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portalling) wrote2022-04-02 01:17 pm
portalling) wrote2022-04-02 01:17 pm
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No, not here. [Tav replies as he switches hands and repeats the process. As before, most of the blister dries down, but there are still sections filled with fluid and the exhaustion weighs him further down.] Back home, I'd be able to wake someone unconscious; broken bones were little worry.
[He flexes his fingers, simply allowing the turquoise light to curl along them before he tentatively reaches out for Strange.] Do you have a cut or bruise? So you could feel it?
[Tav is deeply aware of his reputation in the Riftwatch, but he hopes Strange will trust him enough to heal a small wound.]
[He flexes his fingers, simply allowing the turquoise light to curl along them before he tentatively reaches out for Strange.] Do you have a cut or bruise? So you could feel it?
[Tav is deeply aware of his reputation in the Riftwatch, but he hopes Strange will trust him enough to heal a small wound.]
“Oh, no, it’s,” Strange hesitates, “it’s very good. I’ll probably have Ellie take her own crack at the handwashing thing, I expect she might have seen some similar signs so she’ll know what I’m after, but your scale is… it’s…”
He finally admits defeat. Hell, it’s better than what he’d be able to do, so— Now standing as close as he is, the Head Healer just picks up the stiff canvas and moves it over atop a cabinet, propping it against the wall as a preview of what it might look like mounted.
“Yes. See? Very good. Excellent job. We’ll get that mounted properly and put up for the healers’ use and reference. Thank you, Edgard.”
( It’s on the wiki now. That means it’s official™. )
He finally admits defeat. Hell, it’s better than what he’d be able to do, so— Now standing as close as he is, the Head Healer just picks up the stiff canvas and moves it over atop a cabinet, propping it against the wall as a preview of what it might look like mounted.
“Yes. See? Very good. Excellent job. We’ll get that mounted properly and put up for the healers’ use and reference. Thank you, Edgard.”
( It’s on the wiki now. That means it’s official™. )
[ Strange eyes that outstretched hand; the mistrust isn’t for Tav’s capabilities in particular, but a general aloofness to begin with, a stiff personal bubble stretching some five feet across. The sorcerer isn’t too approachable, and so people rarely encroach on him. ]
No,
[ he says, although there’s a lingering unspoken but to that sentence. He’s seen the limitations now: several attempts and it couldn’t fully heal a fresh rope burn, so it won’t be a magical fix-all. He’s loath to get into it; but isn’t he obligated to at least mention it, just in case? So, Strange holds up one hand for Tav’s inspection: even now, it shakes and quivers as he tries to hold still. There are old, ugly scars scrawled down the length of his fingers, carved into the backs of his knuckles. ]
Just this. It’s long-healed, a few years back, so I doubt you could do anything about it now. Maybe if it had been at the time.
[ And if the elf had his full powers. If, if, if. The limitations in Thedas are a perpetual annoyance. ]
No,
[ he says, although there’s a lingering unspoken but to that sentence. He’s seen the limitations now: several attempts and it couldn’t fully heal a fresh rope burn, so it won’t be a magical fix-all. He’s loath to get into it; but isn’t he obligated to at least mention it, just in case? So, Strange holds up one hand for Tav’s inspection: even now, it shakes and quivers as he tries to hold still. There are old, ugly scars scrawled down the length of his fingers, carved into the backs of his knuckles. ]
Just this. It’s long-healed, a few years back, so I doubt you could do anything about it now. Maybe if it had been at the time.
[ And if the elf had his full powers. If, if, if. The limitations in Thedas are a perpetual annoyance. ]
[ The voice gets smaller and then louder as Tav paces back and forth, meaning Strange has to strain to hear the details and then isn’t quite sure he heard them correctly to begin with. You’re a healer, you could remove it! ]
Wait, are you—
Did you just say you have a multi-planal tadpole in your brain?
Wait, are you—
Did you just say you have a multi-planal tadpole in your brain?
[Tav immediately pulls his hand back. He knows he's not everyone's cup of tea and would rather keep his friendship with Strange intact than try to prove something.
However he peers at Strange's scars and frowns at them. They look a bit like the ones on his face and neck from beating against glass to escape his pod. Did... no it's impossible.]
I can't heal scars. [Tav admits quietly.] Else I'd not have these on my face. Came from striking glass.
[His last sentence is heavily weighted.]
However he peers at Strange's scars and frowns at them. They look a bit like the ones on his face and neck from beating against glass to escape his pod. Did... no it's impossible.]
I can't heal scars. [Tav admits quietly.] Else I'd not have these on my face. Came from striking glass.
[His last sentence is heavily weighted.]
I did, at least. I haven't felt it move since arriving. But it would affect me in the Astral Plane as much as the Material Plane.
[More pacing.]
If it can cross those-- and the Infernal Plane, fuck that's three-- it could... do you think? It's buried deep in there, either way.
[More pacing.]
If it can cross those-- and the Infernal Plane, fuck that's three-- it could... do you think? It's buried deep in there, either way.
Edited 2024-03-26 20:36 (UTC)
It's late, when they finally find each other.
The Gallows — quieted, again, as much as it ever is. Their returned comrades cared for, the envy demons puddled into unpleasant ends, the urgency of it all slowed down to the not-quite-peace of recovery. Gwenaëlle vaguely remembers managing to eat something, but that's a distant memory, too, by the time Stephen is joining her on La Souveraineté. She's stowed her weapons (including sword, reclaimed from Vanya at the infirmary), peeled out of a dress that she has no especial desire now to wear again in favour of a robe, and with the thought in mind that he had woken up eating her hair she's sat at her vanity, working it into two neat braids. They'd been talking, a bit, but she's starting to lose the thread of her own stream of consciousness,
and catching sight of him, face down, in the mirror.
Midway through a thought that might have been something like, I don't think you should feel too badly about not knowing, I should have noticed in Halamshiral, she lets it trail into nothing and turns on the low stool, watching for longer than she needs to the slow and steady rise and fall of his breathing, Small Yngvi's big yellow eyes slowly opening where he has nestled himself in the small of Stephen's back.
Some lingering consternation melts, and she says, “I hope you don't think you're staying there,” severely, as she discards the idea of waking him up again in favour of abandoning the vanity, snuffing out the remaining lamp and sliding into the bed beside him. It isn't necessary to dislodge Small Yngvi in the process, but she does, and she's barely lain down but she's asleep, too, breathing evening out into something approaching peace.
When Stephen wakes,
she has been awake for a while, probably, to judge by the clear, alert gaze with which she is placidly watching him, her knee bent over his waist and her foot on the other side of his hip, her chin in her hand and her weight on her elbow.
(Small Yngvi is on half of his pillow.)
The Gallows — quieted, again, as much as it ever is. Their returned comrades cared for, the envy demons puddled into unpleasant ends, the urgency of it all slowed down to the not-quite-peace of recovery. Gwenaëlle vaguely remembers managing to eat something, but that's a distant memory, too, by the time Stephen is joining her on La Souveraineté. She's stowed her weapons (including sword, reclaimed from Vanya at the infirmary), peeled out of a dress that she has no especial desire now to wear again in favour of a robe, and with the thought in mind that he had woken up eating her hair she's sat at her vanity, working it into two neat braids. They'd been talking, a bit, but she's starting to lose the thread of her own stream of consciousness,
and catching sight of him, face down, in the mirror.
Midway through a thought that might have been something like, I don't think you should feel too badly about not knowing, I should have noticed in Halamshiral, she lets it trail into nothing and turns on the low stool, watching for longer than she needs to the slow and steady rise and fall of his breathing, Small Yngvi's big yellow eyes slowly opening where he has nestled himself in the small of Stephen's back.
Some lingering consternation melts, and she says, “I hope you don't think you're staying there,” severely, as she discards the idea of waking him up again in favour of abandoning the vanity, snuffing out the remaining lamp and sliding into the bed beside him. It isn't necessary to dislodge Small Yngvi in the process, but she does, and she's barely lain down but she's asleep, too, breathing evening out into something approaching peace.
When Stephen wakes,
she has been awake for a while, probably, to judge by the clear, alert gaze with which she is placidly watching him, her knee bent over his waist and her foot on the other side of his hip, her chin in her hand and her weight on her elbow.
(Small Yngvi is on half of his pillow.)
There had been lofty and ambitious intentions of doing far more interesting things with their evening, at first, looking forward to it with that heady selfish rush of two people still eager to explore new territory. But at some point throughout the long hours of crisis, wanting to yank off Gwenaëlle’s clothes had eventually turned to just wanting to talk to her,
then, eventually, just wanting to see her,
until it was merely enough to be in the same room, while she braided her hair and they talked through the remains of the day. His voice from the bed had quieted and quieted throughout the conversation, his answers drifting and turning from full sentences into unintelligible Mmhms before eventually into: nothing, just silence and perhaps an ignoble snore, sheer exhaustion dragging him under.
And he finally wakes the next morning, face still buried in the pillows as if he hasn’t moved all night, black-and-grey hair tousled and standing up at odd angles, wavier than usual. There was no particular sound to wake him except for the unmistakable crawling sensation of being watched. Stephen tilts his chin, cracks an eye open; he makes a muffled noise of surprise, and it’s uncertain whether it’s at Small Yngvi practically sitting on his head or at Gwenaëlle’s watchful fey stare looming unexpectedly close to his face (both, it’s both). He stirs slightly, but winds up pinned in place, her ankle digging in to keep him immobile.
“Hi,” he says, drowsy and fond, and, “Good morning.”
then, eventually, just wanting to see her,
until it was merely enough to be in the same room, while she braided her hair and they talked through the remains of the day. His voice from the bed had quieted and quieted throughout the conversation, his answers drifting and turning from full sentences into unintelligible Mmhms before eventually into: nothing, just silence and perhaps an ignoble snore, sheer exhaustion dragging him under.
And he finally wakes the next morning, face still buried in the pillows as if he hasn’t moved all night, black-and-grey hair tousled and standing up at odd angles, wavier than usual. There was no particular sound to wake him except for the unmistakable crawling sensation of being watched. Stephen tilts his chin, cracks an eye open; he makes a muffled noise of surprise, and it’s uncertain whether it’s at Small Yngvi practically sitting on his head or at Gwenaëlle’s watchful fey stare looming unexpectedly close to his face (both, it’s both). He stirs slightly, but winds up pinned in place, her ankle digging in to keep him immobile.
“Hi,” he says, drowsy and fond, and, “Good morning.”
Affection threads through her echoed, “Good morning to you, too,” any disappointment she'd felt at the slow-moving crash of exhaustion unraveling whatever they'd hoped for their evening effectively dissipated by how very, very good it is, actually, just being together. Enough, then, to be comfortable and comforted by curling up together, easing into familiarity like heavenly bodies with patterns of orbit, into and out of reach.
It's given her time to think, though. Turning over the remains of the chaos; considering their own conversations. How much about her is known, broadly and to him, and how much of himself she has been patient and watchful for and still doesn't know—
She starts to move. It is not, in fact, to let him roll over or get up; she follows her ankle with her knee and sprawls lazily on his back, chin against his shoulder, one of her slowly unraveling braids falling to his upper arm as she insinuates herself into a position that is not unpleasant (her shift is thin silk, warmed by her body, slippery between her breasts and hips and his back) if sort of heavy and not immediately easy to extricate from, “It occurred to me this morning that if I'd asked you the sort of personal questions we were all using to test each other that I wouldn't have known nearly as many of the answers as you do, reversed.”
It's not not a test, that she leaves that hanging instead of continuing down the obvious path of so cough it up, Stephen.
It's given her time to think, though. Turning over the remains of the chaos; considering their own conversations. How much about her is known, broadly and to him, and how much of himself she has been patient and watchful for and still doesn't know—
She starts to move. It is not, in fact, to let him roll over or get up; she follows her ankle with her knee and sprawls lazily on his back, chin against his shoulder, one of her slowly unraveling braids falling to his upper arm as she insinuates herself into a position that is not unpleasant (her shift is thin silk, warmed by her body, slippery between her breasts and hips and his back) if sort of heavy and not immediately easy to extricate from, “It occurred to me this morning that if I'd asked you the sort of personal questions we were all using to test each other that I wouldn't have known nearly as many of the answers as you do, reversed.”
It's not not a test, that she leaves that hanging instead of continuing down the obvious path of so cough it up, Stephen.
He lets loose a small exhaled oof, Gwenaëlle’s weight (slight but not nothing) pressing some air out of his lungs. It’s like having a weighted blanket, and so, still quite nice and oddly soothing, even with his chin pressed into the mattress and her hair ticklish across his bare skin.
This is a lot to be bombarded with, when she’s clear-eyed and alert and has the advantage of him and he’s still sleep-addled, but:
“What?” Stephen asks, slowly coming awake. “That’s… absurd. You know everything that matters about me.”
— does she, though? He’s starting to wrack his mind to recall details before there’s a thoughtful pause, then an amendment, “You know more about me than anyone else here. But I can… What would you like? My middle name’s Vincent.”
(Small pieces of trivia, innocent factoids, I wanted to be a guitarist. He’s always been incredibly open with her about his life as a sorcerer, the pivot from surgery to sorcery, but there are long gaps and swathes on that canvas which remain blank. The earliest years, in particular.)
This is a lot to be bombarded with, when she’s clear-eyed and alert and has the advantage of him and he’s still sleep-addled, but:
“What?” Stephen asks, slowly coming awake. “That’s… absurd. You know everything that matters about me.”
— does she, though? He’s starting to wrack his mind to recall details before there’s a thoughtful pause, then an amendment, “You know more about me than anyone else here. But I can… What would you like? My middle name’s Vincent.”
(Small pieces of trivia, innocent factoids, I wanted to be a guitarist. He’s always been incredibly open with her about his life as a sorcerer, the pivot from surgery to sorcery, but there are long gaps and swathes on that canvas which remain blank. The earliest years, in particular.)
It will be very funny, at some point, to tell him that hers is Clothilde. For a moment, she's tempted, but: no. Save that for a time when being derailed by the absurdity of rescuing him from Lady Clothilde won't get in the way of what she wants to do right now, which is interrogate him to her satisfaction—
there was a time in her life that the realisation she'd come to would have frightened her into silence, instead. When she'd have lain beside him agonising over the imaginary reasons he might, secretly, not wish her to know all of those things. She isn't seeking comfort for that part of her when she briskly brushes it aside to just ask, but it is reassuring, his bewilderment, his immediate willingness. Of course she must know these things. Absurd that she doesn't. Where would she like to start.
Gwenaëlle presses a kiss to the back of his neck, undone by fondness, and has to take a moment to decide what she would like. Even though it's obvious, really, because always you start at the beginning if you're going to start anywhere, probably,
“You know about my mothers,” she says, “I've mentioned my sisters.” One of them. “Tell me about your farm, before you were insufferable nouveau riche. Who was there?”
there was a time in her life that the realisation she'd come to would have frightened her into silence, instead. When she'd have lain beside him agonising over the imaginary reasons he might, secretly, not wish her to know all of those things. She isn't seeking comfort for that part of her when she briskly brushes it aside to just ask, but it is reassuring, his bewilderment, his immediate willingness. Of course she must know these things. Absurd that she doesn't. Where would she like to start.
Gwenaëlle presses a kiss to the back of his neck, undone by fondness, and has to take a moment to decide what she would like. Even though it's obvious, really, because always you start at the beginning if you're going to start anywhere, probably,
“You know about my mothers,” she says, “I've mentioned my sisters.” One of them. “Tell me about your farm, before you were insufferable nouveau riche. Who was there?”
Edited 2024-03-27 23:29 (UTC)
Had he not said? Surely he must have said, or mentioned, at some point—
But try as he might, combing back through his considerably accurate memory, Stephen can’t remember breathing his family’s names even once, in the year-and-a-half that he’s been here. It’s an unsettling realisation to have about himself when it’s not something that he did on purpose, just— it was a black hole in his history that he had automatically and unconsciously walked around, skirted, avoided.
He buries his face in the mattress more fully, temporarily holding his breath and not breathing. Just anchoring himself in this: the physical sensation, the warmth of Gwenaëlle’s lips against the nape of his neck, the heat and weight of her sprawled over all of his limbs.
Perhaps it’s a little easier this way, to speak without looking her in the eye, without having to gauge and watch her expressions at the same time as he peels back the layers, picks at the scabs. He readjusts slightly as he comes up for air again, drawing both arms up to fold his forearms beneath his chin, shoulderblades stretching and rippling beneath her. (There’s an offended mrowl from Small Yngvi, before the cat settles again.)
“Besides all the barnyard animals,” said dryly, obfuscating, he’s never actually realised until this moment how very much he obfuscates this exact topic and so she probably has a point,
“A father, a mother, a younger sister and brother. Eugene, Beverly,” there is the briefest pause before the next set of names, “Donna and Victor. Despite the surname, we Stranges were all tremendously, horrendously normal. No millionaire inheritance, no secret ancestral magic, no being bitten by radioactive spiders and granted superpowers. Just a lot of cow dung and hard work and early mornings and fire-and-brimstone church sermons on Sundays. Closed-minded. Pastoral.”
Some people might say pastoral with a touch of dreamy nostalgia, a longing for a simple rural existence; Gwenaëlle can hear the faint bitter derision in it instead. Closed-minded.
But try as he might, combing back through his considerably accurate memory, Stephen can’t remember breathing his family’s names even once, in the year-and-a-half that he’s been here. It’s an unsettling realisation to have about himself when it’s not something that he did on purpose, just— it was a black hole in his history that he had automatically and unconsciously walked around, skirted, avoided.
He buries his face in the mattress more fully, temporarily holding his breath and not breathing. Just anchoring himself in this: the physical sensation, the warmth of Gwenaëlle’s lips against the nape of his neck, the heat and weight of her sprawled over all of his limbs.
Perhaps it’s a little easier this way, to speak without looking her in the eye, without having to gauge and watch her expressions at the same time as he peels back the layers, picks at the scabs. He readjusts slightly as he comes up for air again, drawing both arms up to fold his forearms beneath his chin, shoulderblades stretching and rippling beneath her. (There’s an offended mrowl from Small Yngvi, before the cat settles again.)
“Besides all the barnyard animals,” said dryly, obfuscating, he’s never actually realised until this moment how very much he obfuscates this exact topic and so she probably has a point,
“A father, a mother, a younger sister and brother. Eugene, Beverly,” there is the briefest pause before the next set of names, “Donna and Victor. Despite the surname, we Stranges were all tremendously, horrendously normal. No millionaire inheritance, no secret ancestral magic, no being bitten by radioactive spiders and granted superpowers. Just a lot of cow dung and hard work and early mornings and fire-and-brimstone church sermons on Sundays. Closed-minded. Pastoral.”
Some people might say pastoral with a touch of dreamy nostalgia, a longing for a simple rural existence; Gwenaëlle can hear the faint bitter derision in it instead. Closed-minded.
Gwenaëlle has leaned one arm, similarly, underneath herself (on top of him), and her other hand rests lightly on his elbow, her cheek against his bare skin as she settles to listen, to let him work through it if not perfectly in his own time then not outright rushed, now that he's sketching the picture of it for her. Eugene, Beverly, Donna, Victor. The origin, she supposes as well, of some skills and knowledge that must have been proving more useful to him in Thedas than in New York—
Nothing he had missed about living that life. It catches her ear, the disdain — she thinks about how much he sounds like Stark, often, who had certainly not come from a life like that, about his fastidiousness and his appreciation of fine things. Crass new money, he had said, unabashed about it. How extremely willing he'd been to let her dress him up like a handsome doll when they'd barely known each other, shrugging into the finest version of himself available to him here,
yes. It isn't familiar, exactly, but she thinks wryly that he's not far wrong, you know everything that matters. He isn't telling her things that change him. He is a man she understands.
It also isn't the only part of what he says that catches her, tracing circles on his arm with her thumb. We were, when he was a part of them. Fair. But it's a telling past tense, she thinks, when nothing about his framing suggests that they had shed that life the way he has, and after a moment,
“What happened to them?”
Maybe she's wrong. Maybe he'll say, my sister married some hick and my brother became one, or I could have introduced you in New York but they wouldn't have been real or—
Nothing he had missed about living that life. It catches her ear, the disdain — she thinks about how much he sounds like Stark, often, who had certainly not come from a life like that, about his fastidiousness and his appreciation of fine things. Crass new money, he had said, unabashed about it. How extremely willing he'd been to let her dress him up like a handsome doll when they'd barely known each other, shrugging into the finest version of himself available to him here,
yes. It isn't familiar, exactly, but she thinks wryly that he's not far wrong, you know everything that matters. He isn't telling her things that change him. He is a man she understands.
It also isn't the only part of what he says that catches her, tracing circles on his arm with her thumb. We were, when he was a part of them. Fair. But it's a telling past tense, she thinks, when nothing about his framing suggests that they had shed that life the way he has, and after a moment,
“What happened to them?”
Maybe she's wrong. Maybe he'll say, my sister married some hick and my brother became one, or I could have introduced you in New York but they wouldn't have been real or—
“They’re all dead,” Stephen says, as cleanly as he can, with the same kind of brutal matter-of-factness that Gwenaëlle employs so often.
This, too, is a thing they have in common: the steady loss across their family tree. And she’s clever; she’d already deduced the shape of it. He’s always very clinical and purposeful with his choice of words.
There’s another exhaled sigh. His next lead-in is a vague aim at flippancy and faint gallow’s humour, but it’s a thin attempt. “Also nothing extraordinary. No tragic murders, no supervillains seeking vengeance; it happened while I was in training for neurosurgery, years before I became a sorcerer. Our parents were elderly, so it was just inevitable, those run-of-the-mill incurable diseases like cancers and kidney failures. Victor was hit by a car.”
Banal, everyday, horrible.
The worst one comes last, and there’s another palpable hesitation here; he’s so very unaccustomed to speaking about this, to baring this part of himself, like prying open the cover to a pocketwatch and seeing all his cogs and moving gears open and vulnerable to view. The last person he said this to was in fact himself—
“Donna was just a kid,” he says, and that’s the real sorrow in it. “Ten years old. I was twelve. We were playing at a lake nearby, which we often did. She was a good swimmer but she got a cramp and drowned. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know CPR at the time. Water in the lungs, such a goddamned fixable— It’s what made me decide to be a doctor.”
Which hadn’t, however, helped at all with the other three either. But it does continue to flesh out the shape of him: the control issues, the urge to play god, the hand that wants to hold the knife.
This, too, is a thing they have in common: the steady loss across their family tree. And she’s clever; she’d already deduced the shape of it. He’s always very clinical and purposeful with his choice of words.
There’s another exhaled sigh. His next lead-in is a vague aim at flippancy and faint gallow’s humour, but it’s a thin attempt. “Also nothing extraordinary. No tragic murders, no supervillains seeking vengeance; it happened while I was in training for neurosurgery, years before I became a sorcerer. Our parents were elderly, so it was just inevitable, those run-of-the-mill incurable diseases like cancers and kidney failures. Victor was hit by a car.”
Banal, everyday, horrible.
The worst one comes last, and there’s another palpable hesitation here; he’s so very unaccustomed to speaking about this, to baring this part of himself, like prying open the cover to a pocketwatch and seeing all his cogs and moving gears open and vulnerable to view. The last person he said this to was in fact himself—
“Donna was just a kid,” he says, and that’s the real sorrow in it. “Ten years old. I was twelve. We were playing at a lake nearby, which we often did. She was a good swimmer but she got a cramp and drowned. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know CPR at the time. Water in the lungs, such a goddamned fixable— It’s what made me decide to be a doctor.”
Which hadn’t, however, helped at all with the other three either. But it does continue to flesh out the shape of him: the control issues, the urge to play god, the hand that wants to hold the knife.
Ordinary deaths at the end of ordinary lives, and it doesn't feel like that would be better, truly. Particularly not for a physician, spurred to his calling by a brutal loss, only for more to slip through his fingers before they'd gnarled with pain and time and the enemies he's since made for himself. She thinks fleetingly of Abby and her Lev, or Morrigan unwilling to see Kieran housed in the Gallows for anything, but it's different again: he had been a child, too.
This time, when she presses a kiss to the nearest patch of skin she stays there for a moment, quiet and warm, offering the sort of tactile comfort that is most familiar to her and easiest to reach for— when saying something is hard, and crafting something that probably will still feel wildly insufficient takes time, she can just be near. She can do that.
“I'm sorry,” she says, finally, because it's true. For the loss; for the echo of responsibility he hasn't shaken off. Donna Strange's life could have been longer and it wasn't. And, the same stubbornness shaded into her care that had prompted her to tell Clarisse in so many words, you're worth coming back for, “These are things that matter, too, Stephen.”
The shape of him, she has; shading in the empty space where something has always been, though.
This time, when she presses a kiss to the nearest patch of skin she stays there for a moment, quiet and warm, offering the sort of tactile comfort that is most familiar to her and easiest to reach for— when saying something is hard, and crafting something that probably will still feel wildly insufficient takes time, she can just be near. She can do that.
“I'm sorry,” she says, finally, because it's true. For the loss; for the echo of responsibility he hasn't shaken off. Donna Strange's life could have been longer and it wasn't. And, the same stubbornness shaded into her care that had prompted her to tell Clarisse in so many words, you're worth coming back for, “These are things that matter, too, Stephen.”
The shape of him, she has; shading in the empty space where something has always been, though.
It is so much better, with her touch and presence saying what her words can’t. Because even with Gwenaëlle, this person most precious to him in all of Thedas, he doesn’t want to see if there’s a ripple of pity or shared grief across her expression, or for her to see whatever his face is doing now (is it wounded? is it too cold and callous and not wounded enough?).
But all things considered, it’s the world’s most benign interrogation. Any innocent question to Gwenaëlle had always led to her giving him more than he’d expected, all her most gruesome details in a row; whereas she has to dig in a little harder, rattle it loose from him, until his history comes spilling loose in neat recitation. It’s like dislodging a stubborn boulder, slowly rolling it away.
These are things that matter, too, is such a simple statement and yet the simplicity of it almost undoes him. There’s a hollow ache in his chest, for a wound so old and worn and rarely-travelled. For how methodically Stephen Strange has excised this part of himself, carving it out like a tumour.
“They’re long-dead, and it happened in another universe, multiple lifetimes ago,” he says, which isn’t technically true but she gets the spirit.
Slowly, as he works through it aloud: “I know I can be habitually secretive; annoyingly so. I don’t mean to be, at least not with you. But it just… it’s like I buried that part of my life. It became irrelevant. Does that make any sense? The sorcerer is barely recognisable as the surgeon I was, and in turn he’s unrecognisable from the farmboy. I left it behind and then I consciously, purposefully, worked very hard to not be that person anymore. I haven’t spoken of them in years.”
It’s not that it’s Gwenaëlle he resisted speaking to, in short.
But all things considered, it’s the world’s most benign interrogation. Any innocent question to Gwenaëlle had always led to her giving him more than he’d expected, all her most gruesome details in a row; whereas she has to dig in a little harder, rattle it loose from him, until his history comes spilling loose in neat recitation. It’s like dislodging a stubborn boulder, slowly rolling it away.
These are things that matter, too, is such a simple statement and yet the simplicity of it almost undoes him. There’s a hollow ache in his chest, for a wound so old and worn and rarely-travelled. For how methodically Stephen Strange has excised this part of himself, carving it out like a tumour.
“They’re long-dead, and it happened in another universe, multiple lifetimes ago,” he says, which isn’t technically true but she gets the spirit.
Slowly, as he works through it aloud: “I know I can be habitually secretive; annoyingly so. I don’t mean to be, at least not with you. But it just… it’s like I buried that part of my life. It became irrelevant. Does that make any sense? The sorcerer is barely recognisable as the surgeon I was, and in turn he’s unrecognisable from the farmboy. I left it behind and then I consciously, purposefully, worked very hard to not be that person anymore. I haven’t spoken of them in years.”
It’s not that it’s Gwenaëlle he resisted speaking to, in short.
Despite herself, she hears an echo — but of something she has yet to look in the face, and this moment isn't about her, so it's actually very reasonable of her to keep repressing that, this isn't the time to unpack it, a thing that she never intends to unpack. She sets that aside, and sinks into what he's telling her, absorbs the slow impact of wishing that it wasn't something that made so much sense.
She understands well enough to wish he didn't. It's hard not to only say that, and she's so close to him that he can almost feel against his skin the way her lips purse, holding something in,
“I know a little of reinvention,” she says, finally. Slower, and less deliberate, but: “All the things I told you— when I was first taken to the Inquisition, I thought I'd die if anyone knew them. And the worst things that I had ever imagined happening kept happening, and I kept surviving them,”
and no one can hurt her with the truth if she wears it boldly, she thinks, and sometimes it's true and sometimes it isn't. But,
slowly,
“You don't have to do as I do. I only— I want to be a place for you that's safe. Like you are. For me. I don't mind prising it out of you a little if you don't mind me doing it.”
She understands well enough to wish he didn't. It's hard not to only say that, and she's so close to him that he can almost feel against his skin the way her lips purse, holding something in,
“I know a little of reinvention,” she says, finally. Slower, and less deliberate, but: “All the things I told you— when I was first taken to the Inquisition, I thought I'd die if anyone knew them. And the worst things that I had ever imagined happening kept happening, and I kept surviving them,”
and no one can hurt her with the truth if she wears it boldly, she thinks, and sometimes it's true and sometimes it isn't. But,
slowly,
“You don't have to do as I do. I only— I want to be a place for you that's safe. Like you are. For me. I don't mind prising it out of you a little if you don't mind me doing it.”
He swallows. One of his crossed arms fumbles a little, reaching out for her hand where she’s touching his other elbow: his fingers just lightly grazing her knuckles.
“I don’t mind at all. And I’d like that very much. I need… I’ve always needed people to challenge me.” Which explains a lot about why he likes Gwenaëlle in particular.
There are other, worse angles to this story, the shame that twists Stephen’s gut. He’s too aware that the pieces he’s doled out so far make him sound very brave and noble and responsible: the self-flagellating young boy who embarked on a lifelong quest to save lives, driven by tragedy. It’s not even getting into the twisted arrogance that his career became once he’d lost the plot, forgotten what he was there for.
But if they’re really truly going to know each other—
“And so that you’re not… misled,” Stephen says, halting, “and I’m not cherrypicking the bits that sound best. I would like you to know the ugliest parts of me. While we’re on the topic. Since I don’t know when else I’d mention it.”
“I don’t mind at all. And I’d like that very much. I need… I’ve always needed people to challenge me.” Which explains a lot about why he likes Gwenaëlle in particular.
There are other, worse angles to this story, the shame that twists Stephen’s gut. He’s too aware that the pieces he’s doled out so far make him sound very brave and noble and responsible: the self-flagellating young boy who embarked on a lifelong quest to save lives, driven by tragedy. It’s not even getting into the twisted arrogance that his career became once he’d lost the plot, forgotten what he was there for.
But if they’re really truly going to know each other—
“And so that you’re not… misled,” Stephen says, halting, “and I’m not cherrypicking the bits that sound best. I would like you to know the ugliest parts of me. While we’re on the topic. Since I don’t know when else I’d mention it.”
“...ouais,” after a moment, a slow exhale through her nose that isn't quite a sigh, “yes. In that case—”
she doesn't have to do this, and they're talking about him, and
“—there are things I would like to say, too.” Gwenaëlle is less under any illusion that Stephen views her as particularly flawless or heroic, but he has seen ... a better, maybe the best, version of who she is. She knows the difficult path to where they're standing more intimately than she suspects it entirely appears, sometimes, as ready as he often is to credit her with the best of his pivots in Riftwatch.
And, yes, sure, but.
“But I talk all the time,” she adds, “so you're going first.”
So there.
she doesn't have to do this, and they're talking about him, and
“—there are things I would like to say, too.” Gwenaëlle is less under any illusion that Stephen views her as particularly flawless or heroic, but he has seen ... a better, maybe the best, version of who she is. She knows the difficult path to where they're standing more intimately than she suspects it entirely appears, sometimes, as ready as he often is to credit her with the best of his pivots in Riftwatch.
And, yes, sure, but.
“But I talk all the time,” she adds, “so you're going first.”
So there.
Even in the middle of this godawful conversation, that comment makes him laugh, unexpectedly— and so his back heaves beneath her with that breath, Gwenaëlle rising and falling atop him. (Still an odd sensation, although not quite so much as when he was inside her at the time.)
Once Stephen settles, he starts talking. “You mentioned your mother’s deathbed as she slowly died. You mentioned patching up your father when he was drunk, looking after him.” Gwenaëlle Baudin, the dutiful daughter. He takes another deep breath, as if he’s preparing to rip off a band-aid, and continues:
“I was on the other side of the country when they fell ill. Victor was the one left at home alone, both looking after the farm and then taking care of our parents as each of them… deteriorated. Our mother died first, then two years later our father was going the same way. Victor begged me to come home, to visit, to say goodbye, but I kept making excuse after excuse. My studies, I said. My work was too important.
“But in reality, I just didn’t want to see it happening. I was selfish, didn’t want to watch them slowly die when there was nothing I could do to fix it. I told myself there wouldn’t be any point. I never went home. He came out to New York after, furious; we fought, we argued about it. He stormed out of my apartment. That’s when he got hit by the car.”
It’s not quite as simple as declaring it’s my fault — he’s aware enough of all the different pieces of causality, it’s not like he directly shoved Victor into the street — but there is some of that guilt writhing inside him still. If only they hadn’t argued quite so viciously. Then Victor wouldn’t have been so upset, so careless, when he ran out into Manhattan traffic.
And that atop all the other unsaid goodbyes.
Once Stephen settles, he starts talking. “You mentioned your mother’s deathbed as she slowly died. You mentioned patching up your father when he was drunk, looking after him.” Gwenaëlle Baudin, the dutiful daughter. He takes another deep breath, as if he’s preparing to rip off a band-aid, and continues:
“I was on the other side of the country when they fell ill. Victor was the one left at home alone, both looking after the farm and then taking care of our parents as each of them… deteriorated. Our mother died first, then two years later our father was going the same way. Victor begged me to come home, to visit, to say goodbye, but I kept making excuse after excuse. My studies, I said. My work was too important.
“But in reality, I just didn’t want to see it happening. I was selfish, didn’t want to watch them slowly die when there was nothing I could do to fix it. I told myself there wouldn’t be any point. I never went home. He came out to New York after, furious; we fought, we argued about it. He stormed out of my apartment. That’s when he got hit by the car.”
It’s not quite as simple as declaring it’s my fault — he’s aware enough of all the different pieces of causality, it’s not like he directly shoved Victor into the street — but there is some of that guilt writhing inside him still. If only they hadn’t argued quite so viciously. Then Victor wouldn’t have been so upset, so careless, when he ran out into Manhattan traffic.
And that atop all the other unsaid goodbyes.
It is an unexpected sucker punch,
Alix and Magalie would have been in the Greatwood, if not for her,
the way she hears fault where he stops short of ascribing it only because it's what she would do, has done, couldn't help. Less a condemnation than an acute familiarity with the guilt twisting his gut, a terrible place that she knows well. How she'd avoided falling into it, that night in Halamshiral, riding the high of her success with people who had known her sister better than she did. How easy she knows it is to be felled by, if looked at directly.
(She's never known of a certainty if Annegret had wanted her there or only taken satisfaction in holding her away from her father, afraid that if she had left her side she wouldn't be sent for— dutiful but not selfless, desperate to find love in the absence of its expression.)
“When did you stop talking about them?” she asks, quiet, sliding her fingers against his and leaving their hands there, too loosely connected to jostle his joints but close enough to make the gesture plainly purposeful.
Alix and Magalie would have been in the Greatwood, if not for her,
the way she hears fault where he stops short of ascribing it only because it's what she would do, has done, couldn't help. Less a condemnation than an acute familiarity with the guilt twisting his gut, a terrible place that she knows well. How she'd avoided falling into it, that night in Halamshiral, riding the high of her success with people who had known her sister better than she did. How easy she knows it is to be felled by, if looked at directly.
(She's never known of a certainty if Annegret had wanted her there or only taken satisfaction in holding her away from her father, afraid that if she had left her side she wouldn't be sent for— dutiful but not selfless, desperate to find love in the absence of its expression.)
“When did you stop talking about them?” she asks, quiet, sliding her fingers against his and leaving their hands there, too loosely connected to jostle his joints but close enough to make the gesture plainly purposeful.
It might be time, eventually, to roll over and carry on this conversation normally and in a way where he can see her face; but for now, this is fine. This works. And Stephen thinks for a moment, to verify when he suspects it happened, but he doesn’t have to think for very long. The answer’s right in front of him and has been all along.
“Right from the start,” he says. “When I left Nebraska as soon as I could at eighteen, and moved to New York for pre-med. For school. I even—”
this part is going to sound so laughable, the fucking meticulous lengths he’d gone to, when it’s not like he was hiding a scandalous elfblooded history or anything, it wasn’t anything that would have disastrous social consequences for him, and yet, and yet,
“I even changed my accent. Practiced it until I could fit in. Erased all traces of my past. Until hardly anyone could guess I’d come from the country and with shit on my boots.”
“Right from the start,” he says. “When I left Nebraska as soon as I could at eighteen, and moved to New York for pre-med. For school. I even—”
this part is going to sound so laughable, the fucking meticulous lengths he’d gone to, when it’s not like he was hiding a scandalous elfblooded history or anything, it wasn’t anything that would have disastrous social consequences for him, and yet, and yet,
“I even changed my accent. Practiced it until I could fit in. Erased all traces of my past. Until hardly anyone could guess I’d come from the country and with shit on my boots.”
Maybe if he'd taken her off-guard with it, she'd have had a different reaction — if there'd been no one here to compare him to, if she'd known less about all of them — maybe then she'd have found it more immediately shocking than she does, instead listening to him confirm aloud something she'd suspected, contemplatively, earlier than now. Maybe she'd have said something thoughtlessly insensitive,
although maybe not, as attuned as she is to him in this moment. What she does say is,
“It's still a part of you,” quietly, “but the ... delineation. You mark it so particularly,” sorcerer, surgeon, farmboy. “Like you were different people. But I can see...”
Her fingers trace a line from his hand along his forearm: “The connective tissue between them. How one led to the next. There are parts of you that I couldn't, mmmm, that I didn't understand how they fit. I misread you, sometimes, because of that. ” She says it with such matter of fact certainty; that she had been revising her understanding of him with unfurling context, that she can see the spaces where she guessed wrong with too little to work off of. “I'd bet,”
thoughtfully,
“at that point it was just easier to do the thing you'd been doing anyway. And close that door.”
although maybe not, as attuned as she is to him in this moment. What she does say is,
“It's still a part of you,” quietly, “but the ... delineation. You mark it so particularly,” sorcerer, surgeon, farmboy. “Like you were different people. But I can see...”
Her fingers trace a line from his hand along his forearm: “The connective tissue between them. How one led to the next. There are parts of you that I couldn't, mmmm, that I didn't understand how they fit. I misread you, sometimes, because of that. ” She says it with such matter of fact certainty; that she had been revising her understanding of him with unfurling context, that she can see the spaces where she guessed wrong with too little to work off of. “I'd bet,”
thoughtfully,
“at that point it was just easier to do the thing you'd been doing anyway. And close that door.”
Yeah, it's not something I've encountered either. But thank you. I think we've got some good ideas, and everyone will feel better if we can get this under control. Not least Tav, I assume.
That ache deepens, twists, gnarls in his chest again, his skin burning with that gentle touch trailing along his forearm. He’s never really had anyone see and acknowledge and understand all the connective tissue before; he’d never let them be privy to all the pieces.
“Exactly,” Stephen says. “And then you go through yet another door, and close that one behind you too, and you get further and further from that starting point. Intellectually, of course I’m aware that every step and every brick built led me to who I am today — and here, to you, to which I’m indescribably grateful — but it’s also…”
He’s never had to think about this part before, let alone articulate it aloud.
“I’ve been to your Hightown estate. You could theoretically show me the lake in the Greatwood where you swam. I can’t do that. It’s yet another door removed. I’ve told you about Wong because there’s a fleeting chance a version of him might show up here. But the farm in Nebraska, it’s long-gone people you’d never meet and yet another door removed, an impossibility — although I guess you did get to see Earth, sort of, in the Fade.”
And thankfully that, too, counts as the things that matter. The Sanctum, his closest thing to a home which he’d chosen and taken and made his own, his love for it seeped into every creaking floorboard.
“Exactly,” Stephen says. “And then you go through yet another door, and close that one behind you too, and you get further and further from that starting point. Intellectually, of course I’m aware that every step and every brick built led me to who I am today — and here, to you, to which I’m indescribably grateful — but it’s also…”
He’s never had to think about this part before, let alone articulate it aloud.
“I’ve been to your Hightown estate. You could theoretically show me the lake in the Greatwood where you swam. I can’t do that. It’s yet another door removed. I’ve told you about Wong because there’s a fleeting chance a version of him might show up here. But the farm in Nebraska, it’s long-gone people you’d never meet and yet another door removed, an impossibility — although I guess you did get to see Earth, sort of, in the Fade.”
And thankfully that, too, counts as the things that matter. The Sanctum, his closest thing to a home which he’d chosen and taken and made his own, his love for it seeped into every creaking floorboard.
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