"Yes?" Baralai called from his seat by the window. The door opened, then clicked shut quietly, and he looked up.

"Lady Yuna is waiting in the courtyard, Praetor." The priest bowed, hands tucked in his sleeves, and did not rise. "Word has it she is here to offer her support."

Baralai let himself smile slightly and swirled the wine in his glass. "Is that so?" More likely, the high summoner had come to Bevelle to clear up the misunderstandings between herself and the former praetors of New Yevon. It would be best to clarify things, and hope she would not look unkindly upon him.

If she did decide to join, all the better. Their reputation was so tarnished people often refused to accept that any change had taken place at all. Peace would not be found that way.

"Well," he said finally, setting his glass on the windowsill and standing to face the priest fully. "Let them know I'm on my way. I'll only be a moment."

The priest left as silently as he had arrived, and Baralai spent the moments of his leavetaking studying the rooftops of the temple complex outside the window. If he moved closer it would show him the gates, and the young woman waiting outside. They had never met; he had only seen her once, and the vision had been brief. He wanted to be prepared for their meeting, but at the same time he was afraid to look. It was a long way down to the gates. Long enough to think too much.

He could have requested she come in to meet him. Trema had no qualms about treating her like a glorified servant. And his son - well, that was yet another matter that would have to be cleared up with her.

Baralai reached for his coat, draped over the back of the chair, and pushed his arms into the sleeves reluctantly. He started walking toward the door before it was clasped, tugged it into place, and reached for the doorknob. His hand froze, resting on the metal.

It was just a feeling at first, a cool quality to the air that might remind one of the frosty climes of Gagazet, that left the air tinged with the dry scent of ice. Goosebumps rose on his arms. Then he heard it, half-expected but wholly unwelcome: the keening of pyreflies, like a chorus of voices crying in minor. The sound summoned images he would rather forget, of a dark cavern and what he'd found there, what he had lost because of it.

He straightened and let his hand fall to his side, but he did not turn around, not yet. A few tense beats passed as he tried to steady the pounding in his ears with a few deep breaths and listened hopefully. His mind ran about in the circle of childish logic - if he ignored it, maybe it would go away.

That was not the case of course, and when he twisted to glance back, Trema's silent countenance stared back. There was no expression in his eyes, nor any glimmer of human memory. Baralai suspected it was only deeply-rooted obsession that kept him tied to the temple, instead of the will to live that sustained others.

"You don't belong here." He turned away, hardened his voice. Of all spectres that could have visited him, this one was most unwelcome. "Go back to your resting place." Wherever it might be. He opened the door and stepped into the corridor, the area between his shoulderblades tingling under that gaze.

When he turned to pull the door closed, the vision was gone.


(I think that would be more than a little chilling. Can't say about the story, though.)