When he spoke to Madeline, Maduin was reminded of the years that he'd tried to live among humans. They might not take the forms of birds and beasts, but they held so much variety in other ways, so much potential. Their range of cultures, of languages and goods and food, were like nothing in the Esper world. When he described the life the Espers had chosen to Madeline, he emphasized the virtues of such simplicity, but he found himself thinking, regretfully, of the sacrifices. Espers could live in harmony because they were all, in many ways, the same, united by their commonalities. Humans had never been able to, and by the history Madeline had recounted, that had not changed in the centuries since he walked among them. He might long for the taste of curry, on occasion, but it was a small sacrifice to make for a land without war.
"Probably so," Madeline agreed, when he admitted as much. "People in the village liked to talk about the king — he's styling himself emperor now — and how he's defending our ancient claims. Ours, hah. More like his. It's all greed and war. How do they think people feel when they suddenly stop being from the kingdom of Albrook and now they're from the kingdom of Vector?"
"Espers aren't entirely peaceful," Maduin said, feeling the need to balance her vehemence. "People here argue and squabble as well."
"That'd happen no matter what," she said. "People are people, right?"
"You think of us as people?" he asked, genuinely curious. Few humans he'd encountered had.
"Of course! How else would I think of you?"
She hadn't met everyone, he thought. It was easier for a human to think so of Shiva and Ifrit. He needed to introduce her to those who no longer wore any trace of human form, to Ixion, or Bismarck.
He needed to return her to her own people, he corrected himself. No one here was easy with her presence, and while he enjoyed speaking to her, and in some way seeing his own world through an outsider's eyes, he knew it was better for everyone if she returned home. Her life in her own world would be calling her back soon, if it wasn't already. She had been in their world for a week, as they reckoned time, though the days were a few hours longer here. That was more than long enough for her friends and family to grow worried, or if they'd known the danger of the place she'd gone, frantic. And she would eventually tire of the simplicity of life here, the boundaries within which they operated. She was so alive, so adventurous; a quiet world like this held little for her once the novelty had palled.
"It's true, though," he said. "We've managed to maintain peace here for centuries. There are disagreements, yes, but no permanent rifts."
"In a small town..." She smiled slightly. "That's more than humans can say."
"Is it?"
"Oh, definitely. Where I'm from — I told you I worked at the blacksmith's, right? Well, there are actually two, because the man I work for doesn't speak to his brother-in-law, who used to be a fellow apprentice and then married Mr. Bonheur's sister. They haven't spoken for twenty years. And people took sides, so some of them go to the smith I work for and some go to his brother-in-law. There's just barely enough business for two."
"Twenty years is not so long, for us, but to you..."
"I mean, I'm only twenty-four." She sat down on a rock. "How old are you?"
He thought about it. "Time moves differently here," he said. "I remember the War of the Magi." Her eyes widened, and with a haste he didn't care to examine, he added, "I was just a child then. The magic spread to my brother and I from our father — the warriors called him the Titan. He perished during the war. We believe that's the reason we look so similar even as Espers, because it followed the same lines as any family resemblance."
"So you're a thousand years old?"
"Is that how long it's been?"
"Nearly."
"But that's precisely the point. We came here as children. I was fifteen when I left this world to try to live among humans... and at that point humans said the war had been four hundred years before."
"Wait... fifteen years? Counting time the way we've been here, day by day, not just 'about the same as a fifteen-year-old human'?" She sounded frightened. "How many years have passed outside while I've been here?"
It was hard not to let her fear infect him. "Likely only a week or two."
"But how?"
"Time is different here. Not slower or faster. It's shaped by our wills, to an extent. This week has been longer than many I can remember, because—" Because each day felt so full, spending time with her, yet at the same time, the days flew past. "Your presence here changes the flow of time as well, I believe. It feels so to me. There are others I could ask better attuned to it."
"You think so?" He nodded. "But if that's true, what does that do to everyone else here? Will I grow old over the course of a few months here? Will human time catch up with all of you?"
"I don't know." He should ask. Golem might know, or Quetzalli. They were both closely attuned to time. "Don't worry too much. Once we return to the house, I'll go seek out some of the others who can tell me more. A few hours won't do any more harm."
Madeline nodded, looking subdued. "I hope I haven't caused any harm," she said. "Or spent so much time here everyone back home will think I'm dead."
"Even if something's gone wrong, don't blame yourself," he said. "You were certainly in no shape to leave at first. And no other human has ever come here before. None of us know how that will affect life here."
"I suppose." She took his hand and let him help her up, however. "What was it like, when you went to live among the humans?"
"Among might be a poor choice of words," he admitted. "I built myself a shelter in the forest near a human settlement..." He'd meant only to observe, at first, but there'd been a lost child in the woods — far easier for Maduin to find than for any human search party, once it grew dark — and so he'd become known to them. Predictably enough, some had considered him an angel and some a demon; also predictably, the former had held sway not long after he'd delivered a little boy, frightened but unhurt, into his mother's arms, and the latter had grown louder the next year when a pox sickened first the cows and then the villagers. The tale carried them all the way back home, though. To Maduin, the stories of his life with the humans were fresher than his memories of the week before last, the week before Madeline had arrived, and he had little cause to relive them. None of his own kind cared to hear more about humans. "When I came back, the elders all said that was the way of things," he concluded, as they neared his own front gate. "That was the reason we came here in the first place. Humans couldn't see us as anything other than supernatural."
"Even though you'd been humans once?"
"But we'd been touched by the gods. We weren't normal any longer. We were either prophets or weapons. Gods don't just leave people alone, do they?"
"I suppose that's true. Or if they do, it doesn't make for much of a story, so no one remembers."
"Also possible," he admitted, with a smile. "Would you like more tea?"
"You're going to drown me in tea," she teased. "I think you just like showing off how quickly you can heat the kettle."
He stayed silent on that topic. It was childish, but he did enjoy being able to impress someone with his magic. In the human world, he never dared to use it, and here, of course, it was routine. As he prepared the things for tea, though, she seemed to grow thoughtful. "So you don't think humans and Espers can really coexist?"
"Long-term... I don't know." He kept his focus on the tea leaves, tracking a few scraps of dried tea that had escaped the strainer. "It's always been a matter of Espers in the world of humans." But now that she was conscious, no one would even come near his house, which didn't speak well of the prospects for a human in the world of Espers. He'd been thinking, idly, of a tactful way to leave her alone while he sought out Quetzalli.
"I should leave soon," she said. "You told me people here are frightened of me. Why should they have to get over that just because I waltzed in and decided I liked it here? It's their home, not mine."
You like it here? he wanted to ask. But it was best that she return home. "Someone can guide you through the gate whenever you like," he said. "It might be your only chance to meet another Esper."
"Don't you think they'd rather keep away from me? Or is it worth risking my terrifying presence just to get me out of town?"
Perhaps he should have offered to guide her himself, he thought. But he didn't want to see her leave, even if he knew she should. "I should go ask one of my friends about the flow of time," he said. "For everyone's peace of mind." She looked not just thoughtful, but sad, and he hesitated, but all she said was, "But your tea?"
Re: At First Sight (2/3): FFVI, Madeline/Maduin, PG
When he spoke to Madeline, Maduin was reminded of the years that he'd tried to live among humans. They might not take the forms of birds and beasts, but they held so much variety in other ways, so much potential. Their range of cultures, of languages and goods and food, were like nothing in the Esper world. When he described the life the Espers had chosen to Madeline, he emphasized the virtues of such simplicity, but he found himself thinking, regretfully, of the sacrifices. Espers could live in harmony because they were all, in many ways, the same, united by their commonalities. Humans had never been able to, and by the history Madeline had recounted, that had not changed in the centuries since he walked among them. He might long for the taste of curry, on occasion, but it was a small sacrifice to make for a land without war.
"Probably so," Madeline agreed, when he admitted as much. "People in the village liked to talk about the king — he's styling himself emperor now — and how he's defending our ancient claims. Ours, hah. More like his. It's all greed and war. How do they think people feel when they suddenly stop being from the kingdom of Albrook and now they're from the kingdom of Vector?"
"Espers aren't entirely peaceful," Maduin said, feeling the need to balance her vehemence. "People here argue and squabble as well."
"That'd happen no matter what," she said. "People are people, right?"
"You think of us as people?" he asked, genuinely curious. Few humans he'd encountered had.
"Of course! How else would I think of you?"
She hadn't met everyone, he thought. It was easier for a human to think so of Shiva and Ifrit. He needed to introduce her to those who no longer wore any trace of human form, to Ixion, or Bismarck.
He needed to return her to her own people, he corrected himself. No one here was easy with her presence, and while he enjoyed speaking to her, and in some way seeing his own world through an outsider's eyes, he knew it was better for everyone if she returned home. Her life in her own world would be calling her back soon, if it wasn't already. She had been in their world for a week, as they reckoned time, though the days were a few hours longer here. That was more than long enough for her friends and family to grow worried, or if they'd known the danger of the place she'd gone, frantic. And she would eventually tire of the simplicity of life here, the boundaries within which they operated. She was so alive, so adventurous; a quiet world like this held little for her once the novelty had palled.
"It's true, though," he said. "We've managed to maintain peace here for centuries. There are disagreements, yes, but no permanent rifts."
"In a small town..." She smiled slightly. "That's more than humans can say."
"Is it?"
"Oh, definitely. Where I'm from — I told you I worked at the blacksmith's, right? Well, there are actually two, because the man I work for doesn't speak to his brother-in-law, who used to be a fellow apprentice and then married Mr. Bonheur's sister. They haven't spoken for twenty years. And people took sides, so some of them go to the smith I work for and some go to his brother-in-law. There's just barely enough business for two."
"Twenty years is not so long, for us, but to you..."
"I mean, I'm only twenty-four." She sat down on a rock. "How old are you?"
He thought about it. "Time moves differently here," he said. "I remember the War of the Magi." Her eyes widened, and with a haste he didn't care to examine, he added, "I was just a child then. The magic spread to my brother and I from our father — the warriors called him the Titan. He perished during the war. We believe that's the reason we look so similar even as Espers, because it followed the same lines as any family resemblance."
"So you're a thousand years old?"
"Is that how long it's been?"
"Nearly."
"But that's precisely the point. We came here as children. I was fifteen when I left this world to try to live among humans... and at that point humans said the war had been four hundred years before."
"Wait... fifteen years? Counting time the way we've been here, day by day, not just 'about the same as a fifteen-year-old human'?" She sounded frightened. "How many years have passed outside while I've been here?"
It was hard not to let her fear infect him. "Likely only a week or two."
"But how?"
"Time is different here. Not slower or faster. It's shaped by our wills, to an extent. This week has been longer than many I can remember, because—" Because each day felt so full, spending time with her, yet at the same time, the days flew past. "Your presence here changes the flow of time as well, I believe. It feels so to me. There are others I could ask better attuned to it."
"You think so?" He nodded. "But if that's true, what does that do to everyone else here? Will I grow old over the course of a few months here? Will human time catch up with all of you?"
"I don't know." He should ask. Golem might know, or Quetzalli. They were both closely attuned to time. "Don't worry too much. Once we return to the house, I'll go seek out some of the others who can tell me more. A few hours won't do any more harm."
Madeline nodded, looking subdued. "I hope I haven't caused any harm," she said. "Or spent so much time here everyone back home will think I'm dead."
"Even if something's gone wrong, don't blame yourself," he said. "You were certainly in no shape to leave at first. And no other human has ever come here before. None of us know how that will affect life here."
"I suppose." She took his hand and let him help her up, however. "What was it like, when you went to live among the humans?"
"Among might be a poor choice of words," he admitted. "I built myself a shelter in the forest near a human settlement..." He'd meant only to observe, at first, but there'd been a lost child in the woods — far easier for Maduin to find than for any human search party, once it grew dark — and so he'd become known to them. Predictably enough, some had considered him an angel and some a demon; also predictably, the former had held sway not long after he'd delivered a little boy, frightened but unhurt, into his mother's arms, and the latter had grown louder the next year when a pox sickened first the cows and then the villagers. The tale carried them all the way back home, though. To Maduin, the stories of his life with the humans were fresher than his memories of the week before last, the week before Madeline had arrived, and he had little cause to relive them. None of his own kind cared to hear more about humans. "When I came back, the elders all said that was the way of things," he concluded, as they neared his own front gate. "That was the reason we came here in the first place. Humans couldn't see us as anything other than supernatural."
"Even though you'd been humans once?"
"But we'd been touched by the gods. We weren't normal any longer. We were either prophets or weapons. Gods don't just leave people alone, do they?"
"I suppose that's true. Or if they do, it doesn't make for much of a story, so no one remembers."
"Also possible," he admitted, with a smile. "Would you like more tea?"
"You're going to drown me in tea," she teased. "I think you just like showing off how quickly you can heat the kettle."
He stayed silent on that topic. It was childish, but he did enjoy being able to impress someone with his magic. In the human world, he never dared to use it, and here, of course, it was routine. As he prepared the things for tea, though, she seemed to grow thoughtful. "So you don't think humans and Espers can really coexist?"
"Long-term... I don't know." He kept his focus on the tea leaves, tracking a few scraps of dried tea that had escaped the strainer. "It's always been a matter of Espers in the world of humans." But now that she was conscious, no one would even come near his house, which didn't speak well of the prospects for a human in the world of Espers. He'd been thinking, idly, of a tactful way to leave her alone while he sought out Quetzalli.
"I should leave soon," she said. "You told me people here are frightened of me. Why should they have to get over that just because I waltzed in and decided I liked it here? It's their home, not mine."
You like it here? he wanted to ask. But it was best that she return home. "Someone can guide you through the gate whenever you like," he said. "It might be your only chance to meet another Esper."
"Don't you think they'd rather keep away from me? Or is it worth risking my terrifying presence just to get me out of town?"
Perhaps he should have offered to guide her himself, he thought. But he didn't want to see her leave, even if he knew she should. "I should go ask one of my friends about the flow of time," he said. "For everyone's peace of mind." She looked not just thoughtful, but sad, and he hesitated, but all she said was, "But your tea?"
"It shouldn't take me long."