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driftward · 11 months

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A little eavesdropping never harmed anyone. Ser Zoissette de Vauban has returned to help my sister with her research, and I found a place in the stacks where I could listen to them a bit. Ah, how my ears must have perked up when I heard these most delectable morsels of information. It’s interesting, listening to them. I don’t think my sister has ever gotten on nearly so well with hardly anyone. Maybe not even Thancred, whom she needles quite a bit harder than she does this Ishgardian. And Zoissette, well, sometimes she’s canny, sometimes she’s an idiot, and apparently tonight was the latter. It’s weird, though. I’ve rarely known Shtola to be so indirect, so circumspect in how she treats with another. I’m thinking there’s more here I don’t know.

Part of me wants to press Zoissette, but I think her wary of me. Another part of me thinks my sister is about due another lecture, but she never listens to me. I fear I may just have to content myself with seeing how this plays out.

~*~

It was getting past late in Nuomenon, and so Zoissette set down a cup of a tea and a plate next to Y’shtola. The tea was a Doman blend she knew the Miqo’te favoured, and the plate held a fruit tart, to feed the woman’s insatiable sweet tooth. Y’shtola smiled up at her, gratefully taking both of them as Zoissette sat down next time with a biscuit for herself.

“Ah,” said Y’shtola. “I seem to have lost track of the time again. You simply must forgive me.”

Zoissette just shrugged, and nodded, and leaned her head back, closing her eyes as she ate her own morsel. A quick nap here next to Y’shtola, and when she awoke, she would gather the dishes back up, and both could then retire to the Annex. She’d be up before the Archon in the morning, ensuring that a hearty breakfast was waiting for her upon awaking, and then they both could get back to work.

She finished her biscuit, and opened her eyes, to gaze lazily over at Y’shtola, who had already returned to her reading. Sitting cross legged on the floor so as to better cradle a book in her lap, hunched over it, her tea in one hand and biting thoughtfully at her tart with the other. Her starlens rested on the pages, she reached down every once in a while with a pinky to nudge it to the next passage.

Gods, thought Zoissette, to anyone else Y’shtola must have appeared a mess, a bedraggled researcher, up too late and fraying at the edge of consciousness. And she was, with bags under her eyes, and her ears beginning to droop. But one only had to look at her eyes to see that even in their gray, they retained their sharpness, crinkles at their edges showing the focus of her concentration. She was passionate in the pursuit of truth, and she was beautiful for it.

Zoissette resisted the urge to sigh, and instead settled in. They had a routine, and she had her part to play in it. But something tickled at the back of her mind.

Well, few people ever had shown more than a passing tolerance of Zoissette’s never ending stream of idle questions, and one of them was right in front of her.

“Archon Y’shtola, I do not mean to interrupt your studies, but I am wondering about something.”

Y’shtola looked up at her, and sat up straight, setting her tart aside.

“Whatsoever is on your mind?”

“You started this research even before we knew of the risk to the star. I think, back during the experiment with the nixies, you said you wanted to cross the rift. Not just go to the thirteenth, but the rift, as a general goal.”

Y’shtola nodded, not interrupting.

“Since then, the scope of what we are doing has expanded. The elemental lords. Vrtra’s sister. To say nothing of your own penchant for curiosity, in the pursuit of uncovering almost any mystery.”

“My, I wonder whosoever enabled and nurtured that tendency of mine?”

Zoissette blinked, then ignored her interjection and kept going. “But for all that, I feel like there was more to what started all this than just a passing hungry desire. You are pushing. Hard. You do not just want to succeed here, you almost need to. More than I have seen in many of your pursuits, I think. I mean, you have always been intense, but… I just feel like I am missing something here. I am wondering what it is.”

Y’shtola tilted her head ever so slightly, before clearing her lap, setting book, tea, starlens, tart and all aside, and shifting to sit more comfortably.

“Well. That is no short answer, but I owe you one nonetheless.”

Zoissette turned red and suddenly turned her attention to her biscuit. “You do not owe me anything, and you do not have to answer. I am, uhm, I am just curious.”

Y’shtola made a thoughtful humming noise.

“I made a promise.”

Zoissette blinked slowly.

“There were a people I met in the First. The Night’s Blessed. It was in their company I spent most of my time whilst there. I was first drawn to their midst in the search of answers to my queries. They rebuffed me, at first. But when tragedy visited them in the form of those creatures we called ‘sin eaters’, I was quick to answer.”

Zoissette shifted how she was sitting, leaning closer, any trace of sleepiness fading from her mind to make space for her interest in this story.

“I answered the threat in kind, and carved a path to safety for them. Afterwards, they took me into their confidence. They had been suspicious of outsiders, a sentiment I understood well, and their people have had every right to be so. However, they warmed to me, and I to them, and I found them to be a kind people. They came to treat with me as one of their own, even to look to me for leadership, as they struggled to recover from their losses. In turn, I suppose I began to view them as a sort of family, lost though I was in that land.”

Y’shtola looked up at the ceiling thoughtfully. “They looked to me for leadership and called upon me as someone they could learn much from. In truth, however, I learned just as much if not moreso from them. One lesson in particular remains with me.”

Y’shtola looked at Zoissette, though Zoissette already knew she would not have to ask.

“I learned that duty should not be its own purpose. It should serve something greater than itself and oneself. I no longer see my tasks unto themselves. I do it for those that I love, and that which I care about most deeply.”

The first duty, thought Zoissette, but she did not speak it out loud.

Y’shtola smiled. “I learned that from one of them which I came to know personally and especially well. A man named Runar. I consider him as like unto kin, in a way. He was ever reliable, much like you. He became a leader of the Nights Blessed in his own way, though I am full certain he would never admit to such, even as he shouldered so much responsibility. I will say, he was rather more earnest than you, and his good nature perhaps came a touch more from a childish youthful vigor rather than your well-earned steel resolve, but in that, it is a matter of differences of degree, not of kind. A good man. He relied upon me to help his people, and I in turn learned to rely upon him, much as I oft have you.

“And he did remind me so much of you, my friend. Took care of those around him. Ever doing what needed to be done. Curious, but perhaps not so feckless as you are in the pursuit of such.”

Zoissette made a put-upon disdainful sniffing noise, and Y’shtola laughed at her. But as she kept going, her smile seeming to turn small and wistful to Zoissette, and her voice softening. Even as Y’shtola looked directly at Zoissette, making sure she was holding her gaze. “Kind, perhaps to a fault. Always assuming the best of everyone. Always seeing the best in me.”

Y’shtola’s eyes were piercing, and Zoissette felt as though something was aimed straight at her heart.

“It is to such a person I made my promise, that I would see them once more. And it is to that end I have placed such efforts in our research, that it may yet come true.

“Have I given succor to your wonderings?”

Zoissette sat up straighter as she answered.

“Yes. You have. Thank you. You will keep your promise. I believe that, and I believe you will meet him again, and I would like to be there when you do,” she said. “I will help you see this through.”

Y’shtola smiled. “With you at my side, how can we help but succeed?”

Zoissette nodded, feeling a surge of inspiration and renewed vigor. “Thank you, Y’shtola.”

Y’shtola tilted her head at her, and tapped her knuckles against her chin.

“…Archon?”

“You have reminded me of a curiosity of their culture,” said Y’shtola. “They believed that all things must be hidden from the light, including their own true names. However, it was permitted to use the name of another - thus, children were oft referred to by the names of their parents. Or disciples, the names of their masters. He will know me as Master Matoya. Though he may know my given name, he certainly never had cause to use it. And even if so, he does not know the formalities of Eorzea regarding it.”

Zoissette was bewildered, but nodded. “I, uhm, will make a note of that,” she said, pulling out a notebook and doing just that. “For when we meet him once more.”

Y’shtola nodded, looking thoughtful.

“As for you, you may call me Shtola, if you please. We’ve certainly known one another long enough, have we not?”

Zoissette looked at her dumbfounded, and then found herself nodding again.

“Shtola,” she said. Then a moment later, she smiled around the name, saying it once more. “…Shtola.”

The Miqo’te smiled softly at her, and began to gather her materials up to put them away. “Well. We’ve spent more than enough time here, and I well know you rather appreciate an earlier bedtime. We can return to this once more on the morrow.”

“Oh. Uh. Yes, of course,” said Zoissette, hurriedly standing to her feet, and helping to gather the plates and cups that would need to return to the Annex with her.

“…Sette.”

“Pardon?”

“You - you can call me Sette. Hardly anyone does. Just - just my brother, really. But… Sette. When you want to. If you want to.”

“Sette,” said Y’shtola, looking thoughtful. “Sette and Shtola. Very well.”

“Thank you,” said Zoissette, feeling slightly foolish for doing so.

“Well then. Shall we retire?”

Zoissette nodded, and the two headed back to the Baldesion Annex. As they went, Zoissette felt filled with new purpose. She would always be Y’shtola’s stalwart second, her quiet shadow, a reliable assistant.

She would see Y’shtola succeed.

#The Incident #The beginning and the end

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