Work Text:
I've been thinking lately... But it's been feeling more like a dream.
Except it's also not quite a dream...
More like a nightmare.
I’m walking alone in darkness. Only the ground around my bare feet is visible. It's not that it's too dark to see–I’ve never had trouble with the dark–but that my view is obscured. I cannot see what I've never perceived before, so the world around me is blank.
My feet crunch over leaves and twigs and dirt, but I dare not stop walking. I'm holding something tightly to my chest: a light. It is not a part of me, but I want it to be. I wouldn't be clinging to it if I didn't, I think... It's all I have to give me sight, to give me reason to keep moving.
When I finally look down, I see a large crimson heart bleeding flame, spilling light all over my hands. This heart is precious to me beyond what I can fathom. It's fiery, powerful, beautiful. It's also bigger than my hands can carry. Gods, have my hands always been this small?
And the heart, it keeps beating. It refuses to stop pulsing with a life of its own, even though it's been cut out. Wild and strong. Free. I can’t tell if it’s leading me forward or if I’m leading it, but it’s a new and welcome companion. Fire has never scared me, after all.
When I think about that heart, I am reminded of my oaths: Find the light, Kindle the light, Protect the light. It’s only been a few years, but it feels like a completely different era. I’m not the same woman I was before I knelt and swore my life to it. But I fear I haven't changed at all. I still can’t see past the shadows, with how I’ve tried to stay in the light.
And the heart I carry, the one I can't let go... is you, I think.
Heh, sorry for the strange analogy, Karlach. Maybe this whole dream/nightmare means I missed my true calling as a poet? Or that my love has made me wish I could become one...
Ah, that's right. The nightmare. I haven't gotten to the worst part.
As I carry it, snatches of the world light up, but I almost wish they stayed dark. Horrible war surrounds me. Fire and blood and steel. Betrayal and rage and loneliness. But also there is relief, joy forged after bloody loss. Hope, tinged in fire, spindles around my fingers. The heart clings to me as desperately as I cling to it.
Soon I can’t help myself–I’ve always been compelled to find the sweet in what people call vile. I press my lips to the sweltering heat. I drink the flames like it’s water, swallowing the light until I’m filled entirely. It burns like the hells, but I love the sting. After chasing the light for so long, I wasn’t going to let this overwhelm me. Not when it’s you.
Opening my eyes I see the change: the heart burns blue like a blazing sapphire. The heart grows hotter in my hands, and my heart burns as well. Swelling bigger and bigger, threatening to burst from my chest. To carry someone’s heart, to truly hold it… is something I’ve been scared to touch for a long time. Maybe it's not for any grand reason, but still, it’s a cage of my own making.
Then suddenly–sudden to my eyes–the heart thrashes. Visions of unending war cloud the world again. Pain. A heart ripped away, young and dripping. Flame shoots out at the visions, like it can’t stand to see it again. Burning fire everywhere, until it’s too hot to carry. Fear grips me. I can’t let the light extinguish itself like this, I can’t. But in trying to keep it with me, the heart leaves my hands. Did I drop it? Did I cling too tight? Was I ever capable of keeping it in my grasp?
When I scramble to the ground to scoop it up, the heart crumbles. Ash falls through my fingers. The light sputters and dies in my hands. All because I tried to keep it for myself.
…So, that’s what’s been bothering me lately.
Sorry to go about it in this roundabout way. I’m not all that good at talking when my feelings are knotted up like this.
I still think about what you said, about Dammon’s bad news, that you would rather die than follow his advice. Maybe we didn't have a fight, per say. But it felt like we did.
When I said we were a team, I meant that you don’t have to be alone anymore. I wasn’t thinking. Even as we’ve known each other, I acted like I had any sway over the darkest corners of your life. And even when you were clear about what you wanted, I still pushed you to think of the unthinkable. The only thing running through my head was, I can’t let this light die!
But I feel like I ended up smothering it in my hands. My small, ill equipped hands.
I seem to do that a lot. Try to soothe wounds I could never truly understand. I want to… but looking at you and the others, who am I to speak of loss? Betrayal? The craziest experience of my life before the mind flayers was when I was a girl, but…
Can I really face the darkness as I am? Cling to misery as closely as I do to hope, and still force myself to move?
You don’t have to say anything. All of this is to say… I’m sorry. And I trust you. Your life is yours again, and I never want to keep that from you. Besides, I know you’d never go down without a fight. I love you for that. I never knew I could find so many things to love in one person. Yet here you are, giving me more reasons to love you day by day.
Also, thank you for letting me into your heart. To see the world in a clearer, unfiltered light. After everything we need this sweetness. Let’s not let each other go.
I want to carry your light as long as you will let me.
My Karlach.
My light.