#sorry this is completely incoherent in its verb tense it made sense at the time

[kradogsrats]

oh hey out of nowhere it's 1500 words of Claudiangst, possibly some kind of spiritual sequel to that Viren one from pre-s5

—

Claudia sits on a stone beside the Sea of the Castout, and sharpens her knife.

It’s not quite dawn, and the coming morning promises to be bright and clear—she can almost imagine that it’s just another sunrise in Xadia, and the last few days were a terrible and confusing dream. Maybe even the whole month. The ruined stump below her knee, radiating the dull, persistent ache that was as far as she could reduce the pain with what she had in her satchel, destroys the shelter of that fantasy.

The repeated motion of the blade against stone helps a bit, like her calming mantra once did. There is no synonym for cinnamon, there is no synonym for cinnamon—every stroke a little sharper, a little clearer, a little more deliberate. The soft lapping of the waves against the shore might have done the same, once.

She’d almost drowned. Without the potion, her shifted form hadn’t lasted. She’d kicked desperately toward the surface with one leg while bitter seawater and blood rushed into her lungs. When she finally broke the surface, choking and exhausted, it took everything she had just to stay afloat. There was no way she could swim to shore—only drift, watching the sky slowly darken. At some point, the tears came, hot on her sea-chilled face. By the time she washed up on the rocky beach, she’d been incoherent with pain and grief.

The transformation was also the only thing that kept her from bleeding out—her pentapus limbs fusing back together as they returned to human form had mostly closed the wound. Terry had stripped her out of her soaked clothes and wrapped her in a blanket, her body shivering uncontrollably from cold and shock. He’d bound her leg where it was still oozing blood, and he and Sir Sparklepuff fretted over her late into the night as she alternated between chills and feverish delirium.

She holds the blade up to examine it in the pre-dawn gloom, tilting it to catch whatever light it can. It’s a good knife, slim and elegant and curved. It has always been, ever since she found it on the body of a Sunfire elf while picking through the abandoned battlefield. It's far from the least useful thing she's harvested from the dead.

Still, it's not sharp enough. For now.

Wracked with sorrow and fear and pain, she barely slept an hour. But she dreamed.

She'd been back at the center of the sea, standing above it as if it was no more than a puddle. The surface below her was smooth as glass, perfectly reflecting the sky overhead—so overflowing with stars that she couldn't tell if it was night or day. Blood seeped slowly from her leg and dripped into the dark water, lurid in the harsh light, ripples spreading out of sight.

Aaravos’s voice came to her, echoing from every direction. Soft as a whisper, but vibrating through her bones like thunder. We are all stardust, bound together only by love.

She spun, foolishly hoping to see him there. If she could just plead her case to him—she could do better. She would do better. She'd been foolish, thinking her old friends would understand her. Sentimental. She wouldn't make the same mistake again.

There was no one. She was alone between twin tapestries of stars, indistinguishable save for the red ripples that faintly disturbed the one below.

Someone once thought those words would comfort me. Do they comfort you?

“No,” she said. Her voice cracked. “They don’t.”

I thought not. Soft laughter, the kind of indulgent chuckle where it was impossible to tell if you were being laughed with or at—not cruel, but indisputably superior. They did not comfort me either, but I can give you something that might.

Her mouth trembled, eyes burning. She wanted so badly to be wrong, for him to have lied to her, for there to somehow be another chance. “You already said there's no way to bring him back a second time.”

All that could hold him here is cut loose. He is beyond your reach, now.

She couldn't stop her tears, but gulped in a breath and held it to keep from sobbing. It was her fault. She had failed. If she’d only—

If Ezran had just told her where the prison was—

If Callum hadn’t been so stubborn about bringing the baby Archdragon to Xadia—

If Soren had would have killed the elf back when she'd feigned sleep in that stupid, beautiful moonlit garden—if she'd made him, instead of indulging his stupid, childish sense of sportsmanship and honor—everything would be different. Everything would be fine.

She should have realized then that her brother wasn't on her side. Not really. Not like she'd been on his. Not like she'd always been on their family's side. She'd thought he loved her. She'd thought Callum had loved her, or at least liked her. Even Ezran had abandoned her, now. Everyone was gone. She only had Terry.

But I am not.

And Aaravos.

She breathed, shuddering inhales and exhales as she wiped at her face with her sleeve. "What do you want?"

I'm not the one you should be asking. Search your heart, child—there is still something you want very badly. Something that, with my help, lies within your grasp. If you are strong enough to take it.

She would already have everything she wanted, if she hadn't—if Callum and Ezran and that elf hadn't gotten in the way. If the boys she'd once thought of as her best friends hadn't left her for dead, choking and and bleeding and alone in open water. She'd done a lot of things she wasn't proud of—but she would never do that. Not to someone she cared about. They should have known she wouldn't actually hurt Ez.

She still didn't want to hurt him. Not much.

Callum, though—Callum she wouldn't mind hurting. The elf she'd cheerfully tear apart with her bare hands.

The sky continues to lighten, and she holds up the knife again. It's sharp now, like new—it will cut swift and clean. Traveling Xadia for two years, she'd learned a lot. How sharp a blade had to be, the amount of strength it took to sink it deep enough, where and how to cut. Back in Katolis, it had once sickened her to put her hands around a fawn's fragile neck to save her brother. She'd cried with frustration and shame as she struggled, trying to ignore the creature's panicked bleats and thin, flailing legs. Now, she could cut its throat before it even realized what was happening. Ruthlessly. Mercifully.

It can still be better. She returns to the stone.

Fortunately, you already have something that can give you that strength.

Aaravos had told her what to do. Then she'd been plunged into the blood-red water below her, dragged down into the darkness. She'd fought, reaching toward the receding surface, but she was so deep she couldn't even see the light from the sky. As her strength and breath ran out, everything fading away into a soft, endless black, she thought she felt the brush of fingers against her own.

Sir Sparklepuff had been crouched beside her when she started awake, pawing at her as he stared down into her face from the dark. "Blood!" he croaked, scampering away when she sat up. "Blood, blood of child, bloodied child!"

The eastern sky was beginning to pale by the time she'd dragged herself into her clothes and mixed herself something to bring the pain of her leg down to bearable levels. She'd levered herself upright with her staff, hobble-hopping to a nearby rock. The rocky sand shifted under her with each step, only the staff and her own desperation keeping her from falling. If she went down, she wasn't sure if she'd be able to get up again.

She finally collapsed on the rock, chest heaving with effort from having crossed barely ten paces of beach. Aaravos was right—between exhaustion, pain, and blood loss, she wouldn't be going anywhere without a boost.

Her eyes fell on Terry, a little line of worry creased between his brows even as he slept, snoring lightly. He cared for her so much it made her heart hurt, but so had Callum and Ezran, once. Now she saw that he would only ever hold her back. If she still had those coins, Moonshadow elf would be in the palm of her hand. Even tossing them into the lava beneath Umber Tor, though a waste, might have broken her enough to disrupt whatever sway she held over the boys.

It will be best for both of them for her to leave him behind. Maybe he'll hurt for a while, but he won't see how cruel she can be. How cruel she will be, once she catches up with her prey. Let him remember loving a girl who still hesitated.

The first glimmers of sunlight peek over the horizon, and Sparklepuff is at her side. He gazes up at her adoringly, head resting against her good leg, the pale violet stretch of his throat exposed. The blade is heavy in her hand.

Claudia's knife won't get any sharper. She cuts swift and clean.