I just realized I never posted the other drabbles I wrote based off that clip
Aaravos was there to guide him, to give him the knife, not to force it upon him. That would just be crude. Even to touch him, to kiss him, despite being on the cusp of each others’ reality, it all depended on Viren’s consent, on the next step. He was a gentleman, after all. He watched as Viren came to terms with himself, seething with rage. I refuse this path. I’m done with dark magic, and I’m done with you.
Spittle flew from his lips as he pointed a shaking finger at Aaravos, all his rage, all his regret, poured outside of himself. Aaravos’s eyes widened, his mouth an O. Wait, he said, reproaching, his hands grazing his face. They met a turned gaze. His eyebrows furrowed. His hand could fall away, he could leave it be. What was the point of crudely forcing Viren into something he didn’t want? There was no elegance in that. No efficiency in repeated pleas to stop. He let it pass, watched him go. He came by one last time, if only to give him something to mull over, but did not conceal the pain in his eyes.
—
shoutout to tv tropes also. canon can die i am stuck before s6. I am extremely ill over this scene
ooh you still have my cube, ooh you still have my book.
yes this song is them coded and the scene must have been as well bc star - aaravos, sun - orphan queen, and moon - mutual deception :,)
semi traced but it gave me the styles i wanted so i’m not complaining. specifically looking at the drawing of aaravos in the book (pictured right), i like to imagine that sort of weird demonic drawing is closer to how she perceives him now, now believing/questioning just how much of him is only fiction and mythos. :,)
“You understand, right?” Strangely enough, Puff does. There is no fear in his eyes, no backing away, even as the blade comes out, and the recognition in his widening eyes is accompanied by excitement, by relief, by purpose. Claudia holds the blade right up to his chin, and he leans in, looks up, takes in his big sister one last time. The sky is so beautiful and bright, and his starry brethren twinkle back. They feel closer than ever, this time, and he could reach up, and touch them. Reach up, and know the stars, and purpose. reach up, and grasp Claudia’s arm, and let her know it’s ok. Love, and trust, to the one who brought him into the world.
In one slick movement, violently decisive the way Claudia always acted, it is all over, and Puff is choking on his own blood the way he did on goo so many times, the way it had felt when his father had taken control, his hands grasp towards his fountaining throat, towards his heart, and he collapses, an action mimed once before, easily forgotten, now permanent. Exit stage left.
His last words sound the same as his first.
The birds are singing his funeral songs as the sky lightens to a shade that matches the blood spurting from his throat into a bowl, and the butterfly is dragged into a shape that an ancient voice directed, and it’s limp and far too similar to the jolted way he used to move before, in the heaves and stops of the painting. Feeling strangely familiar in all the wrong ways, this picture only needed one color for it. Red.
At last, it is complete. Claudia is heaving, but she’s done it.
And just like that, the mirror fell to pieces, an ear splitting cacophony of glass shards ringing out.
…Audible even in the dizzy rush of the switch of consciousness.
It was over, and everyone was satisfied enough with his stuttered reassurances of wellbeing to leave him alone for now.
Callum crouched down to examine a shard, seeing his own face in the reflections, broken and distorted and …wrong. Like the way Callum felt after he had regained control of his own body- strangely disconnected from his own limbs, his own vocal cords- I have no voice, yet I must scream.
Rayla and Ezran and Soren all looked at him differently after that too, concerned, but afraid. He couldn’t blame them, either. He wished he could just tell them he’d never say any of that to them, that it wasn’t true, but it wouldn’t matter.
It wasn’t fair. He had spent so long chasing magic, chasing freedom, and after all the hard choices and refusal…and with everything with Rayla it felt like magic was the only constant that had been there for him and now…
He had no idea what to do now. He had no idea how to contact Aaravos, how to get him out of his head, if he would come back at any moment. Breathe, just breathe, Callum. It’ll be ok.
How much longer could he keep telling himself that?
This mirror was supposed to be something key.
The key… Harrow had given it to him. He was destined for magic.
That was supposed to be a good thing. He could help people. He was a mage. But now… the words just felt sour and sick.
He would never even know the primal sources well if not for Aaravos’s key. This whole time he had been pursuing magic from someone who would do… this?
He was useless…powerless…even more so than when… when he wasn’t good at anything. For a moment, part of him wished he had never picked up that primal stone. Was it better to be good at nothing at all than to be destined for evil? He honestly… didn’t know.
No, no. Bad thought. If he could just…. Avoid dark magic, that should be enough, right?
The thought felt hollow after this, like Aaravos had taken it from him too.
He blinked tight, and seared in his eyes was the way it felt for foreign magic to be forced through them, for them to shine as his body was brought to a bow. Haunting even his eyes at rest, he forced them open once again.
He picked up a shard, holding it tight in his hand, catching his likeness in the now hollowed glass. Despite everything, it was still…him.
A broken reflection, how more fitting could it be? He thought he had known who he was, had finally started to heal and then just… there she was.
Only with this, it’s not like he could just pick up the pieces and try again. It had seemed so solid and yet…One petty flourish and the mirror had fallen to pieces. What last tap would it take for Callum to break?
Rivulets ran crimson down his wrist, absentminded and unwittingly holding a broken piece so tight it hurt him, and yet… he just couldn’t let go.
There was no second guessing it. He couldn’t let this happen to him again. Whatever it took, he refused to let himself be someone he couldn’t. To lose control like that again. He looked away, but the question had already slithered in— Just what exactly would it take?
—
Thanks 2 @parroset for beta/feedback bc I was convinced this was garbage but maybe it is. Decent? anyway I have barely any experience writing Callum so we learn as we go fr🙏
And just like that, the mirror fell to pieces, an ear splitting ringing cacophony of broken pieces.
…Audible even in the dizzy rush of the switch of consciousness.
It was over, and everyone was satisfied enough with his stuttered reassurances of wellbeing to leave him alone for now.
Callum crouched down to examine a shard, seeing his own face in the reflections, broken and distorted and …wrong. Like the way Callum felt after he had regained control of his own body- strangely disconnected from his own limbs, his own vocal cords- I have no voice, yet I must scream.
Rayla and Ezran and Soren all looked at him differently after that too, concerned, but afraid. He couldn’t blame them, either. He wished he could just tell them he’d never say any of that to them, that it wasn’t true, but it wouldn’t matter.
It wasn’t fair. He had spent so long chasing magic, chasing freedom, and after all the hard choices and refusal…and with everything with Rayla it felt like magic was the only constant that had been there for him and now…
He had no idea what to do now. He had no idea how to contact Aaravos, how to get him out of his head, if he would come back at any moment. Breathe, just breathe, Callum. It’ll be ok.
How much longer could he keep telling himself that?
This mirror was supposed to be something key.
The key… Harrow had given it to him. He was destined for magic.
That was supposed to be a good thing. He could help people. He was a mage. But now… the words just felt sour and sick.
He would never even know the primal sources well if not for Aaravos’s key. This whole time he had been pursuing magic from someone who would do… this?
He was useless…powerless…even more so than when… when he wasn’t good at anything. For a moment, part of him wished he had never picked up that primal stone. Was it better to be good at nothing at all than to be destined for evil? He honestly… didn’t know.
No, no. Bad thought. If he could just…. Avoid dark magic, that should be enough, right?
The thought felt hollow after this, like Aaravos had taken it from him too.
He blinked tight, and seared in his eyes was the way it felt for foreign magic to be forced through them, for them to shine as his body was brought to a bow. Haunting even his eyes at rest, he forced them open once again.
He picked up a shard, holding it tight in his hand, catching his likeness in the now hollowed glass. Despite everything, it was still…him.
A broken reflection, how more fitting could it be? He thought he had known who he was, had finally started to heal and then just… there she was.
Only with this, it’s not like he could just pick up the pieces and try again. It had seemed so solid and yet…One petty flourish and the mirror had fallen to pieces. What last tap would it take for Callum to break?
Rivulets ran crimson down his wrist, absentminded and unwittingly holding a broken piece so tight it hurt him, and yet… he just couldn’t let go.
There was no second guessing it. He couldn’t let this happen to him again. Whatever it took, he refused to let himself be someone he couldn’t. To lose control like that again. He looked away, but the question had already slithered in— Just what exactly would it take?
—
Thanks 2 @parroset for beta/feedback bc I was convinced this was garbage but maybe it is. Decent? anyway I have barely any experience writing Callum so we learn as we go fr🙏
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