She had set up defenses, in this broken state, intending to keep in it. Shields for the lack of--only because she knew that there would be those who would not easily let her perish herself from the world around her so easily.
She would force her heart to a dull throb, force her brain to a buzzing, unthinking mess. She wouldn't let the pain of others by her get to her--it was the only way to protect them, the only way to finally let herself embrace death without regret.
It started with Annsuel, though she had been the hardest, the test to see if she could force herself to utter out foreboding intentions. It was quick; it felt like it had never happened, though left a heavy drape upon her heart, even past the deluding alcohol.
"Indignation is dead, and so shall be our friendship."
And so, Zurich walked away in the loud wake of Ann's silence.
She encountered Catilyn on her daily walk to Combe. Catilyn's sobs and pleads, as Zurich would give her the same treatment, echoed in her head.
"You can't--You can't leave me! I'm dead if you do!"
Zurich felt bitter humor tumbling into her stomach, making her feel sick, yet wanting to laugh as she'd pause, head turning back to utter her final retort.
"Life isn't kind enough t'let people like us die."
And so she left her, in the fear worse than death; the yearning of it, the ungodly desire to die, and being unable to trick fate into finally letting it happen, in the midst of all things that had nearly killed you.
It was not as easy as Zurich had envisioned it, nor practiced in her mind. There were few others she had the mind of giving the same treatment, for they all had seemed to have disappeared over the time, moved on. She ended up drunk, stupid, depressed--desperate to act out enough to let someone bring her death.
The day would come to even having a blade at her throat at a drunken attempt of thievery--and as then even he would refuse to kill her, she'd fail with suicide by his blade. The night would end with her staggering back to the inn, ordering more whiskey, and promptly passing out on top of the table half an hour later.
By the next day, and another round of whiskey to drown out the throbbing headache from the last night, it would only be such luck that he would arrive, intending to grab her from the rapids of her descending sanity.
Blince Kolten.
