FFxivWrite 2022
FFxivWrite22 Masterpost
Prompt #6: Onerous
āGlory be to Garlemald.ā
How many times had he uttered those words? He couldnāt hope to keep track, dutiful son of the Empire that he was. All he knew was that in the end, there was no glory for his land or his people. An empire founded on lies, destroyed by the same forces that created it. Death and destruction was their reward for playing the role they had been unwittingly cast. The Empire was no more, but what was left of Garlemaldās people still lived on, be it as refugees in foreign lands or survivors in their homeland. Either way, they had no home. They were the same as him now. Who would have guessed Aelius had simply been ahead of the curve in his exile?
Maybe it was a mercy that his path had ensured he was not there in those final days of suffering. Of course, heād never see it that way. As far as he was concerned, he had failed to be there to protect his people and suffer the fate he knew he deserved. He had heard rumors of what had happened, received reports from the few contacts Lucretia still held, but he could not have imagined the scale of the devastation until the rickety airship descended low enough he could see it with his own eye. As he stepped foot upon the frozen earth, the chill of Garlemaldās air cut deeper than he remembered. He chalked it up to his years away, but deep down, he knew it was more than that.
He cast such thoughts aside, but others were more difficult to shake. Like the thought that Septimus was not much older than Valerius would be by now. When he looked at the boy, he saw so much of his brotherāor at least, what he imagined his brother to be. Valerius was little more than a babe when Aelius had left for Eorzea. What had happened to him in Aelās absence? Had he been passed the same mantle Aelius had borne? The heir to the Corinthius familyās legacy, the man of the household. Such responsibility thrust onto a boy so young⦠not that Aelius had been any older. Things were different for Valerius, however. Their father wasnāt just gone, he was dead. Their mother wasnāt just lonely, she was a widow⦠grieving not just the loss of her husband and the father of her children, but for all she knew, also her eldest son.
And now this⦠the war, the capitol⦠what had become of their familyās home? Was their mother even still alive? Was Valeriusāhe couldnāt even bring himself to finish the thought. He felt his hand ball into a fist at his side. He had spent so long running away from everything. He had never intended to return to Garlemald⦠but now that he was here, things suddenly werenāt as simple as retrieving the Eyes of the Forgotten and ensuring their airship could carry them back to Eorzea. No, that was the last of his concerns now. He could no longer run away from the part of himself that remembered his duty to the Empire, and to his family.
@aelius-ffxiv, @tough-bit-of-fluffā, @its-the-val-palā