[sub]This post follows the events from this post.[/sub]
Bitter Ashes
Roen threw the drawers open, snatching up her tunic and breeches, and threw them haphazardly onto the large bag that awaited on the bed. Her eyes darted around the room, wide with panic. She ducked under the bed, pulling out a pair of leather boots; if there was walking to be done, she would need them. She stood, and her eyes caught sight of the white and blue embroidered fabric that still laid on the bed: her Sultansworn tabard. Roen found her breath caught, her body unable to move. What was she doing? Was she really worried about walking through the desert? Did it really matter what she put into that bag?
In a flash of anger she threw the boots in her hand across the room, knocking plates from the table. The dish crashed to the wooden floor, the glass shattering. Roen cared not. She crumpled, sinking to a seat on the floor, her head buried in her hands.
They had her father. Ana Deneith had found Roen in Western Thalanan, just as she was returning from her Trial of Courage, to relay the shocking news. Roen had bid farewell to them that morning, kissing young Brenna and Brayden on the forehead and embracing Ana and Brenden warmly. Brenden had been treated by the royal physicians of the court suns before, and he was feeling stronger. He felt well enough to return to their home in Southern Thalanan; the medical corps had done their job well.Â
But the Deneith family never completed the journey. They were set upon by Garleans who materialized seemingly out of thin air in the middle of the desert, and were taken away. From Ana’s harried description of the events, Roen surmised that they were teleported away and taken to a Castrum. Ana, a farmer by trade and the wife of a simple merchant, did not know which Castrum it was, only that she had been surrounded by large, dark, frightful machines, and technology she was not familiar with.
What Ana Deneith did understand, however, was what they wanted. Why the family was taken. The Garleans made their demands clear to her when they let her and the children go: releasing them was their sign of good faith and willingness to let her father go eventually. But the only thing that would free Breven Deneith was Roen herself. She would need to trade herself for Brenden Deneith. She would need to return home. To Garlemald.
When Ana told her this, the woman’s brown eyes were fixed on to Roen, unflinching. Her gaze held sadness and despair, but also unbidden accusation. Ana never voiced it, but Roen knew. She had always known. Roen believed as much, even as they took her in for all those years after the Calamity, they never asked where she had come from. But her armor, her uniform, her foreign accent… they knew. But they did not care. Brenden never cared where she had come from, only that she was in need of a home.
And now the man that saved her life, who made her part of his family, were in the hands of the people who had brought death and destruction upon the land Roen now called home. Her adoptive father was being held by her birth father’s people, demanding for his daughter return home.
How naive was she to think that her past had been forgotten? That Dorien van Luraes had forgotten about her? That where she had grown up, the army she illegally joined, the fact that she was from a land that all of Eorzea considered their one true enemy? She was foolish to think it didn't matter.
It did. All of it. And now it had caught up to her. Now the life of Brenden Deneith was at stake, and she was the one who had put him in harm’s way. It was up to her to see him freed, even if it meant her own freedom.
Roen stared at the pile of her belongings, haphazardly thrown onto the bag on the bed. She looked to the blue tunic, the tights, and the dress shoes. Erik had given them to her many moons ago, telling her she needed to step out of her armor every so often.Â
Then there was the longsword, the hilt made of mohagony with an ivory falcon taking flight set upon it. It held a beautiful and fine cobalt blade that had been meticulously hammered and smoothed; the sword given to her by her Master in Arms. And the white and blue royal tabard and armor, laid out next to the sword on the bed, granted to her through the trials of becoming a Sultansworn--trials she had completed a short few bells ago.
She was packing them away, as if to bring them back with her to Garlemald. To bring something to remember them by, all those who mattered to her. But as Roen continued to stare at the contents on the bed, the things that spoke of love and friends here in Eorzea, her breath slowly left her, her chest sinking with the realization.
She would not say goodbye to them. How could she? What would she say? Could she bare the look of shock, anger, and maybe even hatred in their eyes when she told them where she was going and why?
Natalie had said time and again how she would happily run a sword through any Garlean she came across. Each time she said it, Roen felt her blood run cold, but she had never intended on the Sultansworn finding out about her past. It was a thing of history, it mattered not to the friendship they had forged. And yet were the truth to ever come out… Roen doubted that Natalie’s hatred for Garleans would remember who Roen had been for the many moons they have known each other. Natalie had always been about duty, and duty would call upon her to arrest her apprentice who had been lying about who she was.
And even if Natalie and the others could see beyond her place of origin, no Sultansworn would ever have a Garlean apprentice. The ranks of the Sultansworns would not accept Roen's past, even if her friends and mentors did. And the consequence of that would ripple beyond just Roen herself. It would fall upon everyone she knew; it would cast a traitorous shadow upon all who cared about her and called her friend. Roen could not allow that.
Pushing herself from her knees, she finally rose from her seat upon the ground, making her way to the broken plate on the floor. As she gathered the scattered bits of glass, she also took a cloth napkin to grab up the half eaten marmot steak that had fallen.Â
Roen paused at it as she looked to the cold brown meat, recalling the night when she was taught how to cook it by Master Gharen. Her fingers tingled with the memory; she had accidentally burned herself, and remembered how he had held her hand as he wrapped it with a cool cloth and an ice crystal.Â
She could not say goodbye to him either. Not after he had forgiven her for all that happened at the mines. Not after he then gifted her with the sword that he had forged during their talk. That very thought twisted her stomach and robbed her of her breath. The thought of leaving him, and her friends, never to see them again...
It brought an emptiness she had never felt before. Pinching her face, she refused the tears that threatened to rise, instead steeling herself with resolve as to what must be done.
I have to.
All that was left was to meet with the Garlean agent, to negotiate her return to Garlemald for Brenden Deneith’s freedom. She was told that she was being watched, as were her friends and the Sultansworns. She was told that if she dared to inform anyone or to gather help, the contact would cease and Brenden’s life would be forfeit. And she was given only two suns to prepare.
Roen carefully set the remnants of the broken plate and food wrapped in a cloth napkin onto the table. She looked to the contents on the bed again. It would all remain here, all the things that brought her joy and hope in this new land. She would leave her new life behind to return to the old. All that would be left were the bitter ashes of sweet memory.
Roen pulled her cloak tight around her and walked out of the room.
