…And lately, every time Glaffin says something, Alec thinks their healer of light will probably end up being one of his most challenging adversaries. While Alec also doesn’t see their victories as “just” in the traditional sense, he considers them very much worthwhile. The stance that conflict is inherently wasteful and pointless is so uncompromisingly…Thariusian that the pirate feels the muscles to either side of his spine tighten. It goes beyond believing that the world needs both viewpoints. He thinks this philosophy is rigid to the point of easily shattering, which is precisely the sort of thing that Alec fights against with misleading words and knives in the dark.
Laelaer, meanwhile, both shames and worries him. She’s clearly taking the conservative view of their shared faith. On one hand, Alec must respect that, yet at the same time, he avoids it. Bringing challenge to the world is well and good, but when he can, he prefers to lean the odds in favor of success and growth rather than leaving it fully to chance. He does not throw people off a cliff and expect them to learn to fly on the way down (unless it’s as an example or motivation for others).
So, Alec acts as he usually does when he is faced with opinions with which he cannot agree. He simply says nothing at all.
At least, on matters of philosophy. ”I will tell him,” he promises Glaffin, pointedly ignoring the rest. ”If all of you will gather whatever else you want to take, then I think we can leave soon.” And with that, he picks up his tools and walks away from the group.
After replacing them in his saddlebags, he steps lightly towards Adrian. Assuming the young man still sits by his friends’ graves, Alec crouches near him with enough distance to give him space.
”…I was nine years old when my first sister died,” he says. His tone is more musing than emotional. ”I can’t remember much of it; so many years have passed. I do know I was old enough to understand the idea of death, but not in the way everyone else might’ve liked. My family and our friends said that she was merely somewhere else. She would live on in this new place, they said, and then perhaps live in many others, as though she’d just moved across the sea and decided to build a new life. Even if I pretended to agree, I didn’t feel it. To me, she was gone, completely. I would never see her again. This, as I’m sure you can imagine, made me very sad.”
He falls back into a sitting position, his feet also resting on the ground and his knees up with his hands behind him for support. ”Now, though, I believe what I was told. I believe Janek and Merla are…somewhere, wherever they’ve found home. This doesn’t invalidate your grief, of course. Lost friends are lost friends, whether they walk with the gods or live in a new town a hundred miles away. Still, I find that it helps me to think this way. Maybe you can find at least a little comfort too? They’ll continue on. Just…not here.”