He sat at his window looking out at the world. The pane was cold, breath spots pale veils on the surface. Absently, he put his hand onto the glass, fingertips gathering the moisture, and then his whole palm pressed tightly against the pane; as if trying to push through and into the world beyond.
If he had never been born, she would be there now. Out there, somewhere.
Rosalind had visited earlier. Not that he could remember what pretence she had offered, all thought he could spare for her appearance was spent on the knowledge that she was worried. He hadn't even attempted to reassure her, too tired of pretending, he had snapped at her. Had she taken offence? He shook his head now and turned back to the distance. His eyelids closed, trying to contain his anguish. If he had never overheard her, they never would have been them, and she would ride still.
He glanced around at his room, home from home. All he knew was that he wasn't home, surrounded by memories. He was glad. Looking back into the recent past, he remembered sitting in his first room, where he had grown up, sitting among voices and faces swirling through his emptiness. Following the fire of an argument, a raging storm, came the barren cold of such terrible knowledge.
It was me.
In the fallout, he had believed the startling sound to have been a twig snapping underfoot. Now it was the crack of a gun. And the scream.
The scream.
There was a voice in the room. Bringing himself back into the cold he turned and saw the ignorant reminder. She had no idea how similar she was to her predecessor. Both fiery and adventurous, but strong and true, their soft gaze able to sooth all the world's hardships. When the shadow spoke, it was as if she was speaking through time, smiling that smile, faded in his mind but as strong as ever in his heart. He struggled to understand her words. They were faint through the silent storm pulsing against his ears.
Vaguely, he registered she was referring to the break. He didn't reply and this agitated her tense stance. He was glad that things had ended badly between them. No way back. No risk to her, to the double of Her. She left and he turned back.
He had never understood it, but he had accepted it all the same. Now, knowing that it was not Fate who had robbed her of her life, but his own actions, his own existence, he could not live himself. It was unjust to breathe whilst she could not, to smile when all her smiles were past or to even live through her death.
Their love had been forbidden, but neither guessed the true extent of this ruling until she fell and he failed to catch her.
He was already shouting when they'd paced to a quiet room, separated from the party. All the caged aggression and anger previously diluted by fear was now strong and clear, surging from him.
"You act like nothing I've ever done was good enough for you-" The taller snarled back.
"That's because you've always been a constant disappointment to me! Everything you do is flawed…And when you were fraternizing with that girl! To even think of it!" Fresh rage leapt from him, anguish from that old wound, the one that hurt the most.
"Don't you dare even mention her!" But the dragon's fire had already been forced from its raging mouth and it sought to burn.
"You defied me! I told you directly not to 'see' that nobody from those stables and you disobeyed!" The flames suffocated in the tension; his strength draining from him so suddenly that the admission was a harsh whisper. "She had to be taken care of." The boy already knew. It was obvious to his subconscious at least. His whole body shook and tensed as he fought desperately to forget. The elder twisted his mouth in an exhausted disgust before turning and leaving his son to breakdown. He nodded compulsively, eyes shut.
The horse hadn't been spooked.
It had been shot.
A figure behind. His cousin again. This time he didn't move at all. It took her longer to leave. The long moments dragging themselves by. But she did leave. A light flickered off somewhere inside his head. They all left eventually.
He remembered the first time he had noticed her; the poorly-bred nobody to his father, the 'poor girl' to his cousin and her friends, the small boned firebird to him. Of course he had registered her presence in his mind, another body on another horse. No name or face had pierced his consciousness until one day when returning his horse to the shared stable he had overheard two of the riders who lodged their horses for free.
"Did you feel how cold it was out there?" Teeth chattered in the blazing sunlight. A ringing laugh.
"I know, those poor rich bitches, so far away from home and their beloved penguins!" More laughter before a moment of quiet was kept, in which the eavesdropper puffed himself up to make an indignant entrance, but then, a sigh.
"I love riding, but, I don't think I can stand it anymore."
"Oh, please don't leave me with these people!" But her joking tone soured as she realised his sobriety. "No, come on! Don't…" An apology dribbled pathetically in the thin air and the unseen figure was heard leaving by the now frozen figure outside. He decided through a silence to go in and leave quickly, feeling the metaphorical cold himself.
Since the moment of seeing a flowering tear in that beautiful girl's eye, he had never looked back, until that same eye lay open, gazing blankly into a distance nobody else could see.
If only I hadn't heard you, if only I hadn't seen.
The darkness within him churned uncomfortably, propelling him further into numbness. He closed his eyes and the memory rose sickeningly, till it filled him completely. His arms moved themselves forwards, hands shaking, palms upwards. He held her again. Absorbed her warmth and softness of her skin. Saw her beautiful, fiery eyes lie open, the flames gone out. Felt her paper thin bones, light and delicate and broken. Heard the silence where there should have been her laughter.
How can I live through this silence?
Dorian sits at his window and he remembers.