❧ IC INBOX: Abraxas

[wiedzminka]

MESSAGES
you've reached ciri; leave a note.

☘   horizon
☘   network
☘   letters
☘   action

back to main

Comments

[wiedzminka]

I know. There are many of us who would not call it that. I understand.

[ She knows she's lucky. She's grateful for it. Even through the visions, despite the hardship, she had her family: that was her constant. ]

Better to be here than dreaming.

I hope you have friends around you, Thancred.

[ Even if it isn't home. ]

[funbreaker]

Less than I did, admittedly, but certainly enough to get by. You need not worry for me.

[ Urianger's absence is felt all the keener given how quickly he'd been made to forget him. He cannot accept that, no matter what this place and its magic tries to tell him about some supposed future. ]

I would like to render you some sort of thanks. I realize that we were not precisely ourselves in that dream, but you were instrumental in helping me recall what mattered most.

[wiedzminka]

I'm not sure I did anything, really.

But if my presence helped, however coincidentally, I'm glad for it.

[ It isn't a particularly good memory, though even that is fading fast. She recalls snippets. Mostly, how she felt, how angry she'd been, the bloodlust rising in her heart. It isn't what he's thanking her for.

Ciri hates the thought of how much they'd forgotten while trapped in that dream. How much they weren't themselves.

But maybe some things that came out of it needn't be all bad and buried. There is still a part of her that feels a certain kinship with Aegis-- with Thancred. A new ally she hadn't really known before. And she knows he's fairly close with Yennefer too, so having another contact near her is good. ]

[funbreaker]

It did. Or at least, I suspect that it did. There was something about that entire situation, about saving that girl from danger and your righteous anger at what was done to her, that reminded me of who I was and who mattered to me.

[ Which is a lot more straightforward and honest than Thancred might usually be with someone he doesn't necessarily know well, but he believes that Ciri deserves to know this and understand the context.

Besides, she is to Geralt what Ryne is to him; all the more reason, especially since Geralt is someone he trusts. ]

[wiedzminka]

[ She remembers that -- pieces of it, anyway. Enough of it. Now, she can piece together the moments where reality had broken through the cracks before Geralt helped her fully realize the unreality of the world she'd come to accept.

It was a moment like that for Thancred too, apparently. If he reached out to talk about it, perhaps it was for a reason. She decides to ask, though she won't push if he'd rather not answer. ]

Seemed like all of us lost something in that place.

What were you reminded of?

[funbreaker]

[ Thancred can't quite put his finger on why, but it seems important to tell Ciri about this. Perhaps it's more for himself, for him to remember and share Ryne with someone. ]

Ryne.

She's my ward.

[ ... ]

My daughter.

I don't want to believe that I would ever forget her, even after all that time.

[wiedzminka]

[ That hits a little too close to home, considering her experiences in the 'dream' with Geralt forgetting her-- but moreover, the very real and not so distant past in which she'd looked Geralt in the eye shortly after arriving and being imprisoned by Thorne, and there had been no recognition there at all. She won't ever forget that feeling.

She hopes never to experience it again. ]

Then don't.

Hold tight to the memory of what matters most to you.

[funbreaker]

[ Simple as that, is it?

Perhaps she's right. ]

That's certainly the plan. With how this place can pry into our heads, however, I can't help but worry that they'll find somewhere to pluck those memories away once more.

[ But... they broke out of it once. That means they can do so again. ]