Alchemised

by SenLinYu

Remembered that she’d been placed there as a prisoner, kept preserved, but someday, someone would come for her.

She had to endure. To stay alert. That way she would be ready. She had to stay ready. She would not let herself fade away.

the High Reeve’s

High Reeve 😈

She looked up at him. “You’re a monster.” He raised an eyebrow. “Noticed that, have you?”

“Is this what it’s like to be you?”

“Ferron always comes for me,”

the scream I scrumpt

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.”

“I’m sure Ilva has filled your head with pretty stories about your importance, but you’re easily replaced. We already have several candidates under consideration.”

Fuck this guy

Calculating, Cunning, Devoted, Determined, Ruthless, Unfailing, Unhesitating, and Unyielding.

“You have no idea how hard it is to save someone, to fix all the ways the people like you break them.” She glared at him. “I hope someday you have to try. See how little you think of it then.”

“You’re like a rose in a graveyard,” he said, and his lips twisted into a bitter smile. “I wonder what you could have turned into without the war.”

Tears

She ran a hand along his jaw, and when her palm grazed his cheek, he pressed his face into it, eyes fluttering shut, a breath escaping him, as if he were starved of touch.

“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.”

They were the inverse and counter to each other. A healer and killer, circling slowly, the push and pull inexorable.

“Don’t die, Kaine,” she said. The line he walked frightened her. If the array was the punishment for a failure, what would the price of betrayal be? A smirk twisted his mouth as he looked at her. “There are far worse fates than dying, Marino.” She nodded. “I know. But that one you don’t come back from.” He gave a bitter laugh. “All right, then, but only because you asked.”

“You know, I used to think the circumstances of my servitude to the High Necromancer as cruel an enslavement as anyone could conceive, but I must admit, it pales beside you.”

“I’m sure there’s something poetic in it all, but right now all I feel is a new set of manacles.”

“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,”

She looked for a door. An escape. He didn’t let go. “Helena…” She stilled at her name. “I’m alone, too,” he said.

“I’m sorry.” His hand still entwined with hers tightened. “I’m so sorry. I ruined so much of this for you. This is how it’s supposed to be. Let me give this to you now.”

“Helena.” Kaine’s lips brushed across her cheek and temple, his breath ragged. “You get to have this. You’re allowed to feel good things. Don’t be alone. Have this with me.”

“I think I’ve nearly memorised you,” she said. “Especially your eyes. I think I learned to read them first.” The corner of his mouth twitched, and he caught her hand, capturing it against his chest. “I memorised yours, too,” he said after a moment, and then sighed, looking away. “I should have known—the moment I looked into your eyes, I should have known I would never win against you.”

“I’ve always thought my eyes were my best feature.” “One of them,” he said quietly.

He pulled her close, crushing her to his chest. “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.”

“Don’t worry. I’m always going to come back to you.”

“Be careful, Kaine. Don’t die.”

“Would you go now, if you could?” His eyes seemed to ripple with heat. “With you, I would.”

“Be careful.” It was always the last thing she said to him before he left her on some rooftop. She would hold his face in her hands, staring into his eyes. “Don’t die.” He’d dip his head forward, kissing her inner wrist or the palm of her hand, his silver eyes locked on her face. “You’re mine. I’ll always come for you.” He always did.

“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.”

“You are so much more than what the war has done to you.”

“Do you see my scars that way?” he finally said. “When you look at me, are they all you see?” She flinched. “No.” “Well.” He met her eyes. “I don’t see you that way, either. You’re mine.” He let go of her wrist and lifted his hand, the fingertips tracing the scarring until it was covered by his palm, warm against her bare skin, then sliding up to curve around her neck. “You are. It doesn’t matter what happens to you, you will still be mine.”

I love you. She told him in the way she held him close; in the way her mouth met his; in how her hands trailed across his skin, mapping him, memorising every detail of what it was to be with him, his scars under her fingers. I love you. I love you. She told him in the way she let go of herself and held on to him instead. With every beat of her heart. I love you. I will always love you. I will always take care of you.

“Be careful,” she whispered. “Don’t die.”

Someday, she promised herself, someday I am going to love him in a moment that isn’t stolen.

The burning came again, cutting her panic short as she tried to place where the sensation was coming from. She knew that feeling. Her hand. Her left hand was burning. The ring. Her heart stalled.

He was looking for her. He’d come for her. He always did. But she could not think about it. She had to forget.

His fingers trembled as he stared at her. She studied him in shock.

“You shouldn’t have assumed I’d be willing to lose you,” she said. “Did you think I cared less because I had other obligations? That I don’t feel things as much as you? I did everything I could to keep you safe. You don’t know all the things I did.” “I just meant—” “Every time you asked, I promised I was yours. Always. There aren’t any exemptions or expiration dates on always.”

“I’m sorry—I’m sorry—I’m so sorry for everything I did to you,” he said, his voice hoarse and broken. “I love you. You left, and I’d never told you.”

“Helena, I’m tired.”

“We’ll go out together, won’t we, old girl? Bennet’s last two monsters.”

OUCH

Her life was a perpetual countdown to disasters that she always failed to see coming.

She studied him sadly, realising their difference: 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.

She looked up as Kaine came out the door and immediately dropped to her belly and crawled across the ground to him, wings and tail flapping, whining and whimpering all the way. He pulled her enormous head into his arms.

“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.”