DELITA AND LARSA FIC OH DEAR LORD.
.
So, I have been ruminating on empire a lot these days. Between that Quartet, and this?
The difference is, this KICKED ASS from the start, and the Quartet only will when it is finished.
I post it directly here because of its crossoverish nature, even though...well, you'll see.
I really want ya'll to read this. It's...special.
Title: Hermeneutic Dialog
Fandom: FFXII and FFTactics. More accurately, FFTactics and FFXII.
Series: Schwanengesang and you can't tell me otherwise.
Character(s)/Pairing(s): Delita, Ovelia, and Larsa
Rating: PG
Summary: "Why are you king?"
Wordcount: ~3000
Acknowledgements: For Kell. For Kell. Jerry helped with much betaing as well.
Spoilers: For the ends of both games.
Hermeneutic Dialog
intended to take advantage of that my face remained largely unknown
Mithrigil Galtirglin
case of the Ninth Bureau, as opposed to that of the Senate wherein the choice
to dissolve it was made preceding Our coronation, with the explicit intent of
unfettering Our brother and subsequently Our self from their collective coil.
While this course of action was precipitated with neither Our knowledge nor
consent, We consider it to have been a great service pending Our eventual
ascension, and the question of reasserting the presence of a republican body
did not bear serious consideration until We had reigned near a score for
years. Chairman Gregeroth’s regicide and Our brother’s reprimand thereof
thus paved a path already delineated; toward an Archadia unencumbered by
partisan bureaucracy and an era of decisive reform in the name of peace.
As previously inferred, upon Our coronation We also assumed direct
control of the Ninth Bureau for a time, that We might allay Our personal
deficit in empirical knowledge of the Empire’s neural circulation, and also
rout out any remaining conspirators without the hindrance of a middle-man.
Our period of outright autocracy was short-lived, no longer than Our brother’s
before Us, and when the Judges Magister had reasserted their numbers, one of
these was instated in the Ninth in Our stead, as had been prior. J.M. Gabranth,
for his precedent connections to Our brother, We
“Come to bed, Delita,” Ovelia called faintly.
“Just a moment,” the young king replied over his shoulder, then turned back to relocate his place.
these was instated in the Ninth in Our stead, as had been prior. J.M. Gabranth,
for his precedent connections to Our brother, We removed from his post at the
Bureau’s head immediately following Our de facto ascension in favor of
ascertaining his loyalties; these proven to an indomitable degree, there was
little cause to shirk his direct service. Thus with the exception of J.M.
Zargabaath, who remained foremost among Our Admirals, the Magistracy bore
correlating reforms to the legislative and executive aspects of Our Motherland’s
rule.
That the populace did not perceive this an upheaval is the result of
efforts not only on Our part but that of Our brother and his cortege, and
their collective precautions against the elevation of the common street-ear.
With the Ninth Bureau in Our direct control, We were able to benefit from
the web of secrecy woven by Our predecessors and, thus alerted to it, not
become entangled Our self, and scavenge from rather than dismantle the
government entire. In this crucial period, in which strife internal has been
shown to undermine even the most noble of sovereign endeavors, that the
reform be imperceptible was its, and Our, salvation. To have reconvened
the Senate would have alerted the gentry unnecessarily to the vagaries of
a government on tent-pegs-for-heels, and likely weakened what may have
“Brilliant man,” Delita muttered as he turned the page.
otherwise been a spectre’s hold upon the country’s reins.
We had not foreseen the eventual permanent dissolution of the
Senate and the strengthening of the Ninth Bureau upon Our initial wresting
of them. In Our time in the position of full autocracy, We had something of
an epiphany regarding the most effective means to preserve peace and
complacency. Historically, much of the unrest provoked by drastic
administrative reorganization has been among those who feel their
personal liberties have been jeopardized and must endure visible changes
in lifestyle. To avoid this iniquity, what few reforms We elicited of the local
and sub-governments were gradual, meticulously researched, and
implemented with the greatest subtlety. In fact, many of the limited
governments under Our auspices were rather expectant of more force and
audacity than We were inclined to provide, and there was a general aura
of reprieve among those who had initially held reservations.
Delita scoffed. “A general aura,” he muttered. “Meaning there was, of course, dissent.”
Dissenters who perceived Our hand were discouraged instead to
said local-level offices for their own visible implementations of perceived
repair, and as these had been largely unaltered during the era of super-
structural turmoil these lobbies were receptive to the will of those people
who would, and more intrinsically than We, know the hearts of their peers.
By denying the gentry direct influence over the Empire, We in actuality
strengthened their visible role in the government, and without the tangle
imposed by Senatorial elections to divert attention from issues of local
concern and dampen the presence of right law in the face of engrossing
politick, also expedited their law-making processes and allowed more
experimental and adventurous, temporary reforms.
“…Well then.” Delita rapped his fingers on the page, as he often did his sword-hilt, and re-read the last couple of sentences with lips parted and breath candle-cool against them.
In addition, upon Our assumption of the Ninth Bureau We were
privy to past accounts of the administrations of the provinces that had since
become the territories of Our Motherland, and gradually reinstated these
to the forms to which the erstwhile subjugated peoples had been initially
accustomed, weaning them off direct consulate and solidifying their
loyalties. What influence We maintained over these principalities was thus
perceived as nominal and was, in actuality, covert
“-just a moment,” Delita said suddenly.
loyalties. What influence We maintained over these principalities was thus
perceived as nominal and was, in actuality, covert. The induction of
plainclothesmen into the ranks of the Ninth and the implementation of, as Our
brother before us, agents of the Magistracy who did not serve in the full
plate that otherwise denotes their station, in addition to Our own direct
deceptions intended to take advantage of that my face remained largely
unknown in Her Territories, facilitated Our gauge of the public opinion and
allowed Us to know with some reliability the hearts of the people.
“The hearts of people you did not fully trust.”
For what other end may a sovereign aspire, than to know he is no tyrant? And yet, though We are perhaps the farthest thing from tyrannous, and love Our people, and have that love returned in works so great and peaceably maintained, we cannot allay this apprehension that in a moment their heart’s-strings will be wrested from us. The human heart is, as the mind, malleable, and perhaps more readily in the hands of men in Our position; and as We were not the first to hold said position, We know its tenuousness, and so strive to maintain it by means less dastardly than all who came before.
“Well, that is something of a comfort,” Delita sighed, hunching over the pages.
To have their love and adulation, if anything, restrained my trust, for I loved them as children and not as my equals. And ever a parent will police his child.
“And so you built your people a cradle,” he muttered, “and rocked it until they slept.”
To have done so is akin to ruling through fear, but fear they heed not. The people have my love in return for theirs, but it is a fettered love, as debt is a fettered love.
Delita turned the page and chuckled, leaning his brow heavily into his palm. “What other kind is there?”
There was one I loved, and let fly free. I did not bind her, but that which I would have twined her in followed her as the unraveling thread followed the Minotaur, as I held the far end and conjectured, and evaded her.
For some reason, Delita’s skin began to crawl. Perhaps it was the subject, or the change in it, more like. “And she was as your people,” he observed, steeling himself. “You bear only the love of parents and children.”
borrowed from the hierarchical structure of the Ninth Bureau, as if to be a
smaller one within the other; some heed was also paid to the Dalmascan
Peaceguard, and indeed some of Her Territories implemented the same
system, notably those inclined toward localized plutocracy. However, the
majority of the largest principalities continued to enlist the Magistracy as
the most direct law enforcement, for the benefits provided thereof, not the
Turning the page, Delita found himself smiling, and leaned back to crack tight air from his neck and wrists. The ceiling and its candles loomed down at him with warm obedience, and he focused and unfocused his eyes upon them and the cherry-red wood above. “Now, such things were easier in your time,” he told the dead Emperor. “Travel, faster. Magic, stronger. People, more distracted.”
least of which was Our own more direct presence. There are virtues
inherent of a largely educated populace, and Our people are as this,
especially following the years of war and infrastructural unrest. While
the class distinctions remain vast even now, the proliferation of technology has not reinforced the gaps which would be otherwise augmented by disparities in ability. The pursuant system of apprenticeship still extant in the north and west territories requires that most of the lower classes be lettered as well as traded; in the east and in the islands, Our Motherland’s educational policies have taken root. I would go so far as to cite the distinction as highly meritocratic, at the point that I am writing this.
I will say, though, that the pitfalls of a learned people nearly outweigh their prides. Warfare in an age as mobile as mine has proven quick, and tempting, and ultimately catastrophic. Skirmishes are shorter, yes; but more numerous, geographically devastating, and rife with casualties unforeseen. Choked on the Mist, the dead rise and become foes to all. And as we need not police them for the palings about our cities, these remain the province of hunters and adventurers, who grow fat on arrogance and undermine the authority of the ruler concerned overmuch with the living. That the belligerent may elect the time and place of their battle, and have it over quick, has cheapened war and thus affected peace.
“But here, we must have our borders ever under guard,” Delita contested.
“As opposed to the land entire? Imagine the strife internal that might have been, were the blood of my Motherland not thickened.”
“You fight through peace as a war,” Delita told him. “You enlist your people into its ranks and force-march them against those who contest you.”
Across the table, the Emperor Larsa sighed. “Peace and freedom are neither equivalent, nor exclusive.”
Delita spat a trill of air sideways. “And so you give the illusion of both, and your people have neither.”
“No,” Larsa asserted, almost petulant. “They had peace. I did not.”
There were portraits of the man on the book’s first pages, throughout his forty-four-year reign, and the person sitting across from Delita looked like all and none of these. His hair was black as ink, past his shoulders in gentle curls (like Ovelia’s, Delita marked) and unbound over his eyes and cheeks on the right side. His tall, winged crown pinned enough of that off his face that Delita might see his pallor, cheeks largely unblemished and unwrinkled, though the same smoke-darkness as his hair spilt forth from his eye-sockets. His garb was rich, not ermined like Delita’s royal robes, but spring-light, the green too bright for nature and the gold too garish for coin. A heavy pendant of twining dragons coiled obstinate around his neck, thrice, like a prisoner’s cangue.
Delita pouted, and considered. They had peace, he tested, I did not. “And none freedom,” the young king finished, looking daringly forward into the spectre’s shadowed face.
It was Ramza’s face, Delita realized, by its shape, its brows, the quiver of its pale lower lip. “They had the freedoms that mattered to them,” Larsa said, calmly, “and the ones they could perceive and account for. To have given them any more liberties would have undermined peace.”
“To which you were committed.”
“Yes. At the expense of freedom, I would have peace.”
Delita covered the open pages with his palm. “A cradle, truly.”
With Ramza’s cheeks, the protestation and indignity in the Emperor’s eyes was chilling. “A cradle from which a gentler man will be lifted, and set aground-”
“-provided his legs have not withered from their long confinement,” Delita finished, leaning forward and glaring smugly.
“You are not yet a father, nor did you have one proper,” Larsa stated calmly, and the cheeks and chin were Alma’s, not her brother’s any longer. Even the eyes, leaking their black tears, were the small and upturned, wide eyes Delita had long thought-
“And thus I am not given to know?” Delita snapped, gritting his teeth but not yet turning away.
He had never seen Alma look so conceited. Not Alma, he reminded himself, the Emperor Larsa Solidor, though he did not quite believe it. “As you have said, your world has not the need to bend before the sovereign I became,” Larsa said, Alma’s pink lips ill-suited to the words. “If there is one thing I have learned entire, it is that the people do not think of their Emperor daily save to curse him when the taxes are high and the orchards unripe, or to toast him at the supper table of plenty without ever having seen his face. Your people will be as this, King Hyral, and sing your story though they know it not.”
“And if I was to teach them?”
He had, however, seen that bastard Algus look so conceited. “And would you have them rise against your rule?” Algus’ features became the robes and crown unsettlingly well.
Delita bit back what could have become a seethe, had he not half-expected the change. “If that is what they wished. It is how I became this, is it not?”
“You are not shy of war,” the Emperor said plain.
“And nor were you, if history tells true.”
“Then it absolves,” he demurred, and he was Olan.
And Olan was the last person Delita desired or expected to see. “History never absolves,” the young king muttered quickly, the power leaving his voice as he recalled that which he had done to the face that this apparition now wore. “It masks, and rewrites, and manipulates, and thus engenders false clemency. Your actions were your actions.” And mine, mine.
“Yes,” the Emperor agreed, and no longer on the defensive; as he sat even the posture was as Olan’s, the hunch of a scholar, though the sightless, dripping eyes were fierce and challenging in the way Olan’s had been only at the very end. “But those you learn and build your world upon are those that history has seen fit to hail. Those I have writ are those that I recall, and cringe not at the thought of laying plain. In my time, there were many men who spoke of ‘taking reins’ and ‘straightening history’s weave’,” and he elided the terms, sing-song and self-deprecating, “and these men had their way. And I result.”
Rapping his fingertips on the paper, Delita sighed, “And now you are as they.”
“You make me so.”
Closing his eyes was no reprieve from the smile. “You’re right.” Never once had Delita seen Olan smile; perhaps the foreignness was not the Emperor’s alone. It was resigned, feline and closed-lipped, and the corners of the vacuous eyes turned up at the edges, black as if burnt, the lashes and his hair rustling in the same nearly gentle wind that slithered up the hairs on Delita’s neck.
The candles flickered overhead.
“I will not have my people be as yours,” Delita asserted, steeling his voice and drilling his elbows into the table’s surface.
“As well that you should not. They are not mine.” Larsa continued to smile through Olan’s lips and cheeks, and it was warm, lulling, that of a counseling priest.
“They fear war too much to stray from peace,” Delita went on. “And thus I can give them freedom.”
“I too once thought so,” Larsa said. Something echoed.
Delita curled a hand into a fist and wrested it from the pages, and his sweat squelched between his fingers. “I would have them educated,” he stated firmly, planting his fist gently onto the table. “I would have them equal.”
The smile was at last gone, and Larsa’s pout was considerate-another expression that Olan had never worn where Delita could see. “Equal to you, their king?”
If Delita had a response to that to begin with, it was lost as he watched the Emperor’s face become his own.
“Why are you king?” he asked himself.
With no small amount of bemused, horrified irony, Delita answered, “You tell me.”
“How you are king is plain, but why is not.”
“Because I will not deny those who have put me here.”
He smiled. It was not his own smile. “No, that is why I became Emperor.”
Delita smirked, and stared into the inkwell eyes. “And we can’t share a reason?”
The spectre’s smile began to fade. “I learned, and far too early in my life, of sacrifices made that I may rule. I did not make them on my own behalf.”
“At least not at first,” Delita whispered.
“You are right,” Larsa conceded.
“And that is where we differ.”
“Why are you king?” he asked again, with Dycedarg’s face instead.
Delita leaned forward and sneered. “So that you are not.”
Larsa smiled in reply. “That is a better answer.”
It was not for long that Delita could only stare, blankly as his anger abated. The Emperor sat with his hands folded on the table before him, the helixed dragons at his throat blinking gold in the candlelight, then shadowed by the curling smoke that flowed from Larsa’s hollow eyes. The features of Dycedarg softened, but not to the Emperor’s own; as Delita squinted, he found that the apparition had no true face at all.
“You’re a brilliant man, don’t get me wrong,” the young king said, “but I don’t think you’re the best idea for the world right now.”
“And are you better suited?” The Emperor’s tone was almost amused.
Delita’s voice fell heavy on the thrust of his breath. “Perhaps not, but I’m at least alive.”
“There is that,” Larsa admitted.
“-Delita?” Ovelia called again.
“Brilliant man,” Delita repeated, staring unfazed across the table.
-