(adjective) easily crumbled
“Grymfalk. I don’t want any of this.”
“‘I don’ want to see it again, but the past couple of weeks you’ve just been so… close. To not bein’ here at all. ‘N I’m worried ‘n dunno how to stop any of what’s goin’ on ‘n … I’m afraid, y’know?”
“Psychic things are difficult. Don’t even know how to begin resisting.”
“Prepare your mind. Identify who among us needs the most protection from psychic attack.”
“Or when I walk in the flesh I will find you and you will not resist me again, and it will be your own spear which foretells destruction.”
“We will need your strength for the war to come.”
They rotate like some sort of hellish pinwheel of voices in her mind. Every waking moment is filled with one and its accompanying scene, and precious few are pleasant memories. Training and playing with Button helps, but his attention span only lasts so long, and he’s gotten used to taking long naps. Grymfalk’s mind is still left alone far too often. Long enough to worry — about Qel, about Sanarisse, about the ritual, about Sionnach’s promise, about her own strength. About Eleksander and his eye and how much his endless selflessness is being used to help him ignore his own needs. About Aisiatar and Kairon and everything they are and hope to be, and whether they’ll be able to be any of those things when this storm has finally blown over. About Eliseo and Ivault and the isolation and helplessness and infuriation resting separately on their shoulders. About Servius, alone on the seas with his crew of lost ducklings. Were they still alive? It had been so very long since she’d last seen them. Anything could’ve happened out there —
And she stops, and she stills, and she takes a long, slow breath. Keep it together, Grymfalk.
She tries to focus instead on recalling her studying. Guarding the mind of a dark knight was complex, remember; concentrate on the techniques to avoid, the tweaks to make, the weaknesses to protect and the assets to let alone. Guarding the mind of a warrior was dangerous, remember; concentrate on the defenses to employ, the signs to watch, the threats to evade and the strengths to encourage. Recall your meticulous notes. Eventually she asks for pen and paper so she can write down everything she remembers, and she has been well-behaved, so they oblige. Something to keep her busy. She draws and details as many diagrams as she can remember, writing and rewriting, drawing and redrawing. The repetition is soothing. She draws Button after she has copied down everything she can remember three times over. He awakens; she goes back to training him; he falls asleep; she returns to her studies, and the memories creep in. Who was she to him? Who is she to them? What does she need to be for them? Is there even any time?
And she stops, and she stills, and she takes a long, slow breath. Keep it together, Grymfalk.
It would be all right. There was no other choice, really. Success or death, and no point in worrying about the latter, not when distress could only weaken her mind.
And she stops, and she stills, and she takes a long, slow breath.