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He was soaked to the skin, even though his heavy coat and his hat had managed to keep the weather away for quite some time, but that was days ago. He didn't ride any more, his trusty steed as tired and worn as himself. No more happy chirp, not even at interesting greens.
Nobody came into this part of the country. It was cursed, everybody knew, and everybody knew the darkness dreamed here, swallowing all that came close.
The castle loomed above him in the distance, an omen amongst the deadened scenery. Neverending rain blotted out the sun, in an eternal night that seemed to cloak only ever the old fortress and its' spires. The young man wistfully recalled clear skies and sunlight briefly, adjusting the hat so that the moisture would run off accordingly to the side. Gold eyes followed the flow to the cobblestones beneath his feet. He had some so far, but had to rest, closer to his goal than he had ever been. However, it would be pointless to reach it when sick from the rain, so upon spotting an empty stable, he coaxed his mount to shelter in short order.
The castle was as close to a ruin as something with a roof could possibly get, clinging to the cliffside like a desperate man fearing the drop into the sea, and it wasn't for the first time the young healer wondered if he made a mistake coming here. None of those who traveled with him wanted to join him, not for money and not for pleas, but it was what the Prophecy foretold.
Departing from his mount at the safety of the stable, the path stretched onward still, winding higher and higher above the crashing of the waves below. He set out before deciding to linger, a question of his nerve. Although the village he hailed from was quite different by most standards, there was something oddly comforting about the consistency of the waves, and it would bring him pause were the downpour not so heavy. Still, upward he pressed, past fallen statues, rusted machinery, and crevices where the stone structure had failed. He came to an aged gate at the base of the largest spire, not unlocked, but not useful in the way gates were designed, either, an odd display of power to no one. Past that, a winding stairwell, the building barely able to keep the elements from soaking in. What little life that grew outside of the castle gates, there was now none to be found, and again, the healer was affronted by his own cause. Clenching his jaw, he slipped past bars too wide to hold him, and he began his ascent.
The young healer climbed and climbed, until his knees and ankles ached, and continued still. The rain permeated somehow, falling on him in waves, enough crumbling gaps to let in the salt air and cause him to wonder how it was all still standing. Gasping, he finally halted, still a ways to go, disdainfully abandoning his pack of belongings. Digging through one of the pockets, he pulled out two small items, tucking them into his jacket. Peering out into the sky outside through a rather large chunk of missing wall, he could almost see the edge of the storm. Taking a deep breath, pulling it down throughout his body and centering himself, he carried on. Compared to the amount of steps he had taken to get to this point, the remaining amount wasn't too far off. The dilapidated tower ended with what he was sure was once an ornate and beautiful door from a sizable foyer, unbelievably holding as far up in the sky as they were. Very suddenly, a chill ran down his spine, and everything in him wanted to turn back. Back to the warmth of his mount, traveling companions, anyone, anything but here. Despite this, he pushed gently on the door, which opened without much force.
It was cold in here, but at least dry. A single large round room under the roof, filled with books over books over books, creating a maze of half-forgotten words and broken spines. No footsteps disturbed the dust that lay as a veil over this little world.
The smell here was vaguely nice and reminded him of the wisewoman's hut back in his village. She had paper too and knew how to read the signs, or at least she claimed that she could, but the sheer amount of knowledge collected here was more than the young man could ever had imagined.
A soft blue light illuminated the place, rising from lines carved in the wooden floor. Unsteady somehow, ebbing and flowing like slow breath. Even in here he could feel the sea in the air, as if the calm currents that found their way into here left their salt as they left, leaving lighter and peaceful.
Heavy curtains blocked whatever sunlight there was to be had in the tower, which brought the golden gaze to the center of the room, where the lines in the floor flickered the truest. What the young healer spied there brought him to a sharp standstill. A man, lounging in a dark bed, sound asleep. At first, it was hard to tell if there was anyone at all in it, looking at first more shadow than man, with hair and stubble to match his surroundings. He looked quite comfortable, and it put the healer at a loss.
Peering back and forth at the shelving beside him, looking up and seeing only weak buttresses holding up a second tier of bookshelves, he gulped before steeling his resolve. Stalking along the edge of the room, he stepped over forgotten stacks, careful to avoid disturbing anything besides the dust on the floor. He got to take a better look at the room's occupant, bed surrounded by books, yet not touched as much by time as the rest. Finally, the healer came to the far window. After gathering the weighted curtain in both arms, the young man pulled , revealing a gorgeous view of the tumultuous storm consuming the sea.
A soft grumble startled him, followed by the shifting of linnen sheets.
“No...“ A low murmur from the middle of the room, drowsy and still drunk with heavy dreams.
After the man settled back to sleep, the young healer frowned. Inwardly sighing, he took the other curtain in hand and revealed that as well, allow refracted stormlight fully into the room. It was of no use, the man remained asleep. Crumpling, the healer came slowly to pace back around the bed to face the being in the center of the room. The breeze blew in, like a relieved breath, rustling the jet black hair of the sleeping man. Biting his lip, the young healer came to sit on the edge of the bed. Cautiously, he brought a hand to the stubbled face.
The man was pretty , almost girlishly so, and his eyes storm-sea blue under long dark lashes, and he yawned a long yawn. “Would you kindly--“ a slow stretch, “--piss off?“
Withdrawing, the young man quickly hopped off the bed. He cleared his throat, taking off his hat to thumb the brim nervously. "Apologies, but I have to wake you up."
"Is it time again? Already?" A heartfelt sigh. He remained in his bed, but at least rolled around a little to see the boy better.
"Again?" The healer curiously asked, tilting his head. The being laid out before him eyed him wearily, recognition plain on his face.
"Why are you here, Ardyn?" A long-fingered hand patted a free spot on the bed.
"Ardyn? But my name is-" A hand silenced him, and again gestured him to sit. With the vaguest huff, the healer sat next to the strange lounging man. They faced one another, tired expression meeting buzzing curiosity.
"Answer my question. And take a blanket. You'll catch a cold."
It was cold. So the healer looked to his side, grabbing the nearest he could find and pulled it over himself. "You know why I am here. But again?"
“Tell my why you're here, Ardyn. Why you want to kill me. Set an end to my reign of--“ A new yawn. Indeed, the dark king wasn't an especially active ruler.
"- darkness and bring light back to our Star." Although still irked by the name, the young healer finished for him, straightening in his blanket. "Yes, I am the Healer of our Star, here to kill you, o King of Darkness." His resolve shone then, but only passingly, as he again took refuge in the offered blanket.
“And then? What then?“ The tired hand tugged at the wet collar beneath the blanket, trying halfheartedly to remove it. “Stay a bit and tell me what happens then. After that, I will tell you what happens then.“
The young man pulled away from the offending hand, swatting away the stranger before beginning to remove his coat of his own volition. "Then... then..." He trailed off, uncomfortable. "Why do you keep calling me 'Ardyn'? Why again?"
“It was your name when we first met. You were older then. Old, so very old. You may even have been as old as I am now, but I remember your crimson hair, and your golden eyes. Eyes like the sun. You always keep those. And every time I ask you to just leave in peace and live out your life. You don't want to take my curse on you, to continue the cycle.“ A slow smile on his sleepy mouth.
The young man blinked for several long moments to absorb after he had finished, allowing him enough time to begin to drift off yet again. The boy's expression was worried, although unoffended. He who was most decidedly not Ardyn sighed again, and gripped the sleeping man's arm to wake him. "So, you are saying that, sometime before this, me - or someone who looks like me, has already killed you?" It was not an unreasonable question given the weight of the potential answer.
“Mh? Oh. No. It was me who killed you then. You begged me, caught in eternity with no escape but the true king. First blood I shed, and with it, your darkness came over me...“ He rolled onto his side, his head in his hand. “You never told me it would, you know? Never told me this is the way of things.“
The way his head rolled and piercing blue eyes again met gold, and the explanation welled in the healer like a song he forgot long ago. In the pit of his gut, he knew. He had seen it many nights in his dreams, his weariness for low bridges and high scarves. "The One True King?" It wasn't a phrase learned, but inherently knew, as sure as his healing. " Ardyn ." The young man repeated, clutching at his neck and gathering himself and blankets up into his arms before melting back, sinking back into the bed, terribly young in that moment. "And the others?"
“I sent them away. It was easier then. I had armies. Yeah, I think I sent them away when they let me. Did not want anyone else to bear this fate, anyone with the energy to actually get up up and do things.“
The ancient's bed was comfortable. The healer relaxed further still, haphazardly leaning on the King through blankets. "Are you lonely?"
“I have my dreams. They didn't leave me.. Are you? From what I've seen, the star still doesn't take kindly to those who are different, as well-meaning as they may be.“
"Oh, I will kill you, my old King - tomorrow maybe." The young healer quipped, sitting upright and moving to stand, throwing his hidden dagger aside. "Surely, we can clean this room, or something, before we lay you to rest... once more."
"You may well try." A little shrug. "If you wish to bear the curse, I will not stop you, even though you probably aren't strong enough yet anyway. Not even a proper stubble on your chin."
A proper blush stained the healer's cheeks, and he grew flustered under the fatigued gaze. "Old enough to kill you." It was a threadless huff. He tried to pick up some of the piles of books laid out about the bed. "Where do these go anyway?"
"Why do you want to throw your life away and spend the last hours of it cleaning another man's room? There are far more pleasurable things to do, don't you think?"
Moving aside the stack, the young man gulped, thrown by the question. "Like what?" Shaking it off, he continued to shift books. "Napping?" He laughed, "This tower subsists on your napping."
"And that's a bad thing? Not like I'm taking up precious space out here." Slowly, very slowly, something like a spark of life returned into him. Slightly more movement, slightly deeper breaths.
The healer worried his lower lip, gold eyes trying not to stare, before looking out over the storm and the sea. "When have you last looked out, my King?" He said, barely avoiding a smirk.
"When is now , Ardyn? I probably could tell you then. Or give a good approximation. I remember the castle growing and staying and starting to fall into ruin, but those are only short memories between long naps. I remember I sent all of them away, because they kept waking me. Waking the darkness, and I never thought that a good idea."
A flinch at the unfamiliar name, but the healer had grown used to it, looking at the man sadly. "Had you friends?"
“Many of them, some of them so close to my heart that they still visit me in my sleep. The way they were, the way I remember them, not the way they went .“ A strange tone in his voice, ancient despair that still was not forgotten.
The air shifted in the room, cold salt wind to still at the old King's words, and the very sky seemed to darken. A sinking weight in the healer's chest followed a chill, like the one from his ascent. He missed the blanket and the warmth of the ancient's bed, returning to sit back across from the the dwelling shadow. Tentatively, the boy reached out, hand hovering over the other's. It held no warmth. "And the first, Ardyn? He was also a healer?" The promise was there, just under his skin.
“He was, until he was not. A dark scourge, as I was once the bringer of dawn, until I was not. Like you will be if you walk this path.“ The absence of hope in the ancient man was tangible.
The words hung in the room, a stagnant perfume that threatened to choke the young man. With only a slight pause, he brought his hand down to cover the other's. There was no warmth but his own, before a faint tingling began in his fingertips. The hand under his jerked away, and the cold glare that met the unwittingly boyish face made him recall the time he was caught stealing from a cart. That beating had hurt. "I'm sorry, I..."
“It isn't your fault. Ain't mine either. You're doing what the fates want you to, and I... I'm trying to keep under lock and key what they want me too. You once were locked away because of it, I'll do it myself. Grin and bear it, you know?“
They sat in silence, and the younger man took to settling back into the king's bed. Awake now, only in time to see the first real look of fatigue pass over the healer's face.
“You've been on the road for quite some time, mh? Lack of sleep and proper showers. And... traveling alone?“
"Oh, there were once five of us, but one died, the rest fell back. We parted ways," as he spoke the healer came to lay back down on his side, speech softer with the sudden weight of incoming sleep. The rain and salt breeze wafted back into the room then, the smell of damp accompanying parchment oddly comforting. The dark king observed the figure of the young man that had come to lounge adjacent to him, a tired hapless fool of fate, and a boy, falling asleep in his space. "I'll be... but a moment." For someone who was not Ardyn, the young man was certainly as precocious.
"Was there an argument?" Noct remembered those, and he remembered how they grew more and more frequent as his men grew older. They, too, parted ways in the end, and he was only with one of them as they died. By then, it didn't really hurt anymore, not because they grew apart, but because his heart was too occupied to notice.
Furrowing a brow, the healer blinked himself aware, bringing a steady gaze up at the king from where he lay. Lips parting, jaw ajar for several moments, he wanted to speak, but only bit back a sigh and his eyelids fluttered shut, answer enough.
"Have you brought rations? Tea?" A complete change of topic to get the boy's mind away from those dark thoughts.
"I expected to die today." The healer muttered, eyes still shut.
"May have some leaves left..." The dark king reached into nowhere, materializing a can with a pattern of kittens on it. Opened it. Sniffed. Nodded. "C'mon. Let's put out a bucket and catch some rain. Can't offer you cookies with it, sorry."
And for the first time in many years, Noctis got up, his feet unsteady on the dusty ground at first, but quickly getting used to being used again.
This roused the healer, who moved up to assist him, but found the ancient to be far more spry than imagined. Not just spry, but graceful even, after finding his footing. The young healer would be found rather useless in the king's footsteps, trailing behind him as he moved, hanging out of a parted window and hooking a bucket to a large but rusted nail. Raging storm above them, there was still some visibility off into the sea, distantly suggesting early nightfall. The bucket wouldn't take long to fill.
The ancient being wandered through the maze of ancient paper, touching a brittle spine here, drawing a line in the dust there. Found what he was searching for in the end: a simple earthen cup with green glaze and a teapot in the same color. Blew dust of the two things and coughed.
"Somewhere here is a little stove. Wonder where I put it..."
The dust that was kicked up curled into the healer's nostrils, and he sneezed, blindly moving to look for the object. "What does it look like?" calling over to the other, a crash sounded as the hapless young man fell headlong into a wall of old texts.
"Like a small stove," the boy heard over the rumbling of the books onto the floor. Some hit him, causing even more dust to rise and adding fresh bruises to all the old ones. Very helpful .
Just as the last book to hit him on the head, Ardyn spied the small warped metal stove behind the next shelf.
--
The King of Darkness squatted before the short stove, heaving a few hapless tomes into a growing fire. A look of concern passed over the young face, before he host grunted it away. Having retrieved the bucket, next to overflowing with rainwater and now sitting beside the stove at the ready, his young guest sat a few paces away, earlier blanket draped around him once more in the damp cold. The kettle sat atop the stove, warming quickly as the fires consumed the pages. Closer to the bed, the dagger caught the light. The healer eyed it sadly, before looking back to the ancient king. Thankfully, the room was already warming.
They sat in silence waiting for the kettle, the sounds of the wind, rain and sea enough to gently fill the space. The old king flipped through several books before casually continuing to toss them into the fire. The boy smiled to himself, despite the way the storm raged outside. For all of the shared weight they carried, that moment was quite peaceful. A high pitched whistle took him straight out of his reverie, and he was soon met with a steaming cup of tea who knows how old, standing to accept it.
"Thank you," the healer took the cup carefully. With a shy look, he leaned in, and planted an affectionate kiss on the old king's cheekbone.
"For getting rid of those?" A little smirk. "They weren't very good, okay, but not that bad ." He didn't shy away from the boy's touch, and there might have been a subtle shift in his stance that even welcomed it, but then, it might be just a lonely boy welcoming it.
"You'll have to bring some fresh tea the next time though."
An urgent look passed over the healer's face at the words 'next time', just as he took the first sip of his tea. It was pungent , aromatic and spicy, and nothing like he had tried before. A sputter, and a near cough, and a hand was patting his back. Instead of the desired "next time", he ended up asking "This is tea?"
“It's missing milk, and maybe honey, but yes, that's tea. Will warm your insides quite nicely.“
And it did. The healer returned to his spot on the floor before the warmth of the stove, cradling his cup in his lap. He tried not to linger on the pleasant buzz he got from the ancient's presence. "Forgive me, but I thought you would be... different."
“The both of us are part of a whole, and you can feel it. Bound to destroy each other and be reborn. But I don't see why we shouldn't be as pleasant and avoidant as possible.“
The young healer had nodded at this, ill at ease with the other's words in spite of their lack of threat. It sat in his guts, head full of echos as he wandered back to the bed, cup in hand. The ancient king just looked on in silence, before returning his attention to the kettle. The golden hazel gaze again drifted outside, into the rain and the storm above, eyes focused on the far off distant break in the clouds, the only colorful thing on the horizon. Too heavily did the weight of his journey finally collapse in on him, and before the old king could notice, the boy was quietly sobbing, continuing to stare out the window.
“It is the first time it feels like you came home.“ Noctis lazily petted the red hair. “And yet, you know you cannot stay. But you may sleep until you're rested. Promise I won't hurt you.“
A pause in the sobs fell after the words, and the young man turned to look back at him. Mouth trembling, eyes puffy. Very quickly, the trembling form fell against the man, face buried into his neck. Relief was tangible in the way the healer's arms wrapped around his waist.
“It's another one of this star's cruel ways.“ Long nails ran over the boy's back. “C'mon, hang your clothes to dry and come to bed with me. Things will look less severe after a good night of sleep.“
And so the young healer stripped off layer after layer, rain having seeped in so deeply that each feel with a weighted thud onto the wooden floor. Noctis had kept the fire going with a lost selection of books, thankfully warming the chamber. The healer didn't stop, each layer heavy, naked as he quickly climbed back under the pile of blankets, avoiding being exposed.
Under here, it was dry and dark and warm, and he dragged the lowest blanket up to the tip of his nose like he used to do as a child.
“Trying to keep away the monsters, Ardyn?“ The dark king tugged his blankets in nice and tight.
"It's cold." The healer protested, snuggling deeper into his spot. Wide eyes blinked up at the other.
“Suppose it is. I was cold when I was your age all the time. Cold and tired and sick.“ He petted the red hair. “You should sleep. It must have been a hard journey.“
Weariness melted away slowly, tension draining at the touch. "Will you sleep again?"
“Until you wake, I will sleep. Until you leave.“ A playful poke into his cheek. “Don't worry for a while. Not here.“
Ardyn, for that is the only name he would be called anymore, let out a laugh, futility ducking. With a happy sigh, he shot an admiring look over at the ancient, smiling curled on his face as he blinked up at him through mussed hair.
“Wanna cuddle?“ the immortal creature offered, still looking every bit like a young man with a strange sense of style.
A blush, and the healer brought the blanket away from his face. "Please?"
“Turn to your side then. Little spoon.“
Ardyn obliged the old king, turning over to his side, toward the salt and sea framed in windows, and away from the man. A chill ran down his spine before he relaxed.
This time, the happy sigh came from behind him, together with an arm that sneaked its way through the blankets. After that, the sensation of another body against his, very much dressed and decent, but still there , and he remembered crawling into his parents' bed before everything started to get strange, and how he lay nuzzled between them in a nest of their arms, and everything was warm and fuzzy, the worries banished to outside the bed they rested in.
Noct pressed a kiss on the top of his head. Asked a silent "Comfy like that?"
A contented hum left Ardyn's lips, resting back into the presence of the body behind his. Between the sound of distant waves crashing and the way the old king's body framed his own, and his breath fell steady as his eyes fell shut in sleep.
For a little longer, Noctis, the Dark King, the Scourge of the Star, the Neverending Abyss, lay awake, listening to the tiny noises the boy made. How often had he been here by now, trying to close that damned circle?
He tried to remember how often Ardyn had returned by now, but one face layered over the other and another one, and he knew it was too often, way too often. The healer was his counterpart, like sea to shore. When he waged war, so did the healer, came with armies and flying ships under his command, and now, that he was tired and docile and lonely...
“Dynamic level adjustment...“ he chuckled. Yawned. Yes, a little nap wouldn't hurt.