"I just don't get it..." Sister Bsess goes, her huff blowing and flapping her lips into a mess of wet noise. I look away from my thoughts and, more literally, the path ahead to look at her. I look back that way again, minding the oncoming sisters so they can go on by without flying. Valkinvar-Imdvarce, like me and Sister Bsess, like most of us up on these walls.
Our sisters go on by, leaving my attention finally free to address her, "How so?"
"Why we are up here. You know? Why we're all up here!" she exclaims, throwing one gloved and armoured hand through her simply brushed hair. She makes a mess of it and I offer a reassuring pat of her head, using my magic to gently blow it all back down. A huff escapes her, and she pulls out a small brush from one of her makeshift pockets. She gets to rearranging her hair, putting far more effort into it than either Cetrepe or Osses, despite the comparative simplicity.
Not like she's wearing it much different to me, either, and I'm practically using the standard do...
A sigh parts my lips, and my thoughts come back to the uncomfortable truth. I linger by some battlements and encourage Sister Bsess to join me next to them. My hands fiddle away on the thoroughly carved stone, tracing what I can and cannot see. Feeling the history and the effort that has gone into it all.
"No one really got punished for the fight in the Hall of Feasts." I remind her, a recent memory flashing through my mind's eye. The temple guard did nothing. They had witnesses, plenty of them and more than enough evidence for convictions and punishments. Yet they did nothing. Leaves one to wonder a lot about the why's but I'm certain it's easier to just be thankful.
"That's precisely the point! You've heard the rumours, yeah?" she goes, her question not exactly the most precise, but I get her meaning either way. It's hard not to when all one has to do is look beyond the walls and the Line Before, even. Not much is out there anymore. It's almost like they've done it. They've brought in every single Valkinvar.
Every. Single. One.
The only ones still operating beyond the walls and the shield dome of Thurn's Forge are the search parties. The oddly Valkinvar-Staguiffmani dominated wings. They're nearly always coming home alone, some wounded, some lacking a sister, although rarely on the latter. What they do manage to find are weak, battered sisters and brothers of the other three Ordoars.
It's an odd sight to stomach, to think and say the least. Having one Ordoar with all this developing animosity towards it handling all of these operations. Especially when the return is so lacking. It's as Sister Pymonsia complained, her efforts to reassure the people of Thurnmourer-Thunlanann are being stifled while these are going ahead.
"What rumours?" I finally ask, lying for my own comfort more so than true ignorance. Though, that is the curse of feigning information. One can never truly pretend they don't get it. The smallest twitches of the eyes and lips reveal all of it.
Bsess sighs, her hand coming away to pinch her nose, "You know the ones I mean."
"I do... I do." I repeat, watching the Valkinvar Gate open for another wing of returning Valkinvar-Staguiffmani. I move away from the walls, going to the very limits of the other side. Several halfmans thick redstone. Once invincible rock impervious to all but secret Valkinvar techniques and technology and now it is nothing more than something to be eaten at. The Line Before was redstone, too. Now it's all cratered by the airship guns.
"See... Look at them. They're all fine and happy while those two Valkinvar-Imdvarce down there are beaten up, bloodied, and bruised. They'll be spending forever locked up in the infirmaries with the bans on using magic to heal people. Valkinvar or no." Bsess points out, her voice just loud enough to hook the attention of one of the floating Sister Staguiffmani. She looks our way, her expression so particularly malicious in its design.
"Mmm." I go, uncertain as to how to process that expression. It seems so strange to see such a smile, such narrowed eyes. The kind meant for our enemy as we slaughter them in the name of divine truth. But for a Valkinvar to be on the receiving end of such a look is...
"The Zaphadren-Valkinvar no doubt played her part in this," Bsess snorts, her sabatons banging against the stone as she storms off. I twist around, giving sensible chase as she works off that flare of energy and anger. Our pace starts to align and our eyes meet again, the path so clear for the moment neither of us needs to pay attention.
"It's no wonder that she did! The Hall of Feasts became a battleground for members of all four of the Ordoars. If the temple guards punished all those present, our morale would somehow plummet even more. I suppose it makes sense that such leeway is given in times like these. The Siege of Thurn's Forge was much the same. Moments of spiked anxiety, stress rubbing on each other like sandpaper." I say, trying to be as fair as I can to everyone involved though, I'm certainly not enamoured with the Zaphadren-Valkinvar.
I can say that much for certain.
"Yet it was only the Valkinvar-Staguiffmani who fought together. The fight was what it was everywhere else, a fight! A fight that just kept on growing and growing and growing nonstop... Only they had any sense of Ordoar unity. The rest of us were like petty creatures bawling for the first sign of safety." she lets out, leaving my frown quite the bit heavier than it was before.
"True... Word through the vines even has it they were hoping to train." I say, recalling quite the peculiar rumour though I have my doubts. Something the Zaphadren-Valkinvar ordered to be spoken so as to save the face of her Ordoar from any misconceptions. Not that anyone sees her words anymore as a one-edged blade. The bias to the Ordoar Staguiffmani is clear. Quite so.
"Train...? Who in All-That-Remains would buy a lie like that? Train!? A brawl in the Hall of Feasts is meant to be training!?" Bsess rightfully asserts, her following strides jagged and abrupt in all the directions she can swerve in.
"Unorthodox training is a thing, Sister Bsess. Even we had our moments of it growing up and going on to become fully fledged Valkinvar. Even after that happened, when our aspirations were sated for the moment. We still had abrupt, strange moments of training." I point out, trying to at least give them some benefit of the doubt, even with how I centre at it. It's an excuse and a bad one at that, but there is a historical precedent for such behaviour.
A fairly recent one as well, too. One implemented by the Zaphadren-Valkinvar herself while I was still training and growing. Just another unfortunate circumstance for Sister Gemorli, I suppose. Changes that worked fine decades ago are not breaking down because of such an unexpected turn in events. Nothing about the Valkinvar really prepared any of us for a last stand at the capital, of all places.
The Line Before, the Seventh Line and all the defences here and between Thurn's Forge... It was all kind of for show, before. A quiet posting that was pomped up on well-earned ceremony and right. And now, here we all are, all that remains of us on All-That-Remains of Creation. Ready to be snuffed out by the power of the Lunar Gods.
"Unorthodox training is one thing, Sister Vapooliar. But there is such a thing as *too* unorthodox. Moments like that should've never been allowed to fly." my friend huffs, crossing her arms and covering her under-boob region. She shifts them about, moving them up towards the shameful scratches on her armour. It's spreading, like an unfortunate leak or something worse... These marks of despair that are restricting all Valkinvar to the city.
"I guess that's why they gave no one a particularly strict punishment." I let out, shrugging as my thoughts putter to a halt on the subject. There's only so much we can say with as little information that we have. Perhaps it is for the best for the curiousless, but for the inquisitive, I suppose it's a death sentence. And moments like these certainly urge the nose to take one a bit of 'y' weight.
"... It's still ridiculous." she huffs, twisting towards the walls and practically slapping against it. Her belly recoils away, the bang of steel ringing out for the world to hear. A fair few eyes and heads turn our way, but not in anticipation of violence. Probably boredom alone twists the gears in their heads.
"I agree completely." I huff in turn, looking about for any sign of Osses or Cetrepe. At least having those two here would make these packed walls feel more alive. There's no siege going on, nothing to watch and observe. Nearly all traffic in and out of the city is gone, and it's drying up like the last drops of water in a hot mug. The walls, simply put, are over-manned.
But that's nothing new these days. We're over-manned where we should be understaffed. Sitting when we should be marching. Recovering when we should be counterattacking with all we have at the expense of our survival instincts and all they demand of us.
Unfortunately, I can see no signs of either of my two former wing members. Most of the Valkinvar-Imdvarce involved with the fight got put on guard duty. Though there's certainly more than the many city walls to patrol. However, I am doubting I will find them on the more forward walls or even the isolated bastions and gun platforms.
Most of us are clinging to the innermost wall for whatever reasons we have. Late cycle shade, cooler air and perhaps even a shorter return to the Hall of Feasts when it reopens. A fair point to be motivated by when so many of us had our dinner cut short. I'm pretty sure I've still got bits of honey-glazed meat somewhere stuck in my armour plates, too. There's an odd stickiness to some movements since the fight.
"Well... I'm not 'patrolling' anymore. I'm going to look for my friends." Bsess groans, her legs bringing her up to the limits of the walls. I look up after her, following suit as she flies off.
"You have one right here." I jest, a slight smile on my face as she looks at me with a mocking scowl.
"... Nah!" she teases, boosting away slightly as I shake my smirking head about.
"I offer you my ears, heart and soul and this is how you repay me?" I ask, grabbing a nearby pole and swinging around it to find my footing again. Sister Bsess remains in the air and floats by at my side. She pokes away at me, flicking and kicking in a most affectionately annoying manner.
"I like the other two more." Sister Bsess childishly goes, her tongue slipping out with an exaggerated roll. My eyes roll much the same, an irk of disgust coming out of me on a hiccup.
"It's good that you have their backs." I say, thinking back to the fight and how well the three did all things considered. Our nature as sword-wielding Valkinvar certainly made the fight a disadvantage to us. Spells can be held back and practiced on, swords can't really be dulled in the moment. We all had to fight without our true power, whereas the Valkinvar-Staguiffmani had the floor to do what they wished. They certainly got that wish, too, corralling us the way they did.
"Don't feel too left out, Wing-Head Vapooliar, we've got yours, too!" she chirps, floating away at greater speed as my head continues to shake to the point of aching. I bring it to a stop, sighing my smirk apart and letting it reform into a smile. She's certainly right... She certainly is right that they have my back as much as I have theirs.
Though she really needs to make a point of not calling me 'Wing-Head,' again... I can get into actual trouble for that as impersonation of a superior officer is a violation of the thirty-second Law of Waionr.