#Madelaine Lachance

[onwesterlywinds]

FEBHYURARY 4TH - TIME @FEBHYURARY

"Let's give it one more try," Sigrid said.

Madelaine nodded and sent up the last of their flares. Still no response came from the portside of the Lady Radlia: the great ship hung in the starry sky, looking for all intents and purposes abandoned, and another two minutes passed without incident.

Rather than approach in her manacutter, Sigrid piloted the Merlose directly beside the much larger Lady Radlia and made the quick jump between their railings. No alarums rang out, no sentries stirred to life.

"Captain," Madelaine said warningly.

"I'll be fine," Sigrid interjected, surer of that than she had been in a long while. "Take the night off. Spend some time with Leofard, why don't you; get those moon eyes out of your system."

"Captain!"

Sigrid shot her a grin just before she descended belowdeck.

She'd been given to understand that the Lady Radlia was gaudy, overly ostentatious in its décor; in contrast, as she paced the halls with only the lantern at her waist to light her way, she found the craftsmanship finely wrought, purposeful in each line of wood and curve of brass. It was certainly a far cry from the Parrock, where the Redbills' idea of decadence was apparently to fill every conceivable space with heaps of treasure; even so, the relative understatedness made the silence and solitude throughout the cabins that much more pronounced. As Sigrid stepped onward, the only movement she could espy was the glow of a candle flickering out from under a closed door at the bow end of the ship.

She drew up and knocked twice with the backsides of her knuckles. "Captain Radlia?"

There came a clatter, the sound of a heavy metal object being thrown against the wooden door. "FUCK OFF, REDBILL!"

"It's Sigrid," she said, then added, "captain of the Merlose."

Radlia loosed a shuddering breath but said nothing.

"Is anyone else in there with you?" Sigrid asked.

"No one. I sent all the others away."

Her heart ached at that, more than anything else she'd heard that night. "I see."

The door creaked open a fraction of an ilm, but no farther; a single set of footsteps receded further into the room. Sigrid did not think to press her entry until Radlia spoke again. "Well, come in, then."

Sigrid could not imagine that any had ever witnessed the young captain in such a state before. Her makeup was smeared halfway down her cheeks from all the crying she'd done, her face shone with patches of pink, and even her hair was out of sorts. A wine bottle and glass sat before her, both blessedly full; they were among the very few objects in the room that had not been upended, tossed aside or torn to shreds in what looked to be a violent and wholly unremarkable expression of grief.

Radlia did not look at her for a long while, much less speak to her. Sigrid righted another chair a moderate, respectful distance from her - about halfway down the head of the table, well within the meager light of the candle.

"You're Ala Mhigan, aren't you?" Radlia said eventually. "It's what some little birds have said - the ones who can find anything on you at all."

Sigrid hadn't expected the question, nor anything like it, from one of the most self-absorbed pirates in the skies; even so, she nodded. "I am."

"Then you must have some idea of what this means for me." Radlia stared off into the distance before elaborating. "'Strong and unified,' we say. Looking after your own, promising to protect them with everything you have - and I've gone and gotten them all killed."

Sigrid could not understand it, not fully. She had elected to never employ any others under the Lily Sigil for that express reason - to ensure that her failures would remain her own - and for a time, they had been. Until Brynhilde. All the same, she nodded to Radlia. "I'm sorry."

"Don't," Radlia snapped. "I need your pity even less than I need a hole in my hull."

"It's not pity," she retorted. "It's sympathy."

That brought some semblance of a reaction out of Radlia: as Sigrid watched, her lower lip began to tremble, until she cut off the impulse with a bite of her teeth.

"Now," Sigrid continued, in as gentle of a voice as she could muster. "I came here to look in on you. Not to berate you, not to spur you into action - only to make sure I didn't drag myself through that Twelveforsaken bog in vain."

"Well, you didn't, did you? You and Leofard found your precious Nullstone."

"That is the very least of my concerns. Your crew are gone, and so it stood to reason that you would have no one at your side to help you through the aftermath of what you endured."

Radia's eyes narrowed. "Speak plainly, Captain."

Yet Sigrid maintained a moment of silence before she breached the heart of the matter. She had hardly endeared herself to Radlia thus far, but there was far more at stake than simple pride; a single misplaced word could traumatize her to the point of despair.

"The demons that captured you." They had strange names - familiar, though Sigrid could be certain she had never heard them uttered before. "Did they harm you?"

The deepening of Radlia's frown suggested she understood all too well the horrors Sigrid implied. In truth, Sigrid had little idea of what she would do if Radlia answered in the affirmative: to insist upon some half-conceived course of revenge would be to place Radlia and all other survivors in even greater danger, yet neither could she sit and lament for the personhood of a young woman she scarcely knew.

But Radlia shook her head vehemently. "They mostly left me alone. But that was the worst part."

Sigrid frowned. She could not relate, not in the least, but neither would she wish for Radlia's better luck without first hearing of the horrors she had endured. From the far-off stare, such details were forthcoming.

"At first I was hiding from... from something. The spider, I think. One of my gunners pushed me behind a boulder while he tried to fend it off, but something massive dragged him away. I didn't see what it did to him. I only heard it - I heard it tearing him and the others apart. Then, just when everything fell silent, the screaming started up again, and I-" She choked out a sob. "That's when the demon bastard took me. I couldn't see; I couldn't move, not to cry out, not even to breathe. I was trapped there, in darkness, listening to them die over and over while he laughed."

Sigrid brought her chair a fulm or two closer, close enough for her to rest a hand upon Radlia's arm - then Radlia leaned her head into her shoulder, utterly motionless in her grief. Sigrid stroked her hair.

"It's over now," she whispered. "It's over and done, you hear me?"

Radlia nodded, then righted herself once again. "Over and done," she repeated.

"But it will take time, and the patience and grace to let yourself grow from this."

"There's one thing I have to know," Radlia interrupted, and Sigrid knew at once what it was from the seriousness in her voice. "Back at the Parrock, I overheard some of the Redbills talking about your battle against Forgall. When the others were all turned undead, you..."

Sigrid let her grapple for a conclusion to her thoughts, a means of stringing them into the question that weighed on her, until Radlia frowned in expectation of her answer. "I wasn’t," she confirmed.

"How?"

She wished she could know the answer for true. Even now she recalled the chill of Forgall's hellish winds, cold as a shriveled, withered hand grasping for her in the dead of night. Her fellow explorers had fallen at her side, one by one; she had heard them choke on their own lifeblood, smelled the rapid decay of their flesh - and when the plague-laden gust had cleared, only she had stood, with her scythe still in her hand, to cut the voidsent prince in two.

She gave as nonchalant of a shrug as she could muster. "I've had my own brush with death."

Radlia apparently did not find this answer satisfactory: her glare returned in full force, no less diminished for her grief.

"Back in Ala Mhigo, long before the occupation, I slew a man who wielded the power of death itself." The admission encompassed so little of the full truth as to be a lie in its own right. "Such... feats... leave one changed. Often in ways one can never fully grasp."

Radlia pursed her lips, and Sigrid could not tell whether she'd found her explanation satisfactory until she spoke again. "My father told me of a story like that - something he'd heard from a woman he'd met in Ala Ghiri." Sigrid had not set foot in Ala Ghiri for many years and did not know who might have spoken so carelessly of the Undercity, let alone of Blackram's reign over it. For a mercy, Radlia did not press that particular line of thinking any further. "Do you think there's a chance I could-"

"Develop your own affinity with the void? I doubt it. You would likely already feel it if you had."

"I almost wish I had. Perhaps then, their deaths-"

"Do not bring that thought to life," she said, perhaps a little more sternly than was needed. "Such powers are not to be spoken of idly. It is a far greater gift that you have emerged from this ordeal wholly yourself, and in control of yourself. That is what your people's deaths bought you, and it is precious indeed."

Neither of them spoke for a long while, until Radlia let out a strangled sort of scoff. "Has anyone managed to tell you how irritating you are when you're right?" Before Sigrid could respond, she added, "But thank you."

"Of course. It's the very least I could do for a cousin."

The word tasted sweet upon her tongue. She had not realized how much she had missed speaking it - how much she had missed Torben.

"C-Cousin?" Radlia stammered.

"My full name is Sigrid Keane." She'd seen Radlia spell her own surname slightly differently from her own at captain's moots - "Keene" with two Es - but such differences were insignificant overall. "I imagine our respective forefathers hailed from the same clan."

Radlia gave a rough sniff. She wiped at her eyes once more, and something in her posture straightened. "Don't think I'll give you any quarter for it, once I've made my return to the skies."

"I'd have it no other way." She smiled, and stood. "Stay aboard the Merlose tonight."

"But-"

"My crew can look after the Lady Radlia - this ship, that is, not your fine person. What you need most is a bright, warm cabin and the sound of company close at hand."

"And you're speaking from experience, are you?" Radlia challenged her.

"I am," she murmured, and Radlia's face fell. "Oh, my dear girl, of course I am."

Radlia said no more, but she did stand from her chair and give the trashed command room one last forlorn look before departing her airship for the evening.

By the time they returned, the Merlose was already short a manacutter and Madelaine was nowhere in sight, which likely meant she had accepted Sigrid's proposal to bother Leofard for the evening. Sigrid drew a hot bath with water heated from the engines' steam and bestowed Madelaine's clean towel upon Radlia.

"I permit myself a glass of arak or whiskey once a month," she said to Radlia on her way out of the bathroom, "and I believe tonight is as good a night as any to partake. You're welcome to join me once you're done; I'll be in the navigation office."

She never allowed herself to work after emerging from a trying circumstance. Despite the treasures to be catalogued and a fresh stack of letters to read through, all of her tasks could wait until the morrow at the very earliest. All the same, relaxation did not come easily: her focus drifted to the star-strewn sky outside the concave porthole window before she had even procured her liquor, submerging her melancholy in the stars with the excuse that she was biding her time for Radlia.

But the young captain never appeared, not even after she'd drained her glass and the melted ice along with it. When she made to return to her bedchamber, it was to find Radlia Keene fast asleep beneath her down comforter, curled up with all the abandon of a child. Sigrid approached her only to blow out the candle at her bedside, then pulled the chair to the door to keep a silent vigil amid the dark.

[farplane]

DAY 3: SCALE

The captain had agreed to meet him off the coast of the Jade Sea.

It might have been simpler to choose any old plain outside of Radz-at-Han, but he had long since understood his home was no longer a refuge and harboured no desire for his dealings to take place in its proximity. And besides—the one who had gone through the most trouble getting to the meet was him.

He didn’t have a bloody airship to fly him halfway across the Continents in a matter of hours. When he lamented such woes to Nairel, she snorted and said, in that delightfully flat tone she took to put him in his place: “You are the very spirit of penury.”

“I am horribly skint at present, I’ll remind you.”

“But skint isn’t poor, is it?” Nairel retorted effortlessly, as if it made much of a difference to a woman who lived in the bloody woods.

She had a way of easing his nerves. 

Though he prided himself on his ability to be in command of most situations, there were two things wrong with that belief: the first being that it had only been hammered into his mind since tender youth by a man whose word he wished never again to live by; the second that, of late, his life had been a veritable unravelling of any control he might have ever had over himself and his own fate.

It was as though he’d constructed the very circumstances that were sure to make him nauseous with dread. This was not Radz-at-Han, but knowing his family’s reach, he may as well have been standing right at the heart of it. He could have picked any place—distant Kugane, some miserably dusty point in Thanalan, even drab freezing grey Coerthas—and instead he had wandered so close to home, like a lost little boy running to the last place he had seen his nursemaid.

He was halfway through regretting his choice of locale for, oh, the eighth time when the Merlose touched down at a careful distance. Nairel, bless her heart, caressed the hilts of her knives as the captain approached.

To her credit, the Merlose party only outnumbered his by one—and their third member didn’t seem a fighter at all. She was slender, slighter than the aging captain—still strong with corded muscle, and no doubt as deadly as her reputation made her out to be—and wore a complicated loupe on a threaded silver chain about her neck. Most likely the captain had preferred an appraiser to a killer for these particular dealings.

It was the long-limbed Elezen at the captain’s right hand who concerned him, but Nairel at his back lessened his fears. Even with a mess of Void churning inside him, he could still bash heads in without magic, and he had the most vicious five-fulm-and-then-some(-she-insists) forestborn in Eorzea at his side.

“Pavane Malichar,” said the captain, as though the name meant something to her.

“Captain. I trust your journey was—”

“You’ve brought the payment?” asked the Elezen, no-nonsense, eyeing the very conspicuous coin pouch at his belt. Then, evidently critical of its size: “All of it?”

Pavane untied the laces, but didn’t part with the purse just yet.

“I understand and empathize with your wariness—in fact, I very much share it. Mine is a difficult package to conceal without glamours, and I neither see it nor sense its aether.”

The aether part was a bluff, but normally, it wouldn’t have been. And that was the reason Pavane had been grinding his teeth enough to ensure they’d be worn down to nothing by the turning of the next era.

“I am not in the habit of robbing downtrodden nobles just standing on a beach,” the captain said with a dangerous smile, and paused long enough to give power to the sound of waves breaking onto shore. “Not much challenge in it.” She turned her head to the Elezen: “Bring it over, Madelaine.”

Madelaine cast him one last dark look—a pirate’s trade-tool, he supposed—then turned on her heel. Pavane tossed the captain his coin pouch, but she didn’t hand it to the appraiser until her right hand had returned with a long coffer under her arm.

Already Pavane could feel some whisper of power stir within him, stoked by a boyish excitement for the relic that was so close to becoming his.

“I understand my first mate’s apprehension, lord,” the captain said, keeping her eyes on him as she passed the pouch to the appraiser. “That purse seems quite light.”

“Yours was a steep price, Captain. I’d have broken my back carrying the full payment if it was only in coin.”

He was confident in what the appraiser would find when she opened the purse, nestled among the absurd amount of gil that was only a portion of the price. The medallion had been forged, it was said, in the stone-heart of Mhach in the last days before the Flood—the first of House Malichar had made herself, then, the inheritor of her city’s great legacy. And it had been passed down through the generations, from heir to deserving heir, to wear her two-headed serpent upon their chest and signify their birthright.

Never had it been lost. Pavane, as a student of history, knew that it had changed hands outside of his family a number of times—but any thieves that stole it had only ever met gruesome ends. That was House Malichar: his ancestors had set a horrifying precedent for the exercise of their own power, all to the singular end of its preservation.

And he was giving his birthright away for another piece of Mhachi power—to make, on his terms, his own legacy.  

The appraiser fumbled her loupe twice in her haste to inspect the medallion. She took a moment, her expressive eyebrows shifting, then whispered something in the captain’s ear; and, finally, dropped Pavane’s whole life into her weathered palm.

“This is a precious thing you are treating as currency, lord,” said the captain of the Merlose, weighing the precious metal in her hand.

“It more than covers your price.”

“To be sure. Even melted down or hacked to pieces, which would be the safest way for me to dispose of it.” Her grave eyes met his. “Are you prepared for that?”

Pavane didn’t waver, though it seemed to him she spoke from some deep place of knowledge for precious, irreplaceable things. He put on his best, most charmingly twisted smile. “Not to worry. I’ve another,” he said, pulling back his sleeve.

The black scales of the snake wound in ink around his forearm shivered and writhed, a mirage of badly-rendered aether. Even when it was wrong, it was precious. It was his alone.

Nothing showed on the captain’s face; her dark brow furrowed no more than if she were merely trying to read something in a viciously small script. Surely a woman of her age—a pirate, a liberator of immeasurably rare weapons; an Ala Mhigan, by the newly-familiar shape of her words—had seen her share of strangeness. With a small gesture of her head, she ordered her first mate to lay the coffer at Pavane’s feet.

“A deal well-struck, then,” she concluded.

Pavane crouched down with wonder coursing up and down his hands, weighting them as he opened the coffer to reveal his prize: a long-bladed scythe, unadorned in the Mhachi style he had come to know from his family’s archives, brimming with power to harness the Void.

“Indeed,” Pavane said as he rose with the scythe in hand. In his breathless appreciation for the weapon, he felt a twist of envy for the captain and her crew—and the adventure they must have had finding it. He pictured ruins, ancient knowledge, a dark thrill of threat.

The captain nodded to him, satisfied with their business, and said little else before she turned back towards her ship with the appraiser in tow. But Madelaine, the first mate, lingered. 

“Thinking of all the harvesting you’ll do, lord?” she asked with a smirk. “Grass? Wheat?”

Nairel, who until then had been so utterly quiet, said, “Or the one it will protect,” in a tone that gave nothing away. “Do Hearers’ daughters know much about harvesting, actually?”

A flash of irritation passed across her face, barely noticeable, before her expression settled into something else. Curiosity, perhaps.

“You’re Nairel?” she said, with an air like she was almost entirely sure of the answer.

“I am.”

A pause. Madelaine glanced over her shoulder at her retreating captain, then made half a step towards turning before stopping to look at Nairel again. “Is your brother well?”

“He’s alive. For now.”

“Aye,” said the first mate, nodding. She turned to walk away. “I knew he would be.”

Pavane blinked, trying to piece together the familiarity that had just passed between her and Nairel. Why had she asked about—

“Wait, what the fuck?”

Nairel stroked his arm. “Let’s go. I’ll tell you once we’re in the shade; my head’s bloody spinning in this heat.”

sigrid keane belongs to @onwesterlywinds; madelaine lachance belongs to @ink-long-dry

[traversingtherealm]

♥ also i am sending one on behalf of sammish for thierre/maddy bc i'm shipping garbage thank u

SCREAMS OK……

“Ah… Madelaine. You know, when I first started to get to know her, I always believed she was quite beautiful. But that was when she was in her disguise, and now that I know what she truly looks like, I am blown away. Her vibrant red hair is… There’s such a fire she possesses and it’s so clear with the colour of her hair. Her eyes… Turquoise like the gem itself.” He felt a blush coming to his face, perhaps his fondness for Madelaine was a bit too obvious. “And I especially want to note the tattoo that she has over her eyes. It’s beautiful, and it is a shame she had to keep it covered for so long. Its statement is important.”

[safestsephiroth]

For Jara/Maddy: “You lied to me.” For Grey/Ashelia: “Hey, have you seen the..? Oh.”

[note: the below drabbles are non-canon, and there are some inaccurate representations of the characters involved. Some NSFW parts.]

Ashelia Riot had a mystery to solve, one she was very agitated about having to solve in the first place. Some of her personal possessions had gone missing, and she was quite upset by this fact, considering her previous night’s enjoyment of Edge had been handicapped by the lack of the missing items.

Naturally, she started with the first suspect that came to mind. She opened the door to Jaraku’s room, and when he wasn’t there she went to Issabel’s.

“Jaraku.” she said. “Where are my chains?” A voice called out from the back of the room.

“We’re busy, Ashe.”

“With my chains?”

“I bought my own, why would I need yours?” After a brief moment of silence, she heard Issabel giggle. She turned and left the room in a huff, shutting the door after a moment in case someone walked past. Next she turned to someone who knew everyone fairly well.

“Resh?” she asked, seeing the happy miqo'te sitting at the bar. “Have you seen my chains?”

“I haven’t, no. Are they missing?”

“Yes.”

“Are the things I bought for you at starlight missing too?”

“No, and let’s not discuss those.”

“Fair enough. Have you asked Jarak-”

“Yes. He doesn’t have them.”

“That’s odd. Who else might have taken them?”

“I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking you.”

“Well…uh. You two aren’t the only couple here.” Ashelia was silent a moment. “I wouldn’t want to accuse anyone but I imagine that madel-” Ashelia had already turned to leave. Resh nervously sipped her tea.

Ashe burst into Erimmont’s room.

“Madelaine, Erimmont, did you take my-” Erimmont was sitting behind his desk, a bruise the shape of an open palm across his face. “What happened to-”

“I haven’t seen anything of yours. I spent the past night with Madelaine.” There was a long pause.

“And where is she-”

“Sleeping.” He jerked his thumb at the wall behind him, and the bed beyond it. “Don’t bother her.” Ashe looked from the doorway, to Erimmont’s face, and back to the doorway. She quietly left the room, shutting the door behind her. She walked back to the bar.

“Resh, they didn’t have them. Who else might?”

“You might ask Blaetlona! If nothing else she keeps her ears open. Can’t hurt!” Ashelia walked to Blaetlona’s room, opened the door to find the Second Storm Lieutenant asleep in her bed, the room completely devoid of chains. Ashe decided waking her up on a hunch wasn’t worth it, and shut this door, too. She walked back to see Resh grabbing more tea.

“Who else might-” Ashelia cut herself off, then quietly walked back to the personal rooms. She stepped into Mara’s and was greeted with the sight of a bored Highlander woman sitting behind a desk, reading a book. “Mara, did you take my-”

“Chains? No.”

“How did you know they’re missing?”

“You haven’t been subtle this morning. Nor last night. Your rage wasn’t hard to detect. More of it than usua-”

“The chains. Where are they? Surely you know?” Mara looked up from the book for a second, a strange expression spreading across her usually-stoic face. Ashelia had never seen this look before.

“You might try opening doors you haven’t checked yet. Or ask Resh.”

“I’ve been asking Resh.”

“Ask again. Please leave me to my book now.” Ashelia nodded, shut the door and walked back out to the bar, almost colliding into Resh as she opened the door.

“Resh?”

“Oh, uh, hi Ashe!”

“Where are you going?”

“Um…Grey’s room!”

“…Why?”

“Well, Grey sneaks around a lot, maybe he heard something!” Ashelia nodded, and turned on her heel. Resh chased after her, horrified, trying to pull her back by her arm as she threw the door open to Grey’s room.

“Grey, have you seen my-”

Grey Riot was in the midst of unfastening a veritable nest of chains, a variety of other equipment gathered in a pile towards the center of the room. Some of it she didn’t even recognize what it was used for. Resh sighed, and Grey shot her an accusing look. Ashelia cleared her throat. “Uh-”

“I found a book in Jara’s room an’ it ‘ad some great ideas innit, I though’.”

Shortly after, Erimmont wasn’t the only Riskbreaker with a facial bruise. But at least he’d gotten his book back, Jaraku mused, holding ice to his swollen eye.

“You Lied to Me”

Madelaine Lachance was not stupid. So when Jaraku met her at the door, to the Sandsea her mission for the Riskbreakers completed, she was immediately suspicious. He was fancied up even more foppish than normal. She caught a glimpse of uneasiness before he changed his tune to a big, hearty

“Welcome back!” She wasn’t convinced.

“Why are you here to greet me?” He looked away from her a moment before putting on a big grin and looking slightly to the left of her eyes.

“I’m here to congratulate you! Ashelia wants to speak with you, debrief you or whatever the term is. I’m not exactly an agent or anything.” He laughed what she recognized as a forced one.

“Jaraku. What happened while I was away?”

“I’m glad you asked! See, Ashe and I had a lovely talk about Grey’s future. Oh, Grey’s dating now! Dating Enea. Brother of that shithead ka-oh, you never met him. Well, suffice to say he was useless but she is great, so apparently failure doesn’t run in the family.” He shrugged. He wasn’t convincing her, and she knew he was growing desperate. What would lead him to lie like this?

“Jaraku. Did you burn Erimmont’s room down?”

“Why would I do that? I don’t play with fire. In the house. Or near it. You should go talk to Ashe.” He nodded emphatically, as if that would fix what had happened, as if that would convince her. She leaned back, crossed her arms, gave him a death glare.

“Stop trying to change the subject, Jaraku. I demand to know-”

“Look, I was told to tell you to see Ashe, okay? Please. Come on. Just go, don’t make me tell you about-” He stopped, a look of horror spreading across his face.

“Tell me about what?” He shrank back.

“Come on, Madelaine, just…please.”

“Tell me, Jaraku, or Ashelia’s wrath won’t be what you need fear.”

“Ashelia’s wrath is always a fear of mine, and as terrifying as you are you are nothing compared to that mad Mhigan axewoman.” Madelaine’s jaw slackened, and she contemplated reaching for her spear before the door to the personal halls opened and Ashelia Riot stepped out.

“Jaraku, what’s taking-” Her eyes fell upon the Elezen she’d been waiting for. “Madelaine. I need to request you come to my office for your debriefing.”

“I refuse. I’ll not be played a fool, not by you and certainly not by Jarak-”

“He’s dead, Madelaine.” Ashelia Riot clenched her teeth at Jaraku’s words. Madelaine stood, dumbfounded for a moment, not connecting the dots. Jaraku looked down, rubbed a spot on his right bicep subconsciously.

“Who’s dead?”

“Erimmont.” Ashelia quietly started advancing on the two. Jaraku didn’t seem to notice her and kept speaking. “He was supposed to be on a simple scouting mission and ran headlong into…the Ixali had moved their camp. He might have done okay if the Garleans hadn’t come up behind him. He sent out a request for help over the linkshell, and I was nearby, and…”

“You failed him.” Grief overcame the bard’s face and he sank backwards, almost falling to the ground.

“There were too many, and I’m a terrible conjurer…I can barely heal a scrape, let alone four gunshot wounds.” He looked back up at her, tears in his eyes, a new firmness in his voice. “I did everything, everything I could. And…the last thing he said was…he wanted me to tell you…” Madelaine Lachance watched the world slow down, saw everything turn monochrome. Jaraku’s lips were moving, but the sound coming out was garbled. Ashelia’s fist was clenched, starting to raise. She saw tears start to pour down his face, and she stepped forward, drawing her lance, and shoved Jaraku down before striking Ashelia in the face with the blunt end, sending her reeling back. She bashed the surprised Grand Steward in the side of the head, swinging quickly, precisely, not the tiniest bit of rage or inefficiency to her movements, until the woman was unconscious on the floor. As Jaraku started to stand she held the blade of the lance to his throat.

“You lied to me.” He made eye contact, finally.

“I did. I didn’t want you to come home to the worst news.” He closed his eyes. “I deserve it, if you think it’ll make things better. I’m sorry. I really am, Madelaine.”

“Why didn’t you tell me sooner? Why didn’t you tell me when I was-”

“Ashelia didn’t tell me how to contact you. Said upsetting you could jeopardize your mission and your life.” Madelaine tilted her head a little, disbelieving.

“She clarified my mission first?” Jaraku started to nod, thought better of it.

“Yes. She did. I’m sorry.” Madelaine looked down at him a moment, a mix of emotions showing on her face. She looked to the bard below her, looked around the place that had been home for such a short time, looked to the Grand Steward, her new captain, the woman she’d risked her life for. Ashelia was starting to struggle to her feet.

“My mission was a success. I accomplished my objectives to the letter. Even though you failed me.” Jaraku for a moment thought she was talking to him before she continued. “Thank you, Jaraku. At least you tried.” He heard the lance hit the ground, the door opened, and Madelaine Lachance was gone.

Not long after, he had left, too. He hadn’t wanted the pity, hadn’t mentioned what had happened to Issabel when she tried to save both he and Errimont. Didn’t mention what had happened to the crippled arm that hung loose at his side.

He respected her too much for that.

[onwesterlywinds]

PROMPT #26: When Pigs Fly

Features Madelaine Lachance, a character from @sammishspook on Twitter.

Set during the events of 3.0.

The Merlose was known throughout Abalathia's skies for its specific method of dealing with Garleans: getting them to walk the plank from thirty thousand fulms.

The practice had first come about during Zeema's tenure as first mate; she had dubbed it "reeducation," and certain intrinsic factors - mostly a lack of space in the hold and an unwillingness to deal with Ishgardian authorities - had made keeping prisoners an unsensible proposition. In the years since, their relations with Ishgard had only grown worse - and the practice, now tradition, had been dubbed "flight training."

Sigrid had expected the newcomer to balk at the prospect, but the force with which the young woman gripped the pilot's bound arms spoke to her intentions. Others in the crew had gossiped of her storied history as a pirate of the sea - including a stint with the Sanguine Sirens, no less - but she had taken to the clouds with little trouble, and best of all, she had become a valued part of the crew without antics. She wore a serious demeanor at most times, and her face as she hoisted their Garlean captive to the plank was positively stormy.

"Wait," Sigrid called from the wheel. All turned to face her, awaiting orders, but it was Madelaine's gaze she sought and captured. "...You know this one?"

Madelaine stared up at her, and her hold upon the Garlean pilot only tightened. "No," she said. "But he's XIVth Legion."

They had seen far more ships of the VIth in free Eorzean skies in the past year, many of them bearing construction materials available for plundering. Their most recent prisoner had carried no such resources - only a rusted bucket of a ship too loose-screwed to make it much further than the Gyr Abanian border. Still, he was no defector: he had been desperate to relay some bit of intelligence or another, up until the moment Cicely dashed his communication device against the deck.

They had no further use for him, and letting him go would have repercussions for Eorzeans they would never meet.

To signal her pre-emptive approval, Sigrid offered Madelaine a single nod.

The Elezen permitted her voice to carry as she stepped her captive closer to the open air. "Where were you stationed? Tell the truth, now."

The pilot mumbled something. When Madelaine gave him a rough shake, he spoke up. "The Shroud."

"As I figured. There's still soil on your boots." There was no pride in this admission, no amusement - only a detached sort of curiosity. Sure enough, when next Madelaine spoke, her tone might have seemed conversational in almost any other circumstance. "Your patrols are still getting picked off, aren't they. It's impossible to keep the ranks filled."

"How do you-"

"It's those forestborn. They're plaguing you like rats." A smile crossed Madelaine's face for the first time. "I'm glad to hear it."

With a hearty shove, she pushed the pilot backwards, and he fell head over heels toward the mountains below. This one went without a single sound; if he cried out, he did so well after he was gone from their sight.

***

"We had a forestborn deckswab once," Sigrid said to Madelaine, much later, when they were alone in the captain's chambers. "Not Elezen, though. Highlander. Hailed from East End; left on account of the war."

On account of the war. Such pointless words to leave her, especially given the horrors she'd heard described. The poor lass had been from Bittermill, a place she had once traveled to with her father to pick up a relic dating back to Cotter's dynasty; the Garleans had turned it into a testing site for some monstrous new weapon of theirs, and the girl had escaped only by leaving her brothers behind.

But the wry twist of Madelaine's mouth made Sigrid suspect she grasped at least some of what went unsaid. "I had a forestborn friend who was a ranger," she admitted. "A damn good one. He and his were all exceptional with a bow."

Sigrid permitted herself to mull over that thought with a sip of whiskey. "And they're fighting back against the XIVth?"

"They are now, it seems."

"What became of your friend?"

Madelaine shrugged. "He's still alive, if that's what you mean." She stared out at the circular porthole window, toward where the stars shone bright in the east. "I haven't heard heard from him in months. Even so, I think I would know it if he'd died."

In a rush of remembrance, another flight training flitted back to her from so many years ago: a time when she had given death to an undeserving Garlean pig. I killed her. Your Undercity contact.

Sigrid leaned back in her chair, heaved a sigh, and set down her empty glass with a heavy finality. When she looked back across the table, her heart ached to see Madelaine sitting across from her instead of young Élodie. "It's so easy think so," she muttered. "...In my experience, it's rarely the case."

[that-singing-jackass]

Myths of Eorzea 4: Llymlaen’s Harpoon

Some scions of greatness have a clear origin. They rise from poverty to challenge gods, they descend from mountains to save thousands of lives, they pick up a sword when their crops are burned. With most, there is at least a point one can pinpoint, a spot in their timeline one can identify as The Moment, the one decision, the one act, the one event, the one trigger that turned their path from one of normalcy to one of legend.

However, this is not true of all.

None are sure from whence Llymlaen’s Harpoon came. There are whispers she descended from the floating lands above us, that she clawed her way out of the earth itself, there are rumors that she was once Drowned by Leviathan, but was so strong of will she broke free of the bonds and slew countless Sahaugin until she had returned. The one fact all agree on is that the critical moment of her life came before her arrival in the city of the sea.

Through calamity, chaos, panic and loss she strode with the calm of a clear sky. Through waves of the scared, the violent, the angry, she carved a path towards glory. None stopped her advance, none could oppose her. She was the Swells, the Crash, the Tide itself. As bandits and highwaymen plagued the city they found, one by one, that a wrath both cold and divine was visited upon them. The predators learned to fear her name, the prey to sing her praise. She is a scourge of all who betray their kind, the tip of the vanguard where all hope is lost, the first to fight and last to leave, and red as a corpse-filled sea.

There are those who claim she hails from the forest or the snow, that wielding a spear is an art of those lands. These shortsighted fools miss the signs.

The point of the Compass is Red.

The weapon of the Sea is the Trident.

The sea is calm but wroth; gentle but mighty; comforting but fearsome; loving but cruel. The sea is a mystery that can oft be considered yet never be solved. All who take this realm of brine and wind for granted perish to it, for it is mighty and dreadful. Why should its embodiment be any different?

[ink-long-dry]

So.... little brainstorm on how to explain my characters’ long ass absence from FFXIV and the Riskbreakers... --

Mupal Dupal -- Explained in THIS drabble... basically he was a big dumb and got himself stranded on Hullbreaker Isle. He uses the same bottle to try and send a message back, in the hopes that someone will eventually save him from this deserted isle. And, because the reliability of a message in a bottle is practically moot, it takes nearly a year before anyone finds out.

Madelaine Lachance -- Having been sent to Ishgard to find out more about the Dragonsong War in the guise of an Astrologian of House Fortemps, her discreet reports to RISK in the form of ciphers prove not discreet enough. They are intercepted and used against her in a witch-hunt accusation that she may be a Dravanian sympathizer. All method of contacting her for nearly a year hits a wall as she goes into hiding, taking up the trade of the Machinist instead. 

Bearforce One -- Takes a long meditative journey in which he does some soul-searching or something like that. When he comes back, he’s bigger and Bear-er than ever.

[traversingtherealm]

I shouldn’t have to wear my disguise anymore.

My part of an art trade with llymlaenscompass. I LOVE MADELAINE!!!!!!!!!!!!

[nogodsarebastards]

Madelaine Lachance has yet to realize it, but she’s been perfect for what I needed from the very start.

To tell her that would doubtless get a smirk, a snide comment about her desirability in bed, and a noncommittal, vaguely disinterested response. But that’s quite fine by me.

Few are they who do not underestimate what they think to be a love-stricken fool. Madelaine Lachance is proud, more than a bit arrogant, very much self-motivated and strong of will, absolutely unshakable in her self-confidence, and in her own way every bit as devious and clever as Jaraku.

Madelaine Lachance is a Gridanian who is in all ways an iconoclastic nightmare for the city. I imagine if Gridania had anyone whose job was to improve how it’s seen by the masses, this person would think of Madelaine as a menace had she any real publicity. She is much Gridania is not - it’s no wonder she’s now in Limsa Lominsa.

Madelaine Lachance is a woman fully aware of her beauty, in complete command of it and who has less than no regard for whether others acknowledge it or not. I sincerely doubt she truly views the upcoming date auction entirely with disdain. I’m sure in some secret corner of her heart she relishes the chance to have all that attention and to perform exceptionally well, as she doubtlessly will.

Madelaine Lachance, from what I learned through asking that brutish pirate Zwynmaga about her, is something of a local star amongst the privateers of the city. I imagine lancers who leave the forest and fully adopt the city, and which then rise to prominence in one of the more well-regarded crews of the lot are not especially common. In a city packed with sea wolves, hyur and lalafell I imagine a tall, sightly Elezen with her demeanor and a lance makes quite the ripples, indeed.

Madelaine Lachance is an inspiring figure to those who take the time to truly learn about her and do not merely leave with the impression they gather at first glance.

Madelaine Lachance is intelligent, yes, but I’ve already gotten what I needed. I’m almost positive that if I had been forthright she would have denied my wishes, purely from being cantankerous and her distaste for what she perceives as orders.

Madelaine Lachance is apparently quite protective of Sairsel Arroway, and therefore is quite capable of caring deeply for others. I somehow doubt their relationship is one of a physical nature, but something akin to a maternal one seems quite likely. Perhaps something of a big sister to a kid brother.

Madelaine Lachance, for all her pride and self-confidence and her clever mind and quick tongue and all of her prowess as a fighter and in private...well.

She still fell for the best trick in the book. It’s the same principle as that behind any con, really:

As long as they’re looking where you want them to and you’re quick enough, you can pull just about anything.

Dear, sweet Madelaine, it’s a shame you’ll probably never find out the full story of what’s happened and what is yet to come. It would be delightful to see that smirk dissolve, almost as delightful as some other things I can imagine. Alas, we can’t always indulge in every pleasure we seek.

...I still desire that moment, though, when I reveal to you what I’ve done. Depending on how the cards fall, I suppose it’s possible I just might get it.....

[safestsephiroth]

Pssst are you still doing that ask meme from a while ago? ;A; i didn't actually see it until now. If so can I ask for Bear for any of your characters? :'D And Madelaine?

No problem! SORRY FOR THE EXTENDED DELAY!

Will do Bear for Marguerite, and Madelaine for Jaraku, Resh, and Gaelle

Marguerite's view of Bear:

0/10 | Sexual Attraction0/10 | Romantic Attraction0/10 | Crushing10/10 | Squishing1/10 | Sensual Attraction7/10 | Aesthetic Attraction

Jaraku's view of Madelaine:

8/10 | Sexual Attraction4/10 | Romantic Attraction2/10 | Crushing6/10 | Squishing6/10 | Sensual Attraction8/10 | Aesthetic Attraction

Resh's view of Madelaine:

1/10 | Sexual Attraction4/10 | Romantic Attraction2/10 | Crushing8/10 | Squishing4/10 | Sensual Attraction9/10 | Aesthetic Attraction

Gaelle's view of Madelaine:

10/10 | Sexual Attraction8/10 | Romantic Attraction8/10 | Crushing10/10 | Squishing8/10 | Sensual Attraction10/10 | Aesthetic Attraction

[onwesterlywinds]

Noble Gold and Silk

Part of my Godhands series.

Features Madelaine Lachance, a character from @llymlaenscompass.

"It's good to see you," said Élodie. The girl had brought flowers - an array of Rhalgr's gold - and as Sigrid accepted them, she lifted them to her face to take in their scent: wild, fresh, shaped in the terrain and breezes of the Peaks.

"So kind of you," she said, and meant it. Yet for all the clutter in the house, she could think of no vase in which to place them; instead, she held them upon her lap and resolved to find a worthy carrier at the market. "And I appreciate your coming."

"You're truly leaving Ala Mhigo, then?"

Sigrid had found her resolve a week ago, and the truth of it had yet to fully sunk in. She had made few preparations for the house - her linens sat unwashed, the pantry remained full, and her parents' relics sat untouched in the loft - with the result that the place looked much as it had when her father had still been alive. Sigrid had wondered for a time if the ghosts of the past would abate if she were to live under another roof, and she had gone so far as to find lodgings in an inn to put the theory to the proof. Yet her dreams had only grown worse. Better to imagine her father's curses and bellows from the basement forge than the whisper of an Undercity lord stirring her from her dreams.

"I must, Élodie." The words pained her, but they carried with them the promise of liberation. She could not stave off what she knew she must do because it would hurt.

"Who else knows? Ashley, I assume, but-"

"You're the first I've told. I meant to send word to Marco later today."

Élodie tucked a strand of her dark hair, so very much like Sigrid's own, behind her ear with a shy smile. "...I'm honored," she said at long last. She carried herself differently in private, with a youthful sort of slouch. Sigrid had once been much the same: accustomed to stooping through Undercity passages, or else lowering herself for the shorter men in her vicinity. Hopefully Élodie, too, would grow out of such habits; Sigrid's heart clenched with the knowledge that she would not be around to see for herself.

A silence drew out between them, and Élodie did not sit. She stared around at the crates stuffed with tomes and the faded rug and everywhere except at her, and her pale eyes had begun to fill with tears.

"What is it?" Sigrid asked her gently.

"Was it not enough?" Élodie blurted out. "Was it all for nothing?! After so long, why do you have to-"

"Because, Élodie," she replied, as firmly as she could muster, "there is a world far beyond Ala Mhigo that I could not even have hoped to conceive of as a servant. My mother was a learned, well-traveled woman; I have always sought to follow her example in that regard. I've gathered excerpts from her diary - records of the places she loved best, and others she never saw." Places with names like Voor Sian Siran and the Sea of Spires. "I wish to see them as well, before I am too old and too afraid to take the chance."

"It doesn't have to do with-"

Sigrid shook her head, a gesture sufficient to cut off the remainder of Élodie's sentence. "If it has to do with anyone in the city, it's Theodoric. Though I suppose I should thank him. He was as good a reason as any to go into retirement."

Élodie offered up a smile, though the expression did not reach her reddening eyes.

"Come here." Sigrid took up the flowers from her lap as she stood, and opened her arms; Élodie threw her own around her, and her lanky frame shook from unshed sobs. "I'll have to write to someone of my adventures, won't I? Marco's whereabouts change by the bell and Ashley hardly ever responds, so it'll have to be you."

"I want to hear from you every week."

"You know I won't be able to promise that." She hesitated, still holding the young woman close. It was perhaps the warmest embrace she could recall in her recent memory, at least since her stint in the Undercity. "...I had hoped to leave the house to you."

Élodie did not break the contact, yet the whole of her body stiffened. "I know what you mean to do."

"Élo-"

"It isn't going to work. I'm embedded now - living in the Undercity full-time."

"Élodie, please."

"I'm making my living, for the first time in my life, and I love it."

Sigrid held the girl at arm's length, staring her straight in the eye for a time before she spoke again. "I, too, loved the Undercity when I was a girl. Even when I was your age. I hungered for it - for its thrills, its dangers, and the things it could show me about myself. But it steeps you in things that no woman as compassionate as you should ever have to endure." Élodie made a noise that might have been a cough, but Sigrid resolved to maintain her contact. "Whatever the Undercity offers, it comes at the cost of a life full of bitterness. It is too much for any one person to change alone, or even to try. I... I meant to step away from it all, even my mother's sigils, when I found Brynhilde. I say this knowing that I would never seek to order you onto any given path, but I hope that you will listen and heed me."

"I am listening," said Élodie. "I listen, and I will remember. But I will not accept this house."

Sigrid's heart sank.

"Leave it to Ashley," Élodie continued. "Or Marco. Or even the both of them. They'll appreciate it, and they'll put it to good use."

Leave it to Ashley. For all her love for Brynhilde, the idea of giving her late partner's son a house to replace the one her death had taken away had not occurred to her. The suggestion settled somewhere deep in her gut, along with all of her suspicions that she was now giving up the last of her father's hopes for her - and she nodded her agreement.

The captain shuffled across the Merlose's deck, uneasy despite their mooring. Madelaine Lachance could hear her steps all the way from the bow. The woman's stealth had been legendary only a few moons ago, to the extent that many wondered if she could teleport throughout the ship at will for the purpose of delivering rebukes; yet her fall had taken much and more, including her mobility, and her full recovery was yet an uncertain thing.

Madelaine breathed out a little sigh but turned to greet her superior nonetheless. "So much for staying in bed."

"I ran out of water and didn't want to trouble you." Sure enough, as the captain approached unsteadily toward Madelaine's vantage in her favorite silk dressing gown, she held a full glass between her bony brown hands. "Lovely morning."

And it was at that, for nothing on Hydaelyn could compare to a sunrise in the Diadem. The region had an atmosphere of its own, as unpredictable as any sea; the aether all above and around them offered different marvels with each waking and with every turn of the head. That morning, the day dawned in a burst of heavy pinks and violets, like the bloom of some all-encompassing flower.

It was only the two of them aboard the Merlose, at least for now. The crew had been small from the first, and comprised entirely of women - less through strict doctrine like the Sanguine Sirens, and more through a string of pleasant coincidences. The other crew members had all departed within the past fortnight, however, to make their preparations for other ventures - leaving only a hold full of plunder, the captain, and Madelaine in the unexpected position of being first mate without any inclination of how long she herself was to remain aboard.

"Where to from here?" Madelaine asked. "Ala Mhigo?"

The captain tilted her head, as if to listen to the wind, but she shook her head. "Not yet."

And for a time, that was all she said as they watched the aetherial sunrise and sipped at their respective drinks. Madelaine was content to stand in silence, a buffer to the northerly winds as the captain's silvered hair whipped across her shoulders.

"Thank you," said the captain at last. "For accommodating all of my dallying. And I hope you know you're under no obligation to follow me to Ala Mhigo."

Madelaine shrugged. "Someone has to help you bring the Merlose into port."

"Perhaps so," the captain replied dryly, as if unconvinced. "A note of sentimentality, then: of all the regrets I've carried throughout my life, perhaps the heaviest of them all is that I often did not express thanks to those I loved before the chance to do so was long past."

"That is sentimental."

"Blame it on this beautiful sunrise. Now, when was the last time you dropped a line to that ranger of yours?"

Madelaine whirled around to the captain in time to see a lock of hair obscure a very self-satisfied smirk playing across her Highlander features. "Don't you try and turn this back onto me."

"I'm quite serious."

Madelaine rolled her eyes. "I imagine now that Ala Mhigo's been freed, he'll be returning at the rearguard." Timing had never been among Sairsel Arroway's virtues. "What about you? Who's waiting for you back in the capital?"

"No one anymore." Somehow, it was the definitiveness with which the captain spoke that struck Madelaine, more so than the bitter reality she conveyed. "Which means that while I may consider paying a visit to your good friend the Grand Steward, I'm in no hurry to return."

If the stories were true, Ashelia Riot had led her force against the Garlean viceroy himself. Perhaps that tenacity would be enough for her to handle whatever business the captain had with her.

"I'll be here until you're ready," Madelaine promised, and found herself meaning it. "But we'll be going nowhere until you park your arse back into bed."

Again the captain scoffed, though she began her slow retreat back to her cabin. "Oh, very well. Boss me around all you'd like, while it's just the two of us; I imagine you've earned it."

Madelaine fired up the Merlose's propellers and charted their course through the resplendent color before them, and only much later did it occur to her that the captain had expressed her love in no uncertain terms.

[onwesterlywinds]

Headcanon: Sairsel Arroway wrote “Take Me to [Eorzean] Church” about Madelaine Lachance when he was really mad about her being gone.

The Resistance have been trying to figure out for weeks if it’s anti-establishment commentary or a gay statement or both.

[onwesterlywinds]

Ashelia Riot: Madelaine Lachance! Ashelia Riot looks equal parts pleased and stern as she regards the long-lost Riskbreaker. Ashelia Riot: ...I should have known you weren't dead. Madelaine Lachance: It's good to be called that name again, in full truth. And no, not quite yet. Ashelia Riot gives Madelaine Lachance a warm smile. Madelaine Lachance: You look as hale and hearty as ever, Ashelia! I thought being the leader of a company so large would have put some grays on your head. You'll be happy to know that I don't see any. Ashelia Riot: For the love of- Ashelia Riot expresses her annoyance with Madelaine Lachance. Ashelia Riot: ...If anything would turn me gray before my time, it would be those damned fools up north. But I daresay you know all about that. Madelaine Lachance lets out a small chuckle as she moves aside the contraption on her head. Madelaine Lachance: That is too true. Too godsdamned true.