RESONANCE
ACT II, SCENE IV
ACT II, SCENE IV
On the road to Natalan, east of Dragonhead in Coerthas
Perhaps another bard, eager to be rewarded with laudation or the rapt attention of a virgin audience, might have spoken of storms, or swirling snows, and breezes gelid enough to strip the warmth from flesh and bone in moments. Such embellishments were expected of bards, after all, and what audience refused the promise of dramatic tension in the very weather itself? The claims would not even have been questioned, after all, for the bleakness of the Coerthas highlands was a legendary thing even among the inhabitants, and punishing winds were simply expected.
However, it would have been a lie, believable or not, this time. Instead, the skies east of Dragonhead were murky, but the clouds simply hung in the sky as if painted there, for there was no wind, no breeze, no snowfall; the air was crisp and exactly as cold as one would expect, but still and hanging. An absent wind meant that no smells were carried forth from the pair that lurked behind the rockface that rose and blocked any view of them from the creaky wood and bone gate that led into the destination their days of travel had finally revealed: Natalan.
The settlement was a testament to both the persistence and the audacity of its founders, the Ixal. Balloons of stitched furs and rough fabrics hung low in the air, lifting platforms, cargo, and gondolas, enough to transport most of the inhabiting beaked beastmen and carry them far away, or perhaps even to nearby Dragonhead, if the Ixal dared. If that had been their intent, in building the settlement, then it was likely that they had not accounted for the experience of the Coerthans against aerial targets; a people hardened enough to fight off waves of Dravanians were sufficient deterrent to keep the beastmen raiders quiescent.
This meant little, though, to the lurking pair. They had layered blankets on their chocobos, and tied the birds to a tree; the mounts, luckily, heeded their training and remained silent and still, and huddled together to share warmth. The two themselves - the tall and beared hyuran bard, and the lissome duskwight mage - were dressed warmly but not thickly, in brown fur jacket and well-lined black robes, respectively. They were as a blot on the white ground, but they had not come intending stealth.
The head, hat and bearded all, peered around the rock again, taking in the view. One of the scraggled wolves of the region, likely tamed and guarding, was sniffing the air within a dozen yalms of the ragged gate, and a pair of spear-wielding Ixal themselves stood guard, one at each of the gateposts, nearly motionless in the cold.
The bard drew himself back, and he felt a sensation creep through him, as if he had been coated in slime, or had a massive, unscratchable itch that seeped through him in intervals. The sensation wasn't new to the moment. He'd begun to feel it as they had left Mor Dhona and entered Coerthas, as if fortnight's worth of anticipation and drive had not truly felt real until the confrontation he sought had become truly inevitable. He bit his lip. He could have turned back at any preceding moment, remembering dozens of his own speeches about nonviolence and happiness, or taking into consideration the life of the comrade who had insisted upon following him when he had let slip his intentions, in a moment of strained peace. But something else... itched, physically, but more in his thoughts, his sense of well-being. Images of ash, screams, squawking birdmen, and shattering crystals, these had visited his dreams nightly, lingered after wakefulness. Perhaps his companion had noticed, and perhaps the mage had not, for the talks along the way had been pleasant enough, even a sort of vacation, were the destination not such a thing of dogged compulsion. But to see Natalan now, a village of Ixal, of the race that had all but eliminated his kin from the world... it made the itch into almost a crawling of the skin. The man he was, was still there, but just as a tickling at the throat can only be ignored so long before one coughs, so was that man's presence subsided, and the giant of a Hyur who took up the massive bow could hardly said to have been Nathan Telluride in much more than appearance and verbal habits. The bard, truly, was still lingering under an awning in Mor Dhona, and the hyur in fur was a bowhunter, one who lived only by the credo that to miss was to die, and with but one way to clear the sensation that made even his eyes seem to itch.
But he was still a man, after all, and felt another twinge. No one but him -had- to do this.
He sidled closer to the mage, set a hand upon her shoulder and whispered into her ear. "Are you ready for this, my dear? There's still time to change your mind."
Violet eyes focused on him. "Of course I'm ready, and you're not going to change my mind. I set out to do this, and by the Lover, I'm going to see it through."
He nodded, eased away a few ilms, and pulled his hat down tightly. It was as if she were echoing the arguments he'd had within himself, and the creeping feeling in his stomach lurched at them. Touching his hat seemed to help, but somehow, it always had. "Then may we return victorious, or, by the Twelve, be a cautionary tale for every tavern bard in Eorzea."
She offered him a soft smile at the low words, and it sent a fresh surge through his stomach. "I'd prefer not to have my death be the focus of someone's ballad, if that is all well and good. Shall we?" She reached out with a graceful hand, and touched his nose, which barely registered the contact in the cold. No, he thought, but it's for a ballad that we're here in the first place; what else can we be, in the end, but a memory fit for a song, or to play the song that makes us a memory?
The thought did not escape his lips, and he simply squeezed her shoulder. "I'll not turn back now." He gave a quick test pull upon Heartstring, his longbow. It felt... right, as if he were simply following an order. Was this how a trained animal felt...but that thought, too, dissipated. A quick hand went to the lute case still strapped to his belt. "I'm feeling a bit of an itch."
The mage unlatched her crescent-headed staff from its resting place on her back, and from her robe pocket, she retrieved a black stone, its shape the same crescent as her staffhead; she tossed the stone up, and caught it deftly as it fell again. He'd seen the stone before, and though he knew, at the level of logic, what it meant, and was for, the reality of it was as jarring as its contrast to the expanse of snow around them. "If you want to go back," she said, "Now is your chance. I'll grant your wish, but I don't think it's going to be pretty."
He stood to his full height, bow in hand, and assessed her with a quick glance. Like dusk, she really was, body and garments alike. "I have a song to sing here, and it has only one real note. If you're joining the chorus, the curtain rises now."
He took a half-score of paces, deliberate, unhesitating, until he stood upon the path to the gate, and nocked an arrow from the quiver at his hip; a single word escaped his lips as his bicep bunched to draw back the stout bow: "Encore." His fingers released the string, and the guard wolf sprouted a shaft from its forehead; the arrow pierced the hard skull between its eyes, dropping the flailing beast and drawing a shuddering whine. Even as it fell, its fur was set alight, and he felt the heat from the path of the swirling streak of energy. She had not even paused before moving to his side, and the convergence of arrow and fire left a burning declaration, in the wolf's charring remains, to the Ixal at the gate.
The guards squawked, and it as if his very soul was being scratched; he felt it as a grating in his teeth. But the hunter, not the bard, was not the one to respond, and even as the first of the birdmen lifted his spear to throw, it had an arrow piercing its throat, the thwip of Heartstring's retort barely audible.
More audible was the whooping cry of the mage, sounding as if she had been joyously released from a horrid captivity. Her staff swung into place, and icy mist formed around both the guards before materializing into a crystalline shaft that impaled them both through their abdomens; black blood stained the snow, and they gurgled and died.
The hunter spit into the snow; the dark stains that the mage's effort brought forth were as a gate crashing down in his mind. "I've not even begun to whet my appetite..." The voice was his, but perhaps not what anyone might have expected from him. Still, as if summoned and dared by them, a snarling, four-legged streak of fur and claw vaulted over the fence, bounding towards the pair. The mage simply whipped the moonstaff to point at the charging wolf, and from the sky descended a bright blue flash, which impacted the canine, leaving little more of it than dust as the energy was spent; sparks briefly orbited the mage as if they were avatars of her satisfaction.
Silence reigned for a pair of moments as the echo faded, and they sprinted for the gate, stepping through, and quickly ascended a raised wood platform behind the fenceline, giving them a view of the path ahead. "You truly are a slayer," he said, not even looking at her.
"You've seen nothing yet." Her voice was hard, but brash.
He nodded; the words simply blended into the rush. The moment had come, and they had made their declaration; already, a faint cry could be heard from the interior of the camp. He set his teeth, and looked ahead; the next gate, barred but unguarded, lay but a few score yalms away. "We make for that gate, and we bottle them at it. Numbers will hinder, not help them, and fear will work for us. You can demonstrate there." The words were as sharp as broken crystal, spoken through his set jaw.
He bounded from the platform, not stopping to see whether the game followed. He didn't question it; it almost did not matter, for his thoughts but formed words: The last son brings his regards to your doorstep, beasts, and so the door has been knocked. Answer or hide within; it matters neither way.
His dash ended behind a low rock overlooking the gate, and there was no question as to what the Ixal's response was - a half-score of them, accompanied by a pair of leashed wolves, scuttled into view as if vomited forth from the settlement's center. They stopped at the gate; the wolf tamers struggled with the leashes upon their beasts, and the others took position just on the other side; six of them carried bows, and they wasted no time in nocking and loosing arrows. The hyur hunkered behind the rock, muttering a low curse, but crunching footsteps followed him close, and he heard the whip of a spinning staff; ice formed in the air above them, and the arcing arrows bounced from it.
He grunted, and half-stood, nocking and loosing an arrow of his own; one of the archers fell, screaming, its eyeball no more than a bullseye. If the mage had any comments on his accuracy, she wasted no time on them. Her feet dug into the snow, and an arc of blue flame formed above the gate, its two points falling upon two more of the archers, devouring them more like a glowing acid than simple flame. The victims' comrades shrieked and flinched, beaks clapping; the mage tossed her head back, and from her throat arose a laugh, shrill and sinister, which made whimpers of the Ixal's cries.
He glanced up at her, breathing through gritted teeth for a moment before offering words; her laugh had almost felt like a scratch to his itch. "You sound as happy to be here as I am. If we didn't have business left, I'd show you how damnably hard you just made me." He nocked another arrow, and loosed it immediately, adding a fresh scream to the cacophony at the gate.
She looked not at him, but focused at the gate; another flash of blue came into being at the Ixals' right flank, and three more of them, and one of the wolves, burst into flaming gobbets. Flares of the same hue danced around her person, like spinning ribbons, and the air around her became hot, making slush of the snow at her feet. "Still worried about me being here?" She said, her tone still as shrill as her battle cry.
A snarl from the beastmen's other flank became audible. "Not now." He simply replied, and stood quickly to full height. The bowstring was pulled back and taut, and then let loose another shaft. The bounding wolf, finally untangled from its leash, had leaped the gate, snarling in fear and pack-minded rage, but the arrow went down its throat, emerging from the back of its head, and the beast could only spew blood and saliva as it fell into a spasming heap into the snow.
It was, apparently, enough. The remaining few of the birdmen fled back towards the center of camp.
The hyur waited a few moments, letting the lingering cries tickle his ears, before nodding towards the gate, which itself was alight and burning with touches of the mage's flame. With the ease and perhaps the fortune of a fool, he bounded towards it, bow in hand. The short run ended with his boot kicking the center of the gate, carrying all his momentum, and the damaged fence fell; he waited not at all, passed through, and sprinted towards the mountainside to the right, hugging it closely as he slowed.
The mage caught up with him briefly after. She crossed her arms at the hunter as he gazed towards the settlement, and the air seemed to warp around her for a moment, and pop back into place, as if it were a bubble bursting in a pond. "We go further in, I'm assuming?" She said.
"All the way to the heart, and if there are none of them alive when we are done, so much the better, and we can set the whole place to the bloody torch." He tugged at the bowstring, the itch and agitation translating into action. His eyes focused, and he caught a violet glint in the near distance, and pointed to it. "There. I'm after their treasure."
She shaded her eyes. On the other side of the small settlement, dimly visible in the smoke and haze of her handiwork, stood the aetheryte. It arose a dozen yalms above the cliff near which it loomed, throwing off glints from both campfire and crackling fences. It was the rival of any in the civilized towns for size, and was covered by hastily-painted glyphs and surrounded by tattered banners. If it was a conduit, like the others, then anything could come from it, just as in the cities of the Twelve's races - perhaps even a primal.
"We've had success so far, but I worry about the two of us taking on the heart of this camp alone. My ice can protect you, but I'm not sure how well, if there are many. Do you even have a means of destroying it?" Her tone had lost its shriller notes, and was a more melodic voice of concern.
He was still focused on the aetheryte, its violet reflections permeating, empowering, his resolve. Musical tones danced in his consciousness. His eyes narrowed, and he wiped frost from his brow. "You're going to see. Worry can burn with them, for I've none of it left. Let them fear, not I."
"As you wish, then. I'm with you all the way." She lifted her staff.
"Then burn with me." He gripped the bow, and trod along the rockface, keeping parallel to the path, but not on it.
The path towards the settlement's center remained unguarded, as if the Ixal had been routed, and their progress was rapid, but the reason became clear as they approached the depression in the ground which marked the center.
They came to the turn in the path, and pressed against the rock; peering around. Smoke rose from cookfires in the stone bowl, in which the snow had largely been cleared. A line of armed Ixal had formed on the north side of the depression, blocking the path into the heart of the settlement - the nests, the huts, the living space.
The aetheryte clearing, and nothing else, lay to the southern path. Why, of course, would raiders care about it, if they had come to destroy the settlement? It made tactical sense, given what little the beastmen must have gleaned from the assault, to protect their homes, their young. Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on point of view, it bore little bearing upon the mission of the pair looking into the bowl. Only a trio of growling wolves were in the depression itself, sniffing the air. Of course - it was a perfect killzone, should someone have tried to storm it.
The hyur's grin was a thing wide and toothy; he turned and nodded at his companion, moving his hand forward in a signal to run... and run he did, stopping at the southern edge of the clearing to loose a quick arrow at a patrolling wolf, catching its heart through its ribs, and setting the fur of the other two bristling. The line of Ixal warriors on the northern side shoulder a squawking challenge, and several archers stepped through the line, and knelt.
The hyur nocked another arrow, lining up the second of the wolves, which had charged; it quickly slid to a halt in the dirty slush as another arrow caught it in the shoulder.
The mage sprinted behind, but stopped, and made a gesture; solid and slippery ice formed under the feet of the third wolf, changing what would have been a powerful leap into a skidding fumble, and the hunter was able to spend another arrow to pin it to the very ice below it.
"Go!" She shouted, and as if the word were the command to fire, a half dozen bows loosed arcing arrows from the Ixal's line. The mage lifted her arms, and shouted a command; a wall of opaque ice sprung forth from the ground, intercepting the arrows and shielding both herself and the scrambling hyur from view.
"I did underestimate you... glad to have been corrected in this particular way!" His words faded as he scrambled from her towards the unguarded aetheryte. She smiled, though it was visible to no one, and spoke mostly to herself, voice lowered. "I told you, Nathan. Friends stick together, always. My magic will keep you safe."
Indeed, the words did not carry, and he would not have heeded them anyway. The violet crystal loomed large in the southern clearing, bedecked in banners and runes and lined by wooden totems, and he froze in place. His eyelids became heavy, and the crawling itch that lurked at the edge of his senses enveloped him like a mist. He remembered faces, names, songs, smiles, the touch of hands now ash, the smells of silks and perfumes and the fussing of sisters who no longer existed outside of memories; it was as if they had reached out to hold him to the spot, motionless. "There..." The word leaked out of him, like drool. "There... I will have peace, and those beasts will have none." His arm responded, finally, and reached ahead of him, towards the crystal.
A familiar crunching of snow under feet entered his awareness; she was next to him, facing the wall she had summoned into being. "Whatever you mean to do, do it. They'll charge soon enough, when no attacks come at them."
He lifted his bow. Knuckles cracked, and from him issued a substantial growl. He nocked an arrow, muttered a curse, and loosed a shot into one of the totems. It penetrated deep, still shivering from its flight and sudden stop.
"Maybe I'll leave one alive. To bloody well remember." His voice was a droning thing; the itch in his consciousness was becoming more like a buzz.
"If you wish," the feminine voice replied, matching his in being deadpan. "But here is what you sought, so do what you came to do."
His body seemed to unlock, and he slung the bow over his shoulder, taking swift steps towards the crystal, until he came to its rocky base. He reached for the case at his belt, and began to unlatch it. He resumed gazing... staring at the aetheryte, as if by look alone he could crack it asunder. He felt his shoulders bunch, and he dropped to one knee. His face felt more like stone than flesh, cold and seared.
The mage stepped backwards, eyes still on the entry to the clearing, until she was next to him. She put a gentle hand on his shoulder, squeezing it and eyeing him.
He sensed her touch, but did not actually feel it. The itch in his senses became like a thousand tiny pricks, and he leaped to his feet, yelling at the crystalline formation. "Hear me, Garuda, and your damnable, filthy spawn. You come to my home, kill my family, and believe you will thrive, and prosper?" He shook his fist. "No. I bring a message. I am the First Godsdamned String, and the last, and with me, I bring a song - the song that will see you screaming in despair!"
The mage simply blinked at him, closed-mouthed, eyes wide. She reached into her robe pocket, with a delicate slowness.
Whatever fury that had come from him, whatever drove the prickling in his consciousness, it subsided, and he was left standing, cold and stiff like the surrounding icepacks. The lute case opened at an additional touch, and from it he drew the instrument, gilt in green and gold. He spoke, and the words felt like a cold fog leaving his mouth. "If anything moves, send it squealing into the Abyss."
"Leave it to me. I'll make sure you are not disturbed."
He didn't respond, but simply trudged the few more steps to the rock formation underlying the crystal. He was unhurried, now, and the itch had given way to a lightness, a warm and mild euphoria. He sat upon the rock, looked up at the violet aetheryte, and set fingers to the lute strings.
"This is how a bard says goodbye, you damned abomination."
(TO BE CONTINUED)
"But in the laugh there was another voice. A clearer laugh, an ironic laugh. A laugh which laughs because it chooses not to weep."