Ch215.5: Conflicted Conspiracy [Beryl POV]

The sound of running water is almost deafening. Countless falls cascade and crash down over short cliff ledges, steamy mists swirling through the suffocating air. Dozens upon dozens of streams rush through channels worn into solid stone over ages past. The discordant cacophony of those hissing, roaring rivers buries beneath it all other sounds.

Yet it isn’t enough to drown out Beryl’s thoughts.

Her long Elf ears twitch and tremble, their pointed tips drooping towards the damp and rocky ground. Those blue-green eyes of hers, usually so bright and lively, stare blankly into her open hands. Beads of moisture gather on her caramel skin, trickling along the creases of her palms.

“{Why...?}” She whispers that question in her mother tongue... only to grimace as the use of that language draws old memories to the forefront of her mind. Memories made worse by her isolation.

Vines barely thicker than strands of hair coil around her ankle, slowly swelling and sprouting little leaves as mana is freely fed to them.

“Ah... Ah should be ‘appy...” The tanned Elf quietly laments, lifting her gaze to face the deep darkness clinging to the cave ceiling high above her head, those stretching shadows forming an empty night sky devoid of moon and star. Her fingers idly touch at her neck, brushing across the stretch of bare skin where a collar briefly sat. Her throat tightens, her heart goes still. An empty feeling festers in her soul... burning hotter and hotter and hotter still as her jaw sets, her hands clenching into fists.

She hates that collar. She hates how it – or at least one just like it – ruined her life those many, many seasons ago. She hates how she has it to thank for all of the good that she has now. She hates how it has tainted the joy and love that she, against all of her expectations, gets to experience each and every day. She hates... She hates...

She hates herself.

Beryl knows full well that, were it not for the accursed collar that she was made to wear, she would be living a miserable life.

There is no denying that detestable fact. No matter how much she may want to.

Had that wonderful, horrible day not come to pass... Had Krvavy not been there to save and, by pure happenstance, enslave her... Then Beryl would barely even exist. For years she did little more than survive, living on as a form of self imposed penance... living only because she didn’t deserve the mercy of death. And the only reason that she isn’t still suffering in solitude... doing naught but wallow in her sorrows from sunrise to sunset, from snowfall to snowmelt... is because she was dragged by force away from that forlorn fate.

An act far to generous, for the likes of her.

That she wasted so much of her life, and would have continued to waste even more of it, proves as much. Each and every moment, whether she was awake or asleep, was spent on accomplishing absolutely nothing. Her survival had no purpose. She was stuck in a spiral, swirling deeper and deeper and deeper. She did nothing but circle the drain, again and again and again. She did nothing but... She did nothing but continue to disappoint her lost love.

The hundreds of vein-like vines splayed out across the ground twitch and shiver as the many sorrows of this melancholic Elf flow through them, sharing in her suffering and weakened by her woes. Yet those plants still sip from the glowing, productive waters pouring down from these many magical hot springs, continuing to live and continuing to grow despite the pain they endure.

As loathe as she is to admit it, Beryl owes her current life to that accursed collar. She owes all that she has to... to that thing... even more than to Krvavy herself. It hurts to even think that way, but it is true.

Krvavy saved her, yes. Had her dearest love not intervened, then Beryl’s life would be infinitely worse right now, in ways that are unfortunately not unknown to her. She would be the property of that abhorrent, detestable, filthy fire mage that she fought... and lost against. A man who was – to a degree that she is still not certain of, and likely never will be – involved in the enslavement, defilement, and desecration of her lost love.

Only by grace of that greedy Dragon was Beryl spared such a fate. It may not have been intentional, but Krvavy taking ownership of her in place of that horrid man...

The latticed network of vines go still as a long, sighed breath crawls past the Wood Elf’s lips.

A spur of the moment decision to approach obvious danger... A spontaneous choice to get closer... Beryl owes everything to that final impulsive moment when Krvavy came rushing in. Had that not happened, or even been a minute late... Her existence would be one of abject suffering, tinged with sickening and saccharine sweetness. Had that happened a second sooner... She would hardly be any better off.

Because Beryl would have never willingly let her misery end.

She would have thanked the Drakling for keeping her from experiencing a truly nightmarish fate... one which she herself failed to save her lost love from... and then she would have departed, disappearing in search of an even more remote wood for her to wither away in. A place where she truly could have been alone.

Instead, she was bound to the will of another. Just as her lost love had been. But unlike... her... Beryl wasn’t so harshly shackled. The power that held, and still holds, her in line wasn’t abused. Her restraints were loosened to such a degree that she could act against the one who owned her heart, her soul, her very being. Not entirely, not with hostile intent, but... more than a slave like herself should ever be capable of.

What should have been the end to Beryl as an individual, as anything resembling her own person, instead led to her being so graciously given a second chance at life.

And she is ruining it.

The tanned Elf pounds a fist into the side of her head. “Nnngh...!” Trembling fingers grasp up handfuls of her messy bark-brown hair. “Nnhn...!” Her knees pull closer, her head thumping down into them. “Hhh...!” Tears stream down her hidden cheeks, her whole body shuddering as she curls up tight, like a child lost to the world.

She can’t let go of the past. No matter how hard she tries... She just can’t let go of the past...

Even now, the sight of her last love in that... that wretched state... It haunts Beryl’s dreams. It haunts her when she is awake. Beryl sees the... the decrepit shadow of her lost love whenever she closes her eyes. Whenever her mind wanders away from thoughts of Krvavy.

She saw... she saw her lost love’s face in Raseyne. Again and again and again in the crowds, always at the edge of her vision. But whenever she looked... her sweet Eirlys was gone.

Beryl can never forgive herself for what she did to her lost love. Not the mercy at the end, that harsh conclusion to what had been warped into a pitiable life. Not... not the failures at the beginning that set everything in motion.

Even had those heinous Humans never encroached upon their home... Even had her last love never been enslaved, then... then...

The two of them would have remained separated.

A soft leaf, a reminder of the past, brushes against the Wood Elf’s pallid, caramel skin. Small flowers sprout from the rock and soil all around her, twin leaves flanking fresh stems topped by drooping bells, their petals a pristine white.

The first love of Beryl’s life was not torn from her arms. Beryl did not even know that her delicate snowdrop had been taken until more than a month after the fact. Had she not pushed Eirlys away... Could Beryl have protected her...? At the very least, her lost love would not have been in the borderlands that day.

All the pain and suffering that Eirlys had to endure... the agony... the torment... the humiliation... the permanent scars upon her soul... It was all Beryl’s fault. All because Beryl was afraid. Afraid of her duties, of her fate, of her only path forward.

And those fears... those fears are back.

Beryl is doing it all over again.

She thought that... that the collar would keep her in line. That it would keep her from being... self destructive. But Krvavy, that softhearted Dragon, has given her too much agency. Too much free will. None of this would be happening right now had Krvavy broken her like those bastards broke sweet Eirlys. It isn’t too late. Krvavy can still put Beryl in her place. It would only take a few words... a few orders... and Beryl would never need to worry again. These thoughts... these memories... they would be banished from her mind, unable to return.

But... Does she deserve that mercy? Does Beryl deserve to get the easy way out just handed to her like that...? After everything Eirlys suffered through because of her, after all of those years she squandered and threw away, does Beryl deserve to be free from this misery of her own making...?

Does she... does she want that...?

It would make everything so much simpler.

Beryl wouldn’t need to feel the stab of guilt, like a knife wedged between her ribs, whenever she earnestly smiled. Whenever she felt joy. Whenever she feels loved.

She wouldn’t need to hide her sorrows beneath false smiles that taint the real. She wouldn’t need to live her life with this... mask. She wouldn’t need to worry so much over letting it slip. Because it wouldn’t slip. It couldn’t slip. She could find peace in that. In living a lie. A lie that may well be truth, to Beryl and all those around her.

It is easier than what she is doing now. And... not that different...

The thin, creeping vines spread across her clammy skin, undisturbed by her slowly rocking body. Moisture is gathered, mana is drawn free. Little roots soak up her tears.

Since returning from Raseyne, Beryl has been avoiding the others as best she can. Beryl has spent as much of her time outside as she possibly could. Beryl has skipped meals. She has been late to bed and early to rise. She has... she has not even so much as kissed her dearest love in days.

And she hasn’t been subtle.

The others have noticed her absence. They have noticed the distance that she has tried to put between them and herself. She has had to throw distractions and excuses their way. But that could only work for so long before they stop trusting her words. And that time is coming soon. She can see it in their eyes, in those moments she lets herself spend around them. The worry, the concern. The questions that she doesn’t want to answer.

She has even been confronted about... all of this. By Adeline and Inanna. Not together, but individually. And while Beryl couldn’t bring herself to... to share what pains her... Both the Halfling and the Dwarf had wanted... to help her. And they have been helping her, in their own ways.

The deliberately placed mounds of soil and countless sproutlings that fill this hollow can attest to that. As can the dozens of quartz crystals scattered around the self-hating Elf, each one held in place by vines and roots.

The earthen beauty of this corner of the cave has been despoiled. At Beryl’s behest, the land above has invaded the land below.

A grove will sprout from these stones, surrounded by revitalizing mists and healing waters. A beacon of life and light hidden in the cold dark. A sanctuary to rest, relax, and recuperate in. A place to heal ones body and mind. A place she desperately needs.

A place she never wanted to make.

Beryl is an exile from her homeland, an exile by her own will. And now she is considering bringing a sliver of that land here, its shadow cast across her new home. She is considering doing what she should have done decade upon decade ago. What she was always destined to do, no matter how long she put it off and no matter how far she ran. Fate would always find her, errant child that she is...

Hopefully... Hopefully Krvavy will see reason and forbid her from continuing this work. A few words and she can be saved. This grove can merely be a garden, nothing more. Nothing... more...

Streams of sorrow freely flow down this Wood Elf’s face, the caramel hue of her cheeks faintly faded.

“Ah’m so... so pathetic...” She whispers, voice drowned out by the water running around her shivering, curled up body. “Ah’m... a coward...”

Beryl shouldn’t force this decision onto Krvavy, onto her ignorant and dearest Dragon. That is... cruel. So very cruel. But it is exactly what she is going to do. Beryl simply... cannot help herself. She is stuck between extremes. It is worse than before. Far, far worse.

She couldn’t make half this decision herself, back when doing so would have fixed everything. She just pushed her last love away, even as she desperately tried to cling onto what they had.

She can’t let that happen again. She can’t... she can’t...

One way or another, Krvavy will fix her. That is the only sliver of hope she has left.