Lies So Sweet, part 1 (full version)
Final Fantasy X
Seymour/Yuna
R
Note: Just a short "what if" I wrote that has randomly turned into yet another full-blown multipart fic that will never get finished. Just throwing it out b/c of the sad lack of FFX fics in general right now (declining fandom:( ).
Begin: Sept. 4, 2007
Last updated: Oct 26, 2007
. 0 .
Fools, the lot of them. The young maester laughs inwardly and carefully readjusts his sash, eying the frayed hem of his robes distastefully.
Looking at his fallen opponents, he begins to walk casually amongst them, slowly examining each as one would pieces in an art gallery. The dark-skinned blitzer lies in a crumpled heap against the east wall. The two female guardians lay prone, not bloodied but not unharmed. Much of the Ronso's fur is charred black—he had been a particularly persistent creature. Pyreflies drift from the legendary guardian's unsent corpse, and Seymour contemplates how long it might be before he becomes a fiend.
Afterwards the maester looks to the blond guardian, a mere boy, yellow soaked in red. Smirking, he watches as the teen stirs, shakily lifts up his head. His eyes drift haltingly up until they meet the maester's.
"Seymour," he snarls through a clot of blood. "You son of a bitch—"
A firm boot pins the blitzer to the ground, eliciting a painful gargle.
"Why don't you go back to sleep, little boy?" Seymour suggests as he drives the hard toe of his boot into the red stain. The blitzer is noisy then silent.
Wiping his soiled foot on the boy's sleeve, his eyes pass over his two fallen guards. They gave their lives in needless defense of their master's life. Seymour wonders if they died happy.
Suddenly, stone doors behind him rumble open. He walks up the stairs at a leisurely pace.
The summoner stumbles out of the chamber and the maester catches her, gathers her gently in his arms, and strides out to the temple antechamber, carefully avoiding the bodies left in his wake.
. 1 .
"Milady is quite drained," Seymour says, and a sea of temple attendants part for him and the unconscious young summoner he carries.
A room is promptly prepared without another word from the maester, and he lays the fragile girl gently upon the bed therein. In any other case a healer would have been sent to take care of the summoner, but the Maester is known to be a proficient healer, and so he easily requests privacy for himself and his fiancée. The last nun to file out of the room smiles a knowing smile and shuts the door quietly.
Seymour has quite a few moments alone with his future bride before she awakens. Seating himself by her side he lets his eyes wander, unhindered by neither formality nor decency; her lips, her lashes, the rise and fall of her breast—nothing escapes his gaze. Not that anything of her would escape him now, he thinks, quite satisfied.
The summoner stirs in her sleep, but the Guado lord does not retract the large hand that envelopes one side of her face. He continues to stroke her flushed cheek with one long thumb, unsmiling.
. 2 .
Yuna remembers how fast her heart began to beat when he had suddenly drawn near. It didn't happen right away—only when his heady scent filled her lungs, intoxicating her with something at once sweet but also masculine, did her breath catch in her throat. His breath had tickled her neck, and the way his voice had become more husky in a hushed murmur made her swallow nervously. For the second time in recent memory (the first had been prompted by the arrival of the blond boy from Zanarkand), she began to wonder what love was.
Yevon's view of summoners—and apprentice summoners, for that matter—was one of utmost reverence. Socially cloistered as if in a covenant themselves, the young men who would sacrifice themselves to save Spira were largely celibate, and the young women who would do so were generally revered as virginal.
Especially as the young daughter of High Summoner Braska, the temple nuns had always made sure to keep most boys—except the brotherly Wakka—at an arm's length from Yuna. Sitting alone in the temple antechamber studying the Summoner's Creed, she felt sometimes like she was already like one of the statues in the temple, cold and stoic and untouched.
Some well-meaning villagers, though, hoped to save Yuna from herself, from her decision, from Sin, by trying to marry her to their sons. Fishermens' sons, farmers' sons, other orphan boys; each offered her a flower and each did not get much farther with her than the last.
As a young adult she realized that the nuns had been right; as a summoner she would meet an inevitable end, and to form that sort of bond with the knowledge that it would soon be broken was too much for her. That much sometimes kept her from dreaming too much of the blond boy.
And as it is also something that would deter her from her mission, marriage is something she never thinks of. Whether it was because her upbringing or her duty, she knows not. But sometimes, late at night, Yuna will remember the boys' gifts and wonder what color flowers she would have liked in her wedding bouquet.
Now, as she lies unconscious, she is dreaming of the maester. It is a dream of ignorance, one where she can't seem to remember Jyscal's revelation, where she is back at the Guado manor, with him, but without her guardians.
He is so close again, cloying scent tickling her insides, but this time he is reaching out to touch her, her face. At first his hand is so cold it makes her shiver, then feels so warm she feels like she's melting into him and soon she's lying down and he's even closer, but she can't see his eyes ...
Upon awakening, Yuna finds herself beset by that same scent. His scent.
As her vision focuses and her mind sharpens, Yuna can only look up with increasing dismay into his smiling eyes. When she tries to sit up, she feels his hand heavy on her collar, bidding her to lay back down. "Relax," he says.
She allows herself to rest on the soft pillow, a rush of memories suddenly flooding back into her mind as she stares at the ceiling. The ignorant dream is gone.
"You've been unconscious for a few hours," he was saying, "Most of the guests have left."
She wonders at his small talk, and remembers.
He hadn't said anything.
Incense smoldered and smoked a thick scent that mixed with those of old tomes and fruits in Maester Seymour's office. As the door was shut behind her, Yuna fought back a nauseating feeling that it smelt of death.
The maester did not look up at the summoner, focused on writing something in quick controlled strokes. "Did Trommel not tell you of the Guado tradition? We mustn't speak to each other before the engagement ceremony, my dear." With his voice sounding pleasantly amused and his former overt politeness partially shed, Yuna became very nervous.
Almost every part of her screamed for her to run as far as she can from this man; except, of course, her duty which stayed her feet.
"Lord Seymour. I am here to ... negotiate with you." she managed.
"Oh?" Seymour smiled, rising from behind his desk. "Do you perhaps require a dowry?"
Caught off guard and flustered, Yuna wrung her hands. "No, that's not it at all, I ..."
As she began to try and find the words, the maester preoccupied himself with books on a nearby shelf, humming a sweet melody. But Yuna knew better, and it chilled her as she remembered the flashes of lightning caught in the sphere recorded the stormy night that Lord Jyscal died. Words rushed back into her mind.
"You killed Lord Jyscal," she began suddenly, stern, fearless. She will not weaver, she will not weaver...
But then he turned around, still humming, smiling, and the young summoner's blood iced over.
Once again, she struggled to find the words, empty spaces and sudden desperation where there once was resolution. "Please, my lord, consider ..."
Soon, however, Yuna found herself before the entrance of the Chamber. The frosty antechamber and Seymour's fingers colored her skin further as he raised her hand to his lips.
He broke the seal on the door and bowed, leaving Yuna feeling like she never will find the words again. Like he will never answer her accusation.
"May Yevon bless your trial, summoner."
Alone with him again now, she feels the same cold feeling that had overcome her when she had confronted him in his offices; a sense that perhaps she was in over her head.
Gently he tucks a few strands of hair behind her ear. "To think, we shall be wed before the next full moon..."
Silently, Yuna closes her eyes. He hadn't denied it.
Perhaps she won't find the words again.
A/N: No, this isn't the end, there's more to come. Sorry it ended kind of abruptly, I tried to cut it off in a good place (a lot more was written). There will be two sections per chapter ... so wow, even my formatting is pretentious. XD
Wahh. Originally, I wanted this to be a short piece, but my long-windedness has gotten the better of me once again. ;; My goal for this is to have it somehow be very dark, and hopefully in-character. Anyway, your guess is as good as mine as to what will happen next. XD BTW, I did use parts of a few of my Onesentence challenge sentences in this fic ... maybe someone who read them noticed. :)
More will come soon, though now I want to focus on my other multichapter fic that will also never get finished (kind of a Seymour-biography sort of a fic). :)
Thanks for reading, please let me know what you think...