the silver crown, epilogue [kiara, leah, henry, elijah]

Book of Myths
Let's go home.

It's a sentiment they can all share, by now. Even the most incredible journeys must come to an end at some point. It isn't clear precisely how long they've been in the umbra. Time... moves differently here. The way it does in dreams. But looking around at their assembled group: four mages, six dire wolves and one fox, the prevailing mood is clearly one of exhaustion. But they are all still alive and well and whole. And they got what they came for, even if it is... less than expected. That's something to be thankful for.

Despite his reassuring words, Henry looks as though he may be in need of a long rest. His legs are shaky climbing out of the hole where he'd been buried, and when he gets to the top he puts his hands on his thighs and lets his eyes droop shut for a moment, catching his breath.

Leah doesn't speak to him. Doesn't even so much as look at him now that she's been reassured of his safety. She just hands the crown to Kiara and turns away like she can't really bear to acknowledge it.

"Yes. I would like that."

The wolves are slower on the way back. The fight took a lot out of them too. They seem... not exactly celebratory, but at peace. Free to roam their territory without the threat of the dragon looming over their shoulders. Perhaps the beast didn't deserve its fate, but if so, the ones to blame for that are long gone.

When they reach the winter tree, it's nearly nightfall. The sunset here is colorless, just a fading glow of light sinking low on the horizon. Before leaving, the wolves arrange themselves in a half-circle around the tree. The way they do it, it feels like a ritual. There's a moment of reflective silence, then they lift their heads in unison and howl a long, beautiful song. The echo of their voices reaches out into the the distant corners of the landscape and up into the sky.

When they finish, they turn and lope across the snow, disappearing into the dusk.

"What lovely creatures," Henry observes wistfully. "I think I will miss this place."

"We almost died, Henry." Leah's voice is cold and brittle when she turns to look at him. "You had no right to do this. You knew and you didn't tell me." For a moment her eyes burn, and there is this sort of... broken anger in them.

"There are things one must remember for themselves, my dear. I am sorry. I truly did not mean to hurt you."

Leah makes a sound, tired and disgusted, and turns away.

KiaraShe doesn't want to touch the crown.

She accepts it from Leah almost reflexively, but hooks it around a strap of her pack, Kiara, so she doesn't have to lay her fingers on it for long. She can feel the power in it, the vibration humming where it sits so close to her skin through bare layers of clothing. The return to the winter tree feels - different. The energy, even among the wolves is of another kind and when they howl their farewells, Kiara's skin prickles, she watches them dart off into the gathering dusk for a long moment.

We could have died.

She turns her attention back, at that. Her dark hair has half fallen from the confines she'd tied it to when they started out and the flower behind Kiara's ear is long gone; lost perhaps, in the midst of the battle (or when they'd been buried in the snow). Her lip still bears a cut she's neglected yet to heal, perhaps the sting of it, the reminder of what caused it, matters right now.

The tiny connection to life. Because she had (nearly suffocated).

"It was a huge risk to take, Henry." Kiara doesn't sound as angry and disgusted perhaps as Leah, but then, it hadn't been her past life being used as a lure. "What if the crown had reacted negatively to Leah being there? The Aeduna were - " she hesitates, casting a searching, considering look at the other Verbena's back, the tension visible in her shoulders. " - I don't think their power is something any of us are meant to have.

It's dangerous." She finishes softly. She has a hand on the tree before she speaks again, this time casting a look that betrays precisely the danger she's concerned with. "The stones, do you think - " her voice drops, edged with uncertainty. "The Nephandi couldn't have taken them from the dragon, could they?"

Her expression reads she wants to doubt the Fallen Ones would have had the capacity to.

Book of MythsLeah turns away when Kiara mentions the Aeduna, but not before a flash of sorrow shows in her eyes. Her flames have not disappeared since she'd recaptured them at the cave, but they are muted now - sliding and flickering around her body like a banked fire. Her flower, too, is gone. It isn't clear when she lost it. There was so much going on, possibly even she didn't notice. Since the avalanche, she's felt... different. Like there are two people living in her body. An eighteen year old girl and... something much, much older. The juxtaposition feels odd, sometimes. Like how she wraps her arms around her chest and folds her spine the way a girl would when she's feeling tired and vulnerable - even while her resonance burns with such heat. Even after melting part of an avalanche like it's nothing.

She takes a few steps into the snow and looks out at the setting sun. Perhaps Elijah goes to her. Perhaps he stays with Henry. Likely, he is as tired and overwhelmed as the rest of them.

Henry, for his part, seems genuinely saddened by Leah's response, and there is a noticeable droop to his shoulders for a moment as he watches her. He too, at times, feels like a person of two ages.

"I wanted her to have the crown. It belongs to her. I thought... what gives the Order the right to keep something like that?" He smiles sadly. "It felt like the right thing to do, bringing her. I thought maybe she would remember who she is. I didn't know the dragon would recognize her. I'm... I'm sorry."

He says it not just to Leah, who still does not turn - though surely she hears him. There's a gaze cast to include Elijah and Kiara as well.

Kiara wants to know if he thinks the Nephandi might have taken the stones, and there's a pensive frown as he considers this possibility. "I think whoever removed them did so before it was ever left here. There's nothing to gain by separating them, unless one wants to keep the crown from being used. The Nephandi would have wanted to use it, of that I am certain. Unless... do the stones have power on their own?"

He asks it of Leah, though they still don't know exactly how much she remembers. Henry speaks of her as though she is the same person who wore the crown but... that person died a long time ago. Whether it is only a part of her that remains, or more... they might never know. People believe different things about reincarnation.

"...Some." Leah offers, reluctantly. "Not much. They're periapts. But the real magick happens when they come together. They hold power from the spheres, and the crown unifies them."

KiaraKiara notices the way the older man seems to deflate beneath the rebuke from Leah (and, to a lesser extent), herself. She's close enough to Henry now to reach out after a moment and brush her hand over his shoulder. There's a crooked, slanting smile that crosses Kiara's lips, this tiny, gleaming thing that recaptures much of the Verbena's typical candor.

"I got to see more of the Umbra and battle a dragon, too," she confesses with a brief, bright expression. Her eyes a warmer honey-gold again; flecked through with the effects of the world they stood inside. "I don't know how many people will ever be able to make that claim." The humor is short lived, though, an interval before it fades and her fingers slide away from Henry's shoulder; leaving a little burst of bright energy in their wake; curling after Kiara's body.

"So, maybe Amara hid the stones somewhere else, to keep this," Kiara touches the crown lightly, grazing her fingertips over as her eyes tick back to Leah, a crease of worry creeping across her brow, drawing her brows together. "out of anyone's hands. It would make sense.

It would have been smart." A beat, a brief flit of appreciation and commiseration, perhaps, for Leah. "Whoever it was, they clearly don't think the crown is something to be used." Kiara's eyes return to the winter tree; she reaches out to trace her fingers over the point where she can feel the fluctuation; the cold air flowing through the portal between. "We might be in agreement on that."

She casts a look over a shoulder at Leah.

"What will you do with it? Will you keep it? Henry's right, I don't think it's the Order's to decide on."

Book of MythsKiara's brief reassurance does put a smile on Henry's face, if only for a moment. And he offers a quiet, "I did say we would have a good story."

There's a question posed to Leah, and the look on her face when she turns around is... complicated. For a moment she runs her hands up and down her arms before letting them fall. Sorrow shifts across her face again, dimming the light in her eyes.

"I searched for it for so long. Now I don't even want to look at it. Do you know how many people have died because of that crown? Because of this thing that I made... when I was beautiful and strong and so full of pride. Everything that I touch turns to ash. Even in this life. When I Woke Up I killed twelve people. One of them was Annie's brother, did she tell you that? Did she tell you that a Nephandus named John Brogan had a vision that I would..."

Her voice wavers and she stops, her eyes bright with tears.

"Sera believes I'm something else. Something beautiful. When I'm with her, I want to believe it too. But she wasn't there. She hasn't seen what I've done. Who I've been. You live enough lives, you get to see yourself do great and terrible things."

Her eyes cut away, and she looks down at the snow. "I am become death, destroyer of worlds. I don't care what you do with the crown. Just keep it away from me. I don't want to see it again."

And with that, she turns and runs through the tree, disappearing onto the other side.

KiaraShe turns and moves out of the path of the tree at some point while Leah speaks.

Her eyes, like the other other Verbana's, are bright with emotion but Kiara's shine with sympathy; with perhaps, some tiny degree of empathy. She doesn't know the way it feels to exist with the knowledge of all that you'd seen and done (and been) before. So many of Kiara Woolfe's lives are hidden from her, yet to be teased and pried to the surface. There are days when she desperately craves the truth of herself and others when the pressing awareness of it, other lives, other loses, seems too much to ever bear real comprehension of.

But - she knows there's a reason why running comes as naturally as breathing to her.

Leah runs, now. Once she's said her piece, she darts through the tree and Kiara can't seem to reach to prevent it but she does look after her for a long moment. And then wordlessly, passes after her into the tree, back over to the glade where there was that stifling silence and nothing but drifting snow and their breath misting out as they breathed.

Kiara's presence can hardly be concealed the way the snow crunches underfoot when she passes back through. She stops several feet from Leah, though and lowers herself to her haunches. Balancing there and reaching to scoop a handful of the frozen earth into her palms; feeling the way the cold seeps beneath her skin. "I didn't know about Annie's brother. I'm sorry." She measures the snow in her palm; tiny flecks of snow are falling over their heads. They catch in Kiara's eyelashes; on her cheeks, dotting them with wetness.

"But you didn't make this crown, Leah. Amara did. It's her mistake. Her cross is to bear all those people who died. Sometimes, it's not about where you start from. We have choices, we can change who we become. If we really want to." Kiara pushes herself back to her feet, slowly crosses to approach the other Verbena. Her hair dancing around her like a dark halo of curling flame.

"I've made so many mistakes already and I know I'm going to make more. But that's life. We can make shitty decisions." Kiara's eyes are fierce, the corners of her mouth shift, suggest at a smile. "It doesn't mean we can't make better ones, too. The Great Wheel turns for a reason. You come back for a reason. It's Mabon." She says softly, as if it has to mean something. "You found the crown on the day light and dark are in perfect harmony. Maybe that's deliberate.

Maybe you have both inside you."

Book of MythsThe others don't cross over right away. Perhaps Henry senses that the Verbenae need a moment alone. Kiara finds Leah standing in the snow staring up at the stars as she inhales deeply of the crisp penumbral air. There are tears on her cheeks, and something wild in her eyes. Like a part of her wants to fly up into that sky and disappear.

"I know that I do." She looks over at Kiara, and something softens a little in her eyes. "I know. Seeds grow in the ash. Death makes life. I forgave myself once. But I'm afraid to forget. I'm afraid that if I don't remember I'll do it all over again." Her eyes skip to the bag on Kiara's back, and there's this little, pained sound. "I can hear it singing to me."

She takes a breath and steps away. "I know what Henry wants. He thinks he fix what happened. Bring back a little bit of myth and magick to the world. But the world isn't that idealistic. I'm almost glad you didn't find the stones, even though... it hurts to see it torn apart like this. I don't..." she sighs in frustration, like she can't find the right words to express what she means. "I don't trust myself with it. Henry, maybe. Let him keep it, since he wanted it so much. Or you, if you think you can. Maybe it'll bring you better things."

Just then, a gust of cold air blows from the gateway, and Henry steps through with Red and Elijah.

"You know Henry," Red offers with a playfully pointed tone, "This is the second time now that I've stolen something from a dragon for you. I hope you remember that come Christmas."

Henry gives a hearty laugh, leaning against Elijah for support. "I would not forget, dear Red. And if I do, I'm sure you will remind me." He looks between Leah and Kiara, his smile sobering to something softer, more thoughtful. "Perhaps we should set the matter of the stones aside for a time. We can return to it once we have rested, and had time to think."

(Had time to reconsider, he might mean in Leah's case.)

"For now, I think, I'm about due for a nap."

Book of Myths[Edit: "he thinks he can fix what happened"]

Kiara"I don't think I'd want to keep it." She hesitates, then. And adds, with a twisting, aware little crook of her mouth. "I give myself credit for having decent self control but I think eventually - " there's a lift of both Kiara's shoulders as her fingers slide under the straps of her pack; she holds them there, the pack to her body. " - I'd forget all the reasons why I shouldn't try and harness that power."

There's a silence that passes between them, then. It doesn't last long, just a beat or two before the breeze heralds the arrival of the others and Kiara is twisting on the spot to observe them. Henry's evident exhaustion where he leans against Elijah, Red's pointed commentary on dragons. Kiara casts Leah one final, considering look before she reaches around and unhooks the crown.

Walks it over to Henry, turning it over in her fingers.

She doesn't hear it beckoning quite the way it speaks to Leah but Kiara can feel the power contained in it; feel the whispers of it, coaxing at her. There's a moment, when she stops before the others that her eyes seem to lose some of that lovely golden light, that a suggestion of something far darker; the capriciousness of nature itself, perhaps, the destructive, devouring edge of it that had existed in the brunette for a time, spirals there.

Then she holds it out, meeting Henry's gaze. "You should have this. To keep it safe." She rubs her arms after she hands it over and quickly turns, as if to avert her eyes from it.

When she reaches Leah's side again, Kiara offers the other woman her hand before they step back onto the Moon Bridge.