YUVEN

Gulls called out for their return — a swell of relieved happiness driving down the rust in his throat as he sat in his entrapment of a bed within the cabin as they moved the major injuries off the galleon when it made port. Neven waited in the corner of his room with Maria long out of sight, and Adara moved off onto the harbor. Everything fell into imperfect, broken pieces of his goal. "Neven," Yuven drew out his Guardian's name, who shuffled on his clawed boots of a Naveeran armor style. Scaled chains wrapped around his hips and fell along his thighs in thick, but malleable metal plating. Larger scales for a wyvern. Yuven picked at the frayed edges of the blanket, then mumbled, "You do not have to sit with me if you want to go see Fenrer. He is in the next room over." Yuven nodded at the wall. "There is much I need to talk to you about..."

"And there is much I would tell you," Neven replied with a flick of his wheat-spun feathers, damp from his romp with the sea drifting Derelicts. His gaze swept over him, and his Guardian smiled, unchanged from the Turns he had last seen him. Sapphire sparkles danced across the abyss in the sea, and he detached himself from the wall with a wave of his hand. "Are you well enough to make that trip? Do you not want to check on Fenrer have the attack?"

Yuven slipped his tongue between his fangs and lifted himself out of bed. Melted jelly squished into his kneecaps, but he nodded and shuffled, with Neven matching his pace with a patient flow. Out into the creaking corridor, Yuven escorted — or was escorted, to the room over. Neven clicked open the door and let it swing on its own hinges. His fingers stuck to his own when he held Fenrer over the fog of death, trying to drag him up the crags. His boots scrambled against his tormented realization that only one would ever make it out alive. Though he dug his heels in, Fenrer let him go and disappeared into the jaws of white foam. Yuven carried himself into a corner of shame when Neven loomed over Fenrer, who evidently passed out during the attack. "Did Maria tell you what is wrong with him?"

"Pneumonia, yes." Neven rested both his hands on Fenrer's shoulders. "I am just happy to see that you two are alive, would that you both were unharmed along with it." He released Fenrer before drawing up the blankets further, a reflection of what they once were. In a small house on the cusp of the beach, shining in morning light. Neven's lips curled into a strange, out of place sense of agony with his fangs bared when he turned to Yuven, but it died on the whisper of the ocean breeze.

This is my fault. Yuven chewed on his cheek and settled his heels in when Neven scooped up the wolven pin on the table. You bid me to take care of each other, but... I haven't been doing any of that and Fenrer's been doing everything. He studied his Oathbound as he slept, left in the peaceful sleep instead of the deathly doze he forced him into when they walked the blizzard's cruel grip.

"I would hear your tribulations, Yuven," he said, then put it back down with a soft clink and approached him with a shake from his arms. "But, all of that can wait. You both need rest. You are home now." Yuven frowned when Neven rested his hands on his shoulders, stopping the trembling of his life. "We can talk more after." He clapped him on the arm, and nudged Yuven out of Fenrer's room. Out of the cusp of his ignorant mistakes and back into his flimsy sense of peace of his cabin, back in his bedsheets. Neven took the seat Maria once occupied, now empty of her thick tome of research materials. His fellow Irimountian — the one whose home he destroyed in the grip of the Husk, and left into ruins of another. Yuven licked his lips with the truth, and tried to drag it out of his heart.

An interruption came in the form of Maria and a couple of Storm Wardens shuffling past her with a folded litter. "Everything has been cleared off the pier, it's time to get these two moving," she said to Neven, who got out of the chair with a nod. Yuven went to join, but he stopped when Maria placed a hand on his knee. "I think it's best for you to take it easy for a bit, Yuven. We can get you up there without issue."

"I can—"

"Walk?" Maria asked. "I'm sure. You're still awake, so we're going to move Fenrer first."

"I have no complaints on that matter." Yuven slipped out of her grasp and swayed on his heels. "I can wait on deck. I will not go running off. I need to taste the air after being trapped down here for a few days out of the gulf of Sivaport." Neven squinted, and he scoffed at Miesero's blatant suspicion. "I do mean that this time." He shooed him out of his room to help the other Wardens with the much more weakened Fenrer Pyren. With one extra body out of his way, he let himself slip into Maria's strong arms, who supported him without conditional strings to go along with them. Among those he loved the most after his journey full of agony and strife. And I'm not done yet... He settled a hand on his chest when Maria hobbled him out of the corridor and up the steps to the deck. A laugh bubbled into his lungs at the wondrous sight of Euros' spires striking themselves out of the tallest peaks of the archipelago. Maria's hand slipped down the small of his back and he found himself placed on the ground with his back against the rim of the boat, in the beautiful splendor of his home.

The citadel's golden spires pulsed out pure magick power birthed from the thermal energy in the bowels of the mountain, the volcano's force providing them power for their magitek and letting it release any added pressure to prevent a catastrophic explosion. Magick of the world which worked in tandem along the flow. People bounced across the harbor, waving their greetings to the Storm Wardens arrival. Houses lined the edge, out of the way of the waves as they splashed into the runes along the marble piers. On either side of the great steps up into the caldera proper, a system of lifts went back and forth between the several layers, connecting the top from the bottom in an efficient manner for those who needed the quick arrival. Yuven smiled at the memories of long days of training, where they found themselves rushing up and down the steps for hours on end, memorizing every piece of the great mountain puzzle. Every route and everyone who lived on the archipelago with them.

Hippogryphs fluttered around the spires, swooping through the peaks. Some disappeared behind the mountain, their chosen grounds for peace from the Storm Wardens constant need, though Riders found themselves more welcome than non-Riders. Tix'snuv's call continued to echo through the air, and agitation swept through his limbs with a desperate need for wings. He tipped his head to the side when a couple of children ran through the distant park, bouncing on the carved sets as adults watched their peaceful, idyllic days.

The one place Derelicts found themselves unable to pierce through.

Yuven snapped back into his reality when Neven and another Warden lifted Fenrer's litter up onto the deck, giving each other quiet directions as their feet matched the pace. Yuven dragged himself to his feet, eyeing Maria as Neven went past them with his fallen Oathbound.

"Yuven." Maria pushed her hand into his cheek and pulled him to her sunlight as Neven and the Warden descended the gangplank with Fenrer between them. "He'll be okay."

Yuven shook his head in one quick motion, but leaned on the banister as the rest fell in line and ran through the harbor, free from the torment of their lives. Her arm wound around his waist as she guided him down the gangplank as Neven and the Warden lifted Fenrer onto a wheeled stretcher. Neven stood beside Fenrer. "Get them on the lift to the caldera. I bid everyone else to clear out the port of supplies," he ordered, bearing the weight of responsibility when he turned to Yuven with a soft smile before allowing another WArden to take control of Fenrer's stretcher, then indicated to another one brought closer.

Ugh. Yuven eyed Maria, who returned it with unwavering conviction. Maria sent her fist into his shoulder with a wry smile of her cruel humor, and he set himself down on it with a huff, with Neven taking the end of it himself. "I hope you don't expect me to lie down."

"I do, in fact." Maria pressed the heel of her palm into his brow and he found himself flat against his back from the sheer strength of her giant heritage. Yuven propped himself up on his elbows, and she led the way for Neven to follow. Against her wishes, he sat up straighter.

"What is it you wish to discuss with me?" Yuven asked.

"I remember saying that any discussions could wait." Neven's sapphire eyes glittered in amusement.

"You do not expect me to sit still silently?"

"Absolutely not." Neven pushed them closer to the great lift which rode on the sides of the carved staircase, skipping the winding pathways into the upper echelons of the citadel. "But I will discuss those things with you when you two are settled. It is more something I must need discuss with Fenrer, but there is also something I must tell you."

"And what is that?"

Neven's nose twitched. "I will not be falling for that, Yuven. Lie down."

"You are a spoil wart."

"Isn't the Common proverb spoil sport?"

Yuven shrugged and went to stretch out his legs, but stiffened a cracking whip of energetic heat. He pressed his hand into Neven's chest, choking the straps of his armor. Wriggly black worms caressed the edge of his eyes, a blinking flash as he faced down Fenrer's conviction in the mirage of Irimount. His heartbeat throbbed in his ears, a nauseating stickiness overflowing in his throat as the worms grew teeth and chewed at the world until nothing remained except the inky abyss. His cheek stung against the icy tiles of the gaol, overflowing with black blood. Bubbles breathed underneath the darkness, and the roar of a wyvern cracked the mirror of death.

"Yuven?" a distant voice asked.

He tore open his eyes.

Sunlight glittered past the blinds of his missed trip. Delicate scents filled his nose when he squinted up at the blurry figure with golden hair. It bounced between two, into one solid Maria. Her frown intensified and his confusion screamed at the continuous movement of the flow. "You know where you are?"

"No idea... We're on Euros."

Maria's shoulders slacked. "You're in the upper citadel ward now. Your flash lasted for thirty seconds." Her hand wrapped around his back and she lifted him up into a sitting position, pushing a cup of thick liquid into his hands. "Drink. It should help with any pain."

"Good to see we're both in shite positions, aye," a raspy voice asked in weary Common, waving with the Hanekan sea.

Yuven lunged around and almost fell off his bed at the familiar lilt. Fenrer laid upon the next bed over, raising an eyebrow at him before giving him a small, weak wave. On either side of them, Neven dove into a book — a Naveeran one, from the spiralling cover of snowflakes. Yuven found his knees bracing for the leap, and in one quick movement, Maria stopped him short from lunging himself at Fenrer.

"Don't push it," she said.

"Have I been asleep this whole time?" Yuven asked.

"You've been out for a few bells," Neven muttered beside him, cheek pressed against his knuckle. "I just finished a precursor discussion about the Derelict infestation on our border and I'm off for now." He snapped the book closed with a smile.

"And how long have you been awake?" he accused the flattened Hanekan in the other bed.

"Before you came to," Fenrer answered with a slight wheeze.

Maria looked between them, then mused, "Yuven, you need a couple more minutes? Need anything?"

Yuven shook his head and sat his neck upon the pillow when Maria's attention turned to Fenrer. "Back to the matter at hand then, I'll be with you shortly." She went straight for the alchemy station protected by a small curved wall.

Fenrer scooted closer. "Did I do something to piss her off, Yuven?"

"I don't know, you two discussed something about sponges back in Sivaport..."

"I can still hear you." Maria left the alchemy station with a plump phial in her palm, swirling it with her own hand as she stood between them and gave Fenrer an expression of stone. "I'm not going to bother going into detail about why I'm pissed off. This will be enough punishment." Fenrer sat up to cup the phial into his hands, but as he uncorked it, Maria put her hand on his shoulder. "Before you take a drink of that, I need to warn you about a couple things and its effects."

Fenrer tipped his head, and Yuven shuffled into his own sitting position to investigate. "Like... what?" He studied her. "Is this going to make me throw up?"

"No..." Maria's lips pursed. "You might wish it did though."

Fenrer shifted in place and winced into his chest when he took a deep breath. Maria nodded, then said, "This will clear out more of the infection and push out the phlegm stuck in your respiratory tract. Your magick should regulate itself with it out of the way and you'll be able to heal properly."

"Is that not a good thing?" Yuven questioned with a frown at Fenrer.

"Yes... but this is used as a last resort for extreme infections," Maria said with a poke of the phial. "Well, Fenrer, go on and take a drink—" Maria tugged out one of the bedsinks and heaved a small pan out from the cupboard., nudging Fenrer to sit at it. "Good luck." Her hand patted his back when Fenrer downed it in one smooth gulp.

"Good luck?" Fenrer questioned.

"Give it a minute." Maria laid out a towel on the end of his bed and pushed a thick napkin into his hands, and Yuven tipped his head when Fenrer squinted in confusion before he settled himself at the pan, awaiting the long minute.

"Anyway," Maria went to sit down.

Fenrer released a wet choke.

"And there it is." Maria returned to his side, and Yuven lunged out of his bed at the sound, but he came to a stop when Neven put a hand on his shoulder.

Fenrer dug both hands into the sides of the pan as he breathed with quiet heaviness. He bleated something out in Hanekan at Maria, holding the napkin underneath his chin when Yuven rounded the other side to check on his Oathbound and the punishment he underwent for his inability to lift him out of the jaws of the ocean. Tears escaped his eyes when phlegm flowed and he knelt closer to the pan with a tremble, pressing his nose and mouth into the napkin. Maria pushed another bundle next to him, and Fenrer's expression of dismayed disbelief caused the laugh which stuck itself into his chest to release itself.

Yuven cackled and slumped into Maria's chair at the flaming weakness in his knees as Fenrer shuddered and sniffed, sticking his tongue between his teeth though the medication continued to drain him.

We're home!

Fenrer muttered something when he released himself from its stickiness to grab another one, slumping closer to the sink-pan to rest his arms straight across it.

"What did he say?" Yuven rasped through his own disbelief.

"I'm going to kill him," Maria translated. "I think. Hard to tell."

Fenrer nodded.

"You'd have to stop getting your lungs wrung out first, first."

Fenrer's neck slumped closer to the pan with a gurgling scoff and another sniff as Neven went to his other side to put a hand on his back.

We're home.

"It'll be over in a couple minutes, but we'll have to do this for the next couple days until it's fully cleared out," Maria said with a matter-of-fact tone while Fenrer drove his hands into his brow with a low, almost annoyed moan. "Yuven, stay in bed and leave him alone," she instructed when Yuven sidled forward to poke Fenrer in the shoulder, causing his Oathbound to glare at him from another fresh napkin, disposing of the other one into the pan, thickened with the infection Fenrer carried for too long.

We're home, Molvisaliz.

Yuven sank into the seat once more, and pulled Fenrer over the edge.

We're home.