beloved
marapozsa.
Fran-centric. Some Balthier/Fran, some Fran/Elza, some Jote/original. I think it's very rushed, especially at the end. It was originally split into a couple different segments and had a lot more in it, but it didn't save properly and I lost it, much to my chagrin (read: I cried for twenty minutes, then started to rewrite it all). Still, I'm fairly pleased with the result. Enjoy.
one
"Beloved," Mjrn croons.
When asked by Jote why she addressed her mortar and pestle so, Mjrn meets her elder sister's eyes wistfully.
"Fran says humes call things they care about beloved."
Jote tries it, calling her bow "beloved" under her breath, but she feels like a fool. Her cheeks burn. The Wood never calls Her children beloved, and the Wood loves Her children above everything else. Obviously the word beloved is of no significance, if the Wood does not use it.
So why, then, does the word taste so fresh and sweet on her tongue?
two
"Mjrn says you are teaching her to speak like the humes."
"Yes."
"Why?"
Fran smiles at that. Her red eyes seem to glaze over as she answers.
"It is beautiful, is it not?"
Jote's gaze darkens, and Fran falters.
"It is no crime to love words."
She shakes her head. "Only when you love humes more."
three
"Beloved," Jote tries again. Her bedmate presses a hand to Jote's creased forehead, smoothing the wrinkles with cool hands.
"Hush," Yjrn says, seeing Jote's forlorn expression. "Be not troubled."
Jote kisses her for it, murmuring again the forbidden hume word. It tastes different now, less fresh and more sweet, but pleasing nonetheless. Her bedmate slips long fingers into the curve of her thighs, and Jote forgets it, writhing.
Her claws find purchase in a mane of silver hair. She pulls back, baring teeth and heaving breasts in her search for flesh to kiss away.
She melts.
four
There is unrest in Fran's eyes. Discomfort. Some lingering trace of guilt.
"You are troubled, my sister?" Mjrn asks.
Fran manages a small smile at that. How dear of a sister, to ask after her welfare.
She is unaware of how tragic she looks, hands clasped in her lap, face turned upward to the sky.
"I did not sleep well. It is unimportant."
Mjrn does not inquire further.
five
She says more to Jote.
"I love the Wood." Defensive.
"Yet you would leave Her?" Disbelieving.
"She will understand." Uncertain.
Jote casts sorrowful eyes to Fran. She moves from the edge of their shared tree perch to crouch beside her shaking sister and run her fingers through Fran's white mane. Her eyes widen.
"You are so cold," Jote gasps, and without another word, pulls Fran into a tight embrace. Against her older sister's bosom, Fran begins to shake.
"Beloved," Jote whispers desperately, not knowing what makes her say it.
"Beloved," Jote tries again. "Please. Do not cry."
A shuddering gasp. Soon Fran has no more tears, and so she composes herself, pulling away from her sister, rubbing her hands together for warmth.
Eying Jote, there is something alien in her face as Fran lies.
"I am not."
six
"What must I do?"
Jote asks the Wood for guidance, but the Wood does not reply.
The air is still.
Jote weeps.
The Wood's silence is answer enough.
seven
Jote cannot meet Yjrn's eyes.
"She is leaving."
"Yes."
"You will not stop her?"
"I have tried," Jote replies feebly.
Yjrn shakes her head slowly, as disbelieving as her mate. She falters - she cannot comfort Jote. There are no words, and too many wrinkles for her hands to smooth.
Jote looks old, as ancient as the Wood, as frail as dead leaves in autumn.
"I am sorry," Yjrn whispers.
Jote does not hear.
After a while, Yjrn stands and leaves. Jote is too lost to stop her.
eight
They know she is leaving because the Wood is weeping. The viera of Eruyt gather to make peace with her, and press provisions and advice on her.
Seed-cakes wrapped in leaves. A bundle of arrows, fletched with bagoly feathers. Murmurs of affection. And faces, so many loving faces. Fran drinks it in, hungry for Eruyt while at the same time yearning to be away. She is sick of viera. It is hume-words and hume-faces she wants now.
Jote does not watch Fran leave. Of her two sisters, only Mjrn comes.
Mjrn, sweet Mjrn. A thin, tiny figure with short-cropped hair amidst all the lithe ripe bodies.
Fran smiles at her.
"Farewell, Mjrn."
Mjrn bursts into tears.
Fran gets down on one knee, wiping away the moisture.
"Hush," Fran replies gently. "I cannot linger. You will miss me, but the hurt shall pass."
Then she is gone.
nine
Outside the village, Jote appears in the trees.
"Sister," Fran cries in surprise. She smiles.
Jote's face twists in anguish. She turns away, yearning to see Fran one last time forgotten.
"You are dead to me now."
Fran's face drops. Jote rejoices bitterly at her sister's pain.
ten
"I do not regret it," she tells Yjrn later, and throws herself into work with unmatched fervor.
Yjrn closes her eyes and bites down on the lump in her throat. Coldly, bitterly, she throws down Jote's defenses with her reply.
"You are a fool, beloved."
To her, the word is ash eclipsing her lungs.
eleven
Yjrn is gone the next morning, and Jote is bereft.
"I am alone," she whispers, waking to cold sheets and a chilly winter morning. "I am alone."
Slowly, Jote draws her knees up to her chin, and prepares for the tears.
Mjrn finds her that way come the morning meal. The tray she brings clatters to the floor, and she makes swift movements to the bed, hugging her elder sister's thin frame to her own.
"Sister," cries Mjrn, and Jote shakes her off.
twelve
Many years pass. Jote does not feel them.
At night, she wakes and cannot breathe, and only by remembering the weight of Yjrn at her side can she sleep again.
Fran she tries not to think of at all.
thirteen
She is an outcast now. But it does not trouble her. She can see her sisters just by closing her eyes. Viera have long memories.
The years are kind. After a decade of wandering, Fran takes on a girl from the sea to be her pupil.
Their days are spent sparring and debating. They take delight in both arts. Fran marvels at the girl, so unlike any viera companion she has ever had. She has hair the color of firebrush, and seems to spit words rather than say them. And she is rowdy and loud and rude, not soft or slow or gentle. Savage, slight and nimble, with ugly calloused hands no viera would take pride in having.
She rents them a room in an inn by the harbor.
Every day, Fran wakes to the smell of the ocean.
fourteen
Then comes the day when Fran has nothing left to teach her.
So instead of teaching Elza, she kisses her.
She tastes bitter, rough, and Fran chokes on it.
"Beloved," Fran whispers hoarsely.
Elza runs.
fifteen
He first approaches her in a tavern. The air is stale. They are in Nabradia before Nalbina falls. And she is rotting from boredom - he can tell.
"A child." Scorn.
"With a proposal for you. And, might I add, I do have a name - Balthier." Arrogance.
"Balthier, then. Seek you assistance?" Wariness.
"Of a sorts. I notice you can navigate an airship?" Curiosity.
"You have one?" Disbelief. So young - how can such a hume boy be captain of a vessel?
"Why, yes, I happen to. And I also happen to be in need of a...partner. Would you care to take up the position?" Smugness. But beneath that, Fran senses a lie. Still, she stands. Immediately there is a four-inch difference between them, ears notwithstanding.
"Aye."
They clasp hands. He has a firm grip.
Among other things, she likes that about him.
sixteen
He confesses his lie soon enough. She expects it and is unsurprised. If he is brave enough to lie to a viera, then he is brave enough to be the partner of one.
"...we'll have to steal it."
She nods. "So we must," comes the reply.
Before she knows it, they are on their way to Archades.
seventeen
The city offends her senses. She dislikes the heavy feminine perfumes, the metallic scent of progress, the looming buildings that block out the sky. Balthier laughs at the way she wrinkles her nose.
Fran draws stares. The gentry are unused to viera as anything but slaves. She is amused to find a viera in armor seems to offend them.
Fran finds the stench easier to bear after a few moments of walking. Even better is when she closes her eyes and imagines the city as a forest - not of trees but of metal.
She blends in effortlessly after that. Even Balthier cannot find her without concentrating.
Fran keeps back a smile.
She has nearly perfected the art of being invisible.
eighteen
Soon she and Balthier leave the city behind. Her hands feel at home on the controls of an airship. The tang of Archades lingers in her nostrils for a moment, tugging at her memory, then is gone.
Fran laughs. The sound makes Balthier's bones go cold.
How could Jote, calm devoted Jote, smell like a hume city?
Balthier reaches over the gap between their seats and clasps her forearm. His hand is warm and shaking.
For a moment she almost tells him to let go, but relents. He is pale-faced. And they could have died.
Instead she says, "She is a beautiful craft."
He manages a small smile. Fran can tell he is pleased.
nineteen
In the same year Fran meets Balthier, Jote dreams of Yjrn. She sees again the long limbs and nimble fingers, the mouth that tastes of honeycomb and coeurl blood.
Alone in her fitful slumber, Jote sweats, each bead sliding down her jaw like quicksilver.
The long limbs are tangled. The nimble fingers are twisted. And the honeycomb-coeurl-blood mouth is still, red hair woven into the incisors.
A word forms. Jote wakes.
"Beloved."
She thinks Yjrn is dead.
twenty
Three years peel away. They are spent pillaging and exchanging broadsides over spicy Archadian sherry. Fran and Balthier speak of many things, but tread carefully around the subject of their pasts.
One morning she rises to find he is asleep in the cockpit. She wakes him by kissing him as if he were Elza. She expects bitterness, but there is none.
He tastes sweet - sweet like alraune-fruit with no seeds. And he kisses back. And he does not run.
"Beloved," she sighs in his ear. He runs his fingers through her hair. His dark eyes are glazed over with desire. He bares his throat to her kisses.
She finds he trusts her. She finds it is not only his lips that taste of fruit.
"Oh, Fran," he breathes.
"Oh, my love."
It pleases her to know he needs her.
twenty-one
It is four years before Fran again sees Eruyt. She enters with a quiet, self-applied Bravery spell but her eyes still swim with tears. How familiar are the trees, the springs, the bird songs.
She forgets she no longer remembers how to take down a coeurl with one shot, or even two.
She forgets she is banned and that her ears are sealed.
She forgets her sisters can only look through her, not at her.
It is enough to be.
twenty-two
"Sister."
"Fran. I know why you have come. You are not welcome here."
"I seek aid."
Jote sighs. She is so weary, but she must ask. She could care less what her sister wants. "Where is Yjrn, Fran?"
Fran hesitates. "With the Wood, in slumber."
"Ah." It is the answer Jote fears. She hurries to close her eyes. It is imperative she hide her grief.
"What aid think you to find here?"
"We seek the paths to the holy mountain. Lacking Lente's Tear, we cannot hope to pass unscathed."
"It is not the viera way to aid humes."
"It is the way of sisters to aid sisters. In your place Mjrn would show kindness."
"Mjrn is gone."
Fran looks around. Panic creeps into her voice. "Where has she gone?"
"Ask the Wood, Fran."
Fran sucks in her breath. Good, Jote thinks. You feel pain yet.
"You know I cannot," she cries.
Jote turns her face away. "Then follow the scent of iron. The air is rank with it."
twenty-three
In the Henne Mines, after Tiamat falls and the group stops to rest, Mjrn tugs at her sister's greaves. Fran bends down and sits beside her. She strokes her little sister's hair, cups her face and clasps the tiny body to her own. She follows her sister's finger as Mjrn gestures to Balthier, who feigns ignorance and commences with cleaning his cuffs.
"Fran," Mjrn whispers, "Your beloved?"
She smiles.
"Yes, little one," she replies. "Beloved."
Balthier has the grace to hold back a smirk.
twenty-four
Jote surrenders Lente's Tear with regal dignity. She purses her lips and does not correct him when Balthier pockets it, drawling, "Our eternal gratitude, my good lady Jete." She thinks he has butchered her name on purpose. She does not like any of Fran's companions, not even the innocent hume girl with hair like yellow rushes. She thinks she hates the pirate most of all.
After he leaves, Mjrn presses a cheek to Jote's arm and closes her eyes, purring.
"Jote?" she says.
"Yes?"
"That hume," she murmurs. "Fran says he is beloved."
Jote's knuckles turn white.
twenty-five
Within weeks they are in Archades again. Although Balthier is familiar with Fran's story - now that they have been to Eruyt - they have never spoken of his own. She knows by the way he greets Jules he is ashamed of it. He thinks his story a poorer tale than hers, perhaps. She worries, though. His face is so pale.
When Jules leers at them, sneers at them, and then finally finds them comfortable lodgings, Fran rooms with Balthier as always.
That night he is restless.
"Fran," he says at last. "I am - "
"Ffamran Mid Bunansa. Cidolfus' boy."
"Yes."
"And a Judge."
A sad smile. She regrets speaking. He is still so pale. "No. Not anymore."
"No," Fran agrees. "Like me you discard what ill becomes you."
He sighs again. The breath whispers by her ear. "Fran, I didn't want you to know unless you had to. I'm not proud of my past. But I am sorry for it."
She bows her head. He stands up and starts to pace.
"Fran."
"Mmm?"
"You aren't mad at me, are you? Because I am sorry. More sorry than I've ever been about anything else."
Fran shrugs.
twenty-six
The next day, Balthier sees his father. They meet at Draklor and Balthier sneers.
"Ah, Ffamran, I knew you would come!" Cidolfus tells his son.
Fran and Balthier notch their bowstring and cock their gun at the same time. Bullet and bolt - aiming ruthlessly for Cidolfus' heart.
Then the Paling rises. The battle goes well at first, and then poorly. Cidolfus escapes. Penelo faints. At last Reddas herds them all out before the roof can collapse on their heads.
They head for Balfonheim not because it is safe, but because it is their only choice.
twenty-seven
At Reddas' manor, they nurse themselves back to health. Of the six - seven, with Reddas - Balthier is the worst afflicted. During the battle it did not matter he was Cidolfus' son - he set himself at the head of the group and would not stop his attacks to tend his wounds. Now he is delirious, feverish, bruised, and there is a hole straight through his calf.
Fran saves him from infection only by drawing the bullet out with her teeth. She tends to his cuts and soothes him with wet handkerchiefs on his brow. She stays by him day and night, and eats nothing without first giving a spoon to Balthier. She becomes accustomed to sleeping upright in a chair. But she cannot make the fever go away. And for a while, she refuses to let Penelo or anyone else tend to him.
Then one day he wakes up and looks at her and says nothing but: "Who are you? Where's Fran? I need her. She loves me. She'll make me better. Just wait and see."
Penelo pretends not to hear.
"Send for one," Fran at last relents.
twenty-eight
Elza is nothing like the girl from the sea Fran loved. She is taller and has somehow grown breasts and hips. She wears a red coat now instead of a grime-covered brown tunic. She sways on heels like knives and her words are no longer like wads of spit shooting from her plump lips. She doesn't bother with weapons, just fists and poisons, and she no longer cares for philosophy. She is in every way changed and alien. And her eyes are colder.
Fran stares.
"You love him," she says. Fran thinks it might be a question. Maybe.
She nods.
"Did you never love me?" Elza accuses.
"Did you never love me?" Fran counters. She feels sick.
"More than you know," comes Elza's cool reply.
Fran chokes on her tears.
"Save him," she rasps, and turns her face away.
twenty-nine
After three days of deep sleep, he awakens.
"Fran?" he whispers hoarsely.
"Beloved," Fran breathes.
"Oh, Fran."
His cracked lips break into a smile. Fran's eyes feel wet.
"I missed you," he whispers, pressing her hand to his cheek. He feels it tremble, and covers her hair in kisses.
"It's alright, Fran. Don't cry. I'm back now."
thirty
After the Pharos, their roles reverse. Fran feels Mist engulf her senses. Then she feels hardly anything at all.
Balthier sings songs as he tends to her pain-wracked body, cradling her face as he washes all the filth of the lighthouse away.
Elza comes without being called, in the dead of night, and leaves before Fran is awake. She has left off her gloves. Balthier marvels at the ugliness of her worn hands. She ignores him. Pours tonic into Fran's mouth, and waits for Fran to swallow. Then she is gone.
Balthier watches her go, before he pulls back the blankets and presses himself to Fran's flushed skin.
"Beloved," he whispers.
Then with a sigh, her eyes flutter open.
"Oh, Balthier," she sighs. "I am so weary. Must the walls crowd me so?"
thirty-one
In Eruyt the viera feel the stirring of the beast. Pollen scatters. Birds flee.
Jote hears the Wood weeping in her bones.
"Oh, Yjrn," she cries. "Beloved, return to me."
The word has lost its sweetness.
thirty-two
All around them, chaos rages. Winds batter the walls. Metal bends under the fury of the storm. The princess, her knight, and their two naive subjects, gone, fleeing. Balthier works, Fran by his side, thinking of nothing but the need to make the sky-fortress fly again - this one last time of times.
Fran touches his arm. He is comforted.
"Fran, my love," he whispers tenderly.
She smiles.
"Beloved," she croons back. The engine hums to life under his fingers. They close their eyes.
Bahamut howls, but at last, Fran is at peace.