A Northern Prince

Leo wasn\'t armed, not physically, not mentally. The two protectors that had been caring for Sei lay on the floor. Leo drew his fingers back from a still warm throat that had no pulse and swallowed. Death was his sister\'s forte, his brother\'s hobby, and Leo didn\'t know what to do about it. It seemed like he ought to do something, say some sacred mantra or sing some song like the northerners did.

\"Do you really want to,\" a quiet, curious voice asked.

He looked up to find a girl, maybe 12 or 13 with rainbow colored hair and silk slippered feet that didn\'t quite touch the ground. His eye twitched. Now his mouth was truly dry. A shiver rolled over his shoulders, down his arms, leaving goosebumps like tiny little pin pricks. \"I can\'t.\"

She smiled, a little more on one side than the other, her eyes narrowing. \"Just because you haven\'t. Doesn\'t mean you can\'t. Do you want to sing their souls to the Summerland?\"ThatThat same ripple went over him, though this time it made all the hair his head stand straight up. \"Where is Prince Sei?\"

\"You love him.\" She said, smugly, as her hands moved out to either side, arms stretching out, moving to some music only she d hed hear. Her hair seemed to dance with her, swirling like living, rainbow creating crystal. \"You love him.\"

\"He\'s a slave,\" Leo said standing now, indignant, frightened maybe. \"His country betrayed us to NortNorth. Songbirds are forbidden here. You are forbidden here.\"

\"The Goddess of Love can not be banished, Leo, my newest Songbird.\" She purred, and then she wasn\'t a child, but a woman, curved and darker than her young self. Light jumped from her fingers, vibrated electric rainbows through her hair, over her skin, and across the air between them to engulf him in sparkling neon goddess power.

Leo screamed. He jumped back away from her, but the light followed him. It danced over his skin, exciting and caressing, teasing and changing. The power of her song soaked into his skin, painting his soul with the colors that he\'d dreamed about in his art, colors and emotions that were not encouraged in the martial order of the palace. Tears warmed eyeseyes and washed down his face. He felt his feet leave the ground, but he\'d stopped trying to explain. \"Who are you,\" he mouthed.

She smiled, no longer menacing in her adult form, at least to him. \"I am Lai Lei, goddess of love. And you, Leo, are High Songbird of the South. I charge you with protecting your heart and with finding Dano, High Songbird of the North. He will tell you things which you need to know. Do not fear. You are always within the light.\"

And just as suddenly as she\'d been there, she was gone. Leo dropped to his knees on the marble floor. Light tickles fell over the back of his hands and he shook both hands to get the unknown object away, only to find that it was his own hair. Red as sunrise and pooling around his knees and hands, at least six feet long, it lay around him like a cloak. \"Augggggg!\"

He stood, knees bruised from where he\'d landed on them, and found his feet tangled in his own hair. \"Ahhhhggg,\" he snarled, trying to get the stuff away from his ankles. He wrapped it around one arm, to preoccupied with getting it up to think about why he suddenly had more hair than a wig maker!

As he stumbled, one foot touched one of the dead protectors and he just stopped. His hair fell back to the floor as both arms lowered. It started in the pit of his stomach, like a hunger, but more urgent. He held up both hands, as if he could push the need away, the empty cold coming from the two bodies before him. New tears started and he sang. He\'d never sung in his life before, at least not anything beyond nursery rhymes and teasing songs. There were no words for it, no language to feeling the lives of these men that lay before him. He knew their hopes and dreams and fears, the losses they\'d had and he felt the other side, the place where She was, where Lai Lei waited for them. Instinctively, he called them towards that, towards the warmth and the love. Until they were free on the other side, safely wrapped in the love and renewal of Her.

Blinking fresh, cold tears from his eyes, he pulled the annoying hair from his face and remembered how to breath. Nothing was the same. Everything he\'d learned was a lie. Lost in the truth of the moment, he stood there, fingers holding long hair back from his face and turned round slowly, looking at the magnificence of his family\'s palace. This was his home. Hair wrapping itself around his legs as he turned, he found his sister there, sword drawn, dark eyes hard and questioning.

There was no one else, just her. He smiled. \"Krista.\"

\"Leo?\" Her head tilted slightly, the blade in her hand turned slightly, an echo of her thoughts. \"Leo?\"

\"There was a woman,\" Leo said, again untangling himself from his hair. \"With rainbows.\"

\"Rainbows,\" Princess Krista asked, \"Rainbows? Did you kill them? What happened to your hair? You\'re glowing. Are you radioactive?\"

\"I don\'t know. Maybe. Ariste took Sei. I have to get him back,\" Leo said, only realizing that it was true when he said it. \"I\'m going north.\"

Princess Krista nodded. \"With me, in two days.\"

\"No. I\'m going now. After I find Sei.\" Leo said, wrapping hair around his arm again. \"I have to find someone named Dano.\"

\"You can\'t get out of the palace without father\'s permission,\" Princess Krista pointed out, as if saying the obvious. \"What have you done, Leo?\"

It was easier this time, picking up his hair. \"I\'ll meet you in the north. Don\'t tell Papa about this.\"

\"Right. He probably already knows!\" Princess Krista snarled, but her sword was lowering. \"They\'re barbarians to the north, Leo. They\'ve attacked you with some drugs or a virus, or both. You should let us help you. Whatever you think you saw, it\'s not real. Magic isn\'t real.\"

\"Maybe not,\" Leo agreed, not sure now what it was he thought he\'d seen or felt. \"But I\'m going after Sei anyway, then we\'re going north.\"

\"I\'ll kill you if you betray us!\" Princess Krista yelled.

What he felt next was too sweet to be a drug or a virus. Love, kindness, compassion, it rose like a warm breeze in the winter. \"I love you, big sister. I wouldn\'t betray you. You can feel that, can\'t you? Can\'t you feel that you should trust me?\"

Leo had moved from where he stood, across the hall, a good ten feet by then, not walking, just was one place, then he was another. Princess Krysta looked pale, eyes wide. \"You\'re not my brother anymore. I don\'t know what the fuck you are!\"

\"Yes, you do,\" he said and the warmth he felt for her came out as a wordless song, hummed and held up a hand to touch the energy of the song. It sat on his palm, like something he could feel or see, something insubstantial that he could sense none the less. He blew it at her, pushing the energy of the song towards her. Her sword hit the marble with a clatter.

He turned and ran, down the hall, then up the stairs, following a scream for help that was no more substantial than the song he\'d just blown towards his sister.