It's just as easy as he thought. He can feel it, feel the way his power is settling heavy over her, and it feels...good. She leans into him, looking up with those wide eyes, and he smiles faintly, letting his voice ring out, echo, crash back down around them like a lulling wave.
"Spür das Glück der Traurigkeit, Fühl die Wohllust doch aufzugeben...."
None of this has to happen. He can make it go away. He can make her stay, and everything can go back to what it was just last night. She's warm, there in front of him, her heart beat slowing as she slips under the trance.
Just like he did.
"Such mit mir den schwarzen Gral...L-lern von mir, was es heißt zu...zu lieben-"
The look of terror that blooms on her is like a knife in his chest. It's familiar, and he places why mid line, a look of pure horror crossing his own young face.
He realizes where they're standing.
And he remembers how scared he was, under that fuzzy, floating feeling, when Count von Krolock mesmerized him with that haunting melody, too, right here.
He stops, a sob killing his voice, fresh tears tracking red lines down his porcelain cheeks. This is wrong. How could he? How could he do this to her? The hand between them drops from the air to land gently on her shoulder, shaking her just a little to help her come to.
"I'm so sorry," he chokes. A moment of lucidity, of pain. "Seras, I'm not - myself. I feel so strange, I - I can't-"
The hand drifts to her hair, smoothing it down. She doesn't want to go, he knows that, really. But he can feel himself slipping, finally tumbling down the precipice he started to find himself on just after that carnival. And now he's proven to himself that... he's dangerous to her. Not because she can't take him, because...she can.
But because she won't back down. Because she won't stop fighting for him, even if her neck is on the line.
Alfred can't in good conscience let her. This is the line he's crossed. And now there is no going back over it, even if he can feel his dead heart falling to pieces.
"Please...he - he really must need you. He must be so lost. I will be fine. And I'm - not mad, not really, I'm just - I'm -
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timeasmymeasure
Cw: mind control/hypnosis
Date: 2022-06-11 05:40 pm (UTC)"Spür das Glück der Traurigkeit, Fühl die Wohllust doch aufzugeben...."
None of this has to happen. He can make it go away. He can make her stay, and everything can go back to what it was just last night. She's warm, there in front of him, her heart beat slowing as she slips under the trance.
Just like he did.
"Such mit mir den schwarzen Gral...L-lern von mir, was es heißt zu...zu lieben-"
The look of terror that blooms on her is like a knife in his chest. It's familiar, and he places why mid line, a look of pure horror crossing his own young face.
He realizes where they're standing.
And he remembers how scared he was, under that fuzzy, floating feeling, when Count von Krolock mesmerized him with that haunting melody, too, right here.
He stops, a sob killing his voice, fresh tears tracking red lines down his porcelain cheeks. This is wrong. How could he? How could he do this to her? The hand between them drops from the air to land gently on her shoulder, shaking her just a little to help her come to.
"I'm so sorry," he chokes. A moment of lucidity, of pain. "Seras, I'm not - myself. I feel so strange, I - I can't-"
The hand drifts to her hair, smoothing it down. She doesn't want to go, he knows that, really. But he can feel himself slipping, finally tumbling down the precipice he started to find himself on just after that carnival. And now he's proven to himself that... he's dangerous to her. Not because she can't take him, because...she can.
But because she won't back down. Because she won't stop fighting for him, even if her neck is on the line.
Alfred can't in good conscience let her. This is the line he's crossed. And now there is no going back over it, even if he can feel his dead heart falling to pieces.
"Please...he - he really must need you. He must be so lost. I will be fine. And I'm - not mad, not really, I'm just - I'm -
Please.
Go to him."