Once.

[ a traveling itch overtakes her fingertips, an urge she fails to temper — as if possessed by the urge to show him how impossible it would be to save her. to fix what's already been broken, when she's been sliced by the fragments of her own shattering spirit.

her fingertips flit to her collarbone, brushing a cold burn like icicles over the ragged scar tissue there, where antlers protrude through soft skin. monster. murderer. there are many names he could call her, once he realizes she's carrying the stag's corpse with her like a morbid memento of her failures. and wouldn't he be right? it wasn't her hand that felled the stag, but it was her who led it to them both — sun summoner and stag alike — to the slaughter. ]

Some Grisha claim amplifiers to strengthen their power. The stag was meant to be mine.

[ was. a destiny that had been stolen from her, a right she hadn't been allowed to claim, a freedom that had been taken. her fingers slip and fall, fisting into the sleeves of her shirt. rather than share those secrets, she mutters, quiet, ]

It didn't turn out the way I thought it would.