Alchemised

by SenLinYu

Penny leaned over the arm of the chair, looking back, her face stricken. “You were right. I’m so sorry. We should have listened to you.”

“Everyone who wins says they were good, but they’re the ones who tell the story. They get to choose how we’ll remember it. What if it’s never that simple?”

“I promised I’d do anything for you.” She curled her fingers into a fist. “Maybe you didn’t realise how far I was willing to go.”

In another life, you could be a healer.” “One of life’s great ironies,”

“I have warned you, if something happens to you, I will personally raze the Eternal Flame. That isn’t a threat. It is a promise. Consider your survival as much a necessity to the Resistance as Holdfast’s. If you die, I will kill every single one of them.”

The rules are simple. We win some. We lose some. You get hit sometimes. You hit back. You get days to recover if it’s bad.

“You made me feel like the parts of me that aren’t useful still deserve to exist. Like I’m not just all the things I can do.”

A healer and killer, circling slowly, the push and pull inexorable.

Used to be afraid I’d be one of the Principates everyone forgot, because nothing happened.” He looked down; he was ripping at his nails, all his fingers bleeding. “I’d do anything to have that now. I can’t taste anything now except blood and smoke, and I don’t feel anything except when I’m on fire. The stories made it sound so good. Fighting for a cause. Being a hero.” He shook his head. “Why does everyone pretend it’s anything like that?” Helena reached out, fingers brushing against his shoulder, not sure what to say, how to comfort him. “Maybe that’s what they had to tell themselves, to live with it. Maybe it’s all they let themselves remember,”

There was a trick to sobbing like that; it was something a person had to learn to do.

“After you nearly bled to death here, I thought, at least I can keep her alive. She deserves to have someone who cares enough to try to keep her alive.

but if the Eternal Flame has decided that you are an affordable casualty, I will not be noble or understanding. I can exact dual revenge. I will make them pay if they get you killed.”

“You are not expendable. You don’t get to push everyone away so that they’ll feel comfortable using you and letting you die.”

“You are not replaceable,” he said, his hands trembling against her shoulders. “You are not required to make your death convenient. You are allowed to be important to people. The reason I’m here—the reason I’m doing any of this—is to keep you alive. To keep you safe. That was the deal.”

“I don’t want to always be alone,” she said. It was easier to be honest in the dark. “I want to love someone without feeling like if they know, it’ll end up hurting them. People who love me always die. No matter what I do, it’s never enough to save them. I have to love everyone from a distance, and I’m so lonely.”

When he kissed her, it felt like the beginning of something that could be eternal.

“You’re mine. You swore yourself to me. Now and after the war. I’m going to take care of you. I’m not going to let anyone hurt you. You don’t have to be lonely. Because you’re mine.”

“When the war is over. We’ll run away somewhere no one knows us. We’ll disappear—forever.”

“Because I have warned you, if something happens to you, I will personally raze the entire Order of the Eternal Flame. That isn’t a threat, it’s a promise. Consider your survival as much a necessity to the Resistance as Holdfast’s. If you die, I will kill every single one of them. Given that the risk to their lives is the only way to make you value your own.”

“Is this not enough? There are, undoubtedly, still unexplored depths to the potential misery between us. Shall we endeavour to achieve all of it?”

“You didn’t save me,” he said when he was finally capable of speech. “You just put us in hell for two years.”

“Every time you asked, I promised I was yours. Always. There aren’t any exemptions or expiration dates on always.”

“I don’t want to choose. I always have to choose, and I never get to choose you. I’m so tired of not getting to choose you.” He looked back at her. “You’re not choosing. You promised me anything I wanted. I want you to stop breaking yourself trying to save me. Go. Live. Tell our daughter I saved you both. That—is what I want.”

You have broken yourself into pieces, over and over, because of me, and you don’t seem to understand that it kills me. Living is not worth it to me if you’re the one who keeps paying the price for it. Let me fix what I can.”

He didn’t have any dreams about what he’d do or be after the war. He had never even allowed for the possibility. He had no idea how to do anything but be a soldier.

“Stay with me,” she said. “You’re supposed to rest now, too.”

“We said always, didn’t we?” she asked, her voice strained. “Always. Well, if you don’t want that promise in full any longer, I’ll give it to you in increments.” She clutched his hand tighter. “Every day. I’ll choose you. That way you’ll know it’s still what I want.”

“Love isn’t as pretty or pure as people like to think. There’s a darkness in it sometimes. Kaine and I go hand in hand. I made him who he is. I knew what that array meant when I saved him. If he’s a monster, then I’m his creator.”

She was a non-active member of the Order of the Eternal Flame and did not fight.