Ripples

Rubies IV

Includes mentions of feeling dissociated from reality, self-emotional manipulation, and previous deaths

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"Why are you faking a smile?" A displeased Lucas asked as soon as Athanasia stepped away from some random gardener. The young blonde turned to look at him analytically even as she led him back to her room. "I can't just think about myself anymore."

"Idiot, that doesn't make any sense. What are you talking about?" Lucas frowned, ruffling his short dark hair.
"You, you jerk," the young blonde thought with a chuckle.

If there was something that Athanasia had always been bitterly familiar with, it was loneliness, that curious cold that never quite lets go. Even with the constancy of Lily, the protection of the ruby palace, and the affection of Claude, she had never fully believed that they were real-as if they were all a figment of her imagination. That's why Lucas was so odd.

The mage punched whenever she did, insults thrown all over the place, but he also held her whenever she was crumbling, whispering sweet nothings. The princess always feared that he would vanish, just like her father did when she began to adore him, either by his own accord or by drowning in the tides of fate. He was what kept her sane, gave her reason to believe that everything was still real. And, by believing that everything was, she could believe that she had the power to change the endgame.

"He's a cocky little bastard, but he has some good in him too," Athanasia thought fondly, humming as she opened the door to her chamber.

There was only one problem.

Claude belonged to Jennet, not to Athanasia. That was the law that Athanasia had fully embedded in her mind. Even though he had been Athanasia's during her last life, her father until he lost his damn mind, that useless man was still naturally Jennet's, and the blonde had to work so hard just to earn his favor again. "It's too late... I'll just have to try again if given another chance."

So, what could she do now that she was "too old?" That she didn't feel helpless, but she felt that she couldn't change Claude?

Athanasia turned to the people around her. To keep a relatively good life in the ruby palace, to at least make her minutes last before greeting death again, Athanasia donned her masks. She smiled and smiled until she was hurt, reopening old wounds and feeling how they stung and burned, only to realize that her emotions have vanished- but that was okay.

Because at night, when it would just be the two of them, Lucas would hold her until her wounds healed, leaving only a scar to remind her of where she had been.

"Nothing," Athanasia replied, pouring herself a cup of tea with a content smile. She couldn't see the frown that graced the features of her companion, but she might have worried if she did.

"She's not crushing on that gardener, is she?" Lucas questioned, huffing as his fists tightened in his coat pockets. "She's too old for that child."

With that, the two sat together in the room, the silence brewing as violently as their thoughts. There, late in the evening as they sat beneath the stars, Athanasia broached a topic that she had been hesitating to even think about.

"Lucas..." Her voice quivered in the silence of the night, earning a soft hum from the head on her lap. She looked up into the starry sky, the sky that Lucas had changed for her because she had been feeling particularly alive. "Can you escort me to my debutante ceremony?"

Although she had already been through it four times, all with varying emotions and thoughts running through her mind, she knew that this would be different again. This time, seeing Jennet walk into the light would stab her right where it hurt most. Those two, a portrait perfect example of a father and a daughter, would reopen a series of wounds from when Claude had killed her with his bare hands. "It would hurt more than usual."

Lucas knew too. Even as he stared at the shadows on the ground, missing the expression on his princess' face, he knew that she wasn't ready to face it alone. But she shouldn't have been bothered worrying about his answer.

"For what reason did I not go to the mana tree if not for you, Athy?"

"Fine, I'll escort you. But you'll owe me," Lucas whispered as if he was reluctant to agree. Athanasia laughed, content with knowing that he would be there for that cursed evening.