That was fun. I don't think a lot of my stories were written very well but it was so productive to just be encouraged to write -something-. I'm so glad I gave the challenge a shot (even if I missed a day, oops).
When the little voidsent had found herself beckoned through a fraying seam in reality, a hole between worlds - she’d expected it to be a brief sojourn. After all, what mortal summoner had use for a minion so diminutive, so weak? Her first master had felt that way, growing bored with her quickly, the mistress that came after though…
She was kind, she took care of her, she taught her lots of things, always indulging her inquisitive nature to the utmost. Together, they had found purpose - to facilitate co-existence between mortals and voidsent. So it was that the sojourns in truth, turned out to be the return trips the crimson shade made to her own star, irreparably broken as it was, but not without value.
The trinkets, writings and knowledge she returned with… Melitta thought them key to understanding the mystery of her kind. Though she was indeed voidsent and the void was where for lack of a better word, she must have been born, returning was always frightful. Not solely for the presence of others inclined to devour her to sate their hunger.
The little voidsent’s placid nature had oft been praised, not only by her mistress but by her mistress’ colleagues too and they’d leant her a measure of trust her more aggressive kin lacked. But she was still voidsent, she shared that hunger as keenly as the rest, the urge to betray that trust and gorge herself on the aether of those who valued her was extant, repressed deep in her being. She would not act on it, she refused.
Here though, where ambient aether was nigh non-existent, where the strong feasted on the weak and betrayed their closest comrades for a sliver of mouth-wateringly craved aether… Could she really say that her nature wouldn’t change if she starved enough, despite her best intentions?
Shuddering at the terrifying notion, the shade continued her flight, distancing her mind from the pessimism that oft congealed in her mind during her travel between the crumbling domains of the void. She would return, she wouldn’t change - Melitta was counting on her.
The little voidsent’s capacity to traverse the void was less limited than her more terrestrial cousins, her wings were small - too small to carry her aloft in the other world, but here reality was less rigid, malleable enough to allow her traversal. Very, very slow traversal at that, but her frenetic fluttering ever eventually yielded results, as they did now.
The lonely island floating amidst a sea of uncreation that was the shade’s destination now loomed above her, a few final flutters gracing her elegantly planting her heels down onto the crumbling stonework below, turning a featureless crimson mien up to eyelessly consider the subject of her studies.
Cracked, worn bricks threatened to yield to time and decay and fall to pieces at any moment, yet… they persisted. The diminutive voidsent ran a slender, rubicund digit along one quizzically, the coarseness-... no. It was the memory of coarseness, diluted and altered by the inexorable march of time. What passed for the shade’s heart twinged with ache at the strangeness of the sensation.
The domains she visited varied drastically, everything from the master’s intent, to the composition of their minions, invaders and lurkers, to the inevitable conflict that brewed within changed their appearance and layout. It had ceased to surprise her when a second visit to the same domain had seen a recreation of a colossal tower transformed into a burgeoning, twisted garden, then a third had seen it as little more than ruins.
Though this place too was mired in decay, the grand structure’s waning parapets, crenellations and buttresses were still beautiful, even as their ornamentation rusted. The ornate engravings on the double-doored gate had long since rusted away into incomprehensibility. Even the gorgeously vibrant stained-glass windows that lined the structure’s exterior were chipped and malformed, the scenes that had once played out across the glass warped into meaninglessness.
“Were you always this way?” the shade murmured, considering. For all she knew, the structure had sprouted up but a few hours before her arrival and yet, the indelible reek of melancholy that stained so much of her world, was ripest here. More so than any of the other domains she’d visited.
The door was much too large, too rusty to yield to her dainty hands the little voidsent supposed, glancing across and up the colossal stone building, pacing around its exterior. Her search was soon rewarded with an open window, far far above the broken pathway. Fluttering her tiny, butterfly-esque wings, the shade ascended sluggishly, trying to peek through the stained glass windows as she did so, but the distorted patterns concealed the interior comprehensively.
Clutching at the open window, the diminutive visitor clambered her way through, slowly descending to the floor as she took in the room she’d intruded into. It was colossal, not so much as to comprise the entirety of the gargantuan building, but enough so that even her descent took minutes.
Floor after floor after floor of bookshelves lined the walls, dust-riddled contents so replete with tomes that it dwarfed anything even the Allagans had yet to make the shade privy to. So many books that many had inadvertently formed and fused into towering structures of their own, pillars to support the looming ceilings or simply grasping out, stretching into nothingness, devoid of rhyme or reason. There was however, an effort in progress.
Unlike the exterior, devoid of her ilk - the interior was not so lonely. Though the quantity of books ultimately made their quest seem pointless, unachievable, silhouettes flapped their way through the dingy library halls, grasping at tomes, scrolls and steles of all shapes, sized and means from the numerous stacks, bringing them one at a time to their respective shelves after a pause for consideration.
“Imps,” the shade thought, though she soon questioned her assessment as she tucked herself behind a giant book, peeking out from the cover at one nearby. The voidsent resembled imps certainly, the same dumpy little bodies, bat-like wings and long tails - but the vibrantly mottled hues that typically defined their flesh was absent, replaced by the dry, crisply yellowing hue of old parchment. But most striking of all, were their heads.
The oversized craniums typical to most imps had given way to, perhaps fittingly if no less uncannily for it - tomes. Opening occasionally as they considered their prizes, only to shut after their ruminations were complete and destinations set. The notion fascinated the shade. Had the master here brought to them these odd imp-like voidsent? Or had they adopted this form to better serve their liege’s whims?
It was however, an additional challenge. Rarely were voidsent so unified in purpose, so uniform - her own half-corporeal, scarlet form stuck out like a sore thumb when the others were so alike, to steal a tome and escape wouldn’t be difficult, but to truly take in the knowledge this place had to offer, to bask in its teachings… -that- would take time.
Just as the little voidsent was herself pensively contemplating her next action, a light “thump!” echoed out beside her, turning her head, only to find herself face-to-face with a book-imp, perching around the side of the giant book, holding itself in place with its talons. A chill, as cold as ice ran down what passed for the shade’s spine, body tensing. A single imp was little threat to her, but if it called for its kin…
The creature’s tome-like head opened, the pages within blotting with black ink into the shape of an eye, blinking. Blinking. Blinking. Frozen with fear and indecision, surprise soon dominated the anxious cocktail of emotions coursing throughout the diminutive voidsent as the eye gave way to lips and a dry, hoarse voice vocalised, its every utterance accompanied by the sound of fluttering parchment, “Would. You. Like. To. See. The. Librarian?”
“What a wretched moon it had been…” the abandoned guttersnipe ruminated, squeaking out a sneeze, followed by a snot-nosed sniffle, “And an awful night too.” She had never been squeamish, she was “Stinky” after all. Of all the talents she could possess, rendering herself so intolerably rancid that her presence served to sabotage her patrons rivals and cheating clients was her one trick, her only trick. Without Papa, what other future did she have? It was better than starving.
Still… the sickly Raen never liked it - quite loathed it in fact and crawling her way ilm by laborious ilm against the water streaming from the streets above was similarly miserable. She was mucky, cold and hungry and her body ached, but she’d done it - she’d managed to heave herself off the street up into an elevated, open-faced shop-stall. Inevitably the urchin would catch an earful from its owner come the morning, but what other choice did she have? Her employers were meant to send someone to bring her to safety and they hadn’t.
“First Papa, now those lot…” the shivering mudlark couldn’t help but let out a mirthlessly bitter laugh, exasperated. She’d sworn… a lot of things, very dramatic things, things she meant - but what good was what one day could be if she froze to death? Stinky stifled a sneeze, then another - peeking around in the open room behind the counter. Anything of value was gone, of course - but perhaps… there!
Snatching a still-dry, spare piece of striped cloth tucked under the counter, the sickly guttersnipe unfurled it with muddy, damp hands, drying them off on it - a spare awning for when the other needed drying she supposed. It’d do, it wasn’t as soft or cosy as a blanket, but there was enough cloth to layer up to nestle beneath and sleep the night away. Limply snatching at its corners, Stinky lifted the awning-cloth upwards in preparation to pull it over herself, only for her eyes to catch a glimpse of a silhouette staring down over the counter.
“Good evening,” the stranger spoke softly, feminine voice replete with the sordid affectations of Hingashi’s aristocracy.
“Weren’t doing nothing,” the urchin blurted moreso by instinct than any conscious determination, flinching away, lowering her arms. “Besides it ain’t evening…” Stinky grumbled. Of all the cursed luck - just -who- thought it worth bothering her? The Sekiseigumi? Had the stall’s owner returned prematurely? Had a “kindly” stranger taken it upon herself to chase away the loitering mudlark lest her presence permanently lower the locale’s value? Perhaps her employers -had- sent someone to come get her? Stinky sat up, squinting at the figure.
“I can see all the nothing you’re doing, yes,” the strange woman offered lightly, conceding soon, “And I suppose you’re right enough, though “good night” has such an ominous ring to it, wouldn’t you agree?”
Stinky shrugged her scrawny shoulders, glancing up, meeting the woman… no, a girl, older than she by quite a few years but her features were too youthful to be those of a woman grown. The pale scales cresting her visage and fin-like horns emerging from the tidy, tumbling midnight veil of tresses in truth, catching the younger girl by surprise. It wasn’t that Raen were in truth, especially uncommon in Kugane, but many belonged to its upper echelons and few to its bottom rungs, fewer still that’d fraternise with her.
“Huh? You’re…” Stinky tried, ruby gaze glancing over the intruding stranger’s features uncertainly. She’d never met her before, at least that she could remember - but she was… familiar? The older girl looked it at least, enough so that the mudlark wracked her brain to try and scratch that particular itch. Only for it to strike her hard enough to recoil with gravitas at the notion. She looked like her.
Reaching a mucky hand up to feel at her own countenance by comparison inquisitively, true enough - there were similarities. A similar nose, face shape, eye shape - they shared the same rubicund hue for good measure, but there were differences too. The other girl’s complexion was healthier, less pallid than her own, and devoid of the gauntness and pock-marks that so plagued her own. Pretty, while people found her own self painful to behold on the rare occasions they’d even deign to do so.
“That remains to be seen,” the other Raen drawled, taking the opportunity the consideration had bought her to reach across the counter and plant a hand on Stinky’s head before she could recoil, even instinctively, talons almost seeming to dig into her mind, wending their way through even as the shock of the magic is enough to drive her ebbing, exhausted consciousness to the rest she needed so terribly, even in the wake of an inadvertent meeting that’d fuse her destiny and the other girl’s together, entwined for the rest of their lives.
Slosh. Squish. Splash! Slosh. Squish. Splash! The sloughing water met boot, sole and heel as the masses of Kugane sifted through the rain rolling down from the elevated, grassy garden districts beyond, ground too sodden to contain the volume of water it chundered downwards. The bleary light of lanterns of those lanterns which’d been positioned or relocated quickly enough to enjoy the protection of the underside of balconies, awnings and the insides of stalls glinted off of the wet cobbles and paving stones.
“Help? Help…” called a weak, miserable-sounding utterance from somewhere within a pile of increasingly water soaked rags. The guttersnipe loathed her current predicament. To crawl her way through the water flooding the streets, to remain sat in it and be condemned to a freezing, damp night or to try and hail for help, to be picked up and moved. “Help? C’mon…” Stinky tried again, invisible to the colourfully water-soaked, parasol-toting strangers streaming past.
The only silver-lining to the rapidly decaying day, now dusk, was that she was spared the worst of the rainfall from above by the stall’s vibrantly striped awning, the fruit of a successful conquest. The merchant once running it harangued by the little Raen, denied customers by her rancid presence until she’d had no choice but to close up and leave to pay her debts to the urchin’s bosses lest the tactical deployment of mudlarks continue to deny her customers.
In truth it was little comfort. They always came back to pick her up when the day ended, why not today of all days? Letting out a groan of frustration for her ill-fortune, followed by a heaved sneeze, Stinky reached a hand towards the path imploringly, calling, calling… But it was never enough, it’d never be enough, her hails would forever go unheeded.
The sickly guttersnipe was invisible, existing only in the brief flickers of recognition the city’s criminals and the merchants they sicced her on, spared for her. More faceless to the masses than they could ever hope to be to her, the patch of paving stone she occupied ceasing to exist in the public consciousness as long as she remained there. To acknowledge her, even for a split second, was to acknowledge the failings of the city that’d allowed her circumstances to perpetuate.
And so the distressed, forgotten urchin waited. And she waited. And she waited. And as dusk ebbed to night, she swore that one day they would see her, one day they would love her, one day they would fear her. One day they would drown in her.
Gloomy, violet light pulsed through the hall, growing ever deeper as one’s eyes, or lack thereof in the shade’s case, drew closer to the origin. A tear in the fabric of reality, fraying around the edges - a hole between worlds, one full of life and splendour, the other long-since consigned to oblivion. The world she had come from, presumably once been born in. Bleak and cold and hungry.
“Are you certain you will be fine on your own? Perhaps if I went through wi-...” the tawny-tressed scholar-to-be began, voice tremulous, brimming with concern.
“You would die,” the taciturn voidsent interrupted softly, spinning on her heels to turn her blank, crimson mien back towards the researcher, a thin line ebbing in hue to form a pale, slightly crooked smile.
Melitta bristled at the notion, palming at her forehead as she groaned, “I’m perfectly capable I’ll have you know, I’m the top of my class for a reason.”
“Yes,” the little voidsent agreed with a curt nod, gesturing a hand neither quite fully corporeal or incorporeal back towards the voidgate as she concludes all the same, “You would still die.” An eyeless face canted back to consider one of her own hands, then across to that the facepalming scholar expressed her frustration with.
They were not so different, not really. She was human, or so Melitta had assured her, a notion that was… comforting and she liked to think true enough. But to be human and to be mortal were different things. The scholar who studied her, took care of her was mortal, she was not, it would be tantamount to suicide, or…
“If you survived, you would change,” the voidsent dissuaded with a shake of her head, elaborating further, offering another smile back towards her friend, “You should remain as you are.”
The notion chafed at the novice voidsent researcher, but… as hard as it was to admit, her charge was right. The void was a place brimming with possibilities, enigmas and endless notions, theses and quandaries to study… but it was also anathema to non-voidsent. The little voidsent was the ideal candidate to send and her reports on her capabilities had made that clear to her father.
Her ability to retain information was uncanny, near-perfect even. Her quiet footsteps, unremarkable aether and small stature would let her escape the notice of her own ilk and her half-corporeal form was hard to damage. Though tiny and ill-suited for carrying her on this star, in the void where the laws of reality were different, they might well be enough to carry the shade through the expanse from domain to domain. Above all though, she was obedient, loyal and eager to return and with her, the scholar’s father hoped, the contents of whatever passed for the tomes and treasures of the void.
“Fine…” Melitta reluctantly conceded, matching the rubicund shade’s crooked smile with a concern-laced smile of her own, “But you have to come back, have to survive. We’ve still so much to do. We’re to bring about co-existence between voidsent and Spoken, remember?”
“I promise, mistress.” the shade reassured, smile broadening slightly at the reminder of the wish she’d shared with her.
She’d have to find something to treat the voidsent with upon her return, perhaps something floral… “I know you will. So break a leg!” the scholar-to-be called back, waving a hand, forcing her enthusiasm to mask her misgivings. Watching as her charge, returning the wave - turned back and after only a moment’s hesitation, stepped through the voidgate.
“W-Wow… you must be really tired,” a squeaky-voiced stutter crept out from across the candlelit infirmary, contents as shielded from the sun by the thick, almost florally spiralling hoarfrost as they were by the fact that it had set a good hour or so ago. “You’ve yawned maybe um… twenty-eight times? Twenty-nine? Um, a lot in the last f-five minutes.”
Another, cavernously dramatic yawn rolled forth from the pyjama-clad Raen quite at odds with the alert, expectant glint to her luminescently ruby limbals, gaze wandering the room predominantly, though ever returning to observe the Veena sat across the room at her, crooked hand gently swishing, flicking and swirling as she dabbed paint across another canvass. Another yawn…
“Oh… I’m boring you a-aren’t I? You’re trying to g-get my attention without asking for it,” the rangy woman occasionally known as Spins mused, drumming the bottom tip of her paintbrush against her chin. The sickly detective scowled, face curdling from the veritable wooden mask it’d been before, ripe with offence so grave an onlooker might think her entire lineage slighted.
“Nonsense, your theory has three grave flaws. Firstly - you’re wrong. Secondly - I command attention with my presence, my grace, my delightful face, I needn’t “try”,” Chiho began, thick, aristocratic Hingan drawl oozing from her lips, concluding with a huff, “Thirdly - I only want attention from attractive people.” Holding up a pale, dainty finger as if to lend her words a sliver of gravitas.
“Oh… that’s true, I’m not r-really pretty,” the wretchling offered lightly, as gently and lacking in the craved offence as if the Raen had offered talk of the weather. A flicker of disappointment wending its way up Chiho’s visage as her insult fails to land. It wasn’t in truth, that the notion didn’t upset the Veena as a whole, but coming from -her- of all people? It had ceased to mean anything.
The arrogant, affluent brat was simply impossible to take seriously, too quick to resort to slinging insults, fish for arguments and to grandstand - words that had once stung so thoroughly that the notion of even being in the same room as her had been frightful utterly dulled.
“You were right about one thing though - you -are- boring me. Entertain me,” Chiho demanded, volume and bombastic energy draining from her voice as she reluctantly observes the ineffectuality of her barbs, deflating slightly. Had she truly fallen so far that even the hideous twig of a creature before her refused to rise or crumble beneath her words?
The wretchling considered the request finally given briefly, dim, dark gaze glancing across to the old, longcase chronometer then offered a hesitant nod, piping up, “O-Okay, I think it should be fine, it’ll be a little while until d-dinner time and I don’t r-really mind.”
Truthfully? The scrawny amnesiac didn’t mind, the foul-mattered brat she’d found herself lingering in the company of, treating and otherwise reluctantly assisting was unpleasant, but with the worst of her tuned out that which remained was so dreadfully pitiable… Company she’d once dreaded, now just scarcely preferable to nothing.
Chiho’s expectant gaze upon her, Spins mused on exactly how she might entertain the heiress. A joke perhaps? But she wasn’t especially funny. She’d gotten about as far as working out that laughing at other people’s quips even if they were dull endeared her to them. Thoughts eventually congealing around one of her favourite subjects, one to which the library that housed the infirmary was prodigiously well-equipped to sate.
“W-We could read a book together? What sort of books do you like, Chiho? I c-could go fetch one if yo-...” The wretchling began, only to be cut off by another terrible yawn.
“I know how to read, I don’t need you to do it for me. If I felt like reading, I’d do so without you Spoons.” followed the interrupting detective bluntly.
The sting of the rejection of one of her favourite hobbies, one the waifish bibliomane scarcely got to indulge with others nearly as often as she liked, was utterly diminished by the ridiculous blunder of the name she was in the process of considering a replacement for.
“You know that’s not my n-name, but the more you s-say it, the more I like it, maybe it should be,” Spins snickered, subsequently placating, “I know you c-can read. Sometimes you f-fall asleep with the book on your f-face, reading books with p-people isn’t about um… ability? It’s f-fun to experience t-together and do the voices.” Gentle, ocean blue doe gaze at odds with the glimmering bright rubies of Chiho’s own as she considered her.
“B-But something else then,” Spins ultimately surrendered lightly, a brief, pensive, fleck of guilt dancing across the pit of her stomach. For all her boasts, pomposity and ludicrous claims of legions of lovers, she’d found while running errands, fetching things for and treating the detective that she loathed sharing her personal space, and absolutely despised being touched, bristling defensively and recoiling rigidly. Reading a book together would not be kind to her.
Adding a few brushstrokes to the portrait of the chipped old mandragora vase she’d been working on, bringing to life the azure hue of the royal blue oldroses nestled within, the wretchling offered another suggestion lightly, “Do you l-like to paint, Chiho? You usually h-have a lot to say when I p-paint.” It was true enough, she’d often brought her paints into the infirmary as to indulge in her second-favourite hobby and not leave the sick Hingan unattended too long and the effort was usually enough to prompt a conversation.
“I like it well enough,” Chiho conceded, the waxing tenseness in her form ebbing slightly at more agreeable suggestion, eventually drawling pretentiously in elaboration, “I’d call it a singular aspect of a far greater art, lesser for its incompleteness, but not entirely without value for the facet it represents I -suppose-...” A sweetly mellifluous giggle rang out from across the room, the bookworm unable to help but chortle, the sound wrinkling the heiress’ nose, prompting her to huff, “What’s so funny?”
“Y-You are. You can’t e-even say you like something without having to p-put it down to b-barely be worth your attention or lift it up to be o-only something you are good at, it’s so r-ridiculous!” the chortling amnesiac managed to creak out in between wheezing breaths.
Chiho’s scowl returned with a vengeance, cheeks inflating into a brief, distinctly puffy-cheeked pout, rocking in place to better push herself into sitting up all the more, eventually exhaling, “My papa says I’m funny… but also says I’m not to be mocked. The fact of the matter is that I am a -phenomenal artist, drawing from the inspiration that forever flows free from my bosom, a living piece of art myself.” Pointing an accusatory finger at the lanky Veena, the plaster pale Raen barked, “I had thought to spare your feelings, but I see you need to be “taken down a peg” as you Eorzeans say. I challenge you to a painting contest!”
“I’m not E-Eorzean, I think I a-already told you that,” Spins frowned, a long, leporine ear lopping limply to the side as she craned her head to stare gormlessly at an angle, eyes briefly crossed in fixation upon the challenging digit. Unfolding her scraggly, bony body up from her chair, a smile crept its way onto the wretchling’s face at the notion, returning the gesture with a crooked digit of her own, squeaking, “As long as w-we’re done before dinner though, I accept. What are we p-painting?”
“Portraits. Each-others. I’ll do you that much of a favour - I dare say if it’s of -my- face, even you could come up with something that might be valuable someday. Such is my confidence I will win, I’m quite happy to lend you that advantage,” the boastful Raen offered, remnants of a pout twisting into an awfully inflammatory sneer. Despite her mannerisms in offering the notion, the prospect ultimately agreeable enough to prompt a nod from the wretchling.
“Aaaaand, aaaaaand!” the increasingly excitable Raen barked, stifling a cough into her pyjama sleeve, continuing after a few shallow breaths, “If - no, -when- I win. I should like a prize.” At the curious cant of a head from the sunny-maned Veena, Chiho elaborated, gaze gleeful at the notion, “I have something I think might… improve your look - such as it is.” Wrinkled nose as the wretchling is considered leaving it quite clear indeed exactly how it was.
“I’d like you to wear it for a few days. I am magnanimous, yes? Even in my imminent victory? Chiho Amada the Eleventh - always considering the needs of her lessers,” the arrogant, self-absorbed detective laid out.
Restraining a snort, the wretchling murmured amusedly, “W-Wow… I sure hope it isn’t embarrassing… I’d h-hate to be lesser -and- embarrassed I t-think.” The excitement coursing through the sickly heiress was, in truth - ever so slightly refreshing to behold amidst day after day largely dominated by lethargy - she didn’t terribly like Chiho, but it was hard not to think well of such an improvement in one’s patient, even for a failure of a chirurgeon’s apprentice.
“What of you then? For fairness’ sake even if the outcome is nigh impossible it’d only be proper for you to choose a prize too,” Chiho insisted, offering a few suggestions with a lackadaisical sweep of a pyjama-sleeved arm as her opponent-to-be considered the question, “Coin? An autograph? A kiss on the cheek?”
Spins shook her sunny-maned head, stuttering up with the choice that’d best amuse her and she supposed, be good for the self-absorbed Raen, “N-No… I don’t really want any of t-those. If I win, I w-want you to say one n-nice thing to every person you meet for a w-week when you f-feel better and it h-has to actually b-be nice. No t-technicalities, no put-downs, no c-comparisons to you.”
The notion soured the heiress’ countenance, just as she expected it would. “Of c-course, if you can’t do that… I wouldn’t blame you for giving up,” the wretchling offered, off-handedly, the kindling that ignited the competitive, crimson glare cast her way.
“I -can-! I can do it! Don’t you dare think I can’t! I’ll blow you away with how truly heartfelt the niceties are!” hurriedly barked Chiho, eager to defend her own capabilities, puffing up pretentiously. “Of course… that requires that I lose and I don’t think that likely. Enough bloviating, face me.”
The wretchling’s lips curled into a grin as she divided her paints and brushes into two, a spark of competitiveness taking root in her own heart.
The squeaking and squawking of gulls revelling, tumbling and swooping through a brilliantly azure sky with nary a blemishing cloud upon its canvas, did much to fill in the silence between the elderly Sea Wolf heart thumping with delight, the pit of his stomach threatening to heave with guilt and the sickly Raen street rat he ever so carefully cradled in his arms. It wasn’t unusual in and of itself, Kugane had mellowed him out, exacerbated his private nature and the girl never seemed much to mind, reserved for her own part.
But she would mind. His fortune was on the ascendance and the vicissitudes of her own were leaning precariously over the cliffs of total disaster. Lips parting as if to speak, no utterances were able to creep their way forth from the carpenter, fraught with tension as he ever so carefully placed the guttersnipe down on a bench, stooping down next to her. “I have to…” he croaked out, ebbing into wordlessness in the face of his intentions.
“You have to what, papa?” the Raen queried, rubicund gaze staring out from a visage of pockmarks and scales, watching as the man who’d been the closest thing she had to a father sunk deeper into the bench, deflating with self-loathing. He had to leave or… no. That was dishonest. He could stay, live out his twilight years caring for the girl he’d inadvertently befriended, whom he’d slowly earned the trust of and opened up to in turn, who’d given him the confidence to write back home.
Home… Kugane wasn’t home, he’d lived there for years and it’d never quite managed to strike that chord with him. The sound of the gulls was the same, the salty sea air too, but its atmosphere, its richness, its vibrancy… none had ever managed to replace the love of his birthplace.
When the carpenter had written to the family he’d once had, a family whom the thought of still needled at his heart every day, he’d expected nothing in return, at best a cold, chiding response telling him to remain overseas. The response had left him wondering if he was dreaming.
The carpenter was a grandfather now, his son and daughters were all grown up and had, had children of their own, built lives of their own - lives that despite everything, time had proven salve enough that he might return to. How could he not? How could he disappoint them -another- time? How could he choose to remain here, to die here in a land on the other side of the star, as far as can be from his heart’s desire?
“I have to… I have to go, jus’ for a little bit,” the homesick Sea Wolf lied, pulling from his coat a woollen bundle he’d prepared for this moment, offering it across to the girl he intended to abandon. He could bring her with him, but she’d complicate things, raise too many questions, a pang of shame coursing through his form at the cowardly thought - he simply couldn’t risk it.
“There’s a few bits in there for you,” the carpenter murmured, offering a painfully fake, strained smile down vaguely towards the girl who’d been his charge, unable to look at her directly, lest he commit this betrayal to memory. It was cowardly, he knew that. To not even tell her, but… she’d be okay. She’d be okay. She’d be okay, wouldn’t she? “You’ll be okay,” he croaked, devoid of belief in his own words and with that, began to shuffle off towards the quayside.
“I’ll be good like, I’ll wait. So come back soon, please papa?” the street rat who’d once been called “Stinky” assured, her only response a brief pause in the carpenter’s footsteps and a wretched, heaving sound and so she waited. And she waited. And she waited…
Cw: Body horror involving animals, general grotesquery
In a pale forest, disparate verdant greens, withered browns and ominous crimsons united, tied together by the snowfall ever threatening to bury them beneath a blanket of white nothingness, now rose two other dominating hues. A raging, tempestuous orange that scorched away all in its path and in its wake, flittering, dancing amidst the embers - grey ashes. This was the ancient forest’s swansong and its guardians would sooner see it burn than succumb to the carrion swarming from its heart.
From the numerous timber rope-bridges and platforms ringing the primordial evergreens together forming an elevated Veena village, the inhabitants threw, shot and poured their last defiance into the forest that was once their home. Coal-tar pitch, the reek of it stinging the nostrils of Viera and voidsent alike as it landed amidst the branches, boughs of lesser trees, on the forest floor below and occasionally on groups of the swarming carrion-things, howling and screaming as their borrowed, cadaverous bodies subsequently caught aflame.
Though the voidsent that had mastered the use of foetid wings, powerful leaping legs and other tools that enabled them to begin to rapidly ascend towards the villagers they so loathed fared, the majority of their ilk were stuck below, unable to escape the rapidly spreading, burning swamp of pitch that would erase their moment of triumph and a crushing defeat for the Veena both.
Deer-things brayed and wailed as their bodies were consumed, bear-things thrashed and rolled, the limp patches of fur clinging to their rotting cadavers only all the more thickly covered in burning pitch. Fox-things darted and wove between their crumbling brethren, but could do little more than postpone the inevitable.
A particularly withered carrion creature that might have once been a stag hesitated, empty eyesockets staring up at the village above, brimming with aether, with the foe that had brought his life to an end time and time again, returning it to a writhingly cramped prison at the forest’s heart. Hesitation… he hadn’t thought to hesitate for so long, why did he…?
“You are not an animal,” a voice as soft as silk, as gentle as a mother to her newborn whispered not into what little remained of the carrion stag’s ears, but almost directly into his borrowed skull - no, into his very being. He turned his head to consider himself, rotten flesh overgrown with blooming, rubicund blooms, bones twisted and misshapen, mouth and throat ill-suited for forming words, but he managed to hack out grotesquely all the same, “V-Voidsent…?” He knew as much, real animals were born, he had to resort to taking a body each time he managed to writhe his soul from the tree. But he’d not thought about it in so long…
“Fie, fie! You are a man, a knight - consigned to a terrible, terrible fate,” the voice chided ever so gently. Fragmented, half-lost memories flooded through the voidsent’s mind, wrenched forth from the deepest part of his being. His father gifting him his first sword, the smell of fresh-baked bread, the sound of singing, words lost to time, of loss… a loss so deep, so without parallel in its magnitude that it threatened to rend his very being apart. The once-knight turned his gaze to consider the other carrion, many had begun to hesitate, to quiver and shake, muttering and grunting.
If he was not an animal, if he was a man - then... the thought began, only for a doe-thing to seemingly reach a similar conclusion to his left. With sickening "CRACK!" after sickening "CRACK!" she bent her cadaverous body upwards, rising to clumsily stand on two legs - seizing with her front hooves a spear hurled down from the village above, dipping it in burning pitch and hurling it back!
Though it didn't quite hit its mark, hooves ill-suited even when bipedal to throwing things, it was enough for the others to begin following suit. Discarded bows were seized, branches were snatched and spears were pulled free, the once-knight electing for the latter-most as the "CRACK!" of his body joined the chorus, setting it aflame in burning pitch. If the Veena wanted to play with fire, they would show them fire and burn to cinders together.
The creaking of the wheeled chair rhythmically rang out, wending its way through the silence of the library as in mutual chagrin, a scrawny, lanky bookworm of a Veena found her precious evening routine invaded by the sickly pale Raen who was her least favourite detective and second-least favourite part of living with the circle of scholars she was ultimately now employed by.
The wretchling ill-liked being in Chiho’s presence - but for one who had an interest in medicine, treatment and oft lurked within the library’s infirmary and for another who equally often found herself within, wracked with weakness, breathing issues and pain, their encounters were both inevitable and inevitably unpleasant.
For her own part the detective had little love for the hideous Viera theoretically known as “Spins” and would gladly never have to blemish her eyes again with the sight of her. Today was however a bad day, a bad day in a series of bad days. A tide of ache, waxing and waning by the hour but doggedly persistent even at its mildest, fits of hacking coughs and wheezing plagued the detective.
“You r-really want to join me on my evening w-walk?” squeakily questioned the sunny-maned amnesiac, pausing occasionally to give Chiho the chance to reach out and turn a door handle for her, own crooked hands capable enough of pushing the wheeled chair along, but ill-suited to grappling with doors even when unoccupied.
“Want? No. It is a matter of need. If I remain cooped up inside for more than three days, legally it’s considered a criminal offence. After all, the people wish, nay -demand- to be reminded of my lovely face,” the arrogant Hingan drawled in response, soon continuing, ignorant to the nameless Veena’s rolling eyes, “You should be glad of the opportunity to be useful.”
The wretchling groaned, pursing her lips as the sickly Raen’s boasts washed over her, robbing her of what little good cheer she could muster, huffing grumpily, “I don’t t-think your face is that special… if it was, you wouldn’t have to l-lie about having a d-dozen lovers or however many it was.”
“Ninety-four,” Chiho “corrected” a scowl settling in on her features as much at the rush of cold, fresh air blanketing her as she’s helped outside, as much as at the doubt the wretchling cast on her, scolding, “Doubt my veracity if you’d like, your thoughts mean little to me. Though I should remind you, I am a detective yes? One of Hingashi’s finest? I am a servant of the truth and the truth alone.”
The bookish blonde offered no retort, unable to bring herself to spare words for the sheer obnoxiousness of the compulsive liar her evening walk was to be shared with. Concern for Hingashi rising if this was really the best they had in offerings as far as detectives went.
Crunch. Crunch. Crunch. The sound of snow compacted under skittish boots rung throughout the frigid, snowy hills of a dusky Coerthas. The sun had disappeared behind the pale mountains cresting the horizon about an hour ago by the Veena’s guess, but the last few stifled rays still offered what small semblance of light they were permitted to, to the skies above. The frigid winds battered and clawed at the padded, cotton armour the wretchling had in truth, very little use for anymore, having abandoned the claymore she’d once paired with it. It was still the warmest thing she owned.
Coerthas was in many ways a reflection of her homeland in its unrepentant coolth - rarely permissive of anything else even at the height of summer, a place lost to snow, rime and ice. For all the things she’d hated about the place of her birth, the climate was not one of them and to live somewhere else that didn’t threaten to render the Veena a veritable sweat-based lifeform on its warmer days was pleasant.
It did however lack the prodigiously enormous, evergreen trees of the forest she’d been born in, and the flora which just about managed to survive the snows beneath them. The voidsent infestation too… though it couldn’t be too difficult to find one, could it? She was the wretchling, accursed and hated, the last ironic embarrassment of a bloodline proliferated to hunt voidsent.
She had a gift. One she had, for the most part - used to do ill. It was no longer as reliable as it had been when she’d been a child - but one that even so many years later, through trauma and amnesia, her blood was still special. Once she had been loathed for it, taught to hate it, a betrayer of her ancestors, incapable of their puissance with blood not sacrosanct, but dirty Then she had come to exalt in it, to relish the affinity with aether-starved horrors it permitted her.
Now… the nameless Veena’s thoughts were less clear, the recovered thoughts of a child taught to curse her own nature and delight in it, the suspicion she’d found herself under as an adult, Fioll’s betrayal, theft of her body and subsequent severance, the few moments she’d managed to convince, control and otherwise manipulate voidsent into doing her bidding… it was a lot to consider.
But truly, what else did she have? Her hands could not hold a blade, not reliably. Asymmetrical, scarred flesh and fragile, twisted bones lacking the grip strength to grasp and turn door handles, let alone remain on a grip mid-swing. Magic had proven fruitless, her half-friend Edric had guided her through how to control her own aether rudimentarily, but he was no mage and those she knew that were, only ever offered empty promises of tutelage.
An affinity for voidsent… perhaps it couldn’t well be the Veena’s damnation, or in truth her salvation - but it could be a solution, couldn’t it? One that could enable her, otherwise powerless, pitiable, pathetic, to stand up to a star that seemed event intent on crushing her self-worth under foot. To stand shoulder-to-shoulder on equal footing with those she cherished, a worthy companion, rather than an afterthought.
And so the voidsent-seeking wretchling shuffled on skittishly through the ever darkening snows. Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.
“Once this campaign is over and the flower of peace blooms, my thoughts shall return to my feelings anon.”
“Ever have you been the lealest of my companions, surely another season of war is to be expected? And if it were to swiftly conclude, no doubt I would anon give consideration to our future.”
“You have done much to advance the cause of my family, -our- family, we’re almost there - just a few more battles and surely even the surliest pureblood should want us to embrace anon, proud of your contributions to the empire, Garlean in all but blood.”
“That you doubt tells me that the time is not yet nigh - it is beneath you. What is another year in the face of love? Is it not just another year to let it blossom all the more brilliantly? Have faith, your worries shall disintegrate anon.”
Bile rose in Prisca’s throat - begging to be unleashed upon the wad of letters she’d dug out from within a long-forgotten crate, a tomb where they’d been left to languish for a long, long time. Faded black ink neatly, evenly spaced - but it was certainly her father’s handwriting, near identical to that woven across the letter of congratulations, the invitation to return home for the winter. And so she would - but not yet, this place - half school, half research facility, all suspicious… it still had many secrets she’d see brought to light.
To reach the prominence their family had in the last few decades achieved was no small feat and it had never eluded the favoured daughter that to succeed, to dance between the labyrinthine plots, schemes and ambitions tying the most prominent imperial families together would require equally underhanded acts as well as military valour and yet… these letters. A soul promised that just a few more acts of service, a little more patience, year after year, would permit the favour and fondness that they craved… it was sickening.
Fishing her fingers through the veritable sea of liar’s letters to consider the other contents within, nearer the bottom - older keepsakes awaited - earlier letters and tucked away amidst the nest of parchment - a small, framed portrait Prisca’s sleek digits seized on, carefully wiggling it forth from its prison, holding it up to the light of her lantern for consideration. Though damaged and weathered by time, the once brilliant brushstrokes eroded in quality and hue by neglect - she could make out well enough the three figures on its surface.
Drip. Drip. Drip. Drip. Drip. A cloudy, rosy-hue sopped from the Hyur’s pallid neck, running in a thin rivulet down towards his clothes, dampening the now stained collar. This bore further investigation. Pulling free a magnifying glass from his suit pocket, the detective strode past a disgruntled-looking Hyur woman who’s crimson robes marked her as one of the Sekiseigumi - Kugane’s peacekeepers. Belying his lofty, broad-shouldered frame, the investigating Raen’s footsteps were elegant and light - those of a man who’s every motion had been carefully considered beforehand.
“I think we can safely deduce this one is dead, eh?” the leering Sekiseigumi mocked. The detective ignored her, considering the origin of the flowing liquid. The man’s swannish neck bore a dense, complex network of stitches, glancing through the magnifying glass, the soft-spoken Raen questioned juxtaposingly pointedly, “Did you tamper with the body? Did anyone else?” The Sekiseigumi scoffed.
“Wouldn’t dream of it, I was told to keep the ijin here and wait for you to arrive and do your bit before moving him,” the guarding peacekeeper grumbled, soon inquiring, “How’d he die?” The obvious answer stared back at the detective through the other side of his magnifying glass - his head had been cleanly severed, likely with a blade, then painstakingly reattached. An execution… or so it seemed at first glance. Carefully pacing around the cadaver, he considered him further.
His clothes were of ijin make, or at least ijin styling and his withered, time-marked features and grey locks left him in his late fifties, perhaps early sixties by the detective’s eye, he had been murdered - there was no question about that, and not long ago, rigor mortis yet to fade completely. Bodies did not simply appear by the quayside bound and contorted with metal wire, posed. The detective ran a gloved finger through the cadaver’s thinning locks, checking for injuries- when he found none he considered his body, gently checking it over for discrepancies - nothing else was out of place, beyond the sheen of seawater clinging to his flesh and clothes.
“Amada was it? Detective Amada. C’mon, tell me how the ijin died!” the Sekiseigumi huffed - prompting the investigating Raen to hold up a hand in objection. “We cannot say for certain he is ijin,” he began, though ultimately conceded, stooping down to consider the man’s neck, “Though it is likely.” The flesh around the man’s throat was more disfigured than the rest, likely where the decapitating blow was struck - but the swelling and discolouration was not consistent with a blow used to kill a still-living person. “He was likely beheaded after death,” The detective known as Amada continued, to the scoffing of his one-woman audience.
“Why? Why bother cutting the ijin’s head off then reattaching it, if he was killed a different way?” she inquired, maroon gaze aglimmer with scepticism. It was a fair question - one to which the detective had a theory, though had yet to concretely prove. “A message. A message that this murder was just,” the detective drawled, gesturing across to the man bent low on the ground. “He pleads forgiveness to the sea. Or perhaps to something across it and his plea is met with execution.”
“Aren’t you overthinking this? Besides, who cares about another dead ijin?” the peacekeeper chided, prompting a grunt of displeasure from the detective. It was not an uncommon sentiment. Though Kugane was open to those from beyond Hingashi - a land otherwise closed to outsiders and those who inhabited it were on average, more amenable to foreigners than their kin on the mainland, many - particularly those in the Sekiseigumi, had little patience for them. She might not care - but the detective did. A life had been stolen from its rightful owner, ijin or no - and even if the peacekeepers intended to turn a blind eye, he’d follow this through to its
conclusion.
Glancing through the magnifying glass back to the flesh which oozed cloudy pink liquid - the detective considered it more closely. Blood, more like as not - diluted by the lingering seawater, lapsing from a tear in the stitching. Rising, drawn upwards to his prodigious height, detective Amada neatened his hat, then scorned, “That thinking is unworthy of a servant of the law. I am going to go for a walk.” And with that, without waiting for an answer from the irritable peacekeeper - he strolled away, glancing at the floor through the glass.
The Hyur was killed elsewhere and moved - if the Sekiseigumi hadn’t been responsible for tampering with the corpse, it was possible the neck stitching was damaged as the cadaver was transported. Perhaps there’d be a trail… and sure enough, near invisible to the naked eye - a few speckles of dried crimson marred the lonely street here and there, the graceful Raen following them to a small, long-since abandoned warehouse several streets away.
“Dion. Doris. Irene. Isidora. Leander. Eulalia,” a monotone voice weakly droned from the door beyond the Allagan scholar’s bedroom. “Dion. Doris. Irene. Isidora. Leander. Eulalia,” it repeated. Again and again and again and again. Melitta’s amber gaze peeled open, blinking at the ceiling. For a few, brief moments the chant coaxed a smile onto her mien.
The little voidsent that was the subject of her first assignment was ever fond of the flowers she’d set out for her - but she was also quiet by nature and rarely vocalised without purpose. Was she merely expressing her appreciation for the campanulas more openly? Lackadaisically conquering the great foe known as bedhead as she rose, running a combing hand through her tawny locks as she made her way through the door to the room beyond.
“Dion. Doris. Irine. Isidora. Leander. Eulalia,” the voidsent repeated, in stark contrast to her emotionless tone - her form quivering with tangible distress, vestigial wings fluttering. Smile extinguished in a moment, the scholar hurried her way over to examine the cause of the upset.
The voidsent expert-to-be’s presence snapped the rubicunt-hued shade out of her fixation, near-blank face canted upwards, a crude, pale line playing imitation to a mouth contorted into a deep frown. “I killed them mistress, I killed them,” the distraught voidsent droned. Melitta’s eyes drifted across to the once colourful array of blossoming campanula flowers.
They had begun to wilt, their once verdant stems, green leaves and brilliantly hued bells fading, growing crisp. The source of the damage caught her eye almost immediately. The final row of flowers - an addition she’d recently encouraged the flora-loving voidsent to plant for herself, rather than do it for her - had emerged from within the soil where the seeds were placed.
Though they had far to grow before they’d bloom, the seedlings were visibly altered. Each possessed of a stem as dark a scarlet as the voidsent that’d planted them, barbed leaves a shade lighter, misshapen and still crimson in turn, choking the aether out of their more conventional siblings that they might thrive all the better.
Though the urge to immediately begin researching the inadvertently voidsent-altered seedlings welled within the scholar - the tangible upset the sight wrought in the voidsent that charge plucked at her heartstrings. Melitta truly had little idea if voidsent could cry even if they wished to, but the creature’s distress was both earnest and pronounced.
“I killed them,” the voidsent began again, only for her shoulder to play host to a gently planted hand. It was the oddest feeling, a shoulder both corporeal and incorporeal simultaneously, but the scholar did not err - offering her kindest smile down to her charge.
“Shh… you didn’t kill them. Some water, fertiliser, some sunlight and a few days rest and they’ll be as good as new. The campanulas you planted are very pretty,” soothed the scholar, smile broadening as she inquired in turn, “But I think we might have to separate them so they can grow apart. Perhaps on the other windowsill?” The little voidsent hesitated at the notion, though eventually proffered a curt nod, calming visibly, wings falling still. “I think that’s a wonderful place for them. Would you mind fetching me another tray and a cup of water?” the scholar requested. The voidsent nodded and slunk away.
Her father would have admonished her for interfering in what might have been a valuable experiment - the void-changed flowers reaping their toll in their more mundane brethren and the reaction the voidsent might have had to their actual deaths would have made for interesting data. Data that Melitta had very little interest in - hand taking up a trowel and very carefully digging up the changed campanulas, potting each up, busying herself adding a sprinkle of soil-enriching fertiliser to the withering flowers.
The data that she could uncover by coming to understand the voidsent; her capabilities, her wants, her thoughts, her feelings - her capacity to learn. These were infinitely more captivating to the studious Allagan and in this, her chosen voidsent was ideal.
She considered the shade filling a vessel with clean, clear water. To consider her harmless would be foolish, she was still a voidsent, but she showed little to no signs of overt aggression and though her lack of a conventional face was limiting, her humanoid form made her body language easier to comprehend than her more animalistic and otherworldly kin. Occasionally her taciturn nature frustrated Melitta, but her ability to speak, comprehend and process information were invaluable for study. It had been… rewarding to work with her.
The tray and cup of water were passed across to her one after the other, the scholar beaming at her inadvertent assistant, praising, “Thank you very much, you’re a lot of help.” The voidsent canted her head in acknowledgement. Carefully easing the freshly-potted plants onto the tray, Melitta carried them across the room, placing the tray in question on the opposing windowsill as promised, a place where they’d thrive away from the other plants they’d sought to stifle the aether of. It was then that unexpectedly, the little voidsent spoke up.
“Will I have to be separated too, mistress?”
The question creased the scholar’s brow, though she offered a brisk shake of the head, returning a query of her own, as much to encourage her charge to share her thoughts more often, as to learn what troubled her, “No. I should like to keep you here with me for as long as you are amenable to that.” The little shade shook her head, though her response was not immediate - hesitating before posing the notion the morning’s conundrum had coaxed forth from within, “Is it impossible for your kind and mine to coexist?”
Melitta recoiled, taken aback by the inquiry that lay at the heart of her work - one she’d given thought to often, but had rarely in truth stopped to consider that her charge might wonder the same. Several answers spun in her head - assurances, encouragement, vague dismissals… but whether it be from concern, curiosity, fear or a cocktail of all three - she had been posed the very question she hoped to prove one way, rather than the other. As the very subject she’d use to prove her thesis, didn’t she deserve the truth?
“I cannot say in certainty,” the scholar began, a twinge of empathy for the voidsent before her that withered at her uncertainty, reaching across to ever so gently take her hands into her own. “But I am of the mind that you and I are not two different kinds, not truly. We have differences certainly, but we have more similarities. We can converse, we can comprehend each other. We are both and perhaps all, very human. I choose to believe the differences are not insurmountable. If we work together, we can achieve greater understanding.”
The little voidsent hesitated, then a wide, crude smile crept across her otherwise blank features, conceding with a nod and an utterance, “That would make me happy.”
Rustle. Rustle. Rustle. The crisp crinkle of parchment turned echoed out throughout the empty cafe. A secret nook, nestled amidst the industrial remnants of the cafe’s past as a warehouse found itself rather less so, host to a prodigiously messy pile of tomes, a bowl of orange peels sundered from the citrusy flesh craved and a menace most foul - all splayed limbs, long ears and oversized eyes, as dim as the dying light in the ocean’s depths. She liked it up here, a place from which she could nest and spend an after noon or two escaping from the anxieties and concerns that ever plagued her. The wretched Veena, finishing yet another book, set it aside in the pile.
“A Guide to the Common Ailments of the Mind” by Ser Eugenius had been an intriguing read, the first book on medical matters the wretchling had been allowed to borrow was another work of Ser Eugenius’ and she ever took to his tomes with the highest enthusiasm. The Ishgardian chirurgeon-knight had an uncanny knack for explaining complex problems and conditions in terms gentle enough for a layman, but with enough depth to grasp the intricacies many of his contemporaries struggled to educate on. The diagrams too were magnificently sketched, enough so that the nameless Viera had oft wondered if Eugenius might’ve been an artist too, though she’d yet to find any of his theoretical artistic endeavours.
Today though… it had been a remarkably lukewarm experience. Mental health was intriguing and the book, she judged - was likely one of his finest but her heart simply wasn’t in it. An empty space opposite her in the nook had grown overwhelmingly present for the absence of what once might have been there - had she been a cleverer soul, a kinder soul - one who’d not made the mistakes she’d owned up to and subsequently now lived with the burden of forevermore. The bookish blonde brushed aside a few of her sunny locks from her mien - then reached a crooked, bandage-laden hand across to sift through the stack of tome for a distraction from the loneliness that haunted her every waking moment.
The contorted, asymmetrical warped fingers wreathed in bandaging fabric spidered their way through book after book - fishing for one largely at random - eventually plucking forth a medium-sized book with a raunchy, half-undressed couple on the front. “Fifty Shades of Gay” proudly read the embossed title, lest anyone dare to try and purchase it surreptitiously and dare to try and hide it amongst less saucy literature in shame. A book that was in itself a commitment to own. A book that she’d once read together with another Viera who was equally bold in her bawdy nature.
The woman who’d once been called Spins liked the novel - it was one of her favourites despite the anxiety that flared within her at the notion of being caught reading something so unapologetically ribald. As fond of the contents as much as the memory of sharing them with the woman she had come to love. “Alaria…” the wretchling signed with her left hand, just about making do in the absence of her smallest finger.
What she wouldn’t give to read it, or any other racy novel together with her again, to giggle and gossip as they took turns exchanging silly quips about the contents, teasing each other. The anxiety that so muted her, melting away between the comfort one of her favourite hobbies brought her and the erstwhile pirate that managed to elevate it to something sublime.
As the wretchling began to read it anew, the novel remained much as it was - a titillatingly bawdy romp through situations so terribly cheesy and unapologetically silly in their eroticism that it was difficult not to laugh. And so the nameless Veena did - snickering at the contents even as woe and an aching loss weighed down on her broken heart - but it simply wasn’t the same…
And how could it be? Without the warmth of another body lain next to hers… Without the delight and amusement of emerald eyes beholding the veritable rainbow of flushing hues her face turned as they journeyed through the tome. Without the sheepishness that flooded her form whenever their hands accidentally brushed when the time came to turn a page, hips aching, almost naked for the absence of hands that’d once straddled them. Without her scent tickling her nostrils. Without her lips pressed against her own.
A sharp, distressed laugh wracked its way free from the amnesiac’s lips. Much as Alaria had seemed to have sprung from a novel herself, a character from the pages of a tale of adventure on the high seas… or had appeared so far first - weaving a multi-hued tapestry of wonderment and fascination she brought into the sterile existence the lonely bookworm had once been trapped in, her absence muted the vibrant hues of what passed for her existence now.
“I hate it…” the wretchling signed fitfully, a sigh rattling from her pursed lips. If she had to be without the woman who’d once been her everything, her obsession, her sweetheart, her victim in truth, then why couldn’t she stop thinking of her? Stop drowning in her? Unwinding the bandages around her left hand, shame flooding the gangly archivist’s form as much as the lingering excitement of times gone by - the nameless Veena slid a shaky hand down her side, slipping under the fabric of her skirt.
A gloved finger ever so gently crested the pastel violet hue of the campanula blossom, its owner inquiring, words laced with excitable curiosity, “What is this one’s name?”
“Dion,” a taciturn voice answered in a subdued statement without pause.
“And this one?” the first voice inquired, gesturing to the neighbouring flower.
“Doris,” the second answered as unflinchingly as before.
Swivelling her finger around in a circle, the enthusiastic scholar chose a third flower at random. Before she had the chance to pose another question, the voidsent’s answer slid forth, “Isidora.”
The scholar asked of the voidsent each of the rest of the flowers names, occasionally asking for a few at once to keep her on her toes - checking each answer against the diagram that she’d put together to track their names herself. The names were in truth not terribly important, but for the simplicity of the experiment it had yielded important data.
A smile bloomed across Melitta’s lips as she praised, “You got them all correct! You’ve done very well, thank you.” The voidsent offered no immediate reaction, the scholar considering her. She was humanoid, not dissimilar to a Hyur in shape though only three and a half fulms tall, her crimson-hued form was neither quite corporeal or incorporeal straddling the line between the two. She had a face, but lacked any features and from her back sprouted tiny, vestigial wings, similar to those of a butterfly. A thin line of the red voidsent’s otherwise featureless mien paled, briefly forming a contrasting arc.
A smile… it was simplistic, even crude - but the voidsent was smiling. “Did that make you happy?” Melitta questioned encouragingly. Her test subject nodded. When she had no other tasks to perform and wasn’t sleeping, the voidsent often came to linger by the campanulas. “Do you like flowers?” the scholar inquired further, hoping to excite an answer from the flora-loving creature, usually so taciturn. No answer.
Ever had voidsent fascinated the scholar, much as they had her father; an expert on their ilk. A field of growing potential, growing more eminent amongst the more established fields of Allagan research. So it was that when she’d announced her intent to follow in her father’s footsteps, he had - chest puffed up with pride, offered to her a lesser voidsent from his collection to study for her first assignment.
Tricky imps, fierce vodoriga, gelatinous flan, mimicry-loving gremlins, ever-staring deepeyes; the collection had been as vast as it had been fascinating. Each so bizarre and odd looking as to almost look the part of an eikon, one of the false gods summoned by one of the empire’s foes, each brimming with its own quirks and wants. But it had been the taciturn voidsent that drew her interest - a creature almost straight out of a fairy-tale.
The Hyur’s meek mien contorted, twisting into the very facsimile of fury - a rage burning so hot as to suffuse every fibre of his being, much to the ignorance of the man who bore a face with features so alike his own. Fingers clenching, a furious twitch nestling in his leafy green left eye, chest rising and falling with rapid, shallow breaths - limbs tensing. “Be graceful about this, brother. You never had any talent, so it’s only natural tha-...” other brother began, sealing his fate - the gysahl green that broke the chocobo’s back. Snarling, the twin in the grip of hatred sprung forth - hands seizing his brother’s head, momentum carrying it forward to be dashed against the wall with a great and terrible, “CRACK!”
A horrified, agony-laced yelp tore forth from the second sibling’s maw, body rigid as he began his belated struggle, clawing back at his aggressor, kicking - but he would not relent. Another “CRACK!” then another as his head was dashed against the increasingly bloodied timber wall repeatedly. A fourth had the weakening twin collapse, sliding down the wall, swollen, broken flesh leaving a wet, crimson smear in the process, falling limp. Even still the incensed Hyur did not relent - kicking and stomping each and every trauma that plagued and scarred his tormented psyche into the splintered bones and rent flesh of his tormentor, a distressed cackle tearing its way from beyond the murder’s lips.
“He killed his brother,” a blunt, aristocratic Hingan voice grimly stated. She had seen enough, her judgement clear. Even so gently pulling her hands away from her own sibling’s smaller mitts, letting the vision they’d so painstakingly sifted through their victim’s head together, fade. The youthful, hate-consumed tailor’s blonde locks faded to a dim grey, losing their lustre, flesh growing taut, marred by time with wrinkles and marks. He lay prone on the bare floor of the derelict dock warehouse, chest rising and falling with life - but lacking consciousness.
“He killed him, but…” the other girl spoke up, reticently running one hand across the lime green pigeon mask shielding her mien from the horrors she’d witnessed, the other reaching out to grasp at one of the garishly brightly coloured wooden puppets that’d been set nearby. The taller Raen seized the other in turn, holding it up to her own mask - a bright orange robin mask, to be considered. “There is no “but”,” she offered tersely, returning the puppet to her satchel - reaching a hand out to accept the pigeon-masked girl’s own, stuffing it within in turn while continuing coldly, “He murdered his brother, a severe crime. It would be just for him to die, to meet the same fate.”
“No, it ain’t as simple as that,” the other girl refuted, her guttersnipe-esque colloquial spiel lacking the grace and gravitas of her sibling. It had taken them hours of sifting through the Hyur’s mind, of following the tail from memory to memory to assess him and eventually, dig deep enough to uncover that he repressed most of all. She felt for him. She always felt for their victims at least a little, it was hard not to after witnessing an unfiltered collage of another person’s worst, most embarrassing, most painful moments. “His brother made him feel real bad, like he weren’t much of anything for their entire lives together. It were wrong but…” she softly disagreed.
“Then you’re saying it was just for his brother to die,” Robin bluntly posed severely. Pigeon shook her head. “No, that ain’t what I were saying at all, it weren’t right, but he lost himself and must’ve seen it too like. How much what he did hurt him? It didn’t never stop playing on his mind; nightmares, self-hatred, he couldn’t stand looking at himself or nothing,” she pleaded on the tormented murderer’s behalf. It had been a crime of passion, all-consuming hatred in the moment, followed by a lifetime of remorse and pain… She rarely felt inclined to oppose her sister, she knew best after all, but this wouldn’t be justice.
Robin’s posture grew more rigid, displeasure coursing through her form. Stooping down to sit behind her sibling - meeting her gaze through the slits in their respective masks. Ruby gaze meeting ruby gaze. “You have a weak heart. It is just for this man to lose his life,” she hissed, soon growling, “He committed a crime, he must pay the price - time and regret fail to change what happened, they do not return his brother to life!” A row, they were rowing and they would continue to do so for many hours. An argument that chipped ever so slightly, the trust between the two.
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