‹ TO ABANDON, TO FOLLOW HABITUAL URGE TO SIMPLY RUN; flee to cope with responsibilities she deemed naught but her own to bear; to handle misery in a way she deemed GOOD. Such had always been her nature; a wild & an obstinate thing, rather prone to sinking her every nail into own skin long ere even considering to INQUIRE aid. To promise & promise only to watch words become ash & backs turn / to then clandestinely wander, never to return [dear Lyse, forgive me, I did it again]. Oh, but can you blame her? The Crystarium had yielded no solace; ‘twas but yet another gilded cage. – summoned, unjustly so. Her presence here was naught but a mistake / grasped & torn out of common routine, soul ripped out of a dying husk. THIS SHE KNOWS: oh, she could feel every year carving itself into dormant body. Into flesh & bone, sheltered somewhere in the Source, comatose, again; lo, a pang of phantom pain, chest heaving as if met with a sudden weight [fingers itching; urging to be pressed against marred skin through dire recollection]. – listen, dear friend, do you hear? Even this separation of body & soul could not delay the inevitable: certain death.
Head turned, scorched glance cast into the undergrowth; to mayhap inspect a nest of roots, aetherial signature entangled & interwoven thus becoming one. Ah, a simile, nay? Dearest allies all dragged into the same pits, fates linked forevermore. – ‘don’t leave me like this’. I wish, I wish, I could but answer frankly. Lids flutter / closing, doing nothing to repress budding INSECURITY; an agony usual mantra could not quench. – an ill-foreboding, the sentiment of paranoia reigning her every thought; shout: WHAT IF IT KILLS YOU, LUNAE? – what if, what if, what if. Oh, dear warrior, don’t you know? She had no life left to give.
❛ Ah, to rely on a mere hag’s fallible judgement seems but inane to me. ❜ lips curl to form a mere simper / it falls apart, dissolves as briskly as it came. – ‘twas an odd jest, spoken in most mellow tone / streaked with but a bit of own bitter TRUTH. Was her once pristine judgement not clouded by own condition? Own bias, own… ever so grim point of view? Was she not too suspicious, too reclusive to deliver an usually CLEAR & PRAGMATIC verdict? Aye, what was she now if not bitter & cruel, BLINDED by duty & relying on the very mercy of the Gods; clandestinely, secretly willing to accept her fate once their voyage had been committed & their battles won. – one final sacrifice, ere she would relapse & retreat, spending the rest of numbered days here midst fauna & ruins, studying the arcane ‘till body would fall apart forevermore.
❛ rest assured, I do. ❜ she began, ever so absentmindedly. FACTUALLY, aye & yet agonized all the same. Indeed, dear Lunae, the years have not been kind. – here’s to the martyr, the hero, a single man meant to SAVE them all; so full of esperance & vigor, so full of stubborn determination perhaps fit to rival her own. Cue a pause, thoughts trailing back to observed roots; tied by destiny, by a course that had never truly been their own. Ah, to sit here with arms in a fold & staff set against a near-by trunk, dull eyes wandering in most merciful melancholia, ears picking up chatter on the other side of established camp; gunbreaker & oracle, academician, red mage & astrologer. Quite the lot, were they not? Indeed, fate had led them here, had reunited what she had once chosen to neglect. Say, can you promise not to fall back into old habits? Leaving due to fearing tears & burning glares, fearing hurting those so very dear? Concealing the very condition that plagued her so, that forced their paths to diverge, that had shattered once caring demeanor with its crippling blows? Brows furrow, a single hand brought up to rest against her very chin, held exhale falling from painted lips [swear all you will. you will break your promise, again & again & again]. It hurt; to know that what followed was yet another lie. ❛ – I won’t. ❜
a languid, labored breath subsequently vacates his slackened lips, and yet ---- to recognize these thwarts of pain is to also prepare for the inevitable. ‘twas just something the miqo’te hadn’t exactly desired to sunder his own heart for ; as y’shtola is by far one of his oldest, most earnest comrades. ❝ you know, ❞ the lilac hues come to a close. almost reminiscent of a calm snowstorm as their hair caught the nearest breeze. silent solace, yet frigid and dormant ; a husk, akin to her own carved carapace. ❝ i met an assortment of warriors of light whence i was in the throes of dying. all from various stages of their lives. different races, a range of newfound and warriors of ‘eld ---- it was almost like looking into a refracted mirror. ❞ they’d never said anything as to what they’d learned in that fragment of a meager second. it was a private epiphany betwixt himself, emet selch and the various others. born of a wish. for each atom that made up lunae willowbane ; there was yet another piece to rise in order to take on his place amidst the world’s waning absence. to ask so much of a single individual ---- to swallow each moment that had passed him by. despite all of this, each loss still weighed so heavy ‘pon his shoulders. so close to shattering, to giving up ---- and hadn’t it been for eorzea’s eyes upon him ---- maybe they would’ve eventually succumbed to the enigmatic ferocity and carnage as zenos yae galvus once suggested ?
❝ and despite there being so many amongst us that can play my role on this gilded stage, there was only ever one of you, ‘shtola. ❞ a placated expression passes by their stalwart visage. ❝ so i suppose ‘ this old hag ’ is going to have to acknowledge that her input is more consequential than she’s been otherwise led to believe ? ❞ still, they choose to obscure themselves in a shroud of vague gestures. in truth, the miqo’te doesn’t wish to display vulnerability in the same notion that y’shtola avoided such ‘ messy ’ personal connections. perhaps it was something akin to how both were raised ; confused, conflicted ---- lost or abandoned amidst a riptide of conditional love. ‘twas only when they realized they held the echo that the world didn’t turn their back on the miqo’te’s struggles. for their people were a prideful lot. disgusting in their blatant hypocrisy and scorn. their cruelty taught them to be hard ; to accept reality ---- no matter the explicit grandeur in which it bifurcated his wept heart. y’shtola would’ve lied to lessen the ache ; she loved enough to lie, and yet the truth is spoken in-between the lines of her painted lips. so pretty, her coy smile once was ; the saccharine of her silken voice, like a mockingbird’s sonnet.
❝ you are quite the actress, though, ❞ his guile knows no bounds. a mere child barely out of gridania he had been, once upon a time. now stands before her a martyr ready to rip asunder the cosmos ; should the stars fall. ❝ ---- so may our words keep their oath, even if our souls cannot. ❞ a silent notion of gratitude ; as simple, and as brief as it was. deeply, he loved her so ---- as a brother would a sister, or as a wick of a tallow candle wouldst a withered flame.
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