[He doesn't need the arcane to see it with abhorrent clarity. Every word twists in his mind, painting a harsh map of the sort of story Baldur's Gate would lap up like fine wine: touting praise over its tragedy for years. Decades. Longer, even, given the lives of those elves who love both theater and practiced pining.
For Leto— for them— it's only real. Worn in sunken swaths of his expression. Etched into the way he can't sit still, even in retelling. It swims beneath Astarion through the muscle he's laid against. The places of Leto that he's folded into or over, and it rattles in that voiced washed out in sips against his curls. Making it one set of memories Astarion is glad he didn't see.
(How childish is that, some aspect of him hisses like the sickly reflex it is. All the nightmares he watched. All the gruesomeness he swore to never look away from, only to make certain the lesson of it always came home: beauty is so fleeting. So pointlessly fleeting. Three years of only one set of hands later and now suddenly he's too spoiled to handle a beheading in weathered retrospect.)
Dull it. Clip it down to the quick. The shape of this exchange is too tender— too wanted— to deserve to bear the weight of bitterness too. Astarion's hand slides instead towards the center of Leto's chest, slow and meandering through the borders of his palm. Cool to warm. Warm to hot. Cheek along one shoulder, and it's nice to remember that he can here— do this, that is. No glassy lines to avoid. No agony in his lover's face each time the weather changes.
I am sorry about your—
About all of them.
He'd say in another life. But sorry never fits well in his mouth. ]
Does anyone ever really recover?
[Nestled in the low end of his chest, it's a gentle observation. A toothless sort of wryness that seeps through to coax them out into the figurative light after they've both burned down to the wick.
He turns their fingers over one another. Kisses the border of marked knuckles, off center.
no subject
For Leto— for them— it's only real. Worn in sunken swaths of his expression. Etched into the way he can't sit still, even in retelling. It swims beneath Astarion through the muscle he's laid against. The places of Leto that he's folded into or over, and it rattles in that voiced washed out in sips against his curls. Making it one set of memories Astarion is glad he didn't see.
(How childish is that, some aspect of him hisses like the sickly reflex it is. All the nightmares he watched. All the gruesomeness he swore to never look away from, only to make certain the lesson of it always came home: beauty is so fleeting. So pointlessly fleeting. Three years of only one set of hands later and now suddenly he's too spoiled to handle a beheading in weathered retrospect.)
Dull it. Clip it down to the quick. The shape of this exchange is too tender— too wanted— to deserve to bear the weight of bitterness too. Astarion's hand slides instead towards the center of Leto's chest, slow and meandering through the borders of his palm. Cool to warm. Warm to hot. Cheek along one shoulder, and it's nice to remember that he can here— do this, that is. No glassy lines to avoid. No agony in his lover's face each time the weather changes.
I am sorry about your—
About all of them.
He'd say in another life. But sorry never fits well in his mouth. ]
Does anyone ever really recover?
[Nestled in the low end of his chest, it's a gentle observation. A toothless sort of wryness that seeps through to coax them out into the figurative light after they've both burned down to the wick.
He turns their fingers over one another. Kisses the border of marked knuckles, off center.
An old habit.]