let me go mad in my own way.

The war and it's conclusion had warped Aymeric in ways he could not openly discuss, those wounds - though healed in skin and bone - would always remain, sliced deep into his psyche that reminded him, at every convenience, of his failures and difficulties. Throbbing reminders of past injuries grew agitated in the cold, but he did not turn tail and head indoors just for discomforts sake, not when he had a thousand questions housed 'pon the tip of his tongue and an aching heart rattling the cage of his ribs.

⋆༺𓆩⚔𓆪༻⋆ "I was headed to the congregation - perhaps my office would suffice? Or-- if you'd rather more comfort, you know my home is not far." Whichever the preference was, for he minded neither; the congregation was closer, but his home offered more familiar comforts. The choice belonged entirely to his company.

“ … if only the circumstances were more favorable. i would naturally choose the latter, you know. ” stepping foot inside the borel manor would mean all those months’ worth of falsehoods sticking to her reputation like mud will, too, follow. she would not be bringing any of it in, she would not touch the front of his door until the blood on her hands is dry.

"Please do." Adelphel, bizarrely, doesn't flinch at words offered but instead seems eager enough to hear the recollected tale of occurrences he couldn't recall in their entirety. His mind still feels as if it was wading through a thick marshland, in a fog so intense one could barely see their hands before their own nose - memories felt hazy, blurred, distant somehow and the ones he had managed to coax forth felt as if they were not entirely his own, as if he had been but only a passenger in his own body, coerced and compelled by a feeling and a force he couldn't describe.

Even now it was gone, even now that he felt... himself, there was a lingering something that made him uncomfortably uneasy. 'T was a feeling he would have to live with.

"... unfortunately, my memory fails me. So if you are genuinely offering to recount- then I shall listen." In fact, he would even find a wall to sit on if need be. Adelphel had only been told fractured portions by Ser Aymeric, and though he had asked to know more, he had not been told. Thus, if the opportunity presented...

“ and i am no storyteller, so i shall tell it as it is. ”

130 favorite horror movies: (21/130)

"there are mysterious parts in that book, but the only true mystery is that our very lives are governed by dead people."

The pull of emotion in the confines of his ribcage is initially one of heartache, of pain, of uncertainty. Soon does it shift, however, to what could only be assumed to be a hint of betrayal. He had mourned his dear friend wholly, day and night, for weeks upon weeks- nay, longer- a candle always lit in memoriam in his home study, thought often drifting, even recently, to what-ifs. Yet here Vianne stood, hale and whole.

⋆༺𓆩⚔𓆪༻⋆ "As Aymeric." He chooses to respond, his expression turning to one more akin to sadness that she even asked such a thing. Had he ever approached her as aught other than himself, no title nor power in play-?

It felt as if his stomach twisted, consciousness wandering away from the moment briefly and toward what possibly could have lead his most dear of friends away, with nary a word nor letter of explanation. He hoped, albeit silently, that there was but a sound reason in place - - even still, his heart ached.

⋆༺𓆩⚔𓆪༻⋆ "We cannot now be so estranged that you would think otherwise, surely-?"

what excuse could she serve him on a bloodied platter? all the words she’d twisted in her exile felt like a skill honed with little effort, an armor forged in lies and mind games she rarely, if ever, discarded in favor of sincerity. the prospect of forgiveness misses her like an arrow: by a hair, just enough to shake her. how exactly is she to admit that he’s stayed the same to her, fair and faultless and every bit the kind friend she’d walked out on because he deserved a better death?

the nameless figures roaming nonchalantly about the plaza aren’t making any easier.

To the stake, the fires, they'd cry. Witchdrop is too good for them. A judgement swift and brutal, both murdered for heresy.

“ ... now, now. let’s not be hasty. that was no evidence of anything, much less romance. ” lies upon lies ground hard through her teeth, the façade so intentionally brazen and so cheekily weak in execution, almost as if she’s wanted the martial artist to know [ … ] the warrior of light’s endearing nature doesn’t release him from the fact he’s got a particularly inconvenient habit of meddling into the affairs of entire nations; catching wind of an individual’s personal life should be an effortless endeavor, to say the least. thus, she reads the warning precisely as she should: concern for the safety of all involved… his and getō’s, by extension.

but she swears, on whatever wicked thing anyone might ask her to swear on: there was no room nor desire for sorcery here.