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[illithidnapped]

Why do you insist on this pointless crusade?

[Sharp as bared teeth— which, coincidentally, is exactly what he happens to be doing while snarling at his own crystal.]

What's next, are you going to haunt me when I dream, too?

[tender]

If I could work out how to manage it, I might.

[ >(((( ]

[illithidnapped]

[If it isn't intended to be a joke— which at this point, he imagines it could go either way— it's close enough to faintly pacify the most jagged pieces of his bestial mood. From the snarling of something cornered to the low, miserable bitterness still simmering in his chest. Nursed along like a drink.

He's quieter now. Nominally.]

...what is it you want, Derrica?

[tender]

[ well. ]

Do you know how long I was on my own after the Chantry razed Dairsmuid?

[illithidnapped]

I have a feeling you're going to tell me.

[Said so flatly there's no missing the unspoken demand: go on, then. Hurry up and get it out of your system.

He has brooding to get to, after all.]

[tender]

Five years.

[ It had felt longer. ]

Then I came here. And I realized I made a mistake, choosing what I did. I should have gone to fight. At least there, I always would have known whether or not I could trust the people around me to defend me.

You have that here. You'll have it after the war as well.

[illithidnapped]

What, alongside you? That sharp-tongued bastard from the crystals? Every other mage fighting for their freedom?

You don't want me on your side.

I'd sell the lot of you out for my own safety. My own...[He fumbles for a heated moment, bitterly searching himself for the right words.] normalcy.

[tender]

I want you on my side. You are on my side, whether you realize it or not.

[illithidnapped]

[It comes later, the softer sound of his voice. So impossibly tired. Only an echo of the man that'd practically begged her to stay.

He only has one question left to ask:]

Why.

[Why would you want that?]

[tender]

[ The absence of immediate reply had brought her to the conclusion that he was finished with the conversation, and that she would have to find him in the morning.

This message is unexpected, but requires an answer. There's a pause, the sound of an inhaled breath before she speaks. ]

Is it so hard to believe that I care for you?

[illithidnapped]

You care. You always care. That’s what you do, darling.

[And it had been nice at the time. A mercy when he needed it, and his guard was so far gone in the gutter he didn’t have the strength of will to resist the warmth of her touch. The closeness. The comfort.

He’s being unfair to her.

He doesn’t know any other way to be.]

When have you ever been cruel? When has hate twisted you to wretchedness?

[tender]

[ It is unfair. But Derrica doesn't falter. ]

Stay to fight with us when Corypheus is gone, and you'll see exactly how wretched I can be.

[illithidnapped]

[He exhales in slow surrender through his nose, deep enough to be audible, one long fang gritting harsh against its lower twin as his jaw cinches tight.]

Do yourself a favor.

Muster it before then, if you want to live that long.

[tender]

And who would you have me be wretched to? Someone other than our enemies?

[illithidnapped]

You've suffered, darling. You don't need me to tell you that. But when the memories haunt and you realize the people standing at your side don't give a damn about throwing you back in a cage to save their own skin, you might rethink the benefit of all those years spent on your own.

People lie. They hurt and they hate and they lie, and they'll ruin you for trusting them.

I'll ruin you for trusting me. So do yourself a favor, and be wretched. Protect yourself. Don't—

[He stops there, breath hitching audibly in the silence.]

—reach for me.

[tender]

There are people like that here. I know that there are.

I don't think you're one of them.

[illithidnapped]

Then you don't know anything.

[His exhale is thin. Tired. Wound up as he's been, he doesn't have it in him to bicker on endlessly. To bite, even when he knows he ought to.]

Goodnight, my dear.