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[nightsung]

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SHADOWHEART

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[nightsung]

I want to believe you.

[ But I don’t know that I do, unspoken. ]

I nearly went to you, first.

[powerhungry]

You should have. Don't drag her into your mess again.

[nightsung]

Saber is everyone’s problem, in these games.

I would have protected her. I’m skilled in battle, even without my powers. And protection is what I do.

[powerhungry]

Then you could have protected me, or any of the party who ultimately bagged the creature you were attempting to hunt.

Don't involve her again. I've said my piece. I won't repeat myself.

[nightsung]

[ She’s seen only fragments of what Silco’s capable of, and only through the gallery of stolen memories. He knows more of her than she of him, and she knows that’s by design.

Shadowheart has given him more, when she perhaps should have been more careful. And still she thinks of how he was the one she went to, after forsaking her goddess; how he stayed with her, something like gentleness in him in the aftermath, when he didn’t have to be gentle. That same gentleness in the fragment of memory where she was young and frightened, and he thought her someone else. ]

I understand how much she means to you. I’m sorry.

What would you have done, had I asked you instead?

[powerhungry]

[ Whatever capacity for gentleness he retains in this mess dwindles at her response, his inclination to trust her — to give her more of himself — eroded by her choice in company and her decision to involve Jinx. Not all the way, when she offers him an apology, but I'm sorry is different from I won't.

He sighs, looking down at his phone. It doesn't matter now. Deleted. Then: ]

Ask me next time, and you'll find out.