into the sea, you and me
all these years, and no one heard
i love you, let's go

He comes to her, or more correctly appears in her life like he has since the beginning of all of this, wearing the burdens of her failed leadership, his loyalty that she probably doesn’t deserve but in the end, cherishes. She can’t lie that she’s surprised to see him despite the plans brewing within the confines of her skull to visit him, to pick up the pieces in what is left of what she now sees as Hell before finally breaking her chains to the desert.
Hobgoblin flutters only internally at the sight of his only true friend, rising up in his shoulders and spine with the curling of his tail as a soft chirp chitters out of his lips, one far different in comparison to the one that he had made in the past to the dragon. Happiness warms him like the fire in a lighter in a snowstorm.
He cannot overpower Sikeax’s sorrows, but he can escape, even if it’s for a short amount of time.
Shame begs her to retreat at his company, but she’s succumbed enough times within the recent moons, and Volterra is not one that can easily take advantage of her again.
But at the same time, she can’t bring herself to lie to him. She can’t bring herself to lie to anyone, because when has she in the past hidden the truth for the sake of pride? Hobgoblin would shun her if not for the circumstances and the presence of the crimson dragon. He cannot even spare her his attention, closing her out in the dark for whatever pleasures he gets out of the company of something that he once sought control over.
Ghosts cloud her blue skies, dimmed by bitterness. Discomfort ridicules her brain in ways that it hasn’t in years, taking her back to when her father had sworn himself to her only for a short amount of time, to his abandonment, of the fear of her home.
This isn’t home.
She feels like a child beneath his exterior, heart aching from shame because how could she bring him into this mess, asking him to discard his hopes and dreams, his future for her failure? He had been kind and warm to her in his own unique way in their last private meeting, and now she feels he’s become nothing more than a statue, built of obsidian and marble with rubies for eyes. All stone and far too cold.
The spaces above her eyes are desecrated by wrinkles. Every portion of her body whispers out the silent pain of her mistakes, the slouch in her posture, the stillness in her bones, the fading stench of sea salt and the thinness of her winter coat. For good measure, sadness attaches weights to her ears so that they hang like the branches of weeping willows.
"Volterra.”
His name rolls off her lips like the wind in the vastness of the ocean: empty.
His kindness, or whatever it is residing in that question, tempts her to turn and yell because is it not obvious how she is exactly? Is the despair in her not written on her pale, sea-torn coat with black ink, the pain swallowing up the life in her eyes?
Out of her and into him, Hobgoblin pours a spitting hiss in Volterra’s direction, not out of his personal need(he has little care, if not any, for the Indomitable’s existence), but for Sikeax’s hard-needed release.
Bitterness never gets the better of her.
“Terrible, if you haven’t noticed.”
Can’t you see that? Didn’t you before?
“Large body, small brain.”
She almost wants to smile at the thought.