#m!WoLxHaurchefant

[mirateski]

burn - for the single-word fic prompt!

(I don't want to think too hard about how long this has been sat in my inbox. So I won't.)

With the spectre of the Aery looming on the horizon, Ar'telan's misgivings are too loud to ignore.

(m!WoLxHaurchefant)

It was not a proposal he enjoyed.

It wasn’t the first time people had tried to convince him to fight dragons. Even befor ethey had fled Ul’dah, he had kept his silence in Coerthas, but he had be able to deflect before. Aiatar, Isgebind - with both of them he had managed to avoid a fight to the death.

Nidhogg would not be convinced.

It was clear from Hraesvelgr’s words that Nidhogg’s anger was beyond mortal ability to reason with. Perhaps his peers could sway him, but they were equally mired in sadness and grief. He wondered if Tiamat, revered and lost as she was, would be equally weighted down.

Estinien would not understand his concerns. Ysayle might have done, if she had not been shocked into immobility. Alphinaud was young and too detached from the idea of honoured creatures to feel his discomfort. He was in the wrong place, at the wrong time. Ishgard was too zealous, in both hate and belief, to feel the plight of a man who had lived with dragons as kin - parent, friend, guide, historian. Dragons not lost to madness, but mourning all the same.

He wondered if there were any left who did not mourn.

—

They had returned to Ishgard proper, sans Ysayle, to find a way through the veil of wind that surrounded the Aery. the Manufactuary had ideas, with the Ironworks, that Ar’telan was not smart enough to understand. It would take a little time, they said, so Ar’telan found himself alone with his thoughts. Such things did not work well for him in Ishgard.

He walked across the Steps of Faith, eyes taking in the damage from the latest attack. He recognised the wounds that Vishap had left in its assault on the walls. Thought about Ysayle, who had justified her goading and supporting under a veil of righteousness. They thought they were different to each other, and yet could not be more similar.

Ratatoskr would have condemned them both.

—

Central Coerthas was cold, as was the norm in the twisted post-Cala mity climate, but for a mercy it was not actually snowing. Ar’telan trudged along the half-buried path towards Camp Dragonhead, still conflicted. To discuss his misgivings was heresy to Ishgard. Though he did not ascribe to Ishgard’s Halone, it still put all who heard him in danger. Made them complicit. Just as the Crystal Braves had done in Ul’dah, he had become a weapon for his enemies to use against those he cared about, this time of his own making. But he could not ignore the wound that festered in his heart.

—

“Ar’telan!” Haurchefant’s greeting was as enthusiastic as always. Though he did not leap from his chair to embrace him - there were too many eyes in the room for that - Ar’telan could read the desire in the smile that spread across his face. Incorrigible as ever.

“Haurchefant. Have you a moment to speak?” he asked, hands quick around the words. The implication was clear - perhaps clear enough that the Echo translated it, unbidden. In private.

“Of course! Corentiaux, please inform me if an emergency arises,” the knight said, all but launching to his feet as he did so. Corentiaux, clearly misinterpreting the nature of Ar’telan’s visit but still willing to cover for his commander, saluted in acknowledgement and tacitly said nothing.

—

A truly private room was difficult to find in Camp Dragonhead, but the room was empty, at least. The benefit to his signing was that it was harder for nefarious types to eavesdrop upon, but Haurchefant’s words would still be heard clearly enough.

“We have spoken to dragons,” Ar’telan began, which made Haurchefant inhale sharply. “In Dravania. The Great Wyrm Hraesevelgr told us of Nidhogg’s rage.”

“It is quite the rage,” Haurchefant agreed, which made Ar’telan grimace, ears pressed back against his head.

“Yes,” he agreed, a single movement which hurt to say. “Even Hraesvelgr feels it is unquenchable. HJe is so angry that he will let Ishgard persist only so he can punish it further.” He shook his head. “If we are to keep Ishgard safe, Nidhogg- Nidhogg must die.”

“It is a truth Ishgard has long known, yet found impossible to achieve,” Haurchefant said, his voice quiet. Ar’telan had spoken to him of Meracydia before. On his meeting with Midgardsormr. Of all those in Ishggard, only Haurchefant truly understood what it meant for him to say what he did. “And you are uniquely placed to do it, now. Did Hraesvelgr offer aught?” Ar’telan cringed at the question.

“Sorrow and silence,” he replied. “He will not stop us should we try. That is all.” He sighed. “But he is not Tempered. He is all but lost in rage, but there is no primal source. He is of the First Brood. Bahamut is dead. Tiamat is lost. Ratatoskr- Ratatoskr is dust. How can I continue man’s folly and feel justified? How is it right?”

For a moment, Haurchefant was silent. Sombre thought ill-suited the knight, but Ar’telan knew the look. He had worn it when Francel had been accused of heresy.

“Ishgard is not Meracydia,” he said, voice quiet. “If Nidhogg were like those you knew, it would be easy to call it wrong. If he and his horde did not slaughter without thought, the question would be easier. But if he is not Tempered, why does he feel such rage?” Ar’telan swallowed his nerves.

“King Thordan and his knights slaughtered Ratatoskr, and ate her Eyes.”

Haurchefant sat in stunned silence for several long moments. When he regained his wits, his voice was barely audible.

“Unprovoked?”

“Avalon and the dragons lived together before it. Yes. The Echo showed me what they did.”

“And Nidhogg’s ire has lasted a millennia in retaliation,” Haurchefant said, shaking his head in disbelief. “What selfish motives of our ancestors. What bitter damnation to run in our blood.”

“But none of those who live now should bear the weight of that.”

Haurchefant sighed. “No. But equally, what Ishgard began should not fall to you to finish,” he said. “The Azure Dragoon is with you, is he not?” Ar’telan nodded.

“He swore to me he would not attack unprovoked, but… I do not trust him. His rage runs as deep as Nidhogg’s does. He suffered the same loss. The well of anger is bitter and deep.”

“And what did Midgardsormr say?” Haurchefant asked. Dangerous words to speak aloud, and they both knew it. Ar’telan’s ears twitched nervously.

“That Nidhogg was lost. His rage has consumed him for too long. But I can’t- I won’t give up on that hope. I can’t. If he is not Tempered, what traps him is his own mind, his draconic nature. Time feels fleeting, and in the Song, Ratatoskr’s death is yet a raw and open wound. If it could but heal…”

“If his own sire cannot heal that wound, what chance does a mere mortal have?” Haurchefant said. “I know it hurts. That the complexity cuts like a knife, and even with Midgardsormr himself backing your actions, your people - your own heart - may never forgive you.” Of course he would know how it felt. Years under the weight of it, but he had never found an answer either. He had given everything to Ishgard, and still…

“Even if it saves Ishgard, I do not think I can do it,” Ar’telan said, fingers shaking as he formed the words. “Even if I’m the only one that ever could, I… I can’t. I can’t.”

Without a word, Haurchefant closed the scant distance between them and pulled him into a hug. Ar’telan closed his eyes, fingernails catching on the rings of Haurchefant’s armour. It wasn’t an escape. It was never an escape.

“I am sorry, my love,” Haurchefant said, voice barely more than a whisper. “Know that I will not blame you, no matter what action you take. Just… be sure to come home. Do not petition the wall so intently that he consumes you. Please.” Ar’telan’s fingers tightened, just for a moment, and he pulled away.

“I will try,” he said, the movements uncertain. “I… I’m sorry. If it had been anyone else…”

“Then you would not be staring down Nidhogg’s fortress to begin with,” Haurchefant cut across. “Follow your heart. It has led you well enough so far, I would say.” Ar’telan managed a tremulous smile.

“I don’t know if I would agree with that,” he said, “but I will try.” He shook his head, trying to collect his wits. “Thank you. For listening. I know it is not precisely safe for you to hear such heresy.”

“With the news you bear, I wonder that the notion of heresy will last overlong,” Haurchefant said, a bitter undertone to his voice. “I will keep my silence until you return, with whatever fate you bring of the wyrm. But it will not go down easy. This history, or Nidhogg himself.” Ar’telan sighed.

“I know,” he said, and wished that he didn’t.

[ofdragonsdeep]

20: Anon

Ar'telan visits his husband, who has received a most peculiar gift.

(m!WoLxHaurchefant)

The cool, crisp air of Ishgard was as a welcome reprieve to Ar’telan. Though troubles yet haunted its streets, the gravest dangers - those Ar’telan was most like to be called upon for - were long passed. In a way, returning to Ishgard was like returning home.

And it was home now. The Fortemps embraced him as family, and Ar’telan saw them as a second tribe, a roughly equivalent exchange of honours. Meracydia still seemed so far away to him, the trials and tribulations of Eorzea and its neighbours tethering him there as moons turned to years beneath a foreign sky. He could go home now, he thought. Could go back. But the boats only left from Radz-at-Han, and there were none left to take up the mantle in his stead. And how much would he leave behind him to do it? Too much.

“Welcome home, Master Ar’telan,” said the gatekeep at the door of Fortemps manor. He bowed, which Ar’telan still found overbearingly formal, but he put up with it rather than make a scene. “Lord Haurchefant is in the greenhouse, if you seek him.” How well they knew him by now.

“Thank you,” Ar’telan said, turning from the door and pausing to brush the worst of the gathered snow from his robes. It would not last long in the greenhouse proper, and he had no desire to be drenched that evening.

The greenhouse had become a tremendous affair over the moons following its renovation. What had initially been panes of glass hastily wedged between gazebo posts, with pots on the sills, had eventually become a fully renovated extra room. It attached to the manor proper now - Ar’telan did not want to know how much that particular renovation had cost - and was a good three times the size, to better accommodate the growing collection of plants that had been lovingly nurtured within. Indeed, every surface was alive with some bright colour or flashes of green, and there was so little room left that Ar’telan was beginning to wonder where they might put the rest.

“Ar’telan!” Haurchefant greeted, turning as the door opened to see him enter. “A delightful surprise as always, my love.” Ar’telan knelt to embrace him. It still felt strange, that he was the taller of the two of them now, but Haurchefant had remained entirely unfazed. “And you have come at a most welcome time. I will confess I find myself a little out of my depth with our most recent acquisition.”

“But I didn’t send anything,” Ar’telan said, a frown on his face. Busywork had kept him very firmly within Eorzea, and without the time to spend on wildflowers and the like regardless. The greenhouse had attracted the attention of a number of Ishgardian nobles - big changes always did, especially ones around the extremely scandalous existence of Haurchefant in general - but they would have little to offer that Ar’telan had not already procured, surely?

“I received a most curious letter last week,” Haurchefant said. “I have it with me, in fact. A donation from an anonymous benefactor.”

“We have benefactors?” Ar’telan said, blinking in bemusement. He was not entirely sure he knew what a benefactor was, but certainly their little greenhouse project did not call for anything he thought it might mean.

“Apparently so! Here, the letter,” Haurchefant confirmed, fishing into one of the pockets on the side of his wheelchair before holding out a slightly crumpled letter. Ar’telan took it, noting the loving folds that Haurchefant had ignored to stuff it unceremoniously in the nearest convenient space, and sighed.

It was addressed to one “Lord Haurchefant de Fortemps”, which was accurate, even if only recently, which implied that whoever had sent it was up to date on Ishgardian current affairs. He traced his fingers over the letters as he read them, mouthing the words to himself as he went. So many big, complicated words where simple ones would do. The gist of it, from what Ar’telan could decipher, was that someone who only identified themselves as ‘a friend’ had heard about their efforts, and they were sending a helpful gift.

“What was the gift?” Ar’telan asked. Haurchefant, in answer, helfted a tray up from the floor and onto the nearest windowsill.

There were the pots, of course, each with dampened soil and a label in Haurchefant’s unruly hand to name them. But there were also two books, a small selection of parchments, and a small collection of tiny packages, each labelled in a script very different from the one that had written the letter. And in a glass jar, suspended in a faint green liquid, a seed.

Ar’telan reached for it almost in a trance. Held the jar up to his eyes as if somehow it would prove it a lie. It pulsed with faint blue light, an aetheric heart stronger than almost any tree Ar’telan had seen outside of Meracydia, save perhaps for the Great Old One itself. In Meracydia, they called them Sephirotic.

“A curious thing, isn’t it?” Haurchefant remarked, his tone light. “I have scoured all of this most helpful reading material, of course, but that particular seed was not mentioned in any of them.” Ar’telan tore his eyes from the jar to examine the books. They were the kind with so many authors it instead listed the edition on the spine, one of them titled ‘A Gleaner’s Guide to Horticulture’ and the other ‘On Flora: A Comprehensive Encyclopedia’ with the subtitle Southern Landmass Compendium. Ar’telan put the jar back onto the tray.

“These are Meracydian seeds,” he said. Haurchefant nodded.

“So the various notes have told me. Sourced with great difficulty from confidential Sharlayan sources, apparently. I can only imagine where they got them from.”

“Radz-at-Han, most likely, though we don’t… don’t tend to trade our plants,” Ar’telan replied. “This… It… We cannot plant this in the greenhouse,” he settled for, gesturing to the seed once more. “And it is not from Sharlayan. Even on Meracydia we do not find them much any more, not since the wood was petrified in the war. And this fluid…” He scowled at it. “Allagan. This was taken from Azys Lla.” Haurchefant raised an eyebrow at that. “There aren’t many people who would know about it. After… after I defeated Sephirot, they wanted to destroy his Tempered. It… would have been the sensible option, I agree. They only fuelled the Eikon, but could not summon it anew, even trapped in their suffering as they were. But the trees… they lived, Haurchefant. And on Meracydia, they are all but dead. I begged Krile to save them, even knowing that they would suffer, in case there was even a chance…”

“And this is… a child, I suppose?” Haurchefant said, sounding surprised for the first time that evening. Ar’telan shook his head.

“Not exactly. I mean, maybe. But none of the trees on Meracydia speak to us any more. We’re not even sure they can,” he replied. “But they are great aetheric confluences. Our cities are built around them, and in times long past we would trade with the woods that nurtured them. They function similarly to Aetherytes, when fully grown.” 

“Considerably larger than a repurposed gazebo, then,” Haurchefant said, frowning in thought. “Perhaps… Well, will it keep in this foul allagan concoction?”

“I see no reason why it wouldn’t, though it pains me to see it kept so far from the earth,” Ar’telan replied. “More to the point…” He picked up the letter once more from where it had fallen, squinting at the letters. “The language is significantly more… obtuse than I might expect, but I recognise the script. This is Alphinaud’s writing.”

“How kind of him, raiding Allagan ruins for us,” Haurchefant remarked with a smile. Ar’telan laughed softly at that, returning the letter to the pile of books on the tray.

“Alphinaud wasn’t involved with the Warring Triad. That would be Urianger, and Krile. Unukalhai maybe,” he said. “Alphinaud certainly has the connections to source the other seeds, though. I can’t imagine the books were sent all the way from Sharlayan as well, though.”

“There were some notes in them,” Haurchefant remarked. “A name you might recognise. One ‘Master Matoya’.” He smiled once more. “This was a group effort, I must presume.”

“But why not simply tell me?” Ar’telan wondered. His eyes went to the pots of seeds, already lovingly planted by Haurchefant. He had learned to do so entirely during his convalescence, a knight’s training not covering the nurturing of crops, just so that Ar’telan would have peace of mind on the health of their plants during his adventures. 

“A surprise for you, perhaps,” Haurchefant mused. “Not every gift needs credit. Sometimes it is simply the giving of it that matters.” 

Ar’telan looked from Haurchefant, to the tray of seeds, to the plants that bloomed around them. They had noticed - even Y’shtola, who had only met Haurchefant for the first time at their wedding. Alphinaud had started it, of that he was certain - perhaps he had only intended it to be something small, even. Alphinaud was not one for grand gestures when it came to personal things, especially with his pride still wounded from the downfall of his last grand project. But they had noticed, all of them, and they had done everything they could to give him just a little piece of home, and would not even have taken credit for it.

“If I find out you were enabling this I will be upset,” Artelan settled for, which got a laugh from Haurchefant.

“Not at all. ‘Twas as much a surprise to me as it was to you, though I have had two full days to investigate it. Not that I think my family is entirely innocent of this, mind you, but for once my hands are entirely clean.”

“A rare statement, for you,” Ar’telan said. 

A knock at the door interrupted any attempt at a response from Haurchefant. Ar’telan found himself reaching for the jar, as if to protect the seed within it, and snatched his hands back. Haurchefant beckoned through the glass, and Ar’telan glanced back to see their visitor. Francel.

“I hope this isn’t a bad time,” Francel said, sidling in and closing the door carefully behind him. The blast of cold air from the pillars rushed around Ar’telan’s ankles, but all of the plants close to the door were ones who could handle such odd temperature variance.

“Not at all. Sit!” Haurchefant declared, before looking around and reconsidering. “If you can, of course.”

“Here,” Ar’telan said, getting to his feet so that Francel could have the space. The young elezen tried to protest, but Ar’telan simply picked up the tray from where it rested, sat in the space it left, then balanced the tray carefully upon his knees.

“I… My thanks,” Francel said, relenting, and he seated himself carefully upon the bench, careful not to disturb the plants on either side of him. “My apologies, I did not mean to interrupt,” he continued. “I have brought news. Pleasant news, I hope.”

“We can but dream,” Haurchefant agreed, clasping his hands together in excitement. “It is so rare to see you here these days, Francel, with all the work that keeps you. A knight of paperwork! I should call you Ser.”

“Haurchefant, please,” Francel said, the tips of his ears going red with embarrassment. Haurcehfant was not wrong, though - early stages it may have been, but Ar’telan knew Francel was attempting to secure permission to develop some of the areas laid to waste in the death throes of the Dragonsong War, not to mention putting a great deal of effort into securing the area around the ruins of the Steel Vigil. Ar’telan was only glad that he was doing it in ways he excelled at this time, rather than leading a contingent of knights up to the nest of beasts himself.

“I hope you have not been overworking yourself,” Ar’telan said, and Francel sighed in defeat.

“No, no, I have not, I assure you,” he said. “Although it is about my work that I have come, in truth. I have been working with Lord Emmanellain, and we have secured the path up to Providence Point. It was imperative to us that you would be able to reach it yourself, Lord Haurchefant, so-”

“Truly? All the way up to the Steel Vigil?” Hauichefant interrupted, excitement sparking in his eyes. “I had thought those Aevises would never be ousted. I dare not ask who you owe favours to in return.”

“Lord Emmanellain was most helpful in that regard,” Francel assured, and though he did not say it, the echo of ‘surprisingly’ hung in the air. 

Ar’telan looked from the conversation down to the tray at his knees. The glowing seed hung in its jar, pulsing with a life that would rival that which grew out of the ruins of St Mochianne’s Arboretum. A tree that towered up to the sky…

“Francel,” he said, and the sight of the sign made Francel pause mid-sentence to focus on Ar’telan. “Had you any plans for the Point itself?”

“Our main goal was to retake the Vigil,” Francel said. “With Svara gone, it seemed a realistic proposal at last. That my brother and all the knights who perished there could be laid to rest…” He sighed, shaking his head at the thought of it. “There is a symbol of Menphina up on the hill that pilgrims yet journey to, though, and it was nice to see the path made safe.” 

“I have an idea,” Ar’telan said, “though it will take many moons, if not years, to see it done. But if you would give us leave to use the space at the Point, I would appreciate it.”

“I imagine that asking on behalf of the saviour of Ishgard will be much simpler than trying to secure such things for even myself,” Francel agreed. “I shall do my best.”

“I am sorry to make more work for you,” Ar’telan said, a rueful look on his face.

“You need not fear. I shall ensure he takes frequent breaks,” Haurchefant reassured him. “It is a little harder to catch him, these days, but even these wheels will find him if he falls asleep at his desk.” Francel went as red as an Ishgardian beet at the suggestion, burying his face in his hands.

“I will sleep, I swear,” he mumbled. “I have been.”

“‘Tis not a good comparison that Lord Stephanivien comes out favourably in, Francel,” Haurchefant remarked, and Ar’telan could see the concern in his slightly chiding tone. “Though you do at least drink slightly less coffee.”

“I sleep more than Stephanivien!” Francel protested, before shaking his head and getting to his feet. “Anyway. I must be getting back to the Locks, ere the blizzard sets in.”

“Safe travels, Francel,” Ar’telan told him, and he smiled in return.

–

Once Francel was gone, Haurchefant turned eager eyes to Ar’telan.

“You will tell me, I trust?” he said, and Ar’telan nodded.

The plan was simple enough to outline, though complex in its execution. Providence Point would be the site where they planted the seed, though it would take some time indeed to make it ready. The living trees of Meracydia had always been remarkably capable of adaptation, before they had drained the life from themselves to summon Sephirot in defence of their woods, but Ishgard’s climate would prove difficult. So Ar’telan laid out his thoughts: A spring crystal from Voor Sian Siran, along with a fire crystal of similar bent that would heat the surrounds and influence the aether, warming just enough of the place to make it habitable. Around the tree they would expand their garden, piece by piece, and Ar’telan would search for the means to stabilise the locale on his travels. 

“It will be a joyous place for Menphina’s pilgrims,” Haurchefant decided, before frowning slightly. “Though I would offer a suggestion of my own. You are aware of what happened at the Steel Vigil.” Ar’telan nodded. It was Haurchefant himself who had told him, before they had led the assault to drive Svara back from its ruined walls. It had been held by House Haillenarte before the Calamity, manned by Ser Chlodebaimt in much the same way as Emmanellain held Dragonhead now. When the moon had fallen, the Horde had risen, and that in combination with the sudden, biting cold had meant they could not hold the line. Ser Chlodebaimt had held the keep with a squadron of men until the very last soldier escaped. He had died fighting. And from all of Ar’telan’s interactions with Ishgard - from Stephanivien and his Machinists, to Francel, even to their father, he knew that Ishgard had still considered it a failure, because he had thought to retreat at all. 

Better one life than many. How well he knew that thought.

“In times past, Ishgard has honoured her bravest knights with memorial statues,” Hauirchefant said. “Though I do not intend to commission something so grand as the great statues in the city, the sacrifice of those who lost their lives that day deserves marking with something other than scorn. I would put it in a place of life, to honour that which Ser Chlodebaimt gave his life for.” Ar’telan nodded his consent immediately. It could never have been his idea, but he would devote himself to it nonetheless.

“And will you tell Francel?” he asked, and Haurchefant smiled.

“Sometimes it is simply the giving of the gift that matters.”

[ofdragonsdeep]

21: Feckless

The youngest true-born son of House Fortemps had a reputation. Some things were more important.

(HW spoilers, character death mention, m!WoLxHaurchefant)

Night seeped through into the rooms of Fortemps Manor. Alone in his room, not even his manservant for company, Emmanellain de Fortemps sat on his bed, staring down at the letter in his hands as though it were a summons to his own execution.

It hadn’t felt real, when the news had come down from the Vault. His little brother - how long it had taken them both to be comfortable with that moniker, precious years stolen by the pernicious hate that stifled the ruling class - gone. He had watched his father crack and break, seen the glassy-eyed shock still written on the miqo’te’s face, watched Artoirel near biting his lip to keep his composure. For the first time in his life, he had found himself utterly without words, at a loss to make any impact at all.

War came for all of them, in the end. He had seen it in the Haillenartes, crushed by the loss of Chloidebaimt during the Calamity. Watched Lanaiatte give herself to the life of the soldier in hopes of recompense, felt the terror that she, too, would be lost. For all that he and Haurchefant had bickered, he recognised the skill his brother had possessed, skill he felt himself lacking. What had happened with the Vanu at the Sea of Clouds had left him trembling in terror, unable to so much as raise his voice in protest. By the Fury, it was cruel to take the competent ones. Would they have missed him? Would his father have broken down to tears at the news of his death? Would it have felt like a hole in the fabric of their family to lose the wastrel, the second-born, the backup son? His father had not loved his mother like he had Haurchefant’s, another failing of the way their society bent them out of shape. Would it have mattered?

He blinked back the tears, looking back down to the letter in his hand, feeling the sadness settle like a pit in his stomach. Haurchefant had given it to him before Ar’telan and his friends had left for Dravania to challenge Nidhogg. He had questioned it at the time - why him, and not the ever reliable Artoirel? Why even write something so grim as a letter intended to be delivered from the grave? Surely with allies so strong and a cause so just, death would not, could not claim them.

Haurchefant had been carefree about so many things, but this was too important to leave to chance. Emmanellain could not even fathom being in such a situation - loving someone so deeply that you left them an elegy in the wake of your death. But here he was, with a letter to deliver that he wished with all his heart he had never received.

---

He walked the short distance to his brother’s room - no need to put a qualifier on it now, horrible as the thought was - and knocked. Artoirel opened it, looking remarkably composed in the face of all that had happened, and blinked at him in surprise.

“Emmanellain. Is Honoroit not with you?”

“No. I… I sent him away. Can we talk?”

Artoirel paused, a pained look crossing his face. Whether it was for the prospect of talking to him at all or the inevitable subject matter, Emmanellain could not say.

“Of course. Come in,” he said eventually, stepping aside to give Emmanellain room to pass. Artoirel’s room was a neat and tidy affair, a far cry from Emmanellain’s own, presenting the precise picture of a responsible heir to any who might care to look. Which, if he understood his brother’s proclivities correctly, was exactly nobody but the manor staff.

“Sit,” Artoirel said, gesturing to the chair at his dresser. Emmanellain did so, shifting the envelope uncomfortably between his fingers as Artoirel returned to his bed and sat upon it. “There was nothing you could have done…” he began, before frowning as he noted the letter. “What is this about?” he said instead, and Emmanellain sighed.

“He gave me this. Haurchefant,” he said, the name difficult to say aloud. “He wanted me to keep it… Just in case. It’s… for Ar’telan.” Artoirel inhaled sharply, the magnitude of the weight Emmanellain now carried clear to him.

“I see,” he said, a simple statement that meant so much. “Perhaps it is best that you hold on to it a while, then. Ar’telan and his companions have already set out for the Sea of Clouds, and intend to pursue the Archbishop beyond it. I do not know how long it will be until they return, but I… I suspect he will be in a better place to receive it when he does.” His gaze went from the letter up to Emmanellain’s face. “Have you read it?”

“No!” Emmanellain protested. “I enjoy listening to gossip, not spreading it. Besides, they already had to deal with so much.” He ran his fingers across the envelope. “I know it’s not just a letter. But Haurchefant didn’t tell me anything else, and I did not think to ask.” Artoirel seemed surprised by the revelation that Emmanellain was capable of respecting anyone’s privacy, but nodded his head regardless.

“Reasonable,” he allowed. “I will go with you, if you wish. To deliver it.” Emmanellain swallowed down the lump in his throat, refusing to cry in front of his brother of all people. As if he hadn’t done that enough in his life so far.

“I would like that,” he said, voice cracking a little under the strain. “I wanted… not to think about it. As if it would go away. But it won’t. So I have to…” Artoirel walked over, placed a comforting hand atop Emmanellain’s own.

“There is no ‘I’, Emmanellain. Perhaps our history would not suggest it, but we have each other yet. We shall stand together, though the memories still hurt. Come and find me when you are ready.” Emmanellain nodded, wordlessly holding out the letter. Artoirel took it, for a moment, felt the weight of the ring that rested within the envelope. With a sigh on his lips, he passed it back.

“It was entrusted to you,” he said. “Keep it. I know you will not lose something so important as this.”

---

Victory was not the joyful fanfares and cheering in the streets that Emmanellain had come to expect from the history books. Uncertainty hung over the city-state like a death shroud, the dull clouds casting a bitter pall across the sky. Eorzea’s Warrior of Light had returned in apparent triumph, but he had not worn a smile on his face, and only a chosen few had been there to receive him. In the aftermath, he had returned to Fortemps Manor like a stray cat, seeking the comfort of familiarity in his uncertainty, but distancing himself from them all the same.

Emmanellain had seen him sat out in the gazebo next to the manor’s walls, ignoring the pot of tea that bubbled merrily on the constant fire there. His eyes looked out across the street at nothing at all, his body moving only to move the warmth back into his extremities. Emmanellain watched him from the window, nervously waiting for Honoroit to return with Artoirel and feeling like a peeping tom.

“You mean to give it to him, then,” Artoirel’s voice cut in, startling him from his impromptu vigil.

“Yes. Do you think…?” he asked, uncertain, and Artoirel sighed.

“It is your decision. What do you think?” he replied, and Emmanellain turned back to the window, biting his lip unhappily.

“I don’t think there will ever be a good time,” he said. “But now seems as well as any. I know that Father worries about him.” Artoirel made a noise of acknowledgement, glancing out of the window himself.

“For all Ishgard has cost him, it is a wonder he can bear to be back here at all,” he said voice quiet. “Let us go, then. On your mark.”

---

The miqo’te stirred from his reverie as they approached him, looking up at them before averting his eyes back to his knees, a deep and abiding sadness written onto his features. Still Emmanellain marvelled at just how short he was, only beating Honoroit by a head despite being old enough to be the boy’s father. He held himself with a quiet grief now, his shortness of stature not stymying the depth of his heart.

“Ar’telan. Um, do you have a moment?” Emmanellain asked. The miqo’te nodded, once, and with notable effort shifted his gaze onto the three of them. “I… I have something for you,” he said, which felt like it barely did justice to it, but it was all the words he had. “I… It… From Haurchefant.”

The sound of the name struck the warrior like a mortal blow, a fleeting moment of agony on his face. He regained his composure with remarkable speed, though, raising his hands to sign a simple thank you at him, reaching out to take the letter. His fingers were cold, Emmanellain thought, showing the time that he had spent outside to his detriment. Still, Artoirel put a hand on Emmanellain’s shoulder, the two of them sitting on the wooden benches of the gazebo and waiting in quiet understanding.

Ar’telan opened the envelope with reverent care, sliding the letter from it and reading it with careful eyes. Haurchefant had told Emmanellain much of Ar’telan - had told anyone who would listen, really. Emmanellain knew he had learned to read Eorzea’s moon runes from an old copy of the Enchiridion, to better understand the faith of the Fury. Emmanellain could see the need for him to follow the marks with his fingers, though he did not, held back by a sense of propriety. It reminded Emmanellain of teaching Honoroit his letters, after they had first met in the Crozier so many moons ago. Though he did not crane his head to read the text, as he might once have done if he passed unnoticed by another noble’s eyes, he could tell even from their distance that Haurchefant had kept his letters neat, rather than the rushing script he had preferred. Their father had opined his messiness, his lackadaisy attitude the one flaw their sire could find in his youngest son. Emmanellain’s late mother had found far more flaws in him, not least of which was his very existence, and it brought the sorrow back too keenly to think on it overlong.

Eyes read the final paragraph. Re-read it. With shivering fingers - surely it was the cold, or so Emmanellain would say to anyone who thought to ask - Ar’telan reached back into the envelope, and drew out the ring.

It was a simple little thing, made of spruce wood and polished til the varnish gleamed in the light of the fire. Ar’telan stared at it for a long time, long enough for the wind to fill the silence left in the wake, then slid it over his finger. A perfect fit, of course - Haurchefant would have accepted no less, Emmanellain knew. The void he had left behind yawned like a chasm between them, this small, quiet man for whom he had given everything, and the family he had left behind.

“I know that you have found it hard. The Fury knows we all have,” Emmanellain said, jolting Ar’telan from his trance. “But you need not run from us. Haurchefant wanted you to be a part of our family, and it would be cruel to refuse you now.” Ar’telan’s eyes went from the letter, to the ring on his finger, to the three of them, sitting uncomfortably around the paltry warmth the fire pit provided. He swallowed, and for a moment it looked like he might cry.

“...Thank you,” he signed eventually. The letter went back into its envelope, then disappeared into one of the miqo’te’s multitudinous pockets. His fingers twisted the ring uncomfortably, a curious hand going to his neck, then back to his lap.

“My brother speaks true,” Artoirel said. “Though I have not read his words, I know our brother would not have asked for your hand without our father’s blessing. He worries for you.” He shook his head then, stamping his feet on the ground to try and stir the blood in them. “Grief is not easy. It is a road with no end, a wound without succor. But though our paths are different, we can walk them beside each other.” Ar’telan closed his eyes, a single tear falling down his dark skin to land upon the envelope in his hands.

“Am I not a reminder to you? Of everything you have lost?” he asked, fingers shaking. Emmanellain shook his head.

“No. You are a memory of all we had,” he disagreed. “I know that our father would agree. You are welcome here.” He held out a hand, and Ar’telan opened his eyes, looking between the three of them uncertainly.

“If you would have me,” he allowed, reaching out to take it. Emmanellain seized the opportunity, pulling the miqo’te from his sitting position and into a hug, getting a rare yelp of surprise and dismay from the smaller man for his troubles.

“Emmanellain…” Artoirel said, shaking his head in despair. Ar’telan wriggled free, straightening his robes with his tail swishing cautiously behind his back. Emmanellain offered him a grin, unrepentant.

“That’s the spirit!” he said, getting to his feet. “Let’s get back inside. The night is wicked cold at this time of year.” Ar’telan looked between them, ventured the smallest of smiles, and nodded in agreement.

[ofdragonsdeep]

24: Illustrious

The city of Ishgard was more vast than even imagination could suggest.

(m!WoLxHaurchefant)

Ishgard. Shining jewel in the crown of the Holy See, rising tall and strong out of the Sea of Clouds. Though her once fair weather had turned to snow and ice in the days following the Calamity, her streets were no less impressive for their gatherings of snow-piles, though the ice certainly made the walkways a little more dangerous.

Ar’telan had spent many days looking up at the city during his time in Coerthas. From the constant back and forth of scurrying tasks that had accompanied their search for the Enterprise, to nights out gathering rare apples on the hoary trees, to moments on Providence Point with Haurchefant, listening with delighted eyes as he extolled the virtues of his homeland. Despite it all, despite coming close enough to touch the gates within when he had helped to hold the line against the Horde on the Steps of Faith, today was his first day within the city.

The circumstance left much to be desired, that was true. A desperate, hurried retreat in the dead of night, the temporary comfort of Camp Dragonhead - Tataru had noticed that Haurchefant lingered by their Warrior of Light, even if Alphinaud had been too lost in panic and fear to do the same - and now here they were. Fugitives. Criminals. His friends were missing or dead. Some hero he had been for them.

Though Tataru and Alphinaud had left with the Count’s manservant to tour the city, Ar’telan had lingered behind. He had noticed the elder of the Count’s sons roll his eyes when he instead crossed the room to where Haurchefant stood, and said nothing of it.

“I believe you promised me a tour,” he said, attempting to inject a little mirth into his smile and likely failing miserably. Haurchefant started, surprised by the address, but gave him a warm smile nonetheless.

“I had wondered if you would remember,” he said, then cast a glance across the room. “Have I your leave, my lord?” he asked the Count, who inclined his head once in agreement. There was a stiffness between them that was impossible to deny - that this was Haurchefant on his best behaviour was already clear, but Ar’telan was still unsure precisely who he was behaving for. There was care and love in the Count’s lined face, no less than that with which he looked upon the two men stood beside him, and Haurchefant yearned-

But here was not the time nor the place for such considerations.

“With me, then,” Haurchefant said, gesturing excitedly to Ar’telan as he escorted him out of the door.

—

The air was chilly in the streets of the Last Vigil, and the knight stood watch outside the manor doors had gained a thin coating of snow during their time indoors. He offered them both a silent, respectful nod as they passed. If any of them thought it strange that their guests had different guides, none of them said it aloud.

“If I were to show you every corner of Ishgard we would be gone for days, I fear, so I shall give you the short version,” Haurchefant decided, another encouraging smile levelled at Ar’telan as he said it. “It was not quite the circumstance I had envisioned, I will admit, but you are here nonetheless.”

“Thank you,” Ar’telan said, before rubbing his fingers together and blowing on them to try and ward off the cold. He was going to need a pair of gloves that came with fingers if he was going to be spending much time outside, and his scholar’s robes were not cutting it. “I know it could not have been easy at such short notice.” A pained look passed over Haurchefant’s face at the reminder, and he shook his head.

“Not at all. The Count knows of your valiant deeds.”

“Because you told him?” Ar’telan inferred, and Haurchefant laughed.

“Perhaps. Come. We shall start from the beginning,” he insisted, ushering Ar’telan down the great slopes like an excited puppy. The knights they passed shot them strange looks - those who wore the rose of House Haillenarte seemed more understanding than the ones who did not, whether they were Temple Knights or simply in service to one of the other two Houses. Ar’telan shrank from their scrutiny, and though Haurchefant moved to put himself between judgemental glares and his charge, he did not reach out a hand in comfort like he had at Camp Dragonhead.

Ar’telan thought he might know why.

—

“So! This is the aetheryte plaza,” Haurchefant began, a wave of his hand encompassing the great area that lay beyond the ingress at the Gates of Judgement. “The Horde’s attacks have been ceaseless of late, even in the wake of their defeat at the Steps. Pay no mind to the rubble.”

“There are wounded,” Ar’telan began, but Haurchefant shook his head.

“Your magicks will be as welcome as they were on your first visit to Ishgard. Though you mean well, it would not do to invite the stares of the Inquisition.” Ar’telan took his hand from his grimoire, his conscience crying out in protest at simply walking past the knights who limped towards their destinations, or collapsed in crumpled heaps out of the reach of the worst snowfall. He remembered what they had said the first time he had begged aid of Ishgard, at the Observatorium. Heretic, they had whispered, his talking fingers that any could understand clearly the work of some fell magic that he had sold his soul to obtain. He did not know which of the tall spires that peppered his horizon now housed the main body of the Inquisition, but Haurchefant was right. He would need all the help he could get.

“Much of Ishgard’s heart beats from here,” Haurchefant said, watching as Ar’telan held out his hand to attune to the aetheryte they stood beside. “The Skysteel Manufactory supplies weapons for the knights, the Holy Stables provides chocobos bred for battle. Then there is the main bastion of the Temple Knights due north, and the Proving Grounds where they hold the tourney every year.”

“Have you ever fought?” Ar’telan asked. Haurchefant frowned at the question.

“I… No,” he replied, shaking his head. “Those who seek to join the Temple Knights and those who would prove the value of their blood are the only ones who may.” Ar’telan bit his lip, holding one hand over the other to prevent asking the question he so badly wanted to ask. “Down below lies the Brume,” Haurchefant continued, as though the interruption had never happened. “They have suffered the brunt of the Horde’s attacks, and there has been precious little time to restore what was lost as of late, I fear.” Ar’telan glanced over at the rickety wooden scaffold, saw the children scowling through the gaps. Their ire seemed reserved for the painted metal of Haurchefant’s shield, though they did not spare Ar’telan the full force of their wrath.

“I can imagine why that might be,” he said, and Haurchefant sighed.

“‘Tis the prevailing attitude that it is better to dash those with less to lose upon the rocks,” he agreed. “It is not the way I try to run the camp at Dragonhead, but it is the way of Ishgard.” Ar’telan tore his gaze away from precipitous drops and dirty children huddled upon rubble.

“You would expect me to look away,” he said, and Haurchefant shook his head, almost automatically.

“I would not expect it of you. But for now you may need to try,” he said, a compromise of sorts. It was strange to Ar’telan - every time they had stood on Providence Point and watched the lights of the city, Haurchefant had spoken of his home at length, the beauty of her streets and the strength of her people. But here he held his tongue, and not for wanting to. Who watched him?

“You may find a little of your time drawn to the Forgotten Knight,” Haurchefant added, moving on with characteristic swiftness. “It is not an upper class establishment, but it is respectable, and Gibrillont will like you once he knows the kind of man you are, I think.”

“You and the Count have placed a lot of stock in that,” Ar’telan said, without even thinking about it. Haurchefant let out a sigh.

“Yes. I have endeavoured not to go on overlong about your virtues, but I am ever prone to getting lost in a topic. I am told it is one of my less favourable features.” The cheerful smile he gave to accompany the statement stopped Ar’telan’s immediate desire to disagree, but it still sat wrong in the air between them. “Come, come. I shall show you the more famous sights!”

—

Haurchefant took him all around the city, from the markets all the way back up to the Hoplon, the statue of the Fury casting a stony gaze upon the more fortunate of the city. Ar’telan listened in enraptured silence as Haurchefant told him of the history and makeup of the city - from its founding under King Thordan I, through the meanings of each and every statue they passed under, to those who ruled it now. Ar’telan knew it already, of course - Haurchefant had spoken on it at length many times before, often without being asked - but it lended a weight to it, to hear it described on the very streets upon which the history had happened. He felt a little of his cheer return to listen to Haurchefant talk, too, a welcome distraction from the troubles which had plagued him since the day of the banquet. But if Haurchefant’s careful words were any indication, he was not entirely done with hiding from unwanted eyes.

“...And that is the long and short of it,” Haurchefant finished. “Though mostly the long, I fear. How do you fare?”

“I could pass a quiz if given one,” Ar’telan offered, which made Haurchefant laugh.

“Well, you never do know with the Inquisition. Come with me, then. The gazebo by the manor is shielded from prying eyes and has a fire besides. We can await the return of your companions there.” Ar’telan nodded, following dutifully where he was led.

Though even the manors of the High Houses were packed in, in a manner not dissimilar to fullmoon sardines stacked in the can, the little gazebo and the boxes of stubborn winter flowers that grew around it were away from the road. The view over the city below was enough to capture Ar’telan’s eyes immediately, and he was propped up on his knees on the seating to better crane his neck over for the view. Haurchefant sat beside him, and a gentle hand upon his own almost startled him enough to send him tumbling the many yalms down into the road below.

“I must apologise for my reticence,” Haurchefant said, and Ar’telan clambered back into a more conventional seating position, watching him with confused and curious eyes. “How long I have dreamed of this day, and yet… I seem unable to seize it.” He let out a morose sigh, a most unsuitable emotion for him, and shook his head. “It was not my intent to seem stifled, my dear… my friend. You must forgive me.”

“There is nothing to forgive,” Ar’telan disagreed. “Not after all you have done for us, all your family has risked. I know what it means.” The smile crept back onto Haurchefant’s face then, and he lifted Ar’telan’s hand to press a gentle kiss to the back of his fingers.

“Fully do I love my homeland and my people, but knowing how we have treated you in moons past, and how we might in the days coming, it is worrisome,” he confessed. “Perhaps one day we shall return to this exercise, and I shall lead you by the hand instead.”

“To finish in the Cathedral?” Ar’telan said, the subtle tease in it enough to make Haurchefant laugh.

“If you are a lucky man, perhaps,” he allowed. “Alas, I have already tarried here overlong, and Corentiaux will have a fit if I neglect my duties any further. I shall return you to his Lordship’s care.”

“Your father’s care,” Ar’telan disagreed, and the wince at the middle word was palpable on Haurchefant’s face.

“Oftentimes I find myself glad that none can overhear your words,” he said. “It would be best if you did not call him thus in front of Lords Artoirel and Emmanellain. The wound ever stings, I fear.”

“If that is what you wish,” Ar’telan conceded, though he did not much like it.

—

His return to the warmth of the manor was uneventful. The Count’s two sons had departed from the main room in the time that he was out, and the servants merely ushered him in and guided him to the sofa by the fire to await his companions’ return. Not a few minutes after the steward had left, the Count walked his slow way into the room, the click of his walking stick against the shining marble floor stirring Ar’telan from his flame-induced reverie.

He did not walk over immediately, instead going to the nearest window and staring out at the view beyond. The snow had begun to settle in something fierce now - likely why Alphinaud and Tataru were so far behind him - so there was little to see but the foggy outlines of the city he had to be intimately familiar with. It was not precisely a comfortable silence, but Ar’telan did not feel confident enough to break it, so he kept his counsel.

He looked up again when the sounds of walking overshadowed the ticking clock, and Count Edmont seated himself opposite his guest. He seemed a very tired man, up close, and Ar’telan supposed he carried a great many burdens all alone, as a Count. A gilded cell, perhaps, and he himself the gaoler, but the stress was no less there for the privilege of it.

“My son has spoken of you at great length,” he said, which made Ar’telan recoil slightly in surprise.

“Lord Haurchefant has overstated my virtues, I am sure,” he said, choosing his words carefully. The Count let out a long and wearied sigh.

“So my eldest has assured me, yes,” he said, gently leaning his cane against the arm of the chair and folding his hands carefully in his lap. “But I have never been a man to judge before I have seen someone’s capabilities for myself. But that is not why I am speaking with you now.”

“I am aware of-” Ar’telan began, but the Count held up a hand, and Ar’telan snatched his own back like an admonished schoolboy, blinking in nervous uncertainty.

“Haurchefant tells me on every occasion he can that the two of you are… careful,” he said, and Ar’telan stared at his knees rather than acknowledge that Haurchefant had spoken of them in front of his own father. “That no unfriendly eyes shall see his overtures towards you, and none of the enemies of our house shall catch the words you speak.”

“He speaks true,” Ar’telan began, desperate to defend him, and the Count shook his head.

“I know he does. He is devoted beyond measure,” he agreed. “I wished only to apologise.” Ar’telan made a surprised noise, fingers trembling in the absence of the response he was supposed to have, ears tilted back in distress. “Regardless of the veracity of his claims as to your strength - which I have no reason to doubt, no matter his clear bias - the fact remains that he loves you dearly. And, if I have your measure, you do him, as well.” Ar’telan swallowed, feeling embarrassment rising in his face at the proclamation. “And yet he dare not say it, not even within his own home, for my sake. I am making a poor impression indeed, as is Ishgard herself.” Ar’telan shook his head.

“No. I understand it, my Lord,” he assured him. “Haurchefant’s love for Ishgard, and for you, is clear in his every word.” Now it was the Count’s turn to be surprised, the frown which coloured his features giving voice to his concerns where his words did not. Still he seemed so tired. Though Haurchefant had spoken at length of his father’s tireless struggle against the xenophobic policies of their homeland, he had either not wanted or not thought to dwell upon the toll it had taken on him.

“I do wonder if we deserve it,” he said, his voice quiet. “I do not imagine that your stay here will be much kinder than your journey, Master Qin. If I could do more, then I would.”

“You have already done more than you should,” Ar’telan disagreed. “I will repay your kindness and the risks that you have taken in allowing us to shelter here. I know it was not an easy decision to make.”

“Ah, well, it is difficult to refuse Haurchefant when he truly wants something,” the Count lamented, shaking his head slightly at the thought of it. “Know that within these walls you need not hide, not even as you did within our camp at Dragonhead. All here understand Haurchefant’s position, as well as your own. After all that you have suffered in recent times, we can at least relieve you of that burden.”

“Lord Haurchefant has returned to Camp Dragonhead, though,” Ar’telan said, confused, and the Count chuckled.

“Yes, but he will be back, within bells if he can. He is not the most subtle of my boys, though the competition is fiercer than it ought be.” Ar’telan hid a laugh behind his hand, then stiffered and straightened as the door was eased open.

“Milord, Master Leveilleur has returned,” the steward said, and the Count inclined his head, getting to his feet and retrieving the cane with barely a huff of effort.

“Fetch Artoirel and Emmanellain, and show him through,” he instructed, before glancing back to Ar’telan. “I hope you can forgive the dance of politics, Master Qin, though both you and your young friend seem accustomed to it.” Ar’telan nodded with a small smile on his face, uncurling from his comfortable position by the fire. A secret behind every word, and a judgement behind every glance, such was the way of Ishgard as Haurchefant had told him. But he had, at least, passed this test, and for that he was glad.

[ofdragonsdeep]

22: Fluster

Haurchefant was never one to keep his feelings close to his chest.

(m!WoLxHaurchefant)

The sound of footsteps on the solid stone of Camp Dragonhead’s keep accompanied Ar’telan on his late-night walk. He rubbed the arms of his robes as he went, the chill seeping through his simple healer’s garb despite the frenzy of activity that he had just left.

A surprise assault by the Dravanians, easily repelled by the knights stationed at the camp but not without its casualties. No deaths tonight, for a mercy, but Ar’telan had spent every bell since before the sun had set in the infirmary with the other chirurgeons, intent on preserving that statistic. If he had not already been intending to stay the night, the sheer exhaustion that seemed determined to seep into the marrow of his very bones would have made the decision for him.

“Ar’telan! I was hoping I would catch you. Have you a moment?”

Haurchefant’s voice startled him, and he all but tripped over his robe to stop himself dead, nodding as quickly as his wearied muscles would allow. Haurchefant, too, looked tired, but his was the tiredness of a man who did not sleep enough rather than that of someone who had just exhausted most of their aether on healing magicks. Both problems were unfortunately incurable, if the quiet grumblings of Haurchefant’s closest subordinates had taught Ar’telan anything.

“I am sure I can find a moment,” he said, cutting himself off before he could add for you, as if he would not have forcibly uprooted time for anyone who came asking, to the detriment of his own health.

“Good. There was something I had wanted to speak to you about, but in the chaos it quite slipped my mind.” Haurchefant had the easy smile on his face that he always wore, save for when he was reviewing news of recent deaths or accusations of heresy, but there was an awkwardness to the way he was holding himself, Ar’telan thought. He was far too tired to process that, though. “You have been given use of a room nearby, yes? That shall do for a venue, if you will forgive the late-night impropriety.” Ar’telan blinked.

“I- yes, I have, we… if you like,” he managed, fingers tangled up on themselves as he tried to process. Haurchefant was not much one for privacy - to his detriment, at times. It was the only thing that Brigie, the Camp’s resident Inquisitor, had to say against him - he would hold tactical meetings out in the snow if not pushed indoors, for any heretic and their mother to hear.

“Excellent! By your leave, then, my friend,” he said, all but herding Ar’telan the rest of the way to his door. Ar’telan was not entirely certain he would not simply pass out as soon as they got inside, but he would at least endeavour to stay awake for whatever late-night secret Haurchefant was seeking to involve him in.

---

The room, much like the one that served as Ar’telan’s back at the Rising Stones, was a simple affair. It was not like the barracks reserved for the soldiers, at least - there was but one bed, and he did not have to share it - but it was small, tucked into the side of the keep, and possessed little more than a bed, a side table, and a stool for the latter. Ar’telan, stifling a yawn, sat himself upon the edge of the bed, tail curling up around his legs, and watched as Haurchefant stared at the empty table instead of at him.

“I confess it is a little embarrassing,” the elezen said, gaze fixed on his reflection in the mirror. “I am sure that by now you have become familiar with the gossip among the knights?” Ar’telan raised his hands, then pulled them back in towards his chest, momentarily taken aback.

“I have heard rumours,” he confirmed, dancing around the subject carefully. Truth be told it was impossible to not hear the rumours, if Haurchefant was not in the keep when Ar’telan arrived Yaelle and Corentiaux were taking it in turns to ask if their commander had professed his affection yet. Embarrassing was certainly an appropriate word. Ar’telan thought that the only person at this point who did not know was Alphinaud, whose head was always firmly rooted in whatever task he was currently focused on. Haurchefant’s eyes lingered on him for a few moments, as if to be sure he would say nothing more, before the elezen sighed and awkwardly folded himself onto a stool not sized for someone of his height or spindliness.

“My apologies if it has caused you undue distress,” he said, and Ar’telan blinked at him in tired confusion. “In truth, there… there is weight to them. I confess I am quite fond of you.” He took a breath, averting his gaze so Ar’telan could not answer before he was done. “But I would not tell you this without context. My father… is Count Edmont de Fortemps.” He looked back at Ar’telan then, who made a pitiful attempt to collect himself. There is weight to them. All the teasing he had endured, all the feelings he had buried…

“The head of your house is your father?” Ar’telan said, trying to piece things together. “Does that… matter?” Haurchefant let out a soft laugh.

“My mother was not the Countess, so yes, it does,” he said. Ar’telan considered the information. He had not, it had to be said, paid all that much attention to the rituals and expectations of Eorzea’s other races, but he understood the theory of marriage, even if it had never applied in the culture he had grown up in.

“I- I’m sorry, I don’t…” he began, shaking his head and collecting himself, “You wish - what is it you are asking of me?” Haurchefant gave him that soft smile he was so fond of, even if Ar’telan could see the lines of nerves in every muscle of his face. How long had he been holding on to this thought, these feelings? And worrying about problems that Ar’telan did not even understand?

“I would ask to court you, if such a thing is your desire,” Haurchefant said, crossing the distance between them to kneel beside the bed and gently take one of Ar’telan’s hands in both of his. “But also to tell you that it is not… as easy as I make it sound.” Ar’telan swallowed down his nerves. “I am a bastard child, though my father yet acknowledges me. It has cost him greatly, both socially and emotionally, to do so, but I love him with all my heart.” Haurchefant shook his head slightly, taking another breath to steady himself. “For the son of a High House to have a relationship with an outsider… Well, it would perhaps be the one time that many of Ishgard’s nobility sought to label me thus.” Though the terms were foreign, the situation seemed clear to Ar’telan now. Ishgard despises foreigners, this he knew from their fateful attempts to locate Cid’s airship. Some of the knights, though not those here, had come close to equating all of those not of Ishgard born with the heretics. If they knew…

“I… I understand,” he said, gently pulling his hand from Haurchefant’s own to shape his reply with his fingers. “At least, I think I do. You would wish me to keep a secret.” Haurchefant nodded.

“Far less simple than cornering you in the training yard, which I will admit was my first choice,” he agreed, and Ar’telan choked at the mental image. “I know it is not a kind ask, my friend. I will not hold it against you if you turn away - and I pray that you will not think less of me for asking.” Slowly, Ar’telan shook his head.

“No. I- Your words make sense, though I have much to learn of Ishgard yet, I think.” He bit his lip nervously, feeling the sharp teeth of his canines catch against the scar that rested there. “I will not refuse you. I do not think I have it in me to do so. I hope that- that I am worth this trouble, this…” The look of delight on Haurchefant’s face quickly clouded to concern, and he placed a finger on Ar’telan’s lips, though he did not take his hands to stop his words outright.

“I will hear none of this self-doubt from you, my friend,” he said. “You are bright, and kind, and brilliant. All who know you are blessed to have done so, and I am honoured to count myself among them.” He ran his fingers down Ar’telan’s chin to tilt up his head, pausing for a few precious moments in case Ar’telan wished to voice his disapproval. When none came - Ar’telan could barely move his hands for all they trembled, much less form words with them - he leaned down and placed a chaste kiss upon his lips.

“Haurchefant…” Ar’telan managed, watching as the elezen moved back and flashed another cheerful smile at him.

“Worry not, my dear,” he said, and the moniker sent Ar’telan’s heart fluttering. “The winter is long, and there will be many more nights where I can find you before you have spent your all on saving lives, as is your wont.” He offered a bow, a wicked look upon his face as he straightened. “Rest well. I shall see you on the morrow.” Ar’telan nodded helplessly, watching as Haurchefant left, closing the door behind him with the quietest of clicks of the latch. It didn’t feel real. Gods preserve him, he would have been content to simply watch with longing, but there was too much strange complication to dismiss it as a dream.

It was lucky he was exhausted, else he might never have slept.

[ofdragonsdeep]

11: Preaching to the Choir

None would have disagreed on the matter of Lord Haurchefant's virtues.

(HW spoilers, character death mention, grief, all that jazz)

The bitter chill of the Coerthas winds did little to salve the ache as Ar’telan walked the familiar path from the Gates of Judgement to Camp Dragonhead. A soft snowfall had set in with the evening, clouds crowding out the stars, and he rubbed his hands together for warmth as he went.

The guard on the gate straightened as Ar’telan approached, then relaxed as recognition set in. He was nodded in, no words spoken between them, but even in the flickering firelight of the meagre torch that marked his station, Ar’telan could see the red around his eyes.

The atmosphere was muted. Despite the ever-present threat, no knights milled about save for the guard up on the ramparts, and the courtyard was entirely free of the adventurers it usually gathered. Up by the aetheryte, there was only the silhouetted form of the foreign-born man who worked on the cannons without cease, and Inquisitor Brigie, leaning against the wall and staring out into the middle distance. She did not see him pass, and he was not keen to alert her, in the circumstances.

The heavy wood and iron doors to the keep opened with a scrape and creak of protest, and the few knights within looked up as he walked inside. Even now, weeks after it had happened, it felt like a twist of the heart to look at the empty chair on the other side of the desk.

“Ar’telan. It’s… it’s good to see you,” Yaelle remarked, offering a weak smile, one of the more genuine ones he had seen of late. Corentiaux rubbed the back of his hand against his eyes, gathering himself.

“We wondered when we might see you here. Are… are you staying long?” he asked. Ar’telan sighed.

“I don’t know. Maybe,” he replied, which felt pathetic in the moment. A young astrologian deviated from the stacks of records to pull out a chair for him without a word, and he sat in it haltingly, afraid of appearing rude. “I wouldn’t want to- to impose. After…” Yaelle shook her head.

“You will always be welcome here. It’s what- what he would have wanted,” she remarked, her voice remarkably level across it all. Ar’telan took a deep breath, and held in the sadness. He was here now. He had waited - no, he had come here as soon as the chase against King Thordan had allowed, but he had left soon after, not able to stand it. He had waited until the dust had settled on that part of the war, until he had felt like there had been some kind of recompense, until he could bear to look the people of the camp in the eye and not collapse under the weight of the guilt of it all.

“We won’t turn you out into the snow. Make yourself at home,” Corentiaux agreed. “You have missed mess, I will allow, but there will be something in the pot for you.” Ar’telan swallowed back the grief.

“Thank you. I… I will try not to intrude,” he managed, feeling the weight of his reasons in the pack he carried. If they wanted to see it, he would let them do it on their own terms, not ones that might soothe his wounds.

As if anything could have soothed them.

---

The young roegadyn woman who was a cheerful constant of the mess hall looked up with a spectre of panic on her face as the door opened. She had been reserved when Ar’telan had first spoken to her, but over the moons she had opened up, her heart boundless in its love. She was… not coping well.

“Ar’telan. The knights didn’t… oh, I’m so sorry, I haven’t…” she tried, before choking back a sob and turning to hide it in the pot on the stove. “Y-you must be hungry. I-I’ll make you something.” Ar’telan tried to disagree, pained by her distress, but she had so lost herself in the busywork of it that she saw none of his desperate hand signs. Resigned, he eased himself onto the edge of one of the benches, elbows on the table and head resting on his hands. They had always taken care of him at Camp Dragonhead, the way they took care of anyone in need who passed through their walls. It was a kindness that permeated every brick, every cobblestone, a smile easy on the face when your spirits were buoyed. They did it now in reflex, stumbling in uncertainty through every day that greeted them. Ar’telan couldn’t help but think back to the days before. He had been there for the internment of knights his healing arts had not been able to save, he had been cheered and encouraged and warmed by the fire that lit every soul within, from the boy who swept the stables to the loftiest knight.

It had hurt, to see knights he had broken bread with that morning in a coffin by the dusk. He had watched the lines of stoic soldiers, some weeping into the shoulders of their fellows as the bodies of their friends were borne past, towards Ishgard. None of it could have prepared him for the grip of the all-consuming grief that lay like a pall over Dragonhead’s heart. Glassy eyes that stared at nothingness, a soul walking with the Fury instead of among the living. And for what? A war without end for the dragons that Nidhogg had driven to madness with his incessant Song, the sins of long-forgotten fathers carved out into the hides of the sons. To bear home the news of the great wyrm’s death, a tragedy of man’s design, and be greeted with a refusal… a refusal to yield.

By Ishgardian hands, by Ishgardian blood. What was it worth?

“Here. I h-hope it’s still good,” Medguistl said, startling Ar’telan from his reverie.

“It will be fine. My thanks,” he said, taking the proffered bowl and setting it down on the table before him. She sat down opposite him, seeming to fold into the table under the weight of her own thoughts.

“It’s not fair,” she said, her voice muffled by wood and her arms. “All those h-horrible people and it had, it h-had to be him.” Ar’telan flinched at her words, staring down at the stew in front of him rather than offer an answer she would not be able to see. “After everything that happened, all the kind things he said, I can’t… I can’t imagine that I’ll never see his smile again. Nobody wants to talk about it. We can’t. It just… it hurts.” She sniffled, looking up at him with an apologetic look on her face. “I-I’m sorry. I-I think this is the last thing you need, t-today of all days. B-but…”

“You are allowed to grieve,” Ar’telan disagreed, the words weaving around the spoon he was holding. “Pretending that it doesn’t hurt won’t make it go away.” He bit his lip uncertainly, sharp canines finding the scar that traced down the side of it. “He would be flattered that he had… touched so many so deeply. Though I think he would rather you held a little cheer, when you can.” Medguistl nodded, sniffing back the rest of the tears.

“Th-thank you,” she said. “I know that we’ll… we’ll carry the memory forever. So maybe… maybe in a way he won’t be truly gone.” Ar’telan wished that it was in a way which mattered, but did not voice the sadness aloud.

“I owe my life to him. To all of you here, as well. So if there is anything I can do…” he began, but the chef shook her head, straightening up.

“You can eat, is what you can do, and maybe we’ll think about the rest afterwards,” she said, and Ar’telan wearily complied.

---

The trek up to Providence Point, lit now by the light of the morning, was made no easier despite the absence of the aevises that had once plagued the trail. The ruin of the Steel Vigil stretched up to greet the day, snow and crumbling rock falling from the edifice at the slightest wind, and to the west, the crest of the hill.

He had come up here before, many times. Not all of them with Haurchefant, but many of them. They had stood before the stone that bore the seal of Oschon, the Wanderer, and Ar’telan had wondered at its presence in a land which clung so stubbornly in place. Beyond the piled stones, the crest of the cliff offered a crystal-clear view of Ishgard and the Steps of Faith, the best place to observe her beauty from save for within the walls of the city herself.

The headstone was small, and unobtrusive. Snow had already settled atop it, a faint dusting of white to match that which plagued the entire land since the Calamity had struck. Ar’telan knelt down beside it, brushed his fingers over the name.

Haurchefant Greystone.

Though they had buried his body in the Fortemps family crypt, in his public monument he could not bear the name. It was so like Ishgard, a place so comfortingly familiar that he had almost felt sure in calling it home. As if Hydaelyn would have let him rest, when he still had work to do.

“I didn’t expect to see you here,” said a familiar voice. Francel, the first truly kind person he had met in this frozen hellscape of a place after the massacre at the Waking Sands. “Though I suppose it should not be a surprise, should it?” He closed the distance between them, joining Ar’telan in kneeling down in the snow. In his hands, a bouquet of Nymeia lilies, of the kind of freshness only the son of a High House could afford. Ar’telan had laid them upon coffins before, but here Francel simply rested them on top of the snow, tears already beading at the corner of his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” Ar’telan said, and Francel shook his head, rubbing the treacherous tears away with delicate fingers.

“No, no. You shouldn’t be,” he said. “He… he would be glad that you’d come. He always… always loved the view up here.” Ar’telan held his tongue on the memories, instead pulling the heavy pack from his back, and gently teasing the shield free from the canvas he had wrapped it in.

All the knights at the Camp had one like it. They adorned the walls of the keep, of the manor at House Fortemps, the arms of every person pledged to the house’s service. The gaping hole in this one, rent by a lance of pure aetherial light, was one he hoped the other shields would never see.

“The Count gave you this?” Francel asked, though he didn’t sound surprised. Ar’telan nodded, reaching out to rest it against the stone of the grave. If it could not protect him in life, it would at least watch him in death. “I’m glad. It’s… you should have had it,” Francel said, the words stiff and awkward in his mouth. “It never gets any easier, does it?” he asked, eyes on the city beyond the rise, across the void of wind that made the Sea of Clouds.

“No,” Ar’telan agreed, sitting back in the snow. “Different, maybe. But never easier.” Francel let out a long, low sigh.

“You will come back, won’t you?” he asked, a tremulous note to his voice. “To Ishgard. To us.” Ar’telan looked over in surprise at the question.

“If I am welcome,” he said, and Francel let out a single, disbelieving laugh.

“Welcome? Of course you are welcome. You helped to save us,” he said, shaking his head slightly at the idea. “All of us are hurting now, every one, but we would never turn you away. Not ever.” His eyes went back to the grave, his gaze lingering on the shield’s mortal wound. “I know you would never leave him behind, and he would not want you to. But I dont… I don’t want to bear this alone.” Ar’telan offered a smile.

“You are not alone. There is not a soul in the Highlands who does not know of Haurchefant’s grace,” he said, and Francel flopped backwards into a sitting position, as if actually hearing his name was a little too much.

“Have you spoken with the Count de Fortemps?” he asked. “After… After it all, I mean. When it wasn’t… When it wasn’t all too much.” Ar’telan sighed.

“Yes. I… I know he would not want me to leave,” he said, the first time he had voiced it aloud. “He said as much, but it is hard to believe it. Hard to let go of the feeling that I… That Haurchefant…”

“You will always have a home here,” Francel said, his voice quiet. “I would make sure of it, but I do not need to. Stay strong, my friend. Perhaps the grief will not fade, but the road will feel easier to walk in stride with another.” Ar’telan smiled slightly at the thought, his tail carving a little eddy in the snow as it swept from side to side.

“I would like that,” he agreed. It hurt, more than anything had a right to hurt, still aching as though Ser Zephirin’s lance had pierced his heart instead, but for the future - there was hope.

[ofdragonsdeep]

8: Adroit

Amid the blizzards of Coerthas, two knights train.

(Implied m!WoLxHaurchefant, discussion of death & grief)

The biting cold of Coerthas, pervasive despite the season, was Ar’telan’s sole companion in the Highlands. The walls of Camp Dragonhead, solid and sure, rose at his back, and the light covering of spruce trees transplanted in the wake of the Calamity provided him with enough cover to avoid startling the merchants which used the road through the camp. Only the occasional cry of a mountain goobbue, echoing in the mountain passes, threatened the surety of his retreat.

The snow which fell in a light drift about him melted to dampness in his hair, frosting his armour and soaking the spaces between it in an uncomfortable fashion. Sword in one hand, shield in the other, Ar’telan practiced the movements which he had seen the knights at the camp perform a hundred times before, often against a slavering beast or crazed dravanian come to beat down the door.

They made it look easy, but it was not. The familiarity of the thrust-twist-move taught to him by the coliseum gladiators was easy to perform on the rocks and sand of Ul’dah, but was much harder in the slippery slush that Coerthan snow became. It felt as though half of his attention was on keeping his balance in the earth, and the flowing, effortless swordplay looked more like a child scrambling in the dirt with a wooden sword and dreams beyond their stature. Not for the first time, Ar’telan was beginning to wonder if it had been wise for a healer to take up the arts of the knight, if a body as weakened as his could ever hold the muscle necessary to protect people with the shield he held as though he deserved it.

“You are improving, my friend! Every time I see you, you have progressed in the art by years when it has been merely moons.”

The sound of Haurchefant’s voice startled Ar’telan so badly that he lost his focus, and thus his balance, and went tumbling in an undiginified heap to the highland dirt. He flushed with embarrassment, attempting to hide it by raising a hand to wipe some of the sweat that had gathered on his brow, and accepted Lord Haurchefant’s graceful aid back to his feet.

“I do not feel it,” he confessed. “I am not even worth a quarter of one of the knights of your house.” Lord Haurchefant laughed good-naturedly at that.

“And do you think that they learned their skills overnight? You are still a squire in skill, true, but all knights once were, and I doubt that many of them were as handy with the grimoire as you are.” His arcanist’s tome sat uncomfortably at his side, an ill-fitting companion to the armour he was wearing, and he shook his head as if that would do as an answer.

“The world will not wait for me to catch up,” he said, before kneeling to retrieve his sword and shield, wiping the worst of the mud from them before stowing them away. “Some of the gladiators at the coliseum called it cheating when I took the soul crystal from the Paladins. I doubt the knights view me much better.” Haurchefant gave him a kind smile.

“Lest you forget, I too am a knight, and I view you in most high regard,” he disagreed. Again Ar’telan felt the blush rise in his cheeks, and averted his gaze to stare down at where he had fallen, an ignoble pile of armour and bone. “It is a noble goal, to wish to protect others,” Haurchefant added, seemingly unmoved by Ar’telan’s unwillingness to engage. “Especially in a land so frosty towards you and yours.” He smiled to himself at the pun, then shook his head. “Perhaps you would like to spar with me?” Ar’telan started in surprise, taken aback by the offer.

“I think you will find me a poor match,” he said, and Haurchefant smiled.

“I think that we both could stand to learn much from it,” he disagreed. “You have not the benefit of my years in training, true, but you have a mastery of techniques that the Holy See is unfamiliar with. Perhaps I will best you today, but two moons from now? At your prodigious speed, who could say?” Ar’telan rubbed a hand through the hair at the back of his head, standing awkwardly at the compliment.

“If you are sure,” he agreed. “Though I will apologise in advance for my performance.”

It was not the first time that Ar’telan had seen Haurchefant fight, though it was certainly the first time he had stood in opposition to him. Though he had sparred with any number of allies at the gladiator’s guild, all willing to test their mettle against the Warrior of Light when they knew he would never take the sands himself, this felt different. His instinct was to aid, to weave the aether about Haurchefant as a second shield, to call upon the faerie to rejuvenate. He could see where Haurchefant held back, noted every movement that by all rights should have toppled him, pulled back before it became final. There was a skill in that which Ar’telan appreciated, enough knowledge not only to see when something would be too much, but to halt it without creating a new opening to exploit, making it seem natural.

Still, as predicted, the veteran knight claimed his victory, and Ar’telan found himself in the dirt for the second time that afternoon, breath misting in front of him as he panted from the excursion.

“You went easy on me,” he accused from the floor, before pulling himself to his feet.

“How else is one to learn?” Haurchefant replied, that delighted smile still on his face. He was wearing the marks of his efforts, too, but not so dearly as Ar’telan was. “But I am impressed, nonetheless. Most do not notice, the first time.”

“I have seen you fight before,” Ar’telan pointed out.

“So too do the squires, and yet,” Haurchefant said. “My thanks, regardless, for humouring me. I have learned a great deal from you, as ever.” He looked back towards the camp, to the smoke rising from the signal fires lit within its walls. “Stay at the camp a while. ‘Tis the least we can do to feed you after all you have done on our behalf.” Ar’telan began to protest, but Haurchefant took him by the shoulders - leaving his hands free for additional, also ignored, protestations - and all but marched him back.

It became a common theme at Camp Dragonhead. Ar’telan would arrive - whether simply on a passing visit, or for further investigation into the heretic trouble that Ishgard was facing - and Haurchefant would eventually encourage him to spar. It was true that he was learning - Haurchefant called it a ‘fantastical pace’, but Ar’telan knew that a lot of it was the whispers in the crystal, a second set of reflexes that he could tap into, easier by the day. He felt guilty for it, the accusations of cheat from the gladiators still echoing in his ears, the praise of the knights at his skills sounding hollow and unearned. Every time Ar’telan would watch Haurchefant move, map the places where he gave ground, conceded inches that should have been his, pulled back from blows that would have ended it, til Ar’telan stumbled a final time to the ground and Haurchefant earned his weary victory.

Ar’telan found that he enjoyed the company.

“Hail, adventurer! It seems your travels do not take you far from Ishgard these days,” said the knight, Corentiaux if Ar’telan had his name right.

“My duties keep me close to Coerthas,” he said, which was not a lie, but it did not feel like the entire truth, either. The elezen smiled at him, nodding in agreement.

“A fact we all must appreciate, in these times,” he said. The knight across from him, a woman named Yaelle, gave a troubled nod of her own.

“The heretics grow bolder by the day,” she agreed. “How fare your training sessions with Lord Haurchefant? You have become most infamous around the camp.” Ar’telan cringed at the idea of being spoken of so often.

“He says that I am learning, but there is yet a vast gulf between our talents. I fear there always will be,” he replied. Behind him, he heard a muffled laugh, and Corentiaux shot a disappointed look to some poor squire at Ar’telan’s back.

“That is to be expected,” Yaelle said. “Lord Haurchefant is one of our most skilled knights, after all. But you are a quick study, we are told.”

“At length,” a scholar called over from the bookshelves, and received the next of Corentiaux’s unimpressed looks.

“It was not my intention to cause a fuss,” Ar’telan said, wilting slightly under the scrutiny of Camp Dragonhead’s knight contingent. Yaelle laughed, shaking her head.

“You have not. No more than anything else which has intrigued him,” she said. Ar’telan did not find that particularly reassuring.

The clang of steel on steel rang out in the morning air. A clear day had blessed them with its rare presence, though the cold still suffused the air, and the snow would not soon clear from the ground below. Haurchefant, never one to relinquish an opportunity, had seized the moment.

Ar’telan knew his movements well, now. The dance between them grew less giving with every meeting, and Ar’telan held out hope that one day they would be able to have a match where the knight did not feel the need to hold back.

He learned from more than just the knights, though. Each of the paladin’s teachings, a gift not given freely, but earned through trial and tribulation, added to his arsenal and gave him the advantage of the unexpected. Most of them focussed on the protection of others - a way to weave a compulsion of aether into your attacks, to hold the attention of your enemy, methods to redirect a hit aimed at a friend onto your own shield. He had learned a few simple offensive techniques, as well, little things that he could slip in between the the main thrust-and-parry that made the knight’s bread and butter. The means to weave one’s conviction into a temporary shield of aether had come at great surprise to Haurchefant, who had immediately stopped that match and demanded that Ar’telan teach him the trick. The paladins of the Sultansworn would have turned up their noses at the idea of outfitting Ishgard’s army with such a thing, but a Free Paladin swore only to protect those in need, so Ar’telan saw no reason to withhold it.

Today felt like a breakthrough. He had no fancy new technique to practice, naught to show for his efforts other than a steadier foot upon the slush and a more confident grip upon his sword, if he even had that. But he could see the spaces where once Haurchefant would have given him room, and now he was being pressed like a true foe might be. Not that he was keen upon the idea - if they met on equal terms, Haurchefant would rightly trounce him yet - but it felt as though it meant something.

A raised shield blocked the latest in a flurry of blows that seemed to channel the strength of the Fury herself, and Ar’telan tried to move to take advantaage of Hauchefant’s apparent surprise at the success. Whether it was a feint or he could recover more masterfully than expected, the knight caught him off guard in return, and Ar’telan found himself pressed up against the wall of the camp with a sword dangerously close to his throat, hearing the thud of his pulse in his ears.

“Well fought, my friend,” Haurchefant remarked, lowering his weapon. Hands still shaking from the adrenaline, Ar’telan sheathed his sword.

“At least this time I did not end up on the floor,” he allowed, which made the elezen laugh. His sunny warmth was a contrast to the harsh climate in which Ishgard now found itself, and Ar’telan would not have been surprised if it could melt the snow around them.

“Perhaps one day you shall put me there, instead,” he said, a wink on his face at the suggestion. Ar’telan found himself suddenly quite glad that he did not need his voice to speak, as the air had quite abruptly left his lungs.

“I am still a few moons from that, I think,” he said, a stuttering laugh accompanying the words. Haurchefant offered a smile.

“With the speed that I have seen you improve, it will be sooner than you imagine,” he disagreed. “But come. We should retreat inside, lest any more unfortunate rumours start to follow you around the camp.” Ar’telan cringed, nodding in agreement and looking anywhere but at Haurchefant. How much of what the knights whispered had Haurchefant heard? How much did he believe? Thancred had levelled enough drunken barbs at Ar’telan that he knew the Scions had seen his affection for the elezen, but by the Twelve, he could do without it being taken seriously here.

The reassuring blanket of night was a balm for Ar’telan, worn ragged by the day’s many challenges. He had climbed one of the towers in the camp’s walls, one not occupied by a campfire and a weary lookout, and sat upon the crenulations and gazed at the world beyond.

Ishgard sat, tantalisingly close but forever beyond his reach, her gates locked tight and protected by suspicious knights who bade him leave with pursed lips. To its right, the ruined masonry of Providence Point painted a sad picture of the wreckage of the Calamity. No Dalamud shard had felled it, though one had fallen in the highlands here, but the Horde’s attacks in its wake. He had learned, not through asking but quiet listening, that Lord Francel’s brother had died defending that wreck, giving his life so that more of his men could flee. Surrendering himself and the ground so that more could live. And people spoke his name with derision, called House Haillenarte cowards for daring to preserve life over the glorious, doomed charge.

To the south, Dragonhead stood. Ar’telan had tried many times to see the dragon’s head supposedly silhouetted in its rocks, but to no avail. The snow was light tonight, so the mountain was not quite obscured, but still his thoughts did not linger on it. Again he was drawn to Providence Point, to the expedition he had aided by the brave knights and engineers of Camp Dragonhead to retake it, to their stand against the dragon Svara. He had walked with them not as a healer but as a knight, spearheading the strike against the dragon itself, the distraction to allow the engineers time to set up their dragonkillers. It had felt real, for once, as the dragon’s blood had hissed against the snow, red water flowing down into the sea of clouds beneath them. The souls in the paladin’s crystal had sung for his bravery, aided his every strike to protect the line behind him.

If it were cheating, would they celebrate it? Would this tradition endure? Who would commit a part of their essence to a charlatan?

It made sense to him, crystallised in the dragon’s dying scream, in the cheers of harried men as the corpse slid from the rocky platform and into oblivion. Just as a squire trained with a knight, so too did a neonate train with a crystal. His memories, too, would live on in the gem, would train another paladin in his place when he was too old to lift a sword. And what better memory to commit to endless crystal than joy?

“The knights had said you were wandering, my friend, but i did not expect to find you here.”

“You looked,” Ar’telan disagreed, turning to greet Haurchefant as the tall elezen hefted the trapdoor down shut. He raised a hand to his face to shield his eyes from the snow, his gaze following where Ar’telan’s had led mere moments ago.

“They are still celebrating in the mess hall,” he remarked, easing himself into a sitting position beside him. “Yaelle told me it was poor form to leave so soon, but a room is empty for your absence.” Ar’telan averted his eyes.

“Crowds… scare me,” he said, close enough to the truth with a detailed explanation. “I needed the space.” He looked back to the ruined stone, concern in his eyes. “It is strange. It feels like a victory - it was a victory. But it feels like… when we drove back the Garleans in Thanalan. We had won, but the bodies… I shudder at the toll of the living, even though they would have slaughtered us without a second thought. How do you… Fighting this war your whole lives, how do you cope?” Haurchefant sighed, a strange sound for him. There was a moment of quiet, twin breaths misting on the cold, before he spoke again.

“We do not,” he said. “In truth, it is only in talking to adventurers and the like that pass through our gates that I see it, but we do not. Each family has a story of the lost. A father, a mother, a son. Each knight writes a letter to his beloved that he keeps close, in case he does not make it home this time. Each of us lives on the edge of a knife, knowing that this night may be our last night.” He took the shield from his back and looked at the symbol blazened across it, the wreathed unicorn of House Fortemps. “The nobility retreats to a battered shell, dehumanises its people so the toll is less bitter. So rarely do we bury our dead, Ar’telan. We add another name to our list of the lost, spoken in prayers to the Fury, and we… go on. Because what is there to do but go on?” He ran his fingers over the symbol, an unreadable look in his eyes. “For those I protect, I would gladly give my life. I have fought beside you, and I know that you feel it, too. And when we are gone, ripped from the world like a spear from a wound, what of those we protected?”

“Lord Francel remembers his brother,” Ar’telan said, hands muted in what passed for quiet. Haurchefant nodded.

“As do we all. He and all those who stood with him. Each cheer of victory carries a prayer to the departed.” He put the shield aside, and flashed a soft smile to his companion. “Live for the living, Ar’telan, not in the shroud of the dead. Carry them close, dear to your heart, but live for those who breathe yet. There will be another day.” Ar’telan thought of all those that his magics could not help, of the desperate need to intervene before the wounds were too grave. Of taking up the sword and shield so that he could be the bulwark, not the watcher at the grave. But so many of those he had led that day had not made it home, and not for his failure, but because such was the price of war.

Haurchefant had seen right through him, just like he always did.

“You are as wise with your words as you are skilled with the sword,” Ar’telan said, and Haurchefant laughed.

“I claim no credit. I steal much of it wholesale from knights many years my senior,” he replied. “But come, my friend. Perhaps the dining hall is too loud, but the night is yet young. Have you the energy for a match, perchance?”

Ar’telan found that he did.

[ofdragonsdeep]

Proposal

The Dragonsong War is finished, but war yet rages for the Scions. In a moment of rest, Ar'telan visits one most dear to him.

(m!WoLxHaurchefant)

Night fell over Ishgard like a blanket as Ar’telan made his way down the snow-covered streets. He had long been a recognised face, but lately the looks had changed from those of scorn to what could, if pressed, be called acceptance. Ending the Dragonsong War had been lost in the upset of upending church doctrine in the process, his outsider status inviting suspicion before gratitude. Ending it for good, with Nidhogg’s Eyes cast into the abyss of wind beneath Ishgard’s towering stone, after the citizenry had seen the wyrms clash in the sky mere films from their homes, had made more of an impact. Still, the ache lingered in Ar’telan’s heart that he had been part of those who put one of the First Brood to the sword. Even if Midgardsormr himself had sanctioned it, even if all who knew him said that Nidhogg was lost to grief and rage eternal, he felt like he had sinned. And it hurt all the more that this was all that Ishgard wished to celebrate.

But he was not in Ishgard for parties or adulation, nor would he receive either if he kept his head down. Current events had left him with but a moment to breathe, and he was seizing it with the furor of a desperate man.

“Welcome home, Master Qin,” said the guard on the door of Fortemps Manor, a gesture Ar’telan returned with a tired smile and a nod of his head. The heavy door was held open for him, then closed behind him, no hands needing to be lifted to mark his own passage. Warmth permeated the halls despite the chill of the night, the flickering fire of its source visible through the half-open doors to the receiving room. 

It echoed so many other nights, as he walked down the hall, opened the door the rest of the way, and came to a halt upon the sofa closest to the fire. How often he had stopped here, bone-tired in a way that sleep would never quite fix. The manor was safe, in a way that so few places were to him now. His foes would not storm the doors while Elidibus led them, it was the only thing he could be wholly certain of. If it had been a risk, he would have stayed away, for all it would have hurt to do so. But it was not. It was sanctuary.

“It is good to see you, Master Ar’telan,” said the steward, maskng his surprise at finding Ar’telan with the practised professionalism of his role. “I was not aware you had planned to visit.”

“I didn’t plan, precisely,” Ar’telan admitted, and that made the stewart chuckle.

“It is of no concern. You are always welcome here,” he assured. “I shall inform Lord Haurchefant of your arrival. No doubt he sits by his window and pines even despite the late hour.” Ar’telan hid his smile at the thought, if only to preserve Haurchefant’s dignity, and nodded his assent.

—

Ar’telan heard him before he saw him, the creak of the wheelchair’s wooden wheels putting an end to any hope of secrecy in the elezen’s approach. From the way his face lit up as he cleared the door, he would have flung himself across the room to greet Ar’telan if he could, though such days were behind the both of them now.

“Ar’telan! How honoured I am that you have spared a moment from saving all the realm to pay me a visit,” he remarked, making Ar’telan cringe as he finished his journey across the floor. The rugs that once had decorated the stone had been removed in the wake of Haurchefant’s convalescence, and Emmanellain had told him that Lord Edmont was contemplating having the patterns simply painted upon the stone instead. Little gestures, filling the void between their fractured family that Haurchefant’s dance with death had so cruelly torn open. 

“I would come more often if I could,” he said, before reaching out one hand to touch against Haurchefant’s own. He smiled, just as he always did, but Ar’telan could see the undercurrent of pain that ran through it. The chirurgeons had not been able to say with certainty if it would ever pass, just as it seemed unlikely that his legs would ever carry him for more than a few moments each day ever again. Ar’telan had agonised over it, as Haurchefant had lain still and silent, breathing only through the grace of magic, but once his voice had returned he had assured Ar’telan that it would be worth it. 

It hurt. That he would have died for him without a moment’s hesitation, it hurt. But Hydaelyn would not have him yet.

“Mortal enemies not too taxing?” Haurchefant asked, a glimmer of mirth in his eyes at the thought, and he caught Ar’telan’s fingers before he could pull them back to press a kiss to them, before releasing him to reply in kind. Ar’telan flushed at the gesture, ears twitching in uncertainty as he collected himself.

“No. It - They - it is complicated,” he settled for, which made Haurchefant arch a delicate eyebrow.

“Ascians?” he guessed, and Ar’telan averted his gaze in embarrassment. “Ah, the complicated ones. I should most like to meet him, if you are ever not busy pretending to kill each other.”

“If only we were pretending,” Ar’telan lamented. “They aim for another Calamity. No doubt I will be summoned on the morrow when they have been found, but I will stay the night, at least.” He sighed. “I hope.”

“If you would like to give your Linkpearl to the steward for safekeeping, it could be a certainty,” Haurchefant offered, as if either of them believed he would ever take the offer. Ar’telan gave him a saddened smile, shifting a little closer to touch his head against Haurchefant’s. It was strange for him to not smell of metal and oil and everything else that characterised the active knight. Just an undercurrent of sharp medicinal herbs, masked by a cologne that didn’t quite suit him. Likely Emmanellain had leant him one of his, while he found his metaphorical feet in what living meant to both of them now.

“I will stay,” Ar’telan said, one hand stretched out to form the words, simpler gestures than he normally used, understandable only because Haurchefant was so used to him. Indeed, he had put in no small amount of effort to actually recognise the words that he formed, despite the Echo translating for them. Knew a few of them himself, and it felt so much more comfortable to ‘hear’ them and not know that the mouth formed different words to the ones his ears heard. Strange to think that he had learned to read the letters of a language he did not speak a single word of.

“I can ask for naught more from you,” Haurchefant murmured, pressing another kiss to Ar’telan’s knuckles. “Come outside with me a moment, my love. I would show you our progress with the gazebo.” Ar’telan nodded, a hum of assent in his throat at the request, and clambered to his feet. He stretched out weary joints, grimacing at the way they creaked, and pulled his grimoire from the bag at his side to summon Lily. She flew to Haurchefant on instinct as soon as she had materialised, alighting on his shoulder with a delicate flutter of wings, and earning a polite shake of her tiny hand from the knight for her trouble.

—

Ar’telan pushed the wheelchair from the house at Haurchefant’s request, pausing on the way for the both of them to find coats for the cold evening air. The gazebo was heated, but there was only so much that could be done in a city like Ishgard.  It nestled around the side of the manor, space at a premium even for the High Houses in the pillared city, the columns now spanned by windows and a door at the opening, which Haurchefant opened the latch on for Ar’telan to take them through.

Inside, the little fire at its centre crackled away merrily, taking away a little of the sting of the outside air. Terracotta pots lined the sills of the new windows, some seemingly empty, some with a few feeble sprouts within them, none altogether fond of the ambient temperature.

“Strange to think this changed so fast,” Ar’telan remarked, watching as Haurchefant extricated himself from the chair with a cavalcade of pained expressions, to sit himself upon the benches. That was progress from when he had first awoken, although Ar’telan was not entirely certain it was wise of him to demonstrate it. Lily, perturbed at the movement, weaved aether around him with an irritated flutter of her wings, which Haurchefant acknowledged with a mock bow.

“It was Francel’s initiative, or so I’m told,” Haurchefant remarked. “A beautiful symbol of cooperation between the high Houses! That, and the Manufactuary being the best place to source the materials, short of going to House Dzemael.”

“Some things never change, I suppose.” Ar’telan remarked, an amused look on his face. He perched himself upon the benches next to Haurchefant, shuffling up until there was no space between them and leaning against Haurchefant’s arm. He felt his partner’s posture shift in response, arm moving to encircle him gently instead, and Ar’telan closed his eyes and relaxed against the soft fur of Haurchefant’s coat.

“To see this when I woke… meant a great deal to me,” Haurchefant confessed. “That you had begun this, not even knowing if I would live to see it. I would not change what I did, not in a heartbeat, but… it made my heart ache to think of what the consequences might mean.”

Ar’telan’s ears tilted back in contentment as Haurchefant ran gentle fingers through his hair, an inaudible rumble of appreciation in his throat. It would have been easier to speak, but he did not wish to move so that Haurchefant might see his hands. Besides, how could the elezen not know that he meant the world to Ar’telan by now?

“Before we went to the Vault, I wrote you a letter,” Haurchefant confessed. Ar’telan frowned at that, turning his gaze up to Haurchefant’s face cautiously. He seemed - nervous? It ill-suited him, against the confidence and positivity he exuded in more usual circumstances. “A confession, I suppose. In case I did not make it out alive. In case you did not, that I could leave the words with you as if I had spoken them aloud.” 

Ar’telan moved the fingers of his hand in a twisting gesture above Haurchefant’s chest, a querying motion of his name. Haurchefant managed a quiet, good-natured laugh at that, linking his fingers with Ar’telan’s in reassurance.

“I had worried that Emmanellain gave it to you when they were not sure if I would… if I would wake,” he admitted. “But he did not. Still, having quite the perspective on such things now… I realise it would not mean so much if the words were simply committed to parchment and delivered too late, so I shall speak from the heart, instead of a page.” He moved away then, the sudden movement startling Ar’telan into sitting upright, one hand in his pockets. “It is not so romantic as I would like, nor the gesture grand enough for all you have captured my heart entirely. And I must sit awkwardly instead of the proper protocol. But, if you will forgive those failings…” From his pocket he produced a band of polished wood, holding it out towards Ar’telan, uncertainty writ large on his face. “If you will have me, I would ask for your hand.” 

Ar’telan blinked, recalling in a panic all he knew of Ishgardian customs.

“I- You wish to be wed?” he asked. Haurchefant laughed in relief at the question.

“Yes, my dear. Normally more fuss is made of such things, at least in Ishgard, but I suppose you cannot expect what you are not familiar with,” he allowed. Ar’telan frowned.

“But do they let - What we have, you and I and Thancred, is that… permitted?” he asked. He remembered the fuss of Haurchefant’s parentage, the horrible mess it had made of his family. If an arrangement like what they had was permitted, surely the Count would have reached for it? Haurchefant, for his part, simply shrugged.

“Some would consider me a cuckold, I suppose, but I have never let such things concern me,” he said, a dismissive wave of his free hand accompanying the statement. “I ask you not because the institution holds sacred value to me, but because it is the deepest expression of my love. The semantics are unimportant, are they not, my dear?” Ar’telan smiled at that, reaching out to take the ring from Haurchefant’s fingers. It was spruce, at his best guess, lovingly shaped and polished and varnished to a tasteful shine. He held it above his fingers, then paused, looking to Haurchefant for guidance. With a smile, the knight guided it to the right finger, pushing it down until it rested just above his knuckle, a perfect fit. 

“It would be my honour,” Ar’telan said, gently pulling back his hand to form the words. “I… I hope that my confusion does not make you doubt my intent. I know that Ishgard resents the damage I have done to her history, her church… her way of life. And I know that it hurts you, has hurt you, this way of being. But I love you. With all my heart, I love you. If this is how you wish to love, then I would share it with you.”

Without a word, Haurchefant pulled him into an embrace, arms tight around his back. He clambered properly into the knight’s lap, arms around his shoulders, looking up at him with a smile all across his face. He felt Haurchefant’s fingers tighten at his back, and thought that he was trembling.

“It is you who honours me. After all that Ishgard has put you through, that you come home to me yet is my greatest joy. My hope,” he whispered, before easing his grip that he could properly meet Ar’telan’s eyes. “It will not be truly traditional, no. And many will disapprove. But you and I shall be together in the eyes of the Fury, and you shall know my heart. What more can a man truly wish for?”

He kissed him, and there was a desperate relief in it. Ar’telan could not imagine how it must have felt for Haurchefant, to fret at the possibility of a refusal. To write the words on paper, so that if fate tore them apart, it was the only proof of intent he would ever know. Ar’telan leaned into him, tail coiling about the bend of Haurchefant’s elbow, and let himself feel the unfamiliar weight of the ring around his finger.

Despite it all, they were here. They were together. And that, at least, would last them the night.

[ofdragonsdeep]

20: Petrichor

The wound only heals once you've pulled out the knife.

(HW spoilers, implied m!WoLxThancred and m!WoLxHaurchefant)

Soft snow tumbled down from the grey clouds above, a thin layer of fragile white settling on the shoulders of Ar’telan’s armour as he sat on the wall at Falcon’s Nest and stared out into the Highlands beyond. The stiff breeze brought a numbing cold, not that it made much impact on his statue-still vigil, his face stoic and his mind churning with regrets.

The peace conference had gone poorly, if one was being kind. Instead of the usual assault by heretics that Ishgard was used to, this time it was the victims of war rising up in anger. He could not even blame them for their anger, knowing intimately the wellspring from which it drew, but this?

He should not have accepted the drink. He should have known better. But it stung more than the cold that they thought he did not understand the way they suffered.

“I wondered if I might find you out here. Still hurts, does it?”

Thancred, solid and steady as always. He hopped up on to the wall beside him with customary grace, sitting easily upon the parapet and following Ar’telan’s gaze, as though there were anything of interest to be found at the end of it.

“I don’t need your pity,” Ar’telan said, and Thancred sighed, shaking his head.

“No, you don’t,” he agreed. “Maybe that was indelicate of me. Apologies.” Ar’telan made a muted noise of acknowledgement, looking away until he felt the touch of fingers brush the snow from his shoulders. A fleeting part of him yearned for what was gone - Haurchefant and the knights teaching him the proper way to dry snow-stained gear, coming in from training covered in sleet and mud, Thancred’s touch on the edge of his robe - but it quickly warped and distorted. A hole in a shield, a wound in his heart, Lahabrea muting his voice with a grip on his wrists. He stiffened, and Thancred withdrew.

“...Sorry,” Ar’telan managed, and Thancred made a wearied noise.

“I should think we’ve moved past that part of things,” he said. “How are you holding up? Beside the obvious, I mean.”

“You should not have hit him,” Ar’telan said, which made Thancred start in surprise. “He made poor choices, but so did all of us, at one point or another. He is small, and scared, and alone. It wasn’t needed.”

“You’re the only person who’s said that,” Thancred said, though he did not seem offended by the statement. “Maybe you’re right. You know them better than I do.” Ar’telan shook his head.

“Barely. Just- Just…” He cut himself off, a sharp inhalation of breath reminding him that he had been sat out here for a long time, and he was cold. ”I don’t want to think about it. How long before the Grand Melee?” Thancred shifted his position, resting one arm on a raised knee, considering the questions both asked and unasked, as he was wont to do.

“It will be some time before the Alliance gets themselves into gear, despite the initial offer,” he replied. “A few weeks at worst, a few days at best. What do you want the time to do?” Ar’telan made a noncommittal noise.

“I don’t know. It all feels like it’s too much,” he said. “It was horrible, what happened at the banquet, but at least it felt easier in Ishgard. Simpler, maybe. And then even that fell to pieces, and I… I feel like I break all that I touch.”

“Lahabrea was not your fault,” Thancred said, and Ar’telan flinched as though he was the one who had been struck, and not Emmanellain.

“No. I know that. But… Sometimes I wonder what the point of it is. The people, they… they see me as a hero. Here and in greater Eorzea. But what good is a bulwark if everything around it falls to pieces?”

Thancred was quiet for a while, an unusual state for him. Ar’telan looked over, saw the frown of thought on his face, the clouds in his aether-bleached eyes. It was easy to remember what had happened after the chaos at the Praetorium, the uncertainty and the anger of Thancred’s recovery - of his own. The wounds were undeniable, in both of them. But the way that the Flow had pulled them apart, even if Thancred himself had only tumbled out a few moons ago, gave them just enough distance for it to feel… distant, somehow. Less keen.

“Well, I can’t imagine that travelling on foot will be particularly fun for you, but I’ve a proposal, if you’ll hear it,” Thancred said eventually. Ar’telan nodded, keeping cautious distance. “It’s only a day’s ride by carriage to Thanalan, if you’ll come with me. Put a few malms between yourself and the pain, for a little while.” Ar’telan wasn’t sure there was anywhere on Eorzea that didn’t hold some poor memory, but it was far away from this pain, this betrayal, and he supposed it would do the job.

“Alright. You’re paying for it, though.”

---

Eastern Thanalan sat on the edge of the vast desert, where the Shroud gave way to high heat and cracked ground. The town around the aetheryte sat in a shaded dip just off the main road, which meant that when it rained - as it often did after the Calamity, and as it was when Ar’telan and Thancred arrived - the rain poured down the entry slopes and pooled on every available surface, leaving the townsfolk to slosh through it in despair.

“Not quite the weather I had in mind,” Thancred remarked as they took shelter in the tavern, Ar’telan shaking the water from his armour with a look of dismay writ on his face.

“I don’t even own an umbrella,” Ar’telan grumbled. Thancred chuckled, gesturing to a table with one hand before going over to the bar. Ar’telan watched with careful eyes, but he only ordered one drink, and did not try to pass it over.

“I think you’ve had quite enough liquid for one day,” Thancred said, though it was still obvious to Ar’telan that he had noticed his concern. He held in his embarrassment with the determination of a man who had killed gods.

“If you have not dragged me out here to watch you drink yourself under the table, why are we here?” he asked, trying not to let the bitterness show through in his voice. A look of annoyance passed over Thancred’s face, but it seemed he was being as coy with his emotions as Ar’telan was trying to be.

“Well, the idea was better before the weather turned, I’ll admit,” he said. “I thought it would be… nice, I suppose. Well, you’ve been collecting all of those seeds, haven’t you?” Ar’telan stiffened at the question, staring down at the table and feeling the fingers of his hands slowly curl against the wood. “There’s a clearing near the chasm here. Maybe you know it. Giant goobbue corpse, nothing too unusual - but it’s covered in odd flowers. They say it came down from the mountains before it died.” Ar’telan swallowed back the well of feelings that threatened to overwhelm him.

“Do you know why I…” he tried, his hand movements jerky and uncertain. Thancred took a long drink from his flagon, waiting in vain for Ar’telan to have the chance to finish, before sighing to himself.

“I’ve my suspicious, yes,” he answered. “If only because I’ve never seen anything else tether you so tightly. It’s for your elezen, right?” It was strange to hear it said without judgement, when they had all but ruined what remained of their friendship over his relationship with Haurchefant. When it had become clear that they would not, could not work again in the wounds that Lahabrea had left behind, the ascian’s spite tearing holes in them even after his forcible discorporation. He was dead now, truly dead, as Ar’telan understood it, but his shadow lingered yet.

“Yes,” he said, pulling his hands in close to his chest as he said it, the closest to a quiet word he could manage it.

“I said some things I regret back then, before all of this Ishgardian nonsense kicked off,” Thancred said, his tone light, but the admission was a serious one. “About you. About him. About a lot of things, if we’re being honest.” He glanced at the window, noting the rain hammering down on it, and shrugged. “I suppose we have time to be honest. I’m sorry.”

“You were not the only one who did things they regret,” Ar’telan replied, hands muted, head still bowed. “I don’t know if… if we could have made it work. If there was a solution for us after what the ascians did. But I did not help matters.” Thancred laughed at that, leaning back in his chair with a creak of old, sun-baked wood.

“Best not to spend too long dwelling on it, I think,” he said. “The ifs and the whys and the maybes - none of them matter in the now. Too many moons between them.” He tilted the flagon towards Ar’telan, who shook his head in refusal. “What matters is where we go. How we move forward. But on that, I would give the floor to you.”

“To me?” Ar’telan repeated, surprised. “Thancred, I… I don’t know. Finding a direction for myself is hard enough, never mind for two.” Thancred’s mouth creased up into a smile.

“It’s not a no,” he decided, draining the flagon. Ar’telan found the embarrassment on his face, the twist of his stomach, was not entirely fear or shame. The distance of moons indeed.

“It is not a yes, either,” he said, a stern look on his face. Thancred sighed.

“Yes, yes,” he said, a hand waving through the air as if to dismiss the concern. The look on his face was kind, though, as he brought his arms to the table to rest his head upon his hands. “I jest. Whatever life decides to throw at us, I will respect your distance. And I won’t ruin a friendship for a snuffed candle this time.” Ar’telan sighed.

“As long as you promise not to die, it is a start,” he decided.

“Well, on that front I can only promise my best.”

--

The sparse grass of the eastern reaches of Thanalan sparkled with collected rain, the ground still soft underfoot even though the clouds had cleared to make way for the stars of night. Ar’telan was knelt by the old goobbue’s grave, carefully collecting what few seeds the rain-soaked plants would offer him, Thancred leaning back against the swell of the ground and watching him work. It was a far cry from their first visit to eastern Thanalan, camped out by the little oasis in borrowed rags and a makeshift tent. It would not end the same, either, though Ar’telan noted the appreciative eyes on the taller man as he got to his feet. Not now. Not soon. But, perhaps, eventually. A bridge built between them by their suffering, instead of tearing out the planks in a misguided attempt to heal. The moon twinkled in the sky above them, a quiet witness to their sadness, and it felt a little like the storm had stopped.

If the clouds would abate, only time would tell.

[ofdragonsdeep]

13: Oneirophrenia

Internal wounds leave the deepest scars.

(MAJOR CW for implied rape, m!WoLxThancred, m!WoLxHaurchefant)

The still quiet of the night hung in the air like a held breath. In the Rising Stones, the air was free of the sickly purple gloom that suffused the air of Mor Dhona, the only disturbances the noises coming from the common room and its tiny yet perpetual bar.

In his room, simple as it was, Ar’telan struggled to sleep. He lay on his side, covers pulled up around him to ward off the cold, tail coiled in a miserable pile at his legs. Each time he closed his eyes, the thoughts came back, wending their way through his sleeping mind as though aware that his defences would be down.

Most of the nightmares he could cope with. He would wake and then sleep again, a huff on his lips at the foolishness of dwelling on them. People he had seen die, the massacre at the Waking Sands, the trail of blood that their campaign had led through Castrum Meridianum, all of this was par for the course. One of the Scions he spoke to on occasion, a young elezen called Alianne who had been an adventurer once, had been learning from the Eorzean Alliance’s trained therapists, what few of them were left in the wake of the calamity. The trauma was expected - normal, even, in people who had witnessed horrific events like the ones he had seen. But there was one nightmare that he did not speak of, the reason he was sleeping alone, if he was sleeping at all. The feeling of ‘Thancred’ catching his hands to silence his words, Lahabrea hearing his every protest with the Echo, the cruel things he had said, the things he had done, to try and crack Ar’telan’s faith in the Scions. Always, inevitably, it went back to that, as if living it once had not been punishment enough.

With a groan of frustration, he rolled over in the bed, pulling the covers over his head as if to block out the night. How easy it would be if he did not need sleep, or if he simply drank himself into a stupor every night like Thancred did, to cope with the aftermath.

Maybe Thancred had the right of it.

---

“You look like the dodo the cook forgot about in the back of the pantry,” Yda said, Ar’telan wincing at the specifics of her description.

“I am fine,” he said, stifling a yawn as he said it. “Just a little tired.” Yda squinted at him - at least, he thought she did, the way she tilted her head towards him, but it was hard to tell through the mask.

“When was the last time you had a good night’s sleep?” she demanded. Ar’telan groaned.

“I don’t know. But I will be fine. Thank you for your concern,” he said. This did not seem to convince Yda, if the way she looked back towards Papalymo was any judge, but she at least left him alone for the time being.

It was Y’shtola who disturbed him, more gently than he was used to from the acerbic conjurer. A poke of her wooden wand into his arm, and he raised his head from where it lay on the table to look at her.

“Am I needed?” he asked, and Y’shtola let out a sharp sigh.

“Yes. Come with me,” she instructed, and Ar’telan pushed himself out of the chair and followed her.

She did not take him to the Solar, like he was inspecting. Instead, she led him into one of the many little side rooms in the Rising Stones, which were normally reserved for all sorts of things that Ar’telan was not involved in.

“Sit,” she demanded, pointing at a chair. Confused, Ar’telan did as he was told. Y’shtola mirrored the motion in the chair opposite him, folding her arms across her chest. “Yda tells me you have not been sleeping enough,” she said, and Ar’telan wilted.

“I am fine,” he said, and Y’shtola let out a harrumph of disagreement.

“I am sure you are. That may have swayed me during our eventful stay at Costa del Sol, but it will not work here,” she snapped. Ar’telan would very much have liked to go back to the busywork of doing inane tasks for the Company of Heroes, in truth. At least when he was busy he did not think, and when he wore himself out his sleep was long and blissfully dreamless. “What troubles you? I would hope that after all this time we are friends enough for you to share it.” Ar’telan grimaced.

“It… it’s nothing much. Nightmares. Alianne has been helping,” he said, trying to evade the brunt of the question. “I will improve when I am busy again. I’m sorry for the fuss.” Y’shtola shook her head again, taking out her wand to bonk him lightly on the head with it.

“Do not apologise for struggling. We none of us are perfect,” she chastised, and Ar’telan shrunk back away from her in shame.

“No. But… No,” he said, changing his mind. Too late, though, for Y’shtola was after the half-formed thought like a starveling wolf on a hunk of fresh meat.

“This is about Thancred, isn’t it?” she surmised, and Ar’telan cringed at the accuracy of her statement. Not that it was exactly difficult to piece together that the two of them were coping poorly in the aftermath of the Praetorium, Thancred through drink and Ar’telan through anything he could get that would not cloud his mind. After Castrum Centri, some part of him had hoped that it would all make sense - that he would be able to parcel it away, file the memories into neat little boxes, half labelled ‘Thancred’ and the rest ‘Lahabrea’, but reality was cold and unfeeling in its truth.

“It is fine. We have reached an understanding,” Ar’telan said, which made Y’shtola scoff.

“They could hear your arguments all the way in Gridania. Well, Thancred’s half of them, at any rate,” she said. “It does not have to be easy, Ar’telan. You have not failed for struggling with it. The Twelve know you are at least coping better than Thancred is.” Ar’telan was not so sure of that, but he held his tongue on it regardless.

“It is fine. He is right-”

“He most certainly is not,” Y’shtola cut in. “Not if it is hurting you this much. Talk to me, Ar’telan. Your words will not reach his ears, if that is what concerns you.” Ar’telan hesitated. He had kept his counsel before the Garleans had raided the Waking Sands, and what had that got him? He had been convinced that his words were meaningless, his opinion irrelevant, his worth nothing more than his usefulness to the cause. To keep his silence was what Lahabrea had wanted from him, wasn’t it?

“It is… it is difficult,” he admitted, and the words were hard to shape, as though he had been avoiding the revelation even to himself. “I can’t… I couldn’t… It comes back. What Laha- what Lahabrea did.” He hesitated over the words, his fingers shaking as he made the sign for the ascian’s name. “I can’t be near him without remembering it. Can’t be close to him. I tried to- tried to ease the fear.” He had touched his fingers to Thancred’s throat, content that if the tiny crystal on its choker was not there, that it was really Thancred this time, that the spectre of Lahabrea would be banished, but Thancred could only see that without it, Ar’telan thought him capable of all the things that Lahabrea had done. Of course it hurt him. Why wouldn’t it hurt him? It was a terrible thing to accuse a person of, even in implicit gestures and terrified catastrophizing. But what was he supposed to do? “Thancred - we - it doesn’t work. And he is angry, and I am s-scared, and when I try to sleep it all comes back.” Y’shtola’s face softened at the revelation. She was the only one who knew, aside from Thancred himself, at least as far as Ar’telan knew. He hadn’t dared tell anyone else, not even Minfilia, given how stressed she was with everything that had happened to her during her time in captivity, and her closeness to Thancred. Part of him had feared that she would think him a monster to believe Thancred capable of what Lahabrea had done, even if that had been the point. It was not supposed to be easy. The ascian would not have bothered otherwise.

“It’s ok,” Y’shtola told him, gently taking one of his hands in hers, leaving him the room to pull it back if he needed to speak. “Such terrors do not fade quickly. Maybe they never will. But we cannot help if you do not tell us.” Ar’telan nodded, knowing that she was right. She usually was. At least she was not as insufferable about it as Alphinaud. “I am not a master of the culinary arts, but I shall speak with some friends, and find you some herbs to help you sleep. I will not tell them why.” He nodded, swallowing down the rising panic at her suggestion, the thought that anyone else would know, would judge him for what had happened, for his weakness in being unable to confront it. It seemed little different to Thancred’s self-medication, still rendering him useless until the herbs wore off, but he would bear it if it meant that he could sleep.

“Thank you,” he said, using only his free hand to do it. It was hard to whisper when you had no voice, but perhaps that counted. “I… I am sorry. For not… not trusting you.” Y’shtola shook her head, naught on her face but concern.

“‘Twas the point of it, was it not? To make you doubt,” she said. “It will take time, and if need be, I shall drag you off to speak with you a dozen more times ere you feel comfortable coming to me yourself. The villain is ousted, and even if he will reconstitute, you have time left to breathe and gather yourself. If there is aught you need, simply say.”

“I will try,” Ar’telan said, the best he could offer in the circumstances. Y’shtola nodded.

“Good. I shall hold you to that,” she decided.

---

Dawn filtered through the cracks in the window like the caress of a lover, rousing Ar’telan from his sleep. The bed was no less simple, and no less empty, but it did not yawn before him like a chasm that seemed impossible to cross, and perhaps that would mean something.

It was not easy. Each night he drank the bitter herbs that he had been so discreetly given felt like a stay of execution more than a panacea, and the tensions between him and Thancred showed no signs of abating. The troubles in Ishgard offered a tantalising opportunity to bury himself in the work of others, to keep his own counsel and pray that an untended wound would somehow heal, but it was not that easy. It was never that easy, not when the knife had cut so deep with edges so sharp and cruel.

He would hold his own. He had no choice but to persevere.

(And when Haurchefant’s hands touched his, though he woke still alone for all their wishes, the elezen let him run his fingers over his throat - unmarked by ascian aether, reassuring in its warmth - it felt like, one day, he might heal.)

[ofdragonsdeep]

31 (Buckle)

Surprise extra ffxivwrite day! You get my cat being a stubborn teenager. This is technically another quick prompt from the Bookclub, and again is. Significantly more than 100 words, though we're not at "Star" levels of ridiculous this time.

Neither he nor Thancred held up well to scrutiny.

(m!WoLxHaurchefant)

The hum and bustle of the Rising Stones was quiet as the evening gloom settled over Mor Dhona. All but a small few of the Crystal Braves were otherwise engaged, and the remaining Scions spread out over the space. It did not quite feel empty, but it was far from full.

In the back room, which had but a few moons prior been converted to something akin to a training area, Ar’telan was stood opposite Hoary Boulder and Coultenet, grimoire in one hand, the other held out to better command the egi he had summoned. A small group of Domans had gathered around them, watching with awe and interest as Coultenet did a few minor feats of thaumaturgy to test its endurance. The robes that the Sons of Saint Coinach had recovered from their dig site did not fit as well as they might, but the aetheric threads woven throughout the fabric were still more than enough for Ar’telan to feel the difference.

“These constructs are truly fascinating,” Coultenet remarked as the egi dispersed with a burst of heat and light. “To be so similar to the primals from which they are drawn, but safe and contained… A fascinating art to revive.”

“Assuming people want to get close enough to a primal to try,” Hoary added, and Ar’telan grimaced.

“I think I would avoid it given the chance,” he agreed, returning the grimoire to its bag, clipped onto the belt of his new jacket. “Thank you for the tests.”

“Any time, my friend!” Coultenet replied, and Ar’telan offered a slight smile as payment for their time.

F’lhaminn nodded at him as he passed the little bar, Moenbryda and Thancred clearly making use of it in a table off to one side.Thancred was far worse for wear than Moenbryda was, which was impressive given the constitution Ar’telan knew Thancred had for drink, but a sideways glance at Moenbryda’s half of the table also suggested she had not exactly been keeping pace with him.

“Oh, are those the summoner robes?” Y’shtola remarked, looking up from the documents she was staring at. Ar’telan nodded, and she got to her feet, examining the outfit with a nod of appreciation. “Y’mhitra has told me a little of what you have been doing. I hadn’t realised it had come so far.”

“It was luck more than anything else,” Ar’telan replied. “The Sons found some coffers in their site by the Crystal Tower.” Y’shtola nodded again, one hand raised to her chin in thought.

“Considering where they found the soul crystals, that is unsurprising,” she said. “Have you not the horn?” Ar’telan cringed, fishing the bright red contraption out of one of the jacket’s many pockets.

“It looks a little silly.” he said, but Y’shtola motioned to him to put it on, so he fastened the straps around the back of his head, adjusting the front until it sat on his forehead in a way that passed for comfortable. The horn channeled aetheric energies, he knew that much, but the vibrant red creation made him look like a particularly well-dressed unicorn.

“Fascinating. I have read a few studies on the subject of summoning, though nothing like as many as my sister,” Y’shtola said, reaching up to help Ar’telan adjust the horn. “They never did find anything quite so adept at focussing primal aether than these creations, though as I understand it a number of potential designs existed.”

“What on earth is that on your head?” Moenbryda said, leaning back in her chair to get a better view of the allagan miscreation.

“An evoker’s horn,” Ar’telan replied, feeling embarrassment sink into every fibre of his being.

“It is an Allagan artifact of immense power,” Y’shtola clarified, not that she had seen his response. “It aids in amplifying the primal energies that summoners call upon to command their egis.” Thancred squinted. Ar’telan wasn’t sure if it was to focus, or just because of the alcohol.

“Y’know what it looks like,” he started, and Moenbryda rolled her eyes.

“An ancient. And powerful. Artifact?” Y’shtola offered, her voice terse. Thancred made a noise that might once have been amusement, but just sounded like a sideways cackle.

“Could prob’ly’ve got one cheaper in th’ right alley in Limsa,” he slurred, Moenbryda gently confiscating the bottle he reached for lest he make the situation worse. Ar’telan reached up, but Y’shtola put one hand gently on top of his arm to stop him from just pulling the horn from his head.

“Thank you for your contribution, Thancred,” she said, shaking her head at his antics. “You are fine, Ar’telan. Perhaps if it bothers you a glamour prism may assist?”

“Y’mhitra said that might interfere with the aetheric signatures,” Ar’telan said. “Something about the weave having its own-”

“Gotta have somethin’ worth takin’ t’... th’ ‘lezen you’re after,” Thancred said, and Ar’telan tensed. He could feel Y’shtola try to pull him away, but he turned back around regardless.

“We are not-”

“Wha’, he’sh a slut f’any advent’rer in, in Eorzea, but not f’you?” Thancred said. Moenbryda grimaced. “M’be you need a bigger ‘horn’.”

The silence carried the same tension that it always did when he and Thancred argued now. Y’shtola had told him not to rise to the beat, that Thancred would regret what he said when he sobered up, to be the bigger man. But it stung. Stung that he hadn’t been good enough to repair things after Lahabrea’s meddling, that Thancred would rather trade jipes and drink himself into unconsciousness than try.

“Haurchefant doesn’t-” Ar’telan started, but Thancred waved a dismissive hand at him and looked away from his attempts to sign a defence.

“Thancred, I think you have had quite enough to drink,” Y’shtola said, hands on her hips, disapproval colouring every syllable of her word. Thancred snorted.

“Y’ know ‘m right. Goin’ up to Coerthas ev’ry hour he can. Might’s well kneel at ‘is desk an’-”

Ar’telan pulled the evoker’s horn from his head and threw it across the room. It hit the table in front of Thancred, scattering the remains of bottles that rested there in pitiful emptiness, startling Moenbryda.

“Maybe they are more welcoming than my ‘friends’ here,” Ar’telan said, jaw clenched, and turned and walked from the Rising Stones. The door slammed behind him on the cacophony of noises that his swift departure started, from Y’shtola calling after him to Moenbryda attempting to salvage the situation with Thancred.

He didn’t care. He was tired of it. Over and over again they tried to reassure him, but for all they talked, none of them could ever stop Thancred when he was deep in his cups. Maybe Lahabrea had been right. Maybe he was just another tool to them, a primal-killing weapon, a convenient servant, content to smile and nod at every job they gave him, no matter how grim.

The crowd in Mor Dhona parted around him as he stomped through Revenant’s Toll, the workers on their breaks from building the walls to the refugees to the House of Splendors vendors all aware from the lines of tension on his face that he was not in the mood for talking. He took the north exit, the purple-tinged gloom of the Toll giving way quickly to the sharp cold of Coerthas.

Was he proving them right? Gods, maybe he was. His linkpearl chimed in his ear, and he ripped it out and stuck it in one of the pockets that the ancient robe had so many of. He had stood against primals, mastered the trails of aether they had left indelibly on his soul in their wake, torn tiny pieces of them from the aether, and his reward was crude jokes and the reminder that he did not matter beyond what he could give them.

—

The night had set in quickly, and Ar’telan was too far down the road to turn back by the time the cool air cleared his senses a little. The snow crunched under his feet, his passage leaving deeper marks in what was left of the trail than he was used to, and the wind was howling at a wicked clip. He didn’t want to go back to the Rising Stones, even though he anticipated that Thancred would be out cold, because Y’shtola would have that look on her face that spoke of despair at his childishness. Alphinaud wouldn’t even know what the issue was, just tut at his outbursts. He could go on to Dragonhead - they were not expecting him, but Haurchefant would always find room for him regardless. He had his grimoire, but he hadn’t intended to wear the old robes for long, and had basically nothing else. Not even enough gil to get to the aetheryte. Well, if he walked he would at least make it by morning.

The snow drove itself with a wicked sharpness into Ar’telan’s face, the collar of the coat doing little to protect him from its ravages. The knights of Ishgard had long since given up on lighting the trail, probably glad for the inhospitality keeping out the nosy outsiders who might try to weasel their way in. The glimmer of the aetheric core of Ice Sprites took Ar’telan from the path more than once, hoping it was the distant glow of the Observatorium’s tower, or even the one at the border, but with the deepening snow he was not even sure where the path was.

In short, he was lost.

With a huff of effort and a poorly-concealed shiver, Ar’telan picked a direction and walked in it. He could barely see in front of his face in the snow, so he pried the tome from his side with stiff fingers and invoked fire. It was not enough to warm him, but the glow inherent to Ifrit-egi’s being would serve the twin purposes of letting him not fall into a chasm and keeping away hungry beasts who thought to brave the cold for a quick meal.

After more trudging through thick snow than Ar’telan had even wanted to do in his life, he found - not civilisation, far from it, but an outcropping of rock, shielded from the worst of the storm. He ensconced himself within it, calling the egi close to him to try and get some of the warmth back into his fingers. Piling the snow up around his sides kept it from becoming a slurry of water wherever the egi hovered, but he was still freezing. Allag’s summoners had fought in warm places, he supposed - Meracydia was warmer than this, and surely it must also have been before the Calamity that had devastated so much of it. Maybe they hadn’t thought of how to fend off the snow.

He was tired. Everything felt heavy after his hours of walking, and now the tension was gone there was an ache in every muscle that had stiffened in misplaced anger. Huddled in a miserable heap with the feeling leeching out of every extremity, he wondered if it would matter if he closed his eyes, just for a moment. He pulled the coat from his back and put it over his head, to stop the wind from sneaking in. The egi would keep him safe. The beasts wouldn’t be out in this weather. If he closed his eyes for just a moment, the snow would stop…

—

It felt like breathing through slurry. He could hear voices, but couldn’t make out the words. With more effort than he had ever thought to put into something so simple, he forced his eyes open, and everything was blurred and out of focus.

He couldn’t see his egi, nor feel its presence in his aether. Couldn’t feel his fingers either, for that matter, or indeed most of his limbs. He heard the voices stop as he managed something akin to a groan - a distant cousin, perhaps, a whispered sound from what was left of his throat. Most of the figures left, but one walked up to him.

“Master Qin. Can you hear me?” The curt tones and painfully Ishgardian accent of Camp Dragonhead’s lead Chirurgeon. Ar’telan had worked with him more than once, helping to heal the wounded knights brought in from defending Ishgard from her many enemies.

Ar’telan tried to raised his hands to agree, and found them unresponsive, so he made a vague noise of assent and nodded his head. The chirurgeon sighed, and a little blinking brought his face into something resembling focus.

“They found you out on the road to the Observatorium. You were lucky-”

“Ar’telan!”

Haurchefant’s voice cut the chirurgeon off mid-sentence, and with a flurry of sound and movement the elezen was beside him. He could feel, just about, Haurchefant’s hands taking one of his, but it was still heavy and bitterly cold.

“When they brought you in we thought you dead. What possessed you to do something so foolish?” Haurchefant said, worry lining every word. “Out in a blizzard with nothing but a coat - you could have teleported to the aetheryte, something-”

“Lord Haurchefant,” the chirurgeon said, and Haurchefant shook his head, attempting to regain his composure and failing most utterly. He did not look like a man who had done much sleeping recently. With effort, Ar’telan willed his hands to respond, and signed something that came close to sorry.

“I know. Don’t try to move too much,” Haurchefant said. “They said they found you before the frostbite could set in properly, but it was a near thing. By the Fury, have you any idea how worried I- how worried we were?” Ar’telan managed a weak, pathetic little smile. He wanted to explain - wished it was so easy as speaking, though even that would have been difficult even if his throat was not damaged. Felt very foolish for needing to explain something so embarrassing as the sequence of events that had led him to this shameful state.

“We have contacted your friends in the Scions,” the chirurgeon added, making Ar’telan grimace. “The runner should be reaching them presently, assuming they were not waylaid by heretics, as seems to be the flavour of the moon.” Haurchefant made a weary noise, a harried look on his face at the reminder.

“It will take you a few days until you can move about properly again,” he said, looking as though it pained him to say it. “Though the chirurgeons will stay with you, of course. Just… promise me you will never do something so foolish again.” Ar’telan tried to flex his fingers, and Haurchefant took his hand again, the warmth of him radiating through every digit, though not quite enough to stir them to action.

He nodded his head, and hoped that it conveyed a promise more than a yes.