Everyone Leaves, Eventually

CW: Trauma , gore , void, death imagery

The home he had been gifted by Duke Matheredor was lovely. Cozy. Enough for a young lad and his love to settle in, to grow in. Without that love...the space was too large. Empty. The walls felt cold. Devoid of laughter. Devoid of made memories.

The weight of the Inquisitor's mantle had been lifted, but, nothing had been inserted to replace it. The life he had thought he'd have in this home just...wasn't there. As the months dragged on, Emrys lacked a purpose. His experiments still lacked a blessing. His thoughts, hypothetical. His notes, untested theory.

He could try it… no one could stop him in this moment. Emerald eyes looked forlornly over the hearth that warmed his home. There were no guards, no companions…just a dog upstairs.

Thoughts returned to the frozen land of Northrend, to Icecrown Citadel, where the fabric of the sky had been ripped apart.

How poetic.

He had heard the murmurs in his last trip to Stormwind. How the Ebon Blade managed a portal to the realm of the dead. How the King of Stormwind had been taken to this place… if only he could see it for himself.

Maybe he could.

Emerald eyes and white sclera shifted, as inky mauve ichor clouded his present vision. As fingertips glowed with an unholy aura. Lips murmured quietly, chanting a spell that had longingly missed his voice.

A view of Northrend, a view of that marred sky. The saronite gates and menacing lichfire pyres. Gargoyles of skulls, of fanged entities that stared as his mind's eye past them. Higher and higher his view raised, testing, wondering if maybe he could just… see that other realm. Beyond the clouds, beyond the ice, he could almost press through the shattered shards of reality.

*Why do you continue to reach for the afterlife? Why do you continue to struggle? All of your effort, all of the sins you’ve committed, will be fruitless and irredeemable.*

The words tugged at his mind. His pulse quickened. It felt as though his mind’s eye was caught in a tarp. Pushing, pressing, fighting…to see being the veil.

*Sofka rots in the ground. Decomposes. And there’s nothing you could have done.*

Effort. Beads of sweat started to paint at his brow.

*You abandoned your mentor. His soul wanders this world, still. He could have helped you.*

His chest started to rise and fall as heavy breaths filled his lungs. He had to keep pushing. Keep trying. Exhaustion. Pain. His hands left the mantle of the hearth to extend. Stance shifted wide with arms and legs apart, mutterings became incantations filled with a deepening, otherworldly voice. This power would bow to him. He commanded to be shown that what he wished to see.

*What will you do when the Matheredors perish, and everyone who ever felt a spark of respect for you leaves you utterly alone again…?*

A shockwave of energy went up his core, like a flash grenade of mauve tossed through a window. The power he controlled swelled and exploded, leaving him on the ground and tinnitus in his ears. The dog upstairs came running, it's legs bringing it to his side. It sat apart from him, staring, panting.

In the end… he couldn’t see beyond the veil.

*You will never have a normal life. Not with her. Not with anyone.*

Emerald eyes and white sclera returned. Tears welled up at the corners of his lashes. He swallowed hard, setting Adam’s Apple to rock with a knot in his throat. Jaw tightened, as the miserable whispers seemed to come from the animal in his presence. He hated animals.

*And even if you did…it would be temporary.*

“Everyone leaves, eventually.” He murmured. A mantra that had been drilled into his mind since his youth. The lanky man curled up onto the floor, setting knees to his chest.

“She left…because of me.”

*Because no one appreciates how much you wish to hold onto them.*

What did he expect? Utter forgiveness? A facetious and lackadaisical regard for the sins he had committed? He entered the situation hopeful, and, that was his downfall.

How foolish of him.

And so, the broken beanstalk of a man laid there, until bones ached from laying on wooden floor. Life would continue, another day of his limited time spent without fruit.