sa and I will take only the fastest kraejen you can give me."