Tale of Moon and Sun

“LADY YUNA! LADY YUNA HAS BEEN MURDERED! CALL OUT THE GUARD!”

Baralai and Gippal looked at each other with incredulous expressions. How could this be? Who would wish Yuna killed? The new couple dressed themselves as quickly as possible and retreated inside the palace. Yuna’s body had been moved from the scene of the crime and taken to her father’s throne room. The guards swarmed the halls to keep any possible assassins from escaping Bevelle’s palace. When King Braska had been retrieved from the eclipse celebration, he collapsed upon seeing his deceased daughter laid out in his throne room. Baralai and Gippal were the two who made it to the King’s side last and found a near-heart-breaking scene.

Braska leaned over his daughter’s body, cradling her head in his arms, sobbing pitifully. Shiido held onto his own daughter, who wept into her father’s side. Aniki stood by, looking at Yuna’s corpse and bravely tried to keep himself calm, teardrops forming at the corners of his eyes.

Braska’s advisor, Maechen, tried to console the king with a reassuring hand on his shoulder, but Braska’s will seemed to have been snapped in half. The king lowered his daughter’s body and let her lay flat, the site of which made Baralai gasp when he saw the murder weapon sticking out of Yuna’s chest.

Gippal held onto Baralai’s shoulders when the jeweler gasped, his eyes staring directly at the pearl-handled awl that had been driven into Yuna’s heart.

“Baralai… what?” Gippal followed the jeweler’s gaze to the awl, watching it be pulled from Yuna’s chest by her broken father. Braska crossed the room faster than most in the hall realized, snatching Baralai by his toga and barreling him into a wall.

The youth’s head cracked against carved stone, his vision blurring on impact. The feeling of dizziness soon passed, however, as he felt Braska’s fingers close around his throat, cutting off Baralai’s oxygen supply. Baralai struggled against the king’s crushing hand, and Gippal pulled on his uncle’s arm until the angry Braska threw Gippal off his arm.

“HOW COULD YOU DO THIS?!” screamed Braska, trembling with misplaced rage. “My daughter loved you like a BROTHER! Why would you do this to her?! HOW COULD YOU?!”

Maechen came close to the king, followed by Yuna’s grieving Ronso bodyguard. The old man wanted to assuage his ruler’s anguish, but first needed the king to calm his emotions.

“Your Majesty, please… would the man who sacrificed his life to save your daughter’s take her life now?” asked Maechen quietly, while Braska still fumed at the jeweler he held against the wall.

“I find it hard to believe! This weapon was a gift to him alone! How many more of these…” Braska brandished the awl near the jeweler’s fear-stricken eyes, “… do you think exist in Bevelle?!”

Baralai struggled for air, his face quickly flushing from his struggles. Braska took a moment to look at the youth’s tears falling from his eyes before dropping the jeweler roughly. Baralai hit the floor with an ungodly smack of flesh against marble, coughing until his dark skin returned to its normal color. As he moved to stand again, he found himself looking up the blade and shaft of a Ronso spear held at his face, and a heartbroken Ronso pointing it at him. Braska had retreated, slumped in his throne despairingly. The bloodied awl fell out of his hand and rolled across the floor.

Rikku picked up the awl, pushing away from her father’s side and falling to her knees beside the body of her beloved cousin.

“Who would do this to Yunie?” she asked quietly, her voice distorted by sniffles. “Even if it wasn’t ‘Lai, who else knew where Baralai’s things were… and her room in the Palace?” Rikku looked to Kimahri, indeed, the entire room looked to the distressed Ronso.

Kimahri turned to the king and lowered his head, no longer threatening Baralai, who remained on the floor.

“Kimahri heard suspicious noise when Yuna watched eclipse from her room. Kimahri see what cause noise…return to find Yuna…” The Ronso’s panting chest and low, distorted growls indicated that even he was trying his best to pull himself together.

Aniki, who had heard enough of the court’s speculations turned his younger brother around and slugged him before Gippal even had a chance to realize what happened to him, sending the younger royal sprawling on his back on the floor.

“What in Solis’ name was that for?!” coughed Gippal, touching the fresh bruise Aniki left him. Without answering, Aniki tackled his younger brother and the two rolled around the floor before Shiido and Rikku could pry them apart.

Aniki raged, trying to fight off his father and the three guards who tried to keep him from tearing his brother to shreds.

Shiido took his eldest son’s arms and shook him until he came to his senses. “What in Solis’ name is wrong with you?! Why did you hit Gippal?”

Aniki took a few deep, angry breaths before answering his father. “If Gippal weren’t so intent on seeing that… that peasant…” spat Aniki angrily. “Yuna might still be alive!”

Shiido shook his head. “What on earth makes you think that is logical, Aniki?!”

Aniki glowered at the guards restricting his tattooed arms, who released him with stunned glances to each other. Shaking himself loose of the guards’ hands, he addressed his father, still quite angry. “Because that jeweler wishes for Gippal to himself! If Baralai and Gippal had not met… if Gippal were a man instead f an abomination…”

Gippal rolled his eyes, his body following the motion with a charge at his brother. “How dare you call my love for Baralai an abomination!” he yelled into his brother’s face, taking Aniki by the collar of his sleeveless shirt and shaking him violently, following up with a punch to his brother‘s nose, cracking the cartilage for all present to hear. “You cannot stand it, can you?! That I would-”

“Gippal, enough!” sobbed the jeweler, who finally found his voice amidst the confusion and hatred stirring in the room. “Prince Aniki… why do you hate your brother?” Baralai had managed to pull himself to his feet, and held his hands together against his dirty and now slightly torn toga. Baralai hiccupped a little before asking more. “Why do you hate me?”

Aniki pushed Gippal off of his body, sitting up to glare at the benevolent young man. “I hate Gippal for shaming our family. It is one thing to indulge yourself in a harem slave… it is another to try to bring one into the court.”

Gippal seemed ready to tear Aniki’s face off at that statement. His fist clenched and opened in a claw, almost as if he meant to do it. “Is that what you think of Baralai? He isn’t some pleasure servant, Aniki. I love him. Get that through your thick head!”

“And you would kill our family line by not even attempting to produce an heir! Father naming you Yuna’s betrothed was also-” Aniki’s face was contorted with rage.

Shiido frowned and scooped his eldest son’s shirt out of Gippal’s grip, bringing him face to face. “Was also what?! You refused every other woman in the world around you in an effort to gain Yuna’s attention but-”

Rikku finally spoke up, tears running down her face. “Stop it, all of you! I don’t care if Gippal wants a man, a woman or a goat for a lover! I don’t care if Aniki hates him forever for it either! Yunie never wanted to marry you, Ani! Just please, stop fighting!” cried the princess, rubbing her eyes furiously to try to stop crying. Baralai stepped to the princess’ side and held onto the tiny blonde, letting her weep against his shoulder.

Braska watched all this with a bland, distant expression on his face. “My daughter passes,” he said hollowly, “and we all attack each other like vicious jackals.” Braska’s face glistened with tears that fell freely down his face, which now seemed older and withered in his misery. The rings on his fingers cast eerie glows of silver, gold and rainbow tones, making his face appear all the more disturbing and sunken. “Please… Yuna would not want to see us fight like this… we need to prepare for a royal funeral…” Braska’s voice was shallow and hoarse, as his eyes wandered to his daughter’s chilled form.

The Al Bhed family turned to one another, then all cast their eyes to the floor. Braska spoke the truth, and all were ashamed that they had fought before the grieving king. The guards gathered Yuna’s body and carefully took her from the throne room to a separate and hidden chamber, to have her prepared for her funeral.

When Yuna was gone from the room, Kimahri turned to the jeweler who still held Rikku in his arms. The Ronso pulled the pair to their feet and offered Baralai an apologetic nod, then turned to follow Yuna’s caravan of guards into the hidden preparation chamber.

Braska slowly melted out of his throne, standing up shakily, even with Maechen’s help. He strode to the center of the room, looking to Baralai who stood with his head lowered when the King approached. Braska’s hand slowly reached out and touched the boy’s chin, tilting his face up. Braska looked at Baralai for several moments that took an eternity to end.

“Where were you, if not at the celebration, Baralai? I did not see you down in the festivities… a beauty like yours with such unusually white hair is hard to miss… even in a crowd.”

Baralai looked to Gippal, who nodded to tell the truth, then up at the king with a blush daring to stain his face. “I was in the royal garden with your nephew, my lord.”

Shiido looked at Gippal with a death glare that perhaps should have killed his young son. Gippal shot the glare back, crossing his arms over his chest. “Yes, I was with Baralai. I was with him, I made love to him, and will love him no matter what anyone says.”

Baralai gave his lover an appreciative smile before the king turned the white-haired youth’s face back to Braska’s attention. “Even if this is true, you are still the only suspect we have, Baralai. I will question my guards after Yuna’s funeral. You both are allowed to attend.”

If Aniki held any resemblance to his father, it became most evident when Shiido and he made the same exact face of disbelief.

“Brother, you’re not serious, are you? Even if he innocent, to have our only suspect-”

“-Attend Yuna’s funeral with my permission would be her wish. As I said, she loved him like a brother… even after he disappeared, Yuna spoke of him as if she expected his return… as if he were simply away on royal business…” Braska’s voice hitched with his explanation, but concluded with a finality that said that he was not going to argue this point, and that the funeral would proceed without anymore fights.

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Princess Yuna’s funeral was most beautiful, and lasted for days with all of Bevelle mourning the passage of Braska’s daughter. The whole nation held a state of malaise; every citizen worried and whispered rumors of what Braska was going to do now that both his wife and only child had departed the world of the living.

Among the rumors, many vicious tales about Baralai and Prince Gippal also spread: some were made in jealousy of the lover’s affair, others spread by nobles about the indignity of a royal loving a peasant, but the most glaring and cruel speculation was that of conspiracy between the two lovers - that Baralai had orchestrated an assassination plot, using the princess’s cousin as an alibi. This story ran the most rampant, from a tale of simple jealous pride, to that of a tragic romance, to wild accusations of the jeweler’s ties with the Cult of Anima and an intricate plot to spread Anima’s power by starting a war among the gods.

Baralai was held in the palace by Braska’s men, though not imprisoned officially until a week after the funeral’s completion. During that time, Baralai speculated what was to become of him now that he had a nation calling for justice. Would he be beheaded? Exiled and hunted like a beast? Burned alive? Buried alive? Every possibility broke down the jeweler’s resolve to be brave a little more. What hurt more was the fact that Gippal was held under house arrest in his royal guest chamber, and only family was allowed to visit him.

While they waited, Baralai did not weep for his misfortune, but prayed quietly. Shackled by the ankles to a corner of a dank cell beneath the palace, Baralai prayed to the gods for justice - that Yuna’s true killer would be revealed unto him and the world. Yet it seemed the gods were silent. Days passed with Baralai being treated with the exact opposite attitude as he had be presented with just over a month prior. He awaited trial with minimal hope in his heart as each day passed slowly and the world gave him cold silence.

On the sixth day since his imprisonment, Baralai was visited by a blinding ray of light as his cell door swung open, revealing Kimahri Ronso, escorting Braska’s advisor, Maechen. The elderly man held a somber expression, and expressed a sorrowful command for the youth to stand to be unshackled. Royal guards let Baralai go, and the jeweler stepped forward with his head lowered. Today was his day of judgment, and possibly his last day alive.

The royal courtroom had been filled with people from all walks of life; nobility who wanted to see the jeweler hang, peasantry who wanted him to go free, religious radicals who thought Baralai was a servant under the Cult of Anima, the Prince of Zanarkand, Tidus, and the Al Bhed royal family, of which Rikku was to testify alongside her brothers. Braska waited upon the gabbatha, his seat of office there in the court as Baralai’s trial judge.

When the silver haired youth was brought into court by an escort of eight men, peasants booed and jeered at the guards, calling for such measures to be unnecessary with such a “gentle soul.” Nobility cheered for his arrest, seeing the boy be brought before the king, taken to a great circular tablet of raised stone, his hands shackled to a large, arcing railing of stone, his hands held before him by heavy iron chains.

Baralai looked down at his hands in chains, shaking them gently, making a light clatter despite the roar of people who surrounded him. Braska stood from his seat on the gabbatha, raising his hands to silence the crowd. It took several minutes for everyone to quiet down, but it did happen.

A guard came forward with a scroll in his hand, reading the charges against Baralai aloud to the court and its attendants. “Royal Jeweler Baralai of Bevelle’s Court, you are hear-by charged with high treason for the assassination of Princess Yuna of Bevelle. How do you plead?”

Baralai went silent. He knew that pleading guilty would be a lie, and thence a break of his character, despite it being a way to quiet the citizens’ fears. Yet he also knew that a plea of innocence would cause more turmoil for the country, despite its being the truth. Finally, when he opened his mouth to speak, he looked up to a carving of Auron that sat over Braska’s position. Swallowing hard, he gave his reply, his eyes watering so much that he was unable to perceive the faces of those around him.

“Guilty.”

Braska sat forward, his eyes wide at the boy’s response of guilt. The crowd drew into a torrent of cheers and cries of injustice. The guard who had read the scroll looked up to the king in surprise. Gippal stood from his seat and tried to shout to Baralai, but his voice was lost in the sea of words.

“This is an injustice!”

“Cut his head off!”

“Hang him!”

“Burn him alive!”

“Sacrifice him to the gods!”

“Let him go!”

“Baralai, you can’t do this!”

The people’s words, in his favor or not, did not penetrate the jeweler’s thoughts. By taking the blame, he would be letting the killer go free, but he would also put the murder and the rumors to rest. His attempt to alleviate the king’s stresses did not go by unnoticed, as Braska leaned back in his seat, dumbstruck.

The guards were beside themselves on what to do now, aside from restraining the riot that appeared ready to spill out onto the courthouse floor. Baralai stood, staring at his hands, no longer speaking or making eye contact with anyone. Commoners and upper class socialites alike began throwing things back and forth; things at Baralai, things at the guards, someone even had the audacity to try to throw something up at Braska. As the tension grew in the room, all eyes began to look nervously between Baralai and the king, who had yet to pass sentence onto the young man. When Braska finally stood and called for quiet, the courthouse became a subtle roar of chatter until Braska finally declared: “SILENCE!”

Stepping from the gabbatha, Braska slowly made his way down a staircase that lead directly from his position in the court to the courthouse floor. “Prisoner Baralai… why do you plead guilty in my court?”

Baralai looked up, his eyes focused ahead of him, even when Braska stepped into his line of vision. “Because I am guilty. It was my awl that killed Yuna.”

The boldness of that statement could have stopped Braska’s heart then and there. “It was your awl… but did you kill her?”

Baralai’s jaw clicked shut and people began to mutter and talk again. Braska raised his hands for silence, and earned it more quickly this time.

“You know what punishment you will face, do you not?”

“No, your Majesty, I do not. But I can guess.”

Braska took a deep breath and looked at the young man before him, this faithful citizen, this loyalist who offered himself in Yuna’s place, this white haired boy that spoke with the honesty of his convictions, and began to understand why Baralai chose death’s path.

“Baralai, I have no choice but to sentence you to death,” said the king, earning another uproar from the crowd. Braska stepped up to the rail that held Baralai’s wrists down, taking the young man by the shoulders and shaking him from his self-induced state of indifference. Under the crowd’s angry din, Braska had but a second to ask “Why?” before a whirlwind blew around the court, seeming to center around the jeweler himself.

The artic gust that forced the riotous Bevellians into frozen silence was accompanied by a swift-moving shadow of immense proportions. Braska found himself struggling to stand as the wind forced him back up against the guards who lined the lower area of the courthouse. As the king struggled to regain his feet, he looked to Baralai and his shock grew even more intense as a circle of fire sprang up around the jeweler. Braska only caught a glimpse of Baralai’s panic-stricken face as he struggled to free his hands from the shackles before the circle of fire grew into a ceiling-high tornado.

The frigid wind died down first, leaving the crowd to slowly collect its bearings as they watched the tornado of flame that encircled the defendant’s place grow to double its girth, then dispersed in a flicker of hot smoke. The crowd gasped in unison once all could see what had happened.

Baralai crouched against the rail he was chained to, shaking fearfully, yet unaware that the fire had gone out. On either side of the raised stone platform, stood Auron and Shiimoa, and neither of them looked pleased.