The Art of Rebellion

The Battle For Veluga

I lie there on the ship for at least half an hour, Mad by my side. Not even a fourth of my magic has replenished yet, so I'm probably gonna be a liability if I try to help the others. Besides, if Castor and Aya are the biggest guns Akira and Nysa have on their side, Corwin alone will be more than enough to finish this mission.

'Forgive me, master,' Shishi starts. 'But I believe you are being irresponsible.'

Oh, by all means, tell me how it's irresponsible for someone who can't even fight with magic in his current state to sit a mission out, oh wise shadowform.

'What if your companions are rendered magicless, just as you were?'

They're not dumb enough to let that happen. Well, Ry's not dumb enough to let that happen. En doesn't fight with magic, anyway, so they should be fine.

'And the two men?' he continues. 'They seem heavily reliant on magic during combat, master.'

Stop calling me master.

'As you wish.' I half expect him to add 'master' to the end, but manages to hold the words back.

"Hey...." Mad says, interrupting our conversation. "Are you feeling a bit woozy, too? I think the poison messed with my head." Oh, boy. I'd completely forgotten about that. What do I tell him? Do I lie?

'Better not, if you care for him,' Shishi advises.

I don't care for him.

'Then why did you put yourself out of commission attempting to heal him?'

Shut up, Shi. I just didn't want the other team to get a win on us. That's all.

"You there?" Mad asks, poking my face. "Oh, no, you're retarded now."

"Oh, sod off," I snap. "And get your hands off me. How am I supposed to know what they gave you?"

"Wow, touchy."

We go back to silent cloud watching. Honestly, I shouldn't have healed him. He's magicless and weak, not to mention gullible. Now I'm here, sitting on my ass while my allies fight.

"So, why'd you think you could trust a councilwoman?" I ask. Honestly, I knew it was stupid the moment I saw her.

"She just asked me to bring her someone who opposes the kingdom," he answers. "I don't get how that was so wro- Oh." Honestly, if it had taken him a minute longer to come to the conclusion he just came to - to go by the 'oh' - I'd write him off as someone of dog-level intelligence. "Sorry, man."

He sounds sincere when he says that, and looks down, too. "Apologies don't mean shit, Madison. If you want me to forgive you, I'm gonna need you to help me out."

He sighs. "Ok, do I do?"

"You look me in the eye and swear you'll be loyal to me first," I instruct, then use a bit of my magic to read his expression and flow of thoughts. Just as I remember, he's the honest, emotional, idiotic type. Those are the guys who died young. He looks directly at me and speaks.

"I swear I'll be loyal to you, Kol. I can't believe you even need to ask that."

"Have you missed the part where another childhood friend betrayed me?"

"Fair enough.... So, what do you want me to do?"

I take a deep breath, then explain. "It's not gonna be long until we make the final move against Aro. I want you to take your ship and find as many pirates and wayward captains who oppose the kingdom as you can, then convince them to join our side. Nazreth isn't anywhere near an ocean, but it's still good to have as many allies as possible. Can you do that?"