blueprints_bloodstains | Trouble never sleeps [ insomnia ]

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Trouble never sleeps [ insomnia ]

Though this entire version of the plan hinges on retrieving the Crown of Karsus, he feels as though they have nothing to lose by pursuing it. Nothing, of course, except their lives at best and their relative freedom at worst. It isn't until afterwards that the bhaalspawn lets a lick of 'what if' touch him, and even then it's muted, stuck beneath the elation of his plan proceeding the way he had intended it to. Satisfaction exists just beneath his sudden and all-consuming need for blood.

When he had taken the idea to Enver, he hadn't been sure yet of the details. He knew the location of the crown and what he planned to do with it, but assaulting an archdevil's vault had always come with the snag of how to get there.

His Banite ally had been more than connected enough to have answers, the diabolist he had in pocket arranging the portal. The remaining work had been to firm up all details and then execute, and he'd been steadfast in refusing to allow a shred of fear invade.

The agreement had been that he wouldn't slaughter and leave behind traces of their crime unless absolutely necessary. Risk to their own limb or life would have been all the permission he'd need to deviate from that agreement, and yet their journey had been remarkably smooth.

It isn't until after they have returned, Mephistopheles' vault lighter by the extraordinarily powerful artefact, and he has long left Enver in order to sate his dark urges that something strikes him as odd. As though he's run his finger over a smooth piece of wood only to find the tears in the grain. He had escorted Enver from the shadows his entire walk back from the diabolist, ensuring his safety. But once he was back within range of a mounting defence, should there be retribution, he peels away to worship Bhaal.

It's in the clarity of freshly spilled blood that he abandons his plan to leave for Moonrise Towers and instead doubles back on himself. The usual path to Enver's chamber is a well trodden one, but he purposely takes a different route as he works his way back.

He isn't stopped once, and for a moment he wonders if Enver has gone so far as to give him automatically easy access whenever he needs it. The traps aren't quite so discerning. He spots them immediately, used to them being deactivated when he's visiting with Enver, now poised to make him sorry for paying a visit at all. It all feeds into a sense of tension, one that he hadn't been able to pay enough attention to ahead of sacrificing lives to his father.

It isn't until he permits himself entry to the man's space that he's greeted with light. Enough of it to betray a very distinct lack of sleep, or attempt at it. Given the energy it had taken to find and steal the crown, he finds his concerns validated. His own semi rejuvenation, gleaned from intense worship, hasn't completely freed him from fatigue, and he can only imagine how Enver must feel

It keeps him momentarily quiet rather than allowing the name that lives on his tongue more often than not these days to slip loose, just in case, against all odds, the man has found reprieve from consciousness momentarily. He stands well out of range of the vicious traps, on the precipice of Enver's primary dominion, vision flicking around in search of the man himself.

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It is probably for the better that the Dark Urge did not say anything when he first came in, because the first thing he would have noticed was that every trap in the chamber was armed. It wasn't unusual if Bane's Chosen were sleeping, for a few to be active. But this is all of them.

And the chamber is indeed fully lit.

Enver Gortash knew the importance of the mission just as well as his partner. It meant not just the execution of a plan well-formed, but a commitment to it, to at last start the ball rolling. No turning back, their obligations to their gods to bring victory no longer just an eventual undertaking but one actively in progress.

His certainty in this and in their own capability left his confidence soaring. When the diabolist fell into place, it was all quite certain.

What Enver did not expect, on entering Mephistopheles' Vault, a place in the Hells he had never been before, was for the smell to immediately take the wind out of him. Not the attack of an overwhelming stench, that would trouble anyone who wasn't too familiar to be blind to it, but of a suddenly clear familiarity, and every memory attached to it all at once. This was a place he had not dared to set foot before but he knew it as soon as he was there because he smelled and felt the sickeningly sumptuous atmosphere of the House of Hope.

And he was suddenly standing a little straighter. He immediately felt phantom eyes on him. The scars on his shoulders, his legs, even the stripe that imperfectly bisected his chin ached with old memory.

This was a mistake. We have to go back.

A thought bubbling to the surface that was impulse alone. In the moment, he stuffed it down.

There was work to do. A small operation, with just the two of them, would be more guaranteed to succeed than taking a party to handle heavy lifting or danger. He could do it, he would do it.

And then he did. He did not utter a word the entire time they were there. Eyes flickering toward any possible sound or movement while the rest of him was almost perfectly still. Sometimes, something less noticeable caught the same reaction. The movement of a curtain when they passed it. Some trinket on display that caught the light just so. And there would be a pause as he filed away whatever he was reminded of or thought it was before moving on. His movements, too precise to be fluid. A clear sign he had planned every twitch of his muscles twice well before it was time to execute.

Home at last, and alone for a time, he was at last able to let go of some of what he had been holding in. Much of it unexpected, the forms they took when at last released, but he was alone, with time to tidy, to wash his face, to let in fresh air that he breathed in with gratefulness.

And then he did not sleep. If they were to be discovered and attacked, it would be in the hours immediately after. Nubaldin would think it an excuse, if he caught him sleeping.

Now he is working, and a name immediately spoken, rather than time for him to actually see someone approaching at a distance and not react on reflex? Probably a good thing. The room is hardly ever in anything approaching disarray, but there might be a chair missing. What is put away has been clearly tidied and organized, and save for a few books that are very neatly situated around him as he takes notes, the desk is clear.

There is a long moment of prolonged eye contact, but the stillness in that stare conceals a great deal of movement happening internally. The immediate reflex that someone has indeed come and to prepare to fight, grab the crown, and flee. It only takes half a second to realize he recognized who he was seeing, and some of the tension might have left him if he were not already drawn tight as a bowstring before the Dark Urge even appeared.

After a tense space of breathlessness, a subtle gesture under the table. The traps disarm.

Edited 2024-08-11 12:00 (UTC)

The staring continues, the instinct to prowl closer something that's his first reaction. Built into the very fibre of his being because of what he is. A hunter. A killer. Brought into existence to murder all in service of Bhaal. So the urge to lock in - like a predator might with its prey - drives hard and fast into his bloodstream. He's too far away from the human for him to be able to pick up the adrenaline that pours through him before his brain can get control of the situation. But it does, clamping down hard on the primal and asserting something from higher in his brain. Easier now that he's had more than his fill of bloodshed.

Steady confusion that slips quickly into concern. In the end, it's more than a few seconds that tick on by before he starts to move. He's heard the clicks of the traps, knows that Enver will have switched them off, but he needs an additional moment to try and understand what's happening here.

The crown is theirs and they should be celebrating, but it doesn't seem as though his partner seems comfortable sitting with that sensation. He contemplates for a moment that they parted and he enjoyed a few hours of maiming and murdering. The perfect way to centre himself. What has Enver been doing?

"Are you alright?"

He finally moves, gait as long and fluid as always, carrying him quickly and effortlessly across the space between doors and table. He ends up standing at the end of it, eyes dipping to look at Enver's papers before back up to study his face.

"Perfectly fine."

Gortash finishes the note he was on and sits back to allow the ink to dry. For a moment his hands come together in front of him, a sudden stop when he doesn't have an immediate idea what he is about to do but the finger tips insistent they should have something to attend to next.

"Vigilant, is all. If anything is going to go wrong, it will be in the immediate hours."

As confident as he is that the heist went well, that they were undetected? He could always be wrong. What if his diabolist were discovered? She might be induced to drop his name as a last resort, all other avenues for deflecting backlash having failed.

Likely? No. But still possible.

Pale eyes absorb every movement and non-movement in equal measure, his gaze far less steeped in the hunt and more tinged with that confusion again. Enver has been - for as long as they have had the full measure of each other - incredibly organised and the depths to which he is detail-oriented has been a boon more often than not. Now it feels bordering on the unhelpful, and all he can really grasp at in so much as how he knows this is that he feels uncomfortable. Concerned. As though he'd like to interject here somewhere but he's yet to work out where that would be best placed.

He doesn't move from the position he's taken up, but he does fold his arms across his expansive chest, brows lifting in challenge.

"I agree, the immediate hours are the most likely for retaliation. Though I would put us past the immediate hours, now." He pauses, not entirely sure how many hours he's been gone, but, if anybody was planning on coming for them, he would have been an easy enough target out there. Especially with his attention trained so intensely on his kills.

"I could suggest there is nothing 'perfectly fine' about this picture," he gestures at Enver sitting at the table, adding: "Is there a reason you're not taking rest where rest is due?"

Gortash looks almost confused. "Because I don't want to sleep." Shouldn't that be obvious?

His fingers carefully lift the page he has been working on, exposing the scrawl there to more air, to dry it faster.

The truth is, he does wish to sleep, or at least his body does; his bones feel heavy, less like the scaffolding holding everything up and more like sandbags slowing it all down. However, his mind hasn't slowed down all night. Even if he were not listening to every sign of movement at the doors and corridors around him, something in his blood certain of an interruption at any moment, there would still be little space for quieter thoughts or emptiness of any kind.

"We've begun something monumental. It's only natural that the nerves are perhaps a little too overeager."

That's an easier sell because it's at least partially true.

Something is askew, not quite right, and he feels a knife of irritation plunge into his chest as he watches Enver flap a piece of paper around. He doesn't immediately grasp what it is he feels irritated about, and perhaps part of it is that he's tired too. Can feel the fatigue start to fray his edges in a way that leaves him a little short, not on patience but instead how to throughly express himself in a way he's not used to.

Rounding the chairs, he plucks the paper out of the smaller man's hand, placing it back on the table and splaying out a large hand over it. With the page pinned firmly to the worktop, he keeps it there, practically towering over Bane's Chosen in a way that brooks no argument as to whether or not it's a very physical display of simmering annoyance. But there's a reason he hasn't touched the man himself, a very conscious choice to ensure he leaves no bruises on Enver's flesh.

"No. It isn't that."

He doesn't know how to express how he knows this. Words refuse to come forth to explain that while he understands that some people would allow their nerves to reign for this much time, Enver Gortash isn't one of them. Which follows on that Enver isn't being completely transparent with him. And it isn't concern that something duplicitous is happening so much as he can feel a note of upset start to step forward to make itself known.

He had thought their relationship close enough not to be fobbed off with half-truths and misdirection.

"You may well be very skilled at leading others on a merry little chase away from what they should be paying attention to, but not me."

When the Dark Urge takes the paper from him, the way he plucks his hand away says too much. It is fast, almost defensive, a flutter of nervous energy in his fingers. He only catches it as it's happening, and inwardly he scolds himself. But the Bhaalspawn's hand presses solidly into the table, and Enver's gaze trails up the line of his arm to find his face.

His words penetrate and it is clear this isn't about business right now. And as much as the alliance, especially with regard to representing his deity, rests at least partly on how he presents himself and what he keeps a tight control of, this is something else.

He also has to ask himself if this is something he even wants to do once it's all over. Once it's just them outside of more than just this room. But this is a little more than ceding control. This is more than allowing himself to voice his pleasure.

And in a way it's something he already feels like he has been promising to do. Or it's headed that way.

A lot of it still feels like too much to lay on the table. But he wants to let go of something. At least loosen the vice that seems to be compressing his chest and making it harder to breathe.

At last he nods, conceding, and his gaze falls back to the table. "That wasn't my first time in the Hells. There's good reason why I knew where to find the crown." He wets his lips, his hand chancing near his chin briefly before he stops the motion. "I wasn't exactly keen to ever go back, but this will work, and it will be worth it."

And nothing happened. He hasn't been found. No one is the wiser.

It seems his outburst has shuffled something loose, and for a moment he says nothing at all, tight expression cracking with contemplation of the facts. Cogs turn and though they start off stiffly at first, by the time they're working cohesively he's arriving at a few key conclusions.

If Enver has been to the Hells before, not mentioning anything ahead of their excursion betrays a few glaringly obvious - and somewhat uncomfortable - details. It seems hardly likely that, somehow, his experience would be any more pleasant than any other soul finding themselves there. That the man had not only supplied the location but also a means to travel to the level of hell they'd needed and then joined the retrieval effort leaves him momentarily adrift in surprise.

As if on cue, his eyes follow the aborted action towards the other man's chin, fixing on the old scar there and feeling his brows knit together briefly. Eventually his hand releases the paper, but only so he can twist and sit himself on the table, perched on the edge next to where Enver sits as he thinks through everything he's just been told. He looks a little like the wind has been taken from his sails, though mostly he's just trying to push puzzle pieces closer together to see if they fit.

"You decided not telling me before we went would be best." It's not a question, though even if he is right, he doesn't know what motivations convinced Enver that would be the correct course of action.

He doesn't even need to ask why the other man joined him. It doesn't really matter regardless, just that he's closer to the crux of the matter than he was a handful of seconds ago. With his gaze turned sideways, he lifts a hand and rests it on Enver's shoulder. Its presence is firm.

"Nobody is coming, Enver. We would have already been pursued. And, if they did come, they would have to go through me first."

Bane's feelings on the matter had been difficult to weigh. If Gortash had been too compromised to go, that his presence there might have been a liability, there would have been wisdom in the decision to stay. But displeasure that such a thing could somehow be beyond his Chosen's control. Instead, he had proven that he could do the work necessary and not allow emotions to compromise him in the moment.

Nor memories of emotions. Or pain or any other sensations he was forced to feel.

Even when he had been unprepared for any of those things to rush up to meet him with full force.

But now it is like the walls he had thrown up before to keep those things at bay refuse to come back down and are smothering him, now that it is all over.

He touches the hand on his shoulder, closes his eyes and lets himself take a slow, steadying breath. To remind himself of the air be is breathing, where he is now and not where he was just some hours ago.

The words, said aloud, are more reassuring. To have something other than his own thoughts battering uselessly against every other one that intrudes and insists the worst could occur at any moment. "Nobody is coming," he repeats.

Edited 2024-08-11 21:08 (UTC)

The sight of a man taking a steadying breath with his eyes closed is familiar to him, but not for this reason. He can't think of many other times in his life he has been reassuring. That this reassurance has been spent on Enver feels right. He leaves his hand as a comforting weight where it is, his eyes glancing to the entrance he arrived through before flicking over to the opposite wall to the bed beyond.

Despite what he is, he still remembers what fear feels like. The creeping sensation that something to fear is out there searching, peeling back shadows to find where he's hiding.

It's been a long time since he felt that, longer now that he has been the something to fear. He remembers the feeling vicariously through the man he's here to check in on, and for a moment he finds himself contemplating that he wants to take it away. The wish is gone in a moment, his mind turning to the scar on Enver's chin again, and then recalling all the others he's seen across his body.

"That's where you got your scars?"

The smallest of grimaces. There is no point in really lying. The question of where would have come up eventually.

"Yes."

His former master was typically not the sort to apply his cruelties in half measures, so when he forbade some in the direction of his new Paige Boy (on account of age, there would be time enough for that later), he might as well have been painting a target on his back.

And for all he knew, that had been the point. Even applying the benefit of the doubt just meant that the devil allowed everything to happen anyway.

The gnome in charge of the human boy delighted in finding reasons to lever all manner of punishments in his direction. And eventually none at all, save that it gave him some measure of power to do so.

He only stopped using the lash when Raphael took issue with the mark it left on Enver's face. That just meant more creativity, and sometimes cruder implements, from then on.

In the present, Gortash pushes the thought away. That wretch will never be invited in this room, even in memory. Nor his master. That has been seen to.

"I did say they weren't my choice."

Nodding that he understands, it's a strange moment that he allows to percolate. Had this conversation happened even just a handful of weeks ago, it wouldn't have given him so much pause. An interesting part of Enver's history, but not one that he would have even considered pursuing the details of because all it would have been was a cheap thrill. A sordid set of facts that would have set his blood churning, should he have let it.

He would have gripped his sense of control tight and moved past it to avoid it being exactly that.

Here and now, it's not in his blood he feels anything, but instead somewhere in his chest. His throat constricts for a moment, tight and unfamiliar in sensation. It leaves him without speech for another few moments as he keeps his eyes on Enver, expression starting to melt into something that could be read as sadness.

Sadness. He hasn't felt it for decades, now, and yet here it is, presenting itself like a long lost friend. He inhales steadily through his nose and eventually forces himself to speak, his hand lifting from Enver's shoulder until the back of his fingers gently stroke his cheek.

"And now your memories won't allow you sleep?"

Almost by instinct he feels himself bending his cheek to that touch, something soft that penetrates through barbs of anxiety and pent-up energy. It radiates downward, reminds so much of his body that it is made of flesh and is not built to be load-bearing.

"Yes...no. Not quite."

It doesn't sound completely correct, and he has to ruminate for something that will.

"I was still a boy when I felt this last, and I haven't missed it."

Being certain that if he closes his eyes, pain is what is going to wake him next. Pain and then whatever is to follow, and there is not enough innocence left to shield him from the dread of knowing what all that could be.

And while it's slow to rear its head on the outside, internally it is very sudden, this feeling of desperation toward replacing that feeling with anything else. His hand covers the Dark Urge's, still turning his face into it, breathing him in, a silent signal to keep it where it is.

"I would very much like not to anymore."

"Memories like those are powerful enough to stay with us."

Some of his own childhood memories have survived despite the cult's teachings and being encouraged at every possible opportunity to forget, to embrace Bhaal's way and only that. He cannot remember the name he was given, but he does recall the smell of sweet peas in bloom every time he was caught by the other children in the neighbourhood and had his face forced into dirt. Of course that stopped the moment he overtook them in height, but the memory lives on.

He has no idea what might be in store for him in only a few short weeks, but without any ability to predict what the future might bring, all he can do is focus on this moment. One in which somebody he's come to care for deeply - more deeply than he has the emotional maturity to fully identify - needs him to try and be emotionally available in a way that helps.

"Tell me how I can aid you?"

In the hours before the dawn, when the task has been finished and there is finite time before things must begin moving again, there is a longing for rest, but something more as well. With the Plot in motion, there will suddenly be much to do, very quickly. And whatever this is? Will have to be quite lean until it is finished. Not done with altogether, but reserved.

Like many things that are not work, it's to be savored, and right now the warmth and utter comfort he feels that the Dark Urge came back, that he is here right now, that this endeavor ended with something good -- not just for his god but for himself? Is exactly what he needs right now.

"Can you stay?" the question is quiet, and he doesn't quite lift his gaze to him until it's fully said. An iquiry, but not quite a plea -- not explicitly, anyhow. "For a little while, at least?"

"I had no intention to leave until you found some rest," he shares in response, not relegating Enver to hanging on for an answer any longer than a shallow breath in. Whether that rest is long enough remains to be seen. If he had to take a guess, he would be leaning heavily towards being resoundingly unconvinced.

The request for the other man to stand doesn't come in words, instead the hand he offers, palm facing up, is meant purely to lever him out of his seat. Whether or not he feels any way at all about the fact that he has faint blood stains on the heel of his hand, he doesn't show it. He's aware that Enver's god requires other types of worship, and that the two of them would be at odds if not for the plan they have originally allied over.

No sooner does he start contemplating that does he stop, learning from the small hours after Lord Gortash's masquerade ball that these are not notions to bring into this very particular space.

"We can start by relocating you to your bed."

There is some desire to argue with that. Perhaps just some juvenile push back toward any sort of suggestion toward a command, which certainly anyone might experience. (Leave alone that he was, after all, a Baneite, and it would not have been unusual for that to feel like the most natural reaction after a decision has been made, no matter how counterproductive.) But whether because he sees logic in the suggestion, is too tired to object, or both, Gortash takes the Dark Urge's offered hand as he rises from his chair.

No mind is paid to the dried blood, save perhaps a more watchful look on the half-drow's body language. Any change in movement, even how he took his hand, that might suggest that it was his own blood.

Doubtful; he knows the man's line of work. But it doesn't hurt to turn his vigilance toward something else for a few seconds.

He needs some manner of distraction, something to hold his attention long enough to let mind realize it's just as tired as his body, and the Dark Urge fills that role admirably, already. Even just a chance for a few minutes with him that don't involve where they were earlier, or what is to be done.

But his gaze flickers from the small curtained corner where he usually rests, back out to the chamber beyond. Other than the two of them, there is no movement.

Time to dwell isn't afforded for all too long as he beelines a path directly to the corner. If it seems as though he isn't concerned about a potential irate archdevil on their doorstep, it's half because he's putting in effort for Enver's sake. He doesn't feel the fear the same way as the other man does, but he isn't a fool either. The more time that passes, the less likely it is they will be linked to the theft. And yet the possibility is never completely off the table.

For Enver, he makes sure to put his best foot forward, leading the way with confidence. And, as expected, there isn't anything lurking for them behind the curtain. He gives his partner a moment to take that in for himself before he releases the hand he's holding. Just for long enough to turn and face him, pale eyes running a quick once over. He forgets the smaller man isn't able to see the same way that he does.

Reaching for the extinguished candelabra near to Enver's bedside, he rounds the corner to light it off one of the other candles and then sets it at the end of the bed. The illumination cast doesn't light up the space completely, but it provides enough for the man to see for himself. Even if the shadows play all the more sinisterly now.

"I went to part of the city I'd never been through earlier," he says as he folds his arms over his chest, as if waiting for Enver to make a decision about getting onto the bed first, or requesting that he does instead.

"Sometimes I have a few moments, before I must act, of being able to watch people."

At first, the beginning of that story only inspires confusion. Enver turns to the bhaalspawn in the dim light, absorbing the words, the gentle tenor of his voice. The cross of his arms makes his mass seem larger, the flicker of the candles leading the shadows around them in a quiet dance to the words he is saying.

The whether the body language has the intended effect or just a coincidence will forever be debated, but Gortash does carefully settle down, at least as far as sitting, watching him, listening. Even coming here his body feels a marked difference, the mattress deep and inviting, meant for a different kind of repose than high-backed chairs.

And in this moment his eyes are still, no longer checking exits.

His intention to lead Enver's thoughts away from their recent trip was always going to need to come at the expense of something else. Talking about the plan, about work, seems counterproductive. Especially since he wants the other man to rest, not delve back into the plans he's been poring over.

Yet, unlike Enver, his whole purpose is to serve his father because that's what he was created for. He wasn't born like the other man. Wasn't given the option to make his own way without influence, thanks to his unholy blood.

And so the only way he can talk about something that isn't the plan is by confessing, again, that his thoughts do stray at times from the path set out for him, simply by way of talking about these experiences. It wouldn't be the first time he's shared something like this with Bane's Chosen, and more than once he's considered how he could have misplaced this exceedingly rare sensation of trust. But it remains, steadfast and bright in their relationship. He trusts Enver.

"I saw a child being taught how to hand stitch leather," he continues, allowing a note of relief (that Enver has sat down) to wash over him briefly. Before he goes further, he opts to drop his arms from his chest, taking up residence on the bed next to the man, thigh pressed against thigh as though a solid, warm presence might aid him too.

"I recalled that my father - my adoptive father - had taught me how to hand stitch leather, too. I do not remember his name, but I remembered that. It doesn't happen often. My life before Bhaal is... something I surrendered all too eagerly when they found me. But... I wonder sometimes if I still remember the things I was taught, if I allowed myself."

It would likely be simple enough to apply that kind of thought even deeper, though he hasn't yet reached a point where he wonders if he would remember his own name. That remains something he understands as not permitted, a line he won't approach let alone cross. For all his thoughts of what life is outside of his own experience, he remains loyal to his father - his blood - all the same.

There's a little more relaxing when the Dark Urge sits next to him, and somewhere inwardly Enver is certain he would have tried invited him to if there had been a few more seconds without. Despite the obvious irony in who they both are, there is an immediate warmth (metaphorical and actual) in the closeness and contact it creates, and it's another buttress coming unmoored.

He doesn't have much interest in reaching equally far back in his own memory -- entirely too much of that tonight already. But he did reveal some of that, in a way, so it is not lost on him that Bhaal's Chosen was doing the same: He spoke to him in his low, earthy voice of something also very old, very secret, something that very much did not have a place in his current life.

Something that in the moment brought comfort instead of strife, even if, silently between the two of them it was understood there was not a happy end attached.

Unless you looked at this moment, this place where they were.

Enver felt himself leaning into the other man's side. A hand came to rest on his knee, a quiet invitation to go on.

He didn't know if this was happy, what he felt right now, but it was the promise of something rather close.

"Would you like to try, when there is time? There will be, eventually, at least. When this is over. Time and freedom enough for nearly anything you could want."

Not quite leaning back, but reaching around enough that his arm takes up something of a supporting role behind the smaller man, he considers the question. It isn't lost on him either that there's a genuine warmth here in this moment, one that he'd be hard-pressed to explain away. Whatever choices they're making here, that he's stepping into fully aware that it isn't all that appropriate, he marches onward regardless.

He bypasses the very immediate response that he almost hears in his father's - Bhaal's - voice. Time and freedom won't be his to command. Not when he has the rest of the plan to follow through on, and if he knows his father as well as he thinks he does, he won't be swayed into letting his spawn delay for such mortal pursuits.

"I don't know."

It seems as truthful of an answer he can give Enver without feeling as though he'll lose himself completely at the prospect of what has to be done. He's run away from his guilt once already. He shouldn't be contemplating that this may be a repeat performance, simply for where it puts him in terms of feelings.

He won't lie. He won't claim to not know how Bhaal would feel about that just as much as he won't say whatever time Enver thinks they have afterwards, it's likely not anywhere near as long as either of them may be hoping for.

"I don't know if the memory is worthy enough of revisiting again."

Gortash accepts the answer with no real awareness of any deep wells standing just beneath it. For the moment, he just settles against the Dark Urge's side, lets the rumble of his voice fill his ears, and for just a moment the stillness and the silence that follows is just that: with nothing lying in wait, not the calm before a storm of motion.

"As you wish, but should you ever change your mind, the offer stands."

He has very little experience himself, save for maybe the odd patchwork and stitches on other fabrics, the sorts of things you just learn to do from a young age to keep your belongings maintained.

He'll write that down later, he thinks. It might or might not be important. But to just put it someplace, just in case. Maybe it's not worth revisiting. That's only maybe, though.

He closes his eyes, and they feel too heavy to immediately open again.

Thick fingers slide up into a head of dark hair as he gently pulls the other man's head against his shoulder. Comforting anybody else isn't something that comes naturally to him, but leatherwork isn't the only thing he's seen during his bouts of people watching. Turning his head, he presses his nose into the top of Enver's head and inhales, his own eyes closing briefly as he works hard to shove away any thoughts about the after. When the plan is done and the rule is theirs, that isn't for thinking about now.

"I hadn't expected, when we first started corresponding, that this would be within the realms of possibility."

If he sounds slightly wistful, it isn't for long. The sentence is spoken into the top of Enver's head and he falls silent again. Holds his lover - there's no other word for him in this moment - close until he recalls why he walked the man over to his bed to begin with. Only then does he gently, carefully start to extricate himself in favour of guiding the man to his pillow.

"I would be lying if I said it was expected." Given he had his own opinions about Bhaalists, but he isn't one to question when Bane has a specific direction. So when the alliance was proposed and then began, he was ready to perform however was needed.

And then all of this. It seems silly to say, even to himself, that he's grateful. One gives praise to their god, of course, but some things you accept without such open enthusiasm, lest it betray something else.

You could also be speaking too soon.

He feels a little smaller, with the arm around him, the breath in his hair, and "...Damnation, why must I be tired right now?"

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