Ky took another shaky breath, then let it out, some of the tension releasing from her shoulders. Maybe some good came from her stupidity after all. Maybe if she could just ensure she was funny when she was stupid then it'd provide comedic relief. She nodded, swallowing hard. "He didn't upset me. I'm glad he thought it was funny not offensive. I just..." She rubbed her face, sighing. "I try so hard to think about things before I say them and then I go and do stuff like that when I don't mean to."
"u and rina are systematically watering down the grammar of yws" - Atticus "From the fish mother to the fish death god." - lehmanf "A fish stole my identity. I blame shady" - Omni [they/he]
"A word of advice from someone who spent...oh, about fourteen years of my life thinking too hard about what to say: don't. Think about it a little, just enough to know if something might get you arrested or cause you to lose a friend. Then just say something. Let your stream of consciousness come out if you need, stop worrying about what other people think. They're worrying about themselves, too, not paying any attention to what you're saying, really. Let the conversation flow naturally."
"The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that." -Karis Nemik
Ky took another deep breath, a bit more of the tension easing from between her shoulders. His comfort was working.
"I don't want to..." she trailed off, not quite sure what she wanted to fill in with there. She pressed her palms to her eyes. "I want to stop making so many mistakes but I can't no matter how much I try."
"u and rina are systematically watering down the grammar of yws" - Atticus "From the fish mother to the fish death god." - lehmanf "A fish stole my identity. I blame shady" - Omni [they/he]
"Try to stop thinking of mistakes as mistakes?" Tomhas suggested tentatively. "That's what Anneke told me, when I was learning how to farm. Think of them as learning opportunities or an amusing turn of events. An unexpected turn down a path, perhaps."
"The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that." -Karis Nemik
Ky rubbed the rest of her face, then lowered her hands with a sigh.
"I don't want to disappoint you," she murmured at last, dropping her gaze. That was the crux of the matter. "I care about you and Anneke far too much to ruin your perfect streak of having wonderful kids."
"u and rina are systematically watering down the grammar of yws" - Atticus "From the fish mother to the fish death god." - lehmanf "A fish stole my identity. I blame shady" - Omni [they/he]
"I'm a hard man to disappoint in matters of family," Tomhas promised her with a self deprecating chuckle. "I think I used up my capacity for disappointment in my early years. You've got nothing to fear, Ky. As far as I see it, you're already wonderful. You're just stepping out of a shadow and figuring out how to walk in the light. That takes time."
"The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that." -Karis Nemik
Ky took a deep breath and nodded. He was right. He was always right.
"I'm never going to be able to fix myself, you know," Ky warned, finally looking up to meet his gaze again. "He broke me too much. It's like he threw a plate on the floor then stomped on all the shards and then kicked it across a whole house and now I'm trying to glue the pieces back together and it's not working and I don't think it ever will."
"u and rina are systematically watering down the grammar of yws" - Atticus "From the fish mother to the fish death god." - lehmanf "A fish stole my identity. I blame shady" - Omni [they/he]
"Nobody's asking you to fix yourself." Tomhas knew all too well how it felt to be broken like that, to feel like you'd never be whole again. The Reeve's son flashed into his mind for a moment and he shuddered, then shook away the memory. "Try to think of it more like a tree, though. I once saw a spruce with a rock lodged deep in its wood. I returned to that spruce a couple years later and a knot had formed around the rock. You'll heal, sort of, and grow around your pain. It'll become a part of you but it doesn't mean you're a lost cause. That tree is still growing strong."
"The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that." -Karis Nemik
(I am not sure if I missed something or am just dense but I am only vaguely understanding what's going on with the Reeve's son. Did Michael kill him in front of Tomhas?)
"Tree..." Ky breathed, considering it. Maybe that was a good analogy. She knew she had strong roots -- twelve years worth of them. So maybe she just needed to keep growing and let Aleth stay as a knot in the wood of her past. She nodded, but it was like someone letting the air out of a balloon as she slowly let her anxiety dissipate. "I'm just so scared all the time. I watched him..." She didn't want to say it. "And yet I still expect him to drag me out of bed in the middle of the night to punish me for screwing up earlier in the day... it's just... I don't know why I'm still so scared. I've been safe for months now."
"u and rina are systematically watering down the grammar of yws" - Atticus "From the fish mother to the fish death god." - lehmanf "A fish stole my identity. I blame shady" - Omni [they/he]
(There have been implications of that throughout Tomhas's freakouts about blood. Tomhas and the Reeve's son fancied each other and Tomhas basically lost his virginity to this boy, they were very close. Michael snuck in one night and gutted the Reeve's son because he's a piece of shit. Tomhas woke up to that and Michael standing over them both.)
Tomhas took a deep breath. "Don't tell him I told you, but Gaius still locks his doors at night. Whenever he's alone, really. Michael's been dead for over a decade but that doesn't matter to him. I...I lock my doors sometimes, too." He looked away, folding his arms tightly against himself. "It's hard to feel safe in unfamiliar places, but Serpent Keep is hard to sleep in for me. For us. If there's a gathering it's usually here."
"The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that." -Karis Nemik
(Yii I've caught the freak outs I've just been confused about the context lol and holy fuckkkk poor Tomhas ;-; )
Ky nodded. She understood. "I don't ever want to go back to Aleth's house. I... heh... there were no locks there." She smirked grimly, then sobered. "At least not on the inside of my room."
"u and rina are systematically watering down the grammar of yws" - Atticus "From the fish mother to the fish death god." - lehmanf "A fish stole my identity. I blame shady" - Omni [they/he]
(Yeah it was meant to build up in little flashes and snippets)
Tomhas felt nauseous talking about this. "I'm sorry he hurt you," he said quietly, trying to remain the supportive father rather than the quivering victim. "I'm sorry I didn't find you sooner. I'm sorry any of that ever happened."
"The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that." -Karis Nemik
"It's not your fault!" Ky said hastily. Did Tomhas think she was blaming him? Gods. She needed to stop trauma dumping on people. Needed to pull herself together. "I..." She shrugged. What could she even say to that? Tomhas had had it even worse than she did. She hadn't had a care in the world for the first twelve years of her life. Tomhas had had to deal with this since he was born. "I'm sorry any of it happened to either of us." She remembered Ash. "... all three of us." And then Tadaaki. "... four of us..."
"u and rina are systematically watering down the grammar of yws" - Atticus "From the fish mother to the fish death god." - lehmanf "A fish stole my identity. I blame shady" - Omni [they/he]
"u and rina are systematically watering down the grammar of yws" - Atticus "From the fish mother to the fish death god." - lehmanf "A fish stole my identity. I blame shady" - Omni [they/he]
"Five of us," he correct quietly; Cecily had it just as bad. "The point is that it was awful, and you didn't deserve to be hurt like that. You were just a kid." What was he saying that she didn't already know?
"The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that." -Karis Nemik
