Laura VII: The Tempest

The Rhan was swelling again, even though the fire Rhan had worked so hard to quench had finally abated. Laura had almost ventured into the water to question why, but she had nothing to offer Rhan and no partner to initiate contact with, unless Duchesne was significantly more altruistic than everything about his words and actions had implied. Even then, he wasn’t exactly someone she could trust, and probably halfway to Villenueve by now.

Stranger still, the Rhan had waves rippling down from the west towards Charenton. Accompanying the swells were relentless rains, crucial to finally quelling the fire, but not altogether pleasant. The sky was still thick with smoke from the fires, painting the sky with a sunset orange that never abated in the sun. The frigid patches of rain took on the color as it fell, as if it were fire raining down on their heads.

Duchesne had recommended a tavern called Shiru when they parted ways for its beverages and clientele both, so Laura had elected to wait out the rain with a drink in one hand and a hand-roll in the other. Duchesne knew the owner, who’d helped him hide beneath the floorboards once when the Empress’s customs officers had broken down the door, which made it unlikely anyone would bother Laura here. If she found any criminals or dissidents up for joining her on her suicide mission, that would be a bonus too. For the moment, the mead here was selling point enough. Imported from the Arboreum, apparently, in one large shipment of many as people fled Avalon’s occupation in droves.

Irritatingly, the streets were flooded enough that a thin layer of water puddled around the door to the tavern, flickering a yellow reflection of the lamp above it. Worse, Avalon’s airborne armada was a lot less likely to fly through a storm like this. Laura had counted on them passing over Fleuville on their way back to Avalon, at least close enough to see and follow, but they’d be completely insane to fly through skies like these.

I suppose I could try flying down towards Micheltaigne. Better chance I’d get a glimpse of them, at least, and that’s all it would take. The mountains had taken on a wasteland quality with all of their vegetation burned, their soil blackened with soot, but that unfortunate fact would have the benefit of keeping the sightlines clearer. It would be hard for them to hide, even if they’d moored them on the ground.

Yes, Laura decided as she signaled the tavernkeep to close out her tab, that sounds like the plan. She felt her posture straighten as she came to the resolution, the end of her turmoil finally in sight.

It was time to be getting out of here anyway. The atmosphere was beginning to sink beneath even its unimpressive starting point, with hushed murmurs fearing the Rhanoir Empress’s imminent capitulation. She’d already pulled back all of her forces north and south of the Rhan, cowering in the most easily defensible triangle of land between the two forks and the sea that had saved the Rhanoir Renarts from the brink in the War of the Three Cubs. Too, if rumors were anything to go by, she’d turned away the Red Knight of Lorraine at the border and cast off any chance of his aid, just to avoid provoking Avalon.

When it came to rumors and the Red Knight, there was absolutely no reason to think there was even the barest kernel of truth, but that didn’t stop all these annoying taverngoers from mumbling anxiously about it.

Worse, right next to Laura at the bar, a woman in some absurd feathered costume was bothering a hooded dark-haired girl too loudly to ignore. “It’s nothing salacious, just an appropriate appreciation of an admirable androgyne anatomy.”

“Androgyne? Is that supposed to sell me on it? I was raised better than to consider such things.” The dark-haired girl scoffed, drawing Laura’s attention enough to see that, beneath her headband, it looked more dark blue than black. One of Leclaire’s maybe, though it was hard to imagine why she’d be so far from home, and the color wasn’t quite right either.

“Modeling is an art like any other, only disrespected by those with fear and shame for their own forms.” Behind her back were small, clear wings tinted purple like a dragonfly’s, with what looked like motley peacock feathers hanging off her arm and dress. The colors matched the wreath of flowers on her head, but she looked more like a player in The Queen of the Pixies than an actual person. “And there’s nothing base about it. I’ve drawn aristocrats aplenty, from Lord Vincenne to the Red Knight to the Fox-King of Malin. You would merely be joining an exalted company of the courageous and capable.”

Lord Vincenne was Her Verdance’s Prime Minister, if Laura recalled correctly, and hadn’t survived the fall of Lorraine. Easy enough to claim credit with a dead man, and appending narratives onto the Red Knight was practically free. Lucien, on the other hand…

“I’m not an aristocrat!” she snarled. “And that’s not the issue anyway. No disrespect to your craft, but I need to keep a low profile right now.”

“On the run? In danger?” The annoying player slid closer to the other girl. “If death is impending, is it not all the more important to leave mementos to follow your life? None will forget what you looked like, not even the slightest detail. Your friends can better treasure the time you had, sure to always remember your face.”

“You didn’t sound like you were just asking to draw my face.”

“I’m happy to follow whatever boundaries you would set, of course! A portrait would be sufficient, and once I had the sketch and the palette you wouldn’t even need to hold your position that carefully. A few hours, at most.”

“She said no,” a hooded man growled, walking up to the bar. Hair red flecked with white, he towered over the annoying pixie woman.

“I don’t know, Nerio, she’s got a point. Everyone thinks I’m dead already, so if we can’t—”

“Lower your voice.” Nerio’s words were whispered, technically, but loud enough that he only called more attention towards the bar. “We need to go, right this instant. The swelling of the Rhan must have disrupted the blockade they set against us, but it won’t be long before they get it set up again. Where’s Gautier?”

The girl held up her hands. “Gone. He said he was going to find you, since we weren't having any luck with the people we talked to. Left hours ago.”

“That treacherous swine. Can’t you see he won’t be coming back?” Nerio sighed. “When all’s said and done, I’ve no doubt he’ll be strung up for his desertion, but in the meantime we have to leave. Right now, my—” He bit his lip. “This instant.”

“Good riddance, honestly. He did nothing but complain.” The girl shrugged. “How do you plan to leave, anyway? We still haven’t found a boat, unless you had better luck at the harbor. And I’m sure you don’t want us to try fl—”

“Quiet! Don’t mention anything that could identify you. Discretion is paramount for your safety.” Nerio covered his face with his hand. “I’m afraid the Empress closed the harbor down. No one was willing to take us, with or without the discretion we require. You really couldn’t find a single captain here after three hours? This place is a smuggler’s den, a wretched backwater of vice and criminality.”

That earned him a glare from the bartender, and probably spit in the next thing he ordered, but the hulking man continued undeterred. “My sources were quite certain it would be the best location to find someone who wouldn’t ask any questions. How many people did you and Gautier talk to?”

The girl opened her mouth, sputtering. “Uh, a few. A bunch, I mean! Like this pixie woman! Turns out she’s not a captain, unfortunately. More of an artist.”

The pixie nodded, inserting herself between the strangers who sure seemed to be an aristocrat and her retainer. “I’d never even been on a boat before taking the ferry across the Norforche, though my home is right on the water. I tried to draw it, but landscapes were never my specialty.”

Nerio glowered. “Would you excuse us, please?”

“Oh, that’s fine. Say whatever you’d like. I’m great at keeping secrets! I’m holding onto a couple now that you wouldn’t believe, really juicy stuff. And I didn’t tell you, so you can be sure I won’t—”

“Please,” the girl requested. “We really need to talk in private.”

Not doing a great job of that, so far. From the sounds of it, they were here for more or less the same reasons Laura was, seeking louche figures on the wrong side of the law for a delicate task. And whoever they were, staying clear of the Rhan Empress was almost certainly the correct call, given the way she was rolling over for Avalon.

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It’s despicable, that weakness. The Arboreum had lost, but they’d gone out fighting. Her Verdance hadn’t escaped until it was truly the last option, and the people there were still spilling Avaline blood from the shadows.

Micheltaigne was little better, though they’d been reduced to such oblivion that the capitulation was more understandable, if nonetheless the wrong choice. The royal family had been essentially wiped out in a single day, leaving only one missing princess who was probably dead and a distant relation left to bow to Avalon in chains. There was no honor in such a surrender, and all it accomplished was sparing Avaline soldiers, keeping them fresh for future wars of conquest.

In the far corner, a familiar, infuriating tune was beginning.

“Would you mind excusing us as well, mademoiselle?” the girl asked, and it was a moment before Laura realized she was talking to her.

“You’re excused.” Laura sipped her drink, turning her head away to pretend she hadn’t been eavesdropping.

“No, I mean, could you please leave us for a minute while we talk?”

You must be joking. “Get the fuck out of here! I was here first. You want to talk privately, talk privately somewhere else. You don’t just get to claim the bar.” Laura scoffed. “And if you want a captain that can be trusted, see if you can find an old man named Duchesne at the harbor. There’s a chance he hasn’t left yet. Very expensive, but worth the price if you need discretion.”

There, do the old man a favor and get these entitled fucks out of my bar. Always nice to squeeze in one more good deed before it was too late.

The girl’s mouth hung open. “You heard that?”

“You aren’t very subtle. Now I guess it’s my turn to say, ‘Leave’.”

The girl and the knight exchanged a look, eyebrows raised.

“Though I don’t see what your rush is. The Rhan’s about as choppy now as it’s ever been, flooding the banks too. The only thing more dangerous than sailing in this weather is flying in it.” Like I’m about to do, as soon as I finish this drink.

After all the work it had taken to get here, the obstacles and mishaps and close calls just to make it to the battlefield that mattered the most, Laura felt a strange lightness of being, almost impossible to bear. This is my destiny, the last great thing I can do. There shouldn’t have been any more to it than that, and perhaps there wasn’t. Perhaps…

The bards in the corner were still going, dressed in a similar motley to the artist from the bar. One of them played a flute, another some kind of bulbous Avaline lute, and the final one was singing those fucking words.

“And after the death, of the heart of the hearth, in the glow of her vile perfidy,

The treacherous, erstwhile sage of Flammare, would have done better simply to flee,

But she wasn’t content

with the one victory.

Her bloodlust was unbound,

Detached from decency-y-y!

The days were like the nigh-igh-ghts

Bereft of warmth from Soleil

Flammare brought back the ligh-igh-ight

But to Laura Bougitte, he stood in the way!

So she turned on Flammare, led him straight to his death, at the hands of Florette, bandit queen of the we-e-est!”

Laura got up from her seat and walked over to the singer, warm from the fire inside her. “Alright bard, let’s make a deal.” She pulled out her sword, glowing with faint green fire. “You stop playing that song, and I let you keep all your limbs. Seems fair, right?”

The bard shrank back, the song mercifully interrupted. “We-we’ll play anything you want. We love to take requests. Um… Maybe The Fox Cubs? Dance in the Skies? Or, if you’re willing to go further afield, I just heard this Avaline song called Millenium Geste. Tragic, haunting, but beautiful all the same.”

“I don’t care!” Laura slashed her sword down in front of them, sending sparks into the air. “What matters is that you don’t play that song now and you won’t play it ever. It’s nothing but a bunch of lies.”

“Uh…” The bard had backed all the way into the corner, and seemed scared to realize he had no further left to retreat. “Wait, are you—?”

“Yes,” Laura hissed, deciding it was time to go. Keeping quiet didn’t matter anymore, so she raised her voice. “My name is Laura Eugènie Bougitte, last sage of Flammare, and I am fed up with your slander! Flammare was tricked by Montaigne and that Florette girl, stabbed in the back so that they could put up their mountain hermit as the sun. This, after I convinced Flammare to help them in the White Night. You want to sing, sing about that.”

Laura returned her sword to her belt, standing taller as she turned towards the door. “Better yet, sing about how I took down Avalon’s armada single handedly. I’ll try to give you a good view.”

“You’re going after them alone?” the girl with dark blue hair asked incredulously. “They just defeated the High King and his entire army; they reduced the peerlessly beautiful Monts de Michel to a wasteland; they ripped Nuage Sombre right out of the High King’s dead hand. Elite Pegasus Knights were cut down by surprise before they could even get their mounts saddled. What few remained couldn’t take down more than four of their ships before they were shot out of the sky with those tiny cannons they’re using now. If you go after them alone, you’ll die.”

Nerio put a hand on her shoulder, glowering disapprovingly.

“So what? If I die, it will be a good death, perhaps even enough to clean some of the mud from my name. If not, I’ll keep trying until I find a better one. I’m not just going to capitulate, to run and hide like Her Verdance or the Rhan Empress. I was raised to be strong, to fight for what’s right and defend my honor. Well, it might be too late for that, but it’s not too late to die with honor.”

Laura slashed her sword twice, cutting an X shape into the door before kicking it open and walking out. She flew into the red sky without another word, feeling the rain flatten against her face the faster she rose.

Telling the truth felt good, finally finished with the need to hide anything. If things went well, maybe she’d even be remembered for half of who she was, rather than Fernan’s lies.

Wanting to conserve what remained of her life for the fight proper, Laura switched to her sword once she was high enough off the ground, gripping it firmly as she blasted fire downwards, ascending higher and higher through the thundering clouds and choking smoke, higher and higher and higher until—

Laura punched through the final cloud, greeted by the eerie calm of blue skies and sunlight. She hovered there a moment, taking in the beauty of it one last time with a mix of anticipation and resignation.

A smile split her face when she saw that Avalon had thought of the same idea.

Floating above the clouds were, by Laura’s count, thirty-one airships heading north from Micheltaigne. Headed right to me.

This is it.

Laura cut the fire from her sword, immediately plunging back into the clouds and out of their sight.

Instantly, the road of thunder returned, the red haze and dark clouds working in tandem to pelt Laura’s face with scarlet rains. She felt the wind try to blast her off course, but nothing could deflect her from her mission now. It was, in more ways than one, the ultimate fight Laura would ever join, the culmination of all her training as a warrior.

The return on all the instruction I got along the way. From Valentine, from Aurelian, from Flammare…

From Lucien, however briefly. Laura couldn’t help but wonder what he would think when he heard the news. Or what he thinks right now. He had a good head on his shoulders, but would he see through the lies with Leclaire pouring poison in his ear? If past experience was anything to go by, it wasn’t promising.

It didn’t matter. This would redeem everything, a new Laura Bougitte cleansed at the dawn of this new age, forever marked by her actions, even if she wouldn’t live to see its culmination.

Laura stopped blasting herself forward for an instant, redirecting her sword to fling herself above the clouds just an instant before a crack of thunder filled the air.

In a way, it’s sad. It would have been nice to see how people reacted, but it would forever be impossible to observe how people reacted to your own death. Unless you’re the sort of lying snake to fake it for political ends, anyway. How Lucien could still accept her after that…

Laura gripped her sword tighter, slicing it backwards to blast herself up the last stretch towards one of the airships towards the rear of the formation. No one had spotted her yet, it seemed.

Perfect.

Abandoning any semblance of restraint, she continued upward, dragging her flaming sword along the edge of the balloon as she cut through its skin. The vessel exploded the moment she reached the top, flinging Laura far above the armada and instantly alerting the other ships to the threat.

Laura somersaulted forward, tucking her arms into a dive as she descended towards the next ship, already hearing the roar of gunfire in the air.

You have no idea what you’re up against, Avalon. I have nothing to lose.