[ He has to remind himself not to grip Viktor too tightly, forcibly relaxing his grip on the other man's limp form, jaw clenched so tightly his teeth squeak against each other. Both hands on Viktor, slowly negotiating their jumbled position into something marginally more comfortable, knees bent beneath himself, tugging Viktor closer when he finally starts to respond, to stir.
( Selfish boy, the voice says, but there's no heat to it, just disappointment. Shame curdles in him all the same; he'd prefer the anger, but the disappointment is worse, several times over. The body lies on the ground between them, not alive, not returned to the Underworld, but in a horrible middle ground. His fault. Our duty is not to heal, to save. Leave that work to others. We do not interfere, we do not upset the careful balance we maintain. If someone passes, our duty is to guide, not to grasp them with both hands and- )
He uses both hands to pull Viktor back, in flagrant denial of that rule. Winds the gold thread of Viktor's being around his palms like a leash no matter how badly it digs into his skin, forcibly making himself an anchor until Viktor warms by ilms. He wishes sometimes that the nature of his powers meant he gave warmth instead; how many times did he come home from working one magic or another and when greeting either of his partners, unintentionally wrested a jump from them as cold hands met their much warmer skin? Death was not warmth and life, though and he had long since missed the chance to throw his lot in with a different Seat, even if he'd wanted to.
Viktor inhales, finally, and the action is a reminder that so too must Emet-Selch. He draws in a shuddering breath of cool, crisp air, tastes green from the crushed grass, the growth of life around them and waits for a second breath, a third.
( Ow? More of a question than an actual declaration, followed by the sound of an impact- a hand on a chest, like smacking a table. This time, the familiar voice is much more insistent, gasping out an, ow?! with much more vehemence, an edge of laughter to it as if he hadn't nearly worn himself threadbare, left Emet-Selch to walk into work and find naught but his corpse.
He continues feeding aether into Hythlodaeus, sloppy, hurried, panicked, until he realizes that Hythlodaeus is not complaining any longer, he's making quiet, pained noises where he has his face buried into Emet-Selch's shoulder. While he's alive enough to do that, and it's a relief, he's not strong enough to shove back any bit of Emet-Selch's aether, and has no propensity for manipulation and so it must have felt like being frozen from the inside out, even as he was wrested back from the Underworld. Hythlodaeus never holds the event against him; he was the one at fault, he'd say, but Emet-Selch doesn't dare forget the lesson. ) ]
I think the one who allowed himself to be distracted while you worked untested magics is the fool, if we will accuse anyone.
[ The gratitude registers and is discarded, not ungratefully but he cannot even think about Viktor being grateful when of course he would save Viktor. Were it within his means to manage, of course - it was his fault. He'd been too distracted thinking of frivolous other topics, fretting about a future they have not yet made manifest, lured into complacency with Viktor's easy acclimation to what once was. He would not make that mistake again. ]
No, they're hideous. Might as well be plums. [ He doesn't study them to judge; a glance is enough to note the fat fruit hanging from each vine and he's far more concerned with the sight of Viktor, far too still in his arms even if he can, at least, feel Viktor with far more surety than moments before.
Beneath him, his knee protests at the shared weight being put on it in such a position; gingerly, he stretches his leg out and settles Viktor more firmly against his chest, never once releasing the careful touch. Always, two hands on him. Greedy. Selfish. But victorious in a way he hadn't been the last time. He tries - the moment he feels that memory bubble up, his mind not kind enough to let the edges of that fade like so many other memories he'd desperately tried to keep - he tries to stifle it, to shove it down but the veil is lifted too far and he does not dare lower it, not until he is certain Viktor will be well.
( There's so much green around them. So much life, in spite of what has occurred. Lahabrea pushes through the destruction just a few yalms away and climbs over what he cannot push, far too exhausted to manage even unmaking the mess in front of them. Before the wave of magic hit, he'd felt the embers of countless souls those they could yet save and would once whatever this was passed. He had enough aether. He could manage. Maybe not all of them, but he could try.
The issue was not his capability - the issue was trying to get out from beneath whatever spellwork kept the three of them locked in place. When the barrier weakened, Emet-Selch shoved his own aether in to strengthen it as the storm raged harder around them, and did not think to analyze why he was so certain he tasted the clear rain-water of Venat's magics. Elidibus had tried to cross the barrier, pushing a hand out through it and they'd watched in mute horror as his hand had simply divided into neat slices of meat and bone at the wrist, and then the flesh divided further. Thinner. Thinner. By the time they'd shaken the horror off and Lahabrea'd wrested him back into the ostensible safety of the bubble of magic surrounding them, Elidibus' hand was gone with neat, surgical precision.
Fix that, Emet-Selch had snarled, because Elidibus was not dying or dead, and Elidibus could heal a hand, or Lahabrea could, but they could not coax embers to flame again and he was drained enough attempting to keep the barrier up. It hadn't mattered, in the end. Whatever magic had been wrought meant those lucky or unlucky enough to survive the immediate disaster were fractured, halved, halved, halved over and over until they were unrecognizable.
Halmarut's wretched vines that Hythlodaeus spent an entire evening litigating the exact leaf shape of, survive, along with the other botany projects scattered about in dust-and-rubble-covered containers.
The barrier drops, the immediate storm over and Emet-Selch sucks in a shuddering breath, nauseous at how much aether it took to weather the storm. They do not find any survivors, but he takes fleeting, bitter pleasure in wresting aether from the flood of green around them every time one of them is injured, and when out of plants and he sees what that storm had wrought of the embers that were unlucky enough to survive, well. The malformed creatures left over aren't aware enough to know they are being repurposed for fuel, anyway. The addition of their souls to the Underworld are insignificant. A pebble dropped into a lake.)
To save Viktor takes very little of his own aether reserves and does not necessitate he dip into any held elsewhere. Bit by bit, Viktor warms, and Emet-Selch starts to knit together the veil's anchor points once again, desperately trying to keep any memories or thoughts or impulses separate with middling levels of success. Only when he's certain does he stitch the last piece down, loose, just in case, and dares to look down at Viktor. The relief at the green surrounding them feels traitorous. ]
i'm soooooo sorry for this LMAOO
( Selfish boy, the voice says, but there's no heat to it, just disappointment. Shame curdles in him all the same; he'd prefer the anger, but the disappointment is worse, several times over. The body lies on the ground between them, not alive, not returned to the Underworld, but in a horrible middle ground. His fault. Our duty is not to heal, to save. Leave that work to others. We do not interfere, we do not upset the careful balance we maintain. If someone passes, our duty is to guide, not to grasp them with both hands and- )
He uses both hands to pull Viktor back, in flagrant denial of that rule. Winds the gold thread of Viktor's being around his palms like a leash no matter how badly it digs into his skin, forcibly making himself an anchor until Viktor warms by ilms. He wishes sometimes that the nature of his powers meant he gave warmth instead; how many times did he come home from working one magic or another and when greeting either of his partners, unintentionally wrested a jump from them as cold hands met their much warmer skin? Death was not warmth and life, though and he had long since missed the chance to throw his lot in with a different Seat, even if he'd wanted to.
Viktor inhales, finally, and the action is a reminder that so too must Emet-Selch. He draws in a shuddering breath of cool, crisp air, tastes green from the crushed grass, the growth of life around them and waits for a second breath, a third.
( Ow? More of a question than an actual declaration, followed by the sound of an impact- a hand on a chest, like smacking a table. This time, the familiar voice is much more insistent, gasping out an, ow?! with much more vehemence, an edge of laughter to it as if he hadn't nearly worn himself threadbare, left Emet-Selch to walk into work and find naught but his corpse.
He continues feeding aether into Hythlodaeus, sloppy, hurried, panicked, until he realizes that Hythlodaeus is not complaining any longer, he's making quiet, pained noises where he has his face buried into Emet-Selch's shoulder. While he's alive enough to do that, and it's a relief, he's not strong enough to shove back any bit of Emet-Selch's aether, and has no propensity for manipulation and so it must have felt like being frozen from the inside out, even as he was wrested back from the Underworld. Hythlodaeus never holds the event against him; he was the one at fault, he'd say, but Emet-Selch doesn't dare forget the lesson. ) ]
I think the one who allowed himself to be distracted while you worked untested magics is the fool, if we will accuse anyone.
[ The gratitude registers and is discarded, not ungratefully but he cannot even think about Viktor being grateful when of course he would save Viktor. Were it within his means to manage, of course - it was his fault. He'd been too distracted thinking of frivolous other topics, fretting about a future they have not yet made manifest, lured into complacency with Viktor's easy acclimation to what once was. He would not make that mistake again. ]
No, they're hideous. Might as well be plums. [ He doesn't study them to judge; a glance is enough to note the fat fruit hanging from each vine and he's far more concerned with the sight of Viktor, far too still in his arms even if he can, at least, feel Viktor with far more surety than moments before.
Beneath him, his knee protests at the shared weight being put on it in such a position; gingerly, he stretches his leg out and settles Viktor more firmly against his chest, never once releasing the careful touch. Always, two hands on him. Greedy. Selfish. But victorious in a way he hadn't been the last time. He tries - the moment he feels that memory bubble up, his mind not kind enough to let the edges of that fade like so many other memories he'd desperately tried to keep - he tries to stifle it, to shove it down but the veil is lifted too far and he does not dare lower it, not until he is certain Viktor will be well.
( There's so much green around them. So much life, in spite of what has occurred. Lahabrea pushes through the destruction just a few yalms away and climbs over what he cannot push, far too exhausted to manage even unmaking the mess in front of them. Before the wave of magic hit, he'd felt the embers of countless souls those they could yet save and would once whatever this was passed. He had enough aether. He could manage. Maybe not all of them, but he could try.
The issue was not his capability - the issue was trying to get out from beneath whatever spellwork kept the three of them locked in place. When the barrier weakened, Emet-Selch shoved his own aether in to strengthen it as the storm raged harder around them, and did not think to analyze why he was so certain he tasted the clear rain-water of Venat's magics. Elidibus had tried to cross the barrier, pushing a hand out through it and they'd watched in mute horror as his hand had simply divided into neat slices of meat and bone at the wrist, and then the flesh divided further. Thinner. Thinner. By the time they'd shaken the horror off and Lahabrea'd wrested him back into the ostensible safety of the bubble of magic surrounding them, Elidibus' hand was gone with neat, surgical precision.
Fix that, Emet-Selch had snarled, because Elidibus was not dying or dead, and Elidibus could heal a hand, or Lahabrea could, but they could not coax embers to flame again and he was drained enough attempting to keep the barrier up. It hadn't mattered, in the end. Whatever magic had been wrought meant those lucky or unlucky enough to survive the immediate disaster were fractured, halved, halved, halved over and over until they were unrecognizable.
Halmarut's wretched vines that Hythlodaeus spent an entire evening litigating the exact leaf shape of, survive, along with the other botany projects scattered about in dust-and-rubble-covered containers.
The barrier drops, the immediate storm over and Emet-Selch sucks in a shuddering breath, nauseous at how much aether it took to weather the storm. They do not find any survivors, but he takes fleeting, bitter pleasure in wresting aether from the flood of green around them every time one of them is injured, and when out of plants and he sees what that storm had wrought of the embers that were unlucky enough to survive, well. The malformed creatures left over aren't aware enough to know they are being repurposed for fuel, anyway. The addition of their souls to the Underworld are insignificant. A pebble dropped into a lake.)
To save Viktor takes very little of his own aether reserves and does not necessitate he dip into any held elsewhere. Bit by bit, Viktor warms, and Emet-Selch starts to knit together the veil's anchor points once again, desperately trying to keep any memories or thoughts or impulses separate with middling levels of success. Only when he's certain does he stitch the last piece down, loose, just in case, and dares to look down at Viktor. The relief at the green surrounding them feels traitorous. ]
You will tell me if any bit of you feels - off.