Blake - Capitulis Seorsum

[Cerynsa]

The flickering uneven light of a fireplace illuminates Guest Suite I on a somber evening. Blake sits alone with two drinks set out on the table before her. Melancholy and grief spoil her as she looks to the plush crimson chair, empty, that the Ghastrian vodka rests in front of. A letter, not once open, lies on the center of the table addressed to someone she once considered her brother. That she still considers her brother.

'For the first time.. I've learned something I think I'd rather not have. There is peace in knowing what happened, the truth, but I am no happier for it. Not for this. Maybe that's why I'm doing this tonight. Mourning or... No, not mourning, that would be giving up on you, but whatever this is. I think you told me often; that there are things better off not learned. I wonder what you'd say? A grumble, maybe? Or an 'I told you so?' I'd bet on a grumble. You never were the type to say 'I told you so.' Even if you probably have wanted to me more than once. Then I'd probably foolishly tell you other things I've learned since that I'm glad to have learned. Things you'd tell me to shut-up about, no doubt.'

Conversation from the hallway stops her and she casts an expectant glance towards the door, though nothing comes from it and the voices fade.

'Carina and I spoke at length about you. Our fond memories. She told me of the time she took you to Sithicus. I told her of our, let's be generous and use a word like.. eventful 'let's try something dumb,' days. Like salvaging the sewers that first time. Or the nightmare that was Harvest Temple. Dangerous as they were... I still look back at them fondly, because you were there. You'd have been proud of how we salvaged the Salt Mines right after telling those stories. Just as dumb and chaotic as when we traveled.

'I kept my promise to you. The last one I made to you on one of our drunken nights. To decide what I wanted. I have. I'm not sure how happy you'd be, judging by your reaction when I first told you, but,' her thoughts are interrupted by the whiskey. She takes a small sip, controlled, compared to when they used to drink together 'Maybe you'd change your mind. Or, at the very least, I think you'd put up with it for me.'

Her gaze settles on the flavorless vodka. 'We're still trying to find you. A few leads. Loose and uncertain at best. Is it the group that operated against yours? The man who controls them? Or the man who sits comfortably above it all? There's also the snake. Maybe something to do with the key you found yourself holding - which, if it was what you said it was, is all the more reason to find you.' Her thoughts quiet again as she takes a smaller sip. 'I'll keep looking, even that key wasn't world ending. /We'll/ keep looking.'

Emerald eyes cast to the letter. 'This and the painting, the one I thought was an anonymous threat, are the only things I have left from you. And, I still can't bring myself to open it, even after all of this.' Her eyes mist as she looks back to the chair he so often sat in. Easily, she sees a hin wearing a red and black suit casually reclined within its cushions. 'I miss you, Egam.’ She wipes something from her cheek and stands.

The Ghastrian vodka remains untouched as Blake drinks the last of her whiskey. ‘And... if by some miracle we do find you, you're buying me that brewery.’ She tugs her cloak tightly about herself and pulls her hood low. The door shuts heavily preceded by the heavy squeak of the old hinges as she steps back into the city of Port a Lucine.

[Cerynsa]

“I’ve been thinking about what defines us lately.

“I’ve heard different answers depending on who’s spoken of it. Lies. I’ve heard that one more than once. Even said the words myself, despite not believing them. The irony there is not lost.
Promises. That was my answer for a long time. But, it depends too much on what those promises mean to who makes them. And they mean a great deal to me, and I know have shaped me, each of mine. The ones I’ve made to Anatole. To family. To friends. Like the one I made to you.”

Blake eased back in the plush red chair. Heavy eyes regarded the empty chair before her, a duplicate of the one she found herself in. Again, two drinks sit on the small table bridging the gap between them. Hers barely sipped while her guest’s is, predictably, full.

“Goals? I’ve toyed with that one. Too often they change, I think. Become colored, tainted, or even clarified—Muddied, usually.

“Failures. That’s what’s been sticking with me. Maybe because I feel I’ve made so many lately. Mistakes. Regrets. They weigh on me. All of us. They burden. They make us struggle. It is our response to those failures – that is what I think defines us most. Are we ruled by them? Or will we grow stronger for them?

“I’m reminded of a story from my world. Of the great titan Atlas whom bore the weight of the celestial heavens themselves for his follies. But, we are no titans. Eventually the weight of our failures will crush us, if we keep making them.

“I saw you as the father I would have preferred to have over mine. Perhaps, because I never go the chance to know you more. I admired you for many things. The stories you shared. The heroics you performed. Most for how you so adamantly faced your failures. Each story you told me, each mistake you tried to right. You bore them. And you always took that most important step. Not that we always agreed on what that step was. Particularly that last one you took.

“He asked me what we could have done differently. Better. He trusted me to answer him. And I was reluctant. Because we made so very many. Clearly so, after the fact. The outcome proves our failures; They both escaped. And they will both continue slaughtering.

“I remind myself that we are not alone in these failures. But that is not enough. I remind myself that had we acted more brashly we would never be able to aid in things like this again. But that is not enough. I remind myself that we attempted many things in our pursuit of them, not sitting idle. But that is not enough. I remind myself that we must step forward despite it.

“We must bear it as Atlas did.

“You would have killed the vampires, I think. Regardless of consequences for yourself. ‘It was writ in your shadow itself to battle Evil,’ I was once told. As if you had no choice to do so. I’d probably have disagreed with your plan, but still, they would be ended.

“Fear of failure paralyzes me from acting like that. Consequences for taking risks that put what we’ve worked for into peril. Weighing the risks I always err so far towards the side of caution.

“What would you say of my scales? Are they weighted too far? Cowardly? Yes-Though you’d not phrase it like that.

“So, ‘What could we have done differently?’ I will still obsess. Yet refuse the question. Instead? ‘What will we do differently?’ We will rule our failures.

“Until they crush us.”