What Kaveri was doing all the way in the capital of Arynn Frey, Kester had no idea. All she knew was that she was supposed to drag his ass back down to the others because so-and-so’s wagon was now officially falling apart and he was a crotchety old man who only trusted Kaveri’s work despite the many other capable carpenters who hadn’t wandered so far away. Unfortunately, that old man had a way of making everyone’s life miserable until he got his way, so Kester, who would apparently never escape her association with Kaveri despite the years of distance that had turned them into strangers, had been sent up to find him and Nephys.

It was likely also because Walnut had volunteered them. He missed Kaveri.

Kester had never been to Elyusian before, and she found its size and relative splendor simultaneously unnerving and intriguing. When they had first come to Arynn Frey, the concept of cities alone had been foreign, let alone one that arbitrarily held more importance than the rest. With streets upon streets of stone buildings that had sat there for generations, Illianar had been strangely sedentary, but the capital took that unfamiliarity and amplified it. The city sprawled. How in all of Terra Nova was anyone supposed to know where anything or anyone was in a place like this?

As she came upon the next intersection of roads she did not recognize, Kester crossed her arms and studied her options.

Which way do you think, Walnut? She asked, peering at the street signs that were utterly meaningless to her. A long pause, then she directed her gaze downward. Walnut?

“Kes, look what I found!” In his distinctive little hopping run, the river returned to Kester’s side from where he’d wandered off to the side of the road, something in his mouth.

Her eyes narrowed. Walnut, that’s a rock. They’re all over the place.

“Yes, but this one is perfect! It rolls so smoothly - watch!” He tossed the rock into the air and watched for a moment as it rolled down the gradual slope of the street before racing after it. Delight turned into alarm when he found he couldn’t keep up. “Wait, Kes, it’s getting away!”

Rocks do tend to do that when you roll them downhill.

Kessie, please!

With an quiet sigh, Kester uncrossed her arms and trotted after the stone as it rolled down one of the streets. She stopped its descent with her foot before crouching down and picking it up, facing Walnut as he caught up to her and holding up the rock in question.

Here, Walnut. Now, can we please—

“Thank you! You’re the best, Kes. I knew I could count on you. You’ve got those long legs, but you’re right, I gotta show Kaveri and Nephys this rock— Oh! What’s that?”

Kester followed her dyr’s gaze to a fountain further down the street. Walnut, no. She straightened up, the forgotten rock disappearing into a pocket.

“Walnut, yes.” He was already running toward the water. “Come on, Kes! It’ll be fun!” Neither of them acknowledged the implicit accusation that she didn’t have nearly enough fun these days.

Kester ran a hand over her face then followed behind him at a more sedate pace. Five minutes, She allowed, watching as he disappeared into the pool of water. Then we’re going to keep looking and actually focus on it, alright?

Though Walnut’s general exuberance with life had been tempered by the nightmare of the past few years, it lingered far closer to the surface for him than it did any others. With fond exasperation, Kester had once suggested it was because his mind could only hold a single thought at a time, but Walnut had only been offended until the next shiny new toy caught his eye. By now, Kester was accustomed to his antics, and he knew how she griped but let him get away with them anyway. That didn’t mean everyone around her did, however.

Aware that they were in a city where Dresmondi were few and far between, she glanced around while Walnut splashed in the water. A child and her guardian they hurried by, staring at the refugee and her dyr as they did so. Kester watched them back until they disappeared from sight, at which point her gaze jumped to a man coming from the same direction she and Walnut had. When they locked eyes, she offered him a smile and a nod of acknowledgement before turning back to watch the otter play in the water.

It hadn’t been anywhere near five minutes yet, but Kester could feel the impatience within her gaining ground. She was a woman of action; standing still didn’t suit her, especially not these days.

“You said five minutes!”

I didn’t say anything!

“But you thought it!”

You’ll get your five minutes, Walnut. Just enjoy your fountain.

He was. Even without the mental connection they’d shared, she thought it would have been obvious from the way he soared through the shallow water, twisting around and pushing off the stone sides with neat little flips. He wove in and out of and around the streams of water that splashed into the basin in which he swam. Part of one ended up frozen into a piece of ice that he chased and batted around as if he wasn’t controlling it. Though far from the most graceful creature on land, Walnut was the epitome of sleek elegance when in the water. That was another reason why she and Kaveri had made a good team. Nephys’ manipulation of water allowed him to—

“Kes, they’re not going anywhere. Sit down for a minute and relax. This is fun, remember?” Walnut paused in his swimming to poke his head above the water and peer at her.

Kester crossed her arms and looked back down at him, but she didn’t have time to make a retort before they both became aware of the man approaching them. As Walnut’s attention shifted to the side, movement in the corner of her eye had her turning to see the large man she’d smiled at before walking around her. She watched as he sat on the edge of the fountain and dipped his fingers in, and unbidden, the thought of Walnut freezing his hand in place jumped to the front of her mind before she dismissed it. They were in Arynn Frey, not on a battlefield in Dresmond. Though the mountain of a man was large and imposing, his size didn’t automatically make him a threat.

The expression on his face and the tone of his voice as he addressed her were certainly not what she had expected of him. Rather disarmed, Kester blinked while Walnut curiously studied him from the fountain.

“He seems nice!”

What? He’s barely said anything to us.

“You should talk to him! Then you can see what I mean.”

You just want more time to swim.

Walnut didn’t deny it, though it wasn’t as if the river otter wouldn’t get his way anyway. Bowen Belcourt, both the name and the person, meant nothing to her, but it felt strange to hold a conversation while standing over someone else. Finally sitting down on the edge of the fountain - and ignoring the flare of success from Walnut’s side of their bond - Kester turned and dipped her own fingers into the water. Then, on the stone between her and Bowen, she painstakingly spelled out her name the way an Arynnite down south had showed her many years ago. Just in case he didn’t get it, she pointed at the word then at herself, fishing around in a pocket and pulling out a not quite fresh but not quite spoiled walnut. Over the years, Kester had learned over the years to collect and save them when she could for this exact purpose. She gestured between the walnut and her dyr, who would roll on his back and wave at Bowen if he turned to look, before returning the prop to its pocket.

Turning her attention back to Bowen, she offered him another smile, a quizzical head tilt, and a slight shrug. As she did so, she spread her hands out in front of her with their palms toward the sky and silently tried to invite him to elaborate on why he had decided to talk to them.

Kester nodded when he repeated her name and didn’t even have to turn to know that Walnut had dipped back under the water with an extra little flourish in response to Bowen.

”He waved!” The river otter enthused as he shoved off another wall with a flip, eyes fixed on the newcomer. “Only the nice ones wave!”

Walnut, you know that’s ju—

“I’m busy swimming, and I can’t hear you! Go talk to the nice man, Kes. He’s saying something.”

Bowen Belcourt was indeed saying something, and she managed to catch the tail end of his question just as he turned to look at her. Yes, this fountain was a little shallow, so she nodded - and Walnut zoomed right over underwater to join them, poking his head above the surface to look at the Arynnite.

“Did he say a larger, deeper fountain?”

Walnut.

“He did, didn’t he! What are we waiting for? Let’s go!”

Kester was not so easily convinced. She watched the Arynnite as he spoke of buying writing utensils for easier communication and expressed his interest in talking with both of them. If anything bound the citizens of Arynn Frey together more tightly than their enchantments, it was their curiosity, and Bowen was no exception. He seemed genuinely interested and excited at the prospect of talking. But he had been so quick to sit down and strike up a conversation, and she remembered how he had come from the same street that she and Walnut had. Curiosity alone was not unusual, but…

Perhaps some of the creeping wariness had shown on her face or perhaps he was more self-aware than most men, but Bowen was quick to offer an explanation. Turning to watch Walnut swim, Kester listened and considered his words.

“So he wants to talk to you, and I get to find a new fountain. What’s the problem, Kes?”

What’s a Minister of Internal Affairs?

”How should I know? He said something about keeping Arynn Frey safe.”

But why would he want to talk to me about that? What would I know?

Walnut paused in his swimming and looked at her. ”Well, we are Dijila, Kes.”

But it’s not like he knows that. Right? A moment passed. And keep everyone safe from what?

“Sounds like something you should ask Bowen,” Walnut practically singsonged back, diving back under the water before poking his head above the surface again to look between the two of them.

We’re supposed to be looking for Kaveri and Nephys, remember?

“We’ve already stopped here. A few more minutes won’t hurt them. They’re not going anywhere, are they?”

I don’t know. And I can’t ask because we haven’t found them.

“Kes, it’ll be fine.”

You just want the fountain.

“Well, I mean, can you blame me? But listen, if he’s a creep, we’ll take care of him, and if his questions get annoying or take too long, we’ll just stop talking.”

She looked at him, deadpan. He snickered as much as an otter could.

Fine, Kester acquiesced. But if this doesn’t go well, don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Turning back to Bowen, Kester nodded her agreement. Her writing was terrible at best, but, like her dyr had pointed out, Walnut would at least get a new fountain for this.

Bowen was a tall man, Kester thought as they both stood up from the fountain and she found herself craning her neck to look up at him. Big, too. In general, she was confident in her ability to defend herself from or hold her own against almost any opponent, but if Bowen Belcourt decided to fight her, any victory on her end would be hard won. Still, as he invited them to carry on, she offered him a smile and a nod before looking back at Walnut expectantly. He hopped up onto the side of the fountain.

“Can I get a ride?”

No. You’re soaking wet.

“Please?”

Have you dried off?

“No.”

There’s your answer.

Once Walnut had hopped off the fountain, Kester turned and fell into step beside Bowen with the otter on her other side. Where he held his hands behind his back, she kept hers hanging loose by her sides, with the water skin on her belt within easy reach. Though aware of the presence beside her, her attention was split between the Arynnite and their surroundings until a sudden motion in her peripherals had her turning to see that he was only waving at someone. As she nodded her understanding at his words, her eyes flicked between the citizen, who had waved back, and Bowen. Did he know everyone or was he just like someone from the Kushti, friendly with everyone by default?

Then the questioning began in earnest, and she took a moment to consider how to answer. The first question would be easy, nothing more than a brief display of Walnut’s power, which in and of itself would have provided an answer to the second question for any Dresmondi. Kester didn’t know how much Bowen knew, however, nor did she know how much she wanted him to know. She remembered Coheed; the knowledge that the caravans were arranged by element and had specific duties had been used against them then and could still be used against them now.

“It’s been years, Kes,” Walnut pointed out. “They probably know all that already.”

Then why is he asking me?

“Well, they’re kinda like icebreaker questions, aren’t they?” The otter snickered. “Get it? Ice—”

Kester cast an unimpressed look in her dyr’s direction. You aren’t nearly as funny as you think you are.

“Kaveri would disagree.”

These days, Kaveri would be too drunk off his ass to even recognize that Walnut had even made a joke, but Kester didn’t point that out. Instead, she reached for the water skin and poured out a tiny bit of water on her palm. Then she tilted her hand, but by the time the stream of would-be water reached the ground, it had frozen into a thin line of ice that shattered upon impact. Drying her hand on her pants, she looked up at Bowen to see if he understood. She would, she decided in that moment, see if he could draw the proper conclusion to his other question from that alone. That and the bustle of streets they travelled down would probably drown out any attempt she made at talking.

The noise and Bowen’s lack of a dyr certainly made answering his third question tricky as well. After a few moments consideration, Kester placed a head at her forehead as if blocking out the sun and made a show of looking around before holding up two fingers. Lowering one, she first pointed to herself and reached a hand up to approximate Kaveri’s height. Then she held up the number two again and pointed at Walnut. She held out a hand to approximate Nephys’s height and outlined the curl of his horns on either side of her face. Kester had no idea if that made any sense to Bowen; it seemed woefully inadequate even to herself, but until she gained access to something to write with, she had no better ideas.

By the time they reached the street lined with vendors, Walnut had mostly dried and was asking her again to be carried. One look at the crowd had Kester bending down to pick him up and moving him to lay across her shoulders, where he would be safe from careless feet.

His wonderment at the ice that Walnut froze reminded her a bit of a child. She watched as he knelt and examined a piece of ice while the river otter stood up on his hind legs beside him and preened under the praise. Then Bowen stood with the complaints and creaks of joints that betrayed his age and they continued on.

Despite her decision to see if he could figure out her caravan from her element alone, Kester hadn’t been sure how he would handle her lack of answer for his second question, which had been born more from a communication barrier than anything else. Perhaps, given what she knew of Arynnites, she should have expected that he’d interpret her metaphorical and literal silence as an implicit challenge of his knowledge, and indeed, he seemed rather excited about it. Bemused, she nodded to confirm that ice was wielded by some members of one of the defensive caravans and glanced at him as he settled into his game. The way he found entertainment in something that, in her opinion, was inherently uninteresting reminded her a bit of Walnut.

As she mimed looking for Kaveri and Nephys, Kester watched Bowen and listened to him reason through her gestures while she made them. Nodding when appropriate in response to his clarification questions, she found herself smiling as he successfully made sense of what she was trying to tell him. Though he had called her brilliant, the Arynnite himself did better than she might have expected as well, and Kester let the sense of success carry her around the corner and onto the busy street.

It didn’t last long. In a few sentences, Bowen had the smile freezing on her face even as he informed her that he could help make her life a lot easier. Maybe it wasn’t her ability to communicate non-verbally that had led him to the correct conclusion. Maybe it was—

I don’t know about him, Kester voiced her suspicion to Walnut. How does he know about Kaveri and why he’s here?

The otter paused from where he lay across her shoulders, washing his face, and looked over at Bowen. “He did say rams are as rare in the city as otters are, and if he is here for work, well, Kaveri’s job isn’t exactly subtle. Someone’s bound to take notice.”

Yes, but that doesn’t mean he should know where Kaveri is right now. Unless—

She thought again of how Bowen had approached them from the same street they had. The suspicion that their interaction was less of a coincidence than she had originally thought had taken root and started to grow, and while she wasn’t sure what she could do about it right now, Kester found the thought that there had been shadows following her - that there were shadows still following Kaveri - disconcerting. The other Dresmondi spent more time at the bottom of a bottle than he did anywhere else; if this Minister of Internal Affairs’s shadows had any malicious intent, it would be all too easy for them to harm an already incapacitated man, and even if he was a pain in the ass, Kaveri was still— well, she didn’t want him to disappear like the other Dresmondi had.

Surreptitiously, Kester glanced around at the sea of faces around them, wondering how many turned in her direction out of genuine curiosity and how many watched her at the bidding of the man at her side. Bowen Belcourt was the Minister of Internal Affairs, he had said, charged with keeping Arynn Frey safe. But what did that really mean?

Unaware, as far as she knew, of the Dresmondi’s thoughts, the man in question paused by a vendor and gestured them over. By the time he had finished speaking, Walnut’s nose was already in the air, and he licked his lips as he eyed the array of seafood that the vendor had to offer. Before Kester had a chance to react, the river otter nodded at Bowen, looking between the Arynnite and the food he was offering to give them. Concealing her misgivings about this entire affair, she offered Bowen one of her well-practiced, brilliant smiles and nodded enthusiastically.

With a nod, Kester stepped forward and pointed first to the mollusks that had Walnut practically salivating on her shoulder then to the food, something simple, that had caught her eye. She waited to the side, watching as it was all packed up and handed to Bowen, who turned back to them as if he hadn’t more or less admitted moments ago to watching Kaveri and probably also herself. They fell into step again when the he abruptly interrupted himself with a snap of his fingers and the name of one of their caravans.

For a moment, Kester blinked, confused by the non sequitur, and then she remembered the game that had been shoved from her thoughts in light of her suspicions about Bowen. Hold up one finger, she nodded. Holding up a second, she shook her head.

The Minister of Internal Affairs and the Dresmondi carried on. Nodding idly at his commentary, she let her gaze move from stall to stall as they strolled by. Without any cities, the caravans had never had an established marketplace like this before, but it reminded her a little of a Conclave, when the tradespeople of every caravan would come together to trade their goods and services. But a Conclave had been more than that. She remembered it so vividly. There would be fires upon fires circling the Cave of Names, and despite the way all of their wagons were scattered so haphazardly, it all made sense. Someone somewhere was always singing, which meant that there were also plenty of people dancing. There were games that the Adoi always did their best to win, celebrations in honor of those who had found their dyrs, and even when the sun set, the festivities - and other activities - continued.

Kester missed it. The refugees might have retained much of their way of life in the southern outskirts of Arynn Frey, but it wasn’t the same.

As was doubtlessly intended, the fountain was the first thing Kester noticed when they turned the corner off the main road. Indeed, it looked like a far better place for the river otter to swim, and the small tables and chairs dotted around it meant that they wouldn’t have to sit on the side of the fountain to stay nearby. It was quieter here, too, which was nice. With Walnut practically vibrating with excitement on her shoulder, she looked up at Bowen when he caught her attention. Then he winked and was gone.

Suddenly the guardian of the bag that held their food, Kester watched Bowen disappear into the shop and considered leaving. She glanced around the square in which he had all but deposited them, wondering if someone was watching her even now, but she was hardly more skilled at differentiating between curious looks and nefarious looks now than she had been minutes before. As Walnut urged her toward one of the tables, dark eyes landed momentarily on the fountain, but the Dresmondi found herself disinclined to head there just yet. The smell of salt on the wind had caught her attention.

“Hey, Kes, wait. Where’re you going?” Still on her shoulder, the otter craned his neck to look back at the fountain as she turned away. “The fountain’s in that direction!”

Mhmm.

Illianar was inland, and Faanor even more so. Though they spent most of their time near the border of Coheed, the caravan had occasionally traveled along the coastline of Dresmond, but even then, they had stayed closer to the plains where the soil was more fertile. But here, in Elyusian, the ocean was right there in its ceaselessly moving magnitude. Setting the bag down on the stone wall, she let Walnut settle onto its smooth surface before leaning her elbows on it as well as she watched the waves roll in and out. For a long moment, even the otter was silent.

“It’s so…” He said finally, and peeling her eyes away from the sea, she turned to look at him.

It is.

“Imagine if we’d had this much water when…”

I know.

They both turned to watch the water crash against dark stone cliffs with a relentless force.

“Do you think Nephys could control all of that?”

She shook her head, understanding implicitly the real question that he had been asking: would it have made a difference if they’d fought by the ocean? Not all of it, not alone. But with as many of water dyrs as we had, all working together? Maybe.

Maybe. The word haunted her. Maybe, if they’d done this, they could have won that battle. Maybe, if they’d done that, the Eldouir wouldn’t have chased them from their homeland. Maybe, just maybe, they would have been riding across the plains in their caravan right now instead of standing in the capital of Arynn Frey, wondering where it all went wrong.

Bowen’s reappearance on the other side of Walnut jolted Kester out of her thoughts, and she twitched slightly more upright as she glanced over at and then around him.

How is he so quiet?

“We were both distracted?”

Indeed, Walnut had lost interest in the crashing waves and followed his nose to the bag of food that she had set down beside him. Ignoring his protests, Kester snatched it up and placed it on the other side of herself, and she cast another glance at Bowen as she did so. She hadn’t planned on lingering by the wall as long as she evidently had, but the Arynnite didn’t seem to mind. Looking out over the ocean too, he commented on its beauty, and she had to agree, even if her perspective was tinged with sadness. The sea was wild and unconquered and powerful - as free as Dresmond ought to have been.

Kester had never been out on the water either, but she didn’t think the constant rocking of a ship would be all that different from the motion of a wagon. Still, it wasn’t as if she’d had the opportunity to test that theory, and now was not the time either. Bowen directed them back toward one of the tables by the fountain, and grabbing their food, she nodded and followed in his wake. Walnut hop-skipped along beside her, nose in the air as he voiced his excitement for the snack in the bag.

With a polite smile, she sat in the chair he pulled out for her and watched as Walnut hopped into his seat. The otter stood upright with his front legs pattering on the table impatiently as he watched the food be distributed amongst them, and when it was placed in front of him, he grabbed onto his meal with both hands and began to devour it wholeheartedly.

You’d think you were starving.

“I’m hungry!” He paused just long enough to meet her unimpressed gaze. “And this is really good!”

As she bit into her own skewered meat, Kester had to agree. After eyeing the notebook and pen that Bowen pushed in her direction for a moment, she reached out and drew them closer to her with the side of her hand, which had remained cleaner than her fingers. The communication barrier had saved her from immediate interrogation, she realized, but now that it had been circumvented, she wasn’t quite sure what to expect. The uncertainty set her a little on edge. While none of the Minister’s questions had been particularly difficult to answer or especially unusual in nature thus far, Kester didn’t think he would go through the trouble of tracking Kaveri, tracking her, and buying her food and a better method of communication simply for pleasant small talk.

Even if he had been oddly friendly throughout this entire affair.

When Bowen voiced his appreciation of the food and critique of his own eating habits, Kester nodded idly and used both the food and her difficulty speaking as excuses to not respond. His next question to her had the Dresmondi glancing up at him and nodding, whether in agreement to his statement and in answer to his inquiry he could decide. Both were true, in any case, but although she now had the ability to give a more specific response, she didn’t quite feel like doing so just yet. It was easier to simply nod or shake her head - and it kept him from asking the harder questions, too.

“Hey.”

Hey what?

“You should tell him I say thanks for the food.”

She looked at Walnut. He slurped down the fleshy insides of a clam and looked back at her.

I’m eating. My hands are full. Pointedly, she raised the skewer slightly. Besides, he’s not doing this because he’s nice. He wants something, and I don’t know what.

“He said he just wants to talk, Kes. He’s hardly the first person who’s been curious about us.” Walnut picked up a new clam and hit it against the table to crack it open. “Not everyone who’s nice to us is nice because it’s a trick. Sometimes people are just friendly because that’s who they are.”

I’m not sure that’s what’s happening here.

“Well, when you finish that, can you tell him I say thanks anyway? I’ll be his friend if you won’t.”

Rolling her eyes at him, Kester set down the skewer and licked her fingers clean before reaching over and grabbing the notebook and pen. After flipping it open to the first page, she awkwardly and painstakingly wrote out ‘Thanks’, trying and failing to avoid smudging the freshly written ink with the side of her hand as she did so. Though legible, the writing was neither neat nor pretty, more closely resembling the unpracticed lettering of a child’s than that of a full grown adult. Turning the notebook so Bowen could read it, Kester smiled, gestured between herself, the river otter, and their meals, then pointed to the word. Then she picked up her second skewer of meat and began to eat.