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It starts, as always, with her smile. Cristabel smiles with thin, pink lips stretched over white, white teeth. Her freckles curve over blushing cheeks, and slope down into asymmetric dimples. Her nose scrunches, ever so slightly, and her eyes narrow until her irises are half moons, peering through a frame of long, dark lashes.
When Cristabel smiles it’s like the second coming of Dominicus. When Cristabel smiles at Mercymorn, it’s like being resurrected all over again.
“Mercy.”
God promised they’d be angels. Even bowed at his feet she would laugh. Mercymorn the judge, Mercymorn the jury; Mercymorn whose house will condemn and punish and pray in the same breath. Mercymorn the angel?
She would never believe it if not for the fact that every time Cristabel said her name, she felt divinity. Her cavalier liked to tease it out, breaking it into two distinct syllables, pronouncing the ‘r’ as a brief exhalation of air. She had pronounced it like that since the moment she first opened her eyes to the new world, seeing first God, and then Mercy, leaning over his shoulder.
At Mercymorn’s critical glare, her promised had laughed.
“Mercy!” She laughs again now, a phantom floating before Mercymorn’s eyes.
“Invading my sleep when I should be dreaming of only the King Undying? You know that’s sacrilege Crissie.”
Cristabel hums, leaning closer, bending down in a way that serves to remind Mercy which one of the two is a whole head taller. Mercymorn scowls - they both know it’s a farce.
“Well I couldn’t let you spend all these hours without seeing my beautiful face, now could I? I won’t tell his Kindliness if you don’t.”
Mercy’s lips twitch. “You’re the last thing I saw before I closed my eyes, and you’ll be the first thing I see when I open them again. That’s still not enough for you?”
Cristabel’s joy dims, the mischief snuffing out.
Mercymorn reaches for her immediately, and where her palm meets the skin of her cav, a bloom emerges;
Red.
The river rushes by, both hollow and full, torrential with the force of grief and agony. Her feet are bare in the gravel sand of the bank, dirtied and wet - but not wet - and stained. A hand is wrapped around her hand, which in turn is wrapped around the grip. The blade itself is short; made shorter still by over half of its length being buried deep in Cristabel’s stomach.
They’re standing so close. A final intimacy.
Cristabel’s forehead presses against hers and Mercymorn can feel her final breaths shuddering over her lips.
No.
“Don’t tell John, but I like that my final act of service is to you.” Cristabel chuckles, whispering like they’re sharing a secret, like it’s not because she doesn’t have the air to speak louder.
No.
“And don’t you dare spend eternity scowling like I know you want to. I’ll know if you do.” She has the audacity to wink, like she’s not paling, like her eyes aren’t fluttering closed, like she’s not-
“No. No.” Mercy chants, or maybe she’s praying, pleading, begging.
“I’m going to be with you forever now, love.”
She smiles and Mercymorn hates it. She hates it.
“No! I don’t- I don’t want that! Not like this. Not- please. Crissie please. I’m begging. I’ll fall to my knees. I don’t want this. Please!”
But Cristabel doesn’t hear. Can’t hear.
Her body falls from Mercymorn’s arms, cracking, crumbling, ash - the musical notes of a silent laugh - sinking into Mercymorn’s pores, forcing their way into her arteries, veins, capillaries.
She feels a rush of power like nothing before, an awareness of more, but all through a veil of numbness that swallows her heart like a suffocating blanket. As Cristabel fades, she meets the halo eyes of Him. Him, the Emperor All-Giving, who has taken her Joy. Him who she loves. And she makes a promise.
For Him they sacrifice, but if ever he proves unworthy, for Him she shall bring suffering.
She wakes, as always, with a promise on her lips. And as she wipes away her tears she makes that promise again.
God has proven unworthy.