La Chanson est Claire
Based on the story told in
Unlawful Disorder: A Twist of Fate
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Prologue
The Oath
Alexa was exhausted. The man, Sanjarro Tallman, had extracted an oath from her, and she had agreed to it. Vee said neither grandmère - nor he for that matter - would live by the oath of a man who was ready, willing and able to kill them and others who complained about the status quo. Alexa couldn't fault the logic, but she also couldn't stand the idea that she might bring harm to the Donadieu name - a name she was very proud of - no matter how slight or how distant from home.
It wasn't just Maman she considered here, either. Sometimes (just sometimes, mind you) she felt so homesick that she considered turning around and going home. 'Just go home,' that tiny voice whispered, 'go home and beg Byron's forgiveness. Maybe you're still marriageable.' Alexa never voiced these thoughts - they would only serve to concern Vee, invite mockery from Edgewater's sons.
She looked down at her hands, dug them deep into her pockets, head lowered. Thank the gods for these veils. Hiding her shaking hands was one thing. Hiding tears of fear, exhaustion and relief was quite another. Oath or not, oathbreaker or not, she had saved them. She walked in silence, but her mind raced. She had saved them. It took a lot not to simply crumple - her head was still pounding, her mouth still dry, her stomach roiling from the alcohol the previous night...and yet she felt such an immense sense of victory. Extreme relief - she knew it was naive to think she could - they could - avoid bloodshed like this in all cases, but she had done it this time. She had done it, and Vee was proud of her.
"Alexandrie Aerith Vanessa Elamys Normaer Donadieu."
She looked up at Vee, suddenly afraid she'd read the situation wrong, very wrong. But then the giant mechanical man, her protector, dropped to one knee and drew her into a hug.
A whimper caught in her throat - the boys were still watching, already thought of her as useless - a child - but she couldn't suppress the tears that rolled silently down her cheeks as Vee held her shaking form. Once again she was overcome with gratitude - grateful to La Chanson that she was chosen, of course, but grateful to grandmère for sending her best friend, grateful to Vee for being willing to travel with her. Grateful again for his care and guidance. She didn't know what they were going to do, where they would end up, but she was grateful she wouldn't have to do it alone.
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Speaking of what they were going to do...Tallman couldn't get away with this. Too many lives were in danger - and that was before he did whatever it was he was going to do with a forge this size. It wasn't, Alexa considered as they kept walking, sanctioned by Shining Capital. That much was obvious. The Bagir'Choyf didn't know about it. They wouldn't have been sent on these two separate, but joined tasks if anyone in the Capital had known about it. So the oath Alexa had just made would do nothing but put people at risk if she kept to it. People would die if they simply did nothing, which...would that be so bad? Well, yes, people dying is awful but what, she thought, were they and their group consisting of two couples supposed to do about it? How could they truly help? That number of soldiers, that amount of power - Sanjarro Tallmann had said he was working for someone, after all. This was beyond the four of them, surely.
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What did La Chanson want? La Chanson had basically guided her to this point, to this place. It had shown her the lizardfolk in the wall and given her the ability to speak with them and their lizard puppies. La Chanson wanted her to help. And surely that was more important than an oath to anyone else. Nothing, she thought resolutely, was more important than doing what La Chanson asked of her, and nothing more important than protecting those she could.
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"It is ok to be afraid," she whispered to herself as the others discussed what to do next. Merde, but she hated being afraid. Just as she hated being tired and sick. Drinking was fun, but it would be a long time before she did it again.
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***
Peoples
As Alexa walked up and down muddy banks, scrabbled as delicately as she could through the swamp, her mind was simultaneously in this hamlet with the lizardfolk and far, far away at the Capital. For all her mockery of him, she could see that Lucas was a well trained fighter with a developed, methodical style. And she knew - having learned from Vee and the others of her personal guard, that style tended to be consistent. She also knew that this was a hamlet smaller by far than Breezy Point Bay, minuscule (if you ignored the physical size of the lizardfolk) compared to Shining Capital. She knew the rough population. In size alone, if what Lucas, Spider and Vee said was right...this hamlet could disappear without a second thought.
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This was the first time that Alexa simply did not want to be seen. At any other time she would have smiled and waved at the young lizardfolk. Such was her nature and upbringing. But here...now...with thoughts weighing so heavily on her, Alexa couldn't even bring herself to make eye contact with the people - yes, definitely people - they passed. She couldn't tell them apart, but she could see their social structure, could see the curious responses, the whispers, the culture, the ornamentation. She could tell that apart. They looked like brute beasts, but this was most definitely a society. A society with houses almost like her own summer home out of the city.
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"I'm here to help," she murmured to herself. What was the point of coming here if not to help?
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The queasy feeling in her stomach intensified as she almost slipped, caught by the ever present and watchful Vee. She absently thanked him and kept moving. If she couldn't persuade the leader of this place to help them...all of this would be gone.
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That was why she couldn't look at them. Eye contact meant seeing each individual person in the moment of their death. And these people were huge, yes, they were huge and naturally armored, but against a hundred Lucases? With fifty Spiders to sneak in first and fifty Vees to help protect them? Even with ten heartless Alexandries to send killing waves and heal allies...
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This was more than a job. It was...beyond money and that was okay. Something somewhere deep inside her loosened, like freeing a knot slightly.
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She was here to help. La Chanson wanted her to help. That's why she was here, why she was on the quest at all. Her stomach stilled and she stood a little straighter. If she was going to convince these people of a course of action, she couldn't look weak, not to those of lower status on the fringes of the hamlet, not to the leader in its centre. She may not be able - she shouldn't keep this oath made under duress. She was a Donadieu after all - a house famous for its decisive action. A house created and driven by fate.
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Clenching her fists, she looked out at the people. Afraid, she met their gaze. Unsmiling (smiling was beyond her for now), she met their eyes unflinchingly.
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'I'm here to help,' she thought. 'I'm here to save you all.'
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***
Changes
Insects buzzed and strange croaking growls kept Alexa awake that evening. She knew the noises were coming from the lizardfolk and lizards of differing sizes, so she wasn't afraid. She'd even used her gift from La Chanson to translate the noises for an hour, hands sleepily drawing notation in the air as she hummed softly. The notes clustered around her, catching in her hair as she closed her eyes, listening to welcome sounds of family. What started as a horrific cacophony of cracking wood became the sound of a concerned mother calling her young. As she strained her half-elven ears she could hear the guard at their door gargle out a warning to some young who were apparently trying to catch a glimpse of...well, her.
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Eyes closed, listening to the world, she wondered what Vee made of it all. She knew he was listening to the noises - she knew he could hear more than she, even if he couldn't understand it. As the hammock swayed unnervingly, she thought about the fact that he was, again, proud. She sighed gently, uncertain. Yes, she had brought the lizardfolk to their cause. Yes, it was in their best interest to help, but she was still uncomfortable with what she had done. People were going to die tomorrow - this was a fact - and the thought did not sit well with the young woman. It was more than that, though. As she lay, listening to this peaceful world around her, she could hear La Chanson weaving its gentle serenade through the air.
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People were going to die, and despite knowing it was Tallman's fault - that without him there none of this would have happened - despite that, a small portion of each death would belong to her.
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The problem - the big problem, was that a tiny part of her didn't care. A tiny part of her was jubilant at what she'd achieved - that she would be able to bring the lizardfolk some justice. Some vengeance. They were owed it - just as she was owed a stinging slap to Ellinora's cheek. Tallman - and those like him - needed to be taught a lesson. She knew that. She did. She could look deep enough into herself - the Song wound itself into the deepest hissing corners of her mind, after all - to know these feelings were here. So what was the problem, really?
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Vee.
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Since leaving home she had seen a different side to him. She knew and understood that his task was to keep her alive - to look after her so she could do what needed to be done. And she thought, often, about the fact that grandmère had failed in that task, whatever it was. She shifted in the hammock, aware that Vee would hear her every move, remembering a time when she was very small that he had woken her from a nightmare and held her until she fell asleep. There were hundreds of memories like this:
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The times she'd infuriated Maman trying to sleep standing beside him; the times she'd forced him to wear a bonnet and pretend to be a baby; the rainy days she'd spent hours clambering over him like a tree; the times he had watched silently as she yelled her hatred of anything that moved; his patience as she regained control of her temper and struggled (everytime) with the process of apology...
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Alexa rolled over to peer out of the hammock at the construct. In the dark as they were, perhaps he couldn't see her from where he stood, but he could hear her. She drew in a breath to whisper to him and hesitated. Lying back down, she let the edges of the hammock fold in around her as closely as her thoughts closed in around those memories. Like the first time she saw his armoured state, she was struggling to reconcile all these gentle, beautiful moments with the ruthless efficiency Vee was showing now - the open disgust he showed for Tallman's existence. She expected Lucas to be efficient - he was a soldier and soldiers were trained to kill. She expected Jasper to be ruthless - he was a criminal and they did bad things - saw bad things. But Chevalier? He'd held her four-year-old hand as she dragged him to the kitchen for milk, had stood with her in the rain as she learned to shoot rabbits, had helped her steal sweets...
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And of course the questions it raised about grandmère...
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In all the stories grandmère had told, she'd never warned Alexandrie about the feeling of killing. Of the consequences. She'd never mentioned the sense of justification and the powerful feeling that came with manipulation.
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She'd also never told Alexa why or how she had failed La Chanson.
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So the question that kept Alexa awake for some time now was:
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Did grandmère fail because she wasn't ruthless, or because she was?
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Vee - Viellard - Chevalier - was the closest proxy she had to her grandmère here. He had learned of this world from grandmère and her party. Did Alexa need to be more like grandmère, or less? Which would make La Chanson happy? Which was Vee proud of?
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Shifting again, the hammock began to sway slightly. Behind the lids of her closed eyes, she could see the light of the spell fading, the lizardfolk sounds returning to their horrific rumble.
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'In the morning,' she thought sleepily, plunged into darkness, the croaks and growls quietening around her, 'we fight.' Fighting sleep, she furrowed her brows as she tried to hold onto fleeting thoughts. 'I don't want them to die...I don't want them to die, but they don't feel the same.' Her breathing slowed, became more regular as she drifted. Hammocks were comfortable when you got used to them. Despite her concerns, despite the fears, she was falling asleep.
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"I won't let anything happen to you, Vee," she whispered at last, and slipped into a deep, deep slumber.
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***
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Je Veux Survivre
The sheer amount of smells assaulting Alexa's nose made her want to heave. This time it wasn't the alcohol, or the exhaustion, or nerves. It was the foul iron-like tang that filled her nostrils and made her mouth water. Her eyes, fixed on Vee's back, flicked to one side just in time to see a lizardfolk's claw pass through a man's throat, saw the burst of crimson spatter out toward her. Frozen for a moment, she stared at the abruptness of death before her terrified eyes met Vee's. Was that pity? Shame? No time to question - they pressed forward. One moment a man lived, the next he was gone. And there was nothing she could do about it.
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They'd crept in at sunrise. She knew the plan was for the lizardfolk to surprise the rest - Tallman and his close party were their responsibility, but... Alexa glanced back in time to see that same lizardfolk - or at least she assumed it was the same one - sprout feathers in his gut. She began to turn back - maybe she could help - but Vee put a hand on her shoulder. The lizardfolk were buying them the time they needed to get close. Time that was rapidly disappearing. The spell she started to mutter fell from her lips, the notes on her fingertips drifted uselessly away. A metaphor, she thought drolly, as she continued to follow silently, for all the good she could do in this situation.
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At which point' she frowned at Vee's back, 'am I more of a risk to Vee than an ally? Am I just creating more risk?' She shook her head as if trying to shake the idea free. She had helped. She had got them here, she had saved them from Tallman in the first place and no, she hadn't done it the way grandmère or maman would, but she had muddled through and they weren't dead. Yet. They were here in this camp getting rid of the problem, dealing with the problem.
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An arrow whistled past Alexa's head. She glanced around. Not the elven woman. "The elf wouldn't have missed," she muttered.
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Where was this elf? Where would she be? On top of one of the buildings? Alexa felt she shouldn't want to speak with the woman - they were there to stop Tallman and his people. That included the elf. The same elf who had spared her life. Tapped on the shoulder when they were trapped in the bunkhouse, the elven woman had spared her life and Alexa was not about to forget that. For whatever reason, the woman hadn't done as told, and Alexa wanted to ask her why.
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A dangerous prospect, considering the woman could be hidden anywhere regretting that decision by now. Still, Alexa was full of questions: Why work for Tallman? Was it money? Did she come from the Burning Lash? Vee suddenly dashed away from Alexa, pausing just long enough to look through the storehouse window. They were close, now, and from here she could hear the splashing and thrashing of what she assumed were lizardfolk. Calamity everywhere, the smells, the tastes, the sounds...for a moment, Alexa stopped, overwhelmed. Vee had run between the buildings and for a second between seconds Alexa stood, alone, watching the almost beautiful contrast of red on green, seeing the dance between cultures, a dance of death, more similar than she expected it could be...the screams and wails and growls and cries of two peoples saying the same thing:
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Je veux survivre.
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Even without Vee, for a moment, between seconds, between years she stood, the slide of a claw on a shield, the gurgle of blood in lungs, the exhale of the end. It all drifted away - no, it merged - with the gentle, soothing, frustratingly short refrain of the Song she had been hearing since her seventeenth birthday. One heartbeat, she closed her eyes and ducked under a blade swinging for her head. Another beat and she leaned to the side, watching an arrow trim a lock of her hair. La Chanson was with her as she ran. She could almost feel a note approaching her that she'd never heard before -
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A loud, sharp smash pulled her out of her reverie and disrupted the Song. Opening her eyes, she found herself behind Vee once more, held together by notes and luck. The two frowned at each other. Together, they peered around the corner to see Lucas cursing broadly with every word he had told her was not appropriate for a person of status (and more that she stored away for later). Glancing beyond him, her mouth fell open in shock as she watched Spider run for cover.
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"Merde."
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***
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The Present
As the bolt thudded into the huge man, Alexa’s mind flew to the forests near home, her mind’s eye sighting a rabbit running through a field. Flying. Landing. Tumbling. A red ragdoll on the ground, a too-large arrow in its body, unmoving simply because a teenager with notes in her head had wanted practice. That day she learned there were limits. Even for La Chanson. At least, for now. The finality, the brutal victory of hitting her target followed by the stillness of the animal had left her, crouched on the ground, trying to heal it for what felt like days. Weeks.
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Mundane or magical, healing could only bring health to the living. She had cried so hard, the golden light washing over the torn form uselessly, that Vee had eventually taken the creature from her. She hadn’t hunted for two weeks, had stopped eating meat until Maman had reminded her of required formalities. 'Those incapable of preserving life,' she had thought, 'had no business taking it.'
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In the bunkhouse she scrambled awkwardly across the heavy table, her mind taking her into the trees to sit in quiet meditation. Those were the days Emily had been her guard. The days when Vee was Chevalier, not her closest friend. A leg up into that tree, followed by a lithe wood elf sitting nearby, keeping watch while Alexa kept surreptitious watch on the elf. Climbing trees on their property was the only concession Maman allowed from being a Lady, being Sanjuio Donadieu, for she knew how much Alexa liked the quiet of the forest. To feel, somehow, sometimes, that she could hide. Even in her mind’s eye, with Emily’s face and the memory of that tree to comfort her, she was pulled back to the present as the large man grunted and took a step back.
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Alexa almost begged forgiveness even as Lucas' sword cut, as Spider's daggers bit – she knew how far the bolt had thrown the rabbit. She knew the amount of force behind a crossbow, light or otherwise. She almost asked La Chanson to heal the man on the spot.
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But he had hit Vee - was trying hurt Vee - only wanted to hurt Vee - and Alexa couldn’t allow that. She took aim once more, lowering her arm as the man slumped to the floor. Alive? Her eyes briefly met Vee’s and he gave an almost imperceptible nod.
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Backing up, she felt her back against the wall and sighed as the automaton charged to the outside. ‘Trapped in this bunkhouse again,’ she thought bitterly, her mind painfully forced to the present.
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A thud and a cry from Lucas had her head snapping around just in time to see clear ice crystals glittering across his shoulder, hear the tinkling of frozen red hitting the ground, spilled.
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“Those incapable of preserving life have no business taking it,” she whispered. “Aidez moi.” La Chanson burst into her mind as power flowed through her, her fingers tingling with the vibration of an unheard Song. She knew that if she placed her fingers on metal in this state, the whole bunkhouse would likely hear the rhythm of it. That was not the point here. It was not about beauty or power, but about helping in this moment. She reached out and projected the music directly at Lucas.
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She wasn’t sure whether he would hear La Chanson, she had never been able to ask the animals she had healed, and though he had offered to be a target, she had never agreed to let Vee be her practice dummy. Lucas shivered and turned to meet her eye. A smile exploded across her face as she saw music warming the ice and closing the wound. As she did, she realised it had been some time since she had genuinely smiled. It felt good. She watched the soldier smile broadly back at her, before running directly into the fray, leaving her alone with Spider and her thoughts.
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***
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Time to Think
He was going to hurt Chevalier and Lucas.
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Alexa had only that thought to comfort her, and it was a grim one. The man she had killed was trying to kill her friends.
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'But did it have to be so brutal?' She thought. 'Did death have to be so painful? Did La Chanson need to treat people with such finality?' And the more frightening thought, of course: 'Was La Chanson only giving me what I wanted? The ability to help. I just wanted to help.'
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He was going to hurt Chevalier and Lucas.
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She could only heal so much - she could only help this way for so long. All too suddenly the battle was over and she was humming the tiny phrase she knew, knitting Lucas' wounds together, healing him, sure, but also trying to distract herself from the man who lay still - burned, she knew - not a mark on his skin.
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Around them lay the dead, the moaning, the crying, the celebratory growls of lizardfolk, smells - the scent of blood and viscera, sounds - so many sounds, the cracking of bones, tearing as lizardfolk... celebrated...she did what she could to block it, but even focusing on the Song in her mind for those few seconds she helped Lucas, it reminded her of the screams she had caused.
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The screams, his screams, had harmonised with the Song. Only she could know that, and it wasn't something she would share with anyone. Not even Vee. His death had been gruesome - but so beautiful it had pricked at her eyes in more than just sadness.
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He was going to hurt Vee
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and how was she supposed to tell Vee that she couldn't stop hurting people? That so quickly she had discovered what was worth taking the lives of others to protect? Vee was there to protect her, not the other way around and yet -
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He was going to hurt Chevalier and Lucas
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and although she wanted to use the power she was given to heal, the longer they fought, the more tired they would get - and those arrows were deadly - how Lucas could just walk out there knowing he could die was beyond her. He wasn't Vee - made of metal. Lucas was made of flesh, and he could very easily have died in this fight. He had fallen. He had fallen and she had scrambled around a door, panicked, doing what she could to keep him from dying.
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They would have killed her friends.
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Watching Tallman sleep, for all Lucas' dragging of him into the bunkhouse, it was she who made sure both men had been sitting as comfortably as their wounds would allow, she who sat in confused contemplation, her eyes passing over the man who had orchestrated the other half of the fray.
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Was this what it mean to be noble? The ability to manipulate others into dying for your cause - be it with money or sweet words...the ability to encourage self-sacrifice for the benefit of others. Was this what it meant to be a Donadieu? Between the two of them - between two houses - they had managed to hurt hundreds of people. Was this noble? Was it right? Was it just? She didn't feel very noble, didn't feel honourable.
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She reached out and gently touched the lump on the side of his head, wincing. She knew what had caused that.
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He was going to hurt Vee and Lucas...and he wanted to hurt me. She withdrew her hand, stood and took a step back, grasping one hand in the other as if burned. Glancing around the bunkhouse, she stopped the hum that had begun to rise in her throat.
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Instinct had told her to heal the giant man, that he shouldn't be in so much pain, not now that the fighting was done - but a deeper part of her, perhaps the Song, perhaps something grandmère or Vee had said that was buried deep in her mind said not to do the same for Tallman.
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He wanted to hurt Vee - he wanted to hurt Lucas, and Spider and all of them. And he wanted to hurt her family, her house, Shining Capital...and he would not regret it the way she would. If he escaped, she knew he would be even more dangerous now. And she knew the others were not as predisposed to preserving life they didn't see as valuable. She knew that they would want to dispose of the problem. Perhaps she was the only one who saw that the problem was human - that there were scores of dead.
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She was not, she knew, her grandmère. Grandmère was ruthless and sure of herself and could do things for the greater good because they needed to be done.
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Alexandrie didn't want to deal with any of this. She wanted to crawl under one of the bunks and cry, or climb a tree far away and pretend it had all been a dream, or wake on her wedding day and realise the only responsibility she had was to produce children and do as her husband requested.
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Running a household seemed laughable now. The household responsibility her mother had tried to train into her - tending to such domestic things...it seemed childish now. Like playing with dolls. She returned to her chair and sat, staring at Tallman. Was that what these people were to him? Dolls?
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Were her friends - when had they become friends - and all the people who had died today... were they dolls to be played with? Destroyed? A flash of anger passed across her face and she slapped him sharply.
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It was time to talk.
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***
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Bon et Juste
"All life should be...it deserves to be...protected."
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Vee had said those words mere months ago. "All life is beautiful and precious," he had said.
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So much blood.
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"We may need to scare him a little. Nothing more."
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He had asked her to leave.
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"If you are here, he may not believe the threat, not believe we would do it while you watched."
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If she had been there, Tallman wouldn't have believed the threat. The threat...what was the threat? Was it more than what she saw? Was it more than Tallman described? Was there more before the man...woman, had screamed in pain? She didn't know, and she didn't want to ask.
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Either way, he had let it happen - and so had she. As they waited for Lucas and Jasper to return, Alexa sat on the bunk, her eyes shifting from Tallman - Mirayam Tallman now - to Chevalier. She couldn't shake the horrible feeling that Tallman was right: He had allowed it to happen. They had sent her away, sent Lucas to distract her knowing they were going to hurt Tallman. She should never have left the room. It had gone against her better judgement - something was wrong, and she knew it, but whose judgement could she trust more than Chevalier's? Who could she trust more to do as he said, and only in aid of the greater good - in aid of her family's safety - her safety?
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But that scream. In a moment, her heart had dropped into her stomach. The day, cool on her skin turned cold, then not cold enough as she bolted to the bunkhouse, slipping under Lucas' arm. He knew too. Had she been the only one?
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"It deserves to be protected." So why was it spilling out on the floor? Was this how life was protected? Did Chevalier remember what he'd said to her? Did it matter? Was it just a platitude? Was it one rule for her and another for him? Whose life was he protecting by letting Spider bite Tallman with her own sword?
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What was there to gain? Alexa couldn't imagine being in so much pain, and she certainly couldn't imagine being asked questions while it happened and saying anything other than what the attacker wanted to hear.
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In the camp, watching Tallman laze, her eyes dropped to the woman's leg. That moment, running into the bunkhouse, seeing blood and a man she couldn't be sure was alive and her closest friend speaking, behaving so nonchalantly about what they had done - it had been the first time she'd silently cursed La Chanson. She wanted to help, wanted to heal, wanted to protect life - all life...and she couldn't. The Song wouldn't - couldn't come to help. She couldn't ease Tallman's suffering, and she desperately wanted to.
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As the others rested, she sat in meditation, apologising to La Chanson and begging for its return. It had returned, of course, and she had been able to help make Tallman's travel less painful, but her eyes still flicked to the smirking woman's leg and nose. Both Spider and Lucas had proven they were happy to hurt, and she would remember that. It didn't sting as much - she expected it. Chevalier, though...
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"All life deserves to be protected."
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"You were the one who taught me of life's importance!" She wanted to scream into the silent room. "You said it deserves protection. All life deserves protection. All of it!" She didn't though. It wasn't a discussion to have here, nor one to have now, with a captive. And if she were honest with herself, she didn't know if she wanted to have the discussion at all. Angry tears pressed at her eyelids and she blinked them away. She knew she was being naive.
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The things Chevalier said and the things Chevalier did were not the same. Besides, who was she to point fingers? She had killed - twice now. Twice in aid of her allies, but twice nonetheless. Did Vee feel the same about what had happened as she did? As she watched him watching Tallman, for the first time in a long time she wasn't sure she wanted an answer.
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"All life deserves to be protected."
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But what if that protection - what if keeping people alive was simply so they could go and hurt someone else? She had helped the big man and sent him on his way. He would now go and hurt again, she had no doubt, but her conscience, at the time, had been clear. She sighed, and was returned to the present when both looked at her.
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Perhaps she should have joined Lucas for that game of Centurion after all. Exchange pain for pain, but at least she wouldn't feel so confused or so...lonely.
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***
Justice and Redemption
As the Bagir's guards took the laughing assassin away, Alexa sat quietly, her eyes firmly planted on the floor as the Chyof's scribe asked for their statements. She spoke when addressed, quietly affirming or giving detail where required. She didn't look at her companions, nor did she look at the door. Again, she was grateful for the veils - 'perhaps I should never remove them,' she thought, grimacing as Spider recounted the deaths of lizardfolk and humans.
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They had completed the task. It was finished. She had done as required - she had done as requested. She was a killer, not a murderer and had done as asked -
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Why did it keep coming back to that? A killer not a murderer. And yet...switch perspectives for a moment. She herself had brought a small army of lizardfolk to attack people working for Tallman. Was she their killer too? Where did the responsibility end? Where did it begin? With her acceptance of the contract? She glanced at her own name prettily carved out on the page, and longed to be that girl again. Unconfused, unhindered by the things she had seen and heard.
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She hadn't been able to watch as they took Mirayam away, but she hadn't been able to stop the involuntary shudders that had shaken her frame as the assassin giggled - nor the tautness of her hands in her lap as Chevalier went to help those guards keep watch over her.
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Hearing her laugh made no sense to Alexa - the woman should be crying - Alexa would have been crying and pleading for whatever life she could have. Mirayam and Martell were cut from the same foreign cloth: fearing death shouldn't be an issue so much as the manner of it. Alexa knew that the manner of death these people had wrought on people was awful, that they deserved to swing - that hanging was justice - and justice made people feel better about the awful outcomes to awful decisions.
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Before all this, Spider had said he didn't - hadn't killed much. But he was complimented by an assassin on how close he was to killing her - how willing he was to kill - seemingly without thought. Was he a killer, then, or a murderer? That acolyte...he didn't think twice, he just did it. Killing came easily to him. Vee ran when he realised Spider might be left alone with her. He knew Spider might...
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"I spoke with the lizardfolk. They are a matriarchal society and very practical. If you trade, send a woman such as yourself, Bagir."
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What made someone like Lucas good and someone like Mirayam bad? Both killed for money. Both kill as a profession, and as Lucas said himself, both enjoyed the job. So why was a soldier better than an assassin? What made Ixachaz better than Mirayam, what made Alexandrie better than Mirayam? Because it was an accident? Did accidents make it alright? Was it because she was defending herself?
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So was Mirayam. What prospects did the bastard daughter of a noble have? She told them her options - of all people, Spider, the bastard understood. He had, Alexa thought. He had. She glanced at him as he twirled his fake moustache and wiggled his eyebrows.
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There was a bounty on their heads. The veils, a disguise, had seemed so frivolous, so unnecessary before. Now, though...
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They would be leaving here as soon as possible. Sailing to Glitter Delta Cove. Alexa glanced at Lucas and sighed internally at his absurd faked accent. He had said he would earn her trust. Just a few days ago. As with everything to do with the young Sanjuio, trust was a complicated ask. He had shown himself to be kind and fair, in his way, but his behaviour was impulsive and dangerous at times. How he went through life so far out of control of himself, she didn't understand. And she was still unsure whether he had wanted to hand Mirayam in because of justice or...some other reason the half-elf couldn't define. Embarrassment? That wasn't it, though that was probably part of it.
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Justice...Alexa didn't like the word. She didn't understand it. It seemed to her that justice meant vastly different things depending on who said it. To Chevalier, it seemed to mean facing the consequences of actions. She could understand that, almost, if justice were equal. The Progress Confederacy was a meritocracy. She was a noble because her grandmère was a noble. But more - the Donadieu family were a relatively young noble family. That's what meritocracy meant. Grandmère had to earn the right to the title she held. 'Where,' she thought, glancing at the doorway, 'was the justice in killing Mirayam because she had killed, without bringing the same judgement upon Alexandrie herself?' Why was the assassin's father not punished, or her mother, or the people who trained her? What about those who restricted her options and pushed her to her role?
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She had pled for her employee's lives. Was she evil? Or just doing the job as required? She had tried to simply send them away initially. Was that evil? Alexa thought again of the elf. What made Mirayam awful and worthy of death but redeemed the elf? They were both doing their jobs...
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Finally, they stood and the Bagir handed Spider another bag of coin. Some of that, she knew, would be used to bring them distinctly closer to their goal. La Chanson played in the back of her mind, frustratingly evading direct thought, as if watching her wrestle with morality. Her thought of the Song deepened and she felt a little tug inland. To the centre, she knew, the same as it always was. Would whatever they found explain justice to her? Would it explain the difference - the true difference for a grieving family - between killing and murder? Perhaps.
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Biting her lip in thought, she slipped her hand in Chevalier's as they left the manor house.
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They would likely not, she knew, see eye to eye on this. That didn't mean he would stop protecting her, nor she him. That she loved him any less. It did mean, however, that they had a lot of lively discussion ahead.
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Perhaps she didn't fully understand the nuances of good and right or justice and mercy yet. Protecting life - all life - would always be difficult. There would be people like Lucas, people like Vee who believed justice was more important than life, sometimes.
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For herself, justice meant offering a chance at redemption. Some deaths were unavoidable, but could be paid for in other ways. In another world, Mirayam perhaps would have gone to the Deliverance and found peace. Perhaps not. Some of her blood would be on Alexa's hands too, mingling with that of lizardfolk and humans she thought of when she stopped for too long.
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La Chanson had not abandoned her through all this. It knew death was unavoidable. Whether it agreed with her decisions fully, she couldn't know. What she did know is that she would keep doing as La Chanson asked. La Chanson was worth killing for - would always be worth killing for.
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She hummed softly as they walked toward the docks. Her redemption started now.
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***