Chapter Nine: Searching

Day passed into night slowly for Baralai, but swiftly for Seymel – she drifted with ease in and out of consciousness, only waking to be given food. She was grateful that finally she was off the broth and onto solid foods – broth just didn't taste right to her and her paranoia over what it contained had got the best of her mental health the past few days.

Baralai was there whenever she needed him, but the rest of the time he was pacing alone around the Moonflow, seething with a need to find the man who did this and kill him. It was a harsh penalty to pay, even in Baralai's eyes, but he felt the need to get some form of revenge for Seymel's suffering. He also had a nasty feeling somewhere in the recesses of his mind a piece of him that blamed himself for what happened to her. Somehow, it was his fault, whether he should of stayed with her, given up his job as Praetor or made sure she was safe before travelling back to Bevelle.

Baralai sighed heavily and paced alone to the Shoopuf to return to the inn. Another hour of pacing had not had the desired effect Baralai was after – he was more riled up about searching for this man than calming down and focusing on things at hand, people at hand like Seymel sitting there in bed perhaps waiting for him to come back.

The Hypello went to talk to him, but remained silent when Baralai nodded at him and went to go aboard with a severely morbid expression. The Hypello decided he was probably best left alone. Baralai handed the money over and sat back and stared out over the Moonflow at dusk as the Hypello guided the Shoopuf across the still waters.

The pyreflies created a glittering iridescent landscape, but Baralai discarded the sight with a turn of his head toward the approaching inn and rested his chin on his hand. His dark eyes burned with a bitter passion to gain revenge on this apparent mugger. He still hadn't got the fully story from Seymel yet and this drove him mad. He wanted to be in the know – now, so he could deal with the problem swiftly.

He'd never felt so determined to end someone's life – it scared him. He would sit and occasionally realise what he was doing – that he was plotting the death of another life and it suddenly chilled him to the bone.

The Shoopuf docked and Baralai got off and entered the inn, giving the innkeeper a brief nod of acknowledgement before heading straight to Seymel, who sat heartily eating a proper meal.

"Hey there stranger! Haven't seen you all day – where have you been?" Seymel asked between mouthfuls of some sort of fish dish.

Baralai stole a piece of fish with deft hands and popped it into his mouth as he pulled up a chair by the bed with a heavy soul, but shrugged and remained silent.

Seymel pressed her lips together and decided to try and crack him by ignoring his moodiness, so put on a bright smile which Baralai saw through like glass.

"The innkeeper here is amazing. He shipped this right from Kilika just for me!" she told him cheerily, but with meaningful eyes and Baralai sagged in his chair.

"Fine, you win. I've been... thinking that's all," he skirted around his dark thoughts and remained in what Seymel could almost see a pall of darkness around him.

Seymel tipped her head with an unconvinced expression and Baralai began to wish he had some kind of resistance against loving Seymel as much as he did.

"Ever since you were hurt, I've been planning the death of the man who did this," Baralai confided to her in a hushed voice and Seymel shook her head.

"Baralai... you don't even know what happened. There's no need to be this vengeful, really. I'm fine, so as far as I'm concerned it was simply a mugger going further than perhaps he realised," she shrugged, not caring to dwell on her own personal shadowy memories of that day.

Sure, it hadn't been the greatest day of her life and she hadn't really thought about it – hadn't really wanted to, frankly - and it was a closed chapter in her life. She was getting better everyday; only today she got out of bed and shuffled around with only minor pains where the blade had pierced her.

They both had their scars now – his shoulder wound from Nooj's shot and her fresh scar along her stomach – his a small, but stark white mark marring his shoulder, and hers a three inch fleshy red jagged line that she had a habit of staring at whenever she could – she just needed to check it still existed, that it really had happened...

'Perhaps the Nooj Incident is why he's so touchy about my wound,' she considered and finished off her meal thoughtfully.

Baralai frowned and sighed heavily.

"Sey! You're in denial or something, because from what Luzzu told me before he left, it wasn't an attack a mugger would carry out, but that of a murderer. And that's what gets to me – someone wanted to murder you, Sey and I don't want that to happen," he said passionately, making Seymel feel tears well up at his display of emotion.

... Maybe she had been a little reluctant in recent days to consider that the man had intended to kill her, but those kind of thoughts were disturbing.

Blinking back tears, Seymel met Baralai's dark brown eyes with her glittering green ones and took a deep breath.

"'Lai, I'll tell you what happened. It doesn't matter whether I'm 'ready' or not, you probably need to know," she began and Baralai watched her intently. He silently reached out and held her hands and she drew strength from his warmth, "Alright. He just sprang out at me and told me to give him my stuff. I refused and he attacked. I got stabbed and he said to me 'you're not getting out alive' and went to leave, but I hit him with a Flare spell. He got pretty toasted from it, but not enough because he got away. It gets all hazy after that... just memories of feeling dizzy and wishing you were there... then waking up to Luzzu, Elma and Clasko's voices," she fell silent and felt a little shaken, before pushing the memories away as best as she could and turned her thought's to other matters, such as how Nooj was going to react to the news.

Blow sky high probably. He didn't deal with his team getting beaten up, no matter who they were, practically the Praetor's wife or not – just the knowledge of a member down this way would motivate him, if the time she'd spent with Nooj, be it interrogation or training served her right.

Baralai ran what Seymel had told him back through in his own head suspiciously.

"He wasn't a mugger, Seymel, he was out to kill you. What kind of mugger would say something like 'you're not getting out alive' and go to leave you to die? Without taking your stuff with him either, or even searching you to see if you had anything of worth?" he said quietly and Seymel shivered and snuggled into the covers.

"I don't want to think about it any more, 'Lai, okay?" she suddenly said and rolled away from him, willing sleep with all her might to take her away.

Baralai said no more, and just sat and thought. His only movement was to reach over and turn the light off and sit in the dark, alone with his thoughts.

That man was going to murder her. Now he had to find him and bring him to justice. Baralai spent the rest of the night reconstructing Seymel's recount of her memory and reviewing it over and over before slipping into an unwanted slumber.

Seymel awoke to the sensation of a heavy weight resting on her stomach. She got a little worried as to what it could be and cautiously opened her eyes to reveal Baralai sprawled across her, his chair tipped dangerously forward as he slept with an expression of deep anxiousness. Seymel began to feel extremely guilty that she was doing this to Baralai when his chair slipped out from under him and his knees hit the floor with a nasty crack.

His eyes flew open and he gave a loud yell before falling onto the floor and gripping his knees. Seymel quickly went from guilty to humoured and gave an audible giggle that made Baralai give a disgruntled frown at her before slowly rising out of his just-woken grouchiness and into good humour, finally seeing the funny side.

"Morning," he grinned sheepishly and stood, wincing as he straightened.

"Good morning, though by the looks of it, it hasn't got off to a good start for you," Seymel smiled and extended out her arms to Baralai, who gently picked her up and proffered a kiss.

"No, but you just made up for it," he replied modestly.

"Good. What's on the agenda today?" Seymel asked expectantly and Baralai sighed and gave a slight shrug.

"No idea. I was hoping you would come up with something," he smiled half-heartedly and Seymel closed her eyes, hoping Baralai wouldn't get too overprotective at the suggestion she was about to make.

"Could we maybe leave? I'm tired of staying here day in, day out when I could be home at Kilika, or even at the Youth League," Seymel voiced and opened an eyes to spy Baralai's expression.

His eyes went wide, and then concern flooded into them. Seymel knew what this meant, but she hoped after he made his counter speech she could convince him.

"But, Sey you're still weak! The other day you could barely get out of bed you were so frail! Please, reconsider. I want you to leave here healthy and strong..." Baralai pleaded and Seymel knew that he thought it was a lost battle.

'This will make things much easier for me...' she mentally chuckled and fluttered her lashes...

"Isn't packing great?" Seymel sighed as she sat on the edge of the bed, the most energised she'd felt in a long time. This was the best thing to happen these past few days for Seymel and it had done her the world of good.

Baralai uncharacteristically grunted as he hauled a case the innkeeper had kindly lent to them to store a few bits and bobs they had knocking about from the time they'd spent here. Enough potions – hi, low, elixirs, you name it – were lying about to cure an entire city if need be and the money spent on them couldn't be wasted.

He took a neatly stacked line of hi-potions and carefully piled them into the battered old teak coloured case before straightening.

"You know I don't approve of this," he said sternly and Seymel sighed and rolled her eyes.

"Baralai, you sound like an old woman sometimes. Anyways this will be good – I feel better already. Plus it'll give us time to maybe question people about who did this," she pointed at her stomach and Baralai felt a swell of anger roll over him.

"I suppose," he said evenly, but inside a tide of vengeance roiled. After a minute it faded and he felt disturbed, but strangely at home to the feeling now that it had frequently plagued his mind for the past few days.

Seymel could see his mind working behind that bandana, but left him alone to brood and sat back on her bed, the energy of impending escape melting away to reveal the tiredness it had been masking.

Just as she had climbed back into her bed and began to watch Baralai haul a mega elixir into the case a strange feeling came over her as if something was about to happen.

Just as the thought occurred, there was a knock on the door that distracted the two of them and Seymel turned to the door with an expression of interest.

"Uh, come in?" she ventured as Baralai looked up from the packing, wondering who on Spira it could be...

A/N: Coming soon – The Detective!