It took Leliana several days to realise that she had stopped smiling again. There was a disconnect between what she felt and how she acted, so when she went down the rabbit hole one more time, turning day into night and she once again felt broken, her body continued without her. Smiling, joking, fighting. It was a reflex, she supposed, a survival technique that was older than Marjolaine's betrayal. She only noticed it when Pomello, the warden, tried to kiss her and instead of reciprocating with happiness, Leliana felt stone cold. She blinked her eyes a couple of times, her body filling with dread. Oh no, not this again.
Leliana wasn't even sure what had set it off this time. She should have been fine. Everything was fine. I mean, apart from the blight and the imminent threat of death, and the hard cold ground, and Alistair's wretched cooking and the ugly, ugly shoes she had to wear, Leliana loved her new life. She had everything a girl could ask for.
She went down to a stream, away from the camp, singing a lullaby quietly. She leaned down and washed her face. Nothing. Why did she feel nothing? She felt scared and her heart sped up and still nothing. Whenever she tried to search how she felt or find something she felt happy about, her insides were a mess. A low murmuring of so many emotions she couldn't pick out any. She tried to calm herself down with the fact that this had happened before. And that it would happen again, no matter how happy she got.
Sometimes, even during happy times, she was scared that it was the times of sadness that were the real her, and the happy times were fake. Once you get really good at pretending, it is very hard to stop. Once you get good at turning off your feelings, you have to relearn to discern what your feelings are. Even harder to dare to act of them. Kissing when you want to. Telling them to stop when you don't want to. All of those simple tasks become a mountain to climb.
And Leliana was tired of climbing.
Because the truth was, once you've been broken, it's easy for the darkness to find its way in again. It seeps into the cracks of your broken soul. And no amount of prayers can help. No amount of fake smiling. Or dancing. Or singing.
She lied down by the stream and put her fingers in the black water. It looked inviting, like it would swallow her whole and keep her safe. The water was cold enough to make her feel warm. It would be so easy to just...
Leliana sat up and pulled her wet fingers through her hair. Her hand temporarily caught in her braid, reminding her of Dorothea. At the thought of the older woman, Leliana's chest filled with a flicker of warmth. She closed her eyes and grabbed on to that feeling with everything she had. It was small, and it wasn't enough to make her smile. But it was something.
It was enough. Leliana got up again and went back to the camp. She would be okay. Again. She would learn to feel. Again. And when she stumbled, she would get up. Again.
The darkness had still not won.
