They don't speak much on the journey to the Edge, but then again, Yseulte has never been one for many words.

And she senses that Dawn doesn't wish to talk, not just yet. Perhaps he will never talk again. She doesn't blame him. Some things are for the heart to know, and no one else. She, of all people, understands this more than most. So she doesn't comfort him with false promises or encourage him to talk to her. She doesn't do much of anything, in fact. She is simply there, supporting him if his numb legs should stumble and glancing at him every so often, making sure he hasn't wandered off to befriend another tree. But he is plodding diligently along, working the circulation through his frozen body, and the sun's light is thin and weak it seems to help him.

To be honest, she is rather tense.

Every fiber of her being feels strangely responsible for this boy since she made that fleeting decision to help save a life—a life she doesn't know quite what do with, now. The feeling is a relatively new one to her, but she has felt it before a long time ago, when she was not much older than Dawn. Sometimes Zjarri would tell her gruesome stories, stories that did not have happy endings like the exciting fairy-tales Finn used spin for her.

But she loved him anyway.

She loved him despite his faults, despite his forgetfulness and the times he would be away for many days before finally returning to her. But she didn't mind so much, really, because Makenna took good care of her. Her aunt was kind and gentle, if not a bit sad and distant, though Yseulte never understood why at that age. Yseulte especially loved her father when a strange, faraway look overcame his pale face and he looked serenely at peace. In those rare, fleeting moments, she knew he was thinking of her mother, Yildun. Sometimes, he would even smile. And it would be real.

But the good did not outweigh the bad.
He hurt people. He hurt many people.

She could not forgive him for that, or herself, for the terrible thing she was about to do.

She blinked. She had felt and done all of this many years ago, when she was not much older than Dawn. In fact, gazing curiously at him with keen, cold eyes, she realizes she must have been the same age, if not a day older. This revelation puts Dawn in a new light, and she is suddenly quite aware of how capable he is, of how capable she had been at that tender, unpredictable age. It makes her uncomfortable. But like all problems she doesn't quite know how to deal with, she pushes it aside and ignores it until her problems disappear.

Which rarely ever happens.

"You are brave, Dawn," she says, quite suddenly, almost desperately. She tells him because she would have liked to been told the same when she was his age. But she'd had no one. And the secret was a terribly heavy burden in her heart. She didn't wish the same for Dawn.

She doesn't speak again until they've long since passed into the serene green folds of World's Edge misty forest. She is taken back by the boy's sudden question, and stops walking to stare at him, and she finds her eyes tracing the line of black-red caked on his cheek. "What will I do with you?" she repeats blankly, still at a loss. She shakes her head sadly. "Feed you to the lions we keep in the backyard, perhaps," she says dryly, regaining her sense of composure. She continues walking, knowing he will follow. The minutes pass. She glances over her shoulder once more.

"What will you do with you? That's the question you should be asking yourself."

yseulte
apprentice craftsman of world's edge

Brave.

A coward dies many lifetimes before his end. The boy feels he has experienced many of these deaths already. He recalls, too eagerly, the moments where he had been too scared to act. The most simplistic desire to protect and to provide; insufficient and inadequate for the one he cared for. Fear wedged itself in his soul, shutting his mouth, blocking his eyes. Dawn allowed fear to rule him.

But he was broken. His brows knitted together, his eyes cold as they stared into the floor. What did that mean? Why would she say that? Dawn quickly lifts his head to meet her gaze. The answer she omits from her lips produces a dull, amused response from the boy. One that brings him back to her previous statement. “Brave,” he says. A single word that forms into disbelief stands ahead of a bubbling laugh. But he stops himself from the tumbling chorus with a shaky sigh, briefly glaring at the forest. “You would know brave.” He does not intend to be rude or above her observations. It’s funny to him regardless; what is bravery? To do things in light of overwhelming circumstances; and what circumstances were those? He’d been injured, how could she be so certain of her verdict?

What perception is this? He coos inside his head… a warrior’s observation? Dawn readjusts his breathing pattern, forcing said amusement down his throat. The overwhelming encouragement is beyond recognition. He has lost too much to believe in it. And before his focus can pull him together his voice mumbles. “If survival is a matter of bravery.” Unlike the needy child who might have accepted it, ate it all up and glowed underneath the immediate protection of the Edge, Ysuelte, he curled away instead.

It was nearly over though - this fumbling into the winter wilderness; but each step that brought him closer to this potential paradise burned him with contradictions. “I-“ It sticks against his throat. Walking as she did, until he met her gaze again with defiant eyes. “I thought you would take me. That there would be work for me to do. That I-,” he stops. There’s a rigid shift in his neck, brief, that adjusts his head just so. “I don’t understand.”

When does hope become an impossible thought? What happens when there’s that incredible chance that it might actually be there after all? Dawn, numb as he was to the thought, tensed underneath this growing confusion. At a loss, he steps forwards, pausing for far too long until finally: “Please… excuse me…” Out of habit he bows his head, a regal salute before he starts to run. He knows not where to run, he just, runs; ahead of her and deviating to the right. Dawn’s breathing quickly becomes heavy. Having ignored the pain he thinks he can run forever, but that idea is far from the truth. The energy in his legs feed warmth into him, but he doesn’t have much of it left. It’s not until he’s completely lost himself in the maze of trees and fog that he regrets running in the first place. It is in his fortune that there is a cave, light that flickers and draws him closer.

“I just want- .” He’s talking to himself, to someone. Each step becomes more difficult, and the youth becomes increasingly light headed. Dawn is at the cave’s mouth, not entirely sure if he’s allowed to be there, if they’d kill him for trespassing. Wasn’t he?

You are brave Dawn.

Did she still think that? The ashen youngster allows his limbs to tuck underneath him, thumping against the ground several feet from the fire. His eyes watch it cautiously.

What was her name…?

“Yseulte.”

DAWN