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He pretended it didn’t affect him seeing them together, did his best to give nothing away. He’d always been good at that, hiding his emotions. Tucking them away in favor of carrying out his duty, his destiny.
But if there was anyone who could see right through him, it was Sersi. In all matters, it seemed, except one.
The knowledge weighed down on him like a two-ton anvil. He’d watched over the millennia as she befriended the locals, learned their languages, partook in their customs. He’d stood by, taking her in when she wasn’t looking, and never in the thousands of human lifetimes since he’d known her did she fail to take his breath away. Compassionate, brave, and true, she was everything he never knew he wanted. The water to his stone.
He’d never been inclined to embrace the frivolities of the heart. His purpose on Earth was to serve Arishem and carry out his mission, and he was nothing if not devoted. But, as it turned out, there was room in his heart yet, a tiny pocket which was Sersi’s alone, carefully locked up until a frighteningly short amount of time saw it expanding to fill his heart near bursting to full. He’d been utterly helpless to it, unable to control it.
And then he’d finally understood that foreign emotion, the most human of them all. Love. He was no longer merely an immortal one more step removed from humanity. He was a man in love.
And yet, it was something greater than that. Love was too simple. Too pithy. He’d witnessed love between humans. Like a narrative, it often had its setup, its confrontation, and then its resolution. Rarely did it last a whole lifetime, even with their fleeting lifespans, though sometimes it did. What he felt for Sersi—and he knew this in his very depths—was unable to be named. It was something that burned brighter than a million suns and would last just as long.
And so he decided long ago he could never tell her the truth of their existence. If he did, he had no doubt the course of action his kind and loving Sersi would take. The knowledge that weighed down on him and Ajak would remain unknown to her, to all of them, from this world to the next.
But no matter how steadfast he believed himself to be in all other matters, he was not so immune to the pettier emotions of which he’d learned immortals could be just as capable as mortals.
After fighting off the Deviant in London, he was unable to control the sharp pang of jealousy as he witnessed the sight of Sersi standing next to the human male called Dane. There was an air of familiarity to them that had him fighting, and probably failing, to hold back a sneer.
He’d known before coming that he might see them together. Unbeknown to her, he’d kept tabs on her throughout the years they spent apart. She’d have hated him if she knew what he was doing, but he had to see her. No matter what, no matter the circumstances, he was always pulled toward her. He had to see her even if they were second-long glimpses from afar as she strolled the streets of London, the tail of her long coat swishing in the wind. He’d take all the scraps he could get.
Because his need to see to her safety was more important than his dread at the possibility of seeing her with another man, he’d braced himself and made sure to shut off his emotions before arriving. But all his bracing could never have prepared him for the reality.
Heat coursed through his body, the wave of barely-leashed violence flowing through him like lava as he watched the two of them together. He could break the mortal man to pieces with nothing but the twist of a finger. This man dared to stand next to Sersi as if she was his?
For as long as they’d been together, there were bound to be times when they were confronted with feelings of jealousy and possessiveness, and he’d experienced more than his fair share. And though he was initially reluctant to admit it and only did so at Sersi’s coaxing, he found it satisfying and arousing to know at the end of the day, she would always end up in the bed they shared. And whenever he was inside her, caging her in as he moved above her, some feral part of him would have him biting her neck or punching his hips more harshly or muttering “mine” and she’d never object—except for when she was angry with him or it was part of their games. And he quickly grew to find he quite liked their games.
But a new era of humanity and of their relationship had come, and on that chilly night on that London street, there were no more games to be played.
Regardless of where his decisions had led them, Sersi was still his, always had been and always would be, and he’d sooner go to his grave than let anyone contest that. Their millennia-old connection wasn’t going to be outdone—couldn’t be outdone—by a mortal who’d known her for not even the blink of an eye.
Or so he thought.
When they later ensconced themselves in the flat Sersi and Sprite shared, he took the opportunity while Sprite was in the toilet to approach Sersi as she sat on the sofa, the gears turning in her head.
In the most casual manner he could achieve, he leaned against the wall opposite her, one ankle crossed over the other and arms folded across his chest. As her attention remained elsewhere, he took the time to drink her in, and it was like a swift punch to the gut, as well as a sharp stab through his chest. Even after all those years, it still felt as though he was seeing her for the very first time.
She finally looked up at him, as though suddenly realizing he was there, then quickly looked away. He couldn’t blame her.
It remained silent, save for the muffled sound of the running tap a few rooms away, and it allowed for all the dark thoughts and emotions at seeing her with Dane to come rushing back to the forefront with a vengeance.
“You looked awfully cozy tonight,” he said without thinking. His voice sounded gritty and foreign to his own ears, as though the silence between them wasn’t meant to be broken.
She looked back at him—so there was that at least—and her brow twisted. “What?”
“You and Dane.” The words tasted bitter in his mouth. “I have to say the two of you make quite the dashing pair.”
She huffed. “For goodness’ sake, Ikaris, are we really going to do this now?”
“Do what?”
“Don’t do that. We’ve just found out the Deviants are back and you’ve decided now is the time to start acting like a jealous lover.”
I am a jealous lover.
A breath was quickly inhaled and his lips were parted, the words were that close to slipping out. He reeled them back in before they could escape.
“How long have you been together?” he said instead.
“It’s not really any of your business, is it?”
“Shall I take a guess, then? One, two years? No, it’s still early days, isn’t it? So what, has it been less than a year, then?”
“I’m not doing this with you, Ikaris.”
“Just making conversation is all. Thought you’d be fine with it. After all, Dane didn’t necessarily strike me as the type to provide the most stimulating conversation, though I’m sure he’s a lovely fellow—”
“Ikaris, stop it!”
He was taken aback into silence.
“You don’t get to leave after everything we’ve been through without even telling me why then come back and act as though I’m the one who’s in the wrong,” she said. “You know I had every right.”
It hurt to hear her say that. To his core, it hurt.
He averted his gaze to his shoes, chastened. “I know.”
“I waited for you,” she nearly whispered. “I waited for you and you didn’t come back. What was I supposed to think?”
Her eyes shone with a guarded pain, the kind she let slip through before her mask fell back into place. But he didn’t want her to do that, not with him, not his Sersi. She’d always been so open and giving and he loathed himself for making her feel the need to close herself off from him.
He nearly crossed the room and took her into his arms so he could take the pain away, but with immense difficulty he fought against every fiber of his being and every instinct that screamed to go to her and stayed put.
“If you’d just told me, maybe I could’ve…” She shook her head, searching for the words. “But you didn’t.”
He couldn’t tell her the truth of why he’d left. But he also couldn’t lie to her, not outright, anyway.
“Are you happy with him?” he said, voice soft as he looked away. He didn’t want to know the answer because he knew it would kill him, so he didn’t know why he asked.
Her answer didn’t come immediately. “What would you say if I said yes?”
Something inside him broke. Whatever had been held together by a tenuous thread snapped apart at her response, and for a split second he thought maybe, just maybe, he was getting a small taste of what it was like to truly die.
All throughout, he kept his face carefully blank. They simply looked at each other for a long stretch, but what she didn’t know was that he was taking the time to collect himself so his voice didn’t come out broken when he spoke next.
He looked at her head-on from across the sofa. “I’d say you deserve it, wouldn’t you?”
She said nothing, just kept his gaze for another eternity of a moment before looking down at her hands.
His hands squeezed his biceps so hard from where his arms were still folded across his chest that he thought they were nearly in danger of popping, and his jaw was clenched tight. Then he realized she could look back up at any second.
“I’ll be back,” he said without preamble. His voice was stiff and he made an effort to loosen his tense muscles.
Sersi’s gaze flew back up as she watched him cross to the door. “What? Where are you going?”
“Out. Don’t worry, I’ll stay near. Soon as Sprite comes out, we’ll decide where to go from here.” His speech was robotic, mechanical. Detached.
As he opened the door, he had the instinct to glance over his shoulder if only to look at her one more time, but he quickly squashed it and passed through, closing the door behind him. He paused right outside the threshold, mind whirling with the remnants of their conversation, before he shook himself out of it and resumed his path.
It wasn’t until he marched down the stairs and out to the side street out of view that he finally stopped, his mask crumbling like scraps in the wind. His eyes screwed shut and he knotted his fingers through his hair, his throat working as he swallowed. He hardly even noticed it was raining.
He’d done it, then. He’d made his bed and now he had to lie in it.
Five thousand years, over. And there was no one to blame but himself.
But it couldn’t be. Time had tethered them together. Empires were built and destroyed, civilizations flourished and failed, human lives came and went, but Sersi, Sersi was forever. She was his constant, his partner in life and beyond, his other half whom he would always come back to. And even if she truly was no longer his, he accepted with the hard, cold finality that came with certain truths in life that he would always be hers.
Such was the tragedy of an immortal life. The same joys that could be embraced a thousand lifetimes over could turn into the deepest agonies to be felt for just as long.
The wide chasm in his chest shrank until it was so tight he could barely breathe. He was grateful for the rain. Maybe it would mask the tears that slipped down his cheeks.
Under the steady spray of rain, Ikaris remained on that cold and empty street, bereft and alone.