Yukimi smiled warmly at the girl. "These two brought you back to the castle to get treated after you fainted," she said, pointing to Egan and Isabelle. "My name is Yukimi. These two are Isabelle and Egan. Who might you be?"
Taking in her surroundings, the girl pushed herself up on the bed. "My name is Fionna..."
"It's nice to meet you Fionna. Can you tell us why you were in the forest?"
Fionna's eyes landed on Isabelle as she spoke. Her expression twisted into one that made it difficult to tell what she was thinking. "I came from Solace Orphanage. Some people had shown up and started destroying the place. Most of the kids there are young so there aren't many of us that knew how to fight back..." She hissed in pain, her head throbbing as she attempted to recall the events that led her here.
"Take your time," whispered Yukimi.
"...They burnt the orphanage down...everyone...everything...it's all gone..." Fionna's voice shook, ripe with sorrow and anger.
Isabelle and Egan exchanged a look. Stepping away, they let Yukimi continue her examination.
"Solace Orphanage was built by grandmother when she first took power. It looks like those blasted nobles are still at it. We should round them up and teach them a lesson."
Egan sighed. "You want a mass execution or something? People have been criticizing the late Empress' regime for being too ruthless. I don't think that plan of yours is going to win us any points here."
"So what? You want to let them go? They were the ones that attacked first. They killed all those innocent people for what? They deserve to have worse done to them."
"No Isabelle," said Egan sternly. "Let's think about this seriously. We already have Li's goons to deal with, dropping everything to go after some mercenaries isn't what we need to be focusing on right now."
Isabelle grimaced, unable to refute him. Before they were able to leave Fionna, having overheard their conversation, pipped up.
"Wait a second! You guys are a part of the resistance right? Take me with you. My abilities are useful! Please! I...I can't sit around doing nothing...my only home is gone and so many others have been left without a family because of this war. I want to do something to help them!"
The pair looked at Yukimi as if to ask if she was all cleared.
"Hmm...first let me ask you, do you have any health issues that might have caused you to faint back there?"
Fionna frowned, shrinking into the bed. "I...I've had problems with my heart since I was young...but I can still fight! Please, I have nowhere else to go..."
Yukimi opened her mouth to say something but was quickly interrupted by Isabelle. "We can take her with us. Didn't you take a while to get used to the climate here? You're going great now! I'm sure she was just really overwhelmed back there is all."
Yukimi glanced down at the frost charm her mother had given her to protect her from melting away in Solaria. "This isn't quite the same thing..."
Egan spotted the pleading look on Fionna's face and quipped up as well. "We'll take care of her."
Yukimi looked back at Fionna and sighed in defeat. She did indeed pity the girl, feeling a sense of de ja vu in that familiar cage of helplessness.
"Fine...just make sure she doesn't over-exert herself and she should be fine."
•~•~•~•~•~•~•
As the day went on, the more exhausted Sin became. He sat in his office listening to a report from Nikiro when Ri-is wandered in.
"Sorry to interrupt but I feel like I should let you know that Dez almost crushed someone's skull just now."
Sin stood abruptly. "What! What happened?"
The courtiers are getting extra antsy since you keep refusing a political marriage. Some of them have gone as far as to speculate that Dez is some evil temptress who got pregnant and tricked you into believing the children were yours just to elevate her status from poor pirate to empress."
Sin felt his blood boil. "Who dares—"
"Dez made sure to put him in his place when she heard him...he had been gossiping with someone near Faustus and Sirius...I don't know if they heard but Dez assumed they had and made sure to shut the courtiers up."
Sin cursed under his breath, making a mental note to ask Dez who exactly it was that was spouting such nonsense so he could handle him at the next morning assembly.
"I wanted to let you know before you heard it elsewhere and decide to fly off the handle."
Sin mumbled out a thanks just as the door to his office creaked open. Yukimi strolled in, glancing at the men in front of her.
"Oh my, it's quite crowded in here today."
"That it is." Sin heaved a heavy sigh and leaned back in his chair. "What brings you here today?"
"I've been given a suggestion on how to test the effects of corrupted shi...but it involves Gabriel so I need your approval."
"...The only reason he's still alive right now is because we needed to convince the people that the rumours the council spread of us being ruthless barbarians were unfounded. If people found out we were using him as a test subject, how do you think that'll look?"
"Then we get him to agree to it willingly. We can have him voluntarily take part in the experiments to lessen his sentence."
"...I don't know if allowing him the freedom to roam around the castle is such a good idea," said Nikiro.
Yukimi shook her head. "He won't be unsupervised. We can put someone in charge of him...perhaps...Avarice can—"
"Absolutely not," said Sin.
"But—"
"Have you already forgotten what Gabriel's capable of? His scheming is the reason Ea's gone, I will not give him the chance to take another brother from me."
Ri-is thought for a moment. He didn't want to rile Sin up further but he had to admit that Yukimi's proposal did make some sense. "Gabriel doesn't seem to want to hurt Avarice though. He could have killed Avarice when he held him captive but he didn't. I think out of everyone that could do it, Avarice is the safest bet. Plus, it will at least show the council and their supporters that we aren't as cruel as they'd like us to be."
Sin slammed a pile of documents onto his desk. The silence that fell upon the room was heavy, unbearable almost. Sin kissed his teeth, glaring at the pile of papers in front of him as he let his thoughts consume him.
It wasn't long before he finally came to a decision.
•~•~•~•~•~•~•
The sound of metal clinking echoed in the barren halls as Gabriel's cell door swung open. A smile broke across his face as he laid eyes upon the person in front of him.
"Why hello there. It's been quite a while hasn't it?"84Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡS3ZDhnpvnW
