kinkfest | FFXII -- Son (Reply)

Title: Son
Fandom: Final Fantasy XII

Characters: …a surprise.

Author/Artist: mithrigil
Rating: PG
Warnings: Combat all over the place. Spoilers for the game.
Word count: 900
Summary: A tournament, postgame.

Note: I cannot tell you who the character or pairing is. If this is your prompt, or you remember the list, you know – if not, well, I hope you enjoy this. I know I did. I will edit the tags to this a day or so after I post it, for archival purposes.

Also, if you recognize the combatants’ names, I love you even more.

Son

Mithrigil Galtirglin

32.

“Last slot,” Sebastian states plain, and slides the forms across the table. “You’re lucky, we had a few cancellations. Just me, or has the going in the Highwaste gotten even worse since the Reclamation? I mean, they’re still finding bits of the Eighth Fleet there, after all these years.”

The only response Sebastian gets is a curt nod of a gold helm. But the competitor removes a gauntlet to take up a pen and sign all the waivers in turn, leaning firmly on the table. The handwriting—print, jagged, etcher-lettered—is very little like the hand. It is callused the whole way through, of course, but spindly-fingered, the knuckles almost delicate in their cloisters of dead skin. There’s what might be a Ring of Renewal on the central finger—a quick glance at the permitted accessories section of the form confirms that.

Sebastian only quirks a moustache-corner when he sees the form right-side up. “You left out your country.”

One pauldron shrugs. The gauntlet goes back on. It’s fairly standard gold armor, appropriate enough to hunters, within the price-range of the better ones as well. Sebastian does not question it, and scribbles in, Phon.

16.

All right, Trishtan knew that he was going to be out of his league, especially if he made it to the second tier. The first fight had been pretty hard, and he’s still feeling it, still glancing at the dent near the pommel of his sword and wondering if something is going to crack it.

But now, this. Just the sight of the person standing across from him now, helm-to-solleret in gold, as fearsome and faceless and implacable as a Judge, is enough to make Trishtan’s throat clog and temples throb. He should yield. He should yield now, before he hurts himself.

Well, he shouldn’t. So he doesn’t.

And then there’s a greatsword, the same sheen as the armor, leveled slaven-stance over a fearsome spiked pauldron, and Trishtan forgets to salute.

Vik laughs, deep and slashing laughter that bleats with his blade on the gold. “C’mon, man, you think you can beat me like that?” This one’s smaller than Vik, but the sword is bigger than his, and it’s throwing Vik off in the best possible way.

He wrenches out of the tussle, and his sword shouts a little, scraping along the other’s, and doesn’t bother steadying before he winds up and hammers down. This fighter’s quick, which doesn’t quite make sense given sheer girth, and half-parries-half-dodges that strike. The gold blade comes whipping through the air and Vik has to block it, lunging just out of the arc’s range to beat the curved sword back. But he’s still laughing, this is enough like sparring with ol’ Blue that he’s still laughing, and when he muscles at the advancing gold pauldron the other guy takes a predictable fall.

What Vik doesn’t expect, though, is that square-solid kick to his knee. And there’s nothing like a face-full of list-dirt to stop him laughing.

The prize doesn’t matter to Bel, now that he’s gotten this far. It’s his first time past the quarter-finals in anything of the kind, at this level, and he thinks to himself that his master would be proud, and Rina’s already won her bet with the other girls at the tavern.

So he looks up the curved golden sword to the curved, golden absence of a face. He can almost see his opponent’s eyes through the visor, but the sun is too bright overhead and he only gets the intensity. His shoulder and wrists, both of them, are throbbing, and he can’t keep staving the sword off, “Wh—what—”

“My name is Azelas,” the fighter answers, and the voice is a low-forced wheeze, a youth’s, not yet fully broken. “That is all you need to know.”

It’s a good fight, Georg decides, just before he has to dodge or lose an arm.

He’s still smiling when his swipe is blocked, when the side-strike of his sheath isn’t quite enough to drive his opponent away, when he sees how loosely that pauldron is held to the cuirass now. Two more passes and he’ll go for it, he decides, and blocks another heaven-borne swipe of the sun-sword, shields his eyes from the glare and feints left, goes left, breaks his own rule and lunges.

The gold pauldron clatters free of the armor and Georg parses only that it landed far away enough, and almost before his own sword is sheathed he’s found a place to draw it to, another breach in this shell of gold, and though the fighter parries it surely Georg has his way. The twin disturbances of blood and Curaja jab through his sinuses—and after, three thuds of metal to earth. His opponent’s gold sword; a laden knee; Georg’s scabbard.

“Azelas, right?” Georg asks, and there’s a little more heave in his voice than he’d like, but he reminds himself that it’s a good fight, and he offers his free gauntlet down alongside the same sword that’s brandishing victory. “Didn’t know he had a son.”

Azelas relinquishes kneeling without taking Georg’s hand, leaving the sword and broken slat of armor in the faint clouding dust. The helm hangs low but more defiant than yielding, and when Azelas comes closer to Georg, the victor’s sword scrapes against Azelas’ cuirass, at the vague definition of a waist.

“He didn’t,” she says in his ear, and Georg can barely hear it over the cheering of the crowd.

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