It's so easy to get back! (TOS-3)

*This is an older version, please check .pdf TOS_part1

The entrance hall, scented with that typical sweet smell of old magic, welcomed me to one of Damien's apartments in Nerkam. It's a horribly modern yet terribly dull place, shrouded only in shades of gray and white, here and there adorned with golden triangles and hexagons, just as their family's tradition dictates. At least he stayed away from the red banner and huge statues of the golden lions. "The heiress will be right with you." a servant's voice informed me, as a glass of whisky landed on the table in front of me with those words, that was also in keeping with their tradition. Overly polite at all times with the best liquor they could get their Immortal fingers on.

Nothing has changed here, I had to laugh about it, all these years here mean absolutely nothing. Before, the whole city would have fallen apart outside the windows. One of the white stones at a time would be loosened, the impregnable walls reduced to dust. Life would leave the bodies of their subjects, and only the wind would remain, the only one to weather the bleached skeletons. All this is more likely than a single rose in a high vase to wilt. Before a single petal touched the beautiful drawing on the wood. It's the same here as it was two years ago or twenty, two hundered, time is nothing to them and they like to show it, with everything they do.

"You haven't even taken a sip yet, what's so amusing?" she asked in a perfectly even voice. I haven't been able to stop thinking about her since that meeting last night. About that calm and so serene voice, the impossibly dark eyes, the beautiful, sincere smile. It wasn't until I saw her, that I realized how much I'd missed her. I figured, I hadn't forgotten the one minute I'd spent with her. And no matter how much I pretended that everything had changed, that she meant nothing to me anymore. They were just lies to keep me sane. Lies that made me stay away from her. And when she stood just a little bit away from me, it slowly dawned on me how lame the lies were. There's nothing that will ever make me stop thinking about her.

"It’s just funny to me, how nothing's changed here." I finally found the courage to take a good look at her. Long hair swept to one side distracted me, I’m not used to seeing her with such long hair. The loose white shirt was concealed by a red strip of thick fabric, decently complemented by a pair of gold lines. I thought she'd come back from somewhere because it was horribly hot here, but she was always cold anyway. She wasn't smiling a bit, and yet she looked beautiful. I can't look at her and think about breathing at the same time and just not stare at her like an idiot.

"Nothing ever changes here, that's kind of the whole point," she stopped leaning against the door and waved at me. "come on in."

I grabbed the glass and followed her into a light-filled room with two long sofas and a desk stocked with a mountain of papers that drew all the attention to itself. She always has her work all over her place, she's literally obsessed with it, and she can't separate it. Free time means nothing to her, and when she remembers something, she just goes back to work. At any time. It doesn't sound that bad, but it's the most annoying habit I've ever seen. "Why do you stay at Jim's, don't you have your own place here?”

"It's not Jim's, this place belongs to the family and right now I'm here." she explained, aggrieved, on her way to the sofa. "I don't feel like staying in Parlasse, and my apartment, as you might call it, isn't ready, I wasn't planning on coming back that fast." she doesn't seem to be in a good mood, which sucks. I thought she’d be happy. "So what's going on?"

"Nothing’s going on," the question caught me off guard, completely unprepared, so to speak. Why should there always be something going on? Can't I just stop here for no reason. And spend some time with her? "I had a feeling you disappeared a little fast yesterday. I just wanted to talk to you."

"Well, I told you yesterday that I just got back. And I wanted to get out of there as soon as possible." she smirked, it wasn't her sweet smile, but I didn't have to get anything either. I should probably take that as a win. “If I hadn't promised Jon a dance, we wouldn't have even met." she added, in a way that she regrets that we met in the first place.

"I thought you'd be glad to see me."I looked her over, aggrieved. She frowned.

"It's not that, I'm just busy."

"Busy? You just got back and I don't see any boxes." what's still so important. Doesn't she have a couple of hours? I haven't seen her in two years. And she doesn't show nearly as much enthusiasm as I do. I thought we were still at least friends, if nothing else. Doesn't she miss me one bit?

“This place is a disaster, it's not about any boxes or unpacking." she threw up her hands, I could almost have sworn she raised her voice. And she hates that. She crossed her legs, folded her arms, and looked out the window. The cobblestones melting in the hot sun, in that huge white city, are more interesting to her than I am. Hot rays bounce off them back to us, giving the whole place an otherworldly glow. Thanks to them, Nerkam is absolutely unique. "I should have said I am very happy to see you." she looked back at me, with a nice smile on her lips. The one I missed so much and yet seemed false. It has to be.

"Yeah, you should have started with that." I smiled, too. Maybe she just, like me, doesn't know how to behave. I'd like to hug her, but it felt out of place. There's so much I want to tell her about everything that's happened over the last few years, but somehow none of it seemed like a good topic to talk about. All the days I've spent so far away from here have created a giant chasm between us, and neither of us can get past it to the other. Magic won't work on this problem, not one bit. It’s all on us. "So, what's going on here that you're so busy?"

"What do you mean, what's going on? I mean, you came back for it." the smile on her face was replaced by surprise. Why does she think I'm back?

"I'm not going back." I assured her quickly. There's nothing to go back to anyway, she makes that pretty clear to me, everything works perfectly here even without me. Andrea breathed a disdainful sigh of relief, stood up quickly and poured alcohol into her glass. Without putting down her glass, she ran a hand through her long hair.

"Of course you're not coming back, you're just passing through, aren't you?" her calm, serene voice vanished. Only the angry tone remained. "You're going to introduce the blonde to your parents and then disappear again." she added even more angrily.

"What's your point?" I couldn't stand it. I came to say hello and she started coming at me like this.

"What's my point? What the hell is yours!?"she cried out in exasperation. "You've been away for two whole years and you can't even pick up a damn pen and send a message that you're still alive! And then you show up, and you expect us all to break down to welcome you here. It's unbelievable." her dark eyes burned through me. She was so angry, and I had no idea why. This isn't just about me coming back or her not knowing how to act. Yelling at me isn't the least of her problems. So what's going on here?

"I just stopped by! I wasn't expecting a welcoming committee, but I thought you'd be at least happy to see me." why do I have to defend myself again? Explaining what I'm doing, where and why. I didn't miss this one bit. That's exactly why I wasn't in any hurry to get back here. All those long days at the little beach house were paradise on earth compared to this. On the one hand, it was very boring, but it spared me this.

"Well," she laughed incredulously, took a sip and fixed her long hair again. I liked the shorter ones a lot better. She didn't look so annoyingly serious with them, she just missed getting them braided and I could have gone talk with her statue instead. "I saw you yesterday and you seemed to have it all sorted out. I don't know why I thought you'd want to stay. That you care about any of us."

“And what's that?!" is she really trying to accuse me of not being alone? I took the liberty of coming in accompanied by another woman, and she can't take it. She has no right to be jealous. She dumped me herself, saying I should find someone else.

“You disappeared just as everything went to shit, we couldn't find you anywhere and we thought something had happened to you. But you just didn't care! You didn't care before and you don't care now."

"You knew I was leaving!

“Yeah, I knew you were going away for a while! Not disappearing when we needed you here!"

"Needed for what?" I stood up too, this is ridiculous. I didn't do anything. All I wanted was to say hello, to see her and make sure she’s, I don’t know, happy? "So you can blame me?"

“Blame you? What the hell are you talking about? We needed someone to lead the army and defend Athran." Andrea paused, her brown eyes burned right through me again. Why should I defend Athran? "Oh my bloody Light, you've got to be kidding me, you don't even know about the war." she laughed incredulously.

"The Tre'Asco war? I thought it was a trivial matter." those were her words, not mine. Everyone was so sure that everything would calm down.

"Yeah, this trivial matter has changed the lives of everyone here and in the North. There are so many bodies on the border we can't burn them in time, it will take months to retake Tre'Asco. Edgar lost a good half of Aegon, there's not much left of the West Army by the end, and you think we want to blame you." she drank the entire contents of her own glass at once and looked at me again. "Have you always been so self-centered?"

"I guess so! You act like it's all my fault." I folded my arms and watched her for a while. Pouring herself another drink, she angrily removed the red strip od fabric and threw it away. "It's not my responsibility."

"Of course it is! Stop acting like a spoiled little prick already. Accept that you were born with a name that actually means something.” she picked up her drink from the table and marched back and forth angrily. "You think it's terribly unfair being Steeles. People have been expecting something from you since the day you were born. So what? You have a responsibility to your people, and you have a damn duty to your father. If there's any reason you don't know about any of this, except that you're a bloody ignoramus, it's because he didn't want you to know. For once, you can thank him."

"I have nothing to thank him for." I finally got the word out, too. This lecture of hers on what I should be doing was a bit much. Her whole damn family, like mine, could have found me at any time, she has no right to pop up like that. "And the least reason to be involved in a war I didn't start."

"Don't you? You owe him your life. You still think you're the only one being manipulated here. You're sticking with it because otherwise you'd have to admit to yourself that you just can't control your life. You can't even keep a simple promise you gave me." I never broke that promise, I’m here, am I not?

"Aren't you exaggerating a little?" neither of her accusations are fair to me. "If he needed my help, he'd find me."

"No…" she laughed contemptuously, shook her head, and turned the contents of the glass back into her at once. I was starting to feel really bad about all this. I missed more than just the war, fighting never bothered her. Any of them, and not even me in the end. "He stubbornly insisted that you come back when you're ready, like a bloody moron he is." the brown eyes stopped on me, looking at me sadly, almost disappointed. "You should talk to him, not me. I couldn’t care less about what's going to happen to Tre'Asco and who's going to lead the way there..."

I don't really want to talk to him. I thought about this conversation all night, I couldn't sleep, all I could think about was what she would tell me if we were alone. Just the two of us. I really believed she'd be thrilled. Instead she'd like to send me somewhere, her light would never get. "What happened, Ans? Can't we talk to each other without yelling at each other?"

“I don't know, Emmett. I don't enjoy it any more than you do. I know it's only been two years," she said with a sigh, reaching for the slab of the stacked table. She picked up a letter that appeared there and quickly opened it, apparently waiting for the news. “a lot has changed and I don't have time to explain it all to you."

That's it. I don't know a bit about what's going on around here and she seems to think it's all my fault somehow or that I had anything to do with it. Like I could change a thing. The only mistake I made is wanting to talk to her in the first place. She gets carried away everytime there’s a reason for her to take her sword and enhance the look of those around her with it. If she has a reason to force obedience, make people follow their rules... And for what? So she can do it all over again in a few years. And only my name isn't enough to make me believe in it as much as she does.

"Cat!" I called into the empty hallway. No answer, she must still be in city. Did she say she wanted to look at it or not? I have neither the inclination nor the time to look for her. I rinsed my face with cold water and changed quickly. I didn't want to talk to him that fast, I haven't even decided if I want to talk to him at all, but I need to understand. Everything that's going on here doesn't make the slightest sense. I haven't tried to get an update on what's been going on in Athran in recent months, but I wouldn't miss it either. This is still my home, damn it.

"Where's my father?" I asked the first guy in a diplomatic uniform I came across. Somehow the whole castle emptied. There are no lords with their pesky suggestions, and I can't see their needy wives anywhere. But there were significantly more guards. At least two per square foot of dark, ice-cold stone. That's how it made me feel. Usually there’d be a simple pair standing behind the front gate and another at the door to the lower level. Halfway through that long room, I entered three extra couples, and at the end, I got to number six. It looks as if the border has already fallen, and every second an enemy army should be pouring in

“He's in his office, in the middle of a meeting with the Duke of Taluire." he replied, terrified. He stared at me like he saw a ghost, wide-eyed. And here I thought I got a tan and it’s people in the North with their scary white skin, resembling ghosts.

"Luke's here? Why would he," I realized exactly one second later than I should have. "He's here instead of me. Of course."

"I don't think they want to be disturbed." he advised me as I started to walk. Whether they wanted to be disturbed or not, I'm still going. With everything changing here, I began to hope that his office is in the same place. He could also move it to a completely different part of the castle, perhaps beyond the barracks, where he would be perfectly safe. I continued on a familiar path, down a corridor, up a smaller staircase and to the right. The guards outside the door assured me that I was going the right way. Unlike the rest of his uniforms, his bodyguard had an overly accentuated wolf on his chest, and they had a very different look on their faces, too. More cocky.

"His Majesty does not receive any visitors." I was briefed sharply by one of the guards. His face was like a sour pickle, equally nasty and slimy.

"I'm not a visitor, I'm his son," I stopped in front of them, smiling slightly. "and believe me, you don't want to tell him I was here and you sent me away." the determination to stop me was gone from the faces of the two nincompoops in a second. They were too young to be standing here in uniform guarding his ass, but maybe he didn't have a choice. I quickly reached for the handle and slipped inside before I could change my mind. All the courage that anger had given me was slowly leaving me. At first I didn't even want to talk to him, and now my brother will be there as well. It's like shit at home has a bigger tendency to hit me.

"...but he doesn't see it that way! And if you think he does, you're even more desperate than I thought.” Luke's voice came from the other room. They had to decide that the first one with the big desk, the giant wolf-head banner and the dark walls, didn't fit in with their conversation.

"Do you find it desperate that I believe in my own children? I didn't know you were such a pessimist." father laughed. He seems to be in a good mood. Hundred percent better than Andrea. I decided to take advantage of it and quickly headed for the door.

"I don't have to be pessimistic about this. You know, I'm right." Luke had his back to me, but I could see his face. With his eyebrows above his grey eyes drawn together, he tries to convince father that he's right. Just like mother does. And like her, he'll never win either.

Father noticed me immediately. He looked different, his brown hair was coiffed as scrupulously as mine, it just didn't have the same volume. I was always better at that. His black coat was adorned with several golden triplets, symbolising our beautiful range, so there was no doubting who he was, but something had changed. The brown eyes fixed on my brother slowly began to smile. "You'd be done with everything so quickly, Luke." he got up laughing from the pillow-filled sofa, patted his shoulder as he walked toward me.

"Hi, I didn't mean to," the rest of my thought broke down, as I did in his embrace. I missed the old man more than I thought. The old man's designation doesn't exactly suit him. Like me, he slowed down his ageing so much that he could match the immortals on this side. But to me, he'll just always be an old man, just because of how many candles we'd have to light on his birthday cake. Being around him reminded me of how much I missed this whole place. The sand and unobstructed ocean views couldn't compete with the grey walls with tall windows behind which the magnificent mountains waited patiently. They just couldn't compete with the place I grew up in.

"You're not interrupting us, you're my son." he let go of me and looked me over carefully. Maybe he expected me to change somehow, but I looked exactly the same as I did two years ago. "It’s so good to see you." he added with a big smile.

"Thanks, I’m glad to see you too." I smiled. I couldn't believe what I was saying was true. I missed him almost as much as I missed her. And that scared me, because he was the reason I wanted so much out. All his backstabbing finally made me disappear altogether. And even so, I couldn't help but be really pleased to see him.

As father stepped aside, it was clear to me that he was waiting for me to greet my brother, just as it was clear to me that neither of us wanted to. We quickly gave each other a hug and looked at each other. I didn't miss him that much. Unlike my father, who hadn't aged a bit, Luke seemed older somehow, but maybe it was the icy grey eyes that did that. "I thought you'd be more tanned."

“I thought you'd be in uniform." I gave him back with a smile.

"I'm so glad you're stuck with your sense of humour." he returned my beaming smile with his wry smile and turned around. "I'll let you talk."

“Thank you, do you have everything you need?" father asked, handing over the dossiers. Luke just nodded his head as he made his way to the door. I swerved to one side so he could pass. There was enough bonding for one day. "Luke, don't forget the dinner. Vivian's looking forward to it."

“You remind me for the third time, I don't have a problem with my memory." he closed the door with a click behind him.

"That goes for you too, Vivian will be glad to see you.” he announced on the way back to the sofa. I hadn't even been here a full five minutes, and I'd already had my family's dinner planned. That went really fast. I thought I might make an excuse, I just missed believable ones. "Are you going to stay that long?"

"Are you seriously asking me if I'm going to stay here until today’s dinner?" I took a deep breath. He could have spared himself the question, he knew the answer pretty damn well. He needed to mention that he expected me to disappear again soon. "I'll probably be here a lot longer. You want to tell me what's going on here?"

"And what should be going on?" he asked calmly. Either he was trying to piss me off or, there wasn't really any other choice. He always has. He provoked me as much as I provoked him. And now it's no different.

"You knew where I was all this time, didn't you?" I assured myself.

"Naturally." for him, the answer was so easy. He always knows everything, he needs to know. The effect it has on others, of course, doesn't interest him in the slightest. That's what always annoyed me about him most of all. How he callously decided what others should do. Without their consent and knowledge. I would see it as a necessary part of his job, but why did he pass it on to me? I’m his son, not subject.

"Then why the fuck didn't you tell me to come back?" I screamed. He frowned, as if on cue.

"First of all, be careful who you’re talking to, Emmett." he immediately roasted me, that was like him, too. In fact, everyone here has reacted this way to me so far. They were polite at first and then they shot me in the face that they didn't like my decisions at all and I should do what they liked. "And second, I thought that's what you wanted."

"Did you think it was better not to tell me about any of this? That I don't want to know that Athran is up against Tre'Asco? Oh, come on!" I buried my hands in my hair, exasperated. If I didn't, I'd have to hit something. And I'd get another one of those scolding looks of his. "Do you think so little of me that you think I don't care what happens to my home?"

"Don't turn it against me. You clearly said you are leaving, you wanted time and to be alone for a while. As far away from me as possible." he shrugged, as if it were no big deal. "I was just following your wishes.

“I would come, if you’d told me.”

"But I didn't want you to come back. You can see everything is standing here, can't you?"

"What about the bodies at the border that you can't burn? How many soldiers from Aegon have you really lost?" I asked more calmly. Screaming didn't help me anyway, even though I really wanted to scream, he wouldn't care. Not that he couldn't raise his voice, just that it did nothing with him as the others shouted. He was pretty adamant.

"Has she found you already?" for the first time, I surprised him with something.

"She didn't find me. I wanted to talk to her and I went to see her myself." I explained quickly. Why would she look for me, right? So far, it seemed like I was just a nuisance to everyone here. “She seemed pretty pissed."

"She yelled at you, didn't she?" he asked as he laughed. Who knows why he was so amused. I didn't find it funny at all. On the contrary, it irritated me even more. "I'd warn you, if you'd stopped by sooner. Try not to be mad at her, please, it's all too much right now. And Stephan is pressuring her to back off, so that he can, with Damien at his side, roll all over Tre'Asco. It's going to be brutal and," he stopped, must have seen my frightened stare. " and… that part she didn't tell you..."

"No, not that part didn't." I confirmed. This new information was the only thing that made any sense to me so far. If Stephan has a plan to destroy the entire country, he needs the approval of all the Heirs, and she's probably the last person to disagree. Damien was all for it on principle, and Jonathan would do whatever came safest to him. So every new innocent victim, every fallen soldier, is on her. Only because she refused his solution, and he would remind her until he had his way. That's why she was so upset, at least in part because of it.

"Sit down before you put up a hole." I obeyed him. Talking back might not end well, either. For me. I wouldn't know anything, and we'd just have a fight. "What did she tell you?"

"I don't really know." the only part I could reliably remember was the one where she called me ignorant and mentioned that I owed my father a thank you. Not that I know what to thank him for. The fact that he gave me some space was the least he could do after all. "Can you sum the whole thing up for me? Start by reassuring me that everything's fine."

"Everything was fine before you left. We had a clear plan and prepared terms for the new contracts, we just never got to the signatures." he stood up, picked up glasses, and looked back at me as he did so. "Have you eaten?" I just rolled my eyes and nodded. I can eat without his supervision, though I don't think he'd agree with the choice of dish. "Everything turned around very quickly. We wouldn't have had time to stop it even if we'd tried. The government in Tre'Asco fell apart and within hours was replaced by a somewhat more radical faction with the support of the army. Their new agenda was to restore the lost glory it had lost over the years. People there," he mused, putting blue alcohol on the coffee table in slanted glasses and sitting down again. "you know, they found an outrageously creative way to use magic, they attacked in an attempt to expand their territory, and then the Heirs stepped in. And there was no way to stop it afterwards.”

"How creative?" I asked before he could move on to anything else.

"Well, you know Tre'Asco is full of magic that doesn't necessarily belong to anyone. And they decided to take advantage of it. They're taking ordinary people who don't have any skills and are trying to give them some." father frowned. I knew him well enough to know that he was very worried and didn't want to go into details when he looked like that.

"It can't possibly work."

"In a manner of speaking... It's like giving someone a blood transfusion and using a bag with an unmarked group, only the chances of someone surviving are even lower. For them, however, only the survivors are important. They're kind of like their chosen ones. They've developed their own cult around it, and they're adapting everything to their new beliefs." he paused for a moment and looked out the window. The snow-capped mountains were as majestic as ever. I missed that view. The problems, not so much. "None of them can control their new abilities. It's hardly surprising, they've never had to deal with anything like this, and those responsible, don't even know how to approach it. They're not trying to tame them, they're supporting them. And their chosen ones are like a time bomb. They destroyed much of the territory at the border and within their own country. Stephan decided that they and those involved in their creation were too dangerous, he wanted to end it once and for all. This left the other Heirs with a choice, either to go slowly and collect only the demonstrably guilty ones, or to level the entire country as planned."

So those were the options, to try to slowly fix it all while risking everything or punishing everyone indiscriminately and securing another victory, albeit at a high cost. "Andrea won't go for it." I said confidently. It didn't sound like something she would do, she never changes her principles. I've seen her kill a lot of people, but not once on her own whim. Something had always led her to it, something she could justify to herself. And murdering innocents probably doesn't fit into any of her categories.

"She won't have a choice." he said it as a fait accompli. Why shouldn't she have a choice? The fact that she always has a choice was her favourite part of Immortality. “Damien will be back in a few days and then they'll move on to the vote and this time they won't cut it until they reach a unanimous decision. They've arranged the Hallies Heirs Meeting, they've only done it once before. And Andrea is up against the remaining Heirs. It will be her arguments, against their decision.”

"That doesn't mean she won't convince them." I persisted. I was sure I still knew her well enough to make that claim. "Or don't you think so?"

"I honestly don't know, Emmett. It's all pretty complicated, and I'd advise you to stay out of it." he looked at me slowly. That stern look of his that always terrified me. Ever since I was a kid and it hasn't changed since. "We'll know soon enough how it's all going to be. Until then..."

"And it doesn't bother you one bit that they make all the decisions?"

"No, not a bit." it sounded like an honest answer. My father mostly went against such decisions. He was obsessed with control. "This isn't a power decision, and it's not going to be pretty on one side or the other. People are going to die, by their hundreds, at least. Getting caught in it is like cutting a branch under yourself. Do you understand what I'm trying to say?"

"Yeah, I hear you." I drank and put the glass back in its place on the table. I made sure she was in exactly the same place as before. A small distance from the vase of white flowers and his correspondence. It was a good way to keep busy for a while. I was sure only yesterday that I was going to stop here for a few days and then leave again. It didn't seem so straightforward now. I have my duties here and I have my family here. I looked back into my father's brown eyes, the same colour as mine. He seemed calmer than when I came in. Completely relaxed and somehow happier. I could stay here just for him. I know you would. I promised Cat we'd stop here for a few days and leave again, but with each passing minute in the North, I was moving away from that promise. And with every second in the South, I wanted to break that promise more and more. "You could have come at any time and told me what was going on."

"Why? So you could come back because you feel like it's your duty?" he asked his questions and let me think about them. What was I supposed to say that I'd be more comfortable being here because I belong here and what I want is not important. I feel like it's my duty because he raised me that way. "You should be able to be happy."

"I should also be able to decide if I want to fight for my home. About whether I want to go back. Damn it, can't you just let me decide what I want for once?"

"Emmett, I haven't seen you in two years. I couldn't make the decisions for you." he defended himself calmly.

"We both know that's not true. You don't need to see me to pull strings and push me where you want me." I gave it back in an icy voice. It's just been that way my whole life. There's not one thing he doesn't push me to do.

"That's a bit of a paranoid point of view, son." he assessed. It didn't come to me the least bit paranoid. With him around, I couldn't even be sure that I'd chosen this blue shirt myself. Maybe he stopped by my apartment and moved it forward or something. "The only reason I didn't tell you is because I really believed you were happy. Was I wrong?"

I'd like to ask him the same thing. Maybe I was wrong myself. Two years of total peace was fine. Far from all the awfully important stuff here that bound me. What I thought was tying me up. Being with Cat was nice, simple and, for the most part, safe. The sea was fine, and so were the white beaches, the wooden dwellings, even their owners. It was all good out there. But I should have another word to describe what I thought I'd wanted all my life. What I've been wanting. Some better word. Fine was very bland and ordinary. To me, it sounded fake.

By contrast, the last day I spent here was already unforgettable. A single evening jogged into my memory more than the other seven hundred and fifty, perhaps a little more. Seeing my old friends again erased memories of all the new ones. And one look at her in a gold dress with that awfully long hair definitely convinced me that I wasn't done with this place. I didn't want to end it. I can't quit and just walk away again.

"Emmett, if you were happy there, you can go back without regret." his voice jolted me from my thoughts.

"What time did you say the dinner was?" I asked instead, explaining how I had been all these long days for the past two years.

"Half past five, as always," he said. I laughed out loud, it's so easy to come back here when there's no change.

"As always," I repeated. The family dinner was beginning to sound like a better and better idea.

Father nodded without smiling. He couldn't understand how special this ordinary encounter of theirs had been for me. "I expect you won't be alone. We should meet your new friend."

"That doesn't seem like a good idea." it's not a good idea at all. Cat wasn't exactly enjoying these get-togethers. And a house full of people armed with information, she's not going to like it. She couldn't even pretend to do that. She's very impulsive, even more than me.

"Maybe not to you, but to me." that stern voice again

"Dad, you don't understand. Cat's not," I stopped myself. His eyebrows went up in the process. "she wouldn't enjoy it."

"And what exactly is there to enjoy? It's dinner." he smiled faintly.

“She won't like me arguing with Luke." it was a terrible excuse, but partly based on the truth. She had never seen him, but I could see how she would look at me all evening. And what I was more worried about was her wanting to argue with him, too.

"Have you considered the possibility of not acting like a small child?" I knew it was just a rhetorical question, but I shook my head anyway. If anyone is to stop acting like a child, it's Luke, not me. "You're both adults, and you can't agree on anything. For the love of Light, Emmett, he's your brother." this time he shook his head. "Do you have any more excuses or do you want to tell me the truth?"

On my way here, I've been making creative excuses to keep him busy. Some were quite believable, like the fact that she couldn't remember anything except her name. Or the one that says she's running away from her life in Narral that she doesn't want to talk about. It was the closest thing to the truth. "Two years ago, when I met her, she was one of the Dishonest." I decided to tell him the truth. Purely because I wanted to see his reaction.

"Very funny." he grunted. He didn't believe me one bit.

"It's hilarious." I finished the rest of the blue liquid and stood up. "Except it's not a joke." I refilled on my way to the door. If he happened to want to get mad, I could just walk away. He must het angry, it's not the sort of thing that could spread to his people. Such information would discredit him and me, along with the rest of our family.

Instead, he started laughing out loud. He didn't understand that I wasn't kidding, but I was totally serious. "She's the captain, isn't she?" he stood up laughing. "The one that disappeared around the time you left. Damien stood by the fact that you weren't in Narral, I thought you fought her and he’s covering for you."

"I fought her, and actually broke a few ribs because of her. We ended up in one of those traps on the border between Narral and Zessia. We both needed each other's help and started talking." I explained.

"Talking? Most of us would have killed her on the spot." the smile stayed on his lips. I didn't expect this reaction. More like a lecture on how I behave and how he expects me to behave, ending with what I'm going to do, to behave the way he wants.

"I know, I've thought about it a thousand times. If I could have stood up then, I probably would have." or I could have just left her there and someone else would have found her. Maybe she could get away and we'd meet again a few years later or I'd never see her again and it wouldn't matter to me at all. It was hard to judge now that she was a part of my life and I really cared about her.

"You know, Emmett, if I didn't know you, I'd think you were doing it on purpose." he stopped by me, put his arm around my shoulder. The smile was gone from his face. "You're both coming to dinner." it was clear to me from his tone that this was not a request, nor a question. I nodded reluctantly. In this case, we had nowhere to run, not me, not Catarina. Guess, I kind of fucked up that part.