by T. C. Edge
She ponders that, though not in a manner that suggests she's going to agree with me. Reluctantly, she shrugs. "I prefer to look at the bigger picture," she says eventually. "But I guess I see your point."
"Good," I beam. "There you go, a perfect example of how what I'm doing is working. There are few as cold as you Hestia - and I mean that in the nicest possible way..."
"Of course."
"But even you can be shown a better way," I continue. "Even you're willing to see the light." I frown at my own comment. "Hmmm, that sounded preachy didn't it?"
Hestia nods.
"Yuck. I don't want that. But, my message is the same."
"Sure. It's a...a good message."
I smile sarcastically. "Are we back to you telling me what I want to hear because I'm a Herald." I cough, a little of that pent of frustration escaping again. "In name, anyway." My eyes shrivel and dart off to the middle distance.
"I know you want me to speak my mind to you, Amber, and that's an order I'm happy to obey." She reaches out, and lays her thin-fingered hand on my shoulder. The touch is meant to be comforting, but it just feels like I'm being shoulder-groped by the gnarled tendrils of a dying tree. Her hand quickly departs.
She turns to move on, actively moving away from the awkward gesture.
"Thanks," I tell her. "You're sweetening up like honey poured over hot coals."
My words bring a smile, her lips creaking out of their usual position like thin planks of wood bent to the point of breaking. "Anyway, your duties as Herald will grow soon enough," she says. "Don't expect to step right in and start commanding people. They need to get used to you first. When they see what you can do, you'll demand all their respect."
"I know," I say softly. "Honestly, I'm not even sure I want all that responsibility. Elian's a better natural leader. He should have been made Herald if the Prime wanted another one for their war. Or any of the more experienced Chosen, for that matter. Like Dianna or Atlas. Everyone respects them."
"OK look," Hestia says, looking towards Elian and the rest, far too far away to hear us. "I like Elian, and yeah he's got some charm and everything, but he's no Herald." She stares right at me, as if looking right into my soul. "You've got something more, Amber. There's something inside you that yearns for the fight, a violence that so few have. Elian hasn't got it. And as amazing as Atlas or Dianna are, you put them up against the other Heralds, and you'll see the real reason why they have 'war' in their title. They were born for it, just like you."
I nod, my eyes slipping down, conflicted by the praise.
"It sounds like a curse," I whisper. "To be born for nothing but to fight."
"Not a curse," Hestia says proudly. "A responsibility. A burden that only few can lift. It's one of the greatest callings we have, Amber."
She manages another oddly shaped smile, though I see the fleeting signs of an attractive woman beneath the harsh demeanour.
"It should have been you," I say, looking at her. "You have it all. The violence. The dedication. The passion. The..."
"The power?" she says, "That's the most important thing, and it's something I'll never have. Not like you, or Elian. I'm content with my position. I will never rise higher."
"You do enough as it is. You've spent years defending the city. You're a shining example of what any soldier should be. Even Perses says that."
Her eyes light up a little. "He...does?"
I nod. "He approves of me spending time with you. Thinks you're a good influence on me. Prime-damn me for saying this, but I kinda agree."
A grin lifts onto my face, and before Hestia's emotions can go beyond their natural setting, a voice calls over to us from afar. We look up, the moment of mutual respect and recognition bursting like a bubble, and see Elian flapping his arms a fair way down the road.
"Well!" comes his voice on the wind. "What the hell are you waiting for!"
72
I stand ahead of Elian, finding it hard not to laugh.
Around us, at least fifty metres away on all sides and mostly hiding behind trees or other sturdy structures, our protective cohort keep watch. Within that circle, prowling about like a tigress, Hestia watches on, ready to help if needed. Otherwise, her function is essentially to watch and learn, auditing and assessing us so she knows just how she and her Fire-Blood troop can support us when the time comes.
All that, however, isn't on my mind right now. No, it's the ever-so-serious look on Elian's face that's making it hard for me to suppress my grin.
Clearly, I'm not doing a good enough job.
"What?" he says, stopping himself mid-explanation of what he wants us to do. Something about combining our heat signature or something. "What's so funny?"
I shake my head, dismissing the grin. "No, nothing."
"Well, it's something. What is it? Why aren't you taking this seriously?"
For some reason, the wording, as much as the delivery, is enough to set me off. I unleash a snippet of a chuckle, before clamping my mouth back down and swallowing the rest. I raise my eyes up to him like a puppy caught scratching at the furniture.
"What has gotten into you?" he demands. "You're acting like a child!"
"Nice turnaround, then," I manage, pulling myself together. "Usually you're the cocky, immature one."
"I am not immature!" Elian says. He shrugs. "Cocky, I can get on board with. But immature? Take it back.'
"No."
"Take it back!"
"No." I lift my chin, and turn it off to the side. I catch sight of Hestia, hands on hips, regarding us with pursed lips and unimpressed eyes.
"And who's immature now?" comes Elian's voice. He looks left and right. "What is this? Are you playing a prank on me or something? Are the rest in on it?"
"No, nothing like that," I giggle. "It's just...I don't know why, but I find it funny sometimes when you turn all serious."
He frowns, though seems somewhat enamoured by the giggling sound I'm making, his lips working into an affectionate smile. "Well...great," he says. "That's precisely the response I'm hoping for. Tremendous." He shakes his head. "You weren't like this when I trained you before. I was serious then, wasn't I?"
I think back for a few moments. "I guess so. But things were different then. We hated each other."
"Oh come on, that's a little inaccurate. No, more like you found me distressingly charming and, of course, that manifested as dislike because you couldn't reconcile your feelings for me. And I, well, I just felt a bit sorry for you. Hated by the world, lost in a new city, totally and utterly out of her depth. You were a charity case, really."
My grin turns into a stricter smile, my mind poising for a verbal exchange, searching for a riposte. The delay, however, is enough for Elian to swoop again.
"Aha, no response. That suggests there's an element of truth in there. Particularly about you finding me distressingly handsome."
"You didn't say handsome. You said charming."
"Oh yes, you're right. Well, I'm sure you felt intimidated by both."
He grins mischievously, his expression reforming into that arrogant facade I once found quite off-putting. Or, at least, I think I did. I can't really recall now. Maybe there's an element of truth in what he's saying...
"Now, is that un-serious enough for you?" he goes on. "Can we get to work, or are you going to enter into a fit of giggles any time I start explaining something?"
I shake my head. "Well, I'll try my best, oh handsome and charming Elian, Chosen of the honourable race of Fire-Bloods."
Elian lifts a hand to his chin, stroking gently. "Hmmm, I rather like that. I'll have to adopt that as my full title."
"I'm not sure the Prime will agree to that."
"Just like they agreed to yours? What is it again? Outlandishly Beautiful Amber, Herald of War and Protector of the Innocent?"
"I'd never petition for myself to by known as outlandishly beautiful," I counter.
"Well you should," Elian says quickly. "Because...because you are."
<
br /> The air goes suddenly still. Still enough so I can hear the yawning of Hestia off to the side, rolling her eyes as she watches on.
"How about you get training," she calls out sarcastically. "You can get a room later."
I look back to Elian, no longer arrogant or serious in his expression, just pleasant. Warm eyes, a soft smile, a demeanour I'm finding myself increasingly drawn to.
"Well, you heard her," he says to me. "She's speaking a lot of sense."
"I'm sure. Especially the second part, right?"
"You said it, not me," he grins. "But seriously - or not-so-seriously, if you like - shall we?"
I take a breath, nod, and set into our afternoon's training.
It goes well. Well enough for me to know that my body is going to really feel it the next day.
We go for a couple of hours, the time spent with a mixture of instruction and active effort. I grin a few times when Elian turns serious, if only to continue the joke. He rolls his eyes and shakes his head, but I can see he's enjoying it too. By the end, I come away thinking that, aside from working well together, I had a whole lot of fun as well.
And around here, at a time like this, that's just what I need.
The training itself is largely unscripted, all of this not only new to me, but Elian as well. While he comes with some idea as to how we can operate as one, hoping to combine our powers into something more devastating, it's all little more than theory until proven possible. In the past, Fire-Bloods have rarely, if ever, combined their gifts, and few have been found to be compatible.
It is, essentially, something that's never been done before; a fighting technique without a guidebook.
"We're pioneers," Elian tells me. "Lets explore what can be done."
We do so, though carefully at first, making sure to tempt at the fringes of our potential, before trying to march too deeply into unknown territory. Unlike many of our gifted people, our own powers are rife for combination and expansion. You can't add the strength of one Titan to another; a Phaser will not be able to run any faster when working in cohort with another of equal speed. They can work side by side, but can't see their own individual powers enhanced and proliferated by the merging of their might.
We can, if the circumstances are right.
We begin, therefore, by testing the speed with which we can increase our temperature, the core ability that underlies much of what we'll be able to achieve thereafter. A great deal of our strength, of the various feats our powers allow us to perform, are predicated on this ability to heat up, and cool down, quickly. If we can quicken that speed by operating as one, then it will automatically make us more potent.
Create a stronger blaze between us, and we'll be able to generate a more powerful Fire-Force-Field. Achieve a higher sustainable temperature, and we'll be able to move more quickly, using the flame to advance our speed in powerful bursts. With the storm raging within us both, we'd become more devastating to our enemies, spreading the blaze faster, further, decimating those around us. And all of that, in the heat of battle, depends upon our ability to 'fire-up' as quickly as we can.
The experiment, in the end, is successful, though with a bit of a caveat: while we're able to heat up more quickly, reaching quite staggering temperatures in record time, we need to remain in close contact for this to occur. And by close, I mean very close. At least at first.
I suspect the experiment is one Elian enjoys, given the look on his face as we step ahead of one another, and fall into what might, to an outsider, look like nothing but a tender embrace. I feel slightly foolish, imagining Hestia or Krun looking on, to see us hugging there in the middle of that graveyard of a town, nothing but hunks of ancient foundation left, linked together by vines and shrubs, and grubby chunks of rock.
I think, at some point, I even hear Hestia repeat her earlier suggestion for us to 'get a room'...
Embarrassing as it is at first, however, it does seem to work. After a bit of awkwardness and joking around, we set into the task properly and focus hard, bringing our full power to bear. With my raging potential, and Elian's well practiced skill and experience, we make the perfect pairing, our fire combining, our temperature increasing more quickly than we could reasonably have expected. When we release one another from the necessary embrace, the temperature seems to hold. We turn our eyes around and find all bits of flammable vegetation nearby ablaze, the rest withered to black. Foundations of buildings are badly scorched. Some areas immediately nearby even look as though they've seen some partial melting.
And again, not far away, we see Hestia adding her voice, though this time with a slightly more constructive remark. "Hot," she says, nodding her approval. "Extremely hot."
We continue on, trying to work around the problem at hand. After all, enjoyable as Elian may find our method of quickly combining, and increasing, our heat profile, it isn't all that practical. Instead, we begin to learn to do so with 'less' contact, much to Elian's humorous disapproval. Little-by-little, we reduce our need to be body-to-body, and gradually work towards the more suitable solution of merely being hand-in-hand.
After about an hour of focused effort, we stand there, hands grasped together, and allow the fire to flow between us. We turn to Hestia once done, herself an expert in gauging the slightest changes in temperature. She nods. "Hotter than ever. No need to get all huggy anymore," she sighs. "Please."
Elian lets out a jokey groan of disappointment, bringing a laugh to my lips.
"She sounds relieved," I say.
"Oh yeah. So am I. Thank the Prime we don't have to get that close ever again."
"Totally. You'd hate that so much, wouldn't you?"
He grins, and offers a nonchalant shrug, and we set into the next phase of our training.
Firstly, that involves testing whether we can 'fire-up' without the use of physical contact. After a few attempts, we discover that it isn't possible. Only by grasping hands, at the very least, are we able to tap into each other's source of power, and bolster our own.
That confirmed, we begin testing our ability to create a more powerful Fire-Shield around us, tapping into the power known as fire-impermeability. It's an ability that, as I've discovered, acts to bolster the defences provided by our combat armour, deflecting or even outright stopping certain types of projectile, depending on factors such as the power of the weapon, range, angle, and so on. Few Fire-Bloods, apparently, have ever been able to stop bullets outright, and have merely used the power to either slow them, lessening their impact, or simply to act as a shield when facing down against an opponent in physical combat. Certainly, when I fought those three Titans during the trials, I found the ability to be most useful. Without it, they'd have likely pummelled me to death within moments.
With our powers combined and in support of one another, however, Elian and I are able to tap into something much stronger than we're used to. It's almost as if there's an additional layer of protection around us, doubling up its strength. To test it out, we get Krun himself to climb into a fire-proof jumpsuit, the very same as our opponents used during the trials to protect them from our heat attacks, and attempt to batter through the shield. Considered one of the strongest men in all Olympus, his attacks are nevertheless futile against our combined might. Certainly, in combat it's not so easy to maintain such a protective barrier during the frantic nature of the fight, but still, it's a highly positive sign.
So positive, in fact, that we decide to also test the shield against gunfire. I suggest to Elian that we delay for another day, suggesting that now's not the best time.
His response is to merely frown and wave it off. "And why not?" he asks casually. "I feel great, don't you?"
I nod, my body truly humming with energy, a great lust for this enhanced power now running through it. "I do, but..."
"But what?"
"But...Perses," I say. "He'll hear gunfire, and might think there's a problem. Shouldn't we ask for his permission first?"
Elian regards me with flashing, golde
n eyes, his blond locks of hair glowing bright, dazzling shards of light upon his head. "He's got you too well trained, Amber," he sighs, white teeth shining, reflecting the blaze. "He'll be fine with it. We're training. He's wise enough to know we're going to be testing what we can do."
It's enough to convince me, my concerns put to one side. Strange, really, that I have no such worries about the actual risk of being shot at. It speaks volumes of my confidence in my own, and Elian's, abilities. Does it speak volumes, too, of how deferential I'm becoming when it comes to Perses. How much I seem to need and crave his permission?
Have I become too....submissive? I wonder. Am I losing the strength of my own instinct and conviction?
I don't ponder the question, but merely set my mind back to the task, the flames within once again calling for my attention. Stepping side by side with Elian, we take hands once more to reignite the fire, wreathing ourselves in a swirling, churning circle of heat, marked here and there amid the boiling air by flicks of red and orange flame.
We stare out towards Krun, standing suitably far away. I note some doubt in him, probably wondering just what will happen to him should something go wrong. It won't. Somehow, I know it won't. We stare at him and nod, and Elian calls out the command to fire.
The Titan delays just a moment, and then pulls the trigger.
My heart stays steady as the flashes of blazing light appear before me. Several come, one after another, perfectly in time with Krun's gunshots. One flash per bullet, connecting with the shield of heat and flame, each of them either ricocheting off to one side, or melting as they try to pass through, falling feebly to our feet as twisted, deformed lumps of lead.
Elian and I glance at one another from behind that burning barrier, smiles of pleasure and pride rising up on our lips. We nod, knowing each others' mind, as if our connection has somehow given us access to one another's feelings, and call out together, "More!"
Soon, Krun's rate of fire has increased, and the shield is flashing with greater regularity. It doesn't break down. Nothing breaks though. We roar for more once again, and other weapons join in, our defences assaulted from other angles. And still, it holds firm.
