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Araya Lucaris (Elora Krisara x AndrewS)

Though her focus remained on Vander and the other remaining guard, while their vision was being impaired Kelaria was able to spare a glance in Vander's direction. Her eyebrows knit together in confusion as she watched him struggle. Why was he holding back? She knew what he was capable of, yet he was fumbling around with the two guards as though he had no more power than they did. Kelaria contemplated helping him but she knew if she lost concentration on the leader then she'd give him the opportunity he needed to take her down.

Kelaria turned her attention back to the still mounted leader. Her attention on Vander had given the remaining guard time to hide himself. Kelaria gritted her teeth. She'd have to deal with him after. He couldn't have gotten far on foot. Kelaria brought her hands towards herself. As she did the wind around her picked up more and began to blow wildly. The scarf around her hair flew off in a flash and her raven hair tumbled out around her shoulders before being picked up in the wind, whipping around her head. If there was any doubt there would be no mistaking her identity now. She looked every bit the part of Crown Princess Kelaria Etherborn.

Kelaria threw her hands in Finley's direction, causing a whirlwind to run hurtling towards him. Kelaria gritted her teeth as she willed the magic to fight his stabilizing magic and knock him from his horse. She felt the tension of her magic as it clashed with his own. She closed her eyes tightly and tried to trust in the strength in her own power. With gritted teeth Kelaria called out about the wind. "We had peace until you lot showed up! I won't let you take any more from me or my people. Not today!" she forced her magic harder against his own.
 
Metal met metal as the guard and Vander dueled, trading blows back and forth. On his best day, Vander would have wiped the floor with him, but he was still injured and his mind heavy, meaning it was more of an even fight than it should have been. Still, finesse and training shined through as Vander eventually managed to meet their blades in the middle, forcing them down towards the dirt. Pressing his shoulder into the man he was locked with, he knocked him off balance and then swept his blade upwards, slicing it against his armor. It made contact with flesh underneath, through the opening between plates, but it wasn't a killing blow. Still, it was enough to knock his opponent to the ground. Vander was forced to look into the eyes of a soldier he probably once commanded, into the fearful stare of a man from his own nation as he snuffed out his life, ending the fight.

As he finished, he felt the wind ripple around him and turned in time to see Ani's scarf fly away, revealing what she had been trying so desperately to keep hidden. Maybe it was the sheer power she was exuding, or the beautiful way the wind made her long, raven locks flow, but he couldn't help but stare, transfixed at the revelation that his gut feeling was correct; this was, without a doubt, the true heir to Astellia's throne; this was Kelaria Etherborn, surviving princess of the crown...and the very person his brother needed more than anybody else in the twin kingdoms.

The reveal seemed to have surprised Finley just as much as it had Vander. He had recoiled from the stone and dirt that had hit his face, but by the time he had recovered, he was able to witness Ani give way to her true self, the girl he was sent to capture. His scowl turned into a wide smirk as he saw his opportunity, forcing his darker magic against hers in a tug of war that was causing damage to everything else around them, tearing away rubble and what remained of homes and casting them asunder in shards and splinters of wood and castaway stones.

"There you are, princess. You've caused us a lot of trouble." Finley kept one hand upwards, exuding energy, while the other moved downwards patting his horse, Finley had instructed it to ride forward, straight towards her. The horse, who had been changed by the magic, made sounds of pain as it ran head first into Kelaria's magic, following it's orders as the energy imbued inside of it let it cut through her wind. As it did, Finley boosted himself off of it's back with a burst of magic off his own, letting the horse stampede forward, directly towards her, on a collision course with the princess. "Peace is an excuse spoken by those too comfortable to push back against their chains...too weak to fight for more. Cowards! All of them!"

She was still caught up in the back and forth, Vander was worried she wouldn't be able to react in time. He felt at odds with himself, contemplating using his magic to help her, but even with his strength, at this distance, he wouldn't be fast enough. she would have to do this on her own.
 
Watching the houses torn apart, Kelaria felt a pang of guilt and sadness. These people had so little left and though she was fighting for their lives, she was playing a part in destroying what remaining sanctuary they had left. She tightened her jaw more as she felt the strain of her magic against his. Her eyes widened as if in fear as he pushed forward towards her. She let out a gasp at the force of his dark magic threatening to snuff out her own.

Kelaria let his words sink in. She knew his type. Her world had just been overturn by his type. Men who though the only value in life was domination. Inflicting their will and power onto others. Men lost in the ego of their own strength. Kelaria let her magic weaken just a bit as she gasped again, feigning weakness. Let him believe he was succeeding. Let him believe he was dominating her. She knew that if this continued, a show of force between powers that it could go on forever and destroy every remaining thing around them. It could kill the survivors she had spent the last three days keeping alive.

As Finley trudged forward Kelaira let her magic wane inch by tiny inch until Finley's victory would seem imminent. "You- You're wrong! You're wrong about me and about my people!" She dropped her half of the tug of war in an instant, causing his horse to lurch forward as it was no longer straining against anything. Taking the opportunity while his attention and magic was forced in another direction, Kelaria scooped her right hand upwards again and this time a huge outcropping of rock shot up from the ground directly beneath Finley and his mount, launching him into the air. She dropped her hand. The raised earth sank gently but swiftly into the ground, causing Finley to fall from that impossible height as the ground disappeared beneath him.
 
Finley seemed to smirk, feeling his magic over power hers, breaking her strength with the overwhelming darkness of his own. Waning within the collision, it seemed to him as though victory was imminent, he would defeat her and then bring her back to the castle alongside the dead body of the king's exiled brother and then, he would be a made man. There would be nothing outside of his grasp, nothing he couldn't have, from this kingdom to the next. He was so over confident that he didn't even believe for a second that this was part of Kelaria's ruse.

"Your people are dead, princess." He told her, laughing, his words laced with venom and his eyes sharpened into a glare. "There's nobody left to prove me wrong."

The sudden shift of the ground beneath his horse caught him off guard as he was too caught up in his display of power that he hadn't seen the telling signs that he was being sat up. Vander watched as Finley was launched high into the air and the earth caved in beneath him, falling into what appeared to be the infinite below. How was she capable of something like this? How was she so powerful?

Even with the dark magic he had possessed, such a feat would have been nothing more than a theory or a dream, not a reality.

He slowly, cautiously approached Kelaria from behind, one hand out stretched in front of him as if to show he was stepping in peace, though the other gripped tightly around the handle of his blood-laden sword, just in case, refusing to let his guard down just yet. "Your power...I've never felt anything like it before..." He told her as he neared. With strength like that, how did their castle even fall? "Wait, I can still feel him..."

There was something sinister afoot, a massive influx of magic that felt a lot like the kind he channeled...no, even worse, it felt more like Balthier.

From within the hole in the ground came a powerful presence. Raising upwards, against the impossible gravity, was Finley, floating within an aura of purple energy. His eyes were a burning red as he rose until he was floating, on his own, above the fissure in the ground. When he spoke, his voice sounded different, somehow. He had given in to the darkness completely to save his own life, submitting to the dominion of the demonic power he had inherited.

"Failure..." He spoke, out loud. "You are a failure."

Vander reached out for Kelaria's wrist, trying to take it, to pull her away. They couldn't fight this. Not how they were, even with her incredible power. She had already used so much. He had asked himself how her castle fell with her being so powerful, but this was the only answer he needed. Finley, in this moment, was the spitting image of his brother; corrupted, unbound...inhuman.

"Your kingdom has fallen. Your people are dead. Your family's flame all but extinguished..."

"We need to go..." He instructed, hoping this time she'd listen.

"My orders were to bring you in but now, I'd rather make you join them..."

The sound of a horse galloping began to echo. Something else was coming from the hole that Finley had risen through. "Close it. Close it, right now!" Vander warned, feeling another dark presence climbing rapidly towards the surface.
 
Kelaira's eyes were bright and angry as they turned to face Vander. She didn't give herself even a heartbeat to enjoy any sort of victory. She didn't see this as a victory. "You tricked me! You're no better than he is! No-" Kelaria felt the energy shift around her. She turned her eyes in just enough time to watch Vander emerge from what should have been his grave. Her eyes widened in horror. She was at the end of her rope. She had used so much of her magic and she had used up so much these last few days healing the others. She could fight him but her chances at beating him now were so slim they may as well not exist at all. All these people... would die because of her. They would die because she couldn't just accept her fate and allow them to take her to the false king. To Vander's brother.

Kelaria hardly noticed his tug on her wrist as Vander tried to urge her to run. She simply stared in horror until she sensed the same presence Vander did. Kelaira sprang back into action. she gathered her magic around her once more and clapped her hands together as she closed the gaping hole in the earth, letting rock tumble into it. She dropped both hands low until they touched the ground them brought them up quickly. A huge wall of rock and stone came shooting from the ground, expanding for miles. and shooting high up into the air. It was her last attempt to buy these people some time to flee. "RUN!" she shouted as loudly as she could manage before she finally let Vander tug her away.
 
From within the hole in the ground traveled Finley's horse, it's hair black as tar, it's mane a furious, purple flame that left glowing, unnatural embers in the air as it rushed towards the surface. Despite her closing it, it was too fast, and the terrifying, warped creature broke free from the gap in the earth just in time for Finley to seat himself down on top of it's back. It looked like something out of a nightmare, a demonic entity devoid of human emotion riding a top a fiery steed, twisted by dark forces beyond imagination. These were horror stories that would be written in books and used as entertainment except this was anything but fabrication.

The giant wall that she had erected spanned as high as she could, separating them from this powerful threat. She finally saw reason and decided to run, letting him pull her away. As they tried to flee the village, so to did the others who were there, desperately trying to put distance between themselves and the stone wall. Over his shoulder, Vander watched as a portion of the wall began to heat up before crumbling, being burnt through from the other side by Finley and his magic. When they had forced their way through, his horse began to send him straight towards them. It floated before making contact with the grown, leaving fiery steps everywhere it's hooves touched, air or stone. It was fast, way faster than they could run. As it strode past villagers, the sheer, dark energy being released seemed to strike them down where they stood. Some collapsed, others burnt with purple, screaming and yelling in horror as they failed to get away and watched their own salvation running away from them in a fleeting attempt to save themselves as well.

This wasn't going to work. They weren't going to make it.

Vander stopped running but held on to her wrist, tightly. He dropped the sword he was holding and reached out for her other hand, holding her in place. It seemed counter productive, stopping their progress, no doubt seeming like he had changed his mind and was holding her in place as sacrifice for Finley to reach. Instead, Vander's eyes shifted and magic began to swirl around his body and, by proxy, hers. The darkness inside of him felt like it was invading her, fighting against her own light to try and take hold. "Stop fighting it. I'm trying to save you..." He warned her, finding it incredibly difficult to focus as her body naturally resisted his influence. The harder he fought against it, the more he had to exert. His heart began to race as he feared what he was about to tap into, forcing every bit of willpower he had into calming her light and enveloping her in his magic.

His crimson eyes looked directly into hers, staggered by their equally impressive color, before shutting entirely as he cast a spell. Within a flurry, the two vanished, just before Finley could reach them. One moment, they were on the path away from danger. The next, they were in a forest, miles away, surrounded not by chaos and fear but by the peaceful serenity of an untouched sea of green. The only problem was that Vander, having given in to that urge inside of him, continued to show signs of being underneath it's influence. While he wasn't nearly as far gone as Finley had been, his magic was volatile and he was struggling to keep it contained after using so much to teleport them. He groaned, loudly, in pain as tendrils of purple energy lashed out from where he stood, swiping at Kelaria and trying to envelop her in their hold once again. They seemed to move on their own, but they were stopping, intermittently, as if being pulled back before fighting against the control of their master and proceeding forward towards the princess.
 
Kelaira felt her heart sink deep in her chest as Finley melted his way through the wall. She dropped it immediatly as she saw him burst through it. There was no point now. She watched in horror, still running, as the people she had fought to save were wiped away. It had all been for nothing. She didn't end anyone's sufferings. She only prolonged it. Vander's grip on her wrist as they ran was the only thing that stopped her from turning and running to their aid in a futile attempt to save them. If only she had just allowed herself to be captured. "No no no" Kelaria gasped the words out, tears stinging in her eyes. Instead of focusing on holding Finley at bay, she focused her magic on helping as many of the villagers escape as she could. She was overextending herself and she knew it but it didn't stop her from acting.

When they suddenly halted their movement Kelaria jerked a bit against his hold on her wrist. Her eyes found his with an expression of confusion that quickly turned to anger and mistrust. why help her in the first place if he only meant to betray her in the end. "You!" She felt his dark energy trying to overpower her as Finley had. She felt suffocated by it. As his eyes shifted from gold to crimson she couldn't help but recall her dream from the night before. Vander's words sank in and against her better judgment she tried to hold her magic back from fighting his. She was aware that she may be dooming herself by choosing to trust him in this moment.

Vander's magic threatened to swallow Kelaria whole as she drew her own in to allow him to save them. She was focused so hard on not allowing herself to be crushed by it's imposing force that she didn't noticed right away that they had been teleported away from the decimated village. She broke free from his hold and staggered as she took in their new soundings. She could only take them in for a moment before she felt the hostile tendrils of his power reaching out to her. Her eyes swung to him, her anger unbridled in them. The tendrils waned for a moment before reaching out again to her, threatening to steal the air from her lungs.

Kelaira stepped backwards, still facing him as she drew up her magic around her. Wispy strands of purple and white light that swirled gracefully one around the other, reached out and wrapped themselves around his tendrils of dark magic. "You! This is all because of you!" She stepped to him, pushing her magic against him. "You'd better give me a damn good reason not to cut you down where you stand!" she allowed her magic to wrap around his arms, reading his magic's reach as an intentional attack against her. Her bright purple eyes glowed and glared into his crimson eyes. Evil eyes. Demon eyes.
 
The dark magic he could not control rebelled against her hold, forcing and fighting, locking her in another battle not unlike the one she had experienced moments ago against Finley. He needed to get control of this before it was too late, but control was the one thing he felt slipping away from him. It was always like this, it was why he didn't want to embrace his power anymore. In a true right, he could have decimated entire regiments...he had, in fact, done that very thing. His brother, and the demon who had given this strength to them, could have taken full armies. It seemed like Kelaria's light was the only force strong enough to put up a fight. If he wanted to kill her, he could have let it take control, he could have became the same as Finley, or his brother, but he didn't want to. She likely didn't realize it, but he was holding back, and even while doing so, the darkness inside him was still enough to hold her at bay.

"I don't want to fight you..." He told her, his voice pained, his eyes expressing the confliction despite their blood-red glow. "I'm trying...to stop it..."

She had every reason to hate him as much as he hated himself. He couldn't blame her for the way she responded to the hurt he had caused, but she didn't yet understand his side. He wasn't sure if she'd give him a chance to tell it, but none of that mattered if he couldn't get this under control.

Purple energy pulsed from his body, pressing forward. The tendrils began to lash more violently, shaking as if they were about to explode. As their vibration increased, they seemed to split off into more, smaller lines of magic, jabbing and poking at her magic like thousands of needles trying to pierce straight through and into her heart. Vander yelled a second time, in pure pain, as he tried with everything he had in him to call it back, to take it all back inside of him. He fell to a knee, barely catching himself as the energy began to retreat. It strained against the pull, but it was almost as if time had been reversed. They collapsed back into each other, being yanked into the direction of the source, retracing their sinister steps until the magic was but an aura swirling around him, an aura that swirled until it could no longer and it vanished.

Vander heaved forward, trying to catch his breath, gasping as he looked up at her, his eyes back to their normal, orange.
 
Kelaria gave a cry of pain as the dark tendrils of his magic turned to tiny needles, stabbing at her own magic. She put all her energy into reinforcing the shield her light created. Kelaria had expended so much that she hardly had any energy left to fight him, instead she focused on keeping her shield up against him, watching as he struggled for control. Kelaira's body sagged a bit, pulled down by the weight of exhaustion, as he finally gained control of his powers. The light surrounding her slowly faded back into her. The glow of her eyes slowly dimmed until her eyes returned to her normal almost iridescent purple.

Unable to call upon her magic again, Kelaria didn't fight him, instead she dropped to her knees as if in defeat. "All those people..." she muttered to herself. "It was all for nothing...I doomed them from the start" The weight Vander had seen threatening to push her into the ground the day before seemed to have returned but stronger. Kelaria dropped so that her hands were on the ground in front of her. "I doomed them" she repeated, unable to gather her strength. Unable or unwilling, it was hard to tell.
 
They both needed a moment to find composure, to find steady ground after all of the energy and effort they had just exerted. She fell to her knees, much like he had been, leaving them both down against the soft dirt and moss of whatever forest they had found themselves in. Sunlight slowly filtered down through the gaps in the leaves and branches overhead as silence fell between them for a brief moment before Kelaria began to speak to him, lamenting her own failure at protecting her people.

"You did no such thing." He reassured her, his breathing starting to regulate as his heart slowed down and the adrenal spike he felt when his powers activated and took hold of him faded out. "None of this was your fault."

It would have been easy for him to have just told her what he thought she needed to hear, to reassure her, manipulate her emotions into finding some sort of peace so that he could use her to find the Araya Lucaris, but it didn't seem right. Not now, at least. The heavy weight she felt was not unlike the weight he felt, they were both kindred spirits in misery in that regard. "It's my brother. That damned fool..."

The cat was already out of the bag. There was no hiding anymore.

"He messed with something he shouldn't have. Darkness, demons, a power that can't be controlled. It took hold of him, but he didn't fight back...he let it corrupt him, change his heart and mind. I remember what he was like before..." And the person that he, himself, had been before he had gotten roped in. He wasn't blaming his brother solely, he took Alzahar's power willingly, after all, and then used it in their conquest, but it all started with an uncontrollable thirst and greed for more than what they had been given.

"That man you fought back there? In the village? He's not the only one. There's more...people just like him, people with indescribable darkness in their hearts...Kelaria, right? That's what they called their princess?" He asked, wanting to make sure he had it right. "This isn't your fault, it's the fault of my family. If you just sit there, and you cry...and you act like all hope is lost, it probably is. But if you want to do something about this? Save the people who are left instead of grieving those who have already been lost? You know what you need to do."

The Araya Lucaris wasn't just their best chance at stopping Balthier; it was their only chance.

"Trust me...or don't. It matters not. My brother is coming for you and he wants the Araya Lucaris. I don't need to explain to you what will happen if he finds it...but if we can get there first, we may be able to stop him yet."

She had absolutely no reason to put any of her dwindling faith in him. She wouldn't trust him and he couldn't blame her, but even she had to realize that what he was saying was the truth, regardless of any potential ulterior motives he may have had for wanting to find that relic.
 
Kelaria kept her eyes fixed on the ground while he spoke. She made no moved to get up until he finished speaking. She sat up, jaw tight and eyes red with tears that she was struggling to keep from falling down her face. Her eyes were sharp as they glared into his own. She didn't answer his clarification on her name. She just glared at him for a moment. "Do you really think I'm going to take you to the Araya Lucaris? You must think I'm a fool, to lead my enemy right to the one thing he wants most?"

Though her whole body felt drained and she wasn't sure where the energy she was pulling forth was coming from, Kelaria slowly rose off of her knees. "Wouldn't that be coinvent. You rescue me from your friend back there. Gain my trust? Convince me to take you to the Araya Lucaris so you can lead your brother right to it? Was that the plan all along? Did you walk into that village knowing you'd be sacrificing them in order to miniplate me? Tell me Vander Albright," the way she spoke his name was almost a sneer, as if the words tasted bad on her tongue. "Was it your blade or your brother's that slit my mother's throat? And my father, I only assume he's dead now that they're searching for me. What about him? How much did he suffer at your hands before one of you cut him down?"

Kelaria knew she wasn't being nice. Ordinarily she would feel bad, seeing the guilt on his face, but she didn't trust this man as far as she could throw him. This would be too easy a set up.

Despite her anger Kelaria made no moves to attack him. It was hard to say if it was her exhaustion that was holding her back or if it was something more than that.
 
Her reaction was neither unwarranted nor unexpected and, again, he couldn't really blame her for responding in the manner that she did. He would have done the exact same in her situation had their roles been swapped. She spoke his name like her tongue were about to burn from her mouth for caressing the four syllables required to speak it, accusing him of some grand plan that would imply he was still associated with his brother in any way. She didn't know yet the tumultuous relationship that they had shared, or how distant they had become.

Still, he let her finish talking. He allowed her to rant and vent her frustration. At least it was just words, not magic, being thrown his way.

"Then go yourself." He responded, simply. "You know where it is, do you not? So, go. Use it to put things right. As long as you stop him, it doesn't matter if I go with you or not."

Vander lifted himself back onto his feet as well, joining her in removing themselves from the dirt. "My brother exiled me from his new castle because I tried to stop him from torturing your father." He told her, truthful, though she had no reason to believe his words were anything more than mere deception. "I have done many horrible things within the borders of your kingdom. I have killed and I have slain, I have taken and I have destroyed, all in the name of Arellia. I was underneath the influence of the dark arcane, but that is no excuse. Be that as it may, I had no hand in the killing of your mother. When I was sent away, your father was still alive, but it was my brother's blade that cut down your mother, not mine."

Vander shook his head. "But do you know who else he has cut down? Our father. Our people. Anybody who wouldn't join his war effort. Innocent people deemed worthless because they couldn't fight. He has a demon at his side, a demon who imparted his darkness onto anyone willing to listen. Right now, he has an army. Give him another couple of weeks and it will be an empire. Give him the Araya Lucaris, and it's everything and everyone. Believe me if you want, strike me down if you don't, I probably deserve it...but do not lump me in with the rest of the savages my brother calls his men. If I were like them, truly like them, I would still be at his side. Hell, I would have been the one riding into your village to come take you hostage. And I certainly wouldn't have teleported you here when I could have taken you straight to the castle."
 
Though his words did little to sooth her, she was strangely grateful he had answered her questions about her parents. She knew in the long run it didn't matter who's blade committed the crime. They were both responsible. Vander stood in that throne room just as much as his brother did. He was just as responsible for his brothers wrong doings. He chose to rebel against him far too late and her people, her family, suffered for it. Though it was insignificant and truly had no effect on his innocence, Kelaria wasn't sure she could let him leave this forest alive knowing it was him who ended her mother's life.

Kelaria didn't speak for a long moment and her glare didn't soften but she did seem to be considering his words. "How can I trust this isn't all a trap? If you had taken me to him there would be no guarantee I would tell any of you where to find it. My father hadn't and he didn't have magic to strengthen his will. Gaining my trust and making me lead you to it is the obvious solution isn't it?" it was obvious she didn't have the energy to fight him now. It also seemed she didn't really want to. Some small part of her wanted to trust him. Wanted to trust somebody so that she wasn't alone in all this. that part of her yearned for someone to shoulder some of the weight that threatened to pull her under and drown her.

The rational part of her fought against that desire with a heavy fist.

"Can't you see the corner you have me backed into? How could I be certian I can trust you? If it were merely a fear that you might kill me, I'd take that chance, but this is the fate of my people. People who have no one else left to fight for them. My one advantage over your brother and his army is the fact that the Araya Lucaris is hidden from him. I risk everything by trusting you with it's location." Kelaria stared him down. Her gaze was still hard but her voice betrayed that she was desperate for a reason to trust him.
 
"Again, I'm not telling you to trust me. I said you can go on your own. It doesn't matter how you get there, it just matters that you do. That's the only way this nightmare ends." He reiterated, shaking his head. He could feel her gaze upon him, her eyes staring through him. They would have been beautiful had they not been filled with such discontent. "If you do nothing, then you lose. He will find you, eventually. Deep down, you know that."

Vander began to walk towards her, bravely, in the face of the vengeful wrath of her glare. If she wanted to attack him, she would have by now. She didn't have the strength to fight him anymore, even if she wanted nothing more than to take his life as payment for those he had taken from her people. "Your people will have nobody left to fight for them if you don't do this. You know that I'm right. There is no other way." She was a dead woman, regardless. If not now, then soon. If not soon, then eventually. Balthier had dominion over both sides of the border. He had power beyond compare and an army that gave him eyes and ears everywhere across the twin kingdoms. She could conceal her identity as much as she wanted, but nothing would change unless she used the Araya Lucaris.

"So, take me with you. You do not need to make this journey alone. I can help protect you, I can bring you to where you need to go." He said protect loosely, given he had nearly killed her just moments before, but his heart was in the right place...it just took him too many months of bloodshed to find that place. "You bare the weight of two kingdoms on your shoulders and you bare it alone. It doesn't have to be that way." There was a warmth to his voice as he spoke, his tone shifting to something more gentle. She didn't need to be lectured, or to be yelled at, she needed to feel like she could finally trust somebody with her burden. Whether or not he was worth of that trust was yet to be determined, but for him, this was step one not only on his road to revenge, but on his road to redeeming the sins he had committed.

She was now his one, and only, shot at finding absolution.
 
Kelaria watched him walk towards her. Her muscles tensed as if ready for a fight but as he spoke it became obvious pretty quickly he had no intention of fighting her now. Kelaria's stance and gaze softened a bit but her face still betrayed a bit of her skepticism. His words were pretty and seemed to be having the desired effect over her. It was obvious he was raised by nobility, by a politician. He spoke like one. Kelaria eyed him wearily as she considered his words for a long moment. Finally her stance relaxed but her eyes never quite lost the look of distrust.

"One wrong more Albright and you're a dead man. I won't take any unnecessary chances on you. I don't trust you now and it's going to take a miracle to change that any time soon, but right now you're all I have, whether I like it or not" Kelaria sighed. The look she gave him now was more like the one she had given him yesterday, when she was only Ani. Her expression was weary and mistrustful but gentle.

Kelaria looked at the forest around them. "We should find a place to camp out of the night. I have a few supplies in my bag but not many. I wasn't planning on leaving the village so soon. I had wanted to stay for a few days more. Help some m-" she winced and stopped herself. "We should try to scout a bit to see where we are but we shouldn't go far. We're both spent and need rest. Tomorrow we can reevaluate and hopefully find a town or village nearby so we can resupply."
 
There was a wariness behind her words as she seemingly accepted his help, for the time being, not out of desire for companionship but out of necessity. He doubted she would ever fully trust him and he was fine with that. He would do whatever it took to stop his brother, the less attached they were as comrades, the easier it would be to follow that route. All that mattered was that they could count on each other in a fight, as he suspected there would be plenty of those ahead. Even now, Finley had likely already returned to Balthier in his newly awoken state of demonhood and they were plotting their next search party, aware not only that Kelaria was very much still alive but that the king's exiled brother had allied himself with the only person in the twin kingdoms who knew the hiding place of the Araya Lucaris.

The target on their backs would only expand in size from here.

"That seems like a sound plan to me."

This girl was a survivor, he was certain of that. She wasn't the type of princess who spent her days in a lavish suite, tended to on hand and knee by servants. She knew how to handle herself, she knew what to do and what not to. He was certain that with his guidance, the two of them could do this, but she was very right, first they needed to figure out exactly where they were and whether or not they were safe enough to even spend their moments plotting their journey.

"Do you have any idea where we are?" He was the one who teleported them there, but teleportation magic was difficult. It was very taxing and hard to master. Given the stress of the situation, his only real intention was to get them anywhere but where they were and to do so in one piece, the actual destination hadn't crossed his mind during their do-or-die. "This is your kingdom and you know it better than anybody else, my brother included. The people here adore you. We should use that to our advantage." In fact, Kelaria had the one thing Balthier never would; the trust and faith of whomever remained alive in Astellia. It was an asset, should she be willing to use it, but he knew it would take some convincing. Maybe that was the warrior inside of him talking, thinking of using their people to their advantage.
 
Kelaria took in their surroundings and tried to find clues that might tell her were they were. "Does your teleport have a distance limit? If it's nearby where we already were then we would have to be in the Ereth forests, about a hundred miles or so South from where we started. It could also be with Wesmont forest, a rather small forest north of the capital...though it doesn't seem cold enough for that. Let's just pray we aren't anywhere near Nither." She walked up to a tree and placed her palm on it, looking up. "These trees can also be found in the woods just out side of Ilya. I won't know until we do some more scouting." she glanced back at him. "You're the one who magic-ed us here. Any idea how far we went?"

Slowly Kelaria stepped away from the tree and began walking in the direction she was confident was west. She didn't look back as she spoke, trusting that he was behind her. "I can't use that to my advantage. I would love to march around the country and rally the support of my people. they need to know I'm still alive. they need to know there's someone still fighting for them. But what if I doom them in the process? You saw what happened to that village. What's to stop your brother's men from doing the same to anyone we cross paths with?". Though Vander was behind her and couldn't see her face, the pain was obvious in her voice.

"If you see a good place to set up camp for the night, feel free to point it out" Kelaria diverted her attention back to the task at hand to prevent herself from being swallowed by the guilt.
 
She seemed to be very knowledgeable about her kingdom, which was to be expected with her position and all of the studying and training she had likely gone through at the castle. She seemed to have decided where they were and he felt the need to agree with her as he didn't really have any better ideas. "One hundred miles? I've never gone that far before...but, I guess I've never had to teleport under circumstances like those before, either." He laughed, shaking his head. It was an actual, real laugh, perhaps the first she had honestly heard from him. "If you say we're in Ereth Forest, then that's where we are. I trust your judgement on this side of the border far more than my own."

She started to walk and he had an opportunity to show that trust, joining her, staying just a couple of steps behind. He was surprised she would let him stay so far to her rear, but he took it as a sign that perhaps she was beginning to warm up to the idea that he wasn't an immediate threat to her right now and that bigger forces were at play.

"That village was doomed by my brother, not by you."

While it was true that her presence there was what drew Finley to her location, it was still a decree made by Balthier out of his greed for power. "If it hadn't happened today, it would have happened eventually. You can't save everybody, Kelaria, not as you are right now. The only way we do that is with the Araya Lucaria, and you need to be prepared to do whatever it takes to make it there."
 
His laugh made Kelaria jump a bit. She gave him the strangest look, one of wonder but a look that also seemed to question his sanity. It wasn't just the first real laugh of his that she had ever heard, but it was the first real laugh she had heard from anyone since the invasion. It was almost as if Kelaria forgot that laughter ever existed in the first place. "I won't know for certian until we do some more scouting. It looks like Ereth Forest but I could be wrong. I hope I'm right. If we ended up in Westmont then we will need to go around the capital in order to go south, which will add more time to our trip and we will have to cut through Nither. I'd rather avoid that if at all possible."

Kelaria continued on, looking out for signs as to their location. She didn't turn to face him as he spoke again, instead she snapped at him "I can try. I don't need to needlessly sentence my people to death." her voice was hard and icy. After a long moment of silence she sighed and looked at him. "Sorry. That was rude. You're right, at least a little bit. I've just been failing everyone. I couldn't save my parents. I didn't even try. I just ran. I heard the invasion start and I packed a bag and ran. I saw my mother dead and my father fighting for his life, and I ran. I thought I could help those people...make up for it somehow. Be what they needed me to be. They trusted me. They were willing to sacrifice themselves to protect me. That man sacrificed himself to protect me. I failed them too. I failed them and I ran." she pinched her eyes closed for a second before opening them again. "And don't you tell me that I needed to survive so I can go to the Araya Lucaris and stop all this. I know that. It doesn't change how I feel though."
 
"Be honest with me, Kelaria."

His voice followed after she began to unload on him with what she was feeling. He had a very straight forward question that he wanted to hear her answer for. "Had you tried to save your parents, do you feel confident you would have succeeded in saving them?

A silence fell between them for a brief moment as he let the question stir inside of her brain. "If you had stayed and fought, and died, what hope would any of your people have then? At least now, you're still standing, they still have a chance. Your power is beyond what I expected, but even with that strength, you're talking about staring down an army of demons who are just as strong as you, if not more. You are no good to your people dead, you are aware of that, correct? You made the right decision. Now, all that matters is that you do right by the sacrifices of those who got you to this point."

He was, in truth, the last person who should be lecturing anybody about doing right by those who had given their lives with how many of those lives he had probably taken himself during their siege...but the point remained poignant, regardless. Had she stayed, his brother would have killed her, or tortured her, or both. He'd have every single key he needed to find the Araya Lucaris, and despite how stubborn the king was before he broke, the things he feared Balthier would have done to Kelaria to provoke a confession from her father made him extremely uncomfortable at the very contemplation.

"You're free to feel what you want to feel and you're free to grieve however you wish to grieve, but once your tears have all dried, you do realize you have a throne to reclaim, don't you? I will help you take it back, if only to finally help my brother find peace." With the way Vander spoke that sentence, it was undeniable that he was telling the truth. There was conviction and anger, a slight hint of sadness, and a desire to finally do something right, all rolled up into one, declarative statement.

The throne, and this kingdom, was hers; but the demon who corrupted his brother, and the lives of his family and everybody who served them? He'd pull him apart bit by bit, on his own, until he wished the Araya Lucaris never willed him into existence to begin with.
 
Kelaria didn't look at him as he questioned her and she paused before answering him. She knew he was right but she was having a hard time letting go of the guilt and forgiving herself. "No, I probably would not have been able to save them....not against your brother and his demon benefactor. What about you? If I had stood up to your brother in the castle and tried to save my father, would you have stood by and watch? Would you have helped me or him?" she turned the tables back on him, mostly because she didn't like that he was right but also because she genuinely wanted to know.

"I know I have a throne to reclaim. I intend to do so. I want to do right by my people and I don't want that to wait until then. I don't want them to look at me and wonder why I didn't do more. I can't look at my own reflection without wondering the same." Kelaria looked at him. "What about you? If we succeed in taking your brother down, you will have your own throne to claim."

Kelaria stopped in her tracks and froze. Slowly, she turned towards the tree nearest to her right. After staring at it for a moment she stepped up to it and placed her palm on its trunk. "Do you hear that?" She peered around the tree. There was a faint tinkling sound that sounded almost like musical chimes.
 
"By the time he had taken the castle, it was far too late for me to do anything. The moment I stood against him, as he tortured your father, he had me exiled and thrown from the castle window. That was how I found you, it was why I was injured." If Balthier would do that to his own flesh and blood, there was no telling what he would have done if he had gotten his hands on Kelaria. Hell, he had murdered his own father to open up a path to power; nobody was safe from Alzahar and Astellia's new king. "I would have stood against him, but that probably would have been the last time I stood at all. Neither of us would have lived to have this second chance."

Vander hadn't really give much thought to what would happen if they managed to stop Balthier. Assuming his brother's life was to be taken in the ensuing battle, it would leave him the same as her, the last heir to the throne of a ruined kingdom. Given his role in the destruction, there would be little trust to go around and repairing relations between both sides would be near impossible, even if Kelaria was the one opposite him, trying to do the same. His brother's bid for dominion had likely thrown both Arellia and Astellia into an endless state of disarray. Oddly enough, the only time there would be any sort of unity between the two would be underneath Balthier's current regime, but for obvious reasions, that couldn't be allowed to last.

Truthfully, he didn't think he wanted it. As the youngest of the Albright brothers, it was pretty much a formality that Balthier would have succeeded their father as king and thus, Vander wasn't school as much in the arts of politics as his brother had been. He had picked up on more than enough, thanks in part to Regis, but he was always second fiddle and he had resigned himself to the fact that the throne wasn't his to take and he was okay with that. Now, he wasn't sure he wanted to be the one to try and pick up the pieces left behind. That wasn't his role to play. He was to bring liberation and then, find a way to make peace with his own sins. There was nothing worthy of being a king inside of him, especially as long as he still had access to the dark arcane.

"I don't want the throne. You can take both, for all I care." To cast aside his family's legacy was a bold claim, one that Kelaria couldn't tell he was making in full confidence, but the distraction she seemed to notice would have tilted the conversation in another direction anyways, preventing any opportunity to linger on the conversation.

"No? I don't hear anyth-" He responded, stopping in the middle of his sentence. Was something...chiming? It sounded like something was making music for them, drifting softly on the forest breeze, whistling through the leaves and trees. "We're not alone..."
 
"Damn it!" Kelaria pushed off the tree and looked around them, panic and frustration on her face. "You teleported us to the Deep Woods of Nither. It's an enchanted forest. It's been disguising itself from us. Tricking us into thinking we were elsewhere. Damn it!" she looked around some more. "This makes everything so much more difficult! Getting out of here is going to be like wandering blindly through a labyrinth. On top of that the threats we may have to face just increased ten fold. This whole place is either going to work with us or against us and there's no way to tell which it will be."

"I suppose the only good news would be that it will be very difficult for your brother's men to find us here." Kelaria sighed. She composed herself as best she could. "We need to find a place to stay for the night and fast. It will get dark here faster than outside the forest and I don't want to be wandering around Nither after dark, fumbling for a place to stay." She turned and began to walk away but noticed his attention on the chiming.

"It's just the trees." She walked back over to him so that she was able to follow his line of sight. She reached out and touched both his arms, slowly turning him by nudging him. Then she pointed in front of him and up a bit past the tree she had been leaning against. "See there? In the distance. You have to know what it is you are looking for but in the distance there are trees with blue flowers" sure enough, barely distinguishable, there was a small grove of trees that almost resembled willow trees but the droopy leaves were covered in large pale blue flowers. "See them? Some trees, in enchanted forests like this, communicate with each other in various ways. Those trees, Wisp Callers, communicate through those chiming songs."

Kelaria looked towards the trees and the corners of her lips tugged up into what was almost a smile but it dropped quickly. She had studied these things but never got the chance to see them in person. Her mother always promised to take her on a trip to explore The Deep Woods of Nither as part of her training. That trip wouldn't happen now. Once she dreamed of seeing this place, now that she was here so was too frantic to get out to truly enjoy it. She tuned again. "Let's go"
 
"I apologize. Choosing a destination is difficult when you don't know where it is you're actually trying to go." He admitted. It wasn't like he really knew where Nither, or Ereth, or any other place she mentioned actually was, he just wanted to get her to safety. He had accomplished what he had sat out to do, but now he was beginning to wonder if he had just made them a new, dangerous problem that would compromise her safety regardless.

He listened to Kelaria give him a crash course on this supposedly enchanted forest. She seemed both worried, and excited. He doubted she had ever been here, this was seeing everything she had read about and studied in books come to life, so it must have thrilled her despite the obvious danger it posed. "Wisp Callers. Blue flowers. Got it." He told her, nodding his head, running through a checklist of the facts she had given him. "So, we follow the flowers until we find some place safe?" He asked, next, hoping he was understanding properly and that these Wisp Callers were actually on their side rather than trying to deceive them any further.

She turned to get moving and he followed behind, quickening his pace to return to her side before slowing it down to time his steps to her own so that neither of them would be easily separated by whatever the Deep Woods through their way. "If this place is enchanted, it means that it's full of magic, that may be something we can use to our favor." Regular travelers who would get lost in here didn't have that luxury, but they did. Maybe they didn't need to be so afraid of what the Nither hid from them, perhaps that was why these flowers were responding to them in the first place.
 
"The blame is not yours. Do not apologize for things outside of your control. How could you have known?" Kelaira was being surprisingly gracious about the whole thing, given how much she despised him to begin with. It would have been easy to take her frustration out on him as he was the only one who she could blame.

Kelaria prepared to turn around and walk in the opposite direction but paused at his question. "I suppose I hadn't considered that. We may be safer sleeping near that grove of wisp callers than wandering off to find someplace else and getting lost in the process. I've never read anything about wisp callers being despeptive or dangerous. We need to keep an eye out for a water source though. We're going to get thirsty fast and I don't have enough energy left in me to gather any for us now using magic."

Without waiting for him, Kelaira began to make her way towards the trees. When he finally did catch up she didn't trun her attention to him, as though she was doing her best to pretend he didn't exist. She couldn't ignore his words though. "You could be right...but we can't rely on that possibility, not yet. I'm sure we'll get the chance to put it to the test though, depending on how deep into the forest we are."

It took them some time to reach the chiming trees as they had to traverse through the wild overgrowth of the forest. With her drained and him injured it was slow progress. When at last they reached the grove Kelaira noticed it was larger than they originally thought. The trees were spread further apart near the center, creating a small clearing. Smaller mossy green trees were sprinkled among the wisp callers. They were in luck, cutting through the grove was a steady flowing stream.

Kelaira couldn't help but take a moment to take in the sight. The flowers drooping down the trees gave off a soft floral smell that filled the grove. Some of those flowers were as big as her head. The chiming was louder here but still soft and gentle.
 
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