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After the roar of the flames, the battlefield falls quiet. Eerily so.
"Yennefer?"
She can hear her own voice, croaky and weak though it is, so she can't be deaf at least.
"Yennefer?"
She twists, looking this way and that and finding the landscape the same in all directions. Blackened. Flat. No sign of the hill where Yennefer had stood; magnificent and brave, raining fire and damnation on all in her path.
No. Not all.
"Yennefer!"
Wherever she turns, the view is the same; nothingness stretching to infinity. She starts to walk, even though she's unsure if she's getting anywhere. Sulphur and copper sting her nose; objects reduced to their base elements. Destruction all around.
Then there is sound. Everywhere and nowhere. Inescapable. And now she wishes she were deaf.
A keening. A wailing. A howling. A lamentation.
She looks down and has to cover her mouth.
She's wading through bodies.
Scorched and burned.
Dead and dying.
Amid the cacophony, a voice rings out, clear and familiar.
"Tissaia!"
She spins around to find Triss reaching out for her, her body aflame.
"Tissaia, help me!"
She tries to move towards Triss. Tries to conjure a spell to put out the fire. But nothing happens. Her feet are frozen to the ground. Her magic muted and dullled. She has to watch as Triss is consumed, shrieking in pain.
Tissaia screams, but no sound comes out.
This didn't happen, a voice says.
Or perhaps it was her own thought.
The words were fleeting and far away. Impossible to catch hold of.
More faces start to become visible in the undulating mass. Sabrina. Vanielle. Coral. She tries to reach them but they die before she can make herself move. Writhing and crying and calling her name.
Everything stops.
The bodies and voices are gone. The fire is no more. All is black, save for one shard of light ahead, illuminating a prone figure, lying face down. Her legs come unstuck and she propels herself forward, her insides twisting with each step as she recognises the thick cords attached to a ragged gown, now singed and smoking.
It's not her.
Once again, the phantom voice is gone before she can seek reassurance.
Tissaia falls to her knees beside the body. Black hair that once fell in a lustrous waterfall is missing in red, weeping patches. The heat is almost unbearable. She reaches for a hand, only for the skin to scald her fingertips before crumbling away to ash. Swallowing, she gently turns the body over, ignoring the bubbling of her skin wherever it touches.
She gasps. Yennefer's face is gone. All that's left in its place is a hollow, blackened skull. It crumbles under her touch until it is nothing but sand running through her fingers.
Tissaia's world collapses on itself. Chaos roils in her belly, churning and growing until it is eating her alive from the inside out. It climbs her throat, devouring tissue and bone on its journey, consuming her whole in its glowing maw until she is no longer a person, no longer a vessel.
She is chaos itself.
She has no mouth, no tongue with which to form sounds, and yet there is but one word in whatever is left of her consciousness.
When she explodes, it is ripped from her and screamed into the void.
Yennefer!
"Tissaia!"
She opens her eyes, breathing fast. (She still has lungs, then. She still has form.)
Firm hands are on her shoulders, violet eyes wide and worried as they search her own.
"What the fuck were you dreaming about?"
"Yennefer," she rasps, grabbing at whatever she can of the other woman, pulling her close, ramming her nose against her neck and inhaling the scent of her, revelling in the strong heartbeat against her chest. The vision from her dream swims into her head and she turns away, lying on her stomach and hanging over the side of the bed as she dry heaves and fights the bile that threatens to rise up her throat.
"Hey. Shhhh." Gentle hands stroke her back and sweep her hair from her face. "It's okay. It was a dream. You're safe."
Tissaia nods, shame filling her cheeks. Yes. She is safe, warm in her bed with her lover. Unlike the others. Yennefer settles beside her, an arm draped loosely over her waist. "What were you dreaming about?" she asks again.
"N-nothing." Tissaia curses the tremor in her voice. She pats Yennefer's hand. "Go back to sleep, darling."
"Yeah, that sounds likely," Yennefer says, bumping her nose against Tissaia's temple. "You were-" She shakes her head. "I know you've had dreams since Sodden, but I've never seen you like that."
Tissaia sighs, closing her eyes. While her physical injuries have healed and her magic has returned, it seems her mind is a more stubborn problem. The dreams, while intermittent, have plagued her since the battle. Since thirteen souls did not return. She'd tried to keep them hidden from Yennefer, but since she started spending more time in Aretuza, Tissaia muses that it was inevitable that she'd be present for one of the extreme of them at some point. It's bad enough that Yennefer has seen her at her lowest physically. She doesn't need to know she's mentally a weakling as well.
Pushing herself up on shaky arms, she swings her legs over the edge of the bed and inhales a fortifying breath. "It was nothing of consequence."
"No, no, no, no, no." Yennefer says, scrambling out from under the covers and slipping out of the bed to kneel at Tissaia's feet. "This-" she points between herself and Tissaia. "-only works if you let me in." Warm hands grasp her own and she can't look away from Yennefer's eyes. "Otherwise what's the point? How am I different to any idiotic novice or bumbling colleague you hold at arm's length?"
"You've always been different," Tissaia whispers, tightening her fingers around Yennefer's, frightened at the thought she might move away. "That's- that's not something you need question."
"Then why can you not talk to me?" Yennefer sighs and lifts Tissaia's hands, brushing her lips over her knuckles. "I know you have bad dreams, sometimes. But usually you settle or wake yourself. What happened tonight?"
Again, Tissaia is assaulted by the image of Yennefer disintegrating in front of her. She pulls her hands free and stands, walking to the fireplace. She wraps her arms around herself, rubbing at them; the dying embers not enough to chase the chill from the air.
A robe lands across her shoulders and she closes her eyes against the warm sting of tears as arms encircle her waist. For the vast majority of her very long life, she has dealt with everything alone. Whatever emotions she had to battle, she did so in the privacy of her own chamber, spelled, if necessary, to keep in the sound of her weeping. She fights her instinct to run now, to retreat inwards and throw up her mental barriers. Instead, she leans back into the offered comfort of the one person who genuinely cares for her.
"Talk to me. Tell me." Yennefer's voice is soft in her ear. "Or show me, if you cannot form the words."
"No." Tissaia shakes her head, grasping at Yennefer's arms, pulling them tighter around her as the images rush back. Ash and smoke catch in her nose and she turns from the fireplace before she chokes, hands coming to wrap in Yennefer's sleep shift. "No, I would not have you bear witness to-" She swallows. "And don't even think about trying to enter my mind."
"I would not-" Yennefer says, steel in her voice, now. "I would never do that without your permission."
"I know," Tissaia assures her. "I know that, love. I apologise for implying otherwise."
Bumping their noses together, Yen sighs against her lips. "What did you dream that's so terrible you can't tell me?"
"It's not-" She clenches her teeth, and shakes her head. "The dreams are a manifestation of the feelings of guilt, I carry." She closes her eyes. "That I can't go back and stop it. That I can't save them. That I'm here and they are not and I-"
"You feel guilty that you survived," Yennefer summarises. "And that others died."
"At my behest!" She steps away from Yennefer, away from the shelter of her embrace. "Those mages were there because of me."
"They were there because they believed they were doing what was right," Yennefer says, stepping closer to her. "They fought for Aretuza. They fought to defeat Nilfgaard and its dark magic. You may have laid out the case to them, but they made the decision to fight on their own."
Tissaia lifts her chin and feels it tremble. "And you. What did you fight for? Not Aretuza."
"No," Yennefer admits. "Not Aretuza."
"You fought for me," Tissaia pushes, needing to hear it articulated. "Because I asked you to."
"Yes." Yennefer nods. "I fought for you. And only you."
"And if you'd-" A sob steals her breath, but she forces herself to go on. "If you had perished on that hill, as I see happen in my dreams, then it would have been because of me. And only me. And I could not-" She sniffs and turns away. "Yennefer, I could not bear it if-"
Yennefer steps in front of her, not allowing her to hide. "I'm here," she says, simply. She lifts Tissaia's hand and presses a kiss to it before placing it on her chest, above her heart. "I'm alive." She places her own hand on Tissaia's chest, over her heart. "And you're here. You're alive."
"But the others-" Tissaia begins.
"Are not." Yennefer closes her eyes. "I dream too, sometimes. I see them die again. I feel it." She presses Tissaia's hand harder against her chest. "And I mourn for them." She opens her eyes. "But that is all that we can do for them now. That, and honour their memories."
"That's- that's not the worst of it." Tissaia turns her head, unable to look at the love shining in Yennefer's eyes as she reveals the darkest parts of her. She scrapes her thumbnail over the skin of Yennefer's chest and closes her eyes. "I feel guilt at their passing, of course. But...that day, on the battlefield as I searched for you-" Hot tears spill over her lashes as she speaks. "I prayed. I begged. I bartered with any deity that was listening, that if only you were-" She blows out a breath, but Yennefer seemingly doesn't need her to continue.
"And do you think I'd condemn you for those thoughts? Those feelings?" Yennefer's brow is creased when she presses it against Tissaia's. "You forget, perhaps, that I burned hundreds of people to death that day. Thousands. And the single soul I gave a shit about saving was yours."
Tissaia opens her eyes, lifting her head to search Yennefer's face and sees her own inner turmoil mirrored back at her. "My darling girl," she whispers. "I-"
"And I'd do it again, in a heartbeat," Yennefer says. "I'd sacrifice every last mage on the Continent, if it meant keeping you safe."
"As would I," Tissaia whispers, sliding her hand from Yennefer's chest to the back of her neck. "For you."
"You've already saved me thrice, by my count," Yennefer says. "The first was when you dragged me out of that pig sty. The second when you thwarted my attempt to leave this world." Tissaia's thumb traces the scars on Yennefer's wrist, a constant reminder of how close she had been to dying. "And the third was when you stuck me in that lookout tower, away from the actual battle."
Tissaia flushes at her own transparency. "A military strategist might say I was protecting my most valuable weapon until it was needed," she protests. She tilts her head. "But I am not a military strategist."
"No, you're human," Yennefer continues. "These feelings we have for each other. They make us human." She presses her lips to Tissaia's, dropping her hands to rest on her hips. "The guilt you're feeling, that also makes you human." She adopts an expression like she's smelt something unpleasant. "And for fuck's sake, Tissaia, I wish you'd told me about this before. I might have reconsidered this relationship if I knew you were just a flesh and blood woman with actual emotions. "
A laugh escapes Tissaia's tight throat and she shoves at Yennefer's shoulder. "Stop that."
Tilting her head, Yennefer widens her eyes in a pantomime of an innocence she lost at far too young an age. "Stop what?"
Tissaia purses her lips and wonders if her heart has ever been fuller. "Trying to make me smile."
Yen leans in, lowering her voice. "Never." She takes Tissaia's face in her hands, tipping it up and swiping her thumbs over her cheeks. "Do you hear me? Never."
They let the word settle in the scant inches that separate them.
Tissaia nods and sniffs, pulling Yennefer closer and hiding her face in her shoulder, allowing herself to be held, comforted. She sighs. "I'll-" She swallows, closing her eyes when Yennefer's arms tighten around her, keeping her safe. "I'll tell you about my dream. If you still want to hear it."
To her relief, Yennefer doesn't make a fuss about this change of heart. A kiss is pressed to her temple. "I want to hear everything that you're willing to tell me." Yennefer pulls back a little. "Now, I'm going to make us some nice soothing tea, and then I'm going to slip some of that good booze you think I don't know about into it." Tissaia rolls her eyes, but can't find the energy to hide her smile. "And then we'll talk, okay?"
"Okay," Tissaia agrees, but she catches Yennefer's hand before she can move away. "That day, at Sodden, I may not quite have admitted it to myself, but it was love I felt for you." She shrugs. "I'm sure I told myself it was admiration, or protectiveness, or duty." She shakes her head. "It was love."
"I know. It was for me too." Yennefer says, dropping a kiss on Tissaia's cheek. "The difference between us is that I told myself it was just lust."
Tissaia tuts. "Well, I'm glad we were both wrong."
"Oh, I wasn't totally wrong," Yennefer says with a wink. "It was also lust."
"Ridiculous girl," Tissaia says, squeezing Yennefer's hand before releasing it. "Go and make the tea while I coax this fire back to life."
Yennefer backs away, her smile finally obliterating the images from Tissaia's dream, replacing that bleak landscape with vibrant, glowing life.
They will, no doubt, need to go into battle again. They will face impossible odds and formidable enemies. But they will do it together, hand in hand, secure in their love for one another.
And, Tissaia thinks, that's something worth fighting for.
Please listen to brazenedMinstrel's musical interpretation of this fic.