Sword and Snow

“Why are we going this way, Vale?” I asked, confused. We were in the middle of the city for some fairly routine shopping. Not only had I come with Vale, but Cierra and Talya had come along as well.

It was the first time that Cierra had come into the city with us. She looked around half afraid and half excited, taking in all of the sights, sounds, and people. Her eyes were wide with so many emotions that I was worried we were overwhelming her too quickly. She held one of my hands in an iron grip, clearly afraid to let go, and kept herself in contact with my side.

However, despite her obvious fear, she seemed equally entranced by the constant motion of the city around us. I was happy to see her continue to open up somewhat, despite her fears. And she was beginning to act more like a normal child.

After reaching the main thoroughfare, Vale had begun to lead us off the main road. The streets in Flowing Dragon City were well maintained and quite wide, so even the back roads didn't feel unsafe. Still, randomly turning off into a side street felt out of character even for Vale.

Vale turned to me with a smile. “It's a faster way to the grocer we usually buy from. And going through here cuts down on some of the foot traffic.”

He was at least right that there was less foot traffic down the side streets. Being less crowded didn't mean empty, however; there were still a number of people around, even on the smaller streets. We continued to follow Vale a little ways down the road before he turned and went down another, even smaller, street.

“This way, ladies.” he said happily, motioning ahead down this new road. We followed behind him for about 15 steps before he suddenly vanished.

Talya and I pulled up short at the sudden disappearance - and then I heard a yelp behind me. I turned around and saw Vale holding a woman to the ground, pinning one of her arms bent behind her back.

“So! May I ask why you've been following us, little miss?” Vale asked, keeping the woman pinned. He began to tap his Qi, prepping for a fight just in case. The woman struggled a little, mostly trying to get her face up off the stone.

As she struggled, I took note of the long white braid and the dirty but still quite striking white and blue robes. It had been a while, but I did still recognize her.

"Miss Axies?” I said dumbly. What in the world was she doing here? When she finally managed to get her face off the ground, she gave me a winning smile although her eyes let through a little of the fear she felt.

“Hello, Miss Vale. Fancy meeting you here.” She said, trying to keep up the act of nonchalance, despite being pinned by someone who clearly outmatched her.

“Sorry, Vale. I know her - and I told you about her; it's Miss Axies. The woman that helped me rescue Cierra.” I looked down at the little girl, who was now hiding behind one of my legs. I ran my fingers through her hair gently. “It's okay, you can let her go.”

Vale looked up at me, nodded, and stood. He scratched the back of his head, looking a bit sheepish. “I'm sorry about that, Miss Axies. I'm not used to friends following us in the shadows," he said, and offered her a hand up.

She took the offered hand and scrambled up to her feet, dusting herself off as best she could. She responded with an apologetic look to Vale. “No, that’s quite alright. It’s entirely my fault for tailing you all the way I did.”

She offered Vale, and then everyone else, a small bow in a way of apology. When her eyes came back up and crossed the group, I inwardly chuckled as I imagined what she may be thinking. I’m sure we all looked like quite a ragtag group of people.

I was dressed in simple gray and black robes, with my hair recently chopped back to a clean, mid-length bob cut. But it was likely not much had changed since the last time we had seen each other. Although, I suppose I wasn’t drenched in blood this time, which was a nice bonus.

Vale looked like a jolly, middle-aged man with a fairly sized paunch; each and every one of his mannerisms was basically designed to look non-threatening and approachable. That same man had suddenly, for all intents and purposes, vanished, appeared behind Avuri, and immediately taken her down. And she very likely felt the beginnings of his intense fire Qi spooling up afterward.

Talya stood beside me, looking bemused. She was a short, stout woman who appeared to be in her mid twenties. Which, to be fair, is around when most Cultivators ceased to visibly age. She was, in fact, three years older than me. She was noticeably shorter than the rest of us, as well as a bit softer. Her slight chubbiness belied quite a beauty though, and her face lit up brightly whenever she smiled. With her hair currently gathered at the back of her head in a tight bun, she gave off the air of a caring mother or aunt.

And then there was Cierra, who was still hiding half behind me. After the night several months ago when she had thanked me for comforting her, she had been making slow strides to recovery. She talked a bit more now, and generally showed more signs of life. But physically, putting her clear anxiety aside, she looked vastly improved from the last time Avuri would have seen her.

After she started to eat more regularly and began to get out of the house and walk around more, her body had made a pretty significant recovery. She was no longer just skin and bones, but looked well fed. She still remained on the thin side, and didn’t regain any baby fat, but she looked healthy. Her onyx hair had regained its normal luster and the straight, well-kept lines of her hair were neatly tucked behind an ear. Most of all, despite the anxieties there, her bright blue eyes were striking in contrast to her much darker hair.

As Avuri took us all in, the one thought going through my mind was ‘There’s no way we look like a family’. And when Avuri’s eyes finally came to rest on mine, I laughed aloud. She looked at me, confused, as I tried to regain myself.

“This is my family, Miss Axies. My father, Vale,” I pointed to Vale, beside her. “My sister, Natalya,” I pointed to Talya in turn. “And my daughter, Cierra.” I pointed to Cierra last, with a big, warm smile on my face.

Avuri’s face was quickly overcome with a smile of her own. “I’m glad to see she’s looking so well!” She said, looking at Cierra. “And it’s nice to meet you, uh-” she stammered, likely about to say ‘Mister and Miss Vale’ but stopped as she didn’t want to cause any confusion with names.

“Just Vale is fine by me.” Vale said. “And you can just call Emery and Natalya by their names too, I’m sure they won’t mind. Natalya usually goes by Talya.” His perfect image of the jolly old man was back in full-force. Maybe ‘image’ isn’t the right word. He really was a jolly old man for the most part.

Talya opened her mouth to protest, but I cut her off. “It’s fine. I owe her for saving Cierra’s life. Without her, we wouldn’t all be here right now.” My hand landed on Cierra’s head again, of its own accord.

Talya sighed aloud and stepped up to offer Avuri her hand for a handshake. “It’s nice to meet you, Miss Axies. I’ve heard about you from Emery. Seems most of what she said so far has been accurate.”

As Avuri took Talya’s hand in a shake, she looked at me questioningly. Probably wondering what I had told them. “Please, just Avuri is fine. No point in holding up pointless civilities in only one direction.” Talya smiled in response and nodded.

Avuri turned toward me and Cierra next, and stepped twice to be right in front of us. She swept some of her robes back a bit to kneel in front of Cierra, to be eye-to-eye with her. Her face had a warm, sincere expression across it. “Hi, Cierra. Do you remember me, by chance?”

I looked down, curious about it myself. Cierra never mentioned the day we found her, and I wasn’t about to bring it up myself. I had no idea how she felt about the whole thing, beyond the obvious fear and anxiety she always exhibited.

The girl nodded. I could feel her grip on my clothes lessen a little, but she didn’t let go. “I do. A little.” She said quietly. Her voice was still scratchy from general disuse, but the sound came through clearly in the end.

Avuri smiled then, and held out her hand for a handshake. She did so carefully and slowly, making sure not to spook the younger girl. “It’s nice to meet you more officially, Cierra. You can call me Avuri, if you’d like.”

Cierra stared at the hand quietly for a moment, before tentatively letting go of my robes to shake hands. Avuri had the understanding of a goddess, and I could not have been more grateful for it; she kept her hand motionless, and only closed her hand around Cierra’s after Cierra did so first. And she let Cierra control the shake itself.

Cierra nodded, having had her fill of the handshake, and they dropped hands. “Ri, thank you.” She said in her quiet little voice.

Avuri smiled. “Ri, huh? That works too.”

I grinned. “I’ve been dubbed Merri, so you’re in good company.” I chuckled, and messed up Cierra’s hair. Her eyes darted up to me immediately, a small spark of anger there, as she let go of my robes with her second hand to set about fixing her hair. I smiled down at her.

“So!” I said, pulling the conversation back to what probably should’ve been front and center. “What exactly are you doing in Flowing Dragon City, Miss Avuri?”

As she once again stood up straight and brushed off her robes once more, Avuri shot me the same winning smile from earlier. This time there was laughter, not fear, in her eyes. “Of course I came to visit you, Merri.” She swept into a mock bow. “I did say I would, didn’t I?”

I glanced at Vale and Talya, who were both now behind Avuri hiding smiles, then looked back to Avuri, my eyes narrowing on her. “I suppose you did say that. But a warning would have been nice. You could have quite literally lost your head a few minutes ago if Vale hadn’t decided to question you instead of killing you outright.” I offered her a cocky grin as her eyes snuck up to mine. “Which, I might add, he has done before to strangers following us.”

“No I hav-!” He started, then stopped for a moment. “Wait, no. Yes, I have done that, haven’t I?” He said, his fingers tracing his chin in thought.

Avuri went a bit more pale than her usual already porcelain white expression. “More than once, in fact.” I said, my lips moving further into an impish grin. “Remember that whole mess you got us into in Deep Well a few years back?”

“Oh.” His face fell. “Oh, yeah. That was a mess, wasn’t it? I should not have killed that guy right in the middle of the market.” He muttered to himself. But perfectly loud enough for all of us, except maybe Cierra, to hear.

Avuri’s face swung back to me, a look of near horror on her face. I sputtered out a laugh. “It’s a long story,” I said, “involving two different assassin sects and a noble family we were doing work for.”

Talya broke in then. “Miss Avuri. We were about to finish our grocery shopping for the trip and then get a late lunch before returning home. I assume you came all this way to see the house, yes?”

Avuri swung back to face Talya. “Hm? Oh, yes!”

“Would you like to join us for now? We could trade stories over lunch.” Talya offered with a smile. “I would love to hear what was going on in your side of the story of rescuing our new favorite little girl.”

“That would be lovely.” Avuri returned.

I shot a glare at Talya, warning her with my eyes. She gave me back an innocent look, surely promising she wouldn’t tell any embarrassing stories.

I continued to pin her with my glare; I knew she’d tell them anyway.