One In The Same Flame. ~Red Queen~ 《Cal x Reader 》

chapter 2+3 leave it to me

After that disaster of a show we went are separate ways. Mare went home and Kilorn with his master. I don't really have a home. I just crash in the nearest tree. I was trying to sleep, but I heard feet shuffling. And I was pulled out of the tree with a jerk from someone. I fall, I close my eyes and wait for impact, but it never comes. I fall into a pair of arms, I open my eyes. Kilorn. His eyes are shot red a d puffy. He puts me down and he opens his mouth to speak but I pull him into a hug. I have to stand on the tips of my toes.
"What happened." I ask in a hushed tone. You never know who's listing.
"Liv I-" he chokes on a sob. I don't know why he's sad and scared, but its making me the same. I feel a stray tear fall down my cheek.
"I'd rather tell you and Mare together." He pushes through the sentence. I nod, we start to walk and I grab is hand. He doesn't let go, instead he does the opposite, he holds my hand tightly. We make it to Mares house. Kilorn let's go of my hand, and I lean against the wall of the Stilt homes. He cups his hands over his mouth and let's out a bird call.
Nothing happens,
He does the call again. I wipe my thumb against my cheek, getting rid of the tear.
Mare slides down a latter my the window that I assume that's her and Gisa room.

"I hope you like black eyes because I have no problem giving you one for this-" Mare stops herself at the sight of us. She looks at his bleeding knuckles, she takes in me looking down hair falling down my face. She walks over and takes my hand, then looks up to Kilorn.
"What is it? What's wrong?" She ask quickly. He takes a moment to respond. Working himself up, now I'm terrified.
"My master- he fell. He died. I'm not an apprentice anymore." I try to hold in a gasp, me and Mare both, but it escapes us both.
"I hadn't even finished training and now-" He trips over his words. "I'm eighteen. The other fishermen have appreciates. I'm not working, I can't get work."
The next words are like a knife in my heart. Kilorn draws a ragged breath and somehow I wish I wouldn't have to hear him.
"They're going to send me to the war."

◇◇◇◇

It's been going on for better part of years. I don't think it should even be called a war anymore, but there isn't a word for this higher from of destruction. In school they told us it started over land. The Lakelands are flat and fertile, bordered by immense lakes full of fish. Not like the rocky, forested hills of Norta, where the farmlands can barely feed us. Even the Silvers felt the strain, soothe king declared war, plugging us into a conflict neither side could really win.

The Lakelanders king, another Silver, responded in kind, with the full support of his own nobility. They wanted our rivers, to get access to the sea that wasn't frozen half the year, and the water mills dotting our rivers. The mills are what make our country strong, providing enough electricity so that even the Reds can have some. I've heard rumors of cities farther south, near the capital, Archeon, where greatly skilled Reds build machines beyond my comprehension. For transport on land, water, and sky, or weapons to rain destruction wherever the Silvers might need. Our teacher proudly told us Norta the light of the world, a nation made great by our technology and power. All the rest, like the Lakelands or Piedmont to the south, live in darkness. We were lucky to be born here. Lucky. The word makes me want to scream. But despite our electricity, the Lakelander food, our weapons, their numbers, neither side has much advantage over the other. Both have Sliver officers and Red soldiers, fighting with abilities and guns and the shield of a thousand Red bodies. A war that was supposed to end less than a century ago still drags on. I always found it funny that we fought over food and water. Even the high-and-mighty Silvers need to eat.

But it isn't funny now, not when Kilorn is going to be next person Mare and I say goodbye to. I wonder if he'll give us and earrings so I can remember him when the polished legionnaire takes him away.
"One week, girls. One week and I'm gone." His cracks, though he coughs to try to cover it up. "I cant do this. They-they wont take me."
But I can see the fight going out of his eyes.
"There must be something we can do."
Mare blurt out.
"There's nothing anyone can do. No one has escaped conscripted and lived."
He doesn't need to tell me that. Every year, someone's tries to run. Ans every year, they're dragged back to the town square and hanged.
"No. We'll find a way." My voice sound authoritative, like a leader. I don't think I recognized my self for a moment, I felt a surge of my power go through me. A slightly aggressive gust of wind blew by us. Did I do that?
Even now, he finds the strength to smirk at us.
"We?"
Mare's cheeks flare up.
"I'm doomed for conscripted same as you, Mare, but they're not going to get me either So we run." Mare says.
The army has long been many's fate, but not mine. But not there's. It's already taken to much from them.
"There's nowhere to go." He sputters, but at least hes arguing.
"No, I'll help get you guys out." I says, I'm not letting them go there.
"Olivia-" Mare started.
"No." That authoritative, leader, figure came back to me, and that strong wind too. My hair flew in front of me.
And saying the words that locked history into place.