Truth and Consequences
(Phon Coast; Autumn, 607 OV)
Balthier wandered down the strand away from camp, listening to the wind howl through the cliffs, licking the sea into peaks of white. In the distance he could see Ashelia sitting beside a tidepool, her legs tucked beneath her and slightly splayed behind. Barefoot, she had discarded her capelet. He couldn't help but note that with bare feet and shoulders, and in less-than-military bearing, the princess seemed almost content.
He was only half surprised when he found himself at her side a minute later.
"Hello," she said simply. The corners of his mouth twitched in a small smile of astonishment as he bowed in return. Fleetingly, Balthier saw why Basch was so smitten with her; in her moments of repose she was terribly pretty.
"It's beautiful here," she murmured, brushing her hair away from her face.
"It is," Balthier agreed, turning his attention to the little assembly of creatures lying at the base of the tidepool between them - A red and black sun crab, a fat cluster of grey and white clams, a small starfish in alarming shades of orange and violet.
"Are you glad to be on home soil, Balthier?" Ashe asked, almost somnolently.
"No," he said, as pleasantly as he could.
Ashe frowned up at him, suspicious immediately; the porcelain grace of her repose vanished. Balthier glanced back up the beach to camp, where Fran and Basch sparred amicably with staves. He might have settled himself in to watch Fran knock Basch into the sand, and what fun that would have been. He chewed the inside of his lip and sighed, annoyed.
"O dear princess, / Whence would you hail?" he asked. If he was going to broach such a nasty conversation, he may as well begin with poetry.
"What?"
Her puzzlement at his meter amused him. He smirked, inclined his head. "Our destination; where are we going?"
She turned away from him, less than amused. "We make for the heart of Archades," she said. "We will find Draklor, and the stone."
Balthier went into a slouch. She was being falsely sure of herself; he hated this about her. "And then...?"
Ashe got up and looked him carefully in the eye. "Balthier, I should think you know..."
"Don't say it," Balthier interjected. "Whatever your motives are, they're with Dalmasca in mind. I understand that entirely. But if you'd set aside your patriotism a moment, I'd like to hear what you're actually planning, if I might be so bold."
"The empire must pay for what it has wrought," Ashe said, turning her eyes to her wedding band for the hundredth time. "If the dusk shard is my only means of defending my people, and avenging those who have died for us, then so be it. I will discover the stone's secret, and bear it to fruition against Vayne. It is my duty."
Balthier hissed in disgust through his teeth. Duty... Stones and retribution and power and madness. One upon another.
"You think I have a choice?" Ashe snapped, offended. Her eyes were wild, already filling with tears as she looked up from her hands.
"Choices," Balthier muttered, glancing away from her down the beach. "Left or right? Wine or ale? To love, or not? And... what of war?" He frowned, turned. Ashe stared back at him.
"I want for war?" She asked, wounded. "You think me so deranged?"
"You remind me of someone, Princess," Balthier said at last. "He's terribly fond of Nethicite. It's a pity; he was a genius before the stone took his mind. Cidolphus Demen Bunansa, the chair and head of Draklor Laboratory... Or, as the rest of Archadia knows him, Doctor Cid."
"I've heard this name... Larsa spoke of him. You know him?"
Balthier looked out over the water and didn't answer for a long time. At last he swallowed hard, and began.
"Cid is not only a scientist, but an engineer as well. He's responsible for many of the modern designs you see in commercial air transport today, both civilian and military. He invented the recurrent mist engine about thirty years ago, and airship design will never be the same. He's best known for the S.S. Ifrit, Shiva, and Leviathan. You're familiar with them, of course."
"How... impressive," Ashe said, visibly unsettled. Balthier pressed on.
"It began innocently; Cid was working for Vayne, right around the time of the coup in Archades seven years ago. Gramis' eldest sons were..."
"Murdered by their servants," Ashe interjected. "I recall. Father was greatly disturbed."
"I should imagine," Balthier agreed, bowing slightly in respect at mention of the King.
"After the smoke from the tragedy cleared, Vayne requested that Doctor Cid take up a new project for him; Cid agreed, and fell to his work with unprecedented vigor. From the moment he heard rumor of Nethicite's existence, it's all he thought about. He'd go on for hours about it. 'If only I could find a way to harness that sort of power. If only I could understand it. If...'"
Cid's grave face flickered into his mind, glowering disapproval behind spectacles.
If only you would aid me, Ffamran. We could be great, you and I.
Balthier shook his head dismissively, but his breath had already begun to stick in his lungs. "New airship designs disappeared into his desk and never surfaced again. He stopped taking funds for any programs at Draklor that weren't directly involved with Nethicite, and devoted his entire attention to research of the stone."
"What makes this relevant?"
"Princess, if you'd kindly not interrupt me. I've only just begun."
Ashe frowned slightly, but Balthier carried on.
"Vayne was so pleased that he appointed the doctor's son to the magistrate as a reward for his devotion. He was the youngest Judge Magister in the history of the cabinet. Thinking ran that his academic prowess would serve a boon."
"He must have been honoured," Ashe said.
Balthier scowled. "Hardly. It was Bunansa's efforts that exposed Vayne as the true murderer of his elder brothers, you know."
"I had heard a rumor to that end," Ashe mused.
Balthier titled his head gravely. "Thirty lashes later, the boy disappeared from Archadia without a trace. Had you heard that little chestnut?"
Ashe looked doubtful, almost bored. "Is that so. Am I meant to care, or is there a point to this sorrowful tale?"
Balthier bristled. "My point is this. Cid didn't mourn when Ffamran Mid Bunansa vanished. The was more concerned with the cache of blueprints that his son ran off with. T'was bad for the family reputation, after all, to see Draklor sabotaged from the inside. But he dismissed the blow eventually, returned to his desk, and proceeded to devote all that remained of his mind to Nethicite. He went entirely mad. Now, Cid's renewed his search for his son. An ill wind blows from Draklor..."
He leaned closer to the princess, trying to suppress a sneer.
"...And I can't run forever."
Ashe's eyes flickered with confusion, then rounded. "No. You... You...!"
Balthier exhaled, took a step back. "Go on. Say it and get it over with," he said, pained.
"You're a Judge?" she cried. "A Judge!"
Balthier closed his eyes, shrugged in clipped concession. "I assure you I loathe the distinction. But you need to understand..."
Ashe glared. "I won't have anything explained to me by a Judge! Give me one reason why I shouldn't order Basch to kill you here and now."
Balthier grit his teeth, enraged. "Ah. Is this your usual method of diplomacy, Princess, or have I missed your meaning entirely? If you wanted me dead, I would be. You might have let Ghis kill me back on Leviathan, in point of fact."
Ashe glared. "I see now that I should have. The life of a man like you means nothing to me."
"A man like me! Hah, so you would have left our dear captain Ronsenburg to die at Ghis' hand as well? The great Kingslayer of Dalmasca is traitor and fugitive no less than I."
Ashe clenched both fists. "Enough of your games, wretched bastard. You're a thief and a liar. I order you to tell me who you are, and what you want. Now."
Balthier grabbed her by the arm and pulled her closer to him with a rough jerk.
"I've said it before; I don't take orders, and especially not irrelevant ones. That goes double from now on. I'm not under your jurisdiction anymore. In fact as long as we're on Archadian soil, by law, you are under mine."
Ashe winced. "I'll die before I take orders from you."
"That's a shame. because if you don't, Your Majesty, you won't live to see your throne restored. My father holds a power that's greater than anything you can possibly dream of. You can not stop him without my help."
"You truly believe me so weak? Of all the arrogant..."
Balthier tightened his grip. "Listen to me. You're naught but a speck, in Archadia's estimation. Do you understand that? Because if you don't, you soon will. Either help me, or shut your royal mouth and get out of my way."
"Unhand me!" Ashe snapped, wrenching her arm from his grasp. "You dare speak to me this way! You dare threaten me!"
"I dare because you give me no choice!" Balthier shouted.
Ashe quailed. Balthier crossed his arms and watched her mind turn over, scrambling in fear of failure. Silly, wretched little beast. To see her turn white and shrink back from him was a fine reward for all she'd put him through. Perhaps he'd savour it a moment.
But then he felt the knot of self-loathing in his gut, and realized that he was becoming exactly what his father wanted him to be.
The sea swallowed the shoreline, retreated, advanced again. a sea-bird cried a long call of proclamation into the cliffs, and the wind rose to answer it. At length Balthier grit his teeth, extended his arm.
"Enough. You don't belong out here; neither of us do. Take my arm and we'll return to camp... unless you'd rather have one of the local bounty hunters feed you a pack of shot."
"I will escort myself, you impudent snake," Ashe choked, and fled up the beach.
Balthier thought to follow her, but then saw Fran and Basch in the distance and changed his mind. Let them argue without me, he thought, untying the back of his vest and wrenching it over his head. What use am I to them now?
The sea breathed, sighed his name. Ffamran... Ffamran...
Ffamran Bunansa let his shirt drop to the sand beside his vest, kicked off his shoes, and ran straight into the sea. When he was chest-deep in the water he dove headlong into the surf, letting it carry him to shore again. The cold shock of the water braced him; his skin broke out in exuberant gooseflesh and he shivered, defiant, a roar of anger rising in his chest. He drew a deep breath, squeezed his eyes closed, and dove into the cold blue tide once again, pushing everything down and away.
* * *
When Balthier returned to camp, he found the campfire blazing redundantly in the late afternoon sun. His throat tightened. Counsel had been called while he tarried in the water; the sand around the fire was marked with footprints. There was a weight to the air that spoke of arguments, and of decisions. Low voices came from the tent a few meters away, indistinct beneath the roar of the sea. In the distance, he saw Fran walking along the red clay ridge above the strand, her back to the camp. Her posture remained impeccable even in the shifting sand, and her hair streamed behind her in the rising wind, a ribbon of smoke. Her pace was too quick; All was not well.
When he turned his back to the fire, the princess and Basch had emerged from her tent. Ashe was steady as stone, her eyes cold, but the soldier's face was indiscernible, his head wreathed in the sun as it drew lower in the sky. The moment dragged, and Balthier felt gooseflesh creep over his arms again.
"Kill him," Ashe said.
Obediently, Basch drew his blade and advanced.
Save The Queen gleamed lethally. It was all Balthier could see; the blaze of the sun blinded him to all else with refractions and false rainbows scattering through his eyelashes, still wet from the sea. Even Ashe was reduced to a blur of white and blue and bronze, shapes melting into shapes. He had lost his bearings. He wanted to fight or to cry protest, but what good would it serve? Had he ever threatened Vayne this way, he would have been dead before he could turn his back. His mind screamed through the furious beat of his heart, jammed sideways in his throat.
The blow he was waiting for didn't come.
"I cannot kill this man, My Lady," the captain said. His voice was flat and empty, his face like stone.
"Captain Ronsenburg, we came to an agreement. The law demands — "
Basch threw his sword into the sand and Ashe stopped short, shocked to silence.
"Your word is true, but the law of God demands I give recompense for my debts," he said. "Here I pay mine, a life for a life."
Balthier's head swam with relief; the world tilted. "Captain..."
"Nay. Listen you, Archadian, and mark. I am a man of my word, and you are free to go your way. Regardless, I see that you are not the man you have claimed to be, and you are not immune to the rule of the law. Should you deceive My Lady again, or threaten her, or steal from her person, my hand will not be stayed against you. Do you understand?"
"I do, good Captain," Balthier said.
"Get you from my sight," Basch said, and turned his back.
Cowed, breath trapped in his lungs, Balthier turned inland toward the place where Fran had been; she was no longer there. He felt the rage rising in his muscles again and began to run, twisted to breaking with sheer tumultuous pain in the pit of his stomach.
* * *
Balthier found Fran sitting in a thick patch of dune grass, her hands over her face, ears drooped in grief.
"I'm shocked you would run off like this," he said, trying to smile. "If we split up, someone might be a fool and get themselves... killed."
Both velveteen ears snapped straight. Balthier saw the streaks of tears working down her face as she turned and sent her perfect ruby eyes flickering over him, first in shock, then relief; she took in the state of his clothes, his damp wind-tangled hair, his lean pale body clean of blood, mercifully whole.
"Aii, tr'liith, ga'tauen a..." she said, hoarse with relief. "You..."
"The captain's more honourable than I'd expected," he mused. "It seems he saw fit to repay that little stunt we pulled in Nalbina. Ashe couldn't overrule him; something about the law of God...?" he frowned. "Religion does confuse me awfully."
Fran turned to gaze toward camp, and Basch. Deep violet shadows from the setting sun played gently over her face, and the wind rose to lick through her hair.
"I offered my life for yours," she said. "Ashe refused."
Balthier felt his stomach drop. "Fran, my love. You didn't have to do..."
She turned. "You would rather I stand aside and let you fall? Your crime..."
Balthier shook his head. "What crime? I did as you told me to. I spoke the truth – as much of it as Ashe would hear, that is."
"And when she reacted as anyone else in her position might, you grew hostile. Are you truly so hjum-traghde that you would deem fit to threaten her? I thought you at least somewhat in possession of sense and discretion."
Balthier raised his brows, wounded. "A'n cit hjum-traghde, Fran. Please."
"But you are. You are ever an arrogant fool of a hume, no matter how time passes or the noose tightens round your neck. A'liith." She turned once more away from him, injury in her eyes.
Balthier took a step back. Fran enjoyed his flippancy, or so he'd imagined; she enjoyed his humour and his swiftness to shrug aside death. Surely it spoke of his resilience, and his worthiness to her. But was he so wrong? As the sun crept lower in the sky Fran busied herself with a thread of dune grass, tying it into crooked knots with her slender brown fingers. She was not one to fidget and fuss with things without purpose, but now her hands seemed unable to rest. Her eyes by contrast were distant and unconcerned, lost in fleeting thoughts with colour and shape to them that Balthier himself would never understand. Even in agitation she was, at her core, steady. Jealousy rose in Balthier's chest, and faded just as suddenly.
"Fifty years," Fran said, crisply.
"What?"
"Since it seems I do not desire to live without you," she said, turning toward him, "You will promise me to live fifty years more; no less."
Her eyes were radiant, fierce with the sheer talent of seeing; she gazed into him, his fickle spirit and his thoughts and his future. He straightened, honored, his heart sweet with astonishment – she wanted him so terribly?
"Fifty," he said, "And not a thousand? I'd gladly outlive you if you so wished, my heart. B'lhai a'sec zhn'al galiit. I swear it."
Fran gazed at him; her eyes were the colour of the sun as it crept closer to the horizon, watery with heat mirages, swollen. "And should I live to see the end of the world?"
"I will see it with you, come burning sea or stones from the sky," he said, and felt his heart clench in his chest when her eyes grew sad and dark. Of course to her, the end was not a subject of poetry; it was already foretold in the trail of blood they'd created, and Jote's bitter predictions. She looked East into the dim twilight that the sun left behind.
"Ffamran..."
He shook his head. "Fifty years, Fran. I give you my... No; I shall endeavor for sixty." he smiled. "I'd rather like to see your Quadricentennial, and to make it merry. If you'd still have me when I'm half-mad and doddering, of course."
She sniffed weary amusement and rose to her feet. The wind had blown her silver hair into a cloud of downy tatters; he moved to brush his fingers through it, smoothing its scented chaos into place.
"Come then," he said, abandoning his false levity. "Kiss your stupid humechild." His voice cracked.
"I love you," she said – a rare confession that made his throat go to knots. She shouldn't. She had no right.
As she kissed him, he folded his arms around her and held fast. They lingered there, murmuring, until the sunset burned itself to ashes over the sea.