Chapter Text
Year of the Realm 873; Autumn
He had not done it on purpose.
And it was not his fault, either, Clive thought irritably as he lay on the bed in the infirmary where he had been deposited and listened to the physicker berate him.
"...that you're invincible," Tarja was saying. She had one hand on her hip and held a phial in the other, full of some herb so pungent that the smell had wrenched him unceremoniously back to consciousness. It waved threateningly through the air as she gesticulated. "As though we don't have enough to do around here!"
Clive tilted his head away as the phial wafted closer to his face again. "Look, I'm sorry—" he tried.
"Sorry?" Tarja snapped. She leaned down over him and, thankfully, set the phial on a table before her smelling salts could spill all over him. "'Sorry' is a grown man wasting my time because he can't understand a very simple concept that every child knows! How long has it been since you've slept?"
"I was asleep just now," he grumbled, because he was annoyed, and also because he didn't know the answer she was looking for. His mind felt like the porridge Kenneth had been serving this morning, and his limbs were so heavy that when he looked down at himself, he was surprised to find that he was not wearing his armour. He began to sit up.
The physicker took a step back, and then came closer again to grab him by the shoulder when he swayed. "You fool," she muttered. "Lie down. Better yet, go back to your quarters and lie down there."
Clive took a deep breath. Behind Tarja, he could see Jill on another bed, lying too still. She had not yet woken since he had beaten her half to death.
He turned away.
Tarja shook him by the shoulder. "Clive. Where have you been sleeping?"
"I don't know," he muttered.
"What was that?"
His hands clenched into fists on his thighs. "I don't know," Clive gritted out. "I...I haven't..."
She threw her hands in the air. Clive tried not to tip over as her supporting grip left him. "Have you not been sleeping at all? You stupid man—where are your things?"
What the hell was she on about? What things did she think he had? "Cid told me I could leave my armour in his solar," he said.
"Yes?" Tarja said.
"Yes?" Clive echoed. Perhaps his mind had melted further from porridge to soup, because he had no idea what she wanted from him.
She opened her mouth, and then stopped. She lowered her arms to cross them over her chest, looking down at him. "Cid's quarters," she said.
Unless Cid had taken his pile of dirty armour and sold them to Charon for scrap, then yes, Clive's armour was in the man's solar. "Yes?" he said again, confused.
Tarja exhaled through her nose. "Wait here. Do not walk off," she said, pointing a finger at him, and then strode out of the infirmary.
Clive sighed. He let his head hang low, bracing his elbows on his knees. The room spun very slowly around him, and he wondered if he could manage to escape before Tarja came back and whether it would be worth whatever she did to him when she inevitably found him.
(It was not truly inevitable. He could leave. He was not staying in this little Hideaway, anyhow, and he had already told them all that. If he simply stood up, walked out of here, and left—)
He jerked awake when the bed jostled beneath him. Cid pulled his foot back, ready to kick it again. "What's this about, then?" Cid asked, standing with his arms crossed over his chest.
"Your latest stray collapsed in the garden," Tarja said, hurrying in behind him. "Martelle called for help, and the Cursebreakers brought him in."
"I can hear you," Clive said pointedly, though the effect might have been ruined by the way his words slurred as he spoke. He shook his head, squeezing his eyes shut and blinking them open again.
"He says," Tarja said testily, "that he's being quartered in your room."
Cid's brow quirked. "Does he now."
"What? I didn't say that," Clive protested. "I'm not being quartered anywhere."
There was a long silence. Clive dug the heel of his hand into his eye, rubbing away the sleep that threatened. He and Cid were going to leave as soon as they received word from the scout who had reported whispers of a Dominant of fire, and that meant Clive needed to be awake and ready to move. This was nowhere near the longest he had spent awake, and he had spent most of it here, in the Hideaway, where he was mopping floors and fetching bowls for people instead of having to fight.
"Are you telling me, Cidolfus Telamon," Tarja said, her tone icy, "that you brought a Bearer home and didn't bother to give him a place to sleep?"
"Otto usually takes care of that," Cid said, but he frowned at Clive. "Did I not tell you there was a warm bed waiting here?"
"For Jill," Clive said, and he could not help but look past them again to see her lying unconscious on the other bed. It had been days. Surely she should have woken up by now?
Founder. He had done that to her. Not alone; not without Tiamat and Aevis, and none of them would have survived more than a moment had Jill not already skirmished with Titan that day. But Wyvern—Clive was the reason their unit had been sent after Shiva. There were not many in the Sanbrequois army who wielded fire magic, and none of those had Clive's power. They might not have known why (Joshua, dear Joshua), but it had been no secret that he was the strongest firecaster among them. He had been the best killer.
(Tiamat might have known why. He had seen Clive use powers that could only have come from an Eikon, and more than once. But if he had known, he had never let on. Clive had often wondered. He would never have the chance to ask.)
He looked down at his hands. First a handful of Ironblood crusaders, then Jill, and then Tiamat. And to think he had once called himself a Shield.
Fingers snapped before his nose, jolting him to awareness. "Oy, wake up—are we boring you?" Cid said, and then Clive's arm was pulled over the man's shoulders. "Come on, lad."
"I'm not staying," Clive said as he was hauled upright. He felt he was in a dream, as though he were walking through a mist. He found his feet and pulled away.
"And yet here we are, three days later," Cid said, and planted a hand in the centre of his back, pushing him toward the door. Clive stumbled forward, scowling. A look over his shoulder showed Tarja still standing with her arms folded, glaring at both of them. She did not move to stop them, though, so it was probably the better part of valour to go wherever he was being led. As they went, he snatched up his sword from where it lay on the floor by the bed and tiredly sheathed it again in the harness he still wore over his shoulder. "Surely you've slept during that time?"
He had, of course, here and there. The Fat Chocobo emptied late at night, enough to find a table in the corner where he could doze off for a bit with his back to the wall. But the Fallen ruins they were in had so many open spaces, and he had lived in the barracks for the Bearers long enough that he knew better than to close his eyes where someone could come upon him unawares. It had taken him over a day to ask Cid if he could take off his armour, and he still could not bear to be out of reach of his blade.
"I don't need to sleep very much," was what he said. "The...the Blessing of the Phoenix."
Cid turned to look at him, though he kept walking. They were moving up the stairs now—going where, Clive was not certain. "Healing magic can't sustain a man forever," Cid said, though he sounded curious. "And it doesn't seem in any man's best interest to rely on it. Are you casting curatives consciously, or is the Phoenix always healing its Dominant?"
"I'm not its Dominant," Clive said, rather than trying to sort through his questions and find an answer. No one really knew how the Phoenix's magic worked. No one living, anyhow; not anymore—not even Clive. Not when the Phoenix was dead.
"Whatever it is, it mustn't work very well," Cid mused, "or you wouldn't have knocked out under Martelle's apple tree."
"I can manage for longer than most," Clive said, and then, "Where are we going?"
Cid pulled open the door to his solar. "Why, I heard you were being quartered in here," he said, and shoved Clive into the room. "Go on."
Clive looked at the armour he had left here the day before, still in a pile in the corner. "Go on, what?"
"Sleep, lad," Cid said, and shoved him again until he stumbled further into the room. "How long had you been in the field when I found you?"
There was no telling. The Bastards had rarely not been in the field, and the trek from Sanbreque to the Dhalmekian Republic had been a difficult one. Such journeys had rarely been easy for four armed men bearing brands and travelling without a master holding their leash.
"I hit my head, somewhere in the Nysa Defile," Clive remembered aloud. He blinked, and the red inside his eyelids was like the colour of Biast's blood on a boulder. "I was asleep after. At least for a few hours, I think, or he wouldn't have been so angry with me."
Cid took him by the arm and pulled him to a stop, his other hand gripping Clive's jaw to hold him still.
Clive froze, startled by the sudden movement. His skin prickled, and Cid's hand, bare of glove or gauntlet, was warm. He could almost feel the phantom pain of his branding, the constant awareness of the mark of a Bearer each time something touched his face.
As though nothing at all were amiss, Cid peered into Clive's eyes. "Who's that?" he asked.
It was strange to be in someone's hands, to feel callused fingers against his chin and to be staring at someone from so close without being on his knees or waiting for some punishment. In the Sanbrequois army, Bearers were either disdained or feared. The last time anyone had been close enough for Clive to see the whites of their eyes had been after he and the Bastards had returned to their camp after a mission gone awry. The men who carried a lash did not fear being so near to a Bearer.
"Hm?" Cid prompted. His eyes were a deep green, flecked with an array of colours and framed by gentle lines when he frowned. The clothes he wore carried the faint scent of the herbs he smoked, and his fingers, though firm, did not dig into Clive's skin. He took his hand from Clive's arm, pointing at something to the side. Clive followed it, though what he was meant to be looking for, he was too tired to see. "Someone was angry, you said?"
Finally, Clive pulled free with a jerk. The hand on his chin fell away, and he breathed. "It doesn't matter."
"All right, all right, keep your secrets," Cid said. He stepped back, too, hands held to his sides. "And how's your head now?"
"My head is fine," Clive said, ignoring the way his vision tried to slide out of focus. He knew the difference between fatigue and an injury to his head. "I heal fast."
Cid made a noise of question, but he pursued it no further. "You're here now, at any rate, so you have your choice. You're a little tall for the couch, but I'll not force a man into my bed."
There was a teasing lilt to his voice. Clive eyed him uncertainly, but if there was one thing he had learned about Cid so far, it was that the man was always teasing. "I'm not sleeping in your room," he said.
"Why not?" Cid spread his arms around. "It's a perfectly good room."
"I'm not staying," Clive said.
"So you've said. And so Otto never assigned you a living space, and fool that I am, I thought I made it clear that this isn't the kind of place where Bearers are refused food and a place to sleep. And so I"—Cid gestured to himself with both hands—"am now in a heap of shit with our physicker, with whom I am usually already in a heap of shit. So do me a favour and get some rest before you keel over and I take the blame for it, eh?"
Clive did not move. Cid's bed was neat, and it looked softer than anything he had slept on in over a decade. And Cid was pulling out his chair, sitting down at his desk, and picking up a quill, clearly meaning to return to work.
"You're their leader," Clive said. Cid paused with his quill above the inkpot. "All of these people here—they follow you."
"I found these ruins," Cid said, "and I've worked hard to turn it into a place where we could live. There aren't many here who actually heed my orders, if that's what you mean."
"And you're offering me a bed to sleep in," Clive said. He cast his gaze around the solar. It was much larger than any of the other spaces where people slept in these ruins, a clear sign of Cid's status among the rest and—Clive eyed the mess littering the desk—his greater responsibilities. "Here. In your own quarters."
"Well, there's no lack of space, as you can see," Cid said.
"What do you want from me in return?" Clive asked.
Cid leaned back. "The same that I want from every other man and woman here: for you to be free. If you start swinging that blade of yours at the other residents, then we'll have words. But beyond that? Nothing."
It was nonsense. It was a fairy-tale for children too young or too dim to know better. Clive pressed down a dull ache in his chest and folded his arms. He had not been a child in longer than he could remember. "Am I meant to believe that?"
This time, Cid dipped his quill into the ink and turned his back, bending over a sheaf of parchment spread over his desk. "We built this place," he said. "It's not a barracks, or a stronghold, or a base of operations. It's our home. Believe what you want, but if I weren't willing to offer my own room to another when he needed it, I'd be a poor host indeed. So! What will it be? Where are you sleeping?"
Clive closed his eyes, just for a second, and then had to open them again lest he fall asleep on his feet. The door was closed.
When he hesitated, Cid said, without looking up, "No one will trouble you while you sleep, if that's what you're afraid of—not even me. This room is as safe as any you'll find."
"I'm not afraid of—" Clive started, and then, frustrated, strode to the bed and rolled up a blanket. He lay down on the floor, pillowing his head on the roll.
The rough cloth smelled like a storm—like the char of lightning, like the aroma that lingered in the air just before rain fell. Cid must be a particularly powerful Bearer for the scent of his aether to permeate even his bedlinens in the Deadlands, though that should not have been a surprise. Clive had not seen him cast the spell on the Ironblood crusaders, but he had seen the carnage it had left behind. Perhaps Cid was a runaway Bearer himself—a soldier, it seemed, from the way he fought, who had managed to hide his magic until he was forced to reveal himself.
"Really?" Cid said, turning to see him. He raised an eyebrow. "Furniture not up to your standards, Lord Rosfield?"
It was the opposite. The bed was likely cleaner than Clive had been in weeks, if not longer. It probably smelled of Cid's aether, too. Clive probably smelled of filth. "Haven't slept anywhere but the ground in years," Clive muttered instead.
Cid cocked his head, as though considering, then grunted and turned back to his work.
"You're not sleeping?" Clive asked.
"Unlike you," Cid said, scribbling something, "I slept last night, and the night before. In a bed, if you can imagine such a thing." He blew on the paper and set it aside to let the ink dry.
But Clive raised his head, frowning, because he had spent the night in the darkest corner of the Chocobo he could find, where he could see anything that happened around him. "No, you didn't. I saw you last night, talking to that Cursebreaker."
"And yet, I managed to finish the day without planting my arse in the plot of dirt where our botanists are working their fingers to the bone to keep us fed," Cid said. He picked up another page, skimmed his eyes over it, and rolled it up briskly. "I may not be Blessed by the Phoenix, but I'm an old man. I don't need as much sleep as a man in the prime of his life like yourself."
He turned around long enough to wink. Clive scowled and closed his eyes so that he would not have to decide what expression to make in return.
"There's no end of things to do," Cid said. "I'll have time to sleep when everything's over."
Clive thought about everything being over—about Joshua's death avenged, his killer killed, Clive's service to the man who had betrayed his father over at last. Once he finished what he had to do, he would never again have to fight in the name of the Sanbrequois Empire. He would never again have to raise a sword in defence of his own life because his life belonged to other men.
It was a good thought. It was a peaceful thought. He was tired.
Yet though his head spun with exhaustion, sleep would not come. The scratching of Cid's quill was a quiet rhythm, and his chair creaked with every shift like a gentle harmony. It was early enough that a muffled chorus of voices and footsteps could still be heard through the closed door as people moved about the Hideaway.
Clive shifted, sighing. It was comfortable enough where he was. It was warm, there was a closed door between him and everyone else except Cid, and Cid seemed too busy to bother him, even should he want to. But when Clive closed his eyes, there was only one face he saw, and it would haunt him until he was done.
"I can ask Tarja for a sleeping draught," Cid said suddenly.
Clive pried his eyelids open, one at a time. His eyes felt hot, and the room was blurry in his vision. He was overtired. It occurred to him for the first time that of course the Blessing of the Phoenix couldn't work its power in the Deadlands and that he really was an idiot, after all.
When he dragged his eyesight back into focus, Cid was still facing away, reading what looked to be a letter. "You wouldn't be the first of our residents to need a bit of help from her stores," Cid went on, still not looking at him.
"I'm not a resident," Clive said. "I'm not staying."
Finally, Cid twisted around in his chair, propping an arm on the back. "You wouldn't be the first to say that, either," he said. He shrugged and turned back. "I won't deny we could use a few more men handy with a blade, but if you want to leave after we talk to my scout, no one'll stop you."
"I should hope not," Clive said.
"No one'll stop you coming back, either."
As Clive lay breathing, the stolas perched behind Cid's desk slowly turned its head, pinning him with its eerie stare. He thought of Jill, of the look of relief on her face when they had finally defeated her, and his bones felt suddenly like they were made of lead. He thought about being a sword in the hands of an outlaw like Cid, rather than in the hands of Sylvestre Lesage's commanders. He had been raised to be a Shield, and he had failed at that, but he made a good weapon. He was only tired of being wielded by someone else.
He wondered if Cid would wield him more kindly than the Empire had, should he choose to stay. Though—perhaps not. A man who could kill dozens of combatants with a thought and without looking back did not deal in kindness.
His hands had been warm, though, and they had let Clive go.
Perhaps it was not the master who mattered. Perhaps it was only that men like Clive were not meant for kindness. Kindness would suit him ill, he thought, like an old shirt that was no longer the right shape for his shoulders. Even when he had been young, he had wondered why the Phoenix had granted him powers that helped him to kill while Joshua's instinct and strength had always been in healing. Joshua was still healing Clive, in a way—at least when he was anywhere but the Deadlands—but Clive had been born for battle and violence. Perhaps that was all he would ever be, no matter whether it was Sanbrequois hands that wielded him or Cid's.
It mattered not. Cid had information that Clive needed, and Clive could lend him strength for now. He needed nothing more than that.
One last task, then—Clive's own, this time. And then...well.
"When Joshua's murderer is dead," Clive said into the quiet. "When his soul is at peace. Perhaps I'll come back then."
If he was still alive.
He would check on Jill, at least. He still did not understand what Cid wanted, because it could not possibly be simply what he said, that he wanted Bearers and Dominants to be free. No one wanted to help people without wanting something in return, and if Clive could choose, he would want to know that he had not delivered Jill to a man who would put her back in chains. If Cid was looking for a weapon, he would have a powerful one in Jill.
Cid lit one of his cigarillos from a candle. His face was hidden from view, but three days in the Hideaway was enough for Clive to be able to picture him sliding it between his lips and breathing deep, the way his eyes fluttered closed with pleasure or relief at the first inhale. He could see the man tip his head back as smoke trailed slowly up toward the ceiling.
"How old was the Phoenix when he passed?" Cid asked suddenly. "They said he was young."
Clive closed his eyes. "He was," he said. "Ten summers."
"A bloody shame, that," Cid said. "And he liked playing at war, I take it? Eager for battle—for blood?"
Joshua stared mournfully at Clive from behind his eyelids. I don't have the strength, he had fretted, the night he had died. "He was ten. He was a child." Clive could feel heat building in his eyes. "He was...gentle. And kind. A healer."
He would gladly have been a weapon in Joshua's hands, because Joshua would not have wanted him to be. He would have lived his life as a Shield, and he would have died knowing he had done his duty to his brother and his liege. Vengeance was the closest thing he had left.
Cid grunted. He folded a letter closed, sealing it with a dab of wax from his candle. When he spoke, it was around the cigarillo clamped between his teeth. "But you think more blood—your blood, like as not—is what will bring him peace?"
Clive gritted his teeth. He turned on his side so he would not risk opening his eyes and seeing Cid looking at him. He looked at Joshua, instead, keeping the image of his brother burned into his mind. "It will bring me peace," he said.
After all, like Cid said, there would be time to sleep when everything was over.