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darkhymns-fic · 2 years

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With the Morning Light (10)

Featuring a small break from Lloyd and Colette’s Exsphere journey. It also just happens to be Lloyd's birthday.

Fandom: Tales of Symphonia Characters/Pairing: Lloyd Irving/Colette Brunel Rating: G Word Count: 1455 Mirror Link: AO3 Notes: Happy 19th anniversary to Symphonia! Updated this short story collection as a small way of celebrating.

Lloyd’s birthday was just at the end of summer.

He would always notice it like this; when the air felt so thick, making his jacket stick to his back, making him see shimmers in the distance that he could never quite catch up to.

When the sun would climb high and bright, hanging above for as long as it could before it would finally descend. It would paint a brilliant green to the trees, a shine across rivers that he and Colette would rush to, dipping in to cool their aching feet.

When summer showers passed by, relieving at first, to drench a sweltered head. But only for the heat to grow soon after, soaking his shirt with both sweat and rain.

Summer in Sylvarant was always at its strongest near the end - but then he would notice the few leaves, here and there, that started to wilt and fall.

There was the soft crunch of grass, moving in time with the birdsong from up in the trees. “Lloyd, here.”

He felt a small nudge at his shoulder, a gentle palm that didn’t flinch at the sweat that already misted over his skin. Seated on the wooden bench, he turned to see Colette holding out a cup to him. It was too hot for her to wear her overcoat, with even the sleeves of her dress rolled up to escape the humidity that thrived all around. It must have joined somewhere with his jacket, both clothing lying somewhere to be forgotten, for now, not with the sun beating down so relentlessly.

He was greedy when he reached for the cup - cold on the surface, the ice cubes clinking inside. He’d never been more excited for water than now. “Thanks! This heat wave has been insane lately. Guess Efreet's not really letting up this year."

“Yeah. I don’t think I can even fly when it’s this hot! I bet my wings would melt right off.” Colette seated herself next to Lloyd holding her own water cup, swinging her legs from the moss-covered bench. Her knee brushed against a loose suspender of his, both straps looped off his shoulders to now hang at his waist.

Lloyd chuckled into his cup, fingers holding onto that chill tightly. “Melt? How would that even work? …But I guess I haven’t used mine yet either.”

To their right, Noishe was panting in his stable, lapping at his water bowl as his ears flicked from the thin rays of sunlight sneaking through the wood slats above. Dirk’s home itself looked nearly the same as they had left it a few months ago, with just a few more clinging vines that now snaked up to Lloyd’s balcony, and the dozens of flower pots that stood outside in a row, in full bloom as they soaked up all the constant sunshine from a cloudless sky.

“You two are always welcome to take a break from yer hardships,” Dirk had said, welcoming Lloyd and Colette with bear hugs. And that was what it was; a break from their Exsphere journey, with only their small pack of collected stones stored off in a closet for the time being.

“But just a small one!” Lloyd had answered, ribs still sore from the hug. “It’s too hard to sleep when we camp… and staying at an inn all summer would be really expensive.”

It had also been a few weeks since their fumble with the Exsphere trader. His tracks were gone, their latest info already growing cold, much unlike the season.

Summer, this year, was brutal.

“I’m sorry we didn’t get to do anything special,” spoke Colette. Her voice blended with the rustling trees. Birds flitted from one branch to the next, some leaving to dodge into the bushes by the riverside.

“Get to do what?” Lloyd asked before he took a gulp. Brisk, soothing. Water always tasted so sweet in the summertime - somehow.

“For your birthday?” Colette blinked, then a smile formed on her lips. “Or did you forget that it’s today?”

Lloyd’s mind worked like a careful step through the brush, unsure where it would land, and still missing his trek forward completely.

“...I think I actually did forget.”

“Hehe, Lloyd…”

“It’s hard to remember sometimes! Especially in the summer… Makes me think so much slower too.” Still, had it really been a whole year? Of traveling the same roads from their first journey? Of going out into a world that was no longer dying, but still struggling to live?

Already his eyelids felt heavy, the sunlight making him want to nap right there on the grass, like he used to do when he was little. Another sip of cold water shot wakefulness into his limbs.

“It’s fine anyway,” he said, tapping his fingers on the cup - porcelain. A gift from Phaidra to Dirk a year or so ago, to stand out among their wooden-made ones in the cupboards. “Besides, I kinda just get sad on my birthday.”

Colette paused in mid-sip, her eyes peering out from the rim of her oaken cup. She shifted on the porch, the wood creaking, his suspender now laid across her knee. “Why?”

“Well, because that meant that summer vacation was ending soon! Then I’d have to go back to school…” Lloyd sighed. “I didn’t need a school day to go down to Iselia. I can just go whenever I wanted. And I did!”

How often had he rushed down to the village with Noishe, even in the thick heat. To play games with Genis, or to help braid Colette’s hair with the special flowers that only bloomed in summer. And when the night would stretch on, still so warm, with crickets chirping right by his ear as he laid out on the fields with Colette - on such nights, the skies were always the clearest, always having the most stars.

Colette brushed her hair behind her ear. Her face was slightly red from the heat, a flush that Lloyd had the sudden urge to touch. “I think I get it. I also didn’t have as many Church lessons in the summer. Just a little bit.”

Colette would disappear less throughout the day, no longer as shut away in a stone temple that he wasn’t allowed to follow into. They would have more time to run across the fields, to pick the fruits from the trees that they would share, to knot flowers into each other's hair.

“Yeah,” he said. “That was another reason, too.”

His birthdays only reminded him of an end to things. It was hard to be excited for something like that.

“But you know, Lloyd, we don’t really go to school anymore,” Colette said.

“Don’t let the Professor know that. I still didn’t finish the last homework she gave me.” Those papers languished in his pack, perhaps stuck together from the heat. He didn’t want to imagine Raine’s face if she found out.

Colette giggled, airy, light - just all-around soothing to hear. “Still, that’s changed. Maybe you can have something fun to look forward to on your birthday from now on.”

He downed the last of his water, already missing it. But the chill made his head think more clearly. “Hm, like what? I guess knowing this heatwave will leave soon is nice…”

Although he liked the bright greens of the trees, the sunlight languishing in the sky before letting night take over, and even the beetles that hovered in the branches above, their iridescent shine winking as they flew.

It was just sad, he thought, seeing things about to end, knowing that they would.

And then, sudden softness on his cheek. One that didn’t mind the sweat on his face, or how hot his skin must have felt.

Colette got to her feet just then, her face even redder than before. She faced him with a smile as she reached to take his cup. “I’ll, um, get us some more water!”

She left for the house so quickly, footsteps light against the grass, barely making any sound. Lloyd would have thought she was flying just then, even without her wings. Noishe raised his head to watch her walk by, then went back to his bowl to slake his thirst.

Lloyd placed a hand against the cheek she had just kissed.

“Something fun to look forward to…” He grinned, even as sweat made his shirt hug tight to his sides. A few more leaves, their green luster faded, drifted from the branches to land at his feet.

Lloyd’s birthday was always just at the end of summer. But for the first time, it felt like the beginning of something new.

#tales of symphonia #lloyd irving #colette brunel #colloyd #fanfiction

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