Dellian Lament

Summary: Cashore, K./Fire. It is fitting, Archer thinks, that the sky above him is blood red and every other shade of magenta. OneShot- Archer, and everything he loves.

Warning: Character death.

Set: During the book.

Disclaimer: "Fire" belongs to Kristin Cashore and is one of the best books I've ever read. Lyrics by Damien Rice, "Cannonball", interpreted by amazing Vienna Teng.

still a little bit of your taste in my mouth
still a little bit of you laced with my doubt
still a little hard to say what's going on
…

When he looks up, he can see the sky.

The sun is sinking, the Great Dells a shadow relief against the clear blue. A beautiful autumn day comes to an end. The ground beneath Archer's back should be cool but he doesn't feel it. It is as if he has enough inner warmth to hold out against the winter that is slowly creeping up on him. It won't last forever, he knows. Nothing does.

Except for Fire's beauty in his heart. Perhaps it is her fire that warms him right now.

Archer, at heart, is a farm boy. He was raised between the green and grey fields and hills of the Little Greys, in a house full of warmth and love. He knows the shifts of summer and winter, the time for sowing, for harvesting and for resting. There is a cycle of life he has lived by for his entire time, and he knows nothing last eternally. But there is a spring after every winter.

Oh, how he misses the Little Greys. He should go back home – take Fire and leave King's City, leave behind the Royal Siblings who steal away his love. Return back to the place he has grown up in, where his father's grey eyes watch every move carefully, both approving and disapproving. Where he knows every hill, ever stone and every tree. It's not like this landscape – grey and brown in the last throws of fall, with hills and mountains and grey stones. The Great Greys are a wider version of his own mountains. They protrude into the sky like towering giants – Archer distinctly remembers Fire telling him a story when they still were children, a tale of how the last giants laid down to rest and turned to stone. A cold sleep for all eternity, until the rightful king would wake and call upon them in order to defend the Dells against invaders from the deep. Archer had laughed then, dismissed it as a mere fairy tale. Looking at the mountains now – he has to turn his head to the side to do so, and he doesn't feel like he has the strength to – he can see them looming up over him and wonders whether Fire wasn't right that time.

After all, she was right so many times.

A tiny piece of his heart still begrudges her decisions. Had she allowed herself to love him – perhaps he could have let go of her more easily, or perhaps if she hadn't tried to run from him every time he told her he loved her he wouldn't have felt the insane urge to possess her entirely. Rationally he knew that nothing – no one – could ever possess her, she was a woman of her own rights and a monster, too. Still, irrational as it was, his heart screamed with jealousy every time he saw her look at someone else, and every time she as much as smiled at another man he had to swallow the urge to grab her and kiss her, making clear to her and everyone else that she belonged to him and to him alone. Taking other women to bed was no alternative. He had found out directly after she had refused his bed for the first time – both of them barely seventeen and him still naïve and vain. He had desired her, she had refused – and he had tried to make her jealous, to hurt her by choosing another woman for the night. She'd never called him in on his decision, never even had spoken about it even though he'd made more than sure that she knew. Perhaps it had been the beginning of the end, the ending of the one perfect year they had been lovers. They'd shared his or her bed many more times during the next years, but never again had he had the feeling that she belonged to him alone.

…

still a little bit of your ghost your witness
still a little bit of your face I long to kiss
you step a little closer each day
still I can't see what's going on

…

Fire looked at the grey-eyed Prince with a longing that mirrored Archer's glance when he looked at her, and nothing ever had been worse than realizing she loved Brigan. Not him, not Archer. He had tried years and years to make her love him back and the Prince had made her fall in love with him even though he had shown her nothing but hate and suspicion. It proved once again what Archer had learned throughout his life: he didn't deserve her, that nothing he ever could have done would have made her love him. It didn't matter. He loved her regardless and he was jealous, regardless. But the burning feeling that had always heated his heart seemed muted today, as if he didn't have the strength to continue wanting her so much despite her obvious unwillingness. For the first time in a long, long time, Archer thought of Fire with a calm heart.

He could picture her exactly.

He knew every line in her face, every color of her eyes. He could read the words of her heart, even though he'd never been happy to do it because he did not like what he could read. Fire was his sister, his best friend and his lover, and now she was like a part of him, too. She'd always be, no matter whom she loved, and the thought made him smile. Rocks, she was so beautiful. It wasn't just her monster beauty that had made him fall in love with her. It was her powerful mind, her strikingly green eyes, the curve of her neck into her shoulder. It had been the way she had agonized over which decision to make concerning Cansrel, and how she had done what had to be done and had almost been broken by it. Archer loved Fire because she loved Small more than any beautiful, proud stallion Cansrel would have given her instead, because of the way her face lit up when she played her violin, because she loved to sit in the library of his house and talk to Brocker. Archer loved Fire for her fire, for her weakness and for the color of her heart. He could see her – she could have been standing right in front of him right now, so vivid were the images his mind conjured up of her. He could almost smell her faint perfume, hear the rustling of the folds of her dress. Her eyes shone.

"Fire, love," Archer whispered. "Don't cry- please, don't cry."

A silent tear ran down her cheek.

…

still a little bit of your song in my ear
still a little bit of your words I long to hear
you step a little closer to me
so close I can't see what's going on

…

There are so many things Archer loves.

The wind in his face after a day full of work on the fields. The friendly smiles and greetings of his people when he rides down the road to his house, the children that call his name when he approaches. The sun setting over the Little Greys, bathing the sky in the same color as Fire's hair. The warm scent of fire and stew when he returns home. Brocker, his father, in his big wheelchair, smiling behind his beard. Strict and loving, and never once has he made Archer feel like he wasn't his true son. Instead, he has raised him, educated him and taught him and there is so much he longs to tell his father but at the same time believes Brocker already knows, having read the emotions in his son's face. Archer loves the long talks during dinner time, especially when Fire spends her evenings with them. He loves the afternoon walks she takes through his forests, especially when he has time to accompany her, and how well she handles the bows he made her. She's been a good student, shooting as straight and true as him, if not with less skill. Archer loves the winter nights when he lies in her bed, listens to her breathing, and the summer mornings when she wakes him by getting dressed in front of her veiled mirror. She is beautiful; incredibly, amazingly beautiful. None of her scars will ever change the fact and he hopes Brigan will love her with the same intensity, with the same regard and respect for the woman she is underneath her beauty and her scars. Then he thinks perhaps Brigan understands her better than he ever did because obviously Fire loves him where she never loved Archer. The thought doesn't elicit jealousy. Not anymore. Archer loves his family, loves his people, his house, his work, his life. Oh, there is so much he loves, so much he longs for right now.

He has lived a full life, he thinks, because there is so little he truly regrets. He doesn't even regret loving Fire. So many things he will leave behind when he goes, he thinks, so many things he still wanted to do. Help Fire. Even help the Royal Siblings, despite his unlove for them. Bring back news and books for Brocker. He wants to breed the new mare, wants to re-do the weapons' room and finally get rid of those ancient pillars that stand everywhere and hinder Brocker when he moves through the hall. Archer wants to finally clear away the last remnants of Cansrel's gardens so Fire won't have to see them anymore. He want to sow a new type of grain, he's already purchased it in King's City and wants to be there to explain his farmers its advantages. He wants to ask Queen Roen why Prince Brigan looks so much like his father Brocker. He wants to tell Fire what he suspects about Jod, the mind-less archer, and how he feels something so terrible he doesn't even want to think about it. He wants to tell Clara he's sorry and that he wants to be the father of her child, and Mila how much he regrets hurting her, not only because it made Fire angry but because he suddenly can see how much he has in his life. Will they be daughters or sons? Suddenly he wants to know, wants to see them grow and walk and laugh. Archer wants to be back home at Winter Solstice, wants to drink hot tea and listen to Fire play her violin for the ceremony. There are so many things Archer wants, too, but now it is too late.

It would be peaceful, he thinks, if it didn't hurt so much.

Fire. Fire. Fire. Archer is dying, and her name is the only thing that goes through his mind. Again and again. He can see her smile. He can see her cry. He can see her angry and tired and full of desire, and she's so beautiful he cannot breathe.

She'll be devastated.

She might not love him the way he wants her to, but she loves him enough to have a piece of her heart die with him. And, even worse: he failed her. Cutter and the strange boy are after her, won't stop until they have her. And Archer does not want her to fall prey to those two fearsome, cruel men. Archer wants her safe in King's City, even with Brigan, if it is what it takes, and as far away as possible from the Great Greys and Cutter's dwelling. Even if it means he has to come back to haunt her, he…

He laughs – a choking sob, more than a laugh, and his hands on his stomach are slick with blood. He taught Fire never to aim there. It's a death too cruel to wish even upon one's enemies. Though, honestly, right now Archer would love nothing more than to shoot Cutter and the boy right in the stomach, as well. Oh the irony that he has been saved by a man who wasn't his father only to be killed by the person he suspects is his real father- No. Brocker is his father, always will be.

"I swear, Fire, if Brigan doesn't love you the way you deserve…"

He isn't even sure he's talking. Perhaps the words only resonate in his head.

Fire. Fire. Fire.

The sun sets above the mountain range, illuminating the sky one last time. It is fitting, Archer thinks, that the last thing he sees is this view. The Great Greys glow in every shadow of red, magenta, violet and pink he ever saw in Fire's hair.

Fire…

…

stones taught me to fly
love taught me to lie
life taught me to die
...