Hope Falls

“I should have communicated it better, I have no other excuses… I shall make it up to you one way or another.” Lucian promised, taking her hand and kissing the back of it before wheeling himself to find Conan.

Conan sat in the office room just across the hall, stood with his back to the door as he stared at his reflection in a mirror. Whispering counts down from ten to try and ground himself.

---

"The two of you may aswell begin your journey back home, I imagine the children are getting homesick by now." Karina whispered as she approached Thea and Magnus. "I'm sorry your visit has been so.. chaotic. So miserable."

“Magnus promised Dagmar we would make sure her children are okay. We’ll be staying until they are… settled, with their mother gone. And to see if we would need to remove them from here entirely. As Conan refuses to relent with his hatred for his wife… you know the potential outcomes.” Thea said sadly, glancing around the room as the last of the witnesses to the event left. “Lucian did not tell you he was going to ride in and save the day, I assume?”

---

“Conan?” Lucian called, tapping the door with his knuckles. “Your guard is outside, I assume you are in here…”

"Yes... yes come in." Conan swallowed, voice hoarse. Slowly lowering himself down into the chair behind the desk, "How is Karina? I - less than two years without Eden is a much better outcome than any of us expected. She must be relieved."

---

"That is the first time I have seen Lucian since the Guardian's first arrived a week ago. He and I are.. going to talk later. His attention is on Conan for now." Karina swallowed. "Ira almost got himself killed with those stunts."

“I am sorry… so sorry I could not get it that low for Dagmar.” Lucian whispered as he wheeled himself into the room, closing the door behind him.

---

“He is only quiet and shy when it comes to everyone but his sister mm?”

"He is only quiet and shy around people he isn't entirely comfortable with, he is the most hot-tempered, passionate boy of his age I know. Especially when he loses his temper. The extremes of both of Emmett and I, a utter whirlwind."

---

"I thought I would be arranging a funeral this evening, so, it feels ungrateful to feel so mournful over a goodbye."

“I wish I knew what to say to make this any better… All I can say is I’m sorry Conan…”

---

“I imagine like his father he will want nothing but space now.”

"Like his father, what he will want and what he will need will be entirely different things." Karina hummed her tired agreement. "I'll give him a few hours, and then I will leave drinking chocolate in front of his bedroom door. Hopefully by that time he will let me near him."  

---

"I don't know how to tell my children they won't see her for five years," He gulped. "If there was a war, if - if there was a reason other than senseless cruelty then they'd be able to swallow it. Aesira, losing Eden too who - who normally would have been her crutch."

“It boils down in its simplicity to rules… And Dagmar broke them, unfair as they are. I guess… a prison sentence is the best way to explain to it… Dagmar is being imprisoned in her former life as punishment, but she will do her time and be home to them as soon as she can be. At least… At least you know, that it is not indefinite. At least you know she will return home to you.” Lucian offered quietly, “I know it is not quite the same… but I know what it is like to be away from someone you love for so long. I haven’t seen Kenna in about the same time now. I know the ache…”

---

“Do not take this in the wrong way… but maybe it will be good for both of them to gain some independence, some space. It is unfortunate it has come as a forced separation but…”

"You and Magnus need to go home, or keep your opinions to yourselves." Karina answered tiredly. "No one is in the mood for your back to front silver linings and you will both end up having fights. Allow everyone here to be upset over the family they have had to say goodbye, or go away."

---

"An ache you avoid talking about," Conan reached across to pour a glass of water for them both, offering one out to him. "One - one you can talk to me about, if you need to."

“I miss her, but I know she will come back eventually.” Lucian shook his head, taking the water. “And I suppose that is all the advice I can pass on to you. You will miss Dagmar but she will return home eventually. The first few weeks are the hardest, I always find the first few weeks the hardest anyway. After that it becomes a little easier to live with.”

---

“I love you, Kari.” Thea whispered, gently squeezing her friends shoulder before bowing her head and taking her leave to find Magnus.

"You haven't been yourself recently, even before this week you have been more reserved. It is why your absence was..." Conan grimaced, unable to find the right word. "Everyone was concerned that you were becoming locked into yourself."

---

Magnus sat in the gardens, head leant back against the wall and eyes closed against the light breeze.

“The blood oath I just made with Idunn… I am in no danger of ever breaking it. I have no idea what was in that book. I couldn’t even read it…” Lucian confessed meekly. “When I first lost Karina, I was - well you remember. I was young, full of rage and all the other shit that young men are full of when they have been rejected. I had a few drinks and ranted to grandpas half mad sister, remember her, Aunt Nell? I was just seething about the world and the Seers and Valkyries and Guardians and how they were all stupid stuck up bitches and well, I was just talking shit. I was angry. I didn’t mean any of it - as soon as I mentioned the Guardians, Nell’s ears pricked up and she prattled on about how her father had fallen for a Seer once too. Abdicating wasn’t an option, so he found a black book with a funny silver picture on the front to blackmail them with so that he would be able to make this unnamed Seer his Queen. But she ended up passing before he could, so he locked the blackmail material away with the rest of the restricted material in the underground library and forgot about it. And so did I - until Luthien turned up and threatened to shatter the family I had just managed to claw together. My family with Karina.” He rolled the glass of water in his palms, careful to not let it slip. “I don’t know if you remember just how big it is down there - how fucking dark and grim it is how deep under the castle… I just snapped, something in my brain told me I had to find it and stop them from ruining my family. I had my Guard take me down - for a normal person it would be a ten, maybe fifteen minute descent down the steps. It took them almost half an hour carrying me in the chair. And I’ve spent the past week pulling almost every fucking book and artifice our ancestors amassed off the shelf to find this mysterious fucking black book that might just help stop my family falling apart. But in the process it fell apart anyway because I wasn’t here to stop it… so I fucked up either way.”

---

“I prefer sunrise at our palace… but it’s not so bad here.” Thea mused as she sat beside him, taking his hand with her own.

"Nothing fell apart, not a thing more than what you would expect. Thea believed she would help Karina, and gave her some of Magnus' stash - your wife was fucking ridiculous and took dust and then boiled mushroom juice almost straight afterwards. Aesira was more concerned with processing herself then spending time with Eden, and when Eden seemed out Dasha for comfort there was little she could offer in her own grief. Cassius tried to be there for Ira, but the two ended up fighting and I don't think they have overly spoken since. None of that has a thing to do with you, what could you have done? All of us have been pawns this week. Everyone will be sad, everyone will still be heartbroken for awhile longer but it could have been worse had you not remembered that conversation, or made the decision to make it your priority. The only person you won't ever claw back is Thea, but she has never liked you to begin with so that is not new, mm?" He offered a tired grin, as playful as he could muster. "How did Karina seem with you, have you spoken to her yet?"

---

"I prefer everything at our Palace, in our Kingdom." Magnus whispered, squeezing her hand gently. "Are you okay, T? That - That wasn't pleasant to watch."

“For all the things I have seen happen in this Kingdom over the last week, visions of its collapse, war… all the possibilities… I never saw the Queen so brazenly lying to the Guardians. Clearly they did not either. It - I am not used to being caught completely off guard. Even if I do not see things, I often sense them, my sisters will be able to say the same. “The same with Lucian and whatever was in that slab of a book he offered. I was so sure that today was the beginning of the end of peace once again when we entered that room. That Eden would be ripped from Karina to not be seen or heard of again for decades, that Dagmar would be buried at dusk and along with her any hope this Kingdom had left of Conan pulling himself together. I am not used to being so blindsided.”

---

“And I should have been here for you and Kari between it all. I’m sorry I just - I abandoned you just as much as I did Karina.”

"She turned the tides again, that woman. It is becoming a habit of hers, the unexpected prize piece that either causes the foundations of everything to fall into ruin or pulls it all back together. It is astounding, really." Magnus swallowed. "I am not used to not knowing how I feel about a person, it unnerves me. I don't think she is to be trusted."

---

"I wouldn't have noticed if you had been. I am living outside of myself, it all feels distant."

“Then do not trust her. Nobody seems to.” Thea murmured, closing her eyes as she sun peaked in her eyes. “Out of everyone in that room, if she had ended up dying for the lies she told… who would have cared, mourned? Everyone is upset Eden is leaving. There would’ve been no end of grief for Dagmar but Liara? Nobody would have cared after a few minutes… perhaps her lack of potential mourners is telling to her character.”

---

“Do you wish for me to try and reason the positives with you? Or just allow you to feel how you feel?”

"She has had terrible luck being chosen for him, I think that is all there is." Magnus frowned. "What a sad reality, to be mean so little to everyone in your life. How miserable."

---

"I am happy to feel in silence, and alone if you would rather be with your wife. I need to put my thoughts together before I speak to Aesira and Cassius, need to know that I won't break, like they all expect me to do. I have heard their whispers all week, what everyone within these walls really thinks of me."

“Lucian chose her. Another thing that man has fucked up it seemed. Dooms the women he comes across.” Thea sighed deeply. “When looking at it like that, do you still think she is not to be trusted? Or she’s just unfortunate to be where she is and she keeps putting her foot in her mouth?”

---

“And what is that? What they think of you?”

"That I do not deserve to be where I am, that you and I are walking disasters. One of the Lords stated it was better before we came back, when that...  murderer wore my crown." Conan swallowed. "It has been a bad week, I am tired, and people have been less shy on expressing their opinions. It will all pass, in time. I - I would like to believe I am not as bad at this as they say."

---

"I don't know," Magnus confessed quietly, blinking his eyes open and turning his head to watch her. "As I said, my opinon is constantly changing. She's an enigma. As for Lucian, I imagine Karina is singing his praises again already? It would never last long, the distaste toward him."

“We know she is miserable. That Conan is miserable. And yet we have to convince them to make it work so our friends, their children, don’t end up displaced… It feels… I don’t like how it feels. But some things are necessary mm?”

---

“Heavy is the head that wears the crown… I am glad I am not in your shoes, I think about how grateful I am of that everyday. I think whoever has the title is subject to more scrutiny than most of us… I think that you have had strong reign so far. But it has slipped. But if you look at your father’s reign, grandpas… it wasn’t a constant high. And they are forgetting that. And I imagine that our cousins wasn’t perfect either. You are at a low point. And you will wallow and feel sorry for yourself for a time, and then you will turn it around again, and they will eat their words.”

"We are here for the children, more than anyone else. We have to remember that." Magnus wrapped an arm around her waist to coax her closer against him. "How does the future change now that Dagmar is not killed? Will the Zaretsky's still fall, do you know?"

---

"I am tired, Luca." He swallowed, leaning forward to hide his face in his hands. "I feel too old, and tired."

“It splits two ways… Conan pulls himself together and realises that he cannot carry on the way that he has, and they at least try to make things work. Or Conan falls apart and… so does his country.”

---

“You are old and tired. They got you up before dawn.” Lucian laughed weakly, trying to ease the mood. “Your children are your children yes, but no longer children. Aesira is an adult, Cassius is becoming one. And they cannot be allowed to sit and wallow either. So we put them to work too. Give them something to work toward. Duties to get lost in. Ways to keep their mind occupied. We work this out together, as a family.”

"You are not long off of my age, so be careful of your jokes." Conan laughed weakly, reaching across the desk to take both of his cousins hands in his own. "You look as shit as I feel, you need some sun before you are mistaken for one of Magnus' people."

---

"The fall of his country, and.. and Karina too? I was so focused on Dagmar that I barely heard. Did she say she had seen her families end? The Guardian's making valkyries stay here too, there must have been multiple visions of it."

“Ira wouldn’t go with us if we tried to make him. So they’d get caught up in it.” Thea confirmed sadly, opening her eyes to stare at the treeline.

---

“I do not think I’ll be looking any better any time soon, not with what is to come.”