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A small blue bead, cracked down the middle. Broken, useless.
Yasha rolled it delicately between her fingers, unsure of which strands of hair it had come from. It was one of many, and yet the small cracked bead mirrored the pain in her chest. Zuella had weaved them into her hair one afternoon when they were alone on a hunt. It had taken her hours to get them all placed just right in Yasha's wild main of white hair. Yasha had enjoyed every second of it. The feeling of Zuella's fingers running through her hair as she worked, and the softness of her voice as she hummed with Yasha lying in her lap. It had been such a peaceful day. One of the last good days of Yasha's life before Zuella was taken from her. Before her feathers were stripped away and she was left with the gnarled, flightless, black remnants of bat-like wings. Before her once pure white hair had started to grow in black like her heart.
Yasha furrowed her brow as she rolled the bead between her thumb and index finger, feeling the pain in her chest turn to nausea as she looked to the sleeping woman in the bed next to her. Beau had yet to awaken, still content and exhausted from the night she had spent with Yasha. Her back was to Yasha, an exposed expanse of dark smooth skin over lean muscle, covered in scratches from where Yasha had dragged her nails across them.
Yasha clenched her fist tightly around the bead that had broken sometime during their tryst and berated herself. It had to be a sign... She had betrayed Zuella. Had given into her bodies aching loneliness and accepted Beau's offer the night before. And with that, one of Zuella's beads had broken, as if she had broken Zuella's heart from beyond the grave.
"A moment of weakness..." Yasha whispered quietly to herself, careful not to wake Beau. "I'm sorry, Zuella…"
Yasha grimaced and carefully untangled herself from the sheets and began to collect her clothes. She held onto the guilt in her stomach as she dressed and refused to look at the sleeping woman who she'd so eagerly pleasured just hours earlier. She tried to steady her breathing to keep her rage at bay. Angry at herself. She had promised herself to Zuella for life... and here she was, giving into her primal wants with someone else.
Quietly she slipped out of the door and made her way out to the deck of the ship where she could look out upon the ocean and be alone with her guilt.
Beau had slept rather soundly. Her body was relaxed and her energy expended blissfully the night before. She woke with a smile on her face to the creaking sound of the ship as it gently rolled on the waves. She stretched out her naked body and sighed with contentment. After months of wanting, months of awkward flirting and months of longing glances, she had finally gotten up the courage to ask Yasha to sleep with her.
Beau's approach had always been to hit it and quit it. There was safety in knowing the boundaries. A one-night-stand meant there was no rejection in the morning. They would leave and Beau would never have to see them again and for one glorious night, she could feel wanted. It was a shallow contract, but it was safe. With Yasha, it was difficult... She knew that when she woke up, she would still have to face Yasha again. It wasn't as simple as the one-night-stands she was used to. With Yasha, Beau reasoned, it was more akin to friends with benefits. Sure they would still have to see each other, but there were no expectations. It was still safe. At least, that's what Beau had told herself when she had posited the question to Yasha the night before.
Beau rolled over in the bed, not entirely sure if she could expect to see Yasha still tangled in the sheets or not. She felt a slight pang of disappointment at the vacant spot next to her but quickly brushed it off. They had both agreed it would be casual. Beau reminded herself that it was safer this way. If Yasha had stayed, Beau might get used to it... might want it.
She gave one last stretch and untangled herself from the sheets and began to search the room for her clothes that had been unceremoniously tossed about the night before.
"Caduceus and I made breakfast!" Jester was the first to greet her as she left the small room onto the berth deck. The smell of cooking vegetables and spices filled the air and Beau took a deep breath in, feeling good about the day as she made towards the small kitchen area where Jester and Caduceus were busy cooking.
"Smells good. What are we having."
"Well, I don't really know what this thing is but Caduceus assures me it's very good for me." Jester said with a pulled face as she lifted the ladle from the hot pot and pointed at a vegetable.
"That's a carrot." Caduceus said with his calm low voice. No judgement in his voice, just a soft excitement for the anticipation of breakfast.
"It's no donut, I can tell you that, but I think it's okay..." Jester dumped it back into the pot and quickly grabbed a couple small bowls and began to scoop ladles of the vegetables into the bowls. "Here, bring one to Yasha. She hasn't been down yet."
Jester filled the bowls and handed them to Beau before ushering her out of the small kitchen area and towards the wooden stairs leading to the main deck.
Beau tilted one of the bowls and blew on the hot stew before tilting it back further to taste it. It was good, which meant that Caduceus did most of the work.
Once on the main deck, Beau glanced around for the familiar black and white tangled mess of hair that belonged to Yasha before spotting her near the bow of the ship, sitting along the scuppers and staring out onto the ocean with a frown on her face.
"Hey, breakfast?" Beau asked and held out the extra bowl to Yasha.
There was a pause before Yasha turned to Beau and eyed the bowl. "...I'm... I'm not hungry."
Beau frowned. "You... you sure? It's not bad."
"I'm sure."
There was a stagnant pause and Beau swallowed, feeling the tension between them. "Did... did I do something wrong?"
Yasha pursed her lips and immediately Beau felt a sense of dread wash over her and a tightness in her chest. The day had barely begun and already it seamed to be ready to fall apart.
Yasha shook her head slightly and then seamed to think for a minute before shrugging. She took a moment to consider telling Beau about Zuella, but then thought better of it, deciding Beau didn't need to know.
Beau set the bowls down on the scuppers and crossed her arms across her chest as if to protect her heart. "Um... I..." Beau sighed and bit her lip, unsure of what to say. She was almost certain that whatever had soured Yasha's mood, it had to do with what they had done the night before. "Is... is this about... last night?" Beau's voice was quiet, concerned.
Yasha continued to stare out onto the ocean as she worried the bead in her hand. "It can't happen again."
Beau felt the rejection as if it were a physical punch to the chest but she tried not to show it. "Um... oh... okay.." Her voice was small and she could feel a pain radiating from her chest she didn't expect.
"It was a mistake, Beau..."
And with that one word, mistake, Beau felt her chest shatter. "A mistake?"
Yasha nodded and avoided Beau's confused gaze.
Beau swallowed and pulled her arms in tighter to her chest. "Yeah... yeah okay... a mistake..." There was a pause as Beau tried to read Yasha's stoic face but the woman gave her nothing. Instead Beau nodded her head solemnly and averted her eyes. "It won't happen again..." Her voice was so quiet, Yasha was unsure she had said anything at all, and with that, Beau quietly turned and left, making her way back down under deck.
Yasha watched her leave, and felt another pang of guilt in her chest. She had managed to hurt more than Zuella and herself. She closed her eyes and sighed, clenching her teeth.
Beau very quickly made her way back towards her small room in the berth deck and closed the door behind her, ignoring Jester's question of if she wanted seconds or not.
She sat on the small bed and furrowed her brow as she watched her hands tremble. "Why does it hurt so much....?"
Her mind went to her father. The one bit of family she had left and the ache in her chest tightened. He had always wanted a son, and instead he got her... A mistake. The fortune teller who told him he would have a son was wrong, instead he got her, and in the process... lost his wife... He had never explicitly blamed her for her mother's death, but Beau could feel it in the distance he kept from her. She was nothing more than a mistake and a reminder that he couldn't get rid of, and so he tried to mold her into something he could love, and she resisted. He tried to make her into someone else and she let him down, again and again until any love he may have had for her faded away and he was left with nothing but resentment for her very existence.
Beau breathed rapidly as she stared into the wood grain of the walls, trying to calm herself as her chest continued to ache before there was a light knock at her door and Beau paused her breathing.
"Beau?" Jester called softly, her voice muffled by the wooden door.
Beau didn't answer her immediately and instead subconsciously wiped away the moisture that was building at the edges of her eyes. "Y-yeah?"
"Are you okay?"
Beau didn't respond. She wanted to say yes, shoo her away and be alone, but another part of her wanted Jester to break down the door and be at her side.
When she received no answer Jester continued. "... I'm coming in."
Before Beau could protest, the door opened and Jester slipped inside, pausing upon seeing the redness around Beau's eyes. She quietly closed the door and padded over to Beau's side before sitting down delicately on the bed next to her as if she were afraid that moving to quickly would break her.
Jester swallowed but didn't say anything, instead watching Beau with concern in her eyes as Beau tried to keep her composure.
Eventually the damn broke and Beau's body lurched forward with a sob. "What's wrong with me...?"
"Beau..."
"A mistake." Beau shook as the word left her throat. "I've been called a mistake my entire life... A black spot of shame..." Beau's body shook and Jester pulled her against her chest, unsure of what had happened to bring this out of Beau. "I'm trying so hard... So hard to be better... and it's still not enough."
Jester pulled Beau tightly against her and stroked her hair. She swallowed. She wanted to talk. To comfort Beau but she had no context on where to start.
"Why doesn't anyone want me?" Beau's voice cracked.
"Beau..." Jester felt her heart break in two and squeezed Beau tighter to her as she felt her body wrack with stilted sobs.
"I just want someone to want me..."