10. Longing

I came home to my tent today... which, wouldn't have been different than any other day, except that it is the first in some time that I have spent completely alone. Alone in the sense that there will be no one to imagine beside me.

I used to do that, you know... 

curl up with my coverlets draped over my shoulders... 

imagining that the warmth I felt was you.

I write this now, knowing that your arms are no longer there to shelter me.
That I cannot lay my head on your chest-- listening to your heartbeat, as I once did.

You said I was strong... for enduring what I have endured, and continuing to fight for the cause. But-- that strength is not my own. It is on loan from you, and from the happiness you have given me. Such that I would break the litany a thousand times, if it meant I got to remain with you forever.

I write this... because I stood five feet from you this day, and felt a vast emptiness within my heart. Emptiness born of the fact that I love you, you love me, and the both of us are powerless to do anything about it. An experience as painful as it is magnificent.

I don't know what I am going to do when your relationship with Elizabeth turns romantic again-- and I am certain it will, because you have been good to her of late in enough ways that she will inevitably warm to you...

I suppose.... I suppose I will try to smile and bear it... watch you go on to take your mate, have your children. All whilst denying these same things of myself-- that you might be free from the guilt and fear of betraying me...

Your conscience was suffering... I could not bear to see you suffer... 

...could not bid you stay.

Dusty has already sent out a request for a suitable partner on my behalf... 
I haven't the heart to tell him it won't go anywhere.

I talk to Richard, but I've no intention of being with him in the way I suspect he wants me to be.

And that count of the winter court?

Speaks Softly?

I do not want for offers... I feel badly for these men. At the heart of it I know I am only going through the motions. A thousand kinfolk, a thousand other Garou, a thousand handsome counts, could not change my mind... only assemble in a sea of faces, and still, I would see only you.

My heart is yours, my hands, my face-- and every other part of me.... and I am of half a mind to keep it that way. Untouched. Pristine.... that I might at least die with the confidence that I waited-- choosing you above all others in this vast and beautiful world.

You would want for me to move on, I am certain. To do the duty I will inevitably neglect... for reasons both selfless and selfish... but I intend to hold out for as long as I can.

Precious little compares to the sorrow I feel when I look to my side and see the twisted, girlish fantasy of a love that was never meant to be. When I lay in bed knowing that there is nothing I would not give... to feel your arms around me, your lips on mine... Nothing I would not sacrifice to watch you fall asleep...

one last time.

I am Sovereign Heart.

Destined to stand alone in all things.

Bound to willing sufferance for the benefit of those in my care...

I am a daughter of kings, and one day, as you say, I will be a great Silver Fang.

... but I miss you, John.