The viera did not take kindly to intruders.
Everywhere Daina turned, reddish or brown eyes glared accusingly at her in total, crushing silence. Tall, nubile women stopped whatever quiet employment occupied them to stare, lips firmly closed. Dark skin glowed with inner light, adorned rather than covered by gorgeous filigree armor of black, silver, or cobalt blue, accented with scraps of lace and gauze. The wood-warders stood above Daina's head on special platforms, bows in hand, arrows nocked. Whenever Vaan was brave enough to ask one of the viera about Mjrn, he met with the same furious statement: What business could a hume have with one of the viera? It must be a mistake.
"Are there only women?" Daina wondered under her breath. "Are there no men?"
"I have heard that viera men live far more cloistered than this," Ashe whispered back, "hidden so deep in Ivalice that no one has ever seen them."
"Better for us that this was not so," Basch muttered. He looked distinctly uncomfortable and undeniably male. The viera's wariness tripled at the sight of him.
"For a man to be so unwelcome as to seem hated, it must be difficult for you," Daina teased. Basch frowned at her. Embarrassed, she remembered that she was trying not to engage him. She tested a gate to a new path, but it was locked.
Nowhere did they find the viera named Mjrn.
Deeper into the village, the viera began to gather. Beautiful, graceful, and suddenly dangerous, they closed ranks, denying further passage. Vaan came to a halt. A breeze danced through the generous space between them and him.
"Hey, Mjrn lives here, doesn't she?" he called across it. "We're here to see her."
Although Vaan waited, the viera merely stared him down, their faces eerily lifeless. And then a single viera stepped forward, dressed in what looked to Daina like a pink negligee, her legs bare, her leporine feet encased in stiletto heels. Like Fran, she wore a garment that clasped at her throat, covering her shoulders and arms in black. Lace foamed around her hands. Soft silver hair framed her flawless but unsmiling face. Her long, furred ears were so white they looked like mist.
"You will leave at once," this viera commanded. "It is not allowed for humes to walk on these grounds."
Vaan had apparently had enough of their unhelpful hostility. "We'll go," he said, his male tenor far more menacing than the viera's feminine tones had been, "as soon as we've seen Mjrn."
"If you can find her," the viera purred.
"We're not leaving until you let us see her."
The viera scowled. She crossed her arms under her small, high breasts.
Vaan scowled right back. "Fine then. We'll look for her ourselves."
He turned and began to walk up an adjacent path, but the viera behind him let out a low, "Ah!" and he stopped.
Fran emerged, sway-hipped and unapologetic though the gathered, silver-eared viera. Only her ears were marked with sable spots at the tips, and only she was dressed all in black. Only she seemed real, less ephemeral than the village viera. She shook her head down at Vaan.
"I've heard the voice of the Wood," she said to him. "She says Mjrn is not in the village. Jote." YOtay. She raised her reddish eyes to the sneering viera woman. "Where has she gone?"
"Why do you ask?" the woman, Jote, smugly asked. "The Wood tells us where she has gone. Or . . ."
She paused, running a speculative eye over Fran. "Can you not hear Her?" She touched the side of a long finger to her lower lip. Her eyes widened. Revulsion wrinkled her nose. "You cannot. Your ears are dull from hearing their harsh speech, I think. Viera who have abandoned the Wood are viera no longer. Mjrn, too, has left Her embrace."
"And you forsake them in turn?" Balthier challenged.
"It is the will of the village," Jote said coldly. "Viera must live always with the Wood. So is the Green Word, and so is our law."
"We'll let you worry about keeping your laws," Vaan told her aggressively. "Just do us a favor and stay out of our way. We'll find her ourselves."
Jote eyed him, weighing his resolve, obviously wishing there was a way to get rid of him. Then she did a strange thing.
She closed her eyes.
Vaan stared at her, probably wondering if she was about to attack him. Slowly, she raised her overlong arms to the sides, and her head tipped back. She breathed in through her small, slit-like nostrils, deeply, her chest rising. From her feet, a magickal, elemental force rose around her, swirling upward with leaf afterimages caught in the glow. She breathed in again, and then let it out in a long sigh. Her arms relaxed. Her eyes opened.
"Our sister has left the Wood and gone west," she said quietly. "She wanders warrens among men who hide themselves in clothes of cold iron. Thus to me has the Wood spoken."
She turned on her heel and began to walk away, her people following close behind. Her misty hair was clasped in a loose ponytail at the base of her neck with a gold barrette.
"The viera may begin as part of the Wood, but it is not the only end that we may choose," Fran said.
"The same words I heard fifty years ago," Jote said dismissively without turning around. She vanished into her sanctuary along with all the others. Within moments, the little party was alone in the lofty village.
Balthier let out a sigh of his own and then hitched his crooked grin into place. "Not bad, Vaan," he said. "I didn't think we'd get any information out of that one. So then, what was she saying about men in a warren?"
"The Henne Magicite Mines," Larsa suggested. "Maybe that's what she meant. They lie in Bancour down at the Ozmone Plain. The entire region is a colony of the Archadian Empire. There would be soldiers."
"Is that a problem?" Balthier asked, and then shrugged when no one answered. "Let's move."
He and Fran led the way to the village entrance, eager to return to Golmore Jungle's humid embrace. The others followed, probably, like Daina, unnerved by all they had just seen and heard. She watched Fran, her silver ponytail swinging over her backside, for any faltering in her step, any bowing of her shoulders, but there was none.
"Fran!" Vaan called.
Fran turned. Her beautiful, ageless face was still cobwebbed with an old sorrow. "Yes?"
"I was wondering," he began, strangely hesitant. "I was wondering – what Jote said, you know? About how you said the same thing fifty years ago?" He twisted his fingers together, obviously stalling.
"Your point?" Fran asked, no longer cobwebby, raising a silver brow on the last word.
Vaan didn't hear the warning in her voice. "How old were you again?"
Dead silence gripped Eruyt Village.
Without a word, Fran marched away.
"Nice, Vaan," Balthier groaned, irritated. He hurried after his partner.
"Surprisingly rude," Larsa said, nose in the air.
Basch said nothing, pretending he hadn't heard. So did Daina, who of course had wondered the same thing but knew better than to ask. The rumors were apparently true that a viera's lifespan outstripped that of a hume many times over. Ashe made a sound of disgust deep in her throat, and Penelo tossed, "Try to grow up, please," at Vaan as they left him, chastised, behind.