Author's note~ I've decided to try and make this story short so I can get it finished before I go home from Uni for the christmas holidays... k?
The morning dawned brightly, the kind of morning that made Quistis glad to be alive. She slid into her instructors uniform and decided to leave her hair loose. It billowed in a golden cloud around her head as she walked out of her room, she yanked a few strands behind her ears as she walked across the courtyard to the guest dorms. It was a place that was only slightly more comfortable than the SeeD rooms and the student dorms. She had brought Marielle here last night, it wasn't often that some waif or another turned up on their proverbial doorstep asking to be taken in, but it did happen. She knocked on the girls' door and went in when she didn't receive an answer. The pallid youngster was curled up on the bed asleep, at least she thought she was asleep, she couldn't even see her breathing. She walked across and put her hand on the girls shoulder. She smiled as her eyes fluttered open and a large yawn cracked on her face. 'Good morning.' Quistis said smoothly.
Marielle sat up quickly, her eyes going from dreamy to hunted in the space of two seconds, they darted around without her moving her head to take in her surroundings. She nodded slowly, remembering where she was. Whatever childhood trauma this kid had undergone Quistis felt for her. They would find out what brought her here in a while, she had asked Squall to assist her with this interview. 'Good morning...' Marielle said quietly. She stood up and looked at Quistis expectantly.
'Well, let's get you some breakfast and then we'll have that interview I told you about last night.'
*
Marielle watched Quistis from the corner of her eye throughout her breakfast. Several people, students and SeeDs came up to talk to her, but it was this woman that held her attention. Marielle shovelled food into her mouth like it was going out of fashion. She hadn't eaten for a while, it was surprising how much was taken out of her by her arrival here. It was only when a young dark haired woman walked into the room that she lifted her eyes away from Quistis. She was smiling and looked supremely confident, as she should be, the power that radiated from her every pore made Marielle's head spin. She looked away and began to breath deeply, the last person who had weilded that power had come close to destroying her. She began to eat, methodically, chewing and swallowing but not tasting. She felt the womans presence coming towards them before she actually saw her.
'Heya Quisty. Not eating again.' Quistis Trepe had gone for her normal breakfast treat of coffee. The woman bit into an apple and grinned.
'Morning Rinoa, could I introduce you to Marielle, she's thinking of joining us here at Balamb...' Rinoa held her hand out to her with a slight frown on her face. 'Marielle, this is Rinoa.' Marielle nodded.
'Of course you would be.' Marielle said and then blinked. 'Sorry, I'm pleased to meet you.' She took her hand and both stared at each other as the connection was made. The apple fell out of Rinoa's hand and shattered against the floor. They dropped each others hand and Rinoa took a shuddering breath, then another. Marielle bowed her head. Quistis stared at the pair of them both in a frozen tableu.
'Are you okay?' She asked Rinoa, who turned to her, eyes a bit surprised.
'Umm, yeah. Don't worry, I think my powers are going a bit squiffy today. They woke me up last night.' She shook her head and cast a speculative gaze at Marielle's bowed head. 'No big deal, I'm gonna have to learn something new to keep them occupied, other wise they continue to complain.' She recovered her aplomb and made her excuses, leaving.
'Come on, I'm sure Squall is waiting for us.' Quistis told her.
*
Marielle still felt the itch that ran down her spine from where Rinoa had touched her. She had never expected that, mind you she had never touched another soceress before unless it was in anger... or pain... or horror. She closed her heavy lidded eyes against her pain, filing it away in her heart, waiting for the right moment to deal with it, for a time when she could stop running. When she could turn and face the people who took her for a monster. Quistis was sat across from her, she would be one of those who believed her for a fiend. She swallowed. The man that walked into the room intimidated her more than anyone else had the ability to, the smile on his face didn't fit, wasn't quite natural.
'Welcome to Balamb, Marielle. Quistis tells me that you would like to come here to train.' Marielle nodded. 'But she didn't say what for exactly... Care to fill me in?' Marielle was stumped.
'Everybody needs something to cling to when they've lost all that mattered to them.' Was all she could think to say, the sudden compassion in his eyes made her feel nervous.
'What brought you to choose Balamb?' He asked her, she pondered what to say with a slight frown on her face, she decided to give him a version of the truth. Soceresses, such as they were, were beginning to come out of the woodwork after the time compression... she knew this. They weren't intimidated now, they were respected.
'My father was murdered by a soceress because he dared to try and save me.' She shook her head, not dropping her icey eyes from his. He nodded coldly.
'We aren't a vengence kick for everyone with a grudge against a soceress you know.' He told her. 'I sympathise with your plight, I really do...' He seemed at a loss for words.
'I'm not going to go after any soceress I see, she's dead now, I killed her.' She lifted her chin arrogently, she couldn't let him beat her, but her heart knew that he already had done so once. He nodded and then frowned.
'But that would mean...' He trailed off and she sighed, then nodded. 'Oh.... So you're looking for a place to hide?'
'No... I'm looking for a place to be taught... a place that doesn't revile me because of something that isn't my fault... I'm trying to understand... Getting nowhere fast on that respect, but I'll try...' She trailed off and he looked at her appraisingly.
'You want Rinoa to teach you?' He asked her. 'One sorceress to another?' She shook her head.
'I'd not ask that off of anyone... It's a soceress eat soceress world out there, or it will be.' She shook her head, she was sharing too much, better for them not to know... better for herself that they didn't know. His face warred with two emotions, worry and compassion. 'I understand why that would worry you... you being a soceress' knight and everything. I will understand if you say no. But I would give anything for some deliverence. Anything.' His face gave away nothing but she could see the fight in him, there was an obvious attraction to the path of least resistance... to keep her away from Rinoa. But he felt sorry for her too... He saw a lot of himself in her, strange considering what she was.
'Why didn't you tell Quistis you were a soceress?' She shrugged.
'It was so much easier not to.' She bowed her head and Squall felt a small peice of apprehension lift from him, she wasn't here with some covert plan, she was just a lost frightened fourteen year old girl. One that had killed... he ignored the small voice in the back of his head. She watched him quietly as he struggled, this was one internal fight she refused to impose her will on, the one aspect of her talent she had managed to master. He nodded.
'Fill in the forms and we'll accept you as a student here.' She nodded quietly.
*
Squall looked around as Rinoa came in through the door that Marielle had just left through. She looked at them questioningly. Quistis sighed. 'She's a soceress.' Was all she said.
'Oh I thought so... just two seconds spent touching her made me feel as though all my bones had fused together. It was weird.' Rinoa looked at Squall. 'So... She coming here?' Squall nodded. 'Good... I want that one where I can keep an eye on her. She's not right.' Rinoa grinned at her own words and laughed self depricatingly. 'Maybe she's a bit young, whatever power she had was a bit wild, not yet tamed.' It had taken Rinoa five years to get her sorcery honed to the level she had, she was just beginning to sense it in others, Edea was pleased with her progress.
Squall picked up Marielle's papers. 'Well one thing is for sure... Marielle Taymar is one of our special cases.'
*
Marielle sat in the darkness of her room that night, tears sliding gently down her cheeks, well they had accepted her, grudgingly but they had accepted her. It had been so long since she had felt that, she had been totally honest during that interview, but lying by omission was still a lie. She was frustrated by the corruptness in her soul, it already had begun and she was frightened of her apathy towards it. Somthing inside her had shifted in the last day, she would be lying if she said that meeting had left her completely unscathed. She had seen the look in his eyes when he had said she could come to Balamb, she had been utterly threatened in a glance. And instead of making her feel slightly cowed, inside she had risen to the challenge, it wasn't where she wanted to be, she was supposed to come here to fight against her destiny, not to fulfill it.
Marielle switched on her light and walked towards the mirror, she looked into it and nodded sadly. The changes were beginning, she was being made different.
Her eyes had gone white.