& this child i would destroy [semi-open]

[grunehexe]

CHARACTERS: Sieglinde & maybe you
DATE: post-Koltira'ing, 10/11 onward
WARNINGS: angst and mentally unhinged children?
SUMMARY: semi-open log for visitors, etc., when Sieglinde shuts herself in her room to work post run-in with everyone's fav elf

[It had been a while, since she'd been reminded so viscerally of how helpless she was. How weak.

Sieglinde had returned from her encounter with Koltira unharmed, though her familiar had not been so lucky. Isengrim slept the sleep of the drugged, the pits of his eyesockets dark, one leg splinted and bandaged tight. But Sieglinde hasn't slept since then, not really- she hasn't left her desk.

If she could isolate what it was that triggered the frenzy... if she could determine what it was about coffee that made it palatable to ghouls... if she could find a spell that would return a huntsman's heart...

Her own project lay neglected, a cure for the Ultimate Magic... it could wait. She'd let the others wait too long, and look what had happened... Along the way, sleep began to wait. Then food. Then bathing. Days slipped by, she was sure, but she didn't leave the room.

She had everything she needed there.]

Comments

[grunehexe]

[Olivia can't see it, but those first words elicit a reaction. Koltira had... told her? Why- why would he do that? She didn't want anyone to know- it had been bad enough Masamune found out when she'd been forced to call for aid to get back to the town...]

If he told you what happened you would know I am uninjured.

[After a delay, her voice is barely audible through the door.]

I have no need for anything but peace and quiet to complete this formula.

[winces]

I'm not here because of any physical injuries.

[ she had been taught under sieglinde herself, after all. she knows most injuries, the girl is more than capable of healing herself. ]

...I'm here as a friend.

[ it is the first time she says the word here, the first time she makes obvious her intent. since oska, she had fostered a desire to become closer to the other girl, to provide her that companionship her future self seemed lacking in. olivia knows forcing it isn't any better, but there had been a small part of her that had hoped... that perhaps being her "favorite disciple" meant a little more than just that.

quietly, she continues, ]

If you do not wish to talk to me, Sieglinde, I understand. But please talk to someone...

[ she pauses, wondering if this is all just for naught. ]

Someone once told me that I shouldn't overextend myself... that our gifts would be useless if we lost ourselves in the process... that there are others here, and that I should learn to lean on them...

[ do you remember, sieglinde? ]

[grunehexe]

[As a friend? Were they friends, now- since when?

Having her words thrown back in her face hurts more than she thought it might. It makes it harder to argue without outing herself as a hypocrite of the highest caliber.

Leaning on others was supposed to be for other people. People weaker than herself. People who needed help- and she wasn't supposed to need it at all. She was supposed to be different.

Better.

And she wasn't.

She'd thought she was done with this nonsense. With useless, time-wasting emotions. Things she'd been taught all her life she ought to disregard if they stood in the way of her goal.

The tears are hot as they start rolling down her cheeks, escaping her tightly shut eyes no matter how she tried, fingers curling in her skirts and hunching over, unable to continue to pretend to be looking through her makeshift microscope, biting back small sobs in order to attempt to keep them inaudible through the door.

She'd have to reply- just. In a second.]

[winces]

[ maybe she should have taken that as her cue to leave. it would have been easy to, really, having given herself the perfect opportunity to just turn and walk away, the burden of responsibility now on sieglinde's own shoulders, that she should seek the help she wants herself...

but it had never really been about that, about accountability and responsibility and obligation—

and so she remains. silent this time, and a touch more patient.

in the end, it is saffron who breaks the silence, bumping his nose against the wood of the door and pawing at it softly. ]

[grunehexe]

[There was nothing to talk about but her failure. Nothing to admit but the fact that she'd made a mistake, that she'd been wrong, that she hadn't succeeded fast enough.

Who wanted to talk about such things? Shameful, disgraceful things- who didn't want to lock them away? Everyone wants to talk. Was that what they did in the outside world, just- talk?

Putting her face in her hands at least muffles the cries, struggling to regain enough dignity to reply, to tell Olivia to just leave her be. Even if she didn't hate the worry, even if she could appreciate the concern later... she can't now. Not when it was taking all of her energy to stay awake, to keep working, to just stop crying.]

There is nothing to talk about! Why can no one just let me work?

[Let her wallow in her regrets, (if she was going to be this damn helpless still, why had she even unbound her feet in the first place?), focus on her projects.

But as much as Sieglinde didn't want to give any indication that she wished for company, Isengrim has limped to the door, curious at the sound of another creature.

And the familiar knows how to let himself out.]

[winces]

[ the door opens with a low, steady creak. the wood is old, and protesting the tension from both sides, but as soon as isengrim lets them in, saffron does not hesitate to burst through, all curiosity and no sense of tact.

while the animals busy themselves with each other, though, olivia makes a steady beeline for the figure of the young girl, crumpled on her knees as she is on the ground. she does not hesitate to stoop down, envelope sieglinde in her arms, and run a comforting hand over her back.

in her hair, olivia speaks: ]

There is so much more to you than the work you do, Sieglinde. Won't you at least try to see that?

[grunehexe]

[She hates this so much. She hates being so weak as to not be able to control her tears, and she hates not being strong enough, (cruel enough), to refuse comfort, to reject those who sought to do her kindness.

Why was she so weak that she couldn't push those things away?]

There is no point if I cannot accomplish what I set out to do-

[How did people from the Outside World find reasons to exist beyond work or duty? What was there besides that? What use was there in a life lived aimlessly?]

If I cannot do work, then I may as well disappear.

[The last is a barely audible sound, the harshest of whispers.

She knew no one would understand. No one ever did, and she didn't know why.]

[winces]

You shouldn't let your handful of failures discount the many other achievements you've done...

[ similarly, olivia cannot understand how someone so strong, so capable, could be so crippled by her own shortcomings. she can understand it of herself, she who has no discernibly useful skill to offer among them, who is more a burden and a liability to the team than not. but of sieglinde? of someone who has been here since the very beginning, of someone who is already ten times smarter than any adult even in her youth?

she cannot comprehend it, which makes her wonder just how much of that calm, confident face that sieglinde wears is truly herself... if anything, it only makes her arms tighten around the young girl, drawing her closer to her chest. ]

I owe you so much... I know many others here do too.

[grunehexe]

[Humans were such weak creatures. Could she blame this weakness on that, on biology, instead of a failure of the personal kind? The sort of failure that was not fighting Olivia, not petulantly drawing away, not pushing her out or rejecting her kind words. There had never been such things from the Crone- even months after that revelation she still thinks of that woman that way, rather than what she'd found out she was- Mother.

For failure, there was only reminders that she had to do more. Do better.

But she can't put that into words, can't share the stories or the truth, already wrapped up in her lies by admission about her past and still yet hoping that the less she put it to mind and the less she made it into words the easier it will be to forget.

No one understands. Whenever she says what she thinks about this sort of thing... people just told her to take breaks. To rest. To take care of herself. It wasn't what she wanted to hear.

Shoulders hunch, tear drops fall hot and bitter on her stained skirts, on white knuckles clenched in fabric, squeezing her eyes shut as she begins to shake slightly with the force of held back sobs.

Maybe if she didn't say anything, it would be answer enough.]