a kind of integrity, cont.
The next part of that Fran/Balthier thing, this time Fran POV.
After this I don't think I'll have any parts of this silly fic that aren't ridiculously out of order.
Mjrn is the one who finds the body. Fran is out hunting when her sister appears, so wide-eyed and breathless that for a moment she cannot even speak, pointing back the way she has come.
It is a hume - or was. A male hume, and Fran can see where he must have fallen, a patch of earth made unsteady by the recent rains, just waiting for some unwary traveler to step upon it. As she makes her way down, catching at the vine-laced trees with her claws, Fran can see his head is tilted at an unnatural angle. Quick and clean, he would have died instantly. She can hear Mjrn behind her, would keep her sister at a distance had it been a more violent end, but this is bloodless. So silly, these humes, that they live such short lives and seem eager to find new ways to whittle down even those few hours. Not the first hume to venture into their Wood, nor the first to die in it.
“Was he looking for the village?” Mjrn says in a small voice, keeping her distance. Jote often tells tales of humes, who know little more than how to steal and to destroy, who would seize the Wood for themselves and take it all, if the Viera did not have the blessing of the Green Word and the Wood’s powerful magicks to keep them safe.
“Perhaps.” Fran doubts it, not alone. He is oddly dressed for a conqueror, at any rate, no metal plates or fancy weapons, only a short sword - and that is no surprise, even she would not wander the Wood unarmed. Fran approaches, hearing Mjrn inhale sharply behind her as she kneels down. The hume’s pack has spilled out around him, Fran can smell tobacco, soap, the tanned hide of the bag itself. A flash of color catches her eye - pigments in a small metal box, like those they use in Eryut, though these are far more vivid: azure as blue as the sky, shades of purple and red that could match many of the Wood’s brightest blooms.
A glimpse of the same shade near the body, and Fran moves closer, a small book still clutched, half-open in the lifeless hand. Fran murmurs a soft apology as she pulls it free, that he will understand it is only curiosity. Always better to respect those who walk the next path, whoever they might be, that they will feel no need to look back.
Mjrn creeps closer, looking over her shoulder as she slowly turns the pages. Words on the inside cover, and beneath a few of the pictures. Meaningless to them, of course, though the drawings speak with an eloquence all their own. It seems the man was an artist as well as a traveler, and Fran has heard and seen of some of those peoples he has sketched out, all those who pass through the Wood. Seeq, and the Bangaa, and Moogles as well. The world outside is nothing like Eryut, full of infinite variety. Full of humes, in the north and south and all in between, with their own rules and laws and little common allegiance. Cities packed with them, and the man has sketched some of those here as well, skylines so wide they cover two pages. Towers so tall he had set the book vertically to capture them in full, garlanded at their heights by airships, which Fran has ever only seen at a great distance, looking out from the very edge of the Wood.
Fran had passed up the chance at leading the village years ago, and there were those - her sister Jote among them - who still wondered at her decision, confused by her reluctance. Jote, who may have known how she had taken to roaming in wider and wider circuits, but kept her opinions, as always, to herself. The village had been enough, once, but looking down on these colorful pages, all the world’s wonders, Fran cannot help but feel the return of a pang that is like nothing else so much as the Voice of the Wood, the Green Word, even though this voice speaks pure betrayal to all that she knows.
It seems a waste, her life in Eryut, and the word is disrespectful but Fran cannot help herself for thinking it. That she is foolish to move through her days here, one exactly like the next, when there is a whole world beyond.
“Look! I think that is Taje, there in his book!”
Mjrn leans down, as Fran turns the page to reveal a page of sketches of her sisters, and another, and it seems that yes, he was looking for a path into the village, though perhaps not as ill-intended as those who have come before. The illustrations are very good, Fran believes she can recognize most of those who have ventured out of Eryut. The viera are captured in fine and careful detail, along with studies of their weapons or armor, anything they had with them, or had taken from the Wood. A few of them are painted in profile, looking into some greater distance, and Fran wonders if any of them regret the choice. Trade the wide world, no matter what its distractions, for the whispers of the Green Word that breathe even now beneath her skin, ever at her side, here in the Wood where she is sleek and strong and silent. Jote would call it madness, has done so, but would she be as harsh, if Fran had not grown so fond of her solitary walks?
It will hurt to leave. It will hurt to stay.
“What do we do with the body?” Her sister says softly, and Fran sighs, and reaches out, runs the tip of one blunted claw along the edge of the dead man’s face. So very young, even for a hume, to give up all that he knew and understood - to come to her world, seeking more.
“We will bury him. I believe it is what they do with their kind.”
Fran does not think he will mind it, laid to rest here to become one with the Wood. The work does not take long with Mjrn’s help, and when they have made a proper grave she leaves to gather flowers for his feet, to welcome his first steps into the next world. Fran collects what has fallen from the pack, but stops herself, as she is about to put the book back into his hands. It is a decision to be made, right here, and though it may move slow, there will not be a going back.
If Mjrn even notices the slim tome in her sister’s hand as they return to Eryut, she says nothing.
After this I don't think I'll have any parts of this silly fic that aren't ridiculously out of order.
Mjrn is the one who finds the body. Fran is out hunting when her sister appears, so wide-eyed and breathless that for a moment she cannot even speak, pointing back the way she has come.
It is a hume - or was. A male hume, and Fran can see where he must have fallen, a patch of earth made unsteady by the recent rains, just waiting for some unwary traveler to step upon it. As she makes her way down, catching at the vine-laced trees with her claws, Fran can see his head is tilted at an unnatural angle. Quick and clean, he would have died instantly. She can hear Mjrn behind her, would keep her sister at a distance had it been a more violent end, but this is bloodless. So silly, these humes, that they live such short lives and seem eager to find new ways to whittle down even those few hours. Not the first hume to venture into their Wood, nor the first to die in it.
“Was he looking for the village?” Mjrn says in a small voice, keeping her distance. Jote often tells tales of humes, who know little more than how to steal and to destroy, who would seize the Wood for themselves and take it all, if the Viera did not have the blessing of the Green Word and the Wood’s powerful magicks to keep them safe.
“Perhaps.” Fran doubts it, not alone. He is oddly dressed for a conqueror, at any rate, no metal plates or fancy weapons, only a short sword - and that is no surprise, even she would not wander the Wood unarmed. Fran approaches, hearing Mjrn inhale sharply behind her as she kneels down. The hume’s pack has spilled out around him, Fran can smell tobacco, soap, the tanned hide of the bag itself. A flash of color catches her eye - pigments in a small metal box, like those they use in Eryut, though these are far more vivid: azure as blue as the sky, shades of purple and red that could match many of the Wood’s brightest blooms.
A glimpse of the same shade near the body, and Fran moves closer, a small book still clutched, half-open in the lifeless hand. Fran murmurs a soft apology as she pulls it free, that he will understand it is only curiosity. Always better to respect those who walk the next path, whoever they might be, that they will feel no need to look back.
Mjrn creeps closer, looking over her shoulder as she slowly turns the pages. Words on the inside cover, and beneath a few of the pictures. Meaningless to them, of course, though the drawings speak with an eloquence all their own. It seems the man was an artist as well as a traveler, and Fran has heard and seen of some of those peoples he has sketched out, all those who pass through the Wood. Seeq, and the Bangaa, and Moogles as well. The world outside is nothing like Eryut, full of infinite variety. Full of humes, in the north and south and all in between, with their own rules and laws and little common allegiance. Cities packed with them, and the man has sketched some of those here as well, skylines so wide they cover two pages. Towers so tall he had set the book vertically to capture them in full, garlanded at their heights by airships, which Fran has ever only seen at a great distance, looking out from the very edge of the Wood.
Fran had passed up the chance at leading the village years ago, and there were those - her sister Jote among them - who still wondered at her decision, confused by her reluctance. Jote, who may have known how she had taken to roaming in wider and wider circuits, but kept her opinions, as always, to herself. The village had been enough, once, but looking down on these colorful pages, all the world’s wonders, Fran cannot help but feel the return of a pang that is like nothing else so much as the Voice of the Wood, the Green Word, even though this voice speaks pure betrayal to all that she knows.
It seems a waste, her life in Eryut, and the word is disrespectful but Fran cannot help herself for thinking it. That she is foolish to move through her days here, one exactly like the next, when there is a whole world beyond.
“Look! I think that is Taje, there in his book!”
Mjrn leans down, as Fran turns the page to reveal a page of sketches of her sisters, and another, and it seems that yes, he was looking for a path into the village, though perhaps not as ill-intended as those who have come before. The illustrations are very good, Fran believes she can recognize most of those who have ventured out of Eryut. The viera are captured in fine and careful detail, along with studies of their weapons or armor, anything they had with them, or had taken from the Wood. A few of them are painted in profile, looking into some greater distance, and Fran wonders if any of them regret the choice. Trade the wide world, no matter what its distractions, for the whispers of the Green Word that breathe even now beneath her skin, ever at her side, here in the Wood where she is sleek and strong and silent. Jote would call it madness, has done so, but would she be as harsh, if Fran had not grown so fond of her solitary walks?
It will hurt to leave. It will hurt to stay.
“What do we do with the body?” Her sister says softly, and Fran sighs, and reaches out, runs the tip of one blunted claw along the edge of the dead man’s face. So very young, even for a hume, to give up all that he knew and understood - to come to her world, seeking more.
“We will bury him. I believe it is what they do with their kind.”
Fran does not think he will mind it, laid to rest here to become one with the Wood. The work does not take long with Mjrn’s help, and when they have made a proper grave she leaves to gather flowers for his feet, to welcome his first steps into the next world. Fran collects what has fallen from the pack, but stops herself, as she is about to put the book back into his hands. It is a decision to be made, right here, and though it may move slow, there will not be a going back.
If Mjrn even notices the slim tome in her sister’s hand as they return to Eryut, she says nothing.