Chapter Text
It happened that her return to the Source came ten nights and eleven days later. Eager as she was to spend more time with her new lover, she could not abandon certain responsibilities to wither away one lustful evening at a time.
She did not stop at the Rising Stones, nor Camp Dragonhead. When she came upon Ishgard proper, the hour was late, but still she traveled past the Forgotten Knight, past the Brume, and into the Pillars anyway.
By that time, stars had blinked into the sky. Each one reminded her of someone she had avoided on her trek to the Last Vigil - Tataru, Emmanellain, others. But she made her way towards one she had avoided far longer. Far too long.
When she could see her destination, she slowed her pace and tried to control her breathing. Sweat pooled beneath her mail, sweat that cooled her a bit too much now that she was going slower. The streets were nigh empty. A few guards meandered from point to point of interest, and one in particular stood where he always had, waiting for her and hers.
She wasn’t trying to catch his attention - quite the opposite - but his head darted to her nonetheless. Even from beneath his helmet, she could see his eyes grow wide with recognition and shock. He couldn’t see her face, but there was only one of that stature and build who donned a Drachen armet like hers.
Her horns also hinted at her identity.
“M-milady!” He stumbled forward, caught between a bow and a salute. He nearly ended up with a kneel.
She waved him down and grimaced, knowing she would enter the manor wet with sweat after all, unannounced and her lungs burning from the cold.
“Ishgard’s savior, and the world’s besides,” the guard said. “Are you come to see - “
“The old lord, if he’s yet awake.”
The guard cocked his head. “You speak of Lord Edmont?”
“Aye.”
He nodded slowly at first, but faster as his lips opened. “Tis like he yet lingers in his study. I can...have you escorted.”
She clicked her helmet off and exhaled, watching her breath dance from her mouth into the atmosphere. “I can find my own way.”
-
Often she had left her helmet in the sitting room, but it didn’t feel right under her current circumstances. An empty spot in the parlor beckoned her sense of nostalgia - you can just set it here, it isn’t a bother - but she hadn’t just returned from the Aery or the Vault or Azys Lla. She would rest her head elsewhere. Sweat on other sheets. Cry into another pillow, if it came to that.
The warmth of the house was the only thing that kept its halls from looking, from feeling empty. Somewhere a fire burned, its buzz suggesting a lord sipping tea and flipping to the next page of a grand old tale. The Warrior swallowed and stepped deeper into the half-lit manor, like she was exploring a liminal space.
The door to Edmont’s study was open. He appeared before her sudden and grand, dark brows framing blue eyes set upon his book. Though she made no effort to conceal herself - indeed, she thought her nerves would have rendered a more silent approach nigh impossible - he never broke his concentration. Whatever he was reading made him smile. She thought it likely he mistook her approaching footsteps for those of a manservant or maid working into the evening.
Once she reached his door, he realized no maid clinks as loud as she.
The smile stayed painted on his face even as he raised his head to see what manner of knight trudged about the Manor Fortemps. The Warrior’s lips shook when surprise forced his mouth open. With the fireplace at his back, a new light colored him, a colder one, but the twinkle in his eye remained.
He spoke her name like it alone could light the manor.
“Lord Edmont,” she said, her cheeks full with a wide-brimmed smile, one she knew the right combination of words could shatter like glass. “I pray you forgive my coming unannounced.”
The Count rose from his seat, arms wide. She nearly expected to embrace him, but soon he raised his hands in a gesture not unlike one she’d seen his late son make many times. Palms upward, face beaming; it was perhaps the most like Haurchefant she had ever seen him. “The Warrior of Light is welcome in my house at any and all hours. That shall ever be as true as night and day.”
She had no desire to tell him how she’d come to know those concepts as a bit less set in stone than he presumed. “I should...come more often.”
“Sit,” he said, gesturing to a second chair not far from the fireplace.
She stepped into the room, but shook her head. “I...I don’t mean to trouble you long.”
“You are no trouble.”
“I know, but - “
Firm hand on her shoulder. “You are no trouble. Sit.”
She pursed her lips and nodded. Finding the chair, she set her helm at her feet and clasped her hands over her knees. Despite Edmont’s warmth and declarations of praise, she had never quite grown close to him, felt comfortable speaking as an equal in his presence. Unlike Emmanellain and even Artoirel, Edmont had an air of deep lineage about him. He was perhaps the only noble whose nobility she had no choice but to respect.
He sat and set his elbows on the armrests, fingers together. “I hear you have made a name for yourself as a liberator.”
She smiled and looked to the flames.
“Doma, Ala Mhigo...but not before you freed Ishgard from a legacy of bloodshed and deceit.”
“None of that would have transpired were it not for your hospitality.”
He chuckled. “Opening our hearts and home to adventurers of your ilk was no difficult task, child.”
Of course, it would have been harder without a certain knight’s endorsement.
The Warrior sat on that thought, listening to the fire. Edmont shifted and tapped a finger at his lips.
“I am no fool,” he said after a while. “You wear a grim countenance beneath your smile. Had sorrow not befallen us, I’d be less surprised to see you come to Ishgard more often.”
Her shoulders drooped. “I love this city well,” she said, halfway hypnotized by the dancing flames. “This house and this family. That is why I…”
A log broke. A flurry of sparks puffed from the fireplace and faded into gray. The Warrior turned to Edmont, lips yet searching for the proper explanation.
“You need make no excuse,” he said, shaking his head. “There are days I question whether I would leave, had I the option. Or at least the proper walking shoes.”
She smiled and wiped her eyes out of habit, though she had yet to shed a single tear.
“I am glad you have come.” He turned to the fire and held his hands together once more. “It does me well to spend time with one whom I know loved my son as much as I.”
The Warrior clenched her eyes shut and bent forward, hoping he couldn’t see her, hoping her pain hadn’t sent a ripple through the aether itself. “There is...something I must tell you. Something he...Haurchefant wanted to tell you...yet I…”
He didn’t respond for a while, but she kept her eyes closed. She wanted to rub her hands together, to curl her legs to her chest, but she couldn’t rely on ticks to get her through this conversation.
So much silence passed - she had no choice but to speak. A gasp broke her eyes open.
“I can’t find the words,” she said. “Words will not do him justice, I...I can only show you what he showed me.”
Edmont’s eyes were heavy. Ready. “Show me, child.”
She held her lips tight to keep them from trembling and reached into her bag. Finding the tiny wooden box was easy. For weeks it had been slipping into her hands when she sought other things. But it remained with her nonetheless. Once she had it, she held it in one palm and set the other at its lid, turning to Edmont before prying it open.
As he saw the ring, she knew it was one he recognized. A familial piece. Perhaps something he’d given Haurchefant upon knighthood and searched his effects for after his passing. That ring, he may have wondered. Had he given it to someone after all? The expression he wore was one of agonized acceptance, not at the choice his son had made, but at the choice on which his son had been unable to follow through.
“I am sorry,” the Warrior said through tears. “I kept this from you. He had wanted to tell you himself, and since he didn’t get - I just kept it to myself, thinking it would - I never thought to - “
“I would have no other,” he started, deep voice bearing the role of his heritage, “wear this ring.”
“I should have returned it, or informed you otherwise.”
“It is yours to keep. And to wear.”
Her arms grew weak. “How can I?”
“My dear child.” His voice betrayed the sorrow he had tried to wield without breaking. “Grief does not diminish best when hidden away in a wooden box. Nay, it grows stronger.”
“Edmont, I - “
He stood and took the box. The flames cast half his towering body in orange. “Your gauntlet.”
She sniffled and worked the metal from her left hand as best she could, feeling like a child. Edmont knelt before her, so close she could see his tears even in shadow. Armor in her lap, he steadied her wrist with his free hand. The ring hugged her calloused finger, but not so much that it hurt.
As soon as the Count had completed the task, they both stared at the bejeweled silver piece on her finger. Instead of questioning whether it looked or felt right, she wondered what Edmont thought of it? If he regretted insisting she put it on? One pain that kept her from Ishgard was the pain that forced her to fear disappointing this man - the one who could have been her father by law.
At the same time, she and Edmont looked up, eyes locked and all water. And then, laughing through tears like fools, they embraced until they could once again wear smiles worthy of Haurchefant’s final words.
-
-
-
Garlemald. Of all places in the world, Estinien had wound up in an inconspicuous hostel in Garlemald.
If the Scions had the right of it, the Warrior was in an even stranger place.
Perhaps that’s why he thought on her so often. His perils, his mission, his wounds, called to mind hers. He fought the Empire. She fought -
Well, the Scions hadn’t been entirely clear. And he hadn’t entirely retained the explanation. But he knew she had gone somewhere few could follow, fighting on behalf of her fellow Scions and perhaps the world itself. Perhaps another world altogether.
When he thought of Aymeric, he thought not of his companion’s safety nor his place on the Gyr Abanian front. Not often, anyway. Mostly Estinien considered: if indeed he survived long enough to see the Warrior once more, could Aymeric survive the bond he thought he might be capable of forging with his fellow dragoon?
He tightened a bandage around his bicep and winked through the burn.
Perhaps thinking of the Warrior helped him justify the thoroughly sought aid he inexplicably continued extending to the Scions. Or perhaps he’d see her again and find his feelings remained.
It hadn’t occurred to him that the Warrior might return to the Source with thoughts of neither him nor Aymeric on her mind.