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year 5, quarter 3
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It was a good life, surely, and it was the only one he’d ever choose for himself other than, perhaps, a Warrior of Light when the situation called for it. He was granted the freedom of the seas, the freedom of escape, the freedom to leave distant lands behind as well as all the laws that governed them. He was a pirate by choice if not by blood, but that didn’t mean it didn’t come with its own set of unavoidable problems.
For one, it meant making enemies. It meant making a lot of them.
After the horrors that he and his crew had witnessed with the Lich at Dusk Grotto, he’d granted them a week of shore leave in the city of Torensten, hoping that a few nights of ale and women might be enough to get their heads back on straight. Meanwhile, Faris found himself back on dry land, back in a city with which he had a rather complicated history, and back among the regular folks who didn’t want much for adventure.
He landed at the harbor, rebuilt after he’d seen them washed away and flooded by the foul beast Kraken. He walked through streets that had never been the same since he’d seen them smashed by the dreaded fiend Chaos. He’d been given a cape after that to mark him a hero of the people, but he kept that safely stored away, choosing instead to wear only his usual blue tunic and green scarf. He’d been around long enough to be recognized if he ran into a foul bit of luck, but most knew him only for the power of the crystal and the crimson armor he wore as a dragoon.
Or so he thought.
He noticed them in the rougher side of the harbor district, scowling at him over their mugs of ale and bottles of liquor. Those looks were dark enough to set his hair on end, and so his instincts told him to pay his tab and get moving, but then he saw them pay their own and follow. They were a rough sort, all of them men about twice the size of him, scarred by their share of battles with daggers and swords strapped to them, glinting menacingly in the hazy sunlight. Faris kept his eye on them as he moved from the harbor to the upper districts, and noticed too that most of them had the same tattoo on their upper right arms. It was a gang then or maybe a band of rival pirates or smugglers that he’d wrong somehow.
Faris could have taken them. He could have called upon the power of the crystal and struck them all down the second they thought they had him at an ambush, but that would be bringing the city more chaos and violence than it really needed. So instead, he kept walking. He hoped that the order of the upper districts would deter his stalkers, but it only made their advances more obvious. The thought of running made him curse himself as a coward, but really, it was more an act of mercy. So as soon as he turned a corner sharp enough that he thought their eyes would lose him, he ducked inside the first open shop he could find and started forward confidently as though he’d meant to be there all along.
But…where was he exactly?
The place smelled of strange spices with a kind of dark, nutty undertone that he’d never smelled before in his life. It looked like a restaurant of sorts, and all of the people around him were seated drinking some sort of darkish brown drink, eating pastries and bread off of little plates. Faris looked up at the board mounted on the wall which seemed to be a menu of sorts, but there was a little too much lettering for him to make out what for, and he certainly didn’t recognize any of the words written on it.
For not the first time, Faris felt completely and utterly out of his depth. He wondered if a life in the castle of Tycoon would have better prepared him for a place like this.
Faris took his place in line and made sure to listen well to the person in front of him so that he could repeat their order without making a fool of himself trying to read off the words on the board. He didn’t recognize the word spoken aloud either, and when the server read out the price…
They expected him to pay how much gil for a single drink? Faris wondered what it must have been spiked with to deserve a price like that.
With his order done, the man in front of him stepped to the side, and Faris hesitantly took his place. He wondered what on all the worlds a “latte” was as he said it, and he hoped he said it right. He was given the same price and had to keep from grumbling as he reached for his coin purse. He couldn’t help but notice that he looked out of place here with his uncombed, wind-swept hair and simple leather armaments made less for fashion and more for withstanding the tossing and turning of the sea. He stepped aside just like the man before him had, and when his name was called, he took his drink and found somewhere to sit with it at a table that was mostly empty.
The drink was hot. Its heat permeated the mug he’d been handed and warmed his hands like mulled wine. It was a lighter brown than the other drinks he’d seen in this place and had a strange kind of foam on top that he couldn’t identify. He knew better than to try gulping down a drink as hot as this and so he leaned back in his chair and took note of his surroundings instead.
The table he was at wasn’t entirely unoccupied. There was another man there, clad in black leather accented by white fur along the coat collar. It seemed awfully hot for a climate like this, but Faris wasn’t about to tell him so. He’d left two seats between them for the sake of politeness. ’You keep to your business and I’ll keep mine,’ it seemed to say, and he hoped it got the point across. In truth, he’d chosen this seat for its view of the door and windows. He was mostly obscured by the curtains on said windows, but if his followers got wind of his location, he’d know it in a heartbeat.
Faris kept the door in the corner of his eye as he looked down at his drink, frowning again in confusion. The harbor district really was a different world from the more well-to-do parts of the city. No matter the kingdom, no matter the city, that was something that never changed.
He hoped his crew was having a better time of it than he was. Once his drink had cooled, Faris sipped it tentatively, wincing at the bitter taste. Liquor he could take, but this? Well, he knew well enough that a man could treasure the taste of anything if he took to it often enough, but he wasn’t sure what there was to take to. Liquor could get him drunk. Why were there so many people drinking this bitter, nutty, foaming milk thing?
Faris glanced over at the leather-clad man at his table to see what he had. The man looked…pale. Like he’d seen a ghost. And then his eyes slammed open and his mug tipped over and the whole dark mess spilled over the table as the man clutched at a scar on his face, his other hand at his shuddering chest. Faris was on his feet in an instant as was one of the servers who the man waved away despite the mess. Faris rushed to his side, forgetting his pursuers in his concern.
”Are you alright, lad?” He reached out to put a hand on his shoulder, thought better of it, and then looked around until he found a stack of paper napkins not too far away and grabbed a fistful of them, bringing them back to soak up the mess of his drink. ”Let me help clean this up. You look in an awful state.” He glanced at the man again. He’d seen enough pain in his life to know the tell-tale signs of a bad memory or was the man having some sort of episode? Was he sick? Faris wondered if his abysmal powers as a white mage would be enough to save a man from a heart attack. Probably not.
He wished for what must have been the thousandth time that Lenna was here beside him.
The napkins didn’t do much but swish the spill around, getting soggy and worn down in the process. Faris took a handful of the dripping things to a trash can, grabbed some more and then went back to the task. ”I take it you didn’t much like the drink,” Faris said with a dry smirk as he glanced at the man beside him. He was young, barely older than a child it seemed, but that scar…
”What brings you to a place like this alone?” he asked just to get the man talking. Talking was the second best distraction from whatever might plague the mind, he’d found. The first being a bottle of whiskey.
Unfortunately, he didn’t have one of those tucked in his belt so a bit of conversation would have to do. ”You don’t exactly look dressed for the weather.”
[attr=class,ooc-notes]
[attr=class,tagline]@squall
Poor Squall. First his trauma and now talking to a stranger.
[attr=class,bulk] Faris liked to keep his mind open when it came to matters of his crystal. There’d once been a time when he’d been a simple pirate type – a captain but a simple one more or less. Steal what isn’t yours. Take any rich looking hostages that you happen to come across. Freedom on the open seas. There had been rules for the life he’d lived and for the reality he’d lived it in.
Then he’d had the dubious fortune of meeting Bartz Klauser.
Ever since then, ever since he’d set foot in the wind temple, ever since he’d been granted his crystal, nothing had ever been that simple again. Reality, as it turned out, liked to play jokes and throw absurdity after absurdity right in his unexpecting face.
All of that was to say that while Faris hadn’t expected the undead fiend before him to talk, it did. And it talked in something like riddles no less. There was a time that he would have been surprised, but now years after receiving his crystal and spending day after day with Bartz, Faris had learned to take it in stride.
”So it’s a home you’re after. Well, I don’t think I’ll be wanting a yellow-bellied devil like yourself for a neighbor! These caves are pirate turf. We’re not known for backing down from a fight!”
The talk, or banter really, wasn’t much for himself, but rather, for those men behind him who could still move fast enough to find shelter while he had the beast’s eye. If there were two things he’d learned about the fiend, it was that it liked flashy shows of violence and that it liked to hear its own voice. If he could just keep it talking, maybe that would buy some time.
The plan worked. For a minute or so at least. While the fiend went on about men and women and dwarves for some reason, Faris heard the telltale sound of feet scampering across the sand to safety. The fiend didn’t seem to notice either.
Not until it did.
The fiend had already raised a skeletal hand, armored glove sparking with magic. Faris had braced himself for impact or perhaps for a fair bit of dodging about the sands. It wasn’t until the devil snapped its fingers and the skies darkened and Faris felt the spark of electricity surge past him that he realized that the spell hadn’t been meant for him at all. His eyes widened as he turned his head just in time to see the grisly end of all those who hadn’t taken their sixty second opportunity to run. The injured, the brave, and those still too stunned to move were all felled as simply as paper dolls set alight by a spyglass in the sun.
He heard the screams over the rolling thunder. Their bodies shivered and twitched inhumanly, their eyes bulging, their mouths agape. ’No!’ Faris stared at them in slack-jawed horror. ’No, no, no!’ Their bodies fell one by one as though exhausted from all the seizing and flailing, some of them alight in flames. Faris smelled the sickening gristle of half-cooked meat. His stomach churned, and he felt his jaw clench, a growl in his throat.
”Why, you-!” There weren’t words for the devil before him. There weren’t any curses adequate, any foul-mouthed obscenities strong enough for the merciless, murdering, madman that ended lives with a snap of its fingers all while it kept on that offhand skeletal grin. Faris growled out every profanity he knew anyway as he charged, spear at the ready, the power of the crystal running like fire through his veins.
There was some part of him, some quiet whisper of a voice that advised that running in to strike a mage known to use electricity with a metal spear that ran straight through to his metal armor might not have been the smartest of ideas, but that whisper of sound logic was left gasping and drowning in the hot floods of rage that urged him onward. Faris was going to strike and spear and parry until he had the thing pinned to the ground. He was going to fight until he’d discovered the heart of whatever foul magic kept the undead bones animated, and then he was going to smash it into dust.
It was rage that drove him now, rage and revenge for all the men this devil had refused to show mercy. Whether luck or the fates or good wisdom was on his side, he’d see it done. And gods help anything that stood in his way.
[attr=class,bulk] Faris’ lips tightened as he watched the scene play out before him. It was like something out of a nightmare – more specifically his nightmares, the kind where he was back defending the crystals from all manner of devils except this time he couldn’t find his power, and he was helpless as the fiends lumbered over to Lenna and she’d scream and he had to watch because there wasn’t a thing he could to until…
Faris swallowed and forced the thought away. The fight on the grotto’s shore wasn’t anything like his nightmares except that it involved a monster and blood and lives lost as he stood by, helpless to do anything but curse the damned thing. Something that he did enthusiastically under his breath. It was like a prayer, like maybe his obscenities would hold some kind of power and travel the distance that Faris couldn’t.
His ship was at full speed now. He heard the bustle of his men behind him, heard the rustle of the sails and the creaking drag of the cannons, as he watched man after man fall along the shore. The demon wielded a greataxe, by the looks of it, and it rended heads from shoulders with ease.
One after the other, heads dropped like stones and rolled across the sand.
They closed the distance. It was a lengthy affair. His ship was faster than most, and the winds were in their favor, but the distance was too great and their mission too dire. Still, they had to try, and as their ship neared the shore, Faris finally slammed the spyglass closed and charged down to the main deck, taking the steps two at a time. He found Karim advising the ship’s first mate, an old Sonoran smuggler by the name of Nikola, and shoved the spyglass back at him.
”Keep the ship on course! When you’re in range, fire the cannons, but only if you’ve got a clear shot. I’ll take the fiend head on myself.”
Karim looked surprised. ”You’re going on your own? Captain, if I may-”
Nikola cut him off with a hearty laugh. ”You’ll have a better chance of changing the tides than changing his mind, Karim.” He gave Faris an even look. ”We’ll hold steady. Do what you came to do.”
Faris nodded. ”And if you manage to make port, get the survivors aboard while I keep its attention. I’ll not have my men fall to its axe if I can help it.”
Karim looked about to argue, but Nikola beat him to it with a simple, ”Aye,” and the Alajanan navigator simply shook his head with a soft sigh.
”Be careful,” he said instead, and Faris let loose a wild grin.
”Now’s not the time for caution, lad. It’s been ages since I’ve had a proper fight.” Faris rolled back his shoulders and felt the crystal’s power surge through him. It always felt warm to him, a matter which shouldn’t have been a surprise considering it was the fire crystal he had in his possession. Stored inside its facets was a wealth of knowledge and experiences that he mentally flipped through until he found his favorite, the one he’d mastered long ago.
Faris was enveloped in a burst of light, and inside of that light, his features changed. His simple blue tunic elongated and hardened into ruby red armor. His sword lengthened into a wicked spear, and his bandanna retracted and twisted into an elaborate helm. In seconds, the transformation was complete. Faris stood powerful and ready, a dragoon empowered by the crystals themselves.
A Warrior of Light.
Faris wasted no time, clearing the crow’s nest in a single jump. He could see the fiend better from such a high vantage point, close enough now that he could easily see the undead monster with the naked eye. With the power of the crystal, could he clear the distance still between them? He made his calculations, based on a wealth of experience and muscle memory, and decided that he could. Once again, Faris cleared his head, angled his body, and jumped.
It was a funny thing, weightlessness. Faris had never feared heights. He’d spent his childhood scrambling up and down the rigging of a dozen pirate ships, but he had to think there was a time that such a feeling, hurtling towards the sun over the open raging waves, would have frozen him with terror. Now he felt only the surge of adrenaline as his body prepared for landing. He would either make it or he wouldn’t, and the thrill was like a shot of thunder to the heart.
He traveled over waves, over shoals, and finally over sand. He heard screams over the whistle of wind in his ears. The pirates were scrambling away from their attacker like ants from an invading hornet. He didn’t have a prayer of landing a strike on the fiend from this height, but he could stand between them at least. Faris angled himself for landing and thrust himself towards the ground.
He landed with a solid thump into the sand, kicking up a storm of it as he stood, spinning his spear through his fingers into an offensive position. ”I heard you were looking for a fight!” he said. ”You’ll not take another step if you know what’s good for you!”
[attr=class,bulk] Faris stood on the deck of the ship, straight-backed and resolute. His eyes were closed as he listened to the sounds of the waves battering the hull, of the wind rustling through the sails, and of the wood creaking first this way then that. There was a clattering of boots as his crew went about their daily tasks, laughing and joking as they set the ship on course to port. He smelled salt on the bitter wind as it swept through his hair and pulled at the trailing ends of his scarf.
This was a good day, he decided. A better day than most, that was. Ever since he’d found himself stranded, washed up on one of this land’s cursed beaches, he’d been like a fish fighting upstream on the wrong current. Without his friends, without his crew, he hadn’t a hope in the world of finding himself. He’d taken to petty thievery just to make ends meet, and he’d held onto Bartz like a life preserver in the tossing sea.
But all that had changed the moment he’d gotten his hands on a chest of genuine treasure and a pirate’s crew in need of a captain. Most had lost everything in the monsoon that had nearly swept away Torensten. More had been killed by the Kraken and the deathly crew of the dreaded ghost ship. Faris, however, had gained something he couldn’t do without. His freedom.
Faris opened his eyes and looked out at the rocky outcropping rapidly growing in size on the horizon. ”How long to port?” he asked without taking his eyes off the island. His quartermaster, a man by the name of Kalim, answered.
”Within the hour if the wind holds.”
Faris nodded. Kalim hailed from the far east, out by the fiery sands, and though his mannerisms could be a bit strange, Faris had never seen a more skilled navigator. They knew their stars in Aljana, it seemed. Faris was lucky to have him.
”We’re making good time then. We’ll have our haul secured by nightfall.” Faris turned to his friend and smiled. ”And there’s not a thing those louts we stole it from can do to stop us.”
Kalim laughed. It was a soft laugh, the kind that Lenna used to make. ”They were a rough kind, weren’t they?”
”The worst. I’ll not stand by while a bunch of devils are extorting those that can’t afford it. I think we’d do better with their plunder than they could do.”
”While we, of course, only extort those who can afford it.”
Faris laughed, loose and loud. ”Glad to hear you’ve taken it to heart.” He turned his eyes back to the horizon and the familiar outcropping that jutted into the sky like a rough-hewn spear. ”There’s a certain honor to this kind of work, I think. Or there can be if you put your heart to it. I got a taste for helping people, back in my world. It’s not something you can forget.”
And he couldn’t forget, not even if he’d wanted to and he didn’t. His time with Bartz, Lenna, Krile, and poor old Galuf was burned into him, heart and soul. That time might have been past, but he could still carry on the kind of work they would’ve wanted from him. In his own piratey way, of course.
A light caught his eye. At first, he thought it might have just been a glint from the sun on the water, but then he saw it again and he saw it bursting with red. Faris frowned, squinting at the light on the shore. ”Kalim. Your spyglass?”
Kalim hummed in surprise but handed it over. ”Is there something there?”
”Something or someone.” Faris raised the spyglass and scanned the island’s beach. First, he saw the entrance to the cave and the roughly painted flag waving outside of it. Then he saw a few panicked men come staggering out, swords drawn. He followed their gaze further down the beach until he trained his sights on…
Faris cursed. ”All hands on deck! Man the sails! Ready the cannons!” There was a hushed silence across the ship, and Kalim looked back at him in alarm. Faris scowled. ”There’s a fiend on those shores. Undead, by the looks of it. And the whole grotto’s under attack!”
It wasn’t their cave that was being slaughtered as they spoke. That hideaway belonged to a captain from the north shore of the Pale Coast, but he seemed a decent sort and Faris wasn’t about to leave them for dead if he could help it. Besides, if that cave fell, then what was stopping the devil from finding his next?
”You heard me! Faris shouted louder this time, and his crew scrambled into action. Faris shot Karim a dire look. ”We’ll need to make it in better time than an hour if we’re to make a difference. Send word below deck. I want the men ready for a fight!”
With that, Faris charged up the quarterdeck to the bow of the ship and raised his spyglass again, ready to give the order as soon as they were in range. If it was a brawl the fiend wanted then Faris would give it to him in spades.
[attr=class,bulk] ”Well, it sounds like you live in a dream. But the rest of us have to pay our dues.” Faris recrossed his arms and let his head tilt back over the edge of his chair. The ceiling swam when he looked at it too hard. He’d best get to sobering up before too long. He felt a lot of fight in him, and there wasn’t much in the way of monsters to take it out on.
”You know what I never liked about you?” There was the fight again, peeking out its ugly head. It wanted to have a go at something, and right now he had enough of it to make him twitch. ”Your thick head. Now, I’m not calling you dull in the traditional sense, but you’ve got blinders on the size of dinner plates! You go about thinking yours is the only way there is until someone smacks you upside the head and tells you different!”
Faris shifted, rolling back his shoulders and cracking his neck to the side. ”You’ve got a good heart. You mean well, but you’ve got to open your eyes and listen for the quiet part before it’s shouted out loud. There’s a whole world that isn’t yours -- more now with everyone dropping in -- and scores of lives that’ve got just about as much in common as a fish and gull!”
Faris sat up straighter and pulled out his coinpurse. There wasn’t much to look at inside, but it was enough for a drink and he fished out the gil, smacking it on the table with a clumsy hand.
”But you’ve got more of an ear than I gave you credit for, I’d say. I see Yuna’s not too mad for putting her trust in you.” Faris gave him a teasing wink and stood unsteadily, gripping the table for support. He wasn’t in as bad a state as he’d have thought, once he got used to life on two feet. He’d always had a good sense for balance. It came with his sea legs.
”The city gets in another rut, you’ll know where to find someone with a high jump and a wicked spear.” Faris laughed. ”Or if you need a ship handled. I’m a captain at heart, after all.
”And a favor, if you could. You come across a pair of lasses by the name of Lenna or Krile? Tell them Faris is looking for them, and I’ve got Bartz wrangled the best I can.” Faris shook his head and gave Caius a short wave. ”I’ll be heading off before the dusk settles in.”
Faris felt himself go as red as the fire in his crystal as he shot him a fierce look. ”It’s nothing to go on laughing about!” It felt like a snarl on his lips -- like something beastly, born hot and bright. Part of Faris wanted to punch him. The other part wanted to hide in a hole. It was nothing to laugh about.
Caius wasn’t laughing at him. That’s what he said anyway, but Faris didn’t want to hear it because it sounded like it was at him and that was enough. Caius was going on like there wasn’t a speck of difference between the genders to him, and not just that, but that he’d never even heard of such a thing. That was all a bunch of swell as far as Faris was concerned. He couldn’t be that naive.
Could he?
”I’ve got no doubts about your partner,” Faris said. ”And Yuna’s got a heart of steel, but there’s still that matter of respect. Sounds like your partner takes her share of trouble, and more than you’d know. Doesn’t matter how fierce she is, she’s got something to prove if she wants to be held to your level in their eyes. A man’s got to be strong. A lass’s got to be stronger in spades.”
He shook his head. ”I’ll fight as either one if the crystal’s class demands it. I’ve got friends who call me both. But I’ve lived this long how I am, and it’s what I like best. A woman’s got an uphill battle, and I’ve not a lick of sense towards all the dresses and jewels and whatever comes along with it.”
He laughed. ”Captain though. I like that. Nice and simple, no two ways about it.” He shook his head. ”I can’t tell if your world’s a dream or if you’ve kept your head in the dark. I've got hopes in the first. That’d be nice to know, a place like that being out there and all.”
[attr=class,bulk] Whatever that flashy round of magic had been, it seemed to do the trick. He saw Rinoa bring magic to herself then lift her arm with a massive burst of lightning. And that was the end of that. Whatever foul curse was keeping the undead walking was broken, and they all clattered to the deck, a pile of lifeless bones. For a moment, Faris could only stare at the crumpled heap of the behemoth he’d been fighting. Then he let out a barking laugh. ”If that isn’t a way to go!”
He looked back at the fellow princess and grinned, throwing his arm up in the air to give her a wide wave. It seemed it was over more or less. Except…
The deck of the ghoulish ship gave a sudden shudder. Faris cursed as he caught his balance, eyes darting in every direction for the cause. Something below the deck had caught fire (gunpowder?) and the ship was none too happy with it. He saw the wood of the deck splinter. He saw the ship give a massive buck against the waves. He saw the fiendish pirate crew scramble back to safety, and he gave one final jump, thrusting himself into the air just as the ground below him splintered and crumbled into the sea. He landed heavily on the deck of the remaining ship and watched the undead frigate as she tore herself in two.
His eyes were stormy. The skies were dark. He thrust a handful of loose, sopping hair over his shoulder, sweeping it from his eyes.
He only allowed himself a moment to think. Not to mourn, but to think. It seemed a mighty coincidence that they should be waylaid by brigands only to be found by the undead crew a wind’s breath later. Then there was what to do with the pirates themselves.
He had a lot to think about. Later.
Pirates or no pirates, there was still the storm to contend with, and it was none too happy with them. The crew was busy hauling up some chests that had been loosed in the wreck, and Faris shot them a dangerous look. ”Leave it!” he said. ”It’s your necks you should be saving!” He scanned the situation, eyes narrowed as his sailor’s instincts took hold.
No more fighting, he hoped. There was only the rage of the sea. And that was perhaps the mightiest devil of all.
He dispelled the crystal’s power in a great flash of light, leaving himself in his tunic -- lightweight, breathable, without any armor to drag him into the depths should he be swept overboard. He barked orders at the remaining sailors and pirates alike, confident that his tone alone would spur them to action. He told them to man the sails in just the right angle of the wind -- not too slow as to strand them but not too fast to capsize them either. The helmsman, it seemed, had been lost in the battle. Without him, not one of the louts could make heads nor tails of the ship’s controls. Faris cursed and hopped behind the wheel, thrusting it first one way then the next to keep it on course and fight the ever-stronger might of the waves threatening to topple them.
He didn’t know the sailors’ skills or talents. He could only direct them the best he could, but he knew one princess who could make the difference.
”You’re a mage, aye?” That’s what he’d seen at least. There’d been all manner of spells at her disposal -- an impressive feat, he’d thought. ”Keep the sailors moving! Cura, haste, even reflect could do! The storm’s not through with us yet!”
You've got a lot of brass, or mayhap you're just lacking in brains!
Caius talked a lot about kings. Faris knew he’d talked just as much about crystals, but it was still a little hard to follow when he wasn’t thinking straight to begin with. What he gathered was that Caius’ crystal wasn’t like his crystal and that everyone had the same fighting style where he came from. No switching on the fly. No great flashes of light , and his crystal wasn’t much for talking. Which led to some questions on Caius’ part.
”Your crystals really talk? And send you on silly quests.”
”It wasn’t a silly quest!” Faris said a little louder than he’d intended. ”It was a matter of the world! And the crystals! And that fiend Exdeath though we didn’t know it!” Now where had that come from? There was a fire in his heart, and he wasn’t one to question it. That’s what had granted him the crystal in the first place, hadn’t it?
”Aye, it was all a bit mad, but it was a serious business. It led us to another world on a meteor! And then through the Rift! And all the way to the Void!” He knew, on some level, that Caius wouldn’t know what he was talking about. Didn’t help though. Faris would say what he wanted to say, and nothing like good sense would stop him.
”We were the Warriors of Light!” he said with a huff. ”And that’s that!”
Stupid swordsman and his stupid jokes. Faris wasn’t much of a hero, but he could act like one when he had to, and that was the kind of business he’d found himself in. Hero business. Serious business.
Then Caius had to hone in on the whole ‘Queen’ thing.
”Ngyeuuugh.” Faris made a noise somewhere between a groan and a growl that really, really didn’t want to go there. ”I’m a woman, true enough, and a princess I suppose. But I took to life this way a long time ago, and there’s no going back now. I don’t care what you call me. I’ll be the same whatever your thoughts on the matter.”
In a way, it really did bother him, but it shouldn’t have so that was that. He’d let Bartz come to his own conclusions. It was easier not to argue over the whole thing.
”A man won’t respect you behind the wheel of a ship if they think you’ve got a womanly disposition. And they get lonely after not seeing one for a time.” Faris crossed his arms, feeling stormier than he had before. ”It’s got nothing to do with a peaceful land. It’s my choice, and I’m sticking by it.”
You've got a lot of brass, or mayhap you're just lacking in brains!
Faris shot Caius a look that was both good-natured and fierce. ”It’s the fire crystal,” he said. ”On account of my fiery heart, it said. Bartz has the wind crystal -- the air-headed lout. He can’t stay in one place for a moment and his thoughts are the same.” Now that he thought about it, Tycoon had been keeping an eye on the wind crystal for ages, hadn’t it? With two present from the royal family, it only stood to reason that one of them would be granted its powers. Just went to show the power of heart over blood, he supposed.
Water fit Lenna better anyway.
”It’s more than just clothes,” Faris said, but he was laughing before he could even pretend to be offended. ”Though, aye, that’s part of it too.” And a strange part at that. If he was taking its power, what did the costume matter? He could understand the armor well enough, but what was the difference between a cloak for a white mage versus a cloak for a black mage? ”Maybe the crystals have a sense of style!”
”Wait, you were chosen by the crystals as well?” Faris did a double take, staring at him like he’d grown an extra head. ”Did they talk to you? Where’s the shard? I thought they were shattered by now!”
Wait, Caius was from a different place, wasn’t he? One that hadn’t heard heads nor tails of Tycoon. And one that didn’t follow the same rules, best he could reckon. ”So you took it...from a king? Why is it you always fight the same then? You only ever like using your…” He didn’t know the word for it, flying around and hitting things with magic swords that could also fire undersized cannonballs. ”Your…you class?”
That’d do it.
”That’d make you a Warrior of Light, wouldn’t it? Or something. There were the Dawn Warriors before us.” This was all getting jumbled around. Faris couldn’t make a thing out of it, not when his head was as murky as a stormy sea. ”Did they send you on a quest round the world?”
That’s what crystals did, wasn’t it? Keep the elements in line, lock away evil warlocks, and send you trekking across the planet and back trying to keep it all running how it should?
”I don’t know much more of the crystals than that. Before all this, I didn’t even know they could talk!” Faris laughed. ”Have you ever met one? It’s enough to make your head spin!”
It was still spinning. The longer he sat upright, that was. Faris didn’t want to know what it would feel like once he got to standing.
Then Caius asked about his sister. ”Lenna?” Faris tilted his head. ”Aye, she’s fine. Or she was when I left. She took the throne of Tycoon like she was meant to. Technically it was mine if I wanted it, but I couldn’t last a day in that stuffy old castle!” Faris shook his head. ”I don’t know where she is now. I hope she’s back where she belongs. It’s safer there, and Tycoon needs a queen.”
He tapped his finger on the table, feeling suddenly surly. ”One that’s not me, anyway.”
You've got a lot of brass, or mayhap you're just lacking in brains!
”Huh.” Faris listened, leaning back in his chair as Caius told him about where he kept his dragon. Apparently he had a nice little house in the countryside. Faris wasn’t sure whether to call him lucky or not so he didn’t call him anything at all. It sounded exactly like he’d have pictured Caius if you’d told him that Caius had the means. Faris was one for the freedom of the open sea. He’d never settle in roots if he had a say in it, but that just wasn’t the mercenary’s way. Faris shrugged.
”I guess you’ve done well for yourself,” he said. ”The drake must be awfully grateful. Like I said, you’d need a stable to keep it well.”
Some part of him had expected Caius would need a lecture on proper dragon care. It seemed Caius was way ahead of him.
”Ehhh?” Faris made a noncommittal noise, tossing his head to the side. ”Not really a family drake, per say. Not for me at least. I told you how I was lost at sea. I only met my father once, and that was on his dying breath. Then it was just Lenna and me.” Faris wished he had more liquor. Wouldn’t do him any good, probably. His head was already heavy and swimming.
”The royal family of Tycoon’s had generations of wind drakes. Real close to them, see. They’re vowed to the protection of the wind crystal. The crystals guard the elements. Keeps them all stable. Or...they used to.” Faris rubbed the back of his head. ”They all shattered some time ago. But everything righted itself out in the end.”
He was rambling, he knew. Going off topic. It was hard to stay focused.
Faris tilted his head, eyes drifting towards the ceiling. ”The fire crystal chose me as a Warrior of Light. Tasked to save the world from whatever was ailing them then from the evil unleashed after that. That’s where I get my power. All the…” Faris waved his hands around, making noises that he approximated to be the whoosh of light overtook him whenever he changed jobs. ”That’s the crystals. The fire crystal. Cause that’s the one that chose me.”
