smartass_captain

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Illario listens as best he can works difficult to decipher but Jim is ever patient. He can tell the other man is struggling too, hurting deeply and Illario wishes he could take all that hurt away far away, and never let Jim feel it again. But it's all he can do to hold onto his hand and with all the strength he can muster, reach up to gently brush away some of the tears from his cheeks.

"Sounds disgusting amore. Worse than Ferelden acorn coffee." He jokes, trying to blink away the shadows around his vision and properly look at Jim, at the beautiful blue eyes tinged with red and the streaks of salt water in his face through the dirt of their fight through Ferelden. He can't let his man down. He can't die and leave his man hurting.

He shifts in Jim's arms fighting against the lead weight of his limbs and tries to curl closer to Jim.

"I want to live, Jim. I want to live and be with you. You let me see there could be more- a future. You are the reason I said to being me here."

He doesn't know the full story of what happened to Jim, but he knows after the Inquisition the Wardens saved him. And if they saved him, maybe Illario can be saved. He has so much more work to do, proving he can change. Unsoing the damage he's caused.

When the toxic looking mix is brought to him, when Jim props him up against his chest, Illario feels the world slip away a little more, but his heart still beat against the poison in his chest and if Fate has any sense of humour she'll let him live. He's spent too long taking the easy way out.

So he drinks. Almost retching, the foul taste and smell far worse than anything he's ever endured before but his hand is against Jim's, and he tells himself drink it, stupido.

And then the pain starts. If he thought he was hurting before, it was nothing in comparison to the fresh wave that spasms through him, through stomach and lungs, heart and head, making his fingers clench and relax and his bones feel like they're melting. Convulsing and cursing, it takes all of a few seconds for his body to simply shut down, overwhelmed and exhausted.

Then suddenly he's awake again, gasping for breath like a man half-drowned, the convulsions less intense but still rocking his body on the small cot, his fingers grasping to hold onto something.