Family... A big one. It must have been warm in this cottage. [ hm. It's just two of them so it seems like a lot of space. ] You should invite some to your cottage more often, Lord Shale.
[yes i would love to memshare i just didn't want to force you........you can give me one, too.]
I'll try to do that. I forgot what it's like in here, I think. It's nice.
[but oops here's a bubble!
You step not so much into a memory but into a place, but a place so deeply filled with love and memory that every stone and leaf of it bubbles with familiarity. A feeling of peace, of home, of nature. You are outside to it, and you tend to it. You walk through what is both a verdant garden and an ancient graveyard, caring for the plants that grow here, checking the growth of plants on the plots surrounding you. Harvesting, gardening, thinking.
Here is what you see:
Behind you is what may at first look to be a stone cottage, but it is something older, something that comes to a steeple at the top. It’s a temple, made of stone, old and ancient. Vines crawl across its exterior, grow out of the cracks, and a layer of moss and lichen colors the stone a deep green. The open windows of the temple are overgrown with vines as well, and the wide wooden door at the front looks cracked and warped with its own layer of green and pink moss. Surrounding the temple are rows and rows of gravestones. Most are so old that no names can be read on the stone, though others are newer, fresher. The graveyard looks well tended, but not manicured. There are plants growing everywhere, wild, from the earth of the graves. Vegetables, fruits, lush vegetation and flowers, mushrooms and fungi. All well cared for, springing from the gravesoil.
Aside from the ring of gravestones, this “garden” is more swamp like. It’s temperate and bordering on humid, lush with vegetation. Flowers of many different varieties and meant for many different climates grow freely here, almost as though protected by some magic. It is dark here, due to the many, many overgrown trees that surround this place, the canopy overhead projecting shadows interspersed with sunlight. There are a few crystal clear pools of water, one steaming with heat and another welling up from a spring, deep blue and cold looking. There are smaller pools, as well, and bits of bog where the soft greens and browns of compost fall into green, thick, algae covered water.
But outside this immediate area of lush, beautiful vegetation, about a dozen yards away, rings of iron fencing surround the grove. There are two concentric rings of fencing, the furthest one about fifty yards from the stone temple. It is immediately clear why these rings exist, because past the fencing, dark and twisted bramble and razor like gray-purple thorn vines are encroaching, overtaking the grove. The outermost fence has been entirely covered in these vines, overtaken, now part of a twisted forest that exudes the energy of death and decay. The inner fence has been partially overtaken as well, purple vines wrapped around it in places, bringing down parts of the fence, gnarled branches reaching over from dying trees.
When you look upon this forest, you feel a deep sense of despair, fear, and revulsion at the dead forest. You love nature, you even love the decay that rots and dissolves what is old and dead and from that rot grows something new. But what’s happening to the forest beyond the fence is not that type of decay. It is a death that exists outside the natural order of death, death from which nothing will recover or grow, the feeling of curse and blight, magic that warps. It feels wrong, and it is growing closer and closer each season, overtaking this grove that you love.
You are here with your sister, or the sort of pinkish greenish blur of wild, bright energy that you believe to be your sister, though how distinct she is in this memory comes and goes. You get an impression now and then, pink hair streaked with color, a wide smile, a mischievous laugh.
It's only the two of you now. How long has it been now since you'd built the second fence, and four other pairs of hands joined along with both of you? At least a few dozen seasons now. The grief you feel towards the parts of the grove you lost to the forest mingle with the grief at the thought of your older sister's stubbornness, how mad your brother always made you. Your aunt's wise advice, dad's cooking, the sound of mom's voice... The blighted forest has long overgrown what you built together, and you and your younger sister and now working on a third fence, an inner ring that will perhaps protect your little patch of earth a dozen seasons longer. It's taken you many, many days not just to put it up but to infuse it with the magic it needs to protect the grove, and it's still only halfway done.
Meanwhile, this morning, you find some of the bramble that's crossed the second fence trailing out like a grasping hand, reaching for the nearest little patch of gravestones. You find your sister near the patch, clearing the bramble, a seriousness to her posture and to the expression you can make out.
"C..." You know she's addressing you, but it's faint somehow. You don't remember. "Look."
Her voice reflects the dismay you feel when you see how the little burst of zinnias that grow from the fresh plot out here have gone black, started to wilt. It shouldn't be this close. You have a sacred duty to protect the dead who have been brought here to be cared for and honored in your temple.
"Only this much," you reassure her, softly. "Once the fence is done, it'll hold off. Long enough for help."
Help should be on its way. Help was sent for a while ago. Too long ago. The last one to leave - dad - how long ago even was it? None of you know exactly what this garden needs to save it, so you were expecting goodbye to last a while. But none of them have ever returned, and on dark days, you can't help but think that they must have all...
You shrug off the thought, notice she's trying to get your attention. "I had the dream again," she says, a little hesitant. "The zinnias were in it. I think maybe it's time, C..."
No. The thought is strong enough, if unpleasant, to shake you out of those other more distant fears. You remember every time one of them left. First your mother and your aunt, a formidable pair together, so very long ago now that you were still adolescent, knowing that you children would be safe here together. A little after the second fence went up, your sister left, always the fiercest of all of you, brave and tough enough to take it alone. Your brother had wanted to go then, before her, and it had been an argument, and then when she didn't return he barely waited a full four seasons before he was insisting it was his turn. You don't know if you even believe he waited to be called to it. Dad did wait, maybe longer than he was supposed to, even, but the second fence started to fail and it was time.
The next should be you by age but by temperament...everyone's always known you are the one who is supposed to stay. The best caretaker, a good gardener, good at talking to the ones who come here to bury their dead. A homebody, never inclined to leave. Your little sister has always had dreams of seeing the world. She'd never abandon you, she may be a pain but she's too good-hearted for that, but you know she's stayed only for your sake, so you won't be left alone. The calling each member of your family has felt, to venture out into the world to find a cure for the blighted forest and save your home, seems to have skipped over you and gone to her instead.
You were raised with a strong faith and a belief in listening for signs and guidance and you know the dreams matter, but even so...
"Yeah," you have to agree, because it's your responsibility to agree. "I'll be okay. You're doing..." you hesitate, but make yourself continue. "You're doing the right thing."
You look at her, and you can see for a moment a more distinct image. Her face, like yours, with the gentle animal nose and floppy ears, pink hair and gray skin, kind and open. You try not to resent the relief she feels, and try not to think about how badly you're going to miss her bright smile.
[ Nice, but what the fuck I’m so sad… Aymeric is also sad. To see the blight slowly makes its way into this beautiful grove, to know the family has left one by one and to have never returned.
For the holder of this memory to stay behind, alone, it’s a sad fate and he wonders what comes next. It takes him a moment and for the question he waits before touching the bubble to dispel of it whole. ]
... She has a beautiful smile, Lord Shale. I hope you two reunite once more.
[ But since the bubble is still here, he touches it. The scene sets.
Dressed in the clothes your parents bought for you, you walk the streets of Ishgard, your home. Her walls tower over you, majestic and great. The knights, too, tower over you and you think of when the time comes where you'll too grow to reach their heights. The men and women who stand ever still, hands on their blades or shields, watching over the Pillars, intimidate you yet you feel swelling admiration all the same.
How could you not? You're only a child.
Because you are a child, your parents encourage to make friends with the other noble children. They would be playing in the Hoplon they told you, so you make some hesitant steps there... You feel fairly nervous, forgetting all of your etiquette lessons, but you muster all of your courage to approach them.
Fortunately for you, the other children are tired of pleasantries and decorum. You can talk to them and play like status doesn't matter. You soon forget what noble Houses they come from, lost in all the laughter and fun. It would have been a good day, one you plan to tell your parents, until you catch whispers of adults who pass by.
"Isn't that Thordan's alleged bastard?"
"I thought that was hearsay."
"And yet he wants to ascend the throne as Archbishop..."
"These men who claim to value 'piety' never truly practice the virtue. 'Tis all superficial."
"I see naught wrong here. The child was born ere his ascendance and passed off to the Borels."
They're not talking about you, are they?
The other children don't seem to understand, either, but it becomes palpable to you when one of their mothers come to snatch them by the wrist.
"Don't play with him, dear. You'll become dirty and it will bring shame to our House."
She looks at you when she ushers those harsh words. At that moment, you think you understand a little of what's going on. Your parents console you when you confront them on this, telling you no matter what you are still their son. You still think about the whispers you heard that day...
These rumors, they follow you for years, and they grow in number. From the same generation, then your own when your peers no longer have that childish naivety to cloud their eyes.
For all of your efforts, you will be labeled a bastard — belittled, overlooked, and unwanted son of the Holy See of Ishgard.
anyway, shale looks like they're going to say something, thank him for his kindness, but instead they're thrown into this unpleasant memory. it's not hard to see this kind of cruelty and then understand the shape of the man aymeric is, the type of person who treats people with as much careful consideration as he does.
it's difficult to know how to talk about these things.]
...People can really be at their worst when they think they're right.
It really is hard to respond to some memories. Happier ones are better and he wishes those showed more often, but i hei did not write them. With the bubble gone, he continues to tend to the shrooms. Would they make compost? He isn't a green thumb, he wouldn't know. ]
They are, but there are many facets to man. I've seen ere the same who sneered at me rise to the cause, sharing the same love for our nation that I harbor.
[ All is good. ]
... Do you remember more of your sister? Or is that the only memory you have now?
[well, that's quite an obvious desire not to talk about it. with some people, shale might push, but aymeric is a little different. he seems to have his own way of dealing with these things, and even if it might do him good to talk, shale is also...less worried that his emotions are a ticking time bomb.]
Sure. People who do one cruel thing aren't always all bad. [...] Do you have a big family, too? [whether it's a blood family or not isn't really relevant to the question. but they will go back to helping to clean.]
I've been remembering a little bit more about my family. She's the clearest. It was her hat. Or - not hers. A present I got for her, if I saw her again.
You may ask all you want, Lord Shale. It is only fair when I come and ask you a number of questions already.
[ The awkward pause was the signal. They can ask him and he's open to that, but they are right to assume. He's a competent 32 year-old and he has outgrown these issues. Sanest adult man I've ever played in my life. ]
... I wouldn't say big, but my adoptive parents made up for it in kindness and love. [ ... ] Mayhap I could have called a friend my brother once.
This may be profane, but... Did you eventually leave the temple? Your family is out there.
It must have been hard to leave all you've known. 'Twas your home, after all, but a door opens when another closes. I won't be presumptuous to assume where you will go, where you've gone, what you've found, and what you haven't, but... I do hope you find home again.
[ With the mushrooms gathered, he places them. I guess on this table and starts dusting. ]
'Tis natural to be curious of your friends, is it not?
[ A small laugh. ]
... I love my home, Ishgard, dearly yet every once in a while I feel the pangs of wanderlust. 'Twas after seeing the isles that float in the skies. Would that I could show you the Churning Mists. They have interesting flora.
[a little softer and fonder at that, because they still understand why aymeric wants to poke, but he's very kind about it.]
I'd like to see it. [...] I've never really been curious about the world. Or, well, maybe that's not true, but I've never felt I had to see it for myself to be curious about it. My sisters, both of them...they both wanted to leave. Not for the reasons they ultimately did, just...if nothing had happened, they still probably would have left someday.
I know that I did leave, and that...I have a sense that time passed, but it's fitting that the memories that come back are all. Home.
I'll peruse the library to see if there are any books on Eorzean geography. They may have pictures.
[ Wider smile! ]
Some souls will always be drawn to the calls of adventure. I find it in myself, but I also understand the comforts of home. I can't imagine being away from Ishgard overlong; homesickness would strike me, surely. I suppose in that way, we are similar, Lord Shale.
It may be... Unpleasant for those who prefer lush and dense forests. It may come as a surprise, but once upon a time Ishgard was surrounded with bountiful trees.
[ A nod, but he grows quiet ]
... 'Tis hard, but change comes whether one wills it or not.
[ It's interesting to him since so many people here are very not catholic, by that I mean without belief. ]
Is there aught stopping you from creating home again? The blight may take what you once knew, but it cannot take your heart as long as you hold onto it.
[they are also very not catholic, but are very fantasy buddhism-adjacent? does that count?]
...The thing about our home is, it isn't just our home. It's a temple, one an ancestor of mine was told to build thousands of years ago. And like a lot of temples, it's also a graveyard. A hero of ancient days was buried there, and since that time, we have buried those who have done good in their lives and who are brought to our door. By the grace of our god, their bodies have become fertile soil, and from that soil the garden has bloomed. And we are tasked to care for this garden.
We could leave and find another home, and found a new temple. The god we follow is not the sort who would want us to die for a futile duty. Rather the opposite; nature teaches us that some things are inevitable, and all things have their time. To love her is to know that eventually she will take back from you what it is you love, because that is the order of things, but something new will grow to take its place.
In this case, though, it feels wrong to...abandon something so sacred, the final resting place of so many, to a blight that comes from outside of nature. It felt like we had to try, that this what what she was asking of us.
In Eorzea, we believe in the Twelve, but Ishgard specifically reveres Halone, the Fury. She is the mover of glaciers, the goddess of war and wisdom, and we believe she led us to Coerthas. [ ff14 just gave them athena ] Not many moons ago, my nation was commanded by the Church, with the archbishop as its head. Much of her doctrine had been twisted for the war's narrative, but with reformation the clergy are restoring the faith to what it should be.
In my pursuit for change, the Church and the myths it sowed was brought to light. It left so many of our pious shattered... But came it the end an era of lies and violence. Mayhap I am not worthy to pray to the Fury now, but I still find myself clasping my hands during the blackest of nights.
[ Ultimately: ]
I would like to think in both of our pursuits, we are still honoring our patron... And that they understand. May the cure or answer be waiting for you, Lord Shale, and if it is here in the Prism, then may you find it.
[shale listens. religion is, it turns out, one of the things they care about most deeply. though the Fury sounds like a very different god than the one they worship, faith itself is something they understand quite well.]
I'd like to think so, too.
[quietly, after a moment.]
It's hard to imagine the god who wouldn't be honored by your service, that you have sought to do right by her, whatever you have felt right may be.
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saturations) wrote2022-02-14 03:52 pm
no subject
[they think for a long moment.]
...I think it's. Family. I had a big family.
no subject
Family... A big one. It must have been warm in this cottage. [ hm. It's just two of them so it seems like a lot of space. ] You should invite some to your cottage more often, Lord Shale.
no subject
I'll try to do that. I forgot what it's like in here, I think. It's nice.
[but oops here's a bubble!
the memory fades.]
Clarabelle...
no subject
For the holder of this memory to stay behind, alone, it’s a sad fate and he wonders what comes next. It takes him a moment and for the question he waits before touching the bubble to dispel of it whole. ]
… Is that your sister’s name, Lord Shale?
no subject
...Yeah. That's my younger sister.
no subject
[ But since the bubble is still here, he touches it. The scene sets.
Dressed in the clothes your parents bought for you, you walk the streets of Ishgard, your home. Her walls tower over you, majestic and great. The knights, too, tower over you and you think of when the time comes where you'll too grow to reach their heights. The men and women who stand ever still, hands on their blades or shields, watching over the Pillars, intimidate you yet you feel swelling admiration all the same.
How could you not? You're only a child.
Because you are a child, your parents encourage to make friends with the other noble children. They would be playing in the Hoplon they told you, so you make some hesitant steps there... You feel fairly nervous, forgetting all of your etiquette lessons, but you muster all of your courage to approach them.
Fortunately for you, the other children are tired of pleasantries and decorum. You can talk to them and play like status doesn't matter. You soon forget what noble Houses they come from, lost in all the laughter and fun. It would have been a good day, one you plan to tell your parents, until you catch whispers of adults who pass by.
"Isn't that Thordan's alleged bastard?"
"I thought that was hearsay."
"And yet he wants to ascend the throne as Archbishop..."
"These men who claim to value 'piety' never truly practice the virtue. 'Tis all superficial."
"I see naught wrong here. The child was born ere his ascendance and passed off to the Borels."
They're not talking about you, are they?
The other children don't seem to understand, either, but it becomes palpable to you when one of their mothers come to snatch them by the wrist.
"Don't play with him, dear. You'll become dirty and it will bring shame to our House."
She looks at you when she ushers those harsh words. At that moment, you think you understand a little of what's going on. Your parents console you when you confront them on this, telling you no matter what you are still their son. You still think about the whispers you heard that day...
These rumors, they follow you for years, and they grow in number. From the same generation, then your own when your peers no longer have that childish naivety to cloud their eyes.
you will be labeled a bastard — belittled, overlooked, and unwanted son
of the Holy See of Ishgard.
Children always have to learn things too fast. ]
no subject
anyway, shale looks like they're going to say something, thank him for his kindness, but instead they're thrown into this unpleasant memory. it's not hard to see this kind of cruelty and then understand the shape of the man aymeric is, the type of person who treats people with as much careful consideration as he does.
it's difficult to know how to talk about these things.]
...People can really be at their worst when they think they're right.
no subject
It really is hard to respond to some memories. Happier ones are better and he wishes those showed more often, but i hei did not write them. With the bubble gone, he continues to tend to the shrooms. Would they make compost? He isn't a green thumb, he wouldn't know. ]
They are, but there are many facets to man. I've seen ere the same who sneered at me rise to the cause, sharing the same love for our nation that I harbor.
[ All is good. ]
... Do you remember more of your sister? Or is that the only memory you have now?
no subject
Sure. People who do one cruel thing aren't always all bad. [...] Do you have a big family, too? [whether it's a blood family or not isn't really relevant to the question. but they will go back to helping to clean.]
I've been remembering a little bit more about my family. She's the clearest. It was her hat. Or - not hers. A present I got for her, if I saw her again.
This was the last time I saw her, I think.
no subject
[ The awkward pause was the signal. They can ask him and he's open to that, but they are right to assume. He's a competent 32 year-old and he has outgrown these issues. Sanest adult man I've ever played in my life. ]
... I wouldn't say big, but my adoptive parents made up for it in kindness and love. [ ... ] Mayhap I could have called a friend my brother once.
This may be profane, but... Did you eventually leave the temple? Your family is out there.
no subject
Glad to hear it. [anyway shale also does not really care to be asked questions like this, but they understand why aymeric would ask.]
I did. A long time later. Eventually the forest started growing over even that fence, and it was time.
no subject
It must have been hard to leave all you've known. 'Twas your home, after all, but a door opens when another closes. I won't be presumptuous to assume where you will go, where you've gone, what you've found, and what you haven't, but... I do hope you find home again.
[ With the mushrooms gathered, he places them. I guess on this table and starts dusting. ]
Does this subject make you uncomfortable?
no subject
[they pause, despite still helping with the work to tidy up.]
But I understand why you ask. We didn't remember any of this, and you're curious what it changes. It's alright.
no subject
[ A small laugh. ]
... I love my home, Ishgard, dearly yet every once in a while I feel the pangs of wanderlust. 'Twas after seeing the isles that float in the skies. Would that I could show you the Churning Mists. They have interesting flora.
no subject
[a little softer and fonder at that, because they still understand why aymeric wants to poke, but he's very kind about it.]
I'd like to see it. [...] I've never really been curious about the world. Or, well, maybe that's not true, but I've never felt I had to see it for myself to be curious about it. My sisters, both of them...they both wanted to leave. Not for the reasons they ultimately did, just...if nothing had happened, they still probably would have left someday.
I know that I did leave, and that...I have a sense that time passed, but it's fitting that the memories that come back are all. Home.
no subject
[ Wider smile! ]
Some souls will always be drawn to the calls of adventure. I find it in myself, but I also understand the comforts of home. I can't imagine being away from Ishgard overlong; homesickness would strike me, surely. I suppose in that way, we are similar, Lord Shale.
... You miss what home was?
no subject
[an exhaled sigh.]
I miss what it was. Before everyone left, before I left.
no subject
[ A nod, but he grows quiet ]
... 'Tis hard, but change comes whether one wills it or not.
no subject
[...]
The god I follow is the god of nature, but cities, places where people live, there's nothing I dislike about it. It's just not me.
no subject
[ It's interesting to him since so many people here are very not catholic, by that I mean without belief. ]
Is there aught stopping you from creating home again? The blight may take what you once knew, but it cannot take your heart as long as you hold onto it.
no subject
[they are also very not catholic, but are very fantasy buddhism-adjacent? does that count?]
...The thing about our home is, it isn't just our home. It's a temple, one an ancestor of mine was told to build thousands of years ago. And like a lot of temples, it's also a graveyard. A hero of ancient days was buried there, and since that time, we have buried those who have done good in their lives and who are brought to our door. By the grace of our god, their bodies have become fertile soil, and from that soil the garden has bloomed. And we are tasked to care for this garden.
We could leave and find another home, and found a new temple. The god we follow is not the sort who would want us to die for a futile duty. Rather the opposite; nature teaches us that some things are inevitable, and all things have their time. To love her is to know that eventually she will take back from you what it is you love, because that is the order of things, but something new will grow to take its place.
In this case, though, it feels wrong to...abandon something so sacred, the final resting place of so many, to a blight that comes from outside of nature. It felt like we had to try, that this what what she was asking of us.
no subject
This god is unlike his own, so he listens and it makes sense to him. Life is just like that. ]
She sounds like a gentle and wise god, then you a faithful follower. [ ... ] Thank you, Lord Shale, for sharing a piece of yourself with me again.
The blight. Is there a cure? Are you seeking?
no subject
[they sound happy to have shared it a little as well.]
...That's what we hope to find. Or learn. There are other temples scattered around the world.
no subject
In my pursuit for change, the Church and the myths it sowed was brought to light. It left so many of our pious shattered... But came it the end an era of lies and violence. Mayhap I am not worthy to pray to the Fury now, but I still find myself clasping my hands during the blackest of nights.
[ Ultimately: ]
I would like to think in both of our pursuits, we are still honoring our patron... And that they understand. May the cure or answer be waiting for you, Lord Shale, and if it is here in the Prism, then may you find it.
no subject
I'd like to think so, too.
[quietly, after a moment.]
It's hard to imagine the god who wouldn't be honored by your service, that you have sought to do right by her, whatever you have felt right may be.