Post by Tom M on Aug 15, 2024 22:09:34 GMT
Co-written with Wixspartan
As they return to the fort Keros feels a gentle squeeze on his shoulder and Ilthuryn gets down, dusting off his cloak of stars. He is completely silent as he finds a corner away from anyone and sits, knees to his chest, cloak covering as much of his body as possible.
Keros watches him awkwardly for a while.
“Do you need me to get you a drink?”
The robe shuffles just a little but stays mostly up.
“Keros, if I couldn't already see you standing there I can hear you too. I don't want a drink, I want to talk, I want answers.”
Keros sighs and sits down in the dirt a way away from Ilthuryn, doing his best to be calm and even toned, "We can talk then. What do you want to know?"
“Did I ever tell you how I lost my voice, how I lost my sight, how I lost every memory I had as a child. Did I tell you that story?”
“No. I asked once, but you told me that it did not matter.”
Ilthuryn finally chuckles, although clearly it is being weighed down with far too many other emotions.
“When I was a child I wandered too far into strange forests, I met with a child and they shared their food with me, we were friends. I don't remember their face anymore, but I remember their laugh, the time we spent together. And then their parents came, fey creatures of the woods, they accused me of theft. A small bit of food Keros, and for that they took my memories, they took my eyes, they took my voice.”
Ilthuryn is clearly crying again.
“I wandered lost until one night I looked up and my eyes were filled with stars. Everything I am I owe to that night, to the beauty of my guardians. He tried to take that night from me Keros.”
Ilthuryn finally stands, the constellations of his eyes swirling rapidly.
“I saw him talk, saw him ask for your gods damned memories. I told you what you were doing, why this was such a bad idea. I did what you asked me to, I did everything I was told to do. I told you what mistake you were making and you made it anyway and I ALMOST LOST THAT NIGHT KEROS!”
“Everything, I did everything that was asked of me and more, and now that memory is damaged.”
Keros puts his head in his hands as he listens to the story, “Ilthuryn I am so sorry. I should never have put any of you in this situation. I wish that I could justify it or excuse my behaviour but I cannot. I was wrong, and stupid, and should have listened to you.”
“Excuse? No. Justify? Yes. You did a lot of justification Keros. You walked in to go see that creature with one objective, you knew you were walking out of that tent with the memories you wanted. You weaselled and wormed and dug your way to the flimsiest justification you could just to give yourself reason behind why you did it. You don't work off of what's right, you do whatever you feel like it at the time and reverse engineer a justification onto it. You called me there to stop you from doing exactly that again but you wouldn't listen to me, you brought people along to help you and in the end you hurt them. I told you people could get hurt. I told you that fey deals were never fair and that you weren't just going to be able to take the crossbow bolt for everyone to make yourself feel righteous, although perhaps at that time I dressed it up in language I thought you'd at least try and listen to. And now Pipper got hurt, now I got hurt, for helping you because you knew you'd fuck up on your own so you dragged people along only to still find a way to try on your own and guess what. You fucked up, on your own. It's a fucking miracle how you're able to do this Keros. Surrounded by friends and yet somehow you still find a way to make yourself the martyr and make yourself the lone hero standing on the hill doing what's right. Do you really care Keros, or do you want to be seen to care? Answer me that before you say a single word else.”
Keros doesn’t get angry, there are no spectral fiends, no smell of brimstone, no dramatics. He just sounds defeated, “Ilthuryn, if I had any idea that doing this could have hurt any of you I would rather have summoned Solution and given up rather than do it. You know that. You must know that. I trusted someone and they betrayed that trust.”
“But you didn't trust me. Did you?”
“No. And that was a mistake.”
“A fey comes to you and invites you to make a deal and you trust them, but the man you've fought with who you went to is not to be trusted. Keros you sound like a fucking idiot. I'm trying to be kind, and I know everything is a nightmare for you right now and I'm so so sorry you're where you are now and having to make the choices you're having to make. But for someone who seems so desperate to make the choice that doesn't hurt people you're doing a poor job of it. Keros you fight now to keep yourself in existence, so why are you so quick to give up pieces of yourself to that end. What's going to be left of Keros Pactsworn when you finish this. What are you even fighting for?”
“You are right. I am not sure I know anymore.” He sighs, “I just need this fight to be over and I need to be the one who ends it. Maybe I would have listened if… never mind.”
Ilthuryn throws his hands up.
“Yes, never mind Keros. It’s your job to do everything, I can’t at all try and give you some insight from a different perspective. I can’t fucking help you if you don’t let me help you, and right now you owe me so you have to let me help you don’t get a choice. You know when I told you that story, the story of everything I lost I was hoping that you’d be able to empathise after what you lost yourself. But now seeing how willing you were to offer up more of yourself I’m not so sure. I know it may have been a consciously hard decision but deep down you would have given anything as long as it was a sacrifice you could make to protect other people. And yet the only person in danger was you, and so you had to sit and let everyone else put themselves in danger just so you could make a sacrifice to protect them. You want to make a sacrifice to protect people? Leave. Go West, find new lands, settle and make peace with the world and the winds. You want to actually stick around? Then stop pretending and do your job. Keep that shield high and take the cuts and scrapes, but don’t pretend that today was anything more than performative. There was no reason to bring me along except to sign off on your poor decisions and make you feel right for picking them, and when I didn’t play along and encourage your dumbass sacrifice you ignored me and found a new justification.”
“I’m so tired Keros. I’m so fucking tired, and it’s not all your fault I know, I know that. But please tell me you at least understand just how many layers of upset this whole saga has begun to make me. Please tell me you understand that this goes way deeper, not just for you but for me too.”
“Ilthuryn you are, again, right. I find it hard to understand what you almost lost today. I can say I am sorry, but I will not lie to you and say that I would have stopped. If it had been just you and I there then maybe, but this is not about a need to be the martyr, this is about making it so that nobody else needs to martyr themselves to save me and I think that even if I took up the mantle of Devotion that would not be enough.”
“I have to do this because if I do not then I know exactly who will. There is no part of myself I will not turn over to stop that.”
“AND WHAT IF I DON'T WANT THAT KEROS! What if Rae doesn't, what if Pipper doesnt, fucking hells only knows what Leonida wants but that's my point. You don't get to make that decision because your decision got people hurt. If you had let someone else try and do the work, if you had let someone else choose how they were going to willingly get hurt to help you then maybe people wouldn't have gotten hurt today in ways they would never volunteer for. I have things I am willing to give up to help you Keros, namely my fucking patience it feels like, and I know several others feel the same. But because you're too stubborn to let them you try and take all the pain yourself. Look where that's gotten us. You've lost memories and now Pipper and I have damage to some of ours, because you couldn't bare to think that maybe you're not the hero who takes the bolt, that maybe you're the hero that holds his shield high and protects people by being there for them, not by charging horns first into stupid shit to look like a martyr. How many times are we going to need to have this conversation Keros, how many. I'm trying to help you, and you seem to want my help, but you never actually listen to me and that makes it so much harder for me to understand you. I think I have you figured out and then you pull another surprise that just collapses everything I thought I was starting to understand. I thought you were a stubborn old soldier trying to do the right thing, but no, no apparently this shit has layers. Layers I can't even begin to try and work through because you don't seem to understand what help actually means. Fucking embarrassing. Today? Embarrassing. Carrell? Embarrassing. What do you even want me to do at this point, because I don't enjoy being angry at you Keros and I sure hope you don't either, so why don't we both just sit and try and figure out how we're finally going to do this and not feel frustrated at each other.”
“But not now, now I need to go speak to some people and recover from the awful feelings you dragged me through today, when you want to come talk; do, but actually be prepared to talk this time, not just speak at me and ignore my response.”
“Ilthuryn I understand that you are angry, but I need you to listen to what I am saying to you because yes, embarrassing is the only word for it.”
He speaks slowly and deliberately, “If I do not do this. If I do not solve this. Rae will. If I do not make sacrifices then Rae will. Did you see them? Did you see what this has already done to them? I could not sit in the same room as them and turn away from something that could let this end. I never meant to put anyone at risk, but my judgement was clouded.”
“I cannot defend what I did. I can only tell you why I did it. It was not deliberate. It was poor judgment. I still regret it.”
Ilthuryn collapses back down to his cross legged sitting position.
“Keros, I try and help people, I try and do everything I can to provide just a little fraction of the insight I am blessed to have. And I am bad at it I know, my job is knowing things not teaching them, not giving people the few tools I have. Every time I have tried to help people they have shown that either they don't need it or don't want it. I tried to help you Keros, I tried so hard because I believe in you so much. But what can I even do anymore? What would you have me do? The only way I was even able to try and help you you didn't want to listen to. That is all I had today and even that was seemingly useless. What would you have me do now? Give up on you?”
Keros sits quietly for a minute. “I know this is going to sound rich, but I need you to trust me. Trust that I have learned a lesson today and that I am not going to make the same mistakes again. Now forget about me. Are you okay? Or… are you going to be okay?”
“No Keros. I’m not. Everything today was a waking nightmare that I had hoped to never experience it’s kind again. But I’ll recover, I always do. As I said, I have some… old family to talk to, they will calm me down.”
“Good. That sounds like a… healthy thing to do. I need to go and apologise to someone else, and I need to make sure that everything you just went through was not for nothing.”
“Enjoy... If you need my advice on the matter well, you're welcome to ask for it, but I hope it's listened to when you call on me. But I'll leave you to it for now, you know where to find me still.”
Continued here.
As they return to the fort Keros feels a gentle squeeze on his shoulder and Ilthuryn gets down, dusting off his cloak of stars. He is completely silent as he finds a corner away from anyone and sits, knees to his chest, cloak covering as much of his body as possible.
Keros watches him awkwardly for a while.
“Do you need me to get you a drink?”
The robe shuffles just a little but stays mostly up.
“Keros, if I couldn't already see you standing there I can hear you too. I don't want a drink, I want to talk, I want answers.”
Keros sighs and sits down in the dirt a way away from Ilthuryn, doing his best to be calm and even toned, "We can talk then. What do you want to know?"
“Did I ever tell you how I lost my voice, how I lost my sight, how I lost every memory I had as a child. Did I tell you that story?”
“No. I asked once, but you told me that it did not matter.”
Ilthuryn finally chuckles, although clearly it is being weighed down with far too many other emotions.
“When I was a child I wandered too far into strange forests, I met with a child and they shared their food with me, we were friends. I don't remember their face anymore, but I remember their laugh, the time we spent together. And then their parents came, fey creatures of the woods, they accused me of theft. A small bit of food Keros, and for that they took my memories, they took my eyes, they took my voice.”
Ilthuryn is clearly crying again.
“I wandered lost until one night I looked up and my eyes were filled with stars. Everything I am I owe to that night, to the beauty of my guardians. He tried to take that night from me Keros.”
Ilthuryn finally stands, the constellations of his eyes swirling rapidly.
“I saw him talk, saw him ask for your gods damned memories. I told you what you were doing, why this was such a bad idea. I did what you asked me to, I did everything I was told to do. I told you what mistake you were making and you made it anyway and I ALMOST LOST THAT NIGHT KEROS!”
“Everything, I did everything that was asked of me and more, and now that memory is damaged.”
Keros puts his head in his hands as he listens to the story, “Ilthuryn I am so sorry. I should never have put any of you in this situation. I wish that I could justify it or excuse my behaviour but I cannot. I was wrong, and stupid, and should have listened to you.”
“Excuse? No. Justify? Yes. You did a lot of justification Keros. You walked in to go see that creature with one objective, you knew you were walking out of that tent with the memories you wanted. You weaselled and wormed and dug your way to the flimsiest justification you could just to give yourself reason behind why you did it. You don't work off of what's right, you do whatever you feel like it at the time and reverse engineer a justification onto it. You called me there to stop you from doing exactly that again but you wouldn't listen to me, you brought people along to help you and in the end you hurt them. I told you people could get hurt. I told you that fey deals were never fair and that you weren't just going to be able to take the crossbow bolt for everyone to make yourself feel righteous, although perhaps at that time I dressed it up in language I thought you'd at least try and listen to. And now Pipper got hurt, now I got hurt, for helping you because you knew you'd fuck up on your own so you dragged people along only to still find a way to try on your own and guess what. You fucked up, on your own. It's a fucking miracle how you're able to do this Keros. Surrounded by friends and yet somehow you still find a way to make yourself the martyr and make yourself the lone hero standing on the hill doing what's right. Do you really care Keros, or do you want to be seen to care? Answer me that before you say a single word else.”
Keros doesn’t get angry, there are no spectral fiends, no smell of brimstone, no dramatics. He just sounds defeated, “Ilthuryn, if I had any idea that doing this could have hurt any of you I would rather have summoned Solution and given up rather than do it. You know that. You must know that. I trusted someone and they betrayed that trust.”
“But you didn't trust me. Did you?”
“No. And that was a mistake.”
“A fey comes to you and invites you to make a deal and you trust them, but the man you've fought with who you went to is not to be trusted. Keros you sound like a fucking idiot. I'm trying to be kind, and I know everything is a nightmare for you right now and I'm so so sorry you're where you are now and having to make the choices you're having to make. But for someone who seems so desperate to make the choice that doesn't hurt people you're doing a poor job of it. Keros you fight now to keep yourself in existence, so why are you so quick to give up pieces of yourself to that end. What's going to be left of Keros Pactsworn when you finish this. What are you even fighting for?”
“You are right. I am not sure I know anymore.” He sighs, “I just need this fight to be over and I need to be the one who ends it. Maybe I would have listened if… never mind.”
Ilthuryn throws his hands up.
“Yes, never mind Keros. It’s your job to do everything, I can’t at all try and give you some insight from a different perspective. I can’t fucking help you if you don’t let me help you, and right now you owe me so you have to let me help you don’t get a choice. You know when I told you that story, the story of everything I lost I was hoping that you’d be able to empathise after what you lost yourself. But now seeing how willing you were to offer up more of yourself I’m not so sure. I know it may have been a consciously hard decision but deep down you would have given anything as long as it was a sacrifice you could make to protect other people. And yet the only person in danger was you, and so you had to sit and let everyone else put themselves in danger just so you could make a sacrifice to protect them. You want to make a sacrifice to protect people? Leave. Go West, find new lands, settle and make peace with the world and the winds. You want to actually stick around? Then stop pretending and do your job. Keep that shield high and take the cuts and scrapes, but don’t pretend that today was anything more than performative. There was no reason to bring me along except to sign off on your poor decisions and make you feel right for picking them, and when I didn’t play along and encourage your dumbass sacrifice you ignored me and found a new justification.”
“I’m so tired Keros. I’m so fucking tired, and it’s not all your fault I know, I know that. But please tell me you at least understand just how many layers of upset this whole saga has begun to make me. Please tell me you understand that this goes way deeper, not just for you but for me too.”
“Ilthuryn you are, again, right. I find it hard to understand what you almost lost today. I can say I am sorry, but I will not lie to you and say that I would have stopped. If it had been just you and I there then maybe, but this is not about a need to be the martyr, this is about making it so that nobody else needs to martyr themselves to save me and I think that even if I took up the mantle of Devotion that would not be enough.”
“I have to do this because if I do not then I know exactly who will. There is no part of myself I will not turn over to stop that.”
“AND WHAT IF I DON'T WANT THAT KEROS! What if Rae doesn't, what if Pipper doesnt, fucking hells only knows what Leonida wants but that's my point. You don't get to make that decision because your decision got people hurt. If you had let someone else try and do the work, if you had let someone else choose how they were going to willingly get hurt to help you then maybe people wouldn't have gotten hurt today in ways they would never volunteer for. I have things I am willing to give up to help you Keros, namely my fucking patience it feels like, and I know several others feel the same. But because you're too stubborn to let them you try and take all the pain yourself. Look where that's gotten us. You've lost memories and now Pipper and I have damage to some of ours, because you couldn't bare to think that maybe you're not the hero who takes the bolt, that maybe you're the hero that holds his shield high and protects people by being there for them, not by charging horns first into stupid shit to look like a martyr. How many times are we going to need to have this conversation Keros, how many. I'm trying to help you, and you seem to want my help, but you never actually listen to me and that makes it so much harder for me to understand you. I think I have you figured out and then you pull another surprise that just collapses everything I thought I was starting to understand. I thought you were a stubborn old soldier trying to do the right thing, but no, no apparently this shit has layers. Layers I can't even begin to try and work through because you don't seem to understand what help actually means. Fucking embarrassing. Today? Embarrassing. Carrell? Embarrassing. What do you even want me to do at this point, because I don't enjoy being angry at you Keros and I sure hope you don't either, so why don't we both just sit and try and figure out how we're finally going to do this and not feel frustrated at each other.”
“But not now, now I need to go speak to some people and recover from the awful feelings you dragged me through today, when you want to come talk; do, but actually be prepared to talk this time, not just speak at me and ignore my response.”
“Ilthuryn I understand that you are angry, but I need you to listen to what I am saying to you because yes, embarrassing is the only word for it.”
He speaks slowly and deliberately, “If I do not do this. If I do not solve this. Rae will. If I do not make sacrifices then Rae will. Did you see them? Did you see what this has already done to them? I could not sit in the same room as them and turn away from something that could let this end. I never meant to put anyone at risk, but my judgement was clouded.”
“I cannot defend what I did. I can only tell you why I did it. It was not deliberate. It was poor judgment. I still regret it.”
Ilthuryn collapses back down to his cross legged sitting position.
“Keros, I try and help people, I try and do everything I can to provide just a little fraction of the insight I am blessed to have. And I am bad at it I know, my job is knowing things not teaching them, not giving people the few tools I have. Every time I have tried to help people they have shown that either they don't need it or don't want it. I tried to help you Keros, I tried so hard because I believe in you so much. But what can I even do anymore? What would you have me do? The only way I was even able to try and help you you didn't want to listen to. That is all I had today and even that was seemingly useless. What would you have me do now? Give up on you?”
Keros sits quietly for a minute. “I know this is going to sound rich, but I need you to trust me. Trust that I have learned a lesson today and that I am not going to make the same mistakes again. Now forget about me. Are you okay? Or… are you going to be okay?”
“No Keros. I’m not. Everything today was a waking nightmare that I had hoped to never experience it’s kind again. But I’ll recover, I always do. As I said, I have some… old family to talk to, they will calm me down.”
“Good. That sounds like a… healthy thing to do. I need to go and apologise to someone else, and I need to make sure that everything you just went through was not for nothing.”
“Enjoy... If you need my advice on the matter well, you're welcome to ask for it, but I hope it's listened to when you call on me. But I'll leave you to it for now, you know where to find me still.”
Continued here.
