awashlogs | Event Seventeen.

[ It's all that she had hoped to hear from him. That he missed her, that he wanted here to remain with him, that he wished for her to stay despite how he had... feared for the world because of her. Feared that she would return and be used again.

He's calling her name as well-- not Pyra's-- but Mythra's, and that's when there is a waver of her presence, a moment where her form glows as if his words alone are enough to awaken someone else within. My Mythra, as well, my weapon, because she is his, has always been his ever since he was the first to awaken her, to imprint his wishes and hopes onto something that would otherwise be dormant, inanimate. She owes him everything, truly: her life, her existence as it is now, and what she's learned of humanity. For she's learned of the goodness within the world because of him; she learned that the world is worth protecting, saving because of him. ]

I... I had thought you wouldn't want to see me again. [ Her hands tighten upon his back, fingers clinging to the cloth of his shirt as if she could ingrain it into her mind that this is real. ] All I've ever wanted was to--- to help you.

I left for your sake. [ There’s grief in his voice as he says it. After all, leaving his uncle’s court—and thus her—behind had been to quell those unsavory rumors regarding their romance. Rumors which disparaged not only her honor as the queen of Cornwall but also that of her husband and king, his uncle Mark.

And both of these people, who were so beloved to him, hardly deserved any of that. ]

Even though all I ever wanted to be was by your side. But it’s different now that you are here. [ He pulls away, if only so he can look her in the eye, and cup her face, treasuring the feeling of having her in his arms once more. ]

I would take on the burden of all your sins as well as mine, so long as we can be together again.

[ Pyra looks up at him when he draws away, guided by his touch upon her face. That sort of tender gesture alone causes a soft tinge of blush to bloom upon her cheeks, a fluttering feeling within her chest, and a selfish desire to not move any further away from him than she is. Something in the way he speaks and how he holds her should have alerted her that something is wrong, but it's too sweet a dream to truly wake.

And... seeing his golden eyes once more is enough to make her fall apart, because he's looking at her so gently and kindly. He's saying all that she's ever wanted to hear: that he forgives her-- something she's known he would do, but cannot accept-- that he wishes for them to be reunited. So of course she accepts; he is everything to her: the one who awakened her, the one who showed her the world. ]

I.... kept you here. [ She brings a hand to her chest, placing her hand upon where her heart would be. ] This entire time. [ His memory, his image, is forever stored within. ] We are one in body and soul, remember? [ He was the one who told her that. And it's only now that she truly understands what that means... ]

[ Her hand leaves her chest, and it goes to rest upon his so that she might feel his heart beat beneath her palm just as she recalls it. Her eyes are brimming with tears, but there's no less affection within them, no less admiration than how he looks at her. Then she can't help herself: she smiles at him, smiles with all of that affection and admiration and disbelief that he's here, the pain to see him once more, and the joy that she can be beside him again. Suddenly there's a lightness within her chest that she can't quantify, and her eyes search his face, drawing comfort from familiarity and more--

One in body and soul... because it was his goodness that imprinted upon her, that awakened her, that made her what she is today, that taught her the beauty of the world and the people in it even during a time of chaos and war.

...Ah.

How could she have not seen it until now? That a human could take something so-- so inanimate and cold and formless and give it life and warmth and the ability to feel and understand and laugh and cry and love is-- ] You... [ She says, voice hushed, overwhelmed, and it's now her turn to mirror his earlier gesture, bringing up her hand to place it upon his cheek, her fingertips just ghosting over his skin as if he is made of porcelain. ]

....You are my soul. My heart.

[ Her hand upon his chest brings up some bitter memories, but they don’t hurt so much now that she’s here, in the flesh, and trying to make him feel better in her own way. Perhaps her touch is enough of a cure—perhaps it is the balm he’s needed all this time. That numbness he feels…it can only be because of her healing touch, is it not?

He doesn’t question it, doesn’t question all of this, and especially doesn’t question her words. Her heart and soul…such indescribably beautiful poetry, delivered in a smile like the sun breaking through the clouds, like the sharp edge of a scythe cutting through the thorns in his heart. Thus, it can only be his Iseult who would speak to him so. He reaches up to take the hand resting over his heart, squeezing it firmly. ]

And this body is yours and yours alone. Ah, my love! Come kiss me and make me yours once more!

[ With that, he leans in— ]

[ There had never been a point when she had left his side after he awakened her, so to be reunited after so long of being without him, she doesn't want to draw away for any reason. When she was sealed, the last she saw of him was when he wore a sorrowful expression coupled with a great amount of weariness and regret. Yet here he's looking at her with such fondness that she can't not be drawn in herself, finding that she feels ever more at ease. She truly is complete when he is with her...

Except-- except then he says that and now he's leaning in and that's when she knows that something is dreadfully wrong. Because he would not say those things to her, he wouldn't ask her to kiss him, to make him hers; and as nice as it feels to be with him again-- to indulge in the possibility that he would say something of the sort to her-- as much as her chest tightens the closer he comes to her... she knows for certain he would never call her his love. Never.

Mythra would have slapped him to the moon. But Pyra? She flusters and stammers, her hand breaking away from his to have it fly up between them so that he might kiss her palm instead of her. She hasn't drawn away completely out of respect for him, but she's caught in a strange stance, awkwardly leaning away from him. ] Wh--......

[ A blink is all it takes to dispel the illusion, the dream, the spell, whatever it is, and once she sees who is actually with her instead... ] ....Tristan?

[ The hallucination is over, everyone go home. If his ends here as well, he'll see Pyra still flustered, confused, ...and completely heartbroken as she looks at him. ]

[ That sudden stop snaps him out of his own trance, and for a moment he leans there, lips pressed against Pyra’s palm as he blinks owlishly, taking in his surroundings, before—

Oh. Oh no. He gently but quickly draws away from her. Takes a step back. ]

Oh, Pyra…forgive me. [ His voice is thick with emotion—with disappointment, though he tries very hard to tamp down that feeling at the sight of her. There is no Iseult in this cruel castle of thorns, only a fellow soul left adrift in the mists of time, forever lost and forever losing those they loved. His heart aches for her, for what she must have seen in him, and yet he knows that this can only mean that the poison within them has sufficiently advanced.

They don’t have much time. ]

I wish I could be a greater comfort to you, but we— [ He turns toward a thorn-covered gate, knowing now that it must lead further inside. ]

We don’t have much time.

[ His expression--... how devastated he seems, because of course she knows who he must have hallucinated her as. It must be infinitely crueler for someone like him to have seen someone so much closer to him than the relationship she had with her own prince, only then to have that illusion fade. He must have had dreams haunt him with the very same thing: to see Iseult, then to see her disappear over and over.

Why is it that every time they run into each other, she only hurts him?

She doesn't know what to do at first. Whether to remove herself from his presence, or to... thank him. Thank him because for at least just one brief moment, she was allowed to imagine that Addam had...

...Now's not the time to be distracted. ] Yes, of course. [ She'll walk towards the gate, stealing a worried glance at him as she does. She feels the effects of the curse weakening her, yes, but him? He must still be recovering from the demons' poison as well. Again, he has it worse than her. ] I had... been in the castle's library earlier, and a book described this curse: it ends with a deep sleep.

[ ....Maybe she should just let the curse be?? ]

I see. [ He follows her, sword drawn to hack away at the thorns, though truth be told the steel feels heavy in his hand, as if it might slip from his fingers at a moment’s notice.

Still he watches her retreating back, a little surprised at how quickly she’d recovered—but then again…

Now isn’t the time, he reminds himself. ]

If this follows a certain old tale, then perhaps I have an idea as to the cure. [ He lifts his gaze toward the spires and turrets rising above them, similarly ominous and thorn-clotted. Would there be a sleeping princess up there, he wonders. But then his gaze falls upon Pyra next, and he feels his heart ache for her.

If his conjectures are true, then he’d only end up hurting her all the more. ]

Most enchantments tend to be broken by a single gesture. And the ruler of this castle might have understood that as well as the Snow Queen…

[ Pyra follows his gaze up at the castle— he clearly sees or knows something she doesn’t about this tale. Which is a shame; she’ll have to find the library once more to read up on any of these so called “fairy tales” to find out about the one this castle is based off of. Pyra has tried looking for something appropriately magical to help those cursed on her own, but seeing as she doesn’t know much about magic herself anyway... His guesses must be far more educated than hers. ]

You believe there might be something all the way up in the towers? [ She asks him, voiced hushed and hesitant. Can they even make it up there to find a cure in time? In truth she’s feeling exhausted, and her chest still feels incredibly tight and constricting from enduring the events hallucination, her mind still reeling from the sudden loss of being reunified with someone so dear to her.

And above all she feels even worse for him, for her grief must be nothing compared to his. She can’t even imagine what it may be like— ]

Then let’s go. [ She urges worriedly. ] I’ll—... I won’t let you fall this time.

[ Maybe this is a way to make it up to him for last time. In either case, she doesn’t want to see him pass out on her again. ]

Pyra… [ He gets the gist behind her words; she still feels guilty about his poisoning, though it hadn’t been anything they could have helped.

In fact, if she hadn’t entered the onsen at all… ]

I know you won’t. [ He wonders if he should try to get her to talk about it—to assuage her concerns on the subject, maybe. But he knows in his heart that it’s futile—and that furthermore doing so might hurt her. His heartache at having lost his visions of Iseult still feels bloody and raw. He can imagine that she must feel the same way.

With a sigh, he cuts away at the thorns protecting the gate, which immediately creaks open to a slight breeze once it’s sufficiently freed of its bonds. The effect would have been creepy, if they hadn’t endured similar encounters—similar castles—already. Regardless, he steps inside, into some musty, closed off back area that might have been the scullery; he isn’t sure. Inside, the place is unlit, and his Servant’s senses have long since been dulled to human levels by the poison. ]

[ She follows in after him, careful of the vines and their thorns. With the castle being abandoned for who-knows-how-long, not a torch is left in sight. Luckily Pyra glows in the dark, and she makes her way through the room to the opposite side where a heavy wooden door remains shut... or, seemingly heavy, for as soon as she presses her palm to it, it cracks and crumbles to the ground, revealing the rot inside. A breeze might have undone it completely, had they waited long enough. ] Ah...

[ And, of course, it's even darker inside the hall that is revealed beyond the door. ] This place... it shifts its corridors so often, that even if we choose one path we might not be able to take the same if we need to get back out.

[ She pauses. ] Maybe you should stay outside, and I can... [ "Can try a find a cure myself", is what she's going to say, but he's free to interrupt her. ]

No. [ Let a woman do all the work while he hangs back? That’s never been his style, even when he’d been helplessly relegated to a damsel in distress role the last time they’d spoken.

To emphasize his point, he pulls out his harp. ]

My bow—Failnaught. I can use it to track down an exit. [ Or whatever living creature might be located near one, which is practically the same thing. ]

We can thus take any route we please, so long as we return within the day. [ Yes, we—he can’t stress that enough. Even if she can find her way around the castle with her handy glow-in-the-dark feature, it's still…well, the signs of darkness and decay should be hint enough. ]

[ It seems she’s tired enough to not press the matter... and too tired to hide her pained look behind a smile. ] Alright—... But I’ll go first.

[ So she begins to lead them through the shadowed hall, lifting a hand to ignite a small flame within her palm. It gives both light and is useful for disintegrating pesky vines that impede their path. ]

You still look ill, Tristan, even now. [ Weaker, somehow, and she knows the reason why. ]

Have... others been taking care of you, I hope?

[ Oh look, stairs. Wooden and rickety and creaking with each step they take. It smells of bird droppings and mold. Time to start climbing them. ]

[ Though he does pay attention to his surroundings, his focus is mostly on her and how...tired she looks. He likes to think that it is because of the effect of the thorns, but they both know it’s more than that. ]

I am well enough, Pyra. [ And he’s got plenty of very kind and insistently caring friends to make sure of it, as a matter of fact. ]

But you forget yourself. [ Or did she think she wouldn’t be constantly on his mind since that day? ]

And that…pains me more than anything else.

[ She should say something instead of keeping her thoughts to herself. But she’s afraid of— what? Him turning her away? Abandoning her? It’s silly, she knows him, of course he is concerned. ]

You... were so hurt, back then. [ She closes her eyes for a moment. ] I still wonder what I can do, to make it up to you.

You think only of atonement. [ That’s not a question. Neither is it an accusation—after all, he can relate. There are plenty of other memories beyond Iseult that haunt him, swallowing him up like the thorns are doing to this castle and even to this cramped and dusty stairwell.

He sheathes his sword at last, putting it away in favor of his harp now that Pyra’s handling the thorns herself. In any case, Failnaught’s useful enough even in close quarters, and if they’re going someplace high above, well…he’d best prepare for the worst. ]

I do not think that anything I ask in return can take away the burden of your guilt. That sort of feeling…

[ He presses a hand over his heart. ]

It cuts deep. Deeper than any mortal wound.

Tristan...

[ It's hard not to look at him even as they climb the stairs. They both are affected by their pasts so deeply that their memories are inseparable from themselves. That they both so easily succumbed to those hallucinations because, she suspects, that the wanted to believe it was real as much as she did. ]

...Do you mind... telling me about her?

[ It'll pass the time, at least. And maybe, just maybe, talking about it will help. Sure it's one thing to resonate with him, but to hear it from him, himself... ] I would like to... honor her memory. [ Maybe that could be a part of her atonement, she thinks. ]

Her memory… [ She definitely has the right of it. He smiles softly at the suggestion. It’s still not her fault any of this happened at all, and he wants to make things up to her on his own as well. But this?

This might actually help them both feel better. ]

No, I certainly do not mind. I would sing of her always, if I could. [ If he didn’t always have to keep his identity a secret. Her name alone is such a huge tell, after all. ]

She was brave. And loyal to a fault. [ Perhaps that’s why he’d so easily succumbed to the hallucinations—there’s something about Pyra that echoes those aspects of Iseult, as it turns out. ]

She would have done all she could to save those she loved most in the world. [ And here he heaves a sigh. ]

Even if it destroyed her in the end.

[ It's not so much what he says about her, but how he says it; he clearly loved-- still loves her, and that makes his heart all the more beautiful to Pyra. ] She sounds like... anyone who met her, would fall for her.

[ A quiet smile. ]

I would listen to your songs of her, if you ever need someone to listen. [ They'd probably be overly romantic-- maybe just like the fairytales they had been put into just a week ago. (Or she hopes they won't be like his drunken songs at the Wei Wuxian's party...)

Oh, but he's focusing on how her goodness brought her to an end and-- that's not what Pyra wishes to bring up right now. She doesn't want him to think about how she fell; she wants him to recall how she lived. ] Tell me about the first time you met her. [ She remembers as clear as dawn, the first time she was awakened, of who she saw standing before her. ]

[ “Anyone who met her, would fall for her.” He can’t help but smile at that, even in the darkness. She really is the kind of woman who was born to be loved, isn’t she? At least, that’s how it’s always been for him. Everyone loved her.

Everyone had to fight for her.

But Pyra snaps him out of those gloomy thoughts with the subject of their first meeting, and despite himself he can’t help but blush a little at the memory of it. ]

Truth be told, it was not nearly as romantic as one might expect. [ But he recalls that day clearly enough—better than most, in fact. The high seas, with Cornwall somewhere beyond the horizon. The need to slake a sudden thirst. Pyra might have sensed all that in his mindscape when she’d brought him into Elysium; he isn’t sure.

It doesn’t matter. ]

I did not know it at the time, but I had drunk a love potion, meant for Iseult and her betrothed—my uncle, King Mark. [ Might as well let her hear the rest of his sorry past, since she’s already gotten his True Name out of the deal. ]

When next I fixed my gaze upon her, I was—we were both smitten. [ His voice, now thick with an upsurge of emotion: ]

I had never felt anything like it before.

Edited (grammar...) 2019-01-25 20:24 (UTC)

[ O---oh.

It's much better, hearing about this from him... and she almost wishes that this is how she first learned of his past, instead of.... well. ] You were in love.

[ She says, voice hushed, but the more she speaks, the quicker her words become. It's hard not to be caught up in the story, especially one as romantic as his. ] And it didn't matter who it was, or what sort of status she had, or-- [ A pause. ] Or to whom she was promised. [ ~~Tristan, you dog.~~ ]

You were tempting fate, but it... didn't matter, did it? All that mattered was that you were with her.

[ To speak of tempting fate inside a dark and gloomy castle…well, he can’t say that it isn’t inappropriate for the occasion.

But…he’s relieved, his shoulders relaxing somewhat at her response. The few who’ve heard of his story have indeed been sympathetic, but he still knows that he’d been treacherous. He’s more aware of his sins than anyone else, after all. ]

Yes…it could have simply been the both of us against the world, and yet… [ He shakes his head with a sigh. ]

She married him, of course. We had to keep up appearances, but it could not last. We were eventually found out. [ A pause, as he turns to her in the darkness. ]

So you see, I know well the need for atonement.

[ --....Ah, there it is again: atonement. He's turned it back to her, somehow. She's usually good at leading topics astray from her, but he's brought it back like bad karma. But maybe she can deflect: ]

It's... difficult to not wish that you and her could have... [ Actually been together. Run away together. Found a place to live in peace together. Could have-- ] ...loved each other, without any consequences.

[ Is that too much to ask from the world, she wonders? She would tell him that she hopes he finds love again in the future, but-- she's under the impression that there will be no one that can fill the void in his heart quite like Iseult. ]

[ He can’t help a little chuckle at that—at her assertion, and at the way she’s trying to deflect the conversation. ]

Ah, Pyra. It could never be called love if there were no consequences. [ So yeah, he can at least own up to that part of his life. ]

Even the owner of this castle likely realizes that. [ Then his smile turns a shade more rueful. ]

Even you.

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