Work Text:
Sapphire Deep wandered the streets of the Ala Mhigan Quarter that Starlight Eve, soaking in the festive atmosphere that pervaded the newly liberated city. Beautifully wrapped presents under snow-dusted trees lay on each corner, snowmen with an assortment of brightly coloured hats and scarves leaning against pale stone walls. Fake icicles hung from arches and crossed overhead, low enough to brush through her hair like fingers of a cherished lover if she wasn’t careful enough. The joy present in the atmosphere made her smile; one of her favourite seasonal celebrations, and she enjoyed it immensely wherever she was, despite the unseasonal weather that surrounded the celebration occasionally.
Hailing from a small town in the north of Abalathia’s Spine, she knew that what people thought of as dry desert could indeed be cold enough for snow, and she remembered many a day in the Peaks having snowball fights with her friends, fellow Hellsguard trying to forget the otherwise harsh existence of their lives. That was all before she had fled from family who couldn’t accept her, from friends turned foes when she revealed her new identity, her new name. It had been shortly before the Garleans had come knocking on the doors of their sleepy villages nestled deep in the mountains, and she – among the first wave of refugees flooding Ul’dah – had found a new home and had finally found some peace.
She stopped at one of the street corners, stepping back and leaning against a wall as she faced the sight of Fordola being dragged along by a few delighted young children, pointing out various decorations to their confused but not entirely unwilling charge. That had been a pleasant surprise and one she was glad to see. After everything that had happened in Ala Mhigo over the past year and some, Sapphire wasn’t sure that the Ala Mhigan woman would ever be fully accepted by her people. And indeed, the adults still viewed her with some suspicion. But the children, they had surprised many – not least Fordola herself – when they had decided that the young, fierce woman needed to be taken in hand and shown the joy of Starlight.
It had started with one young girl who had run up and given Fordola a small trinket, said it reminded her of Fordola’s fiery hair. Then others, too shy initially, had done the same, and suddenly Fordola was surrounded by a gaggle of children on most days, the parents slowly becoming accustomed to the sight, giving Fordola a gentle nod of acquiescence when she had questioned whether it was okay for her to be left with the children. No doubt the parents were glad to have some time to themselves, and the trust that was placed in her after everything that had happened had helped soften Fordola’s spiky interior. Not that her exterior had gotten any smoother, but that probably couldn’t be helped.
Sapphire caught her eye as the redhead was pulled down another street, a nod and a smile returned with a scowl from Fordola, but one that was much lighter than she had ever seen. The woman would recover, she would be okay, and Sapphire was truly glad that she would be offered redemption, that she may in time be forgiven and would learn to forgive herself.
With the crowd of children and the “Butcher” turned babysitter leaving the crossing, Sapphire continued her journey down busy streets, the smells and sounds of festive joy and celebration widening the smile already on her lips, so different from what the city had been like even a year ago. It made all of the worry and woe melt away when she was able to see the change she had helped create, that had been so hard fought for, that had eventually ended in victory. There was still much to do; when wasn’t there more work for the Warrior of Light to deal with? But this, these small moments of peace and contentment, made it all worthwhile.
Passing a particularly busy café, she tensed as she felt focus land on her. Sapphire forced herself to relax as she scanned the customers for the source of that attention. It wasn’t unusual; she was becoming more known as she travelled across the world, but the stares still got to her somehow, reminded her of worse times and preyed on her own trauma. Her deep brown eyes landed on a hazel one, the other hidden behind a black bandana, and she tensed further, her heartbeat stuttering even as she smiled warmly.
Thancred Waters.
Gods, it was unfair how even his gaze was enough to set her heart tripping, his smile sending a warm glow to her chest. She took in the white-haired miqo’te sitting calmly by his side with a cup of tea in her hands, watching on with sharp amusement as the very unsubtle group of women surrounded the bard-turned-rogue-turned gunbreaker, each jostling the other to get closer to his handsome face. She couldn’t really blame them; were her life a different one she would likely have been in the same boat, swooning at a well-placed wink, fluttering her eyelashes at the Scion. Instead, she satisfied herself with being his friend, with knowing that nothing more were likely to happen. They were just comrades-at-arms, for now and evermore.
She gave both Thancred and Y’shtola a merry wave, and then turned to continue on her stroll, ignoring the pang of unrequited affections that sliced through her. A hand placed on her arm pulled her out of the whirlwind of emotion swirling in her mind, and Sapphire turned to come face to face with the subject of her thoughts. He looked flushed, as if he had run across the road, and indeed from the disappointed faces of his adoring fans still in the café, it may have been likely.
“Sapph! Full glad am I to see you here – I was almost tempted to think you’d been avoiding me,” Thancred said, his lips twisting as he dropped his hand from her arm. The warmth of his touch stayed for longer than it should have, and even so, she barely avoided running her hand across it to try and keep it close.
Sapph. That nickname sent a thrill through her, levin zipping down her spine and pooling in her gut. She loved the name Sapphire, had chosen it herself. It spoke of precious gems found deep in the ancestral mountains of her youth, of hidden treasures and beauty yet unearthed. But the way he had shortened it, given it warmth and life, made something coil around her heart and she feared it would not let go any time soon; so very dangerous. Dangerous even more so because his words held a seam of truth that they both tacitly acknowledged in the silence that followed; she knew things had been different between them since he’d returned from the Flow, since Minfilia had decided her path.
“Hi Thancred, apologies! I didn’t mean to drag you away from your gaggle of groupies over there,” Sapphire said, a wave of shame spiking through her blood when he winced at her perhaps sharper than intended words. She had meant it as a joke, but it seemed to miss the mark, and she grimaced at the bitterness, that sharp slice of envy that cut through her. She wanted to be one of them. She was one of them.
“Oh, uh, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean anything by it,” she started, and he waved a hand and looked away, turning back with a fixed grin on his face. She swore internally as she caught the mask descending. Being the cause of that was the last thing she wanted for him; she remembered the feeling of having to hide parts of herself all too well and she wished fervently that he realised that he didn’t have to hide around her, that he would never have to hide himself around her.
“No, no, you’re fine, I just… How have you been?” He trailed off from his initial answer, as if aware that was veering into more honesty than he had intended. She cursed herself again.
“Oh, same old, just been busy here and there. I was just in Doma and Alisaie mentioned that you were back in the city so…” Sapphire trailed off, eyes widening as she realised that she was about to admit way too much about her feelings, as if her own mask had slipped too far. She peeked at his face, something inscrutable flashing across it, and for the third time she cursed herself and her loose tongue and ability to firmly plant her foot in her mouth. Of course, he probably knew about her crush, of course it probably made him uncomfortable.
“Anyway, I should let you get back to–”
“–My gaggle of groupies?” he interrupted her with a sly grin and she laughed aloud, surprised by the amusement in his comment, heart thumping at that twinkle in his eye, all too seldom seen since everything with Lahabrea, everything with Minfilia. She missed that Thancred sometimes, the one that had always been irreverent and sardonic, confident to a fault and a little bit of a show off. But then she also valued the more truthful Thancred too, the moments of insight and clarity that he offered now that he knew not everything needed to be a joke. She wished he had found his way less painfully, but then she knew better than many that the path walked to find one’s true self was not often easy or clean.
“Actually, can we talk? Somewhere away from the daggers being thrown our way, perhaps?” Thancred asked, a quick glance to the side, where indeed a few of the women were glaring at Sapphire with a venom that could kill from 20 yalms away. She chuckled lightly and nodded even as she felt that flicker of fear within her. If only they knew the truth, that he likely wanted to talk about her crush, wanted to let her down gently. Well, if that was the case, then she’d accept it and hope it didn’t break their friendship too badly. She certainly couldn’t control his feelings or attraction, and neither would she want to, so maybe it was a good thing to clear the air between them.
They walked down a few alleyways until they ended up in a small courtyard garden, hidden from the main thoroughfare and bursting with bright red blooms and verdant leaves high enough to shade the courtyard from the bright sunlight of noon. A small fountain burbled away in the centre of the courtyard and Thancred sat upon a cool stone bench sat in the dappled shade, looking up at Sapphire expectantly. He was smiling softly, an expression that made the sharp chiselled lines of his face all the more beautiful. She steeled herself for an unpleasant conversation and sat down next to him, surprised when he shifted closer with a smoothness that always set her heart racing. His thigh pressed against hers, nudged with intent.
“You’re truly okay, Sapph? Not working too hard? I get that it’s important work you do but sometimes all work and no play can make the Warrior of Light a dull girl.” His hazel eye gazed at her as he spoke, searching and almost beseeching, with a hint of edge. It seemed that he saw entirely too much and sometimes she just wished that she were not the focus of his insight. She shook her head, wild black hair brushing against her cheeks as she tried to find words that could reassure him without giving too much away.
The truth was that she had been avoiding him. The discomfort between them was painful, and she knew she had to get over this crush. She had tried to create enough space that she would forget about her feelings for him. Unsurprisingly, it hadn’t worked, and instead the yearning seemed to grow with every malm apart.
“What about you? Anyone ever told you that you’ve been working entirely too hard for a playboy bard?” she snapped back, trying for a teasing deflection but ending up with something a little sharper, a little closer to the bone. She saw her words hit with a force that shocked her, and he dropped his gaze down to his lap, to upturned palms as if he could read the path of his life in the lines there.
“Thancred I’m sorry, but please don’t lock yourself away again. You can trust me, I promise.” She rushed out, desperate to stop the mask from dropping once more, desperate to have him remain honest and open with her. She watched his jaw ripple as he considered his options, and she reached out and placed one of her hands in his, watched as his fingers curled around hers.
“I trust you, I do,” he said, slightly above a whisper, and his jaw clenched again. “I… sometimes I look in the mirror, and I hate the man who stares back at me. Not… not as in I hate myself, not really, just that he’s not what I expect to see. It’s like the face there doesn’t feel like me, not anymore… I’m not making sense, am I?”
“You are,” Sapphire said, giving a gentle squeeze of reassurance and meeting his eyes. She said nothing more, just waited as the silence stretched out, not uncomfortable but still pregnant and heavy with emotion, as if it knew more was yet to be said.
“Sometimes it feels like I’m crawling under my own skin, like I’m trapped in a cage of my own body. I hate it,” he whispered, his hand now tightly gripping hers. He turned his gaze away, staring at the flowers in front of them with a fury that seemed to burn the very air around them.
“Like you feel a disconnect between who you are and what you see in the mirror.” Sapphire added, thinking of her own experiences before she had managed to find a fantasia, before she had taken the steps to become who she truly was inside. Thancred nodded slowly, gaze flickering to her for a second and then back to the flowers.
“How long has it been like that for you?” she asked, and he took a deep breath, slowly loosening the grip on her hand but not letting go entirely.
“Since Lahabrea… it got worse after the teleportation spell, too. Didn’t feel right in my own skin, got used to looking in the mirror and seeing him staring back at me. It’d hit me sometimes, like I couldn’t recognise that it was still me, and then under the palace in Ul’dah, being physically forced out of it... It was a lot to handle, and I don’t know if I’ve ever truly recovered from it. Don’t entirely know if I can.” Sapphire nodded. It made perfect sense, and while it wasn’t exactly the same, she could perhaps at least understand the general feeling, the anxiety and pain that came with it.
“You can, I believe in you. But on the days when it’s tough, when you feel like you can’t… I’ll be here. And if there’s anything I can do to help…” She could feel him spooling himself back in, as if she knew that would be all she got from him today. He nodded; another squeeze of his hand and he looked up at her with a soft smile of thanks.
“You do. Just your presence is enough to help,” he replied softly. And then his gaze sharpened, and he directed that razor insight back to her. “But it would help a lot more to know that you’re not avoiding me, that you’re okay, that we’re okay.”
She took a breath, trying to keep it steady even as it felt like it was shuddering with the emotions that rode her like a mount. Up and down, hope and fear, calm and storm.
“I’m fine, Thancred, honestly. Busy, yes, but I’m taking the time to enjoy myself too. Like today, watching the city come to life again is just amazing.” She spoke fast, almost in one breath, earnestly wishing to allay his fears, to remove herself from his penetrating gaze.
“And watching me suffer through the gaggle of groupies, of course,” he added, his expression carefully neutral even as a flutter of a smirk played at the corner of his lips. Sapphire groaned, leaning against the back of the bench and staring up at the bright blue sky through gently swaying leaves.
“I’m never going to live that down, am I?” she asked to the air at large and Thancred chuckled, voice low and sending another stream of warmth down into the pit of her stomach. They sat like that for a few heartbeats, still holding hands while not acknowledging the contact, like neither of them wished for it to end.
“Do you think they call themselves the Waters Wives?” he asked lightly, and she turned her head to glare, but couldn’t keep up the act at the delight on his face, warmth and affection coiling deep within them both.
“Gods help your future partner, Thancred. They’ll have to put up with much more than I will ever thankfully have to.” Sapphire groaned dramatically and this time his laughter had more than a hint of cackle to it.
“Maybe you should be my partner, and then you’ll get the full benefit of the Thancred Waters charm, as well as everything else you have to deal with. I could certainly help you relax after all these incredibly important missions that keep you away from me.” He turned to her with a wide teasing grin, a wink and a smirk that bordered on lascivious.
She took a breath and found it had nowhere to go, as she considered the implication he had just thrown her way. If she had heard it said to anyone else, she would have perhaps considered it flirty, and the phrase “keep you away from me” rolled around her head incessantly as she stared at him with wide eyes and an open mouth. With nothing else to say, no other way to react, she reached out and slapped his arm lightly with her other hand, a bellowed and strained laugh on her lips, ignoring the other hand still wrapped up in his.
“Fat chance, Waters. You’d never chase after me, don’t need me hanging around you all the time.” She ignored the burn that rolled through her at the truth, all too easily revealed. Suddenly the contact was too much, and she pulled her hand from his, ignoring the way his grip tightened around hers as if he didn’t want to let go.
“Why would you think that?” Thancred asked quickly, the smirk dropping from his face and replaced with an intensity that burned her from the inside. She blushed, turned her face away, stared back at the sky, and let out a deep sigh.
“Because I don’t think I’m your type,” she answered softly, acknowledging the truth that lay between them, laying herself bare and waiting for the gentle rejection she felt sure he would offer.
“You think I’ve not chased you because I don’t find you attractive?” he asked incredulously. “Hells, Sapph, it’s the exact opposite!”
She cautiously met his hazel eye, now turned from indignant to warm and inviting, although to what, she didn’t dare hope. She noticed his fingers twitching closer to hers, as if he wanted to grab her hand again, and she didn’t deny to herself that she wished for that warmth.
“What do you mean by that?” she asked, her voice entirely too breathy, her heart beating wildly in her chest. He turned to fully face her, a hand reaching up to cup her cheek, brushing away some of the hair that always seemed to curl and flip around her face despite anything she tried to do to tame it.
“Sapph, love, before…” he took a deep breath, pain shining in his face at the time he was trying so hard to forget, the pain and terror that she could see trying to wrap itself around him. “Back then I always chased that which was easy, no strings attached. Emotions were… messy, unwished for, so if there was a chance that they would develop, I stayed far away. I ran away, in fact.” He chuckled, a bitter twinge to his words and twisted lips that spoke clearly of his views on himself and his past actions. She opened her mouth, but his thumb brushed against her lips and she stilled, her breath refusing to make its way past her throat at his gentle touch.
“I didn’t chase you not because you weren’t attractive to me, or because you weren’t enough. It was because you were too attractive to me, more than enough, just… more.”
“Thancred… You don’t need–” Sapphire tried to interrupt but he shook his head, the small braid at the base of his neck flipping over his shoulder.
“–No, I think it needs saying. I’ve not said it for long enough and I think me not being honest with you has likely caused some pain, for both of us. I like you Sapph, I like you entirely too much. I have done since the moment I first saw you, fighting that damnable voidsent side by side out by the Sultantree.”
“… What?” Sapphire whispered, not daring to breathe. Time seemed to slow and she had no idea what she was supposed to say, how she was supposed to react. She had rehearsed how to act when he let her down, how to deal with his potential irritation if he got sick of her mooning. But this… this was all so very different from what she expected to hear from him, and she just didn’t know what she was supposed to do.
“Sapph, I like you. Probably more than that, but this is all as new to me as it apparently unexpected to you, so I figure we should probably take it a little slow. Are you okay with that?” Thancred answered, a crooked smile on his lips as he cupped her face with both hands.
“Um… I think so?” She stared at him, watched that beautiful twinkle in his eye, taking in every minute movement, waiting for the moment when the act would drop, when he would say it was all a joke. Surely this wasn’t happening, but as he continued to stare at her, his adoration clear to her for the first time, she had to admit that perhaps, potentially, he really did like her. With that realisation it was like her mind crumbled, but this time with a seam of golden hope running through the cracks, stitching them back together.
“You think so? Do you… do you like me back?” he asked, a hint of unsurety in his voice. It was so unexpected for him to be the nervous one that she couldn’t help but laugh, louder than it should have been, a full release of pent up and confusing emotions.
“Gods, of course I do, you fool,” she replied, and his smile widened even as one hand reached to the back of her neck, burying fingers into her hair.
“Confessing my feelings to the woman of my affection and I get laughed at and called a fool. It’s not going entirely to plan.” Thancred shook his head, and she felt her own smile widen, one hand resting on his chest as the other scratched through the stubble on his cheek.
“I don’t know, it feels entirely right for us,” she said, and he chuckled and nodded, leaning closer.
“That’s the truth. Sapph?” He leaned a little closer, and she could feel his breath, warm and faintly smelling of mint, puffing out against her own lips.
“Yes?” She answered, leaning closer herself, until their lips almost brushed.
“Can I kiss you?”
“Gods, I thought you’d never ask,” she sighed, and then his lips were on hers, softer than she’d imagined but with a burning passion and affection that blew away every doubt this wasn’t real. She melted into this kiss, as perfect in every way as she’d wanted it to be, her own small slice of Starlight happiness.