[silence on the other end. Rincewind remembers. He remembers the joke Will made about his hat, too. The mark it covers.
The man who did those - why would anyone continue to call someone like that a friend? Those aren't gifts; they're burdens. Memories you can't shelve away. Unwelcome reminders. Or they would be to Rincewind. What's been done to Will, that he can see them as anything different? Or wrap up something similar for the only man he shares a world with?
Terrible things, Rincewind guesses. Things, coward that he is, that he's loathe to ask after.]
...I need to be away, I think. For a while. [The Castile for a bit, and from there - well, who knows. Rincewind has slept in stables and forests and dry alcoves before. He's spent nights on the beach when he did't want to stumble home. The wizard needs to think about this, at least. With some distance. He's always felt safer with distance.
It just twists something inside him, in the part of him clinging to fractured memories of an adventure in a bait shop, or a terrible sandwich made in a tiny kitchen, to have to apply that to Will. Will, who has always felt like one of the safest harbors he knows.
I just need to sort this out, Rincewind tells himself, trying to believe it. It was too much of a shock. I just need time.]
no subject
The man who did those - why would anyone continue to call someone like that a friend? Those aren't gifts; they're burdens. Memories you can't shelve away. Unwelcome reminders. Or they would be to Rincewind. What's been done to Will, that he can see them as anything different? Or wrap up something similar for the only man he shares a world with?
Terrible things, Rincewind guesses. Things, coward that he is, that he's loathe to ask after.]
...I need to be away, I think. For a while. [The Castile for a bit, and from there - well, who knows. Rincewind has slept in stables and forests and dry alcoves before. He's spent nights on the beach when he did't want to stumble home. The wizard needs to think about this, at least. With some distance. He's always felt safer with distance.
It just twists something inside him, in the part of him clinging to fractured memories of an adventure in a bait shop, or a terrible sandwich made in a tiny kitchen, to have to apply that to Will. Will, who has always felt like one of the safest harbors he knows.
I just need to sort this out, Rincewind tells himself, trying to believe it. It was too much of a shock. I just need time.]