Work Text:
There is so much yet to do. Best not to think of the dull ache of his knee, twisted as he lunged back away from a Reaver. Best not to think of the bitter twist of Knight Captain’s mouth as she holds her dripping forearm out for the gith’s spell - she’d grown accustomed to a shield at her side these last few months. The look she slants at him as the wound shrinks cuts deeper than he’d expected. Despite himself, he remembers a scrap of a girl nestled in her proud father’s arms. An apology choked out as fierce eyes turned cloudy and a battered, drained body lies still.
His doing. It is all his doing.
He stalks through the halls of the keep, soldiers shrinking from his path. His pride forestalls a limp, even as the abused joint screams with each step. Soon enough, and too late by far, the door of his study swings firmly shut. A moment later, the bolt slides across.
Even here, in as close to a refuge as he has, Ammon Jerro does not allow himself to slump. The illusion of control is not presented solely for those watching. He shucks his armour, wraps his knee with brisk movements and, though the hour is late and his narrow bed a damn sight more inviting than usual, he turns and takes a seat at his desk. There is the work. There is always the work. It is both solace and burden and all he has left.
As the keep settles into quiet, he scrutinizes his maps. The crossing of two rivers to the east, the site of a possible Illefarn outpost perhaps? It was along the correct line from the last two they’d discovered. Vaguely, he recalls a reference or two in Cadesceus’ notes from the second age. He casts about the desk for his copy of the journal and his eyes catch on a thick volume at the edge of the desk.
That was not supposed to be there.
Wary, he slides the unfamiliar tome towards himself. There is a slip of paper pinned to the front cover with a cunning twist of wire. “Ammon!” the note reads, in a scrawl that takes him a few moments to decipher. “Ran across this one in the library and thought of you! May be of some use.” The note is signed with an incomprehensible squiggle. If he squints and tilts his head a little to the right, the first character resembles an A. As written by a drunk man with broken fingers.
A sigh slips past his guard. Aldanon. For all the man’s brilliance, he registers more as a nuisance these days, flitting from one theory to the next most often and then occasionally focusing with sharp intensity on one concept to the exclusion of all else, dragging their shared research to a standstill until he is satisfied. The doddering old fool still speaks as though they were sat in front of the fire in his study, sipping brandy as they debate the nature of Illefarn politics. His assistant shows more sense - Ammon can hardly set foot in the library without coming under his suspicious glare.
He flips the cover open. The spiraling characters of Illefarni script meet his narrowed gaze. It is not until the fifth line that he realizes what he is reading and has to strangle a growl.
Poetry. Aldanon has, for some mad reason, sent him a book of Illefarni poetry. It is about the level of help he expects from the ridiculous man, yet tonight, with his knee throbbing a discordant beat and his eyes gritty from lack of sleep, it is all Ammon can do not to summon something comprised mainly of teeth and shadow and send it off to do them all a favour. The library would be a damn sight quieter without Aldanon’s constant background murmur and then perhaps he would finally be allowed to work. Would it be worth the outcry?
His eyes stray over the script once more as he sits, bitterly debating the merits of murder. A line catches his eye.
Under shadowy cloak of the dark weaver/The song yet rings pure in the trees.
His eyes track steadily across the words. Slowly, battered fingers reach out and flip to the next page of spiraling script.
Time passes. Behind him, the sun rises through his high window, unheeded.