@gonchayas from ———— the hound strains the leash.
Internal war, a schism between what's innate and what's possible, what's right and what's fair. A child should not have to endure such splitting, let alone survive it, but Sylvie has been experiencing this slow, stinging tearing for months. She was born with love and trust and ample care, heart blooming like a flower in the sun; she was installed with a weapon that makes her a target, that forced her to kill, that has her childish heart roaring and breaking and bleeding as it strives to spill its viscera without killing its host.
He promises she's safe — she misses being safe — and that he won't die — she's the nexus of countless bloodstained threads and even now she's so afraid to be far from Alain, if he dies because she wasn't there it's her fault, it's her fault — and she's a child who wants to be safe who wants to be held who wants to be comforted, who wants to be anything but on - edge, who wants —
To stop forward. She does. One step. Two, hand raising, trembling, just a little. She tries for a third, but stops, eyes widening, looking away from him — stupid, stupid, don't look away from the enemy, you're so stupid — and down at her foot; vines wrapped around it to prevent her from moving closer. She pulls away from them, but as soon as she's free, more tear from the earth, grasping her wrist. Her eyes widen further.
She's a child who wants to be held who wants to be comforted who wants to cease being afraid of everyone around her and herself for just one moment and her plants WON'T LET HER! She feels tears building, anxiety and horror edging close to something else. HER PLANTS WON'T LISTEN TO HER. HER PLANTS ———
Her plants can only listen to her. She wants to be safe, she wants to trust this person, AND UNDERNEATH THAT SHE'S SO SCARED OF HIM AND OF EVERYTHING AND OF THE WORLD THAT SHE CAN'T BEAR TO MOVE CLOSER. She is a child who will never get to be safe again, no matter how much she pretends otherwise.
Sylvie wrenches against the vines, now up her arm and around her waist and, when they don't give, the pain and the terror and the tired in her chest gets louder, more panicked, and there's nothing to do but burst into pathetic, wailing sobs.
Wailing, childish sobs, the plants retreating as Sylvie's fear wins out over Sylvie's loving heart. She sways and then collapses to her knees, hands digging into the earth like it's betrayed her, heedless to the scrapes or the bit - short nails and the bit - raw fingertips that threaten to split like her heart. "I'll die!" she screams, only a child, a little girl who's been so strong and so grown up and who's so scared and tired and nothing's right and she can't see a way out or an end to the always - horror except getting killed, slow and painful. She wails, and can do nothing else, words slurring like they can't bear to show past her teeth. "I — I kuh - killed —— p - people and —— !! A - And I'm guh - gon' get killed —— an' — an' —— y - you'll die 'cause o - of me, too —— !!"