ffxivwrite 2021 - #15 Thunderous

Continued from #11 Preaching to the Choir - ( first|second)

Gridania, 1565 6AE

In that peculiar manner like her head had been doused into a stream, the sound went out. A subtle ringing noise replaced it, droning into a disassembling whine until it faded out into the disagreement of birds that punctuated the whispered susurrations of the leaves around them. A chattering chorus that still for some reason felt unreal, leaving her standing there numbly with her fingers slack, hands crooked in front of her like a pair of pleading paws.

“I beg your pardon?” Shandrelle managed at last.

Before she knew why, she flinched.

“Your family,” Ojene uttered, and true awareness roiled back with a rapid prickling down Shandrelle’s shoulders- for the wry familiarity Ojene’s eyes had vanished into a sharp intensity that burrowed straight to her spine. And though Ojene hadn’t moved the dagger, it suddenly bore again a lethal promise that parched Shandrelle’s throat. “They’re trying to kill me,” Ojene repeated. “Again. And you’re telling me you know nothing of it?”

Shandrelle found velvet petals smoothing between her fingers again, grasping backwards as if somehow reaching out to something- anything- would steady her, for abruptly she felt as if the ground beneath her rolled like a drenched log floating down a river, and her scrabbling desperately to stay afloat as her hands windmilled madly at her sides.

“No,” she croaked. “Matron, Ojene, why would I? The last I saw you, Twelve, it was- you up and left and so abruptly! And I haven’t heard hide nor hair of you since.”

“Then why do you think they’re after me?” Ojene asked, her voice suddenly too calm.

“I- I don’t know! How should I know? I don’t even know what you’ve been up to the last decade or so, how could I even feign to guess?”

“Perhaps you could,” Ojene said softly, “if you tried. You said your father told you what happened.”

“And perhaps he’s unhinged enough to try it! I don’t know- I wouldn’t put it past him- but why would he after all these years? You’re not a threat to me anymore. Er- in his eyes!”

Ojene’s expression hardly changed, save for the subtle narrowing of her eyes. “Then your mother,” she said, just as soft. “Or your relatives- think,Shandrelle, think!” In a flash she was off the fallen tree, pacing forward in a wide circle, the dagger loose at her side.

Twigs jutted hard in the small of Shandrelle’s back as she recoiled. “No- leave them out of it! Unless- they diddo something wrong that I don’t know about but- my mother- I don’t think she ever knew, even if she didn’t approve of you and I, she couldn’t- she wouldn’t-”

“And you’re sure?” Ojene nearly whispered, and she stopped but a couple fulms away, looming over with her great height, and oh, by the Twelve- how Shandrelle felt herself shrink in the shadow, pinned there by the twin glaciers that bore such a cold and distant promise that her voice matched.

“I-I-” Shandrelle rapidly stammered. “As sure… as I can be. Which is not to say… a lot.”

Twin creases kneaded around Ojene’s eyes as she regarded Shandrelle for a long, silent moment, before with a low rumble of the back of her throat she turned on her heel and withdrew a couple paces.

And the end of her thought burbled up in the back of Shandrelle’s thought, leaking out like the croak of a frog. “I was sure of my father too,” she blurted. “After all.”

Ojene shot her a glance over her shoulder, but in truth she’d never fully turned away. “All right,” she muttered, and she returned to the spot at the fallen tree, and still standing she propped one boot up in the same place she had before as she leaned forward like an apostrophe.

In the break from scrutiny the deep breath Shandrelle had swallowed heaved out in a tremulous gust, and she seized her elbows in quivering hands, clutching her arms close to her chest.

“Twelve, Ojene,” she breathed. “I know we didn’t part on the best of terms but… what’s happened to you?”

To her surprise a subtle ripple jerked through Ojene’s shoulders, bowing her head a couple ilms lower. The silhouetted panes of her irises vanished as her eyes swiveled off- and yet still not baring her back, not truly looking away-

“A lot,” at last came Ojene’s muttered reply, and as she straightened she turned back, fixing Shandrelle with an expression that after all this felt strangely empty.

Shandrelle loosed another held breath. “By the gods- I know you don’t have any reason to trust me… but that’s a far cry from me wishing harm on you.” Her voice splintered oddly- she swallowed. “I never wished harm on you. Didn’t know about the harm on you, or… didn’t want to see. And maybe I did cause it. And if I’ve hurt you beyond the ways I realized- then I’m truly sorry. But for the sake of what we did have- Matron’s breath I never wanted you dead!”

Quite unexpectedly tears seared into her eyes in surging pools that spilled thick drops into her lashes, and Shandrelle stuffed her hands to her mouth as she indendeted her upper teeth into the meat of her palm, choking back a sudden sob.

In the moment before wetness blurred it out, she saw the way Ojene’s expression suddenly slackened, her brows lofting upwards. But then the waters streamed forth, wiping everything away into a kaleidoscope of grey and green, and Shandrelle squeezed her eyes shut.

“I’m sorry,” Ojene said, a bit breathlessly. “I’m sorry.”

“Gods,” Shandrelle uttered, a hoarse croak against the vice in her throat. She buried her face into her elbow. “What has gotten into you?”

“I’m- you’re right. You shame me- and rightfully so.”

In the lapse of momentary silence Shandrelle staggered a tremulous breath into her lungs, and with a deep breath she lifted her face aloft. The blurry figure of Ojene resolved, in the absence of tears, into a withdrawn shape once again perched upon the fallen tree. But this time her legs crooked up in front of her, drawn inwards as her hands looped absently around the hilt of the dagger, the blade disappeared under the flats of her arms.

Their eyes met, and a muscle flickered through Ojene’s jaw. “I never truly thought you were out to cause me harm,” she continued softly. “I suppose I was just- furious about it.”

Sniffing hard against an unpleasant wave of phlegm, Shandrelle struck her sleeve across her eyes. “Over- the past? Or now?”

“Both, I suppose… but I shouldn’t have treated you like that. I’m sorry.”

“Why did you?” Shandrelle demanded- and suddenly as she did she had the sense that the ground had changed beneath her feet but this time her shoes burrowed against solid earth that buoyed her up the lip of the hill looking down, not the other way around.

Ojene averted her eyes, one thumbnail budging under the dagger’s pommel. “I guess I wanted to know if you were telling the truth.”

With a disbelieving laugh Shandrelle thrust a hand over the top of her head, flattening down a few straggly hairs as she went. “Well, there’s better ways to do that, you know! Instead of launching me into- some bloody interrogation! I mean, honestly! Did you not hear a word I said?”

“There’s hearing. And then there’s believing.” Ojene’s gaze flicked up, suddenly affixed to Shandrelle’s face with a seriousness that stopped her short. “My life has been a liability to the people around me for- some time now. So I have to be careful with who I bring into it- especially with you.”

“And what is that supposed to mean?”

Ojene grimaced- and as soon as she’d met Shandrelle’s eye she glanced away again, one shoulder rolling in an approximation of a shrug. “Well, if you weren’t part of it all, then… I was going to have to ask for your help.”

A particularly shrill ululation of birdsong punctuated the silence.

“Ojene,” Shandrelle gritted through a half-bared grimace of a smile. “You have one hell of a way of asking for support.”

Ojene opened her mouth to reply, but Shandrelle battened it down with the sharp loft of a finger. “I am very put out with you!” she said. “And I am going to need a moment to process- whatever the hells all this is- but if you’re telling me that you’re in danger and it’s my family that’s doing it- well, I couldn’t very well say no, could I?”

“You don’t know that yet,” Ojene hazarded.

“I suppose I don’t! But fuck you, honestly, showing up here, telling me things like that, and then expecting me not to give you succor. I am going to need some time!” Bending down, she swiftly plucked her lunch basket over her arm. “So you are going to stay here.” She turned on her heel. “And don’t follow me!”

With a great huff Shandrelle swept down the path she had meant to walk down to the creek from the start, blooms of vetch long since forgotten as Ojene’s silent eyes followed her til she turned out of sight.