Chapter Text
Bright embers wafted through the frigid air, floating from the small campfire and soon entangling with falling snowflakes, snuffing out as quickly as they’d come to life. Dismas watched this cycle, dark eyes unreadable. He sat against a long fallen log, trees surrounding him but the town’s lights still visible, his chosen position not unlike that of the survivalist. He could hear the woods whisper to him, enticing him to wander farther, to enter the Weald proper and return to who he was and always would be, the highwayman that killed and robbed as easily as he ate and breathed.
Dismas ignored its call, pulling a flask from his coat and taking a swig. The amber liquid burned his throat as it went down, but he savored the pain, considering it the least of his penitence for his crimes. He hid a cough in his crimson scarf, feeling the snow melt against his hair and sap the heat from his coat, the cold seeping in slowly throughout his body. He was all too aware of the aches and pains he’d feel in the morning from the cold, and the squawking to come from his plague doctor teammate Eveque, but at that moment, he couldn’t care less.
He craved the solitude, needed it even. Out there, alone in the woods, he could reminisce all he wanted about the life he’d led prior to coming to this wretched place in the hopes that his efforts could redeem him. He could wonder if he would ever feel worthy of the pride and love that the woman that’d left his life so long ago had felt for him. He could feel every stab of guilt and remorse unperturbed by well-intentioned but bothersome teammates, and perhaps even friends.
He could even dismiss to himself the drops of water falling down his cheeks as nothing more than simple melted snowflakes.
The small campfire crackled in front of him. The sound was familiar, for a time, and it painfully reminded him of the times with her he’d been lucky enough to share. Yet it was a good pain, a pain he’d take a million times over if it brought him a hair’s length closer to her. He let himself fall into his memories, to relive them and hold and cherish them, though never ever enough for their true worth.
“Dismas...” She cooed, smiling so sweetly as her arms looped around his neck. He only grinned, swaying with her as they danced the night away, every new song only ever bringing them closer together. He had never been happier. In all his life, nothing had made him happier than being with this woman.
His eyes widened imperceptibly as she leaned in for a kiss, and he obliged her with all he had (barring public indecency). His bandit’s sense was going haywire, as if someone had now decided to try to end his life, but with her in his arms, let them try. She was all he’d ever need, and he’d die before losing her.
She beamed up at him once they parted, smile so wide and gleeful that her eyes closed-
Her eyes were closed, but now her expression was full of pain, worry, and fear. Yet it was a mere lingering tightness in her expression, an echo of the life that felt the sorrow. He trembled as he pulled her in one last embrace, and only once he felt her head limp on his shoulder did he break.
“No!” He keened, screaming into the dead night as he lost everything he’d ever held dear, their child growing cold between them. The shattered man sobbed into her hair, pleading with any god he could think of. “Don’t take them! Please, for gods’ sake! Take me instead, take my worthless form, give them back! Let her live, you bastards!”
He opened his eyes, taking another deep swig and letting the deep burn fight the pain in his chest. It didn’t work. Dismas swiped angrily at his eyes, taking his trusty blade in hand and considering it for the slightest of moments. His grip trembled, mind at war, before sheathing it once more. “No, Eveque’s too damn perceptive... Damn bird woman.”
The rogue tended to the flames a bit more. He took note of the small log that was in the center of the fire, the one that he’d centered the flames around purposefully, to always have fuel and help continue its warmth. He thought back to his own beginnings, then decided that if he was to examine his life, he needed more ale. He drained his flask in one go, then lay his head back on the log and began to dream of a better time, of a better life before he himself had destroyed it.