isolt griffin
It is but one of a plethora of intricacies of the immortal status that not even the semi-darkness that licked at but a few surfaces in Isolt's quarters could begin to shroud the evidence of the gory tears that washed her porcelein cheeks. She had harbored them, held them at bay for so long a time that she might have been capable of crafting the delicate illusion that, when they did finally come, they would be as they had been before. To no avail, it would seem. Even in this most intimate display of sorrow, of agony, was she to reveal the nightwalker that she had become. The "monster" squatting nicely within this husk of her human self.

And so it is with surprise and trepidation that her eyes swivel wildly to Davante's hands as they seek her delicate features. So unaccostumed and weary had she become to even the slightest foreign touch that the young woman's muscles bunch into hardened coils beneath the supple pallor of her flesh, gliding easily over an indestructable palace of bone. Fragile is her faith, weaker still the trust she might be capable of placing in the hands of even this man who had presented himself as nothing apart from an ally when she had required one most. It is, in its simplest and cruelest form, a learned response courtesy of a maker who had only ever imparted physical touch upon her for the purposes of punishment... her caresses only ever harsh, deleterious and agonizing. A mode of polite warning is the touch of her fingers as they clasp gently about one of his wrists, Isolt not daring any further venture of movement as he utilizes her forfeited tears to heal more immediately the parts that ailed him so.

In dutiful silence does the flame-haired woman listen to the tales of her counterpart, her tongue stayed politely even though he wishes, as ailing individuals so oft tend to do, to compare his sorrow against hers if only to affirm that it is he who holds the greater pain, he who has known the fiercest demons and bares the deepest scars. Instead, she does naught but listen to the lugubrious tales of he needed so desperately to tell. Blades of barbed wire delve themselves against her heart as tears, true tears, well against the palest azure of his eyes, and only then does she move. Her hands slide into his, wrapping lightly against them, consideration dictating her silence for a moment before she speaks to him. "I'm not making excuses for anyone, I don't doubt that these hands have done terrible things, but...," she gives pause for a lingering moment of weighty quietude, her eyes falling to their joined hands for the barest second before returning to him. "You are not lost, Davante, you are not hopeless. And it doesn't matter if you want to be something to someone, you don't have a choice. That is why you have to move forward... we have to move forward. You can come back from this, you can still protect her. You can still be the person you wanted to be." Solemnly does she nod to denote the end of what dismal speech this might have proven to be before rising easily from the expanse of her bed. "Listen, um... you need to rest. You shouldn't leave tonight, you can stay here. I'll stay with you... I'll be right here."