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iluvroadrunner6) wrote2025-03-08 09:42 am
iluvroadrunner6) wrote2025-03-08 09:42 amget your words out { 2025 } yahtzee tracking
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iluvroadrunner6) wrote2025-03-08 09:42 am
this night ain't for the faint of heart | fantasy girl gang | 1100
Tristan changes out of her bloody armor before making her way to the twins, opting for something lighter and quieter than her usual breastplate. The leather armor adds speed to her step as she makes her way to the twins’ room and quietly lets herself in the door. They both look up in surprise from their chess board, blinking at her with wide eyes. She stares into their young faces, not even fifteen years-old, and she knows that killing either of them isn’t an option. It never could be.
“We need to leave.”
They both blink at her again, more surprise coloring their features, and she sighs.
“The two of you aren’t safe here any longer. We need to get you both away from the Emperor.”
“Tristan,” Kira begins cautiously, “are you sure about this?”
“Don’t worry. I know what I’m doing.” Saying it out loud feels infinitely harder, and possibly a little desperate. These children’s lives are in her hands. If she doesn’t know what she’s doing, then there’s no way they survive this.
“Do you?” Kira’s always been the more realistic of the two. It makes sense that she’s the one questioning Tristan now. “Because what you’re suggesting sounds a lot like treason. And trust me, while I’m not exactly opposed, I want to make sure you know what it means for you.”
“I don’t care.” That’s wrong, she cares. But she doesn’t care enough to override what she feels she needs to do here. “The new Emperor, he’s … it’s not the same. And I can’t let him do to either of you what he did to Talia. What he plans to do to the Oracle once he finds out who they are.”
“He doesn’t know,” Asheron protests, crossing his arms in front of his chest. “That’s what this whole charade has been for this entire time.”
“Yeah, and he’s gotten impatient. He’s ordered me to determine which one of you is the Oracle and execute the other.”
Both children go still, trying to process that information. Kira comes out of it first, and Tristan recognizes the look on her face from their training: calculating and looking for angles of escape or flaws in the existing plan. “How does that get him what he wants?”
“It eliminates another heir and allows him to foretell when his enemies are coming for him.”
“He should know that I won’t give him a single vision if he kills my sister.” Asheron’s anger is nearly palpable. He doesn’t hide the truth of him from her, now when it comes down to lives on the line. Or maybe he suspects that Tristan already knew the truth. “How will he know if he’s being told the truth?”
“Oliver Tannenbaum says he’s been cooking something up with the court alchemist. Something to increase the potency of your visions and not allow for any … subterfuge.”
Both their faces pale, and again, Kira snaps to attention first. “We have to go. We can’t allow him to have access to that kind of power.”
“No,”
“No?!” Kira turns on her brother with fury in her voice. “Alright, fine. At least let Tristan take you. I can stay here and play fake oracle instead.”
“No, that’s insane.” Tristan doesn’t know if she’ll be able to swing getting both of them out, but she knows for sure that if she leaves a decoy behind, it won’t end well for her. “He’ll kill you the second he finds out you’re the wrong twin.”
“He can’t. Then he has no leverage to bring Ash back. Besides, Ash has already seen how I die.”
Tristan’s feels that statement sink into her stomach like a stone. She doesn’t want him to make anything about Kira’s potential death true and she can feel herself holding her breath as Asheron opens his mouth to speak.
“I have. It’s not tonight. And Kira’s plan is the right one—” Kira’s fist rises into the air in victory before Asheron continues. “—but for the wrong twin.”
Kira wheels on her brother, eyes flashing with betrayal. “I can’t leave you here.”
“You have to.”
“You’re what he wants! If I leave, there will be no one here to protect you.”
“I’ll figure it out. But if you stay here, you die, and if you try to get both of us out, Tristan will.”
“I’m okay with that,” Tristan interjects, without even thinking twice. “That’s my job.”
“You have children,” he points out, and she shakes her head.
“I’m a soldier. That was always part of the deal.” She takes a deep breath and squares her shoulders. “Carver will take care of them. He’s already moving them somewhere safe so that the Emperor can’t find them when this is done.”
Asheron, however, does not seem convinced. “They still need you, and Kira is going to need you to get her somewhere safe so that she can disappear. Taking me will not help you.” Asheron glances between both of them, knowing that this is something neither of them want but what has to happen. There’s a moment where Tristan can see in his bearing that of his mother, the previous oracle, when she’s issuing a command. “You haven’t seen the future. I have. So will you trust I know what I’m doing, too?”
Tristan nods slowly, before stepping back and moving to watch the door. “I’ll be waiting at the door. Take some time to say goodbye, but we don’t have much.” Even as she eyes the hallway, she can still pick up the soft tones of their conversation from afar.
“We will be together again. We will find each other and we will have a life free of this place. But I need you to trust me and go with Tristan now, understand?”
“I don’t like this.”
“None of us do. But it is what must be.”
“Now you sound like Mom.”
“I better. I’m taking her place.”
Tristan’s heart clenches when she hears how Kira’s voice breaks as she continues. “You keep your necklace on you at all times, so I can reach you whenever I need to.”
“I will.”
“And you’ll be careful with how much you tell him.”
“I’ll try.”
Footsteps pick up in the hallway and Tristan tenses, a hand on her sword. “Kira, if we’re doing this, we have to go now.”
Kira breaks away from her brother, pulling on a cloak and some other necessities, before moving to stand next to Tristan. “Okay, okay. What’s the plan?”
Tristan takes a deep breath and nods as she pulls the young girl into the shadows. “Let’s go.”