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person4Title: Tokens
Fandom: Final Fantasy XII
Pairing: Balthier/Ashe
Rating: G
The first year she found a small chocolate cake, beautifully decorated, in a plain box sitting on her desk. Neither she nor any of her guards had seen or heard any sign of a person coming or going, and though she could make a guess at the only person who might have snuck in so stealthily she still make a food tester eat half before she let a crumb cross her lips.
It was delicious enough to make her regret her caution.
The second year it was a bracelet, left just as silently as the last gift. It was much simpler than the jewelry one would usually expect a queen to wear at first glance, but closer look revealed a beautifully etched garden design, so detailed that it might take a skilled craftsman weeks to get every tiny perfect petal in its place. She slid it onto her wrist and held it to the light to see the way the metal gleamed.
In the year to come it rarely left her wrist.
The next year she was in Arcadia when the day came around, there to visit Basch and Larsa as much as for the diplomatic talks she was meant to be attending. This time around she suspected that her silent gift-giver had involved Basch in his plotting, for the present appeared on her pillow when she'd been lured out of her room for just a moment by his knocking on her door. It was a necklace to match the bracelet, and it twisted around her neck like a vine.
As time passed, it became her habit to raise her hand to her throat toy with it whenever she was deep in thought.
The next year she swore to catch him in the act. She left her room in the morning as always, but instead of going about her work she instead slipped into the room next door. She felt a little silly when she slipped to the floor immediately after stepping through the door and began to drag herself across the room on her stomach, but she couldn't allow herself to be seen. She slowly pushed herself to her knees when she reached the wall beside the window, and pressed herself tightly back against it to watch her own window intently.
With the guards stationed at her door, there was only one way for a person to sneak into the room.
She didn't need to wait long before she heard the whirr of an engine and saw the little skimmer that was usually kept in the storage room of the Strahl fly up to the window and the man on it set it to hover before quickly slipping through the frame.
She was just as fast at climbing out the window she was beside, using the skimmer as a handy stepping stone to follow his path. "I've caught you this time!" she exclaimed as he whirled around at the sound of her entrance.
If she had hoped to get a startled reaction from him she was disappointed; whatever surprise he'd felt at the sound she'd made was hidden behind an easy smirk and a raised eyebrow by the time he was facing her. "Do you often make a habit of entering your room through the window, Your Highness?"
"Only since you have," she snapped back. "This has gone on long enough, Balthier. Do you know the rumors that have been circling my palace ever since you've begun this? The only ones worse than those speculating about who my secret admirer might be are those claiming that Prince Rasler's ghost returns each year to leave me a gift on the day of romance! Why are you doing this?"
He laughed softly, stepped up to her, and took her hand in his. "Tis but a tradition, m'lady," he said as he raised the hand and slid a ring onto her finger, one that she knew without looking would have a pattern of flowers and vines on silver. "Even a queen should be allowed her yearly token."
Fandom: Final Fantasy XII
Pairing: Balthier/Ashe
Rating: G
The first year she found a small chocolate cake, beautifully decorated, in a plain box sitting on her desk. Neither she nor any of her guards had seen or heard any sign of a person coming or going, and though she could make a guess at the only person who might have snuck in so stealthily she still make a food tester eat half before she let a crumb cross her lips.
It was delicious enough to make her regret her caution.
The second year it was a bracelet, left just as silently as the last gift. It was much simpler than the jewelry one would usually expect a queen to wear at first glance, but closer look revealed a beautifully etched garden design, so detailed that it might take a skilled craftsman weeks to get every tiny perfect petal in its place. She slid it onto her wrist and held it to the light to see the way the metal gleamed.
In the year to come it rarely left her wrist.
The next year she was in Arcadia when the day came around, there to visit Basch and Larsa as much as for the diplomatic talks she was meant to be attending. This time around she suspected that her silent gift-giver had involved Basch in his plotting, for the present appeared on her pillow when she'd been lured out of her room for just a moment by his knocking on her door. It was a necklace to match the bracelet, and it twisted around her neck like a vine.
As time passed, it became her habit to raise her hand to her throat toy with it whenever she was deep in thought.
The next year she swore to catch him in the act. She left her room in the morning as always, but instead of going about her work she instead slipped into the room next door. She felt a little silly when she slipped to the floor immediately after stepping through the door and began to drag herself across the room on her stomach, but she couldn't allow herself to be seen. She slowly pushed herself to her knees when she reached the wall beside the window, and pressed herself tightly back against it to watch her own window intently.
With the guards stationed at her door, there was only one way for a person to sneak into the room.
She didn't need to wait long before she heard the whirr of an engine and saw the little skimmer that was usually kept in the storage room of the Strahl fly up to the window and the man on it set it to hover before quickly slipping through the frame.
She was just as fast at climbing out the window she was beside, using the skimmer as a handy stepping stone to follow his path. "I've caught you this time!" she exclaimed as he whirled around at the sound of her entrance.
If she had hoped to get a startled reaction from him she was disappointed; whatever surprise he'd felt at the sound she'd made was hidden behind an easy smirk and a raised eyebrow by the time he was facing her. "Do you often make a habit of entering your room through the window, Your Highness?"
"Only since you have," she snapped back. "This has gone on long enough, Balthier. Do you know the rumors that have been circling my palace ever since you've begun this? The only ones worse than those speculating about who my secret admirer might be are those claiming that Prince Rasler's ghost returns each year to leave me a gift on the day of romance! Why are you doing this?"
He laughed softly, stepped up to her, and took her hand in his. "Tis but a tradition, m'lady," he said as he raised the hand and slid a ring onto her finger, one that she knew without looking would have a pattern of flowers and vines on silver. "Even a queen should be allowed her yearly token."