[Fic] Point of No Return 2/8

[Nightheart]

Van Slanzar de Fanel, King of Fanelia looked out over the expanse of his capitol city with a feeling of pride. It hadn?t been easy but the city had at last been mostly completed and thanks to the talents of a fine team of architects and city designers it was even better and more beautiful than it had been before.

Surrounded on three sides, west, north and east by a sheer cliff wall, the only way in or out was through the high wall blocking out the mouth of the city at its southern end. There was of course a main gate in the central part of the wall. Just inside the main gate stretched an immense main square one hundred feet wide and another hundred feet long and paved in fine marble tile with a mosaic of twining knots and dragons; it met the first of the main roads that swept east and west across the city from cliff face to cliff face. Shooting up from the south at the middle of the northern end of the great square straight in the direction of the palace at the very northernmost point in the city was the main road, the way of the dragon, called so because of the one story high dragon statuary lining the sides of the streets. To the east and west side of the city there was mostly cliff face as well seeming to embrace the city itself like the loving and protective arms of a mother; and terraced four stories up into the cliff face were landings holding the houses of Fanelia?s nobility. The cliffs had always seemed a little dreary in old Fanelia, the unadorned, weathered stone unimpressive and even a little depressing on rainy days. Now there were enormous stylized stone dragons reared up on their hind feet, their gaping mouths looking out at their counterparts across the city, carved directly from the cliff face. The tops of their heads supported grand stone arches that arced from one stone dragon pillar to the next also carved from the face of the cliff just below the terraced landings of the nobility. In the hollows carved out by the arches were the entrances to the lifts that took one up to the terraces; the covered arches of stone with their marble-lined floors also played host to impromptu markets where craftsmen and artisans liked to display their wares to likely buyers. There were six dragons all told, three on the eastern side of the city and three in the west. They were connected east to west by the three main roads that swept straight across the city in those directions. There were also two other main roads running north to south on either side of the Dragon?s Way that led from the steps of the palace courtyard to the two lesser exit gates at the South Wall.

The main streets were then further divided by smaller but still neat and functional streets that divided the large squares created by the six main streets into blocks that held housing and residential areas, shops and business areas, the myriad of different market squares, a few small entertainment houses, parks and gardens and everything else that was part of a living breathing city.

With the last of the palace completed the capitol city of Fanelia was completed at last. There was to be a huge festival that coincided with the time that Van had originally been coroneted (and the city had been destroyed in the first place) planned and all of the citizens were looking forward to it. In the beginning when the council had recommended the celebration and Van had okayed it he?d had people coming up to him constantly interrupting his other important business to get his approval on every little detail and he?d started getting very frustrated. What did he care if the banquet had white wine or red, or if the banners were royal blue or cerulean?! (He wasn?t even certain if cerulean was a color). In one of their nightly conversation across the space separating him and Hitomi she had recommended that he just tell them to establish a committee and let them go to it. He?d taken her advice, she?d given him other such useful advice in the past and he hadn?t felt sorry for taking it.

Now that he thought of it, he hadn?t heard from Hitomi in a while? that was a little odd. She was usually so good at keeping in contact with him. Maybe she was just too busy; it wouldn?t surprise him. He?d taken a look at that schedule of hers one time. Hitomi had won what she called a ?scholarship? which meant that the really good schools would pay for her education if she would agree to maintain their high status by running on their track team. She was taking a full course load of classes complete with lectures and labs. She had a class in which she studied another language, a class in which she studied her own language (it sounded odd to him that they would have her study her native tongue even though she spoke it fluently) she was taking a science class for half of a Saturday on her weekends, a mathematics class (which she was really struggling with) and a class in which she studied economics (money and how to manage it). All of those classes assigned extra reading and work for her to do on her own time so she was constantly studying when she wasn?t involved in her activities. She was on some kind of leadership council for her student body, then she was also involved in some kind of council board that mediated disputes and arguments between students before things became violent, she also took part in some interscholastic project that had its participants act as if they were diplomats on a mock-up of a thing that was a lot like the meetings for the Alliance, and finally she had track practice. On top of all of that she had a part-time job to help pay for her food, dorm and expenses. She worked part-time as a secretary for some kind of businesswoman. Due to all of this, she was very organized. The school she went to (and all schools on her world or so she told him) periodically gave out grueling tests that reviewed everything they had learned up until that point. Those tests always sent Hitomi into a frenzy of nervousness and frantic study in which Van or anyone else would be unlikely to hear from her until they were over with. Perhaps that was what had happened, he wasn?t hearing from her because she?d exhausted herself studying long into the night.

Van himself was very busy, but less organized. He had a lot of balls to juggle so he generally just took care of problems as they came up. A lot of his provinces in Fanelia had no Lords or really any leadership of ant kind so they had to constantly come to Van himself to solve all the problems that would have ordinarily been solved by a local Lord. He often felt like he was living in a state of near-crisis. That day alone he?d nearly had a diplomatic incident with the ambassador from Egzardia, had had to mediate a dispute between two of the nomadic tribes of the Anubi (the dogmen of non-human sentients) that claimed allegiance along his western border. He?d had to meet with the rivermen who were petitioning for a special redress of taxes for the fifth time that year (Van had already reviewed their petition and sent an emissary and all information pointed to them being well able to pay the tax and not burden themselves) and turn them down again, he?d had to meet with one of the lords of one of his northern provinces who had come to request a loan of coins to buy seed grain for the next seasons crops as the Empire of Zaibach had burned down his crop fields and granaries. And his day had only just started. His next crisis had to do with a tribe of refugees down from the mountainous north who wanted to claim sanctuary and citizenry in Fanelia; Fanelia already had a lot of war refugees who were trying to rebuild their homes and lives and while he really really didn?t want to turn anyone away Van had to wonder if it was feasible to support them. Not only that, some of the tribes carried unfamiliar diseases with them and would have to be quarantined from the general populace before a health inspection could be made, then they would have to register their citizenship. He still didn?t know where he was going to put them assuming that he could indeed take them in.

Van was hard-pressed to come up with solutions for every problem. His current government was petty inefficient. He was really short on qualified personnel with the skills necessary to delegate authority to. There were almost no lords left and of the few that were, many of them were simply interested in rebuilding their old power bases. He had a small circle of advisors left over from his father?s old advisory council. They were less than helpful to put it mildly; mainly they sucked up to him to his face and looked down on him and his breeding behind his back. They didn?t even advise mostly; they were quick to say something when Van suggested a solution that had the vaguest chance of offending someone, especially someone of importance. Van would have ousted the whole lot of them a long time ago if they hadn?t been all from the Fanelian nobility. Van, young in his rule as he was, couldn?t risk alienating the noble class. So he tried desperately to keep ahead of everything with insufficient time, or information, or resources, or all of the above. Oftentimes he felt more like the country was running him than he it. He was exhausted from trying to keep track of every little detail, both of his offices were piled high with scrolls and papers as he tried to get a handle on what his country had at hand to trade or spend and what was it was most needful to be spent on. Now that the rebuilding was accomplished he needed to work on stabilizing the Country?s economy and trade base but he couldn?t do that without the right kind of information and that was in short supply. Truthfully, he was looking forward to the celebration as much as, if not more than his people were; if he was lucky he?d be able to grab some time to himself for a change. Time away from affairs of state and the endless list of other people?s problems was something he really desperately needed. He felt like everyone had a hold of a piece of him and was each trying to pull him in a different direction, all he ever seemed to get for all of his troubles was two offices full of stacks of paper and a whole lot of headaches.

If it hadn?t been for his conversations with Hitomi he would have gone off the deep-end long before then. She was often able to comfort him and soothe his frustrations, her experience with the Diplomatic corps gave her insight on international relations that he found invaluable, and her experience in mediating disputes had saved him a time or two. Van would have begged her to return to Gaea not only because he loved her desperately but also because he needed her? but he had heard about all the wonderful times she got to have with her family when she returned home for the short vacations her schooling allowed her. Van had no more family of his own, they were all dead and he was the last so it seemed very important to him that she be able to spend time with her family. She was happy there in the world she belonged in, he couldn?t ask her to give that up just because of some selfish desire of his. Still, he worried about his not being able to contact her, he didn?t like not being able even sense her just a little. Itmade his mind and heart seem too quiet, and desperately alone He?d just try again tomorrow night.

* * *

Hitomi sat cross-legged on her bed with her eyes closed and tried yet again to reach her beloved. She?d been trying to synch up with Van; she?d never had any sorts of difficulties before now. Even without having to enter into a full meditative trance their bond was always just there, at the edge of her consciousness. She could feel the bond itself, like an ephemeral thread of soul-stuff. Usually all she had to do was give it the barest of nudges and it would awaken and put her in contact with her beloved at the other end of it. Now it just seemed to hang there cut off from its other end. When she tried to follow it to Van she only got so far before running up against some force that blocked her progress. It was like a diamond wall, no matter how hard she pushed at it with her senses, banged on it, scratched at it; it remained un affected.

To make matters worse her visions, the ones involving Van?s assassination had been growing stronger, more urgent. She only had five days left before her horrible vision came to pass. If she didn?t find some way to break through and warn him he would die and it would be all her fault. She couldn?t, she couldn?t, she couldn?t let that happen. No matter what the cost she had to find a way to get through to him. Resolutely Hitomi cleared her mind again and started trying to find a way to get past the block between her and Van.

After another full hour of trying she gave into her exhaustion (using her paranormal abilities on Earth was even more exhausting than it had been in Gaea) and fell asleep in her old childhood room. She?d come home to visit her family after her exhausting midterms were over with. She had found no peace from her dreams there, if anything they?d gotten even worse. Hitomi thought it might be the fact that her psychic imprint was all over everything in her room thus amplifying her dreams and visions. Whatever the cause, she had to get to him. She suffered every time the awful vision o him hitting the ground and looking to her helplessly as he died replayed in her head. Waking or sleeping she was faced with the death of the one she loved over and over and each time it seemed to cut more deeply.

The sky was too blue, the clouds too sharply defined. The grass was a glowing luminescent green. The rough stone streets were crowded with cheerfully laughing people and th banners of the royal crest of fanelia snapped in the breeze. Not again. Part of her tried to scream at the ongoing premonition in progress but she already knew that it would do no good. Like her own private version of Hell, the vision would follow through to its awful conclusion and nothing she said or did had changed it or would. She saw Van emerging from the castle behind him standing out on the steps of his palace with the people cheering just below him. Again her consciousness was split in two as she both watched Van and watched his killer take aim. Again she watched in helpless despair as the bolt flew straight through his neck and he toppled backwards into the dirt. Hitomi screamed in powerless denial as he mouthed the words of her name before he died.

She awoke drenched in sweat and gasping for breath once again. She tried to smash her way past the block in their link with a psychic strength borne of desperation. At first she thought she might be making a little progress and pushed harder but her frantic strength slowly started to wane and she realized she hadn?t even made a dent in the wall. She couldn?t tunnel under it, she couldn?t get around it, she couldn?t smash through it; everything she tried resulted in failure and she was reduced to beating her psychic ?hand? against it and weeping. She couldn?t get past it but she would be damned if she gave in to despair.

Hitomi faded back into herself, shaking from exhaustion and weeping. After giving herself a tension-relieving cry she forced herself back to the task at hand. If she could not reach him by their psychic link, than that only left one other method to save his life. She would have to go there in person.

* * *

End Chapter Two

Disclaimer: I do not own Tenkuu no Escaflowne, the show and its characters belong to sunrise, Bandai and its respective writer creators Shoji Kawamori and Hajime Yadate.

Authors Note: It certainly took me a while to write this chapter. A great many revisions, adding in parts and taking out others, I had to sketch out the layout of the new city and dream up additional features. I originally had a description of the interior and exterior of the castle designed by me but it turned out that it contributed nothing whatsoever to the general plot of the story and I took it out in order to keep the fic moving along at a good clip. I hope you enjoyed, the next chapter is where you find out exactly why the story is entitled Point of No Return.

[Lara Winner]

Ooooh!

*sits on edge of seat* Hitomi had better do something quick. If she doesn't make it then poor Van is in some serious trouble. Excellent description and supurb character insights. For a minute there I could really feel Van, ya know, tired and stressed with way too much on his mind.

Great so far, I can't wait for the rest!

[athena]

Wow!! I'm really enjoying this story. You've got an amazing gift for detail, and I agree totally with Laura that you really feel for the characters.

Off to the next chapter!