Disclaimer: not mine.
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It not oft at all that she would wake to such warmth; refreshing enough not to be oppressive and comforting enough to leave her wanting almost not to wake.
(Fran did not meet requirements to be called a lazy daisy, regardless of what Penelo was so convinced.)
Slowly, and with what she would never admit was reluctance, she eased her eyes open slightly.
She saw Balthier, perched on the nearer of the two beds, leaning his forearms onto his thighs with that fanciful head of his slung low.
Just at the sight of him hunched, she knew him to have been without sleep for at least a fortnight.
(Bad posture was, indeed, a grave offense when it came to Balthier, who'd been taught relentlessly that presence makes the man.)
He didn't turn his head to face her. "You know, darling, you've the makings of an endearing sleeping beauty."
She needn't turn her head to see the tub of steamy bathwater in which she sat, hair lightly damp, the surface of the water curling with bubbles.
"Nothing has this to do with you having seen me nude?"
"While exceedingly contributory," he said, and took a moment to smile at his lap, "it was not the deciding factor."
He toyed with a roll of gauze – little of it was left.
"Halfways did I expect to never again wake."
"You and I both," Balthier muttered, sighing. "I would be lying if I said you did not have me near to crying every now and again."
Fran wanted badly to walk to him, but she felt soreness in every fiber of her being and could not move.
"I'd advise you to keep still, Fran; wounds have a tendency to tear open. And I felt I should remind you, considering your animated temperament." He was not too proud to smile at his own sarcasm.
"How did we survive?"
"That, my dear, is quite beyond me. I awoke far quicker than you, though. Let me be the first to tell you that you make for dull dead weight."
"I would rather not meet a fellow who would not be, if asleep as I was."
He chuckled, a deep, gentle sound she found she liked much more when she was near enough to feel it.
"Why have you put me in the bath?"
"It's the best thing, I suspect, for wounds both of the physical and mental type."
Balthier gave a yawn.
"Have you not slept?"
He looked up briefly and shook his head with a weary little grin that quickly faded.
"After all that has happened, I cannot yet find it within me to forgive him."
"All is as to be expected, Balthier."
It was not an easy feat, to forgive a father who turned madman and then quite suddenly, in his dying minutes, returned as father once more.
(Especially when one considered that the self-same father-madman nearly brought about the end of civilization.)
After a moment, Balthier turned his head, softly, and looking into her eyes, regarding her.
"After such a parting, I want so badly to think of him only in good, and too soon have I found there is little good to think of. Fran, I thought myself past this. I thought myself new, reborn, given opportunity."
"No such thing is there. One's past never disappears, only fades. There is oft no remedy for such damage as your father caused you. Time alone can give you power to forgive."
"But I thought I was changed! I'd thought myself the better man, returning with every intent to put to rest a demented man, and he passed so…so easy with me. I shall not stand passive while the stain left behind in me by my father grows darker when it should lift away."
"Someday you shall find yourself ready to forgive. Gone is he, and absolved of you, at your leisure, he will be."
He cast his gaze to the side, then pushed himself to standing and sat again beside her.
"How can you be so sure?"
Fran stared at him, lifting a wet hand and hesitating to touch his face as she had in the Ridorana Cataract.
Balthier saw her intent and touched his hand to hers and pushed it on his face, smiling slightly at the dampness of it.
"Balthier, it has never been quick work to forgive. He, in his parting, wished for you to forgive. So, forgive. But rush not. And falter not. You needn't. He's all the time in the world to await it."
He smiled slightly. Fran was always right.
(Save that unique incident in Balfonheim, where she was, in fact, quite mistaken, and discovered that no, Imperials do not in fact, sink in water.)
"I am a lucky man to have such a lady as you by my side, Fran, my dear."
He gripped her hand a little bit tighter and watched with a small sense of loss as it fell away to disappear under bubbles.
"It is not for your sake I love, but in spite of mine own," she said mildly, as if it were no more than a simple confession of disliking rain.
(Fran loved the rain.)
She stroked soap bubbles onto her arm, effectively, businesslike - so very Fran-like.
Balthier stared at her – her face, to which end he made quite an effort, what with her still being in the tub and very naked.
"Fran, please," he sighed, deciding, perhaps, that she knew little of what it meant.
She gave him a sideways glance – he knew she hated it when he said that, no matter the context.
He held her stare, then turned away and yawned.
"Come now, lets get you out of the water – I'll need to redress those wounds. I trust it will be an easier venture, considering your current liveliness."
Smoothly, she pulled one hand out of the water and beckoned him come.
"Pardon?"
"Come in. You've the look about you of needing more relief than I. Did you not say a bath was best for such ends?"
He regarded her, head cocked. "Right."
She gave him the whisper of a smile. "Come."
He gave her a smirk as he slipped into the water, fully clothed.
"What of your trousers?"
"Replaceable."
Fran gave him a look.
He bent over and gave her a gentle kiss on the cheek, resting his head in the naked slope between neck and shoulder.
Despite himself, he yawned.
"Wish you not to sleep?"
He laid a kiss on her neck where he could reach it.
Softly she wrapped her legs around his waist and held him close in a way that was almost maternal in its comfort, but like a lover's in its ease to touch.
"In lieu of more… carnal endeavors? Perish the thought."
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A/N: another BalFran fic. Miniature, I know, but I just never have the commitment for a really long fic, and no inspiration besides. So I hope this will do. (:
Lol, here's hoping I get reviews on this one and not just favourites 3