Author's Note: Terribly sorry for the long wait. University decided to dump everything on me all at once.
Chapter 25
The first rays of dawn found Balthier on the dreaded wooden table. Whenever he shifted in the night, he felt the pull of the dried blood that leaked from his torn stitches. He decided to glance at it now, and he laughed bitterly at seeing half his torso swathed in blood. The laugh was short-lived and his face turned back to burned stone. I swear, I am going to kill that bitch, even if it means I have to die.
The door opened and he turned to see her enter. She cocked her head at his willingness to face her now, in contrast to when he attempted to ignore her. She made no comment of that and instead said, "My goodness, Balthier. I heard you tried to escape last night, using Marskot. Hah! I forgot he was even here."
"Liar," he snapped and he was glaring daggers at her. "Marskot is no use to you. Let him go!"
She grinned. "You still have spirit, not that I would expect anything less from you. No, you see, Marskot is very much in the same position as you are. He is here so I can make him suffer."
Balthier growled at her and said, "No matter what you do to him or me, just remember that one day you will be forced to answer for your crimes. When that day comes, I sincerely hope you suffer as slowly and painfully as all your victims have. And I hope it's Sard who does it too." He smiled when he saw her pale slightly.
"As much as you talk, it's quite clear you know little about Sard if you expect him to swoop in and rescue you. It is us who govern him," she replied as coolly as she could, but Balthier only smirked and shook his head.
"I would be astounded if he did come down here with the intention of rescuing me. But if he is, I may correct you while I wait. You are doing nothing more than trying to delude yourself into thinking Sard can be saved for your petty scheming, when it is quite clear that you fear to receive your death at his hands."
Balthier suddenly yelped when she abruptly climbed onto the table and straddled him. He thrashed, bucking his hips and pulled at the cuffs to dislodge her, but she stayed where she was and leaned over him until they were very nearly kissing. She ran a finger down his face. "Your cheeks are flushed, Balthier. I think the fever is setting in." There was a moment of silence where they breathed in each other's air and stared into each other's eyes, each of them looking for the other's mood.
She had been certain he was about to break with the last torture session, but even after the fever and the chills began to wrack him he kept the truculent jut to his jaw. She knew seeing Marskot, despite the traitor killing him, had stirred his unfailing loyalty and the need to be the Leading Man. One visit from Marskot had undone all of their work in halting his and Sard's ridiculous campaign.
"I have tried everything to break you. Most of my victims succumb after having holes driven into their palms, but you…even before Marskot ruined everything I knew I had not driven you beyond that point. But now the gloves are off. No more games." She began tearing at the buttons on his trousers, and for one horrible moment he thought she was going to rape him. Then she jumped back off the table and undid the cuffs on his leg so that she could pull his pants off, before making her way back up to the front and releasing his hands as well.
She pulled the door open to consult the guards. "Take him to the second chamber."
Balthier scrambled to his feet as she talked to the armored men, and he waited for an opening. Then when the men came closer, he lowered a shoulder and attempted to dodge between them. He felt his heart soar when he was certain he'd cleared them, but one guard got a hand on his arm and crushed a dark blue bruise into it.
The entire way, Balthier dragged his heels and pulled and thrashed any way he could to break their steel grip, but he found himself, still naked and covered in sweat, chained in the middle of the new chamber. The Occuria entered merely a couple of minutes later and she did not hide her appreciation as she looked him up and down. He glared at her.
"I can see why your wife must enjoy being married to you," she said. She jumped back when he violently pulled at the chains again. "'Tis a pity I have to destroy her flawless image of you. I would have loved you for myself." He jerked his head away as she ran another splayed hand across his cheek.
His eyes suddenly fell on a glint of metal in her hand and he felt his breath catch at the thick pipe hanging loosely from her fingers. "If you've been keeping track of this in stages, consider this the beginning of the end."
"I thought that when I first teamed up with Sard," he snapped.
"Well, consider this the final act then. By this time tomorrow, I will be throwing your carcass out for the carrion. I think the day after I'll see to it your wife receives whatever is left for a proper burial."
Balthier's eyes narrowed in growing hatred of this Ocurria posing as anything remotely human. His eyes went to the tiny barred window on the wall and was surprised to find it was barely noon outside. I am supposed to be dead by tomorrow morning, he somberly told himself.
The knowledge of his impending doom made time stretch around him. He watched her raise the iron bar over her head and closed his eyes when she brought it down. It stung his skin with a dull 'thunk,' and he groaned in the agony.
After half a dozen hits, his face now seemed to be screwed into a permanent grimace. He gasped and cried, wondering how in the world his bones were holding against this onslaught and sincerely hoped his organs were just as tough. Why? You're going to die, so why? Why not simply die from this beating. It might ease my passing.
He was still not ready to give up though. He was almost certain they were speeding up this process because of Sard. Balthier couldn't stop the snort of laughter at this thought. Wishful thinking…
Balthier jumped when the metal pipe cracked him on the cheek, and he ran his tongue along the inside to be sure his teeth were all still intact. He blearily opened his eyes to see the Ocurria scowling at him, and her jaw was clenched in trembling rage. "How can you still stand there and laugh?"
"Despite what you seem to think, death isn't an entirely unwelcomed prospect." Balthier felt like he was lying through his teeth at that. There was no denying he wished his body would finally be given a rest from the constant agony, but despite all of the pain he had difficulty believing he would not be breathing by noon the next day.
With the sole exception of Marskot stabbing him, luck had always been on his side in the form of far too many close shaves with death. The two fights with Bergan, fighting the Golmore Dragon, fighting what should have been the unstoppable combination of Vayne and Venat, escaping the Bahamut, and escaping Sard, and now finding himself alive at the end of two particularly violent encounters with the Occuria. Now as he tried to tell himself that he really was going to be dead tomorrow, he could not help but feel pleased that it took an angry god to see him dead.
I shouldn't give up, he told himself. I promised Ashe I would see her again. I am beholden to that promise. I always keep my word. Even if he found it difficult to believe he would be dead tomorrow, he did not find it so hard to fathom that he might not end the venture in a living state either. Whether it was tomorrow or next week, he felt certain he was doomed to failure in some way or another.
He heaved a sigh of exasperation at the turn of his thoughts and desperately tried to shake them. So far luck has been on my side! Maybe the dies of fate will roll favorably for me, he mused to himself.
Balthier wasn't sure how long he had spent musing, but the Occuria eventually grew tired of him standing slumped in his chains without any cries of pain bouncing off the walls. The metal pipe interrupted his conscious with a vengeance and a howl escaped his lips before he could stop it.
After what felt like hours of having the pipe land on every part of his body, Balthier sagged in the chains sucking in air as if that was all that was precious to him. The Occuria grabbed his face in one hand once more and stared him coldly in the eye, "Remember, this is the last day you can enjoy such simple pleasures as breathing." Then she let his head drop and walked out the door, signaling to two guards to take him back to his room.
The moment they released his hands from the cuffs, he fell to the floor in undisguised exhaustion. His whole body shivered from the pain and his dull eyes peered out from beneath heavily eyelids to stare blankly. Once more they grabbed his arms and dragged his knees along the floor to his cell. He refrained from putting up a fight and simply let his head hang limply. He blinked dully, but his eyes scanned the black and blue stripes that now decorated every inch of his body. He remained silent when they let him fall to the floor.
Balthier refused to stir even after he was alone. He struggled to open his eyes and his body trembled with the constant ache that seemed to have settled directly into his bones. After what felt like hours he began to leverage himself up and he dragged himself over to lean against the wall. He wrapped his arm around his legs and curled into a fetal position.
The other half of her torture must be leaving us to over think the situation, he grumbled. He struggled diligently to keep his mind blank for fear of all his doubts crushing the only thing he had left. No one would even recognize it. He'd be dead before they could know, but out of respect for himself he would prevail. If there is a second life, then I will vow to make sure they die before anyone else can suffer.
He chuckled. It all seemed like a foolish pipe dream, but it was the only hope he had left.
Balthier was jolted awake sometime later to the sounds of naked steel clashing and the screams of dying men. He focused on the small window in the door and felt the hair on his neck stand on end when the sounds of battle abruptly died. He could just barely detect a soft padding in the hallway and he cocked his head when a shadow blocked the window.
"Balthier?"
He blinked and then he laughed. "Now I know I'm dreaming," he replied in a hoarse voice.
The lock clicked and Sard rushed in and knelt down to look him in the eye. "Don't flatter yourself. I had to kill the Occuria down here and you just happened to be along the way. Might as well drag you back, because General Al-Tamir hasn't deemed you important enough to deserve a rescue party."
"Rozarria's politics is not dissimilar from Archadia's," Balthier began in a low, thick mumble, "They point fingers at each other until the problem has passed and then sweep it under the rug, and wait for everyone to forget about it."
"Where the hell are your clothes?" Sard finally pried his arms apart and then he noticed his palms and clicked his tongue. "Classic vengeance torture: maximize pain without causing permanent damage. Your temperature is through the roof and none of your wounds are dressed. I need to get you out of here before you're cooked in your own skin. Stop clinging!" He shook Balthier's hands off and disappeared one more.
"If this is a dream, it's quite real," Balthier said.
When Sard returned, Balthier was passed out, his mouth hanging slightly ajar and his eyes were half open and unresponsive. He had found Balthier's possessions in another room, but his shirt had been torn apart, and he was forced to root around for a blanket. God damned Occuria beat him to within an inch of his life. He's not quite as weak as I presumed. Sard shook his head at the hume as he pulled on the pants and wrapped the blanket around his shoulders. He couldn't wait to get this man off his paws, but he as an insignificant nuisance in comparison to the Occuria.
Sard tried to ignore the worry that clawed at his mind when he started carrying Balthier through the hallways. He's too light and he's burning up with fever. How perfect that he dies on the ride back from infection. If that does happen, I could easily use his death as an albatross for the General to continue to aid me in my fight against the Occuria.
The creature sighed when he saw more men in armor taking no heed of the bloodbath in the hall and charged with their swords raised. Sard set Balthier down more gently than he thought he had in him and quickly unsheathed the sword of the gods, running the first man through easily and pulling it out to cut the legs out from beneath the other man. He picked up Balthier yet again and carefully stepped around the bloody mess of at least half a dozen corpses lining the hall.
The next thing Balthier could recall, he was suddenly lying back on a much softer surface than what the cell provided. He opened his eyes fractionally to suddenly see Sard leaning over him, before something wonderfully cool touched his forehead and he sighed with relief. It was after a few minutes of this that he realized he could hardly feel his hands or the stitched gash on his shoulder and he craned his head for a better view only to have Sard push him back down.
"Stay still before I am inclined to give a bruise on your head to add to your collection of injuries. I put poultices on your shoulder and palm, which will keep them clean and hopefully take away some of the pain," Sard said as he continued to sponge his partner's head.
The Prince-consort did not know how to respond to this and he merely laid his head back down and allowed himself to drift back to sleep. Darkness swirled around him, but on occasion he would open his eyes to find the ground whipping by at a rapid pace beneath him, he felt the rhythmic bob and jolt of the cerose as he ran through the forest, and oddly enough he felt the warm solid wall that was Sard, who acted as a support and balance for Balthier to lean against throughout the journey.
Balthier was not sure how long they had been traveling, but it seemed that in every instance he woke up they were constantly on the move. A small smile twitched on his face at the very familiarity of it. How so very like Sard. Although the constant bob and jolt of the cerose made for a not especially comfortable ride, he still marveled over the fact that he was experiencing very little pain, besides the penetrating ache of his bones and the occasional twinge in his palms.
The next time he woke up the atmosphere and setting had changed. There was no bob in the stride of the cerose, there was no Sard to lean against, and there was no wind rushing past his face. He attempted to open his eyelids, but they felt like heavy weights. He could feel his body being jostled as it was moved, and although he could barely feel the cloth beneath him, he was almost certain they were carrying him by stretcher.
Voices flew over his head, some familiar and others not quite so much. He only managed to catch scattered bits of conversation, but his lips quirked pleasantly when he recognized one voice as Sari's.
"By the gods, what did the—"
"—torture of the most painful—"
"—n't repair the damage to his ha—"
"—ake the stitches out and heal his sh—"
"—ust control the fever first."
"You worry about his shoulder, I'll worry abo—"
"—he's coming out of it."
"Balthier, can you hear me?"
He desperately wanted to acknowledge Sari, but he couldn't move his painfully chapped lips anymore than his eyelids and so he simply lie there and continued to breath.
"Don't worry, Balthier, we'll heal you back to the way you were," Sari said.
Suddenly he felt hands on his body as he was lifted into the air and down onto a bed. He could not keep the sigh from escaping as his aching bones and muscles sank into the soft contours of the mattress. It was barely another minute before he was once more blissfully passed out in a void of comfort and painlessness.
As he slowly came to, he inhaled a larger breath and was astonished at the tightness in his chest, as if it was the first breathe of oxygen he had ever tasted. His eyelids no longer felt like ten ton weights and he was able to open them wide enough to see the room he had used at the Rozarrian palace take shape before his eyes. Light spilling in from the windows showed it was at the very beginning of sunrise, and as he looked around the room he could not keep from chuckling.
Sard lie with his back turned to Balthier on the couch. Usually the creature was up yawning and stretching before dawn, but apparently even exhaustion could take a toll on him. He turned his head to find a mass of dark strands splayed out near his shoulder and he shook his head in dismay. She's pregnant. She shouldn't be sleeping in a chair, slumped over onto a bed. Such a stubborn woman, he mused.
He reached over to gently shake her but he was surprised when the stitches in his shoulder didn't pull. He twisted his head to look at his shoulder and was surprised to see they were no longer there. The wound had clearly been healed appropriately by a spell, but the lack of a proper healing spell from the start insured he would care a long, red scar there for the rest of his days. Balthier next lifted his hands so that he could get a good look at them and sighed when he saw they were still bound thickly with linen. Bones were still something the mages had yet to discover how to heal and whole chunks had been driven out of his palms with a spike and hammer.
With a heavy feeling of misery, he reached over and gingerly touched Sari's head until she stirred. She blinked owlishly, but her confusion lasted only a moment before her face broke into a smile, "Oh good, you're awake."
Movement from across the room drew their attention in time to see Sard whip his head around to stare at the pair of them. "About time! I was ready to abandon you if you didn't come around."
He saw Sari roll her eyes and she whispered, "He worked awfully hard to beat your fever. The doctor was really afraid you might not make it."
Balthier narrowed his eyes, glancing between them and asked, "How long was I out?"
"Six days," Sard replied. "It took me four days to drag you back across the border. I thought you'd die on the journey, but you surprised me again. I would've been pissed if I'd wasted my time dragging you along if you'd kicked it."
Balthier nodded stoically but after a moment he could no longer keep the smirk from his face. "Thank you."
Sard scowled. "You have intrinsic value."
"Of course I do," he replied. The amusement disappeared. "What's been happening? I doubt my condition was all that worried you."
An entirely silent conversation suddenly took place right before his eyes. Sard, who was standing at the foot of his bed with a knowing smile, deliberately switched his eyes to Sari. She also turned from Balthier to glare at the creature. Balthier thought he saw the barest shake of her head, but it seemed Sard had long made his decision.
"The dragon ran away from me and is now wreaking havoc across the countryside," Sard said and Sari sighed heavily in exasperation.
"That's why Al-Tamir gave me no thought," Balthier finished.
Sard gave a bark of laughter. "His time and men would have been better spent rescuing you. As it is, the dragon barely has a scratch and the casualties are in the three hundreds. There isn't a single weapon they have that can penetrate those scales. Futile."
"And you're just going to love holding that sword out of Al-Tamir's reach, aren't you?"
It was subtle, but Balthier was certain he saw Sard's smug grin falter. He felt his alarm heighten and he leaned forward to peer at him suspiciously.
This time Sari chose not to stay silent. "Sard, don't."
"He'll find out eventually," the creature said with a growing smile. She insisted on shaking her head, but Sard simply brushed past it. "The dragon is heading north, towards Dalmasca."
Balthier sat up in alarm, but Sari placed a hand on his shoulder and cast a venomous glare at Sard. "No, Balthier, you need your rest. You almost died and your body needs to recover before you fight again."
"The Occuria are not going to wait for me to recover," he said in exasperation. "Bring me Al-Tamir." Sard's face twisted from the grin to a moody sneer. "Now, Sard!"
Once he had left, Sari turned her full attention to him. "Don't do this. I know that sword is powerful but you can't just run off and expect to take it head on."
Balthier laughed. "Sari, how often have I run off half-cocked? I need to do this. And don't worry, I have a plan."
Sard returned with Al-Tamir after only a few minutes.
"Lord Bunansa, it's a relief to see you doing bett—"
"Cut the false sincerity. We both know you had little concern for his welfare," Sard said as he went over to stand on one side of Balthier's bed.
The Prince-consort remained silent throughout the exchange, but not without sending a disapproving stare Sard's way to keep him from cutting in with anymore nasty remarks. After a minute of this, he finally turned back to the General and said, "I don't care that you didn't come to get me. What's done is done! What I need you to do now is smuggle us into Rabanastre."
His statement was met with a shocked silence as they all stared at him as if he'd gone mad. All but Sard who merely scoffed at the idea, "Why? So you can have a secret rendezvous with your wife?"
Balthier shut his eyes and took several deep breaths to control his temper before he opened them again and said, "We obviously need an airship to counter the dragon. General, I would appreciate it if you could disguise your visit as a helping gesture to keep the dragon at bay, and Sard and I will stowaway aboard your ship and then sneak out at the right moment."
Al-Tamir stared at him, completely flabbergasted. "Wha-why do you need to steal a ship in Rabanastre? We have plenty of ships here you could—" But Balthier was already shaking his head.
"No. None of your transports are agile enough and don't have a wide enough roof for what I want to attempt. We're going to get the Strahl."
After a brief nap, Balthier found himself unwrapping the bandages held tight around his hand, smiling to himself with renewed hope and vigor. He grimaced when he finally pulled it off and saw that the skin had been cauterized to prevent further infection, but he could still see right through both his palms.
"This is stupid."
"I hate to disappoint you, Sari, but I'm really not seeking your approval on this. I won't stand for any other ship."
"What the hell do you think Ashe is going to do when her beloved late husband's ship is stolen?"
"She will do everything in her power to get it back," he replied without hesitation.
"A meeting with her will be inevitable!"
"Yes, but I will get to choose when and where it happens. She can't meet with me if I don't take the ship back to Rabanastre. I will have to abandon it somewhere remote," He said.
"Yes, that won't appear suspicious at all," Sari said with an annoyed frown. "She will figure it out eventually. You wouldn't have married her if she was completely witless."
"No, no I wouldn't have." He closed his eyes momentarily to mutter the healing spell the gods had given him. A tingling sensation in his palms gave him hope it was working and when he opened his eyes again, he grinned in relief when he saw patches of white skin now covering the gaping holes. The skin was puckered and slightly off-color, but if that was the only scar he would get for that wound then he would be pleased. He refocused his gaze back on Sari and said, "I will need you to help me keep her off my trail. If push comes to shove, tell her the truth. With any luck, I should be too far away for her to try and snatch me back before I can complete my task."
Sari closed her eyes and let out a shuddering breath. "All right, I will do this for you. You will not forget this favor. I don't fancy being the obstacle between an upset queen and you."
Balthier grinned. "I can understand. She is not a woman to be trifled with. Sard, are you ready to go?"
The creature had been standing there the whole time remaining amazingly silent as he shoved food into his pack and made sure he had enough bolts for his crossbow. Slinging his sword over his shoulder he said with a hiss, "Yessss!"
"Then let's get out of here," Balthier replied, after holstering his gun and also slinging his sword around his back with his pack. As they walked down the hall, he could not keep one thought from running through his mind: I can't believe I'm going to steal my own ship.