Kitchen of the Beauty
77 Spring 218
Talith
Pain. Suffer. Pain. Suffer. Pain. Suffer.
The feeling was no longer pulling at the back of his mind. The ever present feeling that he had lived with for so long - the feeling that he believed was a natural, everlasting sensation in his existence, was no more. Sure, he still had his past as well as the pain with it that he carried, but the feeling of something more, something darker, was gone. It felt liberating, but also despairing. The absence of this suffering also meant the absence of his sister, Vivian.
That fool.
She had sacrificed herself to free him of The Suffering, yet in doing so, only completed the entity’s endeavor of becoming a full god. Did this make her a hero, the one Talith had always envisioned? The answer, of course, had become obvious now. Still, these were thoughts he would have to put aside for now. It hadn’t been long since his awakening and since then, he felt as though he had no time to breathe nor process previous and current events unfolding before his very eyes. At the very least, he could be thankful to be alive and be reunited with familiar faces. Though, the reunion did nothing to help his fatigue, aching body, nor the pit in his stomach that could only be satiated through proper nourishment.
Ever since his awakening, Astarael had been his main source of comfort as he felt he was clinging to her like a lost puppy with nowhere else to go, lost in unfamiliar lands. That said, it was only minutes prior that Astarael had left him to speak with the captain, a woman who he’d yet to meet. As mentally drained as he was, despite his need to lay down to process everything while he had a moment alone, his stomach protested, beckoning his survival instincts to search for food. He hadn’t even realized how hungry he was until Astarael had left him. For that matter, he had no idea how long it had been since the last time he ate. Did he even eat at all during his time as this Suffering? If so, did he eat proper food or something else…? It was a thought he didn’t want to dwell on. And so, he ever so slowly stood to his feet and began to wander towards where he hoped the kitchen would be. Along with every movement towards the kitchen, a heavy, jarring sensation latched to various bruises throughout his body.
It wasn’t long before he had finally managed to find the kitchen. While the smell of the open waters was a foreign one, the kitchen was not. Had he been relying on the sense of sight more than smell, he would have stopped in his tracks the second the kitchen came into view. However, his vision already felt as though it was lagging behind his mind, and he only saw a dwarf complaining about some potatoes - potatoes that Talith would happily eat if the dwarf wasn’t going to use them. To his dismay, one girl, a familiar one, went completely unnoticed until it was too late.
Vanja sat on a stool alone with the dwarf. It took Talith a moment before he realized that her clothes seemed to be the wrong fit. She looked like a little girl attempting to fit into her mother’s clothes. It was a second longer that Talith noticed it wasn’t just that the clothes looked too big, it was that Vanja looked smaller. He couldn’t help but see a small, miserable, pathetic child seemingly clinging to food as though it were her last - an orphan. This wasn’t the Vanja he remembered, not clearly at least. Regardless, this was the last place he wanted to be. Talith was not ready to confront Vanja, not yet. It was too late. Talith had already made plenty of noise while dragging his reluctant body into the kitchen, and the miserable girl, once known as Vanja, had taken notice.
Vanja
Vanja hadn’t eaten a meal with the rest of the crew since the fateful supper when she admitted her betrayal. She was always hungry, though. Her stomach churning constantly with the motion of the ship, feeling as if it was eating itself.
She’d seen this sort of thing before, in her village. Men returning emptyhanded from weeks of hunting, having survived on snowmelt and pine tea who couldn’t fill their bellies without vomiting. On the streets of Dusttown, too. Children who became sick when they had the rare chance to eat as much as they liked, their parents fretting about poison.
At first, she would enter the kitchen quietly, asking for food in the formal, respectful way that she’d adopted with Athelia’s crewmen. Now, though, with York having supplied her with what foods doubled as medicines, and a set of sharp carving knives, Vanja sometimes stayed for a while. She rarely talked, but York’s low Dwarven mumble mixing with the smell of roasting potatoes reminded her, painfully, joyfully, of her childhood.
York grumbles about a barrel of spoiled potatoes, already prepared and now gone to waste, and Vanja says something in low Jorungun - the same language, but with her Northern cadence, before switching to the common language of Isendel to finish her sentence, “—by magic, you know. Det smak kjedelja. It’s not good, but you could always add salt or something, I don’t know. I was just offering. On days where we don’t fight a dozen monsters, of course.”
York doesn’t respond, distracted by something, and Vanja follows his gaze to the door of the kitchen. At the sight of Talith, a thrill of adrenaline - of fear and Riverlight - floods through her system. She’s not safe, here. She jumps down from the stool, her body ready to run or fight even as she remembers Ethan’s words - the reassurance that he and Roux were certain Talith was himself and no longer the thing that had visited her only a few nights past.
From the corner of the room, York’s thick voice, “Tch. Know better’n that girl. Gotta sit. Gotta wait for it to settle.”
Vanja glances at the stout cook and swallows back her protest as she settles herself back on the stool, locking her heels in an upper rung and resting her arms on her knees. From this angle, she can see the bones of her wrist, clearly defined even under the black runework of her tattoos. She flexes her hand, irritated by her own weakness, and then looks up at Talith.
“Hei,” she says, offering a smile, “I’m sorry about before, in the infirmary. I’ve been…” she pauses, “under a lot of stress, lately. And seeing you again after you’d…not that it was even you. When you were controlled by that darkness…it isn’t as if it was your fault,” She looks down at her hands again, tilting the nearly empty wooden bowl absently. “I was scared. And then when Astarael showed up.” Vanja laughs a little, but it’s a humorless thing, “I got defensive.”
Talith
He thought he was about to die. Vanja’s sudden jump from her stool - his first instinct was that she’d run him through, out of fear or survival instinct, with whatever she could get her hands on. The ever so brief sensation jolting through his body wasn’t fear, but a sense of atonement for what he had done. Despite only recently coming to, he was already accepting his death, giving his current state physically and mentally. Just as quickly as the sensation had come, it was replaced by one of confusion. At the words of the dwarf, Vanja had seemingly regained her composure, or something of the sort, and had overcome whatever her initial instincts were. Truth be told, Talith hadn’t the faintest idea what to expect from Vanja. It was as if he were meeting, no, threatening a complete stranger and accidentally cornered them with nowhere to run.
After a moment, she spoke. Her words cautious, yet singed with anxiety as they almost trembled from her lips. Though, it was only the manner of her words that he seemed to hear, but not her articulation. The words themself were lost on him, for it was her smile that seemed to communicate more than the words ever could. It wasn’t something he could put into words himself, but he couldn’t help but feel her smile was false. It was a sensation similar to being able to feel tension in the air. The girl seemed tense, of course, but beneath that was a much deeper layer - Vanja was hurting. Sure, she wore the smile, but the absence of joy that once gleamed in her eyes now betrayed her. And it was at this moment that Talith found it difficult to look Vanja in the eyes. He wasn’t ready for this, not yet at least, yet here he was. Despite this unexpected encounter and his body’s unwillingness to cooperate, simply turning to leave wouldn’t help the situation. He knew he’d eventually have to confront her, and it seemed fate had decided that the moment would come sooner rather than later. In an attempt to regain his own thoughts, to regain order in his mind, he let out a sigh before drifting his eyes back to the girl’s face. He wasn’t sure how to correct the situation nor how to console his stranger of a friend, yet he had to say something. He hoped with all his being that the right words would come out, that emotion and instinct would take over to guide them.
“Vanja.” His words seemed to warm and soften. “I hold nothing against you. Your reactions as well as your instincts towards me are justified.” Talith leans his shoulder against the doorframe, an attempt to support the weight of his own body.
“Were I to see my mother or father, and by some miracle, they were suddenly the most loving, most gentle people in all the lands, I would still shudder at the very sight of them.”
A beat passes by as Talith ponders, his eyes now sail to the dwarf and back to the girl..
“Vanja, I can only imagine the stress you’re under right now.” His words sympathetic. “Would you like me to leave?”
Vanja
Vanja sets her bowl down on a shelf behind her, ignoring the grunt of annoyance from York. She shakes her head, “No, please stay. Grab something to eat.” She gestures at the prep table that takes up most of the space in the cramped room, “There’s potatoes a few different ways - I think Ethan made some of them. And soup.” She shrugs, “Well, broth.” She looks Talith up and down with a critical eye, “wherever you were, you weren’t starved, at least, so York might even let you have bread.”
There is more muttering from the cook, then a comment about the garden. York gives a small nod to Vanja as he leaves the room.
Vanja looks back at Talith, searching automatically for signs of injury. “How are you feeling?” Vanja asks, at last. “Any injury, besides whatever’s leftover from when I…” she cuts herself off and changes her words, “when we were all on deck the other day?” She indicates his general form with a wave of the hand, “Whatever you went through seems to have taken a fair amount out of you, but are you alright, physically at least?”
Talith
After a moment of hesitation, Talith makes his way to the prep table, every few steps a creaking sound from the wooden boards beneath him would accompany his boots. He grabbed the nearest ladle before dipping it into the soup and transferring it to his bowl.
“Well… to be honest -” He grabs a potato and meticulously places it into the soup, allowing it to gently rest at the bottom. Right now, this looked just as good as any meal he’d ever had at the Petriar Estate and the potato would be perfect after a bit of soaking. “I’m just happy - well, surprised, really, to be alive.”
Wood continues to moan and creak beneath him, he forgoes grabbing a stool and instead, finds a spot on the floor, against the wall roughly five feet down from Vanja, and leans his back against it to add support to his body.
“Of course, I would be lying if I said I feel vigorous.” He digs his spoon into the soup, sailing it around the potato before submerging it. “Actually, it would be more accurate to say I feel like shit.”
Vanja
“That’s good to hear,” Vanja says, then she laughs. A genuine thing that seems to surprise her, “Not that you feel like shit, but that you’re, you know, alive enough to feel it. And that you seem to be… yourself.”
She looks down at where he’s sitting on the floor. He does seem to be Talith. There was no evidence of that dark thing that had his form and tried to pull her deeper into her own depression and grief.
Her suffering.
He’d said she was suffering.
“You are yourself, right?” Vanja says. She kicks her foot good-naturedly in his direction. “Because I’ve been fooled before! Roux died and then came back just fine, but Bax didn’t die and yet came back different…” she scoffs. “And I was certain you were dead. Even held a little memorial for you, with Astarael. Might have been the most friendly conversation she and I have ever had, I think.”
Silence, for a moment.
Vanja hesitates, but then pushes through the awkward pause. “How…do you know how you came back at all? Because we didn’t even have your body and yet—”
She looks away, pulling her braid over her shoulder, shielding her blind side - a self-conscious, automatic thing now. “I’ve lost a lot of people,” she says, quietly, “and I know we all have, but even before you came back whole, your sister was still here. We saw her, sometimes. I…” She blinks, hard, “I know she’s dead, but there was something of her left. Something that was connected to you, right? How did you get her to come around?” Vanja speaks quickly, stumbling over her own speech, “And you mentioned your parents? Did they used to visit, too? Even as shades or… I just…” She takes a deep, steadying breath, filling her lungs with air scented of salt and roasted potatoes, so like her home. A wave of grief fills her stomach. “I wish I could talk to them again. My brothers. My parents.”
Talith
At the mention of Roux and Bax, Talith’s eyebrows slightly furrow as he takes another sip from his spoon. “Yeah… I heard about that.” Talith drops the spoon to rest on the edge of the bowl, a subtle knocking sound of wood following suit. “Rest assured, as far as I can tell, I am myself—” He took a moment to contemplate his next words carefully. He was well aware of his visiting Vanja as the suffering now as well as the fact that as Vivian, now the full fledged suffering, would likely do the same. Though, he soon realized that in his moment of silence, he’d taken to long to continue the thought, and Vanja already began to weave together her next words.
Initially, at the mention of Talith not having a body, he struggled to keep up - not quite being able to grasp her meaning. This quickly washed away as her words carried on. Talith’s previous suspicions of Vanja and The Suffering, were now beginning to burn more than before. He listened intently as she seemed to occasionally stumble over her own words, occasionally cutting herself off. It had reminded him of his own past - reminded him of the many times he sought answers or tried to explain unexplainable details to his friends due to the awkwardness of anxiety, fear, and the lack of knowledge. His words were often jumbled together out of desperation to make someone understand. Though, this wasn’t exactly the same, the awkwardness of anxiety and fear were still present, dragging the words out of her mouth before her mind could resist, or so he believed.
Beyond her speech pattern, there was another underlying message, one that he could perceive as much more concerning. While her questions did seem to revolve around himself, his sister, and even his parents, it was more than that. But, what Talith lacked in general intelligence, he made up for in perception. Though she seemed to have questions about his sister, none of them were about her as a person, but rather her death and her reappearance. It was the same when she spoke of himself and it was the same when she spoke of his parents. Though, not of this clicked for Talith until the words left her lips, “I wish I could talk to them again. My brothers. My parents.”
He caught himself lingering in silence once more, dwelling on these thoughts, before he noticed Vanja awkwardly awaiting his response. He did his best to hide his internal scans of the girl, whether or not he was succesful, he was unsure. A deep inhale follwed by a deep exhale ensued as he, ever so gently, placed the bowl on the floor beside him and rested the back of his head against the wall.
“That’s a lot of questions, Vanja.” He lets the back of his head turn along the wall to face her. “But I get it.” He continues. “If I’m being honest, in the past, I would have struggled to tell you what I’m about to tell you now. But, I’ve come a long way since then, and I can’t think of any short answer to give you that won’t beg for more questions and so, I’ll just start from the beginning - I’ll tell you everything I’ve learned.” And so Talith began.
“Before my town burned to the ground, if you were to ask anybody there about the Elinasti family, they’d say the family was one of the happiest one they’d ever been around. Though, that was far from the truth. My parents wore there masks well, and as a result, Vivian and I learned to do the same.
Vivian was well known throughout Aelorean’s Crossing. She had beauty as well as a long line of potential suitors. She didn’t care for any of that though. What she sought was to be the face of hope for those around her, a light in the dark, if you will. She always trained her body, read books, and competed in the more physical events held in our town.” He lets out a chuckle. “Believe it or not, she and Ethan’s brother used to be rivals, maybe even more. Even with all of this, she still managed to find time to help with the elderly, feed the homeless, and honestly, be wherever and whenever she was needed to lend a helping hand. She managed to do all of this daily while wearing a bright, warming smile on her face - not even her eyes seemed to betray her smile.” We did have a curfew, however. I mean, what type of perfect family wouldn’t give their children a curfew?’ Talith pauses for a moment, shifting his weight accompanied by a wince before continuing.
“Though I wasn’t aware until after her death, our curfew was a time to come home for dinner and rest, but a time to fear and dread. Vivian, being the elder of us, got to experience this dread well before I did. Two to three nights a week, my parents tortured her for years. One night, Vivian simply vanished at the age of fifteen. Though I didn’t quite understand it at the time, I was only eight, Vivian ran away. For years, I hated her for leaving, yet still wanted her to come back. Now, of course, I know what happened. My parents murdered her, though they put on an excellent show to the village acting as though they were worried parents searching for their runaway daughter. Although I was only eight, it was my turned next. I quickly learned why my sister had always been late to bed. Just like her, for years, I was tortured by my parents.” He hesitates for a moment. “I won’t go into the details of our torment, but I found out much later why my parents did what they did. Turns out, they were cultists looking to bring about a new god - a god known as The Suffering, and the method to bringing about the birth of such god is its name. Originally, Vivian was supposed to inherit the god in the process, but she didn’t make it. In my parent’s eyes, that’s where I came in.”
“It was after I found the courage to flee my town with my friends, when the swans attacked, that I began to receive visions, sometimes confused with dreams, of my sister and not my sister at the same time, reaching out to me. She would appear to me as her, but in a monster-like shape, a grotesque form. At the time, the only word she, no, it could manage to say, was my name. Even that was difficult for it. Eventually, after we took back Alorean’s Crossing from the Swans, I decided to go back to my home and confront my mother. When I arrived, I found my father’s mangled body, and on the ceiling, just above an altar, stood my mother as if she were standing on the floor. She too, now possessed a grotesque form. She attempted to lure me in, but I fought back, though to no avail. As she had me pinned with unnatural strength, I desperately reached for the nearest object I could grab. Seemingly out of nowhere, felt the hilt of a sword in my hand and instinctively drove it through my mother’s ear, finally slaying her. As I rose to my feet, I noticed something stained on the flooor. It was as if something stood there, but only it’s shadow was faintly visible. It was in that same moment that I saw Vivian, my sister, on the other side of the room to greet me. That was when I learned that she and that sword, the one I still keep today, were one in the same. After I slew my mother, I took her cold, dead—”
That’s when he realized it. He hadn’t seen it since before he had become the Suffering. Talith subconsciously taps his finger on the wooden bowl next to him a couple of times.
“I’m sorry.” He interrupts himself. “It’s a lot to recall.” After another brief sigh, he continues. “At the time, I wanted to believe that since I could now use magic and achieve what was previously thought impossible, that it opened up the possibility of bringing my mother back to life. With new doors opening, it seemed plausible at the time. And so I carried that hope with me for some time…until recently.”
“For a long time, nobody believed that I could see her, despite her reappearing to aid me. I eventually learned there there were two sides to my abilities. Radiant and warmth, which seems to be linked to some of my abilities—” He raises his left palm. “Dark and cold, which are linked to others, such as my ability to summon my sword at will. However, now that Vivian is gone, I can no longer summon my weapon at will.” He reaches out, fingers outstretched as if to pull a sword from its sheath, only to grasp at air instead. “Those abilities are gone. Though, some of my abilities remain. It seems that the ones I still have are the ones that weren’t directly linked to the suffering’s abilities, but rather Vivian’s herself…or maybe my own. She was, after all, studying to become a holy knight through a strange book that I eventually recovered and continued where she left off.
“I’ve recently learned that bringing back the dead through the abilities granted to me through my sister, through the suffering, would never truly allow me to bring anyone back.”
Talith’s eyes dart to Vanja ever so briefly, before casting them back in front of him.
“Through those means, whether someone can be brought back is strictly up to the suffering, and it’s methods to bring one back require immense despair, dread, and suffering to others. Even after all of that, the one brought back is trapped in the form they took before death and they remain unable to fully be happy - unable to truly enjoy life.”
“So as of now—” Talith slowly lifts himself up to a standing position. “I now know more of the truth behind the Suffering. When my sister died, that birthed half of the Suffering, an incomplete god, which existed within my sister after death, allowing her to come back in an ethereal form through its power. Throughout my travels, we still seemed to encounter the Suffering aside from my sister. I now know that that version of it was it’s other half. I can only surmise that the other half came about through my mother. She had taken on a grotesque form that I’ve only ever seen brought about through the suffering. When I slew her, that was when I saw that empty shadow on the floor, which now seems to be the other half that left my mother. At the time, it was much, much weaker and incomplete. Whenever we would encounter the Suffering in the past, my sister was never present, not even to me. That can only lead me to believe that the other half must have used my sister’s half in order to sustain itself until we defeated whatever abomination it possessed, such as that grotesque mesh of corpses that Sav, Astarael, and I once fought in the tunnels beneath Northgate. Ultimately, that other half managed to take hold of me as I was being tortured through the swans. My torture very likely made it easier for it to manifest itself in me before merging completely. And then, when you all defeated me in battle here on this ship, Vivian sacrificed herself to absorb the half of the Suffering within me—” His eyes drift to the floor. “I could feel it leaving me when it happened, along with my sister. And now. Both incomplete halves have come together within Vivian to form a whole, complete god known as The Suffering - and it only continues to grow stronger through the manipulation of others and their torment.
“So, let me reassure once more. The suffering no longer seems to have a presence within me. I am Talith Elinasti. I am myself.”
Talith’s eyes avert once more to Vanja, his eyes meeting hers.
“Are you?”
Vanja
Vanja catches Talith’s gaze, but looks away, down and back at her hands. Bax’s eyepatch is wrapped around her wrist, and she worries the end of the strap between her fingers, focusing on the action and how the cord tightened when she pulled, cutting into the skin of her wrist.
“It was your parents who worshipped this thing? The Suffering?” She pulls at the eye patch again, twisting the loose end around her thumb. “Det frajtelin,” she says, softly. Without thinking of it, a short prayer of protection escapes her lips. Her mother’s words. A blessing to prevent the spread of bad fortune. “That’s terrible,” she says, at last, to Talith.
“And they…worshipped it by hurting your sister? By hurting you?” It’s a question that doesn’t need an answer - Vanja had been listening closely.
“She’s always looked out for you, then,” Vanja says, speaking to Talith, but not looking at him. Keeping her voice low, “When she was alive, she tried to protect you from your parents, and even after her death, she helped you…rid yourself of your mother. Of the person that caused you both so much pain. And even though she was the suffering herself, she only ever helped you…” She shakes her head and glances at Talith. “It’s the sort of thing my brothers would do. It’s good family, that looks out for one another that way.”
“And even with that battle on the deck, she pulled the Suffering that was in you to her, instead. She gave you this chance, this…second life. Without the Suffering in it.” Vanja tilts her head, taking Talith in with as much of her sight as she has. “She must have loved you very much.
“But you said she’s gone now?” Vanja asks, “You haven’t seen her, even in her…ethereal form since the battle on deck?”
Talith
It was true, his sister had loved him very much. Vivian was the only one that shared his blood, even if only half, that he could truly call his family. She was always the one that took care of him, the way his parents should have.
Talith does his best to take note of Vanja’s response. “Yes, she is gone now. Before, I could always feel a presence, almost in the same way that you might sense when someone is standing near you, or the feeling of knowing when a friend is nearby versus being alone. That presence is now gone. Before, Vivian was still able to maintain a piece of the humanity from before she died. Now however, she is no longer Vivian. Right now, that is The Suffering.”
Talith shifts his weight to favor his left leg, wood protesting beneath him.
“Vanja, as your friend and ally, it’s concerning to me that you haven’t answered my question. I’ll be completely honest with you, I have my suspicions.”
His eyes focus, as if they’re searching, maybe even testing for something.
“I remember seeing and conversing with you through The Suffering’s eyes. This alone concerns me, especially when it involves my friend. Please, answer me. Are you yourself?”
Vanja
Vanja shrugs, and pulls her knees to herself, shrinking smaller perched on the stool. “I’m myself,” she says. “But that’s bad enough.”
She closes her eyes and lets out a long, shaking breath.
“I’m sure you’ve heard by now? Astarael would have told you. Or Ethan.” She opens her eyes, flashing blue and stark, colorless white. “I’m a traitor. I was arrested. I talked.” She swallows hard, clears her throat, continues. “Told them everything they wanted to know. So now the Swans know everything, and no one trusts me. Feels like they can barely stand to be in the same room as me. If I didn’t have this…” she flicks the fingers of her left hand, green Riverlight rising off of the tattoos on her arm. “…Utility, I’m sure I’d be off the ship.”
She laughs a little at this, humorlessly. “I’d leave, too, if I had anywhere else to go. Anyone else. But my last brother is somewhere South, and I’m too weak,” she turns her hand again, dousing the green light, “and too scared to go alone.”
“So I’m…stuck. Trapped here.”
Another small noise like a laugh. “And the thing is, I think I did the right thing. Even with all this,” she gestures at her face, at the ship, “and with how much they all hate me now because of it, I don’t regret it.” She nods, as if confirming it to herself, “The Swans were going to kill those girls, and they were good people. Innocents. They’d done nothing wrong or evil ever. I don’t know that we can say that, any of us.”
She sighs.
“Do you ever think about that? How we’re all killers? How we’re all witches? I mean, has any one of us only ever done any lasting good with this power we have? Anything real and heroic and worthwhile? We are dangerous.” Vanja glances at Talith again, trying to gauge his response, “We’re on our way to the Capitol to do what…rescue another witch? Overthrow the government? Somehow defeat an army that outnumbers us a thousand to one?” She scoffs, “If we can do that, maybe people are right to be afraid of witches.”
Talith
Talith can only stare after Vanja’s questions linger in his mind. These were similar questions that he had asked himself, but had never felt as though he could come up with a definite, final answer. Though, he had now had plenty of time and more experience since he last pondered these philosophical questions, and so, he would give it another shot.
Talith takes a few steps towards Vanja before squatting down, forearms resting over his thighs, hands falling limp in between. He looks up to his friend, a subtle smile at the corners of his lips.
“Vanja, everything you said you did, not a word of it sounds like the actions of a traitor to me. To me, it sounds like there was once a girl who met a strange unique group of travelers with unique abilities similar to her own. Through her travels with these strangers, she began to see them as companions and eventually, friends. Before she knew it, she was thrust into numerous, unfamiliar battles followed by tragic events much different from the life she had grown up to know. Despite this newfound, confusing and daunting life, she still tried her best to stay positive and be there for her friends even if she wasn’t always perfect at it.
“One day, after going through many unfortunate events, she was thrust into custody only to be interrogated and undergo horrors. And as a result, she was met with a difficult choice, neither having the option of being a positive outcome. The girl, who was so suddenly thrown into this new, cruel world, crumbled under the weight of it, but even still, she did her best to think of others. On one hand, she could give up information on her companions, who were in fact experienced combatants, potentially spelling their demise. On the other hand, she could remain silent, without a doubt sealing the fate of innocent lives. The girl was terrified, not just of the torture, but of the weight of her decision as well. Even still, the terrified girl made a choice to the best of her abilities, and as a result, the innocent hearts of the girls still beat today, and so do those of her companions.
“Eventually, the girl was forced to be confronted by the companions who felt wronged by her. As a result, a heavy guilt weighed upon her. Even though she was forced with an unspeakable decision and even though she tried to make the best possible choice, it still wasn’t enough - she felt that ‘she’ wasn’t enough. And so, the guilt and feeling of rejection from her friends manifested itself into another prison, the bars rooted in anxiety, grief, and self-doubt, each property using one another as fuel, making it much more difficult for their prisoner to escape. And now, the girl who was once positive and full of life, sits alone in a cell, rotting away at the mercy of her own thoughts.”
Talith’s eyes seem to drift off, as he were seeing and living in place not on the ship. With a smile still edging his lips, he continues.
“The world that we currently live in, is now one of war. What’s right and what’s wrong, what’s considered a heroic action versus the actions of a murderer - I honestly don’t think I can give a definite answer. All I can say is that every individual’s actions are perceived differently for every onlooker. We’re mortal beings far from perfect. Take my sister for example. She spent much of her time helping the ill best she could. We had many travelers come and go through Aelorean’s Crossing. Some of them would carry wounds, and she would do her best to mend them or at the very least, assist the physician. She was so young, but already helping others. People, myself included, couldn’t help but admire her for her deeds. That said, it’s very likely that one of those wounded people she had helped could have been a thief or a killer who had received their wounds from a mother trying to defend her family. Say a child from that family survived and later found out that Vivian had treated the murder if his family to good health only to be on his way to commit another crime - do you believe that the child would view Vivian with the same admiration that I or the other townsfolk did?
“I don’t believe good and bad people exist. There are people who commit actions, and those actions are judged by an onlooker’s perspective. It’s the onlooker that decides for themselves whether a person is good or bad based on their own morals. I’m sure that those girls that lived because of your decision have a much different perspective of you than some of our companions. So yes, we’re all heroes, we’re all killers, we’re all good people, and we’re all bad people.”
Talith eyes now meet Vanja’s once more, no longer adrift in whatever world they had previously faded into. His tone falls lower, words softening.
“There’s one thing that the girl trapped in her prison still hasn’t realized yet. Her companions, her imperfect friends, stand just on the other side of the bars, and in their outstretched hands, is the key to the cell. She only has to choose to stand up, walk forward, and take it. Once she does, the cell will always remain there behind her, but she will no longer be trapped in it. Instead, she’ll have the key to take control of it. From time to time, she may wander through her past to gaze upon it - a reminder of how far she’s come since that cell, a reminder of her growth, but never as a prisoner.
“Vanja, so long as you continue to stay isolated and let your guilt shape your character, those who already deemed you guilty will only ever see you as such. But, if you look ahead, instead of dwelling on your past mistakes and use your actions to continue being the caring, positive, confident friend that I know you are and you rely on your friends while allowing them to continue to rely on you regardless of what they might think of you, then I promise your feeling of isolation will fade away. Because the reality of the situation is, you’re not alone. All you have to do is move forward and take the key.”
Talith lets his words linger for a few moments, giving Vanja time to absorb them. Well aware that his friend had much to think about, even more so now, he rises to his feet and moves towards the door. About halfway, he stops for one last comment.
“Whether you believe it or not - whether you want to believe it or not, you’re part of our family. Every family has conflict. It’s just simply a fact of life, but you’re family nonetheless. Don’t you ever forget it.”
And with that, he exits.
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