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“This aether. It emulates that of the Steppe’s sacred trials,” Yesuntei called out, wincing lightly as she felt herself sealed with wards by Y’zel’s barrier. “We must expend his aether!”
“A feat that might prove a tall order. His aether pool is near inexhaustible, not that he has much of a talent for manipulating it,” Y’shtola said, hand reaching back to find Zoissette’s before finding her partner being pulled away from her, trapped in aetherial chains. “Zoissette!”
Zoissette squirmed, writhing in her fetters as she and Claudien were suspended away from her. As they were pulled away, she furrowed her brow at Y’zel, concentrating on him as he brought his hand up then started to steadily strike it down a lyre, a pulse emanating three-quarters of his platform before he started to turn. Quick to catch on she yelled out, “On your guard! 6 to 9 is safe! Watch his clockwise rotation!”
“Of course even fighting him would be annoying. Stay close Yesuntei, Natsu,” Erick gruffed, watching the crystal floor rise to the north of him before rushing forward, making sure the girls stayed with him.
Y’mhitra pursed her lips, running with the rest into the next quadrant as the floor fell out behind them only to be re-iced over. “No concern for us sister. I think we’re no longer maidens in his eyes.”
“I do not know what you mean Mhitra. I’m still a spry 23,” Y’shtola responded with a smirk, focusing on the aether of Ryssthota’s egi to guide her to safety as they spun.
“And we’re more than capable of taking care of ourselves,” Rysshthota laughed before noticing Y’zel had stopped strumming to catch his breath, trading his lyre in a flourish to summon a circular keyboard and sound mixer about him, organ pipes rising slowly behind him as he started to work the keys. “Incoming ballistics! Watch the skies!”
Soon small shards of ice started to pelt the arena about them, small ones pelting off the arena after being struck before two large ones descended downward on opposite ends. Asa looked to Fuyu’li and gave him a small push toward the incoming crystal before moving to soak up his own as Y’zel summoned back his lyre and strummed at it as it continued to hail ice shards.
“He has the lyre again,” Zoissette called out, the group quickly bunching together to wind through the falling debris as the field shot upward.
Fuyu’li hurried along, doing his best to keep up only to feel the floor give on him. His eyes widened, looking to Natsu as he closed his eyes and braced for the fall. Instead, he felt himself tugged forward to Yesuntei’s side. “Please try not to fall behind,” she cautioned.
Rysshota held out her arm to stop the others, noticing as the projectiles stopped falling just as the field calmed again. “Is he finished,” she asked, looking at the other as the instruments frosted over and turned to ash.
“Just be still! I shall reunite us all with those we love! Why do you not understand,” Y’zel said, shaking his head before summoning his scythe to the ground. Pomodoro, Y’zel’s voidsent, sprung up from the ground, letting out a wail as Y’zel flew forward, hand on Claudien’s chest as he kissed him before drawing it back slowly, a flame flickering in his palm as his lover went limp.
Teleporting back to Pomodoro’s side, Y’zel fed the flame to the avatar. The creature writhed before taking the shape of a Viera man, with the same fiery eyes and blond locks as Claudien. Together, they swung scythes into the ground, to the right, the left then the center.
“This aether…Beatrice,” Y’shtola breathed out. “Follow me! The lines will erupt with an aetheric blast!”
The group followed Y’shtola as she maneuvered through the flames before the duo struck the ground again. Racing away, they narrowly avoided the final blast before hearing the sounds of chains breaking. “Zoissette! No!” Y’shtola cried out, finding her to have phased out from her chains to appear before Y’zel and Pomodoro, separating them with a slice.
Metal against metal rang out as Y'zel swung his scythe in turn, parrying Zoissette’s next swing. The two began to phase about the aetherial space. Pomodoro groaned then found himself being dragged back into void, reaching out toward the others before emitting a blast of fire that shattered the barrier protecting the Heart of Sabik.
“Quick! Try to disrupt it with our aether,” Y’mhitra called out, raising her wand in turn with Yeusentei as she raised her cane, trapping it in a wind vortex.
Ryssthota raised her grimoire high over head, letting it send out a salvo of unaspected aetherial missiles with Asa doing the same with dark pulses from his palm into the stone. Y'shtola summoned a sigil beneath her before summoning three balls of fire to explode around the stone. “Natsu! Your attention is needed here!”
Natsu let out a breath, finding herself distracted as Zoissette and Y'zel blipped about. Attention pulled she nodded then whipped her focus around sending out a jolt of red sparks exploding about the auracite while Fuyu'li fired rounds of aether bullets beside her. A familiar surge in magick flew through her as she felt more and more restored. Looking to Erick grumpily standing still gathering chakra she shook her head and called out, “Give your aether up to Mister Gage!”
“Great. Shared power and I don't even get to punch Y'zel, but a rock instead,” Erick said wryly as he sparked with magick, the party offering up their power to him. Launching forward, he punched hard into the auracite natural aetheric shroud before a pillar of light exploded about him. “Final Heaven!”
Natsu let out a breath of relief as she felt the aether around them start to stabilize before hearing Y'zel wail out: “NO!”
Everyone's eyes turned skyward, expecting Y’zel to have paused for stone, only to find Zoissette, unaltered, free falling from a blow from the other’s scythe.. Rushing forward, Y'zel caught her then landed on his platform, sobbing into her shoulder as he awkwardly held her.
“Zoissette!” The group called out advancing forward all at once before being stopped as Y'shtola held out her cane to prevent them going forward.
“She yet lives but stay back! He does not hear us unless he is looking at us and provoking him could be worse for her. The auracite is responding to the call of his dynamis,” Y'shtola warned, eyes narrowed.
“I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Wake up…wake up…Sister…wake up…,” Y'zel whimpered, rocking before crying out as the Heart of Sabik flew to him and embedded itself in his chest. He screamed as he felt himself altered, white wings sprouting from his back. As he screamed he held Zoissette tight then arched back, letting her float from his arms to become enshrouded in a protective crystal. “Don't worry…I'll fix this…I'll…fix this.”
Wobbling, Y'zel got to his feet, clothing turning crimson as he lifted his gaze. Y'shtola stepped forward, huffing. “Are you done now? You've hurt a dear friend in your recklessness and the auracite has grafted itself to you. Let us help you before it consumes you!”
“No! I will fix this! I will fix everything so that it is perfect and no one will ever have to make a sacrifice for us ever again,” Y'zel shouted defiantly. “Not you. Not Zoissette. No one! I am to be the red thread that binds us all together in an everlasting present!”
“Fine. Play the Lover. But remember, most of us here have made careers of taking down those who saw themselves ignorant enough to declare themselves gods,” Y'shtola said before instantly whipping aether about her to fire off a bolt of lighting.
Y'zel deflected the blow with his sword, feet lifting off the ground. “The Lover…you still haven't bothered to learn anything about me, cousin,” Y'zel screamed before launching forward toward her, intercepted by Fuyu'li’s gunblade as Erick scooped her up and away.
“See, I protect all girls, I’m not about to let him hurt a lady” Erick called back to Ryssthota and Y’mhitra.
“How did we fail to stop him,” Natsu asked, flitting her sword to send a gust of wind at her brother before summoning a boulder over his head.
Yesuntei, concentrating her healing on Fuyu'li’s increasingly tiring arms, shook her head. “It is as Y'shtola said. The Heart of Sabik interacted with his heightened emotional state and wellspring of aether.”
“In other words, we're going to have to beat the stone out of him,” Erick gruffed, launching himself forward to pummel Y'zel in the chest with a furry of blows before the latter vanished and recentered himself on the field, holding himself.
“Claudien…my love ,” Y'zel said to himself, fire emanating from his body.
“Cease your movement less you be burned,” Asa called out, before stabbing his sword into the ground and mumbling a spell to protect them with his aura.
A wave of fire spiraled out from Y'zel as he shook out his head before crying out, hand clutching at his heart, ice aether freezing the air around him. “Ysayle…Zoissette…,” he whimpered.
“Now move and do not stop moving until you feel warmth again,” Asa called out, swinging his sword to send a dark wave at his nephew before a cold burst of ice rushed out from him.
Ryssthota nodded toward Asa, “Good call. Now then, cry Phoenix,” she bellowed before summoning the great bird to appear and send a gust of flames into Y'zel.
Y'zel shielded himself but felt himself falter. Shaking it off, he flew up then slammed his sword in the ground, sending an icey aetheric chill through everyone, quickly eased by Yesuntei and Y’mhitrs casting twin domes of healing auras to restore their strength. Frustrated, his guard fell leaving him open as Erick flew in for a quick kick to his stomach before using the leverage to flip and hit his jaw.
Sliding back to the edge of the arena, Y'zel coughed, holding himself up by his hands and knees as his wings burst into aetheric dust. His fist slammed the ground as he let out another cry.
“Yield…Zel. You are the Lover no more,” Y'shtola said, tilting his chin up with the edge of her cane as Y'mhitra ran up beside her.
“His eyes. They're still red,” Y'mhitra noted before pulling her sister back a bit cautiously.
“As I said…you know nothing of me. I am not the Scion of Menphina,” Y'zel said before becoming engulfed in light, the field following after.
Natsu rubbed her eyes as she found them standing in a beautiful flowering tundra by a river, several mountain streams in the distance feeding it from their snowy mountain tops. “It is beautiful…” she breathed out, watching as little balls of iridescent light floated about her.
“My Elysium…The Destination of our Fate,” Y'zel’s answered from above, descending from a sky filled with pinkish purple clouds. His hair had grown longer and whiter. His clothing had changed from that of a white coat and violet trousers.
“Nymeia, the Spinner,” Y’mhitra said, taking a cautious step forward.
“It is my inheritance, claimed early so that I can ensure we are never separated again. Life and death meet here and are one in the same,” he Y'zel said, hand reaching out to let a little soul rest in his palm before floating on with another light.
“The promise of Omphalos was to be observers. To hear and feel. Not to act! You should know that better than anyone,” Ryssthota called out.
“I only hear and feel. Voices of today. Voices of yesterday. Haunted…but no more. I shall weave all into one!”
Y'zel's hands reached into the sky, summoning two loom wheels into his hand before flourishing an aetheric pulse of light away from him. Natsu gripped her arm as she felt herself weakened before holding her foil high and sending a jolt of red aether at her deified brother as Fuyu’li pulled focus with bolt of electricity from his blade.
The battle turned from there, and not for the better.
The aether of the entire lifestream seemed to answer to Y’zel’s call. A sweep of his hands sent a huge wave of water crashing out from him, throwing everyone back. Natsu rolled along the floor, holding her hands to her head defensively. She looked up, her sight blurry, as she saw Y’zel sweep back Ryss and Asa with a flurry of razor sharp ice. Y’shtola’s staff was in the air as she struggled to channel another spell, Y’mhitra next to her staggering to try to get back up to her feet.
She looked up, eyes filled with tears, reaching a hand up to Y’zel as he turned, and another spray of ice leapt from his hand. Fuyu’li stood, guarding Erick from being struck down, but the aetheric shield from his gunblade started cracking almost immediately.
She almost cried out to him, when she felt a hand on her shoulder. Startled, she turned, and looked.
Zoissette was there, her breathing heavy and labored, a determined look on her face as she looked past Natsu, focused on Y’zel. Natsu stared, and then looked to where she was certain Zoissette’s body still lay.
All she saw was a smoking purple miasma evaporating into nothingness.
“What…?”
Zoissette kept one hand on her shoulder, and reached forward with her other hand, and tugged off Natsu’s glove before grabbing her wrist back where skin contant could be avoided.
“To share someone’s memories is to know them,” said Zoissette. “There are no secrets in the Echo, no place to hide. If I can get you close, can you touch him? Do you think you can bring him back?”
“I thought you were dying!” said Natsu.
“Do not worry about that. He does not know what Lavender and I can do,” replied Zoissette. “I can explain more. Later. Can you do it?”
“I… I think so,” said Natsu, taking a deep breath in, feeling Yesuntei’s healing aether wash over herself and Zoissette.
Zoissette just nodded, and she watched as Y’zel pointed both of his hands at Fuyu’li and Erick, doubling the stream of ice flowing from him, looking to overwhelm them.
“Now,” said Zoissette, and in a blink, Y’zel’s back was right in front of Natsu.
Natsu reached out, and she touched him.
The world was a blur of light. She was exposed, world noisy. The only familiarity was the scent of her former home and the murmur of the only voice she knew laughing. Her ears were kissed.
“I love you, little Y'zel.”
And then nothing. No familiar beat. No breath.
She was eight now, and bitterly cold. Her father's cough had finally ceased. She put his arm around him, snuggling tight as the snow billowed around them. Her father's stillness lulled her to sleep.
She was taller now, but not as tall as Ysayle had become. Ysayle pulled his hand, running as fast as they could through the snow. She looked back, watching as a walk of Shadow became consumed by tumbling snow. “Dad!” She screamed, over and over until her voice ached and her face pulled into Ysayle’s breast. She wailed as her sister stroked over her ears.
Ysayle was gone before her eyes. No matter how much U’noloh kissed her and held her and promised it would be okay, it didn't land. The sorrow was too much. She cried until she passed out in his arms.
She wandered through the forest…she wondered how long it had been. The decorations in her hair hand long fallen free. Tired and sore she found herself at the docks looking at a startled ferryman. “Take me east…as far as I can get,” she said before getting in the boat.
Sobbing, she pulled out a black cloth and wrapped it, letting U’noloh’s bloodied hair piece glisten in the light before she put it to her her chest and started to sob again.
“Is he going to save you this time?” sneered A’yurn Tia, the white-haired Mi’qote soon grinning ear to ear as he slapped a wooden board in his palm.
She thought of Hien that bade her to return home for a spell, making her promise to go straight to the docks. If she'd listened…if she hadn't turned back….Closing her eyes she shook her head then heard the sound of the bat whistling toward her head.
Claudien was missing. No matter how many reassurances to not worry she was given she could not help but feel cursed. How could she bear another one taken from her so soon? She wanted to freeze the world over. She did not want to find out she'd lost him again.
Rain beat upon her. She was barred entry from the lab. She had just wanted to help where she could, and yet was reminded of how little use she could actually be. Silver touched her knee, the farie looking up at her with sympathetic eyes. Zoissette was out of reach. Gone. Just like Ysayle. There was nothing for her to do. All in all, she felt that she didn’t amount to anything.
She couldn’t focus. Leon’s form coming in and out of view as her eyes looked up to the message then down to his wound. She collapsed on the ground, unable to hear the sound of her own voice as she screamed. Everything went cold, aether flooding out of her, the apartment freezing over around her. Her heart ached, then she felt a call…far away. She closed her eyes, picturing a stone sitting in Claudien’s cabinet, pulsing with life…
Nastu felt herself be repelled, feeling more and more herself as she tried to delve deeper. A sense of overwhelming power, the auracite. Reaching out to it, she fed it a bit of her own aether, forcing Y’zel to see her own memories.
She was alone in an empty storage room, barely a girl of seven. The maids whispered and giggled in the room beyond about their peer, her mother. They called her a liar. A fortune seeker. Natsu was confused why they hated her mother so…and why her mother hated her. She sniffled, knowing she’d be scolded if she interrupted…
She was ten, walking paces behind her mother, cheek sore. She tried not to shed a tear, not wanting to be struck again. The dango offered by the nice man at the stall for her still lingered on her tongue but it was far behind them now, the rest on the ground for the gulls.
“How dare you indulge their pity!? Don’t you realize they see us as worthless? Something to be discarded? If it wasn’t for your father abandoning us…you could know nothing but halcyon days eating whatever you wanted. I would have the silks I need and combs I want. If it wasn’t for you, I still might have them!”
She sniffled. Her heart felt hard…
She stared up at her mother’s portrait. She was sixteen summers now. She didn’t shed a tear. The few that came offered her condolences, but she didn’t know a face. An older Auri woman was wheeled in, looking rather cross as she stared up at her.
“If your father’s family would have just stayed a little longer, perhaps she would have gotten the help she needed,” the woman said while shaking her head. “Or perhaps if she wasn’t so blinded by her anger at his rejection she might have thought to send a bird on his departure.”
Natsu looked at the woman. “My father abandoned her when he found out she was pregnant with me,” she stated coldly.
“Young Raiden? No. He was far too noble to do such a thing. If he’d have known of you, he’d have come back to take you away from her. Or he might have even married her and given her the life she wanted.”
For once Natsu felt a twinge in her heart. “Do you…know where my father is? Who are you?”
The old woman sighed. “Perished in the aftermath of the moonfall in Eorzea. I met a young man claiming to be his adopted son, who visited me some time ago and told me of his fate. A nice boy, though he seemed a little lost… As for myself: I am your grandmother’s younger sister on your father’s side.”
Natsu’s heart sank, having a chance to have a good, kind father strewn before her then dashed away. She stood there for a moment, looking at her great aunt in silence. “A son…so then. I have a brother?”
“In a sense, yes.”
“Then, perhaps you can tell me of my father and then I can seek him out to fill in the rest,” she said, feeling a strange feeling wash over her. Excitement? Hope? “I know you might see me as a stranger, but perhaps you might let me touch your hand?”
Her great-aunt smiled, the best she could. “Yes, child. If you’ve no means of your own, might I suggest you stay in my home? Just until we can send you off to Othard. That was where your brother was headed.”
Natsu and Y’zel let out mirrored gasps as they repelled from one another. The latter turned, tears in his eyes as he looked down at his sister. “You…You who have known so little love. Why do you defy me? I can bring us back together with our dad. I can make a world without loneliness,” he said, voice raspy before lashing out, swinging one of his wheels down toward her only to have one of the floating souls swoop in to shield Natsu as she covered her face from the light.
“Because life and death separated gives us meaning. That is why we celebrate life while we have it. And why must we embrace death when it is our time,” a calm voice said.
Natsu’s eyes shot open, tears streaming down her face as she turned and hugged Drowning Thunder from behind. She inhaled his scent then rubbed her face into his back. “Kami…it is you…,” she breathed out.
“Yeah. In the flesh, sort of. It’s a long story. Bounding says ‘Hi’ though,” he said, pushing Y’zel backward and onto the ground.
Natsu wiped her tears then wandered around her husband, hugging him tight before looking over to her brother as he weakly tried to pick himself up.
“I knew a life of loneliness…lovelessness. I only had the thought of meeting you, to make a connection with a father who loved you so much. And then I met Fuyu’li, who became my friend. And then I met your friends and family who all welcomed me in and took care of me just because I was connected to you. Yes, you’ve the lionshare of loss, but when you’ve lost you’ve always found love,” she said, looking off toward the party as they picked themselves up. “Whether that was in a parent, a sister, family, found family, a lover; there was always more love waiting for you. The world you want already exists brother. I am here because they love you. They are here because they love you. The world we have was already perfect…It is as Drowning says…life and death have its place…you feel your loss so heavily because you are still tied to those you’ve lost.”
“Well said,” a second voice called out. “I leave you to go on an errand and you get yourself into all sorts of trouble. I really should have never left you alone.”
Y’zel’s ears perked, the voice familiar but he could not place it. As he sat there, the auracite fell from his chest, tumbling into the grassy field, aether growing quiet. Elysium faded, and they were returned to the platform, aetheric sea calm once more.
At the gate into the aetheric realm, Ioh’juhn Reighn struggled to hoist the weight of Claudien over his shoulder while Emperor Rijin beamed down at them then hopped onto the platform. “You should thank your dear sister here for reuniting us. As well as your Cousin,” he said, giving a polite bow to Y’shtola.
Y’zel’s ears flitted back, deified clothes evaporating back into what he’d been wearing before. “I-I’m sorry but why are you here? And how do you know me,” he panted, scooting away toward Natsu as the man approached.
Hien blinked, “Kami, he really doesn’t know me.”
Natsu knelt down, carefully draping Y’zel’s arm over her shoulder before hoisting him to his feet along with Drowning. “There’s a lot to discuss here…but, I think for now we should return home…And draw lots for who gets to scold him first,” Natsu said, turning to look at Y’zel with a smile.
- Chapter 19 - The Destination of Our Fate [Ex] or The Wheel That Spins Us Round -