tangled up in me

and my heart ran away with me

With tears blotting both of their cheeks and Remi clutching Ronin close for all he's worth, the Lullaby shakes his head against his husband's shoulder as he feels the stability they've worked so hard to build dissolve beneath them. But, foundations built on sand and all of that; they would rebuild as they always had.

Cowed and feeling the fresh pangs of terror anew, just as he had felt them when all of this had first happened and the prospect of losing his husband had been overwhelming, Remi tries to drag in a breath. "I don't either." He whispers, breathless. Raising his head, his sea-glass stare made all the more pale for his tears, Remi closes his eyes against the mounting sob in the back of his throat. "Hate me, instead." Is all he can think to say as he searches his husband's face. "Beat me nearly to death if you need to. Fuck anyone else. Have anything you want." Very nearly does Remi say, ask me to abandon them, but he doesn't. Not because he wouldn't, but because it wouldn't be fair to dangle something like that before Ronin. Not while knowing the Huntsman would want to say yes, but would be forced to say no.

So instead he continues to kneel, his fingers in Ronin's shirt and his face blotched by tears and crimson circles, searching the Huntsman's face for a way forward.

remi

Styling stolen from Sky (obviously)

the things we hold are always the first to go

Smoothing a hand through messy curls and tilting his head back as if that will somehow draw in the emotions that keep spilling out, Ronin inhales a shuddering breath and lets it out again. "I couldn't hate you," he whispers, glancing down at the other man with wet cheeks and eyes that are desperately sad for knowing the truth of their situation. "And I already nearly beat you to death, and that didn't help. I don't... the only thing I want isn't something we can get." He shrugs.

Slumping to sit back on the blanket, his arm stays curled around Remi as if he can gather him up in his lap. "I'm so tired," he whispers as fresh tears track his cheeks. "Aoife died, Seren is just... gone, Mateo barely thinks of us as parents... I never thought I'd end up being such a shitty father."

and my heart ran away with me

The truth, as it often does, hurts most of all. Finding himself feeling quite cold, Remi lets his lungs fill with stale air as his body demands that he breathe. As Ronin pulls away the alchemist slumps forward awkwardly, uninterested in the protests of his back. "The only one of them I ever really wanted to protect and keep safe...and she died in my arms." The Lullaby whispers as fresh tears bite at his eyes. The corners of his lips draw up, but Remi's expression is not one of happiness. "She...it's so wrong to say, but she still feels the most real, out of all of them. The most ours." Even though she wasn't.

Glancing at the bottle of gin and wishing they could get drunk and leave this all behind for a few hours, Remi shakes his head before looking back to Ronin. "It isn't even ironic that I was the one with an unexpected pregnancy." He mutters. "It's just stupid."

remi

Styling stolen from Sky (obviously)

the things we hold are always the first to go

"I wish I had been there," Ronin admits quietly, even as he shifts them so Remi might be properly in his lap, so he can lean in and rest his forehead against the alchemist's. "I know that's terrible to say... but I do. It didn't ever feel like I could say goodbye to her." Sniffing, he loops his arms back around Remi to draw him closer. "It's not wrong to say. I feel it as well," he whispers.

Scoffing, though it's hardly a sound of amusement, Ronin finds himself pressing careful kisses along the alchemist's shoulder and collarbone, unintentionally wetting them with his tears. "It's all stupid," he mumbles. "I just... I can't even say I wish for anything. It's exhausting and it won't make anything better." He peers up at Remi again through wet lashes. "I do still love you, though."

and my heart ran away with me

Closing his eyes and trying to focus solely on the man before him, Remi reaches out that his hands might clasp or hold whatever of Ronin he can. "Gods that day...and then we were just...everything was gone." Despite the fact that it's only the two of them, Remi finds he can hardly speak in more than a whisper lest some stray bit of magic steals his words and carries them back to Mateo, Seren, or Enzo and Flora. "I would trade them all to have her back. I would trade everything I am and I have, except for you, to have her back."

Tilting his head against Ronin's, his fingers working at the muscles of his husband's thighs, Remi nods. "That's what makes it feel like it does, I think." He manages. "I think .. I think it's just broken with no way to be fixed." Straightening just enough to meet Ronin's eye line, the Lullaby's fingers tremble as he tries and spectacularly fails to smile. Instead, his lips flinch against the words his mind is forming, before a half sob parts them, pitching Remi forward. 'Gods I love you too.' He whispers, before pressing a jagged and tear-wet kiss against Ronin's lips. 'I'm so sorry.'

remi

Styling stolen from Sky (obviously)

the things we hold are always the first to go

All of Ronin is available for Remi to grab and clasp and pull - to crush and crack and bruise too, if that's what the other man wants. "Everything was gone," he agrees through a sorrowful whisper, his hands smoothing across Remi's shoulders and down his biceps, though the only thing that can warble between them is grief at this point. Grief and love, a golden, unbroken thread through a mire of black.

"If I could bring her back I would. In a second," he says softly, having nothing but understanding for Remi as he speaks, even if what he has to say is hard to hear. It's just broken with no way to be fixed. He knows it, and he hates it, and as Remi pitches forward Ronin is there to meet him, slipping his arms around him properly.

"Me too," he says, kissing him again for good measure. "Just.. stay here with me, for a bit? Please?"

and my heart ran away with me

How that thread remains golden despite how each of them have cut their palms into bloody ribbons holding onto it, is beyond Remi. But he can see it now just as clearly as he'd seen it the day Ronin had died, and he'd never stop reaching for it.

'Forever, if you like.' The Lullaby agrees, wishing this could all be wiped away as easily as their tears. But because it could not, he doesn't bother to dry their cheeks and instead continues to clumsily kiss the Huntsman's face.

Hours or maybe centuries go by, their picnic grows stale, and Aoife is dead even though the twins are still alive. Even though somewhere not terribly far away Mateo is having the time of his life. It's cruel and unfair and lonely, which is why the two men decide to make their way home separately; not because they've had enough of each other's company, but because sometimes grief demands to be dealt with solo.

~FIN

remi

Styling stolen from Sky (obviously)