The first time Scar dies, Grian places his hands on his throat and looks him in the eyes, and for one terrible second Scar wants to–
Grian looks him in the eyes, into the burnt out red around his iris, and he apologizes, over and over, and his tears sting in Scar's wounds, and it feels like he is dying a fourth death with each drop.
Scar knew this was going to happen, but somehow he thinks that Grian didn't. That he thought he could die for Scar, somehow, and that that would be redemption.
Scar is prone to no such delusions. He knew he was going to die the second he heard that hissing noise, and afterwards his visions of death became different; haunted by bloody gleaming swords and Grian's choked off laughter, and that was fine.
Because he was ready to forfeit his life, to give it a million times over just to have Grian stay by his side and take first watch over the dark desert grounds and bake bread in the early mornings, where the dunes were still cold.
Being red makes Scar a little hollowed out, a little brittle and desperate, and when Grian asks why he won't kill, he's afraid of his own answer.
("Because no one should feel this way", Scar murmurs, and tries resolutely to not look Grian in the eyes. He fails, of course.
"What?", says Grian, who wasn't expecting an answer to a question he asked three hours ago, still knee deep in the soil of their carrot patch.
Scar shakes his head, and some sand falls into his eyes.
"Nothing, nothing, I was just talking to Pizza!"
Grian huffs with indignation, but still continues to plant the carrots in neat little rows.
In his dreams, Scar has his hands around Grian's neck and he squeezes, hard and dark and terrible.
In his dreams, Scar watches Grian explode over and over again, and each time his hands press the doomsday button again.
In his dreams, Grian sits on Pizza and his head is thrown back in laughter, melodious like a wind chime, and the sun that rises over the mountains is never red.
In the end, Grian has his hands around Scar's neck and he is pleading for forgiveness and there's blood in the sand, blood in Scar's hair and under Grian's nails.
Scar says nothing at all, because the sun is still coming up red and Monopoly Mountain has collapsed, and being red has made Grian another monster entirely.
The world fizzles out slowly, and in the void, the warmth of Grian's hands lingers on his neck.
The second time Scar dies, he takes an arrow through the throat, and he doesn't even have the time to feel the pain.
He'd been all alone on that mountain top for the longest time, so he doesn't know why it makes him want to scream now, this terrible loneliness.
His blood on the ground is nobody's business, even now.
Inanely, he remembers staring at the walls of the Southlands, waiting to catch glimpses of the life within, and sort of–
Well. He certainly doesn't feel sorry when they exile Grian, is all.
("Listen, Scar.", Grian says, and he looks far too happy with that sword in his hand, bloody teeth and eyes like dynamite, "I have a deal for you!"
Scar tries to hold very still, remembering faintly that itch under his skin, that terrible urge that took root when he was red. He wants to save Grian. He wants Grian to die.
Ironic, that he had wanted Grian to return so much that even this reunion isn't soured for him yet. And if he decides to kill Scar, well, Scar wouldn't fight back. He couldn't.
"Alright", says Scar, who is weak in the face of his killer, who is so very desperately trying to make him stay, and he gives a piece of his soul to Grian just because he asked. Just because it's Grian.
Of course, he's still left behind.)
A wizard in a tower, defeated by a familiar face and the aching of his heart, standing on the precipice of death just for one second of companionship.
Now, with that arrow through his throat, Scar bleeds out on the warm stones, and because the fight is still ongoing, no one notices for a long time that he is even dead at all.
The third time Scar dies, he really thought Grian and him would have a chance at a happy ending.
Their alliance of sand was bound to fail, and Scar had known, but this time, oh this time, just once, they could've stood together. They could've.
Here, in the graveyard of their relationship, so far away from the desert yet always returning to it, they could've worked it out.
("These…", Scar says carefully, "are for your secret soulmate!"
Grian's wings puff up, and he turns his chin up defiantly.
"I have no idea what you're talking about!"
But he won't look Scar in the eye, and his voice sounds like back then, when he would insist he just forgot to wake Scar up for his watch or that he really didn't mind the heat all that much.
It's painful how familiar he is, because Grian does not care, does he?
Scar's blood is still stuck under his fingernails, and he is trying to ignore it, the image of Scar's corpse superimposed on his eyelids.)
If Scar is feeling benign, he'd say that it's the guilt, the feeling of his blood in Grian's teeth that makes his soulmate so distant.
But he's not feeling very benign, watching Grian smile to himself on his way out the door. He does not feel very benign at all.
But sometimes, Grian is so sweet, so caring that somehow Scar just… can't leave.
He can't leave Grian, just as he couldn't kill him in that desert, and well, at least this time, Grian can never really leave him either.
If only for his own life. If only for the memories.
So here's their happy ending, just within reach, Grian's hand shaking and red with Big B's blood, eyes hungry for gore.
Here's their happy ending.
Scar is somewhere in the forest when it happens, calling out for his soulmate, and it is raining.
He thinks, somewhat cynically, that even now, he is alone.
He thinks of Grian's hands on his neck, around his throat, and he wishes, desperately, that Grian were here, just so that there'd be that warmth again in the void.
Scar wants to take his soulmate's hand just once, wants to know that he is not alone, that he will be alright.
(They never did respawn in the same bed.)
Well. Scar has wanted a lot of things, and still the sun comes up red and somewhere, a castle still collapses into the hot sand, and Grian is far away, and they are both dying.
This, at least, is familiar.
In the end, there's not even enough time to scream.
(far beneath the earth, in a little mineshaft dug out hastily, grian's chest is heaving, his ear drums shattered. he is dying. he is dying, and all he can hope is that scar is not as alone as he is. he wishes they could've been better for each other, but the blood in his mouth is familiar and he is already fading. his muttered apology never makes its way out of the damp earth.)
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