itbomm

chapter 18: i've got enough on my mind at the moment

Everything before and after is a blur, but it's more than what he remembers about everything in between.

.

It starts like this:

The room is quiet, almost uncomfortably so. She breathes, abrupt and almost angry at first, only to exhale softly with a tune of fatigue. He shifts in his seat on an elegantly designed sofa that was old and worn from age. Something is different — unsettling, almost, but he can't tell what it is.

"So you're going through with this, after all," his guest states, her voice barely shaking — he didn't expect any less of her composure. Even in the face of something like that, she still retains her calmness, and a familiar sense of fondness washes over him. "Do you truly love him, so much that you would run away?"

"I am, I do," he states, and there's an apology waiting to slip out, but he bites his tongue. It would be nothing but lies, just empty words spoken for show when they both know he doesn't mean it, just as much as he knows that she has nothing been calm despite her demeanour.

"Hm. That's just like you," she grips the handle of her teacup, staring at the liquid with an entranced stare. "I don't know why I expected anything else."

"Perhaps in another life, it would've been different," he simply said, watching her take a sip of her tea. "I care about you dearly, [][][][][][], but my feelings for you are far from being lovers. You've known this for years that we wouldn't ever be more than—"

Her teacup clicks against the small plate in interruption, and she would then speak with a hardened tone of voice. He feels naïve and callous, even though it was all an agreement.

"I would destroy my family pride," she stated with a burning stare. "For you, I would do anything."

"...You know I wouldn't ask that of you."

.

Everything starts to blur afterwards:

There's an image of a desk, with a journal torn to shreds. The hints and notes — twas written haphazardly, as though the writer was in a hurry to flee.

A flash — and there was a girl with a gentle smile, in a colourless world where her life won't last for a while. She laid on her deathbed without a say, she held onto a future that only withers away.

Immediately there was a knight whose loyalty had turned, against a kingdom whose actions toward him were spurned. He shall fight to have every single one of them fall, he shall fight for the future or never at all.

She will grant him wishes or bring nightmares to fruition, to save her beloved has become her life's final mission. A magic stained red in a stone tower drawing near, and an absence of colour is the only warning to fear.

The young blacksmith stood by the fire he oft tends, who trusts that their love shall always mend. To hide away from prying eyes was what they must always abide, for their only other alternative was to be torn from each other's side.

He was a young gentleman with worries to spare, twas clear from the start that it's a love that's unfair. A love left as only unrequited will shatter weary bones, an indirect killing of a love that can never be loaned.