Petrichor.
The softly golden light of the candle wrapped its honey hue over the windowsill. The sheets of rain just outside pittered a multitude of tiny beats over the face of the building, trying in vain to extinguish the light of the tiny flame which, unaware, danced to its own reflection in the glass. Outside, darkened streets illuminated only by the light of a row of dim gas lamps glistened, slick and slippery, as the last few night wanderers took up their hoods to hurry someplace dry, muttering complaints under their breath as the spring's nightly tempest purged the streets of their ilk.
With half-lidded eyes, the girl watched the last remnants of diurnal life scatter beneath her window, and as she scanned the blackening horizon, a nervous, purple vein of lightning flashed in the distance. Eyelids softly closing, she lay back in her bunk, steely hair spreading across her pillow like outstretched wings. Her arm crossed her chest to rest against the cold window pane, and when only a moment had passed, her fingertips savored the tiny vibrations of glass as a peal of thunder rumbled just overhead.
"Aqua?"
Two knocks, then the door to her room creaked open, and the kindly face of her master, a man known only as Eraqus, appeared in the doorway. A tealight cupped in his hand illuminated his face, sending black shadows dipping over his eyelids, and for a moment he appeared ominous until he stepped further into the room. He was no more than thirty-five, a young man, though deep lines marked his face from his constant beaming - suiting his demeanor, which someone had once candidly described as being 'perpetually tickled'. His hair was black, long in length and untameable, with a bolt that fell across his face which reminded the child of lightning. This night he was still dressed in his daily attire, and the dark purple streaks beneath his eyes suggested that he had only just finished his work for the day. With a sigh, and contented smile, Eraqus placed the candle at the edge of the hearth as he entered.
Aqua turned to look at him, smiling brightly as she removed her cold hand from the window and stretched her arms toward her teacher, reaching further and further, balancing just on the precipice of her mattress, until he strode forward and scooped her up into his embrace. Eraqus squeezed her tight and rocked her side to side, her legs swinging limply as she giggled. Aqua's hands clutched at his hood tightly, her face pressed against the scarred skin of his neck, nuzzling softly. With some effort, he managed to free himself of her clutches, and placed her on her feet on the floor. He knelt before her, knees creaking, back aching, and with smiling eyes he held out his hand.
"Aqua the Bright and Blue," he said with a flourish, as she placed her tiny hand on his palm. "Pretty bluebird. Were you watching the rain?"
She smiled, nodding once as she turned again, distracted by further rumbling outside. Aqua scrambled back up on the bed, pressing her face to the window as Eraqus undid the bedsheets and tucked her in half-way, prompting her to look at him.
"Tomorrow is a big day! Sleep, little one," he hummed, waving a gentle hand over her hair as sleeping magic drifted from his fingertips like orbs of dust slowly passing through a beam of light. Aqua yawned, stretching out and settling down into the warmth of the bedclothes which Eraqus swiftly tucked snuggly about her. She smiled up at him, sleep tugging lazily at her eyelids.
"Goodnight, master," muttered the child, sapphire eyes shutting firm.
The man leaned low and kissed her forehead, careful to rise slowly and not disturb the quiet sleep which had so quickly overtaken the girl. She shifted at the tickle of his whiskers, and he smiled to himself as he snuffed out the dying light of the candle on her sill.
They called this place the Land of Departure. Though no one could realistically claim they knew the story of the name, it was often said that the Foretellers had given it this name for its mystic wandering mountains, which had to be chained together for fear of their drifting away. Eraqus had often pondered over this as he would patrol the grounds in the night, and thought to himself there was something rather sad about the way, every evening, the cragged old mountains would tug against the chains which kept them captive.
Old and charming in its character, Departure served as home to a healthy populace, a healthy heart. It was self-sustaining, perserverant, and self-sure in its ways and understanding of its secrets. It was a marketplace for foreigners, it was a homeland to its people, and above anything else, for Eraqus it served as a sanctuary. Eraqus, like so many others who had found their way to this place, had once been a young and boundless soul who in his youth had been taken in by the Ministerium Statera, a knighthood in essence bound to the protection of cosmic equilibrium, gifted with the strength to wield divine weapons known only in the local shorthand as keyblades. Peaked high above the mainland amidst the ever toiling mountains, the Ministerium served as a training ground in one respect, and an orphanage in another.
The aching Master left his youngest apprentice, shutting her door quietly as he turned to face the seemingly infinite hallway, at the end of which stood his own chamber. Eraqus paused, running his hand over the nameplate nailed to her lintel which simply read, Aqua. Like the others before her, she too had come to him an orphaned child of a faraway world, her fate dually unsure and unfortunate. With no family name nor history or memory, only the blue of her eyes to be certain of, the young Master had bestowed upon her the name "Aquae", although he did not care to admit that the name was truly influenced by her sorrowful weeping, which had persisted long after the girl came under the care of the Ministerium. Like her weeping, however, this did not persist, and soon the other students of the knighthood called her simply 'Aqua'. Eraqus agreed with his older pupils that this seemed more appropriate.
He shook himself of his thoughts, and could only smile. Turning to walk down the hall, passing the dormitories of his students, he glanced at each of their names and felt a swell of fondness, of pride, in his heart. Though childless himself, barren by circumstance, Master Eraqus could not help but feel a parental connection to the names passing him as he reached the end of the hallway.
Avius. Aqua. Comitas. Calamus. Laeta. Petram. Patiens. Amare. Fortis.
The teacher was most glad, however, at the empty room at the opposite end of the hallway - boarded up, smelling of plaster and wet paint - in the midst of preparations for its newest arrival. Eraqus smiled as he dropped his robes from his shoulders, climbing spent into his bed, allowing his spine to settle into the comfort of his quarters. Finally, he thought, he would have something to give to her. Something to fulfill the wish she often spoke of when they sat hand in hand at the edge of that captive hillside, watching the taut pulling of the vast chains which, when they met, produced a low note that reverberated over the landscape.
A brother for his bluebird.