Seirion had remained at rest for so long that he had lost all sense of whether it was day or night.
He did not sleep, yet he was not fully awake either. He was caught in an in-between state, a suspension where memories surfaced and unraveled without him summoning them.
Seirion remembered with piercing clarity the reckless word he had uttered: I desire you, Erian.
He knew, better than anyone, the weight words carried. He had spent centuries dictating decrees capable of twisting destinies, correcting names with a mere whisper that could erase entire bloodlines. Words were never without consequence.
And so, in that calm that was not calm, he understood with brutal clarity that his mistake had not been a slip. He had chosen the wrong word.
Seirion wished he had said something else, wished he had explained that it was not desire consuming him from within, but something far vaster, deeper, and forbidden: a love that pierced him without asking permission.
