¸.·´¯`·»Hymn of Memories«·´¯`·.¸
"It's a girl!!!" The voice cried out over the courtyard of excited, waiting people. Seifer shifted in the heavy black armor. His heart leapt, when he heard the news. The press of bodies urged through the heavy oak double doors into a throne room.
A man with a heavy bandages over one eye. Covered in red cloths was holding a tiny screaming baby girl. His frail looking wife clutched his arms still swathed in the white birthing cloths. Seifer's eyes met hers, met her shining blue orbs.
The clicked together like magnets, love swelling in his heart. Quistis was in that woman's body, he could see her lucking deep inside. Behind the new shinning joy of mother hood.
That could have been my little girl.
The thought was not Seifer's, but instead the body of the man he was in. Odin, wielder of the great sword Zantatzuken. The only sword his long time rival needed to complete his set. Never would he give up his family heirloom to that arrogant prick, never would he allow him to get all four.
"Her name shall be Quistis!" the man in head shouted. Seifer frowned panic racing though him. What did this all mean, the baby was Quistis? He reached up and took the black helm off letting his long blond hair tumble down his shoulders.
That was the name we had chosen if we were to have a little girl.
He was standing at the head of a chapel. The altar sprawled before him decorated in spring blooms. The towering stone columns around him twined with brightly colored ribbons. It was the only time Seifer had never been in armor. Instead a bit alarmed to find him in dress robes.
A wedding, his bride was walking down the isle. She wore a long gown of white, a gauzy veil hiding her face. He dreaded her every step. How he hated his father for making him marry. His heart would always belong to another. His eyes drifted to her, who was sitting on the front row.
She was cradling her newborn child to her breast. Her prince in red sitting next to her with his arm wrapped around her shoulders.
His bride reached him, and he slowly drew back her veil. Revealing a very young, beautiful Medarra. Her violet eyes looked up at him full of love.
It was a boy. A boy, he was a father. It was a boy, his wife had given birth to a boy. He stood beside her looking down at the tiny baby in his arms. Medarra lay on the bed sweat beaded on her forehead. She smiled a weak smile up at him.
Those violet eyes still carried undying love for him. Too bad he could never return that love.
"What shall we name him?" she asked her voice soft and gentle.
"Seifer, Seifer Almasy" he whispered. Sock rolled through Seifer, but only love filed Odin. This was he as a child.
This was his father and his mother.
The rain was very cold, chilling him to the bone. The armor encasing him pinged with each drop. She was waiting for him in their spot. Inside the tiny gazebo where he had first told her he loved her.
His love was wearing a long black gown her eyes misty with tears.
"Hello my Queen" he said dropping to one knee as a proper knight would.
"Odin" her voice choked out his name. Seifer rose to his feet and took her hands carefully. It was the first time Seifer had ever noticed the blue gem in her hand. Of course it had always been there, the knowledge just hadn't been revealed to him yet.
"How does it feel to be the Queen?" he asked softly.
"Dreadful, why couldn't they have just lived forever?" she asked moving away from him to collapse on the stone bench near by.
"You were destined to rule" he said.
"I was destined to rule a kingdom I don't want, and to marry a man I don't love" she said breaking into fresh tears.
"I love you" he whispered sitting down next to her.
"Why couldn't things be more simple?" she asked resting her head on his shoulder. He slid his gauntlet off the caress her golden locks softly.
"Life hurts, my heart" he whispered.
"You always say that" she whispered back lifting her head up to look him full in the face. He leaned over and kissed her pulling her into a tight embrace.
Only known to Seifer, in the distance Medarra watched with jealous burning eyes.
"The babies, take them far away" Odin said. Panic rose inside Seifer. He held his child in his arm. Wrapped in gray cloth a silver necklace graced his throat. It was the one that Seifer wore even to this day.
He placed his child into her arms. She looked up at him with blue eyes full of love and pain.
"Medarra knows, she is going to do something terrible. You must flee" he said pushing her away a little bit. She nodded and turned to run clutching his child to her chest. He hoped that he had saved her life and the life of his child.
Seifer struggled against the chains that held him.
"Let us go" he shouted to Medarra who was standing before him. The room, the chains, the sigils painted on the floor all of it was too familiar. Then he spotted them across the room chained to the wall.
The man in red, a black patch over his eye. And her, the one he loved.
"Where did you take my child?" Medarra asked her.
"Never" the woman spat her eyes a fiery blue. The gem in her hand held a fire all its own.
"Then I shall destroy you first" Medarra replied turning to walk to the center of the circle.
"If you kill me you'll never find anything out"
"Killing you would be too easy, I shall bind you to servitude for all eternity" Medarra said with a sneer. The man in red started laughing hysterically his laughter mixing with the strange arcane words that Medarra was saying. Her long fingers weaved patterns in the air.
Light flashed over his loves form. She started to struggle screaming in pain. All color drained from her, her body started to melt, change shape.
"Eden!" he found himself screaming the name of his only love.
"Quis" he breathed dropping beside her. She looked at him slowly, her eyes full of pain and shock.
"I was my mother. The woman was my mother" Quistis said. Seifer nodded helping her slowly to her feet.
"Eden is your mother. Odin is my father" he said softly his voice flat. It was too much to handle.
"Seifer, Medarra.. She's your.. mother" Quistis said slowly tears springing in her eyes. Seifer only nodded afraid to speak. She frowned rubbing her forehead.
"Gilgamesh" she blurted out suddenly. It hit Seifer like a ton of bricks, Gilgamesh was the man in red. Gilgamesh had been his father's rival. Four swords, one eye. Of course it all made sense now.
"Ell, you okay?" Seifer asked suddenly shoving the thought of his parents behind.
"She turned them into Guardian Forces, a life of eternal servitude" Quistis whispered.
"Yes" Ellone answered Seifer leaning heavily on Zell's arm.
"There more. I was in a fire with a woman, whom I called mother. Medarra was there. I need to go there" Seifer explained to Ellone. The brunette nodded and placed her hand slowly on his temple.
White.
"No mommy!" the Seifer's voice echoed in through the marble hallway, the licking flames. He rushed at her and beat the flames down with his teddy bear, before putting his little hand into hers. She smiled down at her with her thin lips. They ran together along the corridor smoke filling the boy's lungs.
Suddenly the mother and her son skidded to a stop before a woman standing in the middle of the hallway. Her purple gown shimmered in the firelight, her would be beautiful face ruined by a cruel smile. Medarra, she had come to claim him.
"Why would you do this?" the boy's mother asked her voice so sad.
"You should have kept your hands off my property" the woman in purple said.
"I told you that I found him, beside the river. I did not know he was your child" his mommy said her voice tired and sad.
"He will be leaving with me" Medarra said.
"I hate you!" Seifer screamed suddenly running at the strange woman. Medarra topple to the floor surprised at his attack. He flailed at her with tiny fists hitting flesh. She laughed softly shaking her head.
"So much like your father" she whispered before disappearing. He lay on the marble floor, angry and hot. He turned to see his mother collapsed on the floor.
"Mommy!" he cried grabbing her hand. He dropped his teddy bear and began to drag her towards the door. Tugging pulling, he heaved her onto the slightly damp grass.
"My Seifer" she whispered touching his cheek slightly. Then it slid away her body lifeless, chest no long rising and falling.
"Mommy" he whispered again rocking back onto his heels holding himself. He didn't even have his teddy bear to clutch onto when the tears started to fall.
"I don't even know her name" Seifer whispered to Quistis who was sitting beside him. She looked down at him, the night sky a swath of stars behind her.
"Who?" Quistis asked.
"The woman who took me in before I went to Matrons" Seifer whispered.
"That's why we didn't arrive at the orphanage at the same time" Quistis said. Seifer nodded slowly sitting up.
His brain reeled with too much new information.
Odin was his father. He had killed his father back in the Lunatic Pandora. A man he could have loved and learned from. A man whose traits he eternally carried with him. Obvious since he had tried to take Squall's eye out, much like Odin had done to his rival.
Medarra was dead in his eyes. Betrayed them all. And now she was here destroying his home, and his friends. Wasn't it enough that she had destroyed his life?
The only woman he had known as a mother was dead. Killed by the women that really was his mother. He didn't even know her name, or where that house that had burned was.
And now Medarra had Matron. Matron the woman he had betrayed his home and his friends for. The woman who had became his mother figure.
There was no way he was going to let Medarra kill Matron. He would never allow her to kill another woman he considered a mother.
A/N: Phew, well my darlings, What do you think?