FFXII: Reins of History 2/?
Title: Reins of History 2/?
Rating: PG
Summary: Everyone wants to remember Ffamran, even those of House Solidor. Balthier, it seems, is the only one who believes that he is perfectly justified in leaving his past as it is - buried. It's painful, being this popular.
Characters: Cast, with emphasis on Larsa, Zargabaath and Balthier.
2292 words. This arc still determinedly attempts to remain as genfic, no matter how hard I plead and beg and moan and whimper. Part 1.
[Archades]
Negotiating unnoticed entrance into the House Solidor compound was not something that Vaan and Penelo had the ability to do. So they didn't bother - there was a far more interesting way of gaining admittance, one which mainly involved leaving Vaan to put his mouth to good use.
By the time the third aide attempting to attend to them had given up and sought the aid of judicial security, Judge Gabranth found it necessary to conduct affairs himself. He gave them a room, and took off the helmet to almost-smile before leaving for just long enough that Vaan had no opportunity to unscrew any valuable paintings before his return.
'You've come visit,' Larsa exclaimed when he entered the room, a little taller than they remembered, but no less earnest. Vaan had the impression that Larsa wasn't half as surprised at their arrival as he let them believe - but the honest pleasure was genuine, so he could be forgiven for having possibly predicted their visit. Solidors - the longer Larsa ruled, the more the blood of his House seemed to flow blue in his veins.
Basch, though, stood ever-reliable behind the small lord like an over-dressed umbrella stand; Vaan saw no purpose for the Judge's armour other than to try and muffle the air of self-effacement that wafted off the man at all times.
'Nice place,' Vaan grinned, putting his hands behind his head and giving Larsa's guest room a leer. "Nice" being a euphemism - the ruling family of Archades certainly did not hold back on either style or expense. Really old furniture, really expensive decor, really nice view, really comfortable chairs.
'I hope you're not here on business, Vaan,' Larsa grinned, letting the word business skip lightly off his tongue. They had all got better at their games: Larsa was a grown politician now, hidden in a boy's body and layered with a saint's patience.
Penelo laughed. 'No, only here to visit. We wanted to see the both of you. It's a lot easier here than in Rabanastre - all the guards there talk and act like Basch.'
Vaan made a face, and there may have been the echoes of a cough resounding behind metal plate mail. 'Take that thing off,' Vaan commanded, glaring. 'How do you even breathe?'
'With practice and by not talking too much,' Basch said steadily, pulling his helmet off his head. His hair was shorter, but the scarred face no less fatherly. 'It's good to see the two of you again.'
Pleasantries and formalities fought for air, and managed to sustain the conversation for perhaps five, ten minutes. While Basch watched (genial, relaxed for the first time in months), they eventually did what three adolescents their age do best - gossip.
-
An adroit mind, inherent ability and a cool grasp of common sense did not, Zargabaath insisted, a politician or leader make. It made for raw talent and a wealth of potential; nothing more, nothing less. The men of House Solidor were two things - gifted, and educated.
Larsa found very little else to say against the Judge Magister's opinions, and their lessons together had become an integral part of everyday life after the end of the war. Zargabaath did not fear authority, nor did he patronise youth; greying now but still sharp, the man was a good tutor and a better ear.
'They say Balthier is at Balfonheim, for now,' Larsa pondered aloud two nights after Vaan and Penelo took their leave. His eyes did not leave the texts describing the earlier years of Ivalice's political history. 'And that Balfonheim wants the sky pirate to stay.'
Zargabaath paused in his writing, his fingers tapping the tabletop as he considered Larsa's bowed head across him. 'I was wondering if he would bore of open skies.' Zargabaath's memories of the man were less of debonair flourishes and more of impatient intelligence. Balthier was not so unlike any other Archadian boy, once. 'Did they say if he'd agreed to stay?'
'Penelo mentioned that he was against the idea,' Larsa said, looking up. His eyes were clear. 'Though apparently he was so vehemently opposed that it begged the question why.'
'Authority and Balthier do not mix,' Zargabaath said, almost smiling, 'if I remember him rightly, and the man does not lend himself easily to being forgotten.'
'I'd heard of his relations. He was at the Akademy, once?' Larsa kept close watch of the Judge's expression; metal hid too much, and faces sometimes showed what Zargabaath's voice would never betray.
'Once, yes, a long time ago,' the man replied. A look of resignation passed over his face. 'Ffamran would be the only one to make the course of three, four? years seem like an aeon.'
'Lord Ffamran Bunansa,' Larsa said aloud, rolling the name off of his tongue. 'That was his name, wasn't it, when he was made judge?'
'Aye,' Zargabaath nodded. 'And he was as ill fit for the job as he was brilliant at it.' Blue eyes caught Larsa's as the Judge put his fingers to his temples. 'Half of these grey hairs belong to you, but the majority of them, I believe, come from the short and futile years of trying to teach that boy his limitations.'
'Did you manage to, eventually?' Larsa laughed.
'I think I did,' Zargabaath replied with odd severity. 'And when he discovered them, what else did he do but breach them? And so Ffamran became Balthier. But this is a political history lesson, Lord Larsa, not a personal recollection of Archadian gentry. Continue. I'll discuss it with you after your essays are completed.'
If Larsa did one thing, it was to take men at their word. Before the tenth hour there were two researched papers sitting neatly on Zargabaath's desk, and a curious lordling seated patiently waiting.
'You make me feel old before my bones even give me protest,' the Judge sighed, giving up even the pretence of attending to his work. 'Peace,' he held up his hand when Larsa moved to apologise with militant authenticity. 'You'll have your tale.'
-
Archades, seven years earlier
Aged sixteen, Ffamran was working his way through the first legs of youthful growth, but bodily discomfort did nothing to dampen the spirit of an enthusiastic mind. The last days of common schooling had, in recent months, drifted into a lazy haze of days spent at Draklor, disturbing circuitry and learning by experience and intuition mechanics, engineering and the combinatrics of electricity and Mist.
A Bunansa was very seldom held back by lack of formal instruction. Boredom and innate aptitude were their own teachers, and by the time two months were out from the last time Ffamran had the study of politics or language to keep him occupied, he'd learnt to fly commercial taxicabs by pestering their drivers and private airships by terrorising his father's staff. Perfecting flight kept him busy for a while, but only for as long as it took a bird to find its wings.
New hobbies had to be found, especially since the attentions of a doting father ensured that access to ship and sail came easy and - for Ffamran - too effortless. The thrill was lost. The convenient misappropriation of certain tools gave him an arsenal that ensured that no lock or pass code was safe, and so Ffamran began to steal - because there was nothing else better to be done, and because it was not theft if you returned everything that you took. It started meek: Draklor's books, then its blueprints, afterwards he'd moved outwards, to the spell shops first, then to the weaponries, then the public libraries and ministries, bauble shops before it became aerodrome flight schedules. Ffamran, at some point, could walk into the public airspace and take a ship docked for a week out for three or four days and return it before its owner even noticed anything out of place.
Even Cidolfus had to agree, eventually, that the boy's time would be better spent on pursuits that engaged him long enough to keep him under control. 'Perhaps you should try the Akademy,' the Doctor mentioned at dinner one evening, bent over a set of maps. 'I shall be leaving soon on an extended trip, and you'd be no good sitting at home doing nothing.'
'An extended trip?' Ffamran asked, glancing at the unfamiliar geography of what his father described as Giruvegan, or something of that ilk. It didn't interest him - the doctor had an interest in magicite and magicks that went against Ffamran's own inclinations towards mechanics and machinery.
'You're a grown boy, aren't you?' Cidolfus said, raising his eyebrows and regarding Ffamran with a dry smile. 'I've waited a long while to go. And now you're tall enough to pass as a man - it won't hurt you to run free of me, and I of you, for the next while. Who knows? Or do you think yourself unfit for the rigours of magisterial duty?'
A challenge from another wasn't something Ffamran could turn down - and a challenge from his father made Ffamran sit up straighter, and send back at the elder Bunansa a smirk that reeked of adolescent self confidence. 'Hardly unfit, sir.'
'Good,' Cidolfus said promptly, and from under the maps he took out a set of forms, his flamboyant signature already appended at the end. 'You can fill these out yourself. It'll see you made into a proper man, Ffamran, by the time I return. They'll teach you everything from flying a fighter to stabbing at critters out in the Tchita uplands. And if you're good enough, they'll make you a judge.'
Ffamran was a Bunansa. And that meant that he had something to prove.
-
'And what happened after?'
Larsa did not yet understand the meaning of weariness; Zargabaath, on the other hand, had spent a lifetime seeing too many late nights. 'Archadian history is twisted at best, lord Larsa, you know that well enough,' the Judge said, standing.
'Enough for now. Let it simply be said that time... passed. Doctor Cidolfus saw fit to encourage Ffamran down the magisterial path. Ghis taught him cruelty. I hope I, at least, managed to teach him compassion. These are old stories - and none are truly mine to tell. If you are so interested, seek Balthier out. Or, more likely, considering your schedule -' Zargabaath sent Larsa a pointed look '- have him seek you out instead.'
'Perhaps I shall,' Larsa considered. 'In the interest of looking out for a friend.'
Zargabaath collected his papers and stood. The stories you want, he thought quietly to himself, are Gabranth's, Ffamran's, Drace's, Zetch's. Dead men's tales. He gave Larsa a questioning look. 'Is interrogation your idea of caring for your friends?'
'Not interrogation,' Larsa chided his tutor, standing also. 'Only that we would want our sky pirate bored, would we?'
-
[Balfonheim]
Vaan and Penelo had left days ago, appeased with gifts of glossair blueprints and a certain list of directions for fun and adventure closer to home. "The Sandsea's less wholesome than you might think," Balthier'd said, and they'd trapped him in the engine room and grilled him for an hour and were now off to attempt an illegal heist in order to fund a very royal, very legal coronation present.
'Your priorities leave much to be desired,' Balthier'd pointed out, but they merely shrugged and parted ways at the aerodrome. Friendship, as Vaan put succinctly, didn't care for thief or tiara.
Well. If they wanted to look at it that way.
'Whereto next?' Fran asked, when peace was returned to them. They had not moved for almost a week - unusual, for their lot, even if Reddas' Manse was a comfortable, quiet place to operate from: secure, for now, even if it was part-library and part-hovel. It still seemed too much like its eccentrically logical past owner for Balthier to be so easy keeping nest there.
Balthier stretched out in his chair. 'Another job?' he shrugged, closing his eyes. 'Or a plans for visitation and congratulations? Solidor moves needlessly fast, Dalmasca needlessly slow. In between the both of them, Larsa and Ashelia are perhaps a monarch and a half put together.'
'So the hume says,' Fran commented, giving him an unreadable look. Balthier crooked at eyebrow at her. 'You've been irritable,' she points out with judicial calm. 'Idleness ill suits your hand.'
'As opposed to the governance of a not insignificant den of piracy, which does? Dear Fran. Leave the psychology out - something will come.'
There came a pounding on the door, and Balthier exhaled angrily. 'Speak of the devil, and he always indulges,' he grumbled, getting up. 'Elza,' he greeted the woman sharply, opening the door to her voluminous and perpetually angry presence. It was the sixth time in half as many days. 'How pleasant to see you. Before you speak, allow me to make myself very clear: I will not take over your quaint little port, Reddas and his blessed memory be damned. Do you understand?'
'I didn't come here to pester you today, pirate,' she spat, as though calling Balthier by his trade name were truly very insulting. It was as mild as Elza got, though - she seemed almost pleasant today. 'You've got friends in high places.' She put two letters into his hands, and Balthier spotted the unbroken wax seal of House Solidor on the topmost envelope. 'Tell them to play their own messenger. Good day,' she simpered, and exited with the flair of a practice stage actor.
'Who are they from?' Fran asked, as Balthier broke the first seal.
'Larsa, as expected,' Balthier said absently.
There was a pause. 'And the other?' Fran prompted.
'Zargabaath,' Balthier said quietly, shuffling Larsa's letter aside. 'Judge Zargabaath.'
Rating: PG
Summary: Everyone wants to remember Ffamran, even those of House Solidor. Balthier, it seems, is the only one who believes that he is perfectly justified in leaving his past as it is - buried. It's painful, being this popular.
Characters: Cast, with emphasis on Larsa, Zargabaath and Balthier.
2292 words. This arc still determinedly attempts to remain as genfic, no matter how hard I plead and beg and moan and whimper. Part 1.
[Archades]
Negotiating unnoticed entrance into the House Solidor compound was not something that Vaan and Penelo had the ability to do. So they didn't bother - there was a far more interesting way of gaining admittance, one which mainly involved leaving Vaan to put his mouth to good use.
By the time the third aide attempting to attend to them had given up and sought the aid of judicial security, Judge Gabranth found it necessary to conduct affairs himself. He gave them a room, and took off the helmet to almost-smile before leaving for just long enough that Vaan had no opportunity to unscrew any valuable paintings before his return.
'You've come visit,' Larsa exclaimed when he entered the room, a little taller than they remembered, but no less earnest. Vaan had the impression that Larsa wasn't half as surprised at their arrival as he let them believe - but the honest pleasure was genuine, so he could be forgiven for having possibly predicted their visit. Solidors - the longer Larsa ruled, the more the blood of his House seemed to flow blue in his veins.
Basch, though, stood ever-reliable behind the small lord like an over-dressed umbrella stand; Vaan saw no purpose for the Judge's armour other than to try and muffle the air of self-effacement that wafted off the man at all times.
'Nice place,' Vaan grinned, putting his hands behind his head and giving Larsa's guest room a leer. "Nice" being a euphemism - the ruling family of Archades certainly did not hold back on either style or expense. Really old furniture, really expensive decor, really nice view, really comfortable chairs.
'I hope you're not here on business, Vaan,' Larsa grinned, letting the word business skip lightly off his tongue. They had all got better at their games: Larsa was a grown politician now, hidden in a boy's body and layered with a saint's patience.
Penelo laughed. 'No, only here to visit. We wanted to see the both of you. It's a lot easier here than in Rabanastre - all the guards there talk and act like Basch.'
Vaan made a face, and there may have been the echoes of a cough resounding behind metal plate mail. 'Take that thing off,' Vaan commanded, glaring. 'How do you even breathe?'
'With practice and by not talking too much,' Basch said steadily, pulling his helmet off his head. His hair was shorter, but the scarred face no less fatherly. 'It's good to see the two of you again.'
Pleasantries and formalities fought for air, and managed to sustain the conversation for perhaps five, ten minutes. While Basch watched (genial, relaxed for the first time in months), they eventually did what three adolescents their age do best - gossip.
-
An adroit mind, inherent ability and a cool grasp of common sense did not, Zargabaath insisted, a politician or leader make. It made for raw talent and a wealth of potential; nothing more, nothing less. The men of House Solidor were two things - gifted, and educated.
Larsa found very little else to say against the Judge Magister's opinions, and their lessons together had become an integral part of everyday life after the end of the war. Zargabaath did not fear authority, nor did he patronise youth; greying now but still sharp, the man was a good tutor and a better ear.
'They say Balthier is at Balfonheim, for now,' Larsa pondered aloud two nights after Vaan and Penelo took their leave. His eyes did not leave the texts describing the earlier years of Ivalice's political history. 'And that Balfonheim wants the sky pirate to stay.'
Zargabaath paused in his writing, his fingers tapping the tabletop as he considered Larsa's bowed head across him. 'I was wondering if he would bore of open skies.' Zargabaath's memories of the man were less of debonair flourishes and more of impatient intelligence. Balthier was not so unlike any other Archadian boy, once. 'Did they say if he'd agreed to stay?'
'Penelo mentioned that he was against the idea,' Larsa said, looking up. His eyes were clear. 'Though apparently he was so vehemently opposed that it begged the question why.'
'Authority and Balthier do not mix,' Zargabaath said, almost smiling, 'if I remember him rightly, and the man does not lend himself easily to being forgotten.'
'I'd heard of his relations. He was at the Akademy, once?' Larsa kept close watch of the Judge's expression; metal hid too much, and faces sometimes showed what Zargabaath's voice would never betray.
'Once, yes, a long time ago,' the man replied. A look of resignation passed over his face. 'Ffamran would be the only one to make the course of three, four? years seem like an aeon.'
'Lord Ffamran Bunansa,' Larsa said aloud, rolling the name off of his tongue. 'That was his name, wasn't it, when he was made judge?'
'Aye,' Zargabaath nodded. 'And he was as ill fit for the job as he was brilliant at it.' Blue eyes caught Larsa's as the Judge put his fingers to his temples. 'Half of these grey hairs belong to you, but the majority of them, I believe, come from the short and futile years of trying to teach that boy his limitations.'
'Did you manage to, eventually?' Larsa laughed.
'I think I did,' Zargabaath replied with odd severity. 'And when he discovered them, what else did he do but breach them? And so Ffamran became Balthier. But this is a political history lesson, Lord Larsa, not a personal recollection of Archadian gentry. Continue. I'll discuss it with you after your essays are completed.'
If Larsa did one thing, it was to take men at their word. Before the tenth hour there were two researched papers sitting neatly on Zargabaath's desk, and a curious lordling seated patiently waiting.
'You make me feel old before my bones even give me protest,' the Judge sighed, giving up even the pretence of attending to his work. 'Peace,' he held up his hand when Larsa moved to apologise with militant authenticity. 'You'll have your tale.'
-
Archades, seven years earlier
Aged sixteen, Ffamran was working his way through the first legs of youthful growth, but bodily discomfort did nothing to dampen the spirit of an enthusiastic mind. The last days of common schooling had, in recent months, drifted into a lazy haze of days spent at Draklor, disturbing circuitry and learning by experience and intuition mechanics, engineering and the combinatrics of electricity and Mist.
A Bunansa was very seldom held back by lack of formal instruction. Boredom and innate aptitude were their own teachers, and by the time two months were out from the last time Ffamran had the study of politics or language to keep him occupied, he'd learnt to fly commercial taxicabs by pestering their drivers and private airships by terrorising his father's staff. Perfecting flight kept him busy for a while, but only for as long as it took a bird to find its wings.
New hobbies had to be found, especially since the attentions of a doting father ensured that access to ship and sail came easy and - for Ffamran - too effortless. The thrill was lost. The convenient misappropriation of certain tools gave him an arsenal that ensured that no lock or pass code was safe, and so Ffamran began to steal - because there was nothing else better to be done, and because it was not theft if you returned everything that you took. It started meek: Draklor's books, then its blueprints, afterwards he'd moved outwards, to the spell shops first, then to the weaponries, then the public libraries and ministries, bauble shops before it became aerodrome flight schedules. Ffamran, at some point, could walk into the public airspace and take a ship docked for a week out for three or four days and return it before its owner even noticed anything out of place.
Even Cidolfus had to agree, eventually, that the boy's time would be better spent on pursuits that engaged him long enough to keep him under control. 'Perhaps you should try the Akademy,' the Doctor mentioned at dinner one evening, bent over a set of maps. 'I shall be leaving soon on an extended trip, and you'd be no good sitting at home doing nothing.'
'An extended trip?' Ffamran asked, glancing at the unfamiliar geography of what his father described as Giruvegan, or something of that ilk. It didn't interest him - the doctor had an interest in magicite and magicks that went against Ffamran's own inclinations towards mechanics and machinery.
'You're a grown boy, aren't you?' Cidolfus said, raising his eyebrows and regarding Ffamran with a dry smile. 'I've waited a long while to go. And now you're tall enough to pass as a man - it won't hurt you to run free of me, and I of you, for the next while. Who knows? Or do you think yourself unfit for the rigours of magisterial duty?'
A challenge from another wasn't something Ffamran could turn down - and a challenge from his father made Ffamran sit up straighter, and send back at the elder Bunansa a smirk that reeked of adolescent self confidence. 'Hardly unfit, sir.'
'Good,' Cidolfus said promptly, and from under the maps he took out a set of forms, his flamboyant signature already appended at the end. 'You can fill these out yourself. It'll see you made into a proper man, Ffamran, by the time I return. They'll teach you everything from flying a fighter to stabbing at critters out in the Tchita uplands. And if you're good enough, they'll make you a judge.'
Ffamran was a Bunansa. And that meant that he had something to prove.
-
'And what happened after?'
Larsa did not yet understand the meaning of weariness; Zargabaath, on the other hand, had spent a lifetime seeing too many late nights. 'Archadian history is twisted at best, lord Larsa, you know that well enough,' the Judge said, standing.
'Enough for now. Let it simply be said that time... passed. Doctor Cidolfus saw fit to encourage Ffamran down the magisterial path. Ghis taught him cruelty. I hope I, at least, managed to teach him compassion. These are old stories - and none are truly mine to tell. If you are so interested, seek Balthier out. Or, more likely, considering your schedule -' Zargabaath sent Larsa a pointed look '- have him seek you out instead.'
'Perhaps I shall,' Larsa considered. 'In the interest of looking out for a friend.'
Zargabaath collected his papers and stood. The stories you want, he thought quietly to himself, are Gabranth's, Ffamran's, Drace's, Zetch's. Dead men's tales. He gave Larsa a questioning look. 'Is interrogation your idea of caring for your friends?'
'Not interrogation,' Larsa chided his tutor, standing also. 'Only that we would want our sky pirate bored, would we?'
-
[Balfonheim]
Vaan and Penelo had left days ago, appeased with gifts of glossair blueprints and a certain list of directions for fun and adventure closer to home. "The Sandsea's less wholesome than you might think," Balthier'd said, and they'd trapped him in the engine room and grilled him for an hour and were now off to attempt an illegal heist in order to fund a very royal, very legal coronation present.
'Your priorities leave much to be desired,' Balthier'd pointed out, but they merely shrugged and parted ways at the aerodrome. Friendship, as Vaan put succinctly, didn't care for thief or tiara.
Well. If they wanted to look at it that way.
'Whereto next?' Fran asked, when peace was returned to them. They had not moved for almost a week - unusual, for their lot, even if Reddas' Manse was a comfortable, quiet place to operate from: secure, for now, even if it was part-library and part-hovel. It still seemed too much like its eccentrically logical past owner for Balthier to be so easy keeping nest there.
Balthier stretched out in his chair. 'Another job?' he shrugged, closing his eyes. 'Or a plans for visitation and congratulations? Solidor moves needlessly fast, Dalmasca needlessly slow. In between the both of them, Larsa and Ashelia are perhaps a monarch and a half put together.'
'So the hume says,' Fran commented, giving him an unreadable look. Balthier crooked at eyebrow at her. 'You've been irritable,' she points out with judicial calm. 'Idleness ill suits your hand.'
'As opposed to the governance of a not insignificant den of piracy, which does? Dear Fran. Leave the psychology out - something will come.'
There came a pounding on the door, and Balthier exhaled angrily. 'Speak of the devil, and he always indulges,' he grumbled, getting up. 'Elza,' he greeted the woman sharply, opening the door to her voluminous and perpetually angry presence. It was the sixth time in half as many days. 'How pleasant to see you. Before you speak, allow me to make myself very clear: I will not take over your quaint little port, Reddas and his blessed memory be damned. Do you understand?'
'I didn't come here to pester you today, pirate,' she spat, as though calling Balthier by his trade name were truly very insulting. It was as mild as Elza got, though - she seemed almost pleasant today. 'You've got friends in high places.' She put two letters into his hands, and Balthier spotted the unbroken wax seal of House Solidor on the topmost envelope. 'Tell them to play their own messenger. Good day,' she simpered, and exited with the flair of a practice stage actor.
'Who are they from?' Fran asked, as Balthier broke the first seal.
'Larsa, as expected,' Balthier said absently.
There was a pause. 'And the other?' Fran prompted.
'Zargabaath,' Balthier said quietly, shuffling Larsa's letter aside. 'Judge Zargabaath.'