LILIA HELSTEA
"Lilia, I really hope you understand just how lucky you were."
Father was sitting behind his desk, his fingers steepled in front of him. He wasn't yelling, but I could tell how upset he was by the way his voice trembled.
Mother was leaning back against the closed door of Father's office, her face pale, her eyes closed as she listened to our conversation.
"I know, Father, I know!" I said, my own voice sounding thin and whiney to my ears. I leaned forward and hid my face in my hands. "I won't do it again, I promise..."
When there was no reply, I looked up. Father's dark eyebrows had come together in a frown. "Is that how I raised you?"
I sat up straight and stared at him, unsure what he meant.
"Do the Helsteas give up just because of a setback?" His frown deepened. "Were that the case, I promise the Helstea Auction House never would have been successful."
"What are you saying, Father?"
Mother walked across the office and put her arm around me, giving me a little squeeze.
Father smoothed out a rolled parchment I hadn't noticed on his desk. It was a rough map of Xyrus City. Several locations had been marked with little red X's with lines drawn between them. "We just have to be more cautious, that's all. For one thing, directing too much traffic to any one location—whether it's the auction house, our home, or some abandoned warehouse somewhere—will definitely draw attention."
Was my father strategizing the continuation of our efforts to help people escape the city?
"We should rotate through several safe houses instead. I've marked out some possible properties here, and your mother has charted the safest routes for moving people around the city when necessary." He looked at me expectantly.
"I'm...not sure what to say," I admitted.
Up until that moment, I had felt like I was pulling my father along in my efforts to do something, anything, to fight back against the Alacryan occupation. Now I was seeing that, really, he was three steps ahead of me.
The truth was that my close call in the warehouse had dimmed the flames of my rebellious eagerness. We had planned for the worst, and those plans had saved us, but there were a hundred ways it could have gone wrong.
I could have died. The children could have died. Sanborn Troel might have followed through on his promise to throw my parents from the edge of the city.
I'd known it was a risk, of course, but... I killed a man.
My weary mind jumped to Ellie, who had been like my adopted sister. She had gone to war, and she was years younger than me. Had she shaken with fear, standing on top of the Wall fighting Alacryan mages and corrupted mana beasts?
I suddenly realized my father had been speaking. "I'm sorry, Father. What were you saying?"
He looked at me with concern, and my mother ran a comforting hand through my hair. "Are you all right, my dear? Isn't this what you wanted?"
I leaned my head on Mother's shoulder. "Yes, I just...I'm afraid..."
Father smiled softly. "You are a talented mage, Lilia, but more than that, you are very smart. You're afraid because now you see what it will take to fight back against these invaders. You should be frightened, but we won't let that fear hold us back. Not anymore."
"But what if I'm not good enough? Without your careful preparations, I—"
"You were 'good enough' to help your father and I see the truth of what we needed to do," my mother answered. "But none of us needs to be perfect, because we will not do this alone."
I assumed she was simply being poetic about our sticking together as a family, but at that same moment the bell at the front door rang, and Father's smile grew into an excited grin.
"Speaking of that, Lilia dear, will you get the door, please?"
Feeling caught off guard once again, I slipped out of the office and hurried downstairs to the front door. Who would my father trust enough to involve them in our plans? A careless word in the wrong ear...but I shook my concern away. Father had proven himself anything but careless.
Feeling somewhat silly at my own nervousness, I opened the door. The cloaked figure standing on our step was tall and athletically built. She pulled back her hood, revealing a wide grin on her tanned face.
"Professor Glory?"
"Not anymore, am I?" she said, as though that didn't matter to her in the slightest. "But it's probably better to catch up inside, don't you think?"
I stood aside and waved her in, grinning at her carefree attitude. "So you're my father's secret weapon against the Alacryans?"
Professor Glory laughed. "More like he is mine. Although, I hear I have you to thank for that."
I led the way through the house as we continued to chat. "I just reminded him what our friends, the Leywins, did for this continent, I think."
"Hah, don't sell yourself short, Lilia. You reminded your parents what it's like to have hope."
I blushed, but was saved from thinking of a response by my parents, who both rushed to greet my old professor.
"Vanesy, it's so good to see you," my mother said, beaming.
"Yes, we're glad you've come, though I'm surprised you thought it worth the risk to visit Xyrus in person. How'd you get into the city, anyway?"
Professor Glory—Vanesy—laughed. "Flew. Never been happier to be bonded with a winged mana beast than since Etistin. It's made moving around Dicathen a heck of a lot easier. Torch isn't particularly stealthy, but I've only met two Alacryans that could fly, and they both found out pretty quickly that you can't fight a flare hawk hand-to-hand in mid-air and live to tell about it."
"Vanesy here has been establishing a resistance network all throughout Sapin," my father told me, waving at us all to make ourselves more comfortable.
Vanesy nodded, turning serious. "We've got tens of thousands of soldiers out there just itching to take the fight to the Alacryans. I've been coordinating between the different groups, setting up a network of resistance fighters."
"What about the Lances?" I asked eagerly, but Vanesy shook her head.
"No, but I heard a rumor that they were seen in a little farming village to the east. The fact that they've finally revealed themselves is part of the reason I risked this trip in person. I thought it would be a good time to drum up some support, and Xyrus is still home to an above-average number of mages."
My father was nodding along. "The Alacryans will be on their guard now, however. We'll have to be even more careful."
Vanesy smirked. "If there has been a silver lining to the loss of the war, it's that the Alacryans are spread pretty thin, and they're not as attentive as they should be. These Vritra seem to think that we don't have any fight left. I'm looking forward to the day when we get to prove them wrong."
Our conversation continued, and it took me awhile to realize that something had changed within me as I listened. Though the excitement of rebellion had been diminished, something warmer and stronger was growing in its place.
Just like Vanesy said. Hope.