jamie
from the destruction, out of the flame
It takes her mentioning the thing trapped inside her for him to realize that he had felt it, too.
Because the lungs had rattled and the ribcage had ached for so long that it had not occurred to him to think it anything other than the old, familiar pains.
But the things he feels - the separate things - stir in the pit of his gut. In the darkest part of him. He had spent so long excusing pain that he had not thought to entertain it.
He tilts his peculiar head to a stranger degree still, blinking past the soft edge of her face to some dark horizon. He can feel it there, even now. He can feel it whittling away at its cage.
But he does not tell her this, not yet. He merely forces his focus back to her, the things she says, the possibilities she dangles before him. How glorious it would be, he thinks, to bring his home here. Not for his own benefit, but for everyone else’s. He would have preferred to return to that dark place where he felt no pain and the breath did not rattle in his lungs. Where he did not feel so fragile. But there is that shark-tooth smile again, as he thinks about how different the world would be shaped if they brought it here.
He is no monster, Jamie, although he looks like one.
He is no monster, Jamie, though he is finding it harder to convince himself.
“It was drawn to you, just as I was drawn to you,” he rasps and he believes it, certainly, but there is something detached about his tone, too.
“I think I would like to call this place home.”
you need a villain, give me a name
