The first thing that Emet-Selch always sees whenever he wakes up in Vesper Bay is the pattern of notches in the ceiling beams above him.
The marks are old. The wood was gouged out years ago, back when the Convocation had first settled into the Waking Sands: a band of desperate stragglers seeking shelter after the Seventh Umbral Calamity, and largely penniless. Emet-Selch knows the edges of each cut. He has touched his hand to them while balanced precariously on a stool, tsking in disgust and lecturing the other Convocation members on the repair costs from destroying their own lodgings on a whim.
All of the cuts came from knives. None of them were left by any of the Convocation's actual enemies. The damage had happened one evening early on in their residency when everyone had still been settling into the Waking Sands, trying to figure out who should bunk where, and how they could possibly manage to pay for it all without Louisoix's funding. In the midst of all the haggling, Loghrif and Lahabrea had ended up in a drunken series of dares, which had promptly boiled over into everyone else's sleeping quarters as every Convocation member without any wit left had joined in the competition, trying to see who could throw blades best while the room was spinning and they were all seeing double from the cheap ale.
Emet-Selch still remembers waking up the next morning, and finding a fan of metal blades winking at him from where they had been lodged into the wood, hanging precariously above his face.
He could have the beams fixed. Under his and Hythlodaeus's strict financial care, the Convocation has finally managed to accrue enough funds that Emet-Selch could retile the entire ceiling with mosaics of his own design, elaborations of architecture that would make an Ul'dahn Monetarist weep with jealousy.
But he doesn't. Instead, he blinks away sleep each morning and lets his eyes rove over the deep grooves aging into the wood. They remind him that he is here in Vesper Bay. He is Emet-Selch of the Convocation of Fourteen: a fragile group seeking to protect Eorzea from the threat of primals and those who use them. He is an elezen of a fractured star, a soul granted the Blessing of Darkness and called to service. He has just enough of the Echo to recall his first life in a great city known as Amaurot long ago, and how it had been shattered along with their world.
Once, he was something more. Once, he had stood even taller than he does now - had spoken wiser words, known greater magicks.
Once, he had helped protect their star.
Even now - after countless suns of greeting his mornings with them - the sight of the marks stirs a strange disquiet inside Emet-Selch. Like so many other events which are unique to his current life, they are not a part of his days in Amaurot. The drunken evening of their making was not momentous enough to be included in the Convocation's ongoing records. Like so many other small moments, if Emet-Selch does not take the effort to annotate it in his personal diaries, then it will be lost.
Decades later, he may find himself staring up again at those same marred ceiling beams - this time, wondering forevermore as to their cause.
He keeps the ceiling unrepaired. It is damaged, just as they are. Every time Emet-Selch looks at the gouges, he is reminded that he dwells on a fraction of what the Source had been, in a time and place which is far-distant from the fluttering mothwing fragments of memory which haunt the edges of his dreams.
He remembers that he is only mortal now - and that he both is and is not the person he was always meant to be.
He rouses himself eventually, before Hythlodaeus can storm merrily through the door with a cup of morning tea and insist that he drink it. His Convocation mask still hangs where he left it, dangling from a peg on the wall; Emet-Selch scoops it up and hooks it onto his belt, yawning as he pads down the hall in search of something edible.
To no surprise, Lahabrea is already awake. The man is already laboring upon some new project, a variety of wood chisels arranged alongside his breakfast plate. His morning coffee stands forgotten, his cup abandoned to grow cold as he descends into his latest fixation, all attention bent towards his craft.
He nods a wordless greeting as Emet-Selch lowers himself into a nearby chair, and Emet-Selch considers the wooden curves taking shape beneath the crafter's hands.
The mask looks to be a standard one this time: smooth and undistinguished, with round circles for eyes and a beak over the nose. Simple. Anonymous. Emet-Selch had a similar one fashioned for him once; he still owns it, tucked carefully among his belongings. He had set it aside in favor of his current mask after painstakingly fitting together the memories of what he had worn once in Amaurot, sketching out arcs of white across a red field, broken circles made whole with his mouth.
He's not entirely certain all the details are correct, but other Ascians had remembered it as well, which is of some comfort: if Emet-Selch is merely delusional, at least he has suitable company.
But he cannot recall any recent additions to their list of allies. Any Amaurotine would have been cause for announcement; all their members would have been called back for the occasion, the news too valuable to be risked over linkpearl.
He knows from long experience that Lahabrea will simply continue working unless prodded - for entire bells at a time, forgetting to eat or even sleep on occasion - and so Emet-Selch interrupts freely without waiting for the man to pause. "Another mask, so soon? You'll be short on pigment again at this rate, and beggar us all for the ink."
Being forced to heed the question breaks some of Lahabrea's ensorcellment; the man inhales in a sudden, deep rush, shattering his own trance. Setting aside the chisel and dusting off the wood flakes, he holds the mask up, examining the symmetry of its lines with a critical eye.
"Art has its demands, Emet-Selch," he replies breezily, and then breaks into a grin, satisfied with his own progress. He starts to reach for the chisel again, and then - as if only now realizing there is still food on his plate - veers his hand towards the fork. Then back to the chisel. Then to the forlorn cup of coffee, hopelessly cold. "Elidibus said that I should paint this one black, for a change. I told him that we had extras already prepared, should our more-distant agents require them, but he insisted I make one fresh."
Strange indeed. Emet-Selch watches Lahabrea's hand continue to helplessly deliberate over its next task before he takes pity on the man. Plucking the mask away and setting it deliberately aside, he pushes the breakfast plate closer to Lahabrea's hovering fingers, watching carefully until their Speaker finally selects a piece of toast. "Are we to recover another of the Convocation?" The idea is not unappealing. "Did the Fathercrystal tell Elidibus who it is, I wonder?"
Lahabrea, mouth half-full of bread, shrugs. "He and I will be off to Ul'dah soon enough, to investigate rumors of our white-clad foes. I shall ask him more along the way. The Scions never cease to find new ways to meddle." Swallowing the last bite, he reaches for his coffee and takes a sip to wash it down, only to contort his face in a grimace as he discovers how tepid it has become. "Mitron and Loghrif will hie to the Black Shroud, and Igeyorhm to Limsa Lominsa. Mayhap we will merely discover one of our regular operatives, returned from afar. If there is another of the Convocation to be found, however," he adds, offering Emet-Selch a delighted grin, "I cannot wait to see how much of their mask they remember, so that I might create it for them and manifest their imagination into being with my own hands."
With a long-suffering - though exaggerated sigh - Emet-Selch rolls his eyes. He slides his cup of tea over towards Lahabrea; it may not be the man's first choice, but the liquid is at least hot. "I should have known that you would celebrate the chance to craft a new design, rather than the restoration of another soul to our ranks. You do realize that we are fighting to preserve countless lives, Lahabrea."
Adamantly unashamed, Lahabrea plucks up the tea with a nod, lifting the cup in salute and acknowledgement both. "Creativity starves without stimulation, my dear friend. We wither without fresh delights to spark the beauty in our souls. After all," he adds, and his voice sobers, smile evaporating, "that is what She intended to happen, I suppose."
It is Emet-Selch's turn now to incline his head, surrendering the point back to the man. He stands up, leaving his tea behind as fortification in case Lahabrea falls promptly back into his work - though he does snatch the last piece of bacon off the plate.
"Travel safe," he advises, ignoring Lahabrea's yelp of protest. He backpedals deftly out of reach of an attempted kick. "I shall stay here with Hythlodaeus, and we shall eagerly await good news upon your return."
Lahabrea wrinkles his elegant nose. "Mayhap I will find something entertaining in Ul'dah for Fandaniel and Nabriales while I am there," he remarks, with such exaggerated mildness that it can only be a forewarning of revenge.
The only proper answer is for Emet-Selch to take a deliberate bite of the stolen bacon, crunching it with relish. "Stop spoiling those two. They're richer than all the Scions put together. They could fund operations here in the Waking Sands for years with their inheritance alone - longer, if we could convince them to properly return to Sharlayan and make peace with their mortal father."
"They're still young, Emet-Selch. Now is the time when they should be given lenience."
"They are thousands upon thousands of years old, just as we are," Emet-Selch points out irritably. It is a matter which he refuses to waver upon; one of Fandaniel's favorite excuses whenever things go wrong is to claim the defense of childhood ignorance, which is an exploitation of the rudest level for someone who could once outlive entire civilizations. "All you accomplish is the encouragement of irresponsibility."
Lahabrea has already forgotten the crimes against his breakfast in favor of picking up the half-made mask again. His fingers pat rapidly over the wood, affectionate in their eagerness. "And yet the world treats them as inexperienced, and frowns when they speak with maturity beyond that which is assumed of their years. The very same advice that you and I might offer is scoffed at when presented in their voices. Fandaniel and Nabriales may have the luxury to make more mistakes, but they also must fight for every onze of respect they can manage. A single error will lose them far greater status than any one of us. That is a challenge which you and I do not face, Emet-Selch. We should not dismiss it."
With that, the man rotates the mask around several times before finally flipping it up over his eyes, speaking like a mummer from behind its shield of unpainted wood. "Will you give me your blessing for the journey, oh wise and learned Emet-Selch? Should disaster strike whilst I am upon the road and we are parted again until the next lifetime, I would rather sally forth into the Lifestream's embrace with your favor upon me."
Grimacing at the reminder of their risks, Emet-Selch rolls his eyes - but the dramatics of it are enjoyable enough to participate in, despite Lahabrea's japery. He clears his throat, lifting his hands as if to entreat the heavens, or at least the dusty ceiling above them. "May thy road be swift, and thine enemies few in number. Seekest thou our boon companion from days of yore, and may the Darkness bring solace and shadow to thy course, an aegis of night to conceal thy footsteps. Thou goest forth into peril, mighty hero, but will maketh thy return whilst embraced in the scintillations of victory. And if thou wouldst refrain from thy scurrilous nature," he adds primly, "keepest not my patience waiting 'pon thy tenterhooks, Lahabrea."
The lecture is as stern as he can make it, but Lahabrea only chuckles, waggling the mask as if it, too, is laughing. "You protest every time, Emet-Selch - and yet, no theater is as sweet as the one which comes from your lips." Mischief unabated, Lahabrea sets down the wooden shell with care, squaring it upon the table so that it is perfectly aligned with his plate. "I should paint you sometime soon, Hades. The erudite scholar and his faithful carbuncle! What fantastic tableaus you would make. Of the two, I do feel the carbuncle has the better share of humor."
"Stilleth thy tongue," Emet-Selch retorts, and then dispenses with the formality. "If I allow it, will you promise not to become distracted wooing every piece of statuary in Ul'dah?"
He regrets his offer immediately upon seeing how quickly Lahabrea's expression brightens: delight colors every corner of the man's face, like a sunset painting the clouds until they gleam. "You drive a hard bargain. Swear you'll sit for me upon my return. Allow me to immortalize you in your present incarnation, so that you will always be here for me to greet as my future self. I will enter your portrait among my Words, and then - in lives yet to come - we shall look back upon your dour countenance and have proof that no matter what form you may wear, you have always been an unsmiling curmudgeon."
Emet-Selch's mouth turns down even further - a fact he only realizes when Lahabrea's smirk widens by a mirroring amount. "I make no such oaths. Now, if you are done with your foolishness, I have duties of my own to attend to."
"Off to drown yourself in old books again?" Rummaging for a scrap of weathered sharkskin, Lahabrea begins to sand along the rim of one of the mask's eyeholes. "Not to be seen again until the next morrow, voice croaking from lack of sleep?"
It is exasperating - but expected - that Lahabrea can read him so well. "We all do what we can for the cause. Though mayhap you could do with some restraint in that regard. I would like to spend more than a handspan of years with you this time around."
Amused, Lahabrea dusts the mask clean, and then leans back to eye him speculatively, one foot propped against the table leg.
"Remember, Emet-Selch," he says, his grin sharp and unashamed. "Having escaped extinction, now we fight like firebirds: fanatically."
He tries not to let Lahabrea's enthusiasm bother him as he exits from the man's table, resisting the urge to look back over his shoulder for one final glance. Their Seeker should return from Ul'dah without harm. Lahabrea could return. He might.
Emet-Selch has read his own Words extensively: in them, he has traced a legacy of funerals.
In every life, Lahabrea dies early. He dies often, flinging himself into his work and into the fray with equal madness. Entire chapters have been dedicated to the last, desperate stands that their Speaker has taken, placing himself as a shield between the Ascians and the Scions of the Final Dawn. He always dies laughing, perpetually swearing that it means little for him to sacrifice himself, for he needs only to be found again - like a flame that will reignite from the smallest ember, where all will be forgiven so long as it can still burn.
It unsettles Emet-Selch. It has every time, judging from the clipped descriptions that he has written into the records. Lahabrea dies, and Emet-Selch - back in his scholar's lair, surrounded by the safety of his books and scrolls - has the duty of witnessing it.
He retreats through the common room as deftly as he can without drawing attention to himself, too disquieted to put a pleasant expression on. It is not that much of an exaggeration on his part to beg off further company in favor of work; with five of the Convocation out following up on reports, there will be only a handful of their forces left in Vesper Bay, and it falls to Emet-Selch to direct them. His tasks are not matters of battle. Few of the awoken Ascians have combat experience, and though the Blessing protects them from Primal influence, it does little against the various weapons of their enthralled followers.
Theirs is a task of different intent: to record the faint memories of the city they had once shared, and which Hydaelyn has taken from them.
Emet-Selch had been in the middle of cross-referencing a spell that had been used to - if reports were to be believed - create flying gardening trowels which could till a bed of soil all on their own. He was getting close to confirming it to be of Halmarut's design. If luck remains with him, then such creatures will explain some of his own hazy memories, recollections of mysteriously destroyed flower beds in the middle of an otherwise intact series of roads.
Surveying the rest of the common room - noting who is there, and who has already departed on their journeys throughout Eorzea - he makes a nod to himself, and begins to sidle towards the door to complete his exit.
"A moment, Emet-Selch!"
He turns, caught right at the moment of his escape.
He does not see the speaker's face, but a familiar hat bobs behind the far counter, its feather dancing just over the edge of the wood. Then Hythlodaeus shoves a stool over and clambers up atop it, his head popping into view. "Emet-Selch! If you're already heading in that direction, could you bring Elidibus some fare to sup upon? And don't imagine that I haven't spotted you skipping the same of late," the lalafell adds cheerfully, his voice becoming muffled as he descends back behind the counter, dishes clattering about. "I swear, you're the worst of them all. You can hardly eat your own books, you know."
Balking at necessity, Emet-Selch sighs. "I can try."
"A terrible example to set for the newer Ascians. Truly shocking." Hopping back onto his stool, Hythlodaeus sets two plates laden with food onto the counter, and then hauls out a tray to set them upon. Both are filled with the basics - bread, a bit of egg with some undefined leafy green vegetable mixed in, two pieces of the miraculous bacon which was nearly impossible to keep stocked - and, despite himself, Emet-Selch can feel his stomach rumble eagerly. "If rumors of Ifrit's return bear true, then I suspect that Elidibus will need all the strength he can get when he speaks with the Flame General. Our Emissary works himself at a fearsome pace of late. If I didn't know better, I would wonder if he has discovered a private terror which is so dangerous that he cannot breathe a single hint of it, lest it manifest life from his own voice."
Watching the tray rapidly become filled up with more implements as Hythlodaeus adds cups and silverware, pushing them all expectantly forward, Emet-Selch nearly misses the warning in the words. "Has he heard aught from the Fathercrystal to spur him so?"
It is dangerous, if so. Not simply because of the implication of Hydaelyn's agents on the move, nor the steady weakening of the Father - but for Elidibus himself, equally as prone as Lahabrea to pushing himself to the brink of exhaustion. The Emissary's Blessing has always run far deeper than the rest of them, his ties to Zodiark that much stronger. For many of the Ascians, the past is a faint vision, fragmented into dreams and wordless longings that beckon with the grief of eternity lost. Even among the Convocation, only Lahabrea and Emet-Selch can recall their first lives with anything approaching clarity. Elidibus is the sole exception: able to draw upon all his incarnations throughout the centuries, until the vast ocean of experience blurs and threatens to crush him within its tides.
It has unmoored their Emissary at times, leaving him gently drifting between lives: a weakness he conceals from their Grand Company allies, and even most of the Scions themselves. Emet-Selch has never heard anyone question Elidibus's capabilities. But he has watched the efforts drain the man like a hidden crack in a stone reservoir, placidly sapping the strength from him in a manner so gradual that it is nearly impossible to measure. And he has seen the way that Elidibus retreats from them all at the end of each day: a cycle of distance that only has worsened over the years, as Elidibus makes a stranger of himself rather than confess his own mind.
Unlike the rest of them, Elidibus remembers too much.
Hythlodaeus only shakes his head. "If he has, I've not heard it. You know how often he seeks to shoulder all on his own, however. Could you, mayhap, be willing to interfere...?"
Emet-Selch understands the request before it can even trail off into its last half-formed syllables. "I have some availability in my day," he agrees. "I shall spend it with him, and do what I can."
Relief visibly sags Hythlodaeus's shoulders. "Thank you, my friend." The lalafell presses his lips together pensively - a rare expression for a man who still preferred to interject as much playfulness in the course of a day as he could manage. "I can aid the Convocation in so few ways, it seems. Once, if our memories are to be believed, I too could have crafted great wonders with magicks. Now, I can offer so little." He glances down to the tray, lining up the silverware in precise rows, despite how they will only slide around the moment Emet-Selch picks them up. "Naught but my memories and affections, and my dear wish to see you all return through those doors each time I see you go."
Reaching over, Emet-Selch rests his fingers on the sides of the tray. It is simple fare, true. He has eaten it countless times in the Waking Sands: a repetition of meats and breads and even-stranger vegetables, depending on what funds the Ascians have in their coffers each day. It rarely has more flavor than basic spices, rotated about in an effort to keep the appetite fresh. No sultan's table would accept it, as humble as it is.
And yet, every time he sees such meals - prepared by another's care, seeking to keep him in good health and worrying over his well-being - Emet-Selch has always been glad for them.
"Wishes - as we have learned - have the power to change the world, my dear Hythlodaeus." He shifts his fingers to touch the lalafell's wrist reassuringly, Hythlodaeus's tiny hand covered beneath his larger palm. "And so, your powers are no less than my own. If not for your efforts, we would have no doors to return through - no roof to shelter our heads, nor sustenance for our bellies. Do not forget that. Keep wishing on our behalfs, and we will always endeavor to see those wishes fulfilled."
Hythlodaeus's laugh is soft, but sincere as he squeezes Emet-Selch's hand briefly before letting go. "I cannot go to battle with a trencher of sausage, Hades. Though I have sketched out certain concepts..."
The mental image is an entertaining one; Emet-Selch catches himself considering it before he reminds himself of the directions such an attempt will inevitably turn. "Please leave our foodstuffs unanimated," he says sharply, hastily rewinding his interest. "Particularly the roasted vilekin."
"Well." Both of Hythlodaeus's eyebrows arch in wry challenge. "Best take your breakfast and feed our Emissary before I get further inspiration then, hmm?"
Elidibus is not in the solar.
That alone is not cause for undue alarm. Though their Emissary is often deeply entrenched within the papers and logistics of their work, even he steps outside on occasion for fresh air and the reminder that sunlight exists. It is, however, cause for Emet-Selch to be vexed. Between Lahabrea's comments on another potential Ascian in waiting, and Hythlodaeus's observations on the man's mood, it would be far more convenient to find Elidibus tamely sitting at his desk and reading the latest edition of the Mythril Eye.
Now, it is Emet-Selch's turn to worry - that, and to figure out what to do with their rapidly cooling breakfasts.
He slides the tray onto the desk, dislodging several neat stacks of papers in the process, and picks up his new cup of tea in order to warm his throat. Butter and jam slowly saturate the thick slices of toast. Hythlodaeus had managed to find an orange for them both to split, and the rest of the plates are stacked with fried eggs and meat, still fresh from the stove.
Emet-Selch may not be cruel enough to eat all of Elidibus's breakfast, but he can at least steal the ham.
Chewing thoughtfully on his prize, he glances over the numerous correspondences on the desk, and then - inevitably - raises his gaze towards the wall, where the broken staff of Tupsimati hangs.
Aether eddies in a faint cloud around it, barely visible to Emet-Selch's eyes. Even damaged, the tablet bound to Tupsimati's crest retains its power, waiting calmly to be taken up again though its master is no more.
I would rather change one for the other, Emet-Selch cannot help but admit. His hand lifts towards the staff's splintered length, though he keeps it at a respectful distance. Even with a fulm of air between them, he can feel power tingling against his skin, the remnants of its last great conjuration still imprinted upon the weapon's aether.
The act of conjuring primals had cursed their star once, splitting it into fourteen reflections in order to preserve it from Hydaelyn's mercilessness. Summoning has brought disaster upon disaster to Eorzea ever since - while also protecting them from Bahamut's unfettered wrath.
Yet, even before that, the Convocation had been saved by Louisoix first. They had each woken alone across Eorzea, disoriented and half-convinced of their own madness, wandering with only Zodiark's faint promises to guide them - until two of them had been raised up in Louisoix's own grandchildren.
It would have been easy for the man to dismiss the entire business as an act, a juvenile game where his offspring simply called themselves by different names and pretended to have come from another time far removed from the present. Far harder to take them seriously: to accept that Louisoix's own kin were different people entirely, their youthful smiles washed away by the insistence that they were ancients from a lost civilization, and that the danger of the Scions was theirs to combat.
Yet Louisoix had. He had devoted his scholarly efforts towards understanding the change that had come over his grandchildren, following half-remembered tales of the Ascians from generations past. It had been through him that the Convocation had gathered, slowly, under his protection in Sharlayan, a pack of stragglers finding a new home under his paternal care. Louisoux had founded the Circle of Knowing to house them; he had brought them all together, as they had clung to each other with relief at miraculously finding one another again despite all the odds against them.
Most of all, Louisoix had given them a place to belong to, when all the world seemed a newly hostile battlefield: Scions on one side, the vast need to document their knowledge on the other, and the overarching duty to save the Fathercrystal from Hydaelyn's unrelenting threat.
But when news of the Garlean empire had stirred, there had been no question that the Convocation had had to intervene. Louisoix had gone with them, leaving Sharlayan behind in order to join their battles himself.
He had gone with them, and he had been lost.
Louisoix was not an Ascian, as far as they knew. But he had loved his grandchildren even after they had changed with the truth of their memories, and then he had loved his grandchildren's cause and all their allies, taking them into his home as if they had been his own kin. He had given his life in trying to protect their shared world, extending his grace not only over the people of Eorzea, but the Ascians as well.
If any proof was needed that the younger races were worth preserving - that they had deserved a chance to live, rather than be erased by Hydaelyn's thirst to suppress what She had termed chaos - then it was to be found here, in the shattered staff of Louisoux.
Tupsimati was a symbol of inspiration. But it was also a reminder of another soul who had fallen along the way: one of an endless chain of deaths given to defend their world against both primals and Calamities, and the tide showed no signs of slowing.
Mayhap it is not such a blessing to have it mounted here in the solar, Emet-Selch finds himself admitting reluctantly, giving the padded block of the memorial one final tap of his fingers. Placed behind Elidibus's chair, the staff must gaze perpetually down upon Elidibus whenever the man works, a silent reminder when the man already has so much to mourn. The alternative, however, is to put Tupsimati somewhere it might not be seen - and therefore would be forgotten gradually over time, a different kind of cruelty that was made no better from necessity.
To forget or to remember. To remember, or forget. Death will make that choice on Emet-Selch's behalf. It has claimed thousands of years from him already, eradicating the time between Amaurot and the present. He has read his own handwriting upon the pages of tomes penned hundreds of years past, telling stories he does not know in this lifetime. There are entire volumes of Emet-Selch's observations from days when he has walked this star before - days which are lost to his memories now, perhaps forever.
But Elidibus will not share that fate. Louisoux's death will always belong to him, even as the Convocation renews itself with each generation, so that their Emissary will be surrounded by ghosts - growing steadily more isolated, even among their kind.
Emet-Selch sighs, the tea cooling in his cup as he turns reluctantly back towards the mountains of documents steadily arranging themselves into armies on Elidibus's desk.
"How much of our burden are you seeking to contain on your own, my friend?" he murmurs, hearing the echo of it tug upon his mind. It stirs the murky recollection of another chamber in his thoughts, vast and filled with people - of people, and a white-robed youth looking bravely up towards them all, promising that he will not fail.
The room is quiet around him. Emet-Selch unfolds two of the napkins and tents them over the plates to try and keep them warm.
He leaves the solar, and tries not to think about how much refuses to be left behind.
He finds their errant Emissary at last outside the Waking Sands, on the western side facing the bay. The continual ocean spray has been busy eroding the latest coat of plaster that has been slapped across the stones; Emet-Selch eyes the foundation of their home with a displeased eye, noting where they will have to patch it up again lest the mortar crumble entirely away.
The docks are busy with morning traders, exchanging shouts with the sailors and occasional threats to one another. Many of their ships had arrived on earlier tides, and their captains are already eager to empty their holds and cast off again; crates jostle against one another as they are hurried off the landings and into the town, merchants frantically ticking off items from the cargo manifests.
Elidibus watches it all in silence. His arms are folded; the salt of the breeze licks his pale hair, tied back in braids to keep it out of the way. No amount of yelling from the docks causes him to stir. From a distance, he could resemble a statue himself: a lost piece of merchandise misplaced by a collector from Ul'dah, whose bookkeepers will be terribly cross later.
But he looks up when he hears Emet-Selch approach - his shoulders relaxing enough to allow his hands to drop to his sides - and then he smiles.
"I remember when this was all built," he remarks softly, his gaze flicking back towards the clusters of white sails moving past, drifting into deeper waters. His voice floats as well, filled with a sadness that clashes with the liveliness of the traders at their work, each of them concerned with profits and not with grief. "It was so different, then."
Emet-Selch stops mid-stride.
His next step is faster, an attempt to hide the aborted movement as he crosses the remaining distance between them. "Yes," he replies, very carefully and calmly, laying out the chronology with an architect's patience. He fills in the gaps conversationally. "The Calamity did strike this area particularly hard. The reconstruction required a vast amount of investment from Lolorito Nanarito. While the underlying politics have presented some difficulties for us to not have an aetheryte, we have managed thus far."
But the gentle encouragement is not enough to steer their Emissary back to the present this time. Confusion clouds Elidibus's expression, bordering upon distress. "No. Before then. Mayhap - mayhap somewhere else."
Conceding the possibility, Elidibus suddenly lifts his hand to scrub at his brow, screwing up his face as if to ward off a headache. When he looks up again, there is more clarity in his eyes; he no longer seems to be regarding Emet-Selch from across the distance of thousands of years. "Is it time to leave for Ul'dah already?" he asks mildly, with an alertness that washes away his earlier lapse as a mere trick of lost sleep.
It is an alertness, true. But Emet-Selch knows how much of the mask is false: a facade of normality, a bridge that suspends Elidibus just barely above the waters of the past, until purpose alone is the only thing holding him together in meetings with city-states and officials as they face down threats against the star.
Emet-Selch is not heartless enough to call attention to it. "Several bells remain before you must depart. I've been tasked by Hythlodaeus to ensure you do not pass out from starvation on the carriage ride over. If you intend to take ill, remember that the business of handling the Convocation falls to myself and Lahabrea in your absence," he notes pointedly. "I plan to nap through it, should that occur."
The momentary humor lightens Elidibus's face - humor, along with chagrin at knowing just how well that has turned out in the past. "Aye," he relents. "I shall endeavor to have a bite before I go, I suppose."
Like a fish slipped free to asphyxiate on the dock, the conversation struggles. There is no good way to broach the subject. Emet-Selch can mention Lahabrea's newest mask. He can drop an idle comment about seeing candles lit in the solar even past the midnight bell; he can insist on going back to eat their breakfast, which is likely as cold as the stones now.
None of those observations will bring Elidibus any comfort, not when the man reprimands himself at even the slightest hint of weakness.
But they have had these moments between them before - both before and after the Sundering - and Emet-Selch sighs as he resorts to that familiarity to ease the blow. "You are weary, Elidibus." No need to dance about that much. "I understand your desire to spare the younger races and our Ascian kin your fears. But around myself and Lahabrea, at least, you can tell us if there is aught which is on your mind. Both of us are here for you to confide in. Zodiark has not bid you fight alone."
At this last statement, Elidibus finally winces, turning his face away even as his hands curl into slow fists at his side. "Alone," he repeats back, and then draws in a sharp breath, shaking his head in silent argument with himself.
Before Emet-Selch dares to press him again, however, the man surrenders enough to unfold some of his dread. "There is a... possibility which I have known for some time, one which I mislike. And yet," Elidibus adds swiftly, interrupting himself with a sharp laugh, "it is something I know I should celebrate. It is ill of me to even consider it as aught but victory. It is wrong of me to find sorrow in its arrival. I know this."
If it were so simple - Emet-Selch can guess - then Elidibus would have already vaulted that hurdle and moved on. "Say it," he prods, a nascent suspicion already taking shape within his thoughts. "I have heard every other combination of words from your throat already. Naught would surprise me now."
Yet even then, Elidibus refuses to meet his eyes. Instead, the man turns towards the ocean for his comfort, hands opening and closing helplessly as if they hoped to grasp the world before it could sail away.
"So often, we Ascians wake to our new lives alone, and never find one another," he begins quietly, taking a restless few steps towards the edge of the walkway. An errant wave smashes itself against the docks, kicking up a fresh scattering of foam; Elidibus pays it no heed, staring out into the horizon as if an entirely different vista has opened before his eyes. "The star is vast, and there is a great deal we must do in order to save it. Zodiark has raised us up for that sole purpose, and through Him are we reminded of our histories and our companions. Of who we have been for one another - and who we continue to be, throughout the ages. Yet, once the shards are safe," their Emissary adds, his head lowering, "He will no longer need to revive us. And when that day comes..."
Emet-Selch spares him the rest of it, his mind already leaping ahead to the conclusion. "Then we will never remember again," he finishes, feeling the heaviness of it already ladening his tongue.
Elidibus's mouth struggles around the truth. "Yes. It is not death which is to be feared. It is to be alone."
The possibility is not a new one for Emet-Selch. Logic calculated that inevitable path in his studies long ago, weighing best-case scenarios against worst-case facts. Again and again, he could find no other outcome. The greatest triumph for all their worlds would mean the end of Hydaelyn and the preservation of Zodiark; after those tasks were complete, Zodiark could conserve His power and would no longer be forced to revive the past in order to combat the present.
That is the fate waiting for all the Ascian people, should they succeed. To become strangers to one another permanently, memories locked away in the currents of rebirth, unaware of what they had once shared. To pass your dearest friends without recognition - to dwell only a street away from your loved ones for your entire life, and yet never know.
To save a world, but to lose each other forever.
Emet-Selch does not have the powers of his first life. Those vast reserves of aether are gone to him now, along with too much of the knowledge required to shape it; arcanima is similar enough in its construction that he has gravitated towards it, yet even it falls short. He is a fraction of himself. Only dreams remain.
He cannot create a plant from nothingness, and so he draws the shape of it in the air instead.
A circle, to represent the flower's head. A sphere, to represent its volume. A line for its stem. And then, with a flick of his fingers, the scattering of its florets: a dandelion puff disintegrating upon the wind, white bristles soaring on journeys into the unknown.
For an onlooker, it would be a nonsensical gesture. An insult, perhaps; a crude sketch by the most generous interpretation. But for another Ascian - who would remember the life that would have, should have blossomed along Emet-Selch's fingers - it has all the meaning he needs it to.
"The Scions consider our shattered reflections to be splinters - pieces of a larger crystal which must be reassembled together, like inert, lifeless rocks. Mayhap, by their ideals, they are. Yet I think of them instead as seeds." Pacing forward until he stands directly before Elidibus, Emet-Selch closes his fingers as if to dispel the illusion, and then turns his empty palm upwards in offering of a fresh promise. "Though they have flown far, each one has grown into a new world of its own - and in their grasp, our myriad souls also dwell. Not a single one of us is lost. We are all there, within those aetherial seas."
Elidibus holds himself rigid for a moment, his expression struggling to remain smooth - and then his mouth crumbles into a frown. He is the one to collapse the distance between them the rest of the way, clasping his hand tightly upon Emet-Selch's shoulder in a grip that feels more like a plea for salvation than to offer support of his own.
"I will miss you," he says, after a moment. "Even if I do not know the cause, I think I will carry that loneliness around with me instead, for all my lives to come. It will merely become nameless, just as I will be. A vague, formless emptiness that I dare not relinquish, for to do so would be to relinquish all of you. Yet, it is because of tragedy that we have the chance to know each other. I will not have that tragedy continue, simply so that I can recognize your face again."
Reaching up to cover the man's hand protectively with his palm, Emet-Selch gathers his wits to protest. This would be the moment to recite any number of defiant speeches, even ones that are more pragmatic than stirring. To say that he will always be by Elidibus's side, despite the fate of their histories becoming permanently unknown. That he will be there in every face and every name, so that Elidibus will never need to fear being alone again.
Except that he can't.
He knows the hollowness that Elidibus describes. He has seen it every morning when he wakes and finds the gouges upon his ceiling staring back: a warning of what he will, someday, no longer identify as part of himself. Even if he writes the events down, those stories will become mere words upon a page, anecdotes of a life he has experienced but has lost all ties to. They will hold no meaning.
Eventually, he will no longer even miss that much.
It is no comfort to know that everyone you meet may potentially be your loved one, for that simply means the same for every person that you lose.
He has no lies, and so the only defenses that Emet-Selch can think of are haphazard, platitudes strung together without any true evidence to support them. "Elidibus, it may not be so. There may yet be some mechanism that will preserve both Amaurot and Eorzea. The Fathercrystal is merciful. He would never - "
"No." The melancholy of Elidibus's voice ebbs, to be replaced by dull inevitability as his fingers gradually loosen from Emet-Selch's arm and fall away with the same weary acceptance as a drowning victim slowly relinquishing a rope. "I know what you will say, Hades. I know exactly what you will say."
All the warmth of Elidibus's hand cannot banish the cold horror that suddenly worms its way through Emet-Selch's chest.
This cannot be the first time they have debated this point. And in that case, it means that Emet-Selch has already tried to reassure Elidibus - tried without succeeding, on every count.
The bevy of half-formed counterpoints in his arsenal withers away in moments. Any rational point that Emet-Selch can think of must have already been weighed and found wanting. It is not even Elidibus that he needs to convince - it is himself that Emet-Selch must argue against, finding whatever loopholes he is blind to, opposing his own common sense.
Everything Emet-Selch can think to say now, he must have attempted at least once before.
In each of his lives, he has already failed.
"Then you know how much I believe it, Elidibus. The very fact that I have not changed is proof that I never will. And how - even after so many years - I will not stop." With a final squeeze to Elidibus's hand, Emet-Selch reaches his fingers up, gently smoothing down the man's hair from how the ocean winds have already begun to tangle it. "We may have lost our powers of raw creation, but in exchange, we have been allowed an infinity of lives for our souls to drift across. That infinity is a promise. If such things are beyond Zodiark's powers to sustain, then that does not mean they will remain beyond ours. Though each one of us may be weaker in potency, we have become endless in opportunity. Once the Fathercrystal has completed His work of saving the shards, then we will have all the time we need to find a way for Amaurot to live again, even without Zodiark's aid. Our own souls may already have the solution waiting on another star. We have merely yet to meet them."
Silence is his only reward. Elidibus's expression has already turned carefully inwards, devouring itself before it can admit to any fears. Emet-Selch might have expected as much - he should have, if he has any rightful ownership over the memories cradled within his soul.
He evaluates his options as rapidly as he can, dismissing every answer that comes too quickly to his tongue. Instead, he turns to Lahabrea for inspiration, to their absent companions: Altima, Deudalaphon, Halmarut. Azem. "And who knows? Hydaelyn cannot be the only threat that our star will ever face in its long existence. Primal summonings take shape even without the Scions' interference. We may yet be called back to the fore. Or mayhap a sage researching the secrets of the soul may come across a revelation of their own, and uncover their own Amaurotine past like a trove of jewels in the dark. Death does not unmake it. It merely hides what we have been - but that is all."
The words feel artificial on his tongue, full of cheap theatrics and naive illusions. Emet-Selch forces every onze of passion he can inside them anyway. There is no way to tell if this is yet another dead-end path that he has taken before; perhaps in every life, Emet-Selch has come to this exact same conclusion, second-guessing himself into fixed predictability. He has forgotten everything, and so he must also be repeating everything endlessly, tied to a single weathered track. Even now, his very hope may be made farcical by how many times he has promised Elidibus such things - only for each lifetime to fall short.
But Elidibus glances down, as if to gather the courage necessary to humor such a lackluster attempt at encouragement. "Are you saying that we must once more rely upon our creativity to craft a method of saving our people from a terminal oblivion?"
"And whyever not?" Abandoning all sanity now, Emet-Selch performs an elaborate shrug, wrists turning with the liquid ease of an orchestra conductor. "'Tis what our foes wish most to destroy in us. I see no reason to play by their limitations. If naught else, it will serve to spite their wishes - and that, I feel, is a victory all its own."
Elidibus lifts his eyebrows in bemusement, and Emet-Selch seizes upon that opportunity. He thinks of the impulsiveness of Igeyorhm, the fickleness of Fandaniel, and what both of them might say. If Lahabrea were there, their Speaker would have likely already found the perfect argument - but Emet-Selch does not know. All he can do is reach blindly into the history that has been stolen from him, like a beastkin following the same exact path through its cage over and over, its tiny paws scrabbling on the metal as it believes that this time, it will find the way out.
"If we cannot envision a future where we will be saved," he continues, more seriously, "then we cannot follow it into reality. That is how Hydaelyn truly seeks to end us. She has never sought the physical extermination of our people - only our ability to create. Even without Zodiark beside us, Amaurot will not truly be lost until the last of us loses the will to dream."
At first, Elidibus makes no reply. His gaze wanders back towards the ocean, skipping over the activity at the docks and fixing upon an empty patch on its horizon instead. His next question is light and lilting. "And will you dream for me even when I am gone, Hades?"
A shiver of uncertainty nibbles for a second time at the back of Emet-Selch's neck, prickling his skin. Like a sailor's warning, it turns the breeze bitter with forewarning. He shakes it away with a jerk of his chin. "I will dream of your swift return," he says tartly. "If you leave me to be the sole wrangler of Lahabrea, I cannot promise that any part of this star will remain intact for long. Not even Hydaelyn will know what to do with the rubble."
The threat finally sparks a smile from their Emissary. It blossoms by painstaking degrees across Elidibus's face, but once it has taken root, Emet-Selch can see it in the way it crinkles the man's expression. As it finally reaches his eyes, Elidbius shuts them tightly, bowing his head as Emet-Selch's words slowly warm him, tugging him back from whatever remote land he has been wandering lost.
It takes only a moment for him to recover and straighten up, but the fondness remains. Slowly, their Emissary inclines his head in a nod. He swings his attention one last time across the bustling harbor, and then dismisses it all, turning back to Emet-Selch.
"I suppose as long as the sun is on our side, the dawn will never truly be final," he remarks, with only a trace of his melancholy showing through, like a vein of gold buried in stone. "Very well, Hades. Let us imagine the future together, and see what the morrow may bring. But first, there is a far more pressing matter that cannot remain unaddressed. I fear the disasters we would invite if it should go neglected."
Emet-Selch blinks, snapped out of the momentary glow of success. "Oh? What manner of peril awaits?"
But Elidibus is already briskly in motion, striding towards the Waking Sands. He claps his hand on Emet-Selch's shoulder as he passes by: a reassurance that lingers until he finally moves out of reach. "Breakfast."