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pengiesama · 5 years

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The Snow Prince (Fic, TOZ, Sorey/Mikleo, Fairy Tale AU)

Title: The Snow Prince Series: Tales of Zestiria Pairing: Sorey/Mikleo

Summary: Upon a beautiful day in late summer, Mikleo's heart is frozen by a terrible curse, and he is spirited away by a woman in dazzling winter white. Sorey sets out on a journey to save his one true love, and winds up making friends with half the continent along the way.

(A variation on The Snow Queen, written for the 2018 Chocomint Fairy Tale Compilation. With illustrations by Nami/defragmentise/@shamingcows!)

Link: AO3

This was written for the 2018 Chocomint Fairy Tale Compilation. @chocomint-srmk is a Sorey/Mikleo fan project!

The zine’s purchase period is now over, but you can check out some of the other fic and art from the zine in the links below. You might start seeing more of the Fairy Tale pieces go up now that the exclusivity period has ended!

Chocomint’s Tumblr: https://chocomint-srmk.tumblr.com/ Chocomint’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/chocomint_srmk

Read on Tumblr!

Once upon a time, there was a mirror, and the mirror came with a most terrible curse.

The mirror did not reflect, it only distorted. Even the loveliest of landscapes would show as a barren wasteland in its glass. A delicious feast would be shown as rotted, stinking refuse. Art that should properly stir the heart with exquisiteness would be transformed into something repulsive. It turned beauty to disgust, love to disdain. The stronger the feeling, the greater the deformation.

What kind of being would craft such a wretched artifact?

It was the work of a terrible spirit known as Symonne.

Symonne loathed the world and everything in it; from flora to fauna to humans and her fellow spirits. One can presume a fairly tragic event that caused her seething hatred, but her resulting behavior did not inspire sympathy. She was cruel and merciless, and tormented all living creatures that crossed her path, regardless of whether they had done a thing to deserve her ire. But this did not satisfy her thirst for terror, and she set her sights higher – most high. Symonne’s spirit magic allowed her to craft powerful illusions, and with this skill in her arsenal, she set forth in crafting her awful mirror. She poured every ounce of her magic into the mirror, and planned to carry it to the throne of Maotelus, the king of the spirits, to force him to look into its glass and behold the truth of his form.

However, the crafting of the mirror had exhausted Symonne’s strength, and while carrying the terrible thing to the heavenly palace, she dropped it. The mirror shattered into a thousand tiny shards, and the thousand tiny shards flew over the world to lodge in the hearts of humans. Symonne was furious, but when her raging calmed, she realized that this presented an altogether wonderful opportunity to terrorize the world that wronged her – on a scale that she had never achieved before.

This is what brings us to the matter of Sorey and Mikleo.

These two boys were friends from the cradle, and played and grew and learned together. Their hearts were as one, and their love for each other was a simple truth of the world – like the movement of the stars, or birdsong in the morning. This made them a perfect target of the wretched mirror, as it was an artifact that craved the distortion of everything right and true in the world. If it could destroy the love between these two kindred souls, it could surely shake the very foundations of the world.

Sorey and Mikleo were adventurers and scholars, and adored all things archaeological and natural, all things great and small, just as much as they adored each other. They would often race each other on the dirt-and-cobblestone path from their tiny town to the ruined castle in the nearby forest. This ancient stone castle was a beloved play spot of theirs, and over the years, they continued to explore and examine and study its crumbling walls and aging artwork. Sunlight shone through the cracks in the ceiling, and rainwater pooled in the ruined floors; blanketing the ground with a soft cushion of moss to nap and read upon. The very walls echoed with the sounds of their laughter and the warmth of their love.

One fateful day, Sorey and Mikleo were walking the path to their castle, with packs full of notebooks and sketchpads on their backs, and a picnic basket in Mikleo’s hand. It should have been a wonderful afternoon, full of happiness and joy. But a glint from the sky and a terrible whistling noise heralded the arrival of a mirror shard. The shard was thin and crystalline; too fine to be seen by the naked eye, and too sharp to be felt even as it pierced the skin. The shard pierced Mikleo’s chest, and his heart.

Mikleo fell to the ground, causing their picnic lunch to spill over the path. Sorey was at his side in less than a moment, carefully helping him to his feet and dusting the dirt from his clothing. Sorey’s own heart ached with sympathy at Mikleo’s bloody palms; scratched and cut from his tumble.

“Mikleo, are you okay?” asked Sorey. “Did you trip?”

Mikleo looked around them, at the apples and prepared sandwiches and treats that he had so carefully packed for their afternoon trip. His lip curled in revulsion.

“It’s okay,” Sorey assured him. “Five second rule, right? We can just pick out the grass and--”

Mikleo’s gaze finally fell on Sorey, and Sorey could hardly understand the disgust he saw there. Mikleo shoved Sorey’s comforting arms away, and stumbled backward, shaking his head.

“…Mikleo?” Sorey said quietly. He reached out to him, still. “Are you hurt? The castle still has the supplies we stashed there, let’s go in and get you bandaged up--”

“And just why,” Mikleo said with annoyance clear in his voice. “Would I want to traipse through that crumbling wreck with you?”

“Because it’s…fun?” Sorey offered helplessly.

Mikleo rolled his eyes and wandered off in a random direction, scowling at everything around him. Sorey scrambled after him.

“Mikleo! That’s not the way back to town--”

“I know,” Mikleo said irritably. He yanked his arm out of Sorey’s gentle grip. “Why would I want to go back?”

“Because…” Sorey grasped for words to try and describe the obvious. Why wouldn’t he? “Our families are there. And…and the harvest festival will be on soon, and then the merchants from the city will probably be by and we can buy more books with the money we’ve been saving up…”

Mikleo just shook his head at every word out of Sorey’s mouth, as it the very sound of his voice repulsed him. Sorey was at a loss. They’d fought before, but Mikleo wasn’t like this when he was upset with him. This was something different. Something terrible, and something that Sorey had no idea how to handle.

“…if you don’t want to go back to town, where do you want to go?” asked Sorey, finally. He would go with him, if Mikleo wanted to leave. He’d follow him anywhere. “Please. If you want to leave, let’s treat your hands, first, and get some supplies and money from home before we--”

“‘We’?” Mikleo repeated coldly. Blood dripped freely from the scrapes and cuts on his hands; dripped from his fingers to the grass beneath his feet. It looked so painful, and Sorey’s heart ached at the sight.

“Your hands,” Sorey said. “Can you at least let me help with them?”

Slowly, Mikleo looked to his sides. His arms were slack, and he seemed to be observing the sight of the blood with the same detached disgust as he now regarded everything else. He did not resist as Sorey touched his shoulder to guide him into the ruined castle; their special place. He did not resist.

The castle, their little home-away in the forest, was well-stocked with supplies that they had carried in from town over the years: food, medicine and bandages, blankets, and books. All things necessary for a happy home. Sorey washed and tended to Mikleo’s wounds, and was pained himself at his cruel silence. The water was fresh and clean, but it surely would sting such raw and deep cuts. Were the bandages too tight? Mikleo did not respond when asked. He did not even spare Sorey the flushing of his cheeks when Sorey leaned down to kiss his freshly-bandaged palms. He would only stare into the distance; his disdain such that he would not even look at the things that repulsed him so. Sorey despaired.

The supplies in their special place kept them in comfort for that night – Sorey did not dare to bring up the subject of heading back to town, lest Mikleo try to wander off by himself once more. However, before the morning sun broke the horizon, while there was still dew on the grass, Sorey awoke to a commotion outside. Panicked, he looked beside him – to find nothing. Mikleo was gone.

Sorey raced outside, to find a frozen world of dazzling white.

It was early autumn still, and the heat of summer still thrummed in the soil. It was far too early for frost in the mornings, or for Sorey to see his own heaving breath. But there it was – frozen grass, and puffs of mist, and a grand silver-white sleigh pulled by a team of silver-white reindeer. A woman in a snowflake crown and white robes was helping Mikleo up into the sleigh. Mikleo’s chestnut-brown hair had become frosted with white. It shimmered in the first rays of the morning.

“Mikleo!” Sorey called out, racing forward. “Mikleo, wait! Wherever you’re going, please, let me come with you--”

The woman turned her attention to Sorey as she settled in the front seat of the sleigh and picked up the reins. Hers was an expression of great pity, and with a wave of her hand, she summoned a herd of little snowflake-capped creatures to block Sorey’s path. Mikleo’s expression was completely blank as he quietly settled himself to lie down on the back seat of the sleigh – Sorey would have preferred his previous cruel disdain. He did not appear to hear Sorey at all, no matter how Sorey screamed his name.

The woman in white stole Mikleo away, and left behind a remnant of winter. Sorey wanted to race after the sleigh, but was stopped by the little creatures that surrounded him.

“Whoa there! Easy, buddy,” said one. “Don’t worry about your friend. Lailah will take good care of him.”

“Where did she take him!?” Sorey demanded, tears stinging his eyes. “Please, tell me – he’s hurt, and barely ate anything last night, and--”

“He’s hurt more than you know,” said another of the little creatures, solemnly. “Mistress Lailah has taken him in, and will do what she can to save him.”

Sorey’s stomach dropped out. “What happened to him? Please, tell me…”

The creatures murmured amongst themselves for a moment, peeping over their shoulders to make sure Sorey wasn’t eavesdropping. After their discussion, one of the creatures stepped forward to speak.

“A terrible curse is spreading throughout the world, and your friend was unlucky enough to get hit by it,” the creature said. “It’s a curse that…makes people hate everything good and beautiful in the world. Makes them cruel to the people they love. Miss Lailah’s been charged by Lord Maotelus to gather up the people who’ve been cursed, and take them away to try and break the curse before…”

The creature trailed off.

“Before what?” Sorey asked quietly.

But the creature was silent. The whole troupe of them joined hands in a circle, and began to dance. The summer snow swirled and blew into the air, blocking them from sight. When the air cleared, they were nowhere to be seen. Sorey rushed forward in a panic, and begged the empty clearing for answers.

“Please! Please, I’m begging you, tell me where she took him! I can help save him, I know I can!”

An answer rang out from the trees:

“Seek the mountains beyond Meirchio. Your Snow Prince awaits you there.”

And after that, there was silence.

Meirchio was the northernmost city of the land. Beyond it, there was nothing but impenetrable mountains and frozen lands. But if Mikleo had been spirited away there, if Mikleo’s life was in the balance, there was no other possible trajectory.

The compass of Sorey’s heart was pointing north, and he would follow it to the ends of the earth for Mikleo’s sake.

Sorey set out on his quest from his tiny home village that very evening, loaded with what supplies the town could spare, and the tears and well-wishes of his own family and Mikleo’s.

His mother provided him with warm-weather clothes: a scarf, thick gloves, and a warm woolen travelling cloak, with wool from their family’s own sheep. The love woven into it would surely keep the cold at bay, even in the forgotten, distant mountains beyond Meirchio.

Mikleo’s mother provided him with the money she had been keeping safe for them: the money that Sorey and Mikleo had been saving for the harvest festival that autumn. It pained Sorey to take it without Mikleo’s permission, just as it pained him to use it on fares and inn stays instead of the books and gadgets that he and Mikleo had dreamed and talked about all year. But coin was a necessary thing, when it came to the matter of adventuring and rescue.

And Mikleo’s uncle provided him with the gift of knowledge: a copy of his beloved encyclopedia, filled with maps, wisdom, and countless fond memories. Turning its pages, Sorey could recall any number of nights where it was just him and Mikleo under the covers; just them, a candle, and this book. They would read about the wide world beyond town and whisper and dream until dawn; curled around each other, two hearts as one.

Meirchio was a far trek, and it took Sorey a few nights’ worth of camping under the stars before he stumbled onto the first roadblock of his quest. The thicket of trees had looked like a lovely spot to settle in for the evening, and Sorey had done just that. However, when he was lighting a fire atop a pile of gathered sticks and fallen leaves, he heard a sneeze from the surrounding trees. He looked up to see a small girl there; bedecked in spring flowers and lace, and sporting a miserable scowl as she shivered. While it should have still been summer, ever since Sorey saw that mysterious woman and her sleigh, ever since Mikleo was stolen away, the weather had been…strange. Winter seemed to be seeping into everything overnight, and was becoming keener with each passing day. Sorey was warm in his cloak and scarf and gloves, but his guest was clearly suffering.

Sorey smiled and beckoned her close to the fire.

“Are you cold, miss? Please, come sit by the fire and I’ll make you a hot drink.”

The girl snorted, then sneezed again.

“C-c-cold? W-why would I want to accept drinks from a t-t-trespasser—ACHOO!”

Sorey blinked, then looked abashed.

“I’m so sorry. There are no towns or farms anywhere nearby – I thought this was un-owned land. I’m but a traveler, passing through on a mission to save someone I love. Please let me stay on your land for the evening.”

The girl, despite her scowl and dismissive words, had bundled herself up to the fire to get warm. She glared at Sorey, then huffed through her nose.

“You may address me as Lady Edna, human. And where is the drink you promised?”

Sorey prepared hot tea for his host, and presented it with a smile.

“Here you are. Lady Edna, are you a spirit? Have you heard any gossip of a mysterious woman stealing people away in her sleigh? Or word of what is causing this strange weather?”

“Yes to all three,” Edna said, snatching up the tea and warming her hands around it. Her shivering began to ease, which gladdened Sorey’s heart. “I suppose you want me to spill the beans on it, though.”

“If you have any information, any at all, please tell me,” Sorey said. “I have to find Mikleo before it’s too late. I’ll do anything.”

Edna eyed his warm clothing.

“…give me that scarf of yours. The gloves, too.”

“Of course,” said Sorey, already winding it from his neck.

Edna arched an eyebrow. “That’s it? Honestly. I was hoping for something more dramatic.”

Sorey blinked as he held out the scarf and gloves to her. “Hmm?”

“Normally when I make a trade with humans, there’s a lot more haggling involved. You could’ve argued me down to just the scarf, you know.”

Sorey tilted his head to the side, confused. “…but you’re cold, and need it more than I do.”

Edna eyed him suspiciously, and huffed again as she snatched up the offerings and put them on.

“Whatever. Don’t come crying to me when your fingers fall off in this weather.”

Edna took a deep drink of her tea, cleared her throat, and began to explain.

“That woman in the sleigh is Lailah, a spirit. She serves the Great Spirit, Maotelus, and does his dirty work for him. If she stole away your little boyfriend, then he was probably collateral damage in some drama at the big palace upstairs. Said drama is probably also to blame for this weather.”

Sorey’s heart twisted in worry. “Her little creatures said to go to the mountains beyond Meirchio to find Mikleo. Do you know what I’ll find there?”

Edna shook her cup at him, wordlessly demanding more tea before she spoke. Sorey obliged.

“The Killaraus Mountains. Home to a dazzling array of absolutely nothing at all. It used to be the seat of the heavenly palace until they moved it to somewhere more hospitable, so Lailah and her irritating little normins might have your boyfriend locked up in the old ruins somewhere.”

Sorey smiled happily and bowed low to Edna in thanks. He had so much more to go on now – he had evidence that Mikleo was being taken care of, and would remain so until Sorey reached him. It renewed his hope that he’d be able to reach Mikleo and save him.

“Aren’t you going to beg me to teleport you there with a snap of my fingers?” Edna drawled. “Whine at me for a map? Try to threaten more information out of me?”

“Do you have a map? Or – the finger thing?” asked Sorey, curiously.

“No,” Edna said. “But I don’t know what you humans think we’re capable of, anymore. I know what your kind is capable of, though, so you’ll excuse me if I keep some information to myself.”

Sorey nodded in understanding. He bundled his cloak tightly around himself – he was already feeling the chill from the loss of his scarf and gloves. His money was carefully rationed, but perhaps he could find some inexpensive replacements when he next encountered a town. He knew he was careless, and foolish, but he was not so inexperienced to run full-tilt into the icy mountains without protection.

He was quite tired, and his eyes were heavy. He closed them, just for a moment; just so he could conjure up the image of Mikleo’s sparkling eyes and smiling mouth beyond his lids.

“Sorey,” dream-Mikleo laughed as Sorey buried his face in his neck. He smelled so sweet; like the dampness of the soil at the start of spring. “I swear. What am I going to do with you?”

“Do with me what you will,” said Sorey. “You’ll never get rid of me.”

Mikleo’s smile went so soft, then, and Sorey’s heart soared.

“Is that a promise?” Mikleo asked.

“A promise.”

Mikleo’s lips, too, were very soft.

When he opened them again, it was morning, and the fire was nothing but embers. Edna was gone, and there was little more to be done than to pack his things and keep heading north.

Sorey noticed the root vegetables and apples that had not been in his pack before. He also noticed a small, perfect yellow bloom. He thought upon these gifts as he continued to travel another three days, then another three days after that, until he reached the outskirts of a harbor town. He would have to buy passage on a ship headed to Meirchio – Sorey suspected such a vessel might be difficult to come by. Meirchio was a distant, quiet town, and was certainly not a hot tourist spot or business destination. He would potentially have to wait weeks for a vessel to have business going there; camping outside the town the whole while in the freezing cold, with dwindling supplies.

One day, after a week of asking at the docks for any vessels headed to Meirchio – after a week of sailors laughing in his face, acting like Sorey was asking them to ferry him to the moon – he came across a ship he had not seen make port before. It was a small but stout vessel; clever-looking, even. Sorey spotted a red-haired woman on its deck, inspecting a shipping list, and shouted for her attention.

“Hey! Are you guys headed to Meirchio?”

The woman eyed Sorey and his ragged countenance with an amused expression.

“Meirchio? That dinky little mining town? Who’s asking?”

Sorey bowed deeply, and let his desperation show clear on his face. Though he likely looked desperate enough already – the cold nights of camping were taking their toll.

“My name is Sorey, and I have to get to Meirchio as soon as I can. Please. I’ll pay you everything I have, I’ll work your ship during the passage. Anything you ask.”

The woman put her hand on her hip and looked Sorey up and down. He lowered his head.

“I know it doesn’t look like I have much,” Sorey admitted. He looked an utter mess – he was filthy, and his clothes were wrinkled from days of travel on the roads. His hair was wild and windblown. Dark circles bloomed under his eyes – a good night’s sleep was hard to come by, sleeping on the ground. His bare hands were stiff and aching from the cold; the inclement weather having skyrocketed cold-weather gear to a price he simply couldn’t afford. “I’m but a traveler, passing through on a mission to save someone I love. I have to get to Meirchio to find Mikleo before it’s too late.”

Sorey dug in his pockets to present the woman with his travelling funds – the money he and Mikleo had saved up all year, through chores and hard work.

“All I have is yours. Including an extra pair of hands on your crew.”

The woman traipsed down the plank to the dock, and took Sorey’s money pouch from him to count it out.

“…it’s not really enough to make me consider deviating from our delivery schedule,” she said.

Sorey’s heart dropped. But then, the woman was twirling the flower Edna had given him between her fingers, examining it with great interest.

“But this herb here more than makes up for the difference. A single petal from this thing sells for a cool mint in the spice market. If you’re willing to trade it, I’ll be more than happy to put my deliveries on hold to shuttle you to that frozen wasteland.”

Sorey gave an excited shout, and bowed deeply from his waist.

“Thank you, thank you so much--”

“But if you’re coming on my ship, you’re gonna need to clean up first,” the woman said firmly.

Sorey’s cheeks flushed, and he scratched at his wild hair in embarrassment. The woman tossed the coin pouch back to him.

“Go to the inn with the green sign on the main road, and tell them that the Sparrowfeathers sent you. You’ve got enough in there for a hot bath and a good meal. And believe me, if you’re going to Meirchio, you’ll need all the help you can get.”

Sorey bowed again in thanks, then turned and headed down the road. The woman called after him again.

“The name’s Rose, by the way. And your flower is back in your pouch – were you just going to leave it with me while you ran off to blow all your money at the inn?”

Sorey blinked in confusion. “…Yes? You wanted it as payment, after all…”

Rose snorted. “And you were just gonna trust me to not run off with it? You barely know me.”

Sorey smiled a sweet, self-conscious smile. “I guess I don’t. But you seem like a good, trustworthy person to me.”

Rose laughed and shook her head in disbelief. “Go and get washed up, and make sure you keep that herb safe. We leave at sundown.”

Sorey dutifully parted with the money required for a bath – he knew Mikleo would never let him hear the end of it if he showed up to rescue him looking like this, after all. However, though his stomach growled at the thought of hot stew and warm meat, he saved the remainder of his coin for the trials that surely awaited him in Meirchio.

As his freshly-washed clothing dried next to the fireplace, Sorey brushed his fingers over the illustrations in their beloved encyclopedia. Just as its knowledge of edible plants and berries had kept him fed over his journey, just as its maps had kept him on the right path, the memories of reading this book with Mikleo kept his heart and spirit strong. Sorey’s eyes fell on his own stiff, frozen fingers as they turned the page. They were a sorry sight in comparison to the memory of Mikleo’s beautiful hands.

“So to the capital first,” Sorey said in the haze of his dreams. “We’ll check out the libraries and architecture, and then heading south, we’ll be on the pilgrim’s path, so there’ll be plenty of roadside shrines to examine--”

Mikleo laughed. What a beautiful sound, even as a memory!

“You say that as if you’d ever be finished ‘checking things out’ in Pendrago,” he chided. “I know you could happily set up camp in a library for a year. Or a lifetime.”

“A lifetime?” Sorey teased. Head on Mikleo’s lap, he buried his face in Mikleo’s thigh, making Mikleo squeak. “Only if you’re there too.”

Luckily, Sorey awoke from his fevered sleep with time enough to get down to the docks and Rose’s ship. He handed over the herb, and she was true to her word – they set sail for Meirchio.

It was a journey made longer and all the more difficult with the terrible weather; that grew only more terrible as they approached Meirchio. It was proof enough to Sorey that they were approaching where Mikleo was being held, and it was enough to make Sorey pace the deck anxiously as the ship slowly wove its way through the icy waters. Sorey hoped Mikleo would forgive him for being late, just as he hoped Mikleo would forgive him for spending their money, and losing his clothing in this weather. Mikleo had always fussed over his health, ever since his sickly childhood. Sorey hated making him worry, but he seemed rather incapable of not doing so, all the same.

They arrived in Meirchio, and Rose called to him as Sorey made his way into the town proper from the docks.

“Hey! If you’re looking for info, you’re going to have the best luck chatting up the miners at the tavern.”

“Thanks!” Sorey said cheerfully, waving farewell to her. “I will. Mikleo and I owe you so much, Rose.”

Rose watched him go, and quietly said a prayer aloud for his safety. He was a clueless young idiot, and needed all the help he could get – lucky for him, that smile of his could melt the heart of damn near anyone, Rose would bet. It was like the light of spring. Or something cheesy like that. She sighed and wondered if Sorey would question why there was more money in that coin pouch of his than he remembered, and hoped that he wouldn’t get scammed out of all of it anyway at the tavern.

Rose’s prayer did not go unheard, for unbeknownst to her, there was a young wind spirit accompanying her ship. This wind spirit was named Dezel, and, being a spirit, was bound by ceaseless compulsion to grant the prayers asked of him. Heaving a sigh, he trudged unseen by all along the roads after Sorey, irritably sending out gusts of wind to knock over suspicious-looking individuals who were eyeing Sorey like a walking target. The town was not wealthy to begin with, and the cold weather had made people all the more desperate. With Dezel’s assistance, Sorey made it safely to the tavern. Cheerfully, Sorey turned and opened the door for Dezel to enter after him.

Dezel paused. “…you can see me?”

Sorey smiled. “Of course. You’re Rose’s friend, right? I saw you on the ship on the journey here. Did you want a drink before you headed back out?”

Dezel sighed and entered the tavern wordlessly. He could understand why Rose was so concerned about this idiot’s safety, and maybe even understand why she was fond of him. Maybe. A little.

As they entered, they overlooked a sea of dour-faced miners. Sorey didn’t really know where to start asking for information – the bartender was likely a good start, in any case. Sorey walked up to the bar (Dezel following him, still unseen by most) and sat down stiffly. The bartender raised an eyebrow at him and waited for him to speak.

“Do you. Um. Know anything about a lady in a white sleigh? Or a palace in the mountains?”

The bartender wordlessly polished a glass. Sorey fumbled out his coin pouch and carefully counted out a few coins – what, exactly, was a good payment for information?

“Less than that,” Dezel hissed in his ear. “You don’t know if this chump knows a damn thing.”

Still, the coins that Sorey offered seemed to make the bartender more willing to talk. He hummed, as if deep in thought.

“A lady, not so much. But I’ve heard talk about a white sleigh, being driven by a lad with white hair. Dressed like a prince. Sightings started ramping up when this damn weather rolled in, and people constantly whisper about seeing that sleigh when the worst storms roll in. As for your mountain palace, that’s just a fairy tale. If you’re planning on heading into the mountains to go looking for some palace, or that snow prince, may the gods have mercy on you.”

“Is there anyone who knows anything about the palace? Anyone at all?” Sorey asked. He held up his pouch. “I have money, and…”

Sorey heard someone whistling for him nearby, and swiveled his head. A man sat in a corner, and beckoned him near. Sorey nodded his thanks to the bartender, and moved to where the man was sitting.

“Lookin’ for the old palace in the mountains, eh?” said the man. “Has that snow prince stolen your heart away?”

“I – well, maybe,” Sorey said. “You see, my friend Mikleo was stolen away by a woman in a sleigh, and his hair had turned white when she got to him, and he’s so beautiful that anyone would think he’s a prince, so I thought that it’s possible that--”

“He’s a spirit, you know,” Dezel interrupted, gesturing with his chin to the man Sorey was speaking to. “A wind spirit, like me. He’s probably just looking for juicy gossip, and doesn’t have a damn relevant thing to tell us.”

The man clutched at his chest dramatically. “You wound me, my brother-in-elements!”

Sorey hummed thoughtfully. “I figured he was a spirit,” he said. “I’ve always been able to sense them, even when others couldn’t. But I thought a spirit would know better than anyone where the old heavenly palace is in the mountains. Especially a spirit that looks as old as him.”

The man looked far more legitimately heartbroken at that comment. “Really? Do I look old? Is it my hairline? It’s my hairline, isn’t it…”

He patted at his hairline mournfully.

“No, it’s just that you have a certain…air around you,” Sorey said. “An air of worldliness?”

It wasn’t a lie, but it was also kind of the hairline. Still, the man puffed up a little at the compliment.

“The name is Zaveid,” he said with a little flourish of his hand. “And I too have had my heart stolen away by someone driving that sleigh. Her name is the Lady Lailah, and she has had to freeze her fire on the order of the Mao-Man to clean up after some heavenly politics.”

“Politics?” Sorey asked. “Please, tell me whatever you can – I have to save a person I love, and his life might depend on your knowledge.”

Dezel sighed in irritation. Sorey didn’t even need his help to make this Zaveid character talk – there was nothing wind spirits loved more than drama and gossip. (Except Dezel. Dezel was proud to Not Be Like Other Wind Spirits. He was entirely and perfectly undramatic.) Zaveid’s eyes sparkled with tears.

“A romantic rescue…” Zaveid whispered mistily. “You see, there’s this spirit named Symonne who’s a real piece of work. She’s got it out for Mao-Man, and made some crazy cursed mirror to make him think he’s ugly or some shit, I dunno what her endgame was. But she accidentally smashed the thing in the process, and all those little mirror shards flew across the world. They pierce people’s hearts, and suddenly, they’re not who they were anymore – full of hate for everything they once held dear.”

Mikleo’s strange behavior before he was kidnapped made sense now, but the knowing was almost worse than the mystery. Sorey swallowed hard, his heart beating in his ears.

“How can they be fixed?” Sorey asked quietly.

Zaveid shook his head sadly. “That’s something Mao-Man is still trying to work out. In the meantime, he’s having Lailah head out and spirit away the victims and keep them in the palace on the mountain. If she stole your man, he’s there.”

And that was enough for Sorey. He stood up and bowed to Zaveid.

“Please. Lead me to the heavenly palace,” he begged.

Zaveid blinked at him. “…why don’t you ask your other spirit buddy there?”

“I’m not his to ask,” Dezel shot back. “And I wouldn’t do it anyway. I’m not venturing that far away from Rose.”

Zaveid nodded sagely. “We are all slaves to love, I see.”

Dezel sputtered. Sorey bowed deeper.

“Please, spirit; Lord Zaveid. I’m so close to finding Mikleo again – I just need someone to lead the way. Won’t you please grant me your assistance?”

Zaveid grimaced and leaned forward, waiting for Sorey to look him in the eye.

“Leading someone to the heavenly palace is no small thing to ask,” he explained. “Even though the big cheeses have since moved house, the enchantments are still there on the old place. You’ll need to give up something incredibly dear for me to even be able to help.”

Sorey had gotten used to giving things up on this journey. But he had so little left – and he knew that Zaveid wasn’t talking about the few coins he had left in his pouch. Sorey took out his and Mikleo’s beloved encyclopedia, and touched the cover with aching fingers and an aching heart. It was a precious memento. The notes they had made in the margins, the memories in the pages, were irreplaceable.

But what was more precious and irreplaceable was Mikleo himself.

Sorey bowed again, and offered the book to Zaveid.

“Please, spirit. Lord Zaveid. I’m but a traveler, on a mission to save someone I love. Won’t you please grant me your assistance?”

Zaveid accepted the book, and tucked it into his pack.

“It ain’t gonna be easy. Let’s set out while the sun’s still high.”

They parted ways with Dezel, who quickly beat a retreat back to Rose’s ship, and set out from Meirchio into the barren snowfields and towering mountains beyond.

Zaveid spoke true – the road to the palace through the mountains was difficult indeed, even with the assistance of a wind spirit at Sorey’s back. The weather made their way all the more treacherous. The snow weighed down Sorey’s cloak, freezing the fabric and making the cold bite through deep into his bones. Even tucked firmly under his arms for warmth, his bare fingers felt numb and useless. Sorey truly did not know if he could make it through. He kept the memory of Mikleo close to his heart, a gentle warmth that prevented him from freezing all the way through.

“Sorey! Buddy! Eyes up ahead!”

Sorey squinted through the blowing snow, and thought he saw the outline of a structure. Zaveid shoved him forward, and guided him to what looked like a chasm standing between them and the palace. Zaveid whistled aloud, and the chasm glowed with white light. A beautifully-designed bridge appeared to shuttle them across – Sorey would have loved to examine it closer were it not for his duty to Mikleo, and his imminent death in staying outside a moment longer. He and Zaveid hurried across, and Zaveid grabbed him by the hand, dragging him along through the strange glassy doors with their intricate silver filigree work. Through them – as if they were passing through mist.

Sorey had not known what, exactly, to expect when he found where Mikleo was being held. Perhaps maybe Mikleo, chained to a wall, swooning sweetly into his arms. Perhaps that was a bit too much. But what he did not expect was a receiving-hall filled with frozen statues. Sorey wandered up to one, and to his great dismay, he found that these statues were not statues at all.

“Zaveid! These are – these are humans! Frozen humans!”

Zaveid was examining a few of the statues himself, with a grim expression.

“This was their solution to the mirror problem, huh…” Zaveid murmured.

Sorey dashed from statue to statue, trying to find one that was still alive, dreading finding one wearing Mikleo’s face.

“Solution? What do you--”

One statue’s eyes stared back at him, listlessly. Sorey nearly jumped out of his skin, but calmed himself enough to take action. He loosened his cloak, as if to drape it around the frozen person – as if they had any warmth left to keep in.

“Sorey!” Zaveid yelped. “Keep your clothes on! You’ll freeze just like the rest of ‘em!”

Sorey hesitated at the thought of not being capable of saving Mikleo, but – but he couldn’t just leave this person to…to…

“Useless,” said the person in a flat, emotionless tone. The ice around their lips and neck cracked as they spoke. “Why would you sacrifice yourself so readily? Our frozen hearts are beyond saving.”

Sorey’s own too-soft, foolish heart ached. “Who did this to you? That spirit Lailah?”

“The mirror filled our hearts with hate,” said another frozen statue across the way. Their neck snapped with an awful sound as they slowly, painfully slowly, turned their head to look at Sorey. “The spirit Lailah froze our hearts before they rotted from it.”

There were so many statues. So many people. Some murmured their assent to the previous statue’s statement, but others were silent – frozen through with the silence of death. Sorey’s pulse raced, his eyes darting around the room. Not Mikleo, not there, not there either; none of these poor souls were Mikleo, so where—

The gate that Sorey and Zaveid had entered through glowed. Another guest stepped through – but truthfully, this was no guest. A trumpet blew, and snowflake-capped normins raced from every nook and cranny to form a receiving-line. The doors at the end of the receiving hall flew open, showing the throne room – and the throne, perched atop a dazzling frozen lake.

Through the front doors came that same familiar sleigh that stole Mikleo away. But instead of Lailah at the helm, it was Mikleo himself.

He was so beautiful. Mikleo was always beautiful, always, but he was simply…otherworldly. It was no wonder why there were whispers of a snow prince. Mikleo was dressed in a suit and cape fit for royalty; white and icy blue, trimmed with silver and royal navy. His high boots clacked against the marble floor as he dismounted, and his white hair glimmered in the iridescent light of the strange silver flames that lit the lanterns around the palace hall. Mikleo reached up to help his passenger off the sleigh, and led them to stand with the rest of the frozen people. The passenger went wordlessly, and stood without complaint or comment next to their new neighbors. And then Mikleo turned and walked, straight-backed, toward the throne room. He made no indication of seeing Sorey, or caring about the plight of the frozen people around him.

Mikleo was a kind and warm person, who cared deeply about the pain and suffering of those around him. What had that mirror done to him? What had that Lailah done to him?

“Mikleo!” Sorey cried out in despair. “Wait! It’s me!”

Mikleo did not turn to acknowledge Sorey’s voice, nor did he even slow down. He walked across the frozen lake confidently, without slipping a bit on the ice, and arranged himself on the throne with the same air of wordless complaint as the new arrival to the receiving hall. Sorey raced down the hall toward the doors to the throne room, his muscles aching with weeks of stress and strain, his heart aching, also—

The normins blocked his path, again. Sorey gritted his teeth and was about to just vault over their tiny heads, but one stepped forward. They raised their trumpet, and tooted another receiving flourish.

“The Lady Lailah approaches! Show some respect to your host, human.”

Sorey whirled around, trying to see where Lailah was approaching from, trying to see if he had time to grab Mikleo and run (he was sure driving that sleigh wasn’t that hard). And then, she appeared in a crackling of silver flame in the doorway to the throne room. Her expression was pained, and she extended a hand to Sorey.

“You are Sorey,” she observed. “I am Lailah, servant of the great spirit Maotelus--”

Zaveid wolf-whistled. “Lailah! My heart was about to waste away without you. Why don’t you turn those flames of yours back on to warm us up--”

Several of the normins rushed Zaveid to whack him in the shins with their trumpets, causing him to yelp and stumble back into the arms of one of the frozen people. Lailah’s cheeks were colored pink, and she coughed lightly, and started again.

“I am Lailah, servant of the great spirit Maotelus. Sorey. You have travelled so far, and touched so many hearts. Truly, you bring spring wherever you set foot.”

“What did you do to Mikleo?” Sorey demanded.

Lailah folded her hands and stared at her intertwined fingers.

“I am Maotelus’ closest servant,” she began. “And the only one who can wield even a portion of his power. Maotelus charged me with the mission of gathering those afflicted by the shards, and bringing them here for safety…and freezing their hearts so the shards do not destroy their very immortal souls. But I am a fire spirit – the taking away of heat is within my purview, but a more graceful application of the art of ice magic is…beyond me. My clumsy attempts at it have only caused more disaster – this terrible weather, for example.

“However, your friend Mikleo is possessed with a gift for magic. When I froze his heart, it awakened his latent abilities. He was able to take up my duties with far more dexterity and finesse. He has saved so many souls from eternal damnation, and once the Lord Maotelus has determined how to purify the mirror shards--”

Sorey slowly approached her as she spoke, and carefully, bones aching, went down on one knee. He bowed his head.

“Please, Lady Lailah. I’m but a traveler, on a mission to save someone I love. Won’t you please grant me an audience with the prince of this palace?”

Lailah extended a graceful, smooth hand, and Sorey accepted it with his battered, bloody one to rise to his feet again. Lailah made no indication of disgust – only pity.

“You may speak to him,” she said. “But he is unlikely to respond or recognize you for who you are. His heart is frozen through – were it not for his magic talents, he would be just as stiff as the poor souls you see here.”

That seemed like a challenge Sorey was willing to take up. Sorey would never be able to forget Mikleo – through trial and tribulation, through death and on to the ends of the earth. Sorey limped across the frozen lake; his feet not as sure on the ice as Mikleo’s, but his path just as set.

The throne room was dazzling, and an architectural marvel. Intricately-carved white marble spires twirled up to the high ceilings, which were under some strange enchantment – it showed the night sky, and an ever-moving map of the moon and constellations. These enchantments reflected onto the surface of the frozen lake, making Sorey’s path an otherworldly journey through the cosmos. The room sparkled with a sheen of ice and snow, which grew into flower-like blooms around the foot of the throne.

Mikleo did not acknowledge him as he drew closer. He did not acknowledge him as Sorey collapsed to his knees in front of the throne. He was as pale and lovely as a fine marble statue, but his eyes – those beautiful, expressive violet eyes that sparkled with love and intelligence – were so terribly blank. Sorey felt his tears freezing to his cheeks.

“Mikleo,” he said quietly. “It’s me. Sorey.”

Mikleo did not respond. Sorey continued.

“I was so worried when you got stolen away,” Sorey said. “I was worried the night before, when you were acting strangely, too. I’m so sorry I didn’t realize what had happened. You must have been in so much pain from that shard, and your hands were all scratched up on top of that, and you didn’t even eat the lunch we’d packed. Have you eaten since?”

Mikleo remained impassive.

“I wish I had more to offer. I only have some jerky left in my pack,” Sorey went on. “It’s not really a meal meant for royalty. You look even prettier than usual, Mikleo. I didn’t think either of us would have our hair going white for a few decades yet, but it really suits you. So do those clothes. Do you remember how we used to dress in our best for the village festivals? You always looked so nice in that vest and ribbon tie. I always just looked like a barn animal stuffed into a suit. Or I think that’s how you put it, once.”

Sorey flexed his battered hands, watching as fresh blood oozed from the cracked skin. He was battered, as a whole. He was dirty and ragged from travel, he was bruised and bloody and looked like he hadn’t slept in weeks. He was a sorry sight, compared to how stunning Mikleo looked.

“I lost my gloves and scarf on the way here,” he admitted. “And all the money we saved up for the harvest festival. And…and our encyclopedia. I’m so sorry, Mikleo. I’m…I’m so sorry…”

Sorey crumpled, and crawled forward, shuffling over to press his forehead to Mikleo’s knees.

“Mikleo,” he sobbed. “I’m so sorry.”

He wept, and wept, and wept. Perhaps if he stayed here long enough, tears frozen to his cheeks, he would become a statue like the ones in the receiving hall – a statue that crouched at the foot of the throne like a loyal dog waiting for his beloved master’s return.

He almost didn’t notice the soft touch to his ruined hands.

Mikleo examined Sorey’s hand, turning it this way and that. Sorey felt color flood his cheeks, and pouted, despite himself. He knew his hands looked terrible, but Mikleo didn’t need to rub it in. Mikleo blinked slowly, and rubbed his thumb across the dried blood on Sorey’s knuckles.

“…hurts…hurts?”

Sorey stared at him, tears beginning to fall from his eyes anew. Mikleo bent, and pressed his other hand to Sorey’s chest, over his heart.

“Hurts here. You too?”

Sorey nodded, and reached out with an aching hand to press his own palm to Mikleo’s heart in turn.

“It hurts for me, too.”

Mikleo’s hand twitched, and as if on reflex, he moved it to cup Sorey’s cheek and brush his tears away with his fingers. Sorey gave a choked-off wail, and buried his nose into Mikleo’s hand – he thought he’d never feel this touch again. He closed his eyes, and pressed a kiss to the soft skin of Mikleo’s palm.

He heard a sharp intake of breath, and slowly opened his eyes. Mikleo was looking at him – really looking at him – and he looked absolutely distraught.

“Sorey,” Mikleo whispered. “What happened to you?”

Sorey really had thought his crybaby years were over, but here he was, weeping again. Mikleo scrambled down from his seat on the icy throne, and wrapped Sorey in his fur-trimmed cape, rocking them both back and forth and shushing him with gentle noises. Sorey had thought he’d never be fully warm again – how wrong he was.

“I had my heart stolen away by a snow prince on a white sleigh,” Sorey said, through his sobs.

Mikleo pouted at that, and color rushed to his cheeks. It was the most beautiful sight Sorey had seen in weeks, even after travelling the whole of the kingdom. Sorey smiled up at him, and leaned up, tilting his chin, pleading for a kiss. Mikleo leaned in as well, ready to oblige.

They were interrupted by sloppy crying from the throne room’s door.

“I-i-it’s so beautiful,” wailed Zaveid, sobbing into the arms of a normin who was weeping just as hard as he was. “Love! Love is what melts hearts and purifies cursed mirror bullshit! LOVE!!”

He trailed off into more crying. Lailah tugged a hankie from her sleeve and dropped it on Zaveid’s head for his later use, then approached Mikleo and Sorey, happy tears in her own eyes.

“Mikleo,” she said. “You are well again. Though the Lord Zaveid’s explanation was…simplistic, it seems that Sorey’s love for you has rid the shard of its corrupting power – in addition to melting your heart of my magic.”

Mikleo touched his hand to his chest, as if testing it for any sort of pain.

“…I can’t feel it at all, anymore. The shard. Do you think it’s gone?”

“I do not sense its presence within you any longer. A tiny piece of glass is surely nothing in the face of such powerful love. The Lord Maotelus thanks you so much for your service. Do you remember where you are, what has happened…?”

Mikleo nodded slowly. “…I do. Those – the people I spirited away, whose hearts I froze. Will they be…are they…”

“When the Lord Maotelus finds a way to purify the shards, it will be safe for them to be unfrozen. Your skillful work with your magic will ensure that they will live again – it will be as if they wake from a deep winter sleep.”

“And the rest of the shards?” Mikleo asked.

Lailah hemmed, and plucked at her sleeves. “I will tend to those shards that remain. You must tend to Sorey, to get him home and back in his own bed – you have gone above and beyond your duties, and Maotelus will surely bless you in all your endeavors for the rest of your days--”

“I do need to get Sorey home and patched up,” Mikleo said. “And bathed. But please. You saved my life, so I want to make sure no one has to suffer while we wait for a cure. I’ll come back to help, I promise.”

“I’m coming too,” Sorey said, a bit miffed at the bath comment. “You’re not leaving without me this time.”

“Do I really have a choice in whether you tag along?” Mikleo asked mildly, though he already knew the answer. Sorey smiled mischievously.

Lailah gave a watery smile of her own, and curtsied. “Thank you. Please, take the time you need to make Sorey well. He has journeyed far to save you, and his heart has melted a path through the coldest winter.”

A pair of normins trotted up to slide a pair of warm snowflake mittens onto Sorey’s hands, and wrap a matching scarf around his neck. To top it off, he was blessed with a snowflake cap, like the little creatures themselves wore.

“I will see to it that this foul weather is lifted,” Lailah said. “Now that I can rekindle my flame to do so. Mikleo, please take your sleigh and carry Sorey home to care for him.”

“Can I drive?” Sorey asked as Mikleo helped him to his feet.

“Absolutely not,” Mikleo said.

Zaveid stumbled up to the two of them, still crying, and bundled them both into a bear hug.

“You’ve allowed me to bear witness to the greatest romance in the past few centuries,” Zaveid sniffled. “Sorey, my man, you’ve overpaid me for my services.”

With that, Zaveid handed Sorey the encyclopedia back. Sorey took it gratefully, and clutched it close to his chest. Zaveid loudly and obnoxiously blew his nose into Lailah’s hankie, and it was clear one of the normin at his feet wanted to nail him in the shins with their trumpet again out of spite.

They journeyed home with incredible speed, sailing across the skies and making it back to their tiny village before the sun rose. They were welcomed back with open arms and tearful faces, and Sorey was bundled into his family home for a hot bath, a fresh set of clothes, and a big warm breakfast.

“The fruit trees are blooming all over the village,” Sorey noted to his mother and grandfather as he stuffed himself. “And the harvests look even bigger than I remember them. What happened?”

“Well, we thought we’d lose the whole harvest to the early frost,” his mother said. “But somehow our little village was spared the worst of it. It was a miracle.”

Sorey had seen Edna on the way back to his home, sitting on a bench in the town square, pretending to ignore him. She had still been wearing his gifts. He hoped she hadn’t strained herself too much.

Luckily, Sorey and Mikleo made it back just in time for the harvest festival – although they were out the funds they’d saved for it (“Sorey, stop apologizing for spending the money – I would have done the same for you!”), they enjoyed the hustle and bustle, and each other’s company, and the sight of each other in their festival clothing. On the second day of the festival, a caravan bearing the name “Sparrowfeathers” rolled into town, bearing an array of goods and gold to be traded for the village’s envious harvest bounty.

“For the wool, cloth, and goat cheese,” Rose said, handing Sorey’s mother a hefty pouch of coins. “And this here is on the house.”

Rose handed Sorey a stack of freshly-printed novels and journals, straight from the capital. Sorey smiled at her brightly, and thanked her profusely – and waved to Dezel where he sat atop the caravan, also pretending to ignore him. Spirits were so moody, sometimes.

The festival went long into the night, and Sorey and Mikleo curled together under a blanket in front of the bonfire, sipping at hot cider. Sorey was healing up well, and soon, they would be off on their mission to gather the remainder of the shards – Sorey wanted to make the most of this evening together. He nosed at Mikleo’s still-white hair, and watched as the firelight played off the silky strands.

“Is the fire too warm for my snow prince’s comfort?” Sorey murmured.

Mikleo idly traced the air, sending a few snowflakes flying into the night sky. “Hardly. I’m not a delicate, swooning thing, Sorey. I help you and your mother wrestle sheep for shearing.”

Sorey laughed. “I know. But isn’t that below your station, now? Wrestling with barn animals.”

Mikleo slanted a look up at him, and the side of his mouth twitched.

“Wrestling with barn animals is something I’m quite passionate about, thank you.”

It was Sorey that was a bit too warm, now. But with the light of the bonfire, and the beauty and crispness of an autumn night to enjoy, Sorey could make do for a while longer before they headed inside. He tucked his cheek against Mikleo’s silky white head, and sighed happily.

Yes, a while longer.

#sormik #soremiku #suremiku #soymilk #sorey/mikleo #tales of zestiria #i guess this is my personal tales of zestiria tag now #a tenderly crafted fanfiction #chocomint-srmk #chocomint fairy tale compilation #chocomint

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childesballs · 6 years

Note

Could I get sormik with 34 o///////o

(Writing Prompts)

I am sorry I took so so long to get this done, but this did turn out to be a little over 1k... not exactly a drabble. Oops. Oh well.

34.“If you keep looking at me like that we won’t make it to a bed.”

The streets of Marlind weren’t quite what Sorey remembered, but nonetheless he had little difficulty navigating towards the sanctuary. Lailah hadn’t told him why they were meeting here, but when could he ever refuse a request from her?

“Lai—” He pushed through the doors only to find the seraph buzzing around another seraph. Despite his expert control over all forms of wind, Sorey had lost every breath.

Straightened silver hair pulled into a side ponytail fell down bare arms. A sleeveless gray crop top failed to hide even a single line of a well defined, puffed out, chest. The flowy, tapered hem drew attention from his midriff to the perfect curve of hips that were now extenuated in tight fitting black jeans.

Sorey hadn’t noticed the three inch gold accented black heels aiding the appearance of other assets.

“Oh wonderful timing!” Lailah clapped her hands as she approached Sorey.

“You, uh, need me for… something?” He tried to stay focused on her, but he’s eyes wanted to stick elsewhere.

“Yes yes. See, Edna, Rose and I have this fashion line that’s taken off quite well.” She paused to walk him over to a table that held an array of camera equipment. “Zaveid, so graciously informed me this morning that he was too ‘busy’ to resume his role as photographer.”

Sorey took a few seconds to forcibly stare at the table.

“And you want me to take pictures of…”

“Rose was certain you wouldn’t mind.” Lailah tried to hide her chuckle.

“He doesn’t know the full scope of this does he?” Mikleo interjected. That got Sorey once again looking towards Mikleo.

“That’s not important.” Lailah’s assurance felt too enthusiastic.

“Well it can’t be that hard.” Sorey knew he was lying to himself.

“Is that an acceptance?” She trembled like someone waiting on the best news of their life. He could only nod, and then second guess himself when he noticed Mikleo’s flushed expression.

A forty minutes of photography crash course and test photos for the sake of him learning, and he was finally able to focus on getting quality images. Mikleo remained absolutely flawless the entire time, and shifted into every position Lailah requested with ease.

Every outfit change, from long fluttering tops paired with pants and skirts, to eloquent dresses, all came with a handful of awkward photos that exposed where Sorey’s attention had been.

“Alright, that finishes us here,” Sorey sighed with relief. “Everything at the inn should be set up already.”

“Wait, there’s more?” Sorey wasn’t sure how much longer he could last. Mikleo was good at this job. Too good at giving those tantalizing and smoldering looks at a hunk of plastic.

“Only a few more. We need a different… aesthetic for those.” Sorey wasn’t sure why Mikleo had eye rolled at ‘aesthetic’ but he chose not to question it.

Lailah lead the way to furthest back room of the inn. Inside hadn’t been the typical interior Sorey expected. Blackout curtains covered the window, and the bedsheets were soft, silky, and vibrantly colored.

In the midst of setting up lighting gear, Sorey caught sight of Mikleo being handed a pile of clothes. A rather small pile in Sorey’s mind but once again he held his questions in. He didn’t really understand all this fashion stuff and found it easier to simply follow instructions.

A few moments later and Sorey dropped the camera. He had been busy fussing with a stand, and turned to ask Lailah for help only to be met with the sight of Mikleo, hair freed from any restraint, clad in nothing but a pair of white panties and thigh high stockings.

“That’s twenty-thousand gald you dropped.” Lailah commented. Sorey’s heart that had stopped beating sprang back to life as he frantically scooped the camera up and prayed to every Empyrean that had ever or would ever exist.

“We’re good.” Sorey huffed when everything functioned normally.

“Will this be too much for you?” her hands covered her face, but didn’t hide her amusement.

“I-I said I’d do this… I just… might need a minute. To, uh, focus.”

“C’mon. You’ve seen me in less.” Mikleo’s face had gone beet red.

“Oh my.” Lailah gasped.

“You know we’re married!”

“Yes yes, but to hear you say something like that.”

Mikleo sighed largely as he threw himself onto the bed. One leg curled over the other while both hands came up to lay in his hair. Half-lidded eyes found Sorey, who wasn’t sure he could do this now.

“Let’s be quick about this?” his voice was low. Sorey slapped his cheeks before moving around the room along with Lailah to find the best angle.

Sorey’s only hope was to focus on the preview image. Looking at the real thing was eating at him more and more with each second.

They gotten through two outfits and countless photos that not even Sorey could deny were looking more and more suggestive, despite there being more fabric.

“Mikleo…” Lailah chimed in the middle of a pose change.

“Yes?”

“Should I have Sorey wait in the hallway for a few minutes?”

Mikleo’s hands shot down to cover his arousal while his eyes avoided both of them.

“Hang on Lailah.” Sorey handed her the camera and went to sit on the edge of the bed. That definitely wasn’t helping and he could see that in Mikleo’s face. Two hundred years of marriage had taught Sorey a thing or two that could help though.

“That building we passed on the way here, with the intricate carvings. You’re totally wrong about the inspiration.” Mikleo stared at him blankly for some long moments. His mouth moved silently for even longer, and then he sprang up.

“What are you even talking about? I helped build that and you think you can tell me I’m wrong?”

“Yup totally wrong. But I’m not gonna listen to any counters until we’re done here.” With that Sorey went back to his spot next to Lailah, and Mikleo huffed as he flopped back into position. How that had worked she would never understand, but she was thankful.

Only twenty minutes later, they were finished, and Lailah was all too quick to snatch the camera and run. The door clicked and in the same moment Sorey found himself pinned against it with Mikleo back in the white panties and stockings.

“Sorey…” Mikleo was already unbuttoning Sorey’s shirt.

“If you keep looking at me like that we won’t make it to a bed.”

“But it’s right—”

“And you’re right here.” Sorey wouldn’t have a chance to argue further, nor would they hit the bed until much later.

#tales of zestiria #sormik #makkura-taichou

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wavervelvett · 7 years

Text

Tales of Femslash 2017

Pairing: Rose/Alisha

Day One: Flowers

“Take this with you,” Alisha had told her, and left a kiss lingering on Rose’s left cheek, so Rose tucks Alisha’s copy of the Celestial Record inside her robes and hops on the wagon out of Ladylake, still adjusting to the feel of the cape and the way it catches in the wind when she stands up to wave goodbye.

Lailah just smiles when Rose collapses next to her once more, that little sad smile of hers, and the two of them watch the scenery fall away as the Sparrowfeathers wagon trail winds its way towards Rolance. The twins let Rose off in Volgran Forest, and Rose sits in the grass and draws a game plan in the dirt with her finger. All the places the new Shepherd has to be, because not like the workload is letting up at all, or maybe it just feels that way without the rest of her companions beside her.

Still, Lailah is good company all by herself, those first few years. The others come and go. Edna wanders all over the map in a way Rose doesn’t bother to track. All she knows is every few weeks, she’ll wake up to Edna sitting on a tree stump a little outside the campsite or on a bench near the inn, twirling her umbrella and complaining about how long she’d been waiting for them to wake up. So Edna will walk beside them for a few days, maybe two weeks if she feels like it, and then she’ll be gone again, probably visiting Mikleo, the seraph Rose never sees, not unless she treks into the mountains to find him. Zaveid, on the other hand, she does see, though he never joins them for more than a night or two, telling unbelievable stories and trying to hit on Lailah some more before he either moves on or gets kicked to the curb. But somehow, they end up going where they need to be and doing what they need to do. It’s unconventional, certainly, there’s no denying that, but the four of them together are able to put in a good showing of being the new Shepherd, and eventually the robe didn’t feel so strange upon her shoulders.

At night, especially after they first leave Ladylake, Rose speeds through the Celestial Record, noting which pages have been worn thin or marked in some way. Some places Alisha has made it to, and some which are obviously a distant dream, judging by how the spine is bent open to select locations. One such place is the Plitzerback Wetlands, where Rose ends up with Lailah and Edna once again before too long, purifying some kid who’d ended up looking like a fish person until the Malevolence melted away. They sit as they wait for the kid to wake up, and Rose takes out the Celestial Record, notes the fold in the corner of the page that begins talking about Plitzerback and the ruins to be found, little underlines or circles from Alisha dotting the lines of text. Alisha probably won’t ever see the ruins for herself; it’s so remote and there’s no reason for a princess to be here, not unless Rolance and Hyland begin fighting again in really odd locations. Rose doesn’t think much of the scenery, but maybe Alisha would, if she were here. On a whim, Rose plucks a swamp plant out of the damp earth beside her and places it between the pages of the Celestial Record, and then wraps some cord around the book so the plant will be pressed properly instead of withering. She feels Lailah’s eyes on her but doesn’t react. So what if she wants to bring a little piece of Alisha’s dream back with her?

It too easily becomes a habit though, preserving plants and flowers within the pages of the Record. It doesn’t take long for Lailah to catch on to what she’s doing, and Edna begins to chip in as well once she knows about Rose’s interest, acting bored but actually going through some trouble to find nice blooms. She points them out for Rose to collect, sometimes at the most inconvenient times. “How about not when I’m trying not to die?” Rose suggests after Edna wanders off during a purification to find some little white flowers tucked beside a stream.

“You were fine,” Edna tells her flatly as she lays her palm out for the book. Rose grumbles a little but hands it over and watches Edna arrange the flowers neatly so they will press well. Lailah joins them at the last second with a larger purple bloom that Edna dutifully places on the next page over before shutting the Record and binding it tight. “Why are you suddenly a flower person anyway?”

“They’re for Alisha,” Lailah answers before Rose can, and Rose has travelled with Lailah enough by now to know she has her hands clasped together to match a beaming smile, that big huge one that is still kind of sad. Rose focuses instead on brushing some dirt off her knee and hopes it discourages Edna from coming up with sappy nicknames. Edna is gone the next morning anyhow, but she leaves some blue blossoms Rose hasn’t even seen before on top of Rose’s folded cloak. Rose presses them in the proper pages and hopes the color stays just as vibrant.

The next time she sees Alisha, Rose considers giving the book back, but it’s only a third of the way filled, and somehow she ends up walking out of Ladylake with it still tucked in her pocket. The same thing happens again a few months later, when a diplomatic mission brings them both to Marlind. Rose wants to think it’s because the quiet kisses exchanged in the night kept her distracted, but really she knows it’s this whimsical notion of bringing the world back for Alisha. Which is silly and overly romantic but mostly impractical, but also something she seems committed to actually doing now.

Over the next three years, she slowly fills the Celestial Record with plants and flowers from everywhere on the Glenwood continent. Desert flowers plucked from cacti in the desert and little flowers from beside the church in Pendrago. Wildflowers from the mountains and unusual plants she discovers in the ruins. Edna sneaks into the gardens around the palace in Ladylake and lifts some flowers from a topiary there. In that time spent collecting, Lailah tells approximately five thousand, six hundred and eighty-two bad puns and squeals in delight when they find pillbugs. Rose tailors the Shepherd’s outfit to be just a little more slim and a bit reminiscent of her assassin’s gear, much easier to move in. Zaveid starts braiding his hair and dons a black vest, which doesn’t actually make his fashion sense any less atrocious, to be honest. Mikleo builds himself a little house on a hill near Elysia. Edna begins to stay with Rose and Lailah for weeks at a time, and then sticks around permanently. On a grander scheme, Hyland and Rolance solidify a truce, a real solid one this time, the kind that will last. A certain princess has a lot to do with that. Alisha’s name becomes widespread, associated with diplomacy and peace and grace. Rose tries not to knock men flat on their backs when she hears them whispering between themselves about ‘what a looker’ that princess is. Lailah has talked her down out of it a number of times by now.

Time passes.

And suddenly one day, in Lastonbell, Rose presses a flower into the proper page and binds the book shut, and realizes there’s nowhere left to go. She’s visited each city, each mountain, each ruin, and collected it all to gift the world to Alisha all in this little book.

“I think I’m finished,” she tells the other two, sounding a little awed despite herself.

“Finally,” Edna mutters, and continues poking her umbrella at the cobblestones. Lailah is a little more enthusiastic and insists they head for Ladylake immediately.

Except when they get there, Alisha is actually in Pendrago and Rose is forced to wait an agonizing week for her girlfriend to come home. Which, you know, she’ll never actually complain about because Alisha has waited three years and there’s more waiting to come, but still. Staying in the same inn for a week sort of wears away at her romantic impulse.

She requests an official audience with Alisha the moment she hears the princess has returned, because that’s the quickest way, actually scheduling Alisha’s time before Alisha can get herself all busy again. Plus, Rose knows that the Shepherd still makes many politicians in Ladylake very nervous, so while Lailah reminds her almost every time they visit that Rose needs to remain neutral, Rose can never help throwing a little bit of public favor Alisha’s way. She straightens her cloak in the mirror and makes sure her hair is tidy, then sets off for the palace, hiding the Celestial Record in her pocket. Alisha is waiting for her in the hall, in her usual knight garb and looking vaguely amused at the way Rose bows a little bit to every minor lord who looks her way. “Princess,” she says, and bows down low before taking Alisha’s hand and giving it a peck. Alisha rolls her eyes and Rose grins.

“Should we hold our discussion in the gardens?” Alisha asks. “Shepherd Rose?”

Rose nods and reaches to make sure she still has the book in her pocket.

Alisha leads Rose through the castle corridors by the hand, which is more telling to how much Alisha missed her than any of her formal talk. Rose squeezes Alisha’s hand once as they enter the gardens and Alisha releases her, turning and hitting Rose with the full power of her eyes shining bright green in the sun and a shy smile to match, and Rose is so in love with this girl it hurts. There’s no one else around as they wander into the hedge pathways, neither saying another word until they’re hidden by flowering bushes and trellises, safe from prying eyes. That’s when Alisha takes hold of Rose’s cloak and pulls her close, pressing a kiss beside her mouth. “I missed you,” she whispers, and Rose shivers a little. Her hands fumble for her pocket and she pulls out the Celestial Record, pushing it between them without explanation. Alisha frowns down at it for a moment before recognition dawns. She takes the book from Rose’s hands and runs her fingers across the worn cover. “It’s a little thicker than when I gave it to you,” she says, tone asking for an answer.

Rose laughs a little nervously and turns her head to study the magnolias. “Well, I figured, I was stuck travelling all these places while you were stuck doing your own thing and I guess...it’s stupid, but…” She hears the pages rustling as Alisha opens the record.

“You collected all these?” Alisha asks after a moment of silence.

“...yeah. Over the last few years. I figured…” Rose glances at Alisha, who just keeps staring at the book as she flips through the pages, “I figured you might not be able to see some of these places anytime soon, so I...I thought I’d bring them back to you.” She looks away again, feeling her face gradually heating into red. This was a stupid idea. Why would Alisha want a bunch of mummified flowers? And Rose practically ruined her copy of the Celestial Record. This was a very, very, very bad idea that Lailah and Edna had completely enabled and…

Alisha says something, very gentle and soft. Rose counters with a very intelligent, “Huh?”

Alisha flushes pink. “I said you forgot my favorite flower.”

Oh. Damn it.

“Well, I mean…” Rose fiddles with her sleeves. “Sorry. Should I have asked? I mean, is it a rare flower? I can go back and get one if it’s that important to you…”

She’s gone red. Alisha is still pink. Rose tilts her head to the side. “I feel like I’m missing something here.”

“Rose!” Alisha launches herself unexpectedly at Rose and throws her arms around her neck. Rose squawks as she catches her and spins with the momentum, teetering a little but not falling as Alisha sets her feet back on the ground. She buries her face in Rose’s shoulder as Rose steadies tries to enjoy the hug and ignore the pointy metal bits of Alisha’s uniform at the same time. “I can’t believe you did all that!” Alisha gasps, and hugs Rose even tighter.

“Wow, yeah...okay, your knee is killing me,” Rose manages to throw in, and Alisha jumps backwards, using the Celestial Record to cover her mouth.

“Sorry, I forgot.” She peers at Rose over the book, eyes bright and crinkled by a smile. “Was it fun, going to all those places?”

Rose rubs at her thigh where the armor had been poking. “It’s my job now. But sure, it was fun. I’ll take you with me sometime though. So you can see everything for yourself. And you can find your favorite flower too.” Actually, given time to think about it, she’s a little miffed Alisha had to bring up her big mistake right away. But Alisha just starts turning pink again and hides her entire face behind the book. “What?”

Mumble mumble.

“What?”

“Rose,” Alisha whispers, eyes peeking over the pages. “Rose...is my favorite flower.”

They stare at each other silently for a moment before Rose feels the grin spreading across her face. “Oh, that was so sappy.”

Alisha clutches the book to her chest and turns her nose to the air. “You were the one who brought me a book full of flowers. You’re the sap.”

“Rose is my favorite flower,” Rose teases, sidling forward into Alisha’s space. “And if I give you a Rose, just what are you gonna do with it?”

Alisha blushes again and lightly thumps Rose on the head with the Celestial Record. “Well, I was considering kissing you, but I might change my mind.”

Rose laughs and pulls at the hem of Alisha’s coat. “No, kissing sounds good, kissing is…”

She doesn’t get to finish that thought.

That night, the two of them steal roses from the royal gardens and press them into the pages about Ladylake, right beside the flowers already resting there. As Alisha says, it’s a perfect finishing touch.

#talesfemslashweek2017 #rosali #tales of zestiria #myfic #wow late but okay it's done at least!!#:')#unbetaed all mistakes are my own etc etc

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tmariea · 7 years

Text

We Have No Need to Swim

For Sormik Week Day 4 - Loss

Summary: What if sea monsters are water seraphim who went down into the ocean and never came back up? They sunk down to the depths to escape the pain of malevolence and grief, and there they fell anyways. They lurk in the darkness, lithe and sinuous, with milky blind eyes and wavering points of bioluminescence, ready to consume anything that comes too close. There is no happy ending.

WARNING: Major Character Death

Read on AO3

It is around year five hundred that the question comes to Mikleo – is there anything left to explore? Somewhere along the way, he lost count of how many times he had crossed the continent. He had documented every known ruin, and then gone back to document how they had changed with the deterioration of time. He had published innumerable books and papers on the subject, reread and reworked them often enough for the words to lose their meaning.

What is one to do when the world loses that fantastic glimmer? When the one thing that could bring back the light of discovery and novelty slumbers on, for ages unknown?

In the kinds of worries that strike late in the night, pulling sleep from his grasp, he wonders if even Sorey’s return can bring back his sense of wonder.

Other times, when those thoughts crept up the back of his spine, he would seek out Lailah or Edna. Each were a comfort but in very different ways. This time he doesn’t. This time there is a restlessness in his feet that he hasn’t been able to quench for decades, though not for lack of trying, and so he packs a bag and heads out, on the hunt for even one last unseen corner of his world.

He keeps moving, through daylight and under the trail of stars. The same trail of stars they had watched overhead one night in Lastonbell. Mikleo had wanted to scream at Sorey for leaving, had wanted to kiss him and beg him to stay. He hadn’t. He had been so full of hope, then, full enough to drown out the worries. He feels he’s done well at keeping hope, but even best efforts can be eroded with time. He keeps moving; he doesn’t look at the night sky anymore.

He walks and walks until his toes meet the edge of the ocean tide, and looks across. There is nothing but water as far as the eye can see. And that is when Mikleo gets an idea. What exists under the ocean, where no one has ever seen? It is not as if he has ever had trouble breathing within his own element. He leaves his pack on the shore, aside from a small notebook and some charcoal that he can use artes to protect from water damage, and takes his first steps into the surf.

It is beautiful in the depths of the ocean, like nothing Mikleo has ever experienced before. It feels new. The light is different in the way it shifts under the force of the waves above. The creatures are different, in the schools of fish that come swimming up to him cautiously and curiously, only to dart away at the slightest movement. He spends days carefully sketching them in his book, barely shifting aside from his hand. The press of the water on his limbs feels like an embrace, and the way his hair drifts in the currents feels like gentle fingers on his scalp. It’s been eons since he felt these things, and he is loath to give them up.

He doesn’t.

Mikleo leaves his spot near where he entered the water and begins to travel down the coast. He is fascinated by the geography of the ocean floor, the way the water shapes the sediment, and the rocks. Gentle waters create sloping sands which lead back up to the surface. Where the waves are harsh, they crash against the rocks above. There is the sound of their beat in his ears, murkier waters before his eyes, and plenty of rough ground to stumble on under his feet. When it gets too bad, he swims instead. Sometimes, cliffs drop sheer into the water, and if he goes far enough out, there’s a cliff under the ocean as well. That drops off harshly and into darkness; Mikleo decides to leave that place be, for now.

He loves feeling the barest changes in pressure as the tides roll in and out. He’s always had a faint sense for the moon, but here it is stronger than ever. He can feel the way it shapes his environment, shapes the water. The moon, he thinks, must be a water seraph. Then, he laughs at himself for the fanciful notions. That is the kind of image Sorey would have loved, he thinks, then notices the past tense and corrects himself. Sorey will love that image, some day.

He jots a note in the back pages of his book, separate from his observations of the ocean floor, and then tamps down anything he might feel on the matter.

Mikleo hasn’t been keeping track of time well, but he thinks he has spent a few months under the water when he comes upon the ruin. He can feel his heart soaring, in a way that it hasn’t in ages. This is a new ruin, new history, new things to explore and build theories on. It’s exactly what he had been missing before. He wonders who lived there. He wonders how this place came to be under the sea.

There is an open archway leading inside, and Mikleo walks through, after taking a moment to brush his hands along the frame. Between the creatures that have made their home there, he can make out patterns. They are long since worn down by the constant sway of the ocean, but he will have to come back later, to see what he can find.

Just inside the hall, it is dark. Not much sun finds its way to the ocean floor anyway, and none inside this ruin. Mikleo summons mana in his palm, calling on it to glow. Once he has a sufficient ball, he sends it towards the ceiling, and then makes a second for himself to carry. Even this doesn’t fully illuminate the space, although he gasps in delight at the what he can see. The ceiling soars several stories high, and is decorated by delicate, beautiful vaulting. In a way it reminds him of the Sanctuary in Ladylake, but there’s something slightly different, too. He will have to swim up and examine them later. For now, he heads towards the ground story walls, where his light catches on the curves of engravings and casts the dips into shadow.

Mikleo is examining the fresco he found - which is a fascinating mix of styles, parts harkening to Temperance of Avarost while others, strikingly, bear a resemblance to the art which arose during his own Age of Chaos despite the fact that it must be thousands of years old - when he feels a domain brush his own. It’s the last thing he expected to find down here in the depths of the ocean. He whirls to face the room, hair floating softly in the eddies caused by his sudden movement. His eyes strain against the darkness, as the outline of a figure wavers across the vast space. He summons his staff and holds it at the ready, waiting for the figure to approach.

It is a woman who comes into his light, moving in a way that glides more than she walks or swims, with tendrils of blue hair drifting around and in front of her face. As they shift, he can see that the tips of her ears have turned to fins, and the pupils of her eyes are slits and milky with near-blindness. She raises a hand in greeting, and there are blue webs between her clawed fingers, blue fins along her forearms, and the glint of scales visible through the patches in her deteriorating robes.

“Can you put out the light? It’s too bright,” she says. Her voice sounds scratchy, unused, even through the way the water distorts sound. He suspects if it was not their element, they would not be able to understand each other at all.

“Ah, okay,” Mikleo says and lets the light above them shrink and fade. He lets the one near him fade, but not go out, and keeps his staff at the ready; while the seraph might be acting calm, she looks as if she has been tainted. “Who are you?”

“My name is Amelia. Although, it has been a long time since I have had reason to say it.”

“I’m Mikleo,” he ventures, for the sake of politeness, and then wonders if a half-tained seraph would have any care for manners. He nearly snorts at the strange thought, but holds it in. For a moment more, the two of them look at each other, just as wary as before, before Mikleo asks the question burning in his mind, “How did you come to be here?”

Amelia blinks, and the fins on her arms twitch, as if she is anxious or unsure. “We came here to escape the malevolence of the world above, when it became too much.” She must have some sight left, despite her milky eyes, because her face twists and she laughs as Mikleo winces. The laugh is a hollow, grinding thing, like waves against the rocks. It is not pleasant, but even more than that, it is frightening; it contains no emotion at all. Mikleo clutches his staff until his knuckles turn white, and wills himself to hold his ground and not take a step back.

“It didn’t work, as you can see,” she finally finishes, once her bout of strange laughter is done.

“The world above is much more pure now,” Mikleo blurts out.

She stares him down, without blinking this time, and then says, “That is a nice thought. I am glad. But it is not one for me.”

A moment of silence passes, and then another. Amelia does not seem inclined to say more, or to move just yet. Finally, Mikleo clears his throat and asks, “We?”

“There were more of us once.”

And he knows. He knows exactly why there are no others here with her. He asks anyway, “How?”

She laughs her awful, soulless laugh again and Mikleo forces himself not to cringe. “How am I the only one left?”

That wasn’t what he had meant, but he is not willing to correct her.

Amelia shrugs. “Some fall faster than others. Those who hold sorrow or darkness in their hearts, perhaps. I'm one of the lucky ones. Or maybe, I'm not.”

Suddenly Mikleo doesn’t want to talk to this woman anymore. Standing in front of him is a fate that he has spent his life pushing back against, that Sorey had sacrificed himself to prevent. And here it is still. He feels the last five hundred years spent alone - and for what? - laying heavy on him. He feels sick to his stomach.

She studies him for a moment more, eyes narrowing and ear fins twitching. “Stay away from the depths,” she warns, and it sounds like mourning. “Stay away from the older ones, the darker ones. There is nothing left there.” And then, Amelia turns and walks away, out of his light, and taking the feeling of her domain with her, wrapped tight around her shoulders like a cloak.

In the time that Mikleo spends scouring every inch of the entrance hall and the rooms nearby, he does not meet Amelia again. It seems she is just as content to stay away as he is to have her gone. Although, he does always keep the senses in his domain alert for any other surprises that might come along.

From time to time, schools of fish swim in and out. These he likes, and always takes some time away from his study to coax them close and let them swim between his fingers and hair. Their cool, smooth bodies and vibrant, tiny lives are grounding. They move so fast, reminding him of the time passing in a way that he often forgets. He tries to rack his brain for how long he has been under the water, and comes up short.

He doesn’t mind that as much as he thought he would. He remembers the way time was starting to drag before he came down into the ocean, so he could do with a little bit of feeling like it’s flying by.

At any rate, the ruin is vast and there is much more to be explored. By questing with his own domain, he believes that there are several upper stories and a basement, perhaps two, in this vast place. Upper floors are the way to go, he thinks as he approaches a grand, soaring stairway and begins to ascend. Superstition can’t help but tell him that there will be darker things, more things like Amelia, down below.

And yet, something in him is still not surprised when, several rooms into his grand exploration of the second floor, he finds a monstrous creature. Or, really, it’s not so much that Mikleo finds the monster, than the monster finds him. He is narrowly saved by the feeling in the water of the thing’s passing, and reflexes which make him bring his staff up to block as it rams into him.

This thing is all teeth, rows and rows of them, and tiny, milky eyes, and wicked-sharp looking spines. For half of a panicked second, he remembers a frightening, hollow laugh, but then he realizes this thing is small, and for all its fierce appearance, not very powerful. Mikleo gathers the water before him, chills it hard and fast enough that it freezes despite the salt in the water, and waits for the monster to attack again.

It circles for a moment before charging again, and runs head-first into Mikleo’s ice spear. It shakes itself, shrieks in a way that makes the water all around him shudder, and then turns tail to slink off.

Mikleo is careful, reaching forward with all of the senses at his disposal before he tries to enter the room the monster came from, again. It seems to be empty. He guides one of his lights inside, and steps up to the doorway before he freezes. Inside, there is a dark purple miasma slowly pulsing and twisting in its own mindless hunger. There are eons of hurt here, little eddies and pockets of it that drift about on the currents like dark jellyfish. They had always known they needed to purify the land, but who would ever think to purify the sea?

His heart thumps madly, painfully in his chest. There has been so much work done, to purify the land. And yet, this reminds him of nothing so much as the cities of Glennwood when he and Sorey first set out from Elysia centuries ago. And this is just one room, in one ruin, in the vast ocean. How much of the water is infused with malevolence, how much of it has he touched? If things are still like this here, how in the world will Sorey ever cleanse enough of the world to wake?

That is not a thought to be thinking. Instead, he swirls the water in the room into a cyclone to chase away the patches of malevolence. It goes streaming past him as he directs it away. Inside, there are more fascinating carvings, similar to the ones in the grand hall below. Even without looking closely, he has a thrill up his spine that these ones might help him unlock answers.

He decides, even though there is malevolence here, that he will stay.

Mikleo hasn’t written in his notebook as much as he once has. The beginning, when he flips through, is packed full of sketches of fish and notes in a tiny exacting hand on comparisons of art and architecture between historical periods and the periods in which he has lived. The notes are still tiny and exacting in the later half, but it certainly took him several times the amount of time that it did to fill the front, especially since he’s collected plenty enough on the art style here to put together some answers. When he reaches the last page, he finds a note, to tell Sorey that he once had the silly notion that the moon was a water seraph. Until then, he hadn’t even remembered the thought.

Mikleo looks at the page for a moment, decides that he will not write anything more there, and shuts the book. He slides it into the pouch on his belt, still wrapped in magical protections. The thought that he should return to the surface for another is gone from his mind almost as fast as it came. Besides, it’s become hard to write anymore with the webbing slowly creeping between his fingers.

There is a day, when he leans close to a section of wall, to examine an old trap. It’s no longer a danger to him - the rope connecting the mechanism has long-since rotted away. But it’s fascinating anyway. As he looks, his eyes begin to hurt. He rubs them, feeling his fingers skim along the tiny ridges forming underneath. The ridges had concerned him once, but not anymore. The touch does not help with his eyes, though.

He thinks that maybe he has been looking at fine detail too long, and that they need a rest. He turns away from the wall only to come face to face with one of his glowing spheres. The light is harsh on his hurting eyes this close. He’s always kept two with him, one for up close and one to illuminate the wider spaces, so he thinks it might not be a bad thing to put one of them out for now, while he rests. He lets it fade, and breathes a sigh of relief.

He has been practicing finer control of sensing his surroundings in the water. There are things his eyes miss these days; probably his eyes have always missed things, but the water - it’s in everything. It misses nothing.

That is probably the reason he feels the creature in the water first, knows the shape of it to be like a man, before he ever senses the domain of a seraph. He is shocked; the last time he felt something of the like was when he met Amelia again a few months - years? - ago. Even then, she had hardly felt like a seraph anymore, and certainly nothing like this one, who is pure to the core, and in some way familiar.

He decides his curiosity is enough to venture up from the basement level where he has spent most of his time lately, back up the grand staircases and out to the hall, where this one waits.

As he makes his way through the series of halls and rooms, he feels something flash by his cheek. It makes beautiful trails in the water with its passing. It takes him a moment to realize it’s a fish, and he feels something strange in his chest when he can’t remember the last time he saw one. He does remember, though, feeling them dart around him, and in and out of his fingers. When the next one passes him by, he snatches it from his path, with the aid of the webbing on his fingers and a twist he makes in the water. He feels it wriggle against his palm for a moment, the smooth, coolness of its scales. He wonders what it might be like to eat it, but then he lets the fish go and continues on.

There in the entrance hall is the owner of the domain. He senses it is a man, shorter than him but not by much, and sees with what failing eyesight he has left that the man is swathed in blue. Although, it is hard to tell through the light.

“Mikleo,” the man says.

He blinks, tries to think when it was he last heard that name. He tries to think of who this man is. He looks up towards the ceiling, and remembers this man in a similar place once, another grand room with grand vaulting and a sweeping roof. “Uno,” he says back.

“I was sent to look for you, by Lailah and the others. Although, Edna claims no interest in this endeavor.”

“Ah,” he says, and his mind runs through a hundred bored expressions, more often than not hidden away a moment later by an umbrella. He thinks he says, “that’s just like her,” but when he looks back at Uno, blinking against the lights the other seraph has brought with him, he can’t be sure.

“They want you to come home.” His senses in the water tell him Uno’s mouth and eyes are twisted with some kind of emotion.

Before he can even truly feel the word on his tongue, he’s saying, “No.”

“Brother,” Uno says, “can you truly say that this is you speaking, and not the malevolence? I know the things it will make you do.”

He wracks his brain, his memories of the world above. Edna is easy, since Uno mentioned her, she is her teasing and snide comments, but also in the way her voice cracks when she is truly worried for someone she claims not to love. Lailah, she is warmth, and bad jokes, and a teacher despite her sometimes childish ways. Zaveid is an old, solid presence, for all he tries to hide it under all of the flirting. The memories are warm, but his heart twists in his chest to think of missing them, to think of how they would see him now. He clutches his elbows, feeling the scales there under his fingertips.

And then, and then there is the one who is not there. Sorey. He is ruins, and bright green eyes, and falling asleep together as children. He is sparring together, and tickle fights, and the only person Mikleo has ever kissed. He is books, and a heart that welcomes in all he meets, and he is sacrifice. And he is gone. For more years, more centuries, than he ever got to live.

He no longer trusts that Sorey will be coming back.

His heart twists again, and it’s worse this time. There’s a name to it, too. Loneliness, sorrow, despair. All feelings that spawn malevolence; all feelings malevolence spawns. It is a vicious cycle, he thinks, and it is not a new thought. He has thought it many times over the years, but this is the first time that he adds, what a cruel world . Perhaps it is better to stay down in the dark and the silence. He can’t escape it now, oh no, but he would no longer have to see others suffer for it. No one would have to suffer when he, too, succumbs.

Finally, he looks back to Uno, who has waited in silence for his answer. “I am the one speaking,” he says, as clear and as strong as he can.

“It would be a shame to lose a good water seraph. And a good friend. You won’t reconsider?”

“No.” He waits, for Uno to say something else. When there is only silence, he adds, “I’m tired, Uno. Tired of waiting for something which will never come.”

There must have been something in his face, because Uno sighs, and nods. “I have strict orders to bring you back, you know. But if this is truly your choice, I will respect it. Lailah will roast me alive when I come back empty handed.”

“I am sorry,” he says, and he does feel it.

He watches, as Uno turns to go. A moment later, he calls, “Uno!” and reaches to his belt for his notebook. It’s been eons since he’s thought of the thing, but hearing him speak about returning empty handed reminded him. At least some part of him must have remembered, though, because his artes are still firmly in place to keep it safe from the water. He holds it out when the other seraph turns back to him, feels a second set of artes wrap around it, and lets go of his own. “Give this to him,” he says.

Uno nods, takes the book, and turns away again.

He stays to watch Uno leave. This won’t be the last, he thinks. Lailah will find another water seraph to come retrieve him, and the next perhaps won’t be willing to leave him in peace.

Perhaps it is time to move on. He walks out of the ruin once he can no longer feel Uno’s domain. The light outside is nearly blinding, and so he closes his eyes, puts out his own lightt, and uses the water to guide him. Where to go, which will be dark and hidden? There are further depths, down the cliff in the water.

As he glides through the towering gate, he stops for a moment to run his hands along the sides, to feel the patterns under his fingertips between the creatures clinging there. He never got the chance to come back and examine them. He thinks he should be disappointed by this, but instead he just feels empty.

Later, when he reaches the cliffs, he doesn’t bother to create a new light for himself.

Light is a thing he knows as glowing points of blue. They adorn his body in swirling trails, occasionally flicking in and out of vision as his body undulates in the current. Other creatures come to it. They slink through the darkness, into his small light, with eyes blurred and senses dulled and he eats them all.

Which is why it is so strange when another creature comes that makes its own light. It’s a small thing, although not as small as some, but its light is so bright as it floods his milky eyes. They feel like they’re searing out of his skull. He hasn’t seen anything this bright since the days of sunlight. That is a word that the ancient parts of him know, that the rest of him no longer understands.

But this creature, this man, is sunlight. The brightest, most wonderful and most painful thing he has ever known.

He freezes when the man reaches out to touch him. Nothing has touched him like this in eons, with gentleness and no fear. “Oh Mikleo, what has become of you?” Sound does not carry right through water, but he hears anyway.

That word, that name. He’s heard it before, perhaps in a dream. In a dream of sunlight, and air and this man. There is noise in his head now, beating on his skull. There are words there, trying to fight their way out of a mind that no longer understands, a mouth that can no longer shape them. His heart beats fast. He can feel this man’s heartbeat in the vibrations of the water. It is fast too, but familiar, and that hurts. Everything is hurt and confusion. He wants it to all be quiet and dark again.

Because if it is not quiet and dark, then he has to remember what he was, what he has become, and what could have been – what they could have been.

The man is still touching him. He’s speaking again, and no, no, stop, no more words. He cannot take more words – they claw at him, wrench out these feelings that he cannot bear. But he hears them anyway, because the world is not kind or merciful, and the man says, “I have searched for you for so long. Won’t you come home?”

And there is a wave of anger. “I have no home. You left!” screams the ancient part of him. Tries to scream it through his mouth, but it comes out as a roar. There is no sound in the water, but the vibrations shake the stones on the sides of his trench; they come crashing down. The man doesn’t flee; he clutches closer.

That touch seems to burn, that light burns, those thoughts crashing through his mind burn him from the inside out. The ancient parts of him are still screaming. They are crying and wailing and trying to claw their way out of these scales and fins and this cloud of darkness. Anguish and the most bittersweet joy rise up and crash over him like waves, and he’s going to be dragged under. He just wants it all to stop. He reaches forward, to impose silence and darkness and a stilling of his thoughts in the only way he can now.

Somewhere in the depths of the ocean, a light goes out. It is unnoticed, but for the small flock of creatures that had begun to swim towards its alluring glow. They turn back now, interest lost. Beneath them, a creature settles back into the darkness and the solitude, and wills his thoughts to stop and his heart to turn to stone.

#tales of zestiria #sormikweek2017 #sormik #mikleo #tmariea writes #angst #major character death

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wavervelvett · 7 years

Text

Tales of Femslash 2017

Pairing: Rose/Alisha

Day Three (one day late erp): Storybook

It’s ten years, seven months, fourteen days since Sorey went to sleep, but hey, who’s counting? Oh right, Lailah, who’s repeated that fact at least twenty billion times already and they haven’t even had lunch yet. And Zaveid is being loud and pervy and Rose and Alisha are being all gross and lovey-dovey and Mikleo is all puffed up with hot air and honestly, Edna could have spent this day under a lot more favorable circumstances. But of course Mikleo has finally finished his grand book about all their adventures and travels with the Shepherd and well, Edna would have to be sort of heartless not to come celebrate with him.

Not to mention she’s sort of been his go-to editor and maybe offered encouragement from time to time. Maybe decided to move a little closer so they could regularly meet up for a light lunch or afternoon snack. Maybe made sure Mikleo is doing a little more than just waiting for Sorey to come back.

Edna’s done a lot of living waiting for someone to just come back. It’s not what she wants for Mikleo. Plus she still gets enjoyment out of the exact shades of pink he turns when she comes up with new nicknames. She has a few stored away for public presentation today.

Okay, so maybe it’s a little nice to have an excuse to bring them all together again. There tend to be so few nowadays. Mikleo even made all the snacks Edna asked him to.

Actually, all the snacks might be enough reason for Edna to turn her teasing to some other target. Also, Mikleo has had the unfortunate trend of responding to her insults these days with a simple ‘yeah, yeah’ which is infuriating and also definite cause to find her fun somewhere else.

Alisha is bright and smiling and still oh-so-easy. She sits on the arm of the chair half-tugged into Rose’s lap, actually laughing at Zaveid’s awful jokes. Edna sidles her way around the room like a crab with ill intent until she’s leaning against the back of the chair, standing on her toes to see over the top. Mikleo spots her as he walks around with a tray of drinks and frowns. She places a finger to her lips. He owes her. She spent a half hour this morning just trying to tame that mess he calls his hair these days.

“And then I said, ‘Well isn’t that just spectacle-ular!’” Lailah finishes her story with clasped hands, already giggling to herself. Rose groans a little and pulls Alisha even closer.

“Your sense of humor has not improved.”

“Oh…” Lailah wilts a little and takes a drink. “I thought it was clever.”

“It was clever,” Alisha assures her. “Rose is just mad I didn’t get her joke about turnips this morning. What was that even? I still don’t get it.”

“That was…” It’s Rose’s turn to go a little red now. “That’s not a public sort of joke. More a private kind.”

Her chance. Edna slides along the side of the chair and makes herself known. “Oh, so Dirty-sha is still naive and innocent after ten years?”

She knows immediately that the name fell flat, judging by the looks being leveled her way over glasses full of tea. Mikleo has set his tray down and is covering his eyes with one hand over in the corner. Oh yeah, he had also maybe mentioned toning it down while company was over, but since when does Edna have to listen to that whelp of a boy?

“Dirty-sha?” Alisha repeats.

Edna sighs and steals Rose’s half-eaten biscuit from her. “The only one I’ve had to practice on is Meebo over there, okay? You know how easy it is to make names out of Meebo? Very easy. Give me an hour or two and the true Edna will return.”

“Oh, come on, you can’t have lost your touch,” Rose argues, and tries to swipe her biscuit back. Edna steps away. “Look how gross Alisha and I are being!” She pulls Alisha off the arm of the chair completely. Alisha falls into Rose’s lap with a giggle. “This has to waken something in your old bitter seraph soul!”

Edna glares at her and pops the biscuit in her mouth. “Old? Old, did you say?”

“Ancient,” Rose replies with glee, and Edna could summon a rock to launch her and her princess through the roof but she feels like Mikleo would get annoyed at that, so instead she just glares.

“I guess you have lost your touch,” Zaveid says in a low voice over near Lailah, and Mikleo interrupts with hands waving frantically before Edna really can launch people through the roof.

“Sandwiches! I have sandwiches!”

Edna sulks against a wall and watches them all as she eats. Rose doesn’t lead itself to any good nicknames, and she’s hesitant to try again with Alisha. No matter how she tries to phrase it, Alisha’s name just does not lend itself to teasing the way Mikleo’s does. Edna plucks at the crust of her sandwich and picks it all apart to leave on the floor. Or maybe she’s losing her touch. Hundreds of years only to lose her wit over a couple of lovey-dovey humans.

She’s too busy shredding her crusts to notice Rose approaching, because Rose is nearly seraph-level stealthy. “So,” Rose says, and leans against the wall besides Edna. Everyone else is wincing along to another one of Lailah’s long puns. “Are Alisha and I that offensive or has Mikleo just toughened up over ten years?”

Edna glances up at her. Rose stands with a carefree demeanor, casual trousers and loose blouse replacing her customary Shepherd’s garb. Edna knows Rose and Lailah have been discussing the idea of Rose’s successor, not necessarily now, but for a future in which Rose wants to be able to spend more time with Alisha, free of the political implications of the Shepherd being too cozy with Hyland royalty. But the responsibility of the Shepherd looks much better on Rose now than it had ten, even five years ago. Alisha has changed as well, a proper knight now, more sure in her purpose than ever before and all excited about her triad of nieces she’s being entrusted care of. She’s gone casual today too, though her spear is still propped in the corner of the room. Between those two and Mikleo’s ridiculous hair, it’s possible to tell that ten years, seven months, and fourteen days have passed. Edna, Zaveid, and Lailah haven’t changed much at all.

And the sad thing is that those ten years had felt like nothing. That’s what tends to happen when you live for a thousand years. Ten years can pass and Edna doesn’t even really realize it and then she looks up and there’s Rose, all grown up and the next time Edna blinks, both Alisha and Rose will be gone.

“Both,” Edna answers, and Rose laughs before leaning against the wall with arms crossed.

“So now the book is done, what will you do next?”

Edna lets her crumbs fall to the floor. “He’s planning a sequel. I guess I have to stick around for that.”

“Twisted your arm, sort of thing?”

“Yeah.” Edna has always found Rose catches on fast. She glances over at Mikleo, talking with Lailah and smiling wider than she’s seen for a while. “That sort of thing.”

Rose hums and settles more comfortably against the wall, though Edna can tell her gaze is locked on Alisha. “So, sequel?”

Edna thumps the heel of one boot against the wall. “More of a human interest story, I think. About us.”

“Isn’t this book about us?”

“Slightly. It tells what we did, at least. Not who we were.” Edna scrunches her nose and looks up at Rose. “It’s a history book, detailing the journey of the Shepherd Sorey. Very...professional.”

“So no bad puns?”

“None.”

“Pervy jokes?”

“Nada.”

“Obscure animal facts?”

“Zilch.”

“Details about our personal lives?”

“Try anything about our personal lives. He wrote it like he wasn’t even there.” She thumps her boot against the wall again and watches Mikleo. “Maybe that was the only way he could write it this time though. So if he’s ready to try again, I should probably be here to help.”

Rose leans down a little, grinning like mad. “Oh, you have gone soft in your old age…”

If Edna had her umbrella, she’d jab Rose with it. Unfortunately, it’s leaning over with Alisha’s spear. “Don’t you dare say that to any of the others.”

Rose laughs a little and goes back to watching Alisha. Edna joins her in silence for a few minutes, listening to the bad puns and pervy jokes.

“Hey,” Rose says after a minute, “When is Mikleo going to try to get this thing published?”

Edna shrugs. “It’ll be a while. Most humans still can’t see seraphim. It’ll take a few generations of humans growing up with the knowledge that we exist for them to begin to see us naturally again, the way Sorey did. Maybe more of them with natural resonance will start to be able to see us the way you did, in a few more years. Heh, I hope the next book describes that little adventure in more detail. But we need humans to see us before they can publish books, I guess, so it’ll take a while.”

“Hmm,” Rose says, and slouches a bit against the wall. “So, what you’re saying is that I most definitely won’t be the Shepherd when the book gets published.”

“Probably not.” They both leave it unsaid that Rose might not even be alive.

“So as Mikleo’s editor, I need you to make sure something makes it into that second book of his, okay?” Rose continues, suddenly sounding very serious. She bends down so they’re nose to nose. “I need you to make sure the entire world knows that the Shepherd Rose was in love with Alisha Diphda. Okay? Consider it my dying wish to you, that everybody in future generations knows that the princess and the Shepherd were a done deal.”

Edna sends her a Look™. “I’m pretty sure most everyone already knows that. No matter how much you’ve tried to hide it. Why the big deal?”

Rose scowls. “You know how many marriage proposals Alisha has turned down?”

“How many?”

“Thirteen.”

“That not too—”

“In the past year.”

“Oh.”

“It was even worse when we were younger,” Rose grumps. “Back then, every single nobleman from anywhere wanted to be married to the princess who travelled with the Shepherd.”

“And how many marriage proposals did the Shepherd Rose receive?” Edna asks and Rose gives her an expression that hints at a certain deadness inside.

“What, the ex-assassin who spends half her time talking to the invisible magic people?”

“Well, obviously that has to be some people’s type, or you wouldn’t be all lovey-dovey with the Hyland princess.”

Rose opens her mouth but pauses and then straightens up.

“Is that the one thing you want the storybooks telling everyone anyway?” Edna continues. “Seems like a waste of a dying wish. Just telling everyone that you love her? That won’t change that she got proposed to thirteen times. It’ll just mean that people seventy years from now will vaguely associate your names together.”

Rose sighs and stares back towards Alisha. “But it hurts,” she whispers after a moment. “It hurts that people don’t know I love her.”

Edna sighs as well, much more out of exasperation. “You humans are so stupid with emotions. Of course it hurts. It hurts to feel something and have to hide it.” She gestures across the room. “Everyone here today is feeling sad, trying to act happy. Ten years, seven months, fourteen days. It’s already too long but we’re smiling and pretending to be okay for the sake of each other. And tonight we’ll go to sleep clutching at our chest and remembering everyone we miss. It’s why we rarely all get together. It brings back too much but it’s easier to pretend that we’re busy and just don’t have the time. It hurts to feel and know you can’t let anyone know.” She stares up at Rose. “So if I had a dying wish to ask one of the most powerful seraphim on the continent, I wouldn’t waste it on some stupid sentence in Meebo’s book.”

“What would you waste it on?”

“I’d waste in on asking for a good editor on my own book I write. All about the Shepherd Rose’s journey, with exclusive bonus content from the Shepherd Rose herself.”

Rose raises her eyebrows but her mouth purses. “I can’t write worth a damn.”

“Which is why your dying wish needs to be for this once-in-a-lifetime chance to get me as your editor. Trust me, if I can make Meebo’s rattlings about ruins sound interesting, I can make anything work.” She glances over to Mikleo once more with a flip of her hair. “Once-in-a-lifetime. Ask me for this any other time and I’ll pretend I don’t know anything about it. Can’t be giving all my spare time away, after all.” She looks back at Rose, nods once, and then steps away from the wall. She wants another sandwich.

And stops. “Also…” Edna turns back to Rose with narrowed eyes, “I never did understand why Alisha could no longer travel with the Shepherd. The war is over. Wouldn’t a book be a lot more interesting with princesses involve? The stories my brother told me always seemed to include them.” She shrugs and spins back around. “Just a thought.”

In the end, it is nine years, six months, and five days since the Shepherd Rose died before her memoirs are published by a university in Rolance. Edna sits on a sunlit wall and dangles her legs as she reads, and is happy to find that this book includes the bad puns, the pervy jokes, and the obvious fact that the Shepherd and the princess were one hundred percent, absolutely and completely grossly lovey-dovey. For historical accuracy and all that.

#talesfemslashweek2017 #rosali #tales of zestiria #myfic #idk what this is i just wanted to write edna #and day 4 will have to come tomorrow but hopefully i can get 5 out tomorrow too and be back on track

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