[Jill's heart shatters; its shrapnel drops to her stomach, and she can feel the sharp pains of its churning the more that Joshua fights – yet struggles – to stay afloat. There remains nothing she can say and little she can do to assuage any of the grief that he carries within him like a sickness, like a curse every bit as destructive as the one inflicted upon him by his own damned aether. All she can do is scramble for something that feels productive and hope that it lands well enough to at least inch him out of the mire he's sinking into ever deeper.]

I know. We're all too strong for our own good, and beholden to whims beyond our reckoning. But this time you fought yourself, Joshua. Even in your dreams, you refused to relinquish full control. It takes but a moment to prime, but I had time enough to stop you. Believe in that, if nothing else.

[Here, she presses the gentlest of kisses to the crown of his head, then smiles softly before pulling back to rest her chin in the very same place. She thinks about how much easier this was when he was small and could better fit into her arms. Their pains were so much simpler then, quickly soothed away with love and hugs and smiles alone. What she wouldn't give for the slightest taste of that simplicity now.

And maybe she could try to grasp onto that now. Find a light in the darkness. A glimmer of hope. But she's been doing that for five years now, and she knows that it's an ineffective salve. The pain always returns. The nightmares always leave their reminders. So, she doesn't search for ways to make things easier. Instead, she embraces the complexities.]

Maybe we should talk about what happened at Phoenix Gate.