After a long, hard weeks travel they are home, barely making it to bed before they have passed out side-by-side...
Morning comes and still he sleeps, to her surprise, rare treat that it is to rise before him. For a time she simply soaks it all in; her body is stiff and sore but the bed is soft and warm, and the sound of his breathing soothes her - she almost dozes off again several times.
Strange, this pleasant effect he has on her, she cannot help but muse to herself. Curiosity gets the better of her, compels her... How long now has it been like this?
She doesn’t wish to wake him, but her hand moves on a stronger desire, too long held back. Fingers brush the strands of his hair, slowly trace the lines of his face. Her expression, first perplexed by this enigma, gradually softens as the sunlight shifts and casts changing shadows over the bed.
Slowly, his eyes open, but the warm, morning spell goes unbroken.
“Sorry...” she whispers, though the apology does nothing to diminish the smile on her face, gentle and bright like the sunbeams cast around them.
“You’re not.” But still he smiles back, amusement on his breath. His hand brushes over her hair, strands of white threading between his fingers.
“Mm... maybe not.” Now she grins, leaning nearer to him, her lips hovering a breath from his. There she pauses, the aura of teasing mischief hanging around her unmistakable.
His tired gaze is half-lidded in expectation, and he lets out a quiet hum of contemplation at her delay. “Hm?”
She laughs. “We stink.”
“Do we now?” He chuckles and shakes his head. “That’s never stopped you before.”
“No,” she agrees, leaning her weight against him. “But it’s a little more noticeable on my clean sheets.”
“Not quite clean anymore,” he grunts, sliding an arm around her back. “They need washing anyhow -” She’s expecting it, but moves with him fluidly as he flips her over onto her back beneath him, laughing with delight. “We’ll clean them later.”
“Mm...” Already she is unbuckling the holster over his chest. “Sounds good to me.”
I didn’t plan on joining the write challenge or anything, but this prompt, well, prompted an idea, so here it is. Vaguely more vague[F]WoL version over on AO3 [link]. Just a short dealio, ~837 words, 5.3 spoilers!! they’re here!
She wakes slowly, the fog of slumber pulling heavily on her mind, beckoning her back to dreamless rest. But her stubborn persistence, a gift and a curse, pushes her out into the waking world, blinking up at the familiar fanning lines across the ceiling.
“Ah, it seems our friend has finally awoken.” There is that ever-constant hint of barely concealed smug knowing in Hythlodaeus’s voice that makes Azem’s mouth quirk into a smile.
“About time…” Emet-Selch grumbles, and she sees him turn from the corner of her eyes, from whatever task he’d been pouring over at his desk to join Hythlodaeus at her bedside. There is relief in his voice, but it’s likely only she and Hythlodaeus would ever be able to identify it, muddled beneath layers of disgruntlement and disapproval as it is.
“Do you have any idea what a clamor you created passing out cold at the Angle?”
“Oh, I made it that far, huh? Well that’s good…” Grinning, Azem moves to sit up - the grin turning into a bit more of a wince as she does. “Here I’d worried I’d gotten caught mid-spell and you’d had to pluck me out.”
“Again.” Hythlodaeus chuckled quietly, which only made Azem laugh, too, and Emet-Selch roll his eyes.
“You’d think you’d be more embarrassed about that.”
“I dunno, it can be fun playing the damsel sometimes,” she laughed again. Laughter that stopped short this time, however, as a strange new clarity settled over her.
“Says the one always running off to play the hero.” Emet continues, shaking his head.
“But wherever would you get your ideas for those stories of yours, then?” Hythlodaeus’s words do nothing to conceal his mischief now, his smirk dagger sharp.
“You-” For a moment Emet rises to irritation, but it quickly subsides to tired resignation. “You’ve been reading my scripts again, haven’t you?”
Azem remains silent, watching the typical sort of scene run between them. They know, she thinks, and Hythlodaeus turns his eyes to her, a knowing twinkle in them.
“Azem?” He interrupts Emet-Selch’s scolding, which about earns another new scolding, but Emet’s attention instead follows. “Do you remember what happened this time?”
“I was-”
“-in the north.”
It feels like two voices overlapping, two memories, both dusted over with snow that sparkles like crystals, and cold winds that bite deep. She gives a small shiver remembering twice the chill.
With a quiet sigh, Emet moves closer, pulling the blankets up around her.
“There’s no need for all of that.” He says, and his voice sounds… older, somehow. Tired. “You’ve made it home now, wanderer, so take your rest.”
Her eyes raise up to meet his; there is no need for masks here in the privacy of their home, not between the three of them. She looks for the comfort of warm gold, but her eyes catch instead on a sharp, jagged glow at his chest. Her eyes go wide, the memories clash together once more, and her mouth opens in horror at what she has done-
“Hades-”
She wakes slowly, the fog of slumber pulling heavily on her mind, beckoning her back to dreamless rest. But her stubborn persistence, a gift and a curse, pushes her out into the waking world, blinking up at the familiar wood planks across the ceiling. “Oh, thank goodness… You’re finally awake.” Comes the palpable relief in Alphinaud’s voice.
“Come now, it’s not as if there was any real cause for concern. This is Ahru we’re talking about, after all.” Alisaie huffs, but Ahru is already cracking a knowing smile of her own.
“Is that so?” G’raha chimes in, “I do recall you being the one pacing about preparing to lecture her about taking on too much all the time.”
“Oh, stuff it, you.”
With a soft laugh, she sits up, glancing around her room at the Rising Stones, at her friends gathered round. The memory of her dream muddles everything up a bit…
“Wasn’t I… in Ishgard?” Or was she getting the two realities confused. It had felt so real…
“That’s right,” Alisaie frowns, folding her arms. “Apparently working tirelessly to help with the rebuilding efforts. By the time you finally deigned to come home and take a break, teleporting took the last out of you and you dropped in the middle of the Toll.”
Ahru blinks in surprise, piecing these memories together. Right, that was…
She laughs outright, unable to find anything but amusement in their vaunted hero collapsing from overworking herself on construction projects. Alphinaud and G’raha smile wryly, and Alisaie all but sputters in confused indignation.
“Sorry, sorry… I didn’t mean to worry you all,” she shakes her head, quelling her amusement. “I’ll be more careful next time.”
“Pff, snowball's chance in Thanalan…” Alisaie grumbled.
“Now, now…” Alphinaud laughed awkwardly. “What Alisaie means to say is, we’re glad you’re home.”
“Like hell it is! What I mean to say is, the next time you-”
Ah, a lecture. This time, Azem restrains her laughter, but cannot hide her smile.
They stop to rest amid old ruins, the sun and a light rain somehow pleasantly refreshing. It washes away the dirt and sweat of their travels, yet the light is warm enough to keep the chill at bay.
“You realize the point of taking a rest is to... rest, don’t you?”
He turns his head to glance back at her, brow arched quizzically. “I take it I am not resting to your satisfaction?” There is a hint of a jest in his otherwise dry delivery, and she laughs - it is bold and unapologetic, but soft and musical all the same. Always, she is a strange enigma of conflicts. She is open and heartfelt, yet even that is measured.
“I’ve no room to criticize, I’ll admit. But I’ve more recently been getting into the practice of allowing myself some leisure. It looked to me that your thoughts were still on the road. Maybe... two days ahead?” She arches a thin white brow, tilts her head. He doesn’t know why he allows himself to be surprised by her anymore.
“Aye...” It is a quiet acknowledgment, guarded.
“We’ll get there when we do. And when we do, and when we find our quarry, we’ll be ready for it. And better for it, for having allowed our minds some respite along the way.” There’s no hint of scolding to her words; on the contrary they are filled with levity as she lightly swings her legs over the broken wall she sits upon, gaze skyward.
After a moment of puzzling over her, he rests his eyes and quiets his own mind.
“You are correct, of course. Spreading oneself too thin is never wise.”
“It’s not just that.” She chirps up again before he can continue. For an instant, she has fixed him with a furrowed brow and a deep frown - and then it is gone, replaced by something far softer. “You’re carrying too much. And I get it... I really do. But sometimes you’ve gotta put it down. Whether you pick it up again or leave it for good doesn’t matter, but you won’t last like that.”
He knows better by now than to wonder, let alone ask, if she truly cares.
A breeze picks up as the rain thins, and she stretches her arms high above her head. Sunbeams dance over the broken ruins, and the flowers that grow up between the bricks and rubble sway about.
For a moment, he breathes it all in. The scent of rain and pollen, the sound of far-off birds singing. The myriad floral colors, the lost workmanship of the ruin; the newness growing from out the old.
What thin clouds there were drift along, and the midday light warms his back and shoulders, easing away old tension. She is watching him again, smiling that warm, fleeting smile of hers that he cannot help to now compare to a sunshower, captivating and ephemeral.
“Of all the things my hands have held, the best by far is you.”
She laughs, soft and melodic, honest and just a little shy. Though ever-forthright, and occasionally even a little verbose, he’s not a man who overmuch lingers on poetry or honeyed words. But he is honest, and there is honesty in him now as his hands run down her sides, coming to rest at her hips and gripping lightly.
There is gravity in his gaze, the same that weighs down each word he so carefully and earnestly offers to her. He is a man of no few years, who has held the reins of power - both real and imagined, and in his conquests surely no few lovers or treasures have passed through his hands. For better and worse he has held the fates of nations, broke them down and built them up in the image of ideals now made false.
For a moment she smiles and nearly gives in to her long-honed instinct; to tease, to deflect. To tell him, ‘With all that you built now turned to ash and dust, that does not seem like so great a feat.’ But she stops herself, because there is none of her heart in those words.
Instead, still smiling, she runs her fingers over the lines of his face. Whatever came of his past misdeeds and blind conviction, all that he had once possessed had once been all that mattered to him. His confession holds no small significance. And there, at last, she sees the thing behind his haunted eyes she could not place at first.
He is not a man who gives into fear, or uncertainty. But he is nevertheless a man just the same, and one who has seen his every work return to him in blood and fire. Will she, who already carries so much, be the same?
“And what will you do with me, I wonder?” She asks, doing as he so often does when she was uncertain or afraid; drawing out the answers he already possessed within him. Though, for certain, there was no small edge of salacious flirtation in her tone as she leaned in closer to him.
He gave a small huff of laughter, shaking his head - already discerning her intent.
“First,” he said, one arm sliding around the small of her back, his other hand slid downward, fingers slowly -teasingly- giving her rear end a squeeze. “Whatever I must to see you unraveled and mewling before me.”
She laughs again, humming in delight at the promise. Her body twists and shivers happily under his touch, and she tilts her head to kiss and nip at his neck. “And then?”
“Then…” His hand at her back slides up and up, cradling the back of her head as he leans down to kiss her lips. There is heat and passion in his words, but they are nevertheless solemn. These are the words of a man whose passions have burned him out and destroyed everything he held dear once before. “I would give all that I am to ensure my past mistakes are not repeated.”
The first time, there is still the edge of animosity between us; I bite your lip and taste reconciliation [it's in the way you breath my name].
The second time is lustful, urgent. Begrudging? Denial? Whatever it is, we're both too stubborn to give words to it.
The third time is tired, and quiet, after a hard day of blood-spilling and dripping sweat. We are exhausted, but still we fold into one another, our bodies humming in rhythm. [We sleep as if dead - as if we hoped we were.]
The fourth time, after a long absence. During the day you catch my gaze and hold it - I am still learning how to read each wrinkle in your brow, but I have come to understand the wanting all too well. Your arms enfold me, your hands tangle in my hair - I wake early and leave the warmth behind.
The fifth time my only exhaustion is with the charade. I am tired of pretending I don't ache for you. I feel myself smile when your fingers brush me; I laugh when you hit your head against the too-small bed frame. It is subtle in the dim light, I might have missed it, but I saw you smile, too.
The sixth time we are under the stars, same as the first. They are different though, and so are we.
I didn’t reblog that Game Over prompt but you better believe I’ve got some in mind... So here’s one of them.
The Warrior of Light sits among the shadows, deep within a place known very well by the dead. How long ago was it, she cleansed such twisted deeds from Tam Tara... The dark rituals of the Lambs of Dalamud... the twisted madness of Edda Pureheart...
Laughter comes spilling over her lips from some place deeper and darker now. It cracks at the edges, and any who would hear it would likely lose heart. Any who would not are either fools... or heroes.
The Warrior of Light moves sunken eyes across the ritual marks, blood and bodies have been heaped and shaped to whatever dark forces she must beseech. Far and further away she hears shouts and the sounds of battle.
"Edda... Edda...? Is this what you felt?" The words trail off into laughter again, and she turns something between her hands - gently, and with such ardent care.
Gaius's empty eyes stare back, jaw slack in a gaunt, bloodless face. Magic preserved him... but she... She'd been too late. Too late to stop the scales of justice from stealing him away from her.
"The heroes are coming, now, my wolf..." she whispers, and leaning back she raises his head aloft. Violent red light twists across her maddened features, her wild hair and eyes far wilder. She lowers his head, moving her lips against his as she whispers.
"The heroes are coming, and I'll not let them take you again."
How many times had she wondered; was she even human, anymore? How many times had she evaded death, survived while others perished, again, and again… and again?
Overhead the stars twinkled, and she smiled back to them, humming some strange, broken song with a dry, raspy throat. She sang in time with each shimmer and wink - or so she thought. An old, old song… a lullaby, perhaps?
She remembered someone that she had once loved, cloaked and masked, humming it to the sea of souls. Long, long ago…
“Ahru…” There, now, was the man she loved. He sounded so distant, and her brow furrowed a little as she tried to focus - like he’d told her to. Focus, hold on, wait. They’re coming. So much frustration, such soft, sad desperation… These things were not lost on her, she knew them so well, so intimately. The pain he felt now she had felt many times over, and would not wish it on anyone.
Oh, how she longed to stay. How cruel, to have found such warmth and love, only for this.
“Ahru…” He could not find his words, none that would suffice. “You have to stay awake. I… I beg of you…” A small, trembling plea so unlike him - it might have broken her heart, if it were not so close to spent.
She could not see him anymore. The stars she saw were of no familiar constellations she could recall - blots of light in a black sea she now swam in. But to each and every one she wished… and wanted… so badly, to stay with him. To raise her hand, to touch his face, to smile and tell him she would not leave him. But even if she could, her fingers had long gone numb, her tongue still and silent.
‘Stay awake…’ she bid herself quietly. ‘Stay… stay…’
It was to have been a simple enough mission. A quick in-and-out of the Castrum as it were; swiping some rumored intel concerning the empires latest project, and gone before the soldiers knew any better.
Ahru, however, knew better than to assume the simplest outcome of any mission. She did so love to hear the nagging sound of her own internal voice ringing ‘I told you so~’ after all.
The Warrior of Light had seen a lot of things in her travels, abominations of magic and science alike, so to say she’d seen nothing quite like this wasn’t correct. No, she could make a number of comparisons; the androids she’d seen on the First, for one, came to mind. It seemed to have a similar level of intellect and fortitude at least, and certainly the thrice-damned weight. The blows that came from the bloody thing hit like a landslide.
It towered at least four times over the tallest roegadyn she’d ever met, and thus resembled a humanoid form. However while clad in armor not so unlike those legatuses wore, it was clear there was no man or woman of flesh and blood beneath. Every blow or shot that struck true put chinks in that armor, showing writhing black flesh beneath. The first comparison her busy mind leapt to was of Omega’s quicksilver-liquids, not a perfect comparison perhaps, but she nevertheless didn’t particularly think it boded well.
Nor had it, as every wound sealed up quickly, not at all slowing the creature down. Instead it occasionally gave a moment's pause, as if re-evaluating - or perhaps as if the thing were not quite complete enough to process all that was happening around it.
Plumes of white breath broke the cold air. They weren’t getting anywhere fighting it, and at this rate they were just as likely to draw all sorts of unwanted attention from the castrum. She was sure from the subtle shift of weight not ten ilms to her side that the Shadowhunter was reaching the same conclusion. The creature tilted its devil-helmed head at them - was it curious? Was it reading their motives from their stances? Either way, it mattered little.
Unspoken, the decision was made; Gaius tossed a small flash grenade she’d seen him swipe from the castrum earlier, and she likewise fired off a bright blast of white magic as they each in unison turned and ran.
“The bridge.” She heard him call out, and nodded to him as he glanced behind them to fire two shots. She didn’t see, but rather heard them strike their armored mark, and a faint mechanical whirring that she hoped was something failing the creature, however temporarily.
The bridge wasn’t far at all, but they wasted no effort in getting there all the quicker. A chasm some hundred or so yalms wide connected only by what barely passed for being better than a simple rope bridge. No two people -save perhaps two lalafell, or small au ra lasses- could hope to cross it shoulder-to-shoulder, and while it seemed to be reinforced with some Garlean materials or such, she had no reservations about whether or not it would hold the weight of that infernal thing.
With any luck, it’d instead be sent plummeting to the rapids and crags far below. Though, Lady Luck had rarely held her in very high regard, and the feeling by now was quite mutual.
She saw Gaius return the Heirsbane to its place on his back, leaning into a dead sprint as his feet reached the bridge. Hearing the sound of heavy metal feet pounding the earth behind her -already too close for comfort- she did the same.
It was an unconscious thing for her to do these days, adjusting her pace even at a time such as this to fall behind just so. To remain the thing between her allies and whatever pursued them. Funny, perhaps in retrospect, it seemed to apply to any would-be ally, even the Shadowhunter.
Her mind was on the bridge though, it’s structure, however reinforced, still stirring underfoot and in the howling winds that tore through the canyon. She moved with it, careful not to overextend herself, when came the sound of the metal monstrosity crashing into the ground at the end of the bridge from where they’d come.
It must have leapt, she thought, to cover ground. From the explosive sound of it, the shockwave of it’s landing broke the very earth, and the whole of the bridge leapt up beneath her like a great wave. Halting on the spot she grasped the hand rails and spread her feet out to anchor herself. There was no need to look back, even now she could feel everything beginning to turn and list wildly - she fled forward once more, aiming for Gaius’s back where he was pulling himself to safety on the far ledge.
Behind her the bridge violently turned one way, then the other - giving her some muddled idea of it’s slow, seemingly seismic footfalls. Then the weight shifted differently, and she had the dread feeling it was realizing it’s error. There was a high, metallic screeching of the bridge supports giving way, echoing across the canyon, and a rapid clicking sound that must have come from the creature.
“Ahru!”
She leapt - and the bridge went out from beneath her.
Gaius’s hand thrust out, grabbing her by the forearm even as she felt the creatures clawed gauntlets hiss mere ilms from the back of her head - close enough to send frigid chills down her spine. She wasted not a moment reaching her hand up to grab the gunblade from Gaius’s back, holding his arm firm with her feet planted against the side of the ravine as she arched her body around.
The creature had grappled into the rock not a dozen fulms below her, parts whirring and hissing as its armor had come apart around its hands and feet revealing anchoring claws. It’s joints shifted into something less like a man and more like some quadruped, a whip-like cable of a tail lashing behind it - the end of it glowed, nearly distracting her...
The crevice of it’s helm, right where a Garlean third eye would be. There was not, however, and the armor was altered accordingly - a subtle fault. She fired once, then a second time. A light burst from its tail just as she felt herself pulled up and about like a ragdoll. The beam of energy sizzled and stank like something putrid and burning as it whurred past her face.
Stood on the ledge, panting, her fingers were still pressed into the Shadowhunters forearm, his in hers. Her last glimpse had been the creatures head snapping back with the impact of her shots, its claws grasping for purchase and skittering down, down…
“Not bad,” Gaius muttered, releasing his hold. She gave a heavy exhale and did the same, offering him a wry grin as she handed the gunblade back to him.
“Good thing I’ve picked up a thing or two about handling a gunblade.” Through both actual lessons and... being on the opposing end.
“Move,” he grunted, already turned and putting one foot before the other himself. Mirthless as usual, but correct - also, she begrudgingly acknowledged, as usual. Hoping the fall would slow that thing down would have been a fools mistake, and she was quick to follow him.
// So I wrote this shortly before the LL and new Weapon series was revealed and had a pretty good laugh, even though it’s very different from what we’re actually getting - the original doc was even just called W E A P O N. Mostly I just wanted to limber up on some less-soft/fluffy things and more of the action/working together stuff between them. There’s more, but will I get to it? Who knows. But I’m posting it anyway.
Amusingly was digging around for a proper title for it and tripped over a GBF event that hilariously felt very reminiscent actually. The image on the video I linked to in the title definitely isn’t what I was imagining but honestly? If you’ve played GBF there’s probably some similarities in it’s nature. :|a
