{ TGB } Last Words

It still struck her through this haze, as if maybe all of this wasn't a dream, every time she breathed and remembered all over again that he was gone.  
He'd hidden from her so well.  Granted, he'd had so many months of practice, hadn't he?  Maybe that was why Sylvani needed to find him so desperately.  He was sick.  Taren was sick, sick enough to apologize to Alcina and then suddenly leave Earth Tribe camp.

She knew he would only leave camp like this to die.

It was a funny thing, really, that Sylvani still knew Taren so well.  She knew him as if the inside of her heart was etched with his true name, instinctively predicting and even understanding- empathizing, perhaps- his every move and action.  Even for how much agony it had caused her, she understood his decision to never speak with her again.  All his life, Taren had only ever been left behind...she'd been the one cat to never do that.

And then I left him, too, and now he's preparing to wait out the remainder of his life someplace where no one can see him suffer.

A piercing pain stabbed into her side with bruising force, propelling her to move faster, stumbling through the snow in her frantic search.  The winter gusts had already obliterated any tracks Taren had left, so Sylvani was on her own- yet for some reason, her paws still guided her towards a place only she and the Green-Earth- no, the former Green-Earth- knew of.  For whatever reason, that part of her that knew him whispered that she would find him there.

The closer Sylvani got to their cave, the more she began to panic.  What if...what if the unspeakable had already happened?  What if she had been wrong? Night was falling like a black shroud overhead, and she shuddered, bolting across the ground with as much strength as her aching legs could muster.  Before she knew it, she was trembling and calling his name, not caring who overheard.  The powers were gone.  The Spirits were dead.  The least of her worries was sharing his Spirit-given name with any possible intruder in the vicinity.

The small miner stumbled to a halt just before the mouth of the cave.  It was half-blotted out by the snow, barely even visible; she suspected if she hadn't known its exact location, she would have missed it entirely.  As it was, what space was available was scraped away...as if an irregularly thin body had slid past the packed ice and into the darkness.

Exhaustion and fear trembled through her body as she lay in the churned snow, her eye stinging from cold and terrified tears.  What if she had been too late?  What if, after all these months, Sylvani...would never even get a chance to explain herself?  This tom...he had hurt her more than anyone.  Yet he had loved her, too.  And she'd loved him.  She'd loved him enough to have been ready to spend the rest of her life with him, and she suspected she would have, had the Golden-Butterflies never taken Alcina hostage.  Had she never left him.

She had to try and make things right, before it was too late.

Sylvani swallowed hard, shaking like a leaf in the wind before slowly struggling back to her paws.  Carefully, she took a step forward, shoving down her fears- of finding him there, and yet also finding it empty.  She was scared to face him, and yet she knew she had to.

So she padded inside, and as her eye adjusted to the darkness a familiar amber gaze locked onto hers in shock.

She heard his breath catch, holding too long and filling the cave with silence; then a rasping, harsh cough bubbled in Taren's throat and he doubled over partway, shoulders shuddering with the force of it.  Sylvani felt tears spring back to her eye at the sound of it echoing in his chest, as if it were hollow, her gaze lingering on how he already seemed so gaunt and ragged.  This was not the Taren she knew- the Taren that she knew and loved always kept his fur neat and trim.

A strange, conflicting look clashed in his eyes as he stared back at her, and for several long, aching seconds she simply stood there, stock still.  The pain of the last several months and the piercing loneliness she'd felt in the wake of him blazed in her gaze, words unspoken running as if on charged electricity between them, and then it really seemed to strike her and her legs slowly gave out.  "Oh, Spirits..."

Even as Taren slowly rose to his paws, his muscles straining- when had he gotten that thin?- Sylvani slipped to her stomach, trying not to cry as pain washed over her.  His voice was hoarse and hardly any more than a whisper, straining to be heard past the blowing of the wind outside and the pounding of their hearts.

"What are you doing here?"

He was dying.  Great Spirits, he was dying, she could hear death lingering in the rattle of his lungs and the way it gleefully rasped in his coughs and glazed his eyes.  Those beautiful eyes.  Those eyes that had captured her heart and so much more of her.  She suddenly remembered with a jolt the words he had spoken to her when she had been unable to accept his request to soulbond...but had said yes to his offer to be his girlfriend.  "We already share a soul."  And it was true, and maybe that was why this hurt so badly, and maybe it was also why she somehow managed to keep the tears glistening in her eye at bay for just a few moments longer.  She blinked slowly, trying to unfocus and imagine him as he was supposed to be- strong, certain, sturdy- but it was undone.  Nothing could replace the look of him now.

"You really thought.."  Sylvani paused as a shudder traveled down her spine, her eye burning a little more.  "...I wouldn't find you?"

For several seconds he looked at her, unreadable as his eyes wandered over her, and then he sighed.  It shivered in his throat like a delicate sort of thing, something she could pluck out of the air.  "I should've known better, shouldn't I?"

Oh, she almost laughed.  She wanted to laugh, if she was being honest, because he was trying so hard for her sake- she knew he was- and yet she was so hollow inside.  It was as if some invisible hand had reached inside of her chest and simply scooped away anything of substance.  All it had left for her was this aching, horrible pain.

"Yeah," she whispered, before her eye wandered again and she bit her lip to keep it from wobbling.  The next intake hit her again and she shuddered, her eye screwing up slightly in an effort to hold back her tears, and when she'd partway learned how to breathe again Sylvani choked out, "..How...long?"

He stared at her for what felt like forever, and for the first time the binding mistrust and uncertainty there melted away, and she was stunned by the pool of emotion teeming unbidden behind his walls.  He wasn't answering her, though.  He simply stared, and Sylvani felt all of the old shame and self-consciousness burning behind her cheeks and searing itself into her soul.  You did this.  You're the reason for these walls, and you know it.

Then Taren simply...sighed.  She blinked in surprise even as he waved his tail lightly, staggering backward a pace and sinking down to his belly again.  It brushed the frozen ground like bristles.  "Come down here," he murmured.

The tabby stared at the ground next to him for a few seconds, suddenly afraid, as if sitting there would throw the shutters back up again and she would lose him.  She still had so much to say.  So much to apologize for, and so little time, so little patience.  Life was impatient, fleetingly dancing past their eyes in an erratic, free-flowing manner that no one could comprehend.  It was unfair.

Very slowly, as if approaching a fox, Sylvani moved towards his side.  She didn't want to face his anger nor his disappointment anymore...yet even as she feared it, she couldn't help but wonder if he was able to put it aside right now.  He knew as well as she did that this was it, and maybe he wanted to fix this just as much.  A feeble hope flickered like a firefly in her chest, but she cradled it in silence, unable to voice it until she knew.

"Don't."  Sylvani jumped slightly as a cough clawed its way up his throat, interrupting him- the sound of it sent thrills of agony through her, as if it were her cough- before he persisted hoarsely, "Don't look at me like you're scared of me.  Then again..."  His face slowly softened into a light smile.  "You've always been a wimp."  Sylvani blinked rapidly as she felt tears collecting in her eye, blurring her vision of him- that was what bothered her most about them- and his voice abruptly softened to barely any more than a breath.  She almost didn't catch it.  "My wimp, though..."

His words suggested that he still cared.  That after all that had happened and all they'd both done, he still cared about her, and Sylvani could not keep back the tears this time.  They leaked over her cheek and her lips fumbled with one another in the sudden need to get the words out.  "I'm sorry."  Sylvani snatched a shuddering inhale, wondering if she was the one struggling to breathe, if maybe all of this was somehow a misunderstanding.  "I'm so sorry.  I never wanted to leave you, Taren..."

The tom snorted quietly, and she paused, taken aback by it.  It was such a...a Taren thing to do.  "Can we not?  Look, I have a limited amount of breath left and I don't want to waste it telling you it's okay.  Because it wasn't okay."  There it was- that pain, flaring up, even as her throat tightened because she knew it was true.  His eyes flickered shut for a moment, but it took her several seconds longer to realize it was not out of pain- it was his own personal war with his pride.  She saw it in the faint twitch of his jawline just before he started to speak, and that telltale sign was her undoing.  "You weren't right...but neither was I, alright?  I just...."

A soft, shaking sound escaped him as he released the breath neither of them knew he'd been holding, and for only the third time ever, Sylvani saw tears in his eyes.  She almost had to look twice to see if they were real.  A raw helplessness crossed his face and flooded his rasping mew, and she shrank slightly in her fur even as something inside of her seemed to rise.

"I don't want...I..."  Taren hesitated, before his eyes flicked up to hers and his voice grew even quieter.  "Spirits, you're beautiful."

Sylvani couldn't remember how to breathe again.

The first thing she felt was confusion.  How could she still love him, love him so deeply, even after he'd destroyed her entirely?  What, in any part of that equation, made sense whatsoever?  She didn't understand.  What made it worse, though, was the fact that even as that reawoke, washing through her with a jubilant rush, what she felt for Kintsu raged in defiance.  The two very different loves could not...coexist.  As it was, they barely managed to tussle and clash inside of her at peace.  Kintsu was right- they were different.  Even as he had loved Nuri, she had loved Taren, but in a different way.

She had almost forgotten...what it felt like.  

Her throat throbbed as she swallowed, hard, pushing down the absolute bewilderment that his words had dragged out of her.  "I know it wasn't...but I...."  She sat silent, trembling, looking at him for so long.  Too long.  A small voice cried that they did not have time for this, but Sylvani managed to ignore it.  The memory of the agony she'd gone through at his refusal, the way he had rejected her as if she were nothing...it still seared her like fire.  And yet...she could not ignore these feelings.  They seemed heightened somehow, as if the knowledge that he was going to die in days had only fueled their flames in a desperate attempt to get all that they could out, so they were less cheated when time did run short.

"I know I was wrong," Sylvani began again, her ear pinning back, "but you...weren't fair to me either."  Tears ran their course down her fur, and she looked at him and the love that had still somehow survived reflected in his eyes. 

Maybe if this had never happened...she wouldn't have been able to forgive.  But knowing that they didn't have time or luck on their side, Sylvani felt hard pressed to let go of the wrongdoings they'd both committed.  They were both at fault, they were both heartbroken, and they were both far, far too late.

Her eyelid fluttered as her head sank against his shoulder, the fight draining out of her like blood.  She was so tired.  So tired of everything, of pain and of regrets and of loss.  And yet here she was, nestled up to Death himself, waiting till the body beside her grew cold and still and the other half of her soul stopped working.

Taren inched closer, hardly daring to move as if afraid of awakening the cough biding its time in his chest, a light chill creeping over their backs.  His gaze looked so broken and yet so whole at the same time as he stared directly into hers and whispered, "Stay with me."  Before she could even respond, he added, "For whatever amount of days I have left."

"I'm not leaving you," Sylvani sniffed, staring at him as fiercely as she could, even with her fur stained with tears.  How could he even imagine that she would abandon him to die alone?  No cat deserves that.  Even as she let that horrible thought cross her mind, she pressed a paw against his, insisting in a tight voice, "You're not allowed to.  You can't...die."  She choked silently on that last word, closing her eye as tears crept free.

He seemed to wait till she opened her eye again, for his stare was suddenly so intense, and she blinked in surprise to see what looked like hesitance there.  Then the words were out, and she stiffened slowly in utter shock.

"Will you be my mate?  For this short amount of time?  Once I'm gone...."  Here, Taren swallowed, as if unable to bear his own jealousy.  "...you're all his."

Everything that was rational screamed at her.  Screamed at her for even considering this so deeply, when she had Kintsu, when she loved him- loved him more than she could put to words- but she loved Taren too.  And they'd both known that they were never going to last.  Even now, they knew it.  But she'd been so in love with this tom that the flimsy word "girlfriend" hadn't ever been strong enough.

Really, she asked herself, what was the difference in her feelings when it came to calling him her boyfriend or her mate?

There was absolutely none.

"Okay," she managed, a small sound dying in the back of her throat.  It sounded like a suppressed sob.  "Yes.  I...I will."

Sylvani slowly began to shake her head, then, angry at herself and the world and even the air, furious that Taren had to die like this, that she was so unfair to both him and Kintsu for being so torn, that she'd say yes and that she'd even considered saying no.  Of course she'd say yes.  She'd always wanted this, and she'd always felt of him that way.

You can't die, her shaking head seemed to say for her.  You can't.

"I can, and I will."  Taren's head shook just as fiercely as hers, his eye forcing her to look at him straight on.  "Believe me.  I..."

A choking cough shook his body so suddenly that she jumped, and each heave brought tears of pain to the tom's eyes until Sylvani was crying again in sympathy, wishing more than anything that she could take his pain for him and knowing that it was impossible.  When it had subdued, he tried again, his voice much weaker now.  "I've been to Light Tribe.  With everyone's powers down...they can't...."

"But you can't," Sylvani whispered, blinking rapidly as unbelievable pain welled in her chest and threatened to choke her to death, too.  "Maybe...maybe you'll get better..."  And even as she thought the words she stopped, knowing it wasn't true.  Taren wouldn't have given up so easily if he didn't know.  So she pressed her head against his and held back the sobs that were begging to escape, trying to comprehend a world void of this tom.

Instead of finishing his sentence, Taren carefully pressed his nose to her shoulder, and she started at how cold it was.  "Spirits, I've missed you," he breathed, his tone ragged, before pleading, "I love you, Sylv.  Please be okay without me, whatever that means..."  The tabby tom lifted his head slightly so his voice was clearer, his eyes suddenly guarded.  "I've heard of you and the Silver-Fire apparently getting closer.  Is that true?"

"How am I supposed to be okay...?"  Slowly, the miner shook her head, leaning back even as the bewilderment crossed her face again.  "I thought you...I thought you hated me...I thought you didn't want me anymore, but you..."  Something hitched in her throat and she swallowed it back.  "...but now you say that you still love me."

The mention of Kintsu- "Silver-Fire"- set her heart to its helpless struggle once more.  Deep down, she knew the truth.  She loved the ginger tom, and she knew that if she was going to end up with anyone, it would be him.  Perhaps once, she and Taren would have been together...but her mistake had ruined those chances.  Yet she could not tell Taren this.  She only wanted him to know that even if she knew it wasn't enough and it was too late, she loved him.

But she could not lie.

"Yes," she forced out through pressed lips, trembling.  Guilt wracked her frame and she bit her tongue, the taste of rust washing through her mouth.  "..I...I'm so sorry..."

Taren shivered lightly beside her and she winced, but immediately he straightened himself upward, empowering his thin body with all the fierceness and ferocity he could muster.  A harsh tone even colored his words, and that said more than anything.

"Listen up, Sylv.  I want you to really, really listen now, fine?"  She managed a tiny, mute nod, and he set his jaw.  "I've seen you drown before, except this time around I won't be here.  So go to whomever you need in your life to fucking fix yourself.  And if that means loving another tom, then..."  Taren suddenly stopped, the strength in his voice eliciting another spasm of coughing, but he had barely regained the ability to breathe before continuing.  "...then go and fucking love him.  Love him so much that it keeps you breathing.  You deserve every second of it."

Those words...the words that set her free, telling her "It is okay to love him," they broke her.  She could find nothing to say and nothing was good enough anyway; all she could do was tremble and try and fail to speak.  "I'm...I'm scared, Taren," she croaked, her voice small, and he sank against her shoulder.  His paw wrapped around her back and his tail curled across her flank, embracing her, holding her so close that she felt his ribs against her side.

"I know, baby," he whispered.  "I know.  I'll always be with you, though.  And..."  She glanced at him, shivering, and he hesitated for a few heartbeats as if carefully wording what he wanted to say.  When he did speak, his voice was cautiously slow.  "..and let the Silver-Fire know that I wish he'll be shaken by all that nature has to offer should he ever break your heart.  You've gone through that too many times."

His nose ever so gently brushed her good ear, so that his words might reach them as quickly as possible.  "I love you.  I'm here.  I love you.  We'll be okay."

She tried to stay strong for him still, holding her chin high and nodding so hard, so desperately, clinging to that promise even when she knew it wasn't true, and she managed to get out four words.

"I love you t-too," she sobbed, and then she broke into his side and let herself be weak.  Heartbreak hurt so much and she didn't understand it, didn't know why life had programmed them to feel this way if it could hurt so badly.  He kept whispering to her those same few words, over and over, and she stayed with him.  She stayed with him to the end.

Food meant nothing.  The only water she received was a lap of snow here and there, or licking whatever ice flaked itself onto their pelts away.  It was cold and it was miserable, but she needed the cold.  She needed it so freezing that she couldn't think, because if she could then she was going to be destroyed completely, and she didn't quite know how anyone was going to put her back together if Taren was dead.

Two days after she'd found him, he began to whisper those words.  "I love you.  I'm here.  I love you.  I love you."  It was incessant, as if he were seeing how many times he could say them, except the look in his eyes was hauntingly empty and scared and she'd never seen Taren afraid before.  It shook her worse than anything; it was almost a blessing when he suddenly slipped into unconsciousness.  She knew it was only that because his heart kept shuddering out a violent, stubborn pulse, but he never woke up again.

It took four days before it was over.