05-04-2015, 11:17 PM
I love you. Don't you mind, don't you mind? He sees the line. It touches his skin, and he could grab hold if he wanted, but he doesn’t want it. He doesn’t want the rope in his hands. He doesn’t want the lifeline. Margaery wouldn’t have grabbed hold, either. She would have opened her mouth, let the water into her lungs. She would have drown in a black sea, under a black sky. She would have done anything in the world if it meant never having to touch his hand. She would have done anything other than look him in the eye. “I didn’t ask for you,” he snarls, but the words are hardly menacing, not here, cheek against dirt, pretending that her cells could fuse to his. He is not the monster he sees in himself. There is no black blood. There is no poison. Only poor luck made poorer by the inability to cope. She talks about starving like she knows. She cannot, he thinks, but he does. They all saw him waste away until he was only waif and regret, only bones and hardships. They saw his insides on the outside. They saw him fragile. They saw the crack in his smile, and how it wavered, and they’d made him king even still. “I am already starving,” he says, even though his belly is full and his ribs are not yet turned xylophones. He is starving, but not for food. His insides rattle, they groan and tremble, but not for nourishment. He is hungry, but there is nothing left in the world to satiate that need. North. barret ---  |