REMI
the bastion
& my heart ran away with me
Remi nods against the words before they’ve fully left his husband's lips. His body agrees, and so does his head—but his heart, gods, his heart keeps wincing like it doesn’t believe it. “Mmm,” he murmurs lowly, the sound more breath than voice. “Until Pierce comes for her. Or Dorian does.” The names catch like burrs in his throat, and though he grimaces at himself for saying them aloud, he leans sideways and knocks his knuckles sharply against the wooden rail anyway—warding away the things he’s just released into the world.
But Ronin is already turning into him, and the contact makes everything louder.
Remi feels it all. The grief caught beneath Ronin’s sternum like a knife that won’t come out. The thin-threaded guilt wound tight as a tourniquet. The bone-deep need to hold Flora again and the horror of what they had held her through. It pours into Remi like seawater through cracked glass, and in return, Ronin will feel the ache behind his husband's eyes—the unshakable helplessness, the snarling want to tear Dahlia to pieces, the crushing wave of failure despite their win.
“I know,” he whispers, and it’s not a platitude. It’s a confession. He hates it too. Every moment. And because he can’t say anything that wouldn’t feel hollow, he steps forward instead. Lifts his hands and cups Ronin’s flushed cheeks, thumbs grazing the silver at his temples. He tips his husband’s face to his and kisses him—firm, unhurried, aching. His tongue presses forward like it’s trying to shape every unspeakable word he’d buried back in King’s End. He kisses him like it could change the memory, like it might somehow make the screams go silent in both their heads.
He pours it all in. Let me carry some of it. Let me take it from you. Let me hold you through it. There’s nothing else to give but this. So he gives it.
But Ronin is already turning into him, and the contact makes everything louder.
Remi feels it all. The grief caught beneath Ronin’s sternum like a knife that won’t come out. The thin-threaded guilt wound tight as a tourniquet. The bone-deep need to hold Flora again and the horror of what they had held her through. It pours into Remi like seawater through cracked glass, and in return, Ronin will feel the ache behind his husband's eyes—the unshakable helplessness, the snarling want to tear Dahlia to pieces, the crushing wave of failure despite their win.
“I know,” he whispers, and it’s not a platitude. It’s a confession. He hates it too. Every moment. And because he can’t say anything that wouldn’t feel hollow, he steps forward instead. Lifts his hands and cups Ronin’s flushed cheeks, thumbs grazing the silver at his temples. He tips his husband’s face to his and kisses him—firm, unhurried, aching. His tongue presses forward like it’s trying to shape every unspeakable word he’d buried back in King’s End. He kisses him like it could change the memory, like it might somehow make the screams go silent in both their heads.
He pours it all in. Let me carry some of it. Let me take it from you. Let me hold you through it. There’s nothing else to give but this. So he gives it.
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
