ruinations | synodiporia post-game au: (I'm drawn to the unknown, where shadows hide)

The end was supposed to be a relief. It had taken years for them to come to this point, to the finality of their journey, to finally be released from Liminal Space... No more tricks, no more Jaunts. It was time to go home.

There was one problem with that, however. Home was a world she hadn't seen or touched in years. Home wasn't hers any longer - her home was with people who were separating, one by one, bidden home by the very power that had dragged them there in the first place.

There was time to say goodbye, certainly. But even hours did not seem enough. It was too rushed, too abrupt. She held Sansa and Alcuin, embraced Raidou as an old comrade, shook hands with Riddick and even managed to give Joscelin a solid squeeze before he could refuse her. She saw to the others, people who had come and gone, even those she hardly knew. And in classic fashion, initially avoided the one person she did not want to let go. Eventually, she had her time with Remy, time that was too short. A weight settled in her chest as she finally released him and went to the portal that was hers, back to Thedas, back to the place she'd left so long ago.

A single step and it was done.

Like passing beneath the shadow of a long-hanging branch, she went from light to dark to light again - the gloom of sunset, a red sun glinting into her eyes as she went through. The clothes she wore did not change; she looked strange for the setting, though she was still Neria, and the staff she carried - decorated, altered, taken from four Jaunts past - remained strapped to her back. Where she came out... Well, nowhere convenient, unfortunately. She stood on the hilltops that overlooked Highever, many miles from the castle and city, and she had no idea how long time had passed for this place. Months, years? Would anyone know her?

The thoughts caught up before she could really fall into them. A second portal suddenly opened and she spun about, spell in hand, waiting.

And stopped dead as Remy walked out.

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Remy wore a small, crooked smile on his lips as he stepped through the portal; the one that meant he was amused with the world and its many little jokes on him. He rolled his shoulders, stretching, looking over the distant city before he turned fully to Neria, eyebrows arching at the ready pose she'd fallen into.

"Just me, cherie," he said. "No need to fret." He wore the battered leather armor he'd picked up masquerading as a bandit in Dolorosa years ago; it fit in, almost, although the dark and red of his eyes didn't and never would. But that was true in almost any world.

The spell winked out as he spoke. It never occurred to her that this could be a demon or an illusion. The rules of worlds changed for her years ago. Dumbfounded, she took two steps towards him. "Remy, how are you-- What are you..." She'd just left him. And if he was here--

"You're... Why didn't you go through your portal?" she asked, starting to close the gap between them.

"It was a portal to where I'm from," he acknowledged after a moment. "Didn't mean it was a portal to where I was going. You know?" He made it a rhetorical question, light and easy.

That got her to pause, her gaze open and wide and uncertain. She considered what he said, the easygoing nature of a loaded question. Neria made her way towards him once more, keeping a tight rein on her hammering heart. "If you stay, I won't be able to send you back."

Only once directly before him did she stop again, looking up into his face, into the dark of his eyes. "Are you sure that's what you want?"

"I know sometimes it seem like this boy do everything on impulse, cherie," he says, tsking his tongue against his teeth and shaking his head. "But this decision, I thought about. You know we don't have any guarantee of what's happened at home since we been gone. I think you need help. And me? I need a new start." He makes firm, unhesitating eye contact, watching her watching him.

"Besides. If I go away, how bad you miss me? I was raised better than to do that to a girl."

Time felt too slow as she tried to process what he told her. Even as it registered, Neria stared, her gaze unflinching but wide and even confused somehow, as if he'd told her he'd learned how to fly rather than that he'd made the decision to come with her. She exhaled, the sound harsh. And in the space of her next breath, she closed the very small gap between them, went up on her toes, and threw her arms around his neck and shoulders.

Neria squeezed him tightly. Her eyes burned with the weight of his words. "Stupid," she muttered. He had other places he could have gone to, other opportunities. But she would never, ever turn away such a gift. "I can't believe you did this." She pulled away just enough to reach her hands up and cup his face. "You don't know how much I would have missed you-- Or how much I dreaded it."

"You say that," he admits softly, circling his arms around her to hold her in place, an eggshell-gentle embrace. "But that goes both ways, cherie. And you got roots like Remy never has. You see. This way is best for everyone."

He smiles crookedly, lip a little askew because of her hands on his cheeks, and leans in to place a kiss like a benediction on her forehead.

"Roots?" Neria's smile is a lopsided thing. "You had plenty of those, you know." Not that she will let him go now. Her care is a selfish thing, she knows. The press of his lips to her forehead coax her eyes to close, for Neria to have a moment of peace simply being here in his arms, in knowing he is going to be with her-- It twists her heart in her chest.

Her thumbs brush over his stubble and she leans up to kiss his cheek. "Thank you," she murmurs there, soft. He says it goes both ways but, really, she feels she needs him more than he needs her. Turning to him, her eyes search his face. "I... This is going to take a great deal of adjustment." And she isn't certain if she's speaking of returning home, or him coming to a different world, or the both of them.

"I went from five-card draw to Texas hold-em like anybody else," Remy says, confidently incoherent. "I adapt just fine. But maybe you should start teaching me soon."

He leans closer to her, so their sides touch, and lays a finger across her lips in a teasing shush. "Soon," he repeats, meaning not now, and very carefully replaces his silencing finger with a kiss.

She scoffs a little, shaking her head. "That makes no sense--" she begins to protest, never remembering much about card games from world to world... He silences her gently with a finger, and then with his mouth. A faint breath escapes her nose, as if she is laughing.

Then, with care, she goes up on her toes to better meet his lips, returning the kiss in full.

The truth is, of course, he's worried about this decision of his. Not second thoughts - this was the right thing - but that doesn't mean it will work out, doesn't mean it won't be harder than he expects, and he doesn't want to have those doubts, those fears, not now. They'll come in their time. Now, he wants Neria to feel right about this, not guilty. He wants to show her he means it. And maybe that means not so much talking. Remy's always been a demonstrative boy, and his lips on hers try their best to be eloquent, one hand on her shoulder and the other slipping to her side, the gentlest of embraces, easy to break or step away from if the moment is wrong or the intensity is off or -

No doubts, he reminds himself. Not right now.

synodiporia post-game au: (I'm drawn to the unknown, where shadows hide)

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