Only Forward
Nephis looked in the window and remained silent for a while. Her face was distant and still. After a while, she lightly shook her head.
"No… not yet."
Cassie seemed to be surprised by that answer.
"No? But… why?"
Changing Star sighed.
"The… Fire Keepers. That is what people call the Awakened who follow you, right? They all look up to me, do they not?"
The blind girl silently nodded.
"Of course! We… they have been waiting for your return ever since escaping the Forgotten Shore. Even though the Dreamer Army was an alliance of convenience, the bonds that were forged between its members are real. Their bond to you is real, too."
Sunny sipped his coffee with a strange expression. Neph, meanwhile, lingered for a moment, and then said:
"But they want more than just to welcome me back. They expect me to lead them, like I did on the Forgotten Shore. Am I correct?"
Cassie nodded once again.
Neph looked away.
"How can I lead them when I don't know where I am going? I… I need more time to figure things out before I face them."
The blind girl remained silent for a while, then sighed.
"I… I understand. I think."
…Sunny, meanwhile, did not understand.
Sure, on the surface, what Nephis said made perfect sense. She was not sure of what she was going to do, so she could not offer the remnants of the Dreamer Army guidance. She could not become their general again until she decided on the direction her soldiers had to follow.
However, Sunny harbored doubts about the sincerity of this indecision. Nephis had never been one to allow her hesitation to slow her down. More than that, she had spent two whole years alone in the Dream Realm… if he knew anything about her, he knew that she must have dedicated a considerable amount of that time to obsessively making plans of how to destroy her enemies once she returned.
Of course, there was a lot of new information that became available to Neph after she came back. That had to change her approach a little, but should not have affected the core of it. So why was she hesitating?
What was she struggling with?
Sunny did not know, and was not sure that he wanted to know… yet. In any case, he was going to learn sooner or later.
There was something else that bothered him, though…
He glanced at Nephis and Cassie and then said, his voice grumpy:
"Aren't you two forgetting something? This is still my home! We only agreed that Nephis would stay here for a week. Shouldn't you at least ask me before deciding to leave her here for a while longer?"
He was not going to let Changing Star pull off an Effie that easily!
Neph turned and looked at him with an unreadable expression. After a few moments of silence, she asked:
"Sunny, do you mind if I stay for a couple more weeks?"
He coughed, and then glanced away in embarrassment.
"Of course! Sure, no problem. Glad to have you, and all that. See, was that so hard?"
***
Cassie remained for a bit longer to get Nephis up to speed about the state of the Fire Keepers and the renovations they were making to the Immortal Flame manor, and then left. Running a prominent Awakened organization was not an easy task, so she had a lot on her plate.
Sunny and Neph were left alone again.
He hesitated for a few moments, and then asked:
"Do you really not want to go home? I mean… I never really had one, more or less, before buying this house. But if I did, I imagine I would have missed it a lot."
Nephis glanced at him, then slowly shook her head.
"That place is not really my home. We were moving a lot while I was growing up. Sometimes because our financial situation changed, sometimes due to security issues. That manor is just the last in a long series of temporary shelters."
She remained silent for a few moments, then added:
"I guess it were the people who surrounded me that created the feeling of home. But they are all gone now, one way or the other. So, there's nothing for me to return to."
Sunny sighed, remembering the conversation he once had with Noctis.
"I don't really understand what the Immortal Flame clan is, to be honest. And who those people were. You once said that you were raised by your grandmother?"
Changing Star nodded.
"The Immortal Flame… is just me, now. At its height, it was one of the most influential Legacy clans. You could have called it a great clan, even, although that distinction was not established yet back then. Apart from the immediate family, the clan also encompassed hundreds of other people. Professionals to manage our properties, craftsmen, mundane soldiers, Awakened retainers, their dependents… a Legacy clan is more than just a few powerful warriors. It is a… a large, self-sufficient institution. A tribe, even."
She grew silent, and then said:
"Of course, our fortunes turned after Immortal Flame himself died, and my mother became Hollow. Then my father was gone, too. Only my grandmother remained to take care of me. She was not an Awakened… however, don't think that she was weak because of it. On the contrary, although my grandmother was a mundane human, she was also the strongest person I've ever known."
Nephis looked away, a hint of emotion appearing on her face.
"She was a member of the First Generation. She was born during the darkest times of humanity, survived the bloody descent of the Spell and the final convulsions of the old world order, then participated in the establishment of the new one. She was strong. She was also wise, and kind. I couldn't wish for a better guardian."
She looked down.
"However, she was not enough to keep the Immortal Flame Clan from falling, especially not when we found ourselves in the crosshairs of my father's former companions. Slowly but surely, we lost our assets and our standing. Some of the people in our employ left of their own free will, others were forced to abandon us because of adversity. Many of those who remained died trying to protect me. The most loyal ones still persisted… there were several Awakened among them, and even a Master. My mentor."
Nephis sighed.
"But in the end, he was gone, too. By the time I turned sixteen, all that remained were a few mundane servants who had been with us for so long that they had nowhere else to go. After my grandmother passed away and I felt the call of the Nightmare Spell, I paid them a generous stipend from what little funds the clan had left, and let them go. You know the rest."
Changing Star remained silent for a while, and then added:
"...I remember walking through the manor before leaving it to comply with the Third Directive and surrender myself to the police. It was so strange, seeing it completely empty. My grandmother was gone. My mother was in the care facility. The servants had left. It was just me, alone."
She looked away. Suddenly, a pale smile appeared on her face.
"Nothing held me back. So, I wasn't sad to leave at all. There was only one direction left for me… forward…"
Sunny looked at her silently, a somber expression hidden in the depths of his eyes.
Only forward... that was true for the both of them, still.
However, was it worth it to not be held back by anything, if in return you had nothing to hold dear?
Turning away, he sighed.
Life was not that simple anymore...
