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Ro practically fell out of the dumbwaiter and into his room. The half-elf was prone to moments of brooding, and this time was no different. Emerald eyes dark with emotion he opened the closet and pulled out a bottle of brandy he had stashed there and closed the door. Unbuttoning his shirt he tossed it onto the chair near the fire, the fine webbing of scars on his skin glittering as he passed thorugh the firelight.
Flopping onto the bed he popped the cork and tipped the bottle back, the liquid buring his throat and the scent of cherry filling his senses. "Chicken," he chided himself. The ceiling seemed to spin a little bit, making him feel like he was floating. Humming softly he closed his eyes, trying not to think, just letting the darkness carry him.
Normally, when Y'roden went off to brood, Ghet left him to it. Not because she didn't care, but because it seemed best. And of course, she was so often the cause, and there was nothing she could say to make it better. She stopped outside his door, uncertain, knowing her pain and confusion was seeping out of her and into the two men who held her heart between them.
She was terribly confused. She could hardly be blamed for not recognising a situation she'd never experienced before. No-one had ever tasted what she had to give and then chosen someone else, never. Chase had left her, but that was because of something she'd done. What had she done now?
Bugger this. She opened the door and went in, then she stood watching him for a moment, pain and anger battling, as she tried to work out what she could say. "You want to tell me what's going on?"
The wave of emotion that came from Ghetsuhm shocked Y'roden out of the haze he had drifted off into. Sitting bolt upright he stared at the redhead with a look of utter panic on his face. "Oh Ghet.... it's not you, you haven't done anything wrong." Stumbling to his feet the half-elf crossed the room and pulled her into a tight embrace. "I'm sorry, that was terribly insensitve of me."
To his surprise the elf discovered that he was shaking, his heart beating wildly in his chest. "I love you, you know I do."
This was so outside of her experience. She wanted Rodi to hold her, and she didn't. She pulled back a little so she could look up at his eyes. She was bewildered. "I thought you did. I thought you loved me so much that... hurting me carelessly would be impossible. You've just apologised for doing something you wouldn't previously have been capable of doing at all." She fought down tears. Perhaps she'd always known this day would come, but that didn't make it hurt any less. She wasn't ready. "If you still love me, if I haven't done anything wrong, then why do I feel... how can you be slipping away from me?"
The floor seemed to have fallen out from underneath Y'roden and his expression he wore was one Ghet had only seen once before. The moment after the dagger had punctured his heart.
"I... I don't know, I haven't gone anywhere." He shook his head in confusion, "I can't put a label on any of my emotions right now."
The pain forced him to his knees where he wrapped his arms around Ghet's legs, resting his head on her hip. "Don't hate me. Gods... I love you still. I've given everything I have to you."
Then a choked sob did force its way out, and she dropped to her knees, pulling his face to hers and kissing him with naked desperation. "I know that, do you think I don't know that? How could I hate you? I owe you everything. Without you I'd still be that thing you found with Avathar." Her hands slid over the bare skin of his chest, blindly seeking something, some certainty. "You have given me more than I have any right to expect of you. And I have given you everything I can give. We both know... it's not enough."
She pulled a hand back to wipe the tears from her face, to push her hair back. "I don't want to lose you. More than that, I don't want to stand by and watch while I lose you by degrees. I don't want to hang around and wait for you to make up your mind."
Y'roden recoiled from the truth, trying to block out Ghetsuhm's words with a kiss. She had been his once, for a brief time. Broken, ready to take her own life, but his. Just for a moment. The half-elf had always needed more, wanted more, but it was never meant to be. It was killing him, slowly and certainly. It HAD killed him once.....
He had never thought another woman would tug his heart strings. There had been a time when he was positive that no other woman could. He had loved Summerlin, that much was true, but he hadn't been able to let Ghet go for her.
Was he ready to let her go for someone who didn't even know how he felt about them? It wan't a fair question, not to him, not to Silverthorn, and certainly not for Ghet. "I'm sorry," he choked out against her mouth, "I can't make you do anything you don't want to do Ghet." He felt like part of his soul was being ripped out, and it was difficult to breathe.
Ghet sank down and rested her head on his chest, her lips tracing lines she adored. "You can, you know. You can make me do almost anything I don't want to. Do you think I want to do this?" She had been angry, but now that anger was gone and she was simply, inexpressibly, sad. She had done something for this man that she would never do for any other, the worst thing she could conceive of doing. She had deliberately hurt Galain. She had insisted on keeping Y'roden as her lover, even though she knew, could not help but know, exactly how much it pained the man who was her soul.
She lifted her face again to kiss him, trying ot cling on to him in spite of everything. "I think perhaps, that if I stay, you might not... I think it would be easier for you to work out what you felt if I left."
Gathering Ghet to his chest Ro nearly crushed her to him. "Nothing is ever easy without you," he whispered, "But I don't want to hurt you. You deserve better than that. I've hurt you too much already." The emerald hue of his eyes had nearly gone black, stained by an agony he never expected to feel.
Tilting Ghet's chin up he kissed her, losing himself in the familiar scent of ginseng. His hand ran up her back to the base of her neck, supporting her head, the familiar warmth of her long red locks tickling over his skin. Lissenya Nwalme...
That was when she knew. He would never have let her go that easily. There had been a time, he would not have cared what it cost him to keep her, and that time had somehow, when neither of them had been looking, passed. It was worse because there was no fault, there was no-one to blame.
He touched her, roused her, and the name he had always called her burned across her mind. So many things would be easier when she no longer had to perform this balancing act; only living would be harder. She wondered why it was not in her to refuse, to fight to keep him, but really she knew. She loved him too much to keep him where he no longer needed to be.
Still, she would put off parting if she could. She arched up towards him, her mouth devouring his, seeking to push the pain aside. "Not yet, not yet, please. Make love to me."
He had never been able to deny her anything, aside from her own death. If Ghet had asked him to stay he would have, but she didn't. What she did ask he could give, and gladly.
Lifting her into his arms Ro carried his lover to the bed, eyes locked with hers as he lay her down on the soft comforter. Gently pulling the emerald rose from her clevage he didn't even feel it when a thorn penetrated his flesh, a drop of blood falling to stain Ghetsuhm's breast.
Tucking the blossom into the firey haired beauty's hair he bent to kiss her, tasting goodbye on her mouth as his fingers divested her of clothing.
Throughout, she wept silently, tears sliding into her hair. For once, she did not need to fight the urge to beg him to make it hurt: he'd already hurt her more than she could bear. She'd never been on the receiving end of this, it had never been her pain she used passion to try to deflect.
Eyes open, she stroked his face, spoke his name against his lips as she drew him into her body. Aminmela ile, Y'roden, oiale. Forever...
There was a desperation to it, a fevered need to memorize curves already commited to memory, that could never be forgotten.
Why?... Why?... I wasn't ready..
The half-elf's silent thoughts haunted him. He could taste Ghetsuhm's tears on his tongue. He had done this, he had caused her pain. Wasn't it him that was suppose to suffer? Hadn't he sworn to himself that he would never hurt anyone again? Least of all her....
"Aminmela ile, Ghetsuhm," his words whispered into her hair. Feanya yanwe lyaa hilde, nothing can ever take that away.
Every movement of their bodies was agony, the path he carved into her body excrutiatingly slow and tender. Her response was automatic, she could not fail to be aroused by the familiarity of his scent, his strength, his touch. Gods, how could she let him go?
She could feel his pain, his desperation, and there was something of glory in it, a bitter triumph that at least he suffered with her. And he was right, more than he knew. So much of her was his. She had taken not just his love, but his soul and his blood, the very essence of his being, and it had changed her. There could be no clean break, she could never get free of him. She had been a fool, and she was doomed to live with this pain forever.
Somehow, that thought was liberating. The utter despair gave her body free reign, and she arched up to him, taking his mouth to hers and driving them, harder and harder. Release came, but the cry was of agony, not affirmation. She subsided into the bed she would never share again. "How can I live without you?" The thought was so strong it had fallen from her lips before she knew it.
Y'roden buried his face in the crook of her neck, gritting his teeth to choke back a sob. "Don't say that," he pleaded, "Please Ghet.... " Lifting his head he brushed a strand of hair away from her face as his gaze met hers. "You love Galain remember, you live, love and breathe for him."
Steeling himself he clenched his jaw, "You'll never be mine, not completely. Even if something were to happen to Galain, I know you Ghet, you'd pass beyond the viel with him. Either way I'm left broken." He shook his head, "No matter how much I want you, love you, or need you, I can't have all of you."
Confusion was stirring at the back of his eyes, he hadn't known her love for him was that deep. Ghet had spent so much time telling him how Galain came first that it never occured to him how far things had gone. "You'll live, you'll go on. I'm not the one.... I'm just not the one.... It's killing me slowly, but its the awful truth."
Y'roden's words drove the blade right in, twisted it, and she began to weep, hard, clinging to him. She had always been so scrupulously honest with him about her feelings for Galain, had she forgotten to tell him how much she loved him?
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, my darling, I never meant to hurt you like that. I don't know what else I could have done. You are right. He's my soul, my life, and yes, I wouldn't live without him, I couldn't live in that much pain, it would be like being torn in half. I know that's not fair on you. And... he's not all mine, either, is he? I would die for him, but if I should go first, he would stay with Tay. I can't help but know how much he loves her. And he can't help but know, how much I love you. He hates it, but I love you so damn much I've made him live with that. It's only because... I love you so much, and I know I make you miserable, that I can bear this at all."
Y'roden didn't know what to say, the pain was overwhelming, and for once he didn't revel in it. He held her quietly for awhile, the sound of his own heartbeat deafening him.
"There is the truth of it then," he whispered, "Nothing can change, if I stay it is just an enternity of hell for us both, and leaving gives us the same gift."
He didn't want to let go, he so desperatly wanted to just never let her go. But reality said he had too, reality said he was a fool. "I'm so sorry Ghet, I should have stayed away all those years ago when you asked me too. I've put us both in an impossible position." He caught his breath and closed his eyes, "Yet I can't make myself regret a moment of it.... "
She had submitted, without protest, to what she thought inevitable. It was, it always had been, but she would not go down without a fight. It would uselessly make it harder for both of them, it was already done, but it was not in her to go quietly. "I don't want it. I never wanted you to leave me be, if I did I could have made you. I just wanted you to know, that if you needed to leave, you could. And now I just want to make you stay."
She took his hand, and placed it on her stomach, where the chain of symbols encircled her navel. She had lost Chase, now she had lost Y'roden, the thought occured that she could just as easily and suddenly lose Galain, and a wave of pure panic rushed through her. That was the truth of it. She could not help that she feared that loss more, she must let him go, no matter how much it tore at her. Selfish in the depths of her need, she clawed her bond back open, blindly seeking comfort, though she would not try to communicate.
She gave a heavy sigh. She could never take his symbol from her skin. That would be the least of her permanent reminders. The pain was a long way from over. Her voice shook when she spoke. "The fragment... can you take it out?"
Words completely and utterly failed him and his features twisted for a moment. Something within him died with those words....
Lifting his hand he placed it over her chest, letting her feel the conduit in his soul one last time as it slid open. Silently he sought out the part of himself that had lived in Ghetsuhm for centuries, his safe place.... the symbol of his undying love.
Tears streamed unchecked down his face, it was the first time he had wept since before Samara took him. His spirit howled, a thousand images haunting him as he drew his very soul from the woman he had loved beyond all else. In the back of his mind he heard Samara, her laughter mocking him.
"A thousand nights and a thousand screams, but none of it can haunt me as you will haunt my dreams," he whispered.
She wasn't sure, if she had actually screamed when he took it. She wasn't sure if it had been the right thing to do, if it was even what she wanted. The sense of loss was enormous, it felt like he'd ripped out her heart.
She'd seen the deadness in his eyes, and it killed her. She would not let him reject her, misunderstand her, like that. She dragged him to her by main force, kissing at the tears he cried. "I'm sorry." How many more times could she say it? "You will love again, and I... I don't want to feel it. Maybe one day I will get far enough away to be able to be happy for you, but right now, it just eats me up. I don't want to see it, I don't want to be tied to you when it happens. You can always give it..." Oh, that was wrong, she was only saying that because she hurt so much. They had done so much damage today.
Ghet didn't have to finish the sentence, he finished it for her in his mind, and recoiled. Drawing away he sat up turning away for a moment so that only the soft sparkle of emeralds greeted her. Rising he put on his trousers, staring at the shadows that the fire threw upon the wall. His soul was more complete then it had been in centuries, but he felt more hollow at the moment then when he had been in Samara's grasp.
His eye's flickered from green to red and back again, and it was a struggle to ignore the whispering in the back of his thoughts. Shoving the Demon back in the dark recesses of his mind he turned back to Ghet.
"The last gift I can give you is a clear concience and a free heart on your wedding day," his smile was twisted, "You have my love for eternity, no matter what form it takes. If you ever need me just call." That would be a great deal more difficult now.... he couldn't feel her anymore. The life refused to come back to his eyes, but he knelt by the side of the bed to brush her hair back from her face. "I may live to regret this day... as a matter of fact, I regret it already."
Why was he doing this? She had said she wanted him to stay... but he had felt her reach for Galain. As she always did....
"Walk in the light vanimanya melda."
He couldn't do this anymore...
Rising he reached for his shirt and forced himself to head for the door. One more moment and he was sure his heart would break open and bleed...
And now she had hurt him, too much. She couldn't say she was sorry again. How could he think that this would put her heart at peace? It hadn't hurt so much since... she'd found out Galain was alive and known she was going to have to leave Y'roden. She should just let him go...
Her voice pierced the inn quite nicely. "Y'roden, no! Not like this! Don't hate me, please. Please. I love you. Don't go." She was off the bed and trying to get between him and the door.
Caught up in momentum he didn't stop in time and Ghet ended up pinned against the door. Ro looked down at her with a lost look in his eyes, the familiar feel of her body against his a torment he wasn't prepared to deal with at the moment. He placed his hands on either side of her head, flat against the door, and pushed back slightly.
"I don't hate you," he said slowly, "I couldnt' ever hate you." He shook his head, "I can't feel you anymore..."
Ghet looked up at him, knowing she was hurting both of them, and not caring. Her eyes burned with pain and anger. "Would you really want to be able to feel me? To walk away from me and make a new life and still be tied to me?" She took a deep breath and fought the anger down. "We still love each other. I don't ever seem to stop loving. Unless you're planning to start turning up to family parties and behaving like a complete ass? 'Cause that's how I got over Chase. Maybe it would be easier to part in anger, but I don't want to do that. Can't we just do right by each other?"
"You've been part of me for centuries, you'll pardon me if I don't like being cut off," his voice was unintentionally sharp, and he winced. "I'm sorry... and if I ever behave like Chase you can feel free to kill me... again."
The half-elf sighed, "I'm not angry Ghettie, I'm just don't know how to do this. I wasn't ready to part ways, I don't want to part ways. But I can't say I don't feel anything for Silverthorn either. I do... I'm not sure what it is yet, but I do. Damn it Ghet.... I've watched you leave me for Chase, I've watched you leave me for Galain. I guess I thought you would have the same patience with me."
She'd known, but it still hurt, so much, to hear him say it. Why, why wasn't she big enough to let him love someone else, to be happy for him? It had been different with Summerlin, because she was married to Chase, and their relationship was impossible, anyway.
But still... gently, she said, "That's not fair. I was married to Chase before I met you. When I bonded to Galain, you were... away. I know that I have always hurt you, because I loved others, and you know, that's always hurt me. I guess, I'd just got used to having you around. I let myself think, maybe, that I could have you... forever. And now it's come to this. I think, a few years ago, this would have been easier, before... I let myself hope. I wish I could just be happy for you, I wish I could let you hold on to me until you were ready to let go. But, I don't think you really want to do that to me, do you?"
He didn't, he didn't want to put her through the hell. It would be worse then the hell she was in now. "No," he said firmly, "I don't." Taking her gently by the shoulders he moved her away from the door. He kissed her then, slowly, softly. "I love you Ghet. I'm not angry, and we will get through this, somehow. Someday. You're right, I can't hold on to you, I can't put you through it."
He held her gaze, finding the strength somewhere in his shattered soul to do it. "Arminiea drilled it into my head while I was training with her, nothing lasts forever. Nothing shines eternally, there must be change if anything is to grow." He cupped her face with his hand and brushed his thumb over her cheek. "I'm walking out that door now, because if I don't I never will."
He was gone before she could protest, shutting the door firmly behind him and refusing to look back. Part of him was lost forever back in that room, and the demon nipped at his heels. Someday he would be able to look her in the eyes again, but for now he needed distance.... and time.
She held herself back, and let him go, because she knew he needed to. She gave him a moment to get out of range, then let out an anguished howl. She dropped to the ground in front of the fire and gave vent to the intense pain.
Feanya yanwe lyaa hilde - My spirit joined yours forever
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