Chapter Text
It was a clear day.
Extremely clear. So clear, in fact, that if one wanted to, they could climb to the top of the tallest mountain on the continent and see its entirety, from the tumultuous Titanic Ocean on the northeast to the Pacified Ocean on the west, with the Frozen Ocean stretching from the south of the continent to… well, no one knew, exactly.
Syro Irm needed not to climb to be treated to this view. She was able to bask in the entire beauty of the continent almost every single day. It was one of the perks of living on Mount Basha, the aforementioned tallest mountain, and being able to sit on its peak as the sun set and the hustle and bustle of the continent closed up shop for the day.
Syro wasn’t much for metaphors or hypotheticals. But that was a bad attitude to have when you were a Celestial Monarch, given that you were supposed to spend your days writing poetry and pondering symbolism in the grand scheme of life and all that gratuitous nonsense. And if it weren’t already glaringly obvious that Syro was less than fit for her position, she had a bad habit of dealing directly with outside agitators. Directly, as in her detractors would drown directly in the ocean. Which wasn’t exactly popular with the other Monarchs.
As it happened, Syro was especially agitated today. She had pulled up the bulletin board that she had smuggled from under the nose of the next Monarch down (don’t ask), and updated its contents, as always. But something was wrong.
“Huh?” She had paused, stepped back, to look again. But the error was still there, stubbornly mocking her. “Something’s off balance.”
She approached the board once more. The strings which she used to connect all of the inhabitants of the continent were usually balanced in almost every form. The chaotic factions were balanced with the reserved ones. The city populations formed a balance with the rural farmers and the inhabitants of small towns in the far north and west. The warriors formed a balance with the domestics, men with women, youth with elderly. It was one of the few parts of her job which she enjoyed; sure, once you got past all of the metaphorical stuff, it was a puzzle — a game meant to be played. Finding all the ways to connect everything. Finding out how to rewire the string, rewrite the future. Finding out how to solve the puzzle of life.
But now, as Syro had been pondering for no less than from dawn until dusk, everything was unbalanced. Had it been like this for a while, getting out of hand slowly but consistently? That might have explained why the mayor of Phonecia was acting like a dementia-ridden maniac lately— but frankly, he was always like that. More importantly, this whole thing left her with a major problem. How should I get this done?
There had to be some solution. The problem was that it was unclear what that solution was — or if it could be done without messing up some obscure part of the board.
Syro slouched over on the rock. What is it? It has to be something… but, of course, her analysis hadn’t gotten further than that, even after a whole day of thinking.
She decided to head in. She’d be much better at solving the problem if she had it in front of her face.
Or maybe not.
“Can’t move him, Antiaris needs him to stay there. Can’t move her, there’s no one to rewire her with. Can’t move any of those three, they need to stay together…” At this point, it was well past dusk. Syro had run through almost everyone on her list. And if she didn’t have this fixed in a hurry, things were going to go south even quicker.
“Can’t move her, she’s got no way out. Can’t move him, he…” Syro frowned. Why couldn’t she move this one? Quite youthful. From a far northern small town. A shopping center town. No certain career path. He could be moved— but to where?
“Scratch the big cities, he wouldn’t stand a chance there,” Syro thought out loud, her voice filled with hope for once in a long while. “Scratch any other towns, they have roads right back to where he started. Scratch being a nomad— he’d not live too long there, either.”
Syro put her head in her hands. So this was it? This may have been the only shot she had, and this boy couldn’t be moved anywhere ? She had checked everywhere— and there was nowhere to send him!
Okay, technically, she hadn’t checked the Windwalkers yet. But there was no way anyone could be added there— the Windwalkers were a ridiculous group. The Windwalkers were shunned by everyone. The Windwalkers had a culture that no one else could decipher.
The Windwalkers couldn’t take him.
The Windwalkers couldn’t.
The Windwalkers.
The Windwalkers could solve this whole problem, Syro realized. If she connected this boy with the Windwalkers, almost all of the unbalances would go away. Not all of them, probably— there were always bound to be a few stragglers when you fixed some things. But she could always clean those up later.
Was this the solution? The solution that had been staring her in the face the whole time?
Syro breathed in, clenching her teeth.
“I hate this,” she whispered to herself.
She didn’t like to take risks. But at this point, it was far riskier to let the board play itself out and see who connected with what, and when. Otherwise the balance was at risk- and Syro knew she would have hell to pay if her balance got screwed up.
She removed the pin representing the boy from the bulletin board.
“Sorry, kid. I hope this doesn’t screw your life up too much.”
She grabbed the string that the pin had held to its spot, dragging it down the board. When she got to the Windwalkers, she carefully positioned the string, delicately reattaching it with the pin.
“Don’t let me down, alright, kid? There’s a lot at stake here.”
Syro’s tension hadn’t eased too much. But all she had to do now was watch the spectacle unfold.
And, hey, she had a pretty great view for it.