The mark of the stylized Zu emblem gleamed above the door even in the gloom of the alleyway, metallic paint catching what hazy light managed to pierce the deeper city and turning it to delicate strokes of pale silver.
The open, toothy beak snarled down at him. Wild, pupil-less eyes glaring amidst the four fans of the beast's wings, and beneath that the long tail coiled over and across itself in a knotted pattern, lashing like an enraged serpent. The mark of the haven: Deeproost, the hidden Citadel they called it.
Prompto swallowed, but it felt like nothing liquid went down, the walls of his throat almost scraping together. He already knew this wouldn't be good, but he was out of options and just about out of time. Sucking in a low breath, he pushed the door open and slipped inside.
The building was set up almost like a club, though it really served more as a gathering hub and merely doubled as a bar. It also worked as a good façade should any not privy to the group come knocking. The door opened to a small coat room, repurposed to function as a miniature lobby, sparsely decorated with fur rugs, a couple of leather seats, and the large, wooden door to the adjoining room firmly closed. The welcome was less than warm.
A giant of a man rose from the chair closest the door, sweeping up with a grace one wouldn't expect for a man of his size. His tanned arms folded over his chest, thick cords of muscle smoothly tensing in a way that probably wasn't meant to be as intimidating as it was. Probably.
"Surprised to see you, Argentum."
Prompto barely masked a wince. Using his last name. Not good.
"Nice to see you, Quintus," he said, laughing weakly in a pointless attempt to lighten the oppressive atmosphere, "been a while since you were on bouncer duty, you're looking great, dude!"
Quintus quirked an unimpressed eyebrow at him, a look made even worse by the large scar that split it in two, trailing down diagonally across his cheek and only making his expression look all the more grisly. He shook his broad head softly, the dark braids pouring over each large shoulder swaying with the movement.
"You're in the shit, Goldie," Quintus said bluntly, but when Prompto hesitantly looked up to meet his eyes there was no malice in them, mostly pity, "but not everyone's pissed at what you're doing, matter of fact, most don't give a damn."
"Well, that's better than I'd hoped."
Quintus snorted, a tiny smile pulling up a corner of his lips, and just as quickly fading back to his stoic, guardsman's face.
"Go on in, talk to Balius, and get out," he said, his ordinary tone broached no argument, but Prompto knew this wasn't an order, it was a suggestion for his own good, one he absolutely planned on following, "you don't want to hang around with those grumpy old buzzards glaring at you all afternoon."
Prompto nodded, hefting his backpack further over one narrow shoulder and shooting the far larger man a grateful smile.
"Thanks Quin," and he meant it. He knew he lucked out managing to catch him on duty and not some of the more… old-fashioned guardsmen.
"Off you hop, kid," he said with a nod, pulling the thick door open for him. Prompto obediently scampered into the main room and, a few seconds later, heard the expected hollow sound of the door closing tight once more.
See Balius. Get out.
Easy.
He had barely taken a couple of steps inside and immediately came to the conclusion that wasn't going to be the case. It wasn't the utterly terrifying tableau that had seared itself into his brain almost every waking hour (and some of his sleeping ones), of every wild eye in the building latching unerringly to him. Venomous glares and bared teeth. Flashes of sharp things between shadowed bodies.
It was not that. But as he forced his shaky legs to carry him further inside, he did not miss the glances. Not cold, but searching. Not enraged, but cautious. The reek of a taboo broken, no, shattered was more accurate, filled the air like a thick miasma.
Prompto kept his head down, forcing his feet to keep taking steps, headed for the corner booth his target always frequented, every afternoon and into the evening in the week before the 11th of every month. Like clockwork.
If anything, the familiarity of the place always made something pleasant curl in his chest. The air was heavy with the scent of natural incense and beer, mingling around swirls of perfume and time worn leathers. The place wasn't luxury, it wasn't uptown and the whole building had been repurposed from some of the older architecture in the city, but in his opinion that just gave it more personality. He would have loved to run rampant in here with his camera, had photos not been strictly forbidden.
The long, high-ceilinged room was ribbed with great, spiraling stone pillars, wooded floors leading to the far back wall where a worn bar spanned the entire room. Swathes of animal furs scattered the ground much like the two in the entrance lobby, gifts and donations from various patrons. Similarly, the walls were strung with a staggering array of horns, antlers, tusks and fangs and even entire skulls, the trophies of victorious hunts proudly displayed for all patrons to see. Most impressive were the pair of gnarled behemoth horns cresting the bar, crossed over one another like clashing blades.
The orange glow of the ambient lights tinted the people scattered in seats and booths and standing at tables in radiant warmth, the brightness kept low for the sensitivity of every person presents eyes.
And in the wash of lazily swirling particles, the feathers of their wings gleamed like hundreds of polished blades.
Prompto sucked in a low breath, catching himself before he could stand on what he had thought was a left-out cord, only to find he had almost crushed someone's long tail beneath his boot. The tall, pale woman it belonged to still shot him a warning look as he stepped over it, flicking the narrowly missed limb irritably and making the fan of feathers cresting its tip 'thwack' dully against the floor.
He resisted the urge to manifest his own wings and tail, despite how his shoulders itched to bring them out. This was a safe haven, one of the many scattered across the city for their kind alone. Where they could show the glimpses of their true forms without fear of being spotted by humans. But right now, drawing attention to himself was the last thing he needed.
'I think looking like a straight human might be worse,' that familiar, jittery voice in his mind said but he squashed it quickly. Zu could always sense one of their own.
The flash of inhuman eyes followed him like an escort, setting the hairs on the back of his neck on end. But to his relief he finally found himself taking the last few steps towards his destination, narrowly avoiding tripping over his own feet when he tried to close the distance a bit too quickly.
Balius was in the middle of a conversation with another young Zu he didn't recognize, and he definitely wasn't about to interrupt. He wasn't sure if he should take a seat, and the thought of that going wrong was enough to freeze him awkwardly beside the table, trying not to fidget as the discomfort of holding his spine so ramrod straight steadily grew.
The eyes of the those filling the main hall continued to burn against his back.
He distracted himself from the buzzing, swirling feeling steadily collecting in the hollow of his chest by reacquainting himself with the visage of the wizened man he had come to see. Balius was old, but somehow kept himself fit and skilled enough to make even the most ancient of elder Zu bend to his influence sometimes. He still walked with all the strength and pride of a man half his age, even if his tired and beaten body didn't always show it.
Balius' hair and dense beard had long since turned entirely white, yet still shone silver in the sun, wild and bushy and only slightly tamed by the leather straps he used to tie it back. His stormy eyes were framed on all sides by deep wrinkles, lancing out at almost every angle like the stylized rays of the sun painted upon the wall above him. Surprisingly, old laugh lines nestled among them, though he couldn't say he had ever considered the man quick to laugh.
His most notable characteristic had to be the immense scars that all but shredded his skin though. Slashes, bites and even burns marred his flesh, congregating most heavily down the right side of his neck and chest, scattering out up the side of his face and across his shoulder.
Rumors said he had gathered them fighting off hunters after he had been ensnared in their vicious traps. Others say that Raviente himself had given them to him, the great, black shadow said to dominate the Rock of Ravatogh. As with any well-known figure, none but Balius knew the truth, and he was not the kind to speak of it.
Finally, the elder Zu dismissed the youngling, seeing him off with a small but warm smile, and finally turned his piercing gaze to him. Prompto felt his back go impossibly even straighter.
"Well, kid," Balius said, not quite tired, almost amused, ever hard to pinpoint, "you definitely don't do things by half measures."
Prompto felt the breath he didn't realise he had been holding fly out of him loudly, a stuttering laugh leaving his lips like a car backfiring.
"I'll take that as a compliment, I think."
Balius hummed low in his throat, leaning his head on one arm, considering. Then he gestured to the seat opposite him. Prompto wasn't about to refuse, even if the bottom of his stomach felt like it was about to drop out of him. He scrambled to obey so quickly he forgot about the backpack still slung across his back, and so had to awkwardly shuffle it off on to the seat beside him.
It was always a little odd to him that Balius chose one of the few seats in the house that wasn't backless, but then, he had only rarely seen him sporting his great, grey wings, feathers the dappled colour of a stormfront rolling in over rough seas. He had seen them many a time before, on the immense body of the elder Zu's true, fearsome form, and in that guise every beat of them was almost the deafening crack of thunder.
But in a humanoid form, he bemoaned sore joints and tight muscles, the only reasoning he ever gave for not manifesting them more readily. Though he far more freely displayed his tail and the dense coverage feathers over his back, trailing to long secondary tail feathers that hung like a cloak about his waist. The former swayed beneath the table, serpent-like.
"So, you're here to join the hunt I presume?"
Prompto felt himself nod.
"Yes, Sir," he said, remembering himself. Balius gave one of his signature grunts.
"Consider it done," he answered, lifting a heavy pen and jotting his name in rough cursive at the bottom of the list in the notebook beside him. Replacing the pen beside it, he fixed his gaze right back on him, staring from under thick white brows. His heavily calloused hands folded before him on the table.
"You already know what is on everyone's mind," he said, voice pitching lower, until it was barely a rumble, "and you already know I cannot see you without bringing it up."
Prompto swallowed, and if possible it felt even drier than any before it. He knew this was coming. It was inescapable. He had broken, well, not a law. Not exactly. Zu didn't have laws, but they had traditions, culture, and they had taboos.
And at the very top of that list was never to draw close to the Lucian royalty.
Human rulers were fickle things, quick to turn their minds and quicker still to turn to violence. Or so the elder Zu liked to say. Prompto couldn't say he agreed. But when the belief was built on centuries of death at the hands of human hunters and even,, he dare not dwell on it too long, Lucian magic, he also could not say he didn't understand the point of view.
So he just had to go and befriend the human prince, didn't he?
Honestly, he was amazed he had been able to keep his blossoming friendship with Noctis a secret these last couple of months, but he had known this day would come.
"You still here, kid?"
"O-oh! Yes sorry, um, Sir."
"Still your storms boy," Balius said gruffly, pulling a small smile from him at the elder Zu's familiar expression, "I'm not here to lecture you, as far as I'm concerned it's none of my concern who you choose to befriend."
Prompto's smile warmed just a little more.
"However," Balius continued, eyes turning grave and refusing to release him from their hold, "I must remind you that the path you have chosen is not without risk, it is not just you it potentially endangers either."
"I know, Sir."
"I have a name do I not?"
"Yes, Sir, Balius!"
Balius shook his head hopelessly.
"Gods above, I might as well march myself up to the human king himself and take my true body before his eyes."
Prompto shrank in on himself, knowing his ears were turning red. Balius breathed a deep sigh, considering him carefully for a long moment, before seeming to take pity and moving things along.
"You know why they're all wary, don't you?"
"Of course," Prompto said, straining to keep his voice steady, "I can't blame them for it, hell I'd be lying if I said I wasn't too, but it's just the same as any other human friends, right? I know how to keep our world hidden, I've never slipped up before."
"It is not just the same as any other human friend, Prompto," Balius said, "it's the human Prince, not only is he the most fiercely guarded human in the city, he's also the most watched, by everyone."
Balius' stare was hard, unrelenting but not malicious. More testing.
"Should you persevere in this friendship, you will be under scrutiny like never before, not just by those that attend the Prince, but also by the public that follow his every movement."
Prompto felt his throat bob with a swallow, once again it felt like nothing went down.
"I know that, and I'm ready for it."
"That so?" Balius questioned, arching a brow, "you know should you slip, should the truth of what you are be revealed, our entire existence here will be at risk? No one, not even I, would come to your aid."
Prompto could only nod. Balius nodded once in return, slowly. His eyes turned overcast and Prompto knew his next words were not to be ignored, more so than all his others.
"The Lucian boy can never know what you are, human power is too fickle, too unpredictable, it could well mean the end of us, and especially of you. Have you hazarded to think on what the King might do should he deem you a danger to his son?"
Prompto couldn't help it when something dark and instinctive curled like ice in his gut. He had. Oh gods had he ever. Words were bubbling up his throat before he could even think on them.
"I thought you said you weren't here to lecture me?"
It was said half-jokingly. Only half. He wanted this to end, was only slightly guilty of the urge to text Noct and sneak off to the arcade so he could forget this conversation had even happened. Balius' deep rumble pulled him from such pleasant thoughts.
"I suppose I did, but would you rather any other elder?"
Prompto shuddered. That would be a resounding no. He already knew every other would only demand that he sever ties, break this now while it was still new and soft. Balius nodded.
"I thought not," he said, sounding suddenly very tired, "which is why I have seen to them, they will not chase after you under my word that I will see to this matter myself."
The last was said with a tiny smile and a wink he thought he might just have imagined. Prompto felt breathless, understanding why when he inhaled sharply, realizing belatedly he had been holding his breath. Then he broke into a grin so wide it actually hurt a little, but Astrals he didn't care.
"Balius, I don't know what to- "
Balius held up a hand, halting him effortlessly. Beneath the table he felt his tail bump his ankle, urging him to stay focused.
"All I want in return is your word," the elder Zu said seriously, all warmth replaced with hard lines and heavy eyes, "your word that no matter what happens, the truth can never be revealed to the human Prince, you must never give him or his retinue cause to doubt that you are anything other than a normal human boy."
"I give my word," Prompto said evenly, staring straight into the older man's eyes, "I've managed this long right?"
Balius' lip twitched up in the beginnings of that kindly smile again.
"I suppose there's been rowdier younglings," he mused, his gaze turning more considering, "I also suppose if there's anyone who could safely keep such a position, it'd be the one among us raised by humans."
Prompto didn't flinch at those words anymore, hadn't in a long time now. In fact, usually he just ignored any mention of it and absolutely refused to speak on it. He knew how most civil Zu viewed him. Something between human and Zu. Something that never should have been allowed to happen. Yet for some purpose he nor anyone else knew, he was legally bound to his fostering, human family, and the Zu community had dared not attempt to take him from it lest it draw unwanted attention on them all.
So he had remained the only Zu ever known raised under human guardians.
"Perhaps then," Balius said, a hint of amusement on his lips, "you were meant for this."
Prompto stilled at the words, eyes going wide for a long moment, before a soft, shy smile pulled across his face and his eyes darted downward, focusing on the dusty wood of the tabletop.
"Yeah, well, maybe."
Balius merely watched him for a time, finally giving a tiny nod and a soft hum.
"Well then, if that was all, I'll see you here again on the 11th, and you'd best not be late this month."
The familiar grouchy old tones had returned to his voice by the end of his sentence, pushing himself back off the table so he could straighten his tired back against the cushions. He cursed venomously under his breath.
"This damn back of mine, soon I fear my wings will seize in their sockets, then I will truly join those crotchety old elders lording over all you younglings."
Prompto risked a small snicker, moving to gather up his bag and slide out from the booth.
"You already lorded over all of us."
"I do not lord," Balius replied indignantly, playing along for the time being, "I merely pass on my bountiful wisdom to you oh so uncaring children, now, off you hop boy, from the way you continue to stare so lovingly at your phone I imagine you have an important friend you wish to see."
Prompto stuttered, a hot flush immediately sweeping across his cheeks and up to his ears.
"Begone child," Balius laughed under his breath, "and remember your word."
"Balius," Prompto got out with a respectful nod, before rising the last of the way and slinging his pack over his shoulder. He had barely taken three strides when the elder Zu called his name, not loud, merely spoken. Prompto looked back over his shoulder.
"Our kind may not recognize human power, you know our words, we are a people ruled only by the wind and the sky, and yet the human Prince is but a boy, he has done no wrong in this life yet."
Balius would not meet his eye, his gaze locked on the table but utterly unseeing, staring at something long lost in the depths of the woods grain.
"Be a good friend, Prompto, regardless of our own beliefs, crowns weigh heavy on still-young heads and we all have need of a friend."
Prompto watched the elder Zu for a long moment, but the man was lost in something he couldn't begin to know, and finally he nodded.
"I won't fail him, or you."
And he walked once more, past the tables and around folded wings that draped across the floor. Back to the entrance through swirling, golden-lit clouds of incense and over ill-placed tails, the blatant glances from his fellow Zu not nearly as heavy as when he had entered and ever easier to ignore completely. He knocked on the heavy wooden door twice, before pushing it open, slipping out into the lobby and nodding with a smile at the reseated Quintus. The far larger man shot him a knowing smile and a soft 'later, Goldie,' as he opened the front door and returned to the fresh air of the Insomnian evening. His phone buzzed with a message and he knew who it was before he even looked, a smile already pulling at his lips. He was off before he had even finished typing out a reply.
Balius finally shifted his gaze from the tabletop, settling on the last name on his list of young hunters. The future was uncertain, not even the wisest elders or greatest kings could divine how this new partnership would end. He would be lying if he did not hear the fears of his fellow Zu, and feel them in equal turn. One misplaced step could mean disaster, for all of them.
And yet, he too could not help but wonder at that potential future in equal measure. The boy had given his word never to reveal himself, and yet, such promises were prone to go awry when certain situations necessitated it.
The reveal, were it to fall at an opportune time, after a close bond had been forged... Well, who was he to know the nature of such things. For now, he wished this most unusual of pairings a happy friendship.
Gods knew they would both need it in the coming years.
He turned his attention as another youngling scampered over to him, ignoring the taught itch in his shoulders and curling his tail further beneath the table to avoid errant feet. Now they could only allow time to pass, and see where Prompto might lead them.
He found himself rather intrigued to see it.
Here is the first of the AU I have been subjecting my poor friends too since they mistakenly coerced me into playing this damn game. And now I will not be stopped. More content probably to come soon cause this game and this AU really has dominated all my days.
Pinterest board for the Zu!AU: . /brookegdm/ffxv-zuau/