Tale of Moon and Sun

Gippal grabbed the opened door and gave it a series more of hard yanks. “Maybe he fell off there… you go get O’aka or somebody, I’ll try to get this damn door open.”

Not one to argue, Tidus took off into the temple, seeking out the bishop or someone else who could help as Gippal struggled to pull open the heavy stone door. After a few moments of tugging, the Al Bhed took a moment to let his hands rest, cracking his knuckles and stretching his arms as he readied to try again.

This time, however, the door swung open freely, as if there had never been a problem with it in the first place. Gippal raised a brow as he slowly peeked his head into the room. Stepping in, the Al Bhed prince very slowly approached the pillar where Nooj had sat.

“High Priest Nooj? Are you in here? Are you all right?” he said gently, listening for any sort of movement. The orb of polished rock crystal sat undisturbed on the pillow where the oracle once had been. Carefully approaching the twenty cubit pillar, Gippal circled it slowly, looking to make sure he was not about to step on the holy man. Completing a rotation around the pillar, Gippal stood before the two pillars, looking at the double doors he had gone through.

“Maybe he can fly…” he murmured, shaking his head, lost. When he shook his head, Gippal caught a glimpse of the missing Oracle, reflected in the room’s highly polished black marble. Confused, but not yet ready to give up the fact that he spotted the silent man, Gippal headed back to the doors as if he were going to leave. Nooj followed him, just as silently as he had been, the priest’s bare feet explaining to Gippal how he missed having someone behind him or standing in his blind spot. Once he reached the doors, Gippal stopped, and shut them quickly, turning his body too fast for the priest to have known what he was going to do.

“Okay, you had better tell me why you’re following me around the room,” demanded Gippal, his hands going onto his hips. “I could get into a world of trouble for you walking around here without all your blessed junk.”

There was a long pause of unspoken silence, the only sounds were the Oracle’s practiced, steadied breaths and Gippal’s irritated huffs. Nooj’s voice was surprisingly deep and soft when the Oracle did speak. “I was hoping that you would just leave.”

Gippal nodded, circling the much taller man slowly, quite irritated about what had just happened. “And so you stayed on my right while I went around the pillar so I wouldn’t see you. Cute trick. At least we know you’re smart,” he said gruffly, earning a bowed head from the priest.

“I did not mean to offend… I heard you and the Prince speaking in the hallway… I saw you comforting him,” said Nooj quietly.

Gippal thumbed his nose and took a deep breath, calming the anger he still felt about his disability being used against him. “Yeah, well, how in the heck did you get down? Don’t tell me you jumped.”

Nooj shook his head, his knee-length brown hair shifting around his shoulders as he lowered his head more. “No, I can climb down between the two pillars. I am tall enough to be able to reach the mirror without jumping.”

Gippal looked up at the Oracle with a smirk. “So, how long have you been breaking the rules, Nooj?”

The high priest pushed a heavy amount of hair back, straightening himself to look Gippal in the eye. “Since I stopped growing and figured that I could climb back up by pushing myself against the larger pillar from the small one.” The small amount of pride in Nooj’s voice made Gippal a little easier since entering the room.

“So, why did you come to spy on us anyway, Nooj? And how come we couldn’t pull the door open?” asked Gippal, looking to the door, wondering when Tidus and other temple workers would return to rescue a priest who did not need rescuing.

Nooj had an answer for both questions as Gippal asked them, his eyes taking on a hint of sadness. “I wanted to see you. I did not know your voice… you were new to me. As for the door, well…” the priest smirked a little, placing hands on his own hips. “Noojie-Woojie is stronger than you think.”

Gippal laughed, scratching the back of his head as he looked to the floor. “So you heard that, huh?”

“I was right behind the door when you said it.”

The Al Bhed prince shook his head, rather relieved that the priest was a little more human that O’aka made him out to be. “So what makes me so special?”

Nooj went quiet at that question, really thinking about his answer before giving it. “You acted like I wasn’t. Special, I mean.”

Gippal laughed a bit, scratching the back of his head once more. “Well, I don’t believe that people are made special or not because of where they were born in the world. I’m a prince, yeah, but that doesn’t matter so much to me. My people look up to my Father and trust him for guidance. That makes my people happy, so if they want me to be king one day, I’d try to give them what they all need.”

The High Priest smiled warmly, reaching forward to take Gippal by the hands. “Such words… you will make a fine leader one day…” when he took Gippal’s hands, however, Nooj felt weak, his legs giving out beneath his lean body. Gippal jumped to keep Nooj from falling hard onto the marble floor of the temple, just as Tidus was returning with O’aka.

“You! Unhand the High Priest! I don’t know how you got him off the pillar, young man, but you are in great trouble! The oracle will-”

Nooj coughed and held onto Gippal tightly, looking up at O’aka with rueful eyes. “It is not Prince Gippal’s fault, O’aka… I… I’ve had a vision…” he gazed to the Al Bhed prince, who looked back down at the seer with concern. “I have foreseen a long life for the Al Bhed Prince and his lover, and wished to tell him… I fell…” he lied gently, trying to stand with Gippal’s help.

O’aka leaned down to swat Gippal’s hands away from Nooj, who reached to the older man, expecting to be helped up by the bishop. However, O’aka shunned Nooj as if he were diseased. “I will have the priestesses come and help you, Oracle Nooj…” he said in a panicked voice.

Nooj looked down at the floor, ashamed that O’aka would not make contact with him on principle. Gippal groaned and reached down, wrapping arms around Nooj’s torso, pulling the tall brunette to his feet in spite of the bishop’s immediate protests.

“You can’t be touching High Priest Nooj! Now He’ll have to go through all sorts of purification rituals because-” a sharp slap silenced O’aka, who stared at the one who hit him with shock. Nooj lowered his hand, his eyes watering.

“Bishop O’aka,” started the priest in a trembling voice, “I am not made of glass. I will not break.”

“But the traditions!” replied O’aka, looking more worried that Nooj was getting upset than the fact that the red haired man had just been hit by the younger priest. “I cannot just let-”

Gippal interjected, putting his arms around Nooj’s waist and giving the bishop a silencing glare. “Look, he’s fine. If you want, I’ll do some sort of repentance for touching him, but don’t put Nooj through all that garbage. I think he’ll live.”

O’aka looked at a loss. Tidus, who had stood quiet this whole time, put a hand on O’aka’s shoulder to calm the older gentleman down. Patting the Prince’s hand, he turned to Tidus, his head lowered. “I guess… if it’s all right with you, Prince Tidus… I think I’d like to be excused for now… High Priest, forgive me… I’ll have the Priestesses check you over later, if you wish…”

Nooj nodded, holding onto Gippal to steady himself against his lingering dizziness. “Thank you, O’aka… I appreciate it.”

“Hey, O’aka, don’t get yourself down… Nooj is gonna be all right, you’ll see,” offered Tidus as the bishop passed by quietly.

“Thank you, Your Highness. I appreciate it… I really do…”

The three young men watched as O’aka dismissed himself, leaving the Oracle’s chamber without any more words. Gippal raised an eyebrow after the man left, supporting Nooj with his side.

“So what was that all about?” he finally asked, breaking the silence between them. Tidus was the first to answer Gippal.

“I think he feels he’s not needed, poor man… I bet we hurt his feelings.” Tidus put supporting weight on Nooj’s other side, helping Gippal hold the priest up. “I guess we should make it up to him.”

Nooj took a deep breath and shook his head. “I think we should leave that for later. I still feel dizzy…”

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The Priestesses of Lunaris completed their interrogation of their comely guest, having learned a great many details about the young man and the past he had come from. Baralai’s parents had indeed passed away when he was but a young boy, and as far as he knew, he had no living relatives or siblings to call upon. When the jeweler spoke of his life alone, he did not cry for the misfortunes he faced, but praised the other orphans and beggars who had helped him in life, as well as the patron who finally took a young Baralai in to the jewelry trade, and taught him to be a master craftsman.

“Well, Baralai, now that we are familiar with you, I think we can move on to the next step…” said Lulu, taking the young man’s hand gently. “I am not going to lie to you. Paine was speaking the truth when she said we would need your blood… and we need to take it from one of your more vital spots.” Upon seeing the dark skinned jeweler pale at the thought, Lulu smirked and turned over Baralai’s hand. “We will be drawing it from your hands, Baralai. Don’t worry.”

An eyebrow arched on the young man’s face as he looked down to his hands. “Why do you need to draw it from my hands?”

Paine’s cool tone answered him immediately, the silver haired girl rising to retrieve a crescent shaped knife from her part of the chamber. “Because you are a jeweler. All artisans carry… well, let’s call it their ‘power,’ in their hands. By drawing blood from your hands, it is more powerful than any blood drawn from the rest of your body. If you were a singer, we would take blood from your tongue or throat.”

Upon hearing that explanation, Baralai swallowed hard and looked down at his hands, the real tools of his trade. “I suppose a cut on my hands is much better than anywhere else…” he said dryly, standing up beside Paine.

The priestess in white drew Baralai close to the gazing pool, the other women coming up to stand on either of the pair, watching as Paine drew Baralai’s hands over the water, slitting across both his palms to squeeze several drops of the jeweler’s blood into the water. Baralai hissed in pain as he watched his own blood drip into the pool, forming whorls of red wisps. Dona reached behind Baralai’s head and gripped a small portion of his hair, roughly plucking a small swatch of white with a sound of surprise from the jeweler.

“Ouch! Why did you pull that out so hard?” he asked, eschewing politeness in lieu of his pain. Dona snickered, dropping the removed hairs into the brew.

“I wanted to make sure I got enough,” she explained with a malicious smile. Baralai leaned away from her, closer to the more comforting Paine. Paine put a hand on Baralai’s shoulder to reassure the jeweler, who kept an eye on the dark-skinned priestess.

Lulu smirked and drew her own straight-bladed dagger, thrusting the blade into the water to stir the pool’s contents until thoroughly mixed. As Baralai watched, his blood and hair began to fade and disappear into the water’s swirls, mixing into a strange brew that haunted his senses and made him drowsy to watch. The jeweler leaned forward, his mind spinning as though he were falling into a boundless well of energy. Just as suddenly as the dizzying sensations began to wash over him, he felt a tugging on his body, and the world came spinning back into focus, with Paine and Kimahri as his anchors.

“Are you alright, Baralai?” asked Lulu, looking over the young man with concern in her one visible eye. She ran a delicate touch over his cheeks and forehead as Paine held him steady. “Baralai?”

The lightheaded Bevellian took a moment to let the whirlpool in his mind stabilize before he could answer, looking up to those who held him in place with an appreciative smile. “Yeah, I think so… what was that…?”

“We should have warned you… looking into the gazing pool without knowing what you’re doing can be a little hazardous,” answered Paine, letting go of the jeweler’s arm with a sigh. “You sure you’re alright? You look a little pale.”

Dona broke Baralai out of the Ronso’s grip and backed him away from the gazing pool with her ferocious glower, making the white haired lad stumble as he backed away. “A little hazardous is a polite way of putting it. You should have warned him! The boy could have drowned!” She grabbed Baralai’s face and brought the young man close, though it was obvious he did not wish to be. He looked into the imposing female’s eyes with worry as she seemed to stare right into his soul. Lulu and Paine watched with eyebrows raised as Dona burned holes through Baralai.

After a few moments, she released the man’s face roughly, letting a scoff fall from her darkly painted lips as she turned away, almost sounding disappointed. “He will be fine. He’s a little woozy, but the boy is all right. He wasn’t watching long enough to have any lasting effects, save for he may walk funny for a day or so.”

The room itself seemed to breath its own sigh of relief at Dona’s diagnosis of good health. Baralai bowed politely to the dark skinned woman before him, smiling with slight force. “Thank you for your concern, High Mother Dona. I’m glad you could see things will be all right.”

The woman in black smirked and rested a gentler hand on his shoulder than she had a moment ago. “Don’t bother thanking me, Baralai. I was just concerned, that’s all.” The elder woman smirked and smoothed a manicured hand through the youth’s shock-white hair. “Besides, you’re kinda cute. I wouldn’t want to see you a mess on the floor.”

Kimahri placed a large, clawed hand on the youth’s shoulder. “Baralai is all right?” The way the Ronso looked down, one might have thought Baralai was a Ronso cub, and not a human. This fact made Baralai appreciate Kimahri’s presence all the more.

“Yes, I’ll be fine Kimahri, thank you.” The jeweler placed his hand on Kimahri’s before the Ronso retracted it, crossing strong arms over a massive chest.

Paine took Baralai by his arm and brought him toward the chamber’s exit with a gentle pull. “It might be better f you weren’t present during the reading, Baralai… not right now, anyway. It might take us a while to determine what you’ll need to investigate this mystery. I’ll help you locate Gippal and Tidus…” she said softly, opening the chamber door. As she opened the door, the Maiden Priestess’ eyebrows raised slightly to see who was on the door’s other side. “Well, that makes the search easy.”

Prince Tidus stood on the other side of the chamber door, his hand raised to where the handle had once been before him. “I hope I’m not interrupting anything,” he said, looking between the priestesses and Baralai. His bright blue eyes looked around at the ten that watched him back, and he cleared his throat. “Ah, Gippal asked me to come get you… he’s a bit preoccupied with the High Priest… which, incidentally, could one of you ladies give him a hand? I think Nooj is out of it…”

Paine raised and eyebrow and turned to her sisters, not giving them a moment to debate. “I’ll handle it… come on, Baralai… let’s go see what this is about, shall we?”

As the three youths were followed out of the chamber by Kimahri, Lulu turned to Dona with a surprised look of her own. “Nooj is speaking to someone? That is unlike him.”

Dona ran a hand over her tightened hairstyle with a smirk. “My, my, aren’t youths tenacious nowadays? Come, let’s see what we can find while Paine is out.”

Tidus walked beside the white robed priestess as she escorted Baralai through the temple. “So, what’s up, Your Highness? Nooj doesn’t speak to anyone, normally. O’aka must be out of his head…”

Tidus nodded and scratched beneath his blonde fluff of hair. “You could say that… Nooj… well, he’s gotten down from his pillar or something, and well, when I found them, Gippal and Nooj were talking.”

Paine snorted, crossing her arms over her chest as she walked. “Hmph, that’s a new one.”

Baralai stopped walking for a moment, letting the other two get a head of him. “Nooj can get down from there? It’s a twenty cubit drop from there, isn’t it?”

Paine’s voice didn’t waver as she replied, “Actually, it’s only about 18, but this isn’t anything new.”

Now Tidus was the one to stop dead in his tracks. “Wait, it’s not?! You knew?” Baralai came up beside the Prince, resting a hand on the shorter man’s shoulder. “Why didn’t you tell O’aka?”

Paine turned around to the men and smirked at them both with a knowing gaze in her eyes. “Would you? Now, come on, Nooj is probably in need of a meditational bath if he’s been talking to someone. Processing new information for someone who sees the world can take a lot out of someone like him.” With that, she started down the hall again, the young men suddenly having to jog to keep themselves in Paine’s pace.