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“So,” Rin began slowly, poking Kitay in the arm, “the burning?”
“Burning?”
“You're still burning yourself,” Rin replied bluntly.
Kitay turned his face away from her. They were sitting outside, backs pressed against the wall of some Republican building while the sunset melted into twilight and bathed the skies in indigo-purple. The council meeting was over, all the warlords and officials long gone. Retreated to their rooms to lick their wounds after yet another unsuccessful attempt at strategising.
“Your sleeve rode up in the meeting,” Rin said when it became clear that Kitay wasn’t going to reply. “But I already kind of thought you might still be doing it.”
Kitay still didn’t reply and Rin found herself feeling vaguely frustrated. When she first saw those marks on Kitay's arms, she'd been pissed. Not about the burning, about everything else. She'd been mad with vengeance and anger and opium. Driven by revenge, running from guilt. Trying to tame the fiery god in her mind, trying to honour the man she loved, trying to forget everything she did. Then her best friend wouldn’t even look at her. Kitay turned his back on her. He'd sat on his stupid high horse and guilted her. Abandoned her to do the fucking pirate queen's taxes. Tried to moralise a goddamn war. He'd been submerged in guilt, trying to make her drown with him. Rin had wanted to hate him for it, but she could never truly hate Kitay.
The angry red scars had faded the back of her mind, all but forgotten till recently.
“You’re one to talk,” Kitay said finally. He was tugging on strands of grass, twisting them through his fingers. Rin figured it was to stop himself from pulling out his own hair. “Don’t think I haven’t seen the open wounds on your arms? Your legs? Everywhere?”
Rin's stomach didn’t quite drop, but it definitely felt a little heavier. It was different from the concern she’d felt in the council meeting, seeing those fresh wounds on Kitay's arms. That was worry. This was vulnerability.
“Fuck you,” Rin replied eloquently. She’d actually been worried about the idiot but now he'd gone and turned it around on her. In the back of her mind, Rin knew that Kitay felt the same way she did. Cornered. Embarrassed. Scared. In the front of her mind, however, Rin did not care.
They lapsed into silence for a moment before Kitay spoke again.
“Why do you do it?” Kitay asked, unable to sate his curiosity even when asking questions just made things worse for everyone. “I noticed the burns at Sinegard, usually when the workload got harder. At first I thought you were staying up late to study and accidentally knocking over the your candle.”
“The pain kept me awake.” For some reason, this admission did not sting. There was something practical about it. She needed to stay awake to study longer so she dripped molten candle wax onto her skin. Maybe others would consider it extreme, but most others had never been in Rin's position. She hadn’t burned herself for the fun of it, for the rush, for the relief. She’d done it for her future, for something tangible. For something important.
“And the cutting?” Kitay asked without missing a beat. “Do you still need to stay awake. Are you still studying? Burning the midnight oil? I saw the way you looked at me that day, Rin. When Moag gave you my address and I held your hand over the lamp.”
“And you're so much better than me?” Rin snarled, lashing out from the corner Kitay had backed her into. “Are you still burning yourself out of pity for Mugen? For the Federation? Hoping your suface level scars will revive the enemy?”
Kitay curled in on himself and pulled up the blades of grass twisted between his fingers. Part of Rin hated herself for it but most of her was relieved. She was a soldier. If there was one thing she knew, it was how to defend.
…
Kitay didn’t stop burning but Rin didn’t ask. She swallowed her concerns and told herself it was because she didn’t care. If he wanted to set himself alight on a pyre for Mungen, she’d let him.
(She'd pretend she didn’t sometimes do the same thing. Pretend she didn’t enjoy it every time. Pretend she didn’t ask because she didn’t care.)
(Rin could never not care about Kitay. But Rin could also never not be scared.)
…
Rin awoke with a scream.
Luckily, the nearest human was probably miles from the river that her and Kitay's little raft was floating along. Unluckily, she couldn’t get those fucking images out of her head.
Altan. It was always fucking Altan with her. All her nightmares, all her dreams, all her hopes. All of it always boiled down to him.
Altan burning. Altan screaming. Altan telling her he was proud.
Rin tried to draw in air but the oxygen barely made it to the back of her throat before it choked her. Distantly, she could hear someone talking but their words were drowned out by Altan's screams still ringing in her ears.
Or maybe those were her own screams. Her own cries of desperation and pain and grief. She didn’t know, she didn’t care. Rin could barely think enough to distinguish the screaming from the talking, she didn’t know where she was or who she was with. She didn’t even know if she was back in that acursed lab.
Fuck. She needed to clear her head.
Without thinking, Rin made a fist with her right hand and smacked it hard against her temple. There was a second of clarity before everything plunged back into chaos. She did it again. This time she heard the calmness of the other voice, soft and slow enough that she could almost make out what was being said.
The moment elapsed. She needed more. Rin felt around on the floor, nails scrabbling against wood in search of anything that could help. The wood was hard and scratchy but none of it rough enough to break skin. None of it sharp enough for her to find release.
Suddenly she was tipping over and falling headfirst into something cold and icy and wet. She was swimming away from the beach, following the stars to Speer. Warm hands reached under her armpits, trying to pull her up but Rin snarled and struggled and fought back. She tried to summon fire but the water doused the flames before they could fully form. Still, Rin tried her best to burn. She pulled and pulled upon the Phoenix, forcing fire that instantly died. Then, someone else screamed. This distracted Rin so much that she stopped struggling and calling on the Phoenix.
“Altan?”
The hands took the opportunity, skinny arms reaching under her armpits and trying to pull her up. But her clothes were waterlogged and the person lifting - while stronger than their reedy arms would suggest- didn’t have the muscle to pull her up.
“Kitay?” Rin asked, finally looking and really seeing.
Kitay's mouth curved into a tired smile.
“In the flesh,” he whispered, pulling her up with more ease when she finally supported her own weight.
Rin shivered in her wet clothes, making a damp puddle on the raft as she trembled with disorientation. Reality had somewhat set in but the part of her brain that blocked out things she didn’t want to remember wasn’t working properly yet.
“Come here,” Kitay said softly, “leave your wet clothes there and come here.”
Rin's hands fumbled with the fabrics so Kitay gently peeled them off for her. Rin tried to smile in gratitude but it was difficult with the constant thrum of rage-guilt-grief in her mind.
“It'll be alright,” Kitay murmured. He helped her move away from her clothes and Rin crawled forward, disoriented and wearing only her underwear. She didn’t bother with modesty. Neither of them felt the need around each other. Even before the soul bond, they hadn’t cared. Soldiers rarely got the privilege of privacy and they were far closer than most. And now the idea of embarrassment over something so mundane seemed laughable. They had seem every part of each other. Every flaw, every secret, every weakness. Nudity was the least of their concerns.
Rin grit her teeth. The nightmare might be over but the images remained. Flashes of a dead island, though she couldn’t tell if it was Mugen or Speer. Corpses in Golyn Niis. Kitay, Venka and Nehza amongst them. Qara's dead body, Chaghan's look of terror. Altan burning, Altan's voice. Altan. Altan. Altan. Always, always fucking Altan.
“Here, I'm going to help you wrap this around yourself.”
Rin felt Kitay helping her into his clothes while hers remained a sodden heap on the other side of the raft.
“Body warmth,” Kitay whispered. He slowly wrapped his arms around her shivering, limp frame.
Rin hated how gentle he was. She hated the way he coddled her. The way he looked at her like she was someone he loved. Like someone deserving of that love.
Suddenly, Rin screamed. She pushed herself out of Kitay’s grasp and scrambled to the edge of the raft.
“Shit, Rin! Not again!,” Kitay shouted as quietly as he could.
But Rin didn’t want to dive back in. Her hands felt along the edge till she got to the ragged side where the wood had been torn to construct the raft. The wood was rough and sharp and perfect. Rin dragged her forearm across it fast and hard. She relished the burn, the scrape and feeling of blood pooling in the cut. The way it cleared her mind. She did it again, worshiping the sweet release that came with the pain. The images of death and dying and suffering blurred with each line she carved into her skin. She did it again. And again. And again. Until she heard a soft gasp, a hitch of breath behind her.
‘Shit,’ Rin realised, ‘the soul bond.’
…
“It doesn’t even hurt,” Kitay lied.
Rin glanced at the slight scarring on his arms. Thin white lines that streaked through the patchy burn marks on his pale, freckled skin.
“You're lying,” She hissed.
Kitay just pulled her closer.
After she heard him gasp, Rin had instantly turned to look at him. She’d been so shocked that she almost fell back into the lake. Luckily, Kitay steadied her before she could. He'd wrapped a few spare bandages around her arms and brought her back into his embrace.
She tried to apologise.
He insisted there was no apology needed.
Instinctively, Rin burrowed into Kitay's warmth. They were both wearing Kitay's clothes with his cloak wrapped around them as a flimsy shield from the frigid air.
Kitay wasn’t particularly tall but he was a little but taller than Rin. Her head fit neatly under his chin, cheek pressed between to his chest. The perfect angle to hear his heartbeat.
…
“It helps with the grief, doesn’t it?” Kitay asked.
Rin looked at him through the side of her eye.
“What?” she asked.
Kitay sat up from his position on the raft. He must have just woken up, Rin hadn’t realised he was awake till he spoke. He'd been lying down on his side, curled into a contorted shape that had Rin's muscles aching just from watching him sleep. Then again, that might have been their newly intertwined souls.
“The burning. The cutting. The pain. Does it help you with the grief?”
“You know what you saw during the ritual,” Rin snapped without meaning to. “You saw how it makes me feel.”
“It helps you find release ,” Kitay mused aloud, “Helps you keep going.”
Rin pulled her legs up to her chest, chin resting on her knees so she wouldn’t have to look at Kitay while he talked.
“What about you?” she asked after a beat. Because she wanted to turn the conversation around before Kitay could ask her something else. Because she was secretly worried, secretly curious. Because no matter what he said, Kitay's voice would be a welcome difference from the melancholy silence.
“It helps with the guilt,” Kitay murmered a few seconds after she’d asked. “Well, its more of a punishment I supose.”
Neither of them looked at the other. They'd seen eachother’s naked souls but the vulnerability of verbal expression was a new challenge entirely.
For a moment Rin considered asking Kitay what he could possibly feel guilty for. Surely he didn’t actually mourn Mugen that much. Surely he wasn’t so caught up in what she’d done that he still punished himself.
(Rin thought she’d feel guilt at the possibility.
She didn’t. (Or at least she that’s what she forced herself to think.))
Then the moment passed and Rin remembered that Kitay was a soldier just like her. He'd fought, he’d killed, he’d made mistakes and he had more than enough of his own sins to atone for.
“Sometimes it helps me sleep too,” Kitay continued, voice soft as silk and brittle as glass. “It doesn’t take away the pain but sometimes… often, actually, I, ah, want to make it worse. It feels more balanced that way.”
There was a slight pause before he spoke again.
“I have less nightmares when I burn. Did you know that? Sometimes it's the only thing that helps me shut my eyes and not open them back there.”
Rin didn’t have to ask where he meant. Golyn Niis. The hell Kitay dreamt of almost every night. On the raft, she'd witnessed it far more times than she’d have liked to. Kitay waking up, shaking and sweating and disoriented. So sure he was back there. He never screamed though. He'd been too afraid that they would find him.
(Rin wasn’t like him. She almost always screamed when she had dreams.
Dreams of Altan. Golyn Niis. The lab. Altan. The Empress. Altan.
(It didn’t matter what else she dreamed of. It was always Altan in the end.))
“You don’t do it anymore,” Rin realised. And sure, there might have been a myriad of reasons why Kitay was no longer burning himself. For one, they hadn’t had much access to matches or lamps for the past few days. Still, Rin immediately knew the real reason. The soul bond. Kitay wasn’t hurting himself because he didn’t want to hurt her.
“You can if you want,” Rin said without thinking, “I don’t mind.”
(‘Sometimes,’ she didn’t say, ‘I secretly want it too.’)
(Kitay knew she did. He knew everything about her now.)
Rin mentally kicked herself. She was fairly sure this wasn’t something friends were supposed to encourage. Shouldn’t she be happy? After all, she never wanted Kitay to hurt himself, she never wanted him to hurt at all if she could help it.
Still, Kitay had already been hurt so much, was going to hurt so much regardless. He felt pain every time she summoned the Phoenix, everytime she hurt herself, everytime she hurt someone else (though that was a different pain and one she decided to pretend to ignore. Pretend she didn’t feel too.) Shouldn’t at least some of his pain be on his own terms?
Kitay shook his head.
“I don't want to hurt you,” he said.
“I hurt you,” was Rin's immediate reply. “I hurt you last night. I hurt you every time I summoned the Phoenix.”
“It didn’t hurt.”
“Stop lying. I know it hurts. I know I'm hurting you all the time.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
Rin loved him for saying it. But she hated herself for loving it. She tried to ignore that feeling. She wanted to ignore it so terribly and if it were anyone else she might have succeeded but she couldn’t with Kitay. She could never not hate hurting him.
“I love you,” Rin whispered, pressing her forehead to his.
Kitay leaned in to the touch.
“Would you stop me if it got too much?” she asked.
“Yes,” Kitay lied.
Rin knew he wouldn't tell her. Kitay was too loyal and maybe too selfish. He needed the pain just like she worshipped it. He wallowed in the guilt she supressed. And she burned in the anger he compartmentalised.
They were the same. Two anchored souls. Two halves of a whole. Two desperate, angry, grieving, selfish soldiers fighting in a war that neither of them asked for.
And maybe one day Kitay would hate her for it. Maybe one day he'd hate the way she used him, the same way he'd hated the way she burned Mugen. But even if that day came, Kitay would always love her more. He'd always love her more than he hated her and she'd always love him more than she hurt him.
Because at the end of the day, the only thing they loved more than the pain was each other.