—
It was a late summer afternoon the day the stranger arrived in Domina from the road through the western fields. His stride was broken by a limp common to those favoring blisters and every inch of him was covered in the pale tan dust of the road. In one hand were the lead-reins to a tall chocobo hen—her color indistinguishable under the same road's dust—and in the other a worn and much-folded map.
Town residents dealing with outside chores paused a moment in their work as he passed, noting the somewhat battered state of the staff holstered across the hen's saddlebags, the thin pipe-chimes strung through a band tying back a mess of half-curls. They saw the elongated oval of a stone growing from the skin over a sternum left bared by a nomad's open vest and promptly dismissed him as just another Venstry passing through.
If they had known exactly which Venstry he was they might have taken at least a little more interest—if only to fuel the local gossip mill for a few days. For the young man (one Evan Venstry, Guardian of Heliodor by name and title) was none other than the reluctant clan member chosen to take up residence in the newly vacated Haven Tree Cottage.
"Alright, according to the map Rin gave us, our new place is just a few hours walk from here," said Evan, folding up his map and tucking it into a pocket in his vest. "So what'll it be, Tuft? Take a breather and keep walking or call it a day and find the inn?"
"Kweh," huffed the chocobo, who was more interested in seeing how much she could nibble from roadside vegetation than whether or not they kept going. She was a chocobo, a grasslands species, and was built for far more walking than her person.
Her person sighed and rubbed at her beak in affection with his newly-freed hand. "Bottomless pit."
Personally, Van thought they could use the break. It had been a little more than two months since Great ("And don't you go and get started on all those 'greats', young man.") Auntie Lisa had decided to retire and move in with her youngest granddaughter's family in Domina. Half that since the Elders had convened and, with a measure of input from the formidable matriarch herself, chosen who would take up residence in the clan's ancestral home.
Three weeks since he'd been more or less booted out of Etansel with only what Tuft could carry and a promise that the rest of his belongings would be sent after him on the next caravan.
Van still wasn't certain why they'd chosen him. He had siblings and dozens of cousins who were adventurers, entirely gung-ho about helping people—like his ancestor Rei had been—and who had come damned close to skinning him alive when they'd found out he'd gotten the Cottage. He couldn't blame them. He was a lore-keeper, a book-worm. Yeah, he took the occasional trip to Geo for books, scrolls, or anything written he could get his hands on for his private library, but he was of the opinion that if trouble felt like happening it could very well come to him.
After all, it wasn't like there was any shortage of Venstrys, Jumi or otherwise, out in the world these days. Why should trouble bother him when there were so many of his relatives that were more than happy to jump on any problem they found?
He wondered if maybe that was why and the Elders were hoping some of that adventurers' spirit would rub off on him. Because if that would work, then living with a pack of the irredeemable meddlers should have done the trick by the time I was forty.
Steering his pack-bird around a time-worn fountain dedicated to the Mana Goddess only shifted his thoughts further along their well-worn track. Rin—Carina, Knight of Ametrine—had been the one to even get him to agree to this, convincing him as only a well-meaning older sibling could. She had come to him after his initial fury (how DARE they pick his future FOR him?) had subsided and his normally-neat bedroom was a whirlwind mess, gripping his shoulders and tilting her head until he'd looked at her. "Look, Van, I know. You're content here. Your whole life has been spent here in the desert and behind this city's walls and you've never seemed to want anything more. It worries us. It worries me. It's always seemed like you're the Siren in Rei's book of people, satisfied to be in a cage because it lets you avoid everyone. I don't want your wings to wither just because you never bothered to learn to sing.
"At the very least, go look at the Cottage. Who knows? Even if you never do like traveling, maybe a house on a hill will be the home you thought you already had. And maybe you can find a Knight that suits you like no one inside these walls does."
Van sighed again, stopping on the grassy bank of a stream not far from the Goddess fountain to let his thirsty chocobo claim the drink she very much wanted. He had caved. Utterly and completely for the sake of a pair of honestly concerned soft violet eyes. Which currently left him tired, filthy and incredibly footsore.
"To the Underworld with it all," he grumbled to Tuft, pulling off his shoes and plunking himself down to chill his blisters in the stream. "As soon as I can stand the thought of walking again, we'll go find the inn. Can't be to hard to miss, right?"
His chocobo lifted her beak from the water and huffed at him for interrupting her communion with it.
"Right."
And for several long minutes there were no other sounds but the water, a few splashes, and the almost subliminal noise of the town center just a little farther up the road. Van found himself relaxing the more he listened, abruptly realizing how tense he'd kept himself for the last few days of this trip. He'd certainly gotten the most out of it; he'd planned his route carefully to incorporate the pilgrimage every member of his family took sometime in their life with the intent of getting it out of the way now. That way, no matter if he chose to stay at the Cottage or go back to Etansel, no one would be able to use it as another excuse to pry him out of his comfortable hermitage.
Well, as close to a hermitage as he could get in a city of a few thousand people if he chose Etansel, anyway.
He had met the Dragons of Knowledge, Akravator, Jajara and Vadise, and suspected that in a pinch the Bone Dragon might agree to hide him for a few years if Van promised to put back to rights the Fortress Library that one of his cousins had left in utter disarray. (He might go back anyway, the thought of that many books left in no particular order made the lore-keeper in him twitch in a rather violent fashion.)
He had seen the fading ruins of the Tower of Leires, last and least mourned of the Mage Towers that had inflamed wars between men and Fairies. The spell of perpetual twilight still held the land fast—there was not enough knowledge remaining or recently discovered on how to undo it or the spell that had changed the plants to thrive there, and no one reckless enough to try for worry of bringing famine to the area. In the half-light, the crumbling pile of stones that was all that was left of the Tower had loomed...somewhat less than threateningly.
The Mindas Ruins had fared better, perhaps because his ancestress had seen no need to lay her hands upon them. Van had wandered the paths for a little while, smacking a few of the more capricious monsters about the head with his staff until they'd gotten the message and left him alone. The Sproutlings of legend weren't there anymore, and according to the stories, hadn't been since they had left to heal the Mana Tree's last wounds.
And oh, the Tree. Most wondrous of all had been the Tree, tall and proud and so bursting with life. He had seen the blossom-crowned Sapling (six feet tall this decade and growing) with the blue-leaved vine that curled about it from root to first branching, and the massive broadsword sunk point-first into the ground before it. Wrapped around the sword and carpeting the ground at the Sapling's base was a hardy little plant with flowers that started white but darkened to a rich, smoky purple at their center, peering out from leaves the size of his thumb.
He had stayed there the longest, barring Mindas, praying for a little while and listening to the Mana songs being sung by the four inanimate companions. The broadsword—family stories claimed it had belonged to Xan, and had appeared the same day their aging patriarch had vanished along with his wife—had been the loudest to senses tuned to things of the earth, but by no means had it been the only 'voice'.
Van hadn't had the courage to ask the Knights—a pair of cousins on rotation from Etansel—if the four always sang lullabies.
Sounds of laughter brought him out of his musings in time to watch a foursome of children run into the open space of the square across the stream; two of them had the look of the Venstry with green eyes and golden hair, the girl with white flowers woven above her ears. All four of them were Jumi like him, making him wonder if they weren't some of his youngest cousins from one of the caravans.
But who was the idiot that was letting them run around without supervision? Domina was a peaceful town, yeah, but that didn't mean some unscrupulous character hadn't come for a visit with an eye towards kidnapping. Jumi were still Jumi and their cores were still desirable to mages—admittedly, not as much as before, but—!
The four youngsters—the two blonds, a light brunette, and the younger of the two boys an odd blue-green—seemed ignorant of any danger and went about setting up a game of skip-rope, the boys on the ends and the brunette girl in the middle. The chant they called out was older than Van's grandmother, one that he'd learned at her knee. "Who are the Wisdoms, what are their names? Toté the Tortoise, the gentle sage..."
Halfway through it the Venstry girl turned from where she waited, spotted him, and padded on bare feet to the edge of the stream's farther bank. She tilted her head as she considered him, and then piped up, "You look tired."
He blinked. Somehow he didn't think she meant physical exhaustion.
She grinned. "Nope. But, you know...you can rest here. No one rushes here, not even the merchants. No one really expects things of you."
Van quirked an eyebrow. She obviously hadn't met his side of the family. They were always expecting things of him. He'd never been adventurous enough, reckless enough, anything enough to really make them happy with him.
Tucking her hands behind her, the girl rocked back onto her heels. "Well, you're not there anymore, are you?"
"Seven moons in Heaven, seven Wisdoms wise. The Faeries tore down Towers, the mage Anise lost her Eyes..."
"Who are you?"
Another impish smile. "You know, you should really wake up, mister. Mister?"
"Hey, mister!" Van shot upright from his sprawl across the grass, nearly cracking heads with a pink-haired child leaning over him. The other four children were gone with no sign that they'd ever been there, not even the rope they'd been playing with. Tuft was just rousing nearby, lifting her beak from dusty feathers to wark at the teenaged boy that had interrupted her nap. "Whoa!"
"That should be my line," grumbled Van, rubbing at his eyes to rid them of sun-dazzle. "Did I fall asleep?"
"Guess so," chirped the stranger, scampering back a few steps. "Were pretty dead to the world when I came over. Wanted to let ya know this bank gets really chilly at night; you'd be better off sleeping at the...hey, you're not Evan Venstry, are ya?"
"And if I answer 'yes'...?" Van answered cautiously, blinking. The sun was only a few inches from the horizon, maybe a foot. Too late to make it to the Cottage even if he'd wanted to keep walking, but when had he fallen asleep? Had the Venstry girl and her friends been a dream?
The pink-haired boy beamed. "Then you're kin, and it's our job to take care of you. I'm Piperi, Granny Lisa's youngest great-grandkid. C'mon, I'll take you to the house. You c'n get washed up, we'll feed you, and then you c'n sleep in a real bed for a change." He whistled when Van pulled his now very-wrinkly and quite numb feet from the water. "And we c'n doctor those blisters, wow. Whoever sold you your shoes needs to be smacked with a burdock."
"No kidding," grumbled Van as he gingerly patted his feet dry and pulled on his shoes. "I ran out of healing ointment days ago and haven't found a good cobbler to replace it or them."
"Well, we c'n fix those right up for you," Piperi told him while he collected Tuft's reins. "Not a family of healers and herbalists for nothing, you know."
—
Granny Lisa rocked in her chair on the porch, soaking up the last of the day's summer sunshine. It had been a good day, not too hot and not too cold, and she'd been able to spend almost the whole of it here in her chair reminiscing about the old days. Oh, she'd never be the one to say she missed all of the fights one could get into on the road, but she did long for the days when her bones hadn't been so creaky that a trip had to be made by teleportation or she'd have no trip at all.
Voices caught her ear—ancient or no, there was still nothing wrong with her hearing, thank you—and she watched the youngest of her family round the bend with someone and their chocobo in tow.
For a few heart-stopping moments she thought the dusty young fellow was Xan, home again like he hadn't been gone for a couple hundred years with more stories to waiting for him tell them around the dinner table. The boy was the spitting image of him at this distance, half-curls and all. All the picture was missing was that silly hat of his and a broadsword on his back.
"Granny, granny!" Piperi waved to her and pointed at the stranger. "Look, I found a cousin Van! C'n we keep him?"
Lisa smiled at the way her grand-nephew flushed red. "Oi! I am not a pet!"
"No, but you are family, child," she told him when the two had gotten close enough for her worn voice to reach. "Come in, come in. We've been expecting you. Supper should be on the table any moment, so don't forget to wash up. Pips knows the way better than most, don't you, Pips?"
"Aw, Granny!"
"Um, right, thank you, ma'am," Van replied belatedly, then twitched, looking over his shoulder as if someone had whispered in his ear.
"Pips, help Van take his bird to the stable out back and then show him where the washroom is," Lisa told them with a smile quirking at her lips. "And don't forget the Allheal. I know blisters when I see someone limping on them."
The youngster saluted and dragged his cousin off to a stream of chatter. Boy should have been named after a squirrel instead of mint, the way he goes on, mused Lisa indulgently. She waited until the voices had faded before she slanted her eyes sideways towards the porch steps. "You're going to give that poor boy a heart-attack before he's been here a week, Rei."
Chuckling, a shadow resolved into the child-like form of the newest Goddess, grinning at her from around the banister. "He'll get used to it," came the unrepentant answer. "He's a Venstry, weirdness is in the job description. Besides, someone needed to remind him of his manners."
"Just don't scare him out of a year's growth." Lisa shook a finger at her teacher and mother before creaking out of her rocking chair to see about getting to her seat at the table. A small hand brushed against her shoulder where no child's hand could reach, sending warmth to curl into her bones. The elderly woman just smiled and went inside before the spell's effects wore off.
—
Van let out a sigh of relief, looking around his new living room. The cousin that had been taking care of the place had finally gone after showing him around a bit outside and mentioning that his bed had been given a new mattress and the linens were fresh this morning. His pantry, he'd been told, was stocked as well and the ancient, smiling Trent in the garden outside had been given a batch of seeds already.
He'd checked out the barn and gotten Tuft settled, seen the workshops currently sitting idle and waiting; taken a moment to silently rejoice over the numerous tomes sitting in his study, and now, finally, was getting a chance to see what his new bedroom even looked like.
The Jumi youth slowly padded up the stairs, trailing a hand along the rail and feeling how the wood had worn smooth and warm from past generations doing the same. The Cottage murmured to him in a way his suite in Etansel never had, told of settling beams and soft breezes coming through the open windows.
Sunshine, golden and thick, poured across the upstairs floorboards in welcome to the newest life in Haven Tree Cottage. Potted plants sat underneath the main upstairs window while wood laid ready in an unlit hearth.
And in the corner by the dresser, well out of the way of any nippy breezes, a small, round-faced cactus raised a bloom-crowned head to smile at him. "Welcome home!"
Van felt something click in his soul and he let his saddlebags thump to the floor as he smiled back. "Hi, Lil' Cactus. I'm home."
The End
The Wisdoms' chant:
Who are the Wisdoms? What are their names?
Toté the Tortoise, the gentle sage
Rosiotti the Beast, lord of Jungles Green,
The only female Wisdom, Matilda the Serene!
Selva of the Four Winds, currents all awhirl,
Gaeus of Earth, the wise living hill.
Pokiehl the Bard, the truth is what he sings,
Olbohn the Warrior, Underworld's King!
One, three, five, six, two, four, seven!
One for every moon that hangs in Heaven!
Unnamed chant:
Seven moons in Heaven, seven Wisdoms wise,
The Faeries tore down Towers, the mage Anise lost her Eyes.
Irzoile lost his empire, Drakonis finally fell,
And if the Seventh Moon exists Goddess alone can tell.
The Jumi faced extinction, were saved by one heart's pain,
And thus the terror ended of Sandra, Jumi's Bane.
The Mana Sword was found again, the mighty Tree did call,
Sing the praise of Mana, the Goddess loves us all.
PS: I know that in canon there are only six moons in the sky. I added an extra because I could and 'six' just didn't fit in the rhymes. Thank you again, everyone!