@roseire asked: ❝ So sleep in your only memory of me, my dearest. ❞ | Silent Hill Lyric Starters
The dilapidated audience room was silent, empty aside from the two of them. Any grief the man would have otherwise felt at the sight of what had become of his former home was replaced with anger -- burning so intensely within his breast. It acted as kindling for the flames of hatred which threatened to consume him.
Miles -- no, Elwin would not tear his gaze away from the woman. The Holy Empire's former Empress. The scourge of Rosaria, far more devastating even than the Blight itself had been.
Beneath the collar he wore to cover it, that old scar encircling his neck began to burn too; rather than flinching or reaching up to it, his face contorted into a scowl. Lips pulled back, revealing gritted teeth. Though his head tipped slightly downward, those darkened eyes never strayed from Anabella, daring her to move or to speak.
Daring her to give him a reason to draw the dagger sheathed at his thigh, the hilt upon which one hand rested in preparation.
"You have no right to be here," the disgraced royal warned. "Not after everything you have done, Your Grace. Monster. Murderer. Snake in the grass."
Elwin stepped forward slowly. Each footfall that brought him closer to the former Duchess dredged up more and more unwanted feelings, fleeting reminders of times long dead from another life. Her words echoed within his very soul as effortlessly as they echoed throughout the walls of the throne room: So sleep in your only memory of me, my dearest.
"My memory of you has been overtaken with fire and grief. Sleep brings me no peace, no solace -- I dream only of that night, and of the faces of the dead. Ever since my liberation, do you have any idea how many of your messes I have aided in cleaning up? How many of our people -- friends, all, who looked to us for guidance and protection -- I have helped in burying after your men slaughtered them in cold blood? How many horrific stories were relayed back to us by our fellow Cursebreakers out in the field?"
The more he spoke, the more his anger mounted, and the more his voice raised until he was damn near yelling. "Auldhyl. Eastpool. Countless other villages, and still more terrified to incur your wrath lest they be next. Lives snuffed out as if they meant nothing, just like at Phoenix Gate," he snarled, and his tone was laced with venom borne of emotions that he never would have thought himself capable of. "Even our own children, their lives destroyed by your machinations. Isn't that right, Anabella? Or did you forget about them, too, when you started your new life in Sanbreque?"