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Evening bathes the forest in gentle light, washed pink and gold in the autumn sun. With cooler temperatures comes change, leaves drifting and colors turning warm and sleepy hushes falling over the wildlife, a welcome sight at the close of each harvest season. The earliest of frost settles over Sona’s path, dusting the beaten earth with iridescent white, but her feet don’t touch the ground anyways.
She peers into the distance, just overtop the trees before her, and makes out the shape of mountains in the fog. Three peaks, haloed by mist and storms that never drift, just as she’d been told. It’s less than a day, now, maybe a few hours if she’s quick.
Four Ionians had attempted to stray her from her path, not a familiar face in any of them, but they had done so with the kindest intentions. Sona had returned the kindness, choosing not to waste her breath on disputes with those only wishing to help, and continued her way without a glance behind her. If she were to be swayed, it would have happened by the words of Irelia. The other woman had hardly tried, anyway.
Magic thickens the air around her as she reaches the edge of the forest. It’s heavy with resentment, rage, stained heavy to drive away any who happen to wander close enough, but Sona barely pays it mind. Gray settles over the land, devoid of the Vastayan magic that seems to linger in the oldest parts of Ionia, the only detectable notes are those of the new dark magics.
Drawing her hand across her instrument, she breaks the silence, weaving perseverance from the strings. The hums lack power enough to disturb the magic surrounding her, but there isn’t much she can do to combat the ripple undoubtedly spreading from her. Her goal isn’t to surprise anybody, though, so it doesn’t trouble her. Sona strums over an old hymn, hoping to strike recognition in the eyes on her.
It doesn’t take very long for the weight of magic to turn oppressive. Rather than idle, tentative strokes of her instrument, Sona pulls a song with some degree of desperation, her eyes locked on the blurry shape of what she knows to be the castle. Without the knowledge, it would look no different from the peaks of mountains, but she knows better, she knows her better.
Her feet touch the ground first, and everything spirals hard. Air swirls tangibly before her eyes, thick with words she can hear as though they’re still being hurled at her in crossfire— her knees are down, now—her lips contort around her name, over and over.
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Soft, rhythmic, footsteps echo over stone and masonry, aged with years of magic weaving in the gaps of bedrock. Sona’s eyes squeeze more tightly closed, her nose scrunching, her ears are ringing in the silence and she finally peers into the darkness. Cold, frostbitten strands of violet color across her sight, drifting in the still air like dust.
Syndra’s armor glows in the low light, different from how she remembers it, heavier and distinctly Ionian craft. Her orbs thrash in the air, whirling around her as she paces beside the lone window. Hardly lifting her head, she takes in the unfamiliar bedroom.
White eyes level her.
(She can still remember each thread of lightning coming off her lids.)
“You shouldn’t have come here.” Her voice is barely there, scraped down to a pained rasp from years of disuse, but it’s unmistakably Syndra’s. “I told Irelia, I told you—”
She takes a breath, turning her back to Sona once more, and grips the windowsill. Locked jaw, shaking, barely audible, “Leave.”
Without another word, Syndra disappears into the hall.
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As she remembers from their days together in the capital, and as she has proven once more, Syndra is aware of Sona’s presence most certainly not leaving the castle. Sona takes her distant silence as a warning, as sign that she ought to leave while the steps down to the ground below are still steady, but she does not heed. Wandering the halls, she is careful to avoid the fading indigo trails of her friend lingering in the corridors.
The kitchen is easy to find, but unquestionably desolate. Shattered dishes and ware of cast iron, dusted with years of stillness, litter the floor. If Sona were to guess, she would place the castle’s age to be a few centuries, judging by the weathered tiles and style of chairs and cushions scattered about. She settles herself on the floor, feeling remnants of Syndra’s presence sinking through the soles of her feet, and reaches to right a chair knocked aside. Pushing the others flush to the table, she stares down at the worn cushion of one of them before discarding it.
Piles accumulate as Sona picks through the fragments of memory scattered across the floor. It’s a risky move, no doubt, but she opens every window that she can manage to reach. A few are rusted shut, some barely working with shoddy repair, but she doesn’t call upon her magic to sear them back into working condition.
Light pours in through the open windows, bringing breaths of frigid, fresh air into the castle’s suffocating rooms. It’s as though the stone is breathing in the sun streaming across the cracked floors, dust dancing as Sona banishes it. It’s difficult, more draining without her Etwahl and Syndra’s presence pressing down on the air so hard, but she manages to get the worst of the dust out of the kitchen and into the air outside.
Sona takes a breath, leaning back against the heavy table, and deems the room clean enough to try eating in. Before she can consider her chances of being able to leave the castle and get back in, she feels the air shift behind her and she turns.
Even wrapped in blankets, Sona can recognize the shape of her Etwahl, resting gently on the ground in the kitchen’s threshold.
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It’s a bit difficult to navigate the castle, with the seemingly endless twisting corridors and dim lighting everywhere she goes, but Sona manages to find the staircase leading to the North tower. Worn from years of use, she can nearly imagine the shape of Syndra’s steps embedded into the rugged stone.
(There’s someone else here. She can’t let him go.)
The latch for the door at the stairs’ landing is broken, leaving it to swing in the icy wind whistling overtop the surrounding trees. Sona pushes it open gently, hesitating when she sees the silhouette against the remains of daylight hanging in the sky, but she goes forth. Setting her Etwahl down quietly, she allows herself to touch the ground, walking to stand just beside the crenellation peak Syndra is seated on.
Orange and pink light the planes of her face, just aside from the pale glow of her eyes. She turns her face downward, not lifting her gaze high enough to match Sona’s, but she offers a hand to her. Steel presses against her skin, the cruel arc of her claws gentled as not to hurt her, and she feels herself turn weightless under Syndra’s pull. The gravitational orbs make the backs of her legs go numb, but there isn’t a hint of pain. Seating her on the adjacent peak, they pull away, returning to revolve around Syndra slowly.
Sona keeps her eyes downward, her fingers playing over the edges of Syndra’s armored ones, engraved with Ionian scripts too old for her to read. Her eyes flicker up, but dart back down when they meet Syndra’s own.
Missed you.
The words are drawn on the back of her hand. Syndra’s expression pinches, but it’s with shame and regret and sorrow and her heart aches in response.
“I’m sorry.”
Her movements are slow, careful, but her hand finds the curve of Syndra’s jaw and she leans close enough to feel her breath brush against her lips. There’s another hesitation, a moment that she doubts, but she isn’t the one to bridge the space between them. When her fingers come up to touch Sona’s cheek, there isn’t steel nor satin separating the two.