(Done!) Octys Raesar Lexig || D1

Dying was never part of our plan

He thinks we think it's because of him but we don't

I want you home but that can never happen

I know there are two million and one ways to start this letter but I can't just bring myself to sit down and write it because it hurts every time I try. He says it's alright to hurt but we have to pick ourselves up from the wreckage of the plane you mangled and I don't think any of us are ready for that kind of commitment, but you never made that promise to us, never swore to stay in one piece and I can't Septys, I can't. I'm the only thing holding our life raft afloat and there's absolutely nothing I can do and it kills me every fucking day and I hate you but I love you at the same time and I just-

My fingers tremble at the corners of the page and I want to push it away, crumple it and throw it in the small trash can beside my desk but I can't bring myself to do it. This glorious scrap of paper is the first heartfelt thing I've written in weeks and it's not poetic, not beautiful, but it's mine with my own words and my own feelings.

I don't understand the way he just weaves words into songs or how he talks about the beat but he says just practicing will help me get over myself and I don't think I want to just yet. I want it to hurt a little bit more because it proves he existed in the first place, even though now the only way we feel his touch is in the ragged tendrils of our emotions.

I forced myself to take small steps- because that's how you grieve, in slight increments. I've claimed the Aurum name as my own- Octys Raesar Lexig-Aurum, because what better way to remember the legacy of a king than to bury it with a crown of Gold? You would have wanted it this way, wouldn't you? To know that your younger brother can make his own choices, can be a man like you taught?

I think it stings so much because you came so far. If you would have died first, then we would know- the strongest of us never stood a chance, how can we? But you fought, you fucking fought and clawed, bit, scratched, struggled. And you almost won but almost is only good for horseshoes and hand-grenades, kind of like how dad almost stopped drinking, or how mom almost didn't kill herself, and we miss you so damn much Septys.

But we're okay.

Dad is completely out of our lives now. I don't understand what demons he fought before, but now with you gone, he's never sober. I think he's trying to kill himself slowly but it's alright. Mohs took us in, like you asked. We have a mom now, and she doesn't care about Quadrys, she gives him the space he always needed to just exist and I think you would really like her. She cooks sometimes- nothing like how you used to. She finds the time to actually gets stuff from the markets- fresh things, and chops and cooks them on a stove instead of in a microwave like you did because you were always working.

I'll finish writing later, I can hear her calling us down.

I love you.

-8