#Chromatic Existence

Summary :

Genre : Adventure, Drama, Romance, Friendship, Angst etc.
Rating: T, but may swing toward M later on.
Main Pairing : LucTir, though many others will get sprinkled in the story as it goes on.

A/N : This is my first fanfiction. Considering the fact that English is not my main language, if a BETA could take me under his/her wing, I'd be ecstatic. Thank you.

Prologue : Green Grave Moss

"War is an endless cycle that will never be broken, you can run away all you want, but you will always hear its echoes in the faraway distance. Wishing for peace in such a setting is merely a naïve wish ; for battles are forever looming ahead . . . Wouldn't you feel like a hypocrite ; to run away when people need you, to disappear when you could actually do something ? "

She recalls the bitter sermon fondly, chocolate hair swishing along with the soft breeze in a mesmerizing tango.

She remembers the past feeling of guilt that had rushed through her at his words, eyes shying away from the emerald cloth covering his back. Facing toward the flowers populating the castle's garden, he hadn't turned around to observe her reaction as if his speech was devoid of purpose, handed freely to her for no reasons others than sharing.

It seemed tremendously off fir him to partake in such pointless conversations, but at that moment, she had not dared notice; too busy showering herself with guilt. Guilt because she had hoped all along that Riou would take her hand and lead her away from all this, lead her away from the war. She had cried, she had wished. Feeble and uncaring of the pain it would put others through. However, that secretive, self-preserving brat, the one who had taken up the habit of listening to her troubles, had had the means to surprise, with soft words and calm wind.

The Yaza Plains now extending in front of her, ends lost in the horizon, she ponders solemnly. Her eyes are fixated on the two ageless teenagers playfully wrestling in the grass to her left, but it is not them that she sees. Her mind is filled with the memory of fair skin and chestnut hair tinted with the ever present shades of green.

Bitter nostalgia sings her forthcoming, beckoning her to its depth. She remembers his mannerism so well it feels overbearing, frightening, the dainty fingers crossing path with a petal, the garden made alive with the gentle breeze coming from his magic.

"If it means ripping myself from the constricting binds of destiny, I wouldn't. I'd run away with all my might just so fate never has me in its clutches again. People are slaves to their circumstances and lives; if you could have a way out, wouldn't you grasp the chance; to disrupt fate for even an instant, to rewrite history with your own ink . . . "

" Do you mean that you intend to run away ? ", she had asked uncertainly, demands about to spill from her parted lips faster that that blue elf could run, desperation marring her boyish features in a way soldiers were all bound to know.

Would you accompany me to Kyaro? So I won't be lonely . . .

Just stay until Riou is back . . . Please. I'm so tired of this, of seeing my two precious persons fight . . .

Now, she almost regrets not making these selfish demands, not begging him to accompany her.

It's on sunny days like this one that she misses him the most or maybe it's the nights following those lively days that leaves her wanting to hear his voice. Even after so long, after so many years . . . That boy and his ever present frown . . . Within the walls of her mind she dares think of him as her best friend, as her first love. But all that is gone, his presence is a blurry warmth from the past, distant and lost. Forever.

"No not at all. Such a trifling affront against destiny wouldn't change anything for someone like me. ", He had looked at his right hand solemnly, a hint of hurt, of resignation flashing across his partly concealed face.

She had not see it back then, but now it makes so much sense that she wants to cry, she wants to laugh.

"The will of the Rune is too strong to let me, but . . . for someone like you Runes do not apply. "

As she thinks about it, she knows that he had given her the small push necessary for her to make her escape. His words had fed her will and strengthened her mind. He probably knew what he had been doing, knew that the impact of his words could have jeopardized the whole war. Not that he had ever seemed to really care in the first place ; always telling everyone off without a single ounce of shame, always harshly criticizing Riou who would never match up to his standards.

At first she had hated him, hated his mocking and mean comments, but the war went on letting things happened, things that left her awake in her bed with tear-glistening eyes, atrocities that had led her to wander in North Window Castle in the middle of the night; that had led her to him and the flowers. A meeting under and among stars . . .

In a sense, she is grateful for his aloofness, grateful for his listening ear, for his distant and stern understanding, grateful for the pillar he had secretly been to her during the war. She never got the chance to say 'thanks' as she has never seen his face since she fled the battlefield.

The bittersweet mage had salvaged her sanity in a way that had made her able to handle the guilt. Leaving her brother behind through the faking of her own death had been no easy task, but she had learnt that war was not kind with anyone, especially its main actors. Riou would survive, Riou would pull through. None of the soldiers would let anything happen to him, they would protect him, that cherished mage would shield him. Maybe. Maybe not.

She often wonders what happened to him; has he gone back to live with the seer or has he gone to that young bishop holding an uncanny resemblance to him? How is he doing, how does he fare with the burden of his accursed rune? Nostalgia washes through her and the wistful smile that had illuminated her face seconds ago melts unceremoniously away. She has the feeling that, wherever he is, whatever he is doing, that the weight set upon his shoulder is too heavy for him to even be content.

He sometimes mentioned a bleak dream world to her, absentmindedly, rubbing sleepy eyes and grumbling at her for having woken him.

She always knew that his cold complaints held gratitude in them. He never had particularly enjoyed sleep; leaving her to discover him brushing the 108 Stars Tablet with coarse leather gloves more than once. It had been a few weeks after the death of the mad Prince Luca Blight, that she had started to wander off to him.

She had first found him in the garden, partaking in an activity she had soon learned to nicknamed 'the flower dance' to his distaste. She had merely wish to relax in the soft company of nature, but what she had found had been so much more.

That distant and prissy character, moving with something akin to water fluidity, letting the wind carry moonlit petals to the night sky, had stopped her desire for solitude in its track. The ethereal way the stars had made his skin glow, the graceful tips and turns he had been presenting and the simple fact that it had been him who had unconsciously offered her this show, had fascinated her to a point where her thoughts were almost solely filled by his unique movements.

He had been beyond angry, threatening her that if she ever told a soul, they'd have one more True Rune to fend off. She remembers having nodded thoughtfully, wondering what kind of demon could possibly make her share the information she now held in her soul. Such a sight had been, and still was, meant to treasure, just like a secret of a whisper, a precious memento saved to brightened dark days.

Even when the war had been raging, this scene a awoken a serenity so sweet that she had made an habit to sought out the mage as often as possible. She had wanted friendship and, thought unwilling at first, he had warmed up to her slowly, letting her join him whenever he went. It hadn't been noticeable from an outside point of view, but the mischievous comments and barely-there smiles had all been reserved to her exclusively, a salty kind of teasing that had made her stomach jump in silent delight.

That is, until that legendary hero from Toran Republic had appeared. . While the mage had still showed her gentleness and laughter, it hadn't felt the same. She had never seen the boy she had come to love appear so . . . happy.

Distant green irises coming to focus, twinkling with mysteries and secrets, hand brushing a lightly tanned cheek and a rare smile bubbling to the surface. Tir, he had said. Tir, he had repeated, fondness clearly apparent in his tone. She had been both fascinated and jealous, both tormented and appeased. Contradictory feelings all because the other had brought forward a soft look that not even her could manage to summon, all because it was a relief to know that he hadn't been completely alone.

Maybe, after the war, he had found his way back to him; back to the hero he cared so much about. Home was where the heart laid, wasn't it ?

She sighs.

He had disappeared without a word from what her brother had told her. As soon as the war had been finished, nobody had managed to find a hair of the aloof teenager.

Not that they had wasted their time searching for him. Many other matters had been more pressing than the state of an insufferable mage. Still he had left, just like she had done. It leaves blurry hole in her soul, she should've thanked him, should've told him that her death had been a fluke.

" You've been sighing a lot in the past minutes."

The gust still messes with her hair, but the grunts coming from her two companions' friendly fight have stopped leaving their voices to take over.

She must have been lost on memory lane for a long while and she hopes they are not put-off by her uncharacteristic silence. She holds in another sigh, berating herself for falling into remembrance at this time of the day, because when she looks up, the boys are looking at her worriedly. She forces a smile in answer to their silent inquiry.

They do not need to worry about her nostalgia for they can't alter it in way.

" Is the next town near ? ", she asks, brightening her smile.

As much as she misses her old crush and friend from time to time, it's not as she is unhappy with the way her life is. Her existence is full of adventures, affection and peace. She lives in a world painted in vibrant colors. With Jowy and Riou. And she will live that way until her final breath, because home is where the heart lies and even thought she may have loved that greenish illusion from the past, nobody can compare to those two, they are her everything. She does not want to get separated from them ever again.

"We should get to a place called Iskay in a matter of minutes; about twenty if my internal clock is any good. ", answers the blond, truly a man prisoner in the body of a teenager, with a small serene laugh.

She can still see that the worry caused by her abnormal silence has not completely vanished, his eyes shift to her almost questioningly. His stare his mirrored by the inquisitive doe eyes belonging to her precious brother.

" Oh ! Stop it you two ! Am I not allowed to enjoy the quiet once in a while?".

Both males shake their head almost simultaneously.

She groans, slips her arm behind their respective necks and proceeds to drag them in the way she thinks will lead them to the country village, shushing them with her maddening energy, grinding their fears to dust. She is much older, unlike them, the years having taken their toll on her body. She's taller than both boys, stuck somewhere in her thirties. She laughs as she declares herself leader of the small party, chiding them for their common idiocy. She laughs because she does not want to cause them worry, she laughs because she's joyful, but more than anything she laughs to avoid the questions.

Nobody needs to know about Luc, especially not these two.

It's not as if the mage with appear out of thin air to greet her with a smirk. Nanami intends to keep her memories solely to herself, because, really, Luc was a not the nicest pumpkin of the bunch. He had made his disapproval of Jowy clear and had told Riou more than once that he could never compared to previous heroes. To Tir, shes thinks bitterly.

Thus, Nanami keeps silent, her dear friends would not understand. It's less of a hassle to simply pull them along with her, vehemently ignoring Riou's protests, " We're going in the wrong direction, Nanami ! ", as she let her joy and laughter take over.

Luc is gone, Luc has been absent for years. It is not going to change any time soon and she's okay with that, she always has been.

Memories remain memories, left to collect dust at the back of her mind.

Isn't that right ?