Duskfire Glacier g*spy witchcraft

where there should be joy, there is only that looming shadow of grief, of torment ...of fear. this is as close as wintersbane's ever came to having a family ...and it occurs to him that he wasn't even doing it right. he was treating it all like a business transaction, like a contract. was that really family? how could he expect his children to not come to resent him?

he thinks of his own strained relationship with his father made too short by the series of unfortunate events that had swept wintersbane up and blanches; ears fluttering back against his skull. despite not knowing the circumstances of lotte's death it had been easy to pin the blame and the hate on arturo.

the feverkissed tundrian is statue-still, carved from the ice and stone of the glacier he claims as tzila draws nearer. nearer and nearer —

gradually, wintersbane softens as he feels to press of her crown against his neck. touched in a way he hadn't been touched since andraste. it brings with it a miasma of emotions; at it's helm confusion and his innate nature to smother anything resembling affection. he doesn't want to feel those things ...not when history showed him it would only lead to more fissures in his heart.

how? the word wrangles itself from betwixt wintersbane's lips; a smokey rasp of choked things he does not want to be present in his tone but ultimately fails.