[ It feels like it should surprise him, how the details fall into place. It doesn't. Not really. They've always been there, the shattered bits and pieces of what he saw and was told and put together. He doesn't give a damn about the fallen soldiers. Nilfgaard massacred villages and kingdoms in greater numbers than what they lost at Sodden. But it is still...
The fire. It would have burned through her magic. Consumed it. A cost, always, to every decision. (Their shared dream with flames devouring the forest. Ciri.) ]
There was a woman. She said you bought them time.
[ With her life, had been the unspoken implication. And fuck, how that had torn at him. The understanding she was gone, that they never got the chance to speak after the mountain. Then they had. She was here and he could say all the things he wanted to say to her, and where did that leave them in the end?
He wants to ask about the elves, how she went from their captive to Aretuza to fleeing the Brotherhood. When did the Deathless Mother find her? Does it matter? What will it change? ]
I didn't know. All those weeks at Kaer Morhen. When I first saw you at the temple in Ellander, I thought I was dreaming. [ You were gone. His voice is at once soft and full of crooked edges. Not angry, just tired. Why is he even saying it? Why now? Maybe he held it in for so long that it's come tumbling out in that way his words often do when he's around Yennefer. ] She was keen to meet you. Ciri.
[ She doesn't recall. He knows. He's also never said, exactly, what happened. The circumstances in which they united and broke apart just as quickly. You knew what she meant to me. That's the only thing he's said of it until now. ]
no subject
The fire. It would have burned through her magic. Consumed it. A cost, always, to every decision. (Their shared dream with flames devouring the forest. Ciri.) ]
There was a woman. She said you bought them time.
[ With her life, had been the unspoken implication. And fuck, how that had torn at him. The understanding she was gone, that they never got the chance to speak after the mountain. Then they had. She was here and he could say all the things he wanted to say to her, and where did that leave them in the end?
He wants to ask about the elves, how she went from their captive to Aretuza to fleeing the Brotherhood. When did the Deathless Mother find her? Does it matter? What will it change? ]
I didn't know. All those weeks at Kaer Morhen. When I first saw you at the temple in Ellander, I thought I was dreaming. [ You were gone. His voice is at once soft and full of crooked edges. Not angry, just tired. Why is he even saying it? Why now? Maybe he held it in for so long that it's come tumbling out in that way his words often do when he's around Yennefer. ] She was keen to meet you. Ciri.
[ She doesn't recall. He knows. He's also never said, exactly, what happened. The circumstances in which they united and broke apart just as quickly. You knew what she meant to me. That's the only thing he's said of it until now. ]