#jus been idle clicking away while talking to my sister

[p2ii]

What the fuck my dude 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

<3

[brightlilies-a]

fourfold flames.

   “there are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle, or the mirror that reflects it.”               - edith wharton.

                                                                --- --- ---

   the orange glow flickers as it waves across the faces and bodies that surround it. a perfect centerpiece, and yet no eyes linger upon it, each of the outside circle looking to the children dancing on the inside, and each dancer looking to each other, caught up in the rhythm. light music floats on the air, played on lyres and pan flutes and improvised drums and the susurrus of idle conversation. overhead, menphina watches over her children, and whispers soft words through the leaves, that they may somehow reach their ears.

   a pair of amber gazes rest upon the smallest of the troupe, watching every rise and fall of the red and white colored crown with solemn expressions. albi’a shifts slowly to face his mother, and, noting her intensity, turns back to the campfire. crackle, fizzle, snap.  

   “i want bibi ta grow up happy.” there were only a few things he agreed upon with his mother anymore, now that he was older. before, it was easier to ignore all the problems, how utterly dysfunctional their lives had become in exchange for some semblance of togetherness and tradition that would otherwise fall apart at a moment’s notice. but, when it came to the beaming, giggling child who was still enamored with this horrid, cruel world, the two of them could set aside their differences… to an extent.

   “and you think i don’t?” she scoffs, refusing to even glance his way.

   that’s just like her. his eyes roll up and down as he shifts to plant the palms of his hands on the ground behind him, taking a more leisurely approach. “i think ye know he won’t be happy here. kahli’s too tough on him.”

   “just because you hate it doesn’t mean he will.” narrowed eyes glare at her following that, with a click of his tongue announcing his more immediate distaste. they could just dismiss it all as simply tradition, when they weren’t the ones who dealt with the scorn and biting remarks night-in and night-out. heaving a sigh, though, he straightens his posture, and raises a lackadaisical palm——getting mad wouldn’t get him anywhere, and worse, it’d likely drag the kit still skipping about the fire over in a fretful fit.

   no, another tactic would be better for proving his point.

   “ye really think he’ll take ta bein’ a wanderer all by his lonesome, ma? he cries if we ask him ta jus’ watch camp by himself. he’s too soft.” 

   finally deigning to grace him with her attention, aged amber shifts to her left, countering him with a calm flick of her tail, “and do you really think that becoming an adventurer is better-suited for him if he’s so kind? it’s just as dangerous, if not more.”

   “i think he’ll take ta helpin’ people. he likes ‘em plenty,” proudly relaxing, his lips tug into a smirk, “even if he prolly shouldn’t.”

   the matron huffs, folding her arms against her breast, “that’s because he’s mimicking you!”

   “then i’ll just become an adventurer so he’ll mimic that, too—” his teasing is cut short by a giggling shadow casting itself over the pair with its large, red ears standing tall and attentive compared to the rest of his diminutive stature. blue and orange peek out from beneath messy white bangs, wide and wondering and filled to the brim with twinkling pride as the child hovers, swaying this way and that.

   “bi’a!! mama!! didja see me?” the innocent voice beckoning them pulls them away from the moment prior, as their gazes soften and the frustration melts away. his mother is the first between them to speak, earnestly reaching up to tug upon the child’s freckled cheeks while taking a saccharine tone.

   “—of course, my bibi boy! you were so cute, dancing like your sisters!” 

   yer lying, albi’a thinks to himself, because ye only saw as much as i did.

   “don’t encourage him, he’s a boy.” unable to get a word in before a cold, harsh voice called from the group of girls near the fire, albi’a’s expression sours at his sister, if only momentarily.

   “stop being mean ta him, sis! yer jus’ jealous he’s better ‘an you are!” albi’a retorts back, letting his shite-eating grin grow as large as it could.

   “—i’m not jealous of him!” their elder sister huffs and stomps, with her red braids lifting as she turns away from the scene. unlike the two elder keepers willing to leave things at that, however, albi’to’s lips tug into a frown. a moment later, his red moccasins hit the ground, and soon after he takes his sister’s arm into his hold, quite stubbornly refusing to let go amid her attempts to wave him off.

   “i’ll teach ye, matar! it must be really hard ta move well, since ye have yer nose in books all day!”

   “get off me! your steps are clumsier than mine are!”

   looking to his mother’s face, albi’a finds himself staring at the lines, the cuts that didn’t heal right, the melancholy her expression always seemed to bear. he’d known, always, why bi’to was the favorite child——even if she tried to say there were no favorites. it came easier to like him. he wasn’t damaged; he hadn’t watched his father die. he and matar, on the other hand, grew up before their tenth namedays, while bi’to was still a child that saw the world in kinder lights than they. and what a treasure it was, what a thing to want to protect. how unrealistic; how horrible it would be for him later.

   “i don’t want him to be an adventurer, bi’a.” she speaks suddenly and he flinches, slack-jawed and blank of mind. he takes a moment, and newly recomposed, calmly retorts back,

   “yer fine with me wantin’ ta be one.”

   but she expects this, red crown shaking back and forth slowly. even as she takes her loose braid into her hands, laying it to rest over her shoulder and running her fingers over the flow of her hair, however, her eyes refuse to leave the child now tugging his elder sister around, speaking in excitable gibberish that would only make sense to he and his, “because it suits you. you’ve always wanted more than this life, but he… all that bibi wants is this. laughter and smiles and togetherness.”

   “it’ll get taken away from him when he’s an adult.”

   “maybe things will be different by then.”

   is that how it is? pray it changes fer his sake? the young man sighs, running a hand through his patches of red and white hair, tousling it for good measure. what a nice dream that would be, if it could be true. “hundreds a years o’ traditions won’t change in a few moons, ma.”

                                                                 --- --- ---

   after horrible things happen, the land grows quiet, as if also in mourning.

   holding his own makeshift skewer over the flame, albi’to watches the silhouette of the rat they’d found some malms back turn over and over, its lanky, skinned body little more than a weird tumor upon the branch. it wasn’t much by comparison. the twins had received dodo fledglings that hadn’t escaped the initial blaze for their help in the scavenging, pahje was happily licking her lips as she turned over her round of piglet, which had been otherwise split between kahli, his sister and his mother. and meanwhile, despite being the one who had found the piglet squealing in a bush and had put it out of its misery, he sat, staring at a rat.

   there wasn’t much meat on rodents, and even less given how much of it was taken by the fire that had killed it. but kahli’s decisions were final, and so the burdens were given the smallest amount. that was what she had started calling him since the lesser moon fell: a burden. he didn’t give it much thought——thinking about things was how one got upset about them, and it wouldn’t change anything even if he did. nobody talked back to kahli. kahli was the one who led the tribe. kahli’s decisions were final.

   even so, the crackle of the fire was one of the few sounds he could properly make out against the oppressive silence. occasionally, something would snap! or combust a little too quickly, a little too loudly, with such a suddenness against the pall of death that it startled the whole of their group, and it would take some few minutes before they all calmly sat once more. the earth was still; the smoke was somewhere to the north now; nobody, no animals, nothing passed them by this night. how strange, he muses silently as his gaze drifts upward, past the branches and leaves to the starry sky above, to see the night again, when just a few nights ago that unending crimson from the lover’s hound was all they knew.

   “we should celebrate,” he breaks the silence, raising his gaze from his poor excuse for a meal and the dancing flame to the people that encircled it, “since we’re alive.”

   he’s met with an uneasy silence and six pairs of eyes boring into his face, some losing interest quicker than others. after a few seconds, most of them had returned to their anxiety and disquieted thoughts, but a warm, gentle voice humors him quietly, “celebrate how, bibi?”

   his mother shifts, standing and shuffling to sit beside him with her pork skewer in hand. her shoulder nudges his in that encouraging way, as her crown dips to catch his gaze——as if he were only a few summers old and hiding secrets too big to hold. she continues to nudge and prod, with her elbow and the back of her hand and a few more times with her shoulder until his lips tug into a smile and he laughs. batting her away softly, he shakes his head, catching the bit of courage he had before it would fly away, like an ember up into the sky, and exhales.

   “we could…” cheeks bubble as his voice trails——he hadn’t thought that far. so he simmers in contemplation, focusing his attention on the firepit as he stomps in place, waiting for inspiration to come. what could they do, after all, with no food and only a fire? just a fire… but all they needed was a flame! “dance around the fire an’ send our thanks ta menphina fer protectin’ us! it’d be like old—”

   “as soon as we finish eating, we sleep.” opposite him, the silver haired chieftain stares him down, sharpened gold unwilling to budge. her voice, cold, dry, hollow, brings back the silence in an instant, and a chill runs back up his spine.

   “but—” the word has left before he realizes, but even that is cut short.

   “we will sleep through the night as most stragglers will pass through the day. if they find us, they’ll steal what we have and kill us for scavengers.” kahli succinctly lifts her skewer from the flame, blowing at the steaming meat as she gestures to the girl beside her with a nod, “pahje will take the first watch.”

   she wasn’t incorrect. few of the remaining survivors in the wood would travel by night, given the complexities of the paths prior to the devastation, and among them would be scavengers and bandits more than willing to take up the opportunity for easy pickings. but her honesty pulls his lips taut and sets a weight on his chest. pahje, however, the spitting image of her mother, looked more akin to a giggling jackal as she watched him through the fire——probably some secret between them, as there always was.

   “i can help her with that—” albi offers in spite of whatever had his tribal sister in stitches, but finds the pattern follows true. speaking only led to being silenced; male keepers were to be neither seen nor heard.

   “we don’t need a burden keeping watch.”

   a moment passes, and his mother’s hand lands comfortingly upon his own, fingers squeezing his. spitefully, though, the boy lifts his rat skewer to his lips, digging fang and teeth into the scalding hot flesh before ripping away. it hurt, it burned, it was way too hot going down and brought tears to his eyes as the pain sank in, but it’d stay his tongue. and that was all he needed.

   “kahli, you’re being too harsh—” with a sigh, his mother shakes her head in earnest defeat. she pauses, however, and after wrapping an arm about her son’s shoulder, squeezes him snugly against her side. “... you can sleep near me tonight, okay? i’ll feel better having you within reach, just in case.”

                                                                   --- --- ---

   there was no chimney in the renovated storehouse they called their home. in the middle of winter, the pair of keepers were wont to carve out a section of the floor, marked with gathered stones, and built small campfires to heat the cold air that now blew in from coerthas to the north. during those months, mother and son slept in the same bed in the room with the fire, buried under layers of ratty blankets, listening to the embers as they burned themselves out. tonight, though, the matron sits up, running her fingers through her slumbering child’s red locks, smiling wryly in the dark.

   “you’re not happy here, are you?” her hand comes to a slow, expression tightening as she shakes her head, “you’d lie, though. some awful lie with that sad smile he taught you.”

   the light from the fire flickers dimly, the small flame’s shadow dancing proudly upon the wall. outside the window, she catches the sound of strong winds blustering against the cabin walls, and instinctively reaches to pull one of the blankets more snugly over him, “you know… if we were still out there, we wouldn’t be together anymore. i’d still be with your sister and kahli and…” she pauses, flattening her lips, “you’d be… somewhere.”

   somewhere in the twelveswood, by himself, hunting game purely for company that would never want him for more than a few bells, never truly. perhaps they’d cross paths once if menphina blessed them, under the guise of scavenging in the same lands or chasing the same prey, but he’d never be able to stay. they’d say their hello’s, he’d lie horrible fibs to be pleasant, believing it wouldn’t worry her, and he’d disappear into the shade of night. was she so horrible, then, for thinking dalamud’s fall a blessing in disguise? so many people lost things, they lost things, but the young man clinging to his own tail was given a chance at finding joy in a life otherwise set up to disappoint him.

   “your brother was right, you know? you would never be happy with that life.” beginning to pry his fingers from the fabric of his tunic, the woman sighs, “maybe i’ve been holding onto you too tightly, though… people have a tendency to leave me, after all. your father, your brother… then your sister.”

   after tugging his arms apart and batting away the long-haired tail eating up needed space on this rather small, stained and torn mattress, she looks to his face, still calm, still asleep. how he ever slept so soundly was a miracle of its own, but it was a relief for nights like these. “you’re all i have left. my bibi, my precious bibi boy.” the three words that pull her lips into a delighted smile every time without fail, yet such elation quickly fades, “but i have to let you go now, don’t i? i knew one day i’d have to, but i didn’t think i’d have to give you a push to make you leave the nest, so it’s not that easy…”

   jumping as he shifts where he lays, she stifles the gasp that rises in her throat, exhaling a moment later when he settles again with a curse. twelve forfend, if he’s been listening...

   “give me a heart attack and i’ll leave you faster than you’ll leave me…!” with a scoff, the matron lowers herself into her spot and pulls the blankets over herself. she turns away to look at the fire, to watch the amber glow that reminded her of that life long gone, of shadows dancing around a fire, calling at her to watch them, to watch him. “he was wrong, though. all it took was a single moon, and everything’s different.”

                                                                   --- --- ---

   there’s something horrible about fire, albi’to thinks, when it rains from the sky. each rumble of the ground beneath them has him hesitate, has him second-guess when and where he is, because the smell of smoke and burning and panic and death never changes. the tightness in his chest from knowing a molten rock might come crashing down and steal him away to the lifestream never changes.

   it wasn’t intentional, because that would mean emet-selch cared enough to look into a shard of a person’s past, but damn did it cut deeply. that the glamour of the ascian’s most painful memory was so reminiscent of the seventh umbral calamity was a haunting, harrowing, horrible experience to both live and relive. it stole away his breath at times, forcing him to clutch his chest when his memory of the calamity bled over emet-selch’s, and he always brushed the looks that came his way off with unconvincing lies the scions wouldn’t press. the meteors that landed closer were the worst, the heat affronting him in gusts before the shards flew past, both real and unreal, painful and not. as they darted through the falling city, his gaze would occasionally linger on the faces and backs of his comrades, wondering if they felt the same.

   if they did, it likely wasn’t all that similar.

   none of them spoke of where they were when the lesser moon fell and the dreadwyrm rose. not many in eorzea did. mentions of the calamity came up every now and then, especially near the rising, but there was no pride in being a survivor to that nightmare. there was no winning in what happened that day, only loss.

   but it was a gut feeling of his that while he braved the land only malms from where one of dalamud’s fragments fell into the earth and set the land ablaze, that his companions in the scions watched the world irrevocably change from within walled venues. there was no shame in such, but it was a different experience. even among his friends, there were some chosen few he could think of that would’ve, based on the stories they exchanged, bore witness to the red sky from within eorzea.

   they were all experiencing walking through this hellscape, however. even if they felt no attachment to the simulacra running about, falling over, breaking apart, the carnage was real. the threat of death and the sight of loss was real. like an echo vision, specially tailored for those without the elder primal’s blessing.

   he brushes the soot off his arms, eyeing the portal of aether on the far side of the makeshift arena carefully. a dark, swirling vortex that was, like everything else in this liminal space, made for them to follow, made to guide them to the ascian himself. deeming themselves okay to proceed, the keeper’s ears twitch as their footfalls echo off the floor, and instinctively, he reaches out… and grabs nothing.

   “hold up,” pulling his closed fist back, he pauses, mulling over if he should speak——but he already had, so he might as well finish the thought, “we dunno what awaits us on the other side of that, so lemme say something.”

   silver-tongued words meet him just as quickly, and the teasing in thancred’s tone was only matched by the humored smile gracing his features. “i find it rather cliché to give a parting speech before what may be the final battle. friend.”

   “heh, maybe, but it ain’t a good-bye.” it was hard not to laugh as he shrugged, albeit airy and hoarse with all the soot and dust permeating the space, “... it’s a thank you.”

   “that might just be worse!”

   “then it’s worse, and i’m sayin’ it anyway.” a wag of his finger manages to quiet the hyur from any further complaints (a trick he’d picked up from her), and he tugs his lips into a gracious grin, looking to each of the scions softly, “thank ye, though, fer bein’ here fer me. i know minfilia was the one that wanted the scions ta be like family fer me, an’ she prolly said that ta any green recruit she got, but i really think of ye all that way. you, too, ryne.”

   pressing the tips of his fingers against his collarbone as he pauses to gather his thoughts, his chin dips, crown shaking subtly back and forth, “honestly, i didn’t think i’d get a family again after the calamity, but then, ‘fore i knew it, i did. the twelve blessed me with all o’ ye, so no matter what happens, i’ll always have yer backs, because ye guys have mine.”

   what greets him as he lifts his head, however, is a round of silence, as the group looks to one another with unreadable expressions. after a few seconds, all attention returns to face him, as if expecting something more——he hadn’t said anything wrong, had he? beginning to fear the worst, albi hurriedly goes back over his words in his head, trying to find the—

   “done yet?” alisaie chimes, smirking proudly.

   “h-huh?”

   urianger nods, continuing the charade, “tis no secret how highly you think of us.”

   “guys, come on…!” taken aback, the dancer’s expression widens with embarrassment, pink staining his freckled cheeks.

   “not that it isn’t pleasant to hear you say it every now and again.” y’shtola’s arms fold before her, humored visage tilting just for emphasis.

   in a last ditch effort for someone to not tease him so harshly, odd eyes plead with the elezen twin that’s so often stood at his side, that’s been characteristically quiet this entire time, “a-alphy, back me up…!”

   but given the smile playing upon his face, even alphinaud was caught up in the chance to catch the warrior of light off-guard, as he so pridefully chides, “personally, i could do with you mentioning it a little less.”

   even as his flustered face burns amid their amused giggling, however, albi cracks a smile and shakes his head. looking out at them, the group of scholars all brought together by a common cause that had welcomed him into their fold that day in thanalan, fills him with a comforting peace, a friendly reminder that all would be well, that all was how it should be. even if what awaited him on the other side was certain death, they had each other to defy the odds and face that future together with. and for now, they needed him to play his part, and so he would. 

   mustering the lingering hint of frustration before it might float away on the breeze, albi brushes past the group and jogs toward aetherial tear, calling out behind him, “f-fine! let’s move on then, if’n me sayin’ all that was really unnecessary…”

   the last thing he heard, though, before the flow pulled him in, was ryne’s concerned voice chasing after him, “aw, albi… i thought it was nice anyway…!”