Julian

She's not coming back. No matter how hard he tries.

Chapter Music: Red Defeated

"Julian, stay with me." Sara's voice calls. I feel her touch my head, clearing the pain of a migraine like a storm rolling away.

"Always." I squeeze her hand, offering a small smile. She doesn't look convinced, her eyes furrowing as her hands move towards my chest.

"You've bruised your lung. Liquid somehow got in there. If Cal had found you ten minutes later..." She looks away, wiping her eyes with a long finger. I reach towards her cheek, holding it in my hand.

"You found me. That's all that matters." She nods solemnly. She keeps her eyes on her hands in her lap, wringing her hands together. "What is it?"

"Julian, what happened?" It's my turn to look away. The flood of everything I have endured in the past 24 hours suddenly creeps into me, taking away my smile I had kept on for Sara. Everything had happened. Wren's voice trails through my mind, She's done something terrible, Julian. "You should know. There will be a meeting. Everyone in the top of command will be asking you every detail of Mare. I know you'll protect her, no matter the costs. You'll lie to make sure she stays safe, but I deserve the truth. And this," she takes my hands into hers, "is the last time you can tell me it. So please, Julian. Please, I'll only ask you once more for the truth. You owe me that. What happened?"

I owed her far more than the truth. I owed her the past 9 months of my time with Mare. Last time Sara saw me I had promised I would be right back. I had intended to keep that promise. But then I saw the broadcast of Mare being marched to Maven and I saw what he was doing to her. I left. I had thought I would be gone for a week to get Mare, but I had underestimated Maven's obsession towards her. And when I had tried to sing my way past dozens of guards guarding her rooms, my ability failed. I failed.

I look up at Sara, at her bitter grey eyes, and I nod.

"She's done something terrible," I echo.

Sara did not cry, she did not flinch, instead she brought her forgiving hands to my head and cleared away the pain as it came. She helped me dress into fresh robes, discarding my yellow drapes of royal attire that was now stained with blood and ash. The new ones were grey, a neutral color. Claiming me to nothing. Not Mare, not my bloodline, not even the Guard. She whispered warnings of what was coming for me as soon as she led me out the door. She filled in my gaps of what the Guard knew of Mare's movements. In the three days I had been out, they learned many things. None of it being accurate, whether or not they believe that information Sara did not know.

Sara leads me out of my hospital room. She's been assigned as my escort for now until the Guard decides what to do with me. I'm a deserter. Twice now. She escorts me further into the base, down hallways of stone walls that have large, blood red suns stamped on them. She stops in front of a door, typing a code into a keypad. She looks back towards me as it opens.

"They won't let me in with you. But I'll be just out here. Cal will be there." Cal. It will be good to see him again. I nod, squeezing her hand as I enter. For a moment I'm back in Norta, entering the war room. Mare stands just on the other side of the grand table. She looks up and smiles.

When I blink, I'm back in the darkness of the room with the Guard. They're seated around a large, circular table. It's too big for the six of them, but perhaps that's purposeful. There's one seat left open, isolated from the rest. It's clear who it was meant for. I sit down in it, folding my hands in my lap.

"Julian Jacos you are charged with the desertion of the Scarlet Guard and her allies. What do you say to this?" Diana Farley says. Laying across her chest in the smallest blanket is a baby. Clara. Seeing the child with Farley is like looking at a pair of ghosts. I'm the man who was beside Mare when she gave out the declaration of her heir. That day tied both their fates to the throne and made them both targets to the entire world. If Mare wins, I could even be looking at a future queen.

"Guilty," I answer. I am more guilty than anyone could even bear to know. I lost a sister to the crown. Now, I've lost Mare too. Both could have been saved, but I failed again and again.

"We have questions ready for you, and if you answer them we have a deal worked out that could grant you freedom. Do we have an agreement?" I feel the silence leech into my bones as the seconds pass. Despite the comfort it gave me before, I can't bring myself to look at Cal. I can sense him from across the table, his warmth reaching for my senses. I would like to talk to him. But I don't think he would ever understand. "Do we have an agreement?" Farley asks again.

I meet her gaze, her eyes don't carry their usual anger. "Where would you like me to begin?"

"The beginning will do," A girl says. Her face is familiar, with her long wisps of black air and copper skin.

"Coles." Farley says, giving a stern look. Coles, Cameron Coles. I had met her once before... everything. Mare had been training her. Farley looks back to me, "Here is your first question."

"Why did you leave Mare?" Cal asks. I can detect the angry tremble in his voice. I look back towards him.

"Mare sent me away." The silence is deafening. I'm not sure if I can say more, although I'm sure they expect me to. Would they even believe me if I did tell them?

"Why would she do that?" Gisa Barrow, Mare's sister, says. Since I've left, she's grown twice her size. Maybe it's the new uniform. A sling of dagger arches across her chest. Her cheeks are sunken, and her eyes carry deep shadows. Her eyes are familiar nonetheless. War can wear anyone through, no matter how strong. We've both been fighting wars these past few months. Still, she's only 16. She shouldn't have to be fighting.

"I don't know." If I tell them what's happened to Mare, what she has done, the rest may not want to hear it.

"That's bullshit," Farley spits, "Would you like to know what has happened since you were left near dead at the edge of the base? Mass killings, and the Stilts-" She glances to Gisa before continuing, "the Stilts were burned down. Now, you're going to tell us why Mare would send you of all people away. She loved you, Julian. You were nothing less than a father to her and she loved you. She would have never sent you away without reason. So give us a reason." Sick, flickering images of houses burning flash through my mind, filling my vision with twisting arms of orange flame. I reach for my head, to the spot where the Sentinels smashed my head in. The wound is gone, healed by Sara while I was asleep. In some ways I can still feel it.

I glance between everyone else at the table. Kilorn to Cameron, Farley to Cal. Young Gisa, and another man. He's older than them, but younger than me. Wearing long green robes and a mournful face. He recognizes my hesitation, reading me better than anyone else.

"It was Mare's doing. Wasn't it?" He asks. I nod slowly. A wave of heat sweeps across the room from Cal's direction. I can see it in his eyes, he doesn't believe me. Gisa looks away from me, keeping her eyes to the floor. Kilorn used to always follow Mare around, like a planet orbiting its star. I know he loved her once. Anyone could see that. The hurt in his eyes is even more visible. Only Farley can look me in the eye.

She speaks softly. "Why?"

"I don't know." I wish I had a better answer for her. Was it the crown? Was it me? "The power maybe. Mare— She... she believes her destiny is to free the world. To rule us all." Cal stands up from the table, chair screeching on the floor. His heat follows him out as the doors slam closed behind him. Clara wakes from her nap, but she doesn't cry. Farley adjusts her, curling her hair with her finger.

"We've heard the rumors from our spies in the capital city. How the entire Marandus House was poisoned. Did she do that too? I can nearly smell the stench of the room where most of the house lay. I didn't recognize it then, but I do now. It was poison, and perhaps death too. My silence is the only answer she needs.

Farley sighs, "You will be questioned again on this. We need hard details before we move towards an invasion. But you are welcomed back into the protection of the Scarlet Guard."

"Is that what you think I deserve?"

"I think you deserve some peace. I think we all do." Farley doesn't usually let her walls down, but today her shoulders drag her down. She looks worse than Gisa.I stand up from my chair to leave the room to find Sara. She'll know which direction Cal went, and from there I will find him. "Julian" Farley adds, "Cal goes to the coastline when he is like this." I look back to her, nodding gratefully.

Sara leads me to the coast of the beach. We walk down the coast for a long while, looking out as far as our eyes can go. Where the sea meets the sky and disappears forever.

We do not find Cal.