Not happy, but way less sad

Briar laid across the fur, fiddling nervously with her bracelet, watching the sun set. Without her really noticing, Marigold had slipped away, going back to their den in the Armada as soon as she saw Artorias cross through the hot springs from her perch on top of the den so that the two of them could be alone. Briar's heart beat anxiously while she waited for him, hoping and praying that he actually came, but somehow feeling as if he would be justified if he didn't. After how she had acted and how she had treated him she wouldn't have been surprised if he stood her up and left her here on her own. But she continued to plead silently for him to come anyway, to give her one more chance to make things right. She knew it was a lot to ask of him and it wasn't fair. She hadn't been fair to him at all and she didn't know how to express the guilt she felt. She tried to play some words over in her mind, preparing herself for what she might say to him, but when she heard his voice behind her all those thoughts flew away.

Her gaze turned to look at him and it suddenly felt like all the air had been pulled from her lungs. He might have been disheveled and salty and sandy from his day of training, but that didn't matter. If anything, it just made him look all the more rugged and handsome and masculine. The warm light from the sunset caught on those amber eyes that she loved so much and she got so caught up in them that it took her a moment to realize she was just staring at him like an idiot. She barely heard what he said, too caught up in his presence and the fact that he was here. He had come. She watched him move toward her at sit on the fur that was laid out beside the one she was on. His posture was stiff and stand offish, obviously still hurt, but he was here and that alone felt like the biggest blessing. It made her feel like she might have a chance.

When he questioned her elaborate set up with the campfire, the cooking meats, the furs laid out for their picnic, she glanced at it all with a little smile. "This... This is nothing," she insisted with a little shake of her head. She had wanted to do something special for him, something to set the tone and show that she really was trying, but it barely scratched the surface of what she wanted to do for him. "I was expecting someone very special... Extraordinary, in fact," she added with a soft chuckle as her mind caught up to what he said. She brought her eyes back up to his with a pointed, adoring gaze. No one was as special as him, especially not in her eyes.

Doing her best to keep her nerves in check, she sat up and rolled herself to her paws so that she could turn to face him, standing across from him for a moment as she tried to remember any of the words that she had rehersed to herself. She didn't feel the need to look away from him now. Her gaze was apologetic and loving, still pleading in a way, but she didn't feel like she might crumble to pieces looking at him now. She wasn't fully better, she had a lot of growing and learning to do, but she didn't want to do it alone. "Artorias..." she began just for the words to end up dying on her lips. His eyes captivated her and made it hard to think about anything else.

She stepped toward him after a moment of hesitation, crossing that short distance with a new determination. She settled on her haunches in front of him, her gaze lingering on his as she reached up to hold his face between her paws before she leaned forward, pressing her lips to his. She kissed him with a gentle tenderness, but even that made her eyes close for a moment and made her heart skip wildly in her chest. When she pulled back back again she searched his eyes while her paws gently stroked over his cheeks, savoring the fact that she could feel his fur against her paw pads again. His scent filled her nose and it suddenly felt like she was home. She tried to search his face, tried to see if he felt the same as she did in that moment, but she knew she couldn't just kiss him and their problems suddenly be fixed. She had hurt him. Badly. And she had to mend what she had done.

"I'm sorry," she finally said quietly, far more certain and sure than what she had said to him this morning. "Artorias, I'm truly, deeply sorry for what I did. I was so, so selfish... I was unfair to you, to me, to us... I was so blinded by my own shortcomings to see any of the good and I'm so sorry that I took that out on you. I didn't even let you try to help..." Her voice broke as she replayed that night in her mind, her ears flicking. He had tried to stop her, to try and make her see reason and get her to talk it out with him, and she had pushed him away. She had pushed away the only good, stable thing in her life and now she was desperately trying to pull him back.

"I... I understand if you can't forgive me. But... If you can just let me try, if you could just give me a chance..." Her paws shifted away from his cheeks, trailing down to rest on his chest while her eyes remained on his. "I want to be with you. I want more of those days of going on patrols with you and snuggling with you at night and teasing you about things and just... just being with you. That's all I want. Because I... Because-" Her words cut off before they could come tumbling out of her mouth, the realization hitting her all at once. "Because I love you," she whispered after a moment before she finally forced herself to stop, barely able to breathe as she waited for his response.

Briar Fatalis