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The ocean is kind in this moment, ushering the two bodies to shore as strength faded and water threatened to fill lungs. Carrying the other on his back with the hope of land his driving force. He needed to get him to safety. To solid ground and wet sand, anything but the churning seas that pull at his legs.
The undertow threatening to keep them forevermore.
Dragging them to shore is difficult. The tide presses them forward and beckons them back with the whims of the moon overhead. Metia looks down upon the brothers, sorrow in her light. Shivers wracking his body as Clive coughs up sea water, blinking droplets and mats of hair from his eyes trying to find Joshua—to make sure he made it to shore. Blindly reaching out till he felt the solid form of him.
Relief rushed through him, he choked on a sob as more water spilled from his lips.
"Thank the founder…" a whisper, a prayer and request. Keep him safe.
Vision barely clear enough he sees his brother on his side, maybe face down and drags himself to his knees. He's finding it hard to close his left hand. No matter, muttering Joshua's name and hoping to any and all beings that he may yet breathe. Foolish when he held the cooling body in his arms not moments before. But, maybe the spell fixed this mistake of his.
No matter how willing Joshua was in offering his heart and flame, Clive still festered with a dissatisfaction of himself and how he continues even now to fail him.
Heavy hand to his shoulder Clive rolls the other man onto his back, the motion too harsh but his grip loosens and the arm drops to his side, useless.
Ah. the curse. The plight to humanity is gone but it has one last death rattle to offer the one who banished it. Seems fair, he supposes.
Joshua gasps, hacking up blood, ichor and water. In the reliefpanic Clive wonders if that's the curse seeping into the shifting sands. The ocean elects to take whatever comes up and wash it away. He offers his thanks.
Mind sluggish and trying desperately to catch up as his vision flickers with black, he finds Joshua in his arms, the calcification of one hurts but he closes his hand with the wet baring of his teeth. He will hold him. He will always hold him.
His little brother and light manages to find his voice—croaking and brittle— "Clive? I- how am I…?" Clive answers with a smile.
"Maybe I wished it so…" The words spoken and hidden in the heaviness of his breath. He can't seem to get enough air into his lungs. They feel as if they're seizing, he pinches his eyes shut as pain continues lacing up his limbs, that hand, now forever held in a cradle.
Joshua shifts from his hold—maybe he felt the stone beneath his back— and kneels in front of his brother, fear writ in every line. He shouldn't look that way. He should be happy. They made it. They made it.
Everything feels so cold now. He's finding it hard to move. If he does he worries his skin will split like dry earth. Maybe the blood from the wounds will ease the movements, maybe he needs to get back into the water. Maybe…
Maybe he needs to sleep.
"Clive—! Clive look at me. You need to stay awake. You—….fuck" He doesn't think he's ever heard Joshua swear like that before. The way the expletive leaves his lips feels almost wrong. Clive's mouth lifts in a smile wanting to tease—who taught you that…—but he feels the tremble in Joshua's hands at his face.
It's fine, he wants to say. You're okay, he wants to plead. He wants to cry and thinks he might be. Pain and stiffness continue to lean into him, his kneel almost a slump but he can't work the soreness out. His hands wont move from their place at his lap, he thinks. Joshua's been talking, sobbing actually, no… no that can't be right.
"Clive, please. Clive, you can't—" Hands at his cheeks a forehead pressed to his with the wash of fear in his breath. The ever present well of energy that he always carried with him is gone. Ifrit left with the new winds that fill the lungs of a New Valisthea. But, he finds the means to force himself to lift into Joshua and place a kiss to his lips.
He can't seem to feel the connection and that threatens to break something in him—he whispers nonetheless, "You're safe. You're home."
His brother is no more than a smear of colour. Colours he has always loved and cherished. Could he be bathed in them, he wonders quietly. Maybe he whispers love instead.
"Yes. Yes I'm safe—I'm here! But you cannot leave me, Clive—!" Joshua is clutching and pressing into the swiftly graying skin of his heart and twin flame. Feeling the very air leave him more and more with every gasp he tries desperately to take. Each inch that bleeds of colour is another panicked breath and clench of his heart.
"You said you'd always be there, Clive, remember?! You can't wish for me back only to leave me. I won't allow it!! I refuse to lose you!" Every part he touches is stiff and cold.
"You are my home! Without you I have no where to go! I love you, Clive, PLEASE—" The blue of his brother's tired eyes that still somehow smile go gray. Till the very end, he was love.
Face pressed to cold, cold stone—the shoulder he always could find comfort in on weary days—tears bleeding into and dying it black, his breaths heave and he screams. He had accepted his death and knew Clive would carry on. He knew he could. He willed it such! What good was his power if he could not do this One Thing.
He screams.
He screams.
The ocean is kind in this moment. It laps in thanks against the stone of a man who gave every part of himself till he bled of his colour. He made the call for all of humanity, something no One Man should have. In that moment he was selfish. He wished for his brother to live. To live as he wanted. He wanted for one thing in that moment.
As Joshua gave his very light and heart to his shield in a final act of devotion so, too, did his brother. The warmth that left him, is cradled deep within in a special place of the heart.
Joshua finds only dust and ash between his fingers. The ocean is kind in this moment and pulls back from shore.
Metia flickers overhead and Joshua Rosfield feels cold.