July 3, 2014

In Which Sparron Slips Away

June 8, 1186

Not for the first time, Sparron wondered whether it was good or bad that he was losing the will to care.

Not about everything, of course. He loved his son. He loved his father and his siblings and Camaline, and even Renata for all the relationship with a stepmother who had only become such after he was a father himself was unlikely to be intimate. And he loved his daughter, even if he could only do so from afar. If he stopped caring about them--any of them--that would be the end.

But the details were slipping. All the circumstances, all the things that had bothered him in the past... they were all so small now. So inconsequential.

Or not quite inconsequential, but getting there. He wasn't about to climb the highest tower and sing the loud praises of Searle's perfect, pinchable ass. But he hadn't minded leaving his father's castle, treading slowly and clinging to walls as always, but nodding to any servants he passed, telling Florian he was in the mood for a nighttime ride and that he'd sleep at an inn if it got to be too late. He'd fed Lonel some cock-and-bull story about some shady figure creeping around Searle's castle wall, then Lettie had greeted him with a hug and a wink and a whisper that she was keeping separate quarters these days anyway.

As for Searle...

...well, it had been nice, not worrying.

He couldn't sleep. He didn't mind, he guessed, just listening to Searle's snores, the occasional mutter in his sleep. At least, he hoped that was Searle muttering. That was the nice thing about having another person in the room--telling himself that any voice he heard was theirs.

And he supposed he liked the added bonus of that voice being Searle's.

A pity that he couldn't have appreciated that before. Back when there had been time to spare.

I'm sorry, Searle.

NEXT CHAPTER:

5 comments:

Van said...

This one... yeah, I don't know what to say about this one. I guess it's an interlude of sorts.

Ekho said...

Frightening :S
Sparron is the type of person I would want to save in real life, but some people can't be saved, and some people have to save themselves.
I think its worse for him because there is no exact cause or known cause to explain whats happening to him. And the fact that it is hereditary says that it could be anything biological - and consequentially impossible to understand/pinpoint.

Van said...

Alas, whatever Sparron has, it won't be properly understood in his lifetime. :(

Penelope said...

Does he think that his lack of worry is a direct result of him going crazy or that he is just throwing caution to the wind because he knows that he is going crazy (if that question makes any sense)? Is Searle noticing a real change in him?

Van said...

Probably a combination of both. :S

We'll get a Searle POV in regards to Sparron before the year is up, so we'll see how things stand from that side then.