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There is something fragile in that golden gaze when his trusted confidant entrusts the care of his beloved child to him. Less untouchable, less godlike. More mortal. More desperate. He chooses his words with precision and care, worthy of the weight the title Lord Arbiter has.
And Luuk understands, he truly does. Aemeath is precious to him. His family. One of the few left to claim such a bold connection to him. And now he’s leaving, because his heart is too big for his fallible body, and his mission weighs on him like a guillotine over a head. Every moment he spends with Aemeath playing house, making a home for this young girl, is a moment where he could’ve been walking towards his goal. His life’s purpose.
Rover doesn’t say it, but Luuk doesn’t need to be a professional psychologist to see it. How Aemeath makes him happy, how less lonely he feels with his family at his side. He won’t be able to replace her parents, lost to the Void Storm as they were, but it wasn’t as if he trying to do that. He is her new home, her heart, her shelter, and those foundations they’ve built up for her will start crumbling when he leaves.
That’s where you come in, his companion had told him, two steps left of pleading. It wasn’t an order like he was a double agent anymore, nor was it an honest request. It was more of a matter-of-fact, a statement, like he expected Luuk to be there for Aemeath even when they’d never formally met.
He’s right, of course, because Aemeath is precious to Rover, and Rover is precious to Aemeath. Even if Rover hadn’t addressed it, hadn’t asked him for help, Luuk would’ve tried his best to look after that child he so adores. The man had made far too many enemies already. They’d be salivating to try and find a weakness, an easily-broken link to retaliate. Leading them straight to Startorch Academy was risky, especially with the hotbed of interests, and Rover couldn’t, wouldn’t, cage Aemeath’s freedom without harming her more in the long run.
So he had to leave. Maybe earlier than he’d planned, maybe later than he’d intended. But he had to leave, and Aemeath was better off staying in Lahai-Roi than traveling around and getting caught up in whatever world-saving crises Rover would inevitably run into.
Stability was good for children as young and traumatized as Aemeath. Rover couldn’t provide that; not for long, and not without destroying himself in the process.
In the end, Rover would always choose personal sacrifice over the sacrifice of the mass. That was the type of savior he is. That was the type of person he is. He was the favored lamb that offered its throat up to the shepherd for sacrifice, and in doing so, ensured that the world would be protected, at least for a moment longer.
Luuk had once wanted to tell him that it was fine to not stain the altar entirely with his own blood, that it was fine to not work at his goal with single minded intensity, but he would be a hypocrite if he didn’t understand his desperation to achieve a millennia-long mission assigned to him as his purpose.
He had done as such, once before.
The sigh from across the line. The tinny voice in his ears. “The only one that sees you as a tool is yourself.” Embers and ash clouded his vision. Smoke and flames danced to and fro. Luuk had stood in the wreckage of the disaster he’d created. He remembers that day, Rover’s voice stern even through the crackle and pop of the call. Despite that, there was that unmistakable softness, pleading with him to understand that Luuk Herssen wasn’t just a glorified lab rat or a vengeful spy, wasn’t just to be used and thrown away like waste. He was human. A pitiful human who has had terrible things happen to him, and who is trying to build himself up in ice and snow because he knows no other way to rebuild himself.
And still stained in Fractsidious red, fresh-blood red, he’d closed his eyes and surrendered to the whims of his earnest companion. He’d closed his eyes and pretended, if he scrubbed his skin and tracks enough, he’d be able to wash away the carnage and ruins his thirst for revenge had wrought.
Aemeath digs out their connection eventually, because of course she does, she’s a smart girl, and one that Rover raised himself. It doesn’t take long before Luuk has her in his office at timely intervals to talk, beaming cutely like she hasn’t been the cause of at least three alarmed terminal calls to Luuk involving the caretaking of one young lady. The snowfluff seals had been too alluring, apparently.
He wonders if she’s played with them again, in the time that Rover’s been gone. Or does she mope in the shadows like he does, like he’d lost an integral part of a working body and was aching to try and retrieve it. Part of him wants her to know, to tell her of what he knows of Rover and reminisce with her like he’s always had the right to. He wants to know if she’d ever noticed the certain furrow of brows from frustration, the hapless turn of his lips when he’s begrudgingly amused, the softened set of his lips when he’s truly, genuinely happy. She should’ve seen that last one often. Aemeath made Rover unabashedly joyous like nothing else ever did.
Still, he knows of why Rover wanted to keep his work secret from her.
Children were precious, and innocence was a currency burned through far too quickly. It was better for Aemeath to keep hers as long as she could, even if it meant some subtle obfuscation.
But that doesn’t matter; Aemeath smiles at him, prim and demure in the seat across from him in the infirmary, and helpless, Luuk smiles back, tension easing at just how well she’s grown. Rover would be proud of her, he thinks, and it is a thought haunting him far too often. It appears each time he hears a song from the mysterious Fleet Snowfluff or of a new record from a certain outstanding synchronist. He would be so proud of his best qualities coming through in his family, in how loved Aemeath is.
That said, he does wish she took after Rover a little less sometimes.
When she speaks, her intent is thinly veiled.
“Dr. Luuk!” She greets, all cheer.
“Aemeath,” Luuk returns, matching her beat for beat. They beam at each other and pretend he doesn’t know her last family. The fact her upbeat attitude is unfaltering does not take away the fact she’s here to attempt to interrogate a former professional(?) spy. Which. Hm. Another thing to talk to Rover about when he gets ahold of him. “Candy?”
“Naturally!” The girl snatches the sweet from his hand, viper-quick, and Luuk’s pretty sure he’s seen criminal operatives with lesser reflexes. She pops it into her mouth immediately, discarding the wrapper in a blazer pocket and beaming charmingly at him.
The amount of trust she gives is dizzying.
“Would you like to talk about what’s been bothering you recently?”
Aemeath purses her lips. “I recently hit a new sync rate with the Exostrider,” she divulged, like Luuk hadn’t been keeping up with Rabelle College gossip the moment Aemeath was admitted as a synchronist. He nods anyways, congratulating her on her achievement. Her mouth widens into her signature grin, though it fades as she continues. “But I… I couldn’t share that news with my family.”
Luuk hums in understanding and does not think about bright golden eyes or the string around Aemeath’s wrist, holding a cuff that was once used to tie back long hair. “I see,” he says, sotto voce; empathetic, compassionate. In a way, he can relate, what with Rhein and Father and even —
No, Rover wouldn’t count, he denies, because their relationship is hardly close enough to be called family. Friends, maybe, and close associates at most. Two people working toward the same goal.
But that’s changed after Rover had essentially tasked him with rebuilding his own life. Tasked him with putting his old life into retirement.
“I…” Aemeath’s voice gains an near-imperceptible quiver. Still, Luuk wasn’t undercover in the Fractsidius for years because of nothing. “I wish he was here for me to tell him. For him to celebrate with me.”
“That’s understandable,” Luuk said, trying to offer empathy. “But even if your family isn’t here right now, I’m certain he would be proud of you.” He knows Rover would be practically bragging into his face if he’d heard. He’d always taken a special pride in Aemeath, a special pride in the young lady the girl he’d guided through childhood to grow into a young adult. Hearing such news would’ve made him happier than anything anyone could offer him.
Aemeath gave a teary smile, eyes misting over. Her hands fiddled with the gleaming pendant on her bracelet. “Of course,” she agreed. “He always wanted me to live a happy, carefree life above everything.”
And that’s the danger of talking with Aemeath: she’s sincere, and Luuk can hardly bear to return her sincerity with deflection each time. Even as he gives a powerless curl of his lips, dread curls under his skin just like the Ichor does, unpleasant and bittersweet. She’s brought up her family each time she’s come to him, and while that would be normal for a young girl to talk about her guardian often, the continuous hints she’s dropped makes him believe she at least suspects Luuk of having a connection to her family.
She’s hardly wrong, of course, though he wonders what exactly tipped her off to him.
“All good parents,” Luuk murmurs, “Want their children safe and happy first before anything else.” He pauses, trying to compose a sentence worthy of Startorch’s psychologist. He ends up settling for something other than that. “You’ve done well, Aemeath.”
Yes, that should be good enough.
Aemeath looks as though she wants to add more, wants to keep pushing, but lets it go. Her guard is still up, Luuk notices, even as she plays the vulnerable doe looking for comfort and counseling. He wishes she trusted him more. He wishes he would show herself to him and let herself be soothed because she is a child, Rover’s child, and Luuk is an adult.
It’s sometimes hard to look at Aemeath, all tender smiles and bright golden eyes, when she reminds him so much of Rover. He doesn’t know if she ever notices that, on bad days, his own eyes stray a little off from hers, unfocusing just enough that he’s certain he’s not looking at the corpse of his trusted companion.
That’s why in the shadows of the night, when he should really be asleep or even catching up on paperwork, he sometimes… wanders. Drifts. He can take care of himself; ichor thrums in his veins, and a knife or scalpel or scythe could be materialized whenever needed.
He knows he shouldn’t be this paranoid, shouldn’t be this neurotic, but when you find out your father had been dead and replaced by someone else unnoticed, suspicion chipped a hole into your cranium and made a home there. The fact the school was a conflict of interested parties just made it worse.
Truly, what was Rover thinking by sending him here to retire? Perhaps he thought Luuk would be satisfied with a little inter-organizational drama now and again and settle nicely into retirement? That maybe it would take his mind off the way vengeance hid in his shadow and in the corner of his mind, present and forever lurking?
No, he’s being too cruel to Rover.
Sometimes he wanders. Other times, he plots and plans to take out the trash.
In the low glow of the screens at his hideout, he frowns at the new information passed onto him. There’d been a recent upsurge in Fractsidius activity, and Luuk isn’t quite sure how to interpret the data.
He can’t find what their goals are currently, and their forces seem to be scattered so he can’t deduce their target either.
It seems Luuk can only listen and wait for an opportunity to gather information about what they’re trying to achieve.
His eyes narrow in on place in particular.
“Bjartr Woods,” he mutters.
He doesn’t like this data, but he hardly ever does.
Aemeath disappears.
How else is he supposed to say it? What would he tell Rover when he returned? A beloved child, a popular student, a mysterious singer — they all vanished in the simulator.
It was a strange phenomenon; a prized student, suddenly vanishing without a trace once it ended. It was similar to a locked room mystery; with nowhere to go, nowhere to hide, where was Aemeath? Where was her body?
Luuk had been notified beforehand due to the synchronization limiters breaking, and had thus rushed to the simulator to prepare for emergency treatment. To scold her, maybe, on behalf of the school, and on behalf of her family.
But when the door had opened, there was only her bag, a broken chair, and no Aemeath.
Her bag, with spilled papers, and a paper proclaiming her dream to “save the world.”
Aside from the songs that would no longer be released, it was the only hard evidence left by the student Aemeath.
Oh, Aemeath, Luuk couldn’t help but think, ever so helpless in front of golden hued eyes and secretive, tight-lipped smiles. Why must you take after your family so much? What had that smart little girl done? Where had that smart little girl gone?
The shrill sound of electricity crackling in his ear under the sound of his voice. The soft breaths that came through the device. “How can a doctor save anyone else's life if he doesn't value his own?”
Hypocrite, Luuk never said. Maybe he should’ve. Maybe he should’ve forced him to listen, forced him to let him take on some of that burden. Maybe then that bad habit wouldn’t have been passed onto that child.
It would’ve been hard for him to let go of his hatred. He would’ve done it anyways if it was for Rover.
What am I going to tell your father now? Luuk picks up the paper, Aemeath’s proud handwriting staining the surface. How am I going to tell him his daughter is gone? How am I going to tell him I let her slip through my fingers? How am I going to tell him his child is missing, and I have no leads, no traces, no answers?
Luuk was entrusted a heart, and Luuk had lost it. Luuk had no evidence, no explanation, and Luuk will condemn Rover with that fact.
He sits back and lets the proper staff handle the documentation. He marks a note for himself on the urgent report of Aemeath breaking the Exostrider synchronization limiters.
What had caused her to break those limiters? She was smart enough to know those were there for safety. Where did she go? A person can’t just disappear into thin air. Even if she was dead, her body should still be there.
…Unless, of course, it was torn apart. To the point where it no longer exists.
He’s reminded of the increased activeness of the Fractsidius. He doesn’t like where his thoughts are going.
Luuk once asked where Rover had sourced the child after a brief, panicked call about how to take care of a kid who’d fallen into a freezing lake contaminated with voidmatter. His golden boy had turned to him with an opaque expression of seriousness and said, completely blank, “I birthed her myself.”
Just as Luuk was about to contemplate if such thing was possible (if only because of Rover’s penchant for making the impossible possible), the expression broke into an amused smile. “She fell into the lake outside of my cabin at Ginnungamere,” he explained. “I took her in because her parents were lost in a Void Storm.” There was a moment of silence for those who were lost.
Then, “Were there no other relatives to take her in?”
“She’s Roya,” Rover reminded him. “But if she got to the Frostlands on her own… I think she’d be safer where I can keep an eye on her.” Hence, the parenting books he was asking for, all having to do with raising traumatized children. Luuk hummed.
He rose from his seat on the couch, fetching a bag of individually wrapped sweets to drop onto the stack of books Rover had requested. It was big enough that Rover shouldn’t be running out of them for a while. “For bribery,” he whispered conspiratorially with a wink, and his expression grew more genuine when Rover’s face cracked to make way for joy to spread across it. “I’m sure our top student won’t need it, but the student he’s raising might.”
Rover nodded, faux-solemn. “Your efforts are appreciated for raising our next generation of aspiring adults, fellow associate.”
Rover was never good at words. Not before he left, and certainly not after he came back. It’s complicated to talk about me, he once told Luuk, on a rare night spent at Luuk’s Sundermere hideout because Aemeath had already been long tucked into bed. Of course it would be; how could it not, when you were both a god and a man?
How do you explain that you were a god? That power coursed through your veins and thrummed under your skin, divine authority making even the world’s Sentinels bow before you. How do you explain that you were just a man, that you were held together by sinew and muscle and flesh corded around bones and organs, that you were powerful, but not omnipotent? How do you explain that you once were both, that you were powerless to fight against your mission despite that?
(How do you explain that power called to you and clung to your fingertips, but memory failed to recognize what it was?)
Luuk wasn’t sure. But what Luuk knew was this: Rover was just a mortal falling into mortal whims around Aemeath. He was just so human around her. With her, they were just family. No titles, no world-saving goals, no self-sacrifice. Simply a parent and a child, a guardian and their ward. With Aemeath, it was simple to explain: they were family, and that was all.
It’s different for him and Rover. Acquaintances was too cold a term, but companions didn’t quite fit the bill either. Comrades, maybe, but friends would be a better descriptor. It was a sort of limbo state: Rover would assign him tasks, and Luuk would devote himself to it like it was his life’s work. In a way, it was.
Luuk despised the Fractsidius. That was why he was so safe to use as a weapon — as a tool — against them. Sending him to Lahai-Roi under the guise of “keeping an eye on Fractsidius activity” here was a flagrantly poised soft retirement for his undercover activities. It limited him to one location. It bound him down to a place full of life and dreams and ambitions.
At first, he nearly hated Rover for it. Hated that he made him let go of any hunting outside the boundaries he’d set, hated that he was the one that decided it was time for him to move on, hated that he was kept in that school to take care of students who’d hadn’t learned the harsh realities of life.
But on further thoughts, he admitted it was good for him.
“How can a doctor save anyone else's life if he doesn't value his own?”
If Luuk threw his own life away chasing revenge, it would be a fruitless one. One that made the Fractsidius the center of everything, one that made him have nothing outside his revenge.
He’s equal parts grateful for his interference and guilty for not being able to do the same for Rover. For failing to protect the child Rover built his life around outside his mission.
So when he shows up outside his infirmary as a new freshman of Rabelle College for an examination, he can’t help but want to hide behind the facade of Doctor the way Rover used to hide behind the mask of Savior.
He reveals himself with a, “Welcome back,” anyways.
“You and I, what were we to each other?”
Dr. Luuk’s face visibly turns contemplative, as if pondering how to label their past relationship. Aemeath lurks over the shoulder of her family — her Rover — and cocks her head at the doctor. She’d always been curious, having never managed to get a straight answer out of the man either. Her earlier anger at the reminder of Rover’s abandonment by his homeland was pushed out of her mind — at least for the moment.
Rover turns his head to raise a fine brow at her behavior just outside the good doctor’s sight, and Aemeath gives a wide smile in return, not bothering to tell. It seemed it was expected, with the only response being a whisper of an exasperated breath escaping her guardian’s lips.
“Friends, I’d say,” Dr. Luuk finally answered, tucking his hands into his coat pockets. His eyes were gentle even at Rover’s unmoved expression, somewhat fond. “Not the kind who lived in each other's pockets, but, as a Huanglong saying puts it, ‘True friendships are still waters that run deep.’”
“‘Live in each other’s pockets’?” Aemeath repeated. “Like, physical distance?”
Naturally unheeding of a ghost’s words, Dr. Luuk continued, “We met by chance, and by another twist of fate, you entrusted me with a rather long-term assignment.” He paused, shifting his weight and letting Rover digest the information at the moment. “How about this: ‘Strangers in passing who became confidants.’ How does that definition suit you?”
Aemeath hummed as she also attempted to sort through the information Dr. Luuk had given. Her idea that he’d known Rover more than he’d let on was unsurprisingly true.
To be completely honest, it was simply just a wild guess at first. But Aemeath knew of how much Rover worried, and Aemeath knew he wouldn’t leave her on her own without any backup. That visit to Startorch just before he left was proof of that. But the now-Professor Mornye was just an acquaintance, and the two of them weren’t close; she wasn’t enough to keep on eye on her like Rover would’ve wanted.
But Dr. Luuk? He was the school’s doctor and consultant, the person who students ran to when they had their troubles. He was in the perfect position to keep an eye on Aemeath and likely the perfect person to do so, what with his past having him carry tension around like a weapon until recent years. Whatever past he left behind for a life at Startorch, it made him a wind-up toy of tension that kept building until he finally learned to let it go.
What really made her think on it was the taste of the candy offered at each and every meeting and appointment. It was nostalgic, familiar, and if she tried hard enough, she’s sure she can remember Rover handing her similar ones as a reward or positive reinforcement. The flavors and formula had changed over the years, but even so, there was something distinctly familiar in each of them.
When she asked around, it was the doctor himself who made it. It all but confirmed her suspicion.
But the doctor never said anything to her. Never mentioned a single word of his past relationship with Rover to her. And she wouldn’t say it didn’t hurt, wouldn’t say it didn’t sting, but she understood. Adults and their insistence on separating themselves from the children, really.
That doesn’t stop Aemeath from finding humor in their current relationship rekindling. The insistence on calling him “Luuk”? Not “Living in each other’s pockets”? And nicknames as well? “Golden boy”? Truly scandalous, Dr. Herssen! What would the gossip mill say about their school doctor telling a freshman to address him so casually! How unprofessional, Dr. Herssen!
Though Aemeath has suspicions on what Rover had tasked Dr. Luuk to do, the fact the man had waited for a whopping 20 years for him was… amazing, to say the least. Dr. Luuk might’ve been hesitant on what to label their relationship, but as their very own narrator, Aemeath was confident to say it ran further than just simple friendship or trust. It was devotion.
It wasn’t dissimilar to Aemeath’s own attachment to Rover as her family, but Aemeath wouldn’t call Dr. Luuk’s attachment familial. It was love, of course, but as for what type of love… that was for Dr. Luuk to know, she supposed. And, well, she’d always complained about Rover being stupidly charming whenever he acted as his kind, helpful self, much to his oblivious bemusement. She didn’t think his relationship with the doctor was any different.
Rover was quiet, face blank in the way where Aemeath knew he was processing the doctor’s admission. A hand reached up to touch his chin in a way Aemeath herself knew she herself did when she was lost in thought. “I need time before I can take your word for it,” he said finally, lowing his hand from his face.
The doctor’s face softened knowingly. “That's fine. Your work in Lahai-Roi won't be finished so soon, and we still have plenty of opportunities to reacquaint ourselves.” He turned back to the video of the Skyark’s final moments, of Rover crashing through the Etheric Sea.
Aemeath tuned him out as the doctor talked about cleaning up the evidence. It was nice to know her faith in him wasn’t misplaced, wasn’t unwarranted. She’d told Rover to trust Dr. Luuk, but she wasn’t fibbing when she said they weren’t super close. It was only her suspicions of his true alignment that made her trust him, and in turn, encourage Rover to trust him as well.
For now, she had to focus on the problem of Sigilum…
Aemeath turned to smile at Rover — her last family. Her last regret.
If he had simply forgotten her, if she had never told him how they were family, if she had stopped herself from being selfish and wanting him by her side again, maybe he could’ve been ignorant. Happy.
Terror grew on his face as he tried to reach her. There was a horror Aemeath hadn’t seen even when Sigilum had siphoned his frequency bit by bit with each appearance. No, this was something different. Like if he didn’t reach her now, he’d never get her back. Like if he didn’t reach her now, she’d fall through his hands again like sand through a clenched fist.
And she understood, really; she did. The anger at his homeland’s abandonment, the grief for his denied request, the resolve to protect his happiness in ignorance — Aemeath knew those feelings were reflected similarly in Rover too. He raised her like this, after all. The more you cared, the more intensely you felt.
And Rover cared far too much for everyone, she knew.
That’s why she had to do this. That’s why she had to go.
Rover was in good hands. He himself said he wouldn’t be lonely. There was his classmates, his comrades, his friends. There was Dr. Luuk, who looked out for him devotedly, and Professor Mornye, who adored him like the rest of the lines of admirers he’d once had. Rover would be okay. Rover wouldn’t be lonely. Even with the abandonment of his homeland, he would keep going.
That’s why Aemeath could leave now. She had to. For the sake of the world.
For the sake of Rover.
“If you do this, there's no coming back! The Stridergate will shut you out forever!” He pleaded, desperate. That stupid, stupid man had jumped into Voidspace for her. She smiled, and prayed he wouldn’t notice just how wobbly it was.
“This is the only way. the loop will close, and Lahai-Roi will survive—”
“Aemeath!”
“—And we will find each other in the Frostlands.” Aemeath took a deep breath in, and turned away. If she looked even just a while longer, she feared she wouldn’t go through with it. Any longer, and she would’ve faltered. Any longer, and she would’ve been too reluctant.
Aemeath couldn’t let herself give a better goodbye, a better ending.
She left him behind, pretending the heartbroken cries of her family didn’t shatter her already broken heart.
When she freed the other Rover from the tendrils of Aleph-1, she couldn’t resist bopping him on the nose. With a smile, she whispered, “Journey well.”
I hope to make you proud. I hope I haven’t let you down.
…
Dr. Luuk once said you would be proud of me.
I wonder if that’s true. I wonder if he knew.
…
I wish we had more time. I didn’t want to leave.
I’m sorry.
But I have to protect you.
Rover sits next to “Aemeath.” His child. His daughter. His precious family. She’s still. It’s similar to looking at a mannequin, a lifeless doll. He doesn’t know how to feel about it, really. He doesn’t know how to feel about all of it.
He had her. He had her and she told him about his past, his love, his hopes, and she looked at him with such sparks in her eyes that he felt honored to have been the one to ignite them. And then she left him. She left him alone to save the world, left him out of love to protect the world he so devoted himself to. She left him because he loved this world, and so she left to protect it.
He hated himself for that. Hated that he’d raised such a young girl to sacrifice herself for him. Because he’d loved her so deeply, because she’d loved him back just as much, she threw herself into the jaws of the abyss for him. For love. For herself.
But this body is proof. Proof she’s still out there, still fighting.
He doesn’t have a lot after he woke up. Like a stranger inhabiting another’s body, like an imposter in their own skin. Sometimes he looks in the mirror and feels surprised at what he sees, like he’s expecting to see someone else.
The past him had so much. Sometimes he wondered why he left it all behind. Maybe it was the weight, the burden, the grief and the longing all clinging onto him like a particularly stubborn ghost.
He really only had Shorekeeper, before he came to Lahai-Roi. Before Aemeath. Before even Luuk. They were proof of his past self, proof that someone was still waiting on Rover, the person, instead of Rover, the savior. He doesn’t think of spider lilies and mourning symphonies. They were proof of his existence on Solaris-3, like a stain of possession he pretended he never wanted.
“It’s strange,” he murmurs, quiet. “Seeing ‘you’ so quiet like this.” Aemeath was lively. She was energetic and free and so intensely loving. She was never quite this still, never quite this quiet. Even as a ghost, it felt like she was always moving. He closes his eyes, and pretends like guilt and desperation isn’t eating him up like Aleph-1 would be, tearing him apart by his frequency. When he opens them, his resolve is steeled. He can’t let it end like this. He will find another way. “I will cross the Stridergate and bring you home.”
“Aemeath” mouths around words like she can’t control her body enough to pronounce them without a large effort. “Don’t….” It startles Rover, enough for him to get up and kneel so he could see her down-tilted face. When she’s finally able to bring a weak finger to kiss the tip of his nose in the same way she did when he entered Lahai-Roi, he blinks the wetness out of his eyes and wills the stuffiness of his nose to go away. “… be sad…”
He can’t help it. Rover smiles. It’s painful, but he does so. He gently cradles her hand in his own and presses a kiss onto her clothed palm, feeling her warmth through the layers. “Don’t be sad?” He repeats, grief threading through his voice. He shakes his head. “You took my daughter away. Of course I have to be sad.”