Chapter Text
Lyney was looking at Aether.
They hadn't talked again after the end of the famous trial.
Even after Fontaine had been saved.
The last words Lyney had heard from Aether were that he couldn't fully trust him.
Because he was a Fatuus. Because he had hidden that from him when they had met.
At first, Lyney had felt a deep, painful guilt.
(I should've told him. It's my fault.)
These words had looped in his head again and again while crushing his chest and breaking his heart.
Even in his dreams, he would see Aether's piercing gaze and hear his cold words.
But at some point...
Another voice had started to whisper from deep within him.
(You didn't want to risk losing him.)
(You're a Fatuus, so what?)
(He should not judge you.)
(He should try to understand you.)
(He had no right to shun you for that.)
The voice was tempting. Soothing. And somehow, right.
Because Lyney had felt that it also was wrong.
And he had tried to fight it.
Maybe, if Aether had been there... he could've shut the voice down.
But he had refused all of Lyney's invitations.
And so the only thing he heard from him were his last words in his nightmares.
The voice was the only soothing one. Bit by bit, Lyney had come to accept it.
He hadn't been wrong.
He had been unlucky.
He had been misunderstood.
He hadn't done anything wrong.
Aether had to understand.
He could make him understand.
Lyney was looking warmly at Aether from above.
With a smile, a gentle smile.
On the contrary, Aether's gaze was panicked.
His lips couldn't be seen beneath the gag.
Restrained, he fit nicely in the box Lyney had used to carry him to his workshop.
"Shhh..."
Lyney put a finger on Aether's gag.
"Relax... I would never hurt you, Aether."
His eyes shone with an almost sickening warmth.
"I just want to make you understand I'm not a monster."