Disclaimer: Square Enix owns it all, et cetera et cetera.
A Moment of Accord
"Was it difficult," she asks him, ponderously, as if she is musing over many questions and this one the least, "giving yourself to Ondore and the Empire's chains again?"
Basch does not have to shift his gaze, it was settled upon her already. Ashe hunches by the fire, comfortable in her solitude, in the impregnable space around her, and yet there is something open about her voice.
"Aboard the Leviathan," she clarifies, though he doesn't need it. "After so recently regaining your freedom, only to give it up again for my sake." Her head turns a fraction toward him and her eyes finally slide over to his face, carefully half lidded.
"Was it difficult?"
He holds her glance as the past two years flood his thoughts, memories that have mostly been ground down to sensory imprints; the stifling fetid smell of his cell, the eternal ache of his shoulders and neck as he hung suspended, hunger cutting him like a knife and thirst making him sick. And silence pierced with tortured voices, his own or other prisoners, they became identical. And the cold. And the dark. And the despair.
And his brother. The nameless terrors Noah's visits awakened, of love spoiled and bonds broken and trust betrayed.
Basch emerges from the desolation of that time, his back and wrists itch where his skin has become thick and glossy from scarring, and he knows that Ashe has seen some portion of the suffering he endured. He hopes she can see the absolute truth of his answer and understand a little of the vast love he has for her, as a woman or a queen or a symbol or a redemption; even he does not fully know the manner of his devotion.
He reaches out to touch her for the first time since the Leviathan, gentle fingers on her shoulder as a contrast to the crack of her palm against his cheek, and she almost flinches at his invasion, his presumption. Almost, but she doesn't.
"No," he replies, and she returns his smile with a small one of her own.
A/N: My muse, if I ever had one, has been a flaky ho. Ergo I wrote a drabble. Yay for Ashe and Basch trust-building! Hope y'all enjoyed!
