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The Echo could be so very inconvenient. It struck at any time, in any place, with no care for how dangerous it could be. True, it didn’t always grant a person visions. Sometimes, like with Krile, it gave someone the power to sense souls. That kind of Echo wasn’t nearly as inconvenient as the one possessed by Minfilia and the Warrior of Light.
When Moonflower was a child growing up in a meadow in the Black Shroud, she rarely ever had visions from the Echo. She thought they were dreams, or perhaps she was imagining so hard, it hurt her head. As a teenager, she didn’t understand what was happening until the Calamity; she knew then that she was having some kind of vision. Still, she stayed at home with her mother, where the meadow was safe. She prayed that Eorzea would be saved from Dalamud’s fall. For five years after the Calamity, whatever those visions were fell silent.
By the time she had met the Scions of the Seventh Dawn, Moonflower was considered an abstracted person. She often looked where others weren’t, she made comments that seemed out of the blue, and then there were the times she put her hand to her head and seemed to stare into space for a while. The Scions would recognize the last gesture as the Echo, but the rest was all her.
One night, while they were huddled close to ward off the chill, Alphinaud asked in a quiet voice, “Moonflower, how do you see the world the way you do?”
She glanced at Ysayle and Estinien out of the corner of her eye. The one was asleep and the other was keeping guard not far from their circle. “What do you mean, Alphinaud?”
The boy shifted, burrowing into his blanket further. “I mean that just earlier, instead of pointing out that we ought to be worried about the temperature and staying dry, you said it was nice that we could go camping. And then there’s the time that we were running for our lives from Ul’dah and you still managed to say that the ruins we ended up in were interesting, and it was only too bad that we couldn’t stop to explore them further.”
“Oh, that?” She reached over to pull his hood over his head. “There, now you’re good and warm. You need to cover your head when you’re out in the cold like this, dear.”
Alphinaud laughed into his blanket to hide the sound. “That’s exactly what I mean, my friend. How do you see the world this way?”
Moonflower stretched under her blanket and pulled it to cover her nose for a moment. “Because, Alphinaud—it’s better to see the world for the beauty and glory it has, than to live in despair and anger. I know people think I am a silly woman who never pays attention, but I do. I see no point in always pointing out what’s wrong. I see enough of that whenever I have a vision from the Echo.”
“I never thought you were silly,” he whispered, sounding chastised.
She raised a doubtful eyebrow. “Then what did you think?”
He sighed. “I thought I was better than you. I was a fool.” Before he could pull his hood over his face, however, Moonflower ruffled his hair.
“That’s not answering my question. What did you think of me?”
Alphinaud fiddled with his earring. “I saw you as a weapon, at first. A queen on the chess board. Then, after I knew you better, I thought that you simply weren’t as learned as I was.” Blushing, he rushed to add, “I didn’t think you were stupid. You clearly know the lay of the land very well, and you have an excellent memory. But… I thought… I was better than you, because I thought I was smarter, because I was one of the youngest people ever to graduate from the Studium. I thought I could make you and everyone else here in Eorzea work together in ways I saw fit.”
Moonflower chuckled. “I thought you looked excessively surprised when I told Lord Fortemps that I had been educated in Gridania.” Not to the extent of the Studium, perhaps, but she had been taught a variety of subjects and learned at home as well. She could read, write, and do arithmetic, and she also learned history, about the elementals, religious study, and art. “The Echo didn’t make it easy, mind you.” Looking back, her “hard imagining” was definitely the Echo making history class difficult.
“It just goes to show how arrogant I was. I took one look at you and decided I knew what kind of person you were. Not silly, but uneducated in book studies. I thought that your view of the world was childish.” He looked absolutely ashamed.
“Alphinaud, sweetheart, you need to stop punishing yourself,” she said, and pulled his sleeping roll closer to herself. Miqo’te liked to curl up with their friends and family, and while she had held off on doing it until now, her very small, very young friend needed comfort, comfort that best came from hugs and purrs. “You’re only a child, you still have time to grow.”
“I’m not a child,” he protested crossly.
“You haven’t reached adult height yet, silly goose, and you’re only sixteen. I don’t care how adult you pretend to be, you are a child and are allowed to make mistakes. Besides, you corrected your opinion of me. Eventually. Right?”
He nodded and pressed his face into her shoulder. She patted his back at a soothing tempo. “I’ve done so much wrong.”
“No, darling, you haven’t. Some big mistakes, maybe, but not that many. And wouldn’t you say they were born of optimism and hope? You wanted to unite Eorzea. Next time, we’ll just be more careful, okay?” Moonflower smiled at him when he looked up at her. “Now, let’s stargaze awhile, while we wait to go to sleep.”
Alphinaud could have moved away at that point, and indeed, Moonflower expected him to. He shifted, as if about to, but after a moment, laid back down. Moonflower didn’t know what he was thinking, but maybe just for tonight, he wanted physical comfort. She said nothing, only pulled her blanket over the both of them, and together they watched the stars until sleep overtook them.