Heavensent
DISCLAIMER: I don't own Yggdra Union. This piece of (highly) speculative fanfiction be all mine, however. Steal not, or you will be subjected to my great and terrible wrath.
I
When in the future he would try to look back and remember, it was the fleeting impressions that would stand out the most.
The sand and the water both tasted like salt. Salt strong enough to have made his stomach revolt, had there been anything in it. Had he been strong enough to stand the physical strain of vomiting.
His clothes had been sodden with water and weighed down on his body heavily. They never dried out completely—the waves that continually washed over him, sometimes all the way up to his shoulders, ensured that. It was hot. The only way he could tell night from day was when it cooled down just slightly.
His back throbbed horribly. So did his eyes. He knew that not all the wet he felt was seawater—a great deal of it was blood.
Any time he tried to remember anything more concrete, it slipped away. But then, he wasn't sure he wanted to have those memories.
II
Mulminams had been restless. That was the only reason why, really.
Even in his smallest, most companionable form, the albino phoenix could be quite insistent when he wanted something, and his cheeping was quite loud in Paltina's ear as he perched on her shoulder.
Eventually, she gave in, left the diocese, and walked along the shoreline of the little peninsula that lay just south of the abbey.
At seventeen, Paltina was a pretty young girl by all accounts, with her long, pale brown hair and faded-green eyes. Even in the cloistered heart of St. Meriata, she turned heads wherever she went, whether she willed it or not. And quite frankly, she didn't like the attention. The priesthood, the nuns, and Mulminams were enough for her. She didn't covet the hearts of men.
So it was only on her solitary walks with her phoenix that she allowed herself to dance and smile and sing to herself like any ordinary maiden would.
She was half-dreaming, half-dancing, her attention on nothing at all and her skirts flying, when the sight made her stop and stare. And stare.
There was someone lying on the beach.
Not caring who he was or how he'd possibly gotten there, Paltina ran to his side.
Even she could tell that he was in bad shape by the blood that soaked his tattered robes. For a moment she didn't even know whether or not he was breathing. But he had a pulse—he was most definitely still alive. Chewing her lip, Paltina looked him over. He seemed to be about her age, for all that he was slight and probably only about as tall as her, and was as white-skinned as a corpse, with roughly cut blonde hair that framed a sylph's delicately structured, full-lipped face. In addition to the bloodstained robes Paltina had already noted, he wore a pair of gilded sandals and a pair of heavy shackles, attached to heavier-looking chains that hooked into a series of metallic plates that covered the upper half of his face. He was bleeding from some injury on his back, and blood was also running down his cheeks like tears.
"Are you alright? Can you hear me?" Paltina asked aloud, giving his shoulder a tentative shake and looking around. No one else was in sight—just a heavily bound book and a broad white sword that she supposed belonged to him. "Please, say something!"
"…" No response. He probably wasn't conscious.
Biting back worry, Paltina turned to look at Mulminams, who was peeking down at the injured stranger curiously. "Please—go get help. Fly as fast as you can," she murmured to her feathered companion.
The phoenix cheeped and took to the skies.
III
"So will he make it?" Paltina asked the assortment of priests and nuns who'd been called to discuss the matter of her foundling.
"At this point it's difficult to say," one man said, folding his arms and giving her a critical look. "The injuries to his back are quite severe, and they've become badly infected. His eyes are worse, if that's possible, and there's far less we can do about that. Our only certainty as yet is that his eyes are irreparable, even to the best healers available here. He's blind."
"We can't tell when he's conscious or not, and even were he to be conscious, he won't speak. In all likelihood, his mind has been completely shattered by the physical trauma he's suffered," a nun added.
"For all that, we're left with what may be the more important question of who—or what—he is. I can feel a vast power about him, and that spellbook and sword you found with him are filled with an arcane magic I can barely understand. Furthermore, the wounds on his back are behaving much like what's left after a limb is lost." The priest who'd said this shook his head gravely. "We may not be treating him in the correct way if, as we suspect, he isn't human."
Paltina felt her stomach drop a little. "You mean… you think he's an…?"
"It's difficult to tell at this point. If we knew more about him, we would be able to tell whether or not he is. But at this time, no one can say for sure."
IV
Paltina sat next to him on the fresh sheets she'd laid over the floor with a wooden bucket of suds next to her and a wet cloth in her hands. Slowly, patiently, she silently dipped the cloth, wrung it out so it wouldn't drip too badly, and ran it over the curve of his arm.
She was usually the one tasked with keeping him clean. It wasn't like she minded. She had been the one to bring him here, after all, and this was a far more welcome task than scullery or laundry. There was sad peace in his silence, in his lack of any response whatsoever, even when she cleaned his wounds or delicately slipped her cloth between his legs. He was like some oversized porcelain doll but for the fact that he breathed. No matter that he seemed in a catatonic state—as long as his heart and lungs were working, he was still alive.
Paltina peeled back his bandages and made a face. His wounds had barely closed over and the scabs were cracking again, the cuts beginning to weep blood. There wasn't much she could do other than wrap him back up quickly. In the beginning, she'd been awkward at it, but after so long, looping bandages back around his chest and over his shoulders was a task that required little or no thought.
She checked the bandages they'd put around his wrists to keep those shackles from chafing too badly, then set her cloth and water aside and dressed him, sitting for a moment with him leaning liquidly against her side, slumped to fit the way she held him.
"I wish you would at least say something," she whispered. "At least say something, and—and let us know if you're awake and aware."
Mulminams, catching her sentiments, hopped onto his curled shoulder, leaned his beak in, and gave his loudest "PEEP" right into their foundling's ear.
"…" Still nothing.
With a sigh, Paltina hefted him into her arms and laid him back out on the bed. She'd barely set him down when the door opened, revealing a lower acolyte.
"Miss Paltina, there are injured soldiers to be seen to," the man said in a low voice.
"I'm coming," she said, dipping her skirts in a shallow curtsey. No matter how she avoided it here with him, there was ultimately no hiding from the fact that there was still a war going on.
V
"This is very bad," the Pope said, stroking his short beard as he looked at the ground. "Our men continue to be pushed back. The heathens will be at our door soon enough, and we will have no defenders left to stop them. The diocese will be overrun."
"But we can't just give up," one of the nuns protested.
"We have few options. Either way, we will all be enslaved under the infidels' laws or killed," a priest said gloomily. "We can only choose which is better—dying of pride or living with shame."
Paltina sighed and stroked Mulminams where he sat in her lap. The phoenix blinked up at her with a chirp, making her smile sadly. Just what would become of them all, when they lost the war that had been raging since she was a little girl—the war that had claimed her family's lives?
"…This…"
Everyone whirled around; Paltina gasped. There he was—standing, no less—a chained and robed wraith with one pallid hand on the doorframe and the other loosely wrapped around the hilt of that immense sword.
Paltina stood and hastened to him, halting only a few feet away. "…You're alright…!"
"…………" He was silent for a moment. "…This cause… that you fight for…" His voice was hoarse from months of disuse, and absent, as though he was still half-asleep. "Is it… a cause… you believe in…? A cause that… you would take up arms for…?"
Paltina blinked. "W-well… of course…"
"…Then…" He lifted the sword, held it out with both hands, offering it—to her. "This… I will… let you use… this…"
A bit uncertainly, Paltina accepted it from him. It was heavy, but not nearly as heavy as she'd expected. She felt it pulse once in her hands, as if reacting to her touch, but then it was still.
"The sword's name is… Gran Centurio…" he went on, his hoarse but sleepy voice somewhat eerie. "It possesses… divine power… that will grow… as you do…" A long pause, during which the entire congregation watched him intently. "…There will… come a time when… I shall require this back, but… until then… use my sword… as you will…" A little of the exhaustion left his words, and they grew heavy with command. "Wield this… in defense and execution… of your justice…"
As Paltina and the others stared, he let out a soft, sudden cry and sprawled to his knees, still weakly clutching at the doorframe.
"Oh!" Paltina knelt down before him, reaching over the sword to lay an anxious hand on his shoulder. "Are you alright?!"
He didn't reply, but raised his head to give her a slight smile.
VI
Tales were told of him throughout the war, passed from soldier to soldier in hushed, awed tones. Tales of his powerful magic, magic the likes of which had not been seen by human eyes until he used it before them. Magic that decimated all who opposed him. Magic that created things of beauty and power. Magic that even, it was rumored, could serve in place of the sight he'd lost.
They told tales of the way he had presented the holy sword called Gran Centurio to Lady Paltina, the way he had then offered to assist the war effort, displaying a thorough grasp of tactics and major strategy, with a mind frighteningly apt at adapting to any given situation. The way that after only a few weeks he'd had a large part of Lombardia's expanding army in the palm of his hand.
They told darker tales, as well.
Everyone knew that he walked through life as one half-asleep, because he was still recovering from his terrible injuries when the Lady had found him. But they said that his absent state of mind carried onto the battlefield as well. He fought like a dreamer, showing little emotion and absolutely no mercy or remorse as he killed. Those who saw him in the aftermath of battle deemed him a ruthless, inhuman war mage, soaked to the knees or higher in carnage, bloody spatters all over his clothes.
Their whispers and their speculations spread like the poison of his influence, and wove his existence into legend.
VII
"So you really did have wings?" Paltina asked with a gasp, enchanted, as she looked at him in the firelight. "How wonderful!"
"…Flight was a beautiful thing," he agreed, then smiled sardonically. "As for my wings… all they did was make me a freak."
"What? Why?" Paltina blinked at him. Surely she should've become accustomed to his negativity by now, but… sometimes it was just startling.
"What proper angel has only one white wing?" he asked bitterly, his tone self-mocking. "And the other, black as pitch? Difficult to find beauty in such a thing, to be sure."
"…………" Paltina looked down at her hands. "…Nessiah, that…"
"Stop trying to find beauty in this world, Paltina. It's an ugly place," Nessiah told her darkly. "The more you hide from that fact, the more you shall suffer in the end."
"But… if… we work hard, and pray…" she protested, giving him a desperate look.
"Pray?" Nessiah scoffed derisively. "As if that would get you anywhere! The gods you worship so are cold and cruel beings that care for nothing. Their judgment and their justice are absolute. Condemned once, you are forever damned. Am I not enough proof of that?" He spread his arms wide, causing his heavy chains to jangle. "I wasn't always—like this." He rested a hand to his forehead, giving her a twisted smile. "There was a time I, too, believed in the better good. It got me nowhere but crippled twice and exiled to this barren, forsaken world of mortals."
"…………" Paltina just watched him silently. He had a brilliant mind, to be sure, but there were times like this when she was not entirely sure he was sane.
"…No. This world is a cold and ugly place. Never forget it—or you'll end up like me."
He was so bitter, so hateful. Paltina hadn't expected that. He'd seemed—such a pure creature, back when he'd been recovering, when she had cared for him. It frightened her sometimes, she had to admit.
But… at the same time, she owed him so much. So she never said anything about it.
VIII
Paltina's army won the war. Not only that, but they went on to conquer almost all of the known world as well. Paltina and Mulminams led the way, blazing a path in the name of justice, under the power of the Gran Centurio.
The whole time, Nessiah was there, watching. He sealed the island where he had drifted into her care to the rest of the world, forged her a crown, assisted her rule.
When Paltina died and her lands fell to her son Paltineas, her empire fell apart. Paltineas used her sword to claim what little was left as his kingdom, and established rule from the central country, which he renamed Fantasinia.
In time, Nessiah left. No one of that age knew precisely what became of him, just that one day he was there and the next he was gone. The Artwaltz family he had left behind eventually forgot the role he had played. Their rule, they claimed, was a divine mandate, their sword and crown gifts from the gods. They made war, and proved a disturbing inability to sustain peace.
They no longer remembered that somewhere, there was a fallen angel waiting to collect.
IX
"I can barely remember any of that," Nessiah said with a rueful smile, shaking his head. "The pain and the shock, you know. I was only about half-sane, all that time. I suppose I've suppressed many of those memories in any case. It was… not an enjoyable point in my life."
"I suppose not," Gulcasa allowed, shrugging one shoulder. "Starting over is never easy. And given your condition…" He let the sentence hang.
"And when you've lost the ability to believe in anything, starting over is a long, fussy, and none-too-pleasant process," Nessiah quipped. "Even if you can't say it, I will."
The Emperor rolled his eyes. "You're an incurable cynic."
"Paltina was a lot like you, come to think of it," Nessiah went on, gesturing to Yggdra. "Innocent. Motherly. All that changed once she'd gotten her hands dirty, but… I was fortunate that it was her. If someone else had found me, I likely wouldn't have made it this far."
"…………" Yggdra watched him silently.
"The poor girl," the fallen angel said wryly with a brief shake of his head. "She must've thought I was the answer to all her prayers."
"When, really…?"
"I was her worst nightmare."
:owari: