Mercy was watching her, and slowly she stood up. Renfei felt an instant of what she could only call a premonition: she was about to see beyond the mask of the cheery, innocent girl.
The Akura Lowgold reached up with one hand—gloved in slick black, as though she'd dipped it in tar—and placed her fingers on Renfei's arm.
“You must be exhausted,” she said.
Renfei searched her face for anything mocking, but found only sympathy. A trainee shouldn't speak to their Skysworn with such familiarity, and a Lowgold should express more respect to a Truegold.
But she was an Akura, so that much was to be expected. She would have grown up around people who could evaporate Renfei with a thought. Sometimes, Renfei wondered why any Akura stayed only Lowgold, even one as young as Mercy.
“You don't need to worry about me,” Renfei said, turning to walk down the hall. “Follow me, we have to meet your...partners.”
Mercy followed without protest, walking side-by-side. She twirled her staff and almost dropped it. “I can't imagine a more trying time to be a Skysworn,” she said idly.
“I certainly can't remember one,” Renfei said. Or the last time she'd actually sat down for a meal, instead of taking it on her feet or on her cloud.
“I don't know how you find time to sleep.”
“Sleep?” Renfei said dryly. “Never heard of it.”
Mercy nodded along. “You can work every hour of the day, and there's still more to do.”
“We'd be short on staff if we had twice the Skysworn we do. Recruitment will be up next year, you can bet on that, but that means even more work for the instructors and recruiters...”
~~~
Renfei and Mercy arrived first. Lindon looked up hopefully when the door opened, but when he saw it wasn't Yerin, he sank back down into his chair. The respectful thing to do would have been to rise from his seat, but he couldn't make himself move.
The green-armored Skysworn gave him a quick look that suggested she noticed. He winced.
She didn't spare him more than a glance, though, continuing to talk lightly with the girl at her side. Mercy held her tall black dragon-staff behind her back, and the piercing purple gemstones it used for eyes seemed to fix Lindon with a glare. The Akura girl hopped into a chair opposite Lindon. She almost tipped over backwards, grabbing onto the table for support.
Renfei chuckled, and Lindon wondered if that was the first time he'd seen her laugh. She had always seemed stern and professional, if not cold, to Yerin and Lindon. Even before they'd come into direct conflict. Now she treated them like suspects she might have to execute at any time.
Maybe she treated Mercy differently as a daughter of the Akura clan. But then, it was hard to stay on guard against someone who was struggling to pull her chair down to the ground before she spilled over.
Once she settled at the table and sighed in relief, Mercy gave Lindon a wave. “You've been working hard too, haven't you? I've caused you trouble,” she said apologetically, bobbing her head.
She had been recovering from madra exhaustion and a collection of light injuries, after their fight against the bloodspawn and subsequent days in a basement. The spiritual healers of the Skysworn had determined that she was unfit for duty, so she had remained here to recover. She had actually protested Lindon being sent out alone, trying to struggle out of her bed before Bai Rou restrained her.
No, the strange one was Lindon, having been proclaimed fit for duty so quickly. Part of that was the speed of his physical recovery, thanks to the Bloodforged Iron body: after three days in that basement, he had already recovered almost entirely. The touch of Little Blue, the Sylvan Riverseed, had helped ease the burden on his spirit.
But there was nothing she could do about spiritual fatigue, and Lindon still felt a deep ache in his madra channels from overuse. He wondered if he had really been in any better shape than the other two, in terms of his soul.
Or if the Skysworn had simply sent him out without caring if he lived.
“No, no,” Lindon said hurriedly, “I hope you’re all right. I couldn't—”
“Quiet,” Renfei said, cutting him off. “You want to chatter, do it on your own time.”
He couldn't help but notice that she hadn't interrupted Mercy.
The door swung open again, and Bai Rou ushered Yerin in ahead of him.
Seeing Yerin in one piece was a deep breath of relief for Lindon. Her skin was covered in thin scars and her black robes were tattered, but that had always been true. Two arms of Forged silver madra extended from her back, their ends flattening into blades: her Goldsigns.
The halfsilver manacles around her wrist bothered him at first, but he understood the necessity. Her Blood Shadow was made of living madra, like a Remnant, so it wouldn't be able to manifest through halfsilver without carving a chunk of it out. Yerin wouldn't be able to cycle her own madra through her hands without great difficulty, and using a technique of any kind would be much harder than usual. She was effectively hobbled.
But without such precautions, she might not be able to leave this place alive.
Her face cracked into a half-smile when she saw him, and she started to speak, but Renfei repeated her line about chatter. Yerin rolled her eyes, then took a chair next to Lindon. Mercy waved at her, smiled, and mouthed the word 'Hello!'
Looking somewhat confused, Yerin nodded back.
Bai Rou slammed the door and leaned against it, the brim of his hat tilting down to cover his eyes. Was he standing guard against an escape attempt, or just generally being intimidating?
Renfei dropped a cloth sack onto the table. Its string was drawn shut, but a watery blue light spilled from its mouth. She surveyed them as though looking over a host of enemy troops. The cloud hanging over her head seemed darker and more solid than ever.
“You're all Golds,” she began. “I won't spare my words. We all know why the Captain put you all together.”
Because a Blackflame, a Blood Shadow, and an Akura were all potentially dangerous liabilities, but their backing was too strong. The Skysworn couldn't kill or imprison them without cause.
“Because you don't give two plucked hairs if we live or die,” Yerin said, propping her chin on her hand.
That was also true.
“I wouldn't put you on the same team if the Captain hadn't ordered it,” Renfei continued without acknowledging Yerin. “And even so, we had never intended to give you assignments. Keeping you out of the public eye and under our supervision would have been enough.”
She really wasn't sparing her words. Lindon was almost impressed, but her sudden frankness made him wary. What was she leading up to?
“Now, the situation has changed. We're going to use every asset we can lay our hands on, and if it turns out we can't use you, we'll throw you out.”
“Seems to me you tried that already,” Yerin said, but before her statement was halfway out, dark fog boiled out from Renfei. Cloud Hammer madra. Though it looked like mist, Lindon got the spiritual impression of a great fortress wall.
“Do not take this lightly,” Renfei said, nailing Yerin to the spot with the force of her stare.
Yerin didn't back down or look away, but she did shut her mouth.
“We will put you to use for the Empire, or we will throw you in a cell. At best. Now, under ordinary circumstances, Skysworn teams select from the available missions together. But the three of you have to stay isolated from the public. Rumors about a Blackflame loose in the Empire are bad; rumors about a Blackflame under the command of the Skysworn are good. But only if he is under the control of the Skysworn. Understood?”