Cataclysm War | Chapter 64: The Day Before The Rest Of Our Lives (First Draft)

Friday, August 5, 4 S.E.

The day with Maryanne and Reginald had proceeded relatively productively after their initial meeting, and though no peace had really been made between his parents and Kairi, Leonidas felt decidedly optimistic about the encounter. While his haunted sister had never entirely opened up or fully relaxed, the dynamic of the four of them being back together—blended with Aylar’s easy charisma—had made their discourse pass with surprisingly pleasant exchange.

After his mother and father had, if not gotten over his future, at least tacitly accepted it would happen, he and Aylar had taken them and Kairi on a tour of the palace and shown them around the various balconies, battlements, and spires that made up its entirety. With her rule essentially uncontested by the Aristocracy and the expectation of her coronation a foregone conclusion, they had been able to do so with relatively peaceful hearts.

By the time the late morning had transitioned to early afternoon, the five of them had taken a meal together—though Kairi had left abruptly midway through, citing something she ‘had to take care of’. Her sudden departure had confused and wounded their parents, but Leonidas had understood the reasons for her escape: she’d likely reached her limit of playing the ‘diplomatic daughter’ and hadn’t wanted to ruin the atmosphere with a meltdown.

In that moment, he’d loved her fiercely for her self-awareness.

When he’d offered to walk her out, she’d only shaken her head, winked, and slipped away before he could say more. It was reassuring in its own way, but also saddening. He had no idea how to bridge the divide between his estranged family or where to start.

From there, the meal had progressed to matters of State, and Leonidas had watched with adoration and amazement as his future wife had listened to his parents’ frankly naive ideas about the future as if they were both meritorious and actionable. Ceruviel would have called them ignorant dopes, much to his chagrin, but Aylar had handled the matter with courtesy and grace—ending the meal, finally, with a promise to have a repast with them again, just the ‘family’, before they departed.

After they’d left, Aylar had sent her apologies to the dignitaries that came with them, and invited them all to the wedding ceremony as a token of her regret, before swiftly kidnapping Leonidas into her rooms for what she called a ‘sorely-needed discourse’, which involved far less talking and far more destruction of his clothes.

Which was where he found himself, an hour before dusk, wearing only a pair of loose-fitting leggings and not a damn thing else.

Leonidas stared at himself in the mirror, reflecting on the day, as Aylar came up behind him, wrapped her arms around his waist as a sign of their budding intimacy, and quietly rested her elegant chin on his bare shoulder. The Queen was wearing her silken white nightgown, laden with diaphanous layers of translucent cloth anchored to the thankfully opaque silvery gown itself.

It did reveal her wonderfully toned legs, which Leonidas tried not to think about as he stared at himself.

“Something wrong, dearest?” Aylar asked quietly, her lips pressing to his shoulder as he stared at himself, and her as well, in the mirror.

“I think I’m just having a minor freakout,” Leonidas said quietly, while idly reaching down to brush his fingers over hers, feeling the engagement ring on her finger. “We’re getting married, Aylar. Us. Tomorrow.”

“Yes,” Aylar said with faint amusement. “I was there when we made the decision.”

“I know, I’m just—ugh, how do I even explain it? I’m excited while simultaneously being terrified.”

Aylar smiled faintly and shifted position, stepping to the side and clasping her hands behind herself as she bent, peering up at him with depthless azure eyes.

God above, she’s beautiful.

“Having second thoughts, Leonidas?” she teased with a small twinkle in her eyes. “Because after what you’ve introduced me to, I think that cart has trundled.”

Leonidas eyed her for a moment and then shook his head, smiling wryly.

“Ship has sailed, babe,” he said mildly. “The term is ‘ship has sailed’.”

“Truly?” Aylar asked after a moment, straightening with a frown. “That does not sound correct.”

“Yeah, well, it means the same thing,” Leonidas allowed, turning away from the mirror and regarding her more directly. “Besides, they were firsts for me as well, thank you very much.”

Aylar grinned at that, and her cheeks flushed faintly, alongside the tips of her ears as they faintly twitched. “And here I thought you were an expert, after all that vigorous tuition.”

Leonidas smiled wryly and shook his head, stepping forward to slide his hands on her hips and tighten his grip faintly, eliciting a quiet gasp from his fiancée. “You’re incorrigible, Aylar. Absolutely incorrigible,” he said with certainty, while bending to steal a quick, loving kiss. “But I am happy, if you need to hear it, I’m just…”

“Unprepared,” Aylar finished, her eyes closed from the kiss, and her lips folding to enjoy the sensation before she opened her gaze to meet his again. “I understand. I feel the same, truthfully. It’s like the world has been torn out from under us. I was talking to Synthra about it today, to be candid. She seemed to empathize with the feeling.”

“Synthra did? Really?” Leonidas asked with a moment of confusion, and then shook his head. “No, never mind, that does make sense. That woman lives in her own head more than both of us combined.”

Aylar frowned at him and reached up to poke his nose.

“Be kind, Leonidas. That woman will be your second wife.”

Leonidas crossed his eyes to look at her finger, and then grinned.

“Yeah, but if I don’t acknowledge that she’s a bit mental, who will?”

Aylar stared at him for a moment and then let out a guilty laugh.

“Bless her, Synthra can be a little… intense at times, I suppose.”

Leonidas snorted quietly and shook his head. “Aylar,” he said to her wryly, “calling Synthra ‘a little intense’ is like saying the sun is only ‘a little warm’. I adore the woman, I do, but she’s about as intense as a supernova.”

“A… what?” Aylar asked curiously.

“Supernova,” Leonidas repeated and paused to consider how to explain. “You know, when a star explodes—boom!”

“Oh, a {Supernova}!” she clarified in Haelfennyr. “Yes, very well, I understand now.”

Leonidas smiled at that and reached up from her hips to brush her hair behind her ears, earning another little pair of twitches from her when he did. “That aside, though… You did well with my parents. I think they ended up liking you more than me.”

Aylar smiled at him brilliantly when he said it, and her cheeks flushed again, this time with simple joy. “I liked them very much, Leonidas. Your mother was very kind to me, and your father is… Amusing. He is very fascinated by our social matters and decorum. He would not cease questioning me about protocol and Royal procedure, though it was endearing to see him so interested.”

“My parents are nerds,” Leonidas answered without surprise, and a faint mirth that stirred within him with mixed affection. “They named me the way they did because of that, too. A fate I intend to spare for my children.”

“Our children,” Aylar corrected, her hands moving to slide her nails gently across the planes of his chest and brush at his pectoral muscles. “Though, I would not want to impede any lineal practices, if your parents—”

“God, no!” Leonidas said with a laugh, reaching to take her hands in his and squeeze them affectionately. “It’s not a ‘lineal practice’, Aylar, it’s just pure stupidity. My parents named me LARP. In Terran nomenclature, it basically means someone who runs around pretending they can use magic and acting like they’re a wizard or a sorcerer or—”

He paused when he realized she was looking at him in confusion, and then connected that to her; it was perfectly normal. Of course. She’d been born millennia after the System had Integrated Altera.

“They did it before the System, I mean. Before we had magic, classes, or Alphas. Our species had only imagination and the thought of what could be. I suppose explaining it is a little futile, but just trust me when I say that it was not in my favor.”

Aylar grinned at him after a moment and moved forward to press her chin to his sternum, looking up at him with her brilliant blue eyes. “I like it when you speak of your past,” she admitted warmly, her ephemeral and elegant blonde eyelashes faintly catching the light in a play of platinum. “It feels as though I can see behind all that dark, brooding mystery.”

Leonidas hesitated at her words, and then grimaced playfully.

“I do not brood,” he objected after a moment, “I just… Think. Really intensely.”

“Yes. Intense,” his fiancée agreed smugly. “Like Synthra.”

“That’s cheating,” he murmured good-naturedly, and kissed her nose before pulling away, his hands squeezing hers so that she knew he wasn’t upset, before walking over to pour them both a glass of water each from the magically chilled pitcher on the table nearby.

Aylar stepped forward and settled onto the chaise a meter past her immense bed, stretching in a distractingly languid way as she relaxed into the comfort of its embrace.

When Leonidas joined her, she accepted the glass of water with a murmur of thanks and sipped it gratefully, her eyes peering at him as he pondered the day to come.

“You’re ‘thinking intensely’ again,” she noted quietly, a little smile playing on her lips.

“Yeah,” he said with a faint nod. “The Coronation, this time.”

Aylar paused when he said so and instead sipped her water again, seemingly content to let him continue when he was ready. He appreciated her understanding of his mind and took his time, searching for the right way to express what was churning in his thoughts.

“I never wanted to be a King,” he said finally, deciding to forego eloquent philosophy in favor of just speaking his mind as clearly as possible. “Ceruviel kept talking about it, even after only a day of knowing her, and I thought she was bloody insane—but with hindsight, she probably knew me better than I knew myself, with her Psionic potency. She saw this coming a mile away.”

“The Duchess is a very wise woman,” Aylar agreed simply. “She knew we’d be wed before we did.”

“Yeah, and she’ll take credit until she’s dust on the wind,” Leonidas said with an echo of fondness, “but that’s not the point. I didn’t want this, Aylar, because I was scared of myself. It’s the same reason that I refused intimacy—the same reason I avoided it like it was a disease. Fear. Not of the thing itself, but what I might do to someone I got close to.”

Leonidas sighed and shifted, draining his glass of water and drifting it to the nearby table with a reflexive use of [Psionic Force], before flipping up her legs in the same motion and settling them on his thighs—inspiring an amused laugh in his bride-to-be.

“We’re at the cusp of forever, Aylar. The day before the rest of our lives. It’s… a lot, not because I’m not looking forward to it—that’s the thing, I want it. I want it more than I can explain, now that I’ve left the past in the past, but that fear… It’s still there, Aylar. Lurking. Waiting. My Intelligence and Willpower have been enhanced enough that I’m in control, I’m not letting any of it dominate me—but I’m just…”

Leonidas frowned and trailed off, reaching down to grip her shins and distract himself by massaging them, drawing from her a sigh of appreciation. She didn’t interrupt him still, but he could feel her watching him, quietly receptive, silently supportive. It meant more to him than he’d ever be able to express.

“I guess I’m just worried, not because I think we can’t forge an amazing future, but because I’m worried we’ll succeed—I’m worried we’ll knock it out of the damn park, and that scares me more than anything else, because if we do, if we really nail it, then all that fear? All that doubt? It meant nothing. It controlled me for so long, Aylar, and if it meant nothing…”

Leonidas grimaced and slid his hands down to her ankles, squeezing and massaging them gently as she wiggled her toes in pleasure and listened.

“If it meant nothing, then all that time I spent being scared also means nothing, and I have to confront the fact that I’m finally free of it—of Elatra, of the Trial, of everything that ever held me back. I’ll be free of it, and that scares the shit out of me, because I don’t know who I am without that trauma. I don’t know who I am without those nightmares or demons.”

His gaze rose to hers, and he smiled tightly.

“At some point, that pain became part of my identity, and I don’t know how to deal with not having it define me anymore. Does that make, like, any sense at all?”

Aylar didn’t answer him immediately, and instead searched him with her deep, blue eyes—so like the sapphirine gems that often adorned her dresses. After a long moment, when Leonidas felt his heart starting to thunder, she smiled at him.

Instead of speaking, she shifted forward on the chaise, wiggling closer until her hips pressed against his thigh and her knees curled against his side. Her hand found his wrist where it rested on her ankle, and she closed her fingers around it—warm and grounding.

“It makes sense,” she said quietly, her voice soft with affection.

Leonidas frowned at her faintly, skepticism dancing through him as he watched her.

“Really?” he asked uncertainly.

Aylar lifted her free hand and pressed her palm to his chest, right over his heart, and splayed her hands as she felt the thunderous beat within his breast.

“It makes perfect sense,” his bride repeated, and her voice softened even more. “Because you are not afraid of failing. You have never been afraid of failing, my Knight. You are afraid of discovering that you suffered and died—by your own hand—for nothing.”

Leonidas’ mouth felt dry as she spoke, but he listened, mind racing alongside his heart as he absorbed her words.

Aylar’s gaze didn’t waver, and instead, she only smiled at him—warmly, almost lovingly. “You are afraid,” she continued, “that if you surrender that fear, that self-destruction, and the resistance you built to stop it, you will fall.”

Leonidas blinked at her words and felt something stinging in his eyes when she finished, swallowing back a lump in his throat that had appeared without his conscious notice. “Yeah,” he admitted hoarsely. “That’s… yeah.”

Aylar’s thumb stroked the inside of his wrist reassuringly, smiling at him still, and then spoke again. “Leonidas,” she said, her voice quiet, absent Queenly intonation, like what she was in that moment; a woman speaking to the man she intended to build her life with. A woman speaking to her partner. “You don’t need to prove that your pain was meaningful by keeping it. You don’t have to fear losing it because you think that doing so deprives it of meaning.”

His eyes narrowed in reactive sharpness at her words, feeling the strange sense of contradiction where her words had actually offended some part of his psyche. It was puzzling, and he forced himself to relax the moment he was aware of doing it.

Aylar, however, seemed to have anticipated his reaction.

She always seemed to anticipate him lately.

It was patently unfair.

“I know,” she said to him with a wry smile. “I know what your mind wants to do. It clings to that fear because it’s what gave you strength, it’s what motivated your brilliant defiance, it’s what gave you the power to defy the heavens and death itself, because you already embraced it once before. That fear, and the defiance it inspires, is reliable. It does not surprise you. It makes you feel… Prepared.”

Leonidas stared at her for a moment and then grumbled good-naturedly, his voice still hoarse. “Stop reading my mind. I’m the Archon here.”

Aylar’s lips twitched. “I am merely learning you. That is not the same thing.”

He grunted at that, but he didn’t argue. He couldn’t. Not when she was right.

Aylar leaned forward and pressed a kiss to his sternum after his grunt—a feather-light brush of contact, before she settled back, her head tilting as she regarded him with a kind of eternal patience that made his heart thunder for a wholly different reason when he saw it manifest.

“You said you don’t know who you are without the trauma,” Aylar repeated. “Then let me give you some Alteran wisdom, soon-to-be husband.”

Leonidas’ jaw tightened slightly, and he braced for some mad anecdote.

Aylar’s tone became faintly more formal when she spoke, but it lacked the coldness he was used to from Ceruviel in similar situations—it was still fundamentally loving, just… stern.

“A ruler is not forged by what they have suffered alone,” the Swordmaiden said with emphasis. “A ruler, Leonidas, is forged by what they choose to become after it.”

Leonidas blinked at that, and his lips downturned faintly as he mulled over the words.

Aylar continued while he did, her lips quirked still into that faint smile as she spoke.

“Tomorrow does not erase your past, my Knight. It does not absolve your fear. It does not dismiss nor invalidate your nightmares.” Her fingers tightened around his wrist in emphasis, holding him with her Adept-rank strength, as if she were his personal lifeline. “It simply gives you a new duty: to create a world where nobody ever has to suffer as you have suffered. It gives you permission, from your own heart, to move beyond the memories of that trauma, and become something greater than what you were while relying on it.”

Leonidas smiled mirthlessly at her words. “That sounds like therapy.”

Aylar’s eyes flashed with amusement. “In a way, I suppose it is. But, not the therapy of a strange practitioner on a couch with a notebook—”

“That’s only in novels, Aylar,” he interjected fondly.

“Oh,” she said after a moment, and then grinned. “Well, then yes, I suppose it is a kind of therapy; the therapy of self-forgiveness, of giving yourself the freedom to move forward and away from the chains you convinced yourself were your strength.”

Despite himself, Leonidas snorted in amusement.

Aylar smiled at him, and her tone lowered.

“I am not asking you to be healed overnight.”

His eyes searched her quietly when she spoke, but he didn’t interrupt, sensing more to come.

“I am asking you to be honest with me,” she said. “Because I am being honest with you.”

Leonidas hesitated and then asked the question he dreaded her answering.

“Are you scared of this, us, as well?”

Aylar frowned at his words, hesitated, and then sighed quietly.

“Leonidas,” she said with a little smile, “I am terrified.”

He froze at that, and his heart thundered in response, but her squeeze on his wrist gave a reassurance that quickly stilled his instinctive panic.

Aylar’s eyes flicked away for the first time, toward the pitcher, toward the window, toward anything except him, then returned to him afterward.

“I am terrified,” she repeated. “Not of marrying you. Not of being your wife. Not even of sharing you with Synthra, though the woman is going to be downright incorrigible when she joins us.”

Leonidas smiled nervously at that thought, but listened without interruption.

“I am scared, Leonidas, that I will fail you,” Aylar said honestly, her voice vulnerable for a moment. “I am scared I will not be strong enough—or wise enough—to help guide you when you need me most. I am not scared of you, Leonidas; I am scared of failing you. I am scared of the consequences of failing you, not because you are broken, but because you are pure. Not because you are innocent, but because even now, after all the pain and strife, you still choose to be good.”

Aylar lifted her hand from his wrist and settled her fingers on his cheeks, thumbs brushing them with adoration that made his heart sing.

“For all your self-loathing, your self-blame, your self-denigration, you are one of the noblest souls I have ever met—and the thought of being the reason that righteousness shatters, of being unable to save you from your own pains, or from the terrible influence of your Core, it… I don’t want to think about it, but it stays within me, those visions, those trials, like a nightmare repetition of my own greatest failures.”

Leonidas smiled woodenly at her words, and his expression twisted faintly.

“I don’t want you to carry that burden,” he said gently. “It’s not your responsi—”

“In sickness and in health, Leonidas,” Aylar said to him firmly, her azure eyes fixed on his. “In your case, that means more than just a physical ailment. So,” she said and took a breath, smiling at him brightly, and removing the shadow from his soul as easily as the sun tearing through clouds, “promise me something.”

“I’ll promise you the damn moon right now,” he said gruffly.

Aylar laughed at his words and brushed away the tears he hadn’t realized he’d shed.

“Promise me, Leonidas, that when the doubt comes, and when the loss gnaws at you,” she said, “that you will not turn it into new chains. Promise me that you will bring it to me.”

Her eyes searched his as he nodded, and she smiled at him radiantly.

“In return, I promise you this: when my grief comes—when the Court pushes me to the edge, and the weight of my brother’s absence tries to drown me—I will bring those fears, those burdens, those pains to you.”

Leonidas’ lips firmed at her words, and he nodded.

“I promise,” he said quietly, and meant it with every iota of his being.

Aylar nodded at him, once, with a Swordmaiden’s approval.

“You’re allowed to leave the trauma behind, Leonidas. There will be plenty of pain to come. The trick is not to be bound by the old chains while fighting off the new ones.”

Leonidas’ breath shuddered when he drew it in, and he lifted his hands to hold her, drawing her against him tightly as he embraced her.

“You’re annoyingly good at this,” he admitted quietly.

“At being your wife?” she asked warmly, snuggling into him.

“At… whatever this is,” he muttered. “Therapy, I guess.”

“It is called building,” she said simply and kissed his chest, once, twice, three times. “You have survived long enough, Leonidas.”

Her head drew back, and she arched up to shift her position as he released her, hiking up her nightgown to straddle him, and bringing her hands to his face before kissing him, soft and warm, before pulling back to stare him in the eyes.

“You have already embraced death twice, Leonidas. You have already let that grief consume you, once on Elatra, and once here, on Terra.”

Leonidas watched her with a flicker of uncertainty, and Aylar pressed her forehead to his, her nails dragging gently through his scalp. Her scent filled his senses, and he inhaled despite himself, reveling in her closeness as she pressed her lips to his again, before speaking one final time.

“Now, my soon-to-be husband, my King,” Aylar whispered, “just as you promised after my Rite, it is time for you to live.”