I hold Hilde until she lets go and takes a deep breath.
"Um." I sigh as I let go, though we keep our tails and hands together. "Listen, Hilde. I'm not sure–"
"Don't," she cuts me off, jaw clenched as she directs her gaze down to the floor. "Please. I'm so grateful for your forgiveness. I know that's separate. But if you're… If you're rejecting me… I don't think I can handle that right now… Please, let's just leave it ambiguous."
"I don't think I'm rejecting you, Hilde." My chest hollows out and aches as I prepare myself. It's so hard saying things I know are going to hurt someone I love. "I'm just… not saying yes."
"To which?"
"To…" Ah. It hurts. "To being with you again."
"Fuck." She walks away again, hands in her hair as she processes the blow. "Fuck. Fuck. Fuck."
I feel sick. I just hurt her. Badly.
"Okay," she sharply exhales, tail thrashing about on the floor. "Okay. That's your choice. I won't… Hells, I won't fight you. I can't… I can't make this about me." After another few seconds, she takes a deep breath and comes back over. Yes, she's crying more, but her expression is hardened in stone. "Okay. But you're not rejecting me. So that means…"
"I don't know. I don't know what it means."
"Okay. That's its own thing. What about the other? Living with me. Even if we're just friends, I'll still build a place for you and live there with you. I know I can never rebuild your skyland, but I can help you start something new. Something just as beautiful. Just as alive. I can do that for you, Crims. Please, just come with me."
I take a step back. "Wait…"
"You don't belong here. At all." Hilde takes that same step forward. "This place is dark, and you're bright. These people are monsters, and you're anything but. I don't know what they did or said to you that made you fight for that horrid Fell over there, but it's all drakeshit and you know it. Temptation, betrayal, deceit–That's what she does. She preys on the vulnerable, the people who've been cut down, and she makes them into monsters. She talked you into this revenge thing, didn't she? All so she can use you for her futile little war, as if you're nothing more than a weapon. Can't you see that, red? She's using you. They're all using you. So let's get you the fuck out of here."
Fuck. Fuck. I'm petrified. "H–Hilde…"
"What?" She scowls, looking over my head toward the portcullis. "What? They won't let you leave? I expected that much. I'll fight them off if it comes down to it. I'll protect you, Crims. They can't stop us. Not even the fucking Fell. She's just some fallen Primarch, after all. And if you were able to kill the Seraphim, I'd bet together we–"
"Hilde, she's… divine. Umbra is a Goddess. Just the same as Aurora. They're sisters. Umbra is the eldest. You–You can't fight her. You just can't. She'd–"
"What are you talking about?" she cuts me off, incredulous once more. "Divine? Is that what she told you? The Great Deceiver told you she's divine and you–No, no, that bitch is a fucking lizard, just like the rest of us. And she'll die like one too, if that's what it takes."
"Hilde, please. Slow down. Please. Don't…"
"No." She grabs me by the wrist. "I'm getting you out of here. This place and these people are fucking terrible, and I won't let them have you. Just the fact you're hesitating is enough to tell me that she's sinking her fangs into you, to the point where you think she–"
"Relinquish her," Umbra coldly hisses from behind me as her red tail curls around my waist and pulls me back another step. "Now. You are free to speak, but you will not put hands on my Crimson like this."
"Absolutely fucking not." Hilde does the same with her tail and pulls me forward a step. "Your Crimson? She does not belong to you. She belongs to no one but herself. You cannot have her, you fucking monster. Let. Her. Go."
The giants are fighting over me.
"Quite the fierce tongue, for such a little thing." Umbra pulls me back again. "Your ignorance blinds you to reality, Hildegard. Yet there's no reason to remain ignorant. Why don't you come in and join us for tea? Crimson can tell you the whole story, and my guards can resume their work."
"Come in for fucking tea? With the Fell? Hells, you delusional creature. You must be joking if you think I'd actually join you for tea. And I am not little! You're just pretending to be huge with magic!" Hilde pulls me forward again. "Your fiendish guiles may have gotten to her, but I see right through you, wretch."
"There are no guiles, you foolish zealot." Umbra pulls me back again. "I've told her nothing but the truth, and my Crimson has made her own choices. Your baseless denial of this means nothing. It is the truth."
"Baseless denial! Baseless, claims the Great Deceiver! You're a fucking liar and you always have been! You've done nothing more than prey on Crimson's injured pride and twist her good nature to benefit your wicked cruelty! And you've done so with such vile tricks that you've convinced her that she wants to be here! How fucking dare you?"
"Woe unto the vain, for discerning genuine reality from personal delusion becomes that much harder. I was there to catch her when she fell. I was there to take her in and nurse her back to health. I was there to share in her agonies, listen to her lamentations, and support her through her grief. I was there for her when she needed kindness, compassion, and care. And where were you, Valiant Hildegard? It has been ten weeks since she was smited. And only now you come looking for her."
"Th–They…" Hilde falls silent for a heartbeat, her tail thrashing. "They wouldn't fucking let me. I took an extended leave of absence and applied to descend to Avi right away. I did, Crims. But they–Because I'm close to you, they… They delayed everything. For all this time… I only just got approval today."
"Approval," Umbra repeats with venom on her tongue, pulling me to her side and setting a giant hand on my shoulder to keep me there. "Of course. A slave to the bureaucracy. You chose to obey the damnable and detestable rules, yet how easily you could have descended regardless. Crimson was without you, without anyone, and you allowed the tyrant in the clouds to keep the two of you apart, which hardly inspires confidence in the notion that you have her best interests in mind."
"Wha–Me? You're the one making her kill people!"
Umbra lets out a short, dry laugh. "Again, your ignorance blinds you. As does your hatred. Think critically for just one moment, little dragon. Why might Crimson have chosen this path? Would her decision to fight against your tyrant in the clouds truly require instigation on my part? Or has she suffered under the Church's cruelty, the Heavens' disdain, and your cohorts' abuse for her entire life? When you consider the extensive history of just how thoroughly she has been beaten down, is it any wonder why she now seeks to exact righteous vengeance?"
"Righteous, you say. What the fuck is righteous about any of this? You are the unilateral and monolithic source of all evil in existence, and you want to talk about righteousness? This, in the wake of a brutal campaign of execution and violence against dozens of the Church's most faithful, and for fucking what? What have you actually accomplished with these ambushes of yours? Hells, what have you accomplished in all these centuries and millennia of pitiful, futile action against the Goddess's indomitable force? Which, need I remind you, solely exists to combat and indispose you, and has, without exception, proven time and time again that you cannot win!"
Umbra is quiet for the moment, halfway shrouded in shadows with a frighteningly sinister smile. "How endearingly short sighted you are. How miniscule the extent of your perspective. Centuries you have lived. Millennia you merely imagine. Beyond that, you cannot comprehend. I am older than the mountains. Older than the seas. Older than Avi itself. I am older than the Solaris. I am older than the stars in the night. I am older than your Goddess, and by magnitudes at that. Centuries are mere days to me. Millennia are mere months. You see thousands of years of futile action, yet you are utterly incapable of fathoming the intricate, methodical, and deliberate chess match that has been in motion since before the planet of Avi was so much as dust in the void. You speak of my movements as failures, but you cannot even imagine the entire board. This war is ours, child. Mine and Crimson's. And when it is won, truth, justice, and liberty will reign over the Heavens, Avi, and the Hells."
I gape up at Umbra. I've never heard her speak like that.
Hilde starts laughing. "Truth, justice, and liberty! Holy shit! Do you–Oh, no way! You actually believe that? Hells, you are mad! All this time down here in the dark must've rotted at your senses! What part of your bloodthirsty, destructive, evil fucking murderous rampage is just?"
Umbra giggles, pulling me by the leash to stand beside her leg, which is longer than I am tall. With that, she hisses, "Ending the brutalist regime that keeps you draconids in chains whether you realize it or not, of course. But I have no interest in converting you, Valorant Hildegard, for you as an enforcer are the hand that wields the hammer with which Aurora beats your kind into submission. Your blind loyalties are as set as cold steel, so deeply solidified that you won't so much as consider any alternative. It is for Crimson's sake I haven't erased you for daring to set foot here. But my patience has frayed. Leave. Now. And never come back."
Hilde bares her fangs and bristles her dorsal plating as she raises the heavy axe blade on her thick tail. "Gladly. Come on, Crims. Let's get out of here."
Oh. She's… She's talking to me now.
I didn't think I was part of this conversation, and I have no idea what to say or do. I haven't been thinking. I haven't been making any decisions. I haven't even fully grasped what's happening here. Part of me assumed they'd decide between themselves who I end up going with. I don't feel capable of making this choice but now I'm being put on the spot, because they're both looking down at me, waiting for me to do something.
The pressure is suffocating.
I can feel it crushing down on me.
Why me? Why do I have to do this?
It's a lot. It's too much. All at once.
I don't want to lose either of them.
They will never get along. Never.
Choose. Choose. I have to choose?
Right now? This quickly? I can't.
I don't want to. I don't want to.
A shaky breath enters my lungs.
My vision blurs over with tears.
Damn it. Damn it. I'm so pathetic.
I can't do this.
Instead, I sit down on the floor and make myself small, covering my head with my arms, shielding myself with my wings, and jamming my knuckles into my ears. This is too much and I can't handle it. I'm not here. This isn't happening. I'm not here. This isn't happening.
Even through everything, I can still hear their voices.
Hilde. "What is happening? What have you done to her?"
Umbra. "It is you who has done this to her. You've shown up without warning and forced her into this corner, demanding that she abandon everything she has come to know, rely on, and find solace in since she was scorned by your supposedly benevolent Goddess, in favor of another sudden and all encompassing change to her circumstances of living, with someone who has repeatedly broken her heart and betrayed her trust. And you cannot fathom why she's overwhelmed?"
"No, no, you've… You've done something to her. You–You made her Wretched. Of course. Of course! That's not even Crimson, is it? You've made her into another one of your fucking puppets! Otherwise, she wouldn't hesitate to leave this place! Hells, she's under your control. You fucking monster. You fucking monster. What, all of these other puppets of yours weren't enough? You just had to go and take the sweetest and most gentle woman I've ever known and turn her into a mindless slave! No! No! Absolutely not! You can't have her!"
"This has gone on long enough. It's time you left my domain. For Crimson's sake, I will not keep you apart, and so you are welcome to return with a more level head some other day. Next time, try speaking with her. Instead of speaking over her. Graves. Echo. See the enforcer back to Avi. Unharmed."
"What? No! No! I'm not leaving here without her! You can't–Hey! Get the fuck off me! You can't do this! Not to her! I won't fucking let you, demon! I'll put your head on a fucking spike! Crimson! Crimson! Damn it! Get off–Crimson! If you can hear me in there! I will come back and free you from this enslavement! I will not abandon you to this fate! Crimson! And you! I'll be back, you fell fucking monster! I will rip her free from your cold dead hands if I have to! You will fucking regret this, Umbra!"
She keeps shouting but her voice fades away. Those words are resonating like I'm standing inside a giant church bell. All of this has destroyed me again. It's not Hilde's fault. It's mine. I'm the one who chose to take lives for the sake of my vengeance. And only now, I've been confronted with the reality of that being a terrible thing.
Hilde. I love her. So much. So much.
I don't know what to do. I can't do anything.
Umbra gently lifts me up off the floor.
"Come, my little rose. Time to rest."
I let her carry me to bed, dead in the heart.
Hells. I really am worthless.
How pathetic.