Sword and Snow

Emery

Emery paced around the training room, trying to keep her anger in check. Avuri kept reaching out to her in an attempt to calm her down, but she was struggling not to just get more upset.

The whole tree-felling incident didn't actually cause any real harm in the end. The kids were fine, she was fine, even the trees were fine after Vyne ran over to help clean up.

But there were just too many little things that didn't add up for it to be a freak accident. Any individual piece of the puzzle could have probably been dismissed, but together they made her angry and worried.

And on top of that, if she hadn't been there and it had just been some of the kids walking by what she was almost positive was a trap…well, not many of the kids could have stopped two large trees from falling on them, even if a few of them could have.

"Emery, please stop pacing," Avuri asked, still sending reassurances over their connection. Emery opened her mouth to respond but Avuri cut her off. "I know what you're going to say. But you can sit down and try to be calmer about it. You're just working yourself up more with the pacing."

"How are you not fuming right now?" Emery asked accusingly. "Our kids could have died."

"I know." Avuri said evenly, but her tone held an icy edge to it. "But we already checked the entire Basin over twice. Vale and Eiry are running the entirety of the Array to check for any more holes. There shouldn't be any more danger right now, and if there is, the kids are currently holed up in their houses with the defensive Arrays turned on."

Anger still tingled up and down Emery's body, even though she knew Avuri was logically correct. For the moment, the whole family was as safe as they would ever be. It didn't do all that much to calm her though.

"Please."

Emery shot Avuri a quick glare before collapsing into a crossed-legged seated position on the ground where she was standing.

"Thank you."

"What do we do, Ri?" Emery asked, more of her worry bleeding into the tone than her anger. "Putting everything else aside, whoever this was made a move against us here. It's one thing to help defend the city with the Elders. It's another if this whole supposed war opens with an attack on our home, specifically."

"We knew this was one of the risks we took by choosing to stay," Avuri said, trying to maintain her even tone. "At least part of the reason for this whole thing was stated to be Leon's death - and I would assume that word got back to the Mephras that that was our doing. So it stands to reason that part of this whole war will be an effort to get revenge on us for putting that monster in the ground."

"Then -"

"Emery." Avuri's icy interruption stopped Emery in her tracks. "Trust me. They will pay. But we need to wait until the Elders return so we can plan properly." She breathed out, and Emery could see the puff of mist that left her lips, likely thanks to her Qi freezing the air around her. "But make no mistake. If the Elders say that we need to lay low for political reasons, you and I can take care of this ourselves."

Emery's mouth went dry. It wasn't often that she got to see Avuri's truly steely side like that. A few thoughts had barely crossed her mind when she noticed Avuri's eyes narrow in on her, and a slight smile appeared on Avuri's face.

"Really?"

Emery looked away. "Shut up."

That was apparently enough to pull them out of the angry rut they were falling into as Avuri laughed. The sound of it helped Emery climb out of whatever dourness she had fallen into as well. "You are adorable when you get embarrassed." Avuri said, suddenly morphing from dangerous fighter to a teasing wife. "What was it you liked, exactly? The tone? The fury itself?"

Emery wanted to bury her face in her hands. This did not feel like the time for this.

"Both?" she admitted quietly.

"Alright."

Vale's voice pulled both their attention to the entrance where Vale was walking in alongside the Elders. Emery quietly thanked her luck that rescued her from further teasing. She didn't want the teasing to dull her edge after what had just happened, and if anyone would be able to do that, it would absolutely be Avuri.

"What's it look like out there?" Emery asked.

"The Array is intact." Vale said. "The spot you found was the only place we could find where it seemed like it was opened and then poorly repaired. That's the good news, anyway."

"There's bad news?" Avuri asked before Emery could.

"Hard to say for sure." Vale said, but Ray took over from there.

"There's a number of spots in the outer Array that look like they have weakened over time. Generally speaking, they need to be strengthened and maintained. The issue is that there were a few spots that were likely weak enough that someone talented could have feasibly snuck through undetected."

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Emery felt her anger flare again, but more generally - even partially at herself for not maintaining the Array more diligently.

"We can, at least, say that the inner Arrays remain fully maintained. I even flew around to check the upper areas of the dome it creates. There are no holes or even weaknesses I could find in it." Eiry added. "While the outer barrier might have been breached, it doesn't actually translate to very much in reality."

"The hell do you mean?" Emery snapped, "We just had trees fall on top of us."

"Yes, but it's unlikely that an attack of that nature would have been prevented by the Arrays to begin with." Eiry elaborated. "Remember, you were on the outer edge of the Basin, sure, but you were still within the inner Array."

"I imagine what is most likely," Vyne interjected, "is that, under the assumption that it was, indeed, a person's doing, they used some combination of wood and earth aligned Qi to break the trees the way they did. And they likely did it by sending their Qi down into the ground, and traveling under the Arrays that way."

Emery felt her entire body clench as her nails dug into her palm. She very carefully tried to maintain her breathing to avoid sounding too angry when she bit out a simple, "Damn it."

She did at least feel a little better that no one in the room was belittling the event. At least, not in a way that infuriated her further. And despite her best efforts, it was difficult to find a proper target for her anger given that there was not much they could do to stop Qi being sent underground.

They could have set up the Arrays to delve quite a ways down and continued their shell of protection in the dirt, but even if they did, that wouldn't solve the issue. There was always earth and wood Qi moving through the ground naturally, and setting up an Array to trigger a warning whenever Qi passed through it like that would be useless because it would basically be sending up an alarm constantly.

Instead, Emery just growled ineffectively.

"Then, what do we do?" Avuri asked. "Emery and I aren't going to just sit here and wait for things to start when we've already been attacked."

"Before we say anything else, let me make it clear that it is possible this was not an attack from Bouquet or the Mephras." Vale said. When Emery turned her glare on him, he held up his hands in half-surrender. "Hang on. I just want to remind you that it's entirely possible that some random Cultivator with permission to travel the Peaks happened to hike up this far, found the Array as something odd, and decided to poke around. The visitors to Flowing Dragon aren't told about this place."

"And what do you actually think the chances of that scenario are, Dad?" Emery grunted.

"Low. Very low." He admitted.

"So what do we do? Because I'm not about to stand here and wait until they make a second move."

"You're right. I think it's time for us to act." Eiry said. "If we act under the idea that this was a move against your family by Bouquet, then we have a couple questions to ask. First, was this a personal attack coming from the Mephras, and not Bouquet. Second, does this mean that you all - and not the city - are actually their primary targets. And finally," she sighed, "how far behind are we?"

The sudden look of concern on Eiry's face drew more of Emery's own concerns to the fore, replacing some of her anger. "If they're making a move against the Basin, that likely means they are coming from a different direction, and not through Flowing Dragon City. If there's any security in the city at all that we can trust, it's the section that guards official access to the Peaks."

"The breach in the outer Array was closer to the Verdant Dragon Peak." Emery muttered.

"Which would be in the direction they're approaching from to begin with, if they don't circle around to the city by the southern Peak." Avuri continued.

The Elders all nodded. "That's what we thought as well." Cyril said.

"And notably," Lyn added, "all of the Peaks are under the city's control. So if they've moved into the area around the Verdant Peak and set up any sort of camps…"

"Then they're officially on politically defendable land." Avuri said.

Ray nodded. "And we can move against them there with a full proclamation to defend ourselves."

Eiry sighed at Ray's apparent excitement, but agreed with a grave nod. "Suffice to say, if they've set up any sort of forward camp on the Peak, we can start this 'war' on our terms."

"We'll go." Emery declared, as most of the room had expected. "We shouldn't show our hand with all of you entering the fray too early. On top of that, if we expect most of the Cultivators to be coming from Bouquet, they're going to be weak." She quickly looked over to Avuri and muttered, "Sorry."

Avuri shook her head. "Don't be. You're not wrong - Bouquet is weak. It's one of the reasons why I left for the Frozen Mountain Sect in the first place."

"If you do come up against Earth Realm Cultivators from Bouquet, please try not to slaughter them." Vyne said. "You're far and away stronger than they will be now. Don't abuse that."

"We won't." Emery said. "Besides, breaking through our Array was clearly not the work of an Earth Realm. Either they're going to have at least a few Sky Realm opponents with them, or this is simply sending a message."

Vale cleared his throat. "Em, don't…just be careful. They two of you are quite a bit stronger than your average Sky Realm Cultivator too, now. Even that won't be a fair fight."

Emery nodded in agreement, but the actual meaning settled in as the nodding became more genuine. "Right. That bit will take a little getting used to."

"I'll make sure we don't go overboard." Avuri said, stepping up beside Emery. "But just to be clear, how much effort do we need to put into enemy survival?" Emery glanced at her wife, surprised to hear the question coming from her. But the tone didn't carry the anger from earlier as she continued. "Is an accidental death on their side likely to haunt us going forward?"

Eiry shook her head. "No. However, if you can win whatever battle you find easily without killing anyone and scattering the enemy to the winds, that sort of embarrassment might do us some genuine good."

"I can live with that. Beat them so badly that they run away and retreat with their tail between their legs." Emery said.

"Or we can terrify them." Avuri offered. "I think our draconic abilities have quite a terrifying presence."

"That's not an awful idea…" Emery said, considering it. Then she shook her head, refocusing on the task at hand. "We'll see how it played out when we get there. For now, we're going."

The Elders stepped away from the door, allowing Emery and Avuri an open path out of the room. As they passed, Vale placed a quick hand on Emery's shoulder.

"I know I shouldn't need to tell you this, but don't go too wild."

Emery just responded with a curt nod. "We know."