The Waking Sands is exceptionally quiet for the holiday. Each step Erden takes echoes through the empty halls, and with most of the lights off too, it gives off a surreal and creepy feeling to it.
You can definitely walk right now, but being carried around is kind of nice. You try your best to fight any sleepiness you might be feeling, since you aren’t sure if you’re tired from your duel or from being umbrally over aspected. You…don’t want to fall asleep again. Ironic, given you are constantly being told to rest. He sets you back down on the couch, and you feel a chill run up your back.
“I’ll start a fire.” He says, scanning the room. “Where did we keep the firewood again…?”
“Maybe I should light it?” You cup your hands and enkindle a weak flame that struggles to stay alive. A clawing sensation digs on the inside of your throat, forcing you to cough. Erden doesn’t seem to like that.
“Here.” Erden places his hands under yours and feeds into the spell, growing the fire until it’s big enough to warm you both. “You could use some more aether, too-- conjurer’s orders.”
“Do you have a plan to make sure there’s no void…contamination?”
“I don’t want to take any risks.” Erden reaches into his pocket and pulls out his soul crystal. “S’olahr mentioned that this crystal siphons any void aether out of me, and I can draw astral energy out of it instead. As long as you hold it while we do this, it’ll protect you.”
You pull away nervously. The disorienting scream of “S’ANAH’TO” lingers in your memories from when you last held it.
“What’s wrong?” He asks you before looking back to the crystal. “Maybe I should go get S’olahr inst--”
“No!” You say just a little too loudly. “I-I…I don’t like talking to him when he…if I bring him in now, I’ll just need to hear another lecture about the people I care about not being good enough for him.” You reach for the crystal. “It’s just a voice. I can handle it.”
“...Alright. Let’s do this, too.” Erden pulls out the enchanted box Vincent made for you containing the soul crystal. “If you want to stop for any reason, just put the crystal in here and we can just walk away.” You nod.
You take the crystal and hold it loosely in your hand above the box. He grabs your shoulder firmly while placing his right hand on your chest, and you feel his familiar heat rising within you. You brace for impact-- any second now, surely. You stare at the crystal’s surface, but don’t notice anything unusual.
“Are you okay? You’re tensing up.” Erden asks.
“I’m fine.” You say, pausing for a moment. “No voice.” You ease your shoulders. Honestly, you’re starting to feel a little silly. “Maybe it was just all in my head?”
“Mmm.” He shrugs. “All things considered, you’re handling everything very well.”
“When Mizu and I were younger, she would practice her thaumaturgy on critters while I held their attention for her.” You fondly remember the auburn landscape of Thanalan and the marmots you fought there. “It was supposed to help me get used to taking hits, and help her steady her aim.
“From an outside perspective she can seem like a reckless powder keg, but people don’t realize just how precise she’s gotten.” You tighten your grip. “She’s come a really long way, it's been years since she hit me like that, and it wasn’t even her fault. I knocked the ground out from under her.”
“I can see where you’re coming from.” He sighs. “but unleashing that much power in a friendly duel…”
“You’re not getting it.” You shake your head. “She hit me with an explosion to the head, and all that happened was my glasses cracked and a little bit of blood.” You pull closer to him. “You’ve seen what she’s capable of. Do you have any idea how much restraint that took from her? Even with adrenaline running high, she’s still able to hold herself back while being knocked into the ocean.”
“I…” Erden ponders this. “I didn’t think of it like that.”
“And now Olahr is tearing her a new one, because he doesn’t get it either.” Your ears droop. “Mizu was never the type to stand there and take it though. I hope she’s giving him a piece of her mind.” You look toward the entryway. “I should go check on them.”
“I think you should focus on yourself more.” He cups his left hand on your chin. “You need time to rest without worrying about others.”
“I’ve spent enough time relaxing.” You huff. “Day after day where I get nothing done.”
“You’ve been sitting still, but that’s not the same thing as resting.” He says. “You spend your nights obsessing over what you haven’t done yet instead of letting yourself live.” He stops the aether transfer. “I know it can be hard when there’s so much going on that you don’t like, but if you just keep pushing yourself you’ll just end up getting hurt.” He crosses his arms. “Maybe very hurt.”
“But the guild and Merlwyb…they’re counting on me. I can barely keep up with you, Olahr and Phekda, and now even K’yoko is doing better than I am.” Your eyes well up. “What are the other arcanists going to think if they realize I still haven’t come up with something, and she has? Do you realize what they’ve been saying about her? I can’t--”
“The guild, Merlwyb, Olahr and Phekda? No-- EVERYONE on Hydaelyn, they can all wait. It doesn’t matter if it takes ten days or ten thousand of them, whatever time you need to recover will be time well spent.” He punches his fist into his palm. “And if anyone even THINKS about talking smack, I’ll punch the light out of them!”
“That--” You can’t stop yourself from laughing. “That’s not really…” Taking the time to reflect, you don’t feel anywhere near as cold anymore. “...Thanks, Erden. Maybe you’re right.” You lean back. “Maybe I have been pushing myself too hard.”
“No, no, NO!” The voice in your head suddenly yells. “This ends now!”
“Huh?” You feel sharp blades hook into your palm. “Gh!!” You release your grip on the soul crystal above the container but it stays latched in your hand regardless. “H-help!” Erden realizes what’s happening and he tries to pull the crystal from you, but you feel an even sharper pain with each pull. You try to grit and bare it, but let out an involuntary scream when he starts pulling harder.
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“Sorry!” He says, letting go. “I’ll go get S’olahr, he’ll know what to do!” A harsh light starts shining from the crystal and grows brighter by the second. As Erden turned to leave, it burst outwards and knocked him to the ground.
“Erden!” You try to move, but seize up in anguish. “AAGH!” You struggle to see past the light as it showers the room. Pain travels up your arm until your entire body shrieks in defiance, your heart beating faster with each moment, you think of screaming as loud as you can and then-!
The light coalesces into a single point-- a small sphere hovering just in front of you. The pain stops all at once, leaving you feeling numb instead. You lurch forward from exhaustion, and with the light softening you can now see Erden getting back on his feet. The light shifts and eventually takes the form of a man, becoming less bright until you realize that the man is you…sort of. He has the same hairstyle as you, but with white highlights instead of red. He wears a thick white coat, and holds a golden staff which burns with a golden flame.
“Finally…A prisoner no longer.” His voice is nearly the same as yours, just a bit more reserved. After staring at his hands, he eventually turns to you. His eyes are covered by white bandages, but he still seems to be perfectly aware of his surroundings. A radiant glow emits from behind him at all times, making it difficult to look at him directly.
He walks up to you with his weapon ready and mutters a brief incantation. With a wave of his staff, orange chains form around your legs and arms, binding you in place. Whenever you try to move, they sear with fire and lightly burn you.
“Do not move from this spot.” He commands you. “You have led us to ruin, and I shall not suffer this indignity for another moment.”
“Get away from him!” Erden shouts, surging lightning in his hands.
“Planning to strike me down, Erden?!” He yells back, causing Erden to freeze up. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, given your history.” He raises his hand to his chest. “But I am the victim in need of saving here, not him! Locked away in that damned crystal while he destroys our body with this reckless use of umbral magic.”
“So you’re Anah’to’s inner voice then.” Erden stops channeling lightning, but remains alert. “I didn’t know manifesting like this was even possible, but it doesn’t matter. This needs to stop!”
"I am the truth from which he hides.” He says, looking over his shoulder to you. “You deceive so regularly that you scarcely even think of it.”
“They are…necessary.” You pant. “I lie for others!”
“You seek to deny it?” He walks up to you. “So it is merely coincidence that your lies always work to benefit you as well?” The chains slither up your neck and he yanks on them, burning your throat. “You’ve even fooled yourself, haven’t you?” You choke as the grave you’ve dug yourself gets deeper.
“Stop! You’re hurting him!” Erden takes a step closer with his hands raised. “Please have mercy on yourself, I beg you.”
“I am saving us.” He releases you and turns back to Erden. “I have drawn the toxic light from our body in making this vessel so that we may safely heal. Once I’ve wrested control from him, I’ll make sure this aether poisoning never happens again!
“And then…and then things can be like they were always meant to be.” He says as hope swells in his heart. “I’ll focus on research, just as we planned to, instead of playing at being a hero. My discoveries will revolutionize how we fight, and Eorzea will be able to better all of the evils on the star!”
You lack the energy to speak, or perhaps just the courage. The burns around your throat linger in place, encouraging your silence all the more.
“You can’t.” Erden says sternly.
“What?” He scowls.
“You can’t work yourself to the bone like that-- nobody can.” He takes another step forward. “By obsessing over the end goal, every success means less, and every failure feels that much worse. You’ll burn yourself out faster than you think.”
“You don’t know that.” He says. “You don’t know me, or what I’m capable of! How could you, when this whole time we’ve just been working on cleaning up the mess you made?!”
“Is that the root of this all?” Erden asks with sorrow in his eyes. “You’ve…you’ve already helped me so much, Anah’to, even at great expense to yourself.” He looks down. “If it would be better for you to just work without the burden of my problems, I can give you more space!” He ruminates for a second. “If you really wanted to, I would even leave--”
“No!” You both yell in unison. Your inner voice looks back to you before continuing to speak. “I don’t want that. Neither of us do! There just…there has to be some kind of balance.” His voice quivers. “The idea of you getting into trouble and us not being there to help, it just…”
“What do you need?” Erden asks.
“Time.” He says. “We need time to work on our spells, time to grow, time to…catch up. You all seem to make progress so much faster than we do.” He turns to you. “And I need you to listen to me! There’s no worse feeling than being isolated like that, a bystander without a voice…the least you could do is try to talk to me when you’re having a hard time.”
“I’m…I’m sorry.” You say, but you can’t muster much more. After a tense few seconds, he lets out an exasperated sigh.
“I suppose I’ve finally said my piece. If I can help it, I honestly don’t want to subject anyone else to my fate as an onlooker.” He walks up to you and strikes his staff against the chains, causing them to dissipate. “If you don’t start taking better care of us, though, I swear to the gods above, I will seize control permanently.” He places his hand on your chest and pulses healing magic into you, which gradually begins the process of returning you both to normal.
“I’m sorry about shutting you out before.” You say. “It just…it was scary, hearing you like that for the first time.”
“I’m sorry, too.” He says. “I should have made more of an effort to talk to you, it’s just surprisingly difficult to manipulate the aether within this crystal. We never were very good with astral magic.” He smiles.
“Do you have a name we can call you?” You ask him.
“I already told you, I’m you! I’m S’anah’to!” He grumbles. “...But I understand that calling me that is confusing. For the sake of clarity, I will need another name.”
“How about S’anah’li?” You suggest.
“That’s a nice idea, but then we’d have a fourth person turning their head when ‘Anah’ is said aloud.” He rubs his chin. “How about just Li?”
“It’s perfect.” You agree.
“I’m glad you two managed to work everything out.” Erden wipes his brow. “I really wasn’t sure what to do for a minute there.”
“There is some knowledge in this stone which I’d like to pass on to you-- from a former paladin who took the crystal up.” Li says.
He puts his hands on top of yours until they catch fire.
“AAH!” You pull back and shake your hands wildly trying to put them out, until you realize that it isn’t actually hurting you at all.
“This holy flame converts umbral aether into an astral effect. It’s…a bit crude, but it’ll be one of the fastest ways you can recover.” Li closes your hands and the flames snuff out. “I guess it’s only natural that we would resonate with such a spell, we haven’t the strength to cast the kinds of things Erden does.”
“Alright…” Li hands the crystal back to Erden. “I will keep some residual light aether in the crystal to help balance Erden out, too. Just…both of you, please take care not to overdo it.”
“Out of curiosity, can you and Khasar talk to one another?” Erden asked while taking the crystal.
“Yes, try as I might to block him out.” Li shrugged with a smirk. “He makes for good company as long as he’s not agitated.” Li turned to the corrupt crystal box. “I would advise you to destroy that. Khasar may be more open to the idea of being sealed away than I am, but you don’t want to get on his bad side.”
“...Right.” Erden nodded. Particles of light began to form around Li and dissipate into the air.
“My time is spent.” Li turned back to you. “I have a favor to ask, for both of us.”
“What is it?”
“Tell mom the truth-- all of it.” He grabs your hands. “I won’t force you to, because it’ll be tough, but I know she’ll help us get to a better place. She loves us.” You hesitate, but Li puts his hand up to your mouth before you can say anything. “Don’t make a promise you can’t keep. Not to me.”
“I’ll try.” You say, and he seems satisfied with that. Just as Li begins to fully fade away, you pull him in for a hug. It catches him off guard, but after some hesitancy he returns it back to you and disappears in a haze of light. For the first time in a while, you feel reconciled, and try creating a flame in your hand. It’s bright, beautiful, and alive, and you intend to keep it that way.