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The cello could be quite a noisy instrument, especially when played unskilled. At the very beginning, it would creak and groan like the wooden "pirate" ships in one of the late-night movies she had sat in with Itztenoch to watch a part of one time. Not pleasant at all, not like the recordings she had found as a reference.

Out of concern she might be bothering her housemates, she would practice outside when the weather permitted.

There were some woods nearby that made for a good, discreet spot to acquaint herself with her instrument. She didn't like having her glamour on when she practiced. It didn't feel right, like she was pretending to be human with it, or like the cello wasn't truly hers, without seeing her own gray-lavender hands grasping the bow and holding the neck in place.

It ended up being a weekly habit. At first, the woods croaked uncomfortably with her plodding attempts to connect the sheet music to finger placements, to motion, to the notes they conveyed. Her mastery of Hot Cross Buns had been hard-earned, and it was a relief to move on to other songs. The base progression of three descending notes sounded almost exactly like the signal in Velencian showers that told the user their allotment of water had been depleted. She hated being reminded of it.

This week, she had moved on to something slightly more complex, with slightly more skill having been achieved for her efforts. Now, occasionally, she didn't have to stop and squint and adjust -- her hands would move without her having to think, and something almost approaching the barest hint of elegance would come out.

She stumbled on a note, and sighed a bit, and decided to take it from the top again. Hopefully this would be worth all the struggle someday.

The creaking of the branch sounded so much like her clumsier strokes of the cello strings, Fae-Fae didn't notice a thing. The ones she heard, she believed to be another one of her many mistakes. Her frustration kept her hyperfocused on her task, determined to achieve the smooth playing she had heard in the recordings. As the loose branch strained more under the snow, she grew ever more agitated.

She gasped, screamed a bit upon being grabbed and yanked back. The familiar voice saying her name only registered a second later, as the branch crashed to the ground. Sheet music scattered everywhere. The pressure on her shoulders lifted, the source of the voice moved away, but was still there. He was still there.

She didn't dare to think his name.

Slowly, slowly, Fae-Fae turned her head behind her, and from the barest edge of her vision, she saw the long white braid, the golden eyes, the pale blue skin -- and then she did a very innocent thing.

She turned back around. Sat in the snow. Her hands clapped over her ears and her eyes snapped shut. She did everything she could to shut out his presence, so she wouldn't be able to verify it who it was. So she wouldn't have to report that she saw him. So she wouldn't put him in more danger than he was in already.

I didn't hear you. I didn't see you. Please run away.

A wind slowly picked up around her, just barely strong enough to tease the scattered papers along the ground a bit. It filled the space with the air of a faraway world, in a faraway time.

Covering her ears could only muffle up so much sound. Fae-Fae had hoped to hear the muffled footsteps of He Who Must Not Be Named, fading off safely into the distance. Instead, a pause -- maybe he jumped away? -- but then -- a faint pitter-pattering that circled carefully around her.

He was still here. Why didn't he run?

Dejectedly, her arms slowly fell to wrap around her knees, and she openly listened at the rustling of papers being stacked up next to her. Even now, he was so gentle and kind. Her heart wavered a bit. She really did want to see him again, to know for sure that he was okay. If he was still acting like his usual self, she supposed that meant he was as okay as he could be. As anxious as she was to have crossed paths with him again, she still smiled a little bit.

Fae-Fae still didn't move to look at him, but her fingers carefully danced at her wrist.

"Your Highness," she said first, firmly. Then, "Do I have your permission to disclose your location?"

She chose her words with care. Left to her own devices, she couldn't keep this encounter a secret from Lyndin... however, the word of the King would change matters. Without being fully aware of it, she held her breath in anticipation of the answer.

Beautiful? Fae-Fae couldn't understand how her playing could be described in such a way, when it sounded nothing like how it was supposed to sound. It was supposed to be rich and elegant. Instead the cello was clumsy, staggering and confused in her hands.

Any protests she could give, though, were stalled by the King apologizing. Apologizing, for what? For what? What "everything" did he need to apologize for? He had done nothing but be who he was, in circumstances that rejected him for it. Velencya and the Council had rejected him for it. And now he was, he looked, so terribly, terribly alone. Fae-Fae met Caedus's visible anxiety, and audible guilt, with a deep sadness and -- coloring its edges -- anger. Anger on his behalf.

If anything, Caedus was the one who deserved an apology. From everyone.

Then he asked how the Commodore was, and her heart melted a little more.

"He is alright," she said. "He is recovering," she said. "But we lost some people. The Commanders... Caerynn... Gavaen." Her eyes drifted back down to the snow, and the gathered sheet music, and her instrument as she listed the names. The cello was intact, thankfully, but the bow had been snapped in two by the branch, with half of it pinned firmly underneath. It could be replaced.

Then she turned a small, sympathetic smile to Caedus and asked, "Do you miss him?"

It was silent for a moment, nothing exchanged between them but the plumes of their breath in the cold air. Fae-Fae simply accepted Caedus's words, and the twisting grief on his face, with a slow nod and a knitting of her brow. She would do almost anything to make that pain go away. In that moment, it was so tempting to just run away with him wherever he planned to go next, so he wouldn't be alone. So he would have at least one of his own people by his side, to help him with the massive burdens he carried.

She knew she couldn't do that, though.

Or at least, not right now.

Instead she stood up, and drew a shaking breath, and said, "Caedus."

Just his name. Just his name.

"There is nothing wrong with you," she said.

Her own face was twisting up now, with half of her mind back in that battlefield, and her head shuddered around tensing cheeks struggling to fight back tears that came anyway. That peculiar breeze picked up again, whispering through the bare trees, teasing her feathered gray hair, peeling a page of sheet music off the stack and tugging it in Caedus's direction. Her hands trembled and struggled to input the words that had been burdening her heart since the moment she saw Lyndin turn on his friend.

"Your star seed is beautiful. Sailor Cosmos sent it to us that way. It̵͈͗ d̵̯̙̉id̴̙̐͘ n̴̜̈́o̵͉͋t deş̸͝è̵̩r̷̯͐ve tǫ̷̓ ̵̙̂b̸̢͌e h̶͇̔̚u̴͙̽rt!!"

There was a wail of frustration, of protest, of anguish, that quickly decayed into a sob. Fae-Fae wept for a second, openly, and didn't take her eyes off of Caedus's face as she did so. Her hands were still shaking, so much she could barely use them. But eventually, finally, she said, "I am sorry the Council was so cruel to you."

Lyndin was not the only one who put others before himself, Fae-Fae thought, as she witnessed Caedus apologizing once again, then twice again, for circumstances that no one could ultimately be blamed for. For being afraid. For wanting to live with his people on Velenia again. There was nothing selfish about wanting what everyone else on Velencia wanted. She believed his position as their world's senshi did not change that. Continuing this conversation, however, would only increase the risk they were taking by pausing to talk at all. So, again, she accepted his words with stilled tears and a nod. Part of her was honored to witness all the emotions he had shared. Part of her was sad to know just how deep and complex and painful they were.

"I should go," she admitted. They had already borrowed too much time here. But before she turned to leave, she walked up to him, carefully, mindful of the anxiety he had displayed moments ago.

Fae-Fae gingerly pulled the stray paper out of Caedus's hand, and in its place dropped something else: one of the crystals she had been allotted for trade, when she had been assigned to the Vanguard's mission on Earth. It was a partly cloudy, colorless jaggedy thing, splintered on the inside with little short filaments that turned iridescent in the sunlight. The many flaws it held made it worthless from a practical standpoint, and that had made it her favorite.

"Humans use gifts as a form of symbolic communication." That was something she had learned from Vyn, actually. Her face was a mess of freezing tears, but she managed a warm and heartfelt smile. "Please take this as a symbol you are not alone."

Then, she backed away graciously. And her expression became... something new, something that hadn't been seen in her eyes before. There was a determination there, the kind that could only be born through hardship and experience. That fierceness gazed out into the middle distance, and she said,

"I'm going to become the next Commodore and find a better way."

She was saying this, as a Cadet. With complete seriousness and confidence.

"So you can see Velenia again. And so our people are ready to live there again."

Fae-Fae had promised she would do anything she could, to Gavaen and Sailor Cosmos. Now that promise had been extended to Caedus. With one last look at him, and one last smile, she finished, "Please stay safe until then."

That would do for a farewell. She then turned to tend to her papers and her instrument, content to act as if she had not seen him at all.

Fae-Fae listened to the whispers, her head tilting ever-so-slightly, but stayed busying herself with her things -- returning the cello to its case; tucking the sheet music back into subspace; pulling the remains of the bow from the fallen branch. All the same, there was a little smile on her face, relieved to know that she had done something to ease Caedus's pain, if only slightly.

It was probably best not to practice here again, just in case.

As she left, some of his words from their exchange danced at the front of her mind: You make me think of home.

She wondered which one he meant.