Kill me, take me, but don't hate me

"Is it... because of who my mother was?" Sarah asked in a tearful voice, one so silent it barely reached Leon's ears.

And those words hurt. They hurt the bloodmancer badly. Because right now, he couldn't really deny them.

And so, rather than answering the girl, he had no other choice but to simply stare at the door, sensing the girl behind them, with only emptiness in his eyes.

"Didn't you claim you didn't care?" the girl then muttered, in a voice so silent even Leon's sharpened senses barely managed to catch half of what she said, with his mind filling the gaps of what he failed to perceive.

'I...' Leon opened up his mouth, yet no voice came through them.

Because just like before, Sarah's accusations were correct.

Leon pushed his chest up before sitting down on the edge of his bed. With the girl's words putting his guilt on the pedestal of his mind, he was too restless to just keep on lying. And soon, his leg started to move up and down with the heel of his foot striking the floor at an accelerating rate.

"I know we didn't know each other for long," Sarah said only for the sound of her blowing her nose to immediately follow. "But this last day..."

'Right,' Leon suddenly thought, his knee rocking at an even faster rate than before now. 'She knows too much,' he realized, recalling all the moments when she obediently played along with his wishes, hiding the truth both from the villagers and from the soldiers that camped nearby. 'Killing her would be the most pragmatic solution,' he thought, gritting his teeth.

His heel started to hurt from knocking against the floor over and over again.

"In fact, this last day... I was happier than ever before in my life," Sarah said.

And Leon could imagine her raising her head up while tears trickled down her face.

'No, killing her would leave a trace,' he then thought. 'That officer already saw the two of us together. If she were to suddenly die and I were to suddenly disappear, it would mean making myself a killer at large,' Leon continued to wrestle with the cold, logical side of his personality, striving to find a way to excuse the direction his thoughts were going to.

'I can only hope to have any sort of new life in this world because, besides the king, no one else saw me back at the castle,' he thought. 'And since I can't kill her, it would be insane to leave her in the current state of dissatisfaction she is in as well!'

Leon's knee stopped moving. His heel stopped tapping against the floor.

The bloodmancer then raised his head and took a deep breath, finally finding a logical loophole that allowed him to rationalize the idea of leaving the girl alone.

"This was the happiest day in my life since forever," Sarah repeated her last sentence, unaware of the rapid mental struggle going on in Leon's head on the other side of the doors. "It wasn't because I was doing something else. It was because I could follow you," she then said, her voice now turning stronger, filled with determination.

"As such, I don't care if you kill me right away." Sarah wasn't informing Leon nor trying to convince him. She simply stated a fact. "So kill me if you must, but I'm not going to stop on my way of searching for happiness," she said.

The knob on the door then moved around a little.

"Kill me if you must, but I'm coming inside."

The doors opened up, only for Sarah to make her way inside. She took her time to then close the doors only to then rest her back against them as she peered into the insides of the house.

Her eyes moved around only to lock on Leon's motionless figure sitting on the bed. And then, in spite of Leon's earlier warnings, she actually approached him.

Yet, rather than going in for the kill, Leon refused to buckle. His face was once again hidden within his palms, making him appear quite miserable.

And so, the girl moved closer, only to reach the same place where she kneeled down before him just a few hours prior.

Sarah then lowered herself down to her knees only to push her upper body down as well, resting her forehead against the ground.

"Kill me, take me, do whatever you want," the girl whispered, refusing to move even an inch from the floor on which she prostrated herself before the bloodmancer. "But please, don't show me the face you did when you learned about my ancestry!"

Sarah blew her nose while holding back her tears. Through the gaps between his fingers, Leon could see her entire petite body trembling, indicating just how scared this poor girl was.

"Raise," Leon uttered, unable to produce anything greater than just a whisper.

Yet, for the first time since she pledged her obedience to him, Sarah refused to listen to his world, opting to remain prostrated on the floor.

"Raise, I said," Leon lowered his hands, this time putting a little bit more umph behind his words, turning his voice back to its usual state.

Sarah trembled. And then, just like she did all the times when she heard Leon's orders before, she listened.

The girl pushed her hands against the ground before leaning her head up and raising her face to look at Leon with her eyes wide open.

Her face was a mess, snot mixing with tears and dirt all over it.

"Please, don't hate me," Sarah whispered through her trembling lips. She was as scared as a human being possibly could be. And yet, she refused to look away.

"Listen," Leon said, only to nearly instantly swallow down a huge blob that formed in his throat. "I don't hate you. I never had any reason to," he said, struggling to maintain eye contact with the girl. Yet, for how hard it was for him, he felt compelled to do at least this much to honor the girl's dedication and resolve. "I just hate everything about heroes," he said, only to stand raise from the bed and stand up. He then reached out for Sarah's head, resting his hands on the back of her head...

Only to pull her head closer, pushing the girl's messy head against his stomach as he gently embraced her.

"I hate everything about heroes because I'm the final form that they will take."