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[ The feeds turns on to show Leo, visibly shaken, dirt on his face from where he'd fallen after losing his already tenuous hold on the mountain. He hadn't bothered to clean up yet, too focused on watching the aftermath before hauling out of Unseelie territory to find somewhere relatively safe. ]

We lost Mt. Verla. And the Pyrii... walked right into the Void. Like they didn't have anything left to stay for.

[ With their home gone, he supposes that they really don't. It isn't like they wanted to be saved, anyway. They hadn't even tried, and that disturbed Leo quite a bit, though not as much as seeing them march to their deaths. ]

And I can't... I don't know what happened, if it has something to do with them disappearing or not, but... I can't use my fire. [ His voice trembles as he speaks, looking down at his hands with a shake of his head. ] I tried. Over and over, but I can't do it. I've never... not been able to do it before.

Can anyone else use fire magic? Firebending, or whatever?

[ There's a hesitation, but he asks, ] Is there any way to get it back? Would Shard training help?

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Is that what happened?

[Merida's busy right now so her locket is on audio feed, but there's loud cursing in Gaelic a second later and the sound of something hitting a wall. A few minutes later there's shuffling as she picks her locket up once more, voice sounding a little sour.]

I've been learnin' fire magic an' fire bendin' over th' last year. Guess I won't be usin' that to stop th' fruit an' other things natives have been throwin' at us down here.

Edited 2015-05-14 19:33 (UTC)

So you can't do it either?

[ He'll reserve judgment on whether that's a good thing or not for later. What matters now is finding a way to get it back. ]

There's got to be a way to get it back, though. [ This isn't just some kind of magic for him. Sure, he'd gone without using it for years on end, but it wasn't like he couldn't if he tried. Now, he just can't, and that's scarier than going head to head with Gaea herself.

He sighs. ] You're in Leathann? Rachel said they were throwing curses around there, too.

Aye, no.

[And now it just felt like a waste of effort. Merida raked her fingers through her hair with a frustrated sigh. She'd never felt this sense of loss before; she hadn't been born with the magic or talent to use fire, but it had been as natural as her hair when she started. Maybe Wan had been right and she should have learned another magic alongside it.]

There's these coins with bad luck curses on them, aye. Probably other things, but mostly th' coins an' fruit.

Edited 2015-05-14 20:02 (UTC)

It doesn't make sense. All fire just... disappears because the Pyrii do?

[ They should have tried harder to save them. Leo thought he'd been getting the hang of it, too... ]

Maybe you guys should look into shields or something, or I dunno, reflection magic? Is that a thing here? And I don't mean, like, mirrors or anything, but that whole "I'm rubber, you're glue" thing.

[ He's rambling, but if it'll help him stop thinking about the loss, he'll take it. ]

Not even my fire runes work.

[She couldn't comment on that, but it did make her wonder if that meant other things would disappear too. Were the will o the wisps going to vanish? Were the naiads? Bandersnatches? The Void was close to Leathann. What would disappear if it got swallowed up too?]

Someone I know knows luck magic, but he can't be everywhere at once. [She wouldn't ask that of Diarmuid either.] If I used a speed rune, maybe I'd be able to dodge...

Edited 2015-05-14 21:23 (UTC)

There isn't something like a shield rune? Sounds like that would be the most useful. You'd think it'd be one of the first things they teach.

[ Who even teaches that stuff, anyway? ]

[There's a small, noncommittal noise.]

I'm not good with defensive runes. I work best with offense.

[That, and she didn't exactly learn how to use them the traditional way.]

Probably explains why fire magic spoke to me.

Same here. I mean, I'm no Percy Jackson, but I can handle myself. [ Pause. ] Most of the time.

[ He hasn't forgotten about trying to face down Ganondorf with a hammer. Not his best idea. ]

Maybe just stay off the main streets, then? I'd say get some kind of disguise but they can still see our Shards.

Who? [Pause.] Aye. I've been trained to fight in archery an' swordsmanship myself since I was a wee lass.

[She wouldn't take up arms against natives though. It wasn't their fault that the monarchs were ignoring their plight in favor of other things. They were in just as much danger of disappearing as the fae and the shardbearers were. She didn't blame them for being up in arms.]

I have a medallion that conceals my shard, but I lent it to someone. [If he was at Verla and done with it though, then Korra would be too...she'd have to return Appa sooner or later.] I'll get it back soon hopefully.

Percy - he's, like, the strongest demigod alive. Killer with a sword, too. [ Leo shakes his head. ] They won't even let me hold a sword. And I only learned to fight with a chain a few months after the fairies brought me here.

Somehow I don't think it'll get easier for any of us anytime soon. Things just keep getting worse. [ You'd think he'd be used to that by now. That's the life of a demigod, in a nutshell. ] There's got to be something else we can do.

Demigo...oh, like Heracles? [She smiles a little sympathetically when he says that about the sword though.] If it makes you feel better, I wasn't even allowed to hold swords until I was well into my older years. Somethin' about me causin' disaster for everyone in th' trainin' grounds.

['Older years' she says. As if she's not still a young woman. She pauses at that, sighing softly.]

Cha bhi fios aire math an tobair gus an tràigh e. The value of the well is not known until it goes dry. [Merida looks down at the ground.] We're not just fightin' for ourselves. If any of us - native, shardbearer or otherwise - are to come out of this, we need to start thinkin' in regards to th' whole world.

[ She can't see it, but he's making a face. ] Yeah, that guy. Pretty much all of us Greeks are demigods, except Rachel - just most of us aren't huge jerks like he is. And yeah, that's why they won't let me do it. Every time I asked, they'd get these looks on their faces like the world was going to end.

[ Well, that's... some proverb. An annoyingly relevant one. ] I know. But fire was how I was fought. Before that, building things, and I can't even do that outside of the Station or a forge. The queen said the only thing that would make the war end was collecting more shards, though.

[ And that means killing, which... Leo isn't sure he's ready to do, even after all this time. And the Seelie court winning wouldn't just mean the end of the war - it would mean the end of the world at large, too. It doesn't really seem like they have a choice in the matter. ]

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