#oc: adelaine anselout

[blackestnight]

ffxiv and magic traditions: a very self-indulgent and nonsensical “““essay“““

as a joke i said “haha what if i went off and described each of my oc’s magical abilities but in terms of pathfinder’s magic traditions,” but then no one stopped me, so it’s no longer a joke. anyway.

this will come as a shock, i’m sure, but i play a lot of tabletop rpgs, especially pathfinder 2e. as much as i love ffxiv’s armory system as a mechanic (getting to take multiple classes! one one character! with no penalties! it’s fantastic!) the inherent mechanical limits on each class as a result just…bore me, frankly, from a worldbuilding standpoint; i much prefer the inherent flexibility of ttrpgs, where even two characters with identical classes and ancestries can play entirely differently. hence i like to draw inspiration from ttrpgs when doing my own worldbuilding for my ffxiv characters.

some necessary background: when i say “magic traditions” i’m referring to pf2’s four traditions: arcane, divine, primal, and occult—you might also hear these referred to as “spell lists.” these are separate from the eight schools of magic that you see in a lot of ttrpgs (including pf2 and 5e), such as evocation, divination, necromancy, abjuration, etc. put simply, the school of magic dictates what a spell does, but the caster’s magic tradition dictates where the power to cast it comes from, which will make more sense in a second if it doesn’t already.

also, obligatory because-this-is-the-internet disclaimer: these are my personal headcanons and class interpretations, applied for my own worldbuilding purposes to my own interpretation of the game world, i am not trying to dictate how you should play the game or write your story, you do you, etc.

with that out of the way: HERE WE GO

i’m starting with haruki mostly because he…actually doesn’t do much magic in the way of spellcasting, but he definitely has magical abilities, being a not-quite-dragoon. (i like to call him “waterbender with a pointy stick.”) instead of drawing upon the power of his ~inner dragon~ (he doesn’t have one), his supernatural abilities are a blessing from the auspice seiryu, which makes him a classic example of a divine caster. the most common divine casters in a lot of systems would be clerics, but it really just means that a character’s magical abilities are given as blessings from some sort of divine entity. on his own, haruki is not capable of breathing underwater or summoning tidal waves, but he possesses the power to do those things because the power is on loan from seiryu. it’s also important to note that just because he has power from seiryu doesn’t mean he worships seiryu; it’s pretty standard fare in the pathfinder universe for characters to receive divine blessings unasked-for, and sometimes unwanted (this is, like, the entire premise of the oracle class, and i’d argue also fits pretty perfectly with the oracles of light and darkness in ffxiv as well, but that’s a subject for another post).

i’m lumping adelaine and sjanna together because, not only do they practice the same magic tradition, they both practiced multiple traditions over the course of their respective lives. addie, who was enrolled in the conjurer’s guild while growing up in the black shroud, and sjanna, who was raised a servant of the green word in golmore jungle, both started their journeys as magical practitioners of the primal tradition. not to be confused with ffxiv’s primals, the summoned entities, primal magic is drawn from nature and a connection to the natural world—druids would be the iconic primal casters in most game systems. the line between primal and divine casting can get a little fuzzy sometimes, especially once you get into things like the elementals (who are sentient nature spirits worshipped in their own rights), but i ultimately lumped addie and sjanna into the primal tradition because conjury, from what we’ve seen, is about drawing aether from the land itself (and the elementals are depicted as “voices of the land”). the green word as it appears in ffxiv, similarly, is close to the green faith as it appears in pathfinder: a code that demands respect, reverence, and preservation of the natural world. addie learned magic as a conjurer who drew power from the land around her, and sjanna learned magic as a keeper of the wood who revered the green word. later in life, addie (who had suffered emotional and medical abuse under the conjurers’ guild) and sjanna (who committed anathema to the green word by deliberately causing harm to the wood) stopped being practitioners of primal magic, although addie left it behind willingly while sjanna had her power stripped from her.

so both of them instead re-trained in the arcane magic tradition. arcane magic is like, your stereotypical locked-in-a-tower wizard who spends all their time poring over spellbooks—they make a study of magic and use logic and rationality to categorize and control magic. ffxiv’s arcanists are also (fittingly) a good example of arcane magic as it appears in pathfinder. the arcane tradition relies upon casting spells from constructs, like magical diagrams or matrices, which can be physical (like the arcanist’s grimoire, in addie’s case, as she goes on to become a scholar) or a mental construct (which sjanna prefers, being more of a staff-wielder than a book-toter). it’s also worth noting that, in the case of pathfinder (and as i’m using it here), arcane magic draws mostly on the caster’s reserves, rather than drawing on power from an external source like divine and primal magic. addie learned arcane magic as a means of retaining her power without giving up her agency to an elemental tradition that had harmed her; sjanna took it up to reclaim abilities that had been taken from her, but this time under her own power. i just think it’s neat.

and last but not least: hanami. if you’re wondering why she hasn’t come up before now, it’s because i am cracking open a refreshing cold can of my bullshit (drk theorycrafting). settle in.

“but cyan,” you say, “isn’t hanami’s whole thing that she keeps insisting she is not a damn mage?” yes it is. however, hanami is a filthy fucking liar. hanami, as a dark knight, is a practitioner of the occult magic tradition.

occult magic is definitely the least-understood of the four magic traditions, both in the in-universe pathfinder flavor text and on a meta level by the players. the word occult probably brings to mind, like, a circle of hooded figures with candles and weird rituals to summon some horrible tentacled creature from whatever great beyond, but per in-universe texts on occult magic, these practitioners are benefiting more from sheer dumb luck than an actual understanding of occult magic, which is best demonstrated by the iconic occult casters of pathfinder: bards.

occult magic draws its power from the concept of a shared narrative. practitioners at their finest use magic to invoke symbols commonly understood by its beneficiaries (or victims) that, in turn, causes some secondary effect—usually an emotional reaction (you see a lot of mental spells on the occult spell list). in the case of a bard, they will most typically use song, but dark knights as written in ffxiv do the exact same thing. per the lv 30 unlock quest, dark knights are fueled by fear, pain, and rage (and, as we oh-so-memorably learn in the 50-60 questline, all of these are superceded by love, kupo), but the flavor text of several of the drk abilities (back in ye olden days when we actually got flavor text) also include references to emotional manipulation. per enyclopedia eorzea’s description of Unleash (the starting aoe skill): “Releasing his pain and rage upon nearby foes, the dark knight manifests an inky black circle of spikes on the ground around him. All those caught in its thorns are struck by unreasoning terror, and an irresistible need to claw away at its source.” also from EE1, under the section dedicated to Dark Arts (the conceptual magical practice, not the skill, may she rest in peace): “Fueled by the darkness from within, the dark knight employs these techniques to lend an arcane edge to the blows of her greatsword. Though known for their disdain for shields, the fighting style of the earliest dark knights was nevertheless built upon mundane swordplay, and it was not until several centuries later that one of their order first unlocked the secrets of the dark arts.”

we know from the very start of the class questline that dark knights are something of a folktale to ishgardians; the npc who starts the unlock quest talks about dark arts practitioners, and even later in the lv 63 quest, an npc named Lowdy (you know, the waitress who poisoned you back in falcon’s nest like 3 patches ago) explicitly mentions being told stories about dark knights as a child. (based on the relevant npcs’ social stations, it probably varies whether the mythical dark knights are presented as folk heroes or bogeymen.) “but cyan,” you say, “can you get to the fucking point?”

yes i can. my theory—once again, i direct you to the ‘this is me playing in a sandbox’ disclaimer—is that the original dark knights didn’t use dark arts or magic because there was no narrative surrounding them. the first dark knights, being the founders of the discipline, didn’t have the benefit of a ready-made reputation to go with the greatsword and the heavy armor: by the modern day, when the warrior of light and sidurgu and fray take up the mantle, dark knight evokes a very specific image that instills fear, and pain, and rage—which they then harness for their own ends. dark knights use the shared narrative of ‘big fucking scary knight with big fucking scary forbidden magic’ to actually do that magic: the belief and the fear is the source of their power.

also just, one of these days i will go off about dark knights and akasa/dynamis, but this is already long and i’m already getting off-track, let me just put a pin in that.

so hanami, as an occult caster, uses Unleash and summons a big circle of spikes in the ground. scary! that image, which is pretty universally interpreted as threatening, achieves the effect of inducing terror in anyone caught in those spikes, because the magic is powered by the narrative of “big honkin’ thorns made of pure darkness = danger.” on the flipside, the dark knight also draws power from love—the specific example we see is the love a knight bears for their charge. (additional side-rant that folks like @starswornoaths and @autumnslance could do better than me: better paladin story than the paladin story.) what is The Blackest Night skill, if not a manifestation of that story of devotion and adoration?

…this definitely got off track and if you’re still here you get a medal. the medal is metaphorical though. ty for enjoying my rambling, if you’re interested in more information about the pathfinder magic traditions, i pulled a lot of the stuff above from the Secrets of Magic sourcebook, which contains a ton of cool worldbuilding about magic, including stuff about the traditions, the eight magic schools, and the four magical essences that i didn’t even get into here because they’re not immediately relevant, but they are cool. also: if this was fun enough that you want to incorporate the magical traditions into your own worldbuilding, obviously you can because i’m not a cop, but also tell me about it!!! show me your divine red mages or your arcane paladins or whatever cool and funky stuff you wanna do!!! talk multiclassing to me!!!

thank you for reading bye!!!

[blackestnight]

why make lore for your alts when you can make relatable memes

[blackestnight]

For all ships, talk about the domestic life one and two! (If you want to)

heck yeah!

...under a cut because long.

...technically aymeric was the one to ask the question but it was more like they both got shoved face-first into a matrimonial lake. but like, cutely. kind of. nobody died or was seriously injured so let's just count it as a win.

as for wedding: thank you for giving me a chance to just sit down and spell it out because absolutely no part of me wanted to actually write a wedding, i am just here for the sweet domestic bliss. they had a little ceremony in doma (not really at hanami's insistence but definitely for her benefit), because she 1) does not care about halonic orthodoxy and 2) hates crowds. also 3) she appropriately fears her mothers. so when i say "little" i mean her immediate blood relatives, a couple cousins, and edmont and emmanellain were there for aymeric. then they went back to ishgard for The Bullshit They Could Not Escape, that being a fancy church wedding with alliance officials there to rub elbows. hanami spent most of that wanting to crawl through the floor because how dare people perceive her having emotions. thancred and the fortemps boys got to take turns giving embarrassing speeches in varying states of inebriation, though, so that was fantastic.

i haven't talked about my trainwreck lesbians in a while but i need you to know theyre like, doing laundry or something, and elysa looks up from sorting socks and says "hey, do you wanna get married?" and addie says "...uh, sure, when?" and elysa says "i dunno, now?" and they shrug and wander down to the magistrate's office in ala mhigo and get married because they have nothing better to do that day. they forget to tell elysa's parents until they visit for winter's knell and that's how they die. they're so stupid and i love them so much.

and for some reason i don't have a visual of haruki and a'dewah on hand but that's fine because I DON'T KNOW. IT IS OUT OF MY HANDS AND I AM JUST ALONG FOR THE RIDE. all i know is a'dewah is afraid for his life because hanami knows he has a ring in his pocket even though hanami realy does not care, she doesn't want to think that hard about whatever dumbassery her little brother is doing with his catboy (derogatory).

[blackestnight]

we’ll live and breathe it in real time, montage is for the dead and my heart’s still doing fosburys, nowhere near finished yet

(knees knocking and blood flowing, so i want you to know that i want to)

[blackestnight]

scar maps for (almost) all the kids! i probably took too long to make this. being frontline fighters, hanami and haruki naturally get more bumps and bruises than their mage friends; hanami, by virtue of her supernatural constitution, has the most scars from life-threatening injuries, simply because she’s the one able to survive them.

transcriptions below the cut! thank you @carmeladansen​, and everyone please let me know if you need this tagged for blacklisting purposes.

Hanami

Broken horn. Elidibus, possessing the body of Zenos yae Galvus, shattered Hanami’s left horn during their duel in the Ghimlyt Dark. She received a prosthetic replacement from her students at Crown Gemworks, but her physical recovery is ongoing and some signs of head trauma linger.

Light corruption scars. There are white marks on the inside of Hanami’s mouth, reminiscent of acid or burn scars, left from her near-transformation into a Lightwarden. They don’t cause her pain or impact her sense of taste, so she ignores them.

Sword scar. A thin scar down the inside of her left forearm, a remnant of the same battle that took her horn.

Sword scar. A long, thin scar across her torso, left from her first battle against Zenos yae Galvus during the invasion of Rhalgr’s Reach.

Knobby, scarred knuckles. These are especially prevalent on her right hand and are for the most part souvenirs from her days as a gladiator.

Glass scar. A thin pockmark on the base of her palm, which appears innocuous but is left from the assault on Doma Castle, when Hanami broke the windshield of an Imperial gunship to kill the pilot inside.

Loose nail mark. A large, thick scar down the back of her right thigh, by far the most gruesome-looking flesh wound she has. She got it when she was 23 and fell off her roof while drunk.

Sjanna

Accursed eye. Courtesy of the Green Word, Sjanna’s left eye is a luminous bloody red, as opposed to her natural purple. There are a number of small scars on her eyelids, as though she fell into a thorn bush. Her altered eye has lost its normal sight; now it views aether rather than light, in the style of the Sharlayan aetherometers—as well as Y’shtola Rhul’s substitute eyesight. Sjanna and Y’shtola have been researching the history of Flow magic within Golmore Jungle in case of a possible connection, though Sjanna’s sight has been changed since before Y’shtola was born.

Wounded wrist. A number of small shrapnel scars along her right wrist and forearm. These came from a series of explosions during Sjanna’s study in Radz-at-Han, when she was prone to overexerting herself and overdrawing her own aether, channelling to the point that her staves would explode. Myrrh Mistral counseled her on safe magical practices when it became clear that Sjanna would die before she learned otherwise.

Scarred hands. Sjanna’s palms both appear to be near-melted. These are burn scars left from the same fire that saw her exiled from Golmore, and though she’s never been able to confirm, she suspects that the scars are enchantments inflicted by the Green Word, given that they haven’t faded with time like her other childhood wounds. They contribute to the curse that prevents her from using wind-aspected magic.

Addie

Greenbone tattoo. This vine tattoo isn’t technically a scar, but it was given to Addie without her consent shortly after she was enrolled in the Conjurers’ Guild by her mother. It was part of a ritual meant to tie her more closely to the elementals and lessen the “greenbone” that afflicted her joints—which any alchemist or chirurgeon would have correctly diagnosed as juvenile arthritis.

Knobby knuckles. These are also a product of Addie’s arthritis; she has similar joint damage in her knees and hips, though it’s less visible.

Arrow wound. Addie was struck by a poacher’s arrow shortly before the Calamity while out traveling with her best friend, Elysa Cordwyk. The arrow that pierced her thigh would have struck Elysa’s neck if not for Addie’s intervention.

Scrapes and bruises. Addie has a number of faded marks on her shins, left from scraping rocks when she goes cave diving in the Gelmorran ruins.

Haruki

Magic burn. This sunburst scar on his forehead came from an aether-charged explosion of some kind, though Haruki refuses to say when he got it or who is responsible. Careful observers might liken it more to a lily’s petal patterns than a traditional sunburst.

Broken collarbone. This lump on his left collar is a marker of an idiotic youth spent climbing the un-climb-able (though, strangely, in a separate incident than the one that resulted in his sister’s fall from the roof).

Sword scar. This gash down Haruki’s right bicep is ragged, the result of an experimental Garlean buzzsword during the Monzen uprising. Haruki would have lost the use of his arm completely if not for the intervention of allied Geomancers.

Claw marks. Haruki took a nasty blow from Hakutei, Byakko’s familiar, while assisting Hanami and A’dewah Tia in the Jade Stoa.

Back gashes. Once again a product of poor teenage decision-making; he’ll only front-flip off the Dairyu Moon Gates from now on.

Impact scars. Haruki was thrown by a tidal wave in the Wreath of Snakes and gashed his leg on some nearby rocks; this wound didn’t stop him from getting up to finish the fight, and Seiryu commended him for his tenacity with a divine blessing.

[blackestnight]

3: reveille

Prompt: Muster

Word count: 779

Set in late Heavensward patch content, although the time frame isn’t super relevant. Warning for some very, very vague allusions to past medical abuse.

The La Noscean morning came quick, bright and brilliant, the rising sun catching the surface of Bronze Lake like a blanket of emeralds, the glimmer of refracting light muted to a delicate shimmer by a low-hanging layer of fog. The air hung heavy with promise and the chattering of insects, announcing the day over the lap of the water against ancient marble.

In the privacy of her bunk, Addie woke slower.

The damp morning air sunk through her skin and clung to her bones like soaked-through clothing. The barracks for the Royal Marines were little more than shacks, built on leftover land from the Maelstrom troops stationed nearby, and the sweet stink of cedarwood lined the insides of her nostrils as she turned to bury her face into her pillow in protest. The movement tugged at her hips as she shifted.

Lazy cave-rat, she thought idly, a hollow echo of some half-remembered insult in her childhood that had long since lost its sting. Never mind that the Stillglade conjurers lived in a cave, too, but the day the Hearers admitted to having anything in common with Duskwights would be a hot day in Menphina’s hell.

No Hearers here, though, she thought, and went about the business of stretching herself awake. First the knees: those were the worst, still tending to swell in the night even after her regiment of teas and poultices, and they creaked like waterlogged greenwood as she bent them, planting her feet against the mattress. The dull throb echoed up through her thighs, meeting the ache radiating down from the arches of her hips. Fever-heat settled between her muscles. She breathed in to the bottom of her lungs, ignoring the twinge of her ribs where the tension of her legs radiated up and made them ache: one, two, three. Exhaled. Stretched her legs out to straighten them, careful, waiting for the catch of stiffness that sometimes stopped her motion in its tracks.

It didn’t come this time. It hadn’t for a few mornings now, which was a relief on her good days. On the bad days it felt a little more like finding a meal laid out beside a trip wire and knowing there was something dark and weighty hovering just out of sight.

How long it had been since she had been allowed her own health. How long since she had been granted the privilege of care. The good days came more often, and it felt less like a privilege and more like a promise.

She sat up, planting her hands in the mattress to push herself forward, tug at the tension at the base of her back. She grunted as the motion set the ache in her hips flaring, grinding, like powder caught in the sockets of her bones. The motion shook her such that she didn’t hear the pat-pat-drag of motion from the hall until it stopped outside her door.

“Anselout!” came the voice, gravelly as the crumbling marble walls outside. “You’re late! If I come in there and you’re still sleeping I’ll build a damn boat and keelhaul you myself, you pitiful excuse for a Marine!”

Addie grimaced; she had slept well past the wake-up call, she knew, but Halga Tolga’s bluster wasn’t nearly as impactful once she had heard it a few dozen times. “I’m awake, Sarge,” she called back, curling her toes into points and trying to summon the will to stand. “Just...kind of hung up.”

The door rattled in its frame, then against the wall, as Halga Tolga threw it open. The light from the hallway silhouetted the tonberry, the edge of his axe glinting menacingly through the dark of Addie’s room.

“If you’re hurtin’” he growled, “quit mopin’ and have Surito Carito shake you loose. If you want to be a Marine, you’re gonna get in fighting shape or you’re gonna get dead! So drink your brews”—a flash of metal, and Addie barely ducked the flask that Halga Tolga lobbed in her direction, the heat of the liquid fogging the steel against the chilled-fog morning—”and chew your chews”—a second projectile, the packet of herbs fluttering to rest on Addie’s blankets—”and get your scrawny arse in gear!”

Halga Tolga pat-pat-dragged his way back down the hall, fuming, and Addie fingered the packet. Coeurl’s claw, she assumed, and turmeric, shipped in from the groweries in Gridania.

“And you’re on kitchen detail!” Halga Tolga barked, his parting shot in the morning gloom, and Addie huffed. Kitchen detail meant soaking knee-deep in the lapping lakewater checking fish traps. Cool, soothing, weightless.

She scooped up the flask of tea and stood. Slow, but steady. She could handle that.

[blackestnight]

18: light party (bound by faith)

Prompt: Panglossian

Word count: 1112

Featuring gratuitous headcanoning about aetherpool weapons and armor, Duskwight physiology, and a bonus sprinkling of Resident Clueless Adventurer Elysa.

Palace of the Dead is probably not the worst place you could go for a double date, but it’s up there.

While she waits for the rope ladder to get tied off, Elysa closes her eyes and tips her face up to bask in a rare ray of Shroud sunshine, working its way down through the canopy. The breeze is gentle and sweet today, the branches whispering to each other overhead when their leaves brush. She wiggles her toes where they curl over the edge of the sinkhole and thinks, very fondly, of jumping.

“Lysa,” Addie says, “you’re going to fall. There’s loose dirt there.”

“I’ll be fine,” Elysa says, but obediently steps away from the entrance to Issom-Har, pebbles crumbling down in her wake. “It’s not that long a fall anyway. There’s a ledge.”

So maybe her foot slips a little, when she twirls to face Addie. Maybe her toes brush open air. It’s not like she doesn’t know how to catch herself anyway. Not like she needs to, with her second foot already on solid ground and Addie right there to grab her arm, if she really starts to go.

“Please don’t break your ankles before we’ve even gone in,” Addie mumbles, already turning away now that she’s assured of Elysa’s footing, back to Hanami and her elezen friend. New guy. Some Ishgardian rich boy, and Elysa thinks he’s some kind of commander but she’s also pretty sure she’s supposed to know already and it would be rude to ask even though she’s been over the border past East End for like, years now, so sue her if she’s missed some Eorzean news.

Definitely rich though. No one answers ‘show up in clothes you don’t mind getting Morbol puke on’ by wearing leathers that nice if they’re not rich. It’s not like they need the protection, anyway; Elysa already has her bracers from the Wood Wailers strapped on, the ones she and Addie and Hanami keep in the footlockers in Quarrymill, humming with power this close to the entrance cairn. She’s traded her lance for hora, today, hanging delicate and hollow as spun glass by her hips; once they step inside she knows they’ll light up, dense and glowing with aether. Addie’s book is spider silk-thin, pages threatening to tear under her fingers. Rich Boy (Elysa’ll have to ask Addie for his name later, out of earshot—er, hornshot?—of Hanami and her scowl) keeps reaching behind his back to fiddle with the spindly fiberglass of his bowstring.

“You mean to tell me,” Rich Boy murmurs, and Elysa can’t really see his expression with how he’s bent over to talk to Hanami but she thinks he might be making the kind of face Addie makes at her sometimes when she’s got one of her maybe-not-so-good ideas, “that we are entering hostile, isolated territory, with no maps, and relying on unknown magic as our only means of transportation?”

Addie’s ears cant down. Elysa reaches over to take one of her hands from where it’s clutching the cover of her book, pressing her thumb into the divot of Addie’s palm and rubbing. “It’s just like teleporting,” she says, voice raised enough to make sure Rich Boy knows she’s talking to him even if she doesn’t really want to look away from Addie. “Like the aethernets in the big cities.”

Addie folds her fingers to tap Elysa’s thumb in turn. Not really a hand-hold—more of an admonishment, probably, that’s enough, Lysa—but it’s close. It gets closer when Elysa steps sideways and lets their hands dangle between their legs.

“My apologies,” Rich Boy says, contrite. “I misspoke. I should have said that such magic is unfamiliar to me; I fear I lack familiarity with the theory of teleportation, and with the expedition here. I shall take more care in the future.”

Addie shrugs; the movement jostles the arm hanging between her and Elysa, and on impulse Elysa rolls with it, swinging their hands back and forth a bit. “We’re still working on navigating between the beacons,” she says, her ears flicking back up. Looking at her in profile like this, Elysa almost swears she can see the backlight in her eyes, those reflective Duskwight irises that always leave her breathless when she presses their foreheads together in the dark. “We’ll be functionally lost most of the time.”

Hanami crosses her arms. Her hollow-glass shield clinks when the movement brushes it against her sword belt. “We always find our way out,” she says. “We have plenty of food and water. I thought you wanted a real adventure.”

“Besides, the cairns always spit us out in safe rooms every few jumps,” Elysa adds. “It’s way easier to get around from there. There’s really nothing to worry about! Me and Addie are experts. We do this just the two of us all the time.”

“Never this deep,” Addie protests, quiet, squeezing Elysa’s hand again. “It’s still dangerous. We could get hurt.”

“No one will get hurt,” Hanami says, firm, and she turns just enough that Elysa can make out the set of her jaw, hard like—like Captain Meffrid, back when he used to say the same thing, those long nights between crossing the Wall and their arrival in Rhalgr’s Reach.

The reminder tugs at something unpleasant in Elysa’s stomach, but there’s no use dwelling on it now, so she beams instead. “It’ll be awesome!” she promises. “Cool monsters? Tons of treasure? It’s great.”

Addie tugs her hand free to rest her palm on Elysa’s arm instead. Her hands are always so gentle, when she’s calm like this, so different from the brilliant magic that lights them when she’s weaving shields and flinging stones. Elysa can’t really find it in her to be afraid of anything when she has those hands at her back. “Just watch for traps,” Addie says, the words probably as much a reminder for herself and Hanami as a warning for the new guy. “I still haven’t found a way to turn people back if they get turned into a toad, and it’s annoying to wait for the curse to wear off.”

“I beg your pardon,” Rich Boy splutters, and Elysa laughs at that, deep and true and fearless.

“If I hit a toad trap,” she says, quiet as she can around her giggles, leaning over to press the words to Addie’s ear, “will you kiss it better? Like in the stories?”

Addie’s lips quirk. “I’ll turn you back if you give me warts,” she says, solemn.

Elysa bumps her shoulder against Addie’s, urging the lines of tension to loosen. She’s not that worried about toad traps, anyway. Addie hasn’t failed her yet, and Elysa could be helpless, blind and staggered and bound in chains, and she wouldn’t be worried, not as long as they’re together.

[blackestnight]

Fight on!

ff7 was my first final fantasy, and it’s still near and dear to my heart. i adored the remake and decided to spend way too long dressing up my army of alts to pay tribute to AVALANCHE! i’ve been so happy to see one of my favorite games reimagined and i can’t wait for the next installment.

[blackestnight]

only love, only love

[blackestnight]

♥⌛♠ all the kids!!

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA--

hanami.

♥ do they have more muscles or more fat on their body?

she has a lot of muscle mass, and is built like a tiny, scaly brick shithouse. (she’s not nearly as waifish as the in-game models; girl’s got capital-S Shoulders, and thighs to match, because you don’t make a career out of swinging around a sword as big as you are without them.) which isn’t to say she has no body fat; she has plenty of padding, especially around her stomach, hips, and thighs, because...that’s just how bodies work? she eats a lot and stays hydrated and is therefore squish-able if she’s not actively tensing her muscles. (squishing is not advised, because she’ll maim you for touching her.) she actually lost weight recently, but not in a good way: at the end stages of her light corruption, her body was pretty much eating itself to keep going. she’s gaining it back, thankfully.

⌛ do they go shopping for clothes often? how long do they usually need?

nope. she wears her clothes until they wear out and then replaces them. she usually buys ‘off the rack’ (assuming the npc gear merchants indicate that that’s a thing in-universe) from clothiers she knows and trusts to make decent-quality stuff, makes whatever modifications she has to for her tail, and calls it a day. since doma’s liberation she’s made a point of going home to buy most of her clothes, because they’re familiar and comfortable and she believes in supporting local artisans and businesses, plus the fact that the layers mean she can adapt more easily to whatever climate she happens to be in for the day.

♠ any ‘weird’ characteristics on their body? one leg/arm longer than the other?

well, she does have a metal horn, which is pretty unusual, and exists in her mind as a bizarre quasi part/not-part of her body, depending on how The Trauma(TM) is treating her on any given day. the fingers and knuckles of her right hand are much thicker and more knobby than her left; she’s cracked and broken them a lot, since she didn’t wear proper gauntlets in her coliseum days and her sword didn’t have a guard. the inside of her mouth is also blue-gray, which isn’t something she considers weird (why!! do male au ra models!!! get the cute blue tongue!!! and the ladies don’t!!! SQUARE ENIX!!!) because in my zero-cowards-allowed universe it’s just A Thing with all au ra, but she does get people in eorzea trying (and failing) to sneak second looks if they notice.

haruki.

♥ do they have more muscles or more fat on their body?

same deal as hanami! he’s very densely muscled, but also has plenty of fat (just distributed differently). haruki is actually slightly less bulky than his sister, because he’s built for speed rather than raw strength, although given how much bigger he is size-wise it’s hard to notice if you don’t know to look for it.

⌛ do they go shopping for clothes often? how long do they usually need?

surprisingly, he doesn’t go shopping that often. haruki hit his growth spurt early, takes good care of his clothing, and is a handy guy with a needle and thread; this combined with the fact that his fashion sense hasn’t changed much since he was twelve means he usually rips apart and reconstructs old clothes when they start to wear out (as opposed to hanami, who just rips hers apart for cleaning rags). if he does need new clothing, he’ll usually just buy fabric and make it himself, unless he needs something formal or specialized that he doesn’t have the skill level to make on his own. (all of this makes him sound like a much more reasonably-dressed person than he is: his wardrobe looks like doctor frankenstein took up tailoring and got really into floral prints.)

♠ any ‘weird’ characteristics on their body? one leg/arm longer than the other?

he has a big lump on the left side of his collarbone, and a limited range of motion with that shoulder (old injury--not combat, just teenage idiocy). a’dewah keeps bringing up his bone-mending magic (that he perfected on zaya ‘i break my body parts because limits are for boring people’ qestir), but since it doesn’t bother haruki much on the day-to-day he hasn’t accepted the offer. his chest, in the right light, seems to shimmer with a scale pattern--sort of like white tattoo ink on pale skin, only it’s a little blue. his skin is also noticeably cooler than most people’s, even when he’s been out in the sun, which isn’t visible but is definitely unusual.

elysa.

♥ do they have more muscles or more fat on their body?

very muscular, but she has a puffy tummy and bangin’ thighs. she uses a style of polearm combat more similar to in-game drg mechanics and is therefore a little slower and harder-hitting than haruki’s speed-style; she doesn’t have as much upper-body strength as some of her peers because her preferred form of exercise has always been running, rather than weightlifting or body-weight workouts, so she has more fat on her arms and back. she’s been training with the revamped fist of rhalgr and learning on how to direct all those leg muscles into some devastating leaps and kicks.

⌛ do they go shopping for clothes often? how long do they usually need?

she loves to plan all-day ‘shopping’ trips, but actually spends most of the day zipping around window-shopping instead of buying things. she’s also a foodie fiend, and will pop into every cafe and bakery she passes to buy something, either to snack on while she’s walking or to gift to friends. at the end of the day she’ll have a bag or two of clothing and an armload of pastry boxes.

♠ any ‘weird’ characteristics on their body? one leg/arm longer than the other?

her right foot is just over half a shoe size bigger than her left, which is why she goes to a cobbler for custom footwear rather than buying shoes from storefronts...when she can afford it. (adventuring isn’t very lucrative, and there were several years where she just had to buy the bigger size and layer her left foot with extra socks.) she also has a clan mark in red on her right cheek, which isn’t strictly ‘weird’ but which she did cover with her hair until recently--she got it much earlier than most ala mhigan youths, in (well-meaning but misguided) solidarity with addie, and covered it while she was in her self-imposed exile.

addie. 

♥ do they have more muscles or more fat on their body?

definitely more fat. she’s not nearly as physically active as the rest of her friends, and isn’t capable of much in the way of heavy lifting or strenuous workouts, so she hasn’t ever built up muscle the way elysa has (addie swims, but for recreation and physical therapy, not to bulk up or trim down). so, as opposed to hanami and elysa, what ‘figure’ addie has is all fat--she’s a pudgy lady. elysa says it just makes her better for hugging.

⌛ do they go shopping for clothes often? how long do they usually need?

again, no. she’s spent most of her life in uniforms of some kind: first the conjurers’ guild robes, then the arcanists’ guild, and now the twin adders. she gets to wear more civilian clothes now that she’s semi-permanently transferred to the resistance-alliance irregulars stationed in ala mhigo, but even that is mostly leggings and thin shirts under sweaters and dresses. elysa drags her out on shopping trips every once in a blue moon, which is why she owns a few slightly-fancier dresses and waistcoats.

♠ any ‘weird’ characteristics on their body? one leg/arm longer than the other?

she has a tattoo over her right eye: golden-brown leaves sprouting from a vine, a shade lighter than her skin. she hates it; it was forced on her as a preteen by the hearers in stillglade fane, who were convinced that her swelling joints and chronic pain were some kind of proof of the elementals’ touch, not arthritis. the tattoo was meant to be part of a ritual to strengthen her bond with the elementals--one which, obviously, didn’t work, and which was performed without her consent. she hasn’t been able to find makeup or glamours that cover it completely (magic tattoo, whoop-de-fucking-doo) and gets so visibly uncomfortable when people ask about it that they let it drop. she also runs a low-grade fever almost constantly, and often appears flushed; her knees and finger joints are swollen most of the time, but that’s less noticeable.

sjanna.

♥ do they have more muscles or more fat on their body?

chubby bunny! she’s a total glass cannon and has pretty much zero muscle mass, but plenty of fat. she’s in good shape and surprisingly active, for a career book nerd, and often goes exploring in ancient ruins or chasing down rare monsters, she’s just...got a lot of body fat. when she was younger and more reckless, she was also more skinny, by which i mean ‘skin and bones,’ because she made a regular habit of overexerting herself with magic to the point that she would empty her aetheric reserves and start to eat away at her living aether...which was extraordinarily unhealthy, and myrrh mistral singlehandedly saved her life by (tenderly, lovingly) bopping her over the head with ginnungagap until she learned how to recognize her limits--and then blow past them, but safely, this time, using techniques honed from ancient mhach and amdapor. (no soul crystals, though, she’s just that badass and also...a little cursed. but it’s fine!)

⌛ do they go shopping for clothes often? how long do they usually need?

sjanna doesn’t go shopping, she sends fashion plates to her favorite tailor in radz-at-han and has all of her outfits custom-made. she goes in for fittings as needed and maintains an impeccable wardrobe of gowns, robes, and tunics, with a variety of fabrics and embellishments that makes them suitable for citywear or traveling gear. much of her combat gear is enchanted, which she does herself. her closet is the envy of fashionistas everywhere.

♠ any ‘weird’ characteristics on their body? one leg/arm longer than the other?

her left eye is deep wine red, as opposed to her right eye, which is such a dark purple that it almost looks black. they’re hard to notice without getting up in her face, but the red eye almost seems backlit--it’s not natural, and is actually a product of a curse the green word inflicted on her when she was cast out of golmore. she has permanent aether-vision in the same style as y’shtola, although sjanna can’t turn hers off, and maintains normal eyesight in her right eye. her front teeth also grow constantly, and while she can file them down manually (and does, most of the time) she has been known to chew absentmindedly on pencils to help keep them manageable.

irey.

♥ do they have more muscles or more fat on their body?

she’s always been muscular: she joined the temple knights as a teenager, then enlisted in the maelstrom after leaving ishgard, and currently works full-time as a blacksmith with some mercenary jobs on the side. her history as an archer combined with her smithing means she is ripped, and has even broader shoulders than the in-game elezen models. girl’s got arms and abs like whoa. her lower body is comparatively pudgy, and she also maintains a healthy amount of fat around the stomach and waist, although she’s more gangly than the other members of the squad.

⌛ do they go shopping for clothes often? how long do they usually need?

she has an eye for the finer things in life, clothing included: she was born into a minor noble house in ishgard and was frequently dressed up in all the finest fashions on offer. now, however...she is Looking Away. She Does Not See It. she’d rather wear her coveralls every day. even her casual clothing looks like work clothing, though with fewer burn marks and grease stains. she does the absolute minimum amount of clothes shopping that she can get away with.

♠ any ‘weird’ characteristics on their body? one leg/arm longer than the other?

the pinky and ring fingers of her right hand are both cut off past the third knuckle (accident from her early days with naldiq & vymelli’s). in theory she could get prosthetic replacements, but since it doesn’t hamper her ability to work or shoot, she’s not worried about it. she also has a scar over her left eye from a piece of shrapnel that hit her during bahamut’s rampage. careful observers might note especially prominent eyeteeth, and what appears to be a thin film over her eyes, like dunesfolk gloss lite--it’s a trait some highland elezen have developed over the centuries to deal with the sun.

[blackestnight]

ARBATEL; a sixteenth century grimoire on ceremonial magic

[blackestnight]

hewwo could i get uhhh hanaymeric 9/31/34, elysaddie 4/12/26/36, harudewah 2/8/26 and ten piece chicken nuggets?

oh...my god. thank you for the food.

hanami/aymeric

9. - Do they discuss big issues? Religion? Marriage? Children? Death?

religion is kind of a loaded subject, considering aymeric is stuck in the unenviable position of trying to stay true to his faith while also trying to untangle the ways in which it has been used to perpetuate state-sanctioned lies and a cycle of war and death for several centuries. pretty much all hanami can do is shrug and offer a shoulder to have the occasional breakdown on, because she’s never been religious at all and the closest thing to a personal understanding of halonic faith that she has is like, the emotional version of walking around in booty shorts with “FUCK YOU TOO, GOD” printed on the ass. at least aymeric isn’t the only one having a crisis of faith right now; most of ishgard is slogging through it with him, so i imagine the church is offering lots of discussion groups and religious literacy courses and such.

the topic of marriage is not something they actually discussed so much as they tripped and fell face-first into, and i have a wip relating to it but the short version is that they might as well, because even if hanami is not terribly enthused by the concept of weddings she is very enthused by the concept of aymeric having a physical, legal tie to her family, who pretty much adopted him on sight. and aymeric has always kind of viewed marriage as an eventual obligation that he’s been putting off, so finding someone he would enjoy marrying is a pleasant surprise.

death is kind of an inevitable talking point when you’re both a) career warriors and b) survivors of at least one assassination attempt each. it’s not fun, but it’s something they have talked about, usually on a walk around some far-flung corner of the city so they don’t stink up the house with emotional sludge.

the serious answer re: children is that yes, they have talked about it; hanami loves kids (and...kind of legally already has at least one, if you close one eye and tilt your head at the ramifications of the drk 60 quest) and aymeric is open to the idea, ignoring his emotional hangups courtesy of thordan, but...not right now. kids are something that neither of them could handle at the moment, considering their respective obligations and the uncertainty of the immediate future, so: maybe someday, not now, but hanami will keep spoiling the shit out of mune and rielle and ryne and aymeric is getting used to the idea of being a cool uncle.

the joke answer, which you absolutely brought upon yourself, is that hanami is the mom friend of balefire and the first time lunya crashed into the congregation and yelled “MOOOM! DAAAAAD! SATINA’S TRYING TO MAKE ME EAT A FROG AGAIN” they both did a mental blue screen of death, but the fifteenth time it happened they didn’t even look up from their afternoon tea and hanami told sati to go to her room.

31. - Do they finish each other’s sentences? Pick up any phrases or habits from each other? Know when the other is hiding something?

yes to all! they’re very good at reading each other. aymeric in particular finishes a lot of hanami’s sentences--she tries very hard to speak either eorzean or ishgardian despite echo interference, but her vocabulary is sort of limited, so if she “loses” a word she tends to trail off mid-sentence, and aymeric has gotten good at figuring out what she was trying to say and reminding her. (aymeric has been trying to learn doman, but his issue is usually with syntax, which the echo auto-corrects when hanami hears it, so she’s no help.) 

34. - Do they have any pets?

yes! aymeric has an extraordinarily cantankerous old cat named mandragora, who the lady borel brought in when he was a teenager and who has been the uncontested queen of the manor ever since. (i like to imagine she’s some kind of cross between a ragdoll and a himalayan--very fluffy, white and gray fur, big yellow eyes, general appearance of an old soldier who’s telling you the same story about her war days for the tenth time while smoking a pipe and glaring into the middle distance.) hanami has a “pet” panther named katsu, who is really more of a hunting companion and who lives in raincatcher gully where she can terrorize the local beastkin. she has also recently acquired a “hunting” dog named kira, who is a black shiba inu she rescued as a puppy while in yanxia and who, like katsu, just wouldn’t leave her alone. kira lives in the manor, slobbers everywhere, plays happy victim to mandragora’s tormenting, and is completely useless for hunting because she gets too excited by Being With Her People And Having Walkies.

elysa/addie

4. - First impression of each other? Was it love at first sight?

they met so long ago they don’t really remember it--addie was barely a toddler and elysa couldn’t even walk yet. it definitely wasn’t love at first sight. it was love at four in the morning, when they were having their five hundredth sleepover, and elysa was thinking about how she and addie had been playing with their dolls and pretending they were having a wedding and had made little dresses out of an old pillowcase, and she thought “addie and i should do that for real someday” and then promptly rolled over and fell asleep, because four am is kinda of late for a ten-year-old.

12. - Is there a wedding? What was the proposal like? Any kind of honeymoon?

there is a wedding. it’s a mess, and they actually just get married by a resistance officer so they can have the paper. the proposal goes something like: “hey, we should get married.” “...why?” “why not? let’s do it now.” “why?” “do you have anything better to do?” and they don’t have a honeymoon, although they’ve been living in a perpetual “honeymoon stage” since they got together after the liberation, but when they did go back to visit elysa’s parents for winter’s knell and said “by the way, we’re married now” all seven hells broke loose.

26. - How do their friends feel about their relationship? Their families?

supportive. very supportive. thank fuck, you finally did it supportive. being around these two pining for like a solid decade was EXHAUSTING.

36. - What’s their greatest strength as a couple? Their weakness?

their greatest strength is their trust! they didn’t lose faith in each others’ dedication or friendship even when they were separated for years. addie has always trusted elysa to be her closest, most reliable friend, and to care for her like no one else would; elysa trusts addie to be her rock and her good sense, and to be a voice of reason and understanding when her world gets repeatedly rocked.

their big weakness is confrontation. they’re bad at it. please don’t ask them to talk any more about what happened when elysa left for limsa, they’ll both cry.

haruki/a’dewah

2. - How’s their team work? Do they share well?

their teamwork...has its shaky moments (goddammit dewah quit running away from your feelings--) but overall they’re solid; if not even the garlean empire and an entire calamity could drive them apart, nothing is going to, at this point. they share everyday responsibility pretty well; haruki doesn’t slack off when it comes to housework or helping out audeo, so he and dewah both pull their weight.

combat-wise, they’re a dream team. heavy-hitting dps and pocket healer? both blessed by ancient auspices who have known each other since the mountains were young? hell yeah. haruki will be the first to admit that he’s not up to scratch by warrior of light standards, but he does his best and between the two of him, he and dewah are a formidable team.

8. - What do the like best about their partner?

haruki loves a’dewah’s bravery. he literally put himself on the line for the sake of his siblings and tsukiko for years; that takes courage and dedication the likes of which haruki has never seen. not only that, but he had the strength to leave, even when he was risking reprisals just by sneaking out to play at night, never mind running away for good.

also: he’s fun-size. perfect for scooping into his lap for flustering and cuddle purposes.

26. - How do their friends feel about their relationship? Their families?

generally supportive! haruki’s family has known about a’dewah since before he left yanxia (his moms were appropriately cautious about haruki running around so close to a castrum, but proud of him for looking out for his new friend; akinaga was mostly worried-by-way-of-disapproval; hanami didn’t trust a’dewah as far as she could throw him; the twins were mostly ambivalent so long as haruki didn’t try to do anything stupid with his catboy that would piss off the soldiers). 

hanami still didn’t trust dewah when they met again in eorzea--not because of anything relating to haruki, which she had forgotten about (thanks crystal mom), but because she knew he was lying about not having met her before and she couldn’t figure out why. it only went downhill once the raid on baelsar’s wall happened and dewah’s old commander recognized him, but the longer she spent with him traveling through yanxia and seeing him really earnestly trying to undo the harm the empire did the more she eased up on him, and once she saw how happy haruki was to have him back and how easily mune took to him she just kind of gave up and accepted it. she still won’t admit to liking him--he’s stupid and avoidant and exasperating--but he’s family, so she loves him anyway. even if it’s hilarious watching him get scared shitless when she walks in the room.

and, of course, shomi and maki have adopted him. he’s their son now. no take-backsies. the twins still don’t like him, but that’s because of haruki, not anything to do with dewah himself. and mune adores his uncle dewah.

[blackestnight]

my header images from the first week of ffxivwrite. it’s not something i’m hell-bent on keeping up with, but since i had the time and the inspiration this week i figured i could spend the effort to take screenshots for each of my fills (aside from day 2, which is leftover from hanami’s combat meme.) i think my favorite header is day 4′s. which also has the dubious honor of being the screenshot that gave me the biggest fucking headache. goddamn pauldrons.

[blackestnight]

someday, someday

[blackestnight]

9. do they act different in public and at home?

answered for hanami and aymeric here, so HAVE SOME LESBIANS.

and the answer is: absolutely not. elysa wouldn’t know the definition of “discretion” if you read her the dictionary entry, and addie just flat-out doesn’t care. they are maximum mushy 100% of the time. they’ve been joined at the hip since they could walk, pretty much, so people tend to worry if they’re not hanging off each other, because elysa-and-addie the unit is such old news. elysa is dropping “babe”s and “honey”s and “sweetheart”s every other sentence and she means it completely unironically. addie stands behind elysa and props her chin on her shoulder and sticks her hands in elysa’s coat pockets. i feel like everyone knew at least one That Couple in high school, the one that was mildly sickening to be around because they wouldn't stop nuzzling each other and shit? constantly sitting in the same chair and giggling and all that? they’re that couple, just less obnoxious.

when elysa turned five, she asked her parents to get addie a present too, because they were already living in each others’ pockets and elysa didn’t quite get that she couldn’t just let addie share her birthday too. her parents got them matching necklaces, the eorzean version of those cheesy “best friend” necklace sets you get at an outlet store, with the two heart pieces that match up. eighteen years later and neither one of them has taken it off, except to replace the chain. other half is not an exaggeration.

[blackestnight]

just keep your eyes on me

elysa, addie, awkward teenage years, and attempts at festival dances.

prompts: neighbors/dancing together.

(title)

The Sacred Treaty of Peacegarden was a long, dense read, made all the more frustrating by the archaic language, and Addie was seriously considering throwing her copy at a wall and telling Master E-Sumi Yan to take his ‘primary sources of study’ and shove them in some unmentionable places when she was interrupted by a loud bang on the shutter. She did drop the treaty then, the papers scattering across her bed and fluttering to the floor, and wondered wildly if the elementals had somehow heard the disrespect in her heart and come to turn her into a blood currant bush.

There was a second, louder bang, and a voice--which did not sound much like what Addie imagined an elemental would sound like--yelled, “Addie! Aaaaddiiiiiiiiieeeeeeee!”

Addie flung the remaining pages of the Sacred Treaty of Peacegarden onto the floor, freeing her legs so she could toss away her quilt and her pack of hot rice and scramble off of the bed. She had to stop for a second to stumble and catch herself on the wardrobe; her knee was still stiff, but at least it hadn’t locked up totally, and she only took a moment to catch her balance again and hobble to the window. The banging continued, lighter but more persistent, rattling the shutter as she fumbled with the latch and finally, finally, yanked on the handle to let the afternoon light in.

Elysa froze with her fist still raised to continue her assault, looking slightly dumbfounded, and then broke into a wide grin. “You’re home!” she yelped, and reached through the window to crush Addie against the sill for a hug.

Addie whuffed out a breath at the impact of her ribs against the wood, but she reached out to cling to Elysa in return, clawing her fingers into the back of her tunic. “I’m home,” she agreed, craning her neck to press her cheek against Elysa’s ear. Her own ear folded back, a little twinge of discomfort, but it was easy to ignore, drowned out by the stretch of muscles straining to reach another, familiar body. “I just got back this morning. There was some bad brushfall from that storm the other night so the carriage had to take a detour.” 

“That is so not the point,” Elysa said, and detangled herself enough to poke Addie in the shoulders. “Move, c’mon, lemme in--you’re home and you’re here and you get to stay through the holidays, right? You’ll be here for Da's festival, right?"

Addie scrambled out of the way while Elysa pulled the shutters as wide as they would go. “Yeah, I will,” she said, breathless, while Elysa backed up a step. “I had to give up my birthday holiday ‘cause E-Sumi Yan wasn’t happy about me missing the start of the term, but I get to stay all the way through Winter’s Knell.”

“That’s bullshite,” Elysa said, slightly too loud to be a mumble but with the same sour, secretive tone. She hopped forward and planted her hands on the sill, vaulting herself through the open window and into Addie’s bedroom, landing with a tiny stumble. “Matron’s tits, it’s dark in here, don’t you have a lamp?”

“It’s not any darker here than it is inside the Fane,” Addie said. “You could have just come in through the front door, anyway. Papa isn’t home.”

“Yeah but that’s not as fun,” Elysa said. She stretched, the high-pitch groan of relief echoing off the dark corners of the room as she pressed her palms toward the ceiling--Addie watched the hem of her shirt ride up, showing off the barest strip of skin pulled taut over new muscle, and fought the urge to look away. Thank Nophica that she hadn’t turned on the lamp, or she thought Elysa might have been able to see her own blush, and not one she could have written off as a fever.

“You’ve gotten taller,” she said, instead directing her gaze to Elysa’s fingers, laced tight. Elysa relaxed so that her joined hands fell on top of her head, like a runner cooling down, instead of at her sides. When Addie had left the last time, stumbling over her own ankles from the first of her growth spurts, Elysa had just barely reached her chin, but now they were almost at eye level.

“Yeah, it sucks,” Elysa chirped, twisting at the waist and flexing her knees, restless in the dark. “Ma is getting so sick of letting my hems out every moon, she said she’s gonna start just sticking me in skirts until I quit. Da told her she should just put a brick on my head and hope that’ll keep me from growing.” She rolled her eyes, just visible in the light from the window, a clear invitation for Addie to join in her gripes. Parents, right?

Her own father didn’t have to worry about clothing her most of the year, anymore, and the Guild uniforms were one-size-fits-most, but Addie remembered Mariam Cordwyk’s complaints about Addie’s height well enough. How am I meant to pinch your ears when you’re being rowdy if you keep stretching out so much, hmm? “Maybe you’ve been eating too many greens,” Addie offered, in place of commiseration. “Cut back on the spinach.”

Elysa whined. “Gods, don’t remind me. Ma hasn’t even been making extra servings ‘cause you’re not here to give her an excuse anymore. Whose plate am I supposed to steal food from now, huh?” Addie was ready to cut in, to counter that it made sense because Elysa was the only person on the continent who actually asked for extra servings of salt-grilled spinach, but then Elysa threw her hands back up and said, “Wait! Wait, wait, she’ll be making food for Winter’s Knell, and that’s why I’m here ‘cause Da said a couple of drummers from Quarrymill are coming this year so there’s gonna be real music and I want you to dance with me!”

Addie felt her stomach twist in on itself. She’d seen bits and pieces of Ala Mhigan war dances before--Ranolf had liked to clear out the front room of his house and spin Elysa around, back when she had been small enough to balance on his feet--they were beautiful and energetic and her leg started to throb just thinking about it. She remembered, vividly, watching Elysa learn to high-step on her toes, bouncing around the room in a flurry of gold hair and bright laughter while Mariam had wrapped Addie’s knees in rags soaked with eucalyptus, the smell of it so strong her sinuses had prickled. There was no way, in this world or any of the seven hells, that Addie would be able to keep up.

“Lysa, I don’t know if that’s a good idea,” she said, and could feel her shoulders slump slightly as she did. Elysa’s vision wasn’t as good as Addie’s in the dark but even she would be able to see that much. “My legs--”

“What about ‘em?” Elysa asked, and waved her hand when Addie gaped at her. “Don’t look at me like that, I know. I have an idea.”

“An idea,” Addie repeated, a little weak. What about ‘em? Gods--how many times had she heard that, when they were so much younger, when Addie didn’t know how to tell her why she could never run as fast or as far as Elysa--when Mariam would pull her daughter aside and lecture Elysa on being gentle with Addie, who was still learning her own limits, figuring out how to hear the difference between her body saying this is uncomfortable and this is harmful? And now Elysa had a plan.

If Addie cried here she would be forced to keel over and die on the spot, so instead she said, “Your plans scare me,” and Elysa gave her a put-upon look.

“My plans are great, shush,” she said. “First we gotta get out of here, though, this won’t work inside. Come on!” She bounded back to the window, grabbing Addie’s wrist to drag her along as well.

“I have a door,” Addie reminded her, groaning.

“Doors are for nerds,” Elysa countered, and looped her arm around Addie, grasping her under the arms and holding her other hand out. “Well?”

“Just don’t drop me,” Addie begged, and Elysa dipped down to slide her other arm under Addie’s knees, picking her up and cradling her like the brides that came out of the Sanctum.

“I’d never,” Elysa promised. “Watch your ankles, here we go--whoop!” She swung around, and, with upper-body strength she definitely hadn’t possessed the last time Addie was home, deposited Addie through the open window feet-first to land on the grass outside.

Addie stumbled a bit on the landing, but that was mostly because she had clung to Elysa’s shoulders too long. “Gods!” she squeaked, and she wasn’t proud but she also wasn’t used to being tossed around like a ragdoll.

“See? I toldja it’d be fine.” Elysa climbed out of the window after her, swinging one leg after the other over the sill instead of vaulting as she had for her entrance. “Okay, so, I have a couple different ideas so just work with me, and pretend there’s music while you’re at it.”

“What kind of ideas,” Addie said, her stomach twisting itself into knots again, this time with nerves instead of--whatever.

“The best kind!” Elysa dusted her hands off on the knees of her pants, then offered them both to Addie, palms up. “Come here, I’m gonna pick you up again. We both know I can do it now.”

“Just because you can doesn’t mean you should,” Addie countered. Her own palms slicked at the thought of Elysa, and of her arms around Addie’s ribs, and of the ground dropping away and taking her stomach with it. Of Elysa, who could carry Addie with ease now, at least for a little while, with Addie’s body caught in a hiccup of growth.

Elysa wiggled her fingers in challenge. “Come on,” she repeated, and Addie sighed, as she often did, and went, as she always did. Elysa grabbed Addie’s hands and placed them around her neck, then bent carefully down and hooked her arms into the bends behind Addie’s traitorous knees. “Upsy-daisy!” she cheered, and scooped Addie up, settling her legs where her hips were just beginning to fill out. Addie squeaked again in protest, but Elysa just wiggled and bounced her higher until she could link her hands under Addie like a bench seat.

Being carried like a toddler. Addie hoped that was a good enough excuse for the flush creeping to the tips of her ears, because there would be no hiding it out here.

“What are you doing,” Addie hissed, crossing her ankles.

“Dancing!” Elysa said. “We’re dancing. Ready, one, two--”

Addie shrieked again, and dove forward to latch onto Elysa’s shoulders like a patch of moss, and didn’t care how it looked, because Elysa was jumping, tiny hops like a sideways gallop as she chanted under her breath, keeping time in between giggles and eager steps. It was not a graceful war dance. It was like the world’s clumsiest waltz, but worse. Addie clung tighter as her legs slid from Elysa’s hips, and then Elysa tried for a turn, and with a gasp and a loud “Shit!” they fell, Elysa tumbling to the forest floor and Addie crashing down on top of her.

“Fuck,” Addie hissed, as her knees slammed into the ground. Her ankles sat next to Elysa’s calves, having uncrossed at some point in the chaos.

“Oh, gods--are you hurt? Are you okay?” Elysa’s hands were as quick as the rest of her, hop-skipping across Addie’s back, her eyes wide with shock and apology. “I’m so sorry, I thought my balance was better--”

“I’m fine,” Addie promised, wincing away the sour clashing of her skin. Sore, scraped--not bad. Nothing bandages and time wouldn’t fix soon enough. Her knees throbbed worse, would probably swell up, but that could have been from anything. “I don’t think this is going to work.”

“Hey,” Elysa said, surprisingly gentle, and flicked one dangling strand of Addie’s hair. “That was just one idea. I’ve got tons more. Probably better than that, too.”

Addie allowed herself a moment to lean down, brace her forehead against Elysa’s shoulder. “I don’t think I like your ideas much. Just enjoy your dance, Elysa, it’ll be fine.”

“Absolutely not!” Elysa insisted. Her whole body buzzed with force when she spoke it; Addie could feel it down to her ankles. “There’s no point in dancing if it’s not with you. You make everything fun. We’ll work it out, we always do.”

Oh, gods damn her, Addie thought, and blamed her clinging, desperate fingers on the fall.

“Matron preserve us,” she whispered.