Gisele, how is your relationship with the twins? Is there one you feel more of a kinship to over the other?
I love them dearly, and I cannot fairly say which of the two I love more. Tis rather like choosing between my favorite gowns! But I have been through the hells and back with Alphinaud, in a way that I have not with Alisaie, though she is just as dear to me, and she is like my sister all the same.
Truthfully, when I speak of the Scions as my family, tis the Leveilleur twins that are foremost in my mind. I have said many times that I had no siblings of which to speak. Never had I younger children to cling to mine skirts, or to tease me. Serena Tabris, of course, but I never saw her again when the Templars came for me. And oft I was too ill, in those tender years, to play with the other children. I was desperately lonely, in truth.
I suppose part of me envies the twins for their privileged lives in Sharlayan, with a loving family, wealth and titles, a community of scholars that celebrated them as prodigies and permitted their gifts to flourish. I cannot deny it, when they speak of the old country with Shtola, Krile, and Urianger, the bitterness I feel betimes. And I feel a great deal of shame in it; they were not to blame for the degradations I knew in Ferelden.
But I love them well, and always have—even when Alphinaud was betimes insufferable I could not bear him malice, for I saw much of myself in him, when I was an adolescent. For all our respective upbringings could not have been more starkly contrasted, we share a deep and abiding love for the arcane arts, the desire to use them for the good of all, and bearing the weight of expectations in the manner only the truly gifted can know. I was but nineteen when I raised the army which ended the Fifth Blight, and gave my life for the homeland which despised me. Again and again, I was told that I was the greatest Circle Mage of my generation. I took pride in that, but feared it betimes—I could not falter, I must be perfect. The twins understand this well. Many times we speak of it, Alphinaud most of all.
But I would be remiss were I not to address the proverbial marid in the room. Tis awkward of a surety that they both are overfond of me, but they are both wise beyond their tender years, and bear me no malice. If they bicker over my attentions, tis much the way children bicker over a favorite doll. And I feel guilty, I do, that I have inadvertently caused either of them any suffering. But I am a woman grown, and know from this manner of suffering—I was madly in love with Mademoiselle Vivienne well, after all, and she rebuffed me in kind, for I was far too young to know what I asked of her, when I was an apprentice not reached the age of majority, and she was an Enchanter of Montsimmard five winters my senior. I hold fast to the knowledge that such pain is fleeting, mayhap even a part of growing up. Mayhap they understand this, for neither has ever made such confession to me, and bear it in silence.
In the bowels of the earth, deep within Bahamut’s prison, I made a promise to Master Louisoix to guide them in his place, and I keep well my promises. Even now, I feel his gentle spirit with me betimes, and strive to be a worthy heir to his legacy, in all respects. The irony is not lost upon me, that once I dreamed of becoming First Enchanter, training and molding young mages, and now I am mentor to two of the most gifted and headstrong, youths after mine own heart. But I am proud of how they have grown, not merely in their Arts, but as people. I am glad to know them. In the main, I shall not forget that I began this long and remarkable Eorzean adventure with them, even were they far more taciturn than now they are. Again and again, when I think upon the moments of greatest import, so often the twins have been there at my side—and I for them, whensoever they faltered, or needed me. Is that not what family means?