Title: Word of the Day v. FFIV
Author: Garnet Eyes
Archived: fanfiction. net, livejournal. com
Last Updated: 17 Jul 2011
Summary: 12 November 2000 edition.
Rating: T
Characters/Pairings: Rosa, one-sided Rosa x Cecil, Kain x Cecil
Author Notes: missive, noun;
1. A written message; a letter.
Disclaimers: Final Fantasy IV is owned by Square-Enix and I in no way, shape, or form profit off of my writing. This is simply for my own pleasure, and may at any time be removed and/or modified as I see fit.

...

Rosa did feel a twinge of regret, leaving like this, but she knew it had to be done. Her husband-to-be loved her, but Rosa had a painful moment of clarity only days before she was to be wed, and she knew she couldn't go through with it. Cecil loved her, yes, but it was familial love, like a brother and sister. While the white mage had no doubts that he would do his best to treat her well, she would never have his heart. She couldn't live like that. She loved Cecil too much to bind him into such a situation, never being able to content his heart due to already being tied to another. He would never betray her, she knew, and he may never even realize how miserable he would be, but Rosa would know, and she would know that she had done it to him herself.

Cecil was the gentlest soul she had ever met, always taking so personally any human death on any mission, always mourning them. He'd always been blind to his clear empathy, always thought himself something of a scoundrel for the lengths he'd gone to that he would become the dark knight that His Majesty had desired him to be. He'd never been right for the role, never been capable of dehumanizing himself as much as he'd needed to. He would marry her because he knew that she wished to be his wife, not because he wished to be her husband. Cecil wanted Rosa to be happy, even if he was not. Rosa simply couldn't do that to him.

Her realization had come through a whim of fate, seeing the paladin on the parapets in the late evening, when the twin moons were the only guiding light to see by and she hadn't found him in his room when she'd looked earlier. Cecil was seated in a nook in the stones, propped up by the thick wall and wearing only his silk trousers and tunic, along with his stockings and leather shoes, of course. Kain was leaning against the same wall with his arms crossed over his chest, surprisingly outside of his own armor for once. Neither noticed her, and Rosa did not wish to interfere for the fact that Kain needed someone he could talk to, and he wasn't talking to her. It was peaceful, and no words were actually exchanged while she was witness there, but the white mage had noticed something, something that had made her heart tighten in her breast. She spent a lot of time with Cecil, and she was good at reading him. What she saw made her realize that she had never before had the young adopted prince gaze into her eyes with the undying love that every girl fancied she might find for herself one day. That look wasn't reserved for her; one moment was all that it took for Rosa to realize that such adoration was reserved for Kain and Kain alone.

If she took the paladin as her own, he would never be fulfilled. So she decided, and she took the days leading up to her wedding to prepare. It was a bit cold to leave him standing before the priest, but he was too stubborn to get the point otherwise. Rosa needed time to herself to move on and resolve her feelings for Cecil, so she would travel, see the world again without the threat of violent death hanging over her head, and relearn herself and her own needs before returning. She did not wish to leave Cecil believing that she had been taken against her will, so she made one last stop to place a neatly folded note on his pillow telling him that she had left and why before tightening her cloak around herself and threading her way undetected out of the castle in the commotion of preparations. Hopefully, when she returned in a few years, she would find Cecil content in his relationship with Kain; she didn't doubt that he would forgive her for standing him up. Her mother would be another matter, but Rosa knew in her heart that she was doing what was best, and her mother would simply have to understand that.