Sorrow - A Critical Role Tale

by Blr

Syldor Vessar is set in his ways. And yet, he is not unaware of his failings as a father. A drabble, written on my phone during the Chroma Conclave story arc.

Sometimes, in the dark of night, he lies awake with his eyes open, staring at the inky blackness of his manor house bedroom. Sometimes, he finds himself lost in thought as he goes about his daily life, only jerking back to his real world when his new wife mentions his name. Sometimes, after dinners with dignitaries and nobles, he retires to his drawing room where he can finally allow his shoulders to slump with the weight of affections not given, of words both spoken and unspoken.

But, always, he forces those emotions away. He locks them in a box deep within him. When he imagines this box, it is the deep brown of the trees of the elven woods he grew up in. It is covered in silver filigree, so razor thin as if to be nothing more than the whisper of a blade. Inside, along with what he imagines to be a jumble of bright yellow strands of compliments ungiven tangled with cutting words as red as heartsblood, lie images, flashes - of deep brown eyes, of long, raven dark hair. His eyes, unseeing, dart to flashes of ribbon woven into those dark strands of hair by a loVing brother. He sees flushed cheeks, the remnants of heated arguments. He sees the bright blue feathers his daughter wears tucked behind her ear, the dark glistening raven feathers that adorn his son's armor.

He thinks back to his own father, so selfish with his affections. So easily stirred to anger. So full of fear and hate. His hands shake ever so slightly as he acknowledges how fully he is his father's son. And yet, deep within him, as he sifts through this box that is so real to him and yet so intangible, his heart pulses with words of truth he is still afraid to speak lest they be thrown to the ground and trod upon - I love you, Vex'ahlia. I am so proud of you, Vax'ildan. You are enough, his heart cries. I'm sorry, it whispers.

And, in the silence of a darkened room, the embers of the fire in the hearth dying down to nothing, he fears for the safety of his estranged children, and weeps for his inability to breach a gulf he feels is simply too far to ever cross.