welcome home, darling

Characters: Clea Dessendre x gn!Reader Words: 611 Author's Note: For all those who have fallen for the eldest Dessendre. Hard. A moment of peacee for our girl.

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It was late by the time she came to collect you. Stars bright through the windows late. Streetlights hazy with ambling fog late. Moon passed the opus of the sky towards the horizon kind of late, when, finally, the door to the piano room opened. But it just wasn’t right yet. In your chest, a gentle beast of worry at the corners of your heart. The anxiety never ceased since you’d seen her off back into the canvas. She said she would be back so much sooner. 

“I could hear you from the canvas,” she voiced once the two of you were in bed, side by side. “You played sad songs.” 

At this, your memories go back to those songs. You tried playing happily. You have for months trying to convince your hands to a softer register, one of feathers on wind, of flames on a single wick dancing, of the first notice of love in the body. Yet, the ones that came were those of worry. Concern. Of a young love given too much to carry. One you so desperately want to voice. 

You manage, though, just above a whisper, “You were in there longer today. I was scared, Clea.. I was scared you’d been lost to... to it just like... just like...” Like Aline, like Renoir, like Alicia, like Vers– 

Suddenly, you are tugged onto Clea's side of the bed. Arms wrap around you tightly, bringing your hammering, rattling chest against the cool serene of Clea's. You look up, searching, but Clea’s eyes remain closed, but a hand finds yours and holds it firm between the two of you, before saying, "Breathe, ma lapine, you'll give yourself a heart-attack." Then, Clea began taking several deep breaths, holding you tighter, to give you a serene rhythm to follow.

You wanted to cry at that moment. Here she was, equally as tired and ravaged by this war. So exhausted from the monsters she paints. The tactical embrace she has adopted to fight in Aline and Renoir’s plot, the quest to guide her sister, the confusing complexity of an imposter painted brother. All of this on her shoulders, and you are the one being comforted. This world of responsibility you had no access to. You only knew of the one you lived in with real Clea-- one of greying under eyes, skipped meals, countless nights either in the canvas or in her father's study, tracking down the whereabouts of her brother's murderers. The empty side of the bed. A whole manor of quiet. It's what drives you to the music. You don't want to admit your worry. You don't want to admit to your lonely.

“It’s almost over,” She reassures, a whisper against your hairline, once your breathing has calmed. At this her gaze opens and meets yours. You want to be brave for her. Afterall, while your heart yearns for her, for her family, it is her family. The pain, it originates from her heart.

And to be part of her heart means you'd have to be strong. Strong, for her.

“Almost over," You say back and press your forehead against hers. Before you can pull back, you are pulled down. Soft. Everything is soft in that kiss. When you pull apart, she is gazing at you, for the first time that night, with the small crooked smile and eyes full of mirth. 

“You really should learn to sleep without me. You're starting to wrinkle, ma lupine."

You huff at her snarky tone, but burrow into her arms deep, inhaling every bit of her– that otherworldly smells of flowers and earth– and, also, feel the tiniest smile at her teasing against the warm skin of her collarbone.

Character: Verso Dessendre | "Real Verso" Pairing: Verso x Original Female Character WARNINGS: Spoilers for endgame Clair Obscur, grief, letting go Author's Note: My own way of saying goodbye and coping with this beautiful game, this beautiful man, and remembering. Also taking requests if anyone wants to be immersed in this <3 spending more time with Verso or anyone from CO is an honor.

Flowers are meant to wilt. Especially flowers given. Flowers taken away from their mother earth especially. Flowers have felt the heat of hands more than the heat of sun. Daphne remembers this as Alina bends down over the cobblestone. Even in grief, she is remarkably beautiful, elegant, all the woman she was before her greatest loss that Daphne remembered. After placing the flowers, she returns to her husband's side, where Renoir places a tentative arm around her, which, to all's relief, she folds herself into almost immediately. It pulls a smile from Daphne, near tears. The matriarch, finally, grieving and loving, somehow, at the same time again. It gives her hope-- maybe, she can hold these truths too, in her own body.

Daphne knows this, can feel in her body this fundamental truth as the body around her heart withers, but nothing could fundamentally be felt to be truer than when the days following the funeral were most real. The real funeral. Not the extravegent held in the church, which Verso would have hated, the black, the grey. But the true one. The one that didn’t come via invite written in pangingly beautiful scripts, but the one where Alicia appeared on her doorstep personally, with her hands outstretched with a small note, simple and unhurried It’s time.

Everyone brought flowers, red and white, the colors of their loss and love. Renoir. Alina. Clea. Herself. They all approached the grave. No grand tears. No crying this time. Just a small relief. Before leaving the youngest to say goodbye to her brother fully, privately. It was an honor to be invited, as if Daphne was a part of the family, as she could have had things been different. But Daphne has learned to let those memories of “what-if” in the past. Not when they still had one gift: Alicia. The biggest reason to stay present in this timeline, where they have all lost, is to make sure Alicia is taken care of. It is what Verso would have wanted.