A Tainted Story

22: Regrouping

As Basil stared ahead, his hands gripping the controls, he could hear Hannah sobbing openly behind him, all traces of her bravado gone.

Hannah stood, refusing to sit back down. Her hands hung at her sides, clenching and unclenching in nervous bursts of energy. Her body was still in full flight-or-fight; she felt somehow both frozen in place and electrified. Her nerves seemed to burn, her body shook. Beside her, Silva still looked shaken as well, but she was making a visible effort to calm herself.

Despite her panic, however, there was a spark of pride glimmering within Hannah. She'd been useless earlier, when they had seen the crash, but something drove her to act this time. And sure, she didn't land the killing blow, but she'd helped, hadn't she? For the longest time, she'd prefer letting her sister or Silva take charge, but her pride had been dented on this trip, and when she saw her grandmother pause, her mind snapped, drawing her into the moment.

In the first few moments of the creature's appearance, she had instinctively sat back, expecting for her grandmother to handle it, to protect her. But this time she'd fought it, mustered the courage for her charge. Hannah had longed to leave and see the world, but after seeing the wreck, doubts had begun to crop up. Would she just back to her family like a child? It infuriated her. This was her dream, to explore the cities, oceans, and deserts that were only ever tangible in stories..

But now, despite pulling Silva's arms around her, tears dripping down her face, she'd never felt more alive..

Silva looked at the girl in her arms. The girl who laughed and complained more than anything else, now shaking in that chilling fear reserved only for the most deadly moments. The girl who tried to stab a little boy's face because Silva couldn't do it fast enough.

Still, her mind couldn't help conjuring up images of a broken family, A mother who had lost their little boy to that monstrosity. That thing could have always been a monster, of course, but her gut was telling her otherwise. She shook her head, as if the physical movement would dislodge her thoughts. I must be getting soft in my old age, Silva sneered at herself. Slower too, it seemed. She smiled at Hannah as she fought to pull herself together. and despite the worry that racked her, Silva couldn't help but feel a glimmer of pride for the girl.

It took hours for their shoulders to loosen and the tension in the air to fade. Hannah finally slinked back to her chair, listlessly kicking Basil's seat in front of her. Just a few hours ago, he would have yelled at her to stop. But now, he didn't say a word about it. Fear had a way of numbing things.

They traveled within a bubble of shell-shocked silence. Without Silva's urging for them to press forward, Basil was sure both he and Hannah would have succumbed to the shock. All he wanted to do right now was curl up into a ball. But with Silva's orders keeping him rigid, they continued forward, even as the evening turned to twilight.

She'd almost immediately directed them forward after the attack. They had continued along the main road throughout the remainder of the day, and he had noticed that they were steadily heading toward one of the billowing trails of smoke he had noticed earlier. Now, in the faded light, he could see how drastically the landscape had changed. The woods they had been staring at for days had finally receded, and buildings began to spring up. They were low-slung structures of heavy stone, and the bustle of people moving between them was the most human contact the group had felt in a while. Basil noticed other roads- streets- branching off, lined by more of the same stone buildings. The air there was tangy with the scent of salt, and Basil knew, from reading stories, that the smell came from the sea. He pictured Hannah's face behind him, alight with delusions of the ocean. Glancing at the map confirmed to him that the coastline was close, but the shore remained out of sight.

Silva spoke up for the first time in a while.

"Welcome to the western edge of Librio, the port city of Cynan. it's no Valle, but the place has got its own special charm!" 

While Silva's voice was artificially bright, Hannah's genuine excitement seemed to cut right through the events of the past day. "Basil, look!" Hannah was pointing down one of the streets, and he turned to see a strider making its way down the cobblestone road. Beyond its small, chrome-colored frame, he could finally see a hint of the ocean: a strip of blue horizon in the distance. The strider struck a bright figure against the tans and greys of Cynan. Unlike the models in Valle, this one was painted a bright red color, shades of ruby and crimson swirling together. They all turned to watch it pass. Hannah turned to Silva, her excitement growing. "Striders! They must have potencia here!"

Silva eyed the craft warily as it came to a stop just ahead of them. "The Mecha does, at least. That's one of the patrols."

"Patrols?"

She nodded, pointing out a street for Basil to turn into. "Cynan, where we are, and Mechademia, are technically two cities that formed an agreement. Mecha provides security- and the benefits of technology- while Cynan's ports attract goods from all over the country, stuff you wouldn't be able to get anywhere else. At least, that's how it worked the last time I was here." The others listened as they sidled past the strider, but Hannah was disappointed when she saw no one inside. The pilot must have stepped out into one of the little cafes along the street.

As they moved on, Silva continued to guide them, but she began to draw from memory, rather than the map. Her eyes sought out landmarks that the others glanced right over: pointing out a grotesque stone statue that marked a sharp left, a single wooden house along a row of much larger buildings that reminded her to continue moving straight. Every new street dragged her deeper into the past, with sights and sounds she hadn't thought about in years. Basil stole glances at her as he drove. He had joined the Lodestone family a mere year ago, and the revelation that Silva had a history beyond Valle felt somehow disjointing. He wasn't alone in the feeling: Hannah seemed taken aback as well.

As they moved closer to the ocean, the smell of salt grew stronger, and there were less and less homes along the streets, replaced by shoddy-looking inns and hulking warehouses. In the streets, the seaside docks seemed to be much more crowded, and among the bustling dock-workers and sailors were the lumbering shapes of striders, more than they'd seen in one place for a long time. They burst out of the maze of avenues, basking in the brilliant sunlight. Basil stopped without thinking, stunned by an unblemished view of the ocean that had spread out before him like an endless carpet.

He couldn't actually reach the water, however. The city of Cynan was built on a massive, hangng cliffside, so the waves lapped against a shore that was dozens of feet below them. Further down the coast, he could see where the city finally met the sea, and the clusters of ships that congregated there like a flock of birds.

Following Silva's pointed finger, they looked even further, past the docks, where they were greeted with a landmark that rivaled even the ocean's great expanse. A graceful bridge both caressed and clawed at the sky, its huge buttresses and sharp pointed towers rising from the water below it. Unlike the rest of Cyann, the structure gleamed in the light with the glint of polished metal.

It connected the mainland to an island that stood a mile or so out from shore, where the bridge dipped down to meet it. Compared to the simple footpaths across streams back in Valle, the sight took Basil and Hannah's breath away. The island itself was too far for specific details, but they could tell at a glance the skyline was unlike the blocky stone of Cyann. Basil could make out the same sharp towers and light, airy shapes that distinguished the bridge. He could only imagine the brilliant sheen of these impossible metal structures.

Without being asked, Basil pointed the strider in the direction of the island.