The dull sound of metal striking the floor reverberates through the walls, but by now most anyone staying at the Forgotten Knight had grown quite used to the ceremony of the foreign Hyur woman removing her armor and letting it drop heavily to the floor upon returning for the night. She stands in her room, pauldrons beside her on the floor, and sets her jaw. Usually, removing her armor takes but a moment, so familiar with the rote of it as she is. This time she fumbles with the fasteners, bolts of pain making the trembling in her fingers worsen. But Enambris doesn’t flinch. She just needs to get this bloody plate off.
The plate unbuckled, it hits the ground with a loud thud and she exhales her relief, slowly wiggling out of her mail and gingerly wiping away blood from the inside of the chain shirt, lips set into a hard line. The wound was bleeding again, the stitches, despite being expertly sewn, somehow still blooming tiny trails of blood. She exhales, her breath becoming steam despite the roaring fire in the hearth.
Her sword and shield are leaned safely against the wall, over which is draped a pair of gauntlets and a belt. She drops the chain beside the rest and leans briefly against the wall, eyes closed, swallowing the pain. She’ll heal, she reminds herself. This is nothing.
A smile crosses her lips. The meeting itself, while being a somewhat awkward and revealing affair, had only in its aftermath served its ultimate purpose. She had been called Enambris of the Embers. She was embers now, barely smoldering on the surface. But it was intended for her to be stoked, to stir the ashes and reveal the blistering coals beneath; adding kindling to the heat and sparking off the great bonfire she had long ago shone. That thought prompted another: if her fire had gone out, what had doused the flame?
With care and caution she would never reveal to another living soul, she gingerly makes her way to the bed, sitting on its edge as though preparing to sit upon hot coals. How long had she been aimless, a wandering soul with no rest, a blade with no opponent to hone itself against? Had she lost her spark before coming to Eorzea?
In her life, Ana D’mira the Ruthless had spoken to her naught but three times. First as a child, clinging to her uncle’s breeches and staring at the severe woman from behind his towering form; second as an adolescent, the exchange polite but terse, as Ana D’mira questioned the girl thoroughly of her intent when she eventually ascended to take her birth right; and finally, the last, the cold water that doused a growing flame.
It was only days before the woman’s death. Enambris had been growing into her own womanhood, still a rose yet blooming. By then she’d taken up her armor. It was different from the knights, from the lords and their vassals, who lived to serve The Ruthless. Her armor was, to them, unique; a prize brought home from the nearest sovereign nation, gifted to her by her uncle. He called it “Ishgardian”, an heirloom from a distant land. It fit her glove-like, perfectly fitted and with enough give to allow her to grow. She wore it daily, trained in it, lived in it. Ana D’mira had not approved.
A wry smile overtakes Enambris’ lips. She had never burned hotter than the day she defied the woman that had given birth to her. The biting words flung viciously from the woman’s mouth as Enambris had stood triumphantly over her low form had served to change the girl, but not in the way intended.
A sudden, but expected, knock at the door interrupts her thoughts, the wry smile becoming a wolf-like grin. “You can come in,” she calls.
“Hey Rosen’ash… er… you busy?” a voice behind her asks with embarrassment that cannot be masked. She pulls her robe up over slender porcelain shoulders and sashes it at the waist.
“That’s why I asked you here.” She waves absently to a small chair perched next to an equally small , rickety table, and as he takes the seat awkwardly, she strides across the room, rifling through her pack for something yet unknown. She turns, and triumphantly slaps a folded handkerchief onto the table.
“What’s this s’posed to be?” he asks incredulously, running a hand through pitch hair.
“Open it,” she says, the fire in the hearth reflecting little sparks in bright grey eyes. He examines it closely; there’s blood on it. Gingerly he pulls the first fold back, then the second, spreading it out on the table to reveal…
A black spot?
“No seriously lass, what is this supposed to be?”
“A knife,” she says plainly, her gaze unwavering, unblinking. “Part of one, anyway. One that found its way here,” she points to the general location of the surgery stitching beneath the white cotton robe. He deigns not to look, though, as she gestures to the back of her right hip. He clears his throat and delicately lifts the tip of the blade pinched between the kerchief and his fingers.
“So this is the shiny, or not so shiny, bit that was stuck in your guts, then,” he comments, turning it over. It’s like nothing he’s sever seen; black as the darkened sky, tiny pinpricks of light appearing and vanishing as quickly as they’d come. It doesn’t reflect light, just a patch of night hanging in the air. “You want me to find the whoreson, then?”
“No,” she says, the glint in her eye unsettling him. “He’s already dead. I want to know who made this, and who paid for it.” Her jaw is set, stormy gaze boring into his.
“That’s doable,” he replies, scrutinizing the piece. “But it won’t be easy. It’ll be a pretty penny, kid.”
“Done.”
He stares at her, brow furrowed. “That… are you sure? This may take some time, an’ I can’t promise it’ll lead anywhere.” He pauses and adds, “You feelin’ alright, lass?”
She leans on her hands over the table, scooting a small pouch of gill across the pale gray of the wood. “Better than I have in ages,” she replies. “I had a brush with death, thought that I’d become a ghost. Turns out, I’ve been a ghost for some time now.” Confusion evident on his face, she leans back again and folds her arm across her chest. “I had a reminder recently. When we met, do you remember what I said I was going to do?”
He snorts. “Save the world. You finally wake up?” he asks, tone thick with incredulity.
“Nope!” she replies brightly. “Just found the road through the mist, is all.”
He continues to stare at her for another heartbeat longer, and finally shrugs. “Alright then,” he folds the piece of knife away and tucks it into his vest. “I’ll be in contact.” With that he leaves, closing the door behind him with a soft click.
Alone once again, she sits back down upon the bed, smile still tugging the corners of her lips upwards. The pain grounds her, keeps her mind centered. She hasn’t thought this clearly in years, that burning that travels through her veins and makes her heart pump. But despite her smile, despite the exhilaration pounding in her heart, despite the flood of memories and reminders washing over her like the heat of the hearth, there’s something else she knows she must address.
Enambris isn’t fond of deceit, and that’s not what this is. Or at least she hopes it’s not. But she’s also not a fan of being in the dark, she ponders to herself. There was no obvious reason, at least not on the surface, to drive a spark into her smoldering embers, no real need to throw more fuel on her fire. If anything, there were dozens of men, usually the absurdly wealthy men who were so often impacted by her work, that wanted to see her little flame extinguished altogether. So why? She has some semblance of purpose now, however daunting or impossible it seems. An errand that won’t be completed in her lifetime, a purpose that will not only draw attention to the already-present target on her back, but light it up like fireworks. That part she doesn’t mind.
But damn it if he isn’t being cryptic, and damn it all to the seven hells if she isn’t going to find out why. She has questions she intends to have answered.
FFXIV; Balmung; Kindling