#ivarault

Once more, it hadn't been a great day, and Esredes came home in a bad mood.

The Lord he went to see on Ferrant's behalf was rude, an Inquisitor had stopped him on the street and asked him all sorts of veiled questions Esredes was sure was just threatening him, he had been the target of ridicule in a bar yet again- he was fuming as he stormed up the steps, but even more, the cold was spreading through the room, the walls crumbling away to red fog and black.

Esredes ignored it all, and collapsed on his bed, the silence of his home crushing him like a weight. Every time he opened his eyes, all he saw was red fog, but he just shut them again. Go to sleep. It doesn't matter. None of it fucking matters.

Then he opened his eyes again, and the color scheme had completely changed.

His room had turned into a cavern, and he sat on the plain ground mixed with patches of grass. Despite being completely underground, sunlight filtered through the cavern ceiling, and some flowers were blooming in the grass patches. A tree stood in the middle of the room, with many shiny objects hanging from it. Esredes sat up and continued to take in the room in. There were two paths from this room, one following past the tree and the other leading off somewhere else in the cavern, and most of all, the ground around where he was sitting was full of little stones.

He picked one up, the soil dust brushing his fingertips as they all curled around its back, leaving his thumb to run over the smooth surface. It looked like a little black pebble, but it didn’t quite feel like one. Whatever material it was made of felt more like touching a pearl, but even that wasn’t quite right. The others all around were mostly gray, some with slight and dull color. Esredes concentrated harder on the weird stone in his hand. Why were there so many of them?

Then he felt an aura pulse off of the stone, and in an instant it washed over him. A Highlander in a dark hood that was in the crowd when he gave a speech at that Shiva memorial ceremony. The stone gave off his aura.

Huh…

He picked up another stone, this one mostly identical to the last, but red with streaks of black. Some Miqo’te who had jumped off a roof and said hi to him and Vette at a beachside party once. Then there was the Vulort’s house butler who mysteriously appeared to him on a roof and told him about his heretical past right before he was to destroy his master for past wrongdoings. A deep pink gem was the Bishop who had given him a long speech about how the Church needed to do better by a railing once. Several more passed through his hands, all people his memory couldn’t recall the existence of on his own he had never seen more than once. He eventually stood up, and made his way to the tree. The stones he passed on the way gradually became more colorful, a little more detailed, and that’s when he realized as he picked one up they were not just stones, but gems. This one was a light blue gray, still smooth, but this time it felt more properly like a pearl, even though it looked more like a regular gem. The aura pulsed out. Another Vulort, the head’s Shroud born daughter who had said hi to him at a party and called him Eraser for some reason. She was a cute little thing, but her gem was still fairly tiny… Another one of red with flecks of brown stood out to him. Who did he know that had a color scheme like this? He picked it up and examined it; it turned out to be Yves, which... well, it made sense the little thing was just barely resembling a gem at all. Even smaller than Aris’ was a deep blue gray that seemed between the stages of wanting to be one of those gray stones and an actual gem; the surface was not as smooth as the others, it vaguely resembled a gem, but not quite. It was still a pretty little semi-gem, but Esredes hadn’t a clue who it was before the pulse. Oh, that strange friendly Inquisitor who invited him to a picnic- Trigette? What was her first name she signed off with again? He didn't quite remember besides it starting with an L. Oh well, he wasn't sure if this little thing would change to become anything more than it was.

He moved into the next room. Here the cavern walls shifted a little. Instead of a simple brown, they became a little more shiny and closer to the color silver, but not quite. They were still mostly gray. More gems littered the floor as he stepped around them all, levitating some into his hand to inspect them better. The first was a pale white with streaks of equally pale red, and this one he recognized even before the aura pulsed. The gem was very fragile, parts of it were chipped, threatening to crack apart entirely if the right pressure was applied, and it still looked underdeveloped, like the facets hadn’t quite formed. Squire of the Axe. Gerivien, that was his actual name apparently. That Squire of that horrible Temple Knight division who couldn’t seem to decide if he tolerated Esredes’ presence or wanted to kill him, more bark than bite all around. A delicate and frail gem; one that if Esredes pushed even just a little too hard, it would shatter completely. Yet he gently levitated it back down to the ground. Perhaps it would shatter one day or another, but for now he didn’t feel like moving it.

Instead, he levitated a gem that was lying beside it. A deep purplely pink, and this one had sharp edges. If he held it in his hand, he would probably cut himself on it, unless he held it by the one edge that wasn’t sharp. This had to be… yes, it was the son of his Sharlayan friend who believed in him and yet threw a tome at his face once. That troubled, temperamental teenager he had gotten through to after having to do everything in his power to avoid him trying to instigate a fight with him for his heritage. Esredes smiled faintly. Unlike Gerivien, this one didn’t feel fragile at all.

He kept a slow walk through the cavern, levitating the various gems up and down to inspect them. A pale red and faceted little gem with a smooth surface despite the facets; he didn’t recognize it before it pulsed, but that was Lycelle, the Dragoon usually wearing the cute beanie and coat who he said hi to at parties sometimes. Her gem would look great in a necklace… Sylvain’s wasn’t too far away, the last of the Vulorts, a deep red with a yellow center. However, this one wasn’t on the floor like the others; it hung down from the ceiling by a couple thin threads, as if a spider had woven them, one blue and one brown. The edges of this gem had seemed sharp when he first saw it, but now he realized they weren’t particularly sharp. No more likely to cut than the average gem. Then hanging from the ceiling by a blue and purple thread and the same brown as before, there was a gem similar in size and look to Lycelle, but a bright yellow orange. He didn’t know many people who associated themselves with orange… ah, Colette. Well, he knew a few, he supposed.

The glimmer of these more developed gems drove Esredes deeper into the cavern. The cavern slowly became more like pure silver, even glittering eventually, and yet still there were patches of golden grass and flowers on the floor. A lot more gems were suspended from the ceiling in various colors of thread. Some even had it wrapped around the middle of the gem in multiple layers. While the earlier part of the tunnel had almost overwhelmed Esredes, here there were fewer gems, more vibrant and larger in their appearances. He let one float down gently on its single red string towards his face. It was particularly beautiful to him, a faceted and circular gem with smooth edges that mixed a deep navy, bright red, and soft pink all in one. Yet he hadn't a clue who it was until the aura emitted off of it. Fiona. Of course, now the color scheme made more sense- the red of her ever present beret mixed with the navy of her true form when she didn't masquerade as a small Elezen. He smiled faintly. It was no wonder she was such a pretty gem...

A little further into the cave, he floated down another one on but a couple strings that caught his eye. It was hard to miss this one, as it was crackling lightning and a deep purple that seemed like more lightning was constantly emitting inside it, all with flecks of orange. Minami, he guessed correctly. She was one of the campmates that didn't even like him at first, but they had worked it all out in the end. It seemed a lot more associates were in this area-  he found another deep blue gem that he knew immediately had to be Hilda soon after. It suited her perfectly. Then there was a bright yellow and smooth gem with flecks of green and brown, with a sunflower trapped inside the gem and the base of it wrapped around the exterior. Blue, red, and brown strings all kept it suspended from their place around the middle. Elouan truly was his sunflower, it seemed.

Soon he came to the end of the long tunnel, and there the cavern opened in a mouth, revealing the entrance to a golden room. Hanging from the ceiling by its entrance was a red and green sharp gem and a deep blue with flecks of lighter blue that sparkled like stardust, both of which he recognized immediately as Rusty and Dione respectively. Esredes took a few slow steps forward, but then remembered. There was another path back at the entrance, and now that he could glimpse this one's end, he wondered where it went. He turned around and walked back through the tunnel at a brisk pace until he ended back up at the entrance to the other path.

It didn't go on for very long, especially compared to the long, slowly changing tunnel. It was but a short walk before he found himself at a little pool he couldn't quite judge the depth of. Esredes stuck his hand in and swished it around a moment before withdrawing it. His hand wasn't wet, no trace of water droplets at all. Next he stuck his feet in and kicked them around. Again, he couldn't feel the water seep into his boots or pants. Hm... He climbed back out and, using the edge as his ladder, slowly submerged most of his body in the pool. Instead of sinking down, his body simply remained suspended where it was, even when he dared to let go of the edge. Esredes stretched his feet down, and dropped a little more down in the water. When it covered his face, the water didn't rush into his lungs, ears, and eyes. He was still breathing perfectly fine.

Now he had to have answers. He floated down further into the water. It didn't take long before it opened up into a much larger ravine, and the water ceased to be, leaving Esredes floating at the top of the ravine with no way out but that mere hole. It seemed to stretch on forever in all directions but up- down, left, and right.

There were gems here, too, embedded in the walls, but as he floated over to inspect them, they were all shattered pieces of gems stuck in the wall. He ran his hand over several fragments of a gem that was black with blue flecks. When he had been above, the aura pulsed out with a sense of warmth, that only grew the closer he got to the gilded room. But as the aura of these pieces came to him, it was distinctly cold instead. Bellona. These were the pieces of her gem- that Warrior of Light he had pulled into his war efforts without telling her everything. She fled when she witnessed him killing an Ishgardian, and his attempts to clear it up... did not go well, to say the least. And then there was everything her kind did afterwards later on- for so long, they had been nothing but angry at one another, she had most certainly threatened to kill him after he pushed her emotionally once on her own lack of care for Ishgardian affairs. Yet now as he ran his fingers over her cold shards repeatedly, all of the anger of the past was absent from inside him. He merely frowned softly. It's your fault. There came a whisper from his heart, a noise he knew he had heard repeatedly in the past, but never completely listened to before now. He had been horrible to her. The naive young woman had been willing to give her heart over to him, but she was only met with a mask like everyone else got. Maybe if he had found a way to explain himself, not been so scared about losing her, and then continue to ruin it further... He turned away and continued inspecting the ravine. Those shards were not ever coming out of the wall, and he knew it.

The other shards in the wall took many forms- many were lost relationships from before his exile, people he never saw again and was afraid to see in the present. So many shards... friends, family members, fellow soldiers, passing acquaintances he had completely forgotten about, and even the shards of faces and names he couldn't make out, obscured behind the helmets of all those who fell to him who sent shivers down his spine... they were all here, dead and fragmented without any luster to their pieces, and he would never be able to ask for it any other way.

The ravine filled with water in an instant, and he realized in that moment it was no simple ravine. It was an abyss.

And still, he kept floating downward. He discovered other Warriors' shards among the others. There was a spray of purple shards that Esredes blinked at in particular, then ran his hand over and felt the cold pass over him. Oh, it was the one who admitted to doing the act. That purple, tiny Duskwight in his Dragoon armor who tried to tell Esredes he regretted killing his at Snowcloak, that now everything was completely fine because he was helping the alliance and Ysayle's dream had come true. Oh, Esredes had no mercy in psychologically tearing him apart on the spot and watching him break down and cry.

Was it a warranted revenge? He asked himself as he poked at one of the shards. Maybe, maybe not; it wasn't anger that boiled at the memory now as much as complete indifference.

As he kept traveling, shards of a purple gem with orange reminded him of that courtesan who kept trying to come on to him. There really were some nasty little memories down here...

The further down he went, the more identifiable the shards became; these were people he couldn't forget if he tried. What tipped him off was a dull set of shards that seemed to contain fire in them; though he didn't recognize them until the aura came, he immediately remembered the final Vulort, the one he had put in everything to bring down after he sold his people out to the Alliance despite giving them the information on the caravans. Yet he was here on the outside of the wall, and that one was going to rot in gaol. Ah, how ironic the world became.

Down he went, deeper and deeper. As much as multiple parts of him wanted to go back up to the surface, he needed to see the bottom first, to understand just what could lie there at the bottom. He was near it when he came across several shards of orange with red specks. Like many of the shards, these looked very sharp and deadly, like they could kill someone if they weren't lodged in a wall, easily. He tried exerting force on the shards, but they did not crack or break. But oh did he want them to; these were Murielle's shards, and he knew it. Still, they would never move from their spot, safely lodged in the wall and buried, unlike her skeleton. He moved on.

The bottom came into sight not long after that. He passed red and gray shards that were among the sharpest he'd seen, and knew immediately it had to be that Dragoon who wouldn't stop threatening to murder him. He deserved his place down here. Nidhogg and Thordan's shards were right around the same area. But there at the very bottom, there weren't a lot of shards in the wall. His feet touched the ground, and he dared to touch a display of icy blue shards. They belonged to the Garlean scientist who kidnapped his allies and injected the blood into unwitting civilians. Esredes' hand recoiled back at the sheer power of the cold that came from the aura; it was like all the ice of Coerthas entering and exiting his body rapidly, and he exhaled a long and shaky breath.

He had seen enough. He lifted himself up again, past the whirlwind of shards of the countless things he had shattered over the course of his life, and at the end of the path of destruction, he floated right out of the pool and landed on the ground beside it. He walked at a brisk pace through the cavern, back towards the room he had neglected, and in he stepped inside.

In the middle of this room stood a tree with golden leaves, and all the gems hanging from the tree were larger overall than the rest. He recognized all of these at a glance- Mother, Father, Seraphiaux, Alise, Olivette, Ferrant, Heilyn... there were only so many, but each one was richer than any noble could ever afford.

Esredes smiled to himself and sat underneath the tree, resting his body on the soft golden grass. He floated all of the gems down on their strings to hang in the around him. They started pouring in from the other room, covering the floor and the air with gems, so many gems...

Esredes scooped them up in his hands and the rare urge to simply laugh escaped him. Ah, they were all so lovely little things, and just holding them in his arms and hands  filled the man with a deep sense of warmth.

This was his little treasure trove. And there was so much for him to keep close, to cherish, and protect from ever breaking.

He closed his eyes and fell back into his pile, relaxing all his limbs as he got partially buried under it all. For a while, everything stood still, and he decided he would stay right here.

----

Thank you everyone for coming along on the disaster heretic’s journey this XIVwrite!

@thecalmnessandthestorms / @heartofthefury Seraphiaux, Ferrant, Heilyn, Murielle

@yvesoix-sellemontiere Yves, Cardillaut (unnamed mention) Lacendrelle (unnamed mention)

@syerraffxiv Olivette

@whitewingsandblacktalons Dione

@thelemstar Rusty

@eternal-finis Lieuvanne

@momokarp Alise, Thiessen (unnamed mention)

Arius Ivarault (unnamed mention)

Krovennan (unnamed mention)

@axelstriker Axel (unnamed mention)

@rothalion Rothalion (unnamed mention)

@catte-bard Bellona

Lori Gerivien

@serdoctor Caligula, Eremielle (unnamed mention)

@future-exalt Hilda

@floating-city-of-nem Fiona

Tori Minami

Jen Lycelle

Nick Colette

@house-vulort Sylvain, Aris, Clovis, Gael

7:45 in the morning.

Each and every day, Esredes' alarm went off. He was not one with long startup lag- within a minute, he was always up and shutting his alarm off, dragging himself to the bathroom.

Brush your teeth, comb your hair back into those peculiar spikes, splash some water on your face- yes, perfect. And next came the closet, where Esredes mostly changed into the same repetition of outfits each day- all this time, and still he had not bothered to add much new.

Too much attention.

All this took ten minutes at most, and then he was downstairs. A quick breakfast came and went with a dose of orange juice, and he was putting on Heilyn's coat made for him like he did every morning, followed by the trusty messenger bag and sword. Long past were moments like the sheer embarrassment of shutting down on his floor or at his desk entirely- there was no time for suck weakness anymore.

The brisk and cold air of Foundation greeted Esredes as always, and he set out on the usual route to the Pillars. It was nice and quiet on his street, then it soon passed into the main streets of Foundation. Here and there on the way to work, there were sometimes eyes, stares in his direction, some which he noticed and some which he did not- but today he passed them by before his mind could begin to wander.

Ferrant's office space was always a safe escape from the outside world when he arrived- all of the man's office staff was friendly, Heilyn was the raggy-haired piece of shit he always was, and he could greet everyone and get to his office to write papers in peace. But today, Ferrant had a House of Lords person for him to go and talk to on his behalf, so Esredes didn't get to settle in to his office just yet, instead going back out the Pillars and right into another Lords' office.

"Good morning," Esredes said in his usual polite political work voice as he pushed his way into the office. Every time he went to another Lords' office, it hit him just how humble Ferrant was- and how not humble his former noble self was.

The older Elezen man looked up from his desk at Esredes with a calm indifference. "Good morning," he repeated back. "You're Durand's messenger, correct?"

"Correct," Esredes said, coming in and taking a seat, smoothing out the papers in his hands on the desk. "Lord Ferrant sends his regards he is too busy to see you in person as of now, but expect a letter within the next couple weeks for a request for a lunch appointment. Now, here is the papers he requested of you to look over," Esredes turned them around on the desk and slid them forward to the man, then set his hands clasped in his lap as he watched the man read it over with a careful, scrunched up look on his face.

It took him a long moment before he finally spoke. "...I see." He started with. "And tell me, is Lord Ferrant aware of the greater implications a proposal like this would have on the city?"

"It depends on what you mean by that," Esredes said. "But I like to believe he does know, yes. No proposal of his is without careful consideration, after all."

"The way I see it, it's exactly proposals like this which threaten the stability of the public." He put the papers down, shut his eyes, and let out a long sigh. "Is Lord Ferrant not aware how dangerous it is already for our knights most holy to deal with the remnants of Nidhogg's horde? The system in place is perfectly fine for dealing with the heretics who defected to that monster."

"It's not exactly about that," Esredes said. "It's about those who were kidnapped and forced into his ranks, you see, when he writes prisoner of-"

"The Temple Knights are already at risk of being mauled and turned by the knights who get to them." The Lord said. "You cannot ask them to change their procedures without putting countless lives at risk." He smiled at Esredes. "Send Lord Ferrant my regards, but I am not interested in more of this proposal of his. Now, what else does he have to speak of?"

Esredes forced a smile back. "Very well," he said as he took the papers back into his hands. "Then I believe we can cut right to the next proposal on the House floor..."

When he exited that building and went back out into the streets, Esredes let out a sigh and looked over the papers in his hands. Heilyn and himself had been working on that one for so many weeks now, and this was the fifth test subject it had failed without any room for further conversation. How many more rewrites did they need to make this worth any consideration?

Lunch hour was already approaching, and so Esredes decided to make his way down towards the Crozier. He was near enough that he could pick something up and bring it back to the office, and then he'd have just enough time to report the results and get his work in order before his hour break for a client coming in. It was already getting crowded, however, so Esredes opted to pick a stall with a decent line just to save time instead of his usual go tos. The merchant was selling little meat pies that overwhelmed Esredes' nostrils even from this distance back, and it was rare Esredes wasn't in the mood for them. "Hi," he said with a smile when it was his turn in line, taking the gil out from his pouch. "Two, please." He set it on the counter and slid it over.

The Hyur man gave him a peculiar stare as he did so, and Esredes had to keep his smile from faltering. "Sorry, I think it's best you look elsewhere. Stock's limited, and my usual customers show up around now."

Esredes blinked a couple times, staring back at the man before glancing down at his gil and slowly taking it back in his hand. How the hell did this random merchant even know? "Very well, my apologies for the inconvenience." Esredes replied, and off he did as he did best and disappeared into the crowd.

He ended up with a smoked Dodo sandwich instead, carrying it in a box in his hand as he made his way out of the Crozier and back towards the office. Yet as he passed by one tall and light individual on the street, he did a double take and stopped, looking back with a faint smile of recognition. "Good afternoon, Squire of the Axe." He called to the young man, recognizing one of the individuals from the Fourth Temple Knight Company he sort of tolerated, sort of didn't. While others had revealed his real name to him, he still felt the man would scorn him if he tried using it yet. "Hope you're having a decent one. Take care."

Gerivien turned around and stared at Esredes with a look Esredes recognized well out of the man by now- that of burning, unfiltered hatred. It couldn't decide consistently if it wanted to be there or soften on any given interaction, and his mouth twitched downwards.

"Mind yer fuckin' business." Gerivien said, and turned on and kept right on walking with that.

"Until another time!" Esredes called his way with a smirk before moving on. Ah, Gerivien was a hot and cold one- some days he got that, other days the man revealed his soft side he denied existing and something more interesting happened- but today he didn't have time for an interesting moment, so take his opportunity to annoy the Squire it was.

Esredes had lunch alone in his office to make up for the extended length of time that Lord had spent talking about his thoughts on the latest House proposal, munching away on the dodo sandwich while finishing up a paper. Then as 12:55 approached, he stood up and moved to the kitchen, pouring a glass of water and then navigating to the Blue Room instead, setting it down on the side table and opening a drawer to take out his binder and fake pair of glasses, slipping the glasses on and settling into his chair. The 1:00 slot was a vague name of 'Red' simply written down on the sheet, and Esredes wasn't sure who this person was at all, but a new client was always kind of exciting nonetheless. He settled in, put a bright smile on his face for the client's entry- and in came a face he did not in fact, not recognize.

Ivarault Vairemont.

He had never spoken to the man personally, but he knew him well, or so he thought- because the man had started a fight most times he saw him, including one with a dear friend of his, and he knew for a fact this man literally wanted to kill him. He was that sort of ex-Dragoon, the kind who wanted his eliminated and nothing more.

Esredes' bright smile dropped in an instant. His free hand went to his pocket, the one that kept the airborne, powder based sleeping agent in a little vial just in case. "What... what are you doing here."

Suddenly, Esredes realized just how much he took Pyralis' mediocre presence for granted.

Though the man had relatively behaved himself for a change, Esredes left that session feeling drained nonetheless. Back to work it was, until the hour of 5:00 hit.

There he was to switch out of his civilian mode and back into what lurked beneath the surface. He left work, went home, changed into his armor he wore into battles as a harrier, and slipped on his helmet as he departed for the Central Highlands. He had a meeting with an interested party about the ways of Iceheart's people, and he meant to represent his people well.

At least, that's what he planned to do. Instead, his tale of Iceheart's struggles, mixed with those of his own and that of the movement all together, was met with an angry response from the masked individual.

"And was it heroic when you allowed the wyverns into the city?" The lady said. "When you slaughtered those people merely delivering goods to their destination?"

Esredes could do nothing but blink. "No." He said. "It wasn't. I never tried to imply it was."

"There is nothing heroic about your people, as you so call them." The lady continued on, taking a step closer to him. "You are no better than the knights you keep bringing up. You spilled blood to summon a primal, and what did it accomplish? Nothing."

"It accomplished the end of the goddamn war!" Esredes retorted back, taking a step forward and curling up his fists. "If she hadn't stopped that Garlean ship, the Archbishop would have plunged the land into chaos. You and all of those pathetic Warriors owe her for your continued peaceful existence, but no, you can't even be bothered to acknowledge that much!"

The lady narrowed her eyes at him with a look of pure disgust. "You will never be anything but a monster," she said, and then she began to walk away.

Well, that was the second time this year one of these people pretending to hear the other side had turned sour when they heard exactly that. Lovely. Esredes let out a sigh and waited for her to be far enough away, then transformed and flew away.

He found himself at a bar later on in the night, 8:30. It had been a day, and he needed to grab a bottle or two before he went home. Content was he to mind his own business, but soon himself approached by a man, a specific type of man he knew the second he put his eyes on. They always had some kind of shit eating grin on their face and were only there to take an unwanted and creepy interest in you.

"What are you so down about?" The man asked about three lines into the conversation.

"I'm Ishgardian."

The man chuckled to that. "That you might, but it's no reason to have such a stick up your arse, yes? Why don't you loosen up a little and maybe you wouldn't seem so down?"

Esredes wanted to sigh all the way down into Witchdrop and then some. "I think I know what I'm doing, thank you. Please feel free to bother someone more interesting."

"Whatever you say, asshole." The man remarked, and as he turned to leave he pushed Esredes right in the abdomen with one hand, causing him to stumble back against the table and spill part of his drink onto his face. A few people in the bar laughed at the sight.

Without a word, Esredes turned and left the bar in a hurry.

When he collapsed into bed that night at 1:34 AM, he felt like he weighed a thousand pounds, yet he stretched his arms out on the bed and shut his eyes, releasing a long breath.

You did it, he told himself. You made it through the day. Another one down, gods know many left.

A lot of emotions swirled up within him, but what went up must come down. Esredes shoved them all back down to the bottom, and stared at the ceiling in complete apathy until he fell asleep.

He was stronger than the world. Other people could break and fracture, but he would remain here, just as he was.

There was no time today for being delicate and picking himself up. Tomorrow, maybe, but for now he was off to dreamland.

-- @heartofthefury / @thecalmnessandthestorms Ferrant/Heilyn

Content Warning: Shadowbringers Spoilers

When would people start making sense?

The answer was apparently never. People just didn’t think. All it took was some attractive individual to sweep them off their feet emotionally, and no one understood that infatuation wasn’t the same thing as love. This was a fact the perpetually shut off Esredes knew well, but no one around him seemed to.

“Alastor,” Esredes had tried to tell his foolish Miqo’te friend when he got back from rescuing his latest boyfriend from being tempered for the Ascians. He even put on a smile and that delicate tone, he was not upset in the slightest like he had been in the past when it was Haurchefant. “Are you sure you want to get married… this soon? You don’t want to take it a little slower, you know, give it some time so he can… readjust? This is a big commitment, and you haven’t exactly been able to talk recently, or you know… live normally.” But no, Alastor insisted. Their souls proved they were meant to be together. Esredes wanted to groan. “Your soul also dated a man who wanted to kill everyone, and you killed him.” Esredes said. “Just because you were compatible in a past life doesn’t mean your reincarnations are.” And so they were married. Esredes ultimately shut his mouth and just enjoyed the outdoor scenery of the Shroud, but he couldn’t help but sigh to himself. There really was nothing he could do to convince that Miqo’te to think properly before he acted.

This just happened over, and over again.

The earlier phases of the Iceheart movement. A couple allies had been captured, so had many civilians and uninvolved, and a Garlean base turned out to be at the center of it trying to perform experiments with the blood on people. So his people destroyed it— or more accurately, the scientist at the head of its brother did, along with the four other Garleans who turncoated with him.

What a pickle indeed. It wasn’t a situation where you could just execute someone who helped you- but did the man’s seemingly genuine apology about following his sister really make up for all the people permanently disfigured? Not really. So he tried an idea slipped into his head, even though he wasn’t sure it was a sound one. “Levi,” Esredes said to the man when he caught him at a good moment. “I have an idea as to how we can test the genuineness of Quincy. You should get him emotional and see what he says under pressure.” Despite kidnapping the man, Levi kept claiming Quincy cared for him and it was more his sister, even taking his own eye out to give him a chance to escape and be rescued by Esredes’ people. And there was little denying such drastic measures, but Esredes needed information, and it was hard to be certain merely asking the man was revealing everything. Levi was hesitant, but he agreed. He seemed pissed at Esredes afterward for it. And then he came back to him telling him they ‘worked it out’. Esredes was grateful until the others clarified what exactly ‘worked it out’ meant, and then he felt sick to his stomach. He had not asked that of him. Not with the person who he was a captive of. What the fuck, Levi. What the fuck.

Still, he probably didn’t get as sick to his stomach as he did that one time far more recently. When a Dragoon woman who introduced herself as Elodie had approached him at his previous workplace, and talked to him all about how she wanted to help people like him but wasn’t a counselor, merely wanted to make people smile, he had an idea he thought at the time was a good one. He gave her a couple names, names of people he knew he couldn’t get to, and sent her off to see what would happen.

The regret filled him like an ocean when he witnessed the man propose to her in front of him at a party. She threw her arms around Esredes later, thanking him for being such a ‘matchmaker’, despite the fact she had just said yes to who had to be some kind of sociopath who wanted to kill Esredes.

Why was it always the cheery and high energy types in particular? And Esredes could say nothing for fear of his own life. You simply didn’t play with Dragoons, they had a worse kill switch than he could ever.

At least he managed to save another from disaster at least once. At least Yulionne could realize, even through the harshest of methods, how she was making a mistake being with Murielle, that a heretic and Inquisitor could never be together. Maybe a heretic and two fellow monsters that were less annoying than him could be together, even if he had threatened or tried to kill both of them, as was the case with Heilyn that Esredes reluctantly came to accept later. Though not before telling Divah that he would never be with someone who literally stabbed him in the back, even if she couldn’t die. And maybe a forced heretic could be with a loyalist, as was the case with Murielle’s son falling for a woman who was hiding the blood. Unlike Murielle, it actually changed him, and he meant his word to not go against people like her ever again. Elouan and Baptiste had Esredes saying nothing at first, seeing an Elezen and Miqo’te together, but Esredes put his original feelings in a coffin and threw them into the ocean when he saw how much they really completed each other in their respective emotional issues. Yes, all right, it all seemed as illogical as the rest at first, but it eventually made sense.

He didn’t even bother to warn Vlamont about Seraphiaux, he knew Vlamont wouldn’t understand that his little brother was incapable of loving another person at the time, but even Vlamont sort of listened later on, when Seraphiaux came back. They took it slow, they felt out if they could try again or not. And Esredes said nothing as they slipped upstairs to have an alone moment at a Masquerade. It was their journey to take.

But most of the rest still didn’t make sense. At some point, he had to accept that people would continue to be spontaneous and illogical with their feelings, falling for the worst possible choices, and all he could do was keep trying to prevent fires before they happened.

At least he knew better for himself. As he continued to spark nothing at the thought of romance, even with his beloved Alise, he knew the world needed certain mistakes not made. And he was proud to help it out by not making them.

—

@thecalmnessandthestorms / @heartofthefury Heilyn, Alastor, Seraphiaux, Murielle, Trystan (unnamed mention), Lisette (unnamed mention)

@eternal-finis Divah, Yulionne, Vlamont, Ketuseki (unnamed mention)

@momokarp Levi, Alise, Quincy

Mystel Elodie

Arius Ivarault (unnamed mention)

@shieldbcund Elouan