The sky was dark. Morning was coming soon, and Ruko was sat on the mountainside looking out towards the Army of the Thousand Sects. She watched their camp as it sat on the edge of the new marshland, following the figures as they moved, as if they were ants. Every so often, the great shield that covered the entire mountain was hit by an errant attack and the sky lit up like it was filled with fireworks.
“Can’t sleep either?”
Ruko looked up, and smiled at Dreamer as the young woman made her way towards Ruko’s seat. Loose rocks tumbled out from under where she walked as she crossed the rocky outcropping, causing her to stumble slightly, but she caught herself and pulled her body over to the stone jutting out of the mountain that Ruko sat on.
“No. I have a bad feeling, and Master isn’t here to read me stories”. Ruko curled up into a ball and wrapped her arms around her legs. “Plus, I think Fen is mad at me”.
“Why? Aren't you fighting so he doesn’t have to?” Dreamer leaned over and began hugging the young girl. For a moment Ruko just sat still, but eventually she relaxed and began leaning against her older friend.
“I broke some of his puppets. Not the best ones, Master made sure they couldn’t break, but it made him really sad when the others started breaking”. Ruko began playing with the sleeve of Dreamer’s jacket, and as she focussed on that her body seemed to relax more. For a while both of them sat there, just watching the troops below and the sky above.
“How many broke? Can you fix them?”
“No, Fen and Master can, but he’s... too sad to come out right now and Master is busy”. As Ruko spoke she took out puppet after puppet in various states of disrepair. Some were shattered, some cleaved in half, while some were just cracked or missing limbs. Eventually there were twenty statuettes in various states of disrepair placed in front of them both. As she looked on at the damage, Ruko couldn’t help but sigh. I’m sorry, Fen...
“I’ve heard you mention your master several times now, and Fen too actually, but neither of you have told me who your master actually is. It’s pretty hard to gauge the worth of a person if you have no idea who they are”.
“Master is... strong. He’s the big brother of the man who owns the mountain. He’s really smart, but he doesn’t like hurting people. He said he did too much of that when he was younger”.
“Wait, the big brother of the man who owns the mountain? He’s Lord Yun’s older brother?” Dreamer’s eyes bulged. “Okay. Well then. Yes. That’s certainly news. I’ve heard legends of Lord Yun’s older brother. Wait, isn’t he supposed to be crazy?”
“Crazy? I guess so”. As they spoke, Dreamer began running her fingers through Ruko’s shoulder length hair, slowly working out all the knots at the same time.
“Oh wait, yeah, Fen said he’s obsessed with a corpse. That’s not exactly a sign of an entirely balanced individual”.
“That’s miss Cleo. She’s really pretty, like a fire trapped in a stone. I get why master misses her sometimes, but seeing him with her makes me sad”.
“Why? Are you jealous?”
“What’s a jealous?”
“Never mind, why does it make you sad?”
“Because he’s sad. Sometimes he would just sit in front of her and talk to her like she’s there, telling her all about the things he’s been working on or how me and Fen are doing, but sometimes he just sits there and cries”.
“He must miss her a lot”.
“I hope someone misses me that much some day”. Ruko smiled as she looked up at Dreamer, before snuggling even deeper into the young woman’s arms.
I would...
Ruko looked up but saw nobody speaking. As she thought about the voice that she had just heard she realised she recognised it. “Is that you?”
“I didn’t say anything, Ruko. Are you alright?”
“Not you, I heard Fen”. Ruko pried herself from Dreamer’s arms before standing up and looking out at the field below. “Are you there, brother?”
I'm still angry at you.
Ruko smiled, “Well now you're talking to me, I should make you angry more often!”
Please don't. I want my puppets in nice shape. Can you collect them back together so when we win the war I'll be able to fix them.
“You think we'll win?” Ruko turned around and began picking up the broken shards and puppets carefully, making sure to grab even the smallest part. Every-so-often one of the errant strikes from the foreign artillery would go off nearby and she would have to stop to make sure she did not drop anything, but the light given off by the attacks on the shield helped speed up the process momentously.
Yeah, Master is here.
“I’m not sure if that was directed at me or Fen,” Dreamer said as she helped pick up the puppets.
“Both of you really. Fen thinks we’ll win because our master is here”.
“He must have a lot of faith in your master then. Do you?”
Ruko was silent for a while before she stood up. She put the last piece of broken puppet back in her storage ring before going back to staring at the Army of the Thousand Sects. “I... I think if Master is feeling good then we will win. If he’s feeling bad then I think nobody will win”.
“What do you mean?”
“She means that uncle Laurence is unstable, to a terrifying degree”. Both girls turned back to the thin path that both of them had taken to reach their private perch. Piao waved at them before leaning precariously against the wall of the mountain path. “He’s likely the most gifted practitioner of Creation alive, but he’s already almost destroyed Misty Peaks once”.
Seeing Piao show up, Dreamer immediately stood to attention. “Greetings, lord Piao, sir”.
“At ease, soldier. Father asked me to look for Fen and keep an eye on him while uncle Laurence finishes his work. He can’t be interrupted if we want to survive and if anything happened to his apprentice he would become dangerously distracted”. He turned to Ruko and smiled, “You must be Fen, right?”
“Nope,” Ruko replied, before pointing at her chest. “Fen’s in here. I’m Ruko”.
Glancing at Dreamer, Piao frowned in confusion. “It’s complicated, sir, but the child is who you’re looking for”.
“Alright, well seeing as Dreamer has been looking after you, I’ll ask you both to come back with me. There’s no point in separating the two of you now, though I do have to ask why you are out of position, as I do not recall hearing of any of the staffing troops were ordered to look after a child”.
“Sir, my dugout was destroyed by one of the Dragons Teeth. Once the crystal was saved I was ordered by the section commander to look after Ruko. It has been a very hectic day though, I imagine that is the reason why you have yet to be informed about my change in situation”.
“Concise and reasonable response. I accept it for now, however I will be checking up on this the moment things are cleared up”.
As Piao moved back up the path, both girls gingerly walked down from the rock and followed his steps. Their progress was slightly slow because of how precarious the outcropping was, but they kept hold of the wall to their side and made steady progress.
“Do you know him?” Ruko said.
“Everyone does, the son of our leader and the guard of the stairwell. He’s the pride of the new Hephaistians. I admire him”. Dreamer blushed, before turning to face Ruko. “But don’t tell him that”.
“Does he know you?”
“Not at all, I am just another nameless soldier to him. I’m not highborn, or amazingly gifted. I only became a Saint last year, while his entire family is gifted beyond belief. Every single one of them became a Saint within a year or two of study, and I’m... not”. Her shoulders slumped slightly. “Don’t tell him I said this, but I think he’s really pretty”.
Okay, I won’t. How did he know your name if he doesn’t know you? Can he read your mind?”
“Not at all, if you use your truesense on my lapel then you can see my name and unit number. All our jackets are specially made for us when we join the militia. Now come on, we should catch up to lord Piao”.
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