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Chapter Text

His footsteps pounded on the hard wooden stairs, but Callum could hardly hear it over the sound of his harsh breathing and his heart racing in his ears. He still had time, right? They could fix this.

They could actually stop the war. They could make peace. He just had to get to the king before--

Calum shouldered past a guard, but it proved useless as a voice stopped him in his tracks just before the king's chambers.

"Whoa, easy there, step-prince," Soren chuckled, and for a moment Calum hated him for it. How could he laugh when moon-elves were trying to break into the castle?

"The king's pretty busy, trying his best to, you know, not die, and stuff."

"You're not stopping me." Callum tried to push past the older boy, but got interrupted as the doors creaked and a figure slipped through. Instead of the king, Viren greeted the prince with an icy look.

"You should not be here."

Callum took a step back before he'd realized it. He'd never seen quite such a dark expression on Lord Viren's face.

But he knew the reason, now.

"I know what you did." He tried to sound calm and intimidating, even with the other still towering over him. "You stole the royal dragon egg. And you just kept it hidden here. Like it was a relic."

Viren's face stayed neutral as he talked, although his eyes said something different. Callum's irritation spiked.

"But we found it. We're keeping it safe."

"We?" The other replied, carefully, as if tasting the word.

"The king's going to have you in shackles when he finds out!" Callum threw words back, gritting his teeth so the nervousness didn't show on his face. The guards around them were paying close attention now.

"Oh? And what makes you so sure he doesn't already know?"

Anxiety welled up for a moment, before the prince got a hold of himself again. If the king knew, he'd have said something, or at least would have hodden the egg in the vaults, not some dusty secret chamber. Viren was trying to get under his skin.

"Grab him."

And it was working, Callum realized with a sinking feeling, after taking another step back. He didn't even fully register Soren voicing his doubts. The guards were walking forward and he had nowhere to go.

A rough, armored hand gripped his arm, and Callum tried to pull it out of the grip, but only ended up hissing at the pain in his shoulder. The other arm managed to hit the second guard in the side before it was also captured. The hit didn't do much.

The guards turned him to face the man he'd known for years now, and Viren looked at him with something in his eyes that Callum had never seen before.

"I'll call out. I'll scream." Callum threatened, trying to ignore the ball of fear that had settled into his stomach. He had to get his father to see the egg, somehow.

"Go ahead."

Well, that didn't sound ominous at all.

Then the chanting began.

A wave of dizziness hit Callum like a brick. He blinked hard, trying to get the world to stop spinning, trying to focus on what the hell was going on, but he couldn't. He thought he heard someone gag and wondered if it was him, choking on the rising nausea.

Alarmed voices started to break through the dizziness, and the prince realize the guards had slackened their grip. Now would be the chance to run, if the hallway could stop moving around, please.

"What's wrong with you?" Viren's scoff was audible in his voice. "You were spoiled. You got everything. Now you faint at the first sign of magic? Listen here, you little mongrel..." Callum's vision cleared a bit to see the man leaning over him. He struggled to get his feet solidly on the ground again, instead of being held up by the arms.

"Tonight, everything changes. And there's nothing you or anyone can do to--"

A chill went through the corridor and the guards that were holding Callum let go, giving him the oppertunity to right himself with only a small stumble.

As a smaller wave of dizziness hit him, Callum squeezed his eyes shut really hard and wished he was somewhere else, anywhere else. What was he doing here?

The king. He was alerting the king of treason.

"They're here." Soren whispered.

He ran out of time. He'd failed.

"Defend the doors!"

Callum could only watch, helpless, as the moon elves attacked the almost completely unprepared guards.

Eyes wide, Callum looked up just in time to see the guard that had held his left arm block a blow from an elven sword. Another elf had finished their fight and was now running towards them.

"Behind you!" Callum cried. Or tried to.

His mouth had formed the words. Air had passed out of his mouth.

And the guard was lying on the floor, a hole through his chest, a pool of blood quickly forming around him.

...what? But how? Had he frozen up? Was the guard dead because he'd been afraid?

He couldn't look away. The stone floor was hard and cold and the sound of fighting was louder than ever yet distorted and the stench in the air was blood and he couldn't look away. 

The fighting didn't stop. 

Dad. 

Callum tried saying it, he tried calling out, yelling for dad to come and fix this, fix this like he'd fix anything. 

His dad couldn't hear him. No one could hear him. He wasn't talking. 

"-llum! Callum, where are you!"

Ezran.

Everything snapped back into focus. Steel upon steel sounded put clearer than ever  and just hear able over that the sound of his little brother calling for him. 

The irony taste on the back of his tongue didn't matter right now. On the square, Ezran was open and unprotected and not even trying to hide. He had to come first. 

Above everything. 

As he jumped up, Callum didn't even see the fallen light slowly dying, only a few meters away, being smothered by a thick green fog. 

Chapter Text

He ran. Callum ran like the wind because the wind didn't think, didn't have to think, and he didn't want to. He raced down the stairs like it was an escape from being afraid.

"Callum! Did you talk to dad?"

Callum came to a stop, taking in his little brother and the elf standing in front of him. Ezran's voice didn't have an ounce of fear, like he knew for sure things were going to work out.

The prince panted, his hands on his knees, trying to catch his breath for an answer-- lying on the floor, a hole through his chest, a pool of blood quickly forming -- then decided not to bother. He shook his head, unable to look Ez in the eye as the younger prince's face crumbled.

He glanced back toward the tower, a quick look, but the elf saw it. A few steps and she was standing beside him, eyes wide, but determined.

"Say the word, and I'll go back into that tower with you."

Ezran was holding the egg gently, making sure not to let it slip from his fingers. That thing could stop this whole war. They couldn't... They couldn't risk the millions of people who would be lost if the war continued.

An idea starting to take form in his head, Callum began to talk-- and stopped, closing his mouth as he realized there wasn't any sound coming from it. Numbly, he just shook his head and took the offered bag from the elf. Rayla.

She let him lead the way out of the castle with something like sympathy in her eyes, taking his quietness for horror. Callum thought she was half right, too.

Ezran's worried eyes were hiding something uncertain now.

How would he even talk to them? To Callum's knowledge, Ezran didn't know a lot of sign language yet, and Rayla would have had no reason to learn it.

They just had to get away, far away, then he'd figure things out. He'd have to.

By the time they reached the dark of the forest and Callum still hadn't said a word, Ezran couldn't take it anymore. "Callum? What are we going to do now? We have to do something with the egg, right? Get it somewhere safe."

The anxious edge, so out of place in Ez's voice, pulled Callum out of his head. His mind was still numb, trying to deal with everything.

Callum looked at his little brother. At some point, Bait had been moved to Ezran's shoulder, colored a bright alarmed green to match his human.

He floundered. Looked at his brother. Looked at Rayla. Looked back to Ezran.

What was he supposed to do?

Rayla, to Callum's eternal gratefulness, saw the look and took it as a cue for action. "We'll... be fine, kid." She reassured somewhat awkwardly. "We'll take the dragon egg to Xadia. Where it belongs. I'll tell everyone what you did and maybe, it'll put a stop to the war."

"Yeah, we'll take it back to its mother!" Ezran sounded excited, worries forgotten for the moment.

"...Callum?" Rayla tried. "What do you think?"

Frustration was building under his skin. This was...

A quick glance around revealed a part of wood Callum didn't recognize. They must be far enough away to stop for a moment.

Ignoring the elf's question for now, he set his bag down on a nearby rock and began to search for something, anything to help him talk to the other two.

Drawing supplies.

Drawing supplies. Callum could have smacked himself in the face. Of course he'd have them, he had packed them for the trip to the winter lodge.

Quickly taking out paper and a writing utensil, Callum began scribbling like nobody's business. Caught in confusion, Rayla and Ezran just looked on, unsure what to make of it.

"Uh.. Callum?" Ezran ventured. "Does your throat hurt? Is that why you're not talking?"

With a flourish, Callum turned around, presenting the paper.

The blank look on their faces didn't change.

A few awkward seconds later Rayla turned to Ezran and asked quietly, "you can read this, right?"

Ezran just shrugged helplessly.

...Really.

Okay. Fine.

Callum took another sheet and began writing again, slowly and carefully. A few minutes later, spent in mostly silence and one or two whispers of confusion behind him, he finished the sentence with a flourish. If they wanted fancy handwriting, they weren't allowed to complain about fancy handwriting.

He turned back just in time to catch a concerned glance, sent at him from bold, violet eyes. Callum chose to ignore it and sit back, letting Ez and Rayla read through the message.

It felt like ages waiting for them to react, in any way at all, even though he wasn't sure what reaction he was waiting for.

"Callum.. You were hit by a spell? Why didn't you s-" Rayla's frustrated voice fell silent for a moment. "Why didn't you let us know earlier? Dark magic is dangerous!"

Yeah, no dur.

Blood roaring in his ears, the hallway spinning--

Callum had noticed.

Rayla must've caught his deadpan look, because she rolled her eyes. "Fine, you don't seem to be dying. We'll just wait for it to wear off, I guess."

Callum didn't protest. Of the two methods that could've been used to take his voice, one would wear off, over time. He just had to hope it was the one Viren had used.

And in the meantime, they'd just have to keep going.

The spell probably went wrong somewhere and got prolonged. Or Viren used a variation Callum didn't know. After all, the hour needed for it to wear off was long gone, and it had been a while since he'd smuggled a new magic book into his room.

And the part of him that whispered otherwise was just plain wrong, because he was gonna be able to speak again. He had to.

When they started walking again, Callum dropped to the back of the group, lost in thought. In front of him, Rayla had asked a question about Bait, spurring an excited conversation with Ezran that the older boy didn't pay mind to.

The words, practiced tirelessly, came to him almost instinctively. He formed them on his lips, the continued lack of sound weighing on his chest like a brick. He wanted to scream.

Celare. Detego. Lychnus. Avaritiam.

He had to be able to speak again, in time. What kind of mage would he be without a voice?