“You come from royal blood, Kiye. When I was your age, my father made sure that I knew, regardless of our title, that we were nobility. He needed me to know this because his father, your great grandfather, tried to take something that wasn’t his. Because of that, we lost our crown, our lands, and the respect of our people. My brother restored all of that, but it doesn’t erase what came before. Now I am telling you because I need you to understand that nobility is not about status or money. It’s about understanding your duty to the people around you.”
“Then why did you let the older boys pick on me,” Kiye proclaimed. Tears stood out on his ruddy cheeks, and though he fought to keep a straight face, he felt the anguish tugging at the edges of his lips. He wanted to scream and shout and punch the stupid older kids right in their stupid faces. Ki’yeal, his father, was far more skilled at maintaining a straight face than him.
“Being royal does not entitle you to acting like you are better than other people,” his father explained in a calm, even tone. This was the tone he used when he was upset but didn’t want to let Kiye know that. “If anything, it means we have a greater duty than anyone else to behave better. Back home, people look to our family for leadership and advice. We may not be royals here, but we are no less responsible for our actions. You antagonized those boys.”
Kiye opened his mouth to protest, but the unblinking expression of disappointment on his father’s face quelled his argument before it reached his tongue. It didn’t matter that they’d been taunting him about his wooden sword. He realized they were not responsible for his reaction. He shut his mouth, sniffled, and glared pointedly at the ground.
“Tomorrow, we’re going to find those boys and you’re going to apologize. Then maybe you can ask nicely for sword lessons.”
“But I don’t want to apologize,” Kiye exclaimed.
“Growing up means sometimes doing things that you don’t want to do because they are the right thing to do. Especially when you have people looking up to you.”
“What’s the point of being royal if you can’t get your way,” Kiye grumped.
Though he meant it in all earnestness, the comment broke his father’s hardened expression. Kiye looked up at the brief laugh that flitted through the air, at once pleased with himself and irritated that he wasn’t being taken seriously.
“The point is to leave the world better than we found it. Which is a truth for everyone, royal or not. Besides, don’t you want to show those boys how grown up you are by admitting your faults and asking for help?”
Kiye considered the offer for a moment. The allure of being seen as the bigger person did appeal to him, but he really, really hated the idea of apologizing. But then again, they were far better than him with the sword. The whole reason he’d goaded them into a fight in the first place was to show off his own skills.
“Fine,” he said after an extended and detailed analysis of all angles.
“That’s my boy.”
No matter how strong his soured mood, it could not withstand the force of the three words of validation from his father. A reluctant smile spread across Kiye’s face. When his father wrapped him into a hug and lifted him into the air, the reluctance melted away and he squealed with delight.
* * *
One year later…
There were tears in his father’s eyes. He’d smiled as he dismounted Yath, his hulking blue dragon, and strode in through the open frontroom of the weyr, but the smile hadn’t disguised the sheen of light in his eyes.
Kiye followed after his father, stealthily creeping through the shadows as he made his way back to the master bedroom. Kiye was a master of stealth. He imagined himself melding to the very walls of the cavern as he tiptoed along. Which made the hissing tickle of his twin sister’s words against the nape of his neck all the more startling.
“What’re you doing,” Yari demanded.
“Shhh,” Kiye hissed back. He glared over his shoulder and stifled the startlement that shot through his mind at the realization of just how close she was. She practically had her nose touching his shoulder. Her eyes, the vibrant green of their father, matched him glare for glare. “They’ll hear you, Yah-yah.”
“Don’t call me that,” she snarled.
“Don’t sneak up on me,” he retorted.
“I wouldn’t have to sneak up on you if you weren’t sneaking.”
“I’m trying to do some reconnaissance!”
“What?”
“Shh,” Kiye hissed again. He glanced back at the doorway, which had thankfully remained open a crack after his father went in. He could hear his mother’s soft voice within, but no signs that either of his parents had heard him. Relief unclenched some of the muscles in his frame and he looked back to Yari. “Dad came back from Tris’Hath looking all upset. I want to know what happened.”
Instead of scolding him further, as he had expected, Yari edged a little closer to his back. She peeked over his shoulder, her mop of dark brown hair obscuring her eyes.
“Get closer,” she hissed in his ear. “I can’t hear anything.”
Kiye balked a moment, more out of an instinctive need to do the opposite of whatever his sister said than any real reason. His own curiosity overrode that instinct though, and with one last well placed glare, he hunkered down into the shadows outside his parents’ bedroom and inched closer.
“What did you fight about,” his mother asked. She stood out of his line of sight. His father half-turned and faced the space hidden by the door. His shoulders slumped and his head drooped. Though his voice conveyed anger, he looked defeated.
“The war. It’s always the war. He said he’s called in all offworlders to return home.”
“What? For how long?” Surprise coloured his mother’s words, and something else. A little tremor that Kiye didn’t recognize.
“Given the way things are going back home, forever.”
“Are you going?”
Silence issued from the room. Kiye felt the pressure of his sister’s hands on his back as she leaned ever further over his head, trying to get a view. He could only see a sliver of his father’s backside through the narrow gap in the door. It was enough to see him shake his head.
“I told him I couldn’t leave my family. He told me I did have to. That he expected you and the kids to come with me. Can you believe that?”
Silence again. When his mother spoke next, the tremor came through stronger.
“I don’t… I don’t think-”
“You don’t have to worry about it, love,” his father cut in. “I told him no. I told him my home is here, in Seiryuu, with you. I’m not going home. Ever again.”
“What do you mean?”
A long pause stretched between the end of his mother’s question and his father’s answer. When the words did come, the powerful, smooth tenor that had filled Kiye’s childhood with song cracked and shattered into a sob.
“I was so angry, Kare. I couldn’t believe he’d even suggest that. So I said I was leaving. He said not to bother returning, because I’d have no home to return to anymore. I told him that was fine by me.”
“Oh love…” The soft shuffle of cloth on wood told Kiye of his mother’s movements. He watched his father turn and bend into the shadows beyond the doorway. Arms wrapped around him, and his mother spoke again. “I’m sure if you talked to him-”
“Tris’Hath is closed off. The mages threw up a barrier to limit teleportation. Unless you have the key, you can’t get through. So that’s it. I’m locked out. My own brother cast me out.”
Kiye felt a cold pit welling in his stomach. The name of his father’s homeworld invoked such warm, happy memories. Uncle Aaron tossing him in the air. Aunt Mystic creating magical images to tell them stories before bed. The sweltering days and cool nights. The music, the food, the fun with his cousins. He couldn’t imagine all of that simply being gone.
Against his back, Yari’s breath hitched for a moment and her fingers tightened on his shoulders. Kiye reached back to squeeze his sister’s hand.
No one spoke within the room for several long minutes. Kiye watched the shadow of his parents sit down on the edge of their bed while soft, broken sounds issued from his father’s throat. After a time, the sounds quieted into sniffles.
“We’ll have to tell the kids,” he said.
Kiye’s mother made a gentle shushing noise.
“Later, love. We’ll figure out what to say to them later.”
* * *
Twelve years later…
“Kiye, I’m going to kill you!”
The enraged shriek rang out through the crisp morning air, chased by a peel of laughter. Another shriek followed, this one entirely unintelligible.
“What is wrong with you,” Yari demanded. “I can’t believe I’m related to you. You’re supposed to be an adult!”
More laughter answered her incised words. Kiye fell to his knees in the light dusting of snow covering the cliffside, overjoyed by his sister’s response. Nearby, their youngest siblings rolled about in the snow and squealed with delight. They had never seen a snowball fight before, but after Kiye’s expert demonstration, they began gathering up fistfuls of powdery snow to throw at each other, laughing all the while.
Kiye got to his feet as Yari brushed snow from her shoulders with a look of haughty disgust curling her lips. She’d become much more interested in girlish things since they turned eighteen. Maybe it was her new friends steering her wrong, or their teacher insisting that certain individuals had certain roles in society, but Kiye didn’t like it either way. He wanted the old Yari back, and he knew just what buttons to push to let that version of her out.
“Cool down, Yah-yah,” he cajoled as he bent down to gather up another mound of cold, wet snow. “You get too worked up and that temper’ll make you melt in this weather.”
The eye roll that Yari replied with could be seen from orbit.
“Shards and shells, Kiye, that was so lame. And don’t call me Yah-yah.”
“Yah-yah,” he called back in a sing-song tone.
Yari rounded on her twin brother, her cheeks suffused with red that was not entirely the result of the cold air stinging their skin.
“Grow up, Kiye!”
“Yah-yah-yah-yah-yah,” he said as he wound back.
Yari’s eyes doubled in size, then narrowed to black slits.
“Try it.”
For a moment, Kiye hesitated. He knew that glare, that tensing of her muscles, and the threat hidden in her words. For the smallest fraction of a second, he thought he might’ve pushed her a little too far this time. Then his arm propelled the snowball into the air with deadly precision.
Yari was prepared for the projectile this time. She ducked under it, but instead of popping right back up, she turned her crouch into a ready stance. With a screech ripped up from the depths of the underworld, the dark-haired girl launched herself at her brother.
Kiye had one moment to appreciate how effective his tactics were before he took the full impact of Yari’s attack straight to the chest. Air whooshed from his lungs, billowing up in frosty clouds as he toppled backward with his enraged sister atop his chest. As she began to shove fistfuls of snow into his face, down his collar, and through his hair, he wheezed and choked on what little breath he had left.
“Yari! Kiye! That’s enough. You two are supposed to be setting an example for your siblings.” Their mother’s exasperated shout cut the crisp morning air from the far end of the path that led up to their weyr.
“We are,” Yari and Kiye called back in unison.
They disagreed on many things these days, but they’d never broken ranks when it came to irritating their mother.
Their mother’s eye roll nearly matched Yari’s earlier heights. Not once did she break stride as she came down the winding path.
“Enough, both of you. Get up and clean yourselves off. And look after your siblings. I don’t want them playing that close to the edge.”
As Kiye waited for Yari to roll off him, he turned his head to eye his younger siblings. They were still engaged in a “snowball fight” that consisted mostly of powdered snow hurled in a direction that approximated each other. The edge their mother spoke of was a good ten feet away, and led to a snowy bank that sloped gently to the fields below. At most, they were at risk of having a fun overload as they discovered stomach sledding.
Yari stood up and began meticulously dusting off her coat. Kiye waited for her to take his extended hand so he could have some assistance getting to his own feet, but when she ignored him, he let out a scoff and got up under his own power.
A heavy shadow blotted out the sun for a few seconds, followed by the thud and whoosh of air beneath wings. Kiye knew that heavy beat well enough to recognize his father’s dragon, Yath, as the blue banked and came in for a landing.
Their mother was halfway down the path when the blue landed. She turned, watching their father as he bounded off the dragon’s back before the flurry of snow stirred up by Yath’s wings had settled.
Glittering white particles danced in the air, adding a brightness to their father’s deep auburn hair and a sparkle to the blue of his cloak. Kiye shuffled over to his sister under the guise of helping her clean off her coat.
Yari started, instantly wary of his presence beside her. She shot him a narrow-eyed glare and tensed, ready to move away. The only thing that stopped her was a light touch on her shoulder and Kiye’s insistent shushing.
He tilted his head toward their parents and gave her a significant look. Yari turned around and let Kiye dust the snow from the back of her coat.
The way Seiryuu Weyr was built created some fantastic acoustics if you happened to live in the right part of the dragon bowl. The tail end tended to lose sound rapidly due to its wide open design, but being in the neck with the high walls all around and the lake down below, Kiye had learned from a young age that he could stand in just the right spot and hear a whisper from across the Weyr.
He and Yari stood in the right spot to hear their father’s excited words as he swept their mother up in his arms and spun her around.
“The Flurry,” he exclaimed, then dropped his voice so as not to shout. The excited whisper that followed still carried well enough to Kiye’s ears. “Ryslen, the other worlds, they’re all back! It’s all coming back together. Ryslen’s holding another Flurry to celebrate.”
“What? Really,” their mother whispered back just as excitedly. “We haven’t heard from Ryslen in-”
“More than a decade, I know,” their father finished. He held their mother by the shoulders, the fevered light in his eyes bright enough for Kiye to see. “And Kare, there’s more. Mystic was there.”
“What-”
“Tris’Hath has reconnected with the Nexus. We got to talking and she said that Aaron regrets what happened. He wants to talk.”
A heavy silence settled in the air for a moment.
“Kare, I want this,” their father said, his tone abruptly low and somber. “I want to try.”
“You don’t have to convince me, love,” their mother said. She took his hands off her shoulders and held them tight between her own. “If you believe you’re ready, then we’ll go.”
The look of hesitance and uncertainty vanished from their father’s face. His eyes lit up and a grin spread across his lips. With as much joy as when he’d first landed, he pulled their mother into a hug and spun her around once more.
* * *
At Ryslen…
From the first hint of icy winds blowing in off the mountain peaks to the first fat flakes drifting to the ground, the onset of winter at Ryslen took less than a month. Within a week after that first snowfall, a soft layer of white coated the ground and topped all the buildings within the valley. Fires burned day and night within individual dens, lighting up the mountainside with dozens of warm, red stars. People and dragons alike came out to welcome the changing of the seasons. Though some might bemoan the cold, not a single soul missed the rising sense of excitement in the air. This wasn’t just the start of a long, cold winter. These flakes and the flocks of white, silver, and pale dragons that came with them, marked the return of something that hadn’t graced Ryslen’s sands in decades.
The Flurry had returned.
With the return of that hallowed event, so came the dignitaries. The Weyrleaders of Pern, the Empress of Vella Crean (though she really should have avoided the cold, according to her cleric), the Caerlords and Princes and so many more.
Mystic would not be omitted from those ranks. Snow crunched beneath heavy boots as Aaron came up to stand beside her. Mystic smiled up at her husband, leaning into his shoulder as he wrapped an arm around her. The sound of fresh snow compacted beneath large feet created a background rhythm to the gentle buzz of noise coming from the valley ahead of them. Myrah’Care, Blakoreth, Stacurik, Baaki’Virh, and Baneo’Mybl all crowded on the rocky ledge where they’d first landed upon arrival. The dragons would soon take off to find long lost friends and make introductions. Mystic would take her family into the central caverns to find Tiyanni and Jeyann and all the rest whom she hadn’t seen in years. But for those first few moments, she just wanted to enjoy the view.
“It’s been a while, hmm,” Aaron mused.
“Too long,” Mystic said. “The Flurry was always something special in the Nexus. No matter what separated us, no matter the political climates of our own worlds or homes, this brought us together. No one demanded that we make this trek every year, but it became tradition for one and all. I remember one year when-”
Something soft exploded against Mystic’s backside. Cold tickled at her exposed neck, quickly turning to water and then vapour as the spell that kept her warm attacked the offending flakes. She exchanged a disbelieving look with Aaron, then turned slowly.
Thayer stood halfway between his parents and the dragons, looking like the perfect Flurry fanatic in his white and pale blue attire. Red coloured his cheeks and snowflakes glinted in the bright morning light on the tips of his blonde hair. He grinned from ear to ear, steam huffing from between his lips, as he hefted another handful of snow and shaped it into a ball.
“You did not just do that,” Aaron said. He tried to sound disapproving, but the unexpectedness of the assault threw him off. No one, not even her own son, dared have the temerity to attack her so openly.
In response, Thayer lifted his shoulders in a shrug and drew his pitching arm back in a long arc.
“From what I hear, it’s tradition here. You wouldn’t want me going against tradition, would you?”
Mystic drew in a deep breath and held it in her chest, counting to three. The breathing exercise had helped her through worse situations before.
“Thayer,” she began in a measured tone. “We are here as envoys of Tris’Hath. This isn’t just about the tradition of the Flurry. This is an effort to re-establish links with the leaders of Ryslen. It is our responsibility to-”
The second snowball impacted her shoulder. Behind Thayer, the black of his armour standing in stark contrast to the white of the snow all around, Bane threw up his hands in surrender. From his mind, Mystic sensed a quick and fierce desire to divorce himself from his brother's actions.
“Oh come on,” Thayer cajoled as he bent down to scoop up more snow. “It’s the Flurry! You’ve told me so many stories about how awesome this event is. Dancing and drinking and girls and food and girls… Please lighten up just this once. I want to see the fun mom.”
“There will be time for fun and games later. After we have-”
Mystic caught the edge of her cloak and raised it before her face like a shield as the third snowball sailed directly toward her midsection. She felt the impact through the fabric. Some small part of her mind still obsessed with military prowess admired Thayer’s aim. The rest of her mind unanimously decreed that patience was overrated and her child needed a proper reminder of who she was.
Mystic lowered her cloak and brushed glittering snowflakes from the red velvet. She smoothed down the white fur trim and arranged her hood just so across her shoulders. Aaron took a step back. Bane, who already stood several paces removed from his brother, shuffled to the side. Thayer continued to grin from ear to ear while palming a fourth snowball.
“Very well then,” she said.
“Yes, finally,” Thayer cried, pumping a fist in the air in delight. His joy was short-lived.
Mystic closed her eyes and turned her focus inward. Many mages described their magical potential as a well spring to be tapped when needed. What Mystic felt inside herself was more akin to an ocean. A light tap against the dam that held it back spilled power into her waiting palms. She opened her eyes as a veritable horde of snowballs formed themselves and rose into the air around her.
Thayer’s smile vanished. He looked back for assistance, but Bane shook his head and took several more steps back. He was on his own.
The barrage of snowballs sailed forward. Thayer threw his hands in front of his face as the first wave slammed into him, knocking him off his feet. In a matter of seconds, the young heir of the Dragon Throne vanished beneath a mound of snow.
As the last of the snowflakes settled to the ground, Mystic released a relaxed sigh and composed herself once more. She turned toward Aaron, who held out the crook of his arm to receive her hand.
“You don’t think you overdid it a bit,” Aaron asked.
“He needed to learn a lesson,” she countered.
He shook his head, unable to hide the wry grin twitching in the corner of his mouth as they resumed their walk toward the Nidus’ main entrance.
A blizzard rose up around them, erasing the idyllic scene of a Nidus comfortably wrapped in a blanket of snow. Wind whipped at their clothes and stung their eyes. Mystic raised a hand to shield them from the blast, yet not a single arcane word left her lips before the blizzard subsided. She turned, already knowing the source.
Thayer stood atop a newly made mountain of snow, a dozen snowballs hovering in the air around him and a fierce grin on his lips.
“Thayer, no,” Bane said, his voice lacking all conviction. He looked like a man resigned to his fate as he stared up at his rebellious brother.
“Thayer,” Mystic said in warning.
“Mother dearest,” he replied, raising his hands. The dozen snowballs lifted higher into the air in response. “I declare war.”
“Of course,” Aaron muttered under his breath.
A single beat of silence passed between them. A single moment in which Thayer had a chance to withdraw his declaration. The offer didn’t need to be spoken out loud. For all the trouble that Thayer caused his mother, he was absolutely and unequivocally her child.
“Have it your way,” Mystic replied, and raised her hands in turn.
Thayer slammed his hands forward, hurling every projectile at once. They whisked through the air without a sound and smashed into a rising wall of pure white.
In a matter of seconds, as Mystic traced sigil after sigil through the air, mounds of snow rushed together to form an icy castle. Crenellations and turrets and towers shaped themselves out of the soft, white powder, building ever higher and more elaborate structures the longer the spell continued.
Across a narrow gulf of rapidly depleting snow, another fortress rose up. Where Mystic’s was tall and stately, this one screamed of military prowess. Bane stood behind the walls, his hands raised and his dark silhouette nearly invisible within a torrent of glittering, whirling snowflakes. Beside him, Thayer arranged mound after mound of fresh snowballs, ready for the assault.
“I feel a little out of my depth here,” Aaron said as he edged a little closer to Mystic.
With her fortifications made and her attention now turned to ammunition, Mystic paused in her fevered casting to turn toward her husband. Once again the arcane words spilled from her lips and her hands pulled invisible strands of power from the air. She cast the spell out to Aaron and watched as a faint halo of violet energy settled across his shoulders and down his frame.
“There, darling,” she said. “A little bit of extra protection.”
“It would be better if we could call off this war with our children,” Aaron retorted dryly.
Just then, a hail of hard packed snowballs came sailing over the top of the fortress’ wall. Aaron ducked, raising an arm to shield himself as the projectiles slammed into the ground all around him. The magical shield Mystic cast served him well in that moment, deflecting a few of the snowballs that came a little too close to hitting their mark.
“You are welcome to try,” Mystic said, then turned her attention back to building up her own stockpile of ammo. “I, on the other hand, intend to flatten the both of them.”
* * *
Kiye didn’t know what he expected to find on his first voyage off world in over a decade. He’d never seen Ryslen in the heydays of the Flurry, though he’d heard his mother speak of it often. He barely recalled Tris’Hath with its muggy, heavy air and intoxicating floral scents. Part of him wondered if his extended family even remembered him and Yari.
What he didn’t expect to see upon arriving on the snowy banks of Nidus Ryslen was a pair of white fortresses jutting up from the flat valley and a storm of snowballs flying in either direction.
Beside him, Kiye sensed the shadow of his father step closer. Since they’d started packing for this venture, there had been a low but unavoidably tense air about his father. He’d moved with quick, frantic motions and muttered under his breath whenever he thought no one was looking. Things like “everything will be fine” and “this is a good idea.” Things that Kiye had muttered to himself in the past when facing down challenges that were far from fine.
“And that’s my family,” his father said in a soft, resigned whisper.
In a moment, Kiye realized that no matter how many times he’d imagined this day, no matter how much he’d wished for his family to come back together, it couldn’t compare to how much his father must have wished for the same.
Within the taller of the two fortresses, a cry went up. The hail of snowballs slowed, then stopped altogether. Figures began to emerge from behind the white walls. Kiye vaguely recognized the tall blonde one and the towering shadow behind him, but there was no mistaking the jet of red flame wrapped in a fur-lined cloak that was his aunt Mystic, and the dark-haired regal figure behind her that was uncle Aaron.
“Here we go,” Kiye’s father muttered under his breath. He took a step forward as uncle Aaron did the same.
The two men approached each other while everyone else looked on. It was a fascinating event to witness, seeing so many people simply waiting for something to happen. Kiye’s father moved with slow, hesitant steps. Uncle Aaron matched him at first, then began to pick up speed. Before long, he ran across the snow banks while Kiye’s father stood as still as a deer caught in a hunter’s gaze.
When they stood a foot apart, uncle Aaron paused. For a moment, neither man moved. Then they were embracing, and Kiye felt a collective easing of the tension in the air all around them.
* * *
The good mood generated by the reunion of the two brothers did not last near as long as Kiye would have liked. Soon after uncle Aaron and his father made up, the entire group arranged to head up to the family-sized den that had been cleaned out for their visit. There were rooms and beds enough for everyone, and a great room that contained a long dining table and a living space filled with couches and cushions and soft spaces to relax.
Three groups quickly formed. Kiye, Yari, Thayer, and Bane claimed the living space and couches, while the adults took to the long dining table and the drinks laid out there. The younger kids found a space off to the side of the living area to begin building pillow forts.
Then uncle Christev arrived and the tentative atmosphere of openness snapped shut. Cousin Rith at least seemed excited to see them again. He’d left Seiryuu around the same time that they’d stopped visiting Tris’Hath. He’d grown considerably since Kiye had last seen him, but the two came together as if they had been separated for a week instead of nearly two decades.
Uncle Christev, however, did not greet his brothers with such enthusiasm. He greeted uncle Aaron with the respect due his station, then all but ignored Kiye’s father as he took his seat at the table. Aunt Kiarra at least seemed overjoyed to see his mother again.
Rith came to join them on the couches, lounging back with the same relaxed, confident air as Thayer. His younger siblings, Vincart and Sarona joined them. Unlike their brother, they dressed and sat with the composure of nobility, and clearly disapproved of their sibling’s careless posture judging by the dirty looks shot his way. Kiye felt his discomfort with the reunion increase.
“Surprised K’lter let you go,” Thayer said over his shoulder to Rith.
“Not much he can do when it’s family business. He promised me extra shifts when I get back,” Rith replied, an easy smile crossing his lips.
“You’ve got a job now,” Kiye cut in. The last time he’d seen his cousin, Rith had still been training up with the weyrling master. He’d also been a short, scrawny boy with the physical presence of a twig. This confident man with sun-weathered skin and a glittering stud in one ear was a stranger.
“Yep. Search rider.”
“Following the family tradition,” Thayer added.
“Unlike you. Layabout,” Rith chidded.
“I will have you know I hold a very important station. It takes a lot of work to look this good all the time.”
“Really? Hmm. I’ve never had to work too hard at it.”
“Hah,” Thayer laughed, matching Rith grin for grin. “How much you want to bet I can pick up more fine young ladies over the next week than you can?”
“Ugh, that’s disgusting,” Yari muttered under her breath.
“You’re on,” Rith said. Then his attention shifted to Kiye.
Kiye felt the heat of the room double under that mischievous stare.
“What about you, Kiye? You in?”
“Uh…” he stammered. He could feel Yari’s eyes burning a hole through the side of his head. At some point in time, he and his cousins had grown into men. He didn’t consider himself quite as hungry as Rith and Thayer seemed to be, but he wasn’t about to let that get in the way of showing off to them. “Yeah. Sure.”
“Great. So we’ll see three tactics at play.” Rith pointed at himself. “Effortlessly perfect.” He pointed at Thayer. “Try hard.” His pointer finger moved in Kiye’s direction. “And cute but clueless. Which I think is a fan favourite.”
“Hey,” Kiye protested.
“Accurate,” Yari muttered.
A lull in the conversation allowed snippets of the other table’s discussion to reach Kiye’s ears.
“I had to do what was best for my family,” his father said.
“And what are we?”
“Leave it, Christev,” uncle Aaron said, his voice low but commanding.
Rith tsked under his breath, his head lolling back against the couch cushions.
“Dad’s always got to pick a fight.”
“We knew this reunion wouldn’t be easy from the start,” Thayer said.
“Why,” Kiye cut in. Curiosity and frustration merged into a beast that consumed his mind. What happened was such a long time ago. He didn’t understand why it still caused any issues. And why he couldn’t shake his own feelings of awkwardness around his cousins. It shouldn’t have been this difficult.
“Wars do that,” Thayer said, ending his words with a half-hearted shrug. “Make things difficult.”
“I don’t understand why it’s still a problem. It ended years ago,” Yari said. A quick glance at her face told Kiye that his sister took personal offense at the awkward discussions.
“Of course you don’t understand,” Sarona said. “You weren’t there.”
It felt as if a gulf had opened up in the room. On one side stood those who had witnessed the atrocities of war. On the other stood Kiye and his family, who had escaped the war, but grew up with the threat of thread forever hanging over their heads. All conversation had petered away to nothing save the quiet, happy play of the younger kids. The adults stared at their drinks to avoid looking at each other. Yari and Sarona matched glare for glare across the living quarters.
Something had to be done. Someone had to break the tension before they all broke each other.
“Hey, Thayer,” Kiye called out, then immediately regretted the words when his cousin looked his way. He had no idea what his plan was. “I… um… Do you remember that old song we used to sing as kids?”
That was a terrible segue.
“What, the dragon rider one,” Thayer asked.
“Yeah. How did that start again?”
“Gods, it’s been years since I last heard that. No one sings it anymore.”
Kiye’s heart sank. He had failed. Here he was legitimately trying to keep the peace, but he realized in that moment that he simply didn’t know these people anymore. They were family, but still strangers.
A faint hum interrupted his thoughts. He looked up to see Thayer bobbing one hand in the air while he stared at the ceiling and hummed a few bars of a familiar tune.
“It’s gotten some more verses since you heard it last. What was the start again? Gods damn it all. It’s on the tip of my tongue.”
“Sundered bones lay sleeping beneath the earthen tides.” The deep, sonorous tones rolled out from Bane’s lips like the tolling of a bell.
“A wilted rose, a flame unbent, would see their kindred rise.” Thayer’s own sweet tenor joined the thrumming base and together they launched into a tune that was as much a part of Kiye’s memories of Tris’Hath as mosquitos and magic.
Kiye, bewildered, relieved, and thrilled all at once, stomped one foot against the ground to keep the beat.
Thayer and Bane finished off the first verse on their own. Kiye jumped in on the second.
“When the rose’s lips do kiss the sea
Way hey they rise
A gleaming score for all to see
Way hey they rise.”
As they dove into the chorus, Yari’s high soprano joined in. After a roll of her eyes, Sarona added her own.
“Oh dragon rider
Raise your voices high
We’ll burn the sky and light the breeze
For chaos we defy.”
Kiye faltered on the third verse. The words were there, waiting to be sung, but the high, quiet trill of a wind instrument broke his concentration. He looked over his shoulder to see that his father had retrieved his panpipes from one of their bags and currently had the instrument to his lips. Even uncle Aaron looked to be getting into the song, pounding a fist on the table and smiling as he hummed the tune. Then, before his very eyes, his aunt Mystic produced a slender, golden flute and added the instrument's sweet, clear notes to his father’s panpipes.
What came after was as beautiful as tumbling snow. One by one, his relatives joined into the old tavern song. Even stuffy uncle Christev, who likely would’ve protested longer if aunt Kiarra hadn’t elbowed him hard enough in the side to make him double over.
When they reached the new verses, Kiye and Yari fell silent while the other side of the family carried on. The song slowed and became somber as it recounted the cost of the war and the losses suffered. Thayer and Sarona led a sweet refrain about new bones joining the old. Just as Kiye thought that the favoured adventuring song of his youth had turned into a funeral dirge, Bane cut in with his resonating baritone again and wrapped up the end of the war and the banishment of the hydras.
The last verse, sung slower than all the rest, cautioned of a day where the hydras might return and how the dragon riders could never fully put down their arms. Then, just to end things on a high note, Thayer tied it back into the chorus, which they all sang in one thunderous voice while hands and feet slammed out the rhythm.
The song came to a close with laughter and cheers all around. The adults started talking again, their voices now full of reminiscence. Kiye leaned back in his chair, relaxing at last.
* * *
A short while later, Kiye, Thayer and Rith strolled through the snowy pathways of the Nidus, ostensibly to “scope out” the grounds of their bet. The dining hall was empty at this hour, but Rith stated there might still be some late night hunting to be done. So the trio moved on through to the great hall, then out to find the hatching sands. Just for a peek.
“That was some quick thinking you did back there,” Thayer said during a break in conversation. Little disturbed the peace of the night save the crunch of their boots on the packed snow.
Kiye came out of his own thoughts, taking a moment to process the words before he connected them back to the song in their family den.
“You think so?”
The blonde man nodded sagely.
“You got them thinking about the old days before the war. It gave them something to come together around. Things won’t be all roses and sunshine from here on out, but it’s a start.”
Kiye looked down for a moment. Now that the moment had passed, he couldn’t recall why he’d been desperate enough to bring up the song. It seemed ridiculous now.
“When dad came home and told us about the Flurry, he looked so happy and hopeful. I didn’t want him to lose that. I had to make this reunion work.”
A lopsided grin tugged Thayer’s mouth up on one side. He slung an arm around Kiye’s shoulders and pulled him in for a brotherly embrace as they continued on their path.
“My dear cousin, you are a true Audil. Meddling in the affairs of others in the pursuit of happiness for all. May ill moods flee before our combined might.”
“Isn’t that more of your mother’s thing,” Rith asked.
Thayer lifted his shoulders in a casual shrug.
“I get it from both sides. In fact, your father’s a bit of a black sheep, isn’t he?”
“Mom and dad would never admit it, but his true love is tradition. If he could have married ceremony itself, he would have.”
“Which begs the question, where in the name of the gods did you come from?”
A quick, impish smile crossed Rith’s face.
“My mother’s stubborn will and an inborn desire to thwart my father’s expectations of me at all possible turns.”
“That tracks,” Thayer said. After a moment, his attention returned to Kiye. “So, Kiye, have you signed in yet?”
“Signed in for what?”
“The clutch, obviously. Here we are carrying on about tradition and family values and you haven’t even found your bond yet.”
Kiye grimaced.
“Yeah so… I don’t think I’m suited for dragon riding.”
Thayer and Rith exchanged a look. Kiye knew the look well. It was the same one his mother gave him when she didn’t believe his lies.
“I categorically reject that notion,” Thayer declared. “Let’s go.”
Thayer’s comradely arm around his shoulder tightened and began to steer him toward the lower levels of the Nidus. Kiye balked, squaring his shoulders and planting his feet.
“No, I’m serious. Yath searched me years ago and I’ve stood for so many clutches at Seiryuu. I never bonded. It’s just not in the cards for me.”
“Or, and hear me out here, your bond wasn’t at any of those clutches,” Rith said. He took up position on Kiye’s other side, leaving him feeling like cattle being led to a pen.
“What makes you think this time will be any different,” Kiye asked.
“Because I am also a search rider,” Rith said confidently. “And I declare that this is your time.”
“Now hold up a minute,” Thayer said. “Baby dragons make girls go crazy. If he bonds here, we won’t stand a chance.”
“I’m willing to take that risk,” Rith said.
Despite his reservations, Kiye grinned. He couldn't help himself. This was the reunion he’d wanted. The easy friendship with people who were once as dear to him as his own siblings. The connection of blood and shared experiences erasing boundaries between rank and world and history. And he’d help make it happen. Thayer called it meddling. As the trio steered toward the hatching sands with talk of placing bets on what sort of dragon Kiye might bond, he thought back to his father’s mantra; leave the world a little better than you found it. That’s what it meant to be an Audil.
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