I've been here for maybe half a bell, and already have been stopped several times for the sigil on my shield. Scholars--historians--mostly, but a few children as well. It would.....probably be best to stay away from Il Mheg and Amh Araeng for now.
I don't know what I'd do if I saw the desert again, to be honest. Return to Eorzea, probably, even though it wouldn't change anything.
Arenvald, he......when I visited, he had a letter for me. For Una, technically, but it couldn't be delivered. The moogle that brought it decided that wandering Thanalan for a Scion would be easier than returning to its sender, and so it found its way to him.
I still want to give its pom a tug--it could've relayed the letter to the Rising Stones--but that it got to me at all is enough for now.
It was a letter from my guardian. He's alive.
I have no idea how to respond to it.
Too much has happened, too much to try and write down. Even if I filled a bookshelf with every thought and memory, it wouldn't be enough. Not everything can be captured in ink, after all, and anything that didn't make it on the page.....
He'd know it in a glance, I think. I was just a kid when he left--a chatterbox and a bit clingy. The only battlefield I'd seen was a haze of smoke, pain, and fear, and even that memory had been worn into tatters by time.
But the thing that would stand before him now......Forged and reforged like Doman steel. Fine-tuned for combat. Quiet. Hells, I'm not even a Miqo'te anymore.
I'm not sure he'd recognize me.
He's closer to being that child in South Thanalan than I am, at least.
And for all that I've tried to learn from the Archons, I.....I can't find the right words for this. Not even rough approximations. I don't think any exist.
I want to go home.
I've no other way to put it. Crude. Childish.
And don't I have several to choose from? Amaurot, quiet and timeless. Wolekdorf, though it's not for me, exactly. A room at the Crystarium, from one adventurer to another. Mor Dhona, though it's the people, not the place. Coerthas, a warm fire always waiting. Or beyond Gyr Abania, the one I can't remember.
No, it's the impossible I want--the campsite in South Thanalan. The home only in my memories.
It's changed. I've changed.
Like the herbs that grow there now, we can't be linked to our tamed origin. You can make roots grow leaves and act like branches, but you can't turn a tree into a sapling.
I can't return on the path I left on.
It's gone--I naively marked it with breadcrumbs and accidentally snapped branches. I took it for granted, assumed I could find my way, but too much time has passed--the crumbs eaten, the underbrush long since overgrown.
But there's a value in trying, even when it's doomed from the start.
I'd argue there's even more value in knowing, but trying with all your strength despite it. Even a small shift in fate--trading one life for another--means everything to the survivor. I can believe in that much, at least.
But I made a promise when I took up the shield again. So I have to chase it--those beautiful, white and gold feathers of pointless redemption.
And I have to believe that the path I forge by trying will take me where I need to be.
---
I've.....settled down a bit. Sorted out my thoughts.....mostly. Sorted enough. Or rather, it's too late.
There's a room in the Crystarium with no windows, and a heavier door. There are scratches throughout--mostly repaired, repainted, and sanded out--but still there, if you know where to look. A room furnished by kind hearts, because they know what it is.
A room for last mercies, absolution, and execution--in that order.
I hadn't seen it, but I knew it existed. Still, it took a lot of convincing to find, even with my reputation. Sylgham didn't want to admit such a cruel necessity--few people would--but I'd delivered alcohol for one of its residents before.
It wasn't in use--not even for storage--and so I've secured it for the night.
It seems fine at first. Once you're alone, though, you start seeing them--the claw marks on every surface. The door bears the worst of it--nicked, dented, and hammered back into shape--the main target of the desperate need to escape. And.....not every scratch was left by a sin eater. Most of them, but not all.
Cursed......is the only word I have for it. But I didn't seek it out to redeem it, or anything noble like that. It just.....seemed fitting, is all.
I already drank it, by the way. Fantasia. A little vial, already gone.
The first sip is still the worst.
The rumors always omit that--they call it addicting, but anyone repeating that lie hasn't tasted that sip.
They also say you'll lose your sense of self, that you can never really go back. That you'll be an approximation of what you used to be. But that's true without it--just not as dramatic.
It's true, though, that you only need a drop. It's a catalyst, not a reactant. In that way, I suppose it really is like becoming a sin eater. But neither that first sip, nor that knowledge, stops me from drinking the whole vial.
You could call it a form of commitment--so there's none left if you change your mind. The bard in me sees it that way, at least. But the reality is that at the end of that first hellish sip is bliss, as is the rest of the potion.
It goes down smoothly--too smoothly--and intentions be damned, you can't help but finish it.
And the flavor? They say it's different for everyone, but that's not true. Every vial tastes different, even if they were bottled from the same batch, and drunk by the same person. None of the ingredients taste like what I downed in the snow that day, nor would they make the taste lingering in my mouth.
Tears and blood are hard to mistake. So is the spiced tea I had in the Falling Snows.
And I don't know how it was for him, but for me.....it tastes like memories.
Whether it picks them based on the body or the soul--your current form, or your whole life.....I'm not sure. I'd rather not think about the self-absorbed implications of the latter.
It might just be a matter of what's on your mind, or the current weight on your heart. And to paraphrase Urianger, two stars aren't enough to predict the future in the first place.
Light and bile. A cider that's never crossed my lips. Whether it was unsundered or Norvrantic, I couldn't say, but it lingers still, and I won't be able to forget it.
I asked my sundered self before--which fantasia tasted like home? I still don't have an answer. Both and neither.
Hmm....I'm starting to feel it now--the faint tingle of my aether being destabilized. Like traveling between aetherites, but without the vertigo. Or.....I suppose a better comparison would be the Return spell.
Regardless.....it's time.