Chapter 15: Return

The sky was painted in the orange hue of the setting sun as the smoke carried broken dreams towards the sky. Leylin took in the scene as families mourned the loss and a mother's last hope turned to ash. "Everything is pain, misery is permanent, and joy intermittent. That is life," He whispered to himself.

"Must I become a pawn?" He questioned aloud. He sighed as Leylin saw Roran look at him with a mixture of pity and admiration.'Will I have to experience this pain myself, or am I smart enough to imbibe the lesson by observing the pain of others?' he left unsaid.

The journey back to the roost was silent and leisurely. Leylin needed time to think and contemplate the nature of his existence and what he truly wanted from this second chance.

He heard Fawkes trill as the eagle's nest pierced into the clouds. Finally, he would have a well-deserved hot bath and a feathered bed after weeks on the road. He lay in a hammock; as night fell, the blue haze of day lifted to reveal the stars, trying to puzzle the mystery surrounding the nature of his existence and his purpose in this world. One question plagued his mind, 'why had he replaced Fang Ming?'

There may have been a time and place where he would have chalked up the similarities to coincidence, but he wasn't that stupid anymore. Someone wanted him here just like someone wanted Fang Ming. Someone unfathomable, someone beyond comprehension. He hated feeling like a Pawn. 'Maybe even Fang Ming was a Pawn too, a Pawn that became a Queen, still nothing more than a piece on the chessboard.' Leylin didn't want to remain someone's plaything. A glorified and embellished puppet but a puppet nonetheless. He wished he could burn away the strings, but how to breakaway remained an unanswerable question, at least for now. Hell, he couldn't even tug at the strings. Burning them was pretty far away.

He thought, 'What did he want from this life Power, Wealth, Happiness, Peace of mind? What exactly did he want and why. The second question seemed to be even harder to solve.

Leylin thought he wasn't getting anywhere like so he did the next big thing he broke the problem down. What does he want from this life? What does any sentient species want from its life? He inadvertently let out a small chuckle at the stupidity of his line of questioning.

He needed to simplify the problem, not make it a metaphysical question and contemplate the meaning of existence. No, what was his most pressing issue? What was it that he craved above all else? He had his answer. He was a scientist above all else, and scientists are seekers. What he seeks are answers. The path to the answers he seeks is paved with power; to obtain power, he would need resources and wealth. So, he would pursue it, but power is merely a means to an end, not the end itself.

With this silent resolution, he closed his eyes under a cloudless sky revealing bright lights juxtaposed with heaven's black as the star song seduced him to sleep.

At dawn, Leylin cleansed his wariness with a bath and coffee. To think these backward people had had the bean but never drank the drink of gods. 'Such Heresy, Barbarians, the whole lot of them,' Leylin thought as Locke and Mercer entered the great hall.

"My Lord, your prisoner, is in the southern tower," Mercer stated curtly.

"Now is as good a time as any to have a pleasant conversation with our new resident deviant, I suppose," Leylin quipped as he got up and started walking towards the south tower.

He took all but two steps but knew that the moron was following him. So he turned around and asked, "Locke, where do you think you are going?"

"Young master, weren't we to interrogate the filthy bard." He stated.

"No, Locke, I am going to interrogate the dark magus, not US! Besides, he was a musician and not a bard, you idiot!" Leylin bellowed.

"But, Young Mas.." Locke tried to protest, but Leylin cut him off, "No means no, Locke, I know what I am doing."

Leylin held Locke motionless with a frigid glare and walked towards the southern tower.