Alchemised

by SenLinYu

“We’re safe here,” he said. For now. For this moment. But not really. Not ever.

I’m going to take care of you. I’m always going to take care of you.

You always lose. Everyone you love dies.

Alone. Everyone dead. Because they always died. She tried to save them, but in the end, they always died. Her life was a graveyard.

The ring burned again and again and again.

Hold on. You promised you wouldn’t break.

But that Helena didn’t exist anymore. All that was left now was a shadow.

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

“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.”

“You need a willing soul for that, and you’re not going to find one, because the only person who’d die for me is you.”

“I know you don’t want to believe it’s possible, because hoping terrifies you. But I would rather die trying to save you than live knowing there was a chance and I didn’t take it.”

“We have to stop hurting ourselves for each other,” she finally said. “Both of us. We’re not going to last if this is the only way we know how to love.”

“I think I always saw running away as the destination. I never actually thought about what would be left of me by the time I got here.”

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.

“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.”

“Even if people think you’re dead, you should get credit for your work. Luc always used to say you’d be the one to outshine us all.”

She had not come back to rule. She wanted those lost remembered, and she wanted the tragedy of the war confronted, not buried, so that it could not happen again.

“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 doesn’t deserve to be forgotten like this. She shouldn’t be a footnote. This shouldn’t be the only entry she even has. She deserves her own chapter. She deserves a whole damned book of her own.”

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