Next chapter is on the 26th of January.
The girl feels so small in his arms, still in the tattered cloak she'd been in since she came back and the dirty clothes. One eye is shut, swollen a little, while the other remains open, wide as she keeps coughing, the spasms peaking and then flattening out as Fai breaks further with each one.
It's not fair.
It's not fair.
That should be him or he shouldn't be here.
It's all so unfair that she should have to hurt while he is perfectly fine.
The mage swallows, pulling her into his chest and forcing back tears, huddling in on himself, teeth still clenched as he controls his breathing with iron grasp.
Eventually she stills, breathing ragged as she looks up wearily. Her eyes meet his and he gently lowers her down again, understanding the command in it and the veil of stone which has come up over her face with her own tight jaw.
"Mokona-chan. Call Yuuko-san." She asks, voice still stretched too thin as she adjusts herself a little to face the wall where Mokona dutifully projects the witch.
"I'm glad that you made it back." Yuuko says. Her eyes flicker to everyone but Fai feels more than anything that she's talking to him.
He hates it.
He looks down instead, at Sakura, at the princess.
He notices as people begin to speak the way that she seems so distant somehow even with how close they are, as if he's looking down from some height on the girl in his arms.
He can't even feel the weight of her or fully the words that she is speaking.
He knows from a fact that the back of his brain supplies that everything spoken is translated into his language but still the words seem to slip away as if he's underwater. He could grasp them- he thinks- if he tried.
That's distant too now and perhaps that is fine. Perhaps he could drift like this, float away from them, far enough that he couldn't hurt them even with them.
It's quiet as he looks down.
The girl in his lap is the same as the bed, as the floor, as his eyes slide off everything, unthinking, processing nothing.
"Fei-Wang Reed."
The name slices through the silence and he starts a little, lowering his head slightly, unable to fight the guilt and determination he feels at the reminder of what he promised.
Suddenly the full weight of Sakura in his arms and the things he's done crashes down on his awareness.