Jahara to the Occupied City of Rabanastre
Author note: A continuation posted because the marvellous Sapereaude13 herself wanted to see it. Praise from Caesar as they say!
Leaving the Garif behind the party moved on towards the last leg of their journey before reaching Rabanastre.
As always Ashe had mixed feelings about returning to her home city. On the one hand she longed to see the delicate white towers that always reminded her of fondant icing of her home and to lay eyes on her own palace once more!
Yet returning to Rabanastre still a fugitive, no closer to reclaiming her kingdom and her birthright than when she left months earlier, with nothing to offer the people of Dalmasca who suffered under the yoke of the Empire, pained her as few other things could.
Of course today, Ashe had another preoccupation; one that should not factor into her thoughts at all. That was in fact an affront to her dignity and completely beneath her status.
She was; she had no choice but to admit if only to herself, fairly use to this preoccupation, or rather this distraction.
Under the cover of making sure they had packed all their essential provisions and left nothing behind in Jahara, Ashe shot a fast, covert look over at her most persistent preoccupation.
He had not said one word regarding her rather obvious reneging on their 'deal' of the previous day. In fact, Balthier had said nothing at all to Ashe this morn.
All things considered Ashe told herself firmly, she should be very grateful he had not.
Especially as she did not think, for a moment, that Balthier was above blackmail, and she had certainly provided him with enough salacious scandal to be forced to pay him for his silence until they were both in their graves.
What in the name of all the Gods had she been thinking?
Heat, she decided rapidly, her mind scrambling for a defence to justify her actions of the previous day. It was the sun affecting her and the stress.
Yes. That was it, exactly.
She was under a great deal of stress, the very fate of Ivalice, not just Dalmasca, rested upon her shoulders; it was understandable she would look for an outlet for that stress.
An outlet that involved inappropriately touching a damned pirate! A dark voice inside her mind spat at her facile rationalisation for nothing short of adultery. She was still a married woman!
A woman married for two and half years to a dead man. Some other part of Ashe's rapidly unravelling psyche yelled back at the first.
'Princess?'
Ashe spun on her heel so fast she was barely aware of the fact that she had pulled the small dagger from her hip sheath as she turned.
' Ooh!'
She found herself blinking dumbly in surprise her blade edge pressed against the throat of an exceedingly unimpressed Balthier.
' A tad distracted this morning aren't we, Princess?' Balthier drawled raising the free hand that wasn't clasping the reins of a Chocobo, to brush aside her blade.
'Balthier ...what..?'
Ashe tried and failed miserably to marshal her wits, casting a morbidly humiliated gaze over the rest of the party only to find, miraculously, that they had somehow failed to notice, while mounting their own Chocobos, that she had almost slit Balthier's throat by accident.
' I inquired if you wanted to take the reins today, Princess?'
Balthier said rather pointedly snapping her skittish attention back where it ought not to have wavered from.
Ashe considered this.
Yes, she decided, considering what had happened yesterday it was probably infinitely safer for her to be in front.
' Very well, Balthier.'
She acknowledged him with a sharp nod, barely catching the laughter hidden in his sardonic brown eyes as she swung herself up onto the bird.
Scant few minutes into their ride and Ashe was silently and vociferously cursing her stupidity that she could ever have thought, even for one stray moment, that having Balthier at her back under such circumstances could be deemed 'safer'.
The entirety of her being, every inch of skin that came into contact with his, was twitching with his proximity to her.
Ashe was almost excruciatingly aware of Balthier's left hand that rested lightly on her hip.
The heat of his chest against her back as he shifted a little closer to her while trying to get comfortable on their mount, muttering something about saddle sores and the shame of becoming a bow-legged pirate, burned her through her clothes.
Every single second that ticked by she waited for him to say something outrageously indecent to her in that provocative, eminently erudite manner of his.
Every second that went by that he continued to say nothing simply prolonged her torture.
Heart hammering, and almost shivering with anticipation (for what she did not know and she would not let herself imagine either) Ashe spurred on their Chocobo until they were leading the way.
She failed to understand why Balthier had let the bird travel so slowly the day before.
' It was not my fault.'
The words seemed to explode from between her chapped, bitten lips once she was confident they were too far ahead for anyone else to hear them.
'Pardon, Princess?'
Balthier's voice was so deceptively mild she wanted to turn around and slap him.
Admittedly she found herself resisting that urge on a near hourly basis at any rate and would sooner deal with that particular impulse than any of the other urges he inspired in her.
' Our agreement, I meant. I would not want you to think that I was raised to renege on agreements made in good faith.'
She stuttered, berating herself for saying anything at all, especially when his silky little chuckle reverberated up her spine.
' Of course not, Princess. Be assured I hold your honour and good name in as high a regard now as I ever did before.'
Ashe blinked, her mind chasing down the barb hidden in the honeyed sweetness of his words and frowning.
' That is not much of a reassurance as you seem inured to my status altogether.' She snapped.
She could almost hear Balthier's smug and self-aggrandising smirk in his words when he next spoke. How could she let such a man as he affect her in this way? Was she mad?
' Very well Princess, then I will say this. The proof of the pudding is in the eating, and I have been left wanting.'
Balthier's right hand appeared in her line of sight but she had no time between registering the rather cheap and tawdry looking rings on his fingers before that hand snaked up her right thigh and under the hem of her skirt to ever so gently pinch the sensitive skin of her inner thigh.
Ashe could not have jumped harder if he had thrown a bolt of Thundaga straight at her.
It was only his wicked hands that kept her from falling from the Chocobo as she let out a yelp that was less shock or pain than it was release. Her stomach performed acrobatics and her heart went into palpitations.
' Upsy daisy Princess.'
Balthier chirped in gratingly cheerful tones as he righted her on the Chocobo, she could hear him laughing at her behind his smile.
' Your Highness, is everything alright?' Basch called from a little ways behind them.
Gods, but they all must have seen her almost take a tumble. The most regal part of Ashe's psyche went in search of a large rock to hide behind in shame.
' Everything is fine, is it not Princess?' Balthier called out in a voice loud enough for Basch to hear.
Ashe opened her mouth and then froze. The sensible part of her mind told her to jump off this Chocobo right now and insist Basch ride with her, no matter what strange tryst he might be engaging in with Fran.
Fran would just have to ride with Balthier; she at least seemed to have some control over the damned pirate.
Another part of Ashe, which appeared to be in the ascendant, argued that she did not want to ride with Basch. She did not want to be dignified and regal and maintain a constant state of decorum.
It was that part of her mind which was keenly aware that Balthier's left hand had slipped from her hip to creep under her white coat and was stroking over her belly.
'Yes.'
Ashe called out in a slightly peculiar voice. She cleared her throat and forced herself to turn and face her self-appointed protector.
' I am perfectly fine, something pinched me while we were travelling and it startled me that is all.'
Basch frowned at her, from behind him Fran's head rose and Ashe was momentarily distracted by the incongruous sight. It looked as if Fran's head was growing from the top of Basch's.
' Pinched you, your Highness?'
Ashe blinked, realised her mistake and quickly dissembled, ' Pinched me? No I said bit me.'
Ashe put as much regal scorn in her tone as she could muster now that Balthier's evil, wicked, fingers were dancing along the waist band of her skirt, testing her boundaries.
Basch did not appear completely satisfied but did not press. Ashe waited until she felt sure that Basch's keen attention was no longer rooted to her before she let go of the reins with one hand to pull Balthier's hand from out of her clothing.
' All I have to do is say and Basch will cut that damned hand of yours off, Pirate.' She hissed.
Balthier laughed, soft and musical and so terribly, terribly intimate.
' Now, now Princess I am doing no more to you than you did to me. Fair is fair.'
Ashe readied an immediate rebuttal and then thought better of it. He was, after all, right; though she had certainly not pinched him, mores the pity.
Balthier seemed to sense her imminent defeat and instead of pressing his advantage and storming her barricades as she might imagine any self-respecting pirate would, he behaved himself like a gentleman and did absolutely nothing for the rest of the journey.
His only concession to the fact that he was a damned lecherous pirate and certainly no true gentleman was the arm he wrapped around her waist and the hand that he kept pressed against her stomach, albeit over her clothing.
Ashe had to fiercely repress the sense of irrational disappointment such behaviour invoked in her for the rest of the journey to towards her rightful kingdom.
It was only as they were dismounting their Chocobo's and about to enter Rabanastre through the East Gates that Balthier, under the guise of courteously helping her down from their mount, whispered in her ear.
' I haven't forgotten your promise, Highness, one greave and one boot, which I may remove myself. A little belly rub is not going to satisfy me.'
Ashe felt her cheeks flame, muscles low in her abdomen clenched, and her traitorous heart flip-flopped in her chest like a landed fish. Nevertheless her pride and her ever-present anger came to her rescue.
'An eye for an eye pirate, you have your fair exchange.' She spat.
Balthier, as smooth and impenetrable as the Mist of the Feywood, simply smirked, tossed his head so the sun caught on his earrings and sauntered off towards Fran.
Ashe bit her bottom lip as she watched him, eyes narrowed, and observed the damned indecent way he had of strutting about the place as if he was monarch.
He had pinched her, the lascivious bastard!
And now, because she had said herself that she would not be taken advantage of by him, she had to contrive someway of pinching him in return.
And Shewas going to aim a little higher than his thigh!