Ithaca

By icecreamlova

- : -

Before

Squall found her perched on the edge of the stone fountain, a small, lithe figure in crisp blue. With her back turned, he could see only her long hair rippling from the dying breeze, sporadically exposing her neck and the delicate white wings printed on the back of her robes. She glanced over at him with those lively eyes when she heard his approach.

"I wasn't sure you would come."

Squall crossed his arms and settled beside her. "It was my ritual first. You're not going to interrupt it."

"Do you mind me intruding?"

Saying 'yes' would be a lie, so Squall said nothing at all.

She seemed to accept his silence as permission to stay. She soon turned back to her prior engagement: playing with the gleaming water, cupping it, flicking it, letting drops run crystal-clear down her long fingers.

"It's full moon," she said eventually.

Squall rolled his eyes.

"You knew, right?" she said, laughing when Squall didn't deny it, dark eyes dancing. "I'll be like Ms. Trepe, soon, finishing your sentences for you. Then you'll actually have an excuse not to talk."

"I talk," objected Squall, before falling silent again, thus proving her point.

She tilted her head, listening to something out of Squall's hearing range. "Are those—drums? Do you hear Master Merlin shouting? I hope he's not trying to set up another spell."

He shook his head to show he could hear nothing and frowned when he noticed the unease and guilt on her face.

"What's he been teaching you?" he asked, to distract her.

She tilted her head at the darkening sky, melancholy successfully curbed by her passion for her studies. There were still hints of violet and orange glazed over the indigo of night, but Squall could see the first star twinkling white. "Well, Master Merlin showed me one of Lord Ansem's letters to him talking about other worlds. Imagine: around each star spins a multitude of different worlds. Imagine what we could learn if there are other civilizations out there—I mean apart from Disney, of course, because we've already got contact with them. I went through each theory of whatever's separating those worlds – think of some sort of plastic film—"

Squall watched her, amused, and let his mind drift. It did her good to talk, but that didn't mean he had to listen—especially since he was no academic—and her voice was not irritating.

Her voice faded eventually, but a quick glance told him her thoughts were far from Merlin's magic. Her eyes were focused again on the dimming sky as more and more stars appeared, like pinholes punched into a sunset canvas. They sat in companionable silence.

It was strange how quickly she had integrated herself into his life. Barely a month had passed since he approached the fountain to spend another sunset in solitude and found Merlin's new apprentice already there. That first day, Squall had curbed all her attempts at conversation with curt one-liners, but she had returned nonetheless the next day and they'd spent the entire time in silence.

Squall had discovered on the day after that—the third day—that she could not keep her silence, because she had been all conversation again. Eventually, she had been able to cajole him into talking about magic. Squall admitted that he'd heard of her newly discovered magic prowess, and although he hadn't said as much, she had picked up on how magic made him uneasy and hadn't brought the subject up again. Although, Squall thought—her reluctance to bring up magic probably had a different cause to his.

Glazed eyes. Wings bursting out.

Uneasy himself, Squall glanced sideways at her and remembered her earlier comment on Merlin's magical working. Perhaps the universe was playing some cosmic joke, because, coincidentally, at that very moment, a slight tilt of her head swept back her dark hair, exposing her eyes as they began to glaze over.

Oh no. Hell no. Not while he was the only royal guard present.

Squall shot up, air hissing through his teeth in his annoyance. Unfortunately, Squall was a captain, and that meant he couldn't neglect his responsibilities even if he wished to. He knelt down in front of her. After that first night, when Lord Ansem's apprentice, Even, had appeared and done something that involved ice and darkness, to shake her out of her stupor, she had told him that human contact helped bring her back. After a brief hesitation, Squall took her wrist, studiously avoiding contact with her hand.

"Hey," he said. "Hey. Rinoa." He shook the wrist a little. "Rinoa. Snap out of it!"

She didn't move, frozen like a statue, her features perfectly still, arm limp. Something in the air made Squall's teeth ache. For a moment, it was like they were suspended in a moment in time, cut off from the world.

The display was beautiful, awe-inspiring, and terrifying. Like an epiphany, Rinoa's back arched, head snapping back, and a cry of agony pierced the air. Her wings burst out, as white as freshly fallen snow. The resulting blast of wind made Squall stagger and tore flowers and leaves off meticulously manicured bushes.

Rinoa rose from her seat, feet drifting an inch or so above the ground. Squall took a breath, and then quickly pushed off the ground to dart forward. He grabbed onto her hands. Why now? Why him? Her wings were no longer flapping, but why couldn't Even appear again and—and—and do whatever it was that he'd done with the ice and shadows to bring her out again?

"Rinoa," said Squall, realizing his grip was tightening until it had to be uncomfortable, but he didn't let go. What else had she said would help bring her back from wherever it was her mind had gone? "Rinoa Heartilly. You are in Radiant Garden. You are here as Merlin's apprentice. Get your mind back here!"

Her eyes were very blank. They looked right through him as though he were a ghost. For a second, Squall felt the same anxiety that bubbled up at any mention of magic, especially uncontrolled magic, like the ice that had coated his stomach at the old tale of how Merlin had enchanted the fountain to flow forever. Would she lose control?

The world felt like it had stopped spinning, waiting, and Squall's only thought was a useless flashback of her getting him to dance, and the accompanying voice saying that her will was too strong to be overcome by this.

The courtyard seemed to be stretching in and listening for a conclusion.

As suddenly as it came, it ended. Rinoa's wings collapsed, folding and dropping her onto the dirt. Her knees buckled, refusing to her support her weight. He knelt with her, careful not to let go until he was sure it was over.

Then, so quietly that Squall wasn't sure she had said anything, she whispered, "Squall?"

He breathed a sigh of relief, maybe because no one had been injured, maybe because she had her mind back. "Yeah. Rinoa?"

She nodded, face slackening in the same relief, though perhaps it ran deeper through her than even through he, who was sworn to protect the garden and all those in it. Her wings folded neatly until they had disappeared. "Yes. Thanks. I'm sorry, Squall. There's so much magic in Radiant Garden, especially with that spell Master Merlin was working . . . and I'm not used to it yet. But I know, and Master Merlin knows, my powers are growing stronger . . . and if I don't get used to magic now . . . I won't be able to work among magicians at all."

"You've explained this to me," Squall reminded her.

Her smile was a little shaky, but it was a relief to see any attempt at all. "And you haven't started avoiding me despite your aversion to magic."

"It was my ritual to come here first," said Squall, like he had when he first approached to watch the sunset.

Despite his status as captain, Squall wasn't fast enough to see the arms she flung around him, but it wasn't shock that kept him from pulling away. He'd touched her before, after all, though that had been limited to that first dance and the attempt to bring her back from wherever it was she had gone. Rinoa smiled again at him, then, and up close it was like the moon coming out from behind a cloud. Despite himself, Squall stared.

"Thank you," said Rinoa, her cheek gently brushing his, though it seemed unconscious on her part.

Squall froze in shock, because he realized then that he wanted to kiss her.

- : -

During

Even months afterwards, she was sick and weak, and the kind family who had taken her in despite their fear of Heartless had to keep her forcibly from leaving. Perhaps they were grateful because, before, she had healed the youngest son under Merlin's guidance; maybe it was just out of shock at the incredible coincidence it was their doorstep she stumbled across when in need, as if destiny was guiding her path.

"You're sick," was the practical viewpoint from the woman of the household. "It's a harsh world here. You won't survive a day alone, so how will you be able to find whoever it was that you're looking for?"

Rinoa knew she was right, though inside she burnt, and a voice told her: you need to find him. Some of it was because he had promised to keep her under control, hadn't he? Rinoa had been trapped for years under Maleficent, like a backup battery, with her powers under lock and key, and she was afraid that after such long disuse they would burst out again. She was terrified that she would hurt the family that had been so kind to her.

Squall had always managed to bring her back.

Most of the longing was because she needed just to see him. Rinoa smiled every time she thought of the garden and the fountain, the place that people now called Hollow Bastion, and they sunsets they had spent there together. It had been those memories—of his eyes, often cold but so very intense, the way he had looked at her after her second loss of control—that had kept her going under Maleficent put her into stasis. In that place, where she wasn't quite unconscious but certainly wasn't awake, the subconscious knowledge he was still alive kept her from giving into the persuasive voice.

And he was still alive, Rinoa knew. She'd told herself, after she was awake enough and safe enough to think of him, that the spell that she'd cast to expel all the Heartless, herself, and Maleficent, had kept Traverse Town safe. He was alive. He would stay alive until she managed to find him, because he was a good fighter and Rinoa could trust Aerith and Tifa to keep him mentally sane.

Thinking of them made her smile when her doubts about Squall started weighing her down.

"All right," she said to the matriarch. "You're right. I'll stay."

The woman sighed in relief and left, for chores, making Rinoa feel even guiltier because she knew it couldn't be easy supporting a family, even without a practically invalid guest.

Uncomfortable, Rinoa her gaze from the door to push the bag she had been packing under her bed. Too restless for slumber though night had fallen, Rinoa dragged her stool to the window. In this world, where summers were hot and sticky and winters bare of snow, the windows were huge, low, and rarely shut. Humid air drifted in, the sort that would have made Rinoa sleepy if that longing weren't tugging at her. She gazed up at the sky.

Once, Rinoa had heard of gazing at the moon if you and your loved ones were far away, because it would mean you were both sharing something. Now, Rinoa wondered if even the stars shesaw twinkling in the vault of night sky were the same as the ones Squall saw when he looked up at night from the roof of their house in Traverse Town. Rinoa could only take comfort that he was out there somewhere, among them, and if she flew into the spaces between the lights she would find him.

She missed him.

She wanted to laugh with him, talk to him, kiss him. She wanted to wrap her arms around him and feel that he was there, unlike the fragile wraiths haunting her restless dreams. She wanted, even, just look at him. But she could do none of these.

So Rinoa found a scrap of paper and the stub of a candle, and under the light of the flame she lit she wrote to him, periodically watching distant worlds twinkling and wondering which one would wink out next.

Dear Squall . . .

Writing, she found, was oddly soothing, like a backup plan from chatting her teeth off. Determinedly, Rinoa used it to press down the voice that said, 'Go back to Mistress. Go back to Mistress.'

- - -

Every free night, Leon found himself on the roof of his house in Traverse Town, staring alone at the stars. Occasionally, Yuffie or Aerith would drop in, good company even though they didn't fill up the empty space that had always been reserved for another. Even Tifa joined him once, though she didn't speak as much as Aerith or Yuffie, far too tired from her futile journey trying to find their missing comrade.

Not once had they asked why he maintained the ritual of watching dusk fade into night—maybe because they knew.

Leon could not be sure that Rinoa was dead, and some part of him protested that he'd seen only the consuming light that banished both magic-users, but Leon was under no illusions about the ruthless evil lurking within that witch or the guttural hunger of the Heartless that had overrun Radiant Garden.

Hollow Bastion, he reminded himself. It's called Hollow Bastion now. A hundred lives had passed with the name Radiant Garden on their lips, bringing up pictures of fountains, shrubs, roses and castles, but Leon was among the generation with the dubious honor of calling it Hollow Bastion.

Leon had not been given to self-pity for years, ever since Aerith and Yuffie decided enough was enough, but for a moment, he wondered 'why me, why us?', the same way he had questioned the universe when he, and only he, had been around to keep Rinoa from being overwhelmed by power.

Self-pity, he decided, felt like biting into a block of ice or the weight of sadness from the refugees of hundreds of destroyed worlds landing on your doorstep and asking you with silent eyes what they were supposed to do.

Leon wasn't usually given to spouts of poetry either, and when he realized that his last thought had been along the line of artistic, he wondered if he should stop the ritual.

It took leaning back and looking at the stars to realize he would never do it.

It was so easy to be attracted to stare at the twinkling lights that one forgot it wasn't the light itself, but the world spinning around the light, that held life: the spaces between the stars, the dark. (Not the darkness, the opposite of Light and the source of the Heartless, but the dark, the absence of light.)

There was something harsh about bright light. Flicking on the light before entering a room told you exactly what was in it, and if the room had just been overturned by a frantic new arrival, what wasn't. While dark permeated, Leon could give himself the illusion that the empty room was still full, and nothing had been taken. While he watched the spaces between stars and remembered that he couldn't see the worlds themselves, Leon could tell himself there was a chance that Rinoa escaped Maleficent after all, despite the power it must have taken for a magic expulsion; despite the fact Maleficent had come for her after they'd eluded her at Hollow Bastion and for the following two years in Traverse Town.

If there was one illusion Leon had not been able to bring himself to shatter, that was it.

That way, Leon could ask silently, 'Where are you, Rinoa? Are you still alive?' and hope for an answer one day.

In solitude, he could indulge in a brief moment expressing emotions, the absence of which Yuffie had called cold and Aerith had looked so sad over. He could wonder if their story would turn out like one of those tragedies Rinoa had sighed about, back when Hollow Bastion was Radiant Garden and they'd had the luxury of imagining themselves into the epics.

So Leon, formerly Squall Leonhart, gazed at the spaces between the stars and wondered if the vibrant girl he had once shared sunsets with was out there, peering back at him from the other side of the night sky.

- : -

After

Rinoa does not know how long he has been standing there, watching her dipping her fingers into water and letting drops rolling like crystals, unnoticed until a slight scuffle alerts her to his presence. He is standing arms crossed, dangerous in black. Her first thought is 'he's taller' which is stupid because it has been eight years. Her first strong impulse is to run to him, but the only thing that betrays her is a slight twitch that she can't quite stop. Even after all this time, her body reacts to him.

Her first words are: "I wasn't sure you would come."

They make her wince because it sounds like a replay of an old conversation, a recycled sentence that wants to drag with it scripts already read. They do not belong in their meeting, this second meeting of so many firsts.

"I received your letter," Squall—Leon—says. His voice is deeper, and she can see his eyes are sadder. He makes no move to come closer. "It's been a long time, Rinoa."

"Eight years," says Rinoa. She half-expects him to roll his eyes but he doesn't say anything; just stares at her and waits, the way he did when they met at the fountain so long ago. "It's good to see you."

"Likewise." He is clipped and curt; his face speaks of strain. Again, he makes no effort to initiate conversation.

There is a long minute of ringing silence.

They are like strangers.

Rinoa wants to laugh, the way Maleficent did the night before she escaped: crazed and directed at no one at all.

"Is this what we're going to be like, Squall?" she asks, barely holding back the giggles. "A tragic story of two young lovers torn apart forever? Too bad we're both here, because in those stories one or both of us are dead, not in awkward conversation because after eight years we have nothing to say to each other."

She sees him flinch.

"I thoughtyou were dead," Leon tells her. He doesn't look at her.

"Well, I'm not," says Rinoa. She no longer feels like laughing. "Sorry to disappoint you, but I didn't quite manage to sacrifice my life for you."

This is not like her. This is not like her at all, but she's been away from him for eight years, and she is unjustly furious that the memories that kept her going are crashing down. She takes a good look at Squall "Leon" Leonhart. He is still handsome; Rinoa wouldn't dream of denying that. His gunblade is swung over his shoulder. And yes, like her first stupid thought said, he is taller; leaner and stronger, because before Hollow Bastion he worked perfecting drills and during it he fought with Heartless. A fresh scar slices across his face. Maybe he's even become colder, because he doesn't react to her wild accusation with equal anger.

This is indifference, the sort of stories that appear at the beginning of dramas, not the end, when it's either famous tragedy or faded out happiness.

"It was nice seeing you again," Leon says through clenched teeth, and Rinoa wonders if he's really as indifferent as he seems. He turns to leave, but as he reaches the boundaries of the lights set into the fountain, Rinoa feels alarm shooting up her spine. Maybe that's what makes her speak.

"Squall!" she says.

He stops, though he doesn't turn around. "It's Leon."

"Leon," she relents. The word tastes unfamiliar. "I'm sorry. Look, Leon, you said it yourself. It's been a long time, and throughout the eight years I was always afraid that we were going to be a replay of the Tragedy of Vincent and Lucrecia. Now that we finally see each other again, there's only—this?"

He says nothing.

Rinoa sighs, pushing off the fountain and walking to him. She stops a step behind him, and hesitates when she thinks about what his reaction will be, but even now she's not afraid to speak her own mind. "Dance with me?"

"What?" he asks, turning, word raised with the inflection of genuine surprise.

There is no music, there is no one else, and the skies are as gray as city pavement. Rinoa reads what he doesn't say but rests a palm on his shoulder anyway. It leaves an imprint of fountain water on his jacket. She waits expectantly, ignoring the tense muscles stiffening through the layer of leather beneath her fingers. He is staring at her, and for a desperate moment Rinoa wonders if she's made a mistake. Slowly, though, slowly, he is sliding his gunblade into its holder. He is agreeing without words, though his eyes are distinctly wary and his touch light and cautious on her waist and the hand she grabs.

One two three, one two three…

They are like strangers or professionals. They are not too far away as disgruntled children would be and not so close that it speaks of intimacy. It reminds Rinoa of their first dance, though he is a much better dancer, like the years have made him into a charming gentleman. He waits for her to make her point.

She opens her mouth to speak but to her surprise Leon beats her to it.

"You never tried to find me." He is straight to the point as always, as though he's mused long enough on them that he's cut down on every unnecessary syllable. There are no lies, and he has made no effort to hide his feelings. It's like dancing has stripped away all pretenses, no matter how wary he was before. "Three years, a gummi ship, or even magic for crying out loud, but you never went to Traverse Town."

Rinoa glances down at their feet moving in perfect synchrony and nods, eyelids fluttering shut at the tingling at her waist. Before he can take this as a sign of guilt, Rinoa opens her eyes again, watching him steadily.

He wants an explanation. His first few years were spent convincing himself that she was still alive. The following years he adhered himself to the idea that she had died, not because he thought she was helpless or because he wanted a 'tragic epic', but because they both know—or thought they knew—that Maleficent would have killed her if Rinoa were still her prisoner; and, if she had escaped, she would have tried to find Leon. He'd thought that, if she were still alive, he'd have received a sign by the time he gave up.

"I'm sorry," says Rinoa again. One two three, one two three. She looks down at their feet and takes a moment to gather her wits, because even now thinking about it terrifies her out of them. She presses on; she needs to say this. "When I escaped, I had already been her prisoner for five years. What she tried to do . . . She wasn't trying to kill me in the way you imagine. Do you remember when I lost control? That first time, the first time . . . I almost killed you."

Leon opens his mouth.

"Don't protest," she cuts him off. It's very hard to speak. "You know it's true. I would have if . . . Even hadn't been there. And when I escaped, after I recovered . . . I had her like a voice at the back of my mind, calling me to go back to her, to forget about everything else. There were . . . flashes of spells I never learnt and this urge to cast them. In the first year, I wondered if she could track me. I didn't want to find you"—practically a whisper, now—"and then lose you again if she ever became more than a voice."

Throughout, he tried to interrupt several times, but now there is silence, while he takes this all in. (One two three, one two three.)

"You stayed away for three years to keep me safe," he paraphrases finally.

He's right in thinking it sounds like the sort of stupid heroic thing that they'd scoffed at when found in epic stories, but it was different for her when she found herself actually playing it out.

"Better thinking me dead than to have you be dead," she whispers. "You have no idea how much I wanted . . . It was Maleficent, Leon, Maleficent. The witch strong enough to overrun our home! How could I be with you knowing she was in my head and ready to burst out?"

There is long, terrible silence again, and Rinoa think she sees emotions running through his face one by one though he is obviously trying to hide them.

He isn't looking at her now. His voice is hoarse when he does speak. "You could still have told me you were out there. Even just by letter, like the way you told me you were back here in Radiant Garden."

"I thought you would look for me if you knew," she says, smiling sadly, "and that you would have found me no matter how many worlds away I lived. Was I wrong?"

Her heart skips a beat waiting for his answer.

Leon nods eventually, like he's confessing a great secret kept close to his heart for years. "No. You weren't. I would have. Even then, after five years, if I had known . . . yes."

Elation twined with threads of sadness shoot through her at his answer, and she presses her hands tighter, on his shoulder, in his hand. "That's why, then."

They dance, and the courtyard is still and quiet and gray. There is no wind. There is no music, except in her head, and Rinoa isn't sure where it started to swell. Maybe, during this, curious people look out from open windows, wondering why Leon and Rinoa are alone, dancing, so early, but Rinoa doesn't notice anything outside the dance. She wants to speak, even if it's just to comment at the acceptance she can see sinking in.

She says nothing, though, and he doesn't either.

Finally, when the skies begin lighting up, Rinoa can't hold her question back any longer.

She stops dancing, and he almost stumbles but catches himself in time, making no effort to pull away. It's almost comfortable. Her heart squeezes even contemplating the matter, but Rinoa has to ask. This is the million-munny question that's been weighing her down for the past three years, when she realized that she was twenty in her head only.

"It's been eight years," she says softly, haltingly, because she thinks her heart would turn to ice if she receives the wrong answer. "An eternity. And we were only twenty. Is there… someone else? Have you found someone else?"

She is waiting. The courtyard, the world, is waiting for Leon's response. Her heart seems to stop while Leon stares at her, as if for him, too, time has halted. His gaze is so uncharacteristically open, the color and texture of an endless ocean.

Then slowly, intimately, almost jerkily like a marionette, Leon raises a hand and brushes a spilled lock of dark hair off her upturned face. His knuckles, calloused from almost a decade of fighting the Heartless, graze against her cheek, but they are as gentle as the flapping of Yuna's tiny wings and leave a tingling trail.

"No," he admits finally, and there is nothing awkward about it. "Never. There's never been anyone else."

The flare of elation from before is nothing compared to now, and she thinks she can't be any happier when he finally does draw her against his leather-clad frame and kisses her. Even after so long, it is as familiar as air: the spark at the contact, his warm tongue, soft lips. The fingertips dancing along her jaw are roughly textured but gentle, and they make her skin burn. His scent is spicy and so him, that when she closes her eyes and inhales it summons his face.

Pulling away for a moment, together, they watch Radiant Garden flood with color from sunrise.

- : -

END

- : -

Notes:

1) In Greek mythology, Ithaca was the homeland of Odysseus, hero of the epic The Odyssey. His wife Penelope waited there faithfully for him while he was away at war despite his journey home taking twenty years due to in obstacles thrown in by the gods.

2) Rinoa is the heroine of Final Fantasy VIII, which Leon is the hero of.

3) The letter that Leon receives isn't the one that Rinoa writes in 'during', but a reference to how Leon gets an envelope with Rinoa's insignia during the KH2 credits. I have no idea if it means an incarnation of Rinoa exists here or if it's just a reference, but…

4) Too sappy? Not sappy enough? Too short? Too long? Constructive criticism greatly appreciated.