well I've got thick skin and an elastic heart [Any]

[Tantalize]

tantalize

infinity overhead

and i whisper, are you listening?

The moment that Talulah recognizes the name, Liz has her answer. She can see it, the sense of loss in the other. For a moment she can’t breathe, doesn’t even realize what she’s holding inside until she hears it confirmed. He died. He’s dead. He’s gone. All the thoughts that were racing in her head have suddenly gone quiet. Her entire soul has stilled. Surely she should feel happy. He’s gone. The person who had raped her, who had lied to her and said he loved her, the person who had betrayed her… Made her less of a Queen and therefore drove her to a path of failure… He was gone. ”Oh.” The word comes out almost breathless. It’s all that she can say, too stunned to really say anything more.

Why isn’t she pleased? Is it because there is no longer any chance of resolve or closure? That’s part of it. But also, although she would never admit it to anyone just how much, she had really loved Lion. He had been the first to open up her broken heart after the betrayal of Slaide and Coralee. She had loved him passionately and openly and she knows… She knows deep down that the love was real. From both of them. But there had always been another, as was always her downfall in relationships, always someone better that came along. She had been Khaleesi of the Amazons, she had given him everything. What more could he want from a partner? Why had she not been enough? It had all fallen apart when she had refused him in the light of finding out about his other love. It still seems unreal now, a bad dream that replays itself constantly in the dead of night. She still can’t believe that Lion had raped her and that she, a fucking Khaleesi of the Amazons, had not been able to stop him. But it had happened, Cersei had happened. She had started a war because of it, they had kept Lion captive in the jungle. Sometimes she thinks it never really happened, that she made it all up. Unfortunately it had all been very much real. There was no going back for either of them at that point. It had all been ruined.

The few stitches that remained that kept her tattered heart together  are suddenly pulled free, in pieces all over again. Her golden gaze can’t meet that of Talulah who asks how they knew one another. Her tongue is thick. What could she even possibly say? If the Dale’s Lady looks into her eyes, she will know everything. She’s worked so hard to keep the memories in place, buried as much as they can in her subconscious. Now they threaten to rebel and expel all over the place and she doesn’t want that, doesn’t want to be hounded by her pain and mistakes and failure all over again. Slowly she looks at her and finally admits, as everything surges forward, threatening to come out…”We were in love. Once. It ended badly.” Her breath seems to still be stuck in her chest, a wavering in her conviction to not spill out the whole story. But she will hold on to that shame as long as possible. It’s all she has left of him now.