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Legend slips away in the middle of the night, moving on silent feet towards the gathering of magic he senses just beyond the grove. Behind him the others rest easy, if only for the moment. Wild’s on watch, after all, and he’s insistent that this place beyond any other is safe. Safer than…
He closes his eyes on the recollection of the blade slicing into his brother’s gut–appearing from a tree of all things– and sinks to his knees. His magic pools in his hands, infusing into a handful of apple slices he’d spent the last few minutes carving, and waits. It isn’t for long. A beak twitches into existence from thin air, long feathery ears a moment later, and, throat achingly tight, Legend watches this tiny thing hop closer. Buried deep in his chest, a timid pink creature perks up in acknowledgement.
He stays still, stays calm, and feels his lips tremble when the blupee nuzzles against his fingers and takes a slice. A chirrup sounds. He resists the impulse to return it.
“Hi…” he breathes instead, laughing silently at the greed in front of him. “Will you really manage three at once?”
The blupee tilts its head, apple in beak and paws, and clambers into his lap for a seat. Legend freezes. Heart in his throat, he watches the spirit enjoy its snack and– bizarrely– tries not to cry, the urge to growing stronger the longer this little weight sits in his lap. The spirit pauses mid-clean. It’s head turns, ears flicking in a way Legend hates to understand, and presses its paws to his chest.
“I’m okay,” he murmurs, hand hovering over the blupee’s back. “No need for that.”
Beady eyes communicate disbelief clearly, and Legend has to laugh. It comes out a little wet.
“Judgemental, are we? You’ve the look of Ravio…”
The blupee rises a little higher, nuzzles its head against his jaw, and chatters softly. Legend falls breathlessly silent. The first tear that falls is hot. It isn’t the last, but through each and every one this little spirit sits with him, as quiet and still as Legend has become.
He can feel Wild’s eyes on his back, the understanding burning, but for once not uncomfortably. The man brought them here, after all. Told them what they like. He wonders, hand finally daring to rest in the being’s fur and crying a little harder when it does nothing but purr, if perhaps…
By the time morning comes, his tears have run dry. The spirit is still with him, asleep in his lap and oddly purpleish under early morning light. Fondly exasperated at how disinclined to move as it seems to be, Legend wonders how long it will stay.
Three days later, Satori watches them leave with a knowing kind of intensity. Legend aches a little too much at a goodbye he knew would come to work out why.
Out the other side, in the daylight of Four’s era, a familiar chirrup greets him.