Direct sequel to War of the Crystals. I implore you to read the final chapter of that epic!fic for context before continuing. Some information can be found in The Summoned Land as well if you're feeling extra ambitious.
At Magic's End
The Next Turning
The glittering sea shone beneath the shadow of dragon wings. Rydia tightened her grip on Bahamut's scales as wisps of cloud condensed on her skin and hair like a net of diamonds. Sea gave way to shore and finally the wood and stone buildings of Baron slid below.
Mysidia had vanished at the edge of the horizon behind her and with it, the sight of her friends and comrades.
Rydia glanced down at the streets of Baron and spied a child staring upwards with eyes wide. She smiled, thinking what a sight it must be to see a dragon of eld flying overhead, especially with so grand a shadow being cast before them by the sharp angle of the morning sun.
Little one, Bahamut's voice rumbled through her mind, I must whet my appetite upon this star's aether ere we continue.
"Where?" Rydia wondered aloud, already suspecting the answer to her question.
To Mist and the confluence there, he answered, banking his great leathery wings to the north and scooping up rivulets of swirling air. I have been gone overlong and I would take measure of the situation that awaits us.
The clouds deepened as the foothills yielded to peaks and Rydia closed her eyes as ice crystallized on her eyelashes upon Bahamut's ascent.
So this was it, she thought. To Mist after all this time, despite everything she had just uttered on the hillside in Mysidia. Of all the places to fly, she was returning to the one place that made her heart sink and her resolve falter.
It approacheth Bahamut boomed as he folded his wings for a long downward plunge before spreading them wide again to glide.
Rydia opened her eyes and saw the gap in the peaks with its green meadow below, a hue not dissimilar to her hair. The mountains framed the valley like dragon talons curving inward—a comparison that struck her with a new appreciation, as Bahamut wove between them.
Bahamut finally beat his wings in great downward strokes as the ground drew nearer, slowing his descent before alighting in a meadow where plumes of dandelion seeds erupted in all directions.
Rydia carefully climbed down his back and slid into the tall grass, taking a moment to orient herself.
The village of Mist was in the distance, seeming much farther now that she stood on the ground. She tucked a strand of her emerald hair behind her ear and took in the sight of her former home.
To Rydia's surprise, people were bustling about and men with hammers paused on wooden roof beams to stare.
So, some yet live, Bahamut said, jolting her thoughts.
Rydia looked up at Bahamut who had tilted his magnificent head with its glistening horns and golden eyes toward her.
I must away, little one, he said, tilting his great nostrils upwards to take the scent of the wind. I shall return anon, he assured her, lifting off once more and swirling the grasses into a whorl.
Rydia watched him climb higher above the valley, gone to seek the aethereal currents of this uncanny landscape. Mist had always been a place where man and magic met, and the veil betwixt here and the Feymarch could be punctured like thin silk for those with the skill and the knowledge. But perhaps not anymore, she reminded herself. Not with the crystals so dimmed that their voices were naught but a whisper in the back of her consciousness.
She sighed, allowing her gaze to slip downward again, and steeling herself for the walk toward her former home.
People had begun to gather and gawp at her approach from the stone gate, and she swallowed hard, not knowing what to expect.
"Miss!" a dark haired woman cried, beckoning frantically in homespun garb of green and brown. "Quick, before the dragon returns!"
"Surely you saw she was with that beast!" a man exclaimed in exasperation.
Rydia paused her advance and frowned, quickly studying everyone before her. Who were these people? Not a single face was known to her.
"Gods, her hair!" someone else exclaimed.
"She couldn't be one of those…."
"Excuse me," Rydia said, finally finding her voice as she drew near. "Who are you, and how have you come to be in Mist?"
Villagers exchanged confused glances amongst each other. "She doesn't know?"
The woman who had originally beckoned her closer with a matronly air, was the first to explain. "We are travelers from Damcyan and the Troian hinterlands," she said, glancing furtively up at the sky. "We found this place abandoned. Who are you?"
Rydia placed her hands on her hips with tired authority.
"My name is Rydia," she announced, thinking to add a flourish for notoriety. "The last summoner of Mist."
Mouths fell open.
"So that dragon," someone sputtered.
"Is with me," Rydia answered, hoping to instill the sort of trepidation that elicited respect.
"But will it come back? Does it mean to drive us out?" a young woman asked in a panicked voice.
"We are here only for a time," Rydia assured them. "Now," she continued, pressing forward. "I would like to see my home—provided it still stands."
"Someone, find this woman a cloak and something to eat. Quickly!" the in-charge sort of woman demanded, pointing to those nearby.
Rydia walked through the crowd of maybe twenty people, her hand subconsciously reaching back for her rod, prepared for duplicity. These were not her people, after all, and she had no way of knowing if Zemus' influence had spread to the outer lands or the common folk.
Most of the villagers stared at her passing, others ran ahead to gather what they'd been bidden, but a few others whispered.
"I thought they were all gone."
"A magic user."
Rydia stopped in her tracks and turned toward the nearest man.
"Were there others?" Rydia asked, approaching a gentleman with sandy hair and a face wizened from too many days in the sun.
"Others like you?" he asked, shrugging. "Only a few children were left in the village when we arrived. The rest of us," he said, gesturing to the others. "Were looking for a safe place to land, what with Baron's aggression."
"Say," a young man who looked nearly Rydia's age interrupted. "You've the look of someone far-traveled. Is the war ended?"
"Yes," Rydia replied distractedly, casting her eyes about the old foundations and new constructions for further clues about her people. "The war is over."
This got people talking, but Rydia didn't wait for their exultations, only half listening as she passed the throngs of people and entered into the outer limits of the village.
"Did you hear that? It's over!"
"It's done! I can finally return to me mum!"
Rydia left them behind and followed a path that felt at once familiar and foreign to her feet, as though prompted forward by a childhood dream.
"Where is she going?" someone inquired.
"Home," someone else replied.
Rydia paid them no mind, noticing how though the paths were the same, the buildings had changed. Some stone husks remained, but new homes had appeared to replace old, some cobbled together with jagged seams of mortar, where the black of ash contrasted with new white plaster.
Rydia cast her eyes about and spied a shaded lane choked over with plants and vines farther ahead. The remnants of an old gate caught her attention, and she picked up her pace, pushing branches and overgrown brambles aside with her hands.
When she at last reached the other side, she tripped over a stone threshold.
She fell to the floor with a grunt where her hands felt the remnants of smooth tile beneath a layer of soot.
She hastily swept away the debris and felt hot tears prick her eyes. Familiar patterned tiles of green with vines and leaves revealed themselves from out of the black ash in the speckled morning light.
Memories bubbled forth from places she'd thought long forgotten, and a sob tore through her throat.
"Miss?" a voice called from behind her.
Rydia furiously wiped tears with her sleeve, frustrated by the interruption. She turned to see the woman from before holding a thick woolen cloak.
The woman set the cloak over her robes and rested her hands on Rydia's shoulders.
"The war took much from all of us," she said quietly. "Was this your home?"
Rydia nodded numbly. "Yes," she said as another sob gripped her.
"Take your time lass. There's food should you need any. My name's Adlina by the way."
Rydia gave the woman an appreciative but small smile and listened as the woman who called herself Adlina retreated through the brush the way she'd come.
Slowly, Rydia climbed to her feet and walked through the ruined, crumbled remains of her home.
Moments flashed across her mind's eye of years lost to time.
Her mother's red hair shining in the sunlight during morning lessons, the dishes to be washed in the deep tub against the wall, the wooden table with its learning blocks for spells, and the old fireplace with its iron pot.
All gone now, nothing but black ash and half standing walls; shattered windows, and strewn beams.
Sobs wracked Rydia from her core as she gripped the wall for dear life.
Was this all that she had to her name, now? A village of strangers amidst the ruins of her memories? A nigh impossible task yet before her?
What future was there for Mist? Her Mist?
"Stay," the words shot through her mind.
Her gut immediately clenched with regret and anger.
"For what, Edge!" she shouted hoarsely into the empty house. "For who? For you?" she demanded angrily of no one as hiccups from stifled sobs clutched at her throat. "For this?"
Exhausted, she leaned fully against the wall and slid to the floor, listening to the quiet rustle of leaves that now provided shelter where a roof once had. Cupping her face in her hands, time seemed to be neither here nor there. Hadn't she just been in Mysidia the night before, celebrating with friends at what had seemed the beginning of all things new and hopeful? Her feet had been on the Lunarian moon not two days hence. Had she not even slept since? Her mind was bursting with experiences her soul had yet to process and the sudden jarring realization that, for the first time in her life, she was entirely alone.
By choice this time, she reminded herself, but not by necessity.
And then the entreaty that galled her most encroached upon her thoughts again. A pre-dawn kiss and that damnable question.
Rydia winced with embarrassment. She couldn't stay, wouldn't stay. To do so would be to somehow prove Edge right.
Leaning her head back against the stone, she closed her eyes and felt exhaustion finally set in. Thoughts spun into dream and then illusion, until even those faded to darkness.
….
'Sleeping the day away, are we?"
Rydia frowned, thinking she was still curled up on the hard rocky surface of moon waiting for another sunless day in the subterrane to greet her.
"Go away," she grumbled.
"Go away!" a voice balked. "How is that any way to treat an old friend?"
Rydia frowned again when she felt a cold, soft pad touch her nose.
She opened swollen eyes and saw Black retracting a fur-laden paw. The Eidolon's shrewd leonine gaze stared back at her.
Rydia blinked and righted herself, having fallen sideways. "Black?"
"The very same," he answered, sounding pleased with a quick flick of his long, spotted tail.
"But how did you get here?" Rydia asked, wiping both eyes.
"We were summoned," he explained.
"Summoned—how?" Rydia immediately wanted to know, then started. "We?"
"Indeed," an ancient voice agreed from nearby. "We were surprised when it was the Hallowed Father's voice and not yours that drew us through the veil."
"Ramuh!" Rydia cried in astonishment.
"It's been some time," Shiva added, silvery hair and blue robes stepping into view from behind the lord of levin.
Rydia's eyes flicked between the three of them in shock and confusion. Was any of it real?
"How," she demanded, trying to make her numb legs stand.
"Bahamut sent for us," Shiva added. "But it's you we've come for."
The ice maiden strode toward Rydia and crouched before her.
"When Mist said you were a mess, I thought her referring to your state of dress. Now I see she was referring to all of you," the Eidolon remarked, rubbing at what must have been a smudge on Rydia's face.
Rydia's eyes pooled with tears all over again. "This," she said, gesturing to the ruins around her. "Is all that's left."
Shiva sympathetically looked at the charred stones and fallen timber.
"Then I suppose it's for the best that we've business in the Feymarch."
Rydia stared through bleary eyes. "I thought…."
Shiva patted her on the head. "You'll find out soon enough."
"Ready?" Ramuh asked, lifting his staff so that the jewel atop it glowed.
The room took on a fluid cast and shimmered until it resolidified and the village of Mist was replaced with the familiar roads and buildings of the Feymarch.
Shiva helped steady Rydia when her legs buckled from shock and weakness.
Shiva's smile was wan. "I know you're tired, but we're glad you're back," she said, and then sighed. "Would that I could give you better news."
Rydia nodded, swallowing her sorrow. "I know," she replied wearily. "But there isn't time to lose, is there?"
"To the king and queen, then," Ramuh beckoned, brandishing his staff in the direction he meant for them to go.
Rydia took a deep breath and closed her eyes. "Yes," she answered, opening her eyes again. "It's time."
…
A/N: I return to you now, at the turn of the tide…like the recalcitrant layabout you know and love!
Myth, where on earth have you been? Oh, y'know….sucked into the MMO gaming space, sucked into the streamer space, sucked into work as usual, and oh, I dunno, getting married?
Not sure who's still here, but with recent developments with FFXIV, I figured…IV might deserve a bit of a renaissance ;)
Plus, for the first time in seven years I've felt inspired enough to continue.
Also, SebbyWebz, how could you do that to my main girl, Rydia? LOL! You know what you've done….(you'll never read this, it's fine).
Thank you to anyone who's stuck around and to those who review. That aspect of the community makes this whole endeavor worthwhile!
Welcome also, to any newcomers! If you've made it this far in the saga, I assume you're here for the long haul, so thank you, lol. And, er….enjoy the ride!
This chapter has eerie similarities to Escaping the Flames that I wrote, oh so long ago, now. There's a certain symmetry in that, I suppose. 2006, ya'll. Goodness.
Gotta savor those nostalgia bombs while we can!
Thanks again, and until next time….
~Myth