Work Text:
before
You'd think being in a constant life-threatening situation would make this sort of grieving easier. It doesn't.
It only leaves you with a gnawing, hellish background noise of hurt and disappointment in yourself, and a second Sentinel necklace that hangs like a ten-ton rock, the added tension on the skin of your neck a constant reminder of what's lost. You try rationalizing it - losing this beacon too would have been disastrous, for everyone involved. All that pain and effort they went through, literally reversing and reliving time, traversing the pit - it would have been gone in the time it took that fucking hippo to smile smugly at them, waving goodbye. They stood no chances against it, at least not the way they were ambushed. And he couldn't have left the others to fall into the Faded Realm by themselves.
Before he goes to sleep in that cave, after hanging on by a thread to his unofficial role as a mediator, just once, and just to himself, he secretly wishes he would have stayed with Aelys.
He tells no one, and denies it when others allude to him being crushed by it. The truth is, it feels like mourning. Synnove insists she is coming back to them, that she'd promised, and that this isn't an ending, and he wants to laugh - when have things ever worked out in their way? For now, he needs to be a shield, a human barrier to keep the others away from immediate horrors that keep jumping at them. He needs to get the people in this fucked up town safe, and get his friends back to their realm. For that, he cannot afford himself hope, or best case scenarios - letting hope in right now would crush him, and there is no time for him to fall apart, or think about her eyes as she'd asked him to let her do this. So he watches Katari to make sure she's still with them, not in pieces on the floor, and takes as much damage as he can so it doesn't hit the others, confronts the horrors of the underground tunnels with a determined expression.
They've hardly had time to talk about any of it, except for a brief breakdown shared in the cave. Their dynamic as a group, the way they move, it's all changed. He hates that they all walk on eggshells about it with him and Katari. He refuses to accept his hurt is greater in any way, because he's not ready for that kind of realization. He hates that they all look at him for rational thinking and balance and he cannot provide any of it. He's disappointed in himself - for letting them down in that regard, for not acting quicker when the demon tangled Synnove in yet another deal, for not asking Thaegus about Hope earlier, for not offering to listen to Katari before her anger reached the tipping point. Most of all, he'd disappointed in himself for leaving her behind, despite it being the best decision they had to make in the moment.
With every hit, he imagines he's there, shoulder to shoulder with her, keeping her safe while she unravels upon their enemy with pin-prick precise fury. Somehow, he'll learn to live with this helplessness, this burning anger that's directed at no one else but himself for not doing something - breaking apart the ice throne room, clawing the heart out of Hareem with his bare hands, begging even - just anything, instead of watching her pull herself apart and then back together, facing danger alone after learning how it feels to have someone watch your back always.
He thinks of how much he's gained having known her, how they'd helped one another grow, the brief look they exchanged before facing a literal dragon - a look that said 'I've got you'. He tries to remember how to be the storm, for the sake of her sacrifice.
Processing can come later.
after
Nothing feels right anymore. He knows what this realm does to a person, how it pulls and pushes at your very being, makes you see and feel things that aren't there. All he knows is that a second ago, Synnove started telling the librarians a story, and then they were here - an empty pit in his very core. Like trying to grasp invisible strings, he keeps searching for her in the gaps of his thoughts, and comes out empty handed. There's a perpetual sensation the words are on the tip of his tongue, that if he could focus, she would reappear whole, it would all make sense.
It doesn't happen. She's become a ghost of her own memory - for everyone, it seems, as they shared confused looks and urge each other on before it's too late. The energy of his ki doesn't feel right in his bones anymore - something essential is missing, but he doesn't know what. And while the memories might be gone, the feelings that once stained them are still there. What did she end up being to him? How could a lapse in their past hurt so much, like he's choking on smoke while also perfectly breathing? He goes through the two doors mechanically, jumps when he has to, attacks when there's an opening, but it feels empty. Winds that are usually feeding his innate power now ring hollow around him. When he tries to center himself and focus, he opens a door that leads nowhere, a door he was certain would take him to a place of calm and balance. Instead, there's nothing, or rather the brief impression of something, of comfort lost. He soars through the air with the flame in his hand, yelling for everyone to run before its too late, but someone's eyes on him are missing, and it hits the center of his chest as he lands.
He remembers her smile like he's seeing it through a thin veil - her voice is fuzzy, and uncertain. There's flashes of all of them travelling on their sandboat, he remembers always keeping her in his periphery during a battle. There's the brief impression of a singular moment when his heart stopped while looking at her, a sort of want -then, an interruption? There's words he can't put together anymore, but that feel like a sacred mantra, something he'd held onto when he needed to be strongest. Somewhere further down the line, there's a pain so vivid it almost hurts to try and figure out. A longing etched with disappointment like he's never felt before.
They all mesh together, shadows that chase each other and mix into one another, creating one giant blanket of darkness, settling over the idea of her.
It feels unbearable.
And because it feels unbearable, he decides to do something stupid before they have to live with this feeling forever, before he has to go through everyday wondering when is this emptiness ever going to go away. He knows it's important. He knows she's important - he just needs to remember it.
He looks towards the scroll, and then he simply jumps to grab it.