Chapter Text
The sun was out, bright and warm, and its reflection rippled and danced along the surface of the ocean, illuminating the fluffy white caps along the waves. Seagulls cried out in the distance, cruising the gusts of wind. The sky was a vibrant blue, and for once Harrow did not entirely despise the light and sounds of Canaan.
She and Gideon sat sprawled across the red and white checked blanket that they’d brought, and it smelled of buttercups and mown grass and earth, baked warm and fragrant with the sun. Her pinky just brushed the curve of Gideon’s hand and it felt electric, larger than life and yet entirely small. She felt a blush creep up her chest and throat to the tips of her ears.
Gideon whistled, looking out at the stretch of water while petting Ortus’s soft fur. Her familiar was curled up in a pastry shaped swirl on the blanket, pressed up against Gideon’s thigh. The intimacy of her familiar touching another’s skin was not lost on Harrow but Ortus had insisted. He adored the other girl and she’d given up on reminding him of propriety.
“Want something to drink, my midnight lady?”
Harrow rolled her eyes, but nodded shyly, and accepted the jar of water with a hint of lemon water and mint that Gideon handed her. Her girlfriend had long since given up trying fancy fruity beverages to entice Harrow and had resigned herself to understanding that lemon water, at times warmed with a spoonful of sugar, was Harrow's idea of a best time.
She retrieved her own mason jar, juice thick with berries and basil and a splash of cordial. She’d made sandwiches for the occasion, her own made with toasted bread from Magnus, slathered with mayonnaise and pickles and hot sauce, with thick cut bits of meat and cheese melted together. Magnus and Abigail adored Gideon, loved hosting her at the bakery and plying her with elaborate meals. It had become such that Gideon rarely returned home to her own small apartment she inherited from Aiglamene, choosing instead to curl up behind Harrow in the little attic, her warmth more than enough to keep Harrow sleeping and content throughout the night, paired with Ortus purring near her head.
Harrow's sandwich was more of two pieces of lightly buttered dinner roll dusted with herbed salt. She felt silly for her tastes, surrounded by the best food in all the Nine Houses, but Gideon had reassured her that it was quite alright to like what she liked, and she elected to believe her, for once. She was slowly working on giving up battles to hold herself penitent for unnecessary things.
Gideon bit into her sandwich, and Harrow watched the muscles in her jaw work, and felt a bit faint. She chewed thoughtfully on her plain bread and looked out at the ripples of reeds along the shore. Gideon’s fingers, hot to the touch, threaded their way into hers. They sat, the thrum of the earth whispering into her veins, the insistent pull of magic worming its way into her skin. She felt the urge to pull up the bits of bone she could feel buried deeply beneath them, that she might fashion them into a ring or necklace of bone and present it to her.
Gideon shot her a glance out of the side of her eyes. “You’re so pretty, you know. When you frown like that. It’s why I fell in love with you in the first place. That stupid little scrunched up face.”
Harrow blushed, indignantly. “There’s no way you could have wanted me like that. Not in the beginning.”
Gideon looked at her, more intently now. “I did. You looked so serious. So imposing. I knew immediately you were different from anyone I’d ever known. Real. And that I wanted to know you, in any way you'd be willing to have me.”
Harrow squeezed her hand, overwhelmed. She could hardly bear the truth of it.
“I - I wanted you too, you know.” She said, haltingly. “You were the first person I’d ever known - who saw me and really looked. Who wanted to look. And I’m glad you kept trying, despite it all.”
The ginger puffed up her chest in pride, betrayed only by the slight flush on her warm brown cheeks. “No one can resist these babies.”
She flexed, and Harrow poked her, pretending not to love it.
They sat in companionable silence, chewing their sandwiches, savoring the warm breeze on their skin. Harrow would have been content to hold this moment, to freeze it forever and keep it, precious and safe and unpenetrated by the persistent needs of the outside world.
“You know,” Gideon said, conversationally. “I’ve been talking to my dad. And he still owes you, you know, for saving my life and not besmirching the name of his beloved business that could have killed his bastard kid. And I know you still want to save the Ninth, all on your own. But,” here she pauses, tugging gently on Harrow’s wrists to face her, tea colored eyes meeting black ones. “I also think that you maybe don’t want to go back, and stay forever, and fix it. And you can tell me if I’m getting out of line, but if John can help the Ninth financially, get resources and fix up the infrastructure, maybe convince a few of his minions to do a pilgrimage, well, you wouldn’t have to stay so long to fix the magic piece of it all.”
Her eyes were big, nearly beseeching. Harrow loved when she got to deliver good news to Gideon. It felt like repaying a debt.
“Do you promise me,” she said carefully. “That if what I chose, what I wanted, was to go back to Drearburh, and live out my days there. Return to guarding the Tomb, making my way through the catacombs, tending to the skeletons. If that was my calling, would you understand? I couldn’t ask you to stay, but,” she swallowed. “Would you visit, from time to time?”
Gideon’s mouth opened, just slightly, and Harrow was taken with her white, just a tad crooked front teeth. “Of course, Harrow, I don’t want to control you, I -”
“Good,” Harrow interrupted. “I couldn’t bear it. Being told where to go again. But I don’t want to, Gideon, at least not for a while. I would like to take you up on that offer. I hope, soon, you’ll accompany me to Drearburh, to see where I came from. My parents, Crux - they’ll detest you.”
Gideon barked out a laugh, high spots of pink appearing on her cheek. “I’d follow you anywhere, gloom mistress. You say the word. Hell, I’d even go to the Eighth if you wanted.”
Harrow rolled her eyes. She stroked the back of Gideon’s hand, traced the veins there, ran the blunt tip of her nail up the firm skin of her wrist and forearm. She felt the life thrumming underneath, warm and inviting. She wanted her, desperately.
“I find it insulting that you think I’d ever visit the Eighth.”
“Well, I'd still go. Our friends are here, but we can go on pilgrimages. See the world, learn of all the new inventions. I’d like to, you know, go on adventures together. I’d go anywhere, happily, if I were with you.”
Harrow cleared her throat. “And I…you. Though Sextus may begrudge us visiting the Sixth proper without his presence.”
Gideon threw up her hands. “So we take our friends! I’d go anywhere with SexPal. As long as he knows who I really care about.” She threw her hand dramatically across her forehead. “Camilla and those sexy, sexy knives of hers.”
“You’re an oaf,” Harrow said, unable to contain the affection in her voice. Tentatively, she tucked her head into the crook of Gideon’s shoulder. She smelled spicy and herbal, and Harrow loved it.
Gideon ruffled through their pack, and procured a wax paper wrap of strawberries, red and shiny and clean. Harrow allowed her to stretch one out to her, biting into the sweet burst of flavor. The stretch of skin against her own was grounding, comforting. She felt the magic of Gideon’s life energy pulse along with her blood, felt the promising pull of it. A little ways off, tucked against a gnarled old willow tree, were her broom and Gideon’s bike, propeller lovingly fixed with a little help from Camilla and Palamedes, while Dulcie had watched indulgently from the sidelines, Ortus nestled in the wool blankets piled in her lap.
She felt a world away from Drearburh, from the small cold thing she once was, so desperate to find the glowing thing inside her that made her life worth it.
“Hey.” She turned to meet Gideon’s gold coin eyes, staring seriously into her own. “I can hear you thinking, you know.”
Harrow wrinkled her brow at her. “Then help me stop.”
She saw the lopsided smile in front of her that she had come to adore, saw the dimples dappling her brown face like shadows in the forest. She felt her eyelids flutter shut, the breeze caressing her bare skin. Harrow had foregone paint that day, even with the new shipment in, but the vulnerability had her feeling lighter, freer, than she thought possible.
When Gideon’s lips met hers, warm and sweet from the sun and the strawberries, Harrow felt her own mouth part with a sigh. Gideon kissed like she was born to it, like the woman in front of her was the most vital and needed thing in her world.
Gideon kissed Harrow like she was beautiful.
The kind of beauty like the wind whistling past them as they rattled down a twisting road on a bike, the kind of beauty in the floury creased palms of Magnus Quinn, the kind of beauty that infused oss and allowed it to stretch and bend at Harrow’s hand.
Beyond their heads now pressed close together, Ortus yawned and stretched, ambling out into the wildflower studded grass. He thought mostly of thick cuts of meat at the bakery, of the elegant twitch of Matthias’s ears when they watched the swallows dart against the evening sky, of the comfort of Harrow’s bony chest at night when he cuddled up between her and Gideon. Whereas previously his thoughts were mainly of Harrowhark and how to protect her or provide companionship, he found he had space these days to contemplate the peaks and valleys of his own life.
A butterfly, blue wings speckled with white and lavender, caught his eye. He crouched low into the grass, wiggling his behind in eager preparation. One…two…three! And he sprung out into the air, batting playfully at the insect darting just out of his reach. He ambled after it, more butterflies flitting out of the grass into the air.
He felt free, knowing his Harrowhark was taken care of after all. Yes, Ortus thought to himself, I have done well indeed.
The End.
