[Leslie can’t agree with the idea that she shouldn’t concern herself with someone she likes as much as Hubert, but she can’t say anything about it in the face of his request that she read Edelgard’s words. The last words she’ll ever receive from her. She glances down to where Hubert’s touch reminds her where the letter is held right now.]
[It is difficult, though, which is why Leslie takes a few seconds before she finds her voice.]
Okay.
[As she looks back to the letter, her eyes move along the lines slowly but mostly steadily. By the third paragraph, her grip on the letter tightens, resulting in some wrinkles that she will regret when she realizes it.]
[(Later, she will try to smooth the wrinkles out again so that she will be able to preserve it as best as she can, but right now, she doesn’t even notice.)]
[She’s begun to sniffle once, twice through the fourth paragraph, but it’s the fifth where her eyes stop moving, stopped on three words. Leslie von Hresvelg.]
[Though no one has asked her surname here or even commented on how she only uses Leslie, she knows that, legally, her names ties her to a family that is truly evil. Does anyone in all of Aefenglom know of the Sperado name other than the few Leslie has told herself? No, but she knows. Does everyone in her own world who cares for her think of her adoption of a new surname as a fait accompli? Yes, but Leslie takes few things for granted. That slender chain still attaching her to the people who gave birth to her has remained a small but unrelenting weight on her heart.]
[A name she would never have even imagined asking for has now replaced that chain with a link to a woman she admires to an extreme level but will never see again. It’s an unbelievable lightening of her load, but it’s also what starts tears flowing in earnest. Something she only notices when a tear drips from her face onto the bottom of the letter.]
[Realizing what is happening, she drops the hand still holding the letter to her side and brings her opposite arm up to scrub at her eyes.]
Sorry. I’m sorry. I only need — only a minute.
[Getting her crying under control enough to continue reading without staining the paper will take more than one minute, though not much longer than that even if left to sort through it on her own, as she hiccups her way through suppressed sobs attempting to join the tears.]
no subject
[It is difficult, though, which is why Leslie takes a few seconds before she finds her voice.]
Okay.
[As she looks back to the letter, her eyes move along the lines slowly but mostly steadily. By the third paragraph, her grip on the letter tightens, resulting in some wrinkles that she will regret when she realizes it.]
[(Later, she will try to smooth the wrinkles out again so that she will be able to preserve it as best as she can, but right now, she doesn’t even notice.)]
[She’s begun to sniffle once, twice through the fourth paragraph, but it’s the fifth where her eyes stop moving, stopped on three words. Leslie von Hresvelg.]
[Though no one has asked her surname here or even commented on how she only uses Leslie, she knows that, legally, her names ties her to a family that is truly evil. Does anyone in all of Aefenglom know of the Sperado name other than the few Leslie has told herself? No, but she knows. Does everyone in her own world who cares for her think of her adoption of a new surname as a fait accompli? Yes, but Leslie takes few things for granted. That slender chain still attaching her to the people who gave birth to her has remained a small but unrelenting weight on her heart.]
[A name she would never have even imagined asking for has now replaced that chain with a link to a woman she admires to an extreme level but will never see again. It’s an unbelievable lightening of her load, but it’s also what starts tears flowing in earnest. Something she only notices when a tear drips from her face onto the bottom of the letter.]
[Realizing what is happening, she drops the hand still holding the letter to her side and brings her opposite arm up to scrub at her eyes.]
Sorry. I’m sorry. I only need — only a minute.
[Getting her crying under control enough to continue reading without staining the paper will take more than one minute, though not much longer than that even if left to sort through it on her own, as she hiccups her way through suppressed sobs attempting to join the tears.]