#aelrius

  ❝   Felix, Felix -- look !    ❞

       She lifts her hands to reveal a grubby little kitten.

     Not more than twenty-four hours have come to pass since these streams at her feet were sinister & sickening, a stain upon the earth & a smear at her heart. How odd it is, that blood can be spilled just as easily, just as naturally & with as little warning as rain. It falls & almost reluctantly returns whence it came, seeping into the dark warmth of reddened soil. Fódlan cries the tears that Annette finds she cannot as the sky takes up arms of its very own, wielding an iron fist forged of lightning & a sorrow for its people. But they, too, return to the land; a baptism of war. 

     There’s a burning chill that clings to the space between the cloak she wears & her bare skin -- it hurts, but Annette is so very aware of much greater, much more harrowing hurts that she almost forces herself into numbness. Her fingers ache (no, they don’t), her bones creak (no, I won’t listen) & her muscles carry a stone-stiffness (no, I must keep going); but she gives them no mind. This cold, this wet & relentless cold, is but a sliver of the hurt she knows this world can give; she’s seen it firsthand. As long she still stands here with the privilege of a pulse, there will be no validity given to this empty, hollow thing called hurt. 

     She gives pause to the word: hurt. 

                  I hope he’s okay...

     She shakes her head, her matted hair sticking to her cheeks. It’s silly, she thinks, to entertain the idea that he could be anything other than okay; he seems to tease death as though it were something he lived to spite; to laugh in the face of as it rests at the end of his blade; to almost dare to just try & take him. He has an unrelenting animosity toward death & she knows he would never let it take him so soon. He’d sooner take Hades’ throne for his own. 

     But... still. While she knows he’s alive, somewhere out there under these same foreboding skies, there is something that nips at her heart with a bite sharper than the cold at her nose. It’s a real hurt, one that she will momentarily allow to sit in her chest.

                              I miss him. 

     The thought of him, blade in hand & that far away look in his eye, having to see the things she has; having to suffer far greater losses than she; having to bear so much pain & hefty hurts all alone, ones that she couldn’t even begin to imagine... it causes her to shake. She’s numb to the cold, yet her body quakes under the weight of the clouds above her & the rain soaked robe she wears & the blood she knows is on her hands & the painful desire to bring him home; she wants to ease the hurt this war has no doubt hammered into his heart. 

     She sighs, her blue-tinged lips quivering slightly. It’s getting late & she needs to return home despite how desperately she wishes she could just remain within this storm & let it wash her away; take her with the blood it’s washed from this battlefield. So many lives have ended here, why should hers continue? Heavy feet guide her home as she recedes back within her mind where the memories of him remain; where the sky is blue & he is safe & she is warm. 

     As she stumbles through the storm she spots something out of the corner of her eye: a rather pitiful white hyacinth flower. It droops & bends as it is beaten by the storm & despite it being misshapen, its petals being wrinkled & it seeming to barely cling onto life, Annette finds a certain beauty in its resilience. Almost as if drawn to this small light in an unending darkness does she crouch down & pick it, as gingerly as her numbed fingers will allow her. 

"Come to think of it, I think I've seen you a few times around here recently."

Hammerlocke stadium was certainly an interesting building, and Theresa would visit regularly, usually because Raihan's gym trainers would need to have their uniforms mended, but sometimes to admire the scenery as well.

That said, something about this man who's been showing up had piqued her interest. Something about the air he gave off, perhaps? She couldn't quite understand why.