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Some days are better than others. Falin has always been good at moving forward.
She buys new clothes. The old ones feel strange on her. They are too warm, and they are loose in a way that makes them feel more restrictive than comfortable.
She buys new boots, heavy-duty boots with thick soles, that are fit for both stone floors and dirt trails. She buys snacks — salty and sweet, butterscotch candies and cured meat and baked crackers with blocks of carefully wrapped cheese and pouches of nuts and chocolate bars and all the different kinds of dried fruits she can find.
Laios and Marcille and Chilchuck all take her shopping, and they all have different things to recommend. Izutsumi tags along and tells them all that their taste is terrible.
Senshi, even though Falin doesn’t know him well, spends time teaching her the basics of foraging on the road. She knows some already, mostly through trial and error, but he teaches her more — how to combine, change, to use and reuse. How to hunt, if she needs to, and how to prepare the things she catches. How to chop and stir and roast and sear. How to eat and eat and eat.
Falin leaves. She leaves, again and again.
Though she mostly travels alone, Falin never finds herself going long without some sort company, or at least a meal shared in passing. There are the orcs, other adventurers, and a seemingly never-ending stream of immigrants — come to make a home in the new country risen up out of the waves. Most share what they can with Falin, and she shares food and supplies with ones who don’t have enough to spare.
Sometimes she reaches a dungeon. Sometimes she spends days and weeks in the company of strangers. Some of them know her, or know of her. Some of them don’t.
Eventually, she leaves. Sometimes she meets them again — in Merini, or on the road. They always recognize her the second time, and Falin does her best to remember them too, every face and name. They tell her about their garden, or their siblings, or their new nephew. One of the first children born in the Golden Country for a thousand years. Surely that has to mean good fortune, doesn’t it? Good fortune and a healthy child, and a good start in a new life.
There is always a warm welcome waiting when Falin returns home. Even if she arrives in the middle of the night, there is, at least, always someone in the castle kitchen. They will make her a meal, if she is hungry, or just offer a warm slice of bread, generously slathered in butter, if she looks too tired to wait for something to cook.
They like to fill her in on city gossip while she eats, seemingly as happy for the midnight company as Falin is. Sometimes she follows it closely, and sometimes she just lets them talk, easing the tightness in her chest until she is too tired to even pretend to listen, at which point they send her off to her room with a fond goodnight and a glass of water.
Some days are better than others. Some days, Falin returns to a broad smile opening Laios’ face to her like a sunrise, or to Marcille stumbling forward, closing the distance between them so quickly that it would seem the last fifteen or so feet are absolutely unbearable, even after days and days of miles between them.
Some days she hears someone shout her name before she even notices them, and the rush of excitement that overtakes Falin has her running instead, running and smiling and picking up whoever she is lucky enough to have been found by. She can even manage to pull Laios onto his tippy-toes, these days.
It’s not that she minds interrupting. Falin doesn’t even mind waiting, on occasion, when she comes at a time too important to interrupt. It’s nice to see people hard at work, planning the next steps of the kingdom she has grown fond so of traveling through. Talking about farms, and windmills, and towns with newborn children, and livestock, and ships filled with lumber, and ships filled with food.
It’s nice to see Laios and Marcille sitting in the sun, and to watch them both laugh at some joke that Falin is too far away to hear. It’s nice to know they are okay without her.
It’s a little lonely sometimes, too.
None of the new dungeons she finds are as dangerous as the one they used to explore together. They aren’t entirely safe, either.
When Falin comes back with lingering scrapes or week-old bruises, Laios frets over her. When she comes back with dwindling mana reserves and a half-healed sprain or fracture, he sits by her bed while she rests, staying well into the night to share his mana, or just to keep her company.
His healing makes her itch, but it’s not his fault. His hands are gentle, and his voice is soft. He tells her about new dishes she can try tomorrow, or the idea he’s come up with for how to make use of some new machine they have unearthed. Sometimes, he falls asleep in the chair beside her bed.
Marcille taught him well, or at least well enough.
Falin comes and goes. She’s still figuring out what that means for her. Part of her worries, each time she leaves, that they will be mad at her about it. She would understand. After everything they did to get her back, it doesn’t seem fair that she spends so much time away.
But she needs to leave. To travel. To breath new air, and see new things. These are new hungers — ones Falin doesn’t quite understand, but needs to indulge.
They don’t seem to hold it against her.
There are other hungers, too. Falin wishes she knew how to stop them. It seems unfair that indulging one craving only makes it easier for her to notice more of them bubbling up inside of her.
I want to have some stew. I want to eat that cake. I want to explore a dungeon with them again. I want to touch her. I want to know why they are laughing. I want something cold to drink. I want to remember what happened. I want to forget all of this. I want to see the flowers bloom on this hill in spring. I want them to need me more. I want them not to have needed me so much. I want to run away. I want to run away. I want to eat living armor. I want to eat walking mushrooms. I want to eat treasure bugs. I want to stay.
I don’t want to be hungry.
I don’t want to be alone.
“Come with me.” Falin whispers the question into the small of Marcille’s back, as if hoping she can bury it in the folds of her clothes and keep either of them from hearing it. “Come with me next time.”
Falin is curled into her, mostly hidden under the mess of blankets, one arm tucked around Marcille’s stomach. They are both so warm. Fingers. Stomach. Back. Quiet breathing. The whole room is warm, despite the cold outside. Marcille likes it like that. She likes that Falin runs warm, too.
“Falin…” Marcille starts to turn over, pulling away as she does. Her delicate fingers reach for Falin’s chin, but Falin pulls her in tighter, pressing her forehead against Marcille’s back and squeezing her eyes shut.
It’s selfish. She knows that. It’s too selfish.
“Falin,” Marcille tries again, letting out a short huff of frustration, though her voice is remains gentle. “Falin, let me look at you.”
Falin shakes her head, clutching even tighter at her prize. Then she relents, letting her fingers trail across Marcille as she pulls back slowly, looking up. Marcille rolls onto her side, propping her head up on one hand as she looks down at Falin.
“You know I can’t just leave; they need me here. Kabru would throw a fit if I just disappeared. Plus, there is research I need to keep up on, and the elves still expect regular reports from me.” Pausing only briefly to consider the idea, she adds, “I suppose I could ask someone else to look in on the mini-dungeons, at least, but I really don’t know if I want to entrust that to-”
“Is that really why?”
Selfish. Too selfish.
Marcille looks and Falin, and Falin wishes she was better at reading faces. Even Marcille’s, precious as it is, is often beyond her. Is that guilt? Regret? Falin thinks it’s confusion. Concern. Or maybe irritation. Maybe fear. “Are you really just worried about the kingdom?”
Quiet. That’s her thinking face. Marcille opens her mouth. “It’s-” She closes her mouth again. Thinks.
Marcille thinks about her answers a lot more these days, Falin has noticed. Not always, but… sometimes. Sometimes she will mull the question over, chewing on them the same way she used to chew on a difficult hang-up in her magical research.
It’s nice, mostly. Falin can tell that Marcille does it when she really cares about getting the answer right. But Falin also wishes she knew when Marcille had picked up the habit.
“I’m worried about a lot of things, Falin. You know how I am about… everything. I worry about if this country will accept Laios as its king, and then I worry about Laios being stuck as king. I worry about when we’ll next get word from Izutsumi. I worry about Yaad disappearing, I worry about Yaad not disappearing… I worry about Kabru worrying too much and making himself sick, and then I worry about Lin and the rest of them swearing revenge on us — not that I think they could really hurt us, honestly, but I would hate to have to hurt them, and-”
Marcille cuts herself off, focusing back on Falin. “I don’t want you to think I’m choosing them over you — if that’s what you mean. I worry about you too, going off to those dungeons all the time."
Then come with me, Falin pleads again, silently.
“But… it’s not just worries. I made promises to help here. Promises to Laios, and… and to everyone, really. The whole country! I can’t just leave, worried or not. Not any more than Laios can.”
But I didn’t ask Laios. I asked you. Out loud, Falin relents. “I know. But I still…” Still what? She still wants what she wants. Marcille’s attention. Adventures. Monsters. The party. The things she used to have. Falin hasn’t figured out how to explain to Marcille — to any of them — the way it feels to go to sleep in the dungeon after a warm meal, with her family, and then wake up in a world where everything is different. Where the dungeon doesn’t even exist, and where everyone is always leaving. Or always staying behind.
“It’s just strange,” Falin continues, changing tack. “We see so much less of each other, these days. I miss you.”
Marcille’s eyes get misty, her expression instantly melting into a damp smile. For all that she used to go on about how easily Falin blushes, Falin wonders if Marcille realizes how easily she cries. Someone really ought to tell her.
“I know, I know… I miss you too.” Lowering her head, Marcille scooches down in the bed, until she is face to face with Falin. Her eyes are glittery with tears, and her breath is warm against Falin’s cheek. Falin thinks about kissing her.
They have kissed now, a few times. More innocent kisses that Falin wants, if she’s being honest, but they have been enough to make it clear that things have changed between them. They are still trying to work out exactly what that means, though, and Falin isn’t sure if more kissing would make that less confusing. Marcille isn’t the only one hesitant to jump into things too quickly.
Everything had been different, when Falin woke up. The dungeon was gone, the Island wasn’t an Island, and suddenly everyone seemed to want something from her brother — and from her.
They weren’t cruel, but how people behaved individually didn’t always change the feeling of the crowd. It was like neither of them belonged entirely to themselves anymore.
Falin’s friends, too, had changed. They had new friends, new ambitions. New scars. Chilchuck finally introduced them to his family. Shuro had people constantly following him around, or checking in on him when he left them behind. Namari had a new party to fuss over, not that she’d admit to fussing. Marcille needed help with her hair.
And Laios… It was hard to say exactly how he had changed. He loved Falin just as fiercely, that much she was sure of. She could tell it was hard for him, sometimes, not to overwhelm her with it, and sometimes hard not to flinch away from it. Like there was some part of her that couldn’t rest easy in his heart. But he did his best to be kind, and even-handed with his love.
That didn’t change the fact that things were different between them. And from him and Marcille especially, Falin had needed patience.
It was patience they had given in droves, without question or complaint, and it feels rude to risk ruining it with demands to run away. Or with kisses.
Marcille clears her throat. “W-well, anyway… couldn’t you stay here a while? A while longer than usual, I mean. I know you still want to travel, and we both understand that. We don’t mind. But you are always welcome here. Always always.”
We. They had talked about it then? About Falin’s coming and going? Of course they had. Why wouldn’t they? She missed them both too. But there hadn’t been things that Marcille and Laios talked about without her, before. Not beyond budgeting for the next trip, maybe, or debriefing after a fight. “It’s not that I don’t like it here,” Falin says, rolling over on to her back. She inches one hand out as she does, and Marcille wastes no time in grabbing it and lacing her fingers between Falin’s. Her hand is delicate and a little cold, reassuring and gentle. Holding it is probably less dangerous than kissing. “But I get… itchy, when I stay too long.”
“There’s a lot to see out there,” Marcille offers, maybe a little too quickly.
Falin wonders if Marcille has considered it, too — the way monsters tend to stay so far away from the city, and the remaining parts of Falin that didn’t come back entirely human.
Marcille shifts her hand in Falin’s, adjusting in order to rub her thumb along the back of Falin’s hand. “We’ll figure it out,” she adds, her voice little more than a whisper. “We have time.”
“But what if we never do?” Falin gives in to the aching in her chest, at least for a moment. “What if I’m always leaving? What if I never come back?” What if I get too hungry? What if I ask for too much?
“I don’t know.” Marcille drops Falin’s hand and pulls her into a hug, pressing her face into the crook of Falin’s neck. “But we don’t have to have the answers right now, Falin. We can figure it out as we go.”
When did she become someone I don’t quite know, Falin wonders.
She thinks of Laios showing up at the academy, so much taller than he was when had last seen him. Dirty and unshaven. She had thought he looked like their father, at first. But he had smiled when he saw her, and despite the circles under his eyes, and the way his clothes hung loosely from his thin shoulders, he’d hugged her just as tightly as when they were kids. They were both different, but he was still Laios. He still loved her like Laios.
Sighing, Falin relaxes into Marcille’s arms, and tries, somewhat fruitlessly, not to think too much more about kissing.
Some days are better than others, but the hunger is always there. I want to see how tomorrow goes. I want to see the day after that, and the one after that. I want to hold someone’s newborn nephew. I want to eat a warm slice of bread. I want to kiss her. I want to hug him again.
Falin thinks she can live with it, if that’s what it takes to live.