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Evie
fear has favourites
She has relied on him as so many others have, and for a moment there is shame in that. But then he is lifting her into his arms, feet swaying off the ground, and even disconnected from the earth she has had her hands in since childhood she feels just as centered and still. He smells a little different now. Different climate, different duties. Even here there is change. But beneath - the weight of his arms, the tickle of his scruff against her temple as she hides against his throat - everything is still the same. The Sword and the Evergreen. Steel and earth. Two things that will change but never fade - and that is why they are the last.
Laughing along with his deeper timbre, she grins cheekily at him as she is released, and swats at the hand that pokes playfully at her arms. They remain toned, but only because of her work in the Wilds, and not because of training. I'm no baker, dies in her throat, a grief they share, and a grief she can't carry alongside Sam's right now. "Oh I'm sure I do, but I need to brace my ego for the way you'll destroy me before I step into that arena," she laughs. It will happen. Deimos has always been her trainer in that sense. Evie has hardly ever sparred with any other. Taking the gloves gratefully, though she does not speak it aloud, Evie spares a quick touch to Zuriel's shoulder as she passes the unicorn before looking up towards the companion she does not yet know - huffing a laugh at the loudness of the peryton, which seems so at odds with Deimos' countenance. It is there, with her face tilted to the sky, that his words come to her. She softens, despite keeping pace with militaristic precision despite never being a formal soldier. The Grounds did that to you. Lowering her face slowly, she looks to the trail ahead of them, quiet. Neither of them are emotional creatures. Evie moreso, of course, but too used to having to conceal and mislead to be frequently honest. "I continue on," she says softly. "I don't know how not to. There is no laying down for people like us." The borrowed gloves creak as her hands tighten around the straps of her backpack. "But I am...angry. So very, very angry." The muscle in her jaw flexes as her teeth clench, and Evie must breathe through it for a few long moments before she can continue. "I miss him, more than our parents. As much as...as Amalia." Whose name is still hard to say, damn her. Damn them both. "But I am still so angry. At the Gods, at The Voice, at Sam, at the fanatic that believed killing him would mean anything in the grand scheme of this war." Sam, who was stronger and older than most of the Ascended, but who would have cut off his own hand before harming another soul. "At The Voice for changing him, at the Ascended for attacking Stormbreak in his name as if he would have ever wanted that kind of violence and retribution on his behalf. They used his death as motivation for their own hatred and frustration - without ever thinking about Sam. Who he was, what he meant to the world, what he would have wanted." Scoffing, she kicks a chunk of ice, sending it spinning off the trail into the softer snow where it lies. "Everyone is demanding we pick a side - but why should I, when I despise them all? When both sides have taken so much from me?" Taken Amalia, by turning her into a Demigod and forcing her to turn her back on Sam - and even Evie, by moving her to Stormbreak. Taken Sam as a child by Ascending him, then taken him again in death at the hands of an Old God fanatic. Her parents, her friends. Her. Ludo had disparaged her the one time they'd met, and she had run before she could dream of trying to get into its graces. "So. Here I am. Trying to do what little good I can, be of what little use I can be. Use this gods-forsaken magic for something." An unglamorous life, unbefitting her fire, but there seemed no other choice these days. don't let one be you |
Table made by Sky!
