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Were he in a less dire state he would be ashamed of how he could not bring himself to care for her state of health in that moment, but he could hardly even concentrate on where he was much less how his savior was faring. He managed to prop himself off the tree, stumbling towards her when he recognized that his calls had been answered, she'd come for him. Fate had played the cards in his favor for once. It was a small mercy, one he prayed he deserved.

A touch against his shoulder, warmth. His wing was limp but a pitiful twitch managed to get it up and over Resplendence's frame, allowing her the room to help prop him up, no matter their size differences. She was warm and solid against him, one of the few constants his life had ever offered him. How odd it was that someone so broken was also the only one who continually supported Kaj in all he did and stood for. How others could not see her worth was beyond him. Perhaps she was like Cassandra, always mistaken as something else, a lie that could not be believed in except for sinners like him. Her prophecies always held worth, but nobody ever cared to turn an ear to them, thinking her a broken thing incapable of such wisdom. At least Kaj was not so blind.

Words soothed themselves into his ears, but he cannot meet her gaze that searches so valiantly for his. Instead, Kaj turned and tucked his head into the crook behind her jaw, closing his eyes tight against both the tears and the idea of having to look into her face in his moment of weakness. For what little he had left, pride was still among them. Comfort weaved itself into the torn fabric of his very soul with her soothing promises, and he let himself be rocked down and to the ground where he was less likely to harm himself or her. Claws prickled at his shoulders, claws soothing in his mane, and Kaj allowed it and desired it equally. It helped him concentrate on the actual words she was speaking, gave him a medium to speak through. Granted him the ability of a tongue she could understand, once more.

"I loved them," was all he could choke out before her words finally took effect. Kaj had never allowed himself to cry wholesomely. His last memory of it was fuzzy, distant. Years of grief and struggle broke into pieces at her command, and he sobbed into her skin, a mighty thing that was wrenched from the very marrows of his sorrow to spill across his tongue like ichor and turpentine. It was both horrifying and relieving, to feel so weak and broken and yet sense the newness beneath the rot. Perhaps he'd been cracking for too long, and Ophelia had been the one to drive the pick into his brain - a loving lobotomy that had allowed the man to break apart at the seams and become something better once stitched back whole.

"Kahlua-" it was the broken shard that he choked out, nothing more capable of following it. "They leave, they hurt me, god it hurts!" He wailed this newfound agony into her skin, imprinting it upon her. It was a child skinning its knees for the first time, the shock of newness more painful than the experience was likely worth. Except for Kaj, the pain was truly worthy, but the shock factor was still in place. His mighty frame seemed to shake like an earthquake, a mountain crumbling to pebbles. It was a wonder how Resplendence didn't shake apart right beside him, drawn down and smashed upon the rocks, he a boulder tied to her flightless form.

Somewhere in the stride between sobs he whispered a sentence more manageable, comprehensible. "I've given them everything," he whispered, fragile beyond measure or words. "It wasn't enough." It wasn't enough to keep Kahlua at his side, to make Evangeline love him, to keep Quilyan or Destrier as his brothers. They had turned the weapon of his own benevolence upon him, his own gifts striking him down so they could croon and coo over the patterns his heart made when it splattered upon the ground.