Chapter Text
Emet-Selch does not make sense.
Not to the scions, and not to Stella.
She’s used to enemies who are hateful. Enemies who are wicked and twisted, in some way or another..
Enemies who chase you, wreck you, ruin you, despise you.. Enemies who, like Zenos, find thrill and excitement in fighting others. Enemies who, like Fordola, are driven by circumstance, manipulated by others and situations outside of their control..
Enemies who, like Nidhogg, are driven by vengeance, agony, and rage..
Enemies who… don’t offer to help.
She pulls her lip into her mouth, chews on it, and gives another stroke of the pencil upon the journal she has laid out upon her lap before turning her gaze up and out across the markets just opposite the Pendants.
The truth is that everything has been odd since she’s arrived here, and in a strange way, Emet-Selch’s offer to help, odd as it is, shouldn’t feel out of place. The sky is alight all hours of the day, a hooded man who is awfully secretive about his identity has whisked her across time and space, and refuses to show his face. Her friends, the Scions, have been in this world for weeks, years in some cases, when it’s only felt like days to her… And the truth is that they are not even full forms of them, for they are no more than their souls!
And yet, somehow, it is Emet-Selch’s offer to help that stands out to her as odd.
Her gaze follows, in idleness, a child as he runs across the small patch of grass that is laid out before her, and sits just to the side of the Pendants. His hair seems to burn as it catches the light and sends it scattering down over the green below. All the people here see all this as normal, and so, she supposes, perhaps that is why the sky burning bright is not so unusual to her, despite its unsettling nature…
And, perhaps, it is not so unusual for strange things to happen to her, to the Scions.. Y’shtola has been lost in the life stream, and had her sight taken from her for it. Minfillia has all but disappeared without a trace..
…People from all walks have conspired against them, left right and center, and they’ve been framed for regicide, a crime which followed them for what seemed like an eternity even after they’d fled..
Perhaps, all things considered, it really is only Emet-Selch who is unusual. Never before has an enemy offered to help. Never before has an enemy even tried to see eye to eye.. Everything else, she supposes, is not really that unusual, save for him.
Stella lets out a soft sigh, and pulls her gaze back down to the half-drawn sketch before her; lilies of the valley. A return to happiness.
She lets out a snort then, and draws in another slow inhale before returning her pencil to the paper. It doesn’t feel right, drawing her favourite flower at a time like this. Doesn’t feel right, given what it symbolises for her, when what surrounds her seems to be mostly misery and unease..
And yet, she supposes, it brings her a kind of comfort, to do something so familiar, even when everything around her is so strange. To remember all the lily holds for her.. All the memories, warm and soft and gentle..
Once more her pencil pauses, and once more she finds her lip between her teeth as she chews on it in idleness and thought.
Emet-Selch had to be up to something, she knew this just as well as any of the other Scions.. And yet, no matter how much she dwelled on it…
She couldn’t fathom a guess as to what. She’d dwelt on it for bells already, watched the clouds as they danced across the sky and painted the light in varying shapes and shades on the ground below, and picked up the pencil in a desperate attempt to distract herself from thinking about him.
And it wasn’t working. Isn’t working.
Once more, Stella huffs, turning her gaze skyward and letting her head rock back onto the bark of the tree behind her. In idleness, her eyes trace out the shapes of the leaves, and she takes in the way the light filters through them. The way the shadows they form sway to and fro upon the bark just below it, and glint every so often into her eyes…
Her lids flutter shut, and she takes a moment just to breath. Just to feel the air as it moves around her, to hear the sound of the children just off in the distance, playing and running round the Crystarium, round the Pendants..
She ought to sit like this more often, she reasons. What with the chaos that surrounds her recently.. What with the confusion she has grown so used to..
And then her lids snap open again, the moment a chuckle with that familiar nasal timbre disrupts the gentle ambiance.
Stella’s head darts uprights, and her eyes snap open, and though her first instinct is to scowl, when she sees those familiar drooped lids and furrowed brows, it is the glimpse of her sketchbook open upon her lap that has her snatching up the thing and pulling it protectively into her chest.
Emet-Selch chuckles, then, and though Stella searches frantically for words to say, when she looks up at him and meets the amused aurum of his eyes, she finds the words get stuck in her throat, and it is all she can do to clear her throat.
She swallows, swallows again. Furrows her brows, and averts her gaze.
“Emet-Selch,” she says as nonchalantly as she can manage, and before her the man, the Garlean, the Ascian, snickers.
The noise makes her jaw stiffen, and she pulls her sketchbook further into her chest.
“Yes, that is my name” he says with another chuckle, and she watches from the corner of her eye as he settles down beside her. Watches, and feels her frame grow stiff as she eyes him up and down.
Instinctively, she pulls her tail in from beside her, and tucks it round her front, just to ensure he doesn’t settle himself on top of it.
Even now, even like this, the man is a mystery. She can not fathom what he might want with her. Can not fathom what it is he might be doing.
“Can I help you?” she says trying to keep her tension from creeping into her tone.
Perhaps, she thinks, it is all part of his plan. Of his scheme that he has cooked up that she can not for the life of her figure out.
Beside her, Emet-Selch snickers again, and Stella feels the fur on her tail prickle with unease.
“My my you’re so tense,” he says with a laugh, and she can not keep herself from scowling at that. Can not keep herself from swallowing, nor keep her fingers from tightening until they are white-knuckled round the edge of her sketchbook.
He glances at her, and she watches where his eyes fall. Watches as he takes in the drape of her tail across her front.. The prickled fur, the white-knuckled grip, now on both her sketchbook and the pencil twixt her fingers…
Watches, and meets his gaze when he looks up at her face and gives her a sheepish look and a crooked smile that startles her in a way she doesn’t expect.
He looks almost… handsome?
“Relaaaax,” he says with a soft chuckle, and Stella watches as the expression upon his face grows somehow even more sheepish. Watches, and feels further confusion coil within the pit of her stomach.
“Did I not explicitly say I’d help you?”
She swallows, then. Swallows again, and averts her gaze. She tries to keep herself from growing too lax, but despite her best efforts she feels the grip she has on her belongings loosen. Feels the tension in her jaw ease too, as her brows furrow further.
“Did I not say I’d offer you my help?” he continues. “That I’d do naught to deter you?”
Stella feels her brows furrow further, and moves to pull her legs in towards her chest, just a tad.
He had, certainly… But those were the words that had made him seem so odd and out of place. The words that she didn’t trust. The words that she thought were a lie, or at the very least all part of some sinister plot…
Stella swallows, and turns her gaze just a fraction towards him again. Lifts it, and tentatively meets his eyes, once again feeling her pulse quicken when she takes in the so very sheepish look he holds upon his face.
Just a little while ago when they’d met him he had been scowling so fiercely, beaming so sinisterly… She can hardly believe this man beside her is the same person. Can hardly believe that he looks… actually rather attractive, when she’s rather a bit closer to him and not in the midst of being pointed at aggressively…
The thought makes her cheeks heat, and Stella prays that the redness is indiscernible on the ashen shades of her complexion before she wonders, briefly, if this too is a part of the ploy he weaves.
“I suppose,” she manages, and he chuckles beside her again, rather a bit more boisterously this time..
And then he smiles. Not in a sinister way, nor a way hiding malicious intent as he had when they’d first met.
He smiles, and to Stella the thing seems almost..
Genuine.
She swallows, swallows again. Lifts her gaze to meet his fully, and watches as he settles himself further beside her, his back pressing up against the same tree she leans against before he turns to her and beams.
“Well,” he says then, and she almost finds herself struggling not to balk. “While you may not trust me just yet, and I’ve no way to prove my words not a lie, I’ve always found that the best way to get to know someone is to spend time with them in idleness.”
She swallows, then clears her throat, and though she parts her lips to reply, he continues before she can.
“So,” he says with a tilt of his head and his gaze upon the sketchbook in her palms. “Don’t mind me. I’ll just be here, looking. Watching.”
For a moment, it is all she can do to stare. To stare at his eyes, as they gaze back at her. To look at him, up and down, eyes darting over his face, his body, as if she might find something to tell her what his real intentions are…
But then she turns her gaze back before her, and furrows her brows.
It is only after a few seconds that she finally finds her tongue and her voice again, and she pulls herself up off the tree before turning towards Emet to face him.
“Perhaps,” she says, and she curses at how easily her voice betrays the same uncertainty she feels. “Perhaps you think that spending time is the best way to get to know another person, but…”
She hesitates then. Drops her gaze to the grass between them, and watches as a blade shudders amidst the others as a gentle breeze runs by it.
“But I think that talking is better.”
Before her, Emet-Selch chuckles. She spies his lips part, and inhales sharply before he can speak, watching as his brows quirk upwards curiously.
“So,” she continues. “If you’re going to be here, I’m going to ask about you.”
He casts his eyes downwards, and she watches as his lips curl into a smile. Watches him as he chuckles again, and gives a lazy shrug of his shoulders.
“Sure,” he says with a drawl and a half amused roll of his eyes. “I don’t see the harm of letting you do such a thing.”
For a second, then, it is all she can do to keep breathing. All she can do not to let the way he smirks at her, the way he looks at her almost expectantly, get to her…
And then she swallows, swallows again. Clenches her teeth together and furrows her brows to steel herself, calm herself, and, for just a second, manages to think.
“The truth,” she says then, and Emet-Selch’s brows raise. “Tell me the truth.”
A chuckle. A scoff.
Emet-Selch drops his gaze from hers and snickers, before heaving his shoulders in another lazy shrug.
Stella feels a ribbon of irritation coil in her chest.
“Did I not tell you that I’d explain it all if you completed your task properly? If you were able to contain and control the light?”
She can’t keep her brows from furrowing then. Can’t keep her face from twisting into a scowl, nor keep the irritation that swelled up in her chest from making its way onto her face.
“Then,” she says almost petulantly. “I see no reason to linger.”
And it is just as she moves to pull herself to her feet. Just as she lets out another frustrated sigh, that Emet-Selch huffs beside her and lets out a so very irritated ‘fine’, that gives her pause.
Stella shifts back onto the ground, and turns towards Emet-Selch with one eyebrow raised, watching as he rolls his eyes with obvious frustration.
“I will tell you,” he says then, with narrowed eyes. “But only if you swear to keep the truth quiet.”
It is an odd request. So odd that Stella can’t keep the confusion from showing on her face. Emet-Selch chuckles before her, and gives another lazy shrug, but beyond that he says nothing. Does nothing.
He watches, waits, and for several moments, Stella’s mind goes wild.
Is it because the truth is not the truth?
Is it because he fears her telling the other Scions might ruin his plans?
Is it because-
“’Tis nothing suspicious, I promise you,” he says with his lips quirked up at the side, and though Stella decidedly finds the half smile unnerving and insincere, this time…
What else is she to do?
If she is to have even a chance at discerning his intentions…
“Okay.”
She swallows, nods.
“I shan’t tell another soul.”
A chuckle.
Emet-Selch draws his gaze back onto her, and this time Stella can not help but notice the way his eyes glimmer and gleam in a way that seems almost dangerous.
“Trust me,” he says with a soft smile then, and once more Stella feels her pulse quicken. How is it that a man who seemed so suspicious and insincere just moments ago manages to look so genuine in the span of a few seconds, she finds herself wondering.
“I’ll see to it that you don’t.”
Stella watches, almost enamoured, as Emet-Selch raises his hand just off to the side beside him. Watches, as he smiles at her, and then snaps…
And then shivers when a gentle warmth, a gentle tingling, creeps over her skin. When it coats her arms, her chest, even her face, and seems to sink, just an ilm, below the surface…
She can not help it, the way her brows furrow. Can not help it, the way her pulse quickens, and her cheeks heat…
Before her, Emet-Selch beams at her, and she feels her core twist with confusion again as he brings his hand back down to rest in his lap.
“What did you do?” she questions, lifting one of her hands just before her face and searching back and front for any differences.
“Just a simple silencing spell, my dear,” he purrs out, and before she can ask more, before she can pry further, he is speaking again, and her focus is broken.
“Now then, the truth.”
Stella turns her gaze to him, then, and drops her palm back into her lap. She twists on the floor to face him head on, pulls her knees in towards her chest, and tries not to keep herself from flustering when he chuckles at her obvious curiosity.
“The truth is that my people were killed.”
A pause.
Emet-Selch regards her with careful eyes, and Stella looks up at him expectantly.
“And I’m doing everything I can do bring them back. To restore them to the way they were, and the world with them.”
Another pause.
This time, when she waits, Emet-Selch remains silent.
Stella swallows.
“T… Tell me more.”
A chuckle, and Stella feels her cheeks heat again. Somehow, when he laughs, she feels as though she’s made a fool of herself.
“Ah-ah,” he chides, giving a shake of his head. “You asked a question, so now it is my turn to ask you a question.”
Despite herself, Stella scowls, and the motion earns another snicker from before her. She huffs, parts her lips to complain, but Emet-Selch tuts again, and shakes his head.
“Before that, however,” he says, the edge of his lips curving into a smile again, and even more when Stella’s scowl grows at having been denied the opportunity to protest. “Let us see if the spell worked; what did I just tell you?”
There is a pause then. Stella’s brows furrow further and she feels her lips twist into a pout. She wants to complain, wants to protest further and pry, and though she parts her lips to do so, Emet-Selch’s brow lifts quizzically, and she feels an embarrassment rush through her despite herself.
“Once you tell me more,” she says petulantly, and at that Emet-Selch scoffs. “You didn’t say I had to tell you anything in response!”
Another scoff, this time accompanied by a snort.
“I don’t need to tell you anything more at all if you continue on like this, you know.”
Another pause.
“I’ll tell you more in due time, but only if you’re good about it.”
And it is that which makes Stella go bright red. She clenches her teeth, presses her lips into a thin line, and averts her gaze, and it is only after several long seconds of Emet-Selch snickering at her, only after several seconds of her keeping her gaze firmly fixed on the grass between them, that she finally dares look up at him again, a scowl playing fiercely across her features.
“Fine,” she says, and watches as Emet-Selch grins. Watches, as he tosses his head to the side with obvious amusement. “What do you want to know?”
Another chuckle.
“First, we try out the silencing spell my dear; tell me, what did I just say?”
A pause.
Stella swallows.
What is she to expect, when she speaks?
She parts her lips with obvious hesitance, and calls to mind the two brief sentences Emet-Selch spoke to her.
Your people were killed.
You’re doing all you can to bring them back, to return them and the world to how it used to be.
But despite her efforts, nothing comes forth from her tongue.
Instead, all that leaves her is a puff of air, and almost immediately, Stella feels her pulse quicken.
Before her, Emet-Selch’s lips twist into a pleased grin, and Stella feels heat rush to her cheeks.
It is so alien, to have your voice leave you. So indescribable, to speak, but have no words come. She swallows, inhales, then parts her lips to try again, but all the same only a breath of air leaves her, and Stella feels her brows knit together in bewilderment in the center of her forehead.
“Excellent,” Emet-Selch purrs, and though he is ready to move on, it takes Stella several moments, then, to collect herself.
She tries again, again, a fifth time even. Feels her cheeks heat until she is certain the flush upon them can be seen even amidst her complexion…
And then she drops her head, and lets out a soft, muffled, squeak of embarrassment.
The simple truth is that this, whatever it is, feels more intimate than she can put into words. This man, just opposite her, has cast a spell on her that has her voice silenced. This man, just opposite her, has made it so that she can’t speak about a topic if she chooses..
And though she is fully aware that she agreed to that, it is the fact that she has no choice in the matter, the fact that he has such power, that makes her insides twist with humiliation.
“Now then,” Emet-Selch continues before her, and it takes all she has to will her gaze back up to him. Takes all she has to flatten out her eyebrows, and to keep herself from looking like a shocked little doe amidst the middle of all this…
Just moments ago she had been so head strong, even if she was a little timid… She couldn’t handle the prospect of him seeing her like this truly.. Couldn't handle the prospect of him teasing her about it.
She swallows, swallows again, and lifts her gaze up to his. She meets his gaze, and swallows a third time.. Hopes, desperately, that the flush upon her cheeks has faded.
“My question.”
Another pause sits between them for a moment, as his eyes glimmer.
“What are you drawing?”
Silence.
For several seconds, Stella can’t really parse the question. She goes over his words, goes over them again, and then very nearly startles when she realises she’s heard him correctly.
He was taking an interest in.. what she was drawing??
It was such a mundane thing, she thinks, she can barely even believe what she’s hearing.
Her brows knit together again in puzzled confusion, and for a moment, Stella stammers. She glances down at her sketchbook, then back up at him, and almost goes to protest, but she pulls backwards and moves to pull her sketchbook away from her chest. Offers it, with her fingers, towards him, and averts her gaze as a new flush creeps up her cheeks.
“It… It’s nothing really, just something to occupy my mind..”
She dares not look, as he glances at her sketch. Dares not try to piece together his thoughts, lest he think her work poor… He was an Emperor, after all, and she can not help but imagine he had been more used to the finer things in life…
She feels his eyes, as they dance over her art. Feels it, as though his eyes produce a heat all their own…
And then nearly startles when he speaks again. Jumps, and pulls her sketchbook back into her lap, almost expecting criticism and instead finding herself taken aback when instead of pointing out the flaws in her work his response is simply;
‘Oh, you like flowers, do you?’
Stella swallows. Inhales. Exhales. Wills her pounding heart to calm, and turns to look at him from the corner of her eye.
“O-Only the Lilly of the Valley,” she breathes, willing her frayed nerves to ease.
“Then,” Emet-Selch says, and this time, she can not help but turn her gaze to look at him fully. Can not help but watch, as his eyes seem to glimmer and gleam. “Allow me to leave you with something from the world as it used to be.”
She watches, almost enamoured again, as he raises his hand just off his shoulder. Watches, as he snaps. Watches, as twixt his fingers, a thread of green swells and blossoms forth, growing into the evident stem of a flower…
And watches, enchanted, as at its tip, six feathers of white blossom upwards. As they form into a bulb, then unfurl into delicate petals, into two sets of three. Watches, as their edges ruffle and feather. As at their center threads of green tipped with brown burst forth and stand tall amidst the gown of white…
And then stares, still just as enthralled, as he moves it, offers it, to her.
Slowly, timidly, Stella moves. Reaches, to take the blossom twixt her fingers… To bring it towards her, and turn it this way and that, still enchanted by the fact he brought such a thing to life with no more than his fingers.
“What is it?” she whispers, as she calls to mind all the flowers she’s seen over her travels. ‘Tis unlike anything she’s ever seen before, all told. Similar, yet not similar all the same.
“A lily,” Emet-Selch says with a smile. “That’s what they called it.”
And then he pulls himself to his feet, and though she can barely focus on his words as she takes in the blossom before her, she does manage to make out that he ‘ought to be on his way’.
She turns to him then, only as he takes a step away from her. Turns to him, as the black shadow of a portal forms just before him.
“Wait,” she says, before she can stop herself, and feels her cheeks redden when he turns back to her with an amused smile.
“Yes?”
She swallows, and dips her head. Takes a moment, to glance at the flower twixt her fingers again.
“Won’t you come back?”
Emet-Selch smiles at her then, the thing seemingly half genuine and half sinister.
“Perhaps,” he says, turning away from her and raising his arm up off to his side to give a dismissive flick of his wrist. “Perhaps later.”