Chapter Text
"You are the bane of my existence, Furina."
His stern declaration echoes throughout the room. The water inside his goblet remains still—not a single ripple upon its surface—as her worn and fragile heart cracks behind her fist held against her chest.
Blue eyes flash wide. Frozen for a second.
Then they quiver, frantically searching for something behind the sharp stare he sends her way.
She searches for warmth, for an explanation behind his words, for the love she once thought he held for her for the past five centuries.
But Neuvillette just stands wordlessly before her, his entire countenance rigid, as if he is holding back a tumultuous tempest behind his frigid silence.
Furina swallows anxiously, palms turning cold as Cryo underneath her gloves as she maintains his firm and icy gaze.
His lips part slightly, expecting an apology for his words—that he takes them back and never actually meant to say them.
But her hopes are dashed, and her heart sinks when Neuvillette swiftly turns away and snarls—
"Leave."
Her mouth opens. Her hand tries to reach out to him, but she hears—
"Go away, Furina."
Gloved hands ball into fists at his side, quiet fury in his voice as he tells her—
"I don't want to see you ever again."
He swiftly turns to face her again, piercing lilac eyes totally devoid of warmth. He summons his cane and drives it into the tiled floor between them, producing a menacing clack that reverberates throughout his office and sends a chill down her spine.
"You… have brought me nothing but misery. Every second I spent with you was unbearable. Everything," his breath hitches; "is all but a lie."
Her heart sinks like stone pulled down to the depths of the Primordial Sea.
Drowning feels like a less tragic fate than this. And dissolving into water a kinder ending.
"I loathe you," he softly lashes out as his fingers tighten around his cane's grip. "Leave. Leave this place at once before I ask the Gardes to escort you out."
Is this really how things are meant to end between the two of them?
"Wait, Neuvillette—"
She tries to reach out for him, urgency in her blue eyes.
But her hand is met with a forceful slap from him, his nose flaring up at her in palpable disgust.
The force sends her stumbling backwards—a little more and Furina would have fallen to the floor.
Heat blooms at the back of her hand as she slowly meets his gaze.
Neuvillette's eyes narrow at her with a glint of contempt that she knows he only reserves for the most detestable of criminals in the courtroom.
When she stood in trial at the Opera Epiclese, Furina remembers the times when Neuvillette evaded her gaze as tears flooded her eyes, as her voice cracked in between pleas.
But now, he looks at her straight in the eye, his resolve steadfast and his voice filled with scorn and reproach.
Furina lowers her hand and her head, breaking free from his cruel stare.
She takes a step back, holding back a shaky exhale threatening to leave her lips.
Then she glances at Neuvillette one last time, committing his expression to her memory.
So this is how it is, huh?
Her fingers curl into her palm as she fiercely holds back her tears.
In the silence that hangs over them, she only hears the shattering of her already wounded and weary heart.
She didn't expect that all her centuries of hard work and sacrifice would be met like this, and that the man whom she trusts—trusted above all else would ultimately break her heart when she is at her weakest and at her lowest.
"Alright, Neuvillette." She forces a brave smile on her lips as she meets his eyes one final time. "I'll go."
Furina turns around in the direction of the door and begins her solemn exit—the clicking sounds of her heels against the tiles are the tragic echoes of her swansong, the last thing he'll ever hear from her before she opens the door and steps outside his office.
Her steps do not falter even as she feels the sharp and curious stares on her from Sedene, from the gestionnaires, and every other Palais employee she passes by until she reaches the exit.
And when she crosses the threshold of the place that had been her home for the past five hundred years, all the strength leaves her body, causing her legs to buckle.
She lets out a ragged exhale.
Furina collapses, her knees meeting the hard ground beneath her with an audible thud.
She tosses her head back, looking at the sky with a litany of desperate pleas running through her mind but none leaving her lips, except for—
"Neuvillette," she says in a soft and shaky voice as she hunches her shoulders and bows her head.
She tells herself to get up—begs her legs to raise her from the ground.
But after everything that happened, Furina couldn't find the strength to do so.
And she stays there, jaw tightening as she sharply inhales through her nose, nails digging into her palms. Her eyes shimmer, staring down at her hands.
She bites her lower lip, hard.
Until she feels hot tears track down her cheeks, dripping from her trembling chin.
She doesn't wipe them away; she doesn't have the strength to.
All she could do was stifle the sound of sobbing as her heart painfully throbs in her chest with every hitched and ragged breath that accompanies her tears.
The pain slowly spreads like poison throughout her body. But to Furina, this feeling is far more searing than poison in her veins, more suffocating than being strangled, sharper than a knife lodged in her heart.
It takes her several minutes to pick herself up and walk to her home.
The Melusines look on from afar, sorrow in their hearts. They would've rushed to help their Lady Furina—would've comforted her without a second thought.
But their Iudex strictly forbade them from approaching Furina. Ever.
She is no longer their Archon. No longer their superior.
She is no one to them.
Furina approaches her new apartment in Vasari Passage, her pale face still stained in tears and her eyes now red.
She tries to focus on the feeling of entering her new home and slumping down on her new bed, being enveloped in its softness and lulled to sleep.
But the memory of her exchange with Neuvillette from before is still fresh, and his words and unkindness towards her replay in her mind as she stands in front of her apartment door.
She weeps again. But this time, she doesn't hold back her anguished wails, and more tears stream down her cheeks, landing on the wet ground beneath her.
Furina finally reaches for the door and pushes it open.
The cold wind guides her inside. She closes the door behind her, mechanically removing her damp coat and hat and tossing them onto the nearby couch before removing her wet shoes and socks.
The tears finally stop, though the sorrow and pain remain etched into her features.
With a long and melancholy sigh, Furina ascends the staircase, then walks up to her new bedroom.
She crashes into bed immediately and lets sleep claim her, hoping it would assuage her weary and wounded heart.
And as she slumbers quietly in peace, rivulets patter against the glass window relentlessly and the cold air does not seep through, remaining outside as if decreed to not disturb her tranquility.
"Monsieur… are you sure about this?" Sedene asks him, his gaze lost in thought and memory as he peers out the window of his office.
Neuvillette does not turn to face her; he didn't have the courage to look into dear Sedene's eyes after everything he'd said to Furina.
"I'm sure," he answers in frigid certainty.
Sedene could tell—anyone could, from just a glance at the skies outside—that this is hurting him, too. But she refrains from saying anything.
This is the choice Monsieur Neuvillette made.
"It's… better," he continues slowly, "that we end things like this."
A pause.
"It would be better if we don't have any lingering feelings for each other." He finally turns around to face Sedene, and her heart immediately aches at the hopeless expression on his face. "Furina is now human. She shouldn't love me, and I shouldn't love her."
Right?