theblackestnight-ffxiv

[theblackestnight-ffxiv]

It's that time of year. Here's an updated chart on what to do if you find a baby bird. Thanks to the International Wildlife Rehabilitation Council for scientific advice. A portion of this month's Patreon support goes to them, so thanks Patrons!

[theblackestnight-ffxiv]

[theblackestnight-ffxiv]

Another storytelling rule I think people should remember is the law of diminishing returns. If you keep on ramping up the stakes higher and higher and higher, after a point it gets to where the audience can’t really care anymore.

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Commune?

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[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 21: shade

D’zinhla was no stranger to vast forests. Native to La Noscea, her immediate familiarity had been rather sparse growths and the well-tended orchards of the farms near the Grey Fleet, but after leaving her home, her first destination had been Gridania, in the heart of the Black Shroud. Not only was the forest thick and dark to earn its name, it was dotted with the towering trees known as heavenspillars, whose size beggared belief even standing before them.

There had been other forests. The near-tropical riot of Eastern La Noscea’s Raincatcher Gully. The frost-etched conifers of Coerthas, all that remained of their natural trees after the region’s entire climate altered post-Calamity. The strange trees of the Dravanian Forelands’ Chocobo Forest, which seemed as if they had been turned upside-down, standing on thick branching limbs while their crowns were a gnarled gathering of what seemed like roots that had grown leaves. The Fringes, denoting the edge of the Black Shroud breaking into the rocky labyrinths of Gyr Abania. The lavender-leafed Forest of the Lost Shepherd in the First’s Lakeland; when shrouded in fog as the sun rose, it turned into a strange land of mingled pinks and purples that still caught her breath. The Rak’tika Greatwood, of trees that rivaled the heavenspillars, some even said to have contained a terrible serpent to tame its wrath. The Shroud of Samgha in Thavnair, a hot and sticky place thick with natural beauty and peril. Even the broken husks of trees beyond understanding in Ultima Thule, which still yielded lumber as if they had been thriving.

She had seen forests of all sorts, and each time, they were sights utterly unlike what she had seen before. It felt repetitive to make that observation once again, but what greeted her at the edge of the Yak T’el highlands was yet another unique sight.

Yak T’el already stood in distinction from the other woodland of Tural she had visited, the wetland forests of Kozuma’uka; those forests were defined by the branching, meandering, plummeting rivers that nourished them. Yak T’el was a different land, standing on different stone, utterly devoid of rivers or other watercourses as a result. Here there were cenotes, pools of water filling limestone cavities. The limestone therefore defined the land, and how it laid in two layers, with an escarpment dividing the highlands from the lowlands. On the highlands, the forests were tropical, in patches of densities but never so thick that it was hard to find the sun. 

The lowlands were a different story.

D’zinhla couldn’t fully work out what she was seeing, when she first broke the highland forest for the cliffs that plunged into the lowlands. There was no wonder it was difficult to travel between the two, given the height of this wall. What laid below was more forest, but a forest that looked very little like that of the trees above. 

The crowns were not that far from the top of the cliff, and what she could see of their leaves was strange. It was almost as if they were mingled green and blue. It was perhaps not as eye-catching as forests of purple, or red, but the blue was strange. She thought at first it might be a trick of the light, the mottled shadows of leaves above onto the leaves below, but it was too distinct, and there were brighter blues amidst darker, showing that the blue was itself the color of the leaves. Which meant it wasn’t a trick of the strange blue haze that blanketed the forest, refusing to burn off in the sun’s light. From here, she couldn’t see far beyond the crowns, let alone deeper into the forest. The bluish haze and the bluish leaves were certain to create a shadowing effect beneath them, and as that joined with the thickness of the leaves in the canopy, she guessed that very little sunlight penetrated anywhere into the Yak T’el lowlands. 

What she learned of the homelands of the Mamool Ja, of forested lowland poor of resources, solidified that understanding.

When later they were given leave to descend the Ty’iinbek Traverse, she learned just how strange the Ja Tiika Heartlands truly were.

A land of unending shade, which never truly saw daylight. A land where illumination was not from gaps in the canopy or areas of thinned forest, but from the strange flora, fauna, and both simultaneously, which glowed in cool tones of greens to purples, but mostly blue. Frogs and crickets sang as if it were a perpetual twilight broken only by the dark of true night.

As far as she could tell, the only place in all the Heartlands where one could see the sun was atop the pyramid of Mamook. 

It made D’zinhla feel uneasy, and she challenged that feeling, asking herself if it was simply unfamiliarity that made it seem strange and sinister to her–but the behavior of the people certainly hadn’t helped. Not until later… 

But even then, it felt strange.

She was not a person to flinch from darkness; no, she had embraced the darkness within her, and what it meant. She had faced personifications of elemental darkness and even those things related to it, like deepest despair. She faced darkness when she found it, to discover what was within it, what it was made of.

Even still, the darkness of Ja Tiika felt…desperate. A kind of darkness for hiding a terrible secret and the shame it carried. A darkness that concealed the pain of hopes dashed upon the rocks. 

She wondered if the changes promised to the people of Mamook would bring change to the shade that engulfed them.

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[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 20: duel

[placeholder if I fill it later]

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[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 19: taken

The Drowning Wench was positively swimming in patrons this fine summer evening. D’zinhla couldn’t recall the last time she’d been able to pay a visit to Baderon and her other acquaintances, but the sheer crowd was, on its face, rather discouraging. She paused on the walkway, her ears flicked back in hesitation.

“Too many people, love?” Airraim asked softly.

“No, well, yes, a bit, but-” She bit her lip. “I think I can handle it, anyway. Chances are, they’re all caught up in their own business. I might not get to chat very much with the staff, but… oh!” Her ears perked again at the sweet sound of a La Noscean fiddle cutting above the drone of the crowd, and sudden cheers that rose with it, along with the pulse of hands clapping in time.

Airraim smiled. “I suppose that settles it for you.”

“Quite!” She grinned back, brushing her tail against her partner’s. “Well, shall we?”

“I’ll go find us a place to sit, while you investigate the music,” she said with a gentle shooing motion. 

She didn’t need any further encouragement, her steps far lighter–and timed with the beat–as she approached.

It was hard to get a glimpse through the standing crowd at the entrances, especially in a city with so many Roegadyn, so she wasn’t sure who was playing, but she could think of a few fiddlers she knew that played with that style. That reel was especially popular in Swiftperch, and a few other clues hinted the same, but it wouldn’t necessarily follow that the fiddler themself was from Western La Noscea. She threaded her way through the crowd, trying to get a better vantage, and- aha! Solkzedyr! He was from the west, and was astonishingly dextrous, both with the fiddle and with his feet. From the way he bobbed in time with the beat, she figured it wasn’t long before he started to dance along with his own playing, something she knew from experience was tougher than it looked!

Already a space had cleared enough for dancing to begin, and she smiled wistfully. It was great fun to dance, and she wasn’t half bad at it, but it would put far more spotlight on her than she really wanted. After all, she was here to catch up with her guild acquaintances and the staff who had seen her so often, and once she started dancing, she wasn’t likely to want to stop anytime soon.

“Pretty thing like you all by your lonesome?”

Her ears flicked back at the voice beside her, and she forced herself to pull her attention away from Solkzedyr, into the slit-eyes of a fellow Seeker. He wore his wide-sleeved shirt half open, and the knife at his belt suggested he was a sailor. He grinned as their eyes met, dipping his head toward her with a half-wave. “Doesn’t seem right for you to be all alone like this.”

She forced herself to produce a polite smile, one that didn’t go into her eyes, suppressing her urge to lay her ears back. There was still a chance he wasn’t coming onto her, and it was an odd relief to muse that he likely hadn’t recognized her by her realm-wide fame, which was refreshing, despite his behavior otherwise. “I’m quite alright, and here in company, thank you.” 

“Company that’s left you alone at the edge of the dance floor?” He shook his head sadly. “No way to treat a lovely lass like you!” He grinned anew, in a way he must have thought was rakishly charming. 

Her smile thinned. “I assure you, I’ve no complaints, thank you for your concern.” She turned away as she said it, hoping to signal her disinterest in further conversation.

He stepped to follow her. “Aw, come now, and that’s hardly a way to treat a sailor in for the first time in a moon!” He spread his arms imploringly as he said it, which also had the effect of blocking off her ability to move further in that direction. “You came to the Wench for a good time, so did I, why not have it together and see how the night takes us?”

Her ears slanted back. “I told you, I came here in company, and I am not interested in your idea of a good time.”

“And I’m telling you that I can give you better than the sorry arse that left you alone! Come now!” He held out his hand.

She raised her head, feeling her roiling distaste, forcing it into her words. “Leave me alone.”

A flicker of uncertainty made his grin falter and stumble. “Oh, there’s no need for that, now, I’m just being friendly-”

A hand clapped down on the sailor’s shoulder, fingers curled in a clawlike grip. The man’s face registered irritation as he turned–and then his face went white.

To everyone else, the person who had forcefully gotten his attention was an especially stern looking Miqo’te woman. To D’zinhla and the man, it was a figure made of shadows, featureless but for the red eyes glowing balefully at him. To everyone else, the voice was quiet and serious. To D’zinhla and the man, it had an eerie effect, as if simultaneously echoing from a deep well and also coming from right beside the ear. ”She told you to leave her alone. Do it, or you won’t spend very long regretting it.”

The man flinched away from both of them, his hands raised fearfully. “Seven bloody hells!”

“That’s a good first step. But you’ll become acquainted with all seven of those hells sooner than you thought if you don’t leave the premises. Immediately.”

Face fully drained of blood, the man wheeled and cut through the crowd, headed directly for an exit.

As he left, the shadows dispersed and coalesced, leaving Airraim with her arms crossed and a murderous expression on her face. Her eyes were still glowing. “I should follow him and teach him to never again speak to a woman that way. Or anyone.”

“I think he’s gotten the point,” D’zinhla said softly, aware of the concerned and curious looks of the people surrounding them. Thankfully the music was still playing, so they hadn’t caused a scene for the entire establishment to gawk at. Feeling unclean, she shook her head, then took hold of Airraim’s arm. “Did you find a place to sit?”

“I did.” The crimson glow in her eyes faded, leaving them their usual pale gold. “Come on,” and she pulled her through the crowd to a table for two up against the wall.

D’zinhla sat heavily, feeling much better with a wall to her back. “Gods,” she said, shaking her head. “Haven’t had one that persistent in a while.”

“I was biding my time to let him get the picture, but he insisted on ignoring you. So I had to take action.” Airraim lifted her chin, as if daring D’zinhla to refute her.

She would have tried to say that it wasn’t necessary, but she knew it would be a losing venture. The greasiness of the man’s insistence still lingered on her. She shuddered again, ending in a lash of her tail into mercifully empty air. “If he didn’t learn from you, he’ll learn from someone with fewer compunctions about drawing a dagger on him in public.”

Airraim snorted. “The only reason I didn’t cleave him in two was because that would be a mess for Baderon, and a ruin of your evening.”

It wasn’t exaggeration. She smiled a tiny smile. “I appreciate the restraint. I wish it hadn’t been necessary at all.”

“So do I,” she said darkly. “But a fool used to taking what he wants doesn’t learn until he gets it scared out of him–or ends up dead first. The way he’s going, it’s more like to be the latter, but I’ve done my work for the former, only in consideration to you. Not like he’s worth it.”

D’zinhla sighed. She didn’t like dwelling on him, rude as he had been.

Airraim looked back toward her, and her gaze mingled a softness that overlaid pure steel beneath. “You are mine, beloved,” she said, reaching across the table to seize D’zinhla’s hands. “You are mine, and I won’t allow such filth as that to tarnish your evening.”

Something shivered within her, her eyes locked to the fierceness of Airraim’s expression. A resonance within her darkness, a reminder of what they shared, what her shadow held of her. Everything. All of me. She softened, closing her eyes and taking a steadying breath, then gently squeezing Airraim’s hands, her lips curling upward. “Well then. Let’s get on with our evening.”

Airraim smiled, releasing her hands to lean back in her chair, a look of satisfaction on her face. “Yes, let’s, and you can start by telling me what songs our fiddler is playing.”

A distraction, but an effective one, and D’zinhla smiled. “Well, it’s Solkzedyr Einfedarsyn, from Swiftperch-”

“Ah, the nimble Roegadyn, I do recall. You were quite impressed with the way he could slide so many notes into those breakdowns.”

She brightened. “Yes! And he’s been playing several Western pieces, but-” she paused to perk her ears, “yes, this one is fully Lominsan, it’s a piece by L’sonri Tia, written when Merlwyb was named Admiral. Gods, I do miss L’sonri’s fiddling, but Solkzedyr is up for it. He’s got his own style to it, of course, but it does honor the original writing much better than others I’ve heard.”

Already she was feeling better, and she knew that Airraim knew, and was deeply satisfied for it. She could hardly fault her. This wasn’t the first time she’d taken very direct action to discourage unwanted attentions on D’zinhla, and it likely wouldn’t be the last. This one was only meaningful for the fact that the man hadn’t recognized her at all, and she wasn’t inclined to pull the “do you know who I am” card, when that was exactly what had drawn some of them before. Besides, what if he’d only learned to respect those with the standing to safely reject him?

She felt a mental caress, and flickered her eyes back to her partner, who was once more gazing at her with a firmly possessive stare. She flushed warmly, biting her lip, then cleared her throat. “Mm, sorry, where was I?”

“Telling me about Lominsan fiddlers of note,” Airraim answered, with an amused arch to her eyebrow.

“Mm, yes, right, well!” It was a good topic to get caught up in, and hopefully drive away the memory of the unfortunate start to her evening, while the way that Airraim was looking at her held a great deal of promise for the end of the evening.

[theblackestnight-ffxiv]

[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 18: hackneyed

[placeholder as I did not finish in time]

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[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 17: sally

“Sire!”

They awoke to screaming.

They were screaming.

Terror gripped them, a desperate surety of impending disaster, of a falling blade, of a falling star-

No-!

They curled upon themself and tried to banish it all away, tried to force themself back into the deep torpor that had held them for ages uncounted. The screams echoed in their mind, the screams of their kin, the terrible songs of compelled devotion that ended mid-voice but reverberated in the space and time between them.

Sire..!

Every mote of their being needed to keen their despair, to wail a dirge for the lost, but they had to stay silent, had to stay hidden, had to stay outside their captor’s reach. 

Something terrible had happened to the prison of torment. Something terrible had happened to the possessed spirit of their sire, and their kin, held in torment to manifest him eternally.

It had ceased, but what had brought an end to their imprisonment was something more terrible still.

They willed themself back into the nothingness.

***

“Sire?”

They woke again. The memory of their kindred’s cries was waiting for them, and they had to fight the urge once more to cry out their dirge. Time had interwoven itself between them and the moment of their kindred’s passings, only enough for them to know that some small amount of it had passed.

The echoes were fading. No, not only that–they were being sung over in farewells. An ending, a passing, but softer…

Their sire’s possessed spirit among them.

Alarm, and caution, held them in stillness. They had hidden themself away for ages, they could stay hidden long enough to try to discern what it was that had happened–and if it was safe for them to emerge.

Time passed, rather meaninglessly. They had only the low rumbles of the tireless earth, the silt of falling marine snow, the shift in the currents of the sea and the aether currents beside them, to tell that it had passed at all. Slowly, they unfurled their wings, lifted their head toward what would be the surface, so far from them that no light of day reached their haven.

It was safe here. It had been safe for what felt like eras. They had felt the pangs of the star, but they had been too deep in slumber to be drawn out. Not until the terrible song of their sire–of what had taken the place of their sire. Whatever had happened, it had reached them, but it had not compelled them against their will. Their urge to keen in sorrow–that had not been due to some ensorcelled geas. That had been the natural response to feeling the deaths of their kindred.

Deaths! The memory of too many deaths, of too many final songs, swept over them, and the urge to keen rose once more. They fought it back. They did not yet know that it was safe.

They could wait, but would they wait another age?

No. They had to know.

With a sudden decisiveness that would have shocked their broodmates, they lashed their tail and spread their wings wide, driving themself toward the surface of the sea. They ascended from the hadal zone that had held them safely unnoticed since escaping the geas that had enslaved their kin.

They ascended, and it took time. A passage of time of a meaningful amount, not mere moments, but shorter than the time since the songs had ended. Hours, they thought, and it seemed right. Days seemed like too long a span for rising from the ocean’s depths, even the trench that they had occupied. Hours seemed right.

So it was that some hours after their decision, they emerged into the brilliance of night. Brilliance compared to the unstirring dark of their sanctuary, where the only light was the pale lanterns of deep-sea creatures. In comparison, the stars strewn across the night sky were glittering beacons, and the greater moon near-blinding in even a crescent.

There was no lesser moon.

They looked for it–it would not have strayed from the greater moon. It had been tied to it by chains of force, and if even the sliver of the greater moon rested in the sky, the lesser moon must also be there. Yet it wasn’t.

Their eyes drank in the swirling aether, remnants of a disturbance so great that they could hardly begin to untangle it, yet one thing was certain: the lesser moon had fallen. Their sire’s prison had broken. Of their sire, there were only echoes.

Ehd kin…

No. Their sire had been stolen from them before that. Before the prison… The prison had contained the mockery of their sire, the twisted remnant that the Ashan had goaded their sire’s mate into calling forth. Whatever had happened to that thing, that eikon, it had been only his possessed spirit.

Yet the grief was still there…

They drew a deep breath of the air, so strange to feel after so long beneath the waters. Something had happened to the lesser moon, and to the star beneath it. Something had claimed the lives of their ensorcelled kin, freeing them from the dread compulsion to maintain the existence of the eikon that wore their sire’s soul. There were great changes wrought to the star since last they had been free upon it.

Foun Myhk would find out what those changes were.

[theblackestnight-ffxiv]

[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 16: third-rate

“Seven hells, I’ve had it!” D’zinhla threw up her hands, scowling daggers at the paperwork on her desk.

From behind her, she registered Airraim’s curiosity-tinged concern. “What’s wrong, love?” she asked, and after the sound of a few footsteps, a hand rested on her shoulder.

D’zinhla was immediately contrite–but still very frustrated. “I didn’t mean to disturb you, Airraim,” she said in a softer tone. “It’s just… Well, this folio!” She wrinkled her nose as she gestured at the offending documents. “It was so promising! There’s some very old works in here! Padjali and Gelmorran, besides Gridanian, things I’ve never found before! But because it wasn’t stored right, and especially because it wasn’t printed on the right materials, I could teach a class in incorrect archival procedures from just what’s wrong with this singular folio!”

“Mmm,” and she felt Airraim gently squeeze her shoulder. “That’s a deep disappointment.”

“Gods, is it ever. The only pieces that haven’t had parts lost to degradation are pieces I already have well in evidence in other, much better preserved folios.” She couldn’t help the scorn in her voice. “Meanwhile, the pieces new to me? I can tell, even as old as it is, that the paper was hardly worth the pulp it was made from. Too thin in some places, too thick in others, the thin places have worn away entirely and left me with missing sections.” She sighed, shaking her head. “It was kept well, there’s hardly any book-rot, the spine is cracked but that’s manageable, but when the very paper is fallen apart, that hardly helps preserve the information within!”

“Perhaps it was all the paper they had available?” Airraim ventured.

“Perhaps,” she said, biting her lip. “But that means whoever took possession of it later should have seen to it that copies were made, if not a restoration. Though there’s not a whole lot that can be done to restore what was already of poor quality to begin with.”

Her partner kept her hand on her shoulder, brushing back and forth with her thumb. “Though it could mean that copies are out there that were not kept with this piece.”

She flicked an ear. “True enough,” she conceded. “But they haven’t been found by me, or anyone I know of, so they might as well not exist until they are found. Still, I suppose that might have been done, make copies and keep the original as intact as it was… I could only hope that such copies, if they exist, were made before all this damage.”

“But for now, it doesn’t get you the new material you wanted.”

“Well,” and she hummed, considering the documents. “It does get me evidence of these songs, incomplete though they are. And they are new to me, even if they could have been whole and entire, and are instead piecemeal. Still,” she sighed, and lifted a hand to pat Airraim’s. “Thank you for hearing me out, love. I know the minutiae of document preservation hardly interests you.”

“But it interests you, and therefore, I care to hear about it.” Airraim bent and pressed a kiss to the top of D’zinhla’s head. “You heard me out about my latest batch of fragrance failing miserably.”

“But that I can follow better, it’s-” She stopped herself with a wry smile, twisting in her chair to look up at her partner. “Sorry, you’re right, thank you.”

Airraim smiled, and it filled her with a flood of warmth. “Of course,” she said. “Now- what do you need to go on from here?”

D’zinhla knew she was being shepherded away from her indignation and onward into something more actionable, but she could bite back the ridiculous obstinate urge to resist the attempt. “Well, now I need to start transcribing what I can, before this terrible paper degrades even further. So I’ll need my inks-” 

Her partner chuckled. “I’ll leave you to it then. But I think I will take this time to go put some more tea on.”

“A lovely idea, but no rush for me, I’ll need to keep it off the desk while I’m working.” She was already preparing her workspace, thinking mindfully of what needed to go where, what hazards needed to be mitigated, what steps would need to be taken. She heard another chuckle, and Airraim’s steps away, but it faded into background as she focused on the work in front of her. She could indeed salvage something of worth out of this, even if it wasn’t the prize she had hoped it to be!

[theblackestnight-ffxiv]

[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 14: telling

They’ve said something to her, and she doesn’t know what it was. 

Time is meaningless. Any moment, she can be driven back into a memory. It’s just as stark and sharp as when she was there. It plays out in the wrong order. She remembers the sky. His words are seared into her soul. She can’t remember his face.

They didn’t give you time.

She didn’t want to remember his face like that.

A weight rests on her. She wears heavy armor and a greatsword. 

Steam hisses around her. Snow falls on her shoulders, her hair, her cold and tear-stained cheeks. Voices chatter, muffled and strange. There is a painful silence filled only by the wind.

They didn’t give you enough time.

Over and over again, the memories return. She shoves them away, they push their way back up. 

Over and over again, the same events play out. Even if she moved swifter. Even if she loosed her arrow faster. Even if she had a sword to protect this time.

Someone is speaking, and she doesn’t understand the words.

How can they pretend to understand what it’s like for you?

It’s blurring together. Is there a river, or a thunderstorm? She remembers both. She remembers a golden sunset. 

She can’t remember his face.

She didn’t want to remember his face like that.

You won, in Azys Lla. You will win again here.

Is she even awake? Nothing flows right. It feels like a dream. It’s too heavy for a dream.

They’re calling you again. They won’t even let you rest.

She has a duty. There’s something only she can do. 

“D’zinhla? What’s wrong?”

Something cracks. How can they tell, when she can’t even speak? How can they not notice, when she can’t even speak? 

Something has been wrong, wrong, wrong, ever since the golden sunset. How can they still speak? How can they still move? She doesn’t understand how she could move, but she did. Because only she could. And now she needs to do it again.

They burden you even more by demanding you explain yourself.

She opens her mouth but can’t speak. Tears are falling from her face. She wrenches her eyes closed, grits her teeth, and gets back to her feet.

[theblackestnight-ffxiv]

[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 13: butte

The wind was stronger up here, gritty with dust and carrying the last of the day’s heat. Long shadows stretched to the east; this and the other prominent peaks were among the last parts of Shaaloani to be visited by the sun.

“This” was Mount Loazensensaya, the highest point in the dusty bowl that made up much of Shaaloani. It was a flat-topped, steep-sided formation, perfect as a perch from which to get a better view of the surroundings. Or to just get away to take a break.

D’zinhla felt her breathing ease from the aftermath of the exertions needed to climb. She stood in the wind, remembering the story that this place was where the ancestral Tonawawta came to commune with the wind and land, and thus why she had asked if it was alright to do so before making the climb. 

The sun’s last light left her high vantage, the rocks fading from illuminated orange to more sober tones as twilight swallowed the land. She’d been warned that climbing at night was treacherous, between the steep drop, and the emergence of venomous creatures that avoided the heat of the day. Having spied what the locals referred to as a “small” scorpion, as big as her hand, D’zinhla was not eager to have any encounters. 

She’d needed to get away, though. The preparations on the train were proceeding at a solid pace, and at this time, nothing had especially needed her. If left to her own devices she would have just gotten into the way, so she had told her companions she was stepping away for a bit, and would be reachable via linkpearl.

They likely thought she was fishing. True enough, she had attempted to cast her line at Lake Toari, and found it a pleasant fishing hole, but no, she was not taking up with one of her favored pastimes now. She was surveying the dome.

It was even more visible by dusk. Not that a dome of thickened lightning aether was hard to find even in the height of the day, but the darkened skies made the thing far more visible. It had a purple glow to it, and lightning crawled across it at an unhurried pace that made her shiver. Almost as if it were unafraid of any opposition, finding no need to move with the quickness that its element was known for. 

“Probably a trick of the light, and distance,” Airraim murmured softly beside her.

D’zinhla flicked her tail in acknowledgement. Airraim did that, answering her thoughts out loud. Potentially confusing amongst company, but between the two of them, utterly natural. “You’re probably right,” she said. “I still find it unsettling.”

“Oh, I entirely agree,” her shadow responded. “Deeply unnerving, sitting there like some fat spider. I worry what web we’ll be entering when we break in. But there’s no other option, is there?” and she tilted her head, looking at her.

D’zinhla sighed, closing her eyes. “We could always walk away, yes,” she said softly. “Let it be someone else’s problem.” She sensed rather than saw the flicker of satisfaction that she’d admitted it aloud. “But I’m still doing this. Because who knows what else is in there, if they can attack us with such power? Who’s to say this isn’t the first of these domes, and more can’t open elsewhere, closer to home?”

“And you, the hero to answer the call.” Airraim didn’t sound bitter, just matter-of-fact, with a hint of sadness. “Well. So it is. And so you are here, but I am, too.” She took D’zinhla’s hand, fingers twining.

She smiled softly as their fingers threaded together to fit just right, and gently squeezed in response. 

They watched the lightning crackle across the dome.

[theblackestnight-ffxiv]

[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 12: quarry

They were deep in the Dravanian Forelands by now. Stopping in Tailfeather had given them the opportunity to obtain provisions, but D’zinhla felt the need to supplement their food with fresh game. With the presence of so many hunters in Tailfeather, it might be a bit more of a challenge, but D’zinhla was confident in her ability to secure something, and firm in her decision to do it herself.

“And how are you going to fell a grouse with that spear, and leave enough meat behind to be worth it?” she asked the Azure Dragoon archly. 

Still, Lady Iceheart had insisted on accompanying her on her hunting foray, and she had to admit that it was probably wise to stay in groups. The Tailfeather hunters rarely went out alone, and even for someone of her skill level, the chances she could run into more trouble than she could handle were too high to ignore.

Hunting was no time for conversation, but something about the silence and short murmured directions seemed comfortable, rather than strained. Her companion was able to move without excessive noise, and D’zinhla had been skeptical that the Azure Dragoon, in his armor, would have been able to do the same. The brush here wasn’t especially dense, perhaps thanks to the strange trees that towered over them in this forest, but it still tried to catch at them, and required careful movement to pass through without making a production of it.

A couple of gamebirds were what D’zinhla was after, more than enough to stretch their supplies and let them carry on their preserved foods for longer. She’d swapped to bird arrows, which was another reason to have backup; a large predator, or, gods forbid, a dragon, wouldn’t find them terribly dissuading, made as they were to bring down much smaller game. 

“To the left,” she heard in a soft murmur, and she stopped still, looking carefully in the direction indicated. There was movement, but it was hard to discern if it was more than just the breeze on the leaves. Until- With an explosion of wingbeats, a large partridge rose out of the brush. D’zinhla’s bow followed, and she drew back and loosed the arrow. The shot missed the body, winging the bird and sending it tumbling down but still alive; she had a second arrow at the string and tried to nock it before the bird could get away, but then a sudden shard of ice coalesced and drove toward the bird’s body.

The partridge fell and lay still.

D’zinhla sucked in her breath, then nodded. “Very nice,” she said, lowering her bow and going to retrieve the bird. A swift check confirmed that it had been a death shot, the bird’s body cool around the place the ice-dart had pierced, and frost was melting on the feathers. She placed the bird in her gamebag, then looked to Lady Iceheart with an appreciative glance. “Good choice, that little ice-dart.”

“Just enough to finish the job,” the Elezen said in a low tone.

She nodded, trying not to let herself get caught in reading too much into that. “I’d rather like to get one more, but if our luck has run out, this one is large enough for all of us to have a fresh meat portion. A good hunt.”

Lady Iceheart nodded, a look of quiet satisfaction on her face. “Well then. Shall we try that luck?”

“Let’s,” she agreed, gesturing with her head off to the right. A bit deeper into the brush, further from this successful hunt; but hopefully not too far into the wilds to be foolhardy. Hopefully a second bird wouldn’t be far behind.

[theblackestnight-ffxiv]

[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 11: surrogate

Or, how it might have happened.

“So. Let me get this straight. You were fishing in Kozama’uka, and you found a fallen tree with a nest cavity inside. There were eggs in that nest cavity, and one was still whole. So you’ve brought it back with you to see if you can save whatever’s within it.” Airraim ticked off each point on her fingers, then looked up at D’zinhla. “Did I miss anything?”

D’zinhla looked a bit abashed as she clutched the basket holding the precious cargo in question. “N-no, that’s about the size of it.”

“Zinhla, my heart…how do you know it’ll be safe to hatch?”

She blinked. “Oh, well. It’s definitely not a snake egg, if that’s what you mean. It’s absolutely a bird egg, I can tell from the shape and how hard it is. A snake egg would be longer, sort of squished bean shaped, and the shell would be a lot more pliable.”

Airraim still looked slightly aggrieved. “You also don’t know what kind of bird it is.”

“Well, it can’t be a very large one, anyway. Not with the size of the egg. Listen, I- I just want to try, at least.” She felt her ears droop a bit.

Her beloved gave her a wry look. “Why not ask one of the Hanuhanu about it?”

She blinked. “Ah, I suppose that’s…that’s a pretty good idea, but. But I’ve already come all the way back here,” she gestured with one hand at their cabin in Tuliyollal, “and I think it might be best to minimize additional travel, you know?"

Airraim chuckled softly, shaking her head. “You have such softness, my heart. Fine, let’s see what hatches from it.”

That was two days ago, and after carefully setting up the basket with a few crystal shards, to keep it warm and the air around it somewhat humid, D’zinhla had waited with high hopes that there would be a survivor of the fallen nest. She had to admit that Airraim had been right to be cautious, as there was no doubt that the high elevation forests of Kozama’uka were full of their own hazards, but she felt reasonably certain it wasn’t something that would be immediately dangerous upon hatching, the way a venomous snake could be just by virtue of its existence. Besides, she’d have asked Donuhanu, but she had a feeling that the eggs that Hanuhanu knew best were fish eggs.

Then a tiny hole had appeared in the egg, with equally tiny peeping sounds, and D’zinhla had watched, raptly, over the course of the several hours it took for the tiny chick–for it was, indeed, a bird–to break its way free of the eggshell. 

Thus had Yaxk’in come into her life.

She hadn’t known it at the time, especially because he had hatched as the most helpless kind of bird–naked, blind, barely able to do more than lift his head with an enormous gape of a mouth and beg for food. She kept him warm, contrived of a mash of what seemed like appropriate bird food, and fed him round the clock for several rather sleepless days. She began to regret not asking for help.

Then he had started to sprout fluff, mostly grey, but with a brilliant emerald green where it started getting longer, and his eyes came open, and D’zinhla fully realized that yes, that’s right, birds imprint upon what they believe to be their parent.

“I can’t say this is quite what I pictured,” Airraim remarked wryly at one point, causing her to blush.

It was fortunate that her days had been relatively quiet, and she could devote the care the little bird needed. And Donuhanu had known what he was, or at least, he knew now that the chick was big enough to get some color in his fluff.

“A quetzal,” the Hanuhanu said, eyes wide as he stared into the basket. “One of the most beloved of Kixaihih’s children!” And he had told them what he knew of the birds, of their bright green plumes that resonated with wind aether, and the magnificent tailfeathers that the male birds would grow. That they were precious to Kixaihih, and thus to the Hanuhanu as well, and the fact that D’zinhla had aided this one would be seen as proof of her favor under Kixaihih.

“If you believe in all that, anyway! But it is remarkable that you’ve done so well by him, it’s been said they don’t do well when taken from their nests. I know you had little choice, but all the same, most of them do not flourish!”

But flourish he did, and in that remarkable surge of growth that birds had, it didn’t take long until he was no longer utterly dependent upon D’zinhla. He still wanted to be near her, yes, and to be fed by her, but he could do it himself. And he could fly, a development that startled her, and revised a few of the living arrangements.

It also became clear that he was utterly disinterested in leaving his parental figure, for it was clear he saw D’zinhla that way. “And I can’t just take him to the forest and leave him there,” D’zinhla said wearily, as the quetzal sat on her head with a cheery chortle. “So here we are, I suppose.”

“I could say ‘I told you so,’ but I won’t. This time.”

“I appreciate your restraint.”

[theblackestnight-ffxiv]

[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 10: stable

Her ears rang. Her body quaked, shattering spasms wracking her without warning. Her vision washed away in a haze of white. She fell to her knees, coughing up burning white ichor in place of blood, her hands clenching, a roar in her ears-

Please, she could only beg in her mind. Please…!

A velvet touch interposed itself between the light and her shuddering soul. It wrapped around her, embracing her in the coolness of shadows, unable to hide her but able to give her some manner of protection. She immediately found herself able to breathe again. The light still blazed, but dampened, a hearthfire rather than an all-consuming inferno.

There was a sensation like a caress.

She began to be able to hear again. Ryne’s voice, far away, pleading, “Please hold on!” She felt that external force at work, siphoning light from where it had built into such intensity, redirecting it all around her so that at no one point was it threatening to break free. Only moving it, unable to take it from her. She still had to carry it, but the load could be rebalanced.

She felt the velvety caress again, the mantle of shadows fading as the light came under control. 

For a few heartbeats she gathered her strength, envisioning what she was about to attempt, and then she pushed herself to her feet. Immediately she swayed, and a steadying arm wrapped around her back. “Easy now,” was the voice by her ear, Thancred’s voice, as he helped her keep her footing while her head swam with dizziness.

She focused on breathing, on clearing her head of the haze. The light had retreated to the edges of her vision, and there was a high-pitched hum in her ears, but she could see and hear through it. 

She coughed. Ichor had a different metallic taste than blood, with an unpleasant acidity. Her throat burned.

She could no longer smell the aether of her companions, but the memory of that indescribable scent brought a pang of hunger she shied away from. It was the only hunger she had felt since the top of the mountain, and she hated it. 

“Better?” Thancred asked at her ear.

D’zinhla swallowed, trying to find her voice, then nodded instead. 

“Alright,” and she felt his support withdraw, slowly, ensuring she could stay on her feet before he pulled back entirely. 

She paused, checking against dizziness, then pushed herself into taking a few steps, then a few more.

They were all watching her, except for Y’shtola, who seemed forced to look to the side of her. She didn’t want to think about how overwhelmingly bright she had become in aethersight. She shied away from their gazes, instead looking to the cavernous walls around them. Moving her head, she could confirm that some of the haze she saw was a natural fog clinging to the waterless seafloor, not just the burned-in haze of light aether in her vision. There was light of a different kind down here, brilliantly glowing formations of corals, bright enough to illuminate their way. At any other time D’zinhla would be fascinated, would want to study them-

Not now. That attack proved how tenuous her hold on herself had become. It was getting worse, her recovery taking longer. So she took another step, and another, one foot in front of the other, feeling herself drawn as if by a magnet to where Emet-Selch could be found. She had to get there while she was still herself.

[theblackestnight-ffxiv]

[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 9: lend an ear

The last note faded with her breath, and D’zinhla lowered the flute from her lips. She held herself back from the question that nagged at her, instead letting the music settle, and hoping it had jogged something, some memory, some faded recollection. Not on her part, but on that of her audience.

G'raha leaned against the wall, his head bowed down toward his crossed arms and his eyes closed. All that betrayed his awareness was the movement of his tailtip, which flicked in time with the music she had just finished playing. Evidence that he was going over it in his mind, but the lack of immediate response made her worry that this may yet be a dead end after all.

Finally he moved, his hand resting by his mouth in a considering gesture. “You’ve brought me a bit of a riddle, my friend,” he said, his bright eyes meeting hers. “And I confess that I cannot give you a confident answer, much to my dismay.”

Her ears did droop, a bit, but she had steeled herself for this. “Well, as I said, a long shot!” she laughed softly, trying to make light of her disappointment.

“Indeed, but don’t count me out just yet.” He gave her a fond smile. “Because something about that melody did feel maddeningly familiar.”

Her ears perked. “Oh, truly?” she asked, not bothering to hide her excitement.

He put up a steadying hand. “I’m afraid I have little more to give you at the moment. But I trust you’ve transcribed this tune?”

Grinning, she reached over to her desk, where she’d had a carefully-penned sheet of music ready and waiting.

G’raha accepted it with an eager look. “You’ve come quite prepared, and it shouldn’t surprise me in the slightest, where music is concerned.”

Reminding herself that she would do best to temper her own excitement, she took a steadying breath. “And if it turns out you can’t give me anything… Well, I’ve merely transcribed what I heard whistled by a Roegadyn dockworker in Radz-at-Han, who first heard the tune many years ago from a Corvosi Seeker. There’s plenty of opportunities there for things to have been misheard, misremembered, and mistaken–and that’s assuming it’s even a Corvosi song in the first place.”

“How I wish I could take you there myself, rather than rely upon my own challenged recollections,” G’raha said softly. She felt a soft pang; she, too, wished she could go on such a journey with her dear friend, and experience his home with him as her guide. Yet matters since the Final Days still held Corvos in a state of unrest. The defeat of the Garlean occupation had been merely the first step in what would prove to be a long road to recovery for the people there, and D’zinhla felt uneasy at the idea of going there on a pleasure-jaunt. If she were to be recognized as the Warrior of Light…well, it didn’t take Alphinaud’s skill at statecraft to recognize that could cause some very unnecessary complications to whatever delicate matters were underway there. 

“Still,” G’raha continued, “I hope that I can give you something more than a mere feeling of familiarity. Because you are right, there is quite the tradition of Lydian modalities in Corvosi music. Tension, but one that serves to emphasize an uplifting aura. I’m of the mind that it’s the beautiful environs of Corvos–beautiful, but with their own perils–that inspired such sounds.”

She nodded, leaning forward in her chair. “Exactly! Environmental cues can be a powerful inspiration for music. Even such things as the note progression of a bird song can end up reflected as a common motif.”

There was a brightness in his eyes, and for a moment she felt a memory rise, of a campfire among glowing crystals, scholars sharing tales, and a much younger G’raha eager to share songs with this adventurer sharing the fire. “And how the environment can shape how sounds are heard–how well the notes at each extreme of the scale carry!”

She smiled, blinking away a mist that had come to her eyes. It was a shame their work had kept them from this sort of thing. Not just her research into a bit of a song that she wanted to pursue to its origin, but this, sitting together, speaking of music in general. Those nights at the campfire had been full of them, with the two of them eager to share their own songs with one another. She really ought to have made something like this happen much sooner, and repeat more often. 

“Are you alright, my friend?” He took a step toward her, concern obvious on his face.

“Oh, yes, sorry, I-” she shook her head and smiled. “I was just thinking about how nice this is–the two of us, talking about music like this. Like we did back then, and haven’t done nearly enough of. And how I really should try to make it happen more often.”

He paused, and he smiled, with his ears at a relaxed angle, as his tail swept side to side in an expression of quiet pleasure. “I quite agree, Zinhla,” he said, his voice much softer. “I treasure any time spent with you, but I too have missed our meetings over music, with no greater responsibilities as our reason to meet. Perhaps we could attempt to make a monthly meeting of it?”

She tilted her head, then nodded. “I think that would be quite reasonable to try for, yes. We both have full understanding of each other’s responsibilities, so we certainly understand that sometimes things come up. But, one day a month… That can be done.” She looked at him with a bright smile.

“I’d make some statement of doing all within my power to make it happen, but such pledges are quite weighty, aren’t they?” He smiled. “But you are right, we shouldn’t need it to come to that.”

“Hah, no, not to that extent!” She leaned back and flicked her tail, feeling the sensation that, were she a bit more relaxed, she might even start purring. “Thank you, Raha.”

“And you have my gratitude as well, Zinhla. This has been a- a much appreciated diversion.”

Even if nothing came of the musical puzzle, she couldn’t be at all disappointed with what had come of her friend’s assistance today.

[theblackestnight-ffxiv]

[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 8: free day

Prompt 8: free day

When she was concentrating, Airraim got a particular furrow in her brow. D’zinhla found it desperately endearing. She also found it endearing that Airraim would scowl if attention was drawn to it, a scowl which only deepened the furrow. 

Right now, she stayed silent, merely watching her beloved over the rim of her glasses. D’zinhla had been working on more transcriptions, work that was very pleasant to do with Airraim also present in the room. Airraim’s own work was at her botany workbench, where she was examining the growth of the plants she tended. It was while she was doing this that D’zinhla had taken note of that furrow of concentration, and paused her own work to admire her.

Airraim hadn’t noticed her regard, putting all her focus into the seedling she was examining. She tilted her head, delicately brushed the newly formed leaves aside, then frowned in consideration, and all the while D’zinhla watched, her heart swelling with warmth for the person who had stolen it.

Whatever it was that had so captured Airraim’s attention seemed to have instilled a low-level frustration in her, because she set the seedling back down and sighed, rubbing the bridge of her nose. “Zinhla, next time we go to the market, I’ll-” She broke off as she looked at her, and found her already watching. A wry smile twisted her lips. “How long have you been staring?”

D’zinhla couldn’t help but grin. “Long enough.” She pushed her chair back from her desk, crossing over to slide her arm across Airraim’s shoulders. “I adore you.”

Airraim chuckled, her tail swishing as she leaned into the half-embrace. “You make this quite obvious, my heart. Not that I’ll ever tire of hearing it.” She lifted her hand to where D’zinhla’s rested on her shoulder, brushing her fingertips over her knuckles.

“Mm.” She leaned down to rest her head against Airraim’s, inhaling her scent, mixed as it was with the loam of potting soil, the green of her plants, and the soft floral fragrance that clung to her. She could easily get distracted by this. “But you were saying?”

“I was saying, the next time we go to the market, I think I’ll need to try something different for these new seedlings.” Airraim gestured with her free hand at the dozen or so, in small cups of soil. “I think they need soil that drains better. Or containers that do. They’re showing signs of retaining too much water.”

“I see. Easily accomplished, I’ll make sure we spend time there.” The climate of Ishgard made gardens a very difficult matter, but the proliferation of greenhouses and conservatories proved that its people were still quite willing to try. Clever things could be done with arrangements of crystals, for instance. Airraim had no few contacts among Ishgard’s green thumbs, and was starting to gain a name for herself, mostly for the exotic plants from far-off places that she provided to them in exchange for their support and advice with her own plants. It was a nice arrangement, and one that made D’zinhla delighted, for it meant that Airraim had her own connections at a remove from herself. Certainly the reason she went to those far-off places was because of D’zinhla, but the work with the plants was all Airraim, and her botanical colleagues here in the city were her connections first and foremost. It gave her joy and relief to see Airraim at work within those connections.

“Thank you,” Airraim murmured, looking up at her with a soft smile. “I do apologize for distracting you from your own work.”

“Oh,” and she waved her own free hand dismissively at her desk. “Nothing terribly interesting. Just transcribing a few more copies of that Pelupelu alpaca-herd song. It’s astonishingly similar in structure to a La Noscean shepherd song, so I have some inquiries of my own to make. But nothing I regret setting aside for some moments of admiration.”

“Careful, or one might think you’re utterly besotted.” Behind the teasing words there was a softness, the softness that told her that Airraim still quietly marveled that she was the focus of D’zinhla’s affections. She could recognize it, because she had the mirror of it herself. 

So she smiled. “Of course I am. How could I not be?” And she pressed a kiss to Airraim’s cheek, rewarded with the soft flush of her skin.

Airraim was silent for a few more moments, then sighed softly, the hint of a purr in her exhalation. “My heart,” she murmured, and D’zinhla knew that this time, at least, she had won, with Airraim having no further comeback but her favorite term of endearment.

With her heart full to bursting, she said, “I love you too.”