Go a few days without and you’ll trade everything you have for a single drop of water. Rusalka stood at the hillside and looked down upon the masses as bucket after bucket of water was taken form the well. She wiped her reddened eyes and turned her head to face the circles of people who had gathered at their tents. After a while she heard footsteps approaching from behind her and then turned her head to face the sky. There was no need to guess who it was.

“How are you feeling?” Her husband asked her. She’d now had a few days to process what happened, even though that alone wasn’t enough to get over her grief seeing her father alive had allowed her composure to recover somewhat. She turned to face him, her expression neither happy nor sour.

“How I’m feeling bares no need for questioning, doesn’t it?” She replied.

“No, I suppose not.” Her fiance said as he stepped forward. He sat down and then turned his head to face Rudolph. The old scholar had planted his butt upon a rock and was now working to sew up Rusalka’s tattered matriarchal garment.

“These people are all that’s left?” The man said as he faced the survivors, “Six hundred and twenty four people...that’s it?” He was honestly shocked and saddened by the scene. Venus’ population was nearly ten thousand only sixteen days ago and now? He felt like he had woken to a nightmare.

“Yes...they’re all that remains...and I alone have to represent them,” Rusalka said to him. The man turned to look upon her with a sombre gaze. He held up her garment and gave it a once over. The garment was mended, there wasn’t even evidence of the damage it had sustained. “It’s a funny joke, isn’t it? Me, acting as their representative...after I let this happen?” Rusalka said, chiding herself beside him. The man sighed, he stood up and then folded up the garment to pass it over to her. She held out her hands to receive it, but he stopped his feet for a few moments before letting her have it.

“You did nothing wrong,” He said. He then glanced Alexander’s way and saw the boy nodding his head in affirmation. He then turned back to face Rusalka and finally passed the garment over.

“I was their Lady,” Rusalka said, shaking her head, “it was my job to keep them safe...I failed.”

“Then so did Amelia, Melany and I,” Rudolph replied.

“Don’t you dare say that!” Rusalka shouted back at him.

“I’m not,” He replied, “You are. Perhaps if someone else was in charge of it, things would’ve been different? Thinking like that is useless...you are smart, you are talented, no one has earned this, worked for this, more than you.”

“And I failed.”

“You did not fail,” The man said as he turned towards the masses. She followed his steps and soon she beheld them. They had survived, these six hundred people had all survived thanks to her. “There’s not a single person here who blames you, if there is, then that person is a coward, a fool. They all know well that you had been running that city for years before you were formally its Lady, they all know you, child, were effectively their ruler...and you did a splendid job. The enemy that attacked them...was a group of fifty Platinum Class. You are not to blame for that.” He spoke up for what the masses more than likely believed themselves. The majority approved of Rusalka’s rule and if nothing else there was no minority, not on any level, that blamed her for what happened.

“But...even so,” She said, struggling with her words. Alexander sighed, and that lured her gaze over to him. He crossed his arms and frowned towards her. She fell silent and no longer managed to look his way. She couldn’t keep up her depressive mood under those eyes. Rudolph cross his own arms soon after. He looked at his daughter and then glanced at Alexander, the way that she was behaving and the way that he was behaving wove a story for him. The girl sighed, she dropped the subject and then unfolded her garment. After checking it over, she could not but smile. “You’re not bad with a needle,” She said.

“Basic skill requirement for the Platinum Class,” Rudolph replied. Indeed if he didn’t know how to make his own clothes then his shapeshifting powers wouldn’t be able to make them either. The whole process was not as simple, at least in the best cases, but knowing how to use a needle was a start. He dismissed her compliment with this answer and then sat back down as she held the dress to her chest. She turned to face him. She had something on her mind, something heavy.

“So...you’re really going to Vesta?” She asked him. The man nodded back. Thus it was that she bit her lip and turned away. She looked towards Rapture, towards the boy who was sitting sour by the lakeside. “Can you trust Rognir?” Her question was a valid one, even Rudolph could not answer it with confidence. What he knew was that Rognir had the crystals containing his wife, sister, mistress and mentor among countless others in his grasp, hence he could not disobey.

“I have to,” That was the only answer that there really could be to that question. The girl closed her eyes and inhaled deep. The reality that Rude had described to her was indeed one she couldn’t ignore. Her mother and mentors, even Rapture’s mom, had all been claimed by Rognir as his eternal servants. Their world at large could be imagined to be just that, a farm where the gods raised useful livestock. That image did indeed scare her, as did the reality that a titanic war between these beings had happened so nearby, yet not a single person managed to notice a whiff of it. The mortal terror of her own insignificance terrified her more today than ever it had before. What would happen when she died? Would she too become a random deity’s slave? Would the same happen to Alex? Would they ever meet again? Such terrifying thoughts forced their way into her mind and sent it into chaos.

“When do you leave?” She asked him.

“As soon as possible,” He replied.

“I need you,” She muttered.

“No,” He said, exhaling in resignation as he turned to face Alexander, “You don’t.” The girl followed his gaze. She saw her husband standing there. She watched him shrug in the face of her tearful gaze. “I’ll do as Rognir wishes and go to Vesta, if he’s telling the truth I can cure Venus’ curse...after that,” The man frowned as he imagined his next move. Rognir would have him go to the Immortal Clan in Svartalfheim and act as his representative. He wanted him to unify the eleven remaining branches of the clan, all of whom were apparently at loggerheads with one another. Yet why? What was so important about this? He had no answer, only a suspicion. The gods were preparing for something, that much he could tell. Why else would Rognir try to free Authun now and why else would he do it in a way that doesn’t involve him using any of his own power? His gut was telling him that there was a battle coming, a big one. He had in fact seen the gods fighting over Venus, it was clear they were not subject to a collective will and they were indeed very much individuals fighting for individual gains. “As for you lot,” He said with a sigh, “I don’t know what you have planned but a war with Nidhogg is coming, Cain’s actions have laid the groundwork for that invasion.”

“We know,” Rusalka replied, “I have my plans to deal with that.”

“Rusalka,” Rudolph said to her, his voice suddenly turning very stern, “Talk to Lucretia.” The girl’s body trembled, she felt as though her stomach had been tied into a knot. “The common law in Jupiter is that since this is technically our fault, we must at least contribute to resolving the matter, lest we be executed to the last man, woman and child. However, I’m willing to be that the Sovereign will not argue to send a mere six hundred people to war, especially if they’re overwhelmingly female, when his own granddaughter is willing to plea on their behalf.” Rusalka frowned. She turned to face the crowd again as they set up fires to cook their lunch. Staggeringly the still depressed Rapture took notice of that and walked over, he started helping them in his own way. “Poor lad wants to be useful...he probably blames himself ten times harder than you do,” The scholar sadly mused. Indeed Rusalka could not deny his words, not about Lucretia, nor about Rapture. Just as she felt unreasonably responsible for letting this all transpire, Rapture too felt responsible because him and his mother were the real targets of Cain. She could not quite ignore the fact that he was hurting from this. She had not noticed, even now, that her father brought up the matter to stop her from arguing back and further push her towards talking to the princess she could not stand.

“We’re no longer qualified to protect him,” She said as she faced Rapture’s sad figure, “Maybe we never were to begin with.” Lucretia would surely give her a look of contempt upon hearing those words. She felt the weight of her hubris in full. Back there, when she had warned Lucretia that she had her eyes upon her, she felt so powerful...how silly she must’ve actually appeared. She was powerless, Lucretia probably knew it, she was the only one between the two of them who couldn’t see it. She looked towards Rapture, that boy, and decided to go and talk with him for a moment. She would talk to Lucretia not too long after. Thus she left, she walked down from the hill and left the two most important men in her life standing there. She left her husband together with her father.

____________________________________________________

The hilltop fell into a prolonged period of uncomfortable silence as the two men looked to face one another. Alexander knew not what to say. Times be he would have known what to say, but Rudolph now was not just an older man, he was the father of his bride. He turned to try and follow Rusalka, yet he found the man standing there, blocking his path. He was baffled, he looked behind him and then found Rude still standing where he had been moments before. He faced forward again, then found the man looking right at him at an imposing distance. He stepped back, his face pale and mind terrified. The man standing before him smiled, then chuckled as he reached into his coat. The first Rudolph turned to liquid, then sank into the earth. What lay beneath the earth, his current true body, swallowed it. Finally, the remaining Rudolph took a green bottle out of his coat and then lightly tossed it over into Alexander’s hands. Alexander caught the bottle, then stared at it blankly. There was no way he wouldn’t know what it was.

“You’re far too uptight, kid,” Rudolph said with a smirk, “Take that, it’ll help you unwind a bit.” Alexander raised his head. Indeed, the bottle was one of alcoholic drink, something close to wine, yet made from the fruits that only existed inside of this Sanctuary. The young man shrugged, then put the bottle away.

“Your daughter’s the uptight one,” He said, recalling all the times he’d had to literally drag that workaholic wife of his away from her desk. Yet Rudolph just laughed, in his mind they were both uptight, just in two completely different ways. He said as much, then stepped forward and patted Alexander on the shoulder.

“Take good care of her, won’t you, kid?”

“You keep telling me to, and I keep telling you I will,” Alexander replied.

“Good,” Rudolph said, passing him by, “In the unlikely event that we meet again, I expect a granddaughter or two.”

“What do you mean by “unlikely”?” Alexander said as he turned around in a flash, yet when he did all he saw was the earth and the sky. Rudolph was gone, in fact it was as though he had never been there to begin with. Thus the young lad fell silent. He sighed, there was nothing to say if the man had gone away. Then he faced the bottle that Rudolph had gifted him. Supposing that he wasn’t a total stranger to Saturn’s brands, this was a completely different drink altogether. He would certainly find his inhibitions hampered. That thought led him to think of Rusalka, whom he’d been unable to properly bed even now. He popped the cork and took a whiff of the stuff, then once more he sealed it shut. “Guess I’ll share it with Ru and then...we’ll see what happens,” He muttered to himself with a self depreciating grin. After that he turned to face his and Rusalka’s tent, which lay down in the grassy oasis below.