Salvation in Flames
Title: Salvation in Flames
Fandom: original
Rating: PG
Warnings: none
Summary: When everyone is a fugitive, the only safety left is among refugees.
Notes: Written for the March week 3 challenge at brigits_flame, theme “fire in their eyes”, and I was totally going to use the prompt a lot more, but then it got lost in the plot so…yeah. Just pretend it’s there.
…
Caela’s children were shivering.
Rayne bit her lower lip, watching them over the steeple of her folded hands. It wasn’t warm in the forest, not by any reckoning, but she suspected the children’s tremors were from fear, rather than cold.
Not that she could blame them. The Xavier Act had made them fugitives before they were able to understand why, and with their father’s death-Rayne sighed, looking at her twin. Caela put on a brave face, but Jonn’s death had broken her.
If anyone could smile through pain, though, it was Caela. She crouched down next to the children, pushing her hair back behind her ears and unclasping her cloak, draping it over their small shoulders. “There, now,” she murmured, reaching out to cup Marin’s chin. “Is that better?”
Marin nodded. Next to him, Kero squirmed, trying to burrow into the warmth of the cloak and his brother’s side. “Mamem,” he said, turning wide blue eyes up to Caela, “I want to go home. I don’t like it here.”
Caela’s face softened and she ran her fingers through his hair. “I know, love,” she whispered. “I know. And we will go home, someday. I promise.”
Rayne hid her wince behind hands, grateful that the children’s attention was on their mother. There was no home for them to go back to, not any more-government troops had burned it to the ground when they’d discovered Caela and the children missing. It was a good thing their follow-up investigation hadn’t been overly thorough, or they’d have found the traces of Rayne’s hastily-prepared teleportation spell, her magical signature still in place. She sighed, running a hand through her cropped hair. If the troops had bothered to put a tracer on her signature, it wouldn’t be long before-
“Are you alright?”
Rayne shook herself out of her reverie, glancing up as Caela sat down beside her. “I’m fine,” she said, forcing a smile. “How are the boys?”
Caela smiled thinly. “They’re cold,” she said. Her pretty features were pinched and pale; she’d been awake too long. “It’s not good for them, being out here. They need someplace warm.”
“I know.” Rayne rubbed her forehead. “Get them up. I’ll get us out of here.”
“Are you up to it?”
She nodded, climbing to her feet. “I’m not used to shifting four,” she admitted. “But I know a safe place, close enough that it shouldn’t be too much of an issue.”
Caela hesitated, her fingers curving momentarily around Rayne’s elbow. “Are you sure? I know the risks of-”
“I’ll be fine.” It had been over an hour since the last teleportation, and while her powers weren’t up to ideal levels, she had more than enough to get them safely to the compound.
Marin made a fuss when Caela bent to take her cloak back, furrowing his brow and protesting when she pulled him gently to his feet. “I don’t wanna go, Mamem,” he declared, wrenching free of her grasp. “Anabi Rayne is scary and she uses bad magic and I just want to go home.”
Rayne resisted the urge to comment. Marin had never liked her very much, and for all that he was her nephew, she wasn’t overly attached to him, either. Still, he was family, and that counted for something. “Teleportation isn’t bad magic, Marin,” she reminded him, as calmly as he could. “Besides, you wouldn’t want to send your brother off somewhere without you, would you?”
Marin made a face but stopped squirming, curling his fingers around Kero’s smaller ones. It was a low blow, using his brother against him, but it had never stopped Rayne and Caela’s parents. “Good,” Caela said, glancing up at Rayne with a faint smile and motioning the boys over. “Come on, now. Grab onto Anabi Rayne.”
Already chanting softly under her breath, Rayne barely felt it when small hands curled into the fabric of her cloak, or when Caela’s arm slipped through hers. Teleportation was one of the trickier forms of magic-also one of the more illegal, even after the Xavier Act passed-and she closed her eyes to avoid losing concentration. The Words flowed together, long-memorized and still slightly foreign, and as she spoke them she felt the magic rise around her, warm and binding, lifting them and pulling them through the bounds of time and space.
She opened her eyes to see the world shifting around them, forest turning to desert turning to ocean, turning to city turning to plains turning to tundra. And then, as quickly as the shift had begun, forest reappeared, and she let the spell go.
The transition was seamless and she smiled as their surroundings solidified into the forest compound, a hidden commune of fugitive magic-users, born and bred and pursued. Rayne slipped her arm free from Caela’s and reached down to gently detangle the children’s hands from her clothing. “Come on,” she said. “We should get you inside, get you something to eat.”
Marin’s face lit up at the idea of food, but Caela frowned. “Where are we?”
“Forest compound.” She motioned them forward, towards one of the sets of tree-stairs. She had been there when they were carved, Kyros’s brow furrowed in concentration as he pressed his fingers to the bark and manipulated the earth with softly spoken incantations and a power so strong Rayne’s head had spun. “It’s safe here. No one knows where it is.”
“How is that even possible?” Caela scooped Kero into her arms, settling him on her hip as they began to climb.
Rayne shrugs. “No one leaves.”
“You left,” Marin pointed.
Cheeky, she thought. “Only to get you,” she said, reaching down to pull him away from the edge. “Don’t walk so close. You’ll fall, and with your luck there won’t be a levitator down there to catch you.”
“There’s so much magic here,” Caela murmured, looking around in awe. “I haven’t seen so much in one place since-”
“Since you left the People,” Rayne finished for her, pushing back the memory of the day Caela had left, their mother crying, their father shouting.
Caela’s eyes flashed. “I left to be with Jonn. He wouldn’t have been allowed to stay, and I couldn’t-” she broke off, swallowing visibly. “I’m not talking about this. Not with the children here.”
Rayne bit back a retort and turned her gaze ahead as they rounded the corner. The stairs spiraled up to the left but she led them onto a platform of tree houses, sprawling out onto the branches. She stopped in front of the first door, raising her hand and pressing it palm-first against the painted wood.
There was a faint scuffling from within, and then a soft voice called, “I hear you, child. Come in.”
“Who is that?” Kero whispered.
“A friend,” Rayne assured him, and pushed the door open.
The house was large, by compound standards, but the room they moved into was cozy and warm, a fire burning cheerfully in the center pit. Jiyali, sitting in her rocker by the fire, looked up at them, her lined face breaking into a welcoming smile. “Rayne,” she greeted, rising to her feet. “It’s good to see you back safely.”
“It’s good to be back,” Rayne said honestly, ushering the others inside and closing the door behind them. “Caela, boys, this is Jiyali. Jiyali, this is my sister Caela and her sons, Marin and Kero.”
Caela mustered a smile. “Thank you so much for your hospitality, Jiyali-nan. I really-”
Jiyali waved her hand. “There is no need for thanks, child. What kind of mother would I be, if I did not extend the peace of my home to all children?” She turned her gaze to the boys. “Young ones, if you go through that door there-” she gestured to it “-you will find a lovely young lady named Mira. If you ask her very nicely, I believe she will be happy to give you some dinner.”
If there had been any doubt in Marin’s eyes, it vanished instantly at her words. He turned to Caela and tugged insistently at her sleeve until she set Kero down, grabbing his brother’s hand and rushing away with him. Caela watched them go and then rounded on Rayne, eyes blazing. “A fire-witch?” she hissed. “What are you thinking, bringing the children here? If we’re caught-”
“If you’re caught, my dear, being in the presence of a fire-witch will be the least of your worries,” Jiyali chided gently.
Caela’s lips thinned, but she let out a shaky breath and followed the boys out of the room.
Rayne released a relieved sigh, closing her eyes and kneading her temples with her fingertips. The post-teleportation exhaustion was setting in, the headache more intense than usual, thanks to the extra weight. “Thank you,” she murmured. “For taking them in.”
Jiyali’s hand closed around her elbow, and Rayne let the old woman guide her to one of the chairs by the fire, easing down into it. “You should have told her where they were going,” Jiyali said, the old rocking chair creaking slightly as she took her seat again. “Is there any surprise that she reacted that way?”
“Not really.” The headache receded slightly, the comfort of the chair and the warmth of the fire working wonders. “I didn’t know where else to bring her.” She opened her eyes, looking over at the woman who had been the first to give her shelter after Xavier. “Do you know, she barely spoke to me after she left with Jonn? Her own twin.”
“That was six years ago, yes?” Rayne nodded, and Jiyali clicked her tongue softly. “They were already preparing for Xavier then, don’t you remember? Of course she would avoid any connection to magic-users. For the sake of her children, if nothing else.”
“The children.” Rayne closed her eyes again. She remembered when Marin had first exhibited magical abilities, levitating a cup off the floor; Caela’s terrified message sphere. “She hoped they wouldn’t have it. With Jonn’s blood, there was always a chance, but…”
Jiyali nodded in understanding. “It’s stronger, from the mother’s side.” She sighed, shifting in her chair; Rayne heard her bones creaking. “You think you’re the first family torn apart by this? Not everyone has the determination you do.”
Rayne shrugged, leaning back and turning her gaze back to the flames. “What was I supposed to do? Let my sister disappear?”
“Most would.”
“Well. I’m not most.” She felt the prickling of Caela’s magic behind her and straightened, looking over her shoulder to see her sister standing in the doorway, looking nervous. “Did they eat?”
Caela nodded. “I thought they should come and sit by the fire, but they’re frightened.”
Understandable, Rayne thought. They’d seen too many homes, too many families, destroyed by flames. She looked at Jiyali, who nodded faintly, and then turned back to Caela. “Jiyali can set them at ease,” she said, and Caela bit her lip, but left the room again, returning a moment later with both children in tow.
Jiyali waved a hand at the fire and it shrunk instantly, caving in on itself. “Come,” she said, turning her gaze to the children. The faint red ring around her dark irises shimmered into place, only visible when she used her power, and Marin shied away from it, but Kero came forward, shuffling nervously to sit at her feet. After a moment, Marin followed suit, sitting next to his brother, a bit farther back from the flames. Jiyali smiled softly down at them and then motioned back to the fire. The flames jumped, shuddered, and then resumed their cheerful blazing. “Tell me,” Jiyali said, looking down at the boys. “What do you see, in the flames?”
Marin frowned. “Fire,” he said. “What else?”
Rayne raised her eyebrows, but Jiyali’s smile only broadened. “There is fire there, yes,” she said. “But look closer. Inside it. What do you see?”
“Burning,” Kero whispered. “The wood is burning. Falling apart.”
“Yes,” Jiyali said, looking approvingly at him. “The wood is burning. So I suppose, since you know the ending, that I do not have to tell you the story?”
Kero’s brow furrowed in confusion. “I don’t know any stories about fire.”
“And he doesn’t know any endings,” Marin added, and then smirked smugly at his brother. “He falls asleep.”
“Marin,” Caela chastised gently, adjusting her skirts so that she could sit down behind her children, scooping Kero into her lap. “Don’t be rude. Your brother knows plenty of stories.”
Kero shook his head. “No, Mamem, I don’t know the fire story!” He looked up at Jiyali, eyes wide. “Will you tell it?”
Jiyali looked thoughtful. “I don’t know. You already seem to know how it ends. Are you sure you haven’t heard it?”
“I’m sure!”
Rayne smiled at the enthusiasm in his voice, settling back to listen. Jiyali was one of the last of the story-spinners, and her tales varied each time she told them, shifting in color and magic around her audience. It was Jiyali’s stories that had held the compound together when Xavier passed, when they were a haggard group of refugees searching for something to call a home. Jiyali met her eyes over the boys’ heads and smiled before turning back to them.
“All right,” she said. “I suppose, if you really haven’t heard it before, it could be told again. Marin, love, why don’t you come up here and sit with me while I tell it?”
Marin looked slightly doubtful-he had always been slower to trust than Kero-but crawled up to sit in Jiyali’s lap. Jiyali patted his knee gently and then waved her hand towards the fire. “Now,” she said, and her voice shifted slightly, distancing away from them, becoming softer, lighter, younger. “Focus on the flames. Look into them. Now, do you see the princess?”
Marin frowned. “No.”
“Don’t you?”
The flames shifted, flickered, and took shape. Marin gasped. “I see her!”
Jiyali smiled. “Yes. Now, let me tell you…”
It had been a long day, too long, and too much of it had been spent watching fear and pain and grief on her family’s faces. But they were safe, now, and the boys were listening to Jiyali’s story with the warmth of the flames reflected in their eyes, and the exhaustion had eased itself from Caela’s face, leaving only relief and peace.
Rayne relaxed, letting the warmth of Jiyali’s voice wash over her.
They were going to be all right.
Fandom: original
Rating: PG
Warnings: none
Summary: When everyone is a fugitive, the only safety left is among refugees.
Notes: Written for the March week 3 challenge at brigits_flame, theme “fire in their eyes”, and I was totally going to use the prompt a lot more, but then it got lost in the plot so…yeah. Just pretend it’s there.
…
Caela’s children were shivering.
Rayne bit her lower lip, watching them over the steeple of her folded hands. It wasn’t warm in the forest, not by any reckoning, but she suspected the children’s tremors were from fear, rather than cold.
Not that she could blame them. The Xavier Act had made them fugitives before they were able to understand why, and with their father’s death-Rayne sighed, looking at her twin. Caela put on a brave face, but Jonn’s death had broken her.
If anyone could smile through pain, though, it was Caela. She crouched down next to the children, pushing her hair back behind her ears and unclasping her cloak, draping it over their small shoulders. “There, now,” she murmured, reaching out to cup Marin’s chin. “Is that better?”
Marin nodded. Next to him, Kero squirmed, trying to burrow into the warmth of the cloak and his brother’s side. “Mamem,” he said, turning wide blue eyes up to Caela, “I want to go home. I don’t like it here.”
Caela’s face softened and she ran her fingers through his hair. “I know, love,” she whispered. “I know. And we will go home, someday. I promise.”
Rayne hid her wince behind hands, grateful that the children’s attention was on their mother. There was no home for them to go back to, not any more-government troops had burned it to the ground when they’d discovered Caela and the children missing. It was a good thing their follow-up investigation hadn’t been overly thorough, or they’d have found the traces of Rayne’s hastily-prepared teleportation spell, her magical signature still in place. She sighed, running a hand through her cropped hair. If the troops had bothered to put a tracer on her signature, it wouldn’t be long before-
“Are you alright?”
Rayne shook herself out of her reverie, glancing up as Caela sat down beside her. “I’m fine,” she said, forcing a smile. “How are the boys?”
Caela smiled thinly. “They’re cold,” she said. Her pretty features were pinched and pale; she’d been awake too long. “It’s not good for them, being out here. They need someplace warm.”
“I know.” Rayne rubbed her forehead. “Get them up. I’ll get us out of here.”
“Are you up to it?”
She nodded, climbing to her feet. “I’m not used to shifting four,” she admitted. “But I know a safe place, close enough that it shouldn’t be too much of an issue.”
Caela hesitated, her fingers curving momentarily around Rayne’s elbow. “Are you sure? I know the risks of-”
“I’ll be fine.” It had been over an hour since the last teleportation, and while her powers weren’t up to ideal levels, she had more than enough to get them safely to the compound.
Marin made a fuss when Caela bent to take her cloak back, furrowing his brow and protesting when she pulled him gently to his feet. “I don’t wanna go, Mamem,” he declared, wrenching free of her grasp. “Anabi Rayne is scary and she uses bad magic and I just want to go home.”
Rayne resisted the urge to comment. Marin had never liked her very much, and for all that he was her nephew, she wasn’t overly attached to him, either. Still, he was family, and that counted for something. “Teleportation isn’t bad magic, Marin,” she reminded him, as calmly as he could. “Besides, you wouldn’t want to send your brother off somewhere without you, would you?”
Marin made a face but stopped squirming, curling his fingers around Kero’s smaller ones. It was a low blow, using his brother against him, but it had never stopped Rayne and Caela’s parents. “Good,” Caela said, glancing up at Rayne with a faint smile and motioning the boys over. “Come on, now. Grab onto Anabi Rayne.”
Already chanting softly under her breath, Rayne barely felt it when small hands curled into the fabric of her cloak, or when Caela’s arm slipped through hers. Teleportation was one of the trickier forms of magic-also one of the more illegal, even after the Xavier Act passed-and she closed her eyes to avoid losing concentration. The Words flowed together, long-memorized and still slightly foreign, and as she spoke them she felt the magic rise around her, warm and binding, lifting them and pulling them through the bounds of time and space.
She opened her eyes to see the world shifting around them, forest turning to desert turning to ocean, turning to city turning to plains turning to tundra. And then, as quickly as the shift had begun, forest reappeared, and she let the spell go.
The transition was seamless and she smiled as their surroundings solidified into the forest compound, a hidden commune of fugitive magic-users, born and bred and pursued. Rayne slipped her arm free from Caela’s and reached down to gently detangle the children’s hands from her clothing. “Come on,” she said. “We should get you inside, get you something to eat.”
Marin’s face lit up at the idea of food, but Caela frowned. “Where are we?”
“Forest compound.” She motioned them forward, towards one of the sets of tree-stairs. She had been there when they were carved, Kyros’s brow furrowed in concentration as he pressed his fingers to the bark and manipulated the earth with softly spoken incantations and a power so strong Rayne’s head had spun. “It’s safe here. No one knows where it is.”
“How is that even possible?” Caela scooped Kero into her arms, settling him on her hip as they began to climb.
Rayne shrugs. “No one leaves.”
“You left,” Marin pointed.
Cheeky, she thought. “Only to get you,” she said, reaching down to pull him away from the edge. “Don’t walk so close. You’ll fall, and with your luck there won’t be a levitator down there to catch you.”
“There’s so much magic here,” Caela murmured, looking around in awe. “I haven’t seen so much in one place since-”
“Since you left the People,” Rayne finished for her, pushing back the memory of the day Caela had left, their mother crying, their father shouting.
Caela’s eyes flashed. “I left to be with Jonn. He wouldn’t have been allowed to stay, and I couldn’t-” she broke off, swallowing visibly. “I’m not talking about this. Not with the children here.”
Rayne bit back a retort and turned her gaze ahead as they rounded the corner. The stairs spiraled up to the left but she led them onto a platform of tree houses, sprawling out onto the branches. She stopped in front of the first door, raising her hand and pressing it palm-first against the painted wood.
There was a faint scuffling from within, and then a soft voice called, “I hear you, child. Come in.”
“Who is that?” Kero whispered.
“A friend,” Rayne assured him, and pushed the door open.
The house was large, by compound standards, but the room they moved into was cozy and warm, a fire burning cheerfully in the center pit. Jiyali, sitting in her rocker by the fire, looked up at them, her lined face breaking into a welcoming smile. “Rayne,” she greeted, rising to her feet. “It’s good to see you back safely.”
“It’s good to be back,” Rayne said honestly, ushering the others inside and closing the door behind them. “Caela, boys, this is Jiyali. Jiyali, this is my sister Caela and her sons, Marin and Kero.”
Caela mustered a smile. “Thank you so much for your hospitality, Jiyali-nan. I really-”
Jiyali waved her hand. “There is no need for thanks, child. What kind of mother would I be, if I did not extend the peace of my home to all children?” She turned her gaze to the boys. “Young ones, if you go through that door there-” she gestured to it “-you will find a lovely young lady named Mira. If you ask her very nicely, I believe she will be happy to give you some dinner.”
If there had been any doubt in Marin’s eyes, it vanished instantly at her words. He turned to Caela and tugged insistently at her sleeve until she set Kero down, grabbing his brother’s hand and rushing away with him. Caela watched them go and then rounded on Rayne, eyes blazing. “A fire-witch?” she hissed. “What are you thinking, bringing the children here? If we’re caught-”
“If you’re caught, my dear, being in the presence of a fire-witch will be the least of your worries,” Jiyali chided gently.
Caela’s lips thinned, but she let out a shaky breath and followed the boys out of the room.
Rayne released a relieved sigh, closing her eyes and kneading her temples with her fingertips. The post-teleportation exhaustion was setting in, the headache more intense than usual, thanks to the extra weight. “Thank you,” she murmured. “For taking them in.”
Jiyali’s hand closed around her elbow, and Rayne let the old woman guide her to one of the chairs by the fire, easing down into it. “You should have told her where they were going,” Jiyali said, the old rocking chair creaking slightly as she took her seat again. “Is there any surprise that she reacted that way?”
“Not really.” The headache receded slightly, the comfort of the chair and the warmth of the fire working wonders. “I didn’t know where else to bring her.” She opened her eyes, looking over at the woman who had been the first to give her shelter after Xavier. “Do you know, she barely spoke to me after she left with Jonn? Her own twin.”
“That was six years ago, yes?” Rayne nodded, and Jiyali clicked her tongue softly. “They were already preparing for Xavier then, don’t you remember? Of course she would avoid any connection to magic-users. For the sake of her children, if nothing else.”
“The children.” Rayne closed her eyes again. She remembered when Marin had first exhibited magical abilities, levitating a cup off the floor; Caela’s terrified message sphere. “She hoped they wouldn’t have it. With Jonn’s blood, there was always a chance, but…”
Jiyali nodded in understanding. “It’s stronger, from the mother’s side.” She sighed, shifting in her chair; Rayne heard her bones creaking. “You think you’re the first family torn apart by this? Not everyone has the determination you do.”
Rayne shrugged, leaning back and turning her gaze back to the flames. “What was I supposed to do? Let my sister disappear?”
“Most would.”
“Well. I’m not most.” She felt the prickling of Caela’s magic behind her and straightened, looking over her shoulder to see her sister standing in the doorway, looking nervous. “Did they eat?”
Caela nodded. “I thought they should come and sit by the fire, but they’re frightened.”
Understandable, Rayne thought. They’d seen too many homes, too many families, destroyed by flames. She looked at Jiyali, who nodded faintly, and then turned back to Caela. “Jiyali can set them at ease,” she said, and Caela bit her lip, but left the room again, returning a moment later with both children in tow.
Jiyali waved a hand at the fire and it shrunk instantly, caving in on itself. “Come,” she said, turning her gaze to the children. The faint red ring around her dark irises shimmered into place, only visible when she used her power, and Marin shied away from it, but Kero came forward, shuffling nervously to sit at her feet. After a moment, Marin followed suit, sitting next to his brother, a bit farther back from the flames. Jiyali smiled softly down at them and then motioned back to the fire. The flames jumped, shuddered, and then resumed their cheerful blazing. “Tell me,” Jiyali said, looking down at the boys. “What do you see, in the flames?”
Marin frowned. “Fire,” he said. “What else?”
Rayne raised her eyebrows, but Jiyali’s smile only broadened. “There is fire there, yes,” she said. “But look closer. Inside it. What do you see?”
“Burning,” Kero whispered. “The wood is burning. Falling apart.”
“Yes,” Jiyali said, looking approvingly at him. “The wood is burning. So I suppose, since you know the ending, that I do not have to tell you the story?”
Kero’s brow furrowed in confusion. “I don’t know any stories about fire.”
“And he doesn’t know any endings,” Marin added, and then smirked smugly at his brother. “He falls asleep.”
“Marin,” Caela chastised gently, adjusting her skirts so that she could sit down behind her children, scooping Kero into her lap. “Don’t be rude. Your brother knows plenty of stories.”
Kero shook his head. “No, Mamem, I don’t know the fire story!” He looked up at Jiyali, eyes wide. “Will you tell it?”
Jiyali looked thoughtful. “I don’t know. You already seem to know how it ends. Are you sure you haven’t heard it?”
“I’m sure!”
Rayne smiled at the enthusiasm in his voice, settling back to listen. Jiyali was one of the last of the story-spinners, and her tales varied each time she told them, shifting in color and magic around her audience. It was Jiyali’s stories that had held the compound together when Xavier passed, when they were a haggard group of refugees searching for something to call a home. Jiyali met her eyes over the boys’ heads and smiled before turning back to them.
“All right,” she said. “I suppose, if you really haven’t heard it before, it could be told again. Marin, love, why don’t you come up here and sit with me while I tell it?”
Marin looked slightly doubtful-he had always been slower to trust than Kero-but crawled up to sit in Jiyali’s lap. Jiyali patted his knee gently and then waved her hand towards the fire. “Now,” she said, and her voice shifted slightly, distancing away from them, becoming softer, lighter, younger. “Focus on the flames. Look into them. Now, do you see the princess?”
Marin frowned. “No.”
“Don’t you?”
The flames shifted, flickered, and took shape. Marin gasped. “I see her!”
Jiyali smiled. “Yes. Now, let me tell you…”
It had been a long day, too long, and too much of it had been spent watching fear and pain and grief on her family’s faces. But they were safe, now, and the boys were listening to Jiyali’s story with the warmth of the flames reflected in their eyes, and the exhaustion had eased itself from Caela’s face, leaving only relief and peace.
Rayne relaxed, letting the warmth of Jiyali’s voice wash over her.
They were going to be all right.