We Covet all the Waning Hours
Dec. 27th, 2024 04:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seleniasTitle: We Covet all the Waning Hours
Fandom: Final Fantasy XVI
Characters/pairing: Dion/Terence
Rating: gen
Word Count: 1365
Notes: For the 25daysofteredio on Bluesky, a little advent calendar prompt count down. Peace was inspired by this Walt Whitman poem, and Love pulls from a quote in Ursula K. Le Guin's The Lathe of Heaven. Title comes from Neko Case's Tightly.
Fandom: Final Fantasy XVI
Characters/pairing: Dion/Terence
Rating: gen
Word Count: 1365
Notes: For the 25daysofteredio on Bluesky, a little advent calendar prompt count down. Peace was inspired by this Walt Whitman poem, and Love pulls from a quote in Ursula K. Le Guin's The Lathe of Heaven. Title comes from Neko Case's Tightly.
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1. Hope — Terence lurches forward before Bahamut’s roar even graces the air; magic pops and sparks, a great wind sucks cavernously above the earth, and wings unfurl and snap forward into danger, shielding the knights and himself from a volley of fire; shamefully, he’s not immune to the painful swell of pride in his chest too.
2. Stars — Bahamut’s Chariot rises out of clouds lit by the moon and blurs before Terence’s eyes; he’s spent, and the garrison further than his legs or a soldier’s can walk, but Dion returns before the sun to gather the men made loose by the night, eyes unearthly and promising marching orders home before that cold, brutal dawn.
3. Frost — Hoarfrost tinkles against steel plate and scale as dragonets paw through the undergrowth, hissing their furies and spite with small clacks of teeth; Dion’s tempered command as he disperses the morning’s messengers leaves Terence wishing instead that he might turn to him and put the words into his mouth.
4. Tinsel — Silver weeps and shimmers over every balustrade in Oriflamme and the rasp of its cold threads likens the gilded city to a mythril coat clicking shut; Dion keeps his armor as they walk upward through cobbled streets, of two minds as the moon clips over castle, crystal, and Greagor — and the word for the hour is a man.
5. Marzipan — Pieces of Valisthea’s nations are made new every season in confectionery that hearkens to a merchant tossing a swallow of red for Saint Gilbert that their enemies should put down their arms before the wagon and hold out their cupped hands for relief in a seed that may one day germinate; mouth thick with want for an honest story, Terence’s palms rasp against Dion’s in the dark.
6. Sacrament — Terence folds with a click on uneven stone and shoves himself into Dion’s warm embrace where the metal clasps of his bunched shirt press against his temple like medicine; they clutch at the bulk of one another, each in command of their own thoughts but together in the confidence that neither will dull under the companionship of the other, and Terence feels it’s no burden to be a blade for a man that will always point him true.
7. Carols — There was a choir once but most of those boys are gone now; Dion stands like iron before the pealing songs committing to memory the service bells that bring him home.
8. Peace — It’s not only ever an appointed thing; Dion takes his ease and Terence’s fond face into his callused hands and looks no further than how he habits himself with the principle of his joy, chest to chest, and drinks from it. Section 46 from Leaves of Grass (Song of Myself). Thanks Walt.
9. Snow — Snow and bearers consigned to ash blow and dissolve together in the flotsam in Ollepheist Bay; it gives Dion terrible grief how Terence looks back at him with new fear to confirm he’s not alone.
10. Icicle - The white dragon keeps vigil in a darkness made lighter by the mothercrystal Dion asks it to safe guard, speeding to its master’s side to die and shatter into adoring splinters; Terence sometimes wishes he could give himself the same way, but Dion’s clamped jaw turns into his hand.
11. Sugarplum - Terence rolls the fine paper back where the cold candies lodge against each other before placing one into his cheek and sighing harshly; we always took our orders and fulfilled our oaths like the servants we promised to be— so why is the reward a bitter seed?
12. Angels - Attuned to messages he makes clear with steel or orders, Dion marches on a winding road that treads closer to the stone wyrm coiled and obedient at Greagor’s feet; he aches, split into halves where he once thought he had mastery over temperance, but Terence shares more than his faith and sorrows and presses close to receive him still.
13. Mistletoe — The old tree has become a staghorn where the vines have choked it and taken from it the life necessary for it to live so far-removed above the ground; Dion grips the thorns tighter and curses not the threads of his entanglements but the way Terence boughs to hold them both.
14. Evergreen — The dark forests knights and travelers spin yarns about are silent beneath winter dreams; Dion follows Terence’s boot prints where they slide and gouge the earth in pursuit of the prey they hunt, and calls for him once and sharp, his answer in return splitting the darkness and wrenching from Dion relief and a renewed thrill to catch them both.
15. Joy — Campaign season hangs itself on a hook for the winter and assured Dion lays his arms against the wall and divests himself in pieces of his titles, assignments, and chains, laying each bloody tether to rest its course -- but Terence is a perennial companion and only slips in closer.
16. Candles — The pyrotechnician presses off the frozen earth and pivots firmly to the next long wick trailing along the ground before the small mortar catches and rockets upward with a bang; illumination reveals holy things and beneath Dion’s duty, pride, and relief Terence’s teeth are lit.
17. Masquerade — Dion tests the weight of a new spear while Terence snaps his gauntlet on and surveys the morning’s groaning, coughing men under a speckling sky; they give a good performance where their prince’s eyes can track them and turn supplicant under his conspiratorial praises, but they don’t know that Terence gazes at their commander and his back without pretense.
18. Warmth — The body that’s been good to Dion begins to tell a different story; Terence’s sore eyes bitterly relieve him from his lonely vigilance when Dion meant to release him instead from a future of grief, and he lays his merciful hands on the parts that no longer belong to himself, but the empire’s incomprehensible and bloody pursuits.
19. Blessing — All good fortune is aspired to faith, but Dion watches, has watched, has seen, Terence’s dogged foot race through the ranks to his side like a grieved thread pulled taut; and it cannot be by Greagor's machinations of order alone that Terence still turns forward with his lord's name and atrocities cradled in his mouth.
20. Wishes — There is no sparing the blows of sorrow that lash across them both, but Dion grits his teeth and wishes only for grace and endurance to hoist Terence to a better tomorrow with him.
21. Garland — Sanbreque distributes their green laurels to the men and women with scholastic merit or militaristic valor; Dion’s virgin hair slips away between Terence’s fingers without a crown to grace it but the fragrant wyvern tail in his coat should mean everything.
22. Love — Love is hungry work and must be made new, like bread, over and over; Dion folds the knee to His Radiance and Terence folds his to his prince, but finds with joy and grief his plate is always full.
23. Firelight — The cabin’s fire hisses and snaps when they shake their wet hair loose, peeling like mirrors out of sodden leather, mythril, plate, and over-clothes; Terence watches Dion’s shadow stretch forward and he’s burning long before his skin can register the warmth of the blaze.
24. Midnight — Someday Dion will burn as bright as his wings and Greagor will reward him for his generous service with a seat at Her table, but Terence is vigilant and knows Dion’s stride is impartial to how the darkness closes around him now; his back is broad and carries alone more weight than any man, but when the bells toll on the edge of morning Dion grips Terence with inhuman strength to spare and turns them back.
25. Gifts — Things that are given can claim no source or trail and maintain an invisibility that renders them near immortal; Dion has an army to his name that makes him proud, titles he switches between like blades, and an eikon of the highest caliber in his pocket to reassure him of his blood, but the honor that cores him to disbelief and immeasurable joy is that Terence’s devotion endures.
1. Hope — Terence lurches forward before Bahamut’s roar even graces the air; magic pops and sparks, a great wind sucks cavernously above the earth, and wings unfurl and snap forward into danger, shielding the knights and himself from a volley of fire; shamefully, he’s not immune to the painful swell of pride in his chest too.
2. Stars — Bahamut’s Chariot rises out of clouds lit by the moon and blurs before Terence’s eyes; he’s spent, and the garrison further than his legs or a soldier’s can walk, but Dion returns before the sun to gather the men made loose by the night, eyes unearthly and promising marching orders home before that cold, brutal dawn.
3. Frost — Hoarfrost tinkles against steel plate and scale as dragonets paw through the undergrowth, hissing their furies and spite with small clacks of teeth; Dion’s tempered command as he disperses the morning’s messengers leaves Terence wishing instead that he might turn to him and put the words into his mouth.
4. Tinsel — Silver weeps and shimmers over every balustrade in Oriflamme and the rasp of its cold threads likens the gilded city to a mythril coat clicking shut; Dion keeps his armor as they walk upward through cobbled streets, of two minds as the moon clips over castle, crystal, and Greagor — and the word for the hour is a man.
5. Marzipan — Pieces of Valisthea’s nations are made new every season in confectionery that hearkens to a merchant tossing a swallow of red for Saint Gilbert that their enemies should put down their arms before the wagon and hold out their cupped hands for relief in a seed that may one day germinate; mouth thick with want for an honest story, Terence’s palms rasp against Dion’s in the dark.
6. Sacrament — Terence folds with a click on uneven stone and shoves himself into Dion’s warm embrace where the metal clasps of his bunched shirt press against his temple like medicine; they clutch at the bulk of one another, each in command of their own thoughts but together in the confidence that neither will dull under the companionship of the other, and Terence feels it’s no burden to be a blade for a man that will always point him true.
7. Carols — There was a choir once but most of those boys are gone now; Dion stands like iron before the pealing songs committing to memory the service bells that bring him home.
8. Peace — It’s not only ever an appointed thing; Dion takes his ease and Terence’s fond face into his callused hands and looks no further than how he habits himself with the principle of his joy, chest to chest, and drinks from it. Section 46 from Leaves of Grass (Song of Myself). Thanks Walt.
9. Snow — Snow and bearers consigned to ash blow and dissolve together in the flotsam in Ollepheist Bay; it gives Dion terrible grief how Terence looks back at him with new fear to confirm he’s not alone.
10. Icicle - The white dragon keeps vigil in a darkness made lighter by the mothercrystal Dion asks it to safe guard, speeding to its master’s side to die and shatter into adoring splinters; Terence sometimes wishes he could give himself the same way, but Dion’s clamped jaw turns into his hand.
11. Sugarplum - Terence rolls the fine paper back where the cold candies lodge against each other before placing one into his cheek and sighing harshly; we always took our orders and fulfilled our oaths like the servants we promised to be— so why is the reward a bitter seed?
12. Angels - Attuned to messages he makes clear with steel or orders, Dion marches on a winding road that treads closer to the stone wyrm coiled and obedient at Greagor’s feet; he aches, split into halves where he once thought he had mastery over temperance, but Terence shares more than his faith and sorrows and presses close to receive him still.
13. Mistletoe — The old tree has become a staghorn where the vines have choked it and taken from it the life necessary for it to live so far-removed above the ground; Dion grips the thorns tighter and curses not the threads of his entanglements but the way Terence boughs to hold them both.
14. Evergreen — The dark forests knights and travelers spin yarns about are silent beneath winter dreams; Dion follows Terence’s boot prints where they slide and gouge the earth in pursuit of the prey they hunt, and calls for him once and sharp, his answer in return splitting the darkness and wrenching from Dion relief and a renewed thrill to catch them both.
15. Joy — Campaign season hangs itself on a hook for the winter and assured Dion lays his arms against the wall and divests himself in pieces of his titles, assignments, and chains, laying each bloody tether to rest its course -- but Terence is a perennial companion and only slips in closer.
16. Candles — The pyrotechnician presses off the frozen earth and pivots firmly to the next long wick trailing along the ground before the small mortar catches and rockets upward with a bang; illumination reveals holy things and beneath Dion’s duty, pride, and relief Terence’s teeth are lit.
17. Masquerade — Dion tests the weight of a new spear while Terence snaps his gauntlet on and surveys the morning’s groaning, coughing men under a speckling sky; they give a good performance where their prince’s eyes can track them and turn supplicant under his conspiratorial praises, but they don’t know that Terence gazes at their commander and his back without pretense.
18. Warmth — The body that’s been good to Dion begins to tell a different story; Terence’s sore eyes bitterly relieve him from his lonely vigilance when Dion meant to release him instead from a future of grief, and he lays his merciful hands on the parts that no longer belong to himself, but the empire’s incomprehensible and bloody pursuits.
19. Blessing — All good fortune is aspired to faith, but Dion watches, has watched, has seen, Terence’s dogged foot race through the ranks to his side like a grieved thread pulled taut; and it cannot be by Greagor's machinations of order alone that Terence still turns forward with his lord's name and atrocities cradled in his mouth.
20. Wishes — There is no sparing the blows of sorrow that lash across them both, but Dion grits his teeth and wishes only for grace and endurance to hoist Terence to a better tomorrow with him.
21. Garland — Sanbreque distributes their green laurels to the men and women with scholastic merit or militaristic valor; Dion’s virgin hair slips away between Terence’s fingers without a crown to grace it but the fragrant wyvern tail in his coat should mean everything.
22. Love — Love is hungry work and must be made new, like bread, over and over; Dion folds the knee to His Radiance and Terence folds his to his prince, but finds with joy and grief his plate is always full.
23. Firelight — The cabin’s fire hisses and snaps when they shake their wet hair loose, peeling like mirrors out of sodden leather, mythril, plate, and over-clothes; Terence watches Dion’s shadow stretch forward and he’s burning long before his skin can register the warmth of the blaze.
24. Midnight — Someday Dion will burn as bright as his wings and Greagor will reward him for his generous service with a seat at Her table, but Terence is vigilant and knows Dion’s stride is impartial to how the darkness closes around him now; his back is broad and carries alone more weight than any man, but when the bells toll on the edge of morning Dion grips Terence with inhuman strength to spare and turns them back.
25. Gifts — Things that are given can claim no source or trail and maintain an invisibility that renders them near immortal; Dion has an army to his name that makes him proud, titles he switches between like blades, and an eikon of the highest caliber in his pocket to reassure him of his blood, but the honor that cores him to disbelief and immeasurable joy is that Terence’s devotion endures.
