After the run in with Aldon, the night seemed to fly by in a blur of bean soup and dancing and games. Yuna laughed as a small group of children tumbled gracefully through amazing gymnastic feats. The little coins the crowd had given them jingled in their buttoned pockets and sparkled from braids in their hair. Yuna tossed some coins to the tumblers and wandered into a large canvas tent with an ostentatious sigh declaring it "The Tent of Wondrous Oddities".
"Prepare to be amazed!" a tall man announced. Yuna tried to crane her head to see over the crowd and be amazed, but Rikku grabbed her arm and collapsed into her side giggling.
"Yunie, follow me!" Rikku half-led and half-dragged Yuna from the "Tent of Wondrous Oddities" and into a tattered older tent nearby. "Be veeeery quiet," she whispered. Her words weren't quite as clipped as usual, and Yuna suspected that her dear cousin had imbibed in a bit too much ale.
"Can I help you?" a tiny whithered gray woman asked. Her dry claw-like hands folded together over a rose and maroon skirt. It was a young woman's skirt on a skeleton of a hag and the sight left Yuna with a strange sour taste in her mouth. Or maybe the sour taste was just the ale.
The little tent was draped in layers of gauzy material dyed different shades of red. There were little pieces of furniture here and there, a small cabinet was almost hidden in a corner. The furnishings didn't seem to belong, they were too solid in a room that was otherwise cloudlike and dim. It was like walking through a thick red fog.
"We're here for a reading. My cousin has never had her future cast," Rikku said. "I have plenty of coin."
"Leave us alone then girl. Her future is between her and me," the old woman said. Rikku paused long enough to wish her cousin luck and slipped out of the tent. The woman nodded to a low stool sitting very close to her own chair and Yuna took a seat on it. "My name is Nual, and you are the summoner Yuna."
"How do you...?"
The woman held up one of her gnarled hands and shook her head slowly. "I know many things." Nual smiled, a sly knowing curl of her lips. "You loved a dream. You lost him." The woman placed one of her gnarled hands against Yuna's soft face. "I know you aren't living your life. You haven't let go."
"Is this where you tell me to get over it?" Yuna whispered. "Don't bother. I don't need to hear that from you or anybody. I'll grieve in my own way and my own time."
Nual brought her other hand up and framed Yuna's face between her long gristly fingers. "I know better than that." Her eyes had always been half-closed, unnotable, but now Nual opened them both and stared into Yuna's. The old woman might have been faded and dry, but her eyes shone with power and intelligence. A purple light almost seemed to spark and dance in her pupils. Yuna tried to pull away but Nual held fast. "You want him back? You do don't you? Do you know the cost of that? Of course you don't. Do you know the way of it, no." Nual released Yuna and sat back. "But you want it."
Once freed of the old hag's grip, Yuna raced out of the tent, like a wild animal freed from a trap. She sucked in lungfuls of the cool evening air and tried to erase the memory of the woman's horrible dry hands on her cheeks. "You want him back?" the old woman's words echoed in her head. Of course she wanted him back, but it couldn't be. He was gone. Didn't she know, there wasn't any price to pay because it wasn't possible. "Was it possible?"
Against her better judgement, Yuna pulled back the tent flap and headed back into the tiny dim enclosure. "Miss Nual? What did you mean... what you said before..."
The old woman had withdrawn to a dark corner where she was rummaging through a cabinet. "Do you love him?"
"Can't you tell? You could tell everything else," Yuna said. Her voice waivered indecisively. "Can't you tell?"
"Did he love you? Really love you?" the woman asked. Her voice had a shrill note of anxiety to it.
Yuna's heart was beating quickly and an emotion she hardly recognized as hope sprang to life in her chest. "He did. I know he did."
Nual slowly straighten and turned toward Yuna. "I can give him back to you, but there will be a price to pay. You saved Spira from sin, so I'll pay half the price, but you will have to pay the rest."
"Anything," Yuna whispered. "If you can really do this..." A small voice inside her head was screaming that tampering with the dead and the farplane was wrong, that she should let Tidus go and just live. She should let him rest in peace. "I'd give anything."
"Half your soul? Would you give that?" Nual asked.
Yuna brought her hand to her chest. "It wouldn't be a half-life like sir Auron. He wouldn't become a lost spirit."
"He would be as real as you or me," Nual whispered. "Just be sure to guard the rest of your soul. They're resilient things, but you shouldn't ask too much of yours unless you want to become a lost spirit someday."
"Half my soul?" Yuna could see Tidus, sad and torn, before he jumped from the airship and out of her life. When she exorcised, freed, the faiths she'd killed him. How could she not bring him back, if it was possible. "Do it then," Yuna whispered. "I'll pay your price. Just do it."
"Take my hand," the old woman hissed. "Now close your eyes."
Yuna could feel the claw-like hand biting into her soft flesh and she almost cried out. For a moment she was hot, immediately followed by a moment of violence she hardly recognized and couldn't quite quantify. Then her hand was free. "I feel cold," she whispered. Slowly she opened her eyes and blinked until her vision cleared. It felt like someone had drained all the energy out of her body. Then she saw the old woman, Nual, had collapsed into a brightly clothed pile. "Oh God, are you okay? What should I do?" Yuna tried to gently awaken her.
Nual opened her eyes and smiled a black snaggle-toothed grin. "I'm not gone yet. Here, take it." She thrust a tiny glowing sphere into Yuna's hands. "Make your wish. But then you have to find him. He will return to Spira, with no knowledge of who he is." Nual flinched in apparent pain. "There is more. A danger. If you don't find him... risk..." She screamed and wrapped one gnarled fist around Yuna's shirt. Nual pulled her close as though proximity would help her utter her last warning. "Risk losing... soul to them..." The last words were barely whispers on her lips and the old mother, Nual slipped from the world.
For a moment of indecision, Yuna hovered over the still body of the old mother, but there was nothing she could do. This time when Yuna fled the small tent she didn't look back. It wasn't real. What that woman said, had done. It was impossible. Her walk quickly advanced to a run as she tried to escape the rowdy little carnival. It seemed like she ran forever along the beach before she was away from the light and laughter.
Yuna sank down to her knees and pulled out the tiny sphere the woman had given her. It wouldn't even make a plum, it was so small, but it glowed with a life all it's own. "The power of our souls, bound together into this." Was it possible? "Why would you give your life for this?" The dead old woman would never be able to answer that question and Yuna let it go.
Of all people, a former summoner could recognize the power of a fayth, and that's what this sphere was. Different than any fayth which had come before it, but a fayth none the less. Could it really grant her wish?
"I want this," she whispered to the sea. She crawled forward until the tide was churning over her legs and splashing her face. "I won't ever ask for anything else. Only bring Tidus back to me!" Yuna held the tiny sphere tight and prayed.
A voice inside her head whispered. "You'll have to let it go now."
Yuna opened her eyes and slowly unclenched her fists. The tiny fayth sluggishly flew up off her hand a centimeter, then two. It hovered and glowed for a few seconds longer then it flew straight up out of sight.
"Fly true," Yuna called. "I'll find you. Where ever in Spira you are, I'm coming." She positioned her fingers and whistled.