Chapter Text
The Blight had taken firm hold of the land.
Rosaria was a beautiful land, certainly, but what lay beyond the gates of Eastpool was a pall of black. There were no monsters nor men; no vegetation nor animal. All was ash and stone, much like their own Deadlands.
Cid could see how it grieved Clive, to find this land that had once been so lush now desolate and deserted. It had been beautiful, he had said. Cid could not unhear the grief that thickened his tone.
But it did not delay their walk, and the path was short with the absence of beastmen or monsters or any other manner of distractions.
He could tell, the moment they reached the edges of the keep proper. Life clung determinedly here, grass and weeds and brambles springing to form with wily intent, clutching into stone and rock and crumbling walls. Perhaps the Phoenix’s aether had permeated the land, here, at the site of its demise, staving off the blight with flame and ash.
Cid couldn’t say, really, but he could feel a tension in the air, the weight of something, though what that might be, he wasn’t sure. Overlaying it was the scent of Clive - settled more, now, in the absence of Lady Hanna but with the shadows of her comfort still lingering - but still present in the air, twisting with every turn of emotion or pang of discomfort the omega felt.
Cid liked to think he was helping, too. For all they hasn’t acknowledged it yet, they had spent the last several nights cuddling. It soothed some base instinct in Cid, to wake up with the dawn and have Clive wrapped securely in his arms, to smell that enticing scent so near, to bury his face in the back of the omega’s neck and swallow the instinct to bite, to take, content in the knowledge that Clive, or his subconscious, at least, trusted Cid enough to rest in his arms, to present him with the vulnerable parts of himself like his neck, his underbelly.
It seemed the symptoms of his presentation were still bothering him, however. He could see it in the slowness of his movement, the way he hesitated before stepping, occasionally, as if worried it would provoke the twinging in his abdomen. The way he would grimace and pause, letting Cid stride a few lengths in front of him before moving again.
They were helping, but they couldn’t absolve Clive of this discomfort, it seems.
The climb down the ruins was arduous. The stone crumbled at the slightest brush and the chunks of what must have once been the gate to the keep had fallen oddly, as if something had crashed through the middle of it and left it in disarray. Clive managed relatively well, though he felt compelled to reach out and rest a hand on the omega several times when he stumbled during their scramble.
But finally they reached the courtyard of the keep. Cid stepped away from their makeshift staircase with a sigh of relief, glancing around to give the other man a few moments to compose himself.
The ground was firmer here, composed of grass and cobblestone and weeds. It was just as dilapidated as the entrance, or the lack of, rather, but it seemed someone had seen fit to make the pilgrimage out here at some point after the Night of Flames.
Heaps of rusted silver armor and white gleaming bone were thrown unceremoniously against a far wall, heaped without care or thought. Vegetation grew thick around them, curling around the ivory of the bones, crawling across faded insignias of the Empire of Sanbreque, covering up the traces of the invaders as it were.
The Rosarian remains were treated with considerably more honor. Cid reckoned the bodies had been burnt at a pyre, as their tradition dictated, but a smattering of swords was arranged in a small diamond, decorated and embellished helms resting next to each one. The forward-most one seemed to catch Clive’s attention, the man’s breath audibly catching in his throat as he moved to kneel next to the armor.
A small stone rests next to the helmet, something painstakingly carved into its surface. He kneels next to Clive, careful to keep friendly distance between them, and peers at the stone.
May the Phoenix welcome you to Roost, ardent warriors of ash.
Clive seems not to notice his interest, instead reaching out a trembling hand to rest on the helm in front of him, running his fingers over the armor delicately, reverently, hesitantly. His scent is swelling in the air around them, becoming thick and heavy with distress, with grief, and it makes Cid grimace.
“Someone you knew?” He asks quietly, gesturing at the object of the lad’s attention.
“I knew them all,” Clive whispers back. “They were my friends, my guards, my soldiers. But this..this is Captain Murdoch’s helmet. His sword.”
Ah. His omegan parent, then. The Lady Hanna’s husband. A good man, from what he’d gathered. A kind man.
A good father.
He says nothing else - there are no words that will comfort Clive. Not here, in this graveyard of the people he loved and lost. But he reaches his own hand out, lets it rest gently on Clive’s shoulder, and he thinks it helps, just a little. At least the lad knows he’s not alone.
He won’t ever be again, if Cid has anything to say about it.
Eventually Clive shakes him off with a shaky little smile, and they rise to their feet to continue on. The ruins are expansive and phenomenally unstable, scored with ash and soot and cinder and washed out by the sun and the elements.
It isn’t long before Clive spots one of the objects of their attention, however: that blasted man that always seems to appear in that damned cloak just before everything goes to shit. He takes off without another word, and Cid trails behind him. He’s not quite as spry as the omega, even with the other’s presentation slowing him down.
They don’t make it very far, though. When they round the corner to the antechamber of the ruins, a room that would have once been tucked at the very heart of the keep but was now composed of one less wall than it originated with, exposing it to the elements and allowing nature to take its course here, too, the man has once again vanished. Not even a trace of scent lingers in the air, though Clive’s is quick to sour the space around them, letting out a frustrated snarl as they pace forward.
An imposing door sets before them, now, graceful and ancient, clearly of Fallen design. The swooping lines and intricate carvings set into its face are impressive, and the blue gems that gleam at its center certainly catch the eye. Cid’s seen many, many Fallen ruins in his day - the one the Hideaway shelters in, now, had been one of a multitude he’d searched to find a suitable ruin - and yet he’d never seen anything quite like this.
Clive shares none of his awe. The omega is clearly irritated, and he grumbles to himself as he walks up to stand before the door, brow furrowed in a scowl. “Any idea how to open it?” He asks, moving to stand by the other man’s shoulder, peering up at the rather ominous doors before them.
“Only the Phoenix is permitted to enter the Apodytery. As such, it will only open for the Phoenix’s Dominant,” Clive recites, as if the knowledge had been drilled into him. Knowing what little he did of the man’s childhood, it probably had. Rosarians were a traditional sort, certainly, and their religious fervor regarding their Dominant was rather well-known.
He supposed the Gregorians still had them beat out, though, what with the giant fucking statues of Bahamut or Great Greagor’s other dragons on every damn corner in Sanbreque’s cities.
Clive reaches up to run his fingers over the door and, to their surprise, the gems underneath his hand light up immediately, suffusing a soft sapphire glow around them. The ruins around them shake and shudder, loose rock shattering on the ground as the doors rumble open, the blue light disappearing within the darkness that gapes before them.
“Thank you, Joshua,” Clive murmurs.
“Well, guess we’ll just have to chase our mystery man into Apodytery, aye?”
“We can’t!” Clive protests. “It’s sacred.”
“Oh, Clive,” he sighs, stepping forward into the darkness. “Do I seem like the kind of man that lets anything be sacred?”
─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ──
The Apodytery is certainly interesting.
It seems Clive’s irritable mood is bringing back some of his symptoms and the omega remains short with Cid as they make their way through the seemingly endless levels of the Fallen’s design. The constructs that come to life are strange, glowing, almost robotic, were it not for the way they shatter into aether when they die.
Still, they make adequate progress, looking desperately for a glimpse of the hooded figure as they fight their way through. They see no sign of him, much to Clive’s chagrin and his own disappointment, but the constructs are easy enough to kill, and even the wraiths that form out of the aether in the air don’t pose much of a challenge for two Dominants, even with Clive’s handicaps.
No, they face no challenge, until the giant appears.
It’s about the size of the minotaur they faced days, perhaps even a week ago, now. It’s large and gleaming and angry, and it gives them no quarter. Its blinding attacks are devastating and hard-hitting, and he can feel the strain in his bones with each burst of lightning he draws forth.
Between the pair of them, they manage. But it’s not a bloodless fight, like all the rest they’d encountered so far. Cid coughs, splattering his glove with flecks of blood as Clive hisses, burns from being blasted by the creature’s aether shimmering on his torso through the scant gaps in his new armor. Just bloody bad luck, on their part. The Fallen certainly knew their business when it came to designing their guardians.
Jaded soldiers as they were, the pair of them, it doesn’t slow them for long, and they push on through endless levels of ancient machinery and trickery; through rising levels and harrowing descents into darkness. Cid’s never seen anything like it, the magic that powers the Apodytery, and Clive seems similarly abashed.
When they reach the final chamber, it’s eerily anticlimactic. Cid had expected something….more. Some great beast waiting as some last line of defense, perhaps an army of those blasted constructs, or even some of those ghastly wraiths whose shrieks set his ears ringing. Hell, even another one of those giant mechanical beasts. Just something, anything, that might signify that they had reached their final destination.
But there’s nothing, in the end. The platform clicks into place like all the rest, and the pair of them step out into a large chamber. The depths of it aren’t visible - lost to the eerie blackness that swallows anything outside the blue lights that illuminate the cracks in the floor and the notches of stone where more sit.
There’s a large mural, of sorts, on the back wall, and they drift towards it, naturally, as it seems to be the centerpoint of the chamber. Cid’s never seen anything like it. Faded and crumbled as it was, the imposing figure in the middle, depicted in black and in harsh, swooping lines, is still unsettling, quick to draw the eye and just as quick to make the beholder uncomfortable. There are pieces of it lost to the natural dissolution of the stone, but other forms seem to be surrounding the center figure, but he can’t quite make out who or what they’re supposed to be, exactly.
He finds the entire place sort of uncomfortable, frankly. He may live in the Deadlands, but he vastly preferred sunlight and fresh air over the depths of some cantankerous ruin. This place may have been sacred to Clive, to his people, to the Phoenix, and even to the Fallen, but Cid could only think of it as a tomb.
Cid pauses in front of the mural, Clive drawing up alongside him. “Some kind of god, you think?” The lad asks, reaching out a careful hand to run his fingers along the etching, he reckoned. Always tactile, Clive. Always the first to reach out a hand, heedless of if it would be bitten.
He doesn’t have the chance to answer, however. The moment the man’s finger brushes the stone, he inhales sharply, staggering and drawing back. When Cid meets his eyes, concerned with the sudden swell of the lad’s scent as he stumbles backwards, blood beginning to drip from his nose, he can’t see anything but his own reflection in the sudden pinpricks of Clive’s pupils.
“Clive? Clive?!” The man’s already weak enough as it is, as strong a front as he tries to put up. The few days they spent in Eastpool, and particularly Lady Hanna, had done him some good, but he had been dragging in their last few scrapes, his presentation a draw on his energy compounded by the pull he exerted on his aether.
There has to be something, anything, he can do. His instincts rebel at the pain twisting Clive’s scent, at the single-minded ferality that seems to have overtaken him. It’s like he’s not seeing his surroundings anymore - not the Apodytery or the mural or even Cid.
In the end, it doesn’t matter what he tries to do.
Cid reaches out a hand to rest it on the omega’s shoulder, to shake him back to himself or at least keep him standing, when Clive takes a deep, shuddering breath, and drops to the floor, seizing.
─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ──
Cid’s frozen.
Or maybe he’s frozen?
Clive can’t quite tell. Everything is..slow. Is black, is gray, is washed out and two-dimensional; small and infinitesimal and flighty. It’s as if his vision is stuttered, lagging and flickering and blinking in and out. He can’t even feel his body, the oppressive weight of his healing wounds, the aching of his limbs, the persistent cramping in his abdomen - all of it is repressed, and there’s only the uneven beat of his heart pounding in his ears.
He can feel the steady drip of blood from his nose, catches it in his hands, stares at it. His palms are stained red like they always are in his dreams. In his nightmares. The hands of a killer. A Bastard. A kinslayer. A murderer. He wants to reach out to Cid, to check on him, to beg him to be okay, but he can’t touch him with hands like these. He’d only stain him, and Clive’s stained too many, too much, already.
The blood is cold on his skin.
When that blasted man, the one whose identity he’s spent fifteen long, bloody years chasing, appears, he can hardly find it within himself to be surprised. And when that man lowers his hood, baring a face just like Clive’s, down to that fucking brand on his left cheek, it is the scent of omega that they share, his own bitter scent reflected right back at him, filling his nose and his lungs and the marrow in his bones with that same danger, danger, not safe, wrong, wrong, wRONG- that it has every day since he’s presented, he turns to find Cid, desperate for his comfort, his reassurance, the warmth of his hands and the hearth of his scent.
Even that, too, fades eventually, and Clive falls into the dark, his last glimpse that of Cid, standing frozen by his side with a careful hand outstretched.
When he comes to, everything is burning.
It’s eerily reminiscent of the Night of Flames. There’s no castle, here, no stone keep, no guarded walls or screaming soldiers. But there’s the darkness of a seemingly endless sky, the crackle and screech of flames, and the flake of ash over the land. It’s not somewhere Clive’s ever been before, but he can’t help but think it’s familiar to him all the same.
But nothing about the Apodytery has made much sense thus far, and there’s little reason for that to change now.
It’s almost casual, how Ifrit and the Phoenix and the Gate spawn into view, covered by a veil of smoke and the haze of cracking flames. It’s that brutal, unforgivable fight that even now he barely remembers. All Clive recalls is the overwhelming heat, the fury and fear that beat in a great sulfur heart, and the feeling of feathers in iron teeth, ichor in cindered jaws.
The screams of the Phoenix, of Joshua, are familiar, too, as it beats and cries and hurls the great weight of its fury at Ifrit, but it’s simply not enough, in the end. When Ifrit goes for the kill, as Clive knows he will, as the scent of blood hangs heavy in the air, the physical pressure of Joshua’s pain and terror, everything freezes.
Just like it had with Cid.
There’s something else in the air now, though. Something he couldn’t parse before. The tang of blood fades from the air, leaving only fire and something…lighter. There’s the almost amber of Joshua’s childhood scent (the one he never had time to grow out of) but then there’s what must be Ifrit’s, too.
It’s fire and brimstone, soot and fury, but it’s overtly, overwhelmingly omega.
Just like Clive’s.
Even here, in the machinations of some madman’s plan for him, he cannot escape his designation. The curse of his biology.
When a shadow of himself appears, he can’t find it within to be surprised. Perhaps a part of him knows what is to come, and all there is is to overcome it or let it take him.
And when the visions of himself and Joshua flutter into sparks, into embers, into bright lights that fade so quickly into the inferno he finds himself adrift for a moment, it is with determination that he turns to face Ifrit.
The eikon is a curious thing. Almost canine, in the sharp appearance of his maw, of the jut of his snout, the razor of his fangs and the forwardness of his predatory gaze. The antler-like structures, made of mountain cores and stalagmites, belay this, seemingly, but eikons have never had to follow conventions, and an impossible second dominant of fire is no exception.
“Come then, Ifrit. Show me who you truly are.”
The battle is long and fierce and tiring, but it’s almost fun, in its own way. Clive’s done nothing but fight to survive for years upon bloody years. Fighting to live, fighting to eat, fighting to bleed and kill and find some impossible way to exact revenge for his brother - it left little room for else, not that the Imperial Army gave him any quarter, anyway.
But the wounds he takes in their battle don’t sting quite as sharply as normal, and it’s almost as if Ifrit is having as much fun as Clive. The entity’s eyes seem to get clearer and sharper with each moment that passes, the raw, vague look of fight-or-flight leaving those piercing yellows to focus serenely on Clive. It seems the eikon enjoys a challenge - they’re one in the same, in that.
Even the creature’s scent is bothering him less. Perhaps it’s the rush of adrenaline, the comfort of burning muscles and aching arms and smattering bruises, but it’s been nary a thought in his head, all his senses focused on the battle, the opponent, and nothing that would hinder his chance to defeat them.
After an eon, the eikon falls. It’s a keen predator, certainly, ferocious in its strength and wily in its wit, but it’s still a fledgling, it seems. A bumbling pup. Clive has spent the better part of two decades learning strategies and conniving and ways to make things bleed. It gives him a fight, but it’s no match for him in the end.
Just like Joshua.
The shadow of himself that flares into life in the absence of Ifrit is unexpected. It seems the Apodytery is not finished with him yet.
Or perhaps it’s himself that causes its formation.
He’s always been good at denial. And he’s spent the better half of his life denying his eikon, the beast that dwells in the cage of his bones. Murderer, beast, eikon, Clive.
“Still, you deny it. Even when the truth’s right in front of you,” he curses himself. It is fear that prevents him from doing what must be done. From conquering himself, apparently. From coming to terms with Joshua’s, with Elwin’s, with Rodney’s deaths.
The battle against the caricature is more difficult than the one against Ifrit himself. This one is truly, perhaps, the shadow of his soul. It has all his strategies - his moves, his instincts, his familiarity with a blade. It even has a few new tricks it traps him with, keeps him on his toes, on the defensive, for far too long.
But Clive’s not gotten to where he is by being conventional. His ability to think and process and adapt during battle had always been one of his strengths, Rodney had claimed, and it serves him well here, too. He’s able to keep up and even out-perform the construct, twirling blade and singing fire and all. The shadow has more tricks up its sleeves, however, and when it bursts into flame incarnate, into a state of both Clive and Ifrit, some sort of in-between - semi-priming, maybe? - it begins to gain the upper hand, and he has to pull back to regroup.
Perhaps it’s waiting for something. The other him. It gives him several moments to rest, to catch his breath, to grimace at the sting of his wounds and the heat of the flames. It’s trying to tell him something. Ifrit is trying to tell him something. There’s a purpose to all this, even if he can’t quite find it yet.
His first inkling comes when the visage of his younger self once again appears by his shoulder. The feel of those leather gloves, the careful comb of his hair, the anxiety hidden in clear blue eyes - all of these are familiar to him. He had lived each and every day under the thumb of his mother, despite Elwin and Rodney’s best attempts. She had haunted him for years and years and years, with words and bruises and scent. He’d remained terrified of Rodney’s scent until the day the man died, let alone any omegas he didn’t know.
And his mother’s scent. Even now, over a decade later, it haunted his dreams. It didn’t quite have the impact of Joshua’s desperate screams, or the bloodiest missions the Bastards undertook, or the memories of soldiers who saw a pretty face and decided to do as they pleased with it.
But still, it haunted him. Still, it hurt him. Still, it defiled him.
Still, it held him back.
He could almost smell it in the air, that broken, rotten mixture of hatred, of burning sugar and desperation and hatred, a stringent manipulation of his instincts that urged him to run, to hide, to make himself lesser and unknown because no one wanted him, and those who did would hurt him.
No, that’s not quite right, is it? The puppetry of his mother’s scent fades from the air, but the potent spring of omega does not. It’s coming from Clive himself, unsteady and thready, but it is. It’s coming from the shadow of himself that remains flamed and fanged, sword held at the ready even as it allowed him to retain the distance between them.
It’s even coming from that hand on his shoulder, from his younger self.
It doesn’t make sense. He’d never had a scent beyond his childhood one; he’d never presented as an omega at this age. But it remains. It’s brighter, than his current one, the one both he and the shadow are projecting. Lighter and softer, curling more gently through the air and through the heart. The tang of omega is not so intense, not so desperate and stung with wearied bitterness, the hint of remembered fear.
Perhaps that was the way he was always supposed to smell. What he would’ve been if the Night of Flames hadn’t happened, or if his mother had not abused his instincts to the point of desertion.
It’s this that gives him his first true hint at what the Apodytery, what Ifrit, what even his own conscience is trying to tell him.
“No escape, eh?” An escape would be nice. He’d never asked to present as an omega. Never asked to be an impossible second eikon of fire. Never wanted to be a soldier, a killer, a branded, a kinslayer.
Clive was a Rosfield, however, and more importantly, he was a Shield. He could not flee when taken to task. It was his duty, his inheritance, his fate, to stand stalwart and defiant when others would cower.
He’d spent thirteen long years running, and it had never done him any good. It was time to face himself, for better, for worse, and for everything in-between.
“It’s alright. I’m done running from you.
“Together, then.”
When that light sparks around him again - the dissolution of something unknown, something past and present and constant yet intangible - he feels the fire in his soul flare, warmth thrumming suddenly in his veins and his bones as his scent blossoms into the air around them.
It’s…different. He hadn't smelt much of his scent thus far, by his own choice. It tended to make him panic, and his scent glands had been damaged enough by his own hands that they were somewhat nonfunctional, at the moment, producing scent randomly and in various amounts of potency, nearly impossible to predict now that Tarja demanded he leave them open to the air.
What bits he had inhaled had left him conflicted. It was a warm scent, like many of the Rosfield line had, their destinies so intertwined with fire and flame that it even encroached on their very souls, their scents. There were hints of something strange, something that made him think of stardust and plasma and things unknown, hints of pine, of woodsmoke, of cinder and hearth. But always, always, it was bitter with fear, strung with anxiety, riddled with distaste.
But this one…it’s the same scent he’s been carrying, he thinks. The central notes are unchanged, if perhaps stronger and more defined than they’d been before. But the darker emotions - the anger, the pain, the terror, the acidity - they’d lightened, lessened, become fragments when before they’d been the whole.
Perhaps this isn’t just about Ifrit. This isn’t just about accepting what happened at Phoenix Gate, about coming to terms with the deaths he’d caused and the destruction he housed within the cage of his bones.
If he was to accept Ifrit, he would have to accept himself unequivocally. There could be no hesitation, no restraint.
If he was going to be a dominant, he was also going to have to be an omega.
Clive didn’t think it was going to be that straightforward. He was stubborn, certainly, but he was well-educated. Trauma did not cease to exist because of a singular event. Omegas were still a source of pain, of fear, of concern for him.
But perhaps….perhaps he could stop fearing his own scent.
He couldn’t spend the rest of his life, no matter how long or short it may be, running from such an intrinsic part of himself. Scents were difficult to suppress in adults, and particularly in dominants – it was part of the reason Tarja had refused beyond what was necessary to help him begin to heal his wounds, to bring him back to himself and away from the edge he’d been dangling from.
Cid flashed into his mind, here. The look in the other man’s eyes when he woke up with Clive in his arms. The comfort of the alpha’s scent as he cradled him when his distress grew too great. The way Cid tried to be discreet about scenting him, about tucking his nose into Clive’s neck when he thought him still asleep, taking deep lungfuls of his scent like it was worth more than oxygen.
Surely if Cid could find his scent so amenable, Clive could, too.
Fire blazes to life in his left hand and he lifts it, cradling it to his chest as he closes his eyes. It is not the Phoenix’s familiar flames, no. It’s Ifrit’s hellfire, strong and dense and hot and it thrums in his veins, too, ignites wells of power within that he’d never noticed until now, never realized that they were there until they flare into wild life.
“Time to find out who we truly are, then. Once and for all.”
It is Ifrit’s power flowing through his veins, then, that allows him to semiprime. He and the shadow - Ifrit? Himself? - are evenly matched, now, stark with power and furious with life. Trading blows gets tiring, though, and the shadow is waning, too reliant on its attack patterns that Clive is far too quick to learn and counter, and it is wearing on them both.
Still, it seems he was missing something. The shadow flames into cinders once more, an inferno that bequeaths Ifrit himself, the eikon tall and strong and staring at him with piercing yellow eyes that look primal and deadly in the glint of the fire that still encircles them. The power in him flares again, pulsing in time with his heartbeat. It’s persistent, this pulse, something within him calling and reaching for him to understand, to take, to be.
It hits him, suddenly, the way everything else in this godsforsaken Apodytery has. He has accepted the omega part of himself, at least to a degree, but he has not accepted Ifrit.
Foolish. The way he always was.
But he knows the truth of it now, burning undeniably in his veins and the glowing of his eyes, reflecting back at him from the shine of Ifrit’s scales.
“You are not Ifrit. I am.”
Priming into Ifrit is strange. It is not difficult, not in this strange place between realms, between dreams and reality, light and dark. But it is…unsettling. He doesn’t remember the first time he primed, and so could it even count, really, when he had done it unconsciously?
This time he is present. He primes consciously, purposefully, with a roar of fury and the smattering of flames.
Being Ifrit, embodying him is strange, too. He’s suddenly massive, several, several feet taller than he could ever dream of, and made of scales and rocks that look as though they should be hard to maneuver in and yet he’s as light on his feet as he always has been. The tail is new and awkward but kept out of the way, and the rest is familiar enough to him.
Ifrit wants to fight him, honorably, specifically, purposefully.
The fight is long and brutal. It’s nothing like what they’d done thus far - those could be sparring matches between squires for how different this one is. Ifrit is testing him truly. His mettle, his resolve, the strength of his flames, the crush of his jaw. The eikon is to pass judgement, and Clive is suddenly desperate to earn his eikon’s respect.
Perhaps it’s Clive’s tenacity. Perhaps it’s pure luck. Perhaps Ifrit has seen what he wants to see and has not found him lacking.
Either way, eventually, the fight ends.
The corpse of his shadow is burning behind him, and Clive cannot wait to leave, to return to Eastpool and take up Lady Hanna’s offer of using her spare bed, if only to give his aching muscles a chance to relax before their next trek.
And perhaps for himself, too. Just a bit. Just enough to take a few more lungfuls of Hanna’s scent and let it soothe him to sleep much like he’d done as a child.
But he’s not expecting the voice that speaks to him, ringing out ancient and cold and strangely accented in the emptiness that encompasses him now.
Limitless power, it says. No more running, it claims.
There’s no time for him to process it before that same terrible piercing pain strikes him again and he falls, clutching his hand to the side of his head and praying to any god that it might leave him shortly.
─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ──
When he wakes, it’s to Cid shaking his shoulder frantically.
He’s laying on the cold stone floor in front of that strange mural. He’s flat on his back, staring sightlessly at the endless levels of stone that run up and up and up until it disappears into the blackness. There’s something wet on his lip, running from his nose, tacky and iron-scented and gross.
“Are you with me, love?” Cid asks, tapping his cheek softly.
“Yes,” he breathes, more air than sound, and Cid subsides, stroking a careful hand through Clive’s hair until he’s recovered enough to stand, leaning subtly on Cid and the other doesn’t dare comment on it.
He’d had some kind of fit, a seizure or something, and he’d been unconscious for but a few seconds. Enough time for Cid to follow him to the floor, to shake him fruitlessly when his nose had begun to bleed.
“The hooded man’s not here,” he croaks out, finally leveraging himself to his feet. “Let’s not chase anymore shadows.”
Cid helps him limp out, worn and exhausted as they are. They take a few moments to sit in the sun, to catch their breath, to let Cid check him over once more just in case.
The man wipes the blood from his lip gently, and Clive can’t bring himself to object to it. There will be a conversation to be had soon, he thinks, about the intimacy of these gestures, about their sleeping arrangements, amongst other things.
But it doesn’t have to be today. Clive is tired. He’s thirsty. His muscles ache in places he didn’t even know they could. They can take their time, talk on the way to the Hideaway or the few days they might spend in Eastpool.
There’s no rush. Not when Clive knows the truth of it now.
His scent seems stronger, but Cid doesn’t comment on it, and together they make for the gates of the ruin and slip beyond.
The walk back to Eastpool should be pleasant enough, but halfway through, something dirty, permeates the air, and it draws him up short. It seems to grab Cid’s attention, too, the alpha tensing next to him.
It hits him, when he takes another lungful.
Eastpool is burning, and there will be no help for them.