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Chapter Text

Yuna tried to breathe through the Macalanian cold. The inside of her nose stung, and the grip that the Guado steward, Tromell, had on her arm was too tight to be reassuring, and too warm to be terrifying. Hastened by the Guados magicked quickness, the wind was almost too much to bear for her eyes. It was all she could do to keep her balance as they skimmed over ice.

Tromells voice whisked into the air, but the strength of it was stolen by the frozen breath of the tundra. “Lady Yuna, you fought like a true summoner. You will make a fine wife and partner for Maester Seymour.”

Yuna's teeth clenched from the cold and she kept them together to barr anything but a suitable response. She would have liked to wholeheartedly thank the Guado, but the sincerity and enthusiasm he voiced created a sickening conflict in her gut. It chilled what little was left of her warmth. Her numbed brain managed to avoid impoliteness and lies by stalling. “T-T-Truly, Tromell?”

“Oh yes, Lady Summoner. Shall I take you to the banquet dinner directly upon arrival to the Temple?”

Yuna wanted to ask why there was a banquet, and she also wanted to know what happened with Rikku and the other Al Bhed, but she was already accepting his offer. “Th-that would be lovely… thank you.”

The crest of the Lake rose in the distance, the door a small pocket pressed into a cliff face. Yuna pressed her lips together as they crossed the threshold but still her jaw chattered.

The release from the wind into the dome of ice created a sense of vertigo for Yuna. She marveled at the beauty, the vastness, the perfect sparkling sheen as they raced along the precipice bridge. Despite her anxiousness, the joy of movement in such a place beat in her stomach. The depth of the blue below was a mirror like miasma she couldn't properly see, else she'd likely pull Tromell off down with her. The Temple was a carved icicle hanging from the surface of a clear lake, embellished with ice pathways like veins. 

Tromell slid to a stop. Yuna tried to take a deep breath but the façade of the temple close up took it away again. Wide-eyed Yuna stared at the gate to the Aeon of Ice, a wide filigree maw open just enough for a person crossing its threshold to be swallowed by its decoration.  With his long, large, hands the guado made an archaic movement to a priest. Tromell bowed deeply and gestured for her to ascend the stairs. 

Yuna squared her shoulders. ‘I already made my decision,’ she told herself sternly. The knowledge that she had to do something, anything roiled in her gut. She graciously nodded to the monk with the cold eyes and warm smile. 

He benevolently loomed over her, bowing on the top step and gestured for her to venture deeper.

Her multicolored eyes looked at the multifaceted ceiling with reverent wonder and a wish that she could see her guardians' reactions. Rikku especially. Not knowing what happened after the battle on the ice bothered her, enough to lower her gaze to the antechamber where she met the gaze of her father, his face in stone. It looked all too natural for someone with his features. To her it was uncanny. Stone edifices never expressed Braska as her Father, just as a Summoner. The ice crystals that decorated the base of his statue seemed to her to flutter with memories and trepidation. She supposed thoughtfully, it might be just her. 

Her cheeks were pricking with adjusted heat, she held her staff stiffly behind her as she pressed her cheeks.

Seymour's voice drifted high into the vaulted ceiling. “Lady Yuna, it is a pleasure to see you.” 

Yuna startled, frantically her thoughts ran past themselves. Instinctively she dipped into a bow. 

Kindness was inflected in Seymore’s voice. “I had hoped you would be coming. Thank you, Tromell, for escorting her safely.” Tromell bowed as Seymour fixated upon Yuna. His eyes, she realised, were the lilac blue of the Macalanian tundra at dawn. Seymore approached her saying, “I would prefer to escort you to your chambers.” 

Yuna couldn’t tell if her breath was coming in shudders. She wanted to run, the urge away and forward held her in one place. 

An acolyte gushed with Shelinda as Yuna tried to be genuine with her gratitude, but she only managed to make another empty prayer bow.

The Maester extended his long arm. "Don't worry, I won't dream of the old Guado traditions." His voice seemed to carry a texture of a laugh, and it seemed to change Tromells face, but Yuna was unused to Guado expressions. The rough texture of the vine like hair nesting the inset of their eyes was strange to her, and because she didn’t know more than what Lulu knew, couldn’t tell what was really being said.

She hesitated before accepting Seymore’s arm, then swallowed as she made contact with the heavy silk of his robes. She smelled his scent, a mixture of incense, the earth and a faint impression of a mysterious familiar scent. She shifted, lost in the awareness of his presence and identifying an odd internal movement within herself. Every move she made was a struggle in maintaining strategy, expectations and what she thought was right. She couldn't think clearly, nervous, and somehow still torn. He didn’t seem like he could kill his father. He was polite, and considerate.

His eyes, only elaborated by the blue veins beneath his skin, relaxed into careful pleasantry, “I’ll allow for you to drop off your personal items, and to eat something before we enter the chamber.”

Yuna turned towards him, startled. “Wh-what do you mean, Maester Seymour?”

“Please. We are to be wed, are we not?”

Yuna grasped at the first thing she hoped he meant, “Uh-  yes. What do you mean, enter the chamber Seymour?”

He was smiling from another amusement she didn't understand. He glided to the annex not occupied by monks and an overly excitable dog in revel. “You came here to obtain the Fayth, and so, I will help you.” He opened the doors with one hand, guiding her through. Looking down upon her, his face was alight with some amusement.

“Oh.”

She kept moving forward into the room, and his arm delicately followed her before she extricated herself from his grasp, though her eyes still remained connected to his. Vaguely she knew she should be concerned about the Guado tradition entailed, but she didn’t want to begin her confrontation with something so trivial as a demand to postpone traditions that may be important to his people.  She broke away and gently set down her small sack of personal items that contained her duty and her secret. A cat lounging in the room came to sniff at it and then stilled, staring at her. 

She set her hand on her staff again and brought it to her stomach. The spark of knowing, the single-minded determination allowed her to stand, shoulders squared, head up. “I- actually am not very hungry.” She stood resolutely, her hands tightly clasped in front of her, prepared. She needed to focus.

“You have travelled a long way to eat nothing. At least have some bread.” Seymore swung away, to draw her outside.

“…I- alright.”

When Seymour once again proffered his arm to her, she accepted without hesitation. He pulled her up from where she had joined the feast, and pulled her into him. She had instinctively reached out for balance, not expecting him to use his own strength. Her hand had almost touched the scar tissue that petaled pink and her face was close to his bare chest. 

His hand slid up her arm, pushing under her sleeve and she blushed and froze. She was eye level with the black twisted lines of twin dragons, or perhaps leviathans. The attendees rose and bowed and Seymore lifted an arm in acceptance.

His skin was milky, his ribs and muscles shifted in strange patterns that she had never been bold enough to witness. Where the black mark and the guado skin met was an invisible seam of meaningless color, the picture too large for her to understand at this intimate distance. She had never stared quite long enough to make out what they were before, and she would not ever consider asking him such a personal question.  

As she moved, thinking the closeness was an accident, he made a sound in his throat and turned with her.  

Some intuition inside of her rejected the notion that such a flimsy etiquette held sway over her decision to deprive her curiosity. Her purpose was to negotiate some kind of deal in which he would stop… stop what, she wasn’t exactly sure… to bring him to justice for a secret only she knew, give himself up as a murderer, face his atonement, and in return she would do what he wanted, and give hope to all the people in Spira and bring them joy. She would marry him, this charismatic, sometimes unnerving, man who shared some part of her not belongingness, who caused the spirit of his father to accuse him of murder and much worse.That was more personal than asking what creatures lay over his heart.

Marriage .

The weight of what she was doing hit her again like a punch to the stomach. She looked up into his porcelain face run with blue, and his profile faced her, perfect and beautiful, while his hair, strangely deviant, made his appearance somewhat aberrant. She flicked her eyes away a second too late as he caught the tail end of her reflection.  She watched out of her peripheral as he smiled secretively.

They were at the door to the Cloister of Trials when she noticed that two Guado had stepped behind them on the stairs.

She was struck by abject horror that his people might have to overhear this awful accusation. Trying to think of something that wouldn’t sound like a lie- she was embarrassingly reminded of Auron’s glasses accusing her of being a poor liar- she clutched at the heavy silk and squeezed to get his attention.

He asked, heavily expectant and lightly surprised, “Is there something the matter?” His question was without the razor undertone he held when he inquired as to Aurons state of being in Guadosalam.

“I- um…I thought that we might be alone… for this.”

Seymour’s lips spread into a wide, thin smile. “Normally, we would have chaperones- but in this case…” He turned towards the two guards, who halted at his hand. As he turned, he placed Yuna directly in view of his chest and abdomen again, again she noticed how tall he was, and wondered if they were scars or if they accompanied him because he lived.

He smiled down at her, placing his other hand over hers that had fisted over her unsteady heart. “Come then. I said that I would be your Lord Zaon, did I not?” He placed her arm under his and held her hand over his wrist.

Seymour did not stop as he entered, and made no remarks about a trial. About to ask, she tilted her head.

Seymour answered, “The test is whether or not you can continue with the knowledge you have gained.”

Unnerved by his insight, she briefly considered his statement, though it’s true meaning was lost in the cloud of her current preoccupation, “How…true…”

They walked along the dark tunnel to the chamber of the Fayth.

Seymour's voice was mild. “My Lady Yuna, did you know that the aeon that resides here is not only the aeon of ice, but also the patron aeon of lovers?”

Yuna started, and if there was more movement allowed between them, she would have whorled to face him. His arm had held hers against his body and she did not want to look at his chest again.  

He placed his other hand on the door with no intent to push it open. The cold metal of the door was tangible on her face and in her mouth as she took in a breath.   

Before she could melt out of her complete shock, his voice dripped down her neck. “Her true name is Shiva. As you know, most summoners dub their aeons with a new name, for some believe it gives the summoner more…power.” Rivulets of electric fear and something else pulsed strongly in her flesh beneath his grip and in her stomach.

His voice had adopted a quality much like the plucking lute strings and he eased the grip on her arm and moved his hand from the door, “A…pull…if you will, but I feel that leaving the aeons true name gives it more power.” She shrank into the space he made for her. Yuna was blushing for reasons she didn’t know, but she felt it again. The same feeling he stirred when he coolly purred the proposal into her ear in the sphere projection. Their marriage would be their own sphere projection to the people of Spira. 

His breath slid fur-like and warm on the back of her neck and shoulders, “Shiva. A woman of perfect ice and living iron. Who would take the name from her but poor fools trapped inside their own path of fate?” 

She turned to look at him, a sudden beat of resistance within her- what did he know of fate? She would never be trapped! Seymour’s eyes meticulously glazed over Yuna, his face close, his body around her.

Overwhelmed, fighting sensations that were unfamiliar and censurably electrifying, Yuna turned away from him and tried the door. Reaching just over her shoulders he pushed open the heavy door that led to the guardians hall before the chamber of the Fayth.

Something inside her cried ‘Now!’ she should tell him, but the words would not formulate inside her head. Fear and concern crushed her and she fled from him. 

The quicksilver of Seymour's voice cut over Shiva's high silvery hymn, “My Lady Yuna, might I ask you a question before you enter?”

She turned up to look at him slowly, as he came up beside her, and their eyes held a thin line of tension for a mortal breath.

Yuna felt his gaze like ice pricking into her heart. It was a switch from his usual demeanor which was, she knew, a very fine practiced façade.  She guiltily wished he knew that she knew, but a cloud of possibilities rained in her head.

She nodded. 

“Would you have accepted my proposal had it been that I… had not suggested it was for the people of Spira?”

Any previous thought that Yuna may have retained was wiped away by another wave of shock at this- profession, accusation, test- the concepts turned into a hurricane of instability. Her mouth parted in a dumbfounded expression, while Seymour’s eyes lowered. Her hands flew to her face, a nervous and protective reaction. “Why- I- that is…!”

Seymour allowed her to draw back though he stepped closer to her. “I wonder then, if it is that you pity me?”

“I wouldn’t- I haven’t- I do not pity you!” She clung to something that she could answer.

Seymour’s head tilted, his hair creating a surreal frame for his face. “I wonder if that is part of the problem?”

Yuna’s eyes, still wide, still holding the secret truth of Seymour, was looking at everything and at nothing.  Seymour, gentle and immense, encircled her with his arms, then took her errant hand in his. She could feel the rasp of his sharp nails dimpling her skin. With his other hand, his fingertips soft, he tilted her chin delicately up to come once again into his gaze.

“Is there another reason that you accepted to be my wife?”

Now sprang forth in her,  “Yes-” 

“Such glorious resolve I see in your eyes, a future and an end all at once.” Without anything more, he kissed her, his body hard against hers, his lips demanding and Yuna froze. He dug into her mouth and fed at her lips.

He smiled against her mouth, and he drew out from his sleeve, her staff. Trembling, she took it. From his position on the second stair from where he had kissed her, he pushed her forward into the inner chamber of the Fayth.

She stepped forward mechanically and the iridescent petals moved aside as she entered the tunnel. She tightened her jaw to stop the jitter of her teeth. 

She turned back, more to ask herself if that had really transpired, but the door had ground closed, and the rasp of the petals veiled what was left of the opening. She could see only Seymoure’s robe, and a single hand for a moment before it darkened, shut. 

Behind her the room was already illuminated with the Fayth's presence. Yuna, her hand on her lips, a tear rolling down her cheek flicked her eyes forward to see the figure of a woman with her arms crossed, her face angry. 

Yuna fell to her knees, quickly making the sign of prayer. “O honored Fayth-” 

“How dare he.” The woman spoke and her voice was like the cracking of an ice flow. 

Yuna recoiled. 

“Be not prostrated before me, rise and gather your strength.” The Fayth commanded and Yuna shifted to her feet, clutching her staff. She dared not look the Fayth in the eye.  

“Great Fayth, of whom they love and fear, I am here to bid-” Her eyes widened to prevent the water from behind her eyes from spilling.

“Halt, I know why you are here. The question is why you are here with him. ” The woman swiveled her head, and great braids clinked. 

Yuna blinked, looking at the metal rings woven into long brown hair, reminded starkly of chains. “Most honorable lady, he has- I-...” Yuna was unsure but thought surely the Fayth saw Seymore as an honorable Summoner, for he could still summon. She said finally, truthfully, “He wishes for me to defeat Sin.” 

“Bah.” The woman’s braids clinked again, and Yuna nearly raised her eye above the woman's crossed arms. Yuna’s breath was coming faster now, her rubatosis the only thing she could feel other than hymn cutting into her.

Fear of failure gripped her- the aeons before her had been much more receptive, she had never thought once that she would be denied the bond. Yet, Shiva was angrier than even Ifrit and she could not seem to gain steady footing. Ixion’s presence was subtler than the other aeons, but she thought now, more connected to her feelings. She wasn’t used to being so beholden to the strength behind them, and she fought to focus on what she could do.

“Summoner, I think you know that is not why.” Shiva’s voice was condescending. 

Yuna pressed her lips together and bowed, “That is what he has said, but in your infinite wisdom-” 

Shiva scoffed. “Tell me. Do you know him to be a monster?”

Yuna swung back up and this time looked at the woman’s face. Her face was beautiful, but she was wearing heavy clothes, fur and robes weighed upon her. She looked to be swathed, cocooned and plated in armor over her tundra gear. Her hair spilled out behind her cowl and from the sides of her headdress.

The woman narrowed her gaze and stared for a long time. Yuna’s certainty that something must be done and that she was the one to do it caused her to feel shame at her hesitation. Her inability to push Seymour away and her surrender to the only trade she knew she could make was a sickening conflict that she felt too weak to handle. 

"As well, you know this: Born an abomination,” Shiva continued as Yuna flinched and looked down, “-he was doomed to grow into a darkness worse than those that caused the dark for him."

"Then I too, am an abomination." Yuna touched her heart as it clenched in pain. Her mixed heritage was something that she had been having to face more often than she ever had to in her life, though it had never disappeared. Knowing Rikku, and now facing Seymour, caused doubts to surface.

"Ha. No, Summoner. Braska loved your mother. Your people loved you. They still love you." Shiva’s voice was unfeeling.

Yuna nearly in tears from foreign abstract pains, clenched her staff and reached for her center she had forged with Valefor.

Ixion sparked like friction as the woman’s presence brushed like a caress into her mind. Ixion had been the last aeon she had summoned to her. She steeled herself, as she had trained to do. A mantra of faith and hope in the nexus of vying spiritual presences.

“Ixion was difficult for you, wasn’t he?” 

Ixion roiled and Yuna placed her hand over her stomach, ashamed again. Shiva seemed to be stripping her bare further than she had fallen. Ixion had taken her a long time. The first aeon, Valefor for her, was always the most incisive for the initiate summoner, but the bond the first aeon carved were the deepest tributaries. The next aeon depended on how well a Summoner could be with a Fayth. After the most recent summon, the last called aeon lingered.

Ixion was an instinct.  Unlike the others she had called.

“You and I know what it is to be bound. Yet our masters do not know that our leash and bindings are of our own design.” Yuna watched Shiva stalk on her orb above her statue. 

“You feel that you are weak? That is because the limits they have placed on you are crippling you.” Shiva twisted in such a way and looked at her so that Yuna remembered a great Kilikian cat, staring from behind bars of the Bevellian circus. 

Yuna swallowed heavily. This was the test. 

“Are you crippled, Summoner?” Shiva’s voice was soft, kind even. 

“No.” Yuna stated. 

“Are you going to defeat Sin?”

“Yes!” 

“Are you going to sell your heart to a monster, and then crush it beneath the weight of your leash and let yourself rot?” Shiva cut, her cadence saccharine. 

Yuna flinched, the image of Tidus in her mind flashed before her. She hung her head and brought her hands together in the prayer. 

“Oh?” Shiva’s braids clinked and Yuna squeezed her eyes shut.

“I do not know... if I am strong enough.” Yuna started, trying to be honest with herself as the Fayth would know every part of her if she was to accept her spirit. 

“Strong enough for what?” Shiva’s voice cut.

“I… was frozen. I could not move. I could not speak - my words- the accusation, the truth, they would not come out!”

Shiva snapped, “You were frozen, but in the ways that made your weakness clear.” 

Yuna felt the stinging of her eyes, she pleaded, “Lady feared and loved-” 

“I am not loved. Fear is not love. There was once a boy who stood before me who knew that. And you know it too, I think.” 

Yuna blinked, unexpectedly re-steadied. She thought, trying to see what the Fayth was asking of her.

Shiva came to the edge of her statue, “Let me ask you again. Are you strong to sell yourself to a monster in the name of justice or are you only weak. ”

Yuna’s breath hitched. She heard what the aeon said and it took her longer to understand. Yuna stared at Shiva and Shiva’s mouth tilted up in the corner, though her eyes were still sharp. 

“What do you know of my story?” 

“Beyond what the teaching of Yevon say about aeons, I was told you are the patron of lovers.” Yuna bowed her head. After a chilly silence she peeked at Shiva’s face. 

“I am not.” Shiva’s voice resonated like a deep fissure. “I am mercy and vengeance. I am not forgiveness, I am not compromise- I am not the tenderness of two people who share a mutual love for one another.” 

Yuna grew concerned for this Fayth, something about the way she spoke made her seem vulnerable. “I am not driven by anger or fear. I am driven by something greater than love. Sacrifice.” 

Shiva continued, pointing at the orb and the scrolls that lined her altar. “I am held here. I was bound in life, but you take the binding because you seek change. This control you perceive is false. The victim has more control than you think.” 

Shiva seemed resentful of her position. Yuna reeled, ‘In life? Victim?’ 

The transparent remnant of a woman only gave her a moment to process before making further connections. “It is the same with you and Seymour. He needs you. Do you deny that he is a monster? Would you give him the thing that he wants? You know it is wrong. You know you are not ‘strong enough’ to go through with it. But is your resistance, doubt, really your weakness? Or is it your strength?”

Yuna closed her eyes and thought she could almost hear Tidus’ voice. 

Shiva said, “Do you accept that the things that you think are weaknesses may be your strengths? Do you think that you can consider the ways in which you need to harden yourself are not the ways that have been commanded of you?” 

Yuna shook her head, “I-”

“You said you are frozen, but that is not true.” 

Yuna snapped her head up, “No- you’re wrong!” Then she covered her mouth. 

Shiva smiled, her hand under her chin, “Ah, Summoner. We are the only thing that is right."

Yuna thought, she went to her knees, her staff on her legs and she steadied.

Shiva softly said, “If you are frozen, is it fear or because you do not see your next action clearly?” 

Yuna looked at Shiva, who had crouched down to be at eye level. 

“I no longer wish to be afraid of saying no. I wish to no longer bargain my life away for the debt I do not keep- I only wish for justice.” 

Shiva smiled and said, “Vengeance with mercy is justice. You and I- we can be one.”

Chapter Text

Woken by a pain in her skull, Yuna blearily opened her eyes to a bedchamber. She struggled to focus on unfamiliar shapes beyond the gauze of a canopy blowing gently over the posters of a large bed. The smell of the air matched the sounds of the city she had called home before her father left. Incense, wet stone and the faintest scent of metal on a strong breeze.

Yuna tried to breathe through her fear and anger, but Bevelle was suffocating.

Guado had broken into the Summoners Sanctum where the Al Bhed had kept her and the other summoners. The Al Bhed tried to fight them off. Yuna touched her head, tenderly exploring the swollen bruises.  She didn’t remember anything else. The din and chaos had obviously disoriented her enough to be unaware of who and what made her unconscious. Yuna squeezed her eyes shut and focused. A wash of energy rolled through her head. Unsteady, she got to her feet. 

She braced herself on the pillar of the bed and a sound rang out. A maid, sitting innocuously in the corner, dropped her embroidery. 

Yuna tried to cry, but croaked, “Wait!” 

The maid had fled to the door. She stood in the doorway and said to a spear holder that Yuna could not see, “The Lady is awakened and recovered, Praise be to Yevon!” 

The guard outside peeked his head in, smiling. Then, with sudden anxiety, the guard pushed the maid back in as he saw Yuna stumble off the bed platform.

The maid ran to her, and gently took her wrists to stand her up. The woman’s brown hair was covered by a modest cloth, marking her as an acolyte, Yuna realised leadenly. “Mi’lady, please, Maester Seymour said you have been through an ordeal, being kidnapped by the Al Bhed!” She pulled her up and Yuna was too shocked to say anything. 

Seymour was alive, she was not in chains for having killed him, and she was far, far away from her guardians. She felt panic thrum under her chest, and helpless to it’s seizure, let the woman guide her to bed. 

The woman pleaded, “My Lady Yuna! Please, let me help you bathe so we can try on your dress. Been thirty hands on your dress working tirelessly for tomorrow.” 

“T-Tomorrow?” Yuna held her beating throat, the words scratching at her.

“Yes, mi’lady, your wedding day!” The maid beamed and bustled over to a screen where she pulled on a rope and a spout protruded from the wall.

Yuna stared blankly. Feeling her legs weaken, she sat on the bed. She crossed her arms around herself. As she stared, trying to determine if this was real, she ran her hand over the smooth coverlet and tiny threads of embroidery. The cloth had none of the depth of color that the Besaidian weaving style had, but all the same, the embroidery was delicate. She had always tried to replicate the Bevelllian flowers as best she could on her own clothing.

All that remained of her mind was a dumb hollowness that observed her surroundings with dispicable compliance. She shook her head as the water poured from the spout. 

The woman beamed at her and set to work pouring oils Yuna could smell from the bed into a tub. With genuine tenderness, she tried to assure Yuna, “Don’t worry, I’ll be here to help you.”

Yuna wished Lulu were here for the overlay of- lending a hand with her wedding day, reassuring her that everything would be alright and that she wouldn’t have to marry. 

She covered her face in her hands. She couldn’t think through weird, unhelpful thoughts; Did thirty hands mean that there were fifteen people working on a wedding dress?

A thought amalgamated of desperation and hope came to her; perhaps she could simply leave-? 

She looked up and the maid had informed the guard of the bath, and was locking the door. Yuna bit her lip, and stood up quickly, “No, that’s okay I think I’ll be going now. I am - needed,” she scrambled, “-elsewhere.” 

“Oh Lady Yuna, Maester Seymour needs you now more than ever!” The woman took her by her shoulders with plump hands. “He was distraught for three days. No one had seen him, and then,” she placed her hand on Yuna’s wrist, her voice and face earnest. “It was as if he was transformed-” and put a hand on her own chest, too moved for words. 

“I - I would imagine so.” Yuna said, scrambling to find the most tactful way to tell the acolyte maid that the Maester was a murderer, and likely dead because she closed his eyes herself.

The maid started plucking at her obi tie and Yuna grabbed at the strings, “Please! No!” 

“Lady Summoner, please, I am here to assist you and Maester Seymour will be coming soon don’t you-” 

“No! I don’t know you- and-and I don’t really think I should be here!”

“My name is Jin-soo,” she bowed, “I apologise my Lady, but you may not leave, not after the Al Bhed kidnapped you.” The maid looked at Yuna with beseeching eyes, the soft lines at her eyes and pale skin spoke of many years safe, inside a cloister.

Yuna understood that this woman was afraid, and afraid for her. Her heart involuntarily softened and she began to try to reach Jin-soo. “I must tell you that- Maester Seymour -he… cannot be alive.” 

“My Lady, you do not know?” Jin-soo began to glow, at ease now that Yuna had adopted her practiced way of being a Summoner for the people of Spira. 

Yuna said with all the gravity she could muster, “I know- He fell, in the Temple of Lake Macalania.” 

“No! After the Fayth let out a tremendous shock, he was exhausted protecting you from Sin! Sin- praise be to Yevon- left you be, your guardians did not understand the spiritual connection that Maester Seymour had with the Aeon of Macalania.”

Yuna could not help that her eyes went wide, but Jin-soo seemed to be encouraged by this, enamoured of the story she was telling. 

“The love that you and the Maester shared, so moved the Aeon- the patron saint of lovers as you well know- and so she gave the Maester extraordinary power to stave off Sin!” Jin-soo made the prayer of Yevon. 

Yuna, still gaping, reflexively began to mirror her. 

“Due to the rapture, neither the Guado nor your Guardians knew! They were trying to protect you! But the Al Bhed, who tried to take you just before- the terrible machina they used that cracked the ice, they succeeded !” 

Yuna tilted her head, amazed at how wrong all parts of the story had been conveyed and how cleverly it all fit. 

“Oh of course you don’t need to be reminded of that part. How terrible of me.” Jin-soo covered her mouth with a small titter, blushing.

“It is a tale of great tragedy and valor- one that surely will be memorialised in the scriptures. Ani, my closest friend, you’ll meet her soon, heard a rumor that we’d be able to see it in the sphere theatre in Luca once they got enough memories.” She patted her cheeks, flush with excitement. “Now, please, may I assist you with your bath?” 

Yuna clutched at her clothing, and tried not to cry. The story that the people had, the story he had suggested playing out for them- the people had taken into themselves already. The guards would not let her leave. The woman would not listen to reason, not when she had fallen in love so thoroughly with a tale told to her by an admired hero. The only thing Yuna could do was perhaps have another chance to convince Seymour to turn himself in. 

Yuna spoke, “I- can manage. If you would please assist me with putting on my obi. I can handle the rest.” 

Jin-soo bowed, and popped back up with a bright smile. “Your modesty is precious. Of course. Let me set the screen for you.” 

“Ah-alright,” Yuna said, uncomfortably. Nervously, she recalled her last encounter with Seymour, his lips hard on hers. “... and you said Maester Seymour will be seeing me soon?” She put her nail between her teeth. Somehow she was both afraid and doubtful that he would come upon her during a bath. 

Jin-soo nearly squealed, a strange sound coming from a woman who looked to be older than Lulu. “Oh Lady, can you not wait until your wedding day?” 

“No-no, I just- wish to know what is expected.”

Jin-soo stopped the water and set out the bottles and quickly laid out a towel with a secretive smile. Yuna pressed her thumb nail over her lower lip nervously. 

“All set, Lady Yuna.” She guided her past the screen and then bowed. “I will bring you proper attire for the fitting, and the night. Be sure to use this to moisturise. Oh, and leave the water for me to drain- the chamber pot is here as well.”

Yuna blinked and mechanically nodded. “Al-alright.” 

Jin-soo, Ani and four other acolytes surrounded Yuna. Her 'proper attire' for the night was on the changing screen - her other clothes gone for launder. 

There was an acolyte under the large dress, fitting tall boots with heels to her legs. After twenty minutes, Yuna had accepted the awkward position, but was struggling to stand still. Her arms were out to her sides, needles grazed her skin on her hands being fitted for gloves. Her bodice, with the heavy wing attaché set at her hips, was tight. 

Ani said with sternness, “Mi’lady, please tilt your head upward now. We need to ensure that your veil and hairstyle will be secure.” Yuna saw why Jin-soo and Ani were so close, they were stubborn in the same way. Yuna straightened, trying not to squeeze her shoulders together at the tickle and itch of the feathers. 

One of the acolytes sighed happily and looked up at Yuna from the hem, “My Lady, such a romance. Such a beautiful wedding. To be married! At the peak of -” 

Jin-soo hissed, “Hush Sister Lannah- don’t ruin the surprise!” 

Lannah’s jaw dropped, and her eyebrows drew down, “What, it’s probably the most romantic-” 

An acolyte working on the feather lining nudged Lannah, “The security of the wedding, Lannah . Only the pledged of the Church are to be there. We’re not to speak of it.” 

Yuna swayed and tried to reconnect her feet properly on what surface area the stool offered. She asked, "Security?" The acolyte working on her shoe fitting by the top of her legs accidently pricked the inside of her knee. Yuna yelped and drew in her arms. 

Jin-soo said, “Ah-ah. Hush, no need to worry the Lady Yuna.” 

“Look out, I’m checking the veil,” Ani said.

“Lady Yuna, you’re not afraid, are you? You’ve been preparing, I mean you're going to defeat Sin-” The acolyte working on the bodice said, placing a needle with thread on the cloth securely before stepping away.

Yuna looked to the woman, but Ani took her chin and faced it forward. The order was clear.

“Fear of Sin and being worried about the perfection of your wedding is not the same type of fear, girls.” Jin-so said, setting down Yuna’s arm and tapping the other one in preparation for the veil. 

All of the women backed away and the veil fluttered over her. Ani tugged and prodded, but there was a knock at the door and the guard’s voice squeaked, “Maester Seymour has arrived.”

Yuna’s heart dropped.

Ani looked towards Jin-soo in indignation. “During the fitting?” 

Jin-soo put her hands to her face and whisper shouted, “He was in important meetings and likely has more to do-” 

Ani gestured, “It’s bad enough he would see her before the wedding, the night before, but in the dress-?” 

Another knock, more urgent this time, “Uh- Jin-soo? Ani? The Maester is asking if there’s a problem!” The guard’s voice cracked and Yuna jolted.

Lannah sighed, “It’s so romantic-” 

The acolyte next to her that had been tightening her bodice agreed, “He can’t wait-” 

The acolyte that had stabbed Yuna accidentally, added petulantly, “It’s not even done yet.”

Ani and Jin-soo walked the screen by the bathing tub towards Yuna. Yuna held out her hands, trying to ward them away and figure out a way to get off the small stool without falling on her face.

Jin-soo cried, “One moment!” Then to Yuna she said, “Just don’t move off the stool, and we’ll be back to finish as quickly as we can.”  

Yuna shook her head, the veil somehow heavy and unmoving even as it slid over her face. 

Lannah huffed a derisive sounding giggle and gestured to the screen, “This is your solution?” 

Ani pursed her lips and grabbed Lannah’s sleeve. “Come on now.” 

The rest of the acolytes fell into line and went to the door. Yuna's eyes were wide. She didn’t want this process to take any longer, but neither did she feel prepared to face Seymour so soon. 

The door opened. She heard the swish of his robes and the soft cadence of his thanks as the acolytes filed out. 

She felt the precariousness of her dress and felt the trepidatious pinch where the needles held the white cloth against her body. Her heartbeat was in her throat. What would he say, what would he do? What would she say? What had she thought of in the bath- had she thought of a script, anything useful? She swallowed, her throat tight. 

Seymour stopped a few feet beyond, his hair just visible beyond the top of the screen. “Why Lady Yuna, after the intimacy of our last meeting I did not expect you to be so shy.” 

Yuna blurted, sharp, “I am not afraid of you.” 

Seymour peered behind the screen, and Yuna tensed. His smile was narrow, his eyes just as piercing as she remembered and she faltered. Coming to stand before her, he said, “I didn’t say I expected you to be afraid.”

His gaze travelled from her eyes down the length of the veil that hovered above the floor past the pedestal where she was prisoned atop of. “Beautiful.” 

She turned away so as not to feel the crawl of his eyes on her skin. 

Seymour eased forward and Yuna turned to glare a warning, “Stay back.” 

Seymour lifted his hands and stilled. She looked at him suspiciously, fear fluttering in her. His large, clawed hands unnerved her. They were too long from his shoulders, she felt, and still too close to her. How did he look so solid, she wondered, all of the teachings had said that the unsent that took their mortal form were fiendish. Yet, she knew he was dead. 

“You need to tell them the truth.” Her chest was tight but her voice was stronger than she herself was feeling. 

Seymour brought his long fingers to curl up under his chin. “Interesting. What truth do you have in mind?” 

Yuna’s mouth gaped, and she squeaked out, “The truth!” 

Seymour’s face smoothed, a long nail ran along his lip. 

Yuna waited to see his reaction, to judge whether or not he was taking her demand into real consideration or if he was planning to summon, or cast his black magics, or- just stand there, calmly and politely, like she and her guardians had never drawn a blade against him. 

“What is the truth?” Seymour asked softly. He took a step forward and Yuna instinctively tried to slide backward, though she found the ledge of her stool quickly. 

Yuna bit her lip as a cutting response rose up her spine like steel.

“That you’re my bride?” Seymour reached over to her veil and ran his fingertips along the lace.  His voice had adopted that quality she had found so strangely alluring in the tunnel before the chamber of Fayth in Macalania. She was unable to clench her left hand for the needle nestled by one of the fingers in her glove. 

He pinched the delicate veil gently and pulled it slowly.

Yuna twitched her head, mouth ready to say, ‘no.’

“That you and I will unify Spira in joy?” Seymour pulled the veil away. The gauzy cloth slid against the skin of her neck and face.

Seymour came to stand behind her and she felt the urge to not leave her back to him. “That you will defeat Sin?” His breath was on her neck, but it lacked the fur like quality it possessed when it had crept down her back in Macalania. 

Yuna clenched her jaw and turned, “That you murdered y-” 

Seymour placed his hand on her collarbone, his thumb hooked around her neck, his fingernails pressing sharply into her skin as he gripped her. She cried out, as needles bit into her. Seymour’s hands were heavy, colder than she remembered, and his face was close to her ear. 

“Murder is such a strange term, my Lady Summoner.” She was caught, twisted halfway to face him as he held her to his body. 

She tried to escape, but his hands fastened, sinking the needles into her side. She mewled a sound of pain. His grip loosened slightly, and he pressed his mouth into her ear, “What will you say Lady Yuna, beloved daughter of Braska? Will you say that I, Summoner Maester, murdered my father and confessed to you? Will you include that you murdered a Maester with your guardians and ran from justice?”

His words beat into her, the awful reality that the people would learn would be devastating. She wrested away before he could go on. She lost her balance as he released her, then he caught her by the wrist. She clambered down the stool and tried to pull away again. He smiled, thinly, letting her have some distance at the end of his long arm. 

“I can’t let you go. Not when I know that you will defeat this Sin.” 

Yuna cried, “Why?” Realising she had simply demanded a reason for his behavior in totality she scrambled, “How do you know- why did you kill-”

Seymour yanked her forward and leaned down as he grabbed the back of her head. Shocked from his sudden force, she lost her words. 

“Lady Yuna, I can see your talent. I can see what I have always seen in your eyes.” His eyes were still as chilled as the tundra dawn, but something strange was missing. Though she noticed it, she did not search too close to see what it was. “You are an end and a beginning.” Seymour breathed reverently, striking her as lascivious. He moved his hands to wrap around her bare shoulders. 

"Why me?" She asked still, knowing he had already told her. His face telegraphed that he did not think he would have to remind her. She felt his thumbs move in circles on her arms. 

She had not lied when she said she was not afraid of him , yet she was afraid of his unpredictability, her failure. There was no alternative. She had no black magic, the room was strangely shaped so there was no room enough for Valefor, Ifrit or Ixion. Maybe she could summon Shiva, but then, where would she go?  The rapture would leave her body vulnerable to the guards and the aeon could not fight with her in its arms. And she had already vowed her life in service to the people of Spira. Like a stone setting in place over an arch, she found her gravity. Yuna stood up straight.

"Why are you doing this?" She demanded more from his answers, the way he touched her, the necessity of this marriage, the story he spun the world, why he had killed his father. Her eyes, she did not move from his face though his hand moved up to graze a fingertip just beneath her ear. Shivers spiderwebbed over her skin. She drew herself in, "What aren't you telling me?"

"What would you like me to say?" Seymour asked lightly. 

"I want you to tell me why-"

"You are to be my wife?"

Yuna wanted to know what the chaos and destruction his Father spoke of was. Flames of darkness burned inside Seymours heart, Lord Jyscal had recorded, brokenly. If Seymour would volunteer information, she might be able to reach him and see past his clouded mind as the spirit of his Father had begged her to. She nodded.

"You and I are already bound." Seymour said. He continued after Yuna's face expressed her confusion. "We were both, in a way, born from change and destruction." His face had twisted in derisive anger, something she had never seen on him before. "We both were cast from society." Seymour dragged his hand up to the back of her head. "We both climbed to where we are and you-" 

Seymour’s face changed, his eyes lidded, jaw stretched. He leaned in and she leaned away, and Seymour reacted. His fingernails bit into her, he jerked her forward and she cried out as the needles sank through her skin. Her struggle was hindered by the dress and she tripped on the hem, falling to the floor. 

Seymour stepped away, turning towards her and tilting his gaze down at her. 

“You desire peace for all of Spira, do you not? An end to suffering?” Yuna tried to get up, but the needle by her finger wedged, she cried out. 

There was a cautious knock on the door. 

Seymour watched her as she leaned, and needles from the wings pinned to her side sank into her. Yuna cried, “Ah! Yes, of course, but I cannot understand why you must force me into this!”

Another knock at the door and then susurrations of voices. Seymour stepped close to her. She found footing without her arms, but by stepping on her dress she sheared the feathered seams at the front. It tore and she cradled her hand, staggering to find her balance. 

Seymour called out, “It is alright.” His eyes flicked to Yuna’s thighs, then hand. “You may enter.” 

The acolytes filed in and quickly broached where the screen blocked their view. The women rushed forward, but Seymour held aloft his arm, “Hold, this wound is nothing.” 

He turned his hand upward to Yuna. He smiled. “Come now, you know me as an excellent healer. I know that these long days must have exhausted you.” 

Yuna swallowed heavily, brow furrowed.  

Giving a small sigh, Seymour addressed the acolytes, “Her dress is to stay its current length.” 

Jin-soo gasped and bowed while Ani cried, “My lord, surely-” 

Yuna tried to summon her white magic, plucking the needles from her hand as she called for the energy of the world to replenish her. 

“She is a Lady Summoner of action. She cannot be weighed down so that she falls to the ground if she tries to move. Her dress is to be altered as she demands it. Besides- it is less work now, is it not?” Seymour drawled. Yuna finished her cure spell. The blood slowed, and yet her flesh ached from the needles ripping plunge.

“My Lord,” Ani started. There was a plea behind a respectful breath after her address, but Jin-soo coughed pointedly. The other acolytes gave each other side-long looks.

Seymour commanded, his voice flat. “The length is to stay as such. Give me your hand.” 

Yuna’s eyes slid to the acolytes. They were hanging on every motion, on every word. She raised her hand, and Seymour gently, tenderly cradled it in his own. 

He bent to kiss her hand. A spill of ice and blistering heat blossomed slowly from his fingertips and lips. She tried to muffle her cry as it snaked into her arm, running down to her her waist and over her thigh from where she had been pricked. Seymour took her into his arms again as her body spasmed, nerves brushed until alight.

The acolytes made the prayer and Seymour dusted a kiss upon her head.

Yuna’s knees nearly went out from under her as he released her, and went towards the door. The acolytes came to collect her, the four of them surrounding her immediately, Ani and Lannah holding her delicately at her elbows as her head and knees steadied. Jin-soo took one look at Yuna's face and turned quickly. “Most honorable Maester Seymour,” Jin-soo bowed deeply once again to the back of the unsent Maester.

Seymour paused briefly to turn and say, “Yes- thank you for your assistance.” 

“My lord, would it not be best to postpone the ceremony if the Lady is not well?” Jin-soo’s head was bowed still, her hands out in front of her in deference. Ani, holding Yuna’s arm, tightened her grip and drew in a sharp gasp. Yuna was having trouble regaining her senses.

Seymour stilled. 

Jin-soo’s body was still bowed, her arms still clasped. 

“No.” Seymour’s voice was composed, indifferent. He turned, his face blank and Yuna knew him to be at his most restrained. “Lady Yuna is strong. I am sure a good night’s rest will be all she needs.” His eyes flicked to hers. “If it pleases you, I shall return. Tonight.” Yuna shuddered. Seymour smiled thin and wide, “To ensure that her body is fully healed, and bless her with the restorative light of Yu Yevon.” 

Jin-soo dipped her head, her arms still out in a bow. “Yes, Maester Seymour.” 

He left. The guards closed the doors once again. 

As Ani exhaled, Yuna also let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding. Jin-soo's face was pale, but stern. 

Yuna wished that tears did not rise so quickly to her eyes and was thankful that her hair had come undone so she could hide behind it.

Lannah let out a soft squeal. “Oh my Lady Yuna, you looked positively porcelain next to him! Did you see how he looked at her!” She bit her lip, turning to the other women.

Yuna hung her head.

“Let’s finish this- and quickly.” Ani said. Jin-soo agreed. 

“I think the dress cut this short in front is much better.” The acolyte who had been working on the bodice gathered her needle where she had left it, gesturing at the intact train and winking at where Yuna’s thighs showed above her boots and below feathers. Lannah hit her gently, “Oh you’re so bad, Omri.”

Ani and Jin-soo hissed a hush at the other two. Ani’s face looked hard, adjusting the veil. Jin-soo carefully took Yuna’s hand. Omri began to stitch, still chuckling, and Lannah made the final markings for her boots, humming. Yuna’s head was bent down as she tried to hide her fear and steady her breath.

But it was suffocating in Bevelle. 

Yuna sat stiffly at the edge of the bed. 

Jin-soo stitched on a chair set by the light of the brazier. She tsked and huffed to herself. A guard-that-was-not-a-guard in what amounted to Yuna's prison. 

It was a luxurious prison, but still, it was not home. She grew to resent the room that reminded her of her home in all of the wrong ways.

Yuna heard nothing but the silence of the city usually pulsing with bronze bells and hymns. The air still smelled of wet stone, but a coppery floral scent was thickly smoking from the incense left for her hour of prayer and wedding blessing.

Instead of prayer, she had meditated and called upon the aeon Shiva. Belgemine, the mysterious trainer that had insisted on testing her, had summoned her aeons with no dance, no effort. Yuna had thought, she could try something of that nature, too. She breathed in and thought of her bond with the Fayth Shiva. Concentrating so that Shiva would conjure quietly against her to lend her the clarity of cold thought. The aeons' presence was a hard knot in her back.

She sat, alternately staring at the bedroom doors and looking distantly away from them. 

If- when-  Seymour came, she would get up, stand at the ready to face him. Falling asleep would be the worst yet sleep tugged at her eyes, pulled at her limbs. Fear rooted her to the soft bed and itched at her to move. Though, if she did move where would she go? Stand in the middle of the room under draperies that were so thick, she and her Father could have used them for blankets in the winter, and yet were piously set to suffer the cold by the Church? Go to the indoor water spout of clean water, rather than laboriously trek and pump from the ground water by the water flan fiends? Work on the wedding veil she despised with her shoddy embroidery?

Yuna let out a sound of frustration and stood up, her fists clenched. 

Jin-soo cleared her throat. Yuna tried to regain her breath and ease the ugly feelings that cocooned her like a spider.

Jin-soo spoke, “Lady Yuna?” 

Yuna tilted her head.

“Do you wait for him so impatiently? Shall I go and retrieve him for you?” Jin-soo’s voice was thready, and there was a layer of uncertainty that wavered beneath her demurity. 

Yuna blinked. “Yes. Actually. Have him come.” It must have been her attempt at connecting with Shiva. A certainty she was lent to that promised she would regain some control and inflict her order.

Relief melted Jin-soo, “Yes, my Lady Summoner. I shall fetch you your husband.” Jin-soo smiled fully for the first time in hours, and gathered up the veil. She then bowed before she knocked to be let out by the guards. 

A fresh course of energy writhed in Yuna. She paced under the high windows, treading the yellow light cast from the brazier and the white light of the moon. Antsy she turned, but Jin-soo had already gone. She ran her hands over her arm where Seymour had sent that cure spell coursing through her veins. She thought on how he had diverted such energy, to push healing light in the way he did, controlling her feelings, and a scattered idea refracted. 

She went to the door and knocked. 

A voice responded hesitantly, “Yes, Lady Yuna?” 

“I should like tea and dessert sent to my chambers before Maester Seymour arrives.” 

“Oh! Yes, my Lady. I shall… see to it that it is done.” 

“Thank you. I appreciate it.” 

She turned to the room, hands clasped behind her. Missing the stretch that her staff lent her. She put a fingernail between her teeth and thought quickly.   

She went to her bag of personal items and found the empty recording sphere she had purchased in Luca. She set it on a shelf and then hid it’s shape with books. She stood back to look at it.

Yuna turned to the door again and knocked quickly. “Guard?” 

“Yes, my Lady?” 

“First, what is your name?” 

“Er- Youan, your Ladyship.” 

“Youan, please request that the tea and dessert be served in the style of Besaid.” Yuna couldn’t help but feel a sense of premature victory. 

“Uh- what is the Besaidian style, m’lady?” 

“No chairs.The pillows and the tray are enough.” Yuna pushed a finger to her lips imagining Seymour having to seat himself on the floor. 

“Anything else, my Lady?” 

“No thank you Youan, that will be all.” Yuna was less nervous but felt a little uncomfortable at the chill she was experiencing. She breathed in and felt the Macalanian ice like mint in her throat.

A knock came on the door and Yuna turned, quickly adjusting her night yukata.  

“Yes, come in!” Her voice was calmer than she expected. 

The door opened and Ani came through with a tray. She smiled briefly and dipped her head.

Yuna went to assist her, but Ani shook her head. 

Yuna guided her to where she had lain a blanket out on the rug beneath the beds platform. She had plied books around the dim light of the brazier, and hidden away the chair Jin-soo had been using. In unavoidable exchange, the washing tub was exposed. 

“Jin-soo is coming with the requested pillows, Lady Yuna.” Ani said, setting down the tray. 

Yuna nodded and said, “Thank you.” 

Ani stood straight and bowed, “My Lady, if I may?” 

Yuna tilted her head and looked towards the door. “Yes?” 

“My sister has not returned-” Ani’s voice trembled, “-my sister has not returned from Macalania Temple.” 

Yuna’s first instinct of concern was muted but the woman’s demeanor moved her. “Was she expected?” 

Ani’s face smoothed and she took in a breath. “I wonder if she even got to the Temple. Perhaps she survived Sin’s attack by being late, but she was called to prepare for your wedding when Maester Seymour first announced it. She was a fair girl, red hair, her name was Nia. She was nearer your age, set to be your handmaiden.” 

Yuna remembered a woman, setting bread next to her at the feast. Seymour had waved her away and divided her bread on her plate for her. The woman had given a wink and said she would take care of her things for her. It was only moments, seconds she had seen her.

Yuna swallowed. “I-I do remember her.” 

Ani’s face crumpled and then she blinked furiously, “Thank you, my Lady. I had hoped- but the Guado are notoriously uncommunicative and I - well, it is an honor that she be remembered by you, my Lady.” 

The implication that Ani revealed tightened Yuna’s jaw and bruised her heart. 

But Ani left before Yuna could think of something comforting to say. Ani bowed Jin-soo into the bedchamber and quickly departed. Yuna held out her arms for the pillows. Jin-soo between her and the door, hesitant. 

Yuna said, “Go to her.” Jin-soo looked torn before Yuna urged her, “Her sister.” 

Jin-soo placed a hand over her mouth and nodded then ran after Ani. 

Yuna, watching the steam from the kettle, laid the pillows carefully, thinking that there may be alternatives to the lengths in which the Guado would keep their beloved leader’s secret. But no other option if the cover story was an attack by Sin.

Yuna sat at a pillow, properly, and watched for the door to open.

The steam had long since stopped trailing from the kettle and Yuna still did not pour. Her back was stiff and she tried to focus on the task at hand- to get Seymour to divulge his plan, explain the nature of his being to her, to gain his trust and confession.

Her only tools were those which he had given her and that which she could do. 

Alone, she had just vowed to herself to learn black magic from Lulu- and maybe learn how to use her staff for fighting people, like Kimahri. The door opened, no knock. 

Seymour slid into the room and paused. He shut the door behind him. He tilted his head. 

She put her hands on her knees and bowed her head minutely. “The tea is cold, Seymour, but then, I asked for you a while ago.” Her voice was soft, no hint of annoyance or upset.

Seymour’s lips twitched into a smile, and he placed his hands behind his back. 

“Am I to join you for tea? At this hour?” 

“I would have you join me-” she bit off, ‘for no other reason.’ 

Seymour’s robes made a sweeping sound against the thick rug. “And we are to have it upon the floor?” 

Yuna tilted her chin up and nodded, “This is, after all, a tradition from a place I call home.” 

Seymour narrowed his eyes and came to stand behind her. She remained seated, unflinching. She said quietly, “I would like to know a little more of the Guado traditions, if I am to be married to a Guado Maester. I have many questions, still, as we-” she turned to see his boot and pant leg under his robe. “...discussed earlier, in Lake Macalania. Before… things got out of hand.” 

Seymour crouched down and placed his finger on a strand of hair that escaped the nook of her ear. He slid it behind her ear and managed to say malevolently, “Whatever you wish, my Lady Yuna.”

Seymour sat himself close to her, his arm against hers, his hip laid so his boots were stretched off the blanket. 

She poured tea and it was easy to not show her victory at unbalancing him, miniscule as it was. She herself was uneasy. He watched her too intently, and she said, “You mentioned there was a Guado tradition that you wouldn’t dream of … when I first arrived to the Macalanian Temple...” 

Seymour raised an eyebrow, the veins in his forehead stiffly raising his hairline. She held out a cup to him and then picked up her own. 

Seymour accepted it cautiously. “It was banned just before my birth, when the Guado came under the Church of Yu Yevon.” 

“Banned?” Yuna said, fighting to hold onto her sanity. 

“Oh yes.” Seymour shifted. “Much of the Guado ways were banned after they ...submitted  to the guidance of the Church.” 

Yuna blinked, thinking of how to continue to put Seymour at ease, but curious. “Didn’t Lord Jyscal bring the teachings of Yevon to the Guado? Did the Guado not convert?” 

Seymour brought the cup to his lips and stared at her over the rim. “I thought that perhaps you were trying to play a trick on me- but I see now that you are...simply…” Seymour trailed off, swirling the cup of tea and then setting it down.

Yuna poured him more tea.

Seymour was silent. Yuna tried to look neutrally at his face but his expression narrowed. 

“I am sorry, you don’t have to speak of it if it upsets you.” Yuna said, soft. 

Seymour sighed, “Nothing is upsetting.” He brought the cup to his mouth and lowered it again, making a face. “Nothing is upsetting because there is nothing in the world that can be as upsetting as the world itself.” 

Yuna tilted her head.

“Don’t you have any real questions to demand of me?” Seymour set his full cup down and adjusted his legs so that he was facing her from the front rather than sideways.

“You want me to demand things from you?” 

“Yes.” He was light, but sharp.

“Then take off your boots." Yuna said with as much sternness as she could muster.

Seymour chuffed and said, "If you wish for me to disrobe you need only say so. I don't want to dally after every item-"

"I demand it." Yuna said, as if she were reassuring one of her people who had asked for her wisdom. 

Seymour looked at Yuna and crossed his long fingers over his stomach. "There's something else you wish to demand, and I grow weary of this charade."

"Take off your boots. They dirty the blanket. And if you are to be my husband- well," Yuna felt it was easier to imitate Lulu, crossing her arms like the woman who was like an older sister to her. "Take them off."

Seymours veneer shifted in a moment of uncertainty and then, smirking, aquiested.

Yuna sighed in relief and then asked again, "If you do not wish to talk about Guado traditions, why not tell me about how it is… how it is..." Yuna struggled, nervous that she was asking so soon. 

Seymour set his boots aside. To Yuna, his feet were just as unsettling as his hands. He coiled, shifting and Yuna lost her voice. 

He undid the large yellow silk tie at his middle. The heavy cloth thudded. He slid off his stiff robes that had bunched from his seated position on the floor. The black imprints on his chest stained down his sides. The flesh around his ribs and stomach puckered, the tissues scarred-like stitching, mottled pink, white and blue. The proportions and musculature was not something Yuna was used to seeing, but seeing a man take off his robes was also somehow a forbidden experience.  Yuna blushed and looked away, sliding away from the cloth pooled around him. 

He giggled strangely, laying down on one arm. He had never laughed in such a way before. It set her teeth on edge. 

She went to the tray and said, “Your hands.” Two scented towels for washing lay next to settings of fine cups and two covered dishes. 

They used the towels, Seymour discarding his and Yuna taking it to refold.  She asked, bolstered by his enjoyment in her discomfort, “How is it to be unsent?” 

She uncovered dessert for something to do after her question landed. It was far from the Besaid style dessert of sticky rice and candied fruit. Oh, but how she had lamented over tarts labelled behind the window of a shop as a girl. Tidus bought her one in Luca. There was a fierce joy in her that sparked when she knew that, at least, Seymour would not have that part of her.

She offered him the small, beautiful tart: a red berry inside yellow cream, edge’s browned a soft gold. He looked at her sharply and sat up. She tried not to see the ways in which his body folded and rippled. He looked at once too large and too thin. So used to the ways in which his robe granted him volume, she was nervous trying to come to terms with the volatile intimacy that she now willingly shared with him. 

He plucked the tart from the plate delicately. “I no longer taste as I once did. I no longer feel as I once did.” Seymour looked at her as he brought the tart to his mouth. 

Yuna was focused, he was responding to her question and she saw the first sign of hope. He smirked, pleased she was so intent on him. “The thing that drove me in life consumes me now. It is not so different, perhaps easier. The cold I do not feel so keenly. The pain, ever present, is easy to null. I am surprised that we do not have more unsent walking our hallowed halls already.” 

Yuna tilted forward, “More?” 

Seymour said, “Oh yes. More .” His tongue eeled out of his mouth and delved the berry from the center. Yuna tried to control her recoil, but her head still swiveled back. 

Seymour proffered it back to her. “It is a dull experience for me to eat, but then again, it always had been.” Yuna shook her head and gestured to her own tart. “I am comfortable so close to this inbetween.” Seymour placed the tart back on the plate. She picked up hers as she thought on his words. He was watching her with a poisonous satisfaction, “Tell me, are you close with your guardians? Do you speak with them in utter trust?” 

Yuna glanced away and then fought to re-center the focus to him, “I thought that you were to be my guardian- and I am trying to become close to you.” She bit into her tart, the tang of citrus and sweet cream was delectable, but she also felt as if she could not enjoy it fully.

“Ah yes, but that does not answer my question. Though it does bring up something I’ve been longing to discuss. Do you think I am still suited to be your Lord Zaon?” He sat up, folding his leg and foot under his other, resting one elbow on his upright knee. 

Yuna was still stiffly sitting on her heels, legs folded properly under her. Her lower back was still tight. She moved the cream down her throat to respond. He loved to compare her to the first summoner, and portrayed himself as the partner that Yunalesca had, but the connection he implied was more than a guardianship, more than that of husband and wife.

He clarified in her silence, “Do you think that the final summoning will work through me as it should?” Seymour reached out to take the tart and, thinking he wanted the berry, she let him. 

He hovered it over her mouth. Her eyes tightened. His nails held it to her lip, the sharp edges feathering against her. He reveled in the tension, his eyes dancing in the light of the brazier as they squeezed out amusement despite his flattened smile. 

“I-” Yuna started. When he brushed the cream against her lip, she shivered once before barrelling ahead with her answer, “I do not know how exactly...it works, but surely your spirit’s presence will be enough? The Final Fayth decides on the...connection that the Summoners and Guardians possess, does it not?”

The cream she dared not wipe from her lip. 

He made a mou of delight, tilting his head with incredulousness in his eyes. He took the tart away from her lips, another strange high pitched giggle from his throat. Yuna’s anxiousness heightened. He shrugged, his bright hair slipping forward, contrasting with the markings on his chest and shoulders. He sighed, “Alas. You do not know. And you have answered my last question regardless.” 

Yuna’s heart beat was thudding so strongly she thought that he must be able to see it from where he was seated.

He looked at the tart and proffered it to her again, against her mouth more forcefully this time. “I shall return to your earlier question in exchange- the Guado Tradition. If you’ll bite.” He giggled at his pun and Yuna breathed in sharply. She parted her mouth and tried to smile. 

Seymour slid the tart in, his thumb pressing against her upper lip, his fingers caressing her jaw. “There now. That’s one.” 

Yuna used her tongue to crush the tart crust in her mouth and swallowed heavily, sickened. He drew in closer to her and trailed down her neck. He leaned in and Yuna struggled to hold still, feeling invaded but trying to assuage her mind with thoughts recalled from day dreams of what it would be like to have one of Yevons chosen leaders grant her this attention.

“Before the wedding, Guado set to wed each other would feed from each other.” He lowered his mouth to hers and every sense in her body was struggling against her will.  He breathed across her lips. Unable to weather such a foreshadowing, she pulled away. He caught her head and laved his tongue across her lip. A pitiful sound escaped her. 

He chuffed, his breath cool on her face, highlighting the wet on her lip.

“Like so. Another? You see these veins on my skin are... sensitive.” He took her hand in his and slid forward, the tray’s cups clinking, and he forced her backward. The brazier’s heat seeped through her robe. “The roots take shape like iron in my body.” 

He snatched her hand and placed it to his temple where the vein-like roots transformed into his hair. The veins were a meaty pressure. When he pressed her fingers into his hair it was more like vines, overlain with the texture of Lulu’s heaviest braid. There was a strange thought that this satisfied her curiosity. That she would have, on the docks of Luca, been made giddy by such a forward display. Yet now, forced to be at eye level with him made whipcord tension flit through her back. Her body was in a wash of precarious feeling. Her hand flicked away, straining her arm backward. 

“They would decorate their bodies with designs,” Seymour went to his knees and she scrambled backwards but found the brazier to be too hot.  “I thought you wanted to know? I told you- I wouldn’t dream of such a heathen tradition. Merely I am explaining.” Seymour’s smile was at its deadliest.

Yuna thought her hand trembled as she picked herself back up. The steel in her tried to allay her worries- to strike when he thought he had power over her. “I was startled- I still wish to know-” then she faced him, and trying to steady her hand, and pressed against his ribs. Her robe sleeves covered her arms, but her wrist felt too exposed, even with her thin silver bracelet her father had given her for protection.

He looked down, surprise on his face, “Yes,” he placed his hands on her shoulders and then pulled her robe so that her collar and the top of her breasts were exposed to him. She squeaked. He pressed his thumbs along her neck and laughed as he found her pulse, “Do I quicken your blood?” 

Yuna shuddered and said the only truth she could, “Yes.” 

Seymour dragged his nails along the faint veins below her collar bone and scraped along her skin. “They would overlay the veins with a sweet ochre that stained their skin.” 

“I see.” Yuna felt a sickening lurch, wanting him to stop and feeling another sensation she censured, so she pressed out, “There is something else I must know…” 

Seymour dragged his hands down her sleeves, widening the fold that kept her sleeping robe together and pulled on her hands to place them on his chest. “You need only ask my Lady.” 

Doubt flickered, and she swallowed, “Why is it-” 

Seymour sat as she did, lessening his height. “Why is what-” he pulled her hands down to the line at his pants and she jerked back. He laughed again, “Do you think me immune to your charms? I am dead, but still a man who sees.” 

Yuna shook her head, she was no longer able to continue with her ploy. She stood up. Agile though she was, Seymour did not reach for her. She walked away from him where the room had more space and she could regain her cool. 

“No, I ask why you killed your father. I ask- because… I am to marry you, and finish my Pilgrimage- I should know! I should know why you have done this thing, and why you still wish me for to be the Summoner… when I know that you have gone on the Pilgrimage!” 

Seymour curved his back forward, laughing. Shaking with a manic mirth that caused Yuna to spread her stance and try to readjust her robe in quick strokes. She was thankful that Shiva still stood with her to straighten her spine. 

Seymour rose, gracefully and turned to her, “Because. He banished my mother and I.” Yuna’s mouth went dry.  “He took her from her home, then cast her out to die.” He stepped forward quickly.

“Before this, Lord Jyscal slaughtered his loyal followers and cast them bloody upon the feet of Yevon. He turned their placid, devout nature of connectedness to the one thing that the Church of Yevon desired: the gate of death.”

Yuna in the revelation's shock only took another slight step backwards before she found the step to the platform of the bed.

“Oh yes- Lord Jyscal was many things, but the savior of the Guado he was not. Guado are now only connected to the gate of death- the crux of Yevons power.” 

Yuna turned so she would not trip but then regretted having her back to Seymour. 

“Their numbers have dwindled, their guardians darkened, their nature now consumed by the glory of Yu Yevon and the Spiral of death.” Seymour approached her, knowing she was cornered, she having realised she could run no more. His voice was laden with drama and the poise of a speech he would give worshippers. “This hatred- this sudden transplant of their insular lives now focused upon their new human queen, their unquestionable overlords new heir. The Guado could only see this thing that I was as a symbol of the rot that took hold inside of them. At their mutiny, Lord Jyscal at once appeased the affronted Maesters that a Child of Prayer could produce such a creature with a heathen race and appeased his people by sending us away to the Temple of Baaj.” 

Yuna shook her head, Baaj was ruined in a Battle with Sin years before her Father’s pilgrimage. It was nearly a legend. The story she had been told was not this- but she knew it to be the truth, because Seymour’s face was a mask of feral spite. She looked away, saddened for Seymour, his people, and flooded with the thoughts of what else the Church had taken but unable to communicate that to this changed man before her.

Seymour grabbed her arms, pulling her back against his chest, he hissed into her ear, “My mother killed herself so that Lord Jyscal might forgive her for what she was, for what she bore into the world.” His grip tightened, his voice growled. Yuna felt tears prick behind her eyes, for herself, trapped here, his fingers bruising her, and for Seymour’s mother. “She killed herself -with me as her weapon, and I was left, at ten years of age, alone until they found me powerful .” 

Yuna began to cry and still Seymour gripped her. 

“Do not weep- the story is not finished. I am initiated into the Church. I am a Summoner, afterall. I learn of the Church and all its ways and I develop a plan. To end all suffering in Spira. To stop senseless stories of pain. My Father, Lord Jyscal, was short sighted once again. He sought to prevent me but in doing so gave way to the last barrier before I once again- end suffering in Spira.” 

Yuna, sobbed, “But if you wanted to end suffering, why would you kill him?” 

Seymour whipped her around, “Do you not see? Everything he did in the name of good, befell more evil.” Seymours face was a sneer but when he watched the tears fall from her face he softened. 

Yuna wiped away her tears.

Seymour tilted her head. “Do you weep for me still?” 

Yuna, angry, “I still don’t think it’s a good enough reason for murder- you killed him. You betrayed that which Summoner’s stand for.” 

Seymour smiled and laughed, a short burst. His hands on her back and hip, he smiled with wicked curve to his brow, “Yes, I  killed a Maester. Not for one death, but for a future.”

His confession gave her a pitiful slip of joy that she caught it on the recording- but Seymour was amused and his admission was an accusation levied at her.

Seymour pressed before she could reflect, “But, I have not even begun.” 

He dipped down, as if to hug her. She tried to push him away. He latched onto her neck his wet tongue slicked down. He lifted her. She struggled to free herself, panic striking at her as he, with one hand, lifted her off the floor, undoing her robe with his other. 

“No!” she cried out helplessly, her voice fighting to eek out. 

“Have I hurt you, my bride?” 

She tried to push herself upright, her feet finding the edge of the bed, fighting to keep her robe shut. She should have seen the trap coming, she thought, she accused herself of knowingly putting herself in this position, for encouraging him too far- there was split moment where she wondered if she provoked this because some part of her wanted this. Yuna could not know during this flurry that it was not just her own thoughts but a thousand years of crafting submission.

He let her go again in her lapsed moment of un-resistance, like he had before. Then, with suddenness, yanked at her clothing. 

She was bare, the robe half off her as she snatched at it, going to her knees on the bed. He shoved the gauze canopy aside and broached the bed, crawling atop as she backed away, pulling the covers and her robe to her angrily. 

He said, calmly, “Come- let me heal your wounds as I said that I would.” He grabbed her lower thigh and pulled her, and she felt her voice mute as her breath would not out in a scream. 

His hands warmed rapidly as she slid across the covers, the cloth bunching against her hands in futility. She felt that energy surge, blasting through her skin into her flesh, but this time it burned rivulets of that electrifying feeling he had inflicted upon her while still courting her. 

Her back bowed. She hated the sense of relief that plummeted into her stomach. Vitriol welled up within her, while her head was dulled, she lashed out with the full force of his betrayal, “Your confession will be for all to see!” 

Seymour just laughed and covered her shaking body with his own and latched again to her neck. “You think I did not see the sphere trap you set for me?”  Seymours hands held her arms and his groin pressed into her hips. “The more you struggle the more it pleases me.” He said against her neck. He ran his tongue down to lap wetly at her clavicle and sucked. Yuna’s breath hitched and her thoughts whitened and blurred. Seymour made his way down to Yuna’s breast with his tongue, grinding against her.

Shiva breathed into her and Yuna stilled, she froze and Shiva’s thoughts came to her. He has only ever desired power. Shiva’s words echoed into Yuna. 

Cold, calm, she spoke. “You think you will prove I am yours.” It was more Shiva's words than her own. 

He looked into her eyes, smiling wide, his teeth out. 

She glared at him, “You will have only proven your own weakness.” Her voice was still her own, soft, breathy.  He would not stop her, nothing he would do would cease her journey and her pursuit of what was right. 

His eyes clouded, dark, his face slackened. He looked deep into her and his tongue crept along the edge of his teeth. Only the chill needling in her veins kept her revulsion from pulling the strings of her limbs. 

He said, “My weakness is - my desire for you? That would be a fine weakness if it were.” He shifted his weight, from his hips and Yuna kept her arms placid where they were. 

She whispered, “No. It is not desire for me.” She read Seymour’s confusion in how he propped himself further away, sitting on her with his full weight.  “You cannot resist power- but what I have, you will never be able to take by force.” 

Wishing he would not look into her eyes, she held on, to bore into him this truth. Some emotion sliced at his face.  What he had said to her, before she watched his eyes close, before death took him, she felt his expression darken in the same way. 

“Yet, I could take you by force easily.” 

“Yes.” Yuna was still, serene even. She closed her eyes. “But I am already to be your bride tomorrow, and I will choose that for the people of Spira. The marriage will allow me to continue my pilgrimage. There is no choice after deciding to continue my pilgrimage that matters. You will take nothing from me that will not be readily given." She opened her eyes, Seymour was watching her as he did over his tea cup. 

Yuna continued, a clear presence of mind with words she did not formulate but spoke from a deep well within her. "You know what must be given.” There was a moment where Seymour flinched. He curled away. She sat up, facing him. 

Seymour's eyes flickered, and said, “Yes.”

Yuna was freezing, but she did not shiver.

Seymour stood from the bed and turned from her, “Then if that is what my Lady wishes, then I will wait until she gives me her power.”

She watched as he picked up his clothing, and dressed. 

He turned to her, and she sat still bare on the bed, motionless. 

He smiled and some part of her intuition told her that he was enjoying this awful cat and mouse. She did not hide from it. He went to the shelf where she had placed her recording sphere. He plucked it and rolled it into his sleeve. He bid her, "Dream well my Lady Summoner," and left. 

She sat on the bed for a length of time she had no awareness of. Eventually, she got up and removed the clothing that had remained on her one arm. 

She stood to look at the bed. Shiva’s steel would not leave her, and she did not want it to. She was already numb to the cold. Her thoughts iced over.

There was another knock, faintly at the door and Yuna did not reach for her discarded night wear. She wrapped the sheet around her in the way the Aeon Shiva wore her blanket of ice over her nude body when she was conjured into crystalline glory. 

She spoke “Enter,” just as the door opened.

“My Lady, I-” Jin-soo entered then stopped, Ani bumping into her. After a moment, they collected themselves quickly and shut the door. Jin-soo bowed, “We did not expect you to still be awake.” 

Ani moved to the tray and the blankets, hovering over the spilled and ruined mess before quickly packing it up. 

Jin-soo asked softly, “Is… is all well, your Ladyship?” 

Ani dropped a plate, it clattered and broke. 

A swirl of Yuna’s breath moved under the armor of ice, an urge to comfort them. “All will be well.”

Ani stood up, “Please, do not marry this Guado Maester-” 

Jin-soo worried, turned and ran towards Ani, her hands out as if she would cover Ani’s face. 

Ani twisted, “No, please, forgive me for saying so but he-” 

Jin-soo begged over her, “Please, Ani, it is the will of Yevon, we can only care for the Lady as best we can! And the Lady wishes to be a bride-” she turned, looking for confirmation. Ani did as well. 

Yuna knew, then, that there were doubts invisible to her. She knew also she had the power to clear them, to show all in the ranks the truth. She had faith. 

“Jin-soo, Ani. I thank you.” Yuna bowed. “It moves me how honorably you hold your duty. I too, will fulfill my promise. I ask you- for your help, if you are willing to give it. It will require risk.” Yuna stared at Jin-soo and Ani. 

Ani immediately, her lip twitching, bowed, “Anything, anything my Lady.” 

Jin-soo looked near tears. “What has happened? What went wrong?” 

Yuna did not answer and instead, went to her pouch. She handed it to Ani. “Please. Ensure this is on my wedding dress. My staff is to be set inside.” Her small inventory pouch would not hold much.

Ani bowed. “Yes, yes my Lady.” 

They did not ask questions, and Yuna turned away to wash herself again. She did not care to look at Jin-soo as she sniffled and cried. The acolytes left her and it felt like hours before Yuna would sleep.

She walked through the doors as they opened to the wedding procession. The monks surrounding her moved in synchronicity. She looked out and saw only soldiers, monks, machina with weapons. Steadily they marched to the center of the open altar, her footsteps heavy. Bells thrummed in the air. The faint sound of the hymn of the fayth from the people at the base of the temple was a faded airy sound. 

Grand Maester Mika waited, his back bowed with age at the top of the bright stair at the Pinnacle of Bevelle, the height of the Church of Yu Yevon. This was where the guardian wyrm of Bevelle would roost when there was occasion, but she did not see it. She was thankful.

Seymour was across from her and he smiled, head still bowed respectfully. She stopped as the monks stopped. They made the prayer of Yevon and she was left to stand with Seymour facing the stairs up towards the altar. She refused to look at him. 

She counted to three as she had been told to do, but another sound split the low bass of the ceremonial bell. As she ascended the stairs in unison with Seymour, she heard the screaming cry of pyreflies raining from above.

She looked up, seeing blistering mirrored color and painful light pour from the clouds. More than a thousand pyreflies. Anxious uncertainty struck her, she did not know if they had been released for this moment. Then, the soldiers moved, the machina whirred to life, and she felt the attention shift. Something was wrong. 

Maester Kinoc, the Warrior Monk commander she had met at Operation Mi’Hen, shouted, “Fire.”

She turned behind her, hearing something large and foreign billow through the air over the rapid fire gunshots. A giant machina, larger than any she had ever seen, dropped from the sky trailing black smoke. It was upon the stairs faster than she could process it’s existence. Seymour gasped in shock near her. The wind from it’s propellers pressed the veil on her face, tearing at the gentle pin that Jin-soo had set into her hair gathered atop her head. 

Seymour grabbed her, roaring over the sound, yanking her up the steps to Maester Mika as the airship passed them. She stumbled after him, dropping the bouquet of Bevellian roses,  trying not to skin her knees as he dragged her. The airship circled around the tower. Yuna in her confusion thought that the Al Bhed must have returned. More pressing, her plan to send Seymour to the Farplane in front of the gathering had to change.

Seymour smiled, teeth bared as he held her to him, bending her towards Grand Maester Mika. The wizened Maester watched the airship with hands behind his back, his eyes hidden beneath long eyebrows, the watery color of age unblinking in the face of such calamitous surprise.

The airship hurtled wildly, reversing its momentum, the air beating around her stole her veil. A huge, thudding, whir sounded before two bursts like cannon fire sank into the temple grounds. Anchors holding metal ropes whipped the airship back, twisting it's balance, and she watched as figures slid down the ropes. 

Her heart soared- her guardians, Tidus, safe, alive, here for her! Soldiers scrambled as monks fled, filling the aisles, listening to the shouted orders of Kinoc and bracing themselves for invasion. 

“Shoot the ropes! Cut them down!” Kinoc bellowed, his round head glistening at the base of the stair. He turned, eyes hard. Seymour nodded and the Maester of Warrior Monks moved up the stair. 

The ropes twanged as gun fire broke the anchors. Her guardians leapt to safety. She tried to run forward but Seymour held out an arm and grabbed her hand, holding her down. 

Tidus screamed her name. She saw Rikku dart forward, running towards a machina, Tidus behind her striking his sword at a foot soldier with a gun. She whispered no- watching as warrior monks with packs on their back staggered forward, setting up quickly behind reinforcement lines. 

Seymour politely raised his voice, “Maester Mika, please continue with the rights.” 

Grand Maester Mika nodded and began the old words of bonding, beginning the prayer that would call the Fayth to attend this ceremony. 

Yuna felt Shiva’s ice burn in her as Valefor budded in her chest. 

She looked back- watching as Rikku’s face changed, fear- she could not disable these machina. Lulu was setting fire to those on the sidelines- melting their guns and the guards cried out in pain as she crushed them with lighting.

Their shouts were distant, and Seymour forced her to turn towards the Maester to hover her hands in the shape of the prayer. 

Yuna turned again, frantically, hearing Kimarhi roar and Wakka’s shout as they broke through the lines between the aisles. Kimarhi’s fur shone with blood and Wakka beat the floating machina until they crunched into the ground. Cannon fire shattered the tiles and shrapnel surely injured them- she struggled against Seymour to get to them, to stop the fighting, heal their wounds. She threw out an arm to try to reach them with her curative magic but they were too far down the stairs. 

Rikku and Auron were working as a unit, cleaning up the ones that filled in behind Wakka, Tidus, and Kimarhi. Auron shouted, “Remember, cut the ones that matter!” 

Rikku’s elbow connected with a soldier she twirled behind, and with her other hand knocked off his helmet. 

“I know, I know!” Tidus yelled.

Yuna watched briefly, in a moment of horror as the guard’s face showed fear just before Rikku sank her punching claw into his jaw. She remembered Youan. 

Mika called upon the third order, and she smelled the smoke of Ifrit, rage coiling into her head. She heard a gunshot fire and Wakka cry out- Rikku was shrieking. Auron covered Rikku’s dash, striking out and felling a warrior monk and Lulu moved quickly behind Auron. Flame gouted from the tubes and packs of the warrior monks. Lulu rasped in pain, summoning water that crashed over the soldiers, wiping them away and dulling the flames that stuck on her skin and hair as it waved back over her.   

Tidus yelled from behind the last three soldiers “Stay right there, Seymour!” He slashed wildly, cutting at the flame packs. He rolled back after an explosion. Yuna tried to reach for her staff, infuriated but Seymour held her hands with an iron grip.  She cried out, “Let me go!”

Auron, Tidus and Wakka moved into the second wing of the stair beneath her just as Mika finished the invocation.

Kinoc took a gun from under his robe and shot rapid fire into the ground at Tidus and Aurons feet. “This has gone far enough!”

Tidus weaved his arms backward, looking at her, and charged forward again.  

Auron, his sword glinting blood, swung his bare arm into Tidus chest, “Stop.” A bullet wound seeped from his arm. He tilted his head to the soldiers that had waited, on Kinoc’s order, behind the bows of the stairs. 

Her guardians were surrounded. Kimarhi was bowled over, clutching at his gut, dripping from shrapnel and cannon fire. Wakka turned slowly to face the guards that had closed in point blank behind them. Lulu stood stock still, the blade at the end of a musket under her chin. 

Yuna watched as Rikku darted behind the soldiers, behind where the dead and the dying lay. Her cousin was quick and quiet, and slipped into the bows where the soldiers had just ambushed them from. 

Seymour, high from the invocation, he had released her other hand. She had been still long enough, long enough that he was not watching her, and he had left her hand so she could draw her staff from the pouch Ani had sewn into the bouquet tied at her wings. 

Tidus ran forward. Kinoc shoved his gun in Tidus' face. She brought her staff forward and moved away from Seymour, whose finger just trailed after her. He turned, and she faced him. 

“You would play at marriage, just for a chance to send me?” Seymour sounded delighted. 

She glared at him and summoned all her connection to the Farplane, the Fayth. It was not hard, the Fayth were invoked, their presence beat at her like blood and wind. Death was already here- she intended to send those that had fallen as well. She turned her staff abruptly and the farplanes energy poured forth, like standing in the middle of a river the pressure rushed over her but her back was strong and she was immune to the cold. 

“Your resolve is admirable.” Seymour smiled, soft, like he had looked at her in her prison bedchambers.  “All the more fitting, to be my lovely wife.”

She focused entirely on disassembling his physical form, pulling out the pyreflies that lingered on the broken bodies that had fallen. The platform lit, the ones that had scattered in the sky drew together. Their thready sound grew. 

Seymour smiled as pyreflies seeped from him, he looked at the light like how one would watch children play, piteously screeching their existence. 

Maester Mika commanded, “Stop!” He stepped forward. “Do you not value your friends lives?” 

Yuna stopped, turning toward the execution ground. Kinoc shoved his gun into Tidus' stomach. She gasped. 

Mika continued, “Your actions determine their fate.”

Seymour watched, unbothered. 

“Protect them or throw them away.” Mika turned to her. “The choice is yours.” 

Yuna faltered. She gazed down at her hands, gripping her staff through gloves of lace. She would be killing them. 

One hand released it. It was Shiva that held her staff with what was left of her grip before she forced her fingers open, letting her staff clatter on the stairs. It dropped at Tidus’ feet. 

Seymour whispered, conspiratorial, “You are wise.” 

Rage, hate, ice and heat, coursed through her as she glared at him. Then, seeing his victorious smirk, despair etched at her.

“Resume the wedding. We have honored witnesses.” Maester Mika climbed back to the altar to preside and Seymour gestured. The soldiers rested their weapons, though Kinoc did not take his barrel away from Tidus. 

Seymour said, “Little Al Bhed, come out. We have a wedding to finish.” 

Yuna winced, and turning away from Tidus’ stricken face, took her place. 

Rikku climbed out from the bows. The soldiers shoved her forward, unnecessarily forceful. Yuna saw the edge of Seymours robe as he approached her once again. She looked up at him, the sounds of Rikku’s disbelief and Wakka’s exclamation struck at her like knives clattering on glass.

Seymour gave her a small smile, tender, expectant. 

He placed his heavy hands on her shoulders and Yuna felt something in her crack. Maester Mika presided, stone faced and cold. The Fayth, a presence that fell to the trickle of a stream, while Seymours undercurrent grew. He ran his finger nails once more up her neck, tilting her chin up.

He bent forward.

He kissed her. Deeply. His mouth was filling her. His presence an energy, washing her with cold light. She clenched her fists and took hold of the energy, it was like trying to shut a door with water heaving relentlessly through. 

The soldiers clapped, bells of the ceremony from their bonded energy rang out. He fed at her, and drained from holding her ground, she went limp. He brought his arms protectively around her. She felt his head turn towards her guardians. She could not bear to see their faces in his victory.

“Kill them.”

Yuna exclaimed terror, straining as he tightened his arms around her. 

“I am sorry, but this is for Yevon.” Kinoc said, business like. 

Yuna twirled away from Seymour and ran past Mika towards the edge of the altar. She knew- the only tools they had given her and the only things that she could do. 

“Aren’t those weapons forbidden by Yevon?” Auron asked with spite.

Yuna climbed up to the edge of the precipice and looked out into the city. 

Kinoc pistol whipped Tidus with the butt of the gun and turned the barrel towards Auron, face enraged, voice low, “There are exceptions.” 

She turned just in time to see Kinoc raise the barrel at Auron’s one-eyed stare. 

“No!” She shouted, fists clenched. They turned to her, and she commanded, “Throw down your weapons. Let them go. Or else…” 

She was high, high on the precipice. She knew that the edge was behind her, but this time, she stepped towards the ledge three times. She did it assuredly,  watching Seymours face as it hardened. She knew he would consider it no empty threat. She raised her head at him. A promise. Seymour turned and jutted his arm at Kinoc. Kinoc face scrunched and teeth bared, shoved his gun down. The rest of the guards followed suit. 

Tidus and Rikku glanced around at the soldiers and warrior monks, then darted forward to stand abreast of Seymour.

“Leave now, please!” Yuna cried at them.

“You’re coming with us!” Tidus shouted, throwing a wary glance at Seymour, who watched him, snakelike. 

“Don’t worry. Go.” 

Seymour took a step to stand next to Tidus. “This is foolish!” He proclaimed lightly. “If you fall, you’ll die.” He said with a cutting seriousness, worry creased expertly into his brow.

The high winds blew onto her lips, and their connection from the ceremony numbed at her still wet mouth.  She wiped viciously at her mouth, hating him even more. Seymour watched and then closed his eyes, shrugging in secret amusement. 

“Don’t worry,” she told Tidus and Rikku. “I can fly.” 

Tidus was shaking his head, fear stretching at his neck. But Rikku looked focused, intense and hunched. The Al Bhed brought her hands up quickly to her inventory pocket at her thigh. Rikku tried looking meaningfully at Tidus, but Tidus was clearly wracked with turmoil. Yuna smiled, her cousin gave a glance at Tidus and schooled her face in preparation. 

She watched Tidus weigh the option of running at her- to protect her. Valefor budded in her chest at the sight of him, utterly invested in her life . 

She brought her hands together and leaned backwards, falling so that the air would cradle her back. 

Tidus cried, “Yuna!” as she disappeared beyond the ledge. 

She saw their faces poke out beyond the altar before she reached out, to the light and joy that she chose. She looked towards the sky, and remembered the happy days of Besaid where sunlight dappled through the trees and the beach water glistened as her friends played in the water. 

Valefor burst from that light and sped towards her, then under her and she reached out towards her aeon. 

She spiraled down out of their sight, hearing Rikku’s voice call out before a blast ricocheted the air. 

She had landed in the courtyard.  Jin-soo and Ani were there. 

She told them as Valefor spirited away, “I need into the Chamber of the Fayth.” 

Quickly, they took her down to the servants quarters. They let her into the chamber- the secret passage that servants had long since been told to block off. She entered easily, and the Fayth, multitudinous whispered the direction in her.

The door opened, the petals shifted. She entered the tunnel. The milky light of the fayth dappled on the walls. 

She swallowed. Bahamut awaited her already. 

The solidness of the presence was like the reverberation of a gong. 

“I heard you are married now.” It was a strange voice, young but terribly old.

Yuna shut her eyes. She went to her knees.

“I- did not wish to be.” 

“There are many things that we do not wish to be that are.” Bahamut approached her, the small chiming sound of metal against metal clanked playfully. She saw bare feet, small, brown. Clean despite no shoes. They were the feet of a child, no more than seven.

Yuna swallowed and looked up, “You-” 

“Yes. I.” Bahamut said. He was small, hooded. She could see a small smile at his lips. 

Her voice strained, “I -” then broke. 

“Rest, my child.”

“No, how can I continue? When Yevon has done such a thing?” 

“You would cease your pilgrimage?” Bahamut asked as if he did not believe her. 

“N-no- what else- “ Yuna pleaded. Then Bahamut seemed to envelop her. The shadows mulled from the edges of the chamber. He stepped off his platform. She seized, frightened. No fayth had ever- she stilled, the reverberations clattered into her bones, shook her teeth. Blue light flickered and something whirred to life outside the antechamber.

“Have you lost your faith?” His voice was as soft as the church bells heard over the hill as the sunset.

Yuna squeezed her eyes shut. The Church, it’s wealth and the people that lived in poverty at its skirts. The careless death, and Grand Maester Mika supporting his unsent Guado Maester. How could she place her faith in the Church after this? 

“I - cannot say.” 

“No, my child. Faith… in yourself.” 

Yuna’s hands clenched. “I could not stop him.” 

“You must.” 

“I did- everything I could.” 

“Have you? You are still alive.” 

Yuna blinked. She looked at him, facing the hooded boy. She could only see pinpricks of light where his eyes were hidden under a hood. Yuna steeled herself. “I will not stop. I will- go on. No matter the obstacles in my path. I will fight to let the truth be known- I will fight to end Sin.” 

“End Sin?” 

Yuna nodded. 

The boys face smiled, his teeth sharp. He held out his small hand. 

“Good.”

Chapter Text

The wind was chilly, but it did not possess the wraith-like quality of the lake pass to Shiva’s temple. Tidus’ arms around her, holding the harness, kept the harshness of the wind at bay, and he was warm. Unlike Tromell, he was warm enough to be reassuring. Thoughts grew and crystallised in Yuna’s head, falling in a flurry; only to bury themselves as she cleared a path in her mind and banked them upon the wayside. 

She looked behind her to see Rikku bidding them good luck. She watched her cousin blur into too fine a point to pick out over the grass. Yuna leaned back into Tidus, excited and happy to have this chance to be with him. He smiled down at her before urging his favorite chocobo, Beau, to go faster. They broke into a canyon off of a plateau near the Macalania woods. The bridge had collapsed. All that remained to indicate something lay beyond the mesa tip was a post, the wood rotting and splintered.

Tidus guided Beau back.  Bright yellow Beau took a running jump for a glide, landing them heavily down on the other plateau. Tidus cheered and urged Beau forward into the canyon, the earth rising on either side of them.  

The walls of the canyon blocked her vision until the very next second- it made it so the exhilaration of movement was all she felt. She felt Tidus move his whole body into the turns, and Beau’s thumps into the ground as they raced forward into the unknown. The sky opened upon the temple, making her gasp. Beau had a moment of fluttered flight before Tidus said, “Woah!” and the chocobo dug his talons into the dirt. The sounds of rocks and clods of dirt tumbling into the gaping maw mixed with chittering sounds of monkeys and bird song.

“We should probably dismount,” Tidus said, looking at the bridge. 

Beau trilled and they took in the sight of the hidden temple, Remiem. 

“Look- a monkey. Cute. Hey little guy.” It jumped up and down and waved it’s small hands at Tidus. Yuna smiled, watching Tidus bend his knees to wiggle his finger at the big eared creature on the bridge post. 

She peered down. The temple was propped up on pillars that shot down into the unfathomable depths, and it’s darkness seeped upwards, cradling a spiral underbelly that lay betwixt the columns.

Her boot made a hollow sound on the plank of the bridge, alarming Tidus.

“Hey!” He reached out for her as she stepped upon the wood plank. 

“It’s okay.” Yuna said, turning to him with her hands on the rope.

Tidus blinked at her and looked at the monkey, crossing his arms and gesturing to her on the bridge,  “Are you okay with this?” 

Yuna giggled, “Scared?” 

Tidus waved his hands, “Not if you’re not!” 

Yuna gave him a nod and moved over the planks. 

“Stay there Beau, okay?” Tidus placed his hand out to the bird, directing him to remain on the ledge. 

Yuna walked over the bridge, looking down at the impossible distance. She would have more than enough time to summon Valefor if the bridge were to fall, and she doubted that the way to Belgemine would collapse. She searched for how she had decided the way would hold, and found that it was faith. It was still a strange feeling, sifting through her beliefs and questioning them, all the while finding that many of her foundations still stood.

Tidus explored the outside of the temple while she examined the doors. 

The markings were unlike any she had seen and it was lonelier, she decided, than the other temples. She supposed that had to be expected, it being impossible to get to unless one had a chocobo. It was odd to her, because temples were for people. Why this temple had not been placed again on a Pilgrimage path and the bridge re-built was concerning.

“Hey! Beau! What are you doing?” Tidus shouted. 

Beau fluttered across the bridge, making only the barest of talon touches as he ran across the wood. Beau whistled as he broached the landing. He placed his beak on Tidus’ shoulder, guiding him gently to the Eastern side of the Temple’s patio.

There, they watched a sphere recording. Clo, the chocobo trainer he had beaten just yesterday in a race, spoke to them from years past, her voice wavering as if underwater. The trainer was replaced with another person after her report ended. It seemed to be a compilation that stretched backwards hundreds of years. They watched as various faces and voices explained their title as Rider, telling stories of their races and tribulations, all impressing that wild chocobos would be able to communicate with their Rider. 

Yuna looked at Tidus, “You can speak with chocobos?” 

Tidus laughed and shrugged, patting Beau, who tweeted positively.  “I think I just get what they’re saying- and I know how best to… ride? I dunno. This seems like some… sorta… strange… Spira stuff.” 

Yuna stood up straight and made a pensive sound. She was able to understand her aeons, but the only one who used words so far were their soul apparitions. She got impressions sometimes, but they were more like feelings. Images. How thoughts felt when she was not particularly concentrating. She put her hands behind her back, she didn’t doubt Tidus was special though. His eyes caught the light, hair was nearly glowing. He listened to Beau walking around to the Western part of the temple. She loved him: the boy from Zanarkand, the man who would be her guardian like his father to hers before him, the only person in the world who had treated her like she was precious without knowing who her father was, who she hoped to become. She knew he was special beyond her own selfish desires and reasons.

He turned to her, “Let’s go and see if Belgemine is inside. Don’t want to waste our day! Rikku’d be disappointed she fought Auron for nothing.” 

Yuna nodded and allowed Tidus to open the door first. She watched the glyphs shimmer with pearlescent illumination. 

Belgemine stood in the center of the chamber. The huge dome was absent of High Summoners statues. It was dusty and smelled like a cave rather than heavy incense and savory offerings. Yuna bowed respectfully and hid her confusion. She wondered again how long it had been since Remiem had seen any attention from the Maesters at Bevelle. Or why they had abandoned it. She looked at Belgemine’s empty face and a chill that brushed a strange awareness behind her ears.

“You’re here. Bonding with a particular guardian? Interesting.” Belgemine crossed her sleeves, heavy with rope at their cuffs over her thick white robes.

Yuna felt a light prick at her neck and cheeks, “Yes. I am ready for further training.”

A smile lifted one corner of Belegemine’s mouth. “Yes. Let us test your strength as the Rider sends out the call for the sunset race.” 

Yuna looked at Tidus. ‘The Rider’ rubbed the back of his head, looking sheepish and then offered her a ‘keep at it’ gesture. Belgemine, still and unmoving, summoned Valefor.  The shell of the aeon appeared above Belgemine. It did not greet her with joy or with love. Belgemine’s Valefor was not a personality Yuna knew. 

Yuna had known, when she leapt off the Maesters high court in Bevelle, that she would not need to move, not need to summon the way that she had relied on early in her journey, because of Belgemine. She would be ever grateful for the lessons that the mysterious summoner who had failed to gain the final aeon had granted her. While she was appreciative of the woman’s training and tests, Yuna knew how she wanted to summon. It was not with the emptiness that Belgemine called to her side. 

Yuna gripped her staff, closing her eyes briefly. Her back was strong, straight.

Shiva lived in her lower back, and like ice growing up her spine into her head, the diamond sharp clarity shattered into an explosion of force. She had called Shiva to her recently. The soul of the aeon cooled her composure, lending her control and strength for the shattering she had suffered. The fracture she felt from the heavy weight of Bevelle’s hypocrisy. 

Shiva left her cold, even as the aeon bequeathed her a gesture of warmth. A blanket of woven snowlike silk offered her nothing but a reminder: it was that which was borne within her that would be her only source of power.  When Yuna had first summoned her, the chill was painful. Now, it was a welcome hardness, a fierce sort of confidence. 

She looked at the aeon of ice and soft steel and the woman within smiled at her. ‘I see you, I see the way you want to open yourself.’ Then Shiva turned, dangerous and severe to the empty Valefor as Yuna sunk into the connection. They sprung forward.

The rapture left Yuna feeling tired once. No longer. She breathed in slowly, but deeply, only having exerted her self a little. Her breath felt the crisp touch of the Macalanian ice and she was all the more rejuvenated for it.

“I have prepared the annex for visitors if you need time to...rest.” Belgemine said, tilting her head with her perfect, coiled braids wrapped tightly over her ears.

“I’m fine.” Yuna asserted.

“Once more then?” Ifrit rose up from the ground, the plating of the stones roiling out and then coming together like a silent puzzle as Belgemine asked.

Yuna concentrated, touching the joy of sweet summer air. She opened herself, feeling the soft sunlight dappled through coconut palms. Shooting stars across the beach at night. She opened her eyes, hearing the crash of the ocean and the playful foam of the waves and smiled. Valefor swept up to her trilling. Yuna greeted Valefor like a sister.

‘Having fun yet? You should be.' 

Yuna laughed.

Her heart beat a wild tattoo in her chest. Inner fire licked her and made her skin hot. Anger clouded her head like woodsmoke. 

Then, she was in the air, chains of expectation dropped their gravity from her. The moment of freedom, of fear when she gave herself freely, cast her up into the unknown until Ifrit rooted her again. All of her muscles strained with Ifrits roar, the growl tensed her set her next action to edge.

Ifrit was all of the things that Shiva was not. He let things burn in her with claws wanted them to erupt out.  His jowls flexed into a wolfish smile as he asked her, ‘Stoking the fire? All it needs...is a push.’ 

Tidus came up,  sandwiches from the travel agency in both hands. The fire of Ifit unsettled her and burned under her cheeks.

She was breathing in deeply, not panting, but it felt like she had wanted more breath than she was getting. 

He smiled at her, some food in his mouth as he offered her the fully wrapped one. She met his eyes and something shifted. His offer hesitated between them.

Belgemine’s voice floated over them. “I suggest taking your time. Eat. You have done well."

Yuna took the sandwich, flicking her eyes down from where they had traveled to his neck, noticing a pulse. She wished to lick it, to kiss it.

She bit into her sandwich.

The calling was a summer storm, the heat and damp, oppressive and heavy. The will power to channel the conflicting surges of wild pressure narrowed into a pinprick of bright and then all consuming white focus. She applied force and it was suddenly apparent, all friction and electric energy, spiritual joy and the madness of presence.

Ixion stormed in. He stomped wildly, head tossing back. She knew. Knew she should be.

Ixion left her feeling her skin too tightly, her mouth too dry and a certainty that she would be afraid regardless if she succumbed to her feelings in their truest meaning or abstained. 

She called Valefor's gentle playful spirit back to her to defeat Belgemine's Bahamut, and Belgemine smirked as if she had known. 

“There is … one more aeon that you can train against and defeat.” Belgemine said.

Yuna looked to her, solemn, “The aeon of this temple.” Yuna said. 

Belgemine laughed and it was wistful. “No. You’ve improved, but you are not yet strong enough. There is still more that you must gain.” 

Yuna was taken aback, confused. The formidable doors of the temple scraped open. “Hey Yuna! I heard from Rikku.” 

High pitched from twice the shock Yuna squeaked, “What- how?”

Tidus dismounted Beau into Yuna’s arms. He hugged her. She felt his heartbeat in his chest. It was slightly slick against her face, but solid.

“Two for two, yeah?” Tidus grinned down at her.

“I would expect nothing less, from... Zanarkand’s star player.” She teased.

Laughing, he swung an arm around her shoulders, shrugging, trying to be humble. A beautiful cloudy mirror in one hand caught her eye as he lead her inside. 

The central chamber was empty, but the door to the eastern annex was ajar. A flickering light wavered into the dim antechamber. 

Yuna paused though Tidus kept going. 

Tidus walked backward, looking at her with shrugging shoulders. “Hey- she said she prepared it for us, right?” 

Yuna cautiously stepped towards the west annex opening, inspecting it curiously. No light escaped from around the edges. It looked like it was carved to provide an illusion of a door.  She thought that it was strange, but it wasn’t the strangest thing about the temple.

Tidus watched her patiently from doorway of the eastern annex, which for all appearances was the twin of the west. She glanced back at the western door before she slipped past Tidus into the room.

Old tapestries lent the annex chamber a rich feeling she had come to associate with temples, but the teachings of Yevon were nowhere to be seen. Instead poems in fine calligraphy with watery pastorals decorated the stone walls.  

A brazier in the center of the room lit the chamber well, if unsteadily. The brazier took the shape of a pillar, touching the ceiling like a chandelier in carved metal. It gently radiated warmth. She sighed stepping closer to the fiery pulsations, “Ah, it’s nice.” 

But she blinked in surprise as she absorbed the rest of the room. A divider of cloth set in metal, welded to look like vines, stood partially blocking a pipe, basin and pitcher. There was also a chair with a bowl seat attached to another pipe. It was a kind of lavatory she had only seen on the airship. There was a small table set with vegetables, fruits, and a block of cheese in front of a single bed. There were pillows on the floor, and a mound of furs and cloth blankets were stacked and spread on the bed. 

Tidus chortled at her long pause, recognizing where her eyes remained. “Well- I can use the seating pillows for me, uh-. Hey, if you want to wash up I’ll just uhh- look at these… scrolls.” 

“Scrolls?” Yuna looked to where he pointed, a bookcase that was filled with old books and tomes. 

She touched her fingers along the dusty coverings. “These are on white magic. I should study these.” She had been struggling with mastering both fully restoring consciousness and preventing unconsciousness. Her fingers traced the old letters for life embossed on a tome the likes of which she had only seen once in Bevelle.

“Oh well- be my guest. Do -er- do you mind if I wash up first then?” Tidus shut the door, keeping the warmth inside.

Yuna shook her head and pulled the tome from the shelves, seating herself and fighting a flutter in her stomach. 

Tidus began to unlatch his gloves and sat himself on the bed. Though she had glued her eyes to the scrollwork, she knew he was watching her.

He padded over to the table and plucked a plum off the plate, taking a juicy bite that she could hear from her nest. 

She heard clicks, and the slap of leather. Her attention of anatomical forms drawn on old paper was switched to anatomical forms that she could observe. A lighthearted sense of risk nudged her. Valefor lived under her collarbone, and it had been a while since she had been brave enough to let go, enough to have some indulgence for herself.

She propped up the book in front of her face and peered over its ledge. He was standing with his back to her, his neck muscles softly moving as he consumed the plum, looking at something on the brazier. He had unlatched his shoulder straps and taken off his yellow sport jacket and black waist coat. 

His back was finely sculpted, indentations and soft coverings over his bones, beautiful and warm in the braziers incandescence. His shorts were high, the dip of his lower back shadowed. He moved, inspecting a cupboard. Yuna pulled up the book further. She re-focused herself for some time until she heard water sounds from behind the curtain and his voice, “Woah-” 

She chuckled, “Cold?”

He poked his head out from around the divider, “Ha- yeah, but I think I’ve figured it out.” 

She bit her lip as he smiled at her, then he ducked back behind the divider. 

She tried to focus back on how to summon the guardian life force, how to channel the blessing and connect it to blood vessels. She tried to, but she didn’t know if she was quite understanding. The book was old and the words were archaic, but before now she never thought she would have ever gotten a chance to learn, much less master it.

“How’s uh- how’s your reading going, Yuna?” 

“I might need to practice.” 

“Oh! I can help, but I’m uhh gunna need your help first.” Tidus said, putting his arm on top of the metal divider.

He had barely stepped out from behind the screen, a hand on his hip. She could see a line of skin from his chest that changed it’s shade his hip where he rested his hand. She could also not help but notice the line at his thigh. She quickly fixed her eye on the screen, his hand.

He pointed, “Could you get the towel for me? I forgot.” 

She nodded hurriedly, and frantically looked without knowing what he was talking about precisely. She thought- perhaps he meant toiletry? Was it in the inventory he kept on his belt? How was she to open his inventory again?

“Ha- it’s okay Yuna, I’m not cold. It’s over there, by the chest, near the bed.” 

“Oh! Oh, okay.” She understood, and grabbed the linen which he called a towel. She edged to the divider, standing with her back to Tidus and holding out her arm. Tidus slid the linen out of her hand and pinched the corners, coming out behind the divider. She wasn’t looking at him, but out of her peripheral she knew he came out before he had fully wrapped the linen around himself.

Yuna swallowed. “Are you hungry?” 

Tidus shrugged. “I just had a snack, but maybe soon. Did you want to practice that spell on me?” 

Yuna turned, ready to exercise control and focus, but was met with a bare, tan clavicle and shoulders very close to her face. She noticed the pulse at his neck and adjusted to look at his face. Tidus had a smile in his eyes and a serious turn in his mouth. There was damp droplets clinging to his hair. Her will was hanging by a slippery thread.

The bow of his collarbone was at her eye level, and she held out her hand, hovering just over his heart. “Now?” Yuna asked, her breath catching. 

Tidus shrugged, and she watched his chest contract and move her eyes catching on his small, dark pink nipple. He asked lightly, voice heavy, “Why not?”

She hovered her hands over his chest, partially a motion to both control her sight and exercise her desires. 

“How can I help?” He asked, softly. 

She swallowed, and said, “I think, maybe, you should finish drying off.” 

“Oh, okay.”

Yuna put her hands together and whirled away from Tidus, going to stand around the brazier. She wouldn’t be able to focus on the protective light if she was this distracted . 

“Sorry, I- um-” Tidus stuttered. 

“No!” Yuna didn’t want him to feel like he had done something offensive. She bent out from where she had hidden herself behind the brazier.

He had his hand up to his head and his cheek had pinched in embarrassment. 

Valefor was still whispering in her heart. All of the aeons she had summoned bolstered her. She recalled her cousin asking her if she hadn’t ever let her 'body talk', and remembered she had asked her to try. She placed her hands behind her back, making her decision, “I just couldn’t concentrate.” She said to him comfortingly. 

Tidus, still looking down, smiled. He looked at her, tilting his head just enough so he could peek at her under his fringe.

Her heart beat in her throat, “Do- do you think you could help me with something else first?” She asked. 

Tidus’ face lost his smile, he stepped forward, as she went towards the chest. She held another of the cotton linens and said, “Lulu usually helps me with my obi.”

Tidus nodded his head up, stepping forward slowly. “Yeah.” 

“Do -you think you could see- how to wrap it, so you can help me- put it back on?” Yuna said, a shaking hand on her obi pin. 

Tidus' sky blue eyes had darkened and the shadows cast from the brazier flickered. She felt a shudder. Seymour had looked at her like that, but she shook her head.

Yuna pulled in her breath, drawing her strength together. Any thoughts about the ring for pleasure that Rikku had gifted her, about what she was doing, about Seymour, the pilgrimage and her duties, were washed out of her mind like a tide that swelled and receded from the ocean.

“Like this?” He whispered, his fingers on the soft rope that bound her yellow obi, her skirt, and her silk wrap around her waist. Tidus wasn’t Seymour, his fingers were gentle and his question tender.

She pulled the pin out, and the rope went slack. He guided his hands along the rope and Yuna turned, tilting her face downwards looking over her shoulder.

Tidus’s voice hitched and he started again, “Do-I-pull?” 

“Yes.” Yuna said, matching his quiet.

The thick, smooth sound of silk rubbing together and the familiar tightness around her, narrowed her attention to his closeness as he carefully peeled the obi’s tie apart. Tidus finished unwrapping the yellow obi and she felt a little cold, naked and she wrapped her hands with the linen in front of her stomach. 

“Thank you.” She whispered. She turned to him and he looked at her, tight, focused, but his eyes were a deep hazy ocean. 

She took her obi from him, folded and placed it over the chest, trying to regain her bearings and separate herself from him. She hid behind the divider and started divesting herself of her clothing, quickly. The cool air caused her skin to tighten, her arm hairs standing at attention.

She placed her boots and neatly folded clothes just beyond the divider as if she left them for an offering, rather than merely placing them out of the water’s way. But she held back her thin, black breast bindings and lower undergarment tightly in her hand. She heard him come over and saw his hands take her things, quietly, leaving her toiletries she kept in his inventory in their place. She swallowed and tucked her underwear just by the dividers base and turned to the faucet. She turned on the spout and began to wash diligently. 

Slick soap ran along her skin like a physical manifestation of Tidus’ gaze when he had slid off her obi. The water turned warm. Her hands were quick but there was a pleasant throb in her lower body and it thrummed joyously when she was too slow. She gave a little huff of irritation, her head sparking between craving more of this and feeling a profound instinct against it. She turned the faucet spout to the right, and the cool water returned sense into her and she cleared her head. She turned back and saw a linen folded over the top of the divider. She slid it from its perch, finding that it was warm, and dried herself off quickly, replacing her undergarments. She wrapped the linen around herself and tucked it into the Besaidan style of beach wear and peeked out around the divider. Tidus was sprawled over the pillows. 

He had found a robe, and was still wearing the long linen around his hips. He had neatly hung up their clothing to air by the brazier. She saw he had also discovered there was a kettle, and had somehow made it so the brazier accommodated it.

He was holding up a book, but he was not reading it right side up. 

She stepped out behind the divider. “Having trouble reading?” 

Tidus gestured, “I don’t get it. How do you learn from this stuff?” 

“Practice. And maybe holding it upright. Is that for tea?” She came to look at the tray like attache pulled down a ledge in the brazier pillar. 

“Yeah, I thought-” Tidus started brightly but then tapered off.

She moved closer to the clothing chest, hoping to see a robe for herself as well.

“Since you...seemed to be taking a colder shower than I was that I’d warm up some tea for you.” Tidus placed the book over on another pillow gentle and sat up, looking at her seriously. 

She plucked at her linen, a little embarrassed. 

“Yuna,” he stood up. 

She looked at him and hoped her gaze wasn’t too wide, feeling that warmth stirring again, afraid of what she might brave next.

“I don’t want you to- feel like you have to do anything. I just- I want you to relax.” Tidus said, earnest. 

She shook her head, “You- you haven’t done anything wrong. Just- I mean. I-” She stuttered. 

Tidus came over by her and opened the chest, picking out another heavy silk robe. “Here. Would you like some tea and maybe you could practice that spell on me?” 

She nodded, smiling, filled with affection. 

He went to the stove top and started a story about how he had lived in Zanarkand, highlighting the similarities between this and his small place. He told her about the kitchen, and it's small size but his great skill in not only one, but two dishes, about how the bed room was secreted away for parties or brought down. He trailed off and looked at her with something like embarrassment as she sipped her tea. 

“What?” She said, a lilt in her voice.

“Ahh- nothing.” Tidus said, then, “Did you need me to be knocked out or something?” 

“No, no.” Yuna set down her tea and guided the restoration light, she imagined it attaching to his life, where his heart beat, his wrist pulsed, his throat, his- she gasped. 

Tidus looked concerned, “Something wrong?” 

She blushed and looked at the book quickly then re-focused herself. She concentrated and imagined the flow between his blood and life force, their connection to each other and then cast a halo around him. It flared white molten gold around his body and he sighed, eyes closed. “That feels nice.” 

Yuna pleased, “It worked!” It was a heavy kind of spell casting, and it drained her. She would not be able to effectively cast this in battle for sometime. It took her too much time, energy and she was too unsure.

Tidus popped open his eyes, and looked up, “Wow,” his hands rose from where they had been resting on either side of him, as he leaned back near her he reached for the halo. He looked at her, beaming still from her success. “Beautiful.” 

Yuna sighed happily, “Yes, it is.” She reached to touch it. The halo felt like a patch of sunlight as she passed her fingers through it.

Tidus looked at her hand and then to her face, where he captured her gaze. 

“Yuna,” he said, very quietly, “May I kiss you?” 

Yuna’s heart began to beat and a honey kind of warm coated her, “Y-yes.” 

He placed a hand on her cheek. Then, like he was worried she'd fade away, brushed her hair away from her jaw and drew a line to her chin.

She leaned in. He came up, moving his body by curling his stomach. Being this near to him, bathed under the warm effulgence was sweet and pure. He hovered just outside of her lips and she pressed into him. 

His mouth felt soft and his lips were a dry electricity against hers. She questioned, as she sank into his arms, as they wrapped around her and held her body tightly, why she hadn’t insisted that he kiss her all the time after the Macalanian pool. 

A pool of warmth was building in her as he rubbed her back, and stroked her shoulders. She opened her mouth just slightly so the wet of his mouth slipped across her lip. He trailed his hands down her back over the smooth linen until he sank his hands over her hips. 

Then he kissed her neck. She flashed back to Seymour’s mouth on hers, his hands on her body, his mouth on her collarbone, his tongue on her neck and wetly trailing down to her breast.

She tensed. 

He brushed his lips back and forth, the barest of touches now, “Can I taste you, Yuna? Can I bring you closer to me?” 

She paused, he stopped. He looked at her, concern in his eyes, his mouth pink. The splendor above his head flickered. His grip on her sensitive sides lessened. She looked at him and he took his hands away and placed them behind his head, waiting. He bit his lip, and then changed to a small smile. She looked at him, his eyes had a magnetic pull but she was a little scared. “What do you mean?” She asked, shy. 

He let out a shaky breath. “I want to kiss your skin.” 

She nodded, and he leaned forward, kissing just under her jaw, a chaste and light pressure. She shuddered.

He rumbled over her pulse, “I want to kiss your skin more Yuna, show me where I can kiss you.” 

She said, “Can I- can I- ?” She was blushing heavily, her hands played at his robe line, where it had fallen open along his chest. 

He pulled apart his robe, exposing his stomach and the linen tied under his lean taut hips. He placed his hands on his thighs, excitement evident. She had felt it, connected to it briefly as she searched too deeply for his vitality. 

She breathed in, “As a healer, I’ve seen- people before, but- and, I only- with... Seymour.” 

Tidus took her hand, “Yuna- we can stop. Anytime. I never want you to feel-” his eyebrows furrowed, his hand grew tight. “I will always listen to you, Yuna.”

She kissed him, and then after she needed air she drew back, panting, her hands on either side of his face. His hands were hovering behind her head and to her side.

“Okay.” She took her hand and placed it over his chest, running down until she saw his stomach muscles bulge, she glanced up and saw that it was the strain from watching her. He smiled again, a flash of white, and the curve made her react with adoration.

She kissed his chest where his heart lay and stroked his lines and muscles until his eyes grew heavy. She kissed his stomach, and his hips and then pecked dryly at his clavicle, then softly skimmed back down along the small baby fine hairs under his belly indentation. She was avoiding the linen peak beneath the line of cloth tucked at his hips, so she took his hands and placed them on her sides and told him to keep her warm. 

He picked her up and took her to the bed, laying her down gently. Her inner thighs rubbed together as she secreted herself into the blankets of the bed, rubbing the silks on the robe and sheets together.

He went back to the kettle and the brazier and fiddled with the controls.

She admired him, looking lordly in fine robes and long linen wrap. His shoulder was exposed as the robe draped off him. He tried to adjust it as he fixed the kettle. The glory of the halo was barely apparent but it bathed him in a peculiar light- like he was a dream. 

He stood and smiled at her as she rubbed her fingers on her palms and settled herself into the bed- the bed, she thought suddenly and with a pounding in her chest. 

“Tidus, I think I should tell you that- that I- oh, and I-” 

Tidus’s eyebrows drew together, and then widened. The spell for automatic restoration had gone. “Oh, oh no- I was just making you warm. Promise we- I’ll, I will ask you if-. You’re in charge.” 

Yuna turned her head, “As-as your summoner?” Her voice was pitched in concern.

Tidus laughed, “You know, that doesn’t mean much to me,” but he bowed, and winked at her “-but it could.”

“No, please- I’m Yuna. Just Yuna.” She shook her head. Seymour would address her as Lady, Lady Summoner, Lady Yuna- everything but just Yuna. Tidus brought her more tea. She wrapped her hands around the mug as he settled in next to her and tundra eyes of her deceased husband-by-force melted away back into her memories. 

“Better?” He said, smiling.

“Yes- but- I don’t know how you are to kiss me with a tea mug.” 

“Oh well- “ he put his mug of tea down, “May I?” he pointed to her shoulder comically.

She nodded, giddy. 

He leaned back, and asked if he would kiss her in the same places. He looked serious. 

She nodded and he took her mug, setting it down so it made no sound and then turned back to her, saying gently, “Over the towel?”

Yuna felt her face heating and the throb intensify. She bit her lip and reached for the knot over her breast under the robe. He watched raptly, his mouth parted. She felt the cool air wash over her briefly before he drew up the blankets around her and leaned her back against the headboard wall. 

Her most secret parts were protected by a triangle of her bottom undergarments, but like her breasts, it was a paltry cover. His eyes she felt physically upon her skin and her innards crooked into a tight coil.

He did not ask her about removing the last of her coverings. She was glad she had kept them behind the divider. He positioned himself cautiously, hovering over her, watching her for any hesitation. He whispered if it was okay that he straddled her, his thighs taught, kneeling. And then he followed her exact pattern that she had kissed him in, slower. He stroked her while he did it, worshipfully. She felt like electric currents were pleasantly coursing through her, almost a blessed mix of her prayer and just before she called the element thunder to her fingertips. 

She let out a mewling pant, and embarrassed she covered her mouth. 

Tidus looked up, his lower lip still skidding along the bone ridge of her hip. He smiled beautifically. “Enjoying yourself?”

Yuna felt a battle wage within her, shame at enjoying herself and the spirited will to seize this moment. 

“Good-” he said roughly, “I’m glad.” He crawled back up to her face and stroked her eyebrow and her cheek and she felt comforted, swayed by his relentless gentleness.

He whispered in her ear, breath hot, much hotter than Seymours had ever been, the heat was practically radiating out of his pores, “Can you show me where I can kiss you again?” 

Yuna, a pink sensation bubbling, and happiness churning in her belly, said, “No.” 

Tidus, extracting himself off of her, kissed the top of her head, “Alright.” 

She patted his head, then hurriedly ran her fingers through his fine hair to hold him. She said, “Show me how you want to touch me.” 

Tidus eyes widened, “Are- are you sure?” 

She nodded, she trusted him. 

Tidus said, “I won’t take off your clothing, I promise.” 

He shifted, moving around before his warm hands found her thighs. She gasped and he slowly rubbed and massaged them, going up to cup her buttocks, then slid back down. 

He said, “I used to - well, I got a lot of massages after practice. I really like how they feel. Tell me if it’s too much.” 

The professional blitzer turned her warrior ran his hands along her legs, friction hot. He pressed his knuckles into the souls of her feet and up along her calves then kneaded her hips. 

She was a puddle, a melted pile of flesh, utterly relaxed. He moved his hand and brushed his thumb into the crest of her hip. She let out a little sound again, and could feel his smile as he pressed his mouth to her hip. He lapped at her skin and she felt the building pressure within her become wet. 

She opened her eyes when he moved her leg up, eyes affixed on her knee. She breathed heavily as the air hit her inner heat and he looked at her, question in his eyes. She swallowed and nodded. 

He pressed his lips to the bend of her knee, laying it down and setting his mouth, just damp upon it and breathing. He ran a finger between the sensitive soft skin and said, “So smooth, so soft.” 

She breathed in, becoming colder and moving to cover her chest. She pressed against her hard nipples and found pleasure there, too. 

He drew his fingertips back up over her body, “Cold?” and he drew covers back over them.

She helped his efforts and his gaze was on her breasts. She watched him as he breathed, and then flicked his eyes as her, lowering his head slowly. She nodded, fearful but determined. A desperate sort of desire outweighed her sense of precariousness.

He lowered his mouth to her nipple, hidden beyond the cloth of her black undergarment.  He soaked it, and the slick seeped through. He drew her breast inwards, in a gentle but commanding pressure, tantalising a small feeling that made her lower back squirm. He rubbed the sides of her breast, and suckled. He pulled and pinched with his mouth and then flicked with the tip of his tongue. 

She gasped, and panted from this strange kind of beautiful sensation, and before she unrolled her eyes he moved his mouth to the mound of her other breast, kissing along the lines of cloth. He gently pet her pearl-like nipple he had teased and taunted with one hand, and with his other hand he brushed along the curves and press of her other breast. She said, whimpering, “Please.” She watched as he smiled and latched onto the other breast and she raised her hips for a friction she didn’t know she was searching for. She found it and Tidus grunted. 

She returned her hips back to the bed. Tidus released her, only the top of his head visible. He muttered, “That- that was good. If you- want to do it again.”

“O-okay.” 

She rubbed her thighs together tightly, and Tidus bent over her again, moving his hands down her sides and his face near her neck and he kissed and stroked her. She whispered, yes- yes, a sibilant repetition as she ground against him, her hands finding purchase along the dips and curves of the muscles in his back, and found a warm, thick pressure that slid between the crest of her thighs. 

She gasped, and a stroke of fear touched her, and Tidus made a small breathy grunt. Before she fell too quickly into a memory, he straightened his arms, posing his body rigid as a plank above her, “Okay, hey Yuna, I think that I need to change position or I’m- I’m not going to be so in control, okay?”

He breathed, closing his eyes and returning to his cheerful state as he looked down at her, she hoped he couldn’t tell she was throbbing, an edge away from begging him to lay over her again.

Tidus, flushed and heaving, slid his body down. “Can I try something? Like what- I did up here?” He moved his hands over her still sensitive nipples and she gave a wet cry. He moved his hands away, watching her face as he slid his fingers down her stomach until they hovered at her undergarment line. He twitched a smile, brushing a finger over the cloth. Her head felt cloudy and feverish. She nodded. 

He said, “Are you sure?” 

She nodded, but he shook his head, “I need to hear you say it.” 

“Y-Yes please. Please.” She said, and she was proud it did not come out as weak as she felt.

He was a flurry of movement. He moved her body so she was propped up over pillows. He smiled reassuringly as he adjusted her. She felt propped up, one leg higher than the other. He spread her legs, the inside muscles of her legs straining between reluctance and eagerness. She felt exposed and exhilaratingly fearful of what was to happen next. He slid until he was nearly off the bed and kept his eyes on hers as he leaned into her core and breathed. 

She shuddered.

He said into her, “Say it again.” 

“Please.” She said politely.

He said, “Tell me what you want.” 

She obliged. “Kiss me.” 

He pressed his mouth to her core and kissed. He massaged her hidden lips with his, and wetted the cloth and moved his tongue in ways that made her back arch and her feet stretch and curl. She let out a cry. 

He tapped his fingers along the tendons that connected her intimate parts. He pressed and pulled and sucked and she was driven to a quickening and she wanted- she wanted to be filled. 

“Ti-Tidus?” She said, and he released her immediately. 

“Mmm-” throaty, looking at her face. 

“I need- I need,” she swallowed searching for her words, a vocabulary she didn’t have. Her head whirled with thoughts and worries, “I need but I can’t- I just can’t.” 

He nodded, “Hey, yeah- no it’s okay. Do you want me to stop?” 

Yuna said quickly, many times, no, but then scrambled to explain a change, her need, but it was stuttering. 

He said quietly, interrupting her slew with one word then a question- a finger? Just one. 

She reasoned, a finger wasn’t the same as his member- it wasn’t the same, but it would enter her, and then did that mean that she was no longer pure- no longer- she couldn't say because the ideas she had grown with had always framed this experience with a husband and she would never have one.  Not anymore. Not so close to the end. Not as a traitor to the Church which would marry them.

He was waiting, covering her with his body, looking at her, watching her think. She thought about the people, the fayth, the Church. She thought about how everything she had been told was never upheld. She remembered her aeons and it was Shiva’s echo, open, open yourself. 

She nodded- and his mouth returned to her, over the cloth until that heat built back up and she could no longer control her sounds and her hands rubbed themselves into the blankets and tightened into fists and then, he stopped. He drew her underwear aside and the cool air of the room pressed against her- and she picked her head up to look at him and he watched her, watch him. He breathed and she flexed, coiled and clenched. He breathed and placed his lips on her quim. 

It was then much more, and he slid his tongue out of his mouth and licked her, long and wet and slow. It was a silk softer than the brush of a stream over her fingertips, it was a pressure as heavy as the air that pushed against her face as she sped through the world. She took in her breath and he lapped at her and drew circles over a particular spot. 

He drew away when her sound came in a continuous whining thread that wheedled as she twisted her hips. He rubbed her as he panted for breath, moving his jaw, and then spread her inner lips and she stilled. He hesitated, she felt his fingertip at her entrance and she watched him, giving him permission first and then at his stare, commanding him. 

He eased his fingertip forward. Nearly breaching the space she wanted filled.

She commanded and said, please.

He sunk in a finger, pressing up along her top walls strong and clean, and she felt her flesh close around his finger. 

He hissed and then achingly slow drew his finger out and her walls clutched at him. He pressed his thumb on the pearl at the top of her slick and sunk his finger in again and she cried out. She opened her eyes to see again, to witness what and who was drawing this out of her.  

His other hand gripped his member and squeezed, pressing it in quick turns up and down quickly over his linen.

Sopping and feeling her own juices against the press of her buttocks and thighs, she was possessed by a mad desire to see it, to see him, and she placed her hand on his, and he yanked the linen wrap off of his hips and she quickly drew in a breath.

She took in his veins, and thickness, the shape color and curve of him. She reached out and his finger sank in again, his face slack and his mouth curled as she reacted. 

He pulled again on himself, and she placed a hand over his again, and he switched so she was touching it and he was guiding her hand. 

She felt the smooth velvet of his skin and the stiff muscle of his blood swollen penis and was caught in an alien fascination.

She felt it strange and foreign, and was explorative as she escaped his hand and moved to his other skin and flesh.

He moaned and panted and he drew his finger in circles on her mound and she cried out as a whip of electric sensation cracked through her. He went to his knees and placed his face between her thighs once more. 

She was sitting on the edge of the bed and he kissed her again, impatient this time, and she felt a stir and then his tongue plunged into her and rubbed against the fleshy net atop her wall. He whispered into her nothing she could understand and built his speed. 

She cried out, overwhelmed and placed her hands over his head. She ran her fingers into his hair and he sucked as he dipped his tongue in rapidly, in and out, and in and out and then entered his finger once more, lapping her pearl with his tongue. 

Slowly sensations seemed to dim except for a pleasant pressure that roiled and waved. 

Quickly, a wave crashed around her and she cried out, nearly a yell, and her body seized. She writhed in pleasure. 

She lay there on the bed, spent and panting. Tidus covered her with a blanket and stumbled over to the wash basin. 

She heard water running, but couldn’t bring herself to move or to inquire at what he was doing. She heard a quick slap of flesh against flesh several times and then Tidus groan and shudder. She covered her face with her hands and knew that he had taken care of himself. 

She sat up, and fluids leaked from her and she tried to gather it up using the linen to both cover herself and her mess.  

Tidus poked out behind the divider. Seeing her up he rushed to her, hastened. “Hey- I’m pouring a pitcher of warm water if you want to wash up again. You - uh, you should pee.” 

“Wh-what?” Yuna said, she had never had a man talk to her about bowel movements before. She was flabbergasted enough that the haze cleared a bit and embarrassment oozed over her. 

“Yeah- it’s just- maybe I heard wrong, but it sort of purified stuff down there?” Tidus said, scratching his head. 

Yuna nodded jerkily. 

Tidus smiled and touched her face, “I can wait over here if you want to bathe and stuff alone.” 

“I’ll- I’ll relieve myself, alone. Then, you can join me?” She said.

Yuna traded spaces with him and was thankful for the iron screen. She heard Tidus crunch into another fruit and move sheets and pillows around. She flushed, washed her hands fighting the blush that he had heard her relieve herself and then she peered out behind the screen. Tidus stood, hand on his naked back. She saw his member and flesh and thought him all too real for a moment. She would be naked as well. She put her thumb nail at her teeth for a second before taking off the damp breast bindings and sliding off her underwear. Nervous again, she turned on the water then heard Tidus pad around the screen.

He hovered. She felt her heart beating and somehow couldn't summon him on her own. He asked, "Yuna?"

"Yes." She said, quickly.

He came around the corner slowly and a small smile tilted his face.

She poured the soap into her hands and held it out to him. He took her hands and held them, then ran the scent and suds over her arms. He stroked her. Confused, but warmed Yuna let him. He let the water stream over her, and laved his hands over her breasts and around her body. She found herself throbbing again, wondering if she'd ever be able to shower diligently again.

Tidus laughed when her eyes closed and drew her close, the slick of their skin washing together in the pleasant heat. She felt his hardness move along her buttocks and he grazed his fingers between her flesh. she pressed in. Steam layered along the ceiling. She turned to him, moving her hand to stroke him, running the suds in between his legs. He seized in a breath, his hands at her face, pushing her hair back.

She tilted her head, withdrawing.

Tidus, sheepish, twisted his head and pushed back his hair, "Just ignore it- it does it's own thing most times."

Yuna was curious and asked, "Won't- doesn't it-?"

Tidus shook his head and hugged her again, "No, I just don't know if I have another... you know, round of that left in me."

Yuna moved the suds over his skin, worry quickly nulling her pleasant thrumming. She hmm'd and Tidus kissed the top of her head. "I would love to eat and talk more with you." She eased a little, embarrassed that she would continue to wonder.

He gestured to the spout, asking if she was finished and then they went about collecting their linens. She found the experience freeing, and emboldened she left her robe open, smiling a little abashedly.

He laughed and shrugged, "Cheese or bread first? Too bad I can't cook for you."

"Cook for me?"

Yuna wanted to ask many things, but her thoughts were orbiting around what he meant that he didn't have another round in him. He didn't appear tired, in fact he was full of energy- he leapt to the fruit plate and moved the pillows to lay on them.

"Oh yeah- I suppose this isn't my house though so it's not a polite thing to do."

Yuna giggled, "After...? You cook?"

Tidus held out the plate to her and she took a proper seat across from him, folding her robe over herself. Ideas of what his parties were like trickled into her head- and possibilities, the knowlege that he lived very... freely in Zanarkand took root. 

She divided her bread and cheese, glancing at him. He sighed, a blush finally staining his cheeks, "Yeahhh-"

Yuna thought, since he brought it up, it was a better question to ask rather than press him on why he didn't want to... continue. She felt guilt layer over her, seeing herself as greedy, lascivious and so to distract the mounting self-deprecation, "Is it...a long tradition for you to cook after you... kiss... like how we?" She couldn't finish, feeling the guilt and shame stain her neck and ears in blush. She fit a cheese slice and bread into her mouth.

Stiltingly, he rubbed his head and adjusted himself. "Well, Ace players are popular... in Zanarkand. Not- that, well. Zanarkand lives- lived, and breathed blitzball. There wasn't a-" he held up his fingers. "'Church.'" 

Yuna chewed and swallowed, then slowly as he edged towards the cheese admitted, "That, makes sense."

She wondered about marriage, about propriety- all the rules and expectations the Church of Yu Yevon placed on their followers.

"I wasn't bad - I mean, Auron was always hanging around and you know how he is." Tidus chuffed and gave a lopsided smile, his eyebrow pleading.

Yuna choked, "I don't-"

Tidus laughed, then tried to imitate Auron, sitting up and covering an eye, one arm he slug in his robe. "Discipline is non- negotiable whatever you choose to learn- do it well and with honor or not at all."

Yuna sputtered out bread crumbs, laughing, covering her mouth quickly. Tidus laughed with her, saying "Real quote, I swear." 

"That was an awful likeness."

Tidus sighed and tossed up his hands, "Eh, well. I just don't get him most days." He said, looking down at the fruit selecting his next piece. "I won't say that being on the Zanarkand Abes was like being a summoner- but people wanted to get to know-" He shrugged and then paused, Yuna listening carefully.

He swallowed and said, "I just hope that... my 'education' was- useful, for you."

Yuna turned red, drinking out of her tea cup. "Um. Yes."

"Good." He slid next to her.

She sighed into him, "Tell me more about Zanarkand."

"Sure- what do you want to know?"

"Where... would you take me?"

"After the blitz stadium, this dessert place. They had every flavor-"

She bit her lip, thankful and yet embarrassed somehow. It seemed like an escape, a life like what he had promised her in Zanarkand. It felt like they were completely alone. And she was free.

They had more tea and after their nightly ablutions he beckoned her into bed, an arm around her as they fell to sleep, skin against skin. 

Belgemine greeted them in the morning, her face stone-like. 

“I see you rested well.” Her voice was not kind, nor playful. But Yuna blushed anyway. Belgemine stood as a ghostly faint breeze moved her robes. There was a cry as a voice hailed an entity, a mournful string instrument reverberated through the chamber. 

It smelled of cherry blossoms and melancholy.

They learned then that there was an aeon that they had not yet gotten. The eyes and armor of the aeon she faced reminded her of broken promises, bitter duty and strength used beyond human comprehension. It ended her feeling of vacation with a single thumb on the hilt of his blade. In her training, she had not learned of this aeon. For reasons she wanted to demand, it was kept from her.

She called to her Bahamut. She knew peace, knew pleasure, but had a brighter desire for a Nirvana that lasted beyond her small, selfish indulgence. She would banish the dark cloud of loss and death for all. She would fight so that everyone could feel the mana of pure joy and nectar of sweet freedom. She wanted her dream to last forever, but she knew that there was only so much she could control. So, she would control her power, her will, place her faith in her own strength.

Bahamut lived in her head, and as he slammed down as a thousand weights grounded her, steeled her. She defeated the unknown aeon, and Bahamut looked at her and she felt his roar within her.

After Belgemine bequeathed them with a thousand gifts, their chocobo Beau heavily ladened with old temple offerings and a collection of things that she told them she had no use for, she held them with a prim voice. 

“You must go to where the diamond clarity reflects infinite mystery. Where you first learned of a story beyond that which you had been first told. That is the key to unlocking the cloudy mirror.” Belgemine said, a little irritated that Tidus seemed to look lost. 

Tidus turned to Yuna and she looked at him, she softened but a drop of sadness seeped deep into her.

Yuna bowed to Belgemine, "I know.” Yuna told her and turned to cross the bridge back.