Chapter 779: Question

Vesa checked the mark at his wrist. It brightened, held, then returned to its earlier glow when he stopped pressing it.

She waited until Alucard’s presence steadied again.

"Are you still there?" he asked.

"Yes."

"I cannot return every missing piece to you through this contact."

"I haven’t asked you to."

"What do you want me to say?"

"Whether one of your restrictions will stop me warning them about the call."

"No. Not about the step I have asked you to take."

"Which step?"

Alucard sighed faintly.

"You used to let me finish."

"You used to leave me enough to know what you meant."

She regretted the sharpness as soon as she heard it. He did not answer, and she nearly took the words back. Then she thought of assuring Mingyue while still being unable to name the danger.

"I’m asking about the first call," she said more quietly. "I need that answer now."

Alucard’s voice returned after a pause.

"The call through their inherited blood does not require another part of my soul to enter either of them."

Vesa looked up. That was an answer she could use.

"Use their inherited connection for that first call," Alucard continued. "Thepes is a separate problem. I can recognize what was used to make him, but I can’t promise how every altered pattern will answer it."

Vesa held on to the distinction. They could begin without involving Thepes, but his altered pattern would remain a separate risk.

She had wanted him to remove that uncertainty. Now she would have to tell the pair it was there.

"Would you still help if I stopped the call?"

The question frightened her more than she had expected. He had helped them through the battle, and she was already asking about refusing the next thing he wanted.

Alucard took time to answer.

"Tell me why it needs to stop."

"And if you won’t tell me what the danger is?"

"You would refuse me?"

Vesa looked toward the doorway again.

Alex and Mingyue were out there, injured from a battle they could have left if they had abandoned the people depending on them. She had watched them spend their strength on strangers while she tried to keep her old master’s voice from vanishing.

She wanted this call to work. She wanted Master to hear his scattered people answer. If it hurt the pair after another assurance from her, neither would let her explain that she had only been trying to help him.

"If the call does something you haven’t explained, I’ll stop carrying it," she said. "I won’t tell them to keep going because you must have meant it."

The words were out now.

She was still afraid he would end the conversation. She wanted him to understand why she had said it.

His answer came quietly.

"Then don’t."

Vesa closed her eyes for a moment.

She had expected an order, or another reminder of how much remained to be done for their people.

She opened her eyes.

"I’ll help with the call," she said. "But I’m telling them that you haven’t tested Thepes’s pattern. If you want us to use it, you answer the questions when we get there."

Alucard gave a faint breath that almost became a laugh, then stopped.

Vesa did not laugh with him. She waited until he could speak clearly again.

"You have become difficult," he said.

"I still want you here," she said. "I have wanted that for a long time. Don’t make me pretend these questions mean I stopped caring."

Her voice shook on the last words. She hated that he could hear it, but she did not take them back.

For a while, neither spoke.

Vesa checked the contact. It still held, but she couldn’t keep asking questions without spending the strength he had left.

"Rest," she said. "I’ll keep enough open to know you’re there."

"Vesa."

She waited.

"I chose what I gave the pieces. You are right about that."

It didn’t give her the memories back or explain every choice he had made.

But he had admitted that he had kept some knowledge from her. It hadn’t all been lost to corruption or damage.

"I needed you to say it," she answered.

She let the conversation narrow to the faint presence again.

Then she called Alex through their own connection.

"King, before we try the call, I need to tell you what Master actually knows and what we still have to test."

Alex answered after a moment.

"Tell Mingyue too."

"I will."

Vesa brought them both into the exchange, leaving Alucard’s quiet trace separate.

She began with the limit she would once have tried to explain after they had already agreed.

"We can make the first attempt without the artifact. It doesn’t need another piece of him inside either of you. If we need Thepes’s altered pattern later, that’s a different attempt, and I can’t promise we know everything it will do."

She paused before telling them how she had reached that answer.

"Some of the knowledge was kept from the separate parts of me. Master admitted that. He also put limits on things I know but can’t tell you. Those haven’t gone away. He says they don’t prevent me warning you about this first call."

Neither answered immediately.

Vesa almost filled the silence by explaining how weak he was, how much he had already done for them, and why a choice made long ago might have been necessary. She believed those things mattered. They did not change what she had just told the pair.

"I wanted a different answer from him," she said.

Alex’s voice was quieter when it returned.

"Are you all right?"

She looked toward the door as if he were standing there already.

"I don’t know."

The answer felt more exposed than admitting she lacked a piece of knowledge. She was used to finding something useful to do when she did not know what to say. Here, she still had the restraint to watch and the old connection to hold, but neither would tell her how she was supposed to feel about her master.

"I’m coming back," Alex said. "Mingyue is checking on Selene. I can watch him while you take a moment."

"You should be resting."

"I can sit beside a wall here too."

Vesa looked at the empty place where he had crouched during the earlier conversation.

She had been ready to defend Master against another demand. Alex was offering to sit beside her. For the moment, she could accept that.

"All right," she said.

She kept the quiet trace of her old master open until Alex returned. When he sat beside the doorway, she lowered her hand from the wall and folded her four wings close.

Thepes moved against the ice. Alex checked the rune while Vesa stayed on her brick, listening for the faint presence she still wanted there.