#efrmellifer

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part of the rewrite of my DRK zine fic i'm working on!

A knock at the door shattered his reverie; he blinked to refocus—still holding the jar of earth shards, still not a damned clue what he could do with them—and glanced up toward the front door, and Hanami, who had climbed up onto the counter to reach an upper cabinet. “You going to get that?” he asked. She was right there, after all, and it wasn’t as though Sid was particularly well-known for his neighborly hospitality.

“Not my house,” she said, and slammed the cabinet door for emphasis. “Not my problem.”

He heaved a sigh and abandoned the crystals, inching past her perch on the counter so he could reach the door. At least it had sounded like a polite knock, rather than the pounding thud-thud-thuds that had echoed through the alleyways when irate Temple Knights were making their rounds.

Relationship: WoL(Etien Mellifer)/Aymeric

Rating: PG

Summary: Aymeric is a dutiful husband and orders coats for his wife--but he forgets a little detail.

Note: This is a late prize for @efrmellifer for being one of the winners of the Wondrous Tails event! I loved reading about her and Aymeric together, and I equally loved writing them. Their relationship is adorable and so wholesome UvU

It was a cold day in Ishgard, as many of them often were. With the bitter chill able to slip into one’s very bones if they were not properly clothed, Aymeric often wondered if it bothered Etien more than she cared to tell him. Though he and his fellow countrymen had barely several years to grow accustomed to the plummeting temperatures, she did not. Her home of the Black Shroud was certainly not as hot as the desert of Thanalan or the sea-swept La Noscea, but he knew enough to say it didn’t often experience anything less than late-nights of mild chill.

Similarly, he had heard many times over by way of rumor that those of her blood--Miqo’te--were oftentimes sensitive to the cold. Aymeric of course wasn’t the type of man to take a few errant rumours and assume them to be undoubtable fact, but it did certainly add to the man’s worry for Etien’s health as her husband. 

And, ever the doting of partners, Aymeric had several coats commissioned for her, seeing as she had so few already, and what others she owned didn’t seem at all made for the bitter cold so often experienced through Ishgardian nights. 

23. What do they want most in life?

oh boy. ain’t that a question.

so the thing is, hanami left doma (years ago now, and it doesn’t feel like it’s been that long until it does) completely single-minded: she would free doma from garlean rule, or she would die in the attempt. she lived her life with every waking moment dedicated to her warpath. for a long time, she only wanted to view eorzea as a training ground, or a stepping stone. just a way to get back home. then she went and got attached--to the places, but mostly to the people--and they changed her, as attachments do, and by the time she went home she was a very different woman than the one who had left, and home had changed too. and she freed it.

she got what she wanted. now what?

...now she needs to figure out what home really means, these days, and whether it has to be a place or people, and how far she’s willing to go to be there. whether she can have more than one home. and she needs to figure out how thin she can spread her heart before it snaps. so right now, she’d kill for some answers.

25. What is something they think they’re bad at, but are actually pretty competent at?

if we’re talking mundane everyday skills: cooking. she’s not bad, she just doesn’t enjoy it. same thing for academic study--she likes to present herself as this uneducated farm kid-turned-merc who doesn’t have time for the more cerebral pursuits, but she’s very smart and very teachable; it just has to be something that interests her, which usually means it has to be something she can do with her hands. if you say the word “aetherology” she will not listen to whatever words come after, but she loves working with aetherytes and enchanted machinery and has a lot of experience working with both. she won’t learn in a library or a lecture hall: stick her in a workshop and she’ll shine.

for a more meta answer: making friends. “i hate people,” says local lizard, looking very aloof next to her small army of loved ones, with four adopted teenagers clinging to her ankles.

27. Do they have any cool scar stories?

hanami has three kinds of scars. she has:

Plot-Relevant Scars, which are things like her broken horn, or the gash across her stomach from rhalgr’s reach; those are not things she considers cool or fun, and she prefers not to talk about them at all;

Gnarly Scars With Stupid Stories, such as the one up the back of her right thigh, which looks like an incredible battle scar and is actually from the time she fell off her roof while drunk and cut herself on a loose nail;