REYN

Sivaport awoke with the falsity of the wolven dawn.

It coursed through the flared trail of the flow, the first pillar's might come alive. Ancestral intervention, it had to be — the truth of the sun in the Pyren bloodline. Whatever the reasoning for the early rise of the dawn, Fenrer laid limp in the litter he hovered beside as the housecarls rescued them both from the pebbled beach, with Fenrer long gone to the aftershock of drowning, but his chest rose and fell in stuttered motions. Questions arose from their lips, but he had no time to answer each and every one as he grabbed the ice glaive for an answer as they ran back to the city. It had to wait if Fenrer Pyren was to survive through the maelstrom. People leaned outside their windows. Children pointed out to the gulf in awe of the last glimmering flecks coating the ocean foam. Layers of fog filled the streets as magelights swung in containers to guide wayward night owls through without harm.

The lighthouse beacon came closer as they rushed unimpeded through the streets. Housecarls bounced from their posts at the inner gatehouse. "Tell Bryn we have an emergency!" he barked at one of the guards, who ran into the castle ahead of them.

A blanket of drizzle calmed the core of the storm as it drifted along the coast. He stretched his magick through the droplets slipping down Fenrer's cheeks, his lips too pale — too quiet in his life. Reyn chewed on his tongue and resented the powerlessness of the past. First, I couldn't save Soren... am I destined to be unable to save Fenrer as well? It sogged his boots as he trudged through the mud of the courtyard to the door leading into the chirurgeon's quarters. Everyone awoke with a king's arrival, but a crown proved more a hindrance on his head than a help. Reyn helped the housecarls carry Fenrer inside, where the guard he sent ahead stood at the double ebony doors. No... if it is my power... I won't let you die — we are the people of the sea... Reyn gripped the ice glaive, bloodied from where he tugged it out of the ruined features of the strange figure.

Feathers weaved through the tempest.

It was a Naveeran... I think all those bodies were Avaerili's, but what were they doing here? Why was Fenrer in the jaws of the storm in the first place? He knows how dangerous the coastline can get in this weather... And another thing... I know he wasn't alone. Where are Traye and Sazaka? Something isn't right. His own questions had no easy answer, or if Fenrer never woke up from the watery slumber. He handed it to the guard to hold onto as they entered in full.

"Put him on the table!" Bryn ordered and tossed papers and phials to the ground off the closest one. Glass clinked and bounced with the quick wave they sent from the heel of their boot to push them closer to the cabinet of medicinal herbs. Reyn went to help lift Fenrer onto it, but stopped when another housecarl shoved a warming cloak into his arms. Irritation battled his reluctance as he wrapped it around his body.

Bryn checked Fenrer's eyes, mouth, and pulse. Reyn shivered at the dismay writ upon his physician's features. The drum of Haneka pounded in his heart as Bryn gently tilted Fenrer's face from side to side. He gave no reaction to the soft, but no less firm motion of his own body. Bryn released him, then said, "We need to get him out of his armor and clothes." They scrambled over to the cabinet to sort through the bundles within, but they turned with a snap, "Don't just stand there gawking! Get him out of them!" Bryn unfurled the bundles with a growl. "Sunbloom... I just bought some from the apothecary... Where in the Ancients-damned did I put it..."

Reyn leaned for the guard hovering at the door. "Have the Pyren lord's room cleaned out and the fireplace lit, please," he instructed, then clapped them on the back to send them on their way as his personal housecarls undressed Fenrer, tossing his clothes and armor to the side to repair or launder later. Reyn frowned at the thin, crackled trail of blood oozing from a cut on his shoulder. It soaked the trails of water down his skin with crimson. He slid out of the way when Bryn returned with a blanket and fresh, and more importantly, dry clothes. He set the blanket to the side before assisting them to get Fenrer into fresh clothes. Reyn winced when a soft sigh left his lips, his eyelids fluttering.

Bryn crept closer to check them once more. "This isn't good... Your Grace, I need you to give me the situation once we have him in a safe place," Bryn instructed with a nod at the housecarls to put Fenrer back in the litter, throwing the blanket over him.

"Of course..." Reyn rubbed his forearms and trailed after them when they delivered Fenrer to the one place of safety in his reach. None of this makes sense... Hopelessness weighed on his soul as they entered the old quarters of the Pyren's whenever they stayed at Sivaport castle for council meetings. Warmth stretched from the fireplace runes as he set the ice glaive on the windowsill. Trails of water followed the gilded frame. Tears to the potential loss. Left to observe, nothing more than an ornament as they lowered Fenrer into the bed, who continued to breathe. Lightly. Barely.

Bryn took out a parcel and a pestle. "I need everyone but His Grace to leave."

The housecarls left.

"What happened?" Bryn wasted no time as they wrapped Fenrer in the blankets. "Why do I have a half-dead Storm Warden?"

Half-dead... Reyn came closer to Fenrer's bedside, trying to find an answer he didn't have. "I found him drowning near the cliffs. I'm assuming he fell from there." Though I doubt at this rate it was an accidental fall. Fenrer knows better... He folded his arms and gazed down at the Storm Warden.

Bryn put both the herbs and the pestle on the table. "What? How did he end up there?"

"I don't know."

Bryn checked Fenrer's pulse again. "He's insanely lucky the waves didn't bash him against the rocks if he fell from there, or the Ancients themselves intervened," they mumbled with a confused squint. "How long was he under?"

"I also don't know." Reyn shivered with a nauseating wave of cold and tucked deeper into the warming cloak. "I just saw some magick, and dove in."

"You are insanely lucky you weren't dragged into a riptide and deeper into the currents of the gulf, Your Grace," Bryn bit with a concerned huff. "Both of you." They placed the parcel of sunblooms into the pestle. "You resuscitated him?"

"Barely." It's not going to be enough, is it?

As he expected, Bryn shook their head at Fenrer as they crushed the poultice. "I won't sugarcoat this, Your Grace," they whispered. "Any later, and he'd be dead. He still might. We'll know for sure if he makes it through the night. He's very weak." Bryn slipped out a phial of essence before slipping a small spoonful of the crushed sunbloom inside. A flicker of flames danced on their palm, clutched in it until the essence steamed the glass and curdled the rest of the sunbloom, merging it with the liquid. "I'll keep an eye on him. As for you, Your Grace—"

"I'm hale and whole," he mumbled.

"I still want to check you over once I've done all I can for him. If you aspirated water through your magick, I don't want you developing something such as pneumonia," Bryn pointed out, then tipped the phial against Fenrer's lips. A single, warm droplet slipped past them, and they drew their hand back. "That should help keep him warm — I'm going to need a bucket in here."

"I'll get one," Reyn said and went to leave.

"No, I want you to sleep, Your Grace. I'll have someone else get what I need." Reyn scowled at their words, but flinched when they pointed out, "You have done all you can. More than enough, King Reyn. I'll do my best to drag him through the night, I'm just trying not to get your hopes up with his condition." A huff left through their nose as they prodded Fenrer's brow. "You both need rest, that's all we can do for now."

It's never enough... "Thank you, Bryn. Focus on him, I'll talk to you later." He bowed to them, then left the room. Lost in his powerlessness, he shuffled through his pocket to clutch the necklace of the Storm Wardens. The wyvern with their wings around the star — Aztryxer. He held it out in front of him. It glinted a shade of emeralds and icy blues, a dim light within the core. He jolted out of his musings when heavy footsteps crept for him. Gustul. His drunk older brother, though from the twist of confusion to his brow, maybe the drunk haze hadn't clutched his brother too much.

"Reyn, what happened?" he asked, clearer.

Reyn lowered his hand to his side, wrapping the chains of the necklace through his fingers. His lips parted, for an answer, for a meaning to his crown. His breath escaped him instead, and he said, "Fenrer Pyren is on the edge of death." It struck his tongue and bled him to his bones. Gustul stiffened. "He nearly drowned. Bryn is with him now." Shoulders against his neck, he tried to shake out the rippled tension before it clasped into his lungs and stole away his sense of calm in the storm. Tremors bounced through his legs, but he hid deep in the cloak, a mouse against dragons. Voices lost. He sucked in his lips and tried not to fall into the gale growing in his lungs. Frozen in place from the weight of water and the cruelty of the sea, he tried to drag himself out of the spot. Black stone pulsed with the grumble of a dragon, but the more he fought against his own bones, the more it pressurized his chest. Arrows protruded out of a giant's back on the orders of a king.

Water slipped past Fenrer's pale lips.

Death followed the dawn more than it chased the dusk.

Infernal Hells. Hells. Obscura damned— Reyn brought both hands to his temples and tried to pierce his own skull with the necklace and shatter the crown of the kingdom's perception. I can't even save one Storm Warden. I can't even save the son of the man I considered a father.

"Oi, Reyn."

Reyn looked up at his giant brother when he set a hand on his shoulders. Soren. Gustul. Small as a mouse underneath the claw of a dragon. "Go get dry and get some sleep," he said, stern. It didn't fit his reveler of a brother. "I'll check on Bryn and see if he needs anything."

Reyn nodded and let Gustul take the reins he found himself too weak and powerless to hold onto. Five Turns on the burnt throne, and still I can't make that cruelty right. I can't take back what my father did to them. Soren... His feet dragged against the stone floor of the castle. Under the weight of despair, he fought for the hope of his people against the Derelict darkness in Fenrer's place. I will return this necklace to you, Pyren. I will protect this oath of yours until you drag yourself out of the Echo Obscura. Reyn dug his fingers into the wyvern's wings. I can make that single promise, not as a king, but as that boy you refused to give up on. Jealousy. Envy. Both strangled him in Sungrove at the realisation Fenrer had something he could never have while the previous king sat the throne. Love. Comfort. The warmth of hearth and home.

Nonetheless, Fenrer held out his hand with a smile and a singular belief, undeterred by the darkness inside his own heart, extending that same warmth to him.

A tyrant stole it from Fenrer.

A powerless king trapped to observe the hand the Ancients dealt Fenrer in the jaws of the ocean and the death in constant motion behind the last of the Pyrens.

I must have faith and hope that you will weather this, Fenrer. I will try and figure out an answer to give for when you awaken. Until then, rest easy on the wind. You're home. Sea to never ending sea. You're home.