Becoming
She walked down the autumn street, her booted feet crunching into fallen golden leaves. She was oblivious to the sounds they made and the noise of the people around her, oblivious to everything but the turmoil of her mind and the burden that was now hers to carry.
She shivered inside her warm winter coat, remembering things that no one should ever have to see in their lifetime, things that she saw all too often.
Golden wisps of hair fell into her eyes, absentmindedly she pushed them back. Her face was gaunt, her eyes sunken and hollow. She looked like a wraith, although with time she should be healing instead of deteriorating.
A sorceress cannot die without passing on her powers. Her best friend had been a sorceress, and she had died.
Bitter images flashed before her eyes, flashes of pain and sorrow that she did not want to remember, things that she wished she'd never seen. A bloody battlefield, a raging lion, a beautiful angel.
The angel shot through the heart, falling to the ground, the lion rushing to her side, tripping over bodies as he went, falling at her side, holding her chilly hand.
"Rinoa...no...." She could remember his cry as if it were only seconds ago, when in reality it had been more than a year.
The young woman had held his hand tightly, because she knew her fate. "Squall. You have to be strong."
She'd knelt between the two young lovers, taking the younger girl's hand. "Rinoa...you'll be fine. We'll take you to the infirmary, you'll get better..." Her attempts at reassuring the girl were in vain, she knew, as a finger across her lips silenced her.
"You know I'm dying." It wasn't a question.
"I do." She barely could breathe the words, never imagined she'd be saying them.
"You're like a big sister to me, even though I wasn't one of you...Thanks. You made me feel at home." She said simply, her last words destined to be ones of love, her caring heart shining through to the end. "Tell everyone I love them."
Then she had turned to Squall. "Be strong, for me? I love you. I'll be waiting..." She said, repeating their promise with a slow, haggard breath.
Blood was soaking through her blue cloak, staining the angel wings forever red. I looked at her, wondering how she could still be holding on.
That was when I remembered. I knew why she was still here; it hit me as she took my hand.
"Quistis." The voice didn't seem to be hers; it sounded older, wiser. "You know what you have to do." Again, it was not a query.
"Rinoa...I can't."
"You must. That is why you are here. It is your destiny, your birthright."
"It can't be."
"It is, Quistis. You must embrace it." She held my hand with a surprisingly tight grip, and her eyes pleaded with me. "I beg you, accept it."
There was nothing I could do. I had to do what she asked of me.
"I'll do it." I said, quickly, before I could change my mind, accepting a destiny that had long since been decided for me. Seeing the pain in her face, I squeezed her hand gently. Hurry, I urged her. It's hurting you to hold on.
She sighed, relieved, and nodded, her face relaxed.
That was when her powers had passed into me. She had died. Rinoa, who had been so full of life, so animate, the angel no one believed could ever fall.
Dead. Gone. Forever.
And I was left with her powers, her legacy, her undoing. It was a terrible gift, but one I had to take.
I still don't know exactly why I did it. Probably it was because of that longing in her face. She'd glimpsed the next world, and she wanted to go there. I couldn't deny her that, even if it was just an hour while I found a worthier receiver of the sorceress's gift.
She's been gone a year, Squall died a month later. They found him in his room, fallen on his sword. It was reported to be an accident but the six of us left from the orphanage knew the truth.
He'd gone to be with his angel.
Maybe I took the powers because it tantalized me. I did have some magic, the hedgewitch's blue spells, but that was all, nothing to make me into a sorceress. It was intriguing, the power Rinoa had controlled, and I did want to taste some of it.
The day I received the curse of a gift, I did swear to myself that I would control the rage within me at the death of Rinoa, and intertwined with hers, the death of Squall. I would avenge my friends, but I would not go mad with power on the way. The magic would never corrupt me, the lust for more power or eternal life would not blind my eyes.
I would not become another Ultimecia.
To prevent that, I would have to have a knight. Of course, getting a knight wasn't like getting a new weapon. You couldn't just walk into a store and say, I'm a sorceress, I need a knight, something in the thousand Gil price range, please.
Laughing in spite of herself, Quistis turned the corner, her darkening eyes glancing behind her, as if she was afraid of being followed.
Maybe I was scared I was being followed. Why, I don't know. No one would want to follow me. I don't even think anyone knows I'm here.
She'd told the others, her close friends and sometime family that she was taking a break, to come to terms with the change in herself. As politely as possible, she'd made it clear she wanted to be left alone. The only one who hadn't been at the group meeting had been Seifer, who was hiding under a pretense, or maybe a reality of reformation.
They'd told him, of course. Why wouldn't they have?
He wouldn't follow her, probably didn't even know where she was, if he'd even cared, which he most likely didn't.
Satisfied, a little, she tossed the amber scarf over her shoulder and faced forward once again, just missing the young emerald-eyed man who stepped out from behind a tree, the late afternoon sun glinting on his golden hair and his gaze intent on the young woman walking slowly down the street in a preoccupied haze.
Author's Note: I normally don't like to write author's notes, because I think they kinda take away from the stories, but this is just to say the story does NOT stop here and there most definitely will be more and probably soon because I'm on holidays from school and I don't have anything else to do. I know where the story is going, but nothing's ever definite until it's published and sometimes not even then, so any ideas and comments and /constructive/ criticism is welcome.
