we can never go home

by barbariccia

Summary:

A Dark Knight rises within the Holy See, and a murderer stalks the streets of Ishgard. Be ready, damn you. Be ready.

Notes:

the biggest of thanks to @Azlykumos for coming up with the original idea with me all the way back in 2018 (and listening to me talk about it on and off since), and to @CosmicTurnabout for the endless support and enthusiasm. couldn't have done this without either of you.

Chapter 1

FUCK THE HOLY SEE

Safe under the steaming spray of hot water, Aymeric allows his mind to drift back to the graffiti he’d walked by that morning.

Not an especially pious man, he’d nonetheless been shocked to see such blasphemy writ for anyone to see. They’d been scribbled on the side of an alley-facing house, not even on the main street, and he’d paused for all of a minute before moving on, but still they occupy his mind as nothing else. 

Sancy bangs on the door. “You make sure you’re clean, boy,” he calls, and Aymeric dutifully grabs the block of off-white soap waiting to be sudsed up.

I, Aymeric Deepblack, do swear…

The oath he’s meant to be swearing sooner than he cares for keeps slipping out of his mind in favour of remembering the curse. As though trying to scrub himself clean of words instead of dirt, he rubs at his bare skin hard enough his skin turns pink and tingles beneath the spray of water—but to no avail. They stick with him like the smell of chainmail lingers even after a good bath.

… do swear to uphold justice…

His own mail is discarded by the side of the tub, close enough that he can keep an eye on it, though it won’t be his once he leaves the room. Full of idiosyncrasies, he has reason for this: were some servant to come in now to take and wash them, they would see the trinket he keeps hidden resting atop the pile. Mayhap they would mistake it for a lucky charm at first, but its true nature would be revealed the moment they cast their eye more closely over it: blood red and inscribed with a symbol the See has done its utmost to hide from its people. Not that it needs to, not when even the most innocent of scratchings can be labelled as heretical.

And, well, it would not do to be discovered as a Dark Knight on the day of his swearing-in.

“Behind your ears and under your nails,” calls the manservant through the door once again. A permanent fixture of the Congregation who thinks himself more important than most, and taking the opportunity to boss Aymeric around as much as possible before he loses the chance forever. “The Fury might not be taking your oath, but rest assured She’ll be watching!”

The water is still steaming, a luxury that Aymeric intends to take full advantage of: he moves his head under the spray so that his hair plasters against his skull and all he can hear is the drum of water all around, a storm he never wants to leave. If the Fury is watching, no doubt She will be cursing his wastefulness… or mayhap feels some sort of satisfaction in knowing one of Her children refuses the privation preached (but not practised) by Her clergy.

Still, he cannot stay forever. With some reluctance he rinses himself down and turns the shower off, and laughs aloud when he hears Sancy try the door.

“Twelvesblood, man, let me cover myself!”

It isn’t what the manservant wanted to hear, clearly. “Be sharp about it, boy,” is the predictable response, and Aymeric snags the crystal sat on his knightly gear before he goes for the towel, folding one within the other before wrapping both around his waist. “You’ll be late, at this rate!”

The door opens as soon as Aymeric undoes the lock; still dripping, he smiles politely at the older man, who looks as though he might have a lemon hidden under his tongue. “A glacier cannot be moved in a single morning,” he says, and Sancy scoffs.

“You mind that tongue of yours in the Vault. Here, take another towel and get dry already, or do you intend to walk over there with icicles in your hair? Tsk, and your clothes not folded neither…”

Sancy’s gripes are small but many; Aymeric lets him grumble to himself as he takes another towel and begins to dry, grateful that the Congregation allows its Knights softer towels than the squires are forced to use. Too well does he remember rubbing himself raw twice, once in the shower and once after, and then having to stand at attention for hours.

There’s a change of clothes brought for him, fancier than the uniform he’s used to, in colours far too rich for him to feel truly comfortable donning. Sancy must sense his displeasure, for he tsks. “Yes, you must,” he says before Aymeric can so much as open his mouth, “You’ll be wanting to set an example, and it won’t hurt to meet the Ward looking your best.”

At first it seems as though Sancy might stay to watch him dry and dress, but with a disdainful sniff that may as well be fond he leaves and lets the door click shut behind him. Left with his hair still dripping and a second skin to step into, Aymeric lets himself sigh as loud as he dares. Go hither and thither. Wash and sup as and when we tell you. Jump and sit and stay. I, Aymeric Deepblack, do swear to walk the narrow path set before me, in Halone’s name, amen.

---

Between the shoulders of five armoured Knights, Aymeric feels all but naked with his face bare and his greatsword left behind. He doesn’t know the faces beneath the helms, though they’d each saluted in the customary manner and wished him a polite bonne matin. He almost feels a prisoner being marched to the execution ring, and finds he must grip the crystal in his pocket as tight as possible to ward off the image such thoughts conjure. Death does not await him in Ishgard’s inner sanctum the way that warmth does not embrace him without. He is not his father.

It takes two of them to push the great doors of the Vault wide enough for him to enter: within the world is quiet, the city forgotten as a dream is by the bold light of day. Here there are braziers lit and censers hang above every one, perfume seeping from them as though to ward off the unworthy. The smell is overpowering. 

With the Knights following in his steps, Aymeric pushes through the smoke, unmolested by the See’s attempt at keeping its walls free of darkness. The entryway quickly opens into the main hall, as impressive today as it was when first built, no doubt, with ceilings so tall that not even fifty men on one another’s shoulders could reach the top, and great stained windows that filter even weak light into every colour imaginable. There are pews enough for the entire clergy to sit comfortably, but today they sit mostly empty, only the first few rows occupied. Grand it might be, but lonely, too. The Fury is not like to rest in such gaudy halls as these.

Five men wait for him upon the raised daïs, so Aymeric cannot even dawdle to greet those faces he recognises sat at the front, though the head of each corps of Ishgard stands as he approaches nonetheless. They each straighten their backs as he passes—all except for the Azure Dragoon, who wears his drachen helm and is like to be rolling his eyes at the ceremony of it all—and watch as he climbs heavensward, step by marble step.

The Most Revered Archmandrite waits resplendent in white-and-blue, though he looks bored as Aymeric approaches and goes to one knee. Likely he has a thousand things better worth his time than this, though it would be worth good gil guessing whether those things were of any import or merely a man reluctant to remember he is no better than the rest of them with just as much minutiae as any clerk. The four men at his back look much the same: polite but disinterested. 

“Ser Aymeric, rise,” says Ser Zephirin, his voice carrying. Those in the pews rise with him, though they are invited to sit once the Fury has been thanked for the opportunity to see Her children playing at devotion. “‘Tis a great opportunity afforded you today: the title of Lord Commander of the Congregation of Our Knights Most Heavenly. Your devotion to the See has not gone unnoticed over the years, nor has your capabilities, nor your sense of justice; were this not enough to convince me of your worth, the five lesser lords of Our Knights have all to a one nominated you for the seat.”

Formalities, every word. To deny Aymeric the seat now would be folly on the See’s part, and it well knows this. No man is as driven as he has been since his Knighthood; no man has had his eyes set upon the Commander’s seat as he has. Whether those lesser lords like him or not is beneath both his care and his notice, for no one else is suited for the job.

He smiles. “I am worth little but my devotion to Ishgard,” he hears himself say, “Though I thank you for the opportunity, and swear to strive to do my utmost in the name of the See.”

When their eyes meet, Aymeric must fight not to flinch. The Dark Knight’s crystal in his pocket feels a heavy weight in this place, and the Archbishop’s right hand must know, must see it in his face. If he does not see it in his face, surely he will scent it on the air, something foul beneath the incense, or mayhap simply know.

“Kneel,” says Zephirin, and Aymeric is glad for the opportunity to turn his gaze down and away. The stone is hard against his knees, but it is better than sweating through his tunic, guilty and rightfully so. “Your name and oath for the witnesses, ser.”

“I, Ser Aymeric Deepblack,” he says, though his voice does not carry and he must needs clear his throat. “... do swear to uphold justice in the name of Ishgard and the Holy See, beneath the gaze of the Fury Herself, and serve faithfully as Lord Commander until I am no longer capable.”

The crystal in his pocket might as well be burning for how much he thinks of it in this moment. How does a dark knight swear an oath to the very establishment that created them by virtue of turning its face from the worst parts of itself? How does a man lie to the gods and those who serve them and think he will get away clean? How can any man kneel where he kneels now and swear what he has sworn? 

He sees Zephirin’s sabatons come close, but does not dare lift his head lest his face give away his thoughts. Imagine: a man brought to the beating heart of the church and keeping his head when his heart fair bleeds all the See swears to stamp out.

A hand finds its way to his head, and for a moment Aymeric thinks this is it, that he will be pulled up by the hair and tossed to the dungeons, to the Inquisitors, to the Sea of Clouds—

“I, Zephirin Valhourdin, accept your oath in the name of the Archbishop,” comes the response, and Aymeric lets loose a breath he knew not he was holding. “Rise now as Lord Commander, Ser Aymeric.”

Those watching get to their feet with him and applaud, and bathed in the Fury’s light, he looks over the hall with a heart hard and heavy and thinks, with no small amount of contempt, fuck the Holy See.

Chapter 2

Nestled safely in the bosom of Coerthan mountains and surrounded by a sea-less sea, one would be forgiven for thinking that Ishgard is safe from floods and has both the foundation and height to survive such devastating deluges.

Within three days Aymeric had learned that was not the case. By the seventh he is drowning in an ocean of letters; on the fifteenth he must step out for a quick turn about the Congregation and pray futilely that no more awaits him upon his return. The Fury has never listened to his prayers, that cruel mistress, and perhaps She is correct to do so now too, for Her domain is war, not letterheads.

Deaf to his pleas (or simply content to ignore him), Aymeric returns to a silver tray resting in the very middle of his desk bearing an equally silver teapot, one teacup and saucer bearing a faded Ishgardian banner around its rim, and a slab of brioche, thickly buttered, under which rests—

More correspondence. Why not?, thinks Aymeric as he takes his seat once again and feels the weight of all the unattended letters settle on him as he does. Why not one more? My every idea scuppered by Our Most Well-Written. However am I meant to do anything?

Rather than open the envelope, he takes his time instead pouring a cup of well-steeped tea for himself and making some space for the tray to go. With that done he settles back in his chair once more and takes the cup to blow at, and has just raised it to drink when the door opens.

“I’ve just returned,” he says before his visitor can beg attention, “Please, five minutes to sort myself, if you please.”

His guest doesn’t listen, entering and shutting the door behind him. Even with a helm on (though he moves to take it off with sharp, sure movements), it’s easy enough to tell he’s smirking most irksomely. “Here,” says the Azure Dragoon, “I didn’t think it would break you this quickly.”

Helm removed, Estinien places it carelessly on a side table, and turns back to the door to turn the key in the lock.

“I haven’t broken,” Aymeric protests weakly, cup still in hand and starting to rise, “The door, Estinien—”

His companion does not listen and takes the guest’s seat, crossing his legs and looking for all the world at ease with Aymeric’s discomfiture. “Aye, you’re still hale and whole, and I’m the Archbishop. Take a breath. Sit. I’ve not come with more, if that’s what concerns you.”

It was, so Aymeric sits as bid, and allows himself to finally drink. The tea is bitter and scalds his lips; he takes another stubborn sip before putting it down. “If not for work, what brings you this way, ser?”

Estinien scoffs. “Drop the ser, for a start,” and he leans forward to pluck a letter from the big desk, ignoring the feeble protest. “Think of this as a courtesy call—or tell yourself I drew the short straw, if you prefer. How does his lordship fare?”

When Aymeric sighs long and heavy, it provokes Estinien to laugh, a rare but welcome sound. “It is everything I thought it would be and more,” he says, and drops his chin into his hand, decorum be damned. If the Azure Dragoon can misbehave, so can he. “Far, far more. You could have mentioned,” he adds, a touch accusatory, “just how many letters get sent to this office. A clerk, that’s what they've turned me into.”

“Aye,” Estinien agrees, and unfolds the letter he yet holds to glance over it. "For the attention of the Lord Commander: the sous-lieutenant of the XXᵗʰ legionne de Maintigny humbly requests ten sets of armour to outfit his Knights for their upcoming foray to the western Highlands. What,” he scoffs, and reads over the paper once more as though hoping the words will change as he does so, “was going to the armourers direct too great a trek for the sous-lieutenant? These men beg too much.”

If he notices Aymeric frown, he ignores it as he tosses the paper back on the pile. “They ask for what they need,” he starts, and does not miss the way Estinien rolls his eyes.

“If you want to read through the particulars and hem and haw over what you ought or oughtn’t do for each and every one of these, be my guest.” Awkwardly balanced, the open letter and a few more fall to the floor; Estinien does not bother to pick them up. “Shall I bring a bedroll too, ser? Might as well be comfy if you're set on staying in here.”

Aymeric watches the papers topple with tired eyes, and decides to pick up his teacup rather than a quill. “How do you manage it?” he asks. Estinien shrugs.

“I daresay the life of a dragoon is much simpler. Why should anyone care my thoughts on heretics, or whether a ballista turns without sticking, or how well rationed the Temple Knights are? All I must needs do is keep my lance sharp, my aim true, and my knees from locking.”

“Rub it in, why don’t you,” Aymeric mutters, and though Estinien’s mouth lilts upwards as though he means to laugh, he remains silent. “Fury take this whole mountain and deal with it accordingly.”

A snort from his companion that he elects to pretend he does not hear. “I don’t think She’s who you want to be petitioning for aid,” he hears as he sips loudly, “but if you need help, I’ve a bell or two free.”

Aymeric peers curiously at him over the cup. “You’d not rather be in the training grounds?”

“I’d rather do anything other than paperwork, but I’d also rather not find you swinging from the beams in a week's time. Finish your tea.”

---

As it turns out, Estinien’s brand of reticence works wonders where work is concerned, unwilling as he is to entertain idle gossip or minutiae that does not concern him. Once the tray is moved from the desk they work to separate the correspondence into piles of varying import (and an extra pile upon the floor, at Estinien’s insistence, for those worth only feeding to the fire), and from there the process is simple enough.

“You’re not to so much as breathe of anything you read in here,” Aymeric had warned, and watched as two letters in quick succession found their way to the least important pile, already beginning to slide off the desk.

“As if anyone could be interested in this shite,” Estinien had said with all his customary grace, and that had been it for conversation.

Until now, for Aymeric has spent too long reading over one thrice-folded document. It finds itself plucked from his fingers, and at once he shoots from his chair to snatch it back; Estinien raises his brows. “That had best not be a love-letter, Commander.”

“Tss,” Aymeric snaps as though chastising a particularly curmudgeon old cat, and reads through it once, and once more for good measure. “The date on this… Sancy must stop hiding letters beneath more letters.”

“Blame your tardiness, not your manservant,” says Estinien. “What’s so important?”

Aymeric takes a breath and reads aloud.

“It is with great sadness I report the fifth murder in a moon of one of Our Knights Most Heavenly. While Our Knights understand the gravity of their duties and accept they walk a path that leads toward the Fury’s hallowed halls, this latest death follows an unfortunate pattern within Ishgard’s own walls. I write to the Lord Commander to beseech him to investigate at his earliest convenience, for the goodly Knights of the city feel the rightful prickings of fear as they walk their routes. Did you know about this?” he asks with some horror. The colour drains from his face as Estinien nods, and this time he does not resist when the letter is taken from him.

“You’ve been holed up in here too long if you’ve not heard,” comes the answer, surprisingly calm for the gravity of it all. “Nine bodies altogether if I’m not mistaken. All men walking the Brume, all found at dawn by the relief.” Here he pauses to press his lips together disapprovingly. “All found with blasphemy writ above them.”

Aymeric’s heart falters within his chest. Distantly, he hears himself ask, “Blasphemy?” as though he doesn’t already know, and when Estinien leans forward to share the information his heart skips another beat as though attempting to ward off the truth it sees coming from malms away.

“Fuck the Holy See,” says Estinien lowly enough that no eavesdroppers would be able to hear, “That’s what’s wrote above the bodies—or so says the rumours.”

Never one to listen to the rumour mill, Aymeric is at a loss: how can it be that he is the last person in Ishgard to know this? Mayhap it is simply the excitement of his new station that has driven such dark thoughts as death from his mind, or mayhap he simply prefers not to hear the grim and grisly. A laughable idea, he knows: more like he has willfully pushed the information to the back of his mind and pretended that all is well.

“I see,” he says, deliberately light, and takes a steadying breath. “Is there aught else whispered I should know about?”

Estinien turns his gaze toward the papers, a sure sign he’s guilty or embarrassed, though the two often go hand in unpersonable hand. “Best not to bother you with it,” he says, and when Aymeric does not look away, colour floods high upon his cheeks and along the shell of his ears.

“You’ve spent the afternoon thus far telling me to pull my head out of my arse, Estinien. I don’t think of you as the bashful sort. I’ll hear it for myself, if you please.”

As expected, a harsh tone works wonders on the man, who bristles indignantly and straightens his back. "If you please,” he echoes, “Hardly the sort of thing worth paying attention to, but impossible to escape drunken chitchat. They’re saying you killed your father.”

The air feels frigid all of a sudden, as though a window somewhere has blown open and beckoned a blizzard within. Those faceless dead men flee Aymeric’s mind. With a single gaze he affixes Estinien to his chair.

“Oh?”

As hoped, it teases just a little more out of him, though now he refuses to look Aymeric in the eye. “I’m only repeating what I’ve heard,” he says defensively.

“Of course.”

“And no one can keep the story straight, so no one’s certain of the truth.”

“Men are wont to whisper, after all.”

Seeing that he will not back down, Estinien huffs loudly and drums his fingers upon the arm of the chair he sits on, but the story outs nonetheless. “Some say you did it as a favour to the Diocese, or that the Inquisitors were blackmailing you, or some other such nonsense. Whatever the reason, most everyone agrees you did it in the ring two moons back, and it was the final trial for you to cross before accepting the seat of Lord Commander. They’re calling you Hardheart now.”

“They,” Aymeric repeats gently, with a little smile. “How nebulous.”

That earns him a sharp look. “You don’t want to go purging the Knights,” Estinien warns. “It'll be your body they next find if you do.”

The letters upon the table, sorted haphazardly, seem mighty interesting. Aymeric lets his eyes wander over each of them in turn, wondering how long it will take to sign this bunch, to read that, to compose responses that won’t get him criticized in public. The evening stretches out before him, endlessly dull. “Hm? I said nothing of the sort, my friend. Aught else I should know, since they don’t speak to me?”

“... No,” is the answer after a long moment’s consideration. “Or if there is, I’ve not heard it.”

The scene is all too easy to imagine: Estinien sat in the corner of the Knight, alone, half-hidden by the guttering torches and groups of drinkers content to ignore him until the wrong word is spoken, elbows nudging this body and pointed glances that way til the subject was changed. Once the heavy door swung closed behind him, the talk would resume until the Knight was fair humming with gossip. All this while Aymeric sits alone in his offices, buried under requests for this and that, or shades of heresy to follow or ignore as he sees fit.

This path was always going to be lonely.

“It’s true,” he says easily enough, and pulls a sheaf of paper toward him. The inkwell is recovered from under one bunch of papers, but the quill is nowhere to be found, and he must lift and bend and divert his attention as he looks. “I defeated my father in single combat in the ring with the greatsword he trained me with, and with his death I was able to assume this seat. Ah, there you are,” he adds as he sights the quill. One or two vanes fall out when he shakes the dust from it. “My father was once a Knight,” he adds with a quick glance toward Estinien, who is listening with wide eyes, “and left the ranks to provide succor to the poor and needy despite the titles the See bestowed upon him. He disagreed with my goals, and sought me out, going so far as to employ heretical methods to do so.”

“And you killed him,” Estinien repeats.

Best make a start on at least the signatures if not the responses proper. Aymeric pulls a stack of letters toward him and dips the quill in ink, scribbles his name, dips the quill once more, and raises an eyebrow. “I did,” he says as though it is the most simple thing in the world. “My father was a heretic. What else was I to do?”

Silence reigns louder than any Aymeric has ever heard before, though he is content to pretend it does not bother him. Blowing the remnants of dust from the feathers of his pen, he scratches another signature upon the next letter that needs one, the sound almost offensively normal after his admission. This is fine: he has endured worse judgement than silence, and Estinien’s brand of displeasure is not so much that he cannot deal with it, should the need arise. His sword might be across the room, but he does not need a sword to stop a man.

“What, then,” Estinien manages after the fourth signature is writ, “Do you want the Knights not to talk?”

Aymeric’s turn to snort as though the question is stupid. “Even I know the best way to make men do something is to forbid them from doing so. No—let them whisper. What does it bother me?”

“By your leave then, Lord Commander.”

“As you will. Oh—”

Estinien is all but fled from the room already, but he stops in the doorway, helm back in his hands and sliding home to hide him from the cold, uncaring world. Without looking, Aymeric lifts his teacup from a single finger, the porcelain dangling carelessly. “Send Sancy in, would you?”

Chapter 3

Notes:

general blanket warning for descriptions of dead bodies and death in general from hereon.

But for the pallor of his skin, the dead man could be sleeping.

“What was his name?”

“Ser Alaume of House Durendaire.”

“A man of note?”

“No, ser. A bastard’s bastard. Likely a kitchen boy afore he took up a sword—you know how it is.”

He does; there is no glory in scrubbing pots, but too quickly do those who pledge themselves to the Knights forget that there is vastly more safety in doing so. At worst they might burn themselves upon a stove or catch a beating from sneaking into the pantry after hours, but a man can walk away from the back of a spoon in a way he cannot walk away from a malcontent.

“What of his partner?” Even had such things not been mandatory—too many incidents (a nicer name than Aymeric could have thought to call them) brought to the previous Commander’s attention—the Knights would have let fear guide their feet in twos in the hopes that numbers give rise to strength. 

Captain Whitecape looks up from the corpse to deliver a grim look. “Wasn’t in the area at the time. Whoring, by his own admission,” and here he allows the lines between his brows to become pronounced, though he at least does not sigh, “Though how a man can find the strength to abandon their morals in days like these…”

All too easy to imagine: there is but one whorehouse tucked away in the Brume, kept warm enough to host as many bodies as wants to visit, and makes enough gil to persuade the Knight to share their wares, even. Was the ale not already watered down, the brothel would no doubt make a killing thinning it til it was barely anything but water. Lucky that visiting Knights know what Gibrillont’s stuff tastes like already, and so the souteneur has no chance to do such things.

“I daresay he had other things on his mind,” says Aymeric placidly. “Where is the man? I’ve questions for him.”

The good captain smiles grimly, but holds a hand up: wait. “First,” he says instead, and points down at the body between them. “Tell me what you see, ser.”

What he sees? ‘Tis not so very difficult to describe in a handful of words: a dead man going grey with no particular feature or disfiguration to distinguish him, naked from the waist-up, likely Whitecape’s doing. Other than the Knights’ standard scattered scars here and there he is whole, perhaps skinnier than other men, hair sparse across his chest the same light brown as those on his head.

Whitecape must know he is struggling with the question, offering him instead a different route to the answer. “How did this man die, ser?”

How indeed? But for the aforementioned scars, his flesh is pale and unmarked. When he finds not the cause, Aymeric looks him over once more for it, and then again, and then—stops, frowning. “I’ve not a clue. Did he simply drop where he stood?”

“If only.” The captain touches between the ribs of the dead man, where the heart lies still and silent. “They’ve all come back like this—all the ones found in the Brume, that is. I’m sure you’ve heard the stories?”

Something heavy has settled uncomfortably in Aymeric’s gut. “I presume you mean the blasphemy painted above these poor men.”

“Ah, ‘tis part of the pattern, to be certain. We might have thought it was the cold elsewise—nay, ser, the problem runs deeper. His aether was stopped.”

“His—?”

“I did not know him personally,” Whitecape continues as though Aymeric had not tried to ask, “but he was young and healthy enough to go for patrol. I do not think you would send sick men out walking the same way that your predecessor did not, and while Our Most Heavenly are… shall we say, easily distracted, they are not so stubborn that they force themselves to march whilst on death’s doorstep.”

That much is true. If anything, men on patrols are wont to beg off with the sniffles more often than not; not even Aymeric himself is exempt from the behaviour, having plead illness once or thrice during his time in the lower ranks. Only once had he been ill for true, and then from a night of carousing, having been dragged out to warm a stool at the Knight til the dawn had broken and taken his good health with it.

“Then by his aether, you mean—”

“His life, aye, but more than that, too. Have you ever spoken to any practising deacon? They weave magicks with the very same stuff, pulling it from the air or themselves. Without aether,  this,” he gestures broadly at the man laying between them who stirs not, “is what happens. I took the liberty of calling a priest to look him over; the Sister came to much the same conclusion. By all accounts, he was healthy the day before. Healthy men do not drop dead.”

What an awful thing, to fall where one stands, drained so that the strength in one’s legs flees beneath one’s weight. Had he yet been breathing when his murderer stood above him, reviling the church? Or had his breath been blissfully stopped already, so he did not have to witness such heresy be plastered above him as though he was the one who meant it?

Aymeric frowns. “I daresay ‘twas not his hand that wrote those words?” Whitecape shakes his head no, and he sighs as he lets the thought go. “Thank the Fury that his innocence yet remains, then.” Even as we curse Her for shielding our eyes from the truth, he does not add, and casts a guilty glance up.

“Aye, well,” and now he finds himself being shooed with both hands, “Go find your man, Lord Commander—and I pray you find the answers you seek with him.”

---

“I didn’t mean to,” pleads the errant man, “well, I did, but I didn’t mean for—you believe me, ser, don’t you?”

So far Aymeric has not needed to speak a single word. The surviving knight’s guilt is taking care of his professed innocence easy enough. This man is not the murderer, that much is obvious from a single glance—and Aymeric, knowing murderers, does not need to look a second time—but it was his actions that lead him here.

“Please, ser.”

Aymeric has neither the time nor the patience to be gentle. “By your own admission, you abandoned your post to visit a brothel, leaving Alaume to walk the Brume alone.” The knight cringes as though trying to dodge the words; Aymeric follows up with a sharp, “I pray the Hospitaliers need not treat you for more than shock. Start from the beginning, if you will. Leave nothing out.”

It seems as though the knight might cry for a long moment, but he finds the strength to take a deep breath and closes his eyes as he thinks. “... It were like any other night,” he starts, beginning to frown, “Maybe colder. The snow started up for a bell or so. We were walking the regular route—”

“Regular,” Aymeric interrupts, unable to hide his frustration, “You mean to say you walk a path through the Brume well-mapped enough that any troublemaker could avoid if they used their eyes more than once? Carry on,” he snaps when the man’s ears go pink, and folds his arms.

“A-aye, ser. Apologies, ser. Ah… It was just tipping into the next day, and quiet, but not silent. Never is, down there.” No, the Brume is never truly still, not with Knights tramping around as though they own the place, not when empty bellies hurt enough a boy can’t fall quite to sleep. “We stopped at the Pot for a hot drink—” brave, when the lady that keeps the fire going doesn’t ask questions about what goes into her cauldron, “—and kept on after that.

“Well, it were quiet enough that we heard one o’ them girls calling for us,” and here the man goes pink again, and looks down at his hands, “Said she knew where to find a dragon. I went with her, and…”

He trails off, miserable. It is all Aymeric can do to suppress a sigh, feeling the beginnings of a headache building behind his eyes. I can show you a dragon, a real one, laughs a girl in his mind, with long dark hair and startlingly pale eyes. That’s what you say to reel them in when they look stupid enough to fall for it, and when the door closes behind them, voilá! Brigitte had been smart and quick when Aymeric had known her, with a smile wicked enough to tempt anyone toward her, and though she’d kissed him once, she’d been kind enough to leave his virginity well enough alone. It’s something of a comfort to know years later the girl remains true to herself, as much as can be.

“How long were you there?”

The knight shifts uncomfortably, but answers true enough. “A bell… afore she pulled me back, else I’d have been back sooner, ser. I think closer to three bells. Ser.”

“And when you left?”

“I…” the man takes a breath, deep and shuddering, and holds it for a long, awful moment. “I couldn’t find him, but it had been a while, so I thought nothing of it. I walked back along the path we’d come by, back to the Pot, and then a little further, a-and-” he needs take another breath, “I—I saw him, sat against those—you know those poles stuck in the ground, near the steps down from Foundation, the ones they use as a temple?”

Those makeshift spears are older than Aymeric—almost as old as Ishgard proper, if the legends are true. Nothing more than three steel bars, undisturbed but for the simple offerings Brumelings lay before them. Unlike the grand temple in the city above there’s no effigy of the Fury, no great stone face full of some emotion beyond mortal comprehension staring down upon Her self-flagellating subjects. There’s only one place for them, tucked between a boulangerie and an empty house sometimes occupied by orphans, sometimes not.

Aymeric’s father had once told him, on one of their many walks through the streets with straight backs and concealed blades sharp as the winds that cut through the city, that it was the holiest place in Ishgard. Even now he is wont to believe those words. For all its lack of grandeur it prevails the same as the church above, and the poor stop by when they can to bow heads and pray in a way that one cannot simply go to the See. When there is no service, Halone is not listening—but Her ears always hear what Her needy children say.

Aymeric nods, and the man continues, “He was sat against them. I thought he’d fallen at first, mayhap struck his head, but when I got close he was pale as anything, ser, and cold like he’d been d-dead for days. Fury, if I hadn’t gone, he—he might—”

“You saw no one, then?” Not wanting to listen to the man curse himself for his actions (and subsequently talk him out of it), Aymeric cuts across him sharply. It works: the knight takes a careful breath and holds it for a moment, and then shakes his head.

“No one,” he agrees, “Not even one o’ them children we’re told to worry about. Nothing but Alaume, and those word painted above him. It looked like blood, ser,” he adds suddenly, looking through Aymeric as he remembers, “But Alaume weren’t bleeding, so I don’t know where it might’ve…”

There have been deaths enough that the murderer might well be carrying around a bag of blood to paint with. Stranger things have happened in Ishgard, and more grisly, too, though the worst is kept from even Aymeric’s knowledge, and, like the others, he chooses to pretend as though such things do not exist. 

But such things do exist, and here is the proof: a dead man who ought not be dead, far from the first to fall and likely not the last. “Take a few days off,” Aymeric hears himself say. The knight, still malms away, nods, and only when the Commander stands does he wrench himself back to reality to look up at him desperately.

“You’ll get him, right, ser? The bastard that did this?”

And, well, what is Aymeric to do? Tell the truth? A terrible habit, truly, and one he does not need to cultivate, so with a smile, he says simply, “With the Fury’s blessing, of course,” and leaves the man to hopeless, helpless prayer.

Chapter 4

The Brume itself hates Aymeric just as sure as fire is hot and water wet: instinctually, unflinchingly, completely.

He feels it in the way the wind blows through the narrow streets, aggressive enough that it steals beneath his coat no matter how tightly it is clasped; he bears the weight of every sullen glance its residents shoot him as they stand in their doorways watching. This is not your home, it screams silently at him, raging without movement as a storm holds in the sky before bursting. Hie thee from this place and never return.

At least it isn’t snowing. ‘Tis miserable enough here without that added discomfort. Beneath the Knights’ boots the slush fair squelches with every step, near enough black with grime, completely at odds with the cobbles of the Pillars, which are warmed by deacon-flame or cleared by servants on the worst of days so that no noble must face the ignominy of dirtying their boots.

Truly, the divide has never been greater.

Today the commonfolk play innocently at market with their less savory wares hidden from sight, pretending they are as law-abiding as any goodly man or woman. Aymeric knows better. Beneath the tarp of every table (or close enough as makes no matter) are kept items the See prefers not to think about: books detailing every salacious act a person could ever want to imitate; meats whose origins are best left unknown; fogweed sold by the onze; even gems and other insignificant but gaudy items likely stolen from priests that came to preach to the poor.

“Bad luck, ser,” mutters one of his entourage. And bad luck it is, for market means people and all the things that come with them. Any hope they had for clues is washed clean immediately, for though it has been days, it would be easier to sight them without what feels like the entire Brume blocking their attempts to do so. “Shall we block the streets?”

“No,” says Aymeric, who knows first-hand how ineffective such measure will be, “No, I want you to—”

A scream interrupts him, high and girlish. At once he looks for the source of it, as does a full many others, the ambient chatter of buying and selling halted dead in its tracks. He sees her spilled effects before he sees her: already she is scrambling to her feet, the snow having made a dark, wet patch on her skirts where she’d fallen, and grabbing at her things before they can be stolen.

“Which of you knocked her down?” demands Aymeric, fury the backbone of his every word. His Knights are silent. “I said—”

Before he can finish his question, the girl spits at his feet, not quite brave enough to reach his boots. “Don’t need your pity, ser. All o’ them did, or none o’ them. Makes no difference to me.”

The girl’s face is as gaunt as Aymeric’s own once was, the circles beneath her eyes pronounced because of it, and disdain radiates from her every pore as she looks him, unafraid, in the eye. He does not recognise her, but little matter. Enough people know who he is.

“My apologies regardless, madame,” he manages as gently as he can. “If I can take but a moment of your time, we need to ask—”

“We none of us saw nothin’,” she says, just as sharp as before, but this time she does not spit. This time she seems—not afraid, as she stares Aymeric down, but uncertain, and clutches what items she has in her arms just a little tighter. 

Unsure as she is, she is still unwilling to break eye contact first, and soon enough Aymeric finds his patience thinning with the wind. “Let her go,” he says to his men, and holds back the sigh he longs to let loose, “Let any who would go home pass, but make note of any who look as though they might have a hand in hiding our man. Bring any suspicious man or woman to me directly.”

If the air was cold before his words, it is frigid now. These people have good reason to hate him, whether he was once one of them or not. One does not leave the Brume as easy as walking out of it; in their place he too would be suspicious and jealous in spades, unable to relate and fearful of what such a person might bring home. Besides, despising the Temple Knights is a tradition as old as Starlight: he will not take that from them.

And so they get to work prowling through the marketplace, studiously ignored by the commonfolk no matter how they ask their questions. The Brumeborn come and go as they please, taking their pitiful sacks of grain in exchange for a handful of copper coins, or bartering over this or that cut (and, if Aymeric’s ears hear true, the rot) of meat. It does not take long for him to know that this may as well have been a wasted trip. Any captain could stand around and bark orders in the cold, and aren’t there a thousand-and-three papers requiring his hand?, but it feels, somehow, important that he is the one to do those things. For too long has he been holed up in his office pretending that all the work he must needs do is with a pen, even if he does prefer a nib to a bladepoint. And yet—and yet.

By the time the next bell rings, distant but distinct all the same, Aymeric finds his fingers and toes both lost to his senses. One man has been brought before him and a disagreement settled by his word, though it had nothing to do with the murders, and beyond that: nothing. Those answers they have gleaned from the few talkative Brumelings have been nothing more than they already know, or gossip that can be quickly discounted—no matter how emphatic they are that the spirit of Halone is the one sweeping through the streets and righting wrongs, Aymeric rather doubts She would spend her time thusly—and the frustration of all down here is mounting. They all would rather be drinking soup and cracking wise than down here.

A soldier a head shorter than him approaches with a salute and begins to talk without his say-so. A woman’s voice, tinny but confident, says, “As expected, ser, the lowborn refuse us details. We’ve discovered one or two alleys and houses—if one could call them that—that were boarded up ‘til now. The men could use your guidance, ser.”

Nothing in her tone indicates that it is only the men who require guidance; no self-righteous wench, this one. Still, Aymeric barely suppresses a sigh: he does not need to oversee the bashing-in of planks of wood. Most likely they’ll lead to some poor bugger’s room and they’ll catch a young lady cooking or washing or, worse, standing in the altogether as she bathes.

“Lead on,” he says instead of taking his frustration out on the lady before him, careful to trap the irritation beneath the surface and direct it elsewhere. She salutes again and spins on her heel without a glance back: this, at least, he can appreciate, the nature of another one who desires simply not to be here.

Less impressed is he when they come before the cluster of knights hemming and hawing as though they have all the time in the world to waste. “Well?” he demands, and no small amount of them startle. Good. “Get to it, already.”

As one beast they jump to action, pulling planks from where they’re hammered to other bits of wood, some pieces rotting and others not. It does not take long before there is a sizable pile of splinters before them. Some Brumelings have stopped to watch, though they scurry away when noticed. Beneath the planks lays a wall, cracked as many walls are from the lack of upkeep—though Ishgard’s magnificence makes itself known in the singular fact that the city has not yet crumbled into the abyss that surrounds it—and from within, a startled cry.

“That will be the master of the house,” he mutters to himself, and waves a hand idly when one of his knights turns to look at him, clearly frantic even with the helm on. “Go, board it up again, give the man his privacy.” The lady that led him here looks to him with some amusement in her eyes, uncommonly green and framed with lashes so light they might as well not exist. “Walk with me, ser,” he says, and turns on his heel.

She does not interrupt his thoughts with meaningless platitudes or pleasantries, merely follows a pace behind him, every step punctuated with the rattle of metal on metal. When he stops, so does she: together they survey the marketplace together in silence.

Eventually Aymeric has no choice but to speak or fear his lips will freeze together. “Has there been anything else? Anything at all?”  

The answer in the negative is what he expects, but still not what he wants to hear. “No, ser,” says she, and then, “if I might speak freely, ser, I would not waste time waiting for those men to discover the why of it.”

“Those men are trying their hardest.” Aymeric doesn’t believe the words in truth. Hunting heretics within the city walls is one thing altogether (and best left for the Inquisitors and those who know what to look for, besides), but searching for a criminal in a sea of those who abide the law only halfheartedly when they do at best is more difficult than grabbing the first man that takes their eye. For once, at least, they are not willing to cut corners and place the blame on just anyone who walks by, but their motivation makes them inefficient now, never having needed to do more than fear the unknown from the safety of their beds before. “What else would you have them do, then?”

Her answer is swift and certain. “Leave. Or at the very least, not have a big group tramping around as though they own the place. These people aren’t inclined to help us like this, but one or two unassuming faces might have better luck.”

“Unfortunately, it is not quite so simple as that,” Aymeric grimaces. Some scrap of material dislodged by his knights’ work and blown across the marketplace comes to rest against his boot, and he bends to pick it up with cold fingers. “‘One or two’ men is not enough for them to feel safe down here, and I cannot exactly begrudge them that—besides, these people,” he jerks his head in the direction of the market proper, where at least one seller is staring openly at them, “Are not quite so inclined to answer questions easily. Our establishment has not been kind to them, over the… years.”

It feels a betrayal to say anything less than the full length of time, but not even Aymeric is privy to how many years the Knights have been keeping the lowborn crushed beneath their heels. His companion inclines her head as though the very notion disinterests her, and once more Aymeric finds he must hold a sigh in check. “The alternative is doing nothing until something else happens,” she says matter-of-factly. Then, as if she is only now remembering, “... Ser.”

Aymeric is not listening, instead looking over the scrap he holds with great intent.

“Ser?”

“This is leather,” he proclaims, and turns it over to inspect the other side. A frown has made a home between his brows. “Dyed leather. This is pricier than any down here could afford. Here—”

The lady knight takes the scrap in one gloved and gauntleted hand, turning it this way and that so the light catches it proper. Despite being torn, the piece is in good condition, and a deep purple besides. “This came from the stack, ser?” She looks back the way they came from and then back at the scrap. Beneath the helm it’s clear she’s frowning, pretty eyes narrowed thoughtfully.

“You recognise it?”

She does not answer in favour of staring at the leather like it has offended her personally. As Aymeric opens his mouth to ask once more, she walks off with it, steps determined, bound back the way they came from, and he has no choice but to follow in her wake.

“Ser— Ser.”

Despite his calling for her, she does not stop. Back she leads them past the group of men trying (and, by the looks of things, failing) to stack crates and planks in such a manner that neither prying eyes nor frigid winds can enter the poor man’s home. She sidesteps a young child, face gaunt and grimy, and so too does Aymeric, wary of nimble fingers.

“Ser.”

Still she does not answer, but soon enough she comes to a stop before the poor altar. There is nothing to indicate a man was killed her some days past, his effects having been scavenged by those in need and the body safe under the watch of Captain Whitecape a world away from this one. No flowers are lain here, nor coins or other simple trinkets as might be done even in Foundation when unlucky soldiers fall within or without the city as simple tribute. The soldier kneels, digs in the slush that has built up at the base of the Fury’s spears… and when she stands, she has not one but two scraps of leather in her hand.

Aymeric gapes. “How did you know—”

“I didn’t,” is her response. She looks not at him but the scraps, the newest addition being darker in colour and limper to behold, having been buried under the snow. “If something like this was to be anywhere, it would be where the body was found. At a guess, I would say this piece,” she lifts the wet leather, “tore first, trapped under the weight of the body. This piece,” this time the other, “caught on some stall or stand or what have you and was torn when the murderer fled, unsure if he would be discovered soon or not.”

Thoughtfully, Aymeric holds his hand out for the scraps, which she passes over without hesitation. Something about the colour rings more than passing familiar to him, though it as a dream, impossible to remember by day’s bright light. “That much sounds reasonable,” he agrees, and looks to the lady with the barest hint of a smile, “though it is, of course, impossible to say for certain that is what happened here. You have sharp eyes and a sharp mind, ser…?”

“Lucilla.” If she pauses before she gives her name, it is likely from surprise that the Lord Commander himself would give her such attention. “From a house of no import.”

‘Tis not just the sons and daughters of the High Houses that dream of glory. Aymeric holds the scraps back out to her; this time she does hesitate before she takes them, all her earlier certainty fled. “As much as I would like to be at the forefront of this investigation, my presence is requested elsewhere—often and without care for whatever else I might be doing. You, however,” and here he smiles as Lucilla takes the leather pieces from him at last, “have no such responsibilities keeping you from going where you please.”

“... Ser.”

If Lucilla is apprehensive about any of this, her eyes do not reflect it. “I would ask you to lead the investigation of these murders in person, ser,” Aymeric continues, now smiling as gently as he can manage. “Of course, you are free to say no if such a task is beyond your scope—”

“No.” Lucilla straightens, the scraps momentarily forgotten, and salutes. “I would be honoured… ser.”

Chapter 5

Notes:

very light passing mention/implication of sexual and physical abuse in this chapter. ishgard is not a happy place.

Sans the hustle and bustle of the marketplace, the Brume is so quiet it is eerie almost in the extreme. That is not to say it is empty: quite the opposite. Children without any place to go (or dreading what they might return to) sit in clusters hither and thither, sometimes chatting in low, heavily-accented voices, sometimes silent, always thin and wan. The adults are no better, so tired they seem like to blow away if the wind whistles down hard enough.

The clothes Lucilla picked for herself are not so threadbare that she will freeze, but they might well be more thread than fabric for all the repairs done to them. Gone is the occasionally-polished armour and well-padded jacque, too obviously of better quality than anything these paupers could dare to dream of. Gone, too, is the long hair marking her as a woman, being better suited to her sister than she herself besides. Better by far to be seen as anything other than what she is, to hide beneath the cover of poverty and masculinity both.

For all the pains she has taken—shorn hair, loose shirt to hide what little breasts she does have, ash rubbed lightly over her top lip to mimic a moustache—there is no hiding her ears. The helms she wears as a Knight all have sleeves for the long ears of the elezen, but here she is with a small and rounded shell, one of very, very few among the ranks. But here…

Where Ishgard proper is long of limb (and ear), haughty and disdainful, its underface is an imperfect reflection, where more than elezen are ignored by the nobility. Here she does not stand out for her physical appearance: see, this child has the tell-tale stubby tail in the way of the part-Miqo’te; over there, a man with only one arm. They look at her, but their glances slide away soon enough, and Lucilla walks on unmolested.

She does not dally where the marketplace had been set up. No, it is too close to the stair leading out of this place, the first layer of many many, and like any other city, those that sit here looking sorry for themselves are less a symptom of the sickness and more an attempt at sympathy for those bleeding hearts that trek down here to preach. There are too many of those, self-righteous priests that think prayer is the backbone of clawing oneself out of this world, who offer platitudes in place of coin or food or a warm place to rest one’s head for longer than a single night. No, this is not the place for her.

Instead she delves deeper, taking roughly-hewn steps deeper into the city’s core, peeling back the surface to nestle down in the meat of its very belly. Down, where the men are too tired to be vigilant and the women trusting enough of their little community that they smile and talk. Anywhere there is poverty there is this: those that must look out for one another or perish when the establishment refuses to help. It is the same in Limsa, where pirate is another word for family; it is the same in Gridania, where those condemned by the Elementals huddle together under- and over- ground; it is the same in Ul’dah, where parts of the city no longer belong to the natives but to those they pretend that cannot be helped.

Of course, they will not take her in without some suspicion, but that is what her bedraggled appearance is for. And it happens quicker than she could have hoped for: one moment she is wandering, almost-lost, down back streets, and the next a woman’s voice, bold and unafraid. “New, sweetheart?”

It’s a warmer welcome than Lucilla could have imagined existing in a place like this, and belongs to someone smiling. A woman, face lined in the way of age and hardship both, but friendly despite it, with her neck and shoulders wrapped up carefully in a scarf so thick it almost looks comical.

Wary, Lucilla looks back over her shoulder, and the woman laughs. “Yes, lovey, I mean you. Don’t think I’ve seen a face like yours before—and I’d remember, with bones like that.” When she frowns, the lines turn into furrows, turning her old and severe in a matter of moments. “Damn them as drove you down here,” she mutters, and beckons Lucilla over with sudden, impatient movements, “but at least you don’t look like you’re on your way to jump. Come along, love, there’s food enough for you as well.”

“I—” Finding her tongue at last, Lucilla means to protest, but the woman rolls her eyes.

“Don’t give me any o’ that nonsense about making it on your own. We’re a family down here, and never you mind what you’ve heard about us up top. Something hot in your belly won’t hurt, and you en’t the only one getting a bowl neither. Come along.”

So it is that Lucilla finds herself following in the wake of someone that would surely detest her if her secret came to light, bighearted where it would be easier not to be, led away from the street and into a house that, despite its front door needing some upkeep, is warm and homey inside. A low fire is lit and above it, resting on well-worn stilts, is a kettle full of what looks to be pea-and-onion soup, and what looks to be bread resting under teacloths close by. Five women sit in a circle on the floor, chatting happily as they knit or sew or darn, one with a babe slumbering in her arms, and a boy just starting to look gangly throwing furtive glances toward the cooking pot.

“Alors,” says the one with the child as she looks up, “Another one?” and the circle clicks their tongues sympathetically.

“Looking lost as anything,” says the one that lead Lucilla here, unwinding her scarf and setting it neatly down. “Good thing I went out, non? To think, if I hadn’t, another young girl would be wandering out there hungry.”

“I’m not a—” Lucilla tries, but she is met with knowing smiles.

“You en’t the first to try looking like a man, and you won’t be the last.” One woman bites the string clean from the spool she’s using, and folds her work with practised movements, the hint of a smile playing at her mouth. “Clever, though. Too many bastards out there as would take their pity on you, and never mind if you wanted it or not.”

The circle nods and hums their solemn understanding, and with a frown, one woman with an ugly blotch on her cheek—at first Lucilla thinks it is a birthmark, but looking closer realises with her gut twisting the skin is scarred and shiny in the way of a burn—says, “We never did see Catalin without a babe in her arms again, did we?”

“Sit,” says the woman who had the scarf, and Lucilla does so, and points at each woman in turn, introducing them as Jeanne, Édith, Martine, Lisette, Marie-Rose and baby Bertha, the boy as Robin, and herself as Anette. “Eat.”

The soup is better than anything Lucilla could make for herself, and the bread warm and moist in a way that the loaves baked by Our Most Heavenly could only dream of being, spread with honey-and-hot pepper so that it tingles on the tongue pleasantly. Robin all but inhales a good half of one loaf to himself, something Lucilla can not begrudge him for. The fare is better than she could have thought the Brumelings could do for themselves.

Marie-Rose laughs as she sets her bowl down to free a breast for the child, now grizzling. “Not what you expected, miss? It’s writ all over your face.” 

“Better than what I’m used to,” says Lucilla, who means it, and aims for the chunk of sweet onion half-submerged in her soup. “Though I feel foolish for thinking it would be all dregs and scraps here, now.”

There’s another round of tongue-clicking. “But of course,” Édith grumbles as she scrapes her hot honey into the soup directly, “Fury forbid the nobles think we have any more than snow and shite to eat, and never you mind about how we’ve kept ourselves alive for so long on that alone.”

It does seem ridiculous now she puts her mind to it. Is this how the poor of every city live, comfortably if not lavishly, and without such restraints as the better-offs are obliged to live by? Anette says, “Aye, and we’re all meant to be at each other’s throats the whole time. Tsk, as if we would live according to their rules.”

“Some of us did, once, and don’t you forget it,” says Jeanne with the burned face, and the room grows silent and solemn for a moment before she smiles, the scar twisting in a strange way to accommodate it. “But we’re better off down here, anyroad. I’d rather have no money than live like that again.”

They talk around Lucilla, who is silent and awestruck that the Brume has birthed a community like any other, warm and friendly and a world away from the Ishgardian standard. “Oh, aye? Like you weren’t saying only last week you wished you could trade that mattress o’ yours for the one you used to sleep on?”

“Not wanting a bad back, is that a crime now?”

Seeing that she’s done, Robin comes over to Lucilla with his hands out for the bowl, which she hands over with a smile. He has little scars on his knuckles, the kind that could be from knocking into things or from learning how sharp a knife is. Jeanne says, “if I’m to be branded a heretic for wanting a good bed, then may the Fury come down and spear me Her twelves-damned self.”

Just like that, the room goes silent and nervous, eyes flickering toward Lucilla, who keeps a polite smile fixed on her face as she says, “Not scared of being heard by Her, then?”

Titters, relieved and nervous all at once, erupt from the women. Jeanne gets up to excuse herself, leaving her bowl behind, but not even Robin with the hungry eyes goes for it. Anette reaches out to pat Lucilla’s arm gently. “Don’t mind her, if you’re devout,” she says easy enough, “she’s had a few too many bad experiences, is all. Used to be a serving-girl for some minor House, and habits en’t easy to break.”

Lucilla knows that to be true, at least, and smiles again to show she understands. “Still, with everything going on lately…”

There, those uncomfortable looks again, like she’s stumbled on some secret she’s not meant to know. “Anything to do with that?” Lisette asks, hesitantly pointing at the bandages wrapped around Lucilla’s head. Damn—she had quite forgotten about them, her aural anxiety eclipsing all else.

“Ah, I,” she stumbles over the lie, hoping they see it as nerves, “when I did my hair, I nicked myself. It’s not bad,” she adds quickly, hands up pleadingly, “you know, head scrapes bleed more than anything else, so I figured covering it up was best.”

“Oh, aye,” says Édith at the same time Marie-Rose, wiping milk from the babe’s face, says, “Cold water and salt rather than throw them rags away now you’re down here.”

Lucilla nods, but not wanting the secret to slip away, she tries for another smile. “All anyone can talk about up there is the murders.”

There’s those furtive looks again, but this time the women lean in a little closer. “We en’t heard all that much,” says one, “but we’ve heard, too. Is it true? It’s all Knights?”

“It’s true.”

The circle leans back with satisfied looks and tiny smiles. “There you are, then. Told you so.”

“What?”

Jeanne comes back and brings the cold air with her; it’s something of a blessing, the room having grown uncomfortably warm without Lucilla realising. “Snowing again,” she grumbles, and then again, “so what’d I miss?”

“All Knights, just like we heard,” Anette tells her. Jeanne’s brows raise so high they look like to fly away.

“Really.”

“Really. The new miss was about to tell us.”

Lucilla, finding herself pinned beneath six gazes, scratches her head and can’t look any of them in the eye. “I don’t know anything, really,” she lies, this time smoother than the last, “just that there’s been murders. You aren’t scared?”

“Why should we be?” Martine asks, sounding pompous. “We en’t Temple Knights.”

Having collected all the bowls asides from Jeanne’s, Robin with the nicked hands says in a high voice, “Fray and Sid wouldn’t hurt us.”

Tsss, say the women as one, and the boy’s face falls, understanding he’s said too much. Lucilla wants so much to reach out and take his hand, to coax every thing he knows out of him and file it away for future use, but the time for that is already long since fled: the women are gathering their things, sweeping away all evidence of such ungainly topics like murder so they can return to some semblance of normality. Even little Bertha seems to know something must be done to clear the air and starts fussing, though having gotten done with the teat it is anyone’s guess as to what she wants, and most all the attention falls on her or the cleanup.

Anette touches her shoulder with a small, sad smile that looks more sincere than it feels. “I’m afraid we won’t be able to put you up,” she says quietly, “we’ve more bowls than beds to spare between us. Now—and I know how this sounds, miss, but hear me out—there’s a stew not far from us that’ll have room for you, and a job, too, pretty thing like you. I know, ‘tis not the best o’ things, but the souteneur is a nice enough man. Doesn’t beat the girls, for one.” She gives Lucilla a quick once-over as though double-checking she could make it as a working girl, and nods as much to herself as to Lucilla herself. “Ask for Brigitte if the monsieur en’t in.”

Lucilla thanks her, and then all the other women, for even if they are kicking her out they have taken her in and fed her and treated her as one all their own despite not even asking her name, and then must go through a round of assurances that she won’t get lost on the way to the brothel. When the final farewells are said and the door clicks shut behind her, careful not to let the heat escape, she feels at once bereft in a way she has not felt since her girlhood, since she last held hands with her sister as they let flakes of ash and snow fall into their outstretched palms and played at guessing which they held.

But that was then, and this is now: here, there is only snow, silent and plentiful as it comes down. Without her jacque, gooseflesh pricks up along her arms and makes her nipples stiff and sore beneath her shirt, though it bothers her not at all. Eternal winter is nothing in the face of watching a secret try to squirm away, will be nothing compared to the feeling of pulling it free for all Ishgard to see.

Fray and Sid. Sid and Fray. What shadows do they keep to, and what faces do they bear, that they can get away with what they do? Their names are a beat that Lucilla marches tirelessly to, past the brothel and back to market. No doubt the Lord Commander will want to know.

Chapter 6

Who was the Forgotten Knight? Not a single soul in Ishgard agrees on the answer. To some he was simply a man who found less glory than he had been led to believe existed in the verses of the Dragonsong War; to others he was a storied knight injured beyond recovery who found purpose anew in the home he had sworn to defend. There are those who whisper that he was, in fact, a she who hid her sex and when discovered vowed to put up the sword in favour of a paddle. The one thing everyone agrees on is the sword.

It hangs behind the bar for all to see, the blade hidden beneath a healthy amount of rust. For all Gibrillont’s willingness to talk about it, he has always refused to name the man that put the sword into his hands. ‘Tis a useless endeavour, for most everyone knows it came from Symon de Loiselles, who gave it up to take care of his aunt fifteen years prior. Everyone will remember Gibrillont, too, when he moves on, though he swears blind he’ll not suffer hearing his name alone, the only concession to anonymity stretching back centuries. Not all men are for the glory, few and far between though they are.

Not all men, Aymeric muses, sat alone with only the dregs left in his tankard. His mind is not on the man forgotten by those who cry his name every hour of the day (“to the Knight!” they call, or perhaps, “see you at eighth bell,” or maybe even “shall we?”) but another man forgotten by most, of little consequence but for those who have heard his name. Tryphaniel was his name, and he was the first to walk the path of the Dark Knight, though likely not the first to disagree with the See. He certainly wasn’t the last.

Someone raps their knuckles on the table in front of him. Aymeric jumps, startled back to the real world, and follows the arm up, up, til he finds himself looking into the bemused face of the Azure Dragoon.

“When I was told the Lord Commander was drowning his sorrows in the Knight, they neglected to mention the look on your face,” he says, and takes the tankard from him, peering in. “Is this your third? Fourth?”

“First and only,” Aymeric folds his arms in an attempt to look severe. It is done in vain when Estinien looks less than impressed. “Why are you here? ‘Tis not like you to seek out company.”

That garners a little snort, though he cannot tell if it is more amused or offended. “I can hardly argue that. No, I’d a visit from the astrologians and thought it worth mentioning, but you weren’t in your office. Another?”

The idea of Estinien joining him for a social visit is such a surprise that he disappears before Aymeric can so much as nod, without so much as asking what drink to order. He’s not the only one who feels this way: looking around the Knight reveals a good handful of men and women alike craning their necks to see true for themselves if it truly is him. Aymeric shakes his head when the eyes turn his way, as lost as they feel, and is saved from any questions by Estinien’s return. He brings with him wine and two glasses and sets himself down in the next chair along, and seems only to notice the attention when he pours the first glass, deeply red and—if the Knight’s usual vintages are anything to go by—bitter.

“What?”

“Nothing,” says Aymeric, and takes the glass rather than risk laughing in his face. He manages a mouthful before he catches sight of Estinien’s unimpressed glower and chokes on the next sip, unable to help himself, and is left to splutter and clean himself up without help.

“Nothing,” Estinien mutters to himself, and shakes his head. Both glasses filled, he takes his helm off and sets it down, one hand protectively draped over the faceguard, hair a mess even swept back into a tail as it is. “My arse.”

The wine mostly dabbed away, Aymeric allows himself a little grin. “Mayhap you should ask Lord Durendaire for a starglobe and join the astrologians for how astute you are.” The swipe aimed his way is—he hopes—good-natured and dodged easily; pleasantries (such as they are) exchanged, they settle into a comfortable silence, both happy to ignore the myriad glances thrown their direction.

As they sip, Aymeric finds his thoughts winding back to the Forgotten Knight, and to Tryphaniel, and to all sorts besides: that bastard boy of House Fortemps down in Dragonhead; honourable Kain who turned his back on duty; Saint Reinette the humble who gave herself to the cloth. Coloured with blood Ishgard’s banner might be, but not every face that turns up toward it is cut from the same cloth. Faces carved in stone tell of the goodness of its people, and the hands and deeds of those yet living build what brighter future they can. Not every man is the clergyman Tryphaniel cut down; not every woman looks to lead a band of heretics; not every child dreams of becoming Archbishop.

“You look mighty thoughtful.”

“Mmm.” However rare it is for Estinien to probe, Aymeric does not feel much like divulging his secrets. He tucks such thoughts aside to be reexamined under the comforting cover of nightfall and instead asks, “You mentioned the astrologians?”

Estinien grunts and sips at his wine before he answers; the face he pulls is truly magnificent. Gibrillont’s best batch this is most decidedly not. “Aye. Remind me to send thanks to Forlemort for not sending his fop nephew my way, for starters. The stars have shifted, so they say, but in a manner worth mentioning to you and I.”

However the astrologians deduce the movements of the Horde by the sky alone is a great gift that might as well be Hingan for all Aymeric understands of it, but few and far between are the times where such reports have been wrong. “And the E—”

“Quiet,” Estinien says before the whole tavern can listen in to the particulars of the great wyrm’s Eye. They all have their secrets to hold close, safely unnoticed by prying eyes. “Whatever comes our way will be nothing like the Horde’s full might. That much I am certain of. As to what we might face in its stead…” he sighs and makes as though to sip at the wine again, thinking better of it as the glass is halfway to his mouth and sets it down once again. “I shall keep you informed if aught comes to light, but don’t expect the particulars until they’re on us.”

Like any other Knight worth his salt, Aymeric has of course faced a dragon in the field—hard not to when the wretched beasts plague the skies and land both, never showing their full might but striking fast and furious and often enough that every day is an uncertainty as to the foes one might be sent to face. On this day one will slay (or be slain by) one of Nidhogg’s many many children; on that one might tend the cookfire and listen to the commander recite his favourite story for the fifth time in so many days.

Unlike Estinien, he has not the wealth of experience under his belt that bespeaks of gruelling training and proficiency with a lance that is more a part of him than a separate tool to be used. Not even Aymeric thinks as highly of his greatsword as Estinien’s does of his spear—and nevermind the little matter of its supposed saintly origins.

“Would that things were simple just one time,” he sighs, and drains his cup. Not even he can hide his grimace, a mouthful being too sour to ignore, but it does not stop him from reaching for Estinien’s, and he takes it without reproach.

“I take it your investigation…”

“Is proceeding apace, but about as fun as removing splinters. Bah.”

Silence returns, less comforting than before, as Aymeric drinks once again. Not even the chatter of the Knight can penetrate his mood now: he ought never have come here at all, he thinks, knowing the only place in Ishgard he belongs truly to now is his lonely office and not this place of companionship, as rough as that might be. He ought never have left the world only he can occupy; he ought never have thought of those that came before; he ought never have asked for ale.

“Alright,” says Estinien carefully, “What happened?”

On any other day, the very concept of Estinien caring as to any countryman’s predicaments would be worth marking down in the annals of Ishgardian history for how uncharacteristic it is of him, but seated firmly in the moment, Aymeric cannot find it within himself to care. He is, after all, just another man, susceptible to the foibles of personhood and at the mercy of occasional bouts of concern as they all are.

The stolen wine is no less bitter than Aymeric’s own cup was, but he gulps as though it is the sweetest nectar, and wipes the spill from his chin with carelessness that on anyone else might be described as violent. “I am surrounded by what feels endless death and supposed to put it to rights,” he starts, scowling, “and names I had once thought put to rest are come to haunt me in the midst of it all. Tell me,” he adds, and the words trip out of him in such a hurry that he can no more put a stop to them than he could commune with Nidhogg himself, “You had a brother once, yes?”

‘Tis truly impressive the control Estinien has over his face: not a single muscle twitches out of place. He might as well be carved from stone like Reinette before him. As the seconds creep by at a truly glacial pace Aymeric realises he has leapt over the unspoken line between them with reckless abandon and opens his mouth to apologise, when he says, “Aye, once,” and reaches for the very bottle of wine. Aymeric’s cup is refilled and so is the stolen one he now commands, and then, deliberately, Estinien drinks from the very bottle itself. He does not take a small mouthful.

Three years had passed since their first meeting before Aymeric had learned that Estinien had had family at all. Other knights had whispered behind their hands of a great tragedy that had befallen him but never spoken of the incident proper, less out of concern for his feelings and more for the chance that hearing about it would set him to some uncontrollable rage. They had been caught exchanging questions and answers by a campfire on one uneventful excursion to the westernmost Highlands, and Estinien himself had said a brother, a father, a mother, and a whole village lost besides, and scoffed when one had asked if he wasn’t the trueborn boy of Alberic, then?

“I had two,” Aymeric hears himself say, though his heart screams at the admission, and around his neck the soulstone he wears feels as though it burns hotter even than dragonsflame. He ignores it easily. “I was the eldest and, I thought, the most reasonable. I would ask if that was something that fell to us naturally, but…”

A muscle jumps sharply in Estinien’s jaw and his nostrils flare. He stays silent for a full five seconds before saying, “I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that,” as if to prove that he is more than the kneejerk fury that everyone who knows him knows he embodies, “by the Fury’s spears, what are you on about?”

The wine shines as deep as the stone around his neck and will burn the same going down. “I only ever knew one,” he continues, “Father took him in not long after I left for the Knights. And the other…”

Ompagne had once said to Fray, after one particularly stubborn afternoon, that he was more akin to a frozen lake than a boy. Fray had proclaimed this good and well and then ignored him til the sun rose the next morning, even forgoing dinner in order to prove his point—whatever that point had been.

“A brat, I presume.”

Aymeric winces. “How did you know?”

“Younger brothers tend to be.” The bottle is raised again and Estinien takes a longer drink than before. “My condolences.”

The Knight is as homely a place as Aymeric has ever known, with all the familiar smells of his childhood: ale and mail and a fire roaring away in the hearth. Even had he chosen to do aught else, his feet would have led him here sooner or later, he knows. They none of them can escape whence they came from. “They’re alive,” he says to his cup, “though they’d swear blind it’s only ever been the two of them, most like. We disagreed, to make a long story short, and now that door is closed to me. Forever.”

He misses any expression Estinien might make at being burdened with the knowledge that he is not as alone as he has made himself out to be all these years. “They have something to do with all this?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.” Aymeric laughs, quiet and soft and completely lacking in mirth. “If I could ask them, I would—”

“Have you tried, I don’t know, knocking?”

Such simple words, and yet they reveal the character buried under decades of a trauma that has changed his very nature irreparably and isolated him from anyone that might be able to help. “... beg your pardon?”

“Knocking.” Estinien isn’t smiling, but something flickers behind his eyes that might be humour if one cared to chase it. “On the door you say is closed.”

The words are as much a shock to the system as the door that opens and brings the sharp air in. Gibrillont yells at those traipsing in to shut the damn door behind them, and Aymeric finds himself unable to do much more than stare. Of course it is so simple to someone who cannot turn to the dead whenever he chooses and ask forgiveness or whatever else a man might wish to beg of his long lost family.

“I - I have not, no,” he mutters, cheeks hot, though from whether from the shame or the wine he cannot say. Estinien does him the favour of topping his cup up once more, more generous than he has ever been, as though such topics bring out the best of him.

“Then you’ve naught to lose by trying.”

Chapter 7

Notes:

brief warning for emetophobia.

“Take me to the prisoner.”

No one receives his words but the darkness, though Aymeric knows it to be listening, as it ever is. It shifts, nebulous but present in a way that his mind understands even as his eyes do not, and beckons him onward. Torches in their sconces flare to life as he walks by and go dark when he passes, silent as the grave.

So too do his steps make no sound. It is as the first time the Abyss took him into its arms, first slowly as a new lover might and then greedily to wrap around him in full, every ilm of skin its for the taking. Naught is there to hide from the darkness, for it knew him long before he knew himself in full. Even now it knows secrets he has not yet stumbled upon.

The cellblock is unfamiliar to him, though he knows where it leads—where he is being led. Every step takes him deeper than he thought could be possible until, before he realises he has walked so far, he is standing in front of a barred door. When he reaches for the handle it melts away as though there never was a door to try.

Go on, says the darkness, and he takes one step, two, and sits before his father, as nervous as if he was a child and not a man grown.

“You came.”

Ompagne Deepblack looks as though he was never young. Lines are baked so deep around his eyes and mouth that to smooth them out would be deeply wrong. Even before the airs of Coerthas turned from merely cold to truly frigid was his skin weathered from endless campaign. His beard and hair are threaded thickly with grey as they always have been, having been born an old man in a babe’s body. Despite all this, still he does not yet look worn out, his eyes still sharp and his back still straight, even in this endless darkness, even under the weight of the armour he wears, the black-and-purple cloak ragged but not so tattered it is unfit for purpose.

He looks at his hands rather than his son. “Of course,” says Aymeric in the high voice of childhood. “I couldn’t sit still knowing you were here, alone.”

“We are never alone.” It is true: the Abyss has them all in its vise grip, unable or unwilling to let them go. The ones that yet live belong to it just as surely as the men that came before.

But dust and bones seems poor compensation for a life lived in service of others, and the thought of it makes something flare to life in Aymeric’s mind. Try as he might, it slides from his grasp like soap in the shower. “I can’t feel your soul,” he says, and then, “Father—”

The lines on Ompagne’s face grow deeper still when he smiles. “Why not?”

And Aymeric turns from the doomed man who waits in the darkness for the end, knowing that the truth is behind him waiting to be seen—but it moves too fast for him to catch, and when he turns back he is alone in the cell, both father and master are stolen away by the Abyss as all things eventually are. “Father!” he cries, standing, but in this place it does not matter whether he stands or sits, for he is alone, alone, alone.

Alone and yet not alone, for he is the Abyss and it is him. When he looks to his hands they are nowhere to be seen, as black as the blackness keeping him here, and the same with his feet, his legs, his chest: the only concession to himself is the stone that rests around his neck, realer than aught else. In this place it seems bright and dark all at once and beats in time with his own heart, loud, so loud all but the sound fades away like his body. And there, almost in time but not quite, as though on purpose, an echo. He knows that sound, and he knows the echo’s echo though he has never heard it before.

We are never alone, but here, alone, he does not know what to do.

“Come along,” says Ompagne, who has never had patience for the apprehension of youth. Aymeric’s little legs scramble as he rushes to keep up. Here, working, Ompagne is a father no longer, and does not reach for his boy's hand, though Aymeric longs to take it as they walk out from the dark into the uncomfortable twilight of the Brume. “Tell me, Aymeric: why do we walk this path?”

This he knows, the answer having been drummed into him firmly since before he could lift a greatsword of his own. “Because justice is the path all men should strive to walk, and goodness can only be found at the heart of hard choices.”

At Ompagne’s other side, another voice. “Our guilt holds us to higher standards and stubbornly we hold fast to them even at cost to ourselves.” When Aymeric looks, he does not see Fray, though he knows the voice belongs to his brother. No one else is brave enough—or stupid enough—to speak so plainly to a man who lets the Abyss breathe its riddles through him. No one else ever will be.

“Yes and yes,” says Ompagne without looking back. His cloak flutters as they ascend the stair out of the Brume: up and up and up they go until Ishgard is a mere pinprick below them. The Spine of the world is at their back and dragons curl around it protectively, but they do not attack, content to lick old wounds instead of opening more. In the distance do clouds gather, white as snow. “We do this because no one else does. There is a place for all men, and this is ours.”

“Those boys that came before us, then,” says Fray into his ear, “was their place always meant to be below the earth?”

Ompagne has nothing to say to that, nothing at all.

“Father,” says Aymeric, wanting answers, and Coerthas comes rushing up to swallow him whole. He falls the fall of a dragoon’s interrupted high jump, fearful and unable to do anything about it, but the land opens up and plunges him back down into the darkness where he belongs. When he wakes he sits in his father’s armour, unable to stand under its weight, the cell door closed and locked before him. “Father—”

Behind the door is Ompagne, looking at him with sad, sunken eyes. “I should never have let you call me that,” he says, softer than snowfall, “That was my mistake.” His hands, when he puts them against the bars, are rotting to the bone. No armour can ward off the inevitable, and in his father’s cloak and steel, Aymeric knows the end will soon turn its gaze on him. He is a man, and men cannot escape mortality’s siren song. “Forgive me. Forgive me.”

“I can’t feel your soul,” Aymeric says again, no longer desperate but gut-wrenchingly, bone-achingly sad. “What happened to it? What happened to you?”

When Ompagne takes a breath to answer, all the warmth goes with him, and all the sound too, and with it goes the Abyss, ripped from Aymeric cruelly so he is alone at last, and—

---

The weak light of dawn has not yet discovered colour. Everything is grey and out of focus as Aymeric wakes, cheeks wet, and on his back he gags as his stomach lurches violently. Panic rears its ugly head as he tries to roll onto his side, finding himself caught up in his sheets and uncomfortably hot, heart hammering away as he leans over the edge of his bed and tries to remember how to breathe.

Innocently, the soulstone hangs around his neck as though it isn’t the source of his problems as he swallows sour spit. Well—it isn’t, not truly. ‘Tis not the stone’s fault he was born to Ishgard, nor abandoned after birth, nor that the world is cruel and unrelenting. It is not even the stone’s fault that Ompagne took him in and showed him the way, for that choice was all his own, as every one before him. Often has he wondered whose hands held the stone before his, knowing the answer will never be known. They are all the Forgotten Knight, though not so cowardly they abandon duty for a flagon and an easy life.

He seems unlike to vomit, so he unwraps himself from the sheets with great care, glad for the dull chill of early morning that wicks the sweat from him. Both he and the bed are drenched: better than he rises now instead of falling back to sleep in it. Work awaits no matter the hour, and so he decides as he sits to go to it, but the world spins as he does, and he grips the mattress with great force and shuts his eyes. Last night’s wine had followed him to bed as a lover might and kept its grip tight about him; he shivers now and puts his head into his hands to groan, a deep and unhappy noise, feeling wretched for feeling sorry for himself.

In the end it takes almost a full half-bell for him to dress. He does wretch at one point, and what comes out is unmistakably Gibrillont’s vintage, shockingly red in the basin that for a moment he thinks he might have done great harm to himself, but then he heaves again and feels all the better for it when he stands straight and rinses his mouth. The illness leaves him cold and clammy but his stomach is settled (though when he thinks tentatively of toast and bacon it shifts as though it means to rise again, and hurriedly he pretends he did not think such thoughts) and he can devote himself to dressing at long last. First the sheets, ruined as they are, to wipe away what the chill could not chase, and then his smalls to hide his nakedness. Then comes a thin hose, followed by a thicker pair and socks over those, with the first of three thin shirts tucked in to keep the warmth in. After that, a doublet, finer than he feels is correct, but it cannot be helped: his fingers shake as he buttons it and he must go back to redo them when he finds a spare button at the top and a hole at the bottom, cursing all the while.

The mirror tells him that he looks fit for office, but he is not yet done. On goes the great blue coat he has grown so accustomed to wearing when the chill is particularly fierce, and in its pockets the fingerless gloves he wears to write, made of leather so supple they feel a second skin to him. The soulstone is tucked under his shirts safely and the coat’s clasps done up, and with the hood drawn up he looks… well, far too fine for him to feel entirely comfortable.

By the door are his boots and his sword both; he pulls the boots on staring at the sword the whole while, and when he stands it is with uncertain hands that he takes the great handle and lifts it. Balisarde is plain and heavy, not meant to draw the eye but suited for battle nonetheless, the sword of some adventurer that had fallen within the Aurum Vale some years past after the call to clear it had first gone out, recovered by the See and awarded him for some insignificant achievement he no longer recalls. Best to leave it, he thinks, but something about it draws his eye and, before he knows it, he is pulling the guard across his chest and fixing the sword to his back and leaving without a second thought.

The cloak was a good choice. This early it is a stranger kind of cold than he is used to, the kind that creeps along one’s clothes looking for an opening that will be granted if one stands still too long, unlike the harsh winds he is used to that attempt to force their way within. The guards recognise him—or the coat, it makes no difference—and offer sluggish salutes as he passes, but he only pauses to raise a hand in recognition rather than make small talk. Aymeric pulls the second pair of gloves on as he leaves the halls of the Congregation, this time with fingers and lined with wool, and finds Ishgard laid out for him serenely. Only those on duty are out at this time, and the silence is bewildering; no shouts for men to join their fellows or the gossiping of ladies on their way to market to marr the city. It is the same here as it is in the Brume, which his feet find themselves leading him toward: though the nights there are not still and silent in full, the early mornings find the people abandoning their posts in favour of a bed, and only the truly dastardly continue to prowl pre-dawn.

As it was then, so it is now: Aymeric treads with the practised grace of someone who is light on his feet out of necessity, minding the last swells of nausea just as much as once he had ignored the pangs of hunger that had dogged his steps as they’d walked looking for trouble, and trouble’s unfortunate aftermath. He knows where to walk to avoid being sighted by any patrol, fools that they are for continuing to stay to one path, though it works for him now; he knows which alleys lead where and which to duck down to save precious seconds; he knows with every step that this is a bad idea, one of his worst. The stone at his neck beats out of time with his heart as though on purpose.

And then, before he knows it, he comes before a door, grandly insignificant and closed, the handle well-worn and crooked as though merely turning it is not enough to grant entry. The house’s façade is, as every other down here, unremarkable but for the myriad cracks that run through the stone, with no window to peer through, the only indication anyone lives here the weathered tarp that it shares with the next adjoined building where a gutter might be on a residence well cared for. They still haven’t bothered (or more likely, Aymeric reminds himself sharply, they are unable to) fix the leaky ceiling.

He has fantasized many times of marching up to this door and banging on it, haughty and proud, of a mind to show himself off and demand recognition that he has, in fact, made the right choices: look at the clothes he wears! Look at how he has filled out! Look at the good he does! but now before it he finds himself only brave enough to stare silently, nose and lips numb from the cold, feeling foolish for having dressed up so warmly, feeling guilty for not having brought food with him. They’re home, this he knows: not from any sound that spills out from the door’s cracks or having paid attention to routine, but from the incessant beat of the stone around his neck. It hangs heavier than usual as though desperate to return to its fellows, that echo and the echo’s echo beating a half-second out of time to drive him crazy and make him think oh, how did I ever leave? and when he lifts a hand shaking in its glove to knock upon the door, it opens with no more flourish or fanfare than any door ought to.

“Oh,” says Aymeric, looking up into the face of the brother he’d never known ‘til now. “Ah.”

Chapter 8

Aymeric is not a short man, yet he finds himself craning his neck to look up into his other brother’s face. It is not the kind of face he would expect to see in Ishgard, almost as white as snow and decorated in a decidedly Dravanian manner, the bridge of his nose and his chin black as coal and, he realises as he stares, scaled. His hair is unkempt and sticks out in all directions, almost the same colour as his skin, and even his eyes are foreign, green and almost luminous, though there is no light to reflect off them. All this… yet he seems gentle, if the expression he wears is anything to go by.

“Shut the fucking door,” someone calls from within, voice deeper than Aymeric recalls, “You’re letting in the cold.”

The man makes a face and stands aside, candlelight flickering in such a way that something beneath his hair is lit up, hard and black and—horns, he realises with a shock.

“It is cold,” the man murmurs. Even his voice is gentle. “Come in, even if you aren’t going to stay.”

Aymeric cannot take his eyes off the horns. “Is that… alright?”

The only answer is his brother making a gesture that Aymeric recognises as impatient, and he decides that yes, it is far too cold to remain stubborn. When he crosses the threshold he feels as though he is pushing through some barrier that does not want to let him pass—but then he is through, and the door is pushed to behind him, and when he looks the man is smiling a half-smile that Aymeric cannot read.

“My name is Sidurgu,” he says as he locks the door, “but Ishgardian tongues don’t like saying it. Call me Sid.” He looks to the door and runs a finger tipped with the same black scales as his face, hardened into a claw, along its frame. “We weren’t sure if it’d let you through.”

Since Aymeric was a boy, the door has always been trapped with runes of a design found nowhere else in the city. He’d asked about them once, and Ompagne had told him even he wasn’t sure where they came from, but he had drawn them, first with his finger and then again with the Abyss curling out from his hands as a living ink, that rippled on the stone before sinking in, never to be seen until the next time they were writ. Not a single time has he been able to paint them himself, denied so simple a protection by the very thing he serves with his every breath.

“How did you know it was me?” asks Aymeric, wrenching his mind from such things. Sid shrugs with one shoulder, and gestures onward with his other hand.

“I felt your soul.”

He lets Aymeric lead, first steps in a home no longer his uncertain and slow. Little has changed, the most obvious being rags stuffed into cracks to keep the cold out and dust kicked into corners, but the hall is the same as it ever was, the one door to the bedroom closed, the other open. Within is—it can hardly be called a kitchen, but there is a grate with a big iron bowl to cook in and as much firewood as one can carry. Light flickers from within and the telltale crackle of a fire reaches his ears, and Aymeric’s feet stop of their own accord.

“Go on,” says Sid at his back, and pushes him on.

Bundled up in front of the fire is a whole heap of blankets, grey from age and use. Within, slight and sinewy, is Fray, brown back covered in scars that Aymeric doesn’t remember from childhood, pulling a shirt on. It’s as grey as the blankets, pinched here and there from repairs and takings-in, but otherwise fit for purpose.

Compared to their brother, Fray is the picture of mediocrity, being neither tall nor horned nor scaled, though against the backdrop of Ishgard’s haughty milieu he, too, stands out. Not only darker skinned than the majority, but shorter by two heads at least than the average, with hyuran ears and an upturned nose that at least years before he had denied loudly and viciously as being cute.

“You let him in?”

Sid scoffs and steps around Aymeric easily, crossing the room in only a couple of steps, hand out for a blanket, which Fray lifts without being asked. “Don’t act like you didn’t tell me to,” he snaps, sounding much less gentle than he had at the door. Pulling the blanket around himself, he looks to Aymeric much younger than he’d initially thought, cold and vulnerable and not at all like a Dravanian, really. “Stop bitching, or send him away yourself. I’m not doing your dirty work.”

Clearly they are used to arguing without words: Fray and Sid stare one another down with twin scowls as though Aymeric is not in the room and watching. It isn’t long before Fray huffs and looks down at the blankets, finding a stray thread and picking it at it.

“Alright then,” he says when it becomes clear Sid isn’t going to speak for him, but not doing Aymeric even the courtesy of turning around to look at him for the first time in… far too long to be worth thinking about, “what do you want?”

Aymeric winces, stung if not cut wide open on the razor that is Fray’s words. His mouth is dry. “I,” he starts, and finds he must swallow, take a breath and hold it for a moment, “I want to talk.”

Fray snaps the thread, balls it up and pings it to a corner. “We’re talking,” he says, deceptively mild. “That it? You just wanted to come down, play pretend for old time’s sake?”

“Fray,” Sid says lowly, a warning, and just like that Fray snaps as the thread did: suddenly and sharply.

“Don’t you fucking Fray me!” he snaps, startlingly loud, blankets kicked aside as he scrambles to his feet, fists balled so tight the colour is bled from his knuckles. His eyes are the same molten gold Aymeric recalls from better days. “You know who that is? You know who that hardhearted bastard is? Or have you forgotten everything he’s done?! Was the old bastard’s murder not enough, or do I need to remind you what the Knights did to you—”

“Fray.”

He stops at that, breathing so hard it sounds almost painful, trembling as though he means to burst into tears. The tendons in his arms stick starkly out with how hard his fists are clenched. Towering over him, Sid is calm despite the scowl that ruins his brow.

“You’re still my brother,” says Aymeric so softly he thinks for a moment he did not say them, but then Fray begins to laugh, wild and loud and mirthless.

“Oh, no. No I am not. You threw that away when you left, and stomped on the memory when you killed our master. And,” he adds sharply, more of an edge to his words, “I’m not a man, so I can’t be your brother anyway.”

Lost, Aymeric looks to Sid, who spares him enough of a glance to shrug as if to say well, that’s just how it is. Ever had Ompagne been more concerned with morality and one’s place in the world to be concerned with things like what clothes one wanted to wear (beyond, that is, what he could reasonably afford or steal) or one’s name, evidenced by his unquestioning acceptance of Aymeric’s own announcement over dinner one eve that he was from that moment hence a boy, and not to call him anything but. Clearly, that lesson had been taught to Fray too, though why they seem to think the matter of their gender is significant enough that Aymeric would mind when they’d bathed and bled and slept beside one another as they’d grown up is beyond understanding.

“Alright,” he says easily. Fray looks almost taken aback by how simple such acceptance is. “Fine. We don’t need to make up, but—”

Sid adjusts the blanket around his shoulders as if to hide his voice, unable to look at either of them now. “Yes, you do.”

“Get fucked.”

Fray’s response—entirely too predictable—is enough to draw Sid’s ire. His brows knit together and his face twists in such a way that he looks an entirely different person, the scales all drawn together and his eyes narrowed to slits. He might be the Fury, Aymeric thinks, and then notices the unmistakable tip of a tail flicking agitated from beneath the blanket, and the thought flees without further scrutiny.

“How’s this, then?” Sid growls. “You tell him, or I will.”

That shuts Fray up. The pair go back to scowling at one another, back to not needing words, and Aymeric feels entirely lost watching them. 

“I’ll kill you,” says Fray, so soft the threat feels more genuine than their rage. Sid doesn’t even blink. “I’ll—I’ll kill you.”

“Go on, then,” and Sid lets go his anger to look a normal man as he turns back to Aymeric, but before he can say anything more, Fray tackles him. So close, such an attack does little more than make him waver where he stands, but their displeasure makes itself known with how hard and how fast their fists come to rain down upon his chest.

“Don’t—”

“What am I meant to do, Fray?” having had enough of the beating, Sid takes one wrist and then the other in one big hand and holds them tight. Trapped, Fray wriggles but finds no way to break free, and looks up at him pleadingly. “You’re worse every day. I can barely stand it—am I meant to watch you waste away and be alright with that? Gods take you—”

The fight goes out of Fray as though they’ve been punctured: first they sag in Sid’s hold, then they go limp, and then as one they melt together, heedless of the disparity in height, to press foreheads together, eyes closed, firm and gentle all at once as they breath each other’s air. It is more intimate than anything Aymeric has ever seen before.

“... don’t know what to do,” he hears Fray mutter, though he looks at his hands to inspect his fingernails rather than intentionally intrude on them. 

“Talk to him. You never shut up, I don’t see how you’d struggle with it.”

Fray scoffs quietly. “Ass,” they say, but without heat, and there is silence before they lean away and clear their throat, Aymeric’s cue to finish pretending as though his dirty nails are more interesting than aught else. Sid’s eyes are trained on them and he rewraps the blanket around himself as he sinks to the floor, Fray waiting til he’s settled before joining him, resting easily in his lap, still strangely more intimate than brothers-in-arms tend to look, more akin to lovers than brothers, though Aymeric shoves that thought bodily from mind. “Alright. Alright—you came here for a reason? Let’s hear it, then.”

Why had he come here? Not for any reason than to satisfy his discomfited self waking in the early hours and missing his childhood, but to say that feels selfish and wrong, so he settles for, “... people are dying. Knights are dying, and—”

He’s interrupted by a little laugh. “And nothing of any value was lost to the world.”

“I know how highly you think of the Knights,” Aymeric snaps, “but not every one of them is complicit in whatever long list of crimes you’ve indicted them with. Good men and women serve the ranks too, you know.”

“Helping hide the thieves and the rapists, you mean? Yeah, real good people.”

The hand Aymeric had previously been inspecting now curls into a tight fist and he forces himself to breathe deeply before saying, “I’m doing what I can. Father understood why I left—why can’t you?”

Fray’s smirk is screaming to be hit off their face. “Well, ser,” they say, crossing their arms, “I’d be more inclined to hear you out had there been any change at all since you’d left, but us poor folk are in the same position we always were. Not that I’d expect someone of your standing to understand,” they add, with a pointed look down Aymeric’s body, “tell me you didn’t pretty up just to come show off for us.”

It is not as though Aymeric can help what accolades have fallen in his lap: every one of them has been well-deserved, or so he has been told, and still he does not think himself particularly wealthy or well-off, having not been born to any High House and having no experience but his dealings with the Abyss, naturally kept secret, to his name. Is it so wrong to have walked through the doors he has? Ought he have stayed languishing in the dark, bitter and sad and thinking he should no more strive for, if not greatness, then something more than poverty and the justice such situations feel is appropriate?

To have what he offers thrown back in his face stings, of course, but is tempered by a little voice that tells him well, what did you expect?

“My Knights are dying,” he repeats gently, knowing the battle to be lost, “and I wanted to know it was neither of you doing the killing.”

He expects to be laughed out of the house, or to be told yes, and what of it? but all his brothers do is share a look he cannot name. Aymeric frowns deeply, immediately suspicious.

“... Tell me.”

“No,” says Fray, as Sid says, “Do it.” The furrows Aymeric wears deepen as they both open their mouths to start bickering again and he decides that he cannot bear to listen to them like this and stands, though his height is nothing to boast about.

“I don’t want to arrest either of you,” he says before they get started, and two sets of eyes as alike as summer and winter train upon him, “but I will, if I must. Tell me what you know, or—”

“Or what?” Fray asks. Their mouth curves up as though they mean to let loose their manic laughter once more, but their words are cold and clipped. “Or you’ll get the Knights down on us? You’ll run us through like you did the old man?”

“I’ll—”

Whatever Aymeric intends to threaten dies in his mouth as Sid, rolling his eyes, says in a voice that cuts between the two of them, “Fray’s crystal broke.”

Silence rings sharply as the full horror of those words set in. Aymeric can no more stop his hand from going to the stone beneath his shirts than he could halt the rising of the sun, and as Fray launches up from Sid’s lap like they’ve been burned, cursing him all the while, dread grows in his belly, a great, yawning feeling like the Abyss itself feels what he does.

“You said—you said—”

“I did not,” Sid says, and stands too, dwarfing Fray in a heartbeat. It would be funny, were it not for the look on both their faces. “What I said was if you didn’t, I would. And now I have.” To Aymeric: “It was the day you killed our Master,” and he takes a moment to swat away Fray’s hands slapping at him, looking severe, “We were there. Watching. I got the one that—before he was taken, I mean, he—”

His voice falters and he looks down, away from Aymeric, away from the memory his face must conjure. Aymeric can forgive him this: the darkness of his dream swells about him and grabs at his throat as he remembers how his father had looked in the cells. He’d gone to visit him for true before the day of his execution had rolled around, just the once, as was his duty as the soon-to-be Lord Commander. Other than his sword (conspicuously not the one Aymeric was used to him wielding) and his clothes (likewise rags instead of armour) he had had no contraband to confiscate: not coin, not crystal. He does not know now whether he had felt his father’s soul that day or whether he had simply imagined it: but here is the proof.

Fray has stopped their assault and turned their face away; Sid clears his throat. “We watched, and we came home in silence, and then it—it broke.”

“It’s fine,” Fray says, yet facing away, voice surprisingly steady. Sid scoffs. “It is.”

“So fine it split in three. Go on. Get it out.”

There is no arguing with Sid, whose gaze is heavy and piercing, though Fray does not shrink from it when they look—face dry, Aymeric notes with some relief. He does not know how he would take his brother’s tears when he is unable to comfort him as once he’d done in childhood. One long moment passes, and then another, and then with great care, Fray reaches into a pocket and draws it out.

Looking at the broken pieces seems akin to plucking one’s own heart and watching it beat in the palm: deeply, completely wrong. It is just a crystal, just a stone, but these are not meant to break, the way that eyes are not meant to fall upon broken bone or writhing guts. ‘Twould be a lie to say he has not dropped his, over the years, but there has never been so much as a crack along its surface for all the wear it’s been through, and Ompagne’s had been much the same, as he recalls. It would be more comforting to see the Abyss coiled within the pieces, he thinks, to know that even broken it was not inert.

His horror must show on his face, for Fray tucks the pieces back safely away after glancing at him, and it is no hardship to admit they all feel the better for it, and then folds their arms. The ringing silence is back.

“... Right,” Aymeric manages weakly when it becomes clear they are waiting for his disapproval, “I—what does this have to do with…?”

“We thought you’d come to us sooner,” Sid murmurs, expression complicated, hair falling over one eye, “I felt it break, through the one I hold. I thought you might, too.” Aymeric can only shake his head, horrified and mute, wondering what else he has missed—and not only recently. Has he been so ignorant since he first left? “Ah… when it broke, it… did something. I’ve never seen, nor heard our Master speak of anything similar: it was as though the Abyss had been waiting for the moment to be free and poured itself out in front of us, and grew into the shape of a man.

“We’ve been calling it a Myste,” he adds when no one says anything. “It fled from us, and we found the first body just past dusk.”

“Wait,” Aymeric frowns, and holds a hand up as he counts the days back, “That day? The day father died?”

“The day you killed him,” Fray mutters, but Aymeric takes a breath and presses on.

“No body was reported to us then,” and this is he certain of. He might have been behind learning about the situation, but he has since studied the reports that have come in and knows them as well as aught else he is required to know. “Mayhap one or two men here and there missing or—or taken by a unit not their own for duty…”

He cannot finish that thought, knowing now that the answers he has been giving himself are not the right ones. Fray lets a single laugh loose. “Sure, because we were going to waltz into your Congregation with a dead body and be well received. Use your head.”

“It was out of the way the normal patrol walks,” Sid clarifies, “No struggle or indication that anything was wrong but for the body and the footsteps, but they were covered that night by the snow. We knew, though. There’s no one else down here brave enough to kill a Knight, let alone to make it that clean.”

Not even us goes unsaid, but it does not sound suspicious to even Aymeric’s ears as Lord Commander, for he cannot forget shadowing Ompagne as he set out around the Brume to right wrongs and yes, sometimes run Temple Knights through. Rarely had death been quick or clean.

“... What happened to the body?” he asks, and does not miss the glance Sid and Fray share, this time guiltier than the last. He knows. Of course he knows. “You threw it to the abyss below, didn’t you?”

What better place for a dead man to go than to the sea of clouds, that wretched place that stirs the fog thick enough to share its name with the Brume? If, by some miracle, a man finds himself yet breathing as the Abyss looks upon him and finds him wanting, there is no easier way to absolve him than through prayer… and no prayer more honest than that of a man as he plunges to his death.

And if, by some lucky chance, that man does something so unthinkable as save himself by means of dragons’ blood, then Ishgard itself could not very well condemn its knights of any discipline for their actions. Ompagne had taught them all well.

Fray takes a breath to ready something else barbed, but does not get the chance to let it loose: the world outside erupts with the sound of battle and desperate cry. They all three look at one another, startled, for while fights are not uncommon it is yet ungodly early for such things, and—

“Aymeric,” cries a man, rough with the effort. “Get out here!”

Chapter 9

Notes:

chapter warning for violence, threatened eye trauma and very brief mention of sexual assault toward the end. please be aware these warnings cover male-on-female violence.

Aymeric’s brothers let him go first to see the spill in the street, though by the sounds of it they get stuck in the door behind him leaving at the same time. At first he cannot tell how many there are, so furious is the struggle, but then Fray says with some awe, “That’s a lot of noise for only two,” and he realises that yes, there are only two of them—and the one trapped beneath the other shoves at his face, hard, and—

“Estinien?”

Estinien has changed out of the dragoon’s armour he was wearing at the Knight, and for the Brume he is both under- and over-dressed all at once, white and unstained shirt loose and wrenched aside with a gauntleted hand almost to the point of tearing, the seams straining beneath the pull. The skin on display is mottled with old scars. His hair is all askew, teeth bared with the effort of holding the other man down, in full armour as he is.

“Help me, you whoreson,” he growls, and the knight bucks beneath him to throw him off. It almost works, but he holds on, pertinacious bastard that he is, and then he looks up, sees Sid without so much as a cloak to hide his horns or scales or tail, and all his grip leaves him.

The knight is out from under him in a heartbeat and scrambling to get away. Estinien growls and goes to grab for him again, but his boot catches on an errant cobble not quite set and he goes down with a sharp cry, palm first. There’s nothing for it: Aymeric sees the bright shock of blood and charges before his mind catches up with his instincts.

The knight goes down with a clatter, helpless under steel and Aymeric’s own weight, and a high little cry escapes him. “Me—me solvō—!” he gasps as he tries desperately to wriggle away, and then cries out again and jolts. Behind him, Estinien grinds his heel into the knight’s hip with as much force as he can muster and, breathless from sudden effort, Aymeric pins one arm beneath his knee and wrenches the helm off so sharply he feels the rip of hair as it goes.

He stares, aghast, at the hair not quite cut uniformly, at the dirt smeared across the lip, at the pretty green eyes and lashes that might as well not exist.

“Lucilla?”

“She’s a spy, you moron,” says Estinien behind him, sounding winded, and there is the sound of something cutting through the air. Something sharp. On the ground, Lucilla looks for but a moment like she’s scared, though it gives way to defiance in moments. Every Ishgardian has worn that look at some point or another as though it is the national dress, from the High Houses to the lowest-born. Scorn is just as much the city’s lifesblood as the actual blood it spills daily. “She followed from the Congregation and you never once noticed.”

Her glare is trained on Estinien with a ferocity that goes beyond hatred. “You followed too,” she hisses. “Do not play the innocent—”

“If I wanted to play at innocence I’d have a different lance in hand to treat with,” Estinien snaps, and Aymeric sees the point of Gae Bolg inch into his peripheral, so close he fears for a moment that he might have an eye out, but Estinien’s grip holds steady. Even with such an ally at his back, Aymeric doesn’t get up yet, keeping her trapped. “Deepblack—”

“Don’t think to win my favour so easily,” he warns, “I’ll be wanting a report from you, too.”

Estinien snorts, and the lancepoint trembles. “I did not drink half as much as you and had the early watch. When I saw you leave I thought it prudent to follow… and I was right to.” Gae Bolg swings sharply out of view, and Estinien’s tone grows, somehow, sharper than his weapon. “You stay where you are.”

Aymeric looks up, confused, and Lucilla takes the chance to try to struggle free, wheezing all the while. He sees Sid with his hands up and Fray looking incensed for all of a heartbeat before he must shift his weight again. The rush of air that leaves her hits him full in the face. “Get off—”

“Not ‘til you tell me why you were following me!” 

Fray’s laugh is derisive. “Fury’s sagging tits, is it not obvious?”

“Shut up,” Aymeric says over his shoulder, “Why did you follow me? What reason could you have?”

“I was ordered to keep watch on the Lord Commander,” she manages, and tries to squirm away again: Estinien’s foot presses down hard against her hip, and Aymeric feels the pop of something shifting out of place painfully, though to her credit, Lucilla takes only a sharp breath and does not cry out.

It could have been anyone, Aymeric realises, and somehow the knowledge takes a weight from his shoulders, leaving only an ache behind that cannot be relieved. It could have been anyone… but anyone is him. But for Estinien’s surprise appearance, his heritage is not in question—not that he thinks Estinien, of all people, would judge him for it—at least, not for now.

“Ordered by who?”

Until Estinien presses his weight on her once more, Lucilla stubbornly says nothing. “To who?” he demands again, and the sharp blade of Gae Bolg whistles as he directs it to her cheek. She must be in incredible pain, pinned beneath the weight of two grown men, and yet she does not struggle when the bite of cold metal sinks its teeth against her skin, nor when it slides slow and sinister up past her ear to rest at the bandage wrapped around her forehead. “This has never been bloodied, and the chirurgeons don’t waste cloth on scars or pimples. What’s underneath, spy?”

She can’t move for risk of cutting her face open, but the fear is writ plain in Lucilla’s eyes and in the way her lips are barely parted as if to protest. All she can do is whimper when he hooks the blade carefully beneath the bandage and pulls up, sharply, so the weave frays and it parts like butter for a hot knife, and when the wrap falls away...

“What is it?” asks Fray, closer than Aymeric realised they were, and Sid says, “move, let me—” and then falls suddenly, sharply silent.

When Aymeric spares a glance he sees Sid’s face contorted in what can only be raw fury. Gone is the gentle giant: this is the darkest hour, the roar of the fire, the dam that breaks before forgiveness soothes the hurts. 

“Garlean,” he hisses, and when he spits the sound is harsh. “You have bigger problems than just your Knights if scum like this is in the city. Who sent you here?”

Lucilla makes a noise somewhere between a whimper and a breathless, terrified laugh, and she presses her lips so firmly together the ash smears to her chin and the skin goes white.

“Who?” Sid demands, and Aymeric hears Estinien’s curse as he’s wrenched away, and then a hand at Aymeric’s shoulder is tight with fury as he too is pulled up and thrown aside with alarming strength. Sprawled on the floor, Aymeric glances first to Fray, who looks just as shocked as he feels, and then to Estinien, torn between rage and what might be fear, his eyes wide and wild.

The weight that Sid presses into Lucilla’s gut must be a heavy one for the sound she makes, low with pain, but he doesn’t let up and she bends with the force as though being folded in two. Then, not content with that, he drops to pin her, one knee firm at her ribs and a hand at her throat to hold her still. “Non tangere me irrumate—”

“Shut the fuck up.”

One-handed, Sid reaches into his boot and pulls free a knife with a soft sound that everyone hears. When Aymeric makes to get to his feet, Fray comes crunching over to stand above him and shake their head.

“If you’ve done your job,” Sid says casually like he isn’t putting the point of the blade at the base of her Garlean eye ready to pop it out like a blackhead, “you’ll know what I am. Where I’m from. You ever been to Othard, spy?” Frozen solid, Lucilla cannot shake or nod her head in answer, but the silence doesn’t bother Sid. “Even if you haven’t, I’m sure you know what I am. And if you know that, you know someone like me doesn’t much care for your kind.”

Something about the way he talks is eerie to the extreme: Sid seems less a Dark Knight and more the darkness of the night in true, full of the terrible things that parents tell their children of to keep them from running wild. Who has time to fear the Inquisitors when all they do is protect the city from true evil like this? When Aymeric tries to get up he is dissuaded of the idea immediately not just by Fray, who takes a full three steps forward to get between them, but by Estinien too, whose knuckles are white around his lance even as his mind knows not what to push him to do.

As though the world behind him might not exist, Sid continues in the same easy tone, “I have no problem carving this filth out of your head and making you look a little more respectable. Do Garleans have other things like it?” he asks, and Lucilla’s head is kept firmly in place by one big, strong hand as he turns to cast an unimpressed glance up her body. “What do you call it, again?”

He waits patiently, the only indication that something terrible lurks behind his tone the rhythmic swishing of his tail, until Lucilla manages a tiny “Est ocellus,” and Sid nods as though he speaks the same tongue.

“That’s right—the eye that doesn’t see. Well, I don’t see much point in one of those,” and under his weight Lucilla draws her legs up as though meaning to start kicking… but with the knife so close still, she doesn’t dare. “So we’ll have that out, and then see what else you don’t need, and when I’m all done you can go back crying to whoever sent you and tell them they still can’t break the Xaela.”

What would be silence is broken by the awful sound of Lucilla starting to cry, a wretched sound that doesn’t go beyond the wet sound of snot and sharp little gasps for fear of what a full-bodied sob might push her into. Her legs yet squirm futilely, slowly, as though she is an insect on its back slowly giving up, and still Sid does not move an ilm.

“What—what do you want?” she asks wetly.

“To know who sent you, for starters.”

This time, she does not hesitate. “Gaius van Baelsar, Legatus of the XIVth legion.”

“That’s the Emperor’s man,” says Sid flatly, loud enough for all to hear. “You come from high places, spy. What’s your name?” When she doesn’t answer right away, Sid presses the knife against her once more and she sounds as though she chokes from fear and phlegm both.

“No—no, wait, please! I—my name is Lucia goe Junius,” and the sound of her name is as subtle as the difference between Janne and Jean that Aymeric cannot help but laugh once, mirthless. Little wonder he had not realised. “Frumentarium. That’s—”

“A spy,” Sid says, “that’s all we need to know. Alright: you’ve been following our darling Lord Commander. What’ve you learned? And,” he adds, “what have you told the Black Wolf?”

Aymeric might be a stranger to the intricacies of the Garlean Empire, but that at least is a title he recognises. No doubt even the Dravanians have heard of the man, for it was he that had led the push into Eorzea proper so many years previous, his actions that had forced the great wyrm Midgardsormr to reveal itself. Ishgard might have been absent from that battle, but they had watched on with great fear, not knowing if such things would provoke Nidhogg into waking—and to their horror, it had. Not long after the Father of Dragons had risen had Ferndale fallen, and just as sure as one tragedy begets another Estinien stands amongst them today. Aymeric is afraid to look at him.

Oblivious to what rages within the onlookers (or perhaps simply uncaring), Lucia says in the same desperate tone, “Only what concerned him—the Commander’s name and actions. That I had not a chance of getting close to any of the Knights Dragoon, wrapped up as they are with their own revenges. I would tell him what little I heard here tonight, too—that the Commander had met with two poor men and talked about crystals and that that would be the best chance to coerce him into acting on our behalf if he so chose— no!”

The last she near screams as the blade Sid holds angles as though to do as he’d threatened, but Sid instead takes the knife away, slipping it back into his boot, and then with such force the crack echoes awfully, hits Lucia across the face. She’s shocked to silence immediately, face turned into the dirty snow. Aymeric can see how white her face is, and the tracks of tears down her cheeks, and how red and swollen her eyes have gone from the crying.

“That,” says Sid firmly, “is for calling Fray a man, and you’d best not scream again or I’ll belt you harder. Up you get,” he says, and at long last stands, taking the front of her jacque in hand and lifting her as easily as if she was a doll to hoist over his shoulders. “Inside, everyone, before those woken by this harpy come a-looking.”

So it is that they shuffle into the run-down house with its cracks stuffed with rags and one window wedged firmly shut in its pane, Fray closing the door behind them and keeping narrowed, wary eyes on Estinien’s back as he too follows the group. The house is fuller now than Aymeric remembers it ever being from childhood, and bizarre for it. Sid kicks the nest of blankets aside and deposits Lucia roughly on the floor, standing above her with his arms folded looking severe; Estinien’s eyes dart this way and that looking for an escape, always going back to Sid’s horns and tail as though he can’t quite believe what he’s seeing; Fray stands in the doorway almost as though they’re lounging, so unconcerned by the scene before them; and Aymeric… 

“What did you hear?”

“Little and less,” is Lucia’s answer. She raises a hand to wipe the snot from her cheeks and gingerly touches where Sid had hit her, the skin starting to swell. It will be an ugly bruise come tomorrow. “I saw only the—the stones you held, looking through that window—” and she points at it, “—before the dragoon saw me.”

“I saw you the whole time,” Estinien mutters, “you just didn’t get away quick enough.”

Lucia doesn’t look ashamed, and looks much less fearful with the colour flooding back into her cheeks and the knife no longer close enough to threaten her. “Are you going to rape me?” she asks. Silence drops heavy as a shield into the room and shatters as Sid hisses.

“We aren’t you,” he says, angry, and Fray, razor-sharp, adds, “nor are we Temple Knights. No, we aren’t going to rape you. I’d say,” and they look to Aymeric, who thinks that he might still be dreaming, “that it’s up to our darling Lord Commander here to decide what to do with you.”

The weight of every eye falls upon him and Aymeric thinks for a heartbeat why me? as if Ompagne will leave his bedroom and come to clear the air for him—but Ompagne is dead and what remained of Aymeric's innocence died with him, and never has it been more clear than now, standing in the old house with his brothers and his friend, that he can never go home.

Chapter 10

Fray waits until Estinien and Lucia round the corner out of sight before they say with as much tired aggression as they can muster with the adrenaline wearing off, “You’re an idiot.”

Harsh, but true. Aymeric doesn’t so much as bother to sag beneath the weight of them. What is another onze of regret under the tonzes he bears upon his shoulders every day?

Distantly he hears Sid murmur his brother’s name, and Fray snaps back, and then they are squabbling again, a petty and almost-familiar tune they must sing often enough if this is the natural way of things. Of course, Aymeric is not invited to join the harmony, and remains silent, watching nothing in particular as dawn ekes ever closer, as sinister as the night in its own way.

Of all the things that had cut deep, it had been the look of disgust Estinien had shot his way as the orders had been issued, as though he could very well believe the words he was hearing but wished to the high heavens he was not. Lucia was not to be hurt, but neither was she to be kept in her position as a Knight now, and, knowing too much of Aymeric’s associations made her too much a threat to simply put in gaol lest word get back to the Ward, somehow.

(“You could simply cover anything she says up,” Fray had said, and then scoffed when Aymeric protested such things. Forgery and omission ought not belong to Ishgard no matter who is in charge; it is the Seventh Astral Era. They are better than this. They ought to be better than this.)

So she had sworn an oath instead: renounced Garlemald there on the ragged carpet of Ompagne’s old home and said in an unaccented a tongue as she has always wielded, “,” and even offered her hand up to seal the words with blood, if any of them were so inclined. 

Aymeric had helped her to her feet instead, and softer, she had told him, “I pledge myself to the people, ser, as do you—I pledge my blade to you, and no other. Direct me as you see fit,” with a look in her eye so earnest that he could not help but nod, even as the others had scoffed and shook their heads.

(“And if this too is a lie?” Estinien had asked pointedly, eyes sliding from one unfamiliar face to the next, out of his element and fearful for it. “You’ll put her in the cells then?”

“Better to have her head,” Sid had said grimly, and in his heart of hearts, Aymeric had known this for the truth.)

She’d been injured enough that it was worth sending her to the chirurgeons for an examination, and better to send Estinien with her not just to make sure she didn’t bolt at the first chance, but to keep him from drawing his lance next toward his brothers. Damn them all for uncovering what he has worked so hard to keep hidden for so long in but a single night—but then, would not the truth have come out eventually? Ompagne had been executed for a reason, and his brothers had not left the city.

No: they’ve stayed, and so too has Aymeric, and as separate entities they have continued to struggle to keep Ishgard from lurching deep into darkness at the hands of the See. And despite their best efforts—or perhaps their worst—it is like to swallow them up regardless.

“Is there anything else you can tell me?” Aymeric asks absently, eyes on the door and the once-familiar runes etched around it. “About the Myste, or… or anything.”

Silence, indignant as only silence from Fray can be, broken by a scoff that might generously be called disbelieving. “You really don’t give a shit, do you? You came all this way down here and the only thing you want to talk about is this… this mess.” When Aymeric looks over with his mouth already open to retort, Fray shakes their head. “Don’t bother,” they say, soft and sad, and Aymeric’s heart settles somewhere around his ankles with how hard it sinks, “I get it. We’re not important in the grand scheme of things—and it is your schemes that are the most important, isn’t it? No,” they say, firmer, “We already told you everything we know. Go solve your case and go back to the life you made for yourself.”

They take a blanket from the floor and disappear with it down the hall to Ompagne’s old room, the door clicking shut with solemn finality, and Aymeric feels a stranger in this place suddenly, alone and lonely for it despite Sid standing close enough to touch if he wanted. He looks as weary as Aymeric feels, a certain bend to his spine the biggest concession to the early hour.

“... You and I both know this isn’t over,” he says just as soft as Fray before him. It’s hard to imagine this man, weary and worn, as the same beast that had so easily threatened Lucia in the street not a full bell ago. The heart in Aymeric’s breast—or perhaps the one that hangs around his neck—aches for the things he must have seen to change him so.

“Nor will it ever be,” Aymeric agrees. He feels a ruddy fool in his finery, in this place that does not want him. “But we all knew what was to come when we took up the blade. Cut the head off and three more grow in its place—such is the way of things. And we fools, giving up all else to keep the beasts at bay.”

“In sacrifice there is strength,” says Sid, looking for a moment older and wiser than he surely is, though he cannot be older than Aymeric. “If not us, then who else will walk the path?”

One of his hearts grows full and heavy with the burden of responsibility, and Aymeric smiles. “You sound like Father,” he says, and Sid splutters for the comparison before looking boyishly away, still young despite the world’s best efforts to change him. “Take care of Fray, won’t you?”

---

By the time Aymeric has dragged himself back to office, thinking longingly of his bed, his bath, and a good hearty meal the whole while, the city is partway through its initial attempt at livelihood, though the going is yet sluggish and unwilling. The faces that welcome him back to the Congregation are no doubt different than the ones that saw him off, the watchmen changing every four bells, one yawning through his bonne matin in a manner so decidedly normal that Aymeric cannot help but smile.

Tracking down Sancy is no great hardship and the man splutters for being personally accosted rather than called by letter or runner, but he agrees to bring breakfast with little fuss. “Oh, and,” he says as Aymeric turns to leave, “Ser Estinien awaits you. Shall I bring two cups?”

He had not been wrong: Estinien is pacing back and forth as he enters his own office, whirling as though he is like to spring across the room and attack him. “I want an explanation,” he demands, fists tight, and Aymeric cannot help the sigh that leaves him.

“And you’ll get one—but once Sancy has gone away.”

So it is that Estinien must return to wearing tracks in the wooden floor, occasionally offering even a little grunt or agitated scoff in lieu of actual conversation, while Aymeric removes his coat, tosses an extra log and a handful of dried rose petals into the fireplace, and settles into his chair, waiting for breakfast patiently. When it comes it is with a second cup after all, and a great plate of cold sausages in thick gravy, still-warm bread and sweet clotted cream, cheese still with the rind and a generous helping of pickled onion, and a pear on the side. It all feels very luxurious in a way that Aymeric cannot quite begrudge himself for enjoying, and he thanks Sancy sincerely before sending him away, pouring the tea one-handed as he helps himself with the other.

“Talk, damn you,” Estinien growls in such a manner that anyone afraid of being attacked might be set on edge, but wherefore should Aymeric care when he has breakfast? “You owe me that much.”

“I suppose I do. Which part?”

“Which part,” he echoes with a snarl, “Which part— every part, if it pleases your haughty, secret-keeping lordship! What was that, back there? You let her go —”

Around a mouthful of cheese, Aymeric says, “You walked with her. I presume she made no attempt to escape?”

“... No,” comes the grudging answer. “She’s with Whitecape now, so all those broken ribs will be put to rights before midday. Never mind that—if you’re fool enough to trust the word of a—”

“Estinien,” Aymeric says, and isn’t at all surprised when the response is a far too loud what? , “do keep your voice down, won’t you?”

A truly disgusted look is shot his way as Estinien throws himself roughly into a chair and just as quick is on his feet again, back to pacing as though staying still will stop his heart. “You’re lucky I’m listening at all,” he reminds him darkly, and ignores the tea poured for him. “What was that thing? That—with the…”

“My brother.” Aymeric blows on his tea before he sips at it, though it still burns his tongue. “For which I can only offer my apologies. If I’d known prior, I would have taken the time to explain—he isn’t a dragon.”

“Then how do you explain the—”

“Have you not heard of those born without the correct amount of fingers?” says Aymeric sharply, willing him not to say such damning things aloud, knowing the walls could well be listening, “An unfortunate affliction and nothing more. He is as much a man as you and I are.”

Estinien scoffs, but takes the hint and keeps his mouth closed. “You trust too easily.”

“Be that as it may, I trust you,” Aymeric snaps, and that shuts him up for a moment. “Why were you following me in the first place? Am I allowed not even a moment’s peace?”

“Aye, have your peace and the knife in your back besides.” Aymeric gets through a whole sausage before his silence pays off and Estinien adds, “you were out of sorts last night, and drunk, besides. You had a tremendous amount of wine—you probably ought not be here now.”

“Probably,” Aymeric agrees, knowing he will be fast asleep on his desk in but a few hours should he be left alone for long enough. The wine might have been sweated out as he’d dreamed, but who knows truly how long such things linger in the body. “Fine, then. Thank you,” he adds, “it was foolish of me, and—thank you. I’m sorry for everything you’ve seen, but I swear to you—other than Lucia—neither you nor anyone else is in any danger of him. Fray trusts him, and I,” and here his tongue stutters just the faintest amount, to be blamed on the wine and not his own grief, “trust Fray.”

Estinien rolls his eyes and steals the pear from the plate, and a good helping of cream to go with it, using only his fingers. “Piss on you and your judgement,” he grumbles, and licks the cream away as though he holds a personal vendetta against it.

“Charming. Anything else you want to complain about?”

He knows this will not be the end of it, not by a long shot, and he is proven right in mere seconds. Estinien takes a bite of fruit and speaks around it. “Plenty, though I’ll table the most of it for now—do not think I trust that thing on your word alone, for starters. No, no complaints, but a question. The spy said no more as we came up to the city again, but I heard enough to know something strange is going on. What’s all this about crystals?”

Ah. Of course it would come to this eventually. Estinien waits patiently as Aymeric leans back in his chair, the cup of tea nestled carefully between his hands, almost too hot to hold as he thinks the question over. Will he be at risk if he speaks? Most assuredly, but from what? Estinien’s prejudices? What if he says nothing, and his friend goes off in search of answers alone?

“... Are you sure you want to know?” he asks slowly, and Estinien considers the question with as much gravity as it demands. Still out of his armour he looks almost naked, smaller and greater both than when he is wrapped up within it, a different man entirely… as Aymeric must seem to him in the same moment, he is sure.

“If you tell me,” he says carefully, “everything will change forever, won’t it?”

When Aymeric smiles, it pulls strangely at the weary muscles unused to such movement. “The threshold we refuse to cross is a line we draw for ourselves,” he says, and thinks of Sid standing in the old house again, worn down and worn out but still going despite it all. If only he could embody such strength. “I will not begrudge you for preferring to turn your head away.”

The expression that works its way onto Estinien’s face is complicated and nameless. Oh, how much easier the world would be if every difficult thing told you what the choosing would lead to! Perhaps they would all never have come to Ishgard and lived happy lives elsewhere, away from one another but lacking in tragedy. Could that be such a terrible thing?

“Will the telling make it easier?” asks Estinien in a voice that does not suit him, gentle with thought. “Will it ease the burden? Undo what has been done?”

“... No,” says Aymeric wearily, “it will not. You’re right—I said nothing at all. I—”

Estinien is not looking at anything at all, his gaze far, far away, the half-eaten pear forgotten in his hands. “When,” he says slowly, “I first learned the truth of Ferndale I could not begin to imagine why anyone would keep a truth so great hidden—much less someone that had been there and seen such things. Surely, I thought, it would be best if the world knew the reason Ser Alberic lay down his lance, or who I was, or any number of things besides, but the more I thought on such matters I realised such things were kept secret for a reason. To spare the feelings of those close to the heart of the matter, or to keep the city’s spirits strong, or what have you—to a blind man these things mean nothing, for we are taught early on that the truth is the same as what is right, but I know now that isn’t the case. So speak, if you feel it necessary,” and he sounds surer now, “but I know well that if you hold your tongue it is for a reason, and I’ll not pry it out of you without reasons of my own. You act for Ishgard?”

“Er, yes?” so taken aback is he by the sudden question that Aymeric can only nod along.

“You believe that what you’re doing is correct?”

Fray’s manner had cut him deeper than he’d thought and the question stings, but once more Aymeric thinks of his other brother looking like his father, and thinks of his father’s understanding, and nods once more.

“Then may the Twelve take me for a bloody fool, same as you, but I’ll trust you ‘til you give me reason not to.”

And with that Estinien stands, pear still in hand, and he does not need the armour to be a force of nature all his own, impossibly wild in a way that the city cannot hope to ever tame. “I’ll see you at dinner,” he says, “if his lordship doesn’t think too highly of himself to dine with his men,” and he leaves Aymeric alone with two cups of tea, a plate half-emptied, and a curious feeling beginning to bloom in his chest.

Chapter 11

After almost a full week of silence, the summons come. Every night and every morning Lucia has considered making her escape, and occasionally in the moments between moments wheen she stands guard at some post or another thinking longingly of a life that is not this one.

Yet she does not run: it is as if her feet are frozen to the ground ‘til she is called for, and she goes like a hound might trot along to its master when called—obediently and without hesitation. It is not so absurd to her, not when she has gone thusly to Lord van Baelsar in the past like all his other eager children, and he himself scampers after the emperor with puppylike zealotry. They all serve a greater purpose—though Lucia has been lax in doing so, having not breathed even a word of the last week to him, though she has rolled the linkpeal between her fingers and thought a great many times well, what have I to lose? before tucking it away again. It is almost as though to be plucked from this place would be a great loss… and yet here she is, unmolested by those that would stand to gain from what knowledge she possesses.

Garlemald is a shadow that hangs over her every waking moment, though absurdly it feels a relief knowing that her secret is out. That city and this one are not so dissimilar, after all: both bleak and cold, lacking joy as if the weather has wicked it away for good, and les inquisiteurs are as insidious as Frumentarium. The starkest difference is in the way the people dress in Ishgard—it had taken Lucia weeks to grow accustomed to the style here, surprisingly simple even in the High Houses, where the well to-do of Garlemald favour tight fits and gaudy details. Oh, to be sure, this or that count plumps for rich furs and expensive buttons, and the young ladies outdo each other if not in cut then in embroidery and colour, but it is nothing like the high waists and low, lacy necks of the Garlean elite, or fur-trimmed coats and half-capes, with items so simple as gloves and shoes painstakingly embellished with this or that personal sigil. At least here Lucia stands out not at all in wanting to avoid such things: at home she had been forced into skirts and blouses befitting her sex rather than her station, but here in Ishgard there is no shortage of women bearing swords and shields just as easily as their brothers.

As she goes toward the Congregation she considers once more running, but where would she go? Across the Steps of Faith and into the Coerthan wilds? Even should she survive the snow and the beasts that roam the wilderness there are few enough places she could get to. Dravania is even more wild and governed by dragons that care not for which men they fight, so long as they do; the Shroud would see her wretched with Greenwrath before she reached any settlement and Mor Dhona is inhospitable in the wake of the Calamity, with the unfortunate addition of a manned castrum waiting like a spider in its web for her. No, there is nowhere to go but where she is called, and so the city falls away behind her with every step she takes until all that is left is the doors that swing open for her, and the guards that open the commander’s office for her, and the chance to run is lost for good as she stands before him.

“You wanted to see me, ser.”

If early mornings and a great deal of responsibility is taking its toll on Aymeric, he hides it well, his smile coming easily as though nothing weighs him down: not the burden of his brothers nor the hours he keeps nor the murderer that stalks the streets. “I did,” he says, and stands with a little groan. “Will you walk with me, ser? I’ve a mind to show you around the city.”

This is a trap! Lucia knows, but there is naught to do but follow meekly in his wake as though she is a bitch at heel. The thought rankles for all of a second before she thinks again of the heavy tread of the Black Wolf and all the little beasts that follow eagerly in his wake, blind to the leashes they wear. A collar that does not chafe or choke is still a collar, and for all Gaius van Baelsar’s kindnesses, there is a great wealth of unkindness that lives within him—but Aymeric is not the same breed of man, that much is clear.

Today the weather is as close to fair as can be in Ishgard, where the sun has been sighted only a handful of times since the Calamity. No fresh snow has fallen for once, though it is no less cold for it, ice and slush still lining the streets, and there are only a handful of light clouds in the sky, with patches of fierce blue cutting through here and there, aggressively cold. Lucia is led across Foundation quickly, neither of them wishing to be out for longer than is strictly necessary—Ishgard could well give Garlemald a run for its money with its bitter clime, and these people are not bred for such temperatures no matter how well they have adjusted—though he stops as they reach the top of the stair and bids her look out over the far Coerthan peaks and the fortresses that sit upon them.

“Do you know much about the Vigils?” he asks curiously. Not wanting to lie, Lucia shakes her head, and he continues: “There were four of them, once, originally built as watchtowers to warn the city of the Horde’s approach. Not even I know when they were built, but they are old enough—and about as much use to us now as a butter teapot. Not at all,” he adds quickly when he sees Lucia’s confused expression. Pointing from west to east, he names each of them in turn as Dusk, Stone, Steel and Dawn, though the latter two peaks are impossible to see even from here. “It was House Haillenarte that once held Steel Vigil, though it was abandoned in the face of overwhelming Dravanian numbers, and to date they are reviled for it, though I cannot fault them for their decision.

“As for the Dawn Vigil,” he continues grimly, a crease between his brows, “we never found out what happened to it. Once there were tunnels, you see, that ran from Camp Dragonhead to the Eastern Highlands, though they collapsed when the moon fell, and we could only watch from afar as the Vigil toppled. I do not think,” he adds somberly, “that anyone will have survived, cut off as they were. Imagine it: mountains all around you, and no way to return home, and then winter comes, and you’re unprepared for the snows, and then…”

The thought hangs in the air between them, and then Aymeric turns and finishes climbing the stairs as if such things concern him not at all.

Only a little hesitant, Lucia follows him yet higher with not a single backward glance at those lost Vigils, past the feet of the Architects as they look out over their city, and up to the great doors of the See proper—and then without waiting through them, into the cavernous hall within. She’s been here before, but only once, when she’d been knighted alongside a great many other trueborn sons and daughters of Ishgard, all of them dressed in the same shade of blue so that the hall had seemed a sea of sorts. Now it is lonely within, though not empty, robe-clad brothers and sisters gliding here and there to attend their duties gracefully, though what those duties might be Lucia does not know. There are no such places as halls of worship in Garlemald but the roads when the Emperor chances to visit some province or another, the man deified despite his best attempts to put an end to such things. Having only seen him a handful times, and always at distance, Lucia cannot say whether he knows or not, and if he does, if he enjoys such attention—but he is a man, and men are wont to bask in praise.

“This,” says Aymeric gently so that his voice does not carry, “is the Vault. You’ve been here before?” Lucia nods, and he continues, “Then you know it is the bosom of our city, as labyrinthine as any other street, built upon centuries’ worth of history and well-loved for it.” And it truly is impressive, the ceiling taller than a room has any right to be, and filled with such gaudy things as golden candelabras free of wax or fingerprints; enough candles lit that the hall is filled with smoke even before the censures add their heavy scent to the mix. “The Archbishop lives here, as does his Ward, and the clergy besides, and their servants, and likely a great many others besides. Good morning, sister,” he says to a passing acolyte who blushes prettily and does not meet his eye.

Up ahead are the great stained clerestories bearing scenes from the Enchiridion on either side of the fantastic, many-paned display of the Fury, Her light coming through white and yellow and blue. “There are a number of relics stored here, too,” Aymeric continues, “though their existence is known only to a few—not even I know the full extent of what is stored or where. I know of a dragons’ eye kept under heavy lock and key, and I’ve heard rumours of the sword once used by Thordan I too, though I’ve not seen it for myself. Lucia?”

She feels almost drunk in this place, with the heavy smoke crowding her thoughts and the lights doing their best to dazzle her. Little wonder the smallfolk clamour to see this place when they are invited at Starlight and the Fury’s Day, the only times they are allowed to enter such hallowed halls. Little wonder the See’s grip is so tight around them.

“I’m listening,” she says, not at all feeling herself. “Why are you telling me this? I am—”

“You are my woman,” Aymeric interrupts, gentle but firm, and bids her follow him with a single meaningful tilt to his head. He leads them down a hall, and continues, “did you not say such a thing yourself? To serve Ishgard as my blade? Or were such words spoken without consideration of the consequence?”

“What I mean is that you can’t know that I—”

Aymeric raises a finger to his lips and she falls silent right away; a door opens further down the hall and a boy in old but clean clothes comes out of a room with a basket of linens in his arms. He ignores them as they walk by, though Lucia knows better than to think he isn’t listening: she has been the girl that waits in the background until some juicy morsel is dropped for her to run back home with, tail wagging as she awaits the praise her master is sure to give her. In fact, Aymeric says nothing more until they are outside, having gone down a shortly spiralling staircase and through another hall, but the door he opens for her leads to a view that steals her breath clean away. Ishgard is not called the jewel of Coerthas for nothing, and though she has seen the landscape a good many times before, seeing it from this angle is something else entirely: the sun’s light falls in such a way that the mountains almost look as though they are dripping gold, but she does not need to squint to see them with the See’s shadow falling over her. Abalathia’s Spine has neither beginning nor end and boasts a mountain greater than all the rest towering above the rest of the landscape, with a peak that floats above the range proper ‘til it disappears into the sea of clouds above it.

Aymeric closes the door to the little balcony and comes to stand beside her. “Everyone thinks me a fool for sparing your life, let alone taking your word as truth. Even you, it seems,” he adds with a wry little smile that Lucia does not miss as she tears her gaze away from the mountains. Now in the strange half-light his burdens seem clearer upon his face: something about the way he looks distant as though he holds himself at arm’s length, and an easily-missed sorrow hiding just behind his eyes. “But I want to believe in the goodness of people, and I do not think my trust is misplaced. You have not fled, after all,” he continues, and turns from her to look out at the world, “when it would be so easy to do so—and I do not think you have called your liege-lord to tell him all you know, either. Ah—pray forgive me if that title is not correct.”

It isn’t, but that is beside the point: Lucia has never known anyone, man or woman or otherwise, to believe so honestly that people are better than they are, even when the proof is irrefutable. Here she stands, a spy, and there his brothers were, violent and draconic, and there too was the Azure Dragoon, the product of a milennia’s misery and rage—and those are just the people he knows. The rest of Ishgard will be no better, cruel and selfish and heartless in equal measure—not good. Never good. Is there any such thing in this world? Not here, where the See sees all and does what any great and terrible institution does and puts an end to such things that do not suit its agenda, and not at home, where the same thing happens under a different name, and not in any other city state where power prevails over justice everytime and downtrodden remain firmly underfoot. Is this not the way of the world? Is this not as things should be? Who are they to change the world?

“Why?” Lucia hears herself ask.

“Why not?” he asks her back, with the same wan smile he wears so often. “Is it such a crime to believe that at the heart of every person there is a little goodness? Something worth fighting for? Mayhap it is selfish of me to say so, but I do this as much for me as I do anyone else. If I think aught else—if I do aught else—then I am forced to admit the path I walk is as terrible as any other and my best efforts will have been for naught, and that—that, I cannot do.”

His gaze has grown distant; where he seemed not to see the mountains before he now looks as though he sees nothing at all but the past stretching out behind him. He lets loose a little breath that sounds fantastically weary, and says, “I want to believe you, Lucilla,” and the extra sound in her name sounds so strange to her ears that for a moment she forgets he is speaking to her, “but more than that, I want you to believe it, too. You’ve already sworn yourself to me, and I intend to make sure you keep to that—but I have given you what I know, that you may keep close to your heart or share with your liege-lord as you please, and alongside it my faith, too. I ask only for your hand in return, despite the hardships I know you will face if you take it, to help me help these people. Pour les gens, ne pas la ville,” he reminds her as she lifts her hand to—to what? to take his?—and a worried crease appears between his brow. “They will say you spread your legs for this position, or any number of awful things.”

They’d said the same thing in Garlemald too, despite Baelsar’s name attached to hers. “And you still believe they are good at heart?”

“I have to,” he says, looking troubled. “The night is not evil just because it blinds us. The day cannot hurt us even when the sun burns bright.”

His sorrow is so bottomless and his mind so set in its way that Lucia thinks for the first time in a long time of her father, who had been much the same way and died stubbornly far from home. He speaks through her now: “I know, ser. Non tenebras neque aurora metuō: I fear not the darkness nor the dawn. My family’s motto.” If Claudius Junius was alive to see his daughter now no doubt he would have a few choice words to say, and some thrashes besides—it is that thought, and the thought too of Gaius van Baelsar’s brand of quiet fury usually reserved for his other charges’ misdemeanours that makes Lucia reach into her pocket for the linkpearl that is her last line home and throws it with as much force as she can muster over the edge. It catches the sun, winks prettily, and then disappears without fanfare into the churning sea below. “I do not fear such things as day and night, ser. I have no cause to, not while men have swords. I am yours,” she says again, the words feeling truer to say now there is no blade pointed her way, and she looks to Aymeric who looks no less tired, but smiles all the same, “yours, and Ishgard’s.”

Chapter 12

Eleventh bell, the Knight.

The runner that had shoved the note into Estinien’s unwilling hands hadn’t stuck around long enough to say where it had come from, and the handwriting is as foreign to him as the stars’ movements in the sky. Nor can he, in truth, discern Alberic’s hand from Alaimbert’s before he reaches the signature at the end of the pages they send him, having better things to learn than the way a man joins one letter to another.

All day does the note weigh on his mind, at first lightly, easily ignored, but then grows heavy with the passing of every bell that rings across the city. Lunch comes and goes with the damn thing burning a hole through his other thoughts until it is all he can think about, and then the hours become intolerable to sit through, stretching longer and longer between peals until he can no more sit still than resign his post. Meet who? And for what reason? Anyone with any whit of sense—hard to come by in the city, admittedly—would come to his office directly if what they needed to tell him was so important. It would save everyone a great deal of time. For that matter, mayhap the runner got the wrong person: there are no shortage of men like Estinien, tall and lean and hard to deal with.

Just as soon as such thoughts flare to life they die and wither away. Of course it was meant for him, he thinks churlishly, and no mistake has been made, for there is only one Azure Dragoon, and such things find their way to his hands more often than he cares for. If he had only known the work that came with dragonslaying, perhaps he might have considered a different means of taking Nidhogg’s head (or so he thinks with a mirthless curl of his lip).

When the half-bell between the tenth and eleventh bell chimes he still has not made up his mind as to whether he will go. These are dangerous days, to be sure, though no dragoon has been found with their heart stopped in the street, and the manner of Aymeric—and those heretics he calls kin—would be enough on any other day to give him pause. Still he finds himself unfolding and refolding the scrap so much the paper tears, and with the time in one hand and the place in another, he makes up his mind.

After what fate nearly befell Aymeric after his night in the Knight, it seems prudent to go prepared. The dragoon’s uniform is discarded in favour of a simple shirt and trous with a thick woollen pullover on top, hiding a byrnie that does not feel heavy enough and, after some thought, schynbalds beneath the breeches. He does not bother with gloves or gauntlets, his hands rough and used to the sharp sting of frigid air, and his boots are lined with steel in the toe… but when it comes to the weapon, he pauses. Gae Bolg does not accompany him everywhere, nor does Gibrillont care for its presence in his inn, having scolded Estinien before for bringing it in. This is a place of respite and I’ll not run the risk of you lot drawing blades over every lost game of cards, says he, and in the Knight, his word is law.

So be it: Estinien turns his back on the lance and takes a knife from his desk instead, sliding it home into his boot where it feels right at home, and then takes another for his belt. No matter where he sticks it the sheath pokes uncomfortably into his hip or his thigh, but such minor discomforts are of little concern to a man who prepares for every eventuality.

The Knight is as busy as it ever is; Gibrillont’s eyes note him as he walks in and offers a nod but nothing more, and a handful of men and women cringe away from him as he descends the stairs as though afraid they’re to be scolded for drinking when they could be patrolling, but he pays them no mind and their faces are gone within seconds. A seat is free in the corner and he takes it, arms crossed and expression surly as he settles in to watch for whoever called him here.

Eleventh bell comes and goes. The timepiece behind the bar next to the old dingy blade tick-tocks on until five minutes have passed, and then ten. A waitress sets a pint in front of him that he ignores. Fifteen minutes, and a flurry of men burst in singing loudly and off-key, and Estinien feels the beginning of a headache burst into life at the back of his skull. He stands, nearly bumps into the same waitress that brought him his drink and, apologising quickly, darts away from the revelry down the stairs that open facing the Gates.

It’s bitter cold, the wind funneled up from the Brume and its winding streets to whip at his face that does not happen anywhere else in this blasted city, forcing his eyes nearly closed and his skin beneath the pullover to erupt into gooseflesh as he goes to the balcony and takes a deep a breath as he can manage of the night air. No one here but he, and he feels only a little foolish for being here. High above, Menphina watches over him coldly and he thinks for a moment to leap upward to follow her, to find a place to watch the stars in Her wake and think of future wrongs and past regrets.

He doesn’t get the chance. From behind him, movement, and he turns to see a great hooded figure seemingly melt out of the deep shadows the Knight casts, and sees beneath the hood bright green eyes as unnatural as the forever winter.

“You’re awful brave to call me here,” Estinien hisses, though it is an effort to get the words out at all. His heart is racing suddenly and his hands are moist, though the wind dries them quick enough.

Sid raises his hands in a peaceful gesture, but all it does is spike something cold and fearful into Estinien’s heart. Fingers ought not be tipped with claws, nor should skin be marred with scales, no matter what Aymeric says—this goes beyond any affliction. “Or stupid,” he agrees, “but you came.”

“Not to treat with a Dravanian.”

Hearing that, Sid jolts as though he’s been struck, looking to the Knight’s still-closed door as though afraid. “Lower your voice, you fool! I’m not,” and for a grown man (and a dragon besides) he sounds almost petulant. “Did Aymeric not explain? I’m not a—I’m an Au Ra.”

Estinien has never heard of such a thing before, and wonders for the briefest of moments if the See carries books on such creatures that he might learn if they are born this way, and if so, if it is from the union of man and dragon. “You’re afraid of people seeing you,” he says, following Sid’s nervous glance to the door, “is that not enough proof of your guilt? A sinless man would have nothing to hide.”

“A sinless man had nothing to hide once upon a time,” Sid snaps with his eyes narrow and bright with anger, “nothing to hide but a wife and a son and a daughter from men like you that came looking for glory and left behind a massacre, and then a man had no sin because he had no head. You Ishgardians,” and here he spits, the white snow at his feet going dark from the effort, “you’re all the same.”

Something about his tone strikes at Estinien’s heart: for all his foreign features, the man is young, and he can well imagine such things—does not need to imagine. Some things are not easily forgotten, and the world’s cruelty is one of those things. “... The Horde,” he offers, unsure in the face of Sid’s hard gaze, “wiped my—my village off the map. Only I was left, and it is my life’s work to do the same to them.”

“And yet you don’t seem to know what a dragon looks like.” When Sid laughs, it’s harsh and quiet, and a cheer from within the inn has him withdraw closer to the shadows. “More’s the pity—what are the dragoons keeping us safe from, then?” Estinien opens his mouth to retort, but Sid, chuckling, has already turned from him and takes the first step down the stair that leads down to one of the many entrances to the Brume and the main plaza of Foundation, torn down and built up many, many times over the years.

“It—it’s warmer in,” he says instead, making a futile gesture back to the Knight, and Sid turns enough that he can see those bright eyes. It feels strange that he would turn his back at all to Estinien, but here he is, open to attack if he so wished it, looking up at him as though he is something of a friend, or the very least, a comrade-in-arms.

“What’s the matter? Afraid of the cold?”

---

Against his better judgement, Estinien follows Sid away from civility, staying back a pace or two and keeping his eyes trained on his back. The cloak hides every indication that he is less of a man than any other in the city, the tail nowhere to be seen and the horns likewise disguised (though knowing what they are it becomes a little hard to believe that such things can be easily ignored). They pass one or two people who nod at Sid and ignore him, though he finds himself wishing all the same for something to hide his face away. Mayhap he should have worn the dragoon’s uniform after all.

Soon enough they come to a halt at a crossroads of sorts, the street wider than before and illuminated by the spill of torchlight from a nearby house with its front door wide open and a shadow hanging out in front of it, the tell-tale light of a cigarette in its mouth. Sid raises a hand and the shadow returns the gesture; looking closer, Estinien sees shadows flickering in almost every window. One set of shutters opens suddenly and a woman leans out of it to call something down to the shadow, her breasts hanging heavy and bare, and he turns his eyes away as quick as they can go.

“We can talk free enough here,” says Sid, who leans against a wall easy enough, “Your men’s routes always bring them by, but not at this hour, and the clergy are too pious to get close for fear of catching an orgasm. Not,” he adds thoughtfully, “that the priests are concerning themselves with the poor at this hour.”

A whorehouse. Of course. Not that such places are surprising, but the See has managed—successfully— to pretend for years that such things do not exist within the city, for they all are paragons of virtue, clearly. He can’t stop his gaze flicking back to the window with the naked woman hanging out of it, yawning now, and Sid chuckles. “Talk,” he spits before he can be teased for his prudishness, “about what? We’ve nothing in common.”

“If only,” Sid mutters, and then, louder, “not if you keep acting like that, we won’t. We’ve Aymeric in common,” and something about the delivery seems almost embarrassed, as though he has spent a long time trying to forget such a man exists. “My partner—the short one,” he clarifies, though Estinien remembers the little Fury-filled bugger about as well as what he’d eaten for breakfast, “is… well. We didn’t expect Aymeric to come marching right down to our front door.

“Truth be told, this whole situation is a little beyond us,” Sid continues with a little sigh, and when the woman in the window whistles down at them, waves his hand in a dismissive way. “Our Master’s death would have been one thing, but then the—the damn stone, and then the murders on top of it, and all that before Aymeric marched himself down to put his mind to rest or whatever it was he wanted. This whole thing’s a mess.”

“Aye,” says Estinien, who is a sensible sort that understands that murders throw something of a wrench into the grand scheme of things, and then as his mind catches up, he holds a hand up as he adds, “wait—what? You make it sound like everything’s connected.”

There’s an awful silence between them where Estinien heaves a weary sigh, knowing suddenly that everything is connected and that any sort of peace he’d been privately praying for has now given up on existing. “It is,” Sid tells him, and folds his arms. “What, did you not go to him and ask him to explain? You might be Ishgardian but after holding that vermin down the other night I’d imagined you’d have a least something of a brain—”

It’s too much, suddenly: not just the cold and the gloom but the company and the street they stand in, the insults and the way Estinien’s teeth have been on edge ever since he’d first seen those eyes tonight. “Shut up,” he growls, and his feet of their own accord bring him closer as if to threaten him. Sid, with several ilms on him, peers down unamused. “You nothing of me—don’t talk as if you do.”

“Oh, was I mistaken?” The memory of the other brat that had stood in that run-down house comes back with a vengeance as Estinien thinks Fury, they’re even alike. “I presumed you gave not one single shit about the city’s politics in favour of a good occasional bout of dragon-slaying. Or man-slaying, if you were stupid enough to stoop to threatening those that look different to you. Tsk,” and this close, the whiteness of his skin is almost as jarring as the prick against his gut. Where the blade touches feels molten-hot; faintly, Estinien is grateful for the mail he wears, though his hands are yet empty. “And here I thought we knew who the killer was already!”

The shadows in front of the whorehouse shift, and calls out, “You needin’ a hand there, Sid?” When Estinien looks, he sees that the shadows are in fact not shadows but a man with scars reminiscent of childhood pimples strewn across his cheeks; in the windows behind him not one naked woman but three or four are watching.

“Thanks, Guy,” says Sid, who has not taken his blade away, “I’m alright. Just having a friendly chat—isn’t that right?”

Estinien has no choice but to draw back and take a deep breath to steady himself: this is not his domain, after all, though it comes as something of a shock that these people know Sid’s name and likely his face—though, truly, is it so strange that they would not turn in one of their own? The shadows linger for a long moment before parting, though pockmarked Guy remains outside to watch as Sid puts his knife away and the tension bleeds dry.

“So,” he says calmly, as though nothing had happened at all, “You’ve no idea what’s going on, then?” Something about the way he smiles, revealing—oh, Fury—teeth as sharp as any beast’s sets the hair on Estinien’s arms prickling, his body unsure whether or not Sid is friend or foe. “Let me clue you in.”

Chapter 13

Notes:

warning for mention of sexual assault.

“You’re still here?”

If there was any doubt as to how good the chururgeons are at their jobs—or how easily healed so many maladies can be so long as one has access to such things like good quality potions and medical know-how—then it is quickly put aside with a single glance at Ser Lucia, who stands at attention before the Congregation as though naught has ever been wrong with her. No indication is there of the cracked ribs she must have borne after two grown men had wrestled her to the ground: she wears the Knight’s mail as easily as the other man that stands watch with her. The only concession, in fact, to her outsider-hood is the way the ears of her helm flop sadly with nothing to keep them up… and the bandage still around her forehead, easily seen with neither face nor grill to protect her anonymity. How has no one else found it suspicious?

“And you are?”

Well, she talks with all the airs a regular soldier puts on—surprisingly only in that she is lesser than the Brumelings, no matter how well hidden her true allegiances are. She doesn’t even believe in any of the Twelve, if Sid’s to be believed, and that’s worse than running naked across the Pillars and spreading the good word of draconic doctrine. How bizarre, the company Aymeric keeps.

“Let me go,” the man Fray holds tight around the wrist snaps. He’s not stopped struggling the whole way here, as though he’s done nothing wrong.

Fray ignores him as easily as they’ve done the entire slow walk from the market to the Congregation. “You know who I am,” they tell Lucia, though likely she doesn’t know with the helm in place. Shame—she ought to be better at recognising little details like the colour of one’s eyes, as a spy. “Tell that bastard Aymeric I’m here, and I have one of those misbegotten wretches he calls good men ready for gaol. Go. Get him.”

“I said let me go—” the knight in their hold cries, twisting this way and that, desperate for freedom—and cries louder when Fray stamps on his foot with all the strength they can muster.

“I don’t let go rapist pieces-of-shit until they’re dead or chained up,” Fray says calmly, as much to the man himself as to Lucia, “And you’ll have to believe me when I say you’re one of the lucky ones. Go and fetch Aymeric,” they add, and something in Lucia’s appraising glance over the two of them seems to register the scene before her as worth reporting, at least, for she nods and turns on her heel to disappear into the Congregation, leaving her guard-mate behind.

Once again the man tries to escape, and the other guard at least does move to intervene (however half-heartedly, with his hands up like he’s not committed to catching the man should he make a run for it). Fray’s beginning to wonder if a knife in the thigh isn’t the best way to put a stopper on this whole situation when the lord commander appears, Lucia two paces behind, cheeks pink and hair ruffled as though he’d been caught sleeping or getting sucked off.

“Ser Aymeric,” says Fray, casual as you please, though beneath the leathers and the old dinged armour their heart pounds away hard enough it hurts, “Brought you a present.”

Aymeric looks between Fray and the knight they hold, confused. The other guardsman shakes his head as if to say don’t ask me, and the knight—still sounding pained, to Fray’s satisfaction—gasps, “Believe not this man’s lies, lord commander, I’ve done nothing—”

“I caught him,” Fray says louder, “raping a girl,” and all heads but the guilty one turn sharply to look their way, “while she was trying to get home from market. ‘Twas her father who found them, and me who he fetched. I thought I’d bring him here to face your Ishgardian justice rather than the alternative.”

Oh, Aymeric had been half-joking, half-wishing when he’d mentioned bodies tossed to the abyss, though he knows full well as Fray that it does happen on occasion—easy to pretend there’d been a misstep here, a crumbling rock there, after all—but the truth is that the sort of justice the Brume delivers rarely is that straightforward. The worst of them go as far as to put on trials drawn out over weeks before getting to the punishment. This one is lucky. Not that he’ll ever know that.

Aymeric demands the man’s helm off and then his name and rank. Ser Flament, avance d’écuyer of House Gorgagne carries on his protests: “I swear upon the Fury’s own spears, ser, I never—” but he falls silent when he is handed to the spy and pulled away. Fray does not want to imagine what it must be like in the Knight’s cells, though they cannot stop their mind from following for a few paces—where had they kept Ompagne, before he’d died? In the cold, in the dark?—and stifles a shudder as best they can.

“Why don’t you come in?” Aymeric says, and before Fray can say no, turns and disappears into the Congregation, so they have no choice but to follow or be chased down by the now-thoroughly confused guardsman who’d been privy to the whole scene should they decide to flee.

It’s a nice enough building, they suppose: not quite as grand on the outside as the spires of the See proper, but the walls are kept washed and the braziers lit so it looks presentable if not inviting. Soldiers carry out their lives unaware of the heretic in their midst, so normal it makes Fray’s skin crawl: here a handful of them laugh at some bawdy joke as they go from one duty to another; there one sniffles and sneezes like any other man does when ill. None of this holds a candle to Aymeric’s office with its great doors clicking shut firmly behind the two of them. This is a homely place, in a way, the desk covered in much more than just paperwork—biscuit crumbs, rings left by many a mug of tea, a smattering of coinage—the fireplace spitting, the rug beneath Aymeric’s chair thick and colourful. What a waste of good thread.

“She won’t talk,” Fray says before Aymeric can open his mouth, “the Brume girl, I mean. She won’t talk to another Knight ever again and still count herself lucky she weren’t run through with his blade instead of his cock. Her father’ll turn you away if you go asking, too, and rightfully so.”

Aymeric stays standing, at least, as though not making a big show of having the office to his name. “Yes, I know. I grew up in the Brume too, Fray. I know how the people are. You don’t need to be so—”

“So what?” With the door shut in such a hostile place, Fray can feel nothing but caged. The urge to pace is difficult to resist, but resist they do. “I bring you, personally, proof your men are nothing more than scum and you think I don’t need to—to what? Be angry?”

“I was going to say loud.”

Something about Aymeric’s manner, gentle and patient, is starting to grate on Fray already. “Fine,” they say. “I see you’re keeping that Garlean around—that’s where you’re throwing your lot, then?”

“You’re still being loud,” Aymeric says with a sigh, and, incredibly, turns his back on Fray to approach the window and check its latch. “Really, Fray. You’re the one that came here, and yet you’re acting like you had no choice. I know you didn’t need to make a scene on behalf of that filth,” and the way he spits that words is honest if nothing else, “you could have cut him up and spread the bits around the city if you’d wanted to make a statement. Fury knows everyone’s on edge as it is.” He sighs again and turns once more to look at Fray. Does he always keep his face bare? They cannot imagine facing the city without something to hide behind. “What is it that you want?”

It takes a moment for Fray to gather the words, or perhaps simply the courage to talk at all. They give in to their desires and take one step, two, and then they’re pacing this way and that, hands stabbing at the air to punctuate every word they say. “Sid made me. Said I had to grow up. I think he wants us to kiss and make up—that’s not happening,” they add, quick as lightning. Aymeric doesn’t respond. “But he has a point. We can’t fix this mess by ourselves.”

“The Myste?”

“Of course the Myste.” Fray stops before the great desk and looks over it without any particular interest, the letters meaning little and less to them, though the moment they espy the letter opener Aymeric gives it up as lost forever. It’s a pretty tool, the simple blade fitted to a handle of a goobbue horn with a simple knotted pattern carved into it. Fray looks it over before slipping it into a pocket. “We can’t do it alone.”

The crystal around Aymeric’s neck hangs still and silent. Fray might as well be a star away for how alone he feels; he cannot begin to imagine how it must be to have his soul shatter. Even were he not commander, he thinks he’d be helping.

“That’s not like you to say,” he says, and Fray flashes him a look of pure irritation.

“Yes, well, forgive me, ser. The situation’s a little beyond my ken at this point. Who bloody well knew something like this would happen if it broke? I didn’t even know they could break. Yes, we need help,” they mutter as though to themselves, “but it goes beyond this, even. This city’s rotting,” and here they fix Aymeric with something of a pleading look, foreign on them, “from the inside-out. We’re all the same. Oh, the Brume’s the worst of it, sure, in no small part from the way your men help, but we’ve been up here before, too, and—”

“Up here?” Aymeric asks, confused, “What, to Foundation?”

Fray doesn’t hesitate. “Nowhere else serves stuff as good as the Knight does. That’s not the point—even up here we see the same things. People with nothing. Men tired, women afraid, children abandoned. Everywhere we look, it’s just as shitty as before. Unless,” they add thoughtfully, “you’re one of the High Houses or some higher-up in the See, but those bastards would rather die than have a Brumeborn set eyes upon them.”

“... What are you getting at?”

“You said you left to reform this place, right?” In Aymeric’s memories, Fray’s eyes are the colour of summer sunsets, warm and uncertain, but now they could not be further from such things. Now they’re the gold that adorns arms and armour both, cold and unforgiving. “So tell me what it is you’ve done that’s so good you had to turn your back on us.

“You’re the lord commander of Our Knights Most Slovenly, or whatever,” Fray continues when Aymeric doesn’t answer immediately. The fire coughs as though wishing it weren’t party to this conversation. “But I just dragged a rapist in your colours to your door. Seems to me like maybe things aren’t so bad when you’re at the top. Like it’s all worth ignoring for a room to yourself and food whenever you want it.”

“Is that what you think?”

Aymeric’s voice is low and soft. On anyone else it might sound dangerous but on him sounds only pained, as though the accusations weigh him down terribly. There’s hurt in his eyes, too, clear as day—but Fray has no more space for hurt. Such things have long since taken up residence in their bones and refused to leave, the ache of it familiar and unfair and unchanging.

“Fray, it isn’t that simple.”

“Sure it is,” says Fray with all the simple understanding only a criminal—or someone with nothing left to lose—can muster, “Either you can’t change things, or you don’t want to. Which is it?”

Aymeric’s brows are slowly drawing closer and closer. “It isn’t,” he repeats, “I can’t make something happen just by snapping my fingers and stamping my foot—change doesn’t happen overnight.”

“Really? ‘Cause I’ve always found men change pretty quick in a matter of minutes once they’ve been stabbed.”

“Gods take you, listen to me!” Aymeric snaps, and the room falls silent but for the awkward crackle of the fireplace. He has their attention, at least. “Stop pretending like this is all my fault—I can only do so much. I can preach as much as I want, write as many edicts as my hands will let me, aye, and they’ll be laughed out of the See as I’m thrown from this seat. I was like you, once,” they add, and Fray snorts, “thinking the world was not so difficult to change, but guess what, Fray? It isn’t. The path we walk is a path without end. How many years did Father walk it? How many years will we?

“Look,” he says, and runs a hand through his hair, agitated, “Say I tell the Knights—say they listen, and behave as they’re meant to after that. No more rapes, no more thefts, nothing. Would the Brume trust them? Overnight?”

Fray scoffs and this time takes a quill from the great desk, its feather big and bushy. “Of course not. That’s different. Unlearning fear isn’t the same as changing how someone acts.”

“So tell them not to be scared, then,” Aymeric snaps, patience fled. “If you say it, they should listen. Isn’t that what you just told me? We both know they’ll band together to protect you and Sid, you’re as good as any for a voice.”

“That—”

“No? Alright, how’s this, then: tell them to stop stealing.”

“They steal to survive and you know it,” says Fray, and Aymeric laughs shortly, mirthless.

“Is taking my pen going to fill your belly? Lead by example, you hypocrite. You said it yourself: there’s poor people up here, too, and not everyone in Foundation steals. I still know the faces to go to if I want meat I shouldn’t be able to get in the Brume, just as I know which houses have full gardens in them. Yes, Fray, it’s bad—but it isn’t as bad as you make it out to be.”

This time the silence between them is deafening. Aymeric sighs, the sound fleeing as quick as it dares; not even the fire thinks spitting is a good idea now. The feather in Fray’s hand quivers with the way they tremble with barely-concealed rage.

“These are two separate issues,” says Aymeric after a moment, “the way the Knights act, and the Myste. Even if I fix one, the other will remain. Not even I can be in two places at once. If you came here to tell me to work a miracle and make everything better, then I freely admit I cannot, Fray: can you?”

If looks could kill, no doubt Aymeric would be little more than a fine red mist going by the glare sent his way, but he stands firm. Most telling, Fray does no more than glower at him, knowing beneath the righteous anger they cloak themselves in that things are not so simple after all, that men are men and wont to do as they please rather than what is right. 

Rather than answer, Fray throws the quill down and all but stomps over to the doors. It seems as though they might disappear without even a single backward glance, but pause they do with their fingers on the handle, and say, “If you send anyone after me—after us—I’ll kill them, and I’ll kill you,” and then they slip free of the confines of this place to go haunt the city anew.

All Aymeric can do is stand watching the space where their brother had stood and feel his heart grow heavier as though it might fall and shatter—but alas, no such thing happens, and when Sancy comes in with vittles he yet stands there as though lost upon the path that goes only in one direction, on and on and on and on.

Chapter 14

Summary:

general warning for violence.

“You wanted me, ser?”

Estinien doesn’t look up as his second enters the room. Every dragoon under his command knows well what an unpersonable bastard he is. Once they’d all thought it rude, and now—well, they still think him rude, but in a fond sort of way. He’s the same with his father, has demonstrated that plenty of times when Ser Alberic makes the long trek up from the Observatorium where he’s been stationed, ignoring his every gentle suggestion to take breaks or feed himself in favour of another hour alone with his lance and a dummy.

He might be nose-deep in papers (something that happens rarely enough, and the buildup is always sizable for the way he eschews desk work for field work), but he holds his hand out all the same. “Your stone.”

If Heustienne is surprised by the request, she says nothing of it. A good soldier, she, never questioning her orders but for when they’re unclear, as married to duty as he is. They’d competed for the Eye once upon a time, and then Nidhogg had turned his dread gaze upon Estinien, and that had been that. If she is bitter, she hides it well.

She turns over her soulstone easily enough. It is much as his own does: small and blue and warm from where it lay against her skin before she’d taken it out… but so too does it feel nothing like his, impersonal and foreign where his is familiar. He thinks he could pick his out from a pile of the damned things without needing to second-guess himself.

He turns the stone over in his hand several times absently as he rereads the correspondence. Not wanting to be ignored, Heustienne asks, “Unlocking the mysteries of the arcane, ser?”

He snorts. “If I was looking for the arcane, I’d be wasting my time listening to those fops over in the Athenaeum. You’ve seen these?” he asks, gesturing at the pages spread out on his desk, and with a smile Heustienne nods. None of these papers are her business, but she looks them over in Estinien’s stead when—so often—he deems them unworthy of attention.

“The usual, from the fops,” she says, and that at least wins a twitch at Estinien’s mouth, a monumental win, “I assume you already heard from them directly?”

“A week or so past, aye. The usual shite—beware the Horde, listen to the Eye, know that soon we will be set upon on all sides by flame and claw. Nothing from the Eye itself,” he says, looking at her, and Heustienne visibly relaxes, “so whatever comes our way is to be small at best and led by a general at worst. There is, of course, no way to know until it happens.”

“Yes, ser.” A pause, and then, shifting her weight from foot to foot, “... and my stone, ser?”

He yet turns it over and over, finally raising his eyes to look at it. When he raises it it glints dully in the torchlight but does nothing more, secretive in an innocent sort of way. Thoughtfully he takes out his own to compare them: they are the same size, the same shade, the same amount of faces, one with a crude dragon’s head carved into it.

“Hm,” he says rather than give voice to his thoughts, uncertain as they are. “Close your eyes a moment,” he says suddenly, and without asking a single question, Heustienne does so. “Which one is yours?”

With her eyes shut there is no way she can see him swap the stones from hand to hand and then back again, but when she looks her gaze lands on hers without hesitation. “That one,” she points at his left hand, and he passes her stone back to her, grimly pleased. “Is something wrong, ser?”

“Not wrong,” he says, and leans back in his chair to look over his own stone once more like he hasn’t been taking it out to look every bell or so. “Just… wondering if there might be more to these stones than we’ve been told. Mayhap if we knew…”

He falls silent, but Heustienne, accustomed to his brooding silences, simply takes a seat. “The better to fight the Horde?” she suggests, and that is as good a reason as any. In truth, Estinien keeps thinking of all Sid had told him only two nights prior: that there are plenty of similar crystals in the city, and that a single broken one is the cause of every murdered Knight since the commander took office. It might be strange to consider, but in truth is no stranger than anything else Ishgard oversees: do not heretics drink blood to gain power? Who is to say that an apostate stone misbehaving is too strange to believe?

“Aye, the Horde,” he says, glad at least for the not-quite-a lie to fall back upon. For sure, he would jump at the chance to wield more power against the Dravnians. If it came to drinking blood to destroy Nidhogg, perhaps he might take that chance. Perhaps.  “Not that we’re ineffective against them, but there’s only so much a stone can do for us.”

“Really, ser?” Heustienne isn’t put off by the look he gives her. “I don’t think that’s quite true. Any dragoon is a lancer, but not every lancer is a dragoon by virtue of, well, not having one of these stones bonded to them. Take those pikemen in the field: no matter how swift on their feet, they will never match up to us, will never Jump as we do.”

“And if the stones we have are taken away?”

“I don’t much fancy breaking my ankles without it,” is the answer, and Estinien cannot fault her for that. No, he knows in his heart she speaks the truth, for he has never seen Alberic leap the way he’d once been so well known for doing since giving his soul back to the See. “Training was brutal enough with the stones; I’ll not do it all over again without.”

That too is something he understands keenly. Not a single one of their order had been exempt from the painful grasp of fractured bones and torn muscles as they’d learned their art alongside one another, every man and every woman a weapon broken down and forged anew with a shiny stone to show for their efforts. As for whether they would gladly go through the training again, well...

And they are alone in this: no other discipline of Ishgard pushes its children to such lengths, nor bestows upon them such tools that allows them to break the limit of personhood (though if the rumours are to be believed, the eldest Haillenarte boy is doing his damndest to create something similar in his workshop), nor reminds its students daily the reasons they are to remain committed and what might happen should they abandon the path. That’s not to say the Knights learn half-heartedly or ignorantly, but there are no Knights like the Knights Dragoon.

And then there is Aymeric, an enigma beyond knowing, connected to a broken soul that by rights ought not exist.

“I suppose not,” Estinien says, remembering the first time he’d broken a bone in training. It had been healed then and there and he’d been forced to pick his lance up once again and nevermind the pain. “Say, then, one day it breaks. What do you suppose it would take to be put back together?”

Heustienne has no answer to that. No surprises there: never has such a thing been recorded in all Ishgard’s history (and if it ever had been, no doubt the scribe that had written such things had been unceremoniously tossed to the abyss with the pages shortly following him), but that does not mean it cannot happen. Once again he thinks of Sid, shaped like a man everywhere but his horns and his tail and his scales, as real as any other person in the city—and failed by men like Estinien. No doubt that wasn’t recorded, either.

“I don’t know, ser,” Heustienne is saying, and he wrenches himself back to the present with some effort. “I’ve never given it mind before, but doesn’t it feel like something would come out of it if that happened? Memories of those that came before, or something that takes the shape of a dragon, mayhap? Not,” she adds, “that I think they can be broken. I’ve dropped mine on the flags plenty of times, and Alaimbert’s stepped on his—” of course he has, “—and they were just as good to use after as they were before.”

So too have they suffered worse fates than being trodden on, with stones recovered from the bodies of those turned black and crisp from dragonsflame in the field, or opened neck to groin by claw, or any other number of unfortunate deaths. The Knights Dragoon are good, but they are not immortal.

“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that,” he says in a rare moment of good humour, and Heustienne stands, salutes, and leaves him to the papers they both know he’ll shove aside for her to come back to and read at her convenience.

---

Curiously, Aymeric is nowhere to be found.

Long since given up on his duties for which he’ll no doubt catch a lecture for—if the commander wants the dragoons’ share of papers then he’s welcome to them—Estinien has taken to avoiding responsibility and people both, leaping from parapet to parapet with all the grace that has been long since drilled into him—or perhaps belongs more accurately to those that came before him. Had they, at some point, wondered whether their strengths were theirs alone or belonged to yet more shadowy, long-dead men and women? And the very first, besides, Haldrath the Dragonseye—had he always been able to leap thusly, or had it been Nidhogg’s Eye, prised from its socket, that had made it so?

The very idea that he might be more connected to Nidhogg than a terrible past makes him shudder, and he buries the thoughts as deep as he dares and once more leaps. The air claws at his cheeks and arms as he falls, cold enough to push all from his mind but the desire to be still and warm once again.

Wherever Aymeric has gone, he has taken that spy with him, and if anyone knows their whereabouts they are unwilling to give the answer up no matter how gruffly Estinien questions them. Fine, let him hide: it is not as though Estinien needs him for more than thoughts that won’t let him alone. Sid had said the stone that had cracked had birthed some creature into the world that was responsible for the deaths, and then failed to elaborate on what the stone was beyond one like yours. Aymeric had not wanted to tell him where he’d come from and he had let the issue well alone… but the time for turning the other cheek has long fled. It doesn’t take a genius to follow the myriad threads until they reach the same point, terrible as that point might be.

Twelve, how had he escaped the Ward’s notice for so long? Had killing his father been the price of their feigned ignorance?

Too many questions and not enough answers, and none of it his business but he cannot help but wonder if, maybe, it ought to be for once. Estinien leaps once again and descends further, leaving behind the city and plunging into its depths to the one place he knows will be safe.

***

“I’m here for Sid,” he says to the souteneur, cheeks burning. He prays the man doesn’t recognise him: he hadn’t bothered with armour today and left his lance behind too, looking for all the world like any other disgruntled man in need of a good tumble. The Azure Dragoon is not known to frequent whorehouses—especially not ones buried so deep in the city’s underbelly that to cast suspicion on them is first, second and third nature—and he would prefer to keep it that way.

The man raises a brow. “No girls here called Sid,” he tells Estinien, gaze crawling over him like insects, “no boys, either.”

A girl pokes her head out from a room and calls for a towel and a drink, and the souteneur abandons Estinien to bring it to her directly. The man that leaves her care keeps his eyes trained carefully upon the floor to avoid being recognised, smart lad, and when the master of the house comes back wiping his hands on his breeches Estinien wastes no time and hisses, “You know the Sid I mean. Tall and pale. Bright eyes.”

“You wouldn’t be the fellow he was fightin’ with th’other night?” the man asks, and when Estinien flinches at the direct question, smiles. It isn’t a pleasant sight. “Brigitte,” he calls, and the girl he’d given the towel to comes out with it wrapped around her waist, a shirt thrown on but not laced up so Estinien can still—if he so desires—peer down and see her nipples. “You up for a little hunt? Our guest wants Sid,” and the whore casts an appraising glance over him, “Go fetch him. If you’ll follow me, ser, I’ve a place you can wait for him,” he adds to Estinien, and they all three enter Brigitte’s room.

It smells stale. Estinien can’t quite help lifting a hand to his nose, and Brigitte laughs at him as she wipes her thighs with the towel and throws it to a corner. “Open a window, if it bothers you that much,” she tells him, and Estinien does her the courtesy of turning away as she dresses—not that it seems to bother her, as she chats with the souteneur as she pulls a skirt on and pulls the laces on her shirt tight. Then she’s out the door with what sounds like a kiss blown his way, and the man goes with her, but not before asking if Estinien would like some company in the meantime. “Twelve, no,” he growls, and is viciously pleased when the man shrugs and says, “Suit yourself, then.”

Then the room is empty but for him, though not for a moment does he feel alone. Elsewhere in the house he can hear a girl wailing like she’s being murdered and his cheeks burn hotter than he’d thought they could as he fumbles with the window latch and lets in the fresh air. Once it might not have bothered him: he’d watched karakul tup since he was old enough to walk, after all, and helped lamb every year when the grass had been fresh green from the winter snows melting, something that feels so long ago now. He reckons he could do it now, even, if given the chance—his hands might be worn from war but a breech is a simple enough thing to put to rights.

The screaming girl goes quiet after a while and then the house is still, to his relief. He stays standing, the bed deemed not safe enough to sit upon, and wonders just how many people in the city have known about Sid and kept him safe all this time. It wouldn’t have happened in Foundation, where the beggars are quick enough to sell one another out when it suits them. He’s never thought of the Brume as a friendly place, and perhaps to him it never will be, but…

For want of something to do he begins to pace, hands in his pockets and a thoughtful scowl firmly in place. Once more his mind goes back to his soulstone, tucked into his boot safely. What would it take for the blasted thing to break, and how in the Fury’s name would he ever begin to put it back together? More importantly, would the same process work on a different stone, or are all them—the many there are across the world—subject to their own unfathomable rules?

The door creaks open and he turns on his heel. “About time,” he says. “I have questions—”

But he stops, for whoever has come to meet him is not as tall as Sid. The cloak hiding them is ragged, a purple so deep it might as well be black, the hood pulled so far forward all he can see is their chin, heavily shadowed.

“Who are you?”

No answer except for one step forward, and then another, and Estinien has time to think absurdly the next time I come down here I must remember to wear armour as he sees the little blade flashing out and then it’s punching between his ribs no harder than if he was being thumped at the Knight but when he takes a breath it comes sharp and sore and the blade comes out wetly, punches elsewhere—

He gets his hands on the cloak, at least, the bastard beneath trying to struggle free, and they twist and turn this way and that to rip free of Estinien’s grip, the cloak coming away like a second skin. All he sees is black hair and blue eyes and then the knife is pulled free once more, and Estinien can do no more but moan lowly as the pain makes itself known to him. He hears it clatter to the ground, tries to reach for it as though the little knife (can it even be called that? he wonders, for it is so small and the hilt so ornately carved it might better serve as a letter opener than a dagger) as though it might save him, and then there are hands around his throat and his shirt is wet and sticking to his skin as the deep black abyss comes to swallow him up whole.

Chapter 15

“Ah, there’s the wench I wanted to see!”

Nearly a full day in the cells and yet no end in sight. Lucia forces a smile toward the gaoler on duty, who winks at her. Frederic, she thinks his name is, or Francoise? No matter: this man is the same as the one that came before, the same as the one that will come after.

“I’m to relieve you, ser,” she says blandly, and knows the words as a mistake as they leave her. As expected, the man grins.

“I’ve something you can relieve me of right here,” he tells her as he grabs at his crotch with a grip that looks, quite frankly, uncomfortably tight. They’re all the same. Lucia feels wearier than she ought to be. Here and at home, every man is the same, and by these false Eorzean Twelve, how I wish it wasn’t so. “Oh, don’t look so upset, woman. Or am I so unappealing that not even a misfit wants to look my way?”

Lucia resists the urge to roll her eyes, though it feels it comes at a terrible cost. Here is a man with an ego as fragile as glass—moreso, even, for at least glass can withstand a storm!—who needs to lean upon a woman to support him, though he belittles her in the same breath, thinking of women as girls and not knowing that girls are strong by virtue of having to live in the same world as brutes like this. And who can blame him? for there is no doubt in her mind that he—and so many others—would pitch a fit were they to learn just how capable she or any other woman is even without a man to lean upon. They are not equal, nor will they ever be.

Feeling foolish under her unimpressed look, Fremin (or Félix, or Fierabreaux, or whatever his name is) takes his hand off his crotch and stands with a sigh. “Fury, none of you wenches can take a joke. A joke,” he repeats, as though she didn’t hear him the first time. Lucia steps back so he can get by without needing to come too close, not wanting to smell his sweat or the cologne he no doubt wears to mask it. Floris, or Fortanerius, or Fontanier, takes his time gathering his things to her annoyance: first he must close the gaoler’s great book, turn the quill so it rests neatly next to it, tuck the chair in. Only then does he latch his sword to his belt and check the ground for anything else he might be missing, and stretch and sigh… and finally, finally he shuffles by. “Nothing meant on your skill or sex,” he tells her as he goes by, leering unattractively, “though if either find themselves in want of a good testing…”

He winks, and his upper lip raises with the motion, drawing her attention to a pimple half-hidden by a moustache. If Lucia is ever so inclined to be bedded by an Ishgardian (and at no point has such an idea ever appealed to her), it won’t be this one.

Fulloix sighs when she does not respond at all, sliding on by so she is at last free to take his seat. One careful eye is kept upon his back as she takes it: to her relief the guardsman doesn’t bother turning back for one parting jab or even a fare thee well, instead clanking as he takes the stair up and out of this dark and dingy place. When the door swings heavily shut behind him Lucia sighs out loud.

Nightmares, the lot of them, she thinks as she gets settled. Though would it be so different in Ul’dah, or in Limsa? This, she pulls the ledger toward herself and dips the quill in ink to sign her false name and the latest bell, tittling her i with more force than necessary and puncturing the paper, is a man’s world.  

Had she not thought such things before no doubt she would feel the depressing weight of it holding her down, but such things come to her often enough that she finds the reminders sobering instead of somber. No, she is not equal to any man by virtue of her sex alone, but in so many areas she is better than any one of them, as is any woman, she knows. Here in Ishgard alone they all carry on under the watchful eye of the Archbishop, but even he bends neck and knee to the Fury. And does not the newfound Alliance have at its head three women? And in every country ruled by men, did they spring up from the earth, or were they mothered?

But these things are not worth thinking about too closely, for while these fundamental truths of the world might be true they are still worth nothing when so many seek to undermine her on a daily basis in the here and now. No one is coming to save her—not a fairytale knight on a fiery steed, not the Seedseer, certainly not the Twelve—and, to her eternal chagrin, there is only so much she can do to save herself.

Here is something she can focus on instead, something that will not cripple her with anger: the ledger, thick and heavy and filled with minor mishaps in various hands. The cells are often filled with thieves and charlatans (more annoyances than actual criminals in Lucia’s opinion), more often used as a spare room for Knights too drunk to make it back to their own bunks, only occasionally the new home for some suspected heretic before the Inquisition comes to pick them up.

So when Lucia sees the words murder, attempted writ boldly on the page she thinks at first she’s misread, but when she looks back, there they remain. More incredibly, beside them: the Azure Dragoon hospitalised from the attempt. How—? She and Aymeric were gone not even a full day, stuck down here in gaol questioning the good Ser Flament and coming to understand that their visitor from the Brume had been telling the truth of his actions. Less than a full day, and an attempted murder—Ishgard is not so quiet as she’d suspected, clearly.

The book tells her the would-be murderer is kept in cell f-4, so it is down to the deepest dungeons with her, with only a little reluctant sigh. First she checks the floor she’s on: three drunkards sleeping off their affliction, the doors locked. She does not bother to unlock them. They can wait. Then she is picking up her sword and taking a torch from its sconce and going back down the stair that leads deeper into the heart of the Congregation. ‘Tis something of a joke amongst the gaolers that the lettered floors denote just how dark the cells will be, the scale starting with all clear and going right down to fuliginous. The most guilty are kept in pitch-black to think over their sins; Lucia has never had cause to visit them before.

“I have a light,” she calls before she turns the corner, the darkness shying away from the torch as though its enemy is flame. There is a shuffling noise, the guilty no doubt pulling their rags to cover their eyes, and she waits until the shuffling stops, more courteous than she ought to be for a murderer.

And then she rounds it, and the bars of the cell are thicker than those on the top floor, and starting to rust besides, the padlock heavier than any she’s laid eyes upon before, and sat in the corner with a hand thrown out to cover the flickering light sits Fray.

“Oh,” Lucia breathes, and takes a step closer, “Oh, you poor fool.”

She can see their eyes, pointed firmly at the floor and squinting, the gold of them dull down here. “Come to laugh at me?” they ask, though their words lack any real bite to them. “Get it out of your system, then.”

Lucia instead takes another step closer so that her breath disturbs the flaking iron bars, her chest aching in a way she’d not thought possible for this country and its people. Fray looks thin and worn, nothing like the brash knight that had dragged a rapist to the commander’s front door for no reason but to show off how much better they were than all others. Mayhap it is simply the light, but she can see lines on a face too young for lines and a certain brittleness in the way they hold themselves, curled up unto themselves for safety.

“What happened?”

“You haven’t already heard?” their words are weak but venomous, and in a flash Lucia thinks of them not curled up as though waiting to die, but instead as if they are waiting to strike. Alive, Fray is dangerous. “Thought you Knights spent all your time gossiping.”

Murder, attempted, read the book, and Lucia scowls—not in offense but in understanding. Even before Aymeric had taken his father’s life (and she had been there to see his head go rolling, had thought of him then—like so many others—as hard hearted and unfeeling) she’d known of the man in the cells, though the name had escaped her. Not a one of them, the squires and the lieutenants and the corps leaders, had not known the name Ompagne.

“I’ve been busy,” she tells them, and Fray snorts. Somewhat adjusted to the light (or perhaps simply putting on a brave face), they squint up at her, pupils barely pinpricks from the light she holds, which still flickers as though a breeze is batting it this way and that. If they think a stare and a silence will unnerve her, then they will be sorely disappointed… and Lucia does not have the patience to wait. “Well?”

“Well what?”

“What happened? I put little stock in the words of those known to lie,” and if Fray’s eyebrows raise it is only barely so, but she sees the movement all the same, “as we both know the Knights are wont to do. I trust them to tell me who is where but not why —which is why I am asking you.”

A little silence rings in the wake of her words, echoed by the darkness that wants so desperately to press around the both of them once more. There is no mistaking Fray’s brow raising high this time. “Well, shit,” they say, “best not let the other Knights hear you say that.”

Lucia rolls her eyes. “I am not about to start pretending they are the shining example of personal conduct, and there are plenty of them that agree with me—out loud, too. Truly,” she adds when Fray scoffs, “there are enough of them that think they could do far better. Besides, I have only offered to listen—or did you hear that I think your work exemplary, and I’ll let you go, so please continue?”

“If you wouldn’t mind,” says Fray, and Lucia laughs. The sound doesn’t even bother to echo in this place.

“I think no. The book says,” she tells them, switching the torch from one hand to the other and watching the lines on Fray’s face shift direction as she does so, “that you attempted to murder the Azure Dragoon… but you love the commander, and I do not think you would take away his only friend.”

“I don’t —”

“You do.” Lucia’s words are final. “Why you would lie to yourself I have no interest in knowing, but you do, else you would not act as though being around him burns. You wouldn’t have brought that rapist to him if you didn’t think there was something worth seeing in him still, wouldn’t have hosted him in your house if all you bore him was hatred. So: what happened?”

Silence once again, and for a long moment Lucia thinks they might not answer and has almost resolved to leave them to the darkness before slowly they say, “He wanted to meet with my partner. But Sid was—he was busy, and…” they trail off thoughtfully, clearly not wanting to tell her the whole story: she can forgive them this, “... I went instead. He was at the whorehouse,” and that is a surprise, “and when I got to his room he was bleeding on the floor. I tried to help, Guy panicked and called the wrong men, and the Knights got the wrong idea when they turned up. And now here I am.”

Is it just Lucia’s imagination—has she been down here too long—or can she hear something approaching? Does Fray hear it too? “That seems convenient,” she says instead, suspicious all the same, “ tried to help —are you a healer, now? I thought you were some kind of knight, going by what you wore.”

“Once I had the chance to learn, so I took it,” Fray says, and allows themselves to shrug a little like the admission is nothing big. “I prefer a sword to a wand, if it’s all the same to you.”

“You could have broken free if you know magic.” The sound is less muffled now, definitely footsteps, slow and sure on the steps that lead down here. “Why remain?”

Fray stares at her with understanding spreading across their face. “Ah. Garlean,” they say, and Lucia makes a sharp motion to shut them up. “Magic doesn’t work like that—at least, not the sort I know. If I tried to heal that padlock it’d stop rusting, most like. Say—what’s that noise?”

They hear it too, at least, and content that even if Fray springs up to attack her from behind (doubtful, but she has dealt with worse from those meant to be better), Lucia turns, torch held out to the stair so they can both watch their guest descend at the same time. “Why help the dragoon?” she asks as they wait. “Say I believe that you did not try to murder him—but why help?”

If Fray intends to tell her, they do not get the chance: both of them fall silent as Aymeric himself steps carefully down the stair and into the deepest level of gaol. He’s changed his clothes since he had been down here with Lucia previously, his commander’s cloak gone in favour of something a little more ragged, a little darker. First he looks to Lucia and then to the cell where Fray stirs only to see who it is better, and then says as resigned as Lucia has ever heard anyone, “Come to do me like you did the old bastard?”

Not once has Lucia heard Aymeric speak of Ompagne, either before the man’s death or after, and by the way his eyes drop it no doubt hurts him to be reminded of it. In Garlemald such a thing as patricide is unthinkable, the punishment often as cruel as the crime, though no such compunctions are had here in this land where anyone may be deemed heretical if it so suits the teller. He approaches the cell, puts a hand on one rusting bar and looks into it much like one might look at a caged animal.

What passes between the brothers is something Lucia has no name for: it gives her goosebumps to witness, and all the hairs on her neck prick up. Saying nothing, Aymeric takes the padlock in hand and does something to it that she misses—some magic, perhaps, though she’d not known him versed in thaumaturgy or conjury, and if there is a flourish or an incantation she neither hears nor sees it—and it falls away like snow to the ground: easily. When he opens the door it doesn’t so much as squeak, a testament to how those forgotten down here are not forgotten on purpose.

It is as though Lucia is rooted to the ground. She can neither move nor think of moving, can only watch as Aymeric enters the cell to lift Fray who, far skinnier than they had seemed in armour, does not seem able to support themselves, and takes them out, one step at a time. They go slowly but surely, Fray’s hand fisted tightly in the cloak he wears, the shadows they cast by torchlight seeming to mingle as one on the floor.

As they ascend, all the breath seems to come back to her, not having realised it had been stolen in the first place. “Lord Commander,” she tries, and Lucia’s voice is as hoarse as if she’s never spoken a word in her life before, “Wait—there’s been a misunderstanding. Fray didn’t—”

The darkness takes its chance to snatch her up in its terrible grip, and the last thing she sees before the torch snuffs out as the glitter of Aymeric’s eyes, as deep and as fathomless as an abyss.

Chapter 16

Once Aymeric’s office was a sanctuary, if a messy one: a place where one could sit peacefully enough with tea in one hand and, were one so inclined, a bun in the other as they looked over this request and that document. Sometimes the window would be opened to allow the briefest snatches of conversation and on good days birdsong to slip in like old friends, or else the fire would be lit and the crackle of logs within would be the evening’s companion.

Not so now. The door is propped open for anyone to run in and out as they so please—and please they do, men and women in uniforms from all over the city hurrying in to deliver their news before hurrying on—and all the paperwork has been allowed to spill onto the floor. A spare bottle of ink has smashed and the rug is all ruined, and not one person notices—or if they have, they do not care.

The Horde approaches.

The astrologian that had first come with the news had almost been smug in the way that only astrologians seem to know how to be, marching in with his head high and his back straight, but that had quickly fled in the face of the realisation of what, exactly, he was presaging. A hundred heartbeats later and then a call from a harried commander out in the field, the first of many who had seen them and been beaten back by their might. Is it one dragon that comes? Two? All anyone agrees on is that the bulk of the force is made up of men like them, heretics blinded by their faith and armed to the teeth.

To beat back so many of Ishgard’s men is no mean feat, and so it is with this in mind that Aymeric listens to all comers with deadly seriousness and delivers orders precisely. It is like this that Lucia finds him, standing at his desk with four soldiers standing at attention before him, with a fifth dancing awkwardly on the spot waiting to give their report.

“—in the See so long as the Archbishop’s grace extends that far, but with luck we won’t need such measures. Lucia, where have you been? Talk to me, soldier..”

So pressed is he that he does not remember to stress her false name in the right place, but if anyone takes note they say nothing. The four he had addressed take their leave as she approaches, and the fifth garbles on about the westernmost dragonkiller not being fit for purpose, something which makes Aymeric stare mutely with the concentrated force of a man at his wit’s end.

“Then tell the arbalesters to stand where the killer might otherwise be working, and the archers with them,” he says when he finds his voice again, “but for heaven’s sake don’t let them all congregate there—leave some around the Gates, too. Lucia,” he adds, turning his attention to her, and the soldier scampers off, “did you not hear the bells?”

If she had, they had been forgotten in the wake of the cells. “I—ser, there’s a—”

All Aymeric can do is laugh, worn thin as he is. “A problem? Aye, Lucia, I’m aware. I’ve been told that we’re to be overrun in no less than a handful of hours by a van of fifty or so who have been, in the Fury’s infinite wisdom, able to scrape together arms and armour enough to push back our forces in the field. You, there,” he calls past her, and whatever Lucia might have told him of her day feels unimportant in the grand scheme of things. A dragoon joins them, armour copper-tinted and an unfamiliar lance upon her back. “Just where is the Azure Dragoon?”

“I don’t know, ser,” comes the voice, surprisingly high for the body it belongs to, “but the astrologians have determined that there are two generals that approach with the heretics. Vali and Durnyr, if the descriptions are true.” Seeing that such names mean nothing to those listening, she takes a breath to explain—and Lucia can stand it no longer.

“Ser Estinien was nearly murdered,” she says, and all the frantic energy flees as they both stare at her. “By the—ser,” she adds a little urgently, with a desperate look toward Aymeric, who seems to at least understand the meaning of her words without further explanation, though he looks none too happy about this.

“Fury take this whole city—Heustienne, I trust you’ll stand in for him?”

The dragoon’s helmet obscures all of her face but for her grim smile. “Don’t I always? There are seven of us within the city—six, now, I suppose—we’ll take up positions by the dragonkillers and the Gates and go where the fighting is thickest.”

“The westernmost is down,” Aymeric calls after her as she salutes and darts out of his office with purpose, and then all his attention is on Lucia, who wishes she were anywhere else. “You’ve seen him? You’re telling the truth?”

“It gets worse.” Aymeric begins to sit, curses when something slips off his desk. “I—I don’t quite know how to explain—”

But there is no way to explain, not when the captain of some troop or another comes barging in with reports of a dragon freshly sighted from the outskirts of the Stone Vigil, not when such things are unimportant in this very moment. When the soldier leaves and Aymeric’s attention rests once more upon her, all she can do is shrug helplessly.

“You’ve been here all day, ser?”

“Since we parted ways, aye.”

Then Lucia’s suspicions are confirmed, and something strange settles in her stomach, heavy and uncomfortable. “He looks like you,” she says bluntly, and at Aymeric’s confusion continues, “the one that’s been—I saw him, with my own eyes.” If she sounds frantic, it is only because he might not believe such outlandish tales. “And Ser Estinien—”

A bell begins to ring urgently. This time Lucia cannot miss it. “Is he alright?”

“I’ve not seen him, but the book said—” what had the book said? Murder, attempted, for all the clarity such a description provides, “—he’s not dead.”

Aymeric looks wan and drawn, a shadow of himself, and Lucia wonders how she could ever have thought the creature that stole into the cells was him, with its purposeful eyes and healthy-looking cheeks. The commander is a tired man burdened with the weight of the city slowly crushing him with yet more weight on the way… yet somehow he finds the strength to stand straight and take a deep, steadying breath.

“As much as I want to get to the bottom of this, I daresay there are more immediate problems that require our attention,” and the bell ringing agrees with him as loudly as it dares, over and over again. Lucia can feel the vibrations through her whole body, her bones crying out beware, beware in time with every chime that sounds. “Go to St. Reinette’s,” Aymeric tells her, “there ought to be men stationed there. Join them. Make sure the Manufactory stays safe—and if the chief has any of his contraptions to spare, use them. And when the day is done,” he adds, looking grimmer than ever before, “we shall get to the bottom of this. Go, Lucia—and may the Fury guide your steps.”

---

As if the heretics command the very skies, clouds herald their approach ominously. They come rolling in from the sea that surrounds the city to cover the Steps of Faith, the soldiers watching as the stair—and the six pairs of statues that line it—is slowly swallowed up.

“Never fear,” calls someone, voice strong, “the Collar will hold them back!”

Is it the wind that howls? Or distantly a dragon screaming? Whatever it is, the sound is muffled by the cloud and all fall silent to listen. There—rhythmic, beating, the footsteps of fifty people approaching, and the shuffling of every soldier in Ishgard as they pray that the Collar really will hold.

And then, then, the beating of wings great and powerful, and the dragons emerge from the cloud like the stuff of nightmares, first one and then the other. Only the dragoons know (and likely care) which is which: perhaps it is Durnyr with the one horn so deeply gouged everyone can see, even from Foundation; perhaps it is Vali with the tail split so that it has two ends and not one. Together they fly toward the city, getting closer, closer, til at the last moment they part ways and swerve so as not to hit the barrier that men cannot see but dragons do feel, and together they roar so loudly that it feels as though the very foundation of Ishgard might crumble and fall away. But they are safe, if scared, and beyond the sound of the dragons circling comes the stomping of boots as the heretics approach. 

No one dares fire at them, not when the Steps cannot be seen clearly, for if they somehow inadvertently trap themselves on this tiny island the city will not last to the end of the year. It means they must wait until the first of them step close enough to see, and then another, and another behind that one, and at the Gates of Judgement are sinners waiting to be let in. No one moves, not even to pluck a bowstring and send an arrow toward a one of them, and the city waits with bated breath—

Something explodes, and with it all hell breaks loose. The eerie silence the heretics brought with them is replaced with cries of alarm and cheers both, and taking advantage of the confusion, a man at the Gate opens the Gate, and heretics come pouring in. Men and women both in the ranks awaiting them tense and then panic as their comrades turn on them, the ranks having been swelled by those willing to put bad blood aside long enough to rot Ishgard from the inside.

“Break the wards!” someone cries above the crash of swords and conjured flame, and a dragon roars once more. “Let the dragons in!”

The tearing of limbs as men quaff blood and corrupt their mortal bodies comes next, and there are screams as such hellish beasts enter the fray. As though drawn to them, dragoons come raining from the sky point-first to skewer them or be knocked aside, but they at least may leap away to try again unlike their earth-bound kin who must lift shields and pray they don’t shatter under the rain of blows delivered unto them.

Those that fall do so quickly, at least, the heretics not having the luxury of time with which to draw out a death for longer than necessary, and in their haste leave plenty alive (if curled up painfully and gasping like fish out of water) before running to meet the rest of the city. And now the heretics do begin to fall, the archers having taken positions high above the rest of them and waited for backs to be turned for their arrows to take full effect. A glance up might reveal the turn of a deep blue coat as Aymeric finishes giving orders and moves on to the next group that awaits him, and then the next volley of arrows comes rushing down and yet more men fall, and some true Ishgardians with them—but that is the good and true way of things. What honour, to die for Ishgard! What horror, to die at all!

***

Lucia has never seen the city quite so alive as it is now. Sword in hand, she and two others stand at the mouth of the Forum to face down all manner of queer beasts. Never before has she seen claws burst from the beds of nails, nor seen horns erupt from a woman’s face twisted in righteous fury (or the sharpest pain), nor soldiers turn on one another with cruel smiles; never again does she want to. Briefly she thinks of Livia, who must revel in war at Baelsar’s side—she must, else she would not have remained there so long—and of her own underhanded performance as Frumentarium, and how far removed she has been from such things, and then there is time only to fight, not to think. Her sword finds a home in one heretic’s gut and pulls free with a sucking sound that would make her sick if she had the time to listen, and then her shield-arm must come up to catch the great fist of a man-turned-beast—but no shield has she, it having been wrenched from her, and, and—

Copper streaks from the sky and a lance comes clean out the other side of the beast’s chest, and at her back a man calls, “Ho, step back, now!” and something small goes soaring through the air, lit fuse fizzing away. The bomb goes off before it lands and knocks a woman clean off her feet; Lucia herself feels dizzy for the sound alone and turns dumbly to see the chief of the Manufactory standing with a grim look plastered on his face and a basket full of the damned things at his side. Beside him, Aymeric, expression mirrored, and he meets Lucia’s eye for all of a moment before his own sword is drawn. And what a sword it is! Nearly the size of him but hefted as though it weighs no more than perhaps a book, and it swings with such elegance. It swings—why should it swing?—Lucia takes a step and finds one knee unable to support her, so she goes down, or tries to. A pair of hands takes her firmly about the waist and hoists her, drags her.

“Take this,” says a face she doesn’t recognise, and a potion is lifted to her lips. More spills down her chin than goes into her mouth, but what she sips soothes her until the din of battle fades into a quiet roar. “You’re not dead yet, ser, so we’ve need of you yet. Fall back just a little. Lord Haillenarte’s trinkets are…”

What Lord Haillenarte’s trinkets are is quite lost, for something rocks the city with such force that every person standing loses balance. The dragons! Lucia thinks, looking wildly for them, but here, sheltered, she can see nothing of either of them. “Oh, Fury,” gabbles the potion-holder, Haillenarte’s bombs forgotten, “Fury, Fury, keep us, deliver us, je ne veux pas mourir,” and keeps talking to himself even as Lucia pushes past.

The Manufactory’s attendants have been quite diligently taking care of those heretics that have thought of coming closer. Not only does the chief have a seemingly overwhelming amount of explosives, but three—no, more—students either side hold what looks and sounds and smells to be pistolets. With every bright flash another body drops, and Lucia forces herself up the stairs to join them.

“Ser—Ser Aymeric was—”

“He was here, aye,” says a girl with her hair in braids and her nose all scrunched up like she’s enjoying target practise, “off to the dragonkiller a few minutes ago. You hear that big bang? Like as not that was one o’ them dragons breathing flame at us.”

The chief pauses tossing bombs to survey the stairs and deems them safe enough that not another one wants lighting. “He took one of my men with him,” he tells Lucia seriously, “in case the damn thing goes the way of the other. Fury’s grace allowing it’ll work—but we could use your assistance in his stead. I say, you look dazed—are you well enough to fight on?”

When Lucia doesn’t respond right away he turns to a box she’d not noticed before and pulls a potion free to give her. This time she drinks it slow and careful, not a single drop spilling, and by the time the bottle is empty she feels stronger, if dazed. “Yes,” she tells him, and reaches for her—her sword is missing, but there are plenty strewn about. “You said Ser Aymeric went to the dragonkiller?”

“Not even our dragoons are good enough to take down two o’ them beasts at the same time—don’t you remember the last time the Horde flew by?” Lucia doesn’t, not having been in the city, and she makes a noise that could be a yes. “Damn near took a ‘killer with them. Go on,” he adds, “Go find him. He knows we’re alright—and we’ve more bombs if these aren’t enough.”

More, as if the pile beside him isn’t capable of taking on the vanguard and then some, but he seems confident enough. Lucia has not the strength to argue, and so takes a sword and a shield from the fallen, strapping it on tighter this time so that if any hands tear at it as they did before it will stay in place. When she takes the first step down she thinks she might slip, and goes slowly—with good reason, for the city shakes again and this time over the din of battle she hears the dragons roar.

“Forward!”

The heretics again, she assumes, and clutches the sword tighter—but when she reaches the bottom of the stair she sees instead men and women of all ages dressed in rags with such things as pans and handaxes at the ready. They spill up and onto the streets with furious cries and wordless shrieks, and at their center, Aymeric directing them, his great wicked sword held in one hand.

“Ser—”

But her voice is lost beneath the hubbub and she watches as the Brumelings turn their attention to the few heretics yet standing, and with a practised brutality the kind only a mob truly knows, overwhelm them. And at their heart, the commander watches without regard for any not in his flock, cold and cruel and so unlike him that Lucia knows him as a murderer as surely as she knows herself. When she turns down a side street the mob hasn’t flowed down yet she tells herself she isn’t scared, and knows herself a liar.

The dragonkiller. Aymeric is at the dragonkiller.

Chapter 17

Durnyr falls and takes Ser Victoire with it, great wings limp and ragged, its once-powerful tail streaming artlessly behind its hulking corse as the abyss beckons it down. The dragoon on its back—not copper, not black, but so deep a blue it seems impossible to behold for true—seems to wrestle with its lance, buried so deep through the base of its neck it might not come out at all.

“Damned fool— jump, Victoire!” cries Heustienne, so tightly wound she is like to snap and take out all bystanders, and they see him not jump at all but wrench the lance free with such force that blood sprays from the dragon like some unholy geyser. “Jump!”

At last he does, but belatedly as if the spear is more important than his own life. Up, up he goes—but not up enough, or so it seems at first, until he catches some current or uses the power of his soul to guide himself toward a little jut of rock that is one of many ways into the Brume from below, and disappears from sight. Heustienne sighs with relief as he lands, all the tension bleeding out of her.

But there is no time to rest: the second dragon yet circles, out of reach but not out of mind, its twin tails lashing and coiling like the most tempestuous of storms. When its kin falls it howls, the sound as sharp as any blade: Aymeric fancies he will hear it echo through his dreams, or hear it at the back of his mind when the night is still and cold, and then he might shed tears for if not the dragon itself then the loss it sings of, of good men fallen, of a thousand-year-long grudge. They might be different, they might well be wrong, but to deny that any dragon feels less keenly than men do feels a crime beyond crimes when the evidence says otherwise.

Aymeric turns from his perch as Heustienne beside him mutters a prayer laden with curses. From the streets the sounds of battle floats up to meet him, though what he hears sounds slow and sluggish, the product of the dragons’ flame that had rocked Ishgard, perhaps, or maybe the heretics are not quite so well-trained as they had feared. Mayhap—and he banishes the thought as soon as it comes to him—mayhap it is the Knights that are falling back and giving up and dying out.

Who could fault them for it, if they were? Too many men Aymeric saw on his way to the dragonkiller alone quickly become grotesque and pained, scales bursting free from the confines of flesh, and tails and claws and horns as well, the blood used for such transformations dribbling from their mouths as fangs grew where normal teeth ought lie. One would be enough to give a man nightmares, but the streets are thick with the bastards despite the dragoons’ best efforts.

“Ser—Ser!”

Too many men vie for his attention, wanting orders, wanting sanity that he cannot offer them. “Ready the ‘killer,” he calls, and weary soldiers jump at the chance for something to do. “Heustienne, the dragon will need to be kept in place. Can you—”

“No,” she says at once. Ser! cries a voice, or two, or twenty, from somewhere. “You saw Victoire on the last—what hope does any man have of halting a dragon? We’ll need snares,” and as she says the word her head snaps around to look to the Steps of Faith where such things lie waiting, “and those we might lose if it—hells, but we must try.”

“We must,” Aymeric agrees, “and your eyes are keener than mine. Direct the men here,” he tells her, and the sun almost at its zenith catches her armour blindingly as she turns to watch him walk away, “make the beast bleed, and I’ll make sure it’s held steady.”

It sounds so simple, which means that it will be anything but. Aymeric almost laughs as he pushes through the small throng of men clustered around him and takes the steps two at a time, nearly slipping on ice or blood, and at the bottom comes face to face with Lucia, as pale as anything.

“It’s,” she tries, looking for all the world like she might throw up or pass out or run away, “the—the—”

“With me,” says Aymeric, who does not have the time to listen to any half-dazed soldier ramble on about what they might or mightn’t have seen, but she grabs at his arm as he goes by. For one awful instinctive moment he thinks he might strike her for it… but it bleeds from him as quick as it came on, and when he looks at her once more his chest feels tight with sympathy.

“The killer,” she whispers, and Aymeric swears aloud. “It’s—”

He shakes his head. “No time,” he tells her, and grabs her wrist, pulls her along with him as he marches with purpose down the street. His sword is upon his back, being no use against dragons and too heavy to carry for no good reason, though he does reach behind one shoulder for its hilt as they come across a wounded woman lying in the street groaning. She makes no move to accost them, too lost under the blanket of pain, and once more his hand falls to his side. “If a murderer wants to run riot then right now is the best time for him to do so,” he tells Lucia as they round a corner together and pause to peer out. “I don’t know if you’d noticed, but the dragon is a little more immediate a problem.”

Lucia pulls her arm free without resistance and follows him as surefooted as she can with her head still swimming. “It came up with the Brume,” she says, but that makes no sense, and she must shake her head. “No—the people. They’re fighting with the soldiers, now, and it was—he was—it was standing in the open.”

Not one person is at the Gates, pushed fully open by the heretics. The dragon is out of sight but not at all out of mind, its wings beating so hard that even hidden by Ishgard’s spires it sounds directly overhead, and Aymeric with his clear path yet stops to look at Lucia with an expression she cannot put a name to and a voice hushed and ragged. “You said it looks like me?”

When she nods he looks as pained as the wounded woman they’d passed not so long ago. “I’m sorry, ser,” she tries, not quite sure what she is sorry for, and Aymeric shakes his head.

“You stay put,” he says, and turns his eyes upon the open Gate and the Steps beyond. “Get to safety, or keep an eye on him if you think you must, but I—I must—”

The dragon, not taking kindly to being ignored, roars once more and those terrible wingbeats grow louder. Its shadow slides over them and dismayed cries rise to join the hazy din. There is nothing more that Aymeric can say: he darts away across the empty plaza as quick as he can manage, the blue of his coat looking for all the world ike some queerly tempered metal, the bright silver gleam of his sword the gem set within, and then he is beyond the Gate, and Lucia is alone.

The first bolt strikes fast and sudden after what might have been a lifetime of waiting, the dragon having circled the city twice in full and rocking the foundations with its breath. It bites into the dragon’s wing so fiercely the beast jerks in midair, its wing fully trapped, and no matter how it pulls and writhes the bolt stays put. Elsewhere cheers rise to join the battlefield’s orchestra—the crowd at the dragonkiller, no doubt—and the dragon roars in answer. Lucia watches, head empty and ears ringing, as the great beast lashes its twin tails and snaps at the chains holding it in place to no avail, unable to pull away or risk pulling its wing off altogether—and then the second bolt hits home.

If the first was a shock the second is a comfort. The dragon means to move out of way, to see the missile arc past as if to taunt the Ishgardians— here I am, caught but free all the same, and what can you do about it? —but whether by design or by blind stupid luck Aymeric had shot at the area the dragon moves into, and glances off the horn that curls out from its great crested forehead. The bolt does indeed miss, but takes the horn with it, and the dragon, stunned, forgets to beat its wings and begins to fall.

This time there is no cheer. As if time itself stands still, the dragonkiller spits its ammunition toward its quarry, greater and heavier than the makeshift snares had been, a flash of copper riding the tip like some strange figurehead, and jumps free before they hit. The bolt slams home, piercing the dragon’s breast and the bridge behind it, pinning it, and then Heustienne falls with purpose like a dragon in miniature intent on skewering its prey. The dragon is but an insect trussed up in Ishgard’s metal cobweb, and Lucia looks away as the lance is brought down through its eye. She is no fanatic; she can mourn if she so wishes, and feels as though she may well do, the same way she thinks Aymeric might well do should he ever get the time.

He limps back through the Gate some time later held up by Heustienne, her copper armour stained pink with blood and her grin wide beneath her helm. He gestures at Aymeric and she brings him over, quicker than she ought to with the way he favours one leg instead of the other.

“A pulled muscle,” he says before Lucia can say anything, and she must move quickly to take him as the dragoon lets him go. “I slipped going up the tower steps, and the machines were by no means light… No matter. Heustienne?”

She’s paces away already, the beak of her helmet pushed up so that they can see the wild light in her eyes when she turns. “If you’ll excuse me,” she tells him, and all Aymeric can do is sigh as she takes her leave to go celebrate with her fellows or continue her bloodshed. When she leaps high it’s with a laugh.

“Where is the—where is he?”

‘Tis as if calling his twin a murderer makes him one by proxy, and he allergic to such accusations—but that cannot be right, surely. “I don’t know,” Lucia tells him, and hefts him as much as she dares, pleased that her voice sounds a little stronger. “I’ve been waiting here for you. For your orders.”

Aymeric looks a little dazed himself. “The infirmary,” he says firmly and takes one hopping step forward, forcing Lucia to follow if she wants to keep supporting him. “And then I would have you go into the city and—and see what you can see.” When she looks at him, he meets her gazy fully, and when he says, “please?” like a child begging for clemency she cannot possibly tell him no.

---

Whitecape gives him a cane to lean on and a potion to drink—bitter and thick and full of bits that will get stuck between his teeth—and warns him Estinien’s mood is dark and foul. And, well, he wasn’t kidding: out of bed the Azure Dragoon has managed to tear the room up admirably. The bedsheets are torn, the water jug shattered in a thousand pieces across the floor, the spaces between the wooden boards wet and like to mould when it isn’t mopped up in time. Clearly tired from the exertion, Estinien himself is back upon the bed and glowering at him from beneath a fringe unkept and dark with sweat.

“You stay right where you are,” he says, sounding tired even, “not one step closer.”

Aymeric can only sigh. The window is open, enough to hear the sounds of the fighting below but not wide enough for Estinien to wriggle out of it. “It wasn’t me,” he tells him heavily. “It wasn’t.”

“Looked well enough like you. And I can’t exactly—your brother,” he spits as though the word is dirty, “clued me in to what’s going on. How many more are there?” and for a moment Aymeric knows not if he means men that look like him, or like Sid, or some other shadowy figure he hasn’t yet been apprised of.

“May I sit?”

“You may bloody well not.” From without, the wind picks up for a moment, startling the both of them. Aymeric might be tired, but Estinien looks haggard with exhaustion or pain or something else weighing him down. “Who was that, riding the dragonkiller?”

From the way he snaps the question it’s clearly been bothering him, watching the whole affair play out with no way to join in. “Heustienne.”

“Damned fool,” Estinien growls, but has the gall to sound pleased about it, too. He struggles up onto his elbows with grunts that sound more pained than he probably cares to let on, and then he sits up, the loose drape of the shirt Whitecape stuffed him into falling to one side to reveal bandages beneath. “Talk,” he demands when he catches his breath, and for all his fury Aymeric cannot help but think of him as pathetic. “Damn you, talk, or I’ll march to the Ward myself—”

“No, you won’t,” says Aymeric patiently, leaning heavily upon his cane, “we both know you won’t.”

As if to spite him, Estinien stands and keeps his balance despite the way the blood drains from his head as he does, swaying in one place for a moment. “Watch me,” he says, and, his patience run out, Aymeric’s free fingers find the stone hanging around his neck and grips it tight.

As if returning the call, the room grows dark and small, the air rushing out of it to make way for the comforting swell of the Abyss. It curls around Aymeric and then outward, to taste the spilled water and the cold stone walls, and then toward Estinien who can only cringe away from it, seeing nothing but knowing something comes. “Stop that,” he whispers, and the Abyss dips below his shirt, beneath the bandages to taste and test him as gentle as the lover he refuses to let himself know. “Stop.”

“Then sit down,” Aymeric tells him placidly. He feels at peace for having freed the churning darkness, knowing that if it drowns him it is simply the way things are meant to be. Naturally, Estinien does not sit, but brings his hands up as if he means to fight or simply hide behind them. “If you believe in anything, Estinien, believe in me.”

“I—what are you—”

“Have I ever given you reason to doubt me?” he continues. Some of that darkness has crept back beneath his skin to stoke what little anger has woken within his breast. “Have I ever given you pause? Did you not say yourself that you would trust me ‘til I gave you reason not to?” Aymeric remembers those words clear as day, when the truth had seemed too terrible to share. Now it seems an obstacle that must be passed no matter what. “Yet here you are with your tune changed so quickly. What happened, Estinien? What happened that my only friend has turned from me without so much as a by your leave, ser?”

Estinien’s face is pale and his eyes are wide and fearful. He flinches when his name is spoken, and winces for how the movement jerks his injuries about. “I—it was—if you’d been there,” he starts, and then shakes his head furiously so his hair falls into his eyes, “but you were. It was you, right down to the pores on your nose—”

“It wasn’t me,” Aymeric tries, but it is Estinien’s turn for fury, though he at least stays sitting.

“It was! It wasn’t you but it was, I saw him—you—purple really isn’t your colour,” he adds absurdly as though such things are meant to mean anything, “and I thought that odd enough, but then I—I was to meet with your brother,” he adds, and finally sits, the effort of talking and standing too much for him to bear. “I met with him once before. He told me what’s been going on.”

“You said as much before.” Aymeric cannot imagine Fray patiently guiding anyone to any sort of answer, let alone someone as angry as Estinien, so it must have been Sid—but he’d not have guessed in his wildest dreams that the two would meet of their own accord and be pleasant with one another. “What, pray tell, did you learn?”

“That you’re a—” Estinien cannot seem to bring himself to say it, not even with the creeping tendrils of the Abyss pressing unseen at him. “The same as your father,” he settles for in a voice the kissing-cousin of a whisper, and cannot meet his gaze, “Alberic told me of him once. Only once. That he was everything everyone said he was, behind his back, but those that knew were content to turn their eyes. Too respected despite turning his back on the Knights, I think, or he’d done some great charity, or—or something.”

He’s not wrong on either count. In life Ompagne Deepblack had been loved and feared in equal measure; in disgrace he was left quite alone to do as he pleased, so long as his feet didn’t bring him before the clergy. When he’d left the order he’d relinquished his title and his home and almost all the gil to his name to be used for the good of Ishgard, and though he never talked to Aymeric about what he’d given up, there were plenty of nights where he sat watching the fire burn to nothing, as melancholy as a man can be.

Not knowing any of this, Estinien continues: “Not just you, but your brothers, too, both of them, and the one I didn’t meet was… you all carry stones like mine, but different, and there’s no formal giving them out, or—I don’t understand,” he says, and his brow creases deeply. “Why didn’t you give it up, when you joined? Why did you hold onto it, knowing anyone could find out? I could go to the Ward, you know. Spill everything to them and have you hang.”

He meets Aymeric’s gaze then, looking as lost as a lamb. “You could,” he agrees, “but you won’t.”

“You don’t know that,” Estinien mutters, and presses a hand against his ribs. “Go ask Whitecape for a potion—no, stay,” he says quickly as Aymeric turns to do so, “don’t—just tell me why.”

It’s a question worth answering, even when the world demands him in this and that place. No doubt the soldiers outside are waiting for him (or talking to what they think is him, or being slaughtered by what they think is him), or some lord will want to know what to do with the corpses or the dying men or the inhuman beasts they’ve captured, or any other number of things. The list goes ever on, but for this moment, Aymeric can pretend it asks nothing of him.

“I couldn’t do anything else,” he explains, quiet so as not to disturb the world. “Throw away my soul? Ignore my convictions? I could no more do that than you could lay down your lance and let Nidhogg live. It would be unconscionable. Impossible. And look where it got me.” Aymeric sighs and shifts his weight from one foot to the other, feeling his ankle twinge as he does. “All I can do is carry on and pray that one day the world becomes kind instead of cruel—if not to me, then to those that deserve it. And I—perhaps it has been foolish of me to hope that I might not always be alone, but I thought…”

He chances a look at Estinien, whose hand is firm at his side and paler than seems healthy, but listening all the same. “I thought,” he continues, quieter, “that I could be the one to guide others to that better world. Or at the very least, make people begin to think about it, to see that things do not have to be the way the See dictates. How arrogant,” and he laughs softly, entirely without mirth, “how… presumptuous of me, to think I could be the voice of change.”

Estinien still says nothing, and with a sigh Aymeric closes his eyes for a brief moment, savouring the silence before he must head back into the world. “You look in pain,” he tells him, “I’ll tell Whitecape to bring you something. Thank you for listening, at least, my—my friend. I’m glad you’re alive.”

The cane is a great help, and he already mourns its loss knowing that he will not be bringing it out with him, and so Aymeric takes his time leaving, feeling exhausted and alert all at once. Were he to lie down now no doubt he would be unable to sleep, but so too does he know when plans are put in front of him they will make no sense. All he can do is carry on, one step in front of the other, one and then the other and then the other again, every day until the end of days.

“I believe you,” he hears, and turns to see Estinien still drawn and wan but honest. Mayhap it was the fear of the Abyss, or the fear for his life, or some other such. “You damn arrogant fool. And—stay alive out there.”

“This isn’t over yet?” Aymeric says, neither bothering to turn nor stop, and fancies he knows his friend to be smiling. “Of course not. Later, Estinien. Be well.”

Chapter 18

“Don’t you go out,” Sid had said firmly. What was Fray to do except ignore such sage advice? Nothing said in the wake of an argument was worth paying much attention to, much less when it was given in annoyingly good faith—if he had meant it, he’d have tied them down just to stop them being contrary.

If only he could see them now. All the I told you so s in the world wouldn’t begin to cover it.

Ishgard is hushed like it’s waiting to die, the rattle of its breath the gusts of wind from all directions, bizarre enough that even Fray, tired and half-blind from the cells, had noticed and even stopped to listen. The Myste hadn’t wanted them to stop, had kept its hand at their back and urged them on without words, but even hurried footfalls hadn’t disguised just how strange the city sounded with its people hiding in the day. The few men they saw looked down and away, and Fray had been brought home without interruption. Who would tell the Lord Commander to stop what he was doing? The Ward, perhaps, but the Ward are occupied elsewhere, and so the Myste wearing Aymeric’s face does as he pleases. It’s annoyingly intelligent, and Fray wonders as they walk if it was natural, or if it was the kind of idea that they might have thought up, stolen from them. They can’t tell.

Whether or not it knows what they think it never stops moving. Down they go, down through the last attempt of the city to put a buffer between the needy and the truly poor, the no-man’s land neither the Brume nor Foundation proper, usually littered with men wanting work but now surprisingly empty. They turn down one alley half-blocked with detritus, going slowly until it opens up into a square where a body had been found at the base of the makeshift temple the poor pray to… and then the hand at their back melts away, and when they turn to look, the Myste is gone.

Without a guide Fray feels overwhelmingly and uncomfortably alone, and the cold starts to creep in quick enough. They should know where they are—the steel pipes are an ancient fixture and just one of many landmarks that Fray knows better than the backs of their hands, but all they can do is stare at them, unsure where to turn. The temple is as much a mystery to them as the wilds of Coerthas, and their heart hammers away, afraid and not knowing why. Who lives here—does anyone live here? Or are these housest like so many other buildings up top, ruined and empty?

One hand upon the stone to keep themselves steady, Fray inches out of the square and down the closest steps, slow and careful so as not to slip, trying to ignore the way sweat beads upon their brow or the way their breath comes harsh and quick as though they’ve been stalking through the night without pause. But nothing could be further from the truth: the cell had been cold and dark but no more taxing than any other night spent shivering and hungry. One step, and then another, and another, and it really ought not be so difficult. It hadn’t been so hard to walk when the Myste had been at their back, but here they are stumbling around like any wastral with an empty belly might.

Not that the answer matters. Not that anything matters much: not the silence of the city, not the cold air, certainly not whether the Myste has taken from them something more important than they’d first noticed. Left foot. Right foot. Hand flat against the wall. Every step feels harder than the last until they must force themselves to remember just why they ought to keep going, and those reasons are hard enough to think of: the way Sid laughs when they share a dirty joke; the warmth of la bise the whores press upon them when they go visiting. What else? What else? He thinks of Aymeric, his face still fresh in mind, and then tries to think of anything but… But like an illness the thought of him spreads until it is all-consuming. Brother. Brother, but not a brother, not for so many years—a bastard instead, more concerned with the city than his family.

Aren’t you the same? some traitorous part of their mind whispers. Fray pauses to catch their breath and takes the next set of stairs one at a time, pretending their stomach lurches for the movement and not the thought. Don’t you go out at night playing saviour?

It’s different, they tell themselves, and firmly think of nothing more until they reach the bottom, knees shaking. I’m a dark knight. That’s what we do.

But, they know—and can’t hold back an annoyed sound as they start walking again—that it is not so different from what Aymeric does. Both of them wear swords and work to protect the weak, damned be all else. Not even Sid is exempt.

Sid. He’ll be at home, but where is home? Not here, in this corner of the Brume they don’t recognise, where it’s colder than—ah, colder than usual because of the way it leads to the very sea of clouds itself. This is a dangerous place, where one false step can send someone plummeting to their death. But there, coming in from the edge, a man behelmed in the manner of the elite, lance in hand and soaked with gore.

“Who,” they try, but their tongue is all dry and cracked and it comes out wrong. “Oh—who?”

“Ho there,” says the dragoon, “the dragons don’t frighten you? You’re a brave lad—what’s wrong? Do you need help?”

But Fray cannot tell him, cannot so much as think of the words to tell him to take his spear and stick it deep enough to taste. All that comes out is a whimper, pathetic and quiet, and the dragoon sets his jaw and comes close to take their arm. “Let me take you home,” he says, and that, it seems, is that.

If anything happens on the walk home, Fray barely notices it beneath the effort of keeping their breath steady and their legs from giving out. At some point a sound rings out loud enough to break anyone’s concentration, and both they and the dragoon look to the sky for the source, but no answer emerges. A crowd goes thundering past as Fray says, with chattering teeth, “r-right here—deeper,” and they tuck themselves against the wall to avoid being trampled. One woman, younger than she looks, stops to beckon Fray to join them. “Heretics, Fray, come on!” but disappears before she notices their condition, eager not to be left behind by her group.

Whatever directions Fray gives the dragoon, they’re eventually brought to a familiar clearing. There, the old house with its sagging facade, the stonework dirty from years of not caring to wash it, with its door that sticks in the jamb and its beating heart Sid inside. They can only pray Sid is inside, for they cannot feel him with their soul so split, and it is a cold and terrible existence being so alone.

Then they are alone—perhaps they sent the dragoon away, or perhaps he found something better worth his time—and, cold and numb, Fray takes one careful step forward, and then another, and then the door is before them. There is no way they’ll summon the strength to lift it in the way it needs to be opened without hassle, and instead they rest their head against it with a thunk, loud and painful. If the house’s heart is out they’ll die here, they know, and what an ignoble end that will be, sliding down broken and frozen and alone.

Beat. The sound of their heart, doing its best to carry on despite its owner’s waning health. Beat. The sound of footfalls coming close and melting away. Beat. The pieces of the soulstone wanting nothing more than to become whole once more—no, that can’t be it.

The door opens, and Fray falls through the frame and the abyssal runes into Sid’s surprised embrace.

“Fray?” and then, worried, “Oh—oh, you fool, what have you—”

“Fuck,” says Fray feelingly. They laugh weakly, and feels themselves lifted clear off the ground. Any other day they might kick and spit and protest, but today this is a blessing. Sid is so warm he almost burns where his skin meets theirs. Perhaps it is the Abyss beneath his skin, comforting and distressing all at the same time, a deep well of feeling Fray is cut off from but still knows so very well.

The harsh light of day quickly fades as Sid brings them in and kicks the door shut behind them. He takes them not to the living room where their thin blankets are balled up on the floor, but to Ompagne’s old room, the one they’ve not touched since his death. With no window in here the air is musty, but the bed at least is soft enough, and still smells like the cologne he’d liked to wear, one of the very few vices he’d allowed himself to keep after his self-imposed exile.

“You’re an idiot,” says Sid, kneeling beside the bed to rest his head next to theirs, but his voice is soft and lilting. “What did I say?”

Eyes slipping closed easily, Fray can’t help but smile. “Never miss an opportunity to say I told you so, huh? Jackass.” When Sid flicks their nose, they don’t even so much as flinch. “Lucky I came back at all. Nearly didn’t.”

“What happened?”

The fingers at their nose slide across their cheek and into their hair, where they snag right away on a tangle. “You were angry,” Fray sighs, and Sid stays quiet as he fixes the knot. They’d come back from Aymeric’s office furious, and Sid had become angry in turn—not just that they had left at all, but that they’d been rude to Aymeric, who he has been convinced from the start is a better person than Fray wants to believe. “I couldn’t take it. I went for a walk, and Brigitte caught me—she was looking for you. Something about that dragoon friend of his wanting you, and I don’t… I don’t trust anyone that just asks for you. So I went instead. Keep you safe, get back in your good books…”

“No one could ever accuse you of doing something nice just for the sake of it,” Sid says, and Fray laughs, the sound soft and tired. Sid’s fingers move on from one knot to the next. “And?”

“Found him bleeding out on the floor.” It had been such a shock that Fray hadn’t moved at first, not sure if it was a set-up or not, but when Estinien had groaned, they’d recognised the sound as genuine pain and called for help right away. “They thought it was me, so they dragged me up top and threw me in the cells. Thought I was—” and as they breathe in Ompagne’s cologne once more, hot tears prickle up beneath their eyelids. “—well. Didn’t think I was coming back. But the Myste, it came for me. Maybe ‘cause I still have those rocks.”

Mayhap they’re tired after the night away from home: it takes a real effort to slip their hand into their pocket and take the stone pieces in hand. Nothing stirs within, not even the faintest wisp of the Abyss. “It set me free. And then I… I don’t really remember how I got here.”

Sid’s breath washes over their face, musty and warm. “Surprised no one roped you into their war. You didn’t see the dragons?”

“Dragons?”

“Oh, yes,” Sid says, and gives up sorting through their tangles to run his finger along the shell of their ear, a permanent novelty. “All the way from Dravania and heretics with them. Aymeric himself came down to tell people to get up and fight with the soldiers. That Robin kid came banging on the door to tell me not too long before you got here.”

“I don’t think that was Aymeric,” Fray says softly, thinking once more of the Myste and how it had looked in the dark. The two would be indistinguishable standing next to one another, but Aymeric wouldn’t beg the Brume to fight his battles for him.

They sit in silence together, Fray with their eyes still closed and breathing softly as though they’re asleep, face pale from the effort of living. In a burst of inspiration, Sid pulls his own soul crystal free and tucks it into Fray’s open palm. At once they look better, though barely so, as though only the Abyss is enough to heal them—but even the Abyss has limits.

“Sid,” they say when Sid is certain they’ve fallen asleep, voice as soft as rain, “Sid.” Their fingers curl around the crystal of their own accord, and Sid takes their hand, feeling the crystal beat even through that barrier. “I don’t know what to do.”

But neither does Sid, who worries at his lip so hard it splits, and presses their foreheads together firmly. Too many nights have they lain together awake until the day can be no longer considered late, only early, wondering if all they’re good to do is wait patiently for death, and if so, how much longer they have left.

Chapter 19

The cane makes the going slow, but, as Aymeric tells Lucia with surprisingly good cheer, better slow than not at all.

Ishgard’s mess is quickly put to rights with the dragons gone. What few heretics not slain where they stood have been captured or are being hunted down without mercy. If they’re sensible about it they’ll throw themselves into the abyss or pretend they were being forced to act thusly on pain of death. the Inquisitors will still have their way with them, but they won’t be killed immediately. Guardsmen are back at the Gate, stern-faced and wary as Aymeric goes up to them, leaving Lucia to wait at a distance as they talk.

The plaza was not so affected as other parts of the city: some few bodies lay fallen here and there amongst the rubble the dragons created in their wake, but the heretics had been smart enough to push further in. When Aymeric returns he announces cheerfully that the Steps are well protected—and Lucia holds her tongue, having thought them so before they’d been opened willingly—and then it is to the Manufactory, where the stones quickly become charred and broken. The chief engineer’s bombs had had no end to them, or so it had seemed, and here are the bodies to prove it. Most have been dragged to the side of the street rather than take up space where they’d died, the cobbles wet and icy and red with blood where they haven’t been outright destroyed. There, on the left, a beast that looks like neither man nor dragon, laying still with its legs awkwardly splayed and its eyes open but unseeing and glassy.

The commander and his right hand step by without a second glance and find the Manufactory itself awake and thriving, the door wide open and steam pouring out as the machines within toil away. Aymeric bangs on the door with his cane to announce his arrival, and the chief appears quick enough, cheek smudged and a wild look to his eyes that is usually only seen in men that have had one cup too many of coffee. “Lord Commander! Apologies for the mess. Do come in.”

But they hang back in the cold rather than by the furnaces, and Aymeric explains they have come by only to check that those involved with the fighting are hale and whole. Only one of the Manufactory’s men has fallen, a Brume boy that was responsible for the bellows and not at all accustomed to the using of the Skysteel’s queer contraptions, having—in Stephanivien’s almost bemused own words—held onto his bomb for too long and blown himself up with it. Otherwise they’re back to work already, with plenty of items wanting replacing, and preparing for the requests that will be coming their way for such things as scaffolding, no doubt.

Then it is away as quick as they can go, back down the stair with Aymeric taking his time, and a boy runs out of an alley ahead of them. He’s dressed in rags and holding a purse clearly too fine to be his by rights: he hears the click of Aymeric’s cane first and then sees both him and Lucia coming, and with his eyes wide skitters off again like a rat with a dropped biscuit, into the cracks of the city never to be seen again. There’s no point in following, though the appearance of such a bedragged creature makes something niggle at the back of Lucia’s mind.

At the dragonkiller, the crowd has mostly dispersed, though Heustienne yet has her eyes turned south upon the great corse of the dragon hanging from the side of the Steps of Faith. At her side is the dragoon that had disappeared not to his death but the Brume and reappeared some time later looking as proud as any one man can be without exploding; away from them is a collection of soldiers tending their wounded.

“Lord Commander!” cries one as they espy him approaching, and the cheer is taken up albeit weakly by the rest of them. One or two sit trussed up at the side—not soldiers but heretics awaiting their judgement, needing potions like the rest of them and looking not at all happy for it.

The captain is a woman both short and stout, with near enough a decade on Aymeric. She gives her report quickly and matter-of-fact, explaining that they’re all but finished wrapping those that need wrapping in bandages, the healthy soldiers waiting to help escort them to the infirmary. As she talks, a brave young thing creeps closer and closer, nervous until Aymeric flashes a smile their way.

“T-thank you, ser!” they gasp, all breathless with admiration. Not having the height of a full-grown elezen, Lucia can’t help but smile to herself: all the foolishness of youth is quickly stamped out in battle but reignited quick enough should the right face appear. She had been the same way, once. “You—you saved me during the last push! Your blade is mesmerising to watch!”

Aymeric’s smile stays fixed on his face, tired but pleased, though the youth’s captain scowls at the interruption. “It should be me thanking you for your service,” he says modestly. Such niceties are often spoken but rarely meant, though Aymeric’s manner is more charming than most, and extended to more than just those of high rank. Whoever heard of thanking a squire, or a handmaid, or a peasant?

“I would have thought such steel would have slowed you down—for you to help us and then get to the snares is, well, no mean feat…”

Aymeric’s smile freezes, suddenly brittle where it was not before. “I beg your pardon?”

Either undeterred or oblivious to the way Aymeric’s gaze falls upon them now, the youth continues, “Ser? You must’ve run like hell to shoot the dragon in time—and with that sword, no less! Oh, if only I were able to—”

The squire continues babbling gratitudes, and Aymeric meets Lucia’s eye grimly. No doubt there will be plenty of stories like this lad’s: of the commander being talented enough to be in two places at once, directing the Knights and the poor alike without any problems. But how strange, for the Myste to help the Knights now where it had been attacking them before.

Excusing himself, he hobbles away with Lucia in tow, who waits until they’ve at least gone some ways from the wounded before asking, “What’ll you do?”

Aymeric clicks his tongue. “See what my brothers have to say for themselves, I suppose. Fury, they deserve thanks for their help, at least, but…”

Like a bolt of lightning to the gut, Lucia realises that with the sudden appearance of the dragons she’d had no chance to explain the morning, and stops dead in the street. The cane click-click s down the street a few paces further before Aymeric turns to look at her impatiently. “It was Fray,” she says, and then must shake her head quickly to undo the damage. “I mean—it wasn’t Fray, but it was them in the cell. I guess no one saw the—it wasn’t them that did it,” she adds, quicker now that she sees the way Aymeric’s cheeks grow pale. “Ser Estinien—is he—?”

His gaze is like stone, cold and weighty. “... Alive,” he says, and Lucia lets loose a breath she’d not known she was holding. “You’re sure it wasn’t them?”

Sure is a funny word in this city where souls give rise to murderers. “Fray said as much themselves, and I believe them. It came to set them free,” she adds, like that means something. “Surely it wouldn’t have done that if it wasn’t them.”

Click-click-click goes Aymeric’s cane as he turns and leaves her in the street, deep in thoughts she’s not privy to.

---

The runes have been redone. They press upon Aymeric as he enters the old house, but with his crystal in tow they have no choice but to let him through, no matter how much they want him kept out. It’s Sid’s magic, he knows, rough and unpolished and full of emotion in a way that Aymeric’s is most decidedly not, never having needed to practise them until recently. The door had been unlocked and the Abyss had stood aside: Sid waits within like he’d known Aymeric had been coming. 

“Which one are you?” he demands before Aymeric can say anything, an unfamiliar edge to his tone. There’s no blade on his back nor in his hand, but no one worth their salt in Ishgard needs a weapon to hurt a man, and Sid, tense and uncertain, is danger incarnate. “The shade, or the real thing?”

Only somewhat taken aback, Aymeric finds himself going tense in turn, his heart thumping at his neck. “You’ve seen it, then? What did it want?”

Silence, as Sid eyes him, one bone-white finger twitching as though it longs to be a part of a fist. The black scales at his face extend all the way down his arms to the backs of his hand: the contrast is startling. “Not seen it, no,” he says after a moment. “But I know it’s not worth associating with. You’re the real one, then?”

Behind him, the door to Ompagne’s room cracked open, dark inside, almost begging him to come inside. “Hells if I know what’s real anymore,” Aymeric says, and that seems to be a good enough answer for Sid, who sighs as though exhausted. “Can I see them?”

The room is dark and musty, and Aymeric hesitates before he pushes the door open, feeling for all the world like a child afraid to wake his father. Sid is at his back like the very first time he’d visited, giving him no choice but to go forward. Within, Fray rests on the bed as though sickly, bundled beneath what looks to be all the blankets in the house. Two crystals—one shattered, one intact—rests in their open hand, the only other part of them aside from their head not beneath the covers. All the colour seems to have drained from them, their cheeks hollow, their eyes closed, and Aymeric thinks the worst until softly, Sid calls their name.

They wake as though struggling to do so, with a little startled jerk at being disturbed and frowning before one eye cracks open.

“I’m real,” says Aymeric quickly, mindful of Sid’s wary gaze upon his back. He feels wrong to stand when Fray is so weak, and with some effort sits upon the floor using the cane as a hold, pulling it into his lap when he’s down. “Fray—”

"Why did you kill him?"

Anywhere else, Fray’s voice might be lost, so small is it, but the comforting darkness of the room holds them safe—and they are weighty words, settling around Aymeric’s shoulders and then around his heart. Trapped by the question and Fray’s molten gaze, Aymeric finds his mouth dry.

“I had to,” he says, but it feels all wrong. “No, I—”

“Bullshit.” Fray’s fingers curl around the two crystals they hold, and their hand disappears beneath the blankets. “You could’ve just stayed gone. Why didn't you? Why?”

Hardly an outburst, the words seem to have exhausted them all the same. Still their eyes shine brightly, and a crease appears between their brows as they stare, waiting. “I,” Aymeric starts, and then stops as he remembers the way Ompagne had looked in the cells the night he’d visited, only hours before they’d faced each other in the ring. His eyes had been bright then, too.

The memory crashes over him like a wave and he, detritus in its wake, takes a moment to recover from it before he tries again. “It was much a test as anything else he made us do,” he says softly. “I spoke to him before I—before,” he amends, and then decides that this is not the place to pretend. “Before I killed him. He was polite, not friendly. And he asked me once more what it was I wanted.

“I think he’d have had an answer for me no matter what I’d said,” he continues, closing his eyes to better remember how his father had looked, smiling in death’s face. “Maybe if I’d said the wrong thing, I’d be dead, and he’d be here instead, and none of this would’ve happened. I don’t know. But I told him what I said when I left: that I wanted to make the city better by any means. And he said—”

Ompagne’s smile had grown sad and proud, and he had reached through the bars of the cell to cup his son’s face, to pull him close and kiss his forehead in a way he’d only rarely done before. Where Aymeric had felt sure of himself before, it had been replaced right away with uncertainty.

In the present, Aymeric swallows and barely suppresses a shiver, feeling the ghost of Ompagne’s whiskers against his skin still. “He told me if I wanted to change things I needed to prove myself. Nothing short of doing what Ishgard wanted was going to get the results I wanted so dearly. He told me to—to meet him in the ring, and if the Fury was kind, I would walk away and take my seat, and then, only then, could I start working toward that future.”

He doesn’t bother trying to pretend he doesn’t need to wipe his eyes following the telling of it. The wound is raw within his breast: perhaps it always will be. Few enough could ever hope to understand him, truly alone. Not Lucia, not Estinien, certainly not the two before him that still have one another. And around him the city had crumbled despite his best efforts.

“Bullshit,” says Fray again. “He wouldn’t throw his life away like that.”

“He didn’t.” Both Aymeric and Fray turn to look at Sid, hanging back in the shadow with his arms folded across his chest, staring off into nothing. “You were there too, Fray. You saw him. He fought like hell—wouldn’t have done that if he meant to go quietly. He got you, didn’t he?” he adds with a quick glance at Aymeric, and somehow the memory of the broken rib Ompagne had left him sparks a sort of fierce joy within his breast. The chirurgeons had fixed it up in moments with their magic, but the bruise had remained for a week, and he had pressed upon it often, thinking of the furious way his father had fought. “But you still…”

Joy gives way to regret, and Aymeric’s shoulders slump. “Yes,” he agrees, “I still did it. I’m still responsible for this whole wretched mess, and you’ve ever right to hate me. Both of you. But that doesn’t mean I’m not trying to set things to rights.” What would Ompagne have done? Hunted the shade down and slayed it without mercy, no doubt, and it would have been so much easier for him, not being the beating heart of the city. The Archbishop pretends he’s the core, and mayhap to a select few he is, but without Aymeric’s hand the Knights would fall to pieces and take every rotten brick of the city down with them. “I just want to—to say I’m sorry,” he says, and hangs his head. It wasn’t what he’d come to say at all, but seeing them now, sick and defeated, it is all he can think to do. “For everything.”

Neither brother says anything as he rises with some difficulty, nor offers help, only watch with their glittering eyes as he leaves the darkness behind and his old home with it, leaving Fray bundled up, leaving Sid stern and silent. A great lump appears in his throat as he steps over the threshold and closes the door behind him, and he must stay holding the handle for a long moment, head bowed and eyes closed, willing the tears not to fall.

And when he turns to leave, having collected himself, he sees himself across the little square, waiting.

Chapter 20

Has he always looked like that? Severe and morose all at once, his eyes full of an emotion that he would be hard-pressed to name? Has he always held himself like that—with his shoulders set, his back firm, his head high as though ready to—to what? to take out his sword and guard, or spring forth, or—

When Aymeric shifts his weight from one foot to the other the Myste does the same, though the movement is small enough to go unnoticed. That unnerves him more than the way it looks, for there are plenty of men with eyes his shade or hair his style: no, this creature is trying to be him in more ways than the obvious, and if it has been darting around Ishgard giving orders then it is already succeeding. Without thinking, he puts too much weight on the ankle he’d twisted scrambling up and down the watchtowers on the Steps, desperate to fell that great wyrm at any cost, and the pain makes him gasp aloud.

He cannot fight like this. He cannot fight like this and the Myste knows that, with its eyes that miss nothing and its silent, sombre mouth not-quite turned down.

“Not here,” Aymeric tries, and the wind steals his words away in a fit of pique. The Myste gives no indication it had heard. “Not here,” he repeats, “Or are you so heartless you would fight where anyone could see? Our brothers—” our, he wonders as the word falls out of him, completely out of his control, as if he and it are as any normal family, “—they aren’t the only ones that live here.”

The Myste remains still and silent.

“Please,” Aymeric says, leaning on his cane as though it is the only thing in the world that might support him now, “Please, not here.” Of all the places a man and his double could go to fight to the death—and it will be to the death, for how could it be anything else?—too many are manned or not quite secret enough, except for one: the place where it had all begun. Of course. Nothing else would do. “Where our father fell,” he says, and bows his head in supplication. If he is to fall, let it be by the ghost of Ompagne.

When he lifts his head the Myste is gone, silent as a shadow, the only indication something had stood there the footsteps that lead up the stair back to the city proper. As invitations go it is not the worst Aymeric has ever entertained. At his back, the house is cold and silent and closed to him; he does not so much as consider knocking for help or even looking at the door. It will not open for him, not now, perhaps not ever again. Whether or not he lives—whether or not Fray dies—these things do not matter now. That life is not his to lead, the house not his to hide within.

And so he goes, slow and steady, up the steps that lead to Foundation. The air grows colder with every step he takes, the wind having more area to howl where the houses are not so tightly packed together, and where Aymeric’s hand was sweaty around the cane’s handle before it feels stiff with cold now. One step, and then another, and he wonders if the ankle will be his downfall, or if his hubris will be, or if he will die at all, and if so, how many heartbeats does he have left? A Knight calls his name and he ignores them, focused entirely on the feeling of being alive. Never before has he known the way the blood pulses in his arms and legs, nor how delightful the feeling of taking a breath of air so cold it hurts, nor any number of things that before now were too trivial for him to even consider. 

The Congregation is as busy as ever—that is, empty but for the runners with their memos scampering to and fro—and his office is blessedly empty. He closes the door behind him, sets the cane against it, and takes a deep breath. His sword, left behind when he’d gone to visit Estinien what feels like a lifetime ago, rests in its usual spot on its rack by the window. His desk is as covered with papers as it usually is, a great deal of them fallen to the carpet from the excitement of the morning. The fireplace is cold and needs a good cleaning, and resting atop it, an unfinished cup of tea. All of this he takes in for what feels like a final time and then banishes from mind: leaving the cane behind, he hobbles to the desk to sit, drawing a fresh page and a quill over.

I, Aymeric Deepblack…

He spends some time on his letter, addressed to no one and everyone all at once, not minding when he changes his mind partway through and crosses enough words out that the whole thing looks a great mess, not at all befitting his signature. But sign it he does, after casting his eye over it once, twice, deciding that this will do as far as a will goes, and blows upon it until the ink stops bleeding into the page, and then folds it in three. An envelope suffices to hide it, and then into the drawer it goes, unlocked so that no one going looking for it will need to struggle to find it. There: his last words for whoever comes next to look upon, no matter who that might be—no matter which face they happen to have.

Then all there is to do is to take his things and go.

---

The snow is barely falling, and slowly at that: the ring is barely dusted with white, but that is enough to see that this place is undisturbed. No one else is here, not hidden in any shadow or waiting behind any pillar for him—not that he thinks the Myste would be so underhanded, but it is worth checking all the same. And what a strange thing to think, he muses as he walks around the perimeter, careful not to step too far forward and disturb that pretty sheet of snow, that he is so confident such a creature would not simply shoot him from afar or wait until his back was turned to attack. That would be, after all, the sensible option, and perhaps even the one it employed when killing those Knights unfortunate enough to meet it on patrol. But no, he thinks with a sigh, if it has had his face all this time, no one would have needed to guard against him in the first place.

He forgets the faces of those fallen men as he takes a careful step into the ring proper. The last time he had been here was when Ompagne had fallen by his hand, and the memories are loud enough that he thinks for a moment there is still a crowd cheering his win. There—that had been where his father’s body had lain, though as he thinks of him slumped and dying his mind glides away like butter in a pan, unable to think of him in that way for any length of time. The Ompagne of his memories is a strong and upright man, not crouched and cowed like any other mortal man, and he will not change that memory unduly.

On his back the sword is heavier than ever before. Or mayhap he only thinks that after having spent little and less time with it in his hands as Lord Commander. It isn’t often he’s given the blade much thought at all, it being only a tool instead of a part of him, unlike the Abyss. He could put it down and pick up another at any time and be none the worse for wear for it; it is unlike Ompagne’s in that regard. His father’s sword had had a name and a beauty all its own, pretty to those who knew not what they were looking at and a work of art to those who did.

The sword catches his attention first, it being at the fore of his mind, and for a moment he thinks his father is come back—had never died at all—and that hope dies a miserable death when he sees that it is the Myste instead. The mistake was easy to make: it wears the black-and-purple armour that Ompagne had so favoured to stalk the night in, the cloak ragged from catching on this and that, as comforting and well-known as the Abyss itself. In its hands, Deathbringer, that beautiful blade with its fuller purple and its guard complex. None of these things had been allowed his father when they’d fought: instead he had been forced into Knightly mail, the same as he’d worn before his exile, though they’d dressed him up in his arms and armour when they’d laid him to rest. If he had been anyone else his honours would have been shoved into the same pit as so many others, but the legacy of Ompagne Deepblack was too great to ignore, and those that had known him had allowed him this mercy, at least.

That the Myste has seen his father’s bones where Aymeric has not—will never—fills him with something he has no name for. It comes to life loudly and then snuffs itself out, burrowing deep into his gut and his bones and his heart to be recalled when the nights are long and lonely and ignored elsewise, like all the grief Aymeric has ever known.

What do I call it? Aymeric wonders as they step forward as one. The wind sings and blows the snow away at their feet, the cobbles dirty and grey and waiting to be stained red once more. Does it have a name? Does it want a name?

“It never had to be this way.”

If the Myste’s voice is not its own, Aymeric does not recognise it. Indeed, he must strain to hear it at all, with the wind being what it is. It would be easy to imagine it had never spoken at all and the words were in his own mind. Mayhap they were.

“No,” Aymeric agrees, knowing it tells the truth. He meets its eyes and feels its sorrow as keenly as if it was his own: no, it did not have to be like this at all. He could have stayed at home, he could have chosen not to kill Ompagne. He could have done all manner of things and the world might have turned out differently, or the same, or worse. He’ll never know, now. “But the world is exactly as we choose to make it, and I choose to make it better.”

The world moves aside for them, though Aymeric never feels his own legs move, the twisted ankle forgotten as their drawn blades meet and the Abyss bursts forth from the both of them. The world goes dark, and Aymeric, no stranger to such things as the Abyss making itself manifest, simply closes his eyes, sinking into its familiar embrace.

Then they are apart again, and when he opens his eyes he sees the Myste doing the same, calling the shadows to itself, what snow that hadn’t been blown away melting beneath the magics it summons and unleashes. Aymeric’s ankle twinges as he moves out of range and lifts his sword to block the blow that follows, as Ompagne had taught them— him —once upon a time: only press the attack when you are certain your spells have hit, or pay the price. The price is a hearty shove so that the Myste falls back and loses its footing for all of a moment, and then it is Aymeric’s turn to lift a hand and cast. His magic, not as potent, misses, and he does not bother to follow through, keeping his sword up, his eyes narrow but alert as he watches the creature take one careful step and then another.

The Abyss is so thick upon the air that it would be easy to forget the world was ever made up of anything else. It seems almost to radiate from the Myste, now no longer bound by sorrow and instead pushed forward by rage. But of course: it had been born from Fray’s stone and turned into a man of its own accord, and the Abyss is as unknowable as it is a terrible force. The realisation sinks into Aymeric’s gut like a rock. He cannot hope to win against the Abyss itself.

He nearly loses then and there, when the Myste leaps forward with a show of force any normal man would not be able to copy, its blade high above its head. Unable to get out of the way in time, Aymeric meets the blow with his own blade and feels the clang of metal on metal all the way up to his shoulders, his wrists aching and his fingers numb. It is all he can do not to drop his sword. So close suddenly, the feelings that roll off the Myste are sharp enough to make his eyes water; never before has he seen such an expression on his own face, with his teeth bared and his eyes streaming with tears that have no business being shed. It is the last thing he sees before the darkness reaches out to blind him.

The pain in his arms is gone. The pain in his ankle is gone. It is as though he has neither arms nor legs to hurt: he exists only as a memory of himself, floating in this sea alone. He knows not himself, nor his brothers, nor his father, only the great unending dark that he came from, that he will return to. Here he is—what? Who? Aymeric, for all that matters. Just a boy from the Brume. A man who can never go home, for there is no home to go to. Aymeric Hardheart. Lord Commander. Gutter trash. Does it matter?

Yes, he thinks, and wakes upon his back. The Myste sits on him, its frozen hands around his neck, as real as any trueborn man and as heavy as one. Its cheeks are wet, though whether from tears or snow is anyone’s guess. It leans down as though to kiss him, its breath hot against Aymeric’s face, and presses their foreheads together firmly. Something hot and wet rolls down his cheek. The tear might be his. It might be the Myste’s.

The blue of his own eyes seems as endless as the path that has brought him here. A bird calls to its mate distantly. The sun shines on, hidden behind thick cloud as it is. Two brothers hold hands in a darkened room. A woman walks the city to see what she can see, and a broken man watches his window, eager to be free. The world goes ever on, as it always has, as it always shall.

“I love you,” the Myste says. The second heart at Aymeric’s throat beats so wild with emotion he thinks he might die from that alone. “More than you will ever know.”

And the Abyss reaches out, dark and calm and final.