[FFXII AU] The Bridge (Basch x Noah) (R) 2/2
Title: The Bridge (2/2)
For: Ronsexchange
Prompt: Ivalice!AU - Noah has already acknowledged that he loved Basch when they were children. Now Basch is a dead man living in Mumma's old house and there's a livid scar over both their brows and Noah finds the old feelings returning. When and how does he tell Basch? Any rating.
Characters/Pairings included: Basch x Noah, Larsa, Balthier and Fran, misc., orig.
Word Count: 12,904 edited to remove some porn
Rating: R - graphic sex (even after the edits)
Warnings: incest, melodrama, shades of purple prose, and my inability to end or transition anything.
Notes: see part one
Darkness returns to Gabranth in the form of a packet delivered to his office several weeks later. It contains Solram’s badge of office, the Order’s scales stained with blood. Nothing else, but Gabranth knows his agent is dead. Fury lances through him - not that he had any great affection for the Judge, but each member of the Ninth is his tool to wield, and how dare those brigands dispose of a man under Gabranth’s jurisdiction? He fights down the hot flare and sips coffee, calculating his next move. Obviously, more than smuggling goes on in the Uplands. Solram must have stumbled upon something worth killing over. He pulls the files that contain Solram’s reports and begins to comb through them.
When his secretary Joraan checks in with him an hour later, Gabranth orders a coffee refill and the personnel files for his lost agent. “Draft a letter of condolence to the family,” he says, and his secretary simply nods. Few beneath him ask questions of the head of the Ninth, one of the reasons Gabranth coveted the position.
At the end of his day, he brings the files with him to Basch’s, a place he increasingly thinks of as home - as in, “I’ll stop in the gambit shop for Basch on the way home,” or “I’ll finish this paperwork at home, when Basch is asleep,” or “I wonder if Basch is home.” He finds himself comfortable with those prosaic thoughts, a tension he’d never really been aware of seeping away at the idea of sharing quarters with his brother. At Basch’s suggestion, Noah even brought some of his clothes to keep in the dresser.
“Not that I mind you wearing mine,” Basch had said, his lips curving up in that way that makes Noah want to kiss him breathless. “But you might be more comfortable.” Noah had agreed without thinking much on it, and only later recognized the action as a prelude to a more permanent arrangement. The idea doesn’t worry him as much as he thought it would.
Basch is napping on the sofa when Noah arrives, having slept poorly the night before through no fault of his brother’s, although Noah had indeed given him cause to retire late. He startles awake when Noah enters, and Basch relaxes back into the cushions with a sleepy smile, his hair tousled and sticking up on one side. Noah grins and stoops down to give him a greeting kiss, smoothing the errant blond strands while Basch’s hand steals up to caress his cheek.
“Are you home early, or have I been asleep late?” he asks, his voice roughened, and a small thrill goes through Noah at his brother’s casual reference to their living together as home. Basch bends his long legs at the knee and scoots up to give his twin room to sit down.
“Both, actually,” Noah replies, settling on the sofa and pulling his brother’s legs across his lap, the file bag temporarily forgotten on the floor. “I brought work with me, so if you’d like to go back to sleep...”
“Later,” Basch says, taking Noah’s hand and lacing their fingers together.
Noah smiles, resolving to make sure Basch naps again while the sky remains light. His brother tugs on his captured hand, and Noah allows himself to tip sideways, bringing his other arm up to catch himself. Basch loops his arms around Noah’s neck and stretches his chin up for a kiss that begins sleepy and soft and flares quickly into something hotter. Basch’s leg slides up over the back of Noah’s as the Magister shifts to lie atop his brother; Basch moans and lifts his hips up to press together the hardness growing between both their legs. Noah’s hand drops to his twin’s waist and slides up under his shirt, caressing the smooth skin and solid ridges of Basch’s abdomen.
Noah remembers their only summer as lovers, the way his blood would heat at a glance, at even the smallest brush of their skin. Once his brother had fully taken him, Noah couldn’t stop thinking about their sex, dwelling on the memory of the last time and anticipating the next. Two decades later, Noah finds himself as randy as a teenager again, spurred to hardness so easily by his brother’s gaze and touch.
They couple right there on the sofa, Basch sitting up and thrusting into Noah from below while Noah grips the back of the furniture to avoid drawing blood from Basch’s shoulders. When their passion spends and Basch slowly eases out and settles Noah in his lap, Noah finds his lips next to his brother’s ear and the words that burn on his tongue simmer close to the surface. He kisses the torn rim of Basch’s ear instead, nuzzling his neck and laying his chin on his twin’s shoulder while he gets his breath back. He doesn’t want to gasp it in the afterglow like a silly child flush with new romance, he tells himself.
Basch murmurs something against his hair, but Noah doesn’t hear it, his blood pounding still in his own ears. “Pardon?”
“I said, you are unlikely to get around to your work at this rate,” Basch repeats, feathering kisses along his brother’s scarred brow.
Gabranth groans and takes the cue to stand, nearly falling as his bad leg fails to take his weight. Basch catches him in alarm, and Noah grits his teeth, massaging his hip. “It’s nothing,” he mutters. “The humidity of the season settles in my bones.”
“Aye, don’t I know it,” Basch agrees, rolling his shoulders back with a wince. “Perhaps we two old men shouldn’t fuck quite so vigorously in the rain, eh?”
“Old?” Noah replies archly, well aware he has the greater stamina of the two of them.
Basch laughs. “Well, badly used, mayhap. Come on, then.” He leads his brother into the bathroom, where they wash and caress each other, kissing leisurely under the shower’s spray. Everything wrong between them seems distant, and Noah can’t help but wonder if this is close to what they might have had together, if the world hadn’t ended twenty years ago.
During a quick meal Noah whips up for them, he tells Basch of Solram’s fate. His brother’s jaw clenches briefly, and Gabranth can see the guilt that adds another shadow to his twin’s blue eyes - another man dead because of me. He touches Basch’s hand, but doesn’t bother to protest, knowing that Basch will not hear. In some things, his twin remains the stubborn youth who refused to admit defeat in the mountain camps of the militia. Basch hears what he wishes, and bears burdens he shouldn’t; Noah accepts this with regret, but no longer seeks to avoid mentioning news that could add weight to his twin’s scarred shoulders. Seeking to shield Basch from more pain only adds distance between them.
Sometimes Noah marvels that it’s taken him this long to begin to understand his twin; sometimes he wonders if Basch has any glimmer of understanding himself.
Later, Gabranth goes over his files again, searching for clues about how to proceed. Finally, he sighs and mutters, “I’ll have to send someone else.”
Basch doesn’t look up from his book. “I’ll go.”
“And yet, without knowing the entire situation, I hesitate to - What?”
“Send me.” Basch’s toes, tucked under Noah’s thigh, flex as he pokes his brother with them. “Close your mouth unless you plan on my sticking something in there.”
“Basch, the last person we sent died,” Gabranth argues, glaring.
“So send a dead man next.”
“Stop calling yourself that!”
Basch finally looks up at him, and there’s a haunted quality to his stare that breaks Noah’s heart. “I am, though, you saw to that.” Stricken, Noah flinches, but Basch sits up to touch his arm. “Noah, we must speak of this, it festers still. You killed me when you killed my king. I live but a half-life now, hidden from the world in plain sight. I’m not complaining, Noah, truly; I’ve told you time and again that you’re all I need. But I wish...” He trails his fingers over his brother’s arm, frowning. “I wish to be useful to someone again.”
How long will I be enough to sustain you? Hadn’t Noah only recently asked himself that? Fear of driving Basch further away makes his throat tight. He swallows hard, staring at his brother’s beloved features, seeing only the scar they share. Now he understands why Basch dwells so often on the cut he made in Noah’s face - it links them in pain and regret the way their shared childhood links them in joy. “You... You are useful to me.” Basch’s brow creases and Noah shakes his head, realizing how that sounds. “No, I mean... Basch.” How will I ever make up for what I’ve done? Have we not both suffered enough?
Basch studies him for another long moment, then settles back, picking up his book. “Never mind. I’m little suited for clandestine work, anyhow.” His body language reveals anger, although his expression smooths out and remains placid. Noah’s stomach roils.
Finally, he closes the file and hands it to his brother. “Here,” he says gruffly. “If you’ve a mind to go, you should study what Solram reported of the situation since the end of your tenure. You’ll need to set out within the week. My office will compose a suitable cover story for you.” He stands and stretches. “Contact your pirates; they’ll provide a good cover for your infiltration.” Stiffly, he walks to the kitchen for a drink and a moment alone. The liquor burns his throat as it goes down, distracting him momentarily; he waits for the sound of Basch approaching, but his twin leaves him by himself.
Standing at the counter, Gabranth closes his eyes and allows himself to tremble with a grief so strong it nearly undoes him. This will never work. We are fools to think it will. Again he remembers the summer when everything seemed so perfect, when their whole lives stretched before them and the idea of separation was only a nightmare to trouble Noah’s sleep. I loved you so much. If I had told you then, would you have stayed? If I tell you now, will it be enough to keep you when we have so little left to us? The idea of Basch among murderous smugglers worries him, but his brother’s valor is well-proven, and doesn’t cause Noah’s panic. The idea, though, that Basch will never come back, that once gone from this ghost-life he’ll find no reason to return to Archades, terrifies Noah. He cannot seem to keep from wounding his twin despite all his heartfelt promises; Basch is not happy, doesn’t claim to be, and Noah cannot keep him in another cage.
He’s too lost in his thoughts to hear when Basch finally comes up behind him, and startles when strong arms close around his chest. “Let me go,” Basch whispers against his brother’s back. “Trust me.”
“If I had not tried to make you stay, so long ago, you might have come back,” Noah whispers without moving; the thought has etched holes in his heart for two decades, that Basch’s refusal to return was Noah’s own fault. “To make the same mistake again... I will not, this time.”
Basch tenses in surprise, then hugs his brother more tightly, finally understanding the problem. “Oh, Noah. I am so tired of running away. I want a home, with you, as we once dreamed, be it here or elsewhere. Can you believe I speak truth?”
Noah turns in Basch’s embrace and grips his brother’s arms. “I hated you. Fully, with every fiber of my being. I burned our house to the ground so you would never again call it home. So I could destroy all trace of what we might have built together. I would have sown the earth with salt had I the time, killed the land because I couldn’t kill you.”
Basch doesn’t blink. “Only a great passion - “ he stumbles slightly on the word, Noah hears clearly what he almost chose to say - “could produce such intense hatred.”
“You know I loved you,” Noah replies, honest in his sudden weariness for the dance of words. “And you are correct, Basch. I must let you go. Whether I believe your words or not, I will not fetter you. Only one of us must be bound by steel, you are free to do as you wish.”
Basch sighs and leans his forehead on Noah’s. “Would you leave Larsa, if I asked? Betray your oaths and leave your steel cage of armor behind?”
Gabranth wrestles with himself, then regretfully shakes his head. “I cannot,” he whispers.
To his surprise, Basch smiles. “Good. I could not care so deeply for a man who would break his given word.” He kisses his twin softly. “Come to bed, my Noah. Let me ease your fears, as you have so often done for me. And I will swear to return to you, over and over until you truly hear me.”
Noah looks into eyes the same as his and whispers, “I would trade all I have to go back to our summer.” When I fell in love with you. When everything seemed so perfect.
“I,” Basch whispers back, “would trade the world for the same.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
During the months of Basch’s absence, Gabranth buries himself in work. He moves the rest of his belongings to his mother’s former dwelling, giving up his quarters in the Imperial building. He sleeps in Basch’s bed, breathing his brother’s scent until it fades from the pillow. Larsa comments in passing over a breakfast meeting that his bodyguard’s demeanor has chilled of late, and was anything amiss? Basch as Gabranth would have revealed the truth, but Noah is not his brother, and believes his monarch has no need to know the details of the Ninth’s maneuvers until they bear fruit. Upon this matter, Larsa often disagrees.
He does explain that he’s in the midst of an investigation, and needs must reduce his visible presence around the city. Larsa, after a troubled and thoughtful stare, concedes; Gabranth from then on takes meetings with the Emperor in private, and appears in public only fully armored and helmed. The Ninth has played such games in the past, notably when Judge Gabranth was growing his hair and beard, shortly before Vayne commissioned him Magister. Larsa dislikes secrecy, but acknowledges its uses, and is young enough to bend to his advisers’ expertise when he deems it worthwhile. Gabranth remains mostly in his office, reviewing documents and letters.
The reports that infrequently arrive in Basch’s hand are couched in a code nearly forgotten: the made-up language of twins who always preferred each other’s company to that of nearly anyone else’s. Noah deciphers the code - and his twin’s crabbed and untidy handwriting - and formulates plans.
Powerful drugs, originally brewed through experimental studies at Draklor Laboratories, have made their way to the black market. Stronger than the perception-altering serums Dr. Cid used upon Gabranth himself to sell the ruse that ended the Dalmascan Opposition, the new formula goes by the name Entite, for the way it knocks a person senseless to the world. Shipments get processed in makeshift labs set up in the Salikawood and distributed through a series of middlemen to at least three nations. Something about the high levels of Mist in the brewing process transform the drug from simply a strong hallucinogen to a substance that can separate soul from body, betimes with permanence.
Basch’s efforts focus on gathering enough incontrovertible evidence to shut down the entire operation, since eliminating the upland smugglers will only shift the ring further underground and cause the Ninth to lose their trail. The sealed letters, delivered by a network of moogles Basch knew as a fugitive, contain details to curl Noah’s hair. Undercover, Basch sampled a shipment, and described the effects as best he could so Gabranth could pass the information to physics and healers treating those found in various states of stupor. When he read that, Noah put the letter down and stared out the window for nearly twenty minutes before his hands stopped shaking with rage and fear.
Finally, the message he waits for arrives - Basch is ready to act. Gabranth sends instructions and arranges his schedule, then packs lightly, locks up the apartments, and, cloaked and hooded on a fortuitously damp day, takes a cab to the Aerodome. He paces uneasily, blending in as another impatient Archadian passenger, until he spies a willowy viera with her long, undyed hair caught up in a delicately filigreed mythril clasp. He hefts his long bag - the Chaos Blade and Highway Star are concealed within, along with his armor plates and cloak of office - and makes his way over to her.
“Is all prepared?” he asks without preamble as she turns; he should have known he could not catch her unawares.
“Follow,” she replies, giving him nothing. He had not experienced nor expected a thawing in her haughty demeanor as she sparred grace and skill back into his damaged limbs over a year ago. Certainly, her manner with his twin showed a vast difference - Fran liked Basch and treated him with easy familiarity.
He walks behind her as she angles through the press of people to a private berth. She glances back once, a smooth turn of head and shoulder, whether to assure herself Gabranth followed or to catch him staring at her bare and shapely rear, Noah isn’t sure. In any event, he trods nearly on her spiked heels, and while he can appreciate the aesthetic value of her form, she causes nothing to stir but his impatience as they move through the Aerodome.
Noah is ninety-percent certain his brother enjoyed the viera’s favors, but being jealous of Fran is a little like being jealous of Zalera for marking Basch its own. Noah simply is not in that competition.
Her partner, on the other hand...
They climb aboard the Strahl, and Gabranth stiffens as Ffamran drawls a barbed greeting from within the ship. His response could have formed icicles on the vessel’s hull, and Fran shoots him a look, accompanied by the pirate’s laughter.
“Now, Judge Magister, don’t forget we’re doing you a favor, hm?”
“You are,” Gabranth replies stonily, “doing Basch a favor, and doing the Emperor a favor, two people whose presence you enjoy. I owe you little, pirate, although I appreciate your willingness to serve the Empire of your birth.”
Ffamran - Balthier, he keeps reminding himself of the preferred name - only offers a tight little smile and turns away to duck into the cockpit. Gabranth and the viera follow, Fran taking her seat at the console and Gabranth choosing one in the second row behind her, where he can watch Balthier.
The ship lifts smoothly from her berth, and Gabranth keeps his thoughts regarding stolen Imperial property to himself. After clearing Archadian airspace, Balthier glances at his co-pilot , who nods and directs her attention to the vast sky. Bunansa's renegade son rises and walks back to perch across the aisle from Gabranth, who glares at him.
"Do you have a plan?" Balthier asks. Gabranth lifts his chin and doesn't deign to answer. "Only because I just had the Strahl repainted, and I would so hate to see her hull scratched in some sort of scuffle."
"You need only drop me off," Gabranth growls coldly.
"And miss the opportunity to see Basch? I had hoped to at least spend a night, maybe two, while you perform your maneuvers," Balthier smirks, closely watching the Magister's face. Gabranth unwittingly rewards his scrutiny; his brows draw in and his eyes blaze, his lips thinning down to a white line. He very loudly says nothing, having learned that he cannot best the sky pirate's silver tongue. He stands instead, offers a mocking half-bow, and retreats to the rear of the ship.
The room in which he once lay dying has been scrubbed clean, the linens on the narrow berth spotless and tucked as neatly as any military cot. He sinks down onto it, feeling the ache of his old wounds and the threat of new ones. The pointed banter reminds him of how things stand unresolved with his brother, and dread churns in his belly. He sits for a long time alone, considering the situation from many angles, until finally Fran clears her throat from the doorway.
"I do not mean to disturb," she says, "if you require solitude."
"I... No, Lady," he replies, still lost in dark thoughts. "Basch would say I am too much alone as it is."
Her bowed lips curve up in a tiny flicker of gentleness. "It is of your brother I wish to speak, if you would allow." Gabranth waves his hand at the end of the bunk, inviting her presence; Fran folds gracefully down and regards him with a cool gaze. "Basch speaks to us, at times, of you."
"Does he?" Gabranth feels his brows rise, his naked expression always so difficult to control.
"Yes. Always with a tenderness Balthier opines you do not deserve."
Gabranth shrugs, looking away, at his boots on the polished cabin floor. "Perhaps he has the right of it. Basch forgives easily and dislikes conflict. Ever he sought to keep peace in the scuffles of our youth, unless he felt rightously aggreived. Even when the first punch thrown was his, so too was the first extended hand."
"Impetuous, and repenting of it?"
"Always," Noah whispers. He shakes his head and regards her. "Lady, what would you have me say?"
The smile lasts longer this time. "You have said it, though I believe you meant not to. I hear what lies in the spaces between your words. I have expressed my disapproval to Balthier; he will cease probing at that particular wound. Tell me, what plan do you have?"
Noah stares at her, taking in her calm wisdom, beginning to understand the balance of power in her relationship with Balthier. Equals, a true partnership - his doubts crystallize into a sudden resolve. "You give Balthier what he needs to fly freely, do you not?" At her slight nod, he spreads his hands. "I must then do likewise."
"Good." She tilts her head to one side, an ear twitching with amusement. "Though I meant your mission."
"Oh." He reddens, and looks again at the floor. "Basch will become Gabranth and bring evidence and testimony to the Imperial court. My face is known now in the city, thanks to the Lord Larsa, and Basch's identity as mine will not be questioned. Teams await my word at the edge of the Salikawood; the strikes will be coordinated with Basch's arrest of the smugglers here. We have cast a wide net, and now reel it in."
"What you need of us for success, only ask." Her mouth curves in a feral grin. "Drug smugglers are bad business for honest pirates." With that, she leaves Gabranth to his musings.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
They inn they've chosen for the transfer is large enough that he might go about his buisness unremarked upon. Balthier and Fran busy themselves sampling the local wine; a mix of races frequents the common room, although perhaps not as heterogeneous a group as might be in Dalmasca. Still, the viera draws only the worthy attention her grace and beauty deserves. Balthier blends in completely, to his vast annoyance.
Gabranth strolls by the front desk, and a clerk calls out to him, "Sir, that message you were looking for has arrived."
He approaches the polished wood and watches as the trim young woman reaches into a cubby for a scrap of folded paper. On the back, in the clerk's neat handwriting, reads "rm 405." Gabranth takes it with thanks and opens the fold to see Balthier's handwriting and a few lines of poetry from a popular play about a pair of lovers who died in tragedy and were reborn as twins so they might spend their next lives always at each other's side. His cheeks heat and he forces himself not to crumple the paper and throw it at the back of the pirate's head as he passes through the bar on his way up to the rooms.
He finds the room and pauses to take a deep breath, composing all the compelling arguments he's constructed throughout the flight and in the prior weeks of solitude. The knob turns easily under his hand, left unlocked as they had agreed. He knocks briefly and opens the door.
When Gabranth walks into the small room and sees his brother by the window, calmly oiling his gear, all thoughts fly straight out of his head. Basch has shaved and cropped his hair to match his twin’s and wears Archadian-tailored clothing, and the sense of dislocation is so complete that it shocks the breath from Gabranth’s lungs. Until Basch looks up and smiles radiantly to see his brother, an expression purely his own.
How could we ever pull off these ruses, Gabranth recovers enough to think as Basch stands and strides across the room, when we are so very different? And then his twin’s strong arms wrap around him, and Noah puts his face into Basch’s neck in a fierce hug. He can feel the thump of Basch’s heart as their chests press together, his pulse speeding up.
“I missed you,” Basch says quietly, and Noah gives in to the inevitable, to what has become so painfully clear in these last few months. He is in love again, and glad for it.
“And I you,” he replies. “I’ve been worried.”
Basch loosens his grip enough to bump his forehead against Noah’s with a chuckle. “You always worry.”
“Your letters... Mitron’s balls, Basch, I’ve been afraid for you.”
Basch slides his hands up Noah’s arms to cup his face, rubbing his thumbs lightly over his twin’s smooth cheeks. “It has been...harrowing, I’ll grant you that.” He leans in and brushes his lips tenderly over his brother’s. “I am mortally glad you’ve arrived to take over.”
“Only for that?” Noah can’t help but ask, not an entirely joking question.
“Will you never be done doubting me?” Basch asks without heat, although it smolders in his gaze.
“I doubt myself,” Noah replies softly, his hands too tight on Basch’s hips. “I doubt my ability to be enough for you, with all I’ve stolen from you.”
“Let’s not talk of this now,” Basch whispers, kissing the crease between Noah’s brows.
“Basch... We must talk of this eventually. I thought you were tired of running?”
His brother looks at him soberly, then nods. “Speak, then, of your fears, so I may allay them once and for all.”
Noah sighs. “I have, just now. What sort of life can I grant you, after I dedicated myself to destroying yours? I would go with you far away, where you could live freely and without having to hide, but I cannot leave my lord.”
“No more would I ask you to,” Basch replies firmly. “Your duty does you credit.”
“So what does that leave us? You live as a ghost, and I the man who condemned you to it.” Noah’s fingers tighten on Basch’s hips, revealing his desire to hold on even as he speaks the words to sever them from each other. “We cannot go on like this.”
Blood drains from Basch’s face. “What... What are you saying, Noah?”
Gabranth offers a small, bitter smile. “I swore to you and myself that I would not see you caged again. I intend to hold to that vow. But I would make another to you, if you would hear.”
Basch nods, hiding his fear behind the mask of his face; Gabranth wears no helm, and cannot easily do likewise. He lifts one hand to touch the scar above his brother’s eye, then his lips, finally flattening his palm over Basch’s racing heart.
“For two decades, I have wondered, if I had spoken my feelings for you, would you have so easily left me behind? Did I drive you away, that last night? Did you leave because of some failing of mine?” Basch opens his mouth to protest, and Noah shakes his head. “Basch, these fears I have kept in my heart, and they still drive me. I dislike change. I long for the past, and you... you seem to divorce yourself from it so easily. Perhaps I envy that in you. But I am no longer a child, and I have known the ruination of all I held dear, and laid that at your feet all the while wondering if I am myself to blame. My conclusion,” he says, smiling a little, “is that we are both at fault for allowing the war and our own fears to tear us apart. We were so young. I dare say we would make different choices as adults.”
Basch nods, rapt, his blue eyes bright with things unspoken. Noah takes a deep breath and prepares to bring all to light. “So I make a different choice now. You have always been the center of my world, in love and in hatred. That hasn’t changed. Twice I have destroyed your home, and so my vow is this: I will make you a home, Basch, and wait for you there, wherever your heart takes you. You owe me nothing; I ask only your consideration, that the time we have together is our own, with no more ghosts to haunt us.” He swallows around his pulse, which has risen into his throat, and waits for Basch’s reply.
“My heart,” Basch says thickly, his gaze intent, “will always take me back to you. Only believe that, my Noah. I lacked the courage to tell you when we were young, thinking you understood from my actions what I felt. I, too, learn from my mistakes.”
Noah nods, something easing in his chest at the rare endearment that had once been his brother's frequent pet name for him. “Basch, I love you. I’m sorry I allow my fears to get in the way of that. I cannot promise you I’ll be able to cease, but I will try. For you I would try anything, to make you happy.”
Basch’s expression defies description, and his breath catches in his throat. “You...love me?” he asks in a low voice, sounding stunned.
Noah smiles, relieved to have it out at last. “I always have; I dislike change, remember?” He sobers and finally looks away, ashamed. “Even when I despised you. As you said, only a great love could become such a profound hatred. I didn’t want to risk feeling that again.” He takes a deep breath and slowly exhales. “But all life is risk, and I cannot halt what rises in my breast when I look at you. I fell in love with you at fifteen. I am in love with you now. Nearly all the time in between has been wasted, but I will no longer waste this gift of you.”
He would go on, but Basch touches his lips to stem the tide of his words, and turns Noah’s chin so he can again meet his gaze. “You always talk too much, my Noah,” he says, smiling tenderly, “but I have longed to hear you say this.” He kisses his brother, letting loose all the passion within him regularly held in check, and Noah has no more breath to talk, then or for some time afterwards.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The mission itself seems anticlimactic to Noah, perhaps because for once it went smoothly. "Perhaps Gabranth needs must be in two places at once," Basch had said, and it works beautifully, the twin strikes well-coordinated and executed without a hitch. Despite the knowing glances and unsubtle gibes from Balthier on their flight to the Salikawood, Gabranth remains calm, exchanging only a beleaguered look with Fran, who grins at him and threatens to kick her partner if he does not mind the controls more than the Magister. Balthier's answering smile contains some satisfaction, and Noah wonders what Basch had told him in the few hours they socialized before parting ways again.
He makes it back to Archades for the trial, his prisoners sent ahead of him while he supervised the destruction of the labs and posting of patrols, coordinating the effort with Dalmasca under the peace treaties. In an unassuming judge's armor and helm, he watches his brother take the stand, projecting Gabranth's icy arrogance. If the Magister's voice is lower and rougher than usual, the accent tainted with long desert vowels, no one seems to question the change. Noah spends the brief recess calculating how long it would take for Basch's hair to grow back out to normal, then smiles to himself at his own daft thoughts.
After business finally concludes, the twins celebrate a homecoming together, and Noah whispers his love into Basch's ear while his brother shivers within him. Being able to say the words after nearly a lifetime of holding them in makes Noah lightheaded with relief and a quiet bliss; even the scars etched into his twin's burnished skin can't dim the euphoric glow that buoys his heart. He loves Basch, and he loves the look on Basch's handsome face when Noah says he loves Basch, and after too many long years of pain, Noah thinks he might finally be starting to heal.
The only thing to mar his enjoyment is Basch's silence - his brother hasn't yet repeated what it cost Noah so much to finally say. But Noah finds, lying in their bed with Basch's limbs heavy with sleep and entwined with his own, that he can wait until his twin feels ready. Basch lost much to the dark loneliness of Nalbina's dungeons, with only his fading purpose to sustain him; Noah admits to himself a surprising empathy and the ability to put aside his habitual impatience. Basch will say it - it shines in his eyes, beats with his pulse, glimmers in every touch of hand or lips. If Basch hesitates to commit himself to the man who tried to destroy him, Noah cannot blame him. He waits, thinking of cages, and watching sometimes the airships that zoom out of Archadian skies like birds. He will not chain his brother, but learn, instead, to trust Basch's good heart.
One night, falling asleep in bed over a stack of reports on magicite mining, Noah snuggles a little closer to Basch, who sits up with him and reads stories about the Garif. He plans a visit to Jahara soon to train with Supinelu and his warriors for a few weeks and renew his friendship with the War-Chief. Gabranth cannot leave while the incoming Bhujerban delegation lingers discussing new trade agreements, but he's already thought about the meal he'll cook for Basch's return - his brother's favorite Dalmascan dishes, now that Noah's gotten adept at wielding those powerful spices. Basch's arm lies companionably around Noah's waist, the book propped on his bent knee and his cheek resting on Noah's head. Their fingers lace together over Noah's flat belly, each of them needing only one hand to turn pages. When he notices his twin's chest beginning to rise and fall more slowly, Basch chuckles and kisses Noah's hair.
"Enough reading, time to sleep, my Noah," he says, disturbing them to stretch and lay his book on the bedside table.
Noah makes a muffled protesting sound and blinks his heavy eyes. "A few more minutes, I need to finish this," he mumbles, shifting through papers. Basch reaches over and yanks the folders out of his hands, putting them on top of his book and kissing Noah between his folded brows.
"I love you, but I swear I'm not leading you around when you go blind from all this late-night reading by magelight," he declares, laughing. "You'll have to get a helping dog instead," he teases. His grin diminishes into a tender smile as Noah sits up straight and stares at him; Basch knows what he has said.
"You... Basch," Noah breathes, and tackles his brother, throwing them both flat onto the bed.
Over on the dresser, Basch's small glowstone casts pale light over their bodies as they couple happily, trading kisses and love freely, banishing the ghosts in the shadows until the morning sun dawns on their entwined bodies.
For: Ronsexchange
Prompt: Ivalice!AU - Noah has already acknowledged that he loved Basch when they were children. Now Basch is a dead man living in Mumma's old house and there's a livid scar over both their brows and Noah finds the old feelings returning. When and how does he tell Basch? Any rating.
Characters/Pairings included: Basch x Noah, Larsa, Balthier and Fran, misc., orig.
Word Count: 12,904 edited to remove some porn
Rating: R - graphic sex (even after the edits)
Warnings: incest, melodrama, shades of purple prose, and my inability to end or transition anything.
Notes: see part one
Darkness returns to Gabranth in the form of a packet delivered to his office several weeks later. It contains Solram’s badge of office, the Order’s scales stained with blood. Nothing else, but Gabranth knows his agent is dead. Fury lances through him - not that he had any great affection for the Judge, but each member of the Ninth is his tool to wield, and how dare those brigands dispose of a man under Gabranth’s jurisdiction? He fights down the hot flare and sips coffee, calculating his next move. Obviously, more than smuggling goes on in the Uplands. Solram must have stumbled upon something worth killing over. He pulls the files that contain Solram’s reports and begins to comb through them.
When his secretary Joraan checks in with him an hour later, Gabranth orders a coffee refill and the personnel files for his lost agent. “Draft a letter of condolence to the family,” he says, and his secretary simply nods. Few beneath him ask questions of the head of the Ninth, one of the reasons Gabranth coveted the position.
At the end of his day, he brings the files with him to Basch’s, a place he increasingly thinks of as home - as in, “I’ll stop in the gambit shop for Basch on the way home,” or “I’ll finish this paperwork at home, when Basch is asleep,” or “I wonder if Basch is home.” He finds himself comfortable with those prosaic thoughts, a tension he’d never really been aware of seeping away at the idea of sharing quarters with his brother. At Basch’s suggestion, Noah even brought some of his clothes to keep in the dresser.
“Not that I mind you wearing mine,” Basch had said, his lips curving up in that way that makes Noah want to kiss him breathless. “But you might be more comfortable.” Noah had agreed without thinking much on it, and only later recognized the action as a prelude to a more permanent arrangement. The idea doesn’t worry him as much as he thought it would.
Basch is napping on the sofa when Noah arrives, having slept poorly the night before through no fault of his brother’s, although Noah had indeed given him cause to retire late. He startles awake when Noah enters, and Basch relaxes back into the cushions with a sleepy smile, his hair tousled and sticking up on one side. Noah grins and stoops down to give him a greeting kiss, smoothing the errant blond strands while Basch’s hand steals up to caress his cheek.
“Are you home early, or have I been asleep late?” he asks, his voice roughened, and a small thrill goes through Noah at his brother’s casual reference to their living together as home. Basch bends his long legs at the knee and scoots up to give his twin room to sit down.
“Both, actually,” Noah replies, settling on the sofa and pulling his brother’s legs across his lap, the file bag temporarily forgotten on the floor. “I brought work with me, so if you’d like to go back to sleep...”
“Later,” Basch says, taking Noah’s hand and lacing their fingers together.
Noah smiles, resolving to make sure Basch naps again while the sky remains light. His brother tugs on his captured hand, and Noah allows himself to tip sideways, bringing his other arm up to catch himself. Basch loops his arms around Noah’s neck and stretches his chin up for a kiss that begins sleepy and soft and flares quickly into something hotter. Basch’s leg slides up over the back of Noah’s as the Magister shifts to lie atop his brother; Basch moans and lifts his hips up to press together the hardness growing between both their legs. Noah’s hand drops to his twin’s waist and slides up under his shirt, caressing the smooth skin and solid ridges of Basch’s abdomen.
Noah remembers their only summer as lovers, the way his blood would heat at a glance, at even the smallest brush of their skin. Once his brother had fully taken him, Noah couldn’t stop thinking about their sex, dwelling on the memory of the last time and anticipating the next. Two decades later, Noah finds himself as randy as a teenager again, spurred to hardness so easily by his brother’s gaze and touch.
They couple right there on the sofa, Basch sitting up and thrusting into Noah from below while Noah grips the back of the furniture to avoid drawing blood from Basch’s shoulders. When their passion spends and Basch slowly eases out and settles Noah in his lap, Noah finds his lips next to his brother’s ear and the words that burn on his tongue simmer close to the surface. He kisses the torn rim of Basch’s ear instead, nuzzling his neck and laying his chin on his twin’s shoulder while he gets his breath back. He doesn’t want to gasp it in the afterglow like a silly child flush with new romance, he tells himself.
Basch murmurs something against his hair, but Noah doesn’t hear it, his blood pounding still in his own ears. “Pardon?”
“I said, you are unlikely to get around to your work at this rate,” Basch repeats, feathering kisses along his brother’s scarred brow.
Gabranth groans and takes the cue to stand, nearly falling as his bad leg fails to take his weight. Basch catches him in alarm, and Noah grits his teeth, massaging his hip. “It’s nothing,” he mutters. “The humidity of the season settles in my bones.”
“Aye, don’t I know it,” Basch agrees, rolling his shoulders back with a wince. “Perhaps we two old men shouldn’t fuck quite so vigorously in the rain, eh?”
“Old?” Noah replies archly, well aware he has the greater stamina of the two of them.
Basch laughs. “Well, badly used, mayhap. Come on, then.” He leads his brother into the bathroom, where they wash and caress each other, kissing leisurely under the shower’s spray. Everything wrong between them seems distant, and Noah can’t help but wonder if this is close to what they might have had together, if the world hadn’t ended twenty years ago.
During a quick meal Noah whips up for them, he tells Basch of Solram’s fate. His brother’s jaw clenches briefly, and Gabranth can see the guilt that adds another shadow to his twin’s blue eyes - another man dead because of me. He touches Basch’s hand, but doesn’t bother to protest, knowing that Basch will not hear. In some things, his twin remains the stubborn youth who refused to admit defeat in the mountain camps of the militia. Basch hears what he wishes, and bears burdens he shouldn’t; Noah accepts this with regret, but no longer seeks to avoid mentioning news that could add weight to his twin’s scarred shoulders. Seeking to shield Basch from more pain only adds distance between them.
Sometimes Noah marvels that it’s taken him this long to begin to understand his twin; sometimes he wonders if Basch has any glimmer of understanding himself.
Later, Gabranth goes over his files again, searching for clues about how to proceed. Finally, he sighs and mutters, “I’ll have to send someone else.”
Basch doesn’t look up from his book. “I’ll go.”
“And yet, without knowing the entire situation, I hesitate to - What?”
“Send me.” Basch’s toes, tucked under Noah’s thigh, flex as he pokes his brother with them. “Close your mouth unless you plan on my sticking something in there.”
“Basch, the last person we sent died,” Gabranth argues, glaring.
“So send a dead man next.”
“Stop calling yourself that!”
Basch finally looks up at him, and there’s a haunted quality to his stare that breaks Noah’s heart. “I am, though, you saw to that.” Stricken, Noah flinches, but Basch sits up to touch his arm. “Noah, we must speak of this, it festers still. You killed me when you killed my king. I live but a half-life now, hidden from the world in plain sight. I’m not complaining, Noah, truly; I’ve told you time and again that you’re all I need. But I wish...” He trails his fingers over his brother’s arm, frowning. “I wish to be useful to someone again.”
How long will I be enough to sustain you? Hadn’t Noah only recently asked himself that? Fear of driving Basch further away makes his throat tight. He swallows hard, staring at his brother’s beloved features, seeing only the scar they share. Now he understands why Basch dwells so often on the cut he made in Noah’s face - it links them in pain and regret the way their shared childhood links them in joy. “You... You are useful to me.” Basch’s brow creases and Noah shakes his head, realizing how that sounds. “No, I mean... Basch.” How will I ever make up for what I’ve done? Have we not both suffered enough?
Basch studies him for another long moment, then settles back, picking up his book. “Never mind. I’m little suited for clandestine work, anyhow.” His body language reveals anger, although his expression smooths out and remains placid. Noah’s stomach roils.
Finally, he closes the file and hands it to his brother. “Here,” he says gruffly. “If you’ve a mind to go, you should study what Solram reported of the situation since the end of your tenure. You’ll need to set out within the week. My office will compose a suitable cover story for you.” He stands and stretches. “Contact your pirates; they’ll provide a good cover for your infiltration.” Stiffly, he walks to the kitchen for a drink and a moment alone. The liquor burns his throat as it goes down, distracting him momentarily; he waits for the sound of Basch approaching, but his twin leaves him by himself.
Standing at the counter, Gabranth closes his eyes and allows himself to tremble with a grief so strong it nearly undoes him. This will never work. We are fools to think it will. Again he remembers the summer when everything seemed so perfect, when their whole lives stretched before them and the idea of separation was only a nightmare to trouble Noah’s sleep. I loved you so much. If I had told you then, would you have stayed? If I tell you now, will it be enough to keep you when we have so little left to us? The idea of Basch among murderous smugglers worries him, but his brother’s valor is well-proven, and doesn’t cause Noah’s panic. The idea, though, that Basch will never come back, that once gone from this ghost-life he’ll find no reason to return to Archades, terrifies Noah. He cannot seem to keep from wounding his twin despite all his heartfelt promises; Basch is not happy, doesn’t claim to be, and Noah cannot keep him in another cage.
He’s too lost in his thoughts to hear when Basch finally comes up behind him, and startles when strong arms close around his chest. “Let me go,” Basch whispers against his brother’s back. “Trust me.”
“If I had not tried to make you stay, so long ago, you might have come back,” Noah whispers without moving; the thought has etched holes in his heart for two decades, that Basch’s refusal to return was Noah’s own fault. “To make the same mistake again... I will not, this time.”
Basch tenses in surprise, then hugs his brother more tightly, finally understanding the problem. “Oh, Noah. I am so tired of running away. I want a home, with you, as we once dreamed, be it here or elsewhere. Can you believe I speak truth?”
Noah turns in Basch’s embrace and grips his brother’s arms. “I hated you. Fully, with every fiber of my being. I burned our house to the ground so you would never again call it home. So I could destroy all trace of what we might have built together. I would have sown the earth with salt had I the time, killed the land because I couldn’t kill you.”
Basch doesn’t blink. “Only a great passion - “ he stumbles slightly on the word, Noah hears clearly what he almost chose to say - “could produce such intense hatred.”
“You know I loved you,” Noah replies, honest in his sudden weariness for the dance of words. “And you are correct, Basch. I must let you go. Whether I believe your words or not, I will not fetter you. Only one of us must be bound by steel, you are free to do as you wish.”
Basch sighs and leans his forehead on Noah’s. “Would you leave Larsa, if I asked? Betray your oaths and leave your steel cage of armor behind?”
Gabranth wrestles with himself, then regretfully shakes his head. “I cannot,” he whispers.
To his surprise, Basch smiles. “Good. I could not care so deeply for a man who would break his given word.” He kisses his twin softly. “Come to bed, my Noah. Let me ease your fears, as you have so often done for me. And I will swear to return to you, over and over until you truly hear me.”
Noah looks into eyes the same as his and whispers, “I would trade all I have to go back to our summer.” When I fell in love with you. When everything seemed so perfect.
“I,” Basch whispers back, “would trade the world for the same.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
During the months of Basch’s absence, Gabranth buries himself in work. He moves the rest of his belongings to his mother’s former dwelling, giving up his quarters in the Imperial building. He sleeps in Basch’s bed, breathing his brother’s scent until it fades from the pillow. Larsa comments in passing over a breakfast meeting that his bodyguard’s demeanor has chilled of late, and was anything amiss? Basch as Gabranth would have revealed the truth, but Noah is not his brother, and believes his monarch has no need to know the details of the Ninth’s maneuvers until they bear fruit. Upon this matter, Larsa often disagrees.
He does explain that he’s in the midst of an investigation, and needs must reduce his visible presence around the city. Larsa, after a troubled and thoughtful stare, concedes; Gabranth from then on takes meetings with the Emperor in private, and appears in public only fully armored and helmed. The Ninth has played such games in the past, notably when Judge Gabranth was growing his hair and beard, shortly before Vayne commissioned him Magister. Larsa dislikes secrecy, but acknowledges its uses, and is young enough to bend to his advisers’ expertise when he deems it worthwhile. Gabranth remains mostly in his office, reviewing documents and letters.
The reports that infrequently arrive in Basch’s hand are couched in a code nearly forgotten: the made-up language of twins who always preferred each other’s company to that of nearly anyone else’s. Noah deciphers the code - and his twin’s crabbed and untidy handwriting - and formulates plans.
Powerful drugs, originally brewed through experimental studies at Draklor Laboratories, have made their way to the black market. Stronger than the perception-altering serums Dr. Cid used upon Gabranth himself to sell the ruse that ended the Dalmascan Opposition, the new formula goes by the name Entite, for the way it knocks a person senseless to the world. Shipments get processed in makeshift labs set up in the Salikawood and distributed through a series of middlemen to at least three nations. Something about the high levels of Mist in the brewing process transform the drug from simply a strong hallucinogen to a substance that can separate soul from body, betimes with permanence.
Basch’s efforts focus on gathering enough incontrovertible evidence to shut down the entire operation, since eliminating the upland smugglers will only shift the ring further underground and cause the Ninth to lose their trail. The sealed letters, delivered by a network of moogles Basch knew as a fugitive, contain details to curl Noah’s hair. Undercover, Basch sampled a shipment, and described the effects as best he could so Gabranth could pass the information to physics and healers treating those found in various states of stupor. When he read that, Noah put the letter down and stared out the window for nearly twenty minutes before his hands stopped shaking with rage and fear.
Finally, the message he waits for arrives - Basch is ready to act. Gabranth sends instructions and arranges his schedule, then packs lightly, locks up the apartments, and, cloaked and hooded on a fortuitously damp day, takes a cab to the Aerodome. He paces uneasily, blending in as another impatient Archadian passenger, until he spies a willowy viera with her long, undyed hair caught up in a delicately filigreed mythril clasp. He hefts his long bag - the Chaos Blade and Highway Star are concealed within, along with his armor plates and cloak of office - and makes his way over to her.
“Is all prepared?” he asks without preamble as she turns; he should have known he could not catch her unawares.
“Follow,” she replies, giving him nothing. He had not experienced nor expected a thawing in her haughty demeanor as she sparred grace and skill back into his damaged limbs over a year ago. Certainly, her manner with his twin showed a vast difference - Fran liked Basch and treated him with easy familiarity.
He walks behind her as she angles through the press of people to a private berth. She glances back once, a smooth turn of head and shoulder, whether to assure herself Gabranth followed or to catch him staring at her bare and shapely rear, Noah isn’t sure. In any event, he trods nearly on her spiked heels, and while he can appreciate the aesthetic value of her form, she causes nothing to stir but his impatience as they move through the Aerodome.
Noah is ninety-percent certain his brother enjoyed the viera’s favors, but being jealous of Fran is a little like being jealous of Zalera for marking Basch its own. Noah simply is not in that competition.
Her partner, on the other hand...
They climb aboard the Strahl, and Gabranth stiffens as Ffamran drawls a barbed greeting from within the ship. His response could have formed icicles on the vessel’s hull, and Fran shoots him a look, accompanied by the pirate’s laughter.
“Now, Judge Magister, don’t forget we’re doing you a favor, hm?”
“You are,” Gabranth replies stonily, “doing Basch a favor, and doing the Emperor a favor, two people whose presence you enjoy. I owe you little, pirate, although I appreciate your willingness to serve the Empire of your birth.”
Ffamran - Balthier, he keeps reminding himself of the preferred name - only offers a tight little smile and turns away to duck into the cockpit. Gabranth and the viera follow, Fran taking her seat at the console and Gabranth choosing one in the second row behind her, where he can watch Balthier.
The ship lifts smoothly from her berth, and Gabranth keeps his thoughts regarding stolen Imperial property to himself. After clearing Archadian airspace, Balthier glances at his co-pilot , who nods and directs her attention to the vast sky. Bunansa's renegade son rises and walks back to perch across the aisle from Gabranth, who glares at him.
"Do you have a plan?" Balthier asks. Gabranth lifts his chin and doesn't deign to answer. "Only because I just had the Strahl repainted, and I would so hate to see her hull scratched in some sort of scuffle."
"You need only drop me off," Gabranth growls coldly.
"And miss the opportunity to see Basch? I had hoped to at least spend a night, maybe two, while you perform your maneuvers," Balthier smirks, closely watching the Magister's face. Gabranth unwittingly rewards his scrutiny; his brows draw in and his eyes blaze, his lips thinning down to a white line. He very loudly says nothing, having learned that he cannot best the sky pirate's silver tongue. He stands instead, offers a mocking half-bow, and retreats to the rear of the ship.
The room in which he once lay dying has been scrubbed clean, the linens on the narrow berth spotless and tucked as neatly as any military cot. He sinks down onto it, feeling the ache of his old wounds and the threat of new ones. The pointed banter reminds him of how things stand unresolved with his brother, and dread churns in his belly. He sits for a long time alone, considering the situation from many angles, until finally Fran clears her throat from the doorway.
"I do not mean to disturb," she says, "if you require solitude."
"I... No, Lady," he replies, still lost in dark thoughts. "Basch would say I am too much alone as it is."
Her bowed lips curve up in a tiny flicker of gentleness. "It is of your brother I wish to speak, if you would allow." Gabranth waves his hand at the end of the bunk, inviting her presence; Fran folds gracefully down and regards him with a cool gaze. "Basch speaks to us, at times, of you."
"Does he?" Gabranth feels his brows rise, his naked expression always so difficult to control.
"Yes. Always with a tenderness Balthier opines you do not deserve."
Gabranth shrugs, looking away, at his boots on the polished cabin floor. "Perhaps he has the right of it. Basch forgives easily and dislikes conflict. Ever he sought to keep peace in the scuffles of our youth, unless he felt rightously aggreived. Even when the first punch thrown was his, so too was the first extended hand."
"Impetuous, and repenting of it?"
"Always," Noah whispers. He shakes his head and regards her. "Lady, what would you have me say?"
The smile lasts longer this time. "You have said it, though I believe you meant not to. I hear what lies in the spaces between your words. I have expressed my disapproval to Balthier; he will cease probing at that particular wound. Tell me, what plan do you have?"
Noah stares at her, taking in her calm wisdom, beginning to understand the balance of power in her relationship with Balthier. Equals, a true partnership - his doubts crystallize into a sudden resolve. "You give Balthier what he needs to fly freely, do you not?" At her slight nod, he spreads his hands. "I must then do likewise."
"Good." She tilts her head to one side, an ear twitching with amusement. "Though I meant your mission."
"Oh." He reddens, and looks again at the floor. "Basch will become Gabranth and bring evidence and testimony to the Imperial court. My face is known now in the city, thanks to the Lord Larsa, and Basch's identity as mine will not be questioned. Teams await my word at the edge of the Salikawood; the strikes will be coordinated with Basch's arrest of the smugglers here. We have cast a wide net, and now reel it in."
"What you need of us for success, only ask." Her mouth curves in a feral grin. "Drug smugglers are bad business for honest pirates." With that, she leaves Gabranth to his musings.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
They inn they've chosen for the transfer is large enough that he might go about his buisness unremarked upon. Balthier and Fran busy themselves sampling the local wine; a mix of races frequents the common room, although perhaps not as heterogeneous a group as might be in Dalmasca. Still, the viera draws only the worthy attention her grace and beauty deserves. Balthier blends in completely, to his vast annoyance.
Gabranth strolls by the front desk, and a clerk calls out to him, "Sir, that message you were looking for has arrived."
He approaches the polished wood and watches as the trim young woman reaches into a cubby for a scrap of folded paper. On the back, in the clerk's neat handwriting, reads "rm 405." Gabranth takes it with thanks and opens the fold to see Balthier's handwriting and a few lines of poetry from a popular play about a pair of lovers who died in tragedy and were reborn as twins so they might spend their next lives always at each other's side. His cheeks heat and he forces himself not to crumple the paper and throw it at the back of the pirate's head as he passes through the bar on his way up to the rooms.
He finds the room and pauses to take a deep breath, composing all the compelling arguments he's constructed throughout the flight and in the prior weeks of solitude. The knob turns easily under his hand, left unlocked as they had agreed. He knocks briefly and opens the door.
When Gabranth walks into the small room and sees his brother by the window, calmly oiling his gear, all thoughts fly straight out of his head. Basch has shaved and cropped his hair to match his twin’s and wears Archadian-tailored clothing, and the sense of dislocation is so complete that it shocks the breath from Gabranth’s lungs. Until Basch looks up and smiles radiantly to see his brother, an expression purely his own.
How could we ever pull off these ruses, Gabranth recovers enough to think as Basch stands and strides across the room, when we are so very different? And then his twin’s strong arms wrap around him, and Noah puts his face into Basch’s neck in a fierce hug. He can feel the thump of Basch’s heart as their chests press together, his pulse speeding up.
“I missed you,” Basch says quietly, and Noah gives in to the inevitable, to what has become so painfully clear in these last few months. He is in love again, and glad for it.
“And I you,” he replies. “I’ve been worried.”
Basch loosens his grip enough to bump his forehead against Noah’s with a chuckle. “You always worry.”
“Your letters... Mitron’s balls, Basch, I’ve been afraid for you.”
Basch slides his hands up Noah’s arms to cup his face, rubbing his thumbs lightly over his twin’s smooth cheeks. “It has been...harrowing, I’ll grant you that.” He leans in and brushes his lips tenderly over his brother’s. “I am mortally glad you’ve arrived to take over.”
“Only for that?” Noah can’t help but ask, not an entirely joking question.
“Will you never be done doubting me?” Basch asks without heat, although it smolders in his gaze.
“I doubt myself,” Noah replies softly, his hands too tight on Basch’s hips. “I doubt my ability to be enough for you, with all I’ve stolen from you.”
“Let’s not talk of this now,” Basch whispers, kissing the crease between Noah’s brows.
“Basch... We must talk of this eventually. I thought you were tired of running?”
His brother looks at him soberly, then nods. “Speak, then, of your fears, so I may allay them once and for all.”
Noah sighs. “I have, just now. What sort of life can I grant you, after I dedicated myself to destroying yours? I would go with you far away, where you could live freely and without having to hide, but I cannot leave my lord.”
“No more would I ask you to,” Basch replies firmly. “Your duty does you credit.”
“So what does that leave us? You live as a ghost, and I the man who condemned you to it.” Noah’s fingers tighten on Basch’s hips, revealing his desire to hold on even as he speaks the words to sever them from each other. “We cannot go on like this.”
Blood drains from Basch’s face. “What... What are you saying, Noah?”
Gabranth offers a small, bitter smile. “I swore to you and myself that I would not see you caged again. I intend to hold to that vow. But I would make another to you, if you would hear.”
Basch nods, hiding his fear behind the mask of his face; Gabranth wears no helm, and cannot easily do likewise. He lifts one hand to touch the scar above his brother’s eye, then his lips, finally flattening his palm over Basch’s racing heart.
“For two decades, I have wondered, if I had spoken my feelings for you, would you have so easily left me behind? Did I drive you away, that last night? Did you leave because of some failing of mine?” Basch opens his mouth to protest, and Noah shakes his head. “Basch, these fears I have kept in my heart, and they still drive me. I dislike change. I long for the past, and you... you seem to divorce yourself from it so easily. Perhaps I envy that in you. But I am no longer a child, and I have known the ruination of all I held dear, and laid that at your feet all the while wondering if I am myself to blame. My conclusion,” he says, smiling a little, “is that we are both at fault for allowing the war and our own fears to tear us apart. We were so young. I dare say we would make different choices as adults.”
Basch nods, rapt, his blue eyes bright with things unspoken. Noah takes a deep breath and prepares to bring all to light. “So I make a different choice now. You have always been the center of my world, in love and in hatred. That hasn’t changed. Twice I have destroyed your home, and so my vow is this: I will make you a home, Basch, and wait for you there, wherever your heart takes you. You owe me nothing; I ask only your consideration, that the time we have together is our own, with no more ghosts to haunt us.” He swallows around his pulse, which has risen into his throat, and waits for Basch’s reply.
“My heart,” Basch says thickly, his gaze intent, “will always take me back to you. Only believe that, my Noah. I lacked the courage to tell you when we were young, thinking you understood from my actions what I felt. I, too, learn from my mistakes.”
Noah nods, something easing in his chest at the rare endearment that had once been his brother's frequent pet name for him. “Basch, I love you. I’m sorry I allow my fears to get in the way of that. I cannot promise you I’ll be able to cease, but I will try. For you I would try anything, to make you happy.”
Basch’s expression defies description, and his breath catches in his throat. “You...love me?” he asks in a low voice, sounding stunned.
Noah smiles, relieved to have it out at last. “I always have; I dislike change, remember?” He sobers and finally looks away, ashamed. “Even when I despised you. As you said, only a great love could become such a profound hatred. I didn’t want to risk feeling that again.” He takes a deep breath and slowly exhales. “But all life is risk, and I cannot halt what rises in my breast when I look at you. I fell in love with you at fifteen. I am in love with you now. Nearly all the time in between has been wasted, but I will no longer waste this gift of you.”
He would go on, but Basch touches his lips to stem the tide of his words, and turns Noah’s chin so he can again meet his gaze. “You always talk too much, my Noah,” he says, smiling tenderly, “but I have longed to hear you say this.” He kisses his brother, letting loose all the passion within him regularly held in check, and Noah has no more breath to talk, then or for some time afterwards.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The mission itself seems anticlimactic to Noah, perhaps because for once it went smoothly. "Perhaps Gabranth needs must be in two places at once," Basch had said, and it works beautifully, the twin strikes well-coordinated and executed without a hitch. Despite the knowing glances and unsubtle gibes from Balthier on their flight to the Salikawood, Gabranth remains calm, exchanging only a beleaguered look with Fran, who grins at him and threatens to kick her partner if he does not mind the controls more than the Magister. Balthier's answering smile contains some satisfaction, and Noah wonders what Basch had told him in the few hours they socialized before parting ways again.
He makes it back to Archades for the trial, his prisoners sent ahead of him while he supervised the destruction of the labs and posting of patrols, coordinating the effort with Dalmasca under the peace treaties. In an unassuming judge's armor and helm, he watches his brother take the stand, projecting Gabranth's icy arrogance. If the Magister's voice is lower and rougher than usual, the accent tainted with long desert vowels, no one seems to question the change. Noah spends the brief recess calculating how long it would take for Basch's hair to grow back out to normal, then smiles to himself at his own daft thoughts.
After business finally concludes, the twins celebrate a homecoming together, and Noah whispers his love into Basch's ear while his brother shivers within him. Being able to say the words after nearly a lifetime of holding them in makes Noah lightheaded with relief and a quiet bliss; even the scars etched into his twin's burnished skin can't dim the euphoric glow that buoys his heart. He loves Basch, and he loves the look on Basch's handsome face when Noah says he loves Basch, and after too many long years of pain, Noah thinks he might finally be starting to heal.
The only thing to mar his enjoyment is Basch's silence - his brother hasn't yet repeated what it cost Noah so much to finally say. But Noah finds, lying in their bed with Basch's limbs heavy with sleep and entwined with his own, that he can wait until his twin feels ready. Basch lost much to the dark loneliness of Nalbina's dungeons, with only his fading purpose to sustain him; Noah admits to himself a surprising empathy and the ability to put aside his habitual impatience. Basch will say it - it shines in his eyes, beats with his pulse, glimmers in every touch of hand or lips. If Basch hesitates to commit himself to the man who tried to destroy him, Noah cannot blame him. He waits, thinking of cages, and watching sometimes the airships that zoom out of Archadian skies like birds. He will not chain his brother, but learn, instead, to trust Basch's good heart.
One night, falling asleep in bed over a stack of reports on magicite mining, Noah snuggles a little closer to Basch, who sits up with him and reads stories about the Garif. He plans a visit to Jahara soon to train with Supinelu and his warriors for a few weeks and renew his friendship with the War-Chief. Gabranth cannot leave while the incoming Bhujerban delegation lingers discussing new trade agreements, but he's already thought about the meal he'll cook for Basch's return - his brother's favorite Dalmascan dishes, now that Noah's gotten adept at wielding those powerful spices. Basch's arm lies companionably around Noah's waist, the book propped on his bent knee and his cheek resting on Noah's head. Their fingers lace together over Noah's flat belly, each of them needing only one hand to turn pages. When he notices his twin's chest beginning to rise and fall more slowly, Basch chuckles and kisses Noah's hair.
"Enough reading, time to sleep, my Noah," he says, disturbing them to stretch and lay his book on the bedside table.
Noah makes a muffled protesting sound and blinks his heavy eyes. "A few more minutes, I need to finish this," he mumbles, shifting through papers. Basch reaches over and yanks the folders out of his hands, putting them on top of his book and kissing Noah between his folded brows.
"I love you, but I swear I'm not leading you around when you go blind from all this late-night reading by magelight," he declares, laughing. "You'll have to get a helping dog instead," he teases. His grin diminishes into a tender smile as Noah sits up straight and stares at him; Basch knows what he has said.
"You... Basch," Noah breathes, and tackles his brother, throwing them both flat onto the bed.
Over on the dresser, Basch's small glowstone casts pale light over their bodies as they couple happily, trading kisses and love freely, banishing the ghosts in the shadows until the morning sun dawns on their entwined bodies.