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“I thought I’d find you out here.”
Beau doesn’t turn, just looks out at the vast expanse of snow and spires marking where Aeor fell. She knows that shitty accent anywhere anyway, so she says, “What the fuck are you doing out here, Molly.”
“Just needed to get away for a bit,” says Molly, easily. “You know how it is.” She hears his footsteps, the distant sounds of their friends chattering inside the tower before the door creaks shut. “Good news, I liberated some wine from the Tomb Takers’ supplies. Bad news, it’s complete shit, but it’s still wine.”
Snow crunches behind her, till Molly’s sitting down beside her, fussing with the heavy coat so it covers his ass. There are still bloodstains on it—convincing him to keep the coat for now, at least until they could leave Eiselcross, had been a bitch and a half of an argument. The bloodstains had been a part of it. Some of it had started out in Beau’s body.
“Give it here anyway,” she says now, and Molly hands it over to her. She pops the cork off with practiced ease, then takes a swig and almost chokes on the first taste. “Oh, god, yeah, that’s awful,” she says. “But, y’know, not that bad. I’ve tasted worse.” It’s a complete lie. This is the worst wine she has tasted in her life. It has not aged well, it leaves her mouth feeling like chalk, and she’s not sure if what she’s tasting is grape or like, cat piss. It feels like cat piss.
“I think Otis brewed it up themself,” says Molly.
“It’s the shittiest fucking wine,” says Beau, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, because truly, with all her heart: fuck Otis. “I hate you for bringing this to me. What the fuck.”
“I was going to bring you the good shit, but Caleb said it’d just disappear the second I brought it out of the tower,” says Molly. “So, sorry the apology wine is basically just rat piss.”
Beau looks up, sharply. “The hell do you mean, apology wine,” she says.
“Exactly what I mean,” says Molly, with a sigh, running a hand through his hair. His tail loops around his leg, and he pulls the other leg up to his chest. “Sorry. About—fuck, I don’t know where to start.”
“Trying to kill me,” Beau supplies. “Like, a bunch of times.”
“That’s on the list,” says Molly. “And the gaslighting, and the hostage-holding, and the actual murder, and the almost-apocalypse, and the creepy cult-y bullshit that he, I, he pulled.” He frowns, sour and disgusted, face scrunching up as he looks down at his hands. “It wasn’t me.”
“Yeah, I kinda fucking noticed,” says Beau. “This is a really shitty apology so far. First you give me wine that tastes like Otis shat it out of his ass and mixed it with grapes, then you’re like, yeah, sorry about all the shit that happened, but it wasn’t me.”
“Let me finish, you ass,” says Molly, knocking his knuckles against her shoulder as she passes the wine back to him. “It wasn’t me, but I’m responsible anyway. Because he used my body to do all that shit.”
Beau pulls a knee up, resting her elbow on it and pressing her knuckles up to her chin. “Are you apologizing on his behalf?” she asks. “Because I’m gonna be really pissed if you are.”
“No, gods, no,” says Molly, making a face. “Fuck him. Be as pissed at him as you want. I’m apologizing for me. Half of you lot can’t even look at me now and I can’t blame them, he fucked you all up so much, and I just—I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with that, and I wish I did, and all I can say is I’m sorry, because I don’t know what else I can say, because for all that it wasn’t me, the shit’s still going to land in my lap anyway, and I have to deal with that.” He huffs out a tired laugh, wipes at his eyes, and says, “I don’t even know if you’ll believe me.” Then he tips his head back and chugs the wine.
“I do believe you,” says Beau, looking at Molly the same way she used to, with that fond irritation at his stupid smug face. “Listen, I’m not going to accept the apology, okay?”
“Well, great, thanks,” says Molly, looking crushed.
“Shut up and let me finish, dickhead,” she says, knocking her knuckles against his shoulder. “I won’t accept it because you have nothing to apologize for, all right? Don’t have to make me a stop on your weird shitty apology tour, ‘cause you don’t even have to make it.”
A corner of Molly’s mouth turns up in a small smile. “Thanks,” he says, passing back the wine to her. “I still feel responsible, though.”
“Yeah, you and Yasha can talk about that,” says Beau. “But as far as I’m concerned, you don’t have to apologize to me for shit, okay?” She squints down at the wine, and says, “Except for the wine. I want the good shit.”
“Well, sorry, next time I’ll make sure the people trying to kill us are carrying fancy-ass wine,” Molly says, as snottily as ever.
“And as for the shit that Lucien left in your lap,” says Beau, “we’ll figure out how to clean it up. We’ll help.” She nudges his side with her elbow, and says, “That’s what family’s for, Molly.”
“Is that what we are now?” Molly asks. “Family?”
“If you’ll let us,” says Beau.
“Well,” Molly says, after a moment. “I think I’d like to find out what it feels like. Being part of a family.” He throws a glance over his shoulder, and says, “They’re probably waiting for us in there.”
“Eh, let ‘em wait a few more minutes,” says Beau, leaning back on her palms. “It’s a pretty killer view out here.”
“That it is,” says Molly, leaning against her, his too-warm body pressing against her side. She reaches up her hand to pat his shoulder, absently, and for a couple of minutes they’re just two people watching the fading sunlight glinting off the spires of Aeor, admiring the colors refracting through the glass.
Then Molly says, “So, since you and Yasha are dating, I feel like I have to do my duty as her best friend here.”
“Molly,” says Beau, pleasantly, “I think we’ve pretty definitively proven that you could never take me in a fight without stupid magic blood powers. If you try to give me a shovel talk while we’re out here, I’ll happily demonstrate.”
“Fuck you, you unpleasant little dipshit, I could take you in a fight, I thought we proved that already,” says Molly. “Give me that wine if you’re going to be such an arsehole about this and let’s dance.”
“Nope, mine now,” says Beau. “You wanna make Yasha cry? You wanna break her heart?”
“I love her with all my heart,” says Molly, “so it’s with all that love with which I say, I’m gonna get her a rebound so good she forgets your fuckin’ name.”
“You prick,” says Beau, scooping up a handful of snow, “just for that I’m gonna tell Fjord and Jester that Caleb’s way open to threesomes—”
“You say that like I’m not gonna make it a foursome—”
--
Yasha pokes her head out, says, “Hey, Molly, Beau, it’s almost dinnertime—uh.”
“Yash!” says Molly, trying to stuff Beau’s face into a snowdrift. “Come help me dunk your girlfriend in snow!”
Beau kicks out hard, her knee connecting with his groin, and he keels over with a pained, high-pitched whine. She scrambles on top of him and says, “Yasha, come help me teach your punk-ass buddy here a lesson!”
Yasha purses her lips, as if considering both cases being brought to her. Then she scoops a handful of snow and tosses it, with great accuracy, towards Beau.
“Ow! Babe, I thought you loved me!” Beau shrieks, scrambling off Molly and wiping the snow off her face over Molly’s cackling laughter.
“Oooh, what’s going on?” Jester calls, coming up behind Yasha, who’s packing together another snowball.
“Snowball fight,” says Yasha, peaceably, before she tosses one towards Molly, grinning as it connects to his squawks of surprise. “Go get the rest, this’ll be fun.”