SLYTHERIN: “We save folks as need saving, feed folks as need feeding, and shoot folks as need shooting.” –Dan Houser + Lazlow Jones + Michael Unsworth + Rupert Humphries (Dutch van der Linde: Red Dead Redemption 2)
The
pot on the table didn’t look like much. The metal had probably been
intricately engraved at one point and someone had tried (badly) to
repair a crack in it, but it had been unearthed from the ruins of
Mhach and was thus unfathomably old and a perfect candidate for
Rin—no, for Ritanelle to practice honing her Echo. Across
the table, Minfilia was taking notes, and Rita swallowed hard.
The
Antecedent flashed her a reassuring smile. “It’s alright.
Whenever you’re ready.”
Before
she could have any second thoughts, Rita yanked her gloves off and
grabbed the pot with both hands.
Shadow.
Smoke. Laughing voices, high and cruel, but they don’t scare her
because she knows them—these are her familiars. She is a voidmage
of Mhach, and this pot had been—had been—she’d stored something
very important in it and her familiars had been endlessly curious.
“It’s
a surprise!” And she’d laughed, but—but then—
Pain.
Pain, pressure in her skull like a bladder inflating, and she was
back to being Ritanelle again. “Ow, oh gods…”
Minfilia
looked duly sympathetic, but she was smiling as she patted her hand.
“That lasted much longer than your last attempt. How do you feel?”
She
glared balefully across the table. “Like a bloody herd of aurochs
are stampeding through me ‘ead. But I saw…” What had she seen?
It took her a moment to gather the memory past the pain. “Some
Mhachi sorcerer was hiding…I’m not sure what, but she—the
sorcerer—thought it was just a grand surprise. There was a lot of
smoke.”
“Hmm.”
Minfilia made a few more notes and nodded at her. Her smile was
radiant. “You did very well. You’re improving by leaps and
bounds! Do you think you’ll be up to more lessons today?”
“Eurgh.”
Her head really hurt. “…Maybe after I grab some grub. You
want anything?”
“Oh,
no—you stay right there, I’ll fetch something from the kitchens.”
Rita
slumped forward in her chair, propping her elbows on the table and
her head in her hands. If Hydaelyn calls this a bleedin’
blessing, I’d hate to see her curses.
Something
Gantsetseg of the Bayaqud knows intellectually: Coerthas, ever since
the Calamity, is cold.
Something
Gantsetseg of the Bayaqud only comes to understand when she is
actually standing in Ishgard’s aetheryte plaza, bundled up to her
eyes and still shaking: Coerthas is not just cold. Coerthas, in fact,
is bloody freezing.
Her
tail hurts, she can’t feel her fingers, and when she dares to move
her scarf away from her mouth her breath comes out in white clouds.
She
remembers the crash, the screams of tortured metal. The startled
gunshots as their captors panicked, and the screams as the rest of
the snow landed. She remembers how cold
it was under her bare hands. They’re gloved now, but she stares
down at them and she thinks she can still see the blood under her
claws from
where the ice had shredded her skin.
The
snow had been falling steadily around her, big white flakes that had
melted and weighed down her long hair until she’d torn the remains
of an Imperial uniform off the nearest dead soldier. It falls around
her now the same way.
No.
No, this isn’t—it’s over, it’s—
Eirk’a’s
arm wraps around her shoulders, heavy and solid and warm. She crashes
back into herself with a gasp, reflexively cracking her tail into his
shins before realizing who it is. “Azim’s dick, you scared me!”
He’s
grinning at her, teeth as sharp and white as her own. “C’mon,
it’s cold out. Let’s wait in the Forgotten Knight for Rita, huh?”
She
exhales slowly. She is a Scion, and this is Eorzea and not some
frozen Garlemald mountainside. She is safe. She’ll get inside by
the fire, and she’ll be warm.
The
inn
at Vesper’s Bay was
always busy, but now it was packed to the rafters. Word on the
streets and in the adventurers’ guilds was that the Alliance was
finally planning a major push against the Garleans on Eorzean soil,
and every adventurer and sellsword worth their salt wanted to be a
part of it. Gantsetseg of
the Bayaqud was
just one of many, faceless in the crowd save for the horns just
visible under the hat she kept a careful hand on as she made her way
through the throng. Any other time, she might have stopped—to soak
up gossip, to order a plate of something edible or
a drink of something with fruit juice in it.
There
was no time for that now. She
had to get out.
Outside
wasn’t less crowded, but at least she could make her way across the
square without anyone tripping over her tail. Her destination was a
nondescript building hunched against the northern wall of the town;
it looked like a warehouse, but she knew better. Inside, lit by a
single candle, an
elezen man—tall, gray-tinged, with intricately braided hair—was
seated at a table. He frowned
at her through his glasses, and
she saw his hand stray to the knife at his belt.
“Employees only. Miss.”
She
met his gaze and held it until he had to look away. “I’m new. The
wild roses bloom where they will.” She’d had to snicker when
she’d heard the password—roses, for a woman whose name in part
meant flower?
If she’d believed in fate, it would have been too perfect. As the
man rose,
sighing, to stomp down a short flight of stairs and unlock
the door so she could enter, she couldn’t keep a smile from her
face.
It
stayed when she beheld the Waking
Sands.
Though it was all bare stone—she was sure some of the pillars were
actually carved out of the local bedrock—the oil lamps made it feel
much less stifling than the Scion had led her to expect.
The sight of other people in
the storerooms on either side
and the smell of something absolutely delicious
cooking coaxed her to step away from the stair landing and into
the lefthand
room, which seemed to have more people in it. It was massive, and no
amount of squinting could make out the other end. Nhaama’s scales, how far back does this base
go? She
cleared her throat, feeling suddenly awkward. “Ah,
hello?”
An
elezen woman was sprawled in her chair with a book, booted feet
propped up on a
crate.
So absorbed was she that Gan’s voice must have startled her, for
she yelped and dropped it. “Shite, lost my place—oh!” Now she
was sitting up and staring at her, and Gan felt her face heat as she
was scrutinized by the most brilliant pair of emerald eyes she’d
ever seen. “You’re the archer!”
“Do
I—” But, she realized belatedly, she did know her. She’d been
masked, but the tattoo on her cheek had still been visible the day
she and her companions had arrived to haul Gan out of the sunken
temple of Qarn. “Oh, aye, that’s me.” She took a deep breath.
“I am Gantsetseg of the Bayaqud, and I came to sign up on your
advice.”
The
woman grinned at her as she rose, offering a hand; it took Gan a
moment to realize she was meant to shake it. “Ritanelle Soleil,
glad to have you! Come on, let’s have a seat in the back office and
talk shop.” At her blank stare, Ritanelle elaborated, “Skills,
placement. Shite like that. Not
like you get much choice, we’re a mite thinly stretched at the mo’,
but I’d best debrief you before we head off to the Toll.”
Mutely,
Gan followed her. The future stretched out in front of her,
unspooling like thread, and as she glanced around—there a wall
sconce needed refilling, there a lalafell
woman was scribbling in a massive grimoire—she found her mind
returning to a single thought.
The
cry crackled through Ritanelle’s linkpearl, sending ice down her
spine. She felt her ears flatten, and it was only with effort that
she kept her voice calm. Her surroundings helped. In this cave that
had once been a Gelmorran outpost and was now—thanks to a makeshift
aetheryte and her own hard work—her home, absolutely nothing grew
out of the dirt to wave leafy fronds at her. “Summoned where?”
She
swore the silence on the other end sounded incredulous. “The
Sylphlands, same as last time—you’ll meet us there, aye?”
“…The
Sylphlands.” She knew where it was, but she had to ask. Maybe there
was a second Sylphlands somewhere with fewer trees. It took all of
her strength to stop her entire body from knotting itself up in her
chair. “…In the Black Shroud.”
“Aye—bloody
hell, Reets, you know where it is! You’re from the Twelveswood,
aren’t you? You’re one of the best we’ve got—“
Breathe.
She squeezed her eyes shut as a primal tremor rocked through her;
with a gasp, she forced herself to sit upright with her feet flat on
the stone floor. The cold of it burned on her bare soles. I’m
safe here. Safe. Everything is rock and stone and Gelmorra and there
are no vines or roots or—
—“damnable
Duskwights!”—
If
I have my mask—I’ll have my masks, my egis, I’m a Scion, the
Wailers can’t—
There
was still blood on her hands, and a Wailer standard issue blade on
her belt. And it was said that the elementals never forgot. After
all, that was why
the Duskwights weren’t to be trusted. Everyone knew it would take
only one more slight to bring their wrath down. Words didn’t seem
to want to come out, and she hated her voice for shaking. “Say,
remember when I fought Leviathan for you, on account o’ you get the
heebie jeebies near water? Let’s make it square.”
The
heavy sigh was close enough to the link that she winced and rubbed
her ear. “Fine. But I expect pie.”
Oh,
thank the Twelve. “…Meat
or fruit?”
“Meat,
ye great numpty!”
She
slumped over her desk, head in her hands, and breathed until she no
longer felt like crying. Weak she might be, but she’d go to the
Shroud on her
terms or not at all.
ffxivswarm 