A.N. This is another of my ickle Layers of Harmony shortfics. (BIG thankyou to Sorceress Rina for reviewing my last one!) Another very minor voice, and one that intrigued me from the first. I always wondered if she'd ever make it...

Angst in abundance. If you want a soppyfic, the emergency exit is thataway. >>>

About the original vocab - AshRose wanted to give the moons names when we were talking about it once, so asked me to translate "blue moon" (Isil Luin) and "red moon" (Isil Caran) into Elvish.

So...that means it's all Square's, except the moons, which belong to John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, kay? Can we start the fic now?

The Diary Of Natalie
May 1701


Something damp is seeping into my futon. I rub the mucus out of one of my eyes and take a first look at the day in the dim light that creeps under the door. Grubby water is puddled over the floor. The bucket that should have been under the leak in the roof lies on its side on the ground - I guess it blew over. Mario rolls over in his sleep on the other side of the room, about three feet away.

I roll upright, rub furiously at my left eye, the one that hasn't stopped running since I got the water-sickness a year ago. Then I fold up the wet futon and go kick Mario awake.

"Hey!" He mumbles a little, rolls over again - "Hey!"

"Whaddisit?" He twists away from my foot.

"It's morning, dummy. You've got to get up!"

"Don't wanna work -"

"Look, if you don't work how we ever going to get out of the slums?" My voice cracks slightly as I say it. I know what I want. I know badly I want it. And if this dolt is going to waste my chance I'll -

"Yeah, okay, okay!" He wearily pulls himself up and kicks his futon into the corner. "Where do -"

"Straighten your shirt out!" He's so damn lazy I really don't know why I bother. He'd sink without me to look out for him, and all I ever get whenever I do anything for him is those ugly little scowls, like he'd prefer an empty belly to a bruised ego.

Those little dark eyes were narrowed at me now. He runs his fingers down his creased clothing, sullenness warping his body into a thin twist of bitterness. "So where do I work today?"

"Go to Queen Stella's house."

"She's only interested in Stellazio, what would she want with -"

"Well, fine, go to Sir Knight's estate."

"Oh, yeah, like they ever need -"

"Then go to Dr Tot's tower and I do not want to hear ONE complaint out of you, you hear me?"

He visibly shrinks under my gaze. He backs away from me, curling his shoulders down, nearly falling over when his bare feet encounter his futon. "Yeah. Yeah, s-sure, Sis." He always calls me that when he's scared, like he thinks I'll go mushy on him if he fakes he's my family or something. I guess he isn't, he doesn't look a bit like me. I'm paler than him and I have dull green eyes, I saw them in a mirror at Queen Stella's house once or twice. He's just some slum-kid I've looked after as long as I remember.

I glower at him again. "Good. Now get to it! And remember to look out for Him, alright?"

"Y-yeah, Sis. I-I'll go now." He runs out the door, but I just know he'll be slouching along again before he turns the street. I'll have to earn enough to feed the both of us, like always.

So where should I go? I hate having to make this decision. I'll go all the way out to Queen Stella's, right down the bottom of the hill on the far west of the waterfront, and they'll say "no, sorry, no errands today, little girl," like they think I'm wearing a dress I outgrew a year ago for fun, or I'll go up the auction-house and ask if they need someone to hold the door for the god-damned nobles and it'll be "no, kid, we just got a new doorstop," and then I'll have to tell Mario it's no food again tonight and he'll look at me so gormlessly, like it's my duty to take care of him and I've failed in it. The days I make a bad choice I always wind up feeling it's all for nothing, that I'll never get to be a noble and live on the waterfront and do all the things I dream of…

But I know a good way to make decisions now - no-one's outside. I tiptoe over to where I left my futon, crouch down in the shadows, and I pull open the loose flap of the ripped seam. I wriggle a hand between the two sides of scratty cotton, reach right down into the corner, straining my fingertips, and I finally get a hand over it. I tease it towards the hole and drop it out into my lap.

My magic coin.

It's not money, I know what money looks like. It's bigger than a gil, and it's old and tarnished, with little scratches all over it. It glitters a little bit even in the darkness. There's a twisted symbol on one side, a circle with two prongs coming off it - maybe it's a girl with pigtails, someone like me, only golden and shiny and wise, like I'll be when I'm a noble. I run my hand over the symbol with my eyes closed, feeling the magic. Then I turn it over and whisper the secret mantra carved on the back of the coin.

"Taurus had an idea. He would give Virgo a gift. Through forest and over the mountains, he found a star."

There. Now I knew I could work it all out. It's good looking at the coin, it always seems like I'm wiser for it. I'm going to go down the Café Carta and see if they've got a bit of work for me. I might even get a bit of sugar or some coffee if I work hard enough. I haven't had coffee for ages and ages, not since the girl at the inn gave me some when I got the water-sickness. I'll work so hard I'll -

I set out for the waterfront, Isil Luin out behind me in the east.

*

"Hey, kid, watch it!"

I dive sideways as Senor Carta stomps across the kitchen. "Huh," he says, looking down at me. "I think you missed a spot, huh-huh." He lurches over to the ovens, and I look despairingly at the trail of dusty footprints he's left on the white tiles I just scrubbed so painstakingly. Now I'll never get out into the café! He's not going to walk in here, is he? I stifle a groan and get scrubbing as fast as I can.

I've been looking out for Him ever since the first poster went up nearly a year ago. The narrow shoulders and the bulging muscles. The thick, ropy scarlet hair. The thin moustaches weaving across the blue-tinged skin, and eyes like dark flames burning in a crystal of carved ice. Not a face I could forget. Ten thousand gil. Can you believe that? When I earn ten in a good week? If I work twenty years I might see less money come and go than that. I'd get out of the slums with that! I'd have a house by the river with a big flower garden and lots of servants and a bath, like the one at the inn only bigger, and it'd all be just mine, only I'd let Mario come round every week (no, maybe every other day), and god damn it I have to get out of this kitchen or he'll walk past when I'm not looking and then I'll be stuck here forever!

Oh, yes, I'd do anything, anything, to that man if it got me out of the slums. I'd trap him, trick him, kill him if it'd put me on the waterfront. I'd make him pay for every hour I've slaved in the never-ending twilight of Treno just to live, when I ain't done wrong, when I'm no outlaw like him and god I'd scrag that man if I had hold of him! Even though no-one hates him except some stupid noble. Even though I don't know him at all. Even though -

Even though I know he didn't do it.

*

It was before I'd had the coin to help me of a morning, maybe a year ago, when it'd been "Yes, I'm Lord King's housekeeper, work, huh, well, you run all the way across the city and take this letter to Queen Stella and I'll give you half a gil" like the bitch was feeling generous or something. Work's work, though, and I took the damn thing to the gold-plated crow-Queen, and I was nearly back at the auction house when I heard the cry -

"THIEF!"

Thugs. I hate the thugs, they're so damn fond of getting high on some drug, making shit then finding a kid to pick on. I still had a bruise from the last time it was me. So I hid just round the corner, low in the gutter where they couldn't see anything but shadows but I could see anything I liked.

Well? I don't like thugs, and I don't like Lord King much either, and if they were going to cross each other I wanted a ringside seat. So I waited for the door to open and the thug to come out -

And out into the street flew an eagle.

There was really no other way to describe the man. I swear his feet weren't quite touching the ground. Long, thin arms splayed out behind him; scarves trailed out in his wake like feathers. He slowed under the lamp, looked around with his piercing blue eyes, but he didn't see me. "That", he announced, in a voice as light as a lullaby, running a hand through his downy gold hair, "was too easy".

I could see him even better now. His pinion-tail brushed the ground behind him, and he was shouldering a little knapsack - which chinked. Cooing with soft laughter, he flew off again.

That was when He came past.

There's something about Him that always scared me. It's like he was playing to a different set of rules to everyone else, and if you broke them he'd get angry even though you didn't know what they were. A mystery. The eagle danced straight into his chest, froze, and looked straight up at Him - god, He must have been twice his height! The eagle-boy took a step back, eyes searching for an escape route, but there wasn't one, not anywhere. He met the eyes of his captor. "W-who are you?" he demanded hoarsely - even the eagle was scared of Him. I gulped, waiting for this wonderful bird to be dragged away and roasted.

"You look like a worthy opponent." What? Didn't he know what happened when you caught a thief?

"Hmph." My eagle looked thoughtful for a moment. He hopped back to get a better view of this new rival. "So you're the King family's infamous new security guard, huh?" Sarcasm ripping like a bloody talon. He's either brave or mental...

"What if I am? Hasn't got me any action yet." He crouched, ready to kill. "Come on, fight me."

"Hmph", the eagle said again. He shrugged, disdainful of that monster. "So you're just a thug," he spat.

"What did you call me?" Anger and pride boiled out in His voice. He held his clawed gloves threateningly, quivering in rage but still holding back, waiting for the eagle to accept his challenge.

And the eagle dropped into a fighting stance. "My favourite kind!" he crowed, swooping low to the ground. "I'll knock you out in one minute flat!" But he didn't draw a weapon. My heart fluttered, why in hell? It wasn't my neck on the line.

"Don't disappoint me." He loomed overhead, waiting for the little bird to make a move -

"Where did that thief go?"

Oh, no, the guards - he'd lost his chance, he'd be taken away and they'd clip those little wings and lock him in a cage forever! I gazed at him in despair, damning life, damning nobles, damning myself that I could do nothing to save him. Why was he laughing?

"Hee hee," he flexed his back and smiled broadly, "here they come!" The double doors opened again and the two guards, clattering armour and blades, ran out into the square.

He ignored them. Somewhere inside him I think there's some crazy honour-code, something high and mighty that matters more to him than his own life or safety. "I won't let them interfere…Come on!" he growled, low and threatening, like the devil-may-care laughter was insulting to him.

But laughter it was, and the eagle rose again and folded his wings. "Don't be silly," he said. "The game's over."

"What!" I almost gasped, down in my hideyhole, as the eagle-boy turned tail and ran straight into the path of the two watchdogs.

"H-help!" he cawed shrilly, suddenly seeming as vulnerable as a new-born chick. He waved an arm to Him and stuttered "He came out of that door just as I was passing by! I was staring at him 'cause I thought he might be a burglar, then he started pummelling me!" Damnit, he was all but cheeping! How old was he anyway? I studied his face, his body, his piteous gestures - oh god, he looked barely fifteen! He's losing himself in crime, taking terrible risks when he doesn't have to, he could have just flown away from here long since…

"But he's a guard for this mansion". I just knew he would die.

But he hopped right back to where the glowering, deadly man was standing, and he raked a hand through the air right in His face. "That's why he's suspicious! Just look at him!"

I could see the right hand of one of the guards. It was quivering, moving on and off his swordhilt. His helmeted head faced the ice-blue visage of the scarlet-haired warrior, and I could almost feel the balance shifting. "W-we always had our suspicions, but -"

He swung around, purpose in his eyes, energy in his stance. "I'm gonna call the police! You guys hold him off until they get here!" He spread his arms and took to the air again, sweeping away in an audacious circle. He paused for a second in mid-flight, not four feet from me, so close I could just barely smell him, sweat and steel and leather.

He's even closer than I am, and I heard the eagle whisper hypnotically - "I'll tell you one thing…The truly mighty don't flaunt their power." I looked up him, at the short, gangly frame, the thin scraps of armouring, the tiny dagger in his belt - "How can I explain it to you?" God, he never drew his weapon, he never even touched it once -

"The sly eagle hides its claws."

I felt a chill run down my spine, power, he has power -

The other man arose, baring his teeth in anger and disgust at the eagle's sly trick. God, but slyness is a power -

"I'm out of here! Buh-bye!"

A chink of gold and a flash of feathers and I never saw him again. He was off in the air forever. Some trinket fell from his pack in the wind of his passage, and it rolled unnoticed into the gutter where I lay. I closed my eyes.

"W-we've got you now!" I felt the air move past my face.

"Yeah, right," He murmured, sounding as deep in thought as I.

"H-hey!" A heavy footfall echoed on the ground. "Don't run away!"

Steps and cries and silence. When I finally raised my head, they were gone. It was as if some dream had played itself out in the tiny square. Who was he, what was he? He'd known I was there, I couldn't doubt that, he knew he was speaking to me. Had he read my mind? He was magical, I realised it then, he was a spirit from some other place. How else had he escaped? Why else would I give a fat damn? What had he done to me…?

I rose, wrung out my sodden skirt - and gasped as two objects rolled out of its folds.

The feather fluttered slowly to the earth, and landed square on top of the great coin, covering the circle and almost masking the two devil-horns.

*

Spick and span - or at least until Carta moves again. I lug the bucket out to the yard and upend it in the drain.

"Hey, kid, you finished?"

He's by the window, taking a knife to the latest batch of juicy honey-cakes. I don't look too hard.

"Yeah," I reply, hoping it's servile enough for him.

"Then go take the coffee. It's for Table 3, out on the far left, got that?"

My heart leaps. I scamper across the kitchen, grab the coffee tray and walk out into the café. Nobles sit at square tables, conversations buzzing like a plague of flies. Top hats and scale handbags bob around the room. I stride sedately out to the veranda - but my eyes spin everywhere, scanning and searching, peeled for the slightest clue. Not inside, that's for nobles - I was only interested in the street. I turned out onto the veranda, walking left but looking all over. Was that - no, just a noble girl with a red parasol. What the fuck does she need a parasol for in Treno? I glanced the other way, hoping like hell I didn't miss him earlier, and -

What the-!?

My elbow jars viciously against the table. I clutch at it, and rock backwards when my mind reminds my reflexes that I'm meant to be holding a coffee tray. It's falling, twisting, hitting the floor -

"Aaaighah!" Pain; worse pain than I've known for a long time, and still pain, more pain, burning, choking pain - I'm down on the floor now, I can't stand up, I can't open my eyes. Someone's touching me - oh god, what did I do? The noble's going to beat me and Carta won't pay me and I'll never work for anyone ever again and I -

"Child? Are you all right?"

Damn it, the noble, he's going to kill me -

"Oh, my!" I smother a yelp as he touches my scalded foot. "Oh you poor thing, let me see it I can, oh yes -"

Relief. Cold and stinging, raw and weeping, the pain stops burning and lapses into a dull, muted, throb. I open my eyes again and I sit up. Coffee and water and tears, all in a slick on the veranda. I'll never work anywhere again.

"My stars, child, that was quite a tumble! Can you stand up?"

I turn round. My eyes settle on the biggest nose I've ever seen in my entire life.

I look past the pointed snout, run my eyes fearfully over the lightly furred bridge, and up to the horn-rimmed glasses perched on its crest. Beyond those a pair of beady eyes focus on me an expression I've never seen before but which I don't trust in the slightest. I gulp, "Dr Tot," and damn it my voice shakes. "I-I'm sorry I -"

"Oh, don't fret about that. Are you all right now?"

I nod slowly. This is a trick. Just do it then let me out of here. I don't need this.

"I've seen you around. Are you Mario's sister?"

I glance at him warily. "Yeah. How do you know -"

He smiles. I pull a bit further back. "He's at my tower now, dusting the bookshelves down. Here." He takes my hands before I can crawl away and he pulls me upright. Why… I limp back a step or two. He's staring at me again, like he's surprised? What the hell's up with this guy? He - the floor, he's looking at the floor - "My, whatever has happened to your shoes?"

Throb, throb, throb. I curl and uncurl my toes, feeling every heartbeat come like a hammer in the burnt flesh. "I don't have any shoes," I say coldly.

He blinks owlishly. Ha, you stupid noble, you think kids like me wear shoes? You think at all? You ever worry about anything except having those big statues or flash clothes or stupid trash from the auction? You know you're gonna eat every day and I'll bet you never get rained on in the night or beaten up or sickened by the water-plague. Do you know what it's like to wake up in the morning and think you might be dead by the end of the day? You live in this town too, we're all Trenoans, all of us and you don't have a fucking clue -

I guess my face must've changed or something; his eyes narrow and he says quietly, "How old are you, child?"

Why the hell are you looking at me like that? I look away, down at the floor. The spilt coffee's seeping away between the paving slabs. "Eight." I don't know if he's still staring at me. "I think," I add softly.

"Kid?" I freeze and look over my shoulder. "What're you doing with that coffee, kid?"

Oh, god. He's gonna - no, no, he's not here yet, I can think of something -

"KID?"

I break and run.

*

Off onto the waterfront, ducking past a nobleman with a double chin and a silk cloak, and turning the corner onto Casino Street. I nearly collide with a strange-looking girl in orange coming the other way; she looks at me, startled, but I don't stop. Up the steps from Knight's House, vaulting over the drunk on the walkway, then into the dark of the slums. A thug's outside the inn, staring at me like he wants my blood, so I duck down an alley, then left then right, and I run to the hovel I call home. I throw open the door, run inside, slam it closed then slide down the back of it, weeping. God, I'm dead, dead, I'll never see another gil in my life and I'll die right here and Mario'll die and I knew, I always knew I…no, please no, let there be something left somewhere I could -

I pick myself up, shaking off the rest of the tears, and I go unfold the futon. I slip my hand inside the tear, damnit I shake the bloody thing. Where is it? I rip the hole wider, stick my shoulder inside, thrash all around what in hell happened to it? Oh, no. Did I put it back this morning? I jump up again, search all around, under the futon, inside the bucket, damnit I kick the ash in the firepit all over the room, nowhere, nowhere, I run out into the street, covered in dust and ash, and I look round in the gutters but nothing nothing, nothing, nothing…

Voices drift to my ears. There's a man at the little shop on the corner, talking to the shopkeeper, and I catch the words and -

"Yeah, s'true. The maid at Queen Stella's says. Some girl brought them."

"Real Stellazio? How many?"

"Three. She found one here in the slums!"

"Here? A Stellazio? Wow! Which one?"

"Taurus. Neat, innit? Lass got 10000 gil for it."

no…

I scream. I just can't hold it, the coin, my coin, his coin, stolen and gone forever and I never realised it could save me! My magic coin that always helped me, my one chance and I blew it, forever caged up by that crow-bitch when all I'd ever needed was to give it up to get out of here, I never knew, I never looked, I was too busy looking for that bastard who would've killed my eagle to ever think the eagle's gift could save me. I run back in the hovel, not crying, I'll never cry again. I threw myself on the still-damp futon, hold my teeth together, screw up my face to stop the tears getting out. I mustn't cry. I never had anything, not a hope of anything ever except for tears and that was all so I'd better keep every damn one of them, it's all that's left…

I heard the door open. "Natalie? Hey, Natalie…" Hand on my shoulder. I dive away from him - he is not going to take my tears away, not when he took every other damn thing. "Sis, look, I -"

There's gold in his palm. One, two, three gil, even in the dark you could see the sheen.

Fury and despair rise up in my blood and my own arm knocks his, sending the money flying. I grab him by the fingers and scream "It's over, you fool," ice settling over my heart. I look up at the hole in the roof, the tears of the sky that fall towards me, the only god-gifts I'll ever, ever, receive.

"Sis." I don't look. Another drip shimmers down through the air. "Sis…" And he's holding me, pulling me onto the futon and clutching me like a ragdoll. I close my eyes and wrap my arms around him, squeezing him, trying to get closer to his warmth and his whimpering, the tears he's giving me freely as wind. I bury my left eye in his hair, forcing the water to stay behind the lids with all the will and strength I have.

"Sis, "he murmurs, "it's okay. We're gonna get to the waterfront, aren't we?"

"No," I whisper back. "not any more."

A rumble of thunder sounds in the distance, and Mario trembles in my arms. I remain still.

******************************************