it's delicate

honey, you're familiar like my mirror years ago

"Ronin," Where Remi's accent might otherwise have lent a touch of music to his words, now it only made the syllables as jumbled as the landscape around them. "Whatever you want to feel, you can. It is why we were here. You do not have to be strong, or brave." Feathers fall from his wings, caught in the sticky tar beneath their feet before coating it completely. "It does not even have to make sense." Whatever complicated and irrational violence was in the Nova's soul, here if nowhere else, Ronin could feel it freely.

Because it is Safrin, Remi nearly says, though already the scales have begun to fall away from Ronin's eyes such that he likely didn't need Remi to shine a spotlight over their past relationship. Instead, he pulled Ronin all the more tightly against him until the dream blurred the lines between where one man started and the other ended.

"Mort, I would think." The Lullaby mumbles, before adding, "-or Vi, I suppose." If Ludo could have taken Vanya for itself, it would have.

Inhaling sharply, Remi straightens if only to look into his husband's eyes. "Gods, you have nothing to be sorry for. If anyone does..." Anyone save for Safrin. "..it is me. Had I not fallen so far away from myself, away from you, had I not dreamt Mateo into being, I might have been able to resist Ludo's trade." But he'd been selfish, and sick, and weak.

Feeling the sting of tears anew, Remi looked up fruitlessly as his lips pulled down. "I thought...I always thought you would find out on your own. That she could not possibly keep it from you, or that eventually she would do the right thing. And then.." Gods, then the years had just gone.

innocence died screaming, honey, ask me i should know

no grave can hold my body down

"I can't," Ronin says, the words half whispered and tight with unshed tears. "It's... there's too much, Remi. I can't let it out. I'm afraid I won't come back from it." Hiccuping in a breath to feel the other man clutch him closer, Ronin closes prickling eyes and tries to hold tight to the fracturing dream world around them. It will come, and he knows it will - in the days and weeks to come, in the middle of innocuous conversations, or during quiet and simple chores.

That's when the grief will take him, when he'll want to sob apologies up at the sky and set fire to the Aumakua.

But for now it's the bone deep turbulence of knowing, and he needs every bit of Remi that the Lullaby is willing to offer to stay anchored. "Both of them, then," he whispers, of Vi and Mort. He'll get both of them in a room together, as if it's that simple, and sort this whole mess out.

Sniffling and straightening up enough to gaze at Remi through red rimmed eyes, the Nova shakes his head firmly. "Don't you ever regret our son, however he came into being," he scolds. "Vanya wouldn't want that. I know she wouldn't."

As for Ronin finding out, it's with sad acceptance that he leans in to kiss Remi's forehead. "We both failed her," he whispers. "And we'll live with it together. But... thank you. For telling me now."

honey, you're familiar like my mirror years ago

"You can't keep it in, Ronin." Remi whispers right back, brushing his palm against Ronin's check before letting his fingers curl into the Nova's dark hair. "This world will be here whenever you need it, and so will I." At a moment's notice he could drop them into the Dreaming, no matter how inconvenient it might be for those around them.

'We will call to them.' Not that he wanted to drag their children into it, but perhaps with Mateo and Flora channelling their chances would be better. Then again, perhaps once the gods heard the topic upon which the Taliesin's wanted to speak, they'd grant them an audience regardless.

Pressing his teeth together, Remi gazed at Ronin. Here, they could be scar-free and young. Only Ronin appeared perhaps more weathered than he ever had. Worse, the lines of laughter that so often creased around his eyes and mouth were entirely smoothed, the skin broken only by a scowl or a wince of pain. " We will fix it." Whispered, the Lullaby exhaled against the shiver that nearly sent him to his knees in response to the heartbreaking softness of his husband's kiss.

"I love you." It sounded like an apology, and, maybe it was.

innocence died screaming, honey, ask me i should know

no grave can hold my body down

Nodding gratefully, both an admission that he knows Remi is right and an acknowledgement that he'll make use of every ounce of strength and space the Lullaby can give him, Ronin leans into the soft press of his husband's fingers, feeling further tears wanting to leak down his cheeks. "It should already have been fixed," he whispers, and if Remi needs any indication of the darkness caged and broiling beneath the surface, it's there, laced in the tone of Ronin's voice.

Taking a deep breath and relaxing his hold on the other man enough for it to be considered a real embrace rather than the clinging desperation of a man on the brink, the Nova doesn't know how he manages to feel bone weary while asleep, but he does. "I love you too," he whispers, and overhead thunder begins to purr out an ominous song. "Let's keep walking. I... it's going to be a rough night, I think."

honey, you're familiar like my mirror years ago

Words and phrases ghost across Remi's lips, and though he doesn't give them voice, Ronin will no doubt feel the shape of them like static electricity across his skin. Shapes like, you are the best man I know, and, you are everything to me, and I will find some way to carry this pain for you.

'We can stay as long as you like, although..' Glancing up at the sound of thunder, Remi smiles softly as violet bruises across the clouds. "I think we should sleep in our own bed." Turning to the Nova as his wings fall toward his sides only to melt into so many feathers, Remi gives his husband's hand a soft squeeze.

"I would quick like to hold you for real, tonight."

~FIN

innocence died screaming, honey, ask me i should know