Then.
Ala Mhigo. All Delial Grimsong ever needed to do whenever she felt her will threaten to sway and falter was think of Ala Mhigo. She was born in the city on a bright summer's day and had scarcely left its walls until the day of a most grievous mistake. Around Ul'dah she saw those who claimed themselves the sons and daughters of the city, but what had they to show for it? Little else but dust and hunger and the contempt of fat southerners. She watched them from time to time but never for very long. She could not bring herself to pity them. We are what we fight for, and they fight for naught but themselves.
Delial growled and turned and gave up any pretense she might have had for comfort in the small cot she claimed for herself. The warmth of day had faded into a comfortable chilly night but there were thoughts swarming in her head, hot and bright like so many fireflies trapped just behind her eyes. If she lay still enough she swore she could feel them thudding against her skull, though it could have just been the beginning of another headache. It was pain by any name and she had long since grown tired of it. Sleep - good, honest, soothing sleep uninterrupted by the scritch and scratch of imagined daggers at her door - was a luxury she saw less and less of in those suns.
So she pinched her eyes at the ceiling she could not see, and suffered thoughts that gave her no peace. If we are what we fight for, then what is Wolfsong?
She told herself it did not matter. He was an accomplice to an atrocity that would not come to pass thanks in no small part to her personal intervention. That other elements beyond her ken had also played parts did not matter much in her eye for it was not they that ended up with Aylard Greyarm captured and executed. It was his plan that threatened the lives of so many Ala Mhigans, and it was his word and his reputation that so many others followed. His death was a victory for Ala Mhigo as much as it was a victory for Delial Grimsong, and she would not have anyone take that away from her.
Less than five suns was what Banurein, the white haired Garlean, told her: less than five suns and Wolfsong would be ready and delivered to her that she might pass him back into his sister’s waiting arms. Delial had not set foot in Banuein’s laboratory since her part had been played, when the true weight of Banurein’s ambition was laid bare for her to see. The chains that held him upon the cold metal table looked as though they were meant more for a beast five times the size of the man they shackled instead, and she remembered they way they clanked and snapped against steel and flesh alike every time she cut into him.
“What is a man with a broken soul, Miss Delial?" The question was asked so casually that it had caught Delial off her guard. It must have been then, she supposed, that she finally saw that the even, almost gentle timbre she took masked something far more grave than she had realized.
"This one," said Banurein, "Will be a beast." In the back of her mind, restless as ever, she could still hear the way he screamed.
She turned.
----
Now.
It was well known that Gharen Wolfsong did not take too kindly to the cities. She knew his habits well enough that she knew he prefered nature to the walls and rooftops of civilized society; that he drifted, likely, night by night so that only those who were invited might find him and his fire and be welcomed.
It was also known that he was, in his way, an honorable man. To slight another was not his nature, nor was it to break his word. That Delial nor the others would hear no word from him was not especially surprising: he was a man of the wilds, after all, and the mail could not be expected to find a man who held no address. That he would repeatedly fail to keep his appointments, however, was something else entirely.
When she bid farewell to Limsa Lominsa she damned herself a fool for it and not a sun passed where she did not do so again. The journey across the seas to Thanalan was one she had taken many a time before but from there to the Shroud - through the Shroud, rather, was one that filled her with unease. But there were plenty of caravans eager to trade a spot in their wagons for a bag of coin, and she supposed she might have looked as the adventurers did, eager as they were to seek out new and fascinating ways to get themselves killed.
“You’d think they were rats,†said a man whose name she did not bother to register, “With how many of ‘em come passing through. Like fleeing a sinking ship, I tell you. What’s south? The Jewel, was it? Hah. Never did care for it myself.â€
Delial said nothing, just as she had said nothing the entire time she suffered his presence. It was a futile gesture of course: the man insisted on leaning one way and the other, rocking between two one-sided conversations (the other being, Delial suspected, with a man who was either dead or dead asleep). It was a mistake, she decided, to bring the staff. Normal, common, unimportant people likely didn’t carry staves about but she would be damned to leave it behind after all the trouble it took finding it.
“Not like the north’s any better. Ishgard? Dragons? Bugger them all, I say. Am I right, or am I right?â€
Again she declined to speak, occupying herself with fixing her eye upon the passing trees instead. They were near enough the border that their leaves carried upon them the lightest sheen of frost, slips of crystal white that made them glisten like knife blades. Upon leaving Buscarron’s, she thought to distract herself by counting the trunks as they passed. After the sixth time losing count, she gave up the idea entirely and settled for glowering at them instead, lest she catch herself glowering at the fellow beside her and somehow encouraging him to continue being unwelcome.
As was the trend, he did not actually need the encouragement. Delial braced herself as he swiveled back towards her as if his torso was set on a swing. “What’s your story then, miss? Eh? Don’t much look like the type for dragon-slaying. Uh, no offense of course!â€
Had she been feeling charitable, she might have spoke of missing persons and ominous names. Roen Deneith purportedly had joined the ranks of dragon hunters in Coerthas and her brother, Wolfsong, had vanished with little else but meetings unfulfilled to betray his absence. It was at her request that Delial delay Wolfsong for the sake of giving her time to do whatever it was she thought she needed to do with Nero Lazarov, just as it was to her that Delial promised to keep an eye on Gharen. Now both were gone, hidden or worse.
Banurein. Ser Crofte brought her a bottle of wine and the name that had been Jameson Taeros’ final word. As far as Delial knew, the Garlean she formerly hunted for had gone silent after "returning" Gharen, chained and broken as he was. In allying herself with Taeros, she had hoped more information - any information - regarding Banurein or her plans would surface but the pirate proved to be more distracting than she had hoped. It seemed everyone was on his tail, Gharen Wolfsong included.
Her fingers tightened around her elbows. Wolfsong himself had seemingly vanished without a trace, leaving only promises of meetings that would go on unfulfilled. Deneith had asked her of all people to keep an eye on her elder brother, a request that, if she were feeling honest with herself, need not have been made at all. It was true that she no longer hunted Wolfsong for Banurein, but it was also true that she still hunted. Was it solely at Roen’s request?
It took her a moment to realize that her unwanted companion was still starin, with one brow merging into the creases of his forehead. It also took her a moment to realize that a most unwelcome feeling clutched at the core of her chest, the hot/cold chill that came when the rigid structure of her thoughts and feelings were flustered into disarray. Absurd, came the thought, a command more than anything: hard and swift, it fell like a blade through her mind to pare away the distraction that troubled her.
She looked at the man, stared at him for whole moments too long without saying a word. In another time (another age, she thought, before she ever knew little Wolfsong still lived), she might have found an easy smirk and sweetened words; humoring the fool might have been amusing if nothing else. If she had been feeling charitable at all, the moment swiftly passed, and took with it all but the hollow ache of exhaustion and dread.
“I have often wondered,†she said in a frigid deadpan, “Just how long it takes for a grown man to burn to ash. There are bells yet to pass, yes? Bells yet until Coerthas, and we shall be cold soon enough. I wonder.â€
It was a lie but it did not matter. (Two bells, almost three, beneath an open sky; two bells and the smell.) The man had the decency to be perturbed. He furrowed his brow, his eyes drifting up to the staff that peeked over her shoulder. Then he muttered and pivoted with a harrumph! back to his other side to busy himself over his possibly sleeping neighbor. Delial stared until she was content that he would bother her no more, but even the new found silence gave her little peace. The wood passed by, trunks blurring together into a featureless brown that would be coated in frosty white. Delial hardly noticed for the thoughts roiling through her mind.
If we are what we fight for, then what am I?
Ala Mhigo. All Delial Grimsong ever needed to do whenever she felt her will threaten to sway and falter was think of Ala Mhigo. She was born in the city on a bright summer's day and had scarcely left its walls until the day of a most grievous mistake. Around Ul'dah she saw those who claimed themselves the sons and daughters of the city, but what had they to show for it? Little else but dust and hunger and the contempt of fat southerners. She watched them from time to time but never for very long. She could not bring herself to pity them. We are what we fight for, and they fight for naught but themselves.
Delial growled and turned and gave up any pretense she might have had for comfort in the small cot she claimed for herself. The warmth of day had faded into a comfortable chilly night but there were thoughts swarming in her head, hot and bright like so many fireflies trapped just behind her eyes. If she lay still enough she swore she could feel them thudding against her skull, though it could have just been the beginning of another headache. It was pain by any name and she had long since grown tired of it. Sleep - good, honest, soothing sleep uninterrupted by the scritch and scratch of imagined daggers at her door - was a luxury she saw less and less of in those suns.
So she pinched her eyes at the ceiling she could not see, and suffered thoughts that gave her no peace. If we are what we fight for, then what is Wolfsong?
She told herself it did not matter. He was an accomplice to an atrocity that would not come to pass thanks in no small part to her personal intervention. That other elements beyond her ken had also played parts did not matter much in her eye for it was not they that ended up with Aylard Greyarm captured and executed. It was his plan that threatened the lives of so many Ala Mhigans, and it was his word and his reputation that so many others followed. His death was a victory for Ala Mhigo as much as it was a victory for Delial Grimsong, and she would not have anyone take that away from her.
Less than five suns was what Banurein, the white haired Garlean, told her: less than five suns and Wolfsong would be ready and delivered to her that she might pass him back into his sister’s waiting arms. Delial had not set foot in Banuein’s laboratory since her part had been played, when the true weight of Banurein’s ambition was laid bare for her to see. The chains that held him upon the cold metal table looked as though they were meant more for a beast five times the size of the man they shackled instead, and she remembered they way they clanked and snapped against steel and flesh alike every time she cut into him.
“What is a man with a broken soul, Miss Delial?" The question was asked so casually that it had caught Delial off her guard. It must have been then, she supposed, that she finally saw that the even, almost gentle timbre she took masked something far more grave than she had realized.
"This one," said Banurein, "Will be a beast." In the back of her mind, restless as ever, she could still hear the way he screamed.
She turned.
----
Now.
It was well known that Gharen Wolfsong did not take too kindly to the cities. She knew his habits well enough that she knew he prefered nature to the walls and rooftops of civilized society; that he drifted, likely, night by night so that only those who were invited might find him and his fire and be welcomed.
It was also known that he was, in his way, an honorable man. To slight another was not his nature, nor was it to break his word. That Delial nor the others would hear no word from him was not especially surprising: he was a man of the wilds, after all, and the mail could not be expected to find a man who held no address. That he would repeatedly fail to keep his appointments, however, was something else entirely.
When she bid farewell to Limsa Lominsa she damned herself a fool for it and not a sun passed where she did not do so again. The journey across the seas to Thanalan was one she had taken many a time before but from there to the Shroud - through the Shroud, rather, was one that filled her with unease. But there were plenty of caravans eager to trade a spot in their wagons for a bag of coin, and she supposed she might have looked as the adventurers did, eager as they were to seek out new and fascinating ways to get themselves killed.
“You’d think they were rats,†said a man whose name she did not bother to register, “With how many of ‘em come passing through. Like fleeing a sinking ship, I tell you. What’s south? The Jewel, was it? Hah. Never did care for it myself.â€
Delial said nothing, just as she had said nothing the entire time she suffered his presence. It was a futile gesture of course: the man insisted on leaning one way and the other, rocking between two one-sided conversations (the other being, Delial suspected, with a man who was either dead or dead asleep). It was a mistake, she decided, to bring the staff. Normal, common, unimportant people likely didn’t carry staves about but she would be damned to leave it behind after all the trouble it took finding it.
“Not like the north’s any better. Ishgard? Dragons? Bugger them all, I say. Am I right, or am I right?â€
Again she declined to speak, occupying herself with fixing her eye upon the passing trees instead. They were near enough the border that their leaves carried upon them the lightest sheen of frost, slips of crystal white that made them glisten like knife blades. Upon leaving Buscarron’s, she thought to distract herself by counting the trunks as they passed. After the sixth time losing count, she gave up the idea entirely and settled for glowering at them instead, lest she catch herself glowering at the fellow beside her and somehow encouraging him to continue being unwelcome.
As was the trend, he did not actually need the encouragement. Delial braced herself as he swiveled back towards her as if his torso was set on a swing. “What’s your story then, miss? Eh? Don’t much look like the type for dragon-slaying. Uh, no offense of course!â€
Had she been feeling charitable, she might have spoke of missing persons and ominous names. Roen Deneith purportedly had joined the ranks of dragon hunters in Coerthas and her brother, Wolfsong, had vanished with little else but meetings unfulfilled to betray his absence. It was at her request that Delial delay Wolfsong for the sake of giving her time to do whatever it was she thought she needed to do with Nero Lazarov, just as it was to her that Delial promised to keep an eye on Gharen. Now both were gone, hidden or worse.
Banurein. Ser Crofte brought her a bottle of wine and the name that had been Jameson Taeros’ final word. As far as Delial knew, the Garlean she formerly hunted for had gone silent after "returning" Gharen, chained and broken as he was. In allying herself with Taeros, she had hoped more information - any information - regarding Banurein or her plans would surface but the pirate proved to be more distracting than she had hoped. It seemed everyone was on his tail, Gharen Wolfsong included.
Her fingers tightened around her elbows. Wolfsong himself had seemingly vanished without a trace, leaving only promises of meetings that would go on unfulfilled. Deneith had asked her of all people to keep an eye on her elder brother, a request that, if she were feeling honest with herself, need not have been made at all. It was true that she no longer hunted Wolfsong for Banurein, but it was also true that she still hunted. Was it solely at Roen’s request?
It took her a moment to realize that her unwanted companion was still starin, with one brow merging into the creases of his forehead. It also took her a moment to realize that a most unwelcome feeling clutched at the core of her chest, the hot/cold chill that came when the rigid structure of her thoughts and feelings were flustered into disarray. Absurd, came the thought, a command more than anything: hard and swift, it fell like a blade through her mind to pare away the distraction that troubled her.
She looked at the man, stared at him for whole moments too long without saying a word. In another time (another age, she thought, before she ever knew little Wolfsong still lived), she might have found an easy smirk and sweetened words; humoring the fool might have been amusing if nothing else. If she had been feeling charitable at all, the moment swiftly passed, and took with it all but the hollow ache of exhaustion and dread.
“I have often wondered,†she said in a frigid deadpan, “Just how long it takes for a grown man to burn to ash. There are bells yet to pass, yes? Bells yet until Coerthas, and we shall be cold soon enough. I wonder.â€
It was a lie but it did not matter. (Two bells, almost three, beneath an open sky; two bells and the smell.) The man had the decency to be perturbed. He furrowed his brow, his eyes drifting up to the staff that peeked over her shoulder. Then he muttered and pivoted with a harrumph! back to his other side to busy himself over his possibly sleeping neighbor. Delial stared until she was content that he would bother her no more, but even the new found silence gave her little peace. The wood passed by, trunks blurring together into a featureless brown that would be coated in frosty white. Delial hardly noticed for the thoughts roiling through her mind.
If we are what we fight for, then what am I?
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