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There was someone here, she knew. The slight scent of blood in the air, the faint feeling of wrongness that poured into her territory. The hurt, the sadness, and the scared that flooded her palate with a sour, bitter taste.
Something was here, but Lumera didn’t move. Not immediately, no. She knelt before a small altar tucked in the endless wings of her castle, light cascading through the windows at every angle and bathing her in light.
Washing away her grief, hiding the tears that ran across her cheeks in overwhelming daylight.
Before her sit bits and pieces of her family--armor, bobbles, trinkets, and mementos-- of Divine dragons of all shapes and sizes lost both war and time. Her father, her mother, her uncles, and aunts. All gone.
All save for her.
She dabbed at the tears on her cheeks, a wrinkle of tightly coiled hate squeezing at her heart as she noted the roughness of her hands, the scars that decorated her hands and arms. Notes, proof of all her weaknesses.
Of why she was alone.
But even as her world darkened, so endlessly dim she held on taking refuge in the small lights she did have. People, her people. The citizens of Elyos depended on her, took refuge in her, and prayed to her.
Lumera would not let those people down.
It was closer than it used to be, and its smell mingled with rot and death. Lumera stood out on the balcony, her eyes on the mountains that boarded her lands.
Sir Sigurd, Emblem of the Holy Knight. Stands tall beside her, ever a companion in these trying times. His light wafts off him, bleeding out the shadows that border her peace.
“Something appears over yonder, my lady,” he speaks, an unasked question on the tip of his tongue. “The corrupted?”
Lumera hums, dragging her finger down the ivory stone that made her castle “Yes, Emblem Sigurd—but that’s not all is it?”
He looks at her, bright eyes peeling across her face “An Emblem.”
“A long lost friend, Sir Sigurd. Marth will be upon us soon, won’t he?” a small smile crosses her face, a shining memory of the Hero-King who’d been a friend to her all those years ago.
He’d been lost alongside her Uncle, struck down by Sombron’s mage dragon.
The balustrade cracks under her hold, small fractures in the stone. She’s only barely aware of the rage that swims under the surface of her mind.
“Lady Lumera…” his voice, soothing as ever, pulls her back from murky tides. Her mind turns instead to the one who might bare her ring. It could be one of Sombron’s terrible followers, leading a pack of dogs.
Or…
It could be that child, the young Fell child she found in the mountains that day.
The memory flutters behind her eyes, pushing out hateful memories. A pale face, chalk white and devoid of happiness; and two dim red eyes looking like they’d be more at home on a doll than a person.
A pinky promise, a shared secret, and the Emblem of the beginning on their finger.
The her of some years back sneered at her, running on more rage than despair. They’d whispered she should have cut him down, taken the ring—as was her duty.
That her was a blazing sun to the gentle light she tried to be today. She would not return to her. Her fire would warm her people first. She need not scorch those who only tried to survive, certainly not a child.
So she held her peace, offering Emblem Sigurd a brave smile which he returned with all the grace in the world.
She would wait, just a bit longer.
She rose like the dead, shooting upright like a zombie from a tale. Her chambers were dark and silent like the night.
Someone was here.
Lumera rose from her bed. Shielding her small clothes with a blanket as she swept from the room. Her halls were too quiet at night, her guards away.
Away, not here.
Blood soured her halls, fear and anger and desolation mingled together in an acrid cocktail. Lumera followed the smell to her studies.
Books stacked from wall to wall, her study smelled like wood polish and ink, a single room so rich with history.
The Balcony was left open, the curtains askew with the night, and moonlight poured from outside. Peering out, she could see men and women. Her guards patrolled the gardens.
Looking for something, torches held ablaze like fireflies in summer.
Sigurd appeared at her side, his face turned away from her, and from the corner of her eye, she can see a pale face in the study, red eyes the size of dinner plates.
“Alear,” she calls out to them, turning slowly. As if coaxing a skittish creature. The child nearly ducks away, his grip knuckle white on the broken sword at his side. He bleeds, skin torn and weeping at his belly, staining the carpet below him.
He said nothing, his mouth pressed into a trembling line.
Her heart ached to look at him. His pale face was even more ashen, dark rings stained his eyes red and swollen. He was caked in dirt and blood, and she counted every hurt he got to come here.
She knelt, her arms out “Alear."
He flinches.
"I won’t hurt you, child,” she swears, and she means it. She’d rather pitch herself over the balcony than raise a hand against him.
Another part of her, shaped by war scoffs that it could be a trap. But those thoughts are lost to her as he inches forward, fumbling with something, only for him to offer her his hands.
In them, cupped like a precious treasure. Is the Emblem of beginnings.
“Help him.” the boy begs, his voice wrecked with grief and heartache, and Lumera’s heart fractures at the sound of it.
She’s learned several new expressions since he’d come here, and she loved all of them in a small way. It pained her to see him scared, hurt. But to know he was capable gave her hope that he could feel joy and love.
She suspects she’s right, examining the curious expression on his face as the Emblem of Beginnings appears before them. He is reborn in his former glory, shining with celestial light.
The warrior prince is just as she remembered. Dashing and sweet in every measure, the Emblem of Beginnings looked to have sprung right from legend.
He kneels next to the bed, his face tilted up toward Alear with pride and affection. Blue eyes are just as wondrous as enthralled red.
They’d shuffled Alear along toward a private room near her own, calling the guards to return to their regular duties. She’d spent the better half of the dawn healing and patching Alear’s wounds.
The poor child had run from his father, seeking refuge with her. Hunted and chased through hell and high water all for the sake of freeing his Emblem from Sombron.
His loyalty was as fierce as when they’d met. But now it’d settled its form in a place of love. Lumera knew he’d forged a bond that’d never break.
She rubbed her thumb over the peaks of his knuckles. Another crack in her heart as she counts the scars across his person “Alear…” she whispers.
His eyes turn to her, tired and suddenly terribly afraid. She squeezes his hand, soothing him with all the kindness she can exude “You can’t return home again. Not now, he will know what’s become of Marth.”
He trembles, but his eyes blaze despite his fragility. He knows what he’d done, and he’s come to terms with the change that will follow.
This sweet boy is so brave. Her eyes burn at the sight of him, she might weep.
“But you needn't be alone, child. My offer stands, my home is open to you,” she swears to him, watching his face flicker through a million feelings at once, terribly unsure.
Marth, at their side. Has a complex look on his face, his eyes urging. She smiles, and in the next moment stands from the bed, letting Alear go.
“This, of course, is a big decision. One that you must make on your own.” she turns to Sigurd, who watches fondly by the door. “Let us walk my friend, our guests need privacy.”
He smiles, tipping his head “Yes, a stroll through the gardens perchance?” Lumera hums her agreement, and they make their way from the room.
As she makes her way from the halls, she takes care to turn her ear away from whispered secrets, two voices mingling together behind closed doors.
“Alear is a sweet boy. So dutiful even when it hurt him.” she laments to her friend. The Holy knight grouses beside her, his face a mix of compassion and surly rage “Sombron is a fiend in every name, I fail to comprehend treating your child in such a way.”
She nods, tilting her face towards the moon, taking what peace she can from the tranquility of the night.
“This is good, my dear friend. It’s but another reason to fight our hardest at every confrontation. We fight not only for ourselves and our people—but for the people entrapped under Sombron’s Will. We fight so that we might all live freely. Together.”
A million faces scattered in her memory, stretching from era to era. Some much love and loss have left her battered. She wonders if she could take much more heartbreak.
It’s not a question though, is it? She’ll do whatever it takes, it was decided the moment they crossed paths.