in the privacy of her room, light spilled forth from her fingertips.
the letter they had received a fortnight ago still echoed in her head, ringing. she couldn’t help it, turning the endless possibilities over in her head, among so many other things, like sol. it was a selfish comfort, but in times like these, elinei missed the comfort of her power more than anything. she loved her family, her lovers, more than she could say, but the relief that came when pure light poured out of her was indescribable. a lattice of rays covered the walls, crawling in a vein-like pattern along the floor. it was incomparable; with her power, she felt free.
for france, the old words in echoed in her head. for humanity.
she tramped down on her power, fearing for the safety of her lovers. light burned, and her childhood had been spent training her to do exactly that. it wasn’t impossible, of course, to make the light just light, lacking any warmth, but this had been... easier. (she’d been afraid of her own reputation, of seeing fear in their eyes instead of affection). it’s why she took a new alias, distancing herself from her bloody, stupefied past. a new beginning. she never thought history would repeat itself, or at least threaten to. but this time, she was on the opposite side.
it had been... countless years since she had been mélisande de beauvoir.
sometimes, it was easy to forget within the bliss the mansion provided. other times, it wasn’t. elinei couldn’t recall the last time she was referred to as le brûlant, the burning one. or as porteur de lumière, lightbringer. so many epithets had been attached to her, to what she could do, to what she could do. but only one had mattered, in the end. she was, in the end, a soldier after all. a weapon to use against those threatened to rule humans, to treat them as nothing but blood bags and puppets on strings for amusement.
it was a different time back then, and she was a different person. the only one who could possibly know was adriana, who lived in the throes of vampiric superiority while she remained asleep. now, these are not so black and white; and war is not as glorious as she once thought it was, though duty was no less compelling because of it.
those words used to be said to her, again and again. a mantra that she repeated herself, for conviction and strength, and in her rare moments of doubt. she remembered her mother’s fingers on her face, tilting her head gently. she can’t remember clearly what her mother’s face looked like, nor her sisters’. the fading scent of geneviève’s perfume before her wedding, or the bright crimson trim of séraphine’s dress. small details like that were remembered with clarity.
now it was the way elias’ hair fell in his face, curled up next to the window with a book in hand. or the way duke’s brows knit together when deep in thought. red with bright eyes as she prepared another spell. the press of odie’s arms around her, warm and safe. the regal way adri’s neck craned as she drank.
elinei jerked, reining in her power as she realized her room was lit up so bright; like the eiffel tower at night, that it threatened to spill out through the windows and under the crack of her bedroom door.
the future was what mattered now, the future of all of them - including sol. the lattice of light flared for a moment before vanishing completely. her birth name, old french nobility, being le soleildat again; all of that belonged in the past. this world had no need for her as she once was, and she liked who she was now.
she was swathed in love, and gave love back in return.
they loved her as she was, not who she was. they would get through this all together. her hands gave off a faint glow and she smiled to herself, albeit a little sadly. they were meant to be together, lovers and family and best friends all in hand. no matter what the future held for them, they would be together. the light winked out.
it’d just be so much easier if she didn’t miss this.
