This is one of those scenes where I will probably come back to it in half a year and find it completely cringe-worthy.
Also, a minor content warning as Tyrric considers suicide, followed by a romance. (I told you: totally cringe-worthy!)
Author’s Note
Tyrric considered swallowing coals.
It wasn’t as effective as poison, or as fast as swallowing a knife. Yet he was here, and so were the coals in the fireplace, and he could just barely reach them, if he tried.
He couldn’t even try. So useless you can’t even finish yourself off, he told himself, and willfully blacked out again.
He came to to someone stroked his hair. Over and over again, all in one spot, like a broken piece of gnomish engineering. He slowly lifted his head. It was Alelsa. Her face was ugly with tears, but she was silent now as they poured across her face. Raw. Defenseless. Empty. He knew what that felt like.
He tried to croak out an explanation, but his mouth was too dry for the words to form.
“Don’t,” she said. “I know I’m unlovable.”
Blast it, but that wasn’t what he had meant at all. He took her hand. “You’re not.”
“Oh yeah?” she answered. “My first love… aban-abandoned me. The second one got stuck in a time warp. And now you. Now you.”
It made Tyrric feel positively wretched.
“I thought this time, maybe for sure,” she continued. “After all, why would someone marry me, if they didn’t love me? Dote on me? Even throw all their f-f-family away for m-me!
“I don’t even have the strength to kill you,” she said, reaching over and gripping his neck. “I should. You deserve it.”
“I deserve it,” Tyrric repeated numbly.
“But then I’d only feel worse!” It started a new rash of sobs. “You continue to manipulate me, as you did the rest of them!”
Tyrric winced. No… no… this was wrong. He hated to see Alelsa cry. He lifted himself up, grasping for her hand again.
“Don’t!”
He slid off the glove on her left hand: the one that hid the fel scar that tore down one side of her arm. A mark of her taint, she had told him early on. He bent and kissed it gently, just as he had then, though this time, he dared to think he meant it more.
“You hate me!” said Alelsa in a flurry of tears. “You hate me…”
“The only one I hate right now is myself,” said Tyrric, and that was the truth. Closing his eyes, he placed both hands on either side of hers.
That admission made the rest easier to say.
“I don’t hate you,” said Tyrric. “I used you. Yes, you heard me right. … I wish I could say I didn’t know what I was doing, that it was all the Void’s work, but I fear that would be, in part, a lie.”
“Oh, Tyrric,” said Alelsa, and she collapsed against him. “I did, too.”
“What?” Tyrric stared at her, startled.
“I used you, too. I only wanted you for that book. But then one thing led to another, and I fell for you. I wanted you. Your kisses, your touch…” She touched him now, smoothing his unshaven beard. “I-I wanted… a life… that I could never have… Look at me! I’m a warlock! Scarred outside and in–”
“I’m looking,” said Tyrric quietly, “and I see scars, but I also see you.”
She sniffled and sniveled and pressed her face into his shoulder. “I thought… when I heard you… from the hallway, just now… we must truly be meant for each other. A punishment to the other, for all our sins.” She chuckled unhappily, but he didn’t see the humor in it.
“Is that so?” said Tyrric, and he pulled her closer, against her resistance.
“…but at least this hell… was heaven… for a little while, Tyrric.” She gave him a look, then sat up, pushing away from him, blowing her nose and making to leave.
“Don’t go,” said Tyrric softly.
Another nose blow. “Why?”
“I still need you.”
“Need me? Why would you need me?” The outrage was back.
Tyrric wasn’t sure why he was doing it. He tilted her head back and kissed her cheek, then her lips. An old stir of passion, remembered from their early months together, stirred in his core.
“Because I need you to remind me who I am.”