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Fray won’t leave him alone.
He’s been dead two years today, and he won’t bloody leave him alone.
“Missed a spot,” Fray says, as Sid swings his blade at the weathered training dummy he borrows when the Temple Knights aren’t using it. His voice is gruffer than Sid remembers. Death has turned his smooth tenor into a low rumble. “Not on your game today, are you?”
Sid grunts. “You’re just a figment of my imagination.”
A laugh. “And yet here you are talking to me.” He has him there. Without a proper retort, Sid makes sure to strike his dummy extra hard. “Nice hit,” says Fray.
Perhaps this is what it is to go mad. ‘Twould be just like the gods to strike him with another trial.
“You’re looking dour,” Fray says.
Sid had thought he was done speaking. “Don’t get my hopes up like that,” he grumbles.
Fray, of course, was never so merciful. “What’s with the sour face?”
“My face isn’t sour.” No more than usual, at least.
“Don’t tell me you miss me?”
“How could I miss a man who won’t swiving leave me in peace?”
Fray chuckles at that, but he falls silent.
Not that this means the rest of his morning is peaceful. Not a bell later, Rielle pokes her head through the doorway, mint-colored hair mussed with sleep, eyes as alert and watchful as ever.
“Sid?” she murmurs.
With a huff, Sid turns, hefting his blade onto his shoulder, humming in greeting. “You’re up early.” Usually, Rielle isn’t verbal for at least another several bells.
Her expression is solemn as she searches his face. For a moment, he panics, as though in greeting her he has opened wide the door to his mind and Rielle can read his every thought. Or perhaps she simply overheard him talking to himself, which, for all intents and purposes, is little better.
“I want to play in the snow today,” is all that she says.
She…what? “Alright…?” His confusion must be clear in his face, because she sighs.
“The snow , Sid,” she says, as though that had been the confusing part. When he squints, she has the nerve to roll her eyes at him. “Can’t you see the weather’s perfect for it?”
He can, but the sun’s barely risen, so he’s not sure where she got the idea. All the same, the sky is clear. He’s lived through enough Coerthan winters to know that it’s going to be a beautiful day.
“So has she,” muses Fray.
He raises a point. Sid forgets sometimes that she’s almost a woman grown. Frankly, he prefers not to dwell on it.
Why, then, is she so set on playing like a child? Can they not spend their time as adults do, lurking silently in the corners of shady taverns? That’s what Sid was doing at her age.
“And look at you now.” Fray’s voice cuts into his thoughts again like a blade through air. “What’s the issue? Surely you can handle a little snow.”
He scowls. “Of course I can.”
“You’ll take me, then?” Rielle looks irritatingly pleased with herself. Fray feels irritatingly pleased with himself, hiding away in the back of Sid’s skull. These two will be the death of him.
He huffs. “ Fine .”
They’d better not expect this to become a habit.
—
It had been far easier to get Sid on board with her little plan than Rielle had expected. She hadn’t even had to pull out the puppy eyes, though she’d been practicing them just for this moment.
It’s not as though the snow seems particularly more appealing than usual, or that she even enjoys the outdoors all that much. Really, her coat is far too thin, considering how the Coerthan wind likes to nip on a good day, and more often than not, she finds herself racing inside with her cheeks bright red and her fingers frozen stiff through her mittens.
But, well, Fray.
He'd deny it if she asked. He always denies things when she asks, stubborn arse, like she's not old enough to understand that people die, or that the world is filled with terrible things. But it's been two years since they lost Fray — not that she’s got it marked on her calendar, or anything — and Sid is acting strangely, and it's really impossible not to connect the dots knowing the things that she knows.
Sid’s never been any good at hiding his feelings. Rielle’s not sure he’s caught onto that fact yet. He’s always been a bit dense.
They don't talk much on the way there. Well, Sid doesn’t, even if Rielle tries her damnedest to get him to say anything more than, “Aye,” or “Oh, Fury.” She’d even accept a “sodding Temple Knights” at this point.
Rielle’s not sure what she expected. She’s not even upset, really, but they’re both grown ups (even if Sid continues to insist that she’s not ) , and that’s what grown ups do. Speak to each other. Honestly, sometimes she thinks she’s more grown than Sid is. Arse. Who gets so grumpy over a jaunt through the snow, anyroad?
But she needs to do something to get Sid out of this mood of his.
When they finally arrive somewhere Sid deems “suitable” and “safe enough,” Sid stands himself in a corner – how did he even manage to find a corner in a place like this? – and Rielle is left with nothing but her own two hands and a snow-filled clearing surrounded by trees. Really, Rielle doesn't see how this spot is any safer than anywhere closer to the city – there are wolves out here, Sid! – but she's not the dark knight here. Ugh. time for the real work to begin.
Mouth a line, she calls to Sid over her shoulder. “What are you doing?”
There’s a long pause, as though Sid is trying to parse her meaning from where he’s parked himself amidst the shadows of the forest. “Standing watch.” That idiot.
Rielle turns on her heel proper. “What was the point of bringing me all the way out here if you're still going to stand guard the whole time?”
“There are wolves out here.” Is he serious?
“Then you can pry me from their jaws when they launch their attack. Will you help me build a snowman, or won't you?
“Nay?” He looks as baffled as he sounds.
“You arse .“ Her outburst is met with silence. He probably thinks she’s having one of those fits of the female hysteria, or some such, and is crafting an answer in his head to appease her with as little collateral damage as possible. Before he gets the chance, she bends down, packs two handfuls of snow into a ball, and hurls it at him as hard as she can.
Which isn’t very hard, admittedly, but it shocks Sid, which was the whole point, anyroad. What, does he think she doesn’t know exactly how to get under his skin? Two years is a long time to spend with someone, especially when that someone has been your only company for most of it.
She throws another snowball. Now, Sid finally seems to be waking up to the idea that she’s trying to start a fight.
“You shite ,” he says, just as a third snowball smacks him in the chest. His jaw drops. Gods , he is slow!
Sid’s jaw clenching, he bends down to pack snow between armored hands and hurl it in her direction. Honestly, Rielle expected his aim to be worse; she yelps when the lumpy ball of snow collides with her calf. That arse! He isn’t holding back at all!
Which works out in her favor, all things considered. When she yelps, Sid freezes a moment, as though he’s just made a terrible mistake, and now he’s obsessing over every life choice that led him to this moment. He probably is. He likes to obsess, that Sid.
The next snowball hits him on the side of the head. Or the horn. It’s kind of hard to tell, really. Either way, he doesn’t seem to like it much.
He doesn’t hesitate before hurling another sloppily packed snowball in her direction. It misses her this time, thank the gods, but she hears its heavy thud as it collides with the tree next to her.
“That could have taken my head off, you big oaf!” She snorts. Sid can’t even manage to keep up his scowl, and he’s actually practiced at that sort of thing.
“Fury knows I could use the peace and quiet.”
She nails him between the eyes for that one.
—
“You’re allowed to hold back a little, you know,” Fray muses. Rielle rests on Sid’s back, curled just so to avoid the many spikes that jut out from his pauldrons.
Sid only snorts. Rielle is no more bruised than he, and she has the added benefit of not having had snow thrust down her armor.
Besides, it’s rich of Fray, of all people, to suggest he hold back. Were Fray here — really here — they’d have spent their days dodging snowballs packed with ice and stones. Sid would have, at least. Perhaps he’d have gone easy on Rielle.
The sun hangs low in the sky by the time Sid begins trudging back to Ishgard, Rielle on his back, shivering and pink-cheeked. Rielle is faring better than Sid, shockingly enough. He’ll not concede defeat, but he’ll not pretend he won this day, either.
“You made her happy,” says Fray.
“What?” Glancing over his shoulder, Sid finds Rielle with her eyes closed and a smile on her lips. She still has some growing to do, after all. That she still fits on his back is evidence enough of that.
Rielle’s eyes crack open at the sound of his voice, grumbling something that Sid can tell is a question, masked as it is by the howl of the wind.
“Rest. We’re only halfway there,” Sid tells her. He readjusts his hold on her. In lieu of a response, he’s answered with the faintest hint of a snore, her breath warm against his neck. Shivering against the early spring wind, he huffs.
Will Rielle be alright in Gridania? She won’t be on her own, not with those Seedseers there for guidance, but Sid feels like a mother hen, anxious to see his child leave the nest — whether Rielle considers him a father or not. With his luck, the fates will drop a fresh needy child on his doorstep within the next moon. He’ll not want for company.
But Rielle… will she be alright without him?
“That was never in doubt,” Fray murmurs. Sid agrees. Rielle is adaptable, far more than he ever was. If anything, Sid is the one holding her back, not the other way around.
“What of you?” asks Fray.
“I’ll manage,” he murmurs. He always does.
—-
Back at the Forgotten Knight, Rielle tends their wounds. She insisted. Sid has given up on fighting her over it at this point. Whatever his own thoughts on just bearing with his aches and pains, he’ll not begrudge Rielle the practice.
“You’ll wind up mentoring the Seedseers, at this rate,” Sid says as Rielle wraps a bandage around an injury he’d sustained less than a fortnight ago on his bicep.
“Oh, shut up,” she says. She ties off the bandage tightly enough to make Sid wince.
Behind them, the fire crackles, driving the cold from their bones.
“What’s got you so quiet?” Rielle asks.
“You just told me to shut up,” Sid reminds her.
She frowns. “You know what I mean.”
Sid certainly isn’t going to put words in her mouth. “I’m always quiet,” he tries again, desperate to appease her so that this conversation might end.
For a moment, Sid is convinced it worked. “You’re no good at lying, you know.” The words pierce between the gaps in his armor like the well-aimed thrust of a blade. “You think you are, but you’re not.”
“I’m not lying.” His voice is near a wheeze.
Rielle, for her part, doesn’t seem fazed. “Really, truly awful.”
Sid rises to his feet. “Would you quit your badgering ?” At his full height, Rielle is as small as she’s ever been, but against the flicker of the fireplace, he could almost mistake her for a woman grown. “Fury, you are insufferable.” With a huff, he crosses his arms.
Rielle’s are crossed in turn. “I’m not leaving you, if that’s what you’re so worried about.” She juts out her chin.
“I’d not blame you if you did.” To his own surprise, he means it. It might be the first honest thing he’s said all night. “Don’t throw aside an opportunity to make a life for yourself for my sake.”
“ Sid …” she says, in that tone of voice that means he’s just said something embarrassing. Then, as firmly as Sid has ever heard her, she repeats herself. “I’m not leaving. Even if you are an idiot.”
Sid watches her until he’s certain she’s finished, certain she doesn’t have a shoe to drop, a secret cache of bad news she’s been waiting to spring upon him. Then, his tail swishing, he turns away. “Do as you will.”
“I will.” Her voice, defiant as ever, cuts through the chill of his heart more than the fire ever could. For the first time in a fortnight, he smiles, his lips wobbly, unpracticed, like a toddler learning how to walk.
“That’s a good look on you,” says Fray.
When he looks back, Rielle is smiling, too.