July 23, 1980
The Moonfolks kingdom
The sky castle
Valodya was one of the first people to see the little bundle of joy wrapped in white and purple little tiny duvet right after her bath.
The baby might be the cutest new-born child Valodya has ever seen in his life, and he already feels like he's ready to protect this child with all he is.
A guard announces the arrival of Amara and Felony, and it's the first time Valodya is seeing them since he arrived at the sky castle.
Apparently, Felony is going through an intense course of martial arts on the hands of none other than the Wang LiQin on the winter elves kingdom land, while Amara was on an exploration trip with his friends out in the sand lands.
They both run up to the arms of their parents the moment they step into the room, a man and a woman following after them, who seem to be their guardians, Dagher and Asala, if his memory serves him right as to what the king has told him. Valodya takes a step back and stands by their side, where he belongs, now.
Valodya looks down at the perfect family picture unfolding before his eyes. The two sons in awe as they watch their little sister clueless eyes running all over their faces, the parents eyes onto their three kids in such love and kindness Valodya has long missed seeing, even if it isn't exactly towards him. He now understands why Robin suggested this job for him.
Robin has mentioned that he's the guardian of the war elves prince. He has devoted his life for this boy, and it isn't easy, given how horrible of parents that child was gifted, but Robin is there to be the wall he can lean onto, the pillow he can rest onto, the ears he needs to listen to him, the cloth that wipe off his tears caused by his parents. Valodya knows it won't be the same for him here, looking at how lovely this family of moonfolks is between each other and to their own people. It is heard of all around the globe of how kind and giving the moonfolk royalties are and have been since the beginning of their time.
The two boys seem to catch onto his presence in the room, and they both look at him questionably, which is understandable given that the only people in this room right now are all practically family members.
"Dad? Are you going to introduce us?" Amara, the older brother, seems to have realised why Valodya is there, and he stands onto his feet from where he was sitting at the edge of the bed, walking up to Valodya and bowing elegantly, a hand behind his back and the other before his pelvis.
"My dears, this is Valodya, Evdokia's phoenix guardian. " king Artem smiles at his boys, and Felony takes a few seconds to digest the information, he seems to be in a little of haze from all the heavy workout, and it makes Valodya chuckle.
"Sorry my brain isn't exactly functioning well." Felony says as he blinks multiple times, leaving his place from beside his mother to bow to Valodya.
Felony, even though he isn't the oldest, he's the next in throne after his father. The boy has a lot to learn, but Valodya has no doubt Wang LiQin would bring him up to anything less than perfection.
"It's all good, your highness, " Valodya bows back to both boys, a smile stretched on his lips, "it's an honour being a part of your family."
"eh, it's not that much." Amara goes to say that but Felony hits him at the back of his head, which makes Amara give him a stern look and goes to nudge Felony's waist with his elbow.
Valodya doesn't get to react to the two boys, no, men's bickering as the guard announces the arrival of LiQin to the room.
King Artem is the first to take him by a hug, squeezing the man tightly like two long lost brothers finally meeting. He's followed by Dagher and Asala, going for a hug as well, and it affirms Valodya's assumptions about everyone inside this castle taking each other as family before friends and colleagues.
It all seems to be a regular meet up, Amara going up to say hi too, while Felony stays avoiding LiQin, and Valodya could guess why. LiQin reaches the bed and flicks Felony's forehead, earning him an aw from Felony.
LiQin reaches out for the queen's free hand and kisses it, the other hand holding their little princess. And then he sees him. A man he last saw a thousand years ago when they used to run around together in the same village before LiQin decided on leave for exploration, only to come back to his village burnt to ashes with all its people.
Only that one boy survived. One pure hearted boy rose from the ashes that night and escaped the terror of death for the first time, not knowing that it'll be a curse he'll be trying to get rid of for the rest or his days.
It takes LiQin a few seconds to register that the man standings before him is in fact, Valodya Arbaskan, not a ghost of a boy he once knew, now a man standing tall, so clear and real.
Valodya is first to hold onto LiQin's shoulders, as he watches him fall apart before him.
"You're Valodya! You're alive!" LiQin chocks on his words, emotions getting the best of him.
"And I've thought in this long life I'd never meet another man or woman from Karvastive village ever again." Valodya's emotions are as strong as LiQin's. It's happiness, sadness, confusion, but most of all, longing.
*
June 24, 2021, 07:00
Thomas's private Jet
"First of all, not a single cell in me trusts you. Second of all, are you out of your mind?"
Thomas sighs heavily, he looks exhausted and drained, unlike back when they last met, he was full of life and the most colourful boy she has ever knew.
"I know you won't trust me unless I show you Jean, but I swear to you he's doing fine back in Egypt."
"Yeah, like I'd believe you." He gives her a stern look but it doesn't fathom her one bit.
"Fine, lets say I killed Jean or some other shit, you think I have the balls to fucking stand in front of you after even scratching that man? You're a menace when it comes to him, that much I know well." Thomas tries.
"He's kind of making a good point." LiQin says from behind Thomas, where he's standing by the door frame, arms crosses on his chest.
"Are you on this too?" Evdokia growls at LiQin and Valodya, and they both shrug.
"Can you just hear me out?" Thomas pleads.
"No." She frowns.
"please?"
She frowns harder.
"Fine! Have fun being chained down for 9 hours!" Thomas throws his hands up in the air, "unbelievable, you haven't changed one bit! One bit!" he murmurs to himself, gesturing with one finger at LiQin as he leaves the back seats lounge, followed by LiQin.
"you know your ego will be your undoing one day, eh?" Valodya says as he pushes his weight away from the door frame. He squats before Evdokia, and he could see a tear threatening to fall off her delicate eyelashes.
"How are the others?" she asks first, and Valodya's heart constricts in pain, she truly hasn't changed.
"We were all injured except for Andy, but Ufuk's wound is the only critical one, LiQin is taking care of him though."
She hums and stays silent, the gears of her mind moving at the speed of light.
"Is it true? Is he really rebellious against his parents?" she goes to say, but her voice is shaky with emotions. She already knows the answer to her question, but she has learnt not to trust herself over the years.
"Yes, I believe him, at least." Valodya says as he holds her face with so much care, wiping away those tears he has once sworn to never allow to unleash.
"That's enough for me, I guess." She smiles down at him.
She takes a long inhale, eyes shut in a silent prayer and a thank, and she feels like she wants to fall apart once again, but she holds it together, because there's a lot to think about now.
Thomas has asked her for a favour, a huge favour.
Evdokia thinks even if they were as close as they used to be when they were kids, she still wouldn't agree. She can't agree.
How can she even live with it when everything is over? Is she actually ready to be haunted by more demons? Is she ready to give up lives of people she is taking under her wing? Can she live with the fact that she caused thousand of people to die for the sake of a million to live?
Valodya sees it all happen on her face, and he reaches out to tuck her loose locks behind her pointy ears. Her hair is a mess, but she's pulling it off regardless, and she's beautiful, and such a beautiful delicate creature doesn't deserve to go through what Evdokia has lived up with.
Valodya straightens up from where he was squatting in front of her and goes to sit at the chair beside her. His back is bent and hands hanging between his thighs as he thinks it through.
If someone he hasn't seen in centuries came up to him and asked him to leave everything he has left keeping him sane, to travel to another realm, lead his people who he doesn't know if they even exist or not again to a battle he isn't sure he has an advantage in winning, to end a war that has stretched out for those centuries you were separated at, would he do it?
The answer is simple.
No.
Valodya wouldn't do it. No question about it. But he doesn't think Evdokia is that kind of person, and so he knows his job is to guide her to the right answer, whichever she chooses, he'll be her shield for her demons, an armour and sword for her enemies.
"it's a huge sacrifice of your morals." He says, hands fidgeting.
Evdokia doesn't remember seeing Valodya anxious before in her life, and it kind of freaks her out internally.
"it's a disregard to everything I've promised myself not to commit in my life." Evdokia says, and Valodya hums.
He wipes his sweaty hands against his pants and rests his back against the chair, feeling his back crack. With every breathe he takes, it feels like it only gets harder from there, and he can't even imagine what is going on inside her head.
"Valodya. " she calls out and breaks the silence that has settled in between them.
"Yes?" he thinks he knows what she's about to say, but he allows it to leave her lips.
"What do you think I should do?"
What does he think she should do? He thinks they should open another portal to a different realm and blow it behind them, to run away and never be found ever again, not here, not there, but rather nowhere.
But that's what Valodya would do. That's what an almost father would do to protect his child.
Only that Valodya isn't her father, but he's more of an advisor, a light thread that leads her through the darkest roads and guides her through the dim nights.
And so he does that. Valodya guides her to the right thing to be done.
"I think you need to think this for longer than a 9 hour flight. It's been twenty years already, I doubt a few months of you marinating the plan in your head would change much for them."
Evdokia hums, eyes staring at a stain in the carpet in front of them.
*
June 24, 2021, 23:48
Cairo, Egypt
6th of October city
The jet lag gets the best of them all at some point during the ride from the airport to Thomas's villa.
Not Evdokia though.
She can't, even if her eyeballs are burning like they've been exposed to acid, she physically can't sleep.
There's a lot to think about, for what has happened and now is behind them and for what is yet to come.
She's not going to lie, Thomas's story touched her heart, but how much of it can she believe?
He had eyes on him, his fathers enforcers who were sent with him to the humans realm, and he had to get rid of them, some way or another, without directly killing them with his own hands, because the truth is, someone with Thomas's skills can take down twenty people with three clean swipes of his sword.
According to him, which Evdokia is still suspicious as hell about but doesn't think its too low giving that they're the Edgar family after all, he is under an anti lying spell, that he could be caught in a lie by his parents with a snap of their fingers. He had to get them killed through CPA agents or policemen, which eventually, he did succeed in that, after Valodya and Reema's team took the rest of them all down while Evdokia was following Thomas to the basement.
With that out of the way, Thomas has also succeeded in his second plan, which is reaching out to Evdokia.
Evdokia wouldn't call it two childhood friends reaching out to each other, but rather one trying so hard to reach the other that they almost kill them in every possible attempt, and its laughable.
She knows it wasn't his fault for the number of times they got fucked because of him, for the explosion, for Mizuki's death. LiQin has mentioned to her while they were waiting for their luggage that Thomas didn't exactly take that one well.
Evdokia has also seen a bunch of burn marks over his arms, and for a vampire, scars always fade away in a few days, and so, she has a feeling those marks where put their purposely with a strong spell, and Evdokia does wish to ask if he caused them or someone else, once she sees Jean safe, without a single scratch on his skin, which is happening shortly because the car has finally stopped after what seemed like a two hours ride.
And there she sees him, ash hair a little longer than regular, swinging up in the air with the wind, green eyes creased in a smile and relief, waiting for her at the front of the villa, arms wide open for her to fit just perfectly right between them.
For the first time in a while, she could breath again, now that she knows all three men are safe and sound.
"I missed you." She whispers in his ears as he picks her up off the ground in an embrace.
Her brain blocks out every other sound around them, because that's exactly all she needs right now, all she needs is a hug with the smell of apple and cinnamon all over her.
But good things never last, because Jean, eventually, had to put her down and carry the luggage along with the rest, leaving Evdokia with nothing said, and Evdokia feels cold all over.
*
Evdokia leaves the bathroom door open behind her as she walks to the room assigned to her and Jean. Since everyone is jetlagged and tired as fuck, they've settled on discussing their next move in the morning.
The house overall is as dark as you'd expect a vampire's real estate would be. Its full of dark shades and sharp things, which Evdokia respects, how much Thomas has brought from his own world to this place.
Jean is on the edge of the bed with a lit cigarette between his fingers when she reaches their room. He looks like he hasn't slept in three days, and Evdokia would guess he actually avoided sleep all in all until he knew she was fine. It warms her heart.
"Have he spoken to you?" Evdokia asks as she makes her way through the room, ruffling her hair with a towel over her head.
He doesn't answer, instead he takes a long inhale of smoke and waits for her to dry her hair with a dryer. When she's done, he's already pouring himself a drink on the other end of the room.
"No, but I have a rough idea of what he might want from you."
"Us. It's us." Evdokia frowns, taking away the half glass of rum from him. He doesn't fight it.
"right."
"Jean, something is wrong. What's wrong?" she sits beside him and the bed dips under them. She moves her arms and encircle them around his neck, fingers tangled with the hair at the back of his nape, foreheads touching.
Evdokia's eyes are closed but when she opens them she finds that he's staring outside of the room's window, and he doesn't answer. Instead, he gets up and peels the covers away from the mattress and settles underneath them.
"You do realise we'll have to talk about it, right?" she says through gritted teeth.
"I'd rather not." His mumble is half drowned in a lazy tone of his voice, muffled by sleepiness and the duvet.
Evdokia feels her eyes stinging but she doesn't allow her emotions to get the best of her and keeps it in, even if the only thing she wants to do right now is scream at Jean. Not out of rage or anger, but rather desperation for him to talk her out of it. Because, in all fairness, she's about to do something extremely stupid even in her own eyes.
*