Fireheart [Fanfiction - Alternate Universe]

Digging into the past

CW: Mention of drug abuse and loss.

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Celaena wasn't sure how to feel about any of it. Being back at Rowan's apartment after rolling in the dirt with him and almost falling off a cliff was... Well, awkward. And knowing he was about to open up to her and let her in on the truth, it was jarring. So she took a deep breath, and let her barriers down if even just a little.

"And what does that have to do with... Lyria?" she asked Rowan as he admitted his involvement with Maeve.

"Everything," he said dryly. He wasn't looking at her while he spoke and she could understand how it was easier to look away while letting out hard truths. She knew a lot about dealing with them, even if she wasn't good at talking about them out loud either.

"I'm listening," the Aelin side of her said gently, "take your time."

At the softness of her voice, Rowan glanced up between his lashes, probably surprised by her reasonable and calmed tone.

"You only know one side of me," she said, her tone still controlled, "but there's so much more you don't know so... Don't think I can't feel your pain, or understand it. I do. I know... I know how hard it is to talk about these things," she admitted.

She'd been through so much in the last couple of weeks, even months. It was like being back on that cliff, hanging down while barely awake. There had been a second there when she woke up and hadn't known where she was, and the panic from every near-death experience she'd lived had come back to haunt her. People always said she was fearless, but it wasn't the lack of fear that kept her going, it was the fear itself. Fear for her life, fear for what would happen if she couldn't reclaim her rightful place in the world. Fear of living under Arobynn's thumb forever, like a thug, like a purposeless fighter.

She wanted to fight for a reason. For herself, for freedom, for her life. She'd been face to face with death and made it out alive. She wasn't ready to give up on that, on the second chance that she'd been given. Celaena had to believe all the pain, the years of torture while living with Arobynn, every combat session, every break-in, it all had to be worth something... Because otherwise, what was the point of it all?

Rowan looked at her in the eyes while all these thoughts clouded her mind and for a second, she thought he could see it all on her face.

"Fenrys was right," he finally muttered.

"About?"

"You sure are something..."

What did that even mean?

"I'm not something," she replied in a tired tone, "I'm barely someone, if even that."

She wasn't even someone, was she? She was pieces of three different someones. She was partly Aelin, part Celaena, and also Fireheart, but most of the time, she felt unable to tie those three personalities into oneself. She was fragmented, and she didn't know how to hold all those pieces together. She'd been torn over and over again, her lungs filled with water, her family ripped from her, her inheritance unattainable, her body maimed, scarred, torn, broken.

Cut into ribbons. Left alone to heal.

"Lyria... She was something too. But... It took me too long to realize she wasn't the... good kind of something, she had lost herself..." Rowan talked slowly, every word a struggle as it left his lips.

Celaena leaned back onto the armchair and drew her legs up to her chest, hugging her knees as she listened while Rowan took one last deep breath and downed the remaining whisky before starting his story.