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Title: you'd return the way you said
Prompt: reunions
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 824
Content Warnings/Notes: past character death
Summary: Kyrion Taviot returns from exile, to the bitterest reunion of all.
It has been over ten years, but Lady Melantha has changed not at all as far as he can see: her long black hair is pulled up beneath a sheer veil, in the looping braids and complicated hairstyles of a married woman, but other than that, her smooth skin and luminous dark eyes are the same as the young maiden he had loved in what feels like another lifetime, still slim as a youth beneath her layers of silken robes.
"Lady," he asks, trying to not stumble over the formalities: he can sense her husband's eyes on his back, and wonders just what Melantha has told him over the years about him, about everyone she has ever known. "Lady Melantha. Your brother - is he well?"
Kyrion doesn't know what he expects to hear: Myca hasn't written to him in years, at first regular letters and then they'd quarreled, one last very cool letter and then nothing, even after he'd sent several letters apologizing. He doesn't know what he expects to hear, not when his best friend very likely isn't his best friend any more and Kyrion has no idea where he is, and all he's heard of Melantha since he returned was that she was quite mad.
"We died," she says simply, her eyes fixed blank and empty, staring into eternity, and Kyrion suddenly has a very hard time meeting her gaze, remembering dark eyes lit with laughter. "We died and then we lived."
He repeats her words almost uncomprehendingly, mouthing them silently to himself - we died, we died and then we lived-and wonders, not for the first time, why he had bothered to come home, back to Sarantian, the city of the gods. His exile had been bitter in many ways, but this, this was far more bitter still, returning to a father that had cursed his name as he died, a family that scorned him, a best friend who had died years ago, died more than likely angry at him, and the girl he had loved was not only married but a shattered shell of her former self.
Why had he bothered to come home? Ten years and more beneath a foreign sky, beneath fog and rain, was better than this. There was nothing for him here, nothing.
"Why even bother to come home, Stormbringer?" Melantha's husband, Kyrion hadn't even bothered to remember his name-and it seems like the man has given him the same courtesy, using instead the title, the epithet, that he loathes-, had come up beside him on his blind side, and Kyrion finds himself forcing himself to not draw his sword, or dagger, or reach for lightning, entirely against every instinct he has.
Kyrion instead shrugs, and otherwise ignores the man, as pale fingertips brush for a moment against his palm, fluttering: he does his best to not set his other hand on top of Melantha's, instead remaining still. Her hand is still so pale against his, even after so many years beneath fog, and he can feel the sword calluses on her slender fingers (when had she learned swordplay? she hadn't ever known before-)
"How long ago was it?" he asks Lady Melantha, entirely uncertain of that answer, too. "How long ago did Myca die?"
She tilts her head, birdlike, and the blankness in her eyes doesn't lift. "We do not remember," she says, simply. "What is time for us any more? It passes and does not pass, and there is no difference in the silent kingdom, death and dreaming and stillness, forever stillness."
"Ten years," her husband interjects roughly. "Less than half a year after you were exiled, Stormbringer."
Half a year. Three letters, no more.
"How," Kyrion asks, trying to be gentle, as gentle as he can, though he's certain as he speaks that he doesn't know how to be gentle any more, if ever he could have been.
Melantha shakes her head. "We lived and we died and lived," she whispers, her shoulders trembling beneath the heavy layers of silken robes, dark blank eyes wide before she turns her head away, but there is no sheen of tears on her skin that he could see. He remembers a promise he made, though he isn't certain that Melantha herself even remembers, that he'd never make her cry: but he's already made a mockery of his word and most of the vows he's sworn a dozen times over, what is one more to many? "There is no how,"
"Are you quite satisfied, Stormbringer?" Melantha's husband steps over to her, hand on her shoulder as if trying to comfort her, and Kyrion shouldn't be so glad to see her try to curl away from his touch, rejecting it and him, but he is. "If so, then leave."
"Yes," he says, and turns to leave, though the answer is truly no: no, he isn't satisfied, no, he'll never be satisfied.
He should never have come home.
Prompt: reunions
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 824
Content Warnings/Notes: past character death
Summary: Kyrion Taviot returns from exile, to the bitterest reunion of all.
It has been over ten years, but Lady Melantha has changed not at all as far as he can see: her long black hair is pulled up beneath a sheer veil, in the looping braids and complicated hairstyles of a married woman, but other than that, her smooth skin and luminous dark eyes are the same as the young maiden he had loved in what feels like another lifetime, still slim as a youth beneath her layers of silken robes.
"Lady," he asks, trying to not stumble over the formalities: he can sense her husband's eyes on his back, and wonders just what Melantha has told him over the years about him, about everyone she has ever known. "Lady Melantha. Your brother - is he well?"
Kyrion doesn't know what he expects to hear: Myca hasn't written to him in years, at first regular letters and then they'd quarreled, one last very cool letter and then nothing, even after he'd sent several letters apologizing. He doesn't know what he expects to hear, not when his best friend very likely isn't his best friend any more and Kyrion has no idea where he is, and all he's heard of Melantha since he returned was that she was quite mad.
"We died," she says simply, her eyes fixed blank and empty, staring into eternity, and Kyrion suddenly has a very hard time meeting her gaze, remembering dark eyes lit with laughter. "We died and then we lived."
He repeats her words almost uncomprehendingly, mouthing them silently to himself - we died, we died and then we lived-and wonders, not for the first time, why he had bothered to come home, back to Sarantian, the city of the gods. His exile had been bitter in many ways, but this, this was far more bitter still, returning to a father that had cursed his name as he died, a family that scorned him, a best friend who had died years ago, died more than likely angry at him, and the girl he had loved was not only married but a shattered shell of her former self.
Why had he bothered to come home? Ten years and more beneath a foreign sky, beneath fog and rain, was better than this. There was nothing for him here, nothing.
"Why even bother to come home, Stormbringer?" Melantha's husband, Kyrion hadn't even bothered to remember his name-and it seems like the man has given him the same courtesy, using instead the title, the epithet, that he loathes-, had come up beside him on his blind side, and Kyrion finds himself forcing himself to not draw his sword, or dagger, or reach for lightning, entirely against every instinct he has.
Kyrion instead shrugs, and otherwise ignores the man, as pale fingertips brush for a moment against his palm, fluttering: he does his best to not set his other hand on top of Melantha's, instead remaining still. Her hand is still so pale against his, even after so many years beneath fog, and he can feel the sword calluses on her slender fingers (when had she learned swordplay? she hadn't ever known before-)
"How long ago was it?" he asks Lady Melantha, entirely uncertain of that answer, too. "How long ago did Myca die?"
She tilts her head, birdlike, and the blankness in her eyes doesn't lift. "We do not remember," she says, simply. "What is time for us any more? It passes and does not pass, and there is no difference in the silent kingdom, death and dreaming and stillness, forever stillness."
"Ten years," her husband interjects roughly. "Less than half a year after you were exiled, Stormbringer."
Half a year. Three letters, no more.
"How," Kyrion asks, trying to be gentle, as gentle as he can, though he's certain as he speaks that he doesn't know how to be gentle any more, if ever he could have been.
Melantha shakes her head. "We lived and we died and lived," she whispers, her shoulders trembling beneath the heavy layers of silken robes, dark blank eyes wide before she turns her head away, but there is no sheen of tears on her skin that he could see. He remembers a promise he made, though he isn't certain that Melantha herself even remembers, that he'd never make her cry: but he's already made a mockery of his word and most of the vows he's sworn a dozen times over, what is one more to many? "There is no how,"
"Are you quite satisfied, Stormbringer?" Melantha's husband steps over to her, hand on her shoulder as if trying to comfort her, and Kyrion shouldn't be so glad to see her try to curl away from his touch, rejecting it and him, but he is. "If so, then leave."
"Yes," he says, and turns to leave, though the answer is truly no: no, he isn't satisfied, no, he'll never be satisfied.
He should never have come home.
