A stitch away from making it

She absolutely hated feeling helpless like this. She wanted to fight, she wanted to scream, she wanted to go back home and find out that it had all been some horrendous prank. She wanted to look at her neck and not see those freshly healing scars. Briar held on to him even tighter, all these thoughts going through her head as she cried harder, her emotions tumbling like an avalanche that just kept picking up speed. Having him hold her just as tight helped and almost made it feel like he could keep her from floating off into this sea of hurt she was floating in. She didn't know how long it was before she finally started to come back to reality, her eyes hurting from how many tears she had cried and her arms aching from holding onto him as if that would save her. The feeling of his paws rubbing her back and the sound of his comforting words in her ear gave her something to mentally hold onto, like he was tossing her a rope for her to climb.

Briar didn't let go right away as the tears began to fade, instead just lifting her face away from his neck and resting her head over his shoulder instead, blinking bleary eyes up at the castle that loomed above them. How had it only been less than a season since she had been down here for the first time, looking up at that castle with such awe? It felt like there had been a whole lifetime worth of days between then and now and it didn't make sense in her mind. How could everything go so wrong so quickly? She didn't know what she would do without Artorias... "I got your coat all yet," she commented softly between sniffles, a little, slightly delirious laugh leaving her as she thought back to when she had done the same thing for him and his tears had stained her fur. She was just happy she had him to lean on without worrying what he was going to think about her.

Her paws flexed and scritched over the middle of his back absentmindedly while her thoughts wandered, finally getting a chance to look past what had happened with her father for at least a little while. Speaking of her father... "Why did you beat up my dad so badly? How?" she asked, still leaning into him, still holding him. Her tone still sounded a little distant and distracted, but also curious. There was no blame or accusations in her voice, she was only genuinely curious behind what drove Artorias to do such a thing and how he had even done it in the first place. If anything she was kind of impressed that he got so many hits in on the Warlord.

"Briar" | "Marigold"