"Eternal Mother Nature obscurely warned Jean Valjean of the approach of Marius, and he trembled in the depths of his mind."

Book Three: The House in the Rue Plumet, VII: Sickness and added sadness

Les Misérables – Victor Hugo

CHAPTER SIX: The Sending

--

Yuna

--

Her head was still full of fantasies when she finally collapsed on her bed, utterly spent. Outside Zanarkand was stirring, the sun spilling through her window and casting rose-coloured light upon her face. Yuna blinked sleepily under the warmth of its rays, her eyelids fluttering weakly, a thousand-and-one thoughts in her. She could still hear the roar of the crowd at the stadium, see the glint of Rikku's green eyes, feel Tidus sitting so close. She marvelled at the change in herself, her world, and wondered how much longer she dare hope it could last.

They had all offered to walk her home, but in the end it was Tidus who insisted upon the 'honour', making her blush terribly with his choice of words. "You guys need your beauty sleep more than me and Yuna," he'd teased, before boasting that the two of them were as sleepless as the city. Yuna found her goodbye to him at the garden gate more painful than ever before. Somehow she had found the strength to leave him… and yet, here she was, still thinking of his warm smile.

Vaguely, she realised that she should change her clothes before Shelinda came to wake her, but gathering the energy required to do so seemed beyond her. The soft woolen blankets beneath her seemed to draw her into them; Yuna yielded all too willingly. Sighing languidly, she curled her fingers into the fabric and let her eyes slide shut.

"You're awake early this morning."

Her eyes snapped open to see her father's tall profile filling her doorway, a strange soft smile marking a contrast with his weary stance.

"Father?" she murmured. She passed a hand across her eyes, wiping the sleep-dust from them. When her vision finally focused, he was standing before her.

"Are you well?" she asked him worridly. She had never seen him look quite so fatigued; on the contrary, he often seemed healthier and more capable than boys half his age.

"I am quite well," he assured her, kissing her forehead tenderly.

"How was your journey?"

"It was… educational." Seemingly that was all the answer he intended to give, but Yuna remained unfazed, accustomed to his secrets. The bed creaked as he took his place beside her. "I'm grateful that you rose early, Yuna. I didn't want to wake you."

She looked up at him curiously, a question in her eyes.

Her father smiled. "I've organised your first Sending."

"A Sending?" she repeated. The first unbidden thought that rushed through her was but I haven't slept! The guilt followed soon after.

"Who is it?" she asked her father softly.

"A young lady who died of childbirth." His voice was serious now, and the small smile was gone. Yuna answered his request with a firm incline of her head, determination spreading like fire through her veins. Belgemine prepared me for this. I am ready to do this, on my own.

"When shall we leave?"

"Soon." The corners of her father's mouth curled upwards. "But not yet. First, I have a gift for you."

Yuna smiled despite herself. "A gift?"

He left the room and returned with a mysterious wicker basket, placing it into her hands with surprising gentleness. Yuna, rarely seeing her father in such a tender display, made sure to open the lid with equal care and was rewarded with the soft mewing of the tiniest kitten she had ever seen.

"Oh!" she said, the small syllable expressing all. Involuntarily her hand snaked into the basket and a finger stroked the softer-than-down fur. The kitten was scrawny – not well fed and fashioning a ragged left ear, but its subtle blue fur seemed to shimmer when the sunlight fell upon it.

"We found him still guarding his former master beside a grave," her father explained. "Be careful; he hissed at first when we came close."

"Poor thing," murmured Yuna, more to the kitten than to her father. I know what it is like to face strangers. He may have guarded against the soldiers who saved him, but he seemed perfectly docile under her fingers. You are not so fierce. Just frightened. "I can take care of him."

"I thought you might say that," said her father, smiling. "I fear you are robbed of the pleasure of naming him, however. We called him 'Kimahri' and it seemed to stick. It means 'Guardian' in the old tongue."

"Kimahri," Yuna mused, delighted. "That's just right."

--

Tidus

--

"I like her, Tidus."

It was the third time that Lulu had made such an observation. They were gathered in the kitchen – an inevitable settling place when himself and Gippal were present – awaiting Wakka's famous "Blitzer's breakfast" before heading to practise. Lulu, ever an early riser despite their late-night escapades, had joined them and the topic of conversation had inevitably turned to the quiet young Sender who had blessed them with her company the evening past.

"She's a nice, well-mannered girl," continued Lulu. "Just the type you need. Not one of your ridiculous fangirls who kisses your feet so she can parade you about on her arm and be the talk of the city."

Tidus scowled. "I don't date girls like that."

"Course you don't, Ti," said Gippal distractedly, clapping him on the shoulder.

"I don't!" he said impatiently. "Anyway, it's not like that between me and Yuna. She's just a friend I'm helping out."

"I see. And when will we have the pleasure of seeing your friend again?" asked Lulu.

"I dunno," said Tidus, his mouth twisting with sudden annoyance. "Her old man is at home." The prospect of not being able to see Yuna outside of her garden irritated Tidus. At one time, it had been enough just to sit near her, separated by an iron gate. But now…

"You haven't met her old man yet?" interrupted Wakka.

Tidus rolled his shoulders uncomfortably. Why do we always end up talking about someone's old man? It wasn't really a subject he was in the mood for. "Sorta," he said vaguely.

"Which means?" pressed Lulu, with that slightly impatient look in her red eyes.

"Well I uh… saw him from a distance once. Big guy. Sunglasses. Angry-lookin'. But I didn't exactly speak to him."

Lulu arched a perfect eyebrow.

I'm not gonna get out of this one, am I? He sighed. Sometimes women could be so exasperating. Well, some of them. Not all. "Look, Yuna hasn't told him yet. About me - I mean, about coming out with me and stuff."

"Doesn't she get along with her father?"

Tidus shifted his feet. He glanced at Wakka bent over the breakfast dishes, willing him to hurry up. "No, it's not that. She says she does. But I think… she just knows he'd be angry." That's what he supposed, anyway, though Yuna had never really said as much.

"Why would he be?" Lulu reasoned. "It's normal for a girl her age to have friends."

He shrugged. "Her old man's pretty protective. I mean, if you haven't noticed Yuna's kinda the sheltered type."

"That's the understatement of the year," droned Gippal, earning him a shove from Wakka.

"Yuna's a good girl," the Blitzball captain declared, uncharacteristically serious. He had taken a genuine shine to Yuna, adopting the same protective instincts that Tidus himself was inclined to feel around her. Wakka was more subtle than Gippal and gentler than Rikku, and Tidus thought Yuna found him more approachable than the two wilder characters of the group. "You could take a lesson from her, brudda."

Gippal's face showed exactly what he thought of that notion. Tidus ignored him, reckoning it was about time to let the whole subject of fathers die a quick death. "Anyhow," he declared in what he thought was a tone of finality. "I figure it's Yuna's business if she doesn't tell him."

"Maybe," Lulu was saying. "But it's unhealthy." She was frowning in that thoughtful way that motherly women did. "Maybe I should talk to her."

Tidus groaned. "Just leave it alone, Lulu, trust me on this one. Issues with your old man… it's just something you gotta deal with."

"I hope," Lulu said quietly, but not ungently, "that you're not confusing Yuna with yourself."

Wakka was beginning to look uncomfortable, while Gippal, to Tidus' annoyance, was watching the exchange with a self-satisfied smirk.

But it was more than Gippal's smirk, more than Lulu's self-assured tone of voice that really irked him. So what if he was glad? It felt comforting to know that someone else kept secrets from their father, that someone else's relationship with their father wasn't perfect. So what if it made him feel less – what, alone? Like I've ever felt alone.

All of a sudden Tidus' appetite had vanished. He felt tired and irritated and there was only one person he really wanted to see in that condition, except he couldn't because her stupid old man was in town. "Look, forget the breakfast," he told them quickly. "I'm not hungry. Wakka, I'll see you at practise." He was careful not to catch anyone's eye as he left the room.

"Don't run from it, Tidus," Lulu called after him, but he didn't know how to do anything else.

--

Yuna

--

They had laid her to rest in the water. Behind her casket the candlestick buildings of Zanarkand rose up; a somber, silver backdrop for the sad epilogue of a life cut short.

Tidus had told her once that he had seen only a single Sending, and for that Yuna was thankful. Someone of his disposition was not meant to suffer such things. He was sunshine, and death was dark. Yuna knew that all too well.

Not far away she could see an old woman clutching a sleeping newborn in her arms. Her face was wrinkled, a withered flower, but their was a world of strength in her, Yuna could sense that much. A young man – the widow, Yuna knew – stood at her side, looking out onto the water. He seemed utterly lost… and worse, broken. Sin is gone, she reflected, yet still the world is filled with sorrows.

"Die and be free of pain, or live and fight your sorrow." It was her father's voice, and Yuna looked up to find him standing at her shoulder, his steely eyes taking a measure of the young man. "He must make that choice in the days to come."

Yuna understood. "I hope he is strong enough, for his daughter's sake," she said quietly. "She'll have need of him." Auron looked at her strangely, eyes unreadable. She took strength from his face, the face that she loved so dearly, and carefully made her way onto the water.

Even as her toes touched the cool surface, she had put all thoughts of weariness from her mind. She didn't think about the stadium, or the sunrise, or Blitzball, or the promise of a Lenne concert. She didn't think about Tidus. Once, on a night illuminated by a thousand orange lights, he had told her that a Blitzer had to always have his mind in two places at once, like being asleep and awake at the same time. Yuna had never heard it put into words quite so well. A Sender was the same. There were but two states of mind set to two tasks only: the Dance, and the Sending. And in many ways, the Sending was just as perilous as Blitzball.

While those watching might marvel at the way Yuna's body mirrored so delicately the movement of the water, they would not realise that a part of her would be in danger of straying too far from the mortal plane. Few spirits will go peacefully to the Farplane, old Belgemine had cautioned her once. Those who have been wronged or go before their time will do their best to cling to life, even as fiends. They will hold fast to you, my child. Do not walk the path of death too far with them.

True to the warnings, Yuna sensed the spirit of the young woman clinging to her in fierce desperation, locked to the memory of her lover, her child, her mother. In that moment Yuna ached with a grief and longing that was not her own, a bitterness and sorrow so potent that it was a trial to reach the love at its center. But reach it she did.

On the cusp of death, with all her willpower furiously focused, Yuna began to carve a path. She traced the runes with her Staff, ancient passwords for the journey between life and death.

When finally she raised the Summoner's Staff high above her head, the pyreflies around her sighed in soft farewell and she knew that it was done.

Yuna was only vaguely aware of her feet touching down. As soon as her mind had slipped back into its normal state, the dizziness and nausea of the morning had swept over her like a tidal wave. She swayed for a moment, her blurry eyes trying to focus, but the dizziness came to her twicefold. Her head throbbed.

Later, she wondered how she ever gathered the strength to reach her father, yet somehow she did.

"You did well, Yuna," he said, full of pride.

"Thankyou, father," she said, and fainted.

--

Auron

--

A younger Auron had once sat by another bedside, waiting for a much younger Yuna to awake. Indeed, he would never forget that morning in Bevelle, when his heart had first been touched with the fragile beginnings of paternal love.

Now that love was in full bloom. Yuna had become not just his charge, not just his daughter, but his whole world.

What could have caused this? he agonized. He had moved quick as lightening to catch his daughter at the side of the water as she had teetered on her feet suddenly, and just barely rescued her from a far more brutal fall.

The old woman had attended to her first. "No fever," the old harridan had assured him. "She's spent her energy, that's all." But Auron had been loathe to believe her. She certainly was no surgeon, and he would not let Yuna's health rest on the word of a herbwitch. Worse, he had had to suffer the pitying comments of the other mourners. "Young for a Sender, isn't she?" they had sympathised, to which he had snapped, "That means nothing. She's more than capable." He had not been in the mood to entertain thoughtless remarks.

Gazing down at her face, so peaceful in sleep, Auron pondered all the possibilities of her failing. Her mother's health had oft been delicate, the old woman in Bevelle had said. But the Sending itself was in his mind the most likely culprit. It was her first without her teacher to guide her. For all he knew, such a thing was common amongst Senders. Foolishly he had not thought to inquire after such things before leaving Besaid. Braska would have known. The thought was not without bitterness.

"Father?"

Her voice, small and thin as it was, startled him, and he leaned forward to study her face. She turned her head towards him and the kitten, who had been snoozing soundly at her side, awoke when her hair brushed his fur. "Hello, Kimahri," she smiled weakly.

"How do you feel?"

"A little tired. I fainted, didn't I?"

"You'll rest today," he told her firmly. It was an order rather than a suggestion. He was not a man used to making suggestions. "A healer is coming to see you."

"There's no need for that," she told him softly. "It's because I didn't sleep last night. I couldn't sleep at all."

Presently, the fear that had gripped his heart since she first fell finally gave way a little. Is that all it was? He could not stop himself from sighing in some small relief. "Yuna," he admonished gently. "You should have told me if that was the case."

Her cheeks grew red with shame. "I'm sorry. I know it was wrong, but I wanted to do the Sending. No matter what. I knew I could do it. She was more important than me."

Not to me. Never to me. "You have not been sleeping well at all lately, have you? Yuna, perhaps these ventures of mine were a foolish notion," he said softly. "If you do not feel safe in my absence, then I will not continue to stray from our home. It is my duty, as your father." After all these years, he barely flinched at referring to himself such.

"NO!" Yuna sat up then, and her hands made fists in the blanket. "Father…" she said, swallowing. "What I mean is - I would feel… responsible. I'm quite well, I swear it! I should have told you that I couldn't sleep." She launched into a flurried apology with a vehemency that both surprised and confused him.

"Very well, Yuna, don't trouble yourself. I shan't give up my duties if you don't wish it."

She fell back on her bed with a sigh that seemed almost relieved. Auron could do nothing but frown in the face of such strange behaviour, and soon left her to sleep.

Later, he asked Shelinda in confidence.

"Have you noticed anything strange about Yuna? She was not in ill health, you said, while I was gone?"

"No, Sir. Though… she has developed some strange habits."

"You did not mention that before." He had to bite his tongue to keep himself from admonishing the woman. Must I draw everything out of her myself? The maid was efficient, to be sure, but clearly lacking in intelligence.

"Last night… for instance," the maid continued unawares, "I heard noises downstairs. In the kitchen. It was Lady Yuna, Sir. She said she was having a midnight sup."

"Did she seem distressed in any way?" he pressed.

"No, Sir. I would not have left her so easily had I thought so. She looked quite cheerful. I prepared a small sup for her but she ate little in the end."

Auron grunted. An anxiety habit while I am gone, no doubt. Perhaps he would create more safe spells around the house before taking his next leave of his daughter, so she might feel more secure in his absence.

He did not stay long from her side that day. In the afternoon he reached her room to find her fully dressed, playing with the kitten on the floor with encouraging gaiety.

"Please, father," she pleaded. "Can't we go to the park in D-West? The lemondrops are so lovely at this time of year. I feel well enough."

"I'm not certain the sun is the best thing for you," he said uncertainly.

"I'll take a parasol," she protested, then, seeing his unconvinced expression, "And if I feel faint this time, I'll tell you!"

And so, ever powerless to refuse his daughter the slightest wish, Auron found himself that afternoon sitting on a wooden bench painted-white, somewhere in west Zanarkand. Yuna sat happily at his feet on the grass with her pink-and-white striped parasol shielding her from the sun. She twirled it, murmuring an old Besaidian hymm softly while she twined her toes in the grass.

Auron regarded her over the top of his copy of Phoenix Down. "How have you been spending your time while I've been gone?"

"Oh, this and that."

"Sitting in your garden?" he probed gently.

"Not really," she said mildly, "I don't sit in there so often."

"Oh? You haven't neglected your flowers though, I noticed."

She blushed. Blushes and silences, he observed. I suppose it must be normal for a girl of her age. I have not a woman's insight. It troubled him though, just as every aspect of Yuna's coming-of-age troubled him.

It was not her silences especially that troubled him. She had always been soft-spoken and gentler than others of her sex. But back on Besaid her silences had had a trace of sadness, as though she had not yet learned the words to express what she wanted to feel. Here in Zanarkand, however, her silences had gained an air of… secrecy.

Pursuing such a train of thought, his newspaper soon lay open and forgotten on his knee. His imagination began to conjure up scenarios so ridiculous as to be laughable – his daughter wanted to run away from him - he had made her unhappy by taking her from Besaid - she gazed at other families and envied their attentive fathers - she had fallen in love with some passing stranger – and no matter how he tried to dismiss such unlikely pictures from his mind, his anxiety lingered on. Unable to sit with such agonizing thoughts any longer, he asked her tentatively, "Yuna, is something amiss?"

"No," she murmured, a little too quickly. And she would not meet his eyes. Auron searched her face, briefly, before shaking his head. He would dismiss it as childish fancy. She was still young, after all. She is allowed to have her secrets… only she has never kept anything from me before. That wounded him more than anything else.

Cursing his own weakness, but helpless against it, Auron allowed himself one last act of desperation. "Are you… are you glad we came here, Yuna?"

"Oh, yes!" she said instantly. "Zanarkand is the most wonderful place in the whole world!"

She turned her head to smile at him then, a smile so sweet and innocent that he brushed her lightly tanned cheek with a finger.

"You've caught the sun," he told her.

--

AUTHOR'S NOTES

--

Oh, I'm sorry! I do so hope my imagery mallet didn't whack you on the head on your way out of this fic!

This chapter was much shorter than the last two. I'm sorry for that, but I think I lack inspiration when there's no Tidus and Yuna interaction. There will be in the next chapter, I promise. And a little jealousy into the mix, which I thrive on.

I felt the need for an interval and to start to introduce some growing tension/suspicion/change/whateveryouwannacallit between Yuna and Auron, and also remind you of Tidus' problems.

Also, while I was "polishing" this off so I could finally post it, I realised how very unpolished it infact was. I always try to make Tidus' perspective less formal than Yuna's, both in vocab and style, but it always ends up overlapping with the Yuna-pov-style until it's just a bit of a mess. I think I also find it more difficult to write from his pov because I can't relate to him so much.

Feh. This is rubbish, but I can't stop. So you have to suffer it.