pending the devil or time
Dec. 10th, 2025 11:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seleniasTitle: pending the devil or time
Fandom: Final Fantasy XVI
Characters/pairing: Dion/Terence
Rating: gen
Word Count: 1037
Notes: For the MyDearTerence collection. Written for a prompt on drunkenness (nothing makes sense without youuu) and Terence expressing disenchantment with the empire. I wanted to get at the heart of what Terence embodies as a guy always fated to be below/less than but his agency being heard through service, and the ways in which Dion might chafe as a guy utterly tied to his identity as a weapon. Maybe I got it?
-
871
Friend,
Did I anger you?
I should think I had forced you to go, and perhaps I did, but if my good intentions proclaim otherwise or I’ve missed the mark, I beg you tell me. We are ordinary men. You do like to remind me of that and I look forward to your extended hand (or boot) from that post I sit. I find my answer in easy reach, and I know it is the same for you — save this obscurity I concern myself with now. I feel as though a wrong has slipped past my judgment and you mean to shield me from a wound I dealt you; that is how we bleed to death.
What fears are you harboring away? I want them all.
Withholding that, a scrap of joy from you should keep a man past his time but I should never disbelieve anything so austere as your discerning countenance.
Most Sincerely,
Your Prince
871, Oriflamme
Good Greagor I love a wyrm,
I don’t know what to do with freedom. I squander it. Who was it that said I should have the pleasure to roam like an old expendable dog at pasture yet the new hound should never rattle his chain? It’s on my mind, more often than not, that I may give you over to abandonment in these absences. You may terrorize me for perspective (I should gripe) but you know of what I speak. I only mean to say I want your company more than Greagor’s.
I like my lodgings and the hospitality is nice. I am, aside from unreasonable, drunk, for want of distraction and sleep. I did not wear my regalia today, I wanted discretion and to walk as the pilgrims do, but the purveyor said all know a knight’s stilted gait without the long sword to right us. I am not a part of these people like I once was, looking up at Whitewyrm’s generosity, considering it as my sole benefactor; I see the otherworldliness now and that I am marked. I’ve absconded away on new winds! Delineation is the crux of it. The vantage you’ve hoisted me to is a relief, the better to counsel ourselves. More aptly though I feel my own betrayals that may denounce you in turn.
You pick and choose when to disobey. I don’t envy that. I like my commitment (maybe it bores you? —I haven’t asked). I would not follow a more governable man — I couldn’t, I am too exacting a judge. You remember I was warned away from the knights and priesthood and everything above my station, not for lack of tutelage, but suitability. And yet you put a blade in my hand. My vow is not lost on you, but is it mutable? Will you not govern me?
I expose myself, but you know my bitter attributes well [crossed out]. I’m sorry.
I’m not indulgent, only arrogant. [illegible] maybe I fear your rebuttal. It’s only I wouldn’t want to disappoint. You’re utterly good to me. Let there be no doubt on my house or my grave that I have found and loved pleasurable things. I worry to commit them here, but they’re true, and I am already companion to indulgences I should not only be spoilt to gather but hastily destroyed by without. Pending the devil, or time, or our due course—
Always,
T
871
My parhelion,
To hasten most quickly to your side and match your phantom shame I’ve forsaken sobriety. Better spent in present company where we may slough our foibles together, but I saw the hasty creases in your paper, the over confident strokes, and I know an actor betrayed by the stage hand. I’m afraid I told Sir Emeric to go to hell (he may try); we chafe, I am not a fixed point for him yet, not like we are. I will confess in the morning to pride and absence. He shall have a small tale for you about falling upward when you return.
I must double back to this at once: Spoilt! — you confront my anxieties with near obscene honesty, and were you circling my desk in your melancholy while I bow over my lot in knots I would rise at once and seize you frantically. Arrogance — earned, if you must self-flagellate, but I am not remiss for it. Good Greagor, have some compassion for yourself, your mockery is terrible!
I know your grief and I am sorry for it. Suitability is a conjecture that, should we direct our eyes to blood, means no more than what it allows. I know too why you treasure a command, and if I were to misdirect you before Her I would wander into the Velkroy and be lost to it or spend myself like coin and rain as ash on the sea. The pleasure of freedom is that we have our discretion with choice, but I want the reality for you, and I can give it, not the illusion that I adhere myself to. I see though that I am torturing you. It’s good of you to say it. Mayhap you will feel otherwise.
It is by Greagor’s design that we heel, but that which has us knocking at the length of our chains, bearing our teeth is to your point. When we are together the world resolves. You share difficult truths but I revel in your disputes and perk my ears to catch them. As you say, we pace different axes but are no less where they should cross. I covet my command of that treasure beyond words. I know what I defend.
I’ve had an interlude and made amends with Sir Emeric, so you may not return to fire. He was humbled by my recollection of our students days. I don’t believe the latter has ever stopped. Small mercies. I must rise and walk for a while. My head is taking flight.
Yours
871
[Scrap on torn parchment]
Paragon,
For heaven’s sake, don’t repeat yourself, no matter the weather!
I know too what it is I defend. It was good of you.
I will go to mass and the library after, then depart for Northreach.
Take the greatest care. Stop terrorizing your guard.
T
Fandom: Final Fantasy XVI
Characters/pairing: Dion/Terence
Rating: gen
Word Count: 1037
Notes: For the MyDearTerence collection. Written for a prompt on drunkenness (nothing makes sense without youuu) and Terence expressing disenchantment with the empire. I wanted to get at the heart of what Terence embodies as a guy always fated to be below/less than but his agency being heard through service, and the ways in which Dion might chafe as a guy utterly tied to his identity as a weapon. Maybe I got it?
-
871
Friend,
Did I anger you?
I should think I had forced you to go, and perhaps I did, but if my good intentions proclaim otherwise or I’ve missed the mark, I beg you tell me. We are ordinary men. You do like to remind me of that and I look forward to your extended hand (or boot) from that post I sit. I find my answer in easy reach, and I know it is the same for you — save this obscurity I concern myself with now. I feel as though a wrong has slipped past my judgment and you mean to shield me from a wound I dealt you; that is how we bleed to death.
What fears are you harboring away? I want them all.
Withholding that, a scrap of joy from you should keep a man past his time but I should never disbelieve anything so austere as your discerning countenance.
Most Sincerely,
Your Prince
871, Oriflamme
Good Greagor I love a wyrm,
I don’t know what to do with freedom. I squander it. Who was it that said I should have the pleasure to roam like an old expendable dog at pasture yet the new hound should never rattle his chain? It’s on my mind, more often than not, that I may give you over to abandonment in these absences. You may terrorize me for perspective (I should gripe) but you know of what I speak. I only mean to say I want your company more than Greagor’s.
I like my lodgings and the hospitality is nice. I am, aside from unreasonable, drunk, for want of distraction and sleep. I did not wear my regalia today, I wanted discretion and to walk as the pilgrims do, but the purveyor said all know a knight’s stilted gait without the long sword to right us. I am not a part of these people like I once was, looking up at Whitewyrm’s generosity, considering it as my sole benefactor; I see the otherworldliness now and that I am marked. I’ve absconded away on new winds! Delineation is the crux of it. The vantage you’ve hoisted me to is a relief, the better to counsel ourselves. More aptly though I feel my own betrayals that may denounce you in turn.
You pick and choose when to disobey. I don’t envy that. I like my commitment (maybe it bores you? —I haven’t asked). I would not follow a more governable man — I couldn’t, I am too exacting a judge. You remember I was warned away from the knights and priesthood and everything above my station, not for lack of tutelage, but suitability. And yet you put a blade in my hand. My vow is not lost on you, but is it mutable? Will you not govern me?
I expose myself, but you know my bitter attributes well [crossed out]. I’m sorry.
I’m not indulgent, only arrogant. [illegible] maybe I fear your rebuttal. It’s only I wouldn’t want to disappoint. You’re utterly good to me. Let there be no doubt on my house or my grave that I have found and loved pleasurable things. I worry to commit them here, but they’re true, and I am already companion to indulgences I should not only be spoilt to gather but hastily destroyed by without. Pending the devil, or time, or our due course—
Always,
T
871
My parhelion,
To hasten most quickly to your side and match your phantom shame I’ve forsaken sobriety. Better spent in present company where we may slough our foibles together, but I saw the hasty creases in your paper, the over confident strokes, and I know an actor betrayed by the stage hand. I’m afraid I told Sir Emeric to go to hell (he may try); we chafe, I am not a fixed point for him yet, not like we are. I will confess in the morning to pride and absence. He shall have a small tale for you about falling upward when you return.
I must double back to this at once: Spoilt! — you confront my anxieties with near obscene honesty, and were you circling my desk in your melancholy while I bow over my lot in knots I would rise at once and seize you frantically. Arrogance — earned, if you must self-flagellate, but I am not remiss for it. Good Greagor, have some compassion for yourself, your mockery is terrible!
I know your grief and I am sorry for it. Suitability is a conjecture that, should we direct our eyes to blood, means no more than what it allows. I know too why you treasure a command, and if I were to misdirect you before Her I would wander into the Velkroy and be lost to it or spend myself like coin and rain as ash on the sea. The pleasure of freedom is that we have our discretion with choice, but I want the reality for you, and I can give it, not the illusion that I adhere myself to. I see though that I am torturing you. It’s good of you to say it. Mayhap you will feel otherwise.
It is by Greagor’s design that we heel, but that which has us knocking at the length of our chains, bearing our teeth is to your point. When we are together the world resolves. You share difficult truths but I revel in your disputes and perk my ears to catch them. As you say, we pace different axes but are no less where they should cross. I covet my command of that treasure beyond words. I know what I defend.
I’ve had an interlude and made amends with Sir Emeric, so you may not return to fire. He was humbled by my recollection of our students days. I don’t believe the latter has ever stopped. Small mercies. I must rise and walk for a while. My head is taking flight.
Yours
871
[Scrap on torn parchment]
Paragon,
For heaven’s sake, don’t repeat yourself, no matter the weather!
I know too what it is I defend. It was good of you.
I will go to mass and the library after, then depart for Northreach.
Take the greatest care. Stop terrorizing your guard.
T
