Page 171 of To Free a Soul
To say he was disappointed was an understatement, as she was missing out on seeing the ethereal beauty of their offspring’s soul. It looked just like him in form, only pink and transparent.
At the same time, Weldir could see how much this burdened her. He didn’t know how to comfort her through this, what to say that would ease her weeping, or how to hold her when it was obvious she wanted nothing but to break down before she undoubtedly collected the shattered pieces of herself.
“Please don’t ask me to collect his skull fragments,” she whispered with a whimper. “They’re everywhere. The Demons took all of them. I wouldn’t even know where to start, and I... can’t do it. It hurts too much to touch their skulls when they aren’t whole.”
“As you wish.” Just before he turned from the viewing disc to tend to Aleron’s soul, he paused. He watched her for a little while longer before he said, “Call out for me when you are ready, Lindiwe. I will heal you and do whatever it is you need from me.”
“Okay,”she croaked.
Weldir finally gave his attention to Aleron.
Her anguish had guilt shimmering through his mist at the elation he experienced from seeing the soul of his winged Mavka. The feeling deepened when he knew that consuming it would not only give him another offspring to meet, but that it would empower him immensely.
More than any untainted soul he’d ever eaten.
I’ll never tell her so, though.
He could only imagine how angry she’d become if she learned that eating his own children made him far stronger.
At least I’ll have more mana to spare, should we need it.
He made Aleron’s soul shrink, so he could place it in the centre of his palm, and quickly swallowed him down. Then he teleported to Tenebris to greet him in the afterworld with shadowy open arms.
March 14th, 2024
Lindiwe managed to swallow the barbed sorrow long enough to speak with Ingram when he came back to life aftershehad beheaded him. It had been just as horrible an experience as the first time she’d ever done it, and it didn’t get any easier – but she’d needed to stop him from fighting the Demons after Aleron’s death.
It’d taken her hours to get the worst of her grief out. Hugging Ingram’s skull had been unbearable, knowing her child wasn’t going to be okay at the loss of his twin.
She knew he’d never accept it, that he wouldn’t be able to handle it any better than her. He might even suffer more due to it. Their bond was special; they spent every waking and sleeping moment together. The absence of Aleron’s constant presence would be sorely missed.
It was for that reason that she swallowed the heavy poison of her grief, so that she wouldn’t burden Ingram with it. She needed to hold it in long enough to help him through something he didn’t have the emotional maturity to handle on his own.
To be a rock for him, when she felt like fractured glass.
She hadn’t known that she’d put him on a path of foolishness.He plans to seek out humans to help him kill Jabez.It wasfutile. The humans would never help, and even if they did, they wouldn’t do so alongside a Duskwalker.
The only thing she could think to do was follow his snarling, whimpering form while she flew above him as an owl.Maybe I can speak with whomever he goes to.Whether it be the Demonslayer guild or a human town of soldiers.
She had no idea where he was leading them, only that violent determination and utter loss forged their path.
I can be a buffer.She’d explain the situation, so they didn’t harm him and then take him away before chaos ensued when he was rejected.
No one would ever know how much his path took a toll on her. How she wasn’t allowed to properly grieve because she had to watch over him instead. How it’d barely been two days since Aleron’s death, and instead of wallowing in her pain, of absorbing the loss of another child, she was forced to grin and bear it.
She was struggling.
Her heart felt broken into jagged little pieces. How much more could she take before Lindiwe lost her mind to all this? How much more emotional anguish would she have to suffer before she just...couldn’tanymore.
She could feel her mind fracturing.
Everything felt hopeless.
Her children were being targeted, and the threat of that constantly lingered over her head like a horrible storm cloud. The person she loved was unobtainable and out of reach, and she so desperately wanted to cave to him. To have him collect her in his non-existent arms and just... take this pain away, exist with her in a way where she didn’t have to feel like she was doing this all on her own.
If only he could grieve with her, rather than be so detached from it he couldn’t even properly support her.
Lindiwe knew Weldir saw no issue with their deaths because it meant they achieved new life with him. They eased his loneliness, even if it stopped them from truly living.
