Love Does Not End In Death

[whenbonestellhistory]

Elden Ring OC RP blog

Warnings: Work contains dead dove do not eat, with themes revolving extreme violence, death and other possibly disturbing themes.

Disclaimer: I do not condone anything bad written in text, or similar disturbing things. Kindly learn to separate the writer and the character.

The character is free to be interacted by all. Proper bio, along with art profile will be posted soon.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He banged his head on the table and he thought of the events that had just transpired in his sleep.

What was he going to do now? He questioned himself. It had been days since then, and Amras never really got a proper lick of sleep at the feeling of guilt that ate away at his bones.

Would it have changed things if he simply had agreed to Miquella’s plea? No, both of them would suffer a loveless union to a pointless cause, some bitter part of himself thought. It was mean to think of it that way, but it reassured some part of himself that following through the whims of someone he wasn’t even that close with would not do him good.

It would feel like he was taking advantage of Miquella too if he hadn’t refused it, he reasoned to himself, thinking of how utterly vulnerable he looked.

So much for being a friend.

Amras was well aware he himself wasn’t a good man, but it didn’t feel right to leave Miquella like that on such a lonely place in bitter terms. But he knew he can’t do anything about it for now, not while the Empyrean refuses to be seen.

Somehow, Godwyn crossed his mind. He had an inkling that their brother would have been able to fix it, but that man’s not here now, not anymore.

The golden ring sat heavy between his fingers, the cold band starting to feel surprisingly sharp as if it knows his offense against its previous wearer.

He was lost in his head, not really bothering to acknowledge the presence in the room the moment it came.

@thesleepdeity

[thesleepdeity]

The headache had gotten worse as time went on.

No matter how much Saint Trina tried to ignore it to make it go away, the pain continued to haunt him even though it was not his own. No. Lord Miquella's emotions pierced the too thin barrier between the two consciousnesses, no matter if the deity reinforced that barrier as much as possible. One soul, two bodies. Lord Miquella could not escape her just as she could not escape him, always connected by a thin thread that would never disappear.

From that, she knew that the conversation between Lord Miquella and Amras had not gone well.

It could not have gone well. Saint Trina didn't need the pain to understand it, because she knew Lord Miquella too well and knew how the conversation was going to end. In a misnamed tantrum, perhaps, or simply in a breakdown from which they would both end up suffering the consequences. Amras had no way of winning that argument no matter how hard he tried.

As soon as Amras woke up, returning from the dream palace, Saint Trina appeared beside him.

"...I am sorry."

At times, all they could do was apologize for Lord Miquella's behavior, which they doubted would change any time soon.

"Please, do not take his meanings in consideration," they said, placing a gentle hand on Amras' shoulder in a comforting gesture. "He is hurt, and hurt people make big mistakes, sometimes. He is grateful that you spared him the same fate of a marriage without love."

Perhaps Lord Miquella did not understand at the time, but sooner or later he would see that Amras had saved him.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Seeing him plead like that was terrifying.”

It had taken him a while to be able to answer her, lifting his head from the table and sighing. “I didn’t know how to say anything else but to refuse him. And now he’s gone off somewhere and I won’t be able to find him for a while.” He ranted to Trina, though it was much more a lament than a rant if anything else.

He was horrified, admittedly.

His brows furrowed as he remembered Miquella’s exact expression; that desperation, the haggard look and the plea as if resorting to a last minute attempt at making a futile plan work.

Right now he could still feel Miquella’s hands on his face.

He placed the ring inside of a drawer, hoping he would forget it for a day. He wouldn’t want to admit he’s been honestly a little hurt by what Miquella said, but what choice did he have?

“He offered himself up to me, you know. To become the Elden Lord of the Age he wanted to bring. It’s what I refused.” He elaborated, frowning.

“He told me his body would not be able to handle Godhood, and I did not want him to destroy himself as much as I did not want him to marry me out of that desperation. He was—“ he cut himself off to sigh again. “Not thinking clearly.” And I didn’t want to take advantage of him, went unsaid.

“What a troublesome boy, really.” He huffed, it was not meant to be malicious.

Amras was sad and concerned about him as much as he was upset about what happened, but the sadness prevailed somehow, seeing him like that didn’t feel right.

He didn’t often seek out comfort, but for now he thought he could use one of Fia’s hugs. He didn’t want to bother Trina, and he’s ran out of favors done to ask that of her.

He’s already been shameless enough.

The thought however, still rang inside his mind.

[thesleepdeity]

Lord Miquella was right. His body would not have withstood divinity.

The Gates of Divinity were known to be harsh on those attempting to reach divinity, and would likely taste Lord Miquella's desperation in the air, causing his body to be absorbed without being able to contain the power of divinity within.

The Lands Between told stories of people who failed in their attempts. Lord Miquella was destined to be one of them if he did not continue to gather enough power to reach the Gates of Divinity, and that was only possible by breaking his curse or finding a Lord to share the crown with him. Clearly, Amras had refused, but the rejection had sat so badly with Lord Miquella that Saint Trina didn't know if he was going to recover from it any time soon.

That was no mere rant or temper tantrum. The deity was able to feel the tornado inside her, a tornado of emotions that barely allowed her to hear her own thoughts. It was something darker.

"...He gave you his ring."

It was strange and Saint Trina couldn't help but point it out.

"It is special. The ring. I remember Radahn himself creating it before gifting it to Lord Miquella as a promise ring. I guess it does not make sense to keep wearing it. The Age of Compassion is no more."

Failed before it even started.

She let out a small sigh before averting her gaze from Amras, in an attempt to sever the connection between their minds. Amras' thoughts always went too fast, with an intensity that the deity didn't know how to handle, and he doubted the boy wanted to know that she had been reading his every thought all that time.

Deity life was... incredibly difficult in some ways.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He exhaled. “I messed up badly didn’t I?” He chuckled sardonically. “I doubt he’d want to see me for a while after that, if he even wants to at all.” It sounded like a whine almost, he’s unable to stay calm after what had just happened, the event too fresh.

He wanted his mind to be quiet for once, and so he looked at Trina again.

“Are you up for some soup or some food?” He felt like eating his feelings out of frustration right now, and thankfully cooking would keep his mind out of it.

“If you’re not, I can teach you how to sew instead.” Clearly, Amras was exasperated and confused and it was showing more and more with every moment that passed.

He realized he must have looked like he was about to lose it though, and cleared his throat. “Sorry, that must have looked so strange.” He said, averting his eyes again as the familiar feeling of embarrassment creeped through his bones.

He buried his face in his hands and groaned. “Oh by Marika’s tits I messed up.” He grumbled, hopefully not loud enough for Trina to hear— it’s not even about just Miquella alone now, but rather also Trina seeing him like this.

[thesleepdeity]

"Amras..."

Saint Trina's face darkened.

The boy blamed himself for what had happened, even though Lord Miquella's mental state had not been stable to begin with. The curse caused him to not process emotions as well, his reactions bordering on the tantrum that a small child might do. However, he was far from resembling a tantrum.

Lord Miquella's mind was covered by a cloud of darkness that only Godwyn had managed to calm sometimes with his words and gestures, taking the young Empyrean in his arms to walk around the capital in an attempt to make him forget what had bothered him. And most of the time it worked.

Except that Godwyn was no longer among them, his body a twisted and completely different version of what everyone knew.

"It is okay to... be compassionate with Lord Miquella's situation," Saint Trina said, her gaze softening in an attempt to make Amras understand that she was not scolding him. "It is not a good situation, I admit, but you have tried everything to help him. We cannot do more than wait for the time when he will ask for our help, if that happens at all. Me and him..."

The deity sighed.

"...He would have died if not for Radahn. Marika's children are not meant for godhood. Their bloodline has been... too tampered with. Nothing that comes out of Marika's womb turns out to be right, because they stray from their own paths to follow their mother's footsteps. And Lord Miquellla would have followed her footsteps, I assure you. You would have to have... put him down like a rabid dog then."

The thought of Lord Miquella becoming something contrary to what he preached made Saint Trina feel a shiver in her body, and so, she hugged Amras as if she could be protected from those visions of an uncertain future. Her arms did not let go.

"I do not want him to die, and I do not want him to suffer the change. Maybe that makes me a bad person, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

It took him a few moments to think again as he leaned on Trina’s arms.

“Would you…” he paused, as he thought of his own goals, Miquella’s cries, the age that had failed and her words that one night.

What would Godhood cost him? If Marika’s children failed, then could he ascend himself? The calling of the tarnished was to fix the Elden Ring and usher in a new age— could he do it really? A simple boy like him?

He’s sworn to bring the age of men, an age of impermanence and death, but what would it cost him? If not himself then the blood of others then?

He apologizes to Miquella in his head, as a plan began to form in his mind. Trina’s words and embrace had cleared the clouds somehow as he thought of it over and over.

“Would you still stick with me even if I were to bathe in the blood of many others to pave myself a path to becoming a Lord in the new age?” He asked her, gently touching her arm with his hand as he looked vulnerable almost.

“Miquella will not have to suffer then.” There is a failed age yes, but there will be a new one to come to replace it. It’s a little vile; even Amras was aware of that as he thought that he’s kicked Miquella’s chance for the throne and burned away at every single one of his plans, his efforts.

And yet a small part of himself knew it wouldn’t have ended well if he had agreed to be his Godfrey to Marika.

“My hands will not be clean at the end of this journey— I knew it wasn’t going to be if I were to restore death in these lands.” He sighed as he leaned in more, smelling the traces of lilies and seeing the color of Trina’s lavender hair at the corner of his eyes.

“But it seems that it requires a God too.” He frowned. “That blasted Ring has done enough damage to this place…. If I were to be a god, would that be fine with you?” I am stealing his dream too, after all, went unsaid.

[thesleepdeity]

Would she?

Saint Trina carefully observed and studied the boy who so clung to her words, but whose affection was not shown in the form of adoration. Amras truly considered her a friend, someone to confide in in a place as hostile as the Lands Between. And even if the deity couldn't quite express what the boy meant to her, at that moment, she wanted to make the effort to calm him down.

Saint Trina's hand rested on Amras' cheek, and she caressed it with the same love a lover might have for their other half. The boy's eyes sparkled. She looked into them and saw a stable future that would be slow in coming, but it would come.

"Your time will be the Age of Men."

The deity continued her caresses on Amras' cheek, softly, their faces being barely inches apart.

"Men are unpredictable. It will be hard. People will oppose your authority, but you can prosper if you do not get rid of the compassion and the love that makes you human." They gave him a soft smile. "And I will be there to see it, as long as you allow me to be by your side."

An Age of Men.

The thought was so strange. One that was led by someone who was not born a god, someone who knew what it was like to starve and cry. An age led by demigods was always doomed to failure, but Amras could change everything.

"Death is the only thing that can truly purify the Lands Between. It's time for it to come back. Every human being needs to rest."

Even Amras.

Amras, at some point, would die.

Saint Trina maybe too. When everyone would forget about her for a second time, when there would be no more prayers to answer, then she would die, become one with the air, with nature.

[whenbonestellhistory]

How nice to have yet another person to believe in what he wanted to do. With that thought, Amras smiled.

“I don’t plan on losing myself, don’t worry.” And he’ll make sure he won’t. Briefly, he wondered what Miquella’s Age of Compassion would have been like had he been a Lord and remembered Trina’s words— another Marika, Miquella would have become another Marika.

He averted his eyes from Trina, cheek leaning into the hand that touched him— he promptly ignored the slightest increase of the beating of his heart as he sighed.

Maybe it was better this way, for him to usurp that plan, Miquella’s plan.

“It’s a rather tall order.” He said with a light huff. “Not even halfway there and I already have a list of people I need to get rid of.” Miquella would have looked unnerved at that statement, he briefly thought. He hasn’t known him for very long, but it was clear the empyrean didn’t like blood or bloodshed.

He removed Trina’s hands from his cheeks and held them tenderly instead. Now that his negative feelings had gone away, he became a bit more specially aware of how /close/ Trina was to him— he doesn’t look at her, still.

“It will be… nice, at least. I think people have stayed stagnant here for too long.” Amras thought of the rather miserable expressions a lot of the folk he encountered had plastered on their faces. There were others who chose to make the best of what they had, including himself, but there was always something so strange about the exhaustion— maybe one day he’d be able to grant Miquella that proper rest too, but not now.

Unlike Amras, the empyrean did not get to live the way he truly deserved to.

He thought of those words, the feeling of only being stuck in one place and utter silence and loneliness of that dreamlike realm and being stuck in a childish body. It’s idealistic, he knows, but he hoped that he’d be able to do something about it once he gets the Elden Ring.

It’s the least he could do for rejecting him.

“I’ll be using your arrows on the way on that journey as well, I hope that is alright with you.” He looked at her again, pushing down the growing shyness under her gaze, his draconian pupils slightly expanding without his knowledge.

[thesleepdeity]

So many people had lost their way in trying to reach the goal.

It was strange to think that it would have been the same fate for Lord Miquella, had his vow with Radahn continued without someone interrupting. The gates of the Lands of Shadow would open, letting Amras enter certain death, and Saint Trina...

Saint Trina had little idea what would have happened to her by interfering with Lord Miquella's plans.

The Lands Between had been too long stuck in a loop that did not end, a loop in which beings could not find the eternal rest that souls sometimes needed. It was a madness that gradually took over their mind, to go on without feeling like it, to feel Death escaping from their fingertips without being able to do anything to prevent it. Many times, the concoction of her lilies had been used to put crying babies to sleep and help the sick, but other times, when Saint Trina tried not to look, the concoction was used to escape from the world.

It was not the goal. The heart of the deity suffered.

Perhaps the promise of a new era ruled by Amras was the only option they had to bring everything back to what it was before.

"Use as many as you need," Saint Trina replied, a small smile appearing on her face. It was tired, somewhat sad, but it was genuine. "When you ascend to the throne, I hope I can stand beside you and call you Elden Lord."

But that was a long time away.

The deity let out a small sigh.

"...You should rest. The dream palace is not accessible right now, and it won't be for a long time. Maybe a dreamless sleep will help you think better."

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Hmm. Maybe it will.” He hummed in agreement, returning her smile and letting go of her hands before gently shifting to stand from his chair, glancing at the bed he hasn’t quite used in a while.

Half the time he slept outside or simply on the chair, if not either then he’d always end up in Fia’s chambers for a semblance of a companionship— a security of some sort.

Dreams of deathblight typically invaded him in his sleep when he did so, but it did not bother him much, not even as Fia was taking some of his vitality from him. It wasn’t a bad trade, he had plenty to spare anyways.

He walked over to the bed, eyes tracing over the patterns on sheets of his own making before he sat down, patting the spot next to it absentmindedly. He looked at Trina and remembered how she looked tired; the bed was big enough to handle two people comfortably for a nap. He didn’t know if she’d be fine with that, though.

“Are you tired?” He asked. “You can rest here if you’d like to.” That must have sounded wrong, and so he cleared his throat, glancing away as he patted the spot next to him. “I’ll make sure to stay as far away, don’t worry.” Because if she desired to sleep too, she didn’t deserve to sleep on the floor.

In truth, Amras had an ulterior motive too— he didn’t want Trina to leave, not yet, but he’s unable to ask her that directly for some reason, the proper words for that request for more of her time stuck in his throat. He felt as though he needed her presence near there— needed a /friend/ near him, at least for a while until he could gather himself properly.

It felt selfish, to ask her for more when she’s given him more than enough by showing her support without anything in exchange but to simply stand beside him. Embarrassment crept up in his bones again and he settled himself in before she could answer him, face close to the wall as his ears reddened as he thought he should have worded his invitation differently.

[thesleepdeity]

Saint Trina was exhausted.

Maybe she wouldn't say it out loud. She never would. The deities did not feel exhaustion, their energy flowing like a torrent of water in a river that kept changing day after day. However, she felt a kind of fatigue in her soul that she had never experienced before, something that clouded her mind and forced her to ground herself as best she could.

It was because of Miquella. Saint Trina did not need to be naive to understand that the fatigue did not come from herself, but from the nausea of Miquella himself, who was desperately seeking to disappear from the world for a few moments. She understood him, though he wasn't going to get it. The dream palace had dug its claws into Miquella's soft flesh, anchoring him to the world of dreams without the possibility of returning without a body. At least, for now.

She understood him.

She didn't want to think about how it felt to be trapped in a place that sought to punish you, to shed your skin for how it had been mistreated in the real world.

Sometimes, Saint Trina wished to find Miquella's body and give him a proper burial. Anything to give him just a little peace.

...But they could not.

Perhaps with Amras the deity might find some solace, an ephemeral moment in which to rest.

"Yes. Yes, please." Saint Trina took a step forward, approaching the bed. Their hand went to Amras' hair to gently arrange it. "I..."

She looked down.

"I feel like something is fading. Out there. And I do not know what."

Finally, the deity entered the bed, right next to Amras. The boy emanated a warmth that helped keep them comfortable.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Would talking about it help?” He softly asked, he doesn’t look at her still, but knows she is troubled. “You don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

He knew well enough to know there’s just some things that shouldn’t be talked about, and he wasn’t going to pry it off of her. He had his fair share of things he refused to talk about too, not even with his friends, not even with Kale whom lended him an ear whenever he needed it.

A reassurance always helped in some way though— while simple as an offer, it helped alleviate some heaviness knowing they weren’t alone.

He wanted Trina to know that.

Amras shifted and turned so he could look at her, head half buried in one of the pillows as he reached out to awkwardly pat her shoulder.

“If you need to speak— if you /want/ to speak, I’m here to lend an ear.” He said to her, holding the same gentleness as he did earlier. Wordlessly, he brushed a stray lock from her face and tucked it behind her ear.

“Or we could just sleep, it may clear our heads better like you said.” He smiled, small but warm as his hand retreated between them.

[thesleepdeity]

"It just..."

Saint Trina focused on Amras' chin, purposely avoiding looking directly at him.

"It is strange. To not feel the bond to the dream palace," she tried to explain, though she doubted her words made much sense. Amras was listening to her, however, and that was enough to make her feel ready to speak. "And... there is another land, far away from here. It was unreachable for a long, long time."

The deity buried their face in the pillow, gently, finding Amras' scent concentrated on it. The boy always slept there, right where they were, and they knew his scent would cling to their skin quickly. Saint Trina would begin to smell like Amras, a mark that while not permanent, helped her feel safe.

"It is called the Lands of Shadow..." Before Amras could retract his hand, she took it between hers, squeezing it gently. "And there is a place in the Lands of Shadow, a place that should be completely sealed but is not. The Gates of Divinity. It is at the top of a tower, in a region called Enir-Ilim. It is a wicked thing. A wicked thing that can whisper sweet things to you, to sacrifice all of yourself to reach godhood."

A shudder ran through the deity completely, from top to bottom.

She did not like to talk about it, but it was necessary. Because Amras had to know.

"Miquella managed to reach an entrance to the Lands of Shadow... but everything got complicated, afterwards. Maybe it is for the best, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

Power was something a lot of people wanted in some form— Godhood even more so in some others. Images of a bloodied gate flashed in his mind’s eye, screaming, glowing, whispering— he felt though as if he’s feeling the red ground beneath his feet— sticky and warm, the bodies of that gate calling out to him to become a god.

A dream. It was one of his strange dreams, one of the stranger ones he had as a child aside from the golden fields and and the Elden Ring. He doesn’t know how and why he’s made the correlation somehow with what Trina had told him, about the very place he’s never even been in and the one inside of his dreams.

“He will have to sacrifice what makes him himself.” Amras murmured. “Is that why you were afraid of the change it would bring to Miquella?”

Shedding one’s own being was a terrifying concept to someone like Amras— he couldn’t comprehend it, losing everything that made him himself to be born anew as someone who valued and prided himself with his own identity as Amras, as a man.

Inheriting pieces of the Elden ring was different, not really overwhelming as he just took runes and stored it in his being, mending it in a way that doesn’t tear him apart.

He didn’t have to change.

He doesn’t have to shed his own skin, leave pieces of himself out to rot for a gate that would not guarantee him his wish anyways.

He understood now, what would happen to Miquella. And as foul as his thoughts were, he was glad he had taken that opportunity away from the empyrean.

[thesleepdeity]

Saint Trina closed her eyes, but no matter how much she wanted to make Miquella's terrified face disappear from her mind, she did not succeed. The memory was permanently embedded in her being, not by herself, but by the piece of soul they both shared. Miquella's memories were intermingled with hers, and there were times when the deity was unable to tell when they were her memories and when they were Miquella's.

Miquella, at some point, would also see Amras through her eyes.

"I... do not have the full picture of what he was planning to do," Saint Trina said, her voice sounding unsure and uneasy despite the exhaustion that threatened to make her collapse from one second to the next. "But that... that was not him planning. It was like watching someone else. Miquella would have sacrificed everyone, including himself, just to bring a new age."

It was not the first time Miquella had harmed himself to achieve his goals.

"...He cannot reach godhood. Not like that. There has to be another way to break the curse."

Except that Miquella seemed to have exhausted all his options.

Saint Trina let out a soft sigh before shifting closer to Amras, needing the comfort his presence provided. Maybe she looked too needy, but...

Amras was so different from what they already knew.

"I am sorry. I do not intend to make you feel responsible for us. We are our own person and we need to... to find answers by ourselves, rather than finding answers in others that may not have them."

[whenbonestellhistory]

Tw: Descriptions of murder, and Thiollier being creepy (excuse if ooc)

“You’ll be able to figure it out someday.” He said as he adjusted the blanket so that it would cover her properly. “We should sleep-“ he cut himself off, noticing her soft breathing and smiled.

“Good night, Trina.” He murmured before he too closed his eyes.

The peace didn’t last for very long, though as he was awoken by a presence lurking outside. People should not even be near the area unless they got an invitation— and very few got them.

Amras’ eyes opened, frowning as the haze of sleep slowly started to wear off. Trina was still asleep and it was already night time, one of her arms loosely holding him.

He sat up from the bed, careful not to wake her up as he gently slipped from her grasp to clearly see who could be outside.

Sure enough, there was the lurker. With a white mask on his face and light lavender hair, he stood there, pensively, as if waiting for someone very patiently. Amras noticed he was standing near Trina’s lilies near the window and wondered where the flowers had come from but shook the thoughts out of his head.

He had a bad feeling.

He’d like to give the benefit of the doubt though, and chose to play a little game.

“Good evening.” He greeted, a small smile plastered upon his face at the taller man.

“Hello.” The man spoke to him softly, giving him a curt nod.

“Is there something that you need?” Amras asked innocently, the smile remaining on his face as he assessed him further.

“Yes…” the lavender haired man replied as he picked up the flower that grew on the cracks on the ground. “I believe you have something I desire, hidden behind these walls…”

Desire? Amras’ face went blank, a creeping feeling crawling up his chest.

“The one who shall grant me velvety sleep.. I believe she is there, inside. I need to see her.” The man doesn’t stop speaking, breathing shakily almost. “I need to feel her, her scent, so she may grant me slumber.”

Amras didn’t like the way he shivered.

“I see.” Amras said, though his eyes have darkened. While his intentions are vague, it didn’t stop the feeling of something wrong.

“She is not allowing visitors right now, she is asleep.” He continued with a firm tone, the man didn’t seem to take it well.

“Who are you to say such a thing? It is me who she will only need to speak to— it will do you well not to lie to me.” The man’s voice trembled, voice raising a pitch or two.

“I am her friend, and it will do you well to stay away from her.” Amras glowered. “This is your last warning.” The game was nearing its end.

“I will not forgive you. Y-you— a mere boy, not even a follower—“ The man paused, shaking, before erupting to a frantic swing that Amras was caught off guard by. “You smell like her— I can smell on you her blessing.”

The needle had pierced Amras’ shoulder as the man did not cease to mumble frantically, shakily, that Trina only belonged to him. Her love, her power, her voice. And that it was unfair for someone like Amras to get it.

Amras scowled, disgusted as he pried the man off of him. His intentions have been made clear, while he considered sparing him in the first few words exchanged, he wasn’t going to let him have that option now.

He removed the needle from himself with a grunt, he’ll make this quick.

The night was filled with the sounds of thudding, muffled screaming, and a disgusting squelch before something snapped and fell.

Amras huffed, shaking his head as he turned away to go back inside of his room. He closed the door, quietly stepping in as much as he could to not wake Trina as the scent of blood not just his own faintly wafted in the air.

[thesleepdeity]

Something in the movement of the wind had awakened her.

Saint Trina's eyes threatened to close again at any moment, her eyelids too heavy to continue awake. However, every time she tried to go back to sleep, a rustling in the land they were on and the tinkling of the lilies born around the settlement they were in would once again cause her to lift her head from the pillow, visualizing the starry sky in her mind's eye.

It was still night.

The stillness of the Lands Between when darkness reigned had always been something that made them want to hide, such a human desire for a deity.

Animals retreated to their burrows quickly, leaving behind only their tracks in the earth, and even beings that did not do good decided to remain still in the presence of the moon in the sky. Night, ironically, could be the quietest time of the day... especially when she was standing next to Amras.

Saint Trina moved her hand slowly, feeling the place beside her, but Amras' presence had disappeared from her side. Immediately and fearing the worst, she opened her eyes wide and made the effort to try to listen around her for any movement that would give away the boy's presence nearby.

And she heard it.

A voice she knew all too well. The blood rushing to the floor. a snapping sound that caused the deity to flinch, before she clasped her hands on the pillow in an attempt to find comfort in the scent Amras had left behind. Saint Trina's body continued to tremble for a few moments until she heard Amras' return.

And, though she tried to pretend to fall asleep by closing her eyes tightly, she was unable to do so.

Saint Trina thought of the stars, of the soft light her lilies emitted and how Amras had said her singing was beautiful. She thought of anything but the scent of someone else's blood on the boy's body.

[whenbonestellhistory]

Amras had noticed it, with the way she looked too tense when he had glanced at her as he wiped the blood off of his hands and tended to the poison on his shoulder— surprisingly it had not killed him, despite the spread of purple veins around it.

He’ll have to wait and see.

He dumped his bloodied clothes at the corner of the room and changed into something lighter, the bandages that covered his shoulder strapped tight under the soft clothes before he made his way to the bed and caressed Trina’s hair.

“He’s gone now.” Amras said to her softly, not wanting to scare her. “You won’t have to worry about him coming in.” He continued, shifting, the bed dipping under his weight before placing his hand on top of her own, attempting to soothe her.

“Nothing will hurt you for as long as I’m here.” He placed a soft, brief kiss to her head— an attempt at comfort, gentle reassurances slipping past his lips as he hoped Trina would not be afraid of him after this.

“I won’t hurt you, don’t worry.”

He never would, he would never find the heart to do so.

[thesleepdeity]

Saint Trina's hand slowly relaxed, letting go of the pillow so she could entwine her fingers with Amras'.

Amras smelled of comfort and security. The figure that had haunted her for so long no longer existed, reached by someone who sought to protect her from those hands. The hands that would not have stopped until they could touch her. For a few moments, the deity took only a shaky breath, filling her lungs with air even if she had to endure the scent of blood.

She was safe. Amras had helped them stay safe. Even when they were both asleep and Saint Trina didn't notice the presence outside, the boy did, and it hadn't taken him long to make it disappear for both their sakes.

"...I am sorry."

The deity's words were only a hidden whisper, fearful that she had caused Amras to have to deal with the blood of someone he did not know on his hands. However, judging by the bandage under the boy's clothew, his follower had been the first to attack. Amras only found a way to defend himself.

Saint Trina pulled him towards the bed, hugging his body as if nothing else existed in the world. She needed that source of contact that calmed her and made her see that everything was okay.

"...He hurt you. I am sorry."

Amras was not to hurt himself to protect her. The very thought made Saint Trina's body tremble.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“I’ll be fine.” Amras sighed against her, hiding the pink in his cheeks that surfaced upon her sudden action.

“There’s no need for you to apologize for this, it’s not your fault.” He whispered, although Trina was not warm like him, her presence brought him some comfort, alleviating the numb and pain along his injuries.

A reminder that he had succeeded in keeping her out of harm’s way for now.

He was just happy that Trina was not afraid of him, even though she knew of what he did outside of the safety of their room.

The sounds of the night had returned as he drowsily basked in her presence, hoping that no one will bother them so that he could pretend it’s just the two of them in the world, safe and sound.

In that moment he thought of wanting to protect Trina even more so that she wouldn’t have to be afraid of anything anymore. So she could sleep without being afraid of something having to come after her due to their obsession, so she could simply exist without the worry of people wanting to tear a piece of her.

He cannot always be there for her, nor could he solve her problems along with the problems of everyone else, but the least he could do for her willingness to even deal with him, to not run away from him or use him was to simply try to make life easier for her.

Amras doesn’t quite realize that the gentle buddings in his heart, the small, meaningful thoughts, were from a place of something else other than friendship.

Amras took a deep breath, taking in the scent of lilies and thought of the words uttered by that man earlier— ‘Blessing huh? What a funny way to describe being friends’ he thought, smug almost despite the sleepiness.

“I think,” he began, looking at her. “I think it’s safe for both of us to sleep now.” He told her, half a statement and half a promise, face still pink while a tired smile plastered itself upon his face as he felt the effects of the poison properly without the adrenaline pumping through his veins.

Strangely enough there was no shortness of breath, nor blood waiting to eject itself out of his mouth, only the enticing embrace of sleep.

He will not die tonight after all.

[thesleepdeity]

Even if Amras said that, there was a certain uncertainty in Saint Trina's mind that would not let her rest. The encounter with her follower had awakened a long dormant feeling of panic, accustomed to disappearing into the dream palace when something caused her insecurity.

However, the dream palace had closed, its gates rejecting anyone who wished to enter it; and although Amras took care of her follower, there were so many other dangers in the Lands Between that sometimes the deity only wished to take care of them herself. Except that if she did... her enemies would end up in a very deep sleep from which they would never awaken. And Saint Trina was incapable of allowing herself to do that.

"...Allow me. It will only hurt for a moment."

That was all the deity said, her hands carefully pulling apart Amras' clothes to reach the bandage covering the wound.

She knew the weapon, and she knew the poison. She could feel it on the tip of her tongue.

The wound would not close. The poison would prevent it, keeping the wound open, a weak point for the one who had received it. Little by little, the poison would begin to run through Amras' body completely until numbing his senses and finally make him collapse. So Saint Trina didn't wait any longer, pulling the bandage aside to attach her lips to the wound and suck.

The boy's skin was warm under her mouth, and the wound oozed blood and poison. Her hands gripped his arms to keep him from moving.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“W-wha—?! Trina?!” He let out an undignified shriek, stammers quickly leaving his mouth as she pried at his clothes, heavily startled and confused that it had almost snapped him out of his sleepy haze, wondering what she was even doing as his mind raced.

He’s wide eyed, tensing at the feel of Trina’s lips upon where his wound should be— his brows furrowed, his face unwillingly heating up all the way to his ears, the sound leaving his mouth high much like a squeak.

Most of all, Amras was confused at the surprising display of strength in restraining his arms too. Somehow, that too warranted more heat to rush to his face.

He hissed at the feeling of the blood and poison being sucked out of his system, quiet, shallow gasps leaving his trembling lips, closing his eyes as she continued to do as she wanted upon the wound and sensitive skin.

Tears sprang from his eyes but didn’t fall, it did indeed hurt like she had promised for it to.

The sound of his beating heart rang loudly in his ears as he hesitantly tilted his head and neck to cooperate, so Trina would have an easier time. He had a feeling of what she was doing; however he was still uncertain, his feelings swirling wildly along with his heart as he remained pinned under his deceptively dainty friend.

There was no feeling of danger, but from how flustered Amras felt he simply lost the strength to protest and speak, hands tingling as they too became a lost cause.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He banged his head on the table and he thought of the events that had just transpired in his sleep.

What was he going to do now? He questioned himself. It had been days since then, and Amras never really got a proper lick of sleep at the feeling of guilt that ate away at his bones.

Would it have changed things if he simply had agreed to Miquella’s plea? No, both of them would suffer a loveless union to a pointless cause, some bitter part of himself thought. It was mean to think of it that way, but it reassured some part of himself that following through the whims of someone he wasn’t even that close with would not do him good.

It would feel like he was taking advantage of Miquella too if he hadn’t refused it, he reasoned to himself, thinking of how utterly vulnerable he looked.

So much for being a friend.

Amras was well aware he himself wasn’t a good man, but it didn’t feel right to leave Miquella like that on such a lonely place in bitter terms. But he knew he can’t do anything about it for now, not while the Empyrean refuses to be seen.

Somehow, Godwyn crossed his mind. He had an inkling that their brother would have been able to fix it, but that man’s not here now, not anymore.

The golden ring sat heavy between his fingers, the cold band starting to feel surprisingly sharp as if it knows his offense against its previous wearer.

He was lost in his head, not really bothering to acknowledge the presence in the room the moment it came.

@thesleepdeity

[thesleepdeity]

The headache had gotten worse as time went on.

No matter how much Saint Trina tried to ignore it to make it go away, the pain continued to haunt him even though it was not his own. No. Lord Miquella's emotions pierced the too thin barrier between the two consciousnesses, no matter if the deity reinforced that barrier as much as possible. One soul, two bodies. Lord Miquella could not escape her just as she could not escape him, always connected by a thin thread that would never disappear.

From that, she knew that the conversation between Lord Miquella and Amras had not gone well.

It could not have gone well. Saint Trina didn't need the pain to understand it, because she knew Lord Miquella too well and knew how the conversation was going to end. In a misnamed tantrum, perhaps, or simply in a breakdown from which they would both end up suffering the consequences. Amras had no way of winning that argument no matter how hard he tried.

As soon as Amras woke up, returning from the dream palace, Saint Trina appeared beside him.

"...I am sorry."

At times, all they could do was apologize for Lord Miquella's behavior, which they doubted would change any time soon.

"Please, do not take his meanings in consideration," they said, placing a gentle hand on Amras' shoulder in a comforting gesture. "He is hurt, and hurt people make big mistakes, sometimes. He is grateful that you spared him the same fate of a marriage without love."

Perhaps Lord Miquella did not understand at the time, but sooner or later he would see that Amras had saved him.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Seeing him plead like that was terrifying.”

It had taken him a while to be able to answer her, lifting his head from the table and sighing. “I didn’t know how to say anything else but to refuse him. And now he’s gone off somewhere and I won’t be able to find him for a while.” He ranted to Trina, though it was much more a lament than a rant if anything else.

He was horrified, admittedly.

His brows furrowed as he remembered Miquella’s exact expression; that desperation, the haggard look and the plea as if resorting to a last minute attempt at making a futile plan work.

Right now he could still feel Miquella’s hands on his face.

He placed the ring inside of a drawer, hoping he would forget it for a day. He wouldn’t want to admit he’s been honestly a little hurt by what Miquella said, but what choice did he have?

“He offered himself up to me, you know. To become the Elden Lord of the Age he wanted to bring. It’s what I refused.” He elaborated, frowning.

“He told me his body would not be able to handle Godhood, and I did not want him to destroy himself as much as I did not want him to marry me out of that desperation. He was—“ he cut himself off to sigh again. “Not thinking clearly.” And I didn’t want to take advantage of him, went unsaid.

“What a troublesome boy, really.” He huffed, it was not meant to be malicious.

Amras was sad and concerned about him as much as he was upset about what happened, but the sadness prevailed somehow, seeing him like that didn’t feel right.

He didn’t often seek out comfort, but for now he thought he could use one of Fia’s hugs. He didn’t want to bother Trina, and he’s ran out of favors done to ask that of her.

He’s already been shameless enough.

The thought however, still rang inside his mind.

[thesleepdeity]

Lord Miquella was right. His body would not have withstood divinity.

The Gates of Divinity were known to be harsh on those attempting to reach divinity, and would likely taste Lord Miquella's desperation in the air, causing his body to be absorbed without being able to contain the power of divinity within.

The Lands Between told stories of people who failed in their attempts. Lord Miquella was destined to be one of them if he did not continue to gather enough power to reach the Gates of Divinity, and that was only possible by breaking his curse or finding a Lord to share the crown with him. Clearly, Amras had refused, but the rejection had sat so badly with Lord Miquella that Saint Trina didn't know if he was going to recover from it any time soon.

That was no mere rant or temper tantrum. The deity was able to feel the tornado inside her, a tornado of emotions that barely allowed her to hear her own thoughts. It was something darker.

"...He gave you his ring."

It was strange and Saint Trina couldn't help but point it out.

"It is special. The ring. I remember Radahn himself creating it before gifting it to Lord Miquella as a promise ring. I guess it does not make sense to keep wearing it. The Age of Compassion is no more."

Failed before it even started.

She let out a small sigh before averting her gaze from Amras, in an attempt to sever the connection between their minds. Amras' thoughts always went too fast, with an intensity that the deity didn't know how to handle, and he doubted the boy wanted to know that she had been reading his every thought all that time.

Deity life was... incredibly difficult in some ways.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He exhaled. “I messed up badly didn’t I?” He chuckled sardonically. “I doubt he’d want to see me for a while after that, if he even wants to at all.” It sounded like a whine almost, he’s unable to stay calm after what had just happened, the event too fresh.

He wanted his mind to be quiet for once, and so he looked at Trina again.

“Are you up for some soup or some food?” He felt like eating his feelings out of frustration right now, and thankfully cooking would keep his mind out of it.

“If you’re not, I can teach you how to sew instead.” Clearly, Amras was exasperated and confused and it was showing more and more with every moment that passed.

He realized he must have looked like he was about to lose it though, and cleared his throat. “Sorry, that must have looked so strange.” He said, averting his eyes again as the familiar feeling of embarrassment creeped through his bones.

He buried his face in his hands and groaned. “Oh by Marika’s tits I messed up.” He grumbled, hopefully not loud enough for Trina to hear— it’s not even about just Miquella alone now, but rather also Trina seeing him like this.

[thesleepdeity]

"Amras..."

Saint Trina's face darkened.

The boy blamed himself for what had happened, even though Lord Miquella's mental state had not been stable to begin with. The curse caused him to not process emotions as well, his reactions bordering on the tantrum that a small child might do. However, he was far from resembling a tantrum.

Lord Miquella's mind was covered by a cloud of darkness that only Godwyn had managed to calm sometimes with his words and gestures, taking the young Empyrean in his arms to walk around the capital in an attempt to make him forget what had bothered him. And most of the time it worked.

Except that Godwyn was no longer among them, his body a twisted and completely different version of what everyone knew.

"It is okay to... be compassionate with Lord Miquella's situation," Saint Trina said, her gaze softening in an attempt to make Amras understand that she was not scolding him. "It is not a good situation, I admit, but you have tried everything to help him. We cannot do more than wait for the time when he will ask for our help, if that happens at all. Me and him..."

The deity sighed.

"...He would have died if not for Radahn. Marika's children are not meant for godhood. Their bloodline has been... too tampered with. Nothing that comes out of Marika's womb turns out to be right, because they stray from their own paths to follow their mother's footsteps. And Lord Miquellla would have followed her footsteps, I assure you. You would have to have... put him down like a rabid dog then."

The thought of Lord Miquella becoming something contrary to what he preached made Saint Trina feel a shiver in her body, and so, she hugged Amras as if she could be protected from those visions of an uncertain future. Her arms did not let go.

"I do not want him to die, and I do not want him to suffer the change. Maybe that makes me a bad person, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

It took him a few moments to think again as he leaned on Trina’s arms.

“Would you…” he paused, as he thought of his own goals, Miquella’s cries, the age that had failed and her words that one night.

What would Godhood cost him? If Marika’s children failed, then could he ascend himself? The calling of the tarnished was to fix the Elden Ring and usher in a new age— could he do it really? A simple boy like him?

He’s sworn to bring the age of men, an age of impermanence and death, but what would it cost him? If not himself then the blood of others then?

He apologizes to Miquella in his head, as a plan began to form in his mind. Trina’s words and embrace had cleared the clouds somehow as he thought of it over and over.

“Would you still stick with me even if I were to bathe in the blood of many others to pave myself a path to becoming a Lord in the new age?” He asked her, gently touching her arm with his hand as he looked vulnerable almost.

“Miquella will not have to suffer then.” There is a failed age yes, but there will be a new one to come to replace it. It’s a little vile; even Amras was aware of that as he thought that he’s kicked Miquella’s chance for the throne and burned away at every single one of his plans, his efforts.

And yet a small part of himself knew it wouldn’t have ended well if he had agreed to be his Godfrey to Marika.

“My hands will not be clean at the end of this journey— I knew it wasn’t going to be if I were to restore death in these lands.” He sighed as he leaned in more, smelling the traces of lilies and seeing the color of Trina’s lavender hair at the corner of his eyes.

“But it seems that it requires a God too.” He frowned. “That blasted Ring has done enough damage to this place…. If I were to be a god, would that be fine with you?” I am stealing his dream too, after all, went unsaid.

[thesleepdeity]

Would she?

Saint Trina carefully observed and studied the boy who so clung to her words, but whose affection was not shown in the form of adoration. Amras truly considered her a friend, someone to confide in in a place as hostile as the Lands Between. And even if the deity couldn't quite express what the boy meant to her, at that moment, she wanted to make the effort to calm him down.

Saint Trina's hand rested on Amras' cheek, and she caressed it with the same love a lover might have for their other half. The boy's eyes sparkled. She looked into them and saw a stable future that would be slow in coming, but it would come.

"Your time will be the Age of Men."

The deity continued her caresses on Amras' cheek, softly, their faces being barely inches apart.

"Men are unpredictable. It will be hard. People will oppose your authority, but you can prosper if you do not get rid of the compassion and the love that makes you human." They gave him a soft smile. "And I will be there to see it, as long as you allow me to be by your side."

An Age of Men.

The thought was so strange. One that was led by someone who was not born a god, someone who knew what it was like to starve and cry. An age led by demigods was always doomed to failure, but Amras could change everything.

"Death is the only thing that can truly purify the Lands Between. It's time for it to come back. Every human being needs to rest."

Even Amras.

Amras, at some point, would die.

Saint Trina maybe too. When everyone would forget about her for a second time, when there would be no more prayers to answer, then she would die, become one with the air, with nature.

[whenbonestellhistory]

How nice to have yet another person to believe in what he wanted to do. With that thought, Amras smiled.

“I don’t plan on losing myself, don’t worry.” And he’ll make sure he won’t. Briefly, he wondered what Miquella’s Age of Compassion would have been like had he been a Lord and remembered Trina’s words— another Marika, Miquella would have become another Marika.

He averted his eyes from Trina, cheek leaning into the hand that touched him— he promptly ignored the slightest increase of the beating of his heart as he sighed.

Maybe it was better this way, for him to usurp that plan, Miquella’s plan.

“It’s a rather tall order.” He said with a light huff. “Not even halfway there and I already have a list of people I need to get rid of.” Miquella would have looked unnerved at that statement, he briefly thought. He hasn’t known him for very long, but it was clear the empyrean didn’t like blood or bloodshed.

He removed Trina’s hands from his cheeks and held them tenderly instead. Now that his negative feelings had gone away, he became a bit more specially aware of how /close/ Trina was to him— he doesn’t look at her, still.

“It will be… nice, at least. I think people have stayed stagnant here for too long.” Amras thought of the rather miserable expressions a lot of the folk he encountered had plastered on their faces. There were others who chose to make the best of what they had, including himself, but there was always something so strange about the exhaustion— maybe one day he’d be able to grant Miquella that proper rest too, but not now.

Unlike Amras, the empyrean did not get to live the way he truly deserved to.

He thought of those words, the feeling of only being stuck in one place and utter silence and loneliness of that dreamlike realm and being stuck in a childish body. It’s idealistic, he knows, but he hoped that he’d be able to do something about it once he gets the Elden Ring.

It’s the least he could do for rejecting him.

“I’ll be using your arrows on the way on that journey as well, I hope that is alright with you.” He looked at her again, pushing down the growing shyness under her gaze, his draconian pupils slightly expanding without his knowledge.

[thesleepdeity]

So many people had lost their way in trying to reach the goal.

It was strange to think that it would have been the same fate for Lord Miquella, had his vow with Radahn continued without someone interrupting. The gates of the Lands of Shadow would open, letting Amras enter certain death, and Saint Trina...

Saint Trina had little idea what would have happened to her by interfering with Lord Miquella's plans.

The Lands Between had been too long stuck in a loop that did not end, a loop in which beings could not find the eternal rest that souls sometimes needed. It was a madness that gradually took over their mind, to go on without feeling like it, to feel Death escaping from their fingertips without being able to do anything to prevent it. Many times, the concoction of her lilies had been used to put crying babies to sleep and help the sick, but other times, when Saint Trina tried not to look, the concoction was used to escape from the world.

It was not the goal. The heart of the deity suffered.

Perhaps the promise of a new era ruled by Amras was the only option they had to bring everything back to what it was before.

"Use as many as you need," Saint Trina replied, a small smile appearing on her face. It was tired, somewhat sad, but it was genuine. "When you ascend to the throne, I hope I can stand beside you and call you Elden Lord."

But that was a long time away.

The deity let out a small sigh.

"...You should rest. The dream palace is not accessible right now, and it won't be for a long time. Maybe a dreamless sleep will help you think better."

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Hmm. Maybe it will.” He hummed in agreement, returning her smile and letting go of her hands before gently shifting to stand from his chair, glancing at the bed he hasn’t quite used in a while.

Half the time he slept outside or simply on the chair, if not either then he’d always end up in Fia’s chambers for a semblance of a companionship— a security of some sort.

Dreams of deathblight typically invaded him in his sleep when he did so, but it did not bother him much, not even as Fia was taking some of his vitality from him. It wasn’t a bad trade, he had plenty to spare anyways.

He walked over to the bed, eyes tracing over the patterns on sheets of his own making before he sat down, patting the spot next to it absentmindedly. He looked at Trina and remembered how she looked tired; the bed was big enough to handle two people comfortably for a nap. He didn’t know if she’d be fine with that, though.

“Are you tired?” He asked. “You can rest here if you’d like to.” That must have sounded wrong, and so he cleared his throat, glancing away as he patted the spot next to him. “I’ll make sure to stay as far away, don’t worry.” Because if she desired to sleep too, she didn’t deserve to sleep on the floor.

In truth, Amras had an ulterior motive too— he didn’t want Trina to leave, not yet, but he’s unable to ask her that directly for some reason, the proper words for that request for more of her time stuck in his throat. He felt as though he needed her presence near there— needed a /friend/ near him, at least for a while until he could gather himself properly.

It felt selfish, to ask her for more when she’s given him more than enough by showing her support without anything in exchange but to simply stand beside him. Embarrassment crept up in his bones again and he settled himself in before she could answer him, face close to the wall as his ears reddened as he thought he should have worded his invitation differently.

[thesleepdeity]

Saint Trina was exhausted.

Maybe she wouldn't say it out loud. She never would. The deities did not feel exhaustion, their energy flowing like a torrent of water in a river that kept changing day after day. However, she felt a kind of fatigue in her soul that she had never experienced before, something that clouded her mind and forced her to ground herself as best she could.

It was because of Miquella. Saint Trina did not need to be naive to understand that the fatigue did not come from herself, but from the nausea of Miquella himself, who was desperately seeking to disappear from the world for a few moments. She understood him, though he wasn't going to get it. The dream palace had dug its claws into Miquella's soft flesh, anchoring him to the world of dreams without the possibility of returning without a body. At least, for now.

She understood him.

She didn't want to think about how it felt to be trapped in a place that sought to punish you, to shed your skin for how it had been mistreated in the real world.

Sometimes, Saint Trina wished to find Miquella's body and give him a proper burial. Anything to give him just a little peace.

...But they could not.

Perhaps with Amras the deity might find some solace, an ephemeral moment in which to rest.

"Yes. Yes, please." Saint Trina took a step forward, approaching the bed. Their hand went to Amras' hair to gently arrange it. "I..."

She looked down.

"I feel like something is fading. Out there. And I do not know what."

Finally, the deity entered the bed, right next to Amras. The boy emanated a warmth that helped keep them comfortable.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Would talking about it help?” He softly asked, he doesn’t look at her still, but knows she is troubled. “You don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

He knew well enough to know there’s just some things that shouldn’t be talked about, and he wasn’t going to pry it off of her. He had his fair share of things he refused to talk about too, not even with his friends, not even with Kale whom lended him an ear whenever he needed it.

A reassurance always helped in some way though— while simple as an offer, it helped alleviate some heaviness knowing they weren’t alone.

He wanted Trina to know that.

Amras shifted and turned so he could look at her, head half buried in one of the pillows as he reached out to awkwardly pat her shoulder.

“If you need to speak— if you /want/ to speak, I’m here to lend an ear.” He said to her, holding the same gentleness as he did earlier. Wordlessly, he brushed a stray lock from her face and tucked it behind her ear.

“Or we could just sleep, it may clear our heads better like you said.” He smiled, small but warm as his hand retreated between them.

[thesleepdeity]

"It just..."

Saint Trina focused on Amras' chin, purposely avoiding looking directly at him.

"It is strange. To not feel the bond to the dream palace," she tried to explain, though she doubted her words made much sense. Amras was listening to her, however, and that was enough to make her feel ready to speak. "And... there is another land, far away from here. It was unreachable for a long, long time."

The deity buried their face in the pillow, gently, finding Amras' scent concentrated on it. The boy always slept there, right where they were, and they knew his scent would cling to their skin quickly. Saint Trina would begin to smell like Amras, a mark that while not permanent, helped her feel safe.

"It is called the Lands of Shadow..." Before Amras could retract his hand, she took it between hers, squeezing it gently. "And there is a place in the Lands of Shadow, a place that should be completely sealed but is not. The Gates of Divinity. It is at the top of a tower, in a region called Enir-Ilim. It is a wicked thing. A wicked thing that can whisper sweet things to you, to sacrifice all of yourself to reach godhood."

A shudder ran through the deity completely, from top to bottom.

She did not like to talk about it, but it was necessary. Because Amras had to know.

"Miquella managed to reach an entrance to the Lands of Shadow... but everything got complicated, afterwards. Maybe it is for the best, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

Power was something a lot of people wanted in some form— Godhood even more so in some others. Images of a bloodied gate flashed in his mind’s eye, screaming, glowing, whispering— he felt though as if he’s feeling the red ground beneath his feet— sticky and warm, the bodies of that gate calling out to him to become a god.

A dream. It was one of his strange dreams, one of the stranger ones he had as a child aside from the golden fields and and the Elden Ring. He doesn’t know how and why he’s made the correlation somehow with what Trina had told him, about the very place he’s never even been in and the one inside of his dreams.

“He will have to sacrifice what makes him himself.” Amras murmured. “Is that why you were afraid of the change it would bring to Miquella?”

Shedding one’s own being was a terrifying concept to someone like Amras— he couldn’t comprehend it, losing everything that made him himself to be born anew as someone who valued and prided himself with his own identity as Amras, as a man.

Inheriting pieces of the Elden ring was different, not really overwhelming as he just took runes and stored it in his being, mending it in a way that doesn’t tear him apart.

He didn’t have to change.

He doesn’t have to shed his own skin, leave pieces of himself out to rot for a gate that would not guarantee him his wish anyways.

He understood now, what would happen to Miquella. And as foul as his thoughts were, he was glad he had taken that opportunity away from the empyrean.

[thesleepdeity]

Saint Trina closed her eyes, but no matter how much she wanted to make Miquella's terrified face disappear from her mind, she did not succeed. The memory was permanently embedded in her being, not by herself, but by the piece of soul they both shared. Miquella's memories were intermingled with hers, and there were times when the deity was unable to tell when they were her memories and when they were Miquella's.

Miquella, at some point, would also see Amras through her eyes.

"I... do not have the full picture of what he was planning to do," Saint Trina said, her voice sounding unsure and uneasy despite the exhaustion that threatened to make her collapse from one second to the next. "But that... that was not him planning. It was like watching someone else. Miquella would have sacrificed everyone, including himself, just to bring a new age."

It was not the first time Miquella had harmed himself to achieve his goals.

"...He cannot reach godhood. Not like that. There has to be another way to break the curse."

Except that Miquella seemed to have exhausted all his options.

Saint Trina let out a soft sigh before shifting closer to Amras, needing the comfort his presence provided. Maybe she looked too needy, but...

Amras was so different from what they already knew.

"I am sorry. I do not intend to make you feel responsible for us. We are our own person and we need to... to find answers by ourselves, rather than finding answers in others that may not have them."

[whenbonestellhistory]

Tw: Descriptions of murder, and Thiollier being creepy (excuse if ooc)

“You’ll be able to figure it out someday.” He said as he adjusted the blanket so that it would cover her properly. “We should sleep-“ he cut himself off, noticing her soft breathing and smiled.

“Good night, Trina.” He murmured before he too closed his eyes.

The peace didn’t last for very long, though as he was awoken by a presence lurking outside. People should not even be near the area unless they got an invitation— and very few got them.

Amras’ eyes opened, frowning as the haze of sleep slowly started to wear off. Trina was still asleep and it was already night time, one of her arms loosely holding him.

He sat up from the bed, careful not to wake her up as he gently slipped from her grasp to clearly see who could be outside.

Sure enough, there was the lurker. With a white mask on his face and light lavender hair, he stood there, pensively, as if waiting for someone very patiently. Amras noticed he was standing near Trina’s lilies near the window and wondered where the flowers had come from but shook the thoughts out of his head.

He had a bad feeling.

He’d like to give the benefit of the doubt though, and chose to play a little game.

“Good evening.” He greeted, a small smile plastered upon his face at the taller man.

“Hello.” The man spoke to him softly, giving him a curt nod.

“Is there something that you need?” Amras asked innocently, the smile remaining on his face as he assessed him further.

“Yes…” the lavender haired man replied as he picked up the flower that grew on the cracks on the ground. “I believe you have something I desire, hidden behind these walls…”

Desire? Amras’ face went blank, a creeping feeling crawling up his chest.

“The one who shall grant me velvety sleep.. I believe she is there, inside. I need to see her.” The man doesn’t stop speaking, breathing shakily almost. “I need to feel her, her scent, so she may grant me slumber.”

Amras didn’t like the way he shivered.

“I see.” Amras said, though his eyes have darkened. While his intentions are vague, it didn’t stop the feeling of something wrong.

“She is not allowing visitors right now, she is asleep.” He continued with a firm tone, the man didn’t seem to take it well.

“Who are you to say such a thing? It is me who she will only need to speak to— it will do you well not to lie to me.” The man’s voice trembled, voice raising a pitch or two.

“I am her friend, and it will do you well to stay away from her.” Amras glowered. “This is your last warning.” The game was nearing its end.

“I will not forgive you. Y-you— a mere boy, not even a follower—“ The man paused, shaking, before erupting to a frantic swing that Amras was caught off guard by. “You smell like her— I can smell on you her blessing.”

The needle had pierced Amras’ shoulder as the man did not cease to mumble frantically, shakily, that Trina only belonged to him. Her love, her power, her voice. And that it was unfair for someone like Amras to get it.

Amras scowled, disgusted as he pried the man off of him. His intentions have been made clear, while he considered sparing him in the first few words exchanged, he wasn’t going to let him have that option now.

He removed the needle from himself with a grunt, he’ll make this quick.

The night was filled with the sounds of thudding, muffled screaming, and a disgusting squelch before something snapped and fell.

Amras huffed, shaking his head as he turned away to go back inside of his room. He closed the door, quietly stepping in as much as he could to not wake Trina as the scent of blood not just his own faintly wafted in the air.

[thesleepdeity]

Something in the movement of the wind had awakened her.

Saint Trina's eyes threatened to close again at any moment, her eyelids too heavy to continue awake. However, every time she tried to go back to sleep, a rustling in the land they were on and the tinkling of the lilies born around the settlement they were in would once again cause her to lift her head from the pillow, visualizing the starry sky in her mind's eye.

It was still night.

The stillness of the Lands Between when darkness reigned had always been something that made them want to hide, such a human desire for a deity.

Animals retreated to their burrows quickly, leaving behind only their tracks in the earth, and even beings that did not do good decided to remain still in the presence of the moon in the sky. Night, ironically, could be the quietest time of the day... especially when she was standing next to Amras.

Saint Trina moved her hand slowly, feeling the place beside her, but Amras' presence had disappeared from her side. Immediately and fearing the worst, she opened her eyes wide and made the effort to try to listen around her for any movement that would give away the boy's presence nearby.

And she heard it.

A voice she knew all too well. The blood rushing to the floor. a snapping sound that caused the deity to flinch, before she clasped her hands on the pillow in an attempt to find comfort in the scent Amras had left behind. Saint Trina's body continued to tremble for a few moments until she heard Amras' return.

And, though she tried to pretend to fall asleep by closing her eyes tightly, she was unable to do so.

Saint Trina thought of the stars, of the soft light her lilies emitted and how Amras had said her singing was beautiful. She thought of anything but the scent of someone else's blood on the boy's body.

[whenbonestellhistory]

Amras had noticed it, with the way she looked too tense when he had glanced at her as he wiped the blood off of his hands and tended to the poison on his shoulder— surprisingly it had not killed him, despite the spread of purple veins around it.

He’ll have to wait and see.

He dumped his bloodied clothes at the corner of the room and changed into something lighter, the bandages that covered his shoulder strapped tight under the soft clothes before he made his way to the bed and caressed Trina’s hair.

“He’s gone now.” Amras said to her softly, not wanting to scare her. “You won’t have to worry about him coming in.” He continued, shifting, the bed dipping under his weight before placing his hand on top of her own, attempting to soothe her.

“Nothing will hurt you for as long as I’m here.” He placed a soft, brief kiss to her head— an attempt at comfort, gentle reassurances slipping past his lips as he hoped Trina would not be afraid of him after this.

“I won’t hurt you, don’t worry.”

He never would, he would never find the heart to do so.

[thesleepdeity]

Saint Trina's hand slowly relaxed, letting go of the pillow so she could entwine her fingers with Amras'.

Amras smelled of comfort and security. The figure that had haunted her for so long no longer existed, reached by someone who sought to protect her from those hands. The hands that would not have stopped until they could touch her. For a few moments, the deity took only a shaky breath, filling her lungs with air even if she had to endure the scent of blood.

She was safe. Amras had helped them stay safe. Even when they were both asleep and Saint Trina didn't notice the presence outside, the boy did, and it hadn't taken him long to make it disappear for both their sakes.

"...I am sorry."

The deity's words were only a hidden whisper, fearful that she had caused Amras to have to deal with the blood of someone he did not know on his hands. However, judging by the bandage under the boy's clothew, his follower had been the first to attack. Amras only found a way to defend himself.

Saint Trina pulled him towards the bed, hugging his body as if nothing else existed in the world. She needed that source of contact that calmed her and made her see that everything was okay.

"...He hurt you. I am sorry."

Amras was not to hurt himself to protect her. The very thought made Saint Trina's body tremble.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“I’ll be fine.” Amras sighed against her, hiding the pink in his cheeks that surfaced upon her sudden action.

“There’s no need for you to apologize for this, it’s not your fault.” He whispered, although Trina was not warm like him, her presence brought him some comfort, alleviating the numb and pain along his injuries.

A reminder that he had succeeded in keeping her out of harm’s way for now.

He was just happy that Trina was not afraid of him, even though she knew of what he did outside of the safety of their room.

The sounds of the night had returned as he drowsily basked in her presence, hoping that no one will bother them so that he could pretend it’s just the two of them in the world, safe and sound.

In that moment he thought of wanting to protect Trina even more so that she wouldn’t have to be afraid of anything anymore. So she could sleep without being afraid of something having to come after her due to their obsession, so she could simply exist without the worry of people wanting to tear a piece of her.

He cannot always be there for her, nor could he solve her problems along with the problems of everyone else, but the least he could do for her willingness to even deal with him, to not run away from him or use him was to simply try to make life easier for her.

Amras doesn’t quite realize that the gentle buddings in his heart, the small, meaningful thoughts, were from a place of something else other than friendship.

Amras took a deep breath, taking in the scent of lilies and thought of the words uttered by that man earlier— ‘Blessing huh? What a funny way to describe being friends’ he thought, smug almost despite the sleepiness.

“I think,” he began, looking at her. “I think it’s safe for both of us to sleep now.” He told her, half a statement and half a promise, face still pink while a tired smile plastered itself upon his face as he felt the effects of the poison properly without the adrenaline pumping through his veins.

Strangely enough there was no shortness of breath, nor blood waiting to eject itself out of his mouth, only the enticing embrace of sleep.

He will not die tonight after all.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He banged his head on the table and he thought of the events that had just transpired in his sleep.

What was he going to do now? He questioned himself. It had been days since then, and Amras never really got a proper lick of sleep at the feeling of guilt that ate away at his bones.

Would it have changed things if he simply had agreed to Miquella’s plea? No, both of them would suffer a loveless union to a pointless cause, some bitter part of himself thought. It was mean to think of it that way, but it reassured some part of himself that following through the whims of someone he wasn’t even that close with would not do him good.

It would feel like he was taking advantage of Miquella too if he hadn’t refused it, he reasoned to himself, thinking of how utterly vulnerable he looked.

So much for being a friend.

Amras was well aware he himself wasn’t a good man, but it didn’t feel right to leave Miquella like that on such a lonely place in bitter terms. But he knew he can’t do anything about it for now, not while the Empyrean refuses to be seen.

Somehow, Godwyn crossed his mind. He had an inkling that their brother would have been able to fix it, but that man’s not here now, not anymore.

The golden ring sat heavy between his fingers, the cold band starting to feel surprisingly sharp as if it knows his offense against its previous wearer.

He was lost in his head, not really bothering to acknowledge the presence in the room the moment it came.

@thesleepdeity

[thesleepdeity]

The headache had gotten worse as time went on.

No matter how much Saint Trina tried to ignore it to make it go away, the pain continued to haunt him even though it was not his own. No. Lord Miquella's emotions pierced the too thin barrier between the two consciousnesses, no matter if the deity reinforced that barrier as much as possible. One soul, two bodies. Lord Miquella could not escape her just as she could not escape him, always connected by a thin thread that would never disappear.

From that, she knew that the conversation between Lord Miquella and Amras had not gone well.

It could not have gone well. Saint Trina didn't need the pain to understand it, because she knew Lord Miquella too well and knew how the conversation was going to end. In a misnamed tantrum, perhaps, or simply in a breakdown from which they would both end up suffering the consequences. Amras had no way of winning that argument no matter how hard he tried.

As soon as Amras woke up, returning from the dream palace, Saint Trina appeared beside him.

"...I am sorry."

At times, all they could do was apologize for Lord Miquella's behavior, which they doubted would change any time soon.

"Please, do not take his meanings in consideration," they said, placing a gentle hand on Amras' shoulder in a comforting gesture. "He is hurt, and hurt people make big mistakes, sometimes. He is grateful that you spared him the same fate of a marriage without love."

Perhaps Lord Miquella did not understand at the time, but sooner or later he would see that Amras had saved him.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Seeing him plead like that was terrifying.”

It had taken him a while to be able to answer her, lifting his head from the table and sighing. “I didn’t know how to say anything else but to refuse him. And now he’s gone off somewhere and I won’t be able to find him for a while.” He ranted to Trina, though it was much more a lament than a rant if anything else.

He was horrified, admittedly.

His brows furrowed as he remembered Miquella’s exact expression; that desperation, the haggard look and the plea as if resorting to a last minute attempt at making a futile plan work.

Right now he could still feel Miquella’s hands on his face.

He placed the ring inside of a drawer, hoping he would forget it for a day. He wouldn’t want to admit he’s been honestly a little hurt by what Miquella said, but what choice did he have?

“He offered himself up to me, you know. To become the Elden Lord of the Age he wanted to bring. It’s what I refused.” He elaborated, frowning.

“He told me his body would not be able to handle Godhood, and I did not want him to destroy himself as much as I did not want him to marry me out of that desperation. He was—“ he cut himself off to sigh again. “Not thinking clearly.” And I didn’t want to take advantage of him, went unsaid.

“What a troublesome boy, really.” He huffed, it was not meant to be malicious.

Amras was sad and concerned about him as much as he was upset about what happened, but the sadness prevailed somehow, seeing him like that didn’t feel right.

He didn’t often seek out comfort, but for now he thought he could use one of Fia’s hugs. He didn’t want to bother Trina, and he’s ran out of favors done to ask that of her.

He’s already been shameless enough.

The thought however, still rang inside his mind.

[thesleepdeity]

Lord Miquella was right. His body would not have withstood divinity.

The Gates of Divinity were known to be harsh on those attempting to reach divinity, and would likely taste Lord Miquella's desperation in the air, causing his body to be absorbed without being able to contain the power of divinity within.

The Lands Between told stories of people who failed in their attempts. Lord Miquella was destined to be one of them if he did not continue to gather enough power to reach the Gates of Divinity, and that was only possible by breaking his curse or finding a Lord to share the crown with him. Clearly, Amras had refused, but the rejection had sat so badly with Lord Miquella that Saint Trina didn't know if he was going to recover from it any time soon.

That was no mere rant or temper tantrum. The deity was able to feel the tornado inside her, a tornado of emotions that barely allowed her to hear her own thoughts. It was something darker.

"...He gave you his ring."

It was strange and Saint Trina couldn't help but point it out.

"It is special. The ring. I remember Radahn himself creating it before gifting it to Lord Miquella as a promise ring. I guess it does not make sense to keep wearing it. The Age of Compassion is no more."

Failed before it even started.

She let out a small sigh before averting her gaze from Amras, in an attempt to sever the connection between their minds. Amras' thoughts always went too fast, with an intensity that the deity didn't know how to handle, and he doubted the boy wanted to know that she had been reading his every thought all that time.

Deity life was... incredibly difficult in some ways.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He exhaled. “I messed up badly didn’t I?” He chuckled sardonically. “I doubt he’d want to see me for a while after that, if he even wants to at all.” It sounded like a whine almost, he’s unable to stay calm after what had just happened, the event too fresh.

He wanted his mind to be quiet for once, and so he looked at Trina again.

“Are you up for some soup or some food?” He felt like eating his feelings out of frustration right now, and thankfully cooking would keep his mind out of it.

“If you’re not, I can teach you how to sew instead.” Clearly, Amras was exasperated and confused and it was showing more and more with every moment that passed.

He realized he must have looked like he was about to lose it though, and cleared his throat. “Sorry, that must have looked so strange.” He said, averting his eyes again as the familiar feeling of embarrassment creeped through his bones.

He buried his face in his hands and groaned. “Oh by Marika’s tits I messed up.” He grumbled, hopefully not loud enough for Trina to hear— it’s not even about just Miquella alone now, but rather also Trina seeing him like this.

[thesleepdeity]

"Amras..."

Saint Trina's face darkened.

The boy blamed himself for what had happened, even though Lord Miquella's mental state had not been stable to begin with. The curse caused him to not process emotions as well, his reactions bordering on the tantrum that a small child might do. However, he was far from resembling a tantrum.

Lord Miquella's mind was covered by a cloud of darkness that only Godwyn had managed to calm sometimes with his words and gestures, taking the young Empyrean in his arms to walk around the capital in an attempt to make him forget what had bothered him. And most of the time it worked.

Except that Godwyn was no longer among them, his body a twisted and completely different version of what everyone knew.

"It is okay to... be compassionate with Lord Miquella's situation," Saint Trina said, her gaze softening in an attempt to make Amras understand that she was not scolding him. "It is not a good situation, I admit, but you have tried everything to help him. We cannot do more than wait for the time when he will ask for our help, if that happens at all. Me and him..."

The deity sighed.

"...He would have died if not for Radahn. Marika's children are not meant for godhood. Their bloodline has been... too tampered with. Nothing that comes out of Marika's womb turns out to be right, because they stray from their own paths to follow their mother's footsteps. And Lord Miquellla would have followed her footsteps, I assure you. You would have to have... put him down like a rabid dog then."

The thought of Lord Miquella becoming something contrary to what he preached made Saint Trina feel a shiver in her body, and so, she hugged Amras as if she could be protected from those visions of an uncertain future. Her arms did not let go.

"I do not want him to die, and I do not want him to suffer the change. Maybe that makes me a bad person, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

It took him a few moments to think again as he leaned on Trina’s arms.

“Would you…” he paused, as he thought of his own goals, Miquella’s cries, the age that had failed and her words that one night.

What would Godhood cost him? If Marika’s children failed, then could he ascend himself? The calling of the tarnished was to fix the Elden Ring and usher in a new age— could he do it really? A simple boy like him?

He’s sworn to bring the age of men, an age of impermanence and death, but what would it cost him? If not himself then the blood of others then?

He apologizes to Miquella in his head, as a plan began to form in his mind. Trina’s words and embrace had cleared the clouds somehow as he thought of it over and over.

“Would you still stick with me even if I were to bathe in the blood of many others to pave myself a path to becoming a Lord in the new age?” He asked her, gently touching her arm with his hand as he looked vulnerable almost.

“Miquella will not have to suffer then.” There is a failed age yes, but there will be a new one to come to replace it. It’s a little vile; even Amras was aware of that as he thought that he’s kicked Miquella’s chance for the throne and burned away at every single one of his plans, his efforts.

And yet a small part of himself knew it wouldn’t have ended well if he had agreed to be his Godfrey to Marika.

“My hands will not be clean at the end of this journey— I knew it wasn’t going to be if I were to restore death in these lands.” He sighed as he leaned in more, smelling the traces of lilies and seeing the color of Trina’s lavender hair at the corner of his eyes.

“But it seems that it requires a God too.” He frowned. “That blasted Ring has done enough damage to this place…. If I were to be a god, would that be fine with you?” I am stealing his dream too, after all, went unsaid.

[thesleepdeity]

Would she?

Saint Trina carefully observed and studied the boy who so clung to her words, but whose affection was not shown in the form of adoration. Amras truly considered her a friend, someone to confide in in a place as hostile as the Lands Between. And even if the deity couldn't quite express what the boy meant to her, at that moment, she wanted to make the effort to calm him down.

Saint Trina's hand rested on Amras' cheek, and she caressed it with the same love a lover might have for their other half. The boy's eyes sparkled. She looked into them and saw a stable future that would be slow in coming, but it would come.

"Your time will be the Age of Men."

The deity continued her caresses on Amras' cheek, softly, their faces being barely inches apart.

"Men are unpredictable. It will be hard. People will oppose your authority, but you can prosper if you do not get rid of the compassion and the love that makes you human." They gave him a soft smile. "And I will be there to see it, as long as you allow me to be by your side."

An Age of Men.

The thought was so strange. One that was led by someone who was not born a god, someone who knew what it was like to starve and cry. An age led by demigods was always doomed to failure, but Amras could change everything.

"Death is the only thing that can truly purify the Lands Between. It's time for it to come back. Every human being needs to rest."

Even Amras.

Amras, at some point, would die.

Saint Trina maybe too. When everyone would forget about her for a second time, when there would be no more prayers to answer, then she would die, become one with the air, with nature.

[whenbonestellhistory]

How nice to have yet another person to believe in what he wanted to do. With that thought, Amras smiled.

“I don’t plan on losing myself, don’t worry.” And he’ll make sure he won’t. Briefly, he wondered what Miquella’s Age of Compassion would have been like had he been a Lord and remembered Trina’s words— another Marika, Miquella would have become another Marika.

He averted his eyes from Trina, cheek leaning into the hand that touched him— he promptly ignored the slightest increase of the beating of his heart as he sighed.

Maybe it was better this way, for him to usurp that plan, Miquella’s plan.

“It’s a rather tall order.” He said with a light huff. “Not even halfway there and I already have a list of people I need to get rid of.” Miquella would have looked unnerved at that statement, he briefly thought. He hasn’t known him for very long, but it was clear the empyrean didn’t like blood or bloodshed.

He removed Trina’s hands from his cheeks and held them tenderly instead. Now that his negative feelings had gone away, he became a bit more specially aware of how /close/ Trina was to him— he doesn’t look at her, still.

“It will be… nice, at least. I think people have stayed stagnant here for too long.” Amras thought of the rather miserable expressions a lot of the folk he encountered had plastered on their faces. There were others who chose to make the best of what they had, including himself, but there was always something so strange about the exhaustion— maybe one day he’d be able to grant Miquella that proper rest too, but not now.

Unlike Amras, the empyrean did not get to live the way he truly deserved to.

He thought of those words, the feeling of only being stuck in one place and utter silence and loneliness of that dreamlike realm and being stuck in a childish body. It’s idealistic, he knows, but he hoped that he’d be able to do something about it once he gets the Elden Ring.

It’s the least he could do for rejecting him.

“I’ll be using your arrows on the way on that journey as well, I hope that is alright with you.” He looked at her again, pushing down the growing shyness under her gaze, his draconian pupils slightly expanding without his knowledge.

[thesleepdeity]

So many people had lost their way in trying to reach the goal.

It was strange to think that it would have been the same fate for Lord Miquella, had his vow with Radahn continued without someone interrupting. The gates of the Lands of Shadow would open, letting Amras enter certain death, and Saint Trina...

Saint Trina had little idea what would have happened to her by interfering with Lord Miquella's plans.

The Lands Between had been too long stuck in a loop that did not end, a loop in which beings could not find the eternal rest that souls sometimes needed. It was a madness that gradually took over their mind, to go on without feeling like it, to feel Death escaping from their fingertips without being able to do anything to prevent it. Many times, the concoction of her lilies had been used to put crying babies to sleep and help the sick, but other times, when Saint Trina tried not to look, the concoction was used to escape from the world.

It was not the goal. The heart of the deity suffered.

Perhaps the promise of a new era ruled by Amras was the only option they had to bring everything back to what it was before.

"Use as many as you need," Saint Trina replied, a small smile appearing on her face. It was tired, somewhat sad, but it was genuine. "When you ascend to the throne, I hope I can stand beside you and call you Elden Lord."

But that was a long time away.

The deity let out a small sigh.

"...You should rest. The dream palace is not accessible right now, and it won't be for a long time. Maybe a dreamless sleep will help you think better."

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Hmm. Maybe it will.” He hummed in agreement, returning her smile and letting go of her hands before gently shifting to stand from his chair, glancing at the bed he hasn’t quite used in a while.

Half the time he slept outside or simply on the chair, if not either then he’d always end up in Fia’s chambers for a semblance of a companionship— a security of some sort.

Dreams of deathblight typically invaded him in his sleep when he did so, but it did not bother him much, not even as Fia was taking some of his vitality from him. It wasn’t a bad trade, he had plenty to spare anyways.

He walked over to the bed, eyes tracing over the patterns on sheets of his own making before he sat down, patting the spot next to it absentmindedly. He looked at Trina and remembered how she looked tired; the bed was big enough to handle two people comfortably for a nap. He didn’t know if she’d be fine with that, though.

“Are you tired?” He asked. “You can rest here if you’d like to.” That must have sounded wrong, and so he cleared his throat, glancing away as he patted the spot next to him. “I’ll make sure to stay as far away, don’t worry.” Because if she desired to sleep too, she didn’t deserve to sleep on the floor.

In truth, Amras had an ulterior motive too— he didn’t want Trina to leave, not yet, but he’s unable to ask her that directly for some reason, the proper words for that request for more of her time stuck in his throat. He felt as though he needed her presence near there— needed a /friend/ near him, at least for a while until he could gather himself properly.

It felt selfish, to ask her for more when she’s given him more than enough by showing her support without anything in exchange but to simply stand beside him. Embarrassment crept up in his bones again and he settled himself in before she could answer him, face close to the wall as his ears reddened as he thought he should have worded his invitation differently.

[thesleepdeity]

Saint Trina was exhausted.

Maybe she wouldn't say it out loud. She never would. The deities did not feel exhaustion, their energy flowing like a torrent of water in a river that kept changing day after day. However, she felt a kind of fatigue in her soul that she had never experienced before, something that clouded her mind and forced her to ground herself as best she could.

It was because of Miquella. Saint Trina did not need to be naive to understand that the fatigue did not come from herself, but from the nausea of Miquella himself, who was desperately seeking to disappear from the world for a few moments. She understood him, though he wasn't going to get it. The dream palace had dug its claws into Miquella's soft flesh, anchoring him to the world of dreams without the possibility of returning without a body. At least, for now.

She understood him.

She didn't want to think about how it felt to be trapped in a place that sought to punish you, to shed your skin for how it had been mistreated in the real world.

Sometimes, Saint Trina wished to find Miquella's body and give him a proper burial. Anything to give him just a little peace.

...But they could not.

Perhaps with Amras the deity might find some solace, an ephemeral moment in which to rest.

"Yes. Yes, please." Saint Trina took a step forward, approaching the bed. Their hand went to Amras' hair to gently arrange it. "I..."

She looked down.

"I feel like something is fading. Out there. And I do not know what."

Finally, the deity entered the bed, right next to Amras. The boy emanated a warmth that helped keep them comfortable.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Would talking about it help?” He softly asked, he doesn’t look at her still, but knows she is troubled. “You don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

He knew well enough to know there’s just some things that shouldn’t be talked about, and he wasn’t going to pry it off of her. He had his fair share of things he refused to talk about too, not even with his friends, not even with Kale whom lended him an ear whenever he needed it.

A reassurance always helped in some way though— while simple as an offer, it helped alleviate some heaviness knowing they weren’t alone.

He wanted Trina to know that.

Amras shifted and turned so he could look at her, head half buried in one of the pillows as he reached out to awkwardly pat her shoulder.

“If you need to speak— if you /want/ to speak, I’m here to lend an ear.” He said to her, holding the same gentleness as he did earlier. Wordlessly, he brushed a stray lock from her face and tucked it behind her ear.

“Or we could just sleep, it may clear our heads better like you said.” He smiled, small but warm as his hand retreated between them.

[thesleepdeity]

"It just..."

Saint Trina focused on Amras' chin, purposely avoiding looking directly at him.

"It is strange. To not feel the bond to the dream palace," she tried to explain, though she doubted her words made much sense. Amras was listening to her, however, and that was enough to make her feel ready to speak. "And... there is another land, far away from here. It was unreachable for a long, long time."

The deity buried their face in the pillow, gently, finding Amras' scent concentrated on it. The boy always slept there, right where they were, and they knew his scent would cling to their skin quickly. Saint Trina would begin to smell like Amras, a mark that while not permanent, helped her feel safe.

"It is called the Lands of Shadow..." Before Amras could retract his hand, she took it between hers, squeezing it gently. "And there is a place in the Lands of Shadow, a place that should be completely sealed but is not. The Gates of Divinity. It is at the top of a tower, in a region called Enir-Ilim. It is a wicked thing. A wicked thing that can whisper sweet things to you, to sacrifice all of yourself to reach godhood."

A shudder ran through the deity completely, from top to bottom.

She did not like to talk about it, but it was necessary. Because Amras had to know.

"Miquella managed to reach an entrance to the Lands of Shadow... but everything got complicated, afterwards. Maybe it is for the best, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

Power was something a lot of people wanted in some form— Godhood even more so in some others. Images of a bloodied gate flashed in his mind’s eye, screaming, glowing, whispering— he felt though as if he’s feeling the red ground beneath his feet— sticky and warm, the bodies of that gate calling out to him to become a god.

A dream. It was one of his strange dreams, one of the stranger ones he had as a child aside from the golden fields and and the Elden Ring. He doesn’t know how and why he’s made the correlation somehow with what Trina had told him, about the very place he’s never even been in and the one inside of his dreams.

“He will have to sacrifice what makes him himself.” Amras murmured. “Is that why you were afraid of the change it would bring to Miquella?”

Shedding one’s own being was a terrifying concept to someone like Amras— he couldn’t comprehend it, losing everything that made him himself to be born anew as someone who valued and prided himself with his own identity as Amras, as a man.

Inheriting pieces of the Elden ring was different, not really overwhelming as he just took runes and stored it in his being, mending it in a way that doesn’t tear him apart.

He didn’t have to change.

He doesn’t have to shed his own skin, leave pieces of himself out to rot for a gate that would not guarantee him his wish anyways.

He understood now, what would happen to Miquella. And as foul as his thoughts were, he was glad he had taken that opportunity away from the empyrean.

[thesleepdeity]

Saint Trina closed her eyes, but no matter how much she wanted to make Miquella's terrified face disappear from her mind, she did not succeed. The memory was permanently embedded in her being, not by herself, but by the piece of soul they both shared. Miquella's memories were intermingled with hers, and there were times when the deity was unable to tell when they were her memories and when they were Miquella's.

Miquella, at some point, would also see Amras through her eyes.

"I... do not have the full picture of what he was planning to do," Saint Trina said, her voice sounding unsure and uneasy despite the exhaustion that threatened to make her collapse from one second to the next. "But that... that was not him planning. It was like watching someone else. Miquella would have sacrificed everyone, including himself, just to bring a new age."

It was not the first time Miquella had harmed himself to achieve his goals.

"...He cannot reach godhood. Not like that. There has to be another way to break the curse."

Except that Miquella seemed to have exhausted all his options.

Saint Trina let out a soft sigh before shifting closer to Amras, needing the comfort his presence provided. Maybe she looked too needy, but...

Amras was so different from what they already knew.

"I am sorry. I do not intend to make you feel responsible for us. We are our own person and we need to... to find answers by ourselves, rather than finding answers in others that may not have them."

[whenbonestellhistory]

Tw: Descriptions of murder, and Thiollier being creepy (excuse if ooc)

“You’ll be able to figure it out someday.” He said as he adjusted the blanket so that it would cover her properly. “We should sleep-“ he cut himself off, noticing her soft breathing and smiled.

“Good night, Trina.” He murmured before he too closed his eyes.

The peace didn’t last for very long, though as he was awoken by a presence lurking outside. People should not even be near the area unless they got an invitation— and very few got them.

Amras’ eyes opened, frowning as the haze of sleep slowly started to wear off. Trina was still asleep and it was already night time, one of her arms loosely holding him.

He sat up from the bed, careful not to wake her up as he gently slipped from her grasp to clearly see who could be outside.

Sure enough, there was the lurker. With a white mask on his face and light lavender hair, he stood there, pensively, as if waiting for someone very patiently. Amras noticed he was standing near Trina’s lilies near the window and wondered where the flowers had come from but shook the thoughts out of his head.

He had a bad feeling.

He’d like to give the benefit of the doubt though, and chose to play a little game.

“Good evening.” He greeted, a small smile plastered upon his face at the taller man.

“Hello.” The man spoke to him softly, giving him a curt nod.

“Is there something that you need?” Amras asked innocently, the smile remaining on his face as he assessed him further.

“Yes…” the lavender haired man replied as he picked up the flower that grew on the cracks on the ground. “I believe you have something I desire, hidden behind these walls…”

Desire? Amras’ face went blank, a creeping feeling crawling up his chest.

“The one who shall grant me velvety sleep.. I believe she is there, inside. I need to see her.” The man doesn’t stop speaking, breathing shakily almost. “I need to feel her, her scent, so she may grant me slumber.”

Amras didn’t like the way he shivered.

“I see.” Amras said, though his eyes have darkened. While his intentions are vague, it didn’t stop the feeling of something wrong.

“She is not allowing visitors right now, she is asleep.” He continued with a firm tone, the man didn’t seem to take it well.

“Who are you to say such a thing? It is me who she will only need to speak to— it will do you well not to lie to me.” The man’s voice trembled, voice raising a pitch or two.

“I am her friend, and it will do you well to stay away from her.” Amras glowered. “This is your last warning.” The game was nearing its end.

“I will not forgive you. Y-you— a mere boy, not even a follower—“ The man paused, shaking, before erupting to a frantic swing that Amras was caught off guard by. “You smell like her— I can smell on you her blessing.”

The needle had pierced Amras’ shoulder as the man did not cease to mumble frantically, shakily, that Trina only belonged to him. Her love, her power, her voice. And that it was unfair for someone like Amras to get it.

Amras scowled, disgusted as he pried the man off of him. His intentions have been made clear, while he considered sparing him in the first few words exchanged, he wasn’t going to let him have that option now.

He removed the needle from himself with a grunt, he’ll make this quick.

The night was filled with the sounds of thudding, muffled screaming, and a disgusting squelch before something snapped and fell.

Amras huffed, shaking his head as he turned away to go back inside of his room. He closed the door, quietly stepping in as much as he could to not wake Trina as the scent of blood not just his own faintly wafted in the air.

[thesleepdeity]

Something in the movement of the wind had awakened her.

Saint Trina's eyes threatened to close again at any moment, her eyelids too heavy to continue awake. However, every time she tried to go back to sleep, a rustling in the land they were on and the tinkling of the lilies born around the settlement they were in would once again cause her to lift her head from the pillow, visualizing the starry sky in her mind's eye.

It was still night.

The stillness of the Lands Between when darkness reigned had always been something that made them want to hide, such a human desire for a deity.

Animals retreated to their burrows quickly, leaving behind only their tracks in the earth, and even beings that did not do good decided to remain still in the presence of the moon in the sky. Night, ironically, could be the quietest time of the day... especially when she was standing next to Amras.

Saint Trina moved her hand slowly, feeling the place beside her, but Amras' presence had disappeared from her side. Immediately and fearing the worst, she opened her eyes wide and made the effort to try to listen around her for any movement that would give away the boy's presence nearby.

And she heard it.

A voice she knew all too well. The blood rushing to the floor. a snapping sound that caused the deity to flinch, before she clasped her hands on the pillow in an attempt to find comfort in the scent Amras had left behind. Saint Trina's body continued to tremble for a few moments until she heard Amras' return.

And, though she tried to pretend to fall asleep by closing her eyes tightly, she was unable to do so.

Saint Trina thought of the stars, of the soft light her lilies emitted and how Amras had said her singing was beautiful. She thought of anything but the scent of someone else's blood on the boy's body.

[whenbonestellhistory]

Amras had noticed it, with the way she looked too tense when he had glanced at her as he wiped the blood off of his hands and tended to the poison on his shoulder— surprisingly it had not killed him, despite the spread of purple veins around it.

He’ll have to wait and see.

He dumped his bloodied clothes at the corner of the room and changed into something lighter, the bandages that covered his shoulder strapped tight under the soft clothes before he made his way to the bed and caressed Trina’s hair.

“He’s gone now.” Amras said to her softly, not wanting to scare her. “You won’t have to worry about him coming in.” He continued, shifting, the bed dipping under his weight before placing his hand on top of her own, attempting to soothe her.

“Nothing will hurt you for as long as I’m here.” He placed a soft, brief kiss to her head— an attempt at comfort, gentle reassurances slipping past his lips as he hoped Trina would not be afraid of him after this.

“I won’t hurt you, don’t worry.”

He never would, he would never find the heart to do so.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He banged his head on the table and he thought of the events that had just transpired in his sleep.

What was he going to do now? He questioned himself. It had been days since then, and Amras never really got a proper lick of sleep at the feeling of guilt that ate away at his bones.

Would it have changed things if he simply had agreed to Miquella’s plea? No, both of them would suffer a loveless union to a pointless cause, some bitter part of himself thought. It was mean to think of it that way, but it reassured some part of himself that following through the whims of someone he wasn’t even that close with would not do him good.

It would feel like he was taking advantage of Miquella too if he hadn’t refused it, he reasoned to himself, thinking of how utterly vulnerable he looked.

So much for being a friend.

Amras was well aware he himself wasn’t a good man, but it didn’t feel right to leave Miquella like that on such a lonely place in bitter terms. But he knew he can’t do anything about it for now, not while the Empyrean refuses to be seen.

Somehow, Godwyn crossed his mind. He had an inkling that their brother would have been able to fix it, but that man’s not here now, not anymore.

The golden ring sat heavy between his fingers, the cold band starting to feel surprisingly sharp as if it knows his offense against its previous wearer.

He was lost in his head, not really bothering to acknowledge the presence in the room the moment it came.

@thesleepdeity

[thesleepdeity]

The headache had gotten worse as time went on.

No matter how much Saint Trina tried to ignore it to make it go away, the pain continued to haunt him even though it was not his own. No. Lord Miquella's emotions pierced the too thin barrier between the two consciousnesses, no matter if the deity reinforced that barrier as much as possible. One soul, two bodies. Lord Miquella could not escape her just as she could not escape him, always connected by a thin thread that would never disappear.

From that, she knew that the conversation between Lord Miquella and Amras had not gone well.

It could not have gone well. Saint Trina didn't need the pain to understand it, because she knew Lord Miquella too well and knew how the conversation was going to end. In a misnamed tantrum, perhaps, or simply in a breakdown from which they would both end up suffering the consequences. Amras had no way of winning that argument no matter how hard he tried.

As soon as Amras woke up, returning from the dream palace, Saint Trina appeared beside him.

"...I am sorry."

At times, all they could do was apologize for Lord Miquella's behavior, which they doubted would change any time soon.

"Please, do not take his meanings in consideration," they said, placing a gentle hand on Amras' shoulder in a comforting gesture. "He is hurt, and hurt people make big mistakes, sometimes. He is grateful that you spared him the same fate of a marriage without love."

Perhaps Lord Miquella did not understand at the time, but sooner or later he would see that Amras had saved him.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Seeing him plead like that was terrifying.”

It had taken him a while to be able to answer her, lifting his head from the table and sighing. “I didn’t know how to say anything else but to refuse him. And now he’s gone off somewhere and I won’t be able to find him for a while.” He ranted to Trina, though it was much more a lament than a rant if anything else.

He was horrified, admittedly.

His brows furrowed as he remembered Miquella’s exact expression; that desperation, the haggard look and the plea as if resorting to a last minute attempt at making a futile plan work.

Right now he could still feel Miquella’s hands on his face.

He placed the ring inside of a drawer, hoping he would forget it for a day. He wouldn’t want to admit he’s been honestly a little hurt by what Miquella said, but what choice did he have?

“He offered himself up to me, you know. To become the Elden Lord of the Age he wanted to bring. It’s what I refused.” He elaborated, frowning.

“He told me his body would not be able to handle Godhood, and I did not want him to destroy himself as much as I did not want him to marry me out of that desperation. He was—“ he cut himself off to sigh again. “Not thinking clearly.” And I didn’t want to take advantage of him, went unsaid.

“What a troublesome boy, really.” He huffed, it was not meant to be malicious.

Amras was sad and concerned about him as much as he was upset about what happened, but the sadness prevailed somehow, seeing him like that didn’t feel right.

He didn’t often seek out comfort, but for now he thought he could use one of Fia’s hugs. He didn’t want to bother Trina, and he’s ran out of favors done to ask that of her.

He’s already been shameless enough.

The thought however, still rang inside his mind.

[thesleepdeity]

Lord Miquella was right. His body would not have withstood divinity.

The Gates of Divinity were known to be harsh on those attempting to reach divinity, and would likely taste Lord Miquella's desperation in the air, causing his body to be absorbed without being able to contain the power of divinity within.

The Lands Between told stories of people who failed in their attempts. Lord Miquella was destined to be one of them if he did not continue to gather enough power to reach the Gates of Divinity, and that was only possible by breaking his curse or finding a Lord to share the crown with him. Clearly, Amras had refused, but the rejection had sat so badly with Lord Miquella that Saint Trina didn't know if he was going to recover from it any time soon.

That was no mere rant or temper tantrum. The deity was able to feel the tornado inside her, a tornado of emotions that barely allowed her to hear her own thoughts. It was something darker.

"...He gave you his ring."

It was strange and Saint Trina couldn't help but point it out.

"It is special. The ring. I remember Radahn himself creating it before gifting it to Lord Miquella as a promise ring. I guess it does not make sense to keep wearing it. The Age of Compassion is no more."

Failed before it even started.

She let out a small sigh before averting her gaze from Amras, in an attempt to sever the connection between their minds. Amras' thoughts always went too fast, with an intensity that the deity didn't know how to handle, and he doubted the boy wanted to know that she had been reading his every thought all that time.

Deity life was... incredibly difficult in some ways.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He exhaled. “I messed up badly didn’t I?” He chuckled sardonically. “I doubt he’d want to see me for a while after that, if he even wants to at all.” It sounded like a whine almost, he’s unable to stay calm after what had just happened, the event too fresh.

He wanted his mind to be quiet for once, and so he looked at Trina again.

“Are you up for some soup or some food?” He felt like eating his feelings out of frustration right now, and thankfully cooking would keep his mind out of it.

“If you’re not, I can teach you how to sew instead.” Clearly, Amras was exasperated and confused and it was showing more and more with every moment that passed.

He realized he must have looked like he was about to lose it though, and cleared his throat. “Sorry, that must have looked so strange.” He said, averting his eyes again as the familiar feeling of embarrassment creeped through his bones.

He buried his face in his hands and groaned. “Oh by Marika’s tits I messed up.” He grumbled, hopefully not loud enough for Trina to hear— it’s not even about just Miquella alone now, but rather also Trina seeing him like this.

[thesleepdeity]

"Amras..."

Saint Trina's face darkened.

The boy blamed himself for what had happened, even though Lord Miquella's mental state had not been stable to begin with. The curse caused him to not process emotions as well, his reactions bordering on the tantrum that a small child might do. However, he was far from resembling a tantrum.

Lord Miquella's mind was covered by a cloud of darkness that only Godwyn had managed to calm sometimes with his words and gestures, taking the young Empyrean in his arms to walk around the capital in an attempt to make him forget what had bothered him. And most of the time it worked.

Except that Godwyn was no longer among them, his body a twisted and completely different version of what everyone knew.

"It is okay to... be compassionate with Lord Miquella's situation," Saint Trina said, her gaze softening in an attempt to make Amras understand that she was not scolding him. "It is not a good situation, I admit, but you have tried everything to help him. We cannot do more than wait for the time when he will ask for our help, if that happens at all. Me and him..."

The deity sighed.

"...He would have died if not for Radahn. Marika's children are not meant for godhood. Their bloodline has been... too tampered with. Nothing that comes out of Marika's womb turns out to be right, because they stray from their own paths to follow their mother's footsteps. And Lord Miquellla would have followed her footsteps, I assure you. You would have to have... put him down like a rabid dog then."

The thought of Lord Miquella becoming something contrary to what he preached made Saint Trina feel a shiver in her body, and so, she hugged Amras as if she could be protected from those visions of an uncertain future. Her arms did not let go.

"I do not want him to die, and I do not want him to suffer the change. Maybe that makes me a bad person, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

It took him a few moments to think again as he leaned on Trina’s arms.

“Would you…” he paused, as he thought of his own goals, Miquella’s cries, the age that had failed and her words that one night.

What would Godhood cost him? If Marika’s children failed, then could he ascend himself? The calling of the tarnished was to fix the Elden Ring and usher in a new age— could he do it really? A simple boy like him?

He’s sworn to bring the age of men, an age of impermanence and death, but what would it cost him? If not himself then the blood of others then?

He apologizes to Miquella in his head, as a plan began to form in his mind. Trina’s words and embrace had cleared the clouds somehow as he thought of it over and over.

“Would you still stick with me even if I were to bathe in the blood of many others to pave myself a path to becoming a Lord in the new age?” He asked her, gently touching her arm with his hand as he looked vulnerable almost.

“Miquella will not have to suffer then.” There is a failed age yes, but there will be a new one to come to replace it. It’s a little vile; even Amras was aware of that as he thought that he’s kicked Miquella’s chance for the throne and burned away at every single one of his plans, his efforts.

And yet a small part of himself knew it wouldn’t have ended well if he had agreed to be his Godfrey to Marika.

“My hands will not be clean at the end of this journey— I knew it wasn’t going to be if I were to restore death in these lands.” He sighed as he leaned in more, smelling the traces of lilies and seeing the color of Trina’s lavender hair at the corner of his eyes.

“But it seems that it requires a God too.” He frowned. “That blasted Ring has done enough damage to this place…. If I were to be a god, would that be fine with you?” I am stealing his dream too, after all, went unsaid.

[thesleepdeity]

Would she?

Saint Trina carefully observed and studied the boy who so clung to her words, but whose affection was not shown in the form of adoration. Amras truly considered her a friend, someone to confide in in a place as hostile as the Lands Between. And even if the deity couldn't quite express what the boy meant to her, at that moment, she wanted to make the effort to calm him down.

Saint Trina's hand rested on Amras' cheek, and she caressed it with the same love a lover might have for their other half. The boy's eyes sparkled. She looked into them and saw a stable future that would be slow in coming, but it would come.

"Your time will be the Age of Men."

The deity continued her caresses on Amras' cheek, softly, their faces being barely inches apart.

"Men are unpredictable. It will be hard. People will oppose your authority, but you can prosper if you do not get rid of the compassion and the love that makes you human." They gave him a soft smile. "And I will be there to see it, as long as you allow me to be by your side."

An Age of Men.

The thought was so strange. One that was led by someone who was not born a god, someone who knew what it was like to starve and cry. An age led by demigods was always doomed to failure, but Amras could change everything.

"Death is the only thing that can truly purify the Lands Between. It's time for it to come back. Every human being needs to rest."

Even Amras.

Amras, at some point, would die.

Saint Trina maybe too. When everyone would forget about her for a second time, when there would be no more prayers to answer, then she would die, become one with the air, with nature.

[whenbonestellhistory]

How nice to have yet another person to believe in what he wanted to do. With that thought, Amras smiled.

“I don’t plan on losing myself, don’t worry.” And he’ll make sure he won’t. Briefly, he wondered what Miquella’s Age of Compassion would have been like had he been a Lord and remembered Trina’s words— another Marika, Miquella would have become another Marika.

He averted his eyes from Trina, cheek leaning into the hand that touched him— he promptly ignored the slightest increase of the beating of his heart as he sighed.

Maybe it was better this way, for him to usurp that plan, Miquella’s plan.

“It’s a rather tall order.” He said with a light huff. “Not even halfway there and I already have a list of people I need to get rid of.” Miquella would have looked unnerved at that statement, he briefly thought. He hasn’t known him for very long, but it was clear the empyrean didn’t like blood or bloodshed.

He removed Trina’s hands from his cheeks and held them tenderly instead. Now that his negative feelings had gone away, he became a bit more specially aware of how /close/ Trina was to him— he doesn’t look at her, still.

“It will be… nice, at least. I think people have stayed stagnant here for too long.” Amras thought of the rather miserable expressions a lot of the folk he encountered had plastered on their faces. There were others who chose to make the best of what they had, including himself, but there was always something so strange about the exhaustion— maybe one day he’d be able to grant Miquella that proper rest too, but not now.

Unlike Amras, the empyrean did not get to live the way he truly deserved to.

He thought of those words, the feeling of only being stuck in one place and utter silence and loneliness of that dreamlike realm and being stuck in a childish body. It’s idealistic, he knows, but he hoped that he’d be able to do something about it once he gets the Elden Ring.

It’s the least he could do for rejecting him.

“I’ll be using your arrows on the way on that journey as well, I hope that is alright with you.” He looked at her again, pushing down the growing shyness under her gaze, his draconian pupils slightly expanding without his knowledge.

[thesleepdeity]

So many people had lost their way in trying to reach the goal.

It was strange to think that it would have been the same fate for Lord Miquella, had his vow with Radahn continued without someone interrupting. The gates of the Lands of Shadow would open, letting Amras enter certain death, and Saint Trina...

Saint Trina had little idea what would have happened to her by interfering with Lord Miquella's plans.

The Lands Between had been too long stuck in a loop that did not end, a loop in which beings could not find the eternal rest that souls sometimes needed. It was a madness that gradually took over their mind, to go on without feeling like it, to feel Death escaping from their fingertips without being able to do anything to prevent it. Many times, the concoction of her lilies had been used to put crying babies to sleep and help the sick, but other times, when Saint Trina tried not to look, the concoction was used to escape from the world.

It was not the goal. The heart of the deity suffered.

Perhaps the promise of a new era ruled by Amras was the only option they had to bring everything back to what it was before.

"Use as many as you need," Saint Trina replied, a small smile appearing on her face. It was tired, somewhat sad, but it was genuine. "When you ascend to the throne, I hope I can stand beside you and call you Elden Lord."

But that was a long time away.

The deity let out a small sigh.

"...You should rest. The dream palace is not accessible right now, and it won't be for a long time. Maybe a dreamless sleep will help you think better."

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Hmm. Maybe it will.” He hummed in agreement, returning her smile and letting go of her hands before gently shifting to stand from his chair, glancing at the bed he hasn’t quite used in a while.

Half the time he slept outside or simply on the chair, if not either then he’d always end up in Fia’s chambers for a semblance of a companionship— a security of some sort.

Dreams of deathblight typically invaded him in his sleep when he did so, but it did not bother him much, not even as Fia was taking some of his vitality from him. It wasn’t a bad trade, he had plenty to spare anyways.

He walked over to the bed, eyes tracing over the patterns on sheets of his own making before he sat down, patting the spot next to it absentmindedly. He looked at Trina and remembered how she looked tired; the bed was big enough to handle two people comfortably for a nap. He didn’t know if she’d be fine with that, though.

“Are you tired?” He asked. “You can rest here if you’d like to.” That must have sounded wrong, and so he cleared his throat, glancing away as he patted the spot next to him. “I’ll make sure to stay as far away, don’t worry.” Because if she desired to sleep too, she didn’t deserve to sleep on the floor.

In truth, Amras had an ulterior motive too— he didn’t want Trina to leave, not yet, but he’s unable to ask her that directly for some reason, the proper words for that request for more of her time stuck in his throat. He felt as though he needed her presence near there— needed a /friend/ near him, at least for a while until he could gather himself properly.

It felt selfish, to ask her for more when she’s given him more than enough by showing her support without anything in exchange but to simply stand beside him. Embarrassment crept up in his bones again and he settled himself in before she could answer him, face close to the wall as his ears reddened as he thought he should have worded his invitation differently.

[thesleepdeity]

Saint Trina was exhausted.

Maybe she wouldn't say it out loud. She never would. The deities did not feel exhaustion, their energy flowing like a torrent of water in a river that kept changing day after day. However, she felt a kind of fatigue in her soul that she had never experienced before, something that clouded her mind and forced her to ground herself as best she could.

It was because of Miquella. Saint Trina did not need to be naive to understand that the fatigue did not come from herself, but from the nausea of Miquella himself, who was desperately seeking to disappear from the world for a few moments. She understood him, though he wasn't going to get it. The dream palace had dug its claws into Miquella's soft flesh, anchoring him to the world of dreams without the possibility of returning without a body. At least, for now.

She understood him.

She didn't want to think about how it felt to be trapped in a place that sought to punish you, to shed your skin for how it had been mistreated in the real world.

Sometimes, Saint Trina wished to find Miquella's body and give him a proper burial. Anything to give him just a little peace.

...But they could not.

Perhaps with Amras the deity might find some solace, an ephemeral moment in which to rest.

"Yes. Yes, please." Saint Trina took a step forward, approaching the bed. Their hand went to Amras' hair to gently arrange it. "I..."

She looked down.

"I feel like something is fading. Out there. And I do not know what."

Finally, the deity entered the bed, right next to Amras. The boy emanated a warmth that helped keep them comfortable.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Would talking about it help?” He softly asked, he doesn’t look at her still, but knows she is troubled. “You don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

He knew well enough to know there’s just some things that shouldn’t be talked about, and he wasn’t going to pry it off of her. He had his fair share of things he refused to talk about too, not even with his friends, not even with Kale whom lended him an ear whenever he needed it.

A reassurance always helped in some way though— while simple as an offer, it helped alleviate some heaviness knowing they weren’t alone.

He wanted Trina to know that.

Amras shifted and turned so he could look at her, head half buried in one of the pillows as he reached out to awkwardly pat her shoulder.

“If you need to speak— if you /want/ to speak, I’m here to lend an ear.” He said to her, holding the same gentleness as he did earlier. Wordlessly, he brushed a stray lock from her face and tucked it behind her ear.

“Or we could just sleep, it may clear our heads better like you said.” He smiled, small but warm as his hand retreated between them.

[thesleepdeity]

"It just..."

Saint Trina focused on Amras' chin, purposely avoiding looking directly at him.

"It is strange. To not feel the bond to the dream palace," she tried to explain, though she doubted her words made much sense. Amras was listening to her, however, and that was enough to make her feel ready to speak. "And... there is another land, far away from here. It was unreachable for a long, long time."

The deity buried their face in the pillow, gently, finding Amras' scent concentrated on it. The boy always slept there, right where they were, and they knew his scent would cling to their skin quickly. Saint Trina would begin to smell like Amras, a mark that while not permanent, helped her feel safe.

"It is called the Lands of Shadow..." Before Amras could retract his hand, she took it between hers, squeezing it gently. "And there is a place in the Lands of Shadow, a place that should be completely sealed but is not. The Gates of Divinity. It is at the top of a tower, in a region called Enir-Ilim. It is a wicked thing. A wicked thing that can whisper sweet things to you, to sacrifice all of yourself to reach godhood."

A shudder ran through the deity completely, from top to bottom.

She did not like to talk about it, but it was necessary. Because Amras had to know.

"Miquella managed to reach an entrance to the Lands of Shadow... but everything got complicated, afterwards. Maybe it is for the best, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

Power was something a lot of people wanted in some form— Godhood even more so in some others. Images of a bloodied gate flashed in his mind’s eye, screaming, glowing, whispering— he felt though as if he’s feeling the red ground beneath his feet— sticky and warm, the bodies of that gate calling out to him to become a god.

A dream. It was one of his strange dreams, one of the stranger ones he had as a child aside from the golden fields and and the Elden Ring. He doesn’t know how and why he’s made the correlation somehow with what Trina had told him, about the very place he’s never even been in and the one inside of his dreams.

“He will have to sacrifice what makes him himself.” Amras murmured. “Is that why you were afraid of the change it would bring to Miquella?”

Shedding one’s own being was a terrifying concept to someone like Amras— he couldn’t comprehend it, losing everything that made him himself to be born anew as someone who valued and prided himself with his own identity as Amras, as a man.

Inheriting pieces of the Elden ring was different, not really overwhelming as he just took runes and stored it in his being, mending it in a way that doesn’t tear him apart.

He didn’t have to change.

He doesn’t have to shed his own skin, leave pieces of himself out to rot for a gate that would not guarantee him his wish anyways.

He understood now, what would happen to Miquella. And as foul as his thoughts were, he was glad he had taken that opportunity away from the empyrean.

[thesleepdeity]

Saint Trina closed her eyes, but no matter how much she wanted to make Miquella's terrified face disappear from her mind, she did not succeed. The memory was permanently embedded in her being, not by herself, but by the piece of soul they both shared. Miquella's memories were intermingled with hers, and there were times when the deity was unable to tell when they were her memories and when they were Miquella's.

Miquella, at some point, would also see Amras through her eyes.

"I... do not have the full picture of what he was planning to do," Saint Trina said, her voice sounding unsure and uneasy despite the exhaustion that threatened to make her collapse from one second to the next. "But that... that was not him planning. It was like watching someone else. Miquella would have sacrificed everyone, including himself, just to bring a new age."

It was not the first time Miquella had harmed himself to achieve his goals.

"...He cannot reach godhood. Not like that. There has to be another way to break the curse."

Except that Miquella seemed to have exhausted all his options.

Saint Trina let out a soft sigh before shifting closer to Amras, needing the comfort his presence provided. Maybe she looked too needy, but...

Amras was so different from what they already knew.

"I am sorry. I do not intend to make you feel responsible for us. We are our own person and we need to... to find answers by ourselves, rather than finding answers in others that may not have them."

[whenbonestellhistory]

Tw: Descriptions of murder, and Thiollier being creepy (excuse if ooc)

“You’ll be able to figure it out someday.” He said as he adjusted the blanket so that it would cover her properly. “We should sleep-“ he cut himself off, noticing her soft breathing and smiled.

“Good night, Trina.” He murmured before he too closed his eyes.

The peace didn’t last for very long, though as he was awoken by a presence lurking outside. People should not even be near the area unless they got an invitation— and very few got them.

Amras’ eyes opened, frowning as the haze of sleep slowly started to wear off. Trina was still asleep and it was already night time, one of her arms loosely holding him.

He sat up from the bed, careful not to wake her up as he gently slipped from her grasp to clearly see who could be outside.

Sure enough, there was the lurker. With a white mask on his face and light lavender hair, he stood there, pensively, as if waiting for someone very patiently. Amras noticed he was standing near Trina’s lilies near the window and wondered where the flowers had come from but shook the thoughts out of his head.

He had a bad feeling.

He’d like to give the benefit of the doubt though, and chose to play a little game.

“Good evening.” He greeted, a small smile plastered upon his face at the taller man.

“Hello.” The man spoke to him softly, giving him a curt nod.

“Is there something that you need?” Amras asked innocently, the smile remaining on his face as he assessed him further.

“Yes…” the lavender haired man replied as he picked up the flower that grew on the cracks on the ground. “I believe you have something I desire, hidden behind these walls…”

Desire? Amras’ face went blank, a creeping feeling crawling up his chest.

“The one who shall grant me velvety sleep.. I believe she is there, inside. I need to see her.” The man doesn’t stop speaking, breathing shakily almost. “I need to feel her, her scent, so she may grant me slumber.”

Amras didn’t like the way he shivered.

“I see.” Amras said, though his eyes have darkened. While his intentions are vague, it didn’t stop the feeling of something wrong.

“She is not allowing visitors right now, she is asleep.” He continued with a firm tone, the man didn’t seem to take it well.

“Who are you to say such a thing? It is me who she will only need to speak to— it will do you well not to lie to me.” The man’s voice trembled, voice raising a pitch or two.

“I am her friend, and it will do you well to stay away from her.” Amras glowered. “This is your last warning.” The game was nearing its end.

“I will not forgive you. Y-you— a mere boy, not even a follower—“ The man paused, shaking, before erupting to a frantic swing that Amras was caught off guard by. “You smell like her— I can smell on you her blessing.”

The needle had pierced Amras’ shoulder as the man did not cease to mumble frantically, shakily, that Trina only belonged to him. Her love, her power, her voice. And that it was unfair for someone like Amras to get it.

Amras scowled, disgusted as he pried the man off of him. His intentions have been made clear, while he considered sparing him in the first few words exchanged, he wasn’t going to let him have that option now.

He removed the needle from himself with a grunt, he’ll make this quick.

The night was filled with the sounds of thudding, muffled screaming, and a disgusting squelch before something snapped and fell.

Amras huffed, shaking his head as he turned away to go back inside of his room. He closed the door, quietly stepping in as much as he could to not wake Trina as the scent of blood not just his own faintly wafted in the air.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He banged his head on the table and he thought of the events that had just transpired in his sleep.

What was he going to do now? He questioned himself. It had been days since then, and Amras never really got a proper lick of sleep at the feeling of guilt that ate away at his bones.

Would it have changed things if he simply had agreed to Miquella’s plea? No, both of them would suffer a loveless union to a pointless cause, some bitter part of himself thought. It was mean to think of it that way, but it reassured some part of himself that following through the whims of someone he wasn’t even that close with would not do him good.

It would feel like he was taking advantage of Miquella too if he hadn’t refused it, he reasoned to himself, thinking of how utterly vulnerable he looked.

So much for being a friend.

Amras was well aware he himself wasn’t a good man, but it didn’t feel right to leave Miquella like that on such a lonely place in bitter terms. But he knew he can’t do anything about it for now, not while the Empyrean refuses to be seen.

Somehow, Godwyn crossed his mind. He had an inkling that their brother would have been able to fix it, but that man’s not here now, not anymore.

The golden ring sat heavy between his fingers, the cold band starting to feel surprisingly sharp as if it knows his offense against its previous wearer.

He was lost in his head, not really bothering to acknowledge the presence in the room the moment it came.

@thesleepdeity

[thesleepdeity]

The headache had gotten worse as time went on.

No matter how much Saint Trina tried to ignore it to make it go away, the pain continued to haunt him even though it was not his own. No. Lord Miquella's emotions pierced the too thin barrier between the two consciousnesses, no matter if the deity reinforced that barrier as much as possible. One soul, two bodies. Lord Miquella could not escape her just as she could not escape him, always connected by a thin thread that would never disappear.

From that, she knew that the conversation between Lord Miquella and Amras had not gone well.

It could not have gone well. Saint Trina didn't need the pain to understand it, because she knew Lord Miquella too well and knew how the conversation was going to end. In a misnamed tantrum, perhaps, or simply in a breakdown from which they would both end up suffering the consequences. Amras had no way of winning that argument no matter how hard he tried.

As soon as Amras woke up, returning from the dream palace, Saint Trina appeared beside him.

"...I am sorry."

At times, all they could do was apologize for Lord Miquella's behavior, which they doubted would change any time soon.

"Please, do not take his meanings in consideration," they said, placing a gentle hand on Amras' shoulder in a comforting gesture. "He is hurt, and hurt people make big mistakes, sometimes. He is grateful that you spared him the same fate of a marriage without love."

Perhaps Lord Miquella did not understand at the time, but sooner or later he would see that Amras had saved him.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Seeing him plead like that was terrifying.”

It had taken him a while to be able to answer her, lifting his head from the table and sighing. “I didn’t know how to say anything else but to refuse him. And now he’s gone off somewhere and I won’t be able to find him for a while.” He ranted to Trina, though it was much more a lament than a rant if anything else.

He was horrified, admittedly.

His brows furrowed as he remembered Miquella’s exact expression; that desperation, the haggard look and the plea as if resorting to a last minute attempt at making a futile plan work.

Right now he could still feel Miquella’s hands on his face.

He placed the ring inside of a drawer, hoping he would forget it for a day. He wouldn’t want to admit he’s been honestly a little hurt by what Miquella said, but what choice did he have?

“He offered himself up to me, you know. To become the Elden Lord of the Age he wanted to bring. It’s what I refused.” He elaborated, frowning.

“He told me his body would not be able to handle Godhood, and I did not want him to destroy himself as much as I did not want him to marry me out of that desperation. He was—“ he cut himself off to sigh again. “Not thinking clearly.” And I didn’t want to take advantage of him, went unsaid.

“What a troublesome boy, really.” He huffed, it was not meant to be malicious.

Amras was sad and concerned about him as much as he was upset about what happened, but the sadness prevailed somehow, seeing him like that didn’t feel right.

He didn’t often seek out comfort, but for now he thought he could use one of Fia’s hugs. He didn’t want to bother Trina, and he’s ran out of favors done to ask that of her.

He’s already been shameless enough.

The thought however, still rang inside his mind.

[thesleepdeity]

Lord Miquella was right. His body would not have withstood divinity.

The Gates of Divinity were known to be harsh on those attempting to reach divinity, and would likely taste Lord Miquella's desperation in the air, causing his body to be absorbed without being able to contain the power of divinity within.

The Lands Between told stories of people who failed in their attempts. Lord Miquella was destined to be one of them if he did not continue to gather enough power to reach the Gates of Divinity, and that was only possible by breaking his curse or finding a Lord to share the crown with him. Clearly, Amras had refused, but the rejection had sat so badly with Lord Miquella that Saint Trina didn't know if he was going to recover from it any time soon.

That was no mere rant or temper tantrum. The deity was able to feel the tornado inside her, a tornado of emotions that barely allowed her to hear her own thoughts. It was something darker.

"...He gave you his ring."

It was strange and Saint Trina couldn't help but point it out.

"It is special. The ring. I remember Radahn himself creating it before gifting it to Lord Miquella as a promise ring. I guess it does not make sense to keep wearing it. The Age of Compassion is no more."

Failed before it even started.

She let out a small sigh before averting her gaze from Amras, in an attempt to sever the connection between their minds. Amras' thoughts always went too fast, with an intensity that the deity didn't know how to handle, and he doubted the boy wanted to know that she had been reading his every thought all that time.

Deity life was... incredibly difficult in some ways.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He exhaled. “I messed up badly didn’t I?” He chuckled sardonically. “I doubt he’d want to see me for a while after that, if he even wants to at all.” It sounded like a whine almost, he’s unable to stay calm after what had just happened, the event too fresh.

He wanted his mind to be quiet for once, and so he looked at Trina again.

“Are you up for some soup or some food?” He felt like eating his feelings out of frustration right now, and thankfully cooking would keep his mind out of it.

“If you’re not, I can teach you how to sew instead.” Clearly, Amras was exasperated and confused and it was showing more and more with every moment that passed.

He realized he must have looked like he was about to lose it though, and cleared his throat. “Sorry, that must have looked so strange.” He said, averting his eyes again as the familiar feeling of embarrassment creeped through his bones.

He buried his face in his hands and groaned. “Oh by Marika’s tits I messed up.” He grumbled, hopefully not loud enough for Trina to hear— it’s not even about just Miquella alone now, but rather also Trina seeing him like this.

[thesleepdeity]

"Amras..."

Saint Trina's face darkened.

The boy blamed himself for what had happened, even though Lord Miquella's mental state had not been stable to begin with. The curse caused him to not process emotions as well, his reactions bordering on the tantrum that a small child might do. However, he was far from resembling a tantrum.

Lord Miquella's mind was covered by a cloud of darkness that only Godwyn had managed to calm sometimes with his words and gestures, taking the young Empyrean in his arms to walk around the capital in an attempt to make him forget what had bothered him. And most of the time it worked.

Except that Godwyn was no longer among them, his body a twisted and completely different version of what everyone knew.

"It is okay to... be compassionate with Lord Miquella's situation," Saint Trina said, her gaze softening in an attempt to make Amras understand that she was not scolding him. "It is not a good situation, I admit, but you have tried everything to help him. We cannot do more than wait for the time when he will ask for our help, if that happens at all. Me and him..."

The deity sighed.

"...He would have died if not for Radahn. Marika's children are not meant for godhood. Their bloodline has been... too tampered with. Nothing that comes out of Marika's womb turns out to be right, because they stray from their own paths to follow their mother's footsteps. And Lord Miquellla would have followed her footsteps, I assure you. You would have to have... put him down like a rabid dog then."

The thought of Lord Miquella becoming something contrary to what he preached made Saint Trina feel a shiver in her body, and so, she hugged Amras as if she could be protected from those visions of an uncertain future. Her arms did not let go.

"I do not want him to die, and I do not want him to suffer the change. Maybe that makes me a bad person, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

It took him a few moments to think again as he leaned on Trina’s arms.

“Would you…” he paused, as he thought of his own goals, Miquella’s cries, the age that had failed and her words that one night.

What would Godhood cost him? If Marika’s children failed, then could he ascend himself? The calling of the tarnished was to fix the Elden Ring and usher in a new age— could he do it really? A simple boy like him?

He’s sworn to bring the age of men, an age of impermanence and death, but what would it cost him? If not himself then the blood of others then?

He apologizes to Miquella in his head, as a plan began to form in his mind. Trina’s words and embrace had cleared the clouds somehow as he thought of it over and over.

“Would you still stick with me even if I were to bathe in the blood of many others to pave myself a path to becoming a Lord in the new age?” He asked her, gently touching her arm with his hand as he looked vulnerable almost.

“Miquella will not have to suffer then.” There is a failed age yes, but there will be a new one to come to replace it. It’s a little vile; even Amras was aware of that as he thought that he’s kicked Miquella’s chance for the throne and burned away at every single one of his plans, his efforts.

And yet a small part of himself knew it wouldn’t have ended well if he had agreed to be his Godfrey to Marika.

“My hands will not be clean at the end of this journey— I knew it wasn’t going to be if I were to restore death in these lands.” He sighed as he leaned in more, smelling the traces of lilies and seeing the color of Trina’s lavender hair at the corner of his eyes.

“But it seems that it requires a God too.” He frowned. “That blasted Ring has done enough damage to this place…. If I were to be a god, would that be fine with you?” I am stealing his dream too, after all, went unsaid.

[thesleepdeity]

Would she?

Saint Trina carefully observed and studied the boy who so clung to her words, but whose affection was not shown in the form of adoration. Amras truly considered her a friend, someone to confide in in a place as hostile as the Lands Between. And even if the deity couldn't quite express what the boy meant to her, at that moment, she wanted to make the effort to calm him down.

Saint Trina's hand rested on Amras' cheek, and she caressed it with the same love a lover might have for their other half. The boy's eyes sparkled. She looked into them and saw a stable future that would be slow in coming, but it would come.

"Your time will be the Age of Men."

The deity continued her caresses on Amras' cheek, softly, their faces being barely inches apart.

"Men are unpredictable. It will be hard. People will oppose your authority, but you can prosper if you do not get rid of the compassion and the love that makes you human." They gave him a soft smile. "And I will be there to see it, as long as you allow me to be by your side."

An Age of Men.

The thought was so strange. One that was led by someone who was not born a god, someone who knew what it was like to starve and cry. An age led by demigods was always doomed to failure, but Amras could change everything.

"Death is the only thing that can truly purify the Lands Between. It's time for it to come back. Every human being needs to rest."

Even Amras.

Amras, at some point, would die.

Saint Trina maybe too. When everyone would forget about her for a second time, when there would be no more prayers to answer, then she would die, become one with the air, with nature.

[whenbonestellhistory]

How nice to have yet another person to believe in what he wanted to do. With that thought, Amras smiled.

“I don’t plan on losing myself, don’t worry.” And he’ll make sure he won’t. Briefly, he wondered what Miquella’s Age of Compassion would have been like had he been a Lord and remembered Trina’s words— another Marika, Miquella would have become another Marika.

He averted his eyes from Trina, cheek leaning into the hand that touched him— he promptly ignored the slightest increase of the beating of his heart as he sighed.

Maybe it was better this way, for him to usurp that plan, Miquella’s plan.

“It’s a rather tall order.” He said with a light huff. “Not even halfway there and I already have a list of people I need to get rid of.” Miquella would have looked unnerved at that statement, he briefly thought. He hasn’t known him for very long, but it was clear the empyrean didn’t like blood or bloodshed.

He removed Trina’s hands from his cheeks and held them tenderly instead. Now that his negative feelings had gone away, he became a bit more specially aware of how /close/ Trina was to him— he doesn’t look at her, still.

“It will be… nice, at least. I think people have stayed stagnant here for too long.” Amras thought of the rather miserable expressions a lot of the folk he encountered had plastered on their faces. There were others who chose to make the best of what they had, including himself, but there was always something so strange about the exhaustion— maybe one day he’d be able to grant Miquella that proper rest too, but not now.

Unlike Amras, the empyrean did not get to live the way he truly deserved to.

He thought of those words, the feeling of only being stuck in one place and utter silence and loneliness of that dreamlike realm and being stuck in a childish body. It’s idealistic, he knows, but he hoped that he’d be able to do something about it once he gets the Elden Ring.

It’s the least he could do for rejecting him.

“I’ll be using your arrows on the way on that journey as well, I hope that is alright with you.” He looked at her again, pushing down the growing shyness under her gaze, his draconian pupils slightly expanding without his knowledge.

[thesleepdeity]

So many people had lost their way in trying to reach the goal.

It was strange to think that it would have been the same fate for Lord Miquella, had his vow with Radahn continued without someone interrupting. The gates of the Lands of Shadow would open, letting Amras enter certain death, and Saint Trina...

Saint Trina had little idea what would have happened to her by interfering with Lord Miquella's plans.

The Lands Between had been too long stuck in a loop that did not end, a loop in which beings could not find the eternal rest that souls sometimes needed. It was a madness that gradually took over their mind, to go on without feeling like it, to feel Death escaping from their fingertips without being able to do anything to prevent it. Many times, the concoction of her lilies had been used to put crying babies to sleep and help the sick, but other times, when Saint Trina tried not to look, the concoction was used to escape from the world.

It was not the goal. The heart of the deity suffered.

Perhaps the promise of a new era ruled by Amras was the only option they had to bring everything back to what it was before.

"Use as many as you need," Saint Trina replied, a small smile appearing on her face. It was tired, somewhat sad, but it was genuine. "When you ascend to the throne, I hope I can stand beside you and call you Elden Lord."

But that was a long time away.

The deity let out a small sigh.

"...You should rest. The dream palace is not accessible right now, and it won't be for a long time. Maybe a dreamless sleep will help you think better."

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Hmm. Maybe it will.” He hummed in agreement, returning her smile and letting go of her hands before gently shifting to stand from his chair, glancing at the bed he hasn’t quite used in a while.

Half the time he slept outside or simply on the chair, if not either then he’d always end up in Fia’s chambers for a semblance of a companionship— a security of some sort.

Dreams of deathblight typically invaded him in his sleep when he did so, but it did not bother him much, not even as Fia was taking some of his vitality from him. It wasn’t a bad trade, he had plenty to spare anyways.

He walked over to the bed, eyes tracing over the patterns on sheets of his own making before he sat down, patting the spot next to it absentmindedly. He looked at Trina and remembered how she looked tired; the bed was big enough to handle two people comfortably for a nap. He didn’t know if she’d be fine with that, though.

“Are you tired?” He asked. “You can rest here if you’d like to.” That must have sounded wrong, and so he cleared his throat, glancing away as he patted the spot next to him. “I’ll make sure to stay as far away, don’t worry.” Because if she desired to sleep too, she didn’t deserve to sleep on the floor.

In truth, Amras had an ulterior motive too— he didn’t want Trina to leave, not yet, but he’s unable to ask her that directly for some reason, the proper words for that request for more of her time stuck in his throat. He felt as though he needed her presence near there— needed a /friend/ near him, at least for a while until he could gather himself properly.

It felt selfish, to ask her for more when she’s given him more than enough by showing her support without anything in exchange but to simply stand beside him. Embarrassment crept up in his bones again and he settled himself in before she could answer him, face close to the wall as his ears reddened as he thought he should have worded his invitation differently.

[thesleepdeity]

Saint Trina was exhausted.

Maybe she wouldn't say it out loud. She never would. The deities did not feel exhaustion, their energy flowing like a torrent of water in a river that kept changing day after day. However, she felt a kind of fatigue in her soul that she had never experienced before, something that clouded her mind and forced her to ground herself as best she could.

It was because of Miquella. Saint Trina did not need to be naive to understand that the fatigue did not come from herself, but from the nausea of Miquella himself, who was desperately seeking to disappear from the world for a few moments. She understood him, though he wasn't going to get it. The dream palace had dug its claws into Miquella's soft flesh, anchoring him to the world of dreams without the possibility of returning without a body. At least, for now.

She understood him.

She didn't want to think about how it felt to be trapped in a place that sought to punish you, to shed your skin for how it had been mistreated in the real world.

Sometimes, Saint Trina wished to find Miquella's body and give him a proper burial. Anything to give him just a little peace.

...But they could not.

Perhaps with Amras the deity might find some solace, an ephemeral moment in which to rest.

"Yes. Yes, please." Saint Trina took a step forward, approaching the bed. Their hand went to Amras' hair to gently arrange it. "I..."

She looked down.

"I feel like something is fading. Out there. And I do not know what."

Finally, the deity entered the bed, right next to Amras. The boy emanated a warmth that helped keep them comfortable.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Would talking about it help?” He softly asked, he doesn’t look at her still, but knows she is troubled. “You don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

He knew well enough to know there’s just some things that shouldn’t be talked about, and he wasn’t going to pry it off of her. He had his fair share of things he refused to talk about too, not even with his friends, not even with Kale whom lended him an ear whenever he needed it.

A reassurance always helped in some way though— while simple as an offer, it helped alleviate some heaviness knowing they weren’t alone.

He wanted Trina to know that.

Amras shifted and turned so he could look at her, head half buried in one of the pillows as he reached out to awkwardly pat her shoulder.

“If you need to speak— if you /want/ to speak, I’m here to lend an ear.” He said to her, holding the same gentleness as he did earlier. Wordlessly, he brushed a stray lock from her face and tucked it behind her ear.

“Or we could just sleep, it may clear our heads better like you said.” He smiled, small but warm as his hand retreated between them.

[thesleepdeity]

"It just..."

Saint Trina focused on Amras' chin, purposely avoiding looking directly at him.

"It is strange. To not feel the bond to the dream palace," she tried to explain, though she doubted her words made much sense. Amras was listening to her, however, and that was enough to make her feel ready to speak. "And... there is another land, far away from here. It was unreachable for a long, long time."

The deity buried their face in the pillow, gently, finding Amras' scent concentrated on it. The boy always slept there, right where they were, and they knew his scent would cling to their skin quickly. Saint Trina would begin to smell like Amras, a mark that while not permanent, helped her feel safe.

"It is called the Lands of Shadow..." Before Amras could retract his hand, she took it between hers, squeezing it gently. "And there is a place in the Lands of Shadow, a place that should be completely sealed but is not. The Gates of Divinity. It is at the top of a tower, in a region called Enir-Ilim. It is a wicked thing. A wicked thing that can whisper sweet things to you, to sacrifice all of yourself to reach godhood."

A shudder ran through the deity completely, from top to bottom.

She did not like to talk about it, but it was necessary. Because Amras had to know.

"Miquella managed to reach an entrance to the Lands of Shadow... but everything got complicated, afterwards. Maybe it is for the best, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

Power was something a lot of people wanted in some form— Godhood even more so in some others. Images of a bloodied gate flashed in his mind’s eye, screaming, glowing, whispering— he felt though as if he’s feeling the red ground beneath his feet— sticky and warm, the bodies of that gate calling out to him to become a god.

A dream. It was one of his strange dreams, one of the stranger ones he had as a child aside from the golden fields and and the Elden Ring. He doesn’t know how and why he’s made the correlation somehow with what Trina had told him, about the very place he’s never even been in and the one inside of his dreams.

“He will have to sacrifice what makes him himself.” Amras murmured. “Is that why you were afraid of the change it would bring to Miquella?”

Shedding one’s own being was a terrifying concept to someone like Amras— he couldn’t comprehend it, losing everything that made him himself to be born anew as someone who valued and prided himself with his own identity as Amras, as a man.

Inheriting pieces of the Elden ring was different, not really overwhelming as he just took runes and stored it in his being, mending it in a way that doesn’t tear him apart.

He didn’t have to change.

He doesn’t have to shed his own skin, leave pieces of himself out to rot for a gate that would not guarantee him his wish anyways.

He understood now, what would happen to Miquella. And as foul as his thoughts were, he was glad he had taken that opportunity away from the empyrean.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He banged his head on the table and he thought of the events that had just transpired in his sleep.

What was he going to do now? He questioned himself. It had been days since then, and Amras never really got a proper lick of sleep at the feeling of guilt that ate away at his bones.

Would it have changed things if he simply had agreed to Miquella’s plea? No, both of them would suffer a loveless union to a pointless cause, some bitter part of himself thought. It was mean to think of it that way, but it reassured some part of himself that following through the whims of someone he wasn’t even that close with would not do him good.

It would feel like he was taking advantage of Miquella too if he hadn’t refused it, he reasoned to himself, thinking of how utterly vulnerable he looked.

So much for being a friend.

Amras was well aware he himself wasn’t a good man, but it didn’t feel right to leave Miquella like that on such a lonely place in bitter terms. But he knew he can’t do anything about it for now, not while the Empyrean refuses to be seen.

Somehow, Godwyn crossed his mind. He had an inkling that their brother would have been able to fix it, but that man’s not here now, not anymore.

The golden ring sat heavy between his fingers, the cold band starting to feel surprisingly sharp as if it knows his offense against its previous wearer.

He was lost in his head, not really bothering to acknowledge the presence in the room the moment it came.

@thesleepdeity

[thesleepdeity]

The headache had gotten worse as time went on.

No matter how much Saint Trina tried to ignore it to make it go away, the pain continued to haunt him even though it was not his own. No. Lord Miquella's emotions pierced the too thin barrier between the two consciousnesses, no matter if the deity reinforced that barrier as much as possible. One soul, two bodies. Lord Miquella could not escape her just as she could not escape him, always connected by a thin thread that would never disappear.

From that, she knew that the conversation between Lord Miquella and Amras had not gone well.

It could not have gone well. Saint Trina didn't need the pain to understand it, because she knew Lord Miquella too well and knew how the conversation was going to end. In a misnamed tantrum, perhaps, or simply in a breakdown from which they would both end up suffering the consequences. Amras had no way of winning that argument no matter how hard he tried.

As soon as Amras woke up, returning from the dream palace, Saint Trina appeared beside him.

"...I am sorry."

At times, all they could do was apologize for Lord Miquella's behavior, which they doubted would change any time soon.

"Please, do not take his meanings in consideration," they said, placing a gentle hand on Amras' shoulder in a comforting gesture. "He is hurt, and hurt people make big mistakes, sometimes. He is grateful that you spared him the same fate of a marriage without love."

Perhaps Lord Miquella did not understand at the time, but sooner or later he would see that Amras had saved him.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Seeing him plead like that was terrifying.”

It had taken him a while to be able to answer her, lifting his head from the table and sighing. “I didn’t know how to say anything else but to refuse him. And now he’s gone off somewhere and I won’t be able to find him for a while.” He ranted to Trina, though it was much more a lament than a rant if anything else.

He was horrified, admittedly.

His brows furrowed as he remembered Miquella’s exact expression; that desperation, the haggard look and the plea as if resorting to a last minute attempt at making a futile plan work.

Right now he could still feel Miquella’s hands on his face.

He placed the ring inside of a drawer, hoping he would forget it for a day. He wouldn’t want to admit he’s been honestly a little hurt by what Miquella said, but what choice did he have?

“He offered himself up to me, you know. To become the Elden Lord of the Age he wanted to bring. It’s what I refused.” He elaborated, frowning.

“He told me his body would not be able to handle Godhood, and I did not want him to destroy himself as much as I did not want him to marry me out of that desperation. He was—“ he cut himself off to sigh again. “Not thinking clearly.” And I didn’t want to take advantage of him, went unsaid.

“What a troublesome boy, really.” He huffed, it was not meant to be malicious.

Amras was sad and concerned about him as much as he was upset about what happened, but the sadness prevailed somehow, seeing him like that didn’t feel right.

He didn’t often seek out comfort, but for now he thought he could use one of Fia’s hugs. He didn’t want to bother Trina, and he’s ran out of favors done to ask that of her.

He’s already been shameless enough.

The thought however, still rang inside his mind.

[thesleepdeity]

Lord Miquella was right. His body would not have withstood divinity.

The Gates of Divinity were known to be harsh on those attempting to reach divinity, and would likely taste Lord Miquella's desperation in the air, causing his body to be absorbed without being able to contain the power of divinity within.

The Lands Between told stories of people who failed in their attempts. Lord Miquella was destined to be one of them if he did not continue to gather enough power to reach the Gates of Divinity, and that was only possible by breaking his curse or finding a Lord to share the crown with him. Clearly, Amras had refused, but the rejection had sat so badly with Lord Miquella that Saint Trina didn't know if he was going to recover from it any time soon.

That was no mere rant or temper tantrum. The deity was able to feel the tornado inside her, a tornado of emotions that barely allowed her to hear her own thoughts. It was something darker.

"...He gave you his ring."

It was strange and Saint Trina couldn't help but point it out.

"It is special. The ring. I remember Radahn himself creating it before gifting it to Lord Miquella as a promise ring. I guess it does not make sense to keep wearing it. The Age of Compassion is no more."

Failed before it even started.

She let out a small sigh before averting her gaze from Amras, in an attempt to sever the connection between their minds. Amras' thoughts always went too fast, with an intensity that the deity didn't know how to handle, and he doubted the boy wanted to know that she had been reading his every thought all that time.

Deity life was... incredibly difficult in some ways.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He exhaled. “I messed up badly didn’t I?” He chuckled sardonically. “I doubt he’d want to see me for a while after that, if he even wants to at all.” It sounded like a whine almost, he’s unable to stay calm after what had just happened, the event too fresh.

He wanted his mind to be quiet for once, and so he looked at Trina again.

“Are you up for some soup or some food?” He felt like eating his feelings out of frustration right now, and thankfully cooking would keep his mind out of it.

“If you’re not, I can teach you how to sew instead.” Clearly, Amras was exasperated and confused and it was showing more and more with every moment that passed.

He realized he must have looked like he was about to lose it though, and cleared his throat. “Sorry, that must have looked so strange.” He said, averting his eyes again as the familiar feeling of embarrassment creeped through his bones.

He buried his face in his hands and groaned. “Oh by Marika’s tits I messed up.” He grumbled, hopefully not loud enough for Trina to hear— it’s not even about just Miquella alone now, but rather also Trina seeing him like this.

[thesleepdeity]

"Amras..."

Saint Trina's face darkened.

The boy blamed himself for what had happened, even though Lord Miquella's mental state had not been stable to begin with. The curse caused him to not process emotions as well, his reactions bordering on the tantrum that a small child might do. However, he was far from resembling a tantrum.

Lord Miquella's mind was covered by a cloud of darkness that only Godwyn had managed to calm sometimes with his words and gestures, taking the young Empyrean in his arms to walk around the capital in an attempt to make him forget what had bothered him. And most of the time it worked.

Except that Godwyn was no longer among them, his body a twisted and completely different version of what everyone knew.

"It is okay to... be compassionate with Lord Miquella's situation," Saint Trina said, her gaze softening in an attempt to make Amras understand that she was not scolding him. "It is not a good situation, I admit, but you have tried everything to help him. We cannot do more than wait for the time when he will ask for our help, if that happens at all. Me and him..."

The deity sighed.

"...He would have died if not for Radahn. Marika's children are not meant for godhood. Their bloodline has been... too tampered with. Nothing that comes out of Marika's womb turns out to be right, because they stray from their own paths to follow their mother's footsteps. And Lord Miquellla would have followed her footsteps, I assure you. You would have to have... put him down like a rabid dog then."

The thought of Lord Miquella becoming something contrary to what he preached made Saint Trina feel a shiver in her body, and so, she hugged Amras as if she could be protected from those visions of an uncertain future. Her arms did not let go.

"I do not want him to die, and I do not want him to suffer the change. Maybe that makes me a bad person, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

It took him a few moments to think again as he leaned on Trina’s arms.

“Would you…” he paused, as he thought of his own goals, Miquella’s cries, the age that had failed and her words that one night.

What would Godhood cost him? If Marika’s children failed, then could he ascend himself? The calling of the tarnished was to fix the Elden Ring and usher in a new age— could he do it really? A simple boy like him?

He’s sworn to bring the age of men, an age of impermanence and death, but what would it cost him? If not himself then the blood of others then?

He apologizes to Miquella in his head, as a plan began to form in his mind. Trina’s words and embrace had cleared the clouds somehow as he thought of it over and over.

“Would you still stick with me even if I were to bathe in the blood of many others to pave myself a path to becoming a Lord in the new age?” He asked her, gently touching her arm with his hand as he looked vulnerable almost.

“Miquella will not have to suffer then.” There is a failed age yes, but there will be a new one to come to replace it. It’s a little vile; even Amras was aware of that as he thought that he’s kicked Miquella’s chance for the throne and burned away at every single one of his plans, his efforts.

And yet a small part of himself knew it wouldn’t have ended well if he had agreed to be his Godfrey to Marika.

“My hands will not be clean at the end of this journey— I knew it wasn’t going to be if I were to restore death in these lands.” He sighed as he leaned in more, smelling the traces of lilies and seeing the color of Trina’s lavender hair at the corner of his eyes.

“But it seems that it requires a God too.” He frowned. “That blasted Ring has done enough damage to this place…. If I were to be a god, would that be fine with you?” I am stealing his dream too, after all, went unsaid.

[thesleepdeity]

Would she?

Saint Trina carefully observed and studied the boy who so clung to her words, but whose affection was not shown in the form of adoration. Amras truly considered her a friend, someone to confide in in a place as hostile as the Lands Between. And even if the deity couldn't quite express what the boy meant to her, at that moment, she wanted to make the effort to calm him down.

Saint Trina's hand rested on Amras' cheek, and she caressed it with the same love a lover might have for their other half. The boy's eyes sparkled. She looked into them and saw a stable future that would be slow in coming, but it would come.

"Your time will be the Age of Men."

The deity continued her caresses on Amras' cheek, softly, their faces being barely inches apart.

"Men are unpredictable. It will be hard. People will oppose your authority, but you can prosper if you do not get rid of the compassion and the love that makes you human." They gave him a soft smile. "And I will be there to see it, as long as you allow me to be by your side."

An Age of Men.

The thought was so strange. One that was led by someone who was not born a god, someone who knew what it was like to starve and cry. An age led by demigods was always doomed to failure, but Amras could change everything.

"Death is the only thing that can truly purify the Lands Between. It's time for it to come back. Every human being needs to rest."

Even Amras.

Amras, at some point, would die.

Saint Trina maybe too. When everyone would forget about her for a second time, when there would be no more prayers to answer, then she would die, become one with the air, with nature.

[whenbonestellhistory]

How nice to have yet another person to believe in what he wanted to do. With that thought, Amras smiled.

“I don’t plan on losing myself, don’t worry.” And he’ll make sure he won’t. Briefly, he wondered what Miquella’s Age of Compassion would have been like had he been a Lord and remembered Trina’s words— another Marika, Miquella would have become another Marika.

He averted his eyes from Trina, cheek leaning into the hand that touched him— he promptly ignored the slightest increase of the beating of his heart as he sighed.

Maybe it was better this way, for him to usurp that plan, Miquella’s plan.

“It’s a rather tall order.” He said with a light huff. “Not even halfway there and I already have a list of people I need to get rid of.” Miquella would have looked unnerved at that statement, he briefly thought. He hasn’t known him for very long, but it was clear the empyrean didn’t like blood or bloodshed.

He removed Trina’s hands from his cheeks and held them tenderly instead. Now that his negative feelings had gone away, he became a bit more specially aware of how /close/ Trina was to him— he doesn’t look at her, still.

“It will be… nice, at least. I think people have stayed stagnant here for too long.” Amras thought of the rather miserable expressions a lot of the folk he encountered had plastered on their faces. There were others who chose to make the best of what they had, including himself, but there was always something so strange about the exhaustion— maybe one day he’d be able to grant Miquella that proper rest too, but not now.

Unlike Amras, the empyrean did not get to live the way he truly deserved to.

He thought of those words, the feeling of only being stuck in one place and utter silence and loneliness of that dreamlike realm and being stuck in a childish body. It’s idealistic, he knows, but he hoped that he’d be able to do something about it once he gets the Elden Ring.

It’s the least he could do for rejecting him.

“I’ll be using your arrows on the way on that journey as well, I hope that is alright with you.” He looked at her again, pushing down the growing shyness under her gaze, his draconian pupils slightly expanding without his knowledge.

[thesleepdeity]

So many people had lost their way in trying to reach the goal.

It was strange to think that it would have been the same fate for Lord Miquella, had his vow with Radahn continued without someone interrupting. The gates of the Lands of Shadow would open, letting Amras enter certain death, and Saint Trina...

Saint Trina had little idea what would have happened to her by interfering with Lord Miquella's plans.

The Lands Between had been too long stuck in a loop that did not end, a loop in which beings could not find the eternal rest that souls sometimes needed. It was a madness that gradually took over their mind, to go on without feeling like it, to feel Death escaping from their fingertips without being able to do anything to prevent it. Many times, the concoction of her lilies had been used to put crying babies to sleep and help the sick, but other times, when Saint Trina tried not to look, the concoction was used to escape from the world.

It was not the goal. The heart of the deity suffered.

Perhaps the promise of a new era ruled by Amras was the only option they had to bring everything back to what it was before.

"Use as many as you need," Saint Trina replied, a small smile appearing on her face. It was tired, somewhat sad, but it was genuine. "When you ascend to the throne, I hope I can stand beside you and call you Elden Lord."

But that was a long time away.

The deity let out a small sigh.

"...You should rest. The dream palace is not accessible right now, and it won't be for a long time. Maybe a dreamless sleep will help you think better."

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Hmm. Maybe it will.” He hummed in agreement, returning her smile and letting go of her hands before gently shifting to stand from his chair, glancing at the bed he hasn’t quite used in a while.

Half the time he slept outside or simply on the chair, if not either then he’d always end up in Fia’s chambers for a semblance of a companionship— a security of some sort.

Dreams of deathblight typically invaded him in his sleep when he did so, but it did not bother him much, not even as Fia was taking some of his vitality from him. It wasn’t a bad trade, he had plenty to spare anyways.

He walked over to the bed, eyes tracing over the patterns on sheets of his own making before he sat down, patting the spot next to it absentmindedly. He looked at Trina and remembered how she looked tired; the bed was big enough to handle two people comfortably for a nap. He didn’t know if she’d be fine with that, though.

“Are you tired?” He asked. “You can rest here if you’d like to.” That must have sounded wrong, and so he cleared his throat, glancing away as he patted the spot next to him. “I’ll make sure to stay as far away, don’t worry.” Because if she desired to sleep too, she didn’t deserve to sleep on the floor.

In truth, Amras had an ulterior motive too— he didn’t want Trina to leave, not yet, but he’s unable to ask her that directly for some reason, the proper words for that request for more of her time stuck in his throat. He felt as though he needed her presence near there— needed a /friend/ near him, at least for a while until he could gather himself properly.

It felt selfish, to ask her for more when she’s given him more than enough by showing her support without anything in exchange but to simply stand beside him. Embarrassment crept up in his bones again and he settled himself in before she could answer him, face close to the wall as his ears reddened as he thought he should have worded his invitation differently.

[thesleepdeity]

Saint Trina was exhausted.

Maybe she wouldn't say it out loud. She never would. The deities did not feel exhaustion, their energy flowing like a torrent of water in a river that kept changing day after day. However, she felt a kind of fatigue in her soul that she had never experienced before, something that clouded her mind and forced her to ground herself as best she could.

It was because of Miquella. Saint Trina did not need to be naive to understand that the fatigue did not come from herself, but from the nausea of Miquella himself, who was desperately seeking to disappear from the world for a few moments. She understood him, though he wasn't going to get it. The dream palace had dug its claws into Miquella's soft flesh, anchoring him to the world of dreams without the possibility of returning without a body. At least, for now.

She understood him.

She didn't want to think about how it felt to be trapped in a place that sought to punish you, to shed your skin for how it had been mistreated in the real world.

Sometimes, Saint Trina wished to find Miquella's body and give him a proper burial. Anything to give him just a little peace.

...But they could not.

Perhaps with Amras the deity might find some solace, an ephemeral moment in which to rest.

"Yes. Yes, please." Saint Trina took a step forward, approaching the bed. Their hand went to Amras' hair to gently arrange it. "I..."

She looked down.

"I feel like something is fading. Out there. And I do not know what."

Finally, the deity entered the bed, right next to Amras. The boy emanated a warmth that helped keep them comfortable.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Would talking about it help?” He softly asked, he doesn’t look at her still, but knows she is troubled. “You don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

He knew well enough to know there’s just some things that shouldn’t be talked about, and he wasn’t going to pry it off of her. He had his fair share of things he refused to talk about too, not even with his friends, not even with Kale whom lended him an ear whenever he needed it.

A reassurance always helped in some way though— while simple as an offer, it helped alleviate some heaviness knowing they weren’t alone.

He wanted Trina to know that.

Amras shifted and turned so he could look at her, head half buried in one of the pillows as he reached out to awkwardly pat her shoulder.

“If you need to speak— if you /want/ to speak, I’m here to lend an ear.” He said to her, holding the same gentleness as he did earlier. Wordlessly, he brushed a stray lock from her face and tucked it behind her ear.

“Or we could just sleep, it may clear our heads better like you said.” He smiled, small but warm as his hand retreated between them.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He banged his head on the table and he thought of the events that had just transpired in his sleep.

What was he going to do now? He questioned himself. It had been days since then, and Amras never really got a proper lick of sleep at the feeling of guilt that ate away at his bones.

Would it have changed things if he simply had agreed to Miquella’s plea? No, both of them would suffer a loveless union to a pointless cause, some bitter part of himself thought. It was mean to think of it that way, but it reassured some part of himself that following through the whims of someone he wasn’t even that close with would not do him good.

It would feel like he was taking advantage of Miquella too if he hadn’t refused it, he reasoned to himself, thinking of how utterly vulnerable he looked.

So much for being a friend.

Amras was well aware he himself wasn’t a good man, but it didn’t feel right to leave Miquella like that on such a lonely place in bitter terms. But he knew he can’t do anything about it for now, not while the Empyrean refuses to be seen.

Somehow, Godwyn crossed his mind. He had an inkling that their brother would have been able to fix it, but that man’s not here now, not anymore.

The golden ring sat heavy between his fingers, the cold band starting to feel surprisingly sharp as if it knows his offense against its previous wearer.

He was lost in his head, not really bothering to acknowledge the presence in the room the moment it came.

@thesleepdeity

[thesleepdeity]

The headache had gotten worse as time went on.

No matter how much Saint Trina tried to ignore it to make it go away, the pain continued to haunt him even though it was not his own. No. Lord Miquella's emotions pierced the too thin barrier between the two consciousnesses, no matter if the deity reinforced that barrier as much as possible. One soul, two bodies. Lord Miquella could not escape her just as she could not escape him, always connected by a thin thread that would never disappear.

From that, she knew that the conversation between Lord Miquella and Amras had not gone well.

It could not have gone well. Saint Trina didn't need the pain to understand it, because she knew Lord Miquella too well and knew how the conversation was going to end. In a misnamed tantrum, perhaps, or simply in a breakdown from which they would both end up suffering the consequences. Amras had no way of winning that argument no matter how hard he tried.

As soon as Amras woke up, returning from the dream palace, Saint Trina appeared beside him.

"...I am sorry."

At times, all they could do was apologize for Lord Miquella's behavior, which they doubted would change any time soon.

"Please, do not take his meanings in consideration," they said, placing a gentle hand on Amras' shoulder in a comforting gesture. "He is hurt, and hurt people make big mistakes, sometimes. He is grateful that you spared him the same fate of a marriage without love."

Perhaps Lord Miquella did not understand at the time, but sooner or later he would see that Amras had saved him.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Seeing him plead like that was terrifying.”

It had taken him a while to be able to answer her, lifting his head from the table and sighing. “I didn’t know how to say anything else but to refuse him. And now he’s gone off somewhere and I won’t be able to find him for a while.” He ranted to Trina, though it was much more a lament than a rant if anything else.

He was horrified, admittedly.

His brows furrowed as he remembered Miquella’s exact expression; that desperation, the haggard look and the plea as if resorting to a last minute attempt at making a futile plan work.

Right now he could still feel Miquella’s hands on his face.

He placed the ring inside of a drawer, hoping he would forget it for a day. He wouldn’t want to admit he’s been honestly a little hurt by what Miquella said, but what choice did he have?

“He offered himself up to me, you know. To become the Elden Lord of the Age he wanted to bring. It’s what I refused.” He elaborated, frowning.

“He told me his body would not be able to handle Godhood, and I did not want him to destroy himself as much as I did not want him to marry me out of that desperation. He was—“ he cut himself off to sigh again. “Not thinking clearly.” And I didn’t want to take advantage of him, went unsaid.

“What a troublesome boy, really.” He huffed, it was not meant to be malicious.

Amras was sad and concerned about him as much as he was upset about what happened, but the sadness prevailed somehow, seeing him like that didn’t feel right.

He didn’t often seek out comfort, but for now he thought he could use one of Fia’s hugs. He didn’t want to bother Trina, and he’s ran out of favors done to ask that of her.

He’s already been shameless enough.

The thought however, still rang inside his mind.

[thesleepdeity]

Lord Miquella was right. His body would not have withstood divinity.

The Gates of Divinity were known to be harsh on those attempting to reach divinity, and would likely taste Lord Miquella's desperation in the air, causing his body to be absorbed without being able to contain the power of divinity within.

The Lands Between told stories of people who failed in their attempts. Lord Miquella was destined to be one of them if he did not continue to gather enough power to reach the Gates of Divinity, and that was only possible by breaking his curse or finding a Lord to share the crown with him. Clearly, Amras had refused, but the rejection had sat so badly with Lord Miquella that Saint Trina didn't know if he was going to recover from it any time soon.

That was no mere rant or temper tantrum. The deity was able to feel the tornado inside her, a tornado of emotions that barely allowed her to hear her own thoughts. It was something darker.

"...He gave you his ring."

It was strange and Saint Trina couldn't help but point it out.

"It is special. The ring. I remember Radahn himself creating it before gifting it to Lord Miquella as a promise ring. I guess it does not make sense to keep wearing it. The Age of Compassion is no more."

Failed before it even started.

She let out a small sigh before averting her gaze from Amras, in an attempt to sever the connection between their minds. Amras' thoughts always went too fast, with an intensity that the deity didn't know how to handle, and he doubted the boy wanted to know that she had been reading his every thought all that time.

Deity life was... incredibly difficult in some ways.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He exhaled. “I messed up badly didn’t I?” He chuckled sardonically. “I doubt he’d want to see me for a while after that, if he even wants to at all.” It sounded like a whine almost, he’s unable to stay calm after what had just happened, the event too fresh.

He wanted his mind to be quiet for once, and so he looked at Trina again.

“Are you up for some soup or some food?” He felt like eating his feelings out of frustration right now, and thankfully cooking would keep his mind out of it.

“If you’re not, I can teach you how to sew instead.” Clearly, Amras was exasperated and confused and it was showing more and more with every moment that passed.

He realized he must have looked like he was about to lose it though, and cleared his throat. “Sorry, that must have looked so strange.” He said, averting his eyes again as the familiar feeling of embarrassment creeped through his bones.

He buried his face in his hands and groaned. “Oh by Marika’s tits I messed up.” He grumbled, hopefully not loud enough for Trina to hear— it’s not even about just Miquella alone now, but rather also Trina seeing him like this.

[thesleepdeity]

"Amras..."

Saint Trina's face darkened.

The boy blamed himself for what had happened, even though Lord Miquella's mental state had not been stable to begin with. The curse caused him to not process emotions as well, his reactions bordering on the tantrum that a small child might do. However, he was far from resembling a tantrum.

Lord Miquella's mind was covered by a cloud of darkness that only Godwyn had managed to calm sometimes with his words and gestures, taking the young Empyrean in his arms to walk around the capital in an attempt to make him forget what had bothered him. And most of the time it worked.

Except that Godwyn was no longer among them, his body a twisted and completely different version of what everyone knew.

"It is okay to... be compassionate with Lord Miquella's situation," Saint Trina said, her gaze softening in an attempt to make Amras understand that she was not scolding him. "It is not a good situation, I admit, but you have tried everything to help him. We cannot do more than wait for the time when he will ask for our help, if that happens at all. Me and him..."

The deity sighed.

"...He would have died if not for Radahn. Marika's children are not meant for godhood. Their bloodline has been... too tampered with. Nothing that comes out of Marika's womb turns out to be right, because they stray from their own paths to follow their mother's footsteps. And Lord Miquellla would have followed her footsteps, I assure you. You would have to have... put him down like a rabid dog then."

The thought of Lord Miquella becoming something contrary to what he preached made Saint Trina feel a shiver in her body, and so, she hugged Amras as if she could be protected from those visions of an uncertain future. Her arms did not let go.

"I do not want him to die, and I do not want him to suffer the change. Maybe that makes me a bad person, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

It took him a few moments to think again as he leaned on Trina’s arms.

“Would you…” he paused, as he thought of his own goals, Miquella’s cries, the age that had failed and her words that one night.

What would Godhood cost him? If Marika’s children failed, then could he ascend himself? The calling of the tarnished was to fix the Elden Ring and usher in a new age— could he do it really? A simple boy like him?

He’s sworn to bring the age of men, an age of impermanence and death, but what would it cost him? If not himself then the blood of others then?

He apologizes to Miquella in his head, as a plan began to form in his mind. Trina’s words and embrace had cleared the clouds somehow as he thought of it over and over.

“Would you still stick with me even if I were to bathe in the blood of many others to pave myself a path to becoming a Lord in the new age?” He asked her, gently touching her arm with his hand as he looked vulnerable almost.

“Miquella will not have to suffer then.” There is a failed age yes, but there will be a new one to come to replace it. It’s a little vile; even Amras was aware of that as he thought that he’s kicked Miquella’s chance for the throne and burned away at every single one of his plans, his efforts.

And yet a small part of himself knew it wouldn’t have ended well if he had agreed to be his Godfrey to Marika.

“My hands will not be clean at the end of this journey— I knew it wasn’t going to be if I were to restore death in these lands.” He sighed as he leaned in more, smelling the traces of lilies and seeing the color of Trina’s lavender hair at the corner of his eyes.

“But it seems that it requires a God too.” He frowned. “That blasted Ring has done enough damage to this place…. If I were to be a god, would that be fine with you?” I am stealing his dream too, after all, went unsaid.

[thesleepdeity]

Would she?

Saint Trina carefully observed and studied the boy who so clung to her words, but whose affection was not shown in the form of adoration. Amras truly considered her a friend, someone to confide in in a place as hostile as the Lands Between. And even if the deity couldn't quite express what the boy meant to her, at that moment, she wanted to make the effort to calm him down.

Saint Trina's hand rested on Amras' cheek, and she caressed it with the same love a lover might have for their other half. The boy's eyes sparkled. She looked into them and saw a stable future that would be slow in coming, but it would come.

"Your time will be the Age of Men."

The deity continued her caresses on Amras' cheek, softly, their faces being barely inches apart.

"Men are unpredictable. It will be hard. People will oppose your authority, but you can prosper if you do not get rid of the compassion and the love that makes you human." They gave him a soft smile. "And I will be there to see it, as long as you allow me to be by your side."

An Age of Men.

The thought was so strange. One that was led by someone who was not born a god, someone who knew what it was like to starve and cry. An age led by demigods was always doomed to failure, but Amras could change everything.

"Death is the only thing that can truly purify the Lands Between. It's time for it to come back. Every human being needs to rest."

Even Amras.

Amras, at some point, would die.

Saint Trina maybe too. When everyone would forget about her for a second time, when there would be no more prayers to answer, then she would die, become one with the air, with nature.

[whenbonestellhistory]

How nice to have yet another person to believe in what he wanted to do. With that thought, Amras smiled.

“I don’t plan on losing myself, don’t worry.” And he’ll make sure he won’t. Briefly, he wondered what Miquella’s Age of Compassion would have been like had he been a Lord and remembered Trina’s words— another Marika, Miquella would have become another Marika.

He averted his eyes from Trina, cheek leaning into the hand that touched him— he promptly ignored the slightest increase of the beating of his heart as he sighed.

Maybe it was better this way, for him to usurp that plan, Miquella’s plan.

“It’s a rather tall order.” He said with a light huff. “Not even halfway there and I already have a list of people I need to get rid of.” Miquella would have looked unnerved at that statement, he briefly thought. He hasn’t known him for very long, but it was clear the empyrean didn’t like blood or bloodshed.

He removed Trina’s hands from his cheeks and held them tenderly instead. Now that his negative feelings had gone away, he became a bit more specially aware of how /close/ Trina was to him— he doesn’t look at her, still.

“It will be… nice, at least. I think people have stayed stagnant here for too long.” Amras thought of the rather miserable expressions a lot of the folk he encountered had plastered on their faces. There were others who chose to make the best of what they had, including himself, but there was always something so strange about the exhaustion— maybe one day he’d be able to grant Miquella that proper rest too, but not now.

Unlike Amras, the empyrean did not get to live the way he truly deserved to.

He thought of those words, the feeling of only being stuck in one place and utter silence and loneliness of that dreamlike realm and being stuck in a childish body. It’s idealistic, he knows, but he hoped that he’d be able to do something about it once he gets the Elden Ring.

It’s the least he could do for rejecting him.

“I’ll be using your arrows on the way on that journey as well, I hope that is alright with you.” He looked at her again, pushing down the growing shyness under her gaze, his draconian pupils slightly expanding without his knowledge.

[thesleepdeity]

So many people had lost their way in trying to reach the goal.

It was strange to think that it would have been the same fate for Lord Miquella, had his vow with Radahn continued without someone interrupting. The gates of the Lands of Shadow would open, letting Amras enter certain death, and Saint Trina...

Saint Trina had little idea what would have happened to her by interfering with Lord Miquella's plans.

The Lands Between had been too long stuck in a loop that did not end, a loop in which beings could not find the eternal rest that souls sometimes needed. It was a madness that gradually took over their mind, to go on without feeling like it, to feel Death escaping from their fingertips without being able to do anything to prevent it. Many times, the concoction of her lilies had been used to put crying babies to sleep and help the sick, but other times, when Saint Trina tried not to look, the concoction was used to escape from the world.

It was not the goal. The heart of the deity suffered.

Perhaps the promise of a new era ruled by Amras was the only option they had to bring everything back to what it was before.

"Use as many as you need," Saint Trina replied, a small smile appearing on her face. It was tired, somewhat sad, but it was genuine. "When you ascend to the throne, I hope I can stand beside you and call you Elden Lord."

But that was a long time away.

The deity let out a small sigh.

"...You should rest. The dream palace is not accessible right now, and it won't be for a long time. Maybe a dreamless sleep will help you think better."

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Hmm. Maybe it will.” He hummed in agreement, returning her smile and letting go of her hands before gently shifting to stand from his chair, glancing at the bed he hasn’t quite used in a while.

Half the time he slept outside or simply on the chair, if not either then he’d always end up in Fia’s chambers for a semblance of a companionship— a security of some sort.

Dreams of deathblight typically invaded him in his sleep when he did so, but it did not bother him much, not even as Fia was taking some of his vitality from him. It wasn’t a bad trade, he had plenty to spare anyways.

He walked over to the bed, eyes tracing over the patterns on sheets of his own making before he sat down, patting the spot next to it absentmindedly. He looked at Trina and remembered how she looked tired; the bed was big enough to handle two people comfortably for a nap. He didn’t know if she’d be fine with that, though.

“Are you tired?” He asked. “You can rest here if you’d like to.” That must have sounded wrong, and so he cleared his throat, glancing away as he patted the spot next to him. “I’ll make sure to stay as far away, don’t worry.” Because if she desired to sleep too, she didn’t deserve to sleep on the floor.

In truth, Amras had an ulterior motive too— he didn’t want Trina to leave, not yet, but he’s unable to ask her that directly for some reason, the proper words for that request for more of her time stuck in his throat. He felt as though he needed her presence near there— needed a /friend/ near him, at least for a while until he could gather himself properly.

It felt selfish, to ask her for more when she’s given him more than enough by showing her support without anything in exchange but to simply stand beside him. Embarrassment crept up in his bones again and he settled himself in before she could answer him, face close to the wall as his ears reddened as he thought he should have worded his invitation differently.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He banged his head on the table and he thought of the events that had just transpired in his sleep.

What was he going to do now? He questioned himself. It had been days since then, and Amras never really got a proper lick of sleep at the feeling of guilt that ate away at his bones.

Would it have changed things if he simply had agreed to Miquella’s plea? No, both of them would suffer a loveless union to a pointless cause, some bitter part of himself thought. It was mean to think of it that way, but it reassured some part of himself that following through the whims of someone he wasn’t even that close with would not do him good.

It would feel like he was taking advantage of Miquella too if he hadn’t refused it, he reasoned to himself, thinking of how utterly vulnerable he looked.

So much for being a friend.

Amras was well aware he himself wasn’t a good man, but it didn’t feel right to leave Miquella like that on such a lonely place in bitter terms. But he knew he can’t do anything about it for now, not while the Empyrean refuses to be seen.

Somehow, Godwyn crossed his mind. He had an inkling that their brother would have been able to fix it, but that man’s not here now, not anymore.

The golden ring sat heavy between his fingers, the cold band starting to feel surprisingly sharp as if it knows his offense against its previous wearer.

He was lost in his head, not really bothering to acknowledge the presence in the room the moment it came.

@thesleepdeity

[thesleepdeity]

The headache had gotten worse as time went on.

No matter how much Saint Trina tried to ignore it to make it go away, the pain continued to haunt him even though it was not his own. No. Lord Miquella's emotions pierced the too thin barrier between the two consciousnesses, no matter if the deity reinforced that barrier as much as possible. One soul, two bodies. Lord Miquella could not escape her just as she could not escape him, always connected by a thin thread that would never disappear.

From that, she knew that the conversation between Lord Miquella and Amras had not gone well.

It could not have gone well. Saint Trina didn't need the pain to understand it, because she knew Lord Miquella too well and knew how the conversation was going to end. In a misnamed tantrum, perhaps, or simply in a breakdown from which they would both end up suffering the consequences. Amras had no way of winning that argument no matter how hard he tried.

As soon as Amras woke up, returning from the dream palace, Saint Trina appeared beside him.

"...I am sorry."

At times, all they could do was apologize for Lord Miquella's behavior, which they doubted would change any time soon.

"Please, do not take his meanings in consideration," they said, placing a gentle hand on Amras' shoulder in a comforting gesture. "He is hurt, and hurt people make big mistakes, sometimes. He is grateful that you spared him the same fate of a marriage without love."

Perhaps Lord Miquella did not understand at the time, but sooner or later he would see that Amras had saved him.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Seeing him plead like that was terrifying.”

It had taken him a while to be able to answer her, lifting his head from the table and sighing. “I didn’t know how to say anything else but to refuse him. And now he’s gone off somewhere and I won’t be able to find him for a while.” He ranted to Trina, though it was much more a lament than a rant if anything else.

He was horrified, admittedly.

His brows furrowed as he remembered Miquella’s exact expression; that desperation, the haggard look and the plea as if resorting to a last minute attempt at making a futile plan work.

Right now he could still feel Miquella’s hands on his face.

He placed the ring inside of a drawer, hoping he would forget it for a day. He wouldn’t want to admit he’s been honestly a little hurt by what Miquella said, but what choice did he have?

“He offered himself up to me, you know. To become the Elden Lord of the Age he wanted to bring. It’s what I refused.” He elaborated, frowning.

“He told me his body would not be able to handle Godhood, and I did not want him to destroy himself as much as I did not want him to marry me out of that desperation. He was—“ he cut himself off to sigh again. “Not thinking clearly.” And I didn’t want to take advantage of him, went unsaid.

“What a troublesome boy, really.” He huffed, it was not meant to be malicious.

Amras was sad and concerned about him as much as he was upset about what happened, but the sadness prevailed somehow, seeing him like that didn’t feel right.

He didn’t often seek out comfort, but for now he thought he could use one of Fia’s hugs. He didn’t want to bother Trina, and he’s ran out of favors done to ask that of her.

He’s already been shameless enough.

The thought however, still rang inside his mind.

[thesleepdeity]

Lord Miquella was right. His body would not have withstood divinity.

The Gates of Divinity were known to be harsh on those attempting to reach divinity, and would likely taste Lord Miquella's desperation in the air, causing his body to be absorbed without being able to contain the power of divinity within.

The Lands Between told stories of people who failed in their attempts. Lord Miquella was destined to be one of them if he did not continue to gather enough power to reach the Gates of Divinity, and that was only possible by breaking his curse or finding a Lord to share the crown with him. Clearly, Amras had refused, but the rejection had sat so badly with Lord Miquella that Saint Trina didn't know if he was going to recover from it any time soon.

That was no mere rant or temper tantrum. The deity was able to feel the tornado inside her, a tornado of emotions that barely allowed her to hear her own thoughts. It was something darker.

"...He gave you his ring."

It was strange and Saint Trina couldn't help but point it out.

"It is special. The ring. I remember Radahn himself creating it before gifting it to Lord Miquella as a promise ring. I guess it does not make sense to keep wearing it. The Age of Compassion is no more."

Failed before it even started.

She let out a small sigh before averting her gaze from Amras, in an attempt to sever the connection between their minds. Amras' thoughts always went too fast, with an intensity that the deity didn't know how to handle, and he doubted the boy wanted to know that she had been reading his every thought all that time.

Deity life was... incredibly difficult in some ways.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He exhaled. “I messed up badly didn’t I?” He chuckled sardonically. “I doubt he’d want to see me for a while after that, if he even wants to at all.” It sounded like a whine almost, he’s unable to stay calm after what had just happened, the event too fresh.

He wanted his mind to be quiet for once, and so he looked at Trina again.

“Are you up for some soup or some food?” He felt like eating his feelings out of frustration right now, and thankfully cooking would keep his mind out of it.

“If you’re not, I can teach you how to sew instead.” Clearly, Amras was exasperated and confused and it was showing more and more with every moment that passed.

He realized he must have looked like he was about to lose it though, and cleared his throat. “Sorry, that must have looked so strange.” He said, averting his eyes again as the familiar feeling of embarrassment creeped through his bones.

He buried his face in his hands and groaned. “Oh by Marika’s tits I messed up.” He grumbled, hopefully not loud enough for Trina to hear— it’s not even about just Miquella alone now, but rather also Trina seeing him like this.

[thesleepdeity]

"Amras..."

Saint Trina's face darkened.

The boy blamed himself for what had happened, even though Lord Miquella's mental state had not been stable to begin with. The curse caused him to not process emotions as well, his reactions bordering on the tantrum that a small child might do. However, he was far from resembling a tantrum.

Lord Miquella's mind was covered by a cloud of darkness that only Godwyn had managed to calm sometimes with his words and gestures, taking the young Empyrean in his arms to walk around the capital in an attempt to make him forget what had bothered him. And most of the time it worked.

Except that Godwyn was no longer among them, his body a twisted and completely different version of what everyone knew.

"It is okay to... be compassionate with Lord Miquella's situation," Saint Trina said, her gaze softening in an attempt to make Amras understand that she was not scolding him. "It is not a good situation, I admit, but you have tried everything to help him. We cannot do more than wait for the time when he will ask for our help, if that happens at all. Me and him..."

The deity sighed.

"...He would have died if not for Radahn. Marika's children are not meant for godhood. Their bloodline has been... too tampered with. Nothing that comes out of Marika's womb turns out to be right, because they stray from their own paths to follow their mother's footsteps. And Lord Miquellla would have followed her footsteps, I assure you. You would have to have... put him down like a rabid dog then."

The thought of Lord Miquella becoming something contrary to what he preached made Saint Trina feel a shiver in her body, and so, she hugged Amras as if she could be protected from those visions of an uncertain future. Her arms did not let go.

"I do not want him to die, and I do not want him to suffer the change. Maybe that makes me a bad person, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

It took him a few moments to think again as he leaned on Trina’s arms.

“Would you…” he paused, as he thought of his own goals, Miquella’s cries, the age that had failed and her words that one night.

What would Godhood cost him? If Marika’s children failed, then could he ascend himself? The calling of the tarnished was to fix the Elden Ring and usher in a new age— could he do it really? A simple boy like him?

He’s sworn to bring the age of men, an age of impermanence and death, but what would it cost him? If not himself then the blood of others then?

He apologizes to Miquella in his head, as a plan began to form in his mind. Trina’s words and embrace had cleared the clouds somehow as he thought of it over and over.

“Would you still stick with me even if I were to bathe in the blood of many others to pave myself a path to becoming a Lord in the new age?” He asked her, gently touching her arm with his hand as he looked vulnerable almost.

“Miquella will not have to suffer then.” There is a failed age yes, but there will be a new one to come to replace it. It’s a little vile; even Amras was aware of that as he thought that he’s kicked Miquella’s chance for the throne and burned away at every single one of his plans, his efforts.

And yet a small part of himself knew it wouldn’t have ended well if he had agreed to be his Godfrey to Marika.

“My hands will not be clean at the end of this journey— I knew it wasn’t going to be if I were to restore death in these lands.” He sighed as he leaned in more, smelling the traces of lilies and seeing the color of Trina’s lavender hair at the corner of his eyes.

“But it seems that it requires a God too.” He frowned. “That blasted Ring has done enough damage to this place…. If I were to be a god, would that be fine with you?” I am stealing his dream too, after all, went unsaid.

[thesleepdeity]

Would she?

Saint Trina carefully observed and studied the boy who so clung to her words, but whose affection was not shown in the form of adoration. Amras truly considered her a friend, someone to confide in in a place as hostile as the Lands Between. And even if the deity couldn't quite express what the boy meant to her, at that moment, she wanted to make the effort to calm him down.

Saint Trina's hand rested on Amras' cheek, and she caressed it with the same love a lover might have for their other half. The boy's eyes sparkled. She looked into them and saw a stable future that would be slow in coming, but it would come.

"Your time will be the Age of Men."

The deity continued her caresses on Amras' cheek, softly, their faces being barely inches apart.

"Men are unpredictable. It will be hard. People will oppose your authority, but you can prosper if you do not get rid of the compassion and the love that makes you human." They gave him a soft smile. "And I will be there to see it, as long as you allow me to be by your side."

An Age of Men.

The thought was so strange. One that was led by someone who was not born a god, someone who knew what it was like to starve and cry. An age led by demigods was always doomed to failure, but Amras could change everything.

"Death is the only thing that can truly purify the Lands Between. It's time for it to come back. Every human being needs to rest."

Even Amras.

Amras, at some point, would die.

Saint Trina maybe too. When everyone would forget about her for a second time, when there would be no more prayers to answer, then she would die, become one with the air, with nature.

[whenbonestellhistory]

How nice to have yet another person to believe in what he wanted to do. With that thought, Amras smiled.

“I don’t plan on losing myself, don’t worry.” And he’ll make sure he won’t. Briefly, he wondered what Miquella’s Age of Compassion would have been like had he been a Lord and remembered Trina’s words— another Marika, Miquella would have become another Marika.

He averted his eyes from Trina, cheek leaning into the hand that touched him— he promptly ignored the slightest increase of the beating of his heart as he sighed.

Maybe it was better this way, for him to usurp that plan, Miquella’s plan.

“It’s a rather tall order.” He said with a light huff. “Not even halfway there and I already have a list of people I need to get rid of.” Miquella would have looked unnerved at that statement, he briefly thought. He hasn’t known him for very long, but it was clear the empyrean didn’t like blood or bloodshed.

He removed Trina’s hands from his cheeks and held them tenderly instead. Now that his negative feelings had gone away, he became a bit more specially aware of how /close/ Trina was to him— he doesn’t look at her, still.

“It will be… nice, at least. I think people have stayed stagnant here for too long.” Amras thought of the rather miserable expressions a lot of the folk he encountered had plastered on their faces. There were others who chose to make the best of what they had, including himself, but there was always something so strange about the exhaustion— maybe one day he’d be able to grant Miquella that proper rest too, but not now.

Unlike Amras, the empyrean did not get to live the way he truly deserved to.

He thought of those words, the feeling of only being stuck in one place and utter silence and loneliness of that dreamlike realm and being stuck in a childish body. It’s idealistic, he knows, but he hoped that he’d be able to do something about it once he gets the Elden Ring.

It’s the least he could do for rejecting him.

“I’ll be using your arrows on the way on that journey as well, I hope that is alright with you.” He looked at her again, pushing down the growing shyness under her gaze, his draconian pupils slightly expanding without his knowledge.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He banged his head on the table and he thought of the events that had just transpired in his sleep.

What was he going to do now? He questioned himself. It had been days since then, and Amras never really got a proper lick of sleep at the feeling of guilt that ate away at his bones.

Would it have changed things if he simply had agreed to Miquella’s plea? No, both of them would suffer a loveless union to a pointless cause, some bitter part of himself thought. It was mean to think of it that way, but it reassured some part of himself that following through the whims of someone he wasn’t even that close with would not do him good.

It would feel like he was taking advantage of Miquella too if he hadn’t refused it, he reasoned to himself, thinking of how utterly vulnerable he looked.

So much for being a friend.

Amras was well aware he himself wasn’t a good man, but it didn’t feel right to leave Miquella like that on such a lonely place in bitter terms. But he knew he can’t do anything about it for now, not while the Empyrean refuses to be seen.

Somehow, Godwyn crossed his mind. He had an inkling that their brother would have been able to fix it, but that man’s not here now, not anymore.

The golden ring sat heavy between his fingers, the cold band starting to feel surprisingly sharp as if it knows his offense against its previous wearer.

He was lost in his head, not really bothering to acknowledge the presence in the room the moment it came.

@thesleepdeity

[thesleepdeity]

The headache had gotten worse as time went on.

No matter how much Saint Trina tried to ignore it to make it go away, the pain continued to haunt him even though it was not his own. No. Lord Miquella's emotions pierced the too thin barrier between the two consciousnesses, no matter if the deity reinforced that barrier as much as possible. One soul, two bodies. Lord Miquella could not escape her just as she could not escape him, always connected by a thin thread that would never disappear.

From that, she knew that the conversation between Lord Miquella and Amras had not gone well.

It could not have gone well. Saint Trina didn't need the pain to understand it, because she knew Lord Miquella too well and knew how the conversation was going to end. In a misnamed tantrum, perhaps, or simply in a breakdown from which they would both end up suffering the consequences. Amras had no way of winning that argument no matter how hard he tried.

As soon as Amras woke up, returning from the dream palace, Saint Trina appeared beside him.

"...I am sorry."

At times, all they could do was apologize for Lord Miquella's behavior, which they doubted would change any time soon.

"Please, do not take his meanings in consideration," they said, placing a gentle hand on Amras' shoulder in a comforting gesture. "He is hurt, and hurt people make big mistakes, sometimes. He is grateful that you spared him the same fate of a marriage without love."

Perhaps Lord Miquella did not understand at the time, but sooner or later he would see that Amras had saved him.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Seeing him plead like that was terrifying.”

It had taken him a while to be able to answer her, lifting his head from the table and sighing. “I didn’t know how to say anything else but to refuse him. And now he’s gone off somewhere and I won’t be able to find him for a while.” He ranted to Trina, though it was much more a lament than a rant if anything else.

He was horrified, admittedly.

His brows furrowed as he remembered Miquella’s exact expression; that desperation, the haggard look and the plea as if resorting to a last minute attempt at making a futile plan work.

Right now he could still feel Miquella’s hands on his face.

He placed the ring inside of a drawer, hoping he would forget it for a day. He wouldn’t want to admit he’s been honestly a little hurt by what Miquella said, but what choice did he have?

“He offered himself up to me, you know. To become the Elden Lord of the Age he wanted to bring. It’s what I refused.” He elaborated, frowning.

“He told me his body would not be able to handle Godhood, and I did not want him to destroy himself as much as I did not want him to marry me out of that desperation. He was—“ he cut himself off to sigh again. “Not thinking clearly.” And I didn’t want to take advantage of him, went unsaid.

“What a troublesome boy, really.” He huffed, it was not meant to be malicious.

Amras was sad and concerned about him as much as he was upset about what happened, but the sadness prevailed somehow, seeing him like that didn’t feel right.

He didn’t often seek out comfort, but for now he thought he could use one of Fia’s hugs. He didn’t want to bother Trina, and he’s ran out of favors done to ask that of her.

He’s already been shameless enough.

The thought however, still rang inside his mind.

[thesleepdeity]

Lord Miquella was right. His body would not have withstood divinity.

The Gates of Divinity were known to be harsh on those attempting to reach divinity, and would likely taste Lord Miquella's desperation in the air, causing his body to be absorbed without being able to contain the power of divinity within.

The Lands Between told stories of people who failed in their attempts. Lord Miquella was destined to be one of them if he did not continue to gather enough power to reach the Gates of Divinity, and that was only possible by breaking his curse or finding a Lord to share the crown with him. Clearly, Amras had refused, but the rejection had sat so badly with Lord Miquella that Saint Trina didn't know if he was going to recover from it any time soon.

That was no mere rant or temper tantrum. The deity was able to feel the tornado inside her, a tornado of emotions that barely allowed her to hear her own thoughts. It was something darker.

"...He gave you his ring."

It was strange and Saint Trina couldn't help but point it out.

"It is special. The ring. I remember Radahn himself creating it before gifting it to Lord Miquella as a promise ring. I guess it does not make sense to keep wearing it. The Age of Compassion is no more."

Failed before it even started.

She let out a small sigh before averting her gaze from Amras, in an attempt to sever the connection between their minds. Amras' thoughts always went too fast, with an intensity that the deity didn't know how to handle, and he doubted the boy wanted to know that she had been reading his every thought all that time.

Deity life was... incredibly difficult in some ways.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He exhaled. “I messed up badly didn’t I?” He chuckled sardonically. “I doubt he’d want to see me for a while after that, if he even wants to at all.” It sounded like a whine almost, he’s unable to stay calm after what had just happened, the event too fresh.

He wanted his mind to be quiet for once, and so he looked at Trina again.

“Are you up for some soup or some food?” He felt like eating his feelings out of frustration right now, and thankfully cooking would keep his mind out of it.

“If you’re not, I can teach you how to sew instead.” Clearly, Amras was exasperated and confused and it was showing more and more with every moment that passed.

He realized he must have looked like he was about to lose it though, and cleared his throat. “Sorry, that must have looked so strange.” He said, averting his eyes again as the familiar feeling of embarrassment creeped through his bones.

He buried his face in his hands and groaned. “Oh by Marika’s tits I messed up.” He grumbled, hopefully not loud enough for Trina to hear— it’s not even about just Miquella alone now, but rather also Trina seeing him like this.

[thesleepdeity]

"Amras..."

Saint Trina's face darkened.

The boy blamed himself for what had happened, even though Lord Miquella's mental state had not been stable to begin with. The curse caused him to not process emotions as well, his reactions bordering on the tantrum that a small child might do. However, he was far from resembling a tantrum.

Lord Miquella's mind was covered by a cloud of darkness that only Godwyn had managed to calm sometimes with his words and gestures, taking the young Empyrean in his arms to walk around the capital in an attempt to make him forget what had bothered him. And most of the time it worked.

Except that Godwyn was no longer among them, his body a twisted and completely different version of what everyone knew.

"It is okay to... be compassionate with Lord Miquella's situation," Saint Trina said, her gaze softening in an attempt to make Amras understand that she was not scolding him. "It is not a good situation, I admit, but you have tried everything to help him. We cannot do more than wait for the time when he will ask for our help, if that happens at all. Me and him..."

The deity sighed.

"...He would have died if not for Radahn. Marika's children are not meant for godhood. Their bloodline has been... too tampered with. Nothing that comes out of Marika's womb turns out to be right, because they stray from their own paths to follow their mother's footsteps. And Lord Miquellla would have followed her footsteps, I assure you. You would have to have... put him down like a rabid dog then."

The thought of Lord Miquella becoming something contrary to what he preached made Saint Trina feel a shiver in her body, and so, she hugged Amras as if she could be protected from those visions of an uncertain future. Her arms did not let go.

"I do not want him to die, and I do not want him to suffer the change. Maybe that makes me a bad person, after all."

[whenbonestellhistory]

It took him a few moments to think again as he leaned on Trina’s arms.

“Would you…” he paused, as he thought of his own goals, Miquella’s cries, the age that had failed and her words that one night.

What would Godhood cost him? If Marika’s children failed, then could he ascend himself? The calling of the tarnished was to fix the Elden Ring and usher in a new age— could he do it really? A simple boy like him?

He’s sworn to bring the age of men, an age of impermanence and death, but what would it cost him? If not himself then the blood of others then?

He apologizes to Miquella in his head, as a plan began to form in his mind. Trina’s words and embrace had cleared the clouds somehow as he thought of it over and over.

“Would you still stick with me even if I were to bathe in the blood of many others to pave myself a path to becoming a Lord in the new age?” He asked her, gently touching her arm with his hand as he looked vulnerable almost.

“Miquella will not have to suffer then.” There is a failed age yes, but there will be a new one to come to replace it. It’s a little vile; even Amras was aware of that as he thought that he’s kicked Miquella’s chance for the throne and burned away at every single one of his plans, his efforts.

And yet a small part of himself knew it wouldn’t have ended well if he had agreed to be his Godfrey to Marika.

“My hands will not be clean at the end of this journey— I knew it wasn’t going to be if I were to restore death in these lands.” He sighed as he leaned in more, smelling the traces of lilies and seeing the color of Trina’s lavender hair at the corner of his eyes.

“But it seems that it requires a God too.” He frowned. “That blasted Ring has done enough damage to this place…. If I were to be a god, would that be fine with you?” I am stealing his dream too, after all, went unsaid.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He banged his head on the table and he thought of the events that had just transpired in his sleep.

What was he going to do now? He questioned himself. It had been days since then, and Amras never really got a proper lick of sleep at the feeling of guilt that ate away at his bones.

Would it have changed things if he simply had agreed to Miquella’s plea? No, both of them would suffer a loveless union to a pointless cause, some bitter part of himself thought. It was mean to think of it that way, but it reassured some part of himself that following through the whims of someone he wasn’t even that close with would not do him good.

It would feel like he was taking advantage of Miquella too if he hadn’t refused it, he reasoned to himself, thinking of how utterly vulnerable he looked.

So much for being a friend.

Amras was well aware he himself wasn’t a good man, but it didn’t feel right to leave Miquella like that on such a lonely place in bitter terms. But he knew he can’t do anything about it for now, not while the Empyrean refuses to be seen.

Somehow, Godwyn crossed his mind. He had an inkling that their brother would have been able to fix it, but that man’s not here now, not anymore.

The golden ring sat heavy between his fingers, the cold band starting to feel surprisingly sharp as if it knows his offense against its previous wearer.

He was lost in his head, not really bothering to acknowledge the presence in the room the moment it came.

@thesleepdeity

[thesleepdeity]

The headache had gotten worse as time went on.

No matter how much Saint Trina tried to ignore it to make it go away, the pain continued to haunt him even though it was not his own. No. Lord Miquella's emotions pierced the too thin barrier between the two consciousnesses, no matter if the deity reinforced that barrier as much as possible. One soul, two bodies. Lord Miquella could not escape her just as she could not escape him, always connected by a thin thread that would never disappear.

From that, she knew that the conversation between Lord Miquella and Amras had not gone well.

It could not have gone well. Saint Trina didn't need the pain to understand it, because she knew Lord Miquella too well and knew how the conversation was going to end. In a misnamed tantrum, perhaps, or simply in a breakdown from which they would both end up suffering the consequences. Amras had no way of winning that argument no matter how hard he tried.

As soon as Amras woke up, returning from the dream palace, Saint Trina appeared beside him.

"...I am sorry."

At times, all they could do was apologize for Lord Miquella's behavior, which they doubted would change any time soon.

"Please, do not take his meanings in consideration," they said, placing a gentle hand on Amras' shoulder in a comforting gesture. "He is hurt, and hurt people make big mistakes, sometimes. He is grateful that you spared him the same fate of a marriage without love."

Perhaps Lord Miquella did not understand at the time, but sooner or later he would see that Amras had saved him.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Seeing him plead like that was terrifying.”

It had taken him a while to be able to answer her, lifting his head from the table and sighing. “I didn’t know how to say anything else but to refuse him. And now he’s gone off somewhere and I won’t be able to find him for a while.” He ranted to Trina, though it was much more a lament than a rant if anything else.

He was horrified, admittedly.

His brows furrowed as he remembered Miquella’s exact expression; that desperation, the haggard look and the plea as if resorting to a last minute attempt at making a futile plan work.

Right now he could still feel Miquella’s hands on his face.

He placed the ring inside of a drawer, hoping he would forget it for a day. He wouldn’t want to admit he’s been honestly a little hurt by what Miquella said, but what choice did he have?

“He offered himself up to me, you know. To become the Elden Lord of the Age he wanted to bring. It’s what I refused.” He elaborated, frowning.

“He told me his body would not be able to handle Godhood, and I did not want him to destroy himself as much as I did not want him to marry me out of that desperation. He was—“ he cut himself off to sigh again. “Not thinking clearly.” And I didn’t want to take advantage of him, went unsaid.

“What a troublesome boy, really.” He huffed, it was not meant to be malicious.

Amras was sad and concerned about him as much as he was upset about what happened, but the sadness prevailed somehow, seeing him like that didn’t feel right.

He didn’t often seek out comfort, but for now he thought he could use one of Fia’s hugs. He didn’t want to bother Trina, and he’s ran out of favors done to ask that of her.

He’s already been shameless enough.

The thought however, still rang inside his mind.

[thesleepdeity]

Lord Miquella was right. His body would not have withstood divinity.

The Gates of Divinity were known to be harsh on those attempting to reach divinity, and would likely taste Lord Miquella's desperation in the air, causing his body to be absorbed without being able to contain the power of divinity within.

The Lands Between told stories of people who failed in their attempts. Lord Miquella was destined to be one of them if he did not continue to gather enough power to reach the Gates of Divinity, and that was only possible by breaking his curse or finding a Lord to share the crown with him. Clearly, Amras had refused, but the rejection had sat so badly with Lord Miquella that Saint Trina didn't know if he was going to recover from it any time soon.

That was no mere rant or temper tantrum. The deity was able to feel the tornado inside her, a tornado of emotions that barely allowed her to hear her own thoughts. It was something darker.

"...He gave you his ring."

It was strange and Saint Trina couldn't help but point it out.

"It is special. The ring. I remember Radahn himself creating it before gifting it to Lord Miquella as a promise ring. I guess it does not make sense to keep wearing it. The Age of Compassion is no more."

Failed before it even started.

She let out a small sigh before averting her gaze from Amras, in an attempt to sever the connection between their minds. Amras' thoughts always went too fast, with an intensity that the deity didn't know how to handle, and he doubted the boy wanted to know that she had been reading his every thought all that time.

Deity life was... incredibly difficult in some ways.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He exhaled. “I messed up badly didn’t I?” He chuckled sardonically. “I doubt he’d want to see me for a while after that, if he even wants to at all.” It sounded like a whine almost, he’s unable to stay calm after what had just happened, the event too fresh.

He wanted his mind to be quiet for once, and so he looked at Trina again.

“Are you up for some soup or some food?” He felt like eating his feelings out of frustration right now, and thankfully cooking would keep his mind out of it.

“If you’re not, I can teach you how to sew instead.” Clearly, Amras was exasperated and confused and it was showing more and more with every moment that passed.

He realized he must have looked like he was about to lose it though, and cleared his throat. “Sorry, that must have looked so strange.” He said, averting his eyes again as the familiar feeling of embarrassment creeped through his bones.

He buried his face in his hands and groaned. “Oh by Marika’s tits I messed up.” He grumbled, hopefully not loud enough for Trina to hear— it’s not even about just Miquella alone now, but rather also Trina seeing him like this.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He banged his head on the table and he thought of the events that had just transpired in his sleep.

What was he going to do now? He questioned himself. It had been days since then, and Amras never really got a proper lick of sleep at the feeling of guilt that ate away at his bones.

Would it have changed things if he simply had agreed to Miquella’s plea? No, both of them would suffer a loveless union to a pointless cause, some bitter part of himself thought. It was mean to think of it that way, but it reassured some part of himself that following through the whims of someone he wasn’t even that close with would not do him good.

It would feel like he was taking advantage of Miquella too if he hadn’t refused it, he reasoned to himself, thinking of how utterly vulnerable he looked.

So much for being a friend.

Amras was well aware he himself wasn’t a good man, but it didn’t feel right to leave Miquella like that on such a lonely place in bitter terms. But he knew he can’t do anything about it for now, not while the Empyrean refuses to be seen.

Somehow, Godwyn crossed his mind. He had an inkling that their brother would have been able to fix it, but that man’s not here now, not anymore.

The golden ring sat heavy between his fingers, the cold band starting to feel surprisingly sharp as if it knows his offense against its previous wearer.

He was lost in his head, not really bothering to acknowledge the presence in the room the moment it came.

@thesleepdeity

[thesleepdeity]

The headache had gotten worse as time went on.

No matter how much Saint Trina tried to ignore it to make it go away, the pain continued to haunt him even though it was not his own. No. Lord Miquella's emotions pierced the too thin barrier between the two consciousnesses, no matter if the deity reinforced that barrier as much as possible. One soul, two bodies. Lord Miquella could not escape her just as she could not escape him, always connected by a thin thread that would never disappear.

From that, she knew that the conversation between Lord Miquella and Amras had not gone well.

It could not have gone well. Saint Trina didn't need the pain to understand it, because she knew Lord Miquella too well and knew how the conversation was going to end. In a misnamed tantrum, perhaps, or simply in a breakdown from which they would both end up suffering the consequences. Amras had no way of winning that argument no matter how hard he tried.

As soon as Amras woke up, returning from the dream palace, Saint Trina appeared beside him.

"...I am sorry."

At times, all they could do was apologize for Lord Miquella's behavior, which they doubted would change any time soon.

"Please, do not take his meanings in consideration," they said, placing a gentle hand on Amras' shoulder in a comforting gesture. "He is hurt, and hurt people make big mistakes, sometimes. He is grateful that you spared him the same fate of a marriage without love."

Perhaps Lord Miquella did not understand at the time, but sooner or later he would see that Amras had saved him.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Seeing him plead like that was terrifying.”

It had taken him a while to be able to answer her, lifting his head from the table and sighing. “I didn’t know how to say anything else but to refuse him. And now he’s gone off somewhere and I won’t be able to find him for a while.” He ranted to Trina, though it was much more a lament than a rant if anything else.

He was horrified, admittedly.

His brows furrowed as he remembered Miquella’s exact expression; that desperation, the haggard look and the plea as if resorting to a last minute attempt at making a futile plan work.

Right now he could still feel Miquella’s hands on his face.

He placed the ring inside of a drawer, hoping he would forget it for a day. He wouldn’t want to admit he’s been honestly a little hurt by what Miquella said, but what choice did he have?

“He offered himself up to me, you know. To become the Elden Lord of the Age he wanted to bring. It’s what I refused.” He elaborated, frowning.

“He told me his body would not be able to handle Godhood, and I did not want him to destroy himself as much as I did not want him to marry me out of that desperation. He was—“ he cut himself off to sigh again. “Not thinking clearly.” And I didn’t want to take advantage of him, went unsaid.

“What a troublesome boy, really.” He huffed, it was not meant to be malicious.

Amras was sad and concerned about him as much as he was upset about what happened, but the sadness prevailed somehow, seeing him like that didn’t feel right.

He didn’t often seek out comfort, but for now he thought he could use one of Fia’s hugs. He didn’t want to bother Trina, and he’s ran out of favors done to ask that of her.

He’s already been shameless enough.

The thought however, still rang inside his mind.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He banged his head on the table and he thought of the events that had just transpired in his sleep.

What was he going to do now? He questioned himself. It had been days since then, and Amras never really got a proper lick of sleep at the feeling of guilt that ate away at his bones.

Would it have changed things if he simply had agreed to Miquella’s plea? No, both of them would suffer a loveless union to a pointless cause, some bitter part of himself thought. It was mean to think of it that way, but it reassured some part of himself that following through the whims of someone he wasn’t even that close with would not do him good.

It would feel like he was taking advantage of Miquella too if he hadn’t refused it, he reasoned to himself, thinking of how utterly vulnerable he looked.

So much for being a friend.

Amras was well aware he himself wasn’t a good man, but it didn’t feel right to leave Miquella like that on such a lonely place in bitter terms. But he knew he can’t do anything about it for now, not while the Empyrean refuses to be seen.

Somehow, Godwyn crossed his mind. He had an inkling that their brother would have been able to fix it, but that man’s not here now, not anymore.

The golden ring sat heavy between his fingers, the cold band starting to feel surprisingly sharp as if it knows his offense against its previous wearer.

He was lost in his head, not really bothering to acknowledge the presence in the room the moment it came.

@thesleepdeity

[miquellathekindone]

TW: self-inflicted harm, visions, the worst coping mechanisms ever.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Pain.

There was something slowly burning a hole in Miquella's mind, the ringing in his ears getting louder and louder as time passed. One second. Two seconds. Three seconds.

The stars had disappeared from the sky of the dream palace, hidden, and the night had never before looked so dark from the valley, a mirage of the Abyss that the young Empyrean's sanity was approaching. However, when he tried to get up from the patch of grass under the tree, his legs did not respond. Weak, frail, a voice spat above the ringing. He couldn't contain the sound inside, a humiliating gasp of pain coming from his tightly pressed lips in the dark night.

A shadow covered Miquella's body. The vision grew bigger.

"Leave me alone..." he said, hiding his face even more in his knees. The blood from his nose continued to stain the white dress he wore, the purity disappearing little by little. "Lord Brother, leave me alone for tonight, please."

The young Empyrean could not stand the visions at that moment.

He touched his forearm.

His skin was so smooth. He thought he was going to have those scars forever, that which marked him as the progenitor of the Haligtree. The blood of an Empyrean had been enough to make it grow, but it had not prevented its fall. He missed it. He missed going back home.

Miquella scratched, scratched, scratched.

The thin lines that were beginning to redden, at least, could replace them even if they disappeared in a short time. The young Empyrean visualized the Moon falling from the sky of the dream palace slowly, rolling down the hill, and it happened.

The light that had been born in the dream palace disappeared completely, leaving only the lamps of the Lord's Keep gate to illuminate the false world.

The non-existent crown weighed too heavily on Miquella's hair. The ring on his hand burned.

Maybe, one day, it would all be better.

@whenbonestellhistory

[whenbonestellhistory]

It was unnerving when he had woken up to darkness.

The scrolls in his arms slipped from his grasp as he looked around, not a single sight of a star or light, not a single lily to be found.

He doesn’t understand what’s going on, but heard Miquella’s quiet cries.

Something was wrong. Very wrong.

He trudged through the dark as he followed the faint glow of the boy’s golden hair, and his instincts were proven true at the smell and sight of blood on his arms and his dress.

His eyes narrowed, pupils turning into slits. Something was watching them.

He’s been in this place long enough to know it’s not Miquella’s doing but something else. Something malevolent. It did not come here bearing gifts.

Gently, he approached Miquella and knelt beside him. Firmly but gently prying the hand that scratched at his own arm away and held it, then gazed out into the abyss.

“Leave this place.” He called out to the dark without an ounce of fear, holding Miquella close to him. “You are not welcome here, leave before I make you.” He threatened, the green of his reptilian eyes almost glowing in the dark.

He made it so that the empyrean cannot see how veins bulged on his temple in anger, made it so that he cannot see what kind of expression he was making against the unknown.

“You are safe, Miquella.” He whispered to his friend after a moment, his voice quiet, carrying a sense of care in an attempt to comfort him. “I will not let it touch you.”

[miquellathekindone]

The visions never left.

They always remained in a corner, lurking, patiently waiting for the moment when they could attack Miquella when he was at his weakest, when he was unable to move. And no one, no one had ever tried to fight them before.

However, the voice in front of him was trying. And, for a few moments, he thought that the newly arrived traveler would also be consumed by visions, disappearing from the dream palace or turning into something horrifying that would make Miquella wish to sleep forever. It did not happen. The voice made Radahn's shadow slowly recede until it dissipated into thin air.

The dream palace continued to be completely dark, but Miquella didn't need a light to recognize the person who had disturbed his barriers, those that had prevented Saint Trina's passage back to the dream palace.

"...Leave."

The young Empyrean lifted his face from his knees slowly, despite the blood that covered much of it because of the bleeding from his nose.

"Leave. You do not..." Miquella could feel the pain of his temper piercing him to the bone, and the tremor in his voice was proof of it. "You are not welcome here. Go back."

A fallen god, an uncompleted vow.

Miquella clenched his hand into a fist, feeling the pure gold of his engagement ring. It hadn't stopped burning since the end of the festival. Perhaps it never would.

His only door to the Lands of Shadow had been closed forever.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He was taken aback by what he said.

“No.” He frowned, the darkness had not disappeared yet. “I’m not going to leave.” He shook his head, his statement firm. Miquella was not fine, he will not be leaving this place til the light— or at least a semblance of it, may return once more.

Miquella looked disheveled, and Amras could not prevent the comment that came out of his mouth when he was told he wasn’t welcome.

“I came all the way here carrying you scrolls, and now you want me to leave?” He scoffed. “How rude.”

Despite his words, he did not move from where he was and instead wiped Miquella’s nose and face with a handkerchief he took from his breast pocket with a sigh, looking at his self inflicted wounds with a forlorn expression, his eyes no longer the thin slits that indicated his agitation.

The light did not return yet.

[miquellathekindone]

Miquella tried to pull his face away from Amras' hands, a whimper escaping his lips, but Amras continued to wipe away the traces of blood trickling down his nose from after multiple unsuccessful attempts to get up from the floor.

Humiliation. That was what he felt. If he had felt just a little energy, he would have tried to bite Amras' arm to push him away, to get him to leave once and for all and leave him alone in the dream palace, as it should always have been. Amras didn't seem to understand that, however, his comments only further fueling the spark of anger in Miquella's chest.

His plans had been completely destroyed.

"Leave me alone!"

I am scared, went unsaid, countering any of the young Empyrean's arguments.

Miquella raised his hands, pushing against Amras' chest to leave as much space between them as possible in an attempt to make him finally decide to leave the dream palace, but the trembling in his limbs betrayed the terror he felt at being enveloped in absolute darkness.

Perhaps that was what awaited him.

Absolute darkness.

"Go away!" Miquella shouted again. "I do not want to see you again!"

A child. Miquella looked like a child overwhelmed by circumstances and emotions that he was still unable to understand.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Hey— ack!” He exclaimed, however he doesn’t intend to follow along Miquella’s whims.

He clearly was not alright, it reminded of Amras of something along the lines of a panicking child. He wasn’t leaving, no matter how much Miquella would yell at him.

He won’t.

The light has not returned and he knew the look in his eyes; the boy was terrified. Amras steeled his resolve and prepared for the worst as he continued to trap him in the embrace— he wasn’t going to leave, not until Miquella’s of sound mind again and the light to this world returned because seeing it in darkness with his friend despairing felt so utterly wrong.

Amras knew being aggressive won’t cut it, so for now he will let him cry, shout and try to hurt him all he wanted, but he wasn’t leaving because Miquella needed someone to be with him there at such a low point in his life.

“Breathe with me.” He pleaded— another solution aside from letting him just cry as he couldn’t stand seeing the Empyrean like this. “Breathe, Miquella. Breathe.”

It’s a struggle as he rubbed his back with one hand. “Shhhh, it’s okay… you’re okay.” He swayed his body side by side carefully as he continued to mutter reassurances to him with a gentle voice. He cannot leave this boy here alone.

[miquellathekindone]

Breaths were stuck in his chest, forcing him to hiccup despite Amras' words of calm that slowly pierced through that black cloud that had wrapped itself around his mind.

Miquella's hands clung to Amras' body then, bringing them as close as if nothing else existed in the world, as if letting go would mean losing him in the great tide of darkness in the dream palace. A sob escaped his lips: heartbreaking, like those of a child losing something they held dear. Miquella had rarely felt such a grief, and the sensation was too much for his small mind.

Amras was not Godwyn.

But maybe, just maybe, he could pretend he was for a few moments.

The young Empyrean closed his eyes tightly, visualizing Godwyn's golden locks and gentle gaze on him behind his eyelids. His older brother had never left him alone in the face of danger in the dark, carrying him in his arms when Miquella's legs were unresponsive and teasing him afterwards about being so small that he would drown in his arms. There was no malice in Godwyn's words, but a sense of normalcy.

Slowly, his breathing calmed; enough to stop thinking that the world was closing in around him.

"You... You killed him..."

It was not a question, not an accusation. Miquella just needed to say it out loud, make it real somehow.

Radahn was dead.

His spirit would not be drawn into the Lands of Shadow, because the entrance was still completely sealed.

"Why?"

The question would have sounded strange to Amras' ears, but Miquella desperately needed to hold on to a reason why his future was no more.

[whenbonestellhistory]

It’s a delicate topic, but Amras saw no point in having to lie.

“Yes, I killed him.” He began, his expression unreadable as he struggled to formulate the proper words. He continued to rub the empyrean’s back, never stopping his body’s motions of rocking side by side even as he was finally calm.

He’s not really quite sure how to properly phrase it to Miquella— the other proper reason why he killed Radahn. But he’ll try to anyways.

“It had already been a plan from me along with a couple of others,” his eyes are cast down as he remembered the dream. “It was mine, as I planned to put him to rest— I had felt bad you see.”

“Consumed by madness and wits lost to time, I found it logical to simply put him down like an animal. Though…” He paused as his other hand trailed to Miquella’s hair to run his fingers along the strands.

“It seemed that there was another reason for me to get rid of him too. Because you see, I had a strange dream, and I didn’t like what I saw.” He said, purposefully vague as he did not know how to present it in a way that would make sense; all he knew was that he didn’t like how it made him feel, how Radahn made Miquella feel.

“It felt as though they wanted him gone. They were so afraid..” He muttered, voice low and sad. “So, so afraid and helpless. So I decided I should get rid of the general with that dream— no, with the feelings of the one in that dream had.” He had felt as if he had to carry that person’s helplessness with him, turn it into a rage that served rightful against the injustice done to him— done to that Miquella, who was just a young boy.

“I feel though that I made the right choice— Although, you are free to tell me otherwise.” He knew he cannot remedy it if his choice had been a mistake, but he was willing to take that hatred of him if it meant Miquella’s and Trina’s nightmares of that general’s imposing figure would fade.

He thought of Trina, he thought of how she was reacting and frowned.

That’s when he knew he had made the right choice.

[miquellathekindone]

They wanted him gone.

That was not the truth.

Or, at least, Miquella tried to convince himself of that. The only path that existed to godhood was through having a Lord at his side, and among his brothers, Radahn was the only one whose part of the vow could be accepted. A heroic battle for a marriage. Later, when Miquella had attained godhood, he would have time to repent his ways once they entered the Age of Compassion.

Amras did not understand because he had not been born among demigods and gods and all that meant. Miquella, like the rest of his siblings and half-siblings, had sucked in the genes of manipulation and scheming with their mother and father's milk, and each of them had a goal they desperately needed to fulfill.

But the young Empyrean, as much as he wanted to make Amras understand that, it would do no good.

And Radahn was dead.

"...He was not a threat."

Miquella's voice came out as weak as his body felt, any fight leaving him exhausted and tearless.

"...He was the only one to..." He closed his eyes, as if he could stop hearing the voice summoning everyone to the festival. "...He was the only one to respond to my call. You do not understand, because you are not a demigod, and vows mean nothing to humans."

Miquella moved his hand slowly until he pressed the ring against their chests, the soft golden color glowing in the darkness of the night. A comforting glow, somehow, like a firefly that refused to leave him alone after what had happened.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Just because he was your only choice did not mean he meant well.” He could not stop himself from saying those words, Amras knew of vows, maybe all too well.

Marriage would not change the nature of a warlord. Radahn would seek war, in some way or another— Amras would know, he is Godfrey’s son after all. He knew well of the desire for glory.

“I’ve seen enough to know.” His grip on Miquella had unintentionally tightened, but not enough to suffocate. There’s a dark expression on his face now, one that bore the inner anger of an old scar that has yet to heal. An old ugly scar. With Miquella’s previous predicament being a very bitter and cold reminder of his past choices.

The light had slowly returned, but the expression on his face was stormy, but this is not directed at Miquella himself.

“If he wasn’t a threat,” he began. “Then why did /you/ look so afraid?” Miquella was free to tell him he was wrong, that he might have misunderstood— he wasn’t naive though, and stubborn too much like the empyrean. He knew what he saw, he knew of that crippling fear, but perhaps Miquella would not understand that too.

[miquellathekindone]

Radahn was indeed his only option.

Godwyn was dead, his body discarded somewhere Miquella was unable to access. Mohg sought wed him in a lake of blood. The rest of his siblings would never accept a vow, too distrustful of Miquella, someone who definitely did not align with the values they prosecuted. Radahn was the only option, and yet the Age of Compassion had fallen like a mountain of sand disappearing in the wind.

The festival was over. The stars were returned to their birthplace, although Miquella would probably never see reality again.

Amras did not understand.

Every part of the young Empyrean's body trembled violently, and he didn't get an answer to Amras' question until he took a few seconds of contemplation, of absolute silence. At least the warmth of the boy's body brought him back to the present when the memories threatened to bring him back to the past.

"...Because I was not ready."

The admission was like pull out teeth.

"...Things were going too fast. My- This body," Miquella pointed out to himself, "could not, and still cannot, handle godhood. It would break apart."

The young Empyrean remembered kneeling in front of Radahn and begging for a little more time, because that was the only thing he could do at that moment. His mind was still immature, his voice innocent and without the mental exhaustion of recent years, and Radahn could have taken advantage of that.

"I can barely function with this body." Miquella shook his head. "Godhood would... destroy me."

[whenbonestellhistory]

He sighed, long and drawn out. “Things wouldn’t have changed.” He said. “Even if you were offering yourself to him so freely, did you ever stop to think that peace would be what he wanted?”

“Even as his wits were lost to him he wanted a fight,” he recalled how Radahn had looked at that moment, while robbed of sanity, he still desired a battle. “And indeed he got a fight. I fought him to the death, and I saw a man that did not desire peace but permanent warfare.” Nothing would have changed, he thought to himself as his fingers brushed through Miquella’s hair, his words harsh but his actions gentle.

“He would have taken advantage of you, if he didn’t already. He would have done crusades in your name, battles glorious and bloody but do you think he would ever be satisfied?” He looked down at Miquella. “No, he won’t. Even Godfrey longed for battle as Serosh was placed on him. Radahn proudly proclaimed himself a warlord, and an admirer of my father.” Disapproval laced his voice as he remembered old memories of a time long passed.

“He would have never been satisfied with just one fight.” He shook his head. “Someone would have to kill him before he’d want to stop seeking the glory he wanted.”

After moments of silence between the two of them, he spoke again.

“There is no need for you to shoulder the heaviness of Godhood for whatever it is that you may desire for this world.” He began, and recalled Trina’s words that faithful night.

“I will become an Elden Lord— I can’t change what is already written, but I can try to fix what’s left of everything that had been broken.” He declared— no, /promised/.

“I cannot grant you the age that you desire; I have a feeling we have different goals. But I assure you that I will make it so that no god will fight for power anymore.” He smiled. “It will be an age of men, I hope you are fine with that.”

[miquellathekindone]

Radahn would not have stopped with a heroic death.

His mind was corrupted, and even if he had retained his sanity after the fight with Malenia, he would have tried by all means to continue his bizarre crusade of seeking Godfrey's approval, a single glance from his idol telling him he was doing well.

Miquella could easily recall Radahn's dark eyes on him watching him from above, the shadow of his own throne not enough to wrap him in a protective blanket in which to hide. Radahn had never asked for more than a heroic battle as part of his vow and his hands had never touched the young Empyrean in an impure manner, though the ring on his fingers gave him that freedom.

Radahn had never raised a hand to touch him beyond a reassuring gesture.

The thought that this could have happened made nausea hit him hard. He couldn't. He needed to forget about the possible futures that the Age of Compassion might have brought, despite mourning the adult body he would never have. Miquella hardly dared to look at his reflection for fear of seeing the baby fat still clinging to his face. If he had to stay with that body any longer...

"...You do not understand."

Miquella clenched his hands into fists, feeling the gold of her ring dig into the soft skin of his finger.

"This world won't change for anything, not even an Elden Lord." Miquella knew. His voice grew more desperate almost angry with Amras for not understanding. "The Lands Between, the Lords— they all need a god. You cannot become a Lord without a God, nor a God without a Lord. That is the way."

Queen Marika had had Godfrey and then Radagon, but she always had a Lord by her side to remain a divinity.

"With the Age of Compassion, there would not be war. No genocide, either. Please..." Perhaps stooping to supplication was all he had left. The young Empyrean's hands came to rest on Amras' cheeks, looking him square in the eyes. "Please. Be my Elden Lord. I promise you... I promise you, a thousand year voyage lead guided by compassion."

[whenbonestellhistory]

Amras went quiet at the empyrean’s plea. His thoughts raced, colliding with one another as he took the time to process his words.

His heart came to a decision and all he wanted was to hug this boy to his chest tight and shed tears in his place. He could feel that desperation all too familiar, and as much as he doesn’t want to make Miquella cry again, he could not bring himself to take advantage of him.

Becoming a God’s Lord meant that he was going to marry this boy, this clearly distraught and desperate friend. He can’t do that. No, he cannot do that. It would mean he was betraying the purpose of what he even killed Radahn for.

He took a deep breath and braced himself as he prepared to take the words out of his mouth.

He exhaled, and touched Miquella’s hands tenderly as they stained his cheeks, and looked at him too.

“I cannot do that.” He said. “Not as you are right now.” He took his hand— the one that held his ring, gently. “If you are intending to become this Land’s God with me as your Lord, then say it to me again when you’re sound of mind.” He refuses to take advantage of Miquella.

“For now, I will have to refuse you. I am sorry.” He looked away, expression now forlorn as he carefully chose what words he should utter next.

“I promise you, I don’t desire a war or a genocide. I simply seek to have life return to these lands as it should.” His words are uttered with an open heart and as gentle as the hand he used to hold Miquella’s hand, thumb lightly rubbing the golden band on his ring finger.

[miquellathekindone]

Miquella didn't understand.

He didn't understand. He did not understand. He was not even able to find a single word in his mind that could explain the pain he felt at that moment, a pain as sharp as that of a needle slowly sticking in his chest until it reached his heart. Indescribable, indomitable, Miquella could only watch motionless as he was pierced by what Amras refused to do.

Without an Elden Lord, the young Empyrean would not endure the Gates of Divinity. His body was too frail, too weak, and he would perish before even reaching them in the Lands of Shadow. Then, all his work would be in vain. All that he had dreamed, imagined, planned...

All gone.

A small smile appeared on Miquella's face, a smile that did not match the cascade of tears that began to fall from his eyes. Each passing moment was a new pain that came crashing down on him like a bucket of ice water.

"I wish that..." the young Empyrean's said, "For just one day, you knew what it was like to be in this body. What it is like to be here."

He pulled his hand away from Amras' to slowly remove the ring, which left a reddish mark on his finger. A mark that would remain for a long time. Miquella paid no attention to it, however, leaving the gold ring in Amras' lap as if it were the most precious thing in the world. The ravages of neglect mingled with the blood and tears on the skirts of his dress.

"I hope you give people more choices than you have given me."

And, with those words, Miquella the Kind disappeared into the wind.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“What a troublesome boy.” Amras grumbled, scowling down at the ring on his lap. He rubbed his temples, irritated beyond belief at the outcome of the events.

He stayed there, even as the darkness was almost gone as he contemplated on whether or not he should follow Miquella— no, he wasn’t on the right state of mind, he thought, frowning as he remembered Miquella’s expression and words.

He had a feeling that going to him would make it worse if he were to try to remedy things now.

He groaned, and then inhaled and heaved out a huge sigh. He can try to find him again for now.

Amras picked up the ring and tucked it away into his breast pocket, he stood up and walked, leaving the scroll he had dropped in the distance forgotten as he headed nowhere in particular.

It took him a few more moments of strolling to realize he was getting nowhere.

Miquella had hidden himself away.

He was hesitant to leave, even as he felt bitter as he worried for the empyrean. ‘I’ll come here again after some time, yes, that would be optimal.’ Amras thought to himself, returning to the waking world with an unpleasant taste to his mouth.

He only hoped that Miquella’s head too would clear upon his return.

[miquellathekindone]

TW: self-inflicted harm, visions, the worst coping mechanisms ever.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Pain.

There was something slowly burning a hole in Miquella's mind, the ringing in his ears getting louder and louder as time passed. One second. Two seconds. Three seconds.

The stars had disappeared from the sky of the dream palace, hidden, and the night had never before looked so dark from the valley, a mirage of the Abyss that the young Empyrean's sanity was approaching. However, when he tried to get up from the patch of grass under the tree, his legs did not respond. Weak, frail, a voice spat above the ringing. He couldn't contain the sound inside, a humiliating gasp of pain coming from his tightly pressed lips in the dark night.

A shadow covered Miquella's body. The vision grew bigger.

"Leave me alone..." he said, hiding his face even more in his knees. The blood from his nose continued to stain the white dress he wore, the purity disappearing little by little. "Lord Brother, leave me alone for tonight, please."

The young Empyrean could not stand the visions at that moment.

He touched his forearm.

His skin was so smooth. He thought he was going to have those scars forever, that which marked him as the progenitor of the Haligtree. The blood of an Empyrean had been enough to make it grow, but it had not prevented its fall. He missed it. He missed going back home.

Miquella scratched, scratched, scratched.

The thin lines that were beginning to redden, at least, could replace them even if they disappeared in a short time. The young Empyrean visualized the Moon falling from the sky of the dream palace slowly, rolling down the hill, and it happened.

The light that had been born in the dream palace disappeared completely, leaving only the lamps of the Lord's Keep gate to illuminate the false world.

The non-existent crown weighed too heavily on Miquella's hair. The ring on his hand burned.

Maybe, one day, it would all be better.

@whenbonestellhistory

[whenbonestellhistory]

It was unnerving when he had woken up to darkness.

The scrolls in his arms slipped from his grasp as he looked around, not a single sight of a star or light, not a single lily to be found.

He doesn’t understand what’s going on, but heard Miquella’s quiet cries.

Something was wrong. Very wrong.

He trudged through the dark as he followed the faint glow of the boy’s golden hair, and his instincts were proven true at the smell and sight of blood on his arms and his dress.

His eyes narrowed, pupils turning into slits. Something was watching them.

He’s been in this place long enough to know it’s not Miquella’s doing but something else. Something malevolent. It did not come here bearing gifts.

Gently, he approached Miquella and knelt beside him. Firmly but gently prying the hand that scratched at his own arm away and held it, then gazed out into the abyss.

“Leave this place.” He called out to the dark without an ounce of fear, holding Miquella close to him. “You are not welcome here, leave before I make you.” He threatened, the green of his reptilian eyes almost glowing in the dark.

He made it so that the empyrean cannot see how veins bulged on his temple in anger, made it so that he cannot see what kind of expression he was making against the unknown.

“You are safe, Miquella.” He whispered to his friend after a moment, his voice quiet, carrying a sense of care in an attempt to comfort him. “I will not let it touch you.”

[miquellathekindone]

The visions never left.

They always remained in a corner, lurking, patiently waiting for the moment when they could attack Miquella when he was at his weakest, when he was unable to move. And no one, no one had ever tried to fight them before.

However, the voice in front of him was trying. And, for a few moments, he thought that the newly arrived traveler would also be consumed by visions, disappearing from the dream palace or turning into something horrifying that would make Miquella wish to sleep forever. It did not happen. The voice made Radahn's shadow slowly recede until it dissipated into thin air.

The dream palace continued to be completely dark, but Miquella didn't need a light to recognize the person who had disturbed his barriers, those that had prevented Saint Trina's passage back to the dream palace.

"...Leave."

The young Empyrean lifted his face from his knees slowly, despite the blood that covered much of it because of the bleeding from his nose.

"Leave. You do not..." Miquella could feel the pain of his temper piercing him to the bone, and the tremor in his voice was proof of it. "You are not welcome here. Go back."

A fallen god, an uncompleted vow.

Miquella clenched his hand into a fist, feeling the pure gold of his engagement ring. It hadn't stopped burning since the end of the festival. Perhaps it never would.

His only door to the Lands of Shadow had been closed forever.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He was taken aback by what he said.

“No.” He frowned, the darkness had not disappeared yet. “I’m not going to leave.” He shook his head, his statement firm. Miquella was not fine, he will not be leaving this place til the light— or at least a semblance of it, may return once more.

Miquella looked disheveled, and Amras could not prevent the comment that came out of his mouth when he was told he wasn’t welcome.

“I came all the way here carrying you scrolls, and now you want me to leave?” He scoffed. “How rude.”

Despite his words, he did not move from where he was and instead wiped Miquella’s nose and face with a handkerchief he took from his breast pocket with a sigh, looking at his self inflicted wounds with a forlorn expression, his eyes no longer the thin slits that indicated his agitation.

The light did not return yet.

[miquellathekindone]

Miquella tried to pull his face away from Amras' hands, a whimper escaping his lips, but Amras continued to wipe away the traces of blood trickling down his nose from after multiple unsuccessful attempts to get up from the floor.

Humiliation. That was what he felt. If he had felt just a little energy, he would have tried to bite Amras' arm to push him away, to get him to leave once and for all and leave him alone in the dream palace, as it should always have been. Amras didn't seem to understand that, however, his comments only further fueling the spark of anger in Miquella's chest.

His plans had been completely destroyed.

"Leave me alone!"

I am scared, went unsaid, countering any of the young Empyrean's arguments.

Miquella raised his hands, pushing against Amras' chest to leave as much space between them as possible in an attempt to make him finally decide to leave the dream palace, but the trembling in his limbs betrayed the terror he felt at being enveloped in absolute darkness.

Perhaps that was what awaited him.

Absolute darkness.

"Go away!" Miquella shouted again. "I do not want to see you again!"

A child. Miquella looked like a child overwhelmed by circumstances and emotions that he was still unable to understand.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Hey— ack!” He exclaimed, however he doesn’t intend to follow along Miquella’s whims.

He clearly was not alright, it reminded of Amras of something along the lines of a panicking child. He wasn’t leaving, no matter how much Miquella would yell at him.

He won’t.

The light has not returned and he knew the look in his eyes; the boy was terrified. Amras steeled his resolve and prepared for the worst as he continued to trap him in the embrace— he wasn’t going to leave, not until Miquella’s of sound mind again and the light to this world returned because seeing it in darkness with his friend despairing felt so utterly wrong.

Amras knew being aggressive won’t cut it, so for now he will let him cry, shout and try to hurt him all he wanted, but he wasn’t leaving because Miquella needed someone to be with him there at such a low point in his life.

“Breathe with me.” He pleaded— another solution aside from letting him just cry as he couldn’t stand seeing the Empyrean like this. “Breathe, Miquella. Breathe.”

It’s a struggle as he rubbed his back with one hand. “Shhhh, it’s okay… you’re okay.” He swayed his body side by side carefully as he continued to mutter reassurances to him with a gentle voice. He cannot leave this boy here alone.

[miquellathekindone]

Breaths were stuck in his chest, forcing him to hiccup despite Amras' words of calm that slowly pierced through that black cloud that had wrapped itself around his mind.

Miquella's hands clung to Amras' body then, bringing them as close as if nothing else existed in the world, as if letting go would mean losing him in the great tide of darkness in the dream palace. A sob escaped his lips: heartbreaking, like those of a child losing something they held dear. Miquella had rarely felt such a grief, and the sensation was too much for his small mind.

Amras was not Godwyn.

But maybe, just maybe, he could pretend he was for a few moments.

The young Empyrean closed his eyes tightly, visualizing Godwyn's golden locks and gentle gaze on him behind his eyelids. His older brother had never left him alone in the face of danger in the dark, carrying him in his arms when Miquella's legs were unresponsive and teasing him afterwards about being so small that he would drown in his arms. There was no malice in Godwyn's words, but a sense of normalcy.

Slowly, his breathing calmed; enough to stop thinking that the world was closing in around him.

"You... You killed him..."

It was not a question, not an accusation. Miquella just needed to say it out loud, make it real somehow.

Radahn was dead.

His spirit would not be drawn into the Lands of Shadow, because the entrance was still completely sealed.

"Why?"

The question would have sounded strange to Amras' ears, but Miquella desperately needed to hold on to a reason why his future was no more.

[whenbonestellhistory]

It’s a delicate topic, but Amras saw no point in having to lie.

“Yes, I killed him.” He began, his expression unreadable as he struggled to formulate the proper words. He continued to rub the empyrean’s back, never stopping his body’s motions of rocking side by side even as he was finally calm.

He’s not really quite sure how to properly phrase it to Miquella— the other proper reason why he killed Radahn. But he’ll try to anyways.

“It had already been a plan from me along with a couple of others,” his eyes are cast down as he remembered the dream. “It was mine, as I planned to put him to rest— I had felt bad you see.”

“Consumed by madness and wits lost to time, I found it logical to simply put him down like an animal. Though…” He paused as his other hand trailed to Miquella’s hair to run his fingers along the strands.

“It seemed that there was another reason for me to get rid of him too. Because you see, I had a strange dream, and I didn’t like what I saw.” He said, purposefully vague as he did not know how to present it in a way that would make sense; all he knew was that he didn’t like how it made him feel, how Radahn made Miquella feel.

“It felt as though they wanted him gone. They were so afraid..” He muttered, voice low and sad. “So, so afraid and helpless. So I decided I should get rid of the general with that dream— no, with the feelings of the one in that dream had.” He had felt as if he had to carry that person’s helplessness with him, turn it into a rage that served rightful against the injustice done to him— done to that Miquella, who was just a young boy.

“I feel though that I made the right choice— Although, you are free to tell me otherwise.” He knew he cannot remedy it if his choice had been a mistake, but he was willing to take that hatred of him if it meant Miquella’s and Trina’s nightmares of that general’s imposing figure would fade.

He thought of Trina, he thought of how she was reacting and frowned.

That’s when he knew he had made the right choice.

[miquellathekindone]

They wanted him gone.

That was not the truth.

Or, at least, Miquella tried to convince himself of that. The only path that existed to godhood was through having a Lord at his side, and among his brothers, Radahn was the only one whose part of the vow could be accepted. A heroic battle for a marriage. Later, when Miquella had attained godhood, he would have time to repent his ways once they entered the Age of Compassion.

Amras did not understand because he had not been born among demigods and gods and all that meant. Miquella, like the rest of his siblings and half-siblings, had sucked in the genes of manipulation and scheming with their mother and father's milk, and each of them had a goal they desperately needed to fulfill.

But the young Empyrean, as much as he wanted to make Amras understand that, it would do no good.

And Radahn was dead.

"...He was not a threat."

Miquella's voice came out as weak as his body felt, any fight leaving him exhausted and tearless.

"...He was the only one to..." He closed his eyes, as if he could stop hearing the voice summoning everyone to the festival. "...He was the only one to respond to my call. You do not understand, because you are not a demigod, and vows mean nothing to humans."

Miquella moved his hand slowly until he pressed the ring against their chests, the soft golden color glowing in the darkness of the night. A comforting glow, somehow, like a firefly that refused to leave him alone after what had happened.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Just because he was your only choice did not mean he meant well.” He could not stop himself from saying those words, Amras knew of vows, maybe all too well.

Marriage would not change the nature of a warlord. Radahn would seek war, in some way or another— Amras would know, he is Godfrey’s son after all. He knew well of the desire for glory.

“I’ve seen enough to know.” His grip on Miquella had unintentionally tightened, but not enough to suffocate. There’s a dark expression on his face now, one that bore the inner anger of an old scar that has yet to heal. An old ugly scar. With Miquella’s previous predicament being a very bitter and cold reminder of his past choices.

The light had slowly returned, but the expression on his face was stormy, but this is not directed at Miquella himself.

“If he wasn’t a threat,” he began. “Then why did /you/ look so afraid?” Miquella was free to tell him he was wrong, that he might have misunderstood— he wasn’t naive though, and stubborn too much like the empyrean. He knew what he saw, he knew of that crippling fear, but perhaps Miquella would not understand that too.

[miquellathekindone]

Radahn was indeed his only option.

Godwyn was dead, his body discarded somewhere Miquella was unable to access. Mohg sought wed him in a lake of blood. The rest of his siblings would never accept a vow, too distrustful of Miquella, someone who definitely did not align with the values they prosecuted. Radahn was the only option, and yet the Age of Compassion had fallen like a mountain of sand disappearing in the wind.

The festival was over. The stars were returned to their birthplace, although Miquella would probably never see reality again.

Amras did not understand.

Every part of the young Empyrean's body trembled violently, and he didn't get an answer to Amras' question until he took a few seconds of contemplation, of absolute silence. At least the warmth of the boy's body brought him back to the present when the memories threatened to bring him back to the past.

"...Because I was not ready."

The admission was like pull out teeth.

"...Things were going too fast. My- This body," Miquella pointed out to himself, "could not, and still cannot, handle godhood. It would break apart."

The young Empyrean remembered kneeling in front of Radahn and begging for a little more time, because that was the only thing he could do at that moment. His mind was still immature, his voice innocent and without the mental exhaustion of recent years, and Radahn could have taken advantage of that.

"I can barely function with this body." Miquella shook his head. "Godhood would... destroy me."

[whenbonestellhistory]

He sighed, long and drawn out. “Things wouldn’t have changed.” He said. “Even if you were offering yourself to him so freely, did you ever stop to think that peace would be what he wanted?”

“Even as his wits were lost to him he wanted a fight,” he recalled how Radahn had looked at that moment, while robbed of sanity, he still desired a battle. “And indeed he got a fight. I fought him to the death, and I saw a man that did not desire peace but permanent warfare.” Nothing would have changed, he thought to himself as his fingers brushed through Miquella’s hair, his words harsh but his actions gentle.

“He would have taken advantage of you, if he didn’t already. He would have done crusades in your name, battles glorious and bloody but do you think he would ever be satisfied?” He looked down at Miquella. “No, he won’t. Even Godfrey longed for battle as Serosh was placed on him. Radahn proudly proclaimed himself a warlord, and an admirer of my father.” Disapproval laced his voice as he remembered old memories of a time long passed.

“He would have never been satisfied with just one fight.” He shook his head. “Someone would have to kill him before he’d want to stop seeking the glory he wanted.”

After moments of silence between the two of them, he spoke again.

“There is no need for you to shoulder the heaviness of Godhood for whatever it is that you may desire for this world.” He began, and recalled Trina’s words that faithful night.

“I will become an Elden Lord— I can’t change what is already written, but I can try to fix what’s left of everything that had been broken.” He declared— no, /promised/.

“I cannot grant you the age that you desire; I have a feeling we have different goals. But I assure you that I will make it so that no god will fight for power anymore.” He smiled. “It will be an age of men, I hope you are fine with that.”

[miquellathekindone]

Radahn would not have stopped with a heroic death.

His mind was corrupted, and even if he had retained his sanity after the fight with Malenia, he would have tried by all means to continue his bizarre crusade of seeking Godfrey's approval, a single glance from his idol telling him he was doing well.

Miquella could easily recall Radahn's dark eyes on him watching him from above, the shadow of his own throne not enough to wrap him in a protective blanket in which to hide. Radahn had never asked for more than a heroic battle as part of his vow and his hands had never touched the young Empyrean in an impure manner, though the ring on his fingers gave him that freedom.

Radahn had never raised a hand to touch him beyond a reassuring gesture.

The thought that this could have happened made nausea hit him hard. He couldn't. He needed to forget about the possible futures that the Age of Compassion might have brought, despite mourning the adult body he would never have. Miquella hardly dared to look at his reflection for fear of seeing the baby fat still clinging to his face. If he had to stay with that body any longer...

"...You do not understand."

Miquella clenched his hands into fists, feeling the gold of her ring dig into the soft skin of his finger.

"This world won't change for anything, not even an Elden Lord." Miquella knew. His voice grew more desperate almost angry with Amras for not understanding. "The Lands Between, the Lords— they all need a god. You cannot become a Lord without a God, nor a God without a Lord. That is the way."

Queen Marika had had Godfrey and then Radagon, but she always had a Lord by her side to remain a divinity.

"With the Age of Compassion, there would not be war. No genocide, either. Please..." Perhaps stooping to supplication was all he had left. The young Empyrean's hands came to rest on Amras' cheeks, looking him square in the eyes. "Please. Be my Elden Lord. I promise you... I promise you, a thousand year voyage lead guided by compassion."

[whenbonestellhistory]

Amras went quiet at the empyrean’s plea. His thoughts raced, colliding with one another as he took the time to process his words.

His heart came to a decision and all he wanted was to hug this boy to his chest tight and shed tears in his place. He could feel that desperation all too familiar, and as much as he doesn’t want to make Miquella cry again, he could not bring himself to take advantage of him.

Becoming a God’s Lord meant that he was going to marry this boy, this clearly distraught and desperate friend. He can’t do that. No, he cannot do that. It would mean he was betraying the purpose of what he even killed Radahn for.

He took a deep breath and braced himself as he prepared to take the words out of his mouth.

He exhaled, and touched Miquella’s hands tenderly as they stained his cheeks, and looked at him too.

“I cannot do that.” He said. “Not as you are right now.” He took his hand— the one that held his ring, gently. “If you are intending to become this Land’s God with me as your Lord, then say it to me again when you’re sound of mind.” He refuses to take advantage of Miquella.

“For now, I will have to refuse you. I am sorry.” He looked away, expression now forlorn as he carefully chose what words he should utter next.

“I promise you, I don’t desire a war or a genocide. I simply seek to have life return to these lands as it should.” His words are uttered with an open heart and as gentle as the hand he used to hold Miquella’s hand, thumb lightly rubbing the golden band on his ring finger.

[miquellathekindone]

TW: self-inflicted harm, visions, the worst coping mechanisms ever.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Pain.

There was something slowly burning a hole in Miquella's mind, the ringing in his ears getting louder and louder as time passed. One second. Two seconds. Three seconds.

The stars had disappeared from the sky of the dream palace, hidden, and the night had never before looked so dark from the valley, a mirage of the Abyss that the young Empyrean's sanity was approaching. However, when he tried to get up from the patch of grass under the tree, his legs did not respond. Weak, frail, a voice spat above the ringing. He couldn't contain the sound inside, a humiliating gasp of pain coming from his tightly pressed lips in the dark night.

A shadow covered Miquella's body. The vision grew bigger.

"Leave me alone..." he said, hiding his face even more in his knees. The blood from his nose continued to stain the white dress he wore, the purity disappearing little by little. "Lord Brother, leave me alone for tonight, please."

The young Empyrean could not stand the visions at that moment.

He touched his forearm.

His skin was so smooth. He thought he was going to have those scars forever, that which marked him as the progenitor of the Haligtree. The blood of an Empyrean had been enough to make it grow, but it had not prevented its fall. He missed it. He missed going back home.

Miquella scratched, scratched, scratched.

The thin lines that were beginning to redden, at least, could replace them even if they disappeared in a short time. The young Empyrean visualized the Moon falling from the sky of the dream palace slowly, rolling down the hill, and it happened.

The light that had been born in the dream palace disappeared completely, leaving only the lamps of the Lord's Keep gate to illuminate the false world.

The non-existent crown weighed too heavily on Miquella's hair. The ring on his hand burned.

Maybe, one day, it would all be better.

@whenbonestellhistory

[whenbonestellhistory]

It was unnerving when he had woken up to darkness.

The scrolls in his arms slipped from his grasp as he looked around, not a single sight of a star or light, not a single lily to be found.

He doesn’t understand what’s going on, but heard Miquella’s quiet cries.

Something was wrong. Very wrong.

He trudged through the dark as he followed the faint glow of the boy’s golden hair, and his instincts were proven true at the smell and sight of blood on his arms and his dress.

His eyes narrowed, pupils turning into slits. Something was watching them.

He’s been in this place long enough to know it’s not Miquella’s doing but something else. Something malevolent. It did not come here bearing gifts.

Gently, he approached Miquella and knelt beside him. Firmly but gently prying the hand that scratched at his own arm away and held it, then gazed out into the abyss.

“Leave this place.” He called out to the dark without an ounce of fear, holding Miquella close to him. “You are not welcome here, leave before I make you.” He threatened, the green of his reptilian eyes almost glowing in the dark.

He made it so that the empyrean cannot see how veins bulged on his temple in anger, made it so that he cannot see what kind of expression he was making against the unknown.

“You are safe, Miquella.” He whispered to his friend after a moment, his voice quiet, carrying a sense of care in an attempt to comfort him. “I will not let it touch you.”

[miquellathekindone]

The visions never left.

They always remained in a corner, lurking, patiently waiting for the moment when they could attack Miquella when he was at his weakest, when he was unable to move. And no one, no one had ever tried to fight them before.

However, the voice in front of him was trying. And, for a few moments, he thought that the newly arrived traveler would also be consumed by visions, disappearing from the dream palace or turning into something horrifying that would make Miquella wish to sleep forever. It did not happen. The voice made Radahn's shadow slowly recede until it dissipated into thin air.

The dream palace continued to be completely dark, but Miquella didn't need a light to recognize the person who had disturbed his barriers, those that had prevented Saint Trina's passage back to the dream palace.

"...Leave."

The young Empyrean lifted his face from his knees slowly, despite the blood that covered much of it because of the bleeding from his nose.

"Leave. You do not..." Miquella could feel the pain of his temper piercing him to the bone, and the tremor in his voice was proof of it. "You are not welcome here. Go back."

A fallen god, an uncompleted vow.

Miquella clenched his hand into a fist, feeling the pure gold of his engagement ring. It hadn't stopped burning since the end of the festival. Perhaps it never would.

His only door to the Lands of Shadow had been closed forever.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He was taken aback by what he said.

“No.” He frowned, the darkness had not disappeared yet. “I’m not going to leave.” He shook his head, his statement firm. Miquella was not fine, he will not be leaving this place til the light— or at least a semblance of it, may return once more.

Miquella looked disheveled, and Amras could not prevent the comment that came out of his mouth when he was told he wasn’t welcome.

“I came all the way here carrying you scrolls, and now you want me to leave?” He scoffed. “How rude.”

Despite his words, he did not move from where he was and instead wiped Miquella’s nose and face with a handkerchief he took from his breast pocket with a sigh, looking at his self inflicted wounds with a forlorn expression, his eyes no longer the thin slits that indicated his agitation.

The light did not return yet.

[miquellathekindone]

Miquella tried to pull his face away from Amras' hands, a whimper escaping his lips, but Amras continued to wipe away the traces of blood trickling down his nose from after multiple unsuccessful attempts to get up from the floor.

Humiliation. That was what he felt. If he had felt just a little energy, he would have tried to bite Amras' arm to push him away, to get him to leave once and for all and leave him alone in the dream palace, as it should always have been. Amras didn't seem to understand that, however, his comments only further fueling the spark of anger in Miquella's chest.

His plans had been completely destroyed.

"Leave me alone!"

I am scared, went unsaid, countering any of the young Empyrean's arguments.

Miquella raised his hands, pushing against Amras' chest to leave as much space between them as possible in an attempt to make him finally decide to leave the dream palace, but the trembling in his limbs betrayed the terror he felt at being enveloped in absolute darkness.

Perhaps that was what awaited him.

Absolute darkness.

"Go away!" Miquella shouted again. "I do not want to see you again!"

A child. Miquella looked like a child overwhelmed by circumstances and emotions that he was still unable to understand.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Hey— ack!” He exclaimed, however he doesn’t intend to follow along Miquella’s whims.

He clearly was not alright, it reminded of Amras of something along the lines of a panicking child. He wasn’t leaving, no matter how much Miquella would yell at him.

He won’t.

The light has not returned and he knew the look in his eyes; the boy was terrified. Amras steeled his resolve and prepared for the worst as he continued to trap him in the embrace— he wasn’t going to leave, not until Miquella’s of sound mind again and the light to this world returned because seeing it in darkness with his friend despairing felt so utterly wrong.

Amras knew being aggressive won’t cut it, so for now he will let him cry, shout and try to hurt him all he wanted, but he wasn’t leaving because Miquella needed someone to be with him there at such a low point in his life.

“Breathe with me.” He pleaded— another solution aside from letting him just cry as he couldn’t stand seeing the Empyrean like this. “Breathe, Miquella. Breathe.”

It’s a struggle as he rubbed his back with one hand. “Shhhh, it’s okay… you’re okay.” He swayed his body side by side carefully as he continued to mutter reassurances to him with a gentle voice. He cannot leave this boy here alone.

[miquellathekindone]

Breaths were stuck in his chest, forcing him to hiccup despite Amras' words of calm that slowly pierced through that black cloud that had wrapped itself around his mind.

Miquella's hands clung to Amras' body then, bringing them as close as if nothing else existed in the world, as if letting go would mean losing him in the great tide of darkness in the dream palace. A sob escaped his lips: heartbreaking, like those of a child losing something they held dear. Miquella had rarely felt such a grief, and the sensation was too much for his small mind.

Amras was not Godwyn.

But maybe, just maybe, he could pretend he was for a few moments.

The young Empyrean closed his eyes tightly, visualizing Godwyn's golden locks and gentle gaze on him behind his eyelids. His older brother had never left him alone in the face of danger in the dark, carrying him in his arms when Miquella's legs were unresponsive and teasing him afterwards about being so small that he would drown in his arms. There was no malice in Godwyn's words, but a sense of normalcy.

Slowly, his breathing calmed; enough to stop thinking that the world was closing in around him.

"You... You killed him..."

It was not a question, not an accusation. Miquella just needed to say it out loud, make it real somehow.

Radahn was dead.

His spirit would not be drawn into the Lands of Shadow, because the entrance was still completely sealed.

"Why?"

The question would have sounded strange to Amras' ears, but Miquella desperately needed to hold on to a reason why his future was no more.

[whenbonestellhistory]

It’s a delicate topic, but Amras saw no point in having to lie.

“Yes, I killed him.” He began, his expression unreadable as he struggled to formulate the proper words. He continued to rub the empyrean’s back, never stopping his body’s motions of rocking side by side even as he was finally calm.

He’s not really quite sure how to properly phrase it to Miquella— the other proper reason why he killed Radahn. But he’ll try to anyways.

“It had already been a plan from me along with a couple of others,” his eyes are cast down as he remembered the dream. “It was mine, as I planned to put him to rest— I had felt bad you see.”

“Consumed by madness and wits lost to time, I found it logical to simply put him down like an animal. Though…” He paused as his other hand trailed to Miquella’s hair to run his fingers along the strands.

“It seemed that there was another reason for me to get rid of him too. Because you see, I had a strange dream, and I didn’t like what I saw.” He said, purposefully vague as he did not know how to present it in a way that would make sense; all he knew was that he didn’t like how it made him feel, how Radahn made Miquella feel.

“It felt as though they wanted him gone. They were so afraid..” He muttered, voice low and sad. “So, so afraid and helpless. So I decided I should get rid of the general with that dream— no, with the feelings of the one in that dream had.” He had felt as if he had to carry that person’s helplessness with him, turn it into a rage that served rightful against the injustice done to him— done to that Miquella, who was just a young boy.

“I feel though that I made the right choice— Although, you are free to tell me otherwise.” He knew he cannot remedy it if his choice had been a mistake, but he was willing to take that hatred of him if it meant Miquella’s and Trina’s nightmares of that general’s imposing figure would fade.

He thought of Trina, he thought of how she was reacting and frowned.

That’s when he knew he had made the right choice.

[miquellathekindone]

They wanted him gone.

That was not the truth.

Or, at least, Miquella tried to convince himself of that. The only path that existed to godhood was through having a Lord at his side, and among his brothers, Radahn was the only one whose part of the vow could be accepted. A heroic battle for a marriage. Later, when Miquella had attained godhood, he would have time to repent his ways once they entered the Age of Compassion.

Amras did not understand because he had not been born among demigods and gods and all that meant. Miquella, like the rest of his siblings and half-siblings, had sucked in the genes of manipulation and scheming with their mother and father's milk, and each of them had a goal they desperately needed to fulfill.

But the young Empyrean, as much as he wanted to make Amras understand that, it would do no good.

And Radahn was dead.

"...He was not a threat."

Miquella's voice came out as weak as his body felt, any fight leaving him exhausted and tearless.

"...He was the only one to..." He closed his eyes, as if he could stop hearing the voice summoning everyone to the festival. "...He was the only one to respond to my call. You do not understand, because you are not a demigod, and vows mean nothing to humans."

Miquella moved his hand slowly until he pressed the ring against their chests, the soft golden color glowing in the darkness of the night. A comforting glow, somehow, like a firefly that refused to leave him alone after what had happened.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Just because he was your only choice did not mean he meant well.” He could not stop himself from saying those words, Amras knew of vows, maybe all too well.

Marriage would not change the nature of a warlord. Radahn would seek war, in some way or another— Amras would know, he is Godfrey’s son after all. He knew well of the desire for glory.

“I’ve seen enough to know.” His grip on Miquella had unintentionally tightened, but not enough to suffocate. There’s a dark expression on his face now, one that bore the inner anger of an old scar that has yet to heal. An old ugly scar. With Miquella’s previous predicament being a very bitter and cold reminder of his past choices.

The light had slowly returned, but the expression on his face was stormy, but this is not directed at Miquella himself.

“If he wasn’t a threat,” he began. “Then why did /you/ look so afraid?” Miquella was free to tell him he was wrong, that he might have misunderstood— he wasn’t naive though, and stubborn too much like the empyrean. He knew what he saw, he knew of that crippling fear, but perhaps Miquella would not understand that too.

[miquellathekindone]

Radahn was indeed his only option.

Godwyn was dead, his body discarded somewhere Miquella was unable to access. Mohg sought wed him in a lake of blood. The rest of his siblings would never accept a vow, too distrustful of Miquella, someone who definitely did not align with the values they prosecuted. Radahn was the only option, and yet the Age of Compassion had fallen like a mountain of sand disappearing in the wind.

The festival was over. The stars were returned to their birthplace, although Miquella would probably never see reality again.

Amras did not understand.

Every part of the young Empyrean's body trembled violently, and he didn't get an answer to Amras' question until he took a few seconds of contemplation, of absolute silence. At least the warmth of the boy's body brought him back to the present when the memories threatened to bring him back to the past.

"...Because I was not ready."

The admission was like pull out teeth.

"...Things were going too fast. My- This body," Miquella pointed out to himself, "could not, and still cannot, handle godhood. It would break apart."

The young Empyrean remembered kneeling in front of Radahn and begging for a little more time, because that was the only thing he could do at that moment. His mind was still immature, his voice innocent and without the mental exhaustion of recent years, and Radahn could have taken advantage of that.

"I can barely function with this body." Miquella shook his head. "Godhood would... destroy me."

[whenbonestellhistory]

He sighed, long and drawn out. “Things wouldn’t have changed.” He said. “Even if you were offering yourself to him so freely, did you ever stop to think that peace would be what he wanted?”

“Even as his wits were lost to him he wanted a fight,” he recalled how Radahn had looked at that moment, while robbed of sanity, he still desired a battle. “And indeed he got a fight. I fought him to the death, and I saw a man that did not desire peace but permanent warfare.” Nothing would have changed, he thought to himself as his fingers brushed through Miquella’s hair, his words harsh but his actions gentle.

“He would have taken advantage of you, if he didn’t already. He would have done crusades in your name, battles glorious and bloody but do you think he would ever be satisfied?” He looked down at Miquella. “No, he won’t. Even Godfrey longed for battle as Serosh was placed on him. Radahn proudly proclaimed himself a warlord, and an admirer of my father.” Disapproval laced his voice as he remembered old memories of a time long passed.

“He would have never been satisfied with just one fight.” He shook his head. “Someone would have to kill him before he’d want to stop seeking the glory he wanted.”

After moments of silence between the two of them, he spoke again.

“There is no need for you to shoulder the heaviness of Godhood for whatever it is that you may desire for this world.” He began, and recalled Trina’s words that faithful night.

“I will become an Elden Lord— I can’t change what is already written, but I can try to fix what’s left of everything that had been broken.” He declared— no, /promised/.

“I cannot grant you the age that you desire; I have a feeling we have different goals. But I assure you that I will make it so that no god will fight for power anymore.” He smiled. “It will be an age of men, I hope you are fine with that.”

[miquellathekindone]

TW: self-inflicted harm, visions, the worst coping mechanisms ever.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Pain.

There was something slowly burning a hole in Miquella's mind, the ringing in his ears getting louder and louder as time passed. One second. Two seconds. Three seconds.

The stars had disappeared from the sky of the dream palace, hidden, and the night had never before looked so dark from the valley, a mirage of the Abyss that the young Empyrean's sanity was approaching. However, when he tried to get up from the patch of grass under the tree, his legs did not respond. Weak, frail, a voice spat above the ringing. He couldn't contain the sound inside, a humiliating gasp of pain coming from his tightly pressed lips in the dark night.

A shadow covered Miquella's body. The vision grew bigger.

"Leave me alone..." he said, hiding his face even more in his knees. The blood from his nose continued to stain the white dress he wore, the purity disappearing little by little. "Lord Brother, leave me alone for tonight, please."

The young Empyrean could not stand the visions at that moment.

He touched his forearm.

His skin was so smooth. He thought he was going to have those scars forever, that which marked him as the progenitor of the Haligtree. The blood of an Empyrean had been enough to make it grow, but it had not prevented its fall. He missed it. He missed going back home.

Miquella scratched, scratched, scratched.

The thin lines that were beginning to redden, at least, could replace them even if they disappeared in a short time. The young Empyrean visualized the Moon falling from the sky of the dream palace slowly, rolling down the hill, and it happened.

The light that had been born in the dream palace disappeared completely, leaving only the lamps of the Lord's Keep gate to illuminate the false world.

The non-existent crown weighed too heavily on Miquella's hair. The ring on his hand burned.

Maybe, one day, it would all be better.

@whenbonestellhistory

[whenbonestellhistory]

It was unnerving when he had woken up to darkness.

The scrolls in his arms slipped from his grasp as he looked around, not a single sight of a star or light, not a single lily to be found.

He doesn’t understand what’s going on, but heard Miquella’s quiet cries.

Something was wrong. Very wrong.

He trudged through the dark as he followed the faint glow of the boy’s golden hair, and his instincts were proven true at the smell and sight of blood on his arms and his dress.

His eyes narrowed, pupils turning into slits. Something was watching them.

He’s been in this place long enough to know it’s not Miquella’s doing but something else. Something malevolent. It did not come here bearing gifts.

Gently, he approached Miquella and knelt beside him. Firmly but gently prying the hand that scratched at his own arm away and held it, then gazed out into the abyss.

“Leave this place.” He called out to the dark without an ounce of fear, holding Miquella close to him. “You are not welcome here, leave before I make you.” He threatened, the green of his reptilian eyes almost glowing in the dark.

He made it so that the empyrean cannot see how veins bulged on his temple in anger, made it so that he cannot see what kind of expression he was making against the unknown.

“You are safe, Miquella.” He whispered to his friend after a moment, his voice quiet, carrying a sense of care in an attempt to comfort him. “I will not let it touch you.”

[miquellathekindone]

The visions never left.

They always remained in a corner, lurking, patiently waiting for the moment when they could attack Miquella when he was at his weakest, when he was unable to move. And no one, no one had ever tried to fight them before.

However, the voice in front of him was trying. And, for a few moments, he thought that the newly arrived traveler would also be consumed by visions, disappearing from the dream palace or turning into something horrifying that would make Miquella wish to sleep forever. It did not happen. The voice made Radahn's shadow slowly recede until it dissipated into thin air.

The dream palace continued to be completely dark, but Miquella didn't need a light to recognize the person who had disturbed his barriers, those that had prevented Saint Trina's passage back to the dream palace.

"...Leave."

The young Empyrean lifted his face from his knees slowly, despite the blood that covered much of it because of the bleeding from his nose.

"Leave. You do not..." Miquella could feel the pain of his temper piercing him to the bone, and the tremor in his voice was proof of it. "You are not welcome here. Go back."

A fallen god, an uncompleted vow.

Miquella clenched his hand into a fist, feeling the pure gold of his engagement ring. It hadn't stopped burning since the end of the festival. Perhaps it never would.

His only door to the Lands of Shadow had been closed forever.

[whenbonestellhistory]

He was taken aback by what he said.

“No.” He frowned, the darkness had not disappeared yet. “I’m not going to leave.” He shook his head, his statement firm. Miquella was not fine, he will not be leaving this place til the light— or at least a semblance of it, may return once more.

Miquella looked disheveled, and Amras could not prevent the comment that came out of his mouth when he was told he wasn’t welcome.

“I came all the way here carrying you scrolls, and now you want me to leave?” He scoffed. “How rude.”

Despite his words, he did not move from where he was and instead wiped Miquella’s nose and face with a handkerchief he took from his breast pocket with a sigh, looking at his self inflicted wounds with a forlorn expression, his eyes no longer the thin slits that indicated his agitation.

The light did not return yet.

[miquellathekindone]

Miquella tried to pull his face away from Amras' hands, a whimper escaping his lips, but Amras continued to wipe away the traces of blood trickling down his nose from after multiple unsuccessful attempts to get up from the floor.

Humiliation. That was what he felt. If he had felt just a little energy, he would have tried to bite Amras' arm to push him away, to get him to leave once and for all and leave him alone in the dream palace, as it should always have been. Amras didn't seem to understand that, however, his comments only further fueling the spark of anger in Miquella's chest.

His plans had been completely destroyed.

"Leave me alone!"

I am scared, went unsaid, countering any of the young Empyrean's arguments.

Miquella raised his hands, pushing against Amras' chest to leave as much space between them as possible in an attempt to make him finally decide to leave the dream palace, but the trembling in his limbs betrayed the terror he felt at being enveloped in absolute darkness.

Perhaps that was what awaited him.

Absolute darkness.

"Go away!" Miquella shouted again. "I do not want to see you again!"

A child. Miquella looked like a child overwhelmed by circumstances and emotions that he was still unable to understand.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Hey— ack!” He exclaimed, however he doesn’t intend to follow along Miquella’s whims.

He clearly was not alright, it reminded of Amras of something along the lines of a panicking child. He wasn’t leaving, no matter how much Miquella would yell at him.

He won’t.

The light has not returned and he knew the look in his eyes; the boy was terrified. Amras steeled his resolve and prepared for the worst as he continued to trap him in the embrace— he wasn’t going to leave, not until Miquella’s of sound mind again and the light to this world returned because seeing it in darkness with his friend despairing felt so utterly wrong.

Amras knew being aggressive won’t cut it, so for now he will let him cry, shout and try to hurt him all he wanted, but he wasn’t leaving because Miquella needed someone to be with him there at such a low point in his life.

“Breathe with me.” He pleaded— another solution aside from letting him just cry as he couldn’t stand seeing the Empyrean like this. “Breathe, Miquella. Breathe.”

It’s a struggle as he rubbed his back with one hand. “Shhhh, it’s okay… you’re okay.” He swayed his body side by side carefully as he continued to mutter reassurances to him with a gentle voice. He cannot leave this boy here alone.

[miquellathekindone]

Breaths were stuck in his chest, forcing him to hiccup despite Amras' words of calm that slowly pierced through that black cloud that had wrapped itself around his mind.

Miquella's hands clung to Amras' body then, bringing them as close as if nothing else existed in the world, as if letting go would mean losing him in the great tide of darkness in the dream palace. A sob escaped his lips: heartbreaking, like those of a child losing something they held dear. Miquella had rarely felt such a grief, and the sensation was too much for his small mind.

Amras was not Godwyn.

But maybe, just maybe, he could pretend he was for a few moments.

The young Empyrean closed his eyes tightly, visualizing Godwyn's golden locks and gentle gaze on him behind his eyelids. His older brother had never left him alone in the face of danger in the dark, carrying him in his arms when Miquella's legs were unresponsive and teasing him afterwards about being so small that he would drown in his arms. There was no malice in Godwyn's words, but a sense of normalcy.

Slowly, his breathing calmed; enough to stop thinking that the world was closing in around him.

"You... You killed him..."

It was not a question, not an accusation. Miquella just needed to say it out loud, make it real somehow.

Radahn was dead.

His spirit would not be drawn into the Lands of Shadow, because the entrance was still completely sealed.

"Why?"

The question would have sounded strange to Amras' ears, but Miquella desperately needed to hold on to a reason why his future was no more.

[whenbonestellhistory]

It’s a delicate topic, but Amras saw no point in having to lie.

“Yes, I killed him.” He began, his expression unreadable as he struggled to formulate the proper words. He continued to rub the empyrean’s back, never stopping his body’s motions of rocking side by side even as he was finally calm.

He’s not really quite sure how to properly phrase it to Miquella— the other proper reason why he killed Radahn. But he’ll try to anyways.

“It had already been a plan from me along with a couple of others,” his eyes are cast down as he remembered the dream. “It was mine, as I planned to put him to rest— I had felt bad you see.”

“Consumed by madness and wits lost to time, I found it logical to simply put him down like an animal. Though…” He paused as his other hand trailed to Miquella’s hair to run his fingers along the strands.

“It seemed that there was another reason for me to get rid of him too. Because you see, I had a strange dream, and I didn’t like what I saw.” He said, purposefully vague as he did not know how to present it in a way that would make sense; all he knew was that he didn’t like how it made him feel, how Radahn made Miquella feel.

“It felt as though they wanted him gone. They were so afraid..” He muttered, voice low and sad. “So, so afraid and helpless. So I decided I should get rid of the general with that dream— no, with the feelings of the one in that dream had.” He had felt as if he had to carry that person’s helplessness with him, turn it into a rage that served rightful against the injustice done to him— done to that Miquella, who was just a young boy.

“I feel though that I made the right choice— Although, you are free to tell me otherwise.” He knew he cannot remedy it if his choice had been a mistake, but he was willing to take that hatred of him if it meant Miquella’s and Trina’s nightmares of that general’s imposing figure would fade.

He thought of Trina, he thought of how she was reacting and frowned.

That’s when he knew he had made the right choice.

[miquellathekindone]

They wanted him gone.

That was not the truth.

Or, at least, Miquella tried to convince himself of that. The only path that existed to godhood was through having a Lord at his side, and among his brothers, Radahn was the only one whose part of the vow could be accepted. A heroic battle for a marriage. Later, when Miquella had attained godhood, he would have time to repent his ways once they entered the Age of Compassion.

Amras did not understand because he had not been born among demigods and gods and all that meant. Miquella, like the rest of his siblings and half-siblings, had sucked in the genes of manipulation and scheming with their mother and father's milk, and each of them had a goal they desperately needed to fulfill.

But the young Empyrean, as much as he wanted to make Amras understand that, it would do no good.

And Radahn was dead.

"...He was not a threat."

Miquella's voice came out as weak as his body felt, any fight leaving him exhausted and tearless.

"...He was the only one to..." He closed his eyes, as if he could stop hearing the voice summoning everyone to the festival. "...He was the only one to respond to my call. You do not understand, because you are not a demigod, and vows mean nothing to humans."

Miquella moved his hand slowly until he pressed the ring against their chests, the soft golden color glowing in the darkness of the night. A comforting glow, somehow, like a firefly that refused to leave him alone after what had happened.

[whenbonestellhistory]

“Just because he was your only choice did not mean he meant well.” He could not stop himself from saying those words, Amras knew of vows, maybe all too well.

Marriage would not change the nature of a warlord. Radahn would seek war, in some way or another— Amras would know, he is Godfrey’s son after all. He knew well of the desire for glory.

“I’ve seen enough to know.” His grip on Miquella had unintentionally tightened, but not enough to suffocate. There’s a dark expression on his face now, one that bore the inner anger of an old scar that has yet to heal. An old ugly scar. With Miquella’s previous predicament being a very bitter and cold reminder of his past choices.

The light had slowly returned, but the expression on his face was stormy, but this is not directed at Miquella himself.

“If he wasn’t a threat,” he began. “Then why did /you/ look so afraid?” Miquella was free to tell him he was wrong, that he might have misunderstood— he wasn’t naive though, and stubborn too much like the empyrean. He knew what he saw, he knew of that crippling fear, but perhaps Miquella would not understand that too.