Disclaimer: I own nothing. I'm just a fucking nerd trying to calm my nerves during this trash fire of a year. So, y'know, don't sue me. I don't have any money.
Ashes of Lucis
Chapter 1: Two Roads Diverged In A Darkened Wood
Note: Because I need more angst and Final Fantasy XV in my life, and I've apparently determined that my latest addiction is writing myself fic about my favorite amber-eyed trash king.
This is Starscourge!Noctis, by the by.
The first time Noctis had put down a member of the Kingsglaive, he had been seventeen years old. Less than six months later, that number had climbed to four score and nine, and, three years later, he had caught wind of and grown rather accustomed to the moniker granted him by his enemies, that of the Shade of Niflheim: A masked man whose face remained unknown to the public. A man who could kill without leaving so much as a bootprint in the earth. A man who, as evidenced by his targeted kills, fought in the name of the Empire.
What Shade always left behind, however, was the telltale trace of daemonic miasma, tainting discarded weaponry and corroding pools of his enemies' blood.
Now, in his twenty and fourth year, he stands ready as a simmering warhound at the Emperor's disposal, under command of the Imperial Chancellor, ever shrouded in myth and mystery even within the boundaries of Niflheim's Empire.
To the elite few who know the truth of the Shade's identity, he is but Noctis, right hand to Ardyn Izunia, and the Inheritor of Black Magic.
"Mind explaining exactly why I can't have the barracks locker room to myself?"
While not strictly a sacred space, there was great freedom and satisfaction in the ritualistic act of cleansing his body, worn through with scars and mottled with bruises and dirt and dried blood. In spite of his tone, the myriad mass of unscented soap bubbles outlining the crown of Noctis' head greatly distracts from any venom he may have worked into carefully chosen words. It matters little in the end, for his unwelcome company is not quite so skittish as the soldiers and citizens who tumble out of his way in the streets of Gralea below.
There's the swift sound of a page turning, a thoughtful hum, and the dark-haired man under fire from the showerhead can visualize his handler's false expression of surprise, followed suit by a smirk Noctis could paint in his sleep. The other man clears his throat and sniffs, magazine slapping the tile as he drops it to the floor, likely in a momentary fit of boredom.
"Mm. Did we not already discuss this?" he asks with a lilt in his tone that, to Noctis' ear, bleeds sarcasm, dry as it may seem when contrasted with the thoughtful look he envisions from behind the frosted door. It isn't. "If I don't babysit you —" A grimace creases his brow, and not just because he's gotten a bit of soap in his eye. "— you may well never find your way back home. Certainly not in this frigid weather."
An exaggerated roll of brilliant amber eyes is the soldier's reply, along with a sneer to match as he rubs calloused hands through his black hair, watching the suds vanish down the drain beneath a curtain mirroring the depths of Gralean winter nights. He inhales, holds the breath for several beats — ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen — and pushes it out, intending to relieve himself of at least some of the irritation brought about by his uncle and undesired visitor.
It doesn't work.
The door swings wide as it's nudged opens, chills rippling across wet skin like waves upon the ocean's surface, and Noctis finds himself glowering all the more at the man seated just opposite the stall, poised on the sill of the open window with a cheshire grin plastered to his face. That certainly explained why the room was so damn chilly.
"I hope you fall," he snaps before his handler can get in another remark, stepping out of the shower stall and onto a plush rug, fresh towel snatched from Ardyn's outstretched arm with a sneer.
The chancellor gasps in mock disappointment, a bemused smile tugging at the corners of his lips.
"My, what a thing to say, Prince Noctis."
"Don't know who that is. Last I heard," Noctis replies, voice muffled by the towel, "the prince had died in Tenebrae."
Ardyn takes great pleasure in that statement, as he already knows. There had been a time, quite long ago now, where Prince Noctis Lucis Caelum — first and only child born to King Regis — had begun to question his life here in Gralea with this man, demanding answers from dawn to dusk, with memories of a scant few years under the care of his native Lucis left to haunt him. It had taken the soldiers years of following this seemingly mad man about Niflheim — relying upon and trusting him — and nagging in earnest to wear the chancellor down, convince him that there was indeed a need for a lost boy fully comprehend the events of that fateful day in the distant homeland of the Oracle.
While Noctis is not the least bit adverse to lying when it serves him, even he has to admit that the sudden deluge of information from his uncle had been startling, his heart rate and blood pressure easily climbing a good twenty points on the charts in the span of less than a second. He had been seventeen on that day — not a boy, but not quite a man — and presented a choice, for Ardyn was not known to be an unreasonable man: On one hand, he could elect to remain in Niflheim, ward to his uncle, continue his ascent through the ranks and secure for himself a life of his own design with Ardyn's guidance. On the other, Noctis could well return to the land of his forefathers in Lucis, weave his way through the wearying ins-and-outs of life as a royal resurrected just in time to take the place of his father, King Regis, on the throne and serve a stone bequeathed by hapless gods.
It had been a matter of several days before Noctis had come up with so much as the inkling of an answer, and his uncle had been frighteningly patient — perhaps too patient.
In the end, he had chosen to remain, to maintain the foundations built firm beneath his feet, and seek to stand on his own. Noctis had been adamant in his refusal to be made a mouthpiece for a kingdom that had long pronounced him dead, for gods that had not seen fit to extend to him knowledge of his discarded birthright themselves. From what little bits of information he'd managed to recover from the Imperial archives, the search for him had ceased less than six weeks following Niflheim's strike in the war against both Lucis and Tenebrae. And the gods? Well, aside from the extensive damage they'd dealt to Eos amidst their petty bickering some several thousand years ago, Noctis had decided he'd be better off ignoring them entirely.
He dresses from the bottom up, clad all in black as he turns his head to quietly admire the way it all comes together in the full-length mirror. The look quite suits him, now more than ever, gentle golden accents of his buckle, cuffs, and buttons bringing out the brilliant shine of Noctis' own eyes peering back at him from beneath a mess of damp, dark hair. The angles of his face are well-defined, and a finger traces one side of his jawline, seeking to determine if an appointment with his straight razor is required before his departure.
His look is one befitting a man deemed the Shade.
"Noctis." The way Ardyn punctuates his name, as if chastising a small child for disobeying explicit instructions, is irritating, and the soldier casts an irreverent glance over a shoulder, electing to stare his uncle straight in the eye rather than through a reflection in the mirror. "You have an appointment, do you not?"
A hand flexes instinctively, and the Starscourge crackles beneath his fingertips, a muted electrical sensation thrumming up and down his arm. Noctis stands tall, straightens his shoulders, giving no thought to the waning patience of the audience awaiting his arrival in the tower some thousand or so meters from their post. Emperor Aldercapt, he's come to learn, is quite a stickler for cleanliness and appearances in his court, and so Noctis expects he can get away with showing up a bit later than expected.
The reconnaissance he's collected of late is, after all, of tremendous worth to Niflheim.
