wonderland

say it's here where our pieces fall in place

Ronin's response had felt like more of a rebuke than yelling would have. His expression similarly falling, the alchemist's lips opened to respond, but no words came out. Instead, his eyes softly scanned Ronin's face wishing for the umpteenth time to simply be able to open his mind to his husband the way he could with the other attuned. How could he communicate that he still felt so guilty about having the power that he did? That by sharing it with others, it somehow lessened that burden?

"No.." Was all he could say, rising the few steps so he was on equal footing with the hunter. "Not since you have I felt anything for anyone else. But..whatever it is in their bite, it..." Clenching his teeth together, Remi dragged his fingertips through his hair, his expression one of tortured remorse. "I hate it. I hate every second of wanting someone other than you." If he could, his hand would find its way to Ronin's hip.

'And that should be enough to never do it, I suppose. But if they are in danger...or if they can store it for later...or even for the simple thrill of something like flying.." Remi's heart, too kind and too giving, was making an absolute mess of what should have been a fairly cut and dry situation.

"I don't.." He shook his head, eyes rising to search for the answers in his husband's eyes.

Ronin Taliesin

they say it's all been done
but they haven't seen the best of me

Ronin didn't move away from Remi, allowing him to move closer, but he didn't seem able to find the other man's eyes. I hate every second of wanting someone other than you. And yet here they were, still. Hating something, but doing it anyway. And doing it just because, not because there was no other choice. The hunter had to take a long, deep breath and let it out again, staring a hole in the wall further up the stairs.

"You do whatever is necessary when someone is in danger. I think we can both agree on that." He shrugged. "If they aren't, though..." He scoffed, rubbing at his eyes with his free hand. "It doesn't have to be you, Remi. You know that? If someone wants to fly, or to use earth magic, or create things, there are other people in the world they can get it from." The words came out with more bite than intended, but they were there nonetheless.

say it's here where our pieces fall in place

Every second Ronin's eyes bored into the upper wall was a torturous eternity. Long enough for Remi to have all but counted the unshaven hairs on his husband's jaw, to notice where his eyebrows twisted, to look past the slightly darkened-tinge of his skin to the pores beneath. When he did speak, it was in that same toneless voice that made Remi want to recoil. He didn't, though the hand on Ronin's hip felt held there moreso out of necessity as if it would be too awkward to pull away now.

"Are there?" Remi asked in a low voice, not intending to argue, merely to ensure that once this conversation was over, it never needed to be had again. "No one..." It was almost painful to say the words, their content seemingly belonging to someone else, not the humble alchemist. "...no one else can do what I can." No other earth users. No one who could make magical items. None who could speak to all manner of animals, and no one who could become what he so recently had.

Ronin Taliesin

they say it's all been done
but they haven't seen the best of me

Ronin didn't realise he had bitten his lip until he tasted copper, the hunter's hands having unconsciously balled into fists at his sides. "Then why are you even asking me?" he asked, shrugging his shoulders and finally levelling his gaze on Remi; a fiery, steely thing. Something burned low in his chest, something foreign and dark that had him wanting to splinter the banister and punch his hand through the wall.

"If no one else can do what you can, and you fancy having all the Ascended hanging from your wrists like jewellery, why even get me involved? Whore yourself out to them Remi - gods know I couldn't stop you even if I wanted to!" he snapped, stalking up the stairs and slamming the door to their bedroom shut - hard. Down the corridor, Aoife began to howl.

say it's here where our pieces fall in place

Noticing a bead of blood on Ronin's lip, Remi's expression instantly faltered as his free hand moved as if to cup the side of his husband's cheek. It stopped, paralyzed suddenly by the ferocity of the hunter's gaze as it was levelled against him. "I—" He started to answer, but the latter of what felt like a two-pronged attack was about to begin.

Jaw having properly dropped, his eyes wide with surprise and a far too-naive sort of pain, Remi merely watched Ronin trump up the stairs, flinching as a door was slammed shut. If not for Aoife's cries, the alchemist might have stood for an eternity where he was. Quickly though he ran up to her room, taking the stairs two at a time. Opening the door and swooping his arms into her crib to pull her against him, Remi only recognized just how frantically his heart was beating with Aoife's body against his chest. On his finger, he could feel a similar rhythm pounding away in the next room.

"Shh, sweet girl. You shall have to live through many more slamming doors than this. Best get used to it now." He cooed, trying for a sing-song tone but finding his voice all but slipping away into a foggy whisper. There were too many accusations to sort through at once - being referred to as a whore, letting others share in his abilities, the still gulf-like disparity between what Ronin was capable of, and what Remi was. The anger. The hurt.

Breathing in Aoife's scent as if it might be the last sip of oxygen he might ever have, Remi leaned against the wall and let himself slowly slide down it. Staring bleakly at the empty chair where Ronin normally sat, Remi instead mumbled a half-hearted story into Aoife's curls as her hands pulled away at the many feathers having sprouted in his.

Ronin Taliesin

they say it's all been done
but they haven't seen the best of me

An eternity, perhaps, until the sound of a door quietly opening from down the corridor. And in that time the pulse around Remi's finger would not have calmed even slightly - it might have even spiked, once or twice.

Ronin appeared in the doorway of Aoife's room, a quiet, solemn figure backlit from the sunlight pouring through the windows in the corridor. He ruffled a hand through hair damp with sweat, the blood on his lip and smeared on the back of his hand tinged with inky blackness.

"I'm so sorry," he said in a hoarse voice. "I don't know why I said those things, I... I shouldn't have ever spoken to you like that. I understand if you'd rather I left you alone, but I had to apologise, Remi. I was out of line."

say it's here where our pieces fall in place

Ronin's heartbeat was almost all that he was focused on. That and Aoife of course. The smell of her, the tangible weight that somehow steadied him in this strange and abrupt storm. As he glanced up to the ghost in the doorway, Remi had the unmistakable expression of one beat down and yet still eager for affection. It was a look his father had often chastised him for, and yet for all the old man's bitterness, it had always remained. That gentle optimism that made Remi so eager to forgive.

"It is nothing." The alchemist replied in a low voice, despite the multitude of feathers having been plucked from him, but also anxiously shed as well. Seeing her father, Aoife immediately gurgled a happy hello, her chubby fingers reaching up towards him. Glancing up, Remi's brows twitched a silent question that he couldn't bear to actually ask.

Ronin Taliesin

they say it's all been done
but they haven't seen the best of me

"It is far from nothing," Ronin murmured, his soft disagreement still a world away from the harsh and bitter words he'd all but spat at his husband before. "But I appreciate it anyway." Quietly, cautiously almost, Ronin padded into the room, managing a sad smile to his daughter and moving to perch upon the edge of the chair he usually sat in. "Hey, princess," he greeted her affectionately, warmth in his tone, though he didn't get any closer.

"Did you give her the charm...? From Arduinna?" he asked Remi, seeming vexed and exhausted already by the events of the morning. And still his heart hammered a drumbeat in his chest.

say it's here where our pieces fall in place

Remi watched Ronin enter, his shattered gaze hopeful but wary. Cranking her neck about to follow her father's movements, Aoife continued to stretch her hands for him even as Remi turned her about in his arms. With surprising strength she wriggled unhappily, her tiny fists beating against the cage of Remi's arms.

"Not yet." Remi said softly, having entirely forgotten about anything and everything. Holding Aoife with one hand (now was certainly her chance to escape him, her efforts seem to suggest), Remi pulled the copper leaf-charm from his pocket. "A present for you darling-one. From the trees themselves." Remi hummed. Only when the gift turned out to be clearly for her did Aoife cease her escape-plan.

Placing it over her head, Aoife immediately and proudly put it in her mouth. Softly fingering the ring on his hand with his thumb, Remi's eyes rose slowly towards where his husband sat. Are you alright? He wanted to ask. And of course, What do you need? Instead though, Remi merely sighed softly. "I am sorry this is happening to you."

Ronin Taliesin

they say it's all been done
but they haven't seen the best of me

"Hey, now," Ronin soothed his daughter, smiling to her and attempting a little more cheer, though he felt anything but. "It's important to keep you safe, that's all." Little good the explanation would do for a child, though he seemed relieved as the necklace was placed over Aoife's head. For all Arduinna seemed and seemed not to be, he wanted to hope that she wouldn't have been so cruel as to give Remi a dud this time.

"Not as sorry as I am. I'm sorry it's affecting you," he mumbled in response to his husband, following him with his eyes as he rose to his feet. "It's getting worse." If the inky smudges of blood on his hand weren't testament enough to that.

say it's here where our pieces fall in place

Little good indeed. Crocodile tears formed in Aoife's eyes as it became clear that her struggles were getting her nowhere. Having been woken up from her nap, not of her own accord, the tiniest Taliesin was far from pleased. "Now, now." Remi soothed, pulling the girl back against his chest and pressing a kiss into her dark tangle of curls. "We cannot always have what we want." He said, perhaps a touch too pointedly.

Looking up as Ronin stood, the unsettling stillness of the tension between them making it seem as though the alchemist couldn't speak freely—are you leaving? should I follow?—Remi pushed his back against the wall so that he could stand without taking his hands off of their daughter.

"I will love you through anything." Remi said softly, but genuinely, without so much as a hint of reservation. "I asked Safrin about you." He admitted, his lips turned upwards in a smile though his expression was still woefully sad. "She said..." Biting the inside of his cheek, one of Remi's feet tapped anxiously on the ground. Swallowing, his lashes fluttered as his gaze looked up at the ceiling.

She said a season Ronin.

That you only have a season.

Ronin Taliesin

they say it's all been done
but they haven't seen the best of me

We cannot always have what we want. It was a sentiment that Ronin could understand well, too - he wanted to hold his daughter, to fuss over her and cuddle her close, needing the comfort perhaps as much as Remi, but he was hesitant, and so he merely stood awkwardly in the room, fidgeting with the sleeve of his shirt. "And I love you for having such a big heart, even though you would be well placed to leave, sometimes," he muttered, rubbing at his forehead.

That he had spoken to Safrin perhaps wasn't such a surprise, though as he faltered Ronin frowned at the ground. She had told him he was to become a monster - something frighteningly apparent, though he hadn't expected it so soon. "I know," he muttered. "But we... it'll be cured. We'll find a way."

say it's here where our pieces fall in place

"I can really tell, especially when you say it like that and smear blood on your forehead." Remi said, the barest whisper of a smirk on his face.

Swallowing and letting his eyes lower for a moment, Remi shifted Aoife in his arms. "That we will cure the blight eventually, I have no doubt. But a season is not terribly long, Ronin." So saying he lifted his eyes which were now slightly misty with a wall of unshed tears. "That is what she told me." He added in a rough voice. "That you only had a season."

Ronin Taliesin

they say it's all been done
but they haven't seen the best of me

"Hm? Oh... Sorry." Ronin managed a small smile back, letting his gaze drop to the ground. At the talk of a season, however, his eyes shot back up, Ronin raising an eyebrow questioningly. Safrin had told him that... oh. Well. Fuck. "A season is... it's not that short either," he said, telling himself that it wasn't lying if he just didn't mention what else he'd been told. Dead was better than knowing what else he might become.

"And we have a lot that we're doing to try and combat it," he continued, meeting his husband's gaze and sighing. "Remi, we'll fix this in time. We will. Together, though. Not with me storming off in a strop."