The Zephyr Expanse

Light bled through her eyelids, a sharp, unwelcome intrusion into the dimmest recess of her awareness. Her limbs felt leaden, anchored to the earth, stubbornly resisting the command to move. With a supreme effort of will, she managed to peel one eye open.

Morning had broken, and with it came the acrid stench of charred fish, a smell that clung to the humid, oppressive air. Perla forced herself into a sitting position, her throat a parched desert and a deep, hollow ache blooming in her stomach. To her right, an immense river slid past with a slow, indifferent power. How had she come to be here? This landscape, with its distinctly eastern feel, was a world removed from the northern territories she called home. Her thoughts, thick as the morning haze, scrambled for a familiar landmark, a point of orientation, but grasped only an endless, alien green.

A bright, feminine voice cut through the stillness. “So, you’re finally back among the living.”

Perla’s head jerked toward the sound. A young woman knelt by a lively fire, prodding the flames with a stick. It was Hana. She offered a cheerful, entirely unreserved wave. “You’ve been dead to the world for two days. Must be famished. My cooking skills are a disaster, but it’s salvageable if you avoid the burnt parts.”

Perla accepted the skewer of fish that was offered, her silence born of sheer astonishment. An alien warmth—gratitude—crept through her, a sensation so unwelcome it warred with the profound mistrust she harbored. She had never conceived that anyone would interfere with her final, suicidal gambit. Of all the people to pull her from the jaws of a fate she had chosen, she never imagined it would be Saku’s younger sister, the girl of whispers, the one rumored to be a prodigy of torture. And yet, there was no denying the truth: she was infuriatingly, wondrously, undeniably alive.

“Why?” The word was a raw, gravelly tear in the quiet, spoken after she had consumed enough fish to feel human again and drunk enough water to quench the fire in her throat. “Why did you help me?” The memory pulsed in her hand like a phantom injury. “After you spat on me and broke my fingers.”

Hana pulled off a large, blackened piece of her own fish and chewed on it with a thoughtful expression. She then gave a shrug, a gesture executed with such absolute nonchalance it was practically an art form. “Seemed like the thing to do, I suppose.” Her grin reappeared, revealing a fine constellation of fish scales lodged between her teeth. “Besides, that was some impressive work back there, taking down all those brutes while you were still in chains. How did you manage that? Is it some kind of psychic ability?”

“Something to that effect,” Perla muttered, unwilling to divulge the mechanics of her ultimate strategy to someone so utterly erratic. The bomb’s blast radius was never designed to be so wide. In that final, desperate second, propelled by a force she was only beginning to comprehend, she had reached for something beyond her original design—a plan that was supposed to have ended in her own certain death and the complete obliteration of the enemy encampment.

Hana expertly spat a series of tiny fish bones onto the grass. “You’ll have to show me how it works sometime,” she said lightly. “Think of it as payment for saving your life.”

“I…” Perla started, but Hana interrupted her with a bright peal of laughter.

“Just kidding! Magic is far too much effort for me. These fists are all the power I need.” Hana beamed, a portrait of pure, unassailable confidence. Looking at her hands, Perla did not doubt it for a second.

“Where are we?” Perla asked, nudging the conversation toward more stable territory.

“The Zephyr Expanse, of course,” Hana answered, her voice dripping with theatrical incredulity. “And I always thought you were the clever one, Perla! Have you forgotten your geography lessons already? They were my favorite.”

“That was more than two years ago,” Perla retorted with dry precision. “A few things have managed to happen since then. I imagine it’s all still quite fresh for you. How old are you, thirteen?”

“And a half!” Hana chirped. With a sigh of deep contentment, she fell backward onto the lush, verdant grass. “Ah, this land is so comfortable! I could just lie here forever.”

“In that case, what are we doing in the Zephyr Expanse?”

“It’s perfectly simple.” Hana’s tone implied that Perla was being willfully dense. “We’re going to find Shen Tai.”

The name landed with the force of a physical impact, nearly stealing the air from Perla’s lungs. “What? The ancient assassin? The one who blinded old Carmine?”

“That’s the one,” Hana confirmed, her nod solemn.

“But he’ll murder us on sight!”

“No, he won’t. Let’s just say we have a family connection.”

“Ventus and Ignis?” Perla gaped. “He’s famously disowned his entire family. He would serve us for dinner even if we were betrothed to the twins.”

Hana sighed with exaggerated patience. “Stop being so melodramatic, Perla. Anyway, he’s the only person who can help us now.”

Perla’s eyes narrowed. “What are you talking about? I eliminated Krysta’s most formidable warriors. The rest of the clan can surely manage what remains. I have at least that much faith in them.”

“That isn’t the issue,” Hana said, an edge of irritation entering her voice. “The issue is the package. You were already captured when Jiro and I left, so you wouldn’t know. Before our defection, Krysta acquired a package from Carmine—something with the power to scour the face of the world.” Hana paused, her brow knitting in concentration. “She intends to use it, under the delusion that she can somehow survive the aftermath. Or… saying it out loud now, maybe she knows she won’t. Maybe she simply doesn’t care.”

“She has been dead on the inside for a very long time,” Perla whispered, a chill tracing its way down her spine as she recalled the rumors that had circulated among her captors. “Abused by a possessed mage when she was a child, a friend from her youth. The horror of it has followed her ever since. Or that’s how the stories go.”

Hana’s expression was impossible to decipher. “Where did you hear that?”

Perla flinched. “Her men are incorrigible gossips.”

“Well, regardless of her motives, Krysta wants to see the world burn. And Shen Tai is the only one who can stop her.”

“How do you arrive at that conclusion?”

“Because the weapon in that package was created by Carmine for a single purpose: to serve as a direct countermeasure to a weapon Tai himself has spent years perfecting—a singular hypnotic flute capable of subjugating every living soul in Reverie.”

Perla let out a low whistle. “Carmine is a truly demented old man.”

“You see? A stalemate. Tai would never bother to enslave a world already on the verge of annihilation, and Carmine would never destroy it unless Tai’s actions forced his hand. But Krysta completely upends the equation. As the weapon’s intended target, Tai will be the only person with any kind of defense against the package.”

“What made you switch sides?” Perla asked. The tale was fantastic, but she could not afford the luxury of disbelief. The potential cost of being wrong was too immense to even consider.

Hana grew quiet, idly wriggling her toes in her wooden sandals. The wind whispered through the tall grass around them, and a butterfly landed on Perla’s shoulder before she gently shooed it away.

“I suppose their methods just weren’t for me,” Hana said finally, her gaze directed at the river. “Far too rigid. Too much formality.” She shrugged again. “My own philosophy is to be inventive, fluid, and ferocious in all things. It’s a high standard, I know, but there you have it.”

The explanation was so perfectly, fundamentally Hana that Perla felt her entire understanding of the younger girl reorient itself. Was she not some malevolent sadist, but simply a misunderstood, rebellious adolescent? Perla had to suppress a wry smile. She had barely survived her own turbulent youth.

“Then why spit in my face? Why break my fingers?”

Hana blinked, as if startled from a reverie. “Oh. Was that the wrong thing to do? They kept condescending to me—‘Heh, little girl, you don’t have the stomach to torture your friend’—so I felt I had to prove them wrong.”

Perla studied her face, searching for any flicker of remorse, and found absolutely none. “You could have just punched them instead of directing it at me.”

Hana let out a hesitant, almost abashed laugh. “Oh. Right. Yes. I probably should have done that.” She pressed her lips together in a firm line. “I suppose I was just trying to fit in.”

“And now you want to orchestrate their complete and utter defeat?”

This was Hana’s third shrug of the morning. “Does it really matter who wins or loses? I just thought it would be cool to meet the legendary assassin. He was my hero when I was a little girl.”

That, Perla thought, actually explains a great deal.

She pushed herself to her feet, her joints groaning in protest. “All right. Let’s go.” She offered the younger girl a small, sincere smile. “And Hana? Thank you for saving my life. I’m in your debt.”

Hana’s mouth opened, then snapped shut. A faint blush rose in her cheeks as she rubbed the back of her neck. “Y-you’re welcome, I suppose.”

Perla stood tall, her posture straight. Dealing with this volatile girl would be a challenge, but a manageable one. And with a sudden spark of clarity, she thought that perhaps, just perhaps, she was finally beginning to understand her.