The Dawn

The Dawn

----

Talos and Casiama returned to the mundane world after a long night of long-awaited passion. The elf had taught him much of magic last night; for one, the mere fact that an expert conjurer could teleport people at all. While Casiama was only capable of teleporting point-to-point between her other-dimensional plane and back to the same point of origin, he still found it positively awe-inspiring; not to mention potentially useful. Another skill of the elven princess that simply amazed him.

Casiama returned to the world moving with a bit less grace this morning; a small symptom of a night they would both remember for years to come. Alanna was still asleep when they returned, and the pair quickly vacated the tent to ensure she kept that way at least for a time. For all the sorceress's faults, Casiama still felt guilty for the events of the night before.

She stepped daintily behind Talos as he began a fire in the chill morning and cleared her throat. "So. What will you do about..." Casiama spoke hesitantly, eyes flickering between Talos and the tent.

A branch was added to the blaze when the kindling was lit. Talos didn't turn towards her as he replied, knowing of what she spoke of. "Haven't really had time to think of it, Cass," Talos smirked, finally taking a seat on the ground. He was starving, hoping Casiama could conjure some more food. "If you mean to ask if I'll forgive her... Probably not. It's far from my mind, anyway."

Casiama shook her head, wrapping her arms around Talos' neck as he sat. "No, not that. That's, um... entirely up to you. I'm wondering if you're still going to... you know," she frowned, failing to find the words that would heal her fluttering heart. "If you'll still be with her."

"Hah!" A sharp reply to a poignant question. Unlike Alanna, Casiama couldn't read his mind and so she persisted, pressing her palms into his shoulders.

"I need to know."

Talos replied with an exasperated sigh, leaning his head against Casiama's leg. "Do you remember of when we first met?"

"You mean when you almost killed me?" Casiama replied huskily, squeezing his shoulders.

"Err... after that. After I had cooled off. When you removed the amulet," Talos started, pausing before adding "oh, and if anyone ever asks how we met; you attacked first," he grinned, stoking two fires simultaneously.

Casiama sighed with a soft chuckle, giving him the victory on the second topic. "I remember, Talos."

"What would have happened then? If Alanna wasn't there?" he asked with a smirk. Casiama just giggled at first, kneeling behind him and hugging him around his chest.

"I don't know. However much you would have let me get away with, I suppose," the elf replied slyly.

"Yeah," Talos replied hoarsely, immediately. "It wasn't just you, Cass. My reaction to that moment was the most unsure I've ever felt in all my years. If I had any less willpower I would have pounced on you then, audience be damned. And that doubt, that hesitation... it gnawed at me endlessly," Talos spoke gruffly, frowning with guilty conscious. "You don't need to worry about her. If anything, I apologize for letting it go on after that."

"No, Talos, you couldn't have known," Casiama hastily reassured, finally releasing him to sit beside him at the fire's edge. "There's nothing to apologize for. I thought

I

was the one insane, thinking that way of a man I just met."

A serene silence washed over the pair. Casiama hugged her own legs, leaning against Talos as he stared at the fire. Talos broke the quiet first.

"It

is

a little crazy, Cass," he admitted with a smirk. "Say, you got anything to eat?"

The elf nudged him playfully with her shoulder before acquiescing to his request.

--

Alanna awoke alone under the cold dome of fur, acutely aware of her embarassment over her actions the night before. Alanna had, in a rage when she felt the elf's mind once again imagine usurping her throbbing throne, intended to embarass the elf. She wanted her to feel fear, wanted Talos to laugh at her quivering form.

Then she heard the elf's confession. Alanna couldn't help but start weeping when she heard those words, bawling when her man had reciprocated without a second thought. She had cried herself into a restless slumber after they teleported away, a magic she recognized well.

Alanna silently dressed with red eyes when she heard the laughter outside the tent. Pulling her pants to her hips with some effort, she left the protection of the bear furs to see her man eating next to a small campfire, Casiama giggling with her legs draped over his lap.

"

No. Not my man,"

Alanna thought morosely.

She didn't know what to say. She wanted to cry out, to defy the sight before her. She wanted to apologize for acting like a jealous schoolchild last night. But most of all, she wanted to hide. She wanted to go home.

"Morning, Alanna," she heard the man mumble between bites of pork. The elf looked up at her with angry eyes before her gaze softened. Unreadable. Alanna didn't have the courage to enter her anymore.

"Breakfast?" Talos asked, raising a skewer over his head in a show of peace.

Always the professional.

--

The trio had arrived at their destination as the sun held itself high above their heads. Casiama had reached the complex first, dancing around the statues and inoperable fountains with an undeniable joy. The elf explained the significance of each marble form as they walked through the gardens of her ancestors, giddy with glee. Alanna was just passing the statue of Calion 'the White', First of his Name, when the elf spun on her heel, grabbing her white-and-gold cloak as it floated gracefully around her.

"Okay. Remember not to touch

anything

before asking me. The mausoleum should open up into a massive hall, but the main gates should still be barred inside. I should be able to open them," the elf looked unconfidently towards the stone, "by remembering who I am."

Talos spoke after a moment of silence. "Quite the vague clue, Casiama. Anything else to go on?" The elf shook her head in silent reply before Alanna spoke up, remembering her dream from another life.

"I think I know," she said tersely.

--

The entrance hall of the mausoleum was spartan compared to it's exterior. Dark and drab, grey stone facing grey stone. Thousands of identical crests lined their path towards a blank stone wall, all labeled with the signature of Casiama's forebears; a phoenix in flight.

Alanna felt the magic in the stone at the end of the hall. It had to be the gate she dreamt of. She looked back, her companions walking together under torchlight, examining the room with a patience she didn't have. She sighed and stood up, walking a third of the way towards the entrance of the tomb before placing a hand on one of the crests and removed it from the stone.

"Guys, it's this one," she said matter-of-factly, displaying the crest before returning to the anterior of the hall. Her companions crowded around her, watching as she placed the small symbol on the wall. Bright lights flowed from the center where the crest lay to the ceiling and corners of the room.

But the gate hadn't budged.

Behind them, the clattering of stone sounded loudly, echoing through the hall. Two large figures were being constructed with parts of the mausoleum walls and floor. Stone golems, ten feet tall.

The monstrosities had started running towards them before Talos shouted something Alanna didn't pick up, pointing at the golem on the left. Casiama bounded towards it without a second thought. Alanna watched Talos as he ran towards the golem to their right before she spun back to the wall and pressed her hand against it.

She got it wrong, she knew. Her dream had led her here, but hadn't reveal the correct key.

She watched Casiama roll away from one of the golems, distracting it from the sorceress for now. Talos swung his sword at his monstrous opponent, metal ringing against solid stone as it bounced away worthlessly.

"

That's it!"

Alanna exclaimed mentally, thinking back to the elf's words outside the tomb. The crest had been only half of the puzzle.

"Cass!" Alanna shouted over the cacophony of combat.

"What?!" she heard the elf cry back after rolling from the golem before her.

"Think of things only your family would know!" the sorceress shouted. "Remember who you are!"

--

Thousands of images flooded Alanna's mind as stone stomped on stone behind her. She had her eyes shut and hand on the wall, acting as a proxy between the exhausted elven consciousness and the cold stone under her palm.

"

Come on, come on!"

Her mind raced as her companions continued to evade the golems, their movements slowing further and further over time as their weapons proved ineffective.

Another image. No, a memory. Casiama's memory perhaps, a tiny elven girl twirling peacefully through endless fields of golden grain. The green-eyed child laughed as she spun, then fell onto her back as she panted for air. A majestic golden bird was flying circles in the sky above her...

Click

. The stone before her rumbled under her palms, glowing gold then white. It slowly sank into the ground as she lifted her hands, spinning on her heel to to see the golems, too, glowing and crumbling before her companions.

--

The tombs beyond the main hall were vast and unending, a testament to the elven family's fertility and distant lineage. Many of the rooms they entered were small, with neatly-adorned walls displaying intricate murals of that persons' accomplishments. But the small rooms held no gold, few treasures to be had.

That is, until they entered a small antechamber further inside, which had opened up into a cavernous circular room of marble.

"The hall of kings," Casiama whispered in awe, her mouth agape as she explored onwards.

--

The elf spent two full days in her family's mausoleum, whispering a prayer under her breath to a distant relative whenever she entered a new room. She collected every treasure and artifact she could find, temporarily storing them in her own plane before moving on to the next. It was easy for the elf, the ever-present Law of Consent allowing her to take these artifacts from their resting places with little effort due to her lineage.

Casiama's efforts had left Talos and Alanna with much free time as they waited for the princess to finish her work. Yet if previous events had not occurred, Talos and Alanna wouldn't still be waiting here at all. They would have marched away, leaving the princess to her familial duty while the humans raced off to their next adventure. A continuous, beautiful adventure, one which Alanna had been sure not three days ago would last a lifetime. They had not yet conversed of topics unrelated to their journey since Casiama's confession.

"Talos..." Alanna muttered weakly, stepping anxiously closer as the man sharpened his sword by their tent. She was unable to read him again, finding herself cut off from his thoughts. A stranger once more.

"Hey, Alanna," he greeted professionally.

Alanna pouted, absentmindedly running a hand against her belly as she spoke. "We need to talk."

"And we are. Fortunately," Talos shrugged, laying his sword against the rock he sat on.

"I-" Alanna uttered, soon forgetting what she had wanted to mention. She decided to speak from the heart instead. "I'm sorry. It's... this isn't fair to me, you know?" she said, gesturing between a man sitting and a tomb. "None of it is. Why am I the one left alone, Talos? Did we truly share so little?" Her arms fell to her side, hands balled into fists.

She gave him three moments to reply, and even attempted to read him once more with apprehension.

"Answer me!"

"Of course not. I made a choice, Alanna. It's not exactly a coin toss."

"But... I read you, Talos. I know it wasn't a lie when you declared me beautiful. When you said I was strong, when I fucking saved your life after the wyvern!"

"I'm not saying you aren't," he shrugged, turning away from her swiftly.

"When you said you loved me..." she choked out.

Another pregnant silence. Talos rose to his feet, a hand on his chin as he mulled over possible solutions to an unsolvable problem.

Animosity,

he mused. Animosity allows one to grieve sooner, allows one to return from the abyss through blaming an undesirable outcome on the vicious actions of another. He answered the weeping girl with a heart full of guilt.

"When did I say that?" he asked coldly with back turned, ambling towards the mausoleum without awaiting a reply.

--

Casiama had finally searched every room until she stopped before the one at the very end of the hall. This particular tomb had troubled Casiama since she had first spied it, and she saved it for last. It was labeled as the resting place of Kianra, the goddess of wind and air. The marble etching had confused the elf, and she found its mere existence impossible.

Because a goddesses wouldn't need a tomb. Because goddesses couldn't

die

.

She stepped through the opening to Kianra's chamber, holding Talos' hand nervously as she crept along the ancient marble. The room would have been completely empty if not for one object shining brightly at the center of the chamber. Casiama released Talos' hand, her mouth agape as she stepped towards it.

Casiama's eyes widened as she removed the sword from its stone resting place. "It can't be..." she whispered, incredulosity filling her mouth. She held it up, just for a brief moment, eyes transfixed as if trying to recall some distant memory. Casiama flipped the blade dextrously in her hand, offering it to Talos pommel first as if she had remembered.

"Talos. This is Dawnbringer. The personal blade of Sinderion the First, the founder of my house. It's rumored to have been hammered in the divine forge of Absolon himself..." she uttered weakly, her words barely audible. "And I want you to have it. I offer it to you freely."

He graciously took the sword from her and lifted it to the light of his torch, its brilliance radiating with the magic of days long forgotten. The blade, two inches longer than his bastard sword, shone a bright silver that seemed to brighten up the hall around him with a pale glow. Dark steel bands waved and spun down the blade's center from tip to hilt, a hilt entirely made of white-gold and styled as the wings of a majestic bird. The pommel, a gigantic sapphire held in place by a white-gold talon, balanced the sword perfectly in his hand. It felt not half the weight of his bastard sword, light as a midsummer's breeze.

His eyes were bright as stars. But he hadn't earned this treasure, and it would lose its brilliance in his possession. Talos offered the sword back to the elf. "No, Cass, I can't accept-"

"You can, Talos. And you must."