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When Timo enters Insomnia for the first time, it is nothing like she imagined. Looking from afar, separated by miles of sea and land that seemed unconquerable, the people of her village have always looked to the glowing city as a beacon of hope, a sign of fortitude, solidity, resilience.
Now, stepping foot inside its towering walls and rippling Shield, it just feels empty; cold.
Perhaps it is Timo herself, dispassionate and detached, who is different from what she remembers, but it doesn’t matter. She is one of many who come to the city that day, just another face in the crowd of refugees that are herded through the city like aimless sheep, assigned to quarters in a large building of metal and stone. All cold, all lifeless. She is alone, and the steel walls that surround her while a stranger sleeps in the same room only drives that fact home.
Timo does not cry in the wake of her home. Maybe it’s shock, maybe it’s just the cold, clutching hands of her lonely despair. She doesn’t cry, she doesn’t mourn, but she clings to the memory of her lost kin like a light in the dark, and she builds her resolve around it.
She is going to avenge them. She is going to make the Empire pay. She is going to become a Glaive, like Nyx, like the Hero, the man who had pulled her from the fire when she could not - would not - and forced her to keep on living.
Timo is thirteen years old when she becomes an orphan.
Timo is seventeen years old when she becomes a Kingsglaive.
Four years have passed since that first day inside Insomnia’s cold walls, and she has grown. The Glaive would not accept her before she came of age, would not make her one of their own, use her. They could not stop her from learning, though, could not stop her from watching and copying and, eventually, earning their teachings. She has trained with them for over three years, learning everything she can in preparation for the day she can join their ranks and don their armour, their power.
Nyx is her main supporter, for a reason she cannot quite fathom. He sees something in her she cannot even see in herself, and she wonders why many a time. He never explains, though, just smiles in a distant kind of way and brushes her off, refocuses her into learning a new stance, handling a new blade. She is grateful for his teachings, still owing him a debt of blood that she still does not completely believe was something to be grateful for.
All the physical training does not prepare her for the rush of the Crystal’s power through her veins. Fire springs from her hands and shields crackle and form in front of her at a mere thought, energy racing through her fingertips, as wild and untamable as the Coeurls of her homeland. She revels in it, learns from it, controls it. The fire becomes her breath and pulse, a way to finally fight back, and the weight of the Glaive’s hood falls as right on her shoulders, a burden she was born to carry.
The warping takes time, an obstacle she has watched the others face time and time again during her years of waiting, but was somehow still not prepared for. Nyx coaches her through it, keeps her steady when she feels like giving up, and the debt of gratitude between them grows larger. She does not mention it more than once, not after she sees the look in his eyes that first time. Something haunted, something ungrieved, something guilty .
It reminds her of her own motivations, and she blocks it from her mind.
Timo is twenty one years old before she learns to live again.
She has been a Kingsglaive four years now, learning to trust Nyx and respect Pelna, to banter with Axle and not give Luche a chance to speak lest he spew something idiotic. She is a true Glaive, as firmly entrenched in their ways as any of the others of her kin who serve the King and draw from the Crystal’s power.
She meets him during training. It’s a routine drill, sparring and magic practice, more of a fun way to spend time then the real, grueling training they otherwise engage in. Vaguely, she wonders how they have never met before, but she is more concerned with remembering how to breathe first. His eyes are silver, dancing with a merry light that makes them seem so much more vibrant, and his face is brightened with boyish charm and an almost childish grin.
Timo looks at him and all she can see is the fires of her home and the blood of her family. Bullets rip the air and explosions rent houses to splinters, the roar of Daemons breaking the heavy tread of the MTs as they destroy everything she knows and rip her baby brother from her in a maelstrom of death and merciless destruction.
When she comes back to herself, he’s right there, bending over her, those boyish features twisted into a soft expression of concern and soft eyes overflowing with warmth she cannot take. The fire in her heart has always been cold, as icy as the steel walls that keep Insomnia safe, and the heat of his own crashes over her with such force she barely remembers how to function.
For the first time in years, she runs. She leaves behind questions and confusion, but it doesn’t matter, not at the time, not when her breath is seizing in her chest and her heart feels like it’s trying to remember how to beat properly. She wishes, briefly, that she didn’t have one at all, that she didn’t care, didn’t remember, didn’t know .
But she does, she remembers it every night, every time she closes her eyes, every time Nyx smiles at her with that thinly hidden love in his eyes and she has to try not to scream at him, tell him to leave her, take his loyalty elsewhere. Because she knows, in the depths of her frozen fire, that they will all be gone, sooner or later. The Empire has no mercy, and neither do the gods. There is nothing she, or anyone - not even the King - can do to stop the merciless death, the swing of the gods’ hollow blades, and she refuses to bear that pain ever again.
Kovi becomes a problem.
He is like a ray of light in the midst of the Glaives, a bright beam of sunlight that cuts through her with more success than any blade ever has. Now that she knows he is there, she cannot avoid him, cannot ignore him, and his persistent attempts to befriend her leave her with little room to run. She almost lets it happen, finds herself enjoying the time he spends in her presence, enjoying his warmth. She realises too late, and the panic that sets in triggers an outburst she doesn’t fully remember. It feels wrong, guilt curling in her stomach, but she refuses to let her resolve be broken, her belief shattered, and this is the only way.
He recoils like he has been physically wounded when she attacks him with words, and she is left in peace for blissful days before Pelna sticks his nose where it does not belong. She likes the elder man, that she will admit, but his penchant for butting into other peoples’ business has never impressed her, and it is even more disenchanting now that he has levelled his efforts unto her.
He manages to wear her down with nothing but sheer resolve, drawing the truth from her unwilling lips and pressing his own together in an expression she has come to recognise as one of careful consideration. It hurts , the words slicing her far deeper than even Kovi had as the admission falls from her lips.
“He reminds me of my brother.” She tells him, face turned away and breath carefully controlled, in through the nose and out through the mouth. “He was killed in front of me when he was eight years old.”
Pelna tries to comfort her, tries to apologise, to offer condolences, but she cannot let him, cannot let him break her. She’s come too far for that, buried her demons beneath too much fire and concrete to let them consume her now, but it is not that easy.
Pelna, she’s sure it is him, sure that he cannot simply leave well enough alone, sends Nyx after her. She doesn’t stand a chance against him, not overpowered by her own guilt, and before she can blink, she finds herself alone with Kovi once more.
They’re in the armoury, and the irony is not lost on her. She stands by the door, uncomfortable and wishing nothing more than to leave; but she knows Nyx is still standing watch outside, no doubt with Pelna’s traitorous self at his side, and she needs to find a way to put things right enough that they will leave her be.
She knows she hurt Kovi with her words, those days ago; that had been her intent. Still, it strikes her when his first words to her are cold and stiff, his back turned and a Kukri resting gently in his hands as he goes about his duties calmly, his natural aura of warmth almost subdued by her presence.
“There’s nothing for us to discuss.” He says softly, his face hidden but gaze clearly downcast, “You should see to your own duties.”
She’s ensnared by her guilt, then, even her desire to be free of this swallowed by the realisation that she caused this . She does not know enough of Kovi to speak freely of him, but she knows that the warm, friendly aura she had so hated was not before her now, not even by half. She takes a step forward unconsciously, searching for words as she flails to put things right, even if only a little.
“Kovi...I know you won’t believe me, but I am sorry.” Her voice is not her own, soft and barely audible, the ability to breath suddenly so much more difficult than it should be. “I went too far and...I had no right to be so unfair .”
His shoulders lift and fall, the Kukri clinking softly as he rests it back in its case and snaps the lid shut. The light bounces off his hair, catching on strands of silver and blond amongst the black, yet still he does not turn.
“It’s fine.” He says flatly, little of the warmth and life she has heard from him before present. She feels herself bristle, both in anger at his lack of engagement, and herself. She is out of her depth here, floundering like a coeurl in water, and she doesn’t know how to proceed, how to fix this, how to escape.
“It’s not fine.” She snaps, and it makes sense. Anger is her default defence, the fire growing in her chest a familiar sensation that smoothes a little of the emotion in her throat. “I know you can’t forgive me right now because I hurt you, but I am sorry. I had no right to lash out at you and I regret everything I said, I’ll… I’ll leave you alone, I won’t speak to you if that’s what you want.”
He’s silent for a long moment. She forgets how to breath in that moment, the fire that had previously been soothing her suddenly chilling. Her throat feels constricted and burned, a heaviness behind her eyes, and she doesn’t understand why. It’s not fair, none of it is fair, and she wants nothing more than to be done with it, to be on a battlefield, to face down an armada and unleash the might of her fury and frustration on them.
But she can’t, all she can do is stand with her back pressed to the wall of the armoury, hands fisted by her side and breath trembling in her lungs as Kovi mulls over her hard-drawn apology.
Finally, he moves, turning slowly on his heel and meeting her quivering gaze with dull silver eyes.
“Why?” He asks flatly, and it takes her a moment to even register the word. It cuts through her lungs and a stuttered gasp leaves her, teeth clamping down over her bottom lip too late to capture the sound before it can escape.
He doesn’t break his gaze, staring through her with those light silver eyes, demanding a reason and rhyme. She lets out a slow breath, turns her head away from that suddenly intense gaze, and digs her fingers into her palms hard enough to pierce flesh.
“Because you were getting too close.” She says, and her voice is like a whisper, as strong as she feels in that moment; insignificant and petty. “You were becoming more than just a fellow soldier. You were becoming my friend and I...I couldn’t let that happen. I couldn’t let you mean something only to lose you.”
He’s quiet for a long time, and when she dares to lift her gaze, a gaze she finds is undeniably blurry, he is looking at her with an expression not unlike puzzlement. He blinks as she watches him, his mouth pressing into a thin line, and the coldness in his eyes turns to something brighter, something more like fire, strong and undeniable.
“Do you think you’re the only one who’s suffering?” He asks, and his voice is like a whip-crack. Where before it had been soft and dull, now it crackles like fire and burns through her like a gunshot. She can do nothing but stand there, eyes wide and mouth agape, as he closes the distance between them, his lesser height insignificant as he towers over her with silver eyes that burn .
“Every single one of us Glaives have lost people. We’ve lost families, homes, friends, cultures. Every one of us has lost something to the Empire, to the gods, to the Daemons. Do you think nobody else has lost people? Nobody else has suffered grief? Nobody else has watched their loved ones lose their lives before the Empire’s greed?
“I lost my entire village to the Empire, Timo. Every man, woman, and child that I grew up loving was taken from me in a matter of minutes. My parents, my twin brother, my friends, my home. Everything . I alone survived, and every day that haunts me. Every single day I see something that reminds me of them and it hurts . But I don’t let it consume me, I fight it, I fight for them, not because of them. I saw that despite everything I’ve lost, there is still hope, there is still life . We’re still here and we’re still fighting, we’re still surviving. There’s always a risk you’re going to get hurt, that’s how it works with a family. But, that risk, that worry, that feeling of needing to protect someone or see them safe, it hurts, but the pain is so much better than the solitude. The empty .”
He’s heaving for breath by the time he’s finished, his eyes locked on her own and his face morphed into an expression of righteous fury and stubborn resolve. Timo’s vision is blurred, her breath stuck in her throat and her chest hitching as she fights the flood that is threatening to consume her. Kovi takes a single step back and she crumples like a cut marionette, folding to the floor and covering her face with her hands as she shakes.
“I’m such a fool.” She chokes, squeezing her eyes shut against the burning pain that threatens to overwhelm her. Distantly, as though through water, she hears a soft chuckle, and then arms wrap around her, pulling her close to a bulky chest and tucking her forehead in the crook between chin and shoulder. She stiffens, ready to defend herself, break away, flee.
She doesn’t. Her body relaxes into the pure warmth of his embrace and her tenuous grip on control shatters. Everything pours from her, everything she has kept contained for all the years since that disastrous day. She doesn’t know how long they stay there, but Kovi doesn’t move, holding her close and rocking them softly back and forth as he hums lowly under his breath.
It’s comforting in ways she cannot even begin to describe, and she feels more at peace than she ever has in her life. It still hurts, a deep ache in her chest that threatens to overwhelm her if she thinks about it for too long, but the warm consuming her is just as powerful, beating the sharp pain back and dulling it to a manageable throb.
She cracks her eyes open and finds Kovi’s silver gaze watching her gently, a soft smile pulling at his thin lips. She finds herself mirroring it, shakily, unsure, the expression feeling foreign and strange on her lips, yet good at the same time.
Kovi lifts them both to their feet like she is made of paper, his hand remaining steady on her shoulder as she regains her balance and squeezing slightly as their gazes meet again. He flashes a smile, so bright and encompassing it sparks something warm in her chest, something that reminds her of distant summers past and fields of green with a brilliant sun shining overhead.
“Want to get some grub?” He says, his voice as light and joyful as that first day in the training rings, and she can’t help the soft sound that escapes her lips, somewhere between a sob and a laugh.
“I’d like that.”
Timo is twenty one years old when she remembers what it is to be alive.