Archive of Our Own ^beta

The Rhodes Island personnel are not immune to the charms of the seaside, all dressed for the occasion long before they make landfall. Skadi would have been perfectly comfortable attending the beach in her usual clothes, had she not been shouted down and browbeaten into submission by Grani. Even SilverAsh, normally austere and foreboding in his dark suits and even darker fur-trimmed mantle, deigns to put on a festive shirt printed with bright tropical patterns. He looks colourfully incongruous; even Tenzin sports a bright red flower tucked to the side of his head, no doubt courtesy of Cliffheart.

Skadi plucks at her own ensemble, at the slick, stretchy fabric of the swimsuit with far too many straps and the soft, diaphanous folds of the sheer cover-up she's worn over it. All of these strange, impractical clothes offer little protection against the sun, and less still against the cool water, against the denizens of the deep, against their many-toothed maws tucked behind gnashing beaks, against their sucker-lined tentacles that can strip flesh from bone, against their grotesque jaws distended below their milky eyes, blind and bulging and staring but still all-seeing -- but, ah, this isn't cold, drowned Aegir, lonely and remote and with the whisper of the ocean all around her. 

But yet, it's what the others wear, their outfits picked out the night before -- even as Rhodes Island is still mooring alongside Siesta and talk of business is interspersed between the plans for leisure. It's what Grani picks out for her, holding the offending garments aloft and trying to mix and match them into something that Skadi supposes is meant to be stylish and visually pleasing. And so Skadi wears all of these strange, impractical clothes that hide nothing and serve no functional purpose but to cling too much in some places and billow out at others, and she follows the rest of the Rhodes Island personnel down the gangway and onto the seaside city. All the while, Grani clings to her arm as though afraid of her disappearing into the crowd, and points out all sorts of sights around them -- the Obsidian Festival venue squatting over one end of the vista; the Siesta cultural centre sprawled at the other; the endless little beachside shops and eateries and information kiosks clustered like limpets along the edge of a cliff.

Even now, the other accompanying operators keep their distance, milling around Skadi and Grani like a current flowing and re-forming around an island -- but Skadi doesn't mind that. She wouldn't want to ruin their fun with talk of the deeps and the terrors they can hide; those are thoughts she'd do well to keep to herself.

Through the orange-filtered lenses of her sunglasses, Skadi can see the doctor dragged off somewhere, trailing in Skyfire and Provence's wake as they head off towards one of the hiking trails destined for the volcano. Further up the boardwalk, Nearl and Shining walk side to side, shoulders almost touching, the former holding up her shield as a makeshift umbrella. Out in the water, Vigna drifts between swimmers and surfers on a tiny one-person motorboat, engine idling while Sora takes on song requests and, once her makeshift setlist is compiled, begins an impromptu mobile concert tour in miniature. 

From where Skadi is sitting, the sea seems tame, benign, its waters a bright and glittering blue like a sparkling gem held up to the light.

How beautiful.

How exquisite.

How facetious.

How fallacious.

The land-dwellers know nothing of the sea as it truly is, unspeakably dark and unspeakably deep, just as cruel as it can be kind. Where all light and colour fades, where the jewel-blue turns dark and dim, a murky vision choked and tangled by forests of kelp and the ruins of old ships and fallen mobile cities, buried and crushed in a watery grave.

And, the sunlight is too bright here. The eye of the late afternoon sun blazes with a lurid golden intensity, prelude to a hot evening waiting to descend.

Leaning back in her seat, Skadi flips her sunglasses down over her eyes and tilts the brim of her hat lower so that it shields her face from the worst of the sun. From her deckchair under the shade of a cluster of palm trees swaying in the wind, Skadi watches Grani helping out with Amiya at Gummy's food stand, handling transactions and making menu recommendations. Her face is bright and beaming as she chats to customers while they await their meals.

As though sensing Skadi's scrutiny, Grani glances over and waves energetically, so hard she almost knocks her beach visor askew -- and then the next moment she's running out towards the sea, ponytail streaking out behind her in a pale banner as the wind whips her hat away.

Skadi gets to her feet and gives chase, catching up easily. She reaches forward and stretches out her hand, snatches the woven straw brim of Grani's visor before it can be borne out of grasp entirely. She crams the hat back down on Grani's head, jamming it on over her ears and ruffling her hair with the same movement. Grani makes a little noise of protest, but Skadi withdraws her hand before Grani can smack it.

"You should keep better watch of your belongings," Skadi says. Grani, still red-faced and puffing from her chase through the sand, waggles a finger.

"But it got you out of lurking in the shade," she says once she's caught her breath. Then she grins, face lighting up. "Oh! Since you're finally out to join us -- how about something nice and sweet? As a thank-you for saving my hat? On the house, I'm sure Gummy won't mind."

"No. It's fine. Gummy has a business to run." Skadi reaches forward to give Grani's head a last pat -- and Grani ducks out from beneath her hand. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees something else floating through the air -- a black bowler hat trailing black ribbons. 

"Oh!" Grani makes a jump to catch it, and misses. Skadi reaches out reflexively, grabbing hold of it by the brim. The dark ribbons flutter against her wrist. "Someone's lost their hat."

The material is heavy and velvety in Skadi's hand; she has an idea of who it belongs to. She turns it over, brushing it free of sand. "I'll go and find its owner."

Grani nods, approving. "Yes, yes! Returning lost property is an important civic duty!" she says, very seriously, then claps her hands together. "Aha! I know. When you come back, I'll reward you with a snow-cone for your good and conscientious public service deed of the day!"

"I can take that," Skadi says and nods. She adjusts her own hat on her head and sets off, striding through the sand.

Other beachgoers and Rhodes operators alike part like a tide breaking against the prow of an approaching ship as she meanders down the sandbar. Ploughing onwards, she cuts through family barbecues and between sunbathing couples, across beach volleyball matches and past dozing hobbyist fishermen, in inexorable march until she escapes the noise and hubbub of the crowd. Where the bustle recedes, she follows the sound of singing, the familiar strains of an old Aegirian hymn faint in the air -- a sound that, thought soft, seems to hum and throb in her jawbones.

A woman in a voluminous black dress and shawl perches at the edge of one of the many piers along the boardwalk, overhanging the sea. Her boots are stood neatly upright next to her, lined up toe-to-toe and heel-to-heel; her feet trail in the water, dipped ankle-deep. The end of her long white scarf billows, trailing in the air. Something about seeing her head, uncovered, makes Skadi avert her eyes.

The woman in black faces out into the ocean, hair tucked over one shoulder, weaving the strands slowly together. Her head is bowed, her eyes closed; for the first time in the years since Skadi has seen her again, she looks -- almost -- at peace.

For several seconds, Skadi is content to watch her. Then, under her breath, she starts to sing, giving words, shape, and form to the melody the other woman is humming.

The syllables of Aegirian sound strange and squirming and alien to the ears of the uninitiated -- but, to Skadi, it's a piece of home she carries with her and tucked away into her heart, something to remind her of her distant birthplace beneath the sea when she's alone in her quarters, loosening her hair and combing it out with her hands. It must be the same for the other woman, too, for after a few moments her shoulders loosen and relax, her hands falling to her lap as she raises her voice in a halting aria.

Skadi sits down next to her and tangles her fingers in the other woman's long white hair, and begins to braid.

Two sections. A small section from the left, pulled over and across. Tuck under the right, twist. A small section form the left, pulled over and across. Tuck under the left, twist. Repeat as far as she can go, until her fingers cramp.

All the while, in the same way, their voices mix and twine together as they sing. A savage song, a sad song, a soothing song; an elegy for the distant cold tides they have long abandoned, similar and yet different to the sun-stained seas bordering Siesta.

Skadi sings of dark and drowned Aegir, of the gods and beasts of the deep that lie dreaming beneath the bleached white expanse of sand and coral, buried under the craggy skeletons of long-dead leviathans and long-forgotten ruins crushed by the sea. She sings of their home, so far removed from the clean and pristine white sands around them, from the utilitarian little bathtubs of Rhodes Island and the too-warm geothermal springs of Leithanien, a song of their distant birthplace where the water surrounds them from every side, a fathomless blue expanse that stretches into abyssal infinity.

She sings of watching the sky from Rhodes Island's deck, of seeing the moon and stars reflected in streaks and ripples over the water as they travel over the surface instead of under it; she sings of the past glories the two of them enacted, side by side, before the oripathy came to claim the mind of the woman now called Specter. At the thought, her voice wavers and her tongue trips over the words, over the name she wants to call -- but no, she can't. Not now, not when Specter is finally at peace, given respite from the whispers that worm and burrow into the crevices of her mind.

And so Skadi holds her tongue and keeps herself from calling the name trembling at the edge of her lips, threatening to fall and shatter the fragile calm wound into the air between them.

A soft touch on the back of her hand. She blinks and finds her vision blurred, her eyes wet; she can taste salt on her lips.

Specter's hand shifts to her cheek, brushing away the tears. "Hush, my dear," she says. Her voice is even and gentle. "For what reason do you weep? For what purpose do you mourn? Do you bear the weight of a sin that you wish to be absolved? Come, confess to me, and I shall bring you peace."

"I bear a weight," Skadi begins. "But not that of sin."

"Oh?"

"The weight of remembrance, and regret." She finishes the braid, tying it off with the ribbon from her sunhat. The deep blue and red fabric is a dark slash against Specter's pale hair.

"... do you remember?" Skadi asks. Her voice is steady despite the roiling tide in her heart that hurls itself against her ribs, crashing against her lungs and squeezing out her breath. Perhaps this is what drowning feels like to a land-dweller. "Aegir, our home, the depths, the vast blue sea and the white waves--?"

--and us? She stumbles over the last word, snatching it back before it can escape. Specter's expression, smooth and serene, does not change. A breeze picks up; it stirs the chains and crosses wound around her neck, the jewellery sparkling gold in the fading light.

"No." Specter's voice is a murmur. Her eyes are distant, unfocused, watching the sun sinking low in the horizon. The sky is beautiful, washed with the pink of approaching dusk, the first stars faint pinpricks of light between the clouds. On her lap, her fingers lace and unlace. "But that is of no matter. There is nothing to despair over, not as long as I can still feel and remember the grace of His Omnipotence -- for we are all created equally and in His image, and it is to His side that we will be delivered to in the end. In the same way that all tides are borne back to the sea from whence they came." Her voice lowers into an uneven singsong lilt, so soft that Skadi almost can't hear her. "Though we are far from home, we are never truly alone -- not as long as He continues to sing His dreaming song that heralds the end of time, whereupon He will rise from His sleep and guide us all to His eternity."

Skadi stays silent. Specter lifts one hand and touches it to her hair, running her fingers down the fishtail braid. "Oh," she says, stroking the entwined strands. "Did you do this? It's lovely. Thank you."

"It suits you." Skadi picks up the black bowler hat she'd set down on the pier, and brushes it off. She places it gently, delicately, on Specter's head. "Come, we'd best be getting back. It must nearly be time for the Obsidian Festival to begin."

"Please." Specter's hand reaches out, fingertips skimming against Skadi's. Skadi stares down at her. "Please," she says again, plaintive. "Before that, before we go. I would like to see ... the light of the stars, out here where the sky meets the sea. Would you be so kind as to stay with me? For just a little longer?"

Skadi is used to weathering calamities, to facing the might of the elements battering against her, to enduring hordes of Reunion soldiers hurling themselves at her like a wave crashing and breaking against a rocky shore. But this, this she is unprepared for -- the earnest eyes gazing into hers, the hands clasped around hers as though in prayer or benediction. For a moment, she wishes to bridge the distance between them, to lean closer and whisper Specter's name -- her past name, her true name -- into her mouth, repeating it over and over until Specter remembers it herself. For a moment, she wants to be selfish, to throw all caution to the wind and abandon and forget her principles of holding herself far apart from others, lest the tragedies of the past repeat themselves again.

Over and over, a cruel and inevitable cycle like the ebb and flow of the tide against the moon. Surely she can grant herself a respite from it.

But she can't. Not when the evidence of her previous lapse in judgement is staring her in the face, without the light of recognition in her eyes.

Instead, Skadi bows her head, her sunhat tilting askew, hair spilling over her shoulder and pooling over their joined hands. "Very well."

Specter smiles, a beatific expression. She pats Skadi's hand, her fingers tangling in Skadi's salt-sticky hair. "Thank you. Bless you. Now come, sit with me, and I shall braid your hair for you too. It's so long and soft and beautiful, it will be a shame to let the night winds toss it into disarray."