You don't even remember seeing the starfall. You don't remember it the first time, either. But you must have, to be here.
The glitter of the familiar crystal, turning slowly within the aetherial sea. Spots of light curl in and out around it, uncountable, the Eorzeans who are awakening to the Echo at this moment whether they recognize it or not. No need to send visions of a starshower after that Calamity.
Familiar words echo in your ears, in a familiar voice, tired but not yet spent. Hear, feel, think.
You wait, on the sidelines, until the spiral of stars, the bright spots of new heroes, parts. You have no idea how long it is, but you have the patience to wait, and anyway your body isn't going anywhere anytime soon. You asked a lot of it, probably too much - not that you'll die, but you'll need time to recover, to build up the physical strength that you're used to having alongside the strength of your soul.
(Lorelei was only ever an option when you had no other options. At sixteen, you're not sure that you could lift your sword even if you had it to hand. You certainly couldn't face an army.)
(One thing at a time.)
As the vision tries to fade away, you catch it in your thoughts, and plummet through the aetherial, down, down, down to the depths beneath the deposit of ten thousand years' aether and faith, to where the voice comes from.
She's surprised, the goddess who calls herself Mother, anyone else she might have been forgotten. She looks the same as she did, that day ten years from now, when you cut her free from her burdens, except that this isn't something you could have ever told her. This isn't in the plan.
(Fuck the plan. It's not like she asked your opinion of it, anyway.)
"Venat," you say. Another name from a dead world, a name unspoken even by her enemies for the last ten thousand years. The look of mild surprise is eyes-wide shock now, almost enough that Hydaelyn disappears in favor of the woman underneath. "We need to talk."
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The glitter of the familiar crystal, turning slowly within the aetherial sea. Spots of light curl in and out around it, uncountable, the Eorzeans who are awakening to the Echo at this moment whether they recognize it or not. No need to send visions of a starshower after that Calamity.
Familiar words echo in your ears, in a familiar voice, tired but not yet spent. Hear, feel, think.
You wait, on the sidelines, until the spiral of stars, the bright spots of new heroes, parts. You have no idea how long it is, but you have the patience to wait, and anyway your body isn't going anywhere anytime soon. You asked a lot of it, probably too much - not that you'll die, but you'll need time to recover, to build up the physical strength that you're used to having alongside the strength of your soul.
(Lorelei was only ever an option when you had no other options. At sixteen, you're not sure that you could lift your sword even if you had it to hand. You certainly couldn't face an army.)
(One thing at a time.)
As the vision tries to fade away, you catch it in your thoughts, and plummet through the aetherial, down, down, down to the depths beneath the deposit of ten thousand years' aether and faith, to where the voice comes from.
She's surprised, the goddess who calls herself Mother, anyone else she might have been forgotten. She looks the same as she did, that day ten years from now, when you cut her free from her burdens, except that this isn't something you could have ever told her. This isn't in the plan.
(Fuck the plan. It's not like she asked your opinion of it, anyway.)
"Venat," you say. Another name from a dead world, a name unspoken even by her enemies for the last ten thousand years. The look of mild surprise is eyes-wide shock now, almost enough that Hydaelyn disappears in favor of the woman underneath. "We need to talk."