Letter to Damon (#3)
(Written on Tidree’s island after the feast, before going to sleep.)
Damon,
Thank you for today. We are sorely in need of guidance - in more ways than I care to think about - and your lessons helped greatly.
When I contacted you, I was afraid. Afraid you would say no. Afraid you would say yes. Afraid that it would be impossible to put aside our past. But I was foolish to have worried: though time may have changed us, you were always a good man. The kind of man who would do the right thing, no matter the cost.
Just like you did 500 years ago.
You had a choice back then: certain victory or my flock. The end of the war… or me. You might regret it now, because it didn’t go the way you thought it would, but - if you are being honest with yourself - you know the outcome wouldn’t have changed anything. Win or lose, it didn’t matter: you lost me the moment you made the choice. No matter how correct, how righteous, or how heroic that choice was.
Truth be told, I was never cut out for war. I was good at running headfirst into danger, sacrificing myself… but sacrificing others - those I loved - for the greater good? I could never have chosen Thylea over my flock - or over you - and I think you knew that. That is why you didn’t tell me. Because you thought I would try to stop you.
You thought I wasn’t capable of the right choice.
And I think you were right. I couldn’t do it to my flock; and, were the roles reversed, I could never have done the same to you. I loved you too much to hurt you like that. To break your heart that way. Perhaps that makes me a bad person? That is all evil is, after all: selfish choices.
But, even as I write this - as I acknowledge that you tried to do what was best for Thylea - I don’t know that I can forgive you for the choice you made. For not choosing me.
Maybe that will change. The distance that my faltering memories provide helps take the edge off the pain that drove me away all those years ago. In time, we might be friends. Right now, however, between both the love and sorrow my heart has for you, I can barely bear to be around you.
No matter how I feel though, once this is all over and if I am lucky enough to survive, I should like to hear the whole story from you: if only so that we can both have closure to that part of our lives.
Until we meet again,
Calliope