"You're--!" Here. In one piece. Alive. A professor? Griss can't decide how to complete the sentence as he pushes through the throng of dismissed students spilling out of the classroom, bumping shoulders with a few of them but not even looking back. His eyes instead fix on a familiar figure - the goddess appointed by his dying words - certain that if he were to look away, she'd disappear without a trace.
But when he reaches her, jostled and breathless, the look in her eyes tells him, beyond a doubt, that she's as real as he is. If they were both dead, at least they wound up in the same place.
"You took your sweet time." He doesn't care about the answers to questions, how she got her, or why. Disbelief seems like a waste of breath now, so what he offers her instead is a smile. A rare one: genuine, and soft, like the look he'd given her when they were saying their goodbyes.
"Paperwork must've gotten lost or something." It cracks a little wider with the joke, but doesn't disrupt the clarity in his eyes as he looks up at her. "You're a sight here, that's for sure."
IT HAS ONLY BEEN A DAY SINCE HER ACCEPTANCE, and yet, the church inclines itself to work the mage dragon to her very bones. when she dismisses the class, it is with a faux smile pinned to the curve of her lips and a half - hooded gaze of relief. oh how tiring humans were when faced with knowledgeβββbeady eyes bright with curiosity; unearned, unprovoked. there was a willingness to participate and learn and indulge that, at the very least, filled zephia's still heart with the slightest twinge of hope. the monastery was a lost cause the moment she drew her first breath before its gatesβββits students' inclination to devour information first and ask later simply proved their weakness. it was almost a shame thatβββ
she hears him before she sees him. or, rather, her ears pick up the ruckus that his presence always brings before her eyes can reach him.
students look back as the man forces his way through the mass of bodies, ever so selfish in his conquest of simply existing. and zephia could not be more sure of this if not for the mere reverence in his gaze; its sole fixation on her and only her.
for but a moment, she remembers how revitalizing it is to be worshipped so eagerly.
"g... griss?" her voice leaves her without thought, hardly audible and too breathless; it's too late for her to trap the name between her teeth. ironic, it becomes, when both hounds are finally standing before one another, their breathing thin and eyes wide with respective shock. the silence is not long, for it never is when griss is near. and that, the realization that yes, he is alive and breathing and unharmed, steels zephia's body.
her shoulders lower and away goes the surprise; thus, painted lips straighten into a thin smile. a monotonous expression that almost immediately threatens to soften at the tenderness griss reveals to her. it is anything but rightβββfierceness should be his default, always, alwaysβββand yet, zephia can only utter a small laugh in response.
"trust my words; if i had known you were here, i would have awakened sooner." because he deserved it. what else could she give in light of his sacrifice? his trust? instead of entertaining the thought, zephia sighsβββunmoved by the man's joke, but relieved all the same. "is my presence here that much of a surprise? think now, it was inevitable. this monastery is a fraud of safety, after all; allowing two hounds into their ranks."
she does not comment on her position as a professor. neither does she comment on what his position might be. ( something bloody, surely. something to entertain his urges. )
but the admiration in griss' gaze quickly becomes unsettling; it has been too long, too soon. zephia hides away her smile, turning away to set down the ink - stained papers she has been holding without pause. "have you been in fΓ³dlan long? to me, it was just the other day that i, or rather, we..." died, she almost finishes, but the words never comes out. she continues, "anyway, i trust that you have been vigilant in my absence, darling?"
