Yesterday's Enemy [AoT]

ONE-HUNDRED-AND-THIRTEEN

'The future calls to those willing to listen.'

-An extract from the book 'Evolutions' written by philosopher Adette Briggs.

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ONE-HUNDRED-AND-THIRTEEN

Wall Maria, North Region, Havas, Southern Grimold, Ruins of Ingreed City

There was no way she was this close.

But there was something familiar about these streets— an eerie kind of nostalgia. Memories of the time Lorelai had spent in Ingreed came back to her all at once.

There was no way.

These weren't the same cobbled streets. These ruined buildings hadn't held the happiest nights of her life, surely. She hadn't danced and laughed down these roads, Warren's hand in hers, the moonlight steady upon them.

But, the more Lorelai walked, the more she recognised, the more she knew that somehow, unconsciously, she had returned.

The place looked so different now.

Once upon a time, Lorelai and Warren had idled their young nights away in this part of the city. They had danced and kissed until they could feel neither their feet nor their lips. The ballrooms had been large and gaudy; the music had been loud and carefree. It had all been like a dream.

And on one cold night, when the ballroom music had faded, they had skipped down these streets in their finery. The moon had watched them as Warren stole her away for the rest of the evening.

They had followed the route she now took, careless, freed by their gaiety. Back then, it hadn't mattered that the world's pressures were caving in on them. They had had each other. And that had been enough.

Times had changed.

Lorelai followed their old footsteps to the cave that often appeared in her dreams... and her nightmares.

Warren had taken her here, the cool night air on their skin, the moon above them. They had scaled the snowy cliffside of the Peaks and found themselves in an icy cave that sheltered a waterfall.

He had proposed that night.

The cave looked almost the same. The walls were that familiar deep blue of solid ice. The waterfall still rushed steadily into the depths of the cavern below.

Lorelai drew a shaky breath. What was she doing here? What was this feeling?

Regret? Longing? Grief?

Probably all three. She seated herself on the floor, pulling her cape tighter over her shoulders. And for a while, Lorelai just watched the water spill down; its low rumble was oddly comforting.

Coming to Havas had brought a thousand old emotions to the surface. She had mourned the loss of her city, rued the way Warren's life had ended, even taken it out on Erwin.

Her life had been so busy, so complicated and wrought of hardship. Every high had been accompanied by a new low. Whenever Lorelai gained, she always paid.

Tamsin. Agneta. Warren.

Their ghosts had long been laid to rest now. Lorelai had made some peace with her past.

But, in moments like these, when she was alone, she began to remember who she was and what had brought her here.

She'd spent her whole life trying to repent, to make it all better. Killing Briggs had freed her, and taking her true family name had righted the wrongs of her childhood.