Trying not to show her impatience, Kendall kept her mouth buttoned when Rennyn finally came back only to stand blah-blah-blah-ing with the Imperial Statue about working together again. Kendall hated this throne room, so full of little magics designed to tie its Emperor in place. She couldn’t look at that thing on the throne without remembering how much Smug-Samarin had seemed to enjoy eating, and riding, and everything that didn’t involve sitting in the same room for centuries.
Kendall found she’d moved so close to Sukata that she was almost pressed into her friend’s side, and had to curl her hands into fists because she couldn’t slip one into Sukata’s. She knew Sukata hated the throne room too.
They had kissed each other five times now. They hadn’t talked about that. Kendall hadn’t wanted to talk. It felt like words would make fences, box her up and confuse everything. More than it already was. She edged a little closer to Sukata.
Auri bounced up, but sobered as she checked over her brother. "He’ll start getting better now," she said, almost to herself. "Poor Fal. He’s had to put up with so much. I wouldn’t want to dream of me all night every night, and I’m me!"
"Do you feel…" Kendall started, hesitated, and then pushed on: "Do you think you’ll stay like that?"
"I don’t know. I never thought I wanted to be a boy, but I liked being Dezart Samarin, except sometimes I’d look down and I wasn’t me, and that was like falling down a pit I’d forgotten was there. I was never as much interested in dresses and poetry and the things my mother cared about, but I quite liked myself generally. I never thought I’d come back as anything but me." A darting smile turned her copy-Fallon’s face impish. "Though some boy-parts are fun, let me tell you."
"Spare us," Kendall said hastily.
"At the same time, I’m not half so interested in kissing girls as you," Auri said, laughed, and then took a quick step back with her hands held up to signal truce, even though Kendall hadn’t moved at all. "I’m just so glad to be able to eat and sleep and talk to people and pick things up and…everything. I think I’ll start caring more about what I look like later."
Rennyn had finally made enough plans to return to discuss other matters, and managed to get around to goodbye, and even sketched a curtsey before heading for the door. Sukata nodded, quite grandly, and Auri waved. Kendall, not quite sure how polite she wanted to be, hesitated, then gave the horrible prison of a throne the briefest of nods before quickening her step to catch the back of the group.
~A moment.~
The big double doors closed in her face. Kendall gaped at them, then turned and glared at the statue-Emperor.
"What now?"
~You still haven’t answered my question, Kendall.~
The horrible, hollow voice was even worse when there was no-one else in the room. Talking walls, and a not-a-corpse on a throne, and magic to chain it all together.
"I don’t give a rat’s ass about your stupid questions," Kendall told him, extra clear.
~But I do. I must. I have seen enough of the Kellian now to know they could be an enormous asset to the Empire. At the least they would be useful allies, ones who could open up Semarrak to us. And yet, should they truly become part of the Empire, how much of Kole will end in thrall to them, blindingly loyal?~
"Would that even be such a bad thing? All the Kellian ever seem to want to do is protect people."
~When the Montjuste-Surcleres—especially Helecho Montjuste-Surclere—can inherit command of them? Most certainly.~
"I’m going to fix that."
Kendall hadn’t meant to tell him—to tell anyone—that. Definitely not so soon, when she’d barely decided it was her goal. The long pause told her she’d surprised Smug-Ass as well.
~Are you indeed?~
Well, now that she’d said it, there was no point backing down.
"See, I kept not wanting to be the sort of mage that goes around treating people like toys. Or one who ends up like you or that Nameen woman or even Rennyn: so powerful that you seem to think you’re obliged to do awful things to yourself, because you’re the only ones who can. But Rennyn asked me if there wasn’t anything I wanted to do with magic, that no-one else could."
~You believe you will surpass your teacher?~
Kendall shrugged. "Who knows? Probably not. But then, it’s a bit like how Rennyn had Lieutenant Meniar cast the spell that got all your mages out of the ivy. Rennyn is hung up on the fact that she can tell the Kellian what to do, and that makes her the wrong person to try to fix being able to command them. She ties herself up in knots about feeling responsible for them but not having the right to interfere, and that stops her thinking about it properly."
~You do not fear chaining yourself to a statue?~
"I’m not silly enough to ever come up with that as a solution," Kendall said. "Besides, Sukata is…" She shrugged and eyed him without favour. A piece of furniture. An old man chained to a chair. "I might even think of a way to fix you."
~Mine is a political problem. There is no fixing politics with magic.~
"Listen to yourself," Kendall retorted.
There was a little pause. Then the door opened, and Kendall left him to his living nightmare. She probably wasn’t the right person to fix his problem anyway, though she’d help him if he wanted it. Meanwhile there was Sukata, and the whole idea that Kendall would start minding Sukata’s business. Politely, of course. Asking properly first, and not making decisions just because she could. But definitely poking her nose in.
Sukata was worth it.