#Saoirse is so similar but refuses to lock people out in the same way

[maaaahri]

Oh no I’m thinking about VtM npcs again

[pitofghosts]

AFITS Chapter 35

She’s Important

Warning for what is essentially fantasy police violence! (and also spoilers if you care about that sorta thing <3)

Taglist: @ratracechronicler (this is that scene in full you wanted to see) and @yearlyaquariace <3

Zalizinch was nothing like he had pictured. When Kai Fen thought of railroad settlements, he thought of the long sprawling towns that followed the track across the flatlands. He'd imagined Zalizinch in a similar fashion, stretching long and skinny in a valley between towering mountains.

He was right about the mountains, at least, but that was where it ended. Zalizinch surrounded a gulley, with the city sloping down the mountains to come reach the water in the centre, where ferries made their slow paths across. Heila remarked on how closely it resembled the rice terraces of a farm she'd worked, but stretched huge into streets and passageways. The description meant precious little to Kai Fen. The intermingling of tall, rectangular buildings with equally tall trees was what stuck out to him. The structures here looked constructed rather than carved, and the buildings had sides painted in vivid blues and green. Tall stacks of smoke billowed from two of the mountain tops, which Saoirse explained was the result of factories or mines and not volcanoes.

"The only volcano in Vwos is way up north," he'd said. "And that thing's been inactive for lifetimes."

As they approached the city, Kai Fen got a front row seat to the slow, steady fall of Saoirse's expression. His own face copied.

"What is it?"

Saoirse worried his lip between his teeth and looked over his shoulder at both Heila and Kai Fen, and then let out a nervous laugh. "Unless you two have Vwosi documents I don't know about, we're in for a bit of trouble."

Kai Fen groaned and leaned his head forward against the wood. Had no one thought anything through?

While being under the blankets with others was warm during the night, doing it during the day was hot and stuffy. Kai Fen hend his sleeves tightly in his balled up fists, trying to keep his breathing steady. He loathed dark, crowded spaces, and with Heila shoved next to him and bags piled on top of them, he was beginning to weigh the odds of facing the Vwosi guards and responders against facing the claustrophobia.

"Who's even heard of a checkpoint," Heila muttered. "I still say we should just go in."

"Anywhere secure has them," Kai Fen shot back at her. Even if he wasn't pleased by the situation, he at least understood it. He didn't like the Vwosi for more than just a handful of reasons, but safety precautions during an invasion and onslaught of refugees wasn't one of them. Heila's shoulder caught him in the chin, and he glared. "Maybe you not hearing about them is why Yshtral fell so fast. Be quiet until we get through."

He could sense Heila's disapproval, but he didn't hear about it. She shifted again, and this time her elbow came careening too close to his nose for comfort. "Blankets and bags don't move," Kai Fen hissed. Heila turned her head and he caught her glare even in the darkness, but her movements ceased.

There were a few calls from up ahead in Vwosi. Kai Fen hoped that Saoirse would respond to them in Bridgespeak, but he didn't. Saoirse had spent some time teaching them phrases while they traveled, but it wasn't nearly enough to understand the quick natural flows of conversation.

The voices drew closer as the cart eased to a halt. Kai Fen squinted into the darkness and concentrated on picking out familiar words. Business, person, money, food, name. Saoirse made what sounded like a joke, and then said, "Sasha Minnet." There were a few more quick exchanges, Saoirse stalling on the answers. He made what Kai Fen assumed was another joke. No one laughed.

He didn't need to understand the words to know that Saoirse was nervous. Kai Fen would credit that he played it off well, but there was apprehension in his voice, and too much laughter. It could have been assumed to be a boy, journeying on his own for the first time, and nervous to be out on his own. Kai Fen noticed that his thumb was running over his sleeve and stilled it.

Blankets and bags didn't move.

A sentence with enough familiar words came from an unfamiliar voice. "Sasha Minnet. As in the Predstav's son?"

A laugh from Saoirse. The showman's laugh, Kai Fen noted. He understood enough to get the gist of Saoirse's words: "The one and only."

Shouts. The word people. A word that sounded eerily similar to the word "search" in Enyese. Kai Fen held his breath.

The blankets and bags were moving.

He closed his eyes and tilted his head forward, touching it to the wood, and he sent a silent prayer that he and Heila somehow remained undiscovered, but knowing his luck with prayer, he was only solidifying their capture. He didn't know what the punishment for trying to sneak past a Vwosi check point was, but he imagined they weren't about to get off easy.

The light that spread behind his eyelids felt like a death sentence. He opened his eyes just before a hand enclosed around the base of his neck and yanked him backwards. Kai Fen reached to grab the hand, to pull it away, but then a cold metal bracelet was being slammed around one wrist, and he was being dragged from the cart by at least two sets of hands.

He looked to Heila, hoping to find assistance, but she was in a worse state than him with both hands locked behind her back. He looked up at Saoirse, hoping for an answer, but he was staring at the two of them with completely surprise, and then he screamed something in Vwosi that Kai Fen could definitely understand.

"What?!"

Kai Fen's other arm got twisted behind his back, and yelled as his sprained not wrist was aggravated. He kicked as he was dragged back towards the building, hoping that his heels would find purchase with the ground. He twisted his head to look behind him, towards his destination, and got a sinking feeling that as soon as he was passed the door he wouldn't be able to do much for his position. He had to act fast.

Screw his pride. He hoped this Vwosi backwater didn't keep up to date on global politics.

"How dare you! Don't you know who I am?!" He lurched forward, but a firm hand on his bicep held him back. Heila looked at him with wide eyes, undoubtedly pleading him to shut up. He knew how what he was doing looked, but she'd have to trust him. "How dare you put me in cuffs! You will all be ruined once my father hears of this!"

Even Saoirse, good actor as he was, was struggling to hide his horror. The responders looked largely looked amused, with a few that looked annoyed or angry. Kai Fen begged whatever deity was listening that he get away with this.

"Tell us who you are, then," said the responder who was holding Heila, his tone light and unbothered. Kai Fen glared at him, eyes two burning slits. He used to emulate his father's expressions, his focus and intensity, and tried to will that same energy into his muscles now. All eyes were on him now, and he was beginning to understand how a place like Vwos fell and rose so quickly. Lying was just so easy here.

"I am Crown Prince Jin Zhihao Yang of the Blinding Righteous Enyang, and if you don't unhand me this instant you'll be lucky if my father kills you quickly." He kept his tone even but fierce. He might yell, might shout and demand, but that was not how a crown prince behaved.

Saoirse mercifully switched to Bridgespeak when he spoke. "It's true." All eyes snapped on to him, and for a second, Kai Fen thought he might falter. But this wasn't regular Saoirse, wasn't the boy who'd taught him laundry by the hot spring or drank sbiten before sleeping. This was Saoirse the dancer. Saoirse the musician,  Saoirse the singer, and most importantly, Saoirse the actor.

"He threatened me," Saoirse continued, and Kai Fen felt the hand around his arm tighten. He sent Saoirse a glare. Even when in his element, he was still an idiot. Saoirse noticed his screw up and flicked his eyes towards him, a brief apology that could easily be mistaken for assessment, and then looked back out towards the group. "They approached me last night and asked if I would give them a ride. I refused, I didn't want trouble like the one here, but I guess they came anyway." Saoirse looked between everyone and ran his tongue over his teeth. "I think they have legitimate business here, though. The Gorran girl. She's important."

"More important than a prince?" The responder holding Heila sneered. Kai Fen couldn't tell if he was mocking their web of lies, or if he was mocking him. Maybe being a prince in a nation that killed theirs wasn't a good idea. Kai Fen scowled down at his feet. Maybe Heila and Saoirse did have the right idea to send him horrified looks. He could have said anything else and this would have gone over easier.

His father had made him into a liar for the past four years and now he couldn't stop.

"Equally important," Saoirse said. He lowered himself from the driver's seat and took a step towards Kai Fen, but the responder at his right moved his hand to his belt. Kai Fen couldn't see, but he imagined there was a weapon sheathed there. Saoirse got the message and stood still, hands held palm up at his chest in appeasement.

"And what makes you so important, Gorran?" snarled the responder. Kai Fen irected his eyes onto him, and immediately stopped slouching. The way he loomed over her, bent over so his face was next to her ear, made Kai Fen see red. Heila didn't say anything, just stared down at her feet. The responder laughed, mean and dirty, and pulled the curved blade of a Vwosi sholve from its sheath and placed it at her throat. "Speak, Gorran."

She began to stammer something, but the words were incoherent and messy. Kai Fen's lips pulled back over his teeth. He lunged forward with more strength than the responders expected from him. He escaped the grasp of the right responder's, but the left one tightened and pulled him back before he could make any proper ground.

"Get away from her!" He screamed. Any thought of plans or identity or Zalizinch or some faraway capital with important people had fled his mind. He stared, wide eyed and angry at the responder's face.

"And here I though Enyese princes only socialized with their own caste?" He sounded so smug. He was right, some part of Kai Fen thought, but the sound of the blood in his ears and his heart against his ribs drowned it out.

"The mountains do things to you," Kai Fen spit. The responder considered him, eyes sparked with curiousity. His blade stayed still, his expression begged for a reason to inch it closer. Kai Fen's mouth was a desert. "She's important." It was as much a plea as it was a statement. He wished he had braver, stronger words, but he couldn't find them. There was no more rouse, no more ploy or Zalizinch, just a blade at his friend's throat. The words rung on his tongue and in his ears, buzzed around his head and under his skin.

She's important.

She's important.

She's important.

He couldn't lose her.

"She's blessed," Saoirse said.

All eyes turned onto him. Kai Fen's drifted from the responder and onto Heila. She was looking at him, too. The colour had drained from her face, the rich dark brown turned cold. He never thought she could look so small.

"A blessed Gorran?" The responder sounded rife with disbelief. He moved the blade a little closer, his fingers curled around it a little tighter. He wore amusement like he owned it. "Blessed by who? I can't think of one deity who would touch that place."

"Yshtra." Her voice shook, but she said it with conviction. The responder laughed.

"So if I were to cut you, you'd heal it?"

Kai Fen lurched forward again, only sending his feet backward. "Don't touch her!" The responder cast his eyes in his direction, had the audacity to smile at him, and then stood up straight and resheathed his blade.

"Alright, Prince," he sighed. "You get your way." The responder grabbed Heila by the shoulders and shoved her towards the building. He barked something in Vwosi to the other responders, and then Kai Fen was being grabbed and shoved along with her. He jerked away from each of their hands, but didn't fight them this time. As they neared the door, he turned his eyes onto Heila. Her eyes looked so empty.

Behind them, he could hear Saoirse yelling. First in Bridgespeak, but then in Vwosi. Presumably he was yelling the same in both languages, asking where they were taking them and what was going on. In another situation, Kai Fen might have noted the irony in the way he brandished the word predstav like it gave him an advantage. Kai Fen stole a look at him over his shoulder, and then the door shut behind him.