You may have noticed, if you ever read this, that I did not try to set this letter on fire. Perhaps I should have. I am, after all, still pissed at you and lacking anything better to do. Still bedridden. It hasn't been all that long since my last letter, in truth.
Dante's been visiting us a lot, whenever he can spare the time. He's trying to catch everyone up on what we missed the last fifteen years. He's the only one who's been here the entire time. He never stopped writing reports, so those have been helping some when I can make out the words. Fifteen years and his writing still looks like chicken scratch. At least one thing's still the same.
He has children now. His oldest daughter is six years old. I haven't met her yet. It's hard to imagine Dante as a father when less than a week ago he was sixteen. He turned sixteen in the middle of a war and now he has a six year old daughter. And guess who the mother is? Miss Nana. I remember his cute little crush on her, I remember the way she could make him smile when the rest of us could barely get him to respond at all. They're a good match, aren't they?
She came to see us with Dante. She brought a basket of pastries like she used to bring to the barracks. She made some old favorites to welcome us home. She thought you were with us. She asked where you were.
I couldn't tell her. I couldn't utter a single word. All I could do was sit there, clutching the edge of my cot, eyes on the floor. She figured it out before anyone could explain. She apologized to our lady, and then she sat beside me and put her hand on mine and said nothing. She didn't need to.
So much has happened. Half the village moved away. Dante and Miss Nana are married with a family. All the little ones are grown up. Our little Levin is Lord of Phoenix Drop and can't walk on his own. Cadenza is Lord of Meteli. My father is dead.
For all I know, so are you. I turned back just before I went into the portal. It was only long enough for a glimpse, but I saw him run a sword through you. In your back and out your chest. Did you see me as I turned back? Was I the last thing you saw? I hope I was, if it was between me and him.
I haven't told our lady yet. I haven't told anyone. They still hope that we might be able to go back for you, or that we might be able to find some way to bring you home. I know what I saw, but there's some part of me that thinks you could have survived. If anyone could do it, you could.
I lit a candle for you. You don't know what that means. It's something we do along the Trail for lost souls. We make candles that don't burn out and when someone goes travelling we light one; Dante kept the ones he found in my bunk years ago. The flame is a part of the person the candle is for. It's supposed to guide them home, only going out when someone dies. Your candle is beside me right now. It's been burning bright since I first lit it. I want that to mean you're still alive, but for the first time in my life I'm wondering whether the candle knows. I hope it does. I want you to come home. I want to be there for you the way you were for me. The way you always have been.
My sister lit a candle for me. For fifteen years it has been burning. She wrote a letter to me when it went out. She spent half the flint she had to relight it, and cried over the page when it finally caught. Some lines are illegible, ink warped by wet spots. I haven't seen Seafarer's in writing in so long that I can't believe there was ever a time I struggled to write in anything else.
We spent countless nights transcribing my reports into something you could actually read. The night before you took the amulet from me, it was just like all those nights. Oddly enough, that night out of all the rest feels so far away. Maybe it's because of what almost happened between us that night that never did, maybe that makes it all feel a bit like a dream. Were you thinking of that night when you saw me last?
I don't know if I will ever be able to stop being angry with you. I still watch your candle burn until I fall asleep. I still miss you terribly.
Your second-in-command, Sir Laurance Zvahl of Phoenix Drop
areudirty
gamechangershow
jimmyeatworldofficial
gummygunk
izzy806
amandla
blakekathryn
2087
