#azsire

“Spoilt fer choice, ay? I think Thalsam wins this, but it’s close. Also, I feel like Astelmir would find ae way tae make it hot anyway.”

It was fitting, she thought, that these were still days largely trapped in darkness. Darkness, at the risk of sounding cliché (or worse, like a youngling first dabbling at prose), was ever a breeding ground for suffering and misery. How appropriate for it to dwell so strongly around her on this anniversary, casting frozen ground into ever more freezing temperatures. Sometimes she was glad to have learnt to tolerate the cold, though she supposed that predicament had led directly to this one. Ugh. At least that had been her choice in the end. This had been the opposite.

It shouldn't have been hard to extricate himself from their bodies, but as usual, they had insisted on remaining tangled around him until they had long since become still. Worse, their tears had been plentiful enough to freeze into strong bonds of ice as well - yet another problem to deal with. Mastery of ice meant nothing if one intended to keep the ice intact when leaving. He'd have to teleport, but that could again be a challenge. Teleportation generally required verbal components.

She’d stay a while, then. A resolute decision, yes, and one she'd be keeping to herself. There wasn't anyone to come across this, which she supposed was a positive. Well. There was, in a sense, but even trapped she could ensure that. She wasn't incompetent. The past century had made certain of that - though this had been a failing on her part. It shouldn’t have happened. She’d take the lesson on board and stop it from happening again. 

The first glittering signs of purple-blue-green on the horizon brought with them faint light, the day only following in its lazy manner some hours on, and yet he stayed in the darkness of his own eyes long enough for the sun's rays to die behind the horizon and for midnight to again paint the sky in starlight. And for the cycle to repeat some number of times, as if he too had faded like the bodies that clung close to him. He dwelled in thoughts and memory, and if grief could be found there too then - well, there were none to spy it aside from he.

Perhaps she would have remained there if the pull of her duties hadn't strengthened; if the bite of the curse hadn't begun to burn. She looked not upon them when he left. If it were up to her - which, of course, it was - she would never look upon them again.

(He knew that for a lie when he first thought it. Sometimes, the lies were worth believing.)

At least there were others to replace the sensations. Warm hands, searing bodies - and never did they come with the utter torment of tragic emotion. Not for him. These luxuries, they were to enjoy in their moments. They existed for him to bathe in, resplendent; to drown in their twin pleasures and pains at the hands of those who craved him for their own sordid reasons, then to resurface into the world sated of such mortal, material desires. If only briefly.

Really, they’d done her a favour. She wouldn’t thank them for it. 

I feel like it’d be awkward for him if he did

And plus, consider the horror of knowing something terrible happened but having no recollection of it or of what occurred, only the word of others

GUH its so difficult

F ho because, well you would wouldn't you

For tal and burdie its tricky, right

I could marry either because they're both sweeties. Tal is a goodygood boy who is very gentle and kind and has that properness about him

Burdie is a gentle soul who can seemingly talk and diffuse most situations, he can fill whatever the situation demands and is an emotional rock for you to bestow your woes (also hes a stocky dwarf and prime cuddle material)