all your questions they start to grow Who: Divina Marcos & Lavitz fon Amell What: Somewhere, there's a lost knight. Where: North gate When: Sunday, the 24th Rating: PG-13 Status: Complete!
The North gate, after five minutes of walking, was just up ahead.
The snow hadn't melted since the storm, and neither had the cold dissipated, so Lavitz found himself tucking his scarf in tighter, readjusted his gloves, periodically knocking his elbow into the halberd against his back in the event another monstrous entity showed itself. On the bright side, it helped to clear out his mind. He'd been reeling over the appearance of that— thing, and had yet to wrap his head around it.
Why had it appeared in Finch's place? He entertained the ridiculous thought of Finch turning into the monster, but that was too illogical. And then there was the possibility of the man being dead. That seemed the most probable, yet he wasn't about to give in just yet. There was still a chance; there had to be. Theodore Finch had been with him, and it was his job to find him in one piece.
He sighed, exhaling steam, and straightened the weapon along his back as he approached the gate. A chocobo squawked as he passed it by, catching the attention of the woman astride it. The heavy fur mantle around her shoulders made evident her intent to travel, the black sword strapped against her waist glinting from underneath. With a flick of the woman's wrist, the chocobo shifted so that it stood with Lavitz flank to flank.
"You," Divina greeted sharply.
If the dragoon was deterred but the brusqueness, it didn't show. "Me," he returned. Consciously he took a step from the chocobo; they had always made him uncomfortable, on or around them. His gaze lingered on Divina's face for a few moments. While he wasn't confident they would find Finch, paired or alone, the effort to search was the point of this all. This was his duty.
He raised his brows. "Did you think I wasn't going to help?"
"Didn't think you were going to fucking lose him either."
The words stung, but it wasn't anything Lavitz hadn't told himself. He curled his fingers into a fist. "Which is why I'm going to continue to look," he offered, softly. "It's my responsibility to find him, Divina."
"It was your responsibility not to leave him."
It was an unfair accusation, even she could acknowledge, but the fear that gripped her heart was too real (too familiar). Divina cast her gaze out toward the snow that unfurled before them like clouds fettered to the earth. Her skin prickled with the tactile memory of their cloying embrace; she grit her teeth.
"How far out," she demanded.
Quieted, momentarily, by that accusation, the dragoon merely looked toward her, taking in the dark of her hair, the determination on her face. He followed her line of sight. "I never left the paling on foot; I was with Amarant. I would say about five minutes walk from the gate." Distrustful eyes peered at the chocobo.
She followed his gaze, debating, for a long moment, if she should simply leave him. But the improved chances his presence offered won out over the hard edge of her frustration. Divina gestured toward the steed with raise of the reins. It was clear the woman intended to spend more than five minutes out in the cold. "Get on or get your own."
Lavitz couldn't say, precisely, what it was about chocobos that disconcerted him. The irony of relying on a dragon three times its size and ten times more frightening than a large, fluffy yellow bird didn't elude him. It still didn't mean he had to like chocobos. Eyeing the bird one last time, he hooked his foot into the stirrup and maneuvered himself in behind the younger woman, already wanting off the second he'd climbed on.
He hesitated briefly, wondering if he could break it to her that their chances of finding Finch a day later out in the snow were slim to none. Still, it was a chance, and a chance both were willing to take.
"I could make out a line of trees due north from where we were," he offered instead. "I can direct us there."
She nodded. A cluck of her tongue, a dig of her foot—and off they went, an arrow sailing into the snow beyond.