The ground races by beneath Erelia Glendeylin's pounding feet, the chilled autumn air stinging her lungs. As she runs, Erelia feels her body enter that uncomfortable place of being warm on the inside but cold with sweat on the outside. She knew she'd pay later for not having warmed up or anything before launching straight into a full-out run.
She swings around a thin tree and slows, however, as a new thought enters her mind. She stops and stares down the road where, just ahead, she can see the side entrances to the forest.
She hesitates, taking a moment to breathe, to debate. She pulls the straps of her sheath of arrows forward, bringing the quiver flush with her back, and she feels the weight of her bow bottle as it presses into her spine.
Even though the forest is huge, with patches split by lots of twisty, turny roads and steep rolling hills, it would be a lot faster to cut through.
Erelia glances skyward. Through the smattering of clouds, three early night stars shine in the deepening blue, but it isn't completely dark yet. If she goes through the park, if she runs the whole way and manages not to get lost, she'd make it in time for sure. She knew it.
Her mind made up, she darts for the park entrance.
On either side of her loom tall trees. They seem to watch her as she veers past, taking the one-way dirt road that curves upward into the park. Her path soon narrows to a single, twisting lane of grime. Rows of trees and thick underbrush emerge on either side of her. The farther into the park she runs, the denser the surrounding forest grows.
Overhead, the interlocking patchwork of hanging boughs work to transform her pathway into a darkening tunnel. Through the lacework of limbs, thick clouds inch by.
Erelia runs on, listening to the soft beat of her boots as they pound the ground. She can't wait to get back to the campsite and into a bath in the pond. She thinks about making herself some peppermint tea and maybe even going to bed early, even though she can't say it was because she is looking forward to tomorrow.
Darkness creeps in around her, spreading its fingers through the trees, working to smear them into a single black blur.
As she approaches a fork in the road, she slows, but only long enough to decide that she should keep going straight.
She keeps running, her breath the loudest sound in her ears. The only sound.
Erelia frowns, at last admitting to herself that something had felt funny since she entered the forest. Only now, however, can she place her finger on what.
She slows her run to a jog, listening to the lonely, hollow clap of her boots.
Quiet.
Everything around her stands really still and really . . . quiet.
The breeze that greeted her outside the entrance has vanished somewhere between there and here, and she looks up now to find the tree limbs motionless, their leaves immobile.
Or are those leaves t all?
A black shadow moves in one of the trees, and Erelia registers the silhouette of one huge black bird. It makes no sound, though it seems to watch her from its perch. One of the leaves at its side moves. Another bird. Soon, with a ruffle of feathers, she notices another and, on her other side, another.
One of them breaks the silence with a caw, the sound falling harsh on her ears, rasping and raw.
Spooked, Erelia picks up the pace again, glad that she's kept himself in such great shape. True, she isn't the world's best runner, but she can keep going if she needs to, and right now, she needs to.
She wonders, an ice-water sensation rushing through her veins with the thoughts, if something's following her.
Erelia shakes off the convulsive shudder that rattles its way through her shoulders. Stupid idea. If anything was following, it was someone. Thieves. Bandits.
Maybe the stillness is just her imagination. After all, this is the woods. Woods are supposed to be placid. Serene. Maybe she just misses the sounds of laughing men and people and the glare of candlelight. Besides, everything dies in the fall anyway, right? All the little crickets have chirped their last sometime back in early September.
Still, she can't help feeling that there should be some sounds. Like a foraging squirrel. A startled rabbit or something.
Erelia slows to a stop again, this time so she can catch her breath. She leans forward, clasping her knees, her own huffing all but reverberating in the silence. She glances over her shoulder at the darkening stretch of road behind her, black like a ribbon of ink. She looks forward once more. She wasn't sure, but she thinks the exit to the narrow path lay straight ahead from where she stands right now. If she is right, she'd enter a clearing behind the campsite and be back maybe even with a few seconds to spare.
But something else feels wrong now, and it isn't just the stillness.
Since she has stopped running, the air around her has seemed to compress, to grow denser. She can't explain it, but it feels as though the night itself, unnatural in its calmness, has begun to move in on him, to close in tight.
Her nerves prickle. Along her neck and arms, all hairs rise to stand on end.
The idea of feeling being watched had always sort of struck Erelia as being corny kind of way. Now, though, as she turns and looks around at all the black trees with their skeletal arms tangled in a silent fight for space, she can't help the sudden feeling that, somewhere among them, something watches her, waits for her to move again.
The birds are gone now. Which is weird, since she hadn't heard them take off.
She listens.
Nothing but the silence grows, feeding on itself until it becomes a dull roar in her ears.
Erelia continues on the path, though at a slower, quieter walk, and just when she starts to think that listening to the eerie nothing might be worse than actually hearing something, a hushing sound – a fast whoosh – breaks through from the line of trees at her right.
Erelia jumps and readies her dagger, an ice pick of hear stabbing her through the middle so that, for a moment, she forgets how to breathe.
Whatever it was had been big. As in person big.
"Who's there?"
Skoooshh!
Erelia whirls. This sound had come from the trees directly across the road. It comes again from behind. Erelia hears the pop of a branch and the crush of dry leaves. She spins in a circle, and despite the cascade of sudden noise, the rustling and crackling, she can't sense so much as the slightest movement in any direction.
She feels her throat constrict and her chest tighten. Her heartbeat speeds to triple time. She turns and breaks once more into a run, taking the trail as hard and as fast as her legs would carry her. Her palms, cold and sweaty, tighten around the grip of her dagger, and she feels her quiver of arrows pound against her.
Whatever it was in the woods, it follows her. Out of the corner of one eye, she thinks she sees the edge of a dark something. Then there's another at her left. Figures, tall and long, rush through the black gate of trees on either side of her, their movements too fast. Impossibly fast.
As she speeds up, so do the dappled forms.
They seem to multiply as, out of her periphery, she spots yet another. This one glides away from the others to rush along the group of trees directly beside her.
It moves through the trees, through undergrowth, dashing over the dry ground – a rippling form. Erelia risks a quick glance, head-on, but sees nothing, only blackness and tangled branches and stillness. But that was impossible!
"Go away!" she screams. She can't outrun them, or whatever or whoever they were. She can't gain even the slightest bit of distance, and already a stitch the size of a softball has begun to knot itself in her side. She blocks out the pain, pushing through.
Run. Run. Run!
"Run!" she hears someone hiss. A man.
It had come from the line of trees beside her.
Erelia tries to cry for help but can't find the breath, able to only choke out a low sob. She can't stop to scream, but she can't keep going like this, either. She can't breathe anymore. Her lungs sting from the cold while her sides ache with stiffening pain.
Why hadn't she just gone with someone? Why hadn't she just –
The clearing!
Straight ahead. There! She can see it.
Dizziness wafts in around her temples, but she wouldn't stop now. Somehow, she knew that if she could just clear the heap of fallen tree trunks, she would make it back. She'd be all right.
Reaching for a thick uprooted root of a tree, Erelia clasps a hand to the wood and, as she vaults over, feels the stabbing reward of a thick splinter as it enters her palm. Her feet hit the dust and dirt pathway beyond. She teeters forward from the weight of her sheath and slams to her knees. She picks himself up again, stumbling, scrambling, running even as her body begs her to stop.
The small pebbles at her feet rattle around him. Whispers and hisses. Someone laughs, but the sound morphs into a high-pitched shriek. She hears a splintering shatter, like a crash of plates.
She dares not turn around.
To her left and right familiar gatherings of trees zoom by, looking like interlocked hands trapping her. She tears past them, and even as the campsite draws into view, she does not slow. She wills her body to keep moving in spite of her screaming muscles, the torturous ache in her lungs.
"Ereliaaa."
The sound of her name whisks by her, caught by the wind and then lost in the rush of leaves scattering around her feet. She hears it, though. Her name. Someone has whispered her name.
That, at last, stops her and brings her stuttering to a halt at the edge of the campground threshold. She wheels around, eyes scanning. She gasps for breath, sucking down air in huge gulps.
She peels off his bow and arrows and, mustering every bit of strength she has left, throws it onto the ground. It makes a dull thud sound as the weapons slam into the cold, hard turf.
Whoever it was had said her name. That meant they knew her.
As though triggered by the flip of a switch, rage replaces her fear.
"Who's there?" she shouts, heaving. "Who is it? Why don't you just come out?"
She wiped her running nose with her sleeve, not caring.
"Come on!" she roars toward the gathering of oak trees. "I know you're there!" This she turns on a row of shrubs lining a cobblestone sidewalk.
"Come on you cowards! I'm right here! Come and face me you cowards! Wherever you are – whoever you are –!" As she shouts, Erelia spins in a circle so that her voice echoes all through the open land. So everyone, everything could hear her.
Erelia turns and sees the silhouette of a woman. She could tell the woman is about her age, maybe older. Still with rage coursing, she turns and huffs to the woman. She stands at profile, decorated in all black, a cape billowing behind her. Erelia takes a bold step closer, her dagger close in her hands.
Suddenly the woman slowly turns her head to face Erelia. Her skin porcelain white, deep blood-red lips. Her hands red with blood, and darkness rippling off of her like smoke of a fire.
Erelia's mouth goes dry as paper, and her stomach plummeted to the floor. The eyes depict brutality and a coldness that's so familiar.
She whimpers to the gods, her dagger clanging to the ground.
The woman raises a thin, abnormally long hand, the tips of which ended in long red talonlike claws. She waves at Erelia. Her nails, more like the scarlet fangs from some deadly venomous snake, gleams in the light. Erelia recognized the belt of daggers, a sword strapped to her sides.
Gods no . . .
Erelia freezes, her eyes locking on a jagged black hole that marked the side of the woman's cheek, as though an entire chunk of her face had been knocked out, like a chink in a porcelain vase.
Erelia can see straight through, to the hollow jaw and two rows of white daggerlike teeth within. Fear pulses through her veins and yet stood hypnotized. This woman is horrible and fascinating all at once, like a scorpion prepared to strike, all angles and sharp lines and menace.
In one blinking movement, the assassin lunges at Erelia, jaw unhinging, the black hole in her face widening. Teeth bared, claws outstretched, she unleashes an ungodly sound, something between a death screech and a demon's howl.
It happened too fast for Erelia to form her own scream, too fast for her raised arms to do any good. The assassin's claws rained down, her form loosened into violet smoke.
Erelia coughs and the ground beneath her feet trembles, then shudders before opening up. Darkness swirls inside it like an in ground whirlpool. Erelia falls backward. A shrieking torrent of jet scales engulf the light.
"You can't hide from me."
The edges of her surroundings quiver, dirt and rock loosening until, at last, they break forth in a tidal surge.
Slowly she sinks into the ground like in quicksand. Earth pours over her in rushing waves from all sides. It falls against her body in heavy clods, a suffocating weight that fast becomes crushing.
"No!" Erelia screams in a rustic tone.
She flails and thrashes, battling to loosen herself from the raining soil and ash that threatens to consume her. She fights to stand, causing the dirt to press more tightly around her. It claims her legs, trapping her. She reaches with both arms toward the open sky, but the earth gushes, building to her waist, to her chest. It piles past her shoulder, her head, and now reaches to consume her arms, swallowing the light one fragment at a time.
The packed dirt squeezes her chest, crushes her lungs. She can't breathe. Erelia gasps involuntarily and is rewarded with a mouthful of course grime. She swallows and her body convulses at the acrid taste. Her lungs burn for air. Her heart knocks against her ribcage, begging for release.
Up above, she can see the assassin. Her face torn between helping her, or letting her die.
"Help! Please, help me!" Erelia begs.
Her ears roar, and a strange hum grows louder within her brain as her chest convulses and she coughs, sucking in a mouthful of dirt in exchange.
The grit burns her lungs, and she coughs again.
More dirt. More coughing. More pain.
And then it's gone. The pain recedes. Her chest relaxes.
Erelia's lungs stop demanding air.
Libby sharply gasps for breath, a scream fighting to escape her lips. Her body moist with sweat.
A dull ache creeps up from her spine to settle in her chest. She was dreaming about something. Though as she tries to remember, only small bits buoy to the surface, like the remnants of a shipwreck, bit by bits float to the top.
She rolls over, squeezing her eyes shut, stuffing her face into her pillow. She wasn't ready to remember what had happened, to recall the nightmare.
The faint pins-and-needles sensation, still there, buzzed through her like a soft vibration, though the closer she drifted to full consciousness, the faster it seemed to fade. An unfamiliar tingling prickles along her limbs, like the faint buzz of static electricity.
She opens her eyes again and gazes straight ahead, afraid that her head is light and she will convulse. She swallows to fight the wave of nausea away. As she blinks, she lifts her head and carefully turns from side to side. Her head seems fine, and it's then she takes in her surroundings.
She is bathed in a soft mauve color and Libitania keeps her gaze to the side and drifts it upward to a vaulted roof, the light of the moon muffled by the fabric curving inwards. And then she remembers she's inside a tent. All at once her senses revive and Libitania is suddenly aware of the hard-packed earth beneath her back, a rapidly throbbing pain in the middle of her spine and the softness of her bedroll she's cocooned in. Libitania pushes herself to sitting position and looks around.
The moonlight makes the tent fabric glow softly and Libitania can see the black skeletal silhouettes of the bare trees that surround the tree in an almost constant observant over her. Beyond the flap of the tent, she can see the faint glow of the camp's fire as well as the brownish apparitions of the other tents that circle the campsite, some of their flaps propped open by old tree branches, a warm buttery glow emanating from within themselves. She's wearing a tunic of forest-green, and light grey pants and her feet are bare.
That's right. After she entered Jorrvaskr and delivered Zusa's head to Diamond, she came back here with Nassari and Farkas, because she had nowhere else to go. Farkas came along because he wanted to be with Libby, even when and after he witnessed what she had become.
Looking to her left, she finds Farkas asleep with one arm tucked under his head to substitute for the deflated hay pillow. His hair is a tousled mess, and a soft snore rattles his breath as he inhales. When in sleep his face is so much softer and at ease. He gives off such a sense of peace that his features become smooth like marble.
Libitania has to refrain from touching him since she doesn't want to disturb Farkas with her shaking fingers. She clutches them to her chest and tries to slow her heartbeat and breathing. Tucking her knees to her chest, Libitana wraps her arms around her legs and begins to rock herself back and forth in an attempt to calm herself.
She still remembers it, clear as crystal, and yet, she doesn't feel like it was really her. More like a wild beast wearing her skin. Just like Cidhna Mines. Just like Glenmoril Coven. She wasn't really thinking, more like running off of an instinct that she can't name.
She didn't expect Diamond to be with Malick; that was the only thing she wasn't prepared for. But it didn't matter. Now that Zusa and the prince are dead, there's really nothing left for her to do. There's really no reason to be Libitania Desidenius anymore. She can't go back to the Guild, not after everything she's done. She'd crossed every line that she wasn't supposed to. She disregarded everything the Guild, and her father stood for.
Under her fingernails, she can still see bits of Zusa's dried blood. The battle was, easy. So much that both she and Zusa were surprised when Libitania blocked every move, made every swipe draw blood, and taunted her silently with the maddening ease of how Zusa could not lay a single hit. After her blade was thoroughly bloodied, and after Zusa was kneeling on the floor with a fair sized puddle of blood under her knees, Libitania dropped her blades and resorted to fists and feet.
Sometimes they are more satisfying. And every time her fist ached from connecting to Zusa's pretty little face, the satisfactory was almost orgasmic. She made Zusa pay, far more than she did with the prince. Then when she strolled into the dining room, holding Zusa's head, the remaining members were quiet, but then erupted into cheers and roars of freedom. She let the members spit on her corpse, let them destroyed the entirety of that mansion until fires started to devour the thresholds, the carpets, the furniture. Some members swung from the chandeliers, destroyed even the tiniest possession Zusa owned before they fled the premises; some even ripping off their wrappings and running stark naked through the forest.
Before she went to Jorrvaskr, she stopped by the bank to request a transfer of Zusa's money to each of the members of the Faceless, and when the teller saw Zusa's head in her hand, he didn't ask one question, just asked how much she wanted to each account. Libitania gave it all to each of the members.
She didn't want Zusa's money; but perhaps the rebels would. She brought the sum of money to the camp after leaving Diamond with the head, and again, no one asked any questions.
A loud snore from Farkas makes her jerk her head towards him, even let herself laugh a little. Seeing him now so quiet and with even breathing, Libitania doesn't dare make even the slightest notion to touch him. So she rocks herself back and forth, trying to silence her ragged breathing. Her tent soon feels like a prison cell. If she doesn't get air soon, she fears she's going to scream once more.
As quietly as she can, Libitania pushes to her feet and snatches her boots and jacket that lie sprawled next to her bedroll and pushes through the flap of the tent and out into the crisp, chilled air of oncoming dawn.
Her maneuver wasn't silent enough, as the cold wind swept over Farkas' face and he reacts with a squeezing of his eyes before fluttering them open and finding Libitania's bedroll empty and the flap of the tent wavering slightly.
"Libby?"
Libitania runs down a forest trail and down towards a river close to the campsite. At first glance at her, some random traveler would think with her speed that she's trying to escape from someone. But Libitania isn't looking for escape, only to fill her lungs with air. She wants to be out in the open and see the sky and the moon.
Finally she sees the surface of the water as it ripples in the breeze, disorienting the reflection of the moon's light. She slows her pace as she approaches; the tip of her nose she assumes is already starting to redden as it becomes runny and she has to sniffle. Her face numbed from the wind, Libitania takes a seat on the stump of an old tree cut down years ago. Catching her breath, the assassin haunches forward, elbows to her knees and fingers interlocked in the middle. Her jacket isn't enough to stop her shivering or prevent gooses bumps form crawling their way along her arms and legs, the feeling being similar to ants.
Drawing her dagger free, the entire weapon made of ebony steel and one side serrated while another is smooth, Libitania grips it rightly in one hand as she muscles clench tight against the cold. She may be cold and winded, but she won't let a pack of wild dogs mistake her for being easy prey.
Alone with only her thoughts, Libitania begins to make her gaze go vacant as she drifts off.
She doesn't know what to do. Now that she's free, now that she's killed the Prince and Zusa, now that she's been pardoned for everything she's ever done, what is she to do? The prince and Zusa were all that was left for Libitania. She didn't think of a plan after this, she didn't even think she would see the light of another day again.
Now she's camping with rebels she doesn't exactly fully support, she still has lost her once closest friend, and she's refusing herself to go home. What is she to do with her life now? Join the rebels? She still feels as useless as she did before. Her will to even want to start a new life, away from Skyrim and away from blades and daggers and poison is gone now. She could just be as useless as the rock beneath her.
What is she to do with Farkas? He still loves her, he claims, even after what he had watched her become. But he still doesn't know her, and Libitania can sense an underlying issue between them. And unspoken conversation that just the thought of makes Libby's stomach turn.
Leaning over to see her reflection in the water, Libitania can see another thing that makes her confused as to why Farkas could still somehow love her. She isn't the same ruthless woman that probably would've made a better leader than the one Libitania sees staring back at her. The scar on her left eye is still grossly vivid, and forever will be should she not go and see an expert healer.
She studies the outline of her ebony hair and wan features. Her gaze lingers on the gain dark half-circles etched under each eye.
For a moment, it's as though she can't place his own face. A stranger, too thin, too pale, stares back at her, withered-looking, like a plant in need of sunlight. These days, it was getting harder and harder to tell what was real and not.
As the water settles down with the velvet touch of the wind, Libitania can see a silhouette of a mass in the water. She squints her eyes and leans closer and it isn't until she sees the color of skin morph into the mass does she realize that it's on the surface of the water.
Whirling her head around, she finds Farkas wrapped in a quilt with his long-sleeved tunic and loose trousers underneath. On his other arm he holds another blanket. His hair a tousled mess and drooping to his shoulders. Libitania just stares at him despite the glare her features are giving off.
"I thought I'd find you here." Farkas says softly with a small smile.
Libitania's eyes flick from Farkas' face to the blanket and then back before she turns her head to face the water again. "I couldn't sleep." she mumbles.
"Another bad dream?" Farkas assumes.
She nods and rests his chin on his knees.
"That's the third time this week." he says as he walks over to the assassin. He takes the blanket and drapes it around her shoulders, Libitania slightly cringing before relaxing. She'd lost track of the days. Has Kodlak's funeral already proceeded? She's been so lost in feeing her anger for vengeance she didn't know. But Farkas would've told her by now.
She should get up, move around, work the stiffness from her joints, but instead she merely sits as motionless as the stump beneath her. Farkas pets her head and moves to sit next to the tree stump on the ground. "Are you okay?" he asks.
"No, not really." Libitania replies with a shake of her head.
"Are you sure you don't want any of those sleeping pills –"
"No." she stops him abruptly.
She knows what he's referring to. A female Dunmer bandit is apparently an old apprentice of a healer, but she has since joined the supporters of Erelia and the mutineers in against the Stormcloaks and the Empire. She has the capability to heal the wounded, as she had done many times in the past, and had lately become the doctor of the rebel group.
She has spent the better part of their traveling concocting up potions and spells by using natural ingredients all around them such as flowers and spices and poison plants. She had managed to make a form of sleeping pill created by the nectar of a honeysuckle for sweet taste and the calming components of chamomile flowers. But when Libitania tried a sleeping pill, it had only created hallucinations and nightmares brought on by the memories of her past.
Since then, she had refused them, as they had left a bad taste in not only her mouth but her mind too. The Dunmer insisted they are free of any elements that induce nightmares, but Libitania still refused to take it and even with her reasons not being so strong.
Farkas sighs and leans back, resting on his hands as he tilts his head up to the sky. "You want to talk about it?" he asks.
Libitania huddles into the quilt, finally taking notice that it was even there. She shakes her head. "Not yet."
"Any reason why? You've never hesitated before." Farkas says.
She looks to him and there's a familiar hardness in his eyes that Farkas has watched her put up when she's closing herself off. "I'm just not ready."
Farkas' throat tightens and he has to clear his throat to rid the feeling. "Oh."
He reaches up and manages to grasp Libitania's fingers as they were tracing around the toe of her boot. "You know I'm here for you, right?" he softly speaks.
"I know." A flat reply.
"I'm honestly surprised. I thought after you killed both Zusa and the prince, I thought you'd be, happier."
"Me too."
Unable to take the her stiffly responses, Farkas gets up and rounds to her front. There he takes Libtiania's face in his hands and leans in, placing his lips on hers. He can immediately feel her slowly start to unwind like a tension coil as she lowers her knees to the ground, giving Farkas more space to lean in. Libitania tilts his head to deepen the kiss and sighs into Farkas' mouth. Breaking apart, he rests his forehead against hers, and for a moment and he can hear the woman draw in a shaky breath.
"You should get some sleep." she mumbles.
Farkas can't help but quietly laugh. "As should you."
"That's easier said than done."
"Is there any way I can help?" Farkas smiles.
Libitania gives a small smile back, and that affection alone is enough to make Farkas feel like the richest man in the world. As he sees the assassin come up with an idea in his head, Farkas helps him off the stump. All of Libitania's joints complain and her right leg has been coiled tight for so long that it takes several minutes of pacing before the pins-and-needles sensation dwindles away. According to the sky, dawn is nearly approaching as the two walk back to the camp, Farkas keeping a warm hand on the small of her back.
Back at the camp, they see some of the rebels exchange shifts to watch over the campsite. Farkas gives one Orc a nod as they pass by, Libitania keeping her gaze low as they make a beeline for their tent.
Once behind the tarp curtain, she casts aside her jacket, but keeps the quilt. Without exchanging words, Farkas moves his bedroll closer to hers and they both snuggle down together draping their blankets over.
Libitania scoots closer to Farkas and wraps her arms around his torso in an embrace. Farkas hugs her back and breathes into the crook of her neck. "How about tomorrow we go hunting together?" he says as she rests her head on his chest.
"I'd like that." Libitania says, and Farkas can tell she is smiling.
"Try to get some sleep. Okay?" Farkas pats her back and gives a kiss on her forehead as she settles down in his arms. Libitania hand grips Farkas and she strokes his forefinger with her thumb.
As she lets Farkas' scent inhale into her nose, Libitania catches herself wishing she had taken advantage of being alone with Farkas. Time and again she's had to fight the urge to confess to Farkas about, everything. Diamond would've been the first person, but now she's shut Libitania out forever. There's Nassari, but for some reason that she won't question, Libitania can only trust Farkas with this information. She's tired of lying. She's tired of keeping herself locked in her own purgatory of gaining and losing.
"What's your deepest secret?" she suddenly asks.
She feels Farkas shift and she angles her head to find him staring at her. He blinks, raises his brows but clears his throat. "The only secret I've borne my entire life is my beastblood. That is something I shall go my entire life without voicing. And that I love you. I was afraid that would be another secret that would follow me to my grave."
"How?" She asks softly. "How can you still love me when you saw how dark I can become."
"They might call me a fool, but I see beauty in your darkness. And the pain that I felt after I nearly lost you, I never want to do through that pain again." Farkas says. Libitania burrows into his neck, sighing deeply. "What is yours?"
The tent feels too small, the air too thick. She closes her eyes. It takes her a minute, and more nerve than she realized, but the answer finally came. It has always been there—whispering to her in her sleep, behind every breath, a dark weight that she couldn't ever escape.
"Deep down," she says, "I'm a coward."
His brows rose.
"I'm a coward," she repeats. "And I'm scared. I'm scared all the time. Always."
He removes her hand from his cheek to kiss the tips of her fingers. "I get scared, too," he murmurs onto her skin. "But you want to hear something ridiculous? Whenever I'm scared, whenever I feel nervous, whenever I feel alone, I remember that I have you."
Now it is Libby's turn to blinks.
"I remember that I have you, that you love me. And I remember that I still have something worth fighting for. Something to live for."
"I like that." She whispers. "Thank you Farkas."
After a moment, she speaks up again.
"I guess it's just, I don't know what to do with myself anymore. I had a purpose with the prince and Zusa still alive. Now that they're dead and Kodlak avenged, I just . . . don't see a point in being Libitania anymore."
"You always said you wanted to be free. It's not what you expected?" he asks.
"I didn't expect to lose my best friend. I didn't expect to lose my house or my servants. I didn't expect Kodlak to be dead, I just –" her voice hitches.
"Libitania, none of that is your fault."
"Then why does it hurt so bad?" she whimpers. "I had a purpose."
"Can't you go back to the Guild?"
"Not after everything I've done."
"Some family." Farkas bites bitterly.
"It's not them, Farkas, it's me. I'm not the girl I used to be. I've been so caught in my life as an assassin, that I had practically abandoned my life, and my father's life as a thief. And with the blood I've shed, the people I've killed, I feel like it would almost be a violation to go back to the Guild."
Farkas' hand lifts and tentatively touches the scar on her left eye. The scar inflicted upon her by Diamond. Just the thought alone makes his eyes harden with a need for vengeance.
"We could run away."
Libby lifts her head to him.
"We could. Just you and me. After Kodlak's funeral tomorrow, I'll collect my things and we could leave."
"We can't do that." She states.
"Why not? There's nothing left to hold you hear –"
"We just can't."
Farkas sighs and pulls back slightly, the notion making her nervous. "You know, there's nothing wrong if you just admit that this is about Diamond. Or is this about Erelia?"
Her heart skips a beat.
Farkas goes on. "I know you care for Diamond, Libitania, but she does not care for you anymore. She doesn't deserve you. She is childish and impulsive and still too inexperienced to know right from wrong."
"Farkas,"
"She sent you to the dungeons, to death with no sympathy with what you had just experienced." He pushes further.
"She was just upset. She didn't know what to think and what to believe."
"You can't keep making excuses for her, Libitania." Farkas says, straining to make his voice quiet. "Why can't you see your own denial. Sometimes people aren't worth keeping."
Libitania shakes her head and lowers her gaze.
"You avoid my eyes because you know it's true."
Libitania swallows hard. "I lost her because I wasn't truthful. My lies led her to not trusting me, and jumping to conclusions. While it is true she needs better judgment, it was my own upbringing."
"How can you say that about yourself?"
"I've been lying my whole life Farkas. It's a sickness that I need to quench, but that would mean facing my past and . . . I just can't yet. I'm a coward." She reiterates.
"Look Libby, it's obvious that something more happened when you were young. And admitting it is the first step. And there's no rush. When you're good and ready to tell me the truth, you'll do it. And no matter what it is, when that day comes, I'll be honored that you trust me enough to do so. But until then, it's not my business, and it's not Diamond's business. It's not anyone's business but your own."
She doesn't know what it is – or perhaps she does – but lately she's been wanting Farkas more and more. After confessing their love to one another, it has come to Libitania's attention on how Farkas' kisses alone are almost not enough to sustain the hunger that lingers deep inside her. A hunger for him.
"I can't leave. And there's more to this than just Diamond." She retorts. "And I won't let you abandon your guild."
Farkas chuckles, a tickle of breath on her mouth. "It is no longer my Guild. I don't want anything to do with that place anymore."
"What –?"
"It's not a good fit. Not anymore. After watching them cowardly stand aside after letting you get hauled off, after what Diamond had done, I can't stand to be in the confounds of that place anymore."
"You've lived there your whole life, how could you so easily let it go?"
"Because they let you go."
"Farkas, you can't just drop everything for me. You love your country."
"I love you, Libitania." A chill climbs up Libitania's spine. "And it's not something so sudden. After Kodalk's death, and after seeing where my brother's loyalty lies with that dumb blonde –"
"Farkas."
"Sorry. It just, doesn't feel the same as it did. It'll be a new beginning for the both of us. After Kodlak's funeral, and after you finish whatever else it is you need to do, we can leave."
"You mean it?"
"Whenever you're ready to leave."
"I don't know." She sighs.
"I'm in no rush. Besides, you do have other houses around Skyrim. I've grown so used to your fineries that I've become soft." Farkas chuckles, tickling her side. Libitania squirms, but allow a giggle.
"And that's my fault?"
"All that and more." He says, kissing her lips.
Neither of them say much after that, Libitania filling in the silence with small bits of what she has to get finished, such as electing a new Guild Leader, making sure Nassari is in good hands before she leaves, and making sure she can rake together enough money off of selling her houses. By the time she glances up to Farkas, his eyes have already closed in sleep and his breathing deep and even.
Farkas had told her to go back to sleep. Now that she is wide awake, Libitania begins to doubt if she will ever know true rest again. Not with her thoughts bothering her like a hive of bees.
Still, she closes her eyes and finds sleep.
