#xiv.fic

every bone in Dayir’s body ached to embrace Ishan tight enough to hurt, but ey refrained; there would be time for that later, when Ishan had exhausted his words, his hard-won words. vulnerability came at a great cost to him, and while that cost was being spent, he needed space. when it was over, he would bring his drained and exhausted body to the hands of the one who cared for it the most -- but not a moment before.

for now, Dayir listened sorrowfully but attentively as Ishan continued. “when I was in the In-Between, and the remnant of the Thirteenth was entrusted to me, I thought... this is just me. a Void, a place where only dark things dwell, where nothing can grow or thrive. drained, hollowed, and then unleashed upon Hydaelyn.” Ishan laughed, bitterly. “you think if Cait Sith had turned that Nullstone on me, I would have been unmade too?”

“I just fail to see how your world is so much better than ours, that it should be resurrected at the expense of the potential of so many others,” Dayir countered Emet-Selch with an irritated shrug.

“Of course you fail to see it. You‘ve been blessed with a profound forgetfulness,” the Ascian retorted, and Dayir shrugged again -- is that to be my fault, then? “Imagine -- if your imagination hasn’t shrivelled under this scorching Light -- that you are immortal. Imagine your mind free of the fetters that currently bind it... no threats of senseless war, of terrible loss, of sudden death. Imagine the functional differences between you and I, between us and everyone else, being naught but curiosities -- certainly not worthy of judgement, and certainly not worth fighting over. Imagine--”

“No, Emet-Selch. I don’t want to imagine your world yet again, I’ve heard enough about it already. For all the highbrow values your world has seemingly imbued you and yours with, none of you seem to have stuck to them. You were all too willing to become like us when it suited you.”

Emet-Selch sagged theatrically, raising a gloved hand to rest delicately upon his brow. “Ah... Again you wound me, hero.”

“I told you not to call me that.”

“You must understand, my dearest Dayir -- we are nothing if not adaptable. And we would adapt again, when our world was restored. Would you? Or are you so attached to this false and fragmented self that you would rather die than realise the fullness of your being?”

“I have always carried the fullness of my being with me,” Dayir responded quietly. “I know my worth. I know my vastness. What I do not know is why you cannot see anyone’s worth or vastness except your own. You are trapped in a cage just like the rest of us, only you walked willingly into your prison and locked yourself in. Eventually, after all this, you will challenge me to battle -- I am not stupid enough to ignore this inevitability. And for what? Truly, for what?”

Emet-Selch’s face had hardened when Dayir spoke of cages, and when ey had finished, he merely gave a chilly little smile and took his leave.

Dayir stared gloomily out of eir inn room window, chin propped in hand.

<It is a lovely view,> remarked Talan, eir invisible and everpresent companion. Eir voice lightened the pall in Dayir’s countenance some; the other-worlder’s voice, though infrequent, was always welcome. <But I sense it is not the view that captivates you.>

<I am not a fighter,> Dayir responded, eir shoulders slumping. <You know this of me. My arts are not for slaying, they are for bolstering, for supporting, for revitalising. My arts are for love and for diplomacy, not for strife and conquest. And yet, everywhere I turn in this land, even as I pointedly apply my energies to that which I am made for... I sense I am useless unless I fight.>

The farmers at Summerford had offered much gratitude for Dayir’s labours, but they spoke frequently of kobolds and how they must be put down. Staelwyrn had tried to send Dayir after pirates, and if it weren’t for another adventurer who’d come along and taken up the challenge instead... And just recently, in the Moraby Drydocks, Dayir had to be bailed out yet again, by that selfsame adventurer ey’d run into at the farms. He’d called himself Ishan, had spoken little and irritably waved off Dayir’s expressions of gratitude, and only when Dayir had nearly given up on overtures of cordiality had he begrudgingly added, “Look me up in Ul’dah if you yet again need someone to fight your battles.”

His manner confused Dayir, but yet ey sensed that it would not be long before they met again, and perhaps for longer next time.

<You are not useless,> Talan declared stoutly, and Dayir felt eir words in an outpouring of gentle warmth deep within. <It is still early in your journey. You will see. You will see how these worlds will shift under your influence, how the dogs of war will heel at your quiet command.>

<I don’t want to command,> Dayir balked.

<You will. And it will be on your terms. And your terms will inspire others to follow their own hearts, their own valiant and open hearts. Wait for the tall one, the vicious one. He is your complement. He will pave your way.>

<Ishan?> Dayir asked, astonished.

“We were not always here, were we?” Dayir murmured, shifting on the bed to turn eir face into Ishan’s shoulder. “I feel...”

“Like we’re older than we are,” Ishan finished, his usually sharp-edged and impatient voice softer now, musing. He reclined against the quilted headboard, one of his arms hanging over the side of the bed. He didn’t touch Dayir in return, but he allowed Dayir’s touching, which went far in making the Au Ra feel accepted.

“Yes,” Dayir agreed, “quite right. Like we are much older than we are.”

“What whole life did I live before the curséd Lifestream dropped me here? What sort of person was I? Was I young when I died, or did I grow old and die, only to be made to live again?”

“Perhaps all told, we are ninety, a hundred, a hundred-fifty years old,” Dayir suggested, rising on eir elbows. “Older, even. How many lives have we lived, that we do not recall? And... were we always together? Did we always find each other, and know each other instantly?”

Ishan grimaced and rolled his eyes, but the depths of contempt and annoyance that action would have normally suggested were near absent. “Were you such a sap in every life, or did I do something unconscionable to you in the last life to make you torment me so in this one?”

When Dayir came upon Krile and Alisaie, they were cackling. Ey paused, surprised at the display of mirth when so shortly before, Alisaie’s visage had been tight with worry and frustration. It was something about Krile, Dayir guessed -- as displayed when she and Alisaie had a fond laugh about a much younger Alphinaud, she was good at the balance of gravity and levity during dark times.

“Oh, pardon us, Dayir,” Krile managed, stifling a giggle with the back of her hand. “We take our meager chuckles where we can get them, these days...”

“Why don’t you go check on Maxima for us? I’m sure he’d... welcome the company,” Alisaie added with a meaningful look at Krile, who made a moon-eyed expression back. That sent them into another fit, and Dayir took Alisaie’s advice with an amused quirk of eir lips, confused but certainly happy they were enjoying themselves.

cut for 1. length; 2. mild nsfw

Dayir was no Qestir, but every time ey picked up the quill to write, ey heard it, a sibilant whisper at the base of his skull: words are lies. 

Tataru, sensing that something inside Dayir struggled to get out, had gifted em a treasure -- a journal, plainly but expertly bound, leaves thin but tear-resistant. And Dayir was grateful, but that which couldn’t be spoken couldn’t be written, either. Words may not be lies, exactly, but they certainly could not strike at the heart of truth. Not now.

Ey picked up the quill again, dipped, tapped, poised hand above vellum.

Ey thought of Nidhogg. Its fury, its agony, searing Dayir’s flesh and surely eir very spirit as they fought. Ishan had bid em stay away, but Dayir would not let him fight alone. It had galled Ishan terribly, but what could he do? Whether he liked it or not, they were a team.

Ey thought of Nidhogg, doomed avatar of grief that could never be eased, and willed the words to come. Willed eir spirit to loosen its knot of sorrow and spill it onto the page, willed catharsis to do its work.

(mildly suggestive content)

Dayir breathed in deep and thought of waves -- great white-tipped waves breaking against fragile piers, roaring as they rose, thundering as they crashed. Ey felt the serpent uncoiling, felt massive and scaled and furious. Ey opened eir eyes and bellowed a challenge--

“Oh hells, no,” Ishan grimaced, waving a hand. “Not that one.”

Dayir quelled the primal’s shade with a whispered mantra, the vivid blue light dimming from eir eyes and eir aether. When ey felt like emself again, ey gave a moment’s consideration, then tried not to smirk as ey called up the concept of stone.

“Titan? Really? What did I ever do to you?” Ishan groaned, disgusted. He lounged in a plush armchair that looked fit to swallow him, swirling brandywine in a goblet, and regarded Dayir severely. “I know you’re messing with me.”

Dayir merely smiled winsomely, then raised up onto eir knees from eir seated position and gave emself over to the dulcet song of Lakshmi, blooming dusky rose in colour, the heady scent of lotuses wafting to Ishan in gentle but insistent waves. Ishan leaned forward, watching Dayir sway in captive ecstasy, eir pink gaze heavy with promise.

“Is that the latest one? Is that Lakshmi?” Ishan asked in a hushed voice.

Dayir shifted to the edge of the bed, eir every motion as slick and sinuous as a snake in oil, and brought eir face close to Ishan’s, flicking eir tongue playfully. “Do you like her?” Even eir voice had changed, and Ishan felt its tones deep in his body. A plucked instrument was he, indeed.

“I want to go home,” Dayir whispered, trembling, as Haurchefant bulled a path through the crowds -- a thought that had not once occurred to em in all this time in Eorzea until now.

From the echoing quietude of Zenith, land bereft of man, they’d descended into a city in chaos. Ishgard had always bustled with activity, and at times Dayir had even enjoyed it. Not so now, as they passed under the great gates and into a growing crowd of incensed heretics.

They seethed as they shouted, pressing the Warriors of Light and their travelling companions together as they struggled to pass through. Dayir’s chest tightened and eir throat convulsed, eir body drawing up tight and tremulous as ey were pushed and shoved, twitching as a heretic shouted uncomfortably close to eir ear.

“Make way! Oh, for Fury’s sake, make way!” Haurchefant’s strident voice carried over the mob as he made his way to them. He looked only a quarter as harried as Dayir felt, and the welcome sight of him made Dayir both weakly relieved and further distressed. What manner of child was ey, to be so quickly and thoroughly cowed by naught but a few score men and a bit of clamor? Ey, who felled primals and treated with dragons?

“Are you lot all right?” Haurche asked breathlessly, taking custody of them with casual efficiency, leading them towards where the Temple Knights had formed a line to meet the mob. “Dayir? Has one of them injured you?”

“Nay,” Dayir whispered, but before ey could gather eir shaken mind enough to form more clarifying words, Ishan angrily shoved a rabble-rouser away before she could knock into Dayir and nearly got himself into a fistfight. Haurche pulled him away and continued to propel them forward.

I want to go home, Dayir had uttered to emself then, tears pricking at eir eyes.

When Ishan had been secured, Haurchefant reached behind him and grabbed hold of Dayir’s hand, pulling em close and raising his shield over their shoulders.

“You’re all right,” he said with a brief but sunny smile as they made for the Temple Knights. “Almost there.”

Later, Haurchefant would confide that after a long stint in the city proper, he often wished to bury his head in snow until his brain quit rattling around in his head and his body felt less like a soundly rung bell. “Why do you think Dragonhead suits me so well? Rest assured the walls of my rooms are reinforced to block out any din my fellow knights wish to rouse, as well,” he added with a conspiratorial wink.