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Grian took one step, then another.
The sun burned his shoulders, the sand dry beneath his feet, and his entire body hurt with strain, the adrenaline having vanished and left him hollow. He didn't dare look back again, the blood on his fists enough of a reminder of what he'd had to do to end this horrible game, and reminiscing on it made his stomach twist with disgust. His ears were still ringing, and in the buzzing sound he could swear he heard the voices of his fallen friends telling him there was one more life to go, one more death to end everything.
He took another step.
Scar had been so bright when suggesting they take over the desert, so alive. The conspiratorial whispers, the hushed pitch, and the smile of someone who was so in over his head, but held himself confidently like he could take on the world, it all had been so vibrant. The explosion that took his first life, that fateful moment when their souls were entwined, had also been bright and vibrant in the way that hurts the eyes and makes one sick. Even in the cold night of the desert, as they lit it up to claim the space as their own, Grian felt like he could see the outlines of the explosion in the scarring on Scar's back, forever a reminder of what he had done and what it had cost.
Another step. Sand crunched beneath his feet, bloody.
Sometimes he'd wondered if it had been a blessing in disguise. As baffled as he often was at Scar's antics, there was an affection that brewed in his heart and threatened to spill over with each successful con that left him in disbelief, each plan that went horribly wrong and had them laughing or fuming or sometimes both. This affection tightened around his heart like a noose when Scar slipped through his fingers down into a ravine, and it suffocated him when the man offered him flowers with a tentative smile, hesitation in his voice. 'Can we still be friends?' he'd asked, lilacs and poppies carefully picked and handed so delicately to him, with so much care, so gently held by hands that should soon be drenched in blood. 'Can we still be friends?' he'd asked, and Grian still owed him his life, owed him for getting him to that point, and couldn't bring himself to even think about leaving him. 'Can we still be friends?'
One more step. The cacti at the edge of the circle scraped at his arms, but that hurt no more than the pressure in his chest and his injuries from the fight.
Helping Scar take others' lives had been exhilarating. The thrill was still fresh in his mind, the ringing of explosions and shrill laughter that left his own mouth when they worked together to kill and kill all in Scar's red name echoing around him like an aftershock. Every trap he set carried a heavy risk, sweat dripping down his forehead with each explosive carefully set down only for it to fail, and then succeed in the most roundabout way, and Grian told himself it was all for Scar, these were his kills, it was for him, though he couldn't tell where that feeling ended and his own bloodthirst began. He'd told Scar he couldn't command him to take lives, and then did it by his own volition, while Scar worked his magic with his words and charm. His traps were a mess, they were both a mess, but it still was perfect. They were perfect.
One step. Another step. Slowly closing the gap between him and Pizza's grave. Between him and the edge.
The home they'd built had gone up in an explosion he didn't even get to see. The bunker and desert they'd claimed as their own had also been blown so far beyond recognition, and he hadn't survived that battle either, waking up in a dark safe room gasping for air and feeling his skin burn. But Scar somehow lived through both, even when Grian was already preparing himself to mourn the loss and move on with the game, returning to him with a grin bright as the desert Sun at surviving against all odds. They'd lost everything, but they still had each other, their only allegiance to each other and nobody else. It was the two of them, in the end.
Step. One more step. He let his hand brush against the gravestone, felt the rough stone beneath his fingers. Scar might have gotten a grave, so far away from where he'd fallen, but Grian would never get one.
He told himself it was some moral obligation, that he couldn't let Scar die. He told Scar words were now meaningless, that their enemy wanted his head. And the next hours were a blur of fire and arrows, allies and foes falling one after the other, his only room to breathe the safe house he set up while preparing for the worst. And he knew the worst would come, that his next death was inevitable, but looking down over Dogwarts from the fortress they'd built in the sky, it was easy to feel invincible. It was easy to forget as they fell slowly towards the battlefield that their promises to each other were just wishful thinking.
Yet another step. He leaned back against the gravestone, sand tumbling down the cliff in front of him, falling so far down. Like their allies. Like their kingdom.
They won together against Dogwarts, Scar slaying the Red King and his Hand. The shouts for Scar's victory filled the empty walls of their fortress, king, king, king, deafening out the fact that they didn't know where to go from there. A swift alliance ended even more lives, the last few stragglers, all over a stupid clock - and then all over a stupid, stupid piece of paper he was too slow to reach for, to slow to catch, like he'd failed to catch Scar before. And the pain of the betrayal hurt far more than the bolt that pierced his chest.
He took one last, small step. There was nowhere else to go. Nothing but empty air in front of him. Nothing but the end of the game.
He jolted up in his safe house screaming bloody betrayal. He screamed it at Scar, even as he said he had a plan, even as he killed the last living aside from the two of them. Then Scar knelt in front of him, offered him his life, and Grian found that he couldn't take it. After everything, after all the pain and joy and grief and euphoria, he just couldn't do it. But the game had to have a winner. And the fallen deserved a spectacle. And so they met in a cactus ring, in the remnants of their home, for one final dance.
A deep breath. No more steps to take. More sand falling beneath his boots. The sun burning on his shoulders, his entire body hurt and strained. So close to the end.
Scar fell by his hand one final time. Blood on his fists, on the sand, on the cacti around them, and it was all over. One final life to go, the buzzing in his ears said. One final life.
One final step.
Grian fell, and it felt like flying.