sorrow sinking with a smile (critical role | velora & vex)

[fiachairecht]

sorrow sinking with a smile. critical role, velora & vex'ahlia. vesh-cleric velora swallowed by the storm, killing her sister at the end of the world. 648w, rated t. for ladiesbingo 2019, 'what do you mean, we're related?'

The end is blue.

Vex lies back on the blasted ground, watches the skies wheeling bright, living blue above her, and tries to keep breathing. Movement flickers in the corner of her eye, Velora emerging from the smoke and, behind her, the shadow of her owlbear. The end was only a matter of time, she'd known it for months, and still the shape of approaching death surprises her.

She wishes Vax were with her, or Keyleth, any of the other people she'd lost to death or hiding as the war dragged on. And yet — she's still not alone. It feels like it matters, at least a little bit.

"It's not the worst it could be," she says. Her ribs are broken, her throat is sore, and she's not sure how many of the words leave her mouth, but she has to say them anyway. "Dying, I mean. With my sister."

Velora's brow creases and she kneels, one cold hand on Vex's cheek. "What do you mean?" A thousand storms are caught behind her voice, the death-cries of a million dead. "How long have you been my sister?"

Vex blinks away the sting of tears. When did you stop being my sister? she wants to ask, but she knows already what Velora would say. Can't forget the sight of her little sister crumbled on the floor of a dead city, black smoke clinging to her fingertips.

Can't forget the scars the began to creep up her sister's arms as Syngorn threw itself against the boundaries between the worlds and all of Issylra began to die.

"Please tell me." Velora's hand descends on Vex's chest and she tenses, chokes on dust. She waits for something — the unnatural warmth of healing magic, the sting of one of Vesh's blades — and it doesn't come. "Tell me how long you've been my sister. I want to know, before—"

"Before I die, huh?" It should have been Vax here instead of her — Vax who'd given their baby sister her first knife, who had never stopped being able to look her in the eye. Guilt or blood loss, either one of them could kill her.

The pressure on her chest increases, even as her breathing seems to ease. Is this what dying slowly feels like?

Velora's black and yellow eyes are glimmering with the memory of tears. "Yes. I don't want you to die. But please talk to me before you do. Tell me about being sisters."

Vex tries to laugh, or maybe cry. Blood is spilling from her mouth - has been, maybe, since she fell. "You can have my broom," she says, "If you find it, I mean."

Nothing hurts anymore. Nothing is, anymore, except her sister's hands, her sister's voice. The thought that that's probably a bad sign floats through her mind, but it's gone before she can take hold of it. She wants to reach for Velora's hands, but her fingers won't move.

"You gave me other gifts," Velora says. Soft, like she's surprised herself with the memory. "When I was little. Is that what sisters means?"

"No." Vex's eyes are drifting shut, the noise of the battlefield fading. "Sisters is—" She blinks, refocuses on the off-colour eyes and black-slash mouth where Velora isn't smiling anymore. "Sisters is I never stopped coming back for you. Sisters is that I'm glad it's you here."

Velora's hand lifts, and pain comes rushing back in to fill the space it leaves behind. "Sisters. I'm glad it's me, too."

Velora's hand is still so small when it comes to rest in Vex's own. So small to hold so much death, and to cause even more, but it feels like the only thing keeping her anchored to the ground. "Good night, sister."

Vex thinks, as her eyes slip shut for the last time, that her sister might be be crying for the first time in fifty years.