Chapter Text
Chasing Shadows.
Chapter 1: Ghosts and Whispers.
“I’m sorry, Callum. But I can’t let you come with me.”
The elf was frozen in place. Only the shine of her silver-white hair, the feathered tips peeking from beneath her dark hood, gives away of which arcanum - which race - she was born to. Moonshadow. She stares at him with wide lavender eyes, her face passive and slack. The shock that he sees there reflects his own as Callum hastily pulls his hand from her elbow.
“Sorry, I-” After a moment of indecision, Callum takes a half step backwards and drops his gaze as his hopes and his heart tumble from his chest and fall all the way down into the pit of his guts. Now that he’s looking at her properly, he knows that she is not the elf he’s searching for. She’s a few years too old and a fraction of an inch too short, her frame too full to be suitable for an assassin’s work. And her eyes, now that he’s closer, are more periwinkle than lavender. “I’m sorry, I thought you were someone else.”
He thought that he’d found her.
Without another glance, he turns to leave. Muttering one last, feeble apology as he pushes through the throngs of elves milling around in the marketplace. “Sorry.”
His hallucinations are getting progressively less amusing. The number of times that he’s almost called out her name or stared too long at any elf who bore even the slightest resemblance to her is getting harder and harder for him to justify - harder to convince himself of being a simple case of mistaken identity.
He misses her… so much.
At first, it was easy to identify the tricks played by his overtly optimistic mind. Easy to discard and ignore them. But then his breath would start to catch in his throat whenever he glimpsed a flash of white on his peripherals. His heart would pound violently in his ears whenever he heard a familiar brogue fluttering on the breeze. Once, he’d even swore that he’d heard his name, whispered behind his ear in her voice, but when he’d turned no one he recognized could be found.
Now, he’s seeing her wherever he goes. Finds similarities in every face, no matter how minor. But after grabbing ahold of and frightening that young Moonshadow she-elf, Callum knows that he’s starting to grow desperate. Too desperate. And his desperation is getting dangerous, making him careless. Here, in Xadia, humans are still not welcome. Even now, almost a full month since the dragonling, Zym, had been returned to his mother by the two human princes and their elven companion, contempt for the ‘lesser beings’ still runs rampant. Even after the news of the battle of the Storm Spire had spread throughout the magical lands - where two of the human kingdoms and the remaining elven army of Lux Aurea had battled side by side, brothers and sisters in arms, to defend the weakened Zubeia and her infant son - tension and distrust remain.
The borders are still guarded; Sol Regem continues his bitter and malevolent judgments of any who are foolish enough to enter his canyon and the fearful whispers of possible invasion ripple across both lands that edge the great divide.
Abruptly jolted from his thoughts, Callum yelps and stumbles. His ribs ache dully as they bear the brunt of a stray elbow that catches him in his side, shunting him with enough force to see him wobble dangerously as though he were some drunkard already three hours deep into his day of drinking. The human boy mumbles a clipped and terse apology as he tugs the hood of his cloak lower over his face, careful to keep his extra finger hidden by angling his wrist awkwardly away from narrowed eyes.
“Watch yerself, boy!” Callum flinches under the arrogant sneer. “And watch yer tone.”
He tenses when he feels the elf’s haughty glower settle on him. Can feel the disdain in his eyes and hears it in his voice as the elf - he assumes to be one of the wingless Skywing’s, basing said assumption solely on the distinctive swallowtail shape of his ears and angle of his horns - sizes him up. And, for a moment, Callum is worried that the elf’s keen eyesight might notice his small, rounded human ears, despite the shadows that his hood casts over his face.
The elf says nothing more, but his eyes rove over the Xadian cloak that Callum wears. Scrutinizing the pattern and taking note of the emblem of the pin that fastens it closed. A gift from Ibis - it’s crafted from the scales of a sky dragon, bordered in silver and bearing the symbol of the sky arcanum. It should be enough to placate any elf’s suspicions but still, Callum holds his breath and balls his fists. Tightens his jaw as his nails bite painfully into the meat of his palms.
But the longer the silence drags on, the tighter the grip his anxiety takes around his heart. His mind races, pulling the draconic words that call upon his wings to the forefront should he need them. He knows that, if he’s discovered, a human sneaking so deep into Xadia can and likely will disrupt the tentative talks of peace and unity between the divided lands. He’d be assumed a spy or worse, a mercenary. Harvesting magic and pieces of magical beings to sell on as ingredients for the human mages. No one would listen nor believe that he’d been granted passage by Zubeia herself. No one would accept that he’s simply searching for an elven girl whom he’s desperately in love with.
Finally, the Skywing sucks in a sharp breath and Callum’s eyes slam shut. His heart hammers wildly in his chest and he feels his pulse pounding in the back of his throat… He’s been discovered. The elf knows. He needs to run. Escape. His lips begin to move in a whisper, the first word leaping from his tongue. “Manus.”
“Jumpy little whelp, ain’tcha?” The elf snorts. The biting sneer on his face relaxes into an expression of disinterest. “Just mind yer step in future.” And then he turns and continues on his way. Disappearing into the throng and leaving Callum standing and staring after him in wide-eyed disbelief.
That was close. Way too close. Callum fights the urge to bend over his knees and hyperventilate himself into a faint. Because that would be such a horrific and stupidly bad end to this scenario, avoiding detection during a confrontation only to be discovered because of his inability to breathe normally. It was stupid to come here. Stupid to chance his luck and test his stealth by entering the town in the hopes that the rumors were true. That Rayla had been spotted here, trading her sword skills in payment for information and a bed for the night.
She’s too smart for that. Too cautious - too kind and sweet-natured. If someone had information that she wanted, Rayla would find a way to procure it without revealing herself. She’d certainly never lower herself to acting as a simple hired thug.
That’s one of the reasons why, when they’d been traveling together to return the egg and then the newly hatched Zym, she’d hounded and harried and forced the two human princes to traverse the harder terrains. Avoid detection. Hide in plain sight. Trick only the necessary senses to avoid suspicion.
With those lessons remembered, and with the sun slipping beneath the horizon, Callum decides it’s time to leave the town and the dead-end trail behind him. It’s time to move on.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
The night sky is beautiful. Smooth black marble flecked with stars that shine both brightly and softly. It is alive with raw energy, one that is shared with the young she-elf as she runs beneath the wild and natural canvas.
Her breathing is steady and her heart beats strongly in her breast. She is fatigued but not tired. Not enough to stop for the day - not yet. Following the trail of hushed whispers and hissed rumors of ghosts journeying north from the Storm Spire had led her into that little market town. And eavesdropping on the idle gossip of the weapons merchant as he’d tried to charm the coins from the pockets of young, head-strong elves - eager to prove themselves as warriors and fancying their chances to earn the title ‘Heroes of Xadia’ - had both enlightened her and wounded her.
“Can’t be so difficult.” One says. Testing the heft of his selected blade in his hand. It’s a good sword. Sunfire in origin, but not crafted by a forge master so it doesn’t retain the heat of a sun-forge. “After all, if a single banished she-elf can earn the grace of the Dragon Queen and the title for herself then anyone can.”
The second elf takes a little longer in selecting his weapon, finally settling on a Tidebound spear. “Easy or not, rumors are that, even with Her Majesty’s decree and personal request for a pardon, the Moonshadows refuse to lift the banishment.” He presses his thumbpad to the cutting edge of the ornate spear, checking the keenness of its bite. “Whatever she did to earn her ghosting must have been catastrophic. Probably would have been wiser to simply execute her. Or at least kinder. She won’t last long without her kin.”
“True.” The first chuckles. Dropping his coins into the merchant’s waiting palm and attaching his purchased sword to his belt. “Though, you know what the Moonshadows are like. Stubborn, prideful creatures. Even for our kind.”
Pocketing the coins before turning his watchful eye to the second young he-elf, the merchant adds his own information to the tale. “I heard the banishment was placed because she abandoned the task appointed by the Queen of Dragons herself. She was hand-selected and trained by that Runaan fella.” He pauses and then smirks slyly. “Though, I’ve also heard whispers of her betraying kin to fraternize with those human princes. Apparently, she turned her blades on her own and then fled with them. Can’t imagine anything would undo that kind of dishonor.”
Rayla pauses for a moment to catch her breath and wipe the tears that nip and burn in the corners of her eyes. Don’t be foolish, Rayla, you’re not crying! She scolds herself harshly as she digs her knuckles against her lashes and sniffles through a hiccupping cough. Wind-stung, that’s all it is. You’re not crying. You’re NOT! You’re not a child! You’re not weak!
But she is crying. She knows she is. Her eyes are burning rather than stinging and the tears are stubbornly pushing free from beneath her fingers. Slipping down her cheeks freely and seeping their salty tang between her lips. It hurt to hear the half-truths of her actions so freely scorned. Hurt to understand that it was so very simple for others to twist her nobleness and her sacrifices and losses into selfishness and stupidity. And it hurt to learn that her heart and her morals could be so easily yet so wrongly picked apart and openly traded as gossip - simply because she’d accepted that the cycle of hate and vengeance between all of the races needed to end.
Because she and Ezran and Callum had been bold enough to begin undoing the old narrative of history.
It hurts to finally understand that her hardships and her punishments mark her more than her triumphs. That they mark her an outcast, not just by her own people, but by all of the beings of Xadia.
That they always will.
Her chest expands and she chokes on the whimpers rattling in her throat and lungs. She tugs her hood over her face, hiding her misery from no-one but the moon as she draws her heels together and, with the small of her back braced against the bark, Rayla folds herself around her knees. She shrinks in on herself, sinking down until her rear barely skims the bough she’s perched upon, and she can press her eyes to the backs of her thighs, hiding her shaking exhales until her heart shatters and the dam that she’s been stubbornly holding up finally breaks.
Though the cost to herself is the emotional injury of further ostracization, it has been a small price to pay for the information she’d gleaned. She had followed the same two elves from the weapons merchant and into a tavern. Pressing herself into the shadows and positioning herself close enough to small groups of chattering elves to appear as though she belonged, though not so close as to draw attention to her presence. Finally, she’d sidled herself into a seat just a few spaces away, listening with her head down as the pair of he-elves loosen both their purse strings and their tongues with every long pull on their ales.
At first, they had talked in low voices, watching the other elves with suspicion in their eyes. Twice they’d eyed her; just fleeting glances but it had been enough to snap their jaws shut and hold their tongues, forcing her into ordering a drink of her own to maintain her patron ruse. Thankfully, the pair seemed satisfied with her presence as soon as the tankard was pushed within her reach, placated they quickly fell back into their hushed conversation before she had to force herself into taking a sip. It had been frustrating to be seated so close yet still straining her ears to hear their voices. Frustrating that they were careful to keep their discussions below the wordless drone of others, and it was infuriatingly difficult for her to pick apart anything of significance from what was generic drunken griping.
But thankfully, part-way into their second drink and then their third, their youthful arrogance swelled and the need to boast and brag and to one-up each another had quickly overwhelmed their caution. And finally, finally , Rayla caught the information that she needed so she could leave the tavern and the town and continue on her self-appointed quest.
Ghostly apparitions rising from the battlefield. An unexplained disappearance here and there. Whispers of human mage sightings that could not be proven.
Viren...
She swipes away the last of her tears with her fingers and squares her jaw tight against the trembling of her chin, furious at herself for giving in to her misery and allowing herself to whimper and sob like she were little more than a distressed elfling child. She straightens her knees, rolling up onto her feet in a single, fluid motion and prepares to move on. To continue her dangerous pursuit.
Snap!
In a heartbeat Rayla is alert. Her muscles tense and she crouches low, her ears twitching as she listens. For a moment, everything remains still and silent. Even the breeze, that had been casually playing in her hair, vanishes. Her rabbit-fast heartbeat slows, evening out into a steady rhythm.
Then she hears it. Something moving unseen in the darkness. Something, somewhere - both beneath and behind her perch - drawing nearer. She can hear the leaves scuff over the ground, squashed underneath the unseen assailant’s tread. Her ears perk as she zeroes in on the source. Tracking and following the sound of unpracticed feet, trying to muffle their footsteps rather than silencing them. From the shadows emerges a form, undefined and almost impossible to identify, shrouded by the dark cloak worn about its shoulders.
The shadowed figure pauses directly beneath her branch, casts a quick glance left and right and then slides down to sit and rest nestled among the roots. While the first minute ticks by Rayla waits patiently; as she does when the second minute passes, but then, finally, as the third minute of absolute stillness comes - time begins to drag. Her anxiety spikes and she can feel her patience slipping. She shifts her weight carefully. One foot sliding backwards - almost entirely noiselessly, as she readies herself to abandon her branch and flee, unseen, deeper into the forest.
Then she feels it. A peeling scar in the branch that she’d not noticed earlier catching against the heel of her boot. She catches herself before she can stumble but not before she dislodges a heavy chunk of bark and sends it tumbling through the air to thump noisily against the earth.
She holds her breath and waits. Don’t look up.
Below her, there’s a suggestion of movement as the silhouetted figure shifts. She holds her breath and her heart skips a beat. Please, don’t look up. She finds herself silently pleading as she waits for whoever it is below her to return to their rest.
But they don’t. Instead, the hood covered head begins to tilt. Angling upwards and scanning the tree for the source of the falling debris. Fear and anticipation begin to take hold, torturing her insides and churning in her guts. Rayla’s heart begins to thump wildly in her chest, flinging itself painfully against her ribs as she realizes that the figure has spotted her. She can’t hear the rapid breaths that she swallows down, but she can feel the push and pull of oxygen as it floods in and out of her lungs - panicking as the form scrambles to their feet.
She has no choice now. She draws her blades. Lavender eyes harden as she attempts to pierce the dark void beneath the hood, searching for a glint of an eye or a flash of teeth - anything to help her focus, to show her where to strike…
Then the cloaked figure shifts. An arm raises, fingers outstretched and all at once, Rayla is moving.
The forest scenery that borders her vision begins to blur and swirl together as she tilts forwards, racing a few steps down the vertical trunk in an effort to gather speed before she leaps. She sees the figure’s hand moving, slashing the beginning of a jagged symbol into the air. She flicks her own wrists in retaliation and the duel form butterfly blades snap open. The ethereal silver of her blades glows under the light of the moon, their deadly edges glint viciously in the darkness. One is already shaped into a curved hook; that blade she uses to steady herself as she bounds between branch and trunk, while the second sword maintains its straighter edge, ready for the attack.
She’s almost there. Almost close enough to strike.
And then, she notices it. The strange, brassy tang of charging ozone that coats her tongue and hangs in the air. It’s heavy and thick and raises the fine hairs along the nape of her neck as the heady atmosphere presses in on her. Suffocating, like a long overdue thunderstorm…
That alone is almost enough to end Rayla’s charge, but then she hears it - the word and the voice that makes her heart both leap into her throat and plummet down into the pit of her belly.
“Fulminis!”
The lightning comes as a brilliant shock of white against the darkness. Forking silently and swiftly toward the suddenly startled she-elf. Forced to twist mid-leap, Rayla throws out her hooked blade. Silently hoping that she can catch the blurred trunk or a rushing branch, anything to anchor herself on and aid her in altering her direction.
Thankfully, her wishes are answered. Rayla feels a telltale jolt in her shoulder, informing her that the very tip of her hooked blade has bitten into something solid - just barely. It’s not much of a catch but it’s enough for the nimble Moonshadow elf to haul herself away, out of the path of the dangerous arc of magic and swing her approach around from the other side of the tree. But the abrupt change of trajectory is disorientating, the ground rushing up to meet her is far too fast to properly control her landing and she hits down. Hard. A startled, pained gasp punches out over her lips as her miscalculation winds her and sends one of her blades skittering out of her grasp. The cloaked figure turns, following the elf’s fumbled landing, his hand already cutting the fulminis rune for a second time.
“No, wait !” Rayla shouts. Her voice cracks, loud and desperate as she pushes herself up onto her knees. Her still armed hand yanks back her hood as her empty one stretches out in front of her in a placating gesture. “Please, Callum, it’s me!”
Immediately the hand stops moving and the partial rune fizzles out of existence. “Rayla?”
The Moonshadow elf nods wordlessly and in less than a second, the figure’s hood is down.
Oh, Callum.
It takes a moment or two for her to steady her breathing. And it takes a further moment for the sight of him to push through the haze of adrenaline in her brain and sink in. It’s almost like she’s seeing him for the very first time all over again. As though her brain is either unable to comprehend or unwilling to accept the reality that the human - her human - is standing right there, right before her, even though she knows it could hardly be anyone else. How could it be?
You sweet, brave, stupid boy.
He looks the same as he did the night that she’d left him. Young and soft and kind and so, so wonderful. His chestnut hair has grown a little longer and even more unruly. Ruffled up from the ferociousness of the yank on his hood some of the strands are tangled, sticking straight up while others scatter and hang limply over his familiar features. But it’s not the tangled mop that catches Rayla’s attention, it’s what she spies there, peeking out from behind his ear. A single, dragon-scale braid. The braid that she had tied for him. It’s not as neat as it had once been; there are wispy strands escaping from every single one of the delicate folds, but it draws Rayla’s eye to it all the same and has her swallowing hard against a lump that wedges in her throat.
“How?” Her tongue feels tacky and thick, like it’s far too big for her mouth and her words catch painfully in a hoarse croak. Callum’s here. He’s really here - and all Rayla wants to do is touch him. To fling herself in his arms and never let him go. But she can’t. She doesn’t have that right. Not now. Not after she... Swallowing hard she tries again. “How did you find-”
“You left.” Callum’s words aren’t sharp nor bladed but they’re cold. Unfriendly. And, somehow, they still slice across hers so keenly that Rayla’s jaw instinctively snaps shut with an audible click of her teeth. “You promised you wouldn’t. You promised that we’d go together.”
He’s hurt. Rightly so. She had made him a promise and then, mere hours later, she’d left him behind. And, to add insult to injury, she had left him in the cruelest way possible. In silence. In the middle of the night. With nothing but a short, handwritten note and a single kiss hidden in his hair.
“Why did you do it, Rayla? Why couldn’t you trust me enough to talk to me?” There’s a tiredness in his voice, a sadness that she’s never heard before. It’s a tone that sees her shifting her gaze away in discomfort, ashamed in knowing that it’s her actions that cause him such distress.
“You know I’d have listened to you.”
He sounds so confused when he should be angry, furious even. Sinking her teeth into her bottom lip in an effort to stop it from trembling, Rayla lowers her head and tries to ignore the slide of her own braid - the one that Callum had tied for her during a tender moment between them - as it slips from behind her pointed ear to hang limply at her jaw. He sounds so worn out, so…
“You know I’d have understood.”
Betrayed.
“All you had to do, was talk to me.”
As much as there is a pain so raw and vulnerable in his voice, there is also forgiveness, love, and the unspoken assurance that all Callum wants is to understand. And that hurts. That hurts her so much more than if Callum had come to her in anger. Bitterness, anger, hatred - those are the emotions that she is equipped to handle. Trained, even, to utilize and turn them back onto her opponent as finely honed weapons. Simple. Not like this. Not this myriad of complicated and convoluted emotions that confuse her.
That makes her hesitate.
“Rayla?”
Why can’t he just hate her? Why can’t he scream and shout and walk away from her? Why can’t he see that she’s not worth any of this pain and just let her go?
“Rayla, look at me?”
And why does it make her heart ache and soar in relief that he doesn’t turn away from her?
“Please.”
Fear seizes around her heart and crushes her belly with intense cramps. She wants to look at him. To answer his questions. He deserves to know the truth. She owes him that much. She knows she does. Strong relationships are built on honesty - the full truth. It was an oath that she had sworn to herself the moment that she realized that her decision to continue hiding the truth of King Harrow’s death was not an act of kindness, but rather an act of selfishness and cowardice.
The same selfishness and cowardice that saw her lie to him again . Saw her run away from him… again.
“I love you, Rayla.”
Three words. Just three short, tiny words in front of her name, and suddenly she can breathe again. Relief floods through her, overwhelming her body, making her feel drastically exhausted.
“You know that, right?”
There is something behind Callum’s words, a pain in his voice that pulls Rayla’s eyes to his. They are that same mesmerizing green that she had seen that first day in Katolis. The hue of young spring growth, bright and delicate, gentle, and a little wild all at once. The very embodiment of magic and humanity - so intertwined that it’s impossible for her to separate them again. But, there is also something else to be found in them, something that hadn’t been there before. Flecks of strength and a budding confidence that swirl together through the greens and hazels.
I know, Callum.
She’s doing it again. Trying to wrangle and force the path at her feet. Fighting against these difficult emotions instead of allowing them to flow as a river like that irritatingly insightful, lunatic of a pirate had once made her see - because that’s all that she knows how to do.
That’s why I can’t let you come with me.
“Go home, Callum.” She says quietly and she sees him flinch. Sees him tremble. She sees the pain in those eyes - the eyes that she loves so much as her thorny words tangle around his heart and shred - she sees the confusion. But, she doesn’t see what she needs from him. Not yet. “Go home, where you’re needed.”
Callum snorts and a flash of a smile finds his lips. “Where I’m needed?” It’s not a real smile, of course, it lacks the warmth and affection to ever pass as genuine. It’s simply a reflex before his mouth twitches downwards and Rayla can see the crease tunneling between the brows tugging over his eyes. “That sounds dangerously close to you insinuating that you don’t need me.”
There it is. That little crack in his confidence. The tiniest little quake in his voice. He’s shaken, all he needs now is that last little push.
“I’m not insinuating that I don’t need you, Callum.” Rayla sighs. Readying herself both physically and mentally for the storm that’s to come next. The storm that has to come next. She turns her next words jagged, wraps them up in as much venom and as many bladed edges as she can muster even as her insides tighten in despair. “I’m telling you, that I don’t.”
“What?”
She slams her eyes shut for just a second before she forces them open again and attacks. “I don’t need you following me out here.” But I want you to. “I don’t need you slowing me down and getting in my way.” I’m sorry, Callum. Please, understand, I hate this. I’m terrified and I hate it. “You make me weak. And soft. And I don’t want it anymore.” I do. I do. I’m better when I’m with you. But I can’t be better. I can’t be your Rayla. I need to be the Rayla I was trained to be. The Rayla who is dangerous and deadly. Silvergrove’s prodigy assassin. Unfeeling. Efficient. A killer.
His eyes are shining. Gleaming. Storm clouds of anger whipped up in a tempest of pain. But he’s still fighting, still pushing it back. “You don’t mean that. I know you don’t”
Please, Callum. Just go. She’s choking on her grief, gasping on her desperation. She hates that it’s happening but she has to do it. Has to muster up all of the spite and bitterness and hatred for humans that Runaan had nurtured into her over the years. All of the lessons that she had learned as he had taught her toddler self how to swing her blades, to fight and kill.
But pushed aside after meeting him and Ezran.
She draws up all of the resentment and disgust that her books had instilled into her as she’d read the history of the great divide. All of the cruelty that had so frightened her as an elfling child that she’d thrown her tiny self into Ethari’s strong arms and wailed uncontrollably for her mother and father to come home and protect her from the monstrous humans and not the egg of the dragon king and queen.
The egg that they had saved. The egg that hatched. And the dragonling who she had been willing to die for to defend.
She pulls it all around her. Arms herself with the shields and swords of lies and aims them outwards. Aims them toward the one human who deserves her contempt the least of all others. She aims it at Callum and, with tears burning in her eyes, she strikes.
“Don’t tell me what I mean. You don’t know me! How could you?” She stabs at him with aggression.
“I do know you, Rayla. You know I do.” He parries her with love.
She hopes that he can’t hear the broken hiccupping breaths hidden beneath her snarls. Hopes that he can’t see the trembling of her lips as they curl up and away from her bared teeth or how her voice cracks and strains as she all but shrieks. “No, you don’t! I’m a Moonshadow elf. An illusionist. A killer. I’m sneaky and a liar, and you can’t trust me! I’ve been screwing with your head for fun, just like Lujanne does to those stupid, pathetic humans that stumble up the Cursed Caldera!” Callum reaches out, tries to touch her and Rayla leaps back as though she’s afraid of him. And, in some strange way, she supposes she is. “Don’t! You don’t get to touch me. Not anymore! Filthy human hands, tainted with the death of innocent creatures and dark magic. You make my skin crawl.”
He recoils.
The air between them hangs low and heavy and oppressive, and she’s thankful that Callum isn’t looking at her anymore. She needs him to hate her. Despise her. Like she does herself. She needs to make it easy for him to leave her - as they all do eventually - before someone or something can take him and destroy him.
The atmosphere crackles over her skin and a sudden chill bites goosebumps into her bare arms. Static energy prickles at her nape, teasing the wispy hairs up to stand on end. Something needs to break. Her or him or the whole messed up world. She doesn’t care how or what or even why anymore. It just needs to happen so she can leave and spend the rest of her life - however long or sort she might have left - hunting down Viren and that strange spectral elf. Keep them running, unable to settle and rest and grow stronger. To keep them away until she can find them and kill them or they kill her. It doesn’t matter. It never mattered. She is one elf. One traitorous, broken, desperate elf who’s trying so very hard not to fall to her knees and beg for the human boy to hold her, kiss her, to risk himself in her suicidal plans that she doesn't feel that she can avoid, just so she isn’t alone.
She doesn’t want to be alone anymore.
“Rayla?” He’s reaching out again. Nervous. She’s so tense and so tired and so distraught that she doesn’t dodge his touch this time. His fingers just barely touch her but they scorch into her skin all the same. It hurts. Not because he’s trying to injure her but because she wants it to hurt. She chokes out a heartbreaking cry of distress. It’s a sound that Callum has never heard escape her throat before and it’s a sound that completely mutilates his soul. “Rayla, please.”
“You shouldn’t have followed me.” She whispers. And, for a moment, she doesn’t move. She doesn’t fight him. She doesn’t even look at him. Then her head tips forward and presses, just barely, into Callum’s shoulder. Her body sags forward; belly to belly, chest to breast, heart to heart. “You should never have followed me. Never.”
She’s not just talking about now, this time. She’s talking about all of the times. When he’d followed her to rescue her from her botched rescue of Pyrrah and he’d tainted himself with Claudia’s dark magic to save her. He should not have followed. When she had run, sniveling, from him in the Midnight Desert and left Zym to be taken by Nyx. He should not have followed her. When she had jumped… He shouldn’t -
Callum is cautious as he brings his arms up to hold her, but he doesn’t crush her to himself like he wants to and he doesn’t hold her away like she wishes he would. He’s just there for her, as strong and steady as he always is. Just a presence to guide her. An anchor to ground her. She can choose to burrow closer or retreat. She’s so small in his arms even though she’s taller. So fragile despite her physical strength. And, it’s killing him to see her so utterly wrung out. “I’ll always follow you, Rayla. To the ends of the earth and beyond, I’ll follow you.”
And he will. She knows he will. And that is why she’s so fucking terrified.
“I should have died.” Suddenly, she’s fighting him. There’s so much desperation in her strength and so much strength in her desperation as she twists around in his arms. Her muscles, like tightly coiled springs, throwing herself backwards against restraints that aren’t there. Have never been there. “I should have died with him! That’s why I did it. To make sure he was gone!”
She’s hysterical and Callum gasps as one of her horns catches him painfully in his throat. Then, he’s reeling backwards, stumbling over his feet from the brutality of the she-elf’s shove. He catches himself against the wide trunk of a Xadian oak and stares at Rayla in bewilderment. She’s still shaking but her misery is gone and now her face is a twisted mask of outrage and fury.
“It’s your fault!” She hisses. “ You ruined it! You ruined everything because you saved me !”
Callum’s own temper surges with her accusations, but before he can gather his thoughts and his wits enough to snap back, Rayla is turning. She pivots around and races towards the trees. Her hands already pulling the twin butterfly swords from where she’d dropped them earlier and, with a flick of her wrists, the blades swing free - curving into hooks as the elf leaps into the dark canopies and uses the wicked blades to haul herself higher faster.
She’s running again. She always does when things are too much for her to handle. And she knows that, despite everything, Callum will follow her. It’s what he always does. But she can make it hard for him. The moon is bright and full against her back and her very cells are vibrating with the energy of her arcanum. The leaves beneath her feet barely stir, kissed by her boots as she bounds and leaps and races across bud and bough. She’s light and fast, the hollow bones of her kind gift the Moonshadow elves with the fleetest of foot among all the races; and she is, after all, the swiftest of her kin. So she’s surprised how far into the distance Callum allows her to flee before his form finally erupts through the treeline on furiously beating wings.
It’s like a strange game of cat and mouse between the bizarre pair racing through the forests. Elf assassin and human sky mage. One quick on her feet the other swift in his wings. She knows he’s fast, he knows she’s faster. He knows she has stamina, she knows that he is untested. Whenever it appears that he is closer, has gained some ground, she ducks beneath the leaves and dives into the shadows. Whenever he follows, folding his wings to plunge through the protective foliage, unfurling and skimming the earth as he searches for her, she darts above again.
Finally, Callum begins to slow. His lungs burn with every ragged breath that he forces them to draw and his shoulders ache right to the roots of his teeth. He won’t catch her. Not tonight. He’s not strong enough. Not fast enough. And Rayla still has her trump card to play, her own primal gift blessed to her upon her birth. And the moment that she does, it’ll be almost impossible to find her again. So Callum changes tactics. He angles himself so he can rise high and fast in a steep climb. Pulls on his every last ounce of energy and will-power and the damned stubbornness that traveling with Rayla - that loving Rayla - has instilled into him and soars into the inky skies - his winged form standing bold and stark against the silver moon. At this altitude, he can see everything, almost to the ends of the earth.
But, Rayla is gone. Slipping into the moon’s shadow of her bloodline and her namesake. Her own lines melting into the light and fading into the shadows cast by the ethereal glow - where Callum can no longer see nor follow her - and, finally exhausted, he drops. Tumbling from the night skies, crashing through the trees, and falling into darkness.
Rayla only stops running when she can no longer hear the sickening snaps of what she hopes is only the splintering of wood, nor the agonized cries and grunts of the boy who’d fallen out of the sky. Exhausted and weak-kneed, the elf collapses. Rolling over and kicking herself backward, so that her spine presses up against the brittle bite of the dying tree. Her leg muscles cramp and seize painfully, her heart aches, and her lungs are ablaze with every swallow of air that feels like she’s breathing through broken glass. And then there are the soft little broken sounds that she knows she is making. Something that sounds caught part-way between panting and sobbing, tears at her throat and bubbles over her lips and hurts in an entirely different manner.
She pushes her face into her hands, then pushes on through until her hands are tangled her hair - twisting and pulling and yanking at the silvery strands until her scalp stings and dozens of the moonlight threads come away at the root, knotted tightly around her fingers. She’d not expected Callum to keep up with her quite as closely, or for quite as long as he had.
By the time she finally has control over her breathing the moon has passed its zenith. And, when she pushes herself back onto her feet - the pre-dawn’s first light shyly peeking over the horizon and lightening the sky; streaking lighter patches between the stars, she can feel the borrowed strength of her arcanum leaving her muscles with the wane of the moon.
Her lungs are still throbbing with every inhale and then burning with each exhale. Her feet feel like lead as she forces herself to take that first step, the first step that would take her further away from Callum, closer toward where the strange sightings are located. Closer to Viren and further from Callum. If she leaves now, she still has time to put some distance between them before the power of her arcanum fully leaves her blood. Still has to leave the human sky mage another day’s worth of journeying behind her…
And she tries to. She really, truly does. But her love for the boy and her fear for his injuries after his fall sees her turn back. It sees her retrace her travel and undo her efforts to leave him. Still cloaked in her shadows, she returns to him. Cautious and weary and dragging her feet, she collects a small cache of fruits, nuts, and berries. When the small bag fastened beneath her cowl is more than full enough she switches focus and begins to stuff a second, smaller pouch bouncing at her hip with every healing flower and root that she can find.
When Rayla finds him, crumpled and battered, broken and bruised, with scattered feathers and splintered wood surrounding him her heart breaks anew. There’s blood, bright red and sticky, seeping steadily from tears in his skin, trickling from the split across his brow, and oozing from the corner of his mouth. He doesn’t move, clearly unconscious but breathing steadily, and yet she hesitates, almost as though she’s afraid to touch him despite knowing that time is against her. She still has an hour or two before true dawn breaks and robs her of her shadows, but how long Callum’s eyes remain closed may only last a fraction of that time.
She has to be gone before he wakes up.
So Rayla tends to him with gentle, loving touches. Cleans his scrapes and wounds with a tenderness she had no idea that she possessed. She whispers her devotion to him and scolds him for his stubbornness as she combs out the braid in his hair and then reties it with only a moment’s hesitation. Divides the food she collected and piles half inside a makeshift bindle, cuts the braid from her own hair and ties the scrap of fabric that cradles the offering shut with it.
And then she leaves, stopping only to take with her a single glossy feather of his as a memento. Something to remember him by.
And when Callum’s eyes finally flicker open, Rayla is long gone. But the last words that she whispered still eddy in his thoughts. Not quite real yet not quite a dream.
“I can’t stop you from following but, please Callum - for your sake, don’t seek me out. Learn more of your arcanum, grow strong, and then go back to Katolis. Back to Ez. Protect him, Callum. He’s what matters. Help him grow. Don’t let the world fall back into what it once was. And let me go. Let me keep you safe the way that I know how.”
He groans as he pushes himself into a sitting position. Next to him, his hand nudges a pouch that he doesn’t recognize, a pouch filled with exotic Xadian fruits and nuts and tied with a fluttering string of twisted white.
Curious and careful, Callum releases the tie from the fabric barely paying any heed to the small offering that comes tumbling out. After all, it’s not the food that has his attention, but the gleaming braid of white hair that he now holds delicately between his fingers. It’s Rayla’s braid. The braid that he had tied for her. The braid that symbolizes their bond, now severed, laying limp in his hand.
His heart aches in his throat. But it’s not of anger, sorrow nor rejection but in love and hopefulness.
He gathers the gifts that Rayla left him. Dropping the food into his satchel before digging deeper and retrieving a small length of twine. He takes a moment to carefully bind the frayed end of the elf’s severed braid with the cord, knotting it tightly to prevent it from unraveling. Then he reaches up and finds the braid behind his own ear, the one he’s worn ever since that first time the elf had tied it. It’s smoother beneath his touch. Neater. He smiles gently as he realizes that Rayla must have prolonged her return, risked him waking up, simply so she could touch him for just a little longer.
He moves his fingers down to the root and carefully threads the loose end of the string through the first fold. He takes his time, weaving and tying and securing firmly. And when he lowers his hands again, his fingers curling into fists at his sides, there are now two braids dancing merrily from his scalp, caught in the early morning breeze.
“Alright, Rayla,” He says quietly. Vowing to no one but himself in the middle of the forest. “I’ll learn more. I’ll get stronger. But you can’t expect me to not look for you.” He touches the strands of moonlight idly, strokes the familiar softness between his fingertips as he stares out into the horizon. “You can’t expect me to stop loving you just because you tell me to.”
Inside his satchel, a soft silver glow gently flickers to life. The cube, the Key of Aaravos, stirs… The moon symbol slowly awakening.
“I see through your illusions, Rayla. I see you . I understand your reality and your truths,” Something deep inside Callum’s chest shifts, falls into place with a sigh and a gentle flutter. He’s unsure of what it is but it’s comforting and warm and it reminds him of Rayla’s arms around him.
He shakes out his arms and pulls his scarf up over his nose and mouth. His eyes narrow as he calls upon his mage wings once more, his jaw fixed in tight determination. He has an idea where the elf is heading, a vague one, but it’s still a direction to follow. She’ll have made up her lost distance but she’d not have slept yet. She’ll rest soon, she’ll need to and Callum knows that now is the best chance to try and gain some ground on her.
He also knows that if he does so now, it’ll be no different than what happened last night. And nothing will be closer to resolution between them.
“I’ll do as you asked and I won’t search for you,” He shakes out the glossy gossamer feathers, checks them over for damage, and frowns. He’ll need to clean them soon, remove the last of the loose and broken quills that’ll slow him down, but that can wait until tonight. Until he returns to the Storm Spire and speaks with Ibis. He moves his wings carefully, testing his strength and wincing at the twinge in his ribs before his lips press together in a line behind his scarf.
“But, you can’t be mad at me when I happen to stumble across you while I continue my learning.” With two strong beats, he’s airborne. Winging across the skies. “After all, it’s hardly my fault that our destinations are written in the same book.”